At My Fingertips Chapter 3 (original chapter Chapter 25)

A Few Days Later

Taylor's Room, Hebert Home

Grinning to myself, I laid myself back on my bed and examined my right hand almost fondly. Meeting the Wards yesterday had been a very interesting experience. For one, they were all pretty nice people, very much unlike Sophia. For another, I had managed to touch most of them via handshakes and was able to derive some sort of powers from each of them during the whole tour.

Vista, a Shaker able to bend space into a pretzel (and who had loathed Sophia), had given me a minor version of her power. I could bend space, even the space of objects, but only within three feet of myself and only on objects up to a certain size. I had a feeling it would be very useful in the right circumstances.

The new Ward, Browbeat, had given me a weakened version of his self-biokinesis ability, specifically letting me accelerate my rate of physical healing and minorly bulk up the muscles in my arms. It was pretty cool, actually.

Clockblocker (who had let him pick his own name?) had given me a very much weakened, but nonetheless useful, version of his time-stop touch. Rather than freezing someone in time, I could cause someone/something touched by me to drastically slow down in time.

Aside from them, I got nothing from Gallant, Kid Win or Aegis due to the armored nature of their costumes. On the bright side though, I had managed to shake hands (and get the autographs of) Velocity, Battery, Dauntless and Triumph.

Velocity's power, as his Cape name suggested, let him move fast. As a downside, he had very little ability to interact with the world was reduced in proportion to how fast he was moving. The version I got from him was very much scaled down in both the strong points and the weak points, letting me move at a running speed while jogging, while being slightly weakened physically.

Battery had three uses for the energy her power generated; boosting her speed, boosting her strength and minor electromagnetic abilities. I got the last one, but, on the bright side, Battery's electromagnetic abilities were fairly minor, so there was almost no loss of strength. Score.

Dauntless was a rising star in the ENE Protectorate due to the fact he could infuse an item, any item, with power and give it special abilities and functions. His version peaked every thirty hours or so; mine peaked every four hours but was less than a tenth as strong, with the effects I could imbue being a lot less impressive to boot. His power also altered the shape and composition of the item in question to something resembling Greek armor, while mine shaped them into a costume along the lines I had been thinking for my real costume. Go me.

Finally, Triumph had two components to his powers; his trademark sonic roar and a degree of super strength, able to punch through concrete. I wasn't close to that level, but I was a whole lot stronger than I looked when I wanted to be.

"That's a lot of powers in one day…" I muttered. Seven powers all told. Yes, a lot weaker than their originals, but still. More powers, more utility, less chance of getting hurt.

I hadn't been out and about since I knocked over that Merchant storehouse a few days ago, the one with the sea mine in it (something I was still perturbed about). I think it was time to have Mnemosyne go out and about to 'liberate' more weapons from the Merchants.

"Taylor, dinner!" Dad called from downstairs.

"Coming!" I called back as I sat up. Pizza tonight, followed by going out to raid another Merchant weapon storehouse. Good times.

That Night

Warehouse Roof, Streets of Brockton Bay

Kneeling on the cold concrete roof, I peered down into the warehouse beneath me through the skylight. It was barren for the most part, but with a big stack of crates full of weapons and ammo in one corner, along with grenades, spare parts for machines and all kinds of other things. The merchant I'd taken the memories from had been pretty fuzzy on the details, but he had known enough…including the security system's password, and the location of all of the security cameras inside and outside of the building.

Standing up, I automatically did a once over of my costume to make sure everything was in place. The black cargo pants, jacket, t-shirt, balaclava and trainers that I'd worn for my initial outing had been changed by the use of my new powers, making them into a proper costume. While not spandex-thin, they were still a lot better than they had been initially, looking uniform and professional. The trainers had turned into knee-length lace-up boots, which was pretty useful.

I'd tried to use my imbuement power on the rubber gloves with…dismal results. They were too damned weak for it to work on, so I'd used them on an old pair of gardening gloves that Dad hadn't used in ages. They'd changed to match the rest of my costume, and the thickness on the tips of my fingers was just thin enough for my power to work, which was good.

