Sender Unknown

Objectively, there was nothing suspicious about the package.

Delivered by drone, with an innocent looking return address, no sender's name, and plain brown packaging, there was nothing to set it apart from thousands of other packages delivered daily to doorsteps around the country. No suspicious noises from inside, no unexplained movement, odd smells or ominious ticking. No warning signs whatsoever. Just a single parcel delivered to their house by an unidentified drone.

Honestly, the apparent innocence of the delivery was almost a warning in and of itself!

Jason, as his neighbours knew him, glanced at his two girlfriends, who both wore the grumpy expressions of someone woken too early on a Saturday morning and forced into high alert. "Did either of you order anything? I haven't had any delivery alerts in the past few days."

His self-appointed foster mother still showed up with care packages during busy weeks when he didn't make it in to the restaurant to assure her that they were still alive, but she preferred to deliver those herself. Melissa's family had cut her off when she came out to them, and currently liked to pretend that she didn't exist. Riona had a distant aunt who tended to send her trinkets every so often, but that same aunt viewed plain packaging as a dire insult, so it probably wasn't her.

Both of them shook their heads, Riona stifling a yawn. "Not lately. Ordering online tends to result in a size too small, no matter how carefully I check the measurements."

It didn't help that both of his loves had the arms, shoulders and legs of an athlete, on top of nature being quite generous. Mass-produced clothing just wasn't designed with that kind of women's figure in mind, as Melissa had ranted on several occasions.

Melissa, still wrapped in a bathrobe, vanished behind the door of the hall closet, and emerged with a small mechanical device, which she placed on top of the package. A small, but extremely strong, force-field snapped into place around it, strong enough to contain anything short of a military warhead. "Let's get it down to the bunker. Standard precautions."

Riona nodded, likewise dressed in one of Jason's oversized shirts and very little else, under the princple that anyone knocking this early on a weekend either deserved to feel awkward, or was a close friend/co-worker with more important things to care about. "Superhero suits, too. It wouldn't be the first time a self-proclaimed Nemesis tried to leave an unfriendly gift, and I'd feel better in something explosion-proof."

Superhero suits were expensive, and required a lot of fittings, so most Superheroes only had the single suit that they recieved when they were signed on for Mandatory Service. Most Career Heroes had a back-up, because Supervillains seemed to have a sixth sense for whenever a suit went into the wash or was sent away for dry-cleaning, decontamination or repairs. If the complaints at Superhero Social Nights were anything to go by, it had become standard practice to notify a back-up team before doing the laundry, because that was when Villains put their Evil Plans into action.

Melissa was an apprentice to one of the most in-demand Superhero Designers currently living, and a full third of their sub-terranian architecture was dedicated to producing a particular Super-exclusive fabric. As such, the Defenders could afford multiple suits, stashed in various places around the house. Heading for the book-case in the library (activated using the decorative knot on a desk-lamp, thank you very much, intruders could pull every book in the library and get no-where) Jason made a pit-stop at the linen closet, digging past the balled-up fitted sheets stuffed haphazardly on a shelf.

As a Fire Elemental, Jason possessed a limited invulnerability to most explosions, which left him holding they Mysterious Package while his lovers changed in the elevator on the way down. The Art of the quick clothing change was another necessity that Superheroes mastered quickly. Once they reached the bunker, Jason placed the Mysterious Package on a pedestal, then retreated behind the blast shields usually reserved for experimental Mad Science. Riona created a small shadow-construct, which dove for the package with the enthusiasm of a feline offered a newly-wound ball of catnip-scented yarn.

The packaging was shredded all over the floor in less than a minute, and Riona hastily dispelled the construct before it could do the same to the contents.

They waited another fifteen minutes just to be on the safe side. (Too many Villains had learned the value of adding a few extra minutes to the traditional countdown, no matter what the little red numbers said. Too few Heroes had learned the dangers of overconfidence. Even fewer escaped unscathed to remember the lesson.)

Finally, they cautiously lowered the blast shields and edged closer to the brightly coloured pile of fabric. They unwrapped it even more cautiously, checking for any hidden triggers or remotes in the folds. Nothing.

Then, Jason actually looked at what he was holding. "Well, this is awkward."

Lingere.

Fairly expensive and exotic lingere, in sizes that not even the incomprehensible disparity in online sizing charts could explain.

Melissa winced. "I'm going to go out on a limb and say wrong address. The awkward part is going to be figuring out who it was supposed to go to."

Riona shrugged. "We know some fairly talented hackers, and the Old Lady Bookclub next door just had a grand-daughter move in who either has an exhibitionist streak, or has convinced herself that we're just room-mates."

Melissa laughed, affecting a high-pitched squeal. "OMG, they were Room-mates? I'll grab another box from the post-office when we do the grocery run, that'll give us time for the hackers to see whose internet search history matches the garments."

Jason beletedly realised that he had been imagining the skimpy garment on them - not likely, both were very vocal about their dislike of "Sexy Superheroine" costumes, even for Halloween - and snapped himself out of it. "So, not a late delivery for either of you, then. Pity."

He was probably the only person alive who could make such comments without injury. That didn't save him from twin death glares. "I haven't been that size since our first year at the Superhero Academy. Possibly even Middle School."

"Not without a Shrink Ray, which would almost certainly count as Misuse of Offical Property. If I wanted to shred perfectly good lingere, I'd ask one of you to do it."

She had a point. Jason's foster-mother and Melissa's mentor had unusual ideas of appropriate anniversary gifts, and neither of Jason's partners enjoyed the way nightgowns, even sexy ones, constricted, rode up, or tangled around their legs in the night.

Jason had listened to enough of Melissa's rants about seam placement and shoddy stitching to figure out the right places to tear effectively whenever they wanted to re-enact a scene from a bodice-ripper novel, however. Strictly for accuracy-testing purposes, of course. Apparently, it was one of those things that anyone who worked with fabric textiles had opinions about.

It was probably time for a change of subject. Jason cleared his throat. "Right. So, any breakfast requests?"

For more Superheroes, you can find the series this inspired here.

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