I nosed my way into Boston's PR department, it was a bit smaller than Brockton's and way more office like in that it was just a set of offices instead of a whole presentation. A total switch with the research departments, it was huge here and they loved how weird my power was, whereas in Brockton they barely had time to care.
I walked past doors, glancing through windows until I Observed someone who met my requirements. I knocked on her window and mimed walking in and shrugged, to which she held up a finger and continued speaking into her phone. I faffed about outside the door, reading some posts about a dogshit seasonal anime I unironically loved, until I heard her put the receiver down.
I opened the door, went in, and leant against the edge of her desk.
"Well, if it isn't our little Simurgh Slayer," Nancy's face creased into a thousand crows-feet as she smiled, which wasn't a great look on a twenty nine year old. "What can I do you for?"
I wasn't sure if she was making fun of me, and that aggravated my betamax genes. Surely not, right? The videos had gone viral, as expected, with a largely positive reception so surely I was just being a stupid little bitch for doubting myself in any fashion and I should just roll with it.
"L'me axe you summin, Nance," I made secretive gesture and leaned closer. "Do you ever wish you had your own backing track, or sound effects?"
She mirrored my smile, but her eyes were confusion. "I suppose, it would be pretty interesting, wouldn't it?"
"And it is," I continued, drawing back a little. "I was thinking something like-"
{Guitar riff}
{Dark Smoke Pun-cher!}
Nancy flinched at the sudden blast of sound.
"-But I figured it would be better to ask you guys for help in work shopping it. Like for when I enter the scene or something, bam! Cue the noise, maybe do some poses and shit? Yeah?"
She opened her mouth, paused, and recognition lit up her face at the vague pose-like movements I was making. "I thought your look was strange, but it's all a send up to the Sentai Elite, isn't it? Your whole schtick is a reference to Matcha Black!"
I had absolutely no fucking clue as to who that was.
"It's so obvious," she laughed. "The little gold lightning bolts on your side, the visor ripped straight from his helmet, the weird clash of sneaky and stand-out." She laughed again, covering her mouth. "It's too bad you're so white, we could have capitalised on it a bit more."
"Haha, yeah, I know right?" Matcha Green, yeah, I'd heard of her, but who was this guy meant to be? "My favourite underrated Sentai hero."
"Good," she gave a small, sad, contemplative smile. "That's good. But you're here about managing your presentation, yes? Let me just bring up your file."
She spun her chair around a bit to fossick through her computer, "Why does it say you're an uncooperative liability? You came to us for image help."
Cold sweat broke out under my uniform, "they made me do a test run press conference, and I didn't take it seriously. For some reason they thought I'd really say, 'and Vista is my nigga,' live on air."
She gave me a pitying look and continued scrolling through.
"Sound Generation doesn't seem to be on your list, but I would guess it's a new one," Nancy frowned as she comprehended just who it was she was dealing with. Me, the Trumpiest Trump who ever Trumped. "Then that would be why you're here… It's good to get things like this approved, and while your little sound effect would be fine to use in the public it could do with some fine tuning. It's too loud, for example. And you can never do enough focus testing, because if you can do other sounds?"
I nodded.
"Depending on the situation, and the crowd, you can pick the most popular for that demographic, sway the mood and set a presence," Nancy whipped out a stack of post-it notes and started jotting down reminders. "Leave this with me for now, I'll kick it about the office after I get a recording, see what the others think and get back to you when we have some examples cooked up."
We exchanged Fonzie looks, or at least I tried to, and when she didn't do the face I figured I should forgo ayy woahing out of the room.
"Ok, so I'll, like, email a video of me doing some sounds?"
"That'd be great."
"Cool," I smiled again. "Thanks, see ya later!"
And with that I made myself stride away, desperately hoping she didn't have the time to look up the footage of my practice press release. Fuck you, past Greg, you fuck head. You're a fucking shit head.
