Friday, February 18, 2011
Waking, Amy blinked a few times, then groaned. "God, what a stupid dream," she muttered. "Too many bacon sandwiches. I said four was enough, but no, I got offered another one, and was stupid enough to eat it." She smacked her lips, tasting remnants of something pig-based. "Then I went to bed without brushing my teeth," she sighed. "Yuck."
Stretching, she sighed in relaxation, before sitting up. 'It was a very good evening otherwise,' she thought as she got out of bed, scratched the back of her head for a moment, then headed sleepily for the bathroom and a toothbrush.
Having finished her ablutions some twenty minutes later and much more awake, she headed back to her room, hearing the rest of the family stirring. Once again she'd got up before the rest of them.
Just as her hand was reaching for her doorknob, she consciously noticed the neatly printed sign taped to her door, which she'd not paid attention to on the way out.
She stared, then went red.
The Lair of THE AMY.
Knock or Die.
No Solicitors.
Pulling it off the door with a yank of one hand, she glared at it, then slowly turned around. She could hear giggling coming from behind her sister's partly open bedroom door.
"Vicky!"
The giggling got louder, although the door shut with a click. She stomped over and began hammering on it, while their parents came to see what the hell was going on this time.
Stopping in her tracks at the bottom of the stairs, Taylor sniffed, then looked around, before zeroing in on her father's coat as the source of the unfamiliar scent. Smelling the arm she cataloged the various odors of people and things on it.
'Dad, coffee, traces of Lisa, Zephron, Mark… All people he sees regularly,' she thought. 'And Director Piggot as well, recently, last night I guess. But I don't recognize that one.'
It was female, human, in good health, all that she could tell instantly. But there was something a little weird under that which she couldn't put a metaphorical finger on.
"Presumably that is Chief Director Costa-Brown, Brain," the Varga commented.
'I suppose it has to be. I know the scents of practically everyone at the DWU now and it's none of those. And he didn't mention meeting anyone else. Whoever it was had to have been in his office, or close to him at least, for a while for the scent to soak in this strongly.' She shrugged, hanging the coat up again and heading into the living room. She'd gotten up early to finish cleaning up, there was a lot of stuff like snack wrappings and empty soda cans lying around. They'd kept at the math tutoring after the movie for a while, since everyone seemed to think they were actually learning something and she was enjoying herself more than she'd expected being the teacher.
Amy and Vicky had been the last to leave at just after midnight, both looking tired but happy. Hugging her, both girls had thanked her, then vanished into the night, Vicky picking her sister up and flying off. Taylor watched them go with a smile then had gone to bed, her father having already done so half an hour earlier. She hadn't bothered to do more than a cursory tidying up, though.
Now, she busied herself wandering around the room straightening the furniture and collecting all the cans and plastic, which she crumpled into a tightly compressed wad of random materials in her hands. After a moment, having looked around at the room, she shrugged, turned her head into a scaled down version of her combat form's one, and ate the entire lump of metal and polymers as the quickest method to get rid of it.
"That is still rather disturbing to watch," her father said from the door of the living room, making her turn and smile at him with lots of sharp teeth.
"Quick, and sort of tasty, actually," she laughed.
"You are not what I thought my daughter would grow up to be," he sighed, coming over and holding her for a moment. "Although I can't say I'm sorry about how it all turned out."
"Thanks, Dad," she replied softly. Patting her scaly head between the eyes, he released her.
"Your turn to make breakfast. Assuming you still want any after your healthy meal of random garbage."
Giggling, she reverted to her normal head and grinned at him. "Of course, that was just a snack. There's still some bacon left, I think, and a few tuna sandwiches we need to get rid of."
"That sounds fine, dear. I need a shower, then I'll be back down."
"OK." Shortly she was frying the bacon, humming to herself.
When he came back, she was just setting the table. "Still on for this afternoon?" he asked as he moved to help.
"Sure. I asked yesterday, there's no problem skipping the last period. I'll be at the yard at around two fifteen or so."
"Good, that will give us time to do the work before it gets dark." He looked out the window. "Should be a fairly good day for this time of year. Dry and calm anyway, even if cold. I wish this winter would hurry up and end, I'm getting tired of the dark afternoons and the damp."
"It would be nice to have some warm sunny days," she smiled.
When they'd finished breakfast, she helped him with the dishes, then kissed him goodbye and headed for the back door. Seconds later she was sprinting down the road under the cloak as Saurial, reveling in the sensations of physical activity. It was one of the best parts of her life these days. Speeding up to around forty miles an hour she ran towards Arcadia, feeling happy and looking forward to another day with her friends, some good hard work at the yard, and perhaps a run around the city that night annoying the criminals.
Life was pretty good at the moment as far as she was concerned, she thought with a grin.
Mandy looked up as her second best friend slid into her seat next to her, Lucy, who was on her other side, calling a soft greeting to the other girl. "Hi, Taylor," she smiled. "How was Geography?"
"Interesting, actually," the taller girl replied as she unpacked her books and notepad. "So many places I've never been. I want to travel one day."
"Have you been anywhere cool?" Lucy asked, leaning over to peer past Mandy.
"Canada, once," Taylor replied. "But I wasn't there for long. The Atlantic coast up there is a mess after Newfoundland. We were learning about all the damage that caused today, actually. I didn't realize that the tsunami went all the way past Florida."
