Roots 2.i
One last day.
Velocity ran, tearing across city blocks in seconds and blurring between traffic almost as fast as the eye could follow. Or at least, that was what the civilians saw. For Robin himself, things weren't nearly as exciting. He moved faster than a NASCAR stock car, but his perceptions were sped up to the same degree. What seemed from the outside to be a five-minute rush across the city was, from his perspective, a three-hour walk through a world where everything was frozen in place. It was incredibly useful in a fight, but outside of one, it had eventually made his power dull. One could only marvel at birds or bugs frozen in the air so many times.
Still, he was used to it by now. He'd been in Brockton Bay for years, ever since he'd been shipped out here from his Navy posting. He wasn't much better off here than he had been elsewhere, but the opportunities were at least a little bit better. At the very least, he was better off here than he had been on the ocean.
Hopefully, Boston would be another improvement, but Velocity had his doubts. He'd been told about all the benefits he'd be getting, but if the cost was his foundation here being torn up, then was it really worth it? He didn't think so.
He checked his watch. It was minor Tinkertech designed by Armsmaster, designed to keep track of how fast he was moving by monitoring the speed of things around him and changing what it reported to match. He only had five more minutes in real-time before the end of the shift, which meant that it was about time to start heading back to base. He'd almost hoped to find something, given that this was his last day, but that was fine. He didn't want to become a stereotypical last-day cop.
Over the next half-hour or so, he gradually made his way back towards the boardwalk. He wasn't going so fast that things seemed to have stopped entirely - it made even his shortened patrols even more unbearably long, and if he got into a fight, it would have prevented him from having any real impact on the world at all until he slowed down. As it was, people were just barely moving fast enough to notice, and though he was able to cross even the busiest streets without worry, he still had to keep an eye out for cars. He arrived at the Boardwalk with less than two minutes left on his patrol shift, which was a small enough amount of time that he didn't need to spend time schmoozing. He avoided drawing a crowd toward the bridge site and whoever had the next patrol by simply hopping the railing and dropping the six or so feet to the beach below, then turning his power as high as he felt safe doing and stepping out onto the water.
Once he got to these kinds of speeds, even a jog was tiring. He had to struggle a little to even move through the air. The plus side was, as hard as it was for the atmosphere to move around him, it was a hundred times harder for the water to do the same. As long as he kept moving, he'd stay on top of the waves as if they were solid ground.
He stepped into a door built into one of the pillars supporting the Rig - one of several quiet entrances used exclusively by Movers, and one that only saw use by him. He took a moment to decrease the effect of his power so he could shut the door behind him, covering up the plastic sheeting he'd hung there years before, and had to remind himself to lock it - he wouldn't be coming back, and he doubted anyone else would be using it in his absence. Maybe his replacement, but it was hard to say.
Replacement. That didn't feel good to admit, but he knew it was true. Director Piggot had found a better speedster, and within a day the transfer letter was in his mailbox. He'd met Scatter once, the girl was nice enough, and he was fairly sure that she hadn't even known about the transfer when they'd spoken, but the knowledge that she was the reason he had to leave left a bad taste in his mouth.
He pondered this as he exited his stairwell, entering the main hallway and moving towards his private costume area. He checked his watch again - he had a few hours before he needed to report to the Director for his official transfer to be completed, and then he was due in Boston at noon the following morning.
More scheduling, more timing. His life was still being decided for him, even after all these years. He wouldn't complain - it could have been a lot worse, after all - but that didn't mean he had to be happy about it.
"Hi, um, Velocity," a female voice spoke up from behind him, one he'd barely had time to learn to recognize. He turned to find Scatter walking up behind him in full costume. "I heard you were leaving today, and… I guess I wanted to apologize, I guess?" She continued, not seeming to notice the repetition, "I haven't been here very long, but I can tell that I've kind of broken some stuff by being here, and I know what it's like to get separated from a team that you've worked with for so long, and-"
"Scatter," he interrupted. She'd have run out of air if he'd let her keep going - or would she? "It's alright, really. It's not like it's your fault. The director could just as easily have chosen to transfer you instead of me." That wasn't quite true, given their relative levels of usefulness, but he chose not to bring that up. This… wasn't quite what he'd expected.
"Maybe, but still, I just… I don't know." She was getting frustrated with herself, a feeling that he knew well. "I should probably go, I've got patrol in a few minutes. Good luck in, uh, Boston, and I'm sorry, again." She turned and walked away, a little faster than necessary, and Robin let her go.
