15

Trump Card

Part Thirteen: Preparation

Danny sat up on the sofa as the key rattled in the back door lock. Checking his watch, he frowned; it was late for Taylor to come in, and on a school night too. And the message he had found on the phone from Principal Blackwell …

With a sigh, he stood up from the sofa. As the back door opened, he walked through into the kitchen. Taylor saw him as she stepped inside; she didn't seem overly concerned.

"Hi, Dad." She closed the door and locked it, then dropped the key on the table. "I'll put that back in the morning."

"Taylor," he began. "Principal Blackwell rang me today, and left a very disturbing message on the machine."

"Of course she did," Taylor replied, opening the fridge. "Can I use some of the ham? I haven't had anything since lunchtime."

He found her lack of concern … worrying. "Taylor, this is serious," he persisted. "She told me that you were suspended due to your behaviour. That you acted in a totally disrespectful manner, and then stormed out of the school when she tried to discipline you."

She closed the fridge door and turned to face him. "Yeah, I know it's serious. You want to know what really happened?"

He nodded. "Of course I do."

She took a deep breath. "Emma and the others tried to bully me. I fought back. I didn't hurt anyone, not really, but they went to Principal Blackwell. She decided that this was grounds to call Mr Barnes and Mr Clements in on it, and they were going to face me, eleven on one." Her tone became very dry. "Of course, they couldn't reach you in time."

Danny felt anger building inside of him. "And so you left … ?"

She shrugged. "If I stayed, they would have thrown their accusations at me, and I wouldn't have been able to face all of them down at once. She wouldn't make Mr Barnes and Mr Clements leave, and you weren't there, so I left. She threatened me with suspension if I just walked out, but I figured it was the better option than stay and fight a losing battle."

"Christ," Danny ground out. "The woman's gone too far."

She put her hand on his arm. "Dad, we can deal with this. What we've got to do is work out a strategy that doesn't end in a big legal battle. Because if we go at them head to head, Mr Barnes will pull out the big guns to protect Emma. You know it, and I know it."

His anger faded slightly as he looked at her, the calm demeanour, the collected posture. "You've been thinking about this."

She nodded. "All day. Ever since I left school." Turning back to the fridge, she opened it again, pulling out bread and butter and the packet of ham. "Now, all they can really get me on is leaving the school grounds without permission. That's barely a blip on the radar; I know of kids who haven't attended three days in five." She began to butter a slice of bread.

"And the assault charges?"

She didn't look up, intent on her task. "No bruises, except maybe the girl who ended up on her ass. I didn't break Emma's finger, or Madison's wrist. Madison might have a mark on her wrist, but I doubt it. No doctor will find anything wrong with either one of them."

Danny blinked. She was so casually discussing the aftermath of a fight against superior odds, from which she had emerged victorious. Taylor really has changed. "So you have a strategy in mind?"

This time, she looked up and grinned. "I thought you'd never ask."

I put down the soldering iron, clicked the goggles to clear view, and checked my work by eye. The outer carapace looked good; I got up and walked around it. Clicking the rim of the goggles again activated the magnification function – they had taken barely half an hour to put together, while I was taking a break from the main project – and I examined the joins minutely. Another click gave me thermal sensing; the carapace was cooling nicely, with no stress fracturing.

"Excellent." I stretched; my back popped oddly. This gave me the clue as to how long I had been working in the same posture; I stretched again, more extravagantly, and more vertebrae clicked.

I had brought a cheap alarm clock in to my work room, and now I checked it. "Wow, that late?"

I had known it wasn't early; Alibi had already gotten home, had her discussion with Dad, eaten a sandwich and gone up to bed. I just hadn't realised it was that late.

Just as I usually did, Alibi had had a shower before going to bed, which I'd used as an opportunity to ensure that nothing needed adjusting on the chassis. But everything seemed to be working well; externally, she was identical to me to several decimal places.

