guitar
The Golden Snitch had been a friend. It was fast, it was durable, and it was precise. It knew exactly how to get the best angles. It was also one of your earlier creations, when you and Uber had both decided to become streamers and cape celebrities. You already know how it works.
Spring power. Well, mostly spring-powered. You'd have to wind it up, and that would get the levitation cores up and running. It worked on the same properties as the Hyperforge, except using three cores at once. At different angles, they could allow for complex kinds of movements, and giving it a lot of extra power meant it could flit around extremely precisely. Beyond that, the networking was pretty fun to play with. You'd have it broadcast through a subphase emitter, picked up by pirate stations you bribed, and they sent the transmission to the website you streamed on. This time, though, the Hyperforge is high enough, and has enough antennas to pick up the transmission. You might have some range issues, but with the Daemon as a secondary transmission point, and the Shining Drone as a third, you don't think you'll have any problems.
You keep humming to yourself, sketching it down- and then the Daemon rings. You sit up, glancing at the caller ID, and grin.
"Hello, Icarus here," You say.
"You contacted me about my yard?" Comes the voice. He sounds like an elderly gentleman.
"Oh, Mr. Maxon. Yeah, I was hoping I could purchase it from you."
"Oh yeah?" He asks, a little incensed. "You know exactly what happened, didn't you? You capes came in and fucked up my land, and now you want to buy it off me for a pittance?!"
"... I'm sorry?" You ask. "Sir, no, I just… I heard about what happened in that cape fight, and I know a lot of your stuff got damaged when Lung hit it. I was trying to make up for the damage, not take advantage of you."
In another day, in another age, the man would have been killed by the Merchants. The place left abandoned for years, allowing Squealer to grab whatever she needed from it for her tech. When the man died, you'd lost access to a nice place to get your stuff from. It seemed he didn't have much luck here, either. A different encounter with Lung fighting the Merchants over something else.
"Yeah? What use do you have for a bunch of slagged shit, huh?" He asks. " Not even them metal recyclers will take it."
"I'm responsible for the giant flying machine over the bay, sir." You say. "It can make use of the materials left in your yard no matter what its state it's in."
"Pff. Tinkertech recycling, huh?" He asks. "And why'd you want to buy the whole thing?"
"Well, uh, because I was planning on clearing it out. Taking everything," You say. "Then it, uh, wouldn't exactly be a salvage yard anymore. Just an empty lot, and you wouldn't be getting much money from it anymore. "
He goes silent for a moment.
"You seem an honest sort," he says. "Despite being one of them capes. If you can do what you say you can, then your fancy machine can tell you pound-for-pound what you're getting out of it?"
"Yes," You say.
"... You'll come by on thursday. Use your machine to strip my yard down to nothing, and you'll give me half of what it's worth."
"Only half?"
"'S better than my guys will pay for it." He says. "But I'm not selling you the yard."
"... Alright. It's a deal." You say. "Thursday, right?"
"We open at nine, close at five. Always have, always will." He says.
"I'll have to hover directly over your place. Is that fine?"
"Yeah. Supposed to rain, anyway. Could do with staying dry in the shade."
"Thank you. I'll see you then."
Negotiation: 46
Below, Maxon's Dump-and-Salvage is quickly disintegrating away, dissolving. Cables are being processed down into rubber and paper, and the damaged chain link fence along one quarter of it- damage from the last Lung fight- is melting away, being washed away by the shining light. You're gathering more and more resources from it.
The thinktank is working hard on processing, analyzing everything you could find about Coil, his men, and all the data you've gathered. It's already making progress, and you're starting to feel good about it.
So, you sit back. You close your eyes and relax. The Power Interface Device sits snugly on your head, and you close your eyes.
"... Let's make a design together," You say. The World-machine thrums.
"... Except I'll make whatever you want me to." You say.
After a moment- a heartbeat- everything, the pulsing, shaking worldmachine, the crackling networks, the roiling piles of flesh and crystal… it stops.
It rotates, focusing on you. You can feel a presence. Like it's staring you straight in the eyes.
Like it's asking if you're serious.
It's… some kind of tower.
That's the first thing you think when you see what the World-Machine is showing you. It's tall. Some kind of large beacon, or tower. There's a crystal at the tip, something impossibly complex. It's the only complex part of it. The rest of the design is important, various tubes and architecture, but with the hyperforge you could have it done in days. It's the crystal that's the most important. Some of it- most of it- you don't even begin to understand. The concepts seem to be blocked out of your mind, blackboxed. Things you're not supposed to know. Things you're not even supposed to be taught. You can see chemical refineries, energy amplifiers. This is a multitude of things, probably more keywords than you've ever seen.
You can see an intricate set of dials. All of the dials feel wrong. You're not sure why it has so many controls, so many variables, when you know that all of the settings- most of them- are just… wrong. There's so many incorrect ways to use it, and your power refuses to tell you the right way. You'd have to figure out the settings by the process of elimination.
"What… what does it do?" You ask, looking up at the hologram.
Static floods your mind. Your fingers spasm. Your hand moves in long, strict lines, sketching and labeling parts. Components.
At the top, in handwriting that isn't yours, are the words. The stats. Resource requirements in exact grams, the scale of the device in meters, notes on minor modifications to make depending on the longitude and latitude.
It's only one use. Once activated, it'll cease to function again.
Looking at it… makes you strangely hungry. Hungry for something that isn't food. You can feel it's your power, making you want it. And you do want it. Your shard has desires. You know that by now. Your partner, before Medea.
