Some conflicting information for you.
We are told fairly often in Worm that the major stumbling blocks a Tinker faces are time and resources. It makes sense, multidimensional laser canons don't exactly craft themselves, and the extremely specific parts you need to build them are hardly something you can pick up in a junkyard.
That problem is often summarized with the phrase 'building the tools to build the tools'.
Inversely, because of the nature of storytelling, most of the Tinkers we actually see in Worm appear to just sort of pull technology out of nowhere. We aren't shown the struggle to achieve things or the lengthy requisitioning process. One day, Bakuda just shows up, with a Tinker Tech Armory big enough to kill a God. Armsmaster goes from tranquilizer darts for Lung to a lie detector, combat precog software, and a monomolecular blade in the space of about a month.
Heck, most fanfiction simultaneously showcases and then subverts this issue by having its protagonist cleverly cheat the mechanics of their power to get materials and build stuff faster.
I fell somewhere in the middle of those two extremes.
On the one hand, the technological advancements native to Starfinder were borderline ludicrous.
Take the suit of armor I was currently working on for example.
In Starfinder, a Mining Jack was a crappy low-level armor set that wasn't even technically designed to be armor. It was scraping the bottom of the barrel as far as the game system went. In reality, a Mining Jack was a hardsuit capable of keeping me alive in any environment, from deep-sea to deep space. It had temperature controls that would keep me from burning to death on the surface of the sun (but for some reason didn't stop fire attacks, which... okay I guess). It had storage built into the armor for any other tech I could care to bring, and it was bulky and armored enough that small arms fire would just plink off of it.
And I absolutely lacked the materials I needed to build it because it was an entirely technological device. It had been nearly a week since I started in on the thing, and it was currently collecting dust in the back of the fish packaging plant. I had all the armored plates I needed neatly stacked next to the thing for the day I managed to get all the electrical stuff for its innards - I just couldn't afford any of that electrical stuff. I had used most of my previous stock on my Spell Core and the Mercy Pistol.
Despite Sophia's backpack full of cash, her take from beating up criminals was honestly nearly nonexistent. The unfortunate truth was that she was smarter than to rifle the pockets of normal thugs, and so only actually made money if she got extremely lucky and knocked over a major gang hideout or something. Despite Sophia's renewed aggressiveness and fame - I'd actually heard people at school talking about her a bit in passing - her continuing efforts had yet to turn up any such thing.
Worse, even if she did, I couldn't exactly ask her for a handout. She had nearly murdered me when she found out what I had taken the rest of her money for. As is, she tolerated it, but only because she could draw a straight line between what I was spending it on and being a predator or fighter or whatever weird mental category she slotted herself into.
However!
Not everything I could build used scientific principles to create. Only about half of it did. The other half was mostly magical in nature. Now, probably owing to the fact that magic was less about expensive parts and more about knowledge - which my power helped me cheat at - I could make a whole bunch of nifty tools on the cheap. So while my personal armory was coming along fairly slowly, my list of tools to draw on in the field had expanded a bit faster.
The first such device I had made was a little something called a Mindlink Circlet. It did what it said on the tin.
It made me mildly telepathic. Sort of.
The circlet was simple to make and simpler to use. It was pretty much just a band of metal with a bunch of magical scripts scrawled on the inside of the loop, and while wearing it, I could communicate with anyone nearby by thinking at them. It didn't let me read minds - that was an entirely different spell - but it did open a sort of psychic channel for replies to my messages to come back to me. I built the thing in a day using crap I had laying around in a fit of frustration, having realized I was stuck on my armor for the moment.
I also managed to puzzle out the code for the Zero level spells Daze and Psychokinetic Hand. Psychokinetic Hand was basically just a sci-fi sounding version of Mage Hand, which itself was basically just an invisible hand of force I could use to lift small objects.
The hand was fairly weak - it wasn't attached to a body and so it had no leverage - but it helped me tinker, and effectively meant I had three hands to hold things with, and really that was good enough for me. Daze, on the other hand, was one of those spells that were way more useful in real life than it was in the normal game rules.
See, in the game, Daze had the extremely useful effect of taking away a single enemies turn. They became immune to it after a single use, and it only worked on enemies below a certain level - but within those parameters, it was extremely effective. Here's the thing though, a 'turn' in Starfinder is effectively six seconds long.
That meant I functionally had the ability to turn someone's brain off for six seconds provided I didn't disturb them with any other stimuli - like attacking them. Even better, 'levels' as a concept just didn't exist in real life.
So far as I could tell, Daze would work on just about anyone who wasn't a Parahuman, because the only resistance anyone on this planet had to psychic effects of any kind came by way of being psychically connected to a giant alien space computer.
