- Location
- Odessa
I suggest rereading chapter 16.1 Weld's interlude. It was already stolen there and got some interesting reaction.
Brockton's Celestial Forge (Worm/Jumpchain)
- Thread starter LordRoustabout
- Start date
- Pronouns
- Dude, bro, etc...
Actually it sounds more like it was just the piece of Grue's knife that disappeared. Perhaps I'm wrong, but I believe the brooch is somewhere else in a different container.
Honestly, it hasnt even been a week since Accord asked for it, he honestly dont think he is that impatient
Oh, that implies either the knife doesnt really repair and more reassemble itself. Which is argueably cooler
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- Location
- Odessa
Sorry, you appear to be correct. I assumed that the brooch was under the glass case, but it looks like the knife was there.
Either way once the thing disappears, Armsmaster is likely to assume that it vanished because it's a projection.
- Location
- Germany
That actually makes more sense than them ignoring it because they're to busy.
22 Homeward
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
22 Homeward
I rode out of the ruined storage facility leaving the former conscripts behind me. At the moment I was feeling a bit less than the triumphant hero. Focusing on getting the bombs out of their heads had let me put off contemplating exactly how badly things had gone this night. To be fair I hadn't come into this expecting to be able to end Bakuda's rampage in one swoop, but I think that was part of the problem.
I had approached things, been approaching things, like a freshly triggered tinker. I don't think that was exactly unreasonable, because what else was I supposed to base things on? The problem, which was clear now, was that I was definitely not a tinker. At least not anything like a traditional one.
I could make stuff, incredibly advanced stuff, but that didn't make you a tinker. I'd been fixated on how other cape powers work, how the PRT evaluates them. Tinker is a classification not just for being able to build stuff, but for all the issues around it. Logistics, time limitations, resources, research, workshop space. A tinker couldn't just start building, they had to build up. That's why tinker was a combat relevant classification rather than just the sub-ratings attached to their gear. They had expanded capacities, but also expanded limitations. I had taken that model as an outline for how to function as a cape, and in doing so had taken on the limitations of the classification as well.
Limitations I didn't really have. There were vestiges of them before, but after tonight most of them were irrelevant. My workshop was advanced, persistent, and fully secure. My Workaholic power let me multiply any resource as long as I could even get the tiniest scrap to start with. I could complete mechanical tasks around forty times faster than normal, and if I was doing maintenance or modification of my own gear that ramped up to four hundred times faster. I was getting entire fields of technology fully developed without needing research or testing. When I did need testing or research it was built on established and shockingly advanced principles that I received in full detail.
I needed to stop thinking about what a tinker would do and start thinking about what I could do. What I could be capable of.
For instance, magic. Magic essentially gave me a shocking array of parahuman abilities on command. Finally breaking out my Dark Alchemy made it clear exactly how strong that could be. I might only have two connections to the Magic constellation but they complemented each other perfectly. Runecraft had been a bit of a novelty when I first got it, but it had been empowered by all of those 'useless' aesthetic powers I'd been accumulating. I didn't even know what the upper limit would be for what I could accomplish with it.
Potions were also something I needed to start properly leveraging. A single duplication potion could have swung the fight in my favor, and invisibility might have let me take out Bakuda without giving her a chance to set off any of her contingencies. That entire alchemy field was even more important now, considering what Natural Alchemy was capable of.
Looking back, I just didn't have enough time. There wasn't time to practice, utilize, or develop my abilities. After that first horrible week following my trigger I had gotten so caught up in the fact that I had gotten any power that I hadn't considered how best to leverage what I'd received. The rate powers arrived at had been accelerating, no question, but my ability to manage them hadn't been improving at a similar rate.
The modifications to my mind from those military memories scared me, but without them I don't think I would have made it through the night. They had helped, but they were memories designed for a very different situation and still clashed pretty hard with my mentality at times. I really needed some time to get a grip on them to know how to best utilize them.
Time. The one thing I didn't have to spare. I had been working every second I could manage since the Undersiders attacked the bank, but it hadn't been enough. Maybe it would have been if I'd known what I was getting into, but who could have seen this insanity coming?
Who indeed.
My passenger was being quieter than usual. The complete gap regarding the ABB's new thinker was more than a little concerning. She had managed to stump Tattletale as well, so it might be an anti-thinker effect. That was scary enough, but I never got the idea that my passenger was limited by parahuman interactions. This seemed like something else, and that was a very concerning thought. He had been my safety net since I triggered, and now that net had an obvious hole in it. That was not a comforting idea.
It also made me wonder if there had been any gaps in the other information I'd received. Information regarding the end of the world and what was necessary to prevent it. Once again, not a comforting idea.
I put those thoughts out of my mind and tried to decide my next move. I pulled up Survey through my omni-tool and tried to get a sense of the city. While I'd been occupied in the north end storage facility things had gone to hell across Brockton Bay. It didn't look like the string of random attacks I'd been afraid of. It wasn't even targeted to maximize casualties. No, this was far more coordinated.
I didn't have a perfect picture since the data was being pieced together from disparate sources. Still, Survey had literally been made for this kind of thing so I was able to get a fairly accurate picture of how the attacks had rolled out, as well as a more concerning analysis of the reasoning behind them.
The first wave of attacks had been designed to shock. They were coordinated with the blackout and were the only ones that actually targeted civilian areas, about a half dozen blasts, enough to put people on alert. At the same time there were reported explosions on the PHQ and signs of heavy combat, though still no public announcement on what had happened. Once a response was seriously being mobilized the second wave came.
This was more numerous and tactical. The attacks targeted key roadways, the Brockton Airport, the PRT headquarters and the sites of previous bombings. The PRT headquarters wasn't badly damaged in the attack, but the strike had hit the garage access with an incendiary bomb that was apparently still burning, though thankfully not spreading. The fire was hot enough that attempts to smother it, even with containment foam, had completely failed. Any PRT response vehicles not already on the road were completely locked down.
The secondary bombings had as severe an impact on response to the disaster as the PRT attack. The first few response units to the explosion sites triggered hidden secondary devices. Following that disaster blast sites needed to be cleared by the bomb squad before anyone could be sent in. It slowed the response to a crawl.
This led to the third wave of attacks. These were more spaced out and even more targeted. The third rounds of attacks weren't designed to secure a tactical advantage, slow responses, or create fear. They were clearly targeted based on financial gain.
The blackout dealt with most electronic security and tinker tech bombs removed more conventional barriers. Thus the ABB had led an exceptionally coordinated string of heists across the city. With the chaos slowing police response to a crawl and the strength of Bakuda's bombs backing them up they were able to essentially walk through the juiciest targets in the city.
It was hard to even guess how much they had managed to secure. The rich side of Brockton Bay skewed extremely rich and had services to match. The two auction houses had probably yielded the greatest take in pure dollar value of goods, but that would be difficult to liquidate. There were also the repeated jewelry robberies, hits on depositories, armored cars blown apart or hijacked, and even a good old fashion bank robbery.
It made sense. The ABB would likely have their traditional income streams gutted following this display. No one was going to be heading to ABB territory to partake in any of their vice industries. Protection money was a meager prospect with a depressed economy, even more so following something like this. Beyond that there wasn't much stable cash flow to be had. It seemed their thinker had sidestepped that by ensuring enough take in a single night to support the gang for an indeterminate amount of time.
Actually, I had no idea what the economics of running a gang were like. Judging by behavior it seemed more territory was considered better and quality of territory was a factor as well, but the nitty gritty would have to be guessed from movies and police procedurals. What I did know is this was probably one of the biggest heist sprees in the city's history, and something that could only be pulled off by fully exploiting the chaos of the attacks.
Oh, and the Forsberg Gallery had been taken down. Not 'taken down' on the level of what happened at the storage lockers, but it was definitely in a 'rebuild' rather than a 'repair' category. There was probably a joke in there about not being able to tell when ultra-modern architecture collapses on itself. A few of the supports must have gone, as well as that weird lopsided part that hangs out, but the bottom floors were probably alright.
The damage was a bit excessive if all they wanted to do was cover an art theft. Also I wouldn't really have pegged it as a high value target. Possibly there had been something else going on there, but Survey didn't have any data ready for me.
The A.I. was stressed enough as it dug through social media posts, image board rumors, and news sites from outside the slowly shrinking blackout area. This was not something that would have been possible at the start of the night, but hours of drone coordination and scanner analysis had resulted in a significant boost in the A.I.'s complexity and capacity. Through those efforts I was presented with the worst news of the night.
Lung had gotten away. It wasn't being shouted from the rooftops, and from the looks of things it might have been a close thing, but he was definitely free. There was grainy cell phone footage taken from the boardwalk of some fight on the rig. Not good quality footage. The person was using digital zoom to try to get a close up and turned it into a blurry shaky mess.
It showed a blue blur in what was probably a fight with a big burning blur. The situation wasn't helped by multiple explosions around the two blurs and copious amounts of smoke. It ended with a scuffle between the blue and burning blurs. Then something knocked the blue blur away from the burning blur, the burning blur burned more, and there were lots of explosions. Afterwards the burning blur was gone, the blue blur wasn't moving, and it looked like something had fallen into the bay. Then there were a bunch more explosions, the Rig caught fire, and the force field cut out, taking both the dome and road access with it.
Later on there was a sighting of Dauntless arriving on the scene, then flying back towards the PRT building. Various other sightings of him, Miss Militia, and Triumph were reported across the city, with Battery showing up later in the evening.
It wasn't clear what had happened on the Rig, but a single cell phone photo from an apartment window was posted on Twitter showing a partially transformed Lung entering the city. There were no signs of him going on a rampage or participating in the other ABB activities, but it was clear he was out of Protectorate custody.
Maybe if I'd gone there first I could have tipped the scales. Of course, that would have meant trading the Undersiders' lives, the lives of all of the conscripts, and letting Bakuda run free will all that ordinance. It could also mean a few more Protectorate heroes would be on the streets instead of their missing/status unknown situation, but I wasn't sure how good a trade that would have been.
I could keep thinking in circles forever. The point wasn't if I made the right decision. It was if there was anything else I could do now.
On that note there was something going on pretty much everywhere in the city. The Empire and Merchants were out in force, but unlike the ABB seemed to be having trouble figuring out how to take advantage of the chaos. And it was chaos. This was a blackout with the police heavily tied up and the fire and medical services stressed to their limit. Fortunately there didn't seem to be an excess of firebombs deployed, but any number was a nightmare considering the technology involved. There were scattered fires across the city, likely unrelated to the bombings but still pushing the limits of firefighter's ability to contain them.
Reports from the hospitals were not as horrible as they could have been. A slight shift to the bombing pattern could have clogged the emergency rooms and morgues of the city well past their capacity. Instead they had focused on disruption of response and financial gain, a small and dubious mercy. Still, that took the medical response from an insurmountable problem to a merely taxing one. They wouldn't be doing post-Endbringer style tent hospitals and field amputations, but every medical professional would be on double shifts and earning their pay for the foreseeable future.
I missed a connection to the knowledge constellation as I considered what I should do. What could I do? Panacea was still in containment thanks to the reaction to our conversation. Could they release her for something like this? Somehow I doubted it. It seemed unlikely that containment protocols would have an exemption letting potentially mastered capes free just because their powers would be useful. That sounded like it would be the most exploitable loophole ever.
Thanks to my own status and my effective declaration as a villainous mercenary I couldn't exactly step into her place. I was a suspected master using untested and unverified healing tech that I was not willing to submit to an examination. Medical nanites were wonderful, but in order to develop them a normal person would need to go through iterative designs that could cause all kinds of disasters, and that's not even getting into the Protectorate's stance on nanite technology in general. My alchemy might be a little better, but would raise even more questions. I couldn't see a way to offer help without ending up in PRT custody by the end of the night.
So what else could I do? Somehow just rescuing the Undersiders in the face of all of this didn't feel like enough. Okay, I had saved a bunch of civilians as well, stopped whatever Bakuda was planning to do with that insane amount of ordinance, and while she got away it hadn't been in one piece. The blade hadn't exactly taken her legs, more of a low cut through the shins. The left foot was gone along with most of her calf, but the right wasn't cut all the way through. That said, the right cut was closer to the knee, so that brought its own set of problems.
She obviously didn't bleed out, so credit to either Uber's perfect medical skills or Leet's bullshit technology. This would seem like a victory, but really it just served to hand the ABB a crippled tinker. That's pretty much the nightmare scenario for any tinker to find themselves in and the best present a gang could receive. It also would keep her out of the field, so while that would probably reduce random executions substantially it transfers command to more level headed capes. I'm not sure a less violent but more effective ABB was that much of a step up.
So what did I do now? In a way it was easier back at the facility. The goals were clear and even if the best decisions weren't being made just doing something was generally an improvement. I could deal with a problem that was right in front of me, but a wide reaching, city scale disaster? No.
From what I could discern the wave of violence and looting that had sprung up around the blackout was dying down. Not due to the Protectorate, but surprisingly the activities of minor capes, independent heroes, and even Faultline's crew. Though in their case the smart money was they were defending their stomping grounds rather than taking any stand for law and order. There was no evidence of a coordinated effort from New Wave, but individual members had been spotted on and off through the night. Even the gangs weren't putting up with rioting or looting in their own territory, which clamped down on some of the worst hotspots. I couldn't see any way to help with the general violence that wouldn't throw me unprepared against one of those groups.
