"Hi, guys," Taylor said as she approached Kevin and Randall, both of whom were staring at Linda's mech with envy. "What brings you here?"
"We wanted to catch up, say hi, and talk about a few things, but now we mainly want to try that thing," Kevin replied, not taking his eyes off it.
"Join the line, there's quite a few people in front of you," Linda herself said with a look of satisfaction. They all looked around, seeing a large number of people were still waiting patiently for a go in the mech.
"Where did they get popcorn from?" Danny asked, suddenly noticing that most of them were munching on the snack.
"Zephron decided we needed something to eat," Mark commented as he wandered over and heard the remark. "They're making hot dogs next."
"Oh, for… This place is just getting weird," Danny sighed.
"But it's a lot of fun, right?" Randall snickered.
"You're not the one trying to keep it running, are you?" the older man asked with mild exasperation. "It's a total madhouse and somehow with this sort of thing happening, I can't see that getting less true any time soon."
"Fair point," Randall laughed.
"I need to go and keep an eye on these guys, so I'll see you later," Linda put in, nodding to them all, then dashing off to help the next DWU employee, who was staring up at the mech with wonder, climb aboard.
"Sergeant Foxton wants a quick word before he leaves, Boss," Mark said, turning back from watching the Tinker. They all looked over to where the PRT squad was standing and watching with great interest as well. All of them had managed to try the mech, coming out of it with expressions varying from seriously impressed to flat out envious.
"All right. Gentlemen, I'll probably see you later." He nodded to both not-really-villains, then headed over to the PRT people. Taylor listened curiously from where she was, hearing that he was confirming that the security people had been successfully trained with the new equipment, to his satisfaction and Mark's. He was also very complimentary about how professional they all were, which pleased her, her father, and Mark as well based simply on their expressions. The scents were added proof of that, she thought, smiling inside.
The man was also very impressed by the mech. She listened for a few seconds as he asked a couple of questions, looking thoughtful, and wondered what his report to Director Piggot would say…
While demonstrating the thing for the first time in front of a number of obviously alert PRT personnel hadn't been in the initial plan, it would probably work out well for them. When Linda went to the PRT for her power testing in a couple of days, it was more than likely that they'd already have a fairly good idea what she could do. Or at least what they thought she could do. Taylor was fairly certain that the full extent of their friend's abilities was a little more extensive than the authorities were going to be all that prepared for, which amused her.
'Metis' and Amy joined them, having been chatting to Zephron. "Hi," the latter said, handing her a hot-dog with a grin. "Back already?"
"We just can't stay away," Randall chuckled. "And it looks like that was the right decision. That thing is… unbelievable."
"It's pretty good," Lisa agreed, looking over her shoulder at the mech, which was now jogging around the yard again, Linda watching with approved interest as the newest pilot got to grips with the machine. "I'm really impressed by how many people here can operate it so well."
"Lots of heavy machinery experience, I guess," Taylor said. "Plus Vectura's control system is amazingly good. I'll bet even a child could operate it with a little instruction. These guys wouldn't have any trouble at all." After a moment, she gestured towards the BBFO office. "Come on, let's go somewhere private. You can try it out later when everyone else has finished amusing themselves."
With a last longing look at the rapidly moving mech, both young men nodded agreement. The group headed back towards the office, Kevin stopping at their truck for a moment to retrieve a large flight case from the back. Holding the door open, Taylor waited for him. "New toy?" she asked curiously. It smelled of synthetics and electricity.
"An old toy I fixed," he replied.
Inside, once the door was locked, both of them pulled their balaclavas off, Kevin putting the case down and scratching his head frantically. "Fuck, that thing itches," he complained.
"Why not work out something a little more effective?" Amy asked with a small grin. "Hardly anyone just uses a balaclava, for god's sake. You guys always look like extras from a bad crime thriller."
"Except when we're being really cool in a good costume, right?" Randall asked, smiling. All three girls looked at each other.
"Um..."
His smile slipped.
Lisa snickered. "Don't worry, we're pulling your legs," she assured them. "Sometimes you do look cool. Sort of."
"After a fashion," Amy added, draping herself over a chair and stretching, then relaxing. "More or less."
"Well, don't keep praising us that much or we'll just get big heads," Randall snarked, sitting next to her and putting his feet on the table. "Thanks a lot, guys."
"You're entirely welcome," she giggled. "How's things with you anyway? Modifications still working?"
"Perfectly, thanks," he said. "Both of us think our powers are still getting more… efficient? Cooperative?" He looked contemplative. "It's hard to explain."
"I know what you mean," she agreed, Lisa nodding from the other side of the table where she'd leaned back on her tail. "My power is practically purring all the time now. It's different than it was before I met her." She jerked her thumb at Taylor who had retaken her base form and was making coffee, watching them occasionally and listening. "Back then it wanted to be used, sort of, but not necessarily in a good way. Now… now it keeps suggesting things that fit into our whole theme, improvements to them and all sorts of other things like that. It's not being pushy, it's being helpful. And apparently enjoying the hell out of life."