"I read about how it flooded Miami a few hours after Newfoundland sank," Mandy put in, thinking back to a magazine article. "Half the city was damaged, and there are parts of it that are still under water today."
"New York escaped the worst of that, but then Behemoth did a real number on it," Lucy added. "I hate those Endbringers."
"Everyone does," Taylor agreed soberly. "They've killed so many people I can't even comprehend the numbers."
"I remember, years ago when I was only a little kid, we went to Martha's Vineyard one summer," Mandy reflected nostalgically, her chin in her hands. "It's gone now, the entire island was washed clean by Newfoundland sinking. So many memories ruined..." She sighed a little. "Oh well. Nothing any of us can do about it." She watched as Taylor opened another reference book. "That's a new one, isn't it? Have you already finished that inorganic chemistry one?"
"No, not yet, but something I read it in got me interested in nuclear physics, or the chemistry of isotopes, anyway," the other girl smiled. She showed them the cover of the book she was holding. "It's really complicated, but mostly just math. This book is about thirty years old and I know for a fact is wrong in several places according to things I've seen on the web, but it's the only one on the subject in the school library." She frowned a little. "I'm sort of disappointed in how few modern textbooks there are on some of the more interesting things. But they have some neat ones on electronics and computing that are right up to date, so that's good. I need to look into that next."
"You're going to be a scientist, I can tell," Mandy giggled. "I've never met anyone as curious about everything as you are."
"It's interesting," Taylor protested, smiling. "And the entire world runs on electronics, which runs on chemistry and physics, which is all math. So I want to learn."
The other two exchanged a glance, then laughed. She was so serious about it. "Well, when you learn chemistry to the level that you already know mathematics, you can tutor us in that as well," Lucy suggested with a look of amusement.
Taylor nodded happily, making them both giggle again. "Sure. Last night was fun."
"It was," Lucy replied. "More fun than I expected. And I actually learned something which was more than I thought I would do. I'm sure up for doing it again."
"We'll have to work out a schedule, then," Taylor remarked, sitting up straight as the teacher entered the room and the chatter died down. "Later," she added in a whisper, out of the side of her mouth, as she closed her extracurricular studies book.
Amused, Mandy nodded, then mimicked her friends as they looked eager to learn while the Chemistry teacher began the lesson.
Rebecca looked around at her colleagues as they both read the report she'd written up based on her interviews with both the Mayor and Mr Hebert the day before. Paul finished first, putting his copy down on the table, then looking at her. "Doesn't really tell us much more than we already knew," he commented. "A few more details, one or two interesting items, but that's about it."
"No," she sighed. "Both of them are way too good at this to let anything important slip. Roy Christner is a very experienced politician who knows how to talk for hours without saying anything important."
"We saw that from his press conferences," David noted with a small quirk of his mouth, still reading the last page of his copy.
"Quite. And Danny Hebert is even worse in some ways, that man has the best poker face I've ever seen. I had one hell of a time reading him. I'm certain he knows a lot more about the Family than he's saying, but I don't think he'll ever tell us anything without their permission. And not even because he's scared of them, because he clearly isn't. Just because he made a promise."
"From what I know, he's a good man," Paul said quietly. "He wouldn't promise something like that without a very good reason."
"Fair enough," she muttered, "but it's really annoying. I want to know what the hell is going on around this insane city."
"Live with the fact that there are some things we may never get to the bottom of," he grinned. "Sometimes you just have to accept the status quo. At least it's a good status quo. Could be a hell of a lot worse."
"Why doesn't that make me feel better?" she asked rhetorically. He shrugged, still grinning.
"No idea. Must be you."
She sighed. He was far too cheerful about this whole thing. She looked toward David, who at that moment carefully tapped his papers into a neat pile and put them on the table. "I also would like to know more," he said. "Hopefully talking to Kaiju will tell us something new."
"Be polite," Paul urged. "She's pleasant to talk to but I have a feeling that she has a low tolerance for officiousness. We'll get a lot further asking polite questions than demanding answers."
David didn't reply, but seemed mildly disapproving. Rebecca glanced between them for a moment. Paul was definitely looking worried. "When are you planning on going over to the Docks?" he asked after a moment.
She checked the time. "Our information is that Kaiju will be there sometime after two. We should probably let her get to work first, then go over, I suppose. No point in jumping the gun, or interrupting her as she's getting started. Maybe around three? We can wait for a good moment to talk. I'd like to watch what the other DWU people do, how they react to her, that sort of thing, for a while beforehand. That could tell us a lot."
"All right. That sounds like a good idea." Paul stood up. "I'm going to go and get something to eat, and visit Armsmaster and Dragon for a while. I'll be back around half past two."
"See you later," she replied as he left the room, closing the door behind him. After a few seconds thought, she turned to her other companion. "He's taking this far more calmly than I would think normal."
"He likes her," David said thoughtfully. "I think she impressed him. You know he always tries to see the best in people anyway, and someone who can talk rationally and calmly always tends to make him listen. That's why he gets on with Armsmaster so well. They're weirdly similar in many ways. Although unlike him Armsmaster doesn't have any measurable sense of humor."
Rebecca smirked for a moment. "No, I'd have to agree there. But he's a very good Tinker and a loyal Protectorate hero."
"I'm still worried about Kaiju," David said after a moment. "In the sense of not knowing how stable she is. If she suddenly went off the rails..."
