20 Offensive
I can only imagine what must have been going through the minds of the gang members and conscripts that were scattered across the storage facility as my motoroid plummeted towards the ground. These weren't hardened criminals. Even among the gang members I doubted they'd seen a serious parahuman conflict more than once or twice. Now here they were, caught is a clash between capes with no way out.
The motoroid struck the courtyard for the second time that night, sending a pulse of force outwards. Materials like concrete and asphalt, steady reliable things that had no business acting anything like a liquid, rippled and surged outwards. The facility had been built out of cinderblock lockers assembled at minimum cost with only the loosest adherence to building codes. The only robustness that could be attributed to it was in the weight of its materials, not the resilience of its construction. That fact was plainly visible in the aftermath.
The second strike hadn't leveled the facility, not exactly. Still, the damage was catastrophic. Lockers that had just held on through the first blow were now piles of broken concrete and sheet metal. The shattering of the foundation in the first strike had proved a mitigating influence on the following blow. Without a solid medium to carry the tremor the effect had been blunted. Rather than reduce the entire facility to rubble there were still a few lockers standing at the edges, along with sections of the outer wall.
But the maze of rows that had so effectively pinned in the Undersiders was completely gone. That was the point of the strike. Well, part of the point. I had needed a demonstration. Needed a way to show that the first blow wasn't a one off, an outlier. It had been impressive, but without a follow up it would come across as a tinker Hail Mary, that I was breaking out some treasured one shot technology and expending weeks of effort on a single blow.
No one would think that now. I could plainly see it in the individuals climbing through the wreckage. That look of people who had the world pulled out from under them in an almost literal sense. Fortunately the facility had been nothing but single story lockers with sheet metal roofs. There was no second story or attic to collapse on someone. In fact, no one even had a reason to be inside at the moment of impact. It was a huge amount of devastation for a comparatively small amount of injuries.
But there were injuries none the less. That was something I had accepted coming into this. I didn't like it, but staying completely soft handed would have left me and everyone else at the complete mercy of Bakuda. I didn't have the strength or the resources to afford to take that kind of approach.
Well, I accepted the injuries due to my actions. The traveling shockwave had triggered more than a few of the planted bombs. Some of the bombs had been Bakuda's good work, bombs with advanced scanning and detection systems, able to pick out targets and detonate for maximum injury. However, plenty of them had been of the most primitive models. Mines on the level of Claymores, bombs connected to trip wires, bombs set to recognize movement. Pretty much every one of these that hadn't gone up in the first strike of my motoroid was detonating now.
Flares, blasts, and discharges of tinker tech explosives were going up all across the facility. Luckily the damage to the conscripts was proving to be minimal. The ABB gang members knew where they had been planted and the patrols had been giving them a wide berth. The question was whether that berth had been wide enough.
A group of middle aged office workers got flung like rag dolls away from one of the explosives, landing painfully in a scattered mess. Another group scrambled up a pile of rubble as a glowing blue liquid spread out from a device that pulsed like a dismembered heart. The liquid didn't seem to be reacting with anything it touched, but no one wanted to be the first to test its effect on the human body. Another bomb sent out a wave of flame, giving an older man in a set of coveralls just enough time to shield a pair of tiny white haired women who would have looked more comfortable in a bingo parlor than a battlefield. The man dropped to roll out the flames as his group struggled to help him while their gang member fought to maintain some level of authority.
In addition to the scattered detonations the main impact had thrown up a fresh column of dust into the air. Through the murk the staggering and disoriented forms of the ABB were visibly shaken. Some of them were clearly at their breaking point. These were normal people who had spent the entire evening learning the classic definition of shell shock, taught to them in great detail by both sides of the engagement.
The ABB forces were in complete disarray. What objectives they had been given when the teams had been sent out were completely forgotten. Half of the paths were just masses of rubble and the odds were very good that any locker they had been dispatched to was no longer standing. Additionally the huge deployment of directionless forces had left Bakuda severely underdefended in the courtyard.
From her frantic reaction to the chaos she was well aware of it. The tinker was scrambling to redeploy her forces, calling back patrols and yelling commands to the mortar and rocket teams that had held position. In all the chaos one fact seemed to be overlooked.
This time the motoroid hadn't left the crater.
In the smoke, dust, and fallout of still exploding bombs a person could be forgiven for overlooking a detail like that. That is, until an amplified voice echoed across the devastated storage facility.
"Disappointing."
Bakuda froze in place and that unnatural stillness rippled out from her position. Attention started shifting to the dust filled crater. The sounds of heavy steps and servo motors were echoing across the area. Slowly, like a phantom from the night, my motoroid emerged from the cloud of pulverized concrete.
Before she could respond my transmitted voice blasted out again. "I've finished my 'little tour' and I have to say, I'm not impressed." I could see Bakuda bristle at that. "Not at what you 'accomplished', and not at the condition of what you were willing to bargain with."
"Big talk." The tinker was clearly stressing her own voice modulator to its maximum output in an attempt to match my motoroid. It resulted in the normally monotone voice coming off screechy. "Big fucking talk. Think you can cover with that. I know that you're scared. You've seen what's waiting for you."
"Scared? Of that?" The motoroid leaned forward in a very human way. "Juvenile efforts. Sloppy execution of concept. Overly showy tantrums without substance. Is that the best you have? Is that supposed to impress me?"
Bakuda grabbed her grenade launcher in a fit of almost frenetic rage. "Fuck you. Neolithic simpleton who can't see the greatness of something when it's plain as day." Rather than fire she gestured at her surroundings. "I own this city. Me. My genius, my art brought it to its knees. Decades of stalemate broken in a single strike. It doesn't matter what you think. This is my victory."
"Yes, THAT was impressive. But tell me, is the victory yours?" The motoroid brought a hand to its chin in a gesture that almost looked natural. Would need to work on that. "...or is it hers?"
The tinker started shaking in a way that made those close to her start edging away. "That doesn't matter. It doesn't..."
The motoroid turned its head towards the sky. "Total blackout. From here to Maryland people will be really seeing the night sky for probably the first time in their lives. This will probably trump the Northeast blackout of 1965. It would require an insanely precise and coordinated attack to accomplish something on that scale. So tell me." The motoroid dropped its optics towards Bakuda. "Are people going to give credit to the one who made the stone, or the woman who killed the giant?"
"No. She doesn't matter. I did this. I broke this city. I freed Lung. I showed the world what happens when it challenges me." She lifted the grenade launcher on target. "Are you even in there, or are you buying time for your miserable life while you run off with that bug bitch?" Her pitched up speech was becoming more erratic, making it harder to understand as she ranted faster. "Hiding behind your toys, too afraid to show your face, to face me. What does that say, huh?"
