Day 18, Saturday January 22, 2011
+100CP Perk rolled, field Quality: Resources unlocked. Cost 700CP/350CP. Insufficient CP. 350 CP banked.
+100CP Perk rolled, field Skills: Alchemy unlocked. Cost 1500CP/450CP. Insufficient CP. 450 CP banked.
Today is a bit of a letdown when it comes to perks, but I suppose it just lets me bank up for something better tomorrow. But that does not excuse me from my daily exercise. So I get up and go for my run. There are no messages today. I do scan a bunch of cars on my run. It's probably not the best data, but it might help. I get back home and take a qi pill, and it's like getting hit by a truck. This is the first pill I've taken from the recently harvested spirit beasts. It feels much more potent than the previous ones I had made out of some non-spiritual cow. That's good. I'll have to watch qi dosages more closely when I start giving Je'Lu his qi regimen.
Breakfast passes without event, and I go upstairs to take a shower. When I come downstairs, dad is still there. I had expected him to be at work. Although it is Saturday, I suppose he is taking the weekend off. He asks what my plans are, and I mention the kickboxing class at ten. He asks if I want to practice more driving this afternoon and I bring up the information packet from the distance learning academy. There's a lot of information there, so he starts reading through it too. We discuss the extracurricular activities that they propose. There's a whole variety of activities, but I'm not sure I'm good to spend that much time around teenagers. He encourages me to pick one, and I notice a fencing club. It meets at Clarendon, but it's not actually a school club, outsiders are welcome to join (hence why it was in my packet). Seeing as the survey made me make a fencing style blade, I figure it would be nice to know how to use it.
After some discussion of that, my dad invites me out driving again and this time I can't think of a good way out of it. But that doesn't mean that both of me need to waste our day with my dad. I make a clone on the stairs down to the basement. Then my dad drives me over to the gym and hangs out for the duration of the kickboxing class, chatting up one of the boxing instructors for most of the time. I do better than I did on Thursday, but I'm still tired and sore at the end of the workout.
From there we grab some burgers for lunch. We head out of town, and I get dad to agree to driving around at an old quarry outside town. I'm able to drive pretty well now thanks to that perk I got, even with manual transmission. Dad says he is impressed, but seems disappointed. We take a break, and I manage to get some scans of the mining equipment from the area, they might help develop the Nomad.
Dad seems to be giving up on teaching me to drive. I ask about off-roading, so we check out a place that rents out ATVs. They're a little too expensive for dad to afford right now, and they won't rent to me anyway, but that's okay. I get a quick scan of some ATVs out of the deal. When nighttime comes, he takes me to a gathering at the house of a dockworker named Dave. There are a few other kids there, but the oldest besides me is twelve, so it's hard to fit in. It's also hard to fit in with the adults who are drinking. I wish I could have gotten out of it somehow. I end up helping a couple little kids with their homework. At least there's food at the party.
Taylor summoned me on the stairs down to the basement. I took the tunnel to the garage. I got to work on carving the wand. I could already tell it was going to be a boring day. I did make sure to include Joe in the work. Mostly he just held the wand for me to carve on, but that's not the point. The point was to engage him in conversation. He had gotten a lot better at it.
Je'Lu woke up later, but I didn't have any new powers to report. We did end up fabricating a freeze gun and a plasma rifle for him, though. Once they were out, I recombined each pair together. I took the rapier too, which we had already given the sharpness of obsidian, the hardness of diamond, the resilience of graphene, and the density of lithium. It got recombined into my weapon.
But most of my time was dedicated to carving on the wand. I got off to a late start today, so I'm not sure if I am going to be able to finish it. Je'Lu distracted me with some cat memes, which doesn't help on that effort. Roberta chided him for that. I took lunch with Je'Lu (even though I technically don't need to, but if I didn't, I'd be hangry all afternoon and Taylor was off somewhere and not available to make a new clone after her own lunch).
After half an afternoon of slowly carving a stick, I needed a break, so I set the minifacurer to start spewing out components for a new robot. This one was going to be an actual Pickelman. I could re-dress Joe to play a Pickelman, but I was sure he wouldn't like it and it might confuse him. So better to make a dedicated Pickelman. But those parts needed some serious time to fabricate, so it only gets me a few minutes of break. Then I went back to carving a wand of embodiment. And imagined all the different things I want the wand to do while I do so (that's an important part of the process according to Roberta).
We took a break for dinner and I wanted to make something that requires real cooking, not just microwaving. So I had Je'Lu start a campfire in our resource world (with resource world wood), then I grilled some hamburgers over it. Garnished with the lettuce and tomatoes we had planned for salads, we had to use slices of bread instead of a bun, but even still it was delicious.
I worked late into the night on that damned stick. I don't manage to finish, but it should just need finishing touches tomorrow.
Interlude Coil (Try 1)
In this timeline, I give a go for the foray to capture Palladium. If Palladium is there and sufficiently pliable, I'll keep this timeline, otherwise, this will be a research expedition. Two vans unload masked mercenaries, who swiftly converge on the garage. I hear an electronic noise, and the mercenaries open fire. Reports come in of a defense robot, basically a hard hat with a gun, shooting at them. It's not surprising that the tinker has defenses already, but it's good to learn what they are. Soon more robots show up, this time helicopter drones that use their whirling blades to attack the mercenaries. They're dangerous, but much easier for the mercenaries to take out with the laser rifles I have provided for them.
The squad gets bogged down against the defense robots at the entrance (they're near indestructible when hunkered down), so the second squad moves around to the back wall of the garage, where it borders some residences. The fence there is weak and easily breached. There are more defense robots there, but they are not as far away and not in as defended a position, so it's easier to take them out. Three figures emerge, two in matching armor, one a completely different style. I tell the mercenaries to take them both alive. At this point I don't know which one is the tinker and which one is just a patsy. The thin figure has a freeze ray. It's difficult, but since he (I presume) is not much of a marksman, my mercenaries are able to take him down. Unfortunately, with a hole through the leg, he clatters to the ground. The thicker figure in matching armor has a plasma weapon. He kills several of the mercenaries with disintegrating shots. He's no better a marksman than the thin one, though, so he goes down too. The third figure is the one that gives the mercenaries the most trouble. That one has a shield, and uses it to excellent effect. And he is a much better shot than the other two. That one alone takes out five of the mercenaries (a few broken bones, but no fatalities), and they only end up taking it down with a handful of grenades.
With several mercenaries dead and several more injured, I probably won't be keeping this timeline, but there is still important information to be obtained. It was a respectable showing for a new tinker. I definitely cannot allow this element to be a wildcard in my plans. The mercenaries call an all clear. The matching armors are both empty. It looks like the disappearing girl can disappear right out of her armor. I need to figure out how she does that. Meanwhile the shielded one seems to have actually been a robot. There's not much of interest in the main garage. The office in the corner has been adapted into a living space of little interest to me. The next room has several computers and devices and a door frame. The next one has a wagon-load of chemistry stuff. Then there is an impressive looking forge set up. I head back to the computer room. That's where the most important information will be.
I get there and attempt to turn everything on, but absolutely nothing responds. That is frustrating. I notice a scroll on a shelf and pick it up, but a noise behind me indicates the door frame has activated. I turn just in time to see an old man shoot me with a toaster of all things. There's a searing pain as a piece of toast hits me in the chest, and a perfectly crispy, yet completely uncharred piece of toast falls on my arm. I pull my pistol, but as I do he shoots me several more times. With toast. Tinkers are bullshit. I shoot him several times. I'm still alive, but with third degree burns, I'm not going to keep this timeline going.
Day 19, Sunday January 23, 2011
+100CP Perk rolled, field Skills: Magitech unlocked. Cost 400CP/550CP. Perk A World Is A Living Thing purchased for 400CP. 150 CP banked.
Spoiler: A World Is A Living Thing (400CP)A World Is A Living Thing (400CP): Among Exodites, the Infinity Circuit is known as the World Spirit, and upon the death of an Exodite, this network absorbs their soul, thus keeping them from the clutches of Slaanesh and allowing those still living to commune with them. Now you too bear the knowledge by which one might forge this great and intricate grid of stone circles, obelisks, and menhirs. It will take some time, of course, to cover an entire world - likely more time than you will have in a given journey, at any rate - but it is entirely possible to produce a smaller version over, say, the course of three years, protecting the souls of those within an area about the size of a small township. May the dead know peace at last.
+100CP Perk rolled, field Quality: Efficiency unlocked. Cost 400CP/250CP. Insufficient CP. 250 CP banked.
