Four years prior to the main series, and just after the May Day dance, Sylvia accepts some compliments from friends for winning the ‘Best Dressed’ award. She tells her friends they could have been in the running too had they accepted her offer to order them dresses, but they said they wanted to wear Carly’s less glamorous outfits because they appreciate her kindness. Sylvia finds Carly, compliments her for her outfits, and then gives her a textbook on French haut couture designs to ‘help her improve.’ Carly is incensed by the implied insult, but that night she studies the book and finds it useful, while Sylvia happily thinks that she feels great for having helped Carly even though Carly dislikes her. The next day, Carly is wearing a self-designed graduation outfit and talking with Siggy about their future when a car breaks down in front of them. The driver turns out to be a disgruntled Lansky, and he’s so impressed by Carly’s polyradex outfit that he gives her his card and offers to represent her. Siggy fixes the car and Lansky leaves, after which Sylvia approaches; when Carly brags about her offer of representation, Sylvia claims credit since she gave Carly the book.
In the present, the Kamen Corps attends the local county fair. Kimiko’s father agreed to sponsor them and they show off their transformation sequences before tossing cups of ramen to the crowd. Vermillion Masquerade shows up with monsters in tow, and the Kamen Corps has difficulty fighting them off: Carly has trouble using her bioelectricity because of the close presence of civilians, and Kimiko tries to launch a combo attack with Misha only for it to fizzle because — as Misha yells at her — their elements don’t work together. Sylvia arrives, destroys the monsters, and accepts accolades from the crowd while the Kamen Corps are forgotten.
Lansky calls Sylvia from his office and orders her to charge for autographs as well as to draw the fights out more so they can monetize them more effectively. Sylvia indicates that she’s willing to play along as long as nobody actually gets hurt, and she says she loves that she can finally help people. She also admits to enjoying being able to show up Carly, whom Sylvia thinks is arrogant and unwilling to accept her own flaws. Lansky notes that Sylvia was chosen for this job particularly because she would be motivated to surpass Carly and then says she’s doing great. After they end the call, one of Vermillion’s monsters appears and Lansky gives it a cut of the battle’s proceeds to take back to Vermillion. He also includes a message ordering Vermillion to deal with the Kamen Corps so nobody mixes them up with Sylvia’s persona as Kamen UN.
That night, the Kamen Corps talk about their marketing events and potentially doing a show in Japan; Misha also notes that they need to be careful about transforming in their shows because they can only use their powers for three consecutive hours before they’ll need a full day to recharge. They enter Carly’s house and find Vicki, whose studies of the mud have finally yielded fruit: Vicki has found some kind of radiation in the mud samples. Carly realizes that Vicki is likely talking about chimeratons, which Dr. Gracey already knows all about. She offers to take Vicki to meet him and share her research. Disgruntled at having been scooped, Vicki storms out.
The next day, Misha enters the Steyer family's gun store where she works when she isn’t being a superhero or helping Carly with her fashion line. She and Siggy are suddenly attacked by monsters, and Misha can’t use her powers without setting off the sprinkler system and dousing herself, so Siggy is forced to shoot the monsters by himself. Kimiko is also ambushed by monsters during a lunch with her father, and when Carly does a television interview, the host compares her negatively to Sylvia for a while before removing her disguise and revealing herself to be Vermillion Masquerade. Monsters attack and the television crew, bribed by Lansky, film the fight. Then Sylvia appears and volunteers to deal with the monsters, but she and Carly soon fall to bickering. Vermillion launches a sneak attack which grazes both of them, but they each assume the other did it and begin to fight for real.
Lansky starts to panic as Sylvia’s gentle facade cracks and she vents at Carly, saying that doing good costs money and she’s not ashamed of using her family wealth in that manner. Carly says that Sylvia only does good when the cameras are rolling, but Sylvia insists this isn’t true and she does plenty of other charitable work; she also says it’s wrong for Carly to turn charity into a contest. They continue to argue, Carly thinking Sylvia is entitled and Sylvia thinking Carly is arrogant, until they both shout:
—Carly Vanders and Sylvia Prestige
They realize they don’t have much of a reason to hate each other, with Carly apologizing for thinking Sylvia is evil just because they don’t get along, and Sylvia admitting her jealousy that Carly has done so much on her own while all she, Sylvia, was able to do was spend money until Lansky got her the armor. Vermillion cuts in and dissolves Sylvia’s armor with a snap of her finger, says that Sylvia is a disappointment and no better than Carly, and mocks them both for being manipulated by Lansky, She tells the broadcast audience that Lansky’s agency funded Sylvia’s armor as well as all the monsters to fight, then escapes. Meanwhile, Sylvia is stunned to realize that her heroics were all just helping Vermillion and that she hadn’t done any good at all.
