7.1

7.1

Sunday, 1st​ May

Setting the screwdriver down on the desk, you rubbed your eye with the butt of your palm.

Sleep hadn't come easy the night before.

You had debriefed to Shrugg well enough, after getting him to agree to arrange some crisis management training at some point in the relatively near future, and he had been anything but critical of your performance. Given the circumstances, in fact, he had mostly just expected you to either blow your cover completely – it's what Cinereal would have wanted, after all – or to freeze up and allow Inheritance to take over the entire event. That you'd managed to thwart it and bring two of them in was enough to make his day and allow him to brush off the collateral damage of the broken venue wall from Crumplezone's truck, or the giant chunk of pavement destroyed by Anchor's' weighted stone.

Apparently it wasn't a new tactic for Inheritance. Show up at some kind of event that they deemed degenerate, incite a riot, and then lead it through the streets before vanishing at the first sight of real trouble. Anyone who bothered to look into things would know that it was rigged from the start, parahuman incitement, but the kind of people who just heard about a ruckus from a friend of a friend would have the idea of some kind of sub-culture just kicking off for no reason and running wild in the city.

That kind of reputation was what Inheritance loved to work with, and they'd been fanning the flames of it for years. Without Interlocutor to work with anymore, there was a good chance that things would slow down on that front. Of course, they had other figures who could cause some trouble, but nobody that had such an ease of crowd control, and as Shrugg had detailed the past cases of similar action you couldn't help but feel satisfaction about destroying the villain's megaphone.

On Shrugg's request, you had run a quick question through Percentile to figure out the likelihood of a breakdown; seeing the logic in it and remembering Miss Militia's wound from the Empire's attempt at a similar thing, you hadn't argued. The result was ambivalent; there was a roughly thirty percent chance that they'd try something, and only a ten percent chance of it being successful. You couldn't tell Shrugg the scenarios that would produce success, but it was easy to imagine some of them. If they struck while you were busy elsewhere, for example, or when Cinereal was out, they'd probably have more success.

Without the inclination to tether one of the two of you to the building, however, it was just something to keep in mind when assigning security and a note for Flashdrive to focus his drones to track any potential incoming threats in the immediate vicinity over the next few weeks.

Pushing for more information from Shrugg, you'd managed to confirm that Tritium was going to be okay. Scattershot's bullet had passed through her shoulder and bled heavily, but it had missed her brachial and subclavian arteries, punching a hole in her lung and scapula on exit, but with fairly rapid care she had been stabilised and transferred to a hospital bed. She'd been offered recovery under PRT auspices and had refused it – apparently not for the first time.

Tritium was an odd figure. You'd heard about her briefly before coming to Atlanta, given the fact that she was visually prominent enough that people took note of her even as an independent, but her radioactive downsides were a real problem. Everything you knew about her told you that she generally took that into account, but she had been more reckless than you could possibly approve of during the fight with Inheritance and you couldn't put a finger on why exactly she might have been so worked up. Worked up enough to forget the risks of her power. Worked up enough to forget the risks to herself.

The situation wasn't the same – far from it – but watching her slump to the ground after taking the shot reminded you far too much of watching Rachel scream and collapse after beating Hookwolf into submission, and it put a dense weight in your stomach to think about.

Without many other avenues to pursue (searching for her in a hospital obviously out of line, given the need for both her secret identity to be preserved and your own) you had settled for sending off a message on PHO. Slotting it in after shooting a message to Vicky telling her what happened, and another to Dad giving him the same brief, wasn't too difficult. From the looks of her account, she was active but quiet, and you could only hope that she'd see fit to respond sooner rather than later.

While you weren't certain, you thought that you had the ability to help her. You'd managed it in a broad sense during the conflict; your Pixie Dust had stuck close to her skin and held back any radiation even as it amplified, but you weren't going to be with her every time she went out and even if you were, there were limits to what kind of hero work someone could do while glowing with rose-light. There had to be another way around things; something that you could offer her to help the problem in a more sustainable way.

