Chapter 35: 3-5 Surge

Surge 3.5

2010, November 2: Brockton Bay, NH, USA

Being the first PE class of November, Coach Miller had us playing flag football. We wore belts over our shirts with little flags that could be snatched off easily. Because football teams were rather large, Coach Miller didn't see the point in dividing us by gender and just had us play two games. It was the perfect chance to test my new genetic enhancements.

From the outside, there were no noticeable changes in my actions, particularly since I went out of my way to appear unmotivated and mediocre. From my perspective, the difference was night and day.

The solid state sense type allowed me to perceive vibrations like a sixth sense. The biomass gyroscope gave me perfect balance. I felt as though I'd never run until now, like everything I'd been doing was the fumbling of a drunken fool. I experienced a little of this during my morning run, but that couldn't truly compare to a more dynamic exercise like flag football.

As a gravity child, I could feel myself subtly change my footing with each step to perfectly balance myself regardless of my posture. Even the lightest breeze that brushed the sweat form my face sang to me, telling me of where it came from and where it was blowing. I felt as though I would be able to play this game just fine even if I closed my eyes and relied on my awareness of the air around me.

I dodged out of Grace's way and allowed some guy on her team to pull my flag for our team's fourth down, dropping the ball where I stood. It wasn't about speed because I wasn't any faster than I was last week. It was purely awareness, the instinctive understanding of the location of every inch of my body and the way my body would interact with vibrations in the air.

I felt like Spider-Man.

"Shit," I groaned and gave my captor a high five. "Nice one, Nestor."

"Thanks, Bryce. You get faster?"

"Nah, I'm just good at running away."

"Weenie," Grace called. She strolled over with an arm around Eric.

I stuck my tongue out. Ever since I spent some time with Eric and Grace at the homecoming dance and arcade, the distance between me and my classmates seemed to shrink. I was still the quiet kid, but people came up to at least say hi.

'The wonders of being friends with the popular kids,' I scoffed. Coach Miller blew his whistle again and we got into position.

Their team's quarterback began to shout. "Blue! Red! Four! Five! Nine! Hut! Hut! Hut!-"

"Just start, you fuck!" Stephen heckled.

"That's a detention, Mr. Martin," Coach Martin called. "Mr. Keel, start in four seconds or else."

"Yes sir," Brendan Keel, the quarterback, said sheepishly. His eyes immediately sharpened and I realized that this was his plan. "Hike!"

The ball shot back from the center's legs and Brendan caught it. Already, his teammates were fanning out to cover their quarterback and give him as much time to throw as possible. My own teammates were still trying to figure themselves out. I saw Eric run past the defenders, intent on playing the receiver.

I ran after him. Even after two months of daily morning jogs, Eric was still much faster than me. He'd started from much further back but was already almost past me. He grinned, relishing the thrill of exercise. I groaned. I had no hope of catching him without Agility or my suit. I lunged and he sidestepped, juking around me with a flourishing spin. My fingers touched his flag, but could not get a grip on it before he was away.

"Well, shit," I muttered from the ground. Being a gravity child made me nearly untouchable, but it didn't help me chase down someone who was faster.

"What the fuck was that, Kiley?" Stephen yelled just as the coach called touchdown.

I rolled onto my back and smiled genially. "That, was me getting outplayed."

"No shit. God damn, you suck."

"Lay off, Steve," Eric called. "What's your problem today?"

"My problem is that this lazy fucker doesn't try," he said, angrily pointing at me.

"Relax, Stewie," I told him. Of course, telling a frustrated teenager he should relax was like pouring oil on a campfire to douse it. "It's a game, enjoy it."

"Fuck you, Kiley. What kind of pussy-ass name is Kiley?"

"Well, it's Gaelic for 'graceful one.' My family used to be called O'Kiley a few hundred years back when they were in Ireland. That means 'descendent of the graceful one.' They shortened it to just Kiley when they settled here."

"No one asked, you fucking nerd," he snarled.

"You just did," I replied from my place on the ground. The grass felt nice and cool on my skin.

He could see people start to gather around, wondering what he was doing yelling at the ground, so he turned with an angry huff. "Whatever, you useless fuck."

I laid there, enjoying the grass and morning dew that had yet to fully dry. "You going to get up, Bryce?" Eric asked. Grace joined us and gave her boyfriend a peck on the cheek.

"Nah, class is almost over anyway. Wanna join me? It's comfy."

"Bryce," Grace said warningly.

"Fine," I said grumpily. "How is it every girl says my name with that exact same tone? You, Amy, Vicky, Chelsea, Stephanie, Sierra, mom…"

"It's the 'you're about to be in deep shit' voice. All girls get instructions in the mail from the International Association of Kickass Women after we turn thirteen."

"I knew it. It's a conspiracy!"

"How else would we keep you idiot men-folk in line?"

"Eric, your girlfriend is bullying me."

He gave me a smug grin. "I know, it's great."

"Ass."

"His is pretty nice," Grace quipped, sending the blue-haired cape into a stammering spiral.

