Roy listened as the council chairwoman said, "The vote is six for, two against the proposal to raise the parking fees at metered spaces throughout the Downtown area by twenty-five cents, with one abstention. The proposal is carried and will be executed immediately. Thank you to everyone for the well reasoned arguments on both sides." She paused for a sip of water from the glass at her elbow. "That concludes the final item on today's agenda. Now, is there any other business to discuss?" She looked around the council chambers. No one said anything.
She turned to Roy who was sitting next to her. "Mr Mayor, you had an item of business you wished to raise, I believe?"
"Yes, thank you, Madame Chairwoman, I do."
"The chamber is yours, in that case." She sat down, while he stood up, nodding to an aide at the back of the room who went around the table distributing copies of Danny's report with a two page synopsis he had written up stapled to the front of it.
The various councilmen and women looked curiously at their copies, some eyebrows going up as the faster readers realized what they were looking at. "Ladies and Gentlemen, I wish to put to the Council for a vote a proposal that was brought to me by the man who is as we all know functionally in charge of the largest union in the city, the Dockworkers, Mr Danny Hebert. Now, I know that we have all been aware for some years that the main goal of the Union and Mr Hebert has been the reopening of the Brockton Bay Ferry, and we are all aware as well of the obstructions to that plan. Unfortunately while it would undoubtedly be a positive benefit to the city, the costs far outweigh the short term gains and as a result we have been unable to proceed down that path."
He stopped for a moment, looking around at the other nine members of the City Council, most of whom were listening carefully while a couple seemed to be engrossed in the report, several nodding to various points.
"A short time ago, Mr Hebert came to me with a somewhat different plan. Initially it was only a rough outline but even so it showed considerable promise. I was admittedly skeptical at first for obvious reasons, but he presented a convincing argument of the benefits the plan would bring home almost immediately. The report in front of you is the latest revision to that initial plan, the results of considerable work by Mr Hebert, with input from a number of respected independent experts, some of his choosing and some of mine. The overall opinion of the experts who have studied it and given their support to it is that it stands a very high probability of delivering on all the promised benefits, and that even if part of it ultimately turned out not to work quite as expected, the overall results would still be highly desired by both the city and the public."
He cleared his throat, picking up his own water glass and drinking from it, then put it down again while studying the faces of all the people he knew very well by now. At least two thirds of them seemed very interested, although there were a couple of people who were looking very unconvinced. No one said anything yet, though, wanting to hear him out.
"The plan is well reasoned and highly detailed, as shown in the report each of you has. The synopsis at the front explains it in overall terms, but briefly for the record, the idea revolves around clearing the boat graveyard and the bay of wrecked ships, including the tanker blocking the shipping channel, recycling all the resulting metal and selling the scrap, then using the funds to rebuild the dock facilities, the rail yard, and a number of other major parts of the city's infrastructure. The immediate benefits are the full time employment of several hundred people and the reconstruction of a number of city owned facilities that have been allowed for various reasons to fall into disrepair. The medium term benefits are significant numbers of extra jobs for a large fraction of the city's workforce with special emphasis on manufacturing, construction, transportation, and shipping."
He smiled as they all stared at him. "The long term benefits are a massive boost to the general economy of Brockton Bay, the attraction of outside business to the large amount of newly cleared prime industrial land that is currently lying idle under hundreds of thousands of tons of rusting metal, and a likely level of prosperity that this city hasn't experienced in over thirty years."
There was a long pause. "Is this even possible?" one of the council members asked with some disbelief, waving the report she'd just skimmed.
He nodded. "Yes, it is. Definitely. I have met the Parahuman in question who is willing to donate a very significant amount of time and effort to the project, and I have no doubt she can do exactly what she says she can. Mr Hebert has also vouched for her abilities, and I think we can all agree that whatever issues some of us might have had with the man over the years, he never promises something he can't deliver."
There were a few nods around the table. Many of the people knew the man, and while some of them heartily disliked him for various reasons none would go on record as calling him a liar.