Aside from the change in looks, all of my clothes had the same two powers in them; enhanced durability, similar to weak armor, and all sounds made by the clothes were muffled.

I'd decided I needed a mask as well, just in case, so I'd dug out into my mom's old school things and found a bunch of cardboard blank face-masks that I remembered were for drawing on, and making your own mask design. On a whim, I'd grabbed a black marker and drawn a stylized 'M' across it before using my power on it.

The result was pretty cool; the colors had inverted, making the majority of the mask black, and the 'M' white. It had also added lenses of some kind to the eye-holes, also black, but I could see through them perfectly fine. That was, in fact, one of the two powers that the mask had; night vision and a voice-changer ability.

The bulletproof vest (the one I'd stolen from the Merchants) I had yet to enhance, but I wore it over my t-shirt, but under my jacket. Some protection was better than none, in my book. I was still trying to fly under the radar here; getting into a firefight was the last thing I should be doing.

That being said, I'd still brought along one of the handguns I'd stolen from the Merchants last time, a Glock 21, as well as three magazines of ammo, including the one in the weapon itself. I'd also added two of the flashbangs, just in case.

Something which I'd forgotten to grab in my last robbery had been holsters for the guns, something which I'd hoped to remedy this time around. Having a gun stuffed in a pocket wasn't something which screamed 'safe!' to me. I knew enough about gun safety to know that.

The Merchants, likely someone before they'd shot themselves up with whatever hall-brew concoction they were peddling that week, had actually been smart about security here. All of the cameras were linked both to the security office in the building itself, AND to an off-site backup. Also, deactivating the security system would alert someone at Skidmark's base, although god knows if any of them were lucid enough to remember what the alarm meant.

As for physical security, there was one person inside the warehouse itself, and there had been three people at the off-site backup, which was why I'd paid them a visit first, knocking them all out and destroying the servers and screens. I'd also put an Empire tag on the wall as a way to frame the Empire 88 for what I was doing.

The three morons hadn't seen me because I'd flashbanged them before knocking them out. Having a degree of super strength really was quite useful in this regard. I sure as hell wouldn't have been able to knock a man out with just my bare hands before I'd gotten it.

Now all I had to do was sneak in and take care of the warehouse guard. Simplest thing to do was what I was planning on doing…chucking a brick through a window to draw the bastard out.

Shimmying down the drainpipe that I'd climbed up, I quickly found one that was good enough to use. In the area of town that the Merchants squatted in, there were plenty of broken bricks just lying on the ground. Damned parasites were killing the town, and they didn't even care.

Narrowing my eyes through the mask, I hefted the brick and applied Browbeat's power to my arm. Watching it swell slightly as the muscles grew larger, I was amazed at how useful my Trump power was. I was practically a Cape version of a Swiss army knife.

With a grunt, I sent the brick spinning through the air and through the window at the front of the building. Then, using Velocity's power, I sped up and leaped using the extra strength granted to me by Triumph's power, landing against the wall above the door. I dug my fingers into the brickwork with my right hand and waited.

"WHO THE FUCK IS MESSING WITH THE MERCHANTS, HUH?!" a man shouted as he stormed towards the door from the inside. "Goddamn kids think they're so fucking cool by throwing bricks, huh?! I'll put a cap in their asses, see how cool they are then!"

With a slam, the door beneath me burst open, revealing a man dressed in mangy clothes and carrying what even I could recognize as a pretty damn good gun; it was a goddamn Desert Eagle!

"Where are you, ya little shits! This is the fucking sixth time you little bitches have pulled this shit!" the man howled.

Wow. Guess I hammered his berserk button. Sorry, not sorry.

Letting go of the brickwork with a push, I landed on top of him with both feet, sending him stumbling to all fours and making him drop his gun before landing a chop to the back of his head, knocking him out.

"And that's that for you." I said with a chuckle. "Thanks for the gun."

I picked it up and read it for a moment, absorbing the information on how to properly wield it. Every gun was different with weight, balance and the like to take into account, so I did this for all of them, just in case. Then I ejected the clip, noticing that the moron hadn't even flipped the safety off, and noted that it fired .44 Magnum rounds. Something to add to the shopping list.