"That I stand on my own. Beholden to none but those I choose, and blessed..." my five drones dipped low enough to enter Bakuda's field of view, causing her to mutter some half coherent commands to the conscripts around her. "With competent assistance when I require it."
"Yeah, well there's a problem with toys." Her minions hastily lined up their shots. "They're so easy to break."
Before the first rocket could launch a blast of small objects tore through the dust clouds at the edges of the courtyard. The operators barely had time to register the horrible buzzing before the alchemical insects ripped into their equipment, shattering barrels, triggers, and delicate portions of the weapons. At closer range with a fresher formula the effects were dramatically stronger. Rather than the odd dented barrel or broken trigger metal was torn and rent by the projected creatures as they expended their energy on a single attack.
After the wave had passed only two mortars and a handful of rockets appeared anywhere near functional. The rest either had fully split barrels or shattered delicate components. Taylor had clearly been trying to avoid the ammunition chambers, but these people were not explosive experts and desperately tried to put as much space between them and the damaged equipment as possible.
Bakuda's grenade launcher had taken a glancing strike, likely out of fear of accidentally detonating its ammunition. The tinker had shaken off the impact and was taking in the scattering of her forces with pure fury. With a scream of frustration she bypassed the damaged part and launched a volley of grenades at the stationary motoroid.
In rapid succession three sharp cracks echoed across the courtyard as glowing shots tore through the dust cloud, shattering the grenades. The wind-rune enhanced projectiles left a trail of vortex shockwaves behind them. The aftermath slowly cleared the dust from the air around a pile of rubble that had previously been a line of lockers. As the cloud peeled back the figures of Taylor and myself slowly came into view.
My pistol was drawn and held at the ready, though I was no longer in my firing stance. As the dust cleared enough for the people in the courtyard to make us out I activated my omni-tool, causing a nimbus of orange light to bloom in the dusty air. Taylor pulled the remaining insects from my Sting formula into orbit around her in a pair of rings at offset angles. The effect looked like a cross between hula hoops and an old model of an atom. It would possibly have been amusing if not for the immense damage wrought by the first wave she had sent out.
"Good. Now show off the robot. That always gets to her. She knows she can't build anything like that and she hates you for it."
I didn't show any reaction to Tattletale's voice as I keyed the commands to Fleet through my haptic interface. The motoroid spun up its turbines, then leapt into the air. As it launched it swung both tonfas into the lip of the crater, boosting its speed and sending an aftershock across the area that threatened the footing of the scrambling ABB. It twisted through the air with a precision that it never would have been able to manage at the start of the night before dropped into a three point stance in front of me and Taylor.
I had intended for it to drop into a defensive position, aimed towards the crowd, but it had landed facing us instead. Understandable as Fleet was still learning piloting and I hadn't been that precise with my commands. Of course, the result was the motoroid kneeling before the pair of us like an act of fealty. It seemed pretentious, but apparently Tattletale didn't see anything wrong with that.
"Ha, perfect! Can you do something with your drones as well? Oh, and follow up on that toy comment. She's been excessively precocious her entire life and hates it when people dismiss her as immature or childish."
The motoroid lifted a crackling tonfa into the air and the drones fell into a formation between us and Bakuda, ready to intercept anything coming our way. As it turned and raised both weapons towards the tinker my voice echoed from its sound system.
"Quick to break someone else's toys when they out shine you? Most children learn better than that at a young age."
I could see how much the taunt bothered her, but I wasn't deriving any enjoyment from it. I didn't like this kind of confrontation. I mean, after everything I'd seen tonight and everything I knew about Bakuda I was ready to drop some divine justice on her, but this didn't feel like justice. It felt petty.
We hadn't had long to plan after I launched my motoroid attack. Though granted, we did have more preparation time than if I had left things until the mortars started raining on us. Also the Undersiders were horribly underequipped, even by their standards. I could have fabricated something, but we were too pressed for time. Instead I took the disposable phones Taylor and I still had, slaved them to my omni-tool, and handed them out. That at least let us assemble a rough plan while we got into position.
I had also missed a connection to the quality constellation when we moved out.
"Children!" I'm not sure if Bakuda was actually screeching or if it was just her trying to match the volume of my amplification. "You're the infantile one. I'm changing the face of the city, of the world! What are you trying to accomplish beyond indulgence in some trite sappy sentimentality?"
"Oh, this is good." I had agreed to let Tattletale coordinate my interaction. It was our best chance of keeping Bakuda off balance long enough for the Undersiders to rally and prepare a counter strike. And I had to give the girl credit, when it came to a war of words she knew how to go for the throat. Bakuda was definitely off balance, even if I had to feel like scum to get her there. I think I would have been more comfortable putting a mass effect round through her head than continuing this farce.
"Now you need to take a dig at her love life." No I do not. "She never had a serious relationship, told herself it was because she was too good for anyone, but really she just couldn't make it work." Yeah, not touching that. Is she still broadcasting this on Uber and Leet's show? I still can't nail down their signal. "You should tie it into academics, especially high school. That's the root of the superiority complex and will hit her hardest. Hold on, I'll come up with something for you."
...you ever wonder if you're working for the right side? Like, I'm not saying the ABB was the good side in this equation, but I was kind of feeling trapped between a rock and an asshole.
Miraculously Brian saved me from having to recreate the dialogue of a teen soap opera with his most welcome interruption. "Regent in position. Circling around with Bitch, ready for our entrance."
I smiled at that and looked down at Bakuda. "I've accomplished more than you think."
There was a metallic scoff. "You made it through with your hide intact. I suppose that counts for something."
"More than just mine." I glanced at Taylor who took a defiant step forward.
"Whatever." She brought her grenade launcher towards us. "That's one for five, and it'll take a miracle for the two of you to get out of here alive."
"Not exactly." I made a gesture to cover the haptic inputs to my omni-tool and my drones rose to a more aggressive formation. The motoroid's turbines started spinning, putting out just enough thrust to make my coat and Taylor's hair dramatically dance in the wind. "You never asked what my contract was with the Undersiders. Shame, I expected better from you." I relented to Tattletale's prodding to make that final slight.
"What's that got to do with any..." Bakuda cut herself off as a howl echoed over the battlefield. Not the kind of howl you got from a dog, or even a wolf. This sound had teeth, it rumbled in your chest and seemed to crawl up through the souls of your feat. This was the kind of hunting cry that primitive man had learned to fear, and passed that lesson down in their very DNA.
Mostly because the people who didn't pass down that lesson didn't live long enough to pass down anything else.
The howl went on for longer than I would have thought possible. Gang members struggled to pick out the source from the echoes reflecting through the facility while the conscripts looked to have collectively taken one more step towards the breaking point.