Alibi didn't need to sleep, of course, but she could enter a shutdown mode which mimicked it fairly well. The sandwich she'd eaten would be converted to energy using a basic simulacrum of the human digestive system; she could also eat garbage or drink gasoline for energy, although the former would generate excess methane, and the latter would give her a very distinctive smell for quite some time afterward. Her internal systems had been optimised for normal, processed foods; that sandwich, reduced to its most basic molecules, could supply her with energy for several days if necessary.

I was pleased, although not totally surprised, that Dad had been fooled by her. After the dry run with Über and L33t, I had been confident that she could pass as me with reasonable certainty. And so it had happened; Alibi had talked with Dad, following the prompts I was giving her, while I continued working on my second major project.

I did feel a bit bad about pulling the wool over Dad's eyes like this, but I figured it was necessary; if he didn't know about Alibi, he couldn't accidentally give the secret away. And, for all intents and purposes, it was me in the driver's seat. I just had Alibi's brain handling all the routine stuff while I did the actual thinking.

"Maybe I'd better get some sleep after all," I told myself. The basic chassis of the second project was complete. I knew what I needed to do next on it, but that would go well into the morning, and would require my full attention. And while Tinkers were (in)famous for working long hours to finish their projects, it wasn't as though I couldn't take my time on this.

After all, I didn't have to worry any more about splitting my time between work and school.

Principal Blackwell's intercom beeped. She pressed the button. "Yes?"

"Taylor Hebert is here with her father to see you, ma'am."

"What?"

"Taylor Hebert, ma'am. She's here to see you. Her father is with her."

"Oh, uh, I'm busy. Tell them to make an appointment."

She heard her secretary begin to say just that, until a masculine voice intruded. "It's about Sophia Hess."

Sophia Hess. Shadow Stalker. The only member of the Wards to attend Winslow High. If Taylor's father knew something about her, then …

She pressed the intercom button again. "Show them in."

The door opened, and Taylor entered, followed by her father. Carrie Blackwell tried to remember his name, but only managed to recall that it started with the letter D. They took seats without being invited; Taylor had her backpack over her shoulder.

Principal Blackwell checked that the door was closed and the intercom switched off before speaking; even then, she kept her voice low. "What do you know about Sophia Hess?"

"That she's Shadow Stalker, and that she and her friends bullied me for over a year without any of you doing a single damn thing about it," Taylor told her, in an equally low, but rather intense, tone of voice.

"We didn't know -" began Blackwell.

"Then you're the most incompetent staff that I've ever seen at any school, ever," snapped Hebert. As he spoke, Taylor opened her bag and pulled out a sheaf of papers.

"You will not speak to me in that fashion," Carrie began, but was interrupted by Taylor slapping the thick sheaf down in front of her. "What's this?" she asked.

"A documentation of the last four months," Taylor informed her. "Day by fucking day. Read that and tell me that you didn't see or hear of a single one of those incidents."

Blackwell looked at it, then up at the two expectant faces. "I – you want me to read that now? It's rather thick - "

"Yes, it is, isn't it?" Danny – that was his name, Danny – agreed, leaning forward over the desk. "That's because there's a lot of it. A lot of incidents that happened to Taylor at this school."

"Incidents which I documented," Taylor continued. "Which will be verified by the police."

Carrie Blackwell blinked. "The police? How will they verify it?"

Taylor grinned, or at least showed her teeth. "You may recall the incident on Monday. You will have been warned by the PRT to tell no-one about it."

"I signed a non-disclosure agreement," the principal confirmed.

Danny nodded. "Well, Alexandria paid us a visit just the other night. She informed us that Sophia will be going into custody and being prosecuted for her crimes against Taylor. They will be going through her phone, and finding out whatever else she has done. And I imagine that they will be passing on evidence of any other crimes, say, ones which Emma and Madison assisted in, to the police to deal with."

Taylor tapped on the stack of paper. "And what do you want to bet that they'll find texts that match the incidents, down to the date, in this list?"

Carrie was barely listening. "You're trying to tell me that Alexandria paid you a visit?"

Taylor nodded. "This is one of the things you don't tell anyone, but yeah. She apologised for the way the PRT has been treating me, and promised that they'd leave me alone."

