Built To Last

aidansidhe · Jan 5, 2024

It's kinda vexing, but qq isn't sending alerts when you batch upload. So tracking down just where the previous update was is very tedious. Any chance you could put in an AN just how many you post at a given time in the last one updated?

We Just Write · Jan 5, 2024

aidansidhe said:
It's kinda vexing, but qq isn't sending alerts when you batch upload. So tracking down just where the previous update was is very tedious. Any chance you could put in an AN just how many you post at a given time in the last one updated?

L: We only post one at a time tho. Because we write them one at a time, and we don't prewrite.

Z: Adding onto what Luci said, we have no convenient way to check which posts you have or haven't read.

We Just Write · Jan 11, 2024

C: Due to us wanting to work on other things and not feeling any more inspiration to write this particular story, we are officially discontinuing Built to Last. That said, we're not leaving you completely in the lurch; we wrote a rough outline of how the rest of the story would go, and we have no objections to another author picking up where we left off.

Arc 6: Subversion: Emmy and Melissa hack the shit out of their Shard, and learn even more Horrible Eldritch Lore in the process. Trainwreck shows up looking for work, as does an OC Cauldron Tinker sent as an informant. Construction on the bridge commences.

Arc 7: Explosion: Bakuda starts shelling the Reliabuilt compound to try and prove herself the superior Tinker. It doesn't go well for her. Things escalate to the point where Lung eliminates Bakuda himself as a liability, and he does diplomatic outreach towards Reliabuilt shortly afterwards. The Manchester factory opens for business immediately after the debacle.

Arc 8: Exploration: The crew create their first proper dimensional travel technology, and start scouting for a suitable alternate Earth to co-opt for their usage. The gate machine is kept in some of the secretive sub-sub-basements of the Manchester factory. Armsmaster makes final preparations to upload. Trainwreck uploads, and is welcomed to the crew in full.

Micro-Arc: Exclusion: The crew learns of Cauldron and their activities, and quickly pegs them as completely and utterly compromised by the Entities. They subsequently resolve to keep their operations as disconnected from Cauldron as possible.

Arc 9: Construction: Building forces to secretly invade the Eagleton Quarantine Zone. Meanwhile, construction of the new bridge really kicks into high gear. Armsmaster is uploaded, and Dragon manages to induct him into the anti-Shard conspiracy.

Arc 10: Invasion: The Elite try to force Ruggedizer into the fold, sending Bastard Son to get it done. At roughly the same time, Emmy and Melissa are secretly conquering the Eagleton Quarantine Zone (with Taylor's assistance). Bastard Son ends up getting his upper body vaporized when one of Ruggedizer's killbots tracks him to his current hideout.

Arc 11: Colonization: A synthetic civilization is founded on an unoccupied Earth, specifically chosen for not being heavily surveilled by the Entities. As a collaborative project between Ruggedizer and Armsmaster, they produce an anti-Endbringer weapon in the form of a two meter blade of pure quantum fuckery on the end of a polearm, which uses quantum teleportation to sunder any and all connections in matter the blade passes through. This weapon is dubbed the Shear. As a side tangent, the Travelers come to Brockton Bay in order to get Noelle uploaded. This successfully cures her condition.

Arc 12: Hydration: Leviathan comes to Brockton Bay. While there is significant collateral damage, Leviathan is quickly intercepted by Armsmaster, and absolutely mutilated with the Shear. Leviathan runs for his fucking life, leaving 90% of buildings undamaged and the city's government intact. Incidentally, only Leviathan's tail (containing its core) escaped, leaving behind an almost-complete Endbringer corpse. The new bridge shrugged off the fuckery like it was nothing.

Arc 13: Reconstruction: The world-shaking news that an Endbringer decisively lost without Scion's intervention echoes across the globe. Meanwhile, the damage to Brockton Bay is being quickly repaired, and there's a major surge in Uploading patients after Panacea completely and utterly burns out. The Neohadean robot civilization continues to grow in secret.

Arc 14: Intrusion: The Slaughterhouse Nine finally makes its appearance; not wanting to get splattered, they opt for a mostly indirect method of causing problems, kidnapping people, doing horrific things to them, and making sure the aftermath is visible to the public. The only one who actually tries to infiltrate one of Ruggedizer's bases is Mannequin, who attempts to sneak into the Brockton Bay factory. This results in his unceremonious demise. After that, the Nine leave town.

Arc 15: Abduction: Being absolutely livid at the Nine for what they did in Brockton Bay, the crew opt to do something about Jack Slash before his next "show". As it turns out, they do need some practice at suborning intact Warrior Shards, calling for a test subject no-one will miss. Since Jack Slash fits the bill quite nicely there, they kidnap him and start experimenting.

Arc 16: Transmission: Fairly quickly, the Reliabuilt crew realize they hit upon an absolutely critical asset in the form of the Broadcast Shard. After completely and utterly suborning control over it, they begin mapping out the many, many Shards operating in the vicinity of the Earths. Towards the end of the arc, they find the cluster of Shards composing the Warrior Entity. Back on Bet, there's a mass migration towards Brockton Bay and Manchester, while plenty of other cities are practically begging Reliabuilt to set up branches there.

Arc 17: Usurpation: With the Broadcast Shard under their control and the Shard network mapped, the Reliabuilt crew begin quietly suborning Shards one after another. Extreme precautions are taken to avoid alerting the Warrior Entity of what exactly is going on. Meanwhile a massive superweapon is being constructed on NeoHadea.

Arc 18: Elimination: With the superweapon completed and the Shard Network suborned, the Reliabuilt crew launch a multi-pronged attack on the Warrior Entity. The suborned Shards do an excellent job of drawing the Warrior's attention, opening it up for a sucker-punch from the interdimensional doom cannon built on NeoHadea. This blasts a massive hole in the Warrior's defenses, most importantly breaking the sandboxing barriers preventing dimensional travel to the Warrior's core Shards. The Warrior Entity manages to block the beam from inflicting continued damage, but between the injuries it's already received and the continued attack from the suborned Shards it's effectively stunlocked. The NeoHadean robot armies surge through the breach and start tearing the Warrior Entity apart from the inside. The crew now have uncontested admin control over the source of Parahuman abilities.

Arc 19: Reparation: The Reliabuilt crew quickly exploit their newfound control over the Shard Network to arrange "accidents" for all the really bad villains on the various Earths. Meanwhile they completely change how getting powers works, putting them in the hands of people inclined to use them for constructive purposes and actually requiring informed consent about what the whole deal entails.

Arc 20: Disclosure: To much controversy, Ruggedizer goes public about the source of Parahuman abilities. The diplomatic mess caused by the Neohadean civilization along with open inter-Earth travel is bad enough, but people really don't like the crew playing favorites by refusing to tech-uplift dictatorships and generally having decent conduct strings attached to their help. Meanwhile, Cauldron gets unceremoniously shitcanned.

Epilog: A few centuries down the line, a space fleet operated by the Inter-Earth Federation happens upon another batch of Entities parasitizing a civilization. After some basic investigation to check for benign symbiosis, the Entities in question are simply demolished with starship weapons fire. Diplomatic contact with the locals ensues.

lopsigon · Jan 11, 2024

God, what a cool bundle of ideas, hehe. <3

Thanks for writing/sharing the first portion of the story with us!
And, of course, many many thanks for the summary/ending outline!

（╹◡╹）♡

PJCG · Jan 21, 2024

We Just Write said:
"Emmy got jealous of my amazing robot body. We're working on a machine to transfer her mind to the same sort of synthetic brain I run on."

I just now realized that Emmy is female.

I feel stupid...

TheCenterAct · Jan 31, 2024

PJCG said:
I just now realized that Emmy is female.

I feel stupid...

Only realized it on the second chapter, so I only feel a smidgen less stupid.

We Just Write · May 3, 2024

E: We're baaaack.

Swordstire · May 3, 2024

We Just Write said:
E: We're baaaack.

We are so back!

Cheetored20 · May 3, 2024

Oh? The muse is back in town?

We Just Write · May 4, 2024

(Melissa)

I was working on some more consumer products for my day job when Rose paged me,

"Ruggedizer, I've got some excellent news! The Quantum Uploading Device has been approved for medical applications when used in conjunction with the body builder machine! They've also verified patent eligibility for the QUD, Body Builder, and the synthetic brains."

"Thank you, Rose! Would you please let legal know I'll be talking to them soon? It's about the licensing terms."

"Certainly."

As I walked to the legal offices, I thought grimly about the conversation I'd had with the rest of the family about this. The fact of the matter was, we couldn't release the dimensional shielding tech into the wild; it was all well and good for people to know we could protect our technology from Parahuman powers, but if they put two and two together about how we were doing it, that could completely destroy the opsec required for our anti-alien work.

So the version of the synthetic brains we'd looked to patent didn't have that shielding. The vast majority of Master powers would do absolutely nothing to uploads anyway, and this way we didn't risk the entire world. It still stung to release a deliberately sub-standard product, though.

My musings were paused as I reached the legal offices. I was greeted by Jacob Vespa, one of Reliabuilt's lawyers.

"Hello, Ruggedizer. I heard you wanted to talk about licensing for the newly patented technology?"

I nodded,

"Yes. Bluntly, these are technologies that people's lives will directly depend on, in a much more intimate sense than for most of our products. So anyone who wants to do licensed production will need reliability measuring up to our standards. Also, license-built QUDs and body-builders will be required to have compatibility with Reliabuilt-made brains."

Jose thought for a moment,

"What exactly do you mean by reliability measuring up to your standards? Do you mean a specific hard bar for reliability that mundane manufacturing can conceivably meet, or that it has to equal the tinker-tech that we make here?"

"The former; I'm fully aware that the reliability for stuff I make is beyond most firms' ability to replicate. I just want them to make absolutely sure their stuff won't get a patient killed or otherwise messed up. And that means rigorous testing standards, Reliabuilt inspectors turning up with no notice, and other similar measures."

"Understood. We'll get to work on it. Guessing we should get in touch with Human Resources about setting up an inspections department?"

"Good idea."

(Marcus)

It was two in the morning on Monday, the 28th of February. It had taken quite a few shady deals, but I had managed to arrange a meeting with Lung. I showed up at the Ruby Dreams casino, and was promptly directed to a back room. Twenty minutes later, Lung entered in his trademark steel mask. I was wearing my Mr. E getup, as was typical when I was on business away from the factory.

