Taking the Stage Chapter 5 (original chapter Chapter 148)
Two and a Half Weeks Later, Night of the New Moon
Rooftop Helipad, PRT ENE Building
Miss Militia scowled slightly as she looked out over the cityscape of Brockton Bay. The last couple of weeks had been, needless to say, fraught with both tension and trouble. No one, not the Empire 88, not the ABB and certainly not the Merchants, had ever dared declare their intentions so brazenly.
To say that Emily Piggot was furious was an understatement. It had only been under subtle threat of having Panacea attend to her that Armsmaster and Miss Militia had managed to make her calm down and not have a heart attack or something even worse.
Armsmaster and Dragon had obsessively and thoroughly gone over every possible entry method to Phantom Renegade, given the capabilities that the tinkertech of the so-called 'magician' had displayed thus far. The most reoccurring idea was some sort of feint with a diversionary attack at an obvious route to draw the attention away from a somewhat less obvious route.
Impersonation of a member of staff was almost impossible due to the fact that strict Master/Stranger Protocols had been initiated for the night, while brute force would be an extremely out of character idea for Phantom Renegade. Infiltration was next to impossible as well, as Armsmaster had installed several counter-Stranger devices in the building since his appointment as the Protectorate ENE leader. There was also an experimental device installed in the building that was being tested which was designed to disrupt Shadow Stalker's Breaker state, so there was a chance it could affect any Breaker-type device that Phantom Renegade could use.
"Armsmaster to all units, sound off in order." came over her earpiece.
"Velocity here, all quiet." The speedster said from about a block out.
"Triumph here, no sign of trouble." the Blaster said from just inside the lobby entrance.
"Dauntless here, all clear." the Trump said from his position above the PRT Building.
"Miss Militia here, all clear so far." the Shaker said crisply.
"Alright, that's the ten-minute check in." the Tinker said gruffly. "The next check-in will be at midnight, ten minutes from now. Midnight is the most likely time for Phantom Renegade to strike, given their propensity and flair for the dramatics."
Miss Militia silently agree with Armsmaster on that. 'Joke' villains, more commonly known as 'entertainment' villains, were increasingly rare since the death of Vikare, but they still popped up every now and again. Über and L33t were good examples of joke villains; the only time they'd ever seriously hurt someone, the infamous Grand Theft Auto: Vice City incident, had been because of an unexpected leak that had filled L33t's car with a noxious hallucinogenic gas that had put the two through the mother of all bad trips that had led to the two making an apology on their channel and paying for the hospital bills of the people they'd hurt during their rampage...once they'd recovered from the after-effects of their unintended bender, that is.
Assuming that Phantom Renegade continued to focus on simply harassing Shadow Stalker, they would be treated with kid gloves by the Protectorate...at least, that had been the assumption made by Director Piggot before this little challenge of the magician tinker. Now that Phantom Renegade had directly challenged the PRT in their own home ground, that was likely going to change.
"This is Velocity. I have spotted Phantom Renegade flying towards the PRT Building from the direction of my current location!"
Immediately, Miss Militia shifted her weapon from its current form as a pistol to a sniper rifle and set the scope to her eyes. It was one of the more useful benefits of her power that it wasn't just the gun itself that her power created; all of the nifty little gadgets that were commonly a part of the gun were also created. In this case, it was a night vision scope atop the rifle that was useful.
"Miss Militia here. I have the target in sight." she said after a moment of searching. The distinctive black tuxedo, cape and top hat of the magician tinker floated in her sights. "ETA is around about three minutes based on current speed."
"This is Dauntless! Multiple targets inbound! I repeat: multiple copies of Phantom Renegade are inbound from multiple directions!" the Trump said not a second later. "Current count is twelve hostiles!"
"Say again?" Triumph asked incredulously. "Twelve?"
"Confirmed, twelve and going up!" Dauntless replied firmly. "Now approaching twenty!"
"Phantom Renegade must have advanced their skill in robotics from those cardbots to full-sized human imitation robots." Armsmaster assessed neutrally. "Velocity, return to the PRT building. Triumph, send your squad out to secure the entrance to rendezvous with Velocity while you stay back to guard the lobby itself. Dauntless, Miss Militia, can you tell if any of the incoming bogies are the real deal?"
