34

Date

2011 January 29th - Friday - Earth Bet Time

Colin looked at her with a frown. "Are you sure this is the way you want to handle it?"

She looked back at him, trying to convey her convictions. "Yes, Colin. I've run the simulations, I'm confident my plan will work."

He nodded, relaxed a little, then turned around and began walking towards the exit. "Of course you will have to explain it to the Director. I have better things to do."

She snorted at the joke (at least she hoped it was a joke, you never knew with Colin) and, while directing her drones and armors to box in the Merchants, began her own preparations.

While her new body was rather sturdy, she still wanted to protect it. It was, after all, precious.

Her solution to this issue was a human-sized dragon-themed armor that could fit her body. Luckily it didn't need any life support, so she had more space for weapons and tools. And thanks to Taylor, it even had a kinetic and energy shield projector, as well as a small container full of medi-gel. Though Colin's design was clearly superior, and it would be showing up in the next iteration of the armor.

The armor was conveniently in the next room, so it only took her a few seconds to put it on while leveraging her multitasking ability to observe the opposing force.

The Merchants showed up with several trucks that had seen better days and an unholy amalgamation of a 16 wheeler truck, a tank, and a school bus.

Upon closer examination, she realized that part of the main body was actually from a yellow school bus.

While only a simple barrier blocked the gate, they decided to crash through the actual fence. She observed a purplish-blue field appearing before the abomination before it hit the fence, proving that both Squealer and Skidmark were present. Unfortunately, she couldn't account for Mush, but thanks to her drones there was little chance of the trash manipulator surprising them.

As soon as the armor was on, she turned the body off and took control of it. There was no need to waste processing power on controlling both of them.

She watched as Colin left the building, walking with purposeful strides towards the horde of drugged-up gangsters. She found it funny that he managed to scare them enough that a few of them in the back tried to sneak away.

Of course, her drones were ready and were captured at a distance where no noise would reach the attacking force.

No need to clue them in.

Dealing with these low-rank criminals was so much easier than with any of the S-class threats.

Maybe she could convince the Guild leadership to hold a 'clean up charity event' where they would go around and capture low-level groups?

She could probably sell tickets…

Her musings were interrupted as a shot from the monster of a truck smashed into the walls of the building. Luckily the integrated kinetic shield held, and the only thing that happened was that the projectile exploded, showering the ground in detritus.

She listened to Colin asking them to stand down and to surrender themselves for arrest while standing behind the door, waiting for a chance to enter the situation.

After all, a proper presentation was its own weapon.

She noted the hysterical laughter from the Merchants and continued her analysis of the Tinker's creation. It was, after all, the most dangerous thing they brought with them.

She also activated a drone that was purposefully designed for recording events in the greatest quality she and Taylor could manage. They would use it as evidence, and maybe as propaganda. As distasteful as she found that, she couldn't help but agree that there was a need for it.

She listened to the discussion while going over her scans, feeding information to Colin's screen in his helmet. She was also in contact with the local PRT, reporting on the situation.

The Director seemed angry. Oh, dear…

Well, she could deal with her later. Maybe the Director would be more amenable to her explanation after being presented with the leaders of the gang?

An AI can hope.

"You fucker, get out of your shitty building and take your punishment!" came the yell again from Skidmark, who was speaking through a speaker, probably from the tank. The man seemed intent on ignoring Colin and was yelling about a new tinker who dared to pretend to be Dragon.

It seemed they were actually stupid enough to believe it. She tuned out the rest of the ranting and contacted Colin.

"Armsmaster, I will mark the priority targets for you. I will occupy the tank."

The answer came immediately, courtesy of Colin's hidden microphone. "Understood. Can they escape?"

"No, I have them completely surrounded."

"Backup?"

"On their way, though, some will remain behind in case somebody will try anything."

"Copy. On your mark?"

"Yes. I think it's high time someone gives Skidmark a lesson in manners."

As he stood in front of at least a hundred armed drugged-up criminals, two of them parahumans, and sitting in something that could charitably be called a tank, he wondered why it didn't even phase him. It seemed his time in Brockton Bay was having a greater effect on him than he previously thought. He made a note to discuss it with the psychiatrist on the next rotation, then returned his attention to the crowd in front of him.

The Merchants set themselves up in a half-circle, sandwiching him between them and the walls of the building, with the unappealing tinker tech monster taking the place of pride in the middle.

Ignoring the laughter, jeering, and general mockery from the druggies and the yelling of Skidmark, he went over the information Dragon was providing him through his HUD.

The HUD temporarily overlay an overview of the area into his vision, with the vehicles and criminals clearly marked. He quickly went over it, memorizing their position for the inevitable fight. As soon as he acknowledged the information with a well-practiced eye motion, the overlay vanished and he regained his full vision, the only difference was that some items or people were outlined in different colors, with a nice color explanation in the right corner of the screen.