That is a frustrating perk. It's useless. Awesome, but useless. It's the ability to craft a single thing - a soul trap the size of a city. While it's nice that it may enable me to commune with the dead, it's a massive working to contemplate. Three years work to get it up and running for just Brockton Bay. And it doesn't include the ability to make smaller versions. Or to bring back the dead. Just catch souls and talk to them. Of course, with all the dead souls of the whole city, I'd have plenty of souls for hell-forging. It's almost like my power wants me to turn into a soul-mutilating monster. Of course, the structures should be made of a crystalline psychoactive matrix, so Gemavic can create the material. And because that's the case, Downsized can scale it down to personal scale. Of course, I'm still weak enough using Gemavic that it would probably take a month to do so. And even if I do, what does it let me do? Hand the crystal to someone, murder them, and hold their soul in the crystal to interrogate them? That's completely immoral at best.
I put that rant on hold, though. I can unload at Je'Lu about it once I get to the garage. I get up and go for my run. I scan some more cars on my run, and even manage to luck out and find a pair of dirt bikes to scan. I check for messages, and arrange with my lawyer for him to send a van to pick up the robots and me for our meeting tomorrow. Back at home I take another qi pill, but I'm braced for the rush this time and take it in stride. I take a shower and dad is still asleep. He got a little drunk last night. I actually ended up driving him home, which wasn't technically legal since I wasn't in costume, but I was careful, it wasn't far, and nobody stopped me. I suspected he would be out for a while. So I put a note in the kitchen that I was out and headed down the tunnel to the garage.
I make a shadow clone and upload scans from the Monkey Tool to the Diagnostic Computer to the R&D Center. The R&D center indicates plenty of data to design the body of the Nomad. And the body is going to be made mostly of steel, so I can make most of it. There's also some good progress on the mining portion, but that still leaves four more techs for it to figure out. With that done, I start carving on the wand with Roberta. The clone is going to start assembling and programming the pickelman I (or she, but it's hard not to think of both of us as me) started yesterday.
Je'Lu wakes up just as I finish the wand. I wait for him to come out before I touch it again.
"Blessing of the Endless Space upon you this fine morn. Oh, did you finish it?"
I roll my eyes at him. "Got a new power this morning."
"Hmm? What is it?"
"The ability to build something that will collect the souls of everyone that dies in the city and the ability to talk to them."
"Oh, hmm. That's quite interesting."
"Yeah. Interesting and tempting and useless. It takes three years to set up."
"That is quite a bit of investment. But perhaps still worth it."
"You think? I was thinking it was just my power tempting me to abuse souls on the soul-forge."
"That is very worth it. You should definitely do that. Soul forging is a godly power."
"No, Roberta. I will not. It's evil."
"No, I was thinking that you could ask everybody who dies a traumatic death who killed them and get justice for them."
"Oh, that's actually a mostly moral use of that power. Still not sure how moral holding souls is, though."
Nobody spoke for a moment. "Not going to chime in on that, Roberta?"
"As a rule, on questions of morality, no. But since you asked, it's probably about as moral as holding a nuclear weapon."
And that comment does nothing to clear up how moral holding souls is. "Anyway, time to pick the wand up."
Spoiler: Carving Kit (100CP)Carving Kit (100CP): The tools within this leather satchel are of exceptional quality and have been ritually prepared for work with delicate magical reagents. Having these will make Gemcutting and runecarving much easier. A sheaf of paper in a waterproof scroll case notes useful details on several basic runes and the most common semi-precious gems, but it lacks details on multi-rune sequences and the rarest stones. Still, the papers make a good reference, and they will automatically update themselves when you discover new information through experimentation or research. If lost or destroyed, the kit will reappear in your possession the next day.
That is an interesting power. And something I can potentially use right now. The field, to my lack of surprise, is Toolkits: Magical. Just one more field to unlock before everything is available to me. And the task that's left is to examine Trainwreck's tinkertech. Which means I have to hunt him (and probably the rest of the Merchants) down.
"I can put gems or sets of runes into a non-magical item that has sockets. It has to be a weapon, shield, helm, or armor piece. They give certain bonuses. There are a bunch of different runes, and seven different gems, except somehow this system considers skulls to be gems - I don't know why. But I can make Amethysts, Sapphires, Emeralds, Rubies, Diamonds, and Topazes with my gem power. Unfortunately, I don't have a way to remove things from sockets yet. Eh, Roberta, this seems like it's in your wheelhouse. How about we make this your project? Figure out what you can about this stuff. There's a sheaf of updating notes on it. I think it might be worthwhile to come up with different outfits. Maybe one for mana regeneration to make gems, another for exploring that finds magic items, and another for combat effectiveness?"
"Fascinating. Based on my understanding of your weapon choices, you do not desire to permanently damage to your human opponents, thus the electricity on the sword and the slow beam weapon. It then seems to me that all the gem options for weapons that deal extra damage would be of little value to you. That leaves skulls for health drain, which you cannot make, and amethysts which you can. These would increase your accuracy while firing or stabbing with your weapon, which seems to be a point you do need help with. Would you then consider making a variety of sizes of Amethysts for me to play around with and we'll put those in your weapons?"
"Sure. Make it so." I start producing a variety of tiny amethysts for Roberta to start experimenting with. "Let's have the shadow clones and Joe and Roberta collect resources in the other world. I have a feeling new baddies will have appeared, so be careful. Meanwhile, I'll churn out some cheap weapons for Roberta to start experimenting with."
"And I shall heckle you."
"Come on, just play on the computer or something."
"Of course."
It was a boring couple hours churning out machetes and amethysts. That scrap based post-apocalyptic crafting produces mostly low quality stuff, but at least it produces it cheap and fast. Hence that is what I use to turn spare steel (smelted down from the iron ore deposits we've collected just sitting on the surface of the other planet) and some glue into machetes. It actually takes me longer to put some sockets into them. I figure out I can put from one to six sockets into each machete. After some initial experimentation with different numbers, I end up putting two in each of them because that's what Roberta wanted to start with. I have quite a pile going when the exploration crew comes back an hour later. I need more adhesive if I want to make more, but I had wanted to try larger gems so I had the synthesizer making some large amethysts while I was making socketed machetes. I queue up some adhesive synthesis for later.
The explorers had noted a huge increase in the population of the resource world. There are now skeletons, zombies, beastmen, and imps. They manage to find a couple runes. Roberta plays around (and only uses a tiny fraction of the machetes I had made to figure out how big an amethyst has to be to get the maximum boost, and it's not that bad. Just over half an inch. So I produce a bunch of those while the clone puts sockets on our plasma rifles and Joe's blaster and armors. Roberta has me run one more test, and that is making similar sizes of other gems. The results are about the same based on size. And then she tries combining the gems in the Fab-Unit before socketing them, and now I have a crappy machete that is super accurate, and frostbites, burns, poisons, shocks, and cleanses undead with holy whatever and steals a tiny amount of life (we used a chipped skull the explorers had found). And it turns out that the sockets carry over between weapon forms. We socket the amethysts and suddenly we're much better shots. We take a break for lunch at that point, and I send the clones out for more exploration and resource collection. I spend some time making more gems to combine, and as soon as we find enough skulls, we'll have armors that replenish life and mana, enhance strength, increase magical potential, enhance dexterity, buffer life, increase accuracy, and help find magic items. And now I really want to pull off something just as awesome with shields. But I'll have to think about how to manage that.
I head back to the house to check on dad. He's still asleep, so I take off for the store. I stop by a second-hand store and buy a bunch of hoodies, some jackets, a bunch of hats, and a flashlight/pepper spray keychain. Then off to the grocery store to buy a bunch of groceries (including stocking up on some rarer things we were running low on, like spices, oils and such. I also get the staples, of course.
Dad is up by the time I get home, and he helps me put away the groceries (the clothes went down the coal chute). I spend some time contemplating plans for an offhand/spare weapon. A main-gauche to go with the rapier would be good. A sidearm would also be a good idea. I want something small and concealable too, which the pepper spray and flashlight keychain will do nicely for. A shield would be another good form to add in, but it has to be a weapon for me to be able to recombine it, so I make a note to look up shields that could be considered weapons.
My dad and I have sandwiches together for lunch. Then we kind of stand around awkwardly. In an attempt to have something to do, I take out one of my new textbooks and start reading it. Dad seems to not know what to do with himself and excuses himself to get to work. That gives me the opportunity to head back to the garage. I put a bunch of work into the new Pickelman and free up the clone to harvest resources in the other world. It's not a very exciting day, but it's important work. Je'Lu does call a break to the building and harvesting to run another session of Dungeons and Dragons. I spend some more time summoning gems and constructing my new robot.
I end up going home and fixing a pork tenderloin for dinner. Dad comes home late and eats some. I have enough time to read half of one of my textbooks, but I must admit, I'm reading MUCH faster than before. And retaining and understanding almost all of the information. The intelligence perks really do help with this type of thing.
