Heavy READER
Book Devourer/Speed Reader
- Location
- Fitchburg, MA
Hmmmm looks good now all she needs is micro drones because BEES BEES *cough* Drones I mean Drones yes of course.
- Status
YuffieK
(Verified Ninja Princess)
Not quite yet. Despite her current cyberization level, she still looks perfectly normal. Even her eyes wouldn't be noticed unless Emma or Sophia somehow managed to surprise her, up close, before she could cycle the color.
- Location
- Ohio
This fic has fan art already?:lol Taylor's even got retractable sunglasses and the weird arm baton things now, she's totally female Adam Jensen.
Dragonskyt
Ashen one, hearest thou my voice, still?
- Location
- Kiln of the First Flame
Nah, probably Fem!Adam Jensen.
Still, it's very convenient and can be used to describe Taylor later on in the story.
- Location
- Ohio
I can't believe it's not cyber-Taylor!
- Location
- South Africa
Personally i don't like a dedicated racest/E88!Taylor although the curren is plausable. She has very good reason to be one or go to E88 in cannon but doesn't no matter how bad the bullying got.
I just like to think of Taylor as a bit too smart to ever get behind thier ideals. Also she has close ties to the dockworkers which would almost certainly be a very open culture and against racesim.
I just like to think of Taylor as a bit too smart to ever get behind thier ideals. Also she has close ties to the dockworkers which would almost certainly be a very open culture and against racesim.
You know, I wonder how transhumanism and cybernetic self-modifications would clashwith racism. I mean, "you don't need to change yourself, you are already a supreme human being" could be a genuinely caring supportive statement. When not heard from a nazi. Ok, lots of E88 is about "white culture is supreme", rather than "white biology is supreme", but still. Also, at some point prior to full-body prosthetics you stop being able to differentiate between races. Which would also be a problem.
Join the dark side. We have
Requiem_Jeer
The Most High
I dunno, I see Ruth pop up a lot too.
- Location
- Ohio
I can't believe I didn't notice this bit the first time I read this chapter.
Taylor dares say no to brownies? Blasphemy!
The ABB won't get torn apart all by itself! Well, it might if Bakuda got drunk enough.
- Location
- Somewhere, probably Earth
Bakuda can come with!
Bakuda, Rune, Human Augmentation Taylor, and Purity. Maybe Night and Fog as well.
The crackiest of crackfic teams.
- Location
- Ohio
From the weakness of the mind,Omnissiah save us
From the lies of the Simurg,circuit preserve us
From the rage of Behmoth,iron protect us
From the temptations of Leviathan,silica cleanse us
From the ravages of Scion, anima shield us
From this rotting cage of biomatter,
Machine God set us free
From the lies of the Simurg,circuit preserve us
From the rage of Behmoth,iron protect us
From the temptations of Leviathan,silica cleanse us
From the ravages of Scion, anima shield us
From this rotting cage of biomatter,
Machine God set us free
Chapter V: Preposition
Banjofrog
Amphibian Folk Star
--Ex Machina--
Chapter V: Proposition
That afternoon went exactly how Brooke had described it; we laid out our homework, and over the course of an hour and a half, did approximately half of it, owing chiefly to the brownies and bad TV soap operas we couldn't not make fun of. Eventually though, the time that I had to leave to get home before Dad encroached upon us, and in response, I turned the integrated equation lens I had designed to figure precise measurements and engineering on a micro-scale to my tenth-grade trigonometry homework.
Brooke rightly exclaimed that tinkers were bullshit, and I proudly agreed before packing up the homework and saying one last goodbye to the Fleischers. Brooke's mother, Kathryn, from whom Brooke drew almost her entire appearance, jovially bid me farewell, and implored me to come back sometime. It brought up memories of another friendship so many years ago. I buried the memories before I began to dwell on them, and returned Mrs. Fleischer's farewell. Brooke's father, apparently some sort of high-level accountant at a local pharmaceuticals firm was at a conference in Providence, and wouldn't be back in Brockton for several days.
As I left out the front door and headed for the bus stop, I took one last look at the residence behind me.
My initial assessment wasn't far off, I mused as I glanced over the three-story home in the heart of the west side subdivisions (firmly in Empire territory). The entire exterior was red, grey, and maroon cobblestone blocks, with a front door marked out in an ornate stone arch. Wrought-iron decorated the windows and porch, as well as forming a fence around the property, a field of grass which, while not exactly lush here in the New England early spring, was certainly showing more signs of life than most of the others around it, and definitely more than the yards around my own home.
It was the kind of home fit for someone firmly in the upper-upper-middle class of society, which here in Brockton put them firmly into the upper strata of the population. As I climbed into the bus, the niggling hope bit at me that all that familial income was obtained legally.