It seemed Dragon was enjoying playing with his equipment because he didn't remember programming that feature. The colors were for marking priority targets. Red for primary targets, yellow for secondary, and every other criminal was outlined in blue, just for marking.

It was an excellent system, so he made another note to talk to her about it. He could already see several areas where it could be improved.

He tightened his grip on his halberd, and as a calming exercise, mentally went over his load out.

He noticed that Skidmark's rant was winding down, and at the same time, he got a message from Dragon to prepare himself.

Slowly, so as not to call attention to it, he moved his feet to be in an ideal stance for a running start.

He made another note about developing jump boots. The added speed would have been useful today.

He lowered the center of his body a little and lightly leaned forward.

He was ready, only waiting for the signal.

"For fuck's sake, you stupid bastard! Stop standing there and do something, with that fucking pig sticker!" yelled Skidmark, frustrated.

The fact that Armsmaster refused to move or do anything aside from reciting his stupid speech annoyed him something fierce.

Even the fucking Tinker refused to come out, probably stalling for the rest of the assholes to arrive.

As if he would allow it. He had the tank, dammit; he made the rules.

He leaned over to Squealer, getting a nice eyeful, and was about to tell her to start blowing that shitty building away, when the big doors began to raise.

The door was raised around three meters before it stopped and out stepped someone in armor with a distinct dragon theme.

He couldn't help but grin at seeing that. Apparently, the Tinker really wanted them to think she was Dragon. As if that Canadian whore would build something so small.

He grinned and lifted the microphone he was ready to throw away. "Hey there, cupcake! Ready to pay the dues? I promise to take care of you!"

"Hello, Skidmark." came the reply from the Tinker as she walked next to the bearded idiot.

"So, who the fuck are you? Still trying to tell us you are Dragon?"

This was pretty fun. For once, he was the one who had the power. It was a pleasant feeling. IF he could remember it, he wanted to repeat it. New Wave was pretty weak nowadays.

With a herculean effort, he wrenched himself out of his daydreams, making a note to get more of the stuff, and refocused on the pair standing in front of his giant gun.

Then laughed at his own joke.

"I'm the hero, Dragon. You might have heard of me." came the reply from the armored apparent hero.

"Yeah, and I'm Eidolon in drag! Go fuck yourself, and get a better story, bitch!"

He was really starting to get angry. He made a motion at Squealer, who, understanding him, began to prime the tank.

The annoying asshole tilted her head sideways and replied. "Oh, why do you think I'm not Dragon?"

"Bitch, Dragon's suits are much bigger than yours!" he replied while motioning for Squealer to hurry up. He was feeling weirded out, and maybe he was coming down, or something was hinky. It didn't matter. Either way, he wanted to be done with this shit and get back to get high again.

"You mean like those?" asked the armored woman while pointing at something on the side. "Or those?" She pointed to the other side, and he couldn't help but look. There in the air, appearing from nothing, hovered a very real and huge Dragon suit.

As he was coming to terms with the suit's existence, his gang was yelling about more of them appearing around them.

After around thirty seconds, Dragon's armored suits surrounded them, all of them looking lethal.

He turned back to the two Tinkers as she spoke again. "This is just a small armor I use to interact with lesser life forms."

He could hear the predatory grin in the bitch's voice. Before he could answer, Squealer got his attention.

"What is it, babe?"

"It's ready!"

"Really?"

"Yeah, trust me, this baby is gonna blooow them away!"

"You are the best, baby!" He gave her a high five and a lecherous look then turned back at the heroes. "Well, bitch, then how about this?"

He gripped the sides of the cabin in preparation for what was to come. Then, with a savage grin, he yelled as loud as he could.

"FIRE!"

As soon as they heard the word 'fire' they jumped apart, letting the coruscating blue projectile hit the building.

Armsmaster wondered what it was actually, but then shook his head briefly and refocused on his targets. He ignored the sound of crashing that came from the tank and put all of his concentration into reaching the driving cabin of the nearest vehicle to the tank.

Taking it out would allow Dragon to concentrate more on the tank.

As the Merchants on and around the truck were recovering from the explosion (the building seemed alright, though the ground seemed to take the brunt of it), he reached the cabin. He immediately dropped one of his ConFoam grenades, denying them the use of the vehicle.

By the time he turned around, the Merchants seemed to realize he was there and began to either advance on him with their makeshift weapons or took aim with their clearly unmaintained firearms.

The smarter ones simply ran.

He wished them luck avoiding Dragon's drones.

He momentarily ignored the ones with close combat weapons and raised his halberd. Upon a silent command, the tip opened up and several spikes launched automatically at the targets marked on his HUD.

As soon as the spikes reached their targets, he gave another command, and the almost impossibly thin wire connecting the spikes to the halberd allowed the electricity to incapacitate the druggies.

