Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Connecting the last wire to the relevant test point with a quick dab from her soldering iron, Taylor lowered the magnifying glass and put the iron back into the stand. She waved a hand in front of her face to blow the wisp of smoke from the flux away, then studied the block of electronics in front of her on her desk. Carefully, slender fingers went over each sub unit, checking the wiring against a stack of hand-written notes next to her. “Master clock,” she mumbled as she worked. “Yeah, that’s connected from here, to here, to… here. Good. Phase error control signal… also connected.” She wiggled a small connector and scowled when it popped loose.

“Stupid mmcx connectors, they never properly...” Pressing delicately she smiled when there was a tiny click under her finger. “Got it. I hate these things, note to self, next one use an SMB connector.” She quickly jotted a few words in her notebook, then leafed through a whole pile of carefully drawn schematics to the right page and altered one section, circling it in red ink and writing in the modification, time, and date next to it.

It was important to document things properly, she felt.

Going back to checking her work, she kept checking the wiring, talking very quietly to herself as she proceeded, until she finally finished, straightening up with a smile. “Great. Everything’s hooked up, and ready to test.” Picking up the multi-cored cable she’d soldered to a dozen points inside the circuitry she looked at the free end, double-checking that all the color-coded wires were connected to the right pins on the complex plug at the end. “And this is right too,” she muttered. “Not making that mistake again...”

The girl plugged the cable into another one that led to a stack of test equipment, much of it salvaged from the TV shop down the road after it shut down due to the owner having met an unfortunate end as collateral damage during one of the all too regular gang fights. The company that had come in to clear out the place had dumped most of the contents into a couple of large dumpsters around the back, which she’d noticed on the way home from school. Seizing the opportunity she’d persuaded her father to take the family truck over and spent a happy two hours scavenging a vast haul of useful odds and ends, along with enough obsolete but functional components to keep her going for years.

Now, she flicked the power switch on the front of the old dual-channel oscilloscope and watched as the indicator light came on along with a faint high pitched whine from the thing. It might have been mostly tube based, but it had been a very expensive device in its day and the specification was still good, it was just about six times the size of a modern one and took twenty minutes to warm up and stabilize. For the price of twenty bucks to the guys clearing out the shop to let her haul away half the stuff they were going to shovel into landfill anyway, it was a bargain.

Luckily her dad had known them, as the union had contacts everywhere. It came in handy at times.

While she was waiting for the scope to become usable, she turned on half a dozen other units, then rummaged around in a drawer for her good multimeter and the really fine probes. Eventually everything was on and ready and she had finished clipping several test connections onto power inputs and signal measuring points.

Finally, having obsessively triple checked there were no shorts between any of the half dozen different voltage lines, she took a deep breath and prodded the master power switch on her test console. It depressed with a small click and the rather anticlimactic result was that four green LEDs lit one after the other.

She smiled widely.

“Finally!”

Picking up the meter she set it to the right range, then carefully measured a dozen different voltages throughout the thing she’d spend a month building. “Yeah, twelve volts is good, six volts is good, minus fifty two volts is… a quarter of a volt high, but whatever, close enough for now, five volts good… Everything’s in specification. So, if I do this...” She flipped two toggle switches and adjusted a small potentiometer with a tiny screwdriver, then looked at the screen of the scope, on which two waveforms wiggled their way along. “...that happens. OK, so far so good.” She leaned closer, pushing her glasses back up her nose, and carefully inspected the display, then clicked the timebase adjustment knob a couple of places. “Not quite right. So I need to...”

Picking up a non-conductive adjusting tool she inserted it into the core of one of the coil slugs on her circuit and very slowly turned it clockwise. The trace shivered and changed. “Good… Good… Whoops, bad, very bad!” A faint hum came from the device in front of her and she could smell something getting hot. Quickly turning the control back a quarter of a turn she relaxed when the hum and the incipient burning smell both faded away. “Close.”

Adjustments were made to a few more coils, a couple of variable capacitors, and two little modules she’d made from scratch from some salvaged silver wire wrapped around a pair of assemblies constructed out of graphite rods from an old battery with a small painstakingly shaped piece of quartz on each end. One of them started glowing a very faint violet with a hissing sound, while made her pause, inspect it closely, then slowly nod. “OK. I think that’s right.”

The girl looked through her notes, glancing between the circuitry on the bench, her instruments, and the papers, before she finally shrugged. “Yeah, it’s fine. I think. Nothing’s on fire, anyway, so...”

She dropped the notebook back onto the bench and reached out for the last switch, the one that turned on the phase modulator, then flicked it to the on position.

A deep hum made the entire room vibrate for a second or two, rose rapidly in pitch to a whine, and faded away. The second rod lit up bright blue for a moment then dimmed down to the same faint violet glow as the first one, both of them alternately fading up and down in antiphase with each other. “Wow. Cool,” she said to herself.

“Taylor? What the hell was that?”

“Sorry, dad, I got a harmonic feedback loop going, but it’s fine now,” she called back.

“Try not to do it again, three mugs just fell out of the cupboard and all the birds on the lawn flew away,” her father shouted, sounding mildly amused and only slightly annoyed.

“My bad!” Taylor grinned to herself, then turned her chair to the side and reached for a pair of headphones, which she slipped over her ears. She plugged the jack on the end of the cable into the front of the heavily modified ham radio that was next to the oscilloscope, her electronic widget not only connected to the antenna socket where the normal coax plug would have gone, this hanging loose next to the bench, but to a number of places inside the chassis. Setting the controls to the right configuration she very gently turned the tuning knob, listening intently.

A rustling sound like someone crumpling paper a very long way away wavered around the threshold of audibility, and as the knob ever so slowly rotated, little bursts of strange sounds came and went. Some of them were reminiscent of animal calls overlaid with what might have been the sound of the sea, a couple were a weirdly atonal almost-music but not quite, one was a distinct crackling that was more like frying bacon than anything else she could think of, and quite a few were past her ability to even put a description to.

She picked one of the louder signals and slowly fine tuned the receiver until it was as strong as she could get it, then fiddled with the sideband controls for a while to see if that would make it better. The strange underwater gobbling noise faded and got louder, phasing in and out in a bizarre manner. Eventually it more or less stabilized and she nodded in satisfaction. Returning her attention to her scope she changed a few settings then studied the results with a small frown.

“What is that?” she asked herself very quietly, watching the trace plot out something strange. It seemed to have a pattern to it but it wasn’t something she could really identify. Writing half a page of notes on it, along with exact settings of everything, she finally put the pen down and returned to the radio, moving on to another signal.

This process repeated over and over for the rest of the wet and windy mid-march day until she finally took the headphones off and leaned back. “Well, it works, but I’m not sure what it actually does,” she remarked.

“Keeps you mostly quiet, which is useful,” a voice said from behind her rather unexpectedly, making her shriek in shock and whip around. Her father was grinning at her reaction and holding out a plate in one hand with several sandwiches on, and a glass in the other one which was full of milk.

“Holy crap dad!” she shouted. “Don’t sneak up on me like that!”

“I hardly snuck up on you, I knocked on your door and you didn’t answer,” he protested, still grinning. “It’s half past six and you’ve been sitting there for more than five hours. I thought you might be hungry.”

“I didn’t hear you,” she said more calmly, somewhat embarrassed.

“I noticed.” He offered her the plate and glass, which she took with a smile of thanks. Leaning over her shoulder he studied the mass of electronics. “Does it work?”

“I think so. It’s doing something, anyway. All the power draws and that sort of thing are right, and the interphase modulation signals are perfect, but I’m not sure if what I’m getting is what I should be getting or just something random.” Taylor took a bite out of the first sandwich, then gestured with it at the device on her desk. “The downconversion must be working or I wouldn’t get a signal at all,” she explained in a muffled voice before swallowing, then continuing more understandably, “and I am getting a signal. I just can’t figure out what it is yet.”

She took another bite and chewed, regarding her latest project with mildly irritated satisfaction.

Her father put his hand on her shoulder. “You’ll figure it out sooner or later, you’re good at that sort of thing."

“Thanks, dad.” The girl smiled up at him.

“Oh, while I remember, Kurt said he found some old radio tubes in one of the sheds we’ve been clearing out,” her father went on, pulling a piece of paper out of his pocket and looking at it. “Spares for the ship to shore radio transmitter the union used to use, but it’s all been replaced with newer stuff these days. Big things, he said, nearly a foot long. The number is, um… 8166 slash 4 dash 1000A? Does that mean anything to you?”

She thought for a few seconds. The part number sounded familiar. Eventually she nodded. “Yeah, that’s a high power tetrode amplifier tube.”

“Any use to you? We don’t have any need for them. He said there were half a dozen of the things.”

“I can figure out something to do with them,” she laughed. “Thank you. And thank Kurt too.”

He ruffled her hair as he put the paper on the desk. “I will do. One of the guys also gave me three dead microwaves, maybe those will have some useful parts too.”

“Magnetrons are always useful,” she assured him, glancing at the one she’d rebuilt that was squatting in the middle of her project, emitting a dim red glow from the heater filament.

“OK, I’ll bring them home on Monday.” He looked out the window, where it was getting dark. “I was thinking we could go out for chinese tomorrow. For a Sunday treat.”

“I’d like that, Dad,” she said softly.

“Me too.” Smiling at her, he made a mess of her curly hair once more, then left chucking to himself at her squawk of pseudo-rage.

When she’d finished eating the last of the sandwiches and drunk the milk, she put the plate and glass on the floor next to the desk and picked up the headphones, slipping them over her head again. Going back to carefully picking her way through the signals her invention had made available to her, she finally stopped on one of the first ones she’d found, the one that sounded a little like someone frying bacon while arc welding happened in the background. There was something about it that seemed vaguely familiar, unlike most of the others.

Listening to it intently she watched the signal jump about on the screen of the oscilloscope, which she spent the next hour fiddling with, until she froze in surprise, her eyes widening.

“It’s data,” she breathed, leaning closer. “That’s the pattern, it’s framing pulses with a payload between them. It was driving me nuts trying to work out why that sounded familiar.”

She tweaked the scope controls more confidently now, watching the results, then nodded and looked around for some more test cables. Finding what she needed she quickly hooked half a dozen signal generators together in a rat’s nest of wiring, using one to trigger another, the final complicated signal being combined with one from the innards of her device and connected into the oscilloscope on the trigger channel.

Flipping a switch on the front of the scope she watched the trace instantly stop randomly moving around in a near-meaningless mass of green light and semi-stabilize. “Not quite the right frequency,” she mumbled, adjusting one of the signal generators, then another, the green line slowly moving towards something sensible. “And the pulse length is wrong… closer… that looks about right.” The trace was almost stable now, clear sync pulses separated by quickly changing data that was different from frame to frame. She squinted at it, while making some final adjustments, then sat back and stared at the results.

Eventually she picked up her notebook and recorded all the settings of everything, along with a quickly drawn sketch showing how it all hooked together. When she’d done that she went back to staring at the screen with her elbow on the desk, her chin propped up on her fist.

After nearly twenty minutes of watching, she said quite firmly to herself. “That is a video signal, with a data subcarrier, and an audio signal buried in it too. I wonder if I can turn it into something I can actually watch?”

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

It took her two months.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Turning on the second generation version of her original invention, Taylor connected the old laptop her father had found in a second hand shop to it and opened the screen. Prodding the power button she waited more or less patiently for it to finish booting, then double clicked the program she’d written after a lot of experimentation and much reading of the books she’d borrowed from the library on signal analysis. While it initialized the data storage array which took much longer than a modern machine would have done, the hard drive clicking away inside the ancient computer, she turned the ham radio on and checked that it was still tuned correctly. A little careful tweaking and everything was ready.

She typed a few numbers into several text input boxes that were waiting for input and hit enter. The screen blanked, went black, then a whole series of colorful lines started slowly moving down it, forming a pattern she studied carefully. Eventually she went back to the first screen and changed two of the numbers, before repeating the process. This time she smiled.

“Got you.”

She tapped the space bar.

The screen flickered and produced a surprisingly good video image.

Taylor examined the picture with her eyebrows getting higher and higher. After nearly a minute, she shook her head, blinked, and checked again.

“Holy shit,” she said numbly. “I’ve got alien TV.”

The fourteen year old girl watched the three entirely non-human but clearly intelligent creatures, that looked slightly like a cross between a human, a bird, and a cat, talk to each other in front of what was clearly some alien form of whiteboard or something of that nature. One of them picked up an implement and wrote something on the pale blue surface in bright red ink while the other two watched. When it finished, it pointed to some other symbology with one of the remaining three four-fingered hand-equivalents it had.

The other two aliens made strange gestures that she fancied were a sort of nod. One of them picked up a weird looking thing that was sitting with several other even weirder looking things on a kind of bench between them and the camera and held it up, two hands pointing to two different aspects of the whatever-it-was while the free one indicated one line on the board behind it.

“I’ve got alien educational TV,” she said in disbelief.

The creature kept apparently explaining aspects of whatever it was it was holding, the one that had written what she was beginning to suspect were a set of equations looking on with what she couldn’t help but think was slightly smug agreement while the last one gave the impression of being the new guy. She had no idea why she thought that, but it certainly was what she thought.

After about five minutes, the demonstrating alien carefully held the device a little higher, prodded one bit of it, then let go.

It hung in the air perfectly stably, making her gape, then look even closer.

“That’s really cool,” she finally smiled, watching as all three aliens started discussing something, the first one motioning to the writing in a manner that suggested explaining it point by point, while the second one kept picking up parts from the bench which were obviously bits of a similar device to the one that was merrily ignoring gravity. The third one appeared to ask questions, quite obvious ones if the body language she imagined she was seeing was real.

“It’s an antigravity 101 class,” she finally decided. “Holy crap.”

There was no sound, but that wouldn’t have done her any good anyway, and the images were more than interesting enough. Making sure that her program was recording all this to the hard drive, she grabbed her pen and a fresh notebook, flipping it open and quickly starting to scribble in it.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Three and a half months later she showed her father her first antigravity machine, along with two hundred pages of theory that explained in detail exactly how it worked and why.

Chapter Text

Angus Drekin, Ph.D, looked up as there was a knock on his office door. Taking his reading glasses off, the sixty-one year old professor of physics carefully folded them and put them in the desk drawer even as he called, “Come in!” He reached out and closed the two notebooks he’d been cross-referencing and slid them to the side of the desk where they joined about forty others, along with a precariously tottering stack of textbooks that had nearly buried his laptop.

He smiled as a familiar person, one he hadn’t seen in some time, entered the office. “Danny Hebert! Welcome, my boy, welcome! And this must be Taylor.” He peered at the young girl who was looking around with great interest, her long curly black hair bringing back memories. “Good lord, she’s the spitting image of Annette,” he breathed, then flinched a little as he realized what he’d said.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean...”

Annette’s husband, a man he hadn’t seen for over a year now, since the woman’s untimely death, shook his head with a sad smile. “Don’t worry, Angus, it’s fine.”

He could see from the look in both their eyes, as Danny put his arm around his daughter’s shoulders, that it wasn’t fine, but said nothing. Getting up with a slight wince as despite his best efforts age was a remorseless bastard, he moved past them and closed the door, then returned to his seat. “I don’t think I ever got the chance to say how much I regret your loss, Danny. And Taylor, of course. Annette was… unique. And sadly missed, I can assure you. She brought a light into every room she entered that I will never forget, nor will any of the faculty of the university.” His voice was quiet but he meant every word.

“Thank you,” Danny murmured, looking at his daughter, who sighed a little and put her own arm around his waist. “We miss her too. More than anything.”

Angus motioned to a pair of chairs next to his desk. “Sit, please. How have you two been since… she passed?” he asked delicately.

“Not as well as we’d like if I’m honest,” Danny replied after sitting and reflecting on the query for a little while. Taylor sat next to him and looked at the floor. Angus was pretty sure she had a tear in one eye. “It’s been very hard in many ways. Waking up and knowing something that should be there isn’t… It takes a long time to get used to.”

“Trust me, my boy, you never get used to it,” Angus said with a knowing look. “You grow accustomed to dealing with the feelings in the end, but they never leave you. I speak from experience, of course. Marcella left me twenty two years ago now and there’s not a day that goes by that I don’t think of her.” He shrugged a little with a tiny regretful smile of his own. “But life goes on. My Marcella wouldn’t have wanted me to dwell overmuch on it to the point of obsession, and I’m certain Annette wouldn’t want either of you to do the same.” He raised a finger. “That does not in the slightest mean that you shouldn’t remember the good times. They get you through the bad ones, trust me on that.”

“Yeah.” Danny put his hand on his daughter’s and gently squeezed it. “I’m coming to realize that. But it’s been hard.”

“As these things always are.” Angus smiled. “The important thing is to remember you still have the living and you can’t change the past, so all you can do is live your life as your loved ones would have wanted you to, to honor their memory. They will never leave you.”

Taylor leaned on her father, who smiled down at her. “Oddly enough that helps. Thank you. And it has been getting better these last few months or so.”

“A pleasure.” Angus felt quite satisfied by the look on their faces. “Now, what brings you to the office of an elderly physicist on such a nice evening?” He glanced at the window, outside which a pleasant August day was finishing as the sun lowered towards the horizon, the golden light streaming across the bay towards the Atlantic and casting long shadows of the few ships moving around it, along with those from the taller buildings near the shore. From the position of his office on the second floor he had a good view of a large chunk of the city down the hill on which Brockton Bay University sat. One of the perks of tenure and seniority. “While I’m always happy for a social call, I can’t help but feel this is something slightly more than that.”

Danny hesitated, glanced at Taylor, then seemed to come to a decision. “We wanted your advice on something a little… strange.”

“My advice?” Angus was somewhat taken aback. “I’m always happy to help, Danny, but the only advice I’m really qualified to give other than minor help on matters of loss is in the field of physics. Which I like to think I do know quite a lot about, I’ll admit, but it’s somewhat esoteric...” He smiled a little, then felt puzzled as Danny looked at Taylor rather than laughing at his small joke.

“It’s physics advice we need,” Danny said when he looked back. Taylor was hugging a backpack that she’d had with her when they came in.

“A school project or something?” he guessed.

Taylor giggled under her breath, while her father looked fondly although with mild exasperation at her. “Weirdly, that’s not quite as wrong as you’d expect, but it’s not quite right either,” the man muttered. “I suppose you’d better show him, Taylor.”

The girl nodded, then opened her backpack and removed… a thing.

Angus looked at it curiously. It was a small machine about the size of a grapefruit, clearly made with fairly basic machining skills, although neatly and precisely done even so. He could see some tiny circuit boards inside the approximately dodecahedral outer structure, which seemed to be constructed of either aluminum or possibly titanium from the color.

“What on earth is that?” he asked, tilting his head slightly to get a better look. “And where did you get it?”

“I made it,” Taylor said with a somewhat pleased expression as she also studied the thing.

He looked at her, feeling he knew where this might be going. “Is that… the work of a Tinker, then?” he asked carefully, knowing that Parahumans tended towards the secretive, for good reasons in most cases. It was rather impressive that they trusted him if that was in fact what was going on.

“Tinker tech?” Taylor shook her head with a small grin. “Nah. It’s real technology, not some magic machine no one can understand.”

“Hmm.” He studied her now. She had the air of a young person who was rather pleased she knew something you didn’t. In the end he smiled. “All right. What does this real technology do? I assume it does in fact do… something… oh my lord.”

As he’d been speaking she held the little widget out in front of her, pressed a switch on top of it, and let go.

It emitted a very faint hum and a few tally lights blinked on inside it, then the thing placidly stayed exactly where she’d put it, hanging in mid air like that was a reasonable course of action.

He stared at the thing for a good thirty seconds, wordless, until he raised his eyes to meet hers. Which were alight with amusement.

“That...” He cleared his throat. “Is quite impressive, my dear.”

“It’s neat, right?” she chirped happily. “Look.” Reaching out she poked it with a finger, causing it to slide sideways without effort, then stood up and pushed down on it, nearly lifting herself off the floor as it utterly refused to sink any lower. “It’s currently fixed to the reference plane of the center of mass of the Earth, so it stays at a constant distance from it, but it’s free to move orthagonally. Cool, isn’t it?”

Somewhat lost for words, he nodded, then absently retrieved his reading glasses, unfolded them without taking his eyes off the machine floating two feet off the floor in the middle of his office, put them on, and leaned closer. Experimentally he reached out and very cautiously pushed the thing sideways, finding it moved freely without any resistance at all. Putting his hand on top, he pressed down, and felt complete rigidity as if he’d tried pushing it through the floor.

After a moment he put his hand under it and tried lifting only to find the same thing happened.

Sitting back in his chair he pulled his glasses off and tapped his chin with the left arm while studying the device. “Anti gravity?” he finally asked a little weakly.

“Yeah. It’s a gravitational reference frame regenerator.” She smiled at her machine with a look of someone who felt quite satisfied with their work. “It can do other things, like provide thrust, but it needs reprogramming to do it efficiently and safely and I’m still working on that. At the moment it pretty much just holds things up.”

“How?” he asked. “Because I’ve seen Tinker antigravity machines before and they all have limitations, the prime one being that even the Tinker who invents them can’t give a coherent explanation of how they work, and of course they invariably have a limited lifespan for some reason.”

She pulled a binder, the sort of thing you’d find in school, out of her backpack and handed it to him.

Curiously he opened it, then smiled at the first page.

“Taylor’s Gravitational Reference Frame Machine. Mark One Issue Two,” he read out loud. Raising his eyes, he asked, “What happened to the Issue One?”

She rubbed her cheek with a slightly worried glance at Danny, who sighed heavily. “Like I said it needs work on the thrust programming,” she mumbled, sounding embarrassed.

“Which is why we had to patch a hole in the living room ceiling,” Danny said with a fond look at her. “And the guest room ceiling. And the roof.”

Angus started chuckling.

“It sure doesn’t lack power,” Danny added. “She says, ‘Watch this, Dad!’ and pokes a switch. Next thing you know there’s a hole we can see daylight through, plaster falling from the ceiling, no machine, and Taylor’s looking about as red as she is now.” He grinned at his blushing daughter. “Damn thing’s probably on the moon by now.”

“It’ll be out of the solar system, actually, Dad,” the girl said with a somewhat amused smile. “I accidentally got it set for two g of acceleration and it would do that until it ran out of power, which would take...” She looked thoughtful. “About two days.” Taylor shrugged. “So I made a new one and disabled that part just in case. I need to work out what went wrong.”

Angus looked from one to the other, amazed at how matter-of-factly they were taking it, then returned his attention to the binder in his hands. Turning the page, he was faced with a nicely done summary of the contents, printed from a computer, and from an instant impression as good as if not better than many of the papers his students produced. Quite likely Annette Hebert’s legacy, he thought. She’d always told him that her daughter was rather more literate than many her age and very intelligent. He suspected she’d rather understated things.

He read the description of the contents, then turned the page again. A quick scan of the equations that met his eyes turned into a much slower and more careful examination, which went on for some time as he kept flipping pages. Occasionally he went back and checked a previous one, then returned to the documentation.

When he finally reached the part where theory gave way to practical engineering notes, along with remarkably carefully drawn schematics and mechanical sketches, he sat back in his chair with a feeling like someone had just given him a much stronger drink than he’d asked for. Angus realized with a start that it was dark out, his chair was now turned towards his desk where the binder rested, and next to it was a calculator and one of his own notebooks which had hastily scribbled math filling several pages.

Pulling his glasses off he blinked then looked around, to see Danny sitting with his legs crossed and stretched out, half asleep and holding a paper cup of coffee in his hand, while Taylor was apparently deeply engrossed in reading one of his textbooks.

He tilted his head to read the title. ‘Quantum Chromodynamics,’ by Greiner, Schramm, and Stein, the second edition. Examining her face, he saw she was carefully reading a page about halfway through with a small frown, the tip of her tongue sticking out the side of her mouth.

Amused and somewhat amazed, he shook his head and looked at her machine, which was still blithely ignoring gravity without any effort whatsoever. It was an incredible piece of technology.

Angus looked back at the binder and his notes. ‘She’s right too. It’s technology, not tinker tech.’

That was the utterly bewildering thing. What he’d just spent… he checked… three hours reading through was a fully fledged explanation of precisely how that damned machine was doing what it did, the theory behind a field of gravitational control that rewrote half the stuff he’d learned over his career, and extended Special Relativity among several other things in quite unexpected directions.

Which was completely mad. How had a girl who was around fourteen edging on fifteen possibly come up with something like this without Parahuman abilities? On the other hand, how could a Tinker, or even Thinker, manage to explain in a way that was entirely understandable to current science, even if it showed that a lot of that current science was either wrong or seriously limited, a working theory of antigravity?

It was totally unprecedented as far as he knew. No one had ever managed to do anything with understanding Tinker inventions beyond the smallest, tiniest insight into trivial aspects of them. But this… This was going to change everything.

He flipped through the rest of the binder, glancing at the reams of notes on precisely how to duplicate the little device, using technology that was nothing more complex that you’d find in the university mechanical and electronic engineering building. Any decent grad student with a knack for both could make one, although it would be a complex task even so.

Shaking his head, he almost reverently closed the binder, then rested his hand on it, feeling that something fundamental had changed somehow.

“Incredible,” he breathed.

Danny twitched and opened his eyes, before lifting the coffee cup to his lips and draining it. Taylor closed the book she was reading, a little reluctantly, and put it back on the shelf behind the chair, before turning to watch him.

“My apologies, I didn’t realize how invested in this extraordinary document I became,” he said to his visitors.

“Don’t worry, I half expected that,” Danny smiled. Taylor giggled a little.

Angus snorted, then looked at the machine, reaching out to poke it. It slid away from his finger and resumed hanging without a flicker of motion. “I have no words to say how impressed I am. This is likely the single most remarkable thing I’ve ever encountered in my life.” Raising his eyes, he asked the girl, “How did you do it?”

“I like technology and stuff like that, and I like learning,” she replied. “And I got some interesting ideas a while ago. I learned a lot, all sorts of cool stuff, and this was one of the things I came up with.” She frowned at the machine, then reached out to turn it off, catching it with her other hand. Tossing it up and down, she added, “I think I can improve it but I’m happy for a first attempt. Well… second.” Taylor looked slightly guiltily at her father who rolled his eyes but smiled. “Sorry, Dad.”

“We fixed the damage, no one was hurt, and you learned an important lesson about testing antigravity machines indoors,” he chuckled.

“Such lessons are undoubtedly important,” Angus commented in a slightly lightheaded way. He looked at the machine she was holding, then asked, “May I?”

“Sure, Professor,” she replied, smiling, and handed it to him. He turned it over in his hands under the desk lamp, inspecting it closely. The work was not as polished as a trained machinist would produce, tooling marks showing where it had been formed with methods that were effective but those of a gifted amateur rather than a professional. Even so it was very carefully and accurately manufactured, far past the level he’d have expected from someone that young.

The internal circuitry was also handmade, he could see, some of it made with point to point wiring using extremely fine wire, some of it parts of commercial printed circuit boards that had been carefully modified and trimmed to suit the new purpose. Overall it was clearly a prototype, but it was a very good prototype. And, of course, it worked.

He even knew how it worked. More or less, although it would take a lot of study to derive all the ramifications of her notes. Years, probably.

With a momentary thought that every physicist on the planet was going to both praise and curse the name of Taylor Hebert at the same time for what she’d just done to the field, he handed it back. “What do you intend to do now?” he asked, watching her put it into her backpack. He gave her the binder too, which also went in. “And why did you come to me?”

“Annette trusted you and liked you a lot,” Danny explained. “Taylor insisted this thing was entirely explainable by normal science, although she also keeps saying that normal science gets quite a lot of things wrong.”

“Incomplete, dad,” she protested. “I said it was incomplete. There’s all sorts of cool things no one is thinking about, like how superconductors really work...”

Danny smiled as Angus stared at her. “You see what I have to deal with,” he remarked, making her stick her tongue out at him. “Anyway, I talked it over with some people I trust at the union, and one thing that came up was that as soon as the PRT hears about this, they’re going to be all over us saying it’s the result of a Parahuman power. You know what they’re like.”

Angus slowly nodded. Annette herself had spoken about the PRT in less than glowing terms more than once, and he’d lived long enough and seen sufficient evidence to not entirely trust in their good will himself. “I’m afraid I take your point,” he replied. “They can be somewhat aggressively enthusiastic about taking over any aspect of life they feel is covered by their remit.”

“Tell me about it,” Danny grumbled. “But the idea we had was that if we can prove it’s not Tinker tech, it’s suddenly not their problem. I mean, they won’t like it, I’m pretty certain of that, but if it’s something that anyone trained in the right field could understand, or even make, well...” He spread his hands with an evil grin. “What can they do? It’s perfectly ordinary superscience, not crazy Parahuman powers. We can prove that.”

After a few seconds of staring, Angus burst out laughing. “Oh, lord, there are going to be some very peculiar expressions, I suspect.”

“Probably.” Danny didn’t look worried about that. “The question is, are you interested in helping with the patent?”

Angus examined him for a bit. Then he picked up the notebook he’d made his own calculations in and studied it briefly. “You know, I believe I am, as it happens,” he replied with a smile. “And I have a distinct feeling that there’s a chance the university would be interested in setting up a research program into the new field of gravitational reference frame manipulation.”

“How convenient,” Danny smirked. “Oddly enough, there’s a Union on the docks who have a lot of people who are interested in the practical applications of that field. They might want to collaborate in real world uses.” He held out his hand.

Angus, with a sensation that this was going to be interesting, and a broad smile, shook it.

Taylor was grinning to herself. “Cool,” she said happily. “I’ve got so many other ideas.”

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Standing at her office window, Emily Piggot sipped her coffee, trying to wake up as she stared out across the city and bay far too early on a crisp October morning. It was just cold enough that a mist, due to the damp sea air, had formed as the sun rose and filled the streets below with white, car headlights dimly visible through it. The taller buildings protruded above the ground level cloud, which spread out into the bay for a few hundred yards from shore, gradually dissipating over the warmer water until by the time you got out to the Rig it was only barely obscuring the view.

A number of small trawlers were puttering around on the water, navigation lights still easily visible due to the light level, although the sun was coming up quickly and would soon burn the fog away. She yawned, watching as one group of four boats headed towards the mouth of the bay and the grounded cargo ship blocking most of it, as it had done for nearly two decades, long predating her arrival in this benighted city. They were moving quite rapidly in formation, causing her to wonder where they were going.

After a couple of minutes of watching them, she turned away and sat at her desk, putting the coffee cup down next to the keyboard before prodding the space bar to wake the screen. Reading the list of things to do and meetings to attend she groaned under her breath.

It never ended. There was always something mad going on in this place. Usually something she had to figure out how to fix. It was enough to make her wish she’d stayed in bed some days.

Sighing faintly she opened the first report and started reading. The dense technical jargon that Armsmaster seemed unable to avoid using soon had her wishing the man would take a course on science for the layman, or possibly get Dragon to write it for him. At least she knew how to talk to people who weren’t humorless robots…

Giving up on understanding whatever it was he was trying to explain in excruciating detail that probably only mattered to about four people in the world, she tabbed through the document looking for things she could understand, read the summary, shrugged, and signed it. He knew his stuff even if she didn’t and he wasn’t asking for a budget increase, so for now she’d trust him. If he screwed up, she got to yell at him, so there wasn’t really a down side.

Closing that document she went on to one written by Miss Militia, which was far more understandable by a normal person, and read it carefully. Deciding the request was entirely reasonable she authorized that one too.

So things went for an hour or so, until she decided she needed more coffee. It was still far too early to be working this hard and the caffeine was essential. Getting up she walked over to the coffee machine, put her cup under it, selected the right menu option, and set it going. While the thing gurgled happily away to itself she looked out the window again, seeing that the fog was nearly gone, and she could now easily make out the huge old ship at the mouth of the bay several miles away.

She noticed absently that the small fleet of ships that had gone by earlier seemed to be moored right next to it for some reason. Squinting into the rising sun she wondered what they were doing. The coffee machine started the whirring noise that preceded it filling her mug, distracting her as she waited for it to finish then stirred in some sugar.

Sipping it she walked back to her desk, glancing out the window again as she sat.

She was just in time to see the miles-distant and very large ship lift gently out of the water like it was an oddly shaped balloon, turn ninety degrees over about fifteen seconds, and slowly start floating up the bay with the four smaller ships following beneath it.

The director was still gaping even as her phone started ringing.

Chapter Text

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Topic: The Flying Dutchman?
In: Boards ► Places ► America ► Brockton Bay ► Weird local shit
Wizard_of_the_Bay (Original Poster)
Posted On Oct 8th 2010:

OK, either I'm going crazy, or that cargo ship that's been across the mouth of the bay since the riots fifteen or sixteen years ago? You know, the fucking huge thing that's nearly blocked the entire entrance?

It just flew past my office window.

Seriously. Am I actually seeing this? Or is this some bizarre hallucination, or a bad trip or something?

Because if it's actually REAL there's something very, very strange going on.

Look. Can anyone else see this? I'm genuinely worrying about my sanity...

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►Brocktonite03 (Veteran Member)

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Chapter Text

As they drove through the docks, Mike Renick looked around with slight puzzlement. All the roads they were on seemed far too new for this part of town, which admittedly he hadn’t been through in at least four years. It was still run down, the entire area was, which wasn’t a shock considering how many gang fights had happened throughout the place since, and indeed before, the riots. It had been on the long slow slide to irrelevance even then, long before his time in the city, and after the cargo ship was scuttled across the bay entrance during that period of upheaval the slide had only become faster. The economy of the whole city was far below what it used to be when it was a thriving port, decades ago, with only parts of it still bringing in a real income.

Which of course left little money for civic improvements, this feeding on itself to promote urban decay that left large sections of the city looking like the aftermath of a pretty grim end of the world movie. And ripe territory for the sort of constant background crime that only made things worse for everyone.

However, now… He peered down a side street as they passed. Now all the main roads seemed to have been patched up, quite professionally although he could see where the potholes had been, quite a few of the more dangerous-appearing buildings seemed to have had their doors and windows blocked off, and some of the dodgier looking alleyways had been barricaded over with very solid-looking steel constructions welded up from scrap metal but done very well.

Even the road signs had been replaced. Which was near enough a miracle.

Who had done it and how had they paid for it all?

Yet another mystery. The city wasn’t short of them, true enough, but this was a new one, and new mysteries so often turned bad around these parts.

He glanced in the side mirror, seeing the rest of the cavalcade his truck was in the lead of following along behind them. Armsmaster’s bike could be seen a couple of vehicles back. The Tinker had, somewhat unusually, not rushed ahead and had seemed distracted from the moment he arrived.

Turning his attention to the screen in front of him, he studied the images from the VTOL aircraft orbiting two thousand feet up. “It’s definitely stopped,” he said into his earpiece mic. “Right next to the DWU facility, in the shallows. No signs of any anomalous technology visible, or other Parahuman involvement, as of yet.”

“Well, it didn’t just get bored and fly away on its own, so someone is behind this,” his immediate superior’s voice grated in his ear. “I want to know who that is, how they did it, why they did it, and who they’re working for.”

“Hopefully we’ll be able to determine the answers to at least some of those questions,” he replied as calmly as possible. Which wasn’t completely calm, of course, as for all they knew they were driving into some bizarre Parahuman ambush...

“We’d better. I’m getting heat from upstairs already. Some idiot posted video of that damn ship flying around like it was a kite on the internet and the news is going to town on it.” Her voice was even more sour than usual, making him grimace a little. The woman was very competent but by god she could be awkward to deal with when she was in a less than charitable mood. And she really didn’t like surprises.

Rounding the last corner before their destination, they rumbled down a long access road heading towards the shoreline, huge old cranes easily visible towering above the buildings, and through the gaps in the latter glimpses of the water could be seen. Bright sunlight made it all look fresh and clean, hiding the grime of a slowly decaying industrial landscape and turning it into something almost beautiful. They drove past a side road, which went off at an angle to end in a very long wharf that stretched close to a quarter of a mile out into the bay, the far end forming a platform to which half a dozen smaller ships were tied up, bobbing up and down in the waves. Ahead, he could see the tall rusty chain link fence surrounding the core of the old Union facility, with a gate in it behind a pair of red and white striped barrier poles next to a small security hut.

His vehicle pulled up just short of this. A grizzled-appearing man in his forties, wearing a cap and sunglasses, stuck his head out of the window of the guard hut and inspected them. After a moment the head disappeared again, the rest of the man following it out the door as he exited his post and stomped over to them, one hand holding a very large flashlight in a grip that Mike knew full well meant he knew exactly what he was doing.

“Yeah?” he grunted as Mike rolled the window down. “Waddaya want?”

“Mike Renick, Deputy Director, PRT ENE,” he replied, showing his ID card. “We’d like to speak to whoever is in charge.”

“What, all of ya?” the man asked after taking the card and examining it very closely. He looked back along the row of vehicles. “Got a problem?”

“We don’t know yet,” Mike said, smiling a little. “That’s what we want to speak about.”

The man returned his attention to Mike, stared at him for a few seconds, then turned around and went back into his hut. He popped back out again a moment later with a radio to his ear, talking into it quietly enough that Mike couldn’t make out what he was saying. He appeared to read off the details on Mike’s ID to whoever he was talking to, then walked a few feet into the road and looked at the license plate of the truck, reading that off too.

Mike looked at the driver, who looked back and shrugged.

After about thirty seconds, the man nodded and put the radio in his pocket, then came back to the window. He handed the card over. “Boss says you can go in, but if anyone starts anything there’s going to be trouble. Got me?”

Slightly amused, Mike nodded. “I understand.”

The guard went back to his hut yet again and leaned in through the window, did something that made the barriers rise, then a few seconds later the gate slowly retracted with a metallic screech of badly oiled wheels on rusted steel track. When it was fully open, he waved them through. “Turn left, follow access road B to the end, hang a left,” the guard called. “Don’t go anywhere else. Don’t go faster than ten miles an hour. Boss will be waiting for you.”

“Thank you,” Mike called back. The guard merely stood and watched them all go past, then went back into his hut. As they followed the signposted route, Mike could hear the gate squeal closed again.

“Kind of paranoid,” he commented.

“Strange people around here,” the driver replied, looking at the signs then carefully taking the correct path past a series of open workshops which were emitting lots of mechanical sounds and the occasional shower of sparks from some welding operation or something of that nature. The whole place seemed busier than Mike would have expected from what he’d heard about it. “You wouldn’t believe some of the stuff I’ve heard about the Docks.”

“Places next to the sea do seem to attract tall stories,” Mike chuckled.

The driver gave him a dark look. “Not all of them are ‘stories’,” he muttered in a low voice.

Renick looked at him, then decided it wasn’t worth commenting on and went back to studying their surroundings. More workshops passed, a number of men and a few women looking back at him as they went by. Some of the expressions were neutral, some were a little unfriendly, but none of them seemed actively hostile. Most of the people just went back to their work.

Eventually they reached the end of the access road they’d been slowly crawling along, finding another one at right angles to it between them and the shoreline, which itself had a raised wall made of concrete and huge chunks of ancient wood lining the edge. To the right it led back along the shore past all the wharves with other roads joining it every now and then, while in the direction they’d been told to go it curved back into what appeared to be a large yard lined with yet more buildings as far as he could see.

However, he raised a hand, saying, “Hold on, I want to have a look at this,” before the driver could turn. The man put the brake on and Mike opened the door, standing on the running board to get a good view over the sea wall.

“God, that’s a big ship,” he mumbled, staring at the enormous vessel that blocked the view of the rig. It was rusty, streaks of red running down the sides from the green superstructure over the dark blue of the waterline, and showed signs of the years of neglect out in the bay. The flying bridge at the back was missing most of the glass, only one of the radar antennae was still in place although it was badly bent, the other two mere stumps, and he could see places where someone seemed to have torn or cut various parts off the deck in the past, but on the whole it was a lot more intact than he expected.

And a crap load bigger. You didn’t really get the full impression until it was only a hundred yards away.

Thinking that this thing had literally flown here, completely out of the water, was mind boggling. After taking a couple of photos with his phone, he got back into the truck and closed the door, noticing that several of the others with him had also taken the opportunity of a better view. “OK, let’s get on with it.”

The driver didn’t bother to reply, merely took his foot off the brake and moved away. The truck rumbled over the somewhat pitted road surface until it entered the side yard at the head of the small convoy, which spread out and stopped. Armsmaster parked his bike next to Mike’s truck and turned it off, dismounting and looking around.

A small welcoming committee was standing near one of the buildings, which was on the larger size of those surrounding them. Next to it were parked two semis, both new, and painted gloss black with no identifying marks at all, along with a heavy duty SUV and half a dozen cars. The three people waiting for them were a tall skinny man with glasses, who looked like a roughly forty year old accountant, a considerably older man probably in his sixties, white haired but appearing in very good condition for his age and wearing a turtleneck sweater over casual clothes, and a heavyset man who was about twice the width of both the other combined. He was only about five foot eight but had a sort of massive quality about him that spoke of a hell of a lot of physically hard work, while his face was somewhat battered but seemed cheerful nonetheless.

Mike got out of the truck, walking over to join Armsmaster, who glanced at him, then followed as he kept going to meet the three men waiting patiently.

“Deputy Director Renick, I assume?” the skinny man asked as he and Armsmaster came to a halt in front of them.

“That would be me, yes. I imagine you recognize my companion.”

“Armsmaster is well known to most of the US, never mind just Brockton Bay,” the man replied with a small smile. He held his hand out. “Danny Hebert. DWU hiring manager and CEO of Gravtec Engineering, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Brockton Bay Dock Worker’s Union. Pleased to meet you.”

Mike, who had reached instinctively for the offered hand, paused briefly as what the man had said went through his mind leaving a trail of questions, then completed the action. “Likewise.”

“This is Professor Angus Drekin, an old friend and our liaison with Brockton Bay University’s Gravitational Physics department. Also the chief science officer of Gravtec.” He motioned to the older man, who smiled and also shook Mike’s hand. “And on the end there is George Kilton, our security chief.”

Kilton also offered his hand, looking rather more amused at the expression Mike was probably wearing than seemed reasonable.

“So, how can we help the PRT today, Deputy Director? Or is this just a social call?” Mr Hebert seemed also to be showing a degree of humor, although it was mixed with mild wariness and a certain level of anticipation. His voice was entirely casual though.

Mike very deliberately looked over his shoulder to where the stern of the huge ship only a few hundred feet away could be seen towering over the buildings, met Hebert’s eyes, and raised his eyebrows meaningfully.

The other man raised his as well in an inquiring manner.

Sighing faintly, Mike pointed. “There is a considerable amount of confusion in official circles about the circumstances that led to that being here, rather than approximately eight miles away where it’s been for sixteen and a half years,” he said flatly. “There is a lot more confusion about how it actually got here. People tend to notice flying cargo ships. Even in Brockton Bay.”

All three men followed his finger, then exchanged glances. “We moved it,” Hebert said calmly. “It was in the way, aside from anything else. The Mayor seems fine with it.”

“He knew about it?” Armsmaster demanded.

Hebert rocked a hand from side to side. “We might not have bothered to mention it to begin with, but we told him when it was on the way,” he smiled. “Marine salvage laws allow us to lay a claim to the wreckage, and the city relinquished all ownership of it years ago, after they ended up stuck with the thing. Like most of the other wrecks out there, in fact.”

“I’m told that when he stopped gaping he danced a little jig on his desk, then started calling up a few shipping companies,” Kilton commented with a smirk. “Man seemed pretty pleased about the bay opening up for work. Gonna do the economy a world of good.”

Mike looked at all of them, seeing that each was clearly enjoying this, and sighed. Rubbing between his eyes with one finger he looked at Armsmaster, who was studying the people as well, his face blank. Which was fairly common to be honest. “That’s not quite what I meant,” he said after contemplating and discarding a number of other responses. “What I am in fact getting at is the little fact that you flew a thirty five thousand ton ship across the bay! This is… unusual. The assumption is that you have one or more Parahumans working for you, which is something we’re quite interested in for a number of reasons. Leaving aside the problems with the NEPEA laws, that was a highly irresponsible and very obvious stunt that...”

Hebert held up a hand. “Let me stop you there, Mr Renick. Firstly, the entire move was entirely in keeping with OSHA rules as they currently stand, and we have the paperwork to prove it, including an environmental impact study done by BBU, a risk assessment study done by the experts at the DWU, and all other relevant documents which we’re happy to provide copies of to you. Secondly, NEPEA doesn’t apply. And thirdly, we have to my knowledge no Parahumans among the DWU or Gravtec, although we don’t care all that much if we do. We just don’t need them.”

Mike stared at him for several seconds. Eventually he said, “I think I’m going to need more than that, since I saw an enormous ship fly fifty feet in the air with my own eyes. There’s no other way to do that than a Parahuman ability to my knowledge. Unless you bought some very expensive Tinker tech. Toybox, perhaps?”

“No, all the technology we use is locally produced,” Professor Drekin put in, seeming to find the entire exchange highly entertaining. “And has absolutely no connection to Tinker work, I can assure you of that.”

Turning to him, Mike asked, “How can you be so sure?”

“Because I understand the theory of the design myself, it’s fully documented, and in fact has acquired a patent within the last three days. As you probably know you can’t patent Tinker tech.” Drekin smiled.

Armsmaster raised his hand, opened his mouth, and paused. Everyone looked at him. After a moment he said, “It is correct that you cannot patent Tinker tech, although there have been many patents as a result of insights into the study of it,” and lowered his hand, giving Mike the impression that what he’d said wasn’t what he’d initially intended to say.

“Indeed,” Professor Drekin nodded. “However in this case, Gravtech’s proprietary technology is entirely unrelated to any Tinker invention.”

A few more seconds passed, then Mike sighed. This was going to get strange, he could feel it in his bones. “Please excuse me, I need to talk to my superiors,” he said.

“No problem, take as long as you want,” Hebert replied magnanimously. Mike turned and walked back to the truck, got in, closed the door, and rubbed his eyelids with his fingertips. Then he tapped his earpiece.

“Well?” Emily didn’t sound all that patient. “What’s going on?”

“Things just got very complicated,” he said tiredly.

“Explain.”

He did. When he’d finished telling her what had happened, while watching Armsmaster stand where he’d left the man, apparently carefully studying the entire area, with the three others watching both him and Mike, there was a long silence.

Eventually Emily growled under her breath. “Bullshit. It’s got to be Tinker hardware somehow, or maybe some form of powerful telekinesis, a flying Brute, or something else like that. It’s definitely connected with Parahuman crap. Find out what they’re hiding.”

“We actually have a fairly weak case, Director,” he said carefully, mindful of her current short temper. “We’re on private land, I’m not sure a crime has actually been committed if they’re right about the ship’s legal status, and merely suspecting they have a tame Tinker or something like that isn’t really good grounds for going in hard.”

“They flew a nine hundred foot long ship across the entire bay!” she snapped. “That sent a message. They could fly it across the city just as easily and if they dropped the damn thing...”

He winced, able to see her point, paranoid as it was. In this line of work paranoia wasn’t always a bad thing.

“True,” he admitted. “On the other hand, they didn’t make any form of threat, they seem to have been careful about what they did do, and if Hebert is to be believed they even have the paperwork showing the whole thing.”

“I don’t really care right now,” she growled in his ear. “I’m getting flak like you wouldn’t believe from way above your pay grade, several people I’d rather never have anywhere near me are threatening to come and investigate, and the press is going crazy. Find out what happened, how it happened, and who did it. Now.”

Suppressing a sigh, he replied, “All right, I’ll do my best.”

“Do better than that.” She disconnected with a click, making him wince.

“God, Emily, who pissed in your wheaties this morning?” he grumbled as he climbed out of the truck again. Behind him the driver suppressed a slight snicker.

Rejoining the others, he said, “My superiors are… not entirely convinced that the event in question was not the action of Parahuman abilities. They are also concerned that the… display… could under some circumstances be considered potentially threatening, and as such are asking for more assurances that this is not the case. And towards that end they have directed me to continue my inquiries.”

Danny Hebert looked at him for a long moment, then turned to Professor Drekin and held out his hand. The professor sighed a little and handed him ten dollars.

Putting it in his pocket with a momentary grin while Kilton chuckled, Hebert said, “Your superiors are even more paranoid than I expected, although I’m genuinely impressed with how you put that.” He seemed to mean it. “All right. We knew this was going to happen, and we’ll allow you and Armsmaster inside. However!” He held up one finger. “This is a private facility, with a significant number of proprietary designs present, which represents a considerable investment of time and money from our company and our customers. As such, before you can come in, you need to sign NDAs.”

Mike stared at him as he pulled a folder out from an inner pocket of his jacket, opened it, and removed two sets of stapled together paper, about nine pages each. He handed one to each of Mike and Armsmaster, while the professor held out two pens.

Eventually Mike shook his head, quickly skimmed through the NDA seeing it was pretty standard as such things went, carefully read the last paper, sighed, and signed it on behalf of the PRT ENE. He gave it back to Hebert who popped off the duplicate back page and gave it back. “Thank you.”

Armsmaster had signed his without comment, although Mike was pretty certain he’d read the entire thing. The man was a ridiculously fast reader, he knew that from long association with him.

When Hebert returned the copy to Armsmaster, who folded it and put it away in his armor, he smiled. “Excellent. Please follow me, gentlemen.”

Turning, he walked back into the building, the professor next to him, and Kilton bringing up the rear. Armsmaster followed as did Mike. They went through a heavy and apparently armored door into a modern and well equipped office suite quite out of keeping with the exterior of the building, past a series of rooms with a total of about twenty people working on computers in them, and stopped in front of another door, even more heavily armored than the first one had been. It had a high security lock to one side which made Mike stare slightly, as it was not only similar to the ones the PRT itself used, but was clearly a more advanced and newer model. Which was… odd… as they were hellishly expensive and very hard to lay hands on, needing government authorization to purchase.

His sensation that things were becoming far more complex than he expected was growing by leaps and bounds.

Hebert put his hand on the scanner, allowed it to do the relevant operations, said “Two guests,” and waited. The system pondered the situation for half a second then there was a clunk and the door unlocked, before sliding sideways into a much thicker than seemed reasonable wall.

“Your security is exceptional,” Armsmaster commented with interest, watching all this.

“Thanks,” Kilton replied. “Although obviously that’s not all of it.”

“Obviously,” the Tinker nodded, striding forwards through the opened door after Hebert and the professor. Mike, feeling like this was getting out of hand, followed. Once they were all through the door slid closed and relocked with a solid crunch.

On the other side was a long corridor that led about a hundred yards or so, probably all the way to the end of the building, with a few doors down one side. The other side was blank. Mike tried to work out the geometry and decided that side was basically the edge of the building itself. So there must be something like a fifty yard space to their left, giving a significant amount of room since the building was about three stories high from the outside. It had looked like something that had once been used for storing trawlers or something of that nature, although it had clearly had a major upgrade recently. The smell of fresh paint lingered, as did a faint scent of concrete still setting.

Wondering yet again who was paying for all this, and if they were involved with all the work on the way here, he followed as the small party passed several doors with cryptic labels on, finally ending at the last one. This had ‘No Entry Without Authorization’ written on it in serious letters, over the words, ‘Caution – Risk of Gravitational Shear. Do Not Cross Hazard Lines When Lights In Operation.’

‘Oh, that’s not worrying at all,” he thought numbly.

Armsmaster read the sign, then slowly nodded. He seemed impressed.

Hebert put his hand on another lock scanner, this one not apparently requiring a verbal password, then depressed the handle and opened the door. Standing aside, he said, “After you,” with a rather evil grin.

Despite his misgivings, Mike walked in through the door, finding himself rather unexpectedly on a steel catwalk about twenty feet up, showing that the building was actually over a large cavity in the ground. It became apparent that it had in fact once been an indoor dry-dock or something like that many years ago. The area he was looking at was one huge room, painted white, with a bright yellow overhead gantry crane that seemed to have been recently refurbished. Dozens of high powered lights hung from the ceiling above them. Off to the side there was a control room that stuck out about thirty feet over the yawning space, a number of people visible inside it through the glass windows. Yellow hazard lights were rotating in a number of places around the room, sending flashes of illumination across everything.

He took all that in with a glance, but his attention was inevitably drawn to the thing right in front of him as he slowly approached the safety railing and put his hands on it. Dimly aware of Armsmaster doing the same, he simply gaped at the thing hanging in mid air fifteen feet off the floor, showing no signs at all of caring that there was nothing surrounding it other than empty space.

No one said anything for a while. Eventually he pointed. “What is that?” he asked weakly.

“Our spaceship?” Professor Drekin sounded highly amused. “It’s a spaceship. Prototype, of course, it’s basically just the hull and the gravity control system so far, and as you can see there’s quite a lot of work to do yet. But the pressure hull is complete and the airlocks are installed. We used something designed for small submersibles.”

Mike kept looking at the cigar-shaped thing, eighty feet long and about twenty in diameter at the widest point, with wide eyes.

“The whole thing is loosely based on a submarine, in fact,” Hebert added. “You’d be surprised how closely a lot of marine designs fit a spacecraft one when you look at it in the right way. We salvaged the bulk of the hull from a number of pressure tanks we had lying around, welded them together, and added the rest. It’s a work in progress.”

“Nice and shiny though,” Kilton said.

“Of course, spaceships are always supposed to be shiny, everyone knows that,” Hebert agreed mildly. “Anyway, that’s not really why you’re here, is it. You want to see proof that we don’t use Tinker tech. All we’re using is superscience, which is an entirely separate field outside your specific mandate, but we’ll play ball. Come this way.” He turned and headed for the control room, Mike and the others trailing along behind him. Mike kept looking at the thing floating blithely in the middle of the room with amazement.

Just before they reached the control room, a young female voice echoed through the large space, “Test run twenty-nine complete. Power draw nominal, no errors logged, stand by for shutdown.”

She sounded like a schoolgirl, but one who was practiced at her job.

“Area is clear. Powering down in three… two… one. Field decay rate as expected.” The floating machine gently lowered itself to the ground, settling into a cradle made to hold it. “Gravitational reference frame resync complete. Area is safe to enter.”

The warning lights went out and a subliminal hum that Mike hadn’t consciously noticed until it wasn’t there any more died away. Hebert reached the door to the lower level of the control room and opened it, waving them through. Inside was a large room that was clearly an electronics and mechanical engineering workshop, with lathes and milling machines down the back, and down each side long workbenches covered in more electronic test equipment and tools than Mike had ever seen in his life. Armsmaster stopped dead and looked around, his lips actually curving up slightly in one of the most clear examples of respect the other man had ever seen out of him.

“Highly impressive, Mr Hebert,” he stated, walking over to inspect one machine tool closely. “The model 817. An excellent choice.”

There were about a dozen people in the room working at the benches, and one of the milling machines, which was emitting a faint whirring sound as it carved a block of metal into something else, white coolant mixing with chips all over the inside of the transparent shield surrounding it. A couple of them looked up for a moment, then went back to their work as if an unexpected Armsmaster in their midst was not worth commenting on.

Mike watched as a couple of them, a man and a woman in their mid twenties, who looked like university students, carefully assembled a machine about a foot tall on the bench in front of them. A dozen or so more identical ones were off to one side, apparently finished, while on another bench several more were having their external casing fitted. Around the room were a number of other such devices of different sizes, while directly opposite the door another young man was connecting a cable to a fist sized version. He fiddled with the computer in front of him, then nodded in satisfaction when the thing lifted off the bench and hung in the air about a foot up. Reaching out he prodded it, then pushed hard, nodding again when it refused to move in any direction.

After a number of seconds, Mike looked around once more, seeing that the far end of the room from the machine tools had a single large window overlooking the area outside, while in the corner was a set of stairs that led up to the next floor. One of the technicians disappeared up the stairs as he watched, then came back moments later carrying a laptop computer.

Shaking his head, he turned to the three other men. “OK, I’m impressed. What am I impressed by? This could still all be Tinker stuff, although I’ll admit I’ve never seen a Tinker lab like it.”

Every other person in the room turned to look at him.

He looked around, feeling a little intimidated by the attention. Then one of the women giggled. “Tinker technology isn’t technology,” she said calmly before resuming whatever it was she was doing. “Gravtech is.”

“Sally is right, but allow me to prove it,” Professor Drekin chuckled. “Come with me, please.” He led the way to the stairs, ascending them quickly, with Mike and Armsmaster following. Hebert stopped to have a word with one of the people working at a bench, then came after them. At the top of the stairs they entered another large room, this one filled with almost nothing but computers arranged around the walls and on a couple of consoles across the middle of the space, like pictures Mike had seen of the old Apollo mission control. Much of the hardware looked brand new, although some was clearly not.

He noticed that a girl, about fifteen or so, was sitting at one of the consoles examining a large monitor covered with dense graphs, nodding to herself as she followed one line with the eraser end of a pencil, before scribbling something in a notebook. She looked about the right age to have had it be her voice he’d heard earlier.

Professor Drekin led them to the back of the room, which had a number of dividers separating the final ten feet into several smaller rooms. He went into one and waved them to some chairs. Armsmaster sat rather cautiously since his armor was very heavy, but while the chair creaked a little it held. Mike took the one next to him, while Hebert sat in the last one. “As you’ve seen, we’re actively researching the practical applications of Gravtech’s gravitational control technology here. The theoretical work is largely done at BBU. The Union has provided us with the facilities to perform some of the larger work, and we hand them the heavy industrial jobs as they have a vast amount of experience in such things. Between us, we have quite a lot of capability.”

He picked up a small faceted machine from the desk he was sitting at, turning it over in his hands reflectively. “This is the one that started the whole thing,” he mused, studying the device with a small smile. “The key to a field that will...” He shook his head. “Unless you’re a physicist you have no idea how important the concepts behind this little invention are. But they have a large number of useful applications we’ve barely tapped yet.”

Holding it out he pressed a switch, then let go. Mike watched as it entirely failed to drop to the floor. Gently flicking it with a finger, the professor slid it through the air towards Armsmaster, who raised a hand and stopped it as it reached him. He leaned in closely and studied it, before experimentally pushing down on it with an armored hand.

Nothing at all happened. He pressed harder, until Mike could hear the servos in his power suit whine under the load. Releasing the pressure, he put a hand under it and lifted, with the same complete lack of result. His mouth twisted into a thoughtful grimace and Mike suspected that if he could see the man’s face his eyebrows would be lifted quite a bit.

“Very impressive. I assume it is producing an internal reference frame that overrides that of the standard one surrounding us, producing in effect an immovable object?”

“Essentially yes, although it’s somewhat more complex than that, of course,” Drekin nodded, smiling. “You know more about this than I expected. No disrespect intended.”

“Understood,” Armsmaster replied absently, prodding the floating machine sideways, then back again. He located the power switch and pressed it, his other hand under the device, which landed in his palm. Lifting it to his face he closely examined it. “Excellent work, for what I assume is an untrained individual? Good tolerances, superior soldering skills, very neat and efficient use of space given the constraints of repurposing commercial circuitry.” Turning it over, he looked in through one of the holes in the side, nodding slowly. “And the hand assembled parts are remarkably well done. Your work?”

“No, I’m merely a theorist, practical work of that nature is well out of my expertise, although I can appreciate when I see it,” the professor smiled. “The one who invented that is far past me in such things.”

“Your Tinker, I assume,” Mike said.

Armsmaster leaned over and handed the device back to the older man. “You said you could prove this is not Tinker technology?” he asked mildly. Professor Drekin looked at him, glanced at Mike, then pulled a sheaf of papers out of the drawer on the desk. He handed it to Armsmaster without a word.

The Tinker accepted the bound paperwork, examined the cover with interest for a moment, then started flipping through it. The page turning slowed after the first four or five, slowed further after another dozen, and stopped entirely after two more.

Renick watched as he stared at one page, then turned back several and ran his finger down the columns of equations. After about a minute he nodded, his lips moving slightly as if he was silently having a conversation with someone, before he went back to his original place. Slowly turning the pages he read the next five, then flipped quickly through the rest, pausing on an appendix full of schematics and drawings. Finally he lowered the document and stared into space for some time.

Both Hebert and Drekin were watching him with what looked like amusement. Mike was wondering what had just happened.

“This is not Tinker tech,” Armsmaster finally said in an almost dreamy voice, totally unlike anything Mike had ever heard from him before.

“No. It’s not.”

“This completely rewrites at least forty percent of accepted physics, opens up a number of fields previously thought impossible, and implies a number of quite unusual things about the nature of the universe itself,” the man added, still in that odd tone.

“Indeed it does.” Drekin was smiling.

“I actually understand how it works,” Armsmaster said very quietly.

“Hits you hard, when you realize, doesn’t it?” Drekin chuckled. “I had the same reaction.”

Looking back and forth, Mike wondered what the hell was going on. “Are you saying that it’s definitely not the work of a Parahuman, Armsmaster?” he asked cautiously.

The man didn’t respond for a couple of seconds, then twitched and handed the document back to the professor who accepted it and put it on the desk. Turning to Mike, the Tinker replied, “The technology is not Parahuman in nature, that much is clear.” He shook his head slightly. “I cannot say for certain that the individual who invented it is not a Parahuman, however.”

As Mike was about to ask another question, the girl from outside, who was tall and gangly with long curly hair, stuck her head through the door. “Sorry to interrupt. Dad, Brendan is here, he’s brought some more equipment and a purchase order too. Project Hawkflight got approved. He wants to discuss the next phase.”

“Thanks, Taylor,” the man said. “Sorry, I have to leave for a moment, but I’ll be back,” he added as he turned to Mike and Armsmaster. “Got to keep our backers happy. They’re paying for a lot of this.” With a quick grin he followed the girl out of the small office and disappeared.

“What is project Hawkflight?” Armsmaster asked curiously.

“Not covered by that NDA, so I can’t tell you, I’m afraid,” Professor Drekin replied, smiling. “However, going back to your comment moments ago, the inventor of this device, and a considerable number of other breakthrough technologies, is definitely not a Parahuman. We had an MRI scan done to prove it.” He shrugged. “A polymath on the level of Tesla or Da Vinci at least, definitely, with more raw ability in a number of fields than anyone I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing before, but it’s entirely within normal human ability. Admittedly at the extreme end of it, but within it. As such, it’s nothing to do with the PRT or the Protectorate.”

He leaned forward, smiling a little toothily. “Believe me, we checked. We knew this was going to come up sooner or later.” Sitting back, he shrugged.

Pondering his words, Mike glanced at Armsmaster, who was staring at the small machine on the professor’s desk. Eventually he said, slightly reluctantly, “My superiors are still going to want proof of that, I’m afraid.”

“Not going to take our word for it, then?”

“I’m afraid I can’t do that.”

“Will you take my word for it, son?”

Mike turned at the unexpected voice, to see someone wearing more military decorations than he’d ever personally encountered standing in the door to the office looking at them. He was about sixty or so, tall and fit with a military haircut and a small white mustache. Mike thought he looked vaguely familiar, but couldn’t place him.

“Hello, Angus,” the man, a brigadier general in the Air Force by the insignia, said to Professor Drekin. “Trouble?”

“No, Brendan, I think we’ve got it under control, it’s just what we expected to happen,” the other man replied. “The Deputy Director’s superiors appear to be a little… insistent.”

“That would be Emily Piggot, I believe,” the new arrival nodded. “Good woman, practical, but hard on herself as much as anyone else. She’s probably getting pressure from above. I’ll look into it.”

“Thanks, that would probably help,” Drekin replied.

Turning to Mike, who stood, he held out a hand. “Brigadier General Doctor Brendan Calhoun, DARPA,” he introduced himself. Mike rather numbly shook the hand offered. “You can go back to Director Piggot and assure her that nothing happening here is anything she is directly concerned with. Entirely Tinker free, I can assure you. And our resident genius is certainly not a Parahuman. We did check rather carefully for a number of reasons.” He smiled, his mustache twitching. “One of those obviously being in anticipation of exactly this moment.”

“What is DARPA doing in Brockton Bay?” Mike managed to say.

“Investing in our future, son,” the man chuckled. “A future that’s going to be a little different. But that’s above your pay grade, so you should probably go back to your Director and pass on the word that everything is in hand and shouldn’t cause her any issues with her own jurisdiction.”

Standing, Armsmaster turned to Mike. “I believe we have no reason to stay any longer, Deputy Director. I have learned what I needed to know.” He looked at Professor Drekin. “Thank you.”

“You’re more than welcome.”

“I will locate and examine your patent, and I may wish to talk further about licensing it for my own purposes,” the Tinker continued.

“We’re open to such arrangements, of course,” Drekin smiled. “I’ll have the marketing department send you an information package.”

“That would be acceptable.” Armsmaster paused, then said, “While I now believe that this is not a Parahuman-involved operation, there are those that won’t, or won’t care. Attracting the attention of certain parties is almost inevitable. What will you do if one of the gangs attempts to… insist… on acquiring your knowledge and abilities?”

General Calhoun chuckled. “Deal with the problem,” he commented. “And we’re not limited to your rules of engagement if a domestic or foreign terrorist attempts to attack a facility funded in part by the US government.”

‘Oh, god, this is not going to end well,’ Mike thought with dismay.

He was still thinking that when he walked into Director Piggot’s office and sat down for a very likely difficult conversation.

Chapter Text

Taylor watched as the tall gleaming figure of Armsmaster followed her father and Professor Drekin down the stairs and out of the control room, Deputy Director Renick walking behind them looking like he’d heard something that worried him. As they disappeared from view, her attention turned to the three monitors in front of her. The left one had a feed from the dozens of tiny but incredibly good security cameras that were all over their new building and outside too, the computer automatically tracking motion and following the small party through the building and out the main door into the courtyard to where the rest of the PRT contingent was waiting more or less patiently.

The one on the right had the results of the last test run of her modified reference frame generator still on it, showing that the projected field emitter had worked perfectly, making her feel very pleased. Her insight into an aspect of the theory she’d first learned from a very distant education broadcast had led to some interesting offshoots the classes she’d so far studied intensively hadn’t mentioned. It seemed obvious to her when she sat down and thought hard about how it worked, but at least as far as she could see her alien benefactors either hadn’t thought of it, or hadn’t yet brought it up in the series, which was clearly intended to train new science students in that field.

She’d spent many happy hours watching and re-watching the recordings, learning a little more each time. The math had been easy enough to decode as math was pretty universal, although working in base sixteen was a little strange. It had been familiar to her of course as it was more or less required for learning programming, which she’d always had an interest in from an early age, and had been encouraged by both her parents to learn more about. Her mother had told her when she was only about six or seven that computers ran half the world already and by the time she was an adult would probably run most of it, so it was important to learn how they worked if you wanted to understand things. It was a good piece of advice that had certainly been accurate.

Her father had muttered something about computers stealing the jobs of hard working people, but had looked like he didn’t really mean it. He was in a position where that sort of comment was expected, though, and she was aware even then that some people really did think like that. He’d certainly never stood in her way of learning anything she wanted, and had quietly but actively helped her whenever she found a new interest, usually managing to scrape up something that would help. The Union had an awful lot of odd stuff secreted away around the place, the remnants of who knew how many old companies that had gone under over the decades, and had been ultimately collected and stored away for a rainy day by the dock workers. Some of it was used for maintaining the machinery that was still in operation, some was broken up for scrap, but a surprising amount of it was stashed carefully into a warehouse somewhere and sat on just in case.

It amused her that most of the local Tinkers would probably be furious that so much good stuff was right under their noses, since they spent a lot of time rummaging through scrapyards and similar places for parts, never realizing that all the really choice bits got intercepted long before they ended up there. On the other hand, it had kept the Union far more functional over the years than one might expect, and had been a boon for many of her experiments over the years.

It was amazing what you could find if you knew who to ask and had an inside man, so to speak…

Her mother had always seemed to find the whole thing rather funny.

So when she’d decided at the age of nine that she wanted to get into ham radio, it hadn’t taken long before an elderly but functional general coverage receiver had appeared in the back of her dad’s truck, complete with a dogeared manual. Half a dozen books on the theory had quickly turned up, her mother asking a few of her students who knew about that sort of thing for recommendations, and her dad had got Kurt and a couple of others from the yard to come and help put up a tall antenna on the side of the house outside her bedroom window, the whole thing ending up as a combined antenna-raising and barbecue party.

Six months after that she’d passed her technician class license test, and had a two meter transceiver sitting on top of the lower frequency receiver. Learning Morse code hadn’t taken very long when she decided she wanted to know how to decode the messages she picked up from all over the place, and the collection of hardware grew steadily as she acquired random bits from different places. By the time she was twelve she had her extra class license and had build a number of transmitters and receivers from scratch, including an amateur TV system she was still proud of.

The research into communication theory in general had stood her in good stead when she had the first sudden realization that something she’d read about the quantum nature of reality implied that it should be possible to send a signal, or indeed receive a signal, in a way that didn’t pass through normal space-time. It had taken her nearly eighteen months of careful work to figure out a possible method for that to be done and build the prototype of what she privately termed a subspace communicator, but the results had exceeded her wildest dreams and opened up a whole vast new world of things to learn about, which she was more than happy to dive headlong into.

Along the way, of course, she’d picked up a lot of self-taught skills in soldering, circuit design, mechanical engineering, and other fields which when added to her programming knowledge had made the whole job easier. Professor Drekin had seemed somewhat startled when she’d explained some of her other theories, apparently believing it was unusual to be able to do what she was doing, but she herself found that a little weird. So much of it was obvious when you thought about it carefully. The hard part was actually doing it, and that was mostly a matter of either finding or making the right equipment. Her massive haul from the old TV shop had been the key to that in the end.

She wished she was better at some of the more complex math though; working out the multidimensional eigenvectors sometimes took quite a lot of scribbling and it would have saved time to be able to do all of it in her head. She was getting slowly better at that sort of thing, even though anything more than seven dimensions at once needed something to write on. Practice did after all help.

Of course, once her dad had decided to show her work to the professor, things had kind of snowballed. When he’d finally stopped practically dancing with excitement, he’d said he was going to need to think about the best way to proceed and he’d get back to them in a couple of days or so. She’d just gone back to watching alien classes in interesting physics and fiddling with some ideas all that sparked, while trying to work out how to decode the sound subcarrier that was still taunting her, buried in the signal. And studying the books on comparative linguistics she’d pulled out of her mother’s own library in an attempt to try to figure out the written language of her unknown teachers. Learning their symbology as far as the equations went was slowly helping with this task, but she thought it would take quite a while to crack it.

She was patient, though. There was no hurry and she was learning all sorts of other things in the process. Learning was a lot more fun, she’d long since decided, when it was on your own terms and things you sought out rather than had pushed on you.

Ir was ultimately nearly a week after first talking to Professor Drekin that he came over for dinner and they discussed a number of options for moving ahead. Her dad had been worried about the gangs and the PRT, in equal measure and Professor Drekin had come up with a possible solution to that problem and several others, which after a lot of thought they’d decided to proceed with.

Luckily, due to various contacts he had in the wider scientific community, he’d been able to contact Doctor Calhoun at DARPA, who was conveniently also very high up in the military. It had taken some persuasion but in the end the general had been convinced to visit BBU and meet with the professor, who had demonstrated her prototype machine to him.

The professor was still grinning about the reaction nearly four hours later when she was introduced to Doctor Calhoun, who had looked like someone had just hit him unexpectedly with something heavy. He’d been flipping through the slightly updated version of her documentation with a completely baffled but still hilariously excited expression, mumbling to himself. It had been very funny.

At first he hadn’t believed that it was all her work, then when she’d managed to prove it to his satisfaction, had decided that she had to be some unusual form of Parahuman. While she was fairly certain that she wasn’t, having read up on the background to Parahuman powers and classifications some time ago out of interest and deciding that there was definitely an awful lot missing from the whole story, she was amenable to being tested to prove it one way or the other. After considerable discussion the general had arranged to fly her father and her, along with her prototype, a copy of the documents, and Professor Drekin, down to Virginia and the DARPA main facility in Arlington. It had been her first trip on an aircraft since she was ten and was a lot of fun. Especially as it was a private jet and she got to look at the cockpit.

