Base Status
The Heap - Current Upgrades:
Tinkertech Walls
Single Layer Magical Barrier
(Friend or Foe Detection)
Current Energy: 2
Current Training: Mastermind (5/10) everyone can thank Narasan for this Omake Bonus
Thursday, January 27th, 2011
The Heap, Brockton Bay
As is typical for any day ending in 'Y', you find yourself shaken awake by your Master's attempts to wiggle out of her sleeping bag at six am in the morning.
You make a mental note to secure an Emulation that finds such behaviour tolerable but are otherwise resigned to the behaviour.
The first thirty minutes of the morning are largely standard for your Master. She swings her sword. She unseals it. She swings it some more. It's when these thirty minutes are done that things start to get interesting. For one thing, she spends a sizeable portion of time scribbling on and discarding various pieces of cardstock. It's the first time your Master has really dedicated any of her own time to the creation of Spellcards, and you are proud of her for it.
Naturally, the art and skill required mean that she ends up discarding a majority of what she creates as inferior, leaving a small pile of half-torn or smudged playing cards next to her, and coming out the other end of the experience with only three true successes. You suspect many of your Master's 'failures' were passable enough to work just fine, but you suppose that holding herself to your personal standards might somewhat warp her view of what is good enough and what is not. You are emulating an ancient being that has functionally perfected the art after all. It is a given that your Master would absorb a few of your foibles, even if only because she has misunderstood and interprets the quality of your work as merely 'the norm' instead of 'the pinnacle'.
Ultimately, she ends up with a single contract card and two cards with instances of her healing power trapped within them.
By the time, she has finished, the morning has largely come and gone, and Trainwreck has awoken to continue working on the iron monstrosity in the center of his half of the garage that he intends to replace his current suit of armour with. Work that - at some point - he pauses in long enough to look over at your Master with a thoughtful expression on what's visible of his face before calling out to her.
"Hey, Boss!" He calls across the room to her, causing her to look up from her meagre results with a questioning look on her face.
"You can make those fuck scary portals right? How long do they last?" He asks curiously. Taylor opens her mouth to answer, and then closes it, looking to you curiously.
"Until she closes them." You answer easily. Is leaving an open hole into infinity a terrible idea? Probably. But you want to see where this is going.
"Uh, that, I guess." Taylor answers with a shrug as she starts picking up her discarded trash. Trainwreck takes that information in with a pensive look on his face that quickly turns into a devilish grin that has no place on as grimy a face as his.
"Can you make a bunch of em in some of these materials for me?" The Tinker asks with a glint in his eyes.
"...Why?" Taylor asks suspiciously, to which Trainwreck merely gestures over his shoulder with a thumb at his current project.
"That thing weighs like two tons, and is the best I can do without access to a bunch of military surplus shit I'm sure is illegal. But if I can keep ninety percent of the suits systems here in the heap-" He explains, and your Master jumps in to complete his thoughts.
"Then you could walk around in a forty ton suit like a living fortress!" She says, her eyes agleam. You blink once at this. Naturally, your kind understand the concept of using portals to reduce the outward size and weight of an object. Most Tinkertech works on such principles, with much of the underlying physics being manipulated by a shard on the other end of any given piece of technology. It's the only way to make Tinkering a viable addition to most cycles - most societies just don't have the technological understanding required to achieve anything in any viable period of time.
And yet, you aren't sure any of you have ever considered expanding that concept in the way Trainwreck and your Master have. It's such a staggeringly obvious answer that it boggles your mind. You don't need to carry around a planet's worth of equipment to power a large device if you just connect the output of the device to something handheld via portals.
You watch on in muted awe as one of the worst Tinkers you are likely to encounter inadvertently stumbles upon a workaround for his shoddy work that is likely to immediately propel his current Tinker rating into the stratosphere.
You can't decide if directly informing the PRT of this or letting them find out on their own would be more amusing to watch play out.
It is only slightly later in the day when your Master decides to check in on Aspirant, apparently having realized that she barely sees him when not torturing the boy with training - not that he ever seems to mind.
"Jamie? You up here?" She asks hesitantly as she climbs onto the roof of the Heap. It's not very far up. The building is more wide than it is tall, bearing only a single story - although the Garage portion has very high ceilings and therefore, a roof that is more commiserate with a two-story building than anything else.
