Brockton Bay A Week After Annette Hebert's Funeral.
The Hebert residents.
"Come on, come on take the bait all ready" silently thought a fourteen year old Taylor as she anxiously watched from the steps of her backyard porch. A single medium sized blackbird slowly made its way towards a small pile of seeds that she had placed nearby her houses ancient dead tree, that had an old tyre swing attached to one of its sturdier branches. As the bird got closer to its prize it would randomly swing its head from side to side checking for any kind of predator that would try to eat it, not that there would be any as Taylor had taken a few precautions in making sure that no predators were nearby like stray cats or any other kind of bird eating creatures.
"That's it just a little bit more" the young teenager felt an excited smile forming on her lips, as the small blackbird hopped near the seed pile and started to greedily peck away at the seeds. After a few minutes of watching the bird contently eat its fill Taylor calmly pulled out from her back pocket a device that looked like some kind of silver remote control "your mine now little bird" gleefully thoughtTaylor as she without a moments hesitation pressed a big red button on the remote causing a steel cylinder styled cage to burst out from the ground and trap the surprised blackbird within its metal confines.
"Yes it worked my bird trapper mark 1 was a complete successes!" Taylor happily exclaimed while running over to her bird trap and as she came over Taylor could clearly hear the sounds of the blackbird squawking angrily from within the trap sounding none too happy with its newly acquired metal prison.
"Oh quit being such a baby" she huffed in annoyance while grabbing the top of the cylinder "your not hurt and besides you should feel honoured" Taylor told the entrapped bird while she twisted the cylinder in a 180 degree angle causing a small hiss of steam to rise from the ground underneath the trap "Your going to be the final part I need for my invention that I've being working on all week." The bird's angry squawks grew even louder like it was trying to say that it didn't feel very honoured at the moment though the young teen just ignored its angry squawking as she picked up the cage and headed inside her house though not without first making sure that none of her neighbours saw her carrying the entrapped animal as she really didn't want to answer any of their questions about why she had suddenly decided to cage a blackbird.
"Ok little guy lets get you into the basement" Taylor said though not before she had closed and locked the backdoor because when you live in a criminal infested city like Brockton bay you always make sure to lock up your house unless you wanted to be robbed by the city's Parahuman run gangs. Though truthfully it would mostly be the Merchants who would rob you blind, so that they could get their next quick fix seeing as the ABB and the Empire had far more lets just call them shadier means to gather money so them robbing a persons house was far less likely though not out of the realm of possibility.
Anyway once Taylor was sure that the house was truly secure she swiftly went over to her homes basement door and once in front of the large old wooden door she opened it and quickly descended into the dark murky basement all the while continuing to ignore the rather mad bird that refused to stop crowing at its teenaged captor.
The basement.
"Alright you stay here while I go get everything ready" Taylor said in a soft tone while gently placing the cage she had been carrying on top of her dads old workbench which he had in the past used to repair some of old things that would some times break within the house like the old rundown clock that was usually hung in their kitchen. Though after her mother had died a week ago her father had stopped coming down to the basement something which had turned out to be a blessing as it had allowed her to work on her invention without the worry of her father finding it of course Taylor wasn't stupid as she had hidden it way behind some old cardboard boxes just incase her dad ever decided to come down to work on anything or to just lose himself within the memory's of her beloved yet sadly recently departed mother.
"Oh man I've forgotten just how heavy this thing is" Taylor grunted as she used all of her strength to lift up something that was wrapped tightly within a large brown bundle that was around the size of a average man. "Okay once this little project is done I'm so going to create that strength and speed enhancing serum thats been cooking way within my brain" she grumbled, while placing the very heavy bundle on the workbench. She made sure to not accidentally knock over the birds cage. After taking a moment to regain her breath from lugging around the huge and very heavy bundle she place her hand once again on top of the cylinder cage and twisted 160 degrees, causing the metal around the middle to shift into a prison bar style allowing the bird to finally see its surrounding for the first time since its capture.