--Ex Machina--
"Taylor," Brooke began, breaking the amicable silence we had adopted during our lunch break inside an abandoned classroom on the third floor, "would you mind doing me a huge favor?"
She put her sandwich down onto a paper towel spread across the cheap plastic desk and looked up at me, giving me honest-to-God pleading puppy dog eyes.
"No Brooke," I responded with an overly drawn out sigh of exasperation. "I will not give you laser eyes, at the very least I get them first, no arguments."
"No, well yes, but no a different favor," she replied with a nervous laugh. "See after that night we met you, Viktor and Othala gave their reports to the higher-ups, and eventually um… Kaiser heard about it."
I gave her a wary glare, and beckoned her to go on.
After taking a drink from her water bottle and audibly swallowing, the pale teenager in front of me started speaking in a rushed tone, so as to get everything out before I stopped her again.
"Ok so after Kaiser heard about it, he told me to talk to you if you contacted me first and see if I could make all nice with you. I had already given you the card by that point so I just waited and eventually we did that rooftop thing, and then we've like chatted and hung out for the past week, and then Kaiser told me again to ask you if you would meet with him and me and a few other people from the Empire for like dinner to talk about if you'd like to collaborate at all or anything, and that this isn't a recruitment pitch unless you want it to be."
She said the last part all as one rushed flow of words, and then proceeded to hide behind her sandwich in the guise of taking a bite while I reeled a bit at her requested 'favor.'
After several moments of quietly sitting and thinking, I responded.
"If it's not a recruitment, than what, exactly is it?"
"Well there's about half a dozen independent rogues and, um, villains that we contract for specialty work every once in awhile, so maybe that. I- I don't know for sure, I was just told to make the offer."
Naturally I knew why the Empire would be interested in me. They famously boast one of the deepest benches of any gang on the eastern seaboard, but don't have a single Tinker to their name. It's obvious that they would be interested in me, but...
They're villains, Nazis, a gang that has caused untold violence to me home city. And yet, a traitorous voice in the back of my head reminded me, they're people too, and from what I've seen so far better people than those 'protecting' us. Brooke's house was firmly in the heart of Empire territory, and everyone there seemed well-off, and safe, and content with their lives. And also white.
That's the rub isn't it though? The Empire is arguably doing a better job protecting their 'charges' than the PRT or Protectorate, they're just more selective about whom and what they fight for.
Do I want to help people? Obviously yeah, I do.
Can I become a hero and join the Protectorate, as least while they maintain that that African shitsack is one of their 'heroes?' Fuck. No.
Is remaining independent a viable option, especially with the materials cost for the tinkering I plan to continue doing? Not really, no.
That's one choice made then I suppose.
While I had been pondering all this, Brooke had been quietly nibbling on the remains of her lunch, casting furtive glances at me every few seconds. When she looked up again, I caught her eyes and, holding the connection, slowly nodded once.
Brooke almost seemed to collapse in relief; perhaps she had more riding on my agreement than she had initially let on. Regardless she pulled from her backpack an expensive-looking cream envelope, with the word Machinamentum printed on the front in flowing gold script.
After carefully breaking the seal, I slid out a similarly-colored sheet of actual parchment paper, with that same flowing script, this time a dark black printed on it.
Machinamentum
I would very much like your presence this Saturday evening at Das Beste Essen
We have a private dinner at the restaurant, one of the Bay's finest, on a monthly basis, and would very much enjoy the opportunity to talk with you about future opportunities, for the both of us.
Rune will meet with you at seven-thirty if you choose to accept the offer.
Please come masked, the restaurant expects our presence, so worry not about inquisitive looks from the patrons.
I believe this could represent the beginning of an incredibly profitable partnership, for both sides, and we are prepared to finance any endeavors you would like to undertake.
We can better discuss proceedings and specifications on Saturday in person.
I dearly look forward to making your acquaintance.
All the Best,
Kaiser.
I looked up after finishing the note and Brooke gave me a nervous but hopeful smile. "So, will you at least hear this out?"
"You promise me there's no obligation, no trap, nothing to stop me from walking out halfway through without repercussions."
"What, you think we're the ABB? No, we wouldn't force you into service, and you're free to leave at any time, and you'll never hear this offer again unless you personally invite it."
"Okay then, I'll hear it out at least; perhaps I may actually get something from it."
Oh Scion, what have I gotten myself into?
--Ex Machina--
"You never said anything about this, why do I have to do this."
"Taylor," Brooke began, dressed in a crimson-red evening gown trimmed in black, with her face covered by her costumes lacquered mask. "You can't eat at the nicest restaurant in the city wearing jeans and a sweater, I already bought you the damn dress, just put it on."
From a bag hovering by her side draped out a night-black dress with gold edging. I noted with disgust that it was a beautiful garment and that it somehow matched my ridiculous measurements.
