Chapter Text
(Start - Flare - 3.11)
Late Monday, April 25th, A Car Park in the Docks
Darkness took us.
A fraction of a second later, the world shook.
Everything around me trembled, the ground beneath me quaking like it was ready to tear open and swallow me whole. The very air seemed to vibrate, grinding a noise like shattering of a mountain into my ears and behind my eyes, working itself under my skin and into my bones. It was like the entire world was coming down on my head but never quite reaching me, clawing and baying at me from above, the ceaseless, crushing noise trying with all it's night to reach down and maul me.
It was like being crushed all over again in the body of another, the threat of that memory hanging over my head. Of my skin and fur being torn from my body as steel behemoth crushed me. Of my organs bursting from the force. Of my life leaving me as something great and pitiless bore down on me from above.
I didn't know why I was still alive, but I couldn't look up to see. Every cacophonous crash above made me huddle lower, made me curl smaller into a ball of fear, my jaw clenched so tight it hurt and my eyes stuck stubbornly close as I waited for it to end any second.
For the storm that raged above to finally reach us.
The arms around me clung tight, the only thing keeping my tethered to the world, the frantic breath of someone just as scared as I was brushing down my neck. Her fingers dug painfully into my arms, so rough I was sure they'd leave bruises, but I didn't care. The pain of her touch was more of a comfort than not.
I was holding Douglas just as tightly, his head tuck against my chest, the wet feeling of blood seeping through his hair and around my fingers. I could feel the pulse in his throat against my fingers, the frantic twitching of arterial blood beneath.
Fear. Thick as water and heavy as smoke, shared between all four of us as the world bore down on our heads.
I almost didn't recognize when the crashing above stopped.
The noise of it had all but deafened me, my ears ringing so badly with tinnitus that the transition between cacophonous noise and absolute silence was almost indistinguishable. The only way i knew that it had stopped was by the stillness of it all. The earth under my feet had stopped quaking, the vibrations that worked there way under my skin slowly petering out as everything went still.
The world felt lifeless, without that shaking. Dead, in a ridiculous sort of way.
It took a long time for me to get my thoughts enough in order that I could process things, and when I did I found I couldn't move. I was frozen, paralyzed, my body shocked into stillness and refusing every call I gave it to just move.
I felt Battery swallow dryly next to my ear, then felt a rush of panic when she started to pull away.
My left hand screamed with pain, but I brought it up before I could even think to stop myself, holding onto to Battery's arm. Her breath hitched slightly, in surprise maybe, but she understood without my kneading to say a thing, her arms tightening around me. Less of a vice grip now, more of an embrace.
I felt a breath shudder out of me that I hadn't realized I'd been holding, tears stinging in my eyes as I held the arms around me tight. I was struggling to breathe, to force lungfuls or air down and to push them back up, every inhale and exhale a trial of manual effort as I tried desperately to arrest control back over my body.
My throat felt dry and pained, coated with a thick layer of something foul and coppery, sticking to my tongue no matter how hard I tried to swallow it.
It was like I wasn't there. Like I wasn't present anymore, I was just a spectator, watching as my one body spiraled deeper and deeper into fear.
One moment. I told myself. One moment without control.
I let myself curl inward around the arm wrapped around my chest, around the body held in my arms, holding them both as close to myself as I could as moisture ran down my face. It gathered behind my mask and stank of copper, or iron and blood and salt, and the choked gasp that tried ot leave my throat only drew more of the same out of my eyes.
What was I- what was I thinking? What was- why was I so- calm?
The breath I'd gasped out wouldn't come back, and a strangled noise left my throat as I shook and cried, fighting to push tears out that refused to leave me.
I couldn't get any of it out, none of the tears, none of the cries I wanted to scream into the air. They were trapped under my skin, behind my teeth, they built in my like a fire, waiting to erupt.
I wanted to scream. To claw at my bloodied face until ribbons came away under my nails. I wanted to stop. To stop thinking, stop feeling, stop being.
"Sovereign?"
Battery's voice was warm against the back of my neck.
It was like being shocked, I was drawn back down to my body in a moment, my mind reeling with whiplash as suddenly the divide between me and myself was closed.
"I'm fine." I said, voice hoarse.
I relaxed my hold on her arm, but she didn't pull back immediately. I could practically feel her gaze like a brand on the back of my neck, could just imagine the concern heavy in her eyes as she looked at me, but I ignored it in favor of studying my surroundings.
It was pitch black. Not just dark, but the kind of absolute pitch that you could only achieve in the total absence of light. It felt wrong.
I'd spent almost everyday since I'd implanted my chip with my awareness spread across hundreds of minds. My perception so wide that I never had to worry about being trapped in the dark.
This darkness reminded me of what it was like before, when I was just me, with no mask or Mischief to help me escape myself. A sightless void, constricting me down to just myself. To my own panting breath, to the throbbing pain in my hands and face, to my own uncomfortable skin and ugly scars that pulled on each other every time I dared to move.
The camera's on my mask banished the dark.