"So, you are Reliabuilt's mysterious fixer? Why did you want to meet with me?"

"Bluntly, to warn you about someone, and to make clear that accepting her into your gang will be very bad for your business."

Lung thought for a moment.

"Do you mean that I will be attacked for accepting this person into the ABB, or that they are inherently dangerous to my operations?"

"Both. I came to warn you about an asian-american explosives Tinker going by Bakuda. Putting it bluntly, she is utterly insane, and liable to do all manner of reckless things in an effort to stroke her own ego. Since her Trigger Event, she has been sighted approaching Brockton Bay twice, and it seems likely she will attempt to attack Reliabuilt."

Lung nodded thoughtfully,

"That is quite troublesome indeed. While I've had to downsize the protection services side of my business, the increase in disposable income across the city means my entertainment venues are more profitable than before. Taken together, the ABB is better off overall than before Reliabuilt came along. In addition, the removal of the Empire has been a great boon. Having an unstable bomb-maker ruin all of that is simply unacceptable."

There were another few seconds, before Lung asked another question.

"To be clear, is simply having this Bakuda under my employ in any capacity going to provoke hostilities?"

"If you keep her from causing problems, we won't give you any. But if Bakuda joins the ABB and starts causing trouble anyway? I politely request that you deal with her permanently. I suspect that her actions will provoke you to dispose of her anyway, should she come under your command."

Lung seemed moderately annoyed at my giving him instructions, but kept his composure.

"We shall see. Before you go, I have a message for you to pass to the PRT: the ABB has divested itself of human trafficking. It is not a sensible business to retain, given the changed situation in Brockton Bay."

Lung clearly wanted me to leave, so I stood.

"I understand. Thank you for your time."

To be clear, this is NOT a Lung Redemption Story. He is a bad person through and through, and is entirely willing to harm innocent people for his own gain. That said, he is pragmatic and capable of thinking things through; if he comes to the conclusion that a given act of villainy would be counterproductive, he won't do it.

(Andrea)

Ultimately, we'd had very little direct input on the engineering side of the bridge. There was just too much else for us to do, so we ended up giving the engineers involved a directive to prioritize durability and lifespan for the bridge over every other consideration - with the exception of not hindering maritime access - and left them to it. So I showed up at the north end construction site around noon on Thursday the 27th, to take a look around.

As I touched down at the entry gate, the lady on duty looked up from her lunch.

"Ah, Laniakea. I take it you're here to take a look around?"

"Yes, that's exactly correct."

"Well, you know the rules. Hard hat and high-visibility vest like everyone else."

I nodded, and donned the safety gear without complaint. The hard hat was pretty irrelevant for me, but the high-vis vest could still prevent a nasty accident. Properly attired, I proceeded onto the construction site.

I made an effort not to bother anyone, but I couldn't help being impressed by the large caisson I saw being floated into position.

I noticed a worker coming up to me, and turned to greet them.

The man waved to me,

"Nice to see you, Laniakea. I'm Adam, one of the junior engineers on the project. That caisson's a thing of beauty, yeah?"

I nodded,

"Yeah. That said, I find myself pretty curious about the inner workings of it. Got any details to share?"

Adam nodded,

"Yeah, that's a fully pressurized caisson there, and it'll form the foundation of the bridge's central tower. It's got six decompression chambers for workers coming off their shift, electrical hookups for earth-moving machinery, four layers of redundancy on the pressurization equipment, the works. There's even fully functioning restrooms built into the pressurized section, though not on the bottom level."

I smiled.

"That's genuinely impressive. Sounds like you'll make short work of laying the foundations."

"You'd think that, but the silt at the bottom of the bay is pretty thick here. Even with people working around the clock to dig muck out, it's going to take a while to reach bedrock. At least a month or two."

Ah. Fair enough.

(Emmy)

It took until March 3rd to get the space-expanding machinery to work properly on a link to our power. This really wasn't helped by the fact that we didn't tell our power shit about what we were doing here, and didn't get any help on this at all. Strictly speaking, this was an engineering project, rather than Tinkering. Once more, I found myself grateful for our awesome robot brains.

Anyway, just in case something went horribly wrong, we set up the breach in a dimensionally shielded vault, and none of us were physically present at the moment the space-expander fired. We really needn't have bothered; the portal smoothly grew from two millimeters to four meters in diameter, and stabilized at its new size without incident.

I couldn't help but remark,

"I can't help but feel that was way too easy. Shouldn't there be some sort of security we should have tripped?"

Marcus just shrugged.

"I'm really not surprised. The thousands of extra hosts reporting a completely divergent alternate reality didn't provoke a hazardous response, so why would this? Really, given the results of Project Gaslight this is totally within expectations."

As for Melissa, she had a rather blunt opinion of matters.

"I'm sending the probes in. along with the teleporter installation units. We've got an alien biocomputer to subvert, and sitting around talking about it isn't getting anything done."

Right, it was time to get shit done.

Swordstire · May 4, 2024

We Just Write said:
(Melissa)

I was working on some more consumer products for my day job when Rose paged me,

"Ruggedizer, I've got some excellent news! The Quantum Uploading Device has been approved for medical applications when used in conjunction with the body builder machine! They've also verified patent eligibility for the QUD, Body Builder, and the synthetic brains."

"Thank you, Rose! Would you please let legal know I'll be talking to them soon? It's about the licensing terms."

"Certainly."

As I walked to the legal offices, I thought grimly about the conversation I'd had with the rest of the family about this. The fact of the matter was, we couldn't release the dimensional shielding tech into the wild; it was all well and good for people to know we could protect our technology from Parahuman powers, but if they put two and two together about how we were doing it, that could completely destroy the opsec required for our anti-alien work.

So the version of the synthetic brains we'd looked to patent didn't have that shielding. The vast majority of Master powers would do absolutely nothing to uploads anyway, and this way we didn't risk the entire world. It still stung to release a deliberately sub-standard product, though.

My musings were paused as I reached the legal offices. I was greeted by Jacob Vespa, one of Reliabuilt's lawyers.

"Hello, Ruggedizer. I heard you wanted to talk about licensing for the newly patented technology?"

I nodded,

"Yes. Bluntly, these are technologies that people's lives will directly depend on, in a much more intimate sense than for most of our products. So anyone who wants to do licensed production will need reliability measuring up to our standards. Also, license-built QUDs and body-builders will be required to have compatibility with Reliabuilt-made brains."

Jose thought for a moment,

"What exactly do you mean by reliability measuring up to your standards? Do you mean a specific hard bar for reliability that mundane manufacturing can conceivably meet, or that it has to equal the tinker-tech that we make here?"

"The former; I'm fully aware that the reliability for stuff I make is beyond most firms' ability to replicate. I just want them to make absolutely sure their stuff won't get a patient killed or otherwise messed up. And that means rigorous testing standards, Reliabuilt inspectors turning up with no notice, and other similar measures."

"Understood. We'll get to work on it. Guessing we should get in touch with Human Resources about setting up an inspections department?"

"Good idea."

(Marcus)

It was two in the morning on Thursday, the 27th of January. It had taken quite a few shady deals, but I had managed to arrange a meeting with Lung. I showed up at the Ruby Dreams casino, and was promptly directed to a back room. Twenty minutes later, Lung entered in his trademark steel mask. I was wearing my Mr. E getup, as was typical when I was on business away from the factory.

"So, you are Reliabuilt's mysterious fixer? Why did you want to meet with me?"

"Bluntly, to warn you about someone, and to make clear that accepting her into your gang will be very bad for your business."

Lung thought for a moment.

"Do you mean that I will be attacked for accepting this person into the ABB, or that they are inherently dangerous to my operations?"

"Both. I came to warn you about an asian-american explosives Tinker going by Bakuda. Putting it bluntly, she is utterly insane, and liable to do all manner of reckless things in an effort to stroke her own ego. Since her Trigger Event, she has been sighted approaching Brockton Bay twice, and it seems likely she will attempt to attack Reliabuilt."

Lung nodded thoughtfully,

"That is quite troublesome indeed. While I've had to downsize the protection services side of my business, the increase in disposable income across the city means my entertainment venues are more profitable than before. Taken together, the ABB is better off overall than before Reliabuilt came along. In addition, the removal of the Empire has been a great boon. Having an unstable bomb-maker ruin all of that is simply unacceptable."

There were another few seconds, before Lung asked another question.

"To be clear, is simply having this Bakuda under my employ in any capacity going to provoke hostilities?"

"If you keep her from causing problems, we won't give you any. But if Bakuda joins the ABB and starts causing trouble anyway? I politely request that you deal with her permanently. I suspect that her actions will provoke you to dispose of her anyway, should she come under your command."

Lung seemed moderately annoyed at my giving him instructions, but kept his composure.

"We shall see. Before you go, I have a message for you to pass to the PRT: the ABB has divested itself of human trafficking. It is not a sensible business to retain, given the changed situation in Brockton Bay."

Lung clearly wanted me to leave, so I stood.

"I understand. Thank you for your time."

To be clear, this is NOT a Lung Redemption Story. He is a bad person through and through, and is entirely willing to harm innocent people for his own gain. That said, he is pragmatic and capable of thinking things through; if he comes to the conclusion that a given act of villainy would be counterproductive, he won't do it.

(Andrea)

Ultimately, we'd had very little direct input on the engineering side of the bridge. There was just too much else for us to do, so we ended up giving the engineers involved a directive to prioritize durability and lifespan for the bridge over every other consideration - with the exception of not hindering maritime access - and left them to it. So I showed up at the north end construction site around noon on Thursday the 27th, to take a look around.

As I touched down at the entry gate, the lady on duty looked up from her lunch.

"Ah, Laniakea. I take it you're here to take a look around?"

"Yes, that's exactly correct."

"Well, you know the rules. Hard hat and high-visibility vest like everyone else."

I nodded, and donned the safety gear without complaint. The hard hat was pretty irrelevant for me, but the high-vis vest could still prevent a nasty accident. Properly attired, I proceeded onto the construction site.

I made an effort not to bother anyone, but I couldn't help being impressed by the large caisson I saw being floated into position.

I noticed a worker coming up to me, and turned to greet them.

The man waved to me,

"Nice to see you, Laniakea. I'm Adam, one of the junior engineers on the project. That caisson's a thing of beauty, yeah?"

I nodded,

"Yeah. That said, I find myself pretty curious about the inner workings of it. Got any details to share?"

