16

Exhibition 3

I found the research I was doing pretty interesting, and I was learning plenty. Dr. Kardon definitely helped explain a lot of details of what I was actually looking at, and the hands-on, real-time experience of the brain research taught me far more and far quicker than reading it out of a textbook.

The subject was interesting enough for me that even outside of the hospital, I was still practicing modelling the brain blood vessels. Mainly on myself. When I went for a jog, I mapped out how my brain coordinated that stuff. When I was redesigning my bots to be better for brain research, I was still mapping out how my brain was working there. Even when I was relaxing, I still focused on how my brain relaxed. It was just so interesting now that I was aware of it; I just wanted to map out ALL the things my brain did.

I figured that, eventually, I could do more than just the blood vessels and general electrical signals; my bots might be able to keep track of individual neurons firing.

When I mentioned this to Dr. Kardon, she was, once again, blown away. She wanted me at the hospital almost every day now, and had ideas for dozens of different studies. All of which would probably make her famous within the neurology community.

Previously, studies were limited by what people could fit into an MRI machine. It was obvious if you ever actually gave it some thought (which I didn't, before). A machine which cost millions of dollars and where people had to lay still for half an hour for the pictures to be taken. Which often made it limited to talking, maybe watching a movie, solving a rubik's cube, and stuff like that.

So, when I told her that I had gone jogging and mapped out my own brain activity for fun over the weekend, it left her flabbergasted. I honestly didn't realize it was such a big deal. Now, just like me, she wanted to test all the things.

Meanwhile, she referred me to one of her research partners, Dr. Akagi. Together, with my help, they believed that they would be able to win a Nobel Prize with a new study. How was that for temptation?

Again, this came back to the problem of having to sit inside a multi-million dollar machine for testing to be done. That really limited the amount of research that could be done on capes, even those who were willing. Many capes, especially Blasters, Shakers, Tinkers (who often needed metal tools), and Movers categorically could not be tested. At all. I just massively opened up entire categories of research. I would still have problems testing Changers and Breakers, but it was still a huge improvement over the current body of knowledge.

So, for the past thirty-plus years of the existence of Capes, research was still somewhat limited. Dr. Akagi was one of the people who really wanted to change that. And hey, maybe I'd get my name as a co-author on a scientific paper. Famous without being a newspaper headline? That would be nice.

Not all of my work could be research, though. After what I had accomplished in the ER, and was verified by the surgeons, they were very happy with the results. Sufficed to say, the neurologists and emergency doctors at the hospital were loving me, and were starting to fight for who got to use my time, the way they used to fight over Panacea. I again found myself with more interesting work being pushed on me instead of just basic ER cases. Now I was being pushed around to the elderly care wards, where strokes or long-term aneurysms were common. For a lot of these people, their blood vessels in the brain were in poor condition due to age and lifestyle. They were at risk of a stroke, but not at high enough risk to try surgery.

Now I was being touted as a safer, simpler alternative. With an asterisk. And fine print at the bottom. And signing off on experimental procedures, and initials here and here and here. The director was eager to approve just about anything that would help improve the hospital's showing in whatever place that hospitals get ranked. I wasn't complaining, I got to do more interesting things!

I could deliver blood clotting to seal up a brain bleed, or break up a blood clot that was restricting blood flow, and create microscopic stents that were too fine or difficult to create for normal surgery. I wasn't as good as Panacea in the rest of the body, but I had found my specialty. Many patients were glad to have me around.

The family of this particular patient, however, didn't.

"We want the best! Where is Panacea?" they were shouting. I tried to ignore them, and hopefully the nurses would explain to them why Panacea wasn't here. But they weren't listening.

"We don't want the new girl! Do you know who we are?" I could still hear them shouting outside. I had no idea who they were.

Dr. Mattias put a hand on my shoulder. "Just ignore her. I'll handle it. We get those all the time; patients who think they know better than the doctors. They read one story online about how one doctor messed up a diagnosis or something, and they use it as an excuse to get what they want."

I nodded and moved on to the next patient, while the other lay dying in his bed. It was almost a textbook case; I could have finished in five minutes if the family had been willing to sign the damned forms. But no, they wanted Panacea, even though she didn't heal brains, and they were the type to yell and scream until they got their way. Fifty-year-old toddlers.