Alone, they wouldn't have done a thing, but a flicker of my third eye expanded my sight into more dimensions than just the visual. Waves bounced off the obsidian glass walls around us, echoing off each other again and again, losing energy each time as they bounced around the dome we'd been ensconced in.
Blockade.
I'd gotten a glimpse of her before the collapse, but I hadn't had time to think that she might try to save us. The dome was barely big enough for the four of us, but it had kept the rubble from dropping down on our heads. She'd saved our lives.
Nearly indestructible, she'd said. Her boast had held up, it seemed.
I felt Battery shift, and tensed with surprise, wondering for a second why I hadn't seen felt signature start to move before I remembered that my mask was down.
Right. I thought quietly, I turned it off there at the end, didn't I.
I hesitated before taking it up again. I didn't want to be bound down to just me right now. I felt raw, every little motion from the others making me want to flinch, to cringe away from the bodies that I couldn't predict that moved so close to mine.
But I didn't want to feel them either. I wanted to be me right now. No matter how vulnerable that made me feel, I didn't think I could stand the foreign stimulation of bodies that I couldn't control, but still felt almost as my own.
Armsmaster's gruff voice broke the silence.
"Everyone alright?" He asked.
I craned my neck upward slightly, then turned the cameras on my mask to look at him above us. He was pressed awkwardly against the ceiling of the dome, hunched over, doing his best to avoid touching Battery, who was knelt over me below him.
She pulled back away from me as much as she could, but was still left hovering slightly, back bent uncomfortably as she sighed.
"Yeah." She said, "Kids?"
"Alive." I strained, swallowing around the pain in my throat.
A silence followed, and I looked down at Pace, worrying that he'd fallen unconscious at some point during the downfall.
He was awake in my arms though, stiff and frozen. His hands were curled into trembling fists at his sides, and paying closer attention, I noticed that he was breathing quickly as well. A surge of concern ran through me and I moved my hand slightly, brushing my middle finger against the naked skin above his collar.
Immediately, his body came into focus.
Minor injuries, all of which I recognized and cataloged with ease. Bruises, cuts, wounds, things I recognized and expected from a fight like the one we'd had.
I frowned when I noticed the cortisol pouring through his system, the adrenaline pumping through his veins like he was facing down life or death, his heart pumping so fast I was worried it might hurt him.
His entire body was tensed with sheer, unadulterated terror. I tightened my grip slightly, worried, and felt that terror deepen.
"Pace?"
No response, just the flicker of something in the center of his brain trying to reach out, then failing. His quiet breathing starting to grow in volume, until he was practically hyperventilating.
Slowly, I let go, taking my hands out from around his neck and head.
The moment I let him go he burst into motion, scrambling back from me like a frightened animal, pressing himself back against the black glass walls of our confines.
I stared, frozen where I sat, confused and afraid.
I shuffled slightly closer, then stopped when his hand darted into his coat pocket. Around the handle of his knife.
My eyes went wide, the notion just failed to process in my head.
"Pace?" I said again, slowly, fighting through my confusion to strain his name out, "You're scaring me, what's, what's wrong? I don't know- I don't know how- how to help."
He didn't say a thing, shaking a few feet in front of.
I didn't know what to do with it, it just… wasn't him, he'd never acted like this, never. And I had no idea what to do now that he was.
I felt Battery and Armsmaster's attention on us. Silent observers that made my hairs stand on end, watching the byplay, eyes drilling into the back of my head, darting from me to Pace as he struggled to breathe.
"I'm- Just, don't-" He choked out between lungfuls of air, "Don't touch me."
I'd never heard him emote vocally before. His voice was always so quiet, so lax and bored. A flat affect, according to my brief google searches, trying to better understand my friend.
This wasn't that.
His voice was shrill and desperate now, tight and hoarse with emotion as he backed himself as far away from us as he could. None of that rich, quiet rumble of disinterest that I'd slowly grown to take comfort in.
I pulled back, ashamed to admit that it scared me. I knew he didn't like being touched but this…
I'd felt his fear in the moment before I'd pulled back. Felt the unadulterated terror that pumped through his veins as I held him, the panic and anxiety that had frozen him in place until I'd let go. Looking at him now, backed against a wall, one hand clawed at his shirt, curling into a trembling fist. Like he was trying to root out whatever terror had settled in him.
The other was tucked away in his coat pocket, wrapped around the handle of his knife. I didn't need my mask to know that, to know his finger were probably so tight they were bloodless.
I knew that from experience. Knew it from the countless times I'd seen him react to anxiety, to panic, with violence. His natural instinct was to fight back, like an animal backed into a corner.
I didn't know what to do.
Words failed to form, my arms locked ay my side, staring wide eyed at the person that had replaced the quiet friend I'd come to know.
I felt a hand settle on my chest, urging me backward, and looked down in a daze at the blue and black glove.
"We'll give you as much space as we can, Pace." Battery's voice was gentle, her lips pinched in concern as she looked passed me at Pace, "Will that help?"
