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Do What You Can (Worm x Celestial Forge V3) by Throwaway1971

Books » Private Rated: M, English, Sci-Fi, Words: 324k+, Favs: 238, Follows: 272, Published: Jun 9, 2024 Updated: Jun 10, 2024

20Chapter 6 - First Night Out on the Town

[Jason Wilke]

[January 31st, 2011]

"Comms check," I spoke out, my implant activating the Mk X's auto-band and selecting the band that had the best signal.

"Reading you, five-by-five, Commander." M16A1's voice echoed smoothly into my ears from the helmet's internal speakers.

I'd chosen the Commando variant if only because it had an enhanced communications node already installed on the helmet; without making too many design changes the girls in their future ODST-themed armors would have external communication boosters that would be integrated into their rucksacks. I thought about having the same communications package installed in their helmets, but the Aesthetics talent noted that it would disrupt the changes I made, so I didn't do it. I did have the commo-buoys floating above the city to make sure that there was beyond-excellent coverage, but it was always prudent to hope for the best but prepare for the worst.

"Weapons check."

M16A1 and her two different models of her namesake weapon. The non-lethal M16 had a short 12-inch barrel that had a 4-inch suppressor on the end, and it fired 10mm tranquilizer rounds from a 30-round aluminum magazine that had a CO2 cartridge that was more than capable of firing every dart and then some; should the cartridge not connect then there was an internal CO2 reservoir located in the stock of the weapon that would propel the rounds then.

A hit anywhere on the body would put a full-grown man down in ten seconds for six hours- we would experiment with the potency and ratios once we had more "official" approval from the PRT to utilize them. Subee assured me that even if we amped up the potency to drop the time down to three seconds it would still be perfectly safe; the darts were smart, and could track who got shot how many times, so if someone accidentally caught multiple darts then they wouldn't receive multiple payloads.

Even then, the Lifegiver assured me that more would simply mean that they slept longer.

Her lethal model was a modified 5.56mm round that we created to be caseless; it shortened the width of the magazine by half, allowing M16A1 to carry twice as many magazines as she normally would have, and it cut the weight of each round by 50% without the additional brass. A lot of effort was put into ensuring that the caseless rounds wouldn't cook-off on accident, but the Forerunner tech was incredibly handy for that. The 5.56mm bullet was an 80-grain projectile, Full Metal Jacketed, if only because we actually didn't want to kill every person that raise a weapon at us; the heavier weight would prevent it from tumbling around and fucking them up even further.

If we wanted them dead we would just shoot them in the face; between our bodies and the armors we were more than capable of tagging everyone in the melon.

Or use the Armor Piercing-Incendiary or Explosive projectiles.

Her side-arms were a pair of Springfield patterned M1911s if only because it was familiar to her being a Vietnam Era patterned T-Doll. The .45 ACP chambering was big enough for a tranquilizer round- we wanted the tranq rounds to have a large enough bore so that the needle would penetrate and deposit its payload but wouldn't over-penetrate; the projectiles were kept to about 450 feet per second, so it was more than difficult for normies to see or react to, but quick enough to cross the intervening distance for efficient take-downs.

Everything was tacti-cool'd up to the 9's, with suppressors, IR/Visible flashlights, extended magazines, red dot sights, and production tolerances that would make a Competition Shooter weep tears of envy.

We set up a system- lethal would always be on the weak side, but considering our augments and armors we didn't have a 'weak side', though that was mainly for court filings; saying such things sounded pretty in a court-room. I don't know how often a cape would be summoned to testify, but I wanted to be prepared for any eventuality.

I had gone for a modified BR-55 battle rifle, chopping the barrel down to 12-inches because it didn't add any more accuracy, and velocity was purposefully kept low. I had the same 10mm tranquilizer set up, though with the added diameter of the rounds and the CO2 cartridge at the bottom of the magazine it cut my available rounds from 36 down to 27- or 28 with one in the chamber.

For my lethal option, I chose to pattern a modified MA5D, utilizing the same 5.56mm chambering that M16A1 had, if only keep our logistics streamlined; I would have to create more production lines as my number of T-Dolls expanded, but until I chose them I wouldn't know who to pick. With the caseless 80-grain rounds, I could fit 56 rounds into the remodeled magazine after some design fuckery. I could have fit more but I decided to keep the magazine flush for aesthetic purposes.

The side-arms were a pair of M6C Socoms that were chambered in .45 ACP, just like her 1911s, with one shooting tranqs and the other live ammunition. The lethals were colored black and the non-lethal weapons were painted white and blue for easy identification.

"I'm good to go, Commander," The T-Doll's visor gave me a smile emoji and she added onto that with a thumbs up.

I nodded, "Excellent. Let's go."

We moved out of the warehouse at Work Site 1, the old Brockton Bay Storm Drain control station, and activated our active camouflage units as we moved down the road at a brisk job. We could have moved way, way, way faster, but we used this time outside of the city to begin scoping out targets that the India units provided for us.

Rather than rock the boat too early by hitting the more lucrative ABB and Empire stash houses, we decided to move through the city and up towards Merchant territory. We stuck to the roads and kept off the sidewalks it was midnight, but there were a surprising amount of people still out and about; it was a Monday, people! Go home and go to bed!

