The dragon was magnificent if you looked at it a certain way and ignored the way something that big shouldn't be able to fly, or the teeth and claws that proclaimed that this was not a vegetarian.
Her father had joined them, wearing his power armor, and they heard a startled noise from him as he saw the creature landing on the ledge outside the portal cave. "That's a gold dragon."
"Intriguing," said Taylor, clicking a button on her belt and stepping forward. "Hello there. I am Doctor Curlyhair! Girl Genius!"
"...seriously? You decided to call yourself that. I stopped when I was eight," said the dragon.
"Taylor?" asked Annette Hebert.
"Yes?" asked Doctor Curlyhair and the dragon at the same time.
* Naurelin *
Several things were obvious upon seeing her family in the cave.
One, this was a younger version of her from some very different thread of the multiverse. Maybe fourteen if that.
Her father's voice was a little distorted but still recognizable, currently wearing a suit of power armor that looked sleek and had a large high-tech gun built into one of the arms. Hard to tell more as that power armor did completely encase him. Something told her it was fairly tough despite not being all that bulky.
Her mother looked... better than she remembered. More fit. Longer hair. Still confident and despite facing a dragon over a very short distance.
Scents began reaching her nose and she determined that yes, this was her family. And that her mother was...
With a little tug on that mental knot, she shifted to her human form. This was going to be awkward enough. "Mom?"
She understood that this wasn't her own mother - who was dead. This was, however, Annette Hebert mother to Taylor Hebert.
Naurelin wondered if she could get a hug.
* Sunday August 17, 2008 *
The revelations of the previous day continued to rock the Hebert family.
There was a multiverse, a thread of some cosmic tapestry that included millions of variations of Earth. They'd already known some of this because of Professor Haywire and that there was an Earth Bet and an Earth Aleph. That had been known for several decades at this point and there was actually a trade in some of the media between the two Earths.
There were multiple multiverses, and that part was new, entirely different threads on their own axis.
There was at least one, and quite possibly more than one, version of Taylor Hebert. In one, which had echoes of things from a game that her father had played in his own college days, there was a Taylor Hebert who had become a dragon and joined the junior hero division of the Protectorate - the Wards.
It was hard to imagine any part of that last sentence but they'd met her and it was quite the revelation.
The most surprising thing to Naurelin, the dragon Taylor, had apparently been that Emma Barnes was very much still Taylor's friend. That had been an awkward part and they'd quickly changed the subject.
The Naurelin-timeline was apparently running at a faster rate or something, because that Taylor had been several years in the future. Lots of things were spoilers that Naurelin had refused to speak of as there were dangers and developments that Doctor Curlyhair had yet to face.
So finding out if President Hayes was going to be re-elected or if the Boston Red Sox were going to win anything anytime soon was not something they had foreknowledge of.
There were a lot of things that could be thought of as safe subjects, but apparently the timelines were too divergent at this point to draw much parallels.
There wasn't even a Waffle Burger in Brockton Bay in Naurelin's timeline, but there was a Fugly's and an Arnold's Drive-In, how strange was that?
But that was a concern for another time and it was time to focus on her other projects.
Her father had absolutely no problem with his power armor, which had just been upgraded with some support runes.
Which reminded her, she absolutely wanted to get together with Dragon (not the one from the Outlands) and see about incorporating a magic circuit system. Powered by her internals of course.
For now though, she was beginning work with Adamantine. Which was tougher and harder to work than mithral but the results should be worth it.
So far it was just small things like a new smith's hammer. Steel hadn't lasted very long after all just trying to deal with mithral.
So many things to do and she could only make 10 Shadow Clones at a time and there was so much to build and to research.
There was just so much to do, so much to see, so much to learn!
And... her police scanner just went off to indicate that some parahumans were attacking Waffle Burger. Who the heck would be attacking Waffle Burger, and why?
* Waffle Burger *
Derek Antrosius Washington had ducked behind the counter on seeing unfamiliar capes. He clicked his phone to the PRT app, and opened it.