"Pretty much exactly that with mine, too," Lisa commented, looking thoughtful. "With an added feeling that it really wants to tell me something important, and is getting frustrated because it can't. And kind of pissed off too, not at us, but at something else. I have the definite impression it's hoping we'll do something about something, but so far I don't know what that is. It's annoying both of us."
"Both of you?" Kevin echoed, a little oddly. She looked embarrassed, her currently scaly face shifting.
"I know, it sounds mad, but it really is a separate thing, one that's joined to me. I'm sure of it. Powers are… maybe not intelligent, as such, but I can't help but feel they have the capacity for intelligence, and mine at least seems to be getting slowly closer to that level. A bit like her and the Varga, in a really primitive way, I think." She waved at Taylor who was now distributing coffee to everyone. "Although I wouldn't blame you if you said you thought it was nuts. I think it's nuts, and I'm living it."
Sitting down with her own coffee in hand, Taylor said, "What about our theory that the power 'processors' are computers of some alien sort?"
"I still think that's probably about as close as we can get," Lisa shrugged. "It doesn't preclude them from being intelligent, though, I can't see any reason that there couldn't be an alien AI after all. And my power agrees with me and got quite excited when I was thinking that."
"Huh." Taylor pondered the idea, the Varga doing likewise. With the evidence and suspicions they already had about someone else, it wasn't a stretch. "Fair enough."
Kevin sighed a little, leaning his head back over the rear of his chair and staring at the ceiling. "We're all crazy. Even so, I agree, I think. It fits with my own experiences all too well."
"Mine too," Randall added, picking his coffee up and sipping it, then putting it down again. "My own abilities seem to be steadily improving, like I said, and I keep getting this weird sensation of… happiness… from somewhere. Somewhere that isn't me. Although I'm pretty happy even so." He grinned for a moment. "Largely because of you insane girls."
Bowing from a seated position, Taylor smiled at him. "We live to please."
"You live to confuse the hell out of everyone you meet," Amy sighed. "As you well know."
"Like you're any different. Or her." Taylor pointed at Lisa with the end of her tail. "We're all so similar in some respects sometimes I really wonder if we actually are sisters." She grinned widely as Amy giggled. Lisa laughed for a moment.
"Personally I can't see how I could have ended up closer to any other people even if I was related to them," the black lizard said. "You all are a lot more valuable to me than my actual parents are, so there's that."
Giving her a curious look, Taylor wondered at the comment for a moment. Lisa didn't talk about her family, although it was obvious to her that they hadn't had the best relationship. However, she didn't feel it was her place to pry, so said nothing about it. The look in her friend's eyes thanked her for that.
"So how have things been for you guys since last time?" she asked, turning the attention back on the two men. "It's been pretty quiet with us, nothing out of the usual at all."
Lisa nearly choked on her coffee and Amy lay back laughing hysterically, making Kevin and Randall exchange glances, then fix her with a hard look. "Really? Nothing at all unusual?"
"Nope," she grinned. "It's just been normal business around here. To be honest, I'm star..."
She broke off as a sudden weird sound came from the far corner of the room. Everyone looked sharply over at the strange whistling twang noise, which preceded that corner abruptly looking very weird indeed. It wavered and lost focus in a roughly spherical zone about eight feet across, the light acting very oddly around it like it was going through a lens of some sort. The sound was replaced by a subsonic hum that grew as the center of the distortion darkened, while around them they could feel things vibrating.
"Holy shit," Kevin yelped. "What the fuck…?"
With another weird wrench to the eyes, the spherical zone suddenly turned into a dark void, out of which popped a familiar figure. Everyone stared in shock as Saurial dived forward, rolled to her feet, and looked frantically around. Her trench-coat was smoking in a few places, her fedora was on fire, and she looked generally tattered. Spotting them, she charged over.
"You have to stop her!"
"What?" Lisa gaped in horror as Saurial grabbed and shook her.
"You have to stop her! Before it's too late! I can't stay long, holding the temporal window open is dangerous. But remember. Stop Vista!"
"Vista?"
Several people said the name at the same time.
"Vista! The cuteness! The horrible, horrible cuteness. It's everywhere!" The lizard girl moaned in horror, covering her face, as they stared. "We made a ghastly, terrible mistake teaching her Family math. She opened a pathway to..."
A roar came from the open void. Saurial flinched, whipping her head around. "Oh, hell. It's found me. Too late. I have to go right now. Remember, stop Vista before it's too late, or we're all fucked! You have less than six months."
She looked at a complicated watch-like device on her arm, manipulating it as she ran back to the apparent portal, everyone turning to track her. "You're our only hope, Lisa. You'll need their help, so stick together, no matter what happens."
Everyone twitched violently as whatever she was about to say next was cut off by a huge scaly tentacle that shot out of the portal, wrapped around her several times, and yanked her back in. Moments later, with a weirdly humorous pop! sound it vanished from existence, all the odd light and sound effects stopping at the same time.
There was dead silence for some time.
Kevin was on his feet, pointing at where the anomaly had been. Randall was gaping open-mouthed, staring alternately at that spot and Lisa, who in turn was looking incredibly confused and very worried. Amy was watching her as well, her brow furrowed in deep thought, half out of her chair with a bioceramic knife in her hand that she'd apparently instinctively formed by reflex.