After I had treated several other patients, that family had finally relented when they finally realized their only other option was non-cape medical procedures, which had a much lower success rate. I don't know how many times the doctors had to explain to them that Panacea didn't do brains, and the patient had a brain issue. The time had passed; they were on blood thinning drugs, but the brain damage had occurred and was likely irreversible. I was brought in to break up the blood clot a little faster, but really I had just sped up the process by an hour or two, and missed the critical window earlier on.

I felt terrible that I couldn't save the patient. Yeah, it was the family's fault for being idiots and wasting precious time. But still, here was a person right in front of me that I could have saved and got held back by selfish dumbasses and permission forms. Thankfully, Dr. Mattias explained it to the patient for me when I finished. I certainly didn't want to deal with them.

That didn't do anything for the patient's temperament though. "What? How long did you spend in there? Did you even do anything? Is this some kind of scam? You stupid girl! Why call yourself a healer?"

Holy crap some people just never stopped complaining. Sure, most people were quite friendly and thankful. But a single bad patient stuck in my mind more than ten good ones. I really needed to go out and beat up some thugs with Abyssal to work off some steam.

Thank goodness New Wave had called together a team meeting to break up the hospital work I was doing. This time, we had all gathered at the Pelhams' house. Everyone except Flashbang was there.

"Okay, everybody. The Protectorate's asking for our help because they're expecting the big one," Lady Photon said.

"The big one?"

"For the past few weeks, the Empire has been losing capes. So far, Hookwolf, Victor, Alabaster, Cricket, and now Stormtiger have been captured. This is a heavy blow to the Empire, and Kaiser is rallying the troops while Lung is going off on a rampage. The main issue is trying to make this permanent.

"Due to various extenuating circumstances, they've been held at either PRT headquarters or the Rig until now, awaiting transport to a more secure facility. That move is today. This is also Kaiser's best chance to break out five of his capes and regain power, so we expect that's what he'll do. There's also a chance he has hired mercenaries or received support from Gesselschaft."

"Any ideas which capes Gesselschaft provided?"

"No idea just yet. But again, Lung probably considers this an opportunity to end the Empire once and for all, so he might show up as well."

"Great. It'll be a real party," Laserdream sighed.

"Panacea and Eunoia, we don't want you anywhere near the battle, but on hand to take care of injuries. Are you okay with that?" We both nodded. I was actually eager to be closer, and maybe put Abyssal to use. Even if we were sitting in some armored car or something.

"Alright, let's go. We're dividing up, since there are two convoys. One might be a decoy, or maybe they've divided the prisoners in half, but I haven't been told the details. We defend them either way," Lady Photon said.

I summoned as many bots as I could through the sewers when we passed near the hospital on the way to the PRT headquarters. They weren't too far from each other, and though I wasn't sure where the actual fight would happen, I just needed enough bots in range. To get Abyssal to his proper size, a thousand pounds was a lot of bots, especially to try to squeeze through the sewers without clogging. Since we were only driving by, I only had control of them briefly, and I just barely got enough of them moving. It wasn't quite enough to make him full-size, but I might have enough to give some criminals a scare.

At the PRT HQ, we received more details. New Wave, who had more flying capes, would mostly be helping to escort a convoy departing from the Rig. That one had some pretty heavy hitters, including Dauntless and even Dragon providing a little backup. The other convoy would be departing from PRT HQ with more ground-based forces and travelling through the city streets. We still weren't told which one had which villains – operational security and all.

Panacea and I were going to ride along with another patrol/coordination unit in an armoured van, which would have a few fast-moving backup capes like Velocity and Vista ready to assist whichever convoy was facing more resistance.

That was the weirdest part. I still remembered the pamphlet I had picked up when I originally intended to join the Wards; it was supposed to be a program for young capes to be safe. The bank robbery was one thing; the Undersiders were just small-time thieves. Today they were expecting the entire town's heaviest hitters. Were all the Wards involved? How the hell would they explain to the parents what was happening?