I threw one last scowl at my friend before growling at her to just give me the stupid dress. The garment folded itself back up in midair and floated gently into my hands. Once I had hold of it, I walked into the upper-floor bathroom of Brooke's house and shut the door behind me.
Several minutes later I stood in front of the mirror, looking at the figure appearing in it. The elaborate braid Brooke had given me with a wave of her hand set off the gown beautifully and the fabric made my overly pale skin look intentional rather than simply poor genes.
With a final thought, the black lenses slid from my brow to cover my eyes and upper nose and just like that, I was no longer Taylor, the skinny, bullied high schooler, but Machinamentum, the Tinker with an overly long temporary moniker. Who was about to be wined and dined by the largest criminal organization in the city.
This should be exciting, at the very least.
--Ex Machina--
After I finished my changing/introspection session, I slipped on a pair of soft black flats and stepped back into Brooke's room. After the necessary finishing touches and appreciation of both our outfits, we stepped to the conservatory on the upper corner of the Fleischer home.
The corner room had two walls and most of a ceiling made entirely of windows, which gave a great view of the surrounding property and the neighboring houses almost a quarter of a mile away. Around the room were scattered a few light-colored sofas and chaise lounges. A large oak bookshelf filled with novels to partake in lined the wall near the door. It was this very bookshelf that Brooke (Rune now, as we were both masked) walked to.
Reaching behind some trashy romance novels, I heard an audible click and two of the larger windows swung open letting in the cool night air. Rune led me over to a circular stone in the center of the room and, pulling one foot out from her short heeled shoe, poked the stone with her big toe. The large flat stone, which the two of us were stood on, lifted up and flew out the open window.
As we cleared the sill, Rune lifted us up into the night air, and turned toward downtown Brockton Bay.
After several mesmerizing minutes of soaring above the brightly lit city, we started descending to the roof of one of the larger buildings, a fancy hotel, which had chains in just about every big city in the world.
Eventually, we landed on the roof, near a stairwell access and the two of us stepped off the stone. We walked toward the door, Rune taking the lead and opening up the passageway to a brightly lit stairwell.
After descending a floor, the sounds of dining were made audible and Rune took me to a wood-paneled door with a bronze plaque along the side which read Das Beste Essen. Gesturing for me to follow, Rune walked forward and lightly touched the door, which smoothly opened up for us.
I was immediately struck by two scents. The smells of steak and beer wafted around the restaurant which was decorated exactly like any other high-class restaurant atop any other high-class hotel, with massive windows and wood paneling everywhere.
Rune began walking down a hallway away from the main dining area which had kitchen doors on one side and rooms named after famous Brocktonites along the other. Eventually we stopped in front of the David Sarif room, and Rune pushed (Not telekinetically, but with her actual hands) the dark wood-paneled door open to reveal one of the scariest and most amusing sights I have ever seen.
Along the far wall was a floor-to-ceiling window overlooking the three or four blocks before the Bay and the Bay itself. In the center of the room was an elaborately set table with a white tablecloth and several miscellaneous wine bottles and hors d'oeuvres were scattered across the table, but it was neither the food nor the view that drew my eye.
Rather it was the half-dozen masked individuals seated around the table that had all looked up at our arrival. Kaiser, wearing a tuxedo and sporting an ostentatious metal crown-helm of blades what left open his mouth for the wine glass he was currently raising to his lips, sat at the head of the table.
To his left was a woman in a radiant white evening gown, who was almost leaking luminescence. To Purity's left sat Othala and Viktor, who looked much the same as they did the night I met them, albeit somewhat more 'cleaned up' than they were when I met them wearing 'street level' costumes.
To Kaiser's right sat a single Blonde woman in a metal Valkyrie helmet and a steely grey dress, who looked as if she had walked directly out of one of those magazines printed to make women feel bad about their bodies and buy whatever beauty product was being advertized.
To her right was a man dressed in what seemed to be an old-fashioned German soldier's dress uniform, complete with eagle-shaped medals and black military cap.
Rune immediately left my side and went to sit next to the soldier-looking cape (Kreig I think), leaving the only open chair at the other head of the table, directly across from Kaiser.
The gang leader gave me an unnervingly pleasant smile and nodded toward the empty chair at the end of the table. I slowly walked forward, feeling somewhat awkward moving around in the expensive dress. Eventually I reached the wooden high-backed chair and slid it out with no more sound than a whisper of cloth foot-bottoms on the polished wooden floor.
There was a few awkward seconds of silence, with everyone at the table looking at the new arrival before Kaiser again broke it. Raising his half-empty wine glass her looked directly at me across the table with that same smile and spoke in a clear, hard voice.
"Welcome Machinamentum, I'm so very glad you could meet with us today. Before we get into business discussion, I would be incredibly grateful if you would deign to share this meal with us."