He turned around as well and continued on his way. He hadn't expected her to be guilty over this. Most people would have just shrugged and moved on, as normal as it was. Granted, she was feeling guilty for the wrong reasons, but it was something, and it felt… good. A little extra light behind him as he ventured into the fog, not enough to truly affect much, but it could still give him some stability.
...or something like that. No one had ever accused him of being good with metaphors.
As much hope as Vista had put into Velocity when he showed up, it hadn't really panned out. He'd wanted to avoid his background, she guessed, and that meant he didn't want to teach the Wards anything or even tell stories. As soon as she'd realized that, she'd pretty much left him alone, and that meant that she'd never gotten to know him beyond that.
His replacement, though, was a different story. Scatter was not only willing to train her, but she was happy to. Vista was old enough to know that their 'training exercise' yesterday hadn't been a hundred percent legal, and she'd still gone through with it. Not only that, but she'd gone out of her way to convince Piggot to let her train the Wards altogether.
Now if only she could get everyone else to see things the same way.
"C'mon, more training? Don't we get enough of that already?" Clockblocker groused. Vista had the impression that he hadn't been too pleased with how his power had been turned against him in the fight.
"Relax, Dennis, it might be good for you. If Scatter beat you this badly last time, then imagine how much better she'll get if you let her work with you for a bit," Dean responded. Vista felt some heat come to her cheeks as he spoke up and made her decision to stay out of this argument. Dean was on her side, whether he knew it or not, so she was sure that he'd win the debate. Kid Win and Shadow Stalker, manning the console, weren't saying anything yet.
"For a training exercise, she didn't put that much effort into teaching us. It was more like her taking the opportunity to beat us down. I don't know what I did to annoy her, but I'd rather avoid more of that."
Vista knew that wasn't true. Scatter had been holding back, a lot. If she'd been really trying to beat them, they probably wouldn't have ever gotten past the front door. She didn't really understand why Scatter taught the way she did, but after two training sessions with her, she could see the results. She was being forced to think, act, and react faster than she might have otherwise. It wasn't fun, but it worked. Now if only Dennis could understand that!
"Hey, you were impressed by how much Vista had improved after just one session, right?" He gestured to her, smiling, and she buried her face in the computer screen that she hadn't really looked at since she'd opened it as she felt her ears go red. That was the same point she'd just thought of! "Whatever Scatter's doing, it obviously works. I figure we might as well give it a chance to see how much it can do.."
Dennis grumbled, but stopped arguing. Yes! Go, Dean!
Of course, that was when Shadow Stalker decided it was time to open her mouth. "I don't see what the fuss is. She can't do anything serious to you without getting in trouble herself, so why are you so scared of her?"
"She beat me into the ground without even trying, and that was without her razor-sharp scythe-gun that, in case anyone's forgotten, is as big as any two of us put together. That's enough excuse for some fear, in my opinion," Chris piped up from beside Stalker on the console. At Vista's dirty look, he added, "not that I'm against the training! The way I see it, maybe I can make up for my crappy Tinkering with some fighting ability. I just get Dennis' point, is all."
Stalker grunted, turning back to the console. "You call yourself a hero, you should be able to take a little pain." She slipped the headphones back onto her head, very clearly calling an end to her part of the conversation.
Dean kept looking in her direction for a moment, probably watching whatever it was he saw in her emotional state, before returning to the conversation. "Anyway. We're under orders to try it once, and see how it goes from there. You can put up with one more try, Dennis."
"Maybe she'll teach us some of her crazy ninja-acrobat stuff!" Chris interrupted. "Did you notice in the fight when she backflipped into the air, grabbed my gun, and then tried to shoot you with it while she was still upside down?"
"It was about three feet from my head when it started screeching, Chris. Yes, I noticed."
Chris was smiling big now, and Vista noticed Dean doing the same. Vista guessed that it was easy to feel happy for other people when you could actually see their happiness in a cloud around them. Chris continued, "If she could teach us to do that, then just imagine how much we could do in the field! They might even let us go further out than the boardwalk and the school's district!"