Lucky for me, sitting in between the two planned routes, that actually placed me close enough to the reserves I had stored in my workshop. Now it was just a waiting game. We waved goodbye to Laserdream, Lady Photon, Shielder, and Brandish, who were joining the Rig team. Glory Girl stayed with the HQ team, since they assumed that the heaviest hitters would take the land route, and they needed bigger Brutes to match. There were a limited number of options for villains hitting the Rig convoy's air and water route, and between New Wave's Blasters, Miss Militia, and Dragon's support, most of their bases were covered.

I avoided speaking much with the Protectorate members. I just waited quietly with Panacea. She hugged Glory Girl before we started moving out. I stepped into the armoured van, but Vista and Velocity were in another vehicle in the convoy. I hope that meant our vehicle was the most-protected.

There were no windows in our vehicle, just heavy armour plating. I used the bots in the street to see, but so far, there wasn't anything going on. Then again, the criminals would have had to be especially stupid or bold to pull something so close to PRT HQ. I made my bots scurry through the alleys in small blobs, keeping to the shadows.

One good thing, though, was that the route we were taking put me within range of my workshop. The support team was keeping to the safer parts of town, hopefully where fewer capes would be attempting an ambush. When my workshop came into range, I had all the bots gather up and finally create Abyssal. Somewhere between seven and eight feet tall, as one big unit, he could run and move faster than trying to make the tiny bots move by themselves.

I tried to keep my expression neutral, even bored, as I used spare bots in the streets to find nazis or ABB wearing gang colours.

It didn't take long. They were near the edge of my range, where the HQ transport team was moving.

My breath hitched as a big pickup truck with massive bull bars sped through an intersection and T-boned one of the lead escort vehicles. For a second, I debated whether I should warn them and reveal more of my abilities, but it was too late anyway. The area exploded into chaos faster than I could even speak a sentence.

I heard a whole lot of shouting from the front of the van.

"Vehicle down, vehicle down!"

"We have contact, Defensive perimeter!"

People were jumping into action. Through my bots, I could see Velocity leap out and join the fight.

Crusader and Rune flew in from above. Crusader's ghosts swarmed into the vehicles, directly attacking the drivers and ignoring the all the armour. Armsmaster immediately halted his motorcycle, located Crusader, and hurled his halberd with frightening accuracy. Crusader had to fly out of the way, which disrupted his control of the ghosts just long enough for Battery to reached the downed PRT troopers. The halberd disappeared, teleporting back into Armsmaster's hand. Something unfolded out of the weapon, and he leaped into the fray.

Meanwhile, Rune launched a large boulder at one of the trucks at the back of the convoy, probably aiming to pin us in, but Assault used his power to simply tank the impact, causing the boulder to stop just short of the car and drop pointlessly onto the road. He used the energy that charged him up to smash straight into one of the valkyrie twins, bowling over the already-twenty-foot-tall woman.

Glory Girl shot off to wrestle with the other valkyrie twin.

Triumph let out a deafening shout, which was enough to knock over one of the Empire's vehicles. It was enough to shake up all my bots in its wake too; I lost vision in that area for a while because it got far too scrambled and confusing.

It was absolute chaos, to say the least. PRT troopers jumped out of the vehicles in a practiced manner, loading up containment foam guns, but they were beset by large numbers of their nazi followers. Kaiser was somewhere, as evidenced by the large number of blades shooting out of random surfaces, but I couldn't see him through the chaos.

Every once in a while I would see a streak of red, or blue, which was probably Assault or Battery.

I watched as a relatively innocent-looking couple hiding in an alley turned out not to be bystanders who needed help, but enemy capes as well. The man turned into fog, who started cover and choke people. The woman, I didn't know her power, but she had plenty of flashbang grenades. Interesting to note, my bots didn't go blind from them. Maybe it was because of the way they worked; they just absorbed the light energy and helped recharge them a little more. Still, that woman seemed to be well-armed and was very disruptive based on weapons alone.

I decided it was time to break out my little toy. I'd start well away from the heroes so they didn't mistake him for some kind of Empire backup or mercenary. Make it obvious that I was hitting the Empire.