As his word, the door I entered through opened once again, making way for a trio of kitchen staff in spotless white garments pushing carts which held an assortment of delicious-smelling food. In a flurry of activity, a cut of steak, a tail of lobster, a crisp salad, and a glass of red wine was placed before me and everyone else seated at the table.
I looked down at the assortment of food laid in front of me and accessed a guide on etiquette through the uplink in my eyes. Pulling the large cloth napkin from its ring, I unfolded it halfway and placed it carefully in my lap. I looked up to see everyone else mirroring my movements before beginning their dinner.
I picked up the small salad fork and began eating once I had seen everyone else begin.
The conversation over dinner was incredibly strange.
There were polite but meaningless questions exchanged back and forth between not only the Empire capes and I, but also between the Empire capes alone. They spoke of their costumed efforts and the progress of the Empire as a whole as if it were as natural a topic as the latest football game. I was somewhat uncomfortable knowing that cocaine sales were up by half a percent this week, but at the same time, it was incredibly interesting to hear the way they spoke of such normally taboo subjects as though they were perfectly normal business endeavors.
Which, I mused, they probably were these days.
I was silent most of the time, speaking only when spoken to and enjoying the meal we had been served. That's one point for the Empire I suppose, the food served during meetings was delicious.
Almost an hour later, all the plates and glasses, including my now half-empty wine glass I had drank from after some persuasion from Rune, were cleaned off of the table, leaving it bare. As the last of the kitchen staff left, trays full of empty dishes with them, Kaiser dramatically clapped his hands together, silencing all lingering conversation.
As he did, all eyes turned to him, but he looked only down at me sitting across the table.
"Machinamentum, I thank you once again for your presence this evening, the addition to the conversation was quite refreshing. Now that that delicious meal is finished we can move on to business." He indicated with a tilt of his head that he was expecting an answer from me, so I slowly nodded my head and cautiously responded in the affirmative.
"First of all, I would like to reaffirm to you how impressed I am with what work you have shown already, surviving a pursuit by Lung's dog is no mean feat, opening him for the opportunity to inflict a permanent wound even more so.
Even if you reject the initial invitation to formally join our ranks, I would like to contract you out for some freelance work, I am prepared to expend quite a bit of our vast resources to ensuring you can reach your full potential as a tinker."
"What sort of contractual work," I began, "are you meaning, and what resources are you implying you'll expend for my sake?"
"If you agree merely to a sort of 'freelancer' position with some small exceptions, I am willing to provide for you a fully-stocked and secluded workshop for you to work in, as well as contact information for some of our more… exotic materials dealers, specifically rare metals and minerals. In addition if ever you are threatened, the might of the Empire will fully support you, and for each contract you fulfill, we will pay you very handsomely for your work.
As for the sort of contracts, it would vary, but in general they would be requests from our Parahuman force to augment their capabilities in some way.
You would be under no obligation to complete any requests we give to you, but you will of course not be paid for jobs you don't complete. You will retain use of the workshop for as long as you remain within the contractual obligations. Also, though materials will not be given freely, any job you do for us will pay well enough for you to fully finance your own endeavors for some time."
He finished with a slight smile on his face whilst I sat there absolutely gobsmacked. A fully-stocked workshop would be a significant upgrade over my current accommodations in a coal-storage room in my basement. Meanwhile the thoughts of what I could make if I had access to not only more expensive materials, but also the machinery to properly make use of them had the tinker part of my brain almost salivating.
"And what," I said after a long, palpable silence of everyone expectantly looking at me, "Would be those 'contractual obligations' you mentioned earlier?"
Widening his confident smirk ever further Kaiser responded to mu query.
"Oh simple things really, don't do any work for the ABB, Merchants, or Protectorate, though if you wanted to work in a hospital to help the sick and injured as Othala here or Brockton's famous Panacea are known to do, that is perfectly acceptable.
In addition, don't disrupt Empire business work, and don't work directly against our interests."
So basically I don't have to join the Empire, they'll pay me to be what amounts to a vigilante who doesn't work with the Protectorate and doesn't target the Empire. That in fairness seems like a good deal, though my judgment may be clouded by the image of a functioning workshop where I can finally accomplish the work I had been designing for months, but had lacked the resources and machinery to fully realize.
Before I could fully think through the inebriation of both tinkerlust and alcohol (with my build I'm the very definition of a lightweight), I had accepted Kaiser's offer.
Does this make me a villain now? Does that label even mean anything anymore? I don't know, but it seemed that my acceptance was the cue for everyone to get up and begin leaving. As they passed by, the various Empire capes offered me words of encouragement.
