3.10 Jörð
22nd of March, 2011
"I'm not sure I am entirely comfortable with this approach, Colin," Dragon's voice echoes through his workshop, "This seems like a big breach of privacy all around."
"The project has been greenlit by the Director," the Tinker answers without looking up from his monitor, "She wants the Tinker supplying Nightflyer found as quickly as possible."
Admittedly, so did he, although for entirely different reasons. It still burned that he hadn't managed to get the authorization to observe the damage left in the blade's wake as it was used as a makeshift brake to slow Nightflyer's fall, but Medhall had categorically refused his request to examine the building proper. The man he had talked with on the phone claimed they had already filed for parahuman related damages to their insurance company and weren't interested in suing anyone at the time being, and since there was no signs of the building being broken into, Colin had his hand tied.
Which was infuriating. He is certain that he is on the edge of a major breakthrough and one more analysis could drastically speed-up the process.
"And I perfectly understand that," his friend colleague calmly answers back, "I'm just worried that this is crossing a line."
"The DEA often uses the same approach and techniques," he refutes, "I merely automated the process with a drone of my own making."
The plan he had proposed to the Director was both simple and efficient. A Tinker's activity could be noticeable even when carefully hidden by their energy consumption. And one common byproduct of said energy consumption for most Tinkers – he could think of at least two at the top of his head who wouldn't fit the paradigm, but it was still a good rule of thumb – would be the heat released during the creation process. Ergo, loading an autonomous drone with censors to draw a heatmap of the city before making a comparative analysis to the data provided by the water and electric companies as well as investigating the potential outliers buildings' leases could drastically shorten the time needed to complete the investigation.
As his friend colleague had pointed out, this was technically a grey area for the PRT. The bylaws supporting this kind of investigation simply weren't there – he had double-checked – but it wasn't forbidden either. As a matter of fact – which made him somewhat proud of himself for having the idea in the first place – Colin would be the first Hero to ever try this approach in an official capacity in the US.
His idea would probably need multiple days to pan out properly, but in the absence of a better lead, Colin had–
His attention suddenly narrows on an anomalous datapoint.
"I remain concerned, but I guess– Is something the matter?" Dragon seems to notice how he tensed out of nowhere, and Colin finds himself nodding sharply.
"A potential hit, I think," he curtly explains.
"Already?" his friend colleague's surprise shines clearly through her tone.
"It could be a false alert, but I've sent an email to the local electricity provider for clarifications," he answers a little distractedly, "With any luck, I've just found our unknown Tinker."
"And if you didn't?"
"Then I discovered something worth investigating," he replies neutrally.
A pause.
"Where is it?" Dragon asks, a note of curiosity in her tone.
It takes a hot second for Colin to understand her question, so absorbed by the heatmap's data he is.
"North-North-West of Bay, in the middle of the docks, ABB territory," he answers after giving the data a quick glance to confirm he remembered correctly.
"Lung's territory," his friend colleague muses, Colin catching her looking to the side while rubbing at her chin in thought on his secondary monitor, "Seem a bit risky for an independent Tinker to settle right there. Maybe it is something else?"
"It could also be a way to use Lung's reputation as an aegis to avoid investigations," Colin challenges, his eyes looking up from his own monitor to lock with Dragon's own, "Or it could merely be a clandestine drug laboratory. Which would ultimately be a little disappointing, but still worth investigating."
Though I do have a hunch that I'm going to hit paydirt with this one, the man's lips marginally curl up as he looks at his monitor once again, and that I'll finally be the one to truly honor Hero's legacy.
***
24th of March, 2011
I lean back and away from my latest creation in the wee hours of the morning while letting out a heartfelt sigh of relief. A glance at Dell strapped to my forearm tells me it's close to three o'clock in the morning, but I'm finally done after close to an entire week's worth of uninterrupted work on Project Hooky.
And I have to say, what had started as a Wolfenstein's Panzerhund ended up looking quite different from its 'humble' origins.
But I'm getting ahead of myself. I didn't 'just' work on Hooky during the past week. No, the first thing I did was to entirely upgrade my Hanuebu-V drone to make it actually worth the spare parts, since my current situation gave me a use for it. I tied its commands to Dell using its communication protocols, replaced its battery by Laspack-grade ones, added little solar panels on its roof, then strapped to it the best optics I could manage and a cloaking module, cramming everything together by abusing YuGiOh's advanced miniaturization techniques.
Finding Coil's civilian address afterward had been surprisingly easy. Which isn't actually that surprising since it is his civilian address, and there's only one guy called Thomas Calvert in the Bay's phonebook – metaknowledge is admittedly a bit of a cheat like that. My little UFO drone has been casing his house while invisible for the past few days and I have already confirmed that the tall and thin afro-american man occasionally walking out of the slightly run-down place in the morning was indeed my huckleberry.
Which, I have to give props to the guy, he'd have me completely fooled if I didn't know. Guy is rolling in dough with his side-gig, but his house looks run-of-the-mill and bogstandard as frak. No wonder nobody caught onto his act until it was way too late in canon.
Now, he hadn't come out of his house every day of the week, but since the Empire's saber-rattling is still ongoing I figure he has to closely monitor the situation and probably stays some night in his bunker evilly making evil schemes.
