1.2
"So, you basically sell junk?"
Hogarth stared down at the pimpled teenager, combing his brain for any previous occasion he'd seen the boy. Coming up blank, he sighed.
"I thought all this stuff looked like tinkertech. Like that thing on your arm?"
"I told you, I'm an artist, kid. That's just a prosthetic."
The boy shrugged. "Cool arm." With that, he turned to inspect the shelves filled with metal sculptures.
"What's that?" He asked, pointing to a spherical device.
"Kinetic sculpture," Hogarth intoned. He spun a crankshaft at one end, the entire contraption criss-crossing in an optical illusion. The boy stared for a good moment, but turned his attention to the opposite shelf, running across hardwood to the parahuman action figures.
The shop was cramped, having only two rooms. A glass storefront cheerfully displayed the words 'Dean's Creations!' in mismatched pieces of metal. Five rows of short shelves were arrayed from left to right, crammed with metal and wood art pieces. The air smelled of machine oil, bolts, and wood. A simple counter lay in front of a door, currently shut. Hogarth leaned, his back to the counter's front.
"No way those are real Triumvirate action figures!" The boy said, holding a metal replica of Legend. His wide eyes roved over the thing, smiling despite himself. He tweaked the limbs as he sent Legend crashing to the shelf. Hogarth knew what the boy meant. The Triumvirate remained exclusive in their licensing.
Hogarth had forged that particular figure when he'd began working with Dean, twenty years ago. Now, he'd taken over completely. He watched as the kid guided Legend into another three-point landing before he flicked a switch behind his counter.
Legend came to life. Startled, the boy let go and Legend flared his thrusters at the last moment, returning to his place on the shelf.
"Whoa!" The boy regained his composure. "Well, I've seen better and flashier than that."
Legend blinked, disappearing — and appearing an instant later in Hogarth's hand.
"Okay, maybe a little Tinkertech," he said.
The boy stood slack jawed, but soon began digging in his pockets. "Take my money. Just take it."
A minute later, he strolled from the counter. "Well worth the eighty bucks." On the way out, he paused.
"What's that one, anyway?" he asked, pointing to a larger metal sculpture. "I think I saw something like it in the town square. It doesn't look like any cape I know."
Hogarth spun, amused. "Ah. I take it you're not from around here?"
"Visiting, actually. I live in Brockton Bay." The boy turned to study it. "Iron Giant.." he murmured, reading the label.
Brockton Bay… Hogarth's mind wandered, thinking of his days as a naive young man, rising to the top, and losing it all in the end. He thought of all that he'd left behind coming back to Rockwell, inheriting Dean's — his father's shop. He glanced at his watch: nearly time to pack up.
The boy's eyes continued to rove over the familiar domed head, the two warm, radiant eyes. The clunky but perfect construction.
"Some sort of tinker, imitating Superman from the old DC comics? Well that's a lot of firepower for one small town. You know, Alexandria was pretty much Superman. Scary how accurate it was. I guess it's a good thing, most small towns have a detachment of PRT troopers and that's—
"Alright, Mister—"
"Greg, Veder."
"I'm locking up right about now.
Hogarth sent the boy — Greg— off and locked his store for the day. Five minutes later, he walked past the town square — and Dean's masterpiece. The Iron Giant— to a valiant defender and loyal friend, the plaque read. Of course, visitors to the town would always ask about this, assume that a tinker had defended Rockwell. Only those who'd lived in the town their entire lives really believed the story.
Fifty-seven years ago, Hogarth had discovered the Giant, alone in a field, feasting on the town's power plant. He'd befriended him, taught him his friendly nature — only for a government agent named Mansley to order the Giant's destruction. Eventually, the Giant struck down a nuclear missile above Rockwell, sacrificing his life and saving the town. Hogarth had always had faith in his return, even before the General's recovered bolt had begun rolling out the window.
Though fifty-seven years had passed, Hogarth still held hope. The Giant hadn't appeared for further heroism. Not even to join the first "superheroes" in the eighties, or to pacify supervillains. He hadn't returned to help Humanity against the Endbringers — and against itself. Hogarth wasn't sure they deserved it at this point, but he smothered such treacherous thoughts.
Near the centre of the town, a PRT station stood beside the police station. As Hogarth went by, he peered into the caged windows. One trooper was on duty but lounging, his jacket unbuttoned and weapon ajar; only five troopers were ever active at a time and they didn't carry any containment foam. It'd been this way since _, Rockwell's independent hero had died fighting Behemoth.
The blazing sun still sat straight overhead as Hogarth made his way through the northern outskirts of Rockwell proper. A small town in coastal Maine, it mostly dealt with trade and fish. Dockworkers used to bustle along aged gangplanks, trawlers coasting in the bay—where battleships had sailed that fateful day—containers had flowed from the Atlantic into the shipyards.