Viktor and Othala shook my hand and told me they looked forward to working with me. Kreig and the Valkyrie offered curt nods and reassurance that I had mead the 'correct' choice. Purity only took me by the shoulder and asked me to 'be careful.' And Kaiser had simply turned and began staring silently out the window, out at the Bay.
Eventually, Rune took my hand and we made our way back to the roof, where our stone was parked. The only thing she said to me was a quiet thanks for accepting. There was more subtext there, I knew, but she seemed too silently relieved to interrupt with a question of that sort.
Once we had gotten on the stone, Rune tapped it and we took off, flying in the night back toward her home.
--Ex Machina--
Chapter V: Proposition
That afternoon went exactly how Brooke had described it; we laid out our homework, and over the course of an hour and a half, did approximately half of it, owing chiefly to the brownies and bad TV soap operas we couldn't not make fun of. Eventually though, the time that I had to leave to get home before Dad encroached upon us, and in response, I turned the integrated equation lens I had designed to figure precise measurements and engineering on a micro-scale to my tenth-grade trigonometry homework.
Brooke rightly exclaimed that tinkers were bullshit, and I proudly agreed before packing up the homework and saying one last goodbye to the Fleischers. Brooke's mother, Kathryn, from whom Brooke drew almost her entire appearance, jovially bid me farewell, and implored me to come back sometime. It brought up memories of another friendship so many years ago. I buried the memories before I began to dwell on them, and returned Mrs. Fleischer's farewell. Brooke's father, apparently some sort of high-level accountant at a local pharmaceuticals firm was at a conference in Providence, and wouldn't be back in Brockton for several days.
As I left out the front door and headed for the bus stop, I took one last look at the residence behind me.
My initial assessment wasn't far off, I mused as I glanced over the three-story home in the heart of the west side subdivisions (firmly in Empire territory). The entire exterior was red, grey, and maroon cobblestone blocks, with a front door marked out in an ornate stone arch. Wrought-iron decorated the windows and porch, as well as forming a fence around the property, a field of grass which, while not exactly lush here in the New England early spring, was certainly showing more signs of life than most of the others around it, and definitely more than the yards around my own home.
It was the kind of home fit for someone firmly in the upper-upper-middle class of society, which here in Brockton put them firmly into the upper strata of the population. As I climbed into the bus, the niggling hope bit at me that all that familial income was obtained legally.
--Ex Machina--
"Taylor," Brooke began, breaking the amicable silence we had adopted during our lunch break inside an abandoned classroom on the third floor, "would you mind doing me a huge favor?"
She put her sandwich down onto a paper towel spread across the cheap plastic desk and looked up at me, giving me honest-to-God pleading puppy dog eyes.
"No Brooke," I responded with an overly drawn out sigh of exasperation. "I will not give you laser eyes, at the very least I get them first, no arguments."
"No, well yes, but no a different favor," she replied with a nervous laugh. "See after that night we met you, Viktor and Othala gave their reports to the higher-ups, and eventually um… Kaiser heard about it."
I gave her a wary glare, and beckoned her to go on.
After taking a drink from her water bottle and audibly swallowing, the pale teenager in front of me started speaking in a rushed tone, so as to get everything out before I stopped her again.
"Ok so after Kaiser heard about it, he told me to talk to you if you contacted me first and see if I could make all nice with you. I had already given you the card by that point so I just waited and eventually we did that rooftop thing, and then we've like chatted and hung out for the past week, and then Kaiser told me again to ask you if you would meet with him and me and a few other people from the Empire for like dinner to talk about if you'd like to collaborate at all or anything, and that this isn't a recruitment pitch unless you want it to be."
She said the last part all as one rushed flow of words, and then proceeded to hide behind her sandwich in the guise of taking a bite while I reeled a bit at her requested 'favor.'
After several moments of quietly sitting and thinking, I responded.
"If it's not a recruitment, than what, exactly is it?"
"Well there's about half a dozen independent rogues and, um, villains that we contract for specialty work every once in awhile, so maybe that. I- I don't know for sure, I was just told to make the offer."
Naturally I knew why the Empire would be interested in me. They famously boast one of the deepest benches of any gang on the eastern seaboard, but don't have a single Tinker to their name. It's obvious that they would be interested in me, but...
They're villains, Nazis, a gang that has caused untold violence to me home city. And yet, a traitorous voice in the back of my head reminded me, they're people too, and from what I've seen so far better people than those 'protecting' us. Brooke's house was firmly in the heart of Empire territory, and everyone there seemed well-off, and safe, and content with their lives. And also white.
That's the rub isn't it though? The Empire is arguably doing a better job protecting their 'charges' than the PRT or Protectorate, they're just more selective about whom and what they fight for.
Do I want to help people? Obviously yeah, I do.
Can I become a hero and join the Protectorate, as least while they maintain that that African shitsack is one of their 'heroes?' Fuck. No.