In the bottom right-hand corner of my helmet Indias 3 and 4 were my resident Merchant watchers, and the past few days they'd been observing the movements of all of the hobos peddling drugs; they had a tougher time than the Indias keeping tabs on the ABB, E88, Police, Protectorate, and PRT because the Merchants didn't fly any colors other than "druggie-hobo chic", but once they learned the patterns of life it got a lot easier to track them.

True Hobos meandered between soup kitchen, the liquor store, and wherever they holed up to sleep.

Merchant Hobos had a much wider variety of locations, moving to different houses, through the Train Yards, supposedly abandoned warehouses near the Boat Graveyard, and through the east and western slums; they were also the ones who spent just as much time in vehicles driving around as they did on foot.

The Indias started tracking 87 unique hobos that matched Merchant profiles and public arrest records and began tailing them with an untiring level of persistence that only robots and undead were capable of. Where they went, who they spoke to, what they said when they spoke, and the communications they made with their cheap burner phones were intercepted, cataloged, and then bounced back out. Stash houses for drugs, weapons, and cash were listed out by my intel robots, and I chose to pick the three stash houses that were the most isolated on the map, all located on the border of the Central Railyard and East Slums.

While we moved, the Indias dedicated a dozen drones to conducting more thorough surveillance on the houses while we were en route; the drones analyzed the structures with their powerful sensors and mapped out every person and room in the place. I flexed my index finger and a needle protruded from the tip that leaked a single drop of tranquilizer before I flicked the droplet onto the street and retracted it.

The well-paved streets and clean high-rise buildings of the Financial district gave way to neat and tidy in-city housing developments as we moved through the trio of city blocks that New Wave claimed as their area of responsibility. My sensors caught sight of a woman flying in a slow circuit around the area, and I didn't even need the electronic enhancement of my helmet sensors to identify the blue and white bodysuit and blonde hair of Lady Photon.

I sent M16A1 a ping and she tracked my movement as we jogged, and gave me a run-down of her cape dossier that Nugget helped me put together for every cape in the North Eastern United States- from Boston all the way up to Bangor, Maine. If there was a cape that could potentially shift towards Brockton Bay I wanted to know about them.

The residential areas widened up to a large park with concrete running paths, park benches, trash cans, some spread out but shade bearing trees, and grass that was already beginning to green thanks to Brockton Bay's silly, Fuyuki city-like weather. On the opposite side of the park was the Boardwalk, where a dozen strip mall like small business locations were spread out across a sea of wooden walkways and closed down food stands; some parts of the boardwalk jutted out over the bay on stilts while the northern half slowly sloped down onto the grey-brown sands of the south beach.

We moved through it if only to get a better lay of the land for M16A1 who memorized shop locations and clothing boutiques; no doubt she would be looking for more clothes once we had some petty cash to spend.

The North Ferry area was virtually derelict without the actual ferry to run- the only thing in the area was a small fenced-off area with a security booth that guarded the forcefield bridge out towards the Protectorate ENE Headquarters out in the bay. We observed the Rig and its vivid blue forcefield covering the structure but didn't bother to stop and gawp- it wasn't really important other than to know where it is, but considering it was lit up like a big blue spotlight it was really hard to miss.

Past the Boardwalk, we finally entered into the East Slums areas, where past the two blocks of relatively nice apartment complexes and other en-bloc ground-floor businesses things started to take a very quick downturn. There were a half-dozen soup kitchens and four homeless shelters in this area of the city, but part of the requirements to stay was no gang affiliation and random drug tests, so the Merchants steered clear of causing trouble there; just because the people staying there weren't hooked on drugs now didn't mean they wouldn't turn to drugs later.

I saw a bunch of posts online about Merchants handing off drugs to kids, or at least attempting to, but that seemed either implausible or they were low-level pushers looking to try and hook a younger audience; Skidmark might have been a foul-mouthed scumbag, but he wasn't a total idiot- trying to sell drugs outside of an elementary school was just asking for trouble. The PHO claims were just that, however, claims; I had Nugget look into it because it could have very well been some ABB, E88, or Coil psyops to try and weaken the Merchant's position. To date, no evidence was presented to support these claims, and in an era where people pull their cellphones out in the middle of a cape fight, the absence of any sort of photographs or video footage made it pretty sus.

I felt the Forge grow warm as it reached out and grasped onto a small star from the "Crafting Technological" branch before pulling it into my orbit.

[Attempted Re-Forge: 29.0020 - Big Bada-Boom - 100CP - Azeroth - Crafting Technological]

[Re-Forge Successful]

[Purchased: 0 CP Remaining]

My jaw dropped as I sent Enbee a packet containing all of the crazy shit that I was just given by the Forge.

The ability to make bombs- like, all sorts of bombs. Big bombs, small bombs, bombs that only blew up in one direction with zero backblast, bombs that could be as small and compact as a marble but still level a skyscraper. Small bombs that fit inside bigger bombs that didn't blow up via sympathetic detonation?

Holy shit, it even let me defuse all bombs.

Fiat backed, no matter how crazy or difficult the counter-measures were, if it was a bomb then I could disarm it, no questions asked.