He didn't respond, and I saw Battery's concern deepen. She pulled back anyway, taking me with her as she sat back as far as she could.
Pace flickered, then winced, hissing a pained breath between his teeth. He did relax ever so slightly though, a hint of the tension leaving his shoulders. He brought his legs up, like a barrier between himself and us, letting go of his knife to lock his hands together behind his neck, curling so his head was pressed to his knees.
I chewed my lip, watching him as I settled back down with Battery opposite me.
It was uncomfortable in every possible way. The dome was small, the dead rats around our feet stinking of blood, the space so small it barely fit us all. Short enough that Armsmaster had to hunch over above us and only just wide enough to accommodate the four of us, let alone when one of us needed space.
I ended up tucked against the side of the dome with Battery opposite me, both of us on either side of Armsmaster, who couldn't sit down without being curled into a ball.
He made a tired noise, dragging a hand down his face, "We should be safe until the PRT gets a crew to dig us out. Blockade's shields don't have an observable time limit and oxygen can get through them. So long as there's gaps in the rubble, we'll be fine."
I frowned, "What about the villains?"
"Either dead or escaped." He said flatly, and I felt ice run through my veins.
My tongue darted out between my lips, dry and cottony, "What?"
Armsmaster scowled.
"How many of those villains do you think could survive this, Sovereign?" He said, "Nautilus and Wither. Ballast, maybe. The rest either escaped in the chaos or died in the collapse."
I stared at him, wide eyed, mind rushing past every villain we'd managed to bring down up until this point, wondering which of them would have managed to escape and which ones would have died.
Too well restrained to run, or just not fast enough to try.
"Oh."
His expression deepened into something something angry, his jaw tensing.
"Yes. Oh."
I didn't enhanced senses to hear the scorn in those two words, and I found myself glaring up at him as numbness gave way to frustration.
"If you've got something to say," I said, "Say it."
He met my glare with his own, "Would it do me any good?"
He ground out the words, and my hackles rose as I bore my teeth back at him, hissing a chattering breath through my teeth.
"What the fuck is that supposed to mean?"
Armsmaster's lips thinned into a line, "I think you know exactly what it means, Sovereign."
Battery sighed, her head thumping back against the wall of the dome, "Are we really doing this now?"
"Is there going to be a better time?" Armsmaster demanded, "The moment we're out of this hole, she's going to run off. I'd rather have this conversation now before she has the chance."
He waited for a response, then pressed on when she didn't have one to give.
"It either happens here or at Protectorate Headquarters." He said simply, "And I doubt she's going to choose to come back with us for a briefing after this disaster."
I curled in a little on myself, not liking being talked about like I wasn't there.
"I'm not going to apologize, if that's what you want."
"Apologize?" He scoffed, "Your insubordination almost got half the people here killed. You had no place playing guardian angel."
"You were barely holding it together!" I shot back, "If I hadn't intervened, the two of you would be dead."
"We are trained professionals, Sovereign." His lips dipped into a stern frown, "I've been doing this longer than you've been walking, and Battery is more than capable of defending herself. We're going to be better at deescalating than a bunch of children."
My temper flared, a righteous indignation rising in my chest as I snarled up at him.
"Fuck you." I snapped, "Giving us the order to retreat was a stupid move, and you know it. If it wasn't for me, Battery would be dead, and you'd have followed right after."
Battery raised her hands, "Look, would you two just-"
"It isn't your responsibility to make that call!" Armsmaster bowled through her words, speaking through grit teeth, "Would keeping you in the field when the threat of death was imminent have been better? I have a responsibility to keep you three safe, and you jeopardised that by ignoring my orders."
"We had it handled," I said, "We took down three villains without your support, one of whom was about to tear apart your colleague."
"And what a job you made of that." He scoffed, "Every action you took out there escalated things even further than they already were, put your team and Blockade deeper in danger. You strangled Whiplash, for god's sake! what message do you think that sends to the villains that see it?"
"She was going to kill Battery!" I snapped, "What do you want me to do? Sit back and watch her blow Battery's head off?"
"It's not a question of your competence, Sovereign!" He barked, "It's a question of how you chose to react to a bad situation. Your choice, when the cards were down, was to ignore my orders. Orders you promised to follow, but instead you chose to throw yourself and your team deeper into danger."
His gauntleted hands tightened around the haft of his halberd, "If you had followed my orders, myself and Battery could have disengaged and retreated when we saw fit. Instead, you forced an engagement that had already gone sour, and in doing so endangered all of us."
"You certainly didn't seem keen on retreating when we had all those villains captured." I spat, "You didn't say a fucking word about retreating, not even when I mentioned Rig. Was that you endangering us? Endangering your team?"
His silence answered me, grinding his teeth as he stared down at me, his hands so tight around the haft of his weapon I swore I heard the metal start to whine under the effort.
"We had it handled." I grit out, putting emphasis, "Your little last stand wouldn't have gone half as well if we hadn't stayed."