Getting used to the abilities of a gravity child was much simpler than I'd expected. It hadn't even been a week and I was already moving like I was born with the power. I figured that it was because the enhancements were so much tamer than those found in other fictions. Shorter ceiling, less growing to do to catch up.

X

I spent all of Tuesday's lab session building the Pledge Regalia. It didn't take too long because I had the entirety of the blueprints already designed.

By the end of my four-hour fugue, I found myself standing before the tombstone-like cross. It was an impressive four feet tall and made of lightweight but sturdy alloys primarily consisting of titanium and wapometal. Even so, it weighed ninety-two pounds, heavy, but not unusable with my raid suit giving me the edge. It'd probably take some getting used to regardless.

Luckily, I didn't build it to use it in battle. I was sure there would be a time when perfect sonic manipulation over several city blocks would come in handy, but it wasn't going to see regular use in a combat capacity.

Compared to the finicky, delicate mechanisms of the Pledge Regalia, the headset that needed to be revamped in my helmet was barely a concern. I put on my full costume with the regalia strapped to my back and stared at the full-length mirror I'd stolen from Hillside. I looked… There was no way around it. I looked edgy as fuck. As if it wasn't bad enough that I already looked like a Sentai Elite superfan, I now had a metal, cross-shaped tombstone strapped to my back.

"Yup, definitely not for public use," I told SAINT. "Still, I should turn it on and make sure everything works, right?"

"Reee," he called. He floated off to the side, ready to protect me with Psychic should something go wrong.

"Here goes…"

Every regalia had a set of principles that they expanded upon to obscene degrees. Ramjet, well, worked like a ramjet. Key Mother, the Flame Regalia, amplified the heat generated by friction to create infernos that would make Burnscar weak at the knees. The unnamed Pledge Regalia? This one was unlike the rest. Not only was it not designed with combat in mind, its primary purpose was not to dominate and manipulate, but to understand, to process and improve.

My oversized tombstone split into eight crosses, seven forming a ring around me even as the last clung to my person. The world expanded around me and sight became obsolete. The solid sense type took over as the most important sense available to me. Every cross was a node, a receiver and amplifier both. I felt each whisper of air, every minute current that caressed everything on this ship and more. Each of these vibrations could be considered sound, simply sound too soft for the human ear. The Pledge Regalia heard it all, painting a picture of the world around me in vivid detail.

And with that, I understood. I understood how Kururu could disassemble an opponent's power armor in seconds using this regalia. I wondered if this was at all like the kind of near omniscience Taylor saw in canon.

I examined the model Black Rhino trike I'd made during the One Piece specialization using only the air around it. Subtle vibrations told me where I could find every joint and vulnerability. I pushed for lack of a better word, sending a stream of pure sound through one cross then another, amplifying the wavelengths until they struck the model. I managed to dent its aluminum frame a bit and spin the wheels, but little else.

I understood how Kururu could use vibrations to disassemble something, but that did not mean I had the skill. Simply, I had the potential, and I would have to satisfy myself with that for now.

X

After dinner, I watched a home movie with my mom for a bit before retiring for the night. It was series finale of a sitcom turned into a movie starring Jennifer Aniston, Earth-Bet's version of Friends, but with powers. Rachel was still a trainwreck and Joey was an idiot-savant. It was a weird mix of strange and familiar that left me wanting to go on a movie binge to compare Aleph and Bet shows. Honestly wasn't awful, though the ending did seem rather rushed.

Instead of going to sleep, I locked my doors and closed the blinds before pulling the Pledge Regalia from the DSS. Having cool shit wasn't good enough, I realized that now. Being the jack of all trades wasn't good enough.

In that vein, it was time for training.

I pulled out a toy robot. It was a limited-time edition of Hero's power armor I received for my seventh birthday from dad. It worked off two AA batteries and came with "action-blasters!" or somesuch. Though I never really played with it, mentally far past the age when something like this would hold my interest, I could never bring myself to part with it. It seemed fair then that dad's gift helped me build my own cape identity.

I activated the Pledge Regalia again and set the toy down on the floor.

Bit by bit, I trained myself to use the regalia to its full potential. There were two aspects of it. First, I had to fully understand the vibration feedback that was sent into my headset. What did a ball joint feel like? How about a hinge? What kinds of vibrations did electric currents below a set voltage make? What about stronger voltages? How does heat muddle vibrations? It was much like speaking a different language, one my brain was uniquely engineered to process.

That was the crazy bit: Kururu Sumeragi wasn't a gravity child. She was human as far as anyone knew and mastered this oversized tombstone like none before her. If she could do it, so could I; I had a literal subset of my brain genetically engineered for the use of AT tech.

The second aspect of mastering the regalia was to manipulate the oscillating vibrations that filled the air, to turn them into my hands and feet. Using multiple wavelengths of sound at the same time, I could simulate detailed motions like twisting or latching. By bouncing each wavelength off a different set of crosses, I could designate different strengths for them to get the result I wanted.

By midnight, I managed to twist off the arm of my Hero figurine without breaking it. It was slow, but it was progress. I swore that by the end of the week, I'd learn to construct something with just sound alone.