"Please don't do something to provoke her," she sighed. "He's right, at least in that. We don't want to give her an excuse to do something no one is going to enjoy. If you want to pick a fight with her just to see who's the toughest, challenge her to a duel or something, a hell of a long way away from other people."
David started laughing at her comment, then laughed harder at her annoyed expression.
"Duel..." he snickered. "God, that's hilarious. What, I should slap her in the face with a glove?"
After a moment, she started laughing as well, the mental image this produced overcoming her normal control. It was preposterous, and very funny.
Dennis looked at the door to the cafeteria expectantly. A familiar face hove into view on the other side of the glass pane at the top of it, then it swung open as Amy Dallon walked in, talking to one of her classmates. "There she is," he whispered, Vicky and Chris looking over their shoulders. "Ready?"
"Yes." Both of them were grinning widely.
"On three… One… Two..." He counted down on his fingers, watching as the girl approached, apparently intending to drop her backpack off before getting food. His final finger closed into a fist, which he thrust above his head as he jumped to his feet, nearly half the other people in the cafeteria following suit in the same motion.
"All Hail The Amy!" he bellowed, joining the chorus.
Amy stopped dead, then went purple. She looked at Taylor Hebert, who was grinning like an idiot, although she hadn't joined in, then her sister, who was both grinning like an idiot and who had joined in.
Vigorously, and with a lot of laughter immediately afterwards. Plus, it had been her idea in the first place.
"Vicky!" Amy screamed in rage, tossing her backpack at Taylor who neatly caught it, then charging at the giggling blonde, who saluted her sister with one hand then took to the air, flying around the room being chased by a furious brunette.
"We're going to get into trouble for this, you know," Dean sighed, watching with everyone else as Amy started throwing things at the hovering and giggling figure of her sister. "If only by association in my case." He hadn't joined in, but looked amused although mildly worried.
Dennis watched as a bowl of chicken soup hit Vicky right in the face. "Totally worth it," he snickered. "Wow, Amy's a good shot, and hell of a lot quicker than I'd have thought," he added admiringly, as a bread roll bounced off the blonde's head while she was wiping soup from her eyes.
"She'll be coming after us next," Chris pointed out, hastily finishing his burger, then jumping to his feet as the healer looked around, before fixing them with an evil glare. "Oops."
"Shit." Dennis grabbed the remaining food on his tray, an apple, and got up as well. "Later, guys," he added, to Carlos and Dean, who watched silently as he and Chris ran for their lives. The fuming girl coming towards them was clearly in no mood for prisoners.
Exchanging a glance, they decided that a declaration of neutrality was probably pointless in this case and also made a strategic retreat.
Taylor watched as Amy charged out of the cafeteria waving a mop she'd grabbed from the janitor who had moved to clean up the spilled soup, pursuing a still-laughing Dennis. Vicky followed them, covered in soup and bread, also giggling furiously despite the mess. The janitor watched, shook his head, and wandered away to get another mop.
When the shouting died down, she put her friend's backpack on the chair next to her and turned to the others at her table. "Amy may be late," she said laconically, picking up her orange juice. "She had a previous appointment."
"So I see," Mandy grinned. They exchanged looks, snickered, and got on with their meal.
Some time later, about twenty minutes before the end of the lunch period, a flushed and slightly disheveled Dallon sister sat down with an irritated grunt, slamming her tray down on the table, then glared at Taylor. "Thanks very much for that stupid name," she grumbled, "Vicky has been being a total ass about it all day. You should have seen what she put on my door this morning."
"Poor The Amy," Taylor sympathized, patting her on the head, which made her sigh irritably. "You'll get over it. Did you get them?"
"I got Dennis," she chuckled darkly. "He'll be walking with a limp for a few hours."
Rich and Eric winced as she snickered.
"Dark side, I told you," Eric whispered loudly to his friend, who nodded silently.
"Hopefully the teachers won't be too annoyed," Lucy said, then looked up.
Her eyes widened.
Amy flinched at the hand that landed on her shoulder.
"Miss Dallon? A word, please?"
She looked around, as did Taylor. "Of course, Deputy Principal Howell."
She swallowed a little as she stood, casting a helpless look at her friends, who watched as she trailed after the visibly annoyed and rather intimidating woman.
"We should probably ask Vicky to stop," Taylor commented wisely, to a chorus of nods. "She might be getting carried away."
"Just a little," Mandy noted. Even so, she was still smiling.
Roy waved to Mike on the gate, the guard looking at him and waving back with a smile. Rolling down his window, Roy motioned to the vehicle behind his car, a large white van with a red logo on the side. "They're with me," he said, smiling.
Mike looked over, raised an eyebrow, then turned back to him. "OK. I heard there was an interview or something."
"That's it. They've interviewed me on my own, now they want to do Danny, then both of us together. Hopefully get some footage of the Family later as well. Isn't Kaiju supposed to be here later?"
"So I'm told," Mike replied, glancing at his companion who had just come back from carefully checking the outside of the news van. "That should sure give them something to tape, though. She's pretty impressive up close."
"You don't have to tell me that, my friend," Roy snickered. "I nearly crapped myself that first time."
