With Thomas holding down the fort in the café for the day and Kayden at home and getting prepared, I was free to put the very basic plans in motion.
"Revere." My pheonix friend flies out of the piñata garden and lands on my shoulder.
"Revere, I need to get to the cabin quickly." No other words needed to be said, as I was now walking through the final embers of pheonix fire into the room I slept in during the training trip. I feel my connection to the piñata garden and everyone who was training within snap at the many miles suddenly between us. I stride down the stairs to the basement with chalk and reagents to start my business here.
Kayden's daughter is the one in the most direct danger, but that doesn't mean she's the only one who needs protection right now. Thomas and Kayden both are on a list since she started working in the café. I have a pretty easy solution for everyone, though: leave Brockton Bay for a while.
Well, technically, the solution is Revere teleporting Kayden to and from the café for work while leaving both Aster and Thomas to live in the cabin and have everyone sleep at the cabin.
The problem I'm currently slaving my way through is updating the protections already in place on the property. Most of the bounded fields I used during the trip are on the tool shed and the lake since I spent most of my time there, but if I want to keep watchful eyes at bay, I'm going to need to go all out.
The strongest rituals need an exacting level of placement, enunciation, timing, mathematics, and symbolism. To achieve the bare minimum for the shielding I'm planning to use, I'll need a second and third opinion. So, with a bit of trepidation, I send a request for help through my link to both Gaea and Alaya.
-!!!!!-
I wince at the harsh and aggressive bickering they both start throwing around. Gaea demands for me to give her my summons flat out to make a baseline for her beasts. Alaya is all but crushing me with her insistence to sign a Counter Guardian contract for her aid. Both of them are at each other's throats for daring to overstep and overprice their aid, hypocritical of their own offers. The back and forth is powerful and going too fast for me to parse the conversation out with the weak connection. I can only sit there with a headache as the Wills of Planet and Humanity vicipusly slash at every argument between them.
Halfway into their spat, my soul gives a tug, and I look inward.
The loom spins. Fluid threads float leisurely around the frame. Whenever a string connects to the loom, a pulse of pinkish static energy zaps, and the lazy floating is replaced with vicious griping of anything in reach. As the clump of pinkish threads wrap around one another, the reaching tendrils hit a critical mass and tightly snap into place on the frame. An open beach is shown in the distance, a swimmer in frame struggling with weak feeble movements as a pink jellyfish is seen below the surface, gripping their leg. The Fire Jelly was actively dragging the soul from the swimmer. My mind suddenly doubles as Mental Partition is instantly activated from Revere being active.
With an abrupt shift, the painful headache is evenly divided between my minds. As one train of thought tries to translate the pseudo-speech Gaea and Alaya use, the other is actively controlling my body to continue setting up my ritual space.
It takes them two hours of hyper speed butchering of contract terms to finally calm down. In the end, no slavery or sacrifice was necessary, as I was really hoping would have happened at the start.
Gaea bartered with Alaya to claim full ownership of the Endbringers once they're destroyed and delivers aid with unclaiming the cabin and lake entirely, placing them into my custody. With this, she gets her Beasts of Gaea sooner, and I get to use high-level magecraft with absolute impunity on what is now mystically my land. Alaya gets to contract with whoever she wishes from the Endbringer fights and any natural disasters and helps me by leaving an illusion of semi transparency for me to follow, giving a perfect blueprint for the rituals I need to do.
The idea of these negotiations only ever occurring during my times of need is terrifying. If they only just now have an agreement about the Endbringers and how to obtain their personal countermeasures to each other, it shows they haven't even "spoken" a word to one another otherwise. I'm the sole bridge for the two of them to argue on, and that means they will both be fully willing to leash me for any advantage over the other. Just because they both will support me to the best of their abilities until Scion is destroyed doesn't mean they'll be working together happily. Nor will it be a permanent partnership.
I roll up my sleeves and get to work. I'm already paying a price for the help I'm getting, so I'm making the most of it while I have it. The next ten hours are going to be grueling, but supremely worth it. The cabin and lake are about to become a fortress.
