Chapter 5-6

The woman didn't make a sound as we took her to the rig. None of us did. Then again, I don't think any of us felt like talking. Not after what happened tonight. It was just supposed to be a stake-out, but devolved into a firefight almost without warning. People died on both sides, I was sure of it. What went wrong? I didn't think it was my fault: the snipers clearly didn't know I was on the roof, or I wouldn't have been able to get behind them as easily as I did. What else? Was it Kid Win's hacking that set them off? Did the Boxheads just happen to look out of the right window at the wrong time? What if Miss Militia hadn't ordered the troopers to move out? I suppose all of these things contributed one way or another. The Boxheads shot first, though. I shouldn't forget that.

That little fact alone had a whole slew of implications. There were supposed to be rules among the cape community, rules that even villains didn't break. Wishful thinking, I suppose. That said, a preemptive strike on the PRT, while tactically sound, isn't a very good idea in the long run because it always brought more attention on your head than you needed. Besides, what's the point? What did the Boxheads have to gain from fighting us?

The question of 'why' kept buzzing in my head as the captive was carted into the hospital. Eventually, I gave up, had a shower, and lied down in a bed on the other side of the room. Hopefully, she'd wake up, see me, and remember that she's safe. Hopefully. She could also go on a rampage and kill everyone. Beat someone enough and they become completely unpredictable, I guess. At least the hospital had containment foam sprayers built into the ceiling, just for this kind of scenario. Not that they'd slow her down much, but it was the best option we had. Tying her to the bed was just asking for trouble, after all.

"Armsmaster, this is not acceptable. A high-rated Tinker of this caliber appearing out of thin air…" I heard Piggot yell, somewhere in the building. She had a very distinct voice and was hard to miss. "We can't appear weak at a time like this."

"It was the middle of the night. Have PR spin it as just another cape battle. Yes, the Boxheads deserve to hang for this mess, but you know as well as I that we don't have the resources to hunt them down right now. Not with Empire 88 ready to strike. Unless you can convince Legend to get me more capes, I'm not changing my timetables."

I could all but feel Piggot's anger boil to the surface. Well-deserved anger, if you ask me. "People died. If we let those bastards get away with this…"

"If I divert resources to hunting them down, Kaiser will use the opportunity to take over the Docks. Without Lung to hold him in check, we might wake up and find out that he's running the city in all but name. I won't let Brockton Bay be the first major city to fall under supervillain control." Armsmaster sighed. I guess he was getting tired too. "What the Boxheads did was terrible. Unforgivable, even, but we have larger and more immediate concerns. As far as we know, the only reason they attacked was because they felt threatened. We have no reason to believe that they're actively and publically trying to take over the city. Until they do or if Dragon's report shows that they're much more dangerous than we suspect, I have little choice but to focus my resources on Empire 88. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have work to do."

Right, and I should get to sleep. Eavesdropping on my superiors might actually get me in trouble one day.

I woke up a few hours later, alive and unmauled. The woman was still asleep in her bed while Doctor Jackson was looking her over. Not that he could do all that much for her. By his own admission, her biology was so far removed from the human norm that he couldn't tell what shape she was in and Panacea was too busy helping the PRT, assuming that her power would even work. Ironically, our best bet for figuring out what's wrong with her would be to look at the Boxhead's research once Dragon had decrypted it.

The doctor took a few samples ( 'Better do it now, before she wakes up. Don't think she'll be a fan of needles, after what she's been through…') and left, holding the door open for Kid Win.

"Hey." He sounded tired. On reflection, he looked tired too.

I moved a little, offering him a seat next to me. "Hey. You look like shit."

He chuckled in response and crashed on the bed. "Yeah. Up all night with Armsmaster analyzing the stuff you brought back. That, and dodging Piggot."

Understandable, I suppose. Given what I'd overheard, I wouldn't want to deal with Piggot right now either. "Guess she must be really mad."

"You have no idea. They tell you the butcher's bill yet?" I shook my head. "Seven dead, twelve wounded, and two of them have head wounds so Panacea can't fix them."

I was quiet for a while. Seven dead. That was…I didn't know what to feel. "Is that a lot? For a PRT operation, I mean."

"In Brockton Bay? Last time we lost people was…first fight against Lung, I think." He rubbed the bridge of his nose. That couldn't have been a pleasant memory. "So yeah, this is bad. Oh, and here's the best part: Dragon whipped up some sort of decryption program and she's sure that the base we raided was just a small one. A side-project that didn't fit in the main laboratory, or something. The Boxhead's main base is still out there, somewhere, along with god knows what kind of stuff they have defending that."