Interlude Coil (Try 2)
Yesterday failed to secure the new tinker, but it did map out his/her defenses. Thus my mercenaries have a much better breaching plan. Today they're going in through the back wall with the knowledge of where the defense robots are. They do much better. No injuries overpowering the turtle bots. The helicopter bots are destroyed with no difficulty. There's not even an attempt at defense from the armored figures or the robot. The mercenaries call the garage clear. I don't bother entering myself this time, and soon the armored figures all show up. They come from the door frame in the computer room and they come out shooting. This time, they don't miss. Not even once. Every shot hits a mercenary dead center and freezes them. I don't have an answer as to how they became such good shots overnight. Palladium must have tinkered something up. Tinkers are bullshit. I close the timeline since I'm not going to get anything useful out of it.
Day 20, Monday January 24, 2011
+100CP Perk rolled, field Crafting: Magical Items unlocked. Cost 200CP/350CP. Perk Origami Witch purchased for 200CP. 150 CP banked.
Spoiler: Origami Witch (200CP)Origami Witch (200CP) from Fate/Legends Japan Land of the Rising Sun: A simple art turned deadly in your hands. Years of experience in folding paper has certainly made you a master at creating even the most complex origami shapes, your skill growing to the point that it began to mix with your magical energy, turning into something much more dangerous. You can easily use magic to shape paper into a wide variety of forms, imbued with varying effects. Creating origami familiars from paper, dangerous enough to scythe through human soldiers, is a ground-level effect. Creating powerful shields from overlapping paper flowers, flight through origami wings, patterns that strengthen existing spells or apply curse-like debuffs to those pierced by the paper cranes are all possible. While your main skill lies with direct paper spells, you will also find it much more possible to place magical effects onto paper for use with your magic. Researching some form of Onmyoudo or runic spells could prove especially potent.
+100CP Perk rolled, field Time unlocked. Cost 400CP/250CP. Insufficient CP. 250 CP banked.
+100CP Perk rolled, field Crafting: Technological unlocked. Cost 100CP/350CP. Perk Laboratory Work purchased for 100CP. 250 CP banked.Click to shrink...
Spoiler: Laboratory Work (100CP)Laboratory Work (100CP): Given a few hours and suitable tools you can almost always come up with a set of disposable tools that will counter a given gadget or ability you've encountered in the past. It'll only work once or twice, but with good sense that might be all you need.
I may have gotten the short end of the stick over the weekend, but today's powers are pretty good. Origami Witch is a nice power on its own. Probably enough of a power to be a superhero on its own. But it also combos with my trigram knowledge pretty well. I'm going to need to chat with Roberta to maximize this, but I'm sure the combination will be fantastic. If nothing else, I can print out my tunneling spell and fold it into a swan to fly somewhere and open up a hole in a distant wall. The other perk is nice. I'm not sure how I'll use it yet, but it's nice to know that when I encounter someone who can counter my powers, if I survive I can counter their powers right back. I don't know who that is going to be yet, but off-hand, Crusader probably bypasses all of my technology. Magic might still work on him. We'll have to see.
I get up and summon a shadow clone to head to the garage to wake up Je'Lu to join me for tai chi and then start leveraging the new abilities (and finish the Pickelman). I head out for my run and take another fifteen minutes running around the park before the tai chi starts. Je'Lu meets me there and we start practicing our tai chi. This is only the second session I've been a savant at tai chi, but it's already starting to feel natural. I feel energy moving around inside me. Almost sloshing in me. Still no real control over it, but it will come with more practice. It feels good to make progress on a skill like that.
I go for a more serious jog and get home. I eat breakfast, down a qi pill, and hop in the shower. Dad is up and reminds me that the academy scholarship included an improved internet connection that the installers will be here to put in this morning. So I'm stuck here to let them in. He takes off, so I jog down the tunnel to the garage to remind my shadow clone about the installers. She dismisses herself and I re-summon her (in normal, non-running clothes).
I head back to the house and review my clone's memories. She explained the new paper power to Roberta, so she is busy coming up with three dimensional trigram arrays to use with origami. My clone had spent the hour of her existence working on the Pickelman. It should come together in plenty of time to meet up with Uber and Leet, which the clone will have to do.
I sit around waiting for the installers. The guy doesn't even show up for a couple hours. I'd be annoyed at wasting my precious tinkering time, but I had been letting my schoolwork slide. So I used the time to read another textbook. It was simple enough, and I learned a lot. I'll be much better prepared for school tomorrow. When the installer does show up, it's really simple. I just point him at the phone lines and the computer. He hooks a box up to the wall lines and tests it, then plugs the computer in to it. Just like that we have high speed internet at home. I thank the man and see him out.
And just in time, too. I need to get to the gym for the kickboxing class. I take the bus there and barely make it in time. I learn better form for punching and kicking now that I am in good enough shape that I'm still able to breathe even at the end of the class. I head back home and then I'm finally free to head to the garage.
My shadow clone has already taken off for the meeting, so I hang out with Je'Lu and Roberta. I try out a few 3D trigram arrays that Roberta has come up with. She has come up with one designed to suppress the nervous system. Basically I fold a trigram printed paper into a crane and when it hits someone their body shuts down temporarily. We try it out on an animal in the resource world and it works pretty well. It wakes back up when the crane is removed. There was also one that is supposed to cause the target to get struck by lightning, but that will only work if the weather agrees. There's a third array that's supposed to break the target's arms and legs. We spend a few minutes looking for a skeleton or zombie to use it on and eventually find one. It works, but it's a bit more brutal than I would like, so I keep that one in reserve with a mark missing.
After that, I'm at a loose end. I don't have many projects outstanding. I need to find Trainwreck. I want to make the Nomad, but for that I need to scan some data about upgrading the R&D center itself, ground penetrating scanners, drones, mining, and mass effect. And then I spot my attendants hovering about. I get them to come down and get scanned and feed that data into the R&D center for drones. It helps more than I would have thought (the bunbi helis only got me like one percent of the research, but the attendants were about a quarter of the way). Fortunately, before I do anything too reckless out of boredom, my clone shows up from the meeting. Then she dispels herself and I can remember how her morning went.
I spent a few hours working on the Pickelman. I had set the last pieces I needed to be fabricated overnight, so they were all done. I assembled his arms with those new servos and he was ready to turn on. He activated and started waving his arms about. I could tell he was uncomfortable without a pick and shield. I grabbed the rocket hammer and gave it to the Pickelman and he calmed down a little. He was still waving his arms about a bit, though, so I asked Joe to loan Pickelman his shield. That got him calm enough to start talking to him. Joe helped out there by uploading his vocabulary routines. Pickelman still didn't talk, but at least it was now because he chose not to talk.
I had plenty of steel from the iron ore (and coal) that littered the ground in the resource world. So I grabbed some ingots and forged them into a shield. And I grabbed some more and forged them into a pick. Nothing fancy on either of them, just steel. I quenched and hardened both and then softened appropriate bits. It was all included in my blacksmithing skill. It was simple work, but time consuming. Plus it took longer to paint the shield with the appropriate color scheme. I handed the new equipment to Pickelman and he finally seemed happy.
By that time the van showed up for us to head to the meet and Je'Lu had loaded up all the bunbi helis and metools. I put on my armor, accepted Joe's blaster from him, then brought the new Pickelman with me as I got in the back of the van. Pickelman sat calmly in the back with me. I was kinda nervous. I had a deal with Uber and Leet and I'm pretty sure they want to keep a good relationship with me, but still, things started pretty tense last time, and I didn't know how Leet felt about me or giving up his inventions, so there's a chance of things going south. I brought along my gun just in case, but I hope not to need it.
The warehouse was pretty much as it was when we last met there. The duo were waiting for us. I piled out with my robots. Uber takes a look at the robots I made and nods. Leet comes up to me. "First up, here's the tech for you. Here's the gravity gun from Half Life. It's pretty useful, and I'm sorry to see it go. Here is the Dragonball scouter. It was good, but only really useful to find parahumans, so kind of a huge problem with the unwritten rules. Here is the Research Camera, which I had high hopes for, but I couldn't turn the research into better tinkering. And here's Fenrir from Final Fantasy seven. It's a super fun ride, but not the most important tech I've ever made."
"Thanks."
Leet nodded. "But this might be. It's an atomic re-assembler. It's not from any game. It's just meant to help me make better stuff. It's my hope for the future."
"It doesn't look broken to me."
"It isn't. I haven't had the nerve to turn it on. I used nanotech like this so many times before I know it's going to blow up."
"It doesn't have to turn on, but I can't fix it if it isn't broken." I pull out my freeze ray and swap it to the plasma rifle. I set it to minimum and fire at the machine and a big corner of it turns to slag. Leet winces. I load the remaining three quarters of the machine into the van.
"This here is the portal gun. Made it back in oh eight. It broke my heart when it got shot up last year. It was a great way to escape after a caper. We really need this one back."
I nodded.