It stretched to the point where the dust clouds began to clear, but that only brought a new level of terror. Anyone with a comprehensive enough understanding of demolitions and mechanical properties would recognize that the dust clouds didn't look right. They had been too thick, too imposing. If Bakuda hadn't been focused on her confrontation with me, or more specifically her confrontation with Tattletale using me as a communication medium, she would have seen it in an instant. Instead she was only catching on at the same point as the rest of her minions.
That couldn't have been good for the ego.
When the dust receded it didn't reveal clear air. Instead ominous clouds of blackness choked the facility on all sides. A hulking armored shape with two riders was just visible darting through the edge of the effect. A cry in a language I didn't speak and a point from one of the conscripts drew the gaze of the crowd to a grinning girl in a tattered purple costume, hovering at the edge of the darkness. A second pointed out a smiling but dead eyed boy half dressed in a charred renaissance fair outfit opposite her. Finally a snarl drew everyone's attention as the muzzle of a dinosaur like facsimile of a dog edged out of the miasma just far enough to expose it's riders, a hulking figure in a skull painted helmet leaking darkness from torn and missing pieces of his costume, and a harsh looking girl with dirty blond hair devoid of her usual dog mask.
I had been against this part of the plan. It was excessive and unnecessary showmanship. I hadn't exactly been outvoted, but when Brian's insistence of needing to make an impression to secure their damaged reputations fell flat Tattletale stepped in. A clear thinking Bakuda was a potential death sentence, even with all our precautions. We needed to keep her off balance, and showing her up at her big night was the best way to accomplish that.
It still felt like more high school level nonsense, but if it got us closer to putting her down then I could live with it, no matter how it came across.
God, I hope I don't get permanently associated with spectacles like this.
Tattletale made a cheeky wave which was echoed with an overelaborate bow from Alec. Brian raised a darkness coated finger towards Bakuda while Rachel whispered something to Angelica that caused the now hulking terrier to start growling. The rune-knife I made for Taylor leapt into her left hand and she deployed the baton from her right wrist. For my part I raised my omni-tool and unnecessarily charged the hologram until I was a beacon of orange light. My drones mirrored the glow as they began charging their attacks.
The posturing stretched out longer than I thought it would, mostly because Bakuda seemed at a loss for how to react and no one present was willing to take any initiative without her permission. She spun franticly between the figures of the Undersiders like a broken garden sprinkler. I watched her body language shift through expressions of shock, confusion, anger, embarrassment, pain, doubt, and fear. Finally something seemed to snap and she shifted to pure rage.
And just like that the world was chaos. The woman dragged the grenade launcher in an arc, launching barely aimed rounds more at the clouds of darkness than at any specific target. Bakuda managed four shots before her leg was pulled out from under her and she face planted into the dirt. I just caught a glimpse of Regent's laughing face before he and Tattletale vanished back into the darkness.
The professional gang members, including Bakuda's scorched lieutenants, tried to impose some order and coordination. Scattered groups had made their way back from the deeper patrols into the facility, but after enduring a second seismic event were not exactly ready to jump into a parahuman dust up. The mostly green gang members leading the civilian conscripts were having a hell of a time trying to keep them on task and were mostly getting only token efforts from their charges.
For all her talk about fear it seems Bakuda never considered what would happen if the thing in front of her forces was as scary as the thing at their back. Bakuda was too distracted to punish every case of insubordination and people weren't keen to jump into the mouth of a monster dog, the weapon of an earthquake robot, the stingers of giant alchemical insects, or the shots of a lightning drone.
Not all the squads were breaking down, but the ones that did were going down hard. I watched one group completely abandon their minder as soon as one member decided he'd rather cower in rubble than jump into the melee. Another group had a teenage gang member berating a group of middle schoolers. In his frustration he went for a knife, at which point he was brutally sucker punched by a man with thinning hair in a charred janitor's uniform. The Magic constellation passed me by without a connection as the unconscious ganger was shoved under some sheet metal. The group then made an unspoken decision to try to look busy while staying as far from the fighting as possible.
I stepped in front of Taylor as an ABB member managed to impose some coordination on one of the teams armed with an eclectic collection of firearms. They weren't exactly marksmen, but fifteen weapons opening up on you means a few will connect. It dispelled my force field, but none of the rest even chipped my durability with my height and coat completely covering Taylor. I fired back with some intentionally missed shots which, when combined with two of Taylor's reserve alchemical insects, was enough to break their formation.
Bakuda had managed to get her feet under her and was pulling herself up. I scanned for Regent, both figuratively and literally, but the darkness effectively blocked my omni-tool. It was clear he was still doing something. Bakuda was showing seemingly random twitches, tremors, and hiccups, it was just that none of them were enough to keep her out of the fight, which was the single task Alec was responsible for.
"Tattletale, what the hell is Regent doing?" I sent another couple of shots painfully close to the head of a gang member who was doing a better job at imposing order than his peers. The shockwave from the runes was enough to completely take him off his feet and I noticed a couple of people from the back of the crowd of conscripts decide to take their chances running blind into the darkness over whatever he'd been planning for them.
"What do you mean?" There was a pause and the sound of someone scrambling over rubble. "...oh shit."
"That doesn't sound encouraging." I called down a drone on a near collision course with one gang member who had grabbed a mostly intact rocket launcher. We had managed to keep the exotic ordinance contained, but I'm not sure how much longer that would last. Taylor was sending an alchemical insect after anyone who looked like they could get off a shot, but her supplies were running low. I only had one mixture of that formula left and wanted to hold off in case any serious surprises showed up.
"He's going off script. It's... fuck. If it works it'll solve all our problems but there's no way he has time to pull that off here and." Her voice had a level of concern I wasn't used to. The only thing I'd heard that was close to it was the call that brought me into this mess in the first place.
That would have been worrying enough, but my passenger decided to chime in. I was getting waves of impressions I hadn't picked out since my first research into the Undersiders. Impressions of Alec's past.
I knew there was something messed up there. The sense was Alec was involved in something terrible at the behest of someone even more terrible. Something that actively disgusted my passenger. He wasn't comfortable about it being part of Alec's past, but was happy the boy was distancing himself from it. Whatever he was doing here, whatever he was bringing back from his past was enough to cause some serious concern.
"What's he doing? What is he bringing back?" I remembered that dead stare in the locker that smelled like chemicals and charcoal and how quickly it had shifted back to the happy irreverent practical joker. Alec was not alright, he was very far from alright and I needed to know just what we were getting into.
"How did you... Never mind. I can't talk about it now, and it's not going to make a difference. For now we need some other way of pinning down Bakuda."
