A/N:

Welcome to the chapter where things start picking up. In this installment of DESTINATION: INSERT, fun things happen. Such as Tinkering, Ward meetings, and enough CONFLICT to make Eden proud (well, maybe not that last bit just yet). This will also be a bit longer than you're used to in this story, so you're welcome.

Anyway, I don't have a fun entity disclaimer this time, so here's the standard boring one.

DISCLAIMER: Shockingly, I do not in fact own Worm, or its sequel Ward. What I do own is a gaming laptop that I use to write fanfiction instead of doing something productive with my life. So, free use, don't sue, yadda yadda, etc. etc.

{EARTH BET}

{APRIL 11, 2011}

{WINSLOW HIGH SCHOOL, BROCKTON BAY}

Here I was, once again. A hellhole the likes of which surpassed even Ellisburg or Madison: high school. Why the hell I had to go to school now I had no idea, especially since I had just woken up a few hours ago and every single one of the idiots here had seen the news where they talked about me killing four gang members outside my house. Of course, my apparent 'danger' did nothing to stop them from gossiping behind my back, talking about how 'violent' I was and how they 'knew I was a psycho all along'.

Yeah, I'd love to see them keep talking when I held a Tinker gun to their heads.

That… hold up. Since when do I have thoughts like that? Sure, I'd love to beat them up, but threatening to kill them was a step too far, they were just gossiping…

[ANNOYANCE] [CONFLICT]

Ah, right, the damn voice in my head. No, voice, I don't really feel like going on a murder spree through the whole school right now. That definitely wouldn't help my case in the slightest.

[ANGER] [CONFLICT]

No, voice, I don't feel any angrier than I did a few seconds ago. Also, again, I'm not going to make a hydrogen bomb to blow up the city. Please stop asking.

[CONFLICT] [REWARD]

What, you're willing to unlock more blueprints for my Tinkering if I go out and fight things? … Alright, I was planning on doing that anyway. But no killing just yet, that'll just get me thrown in jail where I can't fight anymore anyway. Maybe once I get out from under the PRT's thumb, I can go shoot Skidmark in the face or something.

Hell, I'd probably get a medal for that.

[ANNOYANCE] [… ACCEPTANCE]

Yeah, glad we could come to an accord. Not like I'm the one in control or anything, no, obviously you have a say in everything I do… jeez, you're worse than my ex was.

[… CONFUSION]

Uh, ex-girlfriend, it means a former lover that I had once. She liked to nag at me a lot, I dumped her after my dad died when she told me that wasn't a good enough reason not to take her shopping like I promised. Massive bitch, that one.

[… REALIZATION] [ANGER]

Ah, right, uh… I didn't mean it literally, I was just grumbling a bit cause I'm annoyed. Not at you really, just… at life in general. A lot of things haven't been going my way lately, and getting powers didn't really help much.

[ACCEPTANCE] [DISMISSAL]

Wow, you're an arrogant one. Alright then, your majesty. The hell kind of name is {QUEEN WARFARE} anyway?

Not receiving an answer from the shard, I just shrugged and turned back to my sketchbook. Normally, I would spend class half listening to music and half complaining about my life, but now I couldn't stop sketching out blueprints for various weapons and whatnot. With any luck, anyone who saw them would just think I was a Sci-Fi artist or something, but so far I had designed enough weapons to supply a small army, and three different land vehicles.

Luckily, the bell rang before I could get lost in my designs again, so I picked up my backpack and made my way out of the classroom. That had been my last class of the day, so now all that was left to do was visit my locker and grab my stuff before I left.

Unfortunately for me, the queen bitch of the school was waiting for me there. Next to her stood her main enforcer, and the add-on. Not in the mood to deal with them, I tried to push past. Before I could, Sophia's hand caught my shoulder.

[HOSTILITY] [CONFLICT]

No, shut up, I'm not going to kill them, please just stop talking.

"Well hello there, Kyle. I hear you had an… incident over the weekend."

SON OF A FUCKING BITCH.

"… What about it, Hess?" I gave them my best glare. Madison looked sufficiently cowed, and Emma looked a bit startled, but all Sophia did was smile.

"According to the rumors, you killed four gang members when they attacked you at home. What do you say to that?"

[CONFLICT?]

No, I'm not, no killing, just be quiet! "… Maybe I did, maybe I didn't. Don't see how it's any of your business."

"Well, I think it's certainly my business. You see, what you did… it proves you're a survivor. That you're willing to fight back when you're threatened. You're not weak like most of the people here. You know–"

[CONFLICT] [REWARD] [CONFLICT] [REWARD] [CONFL-]

"Shut the fuck up!" I shouted, breathing heavily.