"Pory," SAINT urged. The blocky duck pressed his nose into my side to pull me from my thoughts.

"Thanks, SAINT. What would I do without you?" He trilled happily as if to say I wouldn't want to find out before diving into my PokéNav. I reassembled the Pledge Regalia back into its main configuration and digitized it into the DSS before double-timing to the Palanquin for my appointment with Strider, expanded suitcase in hand.

"Hector!" I greeted as I uncloaked in the middle of the bar, arms out wide in a hug. "How's it going?"

Hector looked up with a friendly smile. Now that Halloween had passed, he was no longer wearing a suit. Instead, he had a simple black polo with the club's name stitched over his left breast. "Pretty good, Creed. You here for the boss?"

"Not this time. Just waiting on some mail."

"Ah, I get it. You want the usual?"

"Nah, can I try a Moscow mule?"

"Branching out huh? I like that."

"No," came Faultline's voice. I looked up to find her eyeing me from the balcony. "He doesn't get to drink before a deal."

Hector shrugged helplessly. "You heard the boss, bud. Sorry."

"Rats," I clicked my tongue. "You are the ruiner of all the fun in the world, Faultline."

"I take it Strider has yet to arrive?"

Before I could reply, my PokéNav buzzed. "That's probably him." I answered the call. "Strider, greetings."

"Hey, I'm outside."

"Come inside through the back. I'm sitting at the bar with Faultline."

"Sure, give me a second." A moment later, the man who could only be Strider entered through a side door.

The world's foremost mailman was clad in blue and black, with a train conductor's hat atop his head over a blue domino mask. He wore an overcoat of the same blue shade and carried the luggage I'd fashioned for him. He stopped in front of me and Faultline. "Creed. Faultline, it's good to see you again."

"Welcome," Faultline began. "Would you like a drink?"

"Oh, so he gets to drink?" I grumbled goodnaturedly.

"He's a responsible adult," she shot back.

"Water if you don't mind."

"See?"

I gamely ignored her. She couldn't prove her point if I wasn't listening… That was my stance and I was sticking to it… Instead, I turned to my new favorite mailman. "How're things? The suitcase work okay?"

"Perfect," he said with a grin. "I have my entire life packed in here. You know, I stuffed it full of gym weights until I had eighteen hundred pounds? I wanted to know if your measure was exact. It was."

"Glad to hear it. Do you mind if I take the bag for a few minutes? I was thinking you could relax here for a bit while I unload all of the ash."

"Go ahead, I'm sure you know how to operate your own tech." He slid the suitcase over to me. "I managed to get 3,600 pounds of the stuff, but you're going to have to let me hop back over to a quarry in Hawaii for a second trip."

"Thanks, that works fine."

It took a while because the suitcases weren't themselves attached to the DSS. I had to unload everything from Strider's suitcase out behind the Palanquin, hand the suitcase back to Strider so he could hop to Hawaii, then load everything into my own before doing it all over again. I made a mental note to figure out some kind of portable digitization process. It shouldn't be too difficult… probably…

About thirty minutes later, I reentered the club signed the final receipt. "Here, delivery checks out."

"Yeah, you let me know if you have another job for me, Creed. Nothing illegal, but if you want me to deliver your tech to a client, I'd be happy to do it."

"For a price," I completed for him with a smirk. "Actually, I could always use more ash. If you don't mind getting a few more loads."

"Hmm…" he returned my grin with his own. "You know, I like money as much as the next guy, but I'd be willing do more of these deliveries in exchange for a new costume. Maybe with one of those fancy shield generators on it?"

I nodded. He was a decent fellow. Rogue, technically, but I doubted even Amy could find fault with the man who shouldered endbringer response rates practically by his lonesome. A costume to keep him alive would be an easy way to get him on my side and do a bit of good for the world while I was at it. "That sounds like a wonderful idea. Let's go upstairs and hash this out. I've got a few deals in the works with other tinkers so I'm happy to use your services even excluding any more ash deliveries."

In the end, he agreed to make ten more deliveries of volcanic ash, all at max capacity of 1,800 pounds, as well as any deliveries between myself and tinker clients, with the sole caveat that I could not sell nor purchase narcotics nor firearms. In exchange, I agreed to give him a shield generator in the form of a shawl much like Labyrinth's that he could drape around his current uniform. Of course, it also came with a maintenance guarantee of three years.

In truth, though we did sign a paper contract with Faultline as witness, it was mostly pageantry. If Strider bailed, I couldn't really hunt him down without a ridiculous waste of resources. If I bailed, he couldn't really do much beyond wave that paper around. Like with most deals between capes, it relied heavily on the honor system. In that regard, Strider was taking a risk by trusting me; his reputation was set in stone, mine was not.

Strider hung around with us for a bit longer before saying goodbye. I wanted to go back to my lab, but I got dragged into a dancing contest between Newter and some frat boys. I lost. Miserably. Super-proprioception did not in fact mean I had any natural talent at dancing, only that I wouldn't trip like an idiot.