"Are you glad to see me Mr bird?" Taylor playfully asked her captive who gave an angry caw caw at her in answer. "Well I'm glad you are because I'm going to show you the accumulation of a whole weeks worth of my hard work" she gently grabbed hold of the bundle and preceded to pull it away reviling to the small bird a strange bee based robot that looked like it had been thrown together from spare parts. Its outer casing was a rusted brown in colour with a single black stripe around its thorax that also had two small jet engines attached to its body to help it hover in the air and its antenna seemed to have been painted strangely enough in a sunny yellow colour.
"Impressive isn't it?" Taylor asked the bird while gently petting the currently lifeless robot bees head. "I've been working on this Buzz Bomber ever since I triggered about a week ago at my mum's funeral," she informed her captive while pressing a hidden button on the bees back which caused a plate in-between the wings to lift up and slide down the robots back reviling some kind of chamber within the metal bees body. "Unfortunately I could only make one of them with the subpar resources within the house not to mention that I've had to in the past week delay installing most of the Buzz Bomber's critical programming since I could only really work on the Buzz Bomber when my dad was either asleep or at work." Taylor pouted a little bit as the memories of the past week buzzed within her mind of how she had to avoid her father finding her robot bee and how annoyed the teen had felt when she could only work on the bee at night.
"Thankfully I've already finished installing everything into the Buzz Bomber last night so now all it needs to live is its power source." Taylor carefully picked up the cage containing the bird an excited gleam was burning deep within her eyes "and thats where you come in my little feathered friend." The blackbird seemed to somehow understand what she was implying and began to thrash around its cage trying in vain to escape its captor unfortunately their was really nothing the small bird could do as it was slowly inserted inside the robot bees chamber once the bird was safely inside Taylor twisted the cylinder until a small click was heard and following it a few moments later the metal plate slide itself back up the bee and sank back into its former resting place sealing up the metallic bee and trapping the blackbird inside forever.
"Now for the moment of truth" Taylor excitedly whispered to herself while taking a step back from the inactive bee after all she really didn't want to be hit by its metallic wings when it finally came on line.
"Buzz Bomber 001 activate primary systems authorisation code Eggman 4301 epsilon" she spoke clearly to her inanimate machine hoping that its voice recognition software was working as it should other wise she might have to spend even more time on her robot bee.
"Authorisation code recognised beginning primary systems power up now" the bee suddenly spoke causing Taylor to let out a cheer in victory as the small jets on the bees sides came to life allowing the metallic bee like robot to slowly rise itself off the bench and into the air. "Primary power up is complete no internal faults detected!" the bees cat like eyes focused on Taylor who was doing a little victory dance in celebration of her first successful robot minion. "How may this unit serve you mistress Robotnik?" The robot asked uncaring that its creator was doing a rather silly dance in front of it as all the metallic bee cared about was fulfilling its masters orders.
"Nothing as of right now Buzz Bomber" answered Taylor after finally finishing her victory dance, her happy smile stretching from ear to ear "just go behind those large boxes in that corner over there" she pointed at the aforementioned corner on the right side of the room that was the most covered by darkness. "Go into hibernation mode until I have need of you" the Bomber gave a slight buzz in affirmative before whizzing past its master and flying out of sight and after a few seconds Taylor heard rather than saw the jets go off line telling her that the robot bee was now in its hibernation mode.
"Well better do some clearing up down here after all I won't want dad to get suspicious if he sees that somethings have been moved around" thought the young inventor, as she swiftly moved around the room putting the tools that she used to make the robot back into their original holdings whist taking extra care to hide the brown tarp that she used to cover the now alive Buzz Bomber. While she was dutifully working to hide what she had been doing down in the basement Taylor couldn't help but remember how she had triggered at the funeral how seeing the broken look within her fathers eyes along with the silent men in black slowly lowering her mothers body into the cold unforgiving ground. The stress and pure anguish of it all had been far too much for her young mind to take at the time thus causing her to trigger giving her the knowledge and memories of a man named doctor Eggman. A man by all accounts had a frightening level of intelligence as he had invented unbelievably powerful machines like Metal Sonic the robot counterpart of the speedster superhero Sonic the hedgehog. Eggman's greatest enemy a robot who could adapt and evolve to better fight the blue speedster and now all that intelligence was hers to command and Taylor would be lying if she said that the thought of building some of the more destructive weapons that were locked away inside her mind didn't excite her just a little bit.