The name almost tells you what it's doing, too. Shardside means powers. It's trying to… make connections, extend outward. But it's also trying to subvert something. Break some rule, perhaps, or subvert powers? Your power chose to, when you first connected with it, make your deal, your power chose to try and force you to connect to other tinkers. And with each connection, you've been getting stronger. Taking portions of their powers, or something like that.
You look over the resource requirements. Most of it makes sense. Some of it is exotic, but Big Rig's matter converter should be able to handle it... Then you freeze.
You reread the fuel that this thing will take, that it'll be designed to process and refine.
60 kilograms of matter extracted from Blasphemy or Endbringer Unit.
That's… that's not going to be possible. Or it is, but… That's crazy. It's crazy as fuck. You'd need to just. Kidnap a fucking Blasphemy. Or attack an Endbringer.
As far as portions of your power, parts you'll sacrifice. You know it'll probably use shardtech-
Your hand reflexively twitches, scratching the word out as you write it.
It won't take anything from you. If you're making this thing, it's a present for your power- and it won't punish you for it.
You open your eyes again, pulling out of the connection, and look down at your notepad.
You clamber out, stretch, and let go of a breath you didn't even know you were holding.
"Warning," The Daemon says. "TIG is currently spiking out at 100% awareness."
You run over to it, examining the TIG closely. It's not burning out, but the crystal is shaking. Vibrating wildly. You're suddenly glad you reinforced it, and that you'd maintained it recently. It won't overload, and it won't break. It's just… Constantly on, now. Overloaded like this, you won't be able to use it to tell when you're being 'looked at', because now you're constantly being examined. By something stronger than Coil's power, or any other precog-
At that thought, you freeze.
You look at the notepad again. Matter from an Endbringer Unit.
… Oh. Oh, fuck.
"When did it start?" You ask.
"Twenty-seven seconds after you connected to the Power Interface Device." It says.
The most powerful precog you can think of is the Simurgh. She's the only thing you can think of that might cap out the TIG's capacity… and that means she's watching you. Or predicting you. Or trying to.
The fact that the TIG is actually working is what's more surprising than anything. It's actually working as a shield, or else it wouldn't be noticing her at all.
Then again, it could be other precogs. It could be *every* other precog. As if your future could be so all-consuming that you're crossing over every other timeline's toes, somehow.
The only worry is… if something goes wrong with the TIG. You can't exactly maintain it, not without turning it off. And if you turn it off… that might give them a window.
Somehow… that just makes you hungrier to finish it. If the moment you designed the thing, every precog in the world starts to notice…
The alarms start to blare.
"Fuck! What is it now?"
"Empire forces noted approaching from the west," the Daemon says. You look at the cameras, and there they are. They're all in force, standing not on chunks of rock or rubble- but on three pristine, metallic platforms, all slowly levitating.
Krieg, Kaiser. Menja and Fenja. Stormtiger, Alabaster. Even a half-dozen of Crusader's ghosts are raising around them- the assholes must have broken them out. Rune is crouched between Menja and Fenja, hands spread over the central platform.
There are more capes, too- at least three of them you don't recognize. The Daemon doesn't, either. They must be new. One of them has a hand on Kaiser's shoulder, and your sensors are registering… something, shardside.
"Lift, lift, lift." You say- and before the Hyperforge can even begin to ascend, spires of metal come exploding free from the ground. Faster and thicker than you've seen Kaiser's power work before, claws wind up and over the edges of the Hyperforge. The metal tries to dig into the hyperforge's walls, but they're too dense to. It's the claws on top of the hyperforge that's the problem- they're holding the forge in place, keeping it from ascending.
"Why don't you come out, Icarus?" Kaiser calls, hands on a megaphone. "We can speak like gentlemen."
"Oh, fucking joy." Medea sighs, contacting you. "I'll be out in a sec."
You mentally order the Daemon and Hyperforge to prepare to dissolve the roots of the claws holding you in place, and decide what to do next.You stare at the camera for a long, quiet moment.
Based on their number, their powers, even if they have some kind of crazy, power-boosting trump… you don't even know how they could get close enough to hurt you. Even if they pulled guns, you have your drones. You have your plugsuit.
You get up, and begin to walk. Your drone, connected through the Daemon, levels next to you, forcefield sub-drones holding pieces of your equipment. Voidwax gauntlet, wings, every piece you don't always have on you, you slowly attach. Extra canister of chemicals for the voidwax gauntlet, and an extra canister of ichor. Just in case.
Then you begin to walk. It takes you barely a minute or two to make your way to one of the external exits, and march straight on out through the blast doors.
Kaiser straightens his shoulders, takes a deep breath-
The Voidwax projectile rips free from your palm, slamming straight into Rune. She screams- a second after, one of the other capes steps forward, raising both arms. A translucent bubble appears around them- but it was raised too late. Rune is still twitching, trying to rip the thing off her face. The platforms they're standing on are starting to tremble.
Kaiser starts to yell something. Crusader's ghosts shoot toward you, though you can't see the man himself. Stormtiger is thrusting his palms at you, trying to fire blasts of pressurized air, but… you're too far away. They're falling apart before they can even get to you.
The trump reaches over to touch Krieg's shoulder, and the man takes two steps forward on the platform- and kicks off, throwing himself forward, through the air. The platform bucks- and then slams into the bottom of the translucent bubble, held aloft by the shield cape instead of Rune.
"Time delay." You say. Over your shoulder, Shining sub-drones- shaped like shields- shoot out and slam into Krieg, stopping him in place. He's hovering there, wrestling with them, and you fire another cluster of voidwax toward him. He stops it in the air with his power… and it explodes in his face.
Krieg falls.
The other platforms are shaking as well, though you see spires of metal reaching up to catch them.
Crusader's ghosts start to get close- and then they begin to fuzz out of existence, distorting and rippling away. Medea steps out from behind you, staff held level.