He fielded a few other brief questions, then explained the plan in more detail, before throwing the floor open to discussion. The spirited and at times very loud arguments both pro and con went on for nearly three hours, far overrunning the normal meeting length, but by the time the chairwoman called for a vote, he was pleased with the result.
"All those in favor of implementing the plan Mayor Christner has presented to the Council?" Seven hands, including his own and hers, went up.
"All those against?"
As expected the remaining hands went up, no one abstaining. He'd been fairly certain the two members who voted against were going to do so as they were well known to hate both the Unions and Parahumans in various combinations. It didn't matter, though, the 'for' vote was an overwhelming majority.
"Thank you, everyone. Mr Mayor, your proposal is carried."
He stood again, looking around the chamber. "Thank you all for listening, and for ultimately backing what I firmly believe to be a plan in the best interests of the city. I understand the reservations of those who voted against and I hope that they will still agree to carry out their duties with respect to normal council operations despite losing the vote." Both people in question nodded silently, not looking wildly pleased but not hugely unhappy either. "I think it's essential that we keep this under wraps for the moment until we have decided the best way to announce it to the public, for obvious reasons. I hope I can count on everyone to be discreet?"
A wave of nods and murmurs of agreement went around the table.
"Very good. My apologies for springing this on you with no warning but I expect everyone understands the reasons behind it. If anyone has any further questions, please come to my office and I will try to answer them, or find someone who can. Thank you once again for your trust and cooperation." He nodded to them and sat down. The chairwoman stood.
"Thank you, Mr Mayor. I think I speak for all of us when I say that I am both excited and apprehensive about this proposal, but that I think it will be very interesting to see what happens next." She smiled a little. "This meeting of the Brockton Bay City Council is now over. Thank you everyone and we will meet again here in one week." Tapping the table with her ceremonial gavel she sat again, shuffling the paperwork in front of her into order, then accepting the shorthand copy of the meeting minutes from the stenographer who had been documenting everything. "Thanks, Helen," she smiled.
Turning to Roy, she looked at him. "I hope this plan of yours actually works, Roy, or we're all going to have egg on our faces."
"It'll work, Jean, I'm pretty certain of that." He smiled at her, then stood, picking up his notes. "There are some interesting times ahead for the city."
"Yes, I expect so, based on this," she replied, indicating the proposal she had in front of her. "Very interesting times. I expect Director Piggot is going to have questions, though."
"Probably," he grinned.
"Try not to get the PRT angry with us, Roy. They're difficult enough at times as it is." With that last piece of advice the rather older woman got up and left, having gathered up all her papers. He was left in an empty council chamber, tapping his finger on the report for a moment, before heading back to his office, thinking hard about how to proceed with the next step.
They were going to have to be careful, Jean was right, but he also wanted to start as soon as possible. He'd have to check with Danny and see how the preparatory work was coming along. It might have some PR advantages to possibly accelerate the actual moving of the tanker somewhat, to prove to the public that it was possible.
Not to mention that he really wanted to see Director Piggot's face when Kaiju turned up…
Grinning, he entered his office and headed straight for the phone.
When the doorbell rang, Taylor got up from her desk and went downstairs to answer it, finding Amy and Vicky on the other side, both of them looking pleased to see her. "Come in, guys," she said, stepping to the side to allow them entry. Amy led the way, Vicky following behind and looking around curiously.
"Either of you want any snacks or anything?" Taylor asked.
"I can't stay long, I'm going out with Dean later and have to get ready," Vicky replied, "but thank you. What have you got?"
"Popcorn, potato chips in various flavors, apples, pears, some chocolate, stuff like that," Taylor said as she ushered them into the kitchen. "Plus orange juice, apple juice, coke, and water."
"Some popcorn for me, thanks," Amy smiled, as she opened the fridge and retrieved a can of coke, glancing at her sister and holding it up inquiringly. Vicky nodded, so she handed the blonde that one and got another for herself, closing the appliance then taking a seat at the table, Vicky following suit. Taylor put a bag of microwave popcorn on to pop then also sat.
