19.

I ran towards the docks with as much power assist and jumping as I could safely risk without face planting. A stray thought had me ask Aria to add a note to investigate building or purchasing some sort of vehicle. I had a sudden and strange image of myself riding a bicycle in full armor off to rescue Dinah. That image whilst amusing also caused me to realize that now I had two serious situations to deal with and it stopped being funny.

I was taking the fasted path that Aria could find for me which meant I was jumping over some fairly busy intersections. The SEP bracelet was on maximum, but I did still hear the squealing of breaks at one point which suggested it wasn't full invisibility. I had been hoping to stay off the radar for much longer and just hoped that there weren't able to get a picture of me. When I had rebuilt my Hyper Guardian suit, I had felt my artisan power trying to assist me but I had pushed it down. I felt that my suit should be more a functional device not some sort of art costume, so I had left it pretty the appearance just as it was only replacing the original logo with a Q.

Maybe that hadn't been the best decision. I had mentioned to Taylor that I had a power that could give it more of an impact, but we had discussed it briefly and once we got on to the topic of masters and auras of people like Glory Girl we decided to hold off on experimenting with that just yet.

I kept my mind busy running over previous discussions and decisions as I ran, aware that I was doing my best not to think about what I might find when I got to the storage yard. I had advised Aria to tell me as soon as she contacted Taylor, her suit or when the drones got there and was also resisting the urge to check if anything has changed every few minutes.

As my path took me near a major road, I noticed a lot of sirens and ambulances and fire engines racing along it but not in the direction of the docks. That reminded me about the other explosions I had heard early.

"Aria, how many other explosions were there?"

"After Bakuda triggered the bomb embedded in Hoang Bao Cha she triggered explosions in eleven locations around the city."

I frowned, that didn't make sense. The other explosions happened well after she killed the student, I asked Aria for clarification, "She set them on a countdown when she killed the Immaculata student?"

"No, Park Jihoo was the student she first killed. She later triggered another explosion amongst the civilians. This happened out of sight of Lycaeni's cameras but that was caught by the Snitch and later transmitted."

"That camera is still up?"

"The server that was caching the data has not been receiving any data since the explosion that Lycaeni triggered however it continued to send out the previously captured data up until a few minutes ago." Aria was very matter of fact about what had happened, but I winced.

"If you discuss this with Taylor please say 'when you stopped Bakuda' instead of 'explosion you triggered' okay?"

"Of course, Quartermaster."

Hearing Aria use my alias as I ran almost made me trip, thankfully the powered assist auto corrected. This was the first time she had used it and I should have been ready as I was the one that told her to refer to us both by our aliases when wearing our armor to help me remember to use the right names. She also had instructions to mute me if I accidentally tried to say a real name whilst wearing it. I didn't think that was likely, but it didn't hurt to play it safe.

"Show me where the bombs went off. Map view."

I saw that the bombs were scattered around the city, mostly aimed at infrastructure. I had Aria present me with a verbal summary of the damage. I didn't want to see any pictures. It did seem that the targets had been more structural and aimed at damaging property rather than trying to kill people though there had been several fatalities and lots of injuries. I noted that Immaculata had been targeted, though it had been closed at the time, and wished they had chosen Winslow instead.

"First drone has arrived at the locker Lycaeni entered. No entry seems possible."

I frowned as I watched through the drone's camera as it checked the door, however it was closed solid, and the drone had no external speakers or tools to attempt to open it. I considered asking it to tap on the roof, but we hadn't agreed on any type of signals. I doubted Taylor would understand tap code and morse code was beyond the drones' capabilities.

"Have the others go high and see if they can spot anyone nearby." My mind went to the Undersiders. I hoped Tattletale was okay, it seemed she was at least trying to not be a villain. On the other hand, I hoped Uber and Leet had been close enough to that explosion that I wouldn't have to worry about them again. Anyone who willingly worked with Bakuda didn't deserve any second chances.

I had just arrived at the locker when Aria announced, "Oni Lee has attacked the PHQ. Authorities believe he is trying to break Lung out. They are calling for reinforcements. It seems most of the heroes are out assisting at the bomb sites."

"It was all a bloody diversion so they could rescue him." I decided then that if I had the opportunity, I'd see Lung and Oni Lee both in the grave as well. I'd take my lead from Dirty Harry rather than Batman. I just hoped I had the fortitude to pull the trigger when the opportunity presented itself.