I couldn't think of anything I could do that would make a positive impact without also causing excessive entanglement with the Protectorate or another group in the city. I didn't want anything like that until I had time to leverage some of my new abilities. I had rushed into one situation under-geared and half prepared. I wasn't doing it again.
If there was one key takeaway from the night it was that there was a big difference between having power and knowing how to apply it properly. If I didn't want to repeat my earlier mistakes I would have to get my shit together before anything like this happened again.
That led to me hunting for a darkened alley to access my workshop. That wasn't something in short supply in this part of the docks and I found an acceptably isolated door fairly quickly. Despite the expansions to my workshop the entryway looked the same as ever. The scattered equipment and cast off civilian clothing from my rushed deployment were scattered across the floor. I secured the door, stowed my hoard of tinker tech, and started to get changed.
My costume was in a far worse state than when I left. Virtually all of that damage was due to Uber and Leet's Street Fighter attack. I had defenses against a lot of things, but spatial distortions were not currently on the list. That had to change. I knew that broadcast had gone out, even if I hadn't had time to review it yet. I had little doubt that I would be facing similar weapons in the future.
I didn't have the advantage of anonymity anymore. Villains didn't last in the cape scene if they were idiots. I couldn't hope that they would come at me with attacks that had been demonstrated to be ineffective. Spatial warping drew blood, so any cape or tinker who could produce anything similar would be in extremely high demand.
I could build something to defend against that kind of thing, but that would involve digging heavily into the principles provided by my Skills: Physics power. There were fascinating concepts there, but unfortunately none of the engineering needed to bring them to life. I would have to develop my technology the old fashion way, and that meant research and experimentation.
As a positive, it did provide the basis for defending against time stop bombs and the construction of a personal force field. I had a few different personal force fields I could build at this point and should probably start prioritizing that particular project. There are effects from those bombs where the only safe measure is to avoid contact entirely. With some of that stuff there's no level of durability that can reliably save you.
Despite the exertion and messy nature of combat the costume was still fairly fresh. I had The Flock's Fleece when I made this with Garment, so in addition to always fitting perfectly it created an ideal thermal equilibrium. Never too hot or too cold, and even when sprinting in full costume with a face mask you were perfectly comfortable. It was a minor thing, but I appreciated not ending the night swimming in panic sweat.
The state of my pistol made my costume look pristine. That mega slash thing may have been dramatic, but it was beyond anything that sword had been designed for. The HF capacitor has completely shorted out and I wouldn't want to even try activating the omni-blade mount until I had a chance to see what was happening inside. Really I should have stripped it down right after the attack, but there wasn't time for even my accelerated maintenance. Given my new powers it was probably due for a complete rebuild anyway.
While I got changed I updated the copies of Survey and Fleet running in the computational core with the data from the night. Given how much they had been able to derive from a simple ride around the city this would likely be a feast of information for them. I would have to expand their parameters soon. If they hadn't hit them already they would soon. Since I was basing their upgrades on the powers I received they were well overdue for an expansion.
After I finished getting changed I stowed my gear and made sure my reserve armor plate was in place on my shin. There was a chance that kind of durability could expose me but it was still dangerous out there. I would much rather have someone wondering how I survived a bullet than end up a corpse. In fact I should probably upgrade that as soon as I get the chance. I had an entire database of armor technology in my head, and that wasn't even touching on what I could do with high gravity assembly now that element zero based technologies were an option.
Ultra-compressed high grade refined ceramite plates could come later. Right now I just wanted to get back to the relative safety of my apartment. This night had been draining even before I charges into Bakuda's murder arena. Since then I had been running on desperation and conditioning, thank you military training. The moment the costume came off it was like a switch was thrown. All I wanted to do was sleep for a week.
That sounded like a great idea, but this wasn't the place for it. I signaled Fleet and the motorcycle shifted back into civilian mode, changing from its aggressive shape and black and silver coloring to a still sleek but much less aggressive silhouette in blue and white. Still not exactly inconspicuous, but better than riding around in costume.
I wheeled my transformed bike out into the alley, sealed my workshop, and took off towards my apartment. Signs of violence became gradually more common as I moved into the more populated areas of the docks. Even as the damage reached its peak it wasn't as bad as I had feared. Going into this I had expected the entire city to be a rubble strewn fireball. Frankly I saw more damage due to the actions of normal people in the form of smashed storefronts and broken windows than I did from explosives.
The Docks isn't exactly what you'd call prime looting grounds, but I guess people take what they can get. It was probably telling about the city's drug problem that I didn't see a single pharmacy that hadn't been broken into. Anyone who needed prescription refills in the north side of the city was going to have a hard time of it for a while. Somehow I doubted things were this bad Downtown. There was more spacing between the commercial and residential areas, the Boardwalk had its own security, and office buildings didn't exactly have an abundance of light weight, easily liquidated items to grab.
That said, most of the ABB heists were centered Downtown or towards the Beaches, so I guess that evened things up. It would be interesting to see how the fallout from this night shapes itself. Given the number of cities affected this is probably going to end up with one of those cape specific monikers like the Boston Games.
As I rode the Celestial Forge made a connection to a small mote from the Time constellation. This one was called Don't Need a Team. It made it so that I didn't need a team.
Okay, there was more complexity to it than that. The power let me do the work of an entire team by myself. I wasn't duplicating or using telekinesis or anything like that, it just worked as a combination of expanded knowledge and faster speed that allowed me to handle the tasks of an entire service crew by myself.
It was primarily aligned towards fighter jet maintenance, but could be applied to other fields easily enough, especially with my level of skill. It wouldn't be any use on small projects where a second set of hands would get in the way, but for larger projects I could handle the work of up to ten people with no issue. It was actually just what I needed for expanding my workload and trying to leverage new technology.
I put that power aside and focused on the road. The city was still shockingly dark. You got so used to there always being some level of lighting that this kind of thing, the choking, inky darkness, became severely unnerving. Some buildings still had emergency lighting on, and flashlights and candles showed through the windows of some houses, but generally the land outside the reach of my headlights was a complete void.
I turned a corner and was greeted by an unexpected island of light on an otherwise pitch black street. My gym was bright and fully lit. Light streamed out of its windows and open doors across the people milling around outside. I slowed as I approached the old building. From the looks of what I could see inside the place was packed to capacity, probably with half the neighborhood present.
The attitude of the crowd was complicated. I would probably have described it as a high tension potluck. Some of the larger guys from the gym were out on the street, forming a kind of informal perimeter at the edge of the light. Assorted non-members were behind them. A few were smoking, some had paper coffee cups, and some were just pacing in clear agitation. What was clear was that a sense of 'inside' and 'outside' had evolved around the gym and people were keeping aware of the boundary.
I pulled my bike into the crowded parking area and pulled off my helmet. At the sound of my approach an unspoken exchange was conducted between the gym regulars and two of them moved to intercept me, with the others shuffling around to even out the spacing. It wasn't exactly a military perimeter, but it was probably the closest thing that could evolve naturally in a situation like this.
The two figures approached in a decidedly aggressive manner, but the lead figure's mannerism's changes as soon as he got close enough to see my face. The second figure picked up on it and mirrored his behavior.
"Joe?"
I recognized Vince's voice and shifted slightly so I could see his face without the light completely at his back.
"Hey Vince." I tried to keep the mental exhaustion out of my voice as I spoke, but I think he picked up on it. I glanced over the gym patrons and members of the public standing around. This close and without the engine noise I could hear the mummer of dozens of voices coming from inside the gym. "What's going on here?"
He grinned. "A bunch of us were here when the power went out. Doug kind of took command of things, kept anyone from panicking."
I returned his smile. "I can see that."
He nodded. "Yeah. Anyway, heard streets were getting dangerous so we were set to wait things out. That's when people started showing up. Like, more than just members."
"Seriously?" The gym was a nice place to work out, but I wouldn't exactly call it a community hub. Maybe a known factor on account of its Neolithic architecture, but not a place where people would gravitate.
"Seriously. Get this, there was this cape going around breaking up assaults," Vince put a particular inflection on that word and something told me it was probably more serious that just muggings. "and sending people here."
I blinked. "Why here?"
He just shrugged. "Maybe they knew the place would be open and we'd have a bunch of guys here in case anyone tried to start something? Anyway, Doug started organizing things to account for that. You've seen what it's like out there?"
I nodded grimly.
"Right, the cops weren't showing up for anything less than a murder in progress, so Doug set to get us dug in until things calmed down. He called in some favors, including someone who had an old generator." He gestured behind him. "Once we got the lights on more people started showing up. Doug called in more people to keep things from getting out of hand, and well..."
Well indeed. I had no idea what cape would be sending people to our gym, but the situation had worked out better than anyone could have hoped given the circumstances.
"Oh, Joe this is Casey." He gestured at the thirty-something tattooed boxer next to him. The man gave me a crooked grin and extended a hand like a ham hock.
"Nice to meet you." He was clearly one of those people who turned every handshake into a cursing grip contest. I squeezed back as hard as I could manage and hoped my durability boost wouldn't betray me.
"Likewise." He turned to Vince while still shaking my hand. "So, this the rookie you couldn't put down the other night? Mr. Laborn must have been mortified."
I kept a straight face while Vince laughed it off. When Casey broke the grip I made a show of unnecessarily rubbing feeling back into my hand. That earned a scoff, but his own hand was trembling slightly.
"You should check inside, at least let Doug know you're safe. He's been on the phone all night, but we haven't been able to confirm everyone's okay." Yeah, I guess that's what happens when you leave your civilian phone isolated in another dimension. 'We are sorry. The number you have dialed no longer exists in this reality.'
Still, it was an odd sense of community I hadn't really expected from this place. I couldn't decide if it was endearing or intrusive. That said, I at least wanted to find out about this cape.
"You guys go ahead." Said Casey. He looked over the street. "Things seem to be calming down anyway. I'll keep an eye on things." He glanced at my bike, then shared a look with Vince. There seemed to be something going on there, but I just gave him a nod and followed Vince inside.
Past the door things reminded me more of a church social than a disaster shelter. Someone had set up a bunch of folding tables with some of those giant coffee makers that produce truly terrible coffee on them. It was complimented by assorted foodstuffs that I suspected were mostly chosen based on what would go bad without constant refrigeration. What parts of the workout gear that could be cleared away was pushed to the side to make room for what looked like at least half the neighborhood. People were circulating, chatting, or collapsing into folding chairs, but generally seemed happy to be here. A little island of stability in the middle of a night of insanity.
Vince led me through the throng of people, around the ring, and eventually to the back of the gym near the office. I heard Doug's booming voice well before I spotted the big man. He might be a terror to his students, but give him a disaster to coordinate and he was suddenly everyone's best friend. Or at least the person you wanted on your side.
Honestly, I think it might be a bit similar to what I was dealing with at the storage facility. When things are going to hell it's easier to focus on the job in front of you than try to take everything in. Doug didn't seem the most contemplative person at the best of times and probably favored action over careful consideration. It was easy to see how he ended up pulling this together.
Also he got to yell at people. That always put him in a good mood.
Doug was talking with some of the other coaches and older members of the gym. Vince waved to get his attention and his face lit up when he saw me. The man may not have an ounce of tact in his body but he was probably the most earnest person I'd ever met.
"Joe!" He waved off the crowd and made his way over to me and Vince. "Glad so see you're safe. I swear, this fucking night." He shook his head. "Couldn't reach you, and with your new job..."
He left that hanging and there were some knowing looks from the men around him. Not judgmental, just knowing. In retrospect by talking about a job with 'good pay' and 'terrible hours' I should have realized it would come across as a euphemism for some kind of illegal activity. The entire gym seemed to be onboard with the idea that I had found some kind of legally gray side job.
I mean I had, but not nearly in the way they were thinking.
Wait, that's probably what the thing was between Casey and Vince about my bike. Well, looks like they assumed I was riding around on the proceeds from a criminal venture. I'd be offended if they weren't exactly correct.
"No, I got a call from some... friends. They were in a bad spot because of this and needed some help."
Doug nodded. "Things work out?"
"Yeah." I fell back on my 'nearly lying' tactic of staying as close to the truth as possible. "They had some close calls and are probably pretty shaken up, but they'll be fine."
"Lucky they had someone to rely on." I didn't answer, but joined the chorus of nods around the group.
"Vince mentioned something about a new cape?" The gym's champ grinned at Doug but let him launch into the explanation.
"Oh yeah, it's the damnedest thing. City hadn't been dark for half an hour when this girl shows up, skittish as hell. Said a new cape showed up when she was in trouble, then pointed her our way." He shook his head. "Had no idea what to make of it at first, then the next one shows up. Cindy over there." He pointed at a college age girl with auburn hair sitting by the wall. She was wearing a beautiful jacket over a torn t-shirt and had a split lip that had seen some hasty medical treatment.
Looking around I could see more cases like her. Injuries and damaged clothing, and mostly women. Some were clearly still badly shaken and curled in on themselves in quiet or isolated areas. Others were working to support each other, or even mingling with some of the gym members and people from the neighborhood. I could spot what must have been a dozen, and there were probably more.
"And it was a new cape? No one had seen them before."
Doug grinned. "See, that's what I thought. Then someone found said they'd heard of her. Even had a video." He grabbed a smart phone from a nearby folding table, unlocked it after two tries, tried to navigate a website, accidentally went to the home screen, entered the list of apps, and then inadvertently hit the image gallery icon next to the internet browser.
Huh, apparently Doug liked to go kayaking.