The way she spoke convinced Blackwell most of all. There was no swagger, no boasting, no embellishment. She just stated it, straight out. And from what she'd heard of the actual fight, of the powers that Taylor had exhibited … she wasn't entirely ready to dismiss the story out of hand.

"Now, I could take this list straight to the media," Danny suggested quietly, "but do you really want that?"

He didn't have to explain how badly that could go for her, once the news got hold of that list. Interviews of students and teachers, all of them anxious for their five minutes of fame.

"The staff wouldn't talk," she protested weakly, knowing even as she said it how wrong she was.

Danny snorted. "Talk? They'll be competing to see who can be first to throw you under the bus. You're the one who knew about it and condoned it; they all could see what was happening, and were powerless to stop it because of orders from above, and so on, and so forth. You go, one of them gets the top spot. Want to take bets on who it'll be?"

Blackwell slumped back into her chair. They had her over a barrel, well and truly. "What is it that you want?" she asked; it was almost a whisper.

"Revoke the suspension," Taylor stated flatly. "I didn't assault those girls, and you know it. I just want to go to school."

"But the assault complaint is down in the record now," Blackwell protested.

Taylor rolled her eyes. "Fine. Give me detention for a couple of days. I won't attend, but you can say I did."

Carrie grimaced. "You're undermining my authority here -" she began, but Danny was shaking his head.

"We haven't even started," he warned her. "Give Taylor her detention. And from here on in, she gets the same treatment everyone else does. Or I start looking at the list."

Blackwell thought of protesting that everyone in the school was treated equally, but decided not to. For one thing, it would be a blatant lie, and she knew it. So too, she figured, did Taylor.

Besides, the price she was having to pay was amazingly light; to allow Taylor Hebert to attend school? It wasn't even blackmail, not really.

Which did raise an ugly possibility. "If you try to blackmail me -" she began.

Danny shook his head. "Didn't even cross our minds," he assured her. "Doing this the legal way is much easier. Just let Taylor go to school, and make sure she isn't harassed, and we're good."

Make sure she isn't harassed. The phrase hung in the air. Blackwell finally felt the jaws of the trap closing on her. If the thickness of that list was anything to go by, Taylor had been harassed every single day she had been at Winslow. Every. Day.

If that list was not to go to the media, and the inability of the school to prevent the bullying of one teenage girl was not to come to light, then she would actually have to make an effort to ensure that every teacher specifically watched out for Taylor's well-being.

Again, father and daughter were observing her expectantly. She stared back at them, feeling that she was slowly sinking into a bog, with no bottom in sight.

"Fine." She forced the word out. "You have a deal."

Danny smiled widely; the expression looked genuine. "Great."

Taylor got to her feet, and slipped the sheaf of papers back into her bag. She looked Blackwell in the eye. "Why couldn't you have done this a year ago?"

Before the principal could formulate a reply, she had opened the door to the outer office, and was gone.

Danny paused, and looked over his shoulder as he followed his daughter. "Just make sure. No harassment. None." His voice was flat and hard.

The door closed behind him. Blackwell turned to her intercom and pressed the buttons that gave her access to the school PA system.

"This is Principal Blackwell speaking. All year ten teaching staff will report immediately, repeat immediately, to my office."

Switching off the microphone, she took a deep breath, and then another. This was not going to be fun.

I grinned as I finished calibrating the Manton field generator. That had been kinda fun, even at second hand. Controlling Alibi was becoming less and less strange to me; to be honest, I rather got a kick out of it. It was like I could think on two different wavelengths or more at once, and Alibi got one of those wavelengths and I was already on another. I didn't switch between one and the other; I didn't even juggle them. I just … used them both. At the same time. It was seriously awesome.

As Alibi said her goodbyes to Dad, I started in on the holocloak device. It was an important aspect to the project, and I wanted to make sure it worked the way I wanted it to.

Über knocked on the doorframe, then stuck his head into my workroom. "Hey, Hax," he greeted me. "You're up early. Or did you not go to sleep?"