Walk softly and carry a big gun indeed.

Depositing both gun and magazine in my backpack, I dragged the guard across the street and secured him to a drainpipe via his wrists using some duct tape I'd brought. Then I slapped some over his mouth and around his ankles before heading into the warehouse itself.

Looking around, I easily found the security office, such as it was, and destroyed the VHS tapes with the footage on them, before destroying all of the cameras as well. No harm in being careful, after all.

Then came the fun part: looting the place of all I needed.

Just as with the last place, the equipment stored here was way more than I'd ever imagined that the Merchants could possibly have access to and I greedily added what I needed, including a handful of actual grenades, a couple of holsters and magazine pouches for the Glock, a holster for the six-shooter I'd grabbed last time, a Colt King Cobra, and, last but not least, a P90 selective fire submachinegun, along with as many magazines of ammo as I could stuff into my backpack.

There had only been assault rifles and Uzis in the last place, either too large or too much like gangster weapons for my needs, so this little beauty would be very useful for if I got into a serious fight with someone who wasn't bulletproof.

Barely managing to force the zipper of the bag closed, I huffed as I hefted it onto my back, bulking up a bit all over my body to compensate. I was going to have to find a better place than the disused coal chute in the basement to hide this stuff; Dad may not go down into the basement much, but he would eventually, and I REALLY didn't want to have to answer how I got my hands on enough ordinance to start my own private war against the gangs.

Fortunately for me, there were choices upon choices for where I could set one up. I had another three weeks and a bit before I would be going to Arcadia, and I would have to study to take the assessment tests I would no doubt have to sit beforehand.

In between doing all of my normal chores, studying and my regular life, I would have to search for a place to act as my base and armory. It would have to be somewhere that your regular person couldn't get to, and that a Cape wouldn't think to look there either.

That would be for later though. For now, I had a time-bomb to set up and another Merchant's memories to trawl through for more targets.

The Next Day

Director Piggot's Office, PRT ENE Building

"That makes two Merchant weapons storehouses that have blown up in the last week." Emily Piggot frowned. "One I could attribute to the usual slapdash storage methods and haphazard care that the Merchants use with anything but their damned drugs, but two, with the second following on so quickly after the first? It's too suspicious."

"We managed to take the Merchant who was nominally the guard of the storehouse into custody." Armsmaster reported. "According to him, someone lured him outside of the building with a brick through the front window, and then knocked him out from behind. He woke up later duct taped to a drainpipe opposite the street from the warehouse, which had already exploded. I suspect, Director, that we have a new Vigilante on the Bay."

"Lovely." the sarcasm positively dripped from the obese woman's tone. "We shall have to assume that whoever it is that is responsible for these bombings has 'liberated' some munitions and arms from the storehouses before blowing them up. A vigilante armed to the teeth with who knows how many guns and bombs…tch."

"From what little the BBPD have managed to recover from the first site, it's apparent that the explosion there was as a result of grenades chain-exploding and gunpowder cooking off." the Protectorate ENE leader stated crisply. "In the case of the second bombing, the damage is identical."

"Did the Merchants have any kind of security systems in place at either of them?" Piggot asked, not really thinking they might.

"Actually, yes. The first had a security camera that led to an apartment three doors down." Armsmaster replied. "The footage was recorded on an old VHS tape that was deposited in the toilet, which ruined the magnetic tape. The bleach poured on top of it and the elapsed time certainly didn't help either. In the case of the second location, there was both an on-site VHS tape system that recorded footage from cameras both internal and external, and an off-site backup location with digital memory for storing the footage. Both were thoroughly destroyed, with the cameras also destroyed before the warehouse was mostly destroyed. There was also a security alarm that was deactivated by the Merchant guarding the premises when he left to take umbrage with whoever threw the brick."

As she listened, the Director's frown grew. "For the Merchants, that is a very good security system, in the case of the second site at least. The almost perfect way that the security was bypassed implies some sort of inside knowledge."

"Or a Thinker." the armored man suggested. "Some form of clairvoyance or prediction power would account for a lot of it."