Is remaining independent a viable option, especially with the materials cost for the tinkering I plan to continue doing? Not really, no.
That's one choice made then I suppose.
While I had been pondering all this, Brooke had been quietly nibbling on the remains of her lunch, casting furtive glances at me every few seconds. When she looked up again, I caught her eyes and, holding the connection, slowly nodded once.
Brooke almost seemed to collapse in relief; perhaps she had more riding on my agreement than she had initially let on. Regardless she pulled from her backpack an expensive-looking cream envelope, with the word Machinamentum printed on the front in flowing gold script.
After carefully breaking the seal, I slid out a similarly-colored sheet of actual parchment paper, with that same flowing script, this time a dark black printed on it.
Machinamentum
I would very much like your presence this Saturday evening at Das Beste Essen
We have a private dinner at the restaurant, one of the Bay's finest, on a monthly basis, and would very much enjoy the opportunity to talk with you about future opportunities, for the both of us.
Rune will meet with you at seven-thirty if you choose to accept the offer.
Please come masked, the restaurant expects our presence, so worry not about inquisitive looks from the patrons.
I believe this could represent the beginning of an incredibly profitable partnership, for both sides, and we are prepared to finance any endeavors you would like to undertake.
We can better discuss proceedings and specifications on Saturday in person.
I dearly look forward to making your acquaintance.
All the Best,
Kaiser.
I looked up after finishing the note and Brooke gave me a nervous but hopeful smile. "So, will you at least hear this out?"
"You promise me there's no obligation, no trap, nothing to stop me from walking out halfway through without repercussions."
"What, you think we're the ABB? No, we wouldn't force you into service, and you're free to leave at any time, and you'll never hear this offer again unless you personally invite it."
"Okay then, I'll hear it out at least; perhaps I may actually get something from it."
Oh Scion, what have I gotten myself into?
--Ex Machina--
"You never said anything about this, why do I have to do this."
"Taylor," Brooke began, dressed in a crimson-red evening gown trimmed in black, with her face covered by her costumes lacquered mask. "You can't eat at the nicest restaurant in the city wearing jeans and a sweater, I already bought you the damn dress, just put it on."
From a bag hovering by her side draped out a night-black dress with gold edging. I noted with disgust that it was a beautiful garment and that it somehow matched my ridiculous measurements.
I threw one last scowl at my friend before growling at her to just give me the stupid dress. The garment folded itself back up in midair and floated gently into my hands. Once I had hold of it, I walked into the upper-floor bathroom of Brooke's house and shut the door behind me.
Several minutes later I stood in front of the mirror, looking at the figure appearing in it. The elaborate braid Brooke had given me with a wave of her hand set off the gown beautifully and the fabric made my overly pale skin look intentional rather than simply poor genes.
With a final thought, the black lenses slid from my brow to cover my eyes and upper nose and just like that, I was no longer Taylor, the skinny, bullied high schooler, but Machinamentum, the Tinker with an overly long temporary moniker. Who was about to be wined and dined by the largest criminal organization in the city.
This should be exciting, at the very least.
--Ex Machina--
After I finished my changing/introspection session, I slipped on a pair of soft black flats and stepped back into Brooke's room. After the necessary finishing touches and appreciation of both our outfits, we stepped to the conservatory on the upper corner of the Fleischer home.
The corner room had two walls and most of a ceiling made entirely of windows, which gave a great view of the surrounding property and the neighboring houses almost a quarter of a mile away. Around the room were scattered a few light-colored sofas and chaise lounges. A large oak bookshelf filled with novels to partake in lined the wall near the door. It was this very bookshelf that Brooke (Rune now, as we were both masked) walked to.
Reaching behind some trashy romance novels, I heard an audible click and two of the larger windows swung open letting in the cool night air. Rune led me over to a circular stone in the center of the room and, pulling one foot out from her short heeled shoe, poked the stone with her big toe. The large flat stone, which the two of us were stood on, lifted up and flew out the open window.
As we cleared the sill, Rune lifted us up into the night air, and turned toward downtown Brockton Bay.
After several mesmerizing minutes of soaring above the brightly lit city, we started descending to the roof of one of the larger buildings, a fancy hotel, which had chains in just about every big city in the world.
Eventually, we landed on the roof, near a stairwell access and the two of us stepped off the stone. We walked toward the door, Rune taking the lead and opening up the passageway to a brightly lit stairwell.
After descending a floor, the sounds of dining were made audible and Rune took me to a wood-paneled door with a bronze plaque along the side which read Das Beste Essen. Gesturing for me to follow, Rune walked forward and lightly touched the door, which smoothly opened up for us.
I was immediately struck by two scents. The smells of steak and beer wafted around the restaurant which was decorated exactly like any other high-class restaurant atop any other high-class hotel, with massive windows and wood paneling everywhere.