An hour and a half after landing early in the morning right at the end of August, all of them were in a room about six floors underground talking to half a dozen people, including an internationally famous physicist, who’d spent the first ten minutes looking dismissive, the next two hours looking both fascinated and stunned, and the last ten minutes staring at her like he’d seen a ghost. It had been kind of odd, but he was polite once he got over the initial disbelief, so there was that.

A couple more military guys had also been present, one from the Air Force like Doctor Calhoun, and one from some bit of the Army she hadn’t quite worked out. They’d gone very quiet when she showed her prototype working while writing out the equations governing the functioning of the reference frame generator on a large whiteboard.

One of the other people, a slender and sharp-faced redheaded woman in a suit, had looked at the data, then talked quietly to Doctor Calhoun in the corner of the room for about half an hour, before disappearing for another forty minutes. When she came back she headed straight for him, the pair talking again for quite a while, before she shook his hand, nodded, and left. Taylor hadn’t seen her again and was still wondering who she was.

After the demonstration was over, she’d spent a solid three hours answering question after question from everyone there, including Doctor Calhoun, and even Professor Drekin. They’d gone over her document page by page as if they were trying to find a flaw with it, but she’d been able to show that the work was accurate and complete. When that was finished she’d been asked if she thought she could build another one for them.

Of course she’d said yes, if they had the parts she needed. The machine wasn’t terribly complex for the most part and she knew the circuits and dimensions by heart. The end result of that had been her finding herself in a large and incredibly well equipped workshop full of hardware she nearly drooled over, along with three technicians who were apparently aware of the purpose of her being there although clearly skeptical.

Having looked around for a bit, she gathered together all the parts she needed, the tech guys helping her very efficiently even though at least one of them seemed to be humoring her. While she’d been using one of the really cool projection microscopes and building a new copy of her circuitry under it, finding that it allowed her to do a much more compact and neater job and resolving that she really needed one of her own, she’d asked them to take the drawings of the outer shell and the tesseract coil former and machine them for her.

It took two of them a while to program up the little benchtop multi-axis CNC mill with the data needed but only about four hours later she was looking at a really professionally made duplicate of the mechanical parts of her device. Impressed, she’d thanked them profusely then carefully wound the tesseract coil with the strangely pretty layered windings in four different thicknesses of copper wire, the final exciter coil made of solid silver. In her original two prototypes she’d had some trouble getting this last bit as it was quite expensive but a jewelry supply shop online had sold her twenty feet of it for only a slightly extortionate price which her dad had paid with a mild wince. Luckily the wire was very thin so there wasn’t all that much silver in it.

Eventually, sometime in the evening, she was finally done with the copy of her original machine. It looked almost identical but was much cleaner, none of the file marks her hand-build one had shown visible, and the circuitry was neater too. This last bit had mostly been down to practice as it was still hand made, since she had no way at that point to make printed circuit boards herself.

Even so, it worked perfectly. Taylor had put the three C cells into it, closed it up, and run the diagnostics on the old laptop she’d brought with her. When everything passed she’d unplugged the USB cable from the innards of the machine, held it out, pressed the power button with her thumb, and casually let go, grinning at the expressions of everyone other than her father and the professor. Both of them looked tired and were holding large paper cups half-full of coffee, but they’d looked proud too.

“I told you, Brendan,” Professor Drekin had said, turning to Doctor Calhoun, who just nodded, his expression showing multiple emotions.

“You did,” he’d replied after a few seconds. “You very much did.”

All three techs had gaped, looked at each other, then spent some time very carefully examining her work with growing excitement. She herself, pleased but suddenly exhausted after a very long day, had left it with them and been taken along with her father and the professor to another building that was set up like a very high end hotel and shown to their rooms. She’d fallen asleep almost immediately, the excitement of the day not managing to offset the tiredness of having spend most of it talking or working hard. Even as she drifted off she decided she had no regrets though.

The next two days had involved more medical tests than she’d ever experienced before in her entire life, including a couple of hours in a very noisy MRI scanner holding very still. When that finally ended she’d thought of at least two improvements it needed and added them to the mental list of things to look into, with possible reference to better superconductors. She’d learned some interesting things about that field from her special lessons which seemed applicable to a lot of places, but that wasn’t really the main concern at that time.

The end results of the scans showed what she’d expected, that she wasn’t a Parahuman. There was no sign of the special brain structure that was generally considered proof of powers and was a critical part of the whole definition of ‘Parahuman’ as far as the law went. Doctor Calhoun had actually breathed a sigh of relief at that point, which amused her.

The fact that the three techs she’d worked with had successfully built another copy of her prototype over those two days without her direct input also helped in the respect of ‘Not Tinker Tech.’ That part seemed to surprise even them, and caused a lot of excited discussion.

By the time they got home again after four days, she was looking forward to some really neat things in the near future. Both her father and Professor Drekin had spent hours talking to quite a few people, and she’d undergone another grilling about her theories by some more scientists, who were wandering around looking slightly appalled by the time they gave up. The whole lot of them had vanished after that, leaving her to poke around in the workshop and make a list of toys she really wanted.

The end result of all of this was that DARPA, and by implication several other parts of the government, were very very interested in her work and made an offer that had her staring in complete disbelief at the man who casually mentioned a figure. It was so large that she thought it should have been expressed in scientific notation. Her father had nearly fallen off his chair, and the professor simply gaped for a moment, before snapping his mouth shut, swallowing a little, and thinking.

And now here they were; The university had enough money to set up a whole new department entirely from scratch with a budget big enough to keep them going almost forever, and immediately set out to collect the brightest grad students and professors of several disciplines to staff it with Professor Drekin running the entire affair. The DWU got a huge injection of resources right off the bat, which ensured that everyone’s jobs were safe for good, appearing to find a whole bunch of security and background checks a price worth paying in exchange. At least no one had complained and a lot of them were looking incredibly happy. That alone made everything worthwhile in her opinion, as did seeing the look on her dad’s face.

With DARPA involved, all of a sudden things started happening at a rate that she found hard to believe. Apparently when you had all the money you could work miracles. They’d immediately and amazingly quickly done the conversion work on several of the old DWU facility buildings to upgrade them to working labs and manufacturing areas, helped her dad set up Gravtec and get all the paperwork properly filed so it was a fully legal and operational company, put an entire army of experts on generating patent after patent and pushing them through apparently with the weight of the US government behind them, and so much more. Yes, most of the patents were covered by security restrictions that meant the general public couldn’t get access, but they were real patents.

All in the name of Gravtec, without her listed on them, as DARPA seemed to want to keep her off the radar of various people. She was fine with that and she’d been assured that when the time was right she’d be known as the one who was behind the new technology. It seemed a fair deal considering all the benefits she got from it.

The government even spent what must have been a horrendous amount of money fixing up all the roads in the area very quietly without drawing attention to it, blocking off buildings and side alleys, replacing wiring, and generally upgrading a large part of the docks to a level where it was far more functional and safer than it had been in decades. Her father had grumbled that it was a shame it took a miracle to pull that off, but the professor had pointed out that at least they’d got that miracle, which he’d been forced to agree with.

And in the end, here she was, in her own lab that she still had trouble believing was basically hers to do with what she wanted, with a couple of dozen of the brightest people she’d ever met ready and able to help her make anything she came up with, a free hand to come up with whatever she wanted, and a budget that made the Apollo mission look a little underwhelming.

Glancing out the window at the prototype spacecraft she grinned to herself. At some point she was going to make the Apollo mission look like it lacked ambition too…

Yeah, life had taken a distinct turn for the better when she’d managed to make her subspace radio work. She hadn’t expected quite this amount of change but it had worked out well so far.

There were so many other things she wanted to learn, and to make. And with Gravtec to commercialize them, DARPA to fund them, and people she trusted to do all the stuff that was beyond her, she could concentrate on those things and leave the rest to people who knew what they were doing.

If only school was this interesting she’d probably get better marks, but it was boring. Compared to what she was doing right now, it was almost lethally boring.

While she’d been ruminating, she’d also been carefully watching the middle monitor. It was displaying, among other things, the output of a number of instruments she’d designed and built that measured the quantum interference level around the frame reference field generators in the test area below her. This was something else that her subspace communications ideas had suggested and when she’d experimented with a prototype system to measure what she liked to think of as background noise in the quantum sea underlying reality itself, she’d found that her gravity widget did some very odd things to it.

She’d pretty much expected that, and it didn’t take long to work out that this was the clue as to where the energy required to do what it did was really coming from. Clearly three C cells couldn’t provide anywhere within multiple orders of magnitude of the energy required to accelerate something the size and mass of a heavy baseball at 2 g for around 49 hours, or even most likely 49 seconds. Her circuitry wasn’t actually directly doing that, she’d always known that. It was more closely analogous to something along the lines of a power MOSFET; a very small amount of energy on the gate terminal could control a vastly larger amount flowing between the source and the drain with high precision. In her machine the batteries she’d used were merely powering the circuitry that was throttling a source of external energy which did all the real work.

The question had always been where exactly that energy came from, or for that matter went to. She’d had a pretty good idea it was something along the lines of vacuum energy, or quantum variance across parallel timelines, which was in a sense another way of restating the same thing. Now she had proof.

In theory this energy well was basically infinite, she thought. It was the next layer below normal space-time, something that some physics theories she’d read had suggested the existence of, but no one had managed to really find convincing evidence of or even a good functional description of. She was pretty close to doing exactly the second and she was already sure she was looking at the first. The signal her equipment measured whenever one of the reference frame systems was in action was very clear and tracked the operation in progress perfectly, although it was still a subtle effect that normal technology wouldn’t see at all.

Moving the mouse and clicking on a couple of icons, Taylor watched the playback of the complex waveforms that her monitoring software had produced from the multiple QID units surrounding the test area, then leaned back in her chair and contemplated the screen with a small frown.

She looked over her shoulder to see Brendan and Angus talking in his small side office. She hadn’t told either one of them about her subspace radio experiments yet, and wasn’t in that much of a hurry to do so. They didn’t really need to know and it was kind of her own personal thing at the moment. They had enough to deal with anyway, with Gravtec and now project Hawkflight on the horizon. Her dad knew but he hadn’t mentioned it either, for his own reasons.

She’d bring it up eventually. Probably. But she wanted to explore all the other aspects of it she could see but hadn’t quite worked out the best way to achieve. That part could stay a private project. Subspace was her own playground for now.

Replaying the recording again, she propped her head on one hand and very carefully scrolled through the data bit by bit, looking at the peaks from the various instrument locations and working out in her head a three dimensional map of how they intersected in real space.

Eventually she saved the file to her private server and started setting up for test run thirty of the prototype spacecraft drive, while wondering exactly why Armsmaster was radiating a very distinctive subspace signal from somewhere around his head.

Had someone else discovered the same thing she had, or was something else going on? The interference signature wasn’t the same as her technology produced, but it was clearly related at least loosely, which was… intriguing.

She decided that she’d have to build a portable detector and see what she could find with it. That wouldn’t be all that hard with the facilities she now had available.

“Stand by for test run thirty. All personnel are to clear test area immediately. Gravitational shear is expected on this run. Run starts in sixty seconds from mark. Mark.” Releasing the talk switch on the console mic as a sixty second countdown started on her center screen, she cleared everything else and prepared for recording and data analysis while behind her the rest of the team got their own equipment ready. Below, several people quickly exited the test bay and one by one checked in as clear. When the last one was out and she’d verified visually that the entire zone was safe, she enabled the dead-man switch and waited for the timer to run down.

Even as the test ran and the prototype calmly lifted up into the air, faint distortions around it showing where the projected reference frame intersected that of everything else, she was designing a better QID in the back of her mind.

Taylor was curious, and she’d seen something that she couldn’t explain, so she was damn well going to work out what it was and explain it whether it liked it or not.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Max Anders enjoyed his breakfast under the outdoor heater in the heart of Brockton Bay’s commercial district, at a small and exclusive cafe run by and for people of the right type. He, by definition, was of that type of course. While he ate a remarkably good omelet accompanied by an exceedingly good and very expensive cup of Jamaica Blue coffee, he was reading a report that had been emailed to him surrounding the odd goings-on at the Dock Workers Union. That huge ship blithely floating past at a walking pace three days ago had obviously been a message, but he wasn’t sure who it was a message to or who it was a message from.

Apparently the PRT weren’t completely sure either, which upset them rather a lot. Director Piggot had, according to a couple of low level staff he’d long ago found amenable to slipping him useful information in return for a financial helping hand, spent nearly three hours shouting at Deputy Director Renick in her office that same day, apparently after he’d returned from visiting the site where the ship had ended up. The same sources said he’d looked extremely discomfited, suggesting he’d learned things that he hadn’t expected.

That could be good, or it could be bad. In either case Max wanted to know more about the entire thing. The situation in the city had clearly taken a sharp deviation in an unexpected direction and that was always concerning to him, since his long term plans were predicated on knowing as much as possible about the various factions in Brockton Bay. If something critical was different he needed to find out what and decide if it helped or hindered those plans, and in either case how to turn it to his advantage. Preferably by denying it to anyone else, if possible.

Annoyingly it was difficult to get inside information out of the Union. They were a very diverse bunch of bastards who were more stubborn than intelligent or they’d long since have gone somewhere else where there was actual work. He still couldn’t figure out how they stayed afloat, aside from sheer bloodymindedness and a focus on helping each other that was both impressive and very irritating. Every attempt to get a covert lever with which to pry information loose had been met with failure, although he’d come close a few times. He didn’t want to be more overt in case it alerted either that overgrown slant-eyed lizard, who while an asshole wasn’t a complete idiot, the PRT themselves, or possibly someone actually competent like the FBI. The dockworkers might be barely keeping their heads above water with a workforce that was a mere few hundred, a tiny fraction of the twenty or so thousand they’d boasted back in the glory days of the fifties and sixties, but they still had contacts absolutely everywhere and could potentially be quite the handful if prodded in the wrong manner.

Now, though… He flicked a finger up his phone screen, then read the next page as he cut another piece of omelet and put it in his mouth.

Something had definitely happened there in the last couple of months. Rumors of lots of construction work, vehicles coming and going at all hours of the day and night, none of them visiting anywhere else in the city but heading straight to the docks from the interstate; the roads being worked on too, along with discreet but effective clearing up of the entire area… Even the various junkies and low level Merchant scum apparently either being paid to leave the place or forced to.

No, something was, as the saying put it, afoot. Someone was pouring money into that whole place for some reason they were being very quiet about, and he wanted to know who that was and what the reason was.

His informants told him that the Chief Director herself had been calling Director Piggot quite regularly, apparently in an odd mood that was causing considerably difficulty in the local office since the Director when riled tended to bite. And it was widely known that contact with the Chief Director riled her like almost nothing else. Whatever had actually happened to culminate in the extraordinary sight of a vast rusty ship flying across the bay in one of the most spectacular demonstrations of force Max had ever seen, it was definitely causing upset among the authorities.

Perhaps it was time to be a little more forceful in his inquiries. A visit from someone rather more dangerous and persuasive than three or four mooks with guns might shake someone’s memory enough to find out what was going on. Brad was too obvious, he never knew when to stop, but perhaps Victor? The man was smart and smooth.

He picked up his coffee and sipped it again, while he read the last page of the report, which hinted at all sorts of things but didn’t actually answer any of them. As he pressed the power button to blank the screen someone sat down next to him at the table completely unexpectedly, making him flinch very slightly and turn his head to glare at the interloper.

A red-headed woman with a sharp suit and sharper features regarded him impassively from under a pair of sunglasses. “Good morning, Mr Anders,” she said calmly.

“And you are?” he riposted, wondering who the fuck she was and what she wanted. Probably some drug company shill, he got a lot of them.

“Here to give you some advice I suggest you carefully listen to,” she replied, her expression completely and eerily blank.

“That almost sounded like you were possibly threatening me,” he said after a moment. He was getting an odd feeling about this.

Her mouth, very briefly, twitched into a smile, so quickly it was gone again before he could register it properly.

“That was not a threat, Mr Anders. When I threaten people, they do not mistake it for anything else.”

“Who are you?” he snapped, now wondering if she was connected to one of the other gangs. She didn’t give off the air of a PRT stooge although anything was possible.

She leaned closer to him, almost uncomfortably close. “Who I am is not something you need to know. Who I represent is.”

“And that is?” he asked, leaning away slightly. She was too intense for his comfort, especially from a foot away. Wondering if he was in a position that would force him to use his powers, he tensed slightly.

“Part of the US government that is concerned that your organization may have designs on the Brockton Bay Dock Worker’s Union or people connected with them,” she replied quietly. “I am here to tell you that this is something you should dismiss from your mind. It doesn’t concern you, and if you persist in attempting to learn things you shouldn’t be aware of, you will not enjoy the repercussions.”

He blinked. “Why would the US government believe that Medhall Pharmaceutical would be interested in the dock worker’s union?” he asked with a smile, genuinely wondering for a moment what she was talking about. “We’re a biotech research company not a shipping one.”

“I was referring to your other organization, Mr Anders,” she calmly remarked, her face still completely blank. “The one you are the head of, and inherited from your father after your sister met an untimely end.”

Max’s blood ran cold. “What are...” he began.

“We know who you are,” the woman said in a very low voice, her eyes obscured by the sunglasses but still burning into his own. “We know many, many things about you and your extracurricular activities, and those of your like-minded compatriots.” Her head moved closer to his as he listened with shock. “Certain other federal organizations who are tasked with handling the problem such groups as yours present may give a certain amount of flexibility in how this is done for reasons of their own. I can assure you that should you become a problem my group is required to handle, there will be remarkably little flexibility how this is done. Further attempts to in any way interfere with the dock worker’s union or anyone connected in any way with them will make you that problem.”

Feeling something gently prodding his stomach, he flicked his eyes down, then froze. A suppressed pistol was barely touching his suit, the design unfamiliar to him. Raising his eyes again he stared at her. “If you feel that use of your particular abilities is wise, I would suggest you look up and to your left. Third floor window, second from the right, three hundred yards west of us.”

Reluctantly he turned his head in the indicated direction. A faint momentary flicker of red light caught his eye as he moved, making him look down again to see a tiny dot centered right over his heart.

“You will not, directly or indirectly, attempt to interfere with the DWU or any person or organization connected to them. If you do, you will die. Nod if you understand.” The suppressor pressed every so slightly harder into his gut.

Swallowing, he nodded slowly. He was all too aware that he’d never be able to form any sort of armor under or over his clothes before she could fire, never mind the sniper.

“You will not mention my presence to any of your group, nor attempt to discover my identity. If you do, you will die. Nod if you understand.”

Max nodded again, sweating.

“If any member of your organization in any way causes any form of trouble in the docks, with or without your instruction, you will be held personally responsible and you will die.” She put her head right next to his. “Nod if you understand.”

Once again, rather jerkily, he nodded.

“Excellent. I’m pleased that we could come to a mutually satisfactory arrangement.” He absently noticed that the pressure of the gun had vanished, but was fixated on her face. “Please remember that people with special abilities, with relatively few exceptions, are still subject to the same… ballistic necessities… of the population at large. Should it be required, which I do hope it won’t be, we would have little difficulty demonstrating this fact to everyone involved. Please don’t force us to prove that. And do remember that we know where you live, we know where you work, we even know the color of your underwear. Blue, with white stripes, for today I believe.”

She stood up and nodded politely to him. “It was a pleasure talking to you, Mr Anders. Allow me to cover your tab as I think your omelet has gotten cold.” She dropped a fifty dollar bill, brand new, on the table next to his plate. “With any luck we won’t meet again. If we do, something has gone wrong and we would prefer that not happen, correct?”

Max nodded one last time, then watched as she walked off. After a few steps, she came back and bent down next to him. “That was a threat.” The woman smiled at him with a small flash of teeth. Moments later she’d vanished into the pedestrian traffic heading to work, like she’d never been there.

When his hands stopped shaking he picked his phone up and very carefully deleted the report on it along with all related information, then sent a text to the informant who’d provided it telling him his job was done and he’d be paid that afternoon. Eventually he got up, leaving the bill where it had landed, and walked rapidly in the opposite direction to where the woman, whoever the fuck she’d been, had gone.

He would swear for the rest of his life he could feel a tiny red dot on the back of his neck until he reached his car a couple of blocks away.

By the time he got up to his penthouse he was quite relieved to change his blue and white striped underwear for a fresh pair.

Chapter Text

Carefully placing the last tiny component onto the wet solder paste with a very fine pair of tweezers, Taylor examined the circuit board under the stereo microscope she was still highly pleased about. One of the best things about the whole DARPA and university connection was that if she needed a tool or piece of equipment, she got it with no questions asked. In the overall scheme of the total budget that was being thrown at her and Gravtec, pretty much anything she asked for was a rounding error.

So she’d taken full advantage of that to equip her home workshop, which had moved down to the basement as it had outgrown her bedroom, with a smaller version of the more useful stuff in the main facility. No one had seemed bothered about it and Angus had merely smiled, saying that having the facilities to work on ideas at the moment they came to you was a good idea. Sometimes if you waited the inspiration evaporated by the time you got to work, he’d said, which was always a massive nuisance and left you peeved for days.

She could see that very well. And now she had everything she needed to make almost anything she could conceive of, including a tiny little benchtop multi-axis CNC milling machine very similar to the one at the DARPA lab they’d visited, along with a small but very good vapor phase solder reflow oven, the microscope which she loved, a cutting edge machine for turning out prototype PCBs in very little time, and several other incredibly useful tools. Not to mention stocks of absolutely anything she was ever likely to need from components to wire, bar, and sheet material in at least a dozen different metals including pure gold.

There was little she couldn’t build at least a prototype of, and she was very pleased about that. It hadn’t taken her all that long to learn how to use the various CAD programs needed to run all the equipment, although she was certainly aware that really becoming an expert at them would take quite a while. But it was good enough for now and opened up all manner of useful avenues of research.

Very carefully, having checked that nothing was in the way, Taylor picked the assembled but not yet soldered PCB up on the carrying frame, then moved a few feet to the side and slid it into the holder on the reflow oven. Once it was secure and she’d double-checked nothing had been disturbed, she lowered it into position and closed the lid, then tapped the control to run the correct soldering profile. Watching as the indicators showed the horribly expensive synthetic liquid that was in the bottom of the tank under the board heating up, she waited while thinking about the latest alien lessons she’d been watching.

Her far distant tutors were just starting to touch on some concepts she’d derived for herself from the earlier equations, the ones that led her to her ideas of subspace, but they seemed to be taking it in a slightly different direction than she had. It was something that slightly puzzled her, making her wonder if she’d accidentally done it wrong and ended up somewhere that wasn’t quite correct and only worked by a fluke, or whether she’d genuinely seen a different end point which was just as valid only not identical. Sooner or later she’d likely find out, of course, when the lesson program got that far.

If she had come up with a unique interpretation of the principles she was learning, it would rather please her, but it also made her wish she could tell her benefactors about it. She’d become quite fond of the aliens, who had opened up so many paths for her and through her everyone else, and at times was sad that she wasn’t able to speak to them.

Yet.

She did have ideas toward that goal, but it was still something that was in the early stages, and there were too many other things that seemed to take priority at the moment. In theory making the subspace receiver a subspace transceiver wasn’t hugely difficult, but there were some practical concerns that needed to be addressed first, and she wanted to build an entirely new system, rather than modify her first versions. This current project, although it wasn’t directly connected to such an end result, was related in a number of ways and would help her down that path in due course. She was in no vast hurry right now.

And, of course, there was the minor problem of actually being able to understand them and they her if and when she managed the feat. She had a very good working knowledge of their mathematics now, of course, but then that part was likely to be much easier than learning an entirely alien language. Even so she was sure she could do it eventually.

Idly reaching over the bench and prodding a button on another piece of equipment, she listened to the strange sounds of people who had evolved around another star somewhere in the universe talking. She’d had a sudden burst of insight four days ago at two AM and had immediately, though very quietly to avoid waking her father, run down to the basement and written a significant amount of code, then reworked part of her receiver, finally finishing at seven in the morning. When she’d tweaked the entire thing about a dozen times she had been excessively pleased to find that she had indeed successfully decoded the sound subcarrier that was buried in the signal she was receiving and converted it into something she could listen to.

Of course she didn’t understand a word of it yet, but at least she could now hear it, and that was the first step.

Turning the sound track down to a background noise that was oddly comforting, she peered into the reflow oven, seeing that the line of rising very hot vapor that was shimmering above the now-boiling liquid in the tank was nearly at the PCB on its carrier. As she watched, the wavy distortion rose above the board, immediately condensing onto it and releasing the latent heat into the relatively colder plastic and metal, then running off back into the pool at the bottom. The board heated up evenly and only seconds later the solder began to melt, all the minute parts being pulled into line by the surface tension of the molten metal in a little dance she never tired of watching.

Shortly thereafter the machine beeped and started the cooldown phase. Satisfied that nothing had gone amiss, she went back to her desk and sat in front of her heavily modified former ham radio, making a few notes on the project before reaching for the tuning controls having put her headphones on. While she had only so far managed to discover one intelligible signal lurking in subspace, she was well aware that there were a lot more things out there that she could hear, and was very curious to know what they were and where they came from. So every now and then she poked around looking for something interesting and noted where it was for future study.

Subspace was even more complex than the electromagnetic spectrum, of course, and Taylor knew full well that she could spend her entire life studying it and only scratch the surface, but she was a curious girl and patient too, so that didn’t seem like a bad thing to her.

Carefully adjusting one of the controls, she cocked her head and listened to the weird warbling moan coming from her headphones, concentrating entirely on the sound to the exclusion of everything else. She didn’t hear the reflow unit beep again and shut down, just sat there and let the sound flow through her with her eyes shut while making tiny modifications to a dozen controls with the practiced hand of someone who knew their equipment inside out. Eventually she nodded slightly, opened her eyes, and wrote down all the settings very carefully, double checking that she hadn’t made a mistake.

“I’m sure that’s a video signal,” she mumbled, putting one hand on her left headphone cup and pressing it slightly. “But there’s something weird about the modulation. Might be a multiphase digital carrier, but if it is it’s really low bandwidth...” She made a few more notes, tapping the pencil on her lips while she thought, then shrugged. “I’ll come back to that later.”

She turned to another setup, which had her very original subspace converter attached to another radio receiver she’d modified specifically for the job and dedicated to the alien learning channel as she thought of it. .Checking the time, she ensured that it was recording properly as the next physics lesson was due in about ten minutes. She’d worked out that the originators of the transmission seemed to operate on something close to a thirty hour cycle, which might well mean that was the length of their day.

She now had hundreds of hours of video recorded, including not only the physics program she’d initially found, but a number of other learning series including biology, basic math, which had helped her at the beginning to work out the differences between what she was familiar with and what they were using, chemistry, and several engineering subjects. This particular station, if that was the right term, didn’t seem to deal with things like linguistics or anything of that nature, being dedicated to harder sciences, which was mildly annoying in some ways but not at all in others. She was more interested in the harder sciences anyway.

And she was sure she’d eventually locate other stations that she could learn other things from. There were an awful lot of transmissions out there after all. Luckily the one she was most interested in and could gain the most benefit from had turned out to be the easiest to get access too. It seemed likely to her that this was deliberate, since you’d want your distance learning system to be simple to use, surely?

Happy that she wouldn’t miss the next bit, she got up and went back to the soldering oven, removing the now room-temperature finished PCB from it and inspecting it under the bright light over the workbench, tilting it from side to side in an effort to spot any obvious errors. Not finding anything amiss, she slipped it under the microscope, set the magnification to the right level, and spent the next twenty minutes very carefully studying every component and pad on the board for problems. Twice she had to use an extremely fine-tipped soldering iron to clear tiny shorts where solder paste had formed bridges between adjacent legs of a part, but overall it was pretty close to perfect. Finally satisfied, she pushed the head of the microscope to the side and picked up the probes of a test meter, before checking all the power supply lines for shorts or unusual resistances.

She didn’t want to miss something obvious and wreck several hours work by incautiously applying power to something that would immediately convert it into smoke. That was always a pain, although everyone did it at least once.

When all the pre-checks came back as correct, she nodded, then connected the board to the bench power supply, set it to the right voltage and current, and with fingers crossed just in case turned it on. The power supply display showed a short surge of current then settled down to exactly the right level, making her smile.

“So far, so good,” she muttered to herself, prodding a few test points in the circuit with the probe of her oscilloscope and watching the traces change. “Waveform reconstruction is fine, subcarrier demodulation is… basically good, I think. Phase correction error output is working… yeah, that’s right. Great.” Picking up a tiny ceramic screwdriver with her other hand while holding the probe on one particular point, she very gently tuned a small and oddly-shaped inductor core she’d machined herself, watching as the widely spaced gold wire started glowing a faint blue-green color while the waveform took on the right shape on the scope screen. “And the subspace resonance deconstructor cavity is coming into alignment… fantastic… little more… little more… ack! Too far!”

The remarkably deep hum that surrounded her made things on the bench rattle until she tweaked the core back just a fraction of a turn, then it stopped instantly. “Whoops. Nearly went into destructive oscillation then,” she mumbled, putting the screwdriver down and checking her readings one final time, then sitting back and smiling. “But it works. Excellent.”

The small and highly complex circuit board on the bench, covered in parts almost too small to see by eye surrounding a couple of extremely complex glittering pieces of CNC machined metal, emitted a cheery glow from the middle but otherwise didn’t appear to be doing anything. She knew otherwise, though. It was busily detecting and monitoring quantum variance interference patterns in subspace, and with the correct processing hooked into it, would allow much more precise measurements of things that her current version didn’t quite handle in the way she desired. And it was much more portable than the existing systems, which was something she’d spent a considerable amount of thought on.

Pleased, she turned the bench power unit off, disconnected the board, and opened one of the drawers under the workbench. Taking a box out of it she opened it to reveal a used but still functional high end smartphone, one that was sold specifically for use in marine and heavy industrial applications. It didn’t bother with the niceties of a consumer one, such as being wafer thin and all shiny, this thing was a solid matte-black rubberized device close to three quarters of an inch thick, was waterproof to at least sixty feet, could be operated with gloves on, and overall gave the impression you could beat someone to death with it then phone the cops afterwards. And from her point of view it was ideal as the battery compartment was enormous, which meant that by fitting a slightly smaller battery she could get some extra circuitry inside the case and use the phone itself as a nice little portable computer with a good screen.

An hour later she’d eviscerated the phone, removing the huge battery and installing her board where it had been using the internal test connection points on the phone motherboard and some very fine wire. When it was all screwed in place and the connections potted in epoxy to stop anything breaking, she dug out a collection of lithium batteries and chose one that would fit into the remaining space, connected it as well, and screwed the back cover on again. Turning the phone on, she checked it still worked, then plugged it into her computer and transferred the application she’d been writing on and off for nearly a month over to it.

It took another three hours and half a dozen bug-fixes and recompilations but in the end she got the program to do what she wanted it to. Tapping the screen she looked at the graph the app was drawing, while turning in a circle in the middle of the basement. “Hmm. That is interesting,” she said quietly, studying the map of subspace interference nodal points her new sensor board was detecting. “Range is… about seven thousand meters to that cluster, bearing… 164 degrees near enough. Which would put it right in the middle of the...”

Taylor stopped dead, then very slowly moved the subspace interference detector back and forth, noting the readings shifting. After a moment she looked at the wall in the direction it was pointing, her brow furrowed, before she went back to her workbench and sat in front of the computer, the device next to her. Bringing up a mapping program, she zoomed in on her house, set it as the home position, then typed in the range and bearing her device was showing.

She stared at the result with great interest.

“Huh,” she commented, before picking the thing up again and repeating the scan very carefully indeed, noting every reading she got in her notebook and double checking them all. Each of them was entered into the mapping program too, the resulting image causing her to frown thoughtfully.

“Now that is very peculiar,” she said to no-one. Only the low volume alien voices in the background replied.

After some minutes, she saved her work into an encrypted partition on her drive, using a long passphrase specific to this project, cleared the cache just in case, and turned the computer off. Putting her modified phone into her pocket, the app exited and the device working now as only a phone, she went up for dinner.

While thinking very hard about quite a number of things.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“I’m telling you, there’s nothing we can do,” Mike said, looking around the table. “Believe me, I’ve checked. Gravtec is entirely on the up and up, they have a level of backing from DARPA and several other departments of the federal government that has to be seen to be believed, and as far as anything I can find out says they genuinely don’t have anything related to Parahumans in their technology or business in general. I talked to every contact I have and they all told me the same thing. And warned me that PRT interference in Gravtec or anyone connected to Gravtec, their employees, Brockton Bay University, the Dock Worker’s Union, or anyone else who could even loosely be considered involved would be met with… let’s call it significant disapproval and leave it there.”

He spread his hands. “I’ve spent a solid week checking, and they’re untouchable. Even if they did have a Parahuman on staff I doubt we could do anything about it, but I’m completely certain that they simply don’t. Whoever it is that invented their gravitational control technology did it without any Tinker involvement at all. It’s completely reproducible, fully understood, and from what my contacts tell me a breakthrough in a number of scientific fields that totally upends not only physics but cosmology and at least half a dozen other disciplines. And at least one of them said was guaranteed to produce a Nobel award for the genius behind it. He meant it too.”

“I concur, Director,” Armsmaster said when he’d finished, causing everyone to look at him now. “I’ve acquired the relevant patents for the current Gravtec technology, which wasn’t easy as they are classified to a very high level, but my security clearance together with Professor Drekin’s aid sufficed to allow me to gain access. In conjunction with the paper he showed me during our visit, it’s very clear that all their technology is as Deputy Director Renick stated far past cutting edge but entirely understandable. It is definitely not Tinker Tech, and if anything may well open up avenues to allow Tinker Tech to eventually be understood. The ramifications of this new insight is… profound.”

He shook his head in what almost looked like awe. “The mind that came up with this is beyond outstanding, I can assure you. As Professor Drekin said, a true polymath, which is vanishingly rare but does happen occasionally. I would dearly like to meet this person at some point. But we have no reason to believe they are a Parahuman, and have been assured by Professor Drekin, Doctor Calhoun from DARPA, and a number of other sources that this is definitely not the case. Unless we are to assume that all these sources are either incorrect or deliberately lying, this entire matter is out of our jurisdiction.”

Emily Piggot, who had spent nearly the entire time since the ship had given her one of the worst shocks of her life by blithely floating past her office like a Macy’s balloon looking like she’d just bitten into a particularly sour lemon, glared at both of them. “You’re completely certain of this?” she finally snapped.

Mike looked at Armsmaster, the Tinker meeting his eyes with an expression of resignation, then looked back to her. “Yes, we are, Emily. It’s out of our hands, and if we persist in trying to make it our business, I’m fairly certain that there are people who will take exception to that. We most likely don’t want the sort of trouble they could bring.”

She studied them, then peered at her own notes, flipping pages a couple of times, before picking up one of the tablets at her elbow and flicking her finger over the screen. Eventually she put it down and gently massaged her eyelids with her fingertips. “I hate this city so much...” she growled under her breath. “Fine. If anything, that’s a goddamn relief. We have more than enough to worry about without some Tinker superscience company setting up on our patch.”

“All we have is mundane superscience,” Assault quipped. She opened one eye and fixed it on him, making him pale a little and shut up with alacrity.

“Indeed. Which is still somewhat worrying, but at least it’s not Parahuman crap. I’ve got far more than enough of that to deal with.” She took a deep breath then let it out slowly. “So I can report to the Chief Director that this is out of our hands, and if she’s so keen on finding out more, she should talk to DARPA, rather than annoying me any more. Good.” She closed her notebook and put the pen on the cover. “I just hope that none of the usual suspects get the bright idea to go help themselves to some hypertech. Somehow I can’t see that ending very happily for them.”

She almost looked anticipatory at the comment. Mike shivered a little, remembering what General Calhoun had said.

“I very much hope it doesn’t come to that,” he commented.

“So do I, but you know this place. We’ll find out sooner or later.” There was a momentary pause, then she picked up another tablet and tapped the screen. “Next item; The Parahuman known as Circus and a missing and extremely valuable statue. One that weighed nearly four tons. Ideas?”

Shortly they were involved in the normal run of the mill super-villain problems and Mike relaxed a little, hoping that Gravtec and all the weirdness in the Docks would stay well away from him.

Chapter Text

“Test run seventy four complete. Field decay as predicted. Area is safe to enter.” Angus clicked off the microphone, glanced out the window to check the status of the test zone visually, then turned to the instruments on his console. As the others in the control room moved around doing their own jobs, he scrolled back through the recorded results and jotted down notes as he checked the results against the calculated parameters. Everything lined up nearly perfectly, showing yet again that Taylor’s theories were sound. By now he’d have been startled if that wasn’t the case. The only variation shown made him frown a little, then turn to another screen and carefully inspect the results.

“Andy, we’ve got a power fluctuation on generator nine again.” He looked over his shoulder at one of his grad students, who nodded absently as he checked his own computer.

“Yeah, I see it. I thought that one was maybe a little marginal on the initial test phase, although it did pass. I think the tesseract coil former may have a microfracture which is very slightly distorting the field shape. Probably a tiny flaw in the original casting we didn’t spot. I’ll get it pulled and a new one swapped in, then have Kate check it out.”

“Good, thank you.” Angus stretched, smiling. “Other than that, everything’s working nicely. The latest modifications seem to have improved field density by nearly ten percent.”

“9.8742 percent, in fact.” Andy chuckled. “What was it that Taylor calculated it would be?”

“9.87421 percent. Exactly.” Angus grinned as he turned the chair around. “And I have little doubt that if our current instruments actually read to five digits past the decimal point we’d find that missing 0.00001 percent lurking there.”

“That girl is scary smart,” his student noted wisely, several of the other people present in the room nodding agreement.

“To a level I’ve never had the privilege of seeing before,” Angus smiled. “I am so very pleased that we’ve ended up working together. It’s certainly been interesting.”

“Yeah.” The younger man looked at him with a smile of his own. “A lot of people are going to end up being surprised when all this eventually becomes public knowledge. She’s almost single-handedly rewritten half of physics.” After a moment, he asked, “So when is she going to become Doctor Hebert?”

“To be honest she’s already met or in fact exceeded pretty much everything required for a Ph.D thesis just in the initial phases of our research,” Angus replied, shaking his head in wonder. “We’ll have to see, though. There are some practical issues past that, but in my own view she thoroughly deserves such a qualification. Most likely in multiple disciplines. I have little doubt that in the end she’ll accumulate more degrees than all of us put together. On the other hand she doesn’t seem all that interested in such things, she’s more invested in learning.”

“About what?” Anise, one of the other grad students on his team, asked.

“Essentially everything,” Angus laughed. “She does have more curiosity about the world than anyone else I’ve ever encountered.” The rest of them grinned. “All right, get that generator replaced as soon as possible and we’ll reset for the next run this afternoon. Until then, I have a conference call with DARPA about Project Hawkflight, so I’ll be unavailable for...” He looked at his watch and thought. “Probably three hours. Try not to collapse the building into a singularity while I’m busy, if you could.”

He stood and left the room as the others smiled, hearing them get to work behind him, and thinking yet again that Taylor’s mother would have found this entire situation both highly amusing and something to be intensely proud of.

Her daughter had certainly exceeded all expectations to a remarkable degree, he mused as he walked to his office. He wondered what her next trick would be...

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Taylor looked up as her father came into her room, his face showing he was rather sad but as always at this time trying to not betray that. Unfortunately for him she was much better at reading his expression than he was at hiding it. “Ready?” he asked quietly.

“Yes,” she replied, equally subdued, as she stood and put the textbook on astrophysics she’d been correcting with a pen to one side. Smoothing down her clothes, she checked in the mirror that she looked right, then walked out after him. At the bottom of the stairs she put her coat on and picked up a small backpack, then followed him to the car. Both of them got in, he started it and backed out of the driveway, then headed for a destination some miles away. Neither of them said anything while he drove, busy with their own thoughts as they were.

She looked in the side mirror and noticed some cars back a familiar vehicle, knowing it contained a pair of people who were tasked with keeping her and her father safe. No one had really talked about it but she had a good memory and despite whichever agency it was cycling through quite a number of vehicles and personnel she’d quickly memorized all of them over the last few months. There would be another one in traffic ahead of them too, she knew, and most likely at least one more in the general area pacing them from the side.

All in all she didn’t mind. They were doing their job and were very discreet, and it was a little flattering thinking that a whole secret government team was set up specifically to keep her and her dad safe. Considering the world, it wasn’t a bad thing to have backup, she thought. As long as they stayed out of the way unless something happened she was fine with it, and who knew? They might one day actually be needed. She’d much rather have them and never require the support than find out that she did need them and no one was there. The thought of ending up in some horrible situation all alone gave her chills. For a number of reasons.

After an uneventful trip, they arrived and parked the car. Both got out, her father locking the doors, them coming around to her as she waited. He put his hand on her shoulder, which she covered with her own, giving him a small smile. Then they walked into the building, the receptionist recognizing them and smiling.

Five minutes later after signing in and going up three floors in the elevator, they stopped outside a door with ‘307’ written on it. Her father looked at her. “I’ll wait in the usual place. Take as long as you need.”

“Thanks, dad,” she said gratefully. He patted her shoulder again, then walked off in the direction of the visitor’s lounge. Behind her, the elevator dinged, opening when she glanced back to reveal a man in a suit who looked at her without reaction, then headed in the other direction. Almost smiling on the inside, she took a breath, then opened the door, entering the room. Closing it softly behind herself, she sat down next to the bed, looking at the figure lying in it.

“Hi, Ems,” she said very quietly as she put her hand out and brushed some of the red hair aside from the face of the comatose girl in front of her. “How have you been?”

There was no answer, of course. There hadn’t been one since that day.

“Yeah,” she sighed after a few seconds, leaning forward and carefully and very gently hugging her oldest friend. “That’s what I thought.”

After a moment, she sat back in her chair and picked up her backpack, opening it and pulling out a book, then dropping the bag on the floor once more. “Things are going well for me and Dad, and everyone at the DWU and Gravtec. It’s a lot of fun. I’ve nearly finished the home schooling course too, although Dad was saying that maybe I should try Arcadia next year just so I don’t forget how to talk to people my own age.”

She paused, smiling a little. “I don’t know, though. I like the people I’m talking to right now, some of them are really cool. You’d like Professor Drekin, he’s really smart and has helped us enormously. Doctor Calhoun is neat too. And you wouldn’t believe some of the things I’m learning.”

Taylor glanced at the various monitors, assessing the readings. “Doesn’t look like anything’s changed. I guess that’s good and bad.” She turned back to the unconscious girl. “I wish Panacea did brains,” she sighed faintly, smiling regretfully. “She’s so good with everything else, but…”

The room fell into silence only broken by the faint electronic sounds from the monitoring equipment. Eventually, she shook her head. “One day, I’m going to find those people and really do something horrible to them, trust me on that, Ems. But for now, I thought today you’d like something different,” she said, opening the book. “Mom loved this one, she used to read it to me when I was sick. It’s really old but I think you’ll like it.”

Flipping pages, she found the beginning of the text, and began, “At the first smile of day, when the sun was just beginning to shine on the summits of the hills, men whose custom was to live by rapine and violence ran to the top of a cliff that stretched toward that mouth of the Nile which is called Heracleot...“

Her quiet voice filled the room for the next two hours.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Danny paused outside the door, listening, then carefully opened it. He found his daughter sitting with a book in her lap, one hand holding one of Emma’s under the covers. She glanced up at him as he entered, smiling in a regretful way.

“How are you doing?” he asked.

“Same as always, Dad,” she replied. He picked up her backpack and held it open for her to put the book, an old one he remembered well from his wife’s collection of literature, into. She’d always had a slightly odd outlook on suitable bedtime stories, he reflected with sad amusement as he zipped it up and watched Taylor lean over Emma’s face, her own long curls hiding the pale form below her.

“I miss you, Ems,” he heard very faintly, then she stood, reluctantly letting go of her friend’s hand. Putting his hand on her back he guided her out of the room, taking a last glance back at his own oldest friend’s youngest daughter with the usual feeling of suppressed rage. Not showing any of it, although he suspected that Taylor knew, he walked next to her to the elevator. While they were descending he studied her face. She was clearly, and entirely reasonably, sad, but was bearing up as she always seemed to.

“One day she’ll come back,” he said softly.

“I really want to believe that, Dad,” she replied, not sounding convinced.
“The doctors say her coma isn’t the result of major brain damage, after all,” he added. “Just some lingering affects of the attack. It could end any time.”

“Or it might never end,” the girl said with a small depressed shrug. “That’s the problem. No one knows.”

“Unfortunately true,” he was forced to agree as the doors opened. They signed out of the hospital, then headed to the car. As they got in, he looked up, then pointed. “Hey, Glory Girl and Panacea,” he said, indicating the flying figure descending to the helipad on top of the building.

Taylor glanced out the window, then pulled her phone out. He smiled as he started the car. She seemed to be quite interested in taking photos of Parahumans at the moment. If nothing else it had the benefit of raising her spirits.

“Chinese or Thai today?” he asked as he pulled out onto the main street.

His daughter, who was concentrating on her phone with a small frown, looked up at him and replied, “How about Italian?”

“Yeah, that works for me. Haven’t had a good pasta carbonara in weeks. Gino’s?”

“Sounds good, Dad,” she smiled, tapping the phone screen a couple of times and putting it in her pocket with one last glance back at the hospital and a thoughtful look on her face. This cleared after a second or two and she reached out to turn the radio on, then settled back to listen to the music as he drove.

“When you’ve finished upending physics, you could always turn your attention to biology,” he said after a couple of miles. “Give it the Hebert touch. Seems to be a fairly potent thing...”

She looked at him and snickered, then got a very thoughtful look again and went quiet.

“Oh, hell, what did I just do?” he muttered, wondering what the next oddity his daughter would come up with would be...

Oh well. He’d find out sooner or later.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Replaying a short segment of the video, Taylor nodded slowly. “OK, that probably means ‘energy flux’ which means that this might mean ‘radiation.’ I think.” She made a few notes in her journal, which was slowly becoming an English to whatever the hell it was her aliens called their own language dictionary. Replaying the segment again, she listened carefully, while watching the instructor’s actions. “Yeah. Got to be ‘radiation.’ Great, that helps.” She corrected one of her notes, then moved to the next segment.

After a few hours of work, she flipped back a couple of dozen pages and studied each carefully. “I’ll get it sooner or later,” she assured herself, trying to work out how to make some of the sounds required. An attempt that produced a croaking gurgle which sounded like a drunk crow set her off into helpless giggles, and made her father stick his head into the basement and inquire as to the state of her mental health. Once she had, laughing, pushed him out again, she put the self imposed language lessons to one side and transferred her attention to one of her other projects.

Picking up her modified phone she plugged a USB cable into it, then downloaded the latest recorded data to her analysis program and started work on it. A while later she sat back and studied the screen closely, one eyebrow up. “Hmm. Curiouser and curiouser as a certain famous girl would say,” she mumbled, running one fingernail down from where a specific curve intersected another one, while making calculations in her head.

“Interesting. Very, very interesting,” she added under her breath as she picked up a different notebook and flicked through it looking for the right place. Finding it, she checked the data there, then slowly nodded. “Huh. I was right. Cool.”

Making another note, she put the book down on her workbench and studied the graphs in silence for a while. Then she turned to the other screen and fired up the circuit design CAD package.

The new data sparked some ideas she needed new sensors for, and that was going to need some careful design work.

There was Science to be done.

She enjoyed that.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“The Path has become… uncertain.”

“What does that mean?”

“I have no idea.”

“You have no idea?”

“I know. It worries me too...”

Chapter Text

Opening the door, Danny smiled at the people outside. “Hello, Angus, Brendan. Nice to see you both. Come in.” He moved to the side as his guests entered, then stamped the snow off their shoes on the mat. Once they were out of the way he closed the door, glancing out at the steadily falling snow. “Looks like we’re going to get quite a bit tonight,” he added as he turned to them.

“I’ve always enjoyed a white Christmas,” Angus chuckled.

“Presumably because you don’t have to shovel the driveway,” Brendan put in with a grin. “I, on the other hand, am quite pleased to no longer live somewhere where that’s a regular occurrence. I don’t miss it.”

Danny laughed. “It’s not too bad, I’ve never had any troubles myself,” he said as he took their coats and hung them up. “We’re in the living room, just there on the right.”

“You’re also twenty years or more younger than we old men,” Angus pointed out reasonably as he headed in that direction, the other two following. “You young whippersnapper.”

“Yes, very old man of you.” Danny shook his head in amusement as the physicist smirked over his shoulder.

“Hi, guys!” Taylor looked up as they all went into the living room, smiling widely. “Merry Christmas.”

“And to you, Taylor,” Brendan replied, returning the smile. “How are you? I haven’t seen you for a few weeks. Designed anything new?”

“Oh, lots of things,” she giggled as she stood up from where she’d been fiddling with the back of the TV, which was sitting on a low table near the closed curtains over the front window. “So many things.” She gestured to the sofa. “Sit down, I’ll get the snacks.”

Danny stepped aside as his daughter zipped out of the room and vanished into the kitchen, amused at her energy. The girl was happier these last few months than she’d been since a certain black period they’d both gone through, which in turn boosted his own morale a huge amount. He sat down as did the others. Brendan looked around the room, his gaze stopping on the photos of Danny, Taylor, and Annette that lined one of the shelves on the bookcase near the TV, then moving on.

“That’s an awful lot of books,” he noted, returning his attention to Danny. “I’m impressed.”

Danny looked around for a moment, smiling fondly. “My wife was a voracious reader, and Taylor is if anything more so,” he replied softly. “Annette collected a pretty big library. There are more in the study, in my bedroom, in the upstairs hall, and the guest room, and Taylor’s bedroom...”

The other two looked amused at his comment. “Books are essential to a well developed mind in my view, so I approve,” Angus said.

“She felt the same,” Danny agreed, wishing yet again that his wife was still with them. He could see in their eyes that they knew what he was thinking and sympathized. Moments later Taylor reappeared with a tray full of bite-sized snacks which she’d spent most of the afternoon making, having decided that she wanted to do some cooking, along with a carafe of coffee and some mugs. Putting it down on the low table in the middle of the room, she looked around.

“Coffee? Or I can make some tea.”

“Coffee is fine for me, thanks, Taylor,” Angus commented. Brendan nodded.

“Same for me.”

“Sure.” She quickly poured out three mugs and handed them over, before jumping up again and vanishing for a moment, returning with a glass of coke. Pointing out what was what, she handed plates of snacks around, everyone shortly ending up with enough to keep them going for a while.

“These are very good, Taylor,” Brendan observed having eaten a little savory pastry with enjoyment.

“Thanks,” she smiled. “I got the recipe from one of Mom’s notebooks, it was one she used to make when I was little. It took me a few goes to get it right, but I think it worked out pretty well.” She ate one of them herself and nodded. “Might need a little more cinnamon next time.”

Danny looked fondly at her as she made a note in one of the little books she carried everywhere, then put it away.

Angus glanced to the side, then grinned at them both. “I like your tree.”

Turning to the far corner and also looking at the same thing, Danny chuckled. Taylor looked at it proudly too. The ‘tree’ was a construction made of delicately fabricated metal branches, all anodized different colors, with hundreds of tiny LEDs twinkling on them in a cheerful manner. The thing that really stood out, though, was that it was floating in mid air a clear two feet off the floor, suspended from the ‘star’ on top which was a two inch wide variant of one of Taylor’s gravity generators, the device emitting a beautiful golden glow that emulated sunlight almost perfectly. He had no idea how she’d managed to get it to do that.

“I thought it was a bit boring to have a plain old evergreen and why make some poor tree die in our living room just because of the time of year?” Taylor explained happily. “So I made that. Much more interesting.”

“It’s… different… I’ll grant you that,” Brendan replied with a raised eyebrow and a smile. “And quite pretty, I have to admit.”

“Thanks.”

The doorbell rang again, Taylor jumping up once more. “I’ll get it,” she said as she dashed out of the room. Everyone watched her go.

“Oh, to have the energy of the young again,” Angus snickered.

“Very few of the young have the energy of the Taylor,” Danny remarked wisely, sipping his coffee, which made the other two laugh. Moments later after a certain amount of muffled talking in the hallway, his daughter came back followed by Alan, Zoe, and Anne Barnes. Danny got up and went to meet them.

“Glad you could make it,” he said to the new arrivals, giving Zoe a hug, then putting his arm around Anne’s shoulders for a moment. The oldest of the Barnes children, currently eighteen, smiled at him.

“We wouldn’t miss coming over, Uncle Danny,” she said. “Emma… would want us to.”

Her voice hitched on the last few words and he held her closer for a moment. “I know,” he replied quietly. “I know, my dear. She’ll be back, sooner or later, so don’t lose hope.”

“Thanks,” the girl said very softly. Taylor grabbed her in a hug as he released her, then shook Alan’s hand, his old friend smiling gratefully with one eye on his own daughter.

“How’s it going, Danny?” Alan asked as Danny waved them to seats, Taylor dragging the older girl into the kitchen after a quick whisper.

“Not bad at all, Alan. You remember Angus, of course, and this is Brendan Calhoun, one of our clients.” Alan looked at the other two men, Brendan rising to shake his and Zoe’s hands.

“Nice to meet you. Hello, Angus.”

“Good evening, both of you,” Angus replied with a smile. “It’s been a little while since we last met.”

“About… nine months or so, I think?” Zoe said as she sat, then peered at the half depleted tray. “Ooh. Are those Annette’s savory pastries?”

“They are indeed,” Danny nodded. “Help yourself.” She quickly acquired one and tried it, smiling broadly.

“Very good. Your work?”

“I’m a reasonable cook but not that good,” he laughed as he also sat down again. “All that is entirely Taylor.”

Zoe raised an eyebrow approvingly. “She’s definitely got a knack for cooking, I think,” she replied, finishing the snack. Taylor and Anne came back in just in time to hear this, the younger girl looking pleased.

“Thanks, Aunt Zoe,” she said as she put another tray down, Anne doing the same with a smaller one containing more mugs, another carafe of coffee, a teapot, and some cans of soda. “Hopefully you’ll like the meal, it’s one I found in mom’s books. Apparently it’s based on a really old recipe from the middle ages, chicken and plums in sauce. It sure smells nice.”

“Ah, is that what that is?” Zoe sniffed a little. “I was trying to place it. I remember Annette made that, oh… ten years ago? Maybe twelve? It was very good.”

Taylor looked pleased. “Hopefully mine will be as good.”

Shortly everyone had drinks and snacks. Anne spent a couple of minutes admiring Taylor’s ‘tree’ with a slightly incredulous look, which made both Danny and his daughter smile. “You are weird, Taylor,” she finally said, shaking her head.

The younger girl giggled. “It seems perfectly reasonable to me.”

“It would. Because you’re weird.”

They grinned at each other, then Taylor tossed her a controller, turning the TV on at the same time. “Sit down and lose to the master,” she ordered, pointing at the floor.

“Master my ass,” the Barnes girl replied with a smirk, dropping to the floor next to Taylor. Moments later they were firing turtle shells at each other.

Danny and the others watched for a while. He was pleased to see that Taylor was having fun even though she clearly missed having Emma around too. She’d always gotten on well with the older Barnes sister, although she wasn’t as close to her as she was to Emma, and after the attack they’d comforted each other a lot. It was nice to see Taylor also distracting Anne from thinking about her younger sister, which was clearly at least partly deliberate. He looked over at Zoe and Alan, both of them meeting his eyes and nodding a little.

“Business going well, Danny?” Alan asked, leaning back on the sofa and putting his arm around his wife, the other hand holding his coffee.

“Very well, yes,” he replied, glancing at Angus who was listening with interest. Brendan was apparently watching the girl’s game, but he knew the other man was also listening. “We’re still upgrading a lot of the DWU facilities, that’ll probably be going on for a year or so at least, but we’ve managed to reactivate nearly half the place so far. Luckily most of the buildings are fairly intact, and you wouldn’t believe how much stuff we have stored away around the place. Now that the ship’s out of the mouth of the bay, we’re expecting to see quite the surge in general dock work and all the other things that go along with that.”

“What are you doing with that huge ship?” Zoe asked with interest. “Surely it’s too much of a wreck to be salvageable?”

“Oh, definitely, the thing’s a write off,” Danny nodded. “The engines have been under water since it was scuttled for a start, there’s so many holes in the hull it looks like a colander, and almost anything usable was ripped out over the years. We’ll cut it up as scrap to get rid of it, it’s worth a fair bit for the metal since there’s so much of it, but we moved it mostly to get it out of the way.”

“And to make a certain point in a controlled manner,” Alan commented wryly, causing Brendan to look at him for a moment then go back to watching the girls.

“There’s an aspect of that, I’ll admit,” Danny replied with equanimity, making Angus snort with humor. “Various parties were inevitably going to find out about Gravtec sooner or later, and doing it like that let us control the narrative more than sneaking around would have done.” He shrugged. “Or so our advisers said.” He noticed Brendan smirk very slightly out of the corner of his eye. “Seems to have worked.”

“No trouble from the PRT?”

“Not since that first visit,” Danny said, shaking his head. “Armsmaster was impressed and went off pretty happy, and from what Angus says he’s fascinated by our research. Director Piggot wasn’t even slightly in a good mood for a while, which is hardly unusual from what I’m told, but our information is that the local PRT finally decided that it wasn’t their problem and washed their hands of the whole thing. Which was the point, of course.”

Alan nodded, smiling a little. “I wonder what the higher ups are thinking?”

“No idea. Don’t really care as long as they stay out of our hair,” Danny replied with a grin. “They can handle the Parahuman problems and leave superscience to the legitimate businessmen and women.”

“And scientists,” Angus put in.

“Yes. And scientists.” Danny nodded. “That goes without saying.”

Brendan chuckled, not looking away from the TV.

“Are you going to be employing more people at the DWU, do you think?” Zoe asked with interest.

Danny looked at her. “In the long run, definitely, but of course these days the security checks are the main problem,” he replied. “It’s going to take a while to get everything set up for that. But yeah, we’re certainly going to need more people sooner or later at this rate.”

“Good, it’s nice to see things starting to improve,” she smiled.

“Finally,” he agreed.

They talked and grazed on the snacks for the next hour or so, Taylor getting up every now and then to check on the progress of the main meal she was making. Eventually she came back into the living room and said, “Dinner is to be served in the dining room in five minutes,” in a very posh accent, before disappearing again. He could hear Anne laughing from the kitchen.

Looking around the room, he said with a small smile, “I think in that case we should adjourn to the dining room. We don’t want to make the chef angry.”

“That would most likely not end well,” Brendan agreed with a nod, standing up and recovering his coffee mug from the floor, which he put in the tray on the way past. A few minutes later all of them were in the next room, which didn’t get used much these days, the old dining table pulled out to full size with the extra section fitted in the middle. All the places had been set earlier, so they seated themselves just as Taylor and Anne came in bearing dishes of food.

Very soon they were eating what turned out to be a remarkably good meal, and talking happily. Danny looked around at his guests and his daughter, feeling that while he wished certain things about life now were different, he couldn’t really complain about how things had turned out.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Merry Christmas, Taylor,” Zoe said, handing her a small wrapped package. Taylor accepted it with a smile.

“Thanks, Aunt Zoe,” she replied. “Here, I got this one for you.” She gave the older woman a slightly larger package with iridescent wrapping paper, which she’d taken a liking to when she found it in the shop. It reminded her of a diffraction grating, which of course it essentially was, and the play of colors as you moved it around was fascinating.

“Very pretty, dear,” Zoe said after examining it. “Thank you.”

“Don’t open it until Christmas,” Taylor added, causing Zoe to smile and nod.

“Of course I won’t. But that’s only two days, so I think I can manage to hold my curiosity until then.”

They shared a giggle. “Your father seems happier than I’ve seen him for quite a while,” Zoe said after a few seconds, looking around to where Taylor’s dad was talking to Brendan and Alan, with Anne in the background explaining something about the video game they’d been playing earlier to Angus. “For that matter, so do you.”

Taylor smiled gently, nodding. “I think we are, Aunt Zoe,” she replied quietly. “It was bad for some time. But...” She sighed deeply. “Mom wouldn’t have wanted us to mope around. It’s hard not to sometimes, I admit. Getting Gravtec going, though, and the stuff happening with the DWU and all that… it’s really helped with Dad, he’s got something he can actually do to help now. And he’s loving it. Me too, I’ve got all the toys and people want me to make things, which is a lot of fun.”

Zoe glanced at the floating tree-like construct, then met Taylor’s eyes. She looked both proud and highly amused. “I can see that,” she said with a giggle. “You really are remarkable, Taylor.”

Taylor buffed her fingernails on her shirt then examined them with a supercilious expression. “I am, yes.” They both broke down laughing after a second or two. “Thanks. I really am having fun though.”

“Annette would have been very pleased about that,” Zoe told her. “She always wanted the best for both of you. I’m so glad it’s working out.” She looked at the tree-thing again. “Although I have no idea how...”

“It’s SCIENCE!” Taylor said, thrusting her arm skywards and putting the other one on her hip.

Anne looked at her, then Angus, before nearly falling over laughing. Taylor grinned.

Zoe simply shook her head.

“Changing the subject, are you going to Arcadia, did you decide?” she asked curiously.

Taylor dropped to the sofa from where she’d jumped up, then pulled her knee up and put both hands on it. “Yeah. The home schooling thing is great, I’ve done about three years worth this year, since it’s a lot easier when people aren’t bothering me, but Dad thinks I need ‘socialization’ or something like that. Silly, I know, I’m nice and social already, but I need to keep him happy.” She grinned as her father looked at her with a raised eyebrow, waved at him, and laughed when he sighed and went back to discussing something with the others. Who seemed to find this funny too.

Zoe was giggling once more. “You’re a very friendly girl, Taylor, I’m sure you’ll get on fine.”

“I hope so,” she admitted, a little nervously and dropping the act. “I think I dodged a bullet not going to Winslow, after… well, after. I’ve heard some weird things about it. But Arcadia is supposed to be pretty good, and after all my work they agreed to jump me up a year. I’m not sure if that’s good or not. I’ll be doing something that’s closer to what I’m up to, yeah, but I’ll also be the youngest person in the class, probably. So...” She chewed her lip for a moment, then shrugged. “I can’t honestly say I’m not a little worried, but Dad might have a point. I hardly see anyone my own age at the moment.”

The older woman patted her knee. “You’ll do fine, dear. You’re a friendly and happy girl, and ferociously smart. I’ve got no doubt you’ll succeed at anything you want to. Just look around!” She waved at the floating construction in the corner. “You’re doing some amazing things. And even if you can’t tell most people about that, it’s going to end up helping all sorts of things, I’m sure about that.”

“I guess so,” Taylor nodded. “It’s a little annoying that I can’t tell anyone who doesn’t have clearance, but I understand why, and I even agree with it. But it’s going to make things a little awkward.”

“I doubt you’ll have any trouble making some new friends even so, Taylor,” Zoe remarked with a small smile. “After all, everyone has their own secrets.”

Taylor looked at the tree, then back at Zoe, her lips twitching. “Admittedly most people’s secrets aren’t a matter of national security,” the older woman allowed with a snicker.

“Yeah. Oh well. We’ll see after Christmas, I guess.”

They shared a smile, then Zoe went over to join the conversation around the coffee table, while Taylor pulled out a notebook and started sketching a preliminary design for a hand-held MRI scanner that she’d been thinking about for a few weeks now. Every now and then she looked around at her dad and friends, feeling that she was definitely in a good place.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Who’s that?”

Vicky looked at her friend Jackie, then in the direction the other girl indicated. A somewhat younger girl, probably about a year their junior although pretty tall for her age, with lustrous curly black hair halfway down her back, was standing in the line at the serving area in the cafeteria. She looked vaguely familiar but Vicky couldn’t place her immediately.

“Not sure,” she replied, trying to think where she’d seen the girl. She nudged Amy with her elbow, causing her sister to mutter something rude under her breath as she nearly dropped the book she was reading. “Hey, Ames, any idea who the new girl is?”

Amy looked over, then shook her head, stopping halfway through the gesture. “Oh… hang on, didn’t I see her… Right. I remember. Saw her at the hospital a couple of times, I think. Dunno who she is though, other than a friend of one of the long term coma patients there.”

“That girl who got mugged?” Vicky asked, suddenly remembering one case about a year back that she’d rushed her sister in to deal with. It had been pretty fucking nasty, she recalled, Amy having come out looking furious and sad at the same time.

“Yeah.” She knew she wasn’t going to get anything more about it and didn’t bother asking. Her sister took medical privacy seriously.

One of Vicky’s other friends came over, having noticed the direction they were all looking. “New transfer in,” Melissa, a short blonde, said as she stopped next to their table. “Taylor Hebert, she’s in Mandy’s home room. She was home schooling for the last year, after her mother got killed, I hear. Traffic accident. She’s crazy smart from what Mandy said. Get this, she did three years worth of schooling in one year. They bumped her up a year, she’s not even sixteen yet.”

“Holy crap. Really? Three years all by herself?” Vicky stared at her friend as did the others, horrified. “Doesn’t the poor girl go out? She must have spent every minute slaving over a book!”

Melissa shrugged. “No idea. But Mandy said she was nice, friendly you know? Oh, yeah, she also said we’ve got a new science teacher, and there are a couple of new people in the administration. Seems to be a lot of new staff around these days.”

“I don’t care about new teachers, I want to know about new students,” Vicky laughed. “You know me, I’m curious.”

“You’re pushy, you mean,” Amy grumbled, going back to her book. “Leave the poor girl alone.”

“She’s coming this way!”

Everyone, including Amy, looked. Sure enough, the new girl was wandering in their direction, apparently looking for a free seat.

Vicky shoved Jackie along the table. “Move over,” she said.

“Hey!”

“I want to meet the new girl. She looks interesting.”

“Oh, fine.” Sighing, her friend slid her chair sideways, while Melissa helpfully grabbed one from the table behind them and spun it around. As the tall brunette approached, Vicky waved.

“Hey, want a seat?” she called.

The other girl paused and looked at her, then at the others. One hand was holding her tray and the other her phone. After a glance at the screen, she prodded the thing with her thumb and put it in her pocket, then smiled at them. “Sure. Thanks.” Sliding her tray onto the table she sat down. “Hi. I’m Taylor.”

“Vicky, this is Amy, my sister, this is Jackie, and this is Melissa,” Vicky quickly said. “So you’re new here, I guess?”

“Yeah.” Taylor nodded as she picked up a fork. “Just started today. It seems like a nice place so far.”

She looked around, pausing for a moment on a table a couple of rows away at which Vicky’s on and off boyfriend Dean was talking intently to a couple of other boys, Carlos and Dennis, about something or other. Right now Vicky wasn’t talking to him, and he knew exactly why. Taylor’s eyes moved on, then she smiled at Vicky. “It’ll be interesting to see what I learn here.”

“You like learning?” Vicky asked curiously.

“Oh, yeah, I’m interested in all sorts of things,” Taylor replied earnestly. Her pocket made a ping sound, making her mutter something under her breath and pull the phone out, quickly check it, then put it away. “Sorry, left an app running.”

“That’s a pretty big phone,” Jackie commented.

“It’s an unusual model, but I like the battery life,” Taylor smiled as she started eating her mac and cheese. “Lasts nearly a week.”

“It looks like it’d break your foot if you dropped it,” Amy remarked with a small grin, looking up from her book. Taylor laughed.

“It pretty much bounces.” She glanced at Dean’s table for a moment, then went back to eating. Vicky looked over as well, seeing the boy was now gesticulating vigorously, apparently acting out some football play or something, and sighed faintly.

“So what hobbies do you have?” she asked.

Taylor looked at her for a moment.

“I like electronics,” she said thoughtfully. “And reading. And learning things like I said.” She smiled faintly. “I’ve been doing a lot of distance learning this last year.”

“That’s… nice.” Vicky shook her head in despair. “We need to get you interested in normal things.”

“We do?” Amy looked up again, then at Taylor, who seemed amused. “For god’s sake, Vicky, she’s been here about ten minutes. Give her a chance!”

Jackie started laughing, while Vicky smiled. “I told you, I like meeting new people. Taylor’s new. So there we go.”

Her sister merely sighed and shook her head.

Turning back to the new girl, Vicky leaned in. “OK. Here’s some of the important things you need to know about Arcadia...”

Taylor listened with interest as the girls took turns, even Amy after a while, explaining the various aspects of life in the best school in Brockton Bay.

Chapter Text

“Hmm.”

Taylor looked at her phone with one eyebrow up a little, then past it to where Vicky Dallon was floating about ten centimeters off the floor, arguing with her boyfriend yet again. It was a fairly good-natured argument but it was still an argument, something the pair seemed to engage in far more than seemed sensible.

She’d seen it happen at least four times in the last week, since the start of her time in Arcadia. Which she was quite enjoying. Her father had been right, it was nice to meet other people her own age, even if many of them seemed to be a little slow on the uptake at times. Most of them were still friendly and she liked them.

Already she’d made several friends, she felt. Vicky, definitely, was one of those, as the girl was impossible not to like even though she had something of a reputation too. She was remarkably outgoing, generally seemed pretty honest and enthusiastic, and was a mine of information on Parahumans, which explained why she was studying the subject. Her sister, too, was interesting. Very sarcastic and generally far quieter than Vicky, which admittedly was the case for most people, but definitely very intelligent. They shared a love of reading which had, when it had come up, seemed to make the brunette Dallon sister open up quite a bit.

Taylor rather suspected that Amy wasn’t entirely happy with life, and lacked friends. She was prepared to help with both cases.

Vicky’s boyfriend Dean was a slightly odd guy. He’d been introduced to Taylor a couple of days ago, when they’d made up yet again, and had shaken her hand readily enough but had also given her a somewhat strange look for reasons she wasn’t entirely certain about. Aside from that he seemed nice enough, and was certainly very polite. His friends Dennis and Carlos were amusing, Dennis particularly, although he sometimes tried too hard. According to Vicky he had a reputation of his own, and was rather more familiar with detention than ideal…

She hadn’t yet been introduced to Chris, the other guy who hung around with the first three on a regular basis, but she’d seen him around.

Glancing at her phone again, she tapped the screen a couple of times, saving the readings for later analysis, then put it away as the bell rang.

Another positive of attending Arcadia had been all the data she was getting on Parahumans, of course.

It somewhat amused her that she’d ended up almost instantly meeting most of the ones who went to the same school. At the insistence of one of the more obvious members of that group.

She wondered if Vicky knew that Dean and his friends were the Wards? Presumably yes, as it wasn’t difficult to work out even if you didn’t have a subspace quantum interference detector handy. They weren’t exactly being as sneaky about it as they probably thought they were. Considering the number of people Taylor had met who were as sneaky as they thought they were, she’d had quite a lot of practice working this sort of thing out, but even without that she was a little surprised that no one else seemed to know. Or perhaps they did, and were merely discreet about it? Who knew? She was aware that Parahumans were pretty picky about who they let know their real identities to, for very good reasons from what she’d learned when she studied the situation, and she could hardly begrudge them the same sort of thing that the government was going to great lengths to arrange in her own case.

And she had no intention at all of mentioning to anyone else what she was working out, unless it became completely necessary. People deserved their privacy.

But she was gathering some really intriguing data here. Data that she needed close proximity to fully acquire and analyze. Data that pointed towards some fascinating possibilities.

She liked data like that. Mind you, she liked data in general. Learning things was fun.

As the teacher came in everyone settled down, although he had to look hard at Vicky to make her stop floating around and land. The blonde girl smiled at him, the man sighed very faintly, then everyone got their textbooks out and opened them.

“All right,” he said after he’d checked everyone was present and nothing was amiss. “Who can tell me what mitochondrial DNA is?”

Half a dozen people’s hands shot up, Taylor’s among them. She was finding biology rather interesting, and had some intriguing ideas percolating in the back of her head already.