Laughing, Mike waved the two cars through, stepping back as they rolled past. Pulling up outside the Admin building, Roy found Mark waiting for them. He got out of the car and locked it, his security man who was here at the insistence of his wife also getting out and standing behind him, not saying a word. Mark and the man, a medium height Hispanic guy by the name of Felipe, assessed each other for a moment, then nodded to one another.
Turning to Roy, Mark said, "Danny's expecting you. He said to take you up to his office, and the reporter as well. Do you know if they're planning on doing the interview there? We have a conference room that's bigger if that's more convenient."
"We'll have to ask," Roy replied. "She's only got a cameraman and a sound guy with her, so they'll fit in his office easily enough though."
"OK." They waited for the reporter to climb out of the van, the petite redhead talking to the other two people in the vehicle for a moment, smiling broadly, before heading over to join them. Behind her, the cameraman was connecting his camera gear to a harness he had on, the sound operator, who had also been driving the van, helping him. When they got everything connected the cameraman started recording the general area, presumably for filler material, before slowly heading in their direction.
"Hi," the woman said brightly, holding out her hand, which Mark shook politely. "Kate Andrews, WCVB channel five news."
"Mark Poulsen, DWU Security," he replied politely, "a pleasure to meet you, Miss Andrews. I'm familiar with your work. Please follow me, Mr Hebert is waiting for you all."
"Do you mind if we record on the way?" she asked, motioning to the camera guy now standing a few feet away aiming the camera at her.
"Not at all. We won't be going to any sensitive areas on the way. Please follow me." He started walking towards the main entrance, the rest of the party following him. They headed up the stairs to the fourth floor, a trip Roy was well familiar with.
"Tell me, Mr Poulsen, do you have a lot of people in the DWU security system? Is there much work in that field for you here?"
Kate looked both professionally and personally interested in the answer. Mark glanced back over his shoulder. "We have about twenty full time people in the division and there are a substantial number more we can call on if required," he replied conversationally. "Obviously I can't go into details. We're mainly involved with theft and vandalism prevention but on occasion we do have to deal with… more problematic issues. Normally something like drug addicts who have decided to try and use our property for one reason or another." He smiled at her. "Normally a quiet discussion pointing out we'd prefer that not happen is sufficient. In recent years the problems have been much less of an issue."
"The Archer's Bridge Merchants, I suppose?" she said thoughtfully.
"Mostly, yes. We've had… less than ideal… situations with them in the past. Oddly enough, for the last few weeks we haven't seen many of them around." His smile was somewhat more vicious now. "I can't imagine why."
"I can," the sound man muttered quietly, behind Roy, making him chuckle.
"To be honest, we haven't had too much trouble with the Merchants for some time now, even before the Family turned up. We made our point that they were unwelcome and in the end they mostly seem to have decided we're too much trouble to deal with," Mark added, looking amused. "It was a lot worse a few years ago. When Lung arrived he had a pretty big effect on the gangs, and the Merchants mostly seem to have ended up fighting the ABB and not us. I can't say that for the city it was an improvement, but it helped around here quite a bit."
"I see," the redhead replied, making quick notes in a small notebook she'd pulled out. "Very interesting." After a moment, she asked, "But that changed when Hookwolf and the Empire Eighty-Eight attacked here, I assume?"
"That wasn't a particularly good thing to happen," Mark replied as they reached the top of the stairs and started down the hallway to the back of the building. "Luckily Raptaur turned up and helped, or it might have worked out differently. The E88 gang members weren't too much of a problem, especially since we had plenty of warning, but he would have gone through this place like a hurricane. Raptaur stopped him pretty damn quickly, though."
"I've seen the videos," she laughed. "It was deeply impressive. And deeply terrifying. Doesn't she scare you guys?"
"No, not really. Sure, she's impressive to look at, and see in action, but she's also one of the calmest and most pleasant people I know," he said with a small shake of his head. "And she's one of us. She'll do anything needed to protect the DWU, everyone knows that, and we trust her implicitly." He looked back at her again. "We feel the same about all the Family. Good people. Here we are, Mr Hebert's office. Hold on a moment, please." He went up to Danny's door, tapped on it, then opened the door and leaned in. There was a short quiet conversation before he swung the door open for them "Please, go in."
Roy led the way inside, Felipe glancing at him, then inside the room, before taking up a station next to the door without a word. The news team followed Roy in, then Mark closed the door softly behind them, remaining outside the room. Danny was getting up from his desk as they entered, approaching with his hand out. Roy shook hands, then introduced the reporter and her people, all of whom were looking around with interest.
"It's nice to meet you, Kate," Danny said politely, looking pleased. "Have a seat. Is this enough room for your purposes or would you prefer our conference room?"
"This is fine, Mr Hebert," she replied. Peering out his window, she added, "Great, you can see the tanker from here. That's wonderful, we can get it in the shot." Glancing at the cameraman she was rewarded with a nod. "OK, if you could sit in your chair there and maybe move it about two feet to the right?"
Danny followed her instructions with a smile. "Here?"
"Another six inches, please," the cameraman said, moving around and peering at the monitor attached to his rig. "That's it."
"OK." Danny looked over to the blonde young woman who was sitting at the table on the other side of the room, watching the proceedings with a smile of her own, seemingly quite amused. "Does anyone want coffee, tea, or anything like that?"
"I could do with a coffee if it's not too much trouble, Danny," Roy replied. The news team all shook their heads.
