Parodos 1.4
The ABB became much more aggressive in Lung's absence. According to PHO, the ABB had recently recruited a new cape, Bakuda, who was a real piece of work. She had apparently held her college hostage over a bad grade, showing a degree of narcissism and a general disregard for human life that, when combined with the fact that she was a tinker that specializes in bombs, made for an explosive combination.
God damnit, did I just make a pun?
Anyways, this resulted in the other gangs being put on the defensive more than the offensive. Things weren't a full blown war yet, but Bakuda was proving herself to be far more ruthless than Lung ever was. Sending Oni Lee in to act as a sort of suicide bomber, teleporting into an E88 or Merchant safehouse and using bombs to blow his clone, and the rest of the building, up as he teleported out again. It was obvious to everyone that the Merchants and Empire wanted to take over the territory of the "weakened" ABB, but Bakuda kept them on the back foot, forcing them to shore up their current holdings instead. Things had settled into a new sort of normal, albeit a much more dangerous one, but it was clear that things could get much worse very quickly.
Were I not so concerned with trying to find Dinah's kidnapper, I might have gone out to try to find and take down Bakuda. I knew taking Lung down would have consequences, but I hadn't expected them to be quite so catastrophic. The thing was, I needed to prioritize. Dinah had been kidnapped, and from the statistics I memorized the chances of her still being alive were low. Very low. It had been two days since her kidnapping, and most child kidnappers tended to not keep their victims alive very long. But I also had to keep in mind that it seemed like Dinah was kidnapped by a group, which rose the odds considerably. The lack of a ransom brought those down again though.
I spent my time since my failed rescue attempt looking for leads on this mysterious blonde cape that apparently acted as a middle man between the goons I had taken down and their boss or tinkering with Theseus. Even when at school, since keeping up appearances was still important, I kept myself on autopilot as long as I could so I could go over details of the investigation and blueprints for Theseus in my head. To be honest, I wasn't too worried about looking weird. Given how low my reputation was at school nothing I could do would really make me look weird enough to raise any eyebrows.
Dad thought I was spending time at a friend's house to study for a test right now. I felt bad about lying, but less time at home meant more time dedicated to finding Dinah. It wasn't a total lie either. There really was a test coming up, but I didn't need to study for it since I would be able to call up the memory of all the lectures and every page in the textbook on demand.
Being a Thinker had its perks.
I spent my nights trying to find the Changer I had heard about and tinkering when ever I was at a complete dead end, which was a lot of the time. I spent most of my time in computer class on PHO, trying to find out who in Brockton Bay fin the description of a blonde Changer. No luck there.
I left Theseus' head at home, but tried to keep it hidden. It was quite possibly the most valuable part it, and I was getting well out of my comfort zone as it was leaving the incomplete body in the trainyards.
I had found that my tinkering went a lot faster using the resources available in that area than the boat graveyard. True, the area I had set up in was not as secluded as I would have liked, but the electrification system on the railroads was a god send, and the ease with which I could get what I needed to make my batteries was too great to ignore. Getting scrap metal without being noticed was a bit harder, but not impossible, so overall this location was working out well.
By the time I had finally gotten a new lead, Theseus' body was mostly complete. He lacked any sort of weapon though, and his shield wasn't near to finished. The shield was meant to be able to create a forcefield around the body able to tank the worst of Bakuda's bombs that I had seen, but right now all it could do was make a small field around the shield itself that nudged incoming force away from its center.
I was currently armored up inside Ariadne, stealthed and staking out a pub. It was a dingy place on a long street full of hole in the wall businesses. It had iron bars over the windows, and I idly noticed a few people idling about inside. After shaking down a few muggers I eventually heard about this place. It was apparently considered neutral ground and was a place where various super villains held meeting or made deals with one another.
I had a short list of villains with me. Pictures of the villainous bosses that I thought could have the resources to pull off Dinah's kidnapping. Kaiser and those immediately beneath him, Bakuda, and a relatively unknown cape with a small but well armed gang called Coil. I threw in pictures of the Merchants as well, even if the odd of them doing this seemed abysmally low to me.
I waited for two hours before one of the people I was looking for left the building. He was an young man, perhaps in his late teens or early twenties. I began to follow him. I knew this was risky, but I needed to save Dinah. I needed to. My first fight with Lung...maybe I saved people. Maybe I did the right thing. But in the end being a hero meant helping people, not getting into fights, and some part of me, that horrible insecure part that only quieted when I wore Ariadne, didn't feel like a hero. I beat some guys up, sure, but when I was in a position to save someone, a tangible person that I could put a face and a name to, I had failed.
No. I hadn't failed her yet. I was going to save this girl.
It seemed he was headed out to run an errand. I couldn't be sure how far he would be going, for all I knew he'd be headed into a convenience store around the corner, so once we were in a blind spot out of sight of traffic cameras I ran up behind him and pulled him into an alley.