So the spell went from having a handful of use cases, to being my go-to mook busting spell.
So here I was a week later. My lessons with Mr.Laborn were on Mondays and Wednesdays, meaning I had been to approximately two of them. We hadn't really gotten to actually fighting yet.
Mostly I just came in and got shown how to take a punch or roll with a hit so that I didn't break my neck when I hit the ground.
Despite - or possibly because of that, my body felt like I had been getting my ass kicked every day for months.
When I had told Mr.Laborn that I needed to learn how to fight for real and not for recreational reasons, he had taken me at my word and proceeded to put me through the most grueling and brutal training regime possible.
I gathered that he was doing it in an attempt to genuinely instill in me what I would need to survive in this fucked up city, and further gathered that my adult-like temperament and respect for him appealed to the part of him that was going to have problems with Aisha later on but...
Well, let's just say that if I wasn't specifically paying the man to teach me, the bruises I was hiding under a long sleeve shirt would have raised some questions.
Not that Soph cared. She had responded to me effectively stealing three hundred dollars from her by raising the intensity of our runs back up to what I assume was her normal workout, instead of the reduced version she'd tolerated for my sake prior to this. And yes, I had tried to stick to my own pace so she could do her own thing. It hadn't worked.
As was becoming the norm for me, I spent basically my entire week physically destroying myself or tinkering, with almost nothing else in between. If I was an actual thirteen-year-old, I'd consider the pattern disturbing and unhealthy. I mean, I had no friends, no hobbies, and was apparently some flavour of masochist.
Despite being a teenager, I had approximately zero interest in girls because well... I wasn't a pedo. I had working hormones and all that - I pointedly had to distract myself whenever I saw Alexandria on a billboard or something - but kids 'my' age were about as romantically attractive to me as a dead puppy.
Still, since I had a functioning adult mind, and only barely managed to pretend otherwise to avoid suspicion, I thought I was doing okay for myself. Having an excercise regime and a job wasn't that different from when I was in college even. Even if I was starting to get stressed out by the lack of free time.
I could tell, however, that my current lack of progress was starting to become irksome to my Shard, when I started to have idle thoughts of trying to sell tech to Faultline for cash. Or to try and cut a deal with the PRT - thus alerting them to my existence. Or - and this is my favorite extremely stupid idea - find a mirror to yell 'Contessa' three times fast into, to see if Cauldron would bankroll me.
Hence, I chose to kill two birds with one stone and alleviate my money and conflict problems by doing another patrol in my Junk Armor.
'But John!' You might ask. 'How is a lazy patrol around your neighbourhood going to help with either of those?'
Well, it wouldn't. Which was why I had finally caved and asked Sophia if we could probe the edge of Empire territory tonight. While ABB territory was arguably safer, I currently didn't think we could survive if Oni Lee or Lung showed up to stop us.
At least if an Empire cape showed up there were even odds it'd be one of the ones with a manageable power. I wasn't particularly comfortable going out without an upgraded kit in the first place, so there was no way I was going to pick a fight with Oni Lee - who I literally couldn't escape from.
'Why do you do that?' I asked Soph telepathically after she had done her disappearing act on me for the third time in the night. We had been in Empire-aligned territory for a little over an hour, and contrary to what I'd been led to believe, hadn't encountered a single hate crime. Or crime at all, actually.
Oh, there were swastikas all over the place when I bothered to start looking, but no actual thugs.
'I fucking hate this thing.' She answered me, ignoring my question. Sophia had been less than enthused about the Mindlink Circlet. She described the sound my voice made when I talked to her as 'fucking creepy' along with a number of other rather unladylike adjectives.
She punched me square in the shoulder when I called her unladylike, which I think rather proves my point.
'No seriously, why do you that? You know it's pure luck that I even know what direction to go in when you ditch me like that right?' I pressed. The first handful of times she had pulled that crap on me it was entertaining because it made me think of Batman. I like to think the sudden shock of your teammate simply being gone when you turn around was something I now shared with the Justice League.
Now, however, it was just annoying and dangerous. I wasn't the best at planning or making snap decisions, but not knowing where the hell Soph was at any given moment in time definitely wasn't helping.
Plus, shit like this was part of the reason everyone she worked with hated her. Or at least, hated working with her. Her stellar personality did a lot of the heavy lifting there.
'What the hell do you want me to do? Ask for permission?' She snapped at me.
The fact that we were even calable of holding this conversation while I had no idea of where she was, was the only thing preventing me from snapping back. I was anxious about getting murdered by Nazi's, and irked by my lack of progress on my armor. The tension from openly walking around Nazi territory waiting for something bad to happen left me much less patient with Soph than I usually was.