Well, I have my Bakuda counter, though that was if I let her live in the first place. Or, I could try my hand at recruiting her. The question would be would it be worth it though? I would think on it, and instead set Nugget out to find a half-Asian girl attending Cornell University that had a near-perfect GPA or higher- she had blue eyes if I remember correctly, and with the heavy Boston accent possibly marking her as a Boston native that should probably narrow down the search results quite heavily. It would be weeks before her trigger, as Lung didn't recruit her until mid to late March if I remembered correctly.

M16A1 and I moved down the streets until we reached the block with our first target location. It was a run-down two-story affair with a basement that was blocked off by a one-inch thick steel door; the cash, weapons, and drugs were all located down there in three thick steel trunks that were padlocked. There were six men and two women between the ages of 20 and 40 within the home, and of them only three were awake; the youngest sat on a rickety wooden chair on the front porch and was hidden from view by a thick bush, another sat at the kitchen table was in the middle of rolling up what looked to be cigarettes. The final one awake was in the basement sitting on a couch and watching television while futzing around with his phone.

Two pairs of men and women were asleep in separate bedrooms, and judging by their states of undress they'd had a fair amount of fun a few hours previously. The last man was asleep on what appeared to be a child's bed in a bedroom on the bottom floor; his legs dangling off the bottom of the frame while a crackpipe was nestled against his chin.

Man, the sensors on these drones were no joke.

The Promethean vision that the SPARTAN IVs had access to was so severely neutered that it wasn't even funny; they could see through walls, but only vague outlines, meanwhile I could read the fine print on the bag of cigarette tobacco the Merchant was using to stuff his cigs. Granted, this was a dozen sensors working in tandem to map out a single building, but the sheer fidelity was amazing.

I entered into the Strategy Trance and thought very carefully about how we were going to approach this. It was our first little mission, and I wanted it to be a success- no fuss, no muss. I built up a packet with different versions of the plan based on some variables that could change and then sent it to M16A1 once I left the trance.

We split up. I moved towards the front while she moved towards the back, neither of us had weapons drawn because even with the suppressors the tranq weapons would cause enough noise to attract someone's attention; this wasn't like the movies where everything was whisper quiet. Granted, with Forerunner tech we could get pretty close. Still, with a 10-second window to unconsciousness, someone could make a pretty large racket, so we opted to go close and personal.

I moved around the front yard, sticking close to the small band of darkness that existed between the street lamp a dozen yards away and the faded yellow light above the front porch. In a split second, I leaned over the waist-high banister on the porch and slipped an arm underneath his armpit while the other closed over his nose and mouth; as I yanked him over the railing and onto the ground the needle penetrated his skin and delivered its payload. He tried to scream, but I easily kept him pinned to the ground, with my second hand clasping around his wrists to prevent him from reaching for the gun in his waistband; his booted feet tried to kick, and he squirmed but they barely made a sound against the dirt and grass.

There was a reason I pulled him off the rickety porch; he could have made a lot of noise drumming his heels against the wood.

Also, I didn't think about it, but if your reflexes are super, duper fast... ten seconds feels like an eternity... and yet the opposite is true. Ten seconds is ten seconds, it's not a whole lot of time, but when you're holding down a barely sober druggie it does feel a lot longer.

Once the young man was unconscious I tugged him in the bushes out of sight and made my way to the front door; M16A1 was already around back with a small tool we designed for quiet entry- a super grease that penetrated everything, and a key that would adapt to any lock it was placed in. She lubed up the hinges and locks and was waiting for me to make my move inside so that she could move.

I stepped up onto the porch, careful to not step on the clearly rotted planks; it still did squeak a touch, which caught the attention of the guy sitting at the table. He growled out a curse under his breath and stood up before tucking the handgun on the table into his waistband. The moment he left the table M16A1 slipped the door open and dashed quietly into the kitchen, and at that same moment I opened up the door and dashed in as well. She jabbed him and covered up his mouth and nose, her other arm wrapped around his waist and lifted him off the ground; my arm gathered up his legs while my hand snatched both of his wrists.

He couldn't make a single sound, and he couldn't squirm either- we were twenty-four hundred pounds of man, woman, and power armor. We sat him on the couch.

We moved through the rest of the house, greasing door hinges and spritzing down the sleeping Merchants with a mist borne paralytic. It took a little bit longer to work than the tranquilizers but at least we didn't have to deal with the struggle of naked, sweaty people when we jabbed them to put them under.

The final door was the thick steel door, and once the grease was squirted and the door unlocked I flew down the stairs and took down the last Merchant who was sitting on the couch; I wouldn't say he was none the wiser, because had been alert, with the shotgun he had moved from the table to rest against his leg, but it didn't do him any good. He had likely heard some movement upstairs that was maybe a touch irregular, but not enough to investigate or make a phone call.

While we were moving throughout the house we weren't able to be completely silent with how much we weighed- the MJOLNIR armor had specialized treads that allowed us to be way quieter than anyone as large and as heavy as us had the right to be, but the house was old and wooden. 2400 pounds was a lot to handle, and we had to move up and down the stairs one at a time due to structural concerns.