"Look at your hands, Sovereign." He said in a low, angry voice, "At that cut on your face. Look at the state Pace is in! You call this handled? The only member of your team who isn't severely injured is the ten-year-old that didn't engage anyway, never mind whatever state your stunt sending Blockade after Frenetic left her in."
"I am-"
"You are not fine, Sovereign!" He boomed, "And neither is the rest of your team. Battery and I advocated for you because we thought you'd be better than this, not because we wanted to encourage your recklessness. Whatever the outcome, do you really expect the Protectorate to work with someone who can't be trusted in the heat of a fight? None of this speak well of you as a hero, much less a leader."
He knelt down to eye level, jabbing a finger at me, "This isn't about what's smart and what isn't, it's responsibility and trust. I'm responsible for all of you, of your actions. Whose head do you think this shitshow falls on? Because it sure as hell isn't the middle schooler with delusions of grandeur."
I reeled back a little at the ferocity in his words, but refused to back down, sick of being lectured.
"So it's about your reputation, then?" I said, "You're just angry cause you might get a fucking black mark on your record?"
"There are consequences to your actions, Sovereign!" his shout echoed off the walls of our dome, "Consequences that extend beyond you and your impulsivity!"
I went to respond, but a burst of lightning cut me off before the words could leave my mouth.
Battery slammed her fist into the ground, smashing the cement to pieces with an almighty crash of noise that silenced everything in the dome.
"Enough!" She snapped, "Both of you!"
She looked between us, her lips a hard line, "You're both acting like children. Sir, I don't disagree with you, but you are a grown fucking man, act like it and stop screaming at her. And, respectfully, do not put words in my mouth, I advocated for her because I believe in her, as a person and a hero. She made some bad decisions today but that has not changed."
"And Sovereign," She turned to me, her scowl faltering, dipping into a frown of disappointment as she sighed, "You're better than this, we both know you are. Armsmaster was out of line, but you need to know when to take a step back and reign yourself in. You can't let your temper control you like that."
She slumped back down, looking between us pointedly, "Now I don't wanna hear a word more from either of you, alright? Not unless it's something fucking civil."
I grit my teeth to bite down the retort that wanted to leap off my tongue, clenching my fists tight enough to make my arms twitch with pain, forcing myself back down and shrinking against the wall of the dome.
The anger itched under my skin, like a dozen insects crawling on my tendons begging me to lash out, to throw a punch or fight back or start yelling again or anything to satisfy that fire burning in my throat. The humiliation of being scolded like a child didn't help, the disappointed look on Battery's face when she looked at me. It reddened my face, made emotions boil in my blood that I didn't have a name for but wanted desperately to dash away.
I didn't do anything though. I kept myself still, nails digging into the balls of my hands. I couldn't do anything, no matter how tempting it was. Not without endangering whatever relationship was left between myself and the Protectorate.
The look on Armsmaster's face made it almost bearable though, the way he refused to meet his colleagues gaze. I took a bit of satisfaction in the idea that he was just as embarrassed as I was.
He turned away, tapping his right ring finger against the ball of his hand, and extending a series of tools from inside of his armored wrist. He withdrew them and closed the port, then tapped two fingers on his right against the wrist of his left. A compartment opened on his thigh, and he started to withdraw parts.
I considered watching him for a second, but the bitter feeling in my stomach was too strong to even consider observing another tinker work. I'd be too tempted to follow suit, and trapped as I was without my parts all that would do would frustrate me.
I glanced at Pace, worried that our argument might have set him off again. My heart skipped when I saw his hand in his pocket, the grip of a knife poking out from within.
I barely resisted the urge to curse him as an idiot and shuffled over, reaching out, hesitating before my hand could touch his. He flickered, hearing me move, some of the tension leaving him when he saw it was me.
I let my hand touch his own, pulling it out of his pocket and taking the knife from his hand, keeping my voice as quiet as I could.
"You can't fight him, goddamnit, what were you thinking?"
He flickered, then winced, holding his head in his hands.
"Dunno." he muttered, "Just- got scared, I guess. Thought you were gonna throw a punch."
"Even if I did, you can't," my voice hitched, and I had to bite back a groan, "you can't beat Armsmaster."
He was silent for a second, "I… no, I guess not. Sorry."
I pursed my lips, emotions warring inside me.
Seconds ago I'd been scared of him, scared of what he'd do, and I felt a bit of whiplash now that he was back to his normal self.
No. Not normal, he wouldn't normally make the kind of judgement call that wound up with him knife fighting a guy in power armor. He wasn't that stupid.
"You're concussed." I said, "You're not thinking straight."
He flinched, folding his arms over his knees and slumping back against the wall limply.
"Sorry."
"Stop apologizing." I sighed, "It's not totally your fault. Just, maybe try not to do anything rash, alright? Or run it by me first, I guess."
He nodded stiffly, and I hesitated, kneeling for awkwardly for a second before taking a breath and sitting down beside him, shoulder to shoulder. He flinched when I brushed again him, but relaxed again when I didn't move any closer, slowly easing back into himself.
I watched it all, feeling hypersensitive to every little tic that I wouldn't have assigned much meaning at all before now. Paying attention to every little way he reacted to touch now that I'd seen… whatever that was.