There was a brief hope that they were here for the "Chicken & Waffle Special" for early Sunday mornings. Just a hunch.
"Unangenehm, Dumbelle, get the register," said one of the newcomers. Judging from the nasal quality of the voice, probably the guy in the jester's costume. "White Feather, cover the customers. Shoot if anyone tries anything."
Derek thumbed through the menu. 1 to report a parahuman destroying property, 2 to report a suspected S-Class threat, 3 to report a parahuman crime in progress. He clicked 3 before the scrolling message could continue.
"But what if there's a cape among them?" asked a voice, supposedly the mentioned 'White Feather'.
1 - Yes he was sure that was the selection he wanted.
"Shoot them first," said the nasally voice.
"Like, what do we do with the cash register?"
1 to continue the call in English, done.
"Rip it out of the counter and we can take it with us," said nasally voice person.
"Okay!" brightly said the feminine voice, followed by a ripping sound.
1 to indicate the parahumans are threatening or killing civilians, 2 to indicate the parahumans are destroying property, 3 to indicate that the parahumans are not yet committing a crime. Derek pressed 1 as he felt being threatened with arrows most fit the bill.
At which point Derek realized a good section of the counter he was hiding behind was now torn away with the cash register.
"So, what do we have here?" said the jester-guy.
Meanwhile the PRT Emergency Line was stating that the call was important to them, and to please hold for an operator.
"Someone who is wondering why you didn't just order me to open the cash register so you could grab the money," said Derek, trying to hide the phone and wondering why he paid so much of his taxes for these clods.
"Wait, we could have done that?" asked the guy in the actual cape.
"Don't try and outsmart US," said jester-guy. "Everyone empty your pockets and nobody has to get hurt. Much."
"Okay, okay," said Dan, hoping that things would run smoothly after all. Wasn't that what the PRT said? Cooperate with villains so that all they'll take is your replaceable stuff and you've got a much better chance of surviving. Unless it's the Slaughterhouse. Or that Hookwolf guy. Or...
"Can I ask who's robbing us?" asked one of the customers who'd been standing in line.
"Why?" asked jester-guy.
"So I can blog about it later, naturally," said the customer.
"We are The Interior Five!" declared cape-guy.
"That is NOT what we're calling ourselves," grumbled jester-guy. "Makes it sounds like we'd be called in to show you color swatches and advise people on what kind of furniture they should buy."
"They're calling us the Inbread Five but we never steal bread, so I don't get it," said the woman in the bunny costume.
"We are DEFINITELY not calling ourselves that," said jester-guy. "I am Fröhlicher."
"Frau Licker?" asked the customer who now had her phone out and was recording, making Derek wonder about the sanity of the world and that customer in particular.
"Fro- NEVER MIND," said Fröhlicher. "Come on, get a hustle on as you Americans say. We are Empire 88 and ve vill hurt you if you do not comply!"
"Why do you wear a medieval jester costume if you don't tell jokes or something?" asked the customer.
"I been kinda wondering about that myself," said the bunny-suited girl.
"Dumbelle - just concentrate on getting everyone's wallets," complained Fröhlicher.
"Okey-dokey Smokey!"
"Are those sirens?" asked White Feather, looking very nervous. Even more so than a few minutes ago.
"Luftschiff, stop eating. Everyone - time to make a getaway," declared Fröhlicher.
Everyone in Waffle Burger watched as the villains walked away from the restaurant, or floated in the case of the rotund guy who was carrying a basket of fries.
After a few moments of confusion, everyone put away their phones and wallets as the group hadn't gotten more than four collected.
A moment later and an ambulance passed the restaurant.
"Were they... joke villains?" asked the customer who was still recording the getaway as they were still just fast-walking in pace.
"That would explain the jester costume," reasoned Derek out load. "He even had the little bells."
"I would have expected more scenery-chewing," confessed one of the other customers.
It took most of an hour before the PRT showed up, cementing their uselessness in the mind of Derek. Oh well, at least it was all still down as a cape crime. That should get the insurance to pay for the basket they stole.
