Objects in Motion: A Progression Fantasy Adventure, page 9
“How do you know all this?” Columbuzz challenged, helping Smokeshow to her feet. Isaac helped, reaching out to steady the girl on the other side.
“I saw another attack like this,” Isaac half-lied, since he’d seen the footage from the hospital and the aftermath, even if he hadn’t been there at the time. “Someone is stealing Mechaniacal tech. Which could be anywhere.” It was only a guess, but he made a statement since Chains certainly wouldn’t be uncertain.
“Guh,” said Smokeshow. “QwikMed inside,” she continued, and Isaac exchanged a look with Columbuzz and helped Smokeshow into the building despite its still-active defenses. The guns didn’t swing to target them, thankfully, and the doors opened of their own accord for the three of them. Isaac helped her into a chair in the cafeteria, while Columbuzz rattled through the cabinets before he came out with the healing patch.
Isaac found his hands shaking, so he clasped them behind his back as Columbuzz fumbled out the QwikMed patch, and Smokeshow applied it, slapping it against her arm. She sighed in relief, slumping in her chair, then buried her face in her hands. He exchanged an uncertain glance with Columbuzz as her shoulders shook briefly, since he would have thought that the daughter of a crime boss would be used to violence.
Though thinking about it, he wasn’t sure that was entirely true. Her power made her essentially immune to anything physical and maybe even stuff like energy blasts, and with her dad being who he was, nobody would have tried to bully her even when she was younger. For all he knew, this was the first time she’d actually been punched in the face, metaphorically speaking—and the sensation of losing her power might have been far worse for her than it was for him.
“We should check the rest of the building,” Isaac said, lacking any other useful contribution. Besides, he wanted to know how everything was laid out, hopefully to give him some idea of where and how to get what he wanted from Crash. There might not be a better chance, even if he did feel a bit bad about exploiting the situation, gangers or no.
“Yeah,” Smokeshow said, standing up, her dark makeup smudged. “Dad’s not going to be happy anyway, but it’ll be better if we make sure nothing got stolen.” She took a long breath, then nodded at Columbuzz. “Go button us up. I’ll take Chains with me in case there’s anything else up there.”
The fly man returned her nod and headed off to a door on one side of the cafeteria room, while Smokeshow led him to the other. He kept a hand under her elbow, a habit borne from helping Cayleb get around when they’d both been younger, and while the QwikMed seemed to have worked, she let him do so. She lifted one of the many silver chain necklaces she wore and pressed it against the front of the unmarked door, and there was a click as it unlocked.
Smokeshow silently led him down the carpeted hallway beyond, and he glanced through any open doors he saw. It was clearly a converted office building, but some of the former offices had been turned into bedrooms, others into storage with jumbled boxes. Smokeshow opened one closed door, and through it Isaac saw guns, both conventional and tinker-made, racked on the walls, but he only got a glimpse before she closed it. An elevator took them upstairs, and Smokeshow finally spoke.
“Well, that was shit.”
“Not fun,” Isaac agreed. “But could have been worse.” He couldn’t help but think about how close he’d gotten to being pasted by his own powers. Or the lack thereof.
“Yeah.” Smokeshow produced a cigarette from somewhere and brought it to her lips. As usual, it didn’t smell of anything, and Isaac had to wonder if it was actually real or just one of her illusions. “Never felt something like that before, though.” She wandered along the upper hallway, opening doors that just had knobs rather than any kind of security arrangement.
“Same,” Isaac admitted. The sudden loss of power hadn’t hurt, but the more he thought about it, the more disturbing it was.
“I heard Mechaniacal used to be a big name, but I didn’t realize he had that stuff—this is Dad’s room,” Smokeshow said parenthetically as she opened one of the doors. Isaac peered over her shoulder, trying to commit it to memory. Like the rest of the rooms, it had a small, armored window, illuminating a surprisingly neat and clean floor and bed. In the corner there was a large computer console, one of the old micro-vac models with tape drives, with wires leading to a tinker monitor with half its innards exposed and a thick cable winding up to the ceiling. That was probably Isaac’s target, and while he couldn’t do anything about it now, he made sure to memorize the serial number to make sure he got the right type of tape for it.