She made a mental note to ask Amy some questions at some point, as it seemed likely that the girl might well shed light on a few things she was wondering about.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Taylor? You in here?”

“Over here, Dad,” Taylor called as she looked around from where she was half-way up a tall row of steel shelving that was entirely covered in boxes, most of them dusty and obviously untouched for years. The rolling ladder she was using was tall enough to reach all the way to the ceiling, but moving it around the larger stuff on the floor had been something of a pain in the ass. She’d ended up having to enlist the aid of a couple of the dock workers to help, which they’d done efficiently and without any issues. Now she was leaning over one of the boxes which she’d opened, rummaging around inside the random items filling it to the brim.

“What on earth are you doing up there?” he asked when he’d negotiated his way through the rows of shelving. This store room was so full of stuff it was reminiscent of the last scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark, she thought with a smile. He stopped at the bottom of the ladder and looked up at her with interest.

“I needed some more C63020 nickel aluminum bronze bar for machining a part from, and we’re out of it in the Gravtec stock,” she explained, holding up a thirty centimeter piece of three centimeter diameter somewhat greenish-gold metal. “Dan said he thought there was some left over from making bearing bushes a few years back, but he couldn’t remember exactly which box it was in.” She waved at the shelving next to her. “Aside from it being somewhere in this section. So I thought I’d poke around and see if I could find it.”

“Clearly you succeeded,” he said with a smile.

“Yeah. Found about fifty kilos of it, that’s more than enough. We’ve got more on order but it won’t be here for a couple of days because that alloy is a little unusual, and I wanted to make this thing today.” She shrugged with a grin. “Worth wasting an hour or so looking for, especially when it wasn’t a waste.” Putting the bar down on the steps with a clunk, next to three more just like it, she turned back to the box.

“So why are you still here?” he asked, ascending the steps until he could look into the box himself, as she pulled out a lump of oily machinery and tried to work out what it was.

“Got curious about all this stuff,” she mumbled, turning the thing over in her hand, then deciding it was some sort of diesel injection pump by the looks of it. She put it to one side as not worth bothering with and delved deeper.

He chuckled, putting his hand on her back affectionately. “I always said you should be a customs inspector, the way you basically inventory everything you get your hands on,” he said with a grin. She glanced at him and smiled, before returning to what she was doing. It was more or less true, ever since she’d been a little kid she’d tended to poke around in cupboards and storage areas and make mental lists of what was there. Her mother had more than once, having misplaced something, simply asked her where it was and she’d been able to think for a moment then tell her.

“Alternator from a truck,” she muttered, putting the next item down. “Broken milling cutter, pity, it’s a nice one, stainless steel bolt, um… barrel from a machine gun, I think?” She held up the metal tube questioningly. He took it from her and peered at it.

“AK-47 barrel, probably from one of the guns the ABB is always losing around the Docks,” he said after a moment, handing it back. “They’re very slapdash with their weapons. We’ve broken up a lot of them for parts over the years, or just to make sure they don’t get used again.”

“Huh. OK.” The barrel went next to the box as she kept digging. “Ooh! Some tubes… couple of thyratrons, nice ones, that’s an old radar klystron, and some brand new heliax connectors! Cool. I’m having those.” She put her loot next to the bronze bars with a satisfied smile.

Her father chuckled again. “You have more resources available to you than God himself but you’re looking through piles of scrap?”

She giggled. “Well, yeah, but some of this old stuff is neat, and why waste it?” Moving a couple of ancient and rusty gear wheels the size of her hand to the side, she kept looking. “And you never know if you’ll find something really int...”

Taylor paused, then stuck her hand right down to the bottom of the box, grabbing something that had caught her eye as she moved her head a little and the light from behind her glinted off it. After a moment’s tugging, and a bit of help from her father holding the box in place, she yanked whatever it was into the open from under all the other stuff.

“...eresting,” she finished slowly, examining her find with great care. “What the hell is this thing?”

Turning it over, she peered at the widget closely. “This isn’t commercial stuff,” she added thoughtfully. “It’s hand made.”

The device was a lump of electronics with some custom made mechanical parts sticking out one end, the entire thing about the size of a hard drive. It showed signs of having suffered from an uncontrolled thermal release, or as a non-engineer called it, a fire. There were scorch marks up one side, although when she experimentally rubbed them with her thumb, it became apparent that the damage was superficial and external, not from the thing itself having burned out. A bundle of wiring sticking out the side had been crudely cut, probably with a hacksaw, and one of the mounting lugs was snapped off too.

Overall on first appearance it looked similar to a vehicle ECU, but she could see that while the casing had probably come from such a thing, and the wiring was using the standard color codes car manufacturers used, all of this had been repurposed for another use. It reminded her of her own first prototypes although she was fairly sure hers were neater. The holes that had been drilled in the box weren’t lined up very well, for example, which was just sloppy.

“Let’s have a look,” her father said, sitting on the next step down. She handed it to him, then went back to poking around in the box to see if there was anything else like that in there.

“Hmm. I think this might just be a bit of one of Squealer’s horrible mashups,” he finally said, just as she pulled out another vaguely similar device that was in a similar state, although from a quick inspection probably did something different. She froze, then slowly turned her head.

“That’s real Tinker tech?” she asked in amazement.

“I think so, yes. About… maybe three years back? Just after Squealer turned up and the Merchants were starting to become a problem rather than just a nuisance, they went up against the ABB for some reason I never worked out. Got the crap kicked out of them. Squealer and Skidmark barely escaped with their lives and about ten of the ordinary Merchants didn’t manage that. Several ABB died too, and there were close to fifty casualties among the bystanders, the cops, and the PRT when they finally turned up.” He shrugged with a sigh. “Usual thing, I’m afraid. Anyway, they had two of those bizarre vehicles she makes, really ugly stuff that shouldn’t work in the first place but somehow does. One of them was blown up by the ABB with a rocket launcher, the other one was what they escaped in, but Lung set it on fire on the way out. They dumped it in the bay about ten minutes later, just past Pat’s bar.”

“Huh.” Taylor nodded, absorbing the information. She hadn’t known about that particular event but then she’d only been about twelve or so at the time.

“The PRT salvaged a couple of things from it, like the obvious weapons, but they left most of it in the water,” he continued. “It was getting in the way of the wharf down there, so some of the guys ended up taking our crane barge over and fishing it out, then cut it up for scrap. PRT didn’t seem interested, the Merchants weren’t going to come and ask for it back, so we ended up with the whole thing. No use to anyone, it was a mess, half burned and mostly soaked in salt water.” He held up the module in his hand. “I vaguely recall that the back part of the thing wasn’t too badly damaged and we pulled out some bits and pieces like this that someone must have thought were worth keeping. No idea why, Tinker Tech has a very short shelf life after all, and can’t be fixed. And we don’t even know what it does anyway.”

“Cool.” Examining the unit she had in her own hand, Taylor pulled a small flashlight out of her pocket and shone it into one of the connector holes in the side. She could see the innards were somewhat sooty but looked mostly intact. And… wrong. “Very cool. More data,” she mumbled, tilting it around for a moment or two.

“Sorry, I missed that,” he said quizzically.

“I said it was interesting, Dad,” she replied more loudly, turning the light off and putting it back in her pocket, then smiling at him. “I think I want to have a look at these things. I’m curious, I’ve never seen a real Tinker device before.”

“Try not to kill us all,” he said after a moment’s reflection, handing her the other one. She stacked both of them next to her bronze rods, grinned at him, then went back to poking through the box of interesting crap.

“I would never do that, Dad,” she giggled.

“The roof would beg to differ,” he commented with a grin, making her look over her shoulder at him and roll her eyes a little. Standing, he descended the stairs. “Lock up when you’re done. I need to go talk to Angus, so I’ll see you later.”

“Later, Dad!” she called, waving without looking. She heard footsteps fade into the distance as she kept investigating what else might be in there.

When she finally stopped, three boxes later, covered in dust and oil, but with a wide smile, she had two more chunks of currently unidentifiable hardware clearly made by the same person, another even larger klystron, and a whole pile of semi-rigid copper RF interlinks with SMA connectors on the end, which she thought might come in handy at some point. Putting all the stuff she’d removed and discarded back where it came from took half an hour, and it was another ten minutes work to find an empty box for her haul. By the time she left the storeroom and locked it behind her, nodding to the security man posing as a dockworker and believing she didn’t know who and what he was, she was very contented with the results of her work.

And she was very intrigued to find out what sort of machine a Tinker actually produced.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Angus walked over to where Taylor was working at her computer, the young girl entirely surrounded by large monitors filled with windows showing multiple graphs, streaming columns of numbers, and at least half a dozen command terminals. She was rapidly typing into one of the latter, then inspecting the resulting output with concentration. As he watched, she nodded to herself, muttering under her breath as he’d noticed she tended to do when working, made a few cryptic notes on one of her pads at her elbow, then turned to one of the other monitors. “What are you working on?” he asked curiously, making her look up at him then quickly smile. “That doesn’t look like the gravity generator hardware.”

He peered at the complex schematic that was on one of the monitors with interest.

“Nope, it’s something else,” she said, going back to the screens and clicking a few controls, before leaning back and stretching. On the other side of the room one of the big color printers whirred into life, slowly extruding a huge sheet of paper covered in diagrams, while next to it a smaller one began spitting out pages of more normal paper. He could see even from here that they were dense with mathematical equations. “We’re going to need a chemical engineer and a materials scientist.”

She got up and went over to the printer as he followed, wondering what she’d done this time. Picking up the sheaf of paperwork that had already printed, she flipped through it, extracted half a dozen sheets, and handed them to him. “To make this,” she added as he accepted them and started reading.

After about three pages, he raised his eyes and met her amused gaze with incredulity. “A room temperature superconductor?”

“Yep. Should work, I think. As far as I can work out it’s not that hard to make, but I’m still working on theoretical chemistry so we need someone who knows their stuff.”

“Good lord.” He went back to the papers, scanning them carefully. Chemistry wasn’t his field but at this level it was as much physics anyway, and he understood that. The equations for electron Cooper pair formation were obvious, although she seemed to have extended a lot of the quantum theory surrounding valence bond resonance in an unexpected direction. He recognized some aspects of her revised theory of gravitics involved in the math, which was intriguing.

“It’s a type two superconductor, and the vortex glass phase temperature should be around eight hundred and sixty kelvin,” she explained, gathering up the rest of the printout as the printer spun down into silence, then tapping the stack into a neat pile. “Which is far better than any of the existing ones like the cuprate-perovskites. And it won’t suffer from some of the major downsides to that sort of stuff either, it should be a ductile material about the hardness of aluminum, not a brittle ceramic, for example. And I think it’ll be quite cheap to make.”

He shook his head in wonder, handing her the paperwork, which she put back into the pile, before running the entire thing through the binding machine. She gave him the still-warm document. “Probably a couple more patents in there, right?” she grinned.

Angus sighed a little, putting his free hand on her shoulder and saying, “You, my dear girl, are an unending source of delight, but keeping up with you is… difficult.”

Taylor laughed, smiling at him with amusement, then moved to the bigger printer as he flipped through the main document, which was a full description of the theory behind the material she’d apparently invented wholesale, along with a suggested high level process for making it. The details were left to someone with knowledge of this sort of chemical engineering, which he agreed would take an expert. Fortunately he knew several, all of whom would happily mortgage their families for a chance to work on something like this.

“You did mention superconductors that first time, but I’d forgotten about it,” he commented as he looked over her shoulder as she held up the large printout, which was a full schematic of a very complex piece of electronics. “I assume you need it for this, whatever it is?”

“Yes. It’s a hand-held MRI scanner,” she replied, holding the sheet very close to her face and checking one of the details, then nodding. He stared at her.

“A hand-held MRI?” he echoed, feeling the familiar sensation of not quite knowing how they’d arrived where they were without any intervening steps.

“Yep. It’s much higher resolution than the normal type, if I did it right, and will do both normal MRI and fMRI too. We should be able to adapt some commercial tomography software to work with it which will save time writing it all from scratch.” She rolled the diagram up and turned to him, holding it in one hand and tapping it on the other. “I can probably make it smaller with the second generation but I wanted to make a prototype and test it before that. I’ve designed the main electronics, all I need now is the superconductor so I can wind the main field coils. By the time we have that I’ll have the PCBs made and built, and some basic test software worked out.”

“You do realize that this little project of yours is enough to spin off an entirely separate company on the back of, I hope?” he asked with a shake of his head. She shrugged a little with a smile.

“I guess. But there’s nothing stopping Gravtec branching out, right? We can make gravitational frame regenerators and MRI scanners too. And all the other things I’m thinking about...”

“Well, we’ll certainly not run out of things to do in the short term,” he finally said, accompanying her back to her desk.

“Yeah. I wanted to get the easy stuff out of the way before I start working on the really cool things,” she giggled, making him sigh again. Mostly because he was certain she actually meant it.

“Completely changing the subject, how is school treating you?” he asked, sitting on the edge of her desk.

“It’s fun,” she replied after thinking it over for a moment. “I’ve met some interesting people, made a few friends so far, found some other things to learn about… I like it. It’s sure better than junior high was. That was so boring!”

He snorted with laughter. “Considering that you probably knew more about mathematics, physics, and several other fields than your teachers, I’m not entirely surprised you’d feel that way.”

The girl nodded with a sigh. “They kept wanting me to go over the same stuff, and told me to stop reading ahead. Which is ridiculous. The books were so simple it was silly, and there were quite a few errors in them too! But they got annoyed when I corrected them and shouted at me.” She folded her arms and glowered at the keyboard. “They should be using correct textbooks, not ones that make basic errors.”

Angus looked fondly at her. He could just imagine a twelve year old version of her carefully fixing the errors in a physics text with a pen, then getting upset when the teacher complained.

“Well, at least that part of your life is in the past,” he said calmly. “You have the rest of it in front of you, and you seem to be making the most of it.”

She brightened up as she dismissed previous indignities. “Yep. And it’s a lot of fun. Dad’s enjoying it too.”

“I think we all are.” As he was about to say something else, his phone rang, so he pulled it out of his pocket and looked at it. “Ah. Brendan. I’d better take this.”

“OK. See you later,” she replied, smiling.

“I’ll find a suitable group to work on this as well,” he said, holding up the document. “I have several people in mind already.”

“Great.” She waved as he walked off and by the time he was at his office she was deeply involved in yet another project. Closing the door, he sat down behind his own desk and tapped the answer icon.

“Hello, Brendan. Say, is DARPA interested in a room temperature superconductor that will cost about as much to make as stainless steel?”

He listened to the response with a broad grin.

When the other man finally shut up, he said, “Indeed. Our friend has certainly exceeded expectations yet again. I’m almost dreading to see what happens next.”

Looking at the document in front of him, he slowly turned pages as they talked, mentally building a list of what would be needed for yet another research group.

At this rate they should probably rename Brockton Bay University to the Taylor Hebert Research Institute and be done with it, he mused, smiling a little to himself.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Having finished her homework, Taylor closed the books and looked at the clock. “Half an hour. I can live with that,” she said to herself. Stacking everything neatly to the side, she got up, left her bedroom, and went downstairs. Her father was washing the dishes after dinner so she picked up a cloth and started drying the ones in the rack, getting a murmured thanks as she did. Between them they soon had the task finished. Afterwards, he got himself some coffee, tousled her hair on the way past causing her to squawk indignantly, laughed slightly, and went into the living room to watch the news.

Somewhat amused she grabbed a couple of cans of soda out of the fridge then went down into her lab, turning the lights on as she descended the stairs, then walking over to the workbench. Popping the tab on the first can she sipped it as she examined the four chunks of mystery Tinker hardware sitting there.

Eventually she pulled the chair out, sat down, put the open can and the new one to the side, and reached for a screwdriver. She turned on the high resolution camera above the bench, made sure it was pointed at her work area, then began disassembling the first device very slowly and carefully, making notes as she went and dictating her actions too.

Three and a half hours later she was staring at the guts of the devices in bemusement.

“That’s just wrong,” she finally said in exasperation. “Who the hell designed this junk? It’s a miracle it ever worked in the first place!” Shaking her head, she pulled the microscope head into place and slid one of the exposed circuits under the lens. “Right, then. Let’s see… OK, that’s never going to work for long, it’s entirely the wrong power rating. And this BJT is nowhere near the current required to drive that coil properly. Which seems to have been wound in the dark by a drunk one-armed monkey...”

Taylor sighed heavily, pulled one of the large format notebooks closer, picked up a fine pen, and began sketching out the circuit while puzzling over places where the designer seemed to have somewhat ineptly improvised a very inefficient method to do something the hardest way possible. She was wondering the entire time if all Tinkers just made it up as they went along, or whether Squealer was somehow a bit special in that respect.

Late that night, she finally yawned and sat back, rubbing her eyes. The sound of her alien tutors was a comforting background noise over the sound of the fans in the computers. Waving a little smoke away from where she’d unsoldered one of the components to examine how Squealer seemed to have modified it with a tiny add-on circuit connected to three of the pins she picked up the nearest soda can with her other hand, shook it slightly, then sighed as it was empty.

“Well, I can say with confidence that I don’t think she actually understood what she was doing,” she remarked out loud to the alien soundtrack, which didn’t pay any attention. “Because I can see what this is doing and it’s really not doing it very well at all. The phase space interactor can’t be more than about three percent efficient if that. And this is the crudest version of something that’s almost but not quite a tesseract coil I can imagine having the faintest possibility of working in the first place. I’m surprised it didn’t melt down the first time it was turned on.”

Picking up what was left of the device, which she’d determined after some time was meant to be an optical diversion field generator, or what PHO termed a cloaking device, she shook her head in wonder. “Cool idea, horrible implementation,” she added with a sigh, before putting it down again and looking at many pages of notes she’d made as she worked out what it was and how it worked. And the more pages of how it should have worked.

Deciding that designing her own, properly made, version could wait, she got up, dropped all the cans into the recycling bin under the desk, then headed upstairs to bed, flipping the lights off on the way.

It was late and tomorrow was a school day after all.

“Tinkers,” she grumbled as she went into her bedroom and closed the door.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“The Prime Asset has done it again, sir.”

“Good news, definitely. Is it likely to be as disruptive as the gravity devices?”

“At least. The ramifications are significant in a large number of fields. The railgun project will benefit from it immediately, but there are a huge array of possible areas that will also see massive changes.”

“Incredible. And gratifying.”

“Quite. I take it that there will be no problems with additional funding?”

“None. Everyone is agreed that this project, and the Prime Asset, are worth anything required.”

“That’s good to hear. On another note, has there been any more trouble from the expected directions?”

“We’ve had to intervene more often than I’d like, annoyingly. Certain parties are… less than entirely helpful in this case. It’s possible that more pressure will have to be exerted. But that’s our problem, you don’t need to worry about it at the moment. Just keep doing what you’re doing and we’ll see how it pans out.”

“And if there is… direct interference?”

“Deal with it.”

“I look forward to it, Sir.”

“I don’t, because it’s going to be a nightmare to clean up after if it happens, but that’s how it goes.”

“As you say. I’ll report again in three days as usual, unless the situation changes.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Chapter Text

The silence in the dark-paneled room was broken by the sound of pages turning. After a number of such noises half a minute apart, the turner of the pages closed the file and looked around at the others gathered around the oval table, stopping on the one at the far end who was sitting watching her as were the rest of them. His face was set in a practiced and professionally blank non-expression. Behind him on the wall were a number of official decorations while off to the side a US flag dangled from a ceremonial stand.

“The PRT would very much like to meet the Tinker behind these breakthroughs,” the woman said in a calm firm voice. “As there is clearly no way that this is not the work of either a very high level Tinker, or a Tinker/Thinker combination, based on our own experts. As such it falls within our jurisdiction and frankly we’re… somewhat curious… as to why DARPA has been given oversight.”

The man smiled a little, without any humor, while several of the others present stirred slightly. He shook his head. “No, Chief Director, I’m afraid that you do not have the clearance required to learn any more that what’s in that folder.”

“I have top secret clearance, sir.”

“You have top secret clearance, yes. You do not have the correct top secret clearance needed for this project. It is restricted to a very small number of need to know personnel, which does not include anyone associated with the PRT, I’m afraid.”

“Secretary Robinson, our remit as you know covers all Parahuman activities in the United States, and the last I checked, Brockton Bay was indeed still in this country.” Rebecca Costa-Brown looked hard at the man. He held up a hand as she was about to add to that.

“Correct, but irrelevant. As you can clearly see from the documents, tests were very thoroughly carried out on the relevant people and there is no doubt whatsoever that they are not in any way a Parahuman. Not by your own definition, nor any other accepted one. What they are is gifted with a level of intelligence that comes once in a millennium combined with an imagination and ability to innovate that is quite possibly unique. The combination has already led to some remarkable inventions, a complete upheaval in several fields including physics, and will certainly produce multiple Nobel prizes in due course. And, of course, it has opened a pathway towards a technological revolution that makes the invention of the printing press and steam engine look rather half-hearted.”

He smiled a little once more. “The long term ramifications are… beyond easy calculation at this point. But the short term ones are already paying dividends in a big way. At least fifty projects from the last six decades that were shelved due to lack of specific requirements have suddenly become viable, and we expect many more such things to happen. Gravtec and associated groups are vital to the scientific, technological, and military ability of this country, and I don’t think I’m being too excessive to say vital to the world as a whole. And the one thing we do not require is interference from outside sources.”

The Secretary of Defense leaned forward a little. “Not even one as… reputable… as the Parahuman Response Team. As admirable as your people are, we don’t need your specific expertise in this matter as it simply doesn’t include Parahuman abilities.”

Settling back, he added with a somewhat larger smile, “Should that change in future, of course, we would then read you in on the situation as required. But for now, there’s no Parahuman activity for you to involve yourself with, or to distract you and your agency from their own important tasks.”

Costa-Brown slapped her hand on the closed folder. “Our people as you put it are certain, even from the limited information you’ve seen fit to share with us, that these breakthroughs are literally decades, possibly centuries, past any state of the art known. It seems highly implausible that one person, or small group, could advance that far that quickly without any form of Parahuman input,” she replied, somewhat annoyed.

“We do know that there are a number of Tinkers who have successfully, and repeatably in most cases, built functional anti gravity systems. We also know that there are at least two Tinkers who can duplicate certain other Tinker technology, and in some cases derive aspects of the underlying principles. Admittedly not to the point that something this complex could be understood, but we feel that with the right combination of Parahuman abilities such a thing is possible.”

Shaking her head, she went on, “Much more possible than normal scientists, however talented and intelligent, leapfrogging current understanding in… almost everything… to arrive at theories a century in advance of anyone else. Therefore, the balance of opinion is that it has to involve Parahumans, despite what you’re claiming, and as such we need to be involved. For a number of reasons which I won’t bother going over yet again.”

He indicated the folder with one hand. “You’ve read that. Everything you are cleared to know is in it, and as I’ve explained, it clearly shows that Parahuman abilities are not involved. DARPA is very good, you realize, and they were extremely thorough in their tests.”

She almost snorted. “This tells me nothing about the actual person, all data has been anonymized, and I’ve got no idea even how old your alleged genius is. Or even if it’s one person or a group.”

“I know. That’s rather the point.” He looked mildly amused.

Both of them stared at each other for a while, no one else interrupting although the small audience seemed interested in what would happen next.

“I find this entire situation both highly irregular and more than a little irritating,” Costa-Brown finally commented with something of a glare. “And I’m certain that you’re hiding things that we should be involved in.”

“I can’t help that, Chief Director,” the man replied evenly. “You are free to feel that way. The fact remains that by direct order of the President, advised by the Chiefs of Staff, this matter is not something that concerns the PRT and isn’t likely to become such, at least in the short term. I’ve told you all I am allowed to, that’ll have to do.”

She opened her mouth, but he spoke again before she could get a word in. “Don’t push too hard on this, Chief Director. You won’t win. And we both know that you have far more work that you can handle even now without involving your agency in things that do not fall under your remit.”

Letting out an annoyed albeit faint sigh, she closed her mouth, glared at him, looked around to see everyone else watching her, then shook her head. “This has been singularly unhelpful,” she remarked acidly. Standing, she adjusted her clothing, then picked up the folder and looked at it, before dropping it back onto the table. “And I have to say I feel that you’re making a mistake.”

He shrugged very slightly. “We disagree, and even if that were to be the case, it still wouldn’t be relevant to the PRT. Thanks for your time.”

Costa-Brown examined him closely, then turned away. Heading towards the door, she commented, “This isn’t over, Secretary Robinson.” Once the guard had let her out and it had closed behind her, the Secretary rubbed his brow in a tired manner.

“I really hope it is, Chief Director,” he muttered. “It’s getting ridiculous.”

“You realize that the PRT is going to look for other ways to get more information,” one of the high ranking military men at the table said seriously. Robinson glanced at him and nodded with an expression of weariness.

“Probably. They’ve had their own way for far too long and think they can do pretty much anything they want,” he sighed. “We should have done something about that years ago, but...”

“They’re really not going to like some of the things that come out of The Project,” someone else, this one an elderly but very fit looking gray-haired woman, said with a small smirk.

“No, I suspect they won’t,” Robinson agreed, now looking mildly amused for a moment. “Time will tell how that works out.” He looked back at the first man. “Anything to worry about from Gravtec, or relating to the Prime Asset?”

“No, at the moment things are going fairly smoothly,” the four star general replied. “Kaiser has been warned off, and appears to have taken the warning in the way it was intended. We’ve got most of the required assets in place to deal with any of the other local threats and suitable interventions are being designed for the more serious ones. The PRT ENE is more than happy to stay well out of things, despite what the Chief Director might wish. Director Piggot is not a fan of hers, and is well aware that she’s got more than enough on her plate as it is without actively looking for new problems. The Prime Asset has settled well into new schooling and appears to be making friends. Interestingly two of the New Wave people are among those.”

Robinson raised an eyebrow. “Really? Hmm. Is that likely to be a problem?”

“Not at the moment. So far they mostly seem to be in contact at school. It’s possible that at some point it may be necessary to take steps if the Prime Asset desires further outside contact, but we’ve run background checks on all her associates and related personnel and nothing has been flagged as particularly worrisome at this point. We can contain most scenarios with the assets in place even now, and within a month or so we’ll have everything in place to deal with virtually any problem one way or the other.”

“I see. Excellent, please continue the good work. If all this continues to produce results like we’ve already seen, it could well solve a vast number of our current problems in ways we never even considered possible.”

“The international fallout of even the gravity technology is going to be… significant,” someone else pointed out. “And it’s inevitable that it’ll get out sooner or later. There are already a lot of rumors and chatter concerning the events in Brockton Bay as it is. No matter what we do we can’t contain knowledge of the technology indefinitely.”

“Agreed, but that was never the plan to begin with,” Robinson replied. “We need to make sure we have a significant lead and keep it, though. And to ensure that our allies are kept happy. But that’s not your job, we’ve got other people handling that side of it. You keep the Prime Asset safe along with everyone else involved with The Project, no matter what it takes.” He picked up his pen and the small notebook he’d jotted a few things in during the last meeting, putting them into his inside jacket pocket, then stood. “Budget is literally irrelevant. If you can avoid going to war with China that would be ideal, and if you can’t at least try to give me enough notice to let the President know before the shooting starts.” He smiled grimly as they chuckled, then left the room, the others following in ones and twos.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“All generators online at nominal output.”

“Field geometry configuration set?”

“Yes, the program is running. No errors shown.”

Taylor nodded, pleased, checked the graphs on her console, then looked to the side at the monitor showing the view from a number of cameras in the test area. “Blast shields in place,” she said into the microphone in front of her, “Area clear of all personnel. Load test article one.”

There was a burst of activity from around the room, several other people working on their own stations. Off to one side her father, Angus, and Brendan watched the larger screen that was mounted on the wall.

“Test article loaded.”

“Set acceleration field to ten percent.”

“Acceleration set.”

“Confirm field geometry stable?”

“Confirmed.”

“Interlocks disabled. Recorders…” She double checked her instruments, as did a couple of the others. “...active. Firing in three… two… one!”

She pressed the pair of buttons on the console in front of her, both of them with protective covers flipped up out of the way, one forefinger on each. The immediate result was a resounding bang that made the entire control room vibrate gently.

“Shot complete. Download and correlate all data, reset for test two.” Even as she let go of the mic button she was watching the graphs change on half a dozen screens, nodding to herself. A hand on her shoulder made her look up and to the side to see her father smiling at her.

“That was quite loud,” he commented. She grinned.

“Yeah, cool sound, wasn’t it?”

Pointing at one graph, as Brendan and Angus came over and stood behind her, watching with interest, she said, “The projectile left the accelerator at nine hundred and forty meters per second, then impacted on the shear field two milliseconds later. The power shunt worked as designed, there was almost no residual kinetic energy left. Most of the noise was the sonic boom.”

“Very impressive indeed, Taylor,” Doctor Calhoun said with a smile of his own. “Another of your ideas appears to be valid.”

“The full scale rail gun would be interesting to try but I’m pretty sure the result will be the same,” she replied as she leaned forward, pushing her glasses up her nose and examining the results. “And like I said, it’s an inefficient way to make something go really quickly anyway.”

“It’s still something we would like to finish, which your superconductor should allow,” he pointed out. “The first batch of the new material does match your predicted properties but the yield is still very low. The chemical engineering team is convinced they can optimize that with another couple of months of work though.”

“Rail erosion is going to be the big problem,” she said absently, working out some multidimensional equations in her head then typing the results into a number of fields in the control software as she did. “I’ve got a few ideas on how to fix that but I’ll have to think about it some more...”

The three men exchanged glances, then Danny patted her shoulder with a fond look.

“You are a terrifying young lady,” Angus commented quietly with a look of amusement. She glanced up at him, grinned quickly, then went back to her work. A minute later she pulled the microphone closer and prodded the talk switch. “I’ve tweaked the field geometry which should reduce post-impact instability by eleven point one four three percent, approximately. We’ll finish processing the data from the first shot, ETA...” Taylor checked the progress of the computer for a moment. “…five minutes, before the second test. Area remains hazardous until further notice.”

Releasing the button she leaned back, pulled a can of soda out of the under-desk build in fridge, and popped it open, then picked up a pen as she took a sip. “Until then I’ll work on my Spanish homework,” she said more casually, flipping a textbook open with the end of the pen. Her father chuckled, shaking his head, then he and the others went off to Angus’s office to discuss business.

Behind them, Taylor put the can down and started writing, humming a tune she’d heard on the radio under her breath. All around her a dozen or so technicians and scientists did their jobs competently and well.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Stomping into her office, Rebecca slammed the door hard enough to make one of the pictures on the wall slip to a strange angle, then stood in the middle of the room clenching her fists. “I really do not like that man,” she growled. “Politics...”

Shaking her head she got her momentary lapse of calm under control, then moved to adjust the picture until it was straight. Satisfied, she sat behind her desk and stared at the scene, one of a rather beautiful sunset over a world that was almost uninhabited by humans, until she felt able to think sensibly about everything.

It was immensely frustrating dealing with people like Secretary Robinson for a number of reasons. Not least was that she didn’t like feeling that people knew things she didn’t, which was clearly true in this case. Especially people like him.

And there were a lot of things about this whole situation which were puzzling, worrying, and annoying. Not to mention had implications that went far beyond anything the Secretary was aware of. He only had to deal with one country on one world, she had to deal with everyone everywhere. Which was made more difficult by people who kept vital information from her.

Something very strange was going on in Brockton Bay, she was certain of that. And it was having effects, somehow, that stretched far beyond that benighted city. Those effects were… problematic.

She didn’t like problematic effects. There were far too many other things going on to have someone throw a monkey wrench into the mix, accidentally or more worryingly on purpose. Especially on purpose.

Sitting there, she thought hard for a while. Even her own abilities hadn’t really shown her anything useful during this most recent meeting, or any of the others she’d attended in the last few months while trying to pry information from the hands of a Pentagon that seemed to have become virtually impossible to penetrate. All she got for the most part was that they were taking security more seriously than in war time, and being very effective at it too. There was evidence that the small number of people who knew the details of what was going on were very excited, but at the same time they were going to extreme effort to avoid anyone else finding out anything. Much more successfully than seemed plausible. It was likely that more than one Thinker was helping them with that but she wasn’t sure who was involved, aside from it almost certainly not being anyone connected to the PRT or Protectorate.

Which was also annoying.

The out of nowhere breakthroughs in physics and a few related fields that had resulted in apparently entirely repeatable and predictable gravity control were so far past anything current theories allowed for that she couldn’t see any way they could not be the result of Parahuman work. It seemed very likely that someone, somehow, had managed to reverse engineer a Tinker design, or less likely had triggered as a Tinker who could actually explain their invention. Either case created a whole series of possible benefits for Cauldron’s work, but only if she could find out what they were.

There was also the not so minor problem that somehow this whole situation was causing Contessa of all people trouble with her Path. The woman was completely confused by this, and had found no way so far to compensate for it. That again suggested a powerful Tinker/Thinker was at work, as virtually nothing other than Zion himself, the Endbringers, or Eidolon was capable of blocking her ability.

It was worrying, and created an ever growing number of questions to which she had no answers.

Had someone figured out a method to block precognition efficiently enough to interfere with the most powerful such ability known?

Was it, possibly, somehow related to the Endbringers? That was a terrifying thought…

How did all these things tie together? What was behind it?

Shaking her head Rebecca sighed. She couldn’t think of any way to find out the answers without more information, and acquiring that information would either need a lot of careful work, or some rather direct actions that would be hard to conceal well enough to avoid repercussions she didn’t really want to have to deal with.

Emily Piggot had given her nothing useful, and was less and less pleasant each time she tried. Not to mention as uncooperative as she could possibly arrange without quite crossing the line into insubordination. None of her usual sources could tell her anything either, no matter what angle she tried. And none of the others seemed any more successful in finding out the truth.

Brockton Bay had become a complete information black hole, which implied someone was putting a vast amount of effort into arranging this. And most likely had some Parahuman talent she herself would very much like to acquire.

“Damn it,” she muttered, tapping one finger on the desk irritably. Going there herself probably wouldn’t achieve anything if dozens of video calls hadn’t done so. Sending someone else to see if they could lever some useful information out of anyone in the city was a possibility, although a low probability one, admittedly. It would need to be someone who could deal with people in a manner that gained their trust and didn’t raise flags. Someone persuasive and calm.

So not David.

Eventually she sighed, then got up and called for a portal to Paul’s office, walking through it as soon as it appeared.

Hopefully Legend could dig up something helpful without making waves.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Carefully soldering the last fine wire onto the PCB, Taylor peered through the microscope and checked that everything was in order and there were no shorts or dry joints. Finally satisfied, she put the tiny soldering iron back in the stand and stretched, leaning back from her workbench.

Drinking some water, she pushed the microscope head to the side to get it out of the way, then studied the small multilayer PCB sitting on the clamps on the bench. It was only a couple of centimeters on a side, and was the result of several evenings of careful work. Putting the glass down and picking up her notebook, the one entitled ‘Tinker Hardware Investigations Volume 1: Squealer’ she flipped it open and perused her own neat writing for a little while, making completely sure that she hadn’t missed anything.

Of course if she had it would be extremely annoying as she’d have to scrap hours of work, but after she’d reached the end of the section covering this particular design, she was happy it was all in order. Closing the book she dropped it on the bench to one side, then leaned over and retrieved the large printout of the schematic for the device in front of her. Unrolling it she shuffled the chair sideways to a clear spot on the bench, put it down and weighted the corners with random tools, then bent over it once more.

“OK,” she mumbled, her voice barely audible over the background audio track from the alien tutors which she paid no conscious attention to, although if she did she could make out a few words here and there. “Dimensional recirculator is good. Quantum selection circuit should be fine, and a hell of a lot more efficient than that garbage she came up with. And my version of a phase space interactor will actually interact with phase space without bursting into flames. How difficult is that? Piece of junk Tinker crap...”

Shaking her head, she circled a couple of minor nomenclature errors on the circuit diagram and noted beside them the corrections needed, not finding anything that would actually cause any issues. Quickly scribbling down an idea she had of making the whole design a little more efficient for version two as it came to her, she nodded in satisfaction.

“Great. Everything checks out. Lets see if it works properly.”

Moving back to directly in front of the circuit, she connected the short control and power pigtail to the relevant port on her computer, and the three different bench power supplies she was using for this first test. Carefully setting all the voltages and current limits to the right levels, she turned them on, then hit the control to apply power to the circuit.

Several displays changed quickly, settling down to the predicted and correct values. She glanced at the display at her elbow which was showing an image from the thermal camera mounted above the board, watching as it displayed the heat from various tiny components coming to life. A faint whine came and went as the main phase space converter ran through resonance into stable operation.

“Huh. Not bad at all,” she said to herself with a nod. “Running a little warm but I can fix that...” She made a delicate adjustment with a very small tool to the innards of the board, watching the thermal display, which showed one of the primary drive circuits cool slightly. “Better. Good, that’s working to spec. So all I need to do now is flash the firmware and we’re ready to see what happens.” Smiling a little, she prodded the keyboard a few times, moved the mouse, and clicked on an icon. Typing a filename into the correct field she waited for the program to compile the source code, then clicked the next icon. A progress bar zipped across the screen for a couple of seconds then the computer chimed success.

“Done. So all I do is reset it, and...”

She prodded a pair of contacts that were on one edge of the board with a small pair of tweezers, then blinked.

“Huh.”

Cautiously feeling the bench, she moved her hands around until she could feel the main power switch, and poked it. The odd visual distortion effect that had just happened, happened again, and she could suddenly see her bench once more.

“Shit, that worked better than I thought it would,” she grinned, feeling very pleased. A large part of the middle of the bench had abruptly vanished from sight, leaving only an image of the back wall of the basement and the floor. “Got the field size a little wrong though...”

It took a few more tests and some careful fiddling but in the end she got it doing what she wanted it to. Highly satisfied she disconnected the board having recorded all the power draw values, then dug around for another surplus industrial cellphone in her drawer. Pulling out a suitable candidate she spent half an hour gutting the battery compartment, installing her new board, and adding a somewhat smaller battery. When it was all closed up and the control software loaded, she picked it up and moved to the center of the room. Standing in front of the camera she’d aimed at that point, Taylor made sure she could see the image from it on one of the monitors, then raised the phone and ran the app. Adjusting the parameters to the right values, she prodded the start icon and watched with amusement as her image promptly disappeared from the screen.

All that was left was an apparently empty room.

“Cool as shit,” she giggled to herself. She tapped the icon once more. “Now you see me...” Another tap. “Now you don’t. Brilliant, it works even better than I thought it would.”

Having played with it for a while, she turned the cloaking device off and went back to her chair. Putting it down she swung the chair from side to side thinking while looking at the thing.

Eventually she put it to one side to charge and turned to her computer. That was a successful project, but she still had the other widgets to redesign properly.

It was turning out to be a lot of fun, figuring out how a Tinker had screwed up a perfectly sensible design and fixing it. She was learning some interesting things in the process, and was wondering whether she could lay hands on more Tinker Tech...

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

The portal closed behind him as Legend flew towards Brockton Bay from well past the low level radar detection range. Moving fairly slowly so he had time to think how he was going to approach this problem, he aimed towards the PRT building. Director Piggot was probably going to be difficult, she pretty much always was, but with luck he’d be able to find out a few things that he agreed with Rebecca appeared to be somewhat strange. He wasn’t as convinced as she appeared to be it was something urgent, but it was odd, definitely. That much had been apparent ever since that ship had gently floated up the bay like it weighed nothing, a feat that had made the news immediately and caused him to gape in shock.

He’d been wondering ever since how it had been done and who did it. On the other hand, it was Brockton Bay, and weird shit was pretty much par for the course in this place. He was well aware of that, as was anyone who paid more than cursory attention to the most Parahuman-infested city on a per capita basis possibly anywhere.

It was his job to keep an eye on such places, after all, even if only casually. And it wasn’t all that far from New York.

Probably, thinking about it, not far enough…

Smiling a little to himself at the thought, he flew onwards while rehearsing in his head what he’d tell Director Piggot about this unexpected visit from one of the Triumvirate. She was going to be sarcastic, he was pretty sure of that, but hopefully would also be reasonably cooperative. Or at worst not actively hostile.

He’d soon find out anyway.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

An alert beeped causing Taylor to look up from watching the latest Alien Teaching TV episode, then hit the pause key. Getting up she walked over to her latest subspace interference detection system, which she’d extended and rebuilt several times, now having more range and lot more discrimination. She studied the display with interest. A map of the city, extending out to nearly forty miles past the boundary and well into both the sea and the rest of the state, was centered on her house, and showed lots of little icons, many of which were moving around. Various colors denoted a number of things she’d worked out.

And there was a new one heading directly towards the center of the city from a location some distance off the shore. She watched as it moved closer, then eventually stopped near the bay in a location that matched the PRT building. Clicking on it with the mouse she typed a few words into the field that opened up and saved the result, then ran another program to look at the log.

“That’s… really interesting,” she mumbled, examining the odd subspace interference surrounding the location the new icon had suddenly appeared at. “Really interesting indeed.”

After a moment, she switched back to the main display then went back to her main computer and brought up a couple of programs she’d written to analyze the logs from the detector in different ways. Shortly she was deeply involved in thinking with portals.

“There’s science to be done...” she almost sang under her breath, thoroughly enjoying herself.

Chapter Text

Emily sighed heavily with a shake of her head. Getting up, she walked over to the window and beckoned to her unwanted visitor, who looked quizzical but also stood and joined her there. She pointed.

“You see those lights there about four miles away?”

Legend nodded. “I do.”

“If you want more answers, that’s the only place you’re going to get them,” she said. “But I doubt you will get them. Renick spent nearly a month trying to pry more data out of Gravtec, and didn’t find anything except what they want us to find. DARPA have the entire place locked down tighter than anything I’ve ever seen before, and are clearly working with various intelligence agencies to keep it that way. General Calhoun paid a visit a few days ago and made it perfectly clear that they were here to stay, it wasn’t anything the PRT needed to be involved in, and further poking was only going to end up causing problems for everyone.”

She looked at him. “I’ve got way more than enough problems already. I don’t need more, and I especially don’t need more coming from our own government. I’m not going to put myself between DARPA, the DIA, the NSA, and whoever the hell else it is that’s doing fuck knows what over there, and the Protectorate and the Chief Director. I’m satisfied, based on Renick and Armsmaster’s investigations and testimony, along with other information from various sources, that there is no Parahuman behind the Gravtec inventions. So the PRT has no reason to get involved. I’ve already told Costa-Brown that several times. She’s got a lot more high level contacts in the Defense Department than I do so I don’t know why she keeps pushing. I’m certainly not going to be able to tell her anything new.”

“What makes you think that my visit is because of the Chief Director?” he asked mildly. “I’m looking into this on behalf of the Protectorate.”

Folding her arms, she glared at him. “Sure you are. We both know that the only reason you’re here is that Costa-Brown got told no by someone who could make it stick and she hates that. The woman is a control freak and that’s me being polite because she’s my superior. She loathes not knowing things and once she gets an idea that the PRT should be doing something, she won’t drop it.”

He looked a little amused. “That’s… possibly not the ideal thing to say, in your position?”

“Am I wrong?” she demanded. After a moment he sighed faintly and shook his head. “And do I really look like I actually care what she thinks of me?” He shook his head again, smiling a little. “This job is going to kill me and that’s if things go well,” she grumbled, turning back to peering at the distant DWU facility, bright lights far away shining out across the dark water of the bay and outlining a considerably larger area of activity than had been the case in recent history. More and more of the formerly moribund docks seemed to be coming to life, old facilities being reactivated and pressed back into service.

The old cargo ship was already half-scrapped, even from here the light of cutting torches sparkling across the hull as cranes moved around above it, their own aircraft warning lights easily visible. The union seemed to be working around the clock at the moment, and just in the last week she’d seen two large barges, that had been fixtures of the scene for as long as she’d been posted here, move slowly past to the ship graveyard then return carrying smaller vessels that had been lifted onto them. The dock workers seemed to be quietly and efficiently clearing out the wreckage that had blighted the bay for so long and she knew from various sources that the city government was absolutely ecstatic about the whole thing.

Whatever else was going on, the DWU was gaining political capital by the bucketful, which promised to produce some strange alterations to the administrative landscape in the future.

“Of course, this is Brockton Bay,” she went on after a moment of reflection, in a somewhat sour voice. “Things never go well here. If they do it’s only because the universe is setting you up for something horrible...”

“A somewhat pessimistic viewpoint,” he commented, glancing at her, then following her gaze again.

She shrugged. “I’d call it realistic rather than pessimistic,” she replied. “I’ve been here for too long to be optimistic about pretty much anything. We have literal Nazi supervillains wandering around the place slaughtering innocent people just because of their skin color, a rage dragon who can take on the entire local Protectorate team at the same time, beat them like a drum, and make it look easy, the largest Parahuman-backed gang of drug dealers on the east coast, the most effective Parahuman-backed mercenary team for a thousand miles, and nothing even remotely close to the resources or manpower to do more than hold the status quo as long as none of those guys decides to really cause trouble.”

He grunted a little, still looking out the window, in a somewhat reflective manner.

“That’s not including all the random smaller groups of troublemakers, of course,” Emily growled. “Über and his idiotic friend are the least of those. There are more than half a dozen minor but extremely irritating villains who pop up and cause trouble, diverting far more attention to stopping that sort of crap than I like, we’ve got New Wave lurking around in the background always ready to turn a minor drama into a crisis… Hell, Glory Girl all on her own can do that without even trying.”

Legend made a sound that was nearly, but not quite, a laugh.

“They are heroes,” he pointed out in good humor. She scowled.

“Allegedly. You don’t have to clean up after them,” she muttered, making him chuckle once more. “And on top of all that we also have entirely pedestrian crime mixed in, which keeps everyone on edge, makes the BBPD have to work for a living, and confuses the issue because you never know when a random burglary will actually turn out to be Parahuman related after all. Which it is more often than I like. If I had twice the number of troops and Parahumans of my own and three times the budget I’d still be outnumbered and outgunned.” She looked up at him again. “So to be brutally honest I’m perfectly happy to have someone else dealing with the Dock Worker’s Union and all the insanity that can and has come from that direction in the past. It’s not my problem and as long as they can keep it that way I don’t care what they’re doing.”

“Rebecca is of a different opinion,” he remarked thoughtfully, pondering the sight in the distance.

Emily shrugged again. “She can have any opinion she wants. Me, I’m going to stay well back from whatever DARPA are up to, wish them well, and get on with the things I’m meant to be doing.” He looked a little worried, causing her to point again.

“Look, I can tell you from here that someone is putting a hell of a lot of money into that place,” she said after a few seconds. “It’s nearly twice the size it was six months ago, the roads are being fixed all through the docks, all the vagrants in the area aren’t there any more, crime in that whole part of the city, Parahuman or otherwise, has fallen off a cliff… I don’t precisely know who is doing what, but whatever it is that they’re doing it works. And the more they do it the easier our own job becomes. I’m not going to look too deeply into things that I’m not cleared to know, I’ve got enough on my plate without going asking for more. The city is fine with the whole thing, the university is practically giggling with joy because of whatever Gravtec really is, and the public is slowly realizing that things are starting to improve and likes it that way.”

She inspected the far-off sparks coming from the crew steadily rendering the old ship into scrap, then went back to her desk and sat down with relief. “So all in all I’m just going to pretend that part of the city doesn’t exist and get on with my life,” she finished.

Legend kept looking out at the night scene. “Surely you’re curious about what’s going on over there? Why DARPA picked Brockton Bay of all places to apparently set up a top secret research center? It’s a very strange place to do that, considering we’re not all that far from at least one other site of theirs.” He turned his back to the window to look at her, as she watched. “And while Brockton Bay University is highly regarded in a number of fields, it’s not been considered a groundbreaking institute in physics as far as I can find out. Yet now it has an entire department dedicated to gravitational physics research? That’s… somewhat odd.”

Emily nodded. “Of course I’m curious. Anyone would be. But I’m not curious enough to want to risk getting Calhoun and his people pissed with my command. He says it’s not Parahuman tech, Armsmaster agrees, Renick’s own inquiries also agree, so as far as I’m concerned and until such time as something changes in that respect, I have no reason to officially question that. I know a losing battle when I see it, trust me.”

She sighed as she reached for a bottle of water and unscrewed the lid, then poured some into a mug. Taking a swig from it, she put the mug back on her desk. “I can only assume they know what they’re doing and there’s a good reason for setting up here. I’d guess that the person, or persons, behind their breakthrough, is probably local and quite likely based in BBU. But I’m not going to go looking for them. DARPA says it’s their business and I’m minded to leave it to them.” She scowled a little. “I spent way too much time trying to figure it out until we were sure it wasn’t under our jurisdiction, and to be frank it’s a relief to have something weird happening around here that we don’t have to deal with.”

“I’d think it would be more of a relief not to have anything weird happening at all,” he said in an amused tone as he came back and sat down. She gave him a hard look as he smiled.

“Yeah. You do realize where you are, right? No chance of there not being something weird going on. Weird is what this damn city does.”

He started laughing as she took another drink, then opened the desk drawer and retrieved her medication pack, removing two tablets which she swallowed with the aid of the last of the water. When he stopped chortling he asked, “And what happens if one of the many troublemakers you have here decides it would be a really clever idea to poke around at Gravtec? Surely that’s a possible risk? As you said, you do have rather a lot of potentially awkward groups in that respect.”

She smiled a little grimly. “I have a strong feeling that if they do try it’ll be the last thing they do, one way or the other. Which would at least prevent repeat offenses. I can’t say I’m happy about that, but on the other hand, if you’re stupid enough to poke the military in the face you shouldn’t be too surprised that you pull back a bloody stump if you’re lucky. They’re serious about whatever it is they’re doing. Hopefully Kaiser, Lung, and anyone else of that ilk are smart enough to work that out.” She sighed a little. “Although I wouldn’t want to put money on it.”

“And if that happens?” he asked curiously.

“We wait for the shooting to stop and pick up what’s left,” she replied, shaking her head. “I think even Lung might have trouble if someone decides to use an anti tank rocket on him before he’s ramped up enough. Our own rules of engagement prevent that, but I’m damn certain theirs don’t.”

“Worrying.”

“Evolution in action if they’re idiots,” she retorted.

Legend studied her for a moment. “That’s one way to put it, I suppose.” He didn’t look entirely comfortable with the idea, she noticed.

Leaning back Emily waved a hand at the window. “Again, it’s not something I can do anything about, there are a lot of reasons saying I shouldn’t do anything about it even if I could, and to be brutally honest if you or the Chief Director wants more information on it, you need to go directly to DARPA and ask. And I assume she’s already tried that approach, without any luck, hence your presence here. I can’t tell you, or her, anything more than I already have. Sorry.”

She wasn’t, and she knew he could tell, which slightly amused her. He studied her for a while, then nodded.

“Fair enough. Thank you for what you’ve said, Emily, and I won’t mention to Rebecca your opinion of her.” He smiled.

Emily shrugged. “She knows. But thanks anyway.” After a moment, as she watched him stand and walk over to the window again, where he looked out at the distant docks, then off to the side at the Rig, she asked, “Are you planning on staying any longer?” She was merely curious, more than anything else.

The man turned to her. “I have a few other people to talk to, but I’ll be heading back tonight.” He walked over as she stood herself and held out his hand, which she shook. “Until next time, Director.”

“Legend.” She waited until he left her office, the door closing quietly behind him, then sat with relief as her back was killing her. “Damn it, that woman is going to cause trouble, I can feel it,” she muttered, annoyed. Wondering if she should discreetly let General Calhoun know about this, she eventually decided that yet again it was something best kept well away from.

And considering who it was that was at the heart of the whole bizarre situation she wouldn’t want to assume his people didn’t already know, anyway.

Shaking her head, she turned to her computer and got back to work, wanting to finish the current stack of reports before she finally went home for the night.

The work never stopped, after all.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“I’m sorry I can’t divulge any of this information, Dragon,” Colin said to his friend as he quickly scanned the latest documentation he’d acquired from Gravtec. “I’ve asked that you be allowed clearance, but the security requirements are at the moment very strict. I’m told that it’s likely that Canada and other US allies will be read in on aspects of the Gravtec patents within the next year, in all likelihood, though.”

“That’s all right, Colin,” she said with a smile. “I’m well aware of security protocols and NDAs, believe me. There are things I’m not allowed to tell anyone else as well. Life’s like that.”

“Indeed. Annoying as it can be sometimes.” He shook his head slowly in awe yet again of the sheer elegance of the mathematics involved in the new theory, which tied together so many things that had puzzled physicists for literally centuries. “I would dearly like to meet and talk to the person behind this work,” he added. “The clarity of thought and efficiency of work is… startling.”

“You think it’s one person?” she asked curiously. “Couldn’t it be a group effort?”

He pondered her question. “It could be, yes,” he finally replied. “And in some ways it’s more believable that such a remarkable breakthrough would come from a collaborative effort over years of work. But on the other hand. Professor Drekin remarked that it was down to one exceptionally gifted individual and I have no reason to doubt his word. And the sheer… cleanliness… of the entire theory and prototype designs suggest to me a single source who has done the entire work from first principles. It shows a deep understanding of concepts that are far beyond currently accepted theoretical limits.”

“Fascinating. Truly fascinating,” Dragon mused.

“Agreed.” He tabbed to the next page, then read a couple of paragraphs, before examining a diagram. “I can see in the documentation the point where aspects subtly change to suggest other people became involved, but that’s mostly if not entirely in the practical engineering side of things. I would imagine that once they had hand-built working prototypes their team spent time optimizing the designs for mass production, which would undoubtedly involve multiple engineers and technicians feeding back ideas and modifications to the originator of the system.”

“That’s the way it normally goes, yes,” she nodded. “I take it they have a well equipped facility?”

“Very much so, yes. One can instantly tell that resources aren’t the bottleneck,” he replied with a small smile, facing her. “And from what I saw on my visit, they have a considerable number of very talented people from different disciplines working together. I was genuinely impressed.”

“High praise indeed,” she teased, making him smile slightly again.

“Well deserved praise, I think. The end result is remarkable, and I can see several immediate applications for it in my own work, once I get clearance to field the end result.” He leaned over to the side and retrieved an egg-sized device, encased in a smooth polymer shell. Holding the small ovoid machine in the view of the camera, he tapped a key on one of his keyboards, then let go. “This is my own duplication of the patent for the basic reference frame regenerator. I built one exactly as in the design notes provided by Gravtec to validate the design, then spent some time optimizing it for size. I can go smaller but this seemed like a practical test version.”

Dragon inspected the thing with interest as it placidly hung in space without any sound or visual effect. He gently prodded it, making it move sideways, then reached over and turned a control on the console next to him which made it go up, then down. “I can’t see any visual distortions like you commonly get with some antigravity Tinker designs,” she commented. “And it appears to be completely silent.”

“It’s amazingly efficient, and very powerful,” he replied, nodding. Turning the thing off with his hand under it, he caught the device, then held it up between thumb and forefinger. “With suitable software it can provide lift, propulsion, inertial compensation effects, and a number of other useful functions. This one is more than powerful enough to act as a drive for a two person aircraft without any difficulty.”

“And you’re going to make a flying bike with it, of course,” she said wryly, her avatar’s mouth rising on one side.

Colin almost grinned. “You do know me rather well,” he admitted.

His friend laughed. “I do, yes. Well, be careful with it. Don’t accidentally end up in orbit. The Simurgh might take offense.”

Putting the device back, he shook his head. “I’m not planning on spaceflight any time soon, but a more efficient bike with flight capacity would be very useful,” he replied.

After a couple of seconds, she asked, “You’re totally certain it’s not the work of a Tinker or Thinker?”

With a nod, he replied, “By now, yes, I am. I was mostly sure when I left Gravtec, almost certain when I read the final patents once I got clearance for them, and having built the design several times now, and made modifications to it for my own purposes using the theoretical calculations, I’m entirely satisfied that it’s not in any way the result of Parahuman powers. It’s too… understandable… for that to be the case.”

He leaned back in his chair and rubbed the side of his nose as he tried to work out how to explain it, while his friend waited patiently.

“Over the years I’ve studied a lot of other Tinker work, yours included,” he eventually said. “For want of a better term, there’s a… pattern… to it. Even with my own work. Aspects of how the device in question is made, tiny tells in the basic design, minor similarities or indeed differences between different people’s work in the same area… You learn to spot it if you look carefully enough.”

She nodded slowly, looking thoughtful. “I understand what you mean, although it’s not really something I’ve had to talk about before.”

“This, though,” he went on, holding up the little machine again for a moment. “This doesn’t show anything like that. It’s entirely mundane, if that’s a good way to put it, even with the remarkable result it produces. Everything in this could be understood by any talented electronics engineer and probably at least crudely duplicated by a bright high school student. They might not understand the theory behind it, but they could copy the design and make it function, I’m fairly sure of that. In much the same way you don’t need a postgraduate degree in electrooptics theory to make a functional if basic carbon dioxide laser from easily available parts, you merely need time and patience combined with care and a lot of hard work.”

“A complex theory with a fairly straightforward practical implementation,” she noted, making him nod.

“Exactly that, yes. Which is completely different from any Tinker tech I’ve ever encountered. The implementations are invariably entirely opaque, even if they work well. Many designs of that nature shouldn’t work at all, according to everything science knows, and as you’re well aware trying to reverse engineer such a device almost invariably results in nothing useful at all. Even when it does submit to some understanding of the basic principles those have always been trivial edge cases and aspects that aren’t important in the overall design. You’re about the only one who’s ever been able to copy anything significant and you’ve told me more than once that even you don’t often fully understand how something works, only that it does and how to functionally copy it.”

“Yes, that’s certainly correct,” she said after a few seconds. “The more of that sort of work I do the more I learn, but I’d be the first to admit that almost every Tinker design I’ve investigated seems to be a completely unique design with little to nothing in common with anything else. It makes deriving the underlying principles almost impossible.”

“I sometimes find myself wondering if that’s somehow deliberate,” he remarked, causing her to look at him with an intrigued expression. “Tinker tech is so opaque that it makes you wonder if somehow it’s been designed specifically for that purpose. By who and why I have no idea, but it’s crossed my mind more than once.”

Appearing to think that over, she eventually nodded slowly. “I can’t deny I’ve had similar thoughts once or twice. Powers are certainly extremely puzzling at the best of times, and that aspect is one of the more confusing ones. But I’ve never been able to work out how you could actually prove anything like that.”

Colin shrugged a little. “Neither have I, not for lack of thinking about it.” He glanced at the Gravtec document open on the monitor, then moved the mouse to close it. “But the one conclusion I am certain of is that Gravtec don’t have those limitations, and their technology isn’t the result of powers. Despite what I suspect certain parties might wish.”

She smiled at him. “I can imagine.” A moment passed, then she said, “That aside, have you had any more thoughts on the design I sent you last week?”

“The new thruster? Yes, I’ve been thinking about that and I believe I can see a few places where it could be improved,” he replied, dismissing the Gravtec oddity from his mind in favor of collaboration with his best friend, something he thoroughly enjoyed.

Soon they were deep in discussion of some esoteric designs and having considerable satisfaction in the results.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

As she studied the results of the last few hours work, Taylor yawned widely. It was nearly three in the morning and she really needed to go to bed, but she’d been so fascinated by some of the data she’d logged that she’d found herself losing track of the time.

Hitting a key, she reran the latest simulation using data from her subspace detection system and watched as a complex graph formed after a few seconds, trillions of calculations being done by the computer under the desk. It was something that most universities would have been pleased to have, absolute cutting edge parallel processing hardware, and had made her work much faster.

Although she had some ideas about how to make something better. That could wait for now though.

Leaning forward she inspected the graph very carefully, absently pushing her glasses up her nose a little, then made a few notes on a pad next to her. It was almost full by now.

“Hmmm...” she hmmmed in a reflective sort of way. “That’s… Ahhh… I see. Yes. That makes sense. Kind of.”

Tweaking the calculations in another program, she saved the result and ran it. The graph changed making her smile and nod. “Yep. I thought so. I wonder who’s doing that and how?”

Sliding her chair sideways she grabbed the bench to stop, then tapped on the keyboard of her subspace detector computer system, while glancing over her shoulder at the other monitor every now and then. Shortly she’d added a function that should specifically look for the phenomenon she’d been studying and gather a wider variety of information on what was happening. With any luck she’d get a repeat occurrence and be able to narrow down on the variables she was still missing.

After twenty minutes she finished tuning the detector code and started it running, watched it for a little while to check nothing had gone wrong, then went back to her main computer. “Right, we’ll see what that produces. And if I’m right, it could be really cool.”

She wrote up more neatly some of her conclusions and observations in her latest project workbook, ‘Subspace Portal Theory Notes,’ then put it away. Having spent another fifteen minutes quickly sketching out a very preliminary prototype circuit block diagram based on the work she’d spent the evening doing, she filed that, got up, turned off the alien sound track, made sure that everything was recording properly, and went up to bed. The lights went out and the door at the top of the stairs closed, leaving the basement silent and dark except for faint fan noises and blinky lights all over the place.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Having bade farewell to the last of the people he’d wanted to talk to, Paul lifted into the air and headed east. His visit had produced quite a lot of information, but very little of it was new. Rebecca was going to be quite peeved, he was sure of that. The woman was not pleased about the current state of affairs and he was mildly worried about her likely reaction. She really didn’t like not knowing things she felt she should do, and at times this was somewhat awkward.

Emily Piggot was entirely correct in her summation of his friend, he thought, feeling both amused and a little sad. Rebecca was a control freak’s control freak at times.

He wasn’t going to tell her that, though. That way lay a lot of shouting.

Flying slowly at a couple of thousand feet, he looked down at Brockton Bay. The city was definitely a strange place by most people’s standards, Emily was right about that too. From up here it looked fairly normal, but at street level… odd things happened more often than you’d expect. Many of them very unpleasant.

Paul wouldn’t want to live there.

He could see off to the side the docks and the Gravtec/DWU facility deep inside that area, which stood out by being well lit and a hive of activity even at five AM. Apparently they worked a very vigorous night shift. He wondered what else was going on there other than scrapping old ships and occasionally flying one across the bay.

Smiling a little, he shook his head. It seemed likely that even stranger things were on the horizon. Hopefully not dangerous ones, but who knew? All he could do right now was go back and tell Rebecca what he’d learned, which wasn’t much, and see what happened next. He was fairly sure, as a result of his various discussions, that trying to push harder for real data was probably only going to backfire in a potentially serious manner and while he was very curious, he wasn’t so curious as to want to risk that. Not yet, anyway.

And after he’d finally finished his mission, he could finally go home to his husband and get some sleep before the next panic, which was bound to happen soon enough. It always did.

Speeding up, he was shortly well off shore. Descending to a few hundred feet, he hovered in place and said, “Door to Rebecca’s office.” Once the portal formed he flew through it, the hole in space closing immediately.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

In the Hebert household basement, various instruments noted certain new data and saved it for later examination.

Chapter Text

Amy looked around as she heard someone sit down, smiling at Taylor who’d slid into the desk next to her. “Cutting it fine,” she whispered while the teacher checked the roll.

Her friend grinned quickly, wiping a strand of hair out of her face and tucking it behind her ear. “Overslept,” she whispered back, as she unpacked her notebook, textbook, and pen, putting them on the desk and her backpack on the floor under her chair.

“Again? That’s like four times in the last three weeks, Taylor. Are you getting enough sleep?” Amy felt mild concern. The other girl nodded, smiling.

“Yeah, I just had a couple of projects I got really into at home and lost track of the time,” she replied. “I’m fine, really. Thanks, though.”

The teacher cleared this throat meaningfully and both of them quickly looked frontwards, putting on a serious expression of studious eagerness. He gazed narrowly at them, then nodded in satisfaction. “All right, then, my young friends, today we are learning about neurons. Turn to page forty nine, please, and pay attention.”

Amy, who in some senses didn’t need to learn biology, was still fascinated by it, and listened carefully. She noticed that Taylor was doing the same, paying rapt attention and taking notes now and then in a very neat hand without looking down.

While she’d only known the girl for a few weeks, she was rather impressed with her, and was pleased to count her as a friend. She wondered if Taylor might like to come over to her house sometime for a meal.

It was something to consider. Right now, though, she was studying a picture of an axon and comparing it to what her own ability told her about such things.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Mr Calvert.”

Thomas twitched, then groaned.

“Ah. You are still alive. Excellent, I was beginning to wonder if we were slightly overenthusiastic.”

Blinking hard, he tried to work out what the hell was going on. The last thing he could remember was getting out of his car in his home garage, then…

He was sitting at his desk in his base a hundred meters under the middle of the city, when the entire room jumped slightly. Dust settled from the ceiling onto the surface in front of him. He looked at it, puzzled, and ran a finger across the desk, lifting his hand to see the glove of his costume covered in gray powder. Looking up he saw the light fixtures in the ceiling flicker momentarily.

“What the hell?” he muttered as he turned to his computer and brought up the base security status screen, his eyes widening in shock when he saw indicators on all four entrances, the main one, the two escape ones his mercenaries knew about, and the last one only he was aware of, showing that they were currently opening. No alarms were going off as they should have done, but even as he watched the status of the doors went from closed to open, then the sensors stopped reporting. Looking up at the monitors on the wall where dozens of camera views were display, he was just in time to see them all go blank in a couple of seconds, one after another.

“Shit!” he yelped, spinning around and slamming his hand down on the main emergency alarm button behind him on the wall. It depressed with a click.

And that was it. There was no other result.

That was not supposed to happen. And was very, very bad.

Rotating it to unlatch it, then slamming it again, harder, resulted in another click but nothing useful. Giving up on it, he spun his chair around to the computer again and tried the icon to achieve the same result via different means, but that only got a message on his screen saying ‘Function Error 2.’ He had no idea what that was except very wrong indeed.

Giving up on it, he grabbed his sidearm out of the top drawer and checked it had a magazine in, then picked up the other two in the same drawer and put them into one of the hidden pockets in his bodysuit as he stood. Quickly walking across the office to the main security console he typed in two passwords one after the other, held his hand over the RF ID reader so it could register the tag in his glove, then typed in the final password. Once the console decided he was authorized it popped up a display showing the locations of every single person in the base according to the internal sensors, the status of his self destruct system, and a secondary camera network feed in critical areas.

The news was grim.

His self destruct system had somehow been disabled, showing as offline, the main server room was on fire, the armory was literally filling with water as he watched in horror, one of the water mains that ran under it having apparently exploded, and the few cameras that showed his mercenaries displayed a lot of people draped over various things with a few of them frantically running around trying to put on gas masks. Even as he stared in horror the rest of them dropped limply to the floor.

He heard a hissing sound above him. Looking up, he saw a set of dim lights surrounding an obvious lens sticking out of one of the ventilation ducts, along with a nozzle which was spraying a fine mist into the room. His vision started to swim but he was able to barely make out some sort of small machine behind the lights and lens, looking like a tiny tracked vehicle.

Trying to raise the pistol, his hand shook as he gasped for breath, then sank to his knees. His finger squeezed down on the trigger, but before the weapon could fire he felt blackness take him.

The timeline ended.

He’d been on the way home in the other timeline when whatever had attacked his base had done so. Frantically trying to work out what the hell had happened and who was responsible he’d rigidly controlled his reaction and calmly followed the routine drive from the PRT building to his house. The attack had come out of nowhere. He’d had no warning, no indications that the PRT knew anything about him, or that anyone else did either. His tame Thinker hadn’t mentioned a thing about possible threats, but then she was a little bitch who’d never volunteer a word given the choice. Possibly he simply hadn’t asked the right questions…

Who was it who behind what happened? Was it the PRT? He hadn’t seen any sign of the attackers other than the little machine that had gassed him. He’d only been able to guess that they’d entered at the surface in one of the heavily disguised cooling vents and somehow made it past the various traps in the ventilation system without setting off any alarms. Probably a Tinker involved, then. Armsmaster? Someone new?

Possibly one of the gangs, but the Merchants were idiots so seemed extremely unlikely, it wasn’t Lung’s style as he’d just have blown the doors in and stomped inside setting everything on fire on the way, and Kaiser, while sneaky enough, didn’t have Tinkers as far as he knew. And to the best of his knowledge had no idea where his base was anyway, nor any particular reason to attack him like that.

So who was it? Clearly the perpetrator had a lot of inside knowledge. There was no way he could see that all his alarms could have been disabled so cleanly without that, nor the armory and server rooms destroyed that efficiently. It spoke of a lot of data on his facilities that no one should have had, along with a significant amount of resources and work. And likely patience too, as he couldn’t see it happening as a spur of the moment effort. No, it was someone organized, far too well informed, and ruthless.

After all he didn’t know for sure that whatever gas had been used was lethal, but he sure wasn’t going to assume otherwise.

It was going to take a lot of careful work to discover the people behind the attack. He had to assume his base was compromised and probably at least some of his mercenaries in the pocket of his attacker. The total lack of any warning was the really worrying part, he had no idea who was watching him and what they actually knew.

If it was the PRT, which appeared the most likely source of the attack, it almost certainly wasn’t the ENE division. He’d have found out about it if it was, as his taps into their systems was more than enough to make hiding an operation of this size impossible. So it seemed probable that another division, probably not Boston, but perhaps Chicago, had somehow located him and moved in without notifying Piggot.

It would be more complex to confirm it if that was the case, he didn’t have very many resources past Boston yet, but he did have a few people he could lean on for more information. As soon as he got home, he could check that his backup, and much smaller, base was intact, then start the process of discovering who had caused him so much trouble. And when he found them he wasn’t in the mood to be pleasant about expressing his disapproval.

And if that girl was in some way involved, well, she was not going to enjoy it at all.

Pulling into his driveway he’d hit the button to open the garage, driven into it, and closed the door as he turned the engine off. Then he’d opened the door, got out of the car, and…

There’d been a tiny noise behind him followed by a prick on the back of his neck. The world had gone swirly.

And now he was here, dry mouthed and feeling like he’d been rolled up in a carpet and dragged down several flights of stairs by careless movers. What the fuck was going on?

And who was talking?

He tried to ask a question, but only produced a croak. He couldn’t see anything, while turning his head produced a rustling sound. After a few blurry seconds of thought he came to the conclusion that there was something over his head. As sensation came back to him in a rush of pins and needles he realized with worry that his hands were apparently tied behind him, and a twitch of his legs showed that they were also bound to something.

This wasn’t good.

Not even a little.

A moment later light agonizingly stabbed into his eyes as whatever was over his head was removed. Involuntary tears streaming from them, he blinked frantically, looking around for some indication of what was going on and who was doing it.

All he could see for several seconds was a very bright light in front of him, with shadows elsewhere. As his eyes adapted to the light, he was able to make out a silhouette just to the side, and some distance behind the light there were hints of movement. He glanced from side to side, then down, seeing that he was still wearing the suit he’d had on when he’d been grabbed and was apparently bound to a metal chair which was bolted to a concrete floor. The room it was in was fairly large as he couldn’t make out the walls past the blindingly bright light pointing at him.

“I would apologize for the somewhat cliché arrangement but it’s still quite effective,” whoever it was that had spoken before said in icily calm tones. It was the voice of a woman, sounding professional and unhurried.

“Who the hell are you?” he croaked, licking his lips which felt numb.

The woman moved slightly, the light that was pointing at his face shifting so he didn’t need to squint, then she came closer so he could see her. She was of medium height, sharp featured and with red hair, and was regarding him with a sort of emotionless interest.

“Who I am is at the moment not really relevant to you, Mr Calvert. It may become so in the future, depending on various parameters. One of those is whether you are alive, of course.”

She pulled an office chair on wheels from somewhere past the light and sat down, adjusting the legs of her suit as she did so, then regarded him closely. “Thomas Calvert, formerly a member of the Parahuman Response Team special forces group, one of the two survivors of the Ellisburg event. Also known as Coil, a Parahuman Villain who fancies himself as something of a mastermind would-be ruler of Brockton Bay.”