There was no question about that. Despite near constant twitches of her neck, arms, shoulders, and the odd leg muscle Bakuda had managed to rally a decent crowd of conscripts. The level of obedience probably had something to do with the smoldering skeleton everyone was making a point to avoid looking at. So in exchange for one summary execution Bakuda had managed to bring a pair of patched up mortars, three rocket launchers, and her own obnoxious grenade launcher to bear against our elevated position.
Yeah, it was well past time to abandon the show-off high ground. Before we fell back I signaled Fleet and my motoroid prepared for launch. One tonfa swung away to free the hand for support while the other was held at the ready. The whine of the turbines amplified to a scream, sending a torrent of wind across the pile of rubble. With a sudden burst the motoroid rocketed forward a few scant feet off the ground, barreling towards Bakuda's artillery placement.
This was a maneuver I would never have dreamed of attempting at the start of the night, but the software of my A.I. was progressing as well as I could have possibly hoped. Within a single night Fleet had advanced from roughly controlled jumps to precision vectored thrust flightpaths. As the motoroid skimmed over the ground it tilted to one side and jammed its crackling HF tonfa into the surface of the courtyard. The enchanted weapon sunk into the cracked tarmac like it was water and, following that theme, the ground behind it split apart like the red sea. The depth of the chasm and what simple conservation of mass did to the surface meant anyone in the general vicinity of the motoroid's path was thrown into chaos.
Fleet did not fly through the 'general vicinity' of Bakuda's artillery placement. The motoroid barreled straight through the team of severely undertrained weapon operators, tearing a ravine right in their midst. Experienced soldiers might have been able to peg the less than maneuverable robot with a rocket during its approach. As it stood I'd say Bakuda was the only one with a chance of landing the shot and she was too busy trying to coordinate her minions. By the time she realized what was coming she was already at ground zero for the latest earthquake of the evening.
With the heavy armaments literally split apart, and some of them more than half buried, Taylor and I could finally get off of this stupid, elevated, and exposed position. My military experience was light on precise memories, but two things I could confirm from this stunt was I did not like exposed positions and, judging by how speaking in public made me feel, I was probably not an officer. Maybe it was just the subject matter being fed to me by Tattletale, maybe it was residual social anxiety from before I got my powers, but I did not feel comfortable leading that discussion.
Bakuda was the kind of problem I'd want to deal with using long range bombardment, or at the very least a well-coordinated alpha strike. Instead I got a mess of half coordinated super-powered teenagers who it was now apparent all had different objectives.
Tattletale had been light on analysis since the combat had started. I don't know if she was building to something or if her power was just less helpful in chaotic situations like this. My best hope was she was off trying to get Regent back on task.
And Regent had clearly decided to do his own thing. As the situation stood there was no way to reach him to find out what he was trying or why he decided to abandon the plan. I swear I'm never trying this nonsense again without proper communications in place. Preferably implanted in everyone's God damn head.
Does that count as a quarter thing? It seems like it should count as a quarter thing, though hell if I know what it's connected to.
As Taylor and I pulled back I spotted Grue riding shotgun with Bitch. Honestly he seemed to be putting more showmanship into his efforts than was strictly necessary. I was still worried about his mental state and how much emphasis he had put on redeeming the Undersiders' reputation. That was particularly worrying since, as the leader, I was relying on him to keep the rest of the team on task.
He didn't seem to be doing a stellar job of that with Rachel. Bitch and Angelica were dancing against the line of my conditions for joining the fight. Conscripts were merely body checked out of the way by the giant rhino dog that had previously been an adorable terrier. Generally survivable injuries, but that assumed a robust opponent, not whoever could be grabbed off the street. Still, it was better than the fate of the gang members who were grabbed and thrown aside like chew toys.
Bitch was clearly furious and venting her anger, but I had to admit that she was holding back and exercising excellent control. Her dogs must have been masterfully trained just based on the fact that everyone was still alive at the point when she left them. I have no idea how she managed to teach a creature that size that level of restraint.
I still had concerns about severed arteries or punctured lungs, but frankly I could live with more serious injuries from career ABB than I could from their forced conscripts. It was still horrific, but that kind of thing was different for people who had chosen a life of violence rather than been recently kidnapped and enslaved.
Moving down the pile I found a consequence of sending my motoroid away. It seems my initial idea about the imposing nature of my robot keeping away anyone who would think to swarm me was right on the money. It looked like one of the patrol groups had wandered back through Grue's darkness, which proved to effectively conceal them from Survey's constant watch on my sensors.
They had held back at the edge of the obstruction until my motoroid took off, then decided they wanted to be heroes. Heroes for the ABB, that is. This wasn't one of those groups of old women and young children. My guess is that the two career gangsters had picked out the most compliant of the conscripts to form something of a brute squad. It was over a dozen men in their early twenties all with some form of violent melee weapon. About a third of the group, including the tougher of the two ABB members, decided to charge me on the spot.
They fell over themselves skidding to a stop as my omni-tool baked the ground in front of them with a jet of high energy plasma. With my reinforcement I wasn't bothered by the heat, but I could still feel the intensity of it. That intensity was very evident on the front most conscripts whose skin turned an unhappy shade of pink and clothing began to singe. The professional ABB, leading from the rear, tried to rally his squad, but it takes a lot more influence than he had access to in order to get someone to leap into a high temperature blaze.
Before the heat from my plasma burst could dissipate I turned to back up Taylor and was shocked at the image before me.
When I saw her cutting down zombies it looked like the knife was flying out of her hand. Well, it didn't just look like that anymore. The blade was clearly twirling out of her reach as it sliced a pool cue in half, then circled back as the cue's wielder flailed to escape the reach of the flying knife. It looped around her in what looked like an uncontrolled arc, except it split a giant bowie knife in two before tracing the shallowest cut across the man's arm. A handful of the group who were debating getting within melee reach of a knife that could clearly end their lives were suddenly peppered by high velocity debris as Taylor repeated the opening move she had used against Uber and Leet, swiping the baton through the rubble and sending an effective shotgun blast of concrete fragments flying towards her opponents.
It only took one last burst of plasma to convince the group they were badly out of their depth and that discretion was preferable to the loss of limb and eyebrows. With their retreat the knife circled back to Taylor, its hilt landing cleanly in the palm of her hand. With the blade slowed I was able to clearly see the secret behind her trick.
"Spider web?"
Despite the full face mask I got the sense she was smiling at me. As we moved she let the blade drop and I could just make out the gossamer thread connecting it to her hand. Loose threads trailed from other parts of the knife, but suddenly went taught, pulling the knife into a spinning arc that returned it to her hand.
