Chapter 168: You Crossed The Line

***David Manchin***

“Did I or did I not tell you to wait!?” David asked Bill Grove, his elbows fraying his expensive suit where he ground them into his mahogany desk.

“One of the androids who wandered off got away from the cleanup crews. A little girl. She made it all the way back to the holding unit. They’re responding violently and arming themselves.”

“On the word of a goddamn tween?” David demanded, glaring at the photo on his desktop, the one they’d taken for her I.D. She looked like eighty pounds, soaking wet. Who would give a child the benefit of the doubt?

“She’s something of a political figure in Franklin City,” Bill said, forwarding pictures of the firebrand screaming into a mic.

Children don’t have opinions of their own, David thought with a scowl.

“Well, who’s pulling her strings?” David demanded, a chill going through him. “Solaris?”

“Unknown, but since I can’t locate them, it’s a safe bet that they’re either unimportant, or too secretive to retaliate.”

“Better be right. I really had hoped you could keep this quiet,” David said, rubbing his temple.

“I’ve got it under control, sir” Bill said. “Besides, given Paradox’s evasiveness, we needed some solid bait to bring him to us. At this point going loud is the only way to draw him in and nip his interference in the bud.”

“…Carry on, Bill,” David said, hanging up.

I need some good news at this point.

A knocking came from the door.

Too pissed to say ‘come in’, David grunted in a half-groan.

Elise must’ve taken that as consent, because she barged in, wearing her security clearance pinned on her coat.

Did she leave the building or something?

“What?” David asked.

“The asset has Heather Skinner in custody.” Elise said, showing him her phone.

The pasty Minder had sent a picture of Heather Skinner waving with a bright, happy smile, holding a semi-automatic pistol to her own stomach.

“Sick fuck,” David muttered. “This is why we reign them in, Elise, Minders are complete monsters. Now send that to Paradox and tell him to back off before his baby get splattered all over the wall. Standard double-blind procedure on who holds the asset’s activation codes.”

“…Yessir,” Elise gritted, strangely reluctant.

“Hold up.” David said frowning, looking Elise up and down.

He’d assumed she was the cold-blooded type that he needed as an assistant, but she was obviously having a ‘female moment’ about holding an unborn child hostage.

“Get your head on straight,” David said, shaking his head.

“Yessir,” Elise said before walking away.

Staring after his assistant, David decided he couldn’t take the chance. He called up B.I. to have Elise’s authority temporarily revoked, reverting control over the asset to himself.

Probably better done myself, anyway.

***Chemestro***

Two hundred and sixteen, two hundred and seventeen,two hundred an-

Between one push-up and the next, the context of his situation caught up to him.

He was exercising in a windowless bunker deep underground, being observed 24/7.

This was not normal.

Chemestro took the towel off his bed and wiped the sweat off, walking out the reinforced door as it dissolved under his power.

A woman wearing a security badge stood over the unconscious Minder, her hands clasped behind her back at attention.

“Role, I take it?” Chemestro asked, tossing aside the towel.

“Yessir,” Role said.

“Bring me up to speed,” Chemestro said as they started walking down the bunker’s concrete halls.

“The androids are being targeted for extermination by the ones in charge of Washington in order to maintain their control over the city. You’ve been out for approximately twelve hours, Sin-eater is in that room over there.”

Chemestro tore the door off, revealing Sin-eater snoring on the cot.

How to contain the situation? Chemestro thought as he shook Sin-Eater awake.

“Also…David Manchin, the mayor of Washington…he kind of sent a Minder to take Wraith hostage.

Chemestro’s brows rose.

“Wraith…the one on maternity leave?”

“..yessir.” Role said with a wince.

“While she was in her civvies?”

“…Yessir.”

Hmm…

“How long till Paradox knows?” Chemestro asked, shoving Sin-Eater’s clothes into her arms and standing outside her room.

“As soon as they figure out I’m not sending their messages anymore, could be a few hours, hopefull-“ Role’s voice cut out as the card reader in front of him blinked red.

He swiped his security clearance again.

The reader blinked red again.

“Or they already know. God, that guy’s an asshole.”

“Alright, here’s the plan,” Chemestro said, dissolving the door and the weapons of the SWAT team behind it, brushing them aside. “We’re going to secure the news outlets for Washington.”

“Sir?” Role asked.

“This is going to become an ‘incident’.” Chemestro explained. “The interest of Franklin City is best served by controlling the perception around it, rather than preventing the damage. That’s already been done.”

He glanced over at Role.