“Looks clear,” he observed, and Smokeshow grunted, closing the door. She continued on to the end of the hall and opened the door there, revealing what was obviously her room, with posters on the wall for bands—some he’d never heard of, and a few like Moon Prism that were fairly famous—and a bunch of plush magical girl figurines on a shelf. Thankfully, she didn’t invite him in; Isaac had no idea what to do if she’d gone that far, but she did lean on the jamb and rub her eyes, further smearing her cosmetics. She looked subtly different than usual, less pale and dark, her usual appearance likely altered by illusion.
“I don’t know if I’m up for this,” she said, not looking directly at him. “Running cover was fine, but getting hit like that…”
“There are other options than this,” Isaac said, not sure if he was really equipped to give advice, but he’d take any chance to try and convince someone away from being a ganger. “So long as you don’t go hero.” Smokeshow took a deep drag on her possibly fake cigarette and let it out.
“Maybe? Dunno what I’d do. Everyone I know’s in the Iron Nails.”
“You could come to the convention,” Isaac said, mouth betraying him before his brain caught up. He wished he could play it off as just wanting to offer her another option, something other than gang life, but he wasn’t stupid enough to ignore himself. Despite everything that advised against it—or maybe because of it—he was interested in her.
In a flash he realized that he was going to have a pretty rough time going forward if he was going to try and date the daughter of one of the guys he wanted to bring to account. Or even if he didn’t try, just being in her vicinity was going to screw with his ability to think. It would have been better if he’d not said anything, but he couldn’t take it back now.
“The what now?”
“MetaFiCon,” Isaac clarified, almost feeling things shift as he committed to the course. “Fan convention for metas, real or fictional. Next Wednesday. There are former supers there and other metas. Just people doing something other than this.”
“Huh,” Smokeshow said. “Maybe.” She paused for a moment, studying his face as she took another drag on her cigarette. “I gotta call Dad,” she said abruptly. “You should probably get outta here. Just ’cause he’ll throw a fit and you don’t want to be around.”
“Sure,” said Isaac and backed away as Smokeshow stepped into her room. Just before she closed the door, she stopped and looked back.
“Hey,” she said. “Thanks.” Then she closed the door without waiting for his answer. He shook his head, putting aside the whole interaction with some serious effort, and started snooping on his way back to the elevator. No matter what, he wasn’t willing to compromise on his original goals, and he’d gotten a lot farther than he expected. If he’d had the right tape drive, he would have gone right to Crash’s room, but as it was, he’d have to figure out a way to come back.
Since it was a former office building, he found what he was looking for off to the side of the elevator—a janitor’s closet. He was pretty certain that the clean floors downstairs and the nicely vacuumed carpet upstairs wasn’t something that was done by any of the gang members, and judging by the contents of the closet, he was right.
There was the usual vacuum, mop, broom, and so on, but most importantly there was a checklist and signoff sheet. An itemized list of to-do items, from a weekly refilling of toiletries to a bimonthly rug shampooing. By the dates, the cleaning crew came on Fridays, so he had a day to get ready. He felt a lot more confident about joining in cleanup than he did about getting access by trying to finesse Smokeshow—and a lot better, too.
It wasn’t just that he was interested in her. Smokeshow had her life decided by supers, the same as he had. The girl hadn’t chosen her parents, but unlike him, she hadn’t had a chance to go out and try and make something of herself. Maybe if he gave her something outside the gang, she could escape the trap of being a ganger forever.
He got back in the elevator, poking the button for the ground floor, and by the time he emerged, Columbuzz was sitting in the cafeteria with a cup of coffee. As Isaac watched, the fly guy dumped six packets of sugar into his drink, stirring it around and then extending a proboscis to slurp it up like a straw. Disturbing, but people didn’t choose their powers or mutations.
“Smokeshow is in her room,” he reported. “She’ll need food and drink for the QwikMed.”