"Not before the interview, but perhaps afterwards?" Kate said.
"Sure. Lisa?"
The blonde got up, nodding. "OK, Danny. Back in a minute." She slipped out of the room, closing the door.
"My assistant, Lisa. Smart girl, extremely helpful." Danny grinned. "She knows what I need before I do at least half the time."
Roy looked at him, thinking there was something else going on there. Danny caught his eye and grinned more widely for a moment. Oh, yes, there was definitely something else going on there, he mused. Perhaps he'd find out some time. "So how do you want to do this, Kate?" the DWU man asked curiously.
"Basically, I'd like to start with some questions about the DWU, your history, then move onto meeting the Family, the proposal you went to the Mayor with, and the story behind the whole thing leading up to moving that tanker," she replied. "After we've done that, I'd like to do a Q&A session with both you and the Mayor. Perhaps we could also look around the facility, and get some close up shots of the ship itself, and what you're doing to it?"
"Sure, that's not a problem," he said, glancing at his watch. "It'll be getting dark in about three hours so we should probably look at the tanker earlier rather than later, though, to get the best light. We've got floodlights but there's a limit to how bright they can be."
"This shouldn't take more than an hour or so," Kate said, pulling out a sheaf of paperwork from the slim case she had under her arm.
"All right, that should be fine, then. We'll have to arrange some protective safety gear for you all before we go out there, but that's easy as well."
"I understand Kaiju is hopefully going to be available later as well?" she asked, looking simultaneously eager and apprehensive.
Danny chuckled. "She should be here sometime around half past two, yes. I got word to her last night and she's happy to talk to you. A word of warning, please don't ask too many questions about her family, she won't answer most of them. They're very private. But she'll probably answer anything else you want."
"Wonderful." She was all smiles now.
Lisa came back into the room, handing Roy a cup of coffee. "Here you are, Mayor Christner," she said quietly.
"Thank you," he replied, equally quietly. Sipping it, he smiled. It was exactly the way he liked it. The girl went back to the chair she'd occupied earlier and picked up a pen, making some notes on the pad in front of her while inspecting the others. He glanced at her, got a small grin back, then went back to watching the reporter as she sat in the chair Danny had originally indicated.
"OK. Ready, guys?" She looked over her shoulder to the cameraman, who nodded, then at the sound man who was just in the process of attaching a tiny microphone to Danny's shirt collar.
"Just about, Kate..." The man tapped the mike and checked the recorder he'd put on the desk. "Please say something in a normal voice, sir."
"How's this?" Danny said obediently.
"Great, perfect levels. We're good to go, Kate." He picked up the recorder and moved out of shot, sitting at the side of the room and carefully adjusting a couple of controls.
"OK." She paused, looking at the camera for a moment, then turned to him. "Mr Hebert, you're the hiring manager and lead negotiator here at the Brockton Bay Dock Worker's Association, an organization over a hundred and fifty years old. I'm told that to the three hundred and fifty-seven men and women who directly work for the DWU, you're also essentially the man in charge of the entire thing. Can you tell me how that came to pass, and a little about yourself?"
"Certainly, Kate," Danny began, smiling gently. "You might say it's in the blood, I suppose. One way or another my family has been associated with shipping and labor for many generations. In a sense, my own relationship with the DWU started when I was only a child, due to my father's involvement with the docks..." Roy settled back to listen to the interview, curious to see what he learned from the questions.
Unlocking the BBFO office door at just past ten after two, Taylor, who was currently in the form of Saurial, looked over her shoulder at a familiar scent to see Lisa jogging towards her. "Hi, Lisa," she smiled.
"Hello, Saurial. I wanted to have a quick word with you, please."
"Sure, come on in," she replied, holding the door open. When they were both inside the building, she closed and locked it again, while Lisa turned the lights on. Both of them went and sat down at the table. "What's up? How are you, as well? And the others?"
"I'm fine, and so is everyone else, thanks," Lisa told her, smelling pleased. "Your Dad gave me a job, I assume you know?"
"I do. I suggested it to him, although he'd been thinking of it before as well."
"Thanks for that. It's interesting and fun. So, as his assistant, I wanted to tell you that the BBFO internet and phone hookup will happen in about two hours, at half past four. The tech who was supposed to be here on Monday got delayed, then there was some sort of disturbance on Tuesday..." She trailed off with a grin, while Taylor laughed. "It took them a while to get their shit together after that, but he's coming later. You'll need to make a hole in the EDM lining of this place or he'll never get the cables in."
"Sure, that's no problem," she said. "I'll do it next to the power feed over there, I can fill it in again later. We can run any other cables inside here ourselves."
"You need to get some proper facilities and things in here," Lisa commented, looking around. "You've got that ancient toilet in the side room, this table and the chairs, and that's it."
"I haven't really been here that much so far," Taylor smiled, "but you're right. I was thinking about starting to get some interesting books in here, so I'll need some book cases, then maybe a bench along that wall. If we get more power points put in over it we can put computers and things there, and a coffee machine. A fridge under it would be a good idea as well, and we should get the toilet replaced with something made more recently than forty years ago."
"That would help," Lisa smirked. She was making notes. "If you want, I can order the computers and stuff like that. I'm pretty good with them, I can get you some good ones."
"Sure. Talk to Dad about the money for it. We'll need… hmm, four, maybe? With nice monitors. One for me, Amy, you when you're here, and a spare. That should do it for now."