"It's capture the hostage. The PRT have them protected somewhere in the building and it's up to us to retrieve them, and bring them back to this location, unharmed."
Weld jabbed his finger at a spot of the schematic in front of us, and looked at us expectantly. I was pretty sure I could do this myself. When nobody said anything he continued.
"They have Big Dog and Trick on their side, does anyone have any suggestions?"
"How about I do it," I raised my hand, ignoring the throbbing vein in my temple.
"Do what?"
"It," I gestured broadly. "By myself, the whole thing."
"Greg," Weld sighed. "This is a team exercise, you're not doing it by yourself."
"I'ma do it," I subtly glanced at everyone to see what they thought, but they didn't look too impressed. Whatever, they'd be impressed, I'd make sure of it.
"Come on, I know it's a bit early," Weld continued as though I couldn't do it by myself, and save everyone the hassle. "But you're not always going to get to work during the afternoon in the Protectorate, someone has to do the night shifts."
God I hated night shifts, especially like the one I just got through at the ER. I totally got Amy on a spiritual level right now; how she dealt with all that shit with so little INT I'd never know.
"Well, my pre-cog is giving out nonsense," Roulette yawned into her hand. "Can we just storm the building? We have enough manpower, right?"
"We stormed the building last time, and we got our asses kicked," said Scops, and she was probably going to say something else, but I spoke over her.
"And last time you didn't have me. I'm not joking when I say I can do this by myself, I'm going to be Triumvirate," I stood up and slapped the table. "And if you don't believe me, may your heads be stricken from your shoulders for such disloyalty!"
"Bro, you're not even that fast," Reynard kicked at my foot under the table. "Alexandria can go, like, Mach five, and she's the slowest. Realistically, wouldn't it be more like, dudes like Myrrdn and Chevalier and Narwhal, powergap, you and Dragon, powergap, them?"
I shot him a dirty look.
"And besides, don't you have to be able to fly?" he continued, like the stupid furry he was. "I'm pretty sure that's a pre-requisite."
New Quest 'Airborne'!
Achieve your dream of flight, that'll show them!
Success: 200 000xp, Title: Ariel Ace
New Quest 'Retrieve the hostage'!
Prove you have what it takes, get the hostage back by yourself!
Success: 20 000xp, decreased reputation with Weld, remediable teamwork course
Bonus 1: defeat all enemies
Bonus 2: don't raise the alarm
Failure: decreased reputation with Boston Wards, remedial teamwork course
"Fuck you!" I stormed out of the room. Who did that nigga think he was, Missy? You didn't have to fly to be Triumvirate! That wasn't a rule, I checked. There were no rules, you just had to be a baller par excellence, which I would be. Six fucking months, I was a fat little chode who could barely outrun Tattletale just six months ago, and look at me now. I scoffed internally, they'd understand soon enough, and then they'd say, 'oh, we were wrong, you will be Triumvirate, I guess'.
I cracked my neck as I walked out of our building, and stole into the shadows. I'd show them for doubting me.
The building with the hostage was only just around the corner from where we were set up, on a PRT/Protectorate owned training facility, somewhere in an otherwise unused part of Boston's outskirts. I Hazed and peeked around the corner. Lots of sentries, given that Reynard could hide the whole group under a blanket illusion, but I could exploit that. Reynard was ground bound, I wasn't. I drew back around and dropped my Haze, casting Mana adhesion in its stead before scaling the wall at my back.
I slipped over the lip of the roof and rolled diagonally across until I was roughly in the center. I Hazed, and from there it was but a hop, skip and a jump and I was sailing through the air over the road and all the guards heads.
It had taken a little bit for me to truly get what Grace was, but when I had, oh boy. It was a Breaker effect that let me take a tiny shit on things like gravity, friction and momentum.
It slowed my fall as I neared the roof and I fell into a roll as I hit, barely a sound, landing exactly where I wanted to. I mentally reviewed the schematics, there was no roof access but if I went a bit to my right roughly about… I shuffled a few yards… here, there should be the third floor room almost directly above second floor hostage location.
