"Bury me in the ocean, with my ancestors that jumped from the ships, because they knew death was better than bondage." - Erik Killmonger, Black Panther

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The video began in a spacious, modern office with several large windows and a sunroof to let in copious amounts of natural light. Sitting at a stately desk made of dark wood was a middle-aged woman with cropped brown hair. She frowned over the bridge of her glasses at the laptop in front of her, deepening the wrinkles that already marked her forehead. 

Tap, tap, tap. The woman lowered the screen of her laptop, slowly looking around the room in an attempt to locate the source of the sound. It didn't seem to be coming from her door, and it didn't sound like knocking anyway. In fact, it really sounded more like... 

"Up here, you old hag!" Before she could look up to follow the voice, the woman heard the sound of her beautiful sunroof shattering. A tall, slender figure in a black combat suit dropped through the gaping hole in the ceiling along with a shower of broken glass, landing in front of the desk with the grace of a cat. Her figure was obviously female, but a dark mask and hood fully obscured her face and hair. 

The woman let out an alarmed but dignified shriek, her hand flying up to her neck to clutch an imaginary strand of pearls. "Can I... can I help you?"  

"Now? No..." the mysterious intruder shrugged. "But could you have helped me? Yes. When I was struggling to find my next meal and you were rerouting half your donations to your own bank account, yes, you could've helped me." Bending her knees, she leaped up onto the woman's desk with impossible agility, kicking a stack of papers aside as she cleared her throat. "Madeline Anne Ryker, chairwoman of the Ryker Foundation for the Disabled and Homeless. A superstar, a philanthropist!" she sneered. "What a joke. If only all your board members, all your snooty rich friends could see you now. So small, so weak, so scared. Do you want to know why you're scared? Because deep down, you know what you really are." The intruder dropped down to one knee and hissed in Madeline's ear. "You're a thief. A greedy little thief. And the day comes when every thief will be caught."

"This is harassment!" Ryker rolled backwards in her office chair, picking up her phone. "Get out of my office at once, or I'm calling security!" 

The intruder somersaulted forward, grabbing Madeline's wrist and twisting it at an impossible angle until she dropped the phone on the floor. 

"Please," Madeline sobbed, tears streaking through her many layers of makeup as the intruder delivered a powerful kick to her chest, sending her flying out of her chair and onto the hardwood floor. 

"Oh no," the intruder chuckled cruelly. "I have no mercy for people who've made their fortune stepping on people like me." 

"People... like you?" Madeline choked, slowly pulling herself to her feet. "Who even are you?" 

"You can call me the Raven," the intruder said simply, pulling a stack of folded papers out of the small satchel at her waist. She unfolded them, smoothing them out on her knee before tossing them to Madeline. "You like documents? Well guess what? I've got some documents for you."

Madeline snatched up the papers hungrily as if afraid of what they might say. Her eyes widened as she read them, occasionally looking up at the Raven in fear. 

"Proof of all your crimes, Miss Ryker. Fraud and tax evasion, not to mention the ruthless exploitation of people you thought would never be able to stand up to you. It would be quite poetic if tomorrow morning, the police had to pry these out of the rigid hands of your cold, dead body, now wouldn't it?" 

"How much?" Madeline steeled her jaw. "Name your price, you've got it. I've-I've even got friends in Washington. Whatever you want, I can-" 

"I didn't come here for your money." The Raven raised her hand to reveal five gleaming claws in the place of fingernails. "I came here for justice." 

Seized by a flurry of panic, Madeline hobbled toward the door, but the claws released themselves from the Raven's hand, arcing toward her as if in slow motion before embedding themselves in her back. She coughed, blood staining the front of her shirt as she collapsed onto the ground, still clutching the papers in her right hand. 

"We're lucky that the late Madeline Ryker kept a CCTV camera in her office, or we would never have acquired this footage of her brutal murder," Luna Chu sighed as the video cut out to a black screen. "Ryker was a prominent New York socialite best known for her work as chairwoman of the Ryker Foundation for the Disabled and Homeless. Our American colleagues were completely baffled by the circumstances of her death, and still have not been able to find even the smallest clue as to the identity of the murderer."

"Well, why did they send this to us? An American was killed in New York, most probably by another American. This isn't our problem," Roy commented. 

The four members of Project PROB, along with Commander Chu, sat in the PROBJet on their way to the Jackers' remote island base. Chu, in her typical mood-lightening fashion, had chosen this moment to share with the Heirs a grisly piece of intel she had recently received from the US. 

"On the contrary, it seems like it could very much be our problem," Juliana frowned, tapping Chu's tablet to rewind the video. "Give the killer another good look. Her voice, her fighting style... doesn't she remind you of the Jacker lady we fought at the Hewkins' house? The one who held Meg hostage?" 