Adam nodded,

"Yeah, that's a fully pressurized caisson there, and it'll form the foundation of the bridge's central tower. It's got six decompression chambers for workers coming off their shift, electrical hookups for earth-moving machinery, four layers of redundancy on the pressurization equipment, the works. There's even fully functioning restrooms built into the pressurized section, though not on the bottom level."

I smiled.

"That's genuinely impressive. Sounds like you'll make short work of laying the foundations."

"You'd think that, but the silt at the bottom of the bay is pretty thick here. Even with people working around the clock to dig muck out, it's going to take a while to reach bedrock. At least a month or two."

Ah. Fair enough.

(Emmy)

It took until February 3rd to get the space-expanding machinery to work properly on a link to our power. This really wasn't helped by the fact that we didn't tell our power shit about what we were doing here, and didn't get any help on this at all. Strictly speaking, this was an engineering project, rather than Tinkering. Once more, I found myself grateful for our awesome robot brains.

Anyway, just in case something went horribly wrong, we set up the breach in a dimensionally shielded vault, and none of us were physically present at the moment the space-expander fired. We really needn't have bothered; the portal smoothly grew from two millimeters to four meters in diameter, and stabilized at its new size without incident.

I couldn't help but remark,

"I can't help but feel that was way too easy. Shouldn't there be some sort of security we should have tripped?"

Marcus just shrugged.

"I'm really not surprised. The thousands of extra hosts reporting a completely divergent alternate reality didn't provoke a hazardous response, so why would this? Really, given the results of Project Gaslight this is totally within expectations."

As for Melissa, she had a rather blunt opinion of matters.

"I'm sending the probes in. along with the teleporter installation units. We've got an alien biocomputer to subvert, and sitting around talking about it isn't getting anything done."

Right, it was time to get shit done.

WE ARE SO BACK! Let's gooOOOO!!!

We Just Write · May 5, 2024

A/N: We realized there were some inconsistencies with the story's timeline. Among other things, we'd accidentally written Marcus doing stuff before his activation date. These anomalies have been corrected.

(Andrea)

Due to my mobility, I'd volunteered to supervise the effort to completely suborn our power "from the front". I made a backup before I went through the portal, but I really hoped that wouldn't be needed. I wanted to live, and a version of me from a few hours ago wasn't quite that; it was more of a life insurance plan.

Because of that, I was flying relatively low over the crystalline landscape. We didn't know if our power had anti-air defenses, and really didn't want to find out the hard way. Some of the drones flew higher to get a better view and so far none of them had been shot down, but better safe than sorry.
As our scouts surveyed the area, more and more information was becoming clear. Our power was approximately three hundred kilometers in radius, with the vast majority of its mass being in a huge dome towards the center. The outlying areas were largely dedicated to solar energy collection, meaning that almost the entirety of the database must be in the dome.

Furthermore, there was a massive impact crater in the dome. Some basic estimations indicated that it was consistent with an impact approximately equivalent to 300 kilotons of TNT. Clearly, something had not gone as planned here.

As for our initial intrusion point? It was two kilometers from the dome, and the portal was directly connected to the core by a pulsing conduit of crystalline nervous tissue.

I radio'd back to base,

"Emmy, Melissa, I'm going to start sending units into the dome, starting with the impact site. I have a hunch that crater is our best bet for bypassing the aliens' security."

Emmy replied quickly,

"Andrea, please be careful! I know you're competent and careful, but we're directly tampering with a being vastly more powerful than us."
"I know, Emmy. I know."
Within minutes the first data-jacks were being drilled into the alien's associative network, and as I got the first readings, I couldn't help but pump my fist in excitation. Not only were we getting good data, but it looks like that impact took out whatever passed for higher reasoning in a genocidal alien geological formation. Meaning that all the stuff directly connected to it assumed those jacks had full access permissions.
We were in.

(Emmy)

We'd started our attack on our power just after closing time on the 3rd of March, and stayed up all night analyzing the data we were getting back from the jacks our drones installed. Almost immediately, I was able to prove Andrea's hypothesis correct; our power's decision-making capacity and situational awareness had been crippled by that impact it suffered on approach. Effectively, we were dealing with an alien suffering the equivalent of a severe untreated concussion.

While there was absolutely a treasure-trove of technology in here, we were saving it for later. We had a much higher priority in our examination of the database: extracting as much information as possible on how the alien invasion cycle was going as a whole. What we found was complicated. At five in the morning, everyone gathered in a shielded break room to have breakfast and discuss the situation.

I started,

"Well, the good news is that one of the two network hubs is dead. So at least this cycle won't lead to successful reproduction."

Melissa sighed in response,

"That's far from any guarantee regarding the behavior of the other network hub. Just the fact that the Endbringers are deployed makes me suspect that a genocide is still in the works, and the records we uncovered make me deeply suspicious of Scion. I think he's a sockpuppet for the remaining network hub."

I nodded in thought, as did Andrea and Marcus. Andrea was the next to voice a concern.
"I'm honestly scared that our power is apparently on the small end. Yes I know that's normal for Tinker powers, since they're basically a database and therefore don't need all that much energy. It still means that any other powers we tamper with are likely to put up a much bigger fight than what we got here, even accounting for our power being comatose. We need to build up, way more than we can here on Earth Bet."

Marcus asked,

"Could we maybe build up in our power's reality?"

Melissa shook her head.

"No; the records show that the network hubs are supposed to check up on powers every once in a while. If that happens and there's any obvious alterations to our power, all our hard work on opsec goes right down the drain. So I've already started operations to conceal our subversion of our power."

Now Andrea spoke up,

"Can we please stop calling it that? Calling them powers has mystical connotations that I really don't like, and Sunderer hasn't stuck."
Marcus shrugged,

"Dynalith, maybe?"
"Sure, we can call it a Dynalith."

(Melissa)

The subversion of our Dynalith aside, Reliabuilt was still our single best way to acquire resources. It was also how we were best able to improve the situation here on Earth Bet in the near-to-medium term. That meant getting more products on the market was absolutely a useful thing to do, and the nuclear fusion technology we'd dug up a while back would be great for that. There was just one problem: the laws banning tinkertech from use in public infrastructure.

That meant another end-run around the Rogue Laws was needed. Namely, hiring a bunch of mundane engineers and teaching them how to build a fusion reactor. Then having them do it again without my direct involvement, so it wouldn't be tinkertech, legally speaking. We'd gotten a mix of fresh graduates and experienced nuclear industry personnel in starting on the 22nd of February, and we'd really gotten into the swing of building a fusion reactor starting on the 2nd of March.

By March 8th - Tuesday - the semi-tinkertech prototype reactor was completed. We'd just come back from lunch, and it was time for the initial test operation.

Angie Rains - one of the freshly graduated engineers we'd hired - called out from her station: "We have D-D ignition in chamber number one. We're getting good Helium three and Tritium synthesis rates, along with twenty Megawatts electrical. Thirty Megawatts thermal headed to the radiator on the roof."

A few moments later, Andrew Brown - a veteran nuclear engineer - chimed in.

"Tritium separator is working smoothly; The Tritium storage tank is no longer a vacuum. Helium three tank will be reaching the point of having enough for afterburner activation within an hour."

I couldn't help but smile; technically speaking, we'd crammed two separate fusion chambers into this machine. The afterburner Andrew was referring to was optimized for Deuterium-3He; four times the energy density of pure Deuterium fusion, and a much larger fraction of that energy could be converted to electricity to boot. The end result was that the afterburner would be able to output one hundred and eighty Megawatts of electrical power, for only twenty additional Megawatts of waste heat.

Angie chimed in again,

"Honestly, just chamber number one would have been absolutely revolutionary on its own. Include the Helium three afterburner, and I don't even know how to describe what we've accomplished."

I nodded, "Yeah, this is going to change the world, no question about it. That said, I'm not allowed to help you get the production model built. Though I am rather interested in what sort of ideas you have there."

Andrew answered;

"We've actually been thinking we should make the production model smaller. Shrink it down to the form-factor of a standard shipping container, and we'll drastically reduce the cost of getting fusion power plants set up anywhere we can ship a reactor. It's a lot like that small modular reactor concept that's been kicking around for a while, but with fusion instead of fission. Drops the power per reactor to fifty Megawatts electrical, but that's more than enough for a worthwhile power plant, especially if they operate more than one at a given site."

I nodded as I thought about that,

"Sounds like it would make for a really good locomotive too, come to think of it."

Angie and Andrew both shrugged,

"We'll get there when we get there."

Just before leaving the room, I noted,

"By the way, some people from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission will be coming over starting tomorrow, in addition to the people from the PRT. Not anticipating any problems, but I thought you should know."

Angie saluted,

"Thanks for the heads-up."

(Marcus)

Finding the three remaining members of the Undersiders hadn't been hard; with their Thinker having been arrested, they weren't quite so good at dodging attention as they had been. So I'd left a letter for them at their new hideout - they'd moved prior to their old one getting raided by the PRT. That letter was politely requesting that they come talk to me at Somer's rock, also known as Brockton Bay's local neutral ground for villains to meet up.

Unlike with my talks with Faultline or Lung, this one did have an implicit "Or Else" attached to it. I didn't name any specific consequences, but the tone - along with the fact that I was more-or-less giving them orders - made clear that there would be some for not showing up.

I didn't need to wait all that long; all three Undersiders turned up at eight in the evening on Thursday, March 8th. The tall guy in black was clearly Grue, their de facto leader. I also noticed that Regent looked slightly confused, though it was a bit hard to tell through his mask.

As he sat, Grue asked,

"Are you Mr. E?"

"Yes."

There was a half-second pause, before I asked a very personal question.

"So, why are you three villains?"

Everyone tensed up. I then dropped my follow-up question.

"If you're villains because there's something you want, I can help you get it. The only string attached is that you three stop hurting people and causing problems for Reliabuilt. So, out with it."

There were several moments of awkward silence, before the one with the scepter - Regent - spoke.

"I... I can't go back to my family. I can't go to the authorities, that will just tell him where I am."

I nodded sadly,

"Supervillain father?"

"The worst."

"We can help you fake your death, better than anyone else. Put you in a fresh body, fake a cause of death for your old one, and you've got a fresh start."

The three teenagers seemed stunned for a moment. Then Grue asked,

"Wait, turning people into robots is a thing Ruggedizer can just do!? I thought that was some sort of one time only mad science thing, going by how the papers covered the Winslow incident."