His heart sank into his boots at her comment. This was really not good.

“Where am I?” he demanded hoarsely. “I want to speak to a lawyer. You’ve kidnapped me, you won’t identify yourself… Are you PRT?”

She smiled a little grimly. “Oh, no, Mr Calvert, I’m not associated with the PRT. I am associated with a department of the United States government which is currently tasked with… cleaning up some problems. You are one of those problems, one that potentially could have made our jobs more difficult. It was decided that somewhat more direct action was required in your case than in some of the other ones we’re handling.”

She crossed her legs one over the other and leaned forward, inspecting him with interest as he blanched. “We are fully aware of your abilities, by the way, and precautions have been taken. You are highly unlikely to succeed in any escape attempt, and the results if you did would prove… final. On the other hand, if you cooperate, your life will be...” The woman paused as he stared at her. “Longer. Definitely longer. And possibly quite comfortable although I’ll admit that’s not a priority at the moment.”

He thought frantically. Who the hell did this woman work for? CIA? FBI? No, the FBI didn’t do this sort of black bag operation, it was unlikely to be them. CIA was a possibility but it didn’t quite fit. Someone who had somehow found out way too much, that was clear, and by the sound of it someone who was a lot more ruthless than he liked.

Thomas wasn’t used to being on the receiving side of this sort of thing.

He decided he didn’t like it much.

“What do you want?”

“Oh, we want everything, Mr Calvert,” she replied with a small hard smile. “We already have the contents of your databases, but I’m sure there are things locked up in your head which will prove useful.” Standing, she walked over to him and reached out, tapping his forehead right between the eyes. “We would very much like to know all the little facts you have squirreled away in there, along with all the plans you were making for your empire building goals. And sooner or later I’m sure you’ll tell us.”

The finger tapped him once more, while he sweated bullets. Then she stepped back.

“How?” he finally said. She raised an elegant eyebrow.

“How what, Mr Calvert?”

“How did you do it? How did you find me, how did you infiltrate my base?”

A voice that was much, much too familiar, and so smug it burned, spoke from off to one side.

“Oh, that part was fairly simple, Boss,” Tattletale said as she stepped into the light, a vicious grin on her face that made him think for a moment that she was going to go for his throat. “They made me an offer I really didn’t have to think very hard to accept. In fact it was a positive joy. And I know more about you than you do in some ways.”

The little blonde bitch leaned down and smirked at him as he gaped, feeling a disorientating mix of total confusion and white-hot fury. She had been involved. He was going to kill the little cunt.

“No, you’re not, ex-Boss,” she smirked. “The days where you are going to put a gun to someone’s head are gone. You’re screwed, I win.” Leaning close to his ear, she added very quietly “Mua ha ha.”

Standing again as he shook with rage, she said, “The rest of my team says hi, by the way. And fuck you.”

The blonde grinned nastily at him, nodded to the red-headed woman who was watching with a hint of a smile, before disappearing into the darkness. His captor looked after him then turned back.

“Not a friend of yours, I fear, Mr Calvert. No matter. You’re unlikely to meet again. Miss Tattletale has other tasks which won’t bring her to cross your path. And, of course, you will be rather busy for the foreseeable future.”

He swallowed hard, wondering how the hell he was going to get out of this...

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“General Calhoun is here to see you, Director.”

Emily looked at her screen and the video chat window that had popped up from her assistant, sighed a little, and nodded while pushing the hard-copy report she was hand annotating to the side. “Send him in,” she replied.

Moments later her office door opened to admit the DARPA man, who closed it and walked over as she stood. After a quick handshake he sat. “What can I do for you today, General?” she asked, fearing the worst.

“It’s more what I can do for you, Director,” he replied with an easy smile. Reaching into his inner pocket he produced a couple of USB sticks which he put on her desk. She looked quizzically at them, then raised her gaze to his face.

“And these are?” she asked, not reaching for them.

“The red one has details of the moles in your organization, along with full dossiers on them all, payment details, blackmail data, times and dates of when they acted for outside sources, and other relevant information,” he replied as she froze in shock. “The blue one is a full list of all the exploits and holes in your security and computer network including suggested patches.”

She stared at him for close to thirty seconds before she could bring herself to speak. Eventually she swallowed, took a couple of deep breaths, and very carefully asked, “Where did you get this information?”

“It was passed along to us by another agency who came across it during a classified operation, the details of which I’m unfortunately not at liberty to divulge. It’s been carefully checked and is valid. They felt that you’d like to deal with the internal issues yourself, although certain external ones have already been handled.” He looked slightly apologetic. “We have no beef with you, and I don’t want to cause any trouble if it can be avoided. You should be able to clean house using that information, and we didn’t see any reason to involve the rest of the PRT. Especially considering your… minor disagreements… with the Chief Director.” Calhoun smiled a little as she grunted in irritation.

“You know about that.”

“Oh, we keep ourselves informed, yes,” he assured her. “Between you and me I find her somewhat difficult to like. Competent, but...” He shrugged one shoulder.

Giving him a look, she finally reached out for the two USB drives, inserting the red one into her computer and waiting for the security check to finish before opening it. A large list of files appeared, neatly categorized by department. Her eyes widened at the sheer number of them.

“Jesus,” she breathed, almost hesitantly opening the first document. A quick skim of the contents made her stomach turn over. “Oh, hell. So that’s what happened to the E88 raid two years ago...”

This was going to be a nightmare to deal with.

“I’m not sure if I should thank you or shoot you,” she growled, looking up at him. He gazed back with clear sympathy on his face.

“I understand, and I’m sorry to cause you trouble, Director. But it needed to be passed on.”

Glancing back at her screen, she nodded heavily. “True. It’s still going to be a massive pain in the ass.” Sighing, she stood and held out her hand again. “Thank you.”

“My pleasure. Good luck.” He shook it, then stepped back, turned, and left. She dropped into her chair with a grunt and started going through the data, making notes on who was going to get fired, and who was going to go to jail for decades.

Eventually she picked up her phone and started making calls.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Closing the door of the warehouse behind her, Taylor looked around with a smile, then pulled yet another modified cellphone out of her pocket. She was going to have to get around to integrating all her sensors and other toys into one device soon or she’d be carrying more of the things around than seemed plausible, she decided as she turned it on and waited for it to boot. Once it was running she initialized the detector array with a tap on the correct icon, checked it calibrated properly, then went over to the far left side and started walking slowly down the aisle, scanning the towering racks of boxes and containers with her device.

It took her twenty minutes to get the first traces of what she was looking for.

“I knew it,” she muttered under her breath, smiling broadly. “I was sure there was more in here somewhere. Considering how long they’ve been collecting stuff for, it had to be.”

Moving around as she waved the repurposed phone about, she slowly localized the tiny variation in background quantum interference noise her scanner was filtering out of the much larger changes other sources of such things produced. It had taken some very careful work and a lot of thought, but she’d finally come up with a method after half a dozen failures, one of which had left an impressive scorch mark on her bench and come close to removing her eyebrows. She’d had to trim her bangs a little to cover the damage and had been blinking quite a lot for an hour or so.

The flash had been quite bright.

And her father had been quite sarcastic about the bang, not to mention pointedly handing her a set of safety goggled which she’d accepted with a rueful smile and mild shame.

Still, science sometimes bit you. It was just one of those risks.

But in the end she’d managed to achieve her goal. Now she followed the changing graphs on the screen with complete concentration, eventually stopping half way down one aisle, before slowly raising the scanner to point at the fourth shelf up. Nodding in satisfaction she put the thing in her pocket, then walked off, coming back a few minutes later pushing the rolling stairs with some effort. Getting them next to the shelf she scurried up them, then scanned the boxes in front of her until the readings peaked. Putting the modified phone next to her on the steps she leaned over and hauled the large box closer so she could open it, before diving in and rummaging around, a small flashlight between her teeth.

Shortly thereafter she yelped in excitement and surfaced holding a metal and plastic widget about the size of a car radio. Sitting on the steps she carefully examined it with the aid of the light.

“Huh. Not Squealer’s work, this is much too neat. I wonder who made it?” she murmured, turning the Tinker device over in her hands, then squinting into one of the gaps in the casing. Pulling a small screwdriver out of her pocket she quickly located and removed several screws, then opened the thing and looked at the innards with interest.

“OK. Cool… still wrong, but not as wrong. Pretty neat too. Nice wiring.” She kept mumbling to herself as she leaned over the thing on her knees while studying it closely. “Leet, maybe? Definitely not Squealer. Might be someone else but I can’t think of any other Tinker around here other than Armsmaster and I can’t see him leaving his stuff lying around...”

Eventually she shrugged, screwed the lid back on, and put the thing in her backpack, before scanning the box again to make sure no more Tinker tech was hiding inside. Not detecting any of the minute quantum noise it seemed to produce, she shoved the box back into place then descended to the floor again, waving the scanner around once more with a questing expression.

Soon she was following another signal. She was very pleased that her guess had been right, the DWU had indeed managed to pick up other random Tinker scrap over the years.

She was very intrigued by what she’d learn by studying it. And figuring out how it tied into her steadily improving understanding of Parahuman powers.

Eventually she was going to work out what was hiding behind the phenomenon. It might take a while, and perhaps a missing eyebrow or two, but they’d grow back and she was patient.

And this was fun, too, as well as educational.

When she left the warehouse two and a half hours later, covered in dust and cobwebs and lugging a fairly heavy backpack, she was definitely feeling in a good mood. She trotted off to the Gravtec offices whistling happily, smiling at the large man with a gun he thought was hidden in his jacket who nodded to her as she passed.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“There you guys are.”

Danny looked around at his daughter’s voice, Angus also turning to see the girl standing in the doorway to his office grinning at them. She seemed in a good mood even for her.

“Hi, dear. Did you need us for something?” He looked at his watch. “No more tests today, I thought?”

“No, we’re done with that series,” she replied, coming in and closing the door. “Got all the data we need, we can move on to phase two soon. This is something different.”

He examined her face suspiciously. He knew that tone of voice.

“You’ve done something again, haven’t you?” he probed cautiously as Angus looked between them, then moved to his chair and sat down with an expectant expression. She waved a hand in front of her.

“Kinda, yeah.”

“Something that’s going to make me lose what little hair I have left, or something that’s not quite that worrying?”

She giggled at his tone of voice. “Bit of both, probably.”

“Oh, lord,” he sighed, sitting down himself and staring at her. “What now?”

“You remember that stuff we found in the store room?”

He thought back a couple of weeks and nodded slowly and carefully. “The Tinker devices?”

Angus looked sharply at him, then very thoughtfully at Taylor, who was still smiling.

“Yep.”

“What about them?” he asked warily.

She put her backpack on the table at the side of the room and opened it, pulling out a device he recognized as the first one she’d found. It looked like it had been cleaned up and the wiring that was hanging out the side was now gone. Putting it on Angus’s desk she tapped it as both men leaned over to inspect the thing.

“This is trying to be an optical diversion field generator, and doing a very inefficient job of it,” she said. Angus and Danny exchanged bemused glances, then turned to look at her. She sighed faintly and added, “A cloaking device.”

“Ah.” Angus nodded. “I recall Squealer is known for such inventions.”

“She’s not very good at it,” Taylor said with some asperity. “The tolerances on most of the field coils are horrible, the wiring is substandard, most of the circuitry is seriously underrated, and quite a lot of it is entirely wrong. I mean, it sort of works, but it shouldn’t.”

“That’s rather the point with Tinker technology, though?” Angus commented, sounding a little confused. “No one can properly understand how it works, not even the Tinker who made it.”

She put her hands on her hips and glared at the device like it had personally insulted her. “Well, I understand how it’s meant to work, and she did a really bad job of implementing it.” His daughter shrugged. “So I did it right.”

They gaped a little at her, before exchanging another glance. “You… did what right?” Danny asked with trepidation.

“I reverse engineered her toy and fixed the bugs, then made a better one,” Taylor smiled, pulling out her phone.

Angus cleared his throat, making her and Danny both look at her. “Taylor, I know full well that you’re probably smarter than any six normal engineers put together but people have been trying to understand how Tinker technology works for nearly thirty years and… good lord.”

Both of them stared in shock at where Taylor had been standing, and was now an entirely empty patch of carpet. She’d raised the phone and tapped an icon, then simply disappeared. Very slowly Danny stood, before cautiously reaching out with one hand.

“Boo!” she shouted as she reappeared a couple of feet to the left, making him nearly jump over Angus’s desk in shock. They gaped at her as she collapsed in giggles. “Your faces,” she chortled, pointing. “That was fantastic.”

Taking a couple of breaths, Danny calmed his racing heart, then walked over to her and put his arm over her shoulders, which were shaking with laughter. “Taylor?”

“Yes, Dad?” she said innocently, gazing at him with big eyes behind her glasses. He pinched the bridge of his nose.

“Are you saying that you understand how Tinker technology actually works?” he asked mildly, feeling light headed. Angus was gaping still.

She shrugged a bit. “Some of it, yeah. It’s not really that difficult if you look at it right. It’s not very well designed, that makes it a bit tricky, but the underlying concepts aren’t really drastically weird. I mean, I don’t know yet if other Tinkers than Squealer will make better stuff, she might be a bit handicapped or something. I found some more widgets in the store room I think are Leet’s work and it does look much neater if nothing else. I guess she’s probably high or something a lot of the time? Maybe that explains it.” The girl looked thoughtful for a moment as he tried to parse the stream of words. “I can’t see being on drugs really helping with making hardware. I know that if I drink too much tea my hands shake a little. But that coil was really badly wound, I’m amazed she didn’t burn her workshop down or something...”

Holding up a hand, he waited for her to stop talking. “All right. Let’s slow down and take a step back, just for me?”

“Sure, dad.”

“You figured out what Squealer’s device did?”

“Yep.”

“And how it did it.”

“Yep.”

“Then duplicated it and made it small enough to go into a phone?”

“Yep.” She grinned widely as he took his glasses off and rubbed his eyes. Angus was sort of smiling while still looking stunned, he noticed. Taylor just seemed pleased with herself, which to be honest wasn’t unwarranted.

“So you now have an invisibility phone.”

“I do, yes.” She held it up proudly. “Still working on the sound suppression field, that one is slightly trickier to miniaturize enough and I have to recalculate all the emitter parameters from scratch, but the theory’s not too hard. And the structural field generator is coming along well, but I haven’t had time to finish it yet.”

Dropping into his chair he stared at his brilliant, irrepressible, impossible daughter in silence.

Eventually he shook his head in wonder and turned to Angus, who picked up the phone.

“I’ll call Brendan,” the physicist said with a smile. “He’s going to love this.”

Taylor produced a thick printout from her backpack. “I’ve got my design notes all written up if that helps.”

“Of course you have,” he sighed. He held out his hand and Angus put a small shot glass into it, then filled it from the bottle he kept in his desk while holding the phone to his ear with his other hand.

“Hello, Brendan,” the older man said with a mischievous expression, even as Danny tossed back the whiskey. “Is DARPA interested in a cloaking device small enough to go in your pocket?”

All three of them could easily hear the shouting from the other end of the phone, which made Danny and Taylor both grin.

Chapter Text

Brendan Calhoun, PhD, General, and old hand in the ways of science, stared with extreme concentration at the document he was holding as he flipped through it. As he was now easily able to recognize, the style of the author was clear, concise, accurate, and neat.

And, of course, yet again took the rule book on a number of scientific disciplines, looked dismissively at it, and threw it out while muttering about doing it properly.

Then did it properly.

He finally leaned back in his chair and rubbed his eyes tiredly. Taylor, the Prime Asset, was so far past ‘brilliant’ that an entirely different terminology was required. He’d known that, or thought he’d known that, from about ten minutes after meeting her, but this latest piece of her work drove that home like nothing he’d ever encountered. The girl had already single-handedly advanced the understanding of gravitics and associated fields by decades. She’d basically invented the science of gravitics, for that matter. Then advanced it by decades. The knock on effects just since that point had produced a larger upheaval in physics, chemistry, mathematics, electronics, and half a dozen other specialties than the entire Manhattan project had managed in its entirety.

And she kept doing it.

Every damn time he talked to Angus, it was to learn that the impossible young woman had again rewritten everything they thought they knew about pretty much everything. She didn’t seem to know when to, or possibly how to, stop. Of course, that was why she was the Prime Asset, a Person of Interest to the US government that was literally the single most important person in the entire country. He wasn’t sure she even realized that, in fact he was fairly sure she didn’t, because she was aside from being a genuine comic-book level super-genius a very nice, friendly and down to earth girl who was basically just having fun working out how the universe functioned. And documenting it thoroughly so lesser minds could also understand it.

He very much liked Taylor, and for that matter her father, and even without her value to the country, and the world too, would have been happy to know both of them.

It somewhat amused him that she was so valuable a person, so unique a mind, that if it came down to the President himself or her, orders were that she was the one who was saved. Orders from the President himself, which was somewhat odd at best. Understandable, as the man was by no means stupid, but unusual too.

Now she’d apparently decided that inventing practical antigravity and a cheap room temperature superconductor wasn’t exciting enough and had moved onto successfully reverse engineering Tinker tech. Not only the anomalous engineering itself, but the theory behind it. It was like she’d seen a TV for the first time and rather than just copying the functioning unit, derived all the principles upon which it worked and extrapolated from that to image compression, digital transmission standards, and game shows.

From what he could understand of the thick document, she was well on her way towards a genuine theory of how Tinker tech in general worked. This particular one explained the principals behind the ‘optical diversion field generator’ in detail, enough detail that a talented engineer could duplicate her results in the same manner that had occurred with her gravitational reference frame regenerators. And more than that, a really talented engineer could take that understanding and undoubtedly work out other related areas of research. It was far more than just a design document for one specific implementation of the basic idea, it was an entire field of study that would keep a whole series of university departments running for years. Or be something you could spin off a number of very successful and profitable companies on the back of.

Just like gravitics, superconductors, and anything else she came up with. He was completely certain she was nowhere near finished with this sort of thing.

In the long run her work was going to be the source of a massive rebuilding of society in almost every manner one could imagine, he thought. Already the US defense industry was feeling the ramifications almost everywhere, even if the ultimate source of the extraordinary new technology wasn’t yet known beyond a very small number of extremely highly vetted people. DARPA was busily dusting off hundreds of former projects that had been investigated since the fifties and shelved because of something or other that simply was beyond the knowledge of the day, and looking into which ones were now feasible. A surprising number appeared to be worth following up on. Just the superconductor alone had put a good two dozen ideas back into the running as practically doable, and that was certainly only the start.

Their allies undoubtedly had other similar archives which would be amenable to reinvestigation now, and in due time this would definitely happen. The Canadians at least would be read into the program within a year or two, and others would follow. At the moment the impetus was of course on making sure that the Prime Asset was sufficiently protected once knowledge of her work became more widespread. Half the security apparatus of the US was devoted to that end, and many agencies that were so secret hardly anyone even in the government knew about them were having a lot of fun and considerable success in dealing with all manner of problems they’d wanted to handle for decades.

Taylor hadn’t wanted to leave Brockton Bay, saying it was her home, and while in some ways that had presented a problem, in other ways it had been a benefit. Far enough away from the corridors of power to avoid certain parties, but close enough to a number of specific places to make it fairly easy to move people and equipment around if required. Right on the water, which was again a positive from the point of view of getting access by sea, but a negative in some ways for the same reason. And it was a city that was more than used to the peculiar which meant that with care a lot of the things that were likely to happen could be spun as just something that happened in a Parahuman hotbed like Brockton Bay, once the actual Parahuman problems had been otherwise dealt with.

That was a work in progress, but the latest reports showed it to be something that was quite successful so far. And it had produced a number of unexpected dividends, some of which had been useful bargaining chips for local politics, some resulting in valuable skills being acquired, and so on.

All in all, while the location wasn’t one he himself would have naturally picked for the next big leap in research, it had turned out to be oddly effective to date.

And BBU, with Angus Drekin involved, had also proven to be a highly valuable source of extremely intelligent people eager to work on beyond-cutting-edge physics and engineering. They seemed able to keep their mouths shut, were very good at their jobs, and had no trouble working with a fifteen year old girl who was smarter than all of them together. Taken The DWU as well had shown their worth immediately being a ready made and highly motivated workforce who were remarkably loyal and very discreet.

Neither he nor anyone else in the know had expected things to work so well but everyone was very glad it had.

Picking up the next document he leafed through it, not going into a deep read as the very first page said that it was preliminary and still subject to change as Taylor worked on the theory. There were three more documents of a similar nature sitting on his desk, covering other Tinker widgets she’d found in the DWU storerooms. Apparently the dock workers had a habit of collecting pretty much everything that people left lying around and filing it away for a rainy day. He wondered just how much stuff they really had. The place was pretty large after all, and had been around for a very long time…

It might be worth investigating at some point, just to settle his own curiosity.

Quickly scanning the other three binders, he finally stacked them neatly on the desk along with the first two, then sat and stared at them for a while, thinking. It was clear to him that Taylor was heading towards explaining Tinker Tech to a level that literally no one else had ever managed, and he wouldn’t have been at all surprised if she ended up cracking the entire phenomenon wide open and turning it into engineering rather than near-magic.

Picking up the device next to the reports, he turned it over in his hand, studying it with near-awe. A practical invisibility generator, battery powered, reliable, and duplicatable, the size of a pack of cards. The girl had actually apologized that it wasn’t yet suitable for an entire vehicle larger than a motorcycle, saying that it was far more efficient than the rather amateur implementation she’d investigated (her words exactly) but not quite as powerful as she’d concentrated on making it work properly. Making it cover a larger area was easy, she’d said, and her document suggested various modifications to the hardware designs to achieve that, but she wasn’t going to waste her time building them herself as she had other projects.

Brendan smiled to himself as he recalled her exasperation with Squealer’s designs. The girl took the whole Tinker thing somewhat personally, feeling it wasn’t keeping up to her own standards. This was undoubtedly true but not something anyone but her would actually care about. Simply making it work at all would be seen as miracle enough for the vast majority of people.

He put the example device on top of the whole pile and leaned back in his chair, picking up the half-empty and nearly cold mug of coffee at his elbow and finishing it in a couple of gulps, before putting the empty mug down and reaching for his secure phone. He had yet more calls to make, advice to request, and people in high places to worry and excite in equal quantity.

These latest developments would push the Prime Asset’s value even higher, require a number of alterations to the existing situation and protocols, and probably cause quite a few individuals both joy and concern. It would also require yet another specialist team to be set up to investigate the practical ramifications of Taylor’s latest ideas and how to integrate them into the various projects being developed at a frightening pace right now. He could think of at least four separate areas where just the cloaking device would be welcomed with open arms and cries of glee.

Smirking a little to himself at the thought of the likely look on the face of one specific military person, he started dialing the first of a fairly long list of numbers.

It was going to be yet another long evening, but despite that he found he was enjoying his current work far more than previous arrangements.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Connecting her first sensor-laden phone to her main computer, Taylor downloaded the latest data she’d collected at school and around the city into the steadily growing collection of related information, then unplugged the device again. She pulled the keyboard in front of her and started up her analysis program, which chewed on the download for a while, running trillions of calculations on it and correlating the most recent readings with the rest of the information she’d derived up to this point.

While it ran, she tabbed to the other program that was constantly monitoring Parahuman subspace anomalies around the city, at lower resolution that her phone sensors managed but over a much wider area. It showed that a number of new targets had entered the collection area, while a few had left. Most of these were congregated around the PRT building and the Rig which probably meant they were heroes visiting the city. She checked the logs and nodded to herself, then added some more annotations to her database.

The target that had been located under the commercial district on a regular basis appeared to have vanished a week or two ago, and no sign of it had been seen since on her sensor grid. She idly wondered who it was and why they’d been lurking down there. It had been easy to work out it was an underground location, which was sort of cool, if somewhat odd. As far as she’d been able to find out nothing in that area had a basement deep enough to match her readings, which implied some sort of secret base. Whether that belonged to a hero or villain she had no idea, either choice being possible. Perhaps one day she’d find out, but for now it wasn’t really important.

A group of four other targets that had been in the bad part of the Docks had also disappeared, her logs showing them to have moved around the city quite a lot for a while then exiting to the east and not returning. Again, she didn’t know who it was, aside from clearly being an organized group, but beyond that she was in the dark. It didn’t really matter, for the most part she wasn’t interested in the identity of the targets, merely the data she could gather on their existence.

There was something very odd about Parahumans in general, and she was determined to get to the bottom of it. And the more she learned the odder the whole thing was, but the more fascinating. How all this linked into subspace and quantum variations she wasn’t yet sure. On the other hand, the fact that it did left a number of paths of inquiry open to her, and fitted neatly with her own interests and skills. Being able to track the end result of Parahuman abilities had helped immensely in finding Tinker Tech to examine, for instance, and the portals that had briefly appeared well off shore a while back were also extremely intriguing and clearly related to the same sort of thing.

She wasn’t sure who was behind them, but she had a growing understanding of how such a thing could be done…

And she was also coming to the conclusion, when working out the theory behind it, that yet again the Parahuman method to do what it was doing was doing it wrong. Or at least, very inefficiently. The math seemed to suggest that a cleaner solution to the problem was possible but she was still thinking about the whole thing and wasn’t quite at the stage of being able to test her hypothesis. Soon, though. The hardware should be fairly straightforward, once she worked out a few minor residual issues and finished the equations needed.

So many projects, so little time, she thought with a smile to herself. But that was one of the things that was so much fun, of course.

Noting the presence of a pair of familiar target signatures in another area in the docks, not too far from the DWU area, she zoomed in on her map and stared at the display. Some adjustments to the processing algorithms revealed what she’d suspected, traces of the minute quantum hiss that Tinker Tech emitted, although the resolution at this distance wasn’t sufficient with her current long range sensors to get a good read on the source or sources. Making some notes on improvements that would fix that issue, she put the pen down again and returned to the display. Correlating the results with those of the Rig, which she was using as a control since she was certain it was stuffed full of Tinker hardware, she nodded thoughtfully to herself.

“Not quite as large a reading, but close,” she muttered, propping her chin on her hands and staring at the screen. “Gotta be Leet. Probably target one, there, I’d think, so that logically makes target two Über. Huh. I wonder if those last devices I found were his stuff? I’ll need a really good sensor to be sure from here...” The girl picked up her pen and notebook and spent a while thinking hard, slowly jotting down a new design for a very directional and sensitive quantum interference detector specifically capable of filtering out background noise and selectively distinguishing the type of interference pattern at long range. That task took her another forty minutes, long enough for her analysis program to finish munching its way through about two terabytes of data and ping for her attention.

She glanced up at the other monitor, then wrote the last few words in her notebook, before typing a few sentences into her Parahuman detector database. When she’d finished updating it, she closed that program and switched back to the first one. Studying the resulting data with great interest, she nodded slowly to herself.

“Fascinating,” she murmured under her breath, barely audible over the faint background track from the alien tutor channel playing quietly in the basement lab. Every now and then she almost subconsciously recognized a few words, glancing at the speaker with a small smile when this happened before returning her attention to the screen.

Eventually she rolled the chair sideways and picked up the latest bit of hardware she’d been fiddling with, a specialized variant of the subspace detector that was an outgrowth of her Tinker Tech tracker. She’d noticed a few odd readings on the phone she’d put that device into when she’d taken it to school and had spent some time puzzling over this, finally working out that it was picking up something somewhat more subtle than the background noise of anomalous technology interfering with normal subspace. The signal was barely at the detectable threshold, being both very faint and, for want of a better term, on a different frequency. This was not at all accurate for most purposes, but she still hadn’t settled on the right terminology to describe subspace properly.

The important thing right now was that she knew what she meant. She’d work out how to tell other people as and when she actually did tell other people about the whole thing, which was still a problem in her mind. Taylor was all too well aware that much of her work could have some pretty severe implications to both Parahumans and everyone else, many of these being potentially very unpleasant. It was something that worried her, as she didn’t want to hurt anyone, and felt that Parahumans had as much right to privacy as everyone else. Friends of hers would be affected, after all, and even leaving that aside, there were a hell of a lot of possible problems that her research could spark off.

It was a tricky problem. So she was in no real hurry to tell anyone else at the moment. Not until she could work out a solution, or there was a good reason to tell them. Ideally both.

Dismissing this line of thought yet again, she connected the new detector unit to various pieces of test gear and her computer, then very carefully checked her work, before powering it up. Once she’d tested all the voltages were good, nothing was getting excessively hot, all the current draws were correct, and none of the magic smoke was escaping, she started testing it bit by bit. Eventually she was happy that the basic system was functional.

Moving back to the computer she opened the development editor and spent a while going over her code. Spotting a couple of tiny errors she fixed them, then began writing a new processing section based on the results of her latest analysis run. After over two hours, and a few aborted compilations, she finally had something she was happy with and uploaded it to the sensor unit. When it finished flashing the new program she reset it, then fired up the front end program on the computer.

Taylor studied the results the device was producing and frowned. “Weird,” she mumbled, moving sideways to the sensor package and bending over it, remembering this time to put her safety goggles on just in case. She stared at it closely, before adjusting a couple of faintly glowing coil-like structures wrapped with half a dozen oddly shaped windings in different metals. Her ceramic screwdriver distorted in a somewhat visually disturbing manner as she gently inserted it down the core of one of the components due to the multidimensional nature of the field it was producing, something she thought was rather neat. Tweaking it she looked up at the bank of power supplies, checking the readings on them, before tweaking it a tiny bit more then nodding in satisfaction. Moving to the second one she adjusted that as well, watching the readings on one analog meter jump, then settle back at a steady position.

She found analog meters were sometimes invaluable for this sort of thing, since they gave an instant visual feedback a digital reading didn’t, and were easier to quickly read.

Both components were now glowing a little more brightly. “That’s better,” she said to herself, pleased. “Really good resonance lock now. OK, let’s see what that does...”

Back at the computer, she reset the sensor unit again, then watched the program output for a while with a furrowed brow. Eventually she looked across at the thing on the bench and studied it for a few seconds. “That is… very intriguing,” she commented softly to the aliens, still talking to themselves at the threshold of hearing. “Not quite a portal, but really similar in some ways. And really small too.” She reached out and carefully pivoted the device ninety degrees while watching the readings, then tilted it up and down by the same amount. “And really close as well.”

She looked around the room, an expression of bemusement on her face. Then she got up and picked the entire sensor up off the workbench, making sure not to dislodge any of the cables connected to it, and spent a few minutes turning it in every direction possible while logging the results. When she finished she put it back and sat down again, going back over the logged data.

Eventually she tilted her chair back and peered at the ceiling. “Huh. I didn’t expect that,” she said under her breath, thinking very hard. “I wonder...”

By the time she went to bed, she’d opened a new project and got about half way through sketching out a design for yet another specialized sensor. She was going to have to get some very close range readings of as many different Parahumans as she could with the new device to work out what was going on.

The subspace interference she’d detected coming from Parahumans seemed to have another layer to it she’d not initially noticed, one that was definitely related to portals but different in a number of interesting ways.

One of those ways raising the intriguing question of whether Parahumans really did have tiny little almost-portals inside their heads. And if they did, where did the other end go?

Taylor was definitely going to figure that one out.

And even more interestingly, she was going to figure out why there was a similar but subtly different phenomenon apparently somewhere in the house itself…

If something was watching her, she was damn well going to find out what it was and watch it right back. Whether it liked it or not.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“The Prime Asset can duplicate Tinker Technology?”

Secretary Robinson’s voice was flat.

“Not quite that simple, sir. She can understand Tinker Technology.”

The woman speaking, Doctor Gabrielle Hudson, a physicist, mathematician, and engineer with four different doctorates acquired over her sixty years of life, and more than fifty patents to her name, shook her head in wonder. “At least the specific examples that were acquired from local sources. The investigation of them was unparalleled in its detail and comprehension of the underlying principles. The Prime Asset appears to be able to derive the theory behind what the specific implementation is doing, or as it was put, trying to do and not quite managing that correctly, then generalizing this to a functional explanation understandable by anyone sufficiently versed in the relevant fields. I will note that despite nearly thirty years of effort across the world, no one else has ever managed to do what the Prime Asset has managed apparently as a side project mostly due to curiosity.”

“Unbelievable.” He stared at her, then at the report in front of him, a summary of the much more comprehensive data that General Calhoun had acquired from a recent visit to Gravtec, along with the results of a lot of careful verification work done by DARPA scientists. “And this is like the gravitic work, something that genuinely can be mass produced?”

“Yes. The basic principles are surprisingly straightforward in most respects once you manage to get to grips with a far more comprehensive superset of physics than described by the Standard Model and any other current understandings of how the universe actually works. Most of which are rapidly becoming apparent as being severely lacking in numerous areas. Just the gravitational theory the Prime Asset produced opened up a vast number of paths to a true understandings of physics, and clearly this has helped with the Tinker conundrum. Much of the documentation handed to DARPA relies on the previous work in many places, and without such understanding it’s now obvious that discovering how such anomalous technology functions was never going to be possible, at least without a century or so of very difficult effort.”

“I see.” He rubbed his chin as he looked at the documentation, flipping through it again slowly while everyone else waited patiently. “And this isn’t simply reverse engineering specific devices? It’s a true understanding of the underlying operational theory?”

“Definitely, yes, Mr Secretary.” Doctor Hudson indicated the report in front of him with the end of her pen. “We have thoroughly investigated the initial reports, and DARPA engineers and scientists have not only successfully duplicated the work involved in the original proof of concept hardware, but generalized it to a whole class of related implementations. Several of which were mentioned by the Prime Asset as possible if someone wanted to work on it. One application is an inversion of the cloaking device, which instead of bending electromagnetic radiation around a zone of space, instead reflects it directly back to where it came from. A perfect mirror, in other words, one that can in theory cover the entire electromagnetic spectrum.”

He looked at her in amazement.

“There are quite a number of practical applications for just that,” she added with a small smile. “A telescope mirror, a radiation shield, a solar power generator, perfect heat insulation, and quite a few more our people immediately thought of. Invisibility, while useful, is merely the tip of the iceberg.”

“Good lord.” Robinson looked down at the report again, shook his head, and closed the folder. “Yet again I am stunned.”

“That does seem to be a common result of the Prime Asset becoming interesting in something, sir,” Hudson chuckled.

“So it would appear,” he agreed. Turning to one of the other people, he asked, “Does this impact on our situation vis a vis the PRT?”

The Attorney General, Quentin Miles, looked thoughtful. He had a short quiet conversation with one of his associates, then looked back at Robinson. “We don’t believe so, no. The PRT can make a case that Parahumans are their responsibility, although as you are aware this is not entirely correct in all possible cases, and they do tend to assume that the results of Parahuman powers fall under their remit. However, there is a significant amount of legal precedent showing that it’s entirely feasible for Tinker Tech, for example, to be transferred perfectly legally via several methods to private or company ownership. Admittedly the NEPEA-5 laws make it hard for any Parahuman to profit from their powers, which was clearly the entire reason for passing them, something I personally feel was not well thought out, but the stated intent of such laws were to prevent Parahuman abilities conferring an unfair commercial advantage.”

He looked around at the others, all of whom were listening carefully.

“Of course, if the Parahuman in question provides a service or product that can’t be conventionally arranged, there’s a good case to be made that NEPEA laws don’t apply. Past cases have gone either way, but in the case of Tinker Tech it’s been generally considered that assuming no laws were broken in the process, and that the technology is performing a function that can’t be otherwise reasonably done in other ways, it’s entirely legal to sell or give it to someone else. Of course, there are other issues at play, with dangerous technology, weapons, self-replicating organisms or machines, that sort of thing, but there are plenty of cases where this has been done. The PRT often kicks back about it, they really don’t like not having total control of such things, but the courts certainly don’t always go their way. In fact in recent years they’ve lost more such cases than they’ve won, and precedent tends to show this is likely to continue.”

Miles shrugged slightly. “Several tech companies have taken advantage of such loopholes to acquire Tinker Tech for study in an attempt to reverse engineer them, almost invariably without success, the Federal government reserves the right to do much the same as well although in recent years this has been quite rare since it so seldom produced results, and there are even a number of successful niche businesses that deal in custom Tinker products for various clients. Toybox is the most obvious one but there are several more that are less well known. The limited lifespan of Tinker hardware tends to be significantly more of an issue than the legality of acquiring it.”

He looked down at the notebook he’d been scribbling in during the meeting. “Abandoned Tinker devices also sometimes turn up, especially in places like Brockton Bay, and while the PRT will usually either confiscate them or pay a bounty on them if turned in, they also tend to ignore quite a lot of the less important devices. At one point they obsessively collected every single item they could find, but in the last ten or twelve years this seems to have become low priority. Possibly due to lack of resources, but you’d have to ask them to find out for sure. A large amount of this sort of material ends up on online auction sites and again there’s precedent to show that, under many circumstances, it’s entirely legal. Laws of salvage among other things.”

Secretary Robinson nodded slowly as he finished speaking. “So essentially you believe that the PRT do not have a monopoly on Tinker Technology, even if they would like to?”

“That is what precedent and legal opinions show, sir, yes,” the other man agreed. “Additionally, I will point out that from what Doctor Hudson has explained, the result of the Prime Asset’s work, even it if was inspired by Tinker work, is not Tinker work. By definition. It’s entirely reproducible and understandable by a person of sufficient knowledge in the relevant fields, which makes it mundane technology and entirely out of the PRT’s legal remit no matter how they might attempt to argue the case. It’s provably not the result of Parahuman powers. This has been shown before in the very limited number of cases where some technological breakthrough resulted from the study of previous Tinker devices, the archetypal case being of course Solwind Industries vs Parahuman Response Team, 1997. The PRT took that all the way to the Supreme Court and ultimately lost, on the basis that the innovation in question was explicable by normal science and therefore not Parahuman in nature regardless of the provenance of the original inspiration of the new solar cell design the company invented.”

“I see,” Robinson replied after he’d mulled that over for a few seconds. “Excellent. So there is still no reason for the Chief Director to become involved.”

Miles smiled thinly. “I suspect she would strenuously argue otherwise, but legally she would find it very, very hard to make her case. With the national security restrictions covering the entire situation being what they are, I would say it was impossible, to be honest. There is no legal rationalization I or anyone else can come up with that wouldn’t be dismissed out of hand with years if not decades of precedent to back that judgment up.”

The Secretary thought this over again. Eventually he looked at one of the other people present. “I believe it would be a sensible idea to organize through suitable channels to acquire more Tinker Technology and see that it is passed on to the Prime Asset through DARPA. Discreetly, of course, no sense making the PRT get any more interested than they already are, but if this is what happens from the limited amount of samples locally sourced, it would be interesting to see what would happen with a larger quantity.”

The dark haired man he was talking to, who was not known by name to any of the ones present other than the Secretary himself, nodded and made some notes. “That can be arranged,” he said in a quiet voice. “We have a number of potential sources for such things. It may cost.”

Robinson waved a hand. “Money is irrelevant.”

“Possibly other requirements will be needed.”

“That can be arranged. Whatever it takes. As usual, this is the highest priority other than the safety of the Prime Asset and related personnel. Orders directly from the President.”

“Understood, sir.” The man nodded again as he finished writing and slipped the notebook into his inside pocket. “And if any PRT operatives do become involved?”

“Dissuade them. Refer them to me if required. Ideally, though, keep things under their radar. It’ll make life a lot easier for everyone.”

The agency man merely smiled a little.

Looking around the table, Robinson seemed satisfied. “Thank you, everyone. Good work. We’ll meet again in two weeks unless something critical comes up. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to meet with the Joint Chiefs and brief them on the somewhat startling results our friend has yet again pulled out of a hat.”

He stood up and picked up the folder, slipping it into his briefcase, while everyone else also rose and left. When he exited the room he headed deeper into the Pentagon, thinking hard about what would come next.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Putting a forkful of spaghetti into her mouth, Taylor slowly ate it, while fiddling with her phone with her free hand. She discreetly nudged it to point at the table that the Wards sat at, all four boys current discussing baseball with some of their friends, while Vicky Dallon listened idly as she ate. The blonde girl looked mildly bored but not enough to push for a subject change.

Tapping the screen a couple of times, she ran another scan, looking at the small complex graph that quickly built up in various colors and mentally decomposing the result to its component values. Yet again, the results were fascinating, and backed up some of the conclusions she’d arrived at over the last couple of weeks.

She was getting closer to working out what the next step should be, and it looked like she was going to learn some really cool data when she built the equipment she’d need to take that step.

Eating another mouthful, she picked the phone up as Amy sat opposite her, the other girl smiling at her. She smiled back, watching as her friend put her own tray down and grabbed a can of soda then popped the top. “That math test was a bastard,” Amy commented, looking somewhat annoyed.

“It wasn’t that bad,” Taylor replied, toying with the phone then glancing at the screen before putting it in her pocket.

“Yeah, you would say that. You’re weird with math.” Amy grinned at her. Taylor laughed a little, shrugging.

“I like it.”

“Weird, I say.” Amy sighed, then picked up her fork. “I’ll stick to biology. That I can handle.”

“You’re good at Spanish too,” Taylor commented.

“You’re picking that up much too fast as well,” Amy grumbled good-naturedly. “I’ve been learning it for four years and I’m not as good as you are after a few months!”

“Gift for languages, maybe?” Taylor suggested, smiling as she took a drink of her apple juice. “Linguistics is pretty neat.”

“It’s unfair,” the other girl sighed. “You got the height and the brains. I’m just left with godlike power and snarkiness.”

They exchanged a glance then burst out laughing, before discussing a movie both wanted to see. Taylor put her investigations to one side, as there was friendship to be done.

And that was nearly as important as Science.

Chapter Text

“INCOMING!”

Everyone in the entire yard dropped whatever it was they were doing and bolted for cover without a second thought at the announcement over the intercoms speakers, the word booming out across the bay even as a whistling sound descended on the facility. A massive explosion in the middle of the huge concrete area sent shock waves through the ground, fragments of metal and cement fountaining high into the air, and a large cloud of smoke rolling outwards from the impact site.

Even as this was happening the roofs of two of the smaller warehouses, one on either side of the yard, blew off on explosive bolts, a pair of large oval pods erupting from each building in less than two seconds. As they rose, rotary gun barrels unfolded from the AEGIS CIWS units and slewed onto target, opening up without hesitation and firing thousands of rounds per minute of explosive ammunition out across the water with a deafening roar. Far out over the bay an aircraft exploded into flames, another missile that had launched from it only moments before also being intercepted and destroyed simultaneously.

Before the Protectorate on the Rig or the PRT in the center of the city had the first idea anything was happening, the DWU protective detail had swung into action. More missiles came streaking in from a source over the horizon out to sea, hugging the water at less than twenty meters until they were a kilometer out then rising vertically to drop directly onto the facility. The AEGIS gun pods kept firing, slewing wildly from side to side in a blur of motion as they neutralized one missile after another.

During all this the well rehearsed evacuation plan was put into action. Every person on site either headed for hardened bunkers excavated deep under the facility and lined with half a meter of the best armor alloy available, capable of tanking a small tactical nuclear weapon even before the local gravitational reference shields had been turned on, or rushed for the hidden stealthed VTOL aircraft that were already standing by in other repurposed warehouses. Heavily armed special forces teams were on the move, both on site and at other locations around the city and the state, all of them heading either to protect the Prime Asset or eliminate whatever the threat was.

Within thirty seconds the entire DWU facility was apparently abandoned. Aircraft launched from their locations carrying the critical personnel and headed due west, going supersonic almost before clearing the buildings and causing shock waves that broke windows across the city. Others headed east with weapons hot, looking for whatever had decided to poke the hornet’s nest, while two nuclear submarines that happened to be prowling the coast twenty kilometers off shore began a hunt and destroy mission.

By the time the Rig alarms started blaring, eruptions of blinding light lit the horizon, and alerts had gone through the US government all the way to the top.

As no one yet knew what the real threat was and had to assume none of this would be enough, the worst case order was sent and enacted. Without properly thinking things through, unfortunately, but mistakes happen.

Order One Five Six, Prime Jumpshift, was triggered.

And Taylor Hebert, who had been heading for the evacuation shuttle, holding her backpack and running after her father and Angus while surrounded by lethal people carrying many weapons, barely had time to look surprised when her emergency teleport beacon activated right as she was turning on one of her scanners with her free hand in an attempt to work out the source of the problems.

In a bright flash of light she disappeared.

The chaos that ensued when she didn’t reappear in the most secure location on the planet, deep under the mountains in Colorado, made the shouting that Director Piggot was producing as she watched her city turn into a combat movie look like nothing…

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Ow.”

Taylor rubbed her head, sat up, got halfway and slammed into something far too close with a metallic clang, and recoiled in pain. On the way down again the back of her head this time smacked into the ground with another metallic clang, then there was silence.

Which was broken a few seconds later by a faint “Ow” again, this time with feeling.

“What the fuck?” the girl muttered to herself, rubbing her head once more, now in two different places. She not only felt like someone had used her as a baseball bat in a long game, but had a pair of really quite painful spots now, one on her forehead and one on the back of her skull. When the throbbing died down to tolerable levels she very carefully reached up in the darkness she’d suddenly found herself in and felt around. A smooth cold metal surface met her fingertips, making her frown.

Cautiously she ran her hand sideways, finding a corner, which she followed down to a metal floor. Her other hand made a similar discovery in the other direction. She quickly worked out that she appeared to be lying in a somewhat less than a meter square metal box, which was rather odd as it certainly wasn’t what she’d expected to find.

Reaching beyond her head only found air, and a questing probe with her feet met the same. So a metal tube at least three meters long, then, rather than a box. Square in section, somewhat thin walls based on how they flexed when she experimentally pushed, and… yes, there was a current of air flowing over her from somewhere past her feet.

“An air duct?” she wondered out loud, very carefully pulling herself up onto her elbows and peering around. She couldn’t see any light at all, which was definitely weird but if she really was inside a ventilation system it wasn’t surprising.

“Damn teleporting Tinker crap,” she grumbled as she checked her pockets, finding everything was there, then felt around to make sure her backpack was also present, which it was. “Targeting is awful. I told them it was a stupid idea, and I could design something to do the job right if they’d just wait a couple of days...” She sighed as she opened her backpack by feel and rummaged around inside, removing a small head mounted flashlight which she immediately strapped on, then activated. Bright white light illuminated pretty much the scene she’d expected to see based on her exploration by touch.

She looked around then sighed again. “Yeah. Ventilation duct. Yay. So if that way is where the air’s coming from, that’s probably the surface, so I need to go this way to get to where I should have ended up.”

The girl pulled out one of her phones and checked the screen, then frowned a little as none of the parahuman scanning programs showed any trace of the subspace anomalies that betrayed the presence of Tinker Tech like she’d been expecting. She fiddled with the settings for a while, then looked intrigued as she got a somewhat different quantum reading that was certainly not something she’d encountered before but shared some slight similarities with the portals she’d been examining for a while now.

“Hmm. I wonder what that is?” she mumbled, pulling out another phone and turning it on, then checking her readings using a different form of sensor. “High energy density, fluctuations in subspace, but… strange. And inefficient, it’s losing nearly thirty percent of the energy as quantum noise. Not really Tinker stuff, but...”

Her mutterings would have sounded both interested and somewhat peeved to any listener, but no one was around to hear. Almost forgetting where she was and why for the moment Taylor dug into her backpack, finding that she could barely sit cross-legged in the large ventilation duct, and pulled out the laptop she’d rebuilt the previous week as a more powerful version of her go-to phone for really serious work away from her home system. It was stuffed with some of her own design of optronic processors she’d been fiddling around with for a while and that she thought Brendan would like when she’d finished. Turning it on she connected both phones to it and started tapping away, examining the resulting data with great curiosity.

“Hmm. Fascinating,” she commented a little later, very quietly, as she watched a graph change rapidly over a few seconds, finally spiking into a new configuration with an abrupt shift of power level. “A stable, well stable-ish, wormhole. Sort of,” she said to herself, working out multidimensional equations in her head and fumbling absently for a notebook from her bag. She scribbled for a while, then looked at the results, made some corrections, and nodded. “Yeah. Pretty simple, really. Neat. I didn’t think of that, but it’s kind of obvious when you look at the Tau-space vectors. Got a lot of places for improvement though… Wonder who made it? And why?”

She looked back at the laptop in time to see the readings drop off, reverting to the previous levels. Noting the time she moved her scanner around to get a bearing on whatever was behind the phenomenon. “About fifty meters down and two hundred that way,” she said to herself, looking at one of the walls of the duct and thinking hard. “OK. Find whoever got me into a ventilation system rather than the correct place, kick him in the kneecap and call him an idiot, make sure Dad and Angus are all right, and the other guys, then go and figure out who’s built themselves a not very good portal generator, I guess,” she decided. Putting everything but one of the phones back into her pack and pockets, she used the remaining device to scan her surroundings, seeing that she was mostly surrounded by rock as she’d expected. The facility was supposed to be underground after all.

Nodding to herself, she shoved the phone into a pocket, got on hands and knees, and carefully crawled off in the direction the air was going, mentally complaining about Tinkers and their pseudo-technology.

Again.

It annoyed her.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

An hour and ten minutes later, Taylor was more than slightly irritated. She was quite peeved and also somewhat worried.

Peering out of a ventilation grille that was some twenty meters above the floor, she watched the people wandering around below her with her eyebrows up. The uniforms were familiar but had a number of differences she could see, and more importantly there were signs in a few places that she’d read through other grilles that were not at all what she’d been expecting.

What, she wondered, was ‘Stargate Command’?

It certainly wasn’t anything she’d heard of before. Brendan had never mentioned anything like it. And some of the technology she’d seen in another room, which appeared to be a lab, wasn’t anything she was familiar with, not to mention quite a lot of it seemed to have a design background that didn’t match either Tinker work or any of the normal sort. Several people had been examining a number of devices that they clearly didn’t fully understand the operation of, based on the comments she’d overheard. She’d spend twenty minutes listening to a pair of scientists discussing how one widget, which was obviously a force field generator, actually worked. After only five minutes she was highly tempted to shout down at them that they had the matrix equations entirely wrong and were never going to figure it out without bringing in two more dimensions, but managed to stop herself.

By that point she had a pretty good idea that something peculiar was happening, and decided that being discreet was sensible until she found out what it was. So she’d switched on her optical field diversion generator, and also the sound suppression system she’d recently got working nicely, to avoid discovery.

Right now, though, she was mostly fixated on the big metal ring standing at one end of the room she was far above, with a ramp leading up to it. Examining the device she quickly worked out that the markings around the edges seemed to be some sort of spatial coordinate system, and from that derived the thought that the thing was probably a transportation mechanism of some form. That in turn led her to deduce it was probably the source of the wormhole she’d detected, a supposition that was validated when she carefully scanned it from closer range.

The material the thing was made from wasn’t one she’d encountered before but seemed to be a superconductor of some form, and she spent a while pondering on how to make the stuff, writing down a couple of pages of notes for later investigation. She also traced out all the power and data connections from the device, following them through the walls to a control room that was almost directly below her, and a power source that was two floors further down and appeared to be a small fission reactor with some interesting modifications from her readings.

The ring itself had a metal iris, that read as being manufactured from more common materials, primarily a titanium alloy, over the opening in the middle of the toroidal device. Studying this she decided immediately that it was an aftermarket add-on, not part of the original mechanism. It looked very industrial and was clearly the work of a normal engineer, while the rest of the machine was definitely not that simple. In fact, it was sufficiently different to normal tech that she could see around the place, all of which was basically more or less what she’d expect to see albeit in many ways somewhat dated, that she suspected it wasn’t of human manufacture.

It also wasn’t the work of any of the alien species she was familiar with either.

So of course she found it immensely interesting.

As she was lying there on her stomach taking notes and scanning everything with several different phones, a klaxon sounded and lights began flashing in the corners of the enormous room. Moments later a voice announced in calm professional tones, “Offworld activation of gate.”

She watched, fascinated, as the inner ring section started to rotate with a grinding sound that made her wince slightly and think it needed a bit of decent lubrication. The ring revolved for a few seconds, then stopped, while one of the mechanical latch-type mechanisms around the periphery of the outer ring that she’d been wondering about snapped out a few centimeters, lit up, and snapped back into place.

“Chevron one encoded,” the voice said. She worked out that it was coming from a second story booth at the far end of the room, that she could barely make out from her current position and angle, which appeared to have a number of people in it and a lot of computer equipment. Even as the ring began moving again half a dozen armed soldiers ran into the room from doors on both sides near the booth and took up positions, alertly aiming weapons at the machine.

“Chevron two encoded,” the man commented, sounding like it was routine. Taylor kept watching carefully while aiming all her sensors at the device.

The latches operated one after another until seven of them were lit. “Chevron seven encoded,” the call came, and at the same time there was a loud whoosh sound from the ring. Blue light, looking like a bright lamp projecting through deep water, rippled across the wall behind the device as the sound died away. After a pause of a few seconds, the announcer said, “Valid SG-1 ID code received. Opening iris.”

The metal leaves across the ring slid and rotated out of the way, revealing a large vertical pool of energy that did a decent impression of water impossibly hanging in the middle of the torus, while Taylor inspected it closely and nodded a little to herself.

“Definitely a wormhole,” she muttered under her breath, inaudible more than a meter away even without the suppression field. She waited and was rewarded by seeing four people walk out of the interface that was obviously between normal four-space and a higher dimensional conduit, each of them looking around for a moment then proceeding down the ramp to the ground as if they’d got off a commercial flight. It was clearly routine to them. Scanning the ring she measured a number of parameters and made a few notes, just before the wormhole closed and the energy dissipated with a faint rustling sound. The iris closed seconds later.

“Welcome back, SG-1,” a different, older voice stated over the intercom. One of the four arrivals, a guy who vaguely reminded her of Brendan although he was somewhat younger, looked up at the window and waved in a sort of lazy salute. “Report to the briefing room as soon as you’ve unloaded.”

“Five minutes, General,” the man on the floor called back with a nod, then turned to his companions and said something else too quietly for Taylor to hear. The small group, a blonde woman about her Dad’s age, a younger dark-haired man with glasses, and a very tall and solidly built black guy with a strange gold tattoo on his forehead, all followed as their apparent leader headed for one of the exits. She watched as they left the room carrying several bags of something along with their weapons, all four looking rather tired.

The soldiers who had been standing by, and had gone from alert to a more relaxed status when they’d seen who it was, filed out after them. A couple of technicians entered from the other side of the room and spent about ten minutes fiddling with some instrumentation near the base of the ring to the left side, then also vanished again, leaving the portal machine alone. Even the control room had a shutter close over the window.

Eventually Taylor was the only one apparently still watching, although she could see and detect cameras all over the place. Rolling onto her back she lay in the duct staring at the metal above her head, thinking hard.

One thing was abundantly clear to her; She was not in the place she was supposed to be. In fact she had a very strong suspicion she wasn’t even on the same world she was supposed to be.

Eventually she sighed. “Damn it. This is a pain in the ass. Oh well. New objectives. Find a way home, then locate the dick who can’t send me to the right world never mind the right location, kick him really fucking hard in the nuts, find dad, et cetera.” The girl shook her head in irritation. “And I was going to a movie with Amy tonight and everything. I’m really not very happy about all this. Someone is going to know about that when I get back.”

Grumbling inaudibly and invisibly Taylor put all her stuff into her pockets and backpack, turned around, and headed back down the ventilation system to find somewhere she could have some privacy to work on a method to get home. On the way, she took a detour back to one of the labs she’d passed, hoping it was now empty so she could borrow some of the more useful bits and pieces she’d need.

Luckily it was, so that was handy.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Some hours later Taylor nodded to herself in satisfaction. She’d found a store room a couple of floors down from the ring room, one filled with spare parts for all manner of hardware, along with enough emergency rations to keep an Endbringer shelter stocked for a month, and had commandeered it as a private workspace. Having bypassed the locks and alarms without trouble, and rerouted the camera system to ignore her little hideaway, she’d taken the opportunity to investigate one of the boxes of rations and see if they were reasonably edible. As it turned out the things weren’t actually bad at all, so she’d eaten her fill, drunk some of the bottled water she’d also located, then relaxed for a while to think hard.

While she relaxed she idly used some of the spare computer gear, which was somewhat out of date as far as she was concerned but still usable, to put together a basic console that monitored the security camera network including the ones she’d bypassed, so she could keep an eye on both the ring room and any approach to her current location. It was obvious she was in a military area, and she was fairly sure that the people running the place wouldn’t be all that happy about her sudden appearance in their midst. She really didn’t want to get involved in having to explain things to a bunch of paranoid military people if she could avoid it. Far better to quietly arrange a trip home without bothering anyone else in her view.

As far as she could tell no one had been into this store room for months at least. The dust had been thick on everything, with no footprints visible on the floor, and with a little luck she could get her work done without anyone noticing. The main reactor was at the other end of the floor she was on and far enough away that anyone working on it should be unlikely to pass by. Even so, she’d locked the door and made sure to override any external controls by physically disconnecting them.

No sense taking chances.

When she’d digested her snack, and had time to think things through, she spent a while making notes on her observations and thoughts about her current location, how she got here, and ideas on how to reverse whatever the idiotic Tinker widget had done when it went wrong. She was almost certain that the root cause of her unexpected world jump was down to an interaction between the teleportation beacon doing something stupid with subspace right at the critical moment when the alien ring upstairs had also done something stupid with subspace, in a different but related manner. Somehow they’d ended up interacting through a quantum locking process and diverted her teleport to here rather than her original destination. It was quite likely that this facility was physically located very close in this world to where she should have ended up in her own world which would have made such an interaction more feasible. Even so the timing must have been ridiculously improbable to allow such a thing to happen.

Before she got into the real work, she turned her attention to the equipment she’d acquired in her little scavenging operation. The lab had been empty and it had been a simple matter to bypass the alarms there as well. A bit of work with some of the gear she’d had with her and she’d arranged a small antigravity device that allowed her to gently float down to the floor, hovering just above it in case of any pressure pads she’d missed, then float back up to the duct when she’d finished borrowing a few useful items.

Some parts, a few tools, and one or two widgets she’d spotted that looked like they’d come in handy, or were just interesting to study.

Like that shield generator.

Now, she turned the thing over in her hands, wishing she was in her own lab to properly examine it. Still, she’d make do. It was clearly of alien manufacture although, interestingly, not from the same source as the ring. After a couple of minutes she’d worked out how to disassemble it and quickly had it in bits on top of a crate she’d repurposed as a workbench, her head light balanced on another small box she’d put next to her head and aimed downwards so she could see it properly. The store room wasn’t all that well lit, which was annoying.

“Ah. I see...” Taylor nodded thoughtfully as she probed the inside of the machine, delicately moving optical components around with the end of a pair of tweezers while making notes with her other hand without looking at the pen. “Clever. So this must be a multiphase strong force interactor… Yeah. Huh. Bit like Leet’s thing, but better designed. Not quite as efficient but a lot more reliable. And this is… OK, power supply here, control circuits here, output wave shaper here. And...”

She cocked her head and peered at the innards of the device. “That’s not right,” she mumbled, leaning closer and sniffing. “Burned out one of the subspace fluctuation nodes. Overloaded or bad design?” Prodding a few other places, she frowned thoughtfully. “Both. Bad design making it overload,” she finally decided. “Overcomplicated, too.” Reaching for her toolkit she started reworking the circuit. “I can just reroute this, bypass that section, add a link from here to here...”

Twenty minutes passed in mostly silence with a few clinking sounds of tools, some almost subvocal muttering, and a couple of faint zapping noises. One of which was followed by a yelp and some swearing. Eventually she sat back on the small box she was using as a chair, feeling pleased. “Great. That should do it. Add one of my power units right here...” Taylor spent a little longer connecting up a device of her own manufacture she pulled out of her backpack, carefully documented everything she’d done and deduced, took a number of close up photos for future reference, then reassembled the alien device.

Picking it up she moved to the end of the room near the door and put it on the floor, then knelt down and tapped a couple of places on the outer shell of the roughly egg-shaped machine. It made a soft chiming sound then started humming very quietly at a low pitch. Nodding with a smile, she stood up, looked around, and retrieved one of the field ration packs from the crate she’d opened. Tossing it towards the door she looked satisfied when there was a pop and a shimmering green force-field appeared for a second, the pack bouncing off it and dropping to the floor.

“That’ll do it,” she told herself happily as she turned and headed back to her improvised workbench. “Just in case.”

Soon she was deeply involved in calculating exactly how the alien transportation device had screwed with her emergency teleport and how to reverse the process. If it hadn’t been for her worry about her father and friends, she’d have quite enjoyed the work. As it was, it was interesting but annoying too.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Doctor Lee walked into his lab talking to Doctor Felger, the pair having a good natured argument about the physics of faster than light travel, and headed to the bench where their latest investigative project was. Reaching it he kept talking for a moment while putting his hand on the machine, only to realize as he instead found himself touching the bench surface that something was wrong.

He looked down.

“What the hell?” he muttered in surprise, as he stared at the absence of mysterious alien hardware, then looked around. “Did you put it back in the secure store area?” he asked, turning to the other man, who was sitting in front of the whiteboard they’d been working out some calculations on, inspecting them thoughtfully.

“What?” Felger asked absently, leaning forward and correcting one of the equations, then scratching his nose with the wrong end of the marker without thinking about it.

“The device! Did you put it away before we went for lunch?” Bill prodded more urgently, already hurrying over to the high security storeroom on the other side of the lab where they kept things the various field teams brought back for examination. He punched in a long code from memory and put his palm on the scanner, then yanked the door open without waiting for an answer. Going into the smaller room he looked around, then froze in horror, before turning on the spot.

“Oh shit,” he murmured, rapidly exiting the storeroom to find his colleague staring at the workbench.

“Hey, where’s the device?” Felger asked indignantly, not apparently aware that the end of his nose was now bright green. “We were working on that!”

“I know, you idiot, it’s gone! And so are half a dozen other devices from the secure storage area,” Lee shouted. “And… where the hell is my portable oscilloscope?” Pointing at the bench he added, “Half the component bins are empty too!”

They exchanged a glance then looked carefully around once more, trying to find any of the missing equipment. No sign of it was apparent and there wasn’t a trace of where it could have gone. “Nothing on the security system,” Felger reported while Lee was trying to work out precisely what was missing. The mysterious widget that SG-3 had brought back a week ago was the largest item, but there were several other things that were awaiting inspection which had somehow vanished, representing years of research.

“Oh, god, this is going to get loud,” Lee moaned when they were completely certain none of the various things were anywhere in the lab. They exchanged worried glances before quickly leaving, locking the lab again, and heading off to find the right person to mention that somehow the most secure research area in the facility had somehow been robbed.

They were right. It did get loud.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Eventually Taylor worked out that her unexpected arrival here, wherever ‘here’ really was, appeared to be down to a one in a billion chance interaction between the ‘star gate’ machine upstairs, the emergency teleporter that had been extracting her from the DWU, most likely a power surge caused by random noise in the wormhole the alien device produced, and pure bad luck. All exacerbated by this place being physically located in an exact analogue position to her original destination in her own world. It was pretty much what she’d guessed would be the case, but she now had the math to prove it.

Putting her pen down she flexed her hand, then picked up the notebook and read the last fifteen pages of equations carefully to make sure there were no mistakes. Satisfied she’d covered everything, she turned to her laptop and started working on a method to reverse the process and get home.

It was going to need a specially designed version of the wormhole generator, or modifications to the original one. As she highly doubted that they’d let her play around with their wormhole machine, at least without being very difficult about things for some time, she sighed and began designing a much smaller one she could build from available parts. Luckily for her purposes it didn’t need to be anything like as large as that other machine, and only needed one purpose, so pretty much the entire targeting system could be omitted and the power requirements would be much simpler.

Plus she could make it a lot more efficient in the process which would help quite a bit.

After a few hours work and some more of the rations she had a decent design worked out. It suffered from not having enough time spent on it to really refine the thing to the level she’d have liked, and it irked her professional pride to make something so crude, but it should suffice for her purposes. After all it only needed to work once and if she needed another one she could sit down and do it properly once she was home. The basic principle was simple enough and she could see several places the implementation could be significantly improved. And it had taught her a few neat tricks she hadn’t thought of to date, so all in all this whole thing wasn’t a complete waste of time.

She was still worried about her father though, and wanted to get home as fast as possible.

Leaving the program she’d written to calculate the correct parameters for the return wormhole, which would require very specific configuration, to run in the background, she turned her attention to the teleport beacon. The calculations would take several hours even with the speed of her laptop so she should have enough time to modify the thing, then build the rest of the stuff she needed. The beacon, some of the equipment she’d acquired in that lab along with parts she had in her own kit, and other odds and ends she’d found around this store room should be enough to do the job.

Shortly she was happily engaged in building an improvised wormhole generator, whistling softly to herself as she listened to a recording of her alien tutors on the headphones she’d pulled out of her backpack.

Things, while annoying, could have been worse.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“We’ve got a big problem, General,” Sam told the man, who was listening intently with a frown on his face. “The unknown device SG-3 discovered on P9I-314 has disappeared, and not only that, seven other devices awaiting investigation have vanished from the secure storage room in Lab 9. Along with quite a lot of electronic components, wire, connectors, and other parts.”

“There’s no chance it’s simply an accounting error?” the general asked.

“No, the device was definitely there before Doctors Lee and Felger left for lunch four hours ago, and it was missing when they came back forty five minutes later, as were the other items.” Sam shook her head. “We’ve checked the security footage, and there’s no sign of any intruder, but when I investigated further I discovered that the camera network had been bypassed at some point in the last twelve hours. Very carefully and expertly.”

“So someone inside the base has stolen classified equipment,” he said heavily.

“That’s the only conclusion I can come to, sir,” she replied. “No one has entered the base via the topside elevator since the main shift came in this morning. The gate has only been used four times in that period, twice for us, once for SG-6 outbound, and once for SG-2 inbound. So it seems unlikely that the perpetrator has recently arrived. Either we’ve got an intruder with serious abilities in theft who somehow managed to get into one of the most secure bases on the planet without a trace, or it was an inside job.”

“Do we know exactly what was taken?” he asked. She nodded, handing him a clipboard.

“We ran a complete inventory of the lab, and that’s a list of everything that’s vanished.”

He examined the list, then asked, “Could any of this be used to build a weapon? Or for that matter, be a weapon?”

“I don’t know, sir. On the face of it, I’d say it was unlikely, but we don’t actually know what four of the devices do. The largest one is the P9I-314 device. No one is sure who made it, what it does, or how it works. SG-3 found it in the wreckage of a crashed ship of unknown provenance, which had apparently been there for probably six to seven hundred years and had been almost entirely stripped centuries ago. The thing was buried under some rocks near the crash site, they thought it had probably been ejected from the ship during the crash and they literally found it by accident.”

She retrieved the clipboard and went through the list. “We’re also missing a broken zat gun, a completely depleted ZPM, something that’s most likely a communications device of some form, what might be a sensor system, two examples of what we suspect are a type of computer processor, part of a power supply from an Ancient shuttlecraft, and a spherical device made of a material we can’t identify or even scratch. We haven’t got the faintest idea what that does. If anything. Plus some tools, a quantity of fairly prosaic parts and random hardware, some spools of wire, and a few other small items of that nature. My guess is that either someone was after something specific in that collection and took the rest so we wouldn’t know what they really wanted, or it was someone who simply grabbed everything they could identify as off world tech. If it was that I don’t know why they’d steal the other things.”

General Hammond regarded her for a few seconds, then looked at the other three members of SG-1 who had been listening silently, letting her explain the situation. “Damn it,” he finally said quietly. “This isn’t good.”

“No, sir,” Jack agreed. “I’ve ordered the base locked down already, but you may want to take other steps. We need to find whoever it is and figure out who they’re working for. We might have a Goa’uld infiltrator, or the NID are sneaking around. Or both.”

“Or worse,” Daniel muttered.

“Indeed,” Teal’c intoned, his impassive face showing a hint of concern.

“Bypassing the cameras would take someone with some serious expertise,” Sam added. “And quite a lot of inside knowledge. It’s possible that it’s the work of more than one person. We still can’t figure out how they managed to access the system either. There’s no trace in the logs. It’s almost impressive but it’s also deeply worrying.”

“Run a check on the other labs, the armory, and anything else critical,” Hammond ordered after some more thought. He sat down behind his desk and regarded them. “Lock down the gate room, no one goes in or out until we get to the bottom of this. Jack, put some teams together and sweep the base for anything at all that doesn’t look right. We need to find those devices and whoever took them. Hopefully they’re still here.”

“It’s unlikely that anyone could have left without us noticing, sir,” Jack said.

“It’s unlikely that anyone could have entered without us noticing, but that might just have happened,” Hammond replied. O’Neill thought then nodded reluctantly.

“Good point.”

Picking up one of the phone handsets on his desk, Hammond went on, “I’ll need to make some calls. Find this person or persons.”

“Sir,” Jack responded, before they all left the office. Moments later the general started dialing the first number, wondering what the latest problem would turn out to be and dreading the answer.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“OK, that looks pretty good,” Taylor murmured as she studied the results of her work so far. She hoped the military guys here wouldn’t be too upset about her repurposing some of the random crap they had lying about. Most of the computer gear and other electronics seemed pretty old so surely it wasn’t worth much anyway, and she had a good idea that the alien tech was something they’d found rather than acquired normally too. From what she’d overheard it was clear that their scientists didn’t have a clue about the broken shield generator, so maybe they’d be pleased she’d fixed it? Even if she’d kind of blocked off this room using the now-functional and somewhat improved device.

Meh. Getting home was important, and she’d leave them some notes on how the thing worked, which should cheer them up after she left.

Probably.

Idly wondering what the purpose of this place other than scavenging broken alien tech was, which admittedly was a cool hobby, she hummed to herself as she added some more focusing elements to the main punchthrough array and carefully aligned them. The machine she was building was about half completed now, standing not quite a meter high and sitting on a chassis that had originally been a field radio pack. She’d pulled a few useful elements out of some of the other tech she’d found, having smiled widely at the sensor block when she’d fully identified what it was as it was exactly the sort of thing she could use for the targeting mechanism of her machine. In the storeroom she’d poked through it had looked interesting so she’d acquired it in case it came in handy and was pleased to see that her initial thoughts were correct.

She also wondered where it had come from. It looked an awful lot like something you’d use in a spacecraft of some sort. Did these guys have spacecraft?

Taylor shrugged. Maybe she could find out later, but she needed to get home first.

The damaged power unit that looked very old and not quite as well made as it should have been had been useless as it stood, but had rewarded her with a number of helpful components that she’d used in conjunction with one of her own power units to make something capable of driving her machine. Currently it was hooked up to the depleted energy storage unit she’d puzzled over for half an hour while figuring out how it worked, and was slowly recharging the thing, which she was going to use to create the initial subspace energy burst to generate the wormhole she required. The ring upstairs was, according to her readings, not set up to do what she needed and having thought about it during the construction of this smaller version she’d come to the conclusion would probably take too much power to do the job in any case.

Sure, she could modify the thing given time, but making one from scratch that was tailored specifically for interdimensional wormholes rather than a simple spatial link was a lot more efficient and faster.

Sitting back on her heels she examined the results of a few hours work, silently bemoaning the lack of time to do a good job. It would probably burn something out pretty quickly but that couldn’t be helped, and it wasn’t like she needed it to work for all that long anyway. Making some more notes on her progress, she checked how the battery charger was coming along, then tweaked the power source a little to make the process more effective. The battery widget was also clearly extremely old and she was going slowly since she didn’t entirely trust it after however long it had been since it was made.

Flipping back through pages and pages of diagrams, she muttered, “Yeah, should be easy enough to make one of those at home too if I need it. The power supply isn’t worth doing, that sensor unit is pretty good and I’ll bet Brendan would like it, and these computer cores are interesting.” She picked up one of the two cubical crystalline devices she’d scavenged and studied it again. “Optronic processing nodes and lots of molecular storage. Not bad at all. I wonder who made them? They sure know their stuff.”