Line Break
With Kayden and Aster's situation possibly handled, I think it's a good time for shopping. I need something to distract me from the monumental crisis I need to navigate between two inhuman entities of potentially extreme power. With a conscious effort, I merge my two trains of thought so I can relax a bit.
Even without a proper workshop in the garden yet, I do have a temporary place to do my research in the tool shed outside. I look to Revere, who hasn't left my shoulder at all.
"Hey there, buddy. Do you mind giving another lift? Over to the café this time, and I'll need another flash to get back." Revere bats me over the head, incredulous agreement floating across the bond. I chuckle and surrender.
"Alright, alright, I get it. You're always willing to help, now leave my poor head alone." Revere nods imperiously, amusement glinting in his bronze eyes. Without any more fanfare, I'm standing in the garden's closet with flakes of harmless fire guttering out.
I quickly gather my wallet and coat, throw an illusion onto Revere to hide his existence, and sprint out the café door. A few blocks down is an old hobbyist shop. Taking the last turn around the final corner, I powerwalk inside.
An electric bing-bong resounds around the store, and the older gentleman at the counter looks up and sees me prance about excitedly and gives a small pinched smile.
"Hello there. Haven't seen you around here before. Do you need any help finding anything today?"
I look up from a model RC car and send a smile of my own his way. "Yeah, actually. In class the other day my science teacher was talking about lasers and I found it all absolutely fascinating. Do you have any kits with, uh, what are they called?" I fiegn ignorance a bit to sell my story. I'm fully aware that shops like these are pretty much sacred ground for Tinkers, both old and new. If I want to avoid getting on a list and staying there, I'm gonna have to act like a clueless beginner here.
The clerk's tension fades a bit, and an amused light enters his grin. "Laser diodes?"
"That's it, yeah! Mr. Laine was saying any hobbyist place worth their salt has a few kits for lasers and UV lights and stuff." Acting isn't really difficult with my earlier use of self-hypnosis. I'm mostly flying on auto-pilot to let the programming I gave myself take full effect.
With an even more relaxed, genuine smile, the employee barks out a laugh. "You bet your ass they do! Ever since lasers entered the public domain of technology, we've been stocked with diodes aplenty. It's a crying shame that most of them on the market get cobbled into some Tinkertech pistol nowadays, but I've got quite a few stocked in the back for real hobbyists like yourself."
I beam with 'innocence'. "That's great! I kinda forgot about Tinkers buying their stuff being a thing. To be honest, I was just excited to play around with something like those old science kits I had as a kid." Build a good enough narrative and deliver it with confidence, the barebones to good acting and lying. It sucks that I need to lie to this guy, but I don't have the time to spare to be hounded over a power I don't have.
With a hop, skip, and a flash of flames, I'm back in the toolshed to, ironically enough, tinker. In the original sense, that is. Soldering iron in one hand and pre-made circuit board in another, I get to work. With some quick setup and a fresh set of batteries, I have a very bulky and unweildy laser pointer and UV lamp.
The reason I bought these was because I wanted to do some magecraft research, and continuing my work on how light interacts with my magic and how different types of light react differently will be greatly beneficial in the future.
Summoning my wand for better precision, I set a pane of pure prana in front of the diode and turned it on. Immediately, the invisible sheet glows red. Looking at the wall behind the panel of magic shows the laser got pretty effectively trapped inside it, very little continuing beam of light exiting the other side.
Shaping the plane into a prism shows no difference, and the other shapes I try give no different response. Adding more prana to the pane, the glow and vivid color dim, the internal prana presumably absorbing even more of the charged light particles. Eventually, after adding more and more magic, the prana absorbs the entire laser beam and shows no glow or coloration. How interesting.
Turning off the laser, I move the pane into a bounded field designed to make a vacuum of the ambient mana and prana and cast a structural analysis on the sheet.
"Fascinating."
It appears my prana is clinging to the particles and siphoning the energy it has to remain in effect. If I stopped feeding prana to it, the pane would remain for a bit longer than normal. I wonder if a parahuman's lasers will give the same result or if they utilize something other than actual lasers to deliver their power expressions.
It seems that the majority of standard visible light doesn't have enough inherent energy to absorb to provide any observable interactions, but the more powerful light waves do interact with my prana. Hmm, does my prana have this interaction only because of my elemental alignments, or does all prana act this way?