I knocked on the door of the locker, "Lycaeni. It's Quartermaster. I'm coming in."

I opened the door and saw Taylor in her suit sitting slumped against the back corner of the locker and for a moment I had a terrible thought that she was dead. But as I came closer she raised her hand and popped the seal on her helmet but she left it on. Just lifting it enough to leave a gap.

"Hi. Suit lost power. Broke my leg when I fell." Taylor's voice was missing all the normal energy that it had when she was suited up. I guessed that a broken leg was probably only part of it. I wished I had been given some sort of medical bay power so at least I could address that.

"Let's get you out of here."

I fully entered the locker and closed the door behind me only to see that there was no internal keyhole that I could use it to open from the inside. I also realized that even the outside wouldn't be usable. They were designed to be used with padlocks and we had tested padlocks and they didn't open to by base. I needed a door with a keyhole.

"Damn. Not going to be that easy. Let's see if we can run some diagnostics on your suit. Get it working again so we can move you." I mostly wanted the suit powered up so we could check the internal health monitors to see how badly off Taylor was, but I didn't think she'd appreciate my concern.

Thankfully the charge and data cables on the suits had universal connectors, no male female issues there, so I plugged my suit into Taylor's and her suit immediately came to life as it rebooted using the power from mine. A quick check told me that Taylor had a badly broken leg, a sprained wrist and numerous bruises but was overall okay. I was sure she was seeing the results of the diagnostics as well so I didn't say anything and instead examined the suit condition.

It actually was in good condition. System logs just cut off right as the explosion went off and battery was totally drained. Something that shouldn't actually be possible as the system would be forced to shutdown and wouldn't actually draw anything when it was around three percent of maximum due to current draw limitations. From the logs in had been over ninety five percent of its charge before it lost power. I decided it was probably an effect from one of Bakuda's bombs.

Thinking about tinker tech reminded me of something else I wanted.

"Aria, I'm going to apply some pain killers to Taylor's leg. Please keep a watch and also see if you can find that Snitch." I turned to face Taylor. It was actually disconcerting to be speaking to the bug-eyed suit. "Taylor, I'm going to open your suit leg and apply the topical cream to your leg. It's mainly for cuts and burns but it'll also help with the bruising and has a pain killer in it that'll help. The suit itself can lock around it and act as a brace now that it has power."

She just nodded so I got to work. It wasn't pretty but the bone hadn't broken the skin which was good. After I coated it with the cream and confirmed that Taylor couldn't feel anything I did my best to straighten it out. I wished I had a portable MRI or X-Ray machine. Once it was roughly straight, I had the suit closeup around it and lock the leg into position. It'd make it awkward to walk but would prevent her doing any further damage to it.

"Any suitable doors nearby Aria?"

"Yes Quartermaster, there is a small office around forty yards to the east that can be used. There is an internal storeroom that is out of sight from the main door and is intact. I have also located the Snitch and the Undersiders."

"Are you up for moving… Lycaeni?" I needed to practice using the right name.

Taylor nodded as she resealed her helmet, "It's not hurting at all now. That works well." Her voice had partially returned to its normal energy and came through the comms system again.

I offered her a hand and I assisted her to a standing position. It would have been a lot harder if we both weren't wearing powered armor.

I glanced at the HUB map and confirmed that there was no one within sight. It didn't mean there weren't people hiding in closed lockers, but they weren't an immediate threat. If there were people around, I expected they were more focused on hiding that setting up an ambush. The Undersiders were a quite few rows away and had gathered in a workshop of some sort.

The location of the Snitch wasn't far and thankfully not within direct view of the spatially warped explosion site. I didn't want to look at that again, it had been most unpleasant. It brought back uncomfortable memories.

Taylor rejected my offer of a shoulder or arm to support her, "You'll need both arms if someone comes. I can manage." She put action to works and kept up a decent pace with her lopsided limp.

The Snitch had rolled against the base of a locker and there was no sign of life from in. I was going to presume flat battery but still be very careful with it. I wanted the tech from it and was paranoid about traps or self-destructs.

"Are we going to check on the Undersiders?" Taylor asked after I had retrieved the snitch, and, not having anywhere better to store it, clipped it to the side of my suit. I created a to-do entry to put together a hard-shell backpack for both myself and Taylor.