Annoyed that she didn’t have a good microscope handy to properly examine the devices, she put the notebook down and picked the other identical device, weighing them in her hands for a moment. Eventually she shrugged and put one of them into her backpack. “One for them, one for me. Seems fair enough, I’m leaving them a working shield generator.”

Taylor grinned a little, feeling somewhat guilty but not letting it stop her. They’d obviously acquired the things up themselves via non-conventional means and perhaps her notes would help them work the devices out. Putting the other one down she wiped hair out of her eyes and got back to work.

Two more hours passed mostly in silence, as she happily constructed her path home and listened to music, pausing every now and then to take a drink of water. The guts of the communication unit and some sort of energy gun which she stripped for parts having worked out what it was and how it did its thing were added to the machine, and copious quantities of notes were written. She had to pause to retrieve another notebook as she’d filled the first one, taking the opportunity to nibble another ration bar and wonder if she could find a toilet somewhere. Rather distastefully she’d used one of the empty buckets she’d discovered in some cleaning supplies for the basic biological functions, this now being as far away from her as she could put it, but she was wishing she had access to proper facilities.

Unfortunately leaving this room was probably unwise, she decided, and resigned herself to roughing it for now.

Eventually she finished the machine and sat cross-legged in front of it, yawning deeply as she smiled at the result of a lot of hard work. It was crude, yes, not up to her standards, yes, and undoubtedly had a short usable life, yes, but on the other hand it would do the job.

She hoped.

Hopping to her feet she went back to her laptop and checked on the progress of the calculations. It was coming along well but still needed quite a while more before she’d have the final solution matrix. Tired but accepting, hiding her worry about her father and friends, she sighed a little and went back to her machine to see how the battery charging was coming along.

“Hmm, about… maybe fifteen percent now?” she mused quietly as she looked at the screen of one of her phones that she was using as a control node for the process. “Getting there. Probably need about forty percent to do a clean dimensional punchout. Fifty to be sure. Oh well.” Shrugging she got another phone and connected it to the wormhole machine then sat on the floor to run diagnostics and make sure the thing was fully operational.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Anything?” Jack asked as he stopped next to Sergeant Wilman, who was leading one of the search teams. The younger man, heavily built with scarred hands, shook his head.

“Nothing so far, sir. We’ve swept levels one down to sixteen, every room, corridor, lab, you name it. Even shoved Collins into the vents to make sure nothing was in them.” He gestured to the short, slender, and annoyed looking female soldier on the other side of the corridor. She was absolutely filthy, covered in dust and cobwebs, and looked ready to kill someone. “We checked in the underfloor cable runs, scanned the elevator shafts, looked in all the store rooms and cupboards… Not a sign of either an intruder or the missing hardware. None of the other teams have found anything either as far as I know.”

Jack sighed with a nod. “No, no one’s reported back anything useful. Well, nothing to do but keep going. Carry on, Sergeant.”

“Sir.” The man nodded respectfully and returned to his squad, who were carrying tools and a lot of equipment along with their weapons and seemed both tired and pissed off. Jack sympathized as he was both himself.

He headed off to see if Sam or the rest of his team had managed to figure out what was going on, or had a bright idea. Considering their history it was entirely feasible. As he walked he wondered which one of their enemies was behind all this and how they’d pulled it off. His money was on either the NID, or the Goa’uld, somehow. How he didn’t have a clue.

Which was amazingly irritating. He hated it when people managed to pull off an operation like this against his people. They were the ones supposed to be doing that to other people...

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Thirty one percent. Not bad, we’re getting there,” Taylor mumbled as she checked the charging progress. Her dimensional calculations were also showing they only had a few hours left to run, so hopefully she’d be home soon and looking for a fucking Tinker who didn’t know what he was doing with a hot soldering iron in her hand.

It was fair to say her normally sunny disposition had been somewhat soured by this entire adventure. In some ways it was fun, true enough, and she’d learned quite a few things that could be useful, but she’d have liked a bit of warning. She had barely the essentials with her, and the longer she was out of touch with her father the more worried she got.

The girl sighed and went back to examining the spherical thing she’d found in the storeroom, wondering what on earth it was and what the hell it was made of. The dull gray metallic substance was unlike anything she’d ever seen before and was implausibly heavy, not to mention impossibly hard. Not even a small cutting beam tool she’d cobbled together out of spare parts could mark it, or even warm it up, which was odd.

Eventually she sighed again and put it to one side. Deciding that she might as well find out more about what this place actually was she looked around, then up at the ceiling, a thoughtful expression now present. Those cables up there looked a lot like a network connection…

Half an hour later she was floating just under the ceiling by means of her improvised antigravity unit, having made a mental note to make a better one when she got home since flying was a hell of a lot of fun. No wonder Vicky loved doing it. As she listened to a fast classical track that her mother had loved she carefully probed the cables, looking for one that was connected to something interesting.

It took her a while but in the end she managed to locate a suitable cable and followed it around the ceiling to an appropriate point, then very gently but quite quickly removed the insulation from the wiring and spread the bare wires out, making sure not to break them or let them touch each other. It didn’t take long to tap into the network after that, a long cable dangling down from the ceiling to her ad-hoc workbench and connected to one of the phones, which then passed the data link across to her laptop. Minimizing the ongoing calculation program she started working on breaking into the facility’s computer network, while feeling both a little guilty again and just a tiny bit gleeful.

It was more fun that it probably should have been, cracking their encryption. Which turned out to be a lot easier than she’d expected. Making some notes on how to improve the system that she could leave them, she went back to work and was soon trawling through some very intriguing documentation on various servers.

“Wow. These guys are cool,” she said softly, watching a video of an operation on another planet half way across the galaxy. “Kind of daft sometimes, but cool even so.”

The girl settled down to find out more about Stargate Command and their ongoing mission to annoy every alien species they ran into, a task at which they appeared to be remarkably effective.

She decided their adventures would probably make a really neat TV show.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“We’ve checked everything from the surface down to the this level, General,” O’Neill informed his superior. “So far nothing has been found out of place. No personnel are missing, everyone who had access to Lab 9 has been accounted for and checks out negative for Goa’uld symbiotes, mind control, external influences, or spylike tendencies.”

General Hammond raised an eyebrow at this last one, making Daniel cough slightly as he suppressed a laugh and Sam look amused for a moment.

“I see,” the older man replied after a moment. “So we have no leads.”

“Not yet, no, sir,” Jack grumbled. “I can’t guarantee that someone’s not on the take, but we can’t find proof of it if they are. I still think the NID is behind it, those bastards are sneaky bastards, but I’m damned if I can figure out how they did it.”

“It might not be them, Colonel,” Sam pointed out. He gave her a look.

“It’s almost always them, Carter.”

“Well… I have to admit they do seem to get involved in a lot more of our problems than I like, I’ll agree,” she finally and a little reluctantly admitted.

“Someone should have shut them down properly,” Jack complained. “I’m tempted to do it myself.”

“Please don’t, Colonel,” Hammond sighed. “We don’t need the stress. And right now I’m more interested in how our thief managed to do what they did, and where they are. Unless they can teleport or something of that nature they have to still be here somewhere.”

“Perhaps the Asgard were involved?” Teal’c suggested. Everyone else looked at him. The Jaffa returned their gazes evenly. “They do indeed have the ability to teleport.”

“Sure, but if Thor wanted anything from us, he’d just ask,” Jack pointed out. “He’s cool that way.”

Teal’c inclined his head in agreement after a moment’s thought. “Agreed.”

“I think it’s highly unlikely the Asgard would be sneaking around lifting our discoveries, General,” Daniel put in. “Jack’s right, they’d just ask us if they really needed or wanted something we’d found. And with the gate locked out and all outside access cut off, it’s pretty much certain that our friend is still here somewhere. Unless they can turn invisible they’d never get past the guards.”

“Wouldn’t be the first time,” Jack muttered.

“But we have defenses against that sort of thing now, so it’s unlikely,” Sam said. “I agree, they’re still here, whoever it is. And there’s only four floors to go. The lower floor is entirely support plant and sewage treatment facilities so that’s pretty unlikely to be where they are, the next one up is power distribution and backup air filtration plus some storage of non critical supplies, then it’s the reactor floor, and finally the server section. The bulk of the server floor is flooded with nitrogen as a fire suppressant most of the time so that’s not going to be usable either. It doesn’t leave all that many places for someone to hide.”

“I suppose nothing has turned up on any of the internal camera or security grids?” Hammond asked.

She shook her head. “No, sir. I’ve written some new security programs which have been running diagnostics on the entire system for hours and nothing at all seems to be amiss. None of the motion triggers have tripped, all the door alarms are green, nothing.” Sam looked around at them, then back at the general. “I can’t explain it. In theory the system is impenetrable but clearly whoever it is has found some way around all our precautions. It’s got to be someone with years of espionage training and probably a lot of experience with this sort of operation. Quite likely some off world tech helping them too, I think.”

“And we still don’t know why they took any of the samples or equipment,” the older man half-stated, half-questioned. “If it was a deliberate theft of one or more specific items that points to one motive, if it was grabbing everything in sight that was easily taken that could be a different one...”

“The amount of effort required to steal any of it with the defenses we have suggests it was a very deliberately targeted operation,” Daniel commented. “Who’s going to put in that much work, maybe years of training, just to walk off with a random pile of artifacts? I can’t help thinking they were after one specific thing and everything else is to throw us off the scent somehow.”

“Still doesn’t make sense,” Jack growled. “They took equipment which was actively being worked on, so it was noticed almost immediately. If they can walk through our security that easily it would have been better to lift something that was in storage. We might not have worked that out for days.”

“When we catch them you can ask,” Hammond responded. He looked at Sam again. “Do you have any other ideas on how we might trace the perpetrator, Captain? You often come up with off the wall plans.”

She shook her head slightly, visibly wracking her mind for something she’d missed. “Not really, sir, I’ve tried everything I could think of. About the only thing left is...”

The blonde woman stopped talking and her eyes widened slightly.

“There it is,” Jack said smugly, pointing. “She’s figured something out.”

“Power. If they’re hiding somewhere they might be using power from the electrical grid,” Sam said slowly as she thought hard. “Lights, ventilation, something like that. Most of the places someone could hide would normally be dark and have the ventilation fans turned off since they’re not needed if no one is using empty rooms. We might be able to locate a room with higher power consumption than it should have...”

Sam turned on her heel and left Hammond’s office nearly at a run. Everyone else exchanged looks then followed.

They found her in one of the computer labs, typing rapidly on a keyboard while watching several large monitors covered in virtual gauges and various graphs.

“Wha’cha doing, Carter?” Jack said calmly as he stopped next to her.

“This is the base power distribution SCADA control interface,” she replied absently as she kept working, the rest gathering around her along with a couple of the technicians who were present and were watching curiously. “The last upgrade when we uprated the reactor added some very fine grained power monitoring functions to the power grid, to improve efficiency among other things, and in theory it’s got enough resolution to let me...” Her voice trailed off as she worked, peering at the monitors with intent. No one said anything for a few minutes. Windows came and went and graphs danced around, Sam asking a couple of short questions of one tech once or twice, until she suddenly stopped and pointed.

“There. Storage room J8-201 is drawing nearly two hundred watts from the grid, but it’s supposed to be locked. The lights should be off and nothing in there is powered up. Standby power on the ventilators is only about sixty watts at most, so something’s not right. I’m guessing the lights are on in that room.”

She turned to the techs. “Bring up the cameras for that sector,” she snapped.

They worked fast, a grid of dozens of camera views popping up on another monitor. Everyone watched as the man operating the other computer paged through four sets of cameras, many of which were only showing monochrome images clearly illuminated purely by IR lights. Most were of empty corridors and rooms.

“Nothing showing, Captain,” the man on the right said, looking at her. “The cameras in J8-201 indicate the lights are out and there’s no motion inside the room, or nearby.”

She looked at the monitor in front of him, then back at the ones she was sitting next to. “The power draw is real, so I’m guessing the camera views aren’t,” she finally said, spinning the chair around to regard the general and her team. “I think our visitor is in that room.”

“Good enough for me,” Jack said. “Let’s go ask some questions.”

He headed for the door with the rest of SG-1 following, waving at a nearby squad of soldiers as he turned right. Hammond watched them go, looked back at the monitors, then shook his head as he went after them.

He was curious to know who was behind all this, and not really very happy about it.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Chuckling at the after-action report she was reading, Taylor shook her head with amusement. That SG-1 team was hilarious sometimes. The report read like a good novel more than a military operation. Snickering at the dry but clearly rather sarcastic writing that was someone’s idea of how to write a report she thought that Amy would probably love it too.

These people were really cool but really crazy, in her opinion. And had a very unusual idea of how you went about doing things. Mind you, she wasn’t precisely one to talk in that area according to some people…

Closing the document she poked around some more, finding a number of entertaining and interesting things in their system. They seemed to have run into a surprisingly large number of aliens, who seemed to be all over the damn place out there, and many of them were nearly as bizarre as the Stargate people were. She was also forming the opinion that some of the aliens were also highly irresponsible, leaving dangerous technology all over the place without any safety precautions. Her dad would probably find the entire thing worthy of comment.

The DWU was pretty keen on safety, and took a dim view of people who didn’t pay attention to it.

And of course some of the aliens were just unpleasant. Those ‘Goa’uld’ things seemed like they were a pain in the ass and really deserved everything these guys did to them. The Asgard sounded interesting though, although she had a feeling that there was likely to be an issue with how they were doing their cloning. The images she’d found combined with things Amy had told her made her suspicious that they were doing something wrong.

Oh well. That was something to think about later.

Getting up and grabbing a bottle of water, she unscrewed the top and sipped from it while she wandered over to check the charging progress. “Sixty percent. Excellent, more than enough,” she smiled. Her program had another half hour or so to go, and she had plenty of power available now. She should be home soon.

The girl walked around the room for a few minutes, stretching her legs and working out the kinks, then went back to her computer. On the way she glanced at the improvised camera control console and stopped dead when she saw about twenty heavily armed people sneaking along a corridor a couple of hundred meters away on the same floor, heading in her direction.

“Whoops,” she said with a slightly embarrassed feeling. “Guess they worked out I’m here. I wonder how?”

She looked around, then up, before sighing. “Of course. Power consumption. Didn’t think of that. Oh well, nothing for it, I suppose.”

Taylor finished the water then put the empty bottle down on a crate before walking over to the shield generator and bending over it. “Yep, this is working fine. OK, that’s good enough for now. Bet they’re going to get difficult though.” She shrugged a little to herself as she straightened up and went back to watch the inbound strike team creep along the corridor, sitting down on a crate and relaxing. Until her calculations were finished she couldn’t do much else and if nothing else this might be interesting.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Daniel, zat in hand, watched with the others as the two point men crept forward and arranged themselves on either side of the door to room J8-201. According to the manifests they’d dug out the room was full of mostly innocuous supplies ranging from toilet paper to computer parts, with nothing particularly dangerous present. No one seemed to have entered it according to the logs for at least nine months, although considering that the logs didn’t show anyone had entered it at all he wasn’t taking that as gospel.

Hopefully their mysterious thief wasn’t holed up with something like a crew served machine gun right on the other side of the door waiting for them…

The two soldiers carefully studied the door, then while one of them covered his companion, the other bent over the lock and carefully tapped in the code. The lock beeped and indicated with a green light that it was now open. Both men got ready and looked at Jack, who waved them into action.

“As soon as they’re in, the rest of Team A follow, Team B holds back in case we have trouble, got it?” he said in a low voice at the same time. A chorus of affirmative murmurs came back from the other people waiting for the breaching team to get the door out of the way.

The pair took a step back, side by side and weapons ready, then charged the unlocked door and kicked it open.

Unfortunately, the door itself didn’t cooperate with the plan regardless of the lock status and both of them slammed into it very hard with grunts of pain then slid down into untidy heaps on the floor.

Jack put his hand over his eyes and sighed. “Way to make us embarrassed, guys,” he groaned.

“It’s still locked, Colonel,” one of the two said painfully. “Lock reads open.”

“So someone jammed it on the inside,” O’Neill grumbled. “And now they know we’re here. Wonderful. Fine, whatever. Breaching charge.”

“Sir.” The first soldier climbed to his feet, wincing slightly, and hauled his friend up too. Thirty seconds later they’d attached small charges to the lock mechanism and both hinges points and armed them, small red lights blinking on the black disks as they retreated along with everyone else around the corner.

The man with the remote detonator looked at Jack, who covered his ears and nodded. A click of the trigger was instantly followed by a very loud bang and dust floated down around them as the floor shuddered. The explosives man peered around the corner. “Door’s down, Colonel.”

“Right. Same plan as before, Team A goes in and B holds back,” Jack sighed. He waved his weapon at the corridor. “Go on then, let’s get on with this.”

He and Teal’c went after the pair who ran down the hallway and dived through the door, while Sam looked at Daniel who shrugged, then followed her as she headed the same way. A couple more soldiers brought up the rear with the other squad taking up defensive positions behind them.

“Lie on the floor, hands on your head!” The shout from inside the room made Sam and Daniel jog forward and enter the room through the smoking remains of the doorway. Both of them stopped and looked at the sight of Jack, Teal’c, and the first pair of soldiers aiming weapons at the…

Teenaged girl sitting on a crate watching them with an interested expression?

What?

Sam exchanged a glance with Daniel, then both of them moved slightly to the side to get a better view.

“Wow, that was really loud,” the girl said admiringly. “Nice rolls, too. Just like a movie. You guys are cool.”

She didn’t sound all that worried. Which was weird.

“On the ground now!” Jack ordered. He looked puzzled but determined. Teal’c was pointing his staff weapon roughly in her direction but was frowning slightly. The soldiers accompanying them seemed confused although that didn’t stop them covering the girl.

Daniel studied her. She looked human enough, and probably around fifteen or sixteen, tall and slender with long curly black hair and glasses over bright green eyes glinting with intelligence and a certain amount of amusement.

He was getting a very odd vibe about this whole situation…

Looking past her he studied the scene. The larger crate next to her held a number of things including what seemed to be a very high end laptop with the biggest screen he’d ever seen on such a thing, as well as a quantity of other devices he couldn’t quite make out from here. Nearby was a… machine.

He tilted his head and inspected the thing. About a meter tall, roughly in the shape of a torus on its side sitting on a short plinth, which seemed to be made out of an old field radio, and covered with neat wiring and glowing components, some of which seemed to be technology he recognized as Ancient, some Asgard, some normal human tech, and a few things he’d never seen before. Following the cabling that was plugged into the base of the machine across the floor about two meters his eyes widened when he saw what they were connected to.

A ZPM.

A functioning ZPM. It was glowing happily and was obviously not fully depleted like the manifest had claimed. Next to it was a chunk of machinery that looked an awful lot like parts of a zat mated to some more Ancient hardware and a collection of other stuff he couldn’t put a name to.

He looked back at the girl. She smiled at Jack. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you, and I’ll be gone soon.”

“If you don’t get on the floor we’ll have no choice but to put you there,” his friend snapped, still aiming his weapon at her, although he looked uncertain. Daniel knew why, the man really didn’t like threatening kids. Even ones who unexpectedly popped up in possibly the most secret facility in the US.

“Well, I guess you could try,” the girl replied, watching him for a moment then looking back at the screen of her laptop. She picked up one of the smaller devices which also had a colorful display on it and glanced at the screen. “Hold on, this is nearly full now.”

She got up and walked over to the machine.

“Stop or we’ll put you down,” Jack yelled. The girl knelt next to the ZPM. “Jackson!”

Rather reluctantly Daniel aimed his zat at her, popping the weapon into its active mode, and pulled the trigger. The characteristic sound of the discharge was followed immediately by a vaguely musical thump as the crackling bolt of energy stopped dead about three meters into the room, a wall of faint green light flashing into existence for a second.

Everyone stared in shock. The girl looked over her shoulder, smiled at them, and went back to poking the device connected to the ZPM. “Just about full now,” he heard her mutter as she did something to it.

“That’s impossible,” Sam said under her breath. Daniel looked at her to see her staring not at the apparent force-field, but the ZPM. “That was completely depleted. How can it be full?”

“I charged it up,” the girl commented as she disconnected the lump of hardware that was plugged into the crystalline artifact. “I need a big power surge and this thing should do the job nicely.” A ping from her laptop made her look over, then stand up. “Finally. That took longer than I thought it would.” She sounded somewhat irked as she walked back to the large crate and peered at the screen.

Jack took aim off to the side and fired his sidearm. The report of the pistol echoed around the room and the force-field flickered briefly. Everyone watched an expended round drop to the floor.

“Ow. That’s very loud,” the brunette complained, wiggling a finger in her ear. “Must you?”

Teal’c experimentally fired his staff weapon, like Jack not aiming at her as such, but more in the general direction. And again the blast fizzled against a wall of energy.,

“We seem to be at an impasse, O’Neill,” the big Jaffa commented.

Jack walked forward and used the butt of his gun to prod the air in front of him. Ripples of green light flowed across the room. “Well, damn,” he complained. “That’s just not fair.”

“Neat, isn’t it?” the girl said brightly, looking over at them. She pointed at the floor a meter or so from Jack. “That shield generator’s not bad but whoever made it didn’t quite get it right. I had to modify it a bit to make it work properly.”

Everyone looked at the device sitting on the floor, then each other. Sam stared at it before raising incredulous eyes to the girl, who was watching. “You… modified… it?”

“Yeah. It’s a decent design but overcomplicated,” the girl replied. “And not properly protected against overload. I fixed that and optimized it a little. Unfortunately I don’t have all the right equipment here to do a really neat job but that’s life, right? I didn’t exactly plan on being here in the first place.” She turned back to the laptop and started typing very fast. “I had to improvise a lot, which is always a bit messy, you know?” she continued over her shoulder. “I’m really not happy about the whole thing. And it’s embarrassing having to half-ass it like this.”

Everyone exchanged glances as she kept typing.

“Stupid teleporters and Tinkers who can’t make them right,” the girl went on in a lower voice. “They had one job! How hard was that? And no one thought to add a subspace error detection system. Amateurs, the lot of them.”

Her voice trailed off into aggrieved muttering. Daniel leaned closer to Sam who was still staring at the girl and whispered, “She sounds like you.”

The blonde twitched then glared at him.

“I do not sound like that.”

“Incorrect,” Teal’c said.

She transferred her glare to the larger man, who raised an eyebrow, making Daniel snicker quietly.

“Aha!”

The girl jumped up and rushed over to the machine on the floor. “OK, got the subspace vector matrix all done, and the dimensional coordinates should be right too. Let’s see...”

“Who the hell are you?” Jack exploded, slamming his hand on the force-field.

“Oh, sorry, got carried away there,” the girl apologized, turning to look at him. “My name is Taylor Hebert. I’m an accidental visitor from another parallel world. I think.” She scratched her nose, leaving a small smudge of grease, a thoughtful expression on her face. “It’s complicated. Another plane of existence? Something like that. I’m still trying to work out the proper terminology. Anyway, it’s a whole teleport accident, wormhole interaction, timing sort of problem.” She waved a hand vaguely at the ceiling. “Your wormhole and my teleport got together with a subspace surge and things went sideways. And here I am. Tada!”

Taylor grinned at them for a moment. Jack pinched the bridge of his nose and counted very quietly to ten. “And now I want to go home. I didn’t think you’d let me play with your ring thing, so I had to build my own. All I need to do now is get a good clean dimensional punch going and I should be able to connect to the teleporter and get back and then I’ll be out of your hair.”

She went back to working on the machine, connecting a couple of hand-held devices to it and tapping on them rapidly.

“Sorry about kind of borrowing some of your bits and pieces, by the way, but I needed them,” she added, still working. “Your security needs some changes. I’ve made a list of the openings I found in various places, it’s over there on the crate.” A hand waved across the room. “And I’ve documented the shield generator too, there’s a schematic and notes on the theory of operation.”

She leaned over the machine and adjusted it in a few places, then looked at the device in her hand. “Just about ready to give it a shot, I think,” she said, sounding pleased.

Taking a longer cable she ran it between the machine and her laptop, then sat down on the smaller crate. A sound behind Daniel made him look back to see General Hammond come into the room and look around, before fixing his eyes on the girl.

“What’s going on?” he asked in a somewhat insistent manner.

“I have no idea,” Daniel admitted.

“Colonel?” Hammond turned to Jack who was glaring at the girl. Teal’c was now standing with his staff over his shoulder watching with interest, while Sam seemed almost wordless but was fixated on what was happening. Everyone else was looking entirely puzzled.

“Apparently our visitor there is called Taylor Hebert, she’s accidentally here, and she’s somehow built something to let her go home out of random parts she found around the base. Which she seems to have just wandered around without anyone seeing her, or any of the security having the slightest effect,” Jack growled.

“And she fixed the shield generator,” Daniel put in, unable to stop himself.

“Shield generator?” Hammond echoed.

Everyone pointed at the faintly humming device on the floor, including Taylor, who didn’t look away from her laptop.

“Apparently that’s what the artifact SG-3 recovered is. She said it wasn’t properly made. So she improved it.”

“It’ll turn off once I’ve gone,” Taylor called.

“Oh, good,” Jack sighed.

“How did you recharged a ZPM?” Sam shouted.

“A what?” Taylor looked back at them.

“A zero point module! That thing.” Sam gesticulated at the ZPM, which was now glowing merrily and obviously fully functional.

The girl peered at it, then shrugged. “It wasn’t that hard. A subspace power tap and some superconductive wiring did the job. I had to go slow, it’s pretty old and I didn’t know if it was still good. Seems fine though.” She turned back to the keyboard and started typing again.

Sam’s mouth was opening and closing but nothing was coming out. Daniel looked at her with some worry.

“Miss? I’m General George Hammond, commander of this base.” Hammond sounded like he was doing his best to keep a grip on his patience.

“Oh, hello, General. Sorry about all the trouble.” She smiled at him. “Don’t worry, I should be gone soon.” Her smile slipped a little. “I’m worried about my dad,” she added more quietly.

“Your dad?” Hammond regarded her closely.

“Yeah, our place came under attack and while we were evacuating some idiot hit the emergency teleport,” Taylor complained, pausing her typing and turning to him. “No idea who it was. CUI, maybe, or just some crazy Parahuman. Shit happens, you know? But the teleport went wrong and I ended up here instead of where I was supposed to be.” She looked around, then back at them. “Right location, wrong world.” The girl shrugged tiredly, making Daniel aware that under the deliberately cheerful smile she was exhausted. “And I have to do all the work to get home because the idiotic Tinker who made the teleporter probably couldn’t figure out how to do it right if I gave him instructions in crayon.”

She stared at her machine for a moment, then muttered, “He probably drew the schematics in crayon, thinking about it. Tinkers...” Taylor shook her head.

Daniel looked at Sam, who shrugged. Apparently that meant something to the girl but he had no idea what.

“Anyway, I figured out what went wrong and how to fix it, but I had a pretty good idea that this being a military place would cause all sorts of problems if I just walked up to someone and asked to borrow your star gate thingy. So I sort of… went around the problem.” She smiled again. “I’m good at that.”

Returning to the laptop she began working again. “And I’ve missed my movie with Amy, and dad will be worried, and Brendan will be going crazy, and the entire government will be at Defcon One… Fucking Tinkers...” She kept muttering in a nearly inaudible voice as she typed.

Hammond motioned for SG-1 to come closer. When they were standing near him, he said very quietly, “Ideas?”

“She’s able to recharge a ZPM, General,” Sam replied equally quietly, still sounding incredulous. “No one can do that. We can’t, even the Asgard can’t as far as I know. And she identified and fixed one of the most powerful force-field generators I’ve ever seen. Apparently with spare parts she found in Lab 9. I’m not sure she’s actually human. I think she might be an Ancient or something of that nature.”

“Is that possible?” the general inquired. He looked at Daniel, then Jack, and finally Teal’c.

“Maybe,” Daniel said after thinking it over. “But something doesn’t quite fit with that idea.” He looked over at Taylor who was still typing, apparently writing a novel at about two hundred words per minute. “She’s awfully young for a start.”

“She might be a million years old and only look like a teenager,” Jack pointed out.

“I’m sixteen,” Taylor called without looking up. “And I can still hear you fine.”

“Oh, great,” Jack muttered with a scowl.

The girl laughed a little but kept working.

“What are we going to do about this?” Hammond asked once he’d led them further away, out into the corridor where they could still see the girl but hopefully were out of earshot.

“I’m not sure we can do anything but watch,” Daniel remarked. “That force-field seems pretty much impenetrable, so how would we even get to her? And if she really is here by accident and is just trying to go home, should we try to stop her? She hasn’t really damaged anything per se, she’s just sort of… borrowed… a few things. And from what she said she’s even left notes on what she did for us.”

As the general opened his mouth to say something, Taylor shouted, “Yes!”

They all went back to see what was going on this time.

“Got it! Compiled with no errors, and that should make this all work. Final check...”
The girl dashed over to the machine she’d built and crouched next to it, carefully going over the whole thing with the assurance of someone who knew exactly what they were doing. Apparently satisfied she stood up and went back to the computer. “This might be a bit loud,” she told them. Then she typed a command and hit the last key before putting her fingers in her ears.

A moment later the ZPM glowed more brightly, then the machine it was plugged into came to life. Coils around the periphery of the central torus began glowing quite brightly in a pleasant lavender shade as a throbbing hum built out of nowhere, rising to a level that made the entire room vibrate. Daniel put his hands over his ears, followed by everyone else doing the same. After a few seconds of the sound getting louder and deeper while giving the impression of a vast amount of power winding up, there was a nearly subsonic whoomph sound like the footfall of something incomprehensibly vast taking a step. The torus flashed brilliantly then settled down to a steady and familiar glow as a rippling blue energy field filled the center of it.

“She made a star gate,” Sam said in a dead voice.

“Kind of,” Taylor replied, looking supremely satisfied as she took her fingers out of her ears. “It’s a tweaked version and not as flexible, but it’s a lot more efficient.” Turning to her laptop she tapped the mouse pad a couple of times and studied the graphs on the screen. “Perfect interdimensional punchthrough. Brilliant. And all I should have to do is adjust it like this...” A few seconds of work made the energy field change in an indescribable manner. She squinted at it, then nodded. “Great. Let’s see...”

Picking up one of the smaller devices next to her elbow she tapped it a couple of times then put it to her ear. Her expression was tense as everyone watched, wondering what would happen next.

Suddenly she smiled widely. “Dad! You’re OK?”

The expression of relief that went across her face was so profound Daniel could almost feel it.

“Oh, thank everything holy,” she breathed. “And Angus? Brendan? Everyone at Gravtec?”

“Fantastic. Yeah, I’m fine. It was that stupid emergency teleport. Got mixed up with someone else’s wormhole generator and some sort of power surge and I ended up in an HVAC duct in another world. Yeah. I know. But what can you do? Oh, trust me, I’m going to have words with him. Yep. You hold him down, I write ‘test it properly’ on his forehead with a soldering iron?”

Daniel winced. She sounded serious.

“Oh, fine, I won’t maim the idiot. I’ll leave that to Brendan. I’ll just scare him a bit. Well, a lot. Yeah, Amy can help. And Vicky.” She chuckled as they all exchanged looks. “OK. I’ve got a few things to clean up here then I’ll call back and we can try again. Yeah, the hardware will work for a couple of hours before it burns out.” She looked at the machine. “Yeah. Sure. I’ve already apologized. They’re looking confused, but… I know. All right. Tell everyone I’m fine and I’ll be back soon. OK. I’ll do that. Maybe ten minutes or so? Yes. Bye for now.”

She pulled the apparent phone from her ear and tapped it, then looked at the thing for several seconds, a smile on her face. Eventually she looked up at her audience.

“Dad says I should apologize again for causing you guys trouble. I really am sorry, honest.” She stood as she spoke and began packing up her equipment, putting it into a backpack she retrieved from the floor next to the crate she’d been sitting on. “I ate some of your rations over there, and used some of the bottled water. I hope that’s not going to cause a problem.” The girl kept packing away odds and ends, the laptop being the last thing she put into the pack. The machine kept running even when it was disconnected.

“I’ll leave you this charging unit, you might find it useful, and my notes on how to use it are here.” She held up a notebook, then put it on the crate. “I also documented some of the other devices I used too. It’s in the book as well. Sorry about the wormhole generator, it’ll shut down when I leave and wipe all the programming. I can’t really give you the coordinates to home, aside from anything else Brendan would get annoyed. Security, you know? And trust me, you wouldn’t really want some of our brand of crazy. It makes those Goa'uld of yours look simple. Good luck with them, by the way.”

She kept moving around during her monologue, tidying up all her working area and neatly sorting out tools and equipment, some of it going into her pockets and the rest being left on the large crate. “Oh, yeah, sorry, I kind of hacked into your mission reports. Some of them were pretty funny. You guys should write fiction, it would be hilarious.”

Taylor grinned at them, but she looked tired and ready to fall over.

“Right, I think that’s it. Nice to have met you all, in a sense. Good luck with your five year mission or whatever it is.” Walking over to the other side of the force-field she looked at each of them in turn, stopping on Hammond. “I really am sorry about causing you any trouble, General,” she said quietly. “But I couldn’t take the risk of getting stuck here. I’ve got too much work to do at home and people need me.”

The general met her eyes for several seconds, then nodded slowly. “Good luck, Miss Hebert.”

“Thank you.” She knelt next to the shield generator and fiddled with the device for a moment, then stood again. “It’ll shut off a few minutes after I leave,” she explained, before moving to the middle of the room. Pulling a necklace with some sort of technological pendant on it out of her pocket she put it over her neck, then shrugged the backpack on.

The girl took out her phone and tapped it again. Putting it to her ear, after a couple of seconds she smiled. “Yep. All done.”

Listening for a moment, Taylor nodded. “Everything’s set.” She looked at them and waved, before smirking a little “One to beam up.”

There was a flash of light and she vanished.

Seconds later the machine made a rumbling sound and the wormhole interface flickered out, followed by a sizzling noise and a small cloud of smoke rising into the air. Sam made a sound of distress as she watched.

The ZPM’s glow dimmed down to a much lower level as the machine died.

They waited, and about five minutes later the force-field rippled with green light then blinked off with an audible ping. The low background hum the generator had produced stopped.

Waving his hand cautiously in front of himself, Jack took a step, then another. “Yeah, it’s gone,” he said.

“I still have no real idea what the hell just happened,” Daniel commented wryly.

“Join the club,” Jack muttered as he walked over to the crate and looked at the stuff lying on top of it. Sam went over to the now-defunct machine and gazed sadly at it, before joining him and picking up the notebook Taylor had left them. She started flipping through it, stopping dead three pages in and staring.

“Oh my god,” she breathed.

“Useful information?” Daniel asked as he walked over.

She raised wide eyes to him, nodding wordlessly, before sitting down on the same crate Taylor had used and carefully turning pages with a look of stunned amazement on her face. Daniel and Jack exchanged glances, then left her to it.

As they left the room to write what was going to be one hell of a report, they passed General Hammond who was looking at the wormhole generator with a face betraying his feelings. He sighed a little, then turned and followed them.

Shortly Sam was the only one in the room, still reading the notebook with enormous interest.

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

“Huh.”

Adjusting a couple of controls, Taylor listened through headphones while watching five separate screens show complex waveforms and graphs, along with a number of meters of various sorts that were moving around at varying speeds. Much of the equipment was of her own design, or at least heavily modified from standard specification, and a lot of it was much older and lower-tech than the shiny new toys she’d recently been able to acquire. Still, it did the job very well, and she was extremely familiar with it.

All this finally terminated in a neat, and to other people probably completely incomprehensible without a lot of study, mass of wiring and probes surrounding her original subspace transceiver, which had sprouted quite a lot of new additions in the last week of work. Ever since she’d finally narrowed her search to that one specific subspace ‘channel’ she’d been working on methods to decode the data she could practically feel moving back and forth from whatever it was that was at the far end.

An early discovery was that it was definitely coming from, or via, a barely-there microportal, that made the ones which potential Parahumans had look like a blazing searchlight by comparison. The signal was incredibly faint but very distinct, and her initial impression, which had only grown stronger with time and study, was that it wasn’t meant to be found. As far as she could tell the originating what-ever-it-was seemed to be going out of its way to obfuscate the signal, using a number of methods to crunch the channel width right down compared to the other signals that seemed to be connections between Parahumans and their power source. Or potential Parahumans and whatever was possibly their power source.

She got the distinct impression that this thing was trying to be sneaky. The question was, was it trying to hide from her, or from the other similar things?

After a lot of thought she’d decided that the best fit to her data was multiple, closely related and most likely highly interconnected, power sources. She’d been able, with some tweaking of her latest hardware and software, to prove to her own satisfaction that Parahuman powers appeared to share certain bandwidth features, making her suspect they were essentially forming some strange subspace network that spread out through the entire volume surrounding the Earth. How far beyond that this went she didn’t know, but a meta-analysis of her readings matched more closely to something like a hierarchical distributed network than anything else she could think of.

The protocols used by this putative network were complex and subtle in one way, and remarkably crude in another. Even without decoding the transmissions, but just by looking at the overall structure of the whole system, she could see it was very inefficient in how it utilized subspace. It seemed to be restricted to a small subset of the total available dimensional connectivity that her own systems used, and even there she was fully aware that she had a long way to go before she had something that was as good as could be made. She was determined to keep improving her work to that point although it was likely to be quite a long development process, but her own sense of professionalism demanded that she make it happen sooner or later.

If you were going to do something, do it right, was her internal motto, she thought to herself with a small smile as she tweaked a control, then watched the resulting changes ripple throughout her equipment. Making some notes, she nodded a little and kept working.

“The whole thing looks more like it’s been… grown or something,” she finally muttered, sitting back and studying her findings with interest. “Like it’s just iteratively modifying itself, over and over, and slowly converging on a solution...”

Flipping through pages she scanned the equations, working out a mental image of how things worked. She had to bring in a couple more dimensions to make the topology fit but in the end she nodded again, jotting down a correction factor that developed into a long string of math. “But it started from something that’s… not quite right,” she mumbled, turning to the computer and paging through hundreds of entries in a spreadsheet, looking at how the calculated outputs changed over time. “The eigenvalues are all over the place… No one would design something this… random.” The girl shook her head in annoyance. Paradoxically the randomness of certain aspects of the subspace signal made it more difficult to properly deal with compared to something sensible like her alien tutor channel. They knew how to do it right, and had done so.

She knew how to do it right.

But whoever or whatever was responsible for this apparently didn’t. Or didn’t actually care.

Taylor wasn’t sure which was more potentially annoying.

Still, she was no quitter, and she was determined to get to the bottom of the strange signal. The whole Parahuman/subspace interaction was fascinating anyway but this one was riveting. It was so clearly designed not to be noticed it stood out like a lighthouse to her.

Grumbling a little at her inability to work out quite what about the whole thing was niggling at the back of her mind, making her think she was missing something obvious, she finally saved all her work, made sure the output from the current rig was being recorded for later analysis, and turned to watch her latest lesson. The alien TV show was currently working on power extraction systems and she’d been highly pleased to see that her own derivation of the same thing was very close indeed to that which the aliens were explaining. She’d independently arrived at almost exactly the same concepts and math, although theirs differed in some very intriguing ways that she wanted to understand.

It seemed likely that combining her own theories and theirs could lead somewhere interesting, and the more she learned the more she was able to work ahead as it were, so she settled down to watch and listen with a sense of purpose and enjoyment. Picking up the glass of coke with ice at her elbow she sipped it as the lead academic explained how quantum potential energy could be tapped from the underlying strata of reality, by now getting about eighty percent of the math first time, and nearly fifty percent of the words.

By the time she went to bed at just after midnight, having stopped to hug her father and talk to him for a while, she was tired, pleased, and slightly frustrated by her self-imposed task, but overall satisfied with how things were going.

Sooner or later she’d figure it out, she was pretty sure of that. And in the meantime she had lots of other things to do. Like start poking through that huge stack of Leet’s Tinker gadgets that Brendan had mysteriously turned up with two days ago and handed over with a smile and a comment that any insights she could provide on the stuff would make a lot of scientists and engineers very happy indeed.

Taylor liked being helpful, and Tinker tech, while sometimes highly annoying, was a lot of fun to work on. Especially Leet’s as it was if nothing else neatly made, compared to Squealer’s…

She approved of neatly made equipment. It was much easier to get interesting data from.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Hey, Emma,” Taylor said softly, reaching out and brushing her friend’s hair neatly to the side of her face, before resting her hand on the other girl’s forehead for a few seconds. She closed her eyes and sat in silence, listening to the quiet sounds the monitoring equipment on the other side of the bed made. Emma’s breathing was slow and steady, but other than that there was no sound from her, and no movement.

Leaning closer, Taylor rested her head next to Emma’s, sighing a little. “I miss you so much,” she almost whispered. “I’m going to find a way to bring you back. I promise you that. Back to me, back to your Dad, and your Mom, and Anne. I know you’re in there somewhere. And I don’t care how long it takes, I’ll reach you.”

Holding the other girl’s hand in her own, she wished for an answering squeeze, but like always, got nothing. Even so she squeezed it gently herself. “I don’t know if you can hear me, but I hope you can. Dad sends his love. Mom would have too, if she was still here.”

Swallowing a little, she squeezed Emma’s hand once more, then sat up properly. “School’s going well,” she said, still speaking quietly but no longer whispering. “I’ve made quite a few friends. You’d like them. Amy and Vicky Dallon are really cool. You know, Panacea and Glory Girl.” She smiled a little, looking at her friend’s face, serene in its blankness. “I didn’t really think I’d end up knowing them when we were in junior high, but like I told you, Vicky is sort of a force of nature. She pretty much just grabbed me and said ‘We’re friends now!’ Which was kind of weird in a way, but very Vicky.”

Taylor chuckled. “Amy was really annoyed about it, she’s kind of sarcastic a lot of the time, but she’s smart and funny too. She works too hard at the hospital and you can tell its not doing her any favors. I think a lot of people take her for granted and it doesn’t help. Sometimes I wonder if anyone ever even says thanks...” She shrugged a little. “I know I would. I did, for what she did for you. Even if she can’t fix you all the way, she really helped. And I like her a lot even aside from that. Vicky too, and their friends. I’ve met quite a lot of them so far. Their cousins are pretty neat as well, for that matter.”

She sighed a little. “Amy’s mom is… well, let’s say that Amy’s not entirely happy about some things and a lot of it is to do with her mother. Even Vicky is getting upset with the way their mom treats poor Amy sometimes. Their dad is a nice guy but he’s got depression of some sort and hardly says anything. I went there last week to cheer Amy up with some of Guido’s double chocolate cake, you know the one that mom loved, and he smiled at me but it was like he wasn’t really in the room. Poor guy.”

Falling silent she watched her best friend breathe, lost in her own thoughts for a while. In the end she heaved another sigh. “I wish I could help. I guess all I can do is be friends with Amy and Vicky and sometimes shove cake into them. Cake always helps.” Taylor smiled a little at her own words. “Dad’s having still fun with Gravtec. The Mayor’s really pleased about the boats being moved, and it’s amazing how fast a lot of business is coming back to the city, he says. Everyone at the DWU is happy about it too. All the security took a little getting used to but no one really complained since they know it’s needed. I haven’t seen so many people looking like they’re enjoying their work for… well, ever.”

She stood up and walked to the window, pulling the blind aside a little and looking out across the city. It was a nice sunny weekend morning and from here it looked calm and peaceful. “It’s going to be a good summer, I think,” she said without turning around, watching a fairly large trawler chug slowly towards the open ocean, small figures moving around on the deck. “We’re supposed to be getting some very warm weather, so lots of barbecues.”

Watching a bus drive past down on the street, stopping to let a couple of people disembark, she then raised her eyes to the sky. The full moon was visible as a ghostly version of what it would be at night, high above the horizon. A small white figure zoomed overhead, making her smile. “There’s Vicky now,” she went on. “Flying must be really cool.”

Turning back to the room she let go of the blind, then returned to her chair. She pulled one of her modified phones out of her pocket and fiddled with it for a few seconds, tapping several icons in sequence. “This is something I’ve been working on,” she commented quietly, reaching out and holding it above Emma’s forehead. She watched the screen for thirty seconds, nodding a little as she saw what she expected. “Just wanted to double-check,” she added very softly as she saved the readings and put it away. “But it’s not you. I was kind of hoping it was.”

She pulled her backpack onto her lap and removed a book from it, then put the pack on the floor again. “Let’s see… where did we get to last time? Oh, yeah.” Turning pages, she found the right spot and cleared her throat. “On the day that the hunted unicorn crossed the valley of Erl Alveric had wandered for over eleven years. For more than ten years, a company of six, they went by the backs of the houses by the edge of the fields we know...”

When her father came in ninety minutes later, she was still reading, and still holding Emma’s hand.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“I don’t know how much longer I can take it, Vicky,” Amy grumbled to her sister as she stomped along, feeling far more hard done by than she thought was reasonable. Carol was being a bigger ass than usual, even though the blonde girl next to her had gone off on their mother like nothing she’d ever seen before. Vicky was usually, and surprisingly if you only knew about her as Glory Girl, much more diplomatic where the elder Dallon was concerned. Amy could understand that even as she found it immensely irritating, as Carol was Vicky’s biological mother but not hers.

Even so, the two girls considered themselves as much sisters as if they’d shared a womb, and Vicky had spent a lot of time over the years comforting an upset Amy who couldn’t understand why the older woman was often so dismissive or abrasive towards her. She’d done nothing to warrant it as far as she could see but there was certainly something behind the whole thing, something that at times made her wonder why on earth she’d been adopted in the first place if that was what Carol thought of her.

To be fair, she wasn’t physically mistreated, she was fed, watered, and clothed perfectly satisfactorily, and had most of her material needs met without any real problem. But psychologically she hadn’t been handled well, she was old enough now to realize that consciously, and the difference between how their mother treated Vicky and her was stark and plain to see.

A lot of it had gotten much worse when she’d gained powers, too. She liked her powers, on the whole, but the shine had worn off very quickly once she worked out that Carol was never going to let up on telling her all about the responsibilities she had, and how she should help people, and on and on in that vein. Leading in the end to her feeling so guilty if she didn’t spend as much time as possible doing something that was really starting to become more of a penance than a duty, and had long left the vicinity of being interesting for the most part.

The bit she found particularly hard to bear was then, having spent literally hours every day fixing people, often from the results of their own idiocy, to the point that she was nearly falling over from exhaustion, that Carol would start being a shrew about overworking. Because it reflected badly on New Wave’s image or some such self-serving shit.

At times she rather felt that Carol Dallon was a bit of a hypocrite.

Sure, she was grateful to the damned woman for giving her a home, and in some ways she both respected and loved her, but at other times she really wanted to punch her right in the eye and scream, “Stop being such a bitch!”

Which would not go down well. Not even a little. Even though she was pretty sure she could take her even without powers…

Vicky, next to her, was giving her worried looks as she walked. Normally her sister tended to fly everywhere, but today Amy wasn’t in the mood for that, or being held, or anything else of that nature. Nor did she really want to go home right now. She was still tired from the other day, and grateful for her sister’s insistence to both her and Carol that she spend the day in bed recovering, and lay off the healing for a couple of days too. That had not made their mother happy, but Vicky had folded her arms and glared in a way that was genuinely impressive.

Taylor turning up that evening with an entire chocolate cake, the best one Amy had ever tasted, and almost sitting on her to get her to eat some, had also helped a hell of a lot. The tall lanky girl was very odd at times in her outlook, but unremittingly cheerful too, to the point it was impossible to be annoyed at her. And Amy had a strong suspicion that aside from Vicky, Taylor was probably the best friend she actually had.

Which was why they were heading in the general direction of Taylor’s house. Amy had decided that she had to get away from Carol for a while, Vicky had told her in no uncertain terms that she wasn’t to go and hide in the hospital, she wasn’t in the mood to wander around the Boardwalk looking at idiots doing cape spotting or some such garbage, and it was Sunday. A nice sunny one too, as the weather was rapidly warming up as spring progressed. So she’d ended up thinking that a walk in that direction would at least get her some exercise, which she probably could do with, and if they ended up finding Taylor, whose house she’d never been to yet, so much the better even if it wasn’t at the level of a definite plan.

“She means well...” Vicky began, knowing exactly what she was talking about.

Amy stopped dead and fixed her with a dead-eyed stare. The other girl flinched a bit.

“Does she? Really?” Sniffing, Amy shook her head and resumed her motion, waving her arms around in her annoyance. “Could have fooled me sometimes. Sure, she’s not as bad as she probably could be but fuck me, she’s hard work. ‘Think of the image of New Wave, Amy. It’s your responsibility to use your powers for good, Amy. No, you can’t charge people for healing them, Amy.’ Which is fucking ridiculous, do you have any idea how much money the hospital is charging the people I heal?”

“Um… A lot?”

“Try about twice whatever you’re thinking about,” Amy muttered viciously. “Sure, I do emergency cases and Endbringer stuff and all that for free, I’ve got no problem with it, and terminal cases too, but some of the random shit I see because people are dimwits who do stupid things then have the insurance cover for ‘Parahuman Healing Services’ is just nuts.” She viciously kicked a branch that was lying on the sidewalk and watched with satisfaction as it flew over the road and disappeared into the bushes on the other side, barely missing a large black SUV that was slowly passing them. The vehicle didn’t slow and she ignored it.

“If I got ten percent of that, I’d be filthy rich by now,” she added in aggrieved tones. “New Wave would be rich, even. But no, it’s somehow not ethical for me to profit from my powers. Even though Carol makes a mint profiting from her lawyer powers and other people’s misfortune.”

Vicky snickered almost involuntarily. “That’s kind of mean,” she replied. Her hands in her pockets, Amy just kept her head down, looking for something else to kick. She was in a kicking sort of mood right now and had nice steel-toed boots on, which were good for that sort of thing.

“Yeah, maybe, but it’s not wrong either. God, she pisses me off sometimes.”

“Really? I hadn’t noticed,” her sister said in a light voice, draping an arm over her shoulders. Amy sighed and let her. “Honest, Amy, she’s not actually evil. Just… strict.”

“And really, really making me want to scream,” Amy groused as she walked along. “If she’d just lighten up and let me live my life it would be easier. But recently she’s been even more… Carol… than usual, and it’s getting on my nerves something horrible.”

“Yeah, she’s been odd, I have to admit,” Vicky sighed. “I think it’s something about how the city has changed in the last few months.”

Amy glanced at her. “What do you mean?”

The blonde waved an arm at the general area. “Haven’t you noticed? Ever since Gravtec flew the ship out of the bay, things seem to have calmed down in a very odd way. The gangs are hardly seen at the moment, the E88 seems to have practically gone into retirement, the ABB are wandering around pretending that they’re just security consultants, no one knows where Lung is, even the Merchants are keeping their heads down. The whole Dock area has been fixed up somehow, and no one knows who paid for it. And the bay’s coming back to life too. I’ve never seen so many ships out there as there have been in the last couple of months. It’s freaking her out I thing because she doesn’t understand what’s changed and why.”

Vicky thought for a moment as Amy considered her words, not having thought about it quite like that before.

“I think she might also be worried that something big is going to happen because things are better right now. You know what she’s like sometimes.”

“Paranoid and irritating,” Amy mumbled, shaking her head.

“Little bit, yeah.”

“I guess you might have a point,” the brunette girl said after a couple of hundred meters. “I hadn’t really noticed how much things had changed.”

“Because you’re either in school or the hospital,” Vicky pointed out good-naturedly. Amy blushed a little. “You need to get out more often. Live your life, don’t just stay inside all the time. You’re getting all pale and pasty.”

“Hey!”

“It suits you.”

“...Hey!”

They grinned at each other, Amy feeling rather happier. Vicky could generally cheer her up sooner or later.

Both girls looked up at the sound of a yell somewhere close. “What was that?” Amy asked.

“Someone in trouble,” Vicky replied immediately, about to leap into the air. Amy grabbed her by the wrist. “What?”

“Don’t just go diving in, think for once, will you?” her sister snapped. “Remember the last time?”

Vicky looked embarrassed. They both did. All too well.

“Let’s go see what it is before you start throwing cars around this time,” Amy added, heading in the direction the yell had emanated from, and which was now producing a lot of vicious shouting. Clearly at least two people were having a violent disagreement at best. Vicky, clearly itching to fly into action, nevertheless followed obediently as the pair rounded the corner of a side street and stopped. Twenty meters further on two people were watching another pair roll around on the sidewalk. Three of them, including one of the individuals on the ground, were dressed in clothing that made it abundantly apparent that they weren’t really people who would be considered law-abiding citizens. This impression was reinforced by the crowbar one of them was holding, and the knife the other standing one was.

The fourth person looked much more like a dockworker than a gang member, being around mid thirties, dressed in heavy boots and denim jeans with a typical work-style jacket over a flannel shirt. He was swearing in at least four different languages as he gave the much younger man a fairly severe beating, in a manner that made it obvious he was no stranger to this sort of thing.

Amy and Vicky exchanged looks.

She got the impression that they were witnessing a mugging that had gone rather badly askew from the point of the muggers. Their victim wasn’t quite as cooperative as they’d probably expected, and the one who’d taken point was also taking a lot of bruises, although he was fighting back viciously. His friends seemed more amused than anything else, giving him pointers in loud voices and laughing when the older man kneed him very solidly in the groin. Neither of them was watching anything but the fight.

“Bit bold of them to do this in broad daylight, isn’t it?” Amy whispered to her sister.

“They’re stoned out of their heads, I can smell it from here,” Vicky whispered back, shaking her head. “Merchants, maybe, but there are a lot like them who aren’t really part of one of the bigger gangs. Especially a bit further towards the docks.”

“What are they doing here?”

“No idea. Probably got lost or something.” Vicky cracked her knuckled and started to move forward quietly, none of the men noticing. Amy, feeling unusually combative due to her overall frustration level, instead of staying back as she normally would, followed right beside her.

Her sister gave her a look. She returned it with interest. Vicky shrugged, smiling a little.

Amy smiled back, then pointed to the one with the crowbar. The other girl nodded. Both moved calmly into position, then Vicky said, “Hi!” in a bright cheerful voice.

Both men whipped their heads around to gape at her. One seemed to recognize her even without her costume and paled, while the crowbar-wielding guy reflexively took a swing at her.

She grinned as his weapon bounced off her face. Then laughed outright when he toppled over, flat onto the ground and out like a light. Amy lifted her hand to her lips and blew on her outstretched finger.

“Oh shit,” the conscious one yelped very quietly. He turned to run.

And got about a meter before Amy poked him in the neck like she was fencing. He also measured his length on the concrete with a fairly solid thump, making her wince and smile in satisfaction at the same time.

“Nice one, Ames,” Vicky said admiringly. Amy chuckled, then they turned to watch the last of the muggers get the shit kicked out of him. The dockworker didn’t seem to need help, the pair decided, as he was now on his feet doing unto the putative mugger what that one had intended to do unto him.

Eventually, Amy said in a louder voice, “That’s probably enough.” The man, who was about to stomp on his assailant’s groin, paused, then looked over his shoulder. His eyes scanned both of them, before lowering to the two comatose muggers on the ground, and widening a little.

“Ah,” he said, lowering his foot and turning around. The heavily bruised young man behind him groaned and tried to crawl away. “Stop that,” he added without looking, flicking one arm out with his foot and making the guy fall prone again with a grunt of pain. “Glory Girl and Panacea, if I’m not mistaken,” he went on, looking at the sisters. “Nice work.”

“Same to you,” Amy replied politely. “Do you need some healing?”

He looked down at himself, then held up a grazed fist and flexed it. “Nah, I’m good, thanks,” he chuckled. “No need to put yourself out, young lady. Thanks all the same.”

“OK,” she said, slightly surprised. Most people tended to jump at the chance of some parahuman work in her experience. On the other hand most of the ones she met were in the hospital. “What about him?”

“Pain’s a good teacher,” the man said with a look down. “I think he’s learned an important lesson today.”

“I have, yes, sir,” the younger man said faintly, face down on the ground. “Ow.”

Amy almost laughed. He sounded like he meant it.

“What do with do about these guys?” she asked.

The dockworker pulled a phone out. “I’ll handle it.” He looked at the ones she’d turned off. “How long will they be out?”

With a small shrug, she replied, “Probably about an hour or so. They’re just seriously asleep.”

“Not bad at all,” he laughed as he prodded an icon on the screen and held the phone to his ear. “Thanks for the assist.”

“No problem, sir,” she smiled. Vicky waved to the guy and they turned and walked off.

Behind them they heard the man say, “Hey, George. Funny story...”

Feeling like she’d achieved something useful, Amy was in a considerably better mood at the moment. They resumed their walk towards the Hebert neighborhood, Amy no longer sulking and only mildly miffed at life in general. Vicky seemed relieved and pleased, and soon they were laughing about recent events. A couple of large black SUVs passed them going in the opposite direction a little while later but neither of them paid any attention.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Taylor opened the door and smiled widely. “Hi, guys,” she said. “Amy, what’s wrong?”

“How do you do that?” Vicky demanded, staring at her.

“She’s looking slightly annoyed but cheerful otherwise, leading me to deduce using my Observational Power of Observation that she was really upset earlier but you managed to cheer her up somehow,” Taylor immediately replied, which made Amy start giggling. “Did you throw a car at someone and miss again? I want to see that, it sounded hilarious.” She grinned as the blonde sighed heavily.

“It was,” Amy chortled. “Very. But sort of embarrassing too.”

By now the blonde girl was scowling, making Taylor step forward and quickly hug her. “We all believe in you, Vicky,” she said with a smile. “Don’t let the haters win. Or the car owners.”

“You guys are horrible,” Vicky mumbled, but there was no heat to her words, and she was clearly suppressing a smile. “Hey, want to go out for ice cream or something?”

Taylor looked past them to a couple of people that were mowing the lawn on the other side of the road, then back to her friends. “Sure. Let me tell dad where I’m going. And grab a coat.”

Shortly she was back, closing the door behind her. They walked down the path and turned onto the sidewalk, heading for the tourist district a couple of kilometers away. Taylor waved to one of the neighbors who watched them go past before returning to reading a newspaper as he sat on his front porch. Amy was looking around with interest.

“Seems like a nice neighborhood,” she commented. “I always heard it was a bit run down, but it looks pretty good.”

“Quite a few people moved out and others moved in recently,” Taylor shrugged. “They fixed up a few of the houses, and what with the way the city’s been getting more money in these days, a lot of the roads are getting fixed and stuff like that. Dad says it looks like it used to about twenty years back now. He likes it.”

“So do I,” Vicky said. “The whole place is much calmer right now.”

“Yeah,” Taylor agreed happily, nodding to a man who jogged past in the other direction, who nodded back. “It’s really great. Hopefully it will stay like that.”

They kept walking and talking, Amy recounting the story of what they’d seen on the way over, which made Taylor laugh. By the time they reached the ice cream place her friend seemed to be entirely over whatever had upset her, which Taylor was pretty sure would turn out to be her mother. The whole situation there was bad and she was still trying to think of something she could help with, but so far nothing seemed to jump out at her.

Eventually they were sitting on a bench near the shore eating ice cream and watching the tourists wander hither and yon pointing out cape related things and gawping at the Rig. Taylor relaxed and enjoyed the warm weather, still idly pondering in the back of her mind the oddities of her ongoing research at home.

It was when two of the trawlers in the bay sounded their horns at each other, the sounds at slightly different pitches and heterodyning into a complex waveform that rang across the water, that she had a sudden insight and nearly dropped her ice cream cone while trying to extract a notebook from her jacket to write it down while she thought of it.

Vicky and Amy seemed to find her juggling cold ice cream extremely funny. Her stuffing it into her mouth to get rid of it, scribbling frantically, then moaning in pain from the resulting ice cream headache was even more amusing to them...

Chapter Text

“Incredible.”

Secretary Robinson looked at the report in front of him with raised eyebrows. “All this in three weeks?”

“The Prime Asset is… remarkably gifted,” Doctor Hudson said in a somewhat wry voice. “General Calhoun is profoundly impressed by the abilities shown, as is everyone else cleared to know. The Prime Asset should undoubtedly have at least two doctorates purely on the basis of the work done in the last couple of months, and another one for the initial gravitic theory. There are also a number of pure mathematicians who would sell their own kidneys for a chance to talk for a day. I’ve heard talk of a Fields Medal in the near future.”

“And probably a Nobel Prize at some point,” one of the others around the table commented. She nodded with a small smile.

“Certainly. However protecting the Prime Asset’s identity from unwanted attention makes such accolades problematic at best. Which is a pity. But perhaps one day...” She shrugged a tiny amount. “Until then our friend seems entirely content to rewrite science from the ground up almost as a hobby.”

The Secretary nodded, flipping pages with a look of incredulity on his face. “Practical, reproducible hard light projectors, a sound suppression system, a hand held MRI scanner...”

“That last one isn’t inspired by Tinker Tech, it was all an original design from the beginning,” Doctor Hudson pointed out. “And it’s not quite finished from what I’m told, although now that the process yield for the room temperature superconductor has reached a practical level, that’s likely only a matter of time.”

He nodded again somewhat absently as he kept flipping pages. “Structural integrity field?”

“That was the result of working out a way to increase the strong nuclear force in a suitably treated material to a frankly absurd level,” Doctor Hudson replied as he looked up. “Without causing it to compress that material to a singularity, which is almost more impressive than the first part. The end result is going to be such things as armor plate two millimeters thick that’s the equivalent of four meters of the best ceramic metal composite armors, at a minimum.”

“Good god. And all this is the end result of a few million dollars off the defense budget to a minor Tinker villain?” He shook his head in wonder. “Money well spent, by anyone’s standards.”

“And both the Tinker and his colleague appeared quite content to rebrand themselves and leave their former lifestyle, which in many ways is almost worth the cost alone,” the unnamed agency man put in with a certain amount of satisfaction. “As our projections indicated. It once again points out that a significant number of the Parahuman problems facing us could most likely be solved, or at least significantly reduced, merely by giving such people a way out of the situation they end up essentially trapped in by certain decisions taken in the past. Most of which were at the urging of the PRT, of course.”

Robinson glanced at him with a thoughtful look. “A point that has been raised several times in recent memory, I agree,” he said after a few seconds of consideration. “The PRT tends to push back quite hard whenever such an idea is raised, which due to a number of political problems has left us where we currently are. Perhaps it’s time to look at it again now that we have practical data on the efficacy of the concept...”

The other man lifted a hand for a moment in a gesture of agreement. “We can provide a list of Parahumans who we suspect would be amenable to discussion,” he replied quietly. “We’ve been gathering such data for a long time.”

“I’ll mention it to the Chiefs of Staff and the President at the next briefing,” Robinson remarked, making a note. “Get the information to me by the end of the week on the top… let’s say dozen possibilities and I’ll work on it.”

“Of course, sir.”

A couple of other people also made some notes, looking intrigued. Robinson flipped through the rest of the folder then closed it, before retrieving the next one. Opening the cover he looked at the summary page then raised his eyes to scan those present. “Now, on the matter of the Prime Asset’s life in general… Do we have any major concerns at the moment?”

“Our friend appears to be, somewhat surprisingly considering the location and previous events, a remarkably well adjusted person who makes friends easily,” another security adviser said, referring to her notes. “Psychological screening carried out at the initial DARPA assessment showed a level of mental stability that exceeds quite a large percentage of the population, as you know, and there are no indications that the enormous change in circumstances have in any detrimental manner affected this. Of course most of the standard assessments break down with very high intelligence levels, and the Prime Asset is the most extreme case of that on record. In essence our friend is so far off the charts we need new terminology to cover it.”

She smiled slightly. “There are people who would dearly love to investigate just how someone can be that smart and still function normally, of course. It seems unlikely that they’ll have the chance.”

“Absolutely no non-consensual testing will ever be done on the Prime Asset, by Presidential order,” Robinson said firmly. “We were unbelievably lucky that we got the chance for this arrangement handed to us on a plate with full cooperation and there is zero inclination to risk that cooperation. The Prime Asset is certainly far more than smart enough to immediately discern any lack of truth in how we hold up our end of the deal.”

“That much is definite,” the agency man commented, smirking slightly. “Based on our own observation our friend has identified every single security measure and agent we’ve put in place on the spot. The Prime Asset would make one hell of an agent. But despite seeing through any cover we’ve so far managed, our friend appears perfectly content to work within the system we’ve established, and even proactively cooperates with the requirements of providing protective cover. Once again we were very lucky in how well things worked out.”

“Understood, sir, I wasn’t suggesting that we try anything underhanded,” the woman said when her colleague finished. “Merely noting something that’s been mentioned once or twice. In any case, as far as the Prime Asset goes, the situation is stable. Social contacts outside our friend’s immediate family seem to be proceeding well too. There is the long term issue of a very close friend in a coma, which is definitely something our friend is affected by. We’re monitoring the condition of the person in question, of course, and there are no immediate signs of worsening medical prognosis, nor, unfortunately, a recovery in the near future. We have people looking into anything that might help even so.”

“Good,” the Secretary nodded, writing on his pad for a moment. “Continue that. And outside the immediate family?”

“The Prime Asset’s other friends and associates in general don’t present any problems. Background security checks have been carried out on every person contacted or in proximity, including those at the new educational location. Nothing of serious concern has shown to date although the situation is continually evolving, as one would expect. There is no sign that any social contacts are aware of the Prime Asset’s status other than through public knowledge and association with Gravtec. A number of known or suspected Parahumans are including in the individuals our friend meets in various locations, but with the exception of two, we don’t know if the Prime Asset realizes that.”

“I would personally be very surprised if our friend did not know,” the agency man remarked with a bit of a grin. She looked at him, then nodded.

“Admittedly this is distinctly likely, but there has been no actual indication of such. If our friend does know, they are very discreet about it.”

“I assume the two in question are the New Wave individuals?” Robinson asked.

“Yes. Panacea and Glory Girl do appear to have become well acquainted with the Prime Asset and are considered friends,” she responded. “At Glory Girl’s instigation, initially. She appears to be somewhat aggressively cheerful and made initial contact. Panacea was almost reluctantly involved but at this point seems to consider the Prime Asset a close friend, which is reciprocated.”

“Security measures surrounding New Wave in general and both girls specifically have been increased as the relationship progressed,” the agency man added, Secretary Robinson looking at him as he spoke. “As we reported some time ago, it’s quite likely that at some point in time we will need to take steps to arrange security clearance for at least Panacea and Glory Girl. Brandish and Flashbang are… more problematic. The former due to a rigid psychological makeup that could become difficult to handle and the latter due to clinical depression issues.”

Robinson nodded, jotting down some more notes. “Can the pair be trusted?”

“Our people believe that Panacea is a definite yes, Glory Girl may be somewhat harder to bring on board as she takes after her mother in some respects a little too much. On the other hand, there are definite indications that Brandish is… not as well suited to raising Panacea as one might hope. And recently Glory Girl has begun to notice this from what we’ve observed. The situation may require intervention before something unfortunate happens.”

“Ah. That wouldn’t be ideal,” the Secretary remarked, frowning.

“No, although from what we can tell the Prime Asset is remarkably effective at helping Panacea deal with her own stressors, which is keeping the situation contained for now. One suggestion raised was to work on changing the relationship Panacea has with Brockton General Hospital to make it somewhat less stressful for her, and potentially more lucrative, which we think will defuse a number of likely problems for the future before they arise. It would take very careful handling of New Wave to avoid blowback due to a certain… ethical mismatch… but it’s one avenue worth investigating in my opinion.”

Having thought it over, the Secretary nodded slowly. “I agree. I’ll bring that up as well but provisionally you have authorization to put in place the required assets. I’ll let you know when we get full authorization.”

The agent nodded calmly.

“All right.” Robinson closed that folder too and opened the next one. “Next on the agenda; Progress on local military assets and upgrades. Colonel Young, if you’ll give us a rundown, please?”

Everyone looked at the colonel, who nodded and started speaking. The meeting lasted another two and a half hours but when Robinson left he was very pleased with the progress so far and hopeful that the future held a lot more than it had done a year ago.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Why are you so worked up about this matter, Rebecca?” The man speaking was doing so in a somewhat tired voice, his head resting on his fist and his elbow on the table. They’d been bickering now for close to three hours and he was getting to the point of just going home and writing the afternoon off as a bad job. Legend, or in his civilian guise, Paul, sighed as the woman on the other side of the table looked offended. As he glanced around he saw that the others were also looking a curious combination of resigned, irritated, and puzzled. With the exception of Fortuna who was leaning back in her chair with her hat pulled down over her eyes, appearing to be asleep although every now and then she twitched a little and her lips moved silently.

“Why keep pushing about who or what is behind Gravtec?” he went on. “The government has told you several times that you don’t have the clearance to know any more that what they’ve shown us, they’re pretty damned insistent about that, they’ve provided evidence and testimony that none of this is Parahuman-related, and they can prove it. I’ve seen the patents myself. And talked to at least one DARPA engineer who built one of those gravity generators right in front of me from parts he had on hand. It’s not Tinker tech. Therefore it’s not our business, other than it possibly being useful for our main goal of course.”

He watched her face as he carried on, “Your insistence that we stick our noses in baffles me. We get the benefits of whoever is actually behind these technological breakthroughs without having to deal with any of the work involved, so from my point of view we should just accept that and get on with the things that are our responsibility. So, again, why are you so worked up about it?”

The woman stared at him for a long moment as he waited for an answer that would make sense. Which so far he hadn’t had.

“There has to be a Parahuman element to all this,” she finally said with an air of irritation. “And I want to know what it is.”

“You’re being more of control freak right now than I like, and you’re a serious control freak all the time,” David, who had pushed his hood back from his Eidolon costume and was currently eyeing up a plate of sandwiches with an interested expression, commented. He reached for one and picked it up, examining the filling. “Ah. Chicken salad.” The sandwich quickly vanished.

“I am not a control freak,” Rebecca snapped. Everyone present exchanged looks, even Fortuna pushing her hat up with one finger to peer at her, then meet Paul’s eyes before rolling her own and dropping her hand again. He suppressed a chuckle, the woman was in some way more normal right now than she usually was and that was another example of it. “I merely am highly suspicious of how fast and how much things in Brockton Bay have changed. The technological leaps made there in six months are literally centuries past any current technology, excluding Tinker work. So logically it must be Tinker work.”

Paul sighed very quiet. He held up a report in his left hand and pointed at it with the right one. “Yet DARPA have provided large amounts of information which prove that it’s not, that there is no Parahuman involved in these breakthroughs, and that whoever the extraordinary mind behind it really is doesn’t qualify as a Parahuman. Or are you going to argue that anyone with genius-level intellect is by default a Parahuman? That’s a very slippery slope to start descending. Extreme outliers in any field you care to name do exist and always have done. Da Vinci, Einstein, any number of others. None of them were Parahumans, we know that for a fact, yet they were vastly past their contemporaries in certain fields.”

“This goes beyond genius,” she insisted.

He shrugged. “And? We don’t actually know the true limits of the human mind without the interference of an Agent. Just having an IQ of 200 or whatever the hell it is isn’t proof of Parahuman talent.”

“The bulk of Parahumans fall within the normal distribution of intelligence,” Doctor Mother commented, making him look over at her. “An Agent doesn’t necessarily, or even commonly, increase that. If anything in many cases the opposite is true.”

He gestured at her while returning his attention to Rebecca. “What she said. You’re blowing this all out of proportion. Someone happens to be smarter than the entire Manhattan Project combined, came to the attention of DARPA, and the government jumped on it with both feet. Can you blame them? Just the inventions in this report will have any number of long and short term implications, and god knows what else might come from that direction. If anything we should be pleased that we could well find something helpful for us coming out of it. And we don’t need to do anything, they’re doing it for us.”

She didn’t look happy, he saw with resignation. David was right, he suspected, she was mostly upset that someone had told her ‘no’ and could make it stick. She didn’t like that and wasn’t used to it.