She swipes downward- and the ghosts crumble apart.
The entire hyperforge lurches, the last of Kaiser's spikes breaking free. As the hyperforge shoots upward, you hold a single hand out over the balcony… and flip the Empire off.
Then you turn around, nod to Medea, and walk back inside. Behind you, the blast doors slam shut.
Combat Results: 47, 94
"What the fuck was that?" Medea asks. "They were all out there."
"Their response to losing control." You say. "We've been chipping parts of them off. They've been losing fights to the ABB, and more groups are pushing in lately. Elite, Dark Society, that kind of thing. So Kaiser wanted to make a show of force."
"Yeah, I noticed that. Why would he have two changers standing on a platform that's clearly weight-limited like that?" She asked. "I mean, I like eye-candy as much as anyone else, but the giant bitches couldn't even grow without making their platforms collapse."
"He was posing. Or maybe he figured his trump would fix all of his problems for him," You say. "That… or he's got a precog that just started freaking out and panicked."
"Pff. Yeah, if he had any precog worth a shit he would have known not to fuck with us." Medea drawls. "Why would a precog freak out?"
You gesture toward the wall. "Show her the TIG's readout," You tell the Daemon, and one of the projectors light up the wall. Medea glances at it for a moment. Then frowns.
"... The fuck?"
"I was doing some designing work," You say. "And now it's like this."
"What did you design?"
"An experiment," You say.
Below, you can see PRT cruisers and vans trying to catch up to the fleeing Empire. Krieg is on his back, ambulance doors open as they cart him in.
"Well, shit. What's the plan now?" She asks. "Do we have one? Any other group wouldn't take a hit like this lying down. If we do, then that means people will see we didn't retaliate."
"Or that we didn't give a shit." You respond. "We're not like other groups, remember?"
"Fair." She says. "Still kind of irks me, though."
"Daemon, give a debrief of this event to the thinktank. Give me its analysis."
A moment later, it chirps, a screen popping up in your vision.
Combat Analysis said:
Crusader remains injured - video record of his ghosts display his physical state. Foot bound in bandages.
Three new Empire capes in generic costumes- new identities extremely likely.
Trump, ambiguous gender. Striker-based. Notable decrease in Kaiser's power use when applying boost to Krieg, indicating one target at a time. Consequences, downsides, side-effects unknown. Body language indicates uncomfortable with conflict. Likely new.
Shaker is identified as Otiluke. European shaker that establishes spherical, zones with preset effects. Can anchor effects to locations in space or to mobile objects. Wanted in United Kingdom for mass destruction and vault robberies.
Third unknown parahuman female, unknown identity. Lack of body language indicates extreme focus. Likely thinker of some variety.
Click to shrink...
Othala wasn't there. You knew that before, but Crusader's ghosts… You had video records of them. They still had injured feet. Othala wasn't with the Empire anymore, and you didn't know where she was.
"... Should I keep working on the Rulebreaker?" She asks.
"What exactly will it be capable of?" You ask.
"At this point… If I spend the time to finish it, it'll counteract parahuman powers." She says. "Override and Reinstate physical law based on a series of parameters taken from an arbitrary amount of time in the past. I'm not sure how long it'll last, and we'll have to hit them with a big fuckoff energy beam. But if it's more important, I can work on something else. Like, do we need heavier weapons? I can work on something like that."
You rap your fingers against the TIG's projection along the wall.
This is what happens when you spend too much time fucking around. Giving the gangs and villains time to group up, collect themselves, decide they can pull this kind of shit.
You called yourself Icarus- but all you've been doing is sitting in the labyrinth, panicking about the wax connecting your feathers to your wings. Metaphorically speaking. Every plan you've had lately, every thought process… you're falling back into bad habits. Falling back into the neurotic, 'come up with pristine perfect plans where nothing can ever go wrong' mode of thought.
And that's what killed you last time… so fuck it.
You promised yourself- and Jacey- that you'd make things better, but all you've been doing is jerking off in a corner. So you're going to actually do something. Soon.
"Medea… Do whatever you feel you need to." You say. You put a hand on each of her shoulders. "I trust you."
She locks eyes with you for a moment.
"... I'll keep working on it. And it's up to you to make sure we survive long enough for me to build it." She says. You nod.
"Good." You say. "But first, mind helping me with something?"
"What?"
"The Empire." You respond.
Medea's grin at you shows teeth.
The two of you shoot through the sky. Medea's crouched atop her servos, covered in thick purple velvet giving them the look of sheet ghosts. You're following along, wings spread, moving at a fraction of your normal speed. Your own Shining Drone follows along as well.
"Sorry, it's not my fault!" Glory Girl says. "I overhead the call. It's just that they don't know you super well, and my mom's like… super paranoid."
"It's alright, I understand." You respond.
She goes quiet for a moment. "Do… you want me to go on patrol, and uh, conveniently end up getting involved?"
You consider it for a moment.
"No, thank you though." You say, in the end. Having Glory Girl risk herself after calling and asking for backup… it would be a flimsy excuse, and would damage your relationship with New Wave's other members.
You hang up, and turn to Medea. "Anything on the Protectorate?"
"Probably not." She responds. "Gave me bullshit about how their capes are already recovering from a previous incident and won't be available. They're basically just bragging about capturing Krieg. Sounds like they'll be sitting on their asses."
"New Wave and Faultline are busts too." You tell her. "Faultline won't take these sorts of jobs in the same town she lives."
"So. It's just the two of us, eh?"
"Just the two." You say.
The two of you are coming overhead. It's a small, privately owned motel building, but there's a few too many cars and vehicles sitting in the parking lot. More people than are staying there, that's for sure.