The heroes regroup at home, with Carly bringing Sylvia along. Sylvia is despondent but Carly invites her to befriend the entire Kamen Corps; she also asks her to come to Area 51 so Gracey can examine her for any lingering effects from the armor. After Sylvia accepts, Vicki drives them all to the airport, and when Sylvia offers to pay to have someone do some of Vicki’s chores, Vicki snaps that the chores are her job and she won’t have her only method of contributing to the team taken away from her.
The Kamen Corps does some media events while Sylvia watches from the sidelines; they also practice shooting (with Misha noting how inept Sylvia is) and catch a baseball game. Once they’re at Area 51, Gracey verifies that Kimiko is healthy and then asks to inspect Sylvia so he can learn what affect long-term exposure to low-level chimeraton radiation (which Sylvia got from her armor) has on a person. Gracey also notes that Lansky and his agency will be thoroughly investigated by Homeland Security.
After more discussion, Gracey reveals one more secret: the government has been using recovered fragments of the space probe to build a duplicate suit of powered armor, but they’ve been stymied by the problem of building a user interface. However, since chimeraton radiation forms organic bonds and Sylvia had been able to bond with her old suit, they think she might be able to bond with the prototype and use it as well. Before they can discuss this more, however, Vermillion leads her monsters in a massive attack on the base. The Kamen Corps rush out to fight, with Carly instructing Sylvia to protect Gracey in the meantime.
The Kamen Corps battles, and Misha and Kimiko pull off a working combo by alternating blasts of fire and ice to reduce the enemy monsters to harmless shards. Carly’s attacks, however, are virtually useless, and Vermillion explains that earth grounds electricity and so Carly can’t produce enough power to break Vermillion’s strongest monsters; the only reason Carly’s prior battles were victories is because Vermillion threw the fights. Carly launches stronger attacks and scores some damage, but then they reach the three hour limit and all three members of the Kamen Corps have to power down. They retreat into the base while Vermillion turns the tarmac to mud and ensnares the garrison soldiers.
Deep in the base, Sylvia castigates herself for being unable to contribute despite all her wealth. Gracey gives her a set of armor; it looks like Carly’s suit and he designed it to augment chimeraton radiation, meaning Sylvia should be able to use it. He also encourages Sylvia to keep trying. Sylvia takes the suit and goes to the room with the other heroes, then asks Carly for her mask. Carly doesn’t know how that would help but agrees to trust her and hands it over. Now disguised as Kamen America, Sylvia goes outside and uses the powers of the armor and her own radiation to blast the monsters and Vermillion away.
The press watching the battle cheer for Kamen America, believing her to have defeated Vermillion Masquerade on her own. Carly, thinking that Sylvia is taking her superhero identity permanently and will get the credit for the victory, says that she’s okay with this but accepts Misha’s attempts to commiserate with her over the loss of her identity and her glory. Sylvia, however, goes back inside and hands the mask over, saying that Carly is Kamen America and nobody can take that from her.
Vermillion renews her attack and the Kamen Corps scrambles to shut the emergency doors and keep her out. Kimiko notes that she was once able to stay in her powered form for more than three hours because she was in a room with lots of steam; she thus theorizes that they can douse themselves in their elements to recharge their powers. They find some beer, which contains water, and Kimiko gulps it down as Vermillion breaks into the building while fighting off soldiers and ranting about how she’s superior to Carly. She gets inside, but Kimiko is able to blast the mud off of her with her recharged water powers, revealing her true form…
Of Vicki.
Two weeks later, Apex Moth and Hare Trigger force Lansky to lead them to Vicki, who is hiding near a site where some of the space probe’s debris fell. They send Lansky away and then approach Vicki to offer her an alliance. Vicki accepts.
This comic contains examples of the following tropes:
- Addiction-Powered: Kimiko is able to bolster her abilities by chugging beer.
- An Aesop:
- Forgive old grudges.
- Also, forgive yourself for your prior mistakes. Gracey has to break Sylvia out of her depression before Sylvia is able to contribute to the fight.
- Badass Normal: Siggy has no powers but is able to fend off the monsters with nothing more than a shotgun.
- Big Bad Friend: Vermillion Masquerade turns out to be Vicki Kaminski, Carly's friend since childhood.
- Insistent Terminology: Vermillion repeatedly protests that her creations are ‘art’ and not whatever else people are calling them.
- Legacy Character: Deconstructed. Sylvia turns down the opportunity to usurp Carly's superhero identity, stating that the identity of 'Kamen America' isn't defined by a uniform or set of powers. Instead, she declares that the hero identity is instead uniquely Carly's on account of all the good deeds and heroic work Carly had done while using that name.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Sylvia is horrified to learn that all her ‘heroics’ were just helping the villains.
- The Resenter: Even before she’s revealed as a villain, it’s clear that Vicki resents seeming ‘useless’ compared to the Kamen Corps in general and Carly in particular. She becomes furious when Sylvia offers to pay someone to do her menial chores, since the chores are the one thing she’s able to contribute to the team.
- Strawman News Media: Carly’s interview is mostly the host, really a disguised Vermillion, insulting her for being inferior to Sylvia.