After close to a minute, Lisa shut her open jaws with a snap of tooth enamel, then faintly asked, "Did anyone else see that?"
"Yes."
"I did. I wish I didn't, but I did."
"I saw something."
She nodded absently, still looking at the corner. "I was afraid of that."
The pause went on for a little longer.
"So, like I said, nothing out of the normal around here," Taylor finally said. "More coffee?" She hopped up and went over to the machine as everyone looked at each other, then slowly turned to stare at her.
"Oh, for god's sake, Taylor," Amy finally said in exasperated tones. "Was that you or him that had that idea?"
"What idea?" she said, looking over her shoulder with a raised eyebrow.
Amy pointed at the innocent corner with the knife, apparently only then noticing it. Reabsorbing it, she added, "That. Freaking us all out with a time-traveling Saurial with a warning from the future."
"That was odd, wasn't it?" Taylor smiled. "Maybe we should talk to Vista again, just to be safe."
The Dallon girl folded her arms and glared. Lisa was now sitting with a hand over her face, muttering to herself. Kevin looked at his friend, then the two girls, then Taylor, who had turned back to the coffee machine. "Um..." He raised a hand. "Excuse me?"
"Yes, Kevin?" Taylor looked back at him with an innocent look.
"What just happened?"
"How do you mean?"
He waved that hand at the corner, then Lisa, mutely asking for clarification. She shrugged.
"Some weird sort of temporal incursion, maybe? Strange things happen sometimes. Do you want more coffee?"
"I do, this one is empty," a small voice said from next to him. Freezing, he slowly turned his head and looked down.
When he saw the six inch high version of Saurial that was leaning on a coffee-cup nearly as big as she was, he quite eloquently shouted "Gaaah!" and leaped sideways, almost falling over. Randall pushed his chair back from the table so hard he ended up tipping it backwards, while both Amy and Lisa merely glanced at each other and sighed simultaneously.
"Sugar?" Taylor asked.
"Please." The mini-Saurial looked satisfied, then stared at the two young men, who were gaping at her from a safe distance. "What's wrong with them?"
"Not a clue. Boys, you know?"
"I think it's humans in general, they seem easily spooked." She turned into a tiny dragon and flew over to sit on Taylor's head, the brunette girl ignoring her as she kept making coffee.
Amy shook her head. "You are a complete menace," she growled.
Snickering, Taylor came back with a tray of steaming new cups of coffee, including one about the size of a thimble which she handed up to her passenger. "Just livening things up. I needed to show them some of my new tricks."
Randall, getting up from where he'd been kneeling on the floor, his eyes so wide it looked like it hurt, asked very slowly, "New tricks?"
"I learned some new things recently," she grinned. Then teleported to stand right next to him, holding out his new coffee, as he yelped and jumped two feet in the air. "Like this."
After a long pause, he stepped closer and took it from her, still staring. Kevin was speechlessly watching from the table. Lisa was now shaking her head, grinning, and Amy was trying not to collapse in laughter.
"I… think... we may have missed a few things..." Randall looked extremely confused. "Want to fill us in?"
"Sure!" She teleported back to the table and sat down, putting her feet up and crossing her legs at the ankle. The tiny dragon enlarged to the more common foot and a half or so, sitting on the table and smirking at them.
"It's a very good technique that my host invented, isn't it?" the Varga said in his normal voice, sounding extremely pleased with himself. "You'll enjoy the video we have as well."
Both of them sat again, Randall pulling his chair over, then exchanged a glance. "You sure about your idea, man?" Randall asked his friend. "It would mean being around these lunatics more often."
Kevin scratched his chin, beginning to grin. "I think it would be worth it," he chuckled. "So. Spill. What the fuck have you been up to?"
The next couple of hours was very interesting to them.
And Amy was giggling under her breath for nearly ten minutes.
"Come in, Sergeant," Emily said as the man in question looked in through the door Hannah had opened when he knocked. Entering her office, he took a seat, saluting first.
"Report, please."
"My team successfully delivered the shipment to the DWU security department this morning on schedule," he began. "Mr Hebert signed for it after we checked the manifest. The equipment was offloaded into a purpose-built on-site armory constructed with the EDM material the Family use, which also had a very high security lock. I can see no way that any unauthorized personnel can gain access without the cooperation of the DWU administration. In my opinion the equipment is stored in a safe manner."
"Armory?" Emily asked sharply. "With weapons?"
"I… am not entirely certain, Ma'am," he replied. "Based on the size and shape of some of the crates there, which were covered up, they might contain submachine guns, but I couldn't smell any normal gun lubricants or solvents. You know how most armories have a very distinctive smell?"
She nodded, knowing exactly what he meant.
"Nothing like that. Just light machine oil, I'd say. I wouldn't be prepared to swear to it but I don't think they have normal firearms in there. Their security chief also made a couple of comments during the day which suggested that Mr Hebert wasn't particularly interested in arming them, other than with non-lethal crowd control systems such as the foam projectors and the like. In my opinion he wasn't completely happy about this but respected it. I would also expect, as an ex-soldier, that he most likely has his own private weapon somewhere close to hand if circumstances demand it, but it would take a substantial threat to make him use it."