"Ruggedizer doesn't do one time only mad science things. Her whole deal is extremely reliable technology, meaning anything she builds will be functioning for a very long time. That includes the uploading technology she developed. It's actually received conditional authorization for medical uses already."

Regent thought for a moment, then answered,

"I'll take your offer. Can't speak for the other two though."

I nodded, then gestured to Hellhound, also known as Rachel Lindt. She answered bluntly,

"I want to take care of dogs without anyone bothering me."

Grue elaborated,

"The only problem with that is that the PRT thinks Bitch murdered someone, when it was an accident. She made a dog that someone was torturing big, and the panicking dog did what panicking dogs do and bit."

I nodded, also mentally noting the term of address Grue used.

"Well then, I can arrange for Bitch to also have her death faked. Would that work for you?"

Bitch thought for a moment.

"Will my dogs still recognize me afterwards?"

I thought for a moment.

"That's something we considered. One idea that comes to mind is to build your new body first, and have you introduce the dogs to it before we put you in there."

"That will work."

I then turned to Grue.

"And, what do you want?"

"Custody of my sister. Our parents don't take good care of her, especially with her learning disability."
I kept my face stoic and very deliberately didn't say what I was actually thinking: You wanted to get legal custody of your sister, and your best plan was to go out and commit crimes? Saying that wouldn't be helpful. Instead, I answered,

"That's easy enough. Get your civilian identity a job at Reliabuilt, and we'll also get you in touch with some good lawyers. Yes that will involve you unmasking, but it's kind of unavoidable if you want to solve a problem in your civilian life."

"I... that's... why did I never think of something that simple before?"

I shrugged.

"Shall we go? I can let you into the Reliabuilt complex, and we can flesh out the plan in more detail there."

All three of them nodded in agreement.

We Just Write · May 6, 2024

It was the fourth of March - a Friday - when Amy noticed the new machinery being moved into Brockton General Hospital. More specifically, it was being moved to the terminal illness ward. Being curious about what it was, Amy found herself asking about it during one of her brief breaks.

Doctor Richard - one of the local Oncologists - answered,

"Ah, that's the new brain uploading machinery from Reliabuilt. It's been recently approved for medical uses, and it should really ease your workload. Basically, it opens up the option to put people in a brand new robotic body, if their current one is too sick or injured to recover any other way. It does mean a lot of medical personnel are also going to need some technical training going forwards, but that's how things go sometimes."

Just like that, all of Amy's self-worth evaporated. The world... just didn't need her anymore.

"Oh... I guess that's a good thing."

She went through the motions for the rest of her volunteer shift at the hospital, dreading what was going to happen. She was really glad that it was Victoria who came to pick her up, rather than Carol.

Victoria noticed the frown on Amy's face as she pulled up in the car.

"Amy, is something wrong?"

"Yes. They don't need me anymore."

Victoria blinked.

"Huh?"

"Ruggedizer's brain uploading technology is undergoing a nationwide rollout. That means I'm obsolete, and I don't have a reason to... exist anymore."

Victoria tilted her head.

"Who told you that you needed to heal people just to be allowed to exist?"

"Carol."

Victoria frowned, even as she put the car in park and got out her cell phone.

"Right, I think a sleepover is in order."

With that, Victoria dialed Taylor. Her sister needed to talk to someone who most emphatically couldn't want healing from her, but cared about her anyway.

Cheetored20 · May 6, 2024

We Just Write said:
A/N: We realized there were some inconsistencies with the story's timeline. Among other things, we'd accidentally written Marcus doing stuff before his activation date. These anomalies have been corrected.

(Andrea)

Due to my mobility, I'd volunteered to supervise the effort to completely suborn our power "from the front". I made a backup before I went through the portal, but I really hoped that wouldn't be needed. I wanted to live, and a version of me from a few hours ago wasn't quite that; it was more of a life insurance plan.

Because of that, I was flying relatively low over the crystalline landscape. We didn't know if our power had anti-air defenses, and really didn't want to find out the hard way. Some of the drones flew higher to get a better view and so far none of them had been shot down, but better safe than sorry.
As our scouts surveyed the area, more and more information was becoming clear. Our power was approximately three hundred kilometers in radius, with the vast majority of its mass being in a huge dome towards the center. The outlying areas were largely dedicated to solar energy collection, meaning that almost the entirety of the database must be in the dome.

Furthermore, there was a massive impact crater in the dome. Some basic estimations indicated that it was consistent with an impact approximately equivalent to 300 kilotons of TNT. Clearly, something had not gone as planned here.

As for our initial intrusion point? It was two kilometers from the dome, and the portal was directly connected to the core by a pulsing conduit of crystalline nervous tissue.

I radio'd back to base,

"Emmy, Melissa, I'm going to start sending units into the dome, starting with the impact site. I have a hunch that crater is our best bet for bypassing the aliens' security."

Emmy replied quickly,

"Andrea, please be careful! I know you're competent and careful, but we're directly tampering with a being vastly more powerful than us."
"I know, Emmy. I know."
Within minutes the first data-jacks were being drilled into the alien's associative network, and as I got the first readings, I couldn't help but pump my fist in excitation. Not only were we getting good data, but it looks like that impact took out whatever passed for higher reasoning in a genocidal alien geological formation. Meaning that all the stuff directly connected to it assumed those jacks had full access permissions.
We were in.

(Emmy)

We'd started our attack on our power just after closing time on the 3rd of March, and stayed up all night analyzing the data we were getting back from the jacks our drones installed. Almost immediately, I was able to prove Andrea's hypothesis correct; our power's decision-making capacity and situational awareness had been crippled by that impact it suffered on approach. Effectively, we were dealing with an alien suffering the equivalent of a severe untreated concussion.

While there was absolutely a treasure-trove of technology in here, we were saving it for later. We had a much higher priority in our examination of the database: extracting as much information as possible on how the alien invasion cycle was going as a whole. What we found was complicated. At five in the morning, everyone gathered in a shielded break room to have breakfast and discuss the situation.

I started,

"Well, the good news is that one of the two network hubs is dead. So at least this cycle won't lead to successful reproduction."

Melissa sighed in response,

"That's far from any guarantee regarding the behavior of the other network hub. Just the fact that the Endbringers are deployed makes me suspect that a genocide is still in the works, and the records we uncovered make me deeply suspicious of Scion. I think he's a sockpuppet for the remaining network hub."

I nodded in thought, as did Andrea and Marcus. Andrea was the next to voice a concern.
"I'm honestly scared that our power is apparently on the small end. Yes I know that's normal for Tinker powers, since they're basically a database and therefore don't need all that much energy. It still means that any other powers we tamper with are likely to put up a much bigger fight than what we got here, even accounting for our power being comatose. We need to build up, way more than we can here on Earth Bet."

Marcus asked,

"Could we maybe build up in our power's reality?"

Melissa shook her head.

"No; the records show that the network hubs are supposed to check up on powers every once in a while. If that happens and there's any obvious alterations to our power, all our hard work on opsec goes right down the drain. So I've already started operations to conceal our subversion of our power."

Now Andrea spoke up,

"Can we please stop calling it that? Calling them powers has mystical connotations that I really don't like, and Sunderer hasn't stuck."
Marcus shrugged,

"Dynalith, maybe?"
"Sure, we can call it a Dynalith."

(Melissa)

The subversion of our Dynalith aside, Reliabuilt was still our single best way to acquire resources. It was also how we were best able to improve the situation here on Earth Bet in the near-to-medium term. That meant getting more products on the market was absolutely a useful thing to do, and the nuclear fusion technology we'd dug up a while back would be great for that. There was just one problem: the laws banning tinkertech from use in public infrastructure.

That meant another end-run around the Rogue Laws was needed. Namely, hiring a bunch of mundane engineers and teaching them how to build a fusion reactor. Then having them do it again without my direct involvement, so it wouldn't be tinkertech, legally speaking. We'd gotten a mix of fresh graduates and experienced nuclear industry personnel in starting on the 22nd of February, and we'd really gotten into the swing of building a fusion reactor starting on the 2nd of March.

By March 8th - Tuesday - the semi-tinkertech prototype reactor was completed. We'd just come back from lunch, and it was time for the initial test operation.

Angie Rains - one of the freshly graduated engineers we'd hired - called out from her station: "We have D-D ignition in chamber number one. We're getting good Helium three and Tritium synthesis rates, along with twenty Megawatts electrical. Thirty Megawatts thermal headed to the radiator on the roof."

A few moments later, Andrew Brown - a veteran nuclear engineer - chimed in.

"Tritium separator is working smoothly; The Tritium storage tank is no longer a vacuum. Helium three tank will be reaching the point of having enough for afterburner activation within an hour."

I couldn't help but smile; technically speaking, we'd crammed two separate fusion chambers into this machine. The afterburner Andrew was referring to was optimized for Deuterium-3He; four times the energy density of pure Deuterium fusion, and a much larger fraction of that energy could be converted to electricity to boot. The end result was that the afterburner would be able to output one hundred and eighty Megawatts of electrical power, for only twenty additional Megawatts of waste heat.

Angie chimed in again,

"Honestly, just chamber number one would have been absolutely revolutionary on its own. Include the Helium three afterburner, and I don't even know how to describe what we've accomplished."

I nodded, "Yeah, this is going to change the world, no question about it. That said, I'm not allowed to help you get the production model built. Though I am rather interested in what sort of ideas you have there."

Andrew answered;

"We've actually been thinking we should make the production model smaller. Shrink it down to the form-factor of a standard shipping container, and we'll drastically reduce the cost of getting fusion power plants set up anywhere we can ship a reactor. It's a lot like that small modular reactor concept that's been kicking around for a while, but with fusion instead of fission. Drops the power per reactor to fifty Megawatts electrical, but that's more than enough for a worthwhile power plant, especially if they operate more than one at a given site."

I nodded as I thought about that,

"Sounds like it would make for a really good locomotive too, come to think of it."

Angie and Andrew both shrugged,

"We'll get there when we get there."

Just before leaving the room, I noted,

"By the way, some people from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission will be coming over starting tomorrow, in addition to the people from the PRT. Not anticipating any problems, but I thought you should know."

Angie saluted,

"Thanks for the heads-up."