It took a few moments for me to realize I said that out loud, and I quickly composed myself. "I'm not in the fucking mood right now, you damn bitch. You and your bottom-feeder friends can go make out with each other behind the lockers, right now I have places to be and things to do that involve a different group of pretentious assholes than you three. So would you kindly fuck off."

It wasn't a question, despite being phrased as one, and all of them knew it. Despite the anger on their faces, they didn't try to stop me when I pushed by them, and I walked out the front door.

I really need to come to an agreement with this damn shard.

{EARTH BET}

{APRIL 11, 2011}

{THE RIG, BROCKTON BAY}

The same idiot as last time met me outside the testing room. "Hey there Kyle, welcome back! Let's try this whole thing again with a bit less unconsciousness, right?"

[CONFLICT?]

No, Queenie, I'm not killing this guy either. If he keeps up the jokes, however, I will punch him in the face.

The guy must have picked up on my hostility, because he just coughed into his fist and opened the door for me. "Just, ah, remember not to make anything radioactive or biochemical, alright?"

Sure, no problem, just limit my best designs like that why don't you. Oh well, once I get the nanomachines up and running I'll have all the time in the world to make whatever I want. The ability to create what amounts to programmable matter was definitely a big plus in my book.

I sat down at the workbench, ignoring the scientist as he locked the door behind me. Instead, I let my mind go wild. Blueprints practically shoved each other to the side, as if my shard couldn't decide what I needed at the moment, but I just waited for them to stop coming before I spoke.

"Alright Queenie, give me something for nanobots, and we'll go from there."

[… ACKNOWLEDGEMENT] [AGREEMENT] [CONDITIONAL]

"… Yes, I'm going to use them to fight people. Actually, I'm going to use them to build things to use to fight people, but it's the same thing really."

[DISAGREEMENT]

"Look, Queenie, the faster I get these nanomachines built, the faster I can build a weapon and get into the thick of it, alright? The longer I have to wait, the longer you have to wait."

[… AGREEMENT] [INFORMATION]

Ah, your standard, everyday tiny drone printer. Small enough to fit in my pants pocket, it could take in scrap metal and turn it into a small robot that was controlled by a mental implant that-

Wait a minute.

"No, Queenie, I'm not putting anything in my brain right now. How about some that I can program to do simple tasks, and maybe we can do the implant thing later?"

[ANNOYANCE] [INFORMATION]

Alright, same as before, but this time the little bots could receive simple signals from a small wrist-mounted computer. More complex commands could be sent from a larger computer, and all the code seemed similar enough to the C languages that I could understand it. Syntax was close enough, at least.

"That'll do. Let's get this thing built, shall we?"

[EXCITEMENT] [… ANNOYANCE]

… Alright then, be like that.

And so, I found myself elbow-deep in electronics once again, tearing apart anything that caught my eye as the nano-printer began to take shape before my eyes. First, a rectangular prism made of metal strips, then a collection of small wires and circuit boards, then a handful of various moving bits, and finally six metal plates, with one of the smaller ones having a hole in it to allow the bot to fly out. A small antenna on top, so it could receive control signals, and a small remote the same size that could supply said control signals.

Honestly, the printer seemed way too small to be able to do what it was supposed to. The thing was more advanced than any 3D printer I had ever seen, and more precise as well. The remote itself had processing power similar to a low-end laptop as well, despite just being used to give commands to the printer. All told, the technology I had just casually assembled seemed a bit… impossibly advanced, despite the fact that I understood every single thing I had just done, and could even explain it if asked.

That felt weird, because from what I knew, Tinkers couldn't explain their work. Only Dragon had been able to come close to reverse-engineering their tech, and even she couldn't fully explain it so that it could be reproduced. My tech, on the other hand? Oh, sure, it required some advanced knowledge of physics concepts that I was fairly certain humanity hadn't discovered yet, but it was definitely reproducible.

Huh, if I can make a printer for nanobots… Can I make a larger printer that used nanobots to assemble weapons or armor, or even vehicles?

[SURPRISE] [… INFORMATION]

… Oh boy that's a lot of very expensive material, but damn the payoff is worth it. A plethora of blueprints, with sizes ranging from smaller than my head to bigger than a house, and every one of them able to break down the molecules of whatever was put inside and reassemble those molecules into different shapes.

In other words: put junk in, get war machine out.

But for now, I had more pressing concerns. I needed some armor, and I needed a weapon. I've never been particularly athletic, so a heavier armored suit would be better until I get some more flexibility, and the only weapons I had ever used were hunting rifles and pistols, along with a shotgun once or twice.