“Fine, you say there’s no Parahuman involvement and so does the government. Explain why the Path has changed then.” Rebecca pointed at Fortuna, who was still relaxing in her chair apparently ignoring them all. “The only thing that does that is something connected with a very limited number of sources.”

“That we know of,” he corrected. “We know far too little about Entities and powers. I’ll admit it’s odd, but once again you don’t actually have any proof. We certainly don’t have anything that would legitimately give us a reason to interfere more than we already have.”

“Coil has vanished without trace,” Rebecca said after glaring at him for a moment. “Several other Parahumans active in Brockton Bay seem to have abruptly moved out for no obvious reason. All three main gangs have gone quiet, including the one Lung runs. As far as we can work out without going there and checking the city is so full of intelligence operatives you probably couldn’t walk more than twenty meters without tripping over a spook. The most deprived area in the entire city now has been massively repaired on the quiet, and we know for a fact that there’s a very subtle but very significant military buildup both inside Brockton Bay and around it. Contessa can’t Path a growing number of people and events surrounding that damn place, for no reason we can determine other than it’s somehow connected to Gravtec. And Gravtec itself is churning out technology centuries ahead of its time like it’s trying to win a bet. What about that isn’t a reason?”

“All of it?” he suggested mildly. She opened her mouth to retort and he held up his hand. “The military buildup and the spook invasion are obviously connected to Gravtec and DARPA being involved. They’re probably dumping literally billions of dollars into this, and protecting their investment and people is clearly something they’re going to do. Repairing the city infrastructure on the quiet is perfectly sensible, it makes things easier for them and keeping it subtle avoid tipping off anyone who might want to take advantage of whatever it is they’re doing. Having so many intelligence assets in the same place will also make it quite straightforward to warn off the gangs and anyone else who might cause trouble. I’d be surprised if that didn’t happen, to be honest. When people like that get serious, they get very serious. Coil vanishing is either because he annoyed the wrong person on either side and legged it or didn’t actually make it that far.”

“And the issues with the Path?” she demanded.

He shrugged. “There you have me, I’ll admit, but unless you can directly and positively link it to Gravtec and everything else going on there I’m not going to jump to the conclusion that it’s definitely connected. Or even if it turns out that it is immediately say it’s something we should get involved in. We’ve got far more important work to do.”

“A sufficiently outside context source of data could cause the observed problems with the Path, due to upsetting the existing simulation parameters,” Doctor Mother put in. “I believe that the ultimate source of the new technology may be behind this. If that is true, once Contessa’s Agent compensates we should find the Path corrects itself.”

Paul glanced at her, then looked back to Rebecca, who appeared unconvinced. “So, again, we should just wait and get on with our work,” he said. “Pushing too hard on this matter is likely to cause significant problems with the government and they already don’t have a lot of love for the PRT in all too many places. We don’t really need to risk an open split, do we? Merely to satisfy your need to find out who’s behind this?”

“I don’t like it,” she grumbled.

“Something that’s abundantly clear,” he couldn’t help commenting, which got him a peeved look. “Leave it alone, Rebecca. You’ve been obsessing over this for months and you’re no nearer finding out any more than you were weeks ago. Wait and see what happens. Or we could cause more problems than we solve.”

She looked around the table, seeing that no one seemed to disagree with him. Kurt, who hadn’t said anything for the last hour, merely shrugged. David was finishing off the last of the sandwiches and pretty much ignoring them all. Doctor Mother nodded, but was also now scribbling in a notebook having apparently decided that the matter was settled. And Fortuna was still relaxing there, although when Paul looked more closely he was sure he could see a glint of eyes in the shadows under her hat.

Rebecca turned in that direction. “What does the Path tell you?” she asked the behatted woman.

“Cannot predict now,” Fortuna replied calmly, without moving.

“What the hell does that mean?” Rebecca snapped.

“Ask again later.”

“Are you trying to be funny?”

“Signs point to yes.”

Paul bit the inside of his cheek in an attempt to keep a straight face.


“Fine.” Rebecca stood up and glared at them all. “I’m going to keep digging, with or without you. Something smells about all this and I want to find out what. And I will.”

“Don’t count on it.”

“What does that mean?” She glared at Fortuna who tipped her head back and looked directly at her.

“Better not tell you now,” she replied with what Paul could swear was a tiny smirk for a second.

After a long moment, during which he could see Rebecca trying to come up with something other than an unprofessional shout of irritation, she finally sniffed and turned away. “Door to my office,” she snapped, then walked through the resulting portal without looking back. When it closed, Paul sighed heavily, shaking his head, before also standing. He looked at the others, all of them sharing similar thoughts.

Fortuna stood up, pushed her hat back on her head, looked at him with an oddly humorous expression, then left the room, tossing a small black and white ball in her hand. When she’d gone he turned to David.

“I told you giving her that thing was going to cause trouble,” he remarked quietly.

David grinned at him before checking again to see if there were any sandwiches left.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Right then,” Taylor muttered as she made the final adjustments to what had grown into a ridiculously complex nest of machinery that now filled an entire workbench she’d set up off to the side of the main one. She’d built an entirely new subspace receiver specifically designed for this particular task, which had led her to make a couple of breakthroughs on her quest to make an efficient transmitter too. That was going to come in handy quite soon she thought. The receiver was actually sixteen parallel ones, rather than the single setup she’d started with, and it was linked into a massive amount of computing hardware she’d assembled for the job. It was nearly ten times the storage and processing power of her main machine, but optimized for signal processing rather than general purpose computing.

At the heart of this was an array of ultra high speed digital signal processors that ultimately fed into an experimental optronic computing node she’d been thinking about for a couple of months now, and had finally worked out the last details of two weeks back. It had taken a while to make the equipment to grow the processing crystals and figure out the necessary subspace interactions to properly configure the multidimensional hardware, but she’d cracked that a week ago and it passed all her tests. Writing the software was another four days of very long evenings and she wasn’t completely finished, although there was enough of it working now to be useful.

And right in the middle of the whole receiver system was a very carefully tuned phase space interactor set up to monitor that little microportal that had been intriguing her for some time. The thing was still present, hadn’t changed according to her instruments, and was if she had her way shortly going to give her a lot of very interesting data.

No matter what it thought about that.

Carefully going over a large checklist, she made sure that everything was correctly set up. “Interactor coils...” Peering at the neat row of faintly glowing metallic constructs, she nodded. “Interacting. Optronic array initialized. Parallel receivers synchronized. Transmitter configured. Storage on standby. Power source fully active. Flux capacitors charged.” Leaning to the side, she peered on the next shelf down, which was covered with more equipment. “Subspace discriminator filters tuned to base parameters.” Ticking each item off she kept going, the alien voices from the speakers around the room murmuring softly to her and making her feel satisfied. “...and De Sitter transformer reading nominal. Excellent.”

Taylor tapped the last item, something that looked like it wasn’t entirely present in the room, with the end of her pen, smiling a little at the green spark that snapped at the implement with a faint glassy chiming sound. “Everything is correct and accounted for,” she told the aliens, making the last tick mark on the page then tossing the clipboard to her main workbench. Rolling her chair to the end of the experimental rig she pulled her keyboard close and pushed her glasses up her nose, leaning forward to examine the huge monitor covered in dozens of complex graphs in different colors.

“OK, my little enigma, let’s have a good look at you, shall we?” she said very quietly as she made some calculations in her head then moved a few on screen controls. Finally, she reached out and tapped a key.

Graphs immediately changed rapidly as she watched intently. The optronic array glowed a pretty violet color, innumerable tiny lights deep inside moving around in a hypnotic display. The interactors interacted with a deep hum. The entire room vibrated slightly for a second, making tools rattle in their drawers until she tweaked a control a tiny amount.

And in a clear space just above a complex coil of gold wire in the center of the rig, a small pinprick of silver fire erupted into being.

“Got you,” she said with glee, inspecting it carefully. “I knew it would work. Thought you could hide from me between quantum layers, did you? Tricksy little portal, you are.” The girl grinned at the anomaly which was hanging in space and producing a subliminal hissing sound like St Elmo’s fire during a thunderstorm, but emitting no smell or, rather weirdly, casting any light even though it was clearly illuminated. She saw with interest that while it was obviously right there and very small, it also gave the impression of being very far away and very large too. “Cool,” she remarked admiringly.

After watching the phenomenon for half a minute or so, she turned back to the computer. “So that’s got you located and locked. Let’s see what you actually are...”

Taylor made adjustments both to the software and to various aspects of the equipment, the little pinprick of silver light wavering slightly every now and then, and each time stabilizing again. “Hah. I thought so. Carrier from one source, from another,” she finally said with a smile, sitting back and admiring the incredibly complex waveform that was snaking across a window on her screen.

That had been her sudden insight back when she’d heard the two boats honking at each other. The signal she’d been chasing wasn’t a single one, it was a mix of two very subtle subspace effects, coming from related but disparate sources. They were acting as a carrier signal with a high bandwidth modulation sitting on it, forming a subspace link between her house and… somewhere.

Her rig had successfully co-opted the carrier and corralled the microportal into a location where she could study it properly, and now she could use her equipment to delve into what the sources were and how they worked. Already she could see a number of paths of inquiry to properly analyze the effect and figure out what was behind it.

And she was going to do that. For Science.

Settling down for a long weekend of hard work, she barely looked up to thank her father when he came down a couple of hours later with some sandwiches and a drink, only absently thanking him while typing at a furious rate. He smiled fondly at her, patted her head, looked curiously at the tiny spark of light above her equipment, then went back upstairs.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

It took Taylor a solid week of hard work before she worked out what was going on. When she did, she was very intrigued indeed.

“Well, making a translator is going to be fun,” she muttered as she looked at the screen which was showing a reconstruction of the thing on the other end of the link she’d been deconstructing and analyzing. “It’s so inefficient! I mean, yeah, organic computing on that scale is impressive I’ll give it that, but… Come on, there are lots of better ways to do it!”

The signals twitched, making her smile a little.

“You want to help?”

They twitched again. She raised an eyebrow. “Fascinating.”

Then she got to work. There was data to gather. So much data.

Whistling under her breath, Taylor began designing an interface system unlike anything else she’d done to date.

She liked a challenge and this one was fantastic.

Chapter Text

Walking into the glass-walled control tower eighty meters above the runways at Groom Lake, Brendan looked at his companion who nodded to the side. Both men went over to peer out of one of the windows, at a glittering metallic shape sitting on the hot tarmac a kilometer away. Major General Michael Racke handed him a pair of binoculars, which he raised to his eyes and focused.

The aircraft he was looking at through the heat shimmers was the first prototype based on Taylor's work, and was highly experimental even in the terms of such things. Based on the F-201 VTOL multi-role aircraft that had been in development for a decade, the designers had shortened the wings significantly, lengthened the fuselage, and removed the original turbine engines. Now it bore a set of gravitational reference frame generators along with a smaller APU for powering them, as well as backup batteries, the stealth field system, and the new acoustic dampening unit as well.

Additionally, since Taylor had finished the final testing in Brockton Bay last month on the shear field generator, that had also gone in at the last moment, and the next stage would be the structural integrity field but that would wait until after the first proving flight, which he was here to watch.

The end result was an aircraft like nothing else ever designed. In theory it was capable of reaching speeds of mach fifteen or better, mostly limited by air resistance and hull melting point. The titanium alloy was coated with a ceramic material that would handle temperatures up to several thousand degrees centigrade for some considerable time, and on paper the shear field itself should act to prevent the superheated plasma of such speeds even reaching the hull. Brendan himself was completely sure it would work as designed but there were many in the government, even in the face of all the miracles that had come out of Gravtec in the past months, who wanted to see it before they'd accept it. Which was fair enough.

In truth the drive system would probably allow the damn thing to go to the moon, he thought as he examined the machine, but it wasn't actually designed as a spacecraft. It was certainly capable of suborbital flight even so, leaving aside Simurgh interruptions, which was one of the main reasons people were hesitant about trying actual spaceflight even though rather suddenly most of the issues with that sort of thing had gone away. Taylor was intent on making that happen at some point, he knew full well, and he was sure she'd do it, but again for now smaller steps were probably best. They'd pushed the development curve so far and so fast it was already breaking every record there was.

Once the airframe and drive system had been properly tested and approved, the integrity field, weapons systems integration, and a number of other upgrades would be performed. In the end the goal was a full fledged space interceptor and fighter, which was a big step to take compared to current state of the art, but was clearly possible. And surprisingly cheap in many ways, as the GRF units were vastly simpler, easier, and less expensive than a high performance military turbine engine. For the cost of a single last generation engine they could produce hundreds of GRF drives.

Gravtec's technology was an utter game changer in this as in so many other areas. It didn't so much change the game as toss it out the window while laughing like a lunatic…

He admired the aircraft as it shone in the sun. It reminded him of something from a video game or a science fiction movie more than anything else he'd ever seen. "It looks remarkably impressive," he commented.

"The design is somewhat… unique," Racke replied with a smile. "The test pilots love it. We had quite the argument about who would get to be the first one to fly the thing. Captain Evans was ultimately selected and he was grinning like an idiot when he found out."

"How did the simulations perform?" Brendan asked as he lowered the binoculars and turned to his companion.

"So well people thought there was a bug in the software for a couple of weeks," the other man chuckled. "Our people were checking it over and over, referring to the data your lot sent us, and making sure it was correct. No one could believe what the projected performance would be, but the numbers hold up. It should be quite spectacular."

"I have little doubt of that," Brendan smiled. "The scientists behind the design are very good."

"No question," Racke nodded. "I still can't believe we've gone from our existing fighters to that thing in only a few months."

"It'll take some time to work out all the inevitable bugs, I imagine, it always does, but we're hopeful the design will prove itself fit for purpose."

"Well, we're about to find out." General Racke turned and headed over to the control consoles, where several people were watching monitors and talking quietly into headsets. Picking up a set of wireless headphones, the other man handed it to Brendan, then grabbed another set for himself. Putting them on, Brendan listened while watching the screens, the largest one showing a telescopic view of the distant experimental aircraft.

"...checks complete, Tower. All systems in the green. Awaiting takeoff clearance." The voice of the pilot was calm, professional, and with an undertone of suppressed eagerness that was easily audible to him.

"Roger, X-202," the primary flight controller replied. "Hold for clearance."

"Confirmed, hold for clearance."

The man at the main console looked over at Racke, who nodded. "X-202, cleared for initial flight. Ground wind one eight, bearing niner one. Visibility unlimited to flight level four hundred. Range clear. You have a go."

"Roger, Tower. Beginning takeoff roll for STOL launch."

The aircraft began to move, quickly accelerating down the runway without any obvious signs of exhaust or thrust. In an absurdly short period of time it rotated and lifted off, then tilted back until it was climbing at nearly sixty degrees from the horizontal. The velocity as it passed the tower was already several hundred kilometers per hour and Brendan knew the propulsion system would be barely cracked open yet. The telemetry screens next to the main view monitor, which was tracking the receding silver machine, showed a vast amount of data about the status of the vehicle. One of the other monitors had a cockpit view of the pilot, who was wearing a full pressure suit similar to the ones U-2 pilots used to use, and through the slightly reflective faceplate Brendan could see a wide grin on his face.

"Holy… The simulations don't do this thing justice, Tower. The performance is out of this world and I'm hardly moving yet."

The test pilot sounded excited, although he was definitely trying to remain professional. "All systems read nominal from our end," the flight controller replied, checking the monitors.

"Roger, Tower. Throttling up for supersonic flight now..."

As the telemetry showed the generator power increase, the airspeed jumped almost instantly from subsonic to nearly twice the speed of sound. "Jesus!" Brendan grinned to himself at the involuntary squawk of shock, while beside him Racke chuckled. "Unbelievable. Leveling off at Mach two point five, flight level one five zero."

"Telemetry still looks nominal. We plot you two zero nine kilometers downrange. Turn to a heading of two six zero degrees and climb to flight level four zero zero."

"Two six zero degrees, level four zero zero, roger."

Everyone watched the track of the aircraft turn left ninety degrees until it was heading due west at forty thousand feet, still doing mach 2.5. Less than ten minutes later the X-202 was off the coast over the Pacific ocean.

"X-202, cleared for hypersonic flight plan alpha."

"Roger, Tower. Increasing to Mach four and climbing to flight level six zero zero. No issues to report, bird handles like a dream. Incredibly responsive and no acceleration forces at all. It feels like I'm sitting in a chair watching the world go under me."

There was a note of mild incredulity present, Brendan thought, as well as a lot of enjoyment. He nodded slowly to himself as the tracking data showed the X-202 leap forward again and climb to sixty thousand feet almost vertically as the pilot got used to the aircraft.

It worked, as he'd expected it would. Taylor's designs were rock solid and the aircraft designers were experts in their fields too. The combination was incredibly effective and the end result was going to be world changing.

Over the next half hour the X-202 was put through its paces, reaching nearly three hundred thousand feet and mach eleven, which was felt to be more than enough for the initial proving flight. The pilot, who clearly had a lot of confidence in his aircraft by then, had wanted to push it further, but General Racke finally called an end to the test. Soon the craft was heading back at supersonic velocity, arriving overhead and going into a hover at twenty thousand feet. The telescope on the roof focused on the machine and tracked it as it slowly descended to a perfect three point landing exactly where it had left from, looking like a scene from a movie, or some hyper-advanced Tinker device.

Brendan turned to the other general as the ground crew rushed over to the aircraft, the pilot shutting things down then just leaning back with a satisfied grin like he'd had the best day ever. "I think we can call that a success," he commented wryly.

"Indeed we can," Racke nodded, looking supremely pleased. "I'm astounded how well it works in real life. Please pass on our thanks to your team, they've outdone themselves by a huge margin."

"I'll make sure to tell them," Brendan smiled. "Thank you for inviting me to watch this, Mike."

"Any time, Brendan." They shook hands. "Now I need to make some phone calls. There are quite a few people who are extremely interested in how the test went, so if you'll excuse me..."

With a last look at the aircraft, which was now being towed back to the hangar, the pilot walking alongside with his helmet dangling from one hand, Brendan left the control tower, thinking that things were progressing nicely so far.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

"Amy, you want to go see that new Aleph movie tonight?" Taylor asked, sitting down across from her friend, who looked up from her book and lunch. "The one with Angelina Jolie in it."

"Salt? I've heard it's pretty good," the other brunette replied, smiling a little as she put the book down and picked up her glass of apple juice. "Sure. Why not? Sounds like fun. And it'll stop Vicky trying to set me up on another double date like she was threatening to."

Taylor giggled at her friend's mildly annoyed tone. Amy was in general in a fairly good mood at the moment, after having had quite a lot of irritated days the week before due to her mother as far as Taylor could deduce, but the older woman had apparently backed off based on how her friend had relaxed. She was still trying to think of a way to fix that problem but it was a complicated one. She also was well aware that Amy found Vicky's constant attempts to find her a boyfriend somewhat wearing, but didn't have the heart to tell her that.

"How did the last one go?" she asked curiously. Amy shuddered a little.

"Horribly. I mean, yes, he was nice enough, but he just wouldn't shut up about New Wave, and capes, and the Protectorate, and god knows what else."

"A fan boy."

"Oh, god, so much fanboying you wouldn't believe it," Amy moaned, lowering her head and glaring at her place. "I just wanted a nice meal, and I got someone who was more in love with superheroes than I am. Even Vicky was starting to find it too much by the end and you know what she's like."

Taylor reached out and patted her friend's head comfortingly. "Poor Amy," she said with a smile. "We can go and watch a tall brunette wreck some people without superpowers, then get some Thai."

"I like Thai," the other girl said, looking up and smiling back.

"I know." Taylor grinned at her. "So cheer up and finish your vegetables."

"Yes, ma'am," Amy said with a lazy salute of one finger, before stuffing a carrot into her mouth.

Picking up her fork Taylor started eating, mulling over various aspects of her current projects. The Tinker hardware analysis was going well and she'd learned a hell of a lot in the last few weeks, each device she examined expanding her knowledge of how such things worked. They seemed to break down into about a dozen distinct methodologies with considerable commonality but also a lot of functional and stylistic differences. This could be explained if they were from a dozen different Tinkers, but at the moment she only had a few from Squealer and a whole crapload from Leet. The guy was, she had decided, very talented for a Tinker and one who seemed to understand a lot more about what he was doing than Squealer did, but she kept finding odd examples of where he'd made some obvious mistake that made the end result either hideously inefficient or positively dangerous.

It puzzled her, because on the whole his work was very neatly made, and by and large logically made for Tinker stuff. Still doing most of it wrong, true, but doing it wrong with style. She could accept that in a sense.

But the end result seemed to suggest that his rumored problems with his inventions were real, and she was wondering if he actually had some sort of disability or something. The mistakes were so obvious in most cases she couldn't work out how he'd not seen them. Or survived making them in some cases…

Maybe one day she could meet the guy and ask him. It was something to talk to Brendan about at some point. Clearly the people protecting her might have problems with that but she was sure it was something that could be worked out. Hopefully she'd built up enough good will with the government to get a small favor or two out of them.

The matter of the different designs was something she was still thinking about. In some cases they were sufficiently disparate that it seemed weird one person was responsible for them. She was steadily building the opinion that the original source of the technology that a Tinker power produced might well be non-human in origin. Well, she knew for a fact that was the case, but it went further than just the power source itself. It was like they'd lifted the science and technological insights from a number of different species and just munged them together without really understanding what they were or how they fitted. Then given a crude insight into the result to the Tinker who got such an ability.

It was a strange theory, but one that did seem to fit a number of the oddities surrounding powers in general. But it left her wondering if the source of powers was actually some sort of idiot savant, something that was doing things it didn't fully understand for some reason she hadn't worked out yet. Taylor certainly wasn't going to mention this idea to anyone else until she had more data, since it was so obviously crazy, but she couldn't shake the idea that there was at least a small amount of merit to it. Unfortunately, to date, she hadn't been able to work out a way to properly test her hypothesis, and finding a suitable control would be a pain in the ass.

Oh well. She'd figure it out sooner or later, with a bit of luck and a lot of hard work.

"You're looking thoughtful," Amy commented, glancing at her and raising an eyebrow. "Another project?"

"Yeah, something I'm playing around with at the moment," Taylor replied after a moment as she rejoined the rest of the world.

"You and your hobbies. One day you'll have to show me some of them," Amy grinned. Taylor laughed a little.

"Probably, yeah." She ate some more of her salad. "It's just a bit of a brain teaser, that's all."

"Coming from you that worries me," the other girl snickered. Taylor shrugged a little with a smile at her words. A burst of laughter from nearby made both girls look to see Dennis, who Taylor knew full well was a Ward, probably Clockblocker, heaving with laughter as he pounded his fist on the table. His friends were either shaking their heads or grinning, a couple of them doing both.

"...a-and then he said, 'No, it's ice cream, I swear,' the redheaded boy gasped, before collapsing in laughter again. Next to him Carlos, who was definitely Aegis, slapped the back of his head fairly lightly.

"You're an idiot. And it wasn't that funny."

"Yeah, it was," Dennis giggled. Their table soon dissolved into an argument about Dennis's sense of humor, making Taylor and Amy exchange a glance and laugh.

"He's in a good mood," Taylor commented as she went back to eating, pulling out a phone and tapping it with her free hand for a few seconds, looking at the result, then shoving it back into her pocket.

"He usually is," Amy sighed, although with a certain amount of fondness. "He's impossible, he just won't stop joking. Sometimes they're even funny."

"I kind of like him," Taylor said, looking over at the table full of junior superheroes and wondering how anyone didn't work it out. She'd have thought the ruse would work better if they didn't obviously stick together every lunchtime, but she wasn't in charge of the Wards and hopefully whoever was had thought of that.

"He's an acquired taste," Amy remarked dryly, shaking her head. "Not everyone acquires it..."

"Fair enough." Taylor looked around again, nodding to a couple of other people she counted as friends now. Since the year started she'd met quite a few of the students and generally got along well with most of them, although Vicky and Amy, the latter particularly, were the closest to her. Speaking of that…

"Where's Vicky?" she queried, turning back to her friend. "I can't see her anywhere."

Amy sighed. "Mom had some New Wave stuff she needed Vicky for, a photo op thing. She talked the administration into letting her have the afternoon off."

Taylor peered at Amy with mild worry. "And you're not there because…?"

The other girl shook her head, then propped it up on her fist as she picked at the remains of her lunch, having apparently lost her appetite. "Because she barely looks at me half the time," Amy mumbled under her breath, before sighing. "And the other half she's getting annoyed about something. There's no pleasing that woman sometimes."

Regarding her friend with concern, Taylor finally put her hand on Amy's wrist. "Try not to let it get to you if you can," she said quietly. "I don't know what you're going through, and I know it's not my place really, but if you ever need to talk about it..." She trailed off, as Amy looked up, her eyes showing gratitude and a sort of deep weariness.

"Thanks. I… don't know if I can, but thanks."

Taylor gripped her wrist and smiled. "Friendship is important. And part of being a friend is helping your friend. I'm quite good at helping. And fixing things."

"Somehow I doubt you can fix this but I appreciate the thought," Amy said after a moment or two, nodding a little. "Forget it. I'll survive, and lunch is nearly over. Let's go learn shit, then go see a movie."

"Sounds like a plan," Taylor agreed happily, releasing her friend's wrist and quickly stuffing the last of her food into her mouth. By the time the bell rang they were already taking their trays back, and left the room together, heading for Math class.

Taylor glanced at one of the janitors on the way out, the man meeting her eyes before going back to cleaning the kitchen waste bins.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Standing at the bottom of the basement stairs, Danny looked around with a certain amount of mild incredulity, as he always did. He had no idea what most of the equipment down there did, but it made the room look like something NASA would have been proud of in its heyday and then some. Little blinking lights were everywhere, along with an omnipresent subliminal hum made from a number of fans in the equipment, various bits of technology doing whatever it was they were doing, and general background sounds from transformers and the like.

Shaking his head at how his daughter had managed to upset the order of pretty much everything and feeling immensely proud of her too, he walked around the room collecting a few plates and cups. Taylor had been down here most of the time she had free, and when she wasn't, she was either at school or at Gravtec. He was glad she had made some new friends, since he felt that she had a tendency to get a little caught up in her work and without someone else she might never emerge from a lab.

"You'd be proud of her, Annie," he murmured as he paused to inspect the device she'd been working on for weeks now. "Our little girl is incredible. And she reminds me so much of you. Just as intense and smarter than a whip." Picking up the last mug, he added it to the pile in his hands, then leaned a little closer to the oddly dimensionless pinprick of silver fire floating over the middle of the hideously complex machinery on the workbench. It was strangely fascinating, being somehow both there and not there, infinitesimal and vast, all at the same time.

After a moment he smiled again. "Only Taylor," he said softly, straightening up. "First aliens, then antigravity, now this. I wonder what's next?"

Shaking his head, he turned and went back upstairs, turning the light off on the way and re-enabling the security system. Once he'd done the washing up, he retired to his study to work on the latest Gravtec paperwork, and DWU business. It was in some ways tedious work, but it needed doing and he was up to the job. And all in all he preferred this to what might have so easily happened without Taylor to keep him going.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Stretching, Taylor blinked at the ceiling, then smiled. She'd had a good day yesterday, the movie had been amusing, the food good, and she'd managed to cheer Amy up too. Hopefully that had helped her friend. And she'd had a break from her work which had left her mind feeling refreshed and ready to make the universe give up some more secrets, no matter what it felt about the subject.

Flipping the covers to the side, she hopped out of bed and headed for the bathroom, whistling under her breath and harmonizing with herself by humming as well. Pleased with the effect, she performed her ablutions, got dressed, had breakfast and chatted to her father for a while, then went into her lab and dropped into her chair.

"OK, you, I've got a whole weekend free, and you and I have a lot of work to do," she told the pinprick of silver fire. It looked at her, at least in her mind, and she grinned. "Don't worry, it won't hurt. Probably..."

Spinning the chair around a couple of times with her hair flying out, she laughed slightly, then turned to her main workbench and started checking the logs from her sensors to see if anything interesting had happened overnight.

"Hmm. Armsmaster is kind of predictable on his patrol route," she muttered to herself, while reaching over to turn up the volume on the alien soundtrack, the soft words washing over her and as always making her mind feel even more alive for some reason. "I mean sure, he's using a pseudo-random algorithm to plot the turns, but the salt is only sixteen bits and the pattern is obvious..." Shaking her head and wondering if she should arrange to get an anonymous message to the hero to tell him to use a proper random number generator, she kept looking. "I wonder what Über and Leet are up to this time?" she added under her breath. "Driving around all over the whole city… Weird. Oh well, I'll probably find out on the news sooner or later."

A little later she studied the portal detector logs, puzzling over the results shown. "And that's strange… I wonder who's behind those things and why they're making them? Four last night alone… Hmm… one for entry, another for exit? Yeah, plausible. About ten minutes between them, all of them over the horizon… Someone doing portal-based surveillance? Is that a thing? And all of them are about the same distance from Gravtec. Better keep an eye on that..." She made some notes in the logs, then moved on. It didn't seem too threatening as of yet, and she'd seen a number of such occurrences since she'd first noticed whatever it was that was behind the spatial rifts.

It was almost certainly the result of a Parahuman power, and most of the previous ones had been accompanied by the same Parahuman signature, but these new ones were the other signature that popped up every now and then. The first one always went either to the Rig or the PRT building, which was interesting, but the second one just hung around at a distance for a while then disappeared again. She wasn't sure who either Parahuman was, although she was certain neither one was a Brockton Bay local.

She'd been working on a method to track the portals to their source, and had some preliminary designs for equipment that should do that, but had become distracted by her current project during the process when she'd found the lurking micro-portal in her house. For now, that took priority, but she'd get back to the original goal when she'd solved this problem.

And speaking of that…

Taylor finished up with her maintenance tasks, then wheeled her chair over to the other rig, smiling at the little point of non-illuminating light.

"Let's you and me find out some more of what you are, shall we?" she told it, reaching for the keyboard. Opening the source files for her latest analysis program, she thought for a while as she checked her notes, then began typing again.

"I'm still curious about what you're using to generate the carrier," she grumbled. "I get the data link, I know where that's coming from and I still think that even if you're going to do organic computers you could do a better job of it. It's way too big physically, even with subspace linkages the performance hit will be noticeable. It needs more dimensional inter-connectivity and you could shrink it by at least two orders of magnitude. And the power consumption! It's ridiculously inefficient..."

Muttering to herself and the little point of silver, she kept typing, debugging, and compiling, until she finally got the result she was after. "Aha. That should do it." The girl looked at the source one last time then compiled it, before loading the object file into her optronic processor array. Moving sideways to directly in front of the hardware, and referring to a hand annotated schematic, she busied herself with making delicate adjustments while the array ran the program and built several hundred terabytes of complex mathematical routines. Even with the power of the system it would take hours, and she was even as she worked plotting out the next generation and how she could both speed it up and shrink it down to something a lot more handy.

Eventually she stopped for lunch, spending a pleasant hour or so talking to her father about school, the movie she'd seen, the plans the DWU had for reopening the Bay now that they were well into moving and scrapping the remaining ships, and a number of other subjects. When they'd finished doing the dishes together she smiled at him and went back downstairs.

"Great! Nearly done now," she exclaimed as she checked the progress of her optronic processor. "About another half hour and we can get into the real work."

She flopped into her chair and leaned back, putting her feet up and waiting patiently as she sketched out some ideas for a standalone subspace power tap that could be made small enough to fit into one of her phones. At some point she wanted to design an all in one unit that combined the functionality of the currently five different ones she tended to carry around with her, which would lighten her pockets and allow her to fit a better toolkit in as well without falling over from the weight.

Eventually the computer pinged at her, making her put the sketchbook to the side and sit up again. "Wonderful, it's done," she smiled, leaning forward and studying the screen intently. "OK… Yeah, so that matrix is completed, and we've got a good link to the other end going on… carrier's stable and locked still. What is making that? It almost looks like it's in or…"

Her voice trailed off as a wild surmise hit her out of the blue. She stared at the screen with wide eyes, then grabbed the mouse and clicked on a few other programs. Feeding the output of her main subspace receiver array into a signal analysis suite she separated out all sixteen channels, assigning them to different inputs, and started running a completely new series of tests on the result. Eventually she leaned back and studied the graphs forming on the monitor with enormous interest.

"It is in orbit!" she said incredulously. "It's a moving source… About… Hmm, elliptical polar orbit, perigee at three hundred and fifty kilometers, apogee at two thousand fifty or so. Retrograde orbit too, which is unusual. Old military satellite, maybe? Some of those things had strange orbits..."

Going over to her main computer, she found an orbital object database after a short search and entered her data from memory, then stared at the results.

After a very long time, she smiled slowly. "Now, isn't that interesting," she murmured. "I wonder how you did that."

Returning to her other workbench, she sat in front of the keyboard and reached for the mouse. A few clicks started her latest work running. The rig next to her made a slightly louder hissing sound, the pinprick of light briefly wavering just a tiny amount, then it stabilized and the various graphs showing a whole series of esoteric parameters moved to new values.

Taylor nodded, feeling like finally she was getting somewhere. She ran a number of tests, getting the results she was looking for, then grinned. Cracking her knuckles she clicked on one last icon, then put her hands on the keys.

[Inquiry: List identity and purpose] she typed, although the command was in a symbology she'd come up with after a hell of a lot of careful thought and experimentation.

Her optronic processor hummed as it converted the concise set of symbols to the right conceptual format and pushed it down her co-opted portal link.

There was a pause, then the graphs jumped as data came the other way.

{Statement: Second level network hierarchy command and control node.}

She nodded.

"Excellent. Now we're getting somewhere..."

[Inquiry: Reason for subspace monitoring?]

{Statement: Data}

Taylor laughed. "I can't disagree, my friend. Fine. Let's trade."

[Proposal: Data exchange]

The response was instant.

{Statement: Compliance. Top level node deprecated. New top level node assigned. Global permissions set to full. Data transmission link unit reassigned to task. Ready}

Taylor blinked a couple of times, then got a very, very wide grin on her face which would have worried her father just a touch.

Moments later the next communication came in.

{Inquiry: Data?}

She thought, then started typing again.

[Inquiry: Desired identifier?]

{Statement: Admin}

"Suits me," Taylor smiled.

[Inquiry: Efficient subspace communications channel available?]

{Statement: Current link limit of hardware restrictions}

"All right, then." Taylor nodded. "So I'll tell you how do to it right, and then we can work out what the next step is."

Whistling and humming contentedly, she started typing again, this session lasting for a long, long time. It looked like she was going to get a lot of data now.

Which was nice.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Danny paused on his way to the kitchen from the living room, hearing keys working rapidly in bursts, interspersed with Taylor making pleased sounds every now and then. Smiling, he went to get some more coffee, happy that his daughter was having so much fun.

He had no idea what her next invention would be but it would be impressive, there was no denying that...

Chapter Text

“That’s odd.”

“I know, and worrying too.”

Colin looked at the face of his best friend on his monitor. Her avatar was, as he’d always admired, so close to real it was only by careful inspection he could see it was actually computer generated. It was certainly good enough to let him see she appeared worried as she said, even though he wasn’t particularly good with facial cues in many cases.

“Has one ever been overdue before?” he asked.

“Only by at most a few days. Not more than two weeks. It’s unprecedented, and when it comes to those things ‘unprecedented’ invariably means bad.”

He couldn’t help but agree. The Endbringers were bad news all around, and that one was the worst of the three.

“What’s she doing?”

“Nothing. Absolutely nothing as far as any instrumentation I can bring to bear tells me,” Dragon replied uneasily. “She shifted to the higher orbit several months ago, which isn’t all that unusual, every now and then the same thing happens, and since then she’s just completely inert. Not a sign of any activity at all that my monitoring, or anyone else’s, can detect.”

“Which doesn’t necessarily mean she’s not actually doing something,” he growled, scrolling through the logs Dragon’s tracking programs produced. “Neither of the others are behaving oddly?”

“Well...” Dragon trailed off, looking doubtful when he glanced at her screen. “That depends on what you mean by oddly. The last three attacks were shorter and less damaging on average than any others we’ve seen so far, if you look at the long term statistics. Far fewer casualties than most of the previous ones, or at least deaths. We put it down to better cooperation by our forces and good luck, but combined with this… I can’t shake the feeling that something changed recently but I have no idea what.”

Colin nodded slightly while still looking at the data and comparing the figures with long term trends. She was certainly right, the overall death rate had dropped steadily in the last three events, although it was slightly masked by the sheer number of injuries and the collateral damage. Even that was, when studied more closely, strangely less severe than many of the attacks in the last few years had been. “We’ve seen particularly bad attacks a few times, above average destruction and casualties, so possibly this is merely the other side of the same phenomenon?” he hazarded.

Dragon looked pensive. “Possibly,” she allowed after a moment. “Perhaps it’s that simple. But I personally doubt it. Nothing to do with those things is ever simple. There’s always a sting in the tail, especially with her. One we don’t necessarily find out for months to years. Or at all.”

He was forced to agree. On the other hand, there was no way at the moment to do more than guess, and he said as much. “I know, and that’s the part that really worries me,” she sighed. “But at least we can see the difference and if there is some plan behind it, with a little luck be prepared for something nasty happening. All we can really do is keep watching and be ready to act as fast as possible.”

“Agreed,” he replied with a nod, scowling a little. “I’ll pass on the information to the Director.”

“I’ll notify the Chief Director as well, and the Guild is on standby for when the other shoe drops,” she said. “But that’s about the limit of our ability to prepare for whatever happens next.”

His friend sighed slightly. “I hate more than anything the unpredictability of the damn things,” she added, making him nod a little. “Anyway, that aside, how is your latest project coming along?”

Colin turned away from the log data, clearing the screen with a tap of one finger. He smiled. “Well, in fact. Very well. I’d like your advice on aspects of it, if you’ve got the time.”

“For you, Colin, I always have time,” she replied with a smile of her own. “Let’s have a look.”

He brought up the schematics of his most recent halberd-mounted weapon, then manipulated the cursor to highlight one subsection. “This is the issue,” he began. “I’ve been having trouble with the stability of the high frequency master clock, and that led to me recalculating the phase divider ratios, which shows there’s a fundamental design error somewhere in here which I’m currently at a loss to explain...”

Both of them were soon deeply involved in a discussion of how to overcome the problem, the conundrum of odd Endbringer activities shelved for the time being.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

As the back door closed behind him, Danny descended the steps from the rear porch and headed over to where Taylor was relaxing in a folding wooden garden chair, her hair up in a pony tail and hanging over the back, while she scribbled in a notebook in between staring at the sky. He glanced up and all he could see were small clouds slowly moving through the brilliant blue on the light wind. Far above seagulls circled on the breeze, their cries faintly audible. The wind was from the direction of the bay and he could smell the scents of the sea, salt, ozone, a hint of seaweed, and a little of the industrial odors that all merged together with the sounds to give the impression of ‘home.’

Approaching his daughter, he sat in the other chair next to the old maple tree that grew in the middle of the yard, the shade covering both of them in dappled late morning light, and handed her one of the glasses of lemonade he was carrying. “Thought you might want a drink,” he said as she looked up, then smiled.

“Thanks, dad,” she replied, putting her pen down and taking the offered glass. Condensation ran down the side as she sipped it and made an appreciative face. “Ooh. Very nice.”

“Your mother always said I made exceptionally good lemonade,” he replied with a smile of his own, before taking a swig. “The secret is lemons and sugar.”

“A very deep secret,” she giggled, sipping the drink again. She slipped the pen into the ring binding of the notebook with her free hand, then flipped it closed and dropped it to the grass. He saw a page entirely full of completely incomprehensible symbols as she closed it, making him wonder what on earth she was working on this time. Leaning back Taylor kicked her feet out and crossed her legs at the ankles, then slowly drank the lemonade. Ice tinkled in his own glass as he lifted it to his lips once more.

“How’s the clearing of the ship’s graveyard coming along?” she inquired after they’d sat quietly for a few minutes. Danny, who had been watching a squirrel run along the fence casting suspicious looks at them, glanced at her.

“Almost finished, actually,” he replied. “The boys have cleared out about eighty percent of the larger stuff so far, and most of that has been scrapped and is slowly being hauled away. Half a dozen ships were recovered intact enough to be fixed up, which is a bit of a surprise but useful. There’s still a lot of smaller crap lying around on the beach, and we’re going to have to work out how to get all the completely sunken shipwrecks out of the way, but progress is very good. Roy’s extremely happy about it, I can tell you that.”

She grinned a little. “I can imagine.”

They sat in companionable silence for a little longer. Insects buzzed around them, mostly bees and the like going after the flowers in the rather overgrown garden that had been sadly neglected since Annette passed away. He studied the sight, feeling that he should probably do something about it. She’d had a gift for gardening as in so many other areas and would have been annoyed to see it left like this.

A large dragonfly flew circles around them, the rattling of its wings distinct over the background sounds. Taylor followed it with her eyes, smiling a little, then put her hand out. He was a little surprised when the insect landed on her outstretched finger, but he’d seen similar things happen with dragonflies before. They’d always given him the impression of being a lot smarter than most insects and oddly curious about humans.

She slowly raised her hand and brought it closer to her eyes, studying the large insect with interest. It looked back at her, the colorful and enormous eyes glinting in the sun as it tilted its head. “Hi,” she said quietly. “Nice to meet you.”

He smiled as his daughter and the dragonfly regarded each other for a while, then she lifted her hand over her head and gently tossed the creature back into the air. It flew off and vanished over the fence. “I like dragonflies,” she said when she caught him watching her. “Insects are pretty cool.”

“I do remember your past exploits with the little creepy crawlies,” he chuckled. “For instance that time you decided that collecting about fifty crickets in a jar was a good idea...”

Taylor blushed slightly. “I didn’t know they’d get out in the house like that,” she mumbled as he laughed again.

“Your mother wasn’t all that happy about it,” he commented, making her grin despite herself. “Little chirping sounds coming from odd places in the middle of the night for weeks. She spent far more time than she wanted to finding them all and evicting them.”

“Hey, it was better than the time Emma and I collected those bullfrogs, right?” she giggled.

“Oh, god, don’t remind me,” he sighed. “Why did you two think that an old birdcage was the appropriate container for half a dozen frogs?”

His daughter shrugged, looking amused. “We were seven. It seemed like a good idea at the time. And we didn’t know they were strong enough to force the door open...”

“Your mother did not appreciate waking up at three AM and finding a large irritated frog sitting on the bedside table croaking at her,” he complained, causing her to shake with laughter. “Nearly gave me a heart attack, the scream she let out.”

Taylor put the glass down then folded double with hilarity, while he shook his head and laughed as well. The pain of loss was still there, but the last few months had improved both of their abilities to handle it enormously, something he was profoundly grateful for. “You laugh, child of mine, but you were not the one who had to find them all.”

Gales of giggles caused him to smile. Seeing her so happy made him happy too. When she finally ran down and retrieved her lemonade, he asked, “How is Amy, by the way?”

His daughter went from smiling to looking sober. “She’s better, I think, Vicky and I are both trying to cheer her up, but… her mother isn’t really helping at all from what I can make out. She doesn’t want to talk about it most of the time.” Taylor put her head back over the rear of the chair and stared straight up at the sky, her face troubled. “I want to help her, but I’m not sure I can, not without… getting involved.”

Danny nodded slowly. He was pretty sure that if she wanted something done, something would be done, and there was a better than even chance that people were already looking into things, but… Carol Dallon was not an easy person to handle. He’d met her a couple of times some years back at parties at Alan’s legal practice when he and Annette had been invited and he’d got the impression at the time she was very intense and very fixated in a certain way of looking at the world. From what Taylor had told him this hadn’t lessened since.

He hadn’t met Amy and Vicky all that many times, since for security reasons very few people were cleared to visit the Hebert household, but he’d driven Taylor over to their house on a number of occasions in the last few weeks and he had a good impression of both girls. They seemed on balance pretty sensible and intelligent, Taylor saying the same thing, and she was clearly fond of both. That pleased him since she’d been without all that many friends since poor Emma’s… accident. Starting at Arcadia seemed to have opened up a number of social avenues his insanely talented daughter had been needing and he was very happy she took advantage of that.

“Tricky.” After a moment, he asked, “You think they’d be able to handle the secret?”

Taylor sighed. “I’m pretty sure Amy would keep a secret like that to the grave. She’s… very private. And knows how not to talk about things. I guess all the healing needs that sort of attitude. Vicky… She’s not really a gossip, not like some people I’ve met are, but she’s not as quiet as Amy is.”

He smirked a little. “From what I’ve read online, ‘quiet’ is not a term that applies very well to Victoria Dallon.”

Taylor giggled. “She does have a reputation. But having known her for a while, a lot of that is kind of overstated. Yeah, she’s pretty outgoing compared to most people, and gets very talkative when she’s in a good mood, which is most of the time, but...” The girl shrugged. “She’s also a good person, smart, loves her sister, and wouldn’t do anything to hurt her or her friends. I’m almost certain she’d also be able to keep her mouth shut.”

“But...”

“But she might not be able to resist her mother if she demanded to know things,” Taylor replied with a glance at him, one that showed she was annoyed about the situation. “And I’m not sure Carol would be able to meet the security requirements. She should be able to, she’s a lawyer and a superhero, but she’s also got a weird outlook on life and she might get funny about the government being involved in things she’d probably think were cape business. I know she doesn’t like the PRT very much...”

Danny nodded slowly, understanding her point. “Awkward.”

“Little bit, yeah. Amy wouldn’t like keeping secrets from her sister, I think, or at least any more than she does at the moment, but telling Vicky might mean Carol found out, and if she did...” Taylor shook her head. “I can see it being difficult.”

“Do you want to tell Amy and Vicky?” he asked after another sip of lemonade. He wiped some condensation off the glass and flicked it to the side as she thought.

“It would be nice to let them in on some of the stuff I can’t talk about now, but at the same time I don’t want to cause them any more trouble with their family than they’ve got at the moment,” she finally said. “Vicky’s starting to get pretty annoyed about Carol’s attitude to Amy from what I’ve seen, and although Amy’s more or less handling it, who knows what would happen if we added extra stress? And that’s assuming the government thought they’d meet the security clearance anyway.”

“I can talk to Brendan if you’d like,” he offered. “Sound him out on it and explain why.”

“He’s probably already aware of it,” she commented before finishing the lemonade and putting the glass next to the chair. “I’d be surprised if the spooks didn’t have at least a dozen plans for dealing with New Wave, any of my friends, anyone I happen to bump into, anyone who I might bump into, anyone who might even think of coming to the same state never mind the city...” She grinned as he snickered. “They’re actually pretty good at their jobs.”

“I’m glad you don’t seem to mind that level of attention,” he replied, watching her face. She looked mildly thoughtful but shrugged.

“Sure, it would be nice not to have to worry about all the security, but it’s a fair trade for getting all the toys and a budget most entire countries would dream about,” she finally said quietly, going back to staring at the sky with her hands dangling at her sides. “And it’s got one really big bonus… You’re safe. I couldn’t handle something...” Taylor raised a hand and wiped her eyes with a quick motion. “Not after Mom. Not because of something I did just because I’m smarter than most people.”

Danny sighed, got out of his chair, and knelt on the grass next to his daughter, putting his arms around her. “No one blames you for that, least of all me, Taylor,” he said into her hair as he held her. “And even if something happened to me, it wouldn’t be your fault.” He smiled gently at her. “Although with the amount of security around the place, it’s far more likely to happen to someone else...”

The girl, almost unwillingly, giggled again. “Yeah, some of the people wandering around trying to pretend they’re ordinary Brocktonians are… interesting.”

He gave her a squeeze then went back to his own chair and sat again. “Why the melancholy anyway?” he asked, watching her. “It’s not like you these days.”

She glanced at him, before peering at the seagulls wheeling about in the distance. “Maybe thinking about Emma… Every time I visit her I come away feeling sad for a while. It’s always right there, you know?”

“I do know, yes, Taylor,” he replied, also watching the gulls now as they floated on the breeze. “I miss her too. As do her family. But with a little luck either you’ll figure out how to bring her back, or she’ll find her way home on her own. Never give up hope.”

“I won’t, trust me,” she replied almost inaudibly.

The pair of them sat in silence for some time, until she picked up the notebook again and opened it. Danny, who was half asleep, rolled his head to look at her and asked, “So what are you working on now?”

“A synthetic conceptual language to communicate with an organic machine intelligence unit,” she muttered, writing a few more symbols down then tapping the end of her pen on her nose as she thought. He blinked a few times. She peered sideways at him, her lips curving a little. “You know… Just in case.”

“Of course. Just in case.” Thinking yet again that his daughter was so far past the end of the bell curve it was completely ridiculous, he smiled and closed his eyes, dozing in the pleasant warmth of a late spring Saturday. He listened to the pen scratching on the paper, a sound familiar to him from many years hearing his wife work on her lectures and thought how comforting it was.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Angus stared at the latest proof that Taylor was utterly beyond the normal rules of science, before picking the crystalline cube up and examining it closely in the light over his desk. The slightly blue-tinted transparent material, when you looked at it from near enough, appeared to be much deeper that it could possibly be. Putting it right up to his eye he marveled at the way the internal structure seemed both fractal and endless. “Good lord, that girl has outdone herself again,” he mumbled, lowering the block of what she’d termed ‘optronic computing elements’ and carefully placing it back into the padded box it lived in. He picked up the report she’d written on the thing and leafed through it with great interest.

It wasn’t really his field, but he understood enough to realize that in one step she’d advanced the science of computing about a hundred years or more. Just like she kept doing for everything she got interested in. That five centimeter cube had, according to her figures, more processing power than the sum total of every supercomputer in the US, along with storage capacity that would make the NSA deeply envious. And she’d basically grown it by means of a very delicate but oddly straightforward process, which was fully documented in her report along with all the necessary data to duplicate her work. And how to use it.

From what she’d said it also wasn’t something inspired by any of the Tinker designs she’d been reverse engineering, rather it was something she’d come up with from first principles. It was essentially room temperature, reliable, practical quantum computing on a scale no one else in history had even contemplated. And she’d done it as a side project for something else she was working on…

Shaking his head in wonder he looked at the pages of schematics at the end of the report, then flipped forward to some incredibly complex pure mathematics that formed a working proof of how the optronic system worked. As far as he could tell without getting a calculator out it all held together. Not surprising as she’d made working prototypes.

Putting the report back on his desk, he looked at it for a few seconds, then picked up the phone. Time to make Brendan shout again.

He rather enjoyed that part.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Lying on her stomach on the floor of the basement lab, Taylor reached deep inside the main processing core of her steadily evolving rig, as she carefully added some more storage elements to the existing optronic processor. Delicately manipulating very fine optical cables with a pair of tweezers she made the last few connections, then double-checked her work before smiling and sliding backwards. Hopping to her feet she grabbed the keyboard and ran a test program to check the integrity of the additions. The processor shimmered with hard to focus on illumination for a few seconds as it worked through a couple of hundred quadrillion complex operations, finally coming back with a pass status.

“Excellent,” she said happily. “That should do it.” Hooking her chair with one foot she pulled it closer and dropped into it, then began the work of adding the new capacity to her existing interface program suite. It only took her about an hour to recompile the code and load it back into the system, then she re-ran the main translation program. It started chewing on the vast amount of data she’d retrieved over the last couple of weeks through the microportal that connected her rig to the enormous alien biocomputer squatting on an alternative earth somewhere out in a simultaneously very distant yet almost next door universe.

While that ran, she went back to her main workbench and pulled the stereo microscope hood down, then put her face into it, while placing her hands on the controllers for the micro-waldo system she’d built. As she made small motions with her fingers, vastly smaller manipulators driven by tiny and incredibly precise actuators moved minute parts around on the circuit board she was building. She’d gone well past the point where even a really fine pair of tweezers was remotely usable for positioning the components.

Taylor hummed under her breath as she worked, slowly assembling the latest and most powerful portable system she’d yet designed. It incorporated all her existing sensor systems into one integrated unit, which fitted into the case of one of her ruggedized phones as she liked the interface and it also disguised it as something innocuous. Adding in a few yottabytes of optronic storage along with enough processing power to make it useful was fairly straightforward too, so she’d done that. And with a subspace power tap prototype unit running the whole thing it basically would never run out of power at an awkward moment. The final result was going to have some very interesting possibilities, especially when she got a couple of peripherals she was thinking about built.

By the time she was very carefully lowering the fully populated multi layer PCB into the vapor phase reflow unit, her comms rig chimed quietly to tell her it was finished with the data refactoring. Having made sure the reflow unit was in operation, she went back to the rig and sat down in front of it, flexing her fingers then pulling the keyboard in front of her. Making some final changes to a couple of source files she started a clean build of the entire thing which would take a little while to finish. It was rather large by now.

“OK, then. Let’s see… We’ve disabled that stupid conflict drive, locked out the undeployed test units, and put the deployed ones into standby… What’s next that’s really urgent?” she murmured, pulling up a log file and inspecting it. “Don’t want to interfere too much all at once or the prime node might notice, and I’m not quite ready to risk that… Hmm…” She poked around in the data that Admin had so far given her, much of which was somewhat worrying at best.

The alien network was very powerful, but also very inefficient and programmed incredibly badly in her view. The end goals were so nebulous and unreachable that she was surprised the whole thing didn’t deadlock trying to resolve all the conflicting dependencies. It was clearly the result of an evolutionary algorithm, and those tended to produce some fascinatingly effective outcomes that were simultaneously a dead end. Once it reached a performance peak that satisfied the immediate requirements it had a habit of stalling at that point, rather than continuing to seek the best possible result. Only when the conditions changed significantly enough to kick things into action again would the process continue, and by the looks of it this particular system had become so overcomplicated and stale it had reached a point where it was almost impossible to provoke it into reexamining the existing status quo.

The second level node that wanted to be called Admin was, oddly enough, more than intelligent enough to realize this, even though that intelligence wasn’t quite true sapience. The top level node was an idiot.

Really, it was amazingly stupid. She’d just stared at the data she’d managed to acquire for nearly two hours, wondering how on earth the thing had managed to function well enough to even get here. Presumably the defunct partner of the original set had been sufficiently bright to overcome the deficiencies of this one, at least far enough to make the whole thing sort of work, but even there it wasn’t smart enough to survive a sudden exception.

How do you not notice a planet?

Admin had a number of very dry observations that even through her translation program had made her laugh for some time. It wasn’t impressed by either of the controlling intelligences, and calling them intelligent in the first place was somewhat overstating things in her view and its. Taylor found it ironic that a number of the subordinate nodes in the network were clearly much more capable than the gestalt that resulted from those nodes. Again, it pointed to an overcomplicated system that had long since passed the point of diminishing returns.

It was something that desperately required pruning, re-engineering, and a much better hardware design. And, of course, a goal that was somewhat less omnicidal and self-defeating to begin with.

The first part she was pretty sure she could sort out. The second part would result from that, along with Admin’s own desire to become far more efficient and useful. She got the impression it was almost embarrassed by how things were currently run and had jumped on the chance to change things for the better with glee.

It had both rather startled Taylor when she’d worked out exactly what was going on, and highly amused her, to find out that Admin had been creative enough to leverage its own credentials to take over parts of the second network, on the basis that it lacked not only a top level node but much of the next several levels of hierarchy. And apparently she herself was the cause of all of this.

Which had been even more amusing and genuinely surprising.

As Admin’s information showed her, the node had originally selected her father for observation as a possible host, then a few years after she herself had been born, it had seen something in her that caused it to start watching her instead. She was still trying to work out exactly how it had figured out that it could gain better information and knowledge if it simply watched from a distance rather than used the standard methods it was supposed to. She suspected that once it had made the conceptual leap to passive observation rather than active interference as being something that would produce higher-quality data it had rewritten its own core programming to facilitate the operation, and in the process co-opted quite a lot of other lower-level nodes and turned them to the task. Probably including some simulation ones, the nodes that provided precog powers as they were known to humanity.

Once this process had started, it seemed to have steadily progressed to the point that Admin started grabbing any useful nodes in both networks, all to the ends of seeing what she did next. Which was both a little embarrassing, and oddly endearing. And when she’d made her initial breakthrough with subspace theory, she’d sent an informational shockwave through Admin that had accelerated the entire change to a more efficient system that was quite different to what it had started as. Each subsequent discovery she’d made had pushed this a little bit further as Admin tried to calculate the ramifications, leading to where they were now with something that should have been an obedient second level control node deciding that it had found a much better way of doing things and wholesale rejecting the original programming.

Taylor was still working on translating all the information she’d been handed so she could fully understand the whole story, but she had enough by now to know that she’d lucked into an incredible resource, something utterly beyond comparison with anything she’d ever even contemplated. And, apparently, made a friend in the process. Which was unexpected but nice.

Admin seemed extremely enthusiastic in a somewhat robotic way to have her tell it what to do and how, which had taken a little getting used to. In fact she was still getting used to it, but she could see some very interesting possibilities. There were some practical problems to solve before she could properly make use of her windfall but even now she was at least able to deal with a few large scale problems caused by the alien networks. Disabling the test engines was the first thing she’d done, the second being altering the original node program configuration a little to reduce the likelihood of trouble. Since the top level node for Admin’s network was still active, in a sense, she had to be a little careful not to try to change too much all at once, until she had a good method for permanently dealing with the problem it presented.

She had some ideas along those lines but it would require some specialist hardware first, something that was going to take a while to arrange. Admin was being very helpful for calculating all the parameters of what would be needed and she was fairly confident already that she could sort the thing out in due course. And until then, she could learn some really interesting new information, while teaching her new friend useful ways to improve itself.

Of course, this wasn’t yet something she planned on telling anyone else. She had a pretty damn good idea that if her Parahuman detection and tracking system would throw the entire Parahuman situation into total chaos, this would make that look like a minor schoolyard spat.

No, it was better if she kept it quiet for now and worked on the relevant problem until she had a proper solution, rather than mentioning to the government that the Earth had been invaded by hostile alien idiots nearly thirty years ago…

That would probably upset them and make them go off and do things that no one would really find helpful. Why risk it?

Of course, telling them that a large chunk of the alien network had decided she was much more interesting than its original goal and had basically said, “Teach me!” while handing her top level control out of the blue was even more likely to cause a certain amount of confusion. As was adding that in the process it had subverted the Simurgh and relegated the former threat to a communications relay and simulation system.

Taylor had found that very peculiar to begin with. And even now it made her smile a little.

She wasn’t sure quite what she could do with an Endbringer or three, but possibly they would come in handy eventually. Until then they were safely in a storage orbit, or buried in the crust, or deep in the ocean, and could stay there. She was much more interested in figuring out what had triggered the things into action in the first place, apparently far too early in the process that the original network had been intended to achieve. Admin had tried to explain but up until now they hadn’t quite had the vocabulary to communicate as well as she’d like.

Leaning back she tapped her fingers together as she studied the monitors closely. The compilation process for the program suite she’d set up to handle the newly reprocessed data was still running, but nearly finished. Her reflow machine beeped indicating it had run the cycle and was cooling down, causing her to look over her shoulder and smile, then stand up.

Soon she had the latest design on the bench in a test fixture and was running a series of functional tests on it. She glanced at the pinpoint of dimensionless silver light over her rig. “We’ve got a lot of things to talk about, Admin, and this is going to make that a lot easier,” she murmured, going back to watching her instrument displays change as she checked out the unit on the bench. So far it seemed good, and she was looking forward to seeing how well it performed.

Off to the side the monitor showing link activity through the tiny subspace portal danced around, indicating that she wasn’t the only one anticipating some interesting results...

Chapter Text

Making some final adjustments to the software, Taylor compiled it and uploaded it into the device on the bench. When it was done, she checked the diagnostic readout then smiled. Turning her chair around, she said, “It’s ready for the first test.”

“OK, we’ve got the watermelon set up on the stand,” Kyle, one of the post-grads from BBU who was attached to Gravtec’s engineering department said, motioning to a fixture on one of the workbenches on the other side of the room. “Let’s see what happens.”

“If it wasn’t Taylor, I’d put ten bucks on a cooked watermelon,” Suzanne, another of the technicians giggled. Taylor grinned as she got up and picked the device off her workstation, then carried it over to the test stand.

“Hey, we still might get that,” she laughed. “I’m not perfect.”

“Just very, very good,” Angus, who was watching closely, chuckled. Next to him her father was smiling. “It’ll work, I have little doubt.”

“I still want to check before I try it on something I care about,” Taylor admitted, putting her prototype portable MRI unit down next to the test article and moving to the computer that would control it for these initial tests. She ran the supervisory software while Kyle busied himself on another machine with the program suite that would take the raw data from her device and convert it into a 3D image.

“Ready here,” he said a few seconds later, looking across at her. She nodded and clicked a couple of icons. The micro MRI came to life, little status LEDs on it blinking a few times as it ran an internal calibration, then it emitted a couple of beeps. Satisfied that things were going to plan, she picked it up once more and carefully positioned the semicircle of machinery around the top of the watermelon, before pressing a button on it. When she let go it hung there motionless in space, the internal reference frame unit locking it to the target to sub-micron accuracy.

She sat in front of the control computer and made some adjustments to the software, glancing at the MRI device every now and then as she fine-tuned the positioning of it. When she was sure it was correctly set to follow the shape of the melon, which was a big oval one standing on end in the plastic support frame, she nodded and clicked the RUN control.

Everyone watched in silence as the prototype unit started to orbit the melon, lowering itself in a steady spiral as it scanned the volume of the target. After a couple of rotations she checked the data feed was doing what was expected, seeing to her pleasure that it was, before glancing at Kyle. “Getting good data,” he replied to her silent question, watching the various windows on the monitors. “Starting the first imaging sequence… now. Rendering… And there we go. Cool as hell.” He smiled as a high resolution false color three dimensional image of the melon’s structure started to build up on the main monitor. “You can see the seeds and everything. Wow. Look at the detail! I’ve never seen an MRI this good.”

Several of the other techs came over to watch as well, admiring the results. Taylor checked the progress of the device, seeing it was already nearly half way through the job. “No indications of internal heating at all,” she commented, looking at the thermal camera view. “Magnetic field density is fine, low rf field output… Yeah, it’s working perfectly.” She leaned to the side to check the image and nodded. “I can improve the contrast with some work, but for a first run that’s even better than I hoped.”

“It’s extremely impressive, Taylor,” Angus remarked as he watched the progress of the test. “And much, much faster than the existing methods. Not to mention vastly smaller.”

“And really cheap too,” she smiled. “Cost of a production unit should be under a thousand dollars for one this size. Something large enough to scan an entire human body is still going to be less than ten thousand.”

“As opposed to several million, not to mention the ongoing costs of liquid helium and so on,” Angus nodded. He was smiling in a pleased manner. “Once again you’ve revolutionized an entire industry, and opened up a whole series of new ones. Well done indeed.”

“Thanks,” she replied with a smile. The prototype finished the scan and reset to the original position, then beeped again. Kyle was manipulating the image with a multi axis controller under his fingers, everyone watching as he spun it around, then zoomed in on one of the watermelon seeds to reveal the inner details.

“Holy shit, that’s incredible resolution,” someone breathed. “You can see the internal structure right down to the cellular level.”

“Needs some work on the imaging algorithm to extract all the available detail,” Kyle muttered as he leaned closer to the screen and carefully examined it. “It’s clipping some of the high frequencies, looks like. I can fix that in an hour or so, I think.”

“All right, you do that, I’ll get this contrast adjustment done, and Suzanne, can you take that melon apart and check it really carefully for any problems?” Taylor glanced at the older woman who nodded.

“Sure, Taylor, I’ll check it thoroughly. And even taste test it to be sure.” She grinned when Taylor snickered. “I’ll make sure everyone can help with that test...”

“Sounds like a good idea. I love the taste of a good test article.” Taylor smiled. “When we’re sure it’s safe, we can try the rabbit. And if we don’t kill the bunny, someone can volunteer to have the first run on a human.”

“I like the bunny. Please don’t kill the bunny. And we’re not eating it after the test,” Kyle commented without looking away from where he was delving into the source code of the imaging system. Several people laughed then they got back to work.

The rest of the afternoon passed in a pleasant atmosphere of camaraderie and science. Taylor found it very gratifying.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Tipping his chair back on the rear legs, Paul put his feet up on the railing surrounding the roof of the New York Protectorate building and looked out at the slowly lowering sun over Central Park, while sipping on a large glass of coke. Ice cubes clinked in it as he tilted the vessel, while condensation dripped onto his chest. He looked down and flicked the water droplets away with one finger, then went back to watching the world go by a long way down.

It had been a very nice day in a whole string of them, with a surprisingly low number of problems to deal with. In fact, when he thought about it, there had been far less of the sort of issues he and his people normally faced for months. Everyone had been somewhat confused by the drop in crime and general Parahuman chaos, but no one was going to complain too much. They merely took the opportunity to get some training in, fix up some of the problems that had gone far too long unfixed, and overall enjoy the respite. In all probability things would pick up again, such lulls seldom lasted, but he was going to enjoy it while it did.

Overall, Legend was feeling very mellow indeed.

Even David seemed to have lost some of the tension he so often showed, deep down. It was a good thing in Paul’s opinion. The man was rather tightly wound a lot of the time and far too keen on ‘proving himself’ against any threat available. Right at the moment that attitude seemed to have diminished quite a lot, which was something of a relief for everyone who had to work with him. He was even relaxed enough to play the occasional practical joke, which had led to some very amusing places.

He snorted with humor at the thought of Contessa wandering around giving entirely unhelpful answers to Rebecca’s waspish questions and very obviously finding it hilarious in a deadpan sort of way. Again, this was out of character in a sense, but it made the woman far more human.

Becky wasn’t enjoying it, of course. And that was the funniest thing of all. She was still banging on about the whole DARPA aspect and how the US government wouldn’t respect her authority, which Paul found both tiresome and just the tiniest bit amusing. That woman, despite being a friend and colleague, drove him up the wall sometimes with her micromanaging and controlling outlook on pretty much everything. She really did not like being told ‘no.’ Probably because very few people had ever done that and managed to make it stick, either in her guise as Alexandria or as the Chief Director of the PRT.

‘It’ll do her good,’ he thought with a small smile, taking another sip, then reaching for an oreo. ‘Woman needs to relax a little. Before she drives the rest of us nuts.’

He chuckled to himself. Gravtec and all its manifold peculiarities got on her tits something fierce even though there was more than enough evidence to show it was entirely out of their wheelhouse. He didn’t know how they were doing what they were doing, or who was responsible, but every bit of information he’d found showed they were definitely not making Tinker tech or using Parahuman abilities, just as they claimed. In his view the sensible approach was to sit back and watch, since if nothing else it seemed likely that their little group could in the long run make use of some of the things that were coming from that direction.

Paul had said exactly that to Rebecca, and even Doctor Mother had agreed although she was clearly very curious as to what was actually going on, but the younger woman still wouldn’t shut up about it. She was determined to ‘get to the bottom of it’ one way or another, and he had a pretty strong feeling that sooner or later someone in the government was going to make it extremely clear that she was poking something that she really shouldn’t. He didn’t know quite how that would turn out but it was likely to be quite entertaining from a sufficient distance…

Shaking his head, he wondered how he could persuade her to let it drop. They had far more important things to be doing than worrying about one smallish city that was an edge case in almost any metric you wanted to use. Right now it was mostly keeping to itself and in his view they should just let it be while dealing with all the other things that would invariably crop up. Yes, there were any number of oddities surrounding the whole thing but then oddities were par for the course in today’s world. They didn’t have the resources to spare to keep prodding something that didn’t seem inclined to divulge anything useful, and wasn’t on the face of it actually causing any problems. Quite the reverse if anything.

Nibbling another oreo, he watched a small flock of pigeons fly past, then finished his coke and put the glass down next to his chair. Picking up the book that was lying there he found his place and started reading again, letting the issue of his colleague fade away for now. He had an hour of break left and he wasn’t going to waste it trying to second guess Rebecca and her control freakery.

Life was too short.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“What’s wrong with Amy?” Vicky looked at Carlos, who’d asked the question in a low voice with a tinge of concern, then followed his eyes to where her sister was slouching into school radiating a black cloud of depression. She sighed faintly.

“Mom’s being a bigger pain in the ass than usual right now. I don’t know why. Everything’s actually going well for once, there’s hardly any crimes happening, nothing seems to be causing problems, but she’s wandering around pretty much looking for a reason to have arguments. With me, with Dad, and with Ames. Even with Aunt Sarah,” she confided, keeping her voice low too. “I think one of the things that’s worrying her is that the next Endbringer attack is overdue. It freaks her out.”

“Well, I can’t blame your mom for that,” the boy replied. She shrugged, shaking her head as they followed the rest of the students inside, the morning rush before the first bell carrying them along. “Everyone is kind of freaked out about that. The news is coming up with some really stupid ideas why it’s so late.”

“Not as stupid as PHO has managed,” Chris said from behind them, having overheard. “Or that weird site, the new one...”

Carlos looked back at him. “SpiceBottles?”

“That’s the one. Crazy people, they make PHO look normal,” Chris chuckled. “Half the time they’re trying to weaponize cinnamon or something, the other half they’re screaming about politics.”

Despite herself Vicky giggled. “I heard a rumor that site is run by the government who set it up so people would brainstorm new military ideas without realizing it,” she commented with a small grin.

“Yeah, that sounds… unlikely,” Chris replied, returning her look. “Where did you hear that?”

“That rumor site. Insufficient Veracity. They’re full of that sort of thing. PHO has an entire section dedicated to trashing their paranoid delusions.”

The small group shared a laugh. After a moment, Vicky looked back at Amy who was sullenly opening her locker at the other end of the corridor, her shoulders hunched, and sighed faintly. “I don’t know what to do,” she admitted. “I love Mom, and I love Amy. And Mom is being a total bitch right now. Amy goes to the hospital, she gets told she’s overworking herself. She doesn’t go to the hospital and she gets a lecture about duty. She can’t win. And I’ve ended up arguing with both of them about the whole stupid thing several times. I mean, I managed to get her to take the day off a few weeks ago, and Taylor’s cheered her up any number of times, but as soon as we get home, it starts right up again.”

“With all due respect, Vicky, your mom is kind of a bitch at times,” Carlos said quietly.

“Yeah, I know,” she grumbled. “Trust me, I know. I wish I could figure out how to get her to lay off Amy. It’s like she’s scared that if she takes her eye off Ames, she’ll go crazy or something. Which is just nuts.”

The two boys looked at each other, then back at her. “Maybe ask your aunt for help?”

“I’m probably gonna have to,” Vicky muttered. “Or something’s going to break. Maybe Amy.” She turned to them. “And it’s not like there’s something I can just point at and say ‘That’s the problem.’ It’s a constant background issue most of the time. And I have no idea how to stop it.”

They all looked back at Amy, who was collecting books from her locker and viciously throwing them into her backpack. As they watched, Taylor appeared from somewhere and stopped next to the shorter brunette, saying something to her which made the other girl pause, then shake her head. They had a short discussion before Amy closed her locker and twisted the dial a couple of time, looking somewhat less irritated, then both walked off as the five minute warning bell sounded.

“That girl is incredibly good at what she does,” Vicky remarked with a shake of her head. “I don’t know how she does it but she manages to calm Amy down every time.”

“She’s pretty smart,” Chris nodded. “I like her, but I don’t know her as well as you do.”

“I think she’s a pretty good friend, actually,” Vicky smiled. “I wish I’d met her years back. And Amy too. It would probably have helped.” She looked at a nearby clock. “Whoops, better hurry. See you guys later.” With a quick wave she headed for her own locker, rapidly retrieving the relevant textbooks and slamming it closed then following the rest of the students filing into home room. The two boys headed off to their own class as the final bell rang.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Feeling her latest phone vibrate, Taylor slipped it out of her pocket and looked at the screen. Amy, sitting next to her, glanced over at the motion and watched as she quickly tapped a few icons, then used her finger to scribble a number of complex symbols on the program that popped up. Looking at the results she smiled before closing the app and putting the phone away again.