You couldn't remember all of their names, but you'd been able to remember some of the outed capes. Max Anders was the big one, and through that you'd been able to recall most of the other names. With names and the Daemon… you got access to the cars they owned, their license plates. Even before the fight was over, you already knew where they'd parked their vehicles, where they'd gotten together to plan the whole thing. And that's where they'd be leaving.
"There's the scrub they've got keeping watch." Medea says. "Hasn't noticed us yet."
She holds out her staff. Her fingers dance along the fingertip contact points, like playing a musical instrument. The tip flickers for a moment. The man suddenly holds his stomach, starting to rush inside.
"... Laxative ray?" You ask. "Again?"
Medea's returning grin is as impish as you've ever seen as the two of you swoop in closer.
"Ten figures, speaking in a large room on the first floor." The Daemon analyzes, using your helmet's thermal scanners. "Densinometry indicates the standing figure is wearing dense steel armor."
You point toward it, and Medea nods.
The Shining Drone levels next to you, the crate sitting on its back. You pop it open and start grabbing canisters. These smoke grenades aren't like the handmade ones you'd played with before- they're idealized versions, designed by the Daemon and reconstructed using the Hyperforge. With the smoke, the flashbangs, and your improved senses… you'll be catching them by surprise.
You set down in the bushes along the wall, and note that all the blinds had been pulled, hiding the meeting from the outside.
"I'll cover you. Counteract any bullshit, especially the ghosts." Medea says. "My Teeth will be helping you."
From her hip, she flips open a canister. Four spheres of crackling light slowly drift up. She lifts a small wand- closer to a tuning fork- and flicks it toward the wall. The four spheres hover out against the surface of the wall, ready to shove themselves in- and rip themselves out.
"Ready?" She asks.
The Shining Drone lifts into the air, projecting various forcefield sub-drones. Your hands are full of various grenades… and you nod.
Medea flicks her wand. The spheres fuse themselves into the wall- and simultaneously, the wall rips itself free from the structure, humanoid forms stepping inward.
A woman yelps, inside- their new thinker, you assume- and you throw in the smokes and flashbangs. Sparks of light, explosions, and plumes of smoke go raging through the conference room. People scream. You can see their forms moving through the smoke, with your sensors, and you can see eddies of smoke start to form around one of their hands. Stormtiger. He could blow the smoke out.
"Target Stormtiger." You hiss.
Drones shoot in through the holes left behind by Medea's dragon's teeth, and spikes of forcefields project themselves forward, slamming into both of his hands. You hear a crunch and a holler.
People start rushing out the doors, disoriented and blinded, and you're sending them to the ground with streams of voidwax, peppering them with effectively taser blasts. The entire right side of the room is locked in place by a translucent sphere, and you can see Fenja angrily banging against the inside, trapped within. Menja is growing up and out through the rooftop, even as the Dragon's Teeth and the Shining Drones are keeping anyone from getting their bearings. People are using their powers, blinded, and in a cramped space like that- they're hitting eachother, accidentally targeting one another.
Kaiser steps out through the smoke, dragging a young man along with them. The man is still half-dressed in the trump's makeshift costume. The man is dazed, covering his eyes and ears. Spikes start to poke out from the ground, of metal, protectively-
And then a gleam enters Medea's eyes.
The servos behind her raise up. She gestures with her staff-
A thin wire shoots out, clamping onto the trump.
Both Servos shoot straight upward, and you see a glint of light as wires are extending out of their bottoms, into pulleys they'd bolted into the asphalt below them.
The Trump is ripped off his feet, sailing straight toward Medea- and out of Kaiser's hands.
"No!" Kaiser roars. Spikes of metal come shooting up around Medea, coccooning the two of them together. You begin blasting him with heavier and heavier shots of Voidwax. His armor is singing and being blasted, but the electricity doesn't seem to be shocking him- Spikes of metal around him seem to be acting as lightning rods, protecting him from the blasts.
A hand-drone, on your command, snags one of the Servo's velvet coverings and shoves it over Kaiser's head. From there, more forcefield limbs grab his arms and legs, pinning him in place.
Menja explodes out of the building. A titanic woman steps up, out of the building, a bunch of other capes in her arms. Unconscious or injured from the chaos. Rune, the thinker, and Stormtiger are limp in her arm.
Thunder booms, and the sky lights up.
Trails of lightning extend over the sky, writhing and twisting. They're not moving like lightning. They're moving like living things. The Daemon screeches, its voice lapsing into static. Your sensors are registering crazy radio-waves, powerful enough that everything's getting jammed.
Beams stretch over the horizon, from different parts of the city. Extending from different locations, coiling up and around the sky above you. A cloud is quickly forming in the air, a crackling, thunderous whirlwind.
Every car in the parking lot startsu p. Every light in the building turns on. Streetlamps flicker on around you.
With a screech of warped metal, the cocoon holding Medea in place pries itself apart. Fragments of metal are reshaping itself in the air, twisting and contorting. Miniature components are assembling themselves in the air around her.
Medea's eyes are glowing.
She's not even touching the staff. Sparks are flickering from her free hand to the surfaces of its control scheme.
The Trump's hand is clasped to hers, energy crackling into her body.
She tilts her head.
The fragments assemble themselves into a spire, hovering in the sky above.
Thunder booms, and lightning strikes the floating assembly. It crackles with power, surging with energy- and dissipates into a psychic wave. It washes past you and Medea harmlessly.
As one, the Empire collapses. Each and every member- injured, conscious or not- drops to the ground.
Menja, in the distance, collapses, her form reverting- and your drones begin dragging her closer.
