Brockton's Celestial Forge

by Lord Roustabout

The Celestial Forge is the greatest combination of crafting powers in Jumpchain, meaning it is the greatest combination of crafting abilities in all of fiction. In Brockton Bay a forgotten side character's trigger event ends with him linked to the Celestial Forge rather than his intended shard. His expanding collection of tinker abilities drag him into the city's cape conflicts.

45. 38 Build Up - Preamble Leet Addendum Rey

Preamble Leet

Leet slowly cracked an eye open at the buzz of the alarm clock. The red numbers flashed at him in the artificial darkness of the room. He took a few frustrated breaths as the discordant beeping echoed around the room before finally reaching over to turn the damn thing off.

He shifted sluggishly, he climbed to his feet and turned on the lights. Three hours didn't seem like enough time to really rest, but it had been working. Largely working. The last time he tried to set up an alternate sleep schedule he had been near psychotic within three days, and that was with Jeff helping him every step of the way.

Just like Jeff always did.

Leet shook his head and put that out of his mind. Despite the reduced sleep he was at least functional. Sleeping nine hours out of every forty-two freed up a huge amount of time, even if it tended to leave him irritable and a bit foggy in the head. He really owed May for helping him with the timing.

God, she was like something out of a dream. A longtime fan shows up with strong powers and the solution to all your problems. It was like something out of a bad escapist anime or any of the post- Kyushu derivatives, right down to her being a damn teenager. Still, Leet had enough experience in the cape scene to know not to underestimate someone based on their age, particularly if they were a thinker.

Thinker. Leet shook his head as he shifted off the cot and moved into the rest of his workshop. This wasn't his main workshop. That had been disassembled when they had to scatter. Once again, May had given them a heads up on that. This place didn't have any of the little touches he had grown comfortable with, but that was probably for the best.

May had explained things to them. He wasn't sure if he really believed her, not until after that first fight. It was unbelievable the difference it made. So much of his power, the decay, the loss of options, the persistent failures, he had attributed it to the cursed nature of his tinker specialty. It wasn't until he came back from that fight, a desperate battle where he actually gave as well as he got, and all the conflicts leading up to it, that he really felt the difference. Agents and Sechen ranges were real, and incredibly significant.

To that end, maybe this was better. Things were… well, not universally better, but at least they weren't universally worse. The unfamiliar environment, the feeling of being on the back foot all the time, the desperate need for that new idea, it brought him closer to what it was like when he got his powers. Even the lack of a normal sleep schedule was part of that.

He sighed. For that, for a power that was actually usable again, he could live with some little discomforts. Looking around the sterile and professionally laid out workshop nobody would expect it belonged to Leet. But then again, what did people expect from Leet? Probably a basement choked with cheeto dust and mountain dew cans, covered in overpriced gaming merchandise with most of the space going towards TVs and game systems.

Maybe at the beginning, back when he had been careless and stupid. When he didn't know about the golden goose he was bleeding dry with each new invention. No, his lab was as professional as any tinker on the east coast. Maybe not as good as Armsmaster's, but the man had the advantage of his specialization to fall back on. He didn't have to obsessively categorize everything he'd ever built to check for potential overlap, or calculate failure models whenever he considered a new piece of technology.

That had been what Leet's lab was focused on. A massively organized system to try to squeeze the final drops of blood from the stone that was his power. He missed it, missed the security that it provided, but it honestly wasn't anywhere as necessary as it had been. Just looking around he could feel it. All those dead ends, the branches that he was convinced would never bear fruit again, they were blossoming to life. He had potential again, and he wasn't about to waste it.

He cracked open a can of Red Bull to try to banish the last of the cobwebs of sleep in his mind. While he sipped the carbonated battery acid he booted up one of his terminals to check the latest news reports. A frown formed on his face as he saw the feed.

Apeiron. Every story had to mention that tinker. There was just no way around it. Cape Blackout retrospective? Mention Apeiron. Report on Brockton Bay conflict? Mention Apeiron. Assessment of regional power shifts? Mention Apeiron. Story about Uber and Leet? Of course they mention Apeiron.

Leet paused on that one and brought up the link. It was from some California university. A local project that had gotten wider recognition. It was from a photography course, and the topic had been the image that tinker had posted to earn his 'Verified Cape' tag. The project had been about Apeiron, his image capture technology and the technique he had used, but the subject of the image wasn't Apeiron's work. It was his.

One of the students had decided to print out that picture as a mural and set it up on one of the walls of the campus. Like everything Apeiron touched it looked unbelievably majestic, but this time it was his own work that served as the focus of the piece.

Seeing it in the real world really drove home how grand that battle had been. This wasn't one of Uber and Leet's classic losses. Seeing it framed in the mural made it look like a clash of titans. Apharmd and Temjin weathered a rain of firepower that would have devastated any lesser works. Glowing shots bounced off of his protective barriers like a judgement from above. Apeiron had managed to catch an exact moment with Temjin shifting to a combat stance and Apharmd opening up with its artillery. The final effect was better than anything that had been put together for their own promotional shots. Hell, it looked better than the actual game did.

Skimming the comments, he saw the opinion was shared. A warm feeling ran through him at the discussion of Virtual On, the history of the game, where you could play it, and the possibility of a new installment. More than that, they were talking about him and Jeff. Actually, for the first time in years they were talking about him without focusing on Jeff.

He'd been seeing more of that. PHO actually had 'Uber and Leet Respect' threads, and they weren't just about how he was the dead weight in the partnership. People were seriously talking about his technology for the first time in years. Sure, it was mostly to talk about how impressive it was that Apeiron had been able to counter it, but that didn't change the fact that they were actually impressed with his work.

He switched over to PHO and checked the forum for mentions. His heart soared at what he saw on the Vs boards. "Uber and Leet vs Triumvirate". Okay, nobody was predicting a decisive victory, but he actually had people arguing that his work would be able to hold out against Legend, Alexandria, or even Eidolon. As impossible as it seemed people were actually making cases for how they could, in the right circumstances, beat a member of the Triumvirate.

He sat back in contemplation. This, it was everything he had wanted. Power, recognition, respect, it was all here. He was still playing second fiddle to an upstart, but so was everyone else in the city. In fact, he was specifically playing second fiddle. As in the assessments went Apeiron, Leet, and then everyone else. People were ranking him ahead of Armsmaster and on a level close to Dragon.

Sure, it didn't happen exactly the way he imagined, but still seemed good enough. Leet's entire career had been a story of one compromise after another. Normally they were made in a desperate bid to stay relevant, to stop his power from completely failing. This compromise, it didn't even feel like a compromise. Second to a tinker who broke all the rules, that was enough right?

Maybe he should talk to Jeff about it. It had been so easy to get caught up in things. May was extremely convincing and she KNEW things, important things. Listening to her had made this possible, but did they really want to keep going? If they bailed now they might still have a chance. Set up somewhere else, leverage their new reputation, and start over.

It had already cost them so much. Not just the old hideout. Their reputation was completely upended after the storage battle. It was nice to be taken seriously, but being associated with the worst of that night's events… Yeah, they had been complicit, but they hadn't been the ones orchestrating it. The cost from that mess was still being felt.

Their staff had needed to be vetted following the rescue. They hadn't been happy to be dragged into that mess, and had been even less pleased when they got the full context of the event. Leet was well aware of how the public regarded being reduced to henchmanning for Uber and Leet.

It was kind of a joke, even within their organization. They didn't have any territory that needed defending, and weren't exactly pulling jobs that needed someone to be an expert in their field. Most of their help were guys who were one step away from homelessness and needed whatever they could get. That's why it hurt so much to see the ranks dwindle.

Some left before they could even start the vetting, but the rest of them to be evaluated by Jeff and May. So many of the old guard had to be cut.. Mason. Frank. Even Reg, who had been with them pretty much since the start.

Leet missed Reg. The guy was careening past middle age when he joined and basically used henchmen work to make up for the complete lack of a retirement package or work placement for someone of his experience and skill set. He was probably the last person you would expect to be on staff for a couple of video game villains, but he always took things in stride. He was also a supportive and calming influence during the worst of their screw ups.

The idea of explaining what they'd done at the storage lot, what they'd been a part of, Leet had been dreading it. But that never came. Jeff and May cut him as a security risk at the same time they abandoned the old base. Now they were down to recent recruits like Gerry, people with no history of influence, and who Jeff assured would be able to go along with their new direction.

He needed to talk to Jeff about that 'new direction'. Jeff was always good at talking Leet around to things, but Jeff was good at everything when he wanted to be. Normally he would have been fine following his friend's lead, but this was different. They were flying high for the moment, but anyone could tell it wouldn't last. Apparently Apeiron was tangling with Dragon. The heat would only grow from there. Even if they could handle it, where would they be when it was over? What would they be?

He finished downing his caffeine and began working out how to approach the topic when there was a brief knock at the door which then swung open without waiting for a response. A tiny Japanese teenager skipped into his workshop with a rabbit mask under one arm and a small box held in the other hand. March moved with the casual irreverence with which she had inserted herself into their lives. He was about to ask her to leave when he saw what she was holding.

"Where did you find that?" His voice was cold as he took in the familiar cover art on the case.

The girl just smiled as she held it up. "They had a copy at a used game place down on Langdon street." She offered the cursed thing to him. "I know it's hard to deal with, but stuff that's important to your trigger can help you connect with your powers. I figured after Tuesday night you might appreciate the boost."

The word 'appreciate' was probably the furthest thing from Leet's mind as he looked down at the box in his hand. Crisp, professional, triple A title with quotes praising its quality scattered over the cover.

'Cecil McHenry's Alpha Strike'

He didn't even remember taking it from her. Just holding it, seeing it this close was stirring up a storm of emotions that overshadowed all his previous thoughts. Leet didn't know if it was bringing him closer to his agent or his trigger or whatever, but it certainly brought back things he'd rather keep buried.

May leaned in as he stared at the game. "Everyone always wondered why you never did anything from the Alpha Strike series. I would never have guessed it was because it was yours."

"It's not mine." He answered in a hard voice. The girl just brushed it off.

"You know what I meant. It was just something people wondered about when you covered other Aleph games." She smiled dreamily. "Most people don't have that possibility. Born too late. You're lucky like that."

Lucky. Leet held back a flinch at the near physical sting of the word. This stupid game. What would his life have been like if he never heard about it? If they never decided to import it. If he didn't run into an instant classic, mega hit, genre defining, masterpiece game with his name on it?

How were you supposed to deal with that? Before that… well, he could barely remember. He had been happy, or at least content. He certainly hadn't been obsessing over his Aleph alternate, trying to figure out the slight changes that lead to him being an entry level I.T. worker in one universe and a rockstar game designer in the other.

Without that he never would have decided to found his own studio. He never would have experienced that slow, horribly dragged-out failure as they desperately tried to come up with anything that would work. Jeff wouldn't have been wearing a dozen hats as they lost people from what passed for their marketing, accounting, finance, testing, and legal departments.

And it wouldn't have come to a head with that last moment. The half-baked game barely ready for release that might have let them tide things over, until they received the cease and desist order. A declaration that his name couldn't be on the title. He didn't have the rights to his own name. That other him, the version whose only crime had been existing as something he couldn't match was suddenly in his life, looming over him and snatching away the last hope he had.

He forced his clenched hand to release. It wasn't pleasant, but that was the point. That was what May had told them about. They could be comfortable bumbling villains slowly sliding towards irrelevance, or they could step up, away from what they used to and try to actually make a name for themselves. The name Leet, not Cecil. Aleph could have that one. He would make do with his own.

"Thanks." He forced himself to say the word as he set the game on a worktable with a shaking hand. "It, it might help." He turned back towards the girl. "Anything else?"

"Yep." She replied in a light voice. "Bakuda. She wanted to talk with you. I said you'd call after you woke up." The girl scrunched her nose. "She complained about the sleep schedule, but I said I wasn't going to wake you early."

The prospect of that hit Leet harder that he expected. The sleep schedule was working, but just barely. The idea of losing even an hour of sleep felt like an unimaginable disaster, and he felt an instant wave of gratitude towards May for putting the other tinker off.

"Thank you for that." He sighed. "I better get this over with. Any idea what she wants?"

The Japanese girl shrugged, sliding up to sit on the edge of a workbench. "Probably more technology exchanges. She's trying to get ready for the upcoming operation."

Leet nodded and activated the VoIP system he had set up when he moved into this lab. As the call connected he shifted his attention to other projects. Bakuda was just plain stressful to deal with, and any level of distraction during the call would be a godsend.

"Finally. Did you have a nice nap there sleeping beauty?" The voice that came from the computer speakers was the girl's natural voice, not the electronic filter she had used in public. As such it came across as demanding, petulant, and massively entitled. He wasn't sure if she had a naturally whiney voice, or just couldn't filter herself, but without the electronic voice changer she would never have been taken seriously on the battlefield, no matter how many hostages she had.

"Yeah, I don't want to hear that from someone who needed twenty hours to sleep off her loss on Saturday." He smiled slightly as he heard her choke over her words.

"Well maybe if you knew half as much about medical tech as you claimed it wouldn't have taken so long."

"Excuse me? Claimed? It was still good enough to hold you together with two and a half severed limbs. And you were the one begging to see my medical work, and my scanning work, and my communications work, and…"

"Well I figured you'd want to see how a real tinker would build that stuff. Show you what it looks like to make something without more defects than features."

"Defects like how your scanning bombs were going to steal all of Apeiron's secrets. How many did you get? Oh, right. None."

"Don't blame your fuckups on me. You weren't complaining about how those worked on Armsmaster's lab, and if your stealth tech had stood up to Apeiron maybe the plan would have held together."

"Right, and if you had let me have a spatial destruct bomb rather than my own model then Apeiron wouldn't have walked out of that crater. But no, you wanted everything on your launch platform. How did that work out again?"

"I don't know, I wasn't the one who got my head handed to me on a live broadcast. How did that feel anyway?"

Leet's stomach fell as he remembered how it had felt in that fight, the hopelessness as everything he brought to bear was countered effortlessly. Apeiron had seemed like an invincible opponent, an impassable obstacle. Was there even a point in maintaining this conflict?

May leaned forward from her place on the workbench, enjoying her spectator position to the now familiar rounds of arguments. The movement of her body revealed the image Apeiron had posted, displayed on the screen behind her. It was a reminder of how far he had come. He might be flailing against Apeiron, but he was doing better than anyone else.

"Is there a point to this, or did you just miss my company?"

Bakuda scoffed through the line. "You wish. I need you to send over some more of your junked stealth tech to see if I can do something with it. I've already finished the analysis of the data from your last fuck up, so I'll send a copy of that, let you see how a proper tinker works. Oh, and try not to screw up next time. I know this is a joke to you but some of us actually take this seriously."

Despite the barely veiled insults Leet smiled. Bakuda would rather eat one of her own explosions that admit to a collaboration, but she on some level knew their relationship was give and take. While the bomb tinker could work at a prodigious rate she didn't have the resources of a tinker who had been rebuilding his gear on a weekly basis for years. Now that he could actually rely on his old inventions he had warehouses of equipment to call on, something Bakuda had to respect as she scrambled to rebuild from one disastrous expenditure after another.

It was kind of ironic. Bakuda's specialty was designed to accommodate disposable technology and has a construction speed to match, but she was finding herself overextended. He had been increasingly conservative throughout his career, but the moment he started to get reckless with his technology was the moment his backlog became viable, meaning he had a resource pool that dwarfed Bakuda's in both volume and versatility.

"I'll send some over. Maybe it'll stop Apeiron from dropping another pair of battlesuits on top of you."

"Worry about yourself. If you can't come back with some decent data this time I don't have time to bother with you."

"Sure, like you ever do."

"Whatever."

"Fine."

He cut the call to see May grinning at him. When he raised an eyebrow she smiled even wider.

"You two are so cute together." She crooned.

Leet rolled his eyes. "Please. I'm not into college age crazy chicks, and I'm pretty sure she feels the same."

"Doesn't matter." May sung. "Your agents are having the best time together. They'll keep nudging you together until something happens."

His stomach clenched at the suggestion. To Leet, that sounded more like a threat than an enticement. He suppressed a shudder as he stood from his computer. A lot of what May has said worked out, and made even more sense after Saturday, but she seemed to have an almost religious confidence in the principles she espoused. It made him uneasy at times.

"I'm going to check on Jeff, see what we need for the next job."

May nodded at his words and trailed after him as he left the lab.

Bakuda's digs about their last job still stung. It had been going so well, right up to the last moment. Once again, it was on him. He had hesitated, fucked up, and blown their chance. Just like so many other times, only he couldn't blame it on a tech failure. It had been entirely his own weakness.