Activating a hastily built field, I program the ambient magic to form a filter for my magic, scraping away the element and Origin of any energy that passes through. Another panel of prana, and the laser goes through the pane with minimal energy loss. Considering how sloppily I threw the field together, I'm willing to bet the energy loss is just from prana that escaped the alignment scrub.
"So, elemental attunement is this potent. Even without any attempt to actively use the light element, my prana simply interacts with high energy light on its own. Perhaps this is why knowing your elements is considered paramount in that datapackage Gaea gave me. To interact with the elements outside one's alignment would require an insane level of skill in magic control, so much so that only the upperclass of magus apparently could."
Now, a question I find myself asking is which element, light or dark, is causing the absorption. A decent hypothesis would be that the absorption is centered around the dark element, but hypotheses need testing. One lengthy adjustment to the scrubbing field, patent pending, and now most prana I push through it will only have the light element.
Set up the pane and diode once more, and -DAMN!
I grope for the diodes' off switch, eventually hitting it while reinforcing my eyesight to handle the bright red light the pane scattered everywhere. Blinking away my spotty vision, I can only grin. Magic is so fucking cool!
The pane is still glowing, but it's fading at a rapid rate. It seems the dark element was definitely responsible for the absorption.
Another change in configuration on my filter, and now only dark is present. I grab some welding goggles, something I definitely should have been using way earlier, and carefully flick the diodes back on.
The pane is still invisible, and now the laser is only minorly absorbed by the pane. Placement in the vacuum field and another structural analysis reveal that the absorption is only happening by surface area. The tiny point of the laser is too small to have a bigger effect.
It seems the amount of absorption from before was because the inherent light element scattered the beam throughout the structure and maximized the surface area interacting with the laser.
Repeating the tests with the UV lamp was much different, however.
The control pane, i.e. fully filtered of elements, acted no different to the lamp than with the laser. But that wasn't where the fun began, oh no. That was when I did the less filtered panels.
The unfiltered pane was a much darker purple under the lamp, and it had an aura of space that was darker than normal. This pane, according to the scans I performed, was emitting something the lamp was also producing that piggybacked on the UV light. The equations and calculations I did show that nothing scientifically observable was being made by the lamp, and yet the scans, my eyes, and my magic sense disagreed.
The light element sample, according to an analysis, acted exactly the same as with the laser, scattering it within the pane's structure. But visually, the panel is glowing a different shade of purple. This new purple shade acts like UV light, but something is missing in the scans that mathematically shouldn't fit in the equations, but I still knew something was missing because it was the same reading that the unfiltered pane was giving. It was also slightly deteriorating, like something was eating the light.
With the dark sample, the pane was an inky gray, and the purple light of the lamp was almost fully absorbed. However, that inexplicable variable was getting scattered like the light sample did with the laser. The aura seen with the unfiltered panel was happening again, and it was bigger than before. There was also that bit of deterioration, but now it felt more burnt off than eaten. I puzzled out what I think it was: a tied in concept of dark that UV lamps have obtained. As the makers of 'black-light', UV lamps have now started to emit the concept of both light and dark.
This might just be a massive breakthrough for me personally. By using black-light as a base for my elemental spells, I can deliver both of the conflicting elements and pair their more complimentary aspects without issue. I can only wonder what infrared light will do, will it have heat tied to it that may allow me to improve upon burning light spells? Writing my ideas in a notebook, I'm about to find a remote with an infrared laser diode when I yawn widely. Glancing at the wall clock reveals a surprising 10:30 pm.
"Dang, I guess it's about time I clean up and head back." Clean up was swift with a few fibers, and soon enough I gave a call to my companion.
"Revere!" The plume of fire engulfed me, and I was gone.
The cabin is now about as secure as a pocket dimension would be, needing extremely nuanced angles of attack to penetrate the perimeter. Thus, it gives an effective base of operations for Noah and a safe house in case the café gets attacked, despite its own protections. Please note that the protections do not protect against shards' power expressions but do block their divination; past, present, and future. Unless a Thinker gets in personally.