"I see. Do we have any information on his service history?" She glanced at Hannah, who slipped her a folder, which she looked through with interest. "Hmm. Yes, with this background, I expect he would. Special forces training… Urban warfare expert… Impressive."
"Several of the security team have similar backgrounds," Foxton noted. "They were quite open about it. The DWU is known for being fairly heavy on ex-military types, a lot of people with those backgrounds traditionally struggle to fit into civilian life. From what I know, the Union prizes the exact same qualities that make a good soldier, and they tend to fit in well. They also seem to end up ferociously loyal to the DWU on top of that, which would probably work out for both sides."
"You appear to know a lot about it, Sergeant," she said a little curiously.
He shrugged. "Friends of friends, Director. You hear things when people with our backgrounds get together in a bar or something like that. Even in the bad times, the Union was good to a lot of ex-service people who would have had a very poor life otherwise, especially these days. Word gets around. 'The Union looks after its own' is definitely a thing. A lot of people respect that."
"I see. Continue."
"Once the equipment was stored, I and my squad engaged in standard training exercises for twenty-three designated individuals. This took slightly over four hours. The performance of everyone involved was very good, several of them I would rate as excellent. They will train more people as needed. We left them with our excess inventory of foam and solvent that wasn't used during the training exercise for that purpose."
Emily nodded, making some notes, as he looked enquiringly at her. "That's fine, Sergeant, the stuff is cheap. It sounds like everything went well from that point of view. With any luck, should our absconder resurface there, they can handle things."
"I expect so, Ma'am," he said with a small smile. "Even without the input of the Family, their security people are good. Now that they know about Shadow Stalker, I doubt she'll be able to infiltrate for very long without attracting the sort of attention she wouldn't appreciate."
"All right. Thank you for the verbal report, I'll expect the full written one by tomorrow shift end."
"Of course, Ma'am. Mr Hebert wanted me to express his gratitude for the quick response, the generous amount of equipment, and the training. He seemed pleased."
"Also good. We need him and his people in a cooperative mood," she sighed. "Thank you. I'll have to call him at some point to keep him updated on our own progress. Not that there is much of it yet." Reaching out, she pressed a key on her keyboard, causing the screen on the wall of her office to switch from the PRT logo background to a high-resolution image of the DWU mech. "Now. What can you tell me about that." She waved at the screen.
He looked at it for a moment. "Only what I heard and observed, Director. I'll do a separate report on it, obviously, pulling in the data and observations of my team."
"Understood. Just a verbal impression for now, though."
"Yes, Ma'am. Well, the machine is approximately seven and a half tons in weight, standing roughly twelve feet tall when active on two legs, and about nine feet on four legs. The outer hull is entirely made of EDM, while the cockpit canopy is a giant single crystal of perfect sapphire with a mesh of EDM on both sides. Vectura was quite open to answering most questions on it," he said, forestalling her own question. "I am unsure of the power source, it's some Tinker design she wasn't talking about, but whatever it is would seem to be very high output, clean, and silent. It's apparently driven by very advanced linear electric motors throughout, which give it a remarkably high speed. She quoted 'in excess of sixty miles an hour' when running, but we witnessed Saurial drive it on four legs to what was easily twice that and it was still accelerating when she had to stop before hitting the boundary fence."
Hannah and Emily exchanged a glance. "That's… more than a little impressive."
"It's extraordinary, Director. I have seen a number of attempts at this sort of mech before, from a number of Tinkers, and DARPA for that matter, but nothing even remotely this effective." He shrugged a little. "The thing is intuitive to control, amazingly quick and stable, and the motion control system is practically alive. It was definitely some sort of adaptive computer, the machine got visibly more stable and fluid in its actions as time went on. It was learning from the people piloting it as much as they were from it."
"Christ." Emily looked back at the image. "They're making war mechs now?"
"Not at all, Ma'am," he said, shaking his head. "That's a construction machine."
There was a pause. "What?" she asked in flat tones.
"That's what Vectura designed it for. Construction, demolitions work, that sort of thing. They're planning on making a quantity of them for aiding the city's renewal project, and were discussing leasing them to other organizations. Hence the warning lights on it, and the safety orange stripes. OSHA regulations, Mr Hebert said." He grinned at her expression. "I know, it sounds insane, but they really are making giant walking mechs to use in place of forklifts and excavators. Vectura had some quite sensible arguments about how for a lot of what they do that thing was a more useful alternative. And a lot safer, the occupant is very unlikely to come to harm from an industrial accident. They seem quite concerned about that eventuality."
Hannah asked, "In your opinion, could it be used as a weapon?"
"Oh, definitely, Miss Militia," he nodded. "Almost anything could, of course, but that machine would certainly make a very effective urban assault vehicle. However, I honestly don't think, after talking to both Vectura and a number of the DWU people, that they're thinking along those lines at all. True, it's technically armed, in a sense. Both arms can deploy EDM cutting blades which will slice through almost anything, and the tail has some sort of plasma lance in it which is terrifyingly effective, but they're very short range. Ideal for cutting up a ship, not so good at shooting down an aircraft, as an example. I have no doubt that they could weaponize the machine but I don't believe they have either the intention or desire to do so."