"... So that's what a trump feels like." Medea says.
Then her eyes roll back into her skull and she slumps, unconscious.
The assembly- made of blasted, warped metal, now worthless, falls to the ground in pieces.
Leaving you, your drones, and Medea's various minions to deal with the result.
"Daemon, send the phase carrier," You say.
Combat: 75, 7
Medea: 100
As the drones pack Medea and the two unknown capes away, you hover over the battlefield. Alabaster is back on his feet again- having recovered- but it takes a few blasts of voidwax, and then clever use of duct-tape to keep him down. The Phase Carrier can't really be piloted, technically speaking, by an electronic device. You'd had to muddle together an analog control system for it, through the Daemon, and you're not confident enough to trust it with people inside, so you'll have to pilot it home. You do have the sub-drones close the door, though, and have it phase out for the next few minutes.
You hold the shining drone, its front camera facing you. Even in a helmet that has no face and no eyes, you know how to bob your head in the right way, how to emote.
"Hello, PHO." You say. "My name is Icarus, of the team Pandora. I was planning to introduce Medea, my partner. But, well, Brockton Bay's special little home-grown gaggle of neo-nazis decided they really didn't like being outside of prison anymore, and came a knocking."
You hold out the Shining Drone, slowly turning it in the air as it reveals the aftermath of the fight. Fenja on the ground, laying on Rune, bandages covering the girl's face. Otiluke bruised and bloody, attacked by the members of the group he'd trapped inside his sphere with them. Even Kaiser, slumped on his back, the metal of his armor already decaying like it had from the Hyperforge.
A bit of rubble from the building falls onto Kaiser's chest with a loud clang. You can hear the PRT's sirens coming close, and you turn it back to you again.
"What you're seeing is the aftermath of pissing Medea off." You let out a well-practiced, long-suffering sigh. "And now I'm stuck here cleaning up the mess. If you want to see what actually happened… stick around. I'll have some footage posted in the thread soon. Though, well, you may have already seen the biggest part, if you're anywhere in the state. And looked up."
With that, you cut the recording off. Package it up, have the Daemon write a thread, and post it online.
You pop your neck, and descend in front of Armsmaster. Amidst the wreckage and destruction behind you, you shrug.
"What… what happened here?"
"They assaulted Pandora's lab." You respond, your voice low. Then, in front of the PRT troopers, the various heroes, even Vista, standing wide-eyed at the surroundings… you spread your arms out, palms up. "So we had to send a message."
Alabaster, the only conscious one behind you, continues to squirm.
"I'd best hurry. Not sure how long Medea's little spell will keep them under." You say, and at that, the PRT begin to bustle.
Not that you're telling the truth. There's a bit of a psionic buildup in their skulls, slowly draining, suppressing their consciousness. It's impressive, and those on the outer edges of the field seem to have gotten less of it.
You sit back, outside one of the rooms in the Hyperforge, fiddling with the footage of the fight. You'd been posting it to the thread. Only scenes that made you look good, or scenes that made the capes look bad. You'd learned quite a few tricks about editing dynamic action scenes over the years, especially when cutting down your stream for compilations, and the plugsuit's control scheme- with the Daemon helping- is much better than any keyboard and mouse could ever be. The thread is surprised, and people are theorizing that you've paid an actual video editor to cut it for you.
Soon enough, though, the Daemon chirps. You glance at the camera, and see that one of the two Empire recruits you'd met have woken up. The trump.
He snaps awake, eyes opening wide. He's looking around what appears to be a completely normal bedroom, at first. A bed. A desk. A wardrobe set into the wall, and a shelving unit, completely barren. But then he notices the small hints of advanced tech. The light panels. The LED strip along the door, a red light indicating it's locked. The keypad and intercom system.
You give him a few seconds to realize what's going on, and where he is. He pulls the blanket aside to see that he's still in his costume, and that you hadn't really taken a look. Once you think he's had enough time, you connect to the intercom.
"Hello, I see you've regained consciousness." You say. "May I come in?"
You wait a few moments. Then a few more.
"Y-yes." He responds, and his voice is higher-pitched than you'd expected. He's not a kid, but he's not really an adult, either. He's got a thick accent, too. You're not sure exactly how to place it- something european, for sure.
You step in through the door. He tenses upon seeing you.
"Hello," You say. "I'm Icarus, though you probably already knew that."
He nods twice, and you notice that the little brown flaps on the sides of his brown hood is supposed to resemble a bear.
"Do you have a cape name yet?"
"Yes. I'm Berserker." He says, quietly.
"Did you pick that name yourself?" You ask.
He shakes his head.
"Do you have that name because of your power?"
"L-loss of control. Increased power. Sometimes other things." He nods.
"Are you from the Bay?"
"N-no." He responds. "Krieg sent for me. B-bought me."
"... From Gesellschaft?" You ask, and he flinches, hard. "Sorry."
"It's… okay." He responds slowly. "Where am I?"
"You're in the Hyperforge, right now, while I decide what to do with you."
"The flying machine?" He asks, his eyes twinkling slightly. He's trying to hide it, but he's a little excited at the concept.
"Yep."
"... Okay." He says, and seems to relax a little.
God. This kid. He's… he's more like a victim, than anything. You can see it in him. Not just his body language, but his costume. His name. None of it's his, it's all something someone else put on him. For all you know, he was 'made', like Night and Fog were supposed to have been.
He starts to quail, shrinking into himself as you think- and then the Daemon chirps again, showing you that the Thinker's just woken up.
"Alright. I'll give you some privacy. For now, you'll have access to this room, the closet, and the bathroom connected to it." You say. "I'll get you some basic supplies and toiletries, food, that sort of thing. There's a screen built into the desk, and you can use it to watch television or youtube or whatever. You just have to ask the computer if you want to watch or play something. Is that alright with you?"