Abyssal ran out of an alley and rushed at the unpowered nazis. Using the huge swords, I knocked them off their feet and smashed them into cars through sheer momentum alone. I didn't want to cut them and accidentally kill them, so I used the flat of the blades, hopefully only leaving them with broken bones and minor concussions. Still, he was nearly twenty feet wide holding both swords, and managed to sweep through plenty of low-level footsoldiers on my first pass.

With the "smoke" of bots that leaked from his body, I had them gather on the guns, cutting through the springs and firing pins to make the weapons useless. Hopefully, anyone who wasn't down and out wouldn't be able to pick up a weapon and rejoin the fight easily.

Abyssal was certainly drawing a lot of attention, as I intended. Guns started turning on him, and he was hit with a spray of bullets from multiple directions. The bullets, naturally, did nothing. They basically shoved a few bots out of the way and damaged some, but I had a thousand pounds of bots to spare.

Abyssal kept smashing through any Empire member I could see. Until one of the Valkyrie twins, now well over thirty feet tall, rushed over and, uh, stepped on him.

As strong as he was, I wasn't going to fight that. I let him get squished, dispersing his bots and looking for a more optimal fight elsewhere.

And then Lung crashed into the scene. He had already ramped up to partial dragon form, with metal scales and flames erupting from his body. He was already taller than Abyssal, but even then he was dwarfed by the three-storey-tall woman. Unlike Abyssal, he was able to match her strength despite the size difference, pounding her into the ground as she tried to fight off both the heat and the strength.

Unfortunately, my bots couldn't take the heat. The ones nearest Lung sizzled and burnt to ash. I had to get out of the metaphorical kitchen.

Not that I had much of a choice, either. The support team was mobilizing. Panacea and I were being driven further away to get to safety while heroes retreated for healing. I pulled Abyssal back with us as we were driven away, so that I wouldn't lose control of all those bots. And to protect ourselves.

An injured Triumph was brought to us, and Panacea healed him as quickly as she could. Several other injured PRT troopers came through as well, sporting everything from bullet wounds to broken bones. I helped stabilize them while Panacea healed them completely.

Velocity was pulled in later as well, this time sporting burns. Lung, no doubt.

We were far from the fighting now; and there wasn't much I could do with Abyssal. Still, I kept him prowling around near the edge of my range, just seeing what I could do to help. Maybe keep the villains from interrupting the healing-conga line that was going.

I felt Abyssal slow down partially. Wait, that wasn't right. Part of Abyssal slowed down, shearing his body apart. A Shaker who could slow things down in an area? That meant Krieg must have been nearby. Protecting Panacea and myself took priority; I had to assume that the PRT's battle plan was going to work, since we were further out of range now.

Still, the Empire was attempting to break out their detainees, and hitting the support team was definitely part of their plans. I guess Krieg was a good candidate for that; they didn't want to do something as horrible as attacking and injuring Panacea, but he could slow down the team and interfere non-lethally.

Unfortunately, all the capes had already departed to help with the fight. The PRT troopers quickly identified where the enemy cape was, and moved with practiced precision. Panacea and I were quickly pulled back into the armoured van, doors locked.

They spread out and shot containment foam at the cape, but all the streams of sticky liquid suddenly lost momentum near him and fell to the ground, short of their target.

He charged forward, intending to take the PRT troops in hand-to-hand. His main targets were moving extremely slowly; even though they were trained in close-quarters combat, their movements were sluggish, as if fighting through molasses. Krieg easily took them down, their blocks and counterattacks moving a quarter the speed that they should have been. Krieg's hits looked like they struck with more impact than should be possible for a normal person as well.

Other PRT troops tried to spray him down, more concerned about taking out the cape than getting their allies caught in the crossfire. It was non-lethal stuff, after all. But once again, Krieg dodged the streams of foam and flew out of the way, despite being surrounded.

Krieg shouldn't be able to fly. I read his profile on PHO, nobody had seen him fly before.

Oh, wait, the Empire had a power lender. Othala. She was also their healer. She had to be somewhere...

While the PRT continued to fight Krieg, I searched with my bots, hoping that Othala was nearby. Although nearly everything within a two-block radius was in my view, I had a hard time focusing on every person individually. Othala certainly wasn't a fighter, and she might not have been wearing her costume. After all, she didn't participate in the fight directly.