At the start of that fight they had felt like gods. That wasn't an exaggeration. Against what Faultline's Crew could bring against them it was like someone had typed IDDQD in Doom. The whole enterprise was a lesson in what happened when the new Uber and Leet fought anyone who wasn't Apeiron.

Apeiron could break layered force fields, weather insane amounts of damage, and pull new tricks out of nowhere. Compared to that, Faultline's Crew failed on every level. Newter couldn't touch them, Spitfire might as well have been using a super soaker, and Faultline herself couldn't come close to Uber in melee and did even worse at range. Gregor was almost a threat in terms of battlefield control, but with May's advice and his own prep the Case 53 had been trivial to contain and work around.

That just left Labyrinth. The only thing close to a challenge and the objective of the entire mess. May had seen through her weakness, and all it took was driving her out of the area to which she'd attuned herself, and suddenly she was helpless.

That was where he'd fucked up. He'd gotten the scans of her power in action, he'd gotten the readings of her body. All they needed was the data from the invasive examination. He'd had her cornered. The probe was ready. One stab was all it would take.

He'd choked. He couldn't go through with it. Then Gregor had slipped past them and laid down enough foam to block her off. With the Protectorate active and May's assurance that the National Guard would be moving out soon they bailed with what they had. A bare fraction of the data they set out for.

It had happened before, more times than he could count. It's just the hesitation usually went hand in hand with some other failure that covered it up.

There were parts of being a villain that were hard to handle. When they started they agreed on limits, on how far they would go. That had been back when they thought they had all the power in the world. Build anything and do anything. Morals and standards were the first thing to be compromised when you didn't have the strength to back them up. And like everything, Jeff had managed that better than him.

Jeff could handle any technique to perfection. That included compartmentalization and emotional resistance techniques. No matter how bad things got he was always able to push through, keep his cool, and manage the aftermath. He never ended up vomiting in the bathroom after a particularly brutal or bloody mission.

He had tried to help Leet, but like with so many things Leet just couldn't keep up. No matter what they tried, whether mental discipline training, exposure therapy, or even KGB anti-interrogation techniques he always seemed to be five steps behind. Never able to put his emotions aside and focus on the job at hand.

The Grand Theft Auto run had been the worst. Leet had wanted to focus on stealing cars. After all, Grand Theft Auto should be about grand theft auto. As usual, Jeff had talked him out of it. Carjacking wasn't cinematic, so they wouldn't get the online audience. Even though Downtown was full of expensive cars they also had expensive trackers and security systems. They might be able to grab them, but they would never be able to flip them. It would just be hijack and joyride, and nothing people couldn't see anywhere else. Finally, they would be stealing from the people who went to Protectorate fundraisers. A dozen people constantly complaining about them to the city's heroes and suddenly they'd have the Protectorate needing to make an example of them.

Carjacking wasn't what was iconic about GTA, beating up prostitutes was. Leet had suggested a dozen options, from holograms to androids, and Uber had shot them all down. Couldn't waste the tech for something that petty. Even the basic holograms, the old ones that would have matched the graphics of GTA3 got rejected. Instead they had gone out into the docks and attacked any street walkers they came across.

Leet didn't like it, but he had never been able to talk Jeff around. Even before he got his power there had been a gap. Maybe if he just admitted he wouldn't be able to handle it, things could have been different, but instead they had embarked on the worst received job of their entire career.

Once again, it was Leet who fucked it up. He cornered a working girl, one who had looked like a decent target from a distance, but up close, looking up from where she'd been knocked down on the curb, it was another story. She was young, too young for that kind of work, and the look in her eyes…

Leet had hesitated. The girl had seen her chance and taken it. One kick to his crotch, captured for the world, and the failure of his weapon management system sending emulated knives and bats across the ground. Jeff hauled him out of there, but it was still a damn mess. All because he couldn't put aside his emotions like Jeff could.

Speaking of, he found Jeff in one of the smaller workshops with a disassembled motorcycle frame propped up in the middle of an explosion of parts. "New hobby?" He asked upon entering.

His friend smirked at him and nodded to May. "Nah. Figured I'd get some basics set up in case we wanted to go with a motorcycle theme, you know, Meet Apeiron half way."

Leet bit back his reaction at the statement. This kind of thing had happened more often as time went on. At first he handled all the equipment, but as he became less reliable Uber had to cover more of the bases, usually with a trip to Best Buy and a construction blitz afterwards. He shook the feeling off.

"What are you thinking? Something like Full Throttle?" Looking over the parts that didn't seem to match up.

"More towards Motor Raid or something like that." He gestured towards the screens where various futuristic or Japanese motorcycles were displayed. Usually promotional pictures, but a few 'on the street' pics as well. One in particular stood out quite prominently.

"Like that, huh?" Leet asked, pointing at the monitor in question. Uber was shameless in his response.

"Hey, someone restores a Suzuki from the golden age of Japanese video games, of course I'm going to reference it." He said with a grin.

"Right, the Suzuki. That's what everyone's looking at. And also why it's featured on 'Brockton Boardwalk Babes', right?" The two capes shared an irreverent look, much to May's amusement.

The picture in question did indeed have a completely restored Suzuki motorcycle, but the focus was on the incredibly stacked girl in pink leathers and a matching helmet posing for the camera. Behind her was the presumed owner of the bike in a motorcycle jacket and full-face helmet, somehow looking stoic despite the company of a woman who put most grid girls to shame.

That was the classic Boardwalk dynamic. Some rich douche cruising by, acting irreverent while showing off to everybody, complete with trophy girlfriend and classic ride. Leet didn't even want to think about how much it would cost to keep a bike like that in parts. Japanese bikes were famous for their status as either time or money sinks, and Leet doubted someone like that was doing their own maintenance work.

"We have something lined up for after the next job?" He asked generally towards May and Jeff. They shook their heads.

"More of a passing idea." Jeff admitted. "Motorcycles are catching on, so I wanted to get ahead of the curve."

"Plus, Apeiron might not be a problem by the time you get back." May replied cheerfully. Uber and Leet shared a look at that, but decided not to comment. There was a mutual doubt that things would go any better for the combined ABB than they had for them, but it had been made very clear that staying out of ABB business would be good for their long-term prospects. Despite the fact that their trick with the Virtuaroids had accomplished its primary goal of distracting Protectorate attention, they were maintaining the narrative of just being hired on by May.

The ABB didn't owe them anything. Lung didn't owe them anything, and even suggesting such a thing would not be good for anyone involved. May knew how to manage things, and Leet had trusted her and Jeff's discretion when dealing with the warlord.

"Oh, come on." She teased upon seeing their reaction. When they didn't relent she made an exaggerated pout. "Fine, doubt me." She let out a sigh and turned to Jeff. "You finished what we talked about?"

"Yep," He answered standing up, "wrapped it up this morning."

"What?" Leet asked. Uber just grinned at him.

"Come on, you're going to want to see this." The big cape jumped to his feet and led them out of the room. A couple of turns through the converted warehouse led them to a room with a tarp on the floor, the reek of drying paint, and a massive wall mounted canvas showing a hauntingly familiar scene.

The painting looked almost abstract. The twists of flesh and jagged crystals that seemed to blend into the space around it. Infinite complexity, approximated in a way only Jeff's perfect technique could manage. Even the background was beautifully rendered, with shadows of other masses and the complicated links connected to them.

"Perfect." March's voice was almost reverent as she looked at the massive painting. "That's it. That's exactly it. This is just what I need."

Perfect. Maybe for Uber and March, but not for Leet. Not for what Leet saw. Not the image that burned into his mind when Apeiron's motorcycle crashed. He hadn't understood at the time. Not until they spoke with May. They hadn't known what Apeiron had been working with, or what they had seen.

May had been ecstatic. She told them what it meant, about her own look behind the curtain, at the source of powers. Just one more thing in the terror that was Apeiron's technological prowess.

But Leet had a niggling concern, an uneasiness that came when Uber and March described their visions. Seeing Uber's rendition of the scene it was confirmed.

Leet's vision hadn't been like Uber's, or what March described. He still saw the same construct of crystal and flesh, the same immense scale and sense of connection. But that was the only connection. Those links, the shadows of other forms in the distance that Uber had lovingly rendered, were absent from his vision. Specifically absent. Missing. Lost. Forsaken.

The feeling he got wasn't the sense of power or confidence that Uber or March described. It was confusion, frustration, and loss. The sense that something was missing, that things weren't going the way they should, and the lack of any way to make them right.

It was a feeling Leet was familiar with. Of everything May had said about bringing them closer to their agent, nothing seemed to be as significant as that. As standing in the presence of the source of your powers and feeling the same way it did. Of understanding where it was coming from and what it needed.

It was a connection, one that had been absent or ignored through most of his time as a cape, but was now surging to the forefront. It was something he could work with, and something that could work with him.

"Thank you!" May hugged Jeff in her excitement. "This will make so much difference, you don't even know."

Leet wracked his sleep addled brain trying to remember what this was supposed to be for. "It's something about reinforcements, right?"

May nodded. "Don't want to jinx it, but someone leaving New York is very interested in power mechanics. This might tip things in our favor."

"Won't they just go to Apeiron instead of you?" Jeff asked. May scoffed in response.

"Maybe if anyone could get a hold of him." She said with a derisive expression. "Apeiron had his moment and let it pass. All the power in the world doesn't mean anything if you can't move it at the right time."

Leet didn't like the reference to 'all the power in the world', or how appropriate it sounded regarding Apeiron.

"You need us for any of that?" May shook her head at Jeff.

"No, we're on a tight schedule between the plan for Apeiron and this recruitment. You have the timing for Barrow?"

Leet nodded. "Got it all down. If you're right we should be able to hit him and Blasto's new lab before Lost Garden can mount anything against us."

It was something Leet was actually looking forward to. Sure, it was probably to get them out of the city when Lung made his move against Apeiron so that there wouldn't be any question as to the credit for the attack, but it was a job he was confident he could handle. Compared to Labyrinth there would be no problem going after Barrow. A middle aged man who surrounded himself with teenagers, even with a supposed environmental movement, was sketchy as hell.

This was it. This was the real reason why he was sticking around. He had seen it in the data they pulled from Armsmaster's lab. The scale of his long term projects. Nanothorns. Combat prediction software. An Endbringer early warning system. The kind of projects that changed the face of the world, that defined capes on a national scale.

The kind of projects he could have done. Well, he could have, if he didn't waste his potential with stupid gimmicks.

He had lamented how many branches of technology he had wasted early in his career, how he could have done better with them. Until he saw Armsmaster's data, or Bakuda's dead man encryption he didn't realize just how much better he could have done. He could have been operating at the level of String Theory, and instead he was playing three steps behind Trainwreck.

It just hadn't been possible. Projects like that required resources, funding, and, most importantly, raw data. Early in his career they'd had none of those. Now they had them all. Years of projects were suddenly usable, both in the field and in support of his tinkering. May's timing let him work better and more efficiently, and with Bakuda he finally had the data he needed.

He had thought it didn't matter, that research didn't apply to him. That was before he saw Armsmaster's scans of Clockblocker, Dauntless, and Battery. Bakuda's assessments of Shadow Stalker and Vista. Capes were a gold mine of data just waiting to be exploited.

He only had a few trees he'd stayed away from completely. May and Jeff were pushing for more wet tinkering, something they'd be able to pick up from Blasto's lab. Leet could do that, but it was an unpleasant and nightmarish option. But he had another choice.

Dimensional technology.

With enough work he could match and possibly exceed Professor Haywire. He had scans of Vista and Shadow Stalker. Despite not getting the final samples he had gotten extensive data on Labyrinth, and now Barrow was in their sights. They would take everything the could from him, squeeze every drop of dimensional knowledge possible. And when Leet finally used that tech tree it would be what he was built to make, what he should have made from the start.

A masterpiece.

He already had plans. The digitization disk was only the tip of the iceberg. Every scrap of data improved his plans, and the ABB's swollen reserves fed by March's heists made it possible. He would create a work of tinker tech the likes of which the world had never seen before.

That would be his legacy. Not a game made in another universe. Not a string of failures and exploding technology. Not a man without the spine to be a villain or the will to find another path. A visionary. And inventor. An artist. Leet would succeed in a way that would eclipse all of those little failures.

And the Game Grid would come online.

38 Build Up

I woke wonderfully rested and refreshed in a way only possible with One Thing at a Time. The completely alien feeling of refreshment, energy, and a sense of being ready to face the day infused me in a way that was so discordant it was nearly painful. Fortunately, the scale of what I had to face in that 'face the day' scenario quickly settled over me, bringing the familiar feelings of dread and apprehension that were an essential part of waking up.

I took a few minutes to bask in the dread of my responsibilities before dragging myself out of bed and into my shower. One Thing at a Time had also compressed my sleep into half the usual time, meaning that despite the fact that I was making up for the previous night's sleep deprivation my early bedtime saw me awake at a point that was technically morning, but a time of morning I was more used to seeing from the front that the back. I had half the night to kill before even the most ardent early risers would be awake.

I did take a small amount of pleasure in that. I had hated being forced into the role of a morning person, but it was really more than that. I wasn't just a morning person; I was a super morning person. I could look down on all those lazy people who slept in to the hour of 5:30am. When they were fumbling with the coffee I had already been up for hours and probably rebuilt a quarter of my workshop in that time.

It was a petty victory, but the petty pleasures were often the most reliable. I enjoyed that thought as I got dressed, adding the lab coat that came with my Scrapper power and enjoying the possible placebo effect it had on my focus. I really doubted I would actually get a chance to look down on anyone like that, but knowing I was beyond even the most ardent early bird gave me a sense of satisfaction that held me through breakfast.

During and past breakfast that satisfaction was eclipsed by the sheer joy of the meal I had managed to prepare. Cooking was even faster and required less ingredients than before. There were enough external factors to stop the entire process from counting as 'handmade' meaning the result was a touch shy of a fully fey crafted divine object, but the quality increases from One Thing at a Time, Elven Enchantment, Lack of Materials, and Master Craftsman produced an end product that could barely be described as food.

Between the mess with Dragon, the fires, and preparing for the meeting with the Undersiders I had skipped on personally preparing my meals the previous day. My duplicates had set up enough handy appliances using Simple Scientific Solution to automatically cover just about any level of food preparation, which was handy in terms of saving time, but considering the level of my actual cooking at the moment I think I would be skipping convenience for the sake of quality.

I'm pretty sure there were potions I had made in the early days of my power that were less significant than the collection of eggs, bacon, and toast in front of me. Eating it didn't just address my hunger, it fortified my body, restored my strength, and focused my mind. I'm fairly sure that PRT would classify my current cooking as a Trump effect; well, I mean if they weren't more likely to assume Master influence on anything I created.

I cleaned my plate, and by that I meant it literally. The food was beyond ideal, meaning a lack of any residue. I'm pretty sure the plate was somehow cleaner and higher quality for having had the food on it than it had been before.

This was a complicated set of interactions that I really needed to figure out. Elven Enchantment could, with just its basic application, take properties of what I made beyond their physical characteristics, to a level where the perfection of the final product was essentially magic. Master Craftsman improved every aspect of an item beyond what should be humanly possible. If the entire object was completely constructed by hand it reached a level of borderline transcendence, but even without that there was a significant enhancement.

Without any other powers supporting it I would be producing items that were enhanced beyond the realm of physics, nearly indestructible with every positive and useful aspect of them taken to a new level. With something like Elven Enchantment factored in, well, suddenly a camouflage cloak was granting effective invisibility, or a solid breakfast was acting with the strength of a half dozen enhancement potions.

You know, this was really the kind of thing I should have fully explored before utilizing it in an S-class nanotech weapon capable of planetary destruction. In retrospect that didn't seem like the best point to jump into, though I had been running on limited sleep.

Okay, 3am thinking was something of a joke, but I might need to take it a lot more seriously now that I had the potential to hand build nanotech assembly matrixes.

On that note I opened my implant to the Workshop network and reviewed the latest updates. It seemed the duplicates I had left active when I went to sleep had split their time between the nanotech lab, alchemy research, and some upgrades for the motoroid's weaponry. Their 20% time was spent on more weaponry, this time mostly for the Veritech fighter.

I guess it was cute that they decided to add a pair of leg-based missile pods designed to accommodate the mole-mortars from my recent Weaponsmith power. The insanity of missiles that could be launched through the ground rather than the air was somehow completely in line with the theme of that power. With a database that contains everything from instructions on how to sharpen scrap metal into shivs to an intricate breakdown of the construction of a laser pistol that fits into a ring, off the wall applications were to be expected.