"Wait a second- back up, guys, she jumped off a bridge into a river. She can't have survived that!" Hayley exclaimed. 

"Unless she has superhuman healing abilities or access to very advanced technology... Order technology," Juliana looked at Roy, who looked up at the ceiling in thought. 

"I think it would do you kids well to know that Ryker's murder was not an isolated incident." Chu crossed her arms. "A woman identifying as 'The Raven' has murdered nine influential social and political figures in four countries over the past two weeks. All of the murders were done in front of cameras, as if she wanted the footage to be found, and all were prefaced with long speeches about the victims' crimes against the poor and the helpless and why they were deserving of their fate. These were more than murders- they were lessons, and warnings."

"Oh, great," Roy groaned. "Our cyborg friend's a communist."

"Worse," Chu sighed darkly. "She doesn't just want forced equality- she wants a bloodbath. She wants to make an example of the wealthy and successful. No wonder she seems to harbor such a personal hatred for our royal family."

Juliana shuddered at the memory of the Raven's murderous gaze. No one else had ever looked at her with such pure hatred and fury. "Wait... Commander Chu, you said she wants to make an example of us, not just kill us. What exactly is that supposed to mean?"

"This," Chu swiped right on her tablet. "Read these headlines."

'The Raven': Superhuman Social Justice Warrior?

The Raven's Vigilante Justice Scares the Few, Empowers the Many

21st Century Serial Killer "The Raven" Becomes Unlikely Champion of the Common Man

"She's fostering division, making established power structures out to be the enemy." Juliana ran her tongue over her teeth, looking decidedly uncomfortable. "Basically, every cheap political ploy in the book. And the worst thing is, the world is in a place right now where what the Raven is saying is exactly what they want to hear." 

"Things are going south almost everywhere, and people are at a tipping point," Roy nodded in agreement. "The Raven's giving them the gentle nudge they need to start fighting for change. I'm not saying the world doesn't need to change in a lot of ways- because it most definitely does- but the Raven is using people's very real frustrations with very real problems in order to fuel her Jacker revolution, and that is something I cannot accept. Speaking of change, you guys aren't going to like what I'm leading into, but the suit our Raven was wearing in the video... she didn't have it at the Hewkins' house. She was just wearing a t-shirt and jeans, with a scarf to cover her face."

"If she had an advanced combat suit then, she'd have no reason not to use it. So this suit was made after we rescued Meg," Chase added. 

"See, Jules? He gets it," Roy darted his eyes at Chase. "Think about it: we already know the Jackers have a spy among us. And now they have a suspiciously Project PROB-like suit that they didn't have before. Tell me, Jules who didn't know much about Project PROB before the Meg mission but has been dying to find out more ever since?"

Juliana paused, looking down at the floor as if afraid to say aloud what she knew everyone in the room was thinking. "Adrian," she finally whispered, breaking the silence. "I gave him a key to my lab in middle school. I agree that he can be a bit nosy, but I never dreamed that he would..." 

"Sell your life's work to the Jackers? Conspire to overthrow your family and everything that we stand for?" Roy mused. If Juliana didn't know him better, she would say he was enjoying this. Perhaps he was, just a little bit... 

"Hold on, kids, this is serious stuff," Chu frowned. "Are we accusing Adrian Harrow of high treason?" 

"Yes ma'am, we are!" Roy declared. "We'll do an unannounced search of his house and his dorm room at the Academy and gather some evidence to support what we already know. Then, we'll give him a taste of Order of Chance justice!" 

"Guys!" Chase waved his arms in the air to get their attention. "I just... this doesn't feel right. Aren't we being way too hasty? I mean, I hate Adrian just as much as the next guy, but he's our classmate. I find it really hard to believe that he would sabotage himself, his family, and his whole world for some money he doesn't even need. The Raven could be killing more world leaders right now- I don't see why we should think up hypothetical enemies while we're literally flying off to fight a real one." 

"Chase, I understand how you feel," Juliana sighed sympathetically, placing a hand on Chase's shoulder. "I don't want this to be the most probable explanation, but it is. The Jackers are finding out about things right after Adrian does, and it's been going on for far too long to be a coincidence." 

"Okay, no one has asked the really important question yet," Commander Chu interjected. "Does Adrian know about the mission we're currently on?" 

There was silence in the jet as all eyes turned to an uncomfortably fidgety Hayley.

"Um, well... I might've bragged to him about it at the party last night just a little bit... " she said softly. 

"So we're flying straight into the Jackers' territory and they know we're coming?" Juliana stared in disbelief, looking down at her black gloves. 

"...yeah, basically."