"It's a nice house," Vicky complimented her.
"Thanks," she smiled. "It needs some work but we've started on that recently. The weather is still too cold to do much outside but I cleared out the basement last week, which is the first time that's been done in about six years. The attic is next. Then we're going to fix all the small things around the house and redecorate." She looked around the room. "Maybe do something in here as well. New cupboards, that sort of thing."
"I think it's nice at the moment," Amy said, sipping her coke and also looking around. "Very homey and lived in."
"It still needs some work," Taylor grinned. "Look, this cupboard door is nearly falling off." She leaned back and wiggled the door in question, which promptly came off its hinges in her hand, making Amy stare, then laugh hysterically. "Oops." Taylor went slightly pink, carefully putting the detached door on the floor leaning against the cupboard. "I'll have to fix that before Dad comes home." She got up and retrieved the popcorn which was done, pouring it into a large bowl that she put in the middle of the table, all three of them helping themselves.
Giggling, Vicky shook her head. "I kept doing that when I got my powers, but it was because I didn't know my own strength," she grinned. "I even did it to the fridge once. Mom was furious, it was a new one." She ate some popcorn, shaking her head at the memory.
This made Taylor laugh as well. "Oh, dear," she snickered. "That must have been embarrassing."
"Just a little," the blonde agreed. "Luckily it doesn't happen very often now."
"Except when you're showing off," Amy laughed. "You always manage to do something you shouldn't under those circumstances. Remember that thing with Über last month? He got you fair and square, but it was at least half your own fault for letting him manipulate you like that."
Vicky scowled, clearly remembering all to well. Taylor tried not to smile, but the blonde picked up on it and sighed.
"You saw it on PHO I guess?"
"I was actually there," she laughed. "In the crowd about fifty feet away. Sorry, but it was hysterical to watch. Dad and I were out having a meal and were just going back to the car when it all started. Amy's right, I'm afraid, from what I saw you practically dared him to do that."
The other girl gave her still-giggling sister a dirty look, then turned back to Taylor. "I know that now, looking back on it, but at the time it seemed sensible. That guy is… irritatingly competent. And really lucky."
"I don't think it's all luck, Sis, I think a lot of it is that he's just that good," Amy smiled. "And he has an amazing voice."
All three of them nodded, then exchanged a look, before collapsing in laughter.
"Don't ever tell him I think his voice is sexy or I'll never hear the end of it," Vicky chortled. "Mom would be horrified. 'He's a Villain, Victoria. Always remember that.'" Her impression of Carol Dallon was spot on, making the other two grin.
"She sees the world in black and white, your mother, doesn't she?" Taylor asked.
"Very much so, yes," Amy agreed with a small sigh. Vicky looked little unsure but eventually nodded a little. Glancing at her watch, she stuffed the remainder of her current handful of popcorn into her mouth and washed it down with the last of her coke, then got up. "Sorry, I have to go. It was nice meeting you again, Taylor. Sis, do you need a ride back?"
Amy glanced at Taylor for a moment. "Dad can give her a lift, Vicky," Taylor told the blonde. "No need to come all the way here."
"OK. Thanks, have fun, you two. Don't do anything I wouldn't." Vicky smiled at them then left, the front door opening and closing. Several seconds passed then they both started laughing again, exchanging a sly glance.
"Poor Vicky. She's never going to live that Über thing down," Amy giggled.
"He seemed to think it was funny, as well," Taylor grinned. "I told him that much."
"I think I'd like to meet him at some point, if we can do it so that Carol doesn't go nuts if she finds out I'm 'consorting with Villains'," Amy smiled, making little finger quotes, which had Taylor smirking again. "She wouldn't approved of that at all. 'Think of the effect on New Wave and their relations with the public, Amy' or something along those lines." Her mimicry of the elder Dallon woman was as good as her sister's was, making Taylor wonder how often they both practiced it. The thought was amusing.
"Did you find out what Armsmaster wanted?" Amy asked after a moment's silence. Taylor nodded.