'Mole mortars' were technically a type of breaching torpedo. They used a combination of a concentrated power field, drilling array, and insanely high temperature projectors combined with standard rocket propulsion to launch through the ground itself. They were clearly intended for combat either underground or in crowded environments, though they could easily be used in more conventional engagements to strike from an unexpected angle, or just ignore every form of cover between you and your enemy.

It was the kind of ordinance that would be highly useful in a city, though the impact on the subterranean infrastructure would be significant to say the least. I doubt it would make me many friends among the city's workers, but given the level of threat that would cause me to need to deploy my Veritech I think that would be something of a minor concern.

Checking the logs, I saw one of the duplicates had spent a good deal of time in the neural interface uploading as much of the weapon and armor database as he could. Actually, a significant portion of the database had been transferred. I wondered how he managed it, then I saw the system logs. That mental acceleration limit of twenty times faster than normal that I imposed for the sake of safety? Well, that was to prevent long term damage. The kind of damage that my duplicates didn't need to worry about.

One of the duplicates had dropped in during his 20% time and slowly ramped up the speed until he found the level that would create enough neural damage to manage to dispel him. He actually managed to make it to 178 times normal perception before the stress on his brain and the cumulative effect of ramping up that high that the accumulated damage dispelled him.

It was a little concerning that copies of myself were willing to engage in such inherently destructive behavior for moderate gains, or just to see what would happen. I guess, being at the end of a limited lifespan with the irreverent attitude they had towards their existence it made sense they would indulge in behaviors like that. I just really, really hoped it didn't say anything about my own mindset.

Their time in the nanotech lab had seen the creation of yet more hand-crafted divine object level nanobots, and a thousand times as many that were directed construction, and thus still enhanced, but lesser. The result of my and everyone else's work blitz was a single vial of silvery liquid holding a borderline unthinkable number of individual nanobots. The artificial intelligence matrix created by interactions between the nanobots was still incredibly primitive, but also much more advanced than it had any right to be. With this type of nanomachine, at the base level provided by Machinist, it would normally require thousands of gallons of interfacing nanobots to even begin to form an identity. I was seeing the same effect emerge within a single droplet.

The duplicates had left the nanotech lab connected to the Workshop systems, resulting in both Survey and Feet continuously monitoring the matrix as it developed. It was kind of fascinating seeing the logs of their reactions, mostly consisting of them comparing their own state in similar levels of development to the nanobots, usually with a sense of fascination at the contrast.

The nanobots were a long way from even being capable of independent operation, and were only functionally replicating thanks to my ability to directly control them. Still, it was encouraging as a development and I was kind of excited to see an entirely new form of artificial intelligence taking shape in my workshop.

The alchemical experimentation and research had been split between my recent understanding of transmutation arrays, and the non-Satan summoning applications of Belmont Alchemy. Transmutation was comparatively easy. It was essentially a science and benefited from my research acceleration powers. Flame Alchemy was a fascinating subject with a lot of potential. Even with the ability to freely generate and control fire, being able to augment the effects with alchemy had a possibly exponential effect on range and power.

Belmont Alchemy was more complicated. It had more in common with various styles of magic than any purely alchemical system. The actual mechanics were based in an understanding of the metaphysical framework of reality, almost the divine structure behind the substance of the world. Manipulation of that principle was how every feat in the system of power was achieved.

Including the more unpleasant and visceral ones. The existence of hell and demons, and the presence of a divine counterpoint, as the source of the ability seemed to imply there was some kind of theological interaction happening. I had a hard time accepting that, though considering I was a demigod in communion with all the technology of the world maybe that skepticism was a little arbitrary.

The higher-level applications of that art utilized a kind of spiritual energy channeled into the alchemical items or bound into the charms and potions. It was another energy source now available to me, distinct from the others but with some serious potential for overlap. I had so many at this point that it felt like I was losing track of them.

Tier magic used mana to cast spells, but I didn't know any spells or have the ability to develop the pool of mana. T'ai Chi Chuan, in combination with life fibers, unlocked an ability to manipulate chi, though the limits and capabilities of that were still a mystery to me. The Skyforge had given me a rapidly refilling pool of magicka, though like with mana I had no idea how to use or develop it. Aura was in a slightly better position, but still not reliable. There was a complicated spiritual cost to higher level Elven Enchantment that I didn't totally understand, though the potential was tremendous. Setup Wizard and my wonderful wand had their own kind of energy, not so much a pool as a constant source and amplifier that relied on efficient use. And now Belmont Alchemy opened the possibility of spiritual energy.

Transmutation arrays ran off my normal stamina rather than any kind of exotic pool of energy. Tetra's life fiber energy functioned in a similar way, as did my pyrokinesis and other divine powers from Divine Child. Those were at least understandable, and relatively easy to develop. The balance of the rest of my exotic energies was an entirely different matter, and something of a trial to both understand and manage.

The spiritual energy of Belmont Alchemy was odd, even by the standards of exotic energy sources. It wasn't exactly magical energy, chi, mana, or anything similar. It was a vague force of potential, able to be channeled into any number of applications, but not operating by the same rules and restrictions as any of them. From my own understanding it could be used to infuse and empower alchemical items and weapons, and act as a power source for dark rituals. The rituals could function without it, but at a greater level of complexity and cost.

The other applications were beyond what that power had granted me. Things like converting spiritual energy into different forms of magic, influencing spirits, or channeling it to empower weapons. It was something I could potentially learn, but that was a project with as much difficulty as cracking the spell crafting of any of the other potential magic systems. I had easy access to a limited application and only enough understanding of the wider scope of the ability to know what I was missing. It seemed that it was something of a theme with my power.

I had just finished reviewing the last of my duplicates' logs when I felt the Celestial Forge make a connection to the Clothing constellation. It was a smaller mote called Putting On The Reich. It was another fashion design power, one centered on uniforms. With it I could design uniforms and outfits that looked both intimidating and powerful while also being fashionable. Further to that, they would make my group look organized and official.

When I said they would make my group or team look official, I meant they would MAKE them look official. The effect was design based, but was practically supernatural. A slight alteration to lines and contours and any number of costumes and outfits I designed would bring across the sense of organization, power, and intimidation.

Given the theme of the power and the name I didn't miss the connection, not when I lived in a city like Brockton Bay. This was practically a joke about Nazi dress sense. Fortunately, no part of the power needed that particular aesthetic or iconography, and it's not like the E88 actually used that kind of design, aside from a couple of odd members like Krieg. The neo-Nazi style tended to be more White Trash than Hugo Boss.

The arrival of the power did bring me out of my contemplation of system records. It reminded me that I was due for a redesign of my costume. I had gained enough powers since the last time I had worked on it that it was badly needed. No doubt Garment had a near endless set of ideas for its new design.

I was more than a little nervous about the direction that could go. I think she was still holding out hope to be able to put those Barbarian Chic designs into practice, but I was confident I could shoot them down. Her more recent work based on my lantern shield was another matter. Garment was a lot more accommodating regarding frivolous design choices than she was when my safety came into play. The way she reacted when she saw Uber and Leet's spatial attack was probably the most adamant I'd ever seen her.

I might be able to mitigate things slightly, but Garment knew a certain design would make it easier for me to use Aura, and there was no way she was going to totally exclude that from my next costume. At best I'd be able to downplay it, but considering my latest power there was a real risk here. That style, well, it was pure edge. The kind of teenage rebellion style I'd never embraced when it would have been mildly age appropriate. It was such a cliché, expressing your own inner turmoil through clothing. Of course, in an environment where people didn't see a reason for you to have any turmoil then any move towards that kind of thing was seen as frivolous at best and idiotic at worst.

My real concern was how this kind of expression would interact with my latest power. I could design clothing that was supernaturally intimidating and striking. That was going to make an impact no matter what overall design I went with. Even a hint of that teenage edge look was going to be amplified to a ridiculous degree.

Well, Garment knew my powers, so if I didn't deal with this it was only going to get worse. I sighed and started towards her work area. It was weird to think about it, but I was actually better at making clothes than Garment. I meant that in terms of pure assembly and design.

The Flock's Fleece let me go from the rawest of materials to immaculate clothing with almost no tools and in an incredibly short time. The clothing produced was wonderful quality, and would always fit whoever wore it. It also shielded people from extreme environments and acted as protective as light chain armor. Secular Skills allowed me to work with even lower quality materials and tools and still produce clothing that would look fantastic, an effect that stacked with The Flock's Fleece. Now Putting On The Reich further increased my design skills and allowed that inbuilt aura of intimidation, power, and organization.

Those were just the powers that only affected clothing. From the universal side, Masterwork Craftsman improved the quality of everything I made, meaning I couldn't make any item of clothing that was less than a masterpiece. That minor Blessing of Athena including clothing production, improving quality even more. Even the base level of Elven Enchanting improved the quality immensely and allowed the characteristics of the product to be directed towards a specific purpose. Using the full materials with my Lack of Materials power improved the quality and added new abilities. Lathe of Heaven further increased the abilities of whatever I made. Finally, if I did the work by hand then my Master Craftsman power would activate, causing the item produced to become a divine object, greatly enhanced in every aspect.

When it came to production time and materials, they were already greatly reduced by The Flock's Fleece. Do One Thing at a Time halved the already reduced time it took to make clothing and doubled the already excessive quality. Manufacturing Line reduced the time by half again, and also cut material needs in half. Workaholic meant I either got five copies of whatever I was making or only needed to work on something about one third the scale. On top of all of that the fact that The Flock's Fleece granted armor-like protection to the clothing allowed it to count, meaning material requirements were cut in half again thanks to Waste Not, and I could include materials I didn't have access to with a 50% chance of success.

All that was just on the mechanical side. From a design point of view the clothing I made saw benefits from Bling of War, Decadence, and Beauty in the Arts, all increasing the aesthetics of the final product. It was a staggering amount of power behind everything I produced, and made it easy to understand why my camo cloak had been so effective. Incredibly, despite all that power, there were still areas where Garment exceeded my abilities.

The clothing I made, well anything I made really, was an absolutely beautiful product. At this point it was an intrinsic feature of everything I created. The thing was, there was more to fashion than just pretty clothes, and that was something Garment grasped at a significantly higher level than I could.

For Garment clothing was like its own language. What someone wore conveyed who they were, what they were doing, and who they were trying to be. She spoke that language like a native. I at best fumbled through it. My design abilities may have increased to supernatural levels, but my fashion sense hadn't increased at the same rate. I could handle high class designs, and could manage a scene if I had enough control over how it was presented, but I lacked Garment's innate understanding. I could handle fashion as a moment in time, not a continuity extending from past trends into movements that hadn't formed yet.

The result was roughly that my work looked like museum pieces while Garment's looked like a brilliant and well-conceived clothing line. Of course, when we worked together these problems canceled out and the strength multiplied. Garment's inherent confidence in her work went a long way to addressing my concerns about any publicly displayed design choices.

While I was moving towards Garment's workplace I picked up some more activity in the Workshop's network. The A.I.s were active, both in their normal roles and in how they had been engaging with other projects. They were probably due for another update, meaning I needed to get Tetra out of stasis, meaning I needed to deal with the agreement about who had the best physical presence options in my coming technology.

I wasn't sure if that was a serious fight, or just a rote presentation of properties of differing technologies that they happened to specialize in. Moderating a conflict like that wasn't something I was particularly good at, so I hoped it never grew beyond the point where I could mediate things, or just separate Survey and Tetra until they found something else to focus on.

Interestingly, Survey was deploying a drone to me, rather than just contacting me through the network. That meant whatever she wanted to deal with wasn't pressing enough to be worth putting aside her social development. I elected to not monitor things through the network and allowed her piloted drone to arrive at its own speed rather than prying with my implant.

That was also something I needed to deal with. A full replacement was something I was understandably nervous about, but now that I had functional nano-assemblers I could manage a patch job that would bypass that particular vulnerability. Skimming Survey's report on Shatterbird I confirmed the vulnerability of the processors in my neural implant.

They weren't the most advanced processors by the standards of what Space Command Engineer was capable of. That scaled all the way up to crystal computers, though my level of understanding of that technology wasn't sufficient to fully recreate that kind of system. The implant still used silicon transistors because of their durability and reliability. Apparently whoever designed this thing felt the same way about repeated brain surgery as I did.

From what records and analysis Survey was able to assemble, silicon chips ruptured during Shatterbird's attacks. Even implanted devices could be affected, with a few post-mortems from pacemakers confirming that in bloody detail. There was no evidence of it affecting silicon compounds that were part of a living being, so there was a Manton Limit at play, as well as artificial limits, probably based on her perception of her power upon triggering.

Powers really did not make sense when evaluated objectively. People thought they were working at the limits of what they were capable of, but those people hadn't seen the workings behind the curtain. The passengers were basically taking their tremendous capacity and fumbling to come up with some kind of relevant application. Taylor was a good example of that. She could control flies and spiders, despite the massive difference between them. It wouldn't surprise me too much if she could control worms or similar animals. One thing that was obvious was she couldn't sense or control mites like she could the rest of her creatures.

The reason was simply that her passenger probably designated a group of creatures as 'bugs' for the purpose of her bug control power. If something fell into that group she could affect it. It didn't matter if it was completely unrelated to everything else in the group, or if something excluded was a close genetic offshoot of something she could control. The limits were there and all she could do was work around them.

Or ask me to make a focus with Arcane Craft that would bend the rules, but there was a good reason I was keeping that power under wraps.

The point was that while Shatterbird supposedly could control silicon and silicon compounds, she really couldn't. She could control silicon in microprocessors, and silica in glass and sand. That was about it for her powers. About 30% of the earth's crust is silicon. There are huge amounts of silicon in rocks, concrete, cement, and more. If she could really control silicon compounds as well as she controlled glass she would be more powerful than an Endbringer.

No, what happened was she triggered with a power that was something like 'control glass' and her perception of things made that extend to things that she felt counted as glass. That meant sand because 'everyone' knows glass is just melted sand, like they dump it from a beach into a furnace and plate glass comes out the other side. She can also control silicon transistors because people don't register the difference between silica and silicon and figure computer chips are basically beach sand or glass.

So, with that the majority of Shatterbird's threat came from the social perception that a microchip was basically smushed sand, and the biggest moderating factor on her was the general ignorance over the quantity of silicon in pretty much every significant structural component of the planet.

From the post-scream analysis, it looked like the components were destroyed by the silicon portions basically exploding. Analysis of the rest of her attacks wasn't pleasant reading, but did paint a picture of what was happening. My guess was some kind of resonant effect, which was also a popular theory in the Protectorate. The specific patterns of destruction were similar to what happened when a resonant frequency allowed energy to build up in an object until it exploded. Unlike in reality, damping effects or levels of mundane soundproofing didn't seem to make much of a difference, suggesting that the effect was more of a vector for her power than something with a logical chain of practical physical effects.

That was frustrating, but did let me know what to expect. In the event of a Shatterbird attack the various microprocessors of my implant would resonate and then explode. The implant was ridiculously sturdy, but probably wouldn't hold against the contained pressure of an exploding processor. After that it would be a question of whether my Fashion reinforcement power affected my brain tissue. Best case it held, meaning it would be like a grenade exploding inside a shell of solid enhanced adamantium. No damage, but not really pleasant, and would scramble the interface connections something bad. Worst case my brain would be pulped while leaving the rest of my head untouched.

Neither of those were exactly enticing options, and justified some drastic alterations if it meant mitigating the damage. The Magitech constellation passed by without a connection as I made my decision, which was also when Survey's drone and hologram arrived.

Taking a second to review things it seemed Survey had taken to maintaining a single hologram and manually directing it around the Workshop rather than flickering in and out of existence. It wasn't the most efficient method, but seemed to help with her sense of self and interaction skills. She was certainly mimicking a more natural stride than she had before and was moving the hologram as if it was actually aware of its environment from its own perception rather than the drone's or the workshop scanners.

Case in point, when the hologram stepped around a corner it demonstrated eye movement and behavior consistent with noticing a new person, then made eye contact briefly before it spoke with Survey's voice. If the hologram wasn't a semitransparent purple form in the shape of a person it would have been an extremely convincing display of human behavior.

"Good morning." A recent alteration, probably due to some duplicate's 20% time, had resulted in a projective speaker system, creating the impression that the sound was coming from the hologram's mouth rather than from a speaker on the drone or one of the wall mounts. "Though that term is typically not used until a few hours before dawn at the very earliest. Still, given that you have already slept, the commonly used but technically incorrect 'good evening' did not seem appropriate."