“How’s your ‘newscaster’ voice?”

“Excellent. Gimmie the I.D. card of a powerful enough media host, and I’ll literally be able to broadcast my face without a camera.”

Chemestro cocked a brow as they emerged onto the street.

“Powerful enough media host?” Chemestro asked.

“You heard me.” Role replied.

“Sin-Eater. Can you pull from androids?”

Sin-eater shook her head.

There goes that idea.

“Sir, the vast majority of the city has some light reprogramming done by the leadership’s captive Minders, especially the media. I would quantify that as heavy reprogramming.” Role said.

“Ah.” Sin-eater said, realizing where Role was going with that. Sin eater couldn’t resist mind control or pull someone out of it while they were under, but she could remove a Minder’s programming, no problem.

“Alright. Let’s go do some damage control,” Chemestro said, picking the three of them up and setting off for the towering building of Washington News Media (WNM)

***Paradox***

When Perry arrived at the apartment complex, the sun had long since gone down, and he was almost too late.

Shouts and the rattle of gunfire broke the dark silence of night beneath him.

The androids were barricaded inside the apartment building, resisting the government as best they could…

Not very well.

Natural-born human supers working for the government were dismantling the android’s barricades, melting them like cotton candy under a faucet.

Sometimes literally. He spotted an acid user who was melting through the walls to allow SWAT members to drag people out of their new homes kicking and screaming.

Something had gone very wrong.

Damnit, how do I stop this? Perry thought, summoning his suit to his location for backup.

Perry felt a touch brush against his mind, and a dozen of the G-men surrounding the scene froze as one. In unison, they looked up at him floating above, pointing their fingers and screaming.

Shi-

The week in Washington had been fantastic! All the androids had seen him off with smiles and waves, but now Perry was anxious to get back to Heather and Natalie, maybe shop around for a pre-schoo-

ZZZZZ!

HP: 9

“GAH!”

Perry convulsed in place as a wrist-thick bolt of lightning tore through him and the three men dragging his limp body along the ground towards a windowless van.

The Mark Seven seemed to consider if Perry needed another jolt, half-raising its left arm again.

“I’m out, okay!?” Perry said, holding up his hands.

He glanced up and spotted the Minders watching him back, their eyes wide.

He marked them all, sending a snapshot of their horrified faces to the Mark seven as priority targets.

The suit blasted away with mechanical precision, sending out controlled blasts of living lightning and using narrow applications of MELT.EXE to soften their kneecaps until running away was no longer an option.

“Protect the B.I. assets! Free fire!”

Perry hit the deck as bullets began flying over him, scrambling to the side for cover, but a few shots caught him in the side.

HP:8

HP:7

HP: 6

They certainly have more bullets than I have HP, that’s for sure, Perry thought.

PPP.EXE

(3/6) remaining

Perry didn’t have time to deploy the spell offensively, because the military supers hit him like a ton of bricks.

Perry wrapped the spell around himself and squeezed his eyes shut as a speedster nearly gouged his eyes out with a piece of broken wood.

HP: 5

Perry snatched the Speedster’s wrist with inhuman speed and drained the shit out of his life-force.

Ooh, if the Pernicious Prison could recharge my HP in addition to healing, that would be a good improvement.

Perry stopped before it caused any damage more permanent than a fifth of tequila and an ass-kicking. There were rules.

Perry kicked aside the speedster, julienne’d the nearby car he’d been using for cover, and sent the shrapnel flying out towards the G-men, forcing them to take cover.

“Gotcha now, prick!” A familiar voice shouted a moment before Perry got blindsided again.

HP: 5->3

Rather than ragdolling away like he had before, Serenity had grabbed his wrist, holding him in place and doubling the force delivered to his face by preventing his body from flying away. She reeled him in again for another undodgeable body-blow.

HP: 3->1

I can see where this is going, Perry thought. Against squirrelly opponents like Perry who they outclassed physically, it was ideal to grab them, hold them, and tear them apart piece by piece without ever giving them a chance to escape.

And judging by the look in her eyes, Serenity wasn’t interested in just knocking him out and capturing him.

HP: 0

Perry made a snap decision, using the Pernicious Prison to cut off his hand, allowing him to back out of Serenity’s range before she rendered him into a meat paste.

Perry and Serenity stared at each other for a moment as Perry capped the end of his forearm with his spell to prevent blood loss.

Serenity actually looked impressed.

“Props,” she said, crushing Perry’s severed hand and tossing it aside.

“Dick move,” Perry replied, glowering. He was still planning on using that hand for things.