"... Yes. That's fine. Thank you." He says. You order the Daemon to have the drones set all that up, and make your way out of the room.
Interrogation: 65
"Ooh, you've got the beautiful princess kept in your tower, haven't you?"
It's the first thing the thinker said when you entered the room. She's sitting in the chair, lounging casually back. She's exuding an aura of confidence, of supreme capability. Her mask- a masquerade mask in all black, with sharp-looking crow feathers- does a lot to cover her eyes and expression, but…
"Sorry. Not tower. It's the sixth room to the left. Third floor down. Centrally located so that the security systems has extra distance to tag me if I escape, right?" She asks.
"How do you know that?" You have the Daemon use your voice, keeping it as neutral as possible.
"Heh. Wouldn't you like to know?" She asks- and as she does, you push the Thinktank to answer. Possible way she might know, anything accessible by human senses.
"Vibrations." You have the Daemon respond. "Room is adjacent to the central spine section. It's also likely Kaiser had you examine the Hyperforge before. You know roughly how it's shaped. You saw pictures of it mid-construction, so you probably know there's a central shaft."
"Or maybe I picked it from your mind, hm?" She asks, drawling. It's a subtle confidence that might work, well, if you didn't already know who she was before she even woke up.
You've seen that smirk too often.
"Let's just get to the part where you think you've one-upped me somehow," You say. "Why the hell'd you end up with the Empire, Tattletale?"
At that, she flinches, hard. Her eyes widen. She tries to play it off, a fake laugh.
"Oh, you went out of your way to learn my name, did you? If you want to get-"
"Or would you prefer Lisa?" You ask.
She pauses.
"... How- you- You've got an in with Numberman, don't you?"
You don't respond.
She stares back for a long moment.
"... Fine. Yeah. Tattletale. That was going to be my cape name."
"Going to be?"
"Hard to say no when you've got a bunch of nazis demanding you use your powers for them," She says. "It wasn't fucking easy to point them at you so I could get out before I got known too well."
"... You pointed the Empire at me?"
"Well, yeah." She says. "You ended up taking them apart in the end, didn't you?"
"... Fair."
She presses her fingers against her eyes, suddenly weary. "... I've got to know. How the fuck did you know what my name was going to be? I don't even have the paperwork yet. And it couldn't be Numberman."
"Tinker bullshit." You respond.
"Fuck. Alright." She says. "So. What happens now? You've got sweet old me bundled up, nobody knows I exist except the nazis you and Miss Psycho captured-... and I just admitted to being the reason the Empire attacked you. Shit."
Tattletale used to be way better than this. Well, this is early on in the timeline, actually- she's probably pretty new.
"And your power isn't working on me right now," You add. "Even if you weren't pushing up against a thinker headache."
"Because you have an AI using your words with your voice," She counters. "And you've locked down your armor."
"So you can't read my microexpressions. Or my voice." You respond. "Since your power works purely off human senses."
"Oh yeah? How'd I know what floor I'm on, then?"
"Barometric pressure. Either your inner ears or your lungs should be able to tell you that."
She lapses into silence.
"... Alright, fine. You've won, your thinker-dick is bigger. What are you going to do with me?"
"... Ever hear of Coil?"
"Small-time gang leader. Kaiser's worried about him, thinks he'd kidnapped Othala. Other than that, I don't know much. Why?"
"Just wondering." You say. As far as you can tell, she's telling the truth there
"... Right." You say, finally, and you let your real voice speak instead of having the Daemon do it. "Here's the thing, Lisa. Tattletale. Whatever you want me to call you."
"... Tattletale." She responds. It's a way to separate herself. A name she'd planned to use, but hadn't yet. You can tell she's trying to keep herself from investing herself emotionally.
"What… do you want?" You ask. "As a cape? In life? What are your goals for the future? Your aspirations?"
"What is this, a job interview?"
"If you'd like it to be." You respond.
Tattletale blinks.
"Well, uh… I want to be safe. Protected." She says. "Free to make my own choices."
"And if that's done? If you're left to your own devices. What would you do with it?"
"I'd work on securing that safety." She says. "Build power and influence. Keep me and mine safe."
"... Then you might not be a good fit for Pandora." You say, with a sigh.
"Yeah? Why's that?" She asks, almost abrasively.
"We didn't pick our names out of a hat," You say. "I chose Icarus specifically for a reason. He flew too high. He reached too far, and failed. Medea is a witch who was cursed by the gods, fought the impossible, and only barely clawed her way into a happy ending."
"Pandora's box. Looking for the hope at the bottom of all the evils of the world." She says. "... You're S-class hunters."
"Quarantine zones, Slaughterhouse, Broken triggers," You say. "Endbringers."
"You're a lunatic." She says. "This is just a complicated way of killing yourself. If this is a job interview, I don't think I want this job."
"Then go. I'm not going to make you stay." You say. "Your power would be extremely useful, but I'm a tinker. I can just build a computer."
Impulsively, your helmet unlatches itself with a hiss. The faceless mask falls off.
Your eyes lock onto Tattletale's bottle-green eyes.
"But when you're done running. When you find a place to stay. Seattle, or Boston, or New York. When you have a small team you're running, some understated thieves or some infobroker group… what will you do when the end comes?"
Lisa looks so much younger than you're used to. Sixteen, maybe a few months after triggering. She's not the experienced cape you remember. She's pale.
