The rest of the week was filled with days similar to one another. Calvin would wake up in an empty apartment, exercise naked in the living room just for the heck of it, redecorate the entire house with funky colors while working out, go out the apartment to take a bath, then come back remembering he was naked, grab some clothes, take a bath, then go to work.

Work shift was filled with the usual avoiding of Marvin's venomous fish and Calli's teasing. After work was more or less the same, with the exception of heading to the weird cube building to train with Quinn and Ina instead of wandering around town on his own.

The training was tiring.

At first the two of them weren't able to complete or keep up with what Ina was having them do, but by the end of the week, they were now able to barely finish all sets.

Quinn had even started enjoying the holographic sparring sessions. Her punches and stances grew sharper and more refined every day, not just due to practice, but also because Ina had changed the face of the holographic projection to that one pervert heckler from the workshop.

It was a slow and steady progress, but just as fulfilling as any other. Especially to Calvin.

Before they knew it, the week had passed and it was day three of the workshop. The three of them had met up in front of Ina's Nightmare Training Cube, as was titled by Quinn.

With Ina's grey car acting as their speedy steed, they headed towards the rest of their day in the workshop.

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> Me: omw 2 wrkshop

>

> Me: wth frends

>

> Me: in car

Ina looked at the message she sent for a moment before flicking her wrist, closing the holowatch's display screen. The small vibration that came immediately afterwards had told her a reply immediately came, just as per usual, but she ignored it for now.

Her eyes turned to the window, a sigh escaping her lips as she watched her car speed past the other vehicles in the Vanguard lane. Any other time she'd have chosen to go the slower route, not even using the car at all, but they had to go faster and a lot earlier if they wanted a chance to make it in time.

"-is restaurant in Victory lane is great, but rumor says a villain owns the place. They have an amazing all-you-can-eat buffet every weekend though, so you can still try-" Quinn was sitting in the back, loudly guiding their new friend to the best restaurants in Central.

Her eyes wandered to the rear-view mirror, looking towards Quinn's seatmate, the guy she had dragged to win a bet a few weeks ago.

Calvin.

She didn't know what his full name was. Or rather if that was his real name.

He didn't share much about himself, about his life, or anything else other than what to call him, and, just recently, what his power is. Not that it was odd, they've only known each other for a couple of weeks.

What was odd was that he knew absolutely nothing. Like he just dropped out of a random hole in the sky one day. She thought he was a vagrant at first, but he was too naïve and careless to have survived outside the walls.

He wasn't a spy either, for the same reasons he couldn't have been a vagrant. Nor was he a secret villain, as evidenced by the power he had displayed. There was a genuinity in his actions and expressions that made her believe he was just that, naïve.

'It doesn't matter.' She shook her head, returning her gaze forward.

"Woah." Calvin said from behind her, leaning forward to see in front. "Lotta people."

Ina let out a tiny giggle at his reaction. "There's a fair for the delegation, so of course there's a lot of people."

The car slowed down significantly and finally stopped beside the nearest unoccupied sidewalk, right in front of the fair in Fallen Vanguards Park.

The three of them got out of the car. Ina immediately felt her arm being grabbed by Qiunn who was turning her head left and right, looking around the grounds with a definite twinkle in her eyes.

Calvin was similarly looking around, but rather than just interest, there was curiosity and confusion in them. "I don't get it, it's just a delegation."

"It's a delegation for Steel City." Quinn emphasized. "Tinker's paradise? Maker's motherland? Workshop in the sky?"

"I have no idea what that means." He shook his head solemnly.

"It means a lot of craftsmen, artists, tailors, carvers, and the like, are in town along with the delegation. And they're in town with a lot of stuff." Ina explained.

"Can we skip the workshop and just go around the fair?" Quinn grabbed her hands and pleaded with her eyes.

"They'll be here for a week, Queenie." She flicked her forehead. "We have plenty of time."

"But they'll run out of the good stuff!"

Ina grabbed Calvin's wrist and dragged Quinn by the cheek, squeezing her way through the park filled with gawking onlookers and haggling salesmen. There was a flow of life in the place that's normally absent, a festive atmosphere rather than the emptiness.

They made their way into the building which was vastly less populated than the outside. However, there were still a lot of people, staff mostly, and the elevator was more of a squeeze to get into.

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

A few more seconds of walking after the elevator and they finally arrived in front of the conference room.

"See? Some people didn't even come!" Quinn complained after they entered the room, seeing the amount of people inside.

Calvin looked around the room, seemingly counting the others that were here, "maybe they got squeezed to death outside."

"It's not that crowded." She chuckled.

Before they could go to their usual corner to wait for Allen, they heard the door open behind them. Turning around, it was the man himself and his doppelganger, wearing the usual 'I just got out of bed' clothes he wore.

He had a surprised look as he saw the three near the door, craning his head back out of the room to look at a plaque.

"Thirteen B." He muttered, coming in and closing the door.

Ina and the others went to the middle of the room and sat down, fully expecting Allen to do the usual and gather them over there.

"Weird." Calvin muttered beside her, his eyes looking down on his wrist.

"What's weird?" Quinn asked.

He smirked. "He's early."

Ina checked her holowatch. Calvin was right, he was early. So were they, by at least five minutes. "Might be because of the fair."

"You know people are usually later if there's an obstruction outside?" Calvin quipped.

As they talked, Allen and his duplicate had made their way in front of them. He started scanning the room, looking at each person and jotting something down on his holowrist. This uncomfortable silence of just him looking up and down between people and his wrist continued for a few minutes.

"Only sixteen." He muttered within earshot. "Eh, good enough."

'Sixteen?' Ina raised a brow looking back at the others in the room. There were eighteen of them.