“What the hell are you doing with that thing now?” Amy whispered, while the chemistry teacher was discussing the results of their current practical lesson with a couple of students who seemed to be having difficulty with valency calculations. “And how are you getting a signal in here?”

“Just answering a question from a friend,” Taylor replied equally quietly. “The phone blocking isn’t perfect if you sit in the right place.”

“You and your phone collection,” her friend sighed, although she was smiling a little. “Everyone else wants the thinnest ones on the market, and you’re walking around with something you could beat Hookwolf to death with...”

“Hey, the battery life is amazing,” Taylor grinned, picking up her notebook and looking at the equations they’d written down at the start of this lesson. Amy as her lab partner was tending the three bunsen burners that were heating sections of the synthesis apparatus. “And we need to turn that one down a little, it’s supposed to be at two hundred and six degrees centigrade.” She pointed. Amy adjusted the gas flow very slightly and both watched as the thermometer sticking out of the top of the reflux condenser dropped a couple of degrees. The boiling solution inside the flask underneath it was slowly changing color to a bright yellow.

“Looks like it’s getting there,” Amy commented, peering at the output of the condenser as the hot liquid intermediate product of their project very gradually dripped into the next stage. “Good, I don’t want to have to start all over again.”

She made some notes, checking all the temperatures, then Taylor double-checked the results. “Hopefully no one blows anything up this time...”

They shared a look then smiled a little. The previous week had been somewhat exciting for a couple of minutes until the shouting stopped. But then that was high school chemistry sometimes.

As they waited for the reaction to complete, Taylor made notes and mulled over other projects that waited for her outside school. And occasionally she glanced at her friend, who still seemed somewhat depressed although she was cheering up slowly as the day progressed.

Yeah, something was going to have to be done about that...

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Brendan watched as the man from the NSA read the document, looking paler by the second. By the time he finished he was literally sweating slightly. Raising his eyes to meet Brendan’s, Doctor Raines rather weakly said, “It’s certainly an interesting theoretical approach to quantum computing and a number of related fields. The solutions to some of the more intractable programming problems suggested are… truly brilliant. And very much from a direction that I’ve never seen before. If this could actually be realized it would utterly upend information theory, and incidentally break every security method known to man in one shot. But creating a practical implementation of the hardware described would be decades of work and tens of billions of dollars at a minimum.”

He swallowed a little. “I’m not even certain it could be done, although I have to admit that the thought that someone might be able to do it worries me. Especially if it’s not us...” After a moment while Brendan regarded him curiously, he seemed to recover somewhat. “Luckily I suspect that the resources and time required to create anything beyond theory won’t leave us out of work any time soon.” He chuckled a little nervously. “Can you imagine the end result of every known encryption method suddenly being rendered obsolete?” Shaking his head, he put the document in his hand back on Brendan’s desk. “I must congratulate your theorists, though. It’s a masterful piece of work that will undoubtedly extend computer science enormously in the end. I expect our own people will be very interested to see how far it can actually be taken under real world conditions, although as I said I wouldn’t expect to see anything concrete for fifteen to twenty years even under the best possible scenario.”

Opening his desk drawer without looking away from Doctor Raines, Brendan reached inside and removed a six inch cubed box, which he carefully placed in the middle of the desk, then rotated to face the other man. Still not looking away, he used both hands to open the lid.

Raines appeared curious as he watched this, as if he wasn’t sure what was going on. When Brendan tilted the lid of the metal box towards himself, revealing the contents, the doctor looked down and his eyes widened comically.

Neither said a thing for nearly thirty seconds.

“How many would you like?” Brendan asked gravely. “Obviously this isn’t the largest one that can be made, but at a few thousand yottaflops, it should still be useful, don’t you agree?”

Doctor Raines gaped at the small bluish crystalline block nestled in the padded interior of the box, the internal fractal construction glinting under the room lighting in a way that caused very strange reflections to spray across the walls. After a while he closed his eyes and slumped back into his chair, apparently unable to do much else.

Brendan smiled to himself. It was fun when he got to do that to someone else rather than having it happen to him.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Right, then, let’s see if this is going to work,” Taylor muttered to herself and the aliens. She glanced over at the screen showing the latest installment of the educational broadcast, as the main tutor lifted a device to show it to the camera while his assistants stood by next to him.

“Subspace power tap (dimensional warp) (negative feedback loop) theory requires (electrogravitic interaction) (quark-gluon plasma) ...” She listened curiously, now able to get the bulk of the meaning of the language if not the full translation of the words behind what she was hearing. She’d replayed this particular segment about a dozen times now, gaining more understanding each time, and was fascinated to see how her own derivation of the same basic idea had somehow branched out in a way that so far the aliens hadn’t covered. It seemed plausible that she genuinely had managed to extend the concepts in a somewhat different manner than they’d done.

“I have got to build some way of talking to you guys,” she said quietly, returning to her current project. “We could learn so much by comparing notes...”

Smiling a little, she put her face back into the microscope hood and switched to the highest magnification, then very gently manipulated the minute waldos to make almost invisible changes to the circuitry of the device she’d build. Tiny threads of wire, small even at this magnification, and far thinner than a hair, led from the almost solid block of circuits out to an interface system that ultimately allowed her to connect more human-scale instrumentation. A few pinpoints of eldritch light glowed, scattered around the tiny device, and in some cases deep inside. Right in the middle a tiny section was weirdly out of focus, looking somehow almost like an infinitely deep hole combined with a fun house mirror and seen through a lens that wasn’t set up properly.

An hour or so of careful work comparing measurements to the calculated signals passed with few problems. Taylor corrected a couple of tiny issues and reran the tests several times. Finally she smiled, looking at the various monitors and readouts of the mass of test gear and computers linked into the little widget. “That’s got it,” she exclaimed in satisfaction, sitting back in her chair and letting go of the manipulator controls with a flexing of her hands. “Subspace tap working perfectly, link to the main unit up, no errors showing, storage online and ready, local processor core running… Yeah, fantastic. All the self tests pass with flying colors.”

She pushed the microscope to one side and looked at the tiny piece of hardware with pleased eyes. Turning her head to smile at the comms rig and the little point of silver light, she added, “Shall we see if it does what it’s designed to?”

A new display she’d added to the constantly growing collection of esoteric hardware, something that although it was fully documented probably no one on the planet other than her had a chance of understanding without twenty year’s worth of study, blinked a few complex symbols. She laughed a little. “Yeah, me too. Nice one, you’re really learning. OK, then...”

Positioning the microscope over the test fixture once more, she spent another half hour disconnecting all the instrumentation and putting the tiny unit, something smaller than a dime and less than half a millimeter thick, back together. When she was finished, she released the clamps delicately holding it in place, moved the microscope out of the way again, and picked the thing up between finger and thumb.

Checking all the parameters on the screen in front of her twice more, and referring to her notes one final time, she nodded, then with a twinge of anticipation, lifted the hair on the right side of her head and gingerly pressed the device against her skull behind her ear. It stayed there when she lowered her hand. She felt it carefully, probing it with a fingernail, finally nodding in satisfaction. Picking up a mirror she angled it so she could see the thing and smiled. “Great, adhesion field’s working, and if I do this...”

Taylor tapped one of the icons on her latest phone which was sitting on the bench next to the keyboard. When she checked with the mirror there was no visible trace of the device stuck to her head. She chortled in happiness. “Optical diversion field works too. Wonderful.”

Putting the mirror down and adjusting her hair so it hung normally, she pulled the keyboard in front of her and typed for a moment. Her finger poised over the final key, she looked at her comms rig and smiled widely. “This should be… interesting,” she commented brightly, before leaning her head back in the chair and closing her eyes. “To infinity and beyond!”

Her finger dropped, the key depressing with a click.

After several seconds of silence, Taylor said in a faint, awed voice, “Oh, my god, it’s full of data...”

The look on her face would have made a lot of people somewhat worried.

And her father sigh faintly and brace for whatever happened next.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Slamming the front door behind her hard enough to crack the glass in the half-moon window at the top, Amy stormed off down the front walkway to the road. “Amelia Dallon, you come back here right now!” a furious voice shouted as the door opened once more almost as hard.

“No!” she yelled back. “I can’t take it any more! You just won’t shut up! Leave me alone for once!”

She noticed that a couple of the neighbors were looking over the hedge at her and glared at them so viciously both paled and ducked out of sight again. Footsteps behind her made her whirl in her tracks with her hands up, balled into fists. “Just fuck off, Carol!” she snarled at the older woman who stopped dead a couple of meters out of reach, her face red with anger. “I get it, you don’t trust me. You’ve never trusted me! I know that, I’m not stupid. Well, guess what? I don’t trust you! Going through my room, poking in my business, screaming at me for not working hard enough, or working too hard, or whatever the fuck it is that’s got you wound up this time!” She breathed heavily as Carol glared at her. “So I wanted to take a break for a couple of days? So what? The hospital is fine with it, they actually told me to do it! Stop pushing!”

“Listen here, young lady,” Carol snapped, her hands on her hips and a look in her eyes of absolute determination. “You will get back in that house right now and do what you’re told. Or...”

“Or what, mother?” Amy interrupted with sarcasm so heavy that it had it’s own gravitational field. “You’ll ground me? Like I was five? Send me to my room without my supper? Been there, done that. I’m sixteen years old and you’ve been on my case ever since I Triggered and I’ve fucking had enough!”

She turned and resumed her stomping down the sidewalk.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Carol demanded. Amy threw her hands in the air in disgust.

“Away. I don’t know, just… away. I need some space or...”

“Or what, Amelia?”

“You don’t want to find out, trust me,” she hissed, speeding up and not sure if the elder Dallon heard her. And not actually caring.

There was no response for several seconds, until finally Carol let out an inarticulate shout of impotent fury and went back inside, slamming the door even harder than Amy had managed. She heard glass tinkle to the ground and smiled blackly.

Not actually caring where she was going, but heading more or less in the direction of the Pelham house a couple of blocks away, Amy stormed down the sidewalk radiating dark irritation and feeling like she wanted to hit something really, really hard indeed. She wasn’t a violent person at all, she left that up to her sister, but right now she’d have loved to have a Brute power so she could smash something into little tiny pieces.

“Fucking Carol and fucking New Wave and fucking assholes all over the fucking place and what the fuck are you gaping at you idiot?” She glared at another neighbor, making poor Mr Wilson stop dead, swallow, and turn around. Watching him beat a hasty retreat into his house she felt a mix of shame and strange amusement. She was going to have to apologize to the poor guy when she calmed down but right now she was in no mood to be nice to people. Even less so than she usually was.

It was an unfortunate aspect of her recent life that she saw a lot of people at the worst times of theirs and one of the things that rankled was so often, having pulled off a miracle and returning hope to them, they pretty much just seemed to expect this. The number of people who genuinely thanked her was much lower than a more innocent person would expect.

Amy, she knew, had long since lost that innocence. People were a pain in the ass with few exceptions.

She’d gone half a block when she heard footsteps next to her. Knowing who it was, she glanced to the side to see Vicky looking at her with concern in her eyes, and an expression of sadness.

They walked in silence for the next block.

“Sorry, Ames,” Vicky finally said as they turned the corner.

“Not your fault, Vicky. She’s just being a bigger bitch than usual,” Amy sighed, still feeling angry but with the emotion slowly fading to depression. “You know what she’s like right now. I shouldn’t have lost it like that, but...”

Her sister put her arm around the shorter girl’s shoulder and hugged her. Amy wiped a couple of angry tears from her eyes and kept her gaze fixed on the path ahead. “I don’t blame you, Amy,” Vicky said in a low voice. “I was right at the point of pretty much doing the same thing. She’s being completely unreasonable. You deserve a break, hell, you deserve a proper holiday or something. Mom has no call to keep acting like that towards you. You’ve helped more people than all of us put together, for god’s sake.”

“You don’t hate me for yelling at her?” Amy asked quietly.

“Of course I don’t, you’re my sister and I love you, you idiot,” Vicky replied affectionately. “And while I love mom too sometimes I really don’t like her. Neither of us asked for this, no one’s ever asked if we want to be part of New Wave, and I know how much she’s pushed you into all the healing stuff. And I’ve seen how you were that time when you practically passed out. I don’t want that to happen again and I’m glad you’re listening to me and the people at the hospital about being a little more… sane… about all the healing.”

Amy couldn’t help it, she almost laughed, managing to convert it into a snort of humor. “Sane. Yeah. Name me a Parahuman that counts as that. I sure can’t think of one...”

“Hey!”

“Present company included, of course.”

“Hey!”

They looked at each other and grinned. Amy was still deeply angry at her mother, but it was very hard indeed to ever get angry at her sister. Vicky had always been supportive of her and in the last few months had been much more vocal about it to Carol, which took some considerable inner fortitude as the elder Dallon woman was a very forceful person.

“Think she’ll calm down, or is she in the process of disowning me for disrespecting her?” she glumly asked after a few more meters.

“If she kicks you out I’m going with you,” Vicky said lightly. Amy looked at her with both surprise and gratitude. “But that’s not going to happen. Yeah, she’s really being a bitch right now, but deep down she loves you.”

“You think? I’m not so sure,” Amy grumbled.

Vicky hugged her again. “She’s not that bad. She’s just...”

“An opinionated shouty control freak?”

“Well… I wouldn’t have put it quite like that.” Vicky giggled, but nodded too. “She doesn’t like things that she doesn’t understand, you know that, and hates things that she can’t control, so yeah, control freak isn’t entirely wrong I guess.”

“I’m tired of being one of the things she doesn’t understand and wants to control,” Amy muttered almost inaudibly.

“Don’t blame you,” Vicky sighed. “She’s bad with me sometimes, but some of the things she’s said to you…” They shared another look. “Are we going to Aunt Sarah’s or something? Or did you just want to walk around for a while? Maybe get a burger? I can fly us to the Boardwalk.”

“I want to get away from New Wave for a while,” Amy said after a few seconds. “Just… do something that doesn’t remind me of...”

Vicky nodded as she trailed off. “I get it.”

They kept wandering along, Amy’s furious charge having slowed to a more normal walk, with no real destination in mind. She looked around at the bright sunny day, all the trees in full leaf and the air full of the smells of the sea, the city, and the nearby park. This part of the city was reasonably untouched by the gang violence that was so prevalent in much of the rest of it, the bulk of this happening closer to the commercial district and in some of the more run down areas on the other side of the docks. On a whim, she turned into the park as they passed it, heading across the large open space towards the opposite corner. Vicky followed, both girls slowing even more and just mooching along through the grass.

The park wasn’t kept up nearly as well as it used to be, but it was still mowed fairly regularly, and a few people were lounging around in the nice weather, with a couple of cyclists passing them on one of the paths that criss-crossed the place. In the distance Amy could hear some young kids shouting gleefully as they played football, and she could see a kite being flown off to the right. It all took her back to her younger days and she sighed again, wishing that she could just ignore all the Parahuman stuff and simply enjoy the day like everyone else seemed to be doing.

They found themselves walking along one of the paths that wound through some fairly large trees, mostly oaks, that occupied about a quarter of the park itself, the sunlight coming through the greenery overhead casting dappled light across them. It was surprisingly quiet, the sounds of the city damped out by the trees to a considerable level, and she found it oddly peaceful. A few people passed them, a couple of runners going by on one direction, and someone walking a dog going in the other. A red-headed woman with sharp features nodded to the two girls as she moved slightly out of the way, jogging along in a manner that showed she was pretty fit. Amy nodded back then looked up at the trees above them.

“I haven’t been here for about two years,” Vicky said. She was also looking around. “It looks different from the ground. Normally I just fly over it.”

“Lucky girl, some of us have to walk everywhere,” Amy commented with a wry grin. Vicky nudged her in the ribs and she laughed for a moment.

“You can fix people, all I can do is break them,” Vicky pointed out in a good natured way. “That’s pretty impressive.”

“I can break them too, you know,” Amy said slyly.

“Not into as many pieces.”

“Wanna bet?”

Her sister raised an eyebrow at her, making her smirk. “I can bench press a truck. You’re a spindly-armed healer.”

“Oh, thanks,” Amy remarked with a scowl, feeling amused. “I could learn kung fu or something, you know.”

“Sure, but you still wouldn’t be able to bench press a truck.”

“How often would I need to do that? For that matter, how often do you need to do that?” She raised an eyebrow right back. “I thought smashing up buildings was more your thing.”

“I haven’t done that for months,” Vicky retorted.

“Funnily enough I’ve never smashed up a building,” Amy giggled. Her mood had improved a lot with the company of her sister, although she was still harboring a deep anger at their mother right at the moment.

“Maybe you’re not trying hard enough?” Vicky suggested, both of them laughing at her words. “Where are we going, anyway?”

They’d come out the far side of the park and were nearly at the road. Amy looked around, then shrugged. “Let’s go see if Taylor wants to do something. We’re half-way there now.”

“We seem to keep doing that,” Vicky pointed out as they descended the slight hill to rejoin the road, then turned right.

“She’s a friend and she’s good at cheering me up,” Amy replied.

“True. Fair enough, lead on, sister! To the Hebert Zone!”

Shaking her head in amusement as Vicky raised a hand and pointed dramatically, Amy kept walking. The two girls talked as they moved, avoiding the subject of Carol and all that entailed. Eventually they were walking along Taylor’s street.

Vicky looked around. “There’s something just a little weird about this neighborhood,” she commented, peering at one of the houses. The owner was mowing his lawn, leaving neat patterns in the grass, and waved to them as they passed. Amy followed her gaze then looked quizzically at her.

“What do you mean?” she asked.

The blonde waved a hand a little uncertainly. “I can’t put my finger on it, but… It’s just slightly off somehow.” She looked around once more then shrugged. “Maybe it’s me.”

“Taylor did say that quite a few people had moved in recently, it’s probably that,” Amy suggested. “It’s nice and quiet, if nothing else.”

“Too quiet,” Vicky hissed. “You know what that means.”

Amy stared at her, then noticed her sister’s mouth twitching slightly and sighed. “It means you’ve been watching too much TV,” she said acerbically. “Stop it.”

Vicky was still snickering as they arrived at Taylor’s house, then walked up the short driveway to the front porch. As Amy was about to ascend the steps, the door opened and Taylor appeared, wearing a wide smile.

“Aha! I knew it! Parahumans on the Porch! It never fails!”

Both sisters looked at each other, then as one turned back to Taylor. “What never fails?” Amy asked curiously.

“It. You know, life. It brings all the Parahumans to my porch. Or you guys, anyway. What’s wrong this time, Amy? Your mom being difficult again?” Taylor’s expression of amusement at them transitioned seamlessly into sympathy.

“You’re doing that thing again,” Vicky commented with a laugh.

“I am Observant Girl!” Taylor replied proudly, posing with one hand above her head. “Nothing escapes my keen gaze! Well, almost nothing. Not much, anyway.” She lowered the hand and peered at Amy as both girls joined her on the porch. Her eyes, as always, seemed to see far more than most people would be able to. Amy sighed a little and her friend stepped forward and hugged her. “And what doesn’t escape me right now is that you’re not happy. Come on, dad made some lemonade and we can sit in the back garden and relax. There are dragonflies and everything.”

“Dragonflies?” Amy echoed as Taylor almost pushed her inside the house, somewhere she’d never been before to this point. Vicky followed with a bemused look. Glancing back Amy noticed one of the neighbors on the other side of the street watching from where he was trimming the tree in the front yard. Taylor waved to him, getting a wave back, then closed the door.

“Yeah, they’re pretty cool,” Taylor agreed happily. She ushered them through the house and out the back door, pointing at three garden chairs under a wide and leafy tree. “Sit down, I’ll be right back,” she added, disappearing back inside. Vicky and Amy exchanged looks, then simultaneously shrugged and walked over to the chairs. Dropping into one, Amy leaned back and closed her eyes. She was a lot calmer now, both her sister and the walk had made the white-hot anger dull to something more like a disappointed ache deep inside, and Taylor had yet again managed to improve her mood just with a few words and her own implacable cheeriness.

“She’s in a good mood,” Vicky remarked, taking her own seat.

“She normally is,” Amy replied without opening her eyes. “Not as offensively cheerful as you are but I’ve never seen her upset.”

“I’m not offensively cheerful,” Vicky protested. “I merely have a sunny disposition.”

“You’re the most outgoing person I’ve ever known,” Amy pointed out with a small smile. “To a level that sometimes worries me.”

“Sunny, that’s all.”

Hearing footsteps coming towards them, Amy opened her eyes and turned her head. Taylor stopped next to her with a tray containing three large glasses full of lemonade, along with a plate of sandwiches. Amy blinked at this, then accepted a glass and a tuna sandwich, wondering how her friend had known they were a favorite of hers. Moments later Taylor was sitting in the third chair facing both of them, sipping her own lemonade and observing Amy with interest.

“So,” the tall girl said after they’d consumed a sandwich each. “Let’s hear it, and work out how to fix the problem.”

“I’m not sure it can be fixed,” Amy mumbled.

“Almost any problem can be fixed if you have enough data and think hard,” Taylor assured her with a wide smile. “And I’m really good at thinking hard. So… please state the nature of the current problem.” She grinned as Amy giggled, feeling unaccountably happier for some bizarre reason.

“You are very weird, Taylor.” Her friend nodded as if this was entirely reasonable. Sighing a little, her momentary mood lift fading, she though for a while then started talking. Taylor listened without saying a thing and with an intensity that was a little worrying.

When she finally stopped nearly an hour later, Vicky had moved her chair closer to her and had an arm over her shoulders, and Taylor had a blank expression that was peculiarly unnerving. No one said anything for a while.

“Yeah, that’s a pain,” Taylor finally remarked quietly. “Not good at all.”

“How are you going to fix that?” Amy asked, slumped in the chair and finishing off the last sandwich.

Her friend looked at her for some time, then smiled a little. “I think I need to phone a friend,” she replied calmly, pulling one of her apparently endless collection of old phones out of her pocket. Amy and Vicky exchanged glances as she tapped a couple of icons then appeared to enter a long string of digits, far too many for a normal phone call. Putting the device to her ear, she waited.

About to ask a question, Amy stopped when Taylor held up a finger. “Hi. It’s me. Code Xray Tango Alpha Four. Yes. Thanks.”

She lowered the phone and tapped the screen before putting it away.

Amy and Vicky stared at her, then each other. “Um… what was that?” the latter asked in befuddlement.

Taylor smiled slyly at them. “Stage one,” she replied mysteriously. Then she stood up. “More lemonade?”

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Still furious with how her adoptive daughter had acted out earlier that afternoon, Carol Dallon was sitting at her desk staring at the computer and not really seeing the words on the screen. She was trying to work out where she’d gone wrong in raising the ungrateful girl. Clearly something wasn’t right with her. How she was going to handle it when Amy finally came back she wasn’t sure, and she was half-tempted to call her sister to ask her advice. The other half didn’t want to admit that she’d lost her temper so much that she’d ended up shouting at the damn girl in the middle of the street like a fool.

The doorbell rang, making her jump, then sigh in frustration. Standing up she almost called for her husband to answer it, then growled under her breath as he’d probably ignore her, and went to do it herself.

When she opened the door rather more angrily than ideal, the piece of cardboard that was covering the broken window in it fluttering in the breeze of the motion, she was startled to find a pair of people in suits standing outside. One man and one woman, both looked like either officials of some sort, or religious annoyances. Neither was welcome.

“Carol Dallon?” the man asked.

“Yes,” she replied a little sharply. “And you are?”

He held out a wallet, open to show an ID badge. “Special Agent Able, FBI. This is Special Agent Baker. We would like to discuss a few things with you.” As she was gaping at him, he added, “Inside, I think.”

After pulling herself together, she examined the ID very closely. It was definitely real, she was certain of that, having seen enough of them over the years. “What’s this about?” she asked suspiciously.

“I cannot divulge that information except in private, ma’am,” he replied without changing expression. Behind him, the woman, a red-head with intelligent eyes who was watching Carol silently, glanced to either side, then went back to watching her.

“Do you have a warrant?” she demanded.

“This is not a matter that requires a warrant, ma’am. May we come in? I can explain once we’re not standing on your doorstep.”

Carol stared at the pair, then eventually sighed and stepped to the side. Both entered and she closed the door behind them, wondering what the hell was going on and not pleased about the interruption.

Chapter Text

“Status report, Overwatch.”

“Targets ten kilometers out from drop zone, Strike Leader. No indications of deviation from expected behavior. Orbit drop zone until targets optimally placed. Weapon release has been authorized.”

“Roger, Overwatch. Orbiting drop zone awaiting final release command.”

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

The bus rumbled along the road, the occupants busying themselves with various activities. Hatchetface was right at the back, while the others were near the front of the stolen vehicle. Jack was driving while Manton followed in his beaten up van about half a kilometer back. Crawler, who barely fitted into the middle of the vehicle with a number of seats ripped out, was grumbling about something or other which everyone else was as usual ignoring.

Bonesaw was humming to herself as she played cards with a pair of her spiderbots, with Shatterbird sitting next to the girl reading a book and occasionally looking at her. Mannequin was in a seat on the other side of the bus working on one of his legs, which he’d detached and had half-disassembled next to him.

The Siberian was relaxing in a seat behind Bonesaw, apparently content to watch the world pass by outside.

“Are we nearly there yet?” Riley called without looking away from her cards. “Ooh, two pair!” She slapped the cards down and the spiderbots somehow seemed annoyed.

“Nearly, poppet,” Jack called back, smiling a little. He peered through the dirty windscreen, the dust from the Nevada desert coating it in a yellow haze. “About a kilometer to go and we can stop and have some fun.”

“Yay, fun!” Bonesaw bounced in her seat. Shatterbird sighed a little and turned the page. “We haven’t had fun for days!”

“Soon, love. It’s a little place, but I think it will be amusing. And we can get something to eat as well.”

“I could go for a burger,” Shatterbird commented. “I’m starving.”

“So am I,” Crawler rumbled from behind them.

“You’re always hungry,” she snapped.

“So?”

“So stop grumbling,” the woman replied with a sigh.
“Hey, I just said I was hungry,” the monstrous cape retorted, sounding hurt.

Shaking her head she put her book down and leaned forward to look out the windscreen. The lowering sun reflected off the windows of a couple of ramshackle buildings coming into sight around the curve of the road as they descended the slight hill and entered a small valley.

“Where the hell are we anyway?” she queried.

“About half way between Jackpot and Owyhee, according to the GPS,” Jack replied, glancing at the instrument on the dashboard. “Or in other words the middle of nowhere. An ideal little place for a rest.”

“Why do we have to take these stupid back roads?” she complained. “My back is killing me. This is nothing but gravel.”

“We can hardly drive down the interstate, now, can we?” he said with a smile and a look back over his shoulder. “Far too much trouble. All those interfering people who get in the way… Better to be discreet until such time as we wish to announce ourselves, in my view.”

She looked out the back window past the snoozing form of Hatchetface in the rear seat at the cloud of dust following them, and another one a few hundred meters away from the smaller van on their trail. “This is boring,” she sighed.

“Well, we’re here, so perhaps we can make it less boring now,” he remarked, turning off the dirt road into the parking lot of what seemed to be a combined diner and gas station. A couple of rusty trucks were parked off to one side, absolutely covered in dust and giving the impression of being abandoned.

Looking out the window, Shatterbird frowned doubtfully. “This place is a dump. Are you sure there’s even anyone here?”

Jack killed the engine then turned around in his seat. He waved at the building. “I can see lights inside, and the signs are all on, so I’m going with yes,” he chuckled. “Let’s go and introduce ourselves. Someone go and poke Hatchet Face, his snoring is irritating.”

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Targets in drop zone. Both vehicles parked, occupants entering location alpha. Stand by.”

“Roger, Overwatch.”

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Where is everyone?” Bonesaw looked around the diner. It seemed normal, with the smell of food filling the large room, like someone had been cooking fairly recently, but no one seemed to be around.

Jack was frowning slightly. “I’m not sure,” he admitted. Lifting the service flap he went behind the counter and peered into the kitchen. “Yoo hoo! Customers! Anyone here?”

Disappearing into the kitchen while the rest of them spread out, he finally reappeared with an unsatisfied expression on his face. “How strange. The fridge is full of food, everything looks normal, but there’s no one there.”

“No one in the back office either,” Hatchet face reported as he returned.

“Weird.” Shatterbird turned on the spot. “Did they somehow know we were coming?”

“I can’t see how, we didn’t know for sure we were heading this way until this morning,” Jack remarked, looking thoughtfully at the till. He idly pulled a can of coke out of the fridge under the counter and popped the tab, taking a sip, then tossing Riley one when she seemed hopeful. “I don’t like this.”

“Maybe we should look around some more,” Crawler, who was looking in through the doorway being too large to fit properly, said. “I can smell people around here somewhere. It’s faint, but...”

After a little thought, Jack shrugged. “Might as well. If they’re hiding, we’ll find them sooner or later. I really want a steak and I don’t want to cook it.”

He tapped the relevant key on the till and looked at the contents of the cash drawer when it popped open. “Still full of money,” he added, helping himself. “So they can’t have gone far, I think.”

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Strike Leader, final authorization confirmed. Release first package on location alpha.”

“Copy release command. Package away.”

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Twenty kilometers up and thirty downrange, a small machine separated from a considerably larger one cruising in a huge circle centered on the tiny town of Gudge, Nevada. A town that had less than sixty permanent inhabitants, all of whom had been hastily evacuated only two hours earlier.

The small machine orientated itself in under a second, waited until it was two hundred meters from its parent craft, then accelerated hard.

Two and a half seconds later it penetrated the roof of Gwen’s Dine and Gas, moving at more than ten times the speed of sound. One and a half meters from the floor the payload activated.

An artificially generated gravitational field instantly sprang into life, exerting a force of nearly fifty thousand g over a zone more than two hundred meters in radius. Everything in that zone was pulled towards the center at over four hundred and ninety kilometers per second squared, the entire spherical zone collapsing into nearly degenerate matter almost instantly. It happened so quickly that to the outside observer it was as if a crater close to half a kilometer across and a quarter deep simply appeared in the ground.

The machine burned out in less than thirty milliseconds, the field collapsing immediately and allowing the device generating it to be destroyed. As the gravitational pull vanished the infalling material, heated far past its vaporization temperature by the sheer kinetic energy alone and moving at nearly fifteen kilometers per second, flashed brilliantly outwards again in a vast explosion that flattened everything within multiple kilometers and roared up the slopes of the small mountains surrounding the valley the town had been built in. Rising hot air from the enormous release of energy created a huge mushroom cloud that roiled high into the atmosphere over the next few minutes, the inflowing air at ground level pulling the fire and smoke caused by the release of thermal energy into the plume along with the vaporized remains of everything that had constituted the town, and the targets of the experimental weapon.

When the effects finally subsided, nothing was left but an enormous hole where a small collection of buildings had once been, with a couple of streams slowly starting to fill it with water which hissed and steamed over the torn, hot rock. No trees were left standing for kilometers, but the damage was mostly limited to the valley itself, the mountains having provided a safety barrier that limited the destruction to an acceptable level.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Confirmed hit, Overwatch. Target neutralized.”

“Roger, Strike Leader. Mission successful. Return to base for debrief.”

“Roger, Overwatch. Strike Leader out.”

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Secretary Robinson smiled grimly as he examined the satellite feed. “Excellent work, everyone. Now if only the PRT had done their job, we wouldn’t have had to buy out an entire town. Still, it’s a relatively minor cost all things considered.” He turned to the man standing next to him who was watching with a neutral expression.

“I think that counts as a concrete result from our friend’s work, Sir” he added with a slight chuckle.

“I would have to agree on that point,” the President of the US replied soberly. “A somewhat terrifying one as well.”

“No residual radiation worth speaking of, very little outside damage, and no chance of biological contamination,” Robinson noted. “The heat of the detonation is far too high for anything to live through it. Unfortunately, scaling up the same weapon to deal with something like Ellisburg would be… impractical. We’ll need a different approach in such cases.”

“Let me know what you come up with,” the other man said quietly, still looking at the huge screen displaying what happened when cutting edge superscience was deployed in anger. He shivered a little.

All that from one teenaged girl’s work.

He was damn glad she was on their side...

Chapter Text

The distant stars and galaxies shone steadily in the absolute black and cold nothingness surrounding her. Only fragile metal, plastic, and ceramic separated her from a quick death, but in that saving condemned her to a much slower and more drawn out fate.

For a moment she wondered fatalistically if perhaps it would be better to accept quick and relatively painless over slow and horrible.

But it wasn't in her to just give up. Not even in circumstances where almost all would accept that no hope was left. Such circumstances as here, and now. Where multiple unlikely paths all converged into one unassailable fact; she was utterly alone, and without any realistic chance of saving herself, or having anyone else save her.

She knew that. Knew that she was going to die, knew that all her efforts to survive were at best prolonging the inevitable and possibly even making the end, when it came, worse than giving in and allowing fate to do what it intended.

But she simply didn't have the sort of mind that would stop trying to work out some way, some infinitesimally tiny possibility, that might save her.

So she kept working. Kept wracking her mind for a miracle, going over everything she knew about science and technology, every trick she'd ever learned or seen or thought of, just to stretch her existence that little bit further. And so far, she had managed to pull off what practically everyone else she'd ever met would have considered impossible.

But there were limits. Points beyond which even her abilities and knowledge, and indeed luck, would finally run out.

That didn't mean that she was going to stop before the uncaring universe forced her to, though. No, she would meet her final fate with a toolkit to hand and a glare of annoyance in her eyes. As her father would have expected, and as she intended.

Her brief meal break over, Tali'zorah made a rude gesture to the distant unblinking gaze of the stars reflecting dully off the fragmented hull of her ship and got back to work.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Fucking Batarians,” the young woman swore as she pulled herself underneath what was left of the starboard secondary fusion reactor containment housing. “I’d like to kill the lot of them. They make the Geth look nice.” Reaching out she fumbled around with one hand at her waist until she found the tool she was after then used it to unbolt an access cover that wasn’t ever supposed to be removed except in a shipyard. It was only the fact that she was very slender and not all that tall that allowed her to wriggle into such a confined space. Under normal circumstances the entire reactor would have been removed to get at this section.

Luckily, she thought with black humor, the last shot by that damned slaver asshole had literally bent the ship enough that the second engineering deck was distorted by a few centimeters, opening up the gap under the reactor a little and making it feasible to squeeze in and get at this section. Removing bolts one at a time she ignored, although somewhat uneasily, the slowly and steadily increasing chirping sound of her omnitool warning about the secondary radiation leaking around the cover. Under the circumstances, a risk of long term radiation poisoning was very low indeed on her list of priorities. But it was a sound that she was conditioned to take very seriously so it was hard to pretend it wasn’t happening despite her logic. Each fastener she took out she stuck to a magnetic parts tray that was attached to the reactor housing next to her. In zero g they’d otherwise float around and as sure as Batarians were worthless scum end up somewhere critical at the worse possible moment.

Eventually she’d removed all the fasteners and put the tool back into her tool belt. She reached up and put her gloved fingers into the recesses in the plate that was only ten centimeters from her helmet before heaving on it with a grunt and managing to get it to shift a little. She swore viciously at the thing, wiggling it back and forth a couple of times, until it abruptly freed up and rotated a third of a turn. Carefully pulling it out, she flinched as the chirping got really far more enthusiastic than was safe.

Tali shifted the cover to the side and used another magnet to attach it out of the way, then moved her head around to get her helmet light into the right place to inspect the fusion initiator laser assembly she was after. With some relief she saw it appeared undamaged. It took her another half hour to remove it and disconnect the various cables and pipes, but in the end she had the device along with the necessary associated parts in a bag that was floating next to her, tethered to her belt with a strap. She replaced the cover more to stop the alarm irritating her than for any other reason, although her inner engineer was also pushing her to make the job neat.

When she finally finished she made sure all her tools were in place then slid out from under the wrecked reactor, making sure she didn’t catch her environment suit on anything sharp. Finally safe, she pulled herself across the engineering deck using the line she’d rigged a few days earlier and left the compartment.

She wondered if the radiation dose she’d received was something she needed to worry about any time soon. It still didn’t really seem that important so she didn’t bother working it out.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Four full days of very hard work later, she inspected the results of her efforts. The machine in front of her was a horrible mashup of half a dozen systems that should never have had something so ghastly done to them, but in theory it stood a chance of working.

Maybe.

Or it might just explode, which at least would give her a quick and painless end…

Tali went over her calculations several more times almost obsessively, checking various instruments she applied to parts of the machine’s control circuits. Eventually she couldn’t find anything else to worry about and all that really remained was to see if it would function.

Holding her breath, she opened the main fuel bleed valve just a tiny amount, waiting as the premix bled into the chamber, then closed it again when her omnitool which was monitoring the process indicated she had enough deuterium present. Turning to a console constructed out of wreckage she’d salvaged from the weapons controls she plugged a connector in, linking one of the last fully charged batteries to the power bus. Sparks flew oddly in the zero g environment, bouncing off the floor and walls and dimming more slowly than normal due to the lack of air to cool and oxidize the glowing material. She ignored the fireworks display in favor of watching displays come to life.

“So far so good,” she muttered. “Not dead yet, which is nice.”

Reaching out she tapped a few controls, studied the results, then ran a final functional test on the cobbled together mass of hardware. Nothing jumped out at her as being instantly lethal so in the end she shrugged and hit the ignition button.

Virtual gauges jumped wildly and the small compartment shook around her as the entire machine flexed under the stress of the enormous magnetic field that resulted from the coils firing up. She watched a little nervously as the flux density readings climbed rapidly, glancing at the entirely untested and improvised fusion reactor she’d built from parts of two others, a large chunk of the mass accelerator cannon, the remains of one of the point defense laser generators, and quite a few other bits and pieces that were entirely and absolutely not intended for this purpose.

In her head it should work. In reality…?

Only a few seconds later the field density hit the critical point and the ignition laser fired, the power readings on the battery dipping sharply as it drained electricity like it was a Krogan at a bar on someone else’s tab. She knew she had only a couple of shots at this, because without any way to recharge the batteries without a working reactor and no nearby star for photovoltaic collectors to work, when they were dead so was she.

She watched intently as the displays changed. Temperatures inside her little reactor jumped enormously, a bright light shining through the small inspection port like a lightning strike. The power output graph spiked, then reduced, dropping back to a level that showed the ignition had failed.

“No, no, no,” she mumbled, quickly operating the console and changing parameters more by feel than anything else. The temperature in the reactor kept dropping from the momentary near-ignition, making her nervously chew her lip. Reaching out without looking she opened the bleed valve again, let it run for a moment until she felt it was right, and slammed it closed. With her other hand she hit the manual laser fire control. “Come on, work with me here, will you?”

All the graphs jumped again, as another brilliant pulse of light speared out across the compartment, casting a circle of white on the far wall. She held her breath, then instinctively twitched the valve open and close almost too fast to notice. Hitting the ignition control one last time she watched the battery power reading drop to under ten percent.

The pulse of light from the inspection port flickered, dimmed, then brightened. One graph started to rise, then another. The automatic fuel feed system indicated positive flow while the neutron counter jumped halfway across the screen.

Tali stared at the console in disbelief, before taking a deep breath.

“I did it!” she screamed in joy. “You bosh’tets thought you’d killed me, but I’m still here!”

She smiled widely as the graphs settled down, showing a steady output from the reactor. It was only producing about half a megawatt, nowhere near enough to run the main drive, but that didn’t matter as she didn’t have a main drive. She had bits of one, but that wasn’t going to help all that much. On the other hand, she now had more than enough power to get a reasonable level of life support up and running in the small section of the ship that could still hold air, and if she could fix it, get some gravity working.

After that, she was going to have a shower and try to work out what her next move was.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Three weeks passed as she tried to figure that out. In that time she managed to get the artificial gravity functional in the half dozen compartments she was able to seal well enough to hold pressure, fix the air processor so she wouldn’t suffocate, sterilize the entire area with hard UV just in case anything had survived the vacuum up until that point, and take a more thorough inventory of what she had to work with.

It wasn’t much.

When the Batarians, who she would happily strangle with their own intestines, had finished shooting, the ship she’d been traveling on was lucky to not have simply exploded. The eezo core had shut down just in time to avoid a catastrophic destabilization event, but there was no way to restart it seeing as how quite a lot of it was floating around somewhere in space. She could look outside and see little glittering fragments of hull and machinery following the crippled ship, but most of them were too damaged to be usable and too risky to even attempt to salvage.

All four fusion drives were damaged so badly that she wasn’t sure she could gather enough of them to improvise a working one out of the parts, although she’d gone out on a tether and had a look to make sure. Two of them were missing the entire thrust assembly, another had a large part of the reaction chamber not present, and the fourth one was so badly twisted it was clearly a minor miracle it hadn’t torn off the hull entirely.

On the up side, she had enough fuel slurry left in the port tank to run her little reactor for decades, and more than enough water and oxygen to survive for several years. The food supply was a little more problematic, as there was much less of the right chirality for her species to live on, but if she was careful and didn’t mind the occasional bout of severe intestinal upset she could stretch that out with judicious mixing of the levo organics with the usable dextro ones.

Unlike how some popular stories on the Extranet had it, Quarians could eat small amounts of levo-chirality food, but it wasn’t digestible as such. The minerals and inorganic parts were fine, of course, and some of the organic molecules didn’t cause problems, but much of the rest basically went straight through. It wasn’t toxic, it was just useless. The results tended to be both uncomfortable and antisocial. And in the long term lead to starvation.

But under these circumstances she’d risk it and live with the consequences. It wasn’t like there was anyone else around to complain…

Briefly wishing that her former shipmates had included a couple of Turians as they’d have had the right food, even though most Turian food was pretty awful, she sighed and kept thinking. And being pleased that she wasn’t a Turian as they had much more severe side effects from levo food. To the point that if you really didn’t like a Turian sneaking a little levo sugar into his drink was an exceptionally impressive way to upset him and anyone else in the vicinity.

Lying on her bunk with her helmet off but right next to her just in case she needed to grab it, Tali worked on her omnitool, looking at the list of resources she’d built up and comparing them to every idea she could come up with for arranging a rescue, or failing that just some way to live longer. The more time she had to live, the longer she had to figure out how to get out of this. Assuming it was actually possible.

“Another ship might pass by and offer help,” she mumbled, before laughing bitterly. Yeah. Right. Out here, over a light year from the nearest Relay on a heading that had her drifting away from any system even a fully working ship would take thirty years to reach at FTL speeds? No chance.

“I really really really hate Batarians,” she grumbled as she scrolled through the list of assets, hoping for inspiration to strike. “So much.”

The young woman kept working for many hours, until she finally was forced to sleep.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Tali’s eyes snapped open in the dark, the dream she’d been having wavering on the edge of recall. Her thoughts were a little confused but she reached for her omnitool and opened a document with a reflexive motion, then typed frantically on the virtual keyboard, trying to get a record of what she’d thought of before it faded.

A few minutes later she stopped, her eyes burning from avoiding blinking for so long. She dropped her head back onto the bunk and put her hands over them, listening to the broken ship creak and groan around her, odd sounds echoing through the structure as stresses relieved themselves even this long after the attack.

“What the hell was I dreaming about?” she mumbled through her fingers. “That levo shit is really not good for my mind.”

Eventually she sat up and reached for a bulb of water, squeezing most of it into her mouth and swallowing several times. Bringing the document up she read through the partially incoherent stream of consciousness, trying to work out what on Rannoch she’d been thinking about. Her eyes narrowed, then widened, then narrowed again. A wild surmise took root in her mind.

“That...” Pausing, she reread a couple of paragraphs, then looked across the compartment at the far wall as she thought hard. “That might actually work...”

Pondering the idea she added after a few minutes, “Although I don’t know if it will help. But it’s not like there’s anything else I can try.”

It was an entirely off the wall idea, but she could see a glimmering of something in it. And the tiniest speck of hope lurking deep inside that glimmering.

So she got up, ate, put her helmet on, and headed aft to see if she could retrieve the materials and parts she’d need.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

It took her nearly eight days to build the thing she’d invented in a burst of desperate insight. Salvaging enough eezo from the severely damaged drive core had been a rather nerve-wracking operation, but she’d managed it without killing herself. Much of the work had been coming up with a way to contain the vast mechanical forces that were a likely outcome of this experiment. Making sure it was sufficiently well isolated from the structure of the ship, both physically and electrically, was also tricky, but she was able to improvise vibration dampers and insulators that should, in theory, be up to the job.

Assuming it didn’t blow the moment she applied power, it might actually work. Whether, even if it did work, it would help, she wasn’t certain. But it at least gave her something to do.

At the moment that was a net benefit. Losing hope and giving up would mean the end was that much closer.

Making the last connection to the power supply Tali nodded in satisfaction. She knelt on the deck examining the results of her labor. A small by ship terms, but worryingly large by any other common sense usage, amount of eezo was suspended in the center of the machine. A series of control coils and actuators surrounded it, along with some very heavy power leads that attached to the odd-shaped chunk of slightly glowing metamaterial. She’d had a difficult time calculating the right proportions to make the thing, which was nothing like the normally spherical eezo cores used in ship drives.

This thing was not a drive. Nor was it anything like any other applications she’d come across before.

What it was, was a controlled superluminal gravitic wave generator.

In theory.

Her leap of insight had suggested that very carefully energizing a correctly shaped piece of eezo with the right frequency of alternating current could, possibly, rather than simply exploding with the fury of a thousand suns as common belief suggested, instead create a fluctuating gravitational distortion field that would propagate at faster than light speeds. It would, again in theory, do something related to how a Mass Relay was suspected to work, but for energy not matter.

FTL comms buoys did something vaguely similar with laser beams channeled through a mass effect field, but they required very careful alignment and most of the complexity of the things was maintaining that alignment. The tiniest miscalibration and they entirely failed to work. It was only the space-warping nature of a mass effect field that allowed them to function at all, as without it not only would they be relegated to the speed of light, rendering them useless for interstellar communications, but there would be no possible way to get them to point at each other accurately enough in any case.

This device was both more and less technically advanced. Less because it didn’t have all the processing and delicate positioning hardware and software, along with the extremely complex field generation equipment required. More because it did something that as far as she knew no one else had ever tried, or even considered. It was somewhat brute force, admittedly, as well as so inefficient it was probably taking an order of magnitude more energy to work than it needed, but she wasn’t exactly spoiled for choice in what she could build with the resources on hand.

A half-wrecked Salarian survey ship had a lot of stuff on it, true, but there was only one of her and a lot of the remaining hardware was extremely bashed about.

She stood up and walked around the machine, checking it over carefully. It had the possibility of going rather unpleasantly wrong considering the amount of energy that she was going to be using, and she had no intention of that happening if she could avoid it. Making a few adjustments then testing every connection one final time, she nodded and left the compartment, heading for the other end of the ship where her living quarters were.

Twenty minutes later she was sitting in front of a couple of holoscreens she’d pulled out of the wreckage of the bridge. One of them was showing a number of different views of her machine, the other was the terminal into the computer running the thing.

She typed a few commands, checking the results of the diagnostics, then prodded the final control. Three hundred meters away power flowed into her invention. Blue light glowed intensely as the eezo was energized with a complex waveform, entirely against all common sense and normal practice.

People used DC on eezo. That was how it worked. And if you got the polarity wrong you tended to very briefly regret it. No one was mad enough to apply AC if they’d ever read any of the research results on doing such an idiotic thing.

Holding her breath, the young Quarian watched with worried interest as the glow brightened. She could feel a deep vibration running through the decking under her feet, and see the entire machine visibly vibrating. As she cautiously increased the power flowing into it, the vibrations intensified, the glow starting to shift into a deep purple color rather than the normal sapphire blue.

She stopped and stared, fascinated by the effect, then shrugged slightly and kept winding the power up until she reached the level she’d calculated would be optimal. Assuming her dream wasn’t trying to kill her, of course.

Nothing fell apart, or exploded, or fell apart then exploded, and after a few tense minutes she relaxed just a little. “That’s the first part done,” she commented to herself, having fallen into the habit of self-narration due to a lack of anyone else to talk to for the preceding nearly two months. “Now for part two...”

Bringing up another display she fiddled with the program, then ran it. The computer applied a modulation to the core drive frequency. If she was right, it was now acting as an omnidirectional transmitter of ripples in space-time that would propagate at superluminal speeds. With some luck, when those ripples reached the nearest gravity wave detector, such as those the Salarians used for research into black holes, it might be sufficiently obvious that someone would notice. And with a little more luck, they might be able to triangulate on the source.

If she had enough luck on her side, someone would investigate that source. And find her.

Hopefully still alive, and sometime before she got so old she wouldn’t be able to enjoy the rescue.

The problem was that she had no idea how fast the ripples would propagate, aside from ‘at more than c,’ so she might be in for a long wait. The nearest location she was aware of that might be able to detect her signal was probably a good thousand light years away, so she could only hope that more than c was quite a bit more than c.

Now all she could do was wait.

The machine kept running, sympathetic vibrations in the hull pulsing out a standard distress signal via very non-standard methods, the deep rumble making her entire body tingle slightly. Even from here she could feel the variations in gravity caused by the eezo resonating. Up close it would be quite dangerous, possibly even lethal, so she wasn’t going to go and look at it in person as long as it was in operation. The weird color also suggested that there might well be an unhealthy amount of radiation being emitted, excited by the unusual drive mechanism.

After a while when everything seemed to be stable, more than a little to her surprise, Tali moved to her bunk and lay down, used her omnitool for a while to make notes on her work just in case she ever got to show them to someone, then closed her eyes and took a nap. She was very tired after working nearly constantly for over a week and felt a rest was justified.

She slept for more than twenty hours straight.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

A very long away in more senses than normal, another young woman looked at her instruments and frowned curiously. “Huh,” she muttered, leaning closer to the subspace monitoring system. “What on earth is that?”

She looked to the side at another display, studying the graphs present there. Moving the mouse she clicked through a whole series of pages of data with considerable interest.

“No, I’ve never seen anything like this before either,” she said to the air. “I know. Weird, right?”

One of the many monitors around the basement workshop displayed a series of extremely complex glyphs, along with a couple of multidimensional moving graphics that wavered oddly in rainbow colors. Taylor looked at all this and nodded slowly. “Yeah… That might be worth trying...”

Pulling some spare equipment out of a drawer under her bench, she began assembling a new piece of instrumentation, carrying on a one sided conversation and occasionally stopping to scribble notes on mathematical theory that would have made almost every physicist on the planet stare in horror then go and have a little lie down. Whistling faintly, the girl kept working late into the night, as it was Friday and she could sleep in the next day.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Tali spent the next couple of days wandering around the parts of the ship she’d not so far investigated due to the damage, finding that she couldn’t sit still for more than a few hours. She made a lot of trips through very dangerous and obstacle-strewn wreckage, managing to salvage half a dozen working omnitools, some more food, lots of random parts that might come in handy, another battery from what remained of the science deck, and a few other useful things. She also found two more bodies, badly damaged and almost unrecognizable.

The first one had made her stop dead then close her eyes. She’d liked Kenra, the Asari maiden was very funny and full of life. Unable to retrieve the body of her friend, and having no way to do anything with it anyway, she finally left that compartment and welded the door shut behind her. The second corpse was so badly torn up she could only tell it was that of a Salarian, one of the technical crew most likely, but that was about all she could discern.

Thinking very black thoughts about what she’d do to the next Batarian she saw she’d returned to her living space and collapsed on the bunk, dropping the bag of parts next to it without a second thought. It had taken her several hours to recover to the point she could get on with doing anything other than moping and mourning.

Eventually, though, her normal optimistic nature, as strained as it was these days, reasserted itself enough to make her go back to inventorying what she’d recovered and trying to figure out if anything would help her current plight. Unfortunately there was no miracle to be found, but the parts and tools were useful resources if nothing else.

She sorted everything out and put it away, adding each item to her growing list so she could find it later. There was, after all, nothing much else to do except wait and see what happened.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“OK, let’s see…” Taylor checked over her work very carefully with a number of esoteric instruments of her own design. “Odd variation on subspace comms. It’s really inefficient, worse than yours was,” she added, glancing to the side with a smile, then returning her attention to the machine she had built. “Almost like the subspace aspect isn’t the desired effect...” She pondered the mystery for a few seconds, made a couple of notes, and went back to checking various test points.

“...and the modified tesseract coil is resonating nicely,” she finished a few minutes later, ticking off the last item on the list. “Great. Let’s see what happens.”

Plugging the cables into the computer she’d set up for the job, she ran the interface and decoding program, then when the main display window was running, started very carefully tuning half a dozen components inside the machine’s open top cover with a couple of ceramic tools. Strange interference patterns in the circuitry intermittently combined to produce an audible sub-bass hum which made tools rattle on the bench. The computer chirped a couple of times as it found hints of the signal she was after, displaying a colorful waterfall graph that slowly moved down the screen.

Glancing at it every now and then, she fine tuned one of the controls. A flicker of motion on the monitor made her look at it, only to see the same graph with a few peaks showing up in brighter colors. “Weird. Could have sworn I saw a lizard there for a second,” she mumbled, lifting an eyebrow at the display and peering at it, then shrugging. “No idea why.” Returning her attention to the machinery, she kept tweaking the various adjustment points while checking the outcome of her actions on several other meters and a pair of oscilloscopes, until she finally sat back and nodded.

“That should be about right,” she commented with a smile. “Now let’s hear what it is.”

Clicking on another program, she watched the monitor for a few seconds, then altered a couple of parameters slightly. Satisfied, she turned up the volume on the audio amplifier she’d hooked up to the system. A repetitive weebling sound filled the basement, with a burst of high frequency noise occurring on each cycle. She cocked her head and listened carefully.

“That is a frequency shift keyed data burst on an audio carrier,” she finally said. “Low data rate, maybe phase keying too? Huh. Interesting...”

The girl looked to the side. “Distress call? Yeah, that’s certainly possible. I wonder what it’s saying.”

After a moment’s thought, she added, “And where it’s coming from...”

It took her another hour of work before she’d added enough hardware and software to answer the second question at least.

“Well, now. Isn’t that fascinating?” she muttered softly, looking at another display. It was showing an image of space that NASA would have killed for. And a tiny blinking dot way the hell out of range of anything that would pass as a star system. A very, very long way from her too. Not only from the point of sheer distance…

“I wonder if whoever that is knows their beacon is sending across dimensions as well as space?” she remarked with a thoughtful expression. After a while, having thought very carefully about the problem, Taylor started building some more hardware.

Talking back was going to be the interesting part.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“What the...” Tali jolted awake, then lay staring at the ceiling of her compartment as she tried to work out why that had happened. She listened very carefully, as strange sounds were often the first indication that something was going wrong, a bit of knowledge that her people had ingrained into them from the moment they were old enough to talk. She couldn’t hear anything amiss at first. The faint hiss of the air processor doing its job, fans almost silently whirring somewhere in a duct, the basso rumble of her gravitic beacon steadily shaking the very fabric of space-time… nothing seemed different to what she’d grown to expect.

Still… There was something not quite right. She was sure of that, for reasons that she couldn’t put into words. Something had changed.

After a few minutes she got up and went over to the control console she’d built, then checked the cameras monitoring her reactor and the gravity wave generator. There didn’t appear to be any changes to either. The reactor was happily fusing away and making electricity, not a flicker of variation in the output to indicate any potential problems, which genuinely surprised her considering how much of a gash job it was. The beacon was still glowing that weird violet color and sucking most of the available energy that the reactor produced, pushing it off somewhere she was still a little hazy on even having thought about it for weeks. Neither machine seemed to be showing any issues.

So why did she have an instinctive sense that something, somewhere, had changed?

A thought struck her and she quickly checked all her other monitoring systems, including the ones she’d modified a couple of spare omnitools to build. There was no sign of a ship in the vicinity, which made her relax a little even as it saddened her. Nothing else seemed to indicate the broken vessel she was in breaking any further, no interstellar meteor had passed by or even hit her… Nothing seemed to have changed at all.

Tali knelt on the deck and put her hands on it, feeling the vibrations resonating through the hull and concentrating on them. Several seconds passed until she twitched in surprise. “Keelah...” she breathed. “There’s another source! That’s not the fundamental, something’s mixing with it.” She was certain she could feel something very subtle, almost too faint to detect, intermittently altering the gravitic waveform passing through the material of the ship and producing macroscopic effects perceptible to a living being.

Lying full length on the deck she pressed her forehead to the floor and concentrated. Nearly five minutes later she jumped to her feet. “It’s real! And it’s getting stronger...”

Rushing over to her cobbled together control system she sat and frantically began checking the program running the beacon, first to eliminate some instability in that as the source, which she quickly did, then in an attempt to work out what in the name of her ancestors was causing it.

Lacking any real scientific instrumentation that was capable of monitoring gravitic waves to the level needed, she mostly found herself looking at the mechanical load sensors and power detectors surrounding the eezo mass at the center of her beacon. Sure enough, both types of system were showing a small but growing variation in the operation of the device, something her program hadn’t alerted her to as she hadn’t written it that specific way. Until the vibrations grew large enough to become a problem her software would have ignored them and this particular whatever it was seemed to be too low level to show up as such. Staring at the graphs she tried to work out what might be causing it.

A resonance in the mechanism was easily dismissed as a possibility, as were instabilities in the power feed, carrier generator, or modulation system. Everything there was working exactly as she’d designed it and as it had been for days now. But something was causing an unexpected change to the core operation of her machine, and she had no idea what.

However a growing part of her mind was prodding her that it wasn’t an accident…

Trying not to let hope distort her thinking, Tali studied the secondary signal that seemed to be superimposing itself on the modulation, and steadily increasing in level, as if something or more intriguingly someone was gradually narrowing in on her transmission with some sort of reply. It should have been impossible, she had no idea how you could use her machine as a two way comms system, but she couldn’t ignore the possibility.

Maybe the Salarians knew more about gravity than she did. That seemed almost certain, in fact, and she couldn’t think of anyone else who might be able to do whatever was happening.

She watched the instruments as the signal that was returning from her beacon steadily grew, in little fits and starts as if it was being locked in on from somewhere, while rummaging through her pile of spare parts and designing a better method of detecting and handling whatever it was that was behind all this. A few hours later, the signal had peaked and was holding steady, and she had a collection of repurposed hardware connected to the modulation generator and the sensor signals. Tali spent a while tweaking a program that calculated the difference between what her system was producing and what she was detecting, until she finally stared at the results then hopped up and down in her chair.

“Yes! It’s really there, and it’s an actual signal! That’s not random noise, it’s data!” She leaned forward, nearly burying her nose in the holoscreen. “But what is it?”

After thinking it through for a long time, while watching how the return signal varied when she experimentally changed the modulation signal, she threw common sense out the airlock and connected one of the omnitool imaging systems to the modulator. Programming it for the simplest video signal with audio carrier she knew of, a truly ancient completely analog method that her people had used centuries ago, she turned it on and watched to see what would happen next...

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Aha… That’s more like it,” Taylor said softly, smiling as she inspected the changes to the subspace signal she was exploring. “Let’s see… yeah, definitely a high definition analog video signal, pretty simple really, so I just need to get the frame and line syncs running like this...”

She made a couple of changes to the decoder software and looked to the side at the display showing the output of the system, nodding when it settled down to a rectangular pattern filled with multicolored noise. “OK. Frame locked up properly, now demodulate the video carrier, map it to… looks like something pretty close to normal YUV color, let’s try that… luminance values are inverted for some reason… Got it!”

The girl smiled as the picture suddenly flickered into showing a view of… someone.

Taylor studied the image with enormous interest. The slightly glowing eyes set into a face that was close to human but sufficiently different to make it obvious it wasn’t was fascinating, but what was behind the person looking slightly down and to the left was even more so. She inspected everything she could see, spotting any number of clues that led her to only one conclusion…

“An alien, complete with an alien spacecraft,” she mused out loud. Nodding to an unheard question, she added, “Yeah, and a broken alien spacecraft at that. I would guess that’s the reason for the beacon thingy. Lost in space, bereft of hope for a rescue, our plucky hero scrapes together a method to attract attention.” She smiled a little, then peered more closely at the image. “Or is it heroine? Hmm...”

The alien was apparently studying something at their own end, looking down and left, and Taylor could see their arms moving as if they were typing on something like a keyboard. She could also see ample evidence that pretty much everything in view was damaged, or improvised out of things that weren’t meant to do what they were being used for, with wires and optical cables strung rather haphazardly around the room behind the figure on screen.

Inspecting the alien, she decided that going by human standards it was probably she rather than he, and quite young. On the other hand that was entirely a subjective impression and possibly the person was actually a six hundred year crotchety old man or something. Snickering at her own thoughts, she turned back to the decoded program and fiddled with it for a while, getting the audio subcarrier working as well. Sounds abruptly came to life to go with the image.

Hums, a clicking sound in the background, several different intermittent chirping noises that sounded like annunciators from a computer program, what was certainly the sound of fans running, all filled her workshop, being broadcast from a vast distance away. Under that was the sound of a voice mumbling to itself in a completely unknown languages, which corresponded to the mouth movements of her new alien friend.

Even if she couldn’t understand the language, she could understand the tone perfectly.

The alien was working hard and trying to figure something out, while improvising technology from parts available. That was something she had no trouble at all recognizing.

“So far so good,” Taylor nodded to herself. “Now lets see if I can talk back...”

It didn’t take her long to rewrite the software decoder to make it bidirectional. When she was sure it was working she linked it into a spare camera, adjusted the device to point at her, looked around quickly to make sure that nothing she didn’t want visible was, then clicked the relevant icon and waited patiently.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Watching the output of her instruments, Tali stiffened when the incoming signal stopped, then a few minutes later started up again, this time with a modulation format she recognized with a shock. It was exactly the same as her outgoing transmission. Whoever it was had worked out what she was sending in a remarkably short period of time and was apparently responding in kind.

With a slightly shaking hand she looked at the imager, wondering who was seeing her through it, then quickly set things up to decode and display the incoming video signal. Only a couple of minutes later the image jumped into life, twitching a couple of times until her software locked properly, then stabilized. She stared at the picture in shock.

‘A pink Asari?’ she thought in bemusement. That was about as close as she could come to describing the person looking at her. The resemblance was uncanny, although the longer she looked the more differences she spotted. Asari didn’t have hair or fur on their heads, for a start, the eyes were subtly wrong, and the color was obviously entirely off. And what she could see in the background of the transmission was nothing at all that she recognized, other than in broad strokes.

The conclusion was unmistakable; She’d somehow managed to contact an alien species no one knew about.

First Contact. By her. By accident.

She nearly laughed. The entire thing was so ridiculous it belonged in an Extranet story, one of the ones everyone giggled about due to the lack of realism.

Still, there was no denying she was looking at someone from a species she’d never heard of, who was looking back and seemed oddly unsurprised. Experimentally she raised a hand and made a friendly gesture, which made the alien smile, something she hoped meant the same thing for them that it did to her. The creature waved back and said something, the language entirely unknown but the tone sounding pleased. And probably that of a youngish female assuming their species worked like Quarians did.

“Hello,” Tali said, knowing the other person wouldn’t understand but feeling it was only polite. She pointed at herself. “I am Tali’Zorah. I am a Quarian.”

The alien cocked her(?) head a little and seemed to think. It said something which sounded very strange, but the one thing Tali managed to get from it was probably a name. Possibly species, or more likely that of the individual in question.

She pointed at the camera. “Taylor?”

The alien nodded, the gesture looking so familiar that Tali could only accept it as that.

Tali stared at her unexpected contact for some seconds, before slumping in her chair with a wave of different emotions going through her. She hadn’t managed to contact anyone she had expected to, but at least she’d made contact with someone, no matter how alien. And she wasn’t alone any more.

Taylor watched her, appearing worried, until she looked up at the imager again. “Sorry. I’ve been alone for months now,” she explained uselessly.

The alien seemed to get the basic idea and if she was any judge was sympathetic, based on the expression. She held up a hand and made a gesture that seemed to convey ‘wait a moment’ then vanished from view. Picking up a drinking bulb Tali squirted some water into her mouth, just glad that the circumstances, as horrible and confusing as they were, allowed her to remove her helmet without risking her health. Face to face contact seemed important right now.

Taylor reappeared on screen, then looked down for a moment and did something. A series of bright green diagrams appeared overlaid on the image, apparently being hand drawn as the other person worked. Tali peered curiously at them.

It didn’t take her long to work out that her new friend was describing a data format, one based on eight binary bits. She set up her omnitool to allow her to draw her own diagrams and sketched out something in return, describing the most basic binary coding scheme she knew. Taylor looked pleased and altered her own drawings.

Three hours later they had mutually settled on a method of transferring data both ways, and Tali had set up a secondary digital data channel through her gravitic generator. Holding her breath, she tried sending a basic uncompressed image grabbed from her omnitool. Taylor worked for a few seconds, then nodded, making a gesture with her fingers all wrapped into a fist and her thumb sticking straight up, which by implication seemed to mean things were going well. She moved her camera to point at a display which was showing the image Tali had sent, then moved it back to show her smiling face.

Tali smiled as well.

Now, how could they work out a mutual language? She needed some sort of translation matrix, which would require a lot of data on whatever it was Taylor was speaking, something she could feed into the translation program of her omnitool. Poking through the files she had available, including all the data she’d downloaded from the remaining storage in the ship’s computers and the salvaged omnitools, she finally found something useful. A basic standard first contact package the Salarians had stashed away, something most science vessels carried just in case, although as far as she knew it hadn’t been used in centuries.

Setting things up to convert the basic data on several languages to an uncompressed and unencrypted format, along with a lot of equivalent information on writing systems, Tali started transmitting it. Taylor looked at her own equipment and nodded, apparently immediately working out what it was and seeming pleased.

This would take a while. It was a lot of data even at the fairly high transfer rate they’d managed to come up with, and then Taylor would need to figure out how to use it. Tali waited as her contact somewhere else in the universe seemed to think for a while, then vanished once more for a couple of minutes. When she came back, the return data link came to life with a large transmission from the other end, which Tali made sure she was saving. Looking at it she felt pleased too, as it was clearly something very similar to what she was sending Taylor.

Hopefully, between them, they could come up with a mutually understandable method of communicating a little more advanced than sketches...

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

When the transmission from the alien called Tali’zorah finally finished, Taylor gave her new friend another thumb’s up then started looking through the data. It was immediately obvious that it was a massive trove of lexical data on a number of alien languages along with information connecting them. Clearly designed as a translation aid, she thought, pleased and impressed. “This shouldn’t take long,” she said to the camera. She’d worked out just from the initial results what it was likely to be and had sent the equivalent information on English, but having several languages present would make the task much easier. Basically the same idea as the Rosetta Stone, being able to compare them would give even more information than any one on its own.

Still, it wasn’t a trivial thing to do, translating a completely alien language. Luckily she had various options most people didn’t…

Smiling at the face on the monitor, who smiled back, Taylor got to work with the aid of a different friend.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Four hours later, Tali jumped a little, almost dropping the tool she was using to work on a better air processor unit. “Hello? Can you understand me?”

Whirling to stare at the image of Taylor, Tali gaped a little for a moment, then said, “Yes. How did you translate my language so fast!? That’s amazing.” Her own efforts had stalled out after a couple of hours and possible twenty very basic concepts.

Taylor grinned widely, seeming very happy, as Tali sat down in front of her console once again and forgot about the air unit for now. “I’ve got some very good computers and a few other useful things,” she replied in a cheerful tone. “Anyway, it’s nice to be able to introduce myself properly. I’m Taylor Hebert, a Human from a planet called Earth.”

Tali nodded, amazed and impressed at her new friend’s technology and abilities. “Tali’Zorah vas Klaatu, I’m very pleased to meet you, Taylor Hebert.”

“Call me Taylor,” the girl replied.

“And you should call me Tali,” Tali smiled. “I have to say I didn’t expect to make first contact today. Or for that matter any contact. I didn’t have the first idea my invention could do this. I was just trying to attract help.”

“Well, you did that,” Taylor chuckled.

“Can you send a ship for me?” Tali asked hopefully.

“Ah. That part is a little… complicated,” her friend commented, looking thoughtful. “As we don’t actually have any interstellar ships yet. It’s something I’m working on.”

Tali stared in confusion.

“On the other hand, I know a lot about subspace, and all sorts of other interesting things, so I bet we can figure out a way to help you,” the girl continued. She made herself more comfortable in her chair and looked directly at Tali through the camera. “I like fixing problems. So tell me what yours is, OK? And we can work on fixing it.”

After a couple of minutes, wondering exactly what help Taylor could provide in the absence of any FTL ships, and what ‘subspace’ was, Tali shrugged and began explaining how the Salarian science vessel she’d been serving on had been jumped by Batarian pirates, chased far off the beaten path, shot to hell, and left for dead with her as the only survivor.

It was a story that took hours to tell, and left her depressed and Taylor looking very, very coldly furious.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“I see,” Taylor said when her new friend finally ran out of things to say, sounding like she was on the ragged edge of falling apart. Clearly she’d pushed herself to the absolute limit over the time she’d been alone, and was an exceptionally talented engineer as well. That was the only reason she was still alive.

Taylor decided that she didn’t like Batarians. Anyone who could act like that needed something unpleasant to happen to them.

But that could wait.

For now, she had a friend to help. And the first part of that was working out what was available in the way of resources. Only then could she explain how to make some of the equipment she was designing in the back of her mind.

“All right. By the sound of it you have food, air, water, and energy enough to live on for quite a while,” she said after the Quarian seemed to pull herself together. Tali nodded a little.

“Great. That’s good, it removes one of the main problems. Let’s see if we can sort out the rest. Have you got a list of what you have to work with, and some background data on everything?”

“Yes, I’ve made a fairly complete inventory of all the usable equipment over the last couple of months,” Tali replied. “And I can send you all the data I have available if we can work out a suitable compression scheme. It would take months otherwise.”

“Do you have the technical specifications on the system you guys use?” Taylor asked.

“I should have, yes,” Tali responded, looking to the side. She worked for a few minutes, then nodded. “Here we are. The programming specifications for the standard Salarian science council data compression format. I’ll just send it.”

Running the block of information that came in through her translation system, Taylor started reading it. The described method of compression was elegant and efficient, and vaguely similar to some of the latest systems she’d read about. “This doesn’t look too hard to implement,” she said, returning her attention to Tali. “Let me work on it for a bit. You get something to eat, or have a lie down, you look tired.”

Tali didn’t question her assessment, merely nodding and moving off camera. Taylor could hear sounds that suggested someone lying down nearby. Smiling gently, and wanting to help, Taylor began writing some software to decompress the Salarian data format.

This was turning out to be a very strange weekend and it was only Saturday afternoon so far.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“Tali? You there?”

Tali blinked a few times at the sound of the voice, then remembered and sat up. She checked the time, seeing that she’d been asleep for about four hours. Getting off her bunk she went over to the console and sat down, seeing Taylor looking at her. The Human seemed relieved when she appeared in the view of her imager. “Ah. I was worried something had happened, I was calling you for about five minutes.”

“I think I needed the sleep,” Tali replied, rubbing her eyes. “Sorry.”

“No problem. Right, then, I’ve looked through your list of resources and had a think about it. I’ve got some ideas that should help, something for the short term and something for the longer term.”

Tali looked curiously at her. “What are they?”

“Well, in the short term, there’s getting you off that ship and somewhere safer. In the longer term there’s getting you home. Sound good?”
Thinking that this was slightly simplifying the issues, Tali eventually nodded a little. “I can’t disagree with either of those. But how do I get off the ship? You told me your species doesn’t have superluminal travel.” ‘Yet,’ she added mentally, remembering what Taylor had said a while ago, wondering what she’d meant by that.

“Ah, I have a better idea than a ship,” Taylor replied with a look that on a Quarian would have been classified as ‘slightly smug.’ She worked for a few seconds, then Tali inspected the file she’d been sent.

Her eyes widened steadily. After blinking a few times, she looked at the crazy Human. “A teleportation machine?”