"And this is Uber's hard-light costume. He's worn it in half the capers we've pulled. Unfortunately, it broke. Probably because I made the hard light cannon and my hard light costume first. This would also be super useful."
"Okay. Uh, by the way, last minute change. I got done with the robots early, so instead of repurposing the Sniper Joe, I just made a Pickelman. He was just turned on this morning, so don't teach him any bad habits. Be nice to him. Call me if he needs any repair."
"Yeah. Sure. You care about your tech. We get it."
"Good. Uh, hey, while I've got you here, do you mind if I ask you some questions?"
"Eh, go for it. No promises I'll answer, though."
"What does this bring to mind?" I pulled out my Monkey Tool.
"Bloons Tower Defense"
"Um, thanks, but I was going to use this to show you something."
I played a video of one of the zombies from the resource world.
"Well, it's definitely a zombie, but there are a lot of zombies in games. My gut is telling me one of the Diablos maybe. Uber, come take a look at this."
I show him a quill-shooting porcupine creature. He identifies it as a spike fiend from Diablo 2. I go on to show him images of a lot of other beasties we have found in the resource world. He identifies many as being from Diablo including blood hawks, cave vipers, giant spiders, scavengers, skeletons, tainted demons, wendigos, winged fiends, and wraith. But several other things I show him were not from Diablo. There were a few from Arcanum of Steamworks And Magick Obscura. The eyewing moth, hundlegs, and sword rat were from Final Fantasy IV. But of course, those were only ones they could identify. There were plenty more that they couldn't. A couple seemed vaguely like Fallout. Another few might be inspired by Starcraft. Most of the critters I showed them went unidentified.
"Wait, do you have access to all these critters?"
"Maybe. Er, I can't exactly make them."
"Holy shit. We could get a couple shows of just Diablo stuff. And I'd love to do a Final Fantasy episode."
"ANOTHER Final Fantasy episode."
"Final Fantasy is awesome, and we haven't done Four yet."
"There's a reason we haven't done four."
"Yeah, it wasn't the best of the series, but we could make it work. We still have most of the gear from when we did six, seven, nine, and ten. We use that stuff to bust up some of these critters, call it grinding for levels."
"Grinding levels? You know our subscribers won't like that."
"Well, we could come up with something better."
"Um, I don't really need to be here for this argument."
"Wait, you didn't answer, how did you get these scans? They're way more detailed than the actual games."
"Er. I'm not sure I should tell you."
"Please. We'll come up with something good for Final Fantasy. And we could do Diablo too. I could do Barbarian or Paladin and Leet could do Necromancer. It could work if we have the enemies to fight. So we need to know, is there some way to fight those things?"
"Yeah. But they're all sorta mixed together. I've sorta been slagging most of them with this plasma rifle, but some of those critters are sneaky."
"You're lucky you haven't gotten ganked by a major demon or something."
"No. Nothing sentient on the planet. It's a limitation."
"That... is disappointing. But probably for the best. But please let us come along and fight a bunch of those things with you. We could use the hard light costumes to quick swap outfits to match the enemies we find, and film a final fantasy four episode, one on Arcanum, Diablo One and Two, and maybe some sort of bug-hunter Starship Troopers tribute. We could get maybe five episodes at the same time."
"I'll think about it. Hey, do you guys have your snitch with you?" Leet was muttering that Warrior and Barbarian were easy, but Necromancer wasn't.
"Yeah."
"Any chance I could scan it?" I hold up my Monkey Tool.
"Any chance we could film your massive bestiary?" Leet was now muttering something about exploding corpses?
"It's not that I object to you beating up those monsters. It's just that the way there isn't exactly mobile, and I don't want to show you my lair."
"That's a valid concern. But that's something we can work on. What if we paid you to help with our shows?"
"I've got plenty of money."
"Why do you want to scan it?" Leet returned to the conversation.
"I want to make this six wheeled exploration slash mining vehicle, but I need to research related technologies to get it to happen. I thought your snitch's drive might be related to the mining drone drive. Or maybe the snitch's cameras could be related to the vehicles sensors. Dunno until I try."
"Okay. I know I'm a bit of a joke as a tinker, but I can do any tech. Like seriously. Anything. And I do really want to use whatever you've got that has those mobs in it. I'd also like you to come along in character. Diablo 1 had three characters, The Warrior" He pointed to Uber. "The Sorcerer" Then he pointed to himself. And then he gestured to me. "And the Rogue. We could use a chick to fill out the party. You don't have to show your face or associate your cape identity with us. Or even give us an answer right now. We'll be busy filming Mega Man this week. Just think about it. Here's a number to contact us if you want to discuss."
Well, that was productive. I start by summoning a new shadow clone. She goes off to start work on repairing Leet's tech. I feed the scans from the meeting into the computers. Then I take Roberta to the computer and look up Bloons Tower Defense, Diablo, and Final Fantasy IV. We notice pretty quickly that the runes in Diablo II match one set of runes I can use, which is a godsend because now we hypothetically have rune words to try. The only thing from Bloons seems to be the Monkey Tool, so that wasn't very useful. I couldn't tell what I might have gotten from Final Fantasy IV. Nothing I read about the game struck me as appropriate to any of my perks.
Still, I now had a list of rune words. Of course, we need to collect enough runes to actually construct the words we want first. Roberta immediately points out a couple I could make with the runes we've already collected, and we try TirEl (which means Steel) in one of the machetes, and it suddenly gains a host of new abilities. It gets increased damage, accuracy, speed, it glows, it opens wounds when you attack with it, and it gives mana when you kill with it. Even with all those abilities, it's still not something I really want to use, but it is a proof of concept.
With that confirmed, we look through the available runewords the game guide tells us about. Then we start considering how well each would work with what we wanted. For example, there were five rune words available for helms: Delirium, Dream, Lore, Nadir, and Radiance. Delirium produces a lot of strange effects when struck, enhances skills, defense and vitality, increases chances of finding stuff on enemies, and can cast a spell that causes enemies to temporarily fight for me. Dream can cast confuse when hit, increase defense, vitality, mana, resistances, and increase magic item find. Lore enhances skills, energy, and lightning resist, gives mana upon kill, reduces damage, and glows. Nadir enhances defense, reduces gold found from enemies (which isn't a problem in Brockton) and negates glowing and produces darkness (like Grue, I guess). Radiance has some excellent defensive bonuses, but I wasn't sure that glowing that much was a good idea in general. Of the five, we decide to try for Delirium (Lem Ist Io) for my helmet and Dream (Io Jah Pil) for Je'Lu's. And maybe making another helmet for stealth activity in the city with the Nadir runeword (the only one we had the runes for so far).
We consider weapons next. I pick Breath of the Dying (Vex Hel El Eld Zod Eth) for my main weapon. It doesn't include random damage that could hurt someone when I'm using the freeze ray to be nonlethal, but it's otherwise very solid. To mix things up, I want Phoenix (Vex Vex Lo Jah) on my backup weapon. Both Je'Lu and Joe want Silence (Dol Eld Hel Ist Tir Vex) for their main weapons. And I'll have to remember to ask Pickelman what he wants on his pick when he gets back from Uber and Leet's shoot.
For armor. I want to have a combat version of my armor as well as a stealth version. The stealth version should probably get the Stealth (Tal Eth) runeword. The combat version could have Fortitude (El Sol Dol Lo). Je'Lu wants Wealth (Lem Ko Tir) as his armor's runeword because he mostly uses his armor to farm in the resource world. And if he ever gets an armor for this world, he wants Stone as the runeword. Both Pickelman and Joe have shields, it only seems fair to enchant them. We settle on Sanctuary (Ko Ko Mal) for Joe's shield and, if he's okay with it, Spirit (Tal Thul Ort Amn) for Pickelman's shield.
Of course, out of all of those runewords, we only have the runes for two of them, and they are Stealth and Nadir. So I go ahead and install two slots on each of my helm and power armor and slot Tal Eth and Nef Tir into them. It makes the armor just a little bit better. Mostly faster, but also resistant to poison, helping in regenerating mana, and better defended against magic. I don't know that there's anything in this universe that I didn't create that counts as magic, but that's okay. At least it's something. The rune word on my helm makes it better defended, able to cast shadows, increases my strength somehow, darkens the area, and makes enemies drop less gold.
Then it's mid afternoon and it's time for me to get to the fencing club I wanted to join. I don't have to join today, but I would like to know if it is the type of thing I would want to join. I head out to take the bus to Clarendon. It's an uneventful ride until I get there. Then a van pulls up and four guys in ski masks hop out and tase me.