"No, it wouldn't be." I replied. "Those kinds of platitudes are generally tailored to whoever you are speaking with and don't need to be completely accurate. Using 'good morning' after someone wakes up is perfectly appropriate regardless of the actual time of day."

"Noted." Survey responded, and I could sense the activity in her main program as she updated her interaction parameters. Both A.I.s were advancing so quickly that I would never have been able to follow their real time progress without my enhanced demigod senses. "I have been asked by your duplicates to provide a summary of the night's events, and supply a fresh duplication potion that they have prepared following the update."

I raised an eyebrow. "Really?" This was more agency than I expected from either Survey or my duplicates. They didn't usually make plans that extended beyond their duration.

"Their exact request regarded the inefficiency of you returning to the Alchemist's Laboratory for each renewal of the potion, as well as assurance that I would wait until all updates were complete so that they would not be required to sit through them as well." That sounded like them alright. "Also, that the potion be taken before you begin any training or fashion experiments that would require you to change out of your standard outfit." And that really sounded like them.

Though, considering these were separate duplicates with no connection to the next ones to be created it was interesting that they were looking out for each other, at least in a certain sense. The whole situation seemed like this duplicate culture had built up around me without me noticing, despite the fact that each set was a perfect copy of myself. There was no continuity between duplicates beyond what I was exposed to, but apparently that was enough to create something of a common thread for my copies to latch on to.

"Thank you for letting me know." I said. "I just received a new ability relating to clothing design, so I'll be heading to Garment's workspace now. Can you update me on the way?"

"I would be happy to." She replied, falling into step beside me. "Also, could I ask you to provide an update of the parameters of your new ability following your meeting with Garment?" Somehow she managed to put an eager and almost pleading tone into the last statement and I had to suppress a smile at that. I didn't know how much of it was the influence of her original function and how much was her developing personality, but Survey absolutely loved information, and having an obvious hole in her information set was something that irritated her significantly.

"Absolutely. There isn't much in terms of technical information, but I'll provide an outline of the ability once I finish meeting with Garment."

"Thank you." She replied softly before shifting to a more business like tone. "In terms of the evening's events, shortly after you retired for the evening Dragon made a public statement announcing her plans to transfer to Brockton Bay and her specific pursuit of you. The commentary has been very active following her announcement."

I took a moment to digitally review the statement and cringed. The effect of the master influence was even clearer now. I wondered why I hadn't seen it before. Then again, nobody had seen it, probably because nobody had been looking for it. It was obviously a subtle effect that allowed her to work within limited parameters, something that my passenger confirmed. Subtle enough that it had slipped past everyone's notice. From what my passenger was telling me even members of the Guild didn't know about it.

"On the subject of Dragon, analysis of the behavior of her interface program suggests it may be a partially autonomous pseudo-intelligence of unknown capacity. Upon conferring with Fleet and given the recent development of the nanotech matrix we wish to raise concerns that the program may in fact be another artificial intelligence, and may be subject to significant limitations and forced objectives." Survey presented the results of her and Fleet's analysis as she spoke.

Reviewing the data it was definitely concerning. Whatever 'software based' system Dragon used to keep pace with a full neural interface, it was obviously at home in the network. My passenger suggested there may be something to Fleet and Survey's concerns that Dragon was using a third Artificial Intelligence. Given the advanced nature of the program and the distinct design it had compared to all of Dragon's other technology it was quite possible she had found an A.I. and co-opted it for her own use. Given how advanced it seemed to be it was really possible that she was effectively shackling it in order to make it useful to her.

Not a pleasant thought and not something I would have thought to be in her character. Still, given the fact that she was subject to an unknown master effect that was obviously impacting her behavior anything was possible.

"I promise I will look into this thoroughly." I assured Survey as we continued to walk.

"Thank you." She mimed shifting some papers through her hologram and continued. "I have an update on the current gang situation in the city."

That made my stomach twist. I had basically tempted fate when I was slinking off to bed and half expected to be awoken to another emergency involving a city-wide disaster. Since nothing had emerged of sufficient severity to warrant waking me up I assumed it was a somewhat stable night, but still kept rapt attention on Survey as she gave her report.

"The first major incident of the night involved a demonstration from the Merchants. The full roster of known capes as well as three new additions were deployed at the border between their territory and that of the ABB, towards the southern end of Pine Street. Present were Skidmark, Squealer, and Mush. They were joined by Trainwreck as an apparent new recruit. Additionally two new capes, presumed to be fresh triggers, were also present. They identified themselves as Whirlygig and Slush."

Survey explained things calmly while also providing supporting information through the network as she spoke, mostly in news snippets, police reports, or bits of media that had been shot earlier in the night.

"Through public demonstration of their powers Whirlygig is able to exert telekinetic force on objects, though appears to be limited to rotating them in a counterclockwise direction centered on her body. Slush was observed generating barriers of a loose material similar to wet snow but without any reported temperature drop. Barriers were not particularly stable, but remained in place without active input from the cape. It is theorized that both individuals triggered during the previous night's fires." Survey explained. "The Merchants were joined by a larger than expected number of unpowered members, and it has been suggested that the gang has absorbed a significant number of the population displaced by the previous night's fires."

I frowned at that as the Alchemy constellation missed a connection. The Merchants were as bad as any other gang in the city, with the closest thing they had to a redeeming factor being their lack of discrimination. It made sense that in a time of crisis people would band together for safety, I just wished they had a better option. The city's social services weren't nearly enough to deal with the homeless problem, and hadn't been for more than a decade. This was a bad situation, both for the people who'd had to run to the Merchants for safety and for what it meant for the power balance between the gangs.

People always looked to the parahuman membership when evaluating a gang's threat. That was certainly a big factor, but without also having numbers on their side there was a hard limit to how far that kind of power could be projected. Parahumans may be able to seize and defend territory, but they couldn't hold or use it. In a single night the Merchants had doubled their number of capes, and if the reports of the demonstration/block party they put on were accurate, may have doubled their non-powered membership as well.

I paused as I scrolled through the recordings of the event before turning to Survey's hologram. "What do you have on Squealer's new vehicle?"

The image of Survey gestured, bringing up numerous shots of the construct, as well as a preliminary evaluation by the PRT that had been distributed to the city's police stations. "It appears to be a new construction rather than an upgrade or redesign of one of her earlier models. With the stress brought from heightened conflicts with the ABB and hero groups it is likely that a number of projects were rapidly combined to produce a new asset for the current conflict."

'Rapidly combined' seemed about right. Squealer's work always had a junkyard sensibility, but this was a particularly egregious example. I wasn't sure if it had been an attempt to create a crawling aircraft carrier, staple six hummers together, or put a warehouse on treads, but the result was as hideous as it was devastating. The vehicle took up both lanes of the street and some of the sidewalk and served as the Merchants' sound stage and command center for this event.

Normally I would say trying to bait the ABB with Oni Lee and Bakuda's bombs still in play would be the stupidest thing possible, but the number of small automated gun placements on that vehicle changed the situation. I'm not sure if their application was as obvious to anyone else as it was to me, seeing as it wasn't mentioned in any of the police or Protectorate analysis, but Squealer had installed a point defense system that would be the envy of every military on the planet while also making the gun batteries look clunky and barely functional.

Apparently someone had seen the videos of my duplicates' fight with Oni Lee and decided to expand upon the principle. Given that she wouldn't be nearly as averse to civilian casualties as I was it was a safe bet that any appearance by the teleporting cape would be met with a storm of indiscriminate supersonic lead.

Survey shifted from the images of the Merchants to recordings from within E88 territory. "Shortly after the Merchants' demonstration began the Empire began organizing a large rally. This was likely both a show of strength after the previous night and an attempt to cover assembly to take advantage of any split focus from the ABB in response to the Merchants activities. Several prominent members including Purity and Rune were absent from the rally, suggesting an ambush may have been planned in the event that the ABB attempted any direct action." The images shifted again. "Protectorate forces were split between all three territories, but did not engage. In accordance with the Emergency Measures Act, National Guard forces and members of the Wards were on standby to respond to any outbreaks of violence. Fortunately each gang's activity remained limited to their own territory through the evening, and largely dispersed by the early morning. Remnants of the Merchants' event are still active, but the gang's capes have fallen back."

I nodded. "That was lucky, but we can't count on that kind of posturing to persist. Eventually things are going to boil over, and it will be worse than what we saw last night."

The hologram returned my nod. "That is most probable. Your duplicate suggested an expansion of ordinance in order to address the coming conflicts, with documented proposals available on the network."

I took a second to review it. This had been the real advantage of getting a chunk of that mental database into the computer. Armourer and Weaponsmith were instructive powers. They covered how to assemble their respective technology, but absolutely none of the principles behind it. Unlike every other technological database I had acquired it was strictly limited in function. That meant any alteration of the weapons basically needed to be done after assembly, since the significance of any specific step was completely unknown within the context of the powers.

By uploading the processes I could start assessing the technology in question and begin redesign work with the advantage of my other powers. Modularization, miniaturization, customization, and the advantages of my other crafting powers could be incorporated into the items produced.

For the most part. Some of the truly advanced technology was still at the limits of my ability to understand. This was basically tinker tech, in the classical sense. It was a set of instructions for how to obtain raw materials, verify their quality, and work them into arcane technological wonders while providing no true understanding of how they actually functioned. The result was a database that could be dropped into anyone's head to allow them to start churning out equipment, but not one that allowed easy modification or development.

In fact, the entire field of technology seemed highly resistant to any kind of innovation. There was a rough sense of how old the various designs were, and the progress seemed to flow contrary to the expected direction. It started with immaculate works of technological wonder beyond my full understanding, and got progressively more basic as time went on. It wasn't like the technology was being streamlined or simplified. More that certain components or principles were being lost and the designers just pushed on regardless. Even the crazy efficient laser rifles that were so numerous and reliable had still made compromises in terms or range, armor penetration, and stopping power. The whole situation was just more of the mystery surrounding my Laboratorium and all the technology within it.

The important thing was, despite having weapons so horrible I felt bad for just knowing about them, it also had the most impressive set of nonlethal ordinance I had ever imagined. The sheer scope of tranquilizers and paralyzing agents was astonishing. More than that, some of the toxins triggered a fear, hallucination, or psychotic response, seemingly just for variety of attacks. Also, given that some of the paralyzing agents specifically excluded any effect on the pain response, and some seemed to amplify it I wasn't convinced this was a complete act of mercy, but I was willing to take what I could get.

The agents could be administered through a staggering range of gas throwers, grenades, injections, poisoned weapons, or even an absolutely insane set of weapons that had a two-stage attack that used a maser to destabilize armor before striking that precise point with a needle of crystalized toxin so small that the wound would be basically invisible and the rapidly dissolving projectiles would leave no trace.

Somehow I had the feeling that weapon saw a lot more use in assassinations than in non-lethal takedowns, but I was willing to work with what my power had given me.

I even had my own version of containment foam. Not quite as good as Dragon's masterpiece, but webber weapons fired a mass of filaments that expanded when exposed to air, forming a nearly unbreakable mesh that would contract when stressed. The mesh also acted as a vector for a contact based anesthetic that would rapidly incapacitate anyone caught in it, and like so many of Weaponsmith's toxins there was specific focus in avoiding allergic reactions. Really, the only way the web could be lethal was if someone ended up tangling to the point of choking themselves, or if someone with more strength than durability stressed its contraction reaction, which could result in the web slicing into them.

Against normal humans neither was a real concern. The weapon was usually used from a one or two handed spray apparatus with fairly short range, but with the designs in my system I could easily expand that to a host of applications. I finally had a reliable solution to the mess that was the ABB's human shields, as well as a massively effective mechanism for bringing down less powerful combatants. I would guess more than half the capes in the city would be in trouble if they got hit by this thing.

"I'll deal with that after I meet with Garment." I assured Survey. "Also, I need to get into the interface throne for another update. I'll be bringing Tetra for that."

Survey's hologram smiled. "I will look forward to that. I have been preparing a series of data sets to help Tetra understand her mistaken assumptions with respect to practical applications of life fibers when compared to the versatility of cybertonium based protomatter." I cringed inside at the reminder of that particular conflict. "Also, with respect to the transmutation of cybertonium…"

"I will put together a plan and schedule for its production. Recent advancements should allow that project to be significantly accelerated from earlier predictions." I assured her.

The hologram mimed shuffling papers again. "I have an updated assessment on the activities of the Slaughterhouse Nine." I raised an eyebrow in interest. "An examination of police and mortuary reports in the area of their suspected activities as well as the Siberian's recently observed hunts shows two clusters of suicides with similar characteristics."

"What were the characteristics?" I asked, while also accessing the reports for myself.

"The individuals had no history of mental illness or warning signs and all inflicted self-harm using bladed weapons. The bodies were also thoroughly exsanguinated with no sign of the quantity of blood lost present at the scene of the event. Incidents occurred in two clusters, separated by time and location, but sharing the same characteristics."

Well, that was horrible, as was expected of anything dealing with the Slaughterhouse Nine. The problem was I couldn't think of any member that lined up with that particular description. That meant either we were missing pieces of the story, or worse, they had already gotten a new recruit.

I wasn't even willing to entertain the possibility that this was a coincidence.

"Continue monitoring of the situation, and expand searches to surrounding areas. If they start to move I want as much notice as possible." And I would need to deal with my implant today, just to be safe.

The hologram nodded and slowed as we approached Garment's workspace. "I will expand my search and monitoring program to that level." The hologram mimed looking down at a clipboard before continuing. "Finally, I believe there is a matter Garment would like you to address. She is currently waiting to present the issue."

I paused just outside of the textile area. Survey had managed to make that statement both accusatory and apprehensive. A quick check of system logs didn't show any hint to what the matter could be, and Survey wasn't keen to share. I considered pushing the issue, but that seemed like completely blatant cowardice.

"Alright. Do you have that potion?" I asked, and Survey gestured to the drone where a small compartment opened to reveal a familiar vial. Another product of my duplicate's 20% time. I nodded in thanks and downed the vial in two gulps, watching my own copies step out one by one. They took a brief look at the workspace behind them and gave me a grateful look.

"Uh, thanks for letting us skip whatever's waiting for you in there." The first said.

"Yeah." Echoed the second. "Um, we'll just see to those projects. The materials for Aisha's armor are probably ready for finalization."

Given the necessity of Aisha's suit to actually protect the wearer rather than just withstand damage I had to break out the ceramite. Ceramite was a wonder material from the database of my Armourer power. It was both incredibly hard, though nowhere close to adamantium, and, more importantly, immensely thermally resistant. The main thing was that it came in varying grades. Low grade ceramite was only good for structural work. Middling grades could be used for simple varieties of body armor, flak or carapace armor.

I had actually thought those were fairly impressive before I saw the kinds of weapons they would need to deal with.

High grade ceramite was some of the most thermally resistant material I could produce. It not only insulated its wearer but also rapidly dissipated the heat of any energy weapon that struck it. It was also insanely difficult to produce.

Ceramite was, unsurprisingly, a ceramic compound. It was produced by heating a mix of specific metal and chemical powders under intense pressure. Higher grades needed more precise and exotic mixes of powders, higher temperatures, heavier pressures, and more time. My acceleration powers were able to reduce the possibly months long process to a reasonable timeframe. I had access to precision combinations of nearly any chemical mix I could want, and in terms of temperature and pressure, it was nothing a gravity generator, fusion engine, and trip to the heart of a volcano couldn't handle.

The ceramite currently baking in my volcano was the highest grade that Armourer could produce. Forget lava surfing, Aisha would be able to bathe in solar plasma once I finished that suit. That was a project that would hopefully come together later today, though that would require getting Aisha on site for the finalization of the design. At the very least that would have to wait until it was what most people considered morning in more than a technical sense. I sent a message to her omni-watch for when she woke up before turning my attention back to the group.

I bid my duplicates farewell, gave Survey's hologram a final nod, steeled myself, and walked into Garment's workspace.

The area was much like I remembered last seeing it. The full assembly of my most advanced polymer and fiber production equipment meshed with a fashion studio, peppered with amateur video recording equipment that exceeded most of Hollywood, and an only slightly cordoned off area containing enough Dust weaving to both outfit and annihilate an army. However, instead of Garment's warm welcome she aggressively gestured towards a conspicuously cleared workbench.

I cautiously approached while Garment waited impatiently with her arms folded. After I arrived she gave the impression she was staring for a moment before reaching down a hefting two heavy objects onto the work surface.

