Chapter 12 - Alice II
Alice happily hummed as she cut into the restrained remains of a Machine Army foot soldier, almost automatically disabling the trigger for their dimensional expansion, stopping the machine from trying to repair itself by pulling from the stored material.
Back when she had worked out of her dorm room, she had thought her Tinker speciality was bombs, which was fairly understandable, most of her ideas came in the form of massive and impressive explosions with esoteric consequences. After working with remnants of the Machine Army though, she had to revise that assumption.
Her speciality was One Time Use Devices and everything to facilitate them.
Which made her, in her own unbiased opinion, the most powerful Tinker on the planet. Move over Hero, your shitty armor and beams can suck it. If she had a couple hours she could build something that blew anything he had ever done out of the water, in his specialty even. She already had plans for a bomb that used wavelength manipulation to erase parts of a landscape.
Anyway, joining with Markus had worked out extremely well so far. Their debut went off without a hitch, her knockout grenades being instrumental in capturing the E88 capes and putting them on ice. Then getting rid of the parahumans of the last two real gangs in the Bay right afterwards by crashing their stupid meeting.
It hadn't taken three weeks and they were the undisputed top dog in the city, just like Markus had prophesied.
And once they got rid of the Protectorate, they would be the rulers of the Bay. Markus kept his plans close to his chest but she knew there was raw ambition behind that stoic facade. He wouldn't stop until the whole world acknowledged him as their god. And she would be right beside him, part of his Pantheon, worshiped as the ultimate Goddess of Destruction.
She had accomplished so much since then, her arsenal steadily growing. The endless supplies from the Machine Army made even the most resource intensive bombs possible. She even got to examine one of the mechanical seeds the artificial intelligence, though to use the word intelligence was extremely generous, used to propagate itself. They were creating a dimensional pocket into which they sucked surrounding material and an advanced printer churned out cell like structures which could be slotted into different configurations.
Pretty interesting but unfortunately her tinker speciality was almost the complete opposite of whoever had designed it. Her short-lived creations clashed with the almost impossible to remove infection of the Machine Army, not that she was interested in creating something like that in the first place. Alice wasn't an idiot and would never be caught dead dying to her own Tinkertech.
She didn't get much out of the seed beyond a couple ideas for bombs that could create temporary portals to random extradimensional spaces or change earth and sand into different metals.
Actually, that last one would have been useful if she didn't already have Markus to harvest the Machine Army for her from time to time.
In the end she quickly concluded that her tinker speciality was superior to whoever built the Machine Army, the sheer breadth of effects she could create with sufficient supplies was almost staggering. She almost couldn't decide which ones to take with her when they went out. Maybe she should figure out a way to carry more bombs, the harness and belt were pretty good but if she had a backpack then she could double her payload easily. Make that bitch Kayden wear one too…
As she thought about a new transport method, Markus walked into her lab extremely nonchalantly, like he wasn't currently surrounded by more explosives than some countries had in their whole stockpile. She was still playing around with some bombs to deal with him specifically, but at the moment she didn't have any good ideas. Destroying a moving black hole was very difficult, even for someone of her intelligence.
He was probably here because of last night. He had told them that Coil was going to be their next target but that they first needed to prepare a bit. Apparently he had his own supervillain base and everything. She didn't understand it, why would they have to prepare for a Thinker and some normies?
"Alice, I noticed the bomb you used at Somers Rock. My powers inspired you?" Markus asked her, forcing her to turn her attention away from her harvest. She set the blowtorch and modified screwdriver to the side of her workbench.
"Yes, and it wasn't easy making the effect so small. I could have made a dozen building destroying Black Hole bombs in the time it took to make one that only destroys a small area." She grumbled, jumping to sit on top of a table in the middle of the large guest house. Alice didn't know how Markus got the surely extremely expensive property but she guessed it involved violence or implied violence, like everything her Boss did. At least the converted barn had enough space and an almost obscenely comfortable loft bed to allow her full use of her powers.
"I thought so." Markus nodded, inspecting the internals of her heat bomb locked in a vice. When it was finished it would boil away anything organic in the blast radius. She was currently still tuning the range. "What would you need to see of a Master power to copy it?"
That question stopped her thoughts about her heat bomb in its tracks. A bomb to master people, something invisible that affected the human brains. Hormones or shuffling brain cells around. Something that would stick. No, she kind of felt annoyed at the idea. Not because of any moral issues of course but because her power hated effects that persisted in a changing environment. Explosive change was fine and came easy to her but, well, the degree to which she would be able to replicate it would depend on the Master power.
"...Maybe if I recorded the signals from the Corona Pollentia inside the brain of the user. Would have to crack them open like an egg though." She speculated, tapping her finger on the table rapidly as she thought about it. "The effect would definitely be more intense at the start but fade pretty quickly." Alice explained, ideas already coming to her for a rage bomb, making people kill their friends and family members in blind anger, and a grief bomb, people commiting suicide because of the overwhelming sadness.
Alice couldn't help but feel giddy. Here she thought she had found a limitation of her genius only to immediately prove herself wrong. An arrogant grin came to her face.
"Good to know, pack your things, we are going on a trip." Markus stabbed through her happy thoughts like a knife through butter. Her grin fell.
"Right now? I have shit to do." Alice answered, gesturing to the still only partially disassembled Machine Army part, her annoyance spiking at not being able to start working on her rage bomb as soon as possible. "Give me some heads up next time."
"I just did." Her leader answered, already on his way out. Alice grumbled and started gathering her tools and equipment. Only the thought that it could be another Machine Army situation stopped her from refusing to come entirely.