I had M16A1 go ahead and dress the naked women while I dressed the naked men, and we gathered them all downstairs to sleep on the couches and armchairs. After inserting the warehouse key I had Subee poot into the living room of the stash house and begin her evaluations of the tranquilizers and paralytics on the systems of the tweakers.

M16A1 stayed upstairs with Subee and chatted with her while I cracked open the three steel trunks and began laying out the drugs, weapons, and cash. Each weapon was photographed with serial numbers, each drug was tested and weighed, and the cash was given a rough count.

We took the cash according to the Vigilante Act of 1993, which allowed law-abiding Rogues the ability to claim spoils in the form of cash and jewelry as long as it wasn't vital evidence for the case based on the charges at the local or federal Law Enforcement would bring to bear through the District Attorneys. That and it had to be documented, which was something most Rogues either didn't know about or didn't care about; considering most were probably teens or young adults they probably only saw that yes, they could keep the cash they took off gangers and that was the end of it.

They more than likely didn't think about it any further.

This particular stash house only had about $23,000 in it, which while small, was more than enough to make this whole trip worthwhile.

I had the Indias move the drones over to the next stash house on our list and sent Subee back into the warehouse with the cash we collected.

After securing our prisoners, of course; it took us no time at all to confiscate their weapons and zip-tie their hands and feet together.

We were able to secure the other two stash houses in much the same fashion, with only little variation. Our active camouflages remained on without a problem after we shut them off for a cool-down period, and everyone was put to sleep with minimal damage; the worst they got was a little bruising around their wrists, ankles, arms, or legs whenever we secured them to prevent struggling.

We ended up collecting about $63,000 in cash between the three stash houses, and that was when I picked up one of the Merchant's burner phones and dialed the Brockton Bay Police Department's non-emergency lines.

"Brockton Bay Police Department, is this call an emergency?" A tired woman's voice spoke out.

"No, this is a non-emergency call, I am a new cape in Brockton- my name is Horizon. I'm calling because I have secured three Merchant stash houses, complete with illicit substances and illegal weapons. There are no injuries that require an ambulance, only vehicles needed to transport seventeen unconscious suspects," I spoke smoothly, giving the pertinent information at an even cadence so she wouldn't have to ask me to repeat myself. "There was no Cape involvement other than myself and my partner."

I listed out the addresses and she assured me that some squad cars and a pair of transport vans would be making it to the locations. She asked if we would stand by to give a statement, and I agreed without issue; if we were to build up a good working relationship with the BBPD then sticking around to answer questions and provide context would be important. I didn't like Piggot, but I didn't dislike her either- showing that we were willing to cooperate would do a lot to keep her from going off the deep end.

Within ten minutes we had a pair of squad cars pull up outside the house and four officers exited their vehicles- thankfully they were smart enough to not come with lights and sirens; no need to wake the whole neighborhood up. I slowly walked out of the front door, keeping my weapons magnetically slung across my back and my hands at my sides. "Good evening, Officers."

There was some apprehension in their stance when M16A1 followed out behind me, but a brief flicker of a smile emoji on her helmet and a gentle wave smoothed things over just a touch. The lead officer was Sergeant that was dark-skinned, in his early 40s with a mustache that had more than a few white hairs; he was a touch overweight, but other than that he fit his uniform well. "You are Horizon, yeah? I'm Sgt. Howards and this is Officer Manuel, Officer Higgens, and Officer Kwon."

16 and I nodded, and he turned to my companion with a small but bemused smile on his face, "I'm afraid we didn't get your cape name, Miss-..."

"Sixteen," She popped another smile emoji onto her faceplate, though this one was different than the last, "EmSixteenAyeOne."

"Like the rifle?" The South Korean officer snorted, and she turned sideways to show off her very tacti-cool namesake rifle that was magnetized to her backplate, "Suppose that answers that question..."

I blinked at the Forge as it grabbed a tiny star from the "Materials Mundane" constellation.

[Attempted Re-Forge: -9.0103 - Lightsaber Crystals - 50CP - Star Wars The Old Republic - Mundane Small Scale]

[Re-Forge Successful]

[Purchased: 50 CP Remaining]

Hah! I was just talking about making lightsabers, and suddenly the crystals, as well as the schematics for making them, just dropped into my lap.

The Star Wars nerds of Earth Bet will lose their shit once I unveil this.

"So, could you tell us what happened here then?" Sergeant Howards spoke up as he nodded to Officers Kwon and Higgins who moved towards the house with their flashlights and tasers drawn.

"I can, but I'm waiting for the Protectorate Hero to show up, that way I can give a full report to the BBPD, Protectorate, and PRT at the same time," I tilted my head to the side as I shrugged exaggeratedly and lit the front of my faceplate up with an eye-roll emoji, "I've heard that the ENE Director is kind of a hard ass, so I want to play ball as much as I can; neither you nor they are the enemy."

[Robin Swoyer - Velocity - Protectorate ENE]

"Vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvveeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeellllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllloooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo-"

Velocity bit back a sigh as he slowed his running pace and exited his breaker state the moment his earpiece started to crackle, "-city this is Console."

"Go, Console," Robin spoke easily as he rubbed his chin with his gloved hand, he took a few moments to gaze at his red bodysuit with its signature 'V' leading down from his shoulders to meet around his belt-line; his eyes tracked over the black and white checkered bands around his biceps, thighs, and waist. He hated the damn things at it made him feel like a crash-test dummy, but Image was a department that was nigh-impossible to combat without a solid reason.