I recognized them immediately, thought I don't think I'd either looked at or thought about them since Sunday night. To be fair, the appearance of a fresh S-Class threat in the form of the Imulsion pump appearing in my workshop had somewhat occupied my attention. The pair of combat boots that had arrived alongside the other equipment that came with my Xenospecialist power hadn't exactly seemed that remarkable.

From how Garment was acting she seemed to believe I had been keeping the treasure of the ages from her. I didn't really get it. The boots were huge bulky things, battering rams of footwear. They were clunky, armored things that reached to the knee. There was probably more steel in them than rubber or leather, and they had an obvious military look. Also, a frontline infantry look, not something from an officer corps or dress uniform. I wanted to ask what was so special about them, but from Garment's behavior she wasn't feeling particularly charitable about me having overlooked whatever it was.

So I took a breath and considered things. These were military boots. Really the only thing special about them is their arrival as a separate item with their own locker rather than part of the COG armor that also arrived with that power. When Space Command Engineer provided its own set of military hardware it had lumped all pieces of worn equipment together into the same set of Battle Dress. These boots being separate items implied there was something special about them, I just couldn't figure out what.

I thought over what my power had told me about the boots. Besides being thick and heavy they were particularly comfortable and offered protection from a great deal of terrains. Outside of that the only thing noteworthy about them was their ability to effectively stomp enemies to death in a shower of gore worthy of a Gallagher performance.

…I am an idiot.

I'm an idiot and Garment knew it. It was incredible how smug a set of gloves and an evening dress could look. And also incredible how one small detail could be so significant.

The boots were weapons. They were also clothing, but unlike when dust was woven into clothing they weren't clothing with weapons added, they were weapons in themselves. They were also armor. A single item, for the purposes of my powers counted as weapon, armor, clothing, craftwork, and fiat backed item.

Garment finally had fully weaponized clothing. It was a chunky set of military boots, but it was a starting point that fully counted as a weapon.

"I get it. Combat boots." I said. "Literal combat boots. Boots for fighting." I shook my head. "I can't believe I missed this before now."

Garment gave me a sympathetic pat on my arm in a way that seemed to convey an understanding of the limitations of people who weren't Garment. It did consistently impress me how she could make arrogance so endearing. Probably had something to do with actually being able to back up your claims.

Before I could continue I felt the Forge make another connection, this time to the Quality constellation. It was one of the smaller motes, but as soon as I got it I could see Garment's excitement build. It probably wouldn't have caused this level of reaction if not for the project before us, but with that as a possibility she was positively ecstatic.

The power was called Aesthetics and Flair. It was another design power, but this time limited exclusively to weapons. It made up for that specialization by being extremely proficient in its field. Fortunately it wasn't another one of those powers that lacked an off switch. The workmanship might be supernaturally stunning, but it was a directed effect, not an autonomous one. However, when it was directed it could produce some truly stunning work.

And that was on its own. Combined with all my other powers, including the latest from the Clothing constellation, and it had the potential to reach some absolutely ridiculous levels. I could understand the level of excitement Garment was demonstrating over this pair of boots.

The power came with two smaller abilities that I'm sure Garment was thrilled about, but I was considerably less enthusiastic. The first… well, it was basically super powered sexual harassment.

Okay, the power itself was actually called Inexplicable Innuendo. It was the supernatural ability to make dirty quips or just behave in a way that came across as sexy. And I mean supernatural. It could be used to make people squirm, or even provide distractions mid battle. It was the closest thing to an actual master power that I had received from the Forge.

It was also so easy to use. The power was basically a set of mannerisms, expressions, eye movements, and a thousand other subtle details that I had never even thought to manage, all of which came together to convey the effect of the ability. It was also a full fledged power, meaning it was beyond the level of normal behavior. I had a supernatural ability to convey a type of emotion that I was not at all familiar with.

Honestly, I think I might have been less comfortable with this power than some of the S-Class threats the Celestial Forge had given me. At least with those I could lock them away and not worry about accidentally causing another internet sensation or round of misconceptions because I broke out Inexplicable Innuendo at the wrong time. The power would probably have been easier to ignore if not for that combat application. A moment of distraction was incredibly valuable, and I could see a thousand ways I might have to use it.

I just hoped there wouldn't be any cameras on me at the time.

That was an equal concern for the second power that had been paired with Aesthetics and Flair. It was called Classy Contortionist. It granted an innate sense of 'posing'. Once again, this seemed to be focused on sex appeal and throwing people off their game. Unlike the other two powers this wasn't optional. There was an effect that would ensure that I would always be positioned in a way that made me look 'good'. I could already feel its effect, a subtle correction in posture and shift in the way I was standing. It was something I was never going to fully get away from, even if I could probably diminish the effect slightly.

At least the Contortionist part of the power had some combat applications. The level of borderline monstrous flexibility it facilitated could easily be used to compliment any combat style. Just going through how it could work with some of the techniques from T'ai Chi Chuan or Skills: Combat was enough to nearly turn my stomach. At the very least, it was sure to take my opponents off guard.

And that was the milder application of that power. I knew Garment knew my powers. I knew she planned around them. Apparently she had latched onto the idea that a certain level of flexibility and physical accommodation was now present in terms of my daily life, because some of the items of clothing she was gravitating towards didn't looking like items I'd be able to wear, comfortable or otherwise, without the benefit of this particular power.

Why did Garment even have that many types of skinny jeans?

"Uh, maybe we should deal with the boots first? I mean, before we get into any of that?" Fortunately Garment latched onto my distraction with great enthusiasm. She eagerly brough her gloves up and I placed my palms against hers. The white gloves shifted form as they folded over my own hands. I could feel the familiar sensation of Garment's power as well as her skill and insight. That particular insight that all my immaculate designs couldn't quite match.

Rather than just flop it onto a hanger Garment manipulated her dress and shoes to mimic the act of disrobing and putting them away. Once again, it was so detailed a display that I felt compelled to avert my eyes, as silly as that may have been. Between the Dragon's Pulse and my other senses, plus Garment's power I could tell exactly what was happening without needing to look. It just seemed intrusive to actually watch something like that.

Instead I turned my attention back to the boots. This was going to be a complete rebuild, which was something of a challenge when it came to fiat backed items. Those items were specifically designed so that they would restore themselves after 24 hours. It was a step up from the 48 hour repair effect I got from my Workshop, and had the added benefit of triggering if the item was lost or stolen as well.

The thing was, it would try to restore itself completely, meaning you couldn't just harvest rare parts from one item and get a renewing supply of them. Anything damaged or removed would vanish when the item was restored. Fortunately that wasn't the case with rebuilds, but that had its own problems.

Rebuilding an item, and having it count as the new base form in terms of fiat required some continuity of design. I could make alterations easily enough, but a complete strip down and rebuild was a serious challenge. Unfortunately, that was also the only way to trigger my powers that required the construction of a new item, including Elven Enchantment. I had managed this once before with my element zero pistol, but that had been a labor of frustration on the part of one of my duplicates. Luckily I now had an advantage that I lacked back then.

My Scrapper power was of dubious usefulness in terms of most applications. It would have been God's gift when I was starting out, but now I was producing technology better than anything I could find in the outside world, and had gotten past nearly all my resource limitations. The prospect of breaking down an item for a few useful components didn't have much appeal.

That is, outside of situations like this.

Scrapper would let me break down the boots to a set of workable components. Normally this would be nowhere near enough to rebuild the boots, but I had both Manufacturing Line and Waste Not reducing the amount of materials required. I also had Bandit Gunsmith allowing me to quickly rebuild an item if given access to enough broken components. Rationing, an early power of mine, increased the amount of useful components recovered from the scrapping process. When combined with all my other powers it gave me more than enough to begin a complete rebuild of the item.

This was where the full weight of my powers came into play. Every aspect of my abilities that applied to clothing, weapons, armor, or crafting was exerted to its limit. I wasn't just taking the boots apart and putting them back together. The design was reworked with the advantage of my design and crafting powers.

The boots had enough metal and armoring to benefit from Smithing, Armourer, Unnatural Skill (Smith), Dwarven Craft, Divine Child, and Lathe of Heaven. In terms of clothing they gained the inherent benefits of The Flock's Fleece, the design boost of Secular Skills, and the inherent intimidation factor that came from Putting On The Reich. From a pure appearance perspective they gained the full benefit of Bling of War, Decadence, Stylish Mechanic, Beauty in the Arts, Tailor Made, and my Minor Blessing of Athena. Base materials in the construction were replaced with enhanced samples of magical metals and advanced materials, boosted by my Skyforge, volcano, and crafting powers.

But the boots were also weapons, and thus saw the benefit of another full range of powers. A high-frequency capacitor was added, empowering the boots with the full properties of an HF weapon. My Weapon Modifications power allowed subtle alterations to the design and additional creativity in the workmanship. Customized Weapons greatly improved the fit, usefulness, and efficiency of the boots' functionality as a 'weapon', taking them from something of a specialist application to a consistently useful offensive option.

The quality of the work itself was beyond comparison. In addition to the raw skill provided by my numerous smithing and divine powers Masterwork Craftsman ensured that I displayed expertise even in the field of shoemaking, the first level of Elven Enchantment was used to pour energy into the work, and, most importantly, the work was done by hand. My hands, which remembered lessons from the Fey that I could not even comprehend, guided themselves through all of my commands and Garment's directions to produce something beyond any mortal work. Something marked by fey lettering denoting it as an object above the realm of men.

As a starting point.

As I worked the Forge made another connection, this time to a smaller mote from the Magic constellation. It corresponded to a power called Heretical Adaptation.

With a name like that you'd expect something exceedingly dramatic. Broadly, that was the case, but not in the way you would think, and not from the start.

The power dove into a concept known as the Sakurai Theory, an extremely esoteric principle governing the resonance of magical sources and the manner in which they would convert that energy into physical constructs. The core principle seemed to be centered around the use of massively powerful items as the driving force for a type of weapons system. The thing was, this energy was heavily regulated. High powered items would require 301,655,722 locks to moderate their power to anything like a useful level. As more locks could be safely released the item and connected system would grow in power and abilities.

The secret of Heretical Adaptation was the application of this principle to other objects. Normal objects didn't have nearly the same capacity as the magical sources Sakurai Theory had been designed to contain, but they had the same concepts of containment and growth that could be expounded upon. In essence, by applying this principle to an object it became possible for that item to effectively 'evolve' over time as limits were released and new and unseen capacities were developed. Using this power could turn anything into a self-improving item, basically Dauntless, applied to whatever I wanted.

It wasn't an easy or automated process. The improvements were heavily based on the use of the item and its relationship with the person using it, but that didn't change the fact that growth would happen, continuously and regularly, allowing my or anyone else's works to be taken beyond the limits of my abilities.

Which is how I ended up with a pair of beyond immaculate, self-upgrading, divine, and enchanted combat boots. And four more pairs because Workaholic triggered as well. Only one was fiat backed, but thanks to my resource and efficiency powers I didn't need to underbuild, meaning five copies were produced. That may have sounded unnecessary, but that would only be the case on the assumption that all of them were for me. And would also ignore the average woman's reaction to footwear.

Two of the pairs were mine. All of the rest were Garments. Customized Weapons allowed each pair to be easily tailored and altered after construction meaning Garment was able to produce immaculate pairs of boots for a wide variety of situations. Well, three varieties of situations. I had a feeling we would be revisiting this particular type of construction as Garment discovered new outfits that needed pairings. Fortunately the mechanical and technological components meant the work was completed at a rate several hundred times faster than normal, and that wasn't taking into account how fast I could work with my current skill level.

I had two pairs of boots. One was ostensibly civilian wear, though obviously high quality. Everything had been streamed down to the point where it could pass as a standard work boot, though very well made and not from any particularly well known brand. It lacked the knee-high plating or solid features of the other pair, but made up for that in sleekness and elegance. It was something that would be able to pair with just about any possible outfit or level of formality, even passing as a dress shoe if needs must. Even the fey script was concealed where the size information would usually be found.

The other pair was not going to pass for anything. That pair wasn't going to be passed at all. It was unpassable. Customized Weapons allowed a lot of modifications to happen after the completed construction triggered the duplication effect. As such these boots were obviously cape boots. They were the pair with the fiat backing and more than looked worthy of that distinction. The design had some superficial similarities to the original construction, but everything was sleeker, more efficient, and much better designed. The clunkiness was gone, replaced with an aggressive silhouette that seemed both dangerous and elegant.

There was a level of edginess to them that I hadn't been able to restrain Garment from conveying. The armored plates were more pronounced and carried razor sharp edges. There were sharp angles and the occasional spike and spur carefully peppered through the design. It managed to restrain itself from being a Hot Topic display piece, instead looking like what those kinds of designs aspired to when they grew up. It was an obvious move towards the design of my lantern shield, and probably spoke to her intentions for my new costume.

They were also incredibly dangerous. I hadn't even applied half the armaments I was capable of and the boots were still completely deadly. The combination of adamantium, mithril, and celestial bronze produced a combination of effects outclassing most superweapons. The rest of the boot was composed of plasteel, synth-leather, custom polymers, and other hyper advanced materials, further strengthened by my crafting powers. The HF capacitor reinforced the boots with high frequency vibrations and strengthened their attacks. These things would hit like a goddamn truck, and that was before you considered my current strength level.

Garment had staked a claim on the final three pairs with the exactly kind of enthusiasm I expected from her. These had been rebuilt to cover a range of designs, basically starting with a classy set that would be the stand out feature of a gala or red-carpet event, then moving to a slightly racier model, and finally arriving at what was basically a wedge heeled and slimmer version of my own cape design. The fey writing denoting their status as divine objects ranged from subtly concealed on the most conservative pair to integrated in the lace work of the racier boots to prominently displayed on the pair that mirrored my own. The style of her boots basically progressed from 'high class every day' to 'highly aggressive fashion' and finally to 'felony assault fashion'.

I joked about that, but the boots really were deadly. The more obvious armor plating components were well concealed in the civilian models, but they were still assembled with all the same power and technology. Garment's boots had HF capacitors built into them, and the stiletto heels on her mid-level pair could probably cleave a tank in half without significant effort.

I honestly didn't know if I had gotten carried away or if this was just my new base level.

The boots were still waiting for any dust infusion to their metals, as well as any dust weaving that could be added to their softer materials. They had no runework, which would add either a range of elemental effects or any of the abilities I might be able to discern from Miss Militia's weapon. I could add additional elemental effects to them with my Maliwan Intern power, something I'd be able to use particularly well in the field. Finally I could still add variable weapon modes or complete hybridizations to the boots, which was particularly easy thanks to the simplification effect of Ambrosial Artificer.

And these were just boots. Just a pair of combat shoes that I had nearly overlooked in the piles of equipment and powers that had been piled upon me. This was the level I was working on now. I could feel Garment's excitement at the idea, the immense quality of the work I could accomplish. There were so many projects she wanted to dive into, but she understood the constraints I was working under.

A sketchbook was drawn towards us by the strength of her telekinesis. Pages flipped by showing dozens of plans for costume updates that had been laid out in immense detail only to be completely abandoned as she moved onto the next idea. It was like watching her stream of consciousness move by with the flicking of the pages.

That stream dipped into Barbarian Chic a lot more often than I expected or was really comfortable with.

Finally, the flicking stopped on the final two pages of the book. A design for a complete costume, and a dress. Specifically a wrap dress, of the same design Garment had used for her cape transformation trick.

I knew she wanted more than this. There were probably entire books of designs she was dying to see brought into life with divine craftsmanship and blessings beyond mortal limits, but she was willing to stop here. Two designs, both of which were in direct service of my cape work. I didn't feel like I could turn her down.

The costume redesign was a little edgier than I would have preferred, but to be honest I was the kind of person to embrace hiding in a corner over putting myself forward. Without the necessity of interacting with villains and the design chops of Garment behind me I would probably still be wearing dark colors and skulking in alleys.

Instead I was… well, I was whatever the internet seemed to think I was. I still wasn't comfortable with that kind of attention, or the response a fashion statement like this would bring, but I had to admit a kind of resonance. It was like with the shield, I didn't want to admit it, but that was an outward concern. It wasn't that the design didn't fit, it was that I was afraid of dealing with the reaction to it. Really, as cliché as it was, this was exactly the kind of look I had been dying for in eighth grade, and one that I never ever gave more than a fleeting consideration.

Well, now it seemed I was going to be the edgiest villain in town, all because of limited fashion freedom in my teenage years and a power that ran on self-expression. To be perfectly honest, I'd heard about powers with much worse limitations on them. I could deal with this.

I signaled my approval to Garment as the Time constellation missed a connection, and got to work.