Scanning seemed like the obvious first step. There was a lot left before you could truly identify powers – you didn't even really know where to start with that yet – but radiation was a physical process with known boundaries and your scanners could work with that. Getting a read on exactly what she put off might be a road to finding a solution. Even if it wasn't quick, it might be practical, and that's always something.

And so you were back in the lab.

'You managed to get it all in, there?' Flashdrive asked as he picked up the drone's cranial module. 'Doesn't look like much.'

'Nothing I make looks like much. It's all really small, that's the approach.'

He shrugged and took a closer look, before pressing a button. A flickering blue light shot out from the artificial eyes – camera lenses made up with Flashdrive's personal flair for aesthetics – and swept across the room in front.

It wasn't anything special. Once you had worked out the scanners for your own costume, replicating them seemed easier and easier every time, and as you'd made up the sixth such example to go in the second eye of Flashdrive's drones, you felt like the process could almost be done on instinct. The only thing limited you was speed, and that was something that you couldn't do any quicker. Tools only went so far, and while the PRT's enormous generosity had blessed you with enough equipment to work on the smallest of scales, you were held back by the clumsiness of fingers. Some form of smaller, automatic construction tool that could work on those scales seemed practical, but it would take quite some dedication to get it done. Maybe something for later.

'Looks good to me, I'll see if I can get it hooked up to my databanks. Log it all in real time.'

'Let me know if you need anymore. I feel like I could make these in my sleep, by now.'

'It's impressive. Scanners this small, you could almost take anywhere.'

It took a lot to resist rolling your eyes.

He wasn't wrong, of course, but you were the one who had been thinking exactly the same thing, only to show up without your costume and thus without your scanners precisely when it might have come in handy at the concert.

'Didn't do me much good yesterday.'

'You can't blame yourself. Nobody has their costume on them all of the time. You think Alexandria hits the grocery store in the helmet?'

Resisting a snort, you looked down at your work and examined it. Taking your mind of the situation felt like a good way to go about things.

'Look,' Flashdrive said, sitting opposite you on your work-table. 'I get that you think things went to hell in a handbasket, but honestly, it could have been a lot worse. Sometimes you just have to learn to take a victory when it comes instead of being upset about the things that could have been better.'

'Sure, but keeping a costume accessible just makes a lot more sense. If I had taken a bag with me, I could have put it in there. No problems, and then when things went badly it would have been right there.'

'And if they didn't, you would have been carrying around a threat to your identity in public that could have been discovered if you tripped over your feet and dropped the bag. You have to accept that if you had reasons not to take it in the first place, those reasons were probably convincing. You're only saying they're bad now because of hindsight. You're not a psychic.'

Looking back up, you locked eyes with him. The intensity of your gaze must have spoke volumes, because Flashdrive didn't take long to continue.

'Well, sure, not entirely psychic though.'

He stood up and moved back over this side of the room, hands resting on his lower back as he examined the drone he had been fitting your scanners into.

'I've got an idea that's been on the back burner for a while. Never managed to get it to work because it's just way too big to be practical. Portable, sure, but convenient? Not really. How about you take a look and see if you can find a way to scale it down? If it works, it might solve your problem.'

Intrigued, you gave a vague gesture of assent with your hand that might have meant yes or no depending on any number of factors, but luckily the older tinker knew what you meant.

'Portable outfitter, basically. Around the size of a briefcase. Costume goes in, you put your details into the computer onboard, and when you need it you can basically just let it put your costume on for you. Instant disguise; problem is, you have to carry a briefcase around with you. Not very helpful for most people. But if you can take it smaller?'

There was no need for additional explanation. You understood the practical need for size. There were parts of parahuman costumes that simply didn't compress; your helmet was an excellent example. While you were sure that it wasn't indestructible, the limits it had were something you hadn't yet reached. Trying to stomp on it to see if it could handle that much impact felt like something so stupid that you had never worked up the courage; if it didn't work, you'd probably break your foot and if it did, you'd be out a lot of money for a very expensive helmet that you'd grown pretty attached to.

But if what Flashdrive had already worked, clearly he'd managed to work his way around that to some extent. Things like helmets lying flat enough in a briefcase to be concealed didn't make sense; there had to be some kind of tinkertech explanation. Such a device was useful even with t he bulk. If you could get it even smaller – maybe the size of a cell phone or less – then your problem would be solved.