"We have a report from the BBPD about three suspected Merchant locations that were cleared by an unknown cape. No Merchant Cape involvement, and no notable injuries. The unknowns seem to be waiting with the responding officers for a Protectorate representative to show up; suspected Tinker with unknown specialization- they are wearing power armor."

Robin arched an eyebrow, "If there is no gang cape involved that is squarely within the BBPD's wheelhouse."

The PRT could usurp jurisdiction whenever a cape was involved period, but as long as the Rogues were obeying the spirit and letter of the law and there was no cape-on-cape involvement Piggot was content to let the various 'lawfuls' do their good deeds for the month before they disappeared back into the shadows. She didn't like it, but it wasn't as though she could pressgang every cape that was just looking out for their local communities. Most of them were kids going out wanting to be heroes, only to find out that even with powers it was incredibly dangerous; only a select few power classifications gave them the ability to shrug off gangers armed with switchblades and handguns.

The ones that survived typically never went back out if they could help it.

There were a dozen of so Rogues unaffiliated with the Protectorate and New Wave that went out consistently, but they were intelligent with how they went about their business- usually intelligent enough to steer clear of Piggot's tendency to strong-arm newcomers to the Bay. Though a few did end up joining the Wards or the Protectorate to get them out of the city after they bit off more than they could chew by stepping on one of the gang's turf with a bit too much bravado.

"Yes, this does meet the Director's criteria to leave it alone, but it was the capes who are requesting a Protectorate representative," The Agent responded.

Oh, a little meet-and-greet then? Probably wanted to show off their success to a Protectorate hero and slyly ask for an autograph; it's happened to Armsmaster and Miss Militia on more than a few occasions. Though if someone asked for his autograph on a night like this it would be a first.

Robin nodded to himself as he double-checked his reflection in the store window to make sure his costume was situated, "Alright, mark me down as responding; I'll give you an update once everything is concluded. What's the address?"

Console rattled off an address that was smack dab in the middle of Merchant territory, but not unsurprisingly; the Merchants were often the first target for new Capes looking to try and cut their teeth- the Empire had more than enough capes to keep their illicit operations safe, and the less about what Lung did to new capes who crossed him the better.

That was if Oni Lee even let them make it to Lung's clutches alive.

With a deep breath Velocity slipped into his breaker state and began moving towards the East Slums; it was technically called "Perdition Grove", and thirty years ago it might have been a real nice neighborhood, but most PRT and Protectorate personnel found it easier to just called whatever region they were patrolling by the current name on the street. That was unless they were going off the Protectorate's nomenclature, then it would just be called 'Sector B-3'.

He kept to the middle of the street, zooming down the road at- for him- was a fast jog.

His powers allowed him to essentially speed up time around himself locally, which gave Velocity incredible movement and reaction times far outside of the norm; he could dodge punches and kicks like they were being thrown by children having a mock slow-motion kung-fu fight after having watched that Aleph flick 'The Matrix'. This incredible speed didn't come without a drawback though; the deeper he went into his breaker state the less and less he could actually affect the world outside of it. Moving at his best possible speed he could run on the surface of the water as if it were solid ground, but he would be hard-pressed to nudge a paperweight on the side of a desk.

It meant that he had to be very careful with how deep he went or else he'd move too fast to be helpful; after a year with the Protectorate he did find a sweet spot where he could throw punches and still move around without any fear of being struck in return, but they hit with all the ferocity of an angry 8-year-old boy.

It was true, they measured his blows against that of one of the Field Agent's 8-year-old sons to see who could hit harder. They were about equal.

It was a bit emasculating, really, but after working with Armsmaster and Dragon they managed to come up with a solution that allowed him to be useful when punching perps in the throat or poking them in the eyes was heavily frowned upon. It wasn't 'heroic' to do such things, but that was just what PR did to capes like him- they took what little he could do and then hamstrung him even further. It took eight months for them to allow him to carry around Containment Foam grenades.

Eight. Whole. Months.

What was standard issue for the PRT Troopers and Field Agents was something he had to struggle with PR because a bandoleer of Confoam grenades looked too 'menacing and clashed with his image of a plucky speedster'; Dragon, the doll that she was, did manage to redesign the housings of the grenade to be less threatening though, but due to their new, less scary shape they could only hold half the amount of Confoam as a regular grenade. That and he had to get permission to carry more than four.

Granted, Piggot often granted it without a peep because he'd proven that he could be trusted not to misuse the grenades, nor did he use them frivolously; they weren't cheap, even with Dragon giving the ENE a Sugar-Mommy discount on behalf of Armsmaster.

Robin chuckled to himself at the thought of seeing the beautiful Canadian Tinker lavishing Colin with all sorts of gaudy gifts and the man having no idea what is going on. Despite the many years they've been 'collaborating' on numerous projects the man was so bad with people that he was blind to the fact that his girlfriend was so embedded in his systems that all he had to do was call out her name and she would drop whatever it is she was doing to talk to him.

Dragon was his live-in girlfriend that he didn't know was his girlfriend.