I conjured a saw (which killed my Haze) and sent it ablaze with writhing arcs. That done I eyeballed the hole I was going to cut, making sure it was big enough for two, and scraped the saw along my imaginary lines, wincing at the noise it made as it sank into the concrete. Slowly, carefully, I cut a rough square hole, every scrape and pop and electric whine setting my teeth on edge.
Ah, rooking fucking mistake, Greg. You didn't even check the room. Baka baka baka.
The cubular chunk of roof slipped as I was making my final cuts, the still attached edges unable to hold its weight, and it almost got out of reach before my hand snaked out and it vanished into my inventory. I dropped through the hole, saw turning into smoke and dust as I released my hold on its mana, and surveyed the area; lots of dust and shit from the ceiling. Note to self, fix that next time I break in through the roof.
I slunk over to put my back to the door, extending a thin tendril of near see through smoke through the gap at the bottom. I carefully swept it back and forth along the hallway at shin level, and not feeling any disturbances, opened the door and slipped through.
Empty, as expected.
I slunk down the hall, my tendril of smoke questing ahead of me, under doors and around the corner, down the stairs; until it hit legs. I wracked my brains, still pretty sure they were standing right outside the room where the hostage was meant to be. Shit. How was I going to do four simultaneous take-downs quiet enough to avoid raising the alarm? It's not like this was a game where I could throw a rock at them, one by one, and they'd path around a corner, this was super cereal real life.
I felt out their rough positions with the thin smoke, two facing directly away from the door, one looking toward my position and one looking the other way; I was pretty sure. This would be a cinch if I had Reynard, but fuck that guy. I'd just have to rush them.
I screwed my eyes shut, inhaled deeply, and opened them on the exhale.
I cast Haze and slowly tiptoed down the first flight until I got to the corner, then stepped out into view. I got a brief look at their formation, pretty much what I thought, before the guy watching the stairs leant forward like he was trying to peer through my Haze. I leapt and he flinched, but he had no chance over this distance. My foot hit the floor and in two steps I was in my critical distance, one hand on his hip, one on his neck, Shackling them together.
My momentum carried me through him, twirling into the gap in between them and the door; into which the guy I'd just Shackled crashed with a pained cry. In a flash my hands were on the second guy, then the third, then the fourth, sending them toppling to the floor with shoves, Shackled and neutralized.
Damn I was sick. Who's not worthy of Triumvirate now, huh? Fags.
Suddenly their radios lit up with panicked voices.
"They are outside the VIP room, I repeat, they are outside the VIP room!"
I rolled my stupid eyes. There goes the alarm bonus, well done Greg, you failed me yet again. I sighed, onward and upward.
I positioned myself in front of the door, jumped, and kicked out with both feet. The door practically splintered, hanging on with one hinge, giving me a glimpse of Big Dog, Trick and who I could only assume was the hostage before I smoked the room. My Shield was already cast before my feet hit the floor, immediately flinging whatever trap Trick had set up aside as I barreled in.
I felt my smoke get swept aside as Big Dog activated his aura, around himself, Trick and the hostage.
"Oh, give me a fuckin' break, Dog," I whined. "Take that thing down."
The aura gingerly swiped a paw through where I was throwing my voice, "no way, man," Big Dog shouted wildly. "Just give up!"
I felt my foot depress something as I slowly circled them, a pressure plate. There was a muffled bang and I reflexively shielded, dodging backward as Big Dog took another swipe at me, tinkertech glue spraying the room from the hidden mine.
I didn't have time for this fucking shit! I stood stock still, trying to figure out where the glue had spread through my smoke, but I didn't have the precision. I was going to run out of mana if this kept up, so, like, fuck it, I guess.