'I'm definitely interested in taking a look.'

'Nice. I'll bring it in later in the week, it's in storage right now. Been sitting on that for a while.'

Contemplating, you wondered whether one day you too would have a closet filled with half-completed tinkering ideas. Things that had possessed you with enthusiasm only to run into some sort of road-block that held you up, or that got passed over when something else caught your eye out of either novelty or urgency, never to be revisited.

A vault of almost-genius. The mark of a tinker, in some ways; what kind of treasures must Armsmaster have tucked away, waiting for the day he could finish it? Dragon? Maybe you'd get the opportunity to ask one day.

With that to look forward to, you packed up and left the workshop. It was still early afternoon, and you had a few things that you needed to get finished.

First stop was by procurement. Flashdrive had pointed you in the right direction, and you remembered stopping off there to pick up containment foam for Regent before leaving on patrol with Scrivener; it was a little strange you had seen less of Alec and Rachel since finding out his name, and you resolved to go out on patrol with them later in the week. You were due some more work hitting the street and being visible anyway, so making sure that you used it to stay in touch with your original trio made perfect sense.

Containment foam, however useful, wasn't the goal though.

Having experienced just how useful some of your powers could be even without relying on some of the more obvious abilities that you had made into stables, you had been thinking a little on ways that you could pull in other powers to diversify your methods of attack and battlefield control. Feeling as lost as you had without your costume, watching while Interlocutor had stirred up the crowd and not really having any instant solutions was something you felt uncomfortable with, and you were determined to get rid of that feeling once and for all. Preparation augurs positive performance, after all, and you were determined to maximise every minute you spent in costume.

When you arrived at the armoury, there was a PRT officer manning the station.

'Hey.'

'Hey. How can I help?'

'I was wondering if it would be possible to put in a request for something a little non-standard. Is there any paperwork I need to fill out for something like that?'

'Depends on what it is. Might already have something in store you can take. Be surprised the things we got.'

His voice was gruff, and you got the feeling that he might have been with the PRT since before you were born. While most of his body was covered in standard issue armour, he had his helmet resting on his knee and without it covering his face, you could see his beard was speckled with a healthy dusting of grey.

'Lighting, mostly. I have a power that works with controlling shadows, so anything that would help make more of them would be a good start.'

The man turned to the screen near his seat and types a few things in. Slow, halting typing using only a single finger on each hand, like you had seen a few times from the older teachers at Winslow.

It took him a few minutes before he said anything. From what you could tell, he was scrolling through some menus and occasionally entering a new word on the keyboard, but exactly what he was looking at was beyond your knowledge. Eventually, though, he turned back and cleared his throat.

'Obviously, making whole places dark, especially outside, isn't easy. No shadow generators or anything, sorry to say.' You nodded, having expected that much. 'Best course of action for now is probably setting up lights to make your own shadows. Shine them from behind an obstacle, cast the shadow. With me?'

'I'm with you. That's pretty tricky though. You don't always know in advance to set things like that up.'

He laughed, a gritty sound like sandpaper over wood, and you wondered if he was a smoker. It certainly sounded like it.

'Don't I know it. We got three options. Well, I guess two. Either you can take what we have – which is powerful flash lights and light emitting sensors, the kind that light up when things come nearby, which would make a shadow – or you can put in a custom request and we can see if there's a tinker somewhere in the network who can help. Your choice.'

Thinking about it, the option was pretty clear.

'I'll take what you have, for now, but I'll think about putting in a custom request and get back to you on that one.'

'Sure thing.'

The man hauled himself off his seat and moved back into the room behind him, sorting through some keys on a heavy chain attached to his belt before he could unlock the door, and vanishing inside. It only took him a few moments to return, and when he did he was holding a flash light the size of two of your fingers put together and a small soft bag.

Both items were placed on the table in front of you.