I glanced over my shoulder at him. "I acquired some meditation techniques using your power, and spent some time doing that," I explained. "Also, I did get some sleep." The camp bed in the corner wasn't the most comfortable, but it had the advantage of being close to my work.

"Christ, from the stuff you've gotten done, not much sleep," he commented. "Can I come in?"

I nodded. "Sure. I needed to take a break anyway. One more thing to do, and then I can finish off my last project."

He strolled on into the room, and observed my second project.

"Is that what I think it is?" he asked rhetorically.

I answered him anyway. "Sure. It's a Tinker thing."

He frowned. "But it's not very thematic. It's very … generic. You won't be able to use it on most of our jobs."

I grinned. "I thought of that."

I didn't elaborate; after a moment, he raised an eyebrow. "You're not going to tell me what you're doing, are you?"

My grin widened, and I shook my head.

He sighed. "If your powers weren't so goddamn hax, I'd be so pissed off at you right now. Anyway, L33t was going to get something to eat. What would you like?"

Automatically, I reached for my purse. "Not sure how much money I've got -"

Chuckling, he waved me off. "No need. That heist the other night, if we sell even ten percent of what we got, just the generic stuff, we're gonna have dollars to spare. You earned your keep that night, keeping Aegis and Vista off our backs. Plus, getting into the vault. And getting us out of there."

"Sure," I told him. Grabbing my notepad and turning to a blank page, I started writing. "Gonna need a few things. We're lacking stuff around here, so we may as well make this a shopping trip."

When I handed him the page, he blinked at it. "Holy crap, is your order on here at all?"

I rolled my eyes, and took the page back. Turning it over, I scribbled my fast-food order. "Seriously, we need to pay more attention to nutrition. Bring me ingredients and I'll cook. Or you can. Because you can't tell me that you don't know how to cook."

Über shrugged. "Two guys. What can I say?"

I rolled my eyes again. If I was going to be working with these guys, there were going to be some changes around here.

Blackwell looked at all the teachers assembled in her office.

"What's this about?" asked Gladly. "I've got a lesson plan -"

"Shut up," she told him harshly, then addressed the group. "Who here knows the girl called Taylor Hebert?"

Mrs Knott cleared her throat. "I know her. She's in my home room class."

The rest of them stared at Carrie; she stared back. "Taylor Hebert. Tall, long curly brown hair, glasses." She held up a photo. "This girl, for crying out loud."

Gladly also stepped forward. "Yeah, I remember her now."

A few more teachers stepped forward; the rest hung back. Blackwell eyed the latter. "Are you absolutely certain that you don't teach any classes that she's in?"

A murmur of voices assured her that no, they didn't know her. Her lips tightened. "Fine. What I'm about to tell you stays in this office. You tell no-one. No-one at all. Not any students, not any teachers, not any parents. Is that perfectly understood?"

The teachers looked at one another, then at her. "Uh, why not?" asked Gladly.

Blackwell gritted her teeth. "Because I told you," she snapped. "Okay, now, it's really simple. You know her face now. If you see her being harassed in any way, you stop it. Stop it dead. You don't let anyone tease her, bully her, push her around, call her names, anything. At all. Full stop."

She took a deep breath and spoke slowly, carefully. "It doesn't matter who the other person is. Who their father is, or their mother. If they are harassing Taylor Hebert in any way, then you pull them up as hard as you need to." She met their eyes, one at a time. "If I find that you've been falling down on the job, then you won't have your job here for much longer." She paused. "Is there anyone here who does not understand what I've just told you?"

That idiot Gladly raised his hand slightly. "I, uh, understand," he told her hastily. "But what I don't get is why? What's so special about her?"

Blackwell eyed him sourly. "She's a student at Winslow. She's being bullied. Do not allow this. Do you need a better reason?"

"But -" he began, then she cut him off.

"Mr Gladly," she growled, holding thumb and forefinger very close together, "I am this close to reviewing your employment here, and finding a replacement who can follow directives. Do not push me."

"I, uh, yes, ma'am," he stammered, face turning red.

