Chapter Seventeen - Pulling the Funds out of Fundraisers

It was just Emily, Sam, and Maple. The other girls were currently having lessons with Miss Henderson, and Emily was discovering that it was surprisingly nice to only have to watch out for one girl instead of a gaggle of them.

Maple was at Emily's side, one of her little hands clinging onto Emily's index and middle-finger while Sam was walking to Emily's right in what passed for casual wear for Sam.

That meant that unlike Emily's own very sensible calf-length skirt and hoodie, Sam was in a tanktop and jean shorts so tight that she had to carry her phone in her hand because there was no feasible way for it to fit into her pockets.

"You want to run a fundraiser?" Sam asked.

"You don't need to sound so surprised," Emily said. "It's a good way to build, uh, good... PR stuff with the city."

"I can think of a few other ways to build good PR stuff," Sam said, a teasing lilt to her words as she imitated Emily.

Emily pursed her lips, but she didn't know the terminology. "What would you call it, then?"

"A PR stunt, I guess. Though I think the HRF would call it something like a 'strategic visibility campaign' or maybe a 'brand awareness initiative.'"

"Wow," Emily said. "That makes it sound... kind of horrific, actually."

"Hey, it's the kind of stuff I need to learn, you know," Sam said with a wink.

Emily frowned. "Aren't you majoring in psychology?" she asked.

"Who do you think hires the most psychologists? Mental health places? C'mon, half the jobs are in marketing, and all of the well-paid ones are there too."

"That's depressing," Emily said.

Sam shrugged. "So, a fundraiser of some sort. You want this to be big or something smaller? Do you actually have a cause you care that much about? Do you just want to bring attention to it, or is the plan to just make yourself look good?"

"Uh, well, honestly, the plan is to steal from the fundraiser. Teddy and Trinity both have quests that could be done during that kind of event, and... well, I guess Maple does too. Right?" Emily asked, that last part aimed at Maple.

Maple jumped, her hand squeezing Emily's harder for a moment before she nodded. Maple was wearing a bright yellow raincoat, mostly because it was the only long piece of clothing they had which could hide her rather obvious tail without making her uncomfortable, and the hood hid her ears too.

It hadn't rained in a couple of days, but who was going to comment on a preteen's fashion sense? Besides, the bright yellow made her easy to spot.

"Right, well, that's the goal, to finish as many quests as possible. Which means, uh, that we need to steal from the event, a little. Not too much, but... yeah. Maybe we can return the money after?" She wasn't sure if that would defeat the entire quest or not.

Sam shrugged. "Alright, yeah, I can work with that. So... hmm, any event where a bunch of heroes show up is going to be a success. We could really go big with this."

"Big means more attention," Emily pointed out. And more attention meant more people she might have to talk to, not to mention more responsibility when one of her sisters did something she absolutely wasn't supposed to. Overall, Emily didn't want that kind of trouble.

"Big means more money," Sam said. "But you're probably right. So something medium in scale? Do you have a particular theme in mind? We could have it be like... to raise money for kids in hospitals?"

"I'm not going to rob money meant for sick kids," Emily said.

Sam rolled her eyes. "Okay, Miss Goodhearted, what kind of charity would you be okay robbing from?"

Emily flushed. "Well, when you put it that way," she said. "I don't know. Maybe... maybe something to help the city fight villains?"

Sam blinked, then started to laugh. "Oh! That's fantastic! Yeah, we could raise money to help local heroes fight local villains. Then you can take all the money. It's perfect!"

"I'm glad you like it," Emily said.

"No, no, it's really good. How about we go slightly bigger in scope? We could have you make the charity look like some neighbourhood help thing? To help the stores that were damaged by Rattles. If you take three-quarters of the money for yourself, give each store enough to fix one window and call it a day," Sam said.

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"I could make a window fixer," Maple said.

Emily looked down at Maple, but all she could see was the top of the yellow hood. Maple's eyes were downcast, focused on the sidewalk. "You could? Hmm. Do you think you could make something to help fix up local shops?"

Maple finally looked up, big eyes blinking. "Um. Maybe? Like a cleaning bomb?"

"I don't like those two words being together," Sam said. "Actually, it's mostly the 'bomb' part that I'm not fond of."

"It's... yeah, maybe we can avoid bombs for now. But it might be cool to have some gadgets to help local businesses. It might convince them that we're, uh, not just stealing from them."

"I can think of some things," Maple said. "But I'm supposed to be making stuff to help the others first, right?"

"That's right," Emily said. "I don't know exactly what would help them though. But whatever you need, as long as it doesn't cost too much."

They had Sam's van parked not too far away in a parking lot, so they'd be able to carry things back to it. One of the big advantages of moving from the dorm to the bunker was the added space they had. Maple had started to set up a little workshop for herself to make stuff in. At the moment it looked like an arts and crafts station, if Emily ignored the toaster railgun hanging off the wall.

Emily and Sam came to a slow stop at the next intersection. They'd arrived close to a bunch of stores, but now they had to decide where to go.

"What do you need first?" Emily asked Maple.

"Um," Maple said. "I had a few ideas. But they'll each need different stuff."

"What're your ideas?" Sam asked.

Maple nodded. "Well, I was thinking I could make one tool for each of my sisters? Teddy needs a hammer and a sickle, she keeps talking about those. But I think I want to start with the hammer first? So I need a hammer for her. Um, for Athena? I actually have two ideas for her. One's a thing that'll improve her range, and another is a notebook that can send notes back in time."

"That's... broken," Sam muttered.

Maple blinked. "But how can it be broken if I haven't made it yet?"

"No, I meant... nevermind, go on," Sam said.

"Okay. Well, Trinity... I think I can make her a poncho of invisibility. She'll need three, though."

Emily didn't like that idea. Trinity was... Trinity, and her being invisible would make her a nightmare. On the other hand, Trinity being invisible would also keep her safer, and make her an even bigger nightmare to deal with. "Okay," Emily said. "What else?"

Maple blushed a bit. "I wanted to make you business cards, so that people know who you are," she said. "I had an idea for a little card maker?"

"Aw, that's cute," Sam said.

Emily nodded. "That's a very nice idea," she said.

"And... and I have two more ideas," Maple said. "For Steffie, Miss Headerson's daughter. Um. She doesn't like her wheelchair, so I thought I could make her something better. But that's a big project."

Emily felt a little twist in her heart, and she gave Maple a hug to relieve it. "That's a very sweet idea," she said.

"You think I should give Steffie a warmech too?" Maple asked.

"Uh... we'll work out the details on that with her mom, maybe?" Emily said.

"Okay," Maple said. "And my last idea was a weapon to deal with Rattles."

"A gun?" Sam asked.

Maple shook her head. "No. Something to counter his powers. I think they work by vibrating things. So I want to make an anti-vibrator."

Sam snorted, and Emily felt herself flushing a little all over again.

"Well," Sam said. "As long as you don't set it off near my room, we're golden."

"Sam," Emily hissed warningly. Maple stared at her, a bit confused. "Anyway. Let's head over to the hardware store first? You need a hammer, right?"

Maple bobbed her head up and down in a quick nod. "Yes, please!"

Emily took Maple's hand in hers again, and off they went, continuing their quest to find the stuff Maple needed to bring Rattles down a notch or two.

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