"I did. He does actually want to make an Anti-Endbringer weapon as it turns out. He didn't go into any real detail on it over the phone. I sort of get the impression he doesn't want the PRT finding out yet, he seemed pretty happy to meet me at the BBFO building tomorrow."
She grinned as Amy looked puzzled. "BBFO? What's that?"
"Oh, haven't you heard? It's the new company that's started up to market the services of… 'The Family'." Taylor lowered her voice mysteriously as she said the last two words. Amy stared at her, then sighed, rolling her eyes.
"OK. You obviously have a secret. Tell me."
Taylor did, making the other girl look first shocked, then surprised, then pleased, to ultimately end up thoughtful. "Wow. That's… an interesting idea. Your Dad is pretty on the ball. I'd never even have considered that."
"I need to go down to the DWU for the ID cards and documentation," Taylor said, pulling out the keys her father had given her at breakfast and dangling them in front of her friend with a grin. "Want to come and check it out?"
"Damn right I do," Amy nodded firmly. After a moment, she looked slightly worried. "but several people know I'm here with you. What if we get seen going there?"
"We will travel in style, by which I mean invisibly," Taylor smirked. "No one will see us."
"I left my riding costume at home though."
"No you didn't, it's right there on the table."
Amy stared at her, then turned her head, before sighing. "You are both massive trolls." She gathered up the duplicate costume, complete with baton, standing up and heading into the living room to have more room to change. Taylor followed, snickering to herself.
"You love it though, don't you?" she asked as she watched her friend take her coat and shoes off and begin pulling the costume on. Amy grinned at her.
"Of course I do. I'm having more fun this last week than I've had for years. Possibly ever." Shortly she was wearing the armored suit, the helmet on her head, and just finishing off pulling the gloves on.
"We'll go out the back, it's easier to make sure no one can see us then," Taylor commented, leading her friend to the door and opening it, before changing to the Raptaur form and having the Varga cloak them both. Outside, she locked the door again, then turned around, Amy quickly climbing aboard. With her passenger strapped in place she jumped over the fence and headed for the road and the docks, her friend laughing faintly at the ride and making her smile to herself.
"Danny, Saurial and a friend of hers are here," Habib said as he leaned into the office. "I just heard from the front gate."
"Send them up when they get here," Danny replied, "I'm expecting them."
"OK," the man said, disappearing again. Shortly his daughter in her first public cape persona and Amy who was wearing a black version of the suit Taylor and the Varga had made for her, with a mirrored faceplate, entered, both of them looking around. He got up and closed the door, then briefly hugged the lizard-girl, who reciprocated, smiling.
"That still feels weird, dear," he laughed, "but I'm getting used to it." He was keeping his voice low to prevent anyone in the office outside hearing him. "Hello, Amy, it's nice to see you again." He recognized the modified Panacea suit from the story his daughter had told him about their prank on Max Anders, which he'd found extremely funny.
The girl pulled her helmet off, grinning at him. "Nice to see you as well, Danny. Taylor told me about the BBFO idea. It's brilliant."
"Thank you," he replied modestly, before returning her smirk. "I thought so. Do you two want to see the building?"
"Yes, please," they both replied before looking at each other and laughing.
"OK, come with me," he said, opening the door once Amy had replaced her helmet and tucked her hair under it. They followed him out. "I'm just heading down to the BBFO building, Habib," he called. "If anyone wants me call me on my cell, please."
"Sure, Danny," the other man replied with a wave, not looking up from the computer screen he was studying.
The two girls followed him through the admin building and into the workshop section, several people calling greetings to Taylor in her Saurial aspect, normally sounding pleased to see her. Most of them looked curiously at the black-clad girl next to her but didn't ask any questions. Stopping to greet a couple of the workers by name, his daughter impressed Danny with her memory for names and faces. It clearly pleased the people in question as well.