Now, Hogarth passed another destitute building left for squatters and rats, windows boarded up and graffiti littered the ground level of its brick walls. The bay, as usual, was utterly empty, only one dock operational at all. Fishermen, though, were a stubborn lot. They wouldn't desert their hometown no matter what a heap of dung it had become and the salmon were as plentiful as before. Scion hadn't changed that.
Hogarth kept walking, heading west. What a heap of dung indeed. He turned to face an empty lot opposite of a gambling den. The building looked the part of a 50s diner, but derelict. It had once been the Chat'n'Chew, his mother's diner. The den was crowded with men, dirt stained windows making it hard to see inside. Technically it was a casino, but how it was ever approved Hogarth didn't know.
A few blocks later, Hogarth arrived home. Dean's old car was long gone, replaced by a chrome minivan. He threw the door open and tossed the keys onto a counter. Finally. After a long day with few customers, he could finally relax, tinker with a few programs, maybe browse PHO too.
Lately he'd only wanted to distance himself from the world of parahumans. Since he moved back to Rockwell, in fact, but he'd found it… difficult. After all, he relied on a few Toybox contractors for tinkertech gadgets.
The kitchen lay to his right, a grandfather block hanging from the far wall. the living room was just ahead. He strolled over to the couch and plopped down. The floorboards, painted blue, were worn and the wallpaper faded. As he came into the living room, Hogarth glanced at the picture- himself, his mother and father together- which hung above a small television. Not an old analog, but one he'd bought just a few short years ago upon his return.
He plopped down on the sofa, yawned, and grabbed the remote with his prosthetic. He switched the TV on, entering a channel number. News.
"-right back to you. Our reporters on site have interviewed multiple bystanders. None of the shelters have apparently been breached and the PRT has yet to give an official statement. All personnel, heroes included, currently remain silent."
What now? The screen displayed a drowned city, as if a tsunami had struck just this morning. Then Hogarth read the caption. "Leviathan attacks Brockton Bay".
No. What of his friends, family that he still had left? Would the world take them too? Surely, oh so surely, there would be thousands unaccounted for. Dozens of parahumans just as well, fallen in defense.
Hogarth shook his head in shock. My Grandchildren… He steeled his resolve and reached for the phone, switching off the TV. He'd seen enough.
He dialed, running his fingers through still-auburn hair. Why had nobody already called him?
Hogarth called his son first. "Dammit, Gerry, pick up. I know you're with those incompetents!" Nobody picked up.
He took a deep breath and dialed again. A woman responded. His daughter. "Oh God. You're okay? Okay. And Dennis?" Hogarth sighed in relief. "Okay."
It seemed his grandson had been wounded, but it wasn't anything serious. He hoped that was the truth.
Someone called him.
"Hold on, I'll have to call you back. There's someone else on the line." Hanging up with his daughter, he answered the new call.
"Hello?"
A calm, smooth voice. "Hello, sir. This is Director Piggot of the Protectorate ENE."
What now? Hogarth blanched.
"Y-yes?" he realized he was being silly. The Director wouldn't call him personally to announce… if anything had happened. Would she?
"We need to ask you a few questions, Mister Hughes. Through.. Through conventional means now, but this is a crucial matter. We need your full cooperation."
Some thinly veiled panic leaked through, Hogarth could tell. He wasn't feeling so well himself. "All right. Ask away?"
"As you probably know, Leviathan attacked Brockton Bay this morning. The good news is, your grandson is alive. Wounded, but not seriously or permanently."
"Thank you, Director," Hogarth managed.
"Furthermore we have determined that an independent known as Tortoise with whom you've affiliated with.. Died in the battle. A number of your former Dockworkers have also passed away."
"But- the shelters-"
"Are not indestructible. A section of aquiferous rock did give away, this resulted in a section of Shelter CH-6 collapsing. All of the other shelters, though, were fine."
"All right, but why contact me so abruptly and directly?"
"And I'm sorry to. For all your contribution in the past, I felt you deserved this sort of briefing. There's another reason too."
"Out with it!" Hogarth near-shouted.
"You saved thousands, tens of thousands today." Piggot's voice broke slightly.
"I…"
Piggot sighed. "Are you in any way affiliated with the cape, machine, vehicle, or device calling itself "Superman"?
Hogarth wasn't on his sofa. He was in the clutches of a Giant, fleeing fighter jets, high above the clouds. He was watching a friend eradicate a military detachment. He was standing, the sun an ominous, bloody sunset red afore him, the barrel above him a mouth of destruction. He was screaming, "You don't have to be a gun! You choose! Choose!"
He was watching a nuclear blossom.
Hogarth blinked. He was still there in his old house, sitting on the sofa, an urgent Director to his ear.
"I…"
A crash.
A sound all too near, that shook Hogarth to the very core, yet a sound all too far in time.
He hung up.