"Yes." Comes the boy's simple answer from where he is sitting cross-legged at the edge of the rooftop in his lankier combat form, gazing out over the neighbourhood.
"Has everything been okay? I don't really see you much. I tried asking Dad and Wreck and they say you just spend all your time up here doing... this." Taylor says as she walks over to sit next to him.
"Not everyone has a power that grants them immediate mastery of themself," Jamie says dryly, though you can detect a subtle hint of annoyance in his tone directed towards your Master. Which is fair. Your Master can do things effortlessly that other people spend their entire lives perfecting.
Mostly because she gets her skills from those people, but still.
Trying to keep up with her in any reasonable capacity is like trying to outpace a racecar on foot - without powers. It's simply impossible from the start, no matter how good at it you happen to be.
Your Master laughs lightly at the jab, either not noticing or not minding the annoyance present in it.
"Yeah I guess I did sort of win the lottery with my powers." She muses aloud, then narrows her eyes and cocks her head towards Jamie.
"Also, you didn't answer my question. Is everything okay?" She asks as she examines the goings-on below you in the street. A man in a suit appears to be walking back and forth in front of the building, just at the edge of the Wards your Master put up the previous day. Despite the extra minute it takes to walk across the section of the sidewalk in front of the Heap, he pauses in confusion when he fully passes it, then turns and walks back the other way, finding himself staring blankly at the building Rey purchased next to your base. The man checks the number on the building, gets a frustrated look on his face, and turns around to repeat the process.
"I'm fine." The boy says quickly, almost snappishly, without bothering to uncross his legs or open his eyes.
"You're sure?" Taylor asks pointedly. "I mean, school starts again soon so-" she hints broadly.
Since realizing that Jamie was roughly the same age as her, your Master has been considering Aspirants truancy for some time. It just wasn't as immediately important as well... not dying. Now that most of the immediate threats in the area are gone however...
"I don't need to go to school. I can study for my GED. It's better that I stay here." Aspirant says flatly, hiding his facial expression by encasing his head in his helmet.
"That's... kind of illegal." Your Master points out.
"The state only requires your parents submit a lesson plan in order to qualify for homeschooling. I can-" Aspirant begins, his tone carefully lacking in emotion.
"Do your parents even know you're here?" Your Master cuts in, silencing him.
"...No." He says irately.
"...Shouldn't they?" Your Master asks again.
"I would prefer not to talk about it," Aspirant says bluntly, sliding off the edge of the building to land in a crouch before your Master can comment.
'He totally ran away from home to join the circus didn't he?' Your Master groans at you.
'Are we a circus now? I had thought that Trainwreck was something of a clown.' You answer with a chuckle.
'You know what I mean. Should I report this to the PRT? I don't want them to think I kidnapped him or something.' Your Master says worriedly.
'I recommend against it, dear. He'll talk to you about it when he's ready. He's not an idiot like Trainwreck, once his mind clears he'll realize the implications himself.' You counsel, still watching the confused businessman stumbling about the sidewalk and stifling a giggle when he startles at Aspirant's sudden appearance.
'Fine. Hey, do the women moving into the building across the street seem familiar to you?' Your Master asks you, changing topics as she waves to the small group of Asian women carefully lifting a couch out of the back of a moving van.
You peer at them curiously for a second, pawing through your memories for any hints as to their identities, before hitting upon one in particular.
'Ah. You recall the night we fought Lung and his lackwit companion? I believe you rescued a number of women from the building.' You note, scrutinizing the group of roughly seven women of varying Asian descents as they struggle with the heavy piece of furniture.
'Wow, I actually kind of forgot about that. So much else happened that night.' Your Master considers, concentrating for a second and then waving her hand towards the women, who immediately find themselves having an easier time moving the couch they are lifting - mostly because it has begun to float slightly off the ground. The women startle slightly, looking about until one of them see's your Master sitting on the roof of the Heap, then waves hesitantly at her. She waves back with an impish grin on her face.