"You-" I stopped, trying to form the words, "What was that, before?"
He flickered, "What?"
"You know what I mean," I said, "your… attack, or whatever. What the fuck was that?"
His hands went tight, fingers digging into the meat of his arms, "I don't know."
"You don't know?"
"I-" He stopped, "I don't know. Don't usually react like that."
I wanted to press, to demand an explanation, to tear into him for scaring me so fucking badly; but every second of silence that I hesitated pushed my chance to do so further away, until it was too awkward to even consider it.
I wanted to make sure he was okay.
I hated this disparity, hated the mess he'd tossed my mind into. I wanted to trust him, to extend the same kind of trust he extended to me, but I was scared too. Scared of how close he was getting, how much control that gave him over me, over my feelings.
It was another disaster waiting to happen.
Something brushed against my mind, a distant burst of information that I absorbed and catalogued automatically, so used to it at this point that the process was practically instinct.
Pace shuffled closer, putting us hip to hip, his arm flush against my own so he could lean in and whisper without being heard.
"You good?"
I gave him a look.
"Are you really asking me that?" I asked, "You?"
His fingers twitched, and I saw his shoulders and elbows move, as if to shove them in his pockets, before he visibly forced himself to stop.
He took a breath.
"I don't- I don't like being touched."
I blinked, surprised, but didn't interrupt, waiting for him to continue. If he decided he wanted to share, I wasn't going to stop him.
He did, after a second, hands flexing nervously, tapping an erratic rhythm across the fabric of his jeans.
"Usually isn't this bad, I can deal with it, but," He shrugged, "I guess everything that was happening set me off. Getting thrown, the collapse, the noise, you," his voice hitched, "you holding me. It set off a lot of shit in my head. Didn't meant to scare you."
"Do you…" I hesitated, feeling awkward, "do you want to talk about it?"
I cringed into myself the moment it passed my lips, embarrassed by how cliched it sounded. How practiced. Like it was a line I was reciting to him and not an actually offer of support, pretending at friendship.
If he noticed he didn't mention it, just shrugged.
"Not really much to talk about. Shit happens."
I frowned, furrowing my brow, "You keep saying stuff like that."
"What?"
"Shit happens or it's nothing or whatever. You downplay it whenever something sets you off or makes you uncomfortable. You always focus on me or Flock instead. You did it back yesterday too. You do know I," I struggled for a second, more with myself than my words, "you do know I care you for you, right?"
A silence punctuated my words that I didn't give him a chance to fill, babbling nervously, words spilling off my tongue before I could stop them.
"I care when shit happens, especially the kind of shit that gives you panic attacks when people touch you. I don't wanna feel like I have to bludgeon you with that just to get you to talk to me." I said, "I want to be there for you, if you need me."
There was a beat of silence, one that I didn't try to break this time, letting it stand. Waiting for him to respond.
"I don't know." he said finally, voice strained, "I don't know why I don't like being touched. I just don't. I get scared when people get close, and I don't know why. Not much there to talk about."
I frowned, then ventured, "Was there anything that happened"
He shrugged.
"Nothing that should make me that sensitive to shit." He muttered, then flickered, tightening his hand into a fist, "You do the same thing, you know."
"What?"
"You push shit off." He said, not unkindly, "Pretend it doesn't matter. Confuses the hell out of me. Makes it hard to tell what actually get to you and what doesn't."
He flickered, bringing a hand up and letting it hover an inch from my face, "Did it earlier."
I pushed it away, "That was different."
He took it back, resting it over his leg and nodding slowly.
"It was. Don't mean I ain't right. So," He nudged me, "are you good?"
I didn't answer right away, biting my lip, grinding it between my canines until I started to taste copper. I cursed, reaching up, stopping when I remember my mask was still on.
"No." I bit out, dropping my hand into my lap, "I'm not good, but it doesn't matter, alright? I've been through worse, I just need out of here so I can start to fix things."
Fix myself.
He was silent for a second, then I heard him shift. He held a hand out in front of me, hovering over my lap, and I stared at it for a moment before looking up up at him.
His wasn't quite facing me, his gaze settling somewhere past my shoulder among the swirling lines of the obsidian dome, but I still felt his attention on me almost innately. A recognition in the back of my mind that he was focused on me, even if he couldn't quite see me.
"If it hurts, it matters." he said, voice small, but coaxing in a way it rarely ever was, "Even the small stuff. No point in ignoring it, just makes it worse."
I couldn't stop the small, amused smile that wormed it's way across my face.
"You sound like Flock."
He let out a quiet hum that sounded almost amused, but didn't say anything more, and I found my eyes drifting down to the hand in my lap without my conscious control.
I reached down and took it, slipping my hand into his. The tendons in my fingers wouldn't curl to wrap around his, but he made up for it by closing his fingers around mine. He ran his thumb across my bruised knuckles gently, careful not to hurt me, and I felt myself relax at the small bit of comfort.