Vista certainly hoped so. Experience didn't matter nearly as much to the Wards' bosses as age did, and since they were 'kids,' they got kept away from anything dangerous. They didn't care that Vista had more experience than Velocity or Dauntless, they were grown-ups so they got to save people from Lung and Hookwolf instead of random muggers. It wasn't worth arguing over though. She'd been dealing with their being condescending for years, and she could keep dealing with it. For now, though, she had work to do. She glanced up to the top-left corner of her screen and eyed the clock. Five PM, which meant her 'on-call' hours were up for the day. She turned the laptop off before closing it and returning it to her bag, then standing up and heading toward the elevator.
"Where are you going, Missy?" Dennis asked from behind her. "You normally stick around for a while after your shift ends."
Vista blinked. She hadn't thought that people might notice a change in her pattern. "I'm… going home for a bit. Mom's home. She's been trying to get me to spend more time with her, and it's sad enough that I'm almost starting to feel bad for her." That was technically true, except for the feeling bad about it part. She had other reasons for going home, but she couldn't tell them that. Not that she thought they'd tell anyone, but they'd be worried about her, and that was the last thing she needed.
Dennis wasn't really buying it, but he let it go. "Alright, don't tell me. Just be careful, okay? We don't need another Hookwolf scare." The others, Shadow Stalker excepted, were giving her concerned looks from around the room.
She winced at that. He had no idea how scary that had been. "Don't worry, I'm not doing any cape stuff. I'm going home, nowhere else." They were more than a little skeptical, but they let her be once the elevator arrived on their level.
She slipped into the tail end of a tour group, found her way to the bus stop, and started the long ride toward her mother's house, just a hair into the Docks. Close enough to Empire territory that there wasn't any real risk of the ABB coming after her, not that it mattered to all the people that wanted to walk her home, 'just to be safe.' She could take care of herself, thank you very much.
Her mom's house was slightly nicer than the others in the general area, mostly thanks to her Wards membership affording them some privileges. She occasionally wondered what they'd do if she decided to quit, but that wasn't something that was ever going to actually happen.
Vista- no. She was home now, she had to think of herself as Missy. Missy stepped through the front door, ran up to her bedroom, and locked the door behind her. Technically, she wasn't allowed to do that, but this wouldn't be the first time she'd gotten away with it by playing the 'but Dad lets me do it!' card if she needed to use it. Mom wasn't home from work yet anyway.
Door secured, she set to work, using her power to shift furniture around, being very careful to avoid making changes you could see from outside the room. It was a challenge, but a fun one, and she'd gotten pretty good at it. She also wasn't supposed to use her powers at home, out of costume, but if she did this right then nobody would find out.
Furniture out of the way, she now had a solid twelve-foot square of open floor in the center of the room, which was all she needed.
She took a deep breath, got up on the balls of her feet, just like her martial arts instructor had taught her, and threw herself backward. She rolled over her shoulder, catching herself on an outstretched leg, and kicked it sideways to roll herself left in the same instant. She felt a pull in her hip as she did, but she could still move it, so it was fine.
She caught herself again with a slap on the floor, then pushed forward. A flick of her wrist caused the floor to shoot up in front of her, creating a three-foot wall in her path. She vaulted over it, feeling the strain in her arm as she put too much force on a not-totally-healed muscle she had pulled last time she was doing this. She braced her feet on the wall, pushed off and up to touch the ceiling, eight-point-five feet above the ground-
And slipped, her shoes losing traction on the wall as she slid down and fell flat on her face. That wasn't the first time it had happened. Or the second. Or the tenth. She'd seen Scatter doing that in their first spar, but she still didn't understand how she managed it. Missy looked back to the wall and sighed in relief as she realized she hadn't left scuff marks that time. They were a pain to clean off without people noticing.
She wasn't supposed to be doing this. She'd get in some trouble for using her powers, but it wouldn't be much. Training and pushing herself like this was okay in small doses, but the Youth Guard would throw a fit if they found out she was doing it at home too. They didn't know what it was like to live in this city, and the extra practice would only make her stronger.
Missy picked herself up off the ground, smoothed out her vaulting wall, and set about sculpting platforms from the walls. It was slow going, but this was the third time she'd tried to set it up and it was getting faster each time. The platforms extended to her desired sizes, and she jumped the three feet up to reach the first before launching herself across the four-foot gap to get to the corner of her practice area, wincing as she landed on an ankle she'd twisted the first time she tried this.