Interlude Coil (Try 3)
I'm not going to have my mercenaries storm the new tinker's compound for no further information, but I do have someone watching it. When a van pulls up to the garage I am interested. I split the timelines and in one timeline rush a strike team to take out the vehicle and in the other assemble them and hold back. The assault shows the tinker is in the van, but disappears once she is wounded. There is also a pick-wielding murder-bot and all the small defenders we had so much trouble with at the compound, which leaves the tantalizing possibility that the place is now undefended. Or at least less defended. I drop that timeline. But if I want to storm the compound, I need the tinker to actually be there. I send a watcher at the warehouse the tinker went to and use another split to send the team after the van as it returns to the garage. Inside, they find the tinker (who disappears from inside her armor again) and a bunch of broken tinkertech. The watcher confirms Uber and Leet leaving the warehouse, so it looks like this is a tinkertech exchange. I can work with that. I don't keep that timeline either, since it didn't net me the tinker.
I split again and set up another assault on the tinker's base. Without the defense robots in place it should be a much easier target. The raid proceeds, but several mercenaries get injured. The defenders seem to have the same greatly increased accuracy as yesterday. The place is secured, so I consider keeping this timeline. But in the safe timeline my spotter reports the girl walking out of the compound unarmored. I send an expendable snatch team to grab her up. And much to my surprise they succeed. In that case, I don't need to keep the results of yet another costly raid on the tinker's compound.
Now this tinker will either work for me or she will die.
Day 21, Tuesday January 25, 2011
+100CP Perk rolled, field Supplies: Magical Small Scale unlocked. Cost 600CP/350CP. Insufficient CP. 350 CP banked.
+100CP Perk rolled, field Skills: Magic unlocked. Cost 700CP/450CP. Insufficient CP. 450 CP banked.
+100CP Perk rolled, field Supplies: Magical Small Scale unlocked. Cost 300CP/550CP. Perk Mana Gems purchased for 300CP. 250 CP banked.Click to shrink...
Spoiler: Mana Gems (300 CP)Mana Gems (300 CP): One rather important power source used in many energy-hungry magitech devices, and also popular with mages and enchanters, are mana gems. But due to their nature, they cannot be artificially created, only forming after several years of mana condensing and purifying in a single location. This commonly happens only on asteroids, where they can be left undisturbed for long periods of time, and truly vast mana veins can form. But even as mining them can be a hassle, their value makes it worth anyone's while, as they are capable of holding and regenerating massive amounts of mana, with the exact volumes depending on the gem's size and quality. And it seems like you've hit the jackpot, as with this you'll be able to gain a steady supply of mana gems each week. You may decide on a case by case basis whether you want several dozen small and low-quality mana gems, or two to three big and high-quality ones.
+100CP Perk rolled, field not yet unlocked. Cost 200CP/350CP, lock in ability? Y/N
What the hell happened? I feel woozy. I was abducted off the street! Where am I? I don't know. In some concrete room strapped to a hospital type bed. This is probably bad. This isn't what the inside of a hospital looks like. And I do not feel like I woke up naturally. I might have been drugged. And there's a creepy looking guy staring at me. I need to get out of here. But as to the power, there can only be one field it could possibly be from. But whatever quality it might be, it won't help me get un-abducted because it won't get me anything until I manage the last unlock task. NO.
Perk refused. 350CP banked
"Ah, you are awake. This way please." He motions in some guys with guns. They point their guns at me while he wheels a wheelchair over to the bed. He unstraps me from the bed and motions me into the chair. I'm wheeled through a hallway into another room. There's a workbench set up there.
"Ah, Miss Hebert. Don't get up. Let's discuss what you will be making for me." There's a tall, thin man in a black bodysuit with a snake meandering down it. This must be the elusive Coil. This is very bad. I don't have any of my tech. But then again, it's not like I'm completely without resources. I still have the Arc of Embodiment. I could still write out a trigram array. I can make gems. I can make a shadow clone. I can enchant things to be more gunlike. I can make magic origami. I have hidden inside me a supersoldier serum that will turn me into an unstable brute/striker. And I have my carving kit. Oh, right, that will reappear if lost or destroyed. So why would it reappear? Unless it was lost. And it wasn't likely randomly moved from the garage, it was probably intentionally lost by Je'Lu. It probably has a message for me. Or it is the message.
"You seem surprised. Did you expect me to call you Nicole Thomas? I know you are tempted to do something foolish and suicidal. Let me just say if you do not do as I say, your father will die." Well that got my attention. I could probably end him right now, but if he has someone ready to kill dad... I need to protect him before I can escape. Which means I need to get a message out somehow.
"I understand that you like playing with other tinker's tech. So let's start you off with a simple task. Fix the item on the workbench."
I go over to the workbench and see some tinkertech. It seems to be a pneumatic piston of some kind. Or well two of them. On either side of a void which happens to be about the same width as an arm. It's a power fist. That makes sense. And that means I can probably at least start to fix it, even though I don't have my toolkit. It takes me a while to understand it, but it is cybernetics, so I should be able to do something with it...
Spoiler: Rationing (100CP)Rationing (100CP): When you don't have much, it's important to be careful with what you've got. You're very good at saving supplies, ensuring that anything you find of use stays found and that it doesn't get wasted by accident. You'll get every last drop of fuel from a can, and never drop some plastic tubing just because you can't think of a use at the moment.
Congratulations on completing all the introductory quests! Advanced mode activated. Please keep playing for more rewards!
That's it? A maniac abducts me and just happens to sit me down in front of a piece of Trainwreck's tech? My power has to be messing with me. Whatever. Now I wish I had locked in whatever that perk was. Oh well. I start playing with tools. I use the screw gun to take apart the power fist. Screw gun. It even feels gunlike in the hand. I start channeling gun magic into the tool. I run through some basic servicing routines to clean out the innards of the power fist. I finish servicing it and put it down.
The question is how do I keep my dad safe. Or, more directly, how do I get a message out? Or even how do I check the message that I received with the carving kit when they're watching me so closely?
"That is an excellent start to our relationship. Continue to obey and your life and your father's life could be long indeed. Your next task will take a little longer. I want you to make a gun for me. The one that shoots plasma, if you please. We'll leave you to it, but remember, hop to it and no funny business. After all, you're on camera." The creepy tall guy pointed to several places around the room where security cameras watched the entire room.
I look around. There's a whole workbench that puts to shame my dad's old workbench that I started with. Of course, with the R&D center and the cybernetics minifacturer, my garage workshop is far superior to these tools. Still, it has everything a standard tinker would want: hand tools, electronics, scrap metal, drawing paper... I look around at the cameras. They capture many different angles. Then I look back at the wheelchair. I push it over to one wall, then sit down in it and hunch down. It needs to look like a comfortable position. I create a few images of me in that position between me and the cameras. Then I pull out the carving kit. I open it up and see nothing unusual inside, until I look at the back of one of the pages. There is printed a souped up version of the tunneling array. It should be able to connect over a hundred miles away. It's a new design, far beyond anything I would have come up with. Which means Roberta made it. Which means they're giving me a way home. I smile. But I can't just run away or my dad will pay the price.
But I can run away if I can be in two places at once. I put the trigram array on the wall to activate it. Fortunately, the wall next to me is on the outside of whatever base this is. A tunnel forms. Then I summon a shadow clone, step into the tunnel and she creates an image of the blank wall where the tunnel is. I take off down the tunnel and my clone sits back into the wheelchair in the same position I was in to take over my role as captive tinker.
The tunnel is very long, maybe over a mile. I run as hard as I can. After a long run, I meet Je'Lu coming towards me. "I got abducted by Coil. He's going to kill my dad if I don't play along. My shadow clone is back there being the pet tinker."
Je'Lu nods and turns around to escort me back to the garage. I make it up the tunnel into the light of freedom, but now I need a plan to save my dad. And to stop Coil. Fast. And it seems larger than me. "Je'Lu, I need to save my dad. Any ideas?"
"Well, I'm here to help you however you need."
"Thanks. But what I need is a plan."
"What are your goals?"
"Save my dad. Make sure Coil can't hurt him any more."
"Okay. Can the authorities protect your father?"
"Maybe. But they would ask why they would need to protect him, and that would out me as Palladium to them."
"We can keep that as a backup plan. But that introduces a new goal, preserve your secret identity."
"Yeah. I suppose."
"Do you know where your dad is?"
"Probably at work. Unless he noticed that I didn't come home last night. Then I don't know. The hospital or police station?"
"Is there anyone else who can help? What about that lawyer?"
"I don't know what he could do. Sue Coil? I don't think that will accomplish anything."
"Perhaps he has contacts that can help."
"Maybe. But his help tends to take time, and I need this fast. Plus... Coil knew about my Nicole Thomas identity. So I don't know if they're with him or just have a mole or are tapped or..."
"Okay. Who else do you know?"
"Well, there's Uber and Leet. But they're complete jokes."
"Perhaps. But perhaps they know someone who can help."
"Fine." I don't have my cell phone. Coil must have taken it when he abducted me.
"Call them, see what can be done. I'll go to the police station and the Dockworkers Association and see if your dad is at either of those places."
