Crystalized Munchkinry - Act IV - Chapter 44 (Patreon)

Vicky was angry.

No.

Beyond angry.

She wanted to rip apart the lowlifes who dared to threaten her sister.

Mush was still standing in front of her, somehow radiating both stench and smugness in equal amounts.

"And then we will use her... hehehe," the soon-to-be-dead man continued. The rest of the Merchants behind him and inside the truck laughed along with him.

Vicky simply glared back, refusing to engage with the scum.

"But don't worry, honey. We will take good care of her!" Mush continued, while the man holding the gun to her sister's head began gesturing for her to move.

Amy glanced at her, and Vicky could see the terror in her eyes.

She wanted nothing more than to take the guy out and then hug her sister, but she knew that no matter how fast she was, the guy with the gun only needed a second.

She was about to say something when her phone rang, but she ignored it.

Mush just smirked at her.

"You just have to stay here like a good girl while we take your sister for a ride. If the fucking PRT deals, you get her back in one piece!" Mush exclaimed, never taking his eyes off her.

"What do you want? You know if you hurt my sister, you're dead, right?" she asked the villain angrily.

Mush leered at her. "Who said anything about hurting her?"

She was about to bash his head in for that comment when several gang members gasped, forcing her to look away from him.

Standing in the middle of the street before them was a tall woman in gray armor, and Vicky could sense the anger radiating off her.

She hoped she was here to help because she had nothing.

For once, her prodigious strength was completely useless.

Taylor was angry and scared.

And a little happy, but she would never admit that to anyone.

Finally, a fight in real life.

She could use everything she had learned in the virtual space and prove her mettle. Granted, it was against the Merchants and not even their main parahumans, but it was still a fight, and she was going to win it.

She was scared because if she fucked up, then in the best-case scenario, Panacea would get taken away. She didn't even want to think about the worst case.

Even though she had practiced hostage situations, whether as the hostage-taker, negotiator, or even the hostage, it was completely different when she knew there was no way to reset everything on demand if she made a mistake.

And she was angry because while she wouldn't say she and Amy were full-on friends yet, she still liked the girl. Even if she didn't know the person who had been taken hostage, she would still be angry on general principle.

But she had the power to change things, and she was going to use it.

Taylor would show everyone what she was capable of.

She took a deep breath, steeled herself, shook her limbs to warm them up, and turned her attention to the screen inside her mask.

Tess was already sending her messages about the situation. Apparently, there were other fights happening in the city, but one had already ended, and the other was only between gangs. She also told Taylor that she only needed to save Panacea, and Dragon was ready to apprehend everyone else once that was done.

She replied with an affirmative, then extended her senses while closing her eyes.

First, she looked for additional explosive devices while keeping an eye on what the Merchants were doing, especially the man holding the gun.

She found one more explosive, suspiciously fixed to the underside of a manhole cover exactly in the middle of the boxed-in street.

Using her Tinker knowledge, she examined the device in detail, looking for a way to disable it. She used her power to break down the solid explosive while simultaneously draining the battery that powered it. After she was certain the explosive couldn't go off under any circumstances, she marked it on her HUD for Dragon to retrieve later.

She then turned her attention back to the situation.

She marked everyone with her power, then moved on to the Tinker truck the villains had arrived in.

It wasn't designed for armor; it was focused more on speed, so it was probably not made by Squealer. She used her sensing power to locate the power source and figure out how to disable it.

Taylor didn't immediately shut it down, instead making sure that when she needed to, she could do so at a moment's notice. Not that it would matter with Dragon setting up a perimeter, but the training beaten into her demanded that she ensure everyone could be taken out as quickly as possible.

Then came the people.

First, the unpowered ones. Most of them were exactly what she expected from the Merchants: bums wearing ratty clothes that probably smelled horrible, carrying weapons that were barely in working condition.

However, there were several people mixed among them who were dressed the same way. Their weapons looked identical, but unlike the others, they were in excellent condition. They were also wearing body armor beneath their clothes and had some kind of communication devices in their ears.

Taylor marked them and sent the details over to Dragon, who immediately began her investigations.

Knowing that was in excellent hands, she softly enveloped all the weapons with her power, paying special attention to the gun pressed against Amy's head, ready to act.

She then turned her attention to the capes.

The fact that she could do this much at the same time was amazing. It was one thing to do this in a simulation, but seeing that it worked the same way in real life made it feel much more real.

When Admin told her that her main power was multitasking, she had dismissed it. But now she understood what he meant. Using her multitasking ability to prepare the battlefield before the fight even started was incredibly unfair to the bad guys.

But in the end, they were bad guys, so she didn't really care.

Though she made a note to thank Admin the next time they talked. It was a really useful power.

Aside from Amy and Vicky, she found two parahumans.

One of them was driving the truck while clad in futuristic armor. More than likely a Tinker. She tried to remember if she had heard of any Tinkers who wore armor like that, but she came up empty.