"Good," she told him shortly. "Now all of you, get out of my office."

When the door closed behind the last of them, she slumped back into her chair. Oh god, I hope that's enough.

L33t complained loudly as he staggered into the base, carrying the laden shopping bags. "These are killing my hands. Couldn't someone have come along to help?"

"You said you wanted to go on your own, bro," Über reminded him. "I did show you her list before you went."

L33t turned to me. "Well, fuck. What's with all this shit, anyway? Gonna use it for chemical Tinker work? Because I don't think my powers work that way."

I snorted. "Nope. But I figure that Über's power could give me the skills to make bombs from this stuff anyway." I looked from one to the other. "No, we need to do some cleaning around here."

L33t frowned. "We keep it clean!"

"Clean-ish," I corrected him. "You'll see the difference. That's why I got you to get cleaning products. Plus, a new shower curtain. The old one has so much mould on it that I don't even like to touch it. Also, that lock? It's for the bathroom door. That one's kind of important."

"We're not going to burst in on you when you're in the shower," protested Über.

I shook my head. "No, but it's my privacy, you know? We're going to need a separate trash can in the bathroom, too."

"What for?" demanded L33t. "Isn't the one we've already got good enough for you?"

I smiled, very slightly. "Ask me again in a month's time."

Über got it first. He grabbed L33t's shoulder. "Dude. Do not argue." L33t opened his mouth anyway; Über leaned close and whispered in his ear.

L33t stared at me with a horrified look on his face. "What, you - ?"

I nodded, once. "Yes. Do I get my trash can?"

Über spoke for him. "You get your trash can."

I smiled again. "Thank you. And just to prove that having me here isn't going to be all pushy demands and dreaded feminine secrets, tonight I'll make you both my mother's famous lasagne dish. And hell, I'll even game with you, if you want."

L33t's eyes lit up. "You play video games too?"

My smile grew to a grin. "Nope, but by tonight I will be." I pointed at the supplies he had bought. "Breakfast first. Then we need to do some stuff around here."

Things got a little domestic after that. I cleaned the stove and started making the lasagne, while Über installed the lock on the bathroom door, and L33t (not without some grumbling) started cleaning around the place. Once the lasagne was in, I went into the bathroom; Über had replaced the curtain, and the lock was in place.

"Excellent," I told him, and set about cleaning the shower cubicle. It obviously hadn't been scrubbed in some time, and I was tempted to Tinker up something to do just that, but doing it the hard way was kind of soothing. In the meantime, I tapped into Über's power, and learned how to play video games.

By the time I had the cubicle sparkling, the cleaning outside had been done, and the pair were settling down to some quality video gaming. I checked on the lasagne, which was doing well, then wandered over to watch them.

"Grab a controller and join in," Über invited, waving at an empty stretch of sofa. "We need a sniper."

"In a bit," I excused myself. "I really need to get the project done."

"You can do that later," he told me. "Right now, we're gaming."

"Sooner I finish it, sooner I can get out there and strut my stuff as Hax," I reminded him.

"Half an hour," L33t urged. "I'm not in there Tinkering. You don't have to either."

I grinned and plumped down on the sofa. "Right," I agreed, grabbing the controller. "Which screen's mine?"

With my pre-installed skills, it didn't take long for me to set up my account in the system, and then we started play. I found I liked being a sniper, using an electronic gun to shoot electronic enemies in the head before they even saw me. Über and L33t were into it too, praising each other – and me – for particularly awesome kills.

It was fun.

Mr Gladly had glanced at me/her when he entered the World Affairs classroom, and every now and again he glanced again, as if he was not quite sure if he wanted me/her there. I/she was fairly sure what the topic of conversation had been when Blackwell had called the grade ten teachers in to her office. It just remained to be seen if her instructions had been stringent enough.

He had put us together in groups; I/she had Sparky and Greg, as well as Kaia, one of Madison's friends. "What I want you to do today," he told us, "is to take a single cape and determine the impact he or she has had on the world since getting powers. Now, Scion is out, but the Triumvirate are fair game. However, I don't want everyone talking about just them. So each group has to pick two capes; if you clash with someone else, you have to go with your secondary."