Emily stared at him, then the image, for several seconds. Eventually she sighed. "This city is… Anything else about it that you can tell us?"
"It's capable of extended deep underwater operation, and Vectura mentioned adding a flight mode at some point." He quickly hid a slight expression of amusement at the expressions of his superiors, not being an idiot. Even so, Emily caught the flicker of his lips and glared a little.
"Of course she did. What would a giant mech be without the ability to fly?" she grumbled.
"Did you have a chance to operate it, Sergeant?" Hannah asked curiously.
"I did, yes. I was more than impressed. Vectura said she was working on a better control system, this one only being a prototype, but it's already as I said far better than anything I've ever even heard of before. My squad agreed. Several of them were saying that we should discuss leasing some of the machines ourselves."
"All right." Emily shook her head in mixed wonder and despair at the weirdness of the city these days. "Thank you, Sergeant Foxton. Please ensure that you fill in a standard Tinker encounter report as well, and get your men to do likewise."
"Yes, Director," he replied, standing.
"Dismissed."
"Ma'am." He saluted them both, then about-faced and left. When the door was shut, Emily leaned back in her chair and scrubbed her face with her hands.
"Is it me or is the DWU getting more peculiar by the day?" she asked plaintively. "Alien reptiles, Tinkers making walking mechs that actually work, to cut up ships of all things, a security team that's mostly made up of highly trained ex-soldiers, and god knows what else. How did we get here?"
"The security team predates the Family," Hannah replied, "but I think everything else is, one way or the other, due to them. They do seem to have an odd effect on people."
"Tell me about it," Emily sighed. "I give up. I'm just not going to be surprised any more by anything they do. It's getting monotonous." Closing the notebook, she stood up. "I'm going to get something to eat. This has been a very long day."
"Can't argue with that," the other woman smiled. "Mind if I join you?"
"Help yourself," she replied, locking her computer and heading for the door. "I wish we had beer in the cafeteria, I could do with one about now..."
Knocking on the door to the BBFO office, Danny waited for a moment. It was shortly opened by Amy, who was grinning to herself, and quite a lot of laughter was coming from further in. "Hi, Danny, come in," she said, stepping aside. He did so, hearing the door close and lock behind him. Über and Leet were adjusting their balaclavas, making it obvious that they'd only just pulled them on, which told him that they had unmasked to the girls. He wasn't surprised by this now.
All of them were gathered around one of the huge monitors, which was playing what he recognized as the tail end of the Coil takedown, video shot by both Taylor and her demon's head cameras. Both young men seemed impressed, a little envious, and slightly worried by it.
"That was incredible," Leet finally said when the recording stopped. "You two are crazy effective. You could have taken that entire place single-handed in minutes, couldn't you?"
"Oh, sure, we could simply have grabbed Calvert and teleported right out before anyone knew what was going on," Taylor, who was in her base form lying back in a chair with a bowl of popcorn in her lap and the Varga in dragonlet form on her shoulder, smiled. "But that would tell the PRT way too much about what we can do. We don't want them to know some of it for some time, and some of it at all. You know as well as I do that they'd probably overreact."
They nodded soberly as Danny walked over and put his hands on the back of her chair. She looked up at him with an upside-down grin. "Hi, dad. What do you think of Linda's little toy?"
"I think it's absolutely amazing and proof she is very talented, dear," he replied. "Everyone else thinks the same. I'll bet those PRT guys gave Director Piggot a very strange report, too."
She snickered, nodding, then ate some more popcorn. "Probably. It wasn't what we were planning on, but it should work out OK. They'll have some idea of what to expect."
"Don't forget that I'll be away Wednesday and Thursday, and possibly Friday as well," he remarked. "I can call her to arrange an appointment for power testing for our new Tinker tomorrow, though. I'd guess that they'll want to go ahead fairly soon, so it might be while I'm down in New York, but considering the whole Coil thing, they may put it off. They're going to be very busy dealing with everything that came out of it."
"They'll want to talk to us sooner than that," Lisa said with assurance in her voice. "Call them tomorrow, and I think we'll be in the PRT testing facility by Thursday morning at the latest." She poked the keyboard of the computer next to her 'Metis' body with a couple of claws, then indicated the screen. "There's already video of the mech up on PHO."
"There were an awful lot of people recording the tests," Amy noted. "And no one said not to mention it."
"Actually, this video is from one of the PRT troopers, I think," Lisa replied, watching it play with her head cocked to the side. "I haven't seen anything from a DWU employee yet, aside from a couple of people pointing out that it's not a weapons system, it's a construction one." She grinned for a moment. "You wouldn't believe some of the comments."
"I suspect I would," Danny sighed. "PHO is a strange place full of stranger people."
"That it is," she laughed. "Fun, though."
"If they want Linda to go in for testing on Thursday morning, that means Amy and Taylor won't be available to go with her, and I'd rather not have her go on her own. Will you go?"
"Of course, I was planning on it. I'm the reason the woman is here in the first place, I'm not going to abandon her now," Lisa assured him. "She's a friend."