“I figure we’re even,” she said with a shrug.

Perry snagged the hand from behind her with a strand of the Pernicious Prison, holding it back to the wrist and channeling the stored life force through an Astra’s Mending.

It…mostly worked.

It felt like Perry had gotten his hand run over by a tank, which was not too far from the truth, actually.

Several bones were still broken and it was purpling rapidly, but at least he could feel the pain, and the circulation seemed good.

The Mk. 7 opened up and engulfed Perry from behind.

“Ah, I forgot you were a Tinker for a moment.” Serenity said, cracking her knuckles. “I guess this is gonna get interesting.

“Hold up,” Perry said, raising a hand. “Before we do this, you’re aware that your government is committing genocide?”

“They’re just robots.” Serenity said with a shrug.

“What about the people signing your checks? They’re robots.”

“Eh.” She shrugged again. “They’re really big checks.”

“And that the current party’s political power is maintained using mind-control? That doesn’t bother you?”

Serenity straightened.

“Are you going somewhere with this? I really don’t give a shit.”

“Just making sure,” Perry said, unleashing MELT.EXE.

Instead of trying to dodge, Serenity waded right through it, shrugging off the softening effect and punching Perry right through the apartment complex’s thin walls.

Something about Serenity’s constitution was allowing her to either hold her body together, like Mass Driver did, or ignore the effects entirely.

Or, for her, several hundred times softer was still harder than steel.

Whichever, Perry thought, leveling himself to his feet with a grunt.

He was in the room with a scared android family…specifically Stacy Watt-Powers and company. Several big, angry looking young men stood around with weapons ranging from iron pipes to assault rifles they’d stolen or bribed from the Washington military.

I don’t think that’s actually her family. Followers?

They tried to stand in front of her, but Stacy elbowed them aside, facing Perry full-on, her arms crossed.

Perry frowned as he spotted their arms.

“Where’d you get the hardware?” he asked.

“I think you’ve got a more pressing problem,” Stacy said, pointing at the crumbling hole in the wall, which Serenity was climbing through, sporting a wide grin.

“I’m surprised you’re still standing. Most Tinkers can’t take those G’s without brain damage,” She glanced over at Stacy, her eyes twitching in recognition.

“And look at that, a bonus fell into my lap. This day might not be a total loss after all.”

Why Stacy specifically? They don’t know who she is, they just…don’t like that she’s leading the civilian androids?

Ding!

Perry’s internal comms dinged, showing he had a text message.

Hopefully it’s a sit-rep from Role.

Instead it was a picture that made his blood run cold, subtitled:

WITHDRAW

BOOM!

Perry was sent flying halfway through the building by a punch, winding up halfway through a couch.

“What’s wrong!?” Serenity chuckled as she followed him through the wall, sauntering with the exaggerated swagger of an asshole with something to prove. “Don’t tell me getting in the suit made you slower!?”

Sliding Stats.

Stability 52->46

Attunement 52->58

“I don’t have time for you,” Perry muttered as he stood, raising a palm and modifying the reflective index of the air in front of him.

“Yeah, well-“

Light

(4/5) remaining

Twin rays of white-hot light scoured out Serenity’s eyes.

The bruiser collapsed like a felled tree. Death or just shock to the brain…Perry didn’t really care.

He was too busy making calls.

***David Manchin***

Long fuckin’ day, David thought, easing out of his suit with a sigh and tossing it in the bin for the maid to clean. Finally got that Zauberer kid under control and the androids back on the train. Everything was back under control. Job well done.

Surely he’d get some emergency call in the next couple hours, but right now, he needed sleep.

Donna and the kids were probably asleep already, and all David wanted to do was snag a huge slice of Jeremy’s birthday cake and wash it down with a wine cooler before collapsing into bed next to his wife.

He trudged through the darkness of the kitchen to the fridge, opening it up to grab a slice that’d been wrapped in plastic and saved for him since he wasn’t able to make it home for Jeremy’s birthday since the android delivery set out from Franklin.

He turned as he closed the refrigerator door, the light from the door casting a beam of light on a void-black gauntlet resting on his dinner table.

David’s heart leapt into his chest as he reeled backwards, the plate of cake shattering on impact with the ground.

“Who the fuck are you!?” He demanded, struggling to pull a knife out of the knife block with one hand while the other sought out the lightswitch.

Where the hell is security!?

Click.

The kitchen light turned on, revealing Paradox, void-black gauntlets clasped together.

“David Manchin,” The modulated voice spoke. “You crossed the line.”