'Soph-' I began but was instantly cut off by her response.
'Shadow Stalker. Don't use my name while we're in costume.' She retorted. I resisted the urge to counter that by pointing out that we were communicating telepathically, and therefore, no one could hear us. If I got sidetracked arguing with Sophia about something that trivial I'd never get back to my main point.
'Fine. Shadow Stalker. Information is important. Keeping eachother updated on the situation might be the exact advantage we need to win a fight someday.' I tried, edging my way around a turn to make sure I wasn't going to walk face first into Hookwolf or something.
You might call that paranoia, but I called it being genre-savvy. Everything I knew about this reality led me to believe that sooner or later something seriously horrific was bound to happen to me. If I was lucky, I'd be able to deal with it.
I am not, nor have I ever been, lucky.
'I fucking doubt it. If you're gonna be such a bitch about it you can just stay home and make shit for me.' She replied. I couldn't tell if the offer was made out of goodwill, spite, or both. It was kind of hard to tell when Soph was trying to help you instead of just being her usual bitchy self.
Regardless, I not only didn't care to be a member of Sophia's support staff - I literally couldn't. My power had clearly defined levels, and if I stayed in our hideout tinkering all the time I had my doubts that they would go up fast enough for me to make a difference in the long run.
As cliche as it was to say, the endgame of Worm was always going to be functionally killing God. I could make a lot of other changes to the timeline, but if I couldn't accomplish that then they were ultimately just an exercise in pointless self-gratification.
'Seriously, think about-' I paused to try and find an example that would appeal to Soph - 'a spec ops team. Those guys do some of the most dangerous shit in the world, and they do it by being well organized. They keep each other updated, they watch each other's backs they-'
'Don't have powers.' Sophia negated, either missing or ignoring my point.
I felt my eye twitch in irritation but forged onward. I really, really, hated the example I was going to use next, because I had gone out of my way to avoid prodding Sophia's weird Predator/Prey thing since getting to know her.
The only way she was going to listen to someone trying to explain how dumb that was, would be if they happened to be a 'Predator' themselves and were significantly more powerful than her.
Currently, I wasn't really either of those things. Frankly, the fact that Sophia tolerated me at all was a victory in my book.
Still, I'd rather she listen to me right now, then have to figure out what to do later when one or both of us inevitably got grievously injured over it.
'Think of, like, a wolf pack Soph. Wolves don't just run at you, they work together. They surround you. When you turn towards one the one on the opposite side of you jumps in. They coordinate to take out bigger prey.' I explained, cringing the entire time.
I actually have no idea how wolf packs work in real life. I just know how encounters with them are supposed to work in DD. I really hoped it was accurate enough to work.
'...huh.' she muttered in response.
Because of course, the fucking wolf analogy was what made it through to her. Goddammit Soph, why are you so freaking edgy?
'Look, I'm not saying you gotta tell me everything, just that if I have to run from Lung or something and need backup, knowing which direction you're in might be helpful.' I followed up tiredly.
All I got in response to that was the mental equivalent of a grunt, which is for the best really. It meant she had at least listened that time. Plus, I'm not sure what I would do if she started preaching her weird philosophy at me. I wasn't old enough to drink yet, so I'd have no way of consoling myself over it later.
While were talking I had been just sort of jogging along the sidewalk while Sophia did her thing somewhere overhead. I had just been about to make my way around corner - we were sort of zigzagging our way forward - when something fist sized and heavy bounced off my shoulder, causing me to stumble sideways into a wall.
Quickly pulling myself upright, I turned in the direction I had been hit only for brick to sail past my head, breaking the storefront window behind me.
I would have been extremely distressed by the kinds of misunderstandings that might cause me later if the situation that faced me as I turned wasn't exponentially worse.
'Stalker, you seeing this?' I asked, taking in the swirling storm of debris that was slowly expanding overhead on the next street over.
'What do you think?' She snarked at me, jumping down to the street next to me so we could change directions.
'I think that's Whirlygig. Short range telekinetic, spins stuff around her really fast.'I explained as quickly as I could, breaking out into a sprint and ducking under another brick.
'Sounds weak. She Empire? 'Soph asked me, using her ghost form to ignore any incoming debris. Her mental voice was excited in a way that I would have found disturbing if I didn't have a better grasp on her psychology than was probably reasonable.
'Don't think so. Might be a Merchant?' I put forth, hesitating slightly. I actually couldn't remember if Whirlygig joined the Merchant's before or after Leviathan. I honestly didn't know much ofanythingabout her. I just knew what her powers were, and that she was a girl. That was about it.