I put on my armor quickly, grab my gun, and head down the tunnel to my house. Dad isn't there.
I call the number that Leet gave me from my house phone. Someone answers on the fourth ring. "This better be important."
"This is Palladium."
"Oh, hey. This isn't a great time. Did you reconsider our offer?" It was Uber's voice.
"Uh, yesterday evening Coil abducted me off the street in my civilian identity."
"Oh, shit. Yeah. That's bad. So... why call us?"
"I've faked him out for the time being, but if I don't play ball, he's going to kill a member of my family. I need help protecting them and taking down Coil."
"Well, shit. Taking down Coil is a bit much for us on short notice. I hear his base is fortified as hell, if we even knew where it was."
"Well I can get back in the way I got out. Plus I've already fixed the portal gun."
"Damn. That's an awesome start. You said you have money, right? How much?"
"Well, a couple thousand on hand. Over a hundred thousand liquid on account. A lot more if I can pay in gems."
"That might work. Let me make some calls, round up a posse. Someone breaking the unwritten rules like that could pull down a shitstorm on Coil."
"Really?"
"Yeah. Of course it helps grease the wheels if you can apply a little money to the situation. Let me make a few calls. Call me back in twenty?"
"Okay. Uh, don't spread it too far. Coil knew info I thought was safe. He might have moles anywhere."
"Oh, yeah. Still, call back in twenty."
Ordinarily, I wouldn't have time to run to Coil's base in twenty minutes, let alone run back. But I was in my power armor. It was already a huge speed boost before I added the Stealth runeword that further boosted the speed. I could get there. I hustle to the garage, grab the portal gun, sprint down the mile long tunnel to form an orange portal near Coil's end of the tunnel, then sprint back. Back at the garage, I grab the tool kit, scouter, gravity gun, and hard-light costume and I bring them all back to the house. Maybe I can get one of them working before I have to call Uber back. When I get back to the house the phone is ringing. I answer it. Je'Lu tells me that my dad is not at the DWA today. Nor is he at the police station. I ask him to try the hospital.
Meanwhile I start working on Uber's hard-light costume. Maybe it will help disguise dad. I wait for the appropriate time and call Uber back. He picks up quick this time.
"Hey, got you hooked up. Faultline is in if you can provide a million dollars in gems."
"Is she reliable?"
"If your money is good, extremely reliable. We'll meet at the Palanquin at ten."
"Okay. I still need to find my family member."
"Yeah. I don't know how I can help you with that."
Right then a key enters the front door lock. I freeze. My dad opens the door.
"Never mind. Found him. See you there."
"Dad!"
"Taylor? Where..."
"No time. Come." I pull his arm and lead him downstairs and grab dad's old ski mask from the stuff we have stored down there. Then I lead him into my tunnel. I also start forming an emerald the size of my fist. "So I'm a tinker. I'm Palladium."
"Uh, never heard of Palladium."
"That's good. I've been trying to lay low until I can build up."
"Taylor, where did this tunnel come from?"
"I made it, of course. But that's not the most important thing right now." I gather my thoughts. "Last night Coil kidnapped me."
"That's why you didn't come home."
"Yeah. He told me I had to make stuff for him or he'd kill you. So I need you to stay safe while I take him out."
"Um, where does this tunnel go?"
"To my tinker base. I bought a garage." I finish growing the emerald. I know I'm done because I had just about run out of mana to add to it. That was the signal to my clone that dad was safe.
"Bought? With what money?"
"Oh, I can just make gold. Or gems. Money isn't a problem. Right now keeping you safe is."
We climb up the end of the tunnel to the garage. I lead him to the storage area. "Here, put this on. It might be a little short, but I think you can fit. It's got a bulletproof force field, energy resistance, enhances strength, stealth mode. It's the best I can do to keep you safe. Now I just need to find somewhere to hide you away. Or, better yet, here, take this scroll, read it, then make the hand signs it says."
It takes him a minute to accomplish, but he puts on the armor and forms a clone of himself. I take the opportunity to grab my stash of saltpeter, stearic acid and poison and my flow specktrometer. "Good. This is the real you, and you need to stay safe by staying away from anywhere people might look for you. This one is a shadow clone. If he is attacked, he'll poof out of existence and you'll remember what he went through. Here, have a toast cannon and a rocket hammer. They're kinda garbage weapons, but they're the best I can spare right now. Also, here's a few spare healing potions."
"Taylor! This is kind of a lot to take in!"
I took one deep breath, in and out. "You're right. Here, take this. This is Roberta. She can explain... most of it. Now turn on stealth mode, and go hide somewhere nobody else will figure out. And clone dad, put this ski mask on and come with me. And don't call me by my name."
I pick him up and hop up to the roofs. Then I start roof hopping across the city. It takes less than twenty minutes to get to the Palanquin. I hop us down to the street and knock on the door.
"Palladium, welcome. Our common acquaintance tells me you can pay in gems."
I step inside and put a 1.8 inch cube of diamond, a fist-sized emerald, and a handful of smaller gems down on the table in front of her. Five parahumans standing alert inside gape at the gems. There's an orange lizardy boy, a big snail guy, a girl with a intricate robe, a lady in a gas mask, and of course the samurai lady in the welding mask.
"We don't have time for an in-depth appraisal. I trust this is plenty to hold in collateral until our business is complete?"
"If these are genuine..."
"They are." Faultline begins examining them with a loupe anyway.
"Then this many many millions of dollars worth of gemstones. That one is literally priceless. That one isn't glass, is it?"
"It's diamond. With gems, I find priceless is just another synonym for worthless. I can't sell it without attracting way too much attention."
"Okay, so the job is this. Keep this guy safe. Make Coil never screw with anyone like that again."
"Leet said you had a way into his base?"
"Yeah. There's a tunnel that goes there. I dropped a portal at the end of it. I can drop another one right here."
"Okay. That's infil and exfil plan one. We'll need more options for exfil."
"Well, you could use the tunnel. I'd rather you didn't. The other end is my base and I want to keep that private."
At that point there is another knock at the door. Gregor lets in Uber and Leet.
"Hey, all. Sorry we're late."
"Sure. Plan 3 will be to find his exits. And I'll put a plan 4 into place."
"Next. Enemy forces?"
"Guys with guns and what looked like tinkertech lasers."
"Any objections to calling in more backup?"
"Nope. Now that he's safe, so long as he stays anonymous, we can call in the Spanish Inquisition if you want."
"Good. That makes things easier. I'll make some calls. Leet, could you use your snitch to scout for us please?"
"Sure." Leet gets his precious snitch out. I shoot a blue portal at a wall. Then I hop through myself and use a trigram that Roberta made up for me to connect the tunnel to another part of the base, about where I expect the infirmary to be. I only had a rough estimate of where it is from my journey from it, but I manage to connect to the room. I quickly embody an image of the wall that got opened up over the opening. Then I signal the snitch to go down that path and head back to the portal.
It's agonizing waiting for the reinforcements that Faultline wants. But I sit down next to my dad and start working on broken Leet-tech. I start with the Scouter since it seems like the easiest to get working. It doesn't take long, so I pop it on and look around the room. It shows numbers by everyone in the room. Faultline shows 212. Newter is 141. Gregor is 155. Spitfire is 114. Labyrinth is 332. My dad shows 12. Leet is 321. Uber is 36. It seems to be working. I get working on the gravity gun next. That takes considerably longer. A few minutes into that, Glory Girl shows up. She's a 264.
The next thing to happen is I get the memories of my shadow clone. It seems Coil told her that her friends did something stupid and he tried to kill her. I summon another shadow clone on the other side of the portal, "Coil knows something is up."
I try to go back to tinkering work, but Faultline decides that is the cue to kick off whatever party this is. She asks Glory Girl to stay with Labyrinth until the rest of the reinforcements arrive. She asks me to stay too, but I don't. I need to join in on this. I hand her a flow specktrometer and half a dozen paralysis grenades and tell her what they do. She hands a couple grenades off to Gregor and Spitfire. I hand everybody a healing potion. Then we all stride through the portal and invade Coil's base.
When we get into the base, there's nobody in the infirmary. Faultline goes to the door and opens it into the hallway. Nobody there either. She clears both ways and heads right. Gregor watches to the left with Uber and Leet and Spitfire and I follow Faultline. We clear a few rooms.
I duck into the room I was being kept in. I had only been in there for a few hours, but I had a few hours and suitable tools, and there's a lot a tinker can do with that. I turn on two devices that I left for myself and rejoin the group. We clear several more rooms, including Faultline throwing a paralysis grenade into one, then Newter spending some time in there. Another is an armory, and Faultline swiftly cuts through every weapon there, breaking them. Then the mercenaries show up. Gregor tosses one of my grenades at them and they all fall. Newter darts forward and gives them all wet willies.