"I've got it." The Celestial Forge missed a connection to the Alchemy constellation as Vince stepped in. He pulled it up with his own phone before Doug decided to start swearing at his or smash it against the wall.
I was expecting some kind of guerrilla style street video of the cape in action. Probably with a homemade costume and the takedown of a couple of muggers or something similar. I wasn't expecting the very familiar sight of a set of curtains framing a red dress with a floating set of opera length white gloves.
I worked very hard to keep my face straight as the video played out, complete with assembly of jacket and finishing with the all too familiar incredibly slow typing. Doug and Vince shared a grin at my expense, so I'm guessing they took my carefully controlled reaction for shock.
"Her name's Garment. Has powers like that fashion girl from down by the college, only people think she's one of those Case whatever folks."
"Case 53s." Vince corrected. "She's not actually invisible, it's just the clothing. There's nothing there to hurt."
The prospect of how someone would figure that out made my stomach lurch, but I nodded along. I hadn't told Garment to stay in the apartment. I'd told her to stay safe. She wasn't obligated to listen to me, but even if she had been this was within the bounds of what I'd said.
But I didn't understand why she'd left the apartment. She'd never shown interest in hero work before, and while there was certainly a need for it this night I didn't know why she decided to start.
I took a moment to think about how Garment saw the world. I didn't have a perfect picture, but from the couple of times I'd worn the gloves I'd been able to get inklings of her senses, the information she received and how she processed it. The way she interacted with the environment around her and the sensation that created. Then I looked over the people she'd been rescuing and sending here. Suddenly something fell into place.
Torn clothing.
There were a variety of levels of injury present, but every one of them had some damage to what they were wearing. I tried to remember what I'd experienced about how Garment perceived things around her, the almost tactile relationship she had with fashion and items of clothing. Then I imagined what would happen during one of these 'assaults', how they would come across to Garment senses.
With that thought I could understand why she left the apartment. I was just grateful she was only dealing with normal humans. I didn't know how well Garment could handle herself in a fight, but apparently it was well enough to break up a street level conflict. Against cape opponents I wouldn't be as confident, so I was glad that things seemed to have been limited on the front.
I made a show of contemplating the video as Vince and Doug watched my reaction. "That's really impressive and all, but how was she fighting with that kind of power?"
Vince beamed as he scrambled to pull something up on his phone. "Oh, this is great." Doug was grinning as he leaned over to look at the screen. Finally he found what he was looking for and turned the phone around.
The screen showed a twitter post of a photo of a skinhead. The lack of tattoos meant it was probably not Empire, just someone who shared the style of that movement. He had what looked like paper cuts across his face, but that wasn't what drew the eye. No, the clear focus of the image was the inch wide pink silk ribbon that had been used to truss him up.
With my knowledge of fabrics and clothing I could easily tell the ribbon has been sewn into his clothing as well as wrapped in a way that effectively immobilized him. With the tensile strength of silk, especially silk of that thickness, there was no way he was getting free unless someone cut him out, and he'd still have the material sewn into his jacket and jeans. The man was clearly furious and red-faced, which clashed horribly with the pink of the ribbon.
Weirdly, except for the shade of his face the entire arrangement looked pretty striking. The pink contrasted nicely with the black jeans and dark grey jacket. It was wrapped in a way that created a kind of banding pattern across his body. I mean, it was clearly intended for restraint, but I could see something in that style ending up on the runway of a fashion show at some point.
Though likely with a more attractive and cooperative model.
"She's been leaving goons trussed up like that all over the area. Sent a few guys out to check on them. They aren't going anywhere until the cops can collect them." Doug looked over at the group of people Garment had sent him. "Had a couple Protectorate capes drop by to follow up on things. Shadow Stalker and that new girl. Said the police will be by to take statements once they can move through the city without getting blown to hell."
"But she can't talk, right? How did she send people here?"
Vince broke in. "She had a laptop with her. Typed stuff out." He saw my expression. "With auto-complete. Still pretty limited, but she got the point across."
"Most of the time." Doug said with a smile.
"What do you mean?"
He turned to carefully lift something off the table behind him. "Apparently had some trouble getting the point across a few times. When she couldn't get through with the laptop she made this."
He lifted a small banner of fabric and held it up. I did not know what to make of it. I knew Garment could work quickly, but I did not expect this.
"She sent it down with the last person to arrive. It was petering out for a while, so theory is she's done for the night." Vince grinned. "We're thinking of hanging it over the ring."
I could see where Vince was coming from, but it was still a shock to see. The item in question was a five foot banner of embroidered cloth, about two feet thick. It looked like wool embroidered onto linen. Actually, it was definitely wool embroidered onto linen because that was what the original was made of. It's just the original Bayeux Tapestry didn't depict any men in boxing shorts.
Garment had decided to get around her communication issues by making a twelfth century tapestry depiction of an empty red dress and gloves intervening to save a maiden from bandits, then directing the maiden along a path to where a group of boxers were standing surrounding a very nice depiction of the gym. After that it showed the boxers defending the maiden from figures in the surrounding darkness. All of this was lovingly sewn in the exact style of the finest medieval tapestry work.
I could only stare at it while Vince and Doug enjoyed my reaction. I shook my head and took in the size of the crowd. The shift in the mood inside the gym compared to the feeling pervading the rest of the city was stark. "This is incredible. I can't believe you pulled all this together on such short notice."
Doug just shrugged. "Some cape thinks we're a good enough place to look after people who were... assaulted. If they have that kind of faith in us I'm not going to let them down. I just took some steps to make sure they'd be alright. Things kind of snowballed from there."
Doug glanced across the room at a tiny elderly woman who looked thin enough for a stiff breeze to knock her flat. She was surrounded by a group composed of gym patrons and members of the public and was commanding the group with the grace of a career general. There seemed to be glimmers of actual fear even in the older heavyweight boxers as they scurried around moving chairs and bringing out food and blankets. She looked over at Doug and the big man immediately averted his eyes.
"Uh, I'll just go see if Mrs. Gartenberg needs help with anything." Vince gave us a quick nod before darting off.
"Mrs. Gartenberg?"
Doug took a breath. "She's... active in the community. A good chunk of this is on her." I suddenly noticed that there was something of a division across the gym, kind of a tone shift separating the realm of Doug's authority from that of the old woman. I considered what it would take to get Doug to secede part of his domain and decided that I definitely did not want to get on that woman's bad side.
At that thought the lights cut off for a second. They came back almost immediately, but there was a concerning flicker to them. Mrs. Gartenberg shot Doug a glare and the big man swore under his breath.
"Hey Joe, you know engineering and that kind of stuff, right?"
I did my very best to keep a straight face as I nodded in reply.
"You know Grant Phillips?" He continued before I could reply. "Used to coach here. Had a generator from when he worked up at the market. The thing's ancient, but we were able to get it working, sort of. Been flickering all night. If it gives out and I don't know how this will go."
It made sense. With the city in darkness this tiny dot of light made things seem normal and in control. Even if you were able to switch to lanterns it would still have a very different and less friendly tone.
Which is how I ended up in the back room of the gym looking at a chugging diesel generator that was a good deal older than I was. Doug had picked up on my nervousness and was taking a soft touch as I examined the machine.
I was nervous, but probably not for the reasons Doug assumed. I could fix the thing. Of course I could fix the thing. There was no question about that. The question, and what I was really concerned about, was could I fix this without announcing my cape status to the world?
I knew I could get everything running perfectly in seconds. That wasn't the problem. What I was worried about was the effects of all my secondary powers. As such I was dragging out my examination while trying to figure out how not to accidentally turn this thing into something that was simultaneously a leap forward in power generation and a work of art worthy of the reverence of generations. I mean, this was compression ignition internal combustion, some of the most primitive of human technology. The challenge was keeping things on that level.
Damn it, that's another quarter for the jar.
Doug picked up on my reaction. "Think you can give us a hand?" Doug was probably the only man in the world who can use his normal speaking voice next to an active generator and still come across perfectly clearly.
I nodded, apprehension clear in all my movements. At the moment I was examining every component to try to make sure I kept things at a comparable technical level.
"So," I said, trying to distract myself. Unlike Doug I needed to put in some effort to drown out the roar of the diesel engine. "Did everyone make it in safe tonight?" I checked the fuel lines and tank. Plenty in stock, and I should be able to do this without increasing the efficiency too much. You know this would be so much easier to just build a diesel powered fuel cell and bypass the mechanical side of… NO! Need to work with the terrible caveman tech.
Doug shook his head. "Few guys I couldn't check in on. Plenty more that stayed home rather than make the trip." He looked grim. "And got some bad news about Laborn."
I looked up sharply. "What happened?"
"Was out at dinner when the bombings started. Avoided that, but he got caught in some mess on the way home."
I winced. "He was alone?"
"Yeah. His son was supposed to go instead, but had to cancel."
Huh. I had no idea why a father and son would switch out going to a restaurant alone. Must be one of those weird things you only get in single-child families.
"He alright?"
Doug nodded. "Someone got him to the hospital. He's a bit beat up, but he'll pull through. The man's a tough old bird." Doug seemed to be considering something. "You really made an impression on him last week."
"Seriously?"
"When Laborn breaks out a session like that it's about seeing when some'll tap out. No one expected you to tough your way through it." He looked distant for a moment. "Laborn, well he's not the best with people, with knowing their limits. Some of the training he did with his boy..." He dropped off, then shook away whatever he was considering. "Point is he has high expectations and is used to people disappointing him. You didn't, and that means a lot."
I nodded politely, but wasn't sure what to make of it. That overly aggressive training had come out of nowhere and I still didn't have a clue what triggered it. It had left me nervous about coming back to the gym all week, but I guess it was good to know something good had come from it.
"Any idea when he'll be out?"
"Monitoring for a concussion, but they'll have him released in no time. The man will see to that." Doug spoke with a slight grin. "So, can you help with this clunker?"
I nodded slowly. "Just give me a few minutes. I think I see the problem."
Doug retreated back to the gym as I dug into the modest tool box they had on hand for maintenance issues. I think I could handle this. Most of my involuntary powers triggered on construction, not repair. There was no risk of ending up with four more generators or involuntary over designing the aesthetics of them. But that didn't mean there were no issues at all.
I was pretty much able to instantly fix the generator with no problems or disruption to operation. Even without the support powers my mechanical skill was insanely good. As it stood the only issue I couldn't contain was the effect of Stylish Mechanic. That power made anything I fixed clean and pleasant to look at. The generator wasn't in complete showroom condition, but probably looked better than it had in years.
I smeared some grease and threw some dust onto the casing, but it was a token effort. I really hoped nothing came of this, but just to be sure I decided to wait out the clock in the back room, serenaded by now much more rhythmic but still extremely loud engine. Can't let people think I worked too fast.
And there went the Vehicles constellation with no connection.
I leaned against the wall and collected my thoughts. Even with the shocking news about Garment this had been nice. It was normal people dealing with a horrible situation the best they could and coming out better for it. I kind of hoped similar things were happening across the city, but it didn't seem likely. Brockton was very much a 'cape town'. People followed the lead of parahumans, and without someone like Garment coordinating things they just wouldn't happen.
Garment. That was still a crazy thought. This is probably on me for not checking in after that first call. She had apparently kept her laptop with her, and the copy of Survey. I could have reached them, but the mess with the Undersiders and Bakuda had been so consuming I hadn't had time to think about anything else.
I hoped she was alright. I mean, physically there wasn't much that could happen to her. She was an animating spirit. The number of parahumans who could even interact with something like that was minuscule. Attacks would just damage her clothes and while she might lament them like a passed loved one that wouldn't actually hurt her.
I was worried about what she mentally dealt with tonight. I'd seen some ugly things at the murder arena, but there was a base level of cruelty that happened on the streets that had a horror all its own. I was undoubtedly proud of her for stepping in, but that didn't change the fact of what she'd been dealing with.
Vince said it looked like she'd called it for the night. I needed to get home and check the apartment. If she wasn't there I could scan for the laptop or start a search pattern. Even if it meant churning out stealth drones and infiltrating surveillance networks I would be able to track her down.
Also, I probably needed to address what Survey considered priority information. Social media posts mentioning a new fabric controlling cape should not have been folded into the summary 'minor capes and heroes'. It was a petty gripe considering the comparatively short time the A.I. had been optimizing, but something I needed to address nonetheless.
Despite my decision to leave as soon as possible that proved to be something of an ordeal. Once it got out that I was the one responsible for the lights no longer flickering there was a focus of attention that I could not break away from, particularly given who was directing it. It seemed that all the skills I'd developed fighting tinkers, countering capes, bypassing murder arenas, and taking on a veritable army of conscripts were completely useless in the face of an elderly Jewish woman.
In her own stern but well-meaning manner Mrs. Gartenberg retrieved me from Doug, thanked me personally in front of her crowd of acolytes and proceeded to march me through the various food and refreshment stations she had coordinated. The crowd regarded the tiny woman with a level of fear and respect Bakuda could only dream of attaining.
It was probably a mistake to mention I hadn't eaten anything since lunch. That comment saw me loaded down with three sandwiches, a cup of soup, a cup full of terrible coffee, and one of those tiny packets of cream cookies. It also saw me seated in one of the few free chairs while I ate. It struck me that my life had reached a level of insanity where I could start the night riding a motorcycle through an explosion to confront a super villain and finish it with soup and sandwiches at an impromptu community potluck.
Also, while I didn't want to pry too much, I was seated close enough to some of the people Garment had rescued to learn some interesting details from basic eavesdropping.