He was interested to see how much more relaxed everyone was around her. The initial worry and near-fear had changed to a respect and liking that he was pleased about. Even the ones who hadn't to his knowledge met her before seemed to know about her and consider her one of the good guys. It was an interesting example of how people could get used to almost anything given time.
In Brockton Bay, of course, they had more than usual to get used to, which might have explained it to a degree.
He'd been keeping up with the talk on PHO and had noticed even there that a lot of the locals seemed almost proud of the supposed group of reptiles living out in the bay, which was something he still found extremely funny. It had crossed his mind on a number of occasions that they'd been very lucky to get away with that idea for so long, especially as it hadn't even been a deliberate policy to start with. Sooner or later someone would work it out, and in fact he knew that several people even at the DWU already knew, not to mention some other capes that Taylor had talked about. Oddly, mostly villains, which amused him for some reason.
But even with this, no one was talking. He couldn't quite work out why, but put it down to equal amounts of respect, amusement value, and fear of upsetting her/them. In the case of the Undersiders girl, Tattletale, and Über and Leet who Taylor also thought probably had worked it out, it might have been those Rules they thought so highly of as well.
If things kept on like this, even if they did eventually admit to it, there was probably a significant number of people who would refuse to believe it anyway, based on some of the more amusing conspiracy theories on PHO. That, he found the funniest part of all.
The introduction of Kaiju was going to make those people go completely crazy…
Eventually they came out the back entrance to the main workshop block, crossed the inner yard, and arrived outside a somewhat run-down but intact building with a shiny new lock on the door. He waved at it. "Here we are. Building 12D East. All yours."
Taylor inspected the front of the building, smiled, then fished out the set of keys he'd given her, quickly finding the correct one, before sticking it into the lock and turning it. The door clicked and opened. A beeping sound made Danny hurry over to the alarm panel and tap in the disarm code before the excessively loud alarm could sound. "You have twenty seconds then it gets very noisy in here. And out there."
"I remember the code," she noted.
"Good."
Behind them Amy closed the door, flicking on the lights as she did so, before removing her helmet again. She looked around the place. "Wow. Big room."
"Eighty feet wide, just under two hundred long, and twenty-five feet high," he said. "Toilet facilities over there on the right with another office room about thirty feet square, which was being used as a stock room. Power panel over there, water taps and the like on the other side. It's an industrial power supply so if you needed to you could pull about a two hundred kilowatts out of it. We get wholesale electricity rates so it's a lot cheaper than normal domestic power. This place was originally set up with a lot of large metalworking tools like lathes and milling machines in, but those all got moved to a larger building years ago. It ended up being used mainly for storage of old equipment we don't need any more so it's all been cleared out."
Walking to the other end of the room with them following, looking around with interest, he indicated the end door, which was a large roller shutter type like the main one at the front. Next to it was another normal door, slightly wider than one found in a house but human-scale. "That goes out almost directly into the water. There's about ten feet of road running along behind this entire row for access. It was intended to allow boats of various sizes to be either loaded from here, or actually pulled in. Like that one we did your original power testing in."
Taylor nodded. "That could be useful."
"I thought you'd like it. The water out there is quite deep, probably about thirty feet, with the edge dropping straight down. You can probably improve that if you want."
He turned to them. "You can do anything you want with the place. I'd prefer it if you not blow it up or make it fall down if possible, but other than that, help yourself."
"Thanks, Dad," she smiled, hugging him again.
"You're welcome," he replied.
Amy poked the rough concrete of the floor with her boot toe. "This is a mess," she noted, looking around at all the ruts and holes in it from where all sorts of things had been bolted down then removed over the decades.
"True," Danny said, "But the building itself is sound, weatherproof, and secure. And private. I'm sure that some special work with the aid of a large fellow of our acquaintance it can be fixed easily. Internal walls and floors are no problem either I suspect."
"Not really," Taylor replied, her tail twitching in excitement as she looked around, apparently working out what would go where. "We can rework this place today with no problems."
"Let's go and get your ID cards sorted out then I'll leave you to it."