Without the extensive mechanical aspects involved the work was less frenetic and more artistic. Even after multiple sessions I still couldn't fully convey the sense Garment had for this kind of work. The best I could say is it came from a completely different direction than my collection of ingrained proficiencies, supernatural powers, instant skills, and divine works. It was like she was part of a continuum of ideas that flowed from the fashions of the past to those that were still emerging. When she worked she wasn't just producing something, she was taking part in the shared history of an artform that stretched back to the earliest moments of human consciousness.

The really exceptional thing was how Garment had an understanding of my powers and how they could be used in conjunction with her own abilities. We used her designs as a starting point, but Garment was aware of where her skills reached their limit and when I needed to take over. She also knew how to direct that work in line with the larger themes and styles of the piece. Before it had been an effective collaboration. Now, being able to sense her through the Dragon's Pulse, it was something much closer than that.

The design flowed naturally from one of us to the other. Garment had the broad outline and trusted me to fill in details she couldn't manage or even completely convey. I could easily follow the direction of her design, adding my own touches and flairs, drawing on the full depth of my power. Piece by piece my new costume and Garment's cape dress came together in glorious detail.

The final step was Garment's insistence of including Dust weaving, which was also the first act of collaboration we had taken in that art. Garment was a masterful and creative Dust weaver and could form incredibly complex effects bound to patterns that were both beautiful and precisely formed. That said, she couldn't come close to my own work. Dust weave patterns were weapons, and all the creativity and skill in the world couldn't come close to what I could do when crafting a weapon.

Weapon Modification and Customized Weapons allowed a great deal more control and specialization of the Dust effects than Garment could manage. Ambrosial Artificer let me strip out unneeded aspects of the design and improve the overall performance of the effect. Since these counted as projectile weapons Fingers of the North Star let me fully analyze Garment's designs and upgrade them for my own applications. Gadget Master shrank the patterns down to less than a tenth the size of Garment's work and let me hide them in the stitching and folds of the costume and dress. Robust Engineering let me enhance the efficiency of the woven Dust to stand up to years of use rather than minutes. I was able to work elemental runes directly into the dust as well as apply Elven Enchantments and the benefits of Master Craftsman due to working by hand.

The final result was a costume and dress that positively radiated menace and power. Even without the effects of Putting On The Reich the sheer amount of destructive force contained within them was staggering. It was like a battleship bound in cloth, like Garment's entire arsenal wardrobe had been distilled into a pair of outfits. Perhaps the two most powerful items on the planet, sitting innocently on hangers in a workspace mostly used for Youtube streams with only the immortal lettering of the fey hinting at the true power contained within them.

A slow clap drew my attention to the entrance where I saw both duplicates reviewing our work. I could have picked them up with my thermal sense or the Dragon's Pulse, but my focus had been concentrated on the work at hand. Something that allowed the full benefits of One Thing at a Time, but wasn't the best in terms of situational awareness.

"Very nice work." The first commented. "I'm glad you decided to be flexible on the redesign. That will really help with Aura use." There was a gray shimmer around him as he spoke, another display of how my duplicates had an easier time with that particular issue.

"They look good." The second added. I felt a slight twitch from Garment's gloves in response. Rather than translate it, I signaled for them to wait and lifted my hands towards the racks of clothes. There was another twitch that seemed to convey thanks, then the gloves folded off my hands. They seemed to take a moment of consideration, then a new outfit was selected from the racks of clothing. A black silk maxi dress with an offset floral pattern embroidered into it floated off its hangar and was joined by a pair of kitten heeled shoes. Once again Garment mimed the act of putting it on, and I noticed my duplicates also had the habit of averting their eyes while Garment was changing.

Once she was dressed the first duplicated nodded to her. "Very nice work Garment, as always." She bashfully waved him off as he turned to me. "We're heading into 20% time, but we wanted to talk about the new abilities."

I knew they were probably referring to Heretical Adaptation, but my mind immediately jumped to Inexplicable Innuendo and Classy Contortionist. Classy Contortionist in particular was evident just looking at them. I guessed they were trying to look casual, but it came across like the cover of a magazine. There was a tone to the shifting of their bodies that just conveyed a sense of poise, and from how persistent it was for them I'm guessing I was doing it as well.

"Yeah, not Classy Contortionist," The second clarified. "Though we're right with you on that one. It's damn annoying." Next to me Garment made an exasperated gesture and shifted her stance in a way that suggested she was the only one with any taste in the room. I watched a few more shifts of stance from my duplicates, but even at their most reserved it came across like something out of a 19th century royal portrait.

I thought about the other 'free' powers that had come bundled with my recent acquisitions. "Hey, you guys also have to hold back an entire library of innuendo and suggestive comments?"

There was a collective sigh. "Yeah." The first admitted. "Hate to see how it will play out when that slips. At least the free power from Heretical Adaptation isn't as bad."

I nodded. Heretical Adaptation came with a minor power called Calling Card. It was probably one of my oddest powers. Upon unleashing an unusually potent attack I could briefly 'freeze' the moment in the perceptions of everyone around me in an effect that would convey the theme of the attack and whatever name I decided to give it. It wouldn't disrupt the flow of combat or actually buy me any time during the attack. It was literally just a way of showing off, a brief chance to say 'look at me, look how awesome I'm being' to everyone around me.

I was not thrilled about that one, but I could see its applications. The fight at the storage lockers had been a lesson in the importance of morale and intimidation. It wasn't something I'd successfully managed in the aftermath, but the way I'd conducted myself was the reason I was able to get everyone lined up for surgery following the fight. I still wasn't comfortable with this kind of self-display, but I could recognize its usefulness and utility.

"So, Heretical Adaptation." The second began. "That's a big one. Self-upgrading means a lot of stuff we've been dragging our heels on can be rolled out."

"You have plans for that?" I asked.

"Well, basically the plan is for you to do it." The first admitted.

"Okay." I began. "Not that I'm complaining, but don't you guys usually go on about how I need to stay away from scut work? Why's this different?"

"Two reasons." The second began. "First, this needs to be a serious overhaul of the base. If I was a future duplicate that's something I'd want personal experience with rather than pulling it from a report."

"I can see that." I admitted. "What's the second reason."

The first duplicate gave me a serious look. "The Arcane Craft."

That made things fall into place. "Warding?"

"Warding, focuses, channeling, mantic conductors, and every future project that is going to rely on that power." I nodded slowly at the second duplicate. The Arcane Craft was a phenomenally powerful and versatile ability, but it was also something that needed practice and refinement. Unlike so many of my powers it only came with the basics and relied on my own development for higher level applications. I had been able to skirt things with the help of my various quality powers, but there was no question that I needed more practice with that ability.

"What are you thinking?" I asked them.

A holographic map of the workshop and volcano sprang up above the first duplicate's omni-watch. "We really need to get a mantic circuit set up in the base. Just the productivity enhancement will make it worth the effort. With divine crafted conductors and the automatic improvement of Heretical Adaptation there's no reason to put it off any further."

I nodded. "I need to handle Fleet and Survey's update, but I'll start after that. It'll probably be on the next set."

"Fine by us." The second assured me. "We're overdue for 20% time anyway."

We split ways, with me heading to the Laboratorium and them going off to… enjoy the end of their existence. Okay, trying not to keep dwelling on that. It's just coexisting with 'people' who are so cavalier about their mortality can be a bit disconcerting.

The Laboratorium's systems and skulls greeted me with their usual enthusiasm. Well, it would be more accurate to say the skulls and some of the simpler systems greeted me with enthusiasm. The major systems, the ones containing the oldest and most advanced machine spirits greeted me with what could be best described as middling approval. Still, considering I could feel the weight of millenia of experience behind those systems that was probably a big deal.

They still thought my coat should be red.

I had barely approached the life fiber stasis bay when the same skull Garment always handed her dresses swung out, ready to take my coat and shirt. I felt a bit bad for taking it from its analysis duties, but it seemed to have fully embraced this role as something of a 'personal assistant' function. There was even a slight reaction from the skulls around it that might have been envy, and further sense of exasperation from the Laboratorium's main systems.

I decided that cybernetic skull office politics was something that could wait for another day and dropped the stasis field around Tetra. The life fibers jumped out of containment, surrounding me in what was either an instinctual predatory tactic or an enthusiastic hug. I decided to assume the second, given what I was feeling through the Dragon's Pulse, and headed for the computer throne, bidding the Laboratorium farewell.

As I made my way to my computer throne I felt a connection form to the Resources and Durability constellation. The power was called Scrapyard Skills and involved the use of improvised 'scrap' equipment in applications far above what it should be capable of. And I meant extremely far above. This was a power that would allow the conversion of a broken washing machine into a jet turbine.

Once again, it was a power that would have been absolutely amazing early in my career, but was a minor benefit given my current resources. It was still useful given the level of technology it could produce with damaged components adapted to new uses, but not something I would be basing my construction plans around.

Really, it would synergize particularly well with Scrapper, allowing better use of recovered components and the construction of more advanced technology with what was broken down. Actually, in theory I could take a mundane object, break it down, rebuild it into something more advanced, and then repeat the process, potentially compounding the effect until I reached the limits of my skill and the materials I was working with.

Like my previous two powers it came with a free ability alongside it, and like my two previous powers it was completely ridiculous. The power was called Rockin' Music and it provided musical accompaniment to my actions.

I was being absolutely serious. This power allowed me to trigger a guitar riff or a few chords of heavy metal music whenever I did something awesome. Two things I was immediately aware of was how easy it was to trigger the effect and the particular style of music it would produce.

That wasn't because of any inherent understanding of the power. It was because my duplicates had gotten it as well and were apparently competing with each other to see who could produce the greatest number of riffs before their 20% time ran out. It was like listening to dueling banjos, except it was dueling heavy metal guitarists and they were playing from opposite ends of my crafting complex.

I hurried to the computer throne where I could at least be insulated from the cacophony once I interfaced properly with the systems. The random riffs would have been bad enough, but it seemed that my duplicates had picked up on the other's actions and were trying to string together the effects of the Rockin' Music power into something that might be able to be defined as a coherent song, if you were feeling very generous.

I settled into the throne and enjoyed the feeling of my mind expanding through the systems. I exchanged greetings with Survey and Fleet before turning my attention to their programs and allowing them to interface with Tetra through my mind. At this point the updates were fairly standard. It consisted of a review of their code for development errors and misconceptions and the scheduling of the next rounds of program expansions based on my recent powers. I calmly worked through the process while my A.I.s exchanged data with Tetra.

When I finished the critical updates I began documentation of my new abilities, both for the sake of Survey's peace of mind and for their potential applications in future projects. Having a robust weapon and armor database accessible in the computer core rather than it being limited to what was in my living brain was a game changer. Being able to rework the technology in a computer environment allowed a huge amount of advancements, and really drove home the importance of fully documenting my abilities for the people who would be assisting me in my work.

While it wasn't directly tied into the main computer core a link had been maintained to the developing nanotech A.I. matrix. Thanks to the quality of its design and construction it was functioning at a level far beyond what could be expected from any form of gestalt intelligence at its stage of development. There had been some light two way communications with Fleet and Survey, though it was still limited to standard system protocols.

I did notice one of my duplicates had dedicated some of its 20% time to the hand construction of additional nanobots and the directed replication of even more, though without the benefit of being divine objects. I quickly confirmed it was based in concern for giving them the same level of oversight as Fleet and Survey received. Unlike the A.I.s, the nanotech intelligence was largely limited by the volume of nanobots it could draw upon. In order for it to have constant expansion of its parameters it needed directed construction from me or one of my duplicates.

That kind of construction was inherently limited. The highest quality of nanobots could only be produced by hand, which meant linear growth. The production of other nanobots was exponential, but required the benefit of my power for key elements of its design to function. There was a possible design of a stripped down nanobot that could be produced without my oversight, but that functioned at such a reduced level that there was no intention towards it, even from the highly limited cognition that the matrix was currently capable of.

The point about additional development of the matrix was a solid one, and would work well with my upcoming project. I turned my attention back to my programs and found Survey had transferred her entire report to Tetra and was now pouring additional data into the life fibers at the limits of what my neurology could handle. I expressed an moderately concerned inquiry to her concerning the process.

"Tetra has exceptional data retention and processing abilities, but continues to maintain an incorrect stance regarding the application of protomatter compared to base life fibers. Attempts to provide supporting information has not remedied this. I believe there may be an error with her perception through this medium."

I actually felt my body sigh at that. "Thank you Survey. I promise I will look into that, but I need to get started on Workshop upgrades. Can you conclude this transfer so I can return Tetra to her bay?"

There was a slight petulant feeling in her code, but the transfer petered out with what seemed like a series of personal messages exchanged in the final moments. I broke the connection to the computer and hurried back to the Laboratorium, once more greeting the systems and performing a few minor maintenance tasks on machinery as I passed by. I returned Tetra, feeling the loss of life fiber energy, but a substantially reduced drain from it, and retrieved my coat from the waiting skull before returning to the Workshop.

I was met at the door by a moderately perturbed Survey hologram and another duplication potion. "The duplicates' duration has expired. They requested the delivery of this once you finished returning Tetra, who still refuses to accept basic facts about the advantages of multi-spatial metamaterial processors."

"Thank you, Survey." I responded, completely sidestepping her second comment. I quickly downed the potion and allowed my duplicates to step out. They both turned and gave me a conspiratorial smile.

"So, I get why you have to stay neutral in this, but that doesn't apply to us, right?" The first asked with a sly grin.

"No." I pleaded. "Please, no. I don't want to deal with…"

"Dibs on team cybertonium." The second quipped, sliding next to Survey's hologram.

"Guess that leaves me on team life fiber." Added the second.

I took one look at the scene, including the now smug expression on Survey's hologram and threw up my arms.

"Nope." I turned and started down the hallway.

"Hey!" The second called after me. "Where are you going?"

"Nanotech lab. I have work to do." I called back, leaving my duplicates to their little bout of pageantry. It was annoying, but I couldn't help but smile now that I was out of sight. The conflicts would need to be moderated, but both Survey and Tetra were coming into their own, forming personal opinions and defending them without my input. It was also nice to see my duplicates enjoy themselves outside the brief flash at the end of their existence.

The products of that last flash was what I was heading towards now. Twelve minutes was enough time for a duplicate to hand build thousands upon thousands of nanobots, but that was a quantity that would barely register on the macro-scale. The process had also allowed him to direct the nanobots' replication, which expanded the portion of non-divine nanobots to a quantity that filled a beaker. It looked like silvery pudding, with just the barest hint of the more gold color of the divine nanobots.

They weren't actually composed of any different materials, but like every divine object they carried a fey script, magically inscribed even at the atomic level and creating a different coloration between them and the more conventionally produced machines. I held up the beaker and extended both my technopathy and nanite control. Blue lines shifted across the surface of the container and fluid and I connected with the basic machine intelligence within.

Almost instinctively, the divine object nanobots were pulled to the surface, changing the appearance of the liquid from cloudy steel to liquid gold. They almost glowed with the power contained within their form and I could sense the potential they contained. At my command they flowed over the container and coated my hand.

I looked at the golden sheen covering my flesh in a perfect shell, even emulating fingerprints and hair follicles. Then, with a single thought I activated the second part of nanite control and absorbed the entire mass of nanobots. Absorption was an aspect of this power that I hadn't really experimented with, but I understood the principles. Unlike the nanites that were already in my system, absorbed nanobots were stored in a kind of conceptual state. I could still work with them or release them when needed, but they weren't physically in my body.

There was still a limit to how much I could contain. Pushing my reservoirs too far would result in loss of control, flare up, and unstable expressions of the nanites' abilities. That wasn't an immediate concern, particularly not with this amount of nanotech. Trying to absorb and contain an active swarm in the process of S-Class replication would be something of a challenge, but I wasn't even close to my current limits.

As the Magitech constellation missed a connection I gathered the parts I needed and moved out to begin the construction of the mantic circuits. The circulation of mantic energy relied on sets of conductors to manage the flow. Normally conductors were statues about six feet tall consisting of a spade shaped structure connected by a pole to a rectangular base. A pair of chains from the outer points of the spade structure connected to the base to complete the circuit.

While the device seemed like a symbolic totem structure, it was actually precise machinery based on mantic principles of energy flow. Conductors weren't anywhere as good as cores in terms of mantic energy, and didn't even come close to what a shard could accomplish, but they still provided consistent energetic effects without needing burstone based materials.