I guess it was a lot after all. "Fuck."

"Fuck." He replied. "They're rating him a tentative Tinker 8, you know. The Tinker working for the Boxheads. At least, assuming it's all from one guy. Nobody knows for sure, so the PRT's playing it safe. Lost too many guys not to, I guess."

Tinker 8 on a scale that goes to ten sounded bad. "What exactly does that mean, 'Tinker 8'?"

He snorted. "It means that we're fucked. Dragon's shitting bricks, Armsmaster probably isn't getting out of his workshop until he's cooked up a countermeasure for everything, and the PRT's pretty much going nuts over this. Half of them want the Boxheads shipped off to the Birdcage and the other half wants them recruited at gunpoint. Considering that we're probably going to do the legwork…yeah, we're fucked."

"That…sounds a little extreme. I mean, sure, their guns hurt like a bitch, but I'm sure you could piece together something better."

Kid Win smiled. It looked like he really needed to hear that every once in a while. "Thanks, but that's not the point. Yeah, I can build one laser rifle, but that lunatic somehow managed to get a dozen of them. It's that…" He sighed, visibly struggling to find the right words. "Look at it this way: Imagine you're living in the nineteenth century and you've got a blueprint of a Ferrari stuck in your head. Can you build one?"

"I'm tempted to say 'yes', but I guess you wouldn't be asking if you could."

"Pretty much. Basically, you can't because you need twenty-first century tools before you can make a proper twenty-first century car. So what do Tinkers do? Well, they get creative. They use the tools they have to build slightly better tools, then use those to build even better tools, etcetera, etcetera, until you get to the tools you need to build your Ferrari. The Tinker cycle, as the lab-coats like to call it."

I nodded. I suppose it made sense, looking at it that way. "So what does that have to do with Alad and the Boxheads?"

"Alad?"

Right, the name wasn't common knowledge yet. "The Boxhead's boss, I think. Probably the top Tinker. Check with Armsmaster, I gave him my notes."

"Right. Now, the thing about Tinkertech is that most Tinkers don't have twenty-first century tools to build their Ferraris, so they'll have to make do. Theoretically, you can still build a perfectly fine Ferrari with crappy tools, but it's always going to be inefficient mess under the hood and only the Tinker knows how everything works. Back to the Boxheads. Well, so I spent all night pulling apart that gun you were swinging around, and I have to say: it's one of the most beautiful things I've even seen."

I snorted. Part of me seemed to agree with him, though for completely different reasons. "Well, it does have great stopping power and those robots couldn't take more than one bullet, so…"

Kid Win groaned. "Not what I meant. I was talking about the insides: perfectly streamlined, perfectly put together…"

"A Ferrari built with twenty-first century tools."

"Exactly. If a Tinker gets to that point, they can build almost anything they can think off. It's where people like Armsmaster and Dragon are. That kind of power in the hands of a bunch of trigger-happy loons like the Boxheads…"

The implications of that thought began to sink in. It was not a comforting one. "Fuck."

"Fuck." He replied.

"Still, Tinker 8… Isn't that one step below 'Run and call the Triumvirate'?"

"Yes it is, and trust me, it's not that much of an exaggeration. Let's review: energy rifles that can hurt someone who can headbutt Lung's fireballs and laugh," Okay, that one made me smile "bullet-proof combat suits with built-in personal shielding, fully autonomous killer robots…" As Kid Win was rattling off the pieces of tech Alad had put together, I saw him get increasingly agitated. "Fuck, they implanted their guys with stuff that made their bodies disintegrate when they die. I mean, seriously, what the actual fuck?! Who does that to their own people?"

I could see the logic in it. No one wants their technology to fall into the wrong hands, after all. Kid Win, though, probably didn't. "This bothers you, doesn't it?"

"Doesn't it bother you?" He snapped back, defensively. I had to remind myself that he was just very tired and would probably say a lot of things he didn't mean. "I mean, that's just from what we've seen already. We're still sifting through the data and I don't even want to know what happened to Red."

"Red?"

"Our damsel in distress, of course. Guys downstairs came up with it because she's, well, red."

Right, the woman who nearly beat Armsmaster to a pulp. I wouldn't have called her a damsel in distress myself, but then again, what do I know?

"So, any plans for the weekend?" Kid Win asked, probably trying to lighten the mood.

Plans? Sadly enough, not really. "Depends on her, I think. I want to wait until she wakes up before making any. Now that you mention it, I should probably start working on the paperwork too."

"Fun times." The boy added bleakly. I felt like he wanted to say something else, but held back, for some reason.

"Yeah, fun times."

The woman, Red, slept on.