I did find her. In a car, guarded by Empire footsoldiers. She was the Empire's support, the counterpart to me and Panacea. Like us, the Empire had moved her away from the main fight, which put her closer to us. Lucky me, unlucky her.

Abyssal formed in front of the car. His looming form instantly sent the driver into a panic. They threw the car in reverse, hitting one of his own men and sending him bouncing over the trunk.

Abyssal chased, ignoring the gunfire. The bullets made holes in the body, which merely reformed as the bots shifted. He ran straight ahead, bowling over the goons, and leaped up. A thousand pounds of mass smashed down onto the hood of the car, with my bots seeping into the engine and vents. The car stopped working quickly when the lines and hoses were sliced apart. Not that the driver could do much anyway; Abyssal smashed straight through the windshield and yanked him out of the seat, tossing him into the pile of Empire members behind.

I didn't bother opening the door; Othala was frozen in fear. Abyssal reached in, and I elongated his arm a bit so he could get from the windshield all the way to the rear seats. I pulled her out, ignoring her protests.

Now where to bring her? The only PRT team I knew about, and was within range, was the one we were with. And they weren't doing too well. Krieg with his additional flying powers, and now with a stolen containment foam shooter, he had practically eliminated the PRT team himself.

I guess they could use a little backup.

Abyssal began running for us, just as Krieg came up to our armoured van.

He started hammering away at the door. "Get back, girls," said the only remaining PRT officer inside the vehicle with us. He held up a taser to the door. I could see the armoured door begin to dent while the vehicle shook.

A few more hits, and the doors burst open. I wondered why the PRT officer didn't shoot, but apparently he was trying. Krieg looked at him, the trigger on the taser already pulled. The man was frozen, and Krieg lazily stepped to the side while the taser's electrode darts shot forwards, inching forward through the air for several seconds.

Krieg looked at the projectile with some amusement while he walked around it, then let it drop to the ground. A punch, a knee, and an elbow that the officer couldn't respond to sent him to the ground, leaving Krieg alone with us.

"Stay out of the way if you don't want to get hurt," Krieg said. "I wouldn't want to hurt a pair of perfectly useful white girls."

"SSSSSSSSSSSSTTOOOOOOOOOP."

Ayssal had arrived, showing up right behind Krieg, holding Othala hostage. A single hand was enough to completely encircle her neck, and she was struggling not to choke as she had both hands gripping his "gauntlets." Not that I would actually choke her to death, but it just made it look more dangerous.

The look on Amy's face was priceless. Krieg, on the other hand, was an experienced combatant, though I was sure his instincts were telling him to run, and run quickly. Especially when Abyssal drew his sword with his other hand.

Still, he hesitated, looking at Othala. At least he had loyalty to his teammates, I'll give him that. He must have been thinking of a way to free her. I took that opportunity to run up to him from behind.

Abyssal had done a good job of being a distraction. Even as Krieg used his power to slow Abyssal down and freeze him in place, he noticed me a second too late. I felt myself slow down as well, but not before I had my hands – and bots – on him.

A small number of bots pierced through his skin and entered his bloodstream. He pulled away when he felt the pinprick, but I had gotten what I needed into him.

He apparently couldn't do anything to the bots that were inside his own body. Though my own body was trapped, unable to move, I could still think clearly. I directed my bots to just cut off supply to his brain, shutting off a few key arteries.

A few seconds later, he collapsed to the ground, and I could move again. I let the blood flow again before he received any permanent brain damage.

"Panacea, a little help?" I asked as I picked up a containment foam gun. I sprayed it liberally all over Krieg, cementing him to the ground for the time being.

Abyssal placed Othala on the ground. "DOOOOON'T MOOOOOOOVVVVVE," he said, bringing his sword high above his head with one arm with the tip pointed down at her face. He let go of Othala. Her legs didn't seem to be working as she collapsed to the ground, barely managing to get to a sitting position. She stared up at the massive knight, and the blade that was as heavy as she was ready to drop on her.

"Panacea, would you like to do the honours?" I asked, handing the foam sprayer to her.