The last part of this is to show both how much experience he has with magecraft, as well as what studying magecraft is like for Noah right now. With so little basic research into elemental prana that Gaea delivered, researching spells aligned to his Origin was the majority of what he worked on during the trip, so now he can start to experiment less broadly and focus on his elements. With both light and dark, some interesting spells become possible, add in his Semblance, and there's a fuckton of room for improvement.
What did you think of the interaction with Gaea and Alaya? I felt pretty confident about it at first, but if you have any questions, I'll try to answer to the best of my ability. Please leave your thoughts, and thanks for reading!
As I leap to the rooftop, I drop the illusion hiding my presence. Looking upon the Parahuman Response Team Headquarters, I feel an inexorable wave of anxiety flood me to my core. I'm fully aware that after this is done, I won't be able to slip beneath any form of scrutiny anymore. In order to reassure any potential patients I have in the future, my healing methods will need this stamp of approval. On the other hand, healing powers are considered the Holy Grail of parabilities for a reason. In the USA alone, there are less certified healers than can be counted on one hand. I'm about to walk in and attempt to certify three separate instances of healing power. With a sobering breath, I fall.
Landing across the street from the HQ, the troopers out front are already tense, clearly having spotted me psyching myself up. I cross the street at the proper crosswalks (let's not break the law by J-walking directly in front of the PRT) and wave to the uniformed people guarding the doors.
As I'm about halfway to the front door, I feel three separate instances of safety flow down from my bond with Revere. It seems Kayden and Aster are now well out of Kaiser's reach now. Good. Why three pulses, though? Eh, I'll address it later. If it was important enough to need my intervention, Revere would have let me know.
I call out to the officers on duty.
"Hey there, nice weather today, huh?" No response.
"Uhh, I have a scheduled appointment to do some power testing today. Is that still going on?" The soldier on the right clicked his radio and mumbled a message before returning to his annoyingly good statue impression.
"It's under Noah? The newest hero in town? Maybe you had a debriefing on me recently?" Nothing.
"... Well, this has been helpful and all, but I have an appointment like I said, so I'm just gonna... slip by you right here, uh... yeah." After I walk past them, the silence is broken by both of them simultaneously switching their safeties on as the automatic door closes. I stand in the entrance for a moment in stunned quiet.
"I could've sworn the R in PRT stood for response..." I mutter to myself.
Shaking my head, I continue to the front desk, where a plain looking man is typing at Mach speeds. His dour expression picks up a hint of disgust.
"Can I help you today?" His voice is nasally and abrasive.
"I hope so, I came in to do some power testing today. Could you please point me to the labs?"
"There will be no need, sir. The Protectorate are on their way now to escort you." His thick glasses reflect the light in my eyes a moment when he turns to look at me. There's a small trace of a sneer in his average features.
"Uh, to the labs for testing, right?"
"Please have a seat while you wait."
"Right..." I mentally balk at how much disdain there is being thrown around in here. This can't all be just in my head, right?
Taking the offered chair against the wall, I utilize my mental partition to ponder and debate magecraft with myself. Was it healthy to rely on a literal copy of my mind to have educated discussions of exotic particle physics? I didn't know, but it sure does help with developing new research topics. I have at least half a notebook in the tool shed with recorded mental discourse, and it looks quite promising.
"Ahem."
I tune back to reality to see Armsmaster standing in the far left doorway. Getting to my feet, I take a second to study him more closely. The sleek blue power armor he wore had a silver accent that followed his musculature, giving a more approachable feel to the otherwise robotic appearance. His famous Armsbeard was on display, further humanizing the bastion of cold steel. The hero's halberd was color coded to his suit, and even a cursory look from my amateur eyes noted the many compartments that a dozen gadgets would fit in.
"Hey there, I'm Noah. Nice to meet you."
"Armsmaster, and likewise. Please follow me to the testing site." With a curt few words, he stalks off toward the elevator at the end of the hallway. Shrugging my shoulders, I do so.
The elevator ride was blessedly quick since Armsmaster had no care for small talk. Stepping off, I feel a bit disorientated as the elevator felt like it spun as it descended several floors. Do they have a Tinkertech elevator? Who even would they call for that?
