[ChicletPrime]

Chapter 7 - With Light

• going by vibes on the title -- Xavier?
  
• Tara is trying to con Nero into going on a company retreat? stay true to yourself, office turtle! don't be swayed by peculious arguments and promises of cheesecake.
  
• Nero.. is in the computer? or something? oh. heh. just hiding behind the monitor like a true LED crustacean.
  
• Tara wins some random good thing on a bet if she can get Nero to go to the bonding event, as nobody else thinks he will.
  
• oops, phone call of doom, Nero bails out of the office entirely. poor Tara.
  
• RANDOM GUESS: Nero is in cahoots with Jeremiah and something big just went down on the dark web.
  
• Nope! There's a poll going on for "Top Hunter" and Nero's charged off somewhere to make sure Lumiere emerges on top. again.
  
• are you telling me Nero ditched work in the middle of the day to go home and start his campaign for Lumiere dominance?! i admire his comittment to a lack of work ethic! ...i wish i could get away with that every time a Caleb-centric thing drops.
  
• awww, he has a secret identity as the Leader of Lumiere's Ultimate Fansite.
  
• note to us: we need to step it up ourselves
  
• Lightchasers.  huh. /eyeballs top of forum for potential name change. could re-do everything in tasteful spring green and goldenrod?
  
• OH NOES! somebody has a grainy back alley N109 picture of Lumiére and .. he's going to be unmasked?!
  
• "a burst of light near a florist transforms into a hooded figure." oh shit, this might be legit. no, wait. under hood, the face has "wrinkles". the real Lumiére is a dewdrop and we know that because he keeps leaping down onto our balcony at inopportune times to make sure our plants are still okay.
  
• ohhh. okay. so some troll has dropped this "exposé" just before the voting begins for Top Hunter, trying to make out like Lumiére is some old hack.  Nero will not stand (sit) for this injustice!
  
• fantastic. Nero tears this obvious deepfake to shreds. truth prevails. (i have sudden flashbacks to V For Vendetta).
  
• Nero been into this fandom since he was a kid.  I Am So Proud.
  
• Next hot take: somebody got a picture of Lumiére napping with a Wanderer.  like, okay! this one i could get behind because of that one time when i (we) personally saw the boy reaching up to a Wanderer as it was reaching down, soft and sweet and not at all violent. if Wanderers are transformed humans, maybe Lumiére recognizes them sometimes under the crystal? and they recognize him back as their king? 
  
• awww, he was just taking a nap because he was so tired after defeating the creature and before it dispersed.  that goddamned collar.
  
• Random Aside: I still have the suspicion that the Hunters Association is in league somehow with EVER, being comprised of Backtrackers at the top echelons. And that captured protocores that are turned in are funnelled over into EVER's labs.
  
• oh NICE! the girlfriend has been pulled into this as a mysterious figure, as the subway attack/sighting have to be 'elaborate hoaxes' and 'the other person fighting alongside Lumiére' has to be the true mastermind. its a money grabbing scheme push him into the Top Ten Hunters to allow him to rule the hunter world with an iron fist!
  
• i feel like i know these fans.
  
• in his quest to put down the troll clickbait articles, Nero collates documents that start to paint an uneasy picture. Xavier's name is all over the reports to do with how protocores are handled/destroyed by the Assocation, the subway incident and the attack in Azure Square (that was a fun one!)
  
• (i presume this next is from the various documents, put out onto the web by this troll/hacker:) The Light Evolver's Evol limit cannot be defined. Tech attempts to probe its limit triggers a special neck suppressor which prevents the Evolver from using their full power. It can't be explained, no physical form detected, no scars, the energy suppression field acts like a Protofield anomaly. After conducting experients, the techies finally unravelled the suppressor's mechanism, boosting its threshold.
  
• Then there are pictures of the collar on someone's throat, 'pulsating a constrictive red ring of light'. in the corner is a bit of silver showing, a tassel earring.
  
• Nero, super fan that he is, knows that decoration in the dark and backwards. He is cut adrift! Lost in the data! He's never seen anything like this before and he is the numero uno fan leader, how could this be!? THAT HAS TO BE LUMIERE.
  
• The rest of the fanbase goes nuts (naturally) with this new material.
  
• Nero is trapped at work, his Hunter watch beeping with health warnings. i guess his blood pressure must be through the roof.
  
• Xavier (hi, boyfriend!) wanders over with the noise to see if something's going on.
  
• Nero nearly throws the screen with the image of the collar and the tassel at Xavier. this! this is what's going on! its a DISASTER!
  
• "Lumiére could be DEAD!"  oh noes. that would be terrible!
  
• (it would be terrible, the girlfriend would tear apart Linkon City for vengeance.)
  
• Xavier offers a paper bag for hyperventilation.  good man Xavier, muahahah!
  
• Two weeks later, the Top Ten Hunter poll results are released. Lumiére wins handily again.
  
• The troll under the name "QuantumSocialite" appears in 10th place on the list. wow. well, antis are popular for a reason i guess.
  
• Nero takes Xavier into his confidence, correctly inferring that Xavier has to be Lumiére's number one fan actually, with his hands all over the reports about the various events Lumiére's been involved in, including the movie gig offer after the subway thing. "A real Lightchaser!"  awww, Nero is in fan-cahoots-love!
  
• Jonah Jameson, meet Peter Parker.
  

after the angst fest of the previous Chapter, i was not really prepared for this one. THIS WAS ADORABLE.

but yeah. who got their hands on Lumiére and when? are the "techs" part of the Association or EVER, or a hybrid of both? Or Professor L's little cohort maybe? Did Lumiére consent to this in the hopes of getting the collar off his neck, or was he actually captured/held and then escaped?