Not that it mattered.

She searched for the armor's power source and marked it for when she needed to disable it.

The other was Mush.

Unfortunately, he didn't even have a phone on him, so she couldn't simply disable him. Even the trash covering him was far from what she had expected based on what she had heard. Instead of random garbage, it was filled with durable metals and even reinforced plastics. There was no random squishy trash or paper mixed in.

It seemed he had prepared as much as he could for a fight.

Pity it was against Taylor.

She watched the events unfold for a while, making sure that nobody could fire their weapons, waiting for an opportune moment to intervene. However, when the criminals began moving Amy, the decision was taken out of her hands.

With a simple flex of her power, she launched herself into the air and descended as fast as she could in front of the group.

They immediately noticed her and looked in her direction, some of them yelling in surprise.

As a side effect, everyone, including the not-Merchant escorting Amy, froze.

Mush, much more on the ball than his reputation suggested, began yelling at her. "Who the fuck are you, you fucking nun reject?"

She toggled the mask's voice distortion ability before answering, "Let the girl go and surrender."

Don't ask, demand, according to Admin's lessons.

Mush's response was to laugh at her, while Vicky threw confused glances at her and worried ones toward Amy.

"Hahahaha! Or what, you depressed nun?" he chuckled for a moment, then, without looking away from her, yelled to his cohorts. "Shoot the bitch!"

Taylor said nothing. She waited until the criminals aimed, then, for theatrics, snapped her fingers. Using her power, she jerked every weapon out of their hands, including the one aimed at Amy.

Then she threw them behind her, into one organized pile.

"Sorry, try again?" she responded, trying to sound calm while hiding her giddiness.

This was so cool. She couldn't wait to review it from the recordings.

There was a ten-second silence as everyone processed the realization that they had lost their weapons.

The first to react was the Merchant next to Amy, lunging for the frozen girl. He was only stopped by a lightning-fast bullet of electricity flashing in front of his face.

"Glory Girl, get Panacea and get out of here!" Taylor yelled at the confused blonde. "I will take care of this!"

The heroine nodded and, with impressive speed, headed toward the healer, picked her up, and flew away while everyone watched.

A few seconds later, Taylor received confirmation that Dragon had seen them and was moving to intercept.

She nodded slightly to herself, then turned toward the visibly furious Mush. "Once again, please surrender."

This time, the response was Mush charging toward her while the remaining criminals began running in every direction possible. With a simple thought, an electrical cage appeared around the wannabe kidnapper, while another surge of power disabled the truck. Then she punched the giant pile of debris in front of her.

Mush flew backward several meters but still landed on his giant metal feet, as she had only intended to create some distance between them.

While Mush was shaking off the punch, she reached out with her magnetic power and began tearing the metal parts away from the parahuman.

A piece of material ripped away from Mush's trash-covered gauntlets and landed next to the pile of guns. "Still not surrendering?"

Another piece was wrenched from his greaves.

Then another.

And another.

Mush continued incoherently yelling insults and threats at her.

The other parahuman was stuck inside his armor, impotently raging as he tried to escape.

After a minute of tearing debris away from the parahuman, Mush was left shivering in front of her, clad in a dirty wife-beater, shorts, and a simple mask, mercifully silent.

"A final time, Mush. Surrender!" she ordered in her most authoritative voice. She left the implied or else hanging in the silence.

The cape, lying on his back and trembling before her, nodded so quickly she feared he would give himself a concussion.

"Yes! Yes! I surrender! Please!"

She nodded and encased the man in another cage before calling Dragon to collect them.

"Stay there and behave yourself," she told the terrified villain, then jumped into the air, vanishing from sight.

She flew around the scene before returning to the same spot where Vicky had thrown her. Then she changed back into her civilian clothes, sat down, and began waiting to be ’rescued’.

He watched as the events progressed and couldn't help but feel disappointed.

Yes, he had caused enough chaos to distract everyone, but because he couldn't really use his powers to ensure everything went according to plan, he had been stressed as hell.

The fight he engineered between the ABB and the Empire fell flat thanks to Armsmaster, so he simply ordered the mercenaries to retreat and dump their gear before leaving the city. They could return later once the heat died down.

As for the fight between the Merchants and the Empire, the less said about it, the better. Without his power, he couldn't really experiment with trying to involve the watching PRT troops.

The loss of Trainwreck didn't really matter. The man was unstable and practically useless as a Tinker. Though, he could probably use his death to cast a negative light on the PRT when the time came.

However, the Panacea kidnapping plan at least gave him some additional information.

He made sure to have a stream running, showcasing the event to the world. If nobody showed up and Panacea got kidnapped, that would be extra chaos. If she got killed, even better.

But instead, a new electricity-using parahuman showed up, dismantled the entire assault force in two minutes, and then left.

It was frustrating, but still not a total loss.