"No matter," I grin to myself while looking at Project Hooky, "He won't know what hit him all the same."
Now, at the approximate size of a fraking white rhino, Wolfenstein's Panzerhunds are big, which means that at merely two thirds of the original's size, Hooky's mass is less imposing. But I consider it a fair trade to be able to comfortably ride the thing around in exchange. And adding a set of retractable handlebars and a comfy saddle onto its frame is by far the least of the modifications I made to the original blueprint. The thickly and bulky armored look has been replaced by a far sleeker and just as effective platting inspired by my Carapace armor blueprints, making its metallic frame looking infinitely more sleeker and just as able to shrug kinetic-based attacks; I admittedly went a little ham and adapted my Power Weapon tech to its forepaws' claws, to make him just that much deadly in close quarter; an anti-gravity generator sits at the center of its frame to allow it to downplay the impact of its almost six hundred pounds of weight on the environment and for extra-lunge distance – and if I ended cannibalizing a lot of the metal laying around in my new 'workshop' for it, nobody needs to know; I of course used Laspack-grade batteries for ease of recharge and staying power in the field; and fitted him with the same kind of holotech module Dell has, meaning that the four legged engine of destruction is actually able to go invisible when needed – which will be most of the time, since I firmly intend on keeping that particular ace in my sleeve for as long as possible. I even touched its profile to make it look more wolf-like and less tank-on-legs! About the only two things I didn't touch is its flamethrower, since a lot of fire can generally solve most problems a lot of brute strength and subtlety cannot, and most of its internals, since Hooky is the first robot I've ever built.
There's only two things left to do before I'll be able to go ahead with my plan to take Coil out of the board.
One of those is running Hooky through its booting sequence, and the other–
I look to the side at the line of cables and processors innocently sitting on a nearby workbench.
"This is going to suck so, so bad!" I whine bemoan neutrally note.
–is to finally go ahead with my pseudo-MIU project.
And saying that I'm not sparkling with joy at the idea of applying a scalpel anywhere near my spine would be like saying that the fall of Cadia was a little skirmish of no import.
"I have the Panacea to make the aftermath sucks less this time around at least," I grumble before stepping next to the table, taking a steadying breath and–
***
–I wake up with a shuddering gasp, laying flat on my belly against a table and surrounded by surgery tools straight out of a mad doctor's nightmare with an empty Panacea injector still sticking from my neck.
"I-I h-hate this so. Fracking. Much!" I hiss through gritted teeth, doing my hardest to remain as still as possible as I feel my flesh knitting itself together.
I take steadying breaths after steadying breaths, trying to ignore both how absolutely unsettling falling into a fugue can be and how I'd have probably pussied out of operating on myself if it wasn't the case.
"At least I had my current specialization to rely on for this," I grumble against the table while gingerly taking the injector's needle out of my flesh, "Small mercies."
I give Dell a look to check the hour, and feel relieved when I see it's barely 6 am.
I remain laying there for a while longer until I feel the unnatural cold of the Panacea running in my blood stream finally settling and only then do I carefully sit myself up on the table.
I repress a shiver – it's a little cold and I'm definitely pointing – while giving the entire array of surgical tools a look full of caution.
"You made all of this on my orders, little guy?" I ask Dell while poking a robot-like arm with a buzzsaw – thankfully unbloodied – on its end.
The Machine-Spirit's fans whir up for a couple of seconds, which is all the confirmation I need.
"Thanks a bunch then, I'll have your favorite incense ready for you this afternoon," I promise it.
I can feel it grow colder against my arm, a mark of contentment I came to learn.
"Are you ready to initiate the connection?" I ask aloud while starting to poke and prod at the new programs I made for it and my pseu–
"This is getting silly, I still don't have a name for my MIU," I sigh, before shaking my head, "Lessee… It's derived from the Da'at Yichud, so how about MIU-D?"
Silence is my only answer, which, fair enough.
"MIU-D it is," I shrug to myself, "So, ready to connect, little guy?"
Dell doesn't answer.
Instead, I gasp as I suddenly become more aware.
I lift my right hand from Dell's screen in wonders and watch as its display changes without me touching it, solely through the power of, well, not my mind, not really, but more like I am navigating its various files and menus with a phantom cursor.
It's a little wobbly for now, but I can feel myself getting more assured as the minutes ticks. It'll take a little bit to get used to the feeling, but I'm sure I can make it work. The possibilities in combat alone…
But more importantly–
"Imma psychic," I make a little silly grin while kicking my feet in delight at my success, before perking up and jumping off the table.
"Now let's wake up Hooky! And then we ride to the house!"
[AN: Minor timeskip because I want things to get going. Colin has a lead, one that will totally not blow up in his face fr fr! Jacky completes both Project Hooky and her MIU-D, making the Omnissiah proud!
– Admittedly, I'm not one hundred percent happy with Armsy's part, but oh well. It does what I need it to, so I'm not going to spend hours rewritting it. Oh, and he hasn't caught on Jacky yet because she did the very same thing she pulled when tinkering in the Barnes' attics, aka. thoroughly insulating the place with her holograms while she's working. She kinda lucked out so far because he wasn't looking her way when she was busy smelting metal, but it's just bad luck on his part more than thorough planning on hers. –