"OK." They began walking back to the other end of the large empty room. "I called Armsmaster at lunch, he really does want my help with a huge weapon of some sort. I told him to meet me here tomorrow afternoon, is that all right?"
"Of course it is. That actually works out well, we're hoping to do the main demolition work on the warehouses tomorrow morning if you can spare the time."
"I'm looking forward to it," his daughter replied with an evil laugh. "Destruction, as much as I want, and no one will get angry!"
"Try to keep it to the buildings in question," he grinned. "Don't get carried away."
"Would I do that?" she asked. He and Amy exchanged a glance.
"Yes, you would," they chorused, before laughing.
"Oh, by the way, Roy called earlier." Taylor stopped, looking at him expectantly. "The vote went through. Seven to two. The plan is a go."
"Fantastic," she yelled, grinning widely.
"You'll like the next bit even more. He wants to accelerate the tanker move." Taylor looked puzzled, glancing at Amy, who shrugged.
"Why?"
"Roy thinks that if they make an announcement that there is a big change coming to the city very soon, then move the ship immediately, it shows everyone how seriously it's being taken. We're ahead of schedule on the preliminary work anyway due to him releasing the funds early, and I can't see a problem with having the ship parked just off the docks while we finish the scrapping area. If you can take down all those warehouses tomorrow the guys can do most of the work by Wednesday, we think. Your help in making the extra fencing material we need would save money and time ordering it in, and you can probably help resurface the work area as well if you're up for it."
"Of course I am," she said, pleased. "But won't that be taking work away from the dock workers?"
"Not really, it's work we have to get out of the way before we can do the main things, so the faster we get it done the better. No one will be upset about it."
"OK, then, that's not a problem. I can come here right after school and spend as long as we need to do it all."
"Good, that works nicely. We'll have lighting and generators set up by then as well so we can work after dark with no problems. Moving the ship itself is a matter of the tide state being right, but rather conveniently it's low at two PM on Tuesday. I can ask the school to let you go an hour early for family reasons and you could start during daylight hours, which will let people watch. Roy thinks that announcing it just beforehand is probably best because only locals will turn up, we won't have thousands of people coming from outside the city to get in the way." He sighed a little as Amy and Taylor exchanged a glance.
"I'd prefer it to be done much more privately but there's no way that would work, everyone in the city will be able to see it. But if we make sure that there's not enough time for everyone to stew over it, but there is enough time to get the word out, assure the public it's safe, that sort of thing, it probably will work out all right. The PRT is the biggest problem but Roy will take care of telling them. I have a plan to make sure no one gets overenthusiastic and hits the Endbringer sirens, which would just cause total chaos."
Amy started laughing. "God, you have no idea. We'd be up to our necks in capes inside half an hour. The Triumvirate turning up looking for Behemoth or something only to find a big piece of marine salvage going on would be funny but I don't think it would end well."
"No, not really," he sighed, smiling a little. "So let's try to avoid that."
"It's pretty short notice," Taylor commented, looking thoughtful. "I thought we'd have a couple of weeks to get ready for it."
"That was the plan originally. But Roy is keen to push it as fast as possible. I think he's worried that some of the councilors will get cold feet and back out on supporting it. Proving that we can actually do what we say we can as quickly as possible is probably a good idea on the whole."
"I guess," she replied slowly. Eventually she nodded, shrugging. "I'm fine with it. I can take down all the warehouses tomorrow, meet Armsmaster in the afternoon, then overnight finish clearing out the channel and the dock area. I'll have that done by Sunday morning. Once the ship is parked there your guys can take as long as they need to get everything set up."
"Great. The equipment has started arriving but most of the heavy stuff won't be here until around the end of next week anyway. But if by then we can have the tanker ready for cleaning out and decontaminating, that will show we're on the ball and up to the job."
They resumed walking, having stopped in the middle of the room. "I can hardly wait to see what the reaction is to that enormous thing slowly coming out of the water," Amy giggled, making Taylor produce a scaly grin. "I'm sure you'll make it as impressive as possible. Because you can."
