Hope Through Overwhelming Firepower 6.7
"This Accord guy is pretty damn impressive." Taylor admitted. "I mean, when you think about what it takes to feed this many people..." She had gone to one of the guys in charge of this whole process and asked for a way to help. The man, being absolutely ecstatic that a hero had finally come by, immediately told her to watch the primary supply line. Apparently, the Merchants had gotten it into their heads that now was the perfect time to begin their 'dastardly deeds' once more, and had hit the last shipment to come in. So now, here she was, watching a bunch of people adeptly move boxes of various things around. It was impressive, the pure efficiency involved. Even human error was accounted for to some extent.
Taylor perked up as the low level scan she was running picked up an... Unusual vehicle. "That's my cue, I guess. But, really, they're doing another run so soon?" Taylor shook her head as she began walking towards what looked like the most likely entrance. "Drugs, what do you want?"
"Is there something wrong, miss?" One of the workers asked her.
"Mhm. Merchants are incoming from..." She paused as she took in the, rather impressive, turn the large vehicle made. "...There, probably." She pointed after a moment's thought.
The worker's eyes widened. "Shit, how'd they get past the security-?"
The section of wall Taylor had pointed at collapsed outwards, as something unseen broke through.
"Ah, it's invisible." Taylor noted. "Kind of impressive, I guess you shouldn't judge a Tinker by her rating."
The Merchants' vehicle let open an invisible side door, and out spilled several men armed with poor quality weaponry. "Yo, all of you better give us that-Oh fuck." The first man out ended with a squeak.
Taylor raised an eyebrow. "Hi."
"I thought all the heroes were supposed to be elsewhere." The druggy mumbled to himself, and visibly swallowed. "D-don't move, or we'll shoot, and you can't defend all those guys behind you."
Inertial Canceler: Extend
Taylor's eyebrow quirked further. "Can't I?"
"...Just fire!" The man shouted.
The other men hesitated. "But... Buster, dude." Said one.
The main druggy hesitated slightly in turn, before hardening his resolve. "Fuck you, cowards." And opened fire.
The bullets spread out, the man clearly making no attempt to actually aim for Taylor. And then the bullets, upon coming in contact with the space Taylor had defined for her inertial canceler, stopped.
Taylor crossed her arms. "I think I can." She released her field, and the bullets fell, loudly clattering on the ground.
The gun slipped from the man's hands. "I-I fuck. Just run!" He shouted, scrambling and tripping in his attempt to get back in the Tinkertech vehicle. His assorted 'friends' followed behind, only barely managing to get inside as the doors closed.
"Uh, no." Taylor began walking towards the Merchants' vehicle. The engine began to hum.
Inertial Canceler: Extend
"They're going to get away!" Shouted a, now considerably more confident, worker.
"No, they're not." Taylor confidently replied.
"What do you mean-" The man was cut off by the screech of sheering metal, as the engine attempted to move the now inertia-maximized vehicle. It failed, and the screech gave way to more humming, as the engine ran uselessly with everything it used to provide movement shorn away by its own strength. "...Oh."
"Mhm." Taylor hummed in response. A few seconds of walking to the downed vehicle and she arrived before it. Whatever it was using to be invisible had managed to survive, not that Taylor cared.
Inertial Canceler: Inviolate
Taylor promptly walked through the side of the vehicle, Tinker enhanced metals falling before her now inexorable march.
The invisibility system died.
Taylor was greeted by a hail of bullets. Bullets which had about as much effect on her as everything had since she had triggered.
A clicking sounded as the weapons ran out of ammunition. "Really? More bullets?" Taylor questioned exasperatedly. It's not like she had magically grown less invincible in the past few seconds.
One of the men drew a knife, and charged. Letting out a scream of rage, he attempted to stab Taylor.
Taylor promptly grabbed the knife, and channeled a single spark into her hand. Reducing the metal into so much slag, and setting the wooden handle on fire. The Merchant immediately drew back his hand with a yelp.
"Honestly?" Taylor shook her head. "And this is why you don't do drugs, kids. Now, where is the PRT?" She could keep them cooped up in this vehicle basically indefinitely, but she would have to leave eventually. If only to help with anything else the Merchants might be planning. They hadn't sent any of their capes this time, either.
The druggy nursed his burned hand. "Fucking super-capes. Think they're so much better than all of us normals." He spat.