"OK. I think some sort of decent fileserver with good security and backup facilities would be a good idea as well. I know the sort of thing that's needed."
"Great." Taylor thought for a moment, then jumped up and went to Amy's workroom, unlocking the door and going in for a moment. When she came back holding a sheet of paper, Lisa was watching her with obvious curiosity.
"What do you have in there?" the blonde asked.
"A surprise," Taylor grinned.
"For who?"
"Pretty much everyone," she snickered. "Don't worry, we'll let you in on it. It's Amy's project, I'll let her explain it."
Lisa looked at her thoughtfully as she locked the workroom again. "Amy… Now there's an interesting subject. I haven't quite worked out why, but there's something about her which is… very powerful. Nearly as powerful as you are, but different."
Sitting on her tail at the table, Taylor gave her a wide reptilian grin. "Hasn't your ridiculously bullshit Thinker power worked it out yet?"
"Hey, I need something to go on, or I get random crap," Lisa retorted. "Even I can't pull facts from nothing. Nearly nothing, sure, but I need a starting point."
Taylor considered her for a long moment, then asked the Varga, 'Do we trust her enough?'
"We trust her enough to let her know about you, and to let her be in close proximity to your father," he rumbled thoughtfully. "Her power is potent, she'll work it out sooner or later even if you say nothing. Letting her in on it shows trust, which I suspect she will reciprocate. I see no harm and several benefits to telling her."
'OK, you're right, like you usually are,' she replied. Lisa was still staring at her, frowning slightly.
"You're talking to the Varga again, aren't you?" she said.
"I talk almost constantly to him," Taylor smiled. "We were just discussing what to tell you. Strictly speaking it's Amy's secret, but we think you'll work it out for yourself, so we're going to trust you with it. Do not let it go to anyone else, please." Her expression momentarily reflected considerable danger.
Lisa paled a little.
"Trust me, you can trust me," she said in a low voice. "Aside from anything else, I owe you my life, as do my friends. And I like you and Danny. And Amy, for that matter. I don't want to do anything to hurt any of you, even leaving aside the whole 'please don't eat me' part of it."
"Thanks. Don't worry, we all like you as well, and don't want anything to happen to you guys. It's just that you have a slight reputation for being something of a know-it-all, and wanting other people to know it."
"You don't have to tell me that," Lisa sighed. "I was always the smart one in school, I know I have a slight ego issue. My powers made that a lot worse. But I think, or I hope, that I've learned to not show it so much. Sure, I want to know everything about everything, but recently I've learned the hard way it's probably best not to know certain things. Or at least let anyone else know that I know certain things."
"The first step toward true wisdom is knowing yourself, Lisa," the Varga said through Taylor's mouth, as she let him talk. "Many people never learn this fact. That you have speaks well of you."
"Thanks," she said. "It nearly cost me more than I wanted to pay."
"Such is often the case. Now, for my own fun, I will give you a hint. She's not just a healer." He withdrew, radiating amusement. Taylor watched Lisa's face as it went through several odd expressions.
The blonde stared at her, then Amy's workroom, then her again. After a moment she got a very thoughtful expression, during which her eyes widened and widened.
"Oh, fuck me," she finally whispered in shock. "Amy Dallon isn't a healer at all, is she?"
"Not just a healer," Taylor corrected. "She can do that incredibly well, but that's only the tip of her particular iceberg."
"A Biotinker, plus other things," Lisa went on, staring wide-eyed at her. Taylor nodded slowly.
"More or less. We're not actually sure what she is really, but that's probably the closest definition."
"Jesus. No wonder you don't want that to get around. Do her family know?"
"No one knows. Except me, Dad, and now you. We need to keep it that way, at least right now. You say Biotinker, people hear Nilbog. I may have to do something about him one day but for now, we just want a fairly quiet life. Amy was going nuts just doing the healing thing, although it was the only thing she'd allow herself to do. Even though a lot of people told her to take it easier." Taylor sighed a little. "I could see how stressed she was from the moment I met her. I could smell it. Another six months… I hate to think what could have happened if she finally snapped and I think she was close."
Lisa had gone pale again. "That… would not be good."
"Not even slightly. Aside from her, the effect on everyone else would have been very bad. Up to terminally catastrophic. Luckily for the city and possibly the world, we bumped into each other." Taylor shrugged a little. "I made a friend, after a somewhat rocky start, someone I like very much indeed and trust with my life, she did the same. We both needed that very much. Her more than me in some ways, since I was already on the way to healing, thanks to the Varga and Dad. She was on the way to somewhere very bad. I don't think that's the case any more."
"No, from what I read from her, she's actually very happy and enjoys her life now," Lisa mused, staring at her. "You know she'd die for you?"
Taylor winced a little, but nodded. "I guessed that. It goes both ways. I hope it never comes to that. We're a lot closer in most ways than I would have expected, in only a few weeks she's damn near a sister to me. I don't really know why."
"And more importantly, she'd kill for you. If necessary. So would Danny."
She nodded again. "Yes, that part I do know. Again, it goes both ways. I protect my family, blood and otherwise. From anyone or anything to the best of my ability." She shrugged. "It's what demons do."
Lisa looked amused, while Taylor grinned, teeth glittering. "Still not convinced about the half-demon thing, but I don't really need more demonstrations."