"Can we talk about it later? At home? Please? I-" I took a breath, "I want to be sure you're okay too. I wanna talk about your touch thing, figure out how to deal with again, if it comes up. Especially if it's the kind of thing that might come up in the field."
He hesitated for a second before nodding, "If that's what you want."
Relief breathed through my chest, cold and cool against the stifling air inside our little bunker.
I leaned against him, just shy of resting my head on his shoulder. I was already embarrassed, holding his hand like a scared child in front of the other two heroes, putting my head on his shoulder would have been a step too far.
"Thank you."
He gave me a small hum, but didn't say anything more to respond. He didn't need to, I was familiar enough with his little quibbles at this point to gather that he was probably exhausted, from the fight and from the conversation.
It left me alone with my thoughts, staring down at the calloused, tan hand wrapped around mine, battered and sickly pale.
I couldn't force myself to push him away. No matter how much I probably should have. Maybe that made me an asshole, subjecting him to myself, but I craved the human connection he provided.
I wanted a friend more than I wanted to be alone, and after all I'd done to push Emma away he was the only friend I had.
It was pathetic. One friend in the world, one real flesh and blood human being, and it was some guy I'd met in a back alley barely more than a month ago. A boy I was constantly suspicious of. Nervous about. Scared was hiding things from me.
Not so much different from everyone else in the world, then.
I shoved that thought down, ignoring it, but that just left me alone with my other thoughts, which were just as dangerous. Douglas had been a relief from them, for a moment, but now that there was nothing between me and them I couldn't think of anything else.
All the villains I'd captured today were probably dead.
The notion didn't affect me nearly as much as I thought it might, honestly.
I didn't feel particularly bad about it. I hadn't wanted anyone to die, I wasn't a psychopath, but I wasn't responsible for any of the deaths that had happened either. I just wasn't.
That was on the heads of every asshole who'd pushed the situation further and further over the edge, who'd plunged everything into chaos in the first place. It was on Frenetic and Brigandine, Rig and Lindworm, on the villains themselves for going out into the world and hurting people. For putting themselves in the line of fire in the first place
They'd chosen to make the world worse, and it wasn't my fault that that had come back to bite them. I wasn't going to take the blame for that, no matter what Armsmaster was shouting at me.
What had my mind in such a state was what it would mean if they had escaped. If I'd failed to properly restraint hem, or if they'd managed to slip out while the rocks fell. If any of them escaped, they could already be reconvening. Coming together to plan their next moves as a unit, instead as three disparate parties.
They could already be out there, hurting people. Eeking out as much profit as they could from the suffering of others.
I needed to make preparations. Countermeasures.
Today had shown me just how vulnerable I was, and I couldn't abide that. I needed to be able to function independently on the field, even if my team was distracted. I couldn't let myself get caught off guard, or thrown on the back foot by my own failing tech
My hands tried to curl into fists on instinct, and I fought back a curse, staring down at the both of them.
I couldn't do anything without them. Couldn't work, couldn't put anything together, couldn't cut myself open and fix whatever was wrong inside of me.
And there was something wrong. I just didn't know what.
It scared me. I had a damaged, half functioning piece of tinkertech lodged against the base of my skull. I didn't want to think about what might have happened if it failed completely. The band of bone around it would have basically turned it into a shaped charge pointed right at my brain stem. A design flaw I hadn't considered.
Stupid.
I needed to fix my hands first. Find someway to put them back together. I could dismantle some parts of my workshop, integrate them, reinforce my hands on the way. I'd go under the knife after that, fix whatever was going wrong with my implant and then move on from there.
Whiplash's frame would be a good template to work off of, the design was elegant in it's simplicity, without any of the crudeness of Rig's tech to complicate things. If the other girl wasn't probably dead I might even ask her for some tips, her tech was immaculate, graceful. I'd have to settle for dismantling it, even if I risked losing some quality.
An extension of the nerve mounts in my shoulder, maybe? It wouldn't be hard to expand the design, it was inherently modular.
My fingers itched to move. I needed to go under the knife and fast. Find a way to get my neck open to get at the administrator implant.
I drew in a long breath of air.
"Any idea how long it's going to take to get us out of here?"
Armsmaster paused in his work just long enough to glance up at me.
"Depends." he grunted, "If any of Yun's squad is still alive and conscious they'll radio home. If not, then Blockade will radio into console and get a crew down here. Either way we're looking at least three hours stuck down here."
I cursed, dreading the prospect of being stuck down her for any longer than I already had been.
Battery wasn't deterred though, perking up slightly across the way, the electric lines on her costume pulsing slightly as she turned to me, "Can you sense any of them up there?"
"No." I said.
Armsmaster stopped again, his expression flickering with something I couldn't identify.
"They're dead?"
"No." I shook my head, "But there's no point in looking. Blockade's shields block my tech."
Armsmaster frowned, "I see."
"How about your rats?" Battery asked, "Do they see anything up there?"
I hesitated, Mischief's node in my awareness for once seeming more ominous than welcoming.
"I don't think that's a good idea." I said.