Before I could make those, though, I needed to start making nanobots. So, I shrugged and dropped a handful of screws and such into the printer and set it to start its work. While it started to slowly form my first ever nanobot, I turned back to the wrist-mounted controller. After a quick glance, I sent a command to the printer's assembler.

Multiply. Limit: 20.

The command would cause the first drone to go out, gather some suitable material, and bring it back for the printer to make another. This process would continue until twenty total drones had been created, at which point all of them would shut down and await further instructions. Quite a handy feature, actually.

With that out of the way, I looked up at the clock on the wall. So far, two hours had passed, meaning it was around half past five in the evening. I had a meeting with the Wards in… two and a half hours, which meant I had plenty of time to start on my main weapon.

And so, I turned my attention back to the workbench, and the piles of scrap sitting on it.

"Queenie? It's time to make something for combat."

[ANTICIPATION]

{EARTH BET}

{APRIL 11, 2011}

{PRT ENE HEADQUARTERS, BROCKTON BAY}

I stood next to Miss Militia outside the Wards' area, a standard domino mask over my face and my controller attached to my wrist. It had taken a lot of convincing for the PRT to let me keep it, but there was absolutely no way in hell I was meeting with a bunch of superpowered teenagers without something to protect myself with, and I made sure they knew that.

So here I am now, standing next to the woman whose power was literally guns, with nothing but a handful of tiny drones to defend myself. If any one of them decided to attack me, there really wasn't all that much I could do about it.

[INFORMATION]

… Except drill a hole in their brains and hearts with a nanobot, apparently.

"Let's, uh, save that for Plan Z, alright Queenie?"

"Hmm?" Miss Militia glanced to me, and I realized I had spoken aloud again. I really need to get a handle on that…

"Oh, uh, just talking to my power. She, uh, she's a bit… intense when it comes to fighting."

Like hell I was telling the woman with all the guns that I could drill a hole through her head with my tiny robots, she might just shoot me and be done with it. Getting killed this early would definitely throw a wrench into my plans, and that's not even mentioning my personal dislike of dying.

Miss Militia seemed interested in just what Queenie had said, but the door to the Wards area opened before she could ask. Shaking her head, she waved for me to step in, following after me and gesturing at the costumed kids in front of me.

"Here we have Vista, Kid Win, and Gallant. Shadow Stalker and Aegis are on patrol at the moment, and Clockblocker is at home due to a family emergency. Wards, this is War Machine, our newest Tinker."

Ah, yes. War Machine, the name that the image department picked out for me after a few minutes' debate. Personally, I thought it was idiotic (who the hell picks a name that literally tells everyone what they can do, anyway?), but of course I was underaged and therefore my opinion mattered about as much as the shit I stepped in the other day.

Assholes, the lot of them.

Realizing I was supposed to say something, I cleared my throat and gave a halfhearted wave. "Hey. Name's War Machine, I build things that kill people."

The frown Miss Militia sent me had my lips twisting upwards, but she continued on with her introductions. "War Machine is… technically correct. His Tinker specialty is Warfare, and he can make anything used for conventional warfare, along with nanomachines. He is working on his costume at the moment, so he'll be working Console until he's finished. Clockblocker can teach him how it works when he comes in tomorrow, but tonight we just want you all to get to know each other."

… What is this, some middle school class where we all do icebreakers together? I don't give a shit about getting to know these people, because the moment I get the chance I'm leaving.

Those of us under the age of twenty just stared awkwardly at each other, before Vista piped up. "Uh, hi! I'm Vista, it's nice to meet you War Machine!"

That seemed to have broken the ice for the rest of them, because Gallant went next. "Hey there, I'm Gallant. Nice to have another Ward on the team."

Kid Win's introduction was a bit more… excited. "Hey! Nice to have another Tinker on the team! I see that computer on your wrist has a pretty powerful transmitter for its size, what does it control? Do you have an army of robots you're building that it controls? It has to have a range of at least a mile, which is way too short for a communicator but could probably be used to–"

Gallant nudged him, "Hey, Kid, you're making the guy uncomfortable. Maybe do the Tinker-talk later, alright?"

… I felt like an outsider, similar to how it was at Winslow. Each of the Wards here was obviously comfortable enough with each other to trust the others to watch their back, whether in a fight or in day-to-day life. It showed in the way they looked to each other for reassurance or guidance, something I had never really seen before. It reminded me of my relationship with my little brother, in a way.

Speaking of Brian, I was informed that he and I would be assigned to a new family tomorrow. And yes, the word 'assigned' was used, we had no choice in the matter. They'd better hope this family treated my brother right, or so help me I'd turn all of them to sizzling goop with a plasma cannon.