"I have some questions to ask you." I said this mainly to keep up appearances, and sure enough he shook his head frantically, tapping his ear with his finger and desperately moving his other in shakey figures. Sign language.
He was deaf. I already knew this, but I was smart enough to know that making it obvious that I already knew that, that I knew who he was, would likely get a lot of villains a lot more pissed at me than they already would be. I had a few pieces of paper stuffed in my gun holster, as well as the pictures I had brought, and took out one of them. I also had a small pencil in there, which had broken in two when I had shoved my gun in the holster after it, but it at least still had a point.
I wrote out my message quickly, figuring that writing it in advance would be too telling. "I'm looking for a blonde Changer. Looks different each time you see them. I have pictures. You tell me if you saw any of them with the Changer."
The young man remained silent, his eyes boring into my faceplate with some trepidation. I took out the pictures, and he stared at each for a long moment. He grabbed the picture of Bakuda and shook his head. I frowned. So the Changer worked with the E88, Coil and the Merchants? Were they a mercenary? If so, that complicated things a lot.
The man made a motion with his hand which I eventually figured out was him pantomiming himself writing. I handed him a sheet of paper and my pencil. He turned, placing the paper against the wall behind him, and began to write. Once he was finished he handed the paper to me.
The handwriting was sloppy due in part to the uneven stone wall he wrote on and his own nerves, but I could make it out. "I don't want my family hurt. Can't speak about who met who in private. I can say this. Changer part of the Travelers."
I frowned. I hadn't come across the name in my research, so the Travelers were likely a team from out of town. I'd normally assume they were working alone, but he mentioned not talking about private meetings, so they obviously were working for someone. It wasn't exactly what I wanted, but it was more than expected.
I wrote a quick "thank you" and went invisible. The man looked around the alleyway nervously, then eventually went back to doing whatever it was he had been doing.
So, E88, Coil, or the Merchants had made a deal with the Travelers to get Dinah kidnapped. This definitely didn't seem to fit the Merchants, so for now I wouldn't follow that thread too closely.
It was still dark by the time that I got back to the train yard, though I knew morning was on its way. I would be able to get maybe a half hour of tinkering in before I'd need to catch a bus so I could sneak back into the house before dad woke up. As distant as we were, I knew that him finding out that I had been gone all night would cause problems. Afterwards I would grab my backpack and head to school. Now that I had this new information I knew I wouldn't be able to stand being at school for too long. I had a test today, so I'd stay long enough to do that, then I'd leave early. I likely couldn't do anything until tonight, but I could get Theseus combat ready. I had gotten a blueprint from my power for a communication device similar to the one in Theseus, though one that would be vastly inferior. It would essentially just be a normal phone, but I'd be able to attach it to Ariadne and interface with it that way. Nowhere near as good as Theseus, but it would probably be smart to give both my suits some means of calling the police.
I got a headache part way back to my makeshift workshop. White noise rang in my ears, and for a moment I felt unsteady and anxious, but in only a couple minutes the feeling was gone. I pushed it out of my mind.
When I arrived at the trainyard, I felt my blood run cold. I had set up in an abandoned passenger car which had fallen over sideways off the track. You had to enter it from the top, and I had made little robots to keep the doors closed. They were small, about the size of the palm of my hand, and looked like spiders. Their only real function was to clamp down where the train cars doors opened to prevent them from moving. They were strong, but any sufficiently fit individual could brute force their way through them. My hope had been that the homeless and the junkies in the area wouldn't be that strong.
The thing was, the spider bot I had found by the open door wasn't broken. It was deactivated. With my hairs standing up on the back of my neck, I dropped down into the train car.
It was gone. Someone had stolen Theseus.
At first I thought the world was tilting due to my shock, then the world tumbled end over end around me. No, not the world. The train car. Glass shattered around me as the car went rolling. I grabbed onto a bar below me to hold myself in place as much as possible, not wanting to go slamming into the walls as this happened. I felt myself grow nauseous, but I held myself back from throwing up in my helmet. Eventually the train car came to a stop, with me hanging on what was now the right wall.
Then the roof, or was it the floor, above me was torn open, and I was met with the visage of a large mechanical monstrosity made of a mismatch of parts and letting off steam from every opening. I recognized the cape from my time lurking on PHO. Trainwreck.
And I was pretty sure he wasn't here to talk.
Power Armor:
Ariadne, Theseus (incomplete, stolen)
Sorry for the long wait. The holiday season was a bitch. Between finals, me having to get a few surgeries done, and a number of personal issues I'd rather not touch on, I wasn't able to write as much as I would have liked. Since returning to school I've been able to sit down and start writing properly again though, and as such things should be returning to something resembling normal.
This chapter was a bit rushed. I didn't want to make you all wait much longer for it. I apologize for that. Anyways, now I have one final thing to say.
IT IS ALIVE!!! HAHAHAHA! THE NECROMANCER BIDS YOU TO LIIIIIIIIIIVE!