Amy walked up to me, looking at Krieg, then Abyssal, then me, then to Othala, then back to Kreig, then the PRT officer on the ground, and finally to the gun. "Might be a nice change of pace," she said as she depressed the trigger.

"I can't believe Amy and Taylor were the only ones of us who took down a villain. EACH!" Vicky threw her arms up into the air.

"What did you actually do to Krieg? How did you take him down?" Eric asked.

"Just some minor brain surgery," I said. Amy gave me a scrutinizing look. "Nothing permanent!" I added defensively.

"Hey, come on, we get partial credit for Lung," Mr. Pelham said. "And my dear ladies managed to fend off Purity. That's no easy task."

"Yeah, but we were just guarding a decoy," Crystal muttered.

"An important decoy," Mrs. Dallon pointed out. "If Purity was hitting the HQ team, who knows how it would have turned out. Good thing most of your fight was over the water. If Purity was fighting directly against Lung..."

"Lord's Market might have ceased to exist?" Eric said.

"And everything else in a three-block radius. I wouldn't call that an exaggeration."

"And we only get partial credit for our takedowns, too," Amy added.

"Yeah, who was that new cape?"

All eyes turned to me and Amy.

I shrugged.

Amy shrugged too. "He just disappeared after I foamed Othala. By the time we were done healing the PRT troops, he was gone. Didn't leave a name."

"Is he a hero?"

"Well, he was fighting against the Nazis..." I pointed out quickly.

"But he does look kinda like Sauron," Amy added.

"Wait, like the Lord of the Rings movies, or Earth Aleph's version?" Eric asked.

"Maybe a bit in between?" I hadn't watched the Aleph versions. Was that what Lisa had been going for? I guess I had used elements of that character subconsciously. It had been a quick go-to when you needed a huge, evil-looking knight, after all.

"Well, good job, at least. It's not a total loss. A bit of a trade for the Empire, and we've taken down Lung. Normally I'd call it a terrible day, but with the two captures you made, I think we actually came out better than before," Mrs. Pelham said.

"But didn't all of the prisoners escape?" I asked.

"Hookwolf and three of their lower-powered capes, sure. In exchange, we have Othala, Krieg, Night, and Lung. Krieg and Night are two of their deadlier capes, and I'd call capturing Lung worth five."

"Wait, how did we capture Night? I thought she was super-deadly when she transforms," Crystal asked.

Vicky shrugged. "That's the thing. She didn't transform, for some reason. Velocity got her and then they just had two PRT officers watch her."

Huh. After taking down Othala, I did keep watch of as much of the fight as I could. I remembered the lady with grenades on her belt walking with a man that transformed into gas. I didn't think Abyssal could do much against someone who was physically gas, so I didn't bother. I just kept watch on them, until Velocity ran up to her, jabbed her with a tranquilizer, and then ran off. The gas-man (Fog, I guess) couldn't react fast enough to stop him. I didn't even realize she had powers, because she just... didn't do anything. I just kept watching them to keep track of the danger.

Most of the rest of the fight was cleanup and healing for me and Panacea. So I didn't get to see all of what was going on. Though there were plenty of injuries.

From what I could tell, in the end, Lung had acted as predicted. He was "helping" the PRT, in a sense, in that he wanted to make sure the villains were sent out of Brockton Bay and made their way to the actual prisons. But he got a little too aggressive, wanting to take down more of the Empire along the way.

Kaiser had seen to this, and instead of focusing on the breakout, he had all his capes focus on Lung instead. Armsmaster used some kind of advanced tranquilizer that eventually brought down Lung. He had made a judgement call; he was more worried about collateral damage than letting a few low-level Empire members escape.

With Lung out of the picture, the breakout was practically inevitable. Oni Lee had gone wild, but wasn't able to break his boss free and escaped. The Empire had brought everyone they could muster for the day. The fact that we still managed to capture a few of them, with zero deaths, was a small victory.

I couldn't wait for things to quiet down again. Get back to the hospital, get back to doing research and medicine.

"Say," I said to the group. "Could I ask you guys a favour?"

"You're the hero of the day," Mrs. Pelham said. "What do you want?"

"Well, Dr. Akagi at the hospital wanted some volunteers – cape volunteers, for this research study..."