Columbuzz gave him a thumbs-up in reply, continuing to slurp his coffee, and Isaac walked out of the building. There were a couple of normal gangers already examining the crushed and severed halves of the device, and they looked guilty as he emerged. It really wasn’t his business, but Isaac hitched a thumb at the building anyway.
“Crash will return soon. Stow that inside or in a garage,” he told them, then walked away down the street. Once he was out of sight, he started jogging, wishing he had some form of transportation for Chains, since he was getting tired of having to run a couple miles every time. At least he was getting exercise.
After a quick change at the self-store, he went out as Harkeem, the fussy southerner, being a solidly neutral and forgettable persona for making a variety of random purchases. A tape drive and extension of the right make for his own computer and set of backup tapes, some extra cleaning supplies, and a refill on cosmetics. He even went and looked at a bicycle for Chains but couldn’t see it meshing with the gruff ganger’s personality. Chains needed a motorcycle or monowheel, but those were far and away too expensive, even if he bought a used one somewhere.
The trip let him listen in on the radio from various stores where the news was playing, and he bought a couple of newspapers from a stand. Before, he’d get most of his news from Cayleb or from gossip at the hospital, but now that he was off by himself or hanging around the slums, he had to resort to more conventional means of informing himself. Mostly, he was morbidly curious if the whereabouts of one Isaac Hartson were being sought, but according to the papers there had been other glimpses of Mechaniacal’s machines in other parts of the Five City Alliance. Perhaps even further abroad, but getting news reports from foreign kingdoms or city-states was a little tenuous.
Before, he’d thought that maybe Blacktime was involved—whenever anything large was stirring, that was the first and easiest assumption. Of course, he had his own personal grudge, but it was just a fact that Blacktime ran most of the crime in the area. But with the attack against Crash, that was out, and worrisome. Isaac forced himself not to fret over it too much, though; he was still just a nominal-class meta, even if he had somehow managed to take out one of the drones. Probably thanks to whoever was messing about with them being vastly inferior to the real Mechaniacal.
He didn’t go back to the slums. Partly because he didn’t want to be interrogated by Crash, partly because he didn’t want Chains to be associated with the cleaning crew even slightly. Mostly because he was all ganger’d out and didn’t feel like facing even a hint of violence. Chains was aggressive and decisive, but that was stressful when Isaac didn’t really know what he was doing most of the time.
Instead, he spent the downtime finishing details on Ravdia’s armor and weapon—some wire and extra padding to reinforce it and make sure that it wouldn’t squash him if he were somehow deprived of powers once again. Then, since he had spare time, he kept at it and added some bits and pieces to Lou’s toolset. Pencils and screwdrivers, old wrenches from a scrapheap in the industrial district, some cough drops, duct tape. Nothing that would imply any skills Isaac didn’t have, but he did know how to at least turn a valve or fix a light switch. Not that he needed to do it, but he had to keep himself busy to stop from dwelling.
Both costumes got packed into a sectioned duffel, along with the outfit for Chains. Under the circumstances, he needed to have all his personas available when he went out. There was no point in creating and establishing them if they weren’t going to be at hand when he needed them. Not that he was looking for a fight, but the city was uncertain at the moment.
He headed over to the slums early in Lou’s costume but dressed overtop that as a generic ganger. A bandana covered Lou’s bald cap, and big, thick eyebrows along with a permanent sneer altered his face. In a way it wasn’t much of a disguise, but changing the way he walked and the details around his eyes and nose tended to be enough to prevent any casual scrutiny. Besides, he wasn’t intending to interact much. He simply swaggered through the slums in the pre-dawn light, with essentially nobody around, and when he reached the street with Crash’s building—which still had swaths of stone missing to reveal metal underneath—he went and ascended one of the fire escapes on the other side of the street.
If it weren’t for the super-fight alongside Smokeshow, he wouldn’t have thought of it, but in hindsight the roof perch was obvious. Too obvious, most likely, which was why he didn’t take one directly across from Crash’s building, but rather down the road, closer to the edge of the slums. A commercial cleaning crew would probably come from the better area of town, so he could hopefully catch it that way.