"Negative. They are all moving in the same way." Dauntless replied quickly. "It's actually possible that they're holograms of some kind, although I can't see any projectors."
'And because Phantom Renegade is a tinker who specializes in devices of trickery and misdirection, if we can't see them, it's because they either don't exist or Phantom Renegade doesn't want us to see them.' Miss Militia thought with a frown. 'Worse, we don't know which is true. Dealing with tricky tinkers is so irksome sometimes...'
"We should assume that they are physical threats until proven otherwise." she said aloud. "Phantom Renegade has shown more flair for robotics than for holograms. Armsmaster, are you prepared to defend the Wards Base just in case?"
"Roger that." Armsmaster replied. This was actually a trick in case Phantom Renegade had hacked their communications. Armsmaster was actually in the PRT Building's Main Security Room, waiting to move to intercept Phantom Renegade if/when they managed to get around the rest of the Protectorate.
And of course, the goal of Phantom Renegade's attack, Shadow Stalker's equipment and costume, weren't even in the building. They had been relocated to a secure room on The Rig for safety. Piggot had smirked when she had ordered that little addition. No matter how hard Phantom Renegade tried, they would not achieve their goal.
"This is Dauntless! The Phantom Renegade copies have exceeded forty in number!"
Snapping her attention back to the scope before her, Miss Militia grimaced as she panned around with it and saw that Dauntless was telling the truth. If anything he had under-counted the number of robots heading their way. More were popping up every second, appearing from the rooftops out of vent ducts and air conditioning units.
'They must have been seeded throughout the rooftops over these last two and a half weeks.' Miss Militia thought, a chill running down her spine at the sheer amount of preparation that Phantom Renegade had put into this one mission. The resources and planning were not inconsiderable either. For an organization, that was no mean feat to accomplish; for a single person, Parahuman or not, it was nothing short of miraculous.
"Armsmaster, requesting permission to engage." Miss Militia said firmly, finger hovering over the trigger guard. "If this keeps up, we're going to be swamped. I doubt that the real Phantom Renegade is out there."
"Negative. The Director has ordered that we not engage until Phantom Renegade makes a clear and unmistakably aggressive action towards us or the public, such as foaming someone or attacking the building." the Tinker said grimly. "As much as it may seem illogical, those are our rules of engagement."
"Velocity to all units!" the speedster said urgently. "Multiple Phantom Renegades approaching on foot!"
Snapping her rifle around towards street level, Miss Militia cursed under her breath as a positive swarm of black cloaks and tops hats emerged from alleyways and started to march in eerie unison towards the PRT Building.
"Armsmaster, this is becoming more serious by the moment." Dauntless said urgently. "Give us permission to deal with these things before we're overrun by them!"
"...fine. Weapons free." Armsmaster agreed.
Immediately, Miss Militia willed a flash suppressor onto her sniper rifle and opened fire, hitting one Phantom Renegade in the arm. The bullet went straight through the limb, which dissolved into dust a second later. Seconds later, a brand new arm was regenerated and in place where the old one had once been.
"Miss Militia here. The robots have some sort of regeneration system." she reported quickly. "I destroyed the arm of one and it was restored inside of five seconds. I will aim for the head next."
Putting her words into practice, the hero lined up another shot and fired, blowing the robot's head off. As before, the remains of the head dissolved into dust. Unlike with the cardbots however, the robot didn't disintegrate. Instead, the head regrew, top hat, mask and all.
"Phantom Renegade has improved their tech so that the head no longer instakills the robots." Miss Militia reported calmly.
"Let's see how they handle my Arc Lance." Dauntless said grimly. Seconds later, a long spear made of seemingly solidified electricity lashed out, extending from the Trump's position above the PRT Building and impaling one Phantom Renegade through the chest, releasing a burst of electricity into the robot, which disintegrated in its entirety.
"Looks as if they're vulnerable to electricity." the Trump assessed professionally before lancing out with his weapon again.
With a grin, Miss Militia switched over to a fairly uncommon gun, an electrolaser, and thumbed the voltage up to fairly serious levels before opening fire, rapidly destroying three of the robots. They seemed to have a fairly large weakness to electric weaponry, which seemed to be a bit of an obvious oversight in their design...