"What will you do when Behemoth steps on you? When a Master puppets your limbs? When someone finally bursts out of the Birdcage? When Jack Slash gives you a glasgow grin? If you want to build something, fine. Do it. I won't stop you. I won't point a gun at your head and demand you help. But here's the thing. Every single place on this planet… none of it is stable ground. Not in a world full of monsters. Not in a world spinning toward hell."
Tattletale can't pull her eyes away from yours. Something in your stare has her locked in place.
She touches the corner of her mouth, as if to reassure her that it feels like it should.
"You're a precog."
"Something like that." You respond. Your grin shows teeth.
Blood on your hands. Balminder's corpse. Splinters in your hands. The World-machine, writhing and ticking in your mind, her cables coiling around your spine.
"How long?" She asks.
"I don't know what happens after twenty-twelve. It was all just my own personal Bad End." You say. "But my recommendation is, get out of the Bay."
Tattletale pauses. You can tell she's panicking internally. She's partially flinching, pushing at her power. She doesn't like what she's getting.
"Fuck you." She snaps. "Fuck you. You could have just let me leave. You didn't have to tell me this shit."
"You would have dug it up anyway," You respond.
She sighs in a way that proves you're right.
"Fuck you." She says a third time, though it has less heat in it. "... Will I at least get paid?"
"In data, tinkertech, and cash." You respond.
"Tinkertech?" She asks.
You flick a wrist.
Screens pop up, displays. Scan data. Everything your sensors had picked up during the fight with Medea.
Tattletale's eyes widen.
"I've already got a design for a little video drone, as high-def as it gets."
"... You should have led with that." She says, breathlessly.
"I knew her from last time." You tell Jacey. Her arms and hands are bandaged up, and you'd taken care of them as best you could. Her fingertips had split, components pouring out of them during the fight, and her power hadn't seen it necessary to repair the damage afterward. "Good power. Brilliant, really. A strong analysis Thinker, only drawback being her lack of endurance. And being kind of a bitch."
"Good," Jacey says. "Information's good. How about the Empire? The rest of them get arrested?"
"Every last one." You say. "They even have Alexandria coming down to keep an eye on things. Or they're supposed to, according to what I heard. Oh! And we got the bounties for them. It's not a lot of money, but it's an extra splash.
"Oh nice!" Jacey says. "What about that other kid? The trump?"
"I talked with him a bit. He's not really sure what to do, but he's scared of being sent back to Europe. Poor kid's never really made a decision in his life, so I'm just letting him stay around the Hyperforge for now. Giving him space and time to figure out what he wants to do."
"Alright." She says. "... Man, that kid…"
"What was it like?" You ask. "Having your power, uh, juiced up?"
"Well, it hurt a fucking lot when my hands split open." She says. "Crystals and weird microchips ripping themselves out did not feel good. But beyond that, it was like… I connected to everything I'd built. There was a range to it, but I could feel my weather machines all over the place. I could even feel a bit of your tech, and some of the cars and cellphones around. And as soon as I considered doing something, or when my power gave me a bit of inspiration… I was already doing it. Like my brain had short-circuited, I couldn't actually make decisions. Thought and action were the same thing."
She frowns and glances down at her hands.
"... I think that kid's power might not be good to use, long-term." She says. "It was like I stopped being me, and just started to be my power. It was pure luck- pure chance- that my power decided to knock everything out. It could have been just as likely that it decided to finish my F-Driver, or convert the hyperforge's laser into something more… destructive. It's like a coin flip, at least for me."
Then she glances up at you. Jacey's eyes locking onto yours.
The computer chirps. Data on Coil. the Thinktank's done its processing, completely, and-
"Hey," Jacey says, finally. "Thanks for talking me up on PHO."
"You're in this for the cred, after all," You say.
"Oh, and just the cred?" She asked, eyes flickering. Slowly, she sits up. "What if I have a secret, second goal?"
"What goal would that be?" You ask- and suddenly she's got her bandaged arms slung over your shoulders, her lips pressed against yours, and asdf ghjkl-
She tastes like mint.
A long, long moment later, she pulls away, a satisfied smirk on her face.
"... I could feel your tech, too." She says, finally. "The care, the obsession. The passion you put into it…There's nothing more attractive than that."
Then, after a moment-
"Well. Shooting energy blasts at nazis is a close second place, in my book." She purrs, and leans forward again.
Jacey's frame is slim, bony. It's nowhere near as delicate as you expected- she's much too fit for that- and she's anything but soft.
Despite that… cuddling with her, holding her close… it feels right. It feels right in a way that you'd never expected.
"... Took you long enough." She drawls.
"I wasn't about to- " You stammer, and pause. "I mean-"
"I get what you mean. You're too focused on this stuff. Your impossible quest." She says.
"It's just… bigger than me." You say, slowly.
"Bigger than me, too?" She asks.
You hesitate to respond-
And Jacey nods.
"It is." She says. "I don't expect to be your biggest focus. We've all got something bigger to work on. But I think you like me just as much as I like you." She says.
"Yeah," You say, with a nod, and lean in to kiss her again.
"I know you want me to build the Tower, but I don't have the fuel for it yet." You say aloud to yourself. You're torn, between upgrading the Leech Device and building the Tower. Out of the two, you decided to go with the one that will give more immediate results.
You're looking through the Thinktank's analysis of Cranial's tech, the small advanced emitters, and all of the historical data on the Leech Device. Figuring out which emitters should be replaced, and where you can expand and rewire the old ones for greater scan depth.
The intercom beeps, and you look down to see that Tattletale's messaging you.
"What's up?" You ask, accepting the call.
"I'm still getting situated with this creepy ass supercomputer." Lisa says. "And I'm still not entirely sure what my job is here. Do you just want me like, telling the computer what I think?"
"That's how I set up the software-"
"You mean that's how you told your AI to set up the software," She interrupts.