"True." Piggot conceded. "The way that whoever this is targeting the Merchants though…"

"One additional thing to be concerned about is the Empire tag that was discovered in the second site's off-site data storage facility." Armsmaster mentioned. "This is far from the typical type of operation that the Empire would be responsible for, so I would guess that the tag is a red herring meant to divert attention and pin the blame on the Empire. Skidmark isn't the sharpest tool in the box, so doubtless he's planning some form of 'retaliation' against the Empire right now."

"Have Dauntless and Velocity's patrol route altered to account for possible friction between the Merchants and the Empire." Piggot huffed. Not that such a thing was easy; the Merchants held territory in dribs and drabs all across Brockton Bay, mostly in the poorer sections of the city, well away from the normal patrol routes of the Protectorate and PRT, who could only patrol the richer sections of the city due to low numbers and funding.

Still, the Empire's unofficial territory was a lot closer to the standard patrol routes, so altering them slightly in the short term would be doable.

"The last thing that we need is for a new kid on the block to kick-start the gang war we've barely been able to fend off for years." the Director muttered. With three large gangs, a host of smaller ones, insufficient funds and personnel to combat them and an uncooperative and seemingly uncaring national command, it was akin to a miracle that Brockton Bay hadn't drowned in its own orgy of blood and violence years ago.

It was only by making tough decisions, severe compromises and through bitter tenacity that the city still danced on a knife's edge today.

Piggot knew that it was a losing fight; a powder keg like Brockton Bay needed only a single spark to cause it to explode, and you could only rely on hard work and good luck for so long. Eventually, whether it was this new Cape or something else, Brockton Bay would explode with violence.

Until that happened, however, it was Emily Piggot's duty to do what she could to keep the peace, including explaining to another idiot Cape how the balance of the city worked.

"I want all cameras within the city kept on the lookout for any signs of a new Parahuman that matches the proposed capabilities." she ordered crisply. "I don't like working with so little an amount of information as we have on this character. We need at least an appearance to go off of, if not a name. We can't even assign a temporary codename with just a suspicion and no eyewitness reports."

"Whether it be by luck or design, Director, the Parahuman behind these two attacks on the Merchants has been able carry both out almost flawlessly." Armsmaster pointed out neutrally. "It's likely that they'll be avoiding the cameras in the streets as well, considering there are likely gang sympathizers in the police and traffic divisions."

"I am aware." Piggot stated tightly. "Miss Militia is far more likely to stumble across them on one of her nighttime patrols, but the effort must be made."

"Understood." the Tinker nodded. "Are we angling to recruit this new Cape or arrest them?"

"That will depend on whether they can understand that their actions will cause more harm than good." the Director sighed. "If they can understand that, we'll go the soft approach. If they can't, then we play hardball."

She could, to a degree, understand the frustration of someone living in Brockton Bay; New Wave was all but defunct and the Protectorate and PRT only protected the rich parts of the city. To the average person, she knew, the government forces were a joke and useless. It was why so many tried the independent hero route when they Triggered, if they weren't pulled into villainy that was.

Emily had been born in a town to the mid-west, a quiet one, but one with a closely-knit community, so she could understand how someone might feel at seeing the government and law enforcement seemingly be helpless to stop their home from being consumed by criminals. In the case of her hometown, a greedy corporation had bought the land the town sat on and evicted the residents.

She was also well aware that her prejudiced views on Capes, that at best they were bullies and at worst they were monsters. The Slaughterhouse Nine, Nilbog, the Three Blasphemies in Europe, the Machine Army…all of them were proof, as far as she was concerned, that Capes were nothing but trouble.

Sadly, Capes were extraordinarily good at seeming to be forces for good thanks to the influence of comic books back in the sixties through to the early eighties. The Unwritten Rules, which turned the whole business into a gigantic game of cops and robbers, were also problematic. What really made Emily Piggot steam was the softball approach she was forced to take with strong villains who committed to showing up at the Endbringer Battles, such as Hookwolf, essentially getting a tepid response to their actions so long as they fought one of the Endbringers every three months.

She and Armsmaster talked further about the mysterious Cape, but moved on to other matters once it was all squared away. Piggot privately hoped that the damned Cape would be reasonable for once, but her inner cynic told her that was unlikely.