"But not yet a member of your little club of reformed villains," he remarked, looking meaningfully at Über, then Leet. The former gave him a thumb's up, while the latter simply chuckled.
"Not all the way, yet," Taylor said. "Probably only a matter of time."
"Quite." He shook his head a little. "Are you planning on collecting them all?"
"It's a thought," she giggled. "Probably not, though."
"Actually, while we're on that subject, Danny," Über said after a glance at his partner in crime, "could we have a word?"
Danny looked at them curiously, then Taylor, who shrugged. Lisa was studying the pair with interest, as was Amy. "OK," he replied slowly. "Am I going to need to sit down?" Both of them shrugged.
Hooking a spare chair with the end of her tail from where she was sitting in another one, Amy flicked it towards him, then looked pleased with herself. He caught it, smiling a little, and sat. "All right. Talk to me."
"We've… been thinking about things," Über said, sounding a little nervous. "Our hobbies, lifestyle, that sort of thing. And what we want to do with life."
"It's possible that we need a change of direction," Leet added. "We like the game themes, and the pranks, but we've become aware that we got carried away a few times. Luckily not so far that we can't walk it back, but..." He shrugged with a sigh. "It would be easy to screw things up. The PRT and the Protectorate don't take us seriously, which helps, and we've been very careful to keep it like that."
"But with the way things are going around here recently," his friend continued, "we decided that we should try to be more… socially responsible, maybe?"
"Legend himself suggested that we could always try not committing crimes," Leet chuckled. "And believe it or not, I respect the man. A lot. He seemed perfectly happy to work with us, as did Armsmaster and Dragon, but I think he'd be happier if we were on the same side. Or at least not opposite sides. And looking at what Taylor and her friends here are doing, how well things are working for the DWU, the city, and the Family, and now with Linda too..."
Über took a deep breath. "What we're sort of talking around is… Would the DWU be open to another Tinker and a professional jack of all trades?"
There was a long silence. Danny rubbed his forehead for a few seconds. "Oh, for god's sake," he mumbled, looking hard at his daughter, who was definitely smirking now. "This is all your fault. Both of you."
She shrugged, grinning.
"We do seem to have an entertaining effect on the locals, Danny," the Varga said with satisfaction. "Personally I feel it's an excellent thought."
"You would," Danny sighed. Turning back to the two apparently now ex-villains, he studied them closely. "Let me get this right. You two want to become productive members of society, and you feel the best way to do this is by joining the DWU?"
They nodded.
"And you're planning on stopping any crimes as a direct result of that?"
They nodded again.
"And you expect me to believe you?"
The nod this time was more tentative. "We hoped you would, definitely," Über said. "I mean, I know we've caused some problems around the city before, but we've also helped out quite a lot. Here, even. You didn't have any issues with our work against those Merchants, right?"
"No, that was actually very well done," Danny admitted. "And as long as I've known you two, you've at least been respectful and polite. That says a lot. Not to mention you didn't tell anyone about Taylor's tail that time." He looked at them for a while longer, then glanced at the three girls and one demon. "Thoughts?"
"I've got no problems with it," Taylor said immediately. "I like these guys, they're talented, smart, and fun as well. I think of them as friends already. If they want to make it official, why not? The Family could do with some new members."
"Oh, god." Her father sighed heavily while Amy and Lisa both laughed. "Lovecraft, what hast thou wrought?"
"It's not that bad, Dad. There probably won't be all that many tentacles." She turned her left arm into one as she spoke, stretching it past Amy to retrieve a can of Coke, which she opened and sipped. Everyone stared for a moment, then as one decided not to comment on it. The Varga was now sniggering under his breath.
"Riiight. OK. Lisa? Amy?"
"They know some useful stuff, Leet has some amazing inventions which Dragon is really interested in, Über can learn to do damn near anything to grand-master level, which is bound to come in handy, and the DWU is hiring at the moment anyway," Lisa replied. "Why not these two? At least we know them fairly well, unlike some random job applicant. And they're not going to screw us over, that much I'm certain of. For a whole stack of reasons."
"Honest to god, no matter what, we'd never cause any of you any trouble," Leet hastily said, raising his hands defensively. "And not only because she could eat us without even trying," he added, pointing at Taylor, who grinned at him with a mouthful of glinting teeth two inches long. "Please stop doing that..." he added in a faint, disturbed voice.
"I'm in favor as well, Danny," Amy said, looking amused as Taylor closed her mouth again, which made both of them relax quite a lot. "They've been helping us out with some experiments recently, and I wouldn't have roped them into it if I didn't think they could be trusted."
"Ah, yes, your mysterious experiments and discussions," Danny remarked. "At some point I'd really like to learn what that's all about."
"Sorry, Dad, I haven't deliberately kept you in the dark," Taylor apologized, "it's just that there are so many things going on at the moment I haven't had time to fill you in on all of it."
"It's not a problem, Taylor," he assured her. "I'm just curious."
"I'll make time to talk about it tomorrow night," she promised.
"That would be fine. Right, then..." He looked at the two young men. "All right. Fine. You can join the insanity ward if you really want to." He pointed at Über, then Leet. "But remember what I told you both a while back. I'm still serious about that."