Assault, Battery, Miss Militia, Glory Girl, and Laserdream show up as we head up to the next level. More barrier doors that Faultline cuts open. More soldiers dispatched by guns, paralysis grenades, freeze ray, adhesive spit, power beams, kinetic punches and fire. One door has traps on it. Faultline avoids them with the Specktrometer. Inside is an office. I take a look at a burned down computer and another with a countdown timer. A trap behind a bookshelf hints at a hidden door. Faultline and Spitfire head down it. They think Coil is escaping that way. They tell the others over their comms that there's a self-destruct in the base. I'm worried about that countdown timer, too. I kneel down in front of it and carve nine lines into it to form a hexagram to impose the concept of Before Completion. I hope it slows down the timer.
I want to salvage the slagged computer. Whatever information Coil doesn't want other people to have, I definitely want to recover. But the self-destruct of the base would kill dozens, including myself, so that is more important right now. Then my power hits me with a surprise.
Task complete: Take down Coil
Spoiler: AI Seed (600 CP)AI Seed (600 CP): A potential Seed AI, capable of the feared "exponential development curve". It is presently inert in a shoebox-sized processor array. Carefully nurtured in a simulspace and given the right interaction, information and physical resources, it is fully capable of growing into a "friendly" ASI like the Prometheans. If left to its own devices, it will grow into something resembling a pre-Fall TITAN - essentially oblivious to any value a human life holds except strategically.
The nascent ASI does not require a companion slot until it reaches human-level intelligence - how long this takes will depend entirely on how you choose to let it develop (with no brakes and free access to hardware, it could race to human level in less than an hour). Firewall and lots of other people will not be happy if they learn you have this.
Spoiler: The Basics (0 CP)The Basics (0 CP): Basic Biomods, Mesh Inserts and Cortical Stack are standard issue for all transhuman bodies.
* Basic Biomods are gene sequences that eliminate nearly all genetic diseases and abnormalities, from Alzheimer's and muscular dystrophy to near-sightedness, as well as reduce space sickness, bolster the immune system, and stop you going into shock from injury.
* Mesh Inserts are an internal computer with enough storage for a normal transhuman's personal data and a Muse AI, medical sensors and a wifi/radio modem. It is the means of accessing the mesh for nearly all transhumans, as well as providing the controls for internal components like cyberware, nanoware and overlaying Augmented Reality displays on your vision. Optionally comes with external access jacks for foptic cable connections.
* A Cortical stack is essentially a solid-state hard drive encased in synthetic diamondoid, about the size of a golf ball. It backs up your consciousness and memories to the second of death. Unfortunately a standard cortical stack only carries a fork of your ego, and not the "real you", so death still counts as death for the purposes of your chain.
Skill Packages (first three for 0 CP):
Psychosurgeon Package - You are a trained psychosurgeon, with the knowledge to apply psychosurgical skills to all manner of transhumans, from biomorphs to synths, humans to uplifts and even AGIs. Most procedures require the use of a simulspace and direct alteration of an ego's digital state, but you have some techniques that can work without these tools. This skill can be used for both therapy and for interrogation.Gear: Psychosurgery simulspace & therapy assistant AI.
Device Engineering Package - You are an expert at designing and building portable and mobile items from scratch. Anything from a flashlight up to a flying car. You can build items from scrounged materials and put disused materials to new uses without having to disassemble it all the way back to raw materials.Gear: Disassembly tools & wrist-mounted tools augmentation.
MedTech Package - You are a medical technician, trained in emergency first aid and field surgery - you know, the kind they used to do before they could just dump the injured in a healing vat and let the nanomachines do the work. You can install and remove over-the-counter cyberware and wetware, and perform reconstructive surgery.Gear: Doctor-Bot (contains a healing vat).
Spoiler: Forking (0 CP)Forking (0 CP): You can create perfect copies of your ego on a digital system known as 'alpha forks'. An Alpha Fork retains all your mental traits - your skills, memories, knowledge, personality etc. - but you can choose to not to copy over certain skills or knowledge (and it then becomes a beta fork, or if very heavily redacted, a delta or gamma fork). It does not retain any qualities of your body, and it does not have any magical or metaphysical components (eg: powers, fiat perks, or a soul). It retains async powers, if any - but it can't use them in cyberspace.
Unlike everyone else in EP, you don't need an ego bridge, mesh inserts or a cortical stack to create a fork of yourself - you just have to touch a computer system and the fork's data will appear in its memory - either stored inert, or running in sim.
You can re-integrate a Fork's experiences back into your own memory within three hours; any longer and it diverges too much and the best you get is being able to experience a recording of what it did. Contact with the computer the fork is running in is required.
Even if you have thousands of years of photographic memory or strange mental skills, your ego (and that of your forks) only takes up the same storage space as a regular transhuman ego.
Spoiler: Resleeving (0 CP)Resleeving (0 CP): You can freely transfer your consciousness from the body you are currently in, into bodies without an occupying mind. Unlike the locals, you do not require any of the standard hardware: you don't need mesh inserts, a cortical stack, an ego bridge, anything like that. All you require is physical contact with the mindless body. This transfer moves your complete self - ego, souls and supernatural traits - to the new body. It cannot produce a duplicate or copy, nor can it transfer parts of you or your powers piecemeal; it's an all or nothing move. It leaves behind your former body without a mind, any motivating force or any of your perks or abilities.
Spoiler: Bodymod Biomorph (0 CP)Bodymod Biomorph (0 CP): All humanlike morphs you purchase are sculpted to appear as close to your bodymod form as possible. All non-humanlike morphs do their best to conform to your bodymod options – a Jumper with a 'light' bodymod build will find their Novacrab is slimmer and more streamlined than the Novacrab that a Jumper with a 'heavy' bodymod build would have, for example. You can decline this option, but the morph will be random or generic in appearance.
I would get up, but now I have something that just might be able to stop whatever self-destruct is happening. I embody a foptic cable and a digital converter and connect myself to the countdown computer. Connecting directly to a computer is trippy. The whole concept of three dimensional space doesn't exist. It's more like one dimensional space. I can't get around the security lockouts, but I can see where the detonation signals will be sent. I get up to track down the explosives, but the shoebox size computer I just got is going to be too difficult to move around. Not that the power armor can't carry it, but it would be bulky. I manifest the Extremis shot I had inside me and merge the computer with my soul for now.
I check the countdown again, and according to my new internal clock, it is slowing a little. I run to the first bomb. It's a big brick of plastic explosives attached to a support column. I carve some lines into it and the explosives transform into water. I head to the next one. It's inside a column this time. Transforming the whole column would probably be as bad as blowing it up, so I carve some hexagrams in for Force and Disperse. I don't know if that will be enough, so I also use the hexagram for Perservering on the column. That's as good as I can do, so I move on to the next. I can get to it, so I transform it to water too. Then I'm off to the fourth. If the countdown had continued with the slowdown I had seen, it should have gone off already. I have no idea when it will. These explosives are buried into a column as well, but I can see which edge they are on. I embody a Jet Black Sword and use it to cut the explosives off the column. Then I turn that chunk into water and release the sword.
The base is as safe as I can make it. I head back to the tunnels. I shoot a new orange portal onto the wall near where the tunnel came out, then tear the trigram arrays that formed the tunnels in the first place.
People on my side are wandering all around Coil's base. Faultline comes to tell me that Coil is dead while I am salvaging the wreckage of Coil's computer. Thermite charge through the hard drive. It should be unsalvagable, but not for me. I take the whole computer. I take a broken laser rifle too. Spoils of war. Then I head back to the Palanquin.
I find my dad sitting with Shielder. I give him a hug and tell him it's over. He dismisses himself and startles Shielder. I sit down with Faultline to discuss how many gems she's going to keep. I take my Flow Specktrometer and spare grenades back. I get her number.
It only takes about two minutes for my real dad to show up at the Palanquin. Apparently he followed us here and waited outside while we raided Coil's base. We can't talk much because I'm still finishing business with Faultline. She keeps the diamond and a couple small gems. She'll cut the diamond herself with her power. I keep the emerald. My dad and I stealth up and head back to the garage. Je'Lu and Joe are waiting there.
My dad and I sit down to talk. "You have some explaining to do."
"What do you need explained?"
"Why didn't you tell me?"
I don't respond. I just start crying. He hugs me.
We're still hugging and my face is all runny when Je'Lu brings us some sandwiches. I'm famished. We missed lunch. My dad and I spend hours talking. I show off everything I've built, and everything I've gotten. It's a weird variety of things to a newcomer's point of view. Roberta already explained the more magical powers that I have, and the tasks I completed to unlock the ones I had. But even she didn't know I had unlocked the last task since I didn't bother to tell her while storming through here this morning. And she didn't bother explaining the more technological powers, so I got to show him the chemical synthesizer, R&D computer, cybernetics setup, and a few other knickknacks. Explaining Je'Lu was awkward at best. How do you tell your dad that your power created a person from another universe to be your friend? Probably not much more awkward than asking your talking skull magical lab assistant to explain things to him.