"...right on the spot. Not even a word about it. Well, you know, but..."
"Yes, yes. It's beautiful work. She made it right in front of you?"
The girl nodded and slipped off the jacket, which on second viewing was much better quality than the rest of her clothing, and showed it to the older woman sitting across from her.
"She had the materials in her laptop bag. After she dealt with, you know, they just floated up and she made it on the spot. Barely looked at it, she did it while she was typing stuff out."
"The seams are beautiful. Haven't seen hand sewing like this in years. It's practically a lost art." The woman shook her head. "Most people are lucky to get an autograph when they meet a cape. This is something else."
I looked around. Not all, but most of the people who had been saved by Garment had some item of clothing that stood out from the rest of their outfit. Sometimes just a scarf, sometimes a whole jacket. I was glad she had kept her material summoning under wraps, and found a smart way of doing it. Knowing Garment she probably would have given whoever she came across entire new wardrobes if she could get away with it, so it was probably good she was restraining herself.
She had also given the people here something to focus on that wasn't their city falling apart around them. I didn't know how much of this had made it online, but her PHO thread was probably blowing up over it. I was proud enough to nearly override my concern as I powered through the last of my food.
"Sure you can't stick around?" Vince asked as he walked me out.
I shook my head. "Need to get back and check on things." I looked back from the parking area at the island of light and the muffled din of voices. "This is great, but I think you have things covered."
"We're managing. Thanks for your help with the generator. That's probably dropped Doug's blood pressure by a good chunk."
I smiled. "I'm sure Mrs. Gartenberg will find a way to bring it back up."
"Well, they say you don't reach old age in this city without being tough enough to handle it."
"You think the city can handle Mrs. Gartenberg?"
He chuckled in response. "Wouldn't go that far. Look after yourself out there."
"Thanks, you too."
I took off from the gym into the darkened streets. The rest of the neighborhood seemed eerily quiet after the hectic environment of the gym. At least in the pitch darkness I didn't have any trouble finding a concealed location to access my workshop and store my bike.
I sealed it and moved through the murky blackness of the power outage to the exterior steps leading to my apartment. It was the first place I needed to check. If Garment wasn't here I could start fanning out. A broad enough search and analysis profile would find her, assuming I couldn't just track her by Survey's laptop.
I unlocked the front door and entered the tiny, lopsided apartment. "Garmen..."
Before I could finish speaking a shadowy shape shot through the apartment and engulfed me. It took a second to figure out what was happening and collect myself.
"Yes, it's good to see you too." I returned the hug, then moved to close and lock the door. "I'm glad you're safe."
It was hard to make out Garment's reactions in the dark, but I got the distinct impression she felt that statement was both ignorant and inconsiderate.
"Oh, I'm fine."
Once again, it was hard to make out her response, but she seemed to have some doubts about the integrity of that statement. I couldn't keep this conversation going without actually being able to see what was happening. I moved deeper into the apartment, past the open laptop sitting on the desk. At my approach it blinked to life and printed a message on the screen.
'Greetings. Welcome back.'
It was a basic chat-bot level communication, but still a big step forward. Acting as an assistant for Garment had really helped this branch of Survey develop language skills.
"Uh, hello Survey." The screen flickered in response. Speech recognition, or whatever was being processed there, was even more impressive. I really needed to get into my neural interface and check on the development of both A.I.s.
While I moved to use the closet door to access my workshop Garment began frantically entering commands to the laptop. By which I mean mouse commands, not keyboard, since they were coming at a rapid fire pace rather than at five to ten second intervals.
The closet door opened to reveal my entry hall. The normally dimly lit room illuminated my apartment like the noonday sun. Suddenly I could make out every detail that had been lost in the blackout, but that was secondary to the picture on the laptop Garment was shoving in my face.
"Ah." Garment made an expression that suggested more explanation was due. The screen showed confirmation that Uber and Leet had indeed been streaming the events of the storage facility. The specific frame on the screen showed the immediate aftermath of Uber's spatial Street Fighter attack. Specifically, me on the ground covered in bloody injuries. Just looking at it brought back unpleasant memories.
I really needed to track down that stream and find out how much had been shared and what the reaction was to it. God damn but I had a lot of projects piling up. I thought I was down to the wire preparing for this attack, but that was nothing compared to the work that came afterwards.
"Look, it wasn't that bad." I had to duck as my costume floated out of the workshop entryway like a specter. With the light behind it every rip and tear was highlighted. Garment held it suspended next to me and crossed her arms.
To be honest she seemed about equally upset about my injuries and the damage to the clothing. I had already committed to improving my defenses. I just didn't expect to be called to task for not addressing that ahead of time. As I struggled for a way to defend myself I felt the Celestial Forge make a significant connection to the Time constellation.
The power was called Most Holy Order of the Socket Wrench. It was basically the last word in mechanics, at least as far as vehicles are concerned. With it I could improve any vehicle to an insane degree. Full on beyond the impossible level improvements, some of which made no sense but would work anyway. Beyond just improving my skills it opened up new options that shouldn't work, but in my hands suddenly would.
There was also a time component. Much like with my last power this let me do the work of many people. The phrase 'one-man chop shop' came to mind. Unlike my previous ability this wasn't limited to the speed boost from extra hands, it also accelerated any mechanical task to a blazing degree. It was simultaneously the ability to do impossible work, and the ability to complete it in an impossible timeframe.
Actually, this power stacked with Don't Need A Team. With both of them I could function as a one-man chop shop... where each person in it could do the work of an entire team unto themselves. The sheer scale of the projects I could build with this...
And Garment wouldn't care about any of it. She was still standing there, both offended and concerned over the injuries I'd suffered.
"Look, I know." She made a flippant gesture. "I do. This night didn't go as planned. I had to rush in, I wasn't ready, and I didn't know what to expect. I did what I could, but I'll do better next time."
Slowly Garment seemed to come around. She made an accepting gesture and lowered the laptop. With that, in the light of my workshop, I could suddenly see her clearly. And it struck me what a massive, massive hypocrite she was.
"Garment." She froze at my tone, then slowly turned towards me. "Garment, what happened?"
She seemed to consider things, then took a step forward closer to the light with absolutely no hint of shame. What I could barely make out earlier became crystal clear.
Garment's dress was a mess. Not a dirty mess. It was a nearly shredded mess. She had bullet holes in it. She had a long tear that would have hit the kidney on a normal person. The neckline was pulled and torn and probably only keeping its shape thanks to her power. In short it looked like she had gone through hell and was proud of it.
I took in the damage and sighed. "I stopped by the gym on my way home. I heard what you did." She made an intrigued gesture. "They're doing fine. Really well, actually. Better than most of the city." She looked particularly satisfied at that.
"Why did you decide to send people there?" She made a nebulous gesture towards me. I suppose it was a known factor that she was sure would have people at that time of night. If you had to send them somewhere it was as good a choice as was available.
"I'm proud of what you did, what you accomplished." She perked up. "Even with the..." I gestured towards her dress. "Actually, why haven't you fixed that?" I knew she could have, and easily. So why leave it?
Garment went over to the laptop, which automatically pulled up a text editor as she approached. More significant developments from Survey. Slowly Garment began typing, getting three letters in before Survey managed to hit the right auto-fill.
E...V...I...DENCE
"They need it for evidence?" She gestured assent. That did make a sort of sense. This wasn't some supervilian dust up. There would have to be criminal charges, and that dress was clear evidence of multiple attempts at lethal force. It also showed that she was taking a serious approach to this, rather than just going out and hoping to beat people up.
That actually put her a good deal above my first attempt at hero work. I never even considered prosecution requirements when I went out for my first patrol.
"I saw a twitter photo of one of the people you caught." Garment gestured excitedly and switched to a web browser with her twitter feed.
It was significantly more active than last time. Also the picture I saw was not nearly the only one in circulation. She began to scroll through the tweets on the #GarmentGloves hashtag.
There were multiple pictures of the people she had caught. In fact, in an act of insanity that would only happen in a cape city, some of the recent pictures seemed to be people taking selfies with the bound criminals. The BBPD twitter account was quick to reply to these, recommending that people avoid the crime scene and that officers would arrive shortly to take the suspects into custody.
Oh, she coordinated the color of the restraints to contrast nicely with the person's outfit. That was a very Garment touch.
The selfies seemed to have petered out, so I'm guessing they had rushed the pickup before something unfortunate could happen. Those kinds of assaults don't happen in safe places and you didn't need more people getting in trouble trying to chase a short lived twitter fad.
Further down her feed there were people reposting her introduction video. Others were tweeting photographs of her on the street, though the darkened city made it hard to see details. Likewise with a single short video that allegedly showed Garment saving someone. She was very proud of it, but in the gloom it was basically a flurry of ribbon in the dark with a lot of whip-crack like sounds and then a zoom in on another captured thug, tied up and sewn into silk ribbons.
I spotted another tweet with a single graphic on it. That was a neat detail. Garment had a label. Two raised gloves, crossed at the wrists. Apparently she had sewn it into the clothing that she'd given out and someone from the Gym had posted a picture of it to Twitter. As a logo it worked for her, simple but identifiable.
There were also a few public recruitment offers that had come in from some of the larger corporate teams, though these were being pretty thoroughly mocked by the public for trying. That seemed to be something of an meme that sprung up around this mess. I could see that anyone who tried something that would distract from the response or was perceived as taking advantage of the disaster while it was still happening was being raked over the coals. I mean, it was internet mob behavior, but that didn't mean it was wrong.
Twitter actually was really active. With people limited to cell phone service it seemed to be the main community forum for all the insanity of the night. I checked the global hashtags, with #CapeBlackout being a leading one. Surprisingly #Apeiron was also trending strongly. That made me both proud and embarrassed at the same time. Much further down was #ItsSpelledApeiron, which I'm guessing was probably an online joke around the name having to be pulled from Uber and Leet's stream.
That was probably the cause of that #Khepeiron hashtag. I get Apeiron is an obscure word, but I didn't expect people to mangle the spelling that badly.
I pulled back from twitter and looked towards the workshop. I still hadn't even taken a look at the expansions that had been added. Additionally I had to check the development of both my A.I. and expand their parameters. I'd been using my powers as triggers and had gotten more than enough for a series of upgrades.
Upgrading the A.I. would have to go hand in hand with improving my computer technology. I was getting to the point where transistors were not going to cut it. Until I could get a sample of cybertonium transmuted and start working with extradimensional processors then optical and isolinear computing was my best bet, even with the difficulty adapting to human technology.
And that reminded me. I got up and headed for the kitchen. One by one two dollars worth of quarters were dropped into the jar, the full accounting for all of this insanity. Given how bad tonight went I think keeping it that low is a decent accomplishment. I don't think I ever fully explained the jar to Garment, but she was acting vaguely concerned as she watched me.
I headed back and stood by the workshop door. "Okay, You know about the expansions and all the new powers I got?" She made an excited gesture. "Right, well I have a lot of work to do. I need to catalog everything that showed up, and could use your help for that. Then I need to update systems and build some defenses so that..." I gestured to the costume that was still hanging in mid-air. "...doesn't happen again."
She made an affirmative gesture and I smiled in response.
"So before I get started, is there anything else from tonight you want to show me?"
Garment excitedly raised a finger, then rushed over to the desk and fished a piece of paper from behind the laptop. She hurried back and presented it to me. I looked down at the short message, somewhat stunned.
"Garment, how on Earth did you get Flechette's phone number?"
Jumpchain abilities this chapter:
Don't Need A Team (Ace Combat) 100:
Fighter planes are pretty complicated machines, and more often than not you need a whole crew to maintain them so that they don't break down in the middle of a fight and doom the pilot. You know your plane well enough to circumvent this issue. You've got just the right idea on what needs tuning up and what needs fixing, along with having the speed to be able to fix a plane up by yourself without the need for a crew in a fraction of the time. Performance issues are a thing of the past for you.
Most Holy Order of the Socket Wrench (Fast and Furious) 400:
You are a master mechanic. Repair and upkeep is nice, but you can go beyond the impossible and improve any vehicle. Take a van and make it beat a supercar? Put NOS injectors on a bicycle (and make it work)? How bout something challenging? And anything you can build up you can tear down, too. You're a one-man chop shop and wiring a car to explode takes but a few moments and some chicken wire.
I rode out of the ruined storage facility leaving the former conscripts behind me. At the moment I was feeling a bit less than the triumphant hero. Focusing on getting the bombs out of their heads had let me put off contemplating exactly how badly things had gone this night. To be fair I hadn't come into this expecting to be able to end Bakuda's rampage in one swoop, but I think that was part of the problem.
I had approached things, been approaching things, like a freshly triggered tinker. I don't think that was exactly unreasonable, because what else was I supposed to base things on? The problem, which was clear now, was that I was definitely not a tinker. At least not anything like a traditional one.
I could make stuff, incredibly advanced stuff, but that didn't make you a tinker. I'd been fixated on how other cape powers work, how the PRT evaluates them. Tinker is a classification not just for being able to build stuff, but for all the issues around it. Logistics, time limitations, resources, research, workshop space. A tinker couldn't just start building, they had to build up. That's why tinker was a combat relevant classification rather than just the sub-ratings attached to their gear. They had expanded capacities, but also expanded limitations. I had taken that model as an outline for how to function as a cape, and in doing so had taken on the limitations of the classification as well.
