(THE BLUE BEETLE OF BROCKTON BAY) CHAPTER FOUR

They no longer tried to pretend he was just some kid.

At first the change was subtle, little more than exchanged glances between officers and hushed lines spoken into earpieces, the kind of things most people might not notice. Yet as soon as the right individuals were informed, the change spread through the building like a slow but unmistakable ripple. 

Word traveled carefully, and everyone acted as though the information needed to be handled delicately, but information that significant did not stay contained for long. By the time the entire headquarters had quietly caught up to who he actually was, the atmosphere surrounding him had transformed entirely.

He was no longer simply an unidentified cape willing to join the Wards. He was the Blue Beetle. The person who had killed Leviathan.

What should have required hours, and perhaps even days, of meticulous paperwork, interviews, and background checks instead became a process so smooth it bordered on surreal. Forms appeared almost magically, already filled out except for the places where his signature was needed, doors opened before he reached them, and officers who had been nervous when he arrived now treated him with a cautious but undeniable respect, as though speaking to him too casually was prohibited. 

One moment he had been a stranger from another dimension; the next, he was being guided toward official Ward status by multiple PRT officials who had seemingly rearranged their priorities around him.

The only part that did not seem rushed was the questioning.

They were careful and controlled, but the intensity behind the questions was unmistakable. Every person in the room seemed determined to avoid missing anything that might matter from his words.

They asked if he remembered his home dimension.

“Yes.”

They asked how he had killed an Endbringer.

“With my suit.”

They asked what the suit was.

“An alien scarab attached to my spine.”

Saying it aloud in this world felt oddly unreal because, according to Khaji-Da’s rapidly expanding analysis, the powers on this Earth came from parasitic extradimensional entities and trauma. Even so, Jaime gave only what was necessary. He knew exactly how dangerous it would be to reveal the full extent of what the Scarab could do to a government he did not yet trust.

Trust needed to be earned, even by heroes of another world. Besides, he had encountered enough militaristic organizations across parallel Earths to know that complete transparency was rarely the wise choice.

The PRT insisted that it was not an interrogation, just the standard line of questioning. Yet the smooth metal walls, the bright overhead lighting that left shadows in the corners, the one-way mirror, and the single exit created an atmosphere that told a different story. But Jaime did not make his thoughts known. He understood why caution was necessary, regardless of their interest in him.

He had killed something previously believed to be unkillable. Of course they wanted answers.

When the questions were finally complete, they escorted him to a lower floor hidden deep beneath the building. The power testing level felt like a bunker designed for disasters rather than routine evaluations, the space enormous and reinforced from floor to ceiling with thick panels of some metal he did not immediately recognize. Massive blast doors lined one side of the room, and scorch marks ran up the far walls visibly built to withstand absurd amounts of punishment.

There, they asked him to demonstrate his capabilities, and he complied.

Energy projection. Flight. Strength. Durability. Target tracking. Construct generation. Environmental adaptability.

As he did earlier, he showed enough to satisfy them but held back anything that might raise unnecessary alarms. The Scarab had weapons and functions they did not need to know about. At least, not yet.

By the time the testing concluded, the evaluators looked physically drained. Some were pale, others wide-eyed, and a few seemed to be having difficulty reconciling the teenager in front of them with whatever their machines had just displayed.

The last stage of the day was the slowest, yet somehow more grounded than everything before it: paperwork. And lots of it.

Miss Militia—a local hero, and the poster child for American patriotism—walked him through the final set of documents, explaining each section clearly as she went. Her tone struck a balance between professional and almost gentle reassurance, easily cutting through the lingering tension in the floor. 

She outlined the benefits of becoming a Ward, which included medical support, stipends, advanced training, continued education, and a direct path to joining the Protectorate once he turned eighteen. She also detailed the rules and regulations he would be required to follow. Some were familiar to him from his time working with the Team and the Outsiders back home. Others were unique to this world’s approach to metahuman, or rather parahuman, oversight.

He listened carefully, asked questions when something needed clarification, and signed each form where indicated.

And just like that, he became a Ward of Brockton Bay.

The ceremony would be scheduled at some later date, assuming the city recovered enough to hold one, but there was no probationary period before deployment. The PRT cleared him for patrol immediately as they could not afford to leave capable heroes on the sidelines.

Brockton Bay was in worse condition than he had thought. The heroes were exhausted, stretched thin, and grappling with a crisis that had left the city fractured. The fact that Miss Militia herself had been pulled from active duty to guide him through the final steps spoke volumes. The city needed every hero it could find, even one who had appeared without warning only days earlier.

He hoped he would be equal to the task.

He was still trying to process it all—the responsibility and the sheer abruptness of it all—when a PRT officer approached Miss Militia and whispered something to her in a low voice. She listened, nodded once, thanked him quietly, and then turned her attention back to Jaime.

“Jaime Reyes,” she said, her tone gentler than before, “the Chief Director would like to speak with you before anything else.”

He did not need to be Sherlock Holmes, or even Batman, to understand why. People in charge tended to follow similar patterns even across worlds.

He drew in a slow breath, straightened his posture, and followed them deeper into the building.