"Phantom Renegade likely left that weakness deliberately for us to discover." Armsmaster stated when she raised the idea on the com-channel. "It fits in with the character of a joke villain to be 'sporting' and deliberately make a weakness in their equipment during a heist or job. They likely have a perfected version of this robot that lacks the overt weakness to electricity."
The bellow of Triumph's sonic roar distracted Miss Militia from her shooting and made her frown. Evidently, Triumph had left the lobby. Either that or the robots had made it past a squad of PRT Troops and Velocity.
"Velocity, status?" she asked, shooting down two more robots as she spoke.
"The numbers are concerning, their armaments more so." the speedster replied quickly. "All robots are armed with internal guns that fire from their fingers! The ammunition is those damned faux-foam rounds from the Über and L33t video! The entire squad of PRT Troopers I had with me are all foamed up and helpless, and I'm only just keeping ahead of the robots by moving as fast as I can! That means I have very little ability to fight right now!"
That was the great weakness of Velocity's power; the faster he moved, the less he could interact with the world around him in any meaningful way. The speed he was currently moving at meant he was about as useful as a piece of paper when it came to fighting. Triumph was likely the only thing stopping the robots from entering the building from the front entrance.
"Velocity, go and grab some of the ConFoam Grenades and start throwing them at the robots!" Armsmaster ordered. "Dauntless, Miss Militia, continue thinning the aerial attackers. Triumph, hold your ground and keep them out of the lobby!"
As the speedster raced off to do just that, an alarm beeped on Armsmaster's end. Seconds later, Dragon's voice came over the line, sounding very worried.
"I've lost contact with all communication lines to and from The Rig. All landlines have been severed and all wireless communications have been blocked." the Canadian Tinker spoke up for the first time that night. "It's as if the entire structure has been switched into autistic mode."
"That should be impossible; The Rig isn't designed to go into autistic mode!" Armsmaster protested. "What about the secure line to the National Protectorate?"
"Dead. I'm trying on all frequencies, but I can't even tell if The Rig even exists anymore; all of the sensors I have available are drawing a blank." Dragon said in unusual frustration. "I only know it hadn't ceased to exist because of some cameras in Brockton Bay pointing in the direction of The Rig can confirm its presence. Otherwise it's a giant electronic black hole of information."
A curse flew from Armsmaster's lips. "Phantom Renegade, it has to be. They predicted our moves in advance and are holding us here at the PRT Building while they attack The Rig!"
Miss Militia cursed herself. Right now, there were only two members of the Protectorate who could go to The Rig, Dauntless and Velocity. Dauntless could fly, while Velocity could move fast enough to run across water. Unfortunately, Dauntless was needed to help take down the flying robots, while it was all too likely that Phantom Renegade had somehow usurped control of The Rig's defenses, which made Velocity less than useful considering the forcefield that encapsulated the lower part of the refurbished oil rig that was the Protectorate ENE's base.
"We should do what we can to defeat these robots as quickly as possible before moving to retake The Rig." the gun-user opined as she took down three more down in quick succession. "There are over sixty PRT Troopers on duty at The Rig, as well as Assault and Battery; they should be able to hold on for a while until we come to the rescue."
Several Minutes Previously
Command Center, The Rig, Brockton Bay
"All scans clear." one PRT Senior Trooper Victor Meldrew droned. Ordinarily, he'd be a bit more enthusiastic about it, but Armsmaster wasn't around to try and impress, so there wasn't much point.
"Three more months and I can finally retire..." he muttered. Unlike most other PRT Troopers, he was only a 'trooper' out of a lack of imagination in rank names. He was more appropriately a supply and administration specialist who kept The Rig's chain of supply in order, as well as doing the busywork that the Protectorate members were too busy to do. Victor had joined the PRT back in 1990 and had kept his head down, working his way in the background and not making any waves.
Now he was approaching sixty and he was very much looking forward to retiring, thank you very much. He and his wife Margaret would move out of the hellhole that was Brockton Bay and find a nice quiet place where they could live their lives out in peace.
"Sir, the cafeteria has gone silent." one of his subordinates reported.
"Silent? What d'you mean by that?" Victor demanded.
"No communications signals are leaving the room and none can enter. Furthermore, the physical lines aren't functioning." The man reported. "Update, the effect is spreading through out the entire Rig! We're losing control of our systems! External communications down!"