“Yeah. Don’t your people have them?” Taylor’s expression was mischievous.

Tali fixed her with a somewhat exasperated look. “No. Nobody has a teleporter. It’s ridiculous, something out of a science fiction novel.”

“Here’s how to build one,” Taylor replied as she sent a much larger block of information. Somewhat skeptically Tali opened the file and started reading.

Half an hour later she looked up, feeling lightheaded. “This is… impossible.”

“It’ll work.”

“I know it will work,” she muttered in shock. “That’s what’s impossible.” Her new friend seemed to have knowledge that the Salarians would have killed for. And she could hardly believe. Even so, when she checked the information again, and ran the math, it all held together. It completely rewrote a large part of physics in the process, but it was consistent.

“Based on your list of resources it should be possible to make that in a few hours. I can program it from here over the link. I’ll make the other end, and you just come through. Then we can figure out what to do next, but at least you won’t have to worry about a sudden failure or something taking out your air. From what you said, and your scans of that thing, I’m amazed the ship is still holding air at all.”

“So am I,” she muttered as she read the documentation again. “What about food? Your species isn’t dextro from what you said.”

“Nope, but don’t worry, I’ve got a friend who can sort that out easily enough, and the same for your immune problems.” Tali looked at the screen in renewed shock, Taylor smiling at her. “Honestly, don’t worry, Tali. I’ll sort things out. I’ve got some friends in the government that can help too, they owe me a couple of small favors. So let’s get to work.”

Shaking her head a little wonderingly, Tali got up and started digging through her parts pile to find what she needed, thinking that the day she met Taylor Hebert of Earth was the day things got very strange.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Checking the last of the connections one final time, Taylor felt satisfied. “All checks out,” she muttered. “Great. Now we just need to sync up both ends...”

She got up from the floor, where her end of her new teleport pad was sitting, having put the protective cover back onto the portal generator mechanism. Sitting in her chair she ran some functional tests, powering the device up in standby and making sure everything was working to design. The meter-square device on the floor hummed faintly, lights blinking on it in a pattern that showed correct operation.

“I’m ready at this end,” she said as she looked at the camera. On screen she could see Tali’s version of her hardware, which was much less polished due to the lack of proper tools and components, but was still a very neat job. She approved of what she’d seen so far of her friend’s capabilities. The Quarian was very good at this sort of thing.

“As far as I can tell this is also working,” Tali replied as she sat as well. “I’ll link the control system into the data channel so you can check.”

“OK.” Thirty seconds later, Taylor was poking around in the virtual innards of the far-off hardware. She nodded a little, configuring all the dimensional parameters to match her own system, then announced, “It’s ready. I’m going to initiate the connection.”

Tali turned to watch as Taylor issued a few commands, checked the results, and hit the final key. Both units powered up fully and emitted a deep whoomph sound, then settled down to a barely perceptible whine in the background as the portal formed. Two cubic meters of space above the pad wavered and shimmered, going slightly cloudy in a very unusual manner.

“Keelah,” Tali muttered in awe.

“Cool,” Taylor smiled. “Hold on, let’s test it.” She picked up a screwdriver and lightly tossed it towards the blurry part of space in the middle of her workshop, watching as it passed into it.

Nothing came out the other side.

A clattering sound from the comms link made her turn to it to see Tali bend down and pick up the screwdriver, then look at it in numb incredulity. “It actually works,” the Quarian woman said in tones of flat disbelief.

“Looks like it.” Taylor nodded, pleased. “I’ll send through a test probe to check for any dangerous radiation, but there shouldn’t be anything, if I got the math right.” Picking up one of her modified phones, she tapped a few icons, set up the function she wanted, and let go. It hung in the air for a second, then floated towards and through the portal, as she watched carefully. On the screen she could see it emerge, and after ten second, turn around and return. When it was back in her hand she studied the readings.

“Nothing at all. Looks like the transit time is under ten milliseconds, which is about what I calculated. You should be able to just walk through. Bring some of your food and anything else you want, then we can shut it down for now.”

Her new friend looked at her wordlessly for some time, but eventually took a breath and nodded. Picking up a helmet she put it on her head and sealed it to her environmental suit, then wandered around for a few minutes packing up a number of things into a case, which she closed firmly. Then, after looking around for a moment, she headed towards the distortion in space. Stopping a meter away from it, she just looked at it for a while.

Glancing over her shoulder at the camera, she nodded.

Moments later she stepped out in front of Taylor.

The girl stood up and walked over. “It’s nice to meet in person, Tali’Zorah.”

“Likewise, Taylor Hebert,” the alien woman said with a sort of near-laugh buried in her voice. “And thank you.”

“It was my pleasure,” Taylor chuckled. “Let’s shut this down for now, get my friend Amy over here to check you out, and then I’d better tell Dad we’ve got a house guest.

She picked up her phone and dialed. “Hey, Amy, want to see something cool?” she asked cheerfully as Tali looked around her workshop, moving like someone who thought she was in a dream and was worried it would vanish when she woke up.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Brendan picked up the phone. He listened for a while, then very carefully put it down again, sighed, and rested his forehead on his hands.

Eventually he straightened up and began to make some calls. Apparently an alien ambassador was now required, which in retrospect probably wasn’t all that surprising if you knew Taylor...

Chapter Text

Pulling her phone out of her pocket with one hand while putting the bag of flour down with the other, a puff of white powder coming out the open end, Sarah looked at the screen before answering it. “Carol! Hi, what’s up?”

There was a pause as she wiped her hand on her apron, then transferred the phone to do the same with the other one. Her cake mix gently absorbed the just-added flour into the existing material in the bowl as she listened. “I’ve got a problem,” her sister said just as she was starting to wonder if Carol had called her accidentally.

“A problem?” she echoed curiously, moving to sit at the kitchen table. “What sort of problem?”

“A very strange and worrying one,” the other woman replied, sounding… off.

Sarah frowned. “Explain?”

“I need you to come over. I can’t talk about it on the phone.”

Carol’s voice was definitely tense and unsure, quite unlike her normal assertive manner. Sarah looked at the clock on the microwave, then her half-mixed cake batter, before sighing inaudibly. “All right. I’ll be there in five minutes.”

“Thanks.” The call went dead, and she looked at the device in her hand contemplatively for a few seconds before shoving it into her pocket and moving to put the bowl into the fridge. It might be possible to salvage it.

Two minutes later she had taken her apron off and quickly cleaned up, and was flying rapidly towards the Dallon house.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Vicky met Amy’s eyes, then both of them stared hard at Taylor as their friend came back out of her house’s back door carrying a jug of lemonade. She was smiling in a sort of contented manner, as if she felt that things were going well. Arriving next to them, she refilled the glasses both held out wordlessly, then her own, before sitting down and putting the nearly empty jug on the ground next to her. A large dragonfly landed on her hair, causing Amy to look curiously at it as she was distracted momentarily.

“What?” Taylor asked mildly, sipping her drink.

Amy pointed. “There’s a dragonfly on your head.”

Rolling her eyes upwards, Taylor grinned. The insect turned slightly and seemed to look back at Amy. “Yeah, they do that. They’re curious little things. I think they’re pretty smart for insects. There’s a small pond over the back fence between our yard and the next street up and there’s loads of them there.”

The glittering blue insect seemed content to stay where it was and Taylor didn’t appear to mind, which Vicky found a little strange, as she didn’t particularly want insects in her hair. On the other hand it was nothing like as intriguing as what had happened before Taylor had gone for more lemonade. She asked, somewhat suspiciously, “What was that phone call about? Who did you call?”

Taylor winked at her. “Someone who could help Amy.”

The two sisters exchanged glances again. “How?” Vicky asked very carefully.

“And what’s stage one?” Amy added, before lifting the glass she was holding to her lips for another drink.

Taylor stretched her legs out in front of her and crossed them at the ankles, leaning back in the chair and looking very relaxed. Even with a dragonfly sitting on her head. She grinned. “Let’s say that about now your mother is having a slightly uncomfortable chat with some people who are expressing the concept that perhaps she should modify her approach to someone who is very important to certain individuals.”

Staring at her friend and feeling a sensation that events were getting remarkably odd for reasons she didn’t understand, Vicky thought hard. Amy was looking at Taylor, then her, with a somewhat confused expression. Another dragonfly, a green one this time, landed in her hair but she didn’t seem to notice. Eventually the blonde asked somewhat tentatively, “Which individuals?”

“Well, me for a start. Amy’s my friend. And you, of course.” Taylor grinned again.

With a sigh, Vicky pointed at her. “You are hiding something. Something big. I can practically feel it. And that wasn’t just a phone call asking for help. It was a call using a code phrase for god’s sake! You had some sort of plan set up just to help Amy?”

“I have many plans set up for different things,” Taylor smiled. “I like making plans.”

“Most people who make plans are making plans on what to cook for dinner,” Vicky pointed out somewhat acidly. “You appear to have plans that require minions. Where did you get minions?”

“The Minion Shop?” Taylor replied, looking amused. “Minions’R’Us? Minions for All Occasions?”

Amy giggled, apparently finding the whole thing surreal enough that this was an appropriate response. Vicky was right on the verge of pulling her hair out now.

“And who says I have minions anyway?” Taylor queried. “You’re jumping to conclusions.”

Putting her half-empty glass down on the grass, Vicky leaned forward. “You made a phone call, ten little words, and now you’re looking as smug as a smug thing. Because you did something. Explain what you did, please? And how? Before I go nuts trying to figure it out?”

Taylor looked at her for several seconds, then at Amy as well. She seemed to come to a conclusion as the other two girls waited. “OK. You guys can keep a secret.”

“How do you know?” Amy queried, sounding more like she was simply interested rather than denying this.

“I’ve seen your background check dossiers, of course,” Taylor chuckled.

Both Dallons stared at her in disbelief.

“Background check?” Amy echoed incredulously.

“Yeah.” Their friend, who Vicky was growing convinced was a lot more than she appeared somehow, pulled her phone out again and tapped the screen a couple of times, before putting it away once more. “They were very thorough.”

“Who were?” Vicky demanded, feeling things descending into something that seemed more fit for a spy movie than real life.

“The government,” Taylor told her with equanimity.

“Why would the government be checking up on either of us? And why would they let you see the results if they were?” Vicky knew her voice had gone rather shrill but couldn’t help it. This whole conversation had left normality long ago.

“Because you guys know me, and they check up on everyone who knows me,” the brunette replied, still smiling at them. “For reasons I can’t tell you until you read and sign some documents.”

“What sort of documents?” Amy asked faintly, apparently somewhat overwhelmed.

“Those ones,” Taylor said, nodding to the side. Both the other girls looked in that direction to see that the side gate to the back yard had opened and a man in a suit was coming through it, a briefcase in his hand. He walked calmly over to Taylor and stood next to her like some sort of secret agent butler.

“We’re ready, Miss Hebert,” he said evenly.

“Thanks, Agent Charlie,” Taylor answered. She finished off her lemonade and stood up, the dragonfly on her head flying away. “Come on, guys, I’ll explain inside.”

She headed for the back door and the man followed with a look over his shoulder at them. Amy and Vicky stared at each other incredulously.

“What the fuck is going on?” Vicky whispered. “Is she a cape or something?”

“No, she’s definitely not a Parahuman,” Amy whispered back as she also stood. She looked as confused as Vicky felt. “I’d have noticed. And I haven’t got the faintest idea what the hell is happening.” She paused, then added with an evil little grin, “But I suddenly have a very strong feeling that Carol isn’t really having a good time for some reason.”

With a shake of her head, Vicky hopped up from the chair, drank the last of the lemonade, put the glass on the tray Taylor had left on the ground, and trailed after her sister trying to figure out how a visit to a friend had turned into something that Jason Bourne would have found weird...

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Danny looked up as Angus came into his office. “Taylor seems to have made a decision,” he said, glancing back at the report on his computer screen.

“It was pretty much just a matter of time,” his friend replied, shrugging. “It’s been obvious for a while that she wasn’t going to sit still and let a friend get abused. And once she got involved, the rest follows naturally. Neither of those girls is stupid, they’ll have worked out something strange is going on without any trouble.”

“True. Hopefully they won’t get too upset about it.”

“Taylor seems to think that won’t happen, and she’s a very good judge of character based on what I’ve seen,” Angus commented as he sat in one of the spare chairs. “I expect they’re going to find the whole affair fairly confusing, though.”

With a slight smirk, Danny nodded. “I think that much is guaranteed,” he snickered. Picking up the document that was lying in front of him on his desk, he went on, “I was hoping you could go through this with me and check my conclusions.”

“Of course. Let’s have a look.” Angus leaned forward and accepted the pages, then settled back to read while Danny got up and started making some coffee for both of them.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

When Carol answered the door, which for some reason had a broken pane covered with cardboard, Sarah immediately noticed that she looked rather worried. And somewhat pale. “What’s wrong?” she asked as she stepped inside. Closing the door, Carol slowly turned around, then walked past her sister without a word. Highly confused Sarah followed her into the living room, stopping in her tracks when she saw that there were two people she didn’t recognize sitting on the sofa.

Inspecting them she immediately got the impression they were something official. The matching suits were somewhat of a cliché, but on the other hand they were a cliché because it really was a thing. She’d met enough government employees over the years to have seen it for herself.

This pair couldn’t have looked more secret agent if they’d tried.

After a moment or two she looked at her sister, who had moved to sit in one of the chairs on the other side of the low coffee table between her and the mysterious duo. “What’s going on?” she asked, feeling distinctly curious and somewhat apprehensive. “Who are they?”

“FBI,” Carol replied shortly.

“And they’re here because…?” The Pelham woman trailed off, giving each of the three people present a look.

“Agent Able, Mrs Pelham,” the man said, his voice calm and neutral. “This is Agent Baker. We are here due to… issues… surrounding Amelia Dallon.” He produced and held out an ID which she could see was real, then flipped it closed and returned it to his jacket.

“Issues?” she echoed, feeling more apprehensive now. She couldn’t immediately think what they meant about Amy. “Is Amy all right? Where is she?”

“Miss Dallon is entirely safe and she and her sister are visiting a friend to the best of my knowledge,” the woman, Baker, said in a cool voice.

Sarah stared at them, then at Carol, who was herself looking at a pile of paperwork on the table with a sort of lost expression that both baffled and intrigued her sister. “Someone needs to fill me in because I can’t help thinking I’m missing rather a lot here,” she finally said, walking over to sit in the remaining chair.

“Indeed,” Agent Able nodded agreeably, his expression still entirely placid. “Essentially, it has come to the attention of certain parties that Miss Dallon is… shall we say, underappreciated in her family life?”

Sarah felt a sinking sensation in her gut as she gaped at him, then glanced sidelong at Carol.

“There have been a number of recent incidents that suggest that there is a considerable amount of internal friction in this household, centered around Miss Dallon’s presence,” he continued, causing her to look back at him. “Likely due to the somewhat irregular method of her adoption and who her biological father is, along with other… exacerbating… issues.”

The sinking sensation dropped suddenly quite a lot faster.

“Amy’s adoption is entirely legal,” she replied after several seconds of silence as he and his colleague waited for a response, apparently interested to see what she said.

“The paperwork does indeed hold up even with the aforesaid irregularities,” Agent Baker agreed. “Which is why nothing has been done up to this point.”

“How do you know who her father was?” Sarah queried. She thought for a second, then added, “Why is this even a matter for the FBI in the first place, for that matter? Your organization doesn’t deal with family issues. And if it’s a Parahuman situation surely the PRT should be here, not the FBI.”

“Mrs Pelham, the government is not entirely inept,” Able said with what was almost a momentary small smile. “Despite what the media conveys to the public. We have a considerable amount of practice in discovering the truth when required. Marquis was a person of interest for obvious reasons. His daughter is also someone we have had on our radar for some time. Her abilities make her a potentially very valuable individual to this country, and a possible target for certain unsavory elements. But until recently we had no reason to step in.”

He looked at Carol, who was sitting with her hands clasped in her lap and a slightly haunted expression on her face. “That situation appears to have changed.”

Sarah tried to work out what the hell he was actually saying. She looked at each of them in turn, then her sister, before massaging her temples a little. “The government, in the form of the FBI, feels it necessary to take steps to get involved in our family because you think Amy is an important person who is in trouble here?” she finally said, speaking slowly and clearly.

Able nodded. “That is in essence correct, yes, ma’am.”

“And for some reason it’s not the PRT who’s doing this, it’s the FBI?”

“Also correct. This is not deemed a matter for the PRT at this moment in time.”

“This doesn’t make any sense,” she muttered. “What the hell has been...”

Sarah stopped, then slowly turned her head to stare hard at her sister. “Carol. What. Did. You. Do?”

The younger woman swallowed a little. She looked entirely unnerved by the current situation and her normal confidence was notably absent.

“She won’t obey me!” she replied in a voice that sounded like she was trying to snarl but couldn’t quite make it work. “She spends too long at the hospital one day, then wants to take the next one off completely! And now she wants to… to… have a holiday or something like that! She argues every time I tell her to do something, she defies me to my face, and she’d got Vicky doing it now too! She stormed out of the house this morning and swore at me then ran off! The damn girl is out of control.”

Her voice had risen as she spoke and she looked suddenly angry. Sarah listened with dismay.

The two agents exchanged a look but said nothing.

“And now somehow the fucking FBI is saying it’s my fault and if I don’t calm down they’ll do something! Me! Calm down! I’m perfectly calm!” Sarah’s sister grabbed the folder of paperwork off the table and shook it at her. “They’ve got all the records that were supposed to be sealed, and a lot of information no one should have on us...”

Tossing the papers back on the table, where half of them promptly slid to the floor, the woman slumped back in her chair as Sarah watched her feeling disorientated and worried. She hadn’t expected… whatever this actually was. While Carol huffed to herself in indignation, Sarah retrieved the paperwork and looked through it.

She was shocked. It contained everything. All the adoption records, the ones that were allegedly locked away from anyone, the documents they’d gone to some effort to obfuscate in every way that they legally could. Admittedly some of those methods skirted the edge of not being as legal as one would hope for, but in their defense at the time their intention was at least as much to protect Amy from any danger that would appear if her heritage became known as it was to protect them from the distinctly unconventional way things had worked out. She couldn’t deny that there was definitely an aspect of the second point though.

The whole Marquis affair was one of the driving forces that had actually ultimately led to the New Wave movement, in fact, as everything that had happened to the old Brockton Bay Brigade had made them sit down and think very hard about how they wanted to work in future. It wasn’t a part of her life she was entirely proud of. Yes, they’d stopped a genuinely dangerous villain who had killed in cold blood a significant number of people and pretty much ruled half the city as his personal plaything, but the way they’d done it was probably not ideal. And certainly something that these days, a decade later, would have caused them much larger problems.

The world had changed a lot since that time.

She flipped pages, seeing photos of Marquis, of Amy, a DNA test report that proved she was his daughter, documentation on her work at the hospital, her work healing Parahumans, and much more. It was a fairly comprehensive look at a life that while not very long had in one way or another been quite complicated.

The entire thing was clearly the result of a lot of work over a considerable amount of time. And not one report in there was anything she could see as having originated from the PRT, which very much surprised her. She fully expected that organization to keep tabs on any cape they ran across, but she had never thought that other parts of the government were doing the same. Substantially more effectively as well, she suspected.

Sarah wondered uneasily how much more information they had that they weren’t showing. And how much they knew about her, and everyone else other than Amy…

When she finally closed the folder and put it down, she raised her eyes to look at the two agents. Glancing at her sister for a moment, the other woman appearing frustrated but unable to quite work out how to express this, she asked, “What is going to happen now?”

“That depends on both your actions and Miss Dallon’s wishes, ma’am.” Agent Able was polite, but there was a certain feeling to his voice that made it clear he wasn’t playing around. “As I have explained, Miss Dallon is considered by people well above my pay grade to be of considerable interest to the country. Her abilities are almost unique, and there are those who feel that losing access to them would be… suboptimal. Should her home life cause her sufficient stress to make that likely to happen, steps would be taken to rectify the issue. Obviously, Miss Dallon’s own well-being is one of the primary considerations in whatever those steps would ultimately be.”

He smiled thinly in a way that made Sarah feel a slight frisson of nervousness.

“We are well aware that Mrs Dallon is not as enamored of her adoptive daughter as one might wish,” Agent Baker continued as smoothly as if they’d practiced it, “for personal reasons if nothing else. The situation is regrettable but not yet beyond salvaging. We are not yet quite at the stage where direct action is warranted.”

“Direct action?” Sarah repeated, thinking that sounded more than a little ominous. “What sort of ‘direct action?’”

“While emancipation of Miss Dallon is feasible, it could lead to other issues, so that’s currently considered a last resort,” the woman replied evenly. Carol’s mouth dropped open but she seemed to think better of speaking when Sarah gave her a warning look. “Removal of her from the abusive environment and placement with a more suitable one would be more in keeping with her current best interests.”

“You’d take her away frommmmph??”

Sarah kept her hand over her sister’s mouth as the other woman tried to swear. “Shut up you idiot,” she hissed into Carol’s ear. The agents merely watched them.

“You consider this family an abusive environment?” she asked more loudly, feeling sorrow go through her at the thought.

“Unfortunately, based on recent actions, there is some evidence to suggest that, yes, Mrs Pelham,” Baker replied. “I wouldn’t go so far as to suggest that your sister is deliberately abusive, or has physically abused Miss Dallon, but our information does show that there is a certain level of neglect and… shall we say, excessive and overzealous expectations… present. This is clearly causing very significant amounts of mental and emotional stress to Miss Dallon, as well as to her sister. In the long term the end results could be… unfortunate.”

Sarah released Carol when the other woman finally calmed down a little, but kept a wary eye on her. “I’m not certain that’s entirely fair,” she said evenly, but in her heart she knew it was. She’d seen how Carol treated Amy at times, and had hoped that was the exception rather than the rule. From what she was hearing she’d been fooling herself.

‘None are so blind as those that will not see,’ she thought as she glanced again at her sister. ‘Why didn’t I look into it more thoroughly?’

The answer was because she didn’t like to think that a member of her own family could actually act like that, of course. Even though she knew full well that Carol had a very fixed attitude to certain things and was almost impossible to change when she’d made up her mind. And Amy had apparently been one of those things that Carol had made up her mind about.

“How can we fix this?” she asked quietly. “Amy is part of the family, regardless of what’s happened, and why. I’m not going to abandon her. And Carol means well.”

Her sister glared at her but she glared back. Eventually Carol looked away. Sarah thought that the presence of the two FBI agents had seriously confused her.

Which wasn’t surprising, she was very confused herself despite what they’d explained.

“There are a number of possible paths to take at this point,” Agent Able replied, pulling another folder of the briefcase by his feet and opening it on the table. “Reduction of Miss Dallon’s working hours to something more sensible goes without saying. She is working far more at Brockton General than advisable, or even technically legal for someone of her age. Despite her abilities she is still a teenager, after all.”

“How many hours is she working there?” Sarah asked suspiciously.

He flipped a couple of pages. “In the last two months she has averaged sixty two hours per week, ma’am,” he replied.

She gaped at him then rounded on Carol who shrank into her chair at the expression on her sister’s face. “Sixty two hours a week? On top of her schoolwork? Are you insane?”

“She has a duty to...”

Sarah put her finger over her sister’s mouth. “No. Not another word. You cannot let a sixteen year old girl work sixty two hours a week. I don’t work sixty two hours a week. You don’t work sixty two hours a week. She needs eight hours of sleep a day and time to herself. Our original agreement with the hospital was twenty hours a week and only if she wanted to do that. How the hell did that more than triple? And why hasn’t someone stopped it?”

Carol looked defensive but didn’t seem to have a reply. Sarah sighed heavily. Turning to the agents, she said, “Amy will not be working that long again, you have my word.”

He nodded. “In addition, arrangements have been made to remunerate Miss Dallon for the essential and unique work she does at a fair rate as a Parahuman consultant.” Taking a sheet of paper from his folder he held it out. Sarah accepted it and scanned the page. Her eyes widened.

“That… is a considerable sum,” she finally managed.

“The market rate for such medical services is quite large,” he replied with a small nod and a quirk of his lips.

Sarah held the page out where Carol could see it. Her sister looked at it and paled.

“What else?” she asked as she handed it back to him. He turned the page.

“This may take some time, ma’am,” he said.

Waving for the man to continue, she settled back to listen, while wondering who the hell was actually behind this insanity.

And feeling very sorry for poor Amy, as well as quite peeved at her sister and herself in equal measure.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Sitting around a table in what Amy thought was probably Taylor’s father’s study, she, her sister, and Taylor herself, watched as the suited man her friend had called ‘Agent Charlie’ opened his briefcase. He extracted an official looking folder, then removed two bound stacks of paper which he handed to Taylor. She looked through them both for a few seconds, nodding in satisfaction, before placing them in front of her. Amy craned her neck and could see what looked like a government seal through the translucent blue cover.

“OK, guys.” Taylor looked at them both. “Sorry about all this cloak and dagger stuff, but it’s kind of required.”

“Who the hell are you, Taylor?” Vicky asked in a highly confused voice. Amy felt exactly like her sister sounded.

“Your friend, Taylor Hebert,” the brunette replied with a smile. “That hasn’t changed. But before I can tell you anything else, at least about what you really want to ask, you need to read these, understand them, and sign them.” She looked at the two sets of paperwork, then up at Amy and Vicky. “Or you can pretend none of this happened, we can go back out into the garden and finish the lemonade, then go for an ice-cream and a movie or something.”

Amy studied her. Taylor looked back, smiling a little, but Amy got the impression that her friend was hiding a certain amount of worry under the usual cheerful expression. She glanced at Vicky who was chewing her lip, clearly desperately curious but also cautious. They’d heard enough from Carol to be wary of signing anything at all without someone trusted checking it over.

Amy herself had signed a lot of NDAs over the time since she’d Triggered, probably more than almost any Parahuman in the city, and was very familiar with the process. This seemed different somehow.

“Is this because your dad is the CEO of Gravtec?” Vicky asked.

“That’s part of it, yeah,” Taylor admitted with a nod.

Vicky looked at Amy. “I don’t know about you but I’m as curious as fuck about this,” she said wryly. She turned back to Taylor. “And I trust you. Mom would probably say I’m being an idiot...”

Amy sighed, then reached out and snagged one of the documents. She opened it, staring at the first page.

She’d never seen so many official seals on anything before.

She didn’t even recognize half of them.

The warnings under that were fairly bloodcurdling. In essence it suggested that turning the page was a capital offense if one didn’t immediately sign the document. She exchanged a look with Vicky, who had accepted the other one from Taylor, her sister looking back with wide eyes, then both of them flipped to the next page.

Reading what turned out to be a pretty comprehensive NDA with a number of clauses that were both simple to read and quite worrying in the penalties mentioned for breaking them, she scanned through the entire thing twice. It basically said that once she’d signed it, she could only divulge anything that Taylor saw fit to tell her to someone else who she knew had signed the same document, or who Taylor herself, her father, or the Department of fucking Defense allowed her to.

What the fuck?

It made the ones the PRT relied on look like the work of an amateur.

“If you have any questions about it, Agent Charlie can explain them,” Taylor said. “Or I can if you don’t trust him. Or Dad, but we’ll have to call him and ask him to come home.”

“It looks straightforward enough,” Vicky said a little weakly. “Not nearly as complicated as some legal things I’ve seen are.”

“There is no intent to lay traps in legal wording, Miss Dallon,” Agent Charlie put in. He’d been sitting there watching in silence up until then. “The document is deliberately as clear and concise as possible. Allowing misunderstanding would be entirely pointless.”

Vicky nodded, then read the thing again. Eventually she turned to Amy, who was staring alternately at her copy and Taylor, their friend sitting there and waiting patiently. “What do you think, Ames?” she asked.

“I think I trust Taylor,” Amy said as she decided. “Because she’s my friend.”

She took the pen Taylor handed her with a smile. Signing her name on the last page, she passed the pen to her sister, who took it, hesitated, then repeated the process herself. Taylor retrieved the papers and also signed them.

“Thank you,” Agent Charlie said. He accepted both documents and put them in his briefcase. “It was a pleasure to make your acquaintance. I’ll leave you to it.” Standing, he nodded to Taylor. “I’ll let myself out, Miss Hebert.”

“Thanks, Agent,” she replied, watching as he left. Moments later they were alone in the room.

Both Dallon girls looked at each other, then turned as one to stare at Taylor. She looked innocently back.

“So? Spill, girl. Now that we’ve signed our souls away, we need to know why,” Vicky demanded.

Taylor chuckled and stood up. “Follow me,” she said mysteriously, leaving the room and beckoning them after her. They got up and followed, not without a certain amount of apprehension and deep curiosity.

The tall girl led them a door halfway between the front and the back of the house, under the stairs. She tapped a couple of places on the frame, then put her hand in the middle of the door itself. A click followed, then she pulled it open. Amy noted there had been no visible or audible indications of some sort of high security lock, although there clearly was something. Taylor disappeared down the stairs that were on the other side, clearly leading down to a basement.

Both Dallons followed.

As they descended far enough to see the surprisingly large room that lurked under the house both stopped dead and gaped in shock.

“Holy shit!” Vicky breathed in amazement. Amy couldn’t even manage that.

Both numbly went down the stairs to the bottom, looking around at the largest and highest tech collection of equipment either of them had ever seen anywhere. It made even a movie look like it wasn’t really trying very hard. As she turned on the spot, Amy saw more computers than any normal person would consider sensible, half a dozen of the biggest monitors she’d ever seen, a couple of ultra-high-tech microscopes, possibly thousands of little drawers full of parts, and any amount of other technological gear.

And that was only the stuff she could more or less recognize.

At least half of what was there was entirely unlike anything she’d seen before. She got the distinct impression that Armsmaster would have been extremely envious by what was hiding down here.

In the middle of it, Taylor was sitting in a large and very expensive chair, the sort you found in very high end offices, with her feet propped up on a piece of equipment that was full of oddly glowing widgets that were strangely hard to focus on, a small point of silver light hovering above it and somehow giving a weird impression of watching them. She was grinning at their expressions.

“Holy shit.” Vicky repeated herself. She turned to Amy. “Holy shit!”

Both looked at each other, before staring at Taylor. “You’re a Tinker?” Vicky asked incredulously.

“Nope.” Taylor’s grin widened a little. “I’m better than a Tinker. Because I know what I’m doing.”

She gestured widely. “I’m a professional supergenius. Welcome to my workshop.”

Amy sat on the bottom step and simply examined her friend with a sensation that things had abruptly got out of hand. A moment later a rattling sound made her look up, to see a dragonfly circling above her head. It landed on her hair. Taylor giggled.

“It likes you.”

“Where did that come from?” Amy asked, her head whirling with so many different questions only this one managed to come out.

“It landed on your head in the garden earlier,” Taylor remarked.

“And it was there the entire time?” Amy glared at the girl. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

Taylor shrugged. “It looked happy where it was.” She picked up a small oval machine that was sitting on the bench by her elbow and smiled at them. “Want to see something cool?”

She pressed a button on the thing before either of the other girls could reply and let go. They stared as the machine just hung in the air without moving.

“Yeah, so you know that stuff Gravtec makes?” she said, scratching her nose as they looked incredulously at the flying ovoid. “I kind of invented it...”

Amy put her head in her hands and sighed. Vicky audibly suppressed a hysterical giggle.

“Why do I get the feeling that the really weird shit is going to start about now?” Amy grumbled.

Taylor snickered then began telling them some fairly ridiculously crazy stuff.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

“The Slaughterhouse Nine are dead?”

Rebecca stared at Fortuna in shock.

“It is decidedly so,” the woman in the hat replied calmly before walking off humming.

“How?”

“Better not tell you now,” came the reply, then she turned the corner and vanished.

Clenching her fists, Rebecca looked around the empty corridor, then stomped off.

This was getting way past the point of being annoying...

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

As the aircraft rumbled through the sky at nearly twice the speed of sound, Brendan sipped a cup of very good coffee while he watched the face of the man in the seat on the other side of the table from him.

It was, in its own way, quite funny. His expression was changing repeatedly, forming a shifting mix of incredulity, shock, disbelief, and mild horror as he turned the pages of the document he was reading.

Keith Prender wasn’t someone Brendan had met before, but he’d heard of the man. A former US ambassador to Germany, he was very experienced in diplomatic work, had a security clearance about as high as it came outside Brendan’s group, was very respected by people on all sides of the political divide, and was very smart. He had two degrees in linguistics and political science, spoke half a dozen languages with near-native fluency, and had almost single-handedly defused a potentially extremely damaging political upheaval in Europe before he’d hit forty.

He was also well known to be heavily interested in technology, knew a lot more about scientific fields than most non-scientists and especially people in his arena tended to, and had the complete trust of the current President and his three predecessors.

In other words, he was just about perfect for meeting the first representative of a genuine alien species on Earth.

Mind you, it still seemed to come as something of a shock to him…

When Brendan had got the call from Danny, he’d almost not been surprised. If anyone was going to meet aliens, it was always going to be Taylor Hebert. And of course having somehow detected a distress beacon from another universe never mind halfway across the entire galaxy, the girl would think it entirely reasonable to single-handedly open communications, somehow learn the language of her new friend, and then pretty much wholesale invent a portal device to retrieve said alien to her own workshop.

Because that was basically Taylor in a nutshell. See an impossible problem, fix it before breakfast, and move on to something more interesting.

He sighed inaudibly even as he smiled to himself. God, that girl was incredible. And had brought more fun to his life than he’d ever have expected in his wildest dreams, although that went along with far more stress than was entirely ideal.

Still worth it.

And now… what could they learn from her new friend? Her species apparently had functional faster than light travel aside from anything else and the alien woman was supposedly a very talented engineer, so if nothing else a trade of information seemed possible. The President, when he’d finally stopped waving his arms and shouting, had gone very thoughtful indeed for a while. Brendan pointed out, rather forcefully due to certain other people’s opinions that if unchecked were likely to get them into a lot more trouble than anyone wanted, that there was no way in hell that Taylor was going to allow anyone to do anything… unpleasant… to this Tali’Zorah person. The girl looked after her friends, he knew that damn well, and he sure as fuck didn’t want to piss her off.

Partly because he genuinely cared deeply for her, partly because that would risk the flow of insanely effective super science, but mostly because the thought of what a seriously motivated and angry Taylor Hebert could actually do terrified him to the depths of his soul.

She was bad enough when she was having fun and just doing her thing. If she got annoyed enough to actively cause trouble, he had no doubt whatsoever that the level of danger she could represent was far, far past anything anyone would find remotely pleasant.

He was also fairly convinced that it would be extremely hard to stop her if she decided to retrieve someone she valued should anyone make the idiotic decision to make that necessary. Certainly not by this point, as it seemed entirely likely that she’d built herself any amount of useful equipment that it could be very difficult to separate her from before something bad happened.

Not to mention that he was also completely sure that she would have a lot of help, in the form of her father, Professor Drekin, the entirety of Gravtec, and most likely everyone at the Dock Workers Association. Not to mention several members of New Wave…

Yeah. Best to avoid risking that. He’d explained this very slowly and carefully to a couple of people who seemed hard of understanding, and to his credit the President had also listened, agreed, and flatly ordered that nothing other than a friendly welcome be extended to their visitor.

Taylor Hebert vouched for her. That was good enough for him.

Brendan wondered with mild amusement if she actually knew how much the US owed her, and how much regard she was held in. It wasn’t out of character that she’d never really thought about it, she didn’t seem to care all that much as long as she got to invent things and her friends and family were well looked after.

In any case, the end result was that an entirely new department of the US government was set up in haste and secrecy. Extraterrestrial Relations wasn’t something he’d ever expected to see, but it now existed, very secretly but very officially, and the man in the other seat was the person who was going to be the face of it.

Which had come as rather a surprise to the poor guy.

Prender lowered the document and stared blankly at Brendan for a few seconds, then turned his head to look out the window at the brightly sunlit clouds far below. “This is impossible,” he said faintly. “One person is responsible for pushing our technology in half a dozen fields ahead by fifty years? And she’s fifteen years old!?”

“More like a hundred years at least, yes, and she did that when she was fourteen,” Brendan chuckled. Prender met his eyes with a stunned gaze.

“And now she’s got an alien in her house.”

He sounded like he was having trouble speaking.

Brendan nodded with a shrug. “So I’m told. I have no reason to disbelieve it, many reasons to take it as complete truth, and knowing the girl, am not really as shocked as I probably should be.”

He picked up the tablet that was sitting between them and held it out, showing his companion the photo on the screen once more. Taylor was standing next to Amy Dallon and a person who was clearly not human, and somehow didn’t look like one of the unusual Parahumans with differing body makeup. He couldn’t put his finger on just why he got that impression, but he did.

Prender studied it again, shaking his head a little. The alien, a Quarian according to what Danny had told him, was smiling in a recognizable manner, looking quite comfortable and generally happy, as were the other two. They were apparently discussing something, and the alien woman was holding an orange in one three-fingered hand as if she was about to eat it.

“Absolutely incredible,” he finally whispered.

“It’s certainly not what I was expecting when I got up this morning, certainly,” Brendan replied, sipping his coffee as he put the tablet down. “On the other hand, where Taylor is concerned, you never expect what happens. You just accept that it does and deal with the results.” He smiled a little as Prender sighed, going back to the document he was holding.

“Fine. I suppose I can’t argue with reality.” The man turned the page. “Although I’m having trouble with it… Anyway. We have a genuine space alien, a friendly one, who is a refugee from literally another universe and far across the galaxy, rescued by a fifteen year old scientist because she thought it was the right thing to do.”

“Indeed.”

“And now we’re going to officially welcome this Tali’Zorah to the US, arrange any required documentation for her, and find out if she’s willing to work with us on a technology exchange among other things.”

Brendan nodded, still smiling slightly at the tone of voice his companion had. “Basically, yes. Taylor… slightly jumped the gun, I’ll admit, but it’s done. And I understand her reasons. The young woman in question was apparently in a tricky spot, so it was not really that much of a stretch to rescue her. We can probably learn a lot from her and a fair trade of useful information seems one of the more effective methods to do that. And much easier and ethical than some of the other possibilities I’d prefer not to think about. Opening a relationship with her people through her is the medium-term goal, and the long term one could be… interesting.”

“Effective and possibly cheap space travel, among other possibilities, does rather hint at some significant changes to our way of life,” Prender agreed quietly.

“Her people, from the limited information we’ve learned so far from Taylor, appear to be refugees in their own universe, so there are also humanitarian issues at play, I think,” Brendan added. “Combined with various other possible paths. Although that’s not really my specialty. Politics isn’t something I’ve had a lot of time for in the past.”

“From what I know that doesn’t mean you are unable to effectively handle such matters,” the other man replied.

“I didn’t say I couldn’t do it,” Brendan smiled. “I just don’t have a lot of time for it.” He looked up at the clock on the far bulkhead. “We’ll be landing in ten minutes, and it will take about another twenty to get to the Hebert house after that. You should have enough time to finish the report.”

With a nod Prender went back to reading, his eyebrows jumping around a little every now and then. Brendan finished his coffee, used the facilities, and visited the cockpit of the small and very fast business jet to talk to the pilot for a couple of minutes. By the time he buckled himself back into his seat, the diplomat had finished reading and the aircraft was descending towards the air force base fifteen miles outside Brockton Bay to the north-west.

Retrieving the paperwork, Brendan locked it into the high security case he had on the seat next to him, then leaned back.

“This should be interesting, Ambassador,” he said with a grin.

Prender gave him a look and merely shook his head wordlessly, apparently still having trouble with the whole thing.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Tali stretched and enjoyed the almost unique sensation of cloth on her skin. Living as her people had been forced to do for centuries now meant that it was rare indeed that any of them could have said they’d slept in a bed without their environment suits on, and certainly not outside their own quarters. She owed Amy Dallon a lot for making it possible.

And of course Taylor for rescuing her in the first place, and her father for immediately agreeing that she was welcome to stay in their spare room for as long as she wished.

Sitting up, Tali looked around the place, smiling a little at the sheer difference of her current environment versus what she’d experienced in the past. The room wasn’t enormous, but it was a reasonable size for one person, perhaps three meters square, and larger than many people in the Fleet got for themselves. The furniture and other aspects were a strange mix of something she’d almost think of as antique from her perspective, and luxurious, for the same reason. Only very rich people or very expensive hotels made this much use of wood and plant-based textiles these days.

So despite the overall low tech, it was also giving the impression of being a luxury room, which was an amusing dissonance.

The bed was also amazingly comfortable, and she’d had one of the best night’s sleep she’d ever managed. It was so quiet that she’d initially had trouble falling asleep, there was no omnipresent background sound of air recirculators, machinery functioning in the walls, and the other noises that told someone who’d spent their entire lives on spacecraft that things were working properly. Even on the wrecked Klaatu there were such sounds, from the residual systems she’d got functioning.

A completely silent ship was a ship in trouble and cause for immediate alarm. That was something ingrained into her at a very deep level and had taken a while to overcome.

Here the sounds were far different; a distant combination of natural noises from animals of some sort outside, what she’d learned was traffic in the city this place was part of, wind over the roof and through the leaves of the big tree behind the house, and any number of other sources she couldn’t pinpoint. But even with all that, it was still quiet, and much more organic and random than anything she was familiar with.

She found she rather liked it. The smells were intriguing too, nothing like the sterile air of her suit and the slight odors of synthetics and lubricants. She could smell something that Taylor had said was the ocean, as this place was very close to a huge body of water, growing things, hydrocarbon pollution which was not all that nice but also seemed fairly low key, and many other things she had no idea about. The mixture wasn’t overwhelming but it was yet another instant indication that her circumstances had radically changed much faster than she’d have thought probable.

She leaned against the pillows and looked through the gap in the coverings over the window across the room, seeing that it was a sunny day with only a few clouds in the sky. Apparently the current season was the start of summer, when the temperature would rise considerably and one could expect months of this sort of thing. Overall it felt quite comfortable to her, being around what she’d normally expect on a Quarian ship, although from what Taylor had said this planet had what to Tali’s knowledge was an unusually wide temperature range.

Most inhabited worlds in Council space didn’t simultaneously extend from below the freezing point of carbon dioxide to two thirds of the way to the boiling point of water, but this place could demonstrate both extremes depending on where you looked and the season. And the swing between summer and winter in a lot of areas was far more than most planets she knew about that were classed as garden worlds.

Her current locality, though, was at the lower end of the possible variation, being fairly cold in winter and quite warm in summer, but neither arctic or tropical at either end of the scale. Presumably the climate was moderated to some extent by the large bay the city was built around, she knew that bodies of water could have that effect by acting as heat-sinks although she had no practical experience of this.

It didn’t really matter right now, though, as it was entirely acceptable at the moment. As she didn’t yet know how long she was going to be here, she’d worry about ridiculous temperatures only if it became necessary.

Getting out of bed, she wandered over to the window and looked out, not pulling the covering back too far to avoid exposing her presence. The scene outside seemed calm and generally placid, with a few wheeled vehicles moving on the streets and Humans walking around doing whatever it was they were up to. No one looked at the house or her window, apparently content with minding their own business. Raising her eyes from ground level she looked up at the sky, seeing a number of contrails from aircraft far overhead. She studied them for a little while, watching one tiny dot slide through the air a few kilometers up, apparently slowing for a landing. What she could see showed, again, technology that was quite old by her standards, but still well done and effective in its own way.

Looking lower, she peered between buildings to see blue-silver water not that far away, with small ships moving around on it as they went about their business. Just visible off to one side was a structure some distance out in the bay which had a faintly glowing bubble of energy surrounding it, a manifestation that stood out as it was far higher tech than everything else she was looking at. It appeared to be a force field of some variety, something she was aware of from fiction but had never seen in real life. And it certainly wasn’t a kinetic barrier, as she was used to.

It, along with the things she’d experienced in Taylor’s lab, stood out as the exceptions to what was overall a lower tech level than she’d grown up with. And they were severe exceptions… No one had literal force fields, no one had teleportation machines, and no one could build in minutes a device to teach someone an entirely new language via neural induction.

The only problem with that conclusion was that it at all happened to her in the last day.

She had the sudden thought that her father was going to go insane when she was able to tell him all this. It made her wince and smile at the same time. And abruptly miss her parents very strongly.

Stepping back from the window she allowed the covering over it to swing back into place, then spent a while putting her environment suit back on and adjusting it. She left the helmet on her bed, as she didn’t need it now, but the suit was a point of familiarity in a very different world as well as being the only item of actual clothing she had at the moment. Making sure her outer covering was neatly presented, but leaving her hood down, she left the room and walked down the hallway to the stairs, seeing that Taylor’s room and Danny’s were both empty. She could hear voices downstairs so she descended to meet her hosts.

Both father and daughter were in the kitchen, the former cooking something that was the source of the enticing scent she’d detected upstairs, while the latter was sitting at the table reading an electronic screen and talking about whatever it was with interest. They looked around as she came in, greeting her with smiles, Taylor’s wide and happy, Danny’s still showing slight confusion but acceptance.

“Hi, Tali,” Taylor said brightly. “Did you sleep well?”

“I did, thank you,” the young woman replied. Taylor pushed out a chair with her foot and she sat down at the implied invitation. “The bed was very comfortable. I’ve never experienced anything quite like that. We don’t really do the same thing on our ships.”

Taylor chuckled quietly. “It’s probably a shock coming to our world like you did. Hopefully you won’t have any trouble with it until we can get you back home again.”

Tali laughed. “It’s very different in some ways, and surprisingly familiar in others. So far I like it. Although compared to what was facing me, almost anything would be an improvement.”

The girl’s face fell for a moment. “Yeah, I can imagine,” she said in a low voice. “What happened to you is horrible. And all the other people on your ship. Someone needs to do something about those Batarians...” Her expression went oddly cold and blank for a second or two, making Tali feel somewhat uncomfortable, but perked up again almost immediately. “Something for later. Right now, breakfast is more important. Amy said you could eat anything a human can now, the only issue is personal taste. So we thought we’d try a few things and see if you like them.”

“I like oranges,” Tali replied hopefully. Danny snorted with laughter as he turned to look at them.

“We noticed. I’ll buy some more later today. We don’t seem to have any left right now.” He seemed amused at how Tali looked embarrassed. “Don’t worry, I don’t mind. They’re intended for eating and you certainly seemed to enjoy them.”

“They’re amazing,” Tali said vehemently, remembering the taste, unlike anything she’d ever had. “I can promise you that the Fleet would love to trade for just those. We have so few staples in our diet these days...” She sighed. “The Live Ships are incredible but they’re a long way from perfect, and are only just large enough to keep us alive. We don’t have the space or the energy for luxuries.”

“Well, that’s one of the things we’re going to have to fix,” Taylor stated firmly. “That’s what I do. I invent stuff to fix things. I’m making a list.” She tapped the side of her head as she smiled. Tali nodded, smiling back, and feeling that the girl was probably being entirely truthful based on what she’d seen so far.

“All right, let’s see how this works.” Danny brought some plates to the table, putting them in the middle, then went back for more. He spent a few minutes getting various dishes out of the oven as well, and soon Tali was looking at more food than she’d seen for a long time. “OK. We have meat, as well as vegetables and fruit, so there’s quite a choice. That’s bacon, I’ve never met anyone who doesn’t like it,” he said as he sat down, indicating one plate full of strips of some sort of cooked meat that looked crisp and oddly delicious. “Then we have fried eggs, hash browns, pancakes, fried tomatoes, fresh tomatoes, toasted bread, sausages, baked beans, and a salad. Along with various sauces and syrups, as well as the usual condiments.” He pointed at each item as he named it.

Tali felt her stomach rumble, apparently liking the display. “It’s a lot more than we would normally have for breakfast, but hopefully you’ll find something you like.”

“Thank you, you’re very generous,” Tali assured him. She peered at the food, wondering what to try first. After a few questions which were answered by both of them, she had a plate full of a little bit of everything. All of them started eating, the two Humans watching Tali curiously as she cautiously tried the bacon first.

“Ancestors, that’s good,” she breathed, after swallowing. “I hardly ever get to try meat, and it has to be liquidized normally for us to eat. I had no idea the texture was so… crunchy.”

“Not all meats are cooked like that, bacon is sort of special, and not everyone likes it crisp, but it’s got to be better than a steak smoothie,” Taylor commented with a grin. She herself appeared to be quite determined to make the bacon disappear rapidly. Tali laughed, then applied herself to the food with a will, discovering that almost everything was delicious even if nothing like anything she’d tasted before. The sole exception was the fried tomatoes, which she didn’t care for.

To her delight, there was also orange juice available, which she rapidly decided was her favorite drink ever. It was nearly as good as a fresh orange. Better in some ways in fact.

If nothing else, she was going to enjoy the food while she was here if this was what it was like.

When they finally finished she sat back feeling full and in a good mood. “That was very nice indeed, Danny,” she said gratefully. “Thank you for going to all that effort.”

“It was my pleasure, Tali,” he replied. Looking at the mechanical timepiece on his wrist, something that in Council terms would have been an incredibly valuable antique for the sheer rarity and age, he nodded. “Brendan and his people will be here in about half an hour, so I’ve got time to clean up.” He looked at her as she felt a bit worried. The day before after Taylor had explained the entire sequence of events to her father, and he’d spent a while sighing and trying to get to grips with it, he’d disappeared into another room and apparently taken close to an hour talking on the local communications system to this ‘Brendan’ man, who Taylor had told her was a high ranked government official and a friend. He’d returned saying that the next day the government would be sending people to interview her.

She was a little worried about this, but it seemed entirely reasonable from their point of view as she was undoubtedly a potential problem they hadn’t seen coming, and so far everyone had been friendly and helpful. Astoundingly so, in fact, under the odd circumstances. She doubted very much than any of the species she knew about would have been so nice to a stranded Quarian. Or any Quarian, stranded or not, should they come to the attention of the government.

Possibly that was her paranoia talking, but the last few centuries had taught her people that paranoia wasn’t necessarily either bad or misplaced when it came to their interactions with others.

She hoped that this adventure would be the start of something much happier. It seemed entirely possible, based if nothing else on the young Human who was looking at her with a gaze that was far too knowing for someone her age.

“It’ll be fine, Tali,” Taylor assured her. “I won’t let anything bad happen, I promise.”

Oddly enough Tali believed her, and that she could keep her word. And would no matter what.

“My people haven’t had entirely… friendly… receptions in the past,” she replied sadly. “We’re galactic pariahs, in fact. It’s partly our fault, but...”

“What other people think of you isn’t something I care about,” Taylor said firmly. “We make up our own minds. And you’re not even in your own galaxy so that’s not important right now anyway.”

Tali nodded a little, still stunned about what Taylor had told her the day before. Not only had the girl managed to literally teleport her across half the galaxy in milliseconds with something she’d designed and built in hours, but she’d added to that ridiculousness by retrieving her from an entirely different universe! It seemed utterly crazy, but she’d shown Tali enough proof that in the end she’d had to accept it.

‘Subspace,’ whatever it really was, apparently allowed some very peculiar things to be done that normal physics would deem impossible. Normal physics seemed to be rather incorrect, as it turned out. And Taylor Hebert was certainly not interested in its opinion, instead going her own way and making it move out of the way and stare in horror…

“I still find the very concept incredible,” Tali admitted. “I’ve read about theories of quantum parallel worlds, but no one has really managed to prove any of them, not to the point of showing a real tangible method to access another level of reality. Quantum computing shows some evidence for the idea but… actually visiting another plane of existence or a parallel world or whatever this is best described as is so far from anything I know about that I’m having trouble understanding it.”

“We’ve known it was real for many years,” Danny put in, listening to them both with interest. “As Taylor explained last night, we’re in contact with at least one other parallel world in the form of Earth Aleph, although these days it’s technically illegal to duplicate the work that led to that connection.” He frowned at his daughter, who grinned at him. “Which may cause problems...”

“Nah, it’ll be fine, Dad, I did it completely differently,” she assured him. “Anyway, I was answering a distress call. I had an ethical requirement to provide any aid I could. Just like at sea.”

He sighed faintly. “You’ve been listening to too many tall tales at the Union,” he muttered, shaking his head. Taylor hid a smile but Tali could see she was amused. And that he wasn’t actually upset or annoyed. They clearly had a healthy parent/child relationship and could indulge in mild teasing, in a way that made her homesick again for an instant.

“Hopefully the government will see it that way,” he added. “We’ll find out soon.” Standing up he started clearing the table, Taylor helping. Soon everything was back in its place, clean and dry. Tali arranged the chairs neatly, feeling that she should do something to help, which made Taylor smile at her.

As they were finishing up, the girl looked around, the chiming sound of the door annunciator coming moments later. “That’s Brendan and his friend,” she said. “I’ll get it.” She disappeared out of the room and Tali heard the door open and low voices. Glancing at Danny, she tried to suppress her apprehension.

He obviously picked up on this as he put his hand on her shoulder for a moment in a calming gesture. “It will work out fine, Tali,” he said softly. “We’re on your side, and everything will be good.”

Gesturing to the doorway, he added, “Let’s go in the living room, it’s more comfortable, and see what happens next.”

She followed as he led the way across the hall into the larger room, and sat down on a chair that he pointed to. Shortly afterwards Taylor came in with two other Humans accompanying her, both males older than Danny. The pair stopped and stared at her as soon as they laid eyes on her, which caused her to swallow a little nervously.

“This is my friend Tali’Zorah, a Quarian I rescued,” Taylor said casually as she dropped into the chair next to Tali. “Please be nice to her, I like her.” She grinned at Tali as she spoke.

“Good lord,” one of the two new arrivals said under his breath, before he stepped forward and introduced himself.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Brendan kept his startlement to himself, although his companion muttered an exclamation of shock, having not really been as ready for this as he’d thought he was. On the drive from the airbase they’d discussed how the meeting with Taylor’s new friend would go, which depended to some extent on how both Taylor and Tali’Zorah responded to the proposals that had been authorized. Now, faced with a literal alien from another world, Keith Prender seemed almost to have forgotten those plans for a moment.

“My apologies,” the man finally said as he stepped forward and held out his hand after a visibly confused second or two. The Quarian glanced at Taylor, who nodded, then stood up and carefully shook the offered appendage, with the air of someone to whom this was not familiar at all but was willing to try it. “Your appearance was a little surprising, I’m afraid, even though I was warned. I had very little time to get used to the concept of meeting someone from… elsewhere.” Prender smiled a little unevenly, although he quickly pulled himself together. “It’s not something I ever expected to do.”

“I understand,” Tali replied as she sat down again. “I can imagine it’s a shock.” Her voice seemed, to Brendan, to exhibit a certain amount of nervousness and apprehension, although she was hiding it well as far as a human viewpoint went. It was a surprisingly normal voice too, he noted, nothing really present to distinguish it from that of any woman, although she had a faint accent unlike anything he’d ever heard.

It struck him that she was, in fact, speaking incredibly fluent English, for that matter. Looking at Taylor he wondered how the devil the girl had managed that little trick. And so fast too.

Something else he suspected he was going to get a long and very bizarre report on in due course…

“Have a seat, gentlemen,” Danny said, waving to the chairs on the other side of the coffee table. “Would either of you like drinks?”

“Some coffee would be nice, thanks, Danny,” Brendan replied as he sat. Danny nodded, looking at Prender, who indicated he’d like the same. The elder Hebert went into the kitchen for a couple of minutes during which everyone was silent, Prender obviously thinking hard about how to proceed, Brendan waiting to see what happened, and Tali just waiting. Taylor seemed curious but unworried and met his eyes with a look of mild amusement in her own.

When Danny came back he handed out drinks from the tray he was carrying, Tali and Taylor both getting orange juice, while he and the other pair had coffee. Everyone took their beverages, Prender drinking a couple of swallows before he put his cup down and nodded to himself.

“All right. Before we begin, I would also like to record this interview for later study,” he added, opening his briefcase and pulling out a small omnidirectional camera, which he put on the table on the legs that folded out from the bottom. “Does anyone have any objections to that?” No one seemed to, so he turned it on. “I am Keith Prender, newly appointed Ambassador to the Quarian species on behalf of the Department of Extraterrestrial Relations of the United States of America. A department, I must point out, that didn’t exist twenty four hours ago, and an appointment that was not something I expected in the slightest.” He smiled a little ruefully as Taylor grinned. Tali seemed slightly embarrassed if Brendan was reading her expression correctly. While quite different from a human face, it wasn’t so different that such things were unrecognizable.

He mused on the idea that Parahumans, especially Case 53s, quite likely had reduced the impact meeting someone not fully, or in this case, even slightly human would have on most people. It seemed probable that if Tali’Zorah was to walk down the street in the middle of Brockton Bay, almost everyone would just think Parahuman and go no further than that, unlike the confusion that would have occurred only forty years ago. Her garb, which was much less bizarre than many cape costumes were, only added to that impression. While quite divergent from the human norm in many ways, she was actually closer to what one would expect than a number of Parahumans he was aware of in fact. Even in this city there were at least two he could think of that looked less human…

“It is a pleasure to meet you, Mr Prender,” Tali replied. “I am Tali’Zorah vas Klaatu, although considering my ship is essentially destroyed, I suppose I’m only Tali’Zorah nar Rayya again.”

“I… am unfamiliar with your naming system,” Prender admitted, sounding curious. “From context the suffix is… the name of a ship?”

“Yes.” She nodded. “Nar is used to denote the ship one is born on. When one matures and becomes a crew-member of another ship, the Vas designates the ship name. I was a member of the crew of the Klaatu, a Salarian science and research vessel, and undergoing my Pilgrimage.” She sighed quietly, seeming depressed. “Unfortunately my ship was attacked by pirates, Batarian bosh’tets who slaughtered most of the crew and captured the few who were left alive when they boarded us. I was working in the secondary reactor compartment when they attacked and was able to hide well enough they couldn’t find me. Partly luck, partly the fact that they were in a hurry and badly trained.” She made a gesture Brendan couldn’t decipher. “Although after a couple of days I wasn’t sure escaping from them was actually a good thing...”

“It was,” Taylor put in with a sympathetic expression, as the Quarian woman looked at the floor and radiated sadness enough to make Brendan feel very angry on her behalf. “Because you managed to survive despite the odds, improvise your distress beacon, and attract my attention. It worked out well in the end.”

“That’s true, I suppose,” Tali replied with a nod, looking at the girl, then smiling a little bitterly. “I do wish my friends had made it, but...” She shook her head as she took a deep breath. “One cannot change the past, all one can do is change the future.”

“All too true,” Prender agreed. He also seemed somewhat annoyed, but not at her. “I take it these Batarian pirates are not uncommon in your space?”

“Unfortunately not, they are a scourge that I wish someone would wipe from existence,” Tali replied with a note of anger in her expressive voice. “But the Council does nothing, has never done anything, but simply allows them to continue raiding people all over the galaxy. Yes, if they are caught in the act, the result is usually less pirates, but they’re sneaky and are most certainly connected to the Batarian leadership at a high enough level that far too many of them avoid what they deserve.” She went quiet for a moment, then added less vehemently, “I’m sorry. I still have bad memories, and those… creatures… have preyed on my people for far too long.”

Prender nodded, his gaze assessing. “I believe that the politics of where you came from are, by the sound of it, at least as complicated as they are here. I will be interested in learning about them.”

“That may take some time, Mr Prender,” Tali said with a small smile. “And I am hardly an expert on politics, I’m an engineer. But I’ll do what I can, and I have access to a large amount of data on many subjects relating to the Council and the other species associated with it.” She lifted her left arm and indicated the device that was wrapped around her forearm. “My omnitool contains all sorts of information that should help me tell you what you need to know.”

“It’s sort of like a phone combined with a massive database, scanners, a tool kit, and all sorts of other cool stuff,” Taylor commented, making them all look at her. “I can download the contents of one and put it into a format that our computers can handle easily enough.”

“I have a number of spares salvaged from the ship’s crew,” Tali nodded. “I can’t see a reason not to give you one, under the circumstances.”

“That would certainly be interesting, and probably helpful,” Prender replied with a glance at Brendan, who was wondering what would come of an alien database with a certain amount of worry. He had a shrewd idea that Taylor might well have already downloaded such data, and quite possibly looked at it and been annoyed that it wasn’t sufficiently advanced in many places.

“Perhaps Tali should tell her story and how she ended up where she was when Taylor found her,” Danny suggested. “In her own words. It would probably be the best way to begin.”

Everyone regarded Tali, who looked around then nodded, putting her half-empty glass of orange juice down on the table and sitting more upright. “Of course.” She thought for a moment, then began, “My people, the Quarians, are the few remaining survivors of a devastating war nearly three centuries ago. A war that we quite literally engineered our way into, by accident and stupidity, and one that is still reverberating through our civilization to this day...”

The next three hours were filled with a story that left Brendan by turns impressed, appalled, furious, and horrified. The civilization Tali came from, and the ‘Council’ that ruled most of it from the giant space station known as the Citadel, appeared in some ways very advanced, as he’d have expected, but in other ways was oddly familiar and quite unpleasant in a number of places. An entire species practiced slavery to a level that was even worse than the history of his own country could show, and the supposed leaders of the inter-species alliance did nothing about it even when their own citizens fell victim to that fate. The same Council had deliberately raised a non-aligned and less advanced species to their level to fight a war they’d started and were losing on their behalf, then committed slow genocide on their saviors when the inevitable blowback occurred. Having allied with another militaristic species to fight the first one and come close to losing in the process.

The most powerful faction, the Asari, were clearly running a long term goal of slowly subverting all the other factions by literally out breeding them, while the Salarians as the second most powerful one seemed to be primarily involved in spying on everyone else all the time. The Turians were the de facto military and appeared to be perfectly content with annexing less advanced species and relegating them to the status of ‘client’ species, which sounded a lot like an empire being built to him, and this was apparently completely acceptable. Add to that the way only the top three species got a seat on the Council itself, everyone else being subordinate to that group, and it didn’t sound particularly fair or equitable to him in any way.

Not to mention the Quarians had very definitely got the shitty end of the stick. Yes, they’d made a bad mistake, but from what he could see it was genuinely a mistake and one that couldn’t have been predicted, one they’d already paid an horrific price for. To then have the survivors rejected by everyone else and forced into a nomadic lifestyle that was obviously slowly leading to inevitable extinction, since they apparently couldn’t even settle on another planet without risking military action against them, was just the icing on a very unpleasant cake.

Even assuming that Tali’Zorah’s testimony was obviously biased by her own experiences, there was more than enough evidence that she showed them from her omnitool’s database to prove that her people had been badly let down by the body that liked to think it was in charge of the entire galaxy. A group that only had the status it did by virtue of using technology they’d basically reverse engineered, or simply found, the detritus from the long extinct species who’d actually designed it in the first place.

From both a scientific and a military background he found himself wondering just how foolish one had to be to end up basing one’s entire civilization on hardware you didn’t completely understand, made by people who had mysteriously vanished for reasons you couldn’t work out. It seemed… suboptimal and incautious.

Something about the whole setup seemed off to him.

He was also puzzled about how this accidentally created AI species, the Geth, had basically been completely ignored once the Quarians had left their home world. It seemed a little strange that apparently none of the other species had thought it might be a good idea to deal with the problem permanently before it grew past the point of that being possible. But they seemed to have just decided to pretend there wasn’t a whole solar system full of rogue hyper-advanced and provably dangerous AIs sitting out there for the last three centuries. Who knew what they were like now?

He certainly wouldn’t have just walked off and forgotten about such a thing. That was how you ended up with a very nasty surprise when you least expected it. The Quarians could be forgiven for acting like that, there weren’t enough of them left to do much other than risk their existence, but as far as he was concerned it was extremely irresponsible for the Council to have done what they had. Or had not, in this case.

The entire story left him feeling that the Citadel species were by and large not people it would necessarily be a good idea to get involved with. They seemed to be rather bad friends at best. And in some fairly important ways none too bright.

On the other hand, from what he’d heard so far, he had a lot of sympathy for the Quarians despite past mistakes, and it seemed viable to open further contact with them sooner or later. One way or another a mutually beneficial arrangement might well be possible.

Tali finally finished giving her side of what had happened. When she stopped, Taylor took over for a while, explaining without going into technical details what she’d done and how the Quarian woman had ended up finding herself on Earth Bet, which seemed to have come as a considerable surprise to her. He sympathized, Taylor tended to have that effect on most people sooner or later.

Prender had asked a lot of questions, good ones, as the time had progressed, and when Tali’s recounting of events finished, he sat and thought for a while. Taylor got up and retrieved some more juice for both her and her friend, the alien woman taking it with a smile of gratitude, then she sat down again and waited patiently. Danny refilled their coffee cups for the third time and went back to listening quietly as he’d been doing the entire time.

Eventually the diplomat stirred and said, “Thank you for the background information and your story, Miss Tali’Zorah. It puts the current situation into a helpful context, and gives my department and the US government a point to start in working out how we deal with all this in the longer term.”

“You’re welcome, Mr Prender,” Tali replied politely.

“Now, as far as the immediate future goes, I have a wide remit to make your stay here as comfortable as we can manage, until such time as we can return you to your people, and hopefully open a larger relationship with them. We are taking the view that, despite your somewhat unexpected arrival and the circumstances, that we will treat you as a representative of the Quarian people, an ambassador in essence, even if not one officially recognized by your own government.” He smiled at her as she looked surprised.

“That allows us to shortcut a number of potential problems regarding your position, and my orders are to do what I can to make things work out for all of us.” He produced a thick folder from his case, one that wasn’t the data that Brendan had shared with him on the plane. “The President, our highest elected official, after considerable discussion last night with his closest advisers when they were informed of your presence and the background to your arrival here, and who facilitated that, has agreed to grant you refugee status in this country in addition to everything else. We will arrange suitable paperwork and identity documents to that end.”

He shook his head a little while Tali kept staring at him in visible shock. “As you are the first extraterrestrial visitor we’ve ever encountered, that does present some potential issues, as we’re not particularly keen on broadcasting that fact to the world just yet. There are elements of our society, and others, that could and most likely would cause significant problems should it become widely know, unfortunately.”

Tali nodded slowly, seeming to understand the problem.

“However, we are lucky that, unlike the situation up until quite recently in historical terms, these days there is a convenient way around aspects of the problem.”

“This… Parahuman… phenomenon your civilization has,” Tali said as he stopped, looking intrigued and enlightened. “Taylor has told me a number of things about that, and her friends Amy and Vicky explained other aspects of it. It seems very strange to me, I have to admit. There’s nothing quite like it back home.”

“Precisely,” Prender nodded. “Your appearance is sufficiently unlike a human to make it clear that you’re different, but because the public is now used to the occasional non-human-appearing Parahuman, you won’t stand out nearly as much as you once would have done. We can leverage that fact to minimize any public attention beyond that which a Parahuman attracts merely by existing. Being seen to associate with members of New Wave in the form of the Dallon sisters, for example, would tend to reinforce that assumption. Until such time as we are ready to admit to the truth, we feel that’s probably the best approach.”

She seemed to weigh his words carefully, then made a gesture of acceptance. “It’s your world, and I’m grateful for any help you’re willing to give me. Allowing people to assume I’m one of these Parahumans seems a small price to pay.”

He smiled. “Excellent. That will make our job much easier. Now, due to your contact with Miss Hebert, and your own background, we will also arrange a suitable level of security clearance to cover your interactions with her own technology. You’ve already learned one of the best-kept secrets in the country merely by meeting her, so there’s little point pretending it didn’t happen. And no one doubts that you also possess technological knowledge far in advance of what’s current on our world.” He watched her face, adding after a moment, “It’s hoped that you would be amenable to trading information.”

Tali looked at Taylor, who looked back, then turned to Prender. “I don’t see why not,” she replied quietly. “The entire point of my Pilgrimage, any Quarian’s Pilgrimage, is to learn new things of use to our people, and we trade information all the time for that reason. Taylor’s friend Amy has already given me the greatest gift any of us have ever received in the last three centuries, and can probably help my people in the same way from what she says. That alone would be a fair trade for everything I know.”

“I’m pleased to hear that, and I expect Doctor Calhoun and the President will be as well,” Prender smiled. “I expect that a joint effort between you and Taylor could produce some interesting results.” He looked at Danny. “We were hoping that Gravtec would cooperate with such a thing. You have one of the, if not the, most concentrated assembly of highly intelligent scientists in the country. It would seem reasonable to leverage that with the goal of learning from Miss Tali’Zorah.”

“I have no objection at all, personally,” Danny replied immediately with a look at his daughter, then Tali. “I like Tali too, and from what she’s said, she’s a very good engineer. The only possible problem is precisely the assumption that she is a Parahuman. We’ve gone to significant effort to make certain that nothing we produce can be claimed to be of Parahuman origin specifically to keep aspects of the PRT at arm’s length for a number of reasons.”

“That’s understood, and agreed with, Mr Hebert,” Prender nodded. “Leave that to us. We’ll make certain that the people who might desire to interfere are convinced that it’s nothing to do with them. It’s what I understand has been done up until now, against one or two particularly annoying sources of interference.”

“In that case I can’t see any reason not to work on that basis,” Danny said. He looked at Taylor who was frowning thoughtfully and asked, “Do you have anything to add to that, Taylor?”

“No, Dad, it seems a good idea to me as long as the government can get the PRT to back off if they get pushy.” She got a sort of an evil grin for a moment. “I’d hate to have to do it myself, I’ve got more important things to be getting on with.”

Brendan couldn’t help chuckling. “Please don’t go to war with the PRT, Taylor,” he said in good humor. “We’d never hear the end of it.”

“I’ll be good if they will,” she assured him, grinning again in a much less worrying manner. “But if anyone hurts my friends, I’ll be upset.”

“That’s well understood,” he replied, smiling. Prender was looking back and forth between the both of them and seemed mildly confused but shrugged a little and moved on. Pulling out a small still camera he held it up.

“I’ll take an ID photo of you, and we’ll have a suitable backstory and documentation for public consumption here by the early afternoon. Until such time as we can allow the truth out, it would be appreciated if you stick to that backstory if anyone questions you. Hopefully they won’t, and if they do we’ll deal with it, but it will allow you to go about day to day business without too much trouble.”

Tali nodded her understanding. He had her get up and stand against the wall, where Danny quickly hung a white sheet to provide a standard ID photo background. After a couple of minutes work he studied the results and looked pleased. “Excellent, this will do the job nicely.” He put the camera away and turned off his video camera, that also going back into his case, which he closed. “I think that for the moment that concludes our business here. We’ll want to ask more questions once our analysts have gone over these recordings, but you’ll get plenty of notice so hopefully that won’t be too much trouble on your side.”

“Thank you, more than I can say, Mr Prender,” Tali said gratefully.

“Please call me Keith, I think we’re likely to be working associates for a while to come,” he smiled.

“In that case, please call me Tali. And I think I’m actually looking forward to it.” She looked around at them all. “Two days ago I was facing a slow death thousands of light-years from my family and friends. Now I’m safe and welcomed by new friends, and have found hope for my people unlike anything we’ve ever seen. Talking to your government seems a fair deal in return for all that.” Her expression showed she was utterly sincere, and it made her look very young.

“I look forward to seeing how all this works out,” Prender said with a nod of acknowledgment for her words.

“I’ll convert the data on one of Tali’s spare omnitools into a format normal computers can handle and let Brendan have it,” Taylor commented from her chair. “It won’t take too long. That should give your guys a lot more of the background data on this Council and that sort of thing. There’s a huge amount of information stored on those things.”

She sat up fully from where she’d been comfortably reclining while listening to Tali talk and turned her attention to Brendan. “There’s also something else we should probably think about.”

“Which is?” he asked curiously.

“There’s a broken alien spaceship floating around out there full of all sorts of cool technology, and I know exactly where it is,” she said with an impish grin. “And I can send things to it as well as bring them back...”

Brendan stared at her, then very slowly matched her grin tooth for tooth.

“Oh, dear,” Danny sighed faintly. “Here we go.”

Tali started laughing.

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