Forget 'Capes of our Lives', this was the feel-good romantic comedy that America needed. The jokes practically wrote themselves.

As he casually side-stepped a stray dog running across the street Robin wondered if he should pitch the idea to Assault; Ethan was more than willing to enjoy a good joke, and the thought of a sitcom based on Dragon and Armsmaster's 'will-they/won't-they' relationship would tickle him pink.

Probably so pink that he'd eventually run the joke to death and would end up infuriating his wife, Amanda- otherwise known by her alias Battery- would flip her lid and he'd end up sleeping on the couch again.

Robin slowed his speed so that he could catch a cigarette butt a bum had tossed towards the street. "Really? Seriously? The trash can is right there."

The hero pointed to the concrete bin on the street not two paces away, and the drunk mumbled an apology before pulling another cigarette from the pack and stumbling on towards the direction of the park; he sighed and threw the butt into the can before amping up his time dilation and began speeding off down the road towards his destination.

He slowed down his speed to a walk, though he kept his breaker state high so that he could leisurely observe the unconscious gangers that were being pulled out of a stash house about a block away from his destination; he pulled out his PRT phone and flipped through it for the incident report, and saw that this was the first address the new capes hit out of three.

He looked around and saw no visible injuries aside from some small bruises, and no damage to the property, which was sort of a rarity when it came to Tinkers rocking power armor; usually busting through the wall like the Kool-Aid man was always high on their agendas, at least once, anyway.

Velocity dropped out of his breaker state to give the officers a quick greeting.

"Hey, Officer Thompson," the red-clad hero called out with a jaunty wave, a small smile on his face as he pocketed his phone, "Got anything for me?"

"Me? Nope, nothing other than the perps were put to sleep and the drugs and guns left out for us to find them," The blonde officer shrugged as he pulled open the back door on the paddy wagon and assisted the other two officers with getting the sleeping man into the back, "The cash is gone, but what else is new?"

Ah, so the new capes were someone that was read-up on the law in that regard, he would have to see if they knew they had to report the amount of cash that was on hand; breaking the law there was a misdemeanor, but like most law enforcement organizations they could hold onto that bit of information for their books. Piggot sure would. "Thanks, Thompson."

"No problem, Velocity."

He knew Thompson, hell, he knew most of the BBPD officers in the city- despite the huge gang and cape problems the low tax revenues kept the department small enough that Robin could say he'd met with most BBPD officers at least once; though Thompson was a regular face to him because the man regularly took the 'Cape' duty and the additional hazard pay that went along with it. His job was to respond to situations like this and hold the area until the PRT was able to arrive on the scene.

Robin stopped by and spoke to the officers at the next house over, and the scene and results were the same. All the perps put to sleep, the guns and drugs on display for the officers to find, and the cash missing.

He moved on towards his intended destination, and with a quick check of his watch he arrived in about five and a half minutes; if he hadn't stopped to chat with the BBPD he could have made it in four, but this was well within his nominal response window. If he was really pushing it he could have arrived in under two, though he would have been huffing a puffing when he got there- even with his personal time being accelerated he still had to run everywhere he went. It was a good thing he learned how to enjoy running in the Army, or else he'd be hating life in Brockton; he always had the largest patrol routes despite the fact he wasn't mounted like Miss Militia or Armsmaster.

He was 'the fast guy', what did he need a vehicle budget for?

He sped up his breaker state to the max so that he could use the extra time to observe the new capes properly. Holy shit, what the hell is that?

Robin reached up and turned the helmet camera on and double-checked to make sure it was recording on his PRT phone.

He'd seen quite a few tinkers over the years, both in Brockton and outside of it; every Tinker that could make power armor and had the budget for it always did. It was almost a rule for Tinkers, one that Robin wholeheartedly agreed with; what man or woman wouldn't make some badass power armor if they had the resources for it? However, the results were almost always the same- they were big, bulky looking, and more often than not were probably jank as hell because their specialization didn't cater well to the various systems that power armor needed to be successful. Whether it was coding, design, armor, or weapons, there was always some area where the Tinker in question had a deficiency that their specialization couldn't cover.

Armsmaster was no exception- Robin had seen some photos of Armsmaster's first power armor when he joined the Protectorate, and even with Hero's aid the man's power armor had some serious faults in the way of protection. He had plenty of weapons and tools thanks to his miniaturization and efficiency specialty, but one couldn't make armor smaller and be more effective.

The armor that the two capes were wearing was... different. It was sleek in all the right places and bulky where it mattered. It looked deadly as all hell, but there was a commanding presence to the armor that cut a heroic profile that was hard to ignore. The blue and white color scheme was obviously intended to give it a law enforcement look and feel, and if Robin was being honest it did a much better job giving a proper first impression than the all-black body armor, chainmail, and faceless masks that the Para Human Response Team's Troopers wore. On the right pauldrons, he could easily read "HORIZON" on the male figure and "M16A1" on the decidedly shorter female figure in a bold white font that had black outlining.

The helmet on the male figure turned towards him, and the man nodded.

At him.

He was as deep into his breaker state as he could go- he moved thirty times faster than the human eye could track, and yet this guy could see him... and nod at him fast enough that it didn't look like he was moving in slow motion?