(Marcus)

Finding the three remaining members of the Undersiders hadn't been hard; with their Thinker having been arrested, they weren't quite so good at dodging attention as they had been. So I'd left a letter for them at their new hideout - they'd moved prior to their old one getting raided by the PRT. That letter was politely requesting that they come talk to me at Somer's rock, also known as Brockton Bay's local neutral ground for villains to meet up.

Unlike with my talks with Faultline or Lung, this one did have an implicit "Or Else" attached to it. I didn't name any specific consequences, but the tone - along with the fact that I was more-or-less giving them orders - made clear that there would be some for not showing up.

I didn't need to wait all that long; all three Undersiders turned up at eight in the evening on Thursday, March 8th. The tall guy in black was clearly Grue, their de facto leader. I also noticed that Regent looked slightly confused, though it was a bit hard to tell through his mask.

As he sat, Grue asked,

"Are you Mr. E?"

"Yes."

There was a half-second pause, before I asked a very personal question.

"So, why are you three villains?"

Everyone tensed up. I then dropped my follow-up question.

"If you're villains because there's something you want, I can help you get it. The only string attached is that you three stop hurting people and causing problems for Reliabuilt. So, out with it."

There were several moments of awkward silence, before the one with the scepter - Regent - spoke.

"I... I can't go back to my family. I can't go to the authorities, that will just tell him where I am."

I nodded sadly,

"Supervillain father?"

"The worst."

"We can help you fake your death, better than anyone else. Put you in a fresh body, fake a cause of death for your old one, and you've got a fresh start."

The three teenagers seemed stunned for a moment. Then Grue asked,

"Wait, turning people into robots is a thing Ruggedizer can just do!? I thought that was some sort of one time only mad science thing, going by how the papers covered the Winslow incident."

"Ruggedizer doesn't do one time only mad science things. Her whole deal is extremely reliable technology, meaning anything she builds will be functioning for a very long time. That includes the uploading technology she developed. It's actually received conditional authorization for medical uses already."

Regent thought for a moment, then answered,

"I'll take your offer. Can't speak for the other two though."

I nodded, then gestured to Hellhound, also known as Rachel Lindt. She answered bluntly,

"I want to take care of dogs without anyone bothering me."

Grue elaborated,

"The only problem with that is that the PRT thinks Bitch murdered someone, when it was an accident. She made a dog that someone was torturing big, and the panicking dog did what panicking dogs do and bit."

I nodded, also mentally noting the term of address Grue used.

"Well then, I can arrange for Bitch to also have her death faked. Would that work for you?"

Bitch thought for a moment.

"Will my dogs still recognize me afterwards?"

I thought for a moment.

"That's something we considered. One idea that comes to mind is to build your new body first, and have you introduce the dogs to it before we put you in there."

"That will work."

I then turned to Grue.

"And, what do you want?"

"Custody of my sister. Our parents don't take good care of her, especially with her learning disability."
I kept my face stoic and very deliberately didn't say what I was actually thinking: You wanted to get legal custody of your sister, and your best plan was to go out and commit crimes? Saying that wouldn't be helpful. Instead, I answered,

"That's easy enough. Get your civilian identity a job at Reliabuilt, and we'll also get you in touch with some good lawyers. Yes that will involve you unmasking, but it's kind of unavoidable if you want to solve a problem in your civilian life."

"I... that's... why did I never think of something that simple before?"

I shrugged.

"Shall we go? I can let you into the Reliabuilt complex, and we can flesh out the plan in more detail there."

All three of them nodded in agreement.

so im gonna say my opinion on this. i think grue should just be left in the dust here. because he stoopid. Like, if he joined the prt that would have put a spotlite on his parents and shown how bad it is.
Also i like the whole shard description and stuff.

We Just Write said:
It was the fourth of March - a Friday - when Amy noticed the new machinery being moved into Brockton General Hospital. More specifically, it was being moved to the terminal illness ward. Being curious about what it was, Amy found herself asking about it during one of her brief breaks.

Doctor Richard - one of the local Oncologists - answered,

"Ah, that's the new brain uploading machinery from Reliabuilt. It's been recently approved for medical uses, and it should really ease your workload. Basically, it opens up the option to put people in a brand new robotic body, if their current one is too sick or injured to recover any other way. It does mean a lot of medical personnel are also going to need some technical training going forwards, but that's how things go sometimes."

Just like that, all of Amy's self-worth evaporated. The world... just didn't need her anymore.

"Oh... I guess that's a good thing."

She went through the motions for the rest of her volunteer shift at the hospital, dreading what was going to happen. She was really glad that it was Victoria who came to pick her up, rather than Carol.

Victoria noticed the frown on Amy's face as she pulled up in the car.

"Amy, is something wrong?"

"Yes. They don't need me anymore."

Victoria blinked.

"Huh?"

"Ruggedizer's brain uploading technology is undergoing a nationwide rollout. That means I'm obsolete, and I don't have a reason to... exist anymore."

Victoria tilted her head.

"Who told you that you needed to heal people just to be allowed to exist?"

"Carol."

Victoria frowned, even as she put the car in park and got out her cell phone.

"Right, I think a sleepover is in order."

With that, Victoria dialed Taylor. Her sister needed to talk to someone who most emphatically couldn't want healing from her, but cared about her anyway.

ah yes, Carol is a bitch as usual.

We Just Write · May 6, 2024

Cheetored20 said:
so im gonna say my opinion on this. i think grue should just be left in the dust here. because he stoopid. Like, if he joined the prt that would have put a spotlite on his parents and shown how bad it is.

P: Marcus' goal here isn't to help the Undersiders. It's to remove villains from circulation. Telling Grue he's an idiot wouldn't be helpful to Marcus' actual goal, no matter how true it is.

Cheetored20 · May 6, 2024

We Just Write said:
P: Marcus' goal here isn't to help the Undersiders. It's to remove villains from circulation. Telling Grue he's an idiot wouldn't be helpful to Marcus' actual goal, no matter how true it is.

right, but i wouldnt be able to resist mentioning it, or giving him an "are you stupid" face.

We Just Write · May 9, 2024

P: We are now accepting Cape submissions for Manchester NH. I repeat, we are now accepting Cape submissions for Manchester NH.

SteamStereo · May 9, 2024

Rainbow: an upper manager for a family owned paint company. Closeted bisexual, her extended family are all social conservatives, who are so proud of their tinker-enhanced/inspired white and black paints that they enforce a monochrome color palet at headquarters. Outside of work she is the villainous changer/blaster Rainbow, whose body is made of a constantly shifting humanoid mass of paint. She can throw the paint enhanced distances (rifle accuracy and range with shotgun to Railgun spread, selectable). The longer she is in her changed state the more colors she is, and the more emotionally unstable/open she is, like a mix of getting progressively more drunk or high but only the emotional parts. Targets high society events at all emotions, and transitions from targeting conservative gatherings when just changed to trying to join LGBT+ gatherings after long periods changed. Most common catchphrase: "You need some COLOR in your life!"

The Huntsman: a rural hick middle schooler with delusions of villainy. Brought up by farmers with no forests on their land and a strict no-wood policy for their home (they didn't even allow paper!), he triggered when brought to the edge of a forest to plant trees as a middle school ecology lesson. Able to grow any tree from seed to maturity in minutes to hours (he once got a redwood seed, and had to leave after an hour with it only half grown), he 'terrorizes' local towns by growing trees in public spaces and wherever a tree has been cut down previously. He even got the teacher that brought him to The Woods by growing an entire stand of fruit trees on her yard, so dense they block her windows! No catchphrase. Has been warned away by police five times after growing trees, but thinks he got away because his costume of comforting fur and leather convinced he was not linked to the crime of Trees! The public views him as a modern, middle school, Johnny Appleseed.

The Knapper: a history professor turned rouge tinker. When trying to learn all the different ways antiquity learned to knapp stone, he fell down his hyperfixation until he lost his job and most of he friends. When his son threw out a box of his oldest knapped objects he triggered with the ability to make tinker-tech exclusively through knapping stone. His tinkertech ranges from the artistic to the moderately advanced technology (clockwork-equivalent: yes, computers: no), all entirely made from a single piece of stone. A fanatical believer of Myrrdin, since he knows that a lot of what he is doing is just flat-out impossible with what he did to make it. His business is primarily sculptures and general artistic tinkertech, his lab features some highly advanced clockwork/tinkertech traps, and his store of personal storeroom is the most heavily defended.

My Cabbages: a housewife who manages a large community garden. Has a masters in Botany, but her husband is a relative of Rainbow so the closest she can get to her passion is managing the community garden. Of course, community gardens involve Community, so when her one peaceful activity is invaded by anti-vax, anti-science Karens she triggered with the shaker power to force growth or decay on any plant life she knows about in a large range (grow at a rate of 1 months growth at ideal conditions/nutrients per second, decay at a rate of 1 year of neglect and no fertilizer per second, can effect animal corpses but she hasn't figured that out yet, range = radius of 100 feet). She only triggered a week ago, but already plans to contact Rainbow's cape persona to see if she can join.

We Just Write · May 9, 2024

P: Gonna have to tweak some of these to fit in the world a bit better, but they're useful character ideas. Thanks.

waffelmeister · May 9, 2024

All I have is bad ideas, and worse ideas.

Stir
Always dressed up like a bartender, with a white button down long sleeved shirt and black vest.
With a Striker power... that Shakes a target.
Enjoys James Bond jokes way too much.

Dixie
Can empower vehicles to flee police and PRT, accelerating faster, dodging better, jumping further than a vehicle normally should. Power lends itself well to car chases that have ridiculous amounts of property damage and cop cars that end up totaled in ditches, but no fatalities. Power also lends itself well to being part of a group, and not all that great solo. No real use outside of a vehicle, so while it's good for a getaway driver, it's not something that's going to work well in, say, a crowded mall.

Brownie Baker
Biotinker healer, but can only make consumable healing items that have marijuana in them. Has never been seen in the same room as Snoop Dogg, but has been in the same room as Martha Stewart. The last time anyone tried to assault him in his lair was just a bad trip for everyone.

We Just Write · May 9, 2024

waffelmeister said:
All I have is bad ideas, and worse ideas.

Stir
Always dressed up like a bartender, with a white button down long sleeved shirt and black vest.
With a Striker power... that Shakes a target.
Enjoys James Bond jokes way too much.