Limitations I didn't really have. There were vestiges of them before, but after tonight most of them were irrelevant. My workshop was advanced, persistent, and fully secure. My Workaholic power let me multiply any resource as long as I could even get the tiniest scrap to start with. I could complete mechanical tasks around forty times faster than normal, and if I was doing maintenance or modification of my own gear that ramped up to four hundred times faster. I was getting entire fields of technology fully developed without needing research or testing. When I did need testing or research it was built on established and shockingly advanced principles that I received in full detail.
I needed to stop thinking about what a tinker would do and start thinking about what I could do. What I could be capable of.
For instance, magic. Magic essentially gave me a shocking array of parahuman abilities on command. Finally breaking out my Dark Alchemy made it clear exactly how strong that could be. I might only have two connections to the Magic constellation but they complemented each other perfectly. Runecraft had been a bit of a novelty when I first got it, but it had been empowered by all of those 'useless' aesthetic powers I'd been accumulating. I didn't even know what the upper limit would be for what I could accomplish with it.
Potions were also something I needed to start properly leveraging. A single duplication potion could have swung the fight in my favor, and invisibility might have let me take out Bakuda without giving her a chance to set off any of her contingencies. That entire alchemy field was even more important now, considering what Natural Alchemy was capable of.
Looking back, I just didn't have enough time. There wasn't time to practice, utilize, or develop my abilities. After that first horrible week following my trigger I had gotten so caught up in the fact that I had gotten any power that I hadn't considered how best to leverage what I'd received. The rate powers arrived at had been accelerating, no question, but my ability to manage them hadn't been improving at a similar rate.
The modifications to my mind from those military memories scared me, but without them I don't think I would have made it through the night. They had helped, but they were memories designed for a very different situation and still clashed pretty hard with my mentality at times. I really needed some time to get a grip on them to know how to best utilize them.
Time. The one thing I didn't have to spare. I had been working every second I could manage since the Undersiders attacked the bank, but it hadn't been enough. Maybe it would have been if I'd known what I was getting into, but who could have seen this insanity coming?
Who indeed.
My passenger was being quieter than usual. The complete gap regarding the ABB's new thinker was more than a little concerning. She had managed to stump Tattletale as well, so it might be an anti-thinker effect. That was scary enough, but I never got the idea that my passenger was limited by parahuman interactions. This seemed like something else, and that was a very concerning thought. He had been my safety net since I triggered, and now that net had an obvious hole in it. That was not a comforting idea.
It also made me wonder if there had been any gaps in the other information I'd received. Information regarding the end of the world and what was necessary to prevent it. Once again, not a comforting idea.
I put those thoughts out of my mind and tried to decide my next move. I pulled up Survey through my omni-tool and tried to get a sense of the city. While I'd been occupied in the north end storage facility things had gone to hell across Brockton Bay. It didn't look like the string of random attacks I'd been afraid of. It wasn't even targeted to maximize casualties. No, this was far more coordinated.
I didn't have a perfect picture since the data was being pieced together from disparate sources. Still, Survey had literally been made for this kind of thing so I was able to get a fairly accurate picture of how the attacks had rolled out, as well as a more concerning analysis of the reasoning behind them.
The first wave of attacks had been designed to shock. They were coordinated with the blackout and were the only ones that actually targeted civilian areas, about a half dozen blasts, enough to put people on alert. At the same time there were reported explosions on the PHQ and signs of heavy combat, though still no public announcement on what had happened. Once a response was seriously being mobilized the second wave came.
This was more numerous and tactical. The attacks targeted key roadways, the Brockton Airport, the PRT headquarters and the sites of previous bombings. The PRT headquarters wasn't badly damaged in the attack, but the strike had hit the garage access with an incendiary bomb that was apparently still burning, though thankfully not spreading. The fire was hot enough that attempts to smother it, even with containment foam, had completely failed. Any PRT response vehicles not already on the road were completely locked down.
The secondary bombings had as severe an impact on response to the disaster as the PRT attack. The first few response units to the explosion sites triggered hidden secondary devices. Following that disaster blast sites needed to be cleared by the bomb squad before anyone could be sent in. It slowed the response to a crawl.
This led to the third wave of attacks. These were more spaced out and even more targeted. The third rounds of attacks weren't designed to secure a tactical advantage, slow responses, or create fear. They were clearly targeted based on financial gain.
The blackout dealt with most electronic security and tinker tech bombs removed more conventional barriers. Thus the ABB had led an exceptionally coordinated string of heists across the city. With the chaos slowing police response to a crawl and the strength of Bakuda's bombs backing them up they were able to essentially walk through the juiciest targets in the city.
It was hard to even guess how much they had managed to secure. The rich side of Brockton Bay skewed extremely rich and had services to match. The two auction houses had probably yielded the greatest take in pure dollar value of goods, but that would be difficult to liquidate. There were also the repeated jewelry robberies, hits on depositories, armored cars blown apart or hijacked, and even a good old fashion bank robbery.
It made sense. The ABB would likely have their traditional income streams gutted following this display. No one was going to be heading to ABB territory to partake in any of their vice industries. Protection money was a meager prospect with a depressed economy, even more so following something like this. Beyond that there wasn't much stable cash flow to be had. It seemed their thinker had sidestepped that by ensuring enough take in a single night to support the gang for an indeterminate amount of time.
Actually, I had no idea what the economics of running a gang were like. Judging by behavior it seemed more territory was considered better and quality of territory was a factor as well, but the nitty gritty would have to be guessed from movies and police procedurals. What I did know is this was probably one of the biggest heist sprees in the city's history, and something that could only be pulled off by fully exploiting the chaos of the attacks.
Oh, and the Forsberg Gallery had been taken down. Not 'taken down' on the level of what happened at the storage lockers, but it was definitely in a 'rebuild' rather than a 'repair' category. There was probably a joke in there about not being able to tell when ultra-modern architecture collapses on itself. A few of the supports must have gone, as well as that weird lopsided part that hangs out, but the bottom floors were probably alright.
The damage was a bit excessive if all they wanted to do was cover an art theft. Also I wouldn't really have pegged it as a high value target. Possibly there had been something else going on there, but Survey didn't have any data ready for me.
The A.I. was stressed enough as it dug through social media posts, image board rumors, and news sites from outside the slowly shrinking blackout area. This was not something that would have been possible at the start of the night, but hours of drone coordination and scanner analysis had resulted in a significant boost in the A.I.'s complexity and capacity. Through those efforts I was presented with the worst news of the night.
Lung had gotten away. It wasn't being shouted from the rooftops, and from the looks of things it might have been a close thing, but he was definitely free. There was grainy cell phone footage taken from the boardwalk of some fight on the rig. Not good quality footage. The person was using digital zoom to try to get a close up and turned it into a blurry shaky mess.
It showed a blue blur in what was probably a fight with a big burning blur. The situation wasn't helped by multiple explosions around the two blurs and copious amounts of smoke. It ended with a scuffle between the blue and burning blurs. Then something knocked the blue blur away from the burning blur, the burning blur burned more, and there were lots of explosions. Afterwards the burning blur was gone, the blue blur wasn't moving, and it looked like something had fallen into the bay. Then there were a bunch more explosions, the Rig caught fire, and the force field cut out, taking both the dome and road access with it.
Later on there was a sighting of Dauntless arriving on the scene, then flying back towards the PRT building. Various other sightings of him, Miss Militia, and Triumph were reported across the city, with Battery showing up later in the evening.
It wasn't clear what had happened on the Rig, but a single cell phone photo from an apartment window was posted on Twitter showing a partially transformed Lung entering the city. There were no signs of him going on a rampage or participating in the other ABB activities, but it was clear he was out of Protectorate custody.
Maybe if I'd gone there first I could have tipped the scales. Of course, that would have meant trading the Undersiders' lives, the lives of all of the conscripts, and letting Bakuda run free will all that ordinance. It could also mean a few more Protectorate heroes would be on the streets instead of their missing/status unknown situation, but I wasn't sure how good a trade that would have been.
I could keep thinking in circles forever. The point wasn't if I made the right decision. It was if there was anything else I could do now.
On that note there was something going on pretty much everywhere in the city. The Empire and Merchants were out in force, but unlike the ABB seemed to be having trouble figuring out how to take advantage of the chaos. And it was chaos. This was a blackout with the police heavily tied up and the fire and medical services stressed to their limit. Fortunately there didn't seem to be an excess of firebombs deployed, but any number was a nightmare considering the technology involved. There were scattered fires across the city, likely unrelated to the bombings but still pushing the limits of firefighter's ability to contain them.
Reports from the hospitals were not as horrible as they could have been. A slight shift to the bombing pattern could have clogged the emergency rooms and morgues of the city well past their capacity. Instead they had focused on disruption of response and financial gain, a small and dubious mercy. Still, that took the medical response from an insurmountable problem to a merely taxing one. They wouldn't be doing post-Endbringer style tent hospitals and field amputations, but every medical professional would be on double shifts and earning their pay for the foreseeable future.
I missed a connection to the knowledge constellation as I considered what I should do. What could I do? Panacea was still in containment thanks to the reaction to our conversation. Could they release her for something like this? Somehow I doubted it. It seemed unlikely that containment protocols would have an exemption letting potentially mastered capes free just because their powers would be useful. That sounded like it would be the most exploitable loophole ever.
Thanks to my own status and my effective declaration as a villainous mercenary I couldn't exactly step into her place. I was a suspected master using untested and unverified healing tech that I was not willing to submit to an examination. Medical nanites were wonderful, but in order to develop them a normal person would need to go through iterative designs that could cause all kinds of disasters, and that's not even getting into the Protectorate's stance on nanite technology in general. My alchemy might be a little better, but would raise even more questions. I couldn't see a way to offer help without ending up in PRT custody by the end of the night.
So what else could I do? Somehow just rescuing the Undersiders in the face of all of this didn't feel like enough. Okay, I had saved a bunch of civilians as well, stopped whatever Bakuda was planning to do with that insane amount of ordinance, and while she got away it hadn't been in one piece. The blade hadn't exactly taken her legs, more of a low cut through the shins. The left foot was gone along with most of her calf, but the right wasn't cut all the way through. That said, the right cut was closer to the knee, so that brought its own set of problems.
She obviously didn't bleed out, so credit to either Uber's perfect medical skills or Leet's bullshit technology. This would seem like a victory, but really it just served to hand the ABB a crippled tinker. That's pretty much the nightmare scenario for any tinker to find themselves in and the best present a gang could receive. It also would keep her out of the field, so while that would probably reduce random executions substantially it transfers command to more level headed capes. I'm not sure a less violent but more effective ABB was that much of a step up.
So what did I do now? In a way it was easier back at the facility. The goals were clear and even if the best decisions weren't being made just doing something was generally an improvement. I could deal with a problem that was right in front of me, but a wide reaching, city scale disaster? No.
From what I could discern the wave of violence and looting that had sprung up around the blackout was dying down. Not due to the Protectorate, but surprisingly the activities of minor capes, independent heroes, and even Faultline's crew. Though in their case the smart money was they were defending their stomping grounds rather than taking any stand for law and order. There was no evidence of a coordinated effort from New Wave, but individual members had been spotted on and off through the night. Even the gangs weren't putting up with rioting or looting in their own territory, which clamped down on some of the worst hotspots. I couldn't see any way to help with the general violence that wouldn't throw me unprepared against one of those groups.
I couldn't think of anything I could do that would make a positive impact without also causing excessive entanglement with the Protectorate or another group in the city. I didn't want anything like that until I had time to leverage some of my new abilities. I had rushed into one situation under-geared and half prepared. I wasn't doing it again.
If there was one key takeaway from the night it was that there was a big difference between having power and knowing how to apply it properly. If I didn't want to repeat my earlier mistakes I would have to get my shit together before anything like this happened again.
That led to me hunting for a darkened alley to access my workshop. That wasn't something in short supply in this part of the docks and I found an acceptably isolated door fairly quickly. Despite the expansions to my workshop the entryway looked the same as ever. The scattered equipment and cast off civilian clothing from my rushed deployment were scattered across the floor. I secured the door, stowed my hoard of tinker tech, and started to get changed.
My costume was in a far worse state than when I left. Virtually all of that damage was due to Uber and Leet's Street Fighter attack. I had defenses against a lot of things, but spatial distortions were not currently on the list. That had to change. I knew that broadcast had gone out, even if I hadn't had time to review it yet. I had little doubt that I would be facing similar weapons in the future.
I didn't have the advantage of anonymity anymore. Villains didn't last in the cape scene if they were idiots. I couldn't hope that they would come at me with attacks that had been demonstrated to be ineffective. Spatial warping drew blood, so any cape or tinker who could produce anything similar would be in extremely high demand.
I could build something to defend against that kind of thing, but that would involve digging heavily into the principles provided by my Skills: Physics power. There were fascinating concepts there, but unfortunately none of the engineering needed to bring them to life. I would have to develop my technology the old fashion way, and that meant research and experimentation.
As a positive, it did provide the basis for defending against time stop bombs and the construction of a personal force field. I had a few different personal force fields I could build at this point and should probably start prioritizing that particular project. There are effects from those bombs where the only safe measure is to avoid contact entirely. With some of that stuff there's no level of durability that can reliably save you.
Despite the exertion and messy nature of combat the costume was still fairly fresh. I had The Flock's Fleece when I made this with Garment, so in addition to always fitting perfectly it created an ideal thermal equilibrium. Never too hot or too cold, and even when sprinting in full costume with a face mask you were perfectly comfortable. It was a minor thing, but I appreciated not ending the night swimming in panic sweat.