My questions remained unanswered, as we arrived at the labs to see a dozen scientists either standing ready at this or that monitor or doing frantic last second calibrations to various measuring instruments. In the middle of the room were two pairs of familiar heroes, Assault and Battery and Glory Girl and Panacea.
"Everyone, this is Noah. I have an urgent meeting later today, so let's get this session done quickly."
"As he said, I'm Noah. It's a pleasure."
Glory Girl zips into my personal space, a common occurance at this point, and gives her own peppy introductions for everyone.
"Hi! I'm Glory Girl! This is my sister, Panacea, and you already know the rest. Is it true you summon monsters to fight for you?" I almost instinctively go to flick her forehead in reprimand, but catch myself.
"I'll answer what I can. It is what I'm here for, but can I at least breathe my own air?"
"Vicky! Aura! Also, back up a bit, will you?" Luckily, Amy is here to bop her sister for me. With a very familiar sheepish look, the feelings of adoration fade. I sigh at the lessened mental strain of ignoring it.
Amy gives me a suspicious look. "You handled her aura pretty well, considering this is your first encounter with it."
I scoff. "Not to offend anyone, but I live and went to school in this city. I've felt the aura before, and I've dealt with it before." Some reproachful looks were sent Glory Girl's way, causing her to get defensive.
"What is that supposed to mean?!"
I wave her off. "It means that you've used it in school before, multiple times. Not intentionally, but you did. I've encountered it enough to be able to ignore it for a little while."
Not at all a lie. Sure, it sounds like I'm saying I go to Arcadia, but if you look closely I don't actually say where I encountered her aura, just that she has lost control of it at her school before, and that I've been in range of her aura a few times. Lovely bit of misdirection that might help obfuscate my identity. I can see at least three scientists twitch at my words, likely jumping to the conclusion I led them to.
"Anyway, we're here to test my partners and myself today, so let's get to it." The heroes nod, Vicky with an embarrassed look, and the devices are set up.
"Let's start with how you summon these creatures of yours. If you would please summon one within range of the scanners."
"Sure, can do." With a miniscule flex of will, Crasberry appears on the marked flooring.
While the scientists and Armsmaster hover by the monitors to check the readings, Amy and Victoria make their way toward the three-eyed crab.
"What is it?" Vicky asks.
I shrug. "Naming wise, they aren't a part of the Earth's ecology, so no scientific naming convention I'm aware of. However, this one is named Crasberry."
Amy waits for the eggheads to give the green light before gently poking the shell. Her eyes glaze over a bit as she delves into the biology on display.
"Wow, a silicon-based lifeform. I read about a hypothesis that it was possible, but to truly see it is another thing entirely. The overall similarities Crasberry has to crustaceans isn't just a visual comparison either, but instead the internals are so close that if it wasn't so alien in make-up I would honestly say that they were completely normal. Ooh, but the brain is where it's super interesting. It takes up about twenty percent more space than its mundane counterpart, and it seems more active in general. If I had to speculate, I would say Crasberry here has a comparable intellect to a particularly smart dog. It seems the third eye is only able to see in the infrared spectrum. I wonder what environment it originates from and what caused these adaptations?" The scientists are scrambling to record all of that, and only Glory Girl and I seem to be trying to follow her verbal scans out of the heroes.
Armsmaster catches that last sentence in particular. "What do you mean by where it originates? Isn't it a projection?"
I shake my head while Panacea ignores him to continue exploring my pet. "Not really. Projections as a term bring to mind energy constructs, right? My summons are fully functional with their internals. They have a full biology, and therefore a full sentience for most of them. Although I do have a couple that aren't biological in nature."
"Hmm. Well, according to the scans, no harmful radiation or other effects appear during your 'summonings', so we can continue with multiple tests if you're up for it."
"Sure."
The first tests that happened were done exclusively with the pets. Seven cute little critters that wouldn't hurt a fly made things go very smoothly indeed, and Amy was practically glued to Crasberry for the entire duration. They tested it with Tinkertech blood machines, showing they were all virus free, had no harmful radiation, were hypoallergenic, and any other samples they took from them disappeared after I unsummoned everyone. One scientist in the corner twitched when the blood sample he was looking at simply ceased to exist.
After the groundwork of safety was cleared, it came time for what I was really here for.