Taylor was amused. "Considering that I'm actually a law abiding citizen, and you're a murderous drug addict and thief, that pretty much automatically makes me a better person than you." Taylor took notice of the PRT's arrival. "And look, here come all the other people who are better than you."
"Fuck you! It's not like all of us have other options." The man vehemently replied.
Taylor snorted. "And the Merchants were your gang of choice?"
The druggy, clearly searching for some way out of this, began to plead. "I... I was forced join. I didn't want too, but they came by and made me with guns and-"
Taylor smiled internally. "Tell it to the judge." A small part of her had always wanted to say that.
A female PRT officer walked up behind Taylor. "This the Merchants?" The officer questioned.
"Just some of their non-powered flunkies." Taylor turned and answered. "They were doing their raids in this thing, which can-could." Taylor corrected. "Go invisible."
The PRT officer's eyes widened in understanding. "That would explain some things. Probably Squealer's work, then."
"Probably." Taylor agreed.
The PRT officer shook her head in disgust. "Even the E88 is, if not helping, laying low. And what do these sick fucks do? Take the crisis as an opportunity to steal valuable medical supplies, all to fuel their drug addiction." Her face twisted. "Makes me sick."
One of the Merchants began reaching for a dropped gun. "No, just, stop." Taylor stated. "I mean, what do you expect to do with that?" She pointed at the offending man and the weapon he was reaching for.
"Thanks, Buster. But we can handle it from here." Another officer walked up and spoke. He took a round object out of a pouch, and tossed it in. Containment foam rapidly filled the entire vehicle.
"Containment foam? For them? Seems kind of a waste." The initial officer spoke up.
"Eh, there's Tinkertech involved. Better safe than sorry." The other officer answered. "Besides, it's not like containment foam is that expensive anyway."
The initial one shrugged. "If you say so, I guess."
"Well, as I'm the guy in charge here, I do say so." The other officer replied in an amused manner.
Taylor smiled slightly. "Well, you appear to have the situation under control. If you don't need me further, I'm going to see if I can't figure out what the real Merchants are up to."
The lead officer nodded at her. "You do that. You might be called in to make a statement or something, but with the current state of things..." He trailed off.
Taylor nodded back. "Right. Now." Taylor spoke to herself while walking away. "Where's Skidmark..." She turned her scan on full, and searched for the man. It took only a moment for her to find him. He was a few blocks away, prepared with the rest of the Merchants capes, probably in order to deal with any pursuit without putting himself or anyone important in any undue danger. Surprisingly intelligent. "I suppose Skidmark can't be a total idiot. He does lead the closest thing to a competitor the E88 has anymore." Taylor spoke to herself. She turned back towards the PRT team. "Hey, Skidmark and the rest of the important Merchants are three blocks that way." She called out.
The lead officer looked at her. "Really? How do you know?"
"I have extrasensory perception within a fairly large radius." Taylor explained. "It's not my most well-known power, but it's there."
"Wow... that's pretty damn useful." The lead officer rubbed his chin. "What's your range?"
Taylor hesitated. "I'm not actually sure; the first time I used it I was limited to roughly a hundred feet. But by the time the Slaughterhouse Nine showed up, I could casually see the entire city. Might as well give it a test." Taylor grabbed the mental hold that represented her scan, and pushed.
The first thing she noted was that the Earth was surprisingly non-spherical.
The second thing she noticed was that she had worldwide absolute extrasensory perception.
The third thing was a bit of a problem. "Ah fuck." Taylor bemoaned. "They're coming."
Every other person there reacted. "You mean-" Spoke one PRT officer.
"Yep. Endbringers." Taylor answered in a far more flippant manner than she actually felt. "Well, I know what I need to do. Is there anything I can help you with quickly first?"
"Time frame?" The lead officer demanded.
"Five minutes, if we're lucky." Taylor answered.
He grimly nodded. "Much better warning than we ever thought we'd get. You can go now." He dismissed, only to pause. "Sorry about the attitude but-"
Taylor waved him off. "Don't worry, I get it. Well, bye." She quickly pulled out her cellphone, and dialed Alexandria. A few moments of ringing, and the phone was picked up.
"Buster?" Alexandria's voice sounded over the phone.
"Here in five minutes." Taylor quickly explained. "I don't know where they'll pop up, but they're almost certainly coming."
Alexandria didn't even question it. "I'll be there, keep on the phone and tell me where they're going to appear when you can." Taylor vaguely heard a 'boom' in the background, as Alexandria went supersonic. Taylor was moderately impressed by the fact that Alexandria's phone was apparently unfazed by the speed it was now traveling at.