The shock was enough to nearly pop Robin out of his breaker state, but he managed to breathe and calm himself down enough that he could slowly come out of it so that he didn't spook Sergeant Howards again. He approached from the side in clear view of the BBPD officers and dropped his power. "Evening, Sergeant Howards, a lovely night to bust some drug houses, huh?"

"Velocity, good to see you," The black Sergeant grinned as he reached into his coat a pulled out a notebook, "When the PRT told me someone would be here in five minutes I just knew it had to be you."

"Heh, you knew it was me because if it had been anyone else you would have heard them," He stepped forward and shook the officer's hand before turning to face the two newcomers, "but where are my manners? I take it you're the two Capes that kicked the doors down?"

The large, almost seven-foot-tall man slowly looked over to the intact front door before looking back at Velocity, his voice firm but flat. "I do not understand, no doors were kicked down during this seizure of alleged Merchant assets."

Was he trying to make an Armsmaster joke?

Before he could comment the visor of the female flashed with light, the letters 'L O L' popping up before a 'Crying' emoji took its place, "It's not nice to poke fun at Armsmaster, Horizon."

A smiling emoji flitted across the male cape's golden faceplate before his shoulders trembled visibly. "I'm sorry, truly, I am. I just couldn't help myself. It's good to meet you as well, Velocity. I am Horizon and this is one of my teammates, M16A1. We're part of a new Hero group that has decided to make its home within the Bay area."

Piggot was going to be absolutely thrilled.

The holographic emojis were a great idea, no doubt the PR teams would flip their shit for not having thought of it first; it allowed the perks of having full face protection while still allowing the capes to emote. He wondered if he could pull enough teeth to have Armsmaster make something like that for him; if there was one thing he wasn't immune to in his breaker state it was gasses and fumes- he still needed to breathe after all. Robin grinned and accepted the man's handshake and gave it a firm squeeze; the man's grip was firm, but it was just the right amount of firm.

A proper handshake.

It indicated that he was comfortable with his power armor enough to even shake someone's hand; most Brutes had a hard time controlling their strength when they first Triggered, and Tinkers with power armor often needed some extensive time calibrating their suits to handle things as simple and mundane as a handshake.

"Pleasure, Horizon, M16A1. So what do you have for us?" Robin deftly sidestepped the obvious question of whether or not it was actually her Cape Alias- even if it sounded silly most people had reasons for why they chose the name that they did, and more often than not it was tied to their Trigger events; best to just let it be. The Intel section can puzzle it all out later.

Horizon tilted his head and looked at the female who straightened up and began laying out a clear and concise sequence of events, from their discovery of the Merchant stash house locations, to a brief overview of their recon of the area, along with a decent description of their catching of the alleged perps and the gathering of the evidence. They even noted how much cash they had liberated for their own purposes.

It was very, very Military.

Horizon nodded at the conclusion of her report, and the woman visibly preened at the acknowledgment; it sort of threw him off because the visible joy showed by M16A1 was countercurrent to her wholly professional debriefing. A trained soldier one moment and a giddy school girl preening at compliments from her crush. It was so Glory Girl that it hurt.

Robin filed it away and took the opportunity to ask the question that the Sergeant was dying to ask but couldn't- while it wasn't illegal to inquire about a Cape's methods of takedowns, it was sort of a taboo for the mundane Law Enforcement, at least that was something he believed to be propagated. A lot of Capes survived by keeping their powers close to their vest. "So, if you don't mind me asking, how exactly did you manage to subdue all of these alleged gang members with so little fuss?"

The man tilted his head from side to side, as if mulling over whether or not to spill before he raised a finger on his right hand up. With a quiet 'shk' a one-inch long needle sprouted from the fingertip. "Fast-acting tranquilizer of our own design. It's been thoroughly diluted, but ten CCs and they're out like a light in ten seconds."

Horizon then reached into a small tactical pouch at the small of his back and pulled out a tan plastic hard case on it with his Cape Name stenciled on the front. He flicked it open and revealed ten small vials of a blue liquid, "This is the tranquilizing agent we use for our glove needles and non-lethal firearms."

Robin blinked for a moment before he looked down at their thighs and across their backs to see they did indeed have firearms. M16A1 turned around slowly and presented her back to him, showing off the two AR-patterned rifles held in place, likely by magnets. "The blue and white ones are our non-lethal weapons, pretty identifiable and easy to spot. The scary black ones are for when putting people to sleep isn't viable."

Velocity was thankful his yellow-tinted lenses covered up his eyes because he did take a moment to appreciate her posterior; he'd seen a lot of power armor before, but never one that accentuated a woman's curves quite to the extent her's did.

When the man closed the case up and handed it over to Robin he was a bit surprised, but he accepted it regardless. "Be aware, this is a courtesy. I'm handing this over to the PRT so that they can have Armsmaster and Dragon look it over and verify that it is safe; we've done plenty of our own testing and found that there are no side effects except for some dry mouth and lingering drowsiness that will pass after a few hours."

"Well, I'll definitely take this to them, not a problem," Robin nodded easily, though it had been a lie. What he was going to do was find someplace isolated to put the case until a PRT van came by to pick it up and inspect it; more than a few ner-do-wells have tried to slip some dangerous things into PRT and Protectorate holdings by handing off things to get inspected.

