Inside the elevator were LED and Victor, “Good morning” Victor said, LED only nodded, I noticed he was wearing some gym clothes, was that the early morning routines Spotlight spoke about?
Payback entered first I followed after him “Good morning, already done with the workout of the day LED?”
“This is just a warmup” the hint of humor on his voice was so faint it could be easily missed but Payback laughed loudly all the same, catching it effortlessly.
“We were just going to grab breakfast want to join us?” He continued jovially.
“I’ll take a bath first then, until later” with that LED went out of the elevator to the rooms quarter, letting the door close with the three of us inside
“I'll have breakfast too” Victor said giving a big yawn. “Not that I even slept”
“You said there was a place where you tested the weapons here yesterday, right? I asked him “do you create them here?”
“Eh, more or less. We work more with modifications. My thing is, huh, weaponizing powers.”
“Is it your power?”
“No. No" he laughed “The world is better without me with something like that, just normal engineering.”
The elevator had already arrived by now but our conversation continued as we moved, presumably towards the eating area, I was only following Payback, which was saying: “Don't underestimate him just because of that though, the things this guy can create are really bonkers. Even more so with the other two recruits.”
“Are they Tinkers?” It would be a great fit for a research base after all even more so one that dealt with weapons.
“One of them is, yes, the other one has a more, well, different power.” He said scratching his head. But before I could ask him more about it, we had arrived at the mess hall.
The eating area was composed of a couple of tables surrounding a larger one that had pan and pots with food stuff in them, I didn’t hear anything about who cooked so I presumed it was done by ourselves, maybe they just didn’t mention the other staff.
We had barely entered the room and one person at the only table with people on it shot up.
“You’re the new guy? Spotty told me you have a super cool power; Can I see it?” I frowned startled, the shrill shouting at so early in the morning making me reel, almost in a flashback, it sounded just like entering a particular noisy class.
Wait, I thought, looking better at who shouted, it was a girl, like, in a teenager.
“What is a teenager doing here?” I asked incredulously.
“Yea, it's quite unfortunate,” Payback said.
“True, I really wish we had got a quieter one at least” Victor also added his bit nursing his head in pain.
“No one seems to have answered my question?”
I stayed ignored as the two who came with me approached the table, at it another new person was laughing at the situation, that made the girl mad and she frowned at the guy, the guy only laughed harder, they had an interesting dynamic going on, the guy looked quite young as well, barely don’t looking like a teenager himself.
I decided to approach as well. What was there left for me to do.
“Here comes the star of the day” Spotlight cheered as I also sat at the table, on top of it was a basket of bread and also the usual butter ham and cheese also a thermos of what I assume is coffee.
“Isn’t that a bit of a stretch? I'm just another recruit”
“We gotta have fun any way we can right, besides it's not that often that we get recruits.”
“Thats true most people just opt to hid away somewhere” the girl spoke now, she had her hair painted in a whiteish blue tone, all chopped at around the length of her collarbone. “I choose to fight for my country.” she stated proudly with a huge smile.
“Creepy patriot you can't fight shit” the other guy I didn’t know spoke up, seemed he might don’t like he that much after all.”
“I'll get better! at least I can beat you up, and you're way older.”
“I'm not that much older, and I was a student, why would I need fighting”
“To overthrow the state of course.” She said cheerily but there was a dark undertone in her eyes.
“What do you mean people choose to hid? As in people the Dawnbreakers save?” I chose to enter in the conversation that seemed to be going way off topic.
“Yeah of course, the Dawnbreakers couldn’t force people to fight for them, they’d just be betrayed then.” She told me, like telling something that is clearly obvious, it made a lot of sense, I glanced at Spotlight grinning at me, he had completely forgot to mention it to me though.
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Not that it would have swayed my idea of joining the fight, well if I triggered at least, would they have offered if I didn't? That’s probably it.
“So, what’s your power? The girl was animatedly asked me again at least I had chosen to sit far away, she just reaching over the table in her curiosity. “Spotlight wouldn’t tell me.”
“Why the interest” I asked instead, not that I was against telling, it was just weird being asked so intently like that, I hoped I didn’t come off like that to people.
“They’re just so cool!" her energy levels were alarming, was that her power, or part of it? “I love knowing and studying about them. I want to become a researcher eventually after we win the fight.”
“You’re not fighting” Payback told her, the tone of someone who said it a lot.
“Come on I'm training.”
“Too young.” He asserted simply.
The girl deflated but I could see it was a dynamic they did very often.
“The girl there has a bit of a loose screw, I wouldn’t approach much if I were you.” The other guy said, he had a mess of straw like hair and glasses rimless on the bottom, paired with his awfully pale white skin made him look like he never saw the sun.
“I’m Joseph, who are you two?” No one had introduced us yet and I wanted to know their names, it would probably be some pseudonym that would reveal something about their powers.