Dixie
Can empower vehicles to flee police and PRT, accelerating faster, dodging better, jumping further than a vehicle normally should. Power lends itself well to car chases that have ridiculous amounts of property damage and cop cars that end up totaled in ditches, but no fatalities. Power also lends itself well to being part of a group, and not all that great solo. No real use outside of a vehicle, so while it's good for a getaway driver, it's not something that's going to work well in, say, a crowded mall.

Brownie Baker
Biotinker healer, but can only make consumable healing items that have marijuana in them. Has never been seen in the same room as Snoop Dogg, but has been in the same room as Martha Stewart. The last time anyone tried to assault him in his lair was just a bad trip for everyone.

G: We can work with Dixie as a local Parahuman; the other two are rejected.

We Just Write · May 9, 2024

(Marcus)

It was the ninth of March when I got a call from Faultline, specifically regarding an information bounty. Two of them, actually, though neither of them seemed likely to be recruitment prospects for Reliabuilt. I turned up in person with the agreed upon ten thousand dollars in cash per information bounty.

As it turned out, Faultline was busy. So the task of telling me what Faultline's Crew had learned fell to Spitfire.

"So, we've looked into a recent incident by the docks. We don't know many of the details, but apparently the PRT snapped up a fresh Trigger into the Wards. Probably a regenerator, given they were picked up from the hospital."

I nodded, though I didn't bother concealing a frown. It was information within the terms of the agreement, but it also wasn't terribly useful.

"Second, we have a confirmed sighting of Bakuda in Brockton Bay."

If I had blood, it would have run cold. Meanwhile, Spitfire got out a printed out photograph, presumably from a cell phone camera. It was a bit grainy, but I could clearly make out Bakuda talking to an ABB foot soldier in a back alley.

"Do you want to activate the pre-prepared contract to hunt down Bakuda?"

I thought for a moment. The more time Bakuda had to Tinker, the more dangerous she would get. But on the other hand, antagonizing Lung without needing to would be rather foolish. More pertinently, getting a reputation for being untrustworthy would make my job of quietly solving problems for Reliabuilt vastly harder in the long term.

So after a moment to think, I chose my answer.

"Not just yet. While she's almost guaranteed to cause problems, she hasn't yet. That said, if the PRT starts a manhunt for Bakuda, the contract immediately goes live. Given the change in circumstances, we're willing to increase the payment by ten percent for additional discretion regarding it being us hiring you."

Spitfire nodded,

"That sounds reasonable enough."

(Andrea)

It was just after lunch on Wednesday (March 9), when Rose paged me.

"Laniakea, Amy Dallon is here? She doesn't have an appointment, but she looks really distressed. Do you want to meet with her, or should I tell her you're busy?"

I saved the project I was working on, then replied.

"I'll talk to her; tell her I'll be in conference room two."

I arrived there about a minute before Amy did, though not before the robots stocked a fresh box of donuts and a jug of apple juice. Also a fruit bowl, in case anyone wanted to eat healthy.

Soon enough, the teenage brunette in question made her presence known. Judging by how messed up her hair was, she'd clearly been having a rough time of things. I offered her a glazed donut, and she immediately took it.

"Amy, what's wrong?"

Swallowing the bite she'd been chewing, the teenager answered,

"I can't go home again. If I have to go back to Carol, I – I won't be able to keep myself from doing something horrible."

I blinked, then motioned for Amy to go on.

"A bit less than a week ago, Brockton General got their uploading machine in. I know it's a good thing, but it got me thinking and I finally admitted to myself that I don't like healing. Stayed over at Taylor's for a night, but when I got back home, everything went bad."

Slowly, the whole story came out. Carol had massively gotten on Amy's case when it came out that she didn't actually like healing, and it had been so awful that Amy had opted to run away from home last night instead of go through another reaming. I didn't blame her in the slightest for running away from a clear case of emotional abuse.

I ran my fingers through my hair as I tried to figure out what to do. Obviously, Amy couldn't go back to Carol, but legal problems on my end could be very troublesome indeed. So I paged the legal office for some advice.

A few minutes later, Jacob Vespa had turned up with a laptop, and a stack of law books.

"So, I do need to make clear that I'm specialized in contract and intellectual property law, rather than whatever this is. Still, I'll do my best to figure out what the applicable laws here are."

An hour went by, along with two bathroom stops and another box of donuts. Still, Jacob had what seemed to be an answer.

"So, the most applicable law here would be Section 633:4 under New Hampshire's Title LXII Criminal Code. The short of it is that at best keeping Amy away from Carol would constitute a misdemeanor at minimum, possibly a felony. The catch is that there's a specifically spelled out affirmative defense: if you were acting in good faith to protect the child from real and imminent physical danger, it wasn't a crime."

Amy frowned.

"That's... not helpful. It doesn't cover emotional danger."

Jacob hummed, then looked something up on his laptop.

"Unfortunately, you seem to be correct. Though there are a few other legal avenues we can take – along with some more dubious measures."

I asked,

"Let's start with the legally clear options first, please."

"Well, calling Child Protective Services is definitely an option, as is starting proceedings to get Amy legally emancipated. With some corroborating evidence about living conditions with Carol, it shouldn't be too hard to get Amy free of that household one way or another. The only concern there is that Amy might be forced back to Carol until those court proceedings wrap up, if we can't get some sort of emergency order."

Amy shook her head vigorously,

"No, no no that's not an option. If I go back I won't be able to stop myself from doing something horrible, I know it."

Jacob nodded,

"And that's where one of the slightly dubious options first makes its appearance. Namely, getting the PRT involved and having them bend the rules a bit. Though how much they're willing to bend rules depends on how dangerous the Parahuman is, and healing isn't generally perceived as dangerous. Also best for Ruggedizer not to put too much of her own implied firepower behind this one."

After a moment of silence, Amy spoke.

"I have to admit something. I'm not just a healer. I can do a lot more than that."

Then Amy grabbed an apple from the fruit bowl, and it immediately reshaped itself into a live rodent of some description.

As the critter ran around in circles, I spoke.

"This... explains a lot. Right, we're going to the courthouse. I'll call the PRT on the way and we can explain the situation."

We'd just reached the lobby when a furious Brandish damn-near kicked down the door, and shouted:

"Laniakea, don't you dare get between me and Panacea!"

I didn't even break stride, though I did say "Sure, she's all yours," as misdirection.

Then I pulsed my gravity nodes just so, flinging myself at Carol. Credit to her reaction times, she shifted into her invincible ball of light form before I could make contact.

Still, invincible didn't mean immobile, and I could hit quite a lot harder than a baseline human. With a single solid kick, I managed to knock Brandish well over two hundred meters away, sending her straight through the factory's still-open front door.

I noted,

"That should keep her busy for at least a few minutes. Come on, let's go."

With that, we boarded the flying ambulance and started on our flight to the courthouse. When we got there, us explaining the situation to the first judge who had an open time slot actually got him to pinch the bridge of his nose in exasperation. While he didn't decide the case in Amy's favor instantly, he did grant Amy's request for alternate housing arrangements during proceedings. More specifically, she would be staying with the Heberts.

Crisis averted, I waited for Amy to get picked up, then flew back to the factory with Jacob.

(Emmy)

It was ten in the morning on Thursday, when I read the report on Byung-Ho's first major project. Namely, he'd managed to produce a superconductor that didn't quench until it reached six hundred Kelvins. Just reading that, my jaw dropped. Yeah the superconductors we'd had for the fusion reactor project were technically room-temperature, but only barely. What Byung-Ho made was actually even better in other regards too; it was flexible instead of rigid, and you could fairly easily splice lengths of superconducting cable together with just pressure and time.

Even if it weren't reproducible (and therefore couldn't be parented), this would have been a massively useful piece of technology. But apparently some PRT scientists had managed to manufacture a small sample of the new superconductor, dubbed BH-1. Albeit with absolutely trash yields compared to what Byung-Ho was capable of getting with Reliabuilt's equipment. Right, looked like Byung-Ho would be getting his first patent.

And yes, it would be his first patent; standard Reliabuilt contract for R&D personnel (Tinkers included) split ownership of the patent just about down the middle between the inventors and Reliabuilt. The idea was that neither party could sue the other for using the patented technology or demand royalties, and while the vast majority of licensing would be handled via Reliabuilt, the inventor got a share of the royalties – which they could voluntarily pay back into Reliabuilt or the BBRF, if they wished.

Either way, I promptly got up from my desk and went to go congratulate Byung-Ho in person. This was most definitely an achievement worthy of praise.

(Melissa)

As we sat down in the living room after work, I noted,

"So, the Manchester factory will be opening on Tuesday. I think we'll need to expand our 'cape roster' to maintain coverage."

Marcus nodded,

"That seems sensible enough. Especially since my professional capacity isn't really publicized. Heck, I don't think I've actually shown I have powers at all when I've been out making deals."

As if to prove his point, Marcus briefly projected an illusion of an unimpressed stick figure.

Andrea also chimed in,

"The big questions are what powers we'll build into the new person, and how we'll design their looks."

Marcus dug out a twenty-sided die from somewhere, then commented,

"Well, I for one think we ought to leave gender up to chance this time. One through ten is female, eleven through nineteen is male, and a twenty is non-binary."

No-one had any serious objections to the idea, so Marcus rolled the die, sending it clattering across the coffee table.

It was a two.

I shrugged,

"Any objections to naming her Rachel?"

We Just Write · Jul 11, 2024

(Andrea)

It was two in the morning on Friday (March 11), when there was a gentle knock on the door of the factory. I checked the security camera… and it was Ryan, one of our employees from shipping and receiving. Right, I better see what the problem was.

Thirty seconds later, I'd let Ryan into the lobby, and asked,

"Is there any particular reason you're here so early?"

Ryan nodded grimly,

"It's Skidmark. He's decided to try shaking down Reliabuilt employees for money, and he's threatening to chuck construction materials through our windows if we don't pay up."

I thought for a moment,

"And you're counting on me to handle things more permanently than the PRT would, I'm presuming?"

Another grim nod.

"Understood. Where did you last see him?"

"Rosebrick projects, one of the residential districts Reliabuilt's refurbished. Pretty sure Mush is slinking around somewhere too, but not sure where exactly."

With that, I wrangled a team of security robots – the newer antigrav models – and off I went. Skidmark needed to be informed that Reliabuilt employees and customers were off the list.

I briefly considered my approach as I flew; there was far too much chance of getting rightly charged for murder if I simply killed Skidmark, but I also needed to fuck him up badly enough that he would be physically incapable of causing further problems. While passing it off as an accident. Yes, an injury to the spinal cord should do the job quite nicely.