Battery gave me a confused look, but Armsmaster hummed knowingly.
"That's why you were screaming, wasn't it." He said. It didn't sound like a question.
I gave him a look, but nodded.
He grunted, "Don't look surprised. You're not the only tinker I know who uses implants. Painful rejection is a common enough symptom of lack of maintenance, especially," he said at length, "implants connected to the nervous system."
"It shouldn't need maintenance," I said, frustrated, "it's partially biological, it should have integrated into my body like it was a part of it. My body should be doing the maintaining for me, I don't know why it's failing."
I'd have to take a closer look at it, but that would require a surgery. A surgery I couldn't perform without my hands.
I huffed out an angry breath, "Even if I could connect to her without frying myself the shields would probably block the control signal anyway."
Armsmaster gave me an odd look before slowly nodding, the tools in his hands spinning back into life, "I see. Battery, can I have your earpiece please?"
She gave him an odd look, but reached up under her visor, unclipping something from within. A little cord, extending from where her ear would have been to just above her mouth, with a small box on either end. Microphone and speaker.
He took it, and I watched curiously as he dismantled it in a few swift motions.
"Is yours broken?"
"No." He said, "Mine is built into my helmet, but forcefield blocks radio signals." One of the tools on his fingers sputtered, and he pressed it to the metal as it came to life, a blinding flare of light suddenly illuminating the bubble, "I'm hoping, however, that if I can extend a transmitter and receiver out beneath the dome that we might be able to communicate with Blockade anyway."
I found myself nodding along, watching him bring pieces together, using some of what looked like a spare reservoir of parts from his hip compartment to slowly mold the pieces together into a radio transceiver. It was near mundane, but still deeply fascinating, the subtle ways his power influenced his work, so different from my own.
I was impressed, despite myself. He could fit some much into such a small space, the thing was so compact and efficient that I could probably wrap it round a thread of nerves and barely even notice it was there.
Still…
"Won't work."
He stopped, looking up at me and frowning.
"What?"
"The transceiver." I said, gesturing at it, "It won't work. There's too much rubble in the way, even if you manage to burrow a hole out under the dome. Something that small won't have the punch to get a signal through maybe…" I chewed my lip, measuring the distance, "a good twenty or twenty five feet of concrete. Not with radio signals."
"As opposed to what?" He asked, more curious than irritated.
"Nueropathic signals. Or," I gestured vaguely, "psionic signals, if you wanna be lame about it. Neurons have a much denser structure, any transmitter you make with nerve tissue is going to be leagues stronger than the purely synthetic stuff."
I craned my head to get a better look at the device, and he tilted it down for me to see. My camera's moved across the device with a thought, moving with my eyes for the best angle, to give my precision the best room to work.
"A neural system could probably function as a better modulator for the outgoing signal too." I muttered, "Not hard to make, but you'll need different tools."
He stared, and I could practically hear the gears spinning in his head, "Is that how your own technology works?"
I opened my mouth to respond, then clamped it close again when my brain caught with my mouth.
Fucking idiot. I cursed myself, Couldn't keep your mouth shut for a second, how long is it gonna take them to ask about your power? How long until they come to some uncomfortable conclusions about Maggie?
I'd been too caught up in my excitement. In fulfilling that withered little part of my brain that still clung to childish fantasy of working with my favorite hero. Of tinkering with the guy that, up until today, I'd probably looked to more than anyone save Alexandria. Working with him had put an end to that ideal.
He wasn't much like the hero I'd hoped he'd be. He was a good fighting, downright awe inspiring in the way he controlled the field of battle with his halberd, but he was too much of a stern, uncompromising ass for me to like him as a person.
My silence stretched long, but he wasn't discouraged.
"Where would you source the neurons?" He asked, "If you could?"
I debated just staying silent, waiting the three hours instead of digging myself an even deeper grave, but eagerness won out in the end. I hooked a foot under one of the dead rats around us and kicked it at him.
In for a penny…
Battery's lips curled slightly in disgust. Armsmaster, on the other hand, didn't hesitate before kneeling down and picking the body up in his hands.
"Plenty of materials," I muttered brusquely, "Living neurons work better, but dead ones can be revitalized pretty easily."
Battery gave me a look at that for some reason, but Armsmaster didn't seem perturbed, looking over the body curiously.
Finally, he held it out to me.
"Show me."
I had to stop myself from leaping at the opportunity.
"I don't have my tools, and even if I did," I slipped my hand from Pace's for a moment, showing off the gash across the length of it, "I'm left handed."
A lie, but they didn't need to know that my right hand was broken.
He pursed his lips, then tapped his right finger against the ball of his hand, taking a small blade from among the tools that extended from his wrist.
He placed it against the nape of the rat's neck.
"Walk me through it then."
I balked, stammering out the first few steps more on instinct than intent, filling what would have been a bewildered silence with something I was familiar with. He obeyed without missing a beat, each step followed with a precision that was impressive for someone without enhanced senses.