Several Days Later

Loft, Abandoned Warehouse, Docks Area, Brockton Bay

Finding an abandoned building in the Bay was as easy as throwing a tennis ball in a random direction and finding where it lands, most of the time anyway, but there was also the risk of it being camped out by Merchants or even just regular hobos.

Because of that, I had immediately ruled out any houses on the waterfront, because it was practically an open secret that most of them were camped out by one or other of the gangs for when small boats snuck in around the half-sunken ships blocking the Bay's entrance to smuggle in drugs and weapons.

I couldn't go far north either, due to the Trainyard, which was the territory of a rowdy Cape called Trainwreck. The Merchants had a lot of people in the eastern part of the Docks area, while the Boat Graveyard took up the north-east and the Broadwalk area took up the south and south-east.

My house was in the Docks South area of the Bay, the name was a bit misleading as it was more to the south-east, but that was just me quibbling. I couldn't have it there, mostly because I wanted nothing of my night life to get back to my house if things went pear-shaped. Fortunately, that had still left quite a large part of the actual Docks area to explore, and I'd found a pretty good place in the western part of the Docks that I was cleaning out and making into a base of sorts.

It was a small warehouse that had been owned by an equally small company, which had quickly gone under once the idiots who sunk ships across the Bay's entrance did their idiotic and foolish deed. They had sold all their assets, declared bankruptcy and moved to Boston, leaving this warehouse empty and gathering dust until I broke in.

Well, I didn't actually break in; someone had used this place to sleep in before and had already broken a window to do so. All I did was use said window to get in. Unlawful entry at worst.

Anyway, I moved a bookcase that had been left behind over the window and nailed it in place; whoever had formerly owned this place had only taken stock that could be sold, while the hobos who had broken in had just been looking for a place to sleep out of the elements, so they likely hadn't tried to get into in the locked cabinets.

Having super strength was really convenient in those sorts of situations.

Once that was taken care of, I had taken a quick look at the other windows. Most of them had been boarded over, leaving just the one I'd entered through and another one clear, so another large piece of furniture was hammered into place. That one couldn't be seen due to the amount of dust, dirt and filth on both sides of the window. A bit gross, but any advantage in a storm.

The loft, where I decided to relocate everything that was useful from the warehouse area below, was just as abandoned as the rest of the place. It stretched across the length of the warehouse, with one window at each end, both of which were boarded up.

All in all, it was perfect for my purposes. I'd have to make some adjustments to it, such as tearing down the stairs leading up to the loft. I wasn't counting on my hasty renovations to keep people out, but preventing them from getting to my base? That was different.

A way in and out was needed, but I was confident that I could jury-rig something that would let me open and close a window without looking any different. For the moment though, I was going to need to build something to store all of my various weapons and ammo on.

Fortunately, I'd done my research on this subject. In gun stores, pistols were either supported under the barrel and the rear by two metal rods, or in the trigger guard by a single flat rule. I chose the latter, as they were easier for me to get my hands on; there were so many old stores that had gone out of business that getting such things was simplicity itself.

In short order, I'd managed to build a suitable little armory section in my new base. With all of the guns hanging from it, it was a pretty intimidating sight. That wasn't all I had planned though. In case something happened at home (like Sophia storming the place again, except more serious), I'd have a place to escape to and hide out, so having a bed or something, a sleeping bag at least, was necessary.

Thing was, it would cost cold hard cash to buy those, and the PRT had yet to pay me the lump sum they had promised, although that was because of red tape and mountains of forms according to Dad, who sympathized with whoever had to sign them.

That being the case, I needed a cash flow injection. The Merchants were wholly undeserving of the money that they had in my opinion, and the Merchant in my last outing had told me, via my psychometry, where a big part of their funds were kept.

With such a target, I'd need to pay them a visit now, wouldn't I?

And that's the end of chapter 3. It's actually nice to come back to this ficlet, which is a very 'Taylor' power; seemingly weak, but goes all 'Escalation' once she has a good grasp of it. Might go up to eight on this one…

For those of you where were bitching about Dinah's power in Waterworks, I've changed the things that you were bitching about. Seriously…