He waited a few seconds, idly knocking out an idiot with a baseball bat studded with nails, then let up the electricity. The locked-up bodies relaxed, automatically dropping their weapons. Using the opportunity, he threw out one of his newest inventions, a device that created a small permanent magnetic field wherever he placed it.

The device landed near the spasming Merchants, and with a quiet beep activated. The weapon laying on the ground immediately moved towards it, and even some handheld metal weapons flew out the hands of the people holding them.

He nodded in satisfaction and began to move through the gang of stupefied people. With a deft hand, following his HUD he incapacitated them with a minor shock via his Taser built into his armored glove and halberd then throwing a ConFoam grenade onto them.

The half-minute it took him of the twenty or so people hanging around was apparently enough for Squealer to reload. He saw the warning on the HUD and noted the cannon was aiming at him.

He was contemplating using one of his defensive fail-safes to protect himself and the unconscious people around him when several drones decloaked in front of the truck, the air shimmering in front of them.

Reading the message about the drones putting up a shield, he turned towards the next truck, trusting Dragon to protect him.

As he ran towards his next target, he reviewed his next target and did a quick count of his remaining equipment. He would need to pay attention to the use of foam grenades because while he specially designed for them to be smaller than the usual, his pockets weren't infinite.

Halfway to his target, he saw the flash, even with his back turned he saw the flash, and only a fool would miss the giant explosion sound that went off when the tank fired.

He immediately heard the round strike the shield, but against his expectations, it didn't explode but was deflected up in the air (as shown by the camera built into the back of his helmet) where it exploded spectacularly.

Well, if people didn't know something was happening, they were now. He could already hear the sirens.

They needed to end this fast before something happened or somebody got hurt.

He redoubled his efforts and the first druggie, still blinking the light of the explosion out of his eyes after looking directly at it, didn't even know what hit him before falling unconscious.

He swept his weapon through the Merchants, idly noting again that their number decreased again, bowling them over. He used the halberd as a hook to drag some of them closer to each other, then dropped another foam grenade.

Looking at the rest of the crowd holding weapons in their shaking hands, he took a step forward. By some coincidence, at the same time, they could hear an immense tearing sound. He saw the Merchants pale, so he took a quick look at his camera.

It appeared one of Dragon's suits managed to get a grip on the cannon and tore it off.

Refocusing on his current targets, he took another step forward.

The people in front of him dropped their weapons.

"I give up!"

"I surrender!"

"I have a wife!"

He scowled, stopping his attack. He couldn't hurt people that surrendered, no matter how much easier it would be to detain them.

"I have children!"

"But you are gay!"

"I can still adopt!"

Ignoring their drug-fueled idiocy, he poked them with the halberd, making them stand in one clump, and dropped another grenade.

Then turned around and headed for the next target.

She was enjoying this too much.

The running Merchants were picked up by one of her forks designated for the job, while another was driving the armors and another the drones. Truthfully, she could have done it personally but felt this was much safer.

After all, anything an escaped Merchant gang member would do would be on her. Best not to even give them a chance.

Keeping an eye on Colin, she began advancing on the tank, intent on stopping it before it could fire again. The shields on the building were strong, but it seems she forgot to shield the surrounding area.

With their stupid luck, if they could fire it again, they would properly cause enough damage that she had to abandon the area.

That was unacceptable.

Her first act was to hit the cannon with her fist, moving its end away from the building. She then initialized the jump function and leaped towards the empty cabin of the nearest truck.

She crashed into it with full speed, destroying it and taking it out of use.

She raised both hands, one aiming at the last truck, the other at the side of the tank abomination.

The hands opened up and small missiles sprang forth, heading for their targets.

The one heading for the truck went through the windshield, embedding itself next to the head of the pale-faced druggie. The man had a moment to glance at the missile before it exploded in ConFoam.

Observing Alice building her explosives paid off immensely.

The other missile struck the tank between the main body and the makeshift gun turret. It immediately expanded, and she could hear the cursing from the inside.

She then frowned, because now the cannon was stuck aiming at Colin, but before she could even panic her fork directed drones at her friend, placing shields between him and the cannon. Relieved, she turned back to the rest-

She emoted through body language the sharpest grin she could, and she was happy to note that several people peed themselves.

She began striding forward in the most menacing way possible, hoping to get them to surrender when she heard the explosion behind her. Checking on a camera, she watched as the blue ball of exotic energy impacted the shield at an angle and flew into the air until it lost whatever was keeping it together and exploded.

Instantly, one of the bigger suits crashed down on the tank.

She turned back to the druggies. "So what will it be, boys?"

They glanced at each other, at her, then at the suit tearing the cannon off the tank, and dropped their weapons.

She grinned, then quickly foamed them, then went to take care of the rest of them, who took a chance of shooting at her.

It was so nice for them to provide an opportunity to stress test her new suit.