I did discover something new however: aura. After my miserable attempt at dancing, I laid bonelessly on the sofa in the VIP lounge, looking over the club and letting the world brush against my mind. It was an interesting experience, fully opening up the psychic floodgates like that. I got a kick out of randomly tapping people on the shoulder, because yes, I was that juvenile.

It was practice, okay?

X

2010, November 3: Brockton Bay, NH, USA

Amy finally remembered to chew me out for the bank "robbery," something a lot harder to take seriously due to her own chuckles. I hadn't actually robbed a bank, simply withdrawn money from an account in a way that drew attention to myself, so she didn't much care in truth. For all the shit she gave me, it was good having someone to talk to about all this cape business.

Arcadia let out early on Wednesdays, perks of a vocational curriculum, so I had a half hour to myself before I had to go tutor Hannah. I took the chance to head to the lab and withdraw the undersuits I'd made for Newter and Faultline from the sewing machine. I'd promised them Germa fiber suits as thanks for putting me in contact with the Number Man and setting up my banking information. I needed to make a new batch of the coating for Gregor, he was a big dude, but I expected to be finished sometime Saturday.

I arrived at the library and gave her the most basic of perfunctory greetings. We then settled in for another awkward two hours where I doodled designs and watched her try and fail at pretending to do her homework. I just didn't give much of a damn about the tutoring session anymore. If Hannah wanted to put in the work, that was fine by me. If she didn't, well, I tried. I just had her finish her homework, checked her answers once to make sure she was doing it right, then cut the session short. No skin off my nose.

After bidding her an unenthusiastic goodbye, I zipped straight back to the Gullrest to train for two and a half hours until dinner.

The Gullrest used to be a mid-sized oil tanker. Which was to say, it could easily house a small village, maybe several. Its cargo hold was several stories tall and as long as a city block or two. It was hard to conceptualize that kind of area as applied to a boat; every time I saw it, I had to take a moment to come to grips with its sheer size. It was far, far too large for any one person to use as a lab.

Coincidentally, it was positively perfect for use as an impromptu racetrack.

In Air Gear, teams were ranked from F to A-class, with each team advancing in rank depending on how well they performed in the Parts War, called so because teams often gambled their own ATs. The ranks weren't just status symbols. In order to teach new storm riders the bare minimum required to not die, or at least decreases the chances, teams could only compete in specific game types according to their rank: Dash, Hurdle, Cube, Air, Disc, and Balloon.

Dash was as it said on the tin; it taught F-class teams to run in a straight line. Hurdle taught E-class teams to avoid obstacles, or go through them if they had the power. Cube was somewhat unique in that unlike all other game types, it was played in an enclosed space, such as a single classroom. It was often a simple brawl between storm riders and was meant to teach D-class teams to ride across the walls and ceiling, 3D maneuverability and turning. Then, only when they mastered the basics, were teams allowed to compete with C-class teams in Air games.

Those… got insane… Most matches were in buildings or spaces similar to the Gullrest's cargo hold. Air was effectively a game of aerial musical chairs. Every team started on a platform. Teams tried to knock each other to the ground, with the added complexity of a random platform becoming unavailable after a set time. The worst of these matches were played on fighter jets by an A-class team appropriately named Sleipnir.

Suffice to say, storm riders had a ridiculous skill gap between D and C-class and an even bigger gap between the average rider and the "kings."

That was the gap I was trying to close in a mere two and a half weeks. No. That was the gap I had to close. I needed to become a king before my specialization changed. I needed to be someone who could defy all logic and tell physics to get bent, someone, had I been born in that world, who could have made a serious claim for the Gram Scale Tournament.

Impossible. Fucking impossible. Or, it would have been had I been alone.

But I wasn't alone. I had SAINT. I had the Germa Expansion Suit. I had Pokémon-style aura, and with it Protect, Recover, Magnet Rise, and Psychic.

I had everything needed to push myself to the absolute limit. I didn't want to be a simple creator anymore. I didn't want to be just a hoarder with dozens of inventions anymore. I wanted to master everything I made, because this world was cruel and it would allow for nothing less. Skidmark of all people taught me that.

"Are you ready, SAINT?" I whispered into my mic.

"Pory," he let out a digital chirp. Concern flared through our bond. "Porygon…"

"That's why you're in here with me. If something goes wrong, if I can't react in time, you can trigger the shields. And if I do get hurt, I have Recover to fall back on."

"Pory-gon."

"I know, trust me. I know."

"Gon…"

"Yup. We're going to go up the Parts Wars match types. Dash first until I get used to the top speed of a basic AT. Then with Agility. Then Hurdles. And then… I guess we can find the captain's quarters for Cube, should be small enough without being oppressive. We'll go from there, got it?"

"Porygon. Pory."

"Yeah. I still haven't decided what regalia I want to strap to my feet, but that's fine. This level of training will be necessary no matter what I do. And, we get to collect more data on just how quickly a gravity child can pick up on techniques like this. Ready?"

"Gon."

I eyeballed the far end of the ship. Slowly, I fell into a sprinter's crouch. "Time me."