"So, Noah. What made you come in today if you already knew all of this?"
I glanced at Assault, who was getting elbowed by Battery when I did, and smiled. "I have a few things with the capacity for healing, and I wanted to certify them with the PRT."
There was a pause in the room as one of the younger scientists squeaked out. "A few?"
"Yup, let me show you. First up, is Ariel." With a dramatic wrist flick, Ariel appears and immediately makes a beeline to me to administer a Wrap. Laughing it off, I scratch at her chin as she sags in bliss.
Amy all but teleports to feel along my Milotic's flank. I was just about to start explaining her Life Dew and her recent addition of Aqua Ring when my soul was stretched.
The loom was not present. In its place was a large vault door. Upon it was written the letters SCP in a stylistic emblem, to the door's side was a panel labeled 919. There was a hiss of hydraulics, and the door flew open to show a concrete room with every wall covered in mirrors. From somewhere within the room, a sheef of papers zipped in front of me. The data kept on SCP-919 was verbatim transfered into my head. Then, the Menagerie informed me in an abnormally mechanical fashion that SCP-919's reflected version of myself would not be hysterical if I utilized it, and any memories the reflection acquired would transfer to me upon termination. The socketing of the Gigantification power was as smooth and intuitive as always, as if to highlight the oddity of SCP-919's new limitations.
I blink my eyes in bemusement. I'll need to study this extensively back in the tool shed, as well as see what other limitations 919 has hidden away.
"Holy Fucking Christ!" And that is my reminder that I have the world's greatest healer inspecting my creatures still.
"What the hell is this energy this eel is making? It seems to constantly cycle and improve whatever it comes into contact with, and -" I interrupt Panacea to get a swift summary in for everybody's benefit.
"That is an exotic bio-energy I've taken to calling aura. Ariel, here, is what is known as a Milotic, the second form of a two life-stage organism that uses its aura to combat others with similar abilities. Milotic are extremely attuned to the element of water, and their aura follows suit to allow an impressive swath of hydrokenetic capabilities. Aura can also be used with other elements. However, for the month I've had her, I've focused on her strengths before I shore up any weaknesses. Her massive size is no joke either, since that constant circulation of aura you noticed does strengthen her physical abilities as well, making her my most versatile combatant by far."
The room is abuzz with energetic scientists hungry to see if they can better understand this exotic energy, while the veteran heroes, minus Assault, take a healthy step back. Amy is well and truly lost to us as she mindlessly pets my Pokémon, unconsciously following her power's information to scritch the best spots perfectly, all but melting my poor unsuspecting Milotic into a puddle of bliss.
The tests for Ariel were genuinely simple, just putting her through exercises for other parahumans like Brute, Mover, Blaster, and Striker tests. Eventually, we reached the point that I requested Panacea for.
"Alright, that leaves Life Dew and Aqua Ring." Amy looks at me with curiosity, seeming to come out of her shell and lose a bit of her ever-present cloud of grumpiness with all the interesting biology shown. I bring my hand to my mouth and bite down hard.
Panacea scrambles to reach me, berating me for my stupidity, where I then dodge her grasping hand, shocking her into silence.
"Ariel, Life Dew." Once my Milotic starts, I grab Panacea's hand to give her a view of the process.
"Huh? Oh, it's delivering the bio-energy with a bunch of nutrient rich mineral water, and the cells are just acting as they should and following standard healing protocols, although the highly dense bio-energy speeds the process up by a factor of over a thousand. The waste produced is actually just washed away with the now much less rich water. That might be the single most efficient form of external healing I've encountered."
I grin. This is all so interesting, learning everything about my creatures and their abilities down to the microscopic scale.
"We should meet up every once in a while, maybe sooner if I get any especially fascinating examples to share with you. I have quite a bit of data about my creatures, but you know more about them with a simple touch! That is so cool!" Amy blushes a bit, but the smile on her face is encouraging. Until it all vanishes in an ugly grimace.
"No, I can't be away from the hospital for too long. People might not get the treatment they need in time." She has a twisted glint in her eyes, a rather gross warping of determination. I see I'm not likely to change her mind on this. A sad smile plays itself across my lips.