Rune began walking down a hallway away from the main dining area which had kitchen doors on one side and rooms named after famous Brocktonites along the other. Eventually we stopped in front of the David Sarif room, and Rune pushed (Not telekinetically, but with her actual hands) the dark wood-paneled door open to reveal one of the scariest and most amusing sights I have ever seen.
Along the far wall was a floor-to-ceiling window overlooking the three or four blocks before the Bay and the Bay itself. In the center of the room was an elaborately set table with a white tablecloth and several miscellaneous wine bottles and hors d'oeuvres were scattered across the table, but it was neither the food nor the view that drew my eye.
Rather it was the half-dozen masked individuals seated around the table that had all looked up at our arrival. Kaiser, wearing a tuxedo and sporting an ostentatious metal crown-helm of blades what left open his mouth for the wine glass he was currently raising to his lips, sat at the head of the table.
To his left was a woman in a radiant white evening gown, who was almost leaking luminescence. To Purity's left sat Othala and Viktor, who looked much the same as they did the night I met them, albeit somewhat more 'cleaned up' than they were when I met them wearing 'street level' costumes.
To Kaiser's right sat a single Blonde woman in a metal Valkyrie helmet and a steely grey dress, who looked as if she had walked directly out of one of those magazines printed to make women feel bad about their bodies and buy whatever beauty product was being advertized.
To her right was a man dressed in what seemed to be an old-fashioned German soldier's dress uniform, complete with eagle-shaped medals and black military cap.
Rune immediately left my side and went to sit next to the soldier-looking cape (Kreig I think), leaving the only open chair at the other head of the table, directly across from Kaiser.
The gang leader gave me an unnervingly pleasant smile and nodded toward the empty chair at the end of the table. I slowly walked forward, feeling somewhat awkward moving around in the expensive dress. Eventually I reached the wooden high-backed chair and slid it out with no more sound than a whisper of cloth foot-bottoms on the polished wooden floor.
There was a few awkward seconds of silence, with everyone at the table looking at the new arrival before Kaiser again broke it. Raising his half-empty wine glass her looked directly at me across the table with that same smile and spoke in a clear, hard voice.
"Welcome Machinamentum, I'm so very glad you could meet with us today. Before we get into business discussion, I would be incredibly grateful if you would deign to share this meal with us."
As his word, the door I entered through opened once again, making way for a trio of kitchen staff in spotless white garments pushing carts which held an assortment of delicious-smelling food. In a flurry of activity, a cut of steak, a tail of lobster, a crisp salad, and a glass of red wine was placed before me and everyone else seated at the table.
I looked down at the assortment of food laid in front of me and accessed a guide on etiquette through the uplink in my eyes. Pulling the large cloth napkin from its ring, I unfolded it halfway and placed it carefully in my lap. I looked up to see everyone else mirroring my movements before beginning their dinner.
I picked up the small salad fork and began eating once I had seen everyone else begin.
The conversation over dinner was incredibly strange.
There were polite but meaningless questions exchanged back and forth between not only the Empire capes and I, but also between the Empire capes alone. They spoke of their costumed efforts and the progress of the Empire as a whole as if it were as natural a topic as the latest football game. I was somewhat uncomfortable knowing that cocaine sales were up by half a percent this week, but at the same time, it was incredibly interesting to hear the way they spoke of such normally taboo subjects as though they were perfectly normal business endeavors.
Which, I mused, they probably were these days.
I was silent most of the time, speaking only when spoken to and enjoying the meal we had been served. That's one point for the Empire I suppose, the food served during meetings was delicious.
Almost an hour later, all the plates and glasses, including my now half-empty wine glass I had drank from after some persuasion from Rune, were cleaned off of the table, leaving it bare. As the last of the kitchen staff left, trays full of empty dishes with them, Kaiser dramatically clapped his hands together, silencing all lingering conversation.
As he did, all eyes turned to him, but he looked only down at me sitting across the table.
"Machinamentum, I thank you once again for your presence this evening, the addition to the conversation was quite refreshing. Now that that delicious meal is finished we can move on to business." He indicated with a tilt of his head that he was expecting an answer from me, so I slowly nodded my head and cautiously responded in the affirmative.
"First of all, I would like to reaffirm to you how impressed I am with what work you have shown already, surviving a pursuit by Lung's dog is no mean feat, opening him for the opportunity to inflict a permanent wound even more so.
Even if you reject the initial invitation to formally join our ranks, I would like to contract you out for some freelance work, I am prepared to expend quite a bit of our vast resources to ensuring you can reach your full potential as a tinker."
"What sort of contractual work," I began, "are you meaning, and what resources are you implying you'll expend for my sake?"