I felt pretty good about fighting Whirlygig. Her telekinetic storm was dangerous, but if we could get her before it got strong enough to throw things like cars around she would have no defense against our energy based attacks. Better, the Merchants weren't exactly well organized. The chances of them declaring a blood feud over this were basically nil. It was honestly perfect.
Of course, this being Worm, I was quickly disabused of that notion.
Rounding the corner onto the street the nascent hurricane of stuff appeared to be emanating from, I was faced with a scene that somewhat complicated my relatively simple reckoning of what was happening.
There was a big white van parked on the side of the road with its back doors hanging open, and a handful of guys cowering on the opposite side of the street from it. Calling them Empire just because they were all white might be sort of a stretch, but the fact that almost all of them were armed lent some credence to the belief.
Within the van, there was a woman. Presumably, this was Whirlygig, and also the person the Empire guys were taking cover from.
I wish I could say we stumbled into a gang fight between the Merchants and the Empire. I really do. That would mean that everyone present was a badguy who I could mercilessly applt violence to.
Unfortunately, several things immediately jumped out at me about the woman in the van.
One, she was naked from the waist down, and seemed to be barely moving. She was positioned so her legs hung over the lip of the truck, and was leaning against the side with a dazed expression on her face, even as random objects continues to fly around her at high speeds. Which brought me to two.
She was barely conscious, clearly swaying left and right, huddling in on her self and shaking at random intervals.
'Soph, knock the girl out then help me with these fuckheads or we're gonna die.' I snapped out after the 1.3 seconds it took me to take in and internalize what I was probably looking at.
I didn't check to see if she was actually doing what I asked because I was too angry.
Again, I came from a civilized society. Inwas not at all accustomed to the almost casual way this city was so fucked up. So when it was shoved into my face, I got just the tiniest bit mad.
And by tiny, I mean I sprinted forward while slamming an Energy Ray into the nearest guy, who - because I usually try to learn from my mistakes - instantly lost the use of his arm where my ray had frozen it.
I didn't really care at this point if the thing fell off as long as he didn't die afterwards.
I'm assuming Sophia followed through on my request, because there was a quick flash of light behind me, and I wasn't pulped by debris as I began my attack, which was good because I wasn't in the right frame of mind to dodge Whirlygigs power right now.
I'm ashamed to say that I almost immediately disregarded Mr.Laborns teachings as I made it into melee range. While the thugs were reorienting on me with their weapons, I closed with the guy whos arm I had frozen and swung a wide haymaker at his temple, while my other hand pointed over his shoulder at the next nearest guy before he could fire his gun at me.
The first guy went down in a heap, and my Daze spell hit the second guy, causing him to go slack jawed and stupid.
A lance of brilliant white light traced a line across my vision to the right and hitting one of the guys further back in the group, but I ignored it in favour of freezing the Dazed guys hand where it was on the trigger of his gun.
Then I punched him in the head to, when he was to distracted by pain to dodge properly.
I fully expected to have to dodge out of the way of the guy behind him,because the group had been stretched out in a line where they were taking cover, but instead found myself facing Sophia, who I guess at some point had leapt into the fray herself and was presently choking out the last guy standing. When he went down, I found myself standing amidst a group of four guys, two of which were probably going to lose their hands, with my heart jackhammering in my chest and my temper still flared high enough that I had to consciously remind myself Whirlygig was still here to avoid doing something stupid.
'Thanks.' I offered as I caught my breath. Mr.Laborn had told me that a real fight last between fourty seconds and two minutes tops. My two experiences on the subject so far had borne that out.
'Should I unfreeze those guys?'Sophia asked eagerly. I knew it wasn't because she cared if they lost their hands to the frost. She just wanted to shoot them with the pain gun. Frankly, I was right there with her.
'Upto you. I don't really care.'I lied, turning away from Sophia's near instant response of firing on one of the unconscious guys.
Then I walked over to Whirlygig. Well, I guess she might not be called that yet, but it was the only name I knew her by.
She was, to my great surprise, vaguely hispanic looking. She had long black hair that was currently splayed all over the place, and was either an unusually adult looking teenager, or a strangely young looking adult. I couldn't tell which, but if I had to hazard a guess I'd peg her as being in her early twenties.
With a grimace at her prone form in the entrance of the van, I crawled in next to her, grabbed the pair of jeans that were laying there, and awkwardly tried to slip them onto her. I wasn't strong enough to lift her and cloth her at the same time, so Soph eventually had to come over and help.
I also tried to give her a quick medical once over, but while I did find a spot on her arm where she'd evidently been injected with something, I didn't have enough medical knowledge to be able to do anything about it. She was breathing, and her heart was beating, and that was good enough.
I quietly called the PRT on one of the Nazi's cellphones, and sat down to wait.