They seemed weirded out for a second when I used my real name, but brushed it off, the girl went first. “I’m Swordjuice” she announced animatedly and then the boy simply saying “Glassmetal” with a short nod
Well never mind that then, I though not being able to glimpse much after all. “Sword... juice?” I asked incredulous.
“It's great isn't it, it's pretty literal though you'll get it when I show you” she said animatedly seemingly oblivious to the name being a little on the ridiculous side.
the other boy, Glassmetal laughed “it was Spotlight’s idea, he suggested China-Tron for me”
Spotlight laughed at that “That was a great one, fits so well” we continued eating the breakfast after that, getting to know each other a bit better.
“Well, I'll go get some shut eye then” Victor said. “I'll hop by later, I’ll want to know how the tests go then see if I can add something to it.” with that he left, leaving just Payback Spotlight Swordjuice Glassmetal and me, Joseph. Starting to feel like I need a pseudonym as well, I'll think of something eventually.
“Where’s Spyglass?” I asked realizing I hadn't seen her yet.
“She normally wakes up later” Payback said, I shrugged, that’s okay then, didn’t seem like she was avoiding me at least.
LED arrived after a while, we were just chatting, everyone having finished their breakfast. “Let's go, it’s the testing time everyone loves” Spotlight grinned jumping to his feet, Swordjuice did the same just as eager, Payback and Glassmetal also got up although not showing the same level of enthusiasm, I also followed everyone a rare grin on my face just thinking of the various ways I could train and test my powers.
We all got into the elevator, it feeling a bit crowded, just the same than the night before. We were missing Spyglass and Victor but Swordjuice and Glassmetal were taking their place, at least the trip was very short, being only 2 floors from the second to the fourth.
We were dropped on another bare smoothed concrete corridor, it didn’t speak so well of the funds of the organization to not have a more well, furbished place. At the same time, I guess we were a clandestine fugitive organization.
The corridor led us straight to another big metal door, LED opened the door for us using his finger on the reader by the door, it opened up to a small area that enclosed us in.
It was a cubicle of metal, nothing else of notice, but, thinking about it, it was probably a hidden second layer of security, probably scanning us with hidden stuff? I decided to just ask.
“Is this a second security layer?”
“It is, well noted.”
He didn’t explain what it was doing or anything, but LED rarely did, it didn’t really matter to me so I just let it pass, there was a click sound of something unlocking and the second door opened, this time the ambient was a bit more exiting.
The big room had the feeling of a lab, wide tables with sinks and gas pipes, the difference here was that this room had tiles, shiny ones, with bits of white and earthy tones they covered the floor walls and even the ceiling, only leaving space from where the lights were. The tables were made of an all-white one, just as smooth and shiny as the floor. It looked very classy and high tech overall.
There was equipment all over the place, crates overflowing with all sorts of bit and pieces that seemed technological, but really diverse like retro futuristic things, with bolts and coils and sleek all white looking ones as well.
The busiest area was the last table, on the other side of the lab, the third one it had a whole bunch of vials filled liquids and some crates of bullets and some pieces of different types of weapons all over the table. I looked at everything interested.
“Don’t touch anything.” LED told me as soon as we had taken one step into the room.
I frowned but he continued, “Victor can give you a tour and explanations later, I'm not really familiar with this, and half of the stuff is tinker tech, you never know with that stuff.”
“Oh, yeah that make sense, I'll keep my hands to myself.” Tinker tech had a tendency to be very unreliable and follow its own rules dependent on the creator. Which begged the question;
“How you all got so much tinker tech though?” I asked “I thought most tinkers were employed by the Stannuns.”
“How, stealing of course” Spotlight told me smiling with raised eyebrows at me.
“Yeah, that make sense.”
“Some of it is mine, those piece on the second table” I looked at where Glassmetal pointed and it was a bunch of blocky weapons and actual blocks of shiny ceramics or polished reflective glass pieces. I couldn’t gather at all what it all did, it looked pretty though.
We arrived at the other side there was a simple metal bolted door here, no security. Both door to the room where in the corner with the rest of the room extending to our left, but we didn’t get to explore more of the lab as the door to where I supposed was the training room was on the opposite corner form the entrance.
On the lab wall was a big window into the training room so I got a glimpse of it before we passed through the door, seeing only smoky gray walls. Entering the room though, there was no window. A one-way mirror? Cool.
This place was almost bare, the tiles being in a various gray tone, smoky. This room was long as well immediately in front of the door was a long table, protected by a viewing glass, probably where they tested their guns I thought, we left that place alone, going instead to the open area, I could see that the far wall had no aims, nor marks of abuse.
“Don't you all test guns here?”
“Yeah, of course.” LED answered me.
“Why?” Payback asked, tilting his head.
“Well, it's just that there are no marks on the wall” I said pointing.
“Ah, that. I just fix it.” Glassmetal said.
“Stop the chit-chat." LED cut in "I want to start with you telling me what you know about your abilities” he said looking straight at me.
“Sure” I nodded, it made sense he would want to know and I had made a bunch of observations though the last days, the other matters could wait, I would probably stay here a while more.