"Gon," he chirped in the affirmative.

Then, I was off.

Author's Note

Not much to say. Strider… is Strider. He's a taxi shaped like a person. And now, he's a U-Haul shaped like a person. Great, right? Marvel at my character development skills!

SAINT is best duck. He'll evolve. At some point.

Have an animal fact:

When a sushi chef feeds you "uni," or sea urchin, he's really feeding you gonads, or testicles. They're salty and creamy and you'll never look at a sushi chef again.

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Chapter 36: 3-6 Surge.

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2010, November 3: Brockton Bay, NH, USA

It hurt. Not physically, I had minimal trouble adjusting to my sprint. Mentally. Emotionally. Kazu, as a fucking novice, was able to use the Flame Road with a basic set of ATs. He was able to, for just the briefest moment, smash the sound barrier. Sure, it was only in a straight line and he'd become the Flame King after Spitfire, but that was as a goddamn rookie in his first ever Parts War.

I couldn't do that.

After an hour of sprinting back and forth, I couldn't copy Kazu's After Burner. I knew how to do it, at least theoretically. Kazu began the technique by falling until his body was almost parallel with the fence he was running on. Oh, yeah, because the ground was too easy apparently; he did this while running along the railings of a fence. Then, when his body was positioned to minimize air friction, he kicked off all at once with an explosive thrust.

Supposedly, his skates were mimicking the afterburners of jet craft, hence the name of the technique, but that made zero goddamn sense! An afterburner was just an additional bit of fuel injected into a jet's combustor located inside the pipe behind or "after" the turbine mid-flight for some extra thrust. There was nothing even remotely comparable between that and the way a basic AT worked!

I dashed through the cargo hold at disappointing speeds and allowed myself to smash into the wall in frustration. Protect and my suit's shield flared as I made like a starfish and left a Creed-shaped imprint into the metal. I shoved with my knees and allowed myself to peel away from the wall like a cartoon.

Landing with a clanging flop, I groaned. "SAINT, how many attempts was that?"

"Pory." The helmet's UI flashed forty-three.

Forty-three attempts in an hour and my top speed sans Agility was clocked at only five hundred sixty-eight miles per hour on the straightaway. It was enough to grant me a hefty mover rating according to the PRT standards, but it was a far cry from the potential I knew I could achieve. Sure, I'd broken this record when I airdropped onto Squealer's truck, but adding Agility and gravity was cheating.

I'd thought After Burner would be the simplest technique for me to learn. Just run fast in a straight line, right? How hard could it be?

I was so, so wrong.

ATs translated the raw kinetic energy of the storm rider's kicks into motorized thrust. The stronger and faster the rider, the more effective the AT became by extension. What did it say about me then that even with the Germa raid suit boosting my strength, I still couldn't crack the supersonic divide, the big seven-six-seven? Did that mean there was something wrong with me? Were anime characters just built different? Was Kazu just a freak of nature?

I sighed and picked myself up again. I wasn't being entirely fair to myself. Yes, Kazu could break the sound barrier in his first Dash, but almost no one else could.

Even towards the end of the series, that kind of raw, straightaway sprinting speed was rare, the hallmark of a king-level rider. Most of the great riders didn't get that kind of speed until their "roads" were much more developed. My bitching was the equivalent of a child picking up a slingshot and complaining he wasn't as accurate as Usopp. Having the right gear wasn't the same as having the right talent. Still, the failure left a bitter taste in my mouth.

There were two plus sides to my repeated failure, beyond redecorating the wall, I mean. One, it showed me clearly that without Agility, some of the fastest tricks would be beyond my abilities. Disappointing, but it did give me an idea of how to improve so it wasn't all bad.

Two, it allowed me to better appreciate my newfound biology as a gravity child. Perception. Proprioception. Thanks to a perfect blend of echolocation and dramatically improved eyesight, I never once lost track of my position or tripped over my feet. I only crashed into the wall a handful of times on accident, and that was mostly me getting used to the braking mechanism in my skates than a failure of my reaction time.

"After Burner's a failure," I told SAINT, "at least, without Agility."

"Pory," he trilled. I could feel him consoling me through the bond.

"That's okay. I'm over it. Instead, what if I used Agility like a jet afterburner? The principle is the same, right? A jet dumps extra fuel into the combustor mid-flight for extra thrust. Why can't I do that mid-run? I wanted to be accomplish everything the main characters could, but maybe that's my problem. I shouldn't have tried to compare myself to them."

"Porygon… pory?"

"Being a storm rider… The biggest theme throughout the series, beyond sci-fi skates I mean, is freedom. Individuality. It's stated multiple times that though there are eight major roads, there are countless offshoots, as many as there are riders. Hell, there's one guy who achieved a Smell Road, whatever the fuck that is. Maybe I should stop trying to copy the kings and make my own road. I'm not just a storm rider after all. I'm a budding aura master, shipwright, geneticist, and inventor. Not using everything I have would clip my wings."