"Yes, sir," Über said, nodding quickly, his friend doing the same. "We remember. We'll be good."
"See that you are. Or at least, don't get caught. And don't drag the DWU into anything that will reflect badly on it."
"We won't." Über reached up and yanked his balaclava off, Leet following suite moments later. "Randall Martins. Nice to meet you, Boss."
"Kevin Sherrill," the other man added, as Danny sighed a little, but shook both offered hands. "Boss."
"Oh, god. I'm going to regret this, aren't I?"
"No, of course not, Dad," Taylor grinned, clapping her hands in glee. "What could possibly go wrong? Now all we need is another building, we can fix that up like we did Linda's place, get all their stuff over here..."
The ex-villains smiled at each other as Danny rubbed his eyes. "Good lord, it's worse than I could have ever thought it would be," he muttered. "What's next? Nilbog?"
"I hate that prick," Amy commented with a scowl. "If he comes around, I'll get into Ianthe and eat him. Why should Taylor be the only one who can threaten that?"
"Please don't eat villains, Amy," Danny moaned. "Your mother would never let me hear the end of it. She's probably already going to make inquiries as to why you haven't been home for two days."
The Dallon girl looked at her watch, then paled. "Oh, shit. I should probably go. It's already nine, and Mom is going to want to talk about all this PRT stuff aside from anything else. I'm surprised she hasn't called me already."
She hopped out of her chair and began collecting a few things. "I'll see you tomorrow at school, Taylor."
"OK. Say hi to Vicky for me."
"I will." Moments later the girl was gone, the door closing behind her. The remaining people looked after her, before going back to the discussion.
"We'll need to get your civilian IDs set up with DWU cards, employment records, and that sort of thing. We can work out what you'll do here later. Randall, from what I know about you, you'd excel practically anywhere, but Kevin might be more of a problem."
"I'm pretty good at electrical work aside from the Tinkering," the man in question pointed out. "Although I'm not professionally qualified in that. I'm a fair machinist as well."
"OK. We can point you at the relevant departments, the guys there can assess you and figure out where you'd fit in. Based on that we can work out a salary. Lisa's right, we do need more people regardless. A building… There's one two doors down from Linda that would probably do the trick. It's a little larger and the roof is sort of falling in, but Taylor and her friend there can fix that easily enough." Danny looked at his daughter, who nodded.
"Speaking of which, as soon as we have time, I'd like to assess all the buildings on site and work out what needs to be done to bring them up to code. You two will make that a lot easier than it would have been. We may as well clear out all the scrap we can while the train's here, we have enough rail cars. It'll be going out next week."
"Sure, that's not a problem at all," she replied, smiling. "We can do that no trouble. A couple of weekend's worth of work will get most of the places around here fixed up, at least as far as the structure goes. It won't cause anyone any loss of work, will it?"
He patted her shoulder. "It's very good of you to think of people like that, Taylor, but trust me, no one minds you, any of you, helping out. In the long term it adds a lot of work and everyone realizes that. Don't worry about it."
She nodded, looking pleased. Danny turned back to the two men. "We'll leave it there until tomorrow. It's been a long day and I'd like to get home reasonably early for once. I'll tell Mark and Zephron about it, and Lisa will see to the records being updated. Come see me tomorrow morning and we'll get the paperwork sorted out, look at that building, and figure out what the next step is." He stood up, stretching a little, then looked around. "What's in the case?" he asked curiously, spotting the flight case on the floor next to the main table.
"Oh, right, we didn't show you that yet," Kevin exclaimed, also getting up. He went over to the case, picked it up, and put it on the table, before unsnapping the latches around the edge. Opening it, he smiled down at his creation as everyone else gathered around. "Cool, right?"
"Holy crap," Danny said, gazing at the enormous energy gun. "What the hell is that?"
"Something I made a while back, nearly blew both of us up with, and only recently fixed," he replied, lifting the weapon out carefully. "It's loosely based on the BFG10K from the Quake games, but it's got a lot of other influences as well, and loads of things I thought of at the time too." Flicking the power switch, he listened to the faint whine. Danny took a step back, although none of the others moved. Taylor was inspecting the thing with great interest, the Varga, sitting on her head, leaning over to do the same. "It's way too dangerous to use in any of our pranks, so it's probably a good thing it sort of broke. We might have been tempted to use it anyway and that would have been… not good."
"It's sort of what led to our decision," Randall put in.
"This and a few other things. I don't really know what I want to do with it, but it's way too good to break up for parts, and way too dangerous to let anyone else know about right now. Especially if it was just him and me. Someone might try to steal it if they knew how powerful it was," Kevin said, turning the gun off again. "We get ignored because most of my stuff breaks pretty quickly, but if anyone really realized just what some of it did… This thing, the wormhole generator, the power armor..." He shivered a little. "I have no wish to get raided either by the Protectorate or the E88. Or someone worse."
Danny studied him, seeing that the young man was genuinely worried about the weapon, at the same time he was proud he'd managed to repair it. He wondered how that had come about and surmised it was something to do with Amy's experiments, which had all sorts of interesting implications.
"What do you intend to do with it?" he asked.