"That's too bad. Maybe someday things will change for the better, and you won't need to dedicate so much time to the hospital." There's a smidgen of both hope and horror, clouded by severe doubt in her expression.
"Maybe..."
I clear my throat as I turn to see Glory Girl with a glint in her eyes, hands wringing excitedly and the rest of the room has a somber tone. It seems fitting to have some pheonix magic help out.
"Revere!" My call was answered, and a burst of sunfire revealed my pheonix perched regally on my shoulder. A cry of birdsong and the mood in the room rose a noticeable amount.
"This is Revere, a pheonix. They are supremely strong fliers, can influence emotion with their song, can flash through fire to teleport, and their tears have extremely potent healing abilities. They also bond very closely, making them steadfast and loyal companions." I caress my friend's head, getting soft content precks in response.
Everyone but me and Revere freeze. A glacial question from Armsmaster takes me aback.
"You mean to tell me you brought a known Master into the PRT HQ?" I blink at him before pointing at Glory Girl.
"You already have one by that definition."
Glory Girl gets an affronted look. "I am not a Master!"
I tilt my head. "Then neither is Revere. I just said he can influence emotion, not control them. Sure, greatly repeated or constant exposure could have lingering side effects, but since Revere can only do so with his songs, he can't realistically do anything other than boost morale."
While everyone else relaxes, Amy pales and excuses herself to use the ladies' room. I ponder what that could be about while everyone else runs Revere through a few preliminary tests. I glanced at Victoria out the corner of my eye, and right when I was about to scold her for losing control of her aura again, I realized what might've happened. Could Amy be addicted to her sister's aura? As Armsmaster starts scolding her instead, I start thinking about my Paladin spells, specifically one I just call Cleanse. Could I help her? Better question, one I think I know the answer to, would she let me? My gut says no, unfortunately.
The tests are over quickly, showing that Revere has actually hit a few new personal bests, including an impressive dead lift / dead hover of about one and half tons. Letting the machine down gently, Panacea returns just in time for the tests of the pheonix tears. A few injured troopers are rolled out, then a few more for a better test of Ariel's healing. It all went smoothly, but Revere did get into a kinda argument with Amy.
"How the heck do your tears heal when they aren't any more special than a human's?! Also, how the hell does your head have room for tear ducts big enough to make the three sizable drops you casually just made!?"
"Caaw~"
"... Did you just sing to me the feeling of self-doubt? Are you trying to say I'M wrong?? You pretentious turkey!"
I probably shouldn't have laughed as hard as I did at that misunderstanding, but after a quick clarification, even Amy was smiling again, even if only a bit. Luckily, with how every other summon had no leftover remnants, nobody even tried to get blood work or tissue samples of Revere. If they did, I would have had a few questions to elaborate on.
Finally, it was time for my Paladin spells, and the confusion around those was very... potent.
"So you got these abilities that mimic a Paladin from Dungeon and Dragons from a creature so close to the human genome you summon it as a transformation?"
"No, the ability isn't inherent to every Faunus. Faunus can develop a Semblance, or an individual power, that mostly has great ties to their character. They do this with a bio-energy so similar to Ariel's I just call both aura."
"And you expect us to believe that, how?"
"Assault, I know you enjoy being an ass, but I can't handle you doubting me on something this personal."
"I'm just asking what we all want to know here."
I glare at him while he holds his hands above his head. I get that it doesn't make scientific sense. I don't get how that's such a big issue when all parahumans make no scientific sense.
"Alright, aright, no questioning the Holy snake men, I get it." That would have been pretty racist on Remnent. "So you can heal and smite in the name of snake Jesus, right?" That would have been enough to get jumped.
"I utilize the positive energy and karma inherent to fulfilling oaths and following my own moral code to ply effects in combat that do include smiting and healing. I do not pray to snake Jesus to help me beat up Nazis."
"Well, that's just disappointing."
I sigh. This has been an exhausting experience. After cleansing the last patient of a fungal virus he voluntarily exposed himself to, probably for a raise if his satisfied smirk said anything, I look to Armsmaster for the next bit of patients only to find the room once again empty of all but heroes and scientists.