"Porygon… Ree-gon…"

"Hehehe, yeah, I'm pretty easily distracted." I hopped in place and began to stretch my legs. It was amazing how natural that felt, even with wheels strapped to my feet. "SAINT?"

"Ree?"

"Thanks?"

"Porygon?"

"For being here. For being my sounding board. You make it easier to think, to reflect," I told him honestly.

"Reee," he trilled, the bond pulsing with fondness.

"Okay. We're going to run laps for the next hour. The goal is to use Agility in lieu of After Burner and to preserve my control even mid-run. Then, if I can do that, we'll call it a win and shift to Hurdles. Got it?"

"Pory!"

X

Other than a short but exhausting training session against SAINT, the only thing of note to have happened on Wednesday was that I received a phone call from Uppercrust. He sounded as his name implied: cordial, professional, and with every syllable dripping with that high society drawl that made you want to ask if he was sipping a tumbler of whiskey and rolling a cigar.

He thanked me for my interest in his work and agreed to examine my engine for compatibility with his tech. I sent Strider a text telling him about the situation so he'd know to deliver the engine to New York when the time came.

I knocked out my homework in a laughable fifteen minutes, the perks of being a post-grad in high school. There was some more work to do researching Canary's trial, but that could be put off for a while longer. While I fulfilled my obligations to the standard education system, I had SAINT compile every news article on Canary's trial as well as any publicized court documents so I could review them all at once when I got around to writing my report.

After that, I took a quick shower and nestled into bed. "SAINT?"

"Reee?"

"Wake me up at three."

"Pory," he trilled reproachfully.

"It'll be fine," I said, waving him off. "It's nine now. Six hours of sleep is plenty. I'll tinker until six then come back here and wait for mom to wake up before heading to school."

"Porygon…"

"Thanks, bud. And yeah, just keep the volume down."

"Reee," he nodded.

I left him to his own devices. SAINT was developing as an individual, not just my glorified AI assistant. He'd taken to music with the same love I had, albeit in a different bend. I converted the original DAW, digital audio workstation, that I purchased into the TM Interface, but it was no trouble at all for SAINT to recreate and install the DAW software onto my computer for his personal use.

I found it both funny and heartwarming to watch him play with electronic music. He didn't really have any conception of earworms or preference for music in the normal sense, but he'd seen me play often enough that he associated certain musical styles and beats with certain emotions. Classic rock for example, because it reminded me of dad, was tied closely with a sense of fond nostalgia to him. Putting together a song wasn't just about compiling a melody for him; it was about building something that could help him invoke and engage human emotions, a way for him to connect with humans.

And, since he could work the computer while digitized, it was no trouble at all to shut off the monitor and turn off the volume. Sounds apparently sounded very different in digital space anyway.

I smiled and nudged him towards the computer. "I can't wait to see what you come up with, bud."

X

2010, November 4: Brockton Bay, NH, USA

The first hour in the Gullrest was spent tinkering. I promised Faultline's Crew Germa fiber costumes as thanks for setting up my banking information but did not enough fibers on hand to make one for Gregor. I didn't want to keep the big fellow waiting so SAINT was mixing chemicals and churning out coated Kevlar threads that were fed into a mechanical loom.

While he was doing that, I was drafting designs to automate the process. If there was one thing post-modern societies had over fantastical settings like One Piece, it was the widespread use of automation in mundane manufacturing after all. I planned to sell this ultra-resistant cloth, and that meant I'd need way more than I could make with my personal attention. For that matter, automated manufacturing of other, relatively simple goods was something I'd need to add to my ever-growing to-do list.

The rest of our time was spent practicing.

I raced around the cargo hold with all my might. Five-seventy... Five-seventy-four… Faster than my record yesterday but not enough.

I approached the corner at speeds rivaling commercial aircraft. Flexing my legs, I stomped my left toe into the floor, ramming the AT's toe-stop and causing a river of sparks and smoke to erupt from the friction. I allowed myself to skid on my toes, drifting while my right leg tensed in preparation.

"Agility!" I shouted. A corona of psychic light shrouded my body like violet flames as I shot forward at a perfect right angle, turning the drift into a rocketing thrust without sacrificing any speed.

I smiled smugly as a resounding bang echoed throughout the metal. Eight-ninety-two and climbing. Suck it, Kazu; I'll find my own road.

The next corner approached and I allowed the Agility to die out before doing it again.

And again.

And again.

SAINT had long since vacated my suit after we'd established that I was at no risk of seriously injuring myself. Once I'd gotten a hang of racing around at speed, we decided to adopt a different approach to Hurdle; after all, SAINT needed practice too.

I stood in the center of the hold as SAINT floated in the air. He bobbed like a rubber duck in a bathtub. "Pory. Reee-gon?"

"Yeah, whenever you're ready, SAINT."

"Gon."

With that, our match was on. Our take on Hurdles was simple: evasion practice. The game type was meant to teach budding storm riders to evade obstacles. What better way was there to learn that than by dodging SAINT's projectiles?

Arcs of electricity surrounded my favorite duck. Then, with a cry of his name, he launched a salvo of Thunder Waves at me. Thus began our game of tag.