Sparky already seemed to be asleep; Greg was enthusiastic, but I/she wasn't wild about his choices. Kaia ignored the whole process, choosing to talk instead to Madison, who was in the next group over. In the end, I/she allowed Greg to choose Lung as our primary, but insisted on Dragon as a secondary; as a Tinker (at the moment) I/she had a certain interest in her career.

Of course, Kaia objected to our choices as soon as we presented them to her. "Why didn't you ask me?" she demanded. "You should have asked me."

"You were talking," I/she reminded her. "We did ask you. You ignored us."

She raised her hand. "Mr G," she complained. "My group won't listen to what I say. Can I join Madison's group?"

Mr Gladly looked over at us. "Kaia was talking to Madison," I/she told him. "We chose Lung and Dragon. Are either of those taken?"

"No!" Kaia insisted. "I didn't get to choose! What if I wanted someone else?"

Her raised voice had gotten attention across the classroom; everyone had turned to look. Mr Gladly looked at me/her, then at Kaia. "Ms Hendricks, your group has made a choice. You should have participated," he informed her curtly. "And no, you can't join Madison's group."

"But, Mr G -"

"I said no," he retorted, then looked at us. "Lung has already been taken, but Dragon is free."

"But we were going to take Dragon!" shouted Madison from her group. "It's not fair! We chose her first!"

Again, Mr Gladly glanced at me/her; he seemed to grimace. Looking back at Madison, he shook his head. "They asked me before you did. They get Dragon. What's your secondary?"

"Legend," she told him sulkily.

"Taken, sorry," he informed her. "Pick another couple of capes."

"But we picked Dragon first," she whined. "Why do they get to pick first?"

"You have thirty seconds to pick, or I send you to Principal Blackwell's office for being obstructive in class," he told her sternly.

Her mouth dropped open, and she stared at him. "Mr G -"

"Twenty-five seconds."

I/she stopped paying attention, and turned to Greg and Kaia. Both seemed to be watching the drama; Greg avidly, Kaia with a certain amount of shock. Never had Mr Gladly brought the boom down on Madison so thoroughly.

"Guys?" I/she murmured. "Dragon. Ideas on what she's done to change the world?"

In the end, I/she wrote most of the joint project my/herself; Kaia spent the remainder of the class commiserating with Madison about being stuck with Miss Militia, and Greg's 'information' about Dragon seemed to be mainly half-baked theories about her powers, capabilities and general situation. Stuff which, I/she had no doubt, he had trawled off some of the more dubious threads in the PHO boards. Seriously, Dragon an AI? Who did he think he was kidding?

When we stood up and read out our presentations, Madison gave me/her dirty looks all the way through. With Greg's dubious assistance, I/she had managed to put together something reasonably complete; Madison and her group had assembled a list of supervillains whom Miss Militia had shot. She had wanted Dragon, that was for sure. Unfortunately for her, Mr Gladly had upheld my/her choice over Madison's.

I/she didn't relax, but there was a faint smile on my/her face when the bell rang for lunch. It appeared that Blackwell was holding up her end of the bargain. So far, anyway.

Video gaming over, I checked on the lasagne again – it was fine, but I turned it down a little, so it could spend all afternoon baking properly – and went back to my work-room. I'd kept the light-spot on Über during the game session, so that I could properly hone my skills, but now I put it back on L33t. I 'saw' the spot moving toward the bathroom; a moment later, he hurried back over toward where I had last seen Über.

"Dude," I heard him faintly say, "I never knew the shower cubicle was that colour."

Grinning, I got back to work.

Danny looked up when Taylor strolled in through the front door and into the living room.

"You're back kind of early," he noted.

"School's out," she reminded him.

He cleared his throat. "But your … uh … after school job?" he insinuated delicately.

She grinned. "Oh, I've got that taken care of."

He blinked. "Taken care of, as in … ?"

"As in, taken care of," she repeated. "Not to be worried about."

"Oh," he replied dubiously. "If you're sure."