"If you agree merely to a sort of 'freelancer' position with some small exceptions, I am willing to provide for you a fully-stocked and secluded workshop for you to work in, as well as contact information for some of our more… exotic materials dealers, specifically rare metals and minerals. In addition if ever you are threatened, the might of the Empire will fully support you, and for each contract you fulfill, we will pay you very handsomely for your work.
As for the sort of contracts, it would vary, but in general they would be requests from our Parahuman force to augment their capabilities in some way.
You would be under no obligation to complete any requests we give to you, but you will of course not be paid for jobs you don't complete. You will retain use of the workshop for as long as you remain within the contractual obligations. Also, though materials will not be given freely, any job you do for us will pay well enough for you to fully finance your own endeavors for some time."
He finished with a slight smile on his face whilst I sat there absolutely gobsmacked. A fully-stocked workshop would be a significant upgrade over my current accommodations in a coal-storage room in my basement. Meanwhile the thoughts of what I could make if I had access to not only more expensive materials, but also the machinery to properly make use of them had the tinker part of my brain almost salivating.
"And what," I said after a long, palpable silence of everyone expectantly looking at me, "Would be those 'contractual obligations' you mentioned earlier?"
Widening his confident smirk ever further Kaiser responded to mu query.
"Oh simple things really, don't do any work for the ABB, Merchants, or Protectorate, though if you wanted to work in a hospital to help the sick and injured as Othala here or Brockton's famous Panacea are known to do, that is perfectly acceptable.
In addition, don't disrupt Empire business work, and don't work directly against our interests."
So basically I don't have to join the Empire, they'll pay me to be what amounts to a vigilante who doesn't work with the Protectorate and doesn't target the Empire. That in fairness seems like a good deal, though my judgment may be clouded by the image of a functioning workshop where I can finally accomplish the work I had been designing for months, but had lacked the resources and machinery to fully realize.
Before I could fully think through the inebriation of both tinkerlust and alcohol (with my build I'm the very definition of a lightweight), I had accepted Kaiser's offer.
Does this make me a villain now? Does that label even mean anything anymore? I don't know, but it seemed that my acceptance was the cue for everyone to get up and begin leaving. As they passed by, the various Empire capes offered me words of encouragement.
Viktor and Othala shook my hand and told me they looked forward to working with me. Kreig and the Valkyrie offered curt nods and reassurance that I had mead the 'correct' choice. Purity only took me by the shoulder and asked me to 'be careful.' And Kaiser had simply turned and began staring silently out the window, out at the Bay.
Eventually, Rune took my hand and we made our way back to the roof, where our stone was parked. The only thing she said to me was a quiet thanks for accepting. There was more subtext there, I knew, but she seemed too silently relieved to interrupt with a question of that sort.
Once we had gotten on the stone, Rune tapped it and we took off, flying in the night back toward her home.
--Ex Machina--
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globalwarmth
ruining the weather.
- Location
- Polar ice caps
Well as long as she keeps being a freelancer coil's reveal should not affect her (much)
Dr. Mercurious
Strangest Person You Know
- Location
- New England
My, that's some slippery slope. And once again we see why Kaiser is so dangerous; in many ways he's the most reasonable gang leader, far more than the ABB, Merchants and PRT (yes, I went there). Of course, this may bite her in the ass when Coil exposes the E88 but hey, that's still in the future. And if Cyber!Taylor isn't a part of the organization, her identity may not be compromised.
- Location
- Somewhere, probably Earth
"I did it, dad. I finally got a Tinker to do work for the Empire."
Massgamer
Advance toward the Future
- Location
- The Future
Should have sprung for the liver and general immune system upgrade so stuff like getting drunk or poisoned is much much harder.
Really hope Taylor can get out from under the thumb of the Empire in the future once she has enough money herself to go fully independent.
Offer her augments to other independents, heroes, legal organizations, Toybox (for tinker stuff), etc since it's never a good idea to stick with a gang for very long.
You can deal with having a short amount of time working with them but long term that will color peoples' perception of you too much.
- Location
- uk
- Pronouns
- She/Her
So, according to her contract she can still augment the PRT squaddies. That's a loophole waiting to be exploited. Or do you think that Kaiser forgot that the PRT and Protectorate are actually separate.
Oh, and new wave, parian and other heroes can quite happily be augmented. Maybe once she has a name for herself she can join the Guild or Toybox
Oh, and new wave, parian and other heroes can quite happily be augmented. Maybe once she has a name for herself she can join the Guild or Toybox
Don't trip, its a pretty steep hill.
serra2
Himouto! Sylvanas-chan
And I like that they held the meeting with the Cyber augment tinker in the David Serif room
VorpalMedia
Inter-Dimensional Techie
- Location
- Wonderland Data Nexus 472b
So... Taylor is learning racism through osmosis.
- Status