"You said to practice with it." Around us I could see insects, actual living insects, not my alchemy creations, moving with thread trailing behind them. "This knife, whatever you did to it, it's incredible. I mean, obviously, but thank you." She dropped her head before continuing. "Uh, I was experimenting with it, seeing what I could do and it was just so light. I was trying to find out how much strength it actually took to swing it and, well..."
Once again she released the knife and it did a pirouette on a strand of silk before returning to her hand. I nodded knowingly to cover my shock at the event.
Quickly I checked on my drones and motoroid with my omni-tool. Bakuda was still recovering from the first scattering strike, but was calling in more conscripts into a close formation. It seemed she'd realized that her command structure only worked if she was personally there to keep the conscripts in line and that human shields were of limited use if they weren't actually shielding you.
With them that tightly packed a repeat of my previous move would result in a mass of pasted civilians. As a consequence my robot and drones were limited to disrupting the coordination of the rest of the forces. It diminished the ABB control over the area, but didn't deal with the tinker sitting on top of a pile of damaged ordinance.
I felt the Celestial Forge make another connection to the Crafting constellation as we moved into the now ruined murder arena. It was a mid-sized mote simply called Engineer. Incredibly for once the power did not increase my mechanical abilities. Instead it improved my capacity to come up with novel and creative designs. I had encountered intelligence boosters before, but this was the first time a power had increased my creativity. It was an interesting concept and the novelty of it was just about enough to outweigh the innate concerns about how much my mind was continuing to be altered.
As novel a concept as that was it wouldn't have been enough to get me excited over a mote of this strength. Really, it was the second aspect that was truly impressive. This power let me hold any blueprint perfectly in my mind without needing any external reference what so ever. Despite all the 'intelligence' boosts I'd received I was still working with a mortal memory. This power completely dealt with that problem. My mind had an effectively infinite amount of storage space for all the plans, blueprints, and technical reference I could ever want. I wouldn't have to write down anything ever again. No data that could get compromised or lost. In the event I somehow was separated from my computer core I would still have all my projects at my fingertips rather than have to try to redesign them with whatever human technology I could scrounge up.
Ok, that's one more quarter for the jar.
Tattletale's voice chirped through my omni-tool and I amplified it enough for Taylor to hear. "Bakuda's working on something with what's left of her equipment. No line on Regent, so regroup where Apeiron met up with Khepri."
"Confirmed." I called out.
"See you there." Grue answered over his own phone. We really needed better communications. With my latest power I could already start designing the plans for a simple com link that I'd be able to fabricate with my omni-tool. This wasn't the kind of nebulous planning to build some general device, it was precise blueprints with exact measurements and detailed components. With this power I could manage design work in the middle of a battlefield as easily as if I was at a drafting table.
That said, a battlefield was definitely not the place for design work. I shared a nod with Taylor and we moved out, though she gave the knife a final spin to float it into a reverse grip.
On reflection magic was quite frankly bullshit. I sort of knew that when I was getting into it, but it was blatantly clear here. The wind rune array I had engraved into the web pattern of the blade, which I noticed had actual spiders on it now, had a simple purpose. Make the knife light. Make the knife fast. Make the knife accurate. However, I hadn't connected that to the scale of the effects or how they could be exploited.
My Decadence power let me engrave runes to a level of detail I hadn't imagined possible. That was responsible for the stronger than expected results from the runecraft on the knife and baton, but there was another factor at play. Runic effects scaled in power based on the weapon in question. Usually what it scaled with was the literal scale of the weapon, size equals strength and all that, but because this was magic there were all kinds of crazy synergies that I hadn't taken into account. In short, certain weapons had affinities for certain elements.
It wasn't exactly obvious what weapons worked best with what elements. I doubt I would have been able to piece it together without my recently increased smithing skill, and some aspects, like what separated a water affinity sword from a fire affinity sword, were incredibly arbitrary. Regardless, the wind element liked small, light, and sharp weapons. The knife I made for Taylor was a perfect match for her. I had accidently created a flying blade.
As we moved away from the center of the fighting Taylor showed off a few more twirls and spins of the knife. It was enchanted to be light enough for anyone to wield, fast and responsive, and accurate to where you intended to strike. Normally that wouldn't extend to her spider puppet show, but whatever effect linked Taylor to her insects effectively made them part of her body for the purposes of the enchantment.
"Do you have any trouble aiming the blade when you do that?" I asked as we crossed another pile of rubble that used to be a locker. She had been confident enough to use it in a hectic combat where a single misplaced swipe could have removed a limb, and not necessarily one of her opponent's.
"Not with my bugs helping me." She grasped the handle again and showed the spiders on the web pattern. "I can sense their location. That lets me know exactly where it is. I just need to put some bugs on whoever I'm fighting and I have a full picture of what's happening."
And there was the terrifying level of situational awareness that separated the low tier masters from the stand out ones. If the claims she made about her range and the quantity of bugs she could control were true, and it all saw this level of accuracy then that was possibly one of the strongest coordination powers on the planet. The only thing that kept her from being a top tier threat was the relative harmlessness of her minions.
Which was a factor I had removed by giving her that knife. She had kept it on close defensive arcs, but what was her range with that thing? The full three blocks of her bug control? Jesus, that was terrifying. Maybe there would be something to that savior-of-the-world impression after all.
We had reached the edge of the walls of darkness that Grue had set up during his prep work for this attack. It was terrifically intimidating and effectively isolating for the courtyard forces, but not the most team friendly power. My scanners were registering nothing inside the miasma and it was hell on conventional communications as well.
"I can navigate with my bugs. Do you need me to lead you through?" Taylor looked at the weapons in both her hands, clearly reluctant to relinquish either of them in the current situation. I wasn't too keen on being led by the hand like a kindergartner either.
"It's alright, I have a formula that will let me see." I dug out one of my Revealer formulas. After its usefulness the first night I had been sure to prepare multiple sets of reagents for that particular mixture.
"It lets you see in Grue's darkness?"
"It lets me see in a lot of situations. It's not specific to that stuff." I gestured at the imposing black clouds. "And it's not perfect. I don't get a lot of detail, but it's good enough to let me navigate."
She nodded as I dug out the ash and wax mixture and combined them. Suddenly, rather than a solid wall the darkness presented a transition to a low resolution wireframe version of the world. Taylor stepped into it and was suddenly a rough outline of her usual appearance. Still, as unnerving as that was it was miles better than stumbling through blackness.
My formula helped with visibility, but did nothing for the other effects of the darkness. I couldn't even read my omni-tool's display in the limited detail and sound was murky and directionless. I was just able to make out faint wisps signifying Taylor's conventional insects, picking over the rubble or sweeping for obstacles. I also noticed the dozen or so that had found their way onto my costume. Apparently she was getting in the habit of tracking her allies as closely as her enemies.