"Of all the...!" Victor muttered. "Lock down the system so it can't be usurped!"
"W-we're trying sir, but...dammit! We're locked out of our own system!" another man cursed. "All we can do is watch! Whoever has hacked us is activating the Anti-Brute Blast Doors on the entrances and exits. We're all locked in!"
"All electronic internal doors have been closed and locked! Storm shutters on the windows have been deployed and locked down!"
"Assault and Battery have been trapped by the deployment of emergency security doors in the corridors!"
"What the bloody hell is going on here?!" Victor whispered in disbelief. Armsmaster and Dragon had designed the system security on The Rig themselves; no one should be able to simply usurp control of it like this so quickly!
He got his answer as all of the screens turned back, with a white mask appearing in the center. The sneering face it made with three simple red crescents sent a chill up Victor's spine. Phantom Renegade, the new villain in Brockton Bay who had single-handedly taken down the entirety of the Protectorate Wards and a squad of PRT Troopers.
"Do we have control of anything?!" he snapped in desperation.
"Nothing, sir! Even the emergency systems are locking us out!" one man reported. "We...we're totally at the mercy of Phantom Renegade, sir!"
"I do not believe it!" Victor cursed, slamming a fist on the arm of his chair. "I simply do NOT BELIEVE it!"
His fury rose even further when the main monitor switched views to show the tinker villain Phantom Renegade floating down a corridor, seemingly without a care in the world.
"Which corridor is that?!" the beleaguered man demanded.
"Main corridor, near the secure storage room that Armsmaster placed Shadow Stalker's costume in." came the swift reply.
"That's...they knew." Victor growled. It was the only explanation. They had somehow known that Shadow Stalker's costume and equipment had been moved over to The Rig at the end of her shift at the console today. "Do we have anyone in that area?"
"There are two PRT Troopers stationed outside the door, as per Armsmaster's instructions, but I doubt that they'll do more than inconvenience someone who took down a whole squad." one of his subordinates replied before he got up and tried to leave via the only door to the room, but was foiled by its electronic lock. "Dammit, we need to get manual overrides on these damned doors..."
"Security risk, according to Armsmaster." Victor said absently as he tried to figure out if he could do anything to alter the situation. There wasn't. All of the systems that the PRT troopers had access to were locked down, and the only system that could possibly override that lockout was Armsmaster's system in his lab, which no one could get to thanks to the locked doors and shut security shutters and forcefields.
They were screwed.
"Assault and Battery have broken out of their confinements." a trooper said hopefully. "They're headed for the secure storage room."
Finally, something good happening for them!
And then Phantom Renegade pulled out a smartphone, tapped a couple of buttons on it and put it away again.
"Ah shit. All forcefields, security shutters and security doors between Assault and Battery and the target room have shut and activated." the same man reported, crestfallen.
"Damn it!" Victor swore.
With Phantom Renegade
Floating down the corridor towards my destination, I was grinning like a loon under my mask. Everything was going perfectly! Granted, this was because I'd discovered that someone had already compromised the PRT Building's electronic security when I'd snuck in to compromise it myself, but hey, I was more than willing to screw over whoever the hell had installed the interesting electronics in the first place in the name of screwing over Sophia.
Once I'd discovered the compromised electronics (all of which was made by different manufacturers in different parts of the country), I'd quietly and subtly pinged the PRT/Protectorate ENE network for any other parts that had been installed at the same time as the ones in the PRT Building. Surprised me a lot when seven returns came from The Rig, of all places.
Only someone with a lot of clout inside the local PRT itself could have done that, which led me to believe that the entire organization had more leaks than a sieve with a brick thrown through it. But that was just a data-point. I had used these electronics (and the back-doors into the system that they presented) to effectively do the same to The Rig as I had to the mall, at least once I'd uncovered Director Emily Piggot's little scheme to have me waste my time infiltrating the PRT Building to find nothing there.
Naughty Miss Piggy. I'll teach you a lesson at a later date.
In between manufacturing the Clone Bots, seeding them in a five block radius of the PRT Building, subtly using the blind-spots in The Rig's information network to take control of it right from under Dragon and Armsmaster's noses at the push of a button and working to get my GED, it have been a very busy half a month.
But now it would be oh-so worth it.