A minute passed. The Endbringers continued to show no indicator of their precise means of entry.
Another minute passed, and Alexandria shot down from the sky. A sonic boom trailing in her wake, she smacked the ground hard enough to leave a rather wide crater. The part of the PRT team that had remained to secure the Merchants pulled themselves off the ground, Alexandria's earth shaking landing having knocked them off their feet. The team took a moment to reorient themselves, before managing to make it off with the Merchants.
Alexandria gracefully stood up from her kneeling position in the crater. "Buster, do you know where they're coming from yet?"
"No, they refuse to settle on a direction." Taylor replied with annoyance in her voice.
Alexandria nodded and began dialing someone on her phone, having hung up on Taylor shortly before her impact. "Tell me the instant you know where they're going, we have something prepared."
"Armsmaster's thing?" Taylor questioned.
"Not entirely Armsmaster's work, but yes." Alexandria confirmed. She put the phone to the side of her head. "Get it ready." She spoke into it. Taylor heard an affirmative of some kind come in response, and they settled to wait.
They didn't have to wait long. "Uh, they appear to have stopped. And... The Simurgh is doing something with its tech cloud." Taylor told Alexandria.
"Hmm. Prepare for worst case scenario." Alexandria spoke into the phone.
The tech cloud spiralled together into some sort of glowing sphere. Several panels of unknown purpose hovered around a solid orb of green light. The light slowly began to increase in size and intensity. "That... could be a problem." Taylor said as her scan took a deeper reading of it. "A Big problem. Uh, I don't think Brockton can survive that much energy."
Alexandria nodded. "Tell me when it fires."
The sphere pulsed. "It's going!" Taylor shouted.
"Move, now!" Alexandria barked into the phone. She grabbed Taylor, and lifted slightly into the air.
Taylor, dangling in the air by Alexandria's hold on her shoulder, was rather confused. "What-"
Brockton Bay vanished beneath her. A divot in the earth, and the abandoned docks area, the only sign of its previous existence. An existence which was now half a mile further south of where it used to be. "What-"
Alexandria shot off to the side, crossing the entirety of what used to be Brockton Bay in a second and a half, Taylor being dragged along with her.
The Simurgh's device, five seconds after the first pulse, did so once more.
The divot were Brockton Bay used to be, vanished. A brief flicker of green light and hundreds of thousands of tons of earth were vaporized.
Taylor frowned. "I think the Simurgh was fairly rushed as well. That thing looks incomplete, like it should be self-sustaining after the first shot."
"You can tell?" Alexandria questioned.
Taylor nodded. "That thing directly converts matter into energy over a huge area. The energy was then directed back towards the device. But, rather than do anything with it, Behemoth shunted it into an alternate dimension."
"Behemoth can manage that much energy?" That was the first thing about today to give Alexandria even the slightest pause.
Taylor shook her head. "No, the device was aiding Behemoth, keeping the energy inert."
Alexandria visibly relaxed. "It's good to know Behemoth hasn't been holding back that much."
"Still, if he can banish it, he can probably pull it back somehow." Taylor noted. "On another note, what happened on your end there?"
"Strider's power, on a huge scale. That was the Tinkers' project; replicating powerful Parahuman powers on a massive scale. They only have Strider's, Clockblocker's, and a few other powers though, we didn't have enough time." Alexandria answered. "And all the big Tinkers who's specialty had anything to do with energy production were among the first hit by the Endbringers after the Toybox, so how long we can do this is heavily limited. However, it does give us something resembling a fighting chance."
"A fighting chance..." Taylor trailed off.
"Perhaps a bit optimistic." Alexandria admitted. "But we aren't going to give up and die."
"Right." Taylor agreed, only to take note of the Endbringers activities. "They're moving again." Taylor spoke. "Tunneling back towards Brockton's new location, somewhere near west of where the docks used to be. I don't think we'll have to worry about the Simurgh's weapon for a while, though; the glow has faded quite a bit, although it's still drawing more energy from somewhere."
"That's good. Are you sure on that location?" Alexandria questioned.
"As certain as I can be. They, assuming they continue to head towards Brockton, don't really have much room for variance left." Taylor answered.
Alexandria nodded, and spoke Taylor's information into the phone. "We're going to try and use Clockblocker's power to direct the Endbringers to a more suitable location. It's even more power intensive than Strider's though, so any information which limits the amount of area we have to freeze is helpful." She explained to Taylor. "Now, we have to get you there." She took hold of Taylor's shoulder once more and-
Critical Threshold passed, all excess mass consumed.