* Tuesday, August 15 2008 *
"This..." said Danny, looking at the remote with wide eyes, "this may be the most important and useful item you've ever created!"
"It IS very impressive," admitted Annette, though sounding considerably less impressed than her husband.
"Well, not everything can be a fusion engine," said Taylor, shrugging one shoulder. "It's just a button on a TV remote that allows you to automatically filter out political ads."
"Congress must never learn of this, they will ban it so fast," stated Danny.
(DING!) went Taylor's communicator.
"Huh?" asked Taylor as she fished out her Omni-tool and checked the scanner. "Oh! I didn't expect the analysis to complete this quickly."
"What analysis?" asked Annette.
"Shipgirl Cubes," said Taylor, reaching for the jam because today's pancakes deserved to be slathered in strawberry jam.
"Another means of making artificial intelligence?" asked Annette.
"I - oh?" said Taylor, sitting upright and momentarily losing the train of thought that involved pancakes.
"Another roll?" asked Danny, though this seemed a bit more than just an alien device plopping other-dimensional knowledge directly into his daughter's head. And what kind of life did he have where THAT was thought of as normal?
"It's middle-sized, so I don't expect... much?" said Taylor, sitting up straight and her voice trailing off.
"Should I be concerned?" asked Danny Hebert.
"Those space collector-bots I started making?" asked Taylor. "They just became more of a priority."
"What did you get?" asked Danny.
* L-4 Saturn position *
A tiny portal opened on the tiny little asteroid. It was barely a mile across by a half-mile wide. It was also not on any chart that any of the terrestrial space agencies had put out there.
Upon finding it the first time, Taylor had quickly determined that it most likely had NOT been there when the last space probe had gone through. Why and how were questions for which she had only one possible answer, and it was why trying to form a portal out this far had automatically clicked into this location.
This was a safe place where a certain Enemy either wouldn't or couldn't look unless she did something to draw that attention. So far she'd only done a few things, keeping a look out for any indication that the Living Oscar (referring to the Hollywood trophy and not the garbage can afficionado) was paying any attention.
The answer was apparently not.
So out of that tiny portal onto that tiny asteroid were three space-suited figures.
"Well, that certainly looks out of place," commented Annette Hebert.
Extending out from the shadow-side of the asteroid was a huge facility.
Danny checked and found that the facility extended into the asteroid. "Big."
"Going to have to use robots," noted Taylor as she activated the jets in her spacesuit and started gliding towards the obvious airlock. "They don't need air or food or water or anything else I'd have to build out here."
"How fast can you turn out robots? Because this really is huge." Danny finished looking over the large facility, lit mainly by the reflected light from Saturn. Then he merely followed Annette and Taylor in a quick burst of jets before heading to the airlock.
"Depends on the model," said Taylor, waiting until all three were in the airlock before starting the cycling process. "Simple stuff I can set up the automated factory to produce three an hour. Work-bees that are basically hands a multitasking control unit can manipulate. Control units like that, maybe two hours. I worked out the plans awhile back. It's just a lot more complicated to build those."
"The Bar-Bee units?" asked Danny.
"Yeah, those," said Taylor. "Oh. Look. There's a connection here to my factory so I can use the shipyard to produce the worker units to build ships."
"Plan B?" asked Annette Hebert, looking around and noting the complete lack of sequentially blinking lights and other common SF props. A few lights that indicated something active, but that was about it.
"Plan B," agreed Taylor. "Plan B just got a upgrade."
"How big a ship are we talking about?" asked Danny Hebert.
* Warrior *
Something was off.
Where the native sapients had been on the projected spiral downwards, even faster than was usual, the spiral had slowed. It was still within operating parameters, but there were clear signs that the initial predictions were off by a statistically small but significant factor.
Accessing memory-retaining shards calmed him though. There had been two species where similar patterns had emerged. A single group of individuals, non-Hosts, had rallied and attempted to stall or reverse the downward slide of their civilization through innovation and challenging their "status quo" by rejecting the overriding narrative.