You know, considering I knew how effectively she could target that blade with her spider web puppetry, finding out I had tracking insects on my body should have been a cause for concern. My passenger didn't think it was any threat, and I was inclined to agree. I still wasn't sure how she was tied to the fate of the world, but of the Undersiders she seemed to have the best intentions.
Of course, saying that about the person responsible for the Aegislash would seem like a bad joke to anyone without proper context of the group dynamic.
It took some work to pick out where our meeting place had been. The question of how Tattletale knew where we ran into each other was just another query for the pile concerning that girl's power. Without Taylor's insect senses or my Revealer formula I doubt we could have made it, but combined we made excellent time across the ruined storage facility.
And it was ruined. This place had more occupied lockers than I assumed, probably long term storage for locals who had run out of garage space. I didn't regret my actions, but the array of shattered furniture, broken china, and household items mixed in with the rubble was unfortunate. Still, I would have reduced this place to a cinder if it meant a better chance of stopping Bakuda before she could repeat her cranial bomb madness on anyone else.
As we approached what I could see as outlines of three figures and a monstrous dog the Celestial Forge missed a connection with the Knowledge constellation. There was a sudden violent transition as we moved from murky low detail darkness to the bright light of the overhead flares. Brian apparently had fine enough control of his darkness to open a gap for the five of us to meet.
The mood of the group was mixed. Tattletale seemed frustrated as well as somewhat out of breath. I'm guessing her power hadn't let her navigate the darkness quite as easily as Taylor and I had. Bitch was running a hand over the plates on Angelica's head and neck. She still seemed to be quietly fuming, but the battle had gotten some of the steam out of her system. Brian looked somewhat agitated and had turned his attention to us as soon as he spotted us through the darkness.
"About Regent..." He stepped forward to speak, then seemed at a loss for how to proceed.
"Any word on him?" Without Grue's darkness blocking all EMF I was able to check in on the courtyard. Bakuda was working on something, which was concerning, while still twitching erratically. The jerky motion seemed to annoy more than it impeded.
"No luck. He's dug in somewhere." Tattletale gave the display a concerned look. Bakuda had advanced from figurative human shields to literal human shields. Particularly, anyone too old, young, or infirm to be of help was being hauled in front of the rest of her forces. My drones and motoroids didn't have the precision to work around the targets or put them down without risking critical injury to the conscripts.
"What's Regent trying to do?" Taylor's attention was half on the screen and half in that unfocused way she seemed to communicate with her swarm.
"Don't worry about it." I was worried about it and Tattletale could clearly pick that up. "It... It's not a terrible idea, but it's probably not something he can pull off in time."
Grue stepped forward with renewed resolve. "Look, I'm sorry about this. I know we had a plan..."
I shook my head. "No, we had a last minute strategy." I would be lying if I said I was alright with the situation, but these weren't soldiers. I would barely expect them to stay on task if they came into this fresh. After what they went through tonight it was really inevitable someone would go in an unexpected direction. "I said I would support you." I assured Brian. "It would have been great if everyone had held to task, but that's not happening. We need to figure out what we're going to do from here."
He gave a grateful nod and turned to Tattletale.
"Bakuda's running low on munitions." She indicated my drone feed. "She's been dipping into equipment that was intended for some kind of follow up after she finished here, and she's burned through most of it."
"What was she going to hit? The PRT building?" Brian leaned in to check the display.
The thinker shook her head. "Not with this level of ordinance. The Protectorate gets really defensive about their civilian staff. A hit like that could bring a response on the level of Eidolon." She saw our reaction. "Okay, she might try it, but this thinker is coordinating things. It was probably a crippling strike on the Merchants, or a serious territory grab against the Empire."
Well, at least we're helping to keep drug dealers and Nazis safe. Okay, to be fair the Empire actually fits into both of those categories.
"Bakuda barely has anything left. She's basically running on fumes. She was already manic and we've been keeping her seriously off balance." She smiled at me in a way I didn't like. "Series of poor decisions, things she didn't prepare for and running into a more competent opponent means defeat is inevitable, and now she knows it." Her smile turned cruel. "There's nothing she can do but run down the clock."
There was a blast from the courtyard as a rebuild mortar sent a shell high into the air. It detonated in an almost soundless ripple that was barely visible until it encountered the fields of Grue's darkness. The black smoke was boiled away like cotton candy in a blast furnace. Some secondary effect of the blast caught my motoroid, spiking it into the ground. It also tore apart my drones, effectively cutting off our visual link to the courtyard.
Brian was the first to speak in the face of the now blank screen. "Uh, what the hell?"
"She didn't have that before." Tattletale's voice had no small measure of concern in it. I shifted to the sensors of my half buried motoroid as I prepared to fabricate more drones. The conscripts were edging away from a hastily constructed series of launchers clustered in the center of the courtyard. It looked like Bakuda had taken every piece of equipment we'd damaged and mashed it into one giant assembly of rockets and mortar barrels.
"Someone's been busy." I kept the concern out of my voice as I analyzed the potential firepower of that assembly.
"No." Tattletale frantically shifted her eyes from the screen to me and then back again. "She should barely be functional. We've been hitting every button of her trigger. There's no way she could have been coherent enough to be able to manage this."
The statement dragged me out of my highly concerned analysis. "Wait, that's what you were doing? Going after her trigger?"
"Yes?" She answered defensively. No one here seemed that comfortable with the concept. Seeing that reaction she pressed on to defend herself. "I know it seems cruel, but we needed to keep her distracted."
"It's not cruel, it's stupid." I pointed at the device on the screen. "You've been... Fuck, no I'm a party to this as well. We've been pushing a God damn chaos tinker into her Sechen range all night!"
"Senchen range?" Taylor asked in a concerned tone.
"It's a theory." Tattletale answered quickly. "The idea that powers get stronger if you're in a situation closer to what happened when you triggered."
"It's not a theory. You've been strengthening her connection to her passenger with every one of those stupid insults and now we have to deal with the consequences. Fuck, she probably doesn't even understand what she's built there."
"Passenger?" I ignored Taylor's question. Without the darkness we were badly exposed. If I didn't get something in the air soon we would be sitting ducks for the next barrage. I flash fabricated five more drones and sent them on a blazing path towards the courtyard.
As soon as they crested the rubble a rocket launched up from the mass of weaponry and veered towards my drones. She had never used tracking systems on her rockets before, but with an attuned chaos tinker there was nothing we could rule out. Taking no chances I directed a drone on a straight suicide run towards the projectile.
The rocket detonated, but not in a conventional blast. A mess of black crystals flew out of the warhead in a cloud of shrapnel. They tore through the eggshell thin casings of the remaining drones like paper, but the real threat didn't start until they hit the ground.
