With Michuru gone, seeking to bring Chienne back after Doctor Pritchard’s banishment, the remaining New Vindicators reviewed the video footage Fluke had been fortunate enough to capture. They mourned Loess’ passing as well as Lodestone’s defection and were puzzled over Doctor Pritchard’s words. Through some investigation and piecing what clues they had together, the heroes came to the conclusion that Doctor Pritchard was actually Abaddon.

Before they could do anything with such information however, the school came under attack from the Church of Genetic Purity. In the wake of the assassination, the United States government initiated the Bedford Act- declaring a state of emergency and putting any suspected Neo-Sapien into relocation camps. Further, with Colonel Crowbar missing, Doctor Cheryl Colbenson had been promoted into his position. The woman’s first act as Director of the Department of SPB Affairs: announcing the existence of the New Vindicators Academy and providing the world with the location of the American campus.

The heroes fought their way through the church members, only to have their battle interrupted by a squad of SHAKE agents, accompanied by Sentry units. Though the children and the faculty managed to hold their own against them, they watched in horror as many of their peers were abducted and taken away to the relocation camps…

Meanwhile, in the lower levels, Kitten, the Damned and Josh Cron encountered more members of the church on their way to free Intertia. They were saved by the Aurelius who teleported them away to the European school- where he announced his intention to train them all as mages.

Further down the east coast, Doctor Pritchard appeared along with Terahertz, Lodestone and Emmanuel Nikolaos. Together, Terahertz was able to irradiate the tektite of Atlantis and render it ferrous- allowing Lodestone to raise the island from the depths of the ocean and bring it to the beach. Breathing the air once more, Apocatastasis was revived and stepped down onto dry land…

Noting that it had taken him six thousand years to release him, Apocatastasis seized Doctor Pritchard and siphoned out his life essence- using it to reconstruct the hand he had long ago lost to the Gibborim.

He did not have much time to celebrate, as missiles were launched then… from Antarctica of all places. Apocatastasis, together with Lodestone and Terahertz, quickly put an end to threat sent by Walkabout and proceeded to go for to gather information- Apocatastasis insisting on learning more of all he had missed out on. Using his telelocation abilities, Apocatastasis found Colonel Crowbar and abducted him, intent to use his knowledge of SPBs to help him build an army- an army Lodestone joined, once bribed with the current location of Adonis Skraag and the Affiliation.

Silverback’s group managed to contact Hikari’s team, hailing Gabrielle to help them flee to Canada. Together with the Next Vindicators, the remnants of the New Vindicators Academy took refuge in the home of Alicia Gladstone and attempted to discern what their next move would be…