"Yeah, exactly." You respond.
"Right now it's just giving me lists of data. Tinkers, right now, with some kind of before and after thing. And your AI's also requesting that I do some research on parahuman studies so I know what most of these terms doing. Is that what I should be doing?"
"Yeah. Ideally you won't be doing much with the tinkertech, but this is one of the devices I've built that I really don't understand well. Any information we can get on it would help."
"Hence the data." She says. "... Wait, you really just… took away a tinker's entire ability?"
"Like I said," You say. "I wasn't exactly sure how it would work."
"Right. I'll just keep researching."
"Thanks," you say.
The two of you chill in Jacey's bedroom, watching the full screen display as the movie's credits run. She's all but sitting in your lap, nestled into your side. Her arms are still bandaged, and you can tell by the twitching that she wants to do something- she's getting antsy.
"So, uh, what are we now?" You ask, and Jacey snorts reflexively- it offends you a little "Hey."
"Sorry, sorry." She says. "That's just like, such a cliche thing to ask. I wasn't expecting it."
"It's still an important thing to figure out." You say. "Uh, make sure we're on the same page, have the same expectations. You know."
"I dunno. We'll end up being whatever we end up being," She says, and raises her still-wrapped fingers, wiggling them. "Just don't expect any handjobs for a while."
You can't help it- your cheeks burn, and Jacey begins to cackle at your expression.
"We'll go steady," She says, finally. You raise your eyebrows.
"Who even calls it that anymore?" You ask.
"Hey, you knew what you were getting into when you started flirting with an older woman," She responds.
You roll your eyes.
"Alright, now get out of my hair," She responds. "I've got to do some programming while I can't tinker, or I'll go crazy."
"Fair." You respond. Your power had stopped screaming to have you tinker for a moment, but you can feel the impulse. "I've got stuff to work on too."
You start to get off of her bed- then stop, turn back, and share one more kiss.
It's with delicate fingers and careful work that you connect the new components. The small, bioorganic nodules in the center of Cranial's work seems to suit the design perfectly. The smaller, sub-emitters will suppress the majority of the brain's activities, resulting in slowed neurological function, clearing up the scan for the more powerful scanning tools. Articulated limbs will orient directly on the pollentia corona. Your studies on Glory Girl's power, and the psionic wavelength that it follows gives you a good hint as to why Cranial's components are organic in the first place- they're psionic in nature themselves. The direct interlink allows for a stronger, more stable connection for the Leech Device.
Much stronger means much more dangerous, of course. There's a lot more chance of negative side-effects to the leeched, now, as far as the data is telling you. More chance of taking everything.
But with the increased stability, it's given you another option. You can use that stability, the boosted fidelity, to keep the leeching at a low-power mode. Minimal side-effects, at the downside of minimal gain.
While you wire in the new option, the intercom begins to flash again.
"Hey, boss." Tattletale chimes in. "I've got some results on your leech device."
"Yeah?"
"First off, every cape you've pulled from, you've taken their main specialty." She says. "Leaving them with stuff they've, uh, derived over time, or their secondary specialties. You know how a tinker branches out over time? It's like you've taken the trunk, and left them the branches. A second application of the leech would take the rest, I'm sure."
"Okay, makes sense." You say. "You said first off?"
"Well… " She hesitates. "I'm pretty sure it does one of two things. I don't know the exact reasons why it does either thing, but at least twice it's put a cape into the same, uh, Cluster as you. Possibly."
"A cluster?" You ask.
"Take this with a grain of salt, since I'm not completely sure. But it's a parahuman science thing- a Mosaic Power Expression. A group of capes trigger at the same time, and they all end up with a grab-bag powerset, each of which has a little bit of eachother's powers, tweaked a little. There's a lot of weird interactions between their powers when they interact with eachother."
"Yeah?"
"Psychological stuff, too. Have you ever heard of the Kill/Kiss dynamic?"
"... Yeah." You say, finally. You've heard of that. "You said twice."
"Yeah. It looks like that's how this device takes stuff. It did it once with… Blasto, as far as I can tell, and ST, whoever that is- " She pauses. "... String Theory? Jesus christ, you used this thing on String Theory?!"
"Yep." You say.
"Fuck. Well, my thought is that getting in fights or interacting with those capes will have side-effects on you somehow. I have no clue where to get started on what those might be. Could be anything from taking their specialties back if they get a hand on your tech, or strengthening their power- at cost to you- under the right circumstances. My power says under friendly circumstances."
"I see," You say- and your immediate thought is Jacey. "What about the others?"
"Well, this Skip and Squealer had completely different results. Similar results to you, but from my read it looks like you outright took a chunk out of their powers. They've been weakened like the cluster group. If my read is right, Squealer's become the new cape Overdrive, in the Boston Protectorate. A Trump/Tinker, limited to modifying the work of other tinkers. She's using refurbished versions of villain tech right now."
"And Skip?"
"He was branching out into teleportation tech, when he was Leeched. Now that's all he has, and he's making the most of it. Getting further than he would have without it, in my opinion."
You look down at the Leech Device. Improved like this, with the high-power and low-power modes, that means you might be able to decide which result you want. Or at least have more reliability.
"Oh, boss. One more thing."
"Yeah?"
"... that thing will kill somebody." She says. "I think you've just been lucky that everyone survived. But I'm sure that it's deadly."
"I know." You say. " But thank you for reminding me."
"... Sure thing, boss." She says, and hangs up.
You take a deep breath, and let it out.
Kiss/Kill. Is that why you and Jacey got together so well? Is that why you're together now?
… Is your partnership with her why the Countdown technique you'd taken from her has been less reliable