It took her about fifteen minutes to gather up everything she would need, Markus helping her move the three, now familiar, tool boxes outside. He himself had brought a metal briefcase and set it on top of her boxes.
"Where are we going anyway?" She finally asked as they softly lifted off.
"Canada." His answer was short but even then Alice could hear the dislike Markus had for the country. She was tempted to ask why he hated it but the way the air had suddenly gotten colder around him, she thought better of it.
Thankfully the awkward silence didn't last particularly long, Brockton Bay not too far from the Canadian border, at least at the speed Markus could travel at. Soon they touched down on a field and Alice was just able to make out a larger settlement a couple miles to their west and the massive body of water to their south.
Markus looked down at his phone, which Alice hadn't even seen until now, and sent off a message. Only about thirty seconds later, the Tinker could hear the sound of jet engines, the roar strangely dampened. Then three aircraft, which Alice could only describe as religiously inspired mechs, landed in front of them on the field. They all had wings, one of them having larger wings than the others and energy swords though once again one of them had a bigger one. They stood about 10 feet tall, towering over her and Markus as they stopped quite far away from them.
Alice felt her hands get damp under her gloves as she fingered her emp bomb, something she had created especially for Armsmaster. Strong enough to punch through any amount of shielding. She would have loved to see the hero caged in his unmoving armor, his own Tinkertech turned into a coffin, but she would like to remain free even more. And if this was Dragon, the currently most famous Tinker hero on the planet, then she had to pull out all the stops.
"Saint, do you have the information?" Markus finally broke the silence. This was someone named Saint? Why was he flying in something very similar to what Dragon was using?
The middle mech, the one with the largest wings, stepped forward and a compartment in one of its fat legs opened up. A brown envelope fell out onto the ground. A modulated voice spoke up. "The location of Heartbreaker's current location, as requested. I hope you know what you are doing, many people have tried taking him on and became just another slave."
"Thanks for the concern." Markus answered and took the metal briefcase in hand before floating forward, the mech backing up quickly, almost afraid of letting her boss get close to him. Probably a good idea. "But I'm immune to Master powers."
Alice's eyebrows raised, not resistant, outright immune? He really was a complete Black Hole Changer then. If he didn't have a human brain, human Masters probably couldn't affect him. If that was the case though, then he was holding himself back tremendously. No wonder he thought of himself as a God if even minimum effort could take him this far.
Alice shivered, it was lucky that he had recognised her genius early on and decided to recruit her into Pantheon. If they had met later in their careers she would have had an even tougher time dealing with him.
Markus put the briefcase next to the envelope before picking it up. He quickly unfurled the string holding it closed and pulled out a sheet of paper half way. The leader of Pantheon nodded once he saw the text and put it back away.
"Looks good. Just one more thing: Saint, I heard you are donating almost all the money you make to charity. Is that true?" Markus' question caused the three mechs to move slightly, like they were surprised at the question.
Alice wondered if they were linked by a brain machine interface to the pilot, the articulation too good for simple cockpit control. She would have to look into building something like that herself, it would allow her a lot more control over which of her creations to detonate. It would also open herself up to being hacked but she was sure she could find a way around that weakness. Maybe use it only for specific bombs…
"Where did you hear something like that?" Saint answered, the modulated voice sounding a little bit nervous.
Markus chuckled. "I just wanted to say that I respect a man of faith and conviction."
"Are you a man of God too?" Saint asked after a moment, clearly not having expected to be praised. To be honest she wasn't either but she could almost understand where Markus was coming from. If he wanted to be a god, he needed worshippers, their Pantheon needed worshippers. Worshippers that would give up anything for their gods. Like Saint apparently gave away his money.
"Oh, I definitely believe in the Devil." Markus' deep voice almost echoed across the empty field before he turned around and walked back to Alice. Once he was looking at the mechs again, Saint moved forward and picked up the metal briefcase and stowed it in the still open leg compartment.
Then Saint nodded, the visor of his mech locked onto Markus, before taking off, his two silent companions following him. Markus watched the Dragonslayer leave stoically.
After a moment Alice finally spoke up. "Most of the charities are probably scams, we should have just taken the information and left. Fucked them up too for good measure." Heartbreaker was bad enough, many in North America knew about his slave harem and captured capes, like Charles Manson he was kind of a cult figure in certain circles, but having the Guild or some other hero team after them at the same time would be annoying. "Who knows what those idiots will do now that they know we are here. What's stopping them from selling that information to the next guy?"
Markus didn't really react to her provocation beyond a snort of amusement. "Wait here, I have to get something."
Alice rolled her eyes as he took off. Did she have to do the thinking for both of them? Now he had to hunt them down and steal their money back from the infobroker. What a waste of time, if he had asked her in the first place she would have told him to just force the information out of them instead of acting in this farce.
The Tinker sighed and sat herself next onto one of her tool boxes, taking out one of her smaller grenades from her belt and opening it up. Yesterday she had an idea for increased yield of her cryo bomb and now was as good a time as any to work on it.
It took four hours for Markus to return, a different metal briefcase back in his hand. He seemed extremely pleased. Alice was cold, half starved and very thirsty, which she let Markus know in no uncertain terms as they started traveling again. He stayed silent until she finally asked him: "What took you so long?"
In response Markus just patted the metal briefcase, a happy note in his voice. "Saint thought he was Saint George but he was just the stone holding my sword."
AN: I might be mixing up my stories but Markus might be the King of England now.