I paused as I rounded the corner to see two Troopers outside a locked and secured door. Even as they noticed me and pointed their ConFoam Sprayers at me, I'd drawn and fired my card gun, foaming them before they could squeeze their triggers.
"Sorry gents, kinda in a hurry." I said breezily as I placed my Cardician Gun back in my hammerspace pocket and kicked the two out of my way. "Sorry, not sorry."
Removing the control pad that now controlled the entirety of The Rig from my pocket, I flicked through its screens and opened the door in front of me after I deactivated the ordinary defenses inside. Those were standard issue for secure rooms like this when something was stored within them; the Protectorate hadn't even imagined that I could infiltrate their little fortress so hadn't placed any special countermeasures here to stop me.
This would be the only time that I would get away with this; Armsmaster and Dragon were too good to let the holes in security stay in place...especially as I was planning on leaving a little note detailing exactly where the parts that allowed me a backdoor into their systems were and when they had been installed. I'd also send a data bomb down the original user's stream before slamming the door shut behind it.
While I was a villain, the thought of someone having claws so deep into the PRT and Protectorate's systems gave me the shivers. Who could have done it? Not the Merchants, as they were to drugged up most of the time. Lung and the ABB arrived afterwards, so not them. Marquis...was a possibility, but it didn't seem to fit the MO I knew of the man, and even if it had been him that placed it, Marquis had been Birdcaged years ago, while the network had still been active until I usurped control of it several days ago, with weekly checks on its status.
That left the Empire 88 as the most likely candidate, but again, it didn't fit the MO of the leader at the time, Allfather, nor did it fit Kaiser's MO. This meant that someone other than the big gangs was a lot sneakier than they were and had big plans for Brockton Bay. Well I wasn't about to let them do as they pleased in my home, whoever they were.
Returning my mind to the task at hand, I espied the container that held all of Shadow Stalker's costumes and equipment, a pod about the size of a steamer trunk. It was the only thing in the room, so it was easy to identify. Taking my control pad from my pocket, I used it to open up the trunk, revealing all of the black costumes and masks belonging to Shadow Stalker. Even her crossbow was here.
"This might not prevent you from using your favorite weapon, but I can at least force you to give in the the PR team's urging and rebrand as someone else, bitch." I muttered as I withdrew a ball from my hammerspace pocket. It was orange and about the same size as a satsuma, ironically enough.
Lightly tossing it at the clothing that so offended me for merely existing, I made the storage container close even as I activated the countdown timer on the ball. As the container slammed shut and locked itself down, I pulled out a card and flung it at the case, having it adhere itself to the case, even as a muffled crack of an explosion took place inside the container itself.
"Heist completed." I grinned and swept out of the room with a flourish of my cape. Passing by the two foamed troopers, I mock-saluted them as I passed. The rest of my trip through the corridors of The Rig was fairly quiet, with only the dull thuds of Troopers banding on their doors fruitlessly in an effort to get out.
By the time I arrived on the helicopter pad, my mask's HUD informed me that less than a hundred of my Clone Bots remained. Considering there had been over two-hundred and fifty of them at the start, I was very impressed at the efficiency of the Protectorate members.
"Sorry, do you think you're just going to leave without saying hello?" an amused male voice asked. I turned around to see two well-known figures standing facing me. Assault and Battery, the pair of capes who were rumored to be husband and wife on PHO.
"Ah. I see that you gave up on trying to stop me from destroying Shadow Stalker's stuff and instead decided to head me off at the pass, so to speak." I said with a curious tilt of my head. "An interesting strategy."
"You didn't exactly leave us much choice, what with all the doors between us and you." Battery noted dryly, her fists clenched.
"True. And I suppose that reporting that you didn't fight me at all would look bad on your report card to Miss Piggy." I drawled idly as I took out my cane and held it at the ready. "Let's dance, shall we? I can entertain you for a minute or two."
"How generous." Assault drawled back as he stood in a loose stance. "We'll see how generous you remain after we beat you. Let's get 'em, Puppy."
"Can you not call me that in front of villains?!" Battery growled sharply before her suit glowed and she sped towards me.
Whew. This chapter...it fought me every step of the way. Seriously. A solid WEEK. Urgh.
I hope to finish this off with the next chapter, so I can return to Force Your Way. Finger's crossed.