The state of my pistol made my costume look pristine. That mega slash thing may have been dramatic, but it was beyond anything that sword had been designed for. The HF capacitor has completely shorted out and I wouldn't want to even try activating the omni-blade mount until I had a chance to see what was happening inside. Really I should have stripped it down right after the attack, but there wasn't time for even my accelerated maintenance. Given my new powers it was probably due for a complete rebuild anyway.
While I got changed I updated the copies of Survey and Fleet running in the computational core with the data from the night. Given how much they had been able to derive from a simple ride around the city this would likely be a feast of information for them. I would have to expand their parameters soon. If they hadn't hit them already they would soon. Since I was basing their upgrades on the powers I received they were well overdue for an expansion.
After I finished getting changed I stowed my gear and made sure my reserve armor plate was in place on my shin. There was a chance that kind of durability could expose me but it was still dangerous out there. I would much rather have someone wondering how I survived a bullet than end up a corpse. In fact I should probably upgrade that as soon as I get the chance. I had an entire database of armor technology in my head, and that wasn't even touching on what I could do with high gravity assembly now that element zero based technologies were an option.
Ultra-compressed high grade refined ceramite plates could come later. Right now I just wanted to get back to the relative safety of my apartment. This night had been draining even before I charges into Bakuda's murder arena. Since then I had been running on desperation and conditioning, thank you military training. The moment the costume came off it was like a switch was thrown. All I wanted to do was sleep for a week.
That sounded like a great idea, but this wasn't the place for it. I signaled Fleet and the motorcycle shifted back into civilian mode, changing from its aggressive shape and black and silver coloring to a still sleek but much less aggressive silhouette in blue and white. Still not exactly inconspicuous, but better than riding around in costume.
I wheeled my transformed bike out into the alley, sealed my workshop, and took off towards my apartment. Signs of violence became gradually more common as I moved into the more populated areas of the docks. Even as the damage reached its peak it wasn't as bad as I had feared. Going into this I had expected the entire city to be a rubble strewn fireball. Frankly I saw more damage due to the actions of normal people in the form of smashed storefronts and broken windows than I did from explosives.
The Docks isn't exactly what you'd call prime looting grounds, but I guess people take what they can get. It was probably telling about the city's drug problem that I didn't see a single pharmacy that hadn't been broken into. Anyone who needed prescription refills in the north side of the city was going to have a hard time of it for a while. Somehow I doubted things were this bad Downtown. There was more spacing between the commercial and residential areas, the Boardwalk had its own security, and office buildings didn't exactly have an abundance of light weight, easily liquidated items to grab.
That said, most of the ABB heists were centered Downtown or towards the Beaches, so I guess that evened things up. It would be interesting to see how the fallout from this night shapes itself. Given the number of cities affected this is probably going to end up with one of those cape specific monikers like the Boston Games.
As I rode the Celestial Forge made a connection to a small mote from the Time constellation. This one was called Don't Need a Team. It made it so that I didn't need a team.
Okay, there was more complexity to it than that. The power let me do the work of an entire team by myself. I wasn't duplicating or using telekinesis or anything like that, it just worked as a combination of expanded knowledge and faster speed that allowed me to handle the tasks of an entire service crew by myself.
It was primarily aligned towards fighter jet maintenance, but could be applied to other fields easily enough, especially with my level of skill. It wouldn't be any use on small projects where a second set of hands would get in the way, but for larger projects I could handle the work of up to ten people with no issue. It was actually just what I needed for expanding my workload and trying to leverage new technology.
I put that power aside and focused on the road. The city was still shockingly dark. You got so used to there always being some level of lighting that this kind of thing, the choking, inky darkness, became severely unnerving. Some buildings still had emergency lighting on, and flashlights and candles showed through the windows of some houses, but generally the land outside the reach of my headlights was a complete void.
I turned a corner and was greeted by an unexpected island of light on an otherwise pitch black street. My gym was bright and fully lit. Light streamed out of its windows and open doors across the people milling around outside. I slowed as I approached the old building. From the looks of what I could see inside the place was packed to capacity, probably with half the neighborhood present.
The attitude of the crowd was complicated. I would probably have described it as a high tension potluck. Some of the larger guys from the gym were out on the street, forming a kind of informal perimeter at the edge of the light. Assorted non-members were behind them. A few were smoking, some had paper coffee cups, and some were just pacing in clear agitation. What was clear was that a sense of 'inside' and 'outside' had evolved around the gym and people were keeping aware of the boundary.
I pulled my bike into the crowded parking area and pulled off my helmet. At the sound of my approach an unspoken exchange was conducted between the gym regulars and two of them moved to intercept me, with the others shuffling around to even out the spacing. It wasn't exactly a military perimeter, but it was probably the closest thing that could evolve naturally in a situation like this.
The two figures approached in a decidedly aggressive manner, but the lead figure's mannerism's changes as soon as he got close enough to see my face. The second figure picked up on it and mirrored his behavior.
"Joe?"
I recognized Vince's voice and shifted slightly so I could see his face without the light completely at his back.
"Hey Vince." I tried to keep the mental exhaustion out of my voice as I spoke, but I think he picked up on it. I glanced over the gym patrons and members of the public standing around. This close and without the engine noise I could hear the mummer of dozens of voices coming from inside the gym. "What's going on here?"
He grinned. "A bunch of us were here when the power went out. Doug kind of took command of things, kept anyone from panicking."
I returned his smile. "I can see that."
He nodded. "Yeah. Anyway, heard streets were getting dangerous so we were set to wait things out. That's when people started showing up. Like, more than just members."
"Seriously?" The gym was a nice place to work out, but I wouldn't exactly call it a community hub. Maybe a known factor on account of its Neolithic architecture, but not a place where people would gravitate.
"Seriously. Get this, there was this cape going around breaking up assaults," Vince put a particular inflection on that word and something told me it was probably more serious that just muggings. "and sending people here."
I blinked. "Why here?"
He just shrugged. "Maybe they knew the place would be open and we'd have a bunch of guys here in case anyone tried to start something? Anyway, Doug started organizing things to account for that. You've seen what it's like out there?"
I nodded grimly.
"Right, the cops weren't showing up for anything less than a murder in progress, so Doug set to get us dug in until things calmed down. He called in some favors, including someone who had an old generator." He gestured behind him. "Once we got the lights on more people started showing up. Doug called in more people to keep things from getting out of hand, and well..."
Well indeed. I had no idea what cape would be sending people to our gym, but the situation had worked out better than anyone could have hoped given the circumstances.
"Oh, Joe this is Casey." He gestured at the thirty-something tattooed boxer next to him. The man gave me a crooked grin and extended a hand like a ham hock.
"Nice to meet you." He was clearly one of those people who turned every handshake into a cursing grip contest. I squeezed back as hard as I could manage and hoped my durability boost wouldn't betray me.
"Likewise." He turned to Vince while still shaking my hand. "So, this the rookie you couldn't put down the other night? Mr. Laborn must have been mortified."
I kept a straight face while Vince laughed it off. When Casey broke the grip I made a show of unnecessarily rubbing feeling back into my hand. That earned a scoff, but his own hand was trembling slightly.
"You should check inside, at least let Doug know you're safe. He's been on the phone all night, but we haven't been able to confirm everyone's okay." Yeah, I guess that's what happens when you leave your civilian phone isolated in another dimension. 'We are sorry. The number you have dialed no longer exists in this reality.'
Still, it was an odd sense of community I hadn't really expected from this place. I couldn't decide if it was endearing or intrusive. That said, I at least wanted to find out about this cape.
"You guys go ahead." Said Casey. He looked over the street. "Things seem to be calming down anyway. I'll keep an eye on things." He glanced at my bike, then shared a look with Vince. There seemed to be something going on there, but I just gave him a nod and followed Vince inside.
Past the door things reminded me more of a church social than a disaster shelter. Someone had set up a bunch of folding tables with some of those giant coffee makers that produce truly terrible coffee on them. It was complimented by assorted foodstuffs that I suspected were mostly chosen based on what would go bad without constant refrigeration. What parts of the workout gear that could be cleared away was pushed to the side to make room for what looked like at least half the neighborhood. People were circulating, chatting, or collapsing into folding chairs, but generally seemed happy to be here. A little island of stability in the middle of a night of insanity.
Vince led me through the throng of people, around the ring, and eventually to the back of the gym near the office. I heard Doug's booming voice well before I spotted the big man. He might be a terror to his students, but give him a disaster to coordinate and he was suddenly everyone's best friend. Or at least the person you wanted on your side.
Honestly, I think it might be a bit similar to what I was dealing with at the storage facility. When things are going to hell it's easier to focus on the job in front of you than try to take everything in. Doug didn't seem the most contemplative person at the best of times and probably favored action over careful consideration. It was easy to see how he ended up pulling this together.
Also he got to yell at people. That always put him in a good mood.
Doug was talking with some of the other coaches and older members of the gym. Vince waved to get his attention and his face lit up when he saw me. The man may not have an ounce of tact in his body but he was probably the most earnest person I'd ever met.
"Joe!" He waved off the crowd and made his way over to me and Vince. "Glad so see you're safe. I swear, this fucking night." He shook his head. "Couldn't reach you, and with your new job..."
He left that hanging and there were some knowing looks from the men around him. Not judgmental, just knowing. In retrospect by talking about a job with 'good pay' and 'terrible hours' I should have realized it would come across as a euphemism for some kind of illegal activity. The entire gym seemed to be onboard with the idea that I had found some kind of legally gray side job.
I mean I had, but not nearly in the way they were thinking.
Wait, that's probably what the thing was between Casey and Vince about my bike. Well, looks like they assumed I was riding around on the proceeds from a criminal venture. I'd be offended if they weren't exactly correct.
"No, I got a call from some... friends. They were in a bad spot because of this and needed some help."
Doug nodded. "Things work out?"
"Yeah." I fell back on my 'nearly lying' tactic of staying as close to the truth as possible. "They had some close calls and are probably pretty shaken up, but they'll be fine."
"Lucky they had someone to rely on." I didn't answer, but joined the chorus of nods around the group.
"Vince mentioned something about a new cape?" The gym's champ grinned at Doug but let him launch into the explanation.
"Oh yeah, it's the damnedest thing. City hadn't been dark for half an hour when this girl shows up, skittish as hell. Said a new cape showed up when she was in trouble, then pointed her our way." He shook his head. "Had no idea what to make of it at first, then the next one shows up. Cindy over there." He pointed at a college age girl with auburn hair sitting by the wall. She was wearing a beautiful jacket over a torn t-shirt and had a split lip that had seen some hasty medical treatment.
Looking around I could see more cases like her. Injuries and damaged clothing, and mostly women. Some were clearly still badly shaken and curled in on themselves in quiet or isolated areas. Others were working to support each other, or even mingling with some of the gym members and people from the neighborhood. I could spot what must have been a dozen, and there were probably more.
"And it was a new cape? No one had seen them before."
Doug grinned. "See, that's what I thought. Then someone found said they'd heard of her. Even had a video." He grabbed a smart phone from a nearby folding table, unlocked it after two tries, tried to navigate a website, accidentally went to the home screen, entered the list of apps, and then inadvertently hit the image gallery icon next to the internet browser.
Huh, apparently Doug liked to go kayaking.
"I've got it." The Celestial Forge missed a connection to the Alchemy constellation as Vince stepped in. He pulled it up with his own phone before Doug decided to start swearing at his or smash it against the wall.
I was expecting some kind of guerrilla style street video of the cape in action. Probably with a homemade costume and the takedown of a couple of muggers or something similar. I wasn't expecting the very familiar sight of a set of curtains framing a red dress with a floating set of opera length white gloves.
I worked very hard to keep my face straight as the video played out, complete with assembly of jacket and finishing with the all too familiar incredibly slow typing. Doug and Vince shared a grin at my expense, so I'm guessing they took my carefully controlled reaction for shock.
"Her name's Garment. Has powers like that fashion girl from down by the college, only people think she's one of those Case whatever folks."
"Case 53s." Vince corrected. "She's not actually invisible, it's just the clothing. There's nothing there to hurt."
The prospect of how someone would figure that out made my stomach lurch, but I nodded along. I hadn't told Garment to stay in the apartment. I'd told her to stay safe. She wasn't obligated to listen to me, but even if she had been this was within the bounds of what I'd said.
But I didn't understand why she'd left the apartment. She'd never shown interest in hero work before, and while there was certainly a need for it this night I didn't know why she decided to start.
I took a moment to think about how Garment saw the world. I didn't have a perfect picture, but from the couple of times I'd worn the gloves I'd been able to get inklings of her senses, the information she received and how she processed it. The way she interacted with the environment around her and the sensation that created. Then I looked over the people she'd been rescuing and sending here. Suddenly something fell into place.
Torn clothing.
There were a variety of levels of injury present, but every one of them had some damage to what they were wearing. I tried to remember what I'd experienced about how Garment perceived things around her, the almost tactile relationship she had with fashion and items of clothing. Then I imagined what would happen during one of these 'assaults', how they would come across to Garment senses.
With that thought I could understand why she left the apartment. I was just grateful she was only dealing with normal humans. I didn't know how well Garment could handle herself in a fight, but apparently it was well enough to break up a street level conflict. Against cape opponents I wouldn't be as confident, so I was glad that things seemed to have been limited on the front.
I made a show of contemplating the video as Vince and Doug watched my reaction. "That's really impressive and all, but how was she fighting with that kind of power?"