Soon enough, I caught a glimpse of Skidmark in all his 'glory', shouting obscenities at a condo block. To legally cover my ass, I sent notice to the PRT that I'd encountered Skidmark "on patrol", and requested backup. If everything went right, this would be over long before they got here.

I then activated my bodycam, and without even the slightest sound I touched down behind Skidmark. I tapped him gently on the shoulder, and as he whirled around I growled out the only warning the man would ever get.

"Reliabuilt employees and property are Off. Limits."

Skidmark scoffed,

"Fuck you, star cunt."

Then he went for something or other; I didn't wait to see what it was. Instead, I lunged and grabbed Skidmark, simultaneously saying "Fine, we'll do this the hard way!"

Then I threw him. The direction I'd thrown him towards had been unoccupied at the time of the throw, but one of the drones had been drifting that way, and "coincidentally" happened to line up its hard forwards edge with the back of Skidmark's neck right when their trajectories aligned.

With a sickening crack, Skidmark slid limply to the ground, and I immediately rushed over to administer first aid. There was no love lost, but this being an accident would be much easier to believe if I did my best to prevent Skidmark from dying of his injuries after the fact. This also let me covertly assess the degree of spinal damage the initial impact had inflicted, and if necessary increase it.

Fortunately, I didn't actually need to risk blowing my legal cover by doing that; all the information I could glean indicated that Skidmark was now a quadriplegic. That should do perfectly fine at keeping him from causing future problems. I also confirmed that his injuries weren't life-threatening. Good.

Three minutes after the initial notification I sent to the PRT, Velocity showed up.

"Laniakea, what happened here?"

I sighed,

"Skidmark got hurt worse than I meant to, and I've been administering first aid for the last few minutes. He's been out of it since the injury, and I've got reason to suspect spinal injuries."

The speedster nodded,

"Right, we already have an ambulance on the way. They should be here in a few minutes."

Anyway, I gave the PRT my bodycam footage of the altercation, and soon enough they hauled Skidmark off to… somewhere. Couldn't put him in a regular prison, or he'd die pretty quick on account of his newfound disability. Couldn't put him in a regular hospital either, or he'd trash the place with his power, paralysis or no.

Meh, not my problem anymore.

(Emmy)

The status of the Brockton Bay Revitalization Fund within Reliabuilt was a bit odd; strictly speaking it was a separate company operating as a non-profit, but it benefited from Reliabuilt's overall legal department and… I suppose the term "non-profit subsidiary" might be applicable? Either way, I was at least nominally the boss of both organizations.

Anyway, today I was interviewing an applicant for seed money. Normally I'd be delegating this, but the applicant in question was a parahuman.

"So, you want to open a martial arts school?"

The self-titled Sensei nodded.
"Correct. My power is extreme skill in analyzing people's movements and fluidly controlling my own body. This seems like something I could use to teach people who are interested in defending themselves, even though I myself have no formal training."

I thought for a moment.

"Could I hear an example, perhaps?"

Sensei clammed up. Not quite like he'd been caught lying, but like he was trying very hard to psych himself up for something he really didn't want to talk about. Eventually, he spoke.

"Six days ago, I was cornered by a group of ex-Empire men. I did not have my power then, but-"

I shook my head.

"Not quite what I meant. You don't need to tell me about your trigger. I want to know if you can teach."

Sensei let out a sigh of relief.

"I was a mathematics teacher at a high school for fifteen years. I was away on vacation when the Slaughterhouse Nine made a visit to said school, and there was no school to return to afterwards. I don't wish to discuss that matter further, but I'm willing to provide my credentials if you need them."

I thought for a moment.

"Would you, please?"

Sensei opened the briefcase he'd brought with him, and provided me with the relevant documents. Apparently his civilian name was Markus Rasp, his teacher's license was legitimate (though expired), and the fingerprints I got off him matched what was in the digital database.

"Good news, Sensei. Looks like you're approved for funding and assistance."

(Rachel)

Date Point: 0133, March 12, 2011

I snapped to awareness in a standing position. Four people were standing around me; I quickly identified them as Emmy, Melissa, Andrea, and Marcus Sykes.

Marcus spoke first.

"Rachel, are you feeling alright? Did the world knowledge directory integrate properly?"

I nodded.

"Yes. I'm in Brockton Bay, and I am a Reliabuilt product intended for sale to law enforcement."

Everyone looked flabbergasted and appalled, and I couldn't help but crack up after a few seconds.

"Hah, gotcha! I know you're my family and never had any intention of selling me, but you only ever get one chance for a prank like that."

Emmy and Andrea both facepalmed, Marcus started giggling, and Melissa grumbled,

"Not funny."

"Was too funny. Also, what's the deal with that encrypted directory?"

Marcus went very serious then.

"That directory contains absolutely top secret information, only kept at such high levels of secrecy out of necessity. If that information gets out at all? The world dies. Why that would happen is one of those incredibly dangerous secrets."

There was a pause, before Marcus continued.

"If you don't want to be burdened by those secrets, you don't have to. But if you do choose to learn it, the programs in that directory will render you straight-up incapable of spreading those secrets without an absolute guarantee of maintaining infosec."

I thought for a moment, before giving my answer.

"Sounds like you need the help. Gimme that encryption key."

(Melissa)

While Andrea, Marcus and Rachel got busy planning the latter's public debut, I was planning our next move against the Dynaliths with Emmy.

Emmy started,

"So, we need to find an unoccupied earth that's only under light surveillance, and set up our operations there."

I nodded,

"That's correct."

"We can't ship enough assets to really get things started from either of our factory complexes. Not without compromising on secrecy, which is unacceptable."

"That's also correct."

"Therefore, we need to find some other site to use as our jumping off point."

There was a long pause, before I finally had an idea. A horrible and insane idea, but one that could work.

"The Eagleton quarantine zone, it's perfect."

Emmy blinked.

"What. How?"

"Think for a moment; because it's a quarantine zone, information on what's going on in there is extremely limited. On top of that, the reason it's quarantined is because of aggressive robots. I do believe we know someone who can Master robots."

Emmy focused on the idea for a moment.

"Do you really think we can read Taylor in on this? Not to mention she'd need to be extremely selective with what she actually did to the Eagleton robots, to avoid tipping off her power."

I thought about it for a bit.

"If push comes to shove, we do have a couple other options. We could get some feedback from Dragon, or we could maybe duplicate Taylor's connection to her Dynalith and do it ourselves."

Emmy answered almost immediately.

"Dragon first. She's already shielded and read in on the problem, not to mention having a lot of resources to work with that we don't have direct access to."

(Marcus)

It was 2 PM on Saturday. Rachel wasn't even 24 hours old yet, and I was keeping an eye on the news. Sure enough, a news story about Bakuda's bombs being used to level a building quickly surfaced. The news program quickly brought on a PRT representative saying that an all-out manhunt for the bomb tinker was now in effect.

I nodded grimly, and activated my internal phone.

"You've reached the Palanquin." said the voice of a receptionist I'd met briefly during previous business discussions.

"It's Mr. E. Let Faultline know that the previously arranged contract to deal with a liability is now active. I'll be there with the first half of the pay within the hour. In cash, as agreed."

Arrowman · Jul 12, 2024

Missed this.

JohnWolfie34 · Jul 29, 2024

We Just Write said:
G: We can work with Dixie as a local Parahuman; the other two are rejected.

I got some ideas!

Operative: an Army veteran who, after his African American friend was lynched by a local white supremacist clan, triggered with the terrifying abilities of someone who, for 500 years trained non-stop in all manner of military operations.

Add a package of Brute(Regenerative factor capable of healing bullet wounds in minutes+able to go over a month without need of rest + peak human capabilities.),Mover (able to run up to 50 miles an hour, with insane reflexes.),and Thinker(can sense an incoming attack 4.3 seconds before injury + 500 years worth of military training, which includes training in tactics and strategy.), he's a terrifying opponent for anyone who draws his ire.

As it so happens, there are no longer any white supremacists in the city and surrounding countryside, and the gangs are very....careful about not causing civilian casualties. Officially, Operative is seen as a murderous villain by the PRT, but unofficially? They aren't really putting much-if any- effort into catching him.

Operative is willing to do whatever it takes to protect innocent people, and loathes the whole cops and robbers thing. He coincidentally has a theory-in the "privacy" of his own thoughts- that an organization has carefully orchestrated events to ensure the world has become what it is today.

Has some pals from his time in the army, and gets together with them from time to time for game night.
Also has a wife and eleven year old daughter, who he loves with all his heart, and he's hellbent on keeping both safe.

JohnWolfie34 · Jul 30, 2024

We Just Write said:
G: We can work with Dixie as a local Parahuman; the other two are rejected.

An independent Heroine going by Blitz, she's a high rated Mover/Striker package, has "caught" bullets flying through the air and redirected them at the one who fired's kneecaps(literally just yoinked the bullet, and lined it up directly with his kneecaps and feet. It's one of her favorite ways to debilitate criminals who carry around guns. Coincidentally, most [read:the "smart" ones] criminals now use melee weapons in the area she patrols.) Has been to the last 5 Endbringer battles, almost died to Leviathan but got healed before she keeled over. She commonly works with the local first responders, so much so that she's trusted to have access to their network. Has saved dozens of lives by zooming people to the hospital or nearby ambulances, and is therefore well liked by local residents.

In her personal life, she's a portrait painter who lives off people's ego's and her dad's deep pockets. Is a happy go lucky kind of gal who likes making people smile, and this bleeds over to her cape identity, where she's prone to cracking decently funny jokes to lift people's spirits. The personal height of her life was getting an autograph from Mouse Protector in her civ identity, likes to brag about it.

We Just Write · Oct 31, 2024

(Dragon)

"Emmy, Melissa, that is quite possibly the worst idea I have ever heard. The Eagleton Quarantine Zone is off-limits for very good reasons, and I will not allow any harebrained schemes to try using it as a jumping off point for extradimensional colonization."

On the other end of the video call, Emmy turned to Melissa.

"Told you so."

Melissa slumped a bit.

"I suppose it was a stupid idea. Thanks for injecting some sense. Still, we do need an offworld base of operations. Any thoughts on what could work?"