"Demon-strations, hmm?"
"Oh, god, don't you start with puns as well," Lisa moaned. "Your father is bad enough. He got me with one yesterday even my power was taken by surprise with."
Laughing, Taylor nodded. "He told me. The look on his face… really really pleased with himself, I'd say. He looked like you do when you know something no one else does."
The blonde laughed. "I know that smile. You have it sometimes as well."
"You're a lot better at it."
"Thank you." Lisa bowed in her seat. Straightening up, she asked curiously and sounding suddenly unsure of herself, "Am I part of that extended family you mentioned?"
Studying her for a moment, Taylor slowly nodded. "I think you probably are. You're my responsibility if nothing else, but I have to admit I like you a lot. So does the Varga. He thinks you show promise."
"Thanks, Varga," Lisa snickered.
"You are most welcome, Lisa," he told her through Taylor, smiling at her.
"That's still one of the freakiest parts of this entire weird thing, you know?" Lisa commented, shaking her head. "I can't get anything useful from either of you, aside from the fact that I can easily tell that you and he are definitely completely different personalities, and not in the 'there's something wrong with her head' way. I mean, clearly there is something wrong with your head, like you're basically nuts, but in a nice way." She grinned as Taylor folded her arms and stared hard at her.
"Should I be insulted?" she asked calmly.
"No, of course not. Sane people are very boring, but luckily very rare." Lisa smirked. "Trust me, I'm a Parahuman, I know. And I also know that all Parahumans are completely loopy. Powers fuck you up. Rachel is at the bad end of that spectrum. I'm at the good end, so is Brian. Alec..." She waved a hand. "Somewhere in the middle maybe?"
"And me?"
"I haven't decided yet, but you're closer to sane than most," the girl grinned. "Depending on your definition of sane, of course."
"Of course."
"So. Amy… She can make things? Live things?"
"Pretty much, yes. She hasn't made anything totally from scratch yet, she's still learning and going really slowly and carefully. She doesn't want to cause harm any more than anyone else would want that. But she's come up with some cool things so far."
Lisa looked fascinated. "Such as?"
Watching as the lizard-girl pondered the question, obviously deciding how much to answer, Lisa could see she was talking to whatever it really was that shared head-space with her. Eventually, Taylor hopped to her feet again and went back to the separate block of rooms, unlocking the door and disappearing inside once more. Firmly restraining her curiosity as to what was actually in there, knowing it was pushing her luck to ask, Lisa waited patiently until the girl came out again, a small box in her hand. She put it on the table and sat back on her tail, watching to see what Lisa did.
Staring at it, Lisa let her power have a go.
Box made of aluminum alloy, two parts, not machined.
Formed via matter creation power
Contains organic liquid, used as biological support system
Artificial biological organism in liquid
Extremely curious and more than a little apprehensive, Lisa carefully reached out and lifted the top half of the box, which smoothly slid off the bottom section, revealing it was half full of a viscous fluid. Floating in that fluid was a small bone-colored chip of… something. Slightly convex on the top surface, it didn't look alive.
Originated from plant protoplasm
Heavily modified, extremely complex DNA structure
Not related to any living creature
In biological stasis
Purpose…
There was a pause, while the mild headache she always got using her abilities grew stronger. She concentrated.
Purpose is healing of human body via symbiotic relationship
Can heal any disease
Can heal any non-immediately fatal wound given sufficient resources
Will enable deep hibernation if resources unavailable
Reverses symptoms of aging process
Lisa could feel her face paling during the first few facts, but the last one nearly made her faint. She double checked her results, heedless of the ache in her forehead.
Reverses symptoms of aging process
"Oh… My… God..." she mumbled.
"It's cool, right?"
"You realize what this means?" the girl asked in a faint voice.
"I've got a pretty good idea, yes," she admitted with a small smile.
"Life extension, that's… people will kill for that, ironically enough," she mumbled. "How long?"
"Amy thinks only around three hundred percent at the moment."
Lisa nearly fainted. "That would make an average life span about two hundred and fifty years."
"Yep."
"Christ."
She shook her head, hard. "This is too much. Every time I think I'm getting to grips with you and this entire insane asylum, you go and drop something like this on me."
"You wanted to know," Taylor grinned.
"I have to stop doing that," Lisa moaned. "All it does is give me a headache." She watched as Taylor put the lid back on the box then returned it to the workroom, while wondering what other miracles were in there. She firmly suppressed the urge to even ask. Right now she didn't want to know, not really.
"At least you didn't faint this time," Taylor laughed as she returned.
"It was a near thing," Lisa replied quietly. After a moment, she asked, "Have you actually tested it?" She thought, then added, "Amy tested it on herself."
"Yes," Taylor confirmed. "Dad gave her the idea, sort of. She ran with it and made the first one. The Mark One."
"Because..." Lisa thought. "Because her powers can't affect her! But she can program the symbiote to do anything she wants! That's brilliant. And she kept tweaking it, until she ended up with that thing. How many iterations?"
"That's the Mark Seventeen. It's the first one she felt was safe to let someone else use."
Staring at her, Lisa thought frantically, a whole series of observations that she'd made suddenly clicking into place and making sense. "Danny. Your father has one, right?"
Taylor nodded slowly. "He's the first, and so far, only, user of one other than Amy. She gave it to him for his birthday, which is next Monday. Best present ever. Although my coat is neat."