Vince beamed as he scrambled to pull something up on his phone. "Oh, this is great." Doug was grinning as he leaned over to look at the screen. Finally he found what he was looking for and turned the phone around.
The screen showed a twitter post of a photo of a skinhead. The lack of tattoos meant it was probably not Empire, just someone who shared the style of that movement. He had what looked like paper cuts across his face, but that wasn't what drew the eye. No, the clear focus of the image was the inch wide pink silk ribbon that had been used to truss him up.
With my knowledge of fabrics and clothing I could easily tell the ribbon has been sewn into his clothing as well as wrapped in a way that effectively immobilized him. With the tensile strength of silk, especially silk of that thickness, there was no way he was getting free unless someone cut him out, and he'd still have the material sewn into his jacket and jeans. The man was clearly furious and red-faced, which clashed horribly with the pink of the ribbon.
Weirdly, except for the shade of his face the entire arrangement looked pretty striking. The pink contrasted nicely with the black jeans and dark grey jacket. It was wrapped in a way that created a kind of banding pattern across his body. I mean, it was clearly intended for restraint, but I could see something in that style ending up on the runway of a fashion show at some point.
Though likely with a more attractive and cooperative model.
"She's been leaving goons trussed up like that all over the area. Sent a few guys out to check on them. They aren't going anywhere until the cops can collect them." Doug looked over at the group of people Garment had sent him. "Had a couple Protectorate capes drop by to follow up on things. Shadow Stalker and that new girl. Said the police will be by to take statements once they can move through the city without getting blown to hell."
"But she can't talk, right? How did she send people here?"
Vince broke in. "She had a laptop with her. Typed stuff out." He saw my expression. "With auto-complete. Still pretty limited, but she got the point across."
"Most of the time." Doug said with a smile.
"What do you mean?"
He turned to carefully lift something off the table behind him. "Apparently had some trouble getting the point across a few times. When she couldn't get through with the laptop she made this."
He lifted a small banner of fabric and held it up. I did not know what to make of it. I knew Garment could work quickly, but I did not expect this.
"She sent it down with the last person to arrive. It was petering out for a while, so theory is she's done for the night." Vince grinned. "We're thinking of hanging it over the ring."
I could see where Vince was coming from, but it was still a shock to see. The item in question was a five foot banner of embroidered cloth, about two feet thick. It looked like wool embroidered onto linen. Actually, it was definitely wool embroidered onto linen because that was what the original was made of. It's just the original Bayeux Tapestry didn't depict any men in boxing shorts.
Garment had decided to get around her communication issues by making a twelfth century tapestry depiction of an empty red dress and gloves intervening to save a maiden from bandits, then directing the maiden along a path to where a group of boxers were standing surrounding a very nice depiction of the gym. After that it showed the boxers defending the maiden from figures in the surrounding darkness. All of this was lovingly sewn in the exact style of the finest medieval tapestry work.
I could only stare at it while Vince and Doug enjoyed my reaction. I shook my head and took in the size of the crowd. The shift in the mood inside the gym compared to the feeling pervading the rest of the city was stark. "This is incredible. I can't believe you pulled all this together on such short notice."
Doug just shrugged. "Some cape thinks we're a good enough place to look after people who were... assaulted. If they have that kind of faith in us I'm not going to let them down. I just took some steps to make sure they'd be alright. Things kind of snowballed from there."
Doug glanced across the room at a tiny elderly woman who looked thin enough for a stiff breeze to knock her flat. She was surrounded by a group composed of gym patrons and members of the public and was commanding the group with the grace of a career general. There seemed to be glimmers of actual fear even in the older heavyweight boxers as they scurried around moving chairs and bringing out food and blankets. She looked over at Doug and the big man immediately averted his eyes.
"Uh, I'll just go see if Mrs. Gartenberg needs help with anything." Vince gave us a quick nod before darting off.
"Mrs. Gartenberg?"
Doug took a breath. "She's... active in the community. A good chunk of this is on her." I suddenly noticed that there was something of a division across the gym, kind of a tone shift separating the realm of Doug's authority from that of the old woman. I considered what it would take to get Doug to secede part of his domain and decided that I definitely did not want to get on that woman's bad side.
At that thought the lights cut off for a second. They came back almost immediately, but there was a concerning flicker to them. Mrs. Gartenberg shot Doug a glare and the big man swore under his breath.
"Hey Joe, you know engineering and that kind of stuff, right?"
I did my very best to keep a straight face as I nodded in reply.
"You know Grant Phillips?" He continued before I could reply. "Used to coach here. Had a generator from when he worked up at the market. The thing's ancient, but we were able to get it working, sort of. Been flickering all night. If it gives out and I don't know how this will go."
It made sense. With the city in darkness this tiny dot of light made things seem normal and in control. Even if you were able to switch to lanterns it would still have a very different and less friendly tone.
Which is how I ended up in the back room of the gym looking at a chugging diesel generator that was a good deal older than I was. Doug had picked up on my nervousness and was taking a soft touch as I examined the machine.
I was nervous, but probably not for the reasons Doug assumed. I could fix the thing. Of course I could fix the thing. There was no question about that. The question, and what I was really concerned about, was could I fix this without announcing my cape status to the world?
I knew I could get everything running perfectly in seconds. That wasn't the problem. What I was worried about was the effects of all my secondary powers. As such I was dragging out my examination while trying to figure out how not to accidentally turn this thing into something that was simultaneously a leap forward in power generation and a work of art worthy of the reverence of generations. I mean, this was compression ignition internal combustion, some of the most primitive of human technology. The challenge was keeping things on that level.
Damn it, that's another quarter for the jar.
Doug picked up on my reaction. "Think you can give us a hand?" Doug was probably the only man in the world who can use his normal speaking voice next to an active generator and still come across perfectly clearly.
I nodded, apprehension clear in all my movements. At the moment I was examining every component to try to make sure I kept things at a comparable technical level.
"So," I said, trying to distract myself. Unlike Doug I needed to put in some effort to drown out the roar of the diesel engine. "Did everyone make it in safe tonight?" I checked the fuel lines and tank. Plenty in stock, and I should be able to do this without increasing the efficiency too much. You know this would be so much easier to just build a diesel powered fuel cell and bypass the mechanical side of… NO! Need to work with the terrible caveman tech.
Doug shook his head. "Few guys I couldn't check in on. Plenty more that stayed home rather than make the trip." He looked grim. "And got some bad news about Laborn."
I looked up sharply. "What happened?"
"Was out at dinner when the bombings started. Avoided that, but he got caught in some mess on the way home."
I winced. "He was alone?"
"Yeah. His son was supposed to go instead, but had to cancel."
Huh. I had no idea why a father and son would switch out going to a restaurant alone. Must be one of those weird things you only get in single-child families.
"He alright?"
Doug nodded. "Someone got him to the hospital. He's a bit beat up, but he'll pull through. The man's a tough old bird." Doug seemed to be considering something. "You really made an impression on him last week."
"Seriously?"
"When Laborn breaks out a session like that it's about seeing when some'll tap out. No one expected you to tough your way through it." He looked distant for a moment. "Laborn, well he's not the best with people, with knowing their limits. Some of the training he did with his boy..." He dropped off, then shook away whatever he was considering. "Point is he has high expectations and is used to people disappointing him. You didn't, and that means a lot."
I nodded politely, but wasn't sure what to make of it. That overly aggressive training had come out of nowhere and I still didn't have a clue what triggered it. It had left me nervous about coming back to the gym all week, but I guess it was good to know something good had come from it.
"Any idea when he'll be out?"
"Monitoring for a concussion, but they'll have him released in no time. The man will see to that." Doug spoke with a slight grin. "So, can you help with this clunker?"
I nodded slowly. "Just give me a few minutes. I think I see the problem."
Doug retreated back to the gym as I dug into the modest tool box they had on hand for maintenance issues. I think I could handle this. Most of my involuntary powers triggered on construction, not repair. There was no risk of ending up with four more generators or involuntary over designing the aesthetics of them. But that didn't mean there were no issues at all.
I was pretty much able to instantly fix the generator with no problems or disruption to operation. Even without the support powers my mechanical skill was insanely good. As it stood the only issue I couldn't contain was the effect of Stylish Mechanic. That power made anything I fixed clean and pleasant to look at. The generator wasn't in complete showroom condition, but probably looked better than it had in years.
I smeared some grease and threw some dust onto the casing, but it was a token effort. I really hoped nothing came of this, but just to be sure I decided to wait out the clock in the back room, serenaded by now much more rhythmic but still extremely loud engine. Can't let people think I worked too fast.
And there went the Vehicles constellation with no connection.
I leaned against the wall and collected my thoughts. Even with the shocking news about Garment this had been nice. It was normal people dealing with a horrible situation the best they could and coming out better for it. I kind of hoped similar things were happening across the city, but it didn't seem likely. Brockton was very much a 'cape town'. People followed the lead of parahumans, and without someone like Garment coordinating things they just wouldn't happen.
Garment. That was still a crazy thought. This is probably on me for not checking in after that first call. She had apparently kept her laptop with her, and the copy of Survey. I could have reached them, but the mess with the Undersiders and Bakuda had been so consuming I hadn't had time to think about anything else.
I hoped she was alright. I mean, physically there wasn't much that could happen to her. She was an animating spirit. The number of parahumans who could even interact with something like that was minuscule. Attacks would just damage her clothes and while she might lament them like a passed loved one that wouldn't actually hurt her.
I was worried about what she mentally dealt with tonight. I'd seen some ugly things at the murder arena, but there was a base level of cruelty that happened on the streets that had a horror all its own. I was undoubtedly proud of her for stepping in, but that didn't change the fact of what she'd been dealing with.
Vince said it looked like she'd called it for the night. I needed to get home and check the apartment. If she wasn't there I could scan for the laptop or start a search pattern. Even if it meant churning out stealth drones and infiltrating surveillance networks I would be able to track her down.
Also, I probably needed to address what Survey considered priority information. Social media posts mentioning a new fabric controlling cape should not have been folded into the summary 'minor capes and heroes'. It was a petty gripe considering the comparatively short time the A.I. had been optimizing, but something I needed to address nonetheless.
Despite my decision to leave as soon as possible that proved to be something of an ordeal. Once it got out that I was the one responsible for the lights no longer flickering there was a focus of attention that I could not break away from, particularly given who was directing it. It seemed that all the skills I'd developed fighting tinkers, countering capes, bypassing murder arenas, and taking on a veritable army of conscripts were completely useless in the face of an elderly Jewish woman.
In her own stern but well-meaning manner Mrs. Gartenberg retrieved me from Doug, thanked me personally in front of her crowd of acolytes and proceeded to march me through the various food and refreshment stations she had coordinated. The crowd regarded the tiny woman with a level of fear and respect Bakuda could only dream of attaining.
It was probably a mistake to mention I hadn't eaten anything since lunch. That comment saw me loaded down with three sandwiches, a cup of soup, a cup full of terrible coffee, and one of those tiny packets of cream cookies. It also saw me seated in one of the few free chairs while I ate. It struck me that my life had reached a level of insanity where I could start the night riding a motorcycle through an explosion to confront a super villain and finish it with soup and sandwiches at an impromptu community potluck.
Also, while I didn't want to pry too much, I was seated close enough to some of the people Garment had rescued to learn some interesting details from basic eavesdropping.
"...right on the spot. Not even a word about it. Well, you know, but..."
"Yes, yes. It's beautiful work. She made it right in front of you?"
The girl nodded and slipped off the jacket, which on second viewing was much better quality than the rest of her clothing, and showed it to the older woman sitting across from her.
"She had the materials in her laptop bag. After she dealt with, you know, they just floated up and she made it on the spot. Barely looked at it, she did it while she was typing stuff out."
"The seams are beautiful. Haven't seen hand sewing like this in years. It's practically a lost art." The woman shook her head. "Most people are lucky to get an autograph when they meet a cape. This is something else."
I looked around. Not all, but most of the people who had been saved by Garment had some item of clothing that stood out from the rest of their outfit. Sometimes just a scarf, sometimes a whole jacket. I was glad she had kept her material summoning under wraps, and found a smart way of doing it. Knowing Garment she probably would have given whoever she came across entire new wardrobes if she could get away with it, so it was probably good she was restraining herself.
She had also given the people here something to focus on that wasn't their city falling apart around them. I didn't know how much of this had made it online, but her PHO thread was probably blowing up over it. I was proud enough to nearly override my concern as I powered through the last of my food.
"Sure you can't stick around?" Vince asked as he walked me out.
I shook my head. "Need to get back and check on things." I looked back from the parking area at the island of light and the muffled din of voices. "This is great, but I think you have things covered."
"We're managing. Thanks for your help with the generator. That's probably dropped Doug's blood pressure by a good chunk."
I smiled. "I'm sure Mrs. Gartenberg will find a way to bring it back up."
"Well, they say you don't reach old age in this city without being tough enough to handle it."
"You think the city can handle Mrs. Gartenberg?"
He chuckled in response. "Wouldn't go that far. Look after yourself out there."
"Thanks, you too."
I took off from the gym into the darkened streets. The rest of the neighborhood seemed eerily quiet after the hectic environment of the gym. At least in the pitch darkness I didn't have any trouble finding a concealed location to access my workshop and store my bike.
I sealed it and moved through the murky blackness of the power outage to the exterior steps leading to my apartment. It was the first place I needed to check. If Garment wasn't here I could start fanning out. A broad enough search and analysis profile would find her, assuming I couldn't just track her by Survey's laptop.