I almost hated my materials and nanoengineering knowledge because it let me tell exactly what was coming. The crystals hit the ground as the seed for a fresh lattice and immediately began pulling in material for expansion. Rather than the towering mass I had seen earlier these grew like brambles, thick jagged twists of angular dark stone. What was worse, somehow Bakuda had made the reaction exothermic. I could see the heat distortion in the air around and between the strands of crystal and even some small fires sprouting on the ground nearby.
They were also advancing, and advancing quickly at that. The momentum of their impact had created a growth vector for the strands and we were staring down a forest of rapidly expanding crystal spears set to completely overrun us.
Without thinking I dug into my reagents and grabbed every copy of my last resort dark alchemy formula. Two drams of grease and a measure of gunpowder. My strongest attack formula, Explosion's older brother, Nitro.
Despite the feelings of desperation I took care when mixing the reagents, cultivating the energy for the maximum effect available to me. The micromanipulators on my hands allowed insane precision during the process and I drew on every shred of supporting knowledge my power had provided me.
When I threw down the mixture in the face of the burning forest of stone it flew into the approaching mass with a titanic detonation. The advance slowed, but kept coming. Fortunately I had been able to recognize enough of the effect to know one formula wouldn't be able to save us. I launched another one, and another. One after another six of my most powerful alchemical mixtures exploded against the abomination of material science. The final detonation was close enough to nearly take me off my feet, but the encroachment finally stalled with only a few meters to spare.
My efforts had bought us a pocket of safety in a burning nest of crystal. The sides had closed in behind us, effectively pinning us down. The heat didn't bother me thanks to my reinforcement, but it was clearly seriously uncomfortable for the rest of the Undersiders. Even Angelica looked unhappy, though that was probably more to do with being penned in than due to the radiating heat.
My motoroid was still trying to free itself from a pile of rubble without impairing our view of the clearly unhinged Bakuda. Too far for audio reception, but she was undoubtedly pleased with the results. Something else launched from the assembly and I feared a second missile before recognizing one of Leet's snitches. It soared away from the courtyard until we could spot it through a gap in the crystal canopy. Bakuda didn't seems at all disappointed with our survival and instead happily went to work on the apparatus.
My mind raced as I tried to figure a way out of the situation. The situation I had caused, or at least been a party to. Even for someone as twisted as Bakuda I hadn't been comfortable digging into her college trauma. I was nearly two years from my first breakdown and those memories still felt fresh and painful. Imagining my own state barely a month after it and well, Bakuda's instability made a lot more sense.
That low blow hadn't served to accomplish anything and in fact had proved to work against us. Effectively we dumped a probable chaos tinker who was consumed with rage and running enhanced powers on top of a pile of damaged highly advanced equipment of their own design and somehow thought of it as a victory. Judging by the power of the first two explosives I had little hope for our survival against the full barrage.
Retreat was definitely the best option here. I still had Escape formulas prepared, but my experience with that effect wasn't that comprehensive. I could probably manage two additional people, any more would be risky. That left two to escape on Angelica with Alec hopefully being able to take care of himself.
The problem with that plan was the complete lack of an escape route for Angelica. I didn't know the exact limits of how high Bitch's dogs could jump, but reaching the top of the crystal hedges wouldn't be enough. She'd have to clear it completely, plus deal with the heat being emitted. Judging from the shimmer above the crystals even if Angelica could endure the conditions there was a decent chance that anyone on her back would be flash cooked.
As I rapidly considered my options the Celestial Forge connected to the Crafting constellation for what was perhaps the most generic and far reaching power I'd ever encountered. It was called Masterwork Craftsman and it made me exceptionally skilled at crafting... things. That was it. Things. Anything that counted as a thing was covered by this power. How skilled was I? Literally the worst I could ever produce was masterwork quality, as in the product of a master who had devoted his life to the craft. That was now my 'phone it in' level.
I watched Taylor try to send her remaining alchemical insects through, over or around the crystals. Unfortunately I was proved to be exactly correct regarding the intensity of the heat. The crystals may have stopped growing, but they were still radiating tremendous amounts of thermal energy. Nothing that she could summon or that I could conjure was making it through that mess alive. Any hope of repeating our opening strike was completely out the window.
Brian was talking hurriedly to Tattletale and Bitch was working to keep Angelica calm. Taylor gave me a hopeful look and I made my decision.
Thanks to blunting their growth with my formulas the crystals hadn't extended nearly as far behind us. There was a decent chance I could blaze a trail. My sword would be able to handle the heat and could extend the reach of its blade thanks to the HF capacitor and shockwave runes. The effect would be more precise than trying to blast our way out, which could easily backfire on us or see me run out of formulas before we were clear.
"Hold on," The group turned their attention to me. I swallowed before continuing. "I think I can deal with this."
Even with all the upgrades I'd built into it my sword might not be enough. Luckily I had something that might take it over the top. I drew a formula consisting of a piece of quartz crystal and a slip of iron and mixed them together. The assembled capes watched as the Energize formula glowed and flowed into my weapon. It wouldn't last long, but the formula would rapidly pull alchemical energy into the weapon, enhancing every aspect of its performance to an incredible degree.
I held out my now glowing pistol and activated the fabricator for my customized omni-blade. That was the moment I realized my mistake. I understood how manufacture by my omni-tool counted as building something for the purpose of my powers, but I honestly didn't expect that to extend to my pistol's blade mount. It wasn't really crafting, it just churned out the same tool every time. Regardless, the fact that it was manufactured out of omni-gel meant it counted and I had a split second to decide, five copies or bigger manufacture.
I chose 'bigger' solely to keep four loose monomolecular blades from flying loose of the assembly. So instead of killing the Undersiders with carbide shrapnel my pistol manifested a sword that could be best described as a surf board with a handle.
That wasn't an exaggeration. The thing was over eight feet long. I had to shift to a two handed grip just to maintain some semblance of control on it. The mass field of the comparatively tiny projectile weapon was pushing itself to the breaking point just to keep the mess together. I had a matter of seconds before this went to hell.
But there was more going on than just a size increase. My latest power decided now was the time to make itself known. The runes along the blade had been printed and thus were usually of middling power with most of the enchantment provided by the body of the pistol. They were more for continuity of effect and would probably have been rendered useless by the size increase, compromising the enchantment of the entire weapon and reducing it to junk. Runes are complicated and you can't just photocopy them at 120% for a power boost.
The thing was, with my new power I was physically incapable of producing junk. Not only were the runes corrected for the new scale of the weapon, but their quality and detail was increased by the level of my new mastery. The sword itself, already an excellent weapon, was further refined and actually subtly adjusted for its new size. It was about as well designed as a sword the size of a motorcycle could be.