"Oh, I have some interesting ideas," his daughter snickered. He looked at her, then her friend.
"Poor Brockton Bay," he sighed, shaking his head sadly. "I have a horrible feeling about this."
"It'll be fine," Taylor smirked. "Wait and see. People are going to be talking about this for years."
"That's what I'm afraid of," he told her, only half-joking.
Laughing, they locked up then headed back into the DWU complex.
"Here you go," Habib said, handing Taylor an ID card, freshly laminated. She looked at it in satisfaction, seeing Raptaur's face looking back at her. She'd already done the Saurial one, leaving the building and coming back twenty minutes later in her other identity. Her father was watching from the doorway to his office, with Amy still wearing her disguise next to him.
"Thank you, Habib," she replied politely.
"You're more than welcome, Raptaur. May I be the first to say how glad we are to have you and your sister as members of the DWU?"
"Thanks," she smiled, careful not to show too many teeth. The man somehow suppressed the flinch she saw develop, impressing her. Very few people seemed able to, it was some sort of instinctive reaction. Holding out her hand she shook his, then carefully turned around, mindful of her tail and the somewhat close-set desks surrounding her, to walk over to her father and friend. She showed them the card.
"Welcome to the DWU," her father smiled.
"Glad to be here," she grinned. A faint giggle came from behind Amy's mirrored faceplate, amusing her. "I have to leave, but I think Saurial will be coming back when she'd finished what she had to do."
"It was nice seeing you again," he replied, obviously trying not to laugh at the silly charade she was still surprised no one had seen through yet. "Give my best to your other sisters."
"I will," she remarked, hearing several people in the room stop what they were doing as they became engrossed in eavesdropping. Turning her head on her long neck she noticed a number of them twitch and hastily start typing again, or whatever they'd been doing. Inwardly amused she waved to Habib, who waved back, then made her way out of the building once again.
Fifteen minutes later she was back in the building she now had access to, Amy standing next to her and laughing. "You and your multiple identities. How the hell you ever thought it would work is beyond me."
Taylor, as Saurial now, shrugged with a grin. "It seemed like a good idea at the time."
"I have to admit it's pretty funny," her friend grinned as she took her helmet off. They'd locked the door behind them to make sure they wouldn't be interrupted. Looking around, Amy added, "So what are you planning to do here?"
"Fix the floor, make it more secure, then make a couple of private rooms for a start," Taylor said thoughtfully, inspecting the place. "We need somewhere for your projects after all."
Amy looked surprised, making her grin. "Really?" the other girl asked.
"Of course. You're my friend, if you want some space here, it's yours. This is way more than I need at the moment anyway."
"Thanks." Amy smiled at her. "That's really nice."
"It's no problem at all. Right then, let's do something about this floor first before someone breaks their neck."
After a discussion with the Varga, she started walking slowly across the floor, back and forth in wide sweeps, a layer of Vargastuff topped with the same grippy material he'd used the time they'd done something similar when testing her powers flooding out from under her feet. Ten minutes later the entire floor was covered. She smiled as she poked it with her toe claws experimentally.
Amy knelt down and felt the floor, taking off a glove first, then nodded approval. "Not bad at all. It's nice to walk on and warm, but not slippery. That's great."
"It should do," Taylor agreed.
Half an hour after that the walls were also reinforced with a layer of the same impenetrable material coated with something that felt like paint, and she was currently twenty-five feet tall and working on the ceiling. Amy was sitting in a chair she'd made watching her with interest.
"Kaiju is over three times that big?" her friend asked.
"At least," she agreed in a deep voice, finishing off the roof and shrinking back to normal Saurial size. "Considerably more if you consider tail tip to nose. The aquatic combat form is longer and more streamlined than the normal one. I stand about eighty feet tall as Kaiju, but I'm over a hundred and twenty feet long. I have no idea how much I weight like that, I haven't worked it out, but it's a lot."
"You're going to make the entire population of the city shit themselves on Tuesday," Amy giggled. "I can hardly wait."