"We can." Apart from wanting to know where they were I hadn't really thought about them since Taylor was hurt. Now that I was confident that Taylor was good enough that she would be fine till we could get her to a doctor I didn't mind being sidetracked. She had after all came at Tattletales request for help and the payoff could be more information on Coil which could lead to Dinah.

As we moved towards the Undersiders I asked Taylor, "We need some sort of vehicle or vehicles. Running here took too long. Any suggestions?"

Taylor took a while to answer which I took to mean she was thinking seriously about it, "We need something that we can store in your base and fit through a standard doorway. Are motorcycles an option? I haven't ridden a motorbike but I did ride a bicycle frequently many years ago so that might help if they aren't too different."

I had Aria collate some data on learning to ride and present it to both of us as we limped along.

"Should be doable. We can use the simulation chamber to learn and practice. If we can find a suitable bike for not too much, I should be able to rebuild it so it'll be strong enough and the right size for us to ride in armor. Doesn't even need to work."

"I still have money left over. If you can find something suitable, we can use that."

"Sounds good. Okay, they are just around the corner." Not that I really needed to say that since Taylor had access to the same HUD and aerial view from the drone as I did. At least she didn't point that out to me after I realized how pointless my comment had been. "You better go first; they don't know me."

I waved her forwarded as I reduced the strength of my SEP field down to minimum. I didn't want demonstrate any more than the bare minimum of my powers.

Taylor nodded and rounded the corner raising a hand in the air, "Hey, is everyone okay?"

I watched through Taylor's suit camera as a face peaked out from the door of the workshop. It was Regent and he looked pale.

"Lycaeni." He said in greeting, then after a short pause, "Wait there a sec."

There was a whispered conversation out of sight before he reappeared. "Okay, Tattletale said she called you. Come on in. Nice suit."

"I've got an ally with me."

Regent frowned but nodded and retreated back in.

I followed Taylor into the workshop. It was pretty empty except for piles of old cardboard. Anything used for the repair of the lockers long since looted.

Regent slumped to the floor and pulled out a phone and tried to power it on. I noted his upper arm now had a rough bandage tied around it. Grue was leaning against the back wall. Wearing his helmet and motorcycle leathers it was hard to tell if he was injured. Tattletale was sitting against the wall. I could see that her burns that were now looking a lot worse. Bitch was the only one not looking at me and Taylor, she was sprouting same additional nasty looking bruises but I couldn't see any fresh blood on her bandages and she seemed more focused on her two dogs.

"This is Quartermaster." She looked around at the Undersiders and then switched over to internal comms. "Are you okay with using your topical cream on them?"

"Sure." I switched to external comms. "I have some cream that will act as a pain killer, antiseptic and blood coagulant. It'll also promote healing for burns."

"Does it work on dogs?" Bitch all but demanded.

I nodded and passed out little plastic bags of the cream. I had plans to make little squeeze tubes for it but for the time being it was just wrapped up in plastic.

"I'll keep watch." I said as I moved to the window. I didn't need to, I had a number of drones watching the nearby area and another working its way outwards sweep the whole area, but I didn't really want to get in a conversation with Villains if I didn't need to. I did enlarge the window showing the rear facing camera view so I could keep a closer eye on them though.

As they focused on applying the cream my attention was taken by another series of rooms. The first was another laboratory, this one will with large jars of growing organisms. It verged on the macabre but it was all done up very professionally. Still, I was glad when the room slid past. The second lab was similar but missing the creatures. Only the posters on the walls and notes on the whiteboards gave me a clue that it was to do with DNA identification. It moved on quickly enough.

The final room was in an entirely different theme, ancient Egyptian I guessed but with more skulls and bones than I recalled were common. Maybe an ancient Egyptian temple to the god of the dead. This I took to be some sort of magical workshop. Examples and the tools for inscribing runes covered various tables. Once again, I had gained an ability to apply magical effects to items but without any suitable effects to apply. Either I was just unlucky in power selection, or I was missing something that should have been obvious.

I made a note to test both this and the enchanting power out. Maybe if I tried to use them it would make more sense. At the moment it seemed like I would be better off not gaining half of these powers. All it would take was some bad timing and I could get in real trouble.