"Sure I'm sure," she told him with a grin. "So, what's for dinner?"

"Lasagne," he told her, and wondered why she started giggling.

"Holy crap, this is awesome!"

I tasted the lasagne; it was about the best I'd ever managed. Between Mom's recipe and Über's power to pick up cooking skills, I had nailed it exactly. However, L33t's startled exclamation still caused both myself and Über to grin at him.

"It is pretty good," Über commented. "Can we have this again, sometime?"

I nodded. "Sure," I agreed. "It's not that hard to make. I can give you the recipe, if you want."

Something seemed to occur to L33t. "Dude," he accused Über. "You can cook, or at least you can learn how to cook. Why don't you ever cook like this?"

Über shrugged. "I, uh, never felt like it?"

I stuck my fork through another slice of lasagne. "I have other recipes, too. Spaghetti carbonara, for instance."

L33t looked at me pleadingly. "Is it as good as this?"

It was my turn to shrug. "Dad seems to like it."

Über grinned and elbowed him. "And you complained about carrying the ingredients back."

L33t studied the forkful that he'd been just about to put in his mouth. "This came from what I bought today?"

I nodded. "Sure. I can show you how too, if you want?"

He blinked. "Uh, no, I'm good. But I'm never complaining about shopping ever again. This is awesome."

Über smirked. "And you were bitching so hard about having a pushy girl on the team."

L33t waved another forkful of lasagne; the previous one had gone the way of all food. "A pushy girl – meh. A pushy girl who games and cooks? I'm good with that."

For some reason, Über and I found that hilarious.

"So, the PRT is interested in Taylor Hebert, but is not actively surveilling her," Coil mused. "Of course, hitting the house would be too obvious. Likewise, the school."

He leaned back in his chair, rubbing his chin. The various possibilities turned over in his mind.

There was a note in the file indicating suspicion that she had linked up with one of the lesser-known criminal gangs; the main suspicion was toward Über and L33t. But she wasn't with them now, and nor had she been there over the last twenty-four hours. It was possible, even probable, that she had decided to sheer away from the life of a supervillain, especially after the close call with the PRT.

All the better for me, he decided. When she disappears, they'll think she tried to join up with another villain gang, and it went bad.

That she would disappear, he had no doubt. What Coil wanted, Coil got. Whatever it took to get it.

With a sigh of relief, I snapped the cover shut on my third project, and hit the self-test button. It hummed, and LEDs flickered on and off. Moments later, it shut itself down again; one green LED shone brightly, to show that the self-test had been successful.

I clicked the goggles back to ordinary vision, and stretched. My back popped again, and I felt my neck crack. Glancing at the clock, I blinked. Where did the time go?

Immediately, an idea flitted into my head for a device that compressed time in an area, so I could get hours of work (or sleep) done in minutes. It was intriguing, but I didn't have the time, or equipment, to build it right at that moment. So I jotted down a note to myself before I could forget about it.

Leaning out the workroom door, I noted that Über was playing a solo game. L33t, I gathered from the location of the light-spot, was in his workshop, no doubt Tinkering.

"Hey," I called to Über. "I've finished. Want me to demonstrate?"

He looked up. "Sure. Just let me save this level and get L33t."

"Okay," I replied. "I'll put it on while I'm waiting."

Putting it on was relatively easy; I had bracelets attached to my wrists and ankles, with RFID chips in them. Another resided in the goggles I was still wearing. I backed up to the suit, clicked the lens frame, and spoke the activation phrase.

Which, as it happened, was "Armsmaster is a dick."

The armour responded, opening like a flower. It flowed forward, clamping around my wrists and ankles. One by one, it lifted my feet, and formed around them. I felt it wrapping itself around my body, folding around my head. It was like being hugged, all over, by something that really, really liked me. A lot.

When it came to rest, fully enclosing my body, a good forty seconds had passed. I had ideas for speeding the process up, but I didn't want to endanger myself in the process; getting a sprained wrist or a broken ankle was all too possible if I ignored safeguards. I had seen that Earth Aleph movie about the fictional superhero called Iron Man. Armour pieces flying into place? I shuddered. That could go very bad, very quickly.