I leapt high, landing on the back of the dog aura, right hand poised to strike. There was a brief wail of electricity as I punched down, Arc Blade cast for the moment of contact before being released again. I struck again, and again, each blow showering sparks on the ghostly, green fur that began to crack and deform under my fists. There was a moment after a strike where the construct shuddered, and vanished out from under me, letting me drop next to them; and that was it. Two quick taps and they were lying bonelessly on the ground, paralysed.
"Just imagine that was one of my harder hits and play dead… oh shit!"
A dozen heavy footsteps rattled the floor, the PRT must have decided they'd faffed about for long enough and that they should come and protect the hostage. I reached out toward the doorway, a thin line of solid mana extending from a fingertip, blossoming into a wafer thin, bumpy wall, that from the other side would look exactly like a stack of claymore mines.
Ok, so, plan? Plan. Good brain.
Big Dog and Trick had started struggling as soon as the paralysis wore off so I hit them with it again, "dudes, just chill, pretend you're KO'd, capiche? And you…" I eyed the presumed hostage. Clearly his role in this exercise wasn't important to him, because it wasn't showing up on his bio. "Play along."
Ok, time to try something new.
I moved quickly under the pressure of incoming jackboots, sliding Trick into a corner and hitting him with a Haze, before turning to Dog who was thankfully mostly still. Mana disguise said it was meant for me, but that could go fuck itself. I tapped a finger to his shoulder and worked through the process of it in my mind.
It should work just the same as casting Haze on something that wasn't myself.
"Where's everyone else?" Norman asked, voice muffled by the floor, turning his head to look up at me plaintively as voices argued on the other side of my fake claymore wall.
"I bet them that I could do this myself, now shush, I'm thinking."
Thinking. So, disguise other. I ran through what made a disguise for myself, how the mana moved, where it moved, what it moved to. There was a point where, after being initially shaped the mana would spread over me, so all I should have to do is interrupt that point and redirect the flow.
I cast, and as expected, laying before me was another me.
Fuckin' mint, ayy!
I grabbed the hostage, who submitted gamely and Disguised myself as Big Dog, aura covering the both of us. It wouldn't hold up if someone bumped me too hard, but I only had to get so far.
Game time. Five mana left, and a dream.
The claymore wall burst into a puff of smoke as I released my hold on it.
"Thank god," I worked my mouth around Norm's voice and dragged the hostage forward. "You're here. I managed to defeat Dark Smoke Puncher, but the others could be anywhere! We need to change location!"
The troopers parted like the red sea as I hustled forward, casting fearful glances behind me. I was making it, and I made it halfway through them before a loud voice called out.
"Hold on, what's your pass-phrase?"
It was at this point my Disguise popped because I ran out of mana. Why had I run out of mana? The only thing I had chewing it up was… the Haze. Fuck you Fred.
I hoisted the hostage onto my shoulders and bolted, shoving troopers aside like children as I dashed for the first floor stairs. I drifted around the corner, hearing con-foam splatter on the wall behind me, feet hammering the floorboard until I took the whole stairwell in two steps; one to jump off the top and one to push off the wall and bounce the other way.
The first floor was empty, all available troops having gone upstairs, but surely the door guards were still there. Well, I'd like to see them hit me. I slowed down a little, measuring my steps, and booted the door that led to outside, turning it to splinters like the other. The two door guards, who were indeed still there, shouted in surprise as I barreled past them with all the gravity of a mag-lev freight train. They might have tried to stop me, but I wasn't looking back, I was getting the fuck back to the finish line.
Even with a full grown guy on my shoulders I was still hitting speeds faster than an Olympic athlete, they weren't catching up. I sucked in great breaths as I ran, back around the wall I'd first climbed up, and around the corner into our building. I let myself slow down to a power walk just before I opened the door to our building and bustled through to the planning room. I gave my head a little shake, put the hostage (who didn't really seem like he'd enjoyed the ride at all) down and opened the door.
Quest 'Retrieve the hostage' complete!
Rewards: 20 000xp, decreased reputation with Weld, remediable teamwork course
Weld's face said it all, but man, fuck that guy.