"The tranquilizers are patent-pending, and so are any possible derivatives of the unique chemical chain, so if I find out about someone trying to utilize my tech without speaking to my lawyers we're going to have some problems."

Now that was something that threw Robin for a loop, "Patents? These... aren't Tinker tech?"

The man shook his head and pulled out three SD cards from his armor, he handed one to the Sergeant while handing the other two to Robin, "No. They're not, it's why I could patent them in the first place; any respectable laboratory with the right equipment could recreate my process. Sergeant Howards, that card contains a written copy of our report, along with a video copy of our interactions. Stored on it are photographs of the serial numbers of the illicit weapons, the amount and type of the alleged drugs, and the list for the amount of liquid cash and assets we 'liberated' as per the Vigilante Act."

"As for you, Velocity," Horizon's faceplate turned toward him, "The white drive contains a step-by-step guide that Armsmaster and Dragon can use to recreate the formula. The blue drive contains all of our current medical and testing data for the tranquilizing formula. We will do our best to wait for PRT and Protectorate confirmation to validate our claims, but we won't sit idle for too long. If you wish to contact us I am verified on PHO,"

"I haven't made one yet, but I'm going to," M16A1 interjected brightly.

"- and when my team is fully assembled we'll contact the Protectorate and PRT offices to settle on a date and time when we can come by a register officially." The man's helmet tilted to the side, a white and black 'question mark' popping up on his faceplate, "Does that sound acceptable?"

"Yes it does, when I get back to the ENE Headquarters I'll be certain to make sure that my report will be the first thing the Director sees on her desk when she comes in." Velocity noted the snort from Horizon.

With that, the power-armored pair bid him and the officers farewell before they turned away and walked down the street until they faded out of sight due to the row of busted street lamps.

"They're too damn big to be that damn quiet," the Sergeant muttered under his breath before inhaling and turning his attention to the paddy wagon that had just pulled in front of the house.

Officer Rawlson, another familiar face, slipped out of the passenger side cab and began talking to the Sergeant, "-first van's full up, so Eddie and Harry are escorting them to the pokie at station 5; once we've got the rest in here where do you want us to go? Station 7? Station 6 only had like three holding cells free-"

Velocity patted the Sergeant on the shoulder before he cranked up his breaker state and moved towards the nearest park before setting the plastic hard case Horizon gave him on a park bench and moving a safe distance away. "Console this is Velocity,"

"This is Console, reading you loud and clear, Velocity," a warm, feminine voice sounded out over his radio. Oh, it was Agent Heather on the Consol for the rest of the night? He checked the time and sure enough, it was 3:17 AM, the shift change had just taken place this week.

"I just received a Tinker Tech care package for Armsmaster and Dragon. The new cape I was sent to link up with was indeed a Tinker- used some sort of tranquilizer to take the alleged Merchant members without much of a fight. I'm standing by for a sweep-and-clear op before I bring this back with me to Protectorate HQ."

"Roger that, Velocity. I'm having a Clearance team sent your way now, ETA 26 minutes."

Robin shook his head as he leaned up against the nearest tree, the man taking a moment to rest and stretch his legs out; now he had to play the waiting game, but this little venture would eat up the rest of his patrol time, easily, so the moment it was done he could run back to the Rig and turn in. He had the night shift again tomorrow night, and he wanted to stop by Fugly's in the afternoon and pick up a burger.

Not for the first time he lamented the fact that Miss Militia, the lone Noctis cape on their roster, didn't get more night shifts, but she was the Second-in-Command and the second-most popular member- she needed to be visible.

"Thanks, Console. Velocity is standing by at Haber Park in Sector B-3."

Special thanks to Lmc9389, Xodarap4, Artillery, DrkShdow, AuraofCalm, Zerak, Mioismoe, Zath, Splendid, D. Wongsonegoro, Darkarma, Acrimonius, T. Balewood, Randall Randall, Dominyx Black, CyberCrisis, Blue, Russ Stilter, Legion_13, Mike Fatal_Bullet, and P. Nguyen for being Patrons!

You guys rock!

A/N: Slightly shorter chapter tonight. Going to get some sleep and then come back swinging when I awaken from my slumber. Little Velocity interlude.

Big Bada-Boom (Azeroth) (100CP)

You may not make the prettiest of engineering gizmos, but boy do you know how to make them go BOOM! You can make big bombs or little bombs or big bombs IN little bombs capable of taking out an entire skyscraper. You are an expert at bomb crafting, able to make bombs the size of a marble that would make even Deathwing flinch. This also extends to defusing bombs if, for some reason, you don't want a boom, but that's just crazy talk.

Lightsaber Crystals (50CP)

If you want to create more Lightsabers without access to the setting's unique metaphysical geology, you'll need these. Each fist-sized rock has a sample of Force-sensitive crystal growing from its surface, which can easily be broken off into chunks sized for lightsaber crafting or creating Force Focuses. Purchase includes a rock for every type and color of crystal available in the setting, including synthetic crystals such as the red Force-crystals favored by the Sith. The crystals are always properly attuned to whoever harvests them, regardless of color, and will regrow within a day.

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