I spoke up,

"I've got a lot of obsolete suits and other equipment in storage from my long career as a Protectorate and Guild Tinker. Though not suitable for combat anymore, that materiel could easily be repurposed for starting an offworld colonization program without anyone noticing. It can even be returned to storage once it's no longer needed, leaving no evidence behind. I'll simply need plans for an interdimensional travel machine, and the coordinates of an appropriate world."

Melissa nodded,

"Thank you for the offer, Dragon."

(Andrea)
Date Point: 1007, March 14 2011

Barely an hour after Reliabuilt's employees clocked in for work, the factory complex's alarms went off. I immediately overclocked my brain to maximum speed and pulled up the information on what was going on and - oh.

There were six projectiles on high arcing trajectories towards the facility. Radar, lidar, and visuals all agreed that they were mortar shells. Ballistics tracking pointed to a firing site 1.8 kilometers away, with firing times synchronized to achieve simultaneous impact.

I immediately tasked point defense to begin shooting down the mortar shells, even as a squadron of eight security drones were mobilized for a flight to the firing site. Sixteen more drones were also assigned to ram the mortar shells midair if they began descending despite both the lasers and regular interceptor missiles.

Another salvo of mortar shells was fired from the site before the drones had even made it a third of the way there, on a notably lower trajectory than the first salvo. Clearly this was an attempt at a time-on-target attack. Fortunately two of the first salvo shots had already been swatted by the time the second salvo launched.

Ballistics tracking also noted a seventh shell firing directly upwards. Why?-

That anomalous shell burst midair, producing a massive glowing vision of Bakuda. It was approximately forty meters tall, and clearly visible throughout most of the city. The illusory Bakuda made a triumphant pose even as the sixth inbound shell was destroyed, and then the damn thing began to gloat.

"I am Bakuda, the greatest Tinker in the world! Today, I erase the accomplishments of Ruggedizer!"

I tuned out the rest of the nonsensical rant, and focused on the job of defending the facility from the remaining inbound projectiles and shutting down the mortar site.

A fourth salvo of mortar shells was fired immediately prior to the flight of drones arriving at the firing site, getting a look at eight or so ABB goons shoveling shells into the six mortars they had as quickly as possible. They also had a flatbed truck here, where the ammunition was stored. I promptly ordered the security drones to taze the artillery crew with their electrolasers- and got a very direct look at their heads exploding, being impaled from the inside in hundreds of directions, bursting into flame from within, instantly freezing solid, bursting into a shower of horrible acid, arcing electricity all over everything nearby, and in one case instantly converting all matter in a 1.2 meter radius to glass. A moment later the remaining mortar shells on the truck also went off, devastating the entire street.

FUCK. I immediately contacted approximately all the emergency services, even as the drones in the vicinity switched to search and rescue mode. One of them had actually been destroyed by one of the matter conversion bombs, so there were only seven there to help. That wouldn't be anywhere near enough.

Fortunately, the factory's defenses managed to neutralize all inbound munitions before any could reach the apex of their trajectory. But that giant fucking hologram kept gloating about the destruction of Reliabuilt's factory. The damn thing had to be a recording rather than a live feed, since it celebrated at the exact moment when the mortar shells would have impacted, despite all of them having been neutralized by then. After a minute of insufferable gloating, it faded.

To think I had been hoping for a relaxing work day.

(Marcus)
In the immediate aftermath of the mortar attack on Reliabuilt, I contacted Lung via burner phone.

"Lung, this is Mr. E. Did you authorize Bakuda to attack Reliabuilt?"

To his credit, Lung answered immediately.

"No. In fact, I explicitly forbid her from taking any such action. I am aware of what happened; I clearly saw the hologram she created."

"Understood. Are you willing to share your plans going forwards?"

"Bakuda will need to be disciplined. Farewell, mister E."

(Rachel)
My official debut had been pushed back by the Bakuda debacle, so I found myself in one of the extreme security labs trying to figure out options for effective anti-Endbringer weapons. Unlike every other group who had to deal with them, we had the benefit of insider information on what the Endbringers actually were, and some knowledge of how they worked.

Analyzing that information was not encouraging, unfortunately. Very quickly, I was able to rule out any amount of straightforward physical force. Any hit of that variety strong enough to kill an Endbringer would be more than enough to render the planet uninhabitable. Assuming the planet was still around after the fact at all.

Meanwhile, the dimensional clusterfuck inside an Endbringer's body meant most varieties of weaponized portal simply wouldn't work. Temporal alterations could possibly have an effect, but given that the Worms had access to temporal effects of their own, that was a temporary measure at most.

I spent most of the day mulling over the problem, before I wound up asking Emmy and Melissa a question at dinner.

"Does the sending end for a teleporter actually need to be fully enclosed?"

JohnWolfie34 · Oct 31, 2024

Ah, it's always a pleasure to see this update.

JohnDoe22 · Nov 1, 2024

Oh snap. An update! Thank you for writing.

We Just Write · Nov 5, 2024

(meanwhile)

Given recent events, Lung had ordered Oni Lee to dispose of his Bakuda-provided grenades immediately, as a safeguard against betrayal. He had then demanded that Bakuda come explain her blatant insubordination in person, given that she had violated a direct order by attacking Reliabuilt. So Oni Lee and Lung waited for Bakuda to either arrive and explain herself, or not arrive and find herself on Lung's hit list. Lung was obvious and in the open, but Oni Lee had found a concealed hiding spot to wait in.

As it turns out, Bakuda did arrive on schedule. But contrary to Lung's orders, she was carrying her grenade launcher, and already had it mostly lined up on Lung as she rounded the corner.

Things happened very fast after that, Oni Lee flashing into existence just in front of Bakuda, knives drawn. At the same time, Bakuda pulled the trigger. The launched grenade ricocheted off Oni Lee's shoulder, tumbling upwards into the air. Oni Lee flashed himself behind Bakuda even as his current self tumbled into the ground, and Lung ducked down away from the grenade.

Then the grenade went off, trapping both Lung and the Oni Lee in front of Bakuda. Well, parts of them anyway; the Oni Lee clone's head was inside the time stop bubble, as was Lung's left arm, raised in an instinctual effort to shield himself from the blast.

Bakuda didn't have long to celebrate her accomplishment, as Oni Lee stabbed her in the neck from behind, then made absolutely sure the madwoman was dead.

Meanwhile, Lung ripped himself free of his trapped arm, and started trudging around the timestop to where Bakuda's corpse was lying. By the time he got there, his left arm had mostly regrown, and Oni Lee had finished cutting off Bakuda's head, just in time to hand it to the regenerating pyrokinetic.

"I commend you for your loyalty, Oni Lee. Now, I do believe we have a message to send."

(Emmy)
Date Point 0815, March 15 2011

The front page of today's newspaper had a rather gruesome picture on the front page: a woman's severed head in a gas mask, erected on a post in one of Brockton Bay's parks. Hanging just below the head was a rather straightforward message:

"This is the head of Bakuda, who betrayed Lung. She is now dead."

Marcus nodded from across the breakfast table, even as he scraped some cream cheese onto a bagel;

"Well, looks like I'll be delivering the rest of Faultline's pay today, even though their efforts didn't really do much about Bakuda."

I shrugged,

"Fortunately, all they want is money, which isn't exactly in short supply for us."

"True. Any thoughts about what you'll be doing today?"

"Planning Rachel's public debut, talking to Trainwreck, and also checking on the Manchester factory site. According to what I've heard back from them, they should be ready to open by the end of the week."

That's when Rachel looked up from her oatmeal, and asked,

"Does my debut really need to be super flashy? I'm not law enforcement, branding isn't super important for me."

I replied, "People still need to know you work for Reliabuilt, meaning some sort of public debut is required. Best to have a plan for that, given you only get one shot at a first impression."

(Melissa)

To my utter shock, I was called over to the Protectorate's Rig on the 15th. I wasn't in trouble for anything, it was just that Armsmaster wanted my advice. Given how we'd gotten along before, I really wasn't expecting him to want to consult my expertise on anything.

Still, I showed up at ten o'clock sharp, wearing my dress armor. Armsmaster was waiting for me at the entrance.

"Ruggedizer."

"Armsmaster. Why did you request my assistance?"

The middle-aged miniaturization Tinker scowled for a moment, before answering.

"You are the world's leading expert on brain uploading. I have been persuaded that for such a high-stakes procedure, I should get your assistance in transitioning to a synthetic."

Ah. Apparently, Dragon talked some sense into him. I nodded,

"The easy way would be to put you through the QUD and let the body builder do its work, but I'm guessing you want a more custom job."

"You are correct. I will be using a Reliabuilt uploading machine, and a destination brain built to Dragon's specifications. But for the rest of my new body, I would appreciate your help ensuring compatibility and reliability."

I kept a strictly professional expression; I fully knew just how galling this had to be for Armsmaster, and I wasn't going to make this any harder on his ego than I had to,

"Understood. I suppose we should get to it, then?"

(Andrea)

Due to some unexpected legal trouble involving the BBRF (nothing too major, but still time-consuming), Emmy found herself with rather less time available than she'd planned on. So the task of talking to Trainwreck fell to me. As I entered his workshop, the Tinker nodded in my direction.

"Nice to see you Laniakea. Anything in particular you wanted to talk to me for?"

I shrugged,

"Something came up, so Emmy had to delegate checking up on you. How have you been since getting here?"

Trainwreck thought for a moment,

"Took me a while to hit my stride with properly long-lasting machinery, but I've mostly gotten up to the level of lifetime guarantee Ruggedizer can manage. Filled a dozen or so orders since then. I hope that's good enough?"

I smiled, "More than good enough. Truth be told, I was mostly here to check on your personal wellbeing, rather than audit your job performance."

Understanding dawned in Trainwreck's expression.

"Ah. There is something that's been bugging me, I suppose."

"You can tell me, you won't get in trouble for it."

There was a pause as Trainwreck hesitated. Then he answered.

"Even with the frame I built for myself, it's not really a body. I'd like to be able to go out and just have some normal time off, but can't see how to make that happen."

I blinked. This was a problem with a readily available solution.

"You do know brain uploading was recently added to Reliabuilt's health plan as an option for interested employees, right?"

Trainwreck blinked,

"I haven't read my contract in weeks. So no, I didn't know that. How do I apply for that?"

Wait... we never did get around to telling people about that, or setting up an official process for getting uploaded. Well that was an oversight we needed to correct.

Built To Last

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Versed in the lewd.

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