'Yes well. I doubt they've made a return to their old line of work.' You muse. You've seen a few groups like that moving into the area immediately surrounding your Master's base. People who were previously abused or used by the gangs that have taken advantage of the mostly abandoned nature of the surroundings to take up residence in a place of perceived safety. The number of former prostitutes that have moved into the area under your Master's nose has been honestly staggering. Your Master has noticed them arriving obviously, but you doubt she has made a connection to the sudden arrival of a plethora of women and the current lack of any strong gangs in town. They aren't the only people that have moved in nearby, but they do make up the majority. You've noticed a number of other people purchase homes nearby that you suspect might be Parahumans - but without permission to spy on them within their homes, you doubt you'll be able to confirm your suspicious any time soon.
You giggle again as the businessman out in the street notices the women waving at your Master, and then turns back around to what - to him - must look like an empty lot. Or an alleyway. Or whatever else his mind could possibly supply to him in order to fill the blank that must exist in his thoughts whenever he attempts to consider the space the Heap currently exists in.
You idly wonder if he'll continue to search for the place or if he'll give up soon.
Thursday, January 27th, 2011
Hebert Household, Brockton Bay
Later that evening, you convince your Master that she needs a new set of clothes to wear - because constantly rewashing her sweats every day is somewhat foolish in the long term.
The fact that you conveniently have hidden most of her clothes in a Gap, leaving only the outfits Victoria recently foisted on her while shopping available goes unspoken, but is extremely obvious once your Master has finished digging through the dresser in her bedroom.
"I'm not wearing this." She says bluntly, pointing to the leggings, knee-length black skirt, and tasteful blue blouse that are arrayed on her bed.
"Taylor, I love you dearly - but you simply cannot exist entirely in workout clothing!" You chide.
"Dad should have some spare jeans he isn't using..." She muses aloud, ignoring you.
"Master!" You say scandalized. You don't understand why this is so difficult. Your Master is cute. You just want everyone else to acknowledge that your Master is cute. It's very simple.
"...If I cinch a belt tight enough..." She continues on, beginning to walk out of the room. In desperation, you snatch at her arm, pulling her backward.
"Chess!" You blurt out, catching a glimpse of an unused chess set in a corner of the closet. "Let's play chess. If you win, you can wear... whatever you want." You say in a pained tone just imagining your Master hiding her athletic body behind frumpy men's clothes that don't even fit her.
"I have literally no reason to accept that." Your Master points out grouchily.
"...The Chess game will double as training?" You offer hopefully. Your Master squints at you, her desire not to dress fashionably and her desire to do anything and everything that qualifies as 'training' warring within her, until one side wins out and she sighs at you.
"...Fine." She agrees eventually.
Fifteen minutes later, you are sitting across the kitchen table from your Master, with the chess set arrayed between you.
"Now then," You say with a glint in your eyes as you begin to explain the rules.
"You know how to play normal Chess I assume?" You prod your Master.
"Yes." She answers you cautiously, eyes going back and forth between the chess set and yourself suspiciously.
"Then you should understand that Chess is horrid as far as real life tactical acumen goes. It's too limited. When you know everything you need to about all the pieces, then yes, life can imitate chess to a degree - but very few people are capable of that degree of data processing. Take this Knight piece for instance," You say, flicking the black horse-shaped piece on the table in front of you.
"In normal Chess, this piece can move in the usual L pattern yes?" You say with a smirk.
"Right..." Your Master answers, obviously wondering how this is relevant.
"But people are much more complicated than that. They have different motivations, often at cross purpose with each other, and often times can't move to achieve any of them. And so this little Knight of mine, will only be able to move when his wife - this Bishop here I think - in his danger." You explain.
Your Master stares at you for a second, then begins to smile dumbly at you when she realizes that you are arbitrarily limiting yourself. She perks up more and more as you move on, listing off random contrived limitations for each of your pieces.
"Are you ready to begin?" You say once you are done, smiling slyly at your Master who is confidently smiling at the board.
"Yup!" She replies, moving a pawn forward.
You, of course, proceed to absolutely demolish her at the game, despite following all of your previously stipulated limitations. Your Master's expression strains and then begins to fall with every move you make, until she is scowling furiously at you by the end of the game, unable to come up with a reasonable criticism to make in the face of the massive handicap you provided her.
"Next time, you'll play with the same rules." You say pleasantly.
Then you put the neat little pile of clothes on the table between you with a smile.
Your Master is not best pleased.