That's what led to my current situation. Runes scale with the weapon. Both the affinity of the weapon for the element and the physical size of it. Masterwork Craftsman had ensured the blade was optimally designed for wind affinity. The size of the weapon could handle more magical energy than anything I'd constructed before. The consequence was such a concentration of wind magic that just holding it at the ready was producing vortices on the ground around me, catching my coat in the gusts and causing the Undersiders to edge away from me.
The dangerous glow that was building as the Energize formula pulled in more and more power probably didn't help.
I looked at my display of the courtyard to see Bakuda gaping at her own display. I turned to glance up at the snitch and she bolted upright. Frantically she started hammering controls on the assembly of artillery. I watched helplessly as the last of the munitions were armed and, with the throw of a final switch, three dozen flavors of death came flying towards us.
I had absolutely no idea if this would work. I had never dreamed of going this far into runecraft. I hadn't even used the Energize formula before. What I did know is that if I didn't do something immediately none of us were likely to get out of this alive.
The sword was heavy. Even with the wind runes and mass fields there was a level of inertia intrinsic to its bulk that couldn't be ignored. The limited leverage afforded by the pistol grip didn't help things. Survey stressed the meager mass fields of my omni-tool to assist with the swing and try to hold the weapon on target. I overloaded the HF resonant capacitor to the point of burnout and released every spark of alchemical energy into that swing. I felt muscles scream as I struggled with a power I never thought I would hold in my hands.
I swung the sword.
The night split in half.
I watched it happen from an island of calm inside a maelstrom of destruction. The slash of the blade tore an arc of baleful energy that exploded up from our position into the night. I don't know if it actually cut a line through the clouds or just looked like I did, but that was only because I was distracted by the devastation being wrought around me.
The crystal thorns split as a horizontal line burned through them. Then the split became meaningless as the shockwave of the slice caught up with the initial cut and tore the crystals apart. The same pattern repeated with the clustered munitions. A plane of absolute destruction obliterating anything it touched, followed by the kind of blast you only saw in footage of atomic tests. The bombs didn't even have time to detonate. The ones that weren't reduced to scattered components had the residue of their effects torn away into the sky in a dozen trails of crackling energy.
The impact on the facility was comparatively minor, but considering what it was being compared to that wasn't saying much. Tornado-force winds tore across the ground sending people and equipment flying. The crystal forest was reduced to shards and spread like caltrops over the wreckage. The Undersiders were spared the worst of it, but even the diminished effects sent Taylor colliding into my back. Tattletale ended up sprawled on the ground while Grue clung to Angelica. Rachel was directing her to grip the ground with her claws, providing a much needed point of stability in the chaos
As soon as things settled enough for me to coordinate the action I collapsed the blade, managing it mere seconds before the mass field and energy cell of the pistol would have burned out. The excess omni-gell from the massively oversized weapon vented out as a cloud of glowing orange vapor that flowed across the ground. I held up the pistol and ejected the badly overheated thermal clip which pulsed an angry red and hissed as it hit the rubble.
The Undersiders were looking at me with shock and amazement. All except for Tattletale. From the look in her eye I could tell. She knew. She knew I hadn't expected that to happen, that I had been managing the effects by the seat of my pants, that I was as surprised by the result as anyone else.
She wasn't just looking at me with amazement. The expression she gave me contained no small amount of fear.
I was saved from having to deal with that by Brian taking the initiative. He guided Bitch into the group after she'd been edging Angelica back. Taylor had basically gone stock still until Brian helped Tattletale up and pulled the team back into a semblance of functionality. Finally he approached me and said what were probably the first words spoken in the facility since my counter attack.
"Thank you. Seriously."
I nodded in response as the sentiment was echoed by the rest of the group, though the shock still hadn't completely worn off. Taylor looked up at the rainbow of still burning explosive effects my slash had carved into the sky, then shook her head.
We followed Grue on the way back to the center of the facility. The five of us approached the thoroughly shaken inhabitants of the courtyard. Bakuda was struggling to pull herself up by the now depleted improvised artillery. There was a sense of hopelessness throughout our opponents. Some of the ABB members still had the odd grenade, but no one wanted to try their luck. On top of everything else Bakuda was still erratically twitching, showing whatever Regent was trying to do was still happening.
There was a sense of cautious relief that slowly spread through the group. Our enemy was broken, her weapons depleted, her allies disheartened, and her support gone. There were no more standoffs, no mind games, no sneaking around trying to get an edge. We had done it. We could finally end this madness.
A sudden siren echoed through the courtyard accompanied by an all-encompassing flash of blinding light. Silhouettes were just visible through the radiance and a voice cried out over the din.
"Challenger Approaching! A new foe has appeared!"
Fanfare played as the glare faded, revealing over a dozen figures clustered around Bakuda. Front and center was a bulky man in mismatched pieces of technological armor and a skinny figure in a blue and yellow jumpsuit with various gadgets strapped to it, including a katana slung across his back. The rest of the figures were an assembly of men in an erratic arrangement of outfits. I spotted an orc, some blue space armor, something that looked like a rubber suit for a power ranger's villain, multiple military uniforms, a badly made robot suit, and a Roman legionary.
Uber and Leet were back, and this time they brought their henchmen. Their sorry assembly of henchmen who seemed to be outfitted in whatever RTS gear they had on hand. Some of it was potentially dangerous if it worked, but they had phased out henchmen tinker tech ages ago. I had no idea what they thought they could accomplish here.
I was getting more than a little fed up with this mess. I was tired and getting low on reagents. I had almost fried my pistol. My motoroid was only now extracting itself from being spiked into rubble. I'd had my awareness tour through more medical procedures than I'd ever wanted to know existed. And after all that I now had to deal with these clowns again. I had no idea who put them up to this, but I was ready to put them down.
A couple of henchmen helped Bakuda to her feet and handed her a headset and more concerningly a pair of cases that they were handling very delicately. At least I was more concerned about the cases until I heard the tinker speak into the headset.
"Yes, alright, just put her on." She adjusted the headset and pulled a new grenade launcher from the case. "Fucking fine. I don't care. I've had it. Just give me the timing."
I shared a worried glance with Tattletale as Leet worked something on a device on his wrist. It seemed the ABB's new thinker had entered the match. Leet launched something into the sky and a set of words appeared with Uber reading them out in his annoyingly over-dramatic voice.
"Round two, fight!"
Jumpchain abilities this chapter:
Engineer (Super Mario RPG) 300:
You're more adept at coming up with novel and creative objects. Any blueprint can be held perfectly in your mind without needing to draw it on paper.
Master Craftsman (Forgotten Realms) 300:
You are exceptionally skilled at crafting things. At your worst, your results are masterwork.