He now knew about a new parahuman who was possibly Serenity, and the world knew about her as well. If she wanted to keep a low profile, that was no longer going to happen.

Though the power she showed was mildly concerning. Even the armor demonstrated that she was definitely not an amateur.

Serenity was a Tinker, so she might have crafted it herself.

Knowing that his power was malfunctioning, he still tried using it one more time.

While the mystery parahuman was talking to Mush, he ordered one of his snipers, after the bomb he had placed under the manhole cover failed to respond, to take the shot.

The shot went off, and he watched as it connected with the parahuman.

However, the moment it reached her, she vanished in a puff of glitter and streamers, while a large scroll unfurled where she had been standing.

On it was a simple, short word:

No.

Hiding his rage, he calmly turned off his power and went back to observing.

Now all he had to do was collate the data he had received and decide how to continue his plan. He sat down in his very comfortable chair, input his code, and prepared to begin when the lights went out and the computer powered down.

He sat in the ominous darkness for a few seconds before uttering one word.

"Fuck."

Tess said goodbye to Colin, then turned her attention toward the situation unfolding near the Boardwalk.

Her drones had already established a perimeter when she received the notification that Taylor was ’online’.

She emoted a smile, pitying the villains.

Then she received the information about the suspicious Merchants and, at the same time, discovered the stream covering the event. She immediately began tracing both the stream back to its source and the frequency used by the earpieces.

It quickly became clear that both were disguised, but that was nothing to her. While it took her a few minutes, she managed to pinpoint the final endpoint to a location beneath the city. After a quick check, it became clear that the origin point was where Admin had said Coil could possibly be found.

Tess, while assigning one of her forks to handle the captured Merchants and assist with cleanup, began concentrating on finding and then infiltrating the villain's lair.

Silly humans.

Nothing could stop a competent and sane AI.

Emily watched as the new cape effortlessly dismantled the remaining Merchant cape, and she couldn't help but feel a sense of trepidation. A new cape appearing just as the Merchants were taken out?

Nothing good could come from that.

At least Panacea was unharmed. She could hardly imagine what New Wave would do if the girl had been hurt. Or the rest of the city.

"Director, Armsmaster and Dragon are at the entrance."

"Good. Test them, then send them to the servers. I want to know who fucked with us."

"Yes, Sir," the agent replied, immediately reaching for their headset to forward her orders.

Another agent approached her, and she immediately knew she wouldn't like what she was about to hear.

"Director, the stream is viral."

Vicky soared through the air, holding her sister by the armpits. Neither of them said anything for several seconds until she spotted one of Dragon's drones. The drone projected a bright arrow pointing downward, so she followed it and several others before landing next to a PRT van at an intersection.

Ignoring everything and everyone around her, she immediately hugged her sister. "Amy! Are you alright? Did you get hurt?" she asked rapidly while holding her sister tightly against her.

Amy mumbled something, but Vicky couldn't understand her. She loosened her grip slightly but still kept hold of her.

"What?"

"Taylor!"

Vicky blinked in surprise, then immediately blanched. "Oh shit, I totally forgot about her! We have to get her!"

She let go of Amy and turned around to fly back, only to be stopped by a familiar voice.

"No need to worry, Miss Dallon," came the calm voice of Miss Militia. "If you are talking about Miss Hebert, Dragon found her, and she is already being checked by one of the medics."

"Oh, thank God!" Vicky exclaimed, relieved. "Can we check up on her?"

"I'm afraid I first need to ask a few questions about what happened. As soon as I am finished, you can go and talk to your friend."

Vicky glanced at Amy, who nodded, then turned back to the heroine. "Okay, but make it quick."

She watched as Miss Militia opened her mouth to begin, but another voice interrupted her.

"Vicky!"

She turned around, only to see her mother being carried by her aunt, followed by the rest of the family.

Miss Militia was immediately swept aside by the entire New Wave, and Vicky and Amy found themselves enveloped by their family, all of them hugging them and asking questions about what had happened.

Hours later, both of them were sitting bundled up in thick blankets, watching a replay of the fight.

After their family had made sure they were alright and listened to them retell the event to Miss Militia, they immediately took them home, refusing to let them go and check on Taylor.

Though Miss Militia had told them she was fine, maybe just a little shocked, they still wanted to talk to her personally. However, Carol was adamant that they return home, where they could be protected.

She told them that, for today, they were to rest, and tomorrow the entire family would get together and discuss what had happened.

Vicky sent a message to Taylor, telling her she would call her later, then focused on making sure Amy was alright.

The entire event had shaken the healer up something fierce.

She barely talked, mostly letting Vicky describe everything while simply clinging to her.

As they finished watching the video of the fight for the tenth time, Amy reached over, grabbed the tablet, and turned it off.

"So that parahuman..." she began slowly.

"Yes?"

"That was Taylor, right?"

"Totally."