Lisa looked oddly at her, then dismissed the comment, concentrating on the important thing. "That explains so much," she remarked in awe. "I noticed how he seemed to be in ridiculously good health for a man in his mid forties, who obviously doesn't exercise like a lunatic. He's way fitter than he should be. My power was having real trouble working out why since he's obviously not a Parahuman."
Smiling, the lizard-girl nodded happily. "It's sure helped. I'm incredibly grateful to Amy for coming up with that thing and giving it to him. I hate to think about my dad being hurt, but the symbiote reduces that possibility a hell of a lot. There are some other plans for later versions as well but we haven't got that far yet."
"You're going to upgrade it to boost strength, speed, things like that, right?"
"That's the idea."
"And Amy is already testing those mods?"
Taylor nodded. "She's several generations past the mark seventeen. We haven't told anyone yet, you're the only one other than the two of us who know. But she's already probably about four or five times stronger than she was, at least twice as quick, and a lot tougher. We think probably about a Brute two, maybe even three rating. Like I said, she's going slowly to avoid making any mistakes, and any attention."
"Even so, when other people, even, no, especially the PRT, find out..." Lisa shook her head in worry. "It's going to make them go totally nuts."
"That's the problem," Taylor sighed. "We haven't quite worked out how to get around that. Our best thought so far is to make it look like Family Biotech. We might be able to spin it like that. Amy's been inspired by my biology, which is entirely unlike anything on the planet, and made all sorts of weird changes to the symbiote which should confuse the hell out of any scientist who analyses it. She's sure it won't read as anything even close to normal life, or something that a human was responsible for. Partly for camouflage, partly because she needed to do that to make it work the way it does."
"I'm not sure if that would be a good thing or not," Lisa mused. "But I can see where you're coming from. Wow. Just… Wow. This is really big."
"Biggish, definitely," Taylor agreed happily. "It's one of the longer term projects. But you see why it must not be talked about, under any circumstances? The only reason I've told you, even though I do trust you, is that your power would have worked it out eventually anyway." She fixed Lisa with a hard look.
"Do not tell anyone, at all. Clear?" Her voice was suddenly very hard and Lisa had no doubt that she meant it. And that this was a test.
"Clear. I promise, I will not even mention or refer to it again, unless you or Amy tell me I can," she replied slowly and carefully. After a pause while those unnerving glowing eyes studied her closely, the scaled head nodded.
"Thank you." A few seconds passed, then the other girl handed her the sheet of paper she'd originally retrieved from the locked room. "Changing the subject completely, can you also track down all this equipment and order it?"
Lisa read the sheet, then nodded slowly. "I think so, yes. Some sort of radio relay system. For phones and the DWU radios? To let them work in here."
"Exactly. Armsmaster emailed the list to Dad after he visited. We could do with it, it's annoying sometimes to have no cell phones and radio communications in here as soon as the door closes."
"Convenient at other times," Lisa noted.
"Oh, sure, which is why it can be turned off." Taylor smiled. "We like our privacy, but sometimes you need to talk to other people."
"I'll get on it."
"Thanks."
Folding the paper up, Lisa tucked it away. She looked at Taylor, thinking about what she'd discovered the day before, then sighed faintly. "OK. After all that, I still need to tell you something. Or at least, show you something, then let you make your own conclusions."
The lizard-girl looked curiously at her. "What does that mean?" she asked.
Producing the bag containing the three bottles she'd removed from Danny's office the day before, after her ability had given her a rather unsettling series of deductions, she handed it over. Taylor opened the bag, looked at the contents, then Lisa, a puzzled expression on her face.
"Empty water bottles?"
"Smell them."
There was a pause, then the girl delicately used the tips of her claws to pick each bottle out of the bag by the tops, sniffing each one carefully. "Zephron handled all of them. Probably took them into Dad's office. I can smell the scent of his carpet on them, so they were there. The bag smells of his room as well. Dad handled this one, and this one. Director Piggot touched this one as well. The last one..." She sniffed again. "Same scent as on his coat. The Chief Director?"
Lisa just looked at her. After a moment, she said, "Remember the scents, and keep your temper. I'll talk to you later. But I don't want to either say anything to prejudice you, or anything that could get me in trouble. My power is warning me not to talk too much."
"Pity it couldn't have told you that a week ago," Taylor snarked, making Lisa grin, but the girl sniffed the bottle again before putting it down carefully. "OK. You're being mysterious, but OK."
Looking at her watch, Lisa got up. "It's half past two. Kaiju should get to work. Make that hole in the EDM, and I'll arrange to get the keys from Danny and keep an eye on the tech when he comes. Have fun with the interview."
Taylor laughed. "I think I probably will. I've never been interviewed before."
"I doubt they've ever interviewed a sea monster before either, so you're in good company," Lisa snickered. She watched as Taylor went over to the relevant spot and touched it, the wall coating vanishing over a square foot area near the main three phase power input.
"Think that should do it?" she asked.
"Should do, yes. Great."
"OK. See you later," Taylor smiled, unlocking the door. Both of them left, she re-locked it, then with a wave disappeared down a narrow alleyway towards the bay. Lisa watched her go, then slowly headed back to the admin block, her mind whirling. The last few days had totally changed her life, but the shocks just kept coming.