'This flash light has an adjustable brightness from five hundred to twenty thousand lumens. Turn the collar clockwise to go up, anti-clockwise to go down. Don't point it in anyone's eyes on high settings unless you hate 'em. Needs charging. Flashdrive's internal batteries last a long time but they are not infinite.'

You nodded, taking it from him and tucking it into one of the loops on your belt. It was much smaller than you would have thought for something of its power, but you weren't going to complain; some of the benefits of PRT investment and research, you supposed.

'These,' he opened the drawstring bag and pulled out a small glass pyramid the size of a grape, 'are the sensors. Bulb in the middle with a sensor attached. Throw them out and whenever anything bigger than a dog comes within ten feet, it'll light up like a Christmas tree. Five thousand lumens. Shadows thrown up everywhere. Bulletproof glass, good for fifty hours of lighting each.'

You took those too, but rather than keeping the bag you transferred them from the pouch into one of the few remaining empty pouches on your belt. There were six of the things, and you wondered how long it would take you to go through them before you needed to come back for more.

'Thank you, those should be really helpful. I'll be back if I can think of anything custom to look into.'

'You do that, young lady. Have a good day. Stay safe.'

'Thank you, you too sir.'

He nodded and sat back down at his seat with a beleaguered grunt that reminded you far too much of Dad, and you made your way out pleased that at least some progress towards a more robust skill set was coming together.

There was only one more task left to complete before heading home. With your mandatory therapy appointment the next day and a planned outing with Dad in the afternoon, you wanted to get the more boring parts of your job out of the way quickly; power testing it was.

Shrugg had been excited when you had given him the rundown of the new power during the brief. You couldn't blame him; he seemed a nice enough man, and even if the positivity was a little too much for you most of the time you couldn't really argue with being happy about power nullification. While you weren't an expert, and by the strictest sense your power wasn't so much nullification as it was an absolute limit on range of effect, you knew that any power that had the capacity to dampen the effects of others was sought after. Not many people with the skill existed, and those that did happened to find themselves involved in big issues.

You remembered a few years back when Hatchet Face, perhaps the most famous example of such a figure, officially joined the Slaughterhouse Nine. For more new members of that nefarious squad there was confusion as to the entire process; how could someone join up, and why would they ever want to?

With Hatchet Face, those concerns never came up. The only question, given his ability to suppress anyone who came close, was how they'd managed to convince him not to kill them instantly. It was still a mystery, as far as you knew, and the hulking maniac had been seen with them on multiple occasions since so the partnership appeared to have been working out well enough.

That someone with otherwise very little firepower could walk among the Slaughterhouse on a daily basis for years and go unharmed spoke volumes as to the utility of a nullification power. For all intents and purposes, it turned some of the world's nastiest capes into a non-factor.

Putting something like that on the table of a PRT Director and then expecting anything but glee was unreasonable, and you knew it. Piggot would have been ever hard pressed not to crack a smile, even if it would have lasted half a second and you'd have been subjected to a gag order to stop the rumours spreading within five minutes.

Consequently, you were making your way down to power testing yet again.

Knocking on the door earmarked with a tatty paper sign for testing, you waited for the response from inside and entered.

Doctor Webby was there, as you had expected, but you hadn't anticipated anyone else.

'Hi.'

'What's up.'

Regent and Scrivener, both in full costume were leaning up against the bed at the side of the room. If you hadn't been in a professional environment, you might have turned and left; the combined force of their antics was enough to make even the most hale-hearted crumble.

'Hi,' you said, closing the door behind you. 'I didn't expect anyone else to be here.'

'I can explain that.' Webby pushed her chair back with the rattle of plastic rollers and got to her feet, walking over. 'Director Shrugg thought that, with your new power largely revolving around other powers, it would help if you had trusted volunteers to help.'

'Guinea pigs, she's saying.'

'Test tube babies.' Scrivener's tired voice followed up.

'I mean,' Webby cut them off, 'trusted volunteers. Director Shrugg thought that it would be best to bring in two figures with abilities that we know work at range. One of them – in this case, Scrivener here – is going to be granted your power boost, so we can see if there is any change to that effect, and the two of them will attempt to enact their powers on you. Scrivener has been given strict instructions that he is only to attempt to cause you to lose the motivation to continue suppressing their powers, so if it works you have nothing to fear.'