On that topic, "Je'Lu, Roberta, dad. I should mention I got new powers. This morning I got a source of Mana Gems. They're a self-recharging magical power source. So add emptying this bag every day to the servoskulls' tasks. Then Coil had me repair a piece of tech. It was Trainwreck's piston-fist. So I completed the last task and got a power called 'Rationing' it just makes me use stuff a little more efficiently and become a bit of a pack-rat."
"I thought you already were a pack-rat."
"I'm not, I'm just getting a lot of stuff for various reasons. Anyway, later, I think when Coil died, I got a task completion message for 'take down Coil'. And it came with another power. Some genefixes for me, a brain computer, and a backup for my memories. But that's all a side benefit for the actual bonus, this computer." I unmerge the AI seed computer. "It houses a baby artificial intelligence. Could turn into a good or evil AI depending on how I raise it. I'm not sure I'm up to the challenge."
"Taylor, you don't have to do it alone." And that set me right back to crying in my father's arms.
I feel a lot better after we let go of each other. At least until my dad opens his mouth, "Taylor, have you considered joining the Wards."
I blubber for a minute, trying to come up with a good argument. My dad notices my discomfort. "It's just that I can't keep you safe. I'm supposed to be the one keeping you safe, not the other way around. You've got powers, and I didn't know. You got abducted and I didn't have a clue why. And all of a sudden you're back and you need me to stay safe. I just want to keep you safe. But I don't have the power to do so."
"I could give you powers."
Silence follows.
"That's quite a claim."
I take out the Extremis shot and put it on the table. "This is the Extremis formula. It gives a person superstrength as well as a large amount of regeneration. It can even regenerate missing limbs. And the person can generate heat. It's a fairly potent Brute/Striker combination. But it's unstable. If the subject's emotions get unbalanced, they can start a chain reaction resulting in an explosion. It would be a BAD idea for you to use this."
My dad looks disappointed, but he doesn't reach for the injector.
"But there are other options. I know how to make qi pills. I'm learning tai chi. Eventually, I hope to become a low level brute through that study. I could do the same for you. That power armor I used. The other one I put you in. I could print out a set for you. It's got a force field that will take several bullets, enhanced strength, stealth mode, toughness. I can add energy resistances, enchant it for more effects. You already know the Shadow Clone technique. That means you can send a clone out to be a hero without worrying about dying. I could replace your body with cybernetics that could give you superstrength, but that feels like going too far for too little benefit. I'm sure I'll figure out more ways as I get more powers."
"Taylor," Je'Lu butted in. "You've told your father about your powers. You may as well tell him about your problems at school as well."
I slump. But he does have a point. Dad was still under the impression that Emma and I had just grown apart. "Dad, when I went to high school, Emma and I didn't drift apart. She turned on me. I don't know why. But it wasn't that she couldn't help with the bullying. She was one of the bullies. The one that directed the others at me. The one that wielded the secrets of a lifelong friendship against me."
"How could Emma?.."
"Dad, it doesn't matter any more. I'm out of Winslow. I don't have to see her. She can't hurt my school life any more. She can't hurt my social life any more."
"I'm proud of you for going for that, and I'm so glad you lucked out and got a scholarship."
"Uh, it wasn't exactly luck. I can make gold. So I endowed that scholarship myself. The lawyer helped. Oh, yeah. I hired a lawyer. Mr. Gursky of Gursky, Ederer and Calle. He's been selling the gold for me. Oh, that reminds me." I take out three thousand dollars and hand it to my dad.
"Taylor, I can't take money from you."
"I've got plenty. And I can get more from my lawyer. Use it to help us both. If you want to help me, then let me help you help us." Dad finally relents. "Anyway, about the lawyers. I used a pseudonym with them, Nicole Thomas. But somehow Coil knew it. He knew my real name too. I just keep wondering how he knew. He must have gotten my pseudonym from them somehow, but I still don't know how he knew my name. And how he knew to target you. If that wasn't all a bluff."
"Is there any way you can find out?"
"I grabbed a hard drive from his lair. I might be able to fix it and read it."
"It might be a good idea to do that. Get a real answer rather than blaming people."
"Yeah. I'm just emotionally drained right now."
"Let's go home."
"Okay."
Je'Lu wants me to take some time off and says we should start our game back up tomorrow. Even invites my dad to join us. I ask my clone to move Coil's drive to the top of the repair queue. Then we head home. I spend a few hours reading for fun. One of our school books, The Handmaid's Tale. It feels good reading for fun. It feels bad reading about a world even more messed up than mine. A few hours later, dad has fixed some dinner.
I showed up in the tunnel and headed back to the garage. As I went, I counted my paces. I know how long my running stride is, so I was able to get a distance. I measured the direction of the tunnel and I projected where in the city Coil's base was located. At the garage, I ran into Je'Lu. He was squeezing into my old chunky armor. I told him I was going to check out the surface of the base. I asked him to wait here. I was sure someone would love to steal the chemical synthesizer or something.
I did need fast transportation, and I didn't have power armor available. I took a ream of paper and opened it up. I formed it into a bunch of flowers and used them to coat my body. I also formed a pair of massive wings. Then I took off into the sky. I embodied an image of sky blue beneath me to hide me from the surface and flew to where I thought the base was. I didn't see anything at first. Then I spotted a blonde girl in purple. Tattletale. She was waiting beside a building. Coil came out of a door on the side of the building and spotted her. She shot him. Then she walked over to him and shot him three more times. She ran away. Faultline came out of the same door as Coil just in time to spot Tattletale fleeing. She checked Coil's pulse and made a call. Then she headed back inside.
It looked like I wasn't needed here. I headed back to the garage. From there, I took the tunnel home. While real me was dealing with dad, I was taking care of my own responsibilities. Unfortunately, it looks like someone trashed the house. And I had already missed my first class of my new school today. I neatened things up a little, but had to go back to the garage to get the repair kit to fix my new computer before my next class was supposed to start. I got it repaired and logged on to the computer and signed in to the video conference class. There were several other students, but I was surprised to see that a few of them were wards. I recognized Weld, a ward from Boston. The class had me introduce myself, and the other students introduced themselves too. Then we got on to the topic of studying civil rights efforts during the Johnson administration.
School went well. Not a single spitwad or shove or even insult all day. I could get used to learning like this. I just wish the material was challenging in any way. Once all my classes were over, I head back to the garage. Taylor is still hanging out with her dad. I sit down at the workbench and get down to the hard work of fixing things. I was trying to fix the gravity gun when we started the raid, so I picked up there. It took a couple hours, but I got that fixed. Then I was going to move on to Uber's hard-light costume, but I asked me to fix Coil's drive first. I did that, but it was a lot of little detail work. By dinnertime, I'm sure my stomach would have been rumbling if I had a stomach inside this shadow clone body of mine. So I wait for Taylor to be ready and dismiss myself.
After dinner, I form a clone and send her off to do more repair work at the garage. Dad takes me to that women's self defense class at the gym. The self defense class isn't terribly complicated, but given that I was abducted yesterday, it feels like it has added importance. Not that I could have done anything against four trained men with guns, even with this training. Still, it makes me feel better. Like the tiniest step toward control over my own life. Dad stays the whole time. They even get him to play attacker once or twice.
He's eyeing some pamphlets for a boxing class. I tell him to go ahead and get a membership, start learning. We can afford it, and it would be nice to think he can protect himself next time.
We get home, and I check in on the Garage. My clone has finished the gravity gun, Coil's hard drive, and the hard-light costume. Je'Lu has been going through the drive. Unfortunately a large chunk of the data on it has been lost. Turns out I can fix the hard drive like new - which means no data on it. But the parts that weren't directly slagged still have recoverable data. There is enough there to start to piece things together. Coil's power was to have two timelines at once. He tended to torture someone for information in one timeline, then drop it. He kept a lot of notes from those sessions. I shudder at the thought that he probably tortured me in another reality. That would probably be how he found out my names. He also had someone raid my lawyer's office to search for information on me. I feel kinda guilty for blaming the lawyer for leaking now. Another thing that was clear is that Coil was backing the Undersiders. Curious then that Tattletale is the one that ended up finishing Coil off. I feel kinda bad for her. I have records of her being tortured in many throw-away timelines, and I know I don't have all of them. But now she has a murder on her conscience. I do get some of Coil's account numbers, but I don't have passwords to go with them. I do get a list of accounts that Coil was paying out to, that's probably valuable. I ask Je'Lu to sort through the data we got and pick out what we want to give to the PRT and others and what we want to keep hidden.
I work with my clone for a little while on Fenrir. I kinda want to be able to go for a ride. We get most of the way done with it before it's time for me to go to bed.