As the room descended into awkward silence again, Miss Militia spoke up. "War Machine, why don't you tell them what all you can do? After all, if you're going to work with them, it would be better if you all know where your talents are most useful."

Oh, sure, and the PRT has no ulterior motives in learning everything I'm able to make. Not like I'm hiding anything other than the more dangerous options anyway (something tells me that my nuclear grenades would not get approved).

"… Alright. Well, I'm a Warfare Tinker, so pretty much all of my tech is used to kill people. Not a lot of 'non-lethal' options here, since even my weaker weapons can punch or burn a hole through a baseline human with no issue. I can also mass-produce my stuff once I get some nano-fabricators built, so I'll be able to outfit the police and PRT troopers with easy-to-use Tinkertech gear. So far, I've got blueprints for railguns, plasma weapons, lasers, napalm and thermite flamethrowers, gatling cannons that shoot dozens of rounds a second, and all kinds of other fun things. My power armor designs range from a skintight stealth suit with near-perfect invisibility and protection against most scanning tech and infrared or thermal vision, all the way to a juggernaut suit the size of a car, with plating thick enough to ignore most modern-day weapons and strong enough to crush steel with its hands. My vehicles range from motorcycles with guns all the way to large space dreadnoughts covered in weapons strong enough to destroy the moon in one shot."

I almost laughed at the looks on all of their faces. Even Miss Militia looked shocked, despite the fact that she must have read all of this in my file already. "Of course, building all of these things requires a lot of material, and most of that material is incredibly expensive. So, while I could build a death-ray that destroys a continent the size of Australia in one hit, it would cost hundreds of billions in resources and the power source would produce more energy than the entirety of the world's population used in the past ten years. Pros and cons, and all that."

Of course, if I could get my nanobots up and running, I could easily have them dig into the Earth's mantle or even launch them into space in order to get the resources I needed, but it's better to keep that a secret just in case. Like the fact that I hacked into the PRT database using my new Tinker abilities, what they don't know will let me hurt them.

Kinda surprising just how many leaks they've had though, not to mention the number of times there's been a connection from some warehouse or whatever. Protocol says that I should tell my superiors about that. Curiosity says that I should check it out personally. Queenie says I should check it out personally, with a big gun.

So, two-to-one in favor of checking it out myself.

Once Miss Militia recovered from the bombs I just dropped, she cleared her throat and started to lead me out of the room. "I'm sorry, Wards, but something has come up and War Machine needs to come with me. He can come by again tomorrow and meet the team."

Huh, guess Piggot screamed something in that earpiece of hers, cause the look she's giving me is legendary.

{EARTH BET}

{APRIL 11, 2011}

{PRT ENE HEADQUARTERS, BROCKTON BAY}

Oh yeah, she's definitely angry.

"And just when, exactly, were you going to inform us that you could create, and I quote, a 'death-ray that destroys a continent the size of Australia in one hit'?" the Director growled at me, Armsmaster standing next to her and staring at me as well.

"Well, I would've got around to it I guess, probably after you stopped holding my little brother hostage to get me to cooperate. Besides, I told the power testers everything I could do at the time. Not my fault Queenie keeps sending me blueprints whenever I have a new idea."

The Director took note of that, apparently, because her next question was about my shard. "Speaking of this… 'Queenie'… what all has it told you? You are the first known parahuman who can speak with the source of their powers, and we stand to learn quite a bit from it."

Huh, didn't realize I was so special. "Well, Queenie seems to be really into conflict. As in, she pushes me towards fighting or killing anything that bothers me. She's doing it right now actually, wants me to fight you for some reason. It almost seems like she's going through the motions, she wants conflict but doesn't really seem to know why or have any reason for it. Other than that, she seems somewhat annoyed that she's stuck with me but also really wants me to work with her towards fighting… something. She's a bit vague about things, most of what she says relies on conceptual understanding and not so much verbally explaining things."

"Are you saying that parahumans are actually pushed towards fighting by their powers?" Miss Militia asked.

"Well, I'm not entirely sure, but let's take a look at the Brockton Bay ones. On the side of the heroes you have things such as the woman with all the guns, the man who can control kinetic energy and give Newton's laws the middle finger, a girl that can turn to shadows or smoke or whatever and pretty much ignore defenses because of it, and of course me. For the villains, you have a man who can steal skills from other people, a guy who can teleport and basically clone himself which he uses to blow himself up repeatedly, a woman who can build vehicles that I'm pretty sure come straight from Mad Max, and the guy who can turn himself in to a massive rage dragon that can fight the biggest monsters we know of. So, yeah, I'd say that most if not all powers are based around combat."