All she had to do was get better at this, and then maybe the PRT would let her do things more freely. She knew she was good enough for it. She just needed to prove that she could handle herself.
"It is with the utmost appreciation that I thank you for your service, and wish you good luck on all of your future endeavors."
There was widespread applause from the gathered audience. Armsmaster's heads-up display began automatically running facial recognition software to identify the various reporters and civilians and identifying who was working for whom, who was being facetious with their applause...
He ended the program manually. There wasn't any reason to use it here. If he'd been speaking, it might have been a different story, but there was no reason to invade people's privacy here.
"Velocity, you are hereby released from all duties with the Protectorate East-North-East," Director Piggot said from her spot on the podium, just where she had been standing days before, giving a small speech at the beginning of Scatter's introduction. Armsmaster was sure that many of those in the audience had caught the connection, and he started mentally composing a response to the inevitable questions that would arise. He didn't fully understand why this had needed to be rushed in this way - typically, the Director was more concerned with the Image side of the cape scene.
Director Piggot continued, "your posting in Boston awaits, and I'm sure I speak for everyone here when I say; thank you for your long service here."
Armsmaster wasn't so sure. Velocity had been around for a while, certainly, but he had never been very effective at doing anything but scout work. Useful, but hardly game-changing. Armsmaster wouldn't normally have attended this PR mess at all, preferring to say his few goodbyes in private, if it hadn't been for a new factor that had forced him to change his plans.
Scatter. The girl's power testing showed her top speed to be on par with Velocity's own, albeit with less maneuverability, but with fewer downsides and a handful of other powers on top of that fact, including a low Tinker rating. All in all, an incredibly potent cape that had the potential to do some incredible things for any team she was a part of.
In other words, a threat.
There was an inherent unfairness when it came to parahuman powers. Beyond the obvious advantages a parahuman had over an unpowered human, not all powers were equal. Armsmaster was comfortable admitting that his own power was likely the only reason he'd been as successful in his career as he had - he'd never been good at politicking or socializing, but his abilities were strong enough to make up the difference. When another cape appeared, pre-set with leadership experience, combat experience, and such an effective power, he felt some concern was warranted.
At the moment, the girl simply wanted to get home. That was a goal he could agree with, but given what he knew about the legal situation surrounding Haywire's technology, it didn't seem to be a feasible one. Fears of interdimensional war were simply too great for Dragon to ever get permission to attempt to search out and contact another world, let alone one as advanced as Scatter's homeland.
No, she'd be staying around. As Piggot's speech finished, Armsmaster stood and began moving offstage along with the gathered command staff of the Protectorate and PRT East-North-East. He hadn't even spoken at the event, just been present, but he felt that he needed every PR advantage he could get.
He'd been making moves already, but he had to do so subtly. He had helped her find a solution to the blade-blunting issue, but she still needed to actually do what Director Piggot had asked. He had no intention of putting real effort into creating her hard-lightning blade concept; as intriguing as the idea was, she hardly needed to be any more effective, and he could hardly use such a thing himself without her asking why she didn't have one yet. They would both need to make do without it, for the moment.
In the meantime, Armsmaster would begin working with her to enhance his own technology. He could already see the possibilities that Remnant's technology could open up for his own Tinkering. If he could incorporate their shifting technology, then that could be the push he needed to keep his career afloat just a little bit longer.
He would need to make every day count, but he could manage it. He'd been fighting his way up the rankings for years, and this girl wouldn't be the one to drag him back down.
Alright, so far so good on the weekly release thing. I don't have quite as much of the next chapter written as I'd like, but I should still be able to put out the next chapter on the 22nd or 23rd. Next chapter will be another interlude, wrapping up the arc, and then we'll (hopefully) get into arc 3 in January.
We're looking in on a few people here, obviously - I couldn't decide on a single perspective for this chapter, so I just chose all of them, heh. This won't be a common thing - I have the rest of the interludes for this story plotted out, POV-wise, and the rest all follow a single character.
In other news, I'll likely begin cross-posting this story to Spacebattles sometime near the end of this week and the beginning of next week. Depending on how much of a pain their formatting is, it might be slow going, but I'll be going through and fixing any errors I come across as I do it. (I've been doing the same as they've been pointed out to me on AO3, but editing chapters on FFN is too much of a pain for me to bother with unless it's pretty extreme.)
But yeah, as always, thank you for reading, any reviews are appreciated, and I'll see you next time!