I unlocked the front door and entered the tiny, lopsided apartment. "Garmen..."
Before I could finish speaking a shadowy shape shot through the apartment and engulfed me. It took a second to figure out what was happening and collect myself.
"Yes, it's good to see you too." I returned the hug, then moved to close and lock the door. "I'm glad you're safe."
It was hard to make out Garment's reactions in the dark, but I got the distinct impression she felt that statement was both ignorant and inconsiderate.
"Oh, I'm fine."
Once again, it was hard to make out her response, but she seemed to have some doubts about the integrity of that statement. I couldn't keep this conversation going without actually being able to see what was happening. I moved deeper into the apartment, past the open laptop sitting on the desk. At my approach it blinked to life and printed a message on the screen.
'Greetings. Welcome back.'
It was a basic chat-bot level communication, but still a big step forward. Acting as an assistant for Garment had really helped this branch of Survey develop language skills.
"Uh, hello Survey." The screen flickered in response. Speech recognition, or whatever was being processed there, was even more impressive. I really needed to get into my neural interface and check on the development of both A.I.s.
While I moved to use the closet door to access my workshop Garment began frantically entering commands to the laptop. By which I mean mouse commands, not keyboard, since they were coming at a rapid fire pace rather than at five to ten second intervals.
The closet door opened to reveal my entry hall. The normally dimly lit room illuminated my apartment like the noonday sun. Suddenly I could make out every detail that had been lost in the blackout, but that was secondary to the picture on the laptop Garment was shoving in my face.
"Ah." Garment made an expression that suggested more explanation was due. The screen showed confirmation that Uber and Leet had indeed been streaming the events of the storage facility. The specific frame on the screen showed the immediate aftermath of Uber's spatial Street Fighter attack. Specifically, me on the ground covered in bloody injuries. Just looking at it brought back unpleasant memories.
I really needed to track down that stream and find out how much had been shared and what the reaction was to it. God damn but I had a lot of projects piling up. I thought I was down to the wire preparing for this attack, but that was nothing compared to the work that came afterwards.
"Look, it wasn't that bad." I had to duck as my costume floated out of the workshop entryway like a specter. With the light behind it every rip and tear was highlighted. Garment held it suspended next to me and crossed her arms.
To be honest she seemed about equally upset about my injuries and the damage to the clothing. I had already committed to improving my defenses. I just didn't expect to be called to task for not addressing that ahead of time. As I struggled for a way to defend myself I felt the Celestial Forge make a significant connection to the Time constellation.
The power was called Most Holy Order of the Socket Wrench. It was basically the last word in mechanics, at least as far as vehicles are concerned. With it I could improve any vehicle to an insane degree. Full on beyond the impossible level improvements, some of which made no sense but would work anyway. Beyond just improving my skills it opened up new options that shouldn't work, but in my hands suddenly would.
There was also a time component. Much like with my last power this let me do the work of many people. The phrase 'one-man chop shop' came to mind. Unlike my previous ability this wasn't limited to the speed boost from extra hands, it also accelerated any mechanical task to a blazing degree. It was simultaneously the ability to do impossible work, and the ability to complete it in an impossible timeframe.
Actually, this power stacked with Don't Need A Team. With both of them I could function as a one-man chop shop... where each person in it could do the work of an entire team unto themselves. The sheer scale of the projects I could build with this...
And Garment wouldn't care about any of it. She was still standing there, both offended and concerned over the injuries I'd suffered.
"Look, I know." She made a flippant gesture. "I do. This night didn't go as planned. I had to rush in, I wasn't ready, and I didn't know what to expect. I did what I could, but I'll do better next time."
Slowly Garment seemed to come around. She made an accepting gesture and lowered the laptop. With that, in the light of my workshop, I could suddenly see her clearly. And it struck me what a massive, massive hypocrite she was.
"Garment." She froze at my tone, then slowly turned towards me. "Garment, what happened?"
She seemed to consider things, then took a step forward closer to the light with absolutely no hint of shame. What I could barely make out earlier became crystal clear.
Garment's dress was a mess. Not a dirty mess. It was a nearly shredded mess. She had bullet holes in it. She had a long tear that would have hit the kidney on a normal person. The neckline was pulled and torn and probably only keeping its shape thanks to her power. In short it looked like she had gone through hell and was proud of it.
I took in the damage and sighed. "I stopped by the gym on my way home. I heard what you did." She made an intrigued gesture. "They're doing fine. Really well, actually. Better than most of the city." She looked particularly satisfied at that.
"Why did you decide to send people there?" She made a nebulous gesture towards me. I suppose it was a known factor that she was sure would have people at that time of night. If you had to send them somewhere it was as good a choice as was available.
"I'm proud of what you did, what you accomplished." She perked up. "Even with the..." I gestured towards her dress. "Actually, why haven't you fixed that?" I knew she could have, and easily. So why leave it?
Garment went over to the laptop, which automatically pulled up a text editor as she approached. More significant developments from Survey. Slowly Garment began typing, getting three letters in before Survey managed to hit the right auto-fill.
E...V...I...DENCE
"They need it for evidence?" She gestured assent. That did make a sort of sense. This wasn't some supervilian dust up. There would have to be criminal charges, and that dress was clear evidence of multiple attempts at lethal force. It also showed that she was taking a serious approach to this, rather than just going out and hoping to beat people up.
That actually put her a good deal above my first attempt at hero work. I never even considered prosecution requirements when I went out for my first patrol.
"I saw a twitter photo of one of the people you caught." Garment gestured excitedly and switched to a web browser with her twitter feed.
It was significantly more active than last time. Also the picture I saw was not nearly the only one in circulation. She began to scroll through the tweets on the #GarmentGloves hashtag.
There were multiple pictures of the people she had caught. In fact, in an act of insanity that would only happen in a cape city, some of the recent pictures seemed to be people taking selfies with the bound criminals. The BBPD twitter account was quick to reply to these, recommending that people avoid the crime scene and that officers would arrive shortly to take the suspects into custody.
Oh, she coordinated the color of the restraints to contrast nicely with the person's outfit. That was a very Garment touch.
The selfies seemed to have petered out, so I'm guessing they had rushed the pickup before something unfortunate could happen. Those kinds of assaults don't happen in safe places and you didn't need more people getting in trouble trying to chase a short lived twitter fad.
Further down her feed there were people reposting her introduction video. Others were tweeting photographs of her on the street, though the darkened city made it hard to see details. Likewise with a single short video that allegedly showed Garment saving someone. She was very proud of it, but in the gloom it was basically a flurry of ribbon in the dark with a lot of whip-crack like sounds and then a zoom in on another captured thug, tied up and sewn into silk ribbons.
I spotted another tweet with a single graphic on it. That was a neat detail. Garment had a label. Two raised gloves, crossed at the wrists. Apparently she had sewn it into the clothing that she'd given out and someone from the Gym had posted a picture of it to Twitter. As a logo it worked for her, simple but identifiable.
There were also a few public recruitment offers that had come in from some of the larger corporate teams, though these were being pretty thoroughly mocked by the public for trying. That seemed to be something of an meme that sprung up around this mess. I could see that anyone who tried something that would distract from the response or was perceived as taking advantage of the disaster while it was still happening was being raked over the coals. I mean, it was internet mob behavior, but that didn't mean it was wrong.
Twitter actually was really active. With people limited to cell phone service it seemed to be the main community forum for all the insanity of the night. I checked the global hashtags, with #CapeBlackout being a leading one. Surprisingly #Apeiron was also trending strongly. That made me both proud and embarrassed at the same time. Much further down was #ItsSpelledApeiron, which I'm guessing was probably an online joke around the name having to be pulled from Uber and Leet's stream.
That was probably the cause of that #Khepeiron hashtag. I get Apeiron is an obscure word, but I didn't expect people to mangle the spelling that badly.
I pulled back from twitter and looked towards the workshop. I still hadn't even taken a look at the expansions that had been added. Additionally I had to check the development of both my A.I. and expand their parameters. I'd been using my powers as triggers and had gotten more than enough for a series of upgrades.
Upgrading the A.I. would have to go hand in hand with improving my computer technology. I was getting to the point where transistors were not going to cut it. Until I could get a sample of cybertonium transmuted and start working with extradimensional processors then optical and isolinear computing was my best bet, even with the difficulty adapting to human technology.
And that reminded me. I got up and headed for the kitchen. One by one two dollars worth of quarters were dropped into the jar, the full accounting for all of this insanity. Given how bad tonight went I think keeping it that low is a decent accomplishment. I don't think I ever fully explained the jar to Garment, but she was acting vaguely concerned as she watched me.
I headed back and stood by the workshop door. "Okay, You know about the expansions and all the new powers I got?" She made an excited gesture. "Right, well I have a lot of work to do. I need to catalog everything that showed up, and could use your help for that. Then I need to update systems and build some defenses so that..." I gestured to the costume that was still hanging in mid-air. "...doesn't happen again."
She made an affirmative gesture and I smiled in response.
"So before I get started, is there anything else from tonight you want to show me?"
Garment excitedly raised a finger, then rushed over to the desk and fished a piece of paper from behind the laptop. She hurried back and presented it to me. I looked down at the short message, somewhat stunned.
"Garment, how on Earth did you get Flechette's phone number?"
Jumpchain abilities this chapter:
Don't Need A Team (Ace Combat) 100:
Fighter planes are pretty complicated machines, and more often than not you need a whole crew to maintain them so that they don't break down in the middle of a fight and doom the pilot. You know your plane well enough to circumvent this issue. You've got just the right idea on what needs tuning up and what needs fixing, along with having the speed to be able to fix a plane up by yourself without the need for a crew in a fraction of the time. Performance issues are a thing of the past for you.
Most Holy Order of the Socket Wrench (Fast and Furious) 400:
You are a master mechanic. Repair and upkeep is nice, but you can go beyond the impossible and improve any vehicle. Take a van and make it beat a supercar? Put NOS injectors on a bicycle (and make it work)? How bout something challenging? And anything you can build up you can tear down, too. You're a one-man chop shop and wiring a car to explode takes but a few moments and some chicken wire.
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pally320
enchanting eyes
- Location
- United states
was about to post I'm half way done with the celestial forge editing. only 160 left to go through and put the cost and description in. BTW final fantasy in that is a mess. there is stuff put in it that don't do anything and were just labeled notes in the jump docs...
Thanks for the chapter, loving it.
Thanks for the chapter, loving it.
Okay, I'm officially worried about Joe. I feel like he's getting more socially oblivious the more superpowers he gets.
It's the only explanation at this point.
Also: wtf Garment swerve. Didn't see that coming.
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Alas, he missed the shipping. Poor Taylor is going to be very embarrassed pretty soon.
- Location
- Chile
Hehehe.
I liked most of this chapter.
Though the first third or so felt a bit exhausting.
I think at this point just naming every single thing he's gained and can do starts to seriously drag on.
He has so many powers at this point that if he could build stuff without justifying every step and I think everyone would just take your word for it.
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- Location
- Canada
I see Aisha has triggered, I wonder if she got caught in whatever injured her dad. I also wonder if she is gonna stalk the MC using her powers or not.
Mizu
Software Developer
- Location
- Victoria, Australia
I missed the fact that was a shipping tag too, to be fair, until you pointed it out. Some people just aren't savvy about that stuff.
Was great seeing Garment go out and rescue people from assault and/or rape attempts, and finding out the protag's local gym is a safe haven in the chaotic Brockton came as an amusing surprise. I wonder if we'll see mecha coming soon, with his latest powers?
Huh missed that, but yeah she did trigger. Considering she isnt second gen wonder if she had a similar experience to her canon trigger, also wonder if she followed him home
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Well, all look good, the city is rundown but mostly whole, some people are doing fine and Apeiron is gearing for war and getting more oblivious.
In other news, Lily has a type, Aisha is invisible and Bakuda is crippled, 2 of 3 being good things is a great score.
In other news, Lily has a type, Aisha is invisible and Bakuda is crippled, 2 of 3 being good things is a great score.
- Location
- Right next to the butcher's shop.
Oof. Hey, Aisha. Wonder if you're still with your dad in the hospital or not? And whether she's got the same power or a different stranger one.
At this point it's stretching my disbelief if he doesn't figure out that people think he's into khepri soon.
- Location
- England
I presume "couldn't".
"gloves"
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Pentekonter
Piano Cat
- Location
- The Internet
This is hilarious. Also, called it. Also, now I want to see Garment texting Flechette about how stupid Apeiron is being by not trying out all these costume designs she has.
"Barbarian Chic is IN Apeiron, you don't even know!"
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- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
- Location
- Odessa
Thanks for update!
"Bakuda is crippled" has potential not to last. Leet can build anything and machine that makes bionic limbs or heals limbs at least once is probably on the list (depends on him being requested to do it). And Backuda's specialty is broad enough that she might be capable of making healing grenades (especially with the boost she got) and probably can do something like a grenade-launching prosthetic leg, or a rocket leg.
"Aisha is invisible" means a traumatic event, I don't think it counts as 'good'.
"Bakuda is crippled" has potential not to last. Leet can build anything and machine that makes bionic limbs or heals limbs at least once is probably on the list (depends on him being requested to do it). And Backuda's specialty is broad enough that she might be capable of making healing grenades (especially with the boost she got) and probably can do something like a grenade-launching prosthetic leg, or a rocket leg.
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The good things are that lily has a type and bakuda is crippled(for now)