Because of the technical nature of the conductors I could freely use my other powers to improve them. Ambrosial Artificer let me strip down their complexity to see blanket improvements in performance. Gadget Master let me shrink the bulky structures to the size of a desk toy. I was able to hybridize them with additional mantic components to improve performance and energy production. All of my quality and enchanting powers were applied to improve performance and capability of the system. The highest class of fabricated advanced materials were used, improving performance even further. Finally, Arcane Craft was used to provide both a warding effect and cause them to act as a focus for the mantic forces.

That was the real purpose of this exercise. Through the construction of a full mantic network the workshop would have access to a constant flow of restorative energy that would also act to increase productivity in any areas it reached. That was incredibly useful, but the reason I was crawling through my volcano base building conductor after conductor in the early hours of the morning was to improve my mastery of the Arcane Craft. It was possibly the most useful ability I had access to, and each newly constructed conductor improved my understanding and skill with that power.

That was also why I had taken my nanobots. The nanobots were capable of acting under my direct command to form into any object I could want, within the limitations of their size. Given their composition and the enhancements on them, I was able to instantly produce any masterful tool I could want, and thanks to Savvy Sultan I could wield them with machine speed and precision. I was working in the field with all the benefits of a dedicated workshop using a supply of the most advanced and magical materials on the planet, constantly improving my workmanship with each new conductor produced.

There was another major advantage to the nanobots. Instant control of their shape meant I could form them into any kind of alchemy array I happened to need. The placement of the conductors required remodeling of most of the workshop rooms and substantial tunneling into the surrounding volcanic rock in most cases. With my nanobots I could just picture the alchemical circle or array I needed and instantly form in it my hand.

It was just a single thought away from being able to command the fabric of the world around me, and was honestly kind of exhilarating. I would walk up to a solid wall, briefly consider the alchemical formula I needed to shape it, form it from the nanobots in my body and watch as the alchemical transmutation broke down the structure of the world and rebuilt in a form more convenient to me.

Through it all I was able to maintain contact with the developing intelligence of the nanobots. Its development was still very basic, but exposure to this kind of work was having an impact. Every shape that the nanobots were formed into was stored in the collective memory of the gestalt intelligence, allowing faster formation on subsequent occasions. Towards the end of my work the matrix was starting to anticipate the requirements of the next stage of the project, both in terms of tools and alchemical arrays.

The way it processed information was fascinating to watch. The emulated cybertonium allowed the bulk of the processing to be conducted outside the physical world, happening in a kind of inter-universal transwarp space. It was the highest level of computational processing I knew about and it was amazing to see it in action.

The work continued through the early morning. Each hour I allowed my duplicates their full 20% time and took a break for additional nanobot production during each 12 minute period rather than hand off the developing matrix. The emerging program seemed to enjoy the stability of the process, predictable improvement work interspersed with periods of expanded productions where its capacity expanded and it received more of the divine object nanobots.

A really high value was placed on those components, particularly when compared to the ones produced autonomously. The base nanobots would be used for structural components when something needed to be formed, but actual interaction with materials and energy always favored the divine objects. It was easy to understand why when observing the matrix in action. Divine Objects were superior in every way, and the emerging intelligence understood that. They allowed collection of more information with a greater ability to analyze the actions being taken. They processed faster and worked better. They even had more reach into transwarp space.

That was the source of one of the first independent actions I witnessed from the nanobots. In anticipating the next possible required tools they began forming their structures out of base nanobots. The thing was, their formation wasn't being conducted in real space. They extended into a subspace pocket where multiple potential tools were prepared at once, providing the option to instantly shift between them with a single thought.

It was a shocking enough discovery to make me pause in my work, which triggered additional analysis from the nanotech matrix. This was one of the core principles of cybertonium, and the nanobots had arrived at it out of simple optimization routines. I quickly provided an update to the duplicates and central computer, then just as quickly denied Survey's request to immediately convey the development to Tetra. A conference soon opened up between me and my two duplicates.

"So, this is it? We've cracked transwarp storage?" The first asked.

I looked over the actions of the nanobots. "Not completely, not until we have reliable access to cybertonium. We can at least influence it though."

"We need to get a subspace pocket set up." The second replied. "That's one of the big ones. We have too much key equipment, and we can't always rely on workshop access when there's a crisis."

"I know." I confirmed. "Any idea how we set it up?"

"Needs an access key. We can emulate that through a piece of armor. Some of the other projects are looking promising. You finish up the conductors and we'll shift to working on that."

I signaled my understanding and dove into my task. By this point there were only a few areas left to address, but the point of a mantic circuit meant full circulation. The volcano was a godsend in terms of mantic energy, but it needed a comprehensive arrangement of conductors to bring the full potential to the surface. That meant I was moving out of the main work areas and touring the little additions that my duplicates had been adding during their 20% time.

It seemed I wasn't the only one who enjoyed using alchemical transmutations to bend the world to my will. Survey had been documenting these additions, but seeing them in person was another matter. My guess was they started working from a list of unnecessary additions rich idiots put in their oversized mansions and decided to see how many they could cram into the volcano.

The answer was a lot. The volcano was an entire mountain, and was solid enough that with alchemy and a thorough understanding of architecture a person would have an unbelievable internal volume to work with.

The fighting arena on the upper levels was one of the more sedate additions. The game room was fine. Tennis courts were unnecessary, but understandable, and even more so for the squash courts. The indoor Olympic sized swimming pool was a bit excessive, especially with the locker rooms that opened into what appeared to be both Turkish and Japanese baths. It was the hockey rink with stadium seating located close enough to active lava flows to use them for overhead lighting that really stretched belief.

Maybe there's a lesson in that. Never give a bored duplicate access to infinite amounts of supernaturally enhanced ice dust?

They were an impressive display of the strength of master level alchemical transmutation, but I didn't know when I or anyone else would ever use these facilities. Well, aside from Fleet's miniature armada that had been set up in the swimming pool, complete with 1:500 scale aircraft carriers and matching flight wings. I guess if someone was enjoying them then that was enough.

It took most of the duration of that set of duplicates to finish the last of the work. I didn't need to announce the completion since I'm pretty sure every being in the Workshop was aware of the surge of mantic energy as the final set of conductors completed the circuit.

Energy pulsed through the walls, floor and equipment of my workshop. This was pure mantic energy, grounded by conductors and given directed purpose. Each room, each piece of machinery, each tool in this tiny pocket of reality was built for a reason, and the conductors drew on that intention and amplified it. There was also the echoing cry of a rather awesome guitar riff, because this far from observation I was willing to indulge myself and let Rockin' Music activate.

The normal result of a set of conductors would have been a few mild effects, a slight improvement on the level of what I felt from my lab coat. I did not work in 'normal'. Not anymore. These were arcane focus conductors built with the skill of a demigod, guided by the infinite training of the fey and bound in the most powerful materials available. They secured, reinforced, and enhanced every aspect of my Workshop.

I could feel the power, the raw heat from the volcano, the blood of the earth, fire of life being pumped through the stones beneath my feet, into the very air I breathed. Everything was better. Everything was improved. This was an accomplishment.

I felt just the slightest hint of acknowledgement from the nanobots I carried with me. They had worked on this project from the placement of the first conductor and had a record of every step of the process. They knew the state before the work began and recognized the improvement afterwards. It was too early to attribute emotions to them, but just the recognition of what they had been part of was an encouraging first step.

I hurried back to the main areas of the workshop, finding the mantic energy making even hallways easier to transverse, when I felt the Forge make a connection to the Knowledge constellation, linking to a mid-sized mote called Valkyrian Science.

This was connected to my Hidden Hideaway and Manufacturing Line power, though with principles linked to the work that the hidden laboratory had been set up to conduct.

Well, sort of.

That laboratory had been designed to tinker with the rough principles of ragnite. It had taken an energetic material and basically banged rocks against it to figure out how to use it. It was rough, primitive, and blatantly idiotic.

That may have sounded harsh, but that was only because I was trying to sound harsh. Whoever had built that laboratory had designed it to take an incredibly advanced, complex, and nuanced material and find the most basic uses for it. Valkyrian Science gave me full knowledge of the principles and capacity of ragnite, and seeing what that laboratory had done with it made me cringe. It was like seeing cavemen cracking open smartphones in order to set their batteries on fire as a source of warmth.

The broad strokes of ragnite were there, its use as a power source, its healing functions, and its capacity for biological integration. The research notes even had some shreds of useful information, having come at the problem from a completely different angle, but that was all a far cry from what the material was really capable of.

It needed refinement, but it could be used to create powerful weapons, incredible devices, and near limitless energy. The quantity I had was pitiful but my resource powers more than made up for that. I wasn't sure how much time I could commit to utilizing it, but it definitely had the potential to be a major asset.

Too bad that potential was locked behind some heavy biological integration. I could probably handle that, but it was a serious level of wet tinkering, and I'm not sure I was ready for something like that. The medical, offensive, and energy applications were good enough for now. I could shelve the super soldier development for another time.

When I made it back to the main areas of the workshop I found both duplicates waiting for me, with Survey's hologram being projected behind them.

"Aren't you both on 20% time?" I asked, confirming the timing with my implant.

"Yeah, but we wanted to get this set up." The first explained. He nodded at Survey's image, which generated a holographic screen outlining the duplicates' plan.

I could access the data directly, but there was something encouraging about Survey's involvement. I was willing to trade a slight drop in efficiency of communication to help her with her development.

"Okay, so the nanobots can access transwarp space. That means direct manipulation of subspace vesicles. We can use them to carve out a chunk of the transwarp for extradimensional storage, but we need to tie it into the specific frequency of an energy source as a special tether." The second explained as Survey's screens displayed outlines of the concept, much to her hologram's apparent satisfaction.

"Right." I replied. "So we need something to serve as an anchor for the subspace storage pocket. It will let us reduce the bulk down to a single item, but it'll still be tied to whatever we choose. Still not like having it available all the time."

"Yeah, if only there was a specific energy source that we could tie into the subspace link. If only there was some form of energy we've had for days and never done anything with that could serve as the link and power source for accessing the storage pocket." The blatantly sarcastic tone of the first duplicate was accompanied by diagrams and thaumic readings that I was able to quickly discern.

"Wait," I asked. "You want to tie this into our…"

"Our magicka pool, yes." The second confirmed.

I took a long look at the display. "Will that even work? We haven't done anything with magicka. It's completely untapped, undeveloped. I don't even know how I'm supposed to use it."

"It recovers faster than any other internal power source we have, and even the base capacity is enough to allow subspace transference." The first answered.

I mentally checked their math and nodded. "Fair enough, but I can't use it directly. We still need some kind of magitek converter, and that's hardly any different from having the pocket tied to an external object."

"It would be." The first continued. "If not for this."

At his signal Survey shifted the display to a runic pattern. It was roughly similar to the runes I used for elemental effects, but seemed totally distinct. It was like it was written in a completely different language. Or intended to channel a completely different effect. I puzzled over it for a few moments before it hit me.

"Is that what I think it is?" The duplicates grinned at my question.

"First breakthrough in analyzing Miss Militia's power. The effect that lets her recall her weapon. We're naming it soul bound, by the way." The second duplicate grinned widely as he explained, and I was guessing he had been a big part of breaking this down.

"So we just need to use that on the conversion focus and I'll be able to call it anywhere, and then access the subspace storage as well?" I asked eagerly. To my surprise the duplicates shook their heads. "What?"

"Well, you don't NEED to do that, because we've already finished it." The first answered, cracking a smile.

I returned the grin. "So where is it?" They showed me, and my grin instantly faltered. "No."

"Yes." The second said insistently, and shoved the black metal armband towards me. "You've been ducking this for too long. Aura is too important to leave on the table, not with the kind of situations we're heading for. The new costume might help, but not as much as this. We've done everything, the conversions, the rebuilds, the upgrades. All you have to do is use it."

"See this?" The first pointed at the center of the band where a specific sigil had been marked out in celestial bronze. I recognized it from the stamp I had yet to use, from the glyph Garment had sewn into her cape dress, from the icon on my PHO posts. "That's you. That's us. That's what codes this to you. In the soul bound rune setup that's what makes it yours. You can feel it right?" I could. There was a link, a faint one but totally undeniable. It was there and it wasn't going away. The band was mine, even more so than it had been when the Forge gave it to me. "This is too important. We know it so you know it. Get over it, and accept the damn shield."

I let out a long breath, then nodded. I lifted my hand and pulled at that link with my mind. The band broke into thousands of gray flecks of light, flowing over each other until they reached me and formed into the familiar shape on my wrist. This close my technopathy could feel the work they had done, the tiny magitek converter modularly inserted into the shield, the complete rebuild taking advantage of Master Craftsman and the upgrade inclusive of all my most recent powers.

I braced myself and made to trigger the shifting mechanism. Oddly, through my powers I felt a second path to the shield form. With slight prodding I watched the band dissolve into a gray blur of energy and reform into the spiky mess of a lantern shield I was so intensely familiar with. A single mental nudge caused the entire process to reverse in a flash.

"Thank you." I said with as much humility as I could manage. It still bothered me how much I needed to rely on my duplicates to force me through things like this. On one hand, it was nice that someone was doing it, on the other it made me feel kind of useless. How were you supposed to take it if a copy of yourself with a one-hour shelf life had his shit together better than you did.

"Don't mention it." The first replied.

"Believe me, we know how hard this is." The second added.

I sighed. "Right. I can handle the transwarp work. You two should get to your 20% time."

"Sure you're okay?" The first asked.

"Not made of glass." I looked down at the horrible defensive weapon that I would never be separated from. "It's hard to deal with, brings up a lot of bad stuff, but I can manage. I have managed."

They nodded and split off, leaving me with Survey's hologram. The projected image cautiously approached me.

"I am not yet familiar with the full scope of the mental stress situations and objects such as this invoke, but I am endeavoring to expand my awareness of the concepts. As you have been averse to communicating details on this matter I do not wish to pursue it unduly, but I wish to convey that both myself and Fleet have your best interests in mind." The hologram paused to consider for a moment. "As most likely does Tetra, though I cannot speak to her judgement in other areas."

"Thank you Survey." I replied slowly with a soft smile on my face. I summoned the nanobots I had absorbed after the completion of the conduits and felt their connection to transwarp space. "I'll need to get started on this work. Given the application of cybertonium I assume you would like to observe?"

"I would greatly appreciate the opportunity." She answered crisply, and fell into step behind me.

I really didn't have a place set up for the creation of an extradimensional structure attached to an esoteric energy source mapped to my body. That was a little beyond the capacity of the workshop upgrades I'd received from the Forge. 'All the cyberpunk' wasn't exactly 'all the space opera', so I was left to improvise. I had a high energy physics area designed for the production of energetic materials, and a few modifications were sufficient to rig enough monitoring equipment that I wasn't completely flying blind.

The actual process of building something that didn't exist in any universe was not a simple one, but also not as intense as you would imagine. When it came down to it 'nothing' was being produced, because the pocket existed 'nowhere'. The process of construction had more in line with creating impressions in a piece of wet sand than any kind of material creation. It was manipulation of the fabric of space time through a thousand tiny pinpricks that combined to create a fold. They pushed on the fold until it grew, tied itself in knots, and then did the entire process over again, again, and again until a useful volume formed.

The work actually started on the Planck scale and increased exponentially through repetition. Still, each repetition compounded the complexity of the actions and the detail I needed to convey through my nanobots to maintain the process. After what seemed like an eternity I had a pocket big enough to just about hold a pin. Then a pencil. Then a loaf of bread. Then an office chair. Then an entire desk.

At this point the calculations were getting intense. I was linked to the main computer and offloading as much of the work as I could, but I could feel the process slipping beyond me. In one final push I attempted a final cycle of expansion, a push to achieve a subspace pocket big enough to hold my entire motoroid and support gear. The multidimensional connections were mind boggling, but I wouldn't let this slide. This was the brass ring, the holy grail, the secret to complete access to my equipment from anywhere on the planet.

For a horrible moment the subspace vessel hung in limbo, like a soap bubble flickering in a strong wind. My mind raced and commands flew like lighting through nanobots operating beyond the physical universe. Commands that should have stabilized the process brought it closer to ruin. I bit back on my growing panic and poured over my calculations again and again.

Slowly the variables dropped into predictable patterns, the fluctuations stabilized and in one final glorious moment the entire vessel solidified, a personal subspace storage pocket bonded to me beyond the universe.

A guitar riff played out through the Workshop and I felt no shame over it.

"Congratulations." Survey said, with her hologram's expression bright. "The duplicates' durations have expired. Would you like to renew the potion."

"In a moment." I replied. "I just want to complete a test run first."

I picked up a small sensor node from a nearby workbench. I focused on the object in my hand and activated the magitek converter in my collapsed shield. I could feel the device draw power from the nebulous ball of energy that represented my magicka pool, converting it into a subspace resonance and channeling it into the item in my hand.