Isaac waited. There was, unfortunately, no telling when the crew would show up, since that hadn’t been helpfully recorded on the sheets in the janitor’s closet, so he settled in for the long haul. He had bottled water and granola bars and a blanket to sit on, so he hoped he wasn’t already too late to catch them.
The idea wasn’t as stupid as it might seem at first blush. He’d long found that people had a certain visceral dislike of being around strangers cleaning up and tended to make themselves scarce. Coupled with the fact that Smokeshow spent most of her time hanging around Loveley’s and Crash was mostly away, there wasn’t likely to be anyone to trip him up other than the cleaning crew—and given the damage, he was planning to just present himself as extra help from the gang.
Even if the cleaners didn’t know exactly who they were working for, it was obvious enough by the surroundings the kind of person, so it wouldn’t be outlandish. And if they didn’t buy it, he wouldn’t push. He could always try again later some other way.
Isaac didn’t own a watch, but by the radio someone had on in the distance, it was just past nine—as marked by The Morning Show with Hal McKinley—when a branded van drove down the road and turned into the garage nearby. The mop and bucket on the side of the vehicle made it clear what it was, so Isaac hastened to finish his change to Lou, with the overalls and the moustache, dialing his inertia down to the minimum as he jumped off the side of the building with the magnetic tape in his pocket.
With no inertia, he just stopped at street level rather than properly landing and restored himself before hurrying across to lounge in front of Crash’s building. Just in time, too, as a quartet of similarly attired people came up the road, the man lugging a wheeled trash can and the three women carrying small bags. The woman in the lead frowned at Isaac, putting her hands on her hips.
“Who’re you, then?”
“I’m Lou!” Isaac said, tapping his scuffed and faded name badge. “Just got sent to do some scutwork, you know? Pay off some debt. I can do whatever you need me to. Vacuuming, toilet cleaning, whatever.” The woman looked skeptical for a moment, but before Isaac could panic it turned out her concern was of a very specific nature.
“We don’t have to pay you, do we?”
“No, I’m on my own hook,” Isaac said, giving them his best hapless smile from beneath Lou’s moustache, hunching slightly with his hands in his overall pockets.
“Hate scrubbing toilets anyway,” the woman grumbled and opened the door. Isaac wasn’t entirely certain how the security worked, but none of the weaponry targeted them as they went inside. They got to work immediately, cleaning wrappers and discarded napkins from the tables and counters, refilling sugar and coffee packets from the supplies, and of course mopping and wiping things. Isaac was sent off to take care of the bathrooms, which was fine. So long as he was let into the upper floor he could manage.
It wasn’t like he didn’t know what he was doing, and it was obvious what places were off-limits. The locked doors he’d seen Columbuzz and Smokeshow open before remained locked, save for the first door out of the cafeteria. It made sense, as it was just a step too far to get a commercial cleaner for the security station or armory.
The cleaning chemicals stung his nose as he worked away, doing his best not to worry. Either he’d get upstairs and be able to do his thing, or he wouldn’t, and the worst he’d have done is lose a morning. Both acting and cleaning were easy enough for him, so he was able to just focus on the work.
Thankfully, there were bathrooms upstairs, too, so maybe thirty minutes in he joined the man—whose name he hadn’t gotten—in the elevator and up to the second floor. His hand almost went to where the tape was in his pocket, but he stopped himself just in time. No need to make any suspicious moves where others would notice. Isaac stepped out onto the second floor, following the other guy to the janitor’s closet.
“I’ll vacuum,” he volunteered, hands in his overalls. “Need a break from the chemicals.”
“You’re still doing the bathrooms,” the guy told him.
“Yeah, sure,” Isaac said easily in Lou’s cheerful voice and took the vacuum he’d been handed. He flicked it on and tuned out the whine as he started on the carpets, running the thing back and forth and getting ever closer to Crash’s door. He was almost there when he heard a voice behind him. A raised, familiar voice.