The Director raised an eyebrow, "And Panacea? Her power is healing, and can't be used for combat other than knocking her opponents out. It also provides a view of the biology of whoever she's healing, so she can check if they're fully healed or suffering from a more esoteric disease."

Huh, good point. Queenie?

[RECOGNITION] [KINSHIP] {QUEEN SHAPER}

Ah fuck my head! That hurt…

Shaking my head to clear it, I answered her question, "Dunno about that, but Queenie calls Panacea's power Queen Shaper. Guess I shouldn't call her Queenie anymore, if there's more of them out there… anyway, I don't really know a lot about powers yet, but the names seem pretty literal. Queen Warfare builds stuff for war, Queen Shaper has to sculpt or change the shape of something. And since Panacea heals people and pets and stuff…"

Oh man that's not a happy look on her face.

"Biokinetic. Panacea is a biokinetic." The Director's face had turned stormy, and she was already dialing a number in on the phone she had sitting on her desk. "You're all dismissed. I have some calls to make."

That went well, all things considered.

{EARTH BET}

{APRIL 12, 2011}

{PRT ENE HEADQUARTERS, BROCKTON BAY}

I made my way into the Wards' area again around two in the morning. I had spent the time since Piggot dismissed me on Tinkering, and I had finished my first weapon. Sitting at four feet in length when fully extended, it had wires running up and down the barrel that were covered in triangular metal plates, with a wireframe wherever possible to cut down on weight. As it was, the thing weighed close to twenty pounds, and due to the recoil was close to impossible for a human to use. For some reason, however, I could lift the thing just fine, and the recoil was closer to a normal rifle than the shoulder-shattering force that it should have been.

The weapon was mostly gunmetal grey, with blinking red and green lights that gave the user information about the internal workings of the gun. For a normal human, it would require months of training and familiarity with the weapon to understand them, but for me it was as easy as looking at them. Probably some side effect of building the thing.

It had three different firing modes, each of which were radically different from each other. First, capsules could be loaded into a breach on the side of the gun, the contents of which would be shot out similar to a shotgun. I had made ten of them already, all of them loaded with various bits of sharpened metal from the Scrapyard. Probably illegal, but I'd take what I could get if I had to fight Lung or Purity. The secondary firing mode was a "simple" laser, which took the form of an attachment on the underside of the barrel. It took a fairly powerful battery I had created in order to work, and it could only make five shots per battery, but it could melt through metal and stone alike, let alone normal human flesh.

And finally, only added because I needed a debatably non-lethal option, the attachment on the left side of the barrel was an air-powered dart shooter. Similar in design to the PRT tranquilizers, it could take any dart up to a certain size and launch it at speeds close to supersonic. These darts could be filled with any liquid, and I had already made several filled with a powerful venom that could melt any biological material it touched.

Those needles were hidden away under tons of random scrap, where the PRT wouldn't find them. Always nice to have a last resort, and there's no way in hell those would get approved.

I had also set my nanobots to start making my armor. The coding required had taken a while, and in fact most of the time I spent in the Scrapyard was trying to get the program to do what I wanted it to. For now, the bots would work through the night on the right gauntlet of my armor, and after that I could check it over for any problems that might have resulted from me missing a bit of code or whatever.

Right now, however, I was exhausted. So, with an oversized gun in one hand and a wrist computer on my other arm, I collapsed on the couch in the middle of the main room, closing my eyes…

Then opened them again, as a thought occurred to me. "Hey, Queenie?" I whispered.

[ACKNOWLEDGEMENT]

"What do you know about the source of powers? Like, what created you?"

I waited for a bit, and when Queenie didn't respond I shrugged it off and closed my eyes again, until…

[CREATOR] [PROGENITOR] [FATHER] [ENTITY] [WARRIOR]

{ZION}

The sheer amount of information shoved into my brain knocked me unconscious so quickly, I didn't even have time to worry about the blood leaking from my eyes.

A/N:

And so, our MC learns about the Big Golden Boy (I call him BGB for short). Isn't it nice that Cauldron's whole reason for existence is about to be exposed to quite a few more people than they wanted? Quite convenient that Path To Victory doesn't quite work on him, isn't it?

Also, yes, communicating with shards physically harms him, because these things are so much more powerful than normal humans and their shard-speak sometimes uses concepts that humans can't quite grasp. Sure, 'conflict' is a pretty easy concept to understand, but 'bullshit magic space whale' definitely isn't.

Of course, to tell anyone about what he learned, he has to wake up first, and that might take a hot minute or three.

See you soon with the next chapter. This is AWDTB, signing off.