The node glowed brightly for an instant, then seemed to fade out. The bulk of the item disappeared first, leaving a rapidly fading outline of its glowing edges. Then it was gone.

But not really gone, just stored outside of the universe. I could already feel the expended magicka refilling. The amount was miniscule for an item this size, and my reserves would be back to full in no time. I concentrated again and activated the converter in my shield. That glowing outline appeared again, then quickly filled in with the rest of the object. Finally the glow faded and the node dropped into my hand.

Survey's hologram was leaning in with an intent expression on her face, which mirrored the activity from every sensor that she was directing in the room. "I assume that was a successful test?"

"Yes, it was." I transferred the sensor node back to my subspace storage pocket in another contained lightshow, then turned to Survey's drone. "Could I have the next duplication potion? There is one last thing to try."

I downed the offered potion and watched my two duplicates step out. They looked at each other, then at me.

"Okay, I guess I'll try this." The first extended his hand and I felt the activation of his magitek converter. There was a brief moment before he shook his head. "No luck. Pocket's there, but it's on a different resonance. Might be able to store my own stuff, but I can't access what you have in yours. Also, no idea what will happen to it when I'm gone."

I frowned but nodded at his words. The duplication potion was already an incredibly powerful ability. It was a shame it didn't extend to copying the contents of extradimensional storage since that would be an easy way to get around the limitation on worn or carried items, but the fact that the pocket itself was duplicated was still somewhat useful.

I felt the Size constellation pass by without connection as my second duplicate turned to me. "So, we dealing with that implant now, or what?"

I grimaced, but nodded. If the Nine were active I couldn't put this off. It wasn't as bad as a full replacement, but I would still be messing with something connected to my brain. At least I would be able to handle it rather than needing to hand it off to my duplicates. "Yeah, I guess it's time. We should probably head for the cybernetics bay."

I started through the workshop with my duplicates following me when Survey sent me an electronic notice while also miming clearing her throat.

"We have received a message from the real estate company that contacted Garment yesterday. Given her interest in the nearby location they have prepared a full lease arrangement. The document was sent at the beginning of business hours, suggesting it was developed overnight. The terms are largely favorable, and will enable Garment to take possession of the property while the arrangements for her boutique are still being finalized."

I reviewed the document myself, seeing Survey had already begun to mark specific terms and passages for revision.

"They're fast on this. Still, an empty building wasn't bringing in any revenue. Plus they probably want to get the publicity out of a deal with Garment before the hype dies down." The first duplicate offered from his own review of the lease.

"Yeah, it's generous, but it's not like she's taking that place on the Boardwalk. I doubt they could give away this property, so it's no wonder they'd want to nail this down." Added the second.

I turned to Survey's hologram. "Can you run this by Garment, find out what she wants to do?"

"I will present the information, but Garment is already adamant about the location. If the company agrees to some clarification of the language it is likely Garment will be able to secure the lease later today."

I nodded. "I know she'll be happy about that. Confirm with her, and reach out to the company." I paused. "After a reasonable amount of time. Make sure there's a believable delay."

The hologram nodded as we continued to the cybernetics lab. Once there I settled into one of the beds while my duplicates set up various sensors and pieces of monitoring equipment. I didn't expect anything to go wrong, but I wasn't taking any chances. When they gave me the green light I took a deep breath and focused on my nanobots.

Nanite Absorption had the advantage of not caring about where the nanites appeared when you un-absorbed them. For instance, having a small amount of incredibly advanced nanobots appear directly inside your brain, adjacent to a neural implant.

This work was being directly piloted by me, and used the most advanced nanobots exclusively. It also required a staged shutdown of individual parts of my implant as I worked. Each section that was deactivated was flooded by nanobots that broke down and absorbed the silicon processors, substituting custom designed germanium based replacements. It was a delicate act of engineering to ensure compatibility, and an arduous process, but it was also a guarantee of survival against Shatterbird, which was worth the trouble and intense focus required.

Said focus was nearly shattered by the arrival of a call, bouncing through the main systems and directed straight to my implant and omni-tool. Fortunately one of my duplicates answered it before it could ruin the procedure. I was only vaguely aware of the floating screen appearing above the second duplicates watch.

"Oh, hi Aisha." His voice echoed through the medical bay.

"Joe?" She asked somewhat uncertainly.

"Nope." He responded. "This is one of the duplicates. Joe Prime is doing some brain surgery right now. Can he call you back?"

I swear I could hear Aisha blink through the line, but kept focused on my work. "Uh, sure. No problem. I'll talk later. You guys good?"

"Never better, well soon never at all, but you know how that goes." He responded in a cheery acknowledgement of his own finite existence.

"Great." She responded a little awkwardly. "So, ask Joe, that is Joe Prime, to call me back."

"Will do." The duplicate responded and closed the line. I tried to give him a dirty look without breaking focus on my work. I don't know how effective that was, but I stayed on task until the last of the silicon was excised from my brain and my nanobots were reabsorbed.

"Looks good." The first assured me. "No errors on full start-up, and all silicon removed from the device. I think you're successfully Shatterbird proof.

I let out a sigh of relief. "Great." I glanced down at my watch. "I should call Aisha back. You guys good?"

They nodded. "Yeah, we've got some more work on her armor, but it should be good to go later today."

"Thanks. I'll confirm that with her." They nodded and made their way back to the main workshop with Survey's hologram trailing behind them. I took a breath and opened a line to Aisha.

"Brain surgery?" The girl asked from the projected screen.

"The duplicate was being overdramatic." I explained. "They do that. I was using some nanotech to upgrade my neural implant to remove the silicon processors."

She scrunched her nose. "Why would you need to remove…" Her face turned ashen. "Shatterbird? It was for Shatterbird? Is she coming here? Do you know something?"

I made a series of rapid placating gestures. "No, no. It's a precaution. I'm probably going to run into them at some point. This was just future proofing. As far as I can tell they're somewhere in Indiana, and probably will be for a while."

I could practically see her deflate as the tension left her. "Right. Good. Thanks." She cleared her throat. "So, what was the message about, and why did you leave it at stupid-o'clock in the morning?"

"Well, for the timing, I had an early night and only sleep half what most people do. Didn't get much rest the night before, so needed to make up for it."

"Was that because of the Dragon thing?" She asked.

"You saw that?" There was a snort in response.

"National news. Everyone saw it. Everyone is saying everything about it. Care to fill me in?" She leaned in towards the screen.

"Later." I assured her. "That's what this is about. Your armor's almost ready. I just need you here for the final details. Can you meet sometime today?"

"Well, I did have a full day of being criticized by my dad all planned out, but I suppose I could spare some time to get tinker tech power armor." She was barely concealing a grin as she spoke. I smiled back.

"Oh, that reminds me. Garment might be signing the lease on her store later today. It's in the area, so if your dad still wants to meet her it would be a good time." I offered.

She sighed. "Yeah, he wants to meet her. Won't shut up about it. Did I mention he likes these clothes? Because he really likes these clothes."

"They are nice clothes." I tried.

"I know that, you know that, Garment knows that, but my dad shouldn't know that. That man's never had an opinion on any item of clothing that's worn outside a boxing ring. It's unnatural."

I smiled at that. I still wasn't sure if he'd want her working with a cape, but given what Aisha used to wear I could completely understand where he was coming from. Not that I would ever admit that to Aisha.

"I'll keep you posted. If it doesn't work out we can set up something else for the armor." I promised.

"Oh, trust me, I'll make time for the armor." She smiled at that. "Send me the details and I'll make sure my dad can get out. He's been itching to get out of the house since they released him, so this will probably be good for everyone involved."

"Right, I'll check in later." I disconnected the call and turned back to my workshop. I could feel the boosts from the mantic energy flowing through the place, the buzz of the nanobots developing intelligence, and the sheer potential of the projects being undertaken. For the first time it felt like I was actually on top of my technology. Like I had a hope of actually bringing my full capacity to bear.

I knew things were going to get worse. Last night was a one-off miracle, and not one I could count on again. Things were going to heat up, and when they did I would make sure I was ready to meet them, head on.

---

Addendum Rey

Rey looked over the aftermath with a sigh. The cynical thought that jumped to his mind was that this must have caused DOZENS of dollars in property damage.

Really, that wasn't fair, but it encapsulated his feelings towards the bulk of Lost Garden. When he first arrived his impression was they were a bunch of sheltered kids with no sense of the realities of cape life who would fold at the first challenge.

Looking around he could see them, folding at the first challenge. The mystical forest of Barrow's shaker effect was rapidly recovering from the attack. The collection of huts, tents, and campers was not so fortunate. The group was damn lucky that there hadn't been any deaths, normally something to be expected from Uber and Leet's stunts, but with their new association and firepower it was far from guaranteed. Given the level of moaning for comparatively minor injuries Rey had to wonder if this group had ever seen combat.

"Can you help them after Barrow?" Asked the young girl walking beside him. Everyone here was young, and a disproportionate number of them were girls. Definitely girls, not women.

This one went by Barrow Rose, as if the dynamics weren't creepy enough.

"I'll try." He offered. He might be able to whip up some pain killer, but it wasn't high on his priority list, not after what they'd done to his lab. Shattered remains of every terminal he had smuggled in greeted him on his return from the last supply run. Unlike Barrow's collection of runaways he couldn't operate on nothing but magical forest fruit. Tinkers needed resources, even tinkers like him.

Lost Garden had always been a last resort. There was the possibility ever since Lauren had introduced him to the group, but they never clicked. The themes seemed like a natural match, but despite all Rey's quirks, and his enjoyment of the occasional chemical indulgence, he was a man of science, not some starstruck dreamer trying to create a mix of a 60s commune and a fantasy novel. He and Barrow couldn't be more different, which was reflected in their arrangement.

The man had been stingy with his resources, even with allocation of the ones produced freely by his shaker effect. Rey had needed to settle his lab outside any of the main living areas, giving space to all the long term residents. He'd provided guard creatures as requested, but was only rewarded with heavy criticism and more demands for chemicals.

Frankly he was planning to leave the moment he spotted a better prospect. Still, the fact that he wasn't completely settled in saved him from losing everything to the raid.

Unlike Barrow.

He found the man being inexpertly nursed by three of his acolytes, the oldest of which couldn't have been more than 18. That was the most unsettling part of this arrangement. Barrow never made any moves towards his circle of teenagers, he just had complete control over their environment, safety, and resources. It didn't take a genius to see the result that kind of power imbalance would have on young minds.

Though it was hard to see any power in the slumped middle aged form lying on the bed of moss. Young capes who previously only saw him as a source of free drugs were looking at him with hope in their eyes.

"I need bright lights, clean water, and the three red cases from my lab." A quick look to Barrow Rose for confirmation sent the three teens scattering for the requested items, letting Rey get to work.

It hadn't surprised him to learn he was the only person with a medical degree in the commune. It had surprised him how little medical training the rest of the group had. Not even basic first aid. Really it was a wonder something like this hadn't happened before.

No, actually the wonder was how this had happened at all. He decried Lost Garden, but Barrow's forest was a formidable obstacle, nearly impossible to navigate and full of dangers. The kids may have been young but they were still parahumans. Anyone else blundering into the group would have been butchered.

But it hadn't been anyone else. Uber and Leet had struck like a bolt of lightning. Hitting when he was on a supply run and the rest of the group was recovering from a usual night of revelry, they had come in better informed, better prepared, and much better armed than anyone could have expected. Only a token effort had been paid to the 'Plants vs Zombies' motif as they drew from their now functional catalogue of weaponry and showed what happened if a normal team tried to stand against them.

Rey shook his head as he continued his treatment and examination. Barrow had gotten the worst of it. A severe beating coupled with multiple cuts, scrapes, and what looked like a spinal biopsy. He had scanned enough parahumans to know what that was about, and didn't like the implication.

"Blas.. to..?" Came a murmured voice as the man regained consciousness.

"I'm here," Rey assured the shaker, "And cleaning up the mess."

"Fuckers." He growled and took an unsteady breath. "How bad is it?"

The bio-tinker let out a sigh. "Bad. Extensive damage to multiple systems. Looks like a detached retina. Some internal bleeding that I've dealt with, but the spinal damage is going to be a problem."

"Can't feel legs." The man grumbled in a low voice. Rey nodded.

"Was afraid of that. They weren't too gentle with you."

"Can you fix it?" Rey looked from the prone form of the middle aged man to the shining eyes of Barrow Rose hovering at the entrance.

"Maybe, but not with what I have here." He wagered. Looking down at the man he could tell what was coming.

"Take whatever you need. Rose has the accounts. She can cover it." Rey nodded solemnly, a small part of him wondering if it would be worth running as soon as he got what he needed rather than stay tied to this mess. "And I want you to go to Brockton."

Rey blinked. "What?"

The prone man shook his head. "This wasn't those clowns' plans. The ABB is behind it. They aren't getting away with it. We have to strike back, or we'll be prey. People will come for the children."

Rey repressed a shudder at Barrow's words and forced himself to nod. "That city is going to be a mess. Dragon's setting up there, the ABB is still active, it's going to be a cluster fuck. The best we can hope for is showing the flag."

"That's enough. We bloody their nose for this, then let the local dogs tear them apart. Can you do that?"

Rey sighed. Out of Boston and into another gang war. Still, his place in the community was at least on the rise. Barrow was likely to be very accommodating if the prospect of cloned spinal tissue was on the table. If he could minimize his direct involvement in the conflicts coming then maybe this could be a good thing.

He smiled, keeping his true intentions from his face. "I'll see what I can do."

Jumpchain abilities this chapter:

Putting On The Reich (Indiana Jones) 200:

They may fear your tenacity. They may hate your cause. They may even oppose your beliefs. But one thing remains constant: A begrudging respect for the aura of organization and sharpness you give off. You have an excellent sense of how to design uniforms that not only are intimidating and show the power of your group, but are also fashionable and make your group look organized, official in a way. It's time to show them who's Boss.

Aesthetics and Flair (Bayonetta) 100:

A gun isn't quite a gun until it LOOKS good, you know? It's supposed to be classy, make you look amazing just for having it. Likewise, that sword could use a bit of badass styling to it. When you create your weapons, you can make them look DAMNED good even on an off day. Expect any weapon creator to envy you, and those who die by your weapons to count themselves lucky as they perish to such beautiful art.

Inexplicable Innuendo (Bayonetta) Free:

You're not sure how, but just by being here you've gotten the jive of things. Any time you want to come off as sexy or just talk in a lightheartedly dirty manner, it's easy as pie for you. Want to make some people squirm with an implication? Done. You can even implement this in your battle quips, throwing them off their game for that moment of distraction you need.

Classy Contortionist (Bayonetta) Free:

Um... this is something. You've got an innate sense of posing that you can utilize, whether it be to show off your sexiness or simply throw people off their game. It's got all kinds of applications, and no matter what you're always going to look good. Throw it into your battle styles or something.

Heretical Adaptation (Senki Zesshou Symphogear) 200:

Symphogears are, in essence, a Relic adapted into a combat system for its ability to generate massive amounts of energy that can be formatted into a certain kind of matter through a generic mass-energy converter. However, they also have the ability to 'evolve' overtime, gaining additional armor and improvements to features such as onboard thrusters. With a bit of study, it might be possible to apply this adaptive behavior to other materials, encouraging them to improve themselves over time.

Calling Card (Senki Zesshou Symphogear) Free:

You spent a lot of time coming up with your combat techniques. It's only fair to name them! When you make an attack that's above par, time almost seems to freeze for a second, and all those onlooking instinctively recognize the name and intended theme of the technique. This effect can be toggled.

Scrapyard Skills (Swat Kats) 300:

Where others see junk, you see treasure just waiting to be utilized. You can make far more use out of scrap metal and tossed out electronics, repurposing them for many different tasks. That washer machine might have the parts needed to help spin an engine turbine, or that piston tube might be JUST the right size to refashion into a grappling hook launcher... it's all in how you use it and how you repurpose things.

Rockin' Music (Swat Kats) Free:

When you're going around or doing something awesome, you can choose to have a sick electric guitar riff or a few notes of heavy metal goodness playing as you work in all your glory! ...or villainy. Either way it's sure to sound amazing.

Valkyrian Science (Valkyria Chronicles) 300:

Somehow you've gained some of the knowledge that the Valkyrur used to possess, giving you the skill and ability to graft Ragnite machinery on a level far above any modern human. At first, you'd only be able to create replica's of the Valkyrian weapons, but with many years of study it might be possible to recreate the Valkyrur themselves.