With the armour in place, it made the connection with my goggles, and the HUD lit up. With pupil movements, I cued up a full diagnostic; this scrolled past at a speed just slow enough for me to speed-read it (Über again). Everything seemed to be in order, save a few minor glitches, which I could easily deal with later.

As I took my first few experimental steps in the armour, Über and L33t appeared at the doorway to my workroom.

"Holy shit," L33t exclaimed. "You fucking built power armour. I am officially jealous."

Über frowned. "I still say it looks generic. And are you taller?"

I nodded. "Lifts in the boots." They both looked a little startled; the voice which they heard had been adjusted to be a little lower and more musical. More adult, even.

"I heard that," Über noted. "Make it harder to pinpoint who you really are."

I grinned, but with my face covered (save for the goggles) he of course could not see me. "As the old saying goes, you ain't seen nothin' yet."

Again I accessed the HUD. "Now, I know this is a limited selection, but I'm sure we can come up with more," I commented as I made my choice. Nothing happened at first, then a gridwork appeared over the armour. Following that, the gridwork filled in, and colour was added. Then texture, and highlights.

L33t's jaw dropped, followed by Über's.

"Holy shit," L33t marvelled. "Master Chief armour. Holy shit."

"How are you doing that?" Über wanted to know.

"Holocloak, duh," L33t informed him. "What else can you do?"

I cycled through a couple more variations of Halo armour, then on to other types.

"Like I said," I told them as I went back to the Master Chief armour, "I don't have many types yet. But I can add more."

"God damn," Über told me sincerely. "I am impressed."

I cleared my throat. "Not done yet."

"Yeah?" asked L33t.

"Yeah," I confirmed. Turning, I headed for the worktable where I had left the third project. Moving in the armour became easier and easier the more I did it; after all, I had programmed it to adjust to my movements. Pretty soon, I wouldn't even notice that I was wearing it.

Hefting the oversized rifle, I went back to Über and L33t. "I wanted to use the holocloak to change the look of this too," I told them, "but not even my hax powers let me bend the rules like that. So I went with a physical cheat." Linking the rifle into my HUD, I activated its change mode; panels moved and shifted, components slid around, and the rifle reshaped in my hands. In moments, it had emulated several of the bulkier hand-held weapons in popular video games.

"So does it fire different shots when it changes shape?" Über wanted to know.

"Uh, no," I confessed. "It only does one thing."

"What's that?" L33t wanted to know.

"It stuns things," I told him.

There was a moment of silence, as they looked at the rifle – big enough to be a reasonable match for me in size and weight, were I out of the armour – and then back at me.

"Just stun?" asked L33t. "At that size?"

Implicit in his statement was the meaning that if he built a longarm that big, it would do one hell of a lot more than 'stun' its target. And to be honest, he was right; it did look dangerous enough to blow a hole through a skyscraper.

I shook my head. "You don't get it. This gun is built to stun anyone."

Über stared at me. "Anyone?"

I nodded. "Any. One. Point this, fire it. If it hits, it will stun them. First micro-second of the beam is actually a carrier wave; it analyses how much effect the beam is having, and sends a message back to the gun, which then ramps it up to the necessary intensity. But even if an unintended target gets hit by accident, the most that will happen is they spend an hour or so in dreamland. One hundred per cent nonlethal."

Über blinked. "Robots? People in power armour?"

I'd thought about that. "Non-damaging EMP."

"Alexandria?"

I shrugged. "Maybe ten seconds."

L33t was looking slightly stunned himself. I figured he was retro-engineering it in his head.

"An Endbringer?" asked Über.

"Maybe about one second," I hazarded. "But I'd need to connect up an extension cord. To a nuclear reactor. And the gun would explode."

L33t shook his head. "Yeah, no," he agreed. "But anything short of an Endbringer … wow."

Über grinned, and slapped me on the back. "We," he declared, "are gonna fuckin' rock."

End of Part Thirteen