'Took hours to persuade him. He had all kinds of horrible plans.'

'Plans of intense malice.'

They were awful.

Thankfully, Webby was able to pull things back under control and the entire procedure went ahead with something that appeared to have at least heard of the concept of discipline.

You began by allowing the two of them to become swamped with the pink smoke, until it solidified around their form into a viscous haze. Webby attempted to have you banish what remained of the smoke in the air, but it was either impossible or you hadn't worked out how to do it yet; if you were working on fewer than three people, you and whoever you happened to be out in the field with were just going to have to deal with slightly blushed vision.

The purpose of suppressing their powers first was simple; Webby wanted to test if you could still overcharge a power through the mist; the applications of such a thing weren't certain, but it was good to know. You could, though it was difficult to know when such a thing might be useful, and rapidly after initial power suppression, Scrivener had been sufficiently overcharged and noted that he could feel the same power burn as he had during trials earlier in the week.

From that point on, tests went ahead as planned, and it became quickly apparent their neither Scrivener nor Regent was able to do anything at all through the barrier. Even the overcharging of Scrivener didn't seem to be doing much good.

'Be careful, still. There are a number of powerful parahumans in this world and I wouldn't want you to be caught off guard. It's all well and good to have pride in your powers but don't take them for granted. For all we know, a sufficiently powerful effect could still make something happen even if it isn't what you would typically expect.'

'Of course, doctor. I'll keep that in mind.'

'See that you do! The Count might be the only real problem while you're in Atlanta, but when you graduate from the Wards in a few years you may want to relocate and who knows what could go on then. Wouldn't want you to test your luck against someone like the Siberian or Heartbreaker without being prepared for the worst.'

'Of course, I'll be sure.'

Turning back to Scrivener and Regent, you were surprised at how different the two of them seemed to be. Scrivener seemed largely unaffected, whereas Regent looked extremely tired. His shoulders were slumped and his posture, typically lazy in the first place, had leaned in on himself.

Uncertain of the long term effects of power suppression – after all, you had been using it for less than five minutes at the concert and hadn't had a chance to see first-hand if the two afflicted parahumans had recovered fully since – you pulled the colour back and watched as Alec seemed to regain a little bit of the strength in his frame. Slight as he was, losing anything took him from willowy to frail in an instant.

'You guys both feeling okay?'

'Yeah, I'm good.' Scrivener said, raising a hand to scratch at his scalp.

'Yeah, fine.' Regent followed.

'Good,' Webby interrupted. 'I know that it may be inconvenient, but would the two of you consent to staying here under my supervision for roughly half an hour or so? I would like the opportunity to monitor any changes you might feel after affliction.'

Both of them nodded.

'Penumbra, one more thing before you leave – if I may.'

Not wanting to let the concern linger, and more than a little curious about what she might have in mind, you consented to stay.

Ultimately, it was a fairly minor task. Having heard about your striker power from the other reports filed on power testing, Webby had a few ideas she wanted you to run through just as an example of the potential versatility of the power. After all, while it currently lay secret, the reality was that it would probably become well known eventually and having something with only a destructive purpose would be quite difficult to market.

Not impossible, she reasoned – after all, Legend was the number one merchandising figure in the entire Protectorate and almost all of his abilities involved something that could demolish a sky-scraper in minutes – but still, it was worth knowing if there were other possibilities.

A few small tests later, and the answer was clear: anything that you touched would be sent flying through the effects of time, for better or worse. When you attempted to brush a computer performing a download, it finished the download almost instantaneously but in doing so, made the computer's fan spin so loudly that you thought it may have broken, day's worth of rotation thrown through the tiny thing in an instant. You didn't ask if you were the only one who smelled burning plastic.

Fruit, too, was ripened – and then, accidentally, overripened – in a brush of the fingertip, and while it technically didn't meet the definition due to not aging within the correct barrel or location, Doctor Webby was of the opinion that your attempt at aging balsamic vinegar had functioned to an acceptable level. The vision of her taking a sip of the stuff was something that you were going to attempt to forget as rapidly as possible.