Primary Singularity: 52% Output
Physical Canceler: Maximum
Rewriting Surrounding Space: Repairs Complete.
"Buster? What's happening? Now is not the time to go all immovable."
Primary Singularity: 100% Output
Secondary Singularity One: 100% Output
Secondary Singularity Two: 100% Output
Algorithmic Image Drive: Online
All Systems Fully Functional
And Taylor remembered.
Three months and a week earlier.
It was big, Taylor noted.
Massive, in fact. A huge creature, spinning and spiraling across countless mirrors of reality. Bigger than the earth, bigger than any conceivable living being.
It was breaking, shattering. A thousand, thousand pieces of its own existence broke apart and scattered, landing upon the countless mirrors like a heavy snowfall.
A piece grew. A single fragment of this gargantuan assistance entered her direct vision, and grew larger, closer. Grew until it seemed as if the earth itself was falling on her.
Then, it shattered. A flash of red broke the shard into ten thousand pieces.
"Oops, was that important?" A female voice spoke.
Taylor's mind began breaking. Connections struggled to form were there was no place for them to form. The piece's half formed connections dragged at her mind, broke and tore it apart as the piece itself was.
"...As it turns out, that was really important and I think I just almost killed someone." The voice spoke with worry. "Uh, how to fix, how to fix..."
Light and power suffused the shattered remnants.
"Sliiiiight panic here. I just broke a girls mind and the Excelion is still mid explosion. Time limits: Not Fun." An edge of panic entered the girl's voice. "Right, right. Calm down, Nono. Let's see... Some sort of symbiotic being? What if I just repaired the thing...?"
The red light pulled the broken fragment back together, instantly reassuming its previous form. The connections were repaired, and Taylor's mind broke just a bit further, as a fathomless emptiness forced its way in.
"What! I-Oh. Can't actually restore the data. Um, new data... Uh, a Buster Corps drone?" The voice mumbled. "Nope, bad idea. Let's see, what other data do I have... Space Monster, bad idea. I have some data on my technology... not enough room? Well, just try and constrain it... And done." The voice spoke as if incredibly please with itself.
Taylor's body began to burn, as a great force twisted at her, trying to imprint something it was never capable of imprinting.
"Waitwaitwait what is it doing?" Panic found its way in once more. "Ergh, didn't see that." The voice spoke with a wince to it. "Kay' so it's now doing... Hrm. Well, it will probably be okay. Probably. In time."
An image of a girl, clothed in an odd white bodysuit and with glowing red hair, came into Taylor's view. "Uh, hi." She waved. "So, in the process of taking this." She pointed towards a massive, splitting and shattering, black object. "Away from anywhere it might do damage... Which is almost everywhere, I accidentally bumped that symbiotic thingy. And it, well, exploded." The girl said with embarrassment. "I repaired it best I could, but it works sliiiightly differently from how I thought it worked. And so now your body may begin to experience... changes."
Was this the Talk? Taylor had already had the Talk. It was very awkward.
"So, I have to go soon. You... feeling alright before I go?" The girl questioned.
Taylor attempted to answer.
"...Can't talk." She rubbed the back of her head. "Uh, that should go away fairly soon. Hopefully." She muttered that last bit. "This isn't exactly my area of expertise, and while I'd stay around longer to make sure there's-"
A crack echoed, and the dark object split further.
"...That." The girl concluded. "And if that goes off here... there won't really be a question of whether or not you survive this." She sighed. "So, I have to go now. I won't ever learn your name, but mine's Nono. And..." She smiled slightly. "I suppose, welcome to the Buster Corps."
She vanished, and Taylor remembered forgetting.
"...or, Taylor!" Alexandria shouted. "The fuck are you doing?"
Taylor blinked.
"Finally responding? The hell happened? We barely managed to get the Endbringers to the correct location, at huge energy loss and-"
Taylor shook her head. "Doesn't matter anymore."
Alexandria frowned. "What? Well, whatever. Let your anti-movement thing go and I'll take you to the fight."
"No need, I'll get there myself." Taylor cut her off.
Rewriting Surrounding Space
Taylor held up a hand.
"How?" Alexandria questioned.
A dark point of non-light formed in Taylor's hand. She smiled slightly. "By Warp." Her hand closed.
"War-"
And Taylor vanished, in a flash of white light.