"We'll call you back at a later date to get the paperwork all set, but as of today, all of your healing abilities have a tentative certification from the PRT. Thank you for your cooperation."
Although it had a wooden delivery, I grinned at the small quirk of Armsmaster's lips that could, at the proper angle, be called a smile.
"Dope. Before you go to that important meeting, can you personally have a look at one last summon of mine? I find you might really learn something from a few scans of him." I could feel his skepticism from across the room, but regardless, he nods to the scanner suite this all started with. With little fanfare, I summon Gearbreak mindless, just to get things moving smoother. He has expressed his disdain for labs before when I asked for more thorough scans myself during the training month.
The moment the massive gunmetal gray steel falcon appears, multiple scanners ping, their corresponding monitors spewing line after line of data and information. The lab is suddenly a storm of whispers, everyone curious about the mechanical animal.
"This is Gearbreak. He's a Cybertronian. They have the fascinating biological functions of sentient and sometimes sapient creatures completely embodied with mechanical engineering counterparts. They are natural machines, meaning the metal he's made of might seem like mundane steel but is actually an organic metal that facilitates natural healing and repairs equally. They can shift most of their mass into a personal pocket dimension they call their Transwarp, combine this with their unique Tranformer Cogs, and they can mimic both organic and mechanic creations. Gearbreak, Valkyrie." At my order, the sound of pistons, servos, and cogs fill the lab as a kitted out XQ-58 Valkyrie UAV is at rest on the examination table.
The lab is now a veritable horde, the mob of scientists baying for details, the heroes clamoring for information, and Armsmaster frozen in place as his helmet faces the monitors filling with page after page of data.
As I start to get overwhelmed, I unsummon all but Gearbreak and edge back to the wall. Seeing I wasn't saying anything more, the mob goes to the computers to translate the raw data, while Panacea is all but insensate with her hand on Gearbreak's thruster. Vicky is poking her sister, Assault and Battery are trying to get something out of the Armsmaster statue, and I'm left alone long enough to feel how clocked out I am. That was a lot more of a reaction than I was expecting.
After an hour of absolute chaos, the scientist mob has quieted to a simmer of excitement, and Armsmaster was straight gone, instantly falling into a trance and ignoring his important meeting to sprint to his lab. Amy was loopily smiling in the corner while Vicky guided her away from Gearbreak, and Assault and Battery went to inform that important meeting about Armsmaster's Tinker Fugue. As nobody had asked any further questions, I just asked for a polite evacuation from the situation to Revere. A flash of sunfire, and I was gone.
Arriving in the toolshed, I pull off my mask and take a breath. That ending was stressful, but otherwise, it was mostly boring, only Amy's scanning proving to be of any interest. If I could request her assistance more, I would, but she has some major things to work through. Obviously, I'm going to need to ask Victoria to look up the kind of traumatic issues being a medical professional can cause and guide her to see that Amy has it really bad.
Shaking my head, I head out to talk with Kayden about how to better herself and how to improve Aster's quality of living while she's staying here.
Opening the front door, I'm blinded by Purity.
"Who are - oh, sorry! Sorry, I didn't know it was you, I thought Max found us or -" the light, similar to her stressed rambling, dims quickly upon seeing my face.
"Kayden, it's fine. I understand how stressful it must have been to trust a random cape with Aster's safety. I bet the several hours without word was killer on your nerves, but Revere sent no impression that any sort of emergency was afoot, so I just finished up my power testing at the PRT labs."
She nods before shifting nervously in place. "Um, I asked Revere before we left, and he said it was fine, well, more like sang a feeling of fine? Uh, he gave permission, I think, to bring him too. Not to say -"
"Kayden, who was it? Are we still safe here?" The voice of a younger boy interrupts Kayden's rambling. Looking around her side, I see a fairly husky boy peering around a corner. Upon locking eyes, he immediately hides fully behind a wall.
"Yes, yes, we're fine, Theo. It was just the cape who helped us." She turned to me with moist eyes and a hushed and hurried tone. "Theo is Max's son, I couldn't leave him there alone, who knows how he'd react to us leaving, Max has gotten violent before, I just -"
"Hey, hey, it's fine, better than fine, I'm glad you made the call to save him." Although, this could complicate things.