I ducked the first bolt of lightning and used that motion to lean forward. I fell until my body was almost parallel with the floor then kicked off, leaving thin skidmarks in my place. I was much faster with ATs, but I'd yet to integrate them with my pyrobloin-based hover boots so I couldn't just condense water vapor to gain altitude. I'd effectively traded 3D mobility in exchange for additional speed because that was what I wanted to train at the moment.

SAINT had no trouble drawing a bead on me despite my increased speed. A second Thunder Wave lanced out towards where I was going, but I stomped my toe-stop onto the floor, swerving into a sharp turn that narrowly dodged the electrical attack. A third blast was avoided by speeding up with Agility.

"Pory!" he cried as he hovered at chest-level. Electricity crackled around him as he rocketed towards me. Spark, a simple enough move for him to improvise and the natural precursor of Wild Charge.

I grinned beneath my helmet. I had no intention of dodging. Instead, I braced my muscles and sprinted forward with everything I had. "Agility," I whispered, my voice drowned out in the sonic boom left in my wake.

I timed a boxer's straight with my lunge. SAINT's electrified head met my seastone knuckles in a shower of sparks. A deafening bang resounded through the cargo hold as our attacks met in the middle. It was an impact that should have smeared me across the walls. I felt my arm stiffen uncomfortably but that was the extent of any recoil, the wonders of Germa technology. As for SAINT, pokémon were made of sterner stuff. Add on the eviolite he wore around his neck, and there wasn't much I could do that he couldn't shrug off with a single Recover.

Neither of us took any real damage from that exchange, but one thing was for certain: I weighed more. My partner was launched back like a bullet, carried on my fist due to his lighter weight.

As I neared the steel wall, I jumped and thrust my feet forward. My ATs found traction and threw me up the vertical surface, leaving SAINT embedded behind me.

"That one's my win, SAINT," I called teasingly.

"Porygon! Pory!" he yelled after me.

I laughed as I skated along the wall. It was a brand new feeling. I knew I should feel dizzy, nauseous even, but I didn't, not with the solid sense type preserving my sense of balance. Feeling daring, I pumped Agility again, transitioning to the underside of a walkway. There were several of these around the hold, as well as large pipes that had been used for ventilation or temperature control.

I rode upside down and did not fall, my speed and friction preserving my run. But that didn't last. SAINT learned much from me, and one of those was "pettiness."

"Pory! Gon! Reee!" he trilled loudly, practically a battle cry for my diminutive friend. Then, the walkway I was skating on began to shiver and tremble.

"Oh, you bitch!"

"Gon!"

I could hear the smugness in that single chirp as he floated closer towards me. The walkway beneath my feet began to undulate like an ornery snake. He'd taken control over it with Magnet Rise and had begun to tear it out of place.

Thinking quickly, I hopped off and made for a nearby pipe. The pipe was as thick as my torso, making it one of the thinnest ones around. I landed with my legs somewhat spread apart, forming a large, "U" shape with my feet. The wheels of the ATs aligned with the curved surface of the pipe, spinning me around its surface in a corkscrew. Even then, never once did I lose my balance.

I crouched down and skid my seastone-tipped fingertips along the pipe's surface, creating a screeching noise somewhere between tortured metal and nails on chalkboard. It was enough to disrupt SAINT's control briefly, and to orient myself towards him.

I launched myself in a textbook "superhero" flying punch that decked the smug shit across the hold.

"Ree!" he shouted, more from shock than actual pain.

"Ha! Take that!" I got my feet beneath me and carried through the punch, turning it into a diving crouch that saw me land feet-first on an adjacent ledge, the second floor of the hold. That allowed me to carry right on running with minimal loss of thrust.

Belatedly, I realized that this had evolved beyond Hurdle and even Cube. I was comfortably "flying" now. This, this was Air.

"First person to touch the ground floor loses, got it?" I called in challenge.

"Gon!"

And so our game was on. When he tore away my road with Magnet Rise, I picked up a stray pipe or even a piece of sheet metal to act as floating steppingstones to the nearest wall. When he let loose a rapid-fire salvo of Thunder Waves, I countered with Protect before firing back with my own Thunder Wave. When he nearly cornered me, I made myself invisible for the slightest second while popping Agility, appearing behind him to hammerfist him towards the floor.

Ours was a contest of skill and technique, strategy and terrain control. It was everything we knew about combat rolled into one, and we loved every second of it. SAINT especially, I could see the battlelust so common among pokémon start to rear its head, that impulsive, instinctive need to get stronger. I couldn't allow him to fight capes, not because I didn't think he was strong enough, but because I wasn't strong enough: I feared that I wasn't ready for the backlash of having a true AI as a subordinate.

But I wouldn't hold him back. I swore I'd let him grow to be the best he could be, whatever that might look like. If that meant I'd need to be strong enough to give him the experience he so desperately craved?

Then so be it.