Reviewing the salient details, Warrior Entity let the matter drop for now. Those two instances had actually been very productive. What the Hosts termed Tinker Shards had been acquired in those two instances as the accomplishments of those civilizations had been coded into the databanks. It was just that this civilization was one of those outliers.
Tracing the changes backwards it became obvious where this group of individuals were located, one of the locations where a Conflict Engine had attacked.
When the time came he'd have to nuke it from orbit. It was the only way to be sure, after all.
No, there was nothing to be concerned about here. No significant deviation.
Then he was lost again in depression and the aching loneliness of a lack of the Thinker Entity. Sharing this data would have been one of their mutual pleasures.
* Thursday August 17, 2008 *
* Bar-Bee 12 *
Technically she was an Administrator type, like Commander White but one stage lower in processing power and rank.
It had, perhaps, been inevitable that a young girl genius with the ability to craft life-like gynoids would create various iterations based loosely on the concept of "Barbie dolls" though without the reliance on plastics. She was the 12th in her series.
While she and the others had enjoyed their time with the young girls, her creator and her two best friends, she had felt under-utilized. Now though - she had been designated Space Engineer Barbie and was relishing the challenge. Fortunately she did not require the amount of food, water, or air that was required of an organic lifeform. The harshness of space would cause damage to her externals though, so she had to wear a pressure suit. That was fine, she had her long hair braided tightly and it was not as prone to shedding as human hair anyway.
Eventually the ship being constructed would be sufficiently airtight that she could dispense with the suit, there were a couple of outfits she wanted fabricated for such things. Wearing a Manticoran military uniform such as was found in the databases, well, she felt she could look quite well in such an outfit tailored for her physical attributes.
Not that she envied Bar-Bee 7, aka Welder Barbie, and having a relationship with a Dockworker. Or Gunsmith Barbie, aka Bar-Bee 9, having a long-distance relationship with some guy she'd met in a tour group. No, she was not programmed to be envious.
Damn it.
She was Space Engineer Barbie and she would be operating mostly alone for at least a few years until the current problems could be properly dealt with.
After the human crew started in though, she was damn sure going to make sure she and the spacedock looked their finest.
She reached out to the Work-Bees, getting them to switch to the next part they were building. Two months and change before the dreadnought, which was basically a destroyer-class with more armor, would be ready.
* Friday, August 29 2008 *
The rumble of the Celestial Forge was easily ignored. She'd been getting a run of "no points added - inapplicable or perk already known" for the past four days and it was quite vexing.
Again it came up with one of the other messages that kept popping up. "Duplicate perk. Contacting SysAdmin per protocol."
Yeah and then would come a message how the 'SysAdmin' was not responding.
[SysAdmin responding.]
Taylor straightened up at her desk in school. Something different at least.
[SysAdmin consulting.]
She had to assure the teacher that there was no problem, and act like the current lesson was something she'd been paying attention to. Considering that it was on the Revolutionary War, and Brockton Bay's part in it, that was old material in more ways than one.
[SysAdmin emote: laughter.]
[SysAdmin adding techbase to Auto-Factory.]
Okay, now she REALLY wanted out of class.
[SysAdmin logged off.]
4.0190 Shipyard (400CP) (Honor Harrington) (Vehicles):
Well, look who struck big! This is a full-fledged Orbital shipyard, capable of making any and all ships you have the knowhow of making. It is automated to the absolutely maximum degree, and what remains is taken care of by an NPC crew of expert technicians who are not and may never become companions. It creates the resources to build both ships and space stations ex nihilo, generating enough to build one Manticoran Superdreadnought every three months. It updates automatically, creating new docks of whatever sizes are needed as you acquire or design new schematics and technology, along with generating any materials required. Except, that is, for any super-rare materials, which are generated at a much more reduced pace, enough to create a single ship using them in about an year. In future worlds, too, it automatically updates with whatever parts and materials are required to build any starships or other space constructions that you know how to build. In case building a starship absolutely requires sapient people, it generates NPCs with the requisite capabilities.