"Find somewhere a long way away to test it, then lock it up somewhere safe," Kevin replied. "Here, probably. No one sane is going to try breaking into the Family office, and anyone nuts enough to try couldn't do it anyway. Not with a quarter of an inch of EDM surrounding the place."
"You're welcome to lock it up in Amy's workroom," Taylor nodded. "We can find somewhere on the other side of the WCC to blow holes in things, that's no problem. But not tonight. I still need to go home and fix a few things there." She looked at Danny. "Like reinforcing the walls with EDM, stuff like that. Just in case."
Kevin looked at her, then Randall. "That sounds… Ominous."
"It's the last part of yesterday," Lisa sighed. "We haven't mentioned that yet, but if you're joining the club as Danny puts it you should probably know about it. It might affect you too."
"I'll leave you to it, then," Danny said. "I need to go and do a few things before going home. I'll see you later, Taylor."
"OK, Dad," she smiled, hugging him. With a last glance at the two newest members of the DWU, he shook his head and left, wondering who would be next. So far his daughter had somehow reformed seven former villains, apparently without even trying very hard.
Where would it end?
"Here you go," Amy said as she sat at the table, her mother opening her mouth with an expression that showed a mildly caustic comment, probably on being late for dinner, was about to come out. She handed her an envelope, then did the same to Vicky and her father.
Carol snapped her mouth shut, took the envelope, and opened it. Pulling out a check she inspected it, the expression turning into a tiny smile.
"Wow!" Vicky said enthusiastically. "I've never had so much money before. We need to do this again, Mom."
"We'll see, Vicky."
"Sorry I'm late. I had a lot of things to talk to Saurial and Raptaur about, and Danny too. Then we got distracted by the thing that Vectura made."
"Vectura?" Carol looked at her. "Thing?"
Amy pulled out her phone, found the relevant recording, and handed it over to her mother. Vicky got up and leaned over her shoulder to see the screen.
After thirty seconds, both of them stared at her. "Um…," Vicky began. "What… is that?"
"A really cool toy," Amy laughed, retrieving her dinner from the oven and putting it on the table, then sitting down again to eat. "Vectura is amazingly good."
Showing her phone to Mark, Carol raised an eyebrow. "Could you explain, please?"
She began the story, pleased that she'd headed off what might have been a minor issue, and relieved too. That was happening more and more these days and made her think that her mother really was changing for the better.
Dropping into bed with a sigh, Taylor closed her eyes and relaxed. She and the Varga had spend three hours interleaving EDM throughout the structure of the house, on all exterior walls, the roof, and the foundations. In the process they'd repaired a number of small problems that her father had intended to fix for years and never quite gotten to, although they'd left the exterior looking the same. Even the windows were now duplicates using the same single-crystal synthetic sapphire with ultra-fine bonded EDM mesh that she was making a lot of use of in helmets and Linda's mech cockpit. Very little was going to get through them, although they were the weak point in the whole thing.
Neither she nor the demon were entirely certain it would stop Sophia's powers, but they thought that at a minimum it would drastically interfere with them. Normal weapons didn't stand a chance. So it seemed likely that there was now a good first line of defense in the obvious place for the girl to attack.
'We should have done this weeks ago,' she thought to the Varga.
"Agreed, although we didn't have any real reason to so do until recently other than general paranoia," he replied quietly. "And you can get far too carried away with that. Amy has managed to add significant protection to your father, Lisa, and several other people, while we have done what we can to divert attention from Danny. It's unfortunate that Sophia has made herself such a nuisance, for whatever reason she has come up with. Regardless, we're taking all the precautions we can, the PRT is doing the same, and if the girl is foolish enough to reappear we will deal with her."
Taylor nodded a little, reassured by her best friend's words. 'We will.'
"I was amused by Kevin and Randall's sudden request," he added, sounding it. "Although not as surprised as I might have been. Their reasons for it are sound."
'They certainly liked Linda's mech,' she giggled. 'Their eyes! I've never seen people look so… so…'
"So much like they'll do anything you ask to be allowed to play with your toys?" he asked slyly.
'Yes. That. It was amazing!'
The pair had, before they'd left, gone with 'Saurial' and 'Metis' to talk to Linda. She'd finally finished letting everyone who wanted to try the machine about an hour before Amy left, and was back in her workshop studying the diagnostic logs from the thing. She and Kevin had spent nearly an hour and a half discussing the intricacies of the mech's systems, while Randall played with it, then the Tinker had also had some time in the cockpit. Both of them were extremely impressed and had been suggesting improvements the entire time, which Linda had noted down, looking interested.
Eventually, at around midnight, they'd all gone their separate ways. Kevin had given her the cased energy gun, which she'd carefully locked up under the workbench in Amy's room, then she'd teleported home in three jumps. Her range was still slowly but steadily increasing, which pleased both of them. Her father had been asleep by then so she'd cloaked to avoid disturbing him, then both of them had got to work.
'It's been a long day, and a slightly weird one, but pretty good,' she smiled sleepily.
"It has, Brain. I find myself looking forward to seeing what happens next," he said. "Good night, Taylor."
'Good night, Varga.' Rolling over, she fell asleep.