X

SAINT didn't come with me to school today. Instead, he agreed to supervise the weaving of Gregor's new outfit. With the last of my commitments to Faultline's Crew entrusted to him, I could focus on what I wanted to build: automation… kind of…

It was true that this was a critical part of my development as a tinker, but I lacked the supply chain to make full use of such a thing even if I managed something large-scale. And, I couldn't help but think that if I could get a contract with Big Rig, or maybe when my specialization changed to a more futuristic setting, I could have far more effective fabricators and automated manufacturing capabilities. I had only two weeks with Air Gear left.

I decided to automate the creation of Germa fibers, but nothing else, for now. My thoughts drifted instead to improving myself as an individual, not strictly as a tinker. Truthfully, I'd already made much of what I wanted this specialization such as the gravity child serum, Pledge Regalia, hybrid soda engine, and both the cores for the Water and Rumble Regalias.

To improve myself, I had two things that I truly wanted to build, as well as two things I truly wanted to master during my remaining specialization. The first was Key Mother, the Flame Regalia. While experimenting with After Burner told me that I'd never be the raw speed-type Kazu was without relying on aura to carry me through, its access to the Inorganic Net and Hole Nine Heaven's Door, I shit you not I didn't name this, was invaluable.

The Inorganic Net recorded every "trick" used by storm riders and Heaven's Door allowed the wielder of Key Mother to access and mimic all of them. Granted, I couldn't learn any new tricks for myself considering there were no other storm riders to record in the first place, but if I could sneak the scanners and data sticks onto the equipment of other athletes, I could use Key Mother to teach myself those same movements. Boxing? Karate? Kendo? Jujitsu? Krav Maga? I could learn them all so long as I could get an ace athlete to wear the data sticks.

Best of all, Amy couldn't even scold me over it. It wasn't like they'd lose their hard-earned skills after all.

The second thing I needed to build was my personal regalia. This morning's spar against SAINT convinced me: The Pledge Regalia's construction capabilities wasn't enough. I could become so much stronger, if only I could discover my "road."

As it stood, Key Mother was my regalia of choice, if only because it was the one that had access to Heaven's Door. But was that all I wanted to be? A copy of Spitfire, Kazu, and Aeon?

I offered Mrs. Currie a lackluster presentation on the current ongoings of the Canary trial and an analysis of jury selection then headed back to my seat to ruminate.

No, the more I thought about it, the more certain I became: I wanted a regalia that was uniquely my own. I had Water, Rumble, and Pledge in my hands at the moment. Of these, it was surprisingly the Water Regalia and its corresponding Lather Road that fit my Germa-style hover boots.

The principle of the Lather Road was that it condensed water vapor for aerial movement. Hell, with that kind of synergy, it'd take barely any effort to combine the regalia with my existing boots. Ōm, the original queen of this road, was so good at condensing vapor that she could pressurize air into rapidly spinning bubbles that both exploded on impact and could cut like a jet cutter. She called it "Bubblegum Crisis," not that I'd be caught dead saying that, but at least the theory was sound.

'Okay, that's one regalia,' I thought. I kept my eyes towards the front of the class as a pair of my classmates talked about something or other that the Vegas Protectorate was doing to combat white collar crime. 'What else? Can I combine that with Key Mother somehow?'

I had a eureka moment. Ōm released the pressurized water and air as bubbles, but there was no reason I needed to do the same. The Flame Regalia was best known for its blistering speed, but its most complex techniques could only be done by harnessing that monstrous friction and turning it into heat shimmers.

The bubbles rotated. Ergo, they generated friction. Probably as much as, if not more, than simply skating in a straight line.

I began to doodle a rough draft. 'Yeah… Let's keep the vapor condenser in the heels... Use the motors to compress water and rotate it… The output should be enough to generate enough friction, but how do I keep it from wearing out my boots in a matter of weeks… Oh, right, seastone. Shit can't be scratched.'

It was all coming together, a regalia born of Germa science, Water, and Flame. With it, I'd make the most of what I could already do, as well as gain access to the Heaven's Door.

First tings first, I'd make the data sticks. Then, I'd sneak them inside boxing gloves, belts of gi, kickboxers' shoes, and whatever else I could find. I could then program the Inorganic Net to parse out useless data from perfected techniques, something I didn't doubt SAINT could help with. After that, I'd build the Flame Regalia so I could access the Net.

As for personal training, I fully planned to integrate those skills into my repertoire later, but until my custom regalia was built, I decided to stick to mastering the Pledge Regalia. Already, I could dismantle my toy robot and my new goal was to disassemble and reassemble a vacuum cleaner from the Heist.

The bell rang and I packed my bag to head to lunch. Truly, there was too much to do.

Author's Note

Not much going on this chapter, but training is good too.

The speed of sound is roughly 767 mph. I love how casually it's used in anime and comics, sometimes so much so that even regular punks and street-toughs have "supersonic" feats in battleboarding. Truth is, in a more grounded setting like Worm, even getting close to that barrier is obscene.

Anyway, have an animal fact: Great frigatebirds, yeah, that's a real name, can stay airborne for two whole months. How? By sleeping in 10 second bursts. Crazy part is, they're not the record holders. The crown goes to the alpine swift, who can stay airborne for 200 days.