Rayburn
Masks: Heartland Justice, 2025-02-27
hospital
Lizzy, mostly recovered but still a patient in AEGIS's super hospital, is in Clarke's room. Clarke is in a coma. She chatters away to him, while she plays their favorite TV show on the TV.
Lizzy's dad arrives: "The nurse told me you'd be here." He's wearing a red ball cap, with a logo of Patton's bat god mask on it. Awkward quality time ensues! With bonus awkward side hug! Lizzy's dad says she must be glad Patton is going to clean up AEGIS and make everyone safer. Argument! Lizzy's dad leaves her with an old photo he kept in his wallet from her childhood. Her as a young girl, in a hospital gown after a thief collided with her on his bike. She's on her dad's shoulders, and they're looking at each other and laughing. "You and your friend will pull through this one too," he says before he leaves.
Abed, Diego, and Miles arrive. They see images on hospital TVs of a protests forming outside of AEGIS HQ, people wearing cheap plastic versions of Patton's bat god mask. They arrive at Clarke's room. Abed has flowers for Lizzy. Miles has pizza for everyone but mostly Clarke. Diego is empty-handed. They try to force feed Clarke, put his human hand in the pizza, but these fail to rouse him. In the end, they shave his bear arm bare.
Abed's phone rings. It's Rayburn, hushed and desperate. He says he can't hear you but repeats a few times his own location: Chicago's Deep Tunnel, near McCook Reservoir. The heroes leave Clarke in pizza and shavings and go.
reservoir
Having requisitioned a Lightning medical van, they pull up to a minor guard house outside the reservoir. They're west of Midway, along the Des Plaines River. An older man greets them and Miles flashes his Lightning family badge. "Wait, you're Bolt's grandson!?" Art is a big fan. Bolt was his hero when he was a kid. Had the decoder ring, read the comics, everything. He insists on a selfie and an autograph. The heroes tell him what's going on. He promises to radio ahead so they'll be waved through. He describes in detail where they need to go and what to expect.
No one waves them through at the next security checkpoint. Instead, a dump truck is parked across the road behind the gatehouse and there are two beefcakes with kevlar vests and machine guns. Miles runs back to the first one but Art is gone.
Lizzy gets out of the van and approaches the guards. One levels his weapon at her; the other holds beefy handcuffs. She tries talking. They try seizing her. Miles runs into disarm them but collides with some kind of force field. (Super speed stops him, but normal speed does not. Like Dune shields.) The guard with weapon drawn turns to Miles and fires. Diego rushes to defend him, colliding with the guard. He discharges his weapon into the air. The other guard takes a swing at Lizzy. Miles creates a spherical moat around the guards. Diego flips the dump truck over on them. They move on.
The heroes come to a building next to stairs down to the tunnel and the base of the reservoir. It's oddly empty. They find a warm mug of coffee on a desk inside. A back door ajar. A place where spinning tires have cleared gravel and revealed bare dirt.
The road continues on past the building but that's the only one. So Miles runs down it. He takes a reservoir walkie talkie. About a mile and a half later, along the edge of the reservoir, a road doubles back toward the tunnel and runs down into the reservoir. A black Suburban is parked near the top. Miles doesn't recognize anyone through the tinted windows. He runs back.
tunnel
The heroes descend the stairs to the tunnel entrance. Standing in waist deep water, they peer into the tunnel's darkness. Something is on the surface of the water. Going in, they find it's Rayburn, seated, unconscious, his mouth and nose barely above the water.
From deeper into tunnel comes the sound of rushing water.
Miles and Diego rush in. Miles collides with another force field. But they work together to free Rayburn from the chains binding him to the chair fixed to the floor of the tunnel. As a wall of water approaches, they run Rayburn out.
Meanwhile, Lizzy has fired anchors into the tunnel ceiling and successfully suspends herself and Abed above the flood.
At the base of the stairs, Diego and Miles realize Rayburn is wearing a vest of explosives, a timer counts down from 30 seconds. Miles vibrates the vest off of him, and runs the vest a safe distance away. The heroes bring unconscious Rayburn to the medical van.
Just then, the radio Mile took crackles to life. It's Art. They have him. They're going to kill him. "It's him or Rayburn," another voice says. "You have five minutes."
exchange
Abed makes a fake Rayburn construct. They meet the black Suburban to swap fake Rayburn for Art. There's three guards, the man in charge, and Art. Lizzy is perched some distance away, arrow trained on them.
Miles pierces the mask of the man in charge. What they're really planning is to kill Rayburn and to lure the heroes out of the city. This crew doesn't know the larger plan, only that the real action is in Chicago. Art is also innocent, not working with them, and these people don't care about him.
As a guard shoves Art at the heroes, he raises his handgun to shoot Art in the back. But Miles, expecting this, pulls Art to safety and disarms the guard. Diego picks up fake Rayburn. "You lied. We're taking Rayburn." But another guard shoots fake Rayburn in the head. Lizzy fires an explosive arrow into the Suburban.
As they speed away in the medical van, Miles calls his mother, Storm. She says everything is fine. The Patton protest outside AEGIS is getting rowdy, but otherwise fine. "That's probably a distraction," Miles says. Storm asks, "Are you o--" The line goes dead.
They stop the van. Miles gets out. Abed gets on his back. They super-run into the city.