"I can't wait to get some more resources" Taylor said to herself with a smile as she placed the last tool back were it belongs "with enough time I could even build an army and finally rid this city of the gangs once and for all." When she was finally done tidying up the basement Taylor walked up the stairs though her mind did begin to fill with visions of an army of killer robots and the very sun itself being blocked out by an armada of colossal airships whist the city's gangs along with their Parahuman leaders ran away in terror of her mighty robot army while she sits within her very own Eggmobile commanding the vast metallic legions. "Yes I'll be the savour of Brockton bay" Taylor closed and locked the basement door and returned the key to its hook "and all the world shall see the true genius that is Dr Taylor Hebert Robotnik" the young genius struck a heroic pose while also giving a grin that was filled with equal parts madness and excitement.
"Taylor I'm home!" She suddenly heard her father call from the front door the sound of paper bags could also be heard from where she was standing "I've brought Chinese food from the takeout near the union building!" The promise of food caused her stomach to rumble.
"But first things first I can't really destroy the city's gangs while running on an empty stomach now can I" the mad scientist thought as she ran into the kitchen where upon entering saw her father Danny Hebert already setting up the plates for tonights dinner.
"Hum I wonder If I should show Emma my Buzz Bomber?" Taylor suddenly thought whist walking over to help her dad set up the table for the Chinese. "Hum something to think about for later" once everything was set up and ready the two Hebert's sat down for dinner "because right now I just wanted to relax and spend time with my dad," with a small smile Taylor began to eat with her dad she started some small talk between them but she took extra care in keeping the conversations away from her mother knowing that any mention of her would cause her dad to get depressed and honestly if she hadn't triggered with Ivo's memories she was certain that she would be just as sad and heartbroken as her dad. But she wasn't because Ivo's past had taught her that even though a family member was gone you shouldn't let it drag you down into despair other wise it may drive you mad and turn you into an unrecognisable monster just like it did to Eggman's grandfather Gerald Robotnik who created the eclipse cannon to destroy mankind after the army had killed his granddaughter Maria.
"I won't ever go mad like Gerald did though" Taylor took a bite of food a sense of determination and utter resolve filling up within her heart "because I'll protect my family from any one who dares to harm them be they the government or the hero's and villains of this world" she took a sip of juice. "I'll crush all who get in my way and bring the world into a new golden age even if I have to drag it and the human race kicking and screaming into the new age I'll do it." Her eyes softened when she watched her dad eat "I'll save this dying world because Ivo's memories also taught me that family is the most important thing in the world and that I have to fight to keep it safe from the monsters who would try to harm them."
"Taylor are you alright?" Taylor looked at her father who had a concerned looked upon his ageing face "You looked like you were zoning out there for a moment kiddo" she smiled softly at him glad to see that he wasn't so broken that he couldn't tell when she was going off into her own little mental world like she was doing just now.
"I'm find dad just got a little be distracted with thoughts on how me and Emma are going to spend are time together in high school," she told him a little lie so that they could get back to dinner and to also help relieve him of his concerns about her zoning out just now.
"Oh alright" her father relented having bought her lie easily enough and the both of them went back to peacefully eating their takeout food.
"Yep you better look out world Taylor Hebert Robotnik is coming to save you" Taylor lazily scurried a spice and sour chicken ball on her fork and after eating the chicken ball she felt her lips go upwards into a confidant smirk "wether you like it or not because no one on this dammed green earth is going to stop me from making this cape filled world a better place." Her light green eyes which she had inherited from her father darkened for a moment though thankfully her dad hadn't seen it "and wow be to anyone who's stupid enough to get in my way because if they do then I'll show them the true terror of having my wrath brought down upon them." She didn't know why but Taylor had turned her head to looked out of the kitchen window where she could see the gang infested city and all its slow decaying glory.
"So enjoy your happiness for now criminals of Brockton bay because a reckoning is soon coming your way and her name is Taylor Robotnik!"