Webby dismissed you; after all, having done your job, there was fairly little need for you to stay around and you could always ask the two boys later on if there had been anything you needed to keep in mind when using your power in the field. That said, you couldn't really think of a need to ever restrain either of them; were you out on patrol and suddenly assaulted by a group of villains, you had enough control over the smoke to exclude your own teammates from the effects.

As you were making your way out of the building, your phone rang.

'Hello?'

'Hello Penumbra.'

Dragon. You would recognise the voice from almost anywhere, especially with that little robotic undertone that reminded you that she was probably speaking to you through the module of some advanced control console, the likes of which you could never dream of building.

She had told you a little while ago that she would be in touch at the start of the month to potentially begin negotiations for Guild work. That much was no surprise – as much as she was both busy and important, Dragon was also friendly and professional. If she said she would get in touch, you were confident that she would.

So soon, though, was a surprise. You had expected it to run later into the month – maybe even close to the end of the month before she had called.

'How are you?'

'I'm fine, Penumbra, thank you. Are you well?'

'Doing okay, thank you.'

'I'm glad to hear it. I've heard wonderful things about your beginnings in Atlanta. You should be proud of yourself.'

Something about the words made warmth well up in your chest. Dragon was an icon; having her praise you was the next best thing to having the Triumvirate show up to award you a medal.

'Thank you.'

'You're more than welcome. I was calling to enquire on behalf of the Guild. Do you happen to have a moment?'

'Of course.'

You didn't even need to think. The words escaped your mouth before you even processed them; whatever she had to say, you wanted to hear it. If there was a problem, that could be worked through after and you weren't about to jump into something without preparation. Saying no was an option. But the idea of delaying even the discovery of what it might be seemed unacceptable.

'Wonderful. On the behalf of the Guild, I would like to ask you whether you would be available to be contracted for thinker support. While right now there are no urgent duties in need of your other skills, we are continuously monitoring threats, and a thinker of your ability is always valued. We would like to offer you a significant fee – in line with our other independent contracts – in exchange for a single day's worth of questioning per week. This would hopefully allow us to remove other resources from tracking certain issues and operate more effectively overall. Of course, we are also aware that this would require you to set aside that day, as the hour of your contact cannot be guaranteed and the reality of thinker powers implies that you will need to rest after these questions have been asked.'

The urge to simply agree out of hand was strong – almost too strong. Luckily, though you were far from an expert, you had spent long enough listening to Carol negotiate the details of your contract, and the thought of the look she would give you if she heard you had agreed to sign a contract without even asking about the compensation or the terms made you shiver.

'Would it be possible for you to send me through all of the details? I wouldn't need long to look over the contract, but I'd like to talk through it with my Dad and perhaps even Cinereal and Director Shrugg first and make sure it wouldn't interfere.'

'That's no problem at all. If you could please send me your response by the end of the week, that would be fantastic, but please do take your time. I understand if it's too much of a commitment for someone of your age and in your situation.'

'I appreciate that. I'll get back to you soon, I promise.'

'I'm sure you will. Take care of yourself, Penumbra.'

'You too, Dragon.'

The connection clicked off and you resisted, just, the urge to grin. Then, realising that nobody could see you inside the mask even if they were there, you did grin.

You weren't lying that you would consult the other people around you to make sure everything was above board, but you couldn't deny that being offered a contract to work for the Guild, even in a consulting capacity for the time being, was thrilling.

And that was before you even saw the terms of the contract, written at the topic of the documents Dragon had somehow already sent through.

Tinker's Choice

Now that we are fully set up, with our own workshop, our own workflow, and some designated weekly times for tinkering, we don't need to be quite so strict about our options. We can work on more than one thing at once - which is great, because we have many things to work on!

So this time, rather than selecting a single thing to work on, your choice in what our priorities are.

Our number one priority will take between 5 and 10 days to complete. Our secondary priority will take between 7 and 14 days. Our tertiary priority will take between 14 and 21 days to complete. The exact number of days for each will be determined by a random number generator, with those numbers as the precise lower and upper boundaries.