"It's going to be fun," Taylor agreed, going over to her friend. "But we need to make sure no one over-reacts too much. There's amusing and then there's irresponsible. I don't want to overdo it."
"You probably can't avoid it to some extent," her friend replied. She shrugged. "People get all worked up sometimes. There will certainly be panic just because it's something no one is expecting. Hopefully that sort of thing will be short-lived and mild when everyone realizes you're helping out and not wrecking the place." She considered her reptilian friend for a moment, then slowly began grinning. "And I have a really funny idea how to make that clear."
"What?" Taylor asked curiously. Amy told her. They spent some time laughing.
"Oh, hell, yes, I'm definitely doing that," Taylor snickered. "It's even better than the idea I had." They exchanged an amused glance. "OK, let's see about making some rooms. How much space do you want?"
"How big are you as Raptaur?" Amy asked.
Taylor changed. "This big?" she said, waving a hand over herself.
Amy paced around her, then moved to the side of the huge room, marking off a space with her hands. "In that case, about this much room, I think. About half-way to the ceiling."
"OK." It didn't take long to make the walls and a door with a simple lock on it. Taylor added another room the same size next to the first one, with a door between them, then a railing around the edge of the more or less cubical construction that was at the side of the warehouse inside the front entrance. A flight of stairs up to the top completed it. "There we go. This should do it, you have a work room and a store room, with extra space on top for storage. We'll need to talk to Dad about getting some lights installed and power feeds, I have no idea how to do that. What sort of furniture do you want inside?"
They went into the small self-contained block of rooms, leaving the door open for some light, then she added a table and some chairs patterned on a nice office one she'd seen earlier. Soon it was complete, at least in outline form. "This is great, Taylor," Amy smiled, as they came out of the private rooms. "Thanks."
"I'll get you a set of keys for the doors as well so you can get in without needing me," Taylor told her.
"I doubt I'll come here without you, but thank you anyway," her friend replied, looking pleased. After a moment, she appeared to remember something else. "Are you going to make costumes to sell to other capes?" she asked curiously. "Chris at least is interested in something like that. He also thought Vista would be as well. Her costume is stab-proof, but not really bullet-proof. I bet you could make a lot of money offering replacement costumes."
"I'm still thinking about that," Taylor told her. "I'm certainly going to provide protective clothing for all the workers here first, I think. Some of the jobs they're going to be doing are pretty dangerous, there's always the risk of something falling on them, for example. Something like your robes would stop that instantly killing a normal person, I think. So I want to do that. After that, though, maybe I should see about making costumes. And protective clothing for the police and other emergency workers."
"You'll have plenty to keep you busy," Amy noted.
"The costumes don't take long once I have an idea of the pattern," Taylor said. "We can just copy an existing set of clothes like I did with your robes. Maybe get the sizes needed and spend a day doing a whole batch of them. If any tweaking needs to be done that's pretty simple later."
"Sounds like a good idea." Her friend glanced at her watch, rolling her sleeve up to do it, then got a small smile on her face. "Still got a couple of hours before I should be home. Are you up for the next project?"
"I am," Taylor smiled back. "How do you want to do this?"
"Make the skeleton first, I think. We'll need quite a lot of biomass for the main part, but that can wait. A load of potatoes or something like that is probably easiest, plant biomatter works as well as anything. This proved that." She held up her right arm for a moment, smiling. "The skin is the really tricky part. Aside from the neural links, of course. And the power source. And the standby mode. Oh, and the life support system."
Taylor could feel her smile widening as her friend kept listing more things. "Let's make the skeleton first and work from there," she suggested. "One thing at a time."
"I hope it works," Amy sighed, suddenly looking nervous.
Patting her on the shoulder, Taylor laughed. "I have faith in you, girl. Let's create an abomination of nature. It'll be fun."
They both rubbed their hands together, produced evil laughs, then exchanged looks and fell about giggling.
When they finally calmed down, Taylor and the Varga began careful work under her friend's guidance, something odd growing on the floor in front of them.