It got simpler as I got into the groove of explaining it, running through the processes easily, explaining in the crudest terms possible how to integrate the rat's dead neural tissue into his transceiver. I felt almost excited, an eagerness I wasn't used to taking root in my chest as steps I hadn't even known myself leapt off my tongue, unconscious motions I took in the middle of my own tinkering laid out so his fingers could complete them instead of my own.
It felt strange, not a power kind of strange but a mundane kind. Something I shouldn't have been very good at turning out much easier than I'd anticipated.
It didn't take long for the both of us to finish, and soon we were left with a long, hair thin radio with two nodes on either end, made from a mixture of dead rats and the reserve material Armsmaster had in his hip compartment.
According to him it was so that he was 'always prepared to tinker in emergencies'. It was a redundancy I admired, even if I think we both knew it was just an excuse to have materials at hand if the urge to tinker struck him in the field.
I'd probably do the same, given his resources.
He turned and knelt by the wall of the dome once he was done, taking a knife from his belt and bringing it down to the ground where the dome met the cement. He stopped before continuing though, his faceplate closing.
"Battery," He said, looking over his shoulder, "You might want to move. This prototype has a bad habit of spitting out the material it dissolves."
I blinked, suddenly a great deal more curious about whatever it was he was doing. I'd thought he was just doing to try and dig a small divot in the ground, just enough room to slip the transceiver under. I didn't expect a knife that could dissolve cement.
Battery nodded and rose, barely having to bend over as she shuffled over and sat down next to me. She gave me a smile and a small nudge, and thought she couldn't see it behind my mask, I still tried to return the favor. I don't think I succeeded.
Satisfied his teammate was out of the way, Armsmaster clicked a button at the end of the knife's hilt.
Immediately, the blade started to buzz, letting out a noise like the distant sound of insects as the entire thing seemed to fuzz in the air. I thought, for a moment, that it might just be vibrating, but then my eyes adjusted and I saw that it was more like a cloud around the blade.
Like the entire thing had dissolved into gas, contained within a field shaped like a blade.
He brought it down to the lip dome, and there was an almighty grinding noise that echoed off the walls around us as it spat up a spray of gravel that pelted the side of the dome with the sound of a thousand chimes clinking together at once.
It was… oddly familiar, actually. I feel like I'd heard something similar before.
The noise stopped after a second, the distant buzz going with it as Armsmaster clicked the button at the end of the hilt again. He stared at the knife for a second, and I heard a distorted grumble before he put it away.
I barely caught the edges of what he was saying as the echo of the noise he'd made faded.
"...gonna match up against an endbringer if they can't deal with a forcefield." He sighed, "Note thirty-seven, talk to Dragon about thorn integrity. Set reminder, ten hours."
I stared at him, slightly wide eyed. Was he making a weapon to fight endbringers?
It made sense, I doubted anyone in the world who had the resources wasn't going to leap at the chance to make a weapon to fight an endbringer, but it also really put into perspective the man in front of me.
Here was a man who casually muttered to himself about working with the greatest tinker alive and was developing weapons to kill the worlds greatest threats.
And he'd been shouting at me like an angry teacher a few minutes ago.
The disparity was striking.
He turned back to us, the faceplate on his armor peeling back as he picked the transceiver back up from the ground. Looking past him, I saw that a clean alcove had been formed beneath the wall dome. There weren't any signs that it had been cut, no rough edges, just smooth concrete. A perfect cut.
There wasn't a scratch on the dome itself. The black glass was completely untouched.
He took the thickest end of the wire and fed it under the dome, sliding it out a few inches before taking the opposite end and plugging it into his helmet. He tapped his helmet and turned to us, the wire hanging from behind his ear.
"You should be able to hear whatever comes through." He said, "We just have to wait until the signal reaches her."
Pace tilted his head, not quite looking at Armsmaster, "You can put your helmet on speaker?"
I found myself smiling as Armsmaster's expression went poleaxed,.
"No." He said, indignant, "I can transmit the audio I receive outward instead of keeping it within my helmet's systems."
Battery laughed.
"I don't know Armsy, sounds a lot to me like your just prettying up putting your fancy tinkertech helmet on speaker. Oh!" she beamed, snapping her fingers, "You got music on that thing?"
Armsmaster glared at her, scowling without any real heat.
"No." He said, "I do not have music on my several thousand dollar piece of government sponsored tinkertech." He smirked slightly, "Even if I did, I doubt it'd be to your tastes? What was it you were listening to this morning? Kesha?"
"Hey!" Battery held up her hands, "What's wrong with Kesha? She was the first parahuman artist to get popularized, you can't tell me you don't-"
Armsmaster's helmet blared with a buzz of white noise, and all of us stopped to watch as he brought a hand up, tapping his helmet. Gradually, he adjusted the frequency, and the garbled mess of static started to shift into something resembling a voice.
I was a struck by how familiar sounded about a second before the warbling static resolved into a familiar, girlish voice.
"...don't know! There's dozens of 'em but they're just watching."
Flock's voice, frantic and tight with concern.
(End - Flare - 3.11)