Allen turned to his duplicate and nodded. With a wave of the duplicate's hand, three gadgets appeared on the floor in a white light. One was a big archway made of metal and wires, another was a small cardboard box, and the final one was a simple stun gun.

With another gesture, a familiar table full of familiar snacks appeared from thin air.

"Hm?" Calvin hummed. "Why's he taking that out?"

"No idea." Ina shrugged, finding it odd as well.

The past few weeks, Allen taking out the table of snacks signified the end of the workshop. This week, it seems, it signaled the start.

"Uh, okay, yeah. Everyone gather." Allen spoke, beckoning them to him. "Ah fuck. I mean, can everyone please come closer? Thank you."

Ina heard a humming sound from behind her. She turned around, only to see Regina blankly towards Allen. She noticed something odd about her eyes, but her attention was shifted back to the instructor.

"Great." Allen nodded after all of them had sat together in front of him. "Okay, so. I'm Allen, and today's lesson-", he glanced at the brochure in his hand, "-gadgets. Or, I guess, Tinker Tech. Can anyone tell me what Tinkers are?"

Regina raised her hand and answered, "tinkers are a type of Gimmick whose powers involve the creation or otherwise invention of technologies revolving around an inherent theme."

Allen was looking at her dazed for a moment before he nodded. "Uh, yeah, that's right. A bit too textbook, but it's correct. Tinkers are basically what it says at the tin. They tinker and make stuff. Super stuff. Like these three examples."

Allen strolled over to the rightmost and smallest Tinker Tech, the stun gun. He bent over and picked it up, grinning as he checked the components by himself. He turned around moments later and started twirling it around, spinning it on his finger and tossing it in the air before catching it with a pose.

"Look. This is a stun gun, obviously. But this stun gun is something special. This one works on supers." He spun it again before sheathing it in the garter of his pants. "The tinker that made this had a concept involving non-lethal weapons. Of course, that guy's dead, so there's a limited supply of this stuff until another tinker with similar concepts awakens.""

He paused scratching his chin in thought. "Maybe there's one now, we just haven't found them yet. Anyway, his concept was really useful in knocking out people without hurting them. On the outside, at least. On the inside, it would feel like hell."

Ina's brows furrowed. The workshop's topic today seemed pretty weird compared to the previous two weeks. Something was nagging her, but she couldn't put a finger on it.

"Anyway, onto the next one." He went towards the cardboard box and picked it up. "This one is... what is it again?""

The duplicate Allen glanced at the original one before sighing, "it's a bomb."

"Ah, yeah, bomb. Tinker tech bomb." Allen scratched his head in embarrassment.

The other people in the room were naturally unnerved with what he just said, they started fidgeting and adjusting their seat while looking warily at the box. Ina's body tensed up, grabbing Quinn's and Calvin's wrist.

"Relax," Allen laughed. "Trust me.This won't go off without the controller. And even then, I'm pretty sure this has a timer of a few seconds, enough to make a run for it and survive even if you were mundane."

His eyes scanned the faces of the others in the room. Ina wasn't sure, but she felt like he paused looking at her and Calvin.

"What's up with him today?" Calvin asked in a whisper.

"I don't kn-"

"Pay attention." He interrupted. "Good. Anyway, this thing was made by someone with a concept of making things out of cardboard.

Weird, right? Cardboard! It seems weak, but his stuff is actually pretty scary. His cardboard swords cut through steel like butter, cardboard guns shoot bullets that pierce through tanks. There were even rumors about a cardboard man, a literal being made of cardboard. Fun stuff.

Anyway this little box has the same kinetic potential as normal brick C4 of the same size. It's enough to vaporize everyone and everything in this room. Of course, I can't show it to you because we'll all actually die. Ha!"

His words only re-instilled panic in the room, making them more uneasy despite his trustworthy words.

'Why's he showing us this?' Ina looked towards her two friends, one of which was glaring quite considerably while the other looked back at her with the same confused face she had.

"Oh and the final and probably most familiar one", he dropped the cardboard box haphazardly and walked to the final tech, "the classic 'gateway'. Anyone tell me what it does? You, tiny kid in the back, answer."

Benjamin looked startled, standing up nervously. "Uh- they're gateways, used to travel long distances between pairs- they usually come in pairs. And, uh, only the highest level tinkers can make them."

"All correct!" Allen clapped. "Anyway, this one is also a weird one, like the others. This one is one use only, as in it'll break down after around half an hour of openi-"

The ground shook, interrupting Allen. The tremor was light, but terrifying nonetheless. Lights started flickering and dimming as a muted sound of an explosion came from outside.

"What was that?" Someone asked in a whisper while most were stunned.

Allen had his finger on his ear, as if listening to a device. "Damn. We have a situation outside, but don't worry, we have it under control. Here-"

Allen's duplicate walked to the door and pressed a button, making a shutter come down from above. There was a beeping sound that came afterwards, and a holographic message appeared in thin air.

EMERGENCY LOCK-DOWN Do Not Panic

"What's happening outside?" Calvin asked.

"Some villains are attacking the capes' headquarters, nothing unusual. Relax, kid." Allen reassured them. "Come, eat, everyone. The food is delicious. Let's just take a break and we'll wait it out here, I'm sure someone will sort it out soon."

Ina heard the hum again, like the sound of a machine turning on. She started trying to focus to find out where it was coming from when her attention was hooked by a stronger bout of shaking. Her first instinct was to figure out what the tremor was, or where it came from, but there's something she wanted to do first.

"Cupcakes." Calvin muttered, standing up and walking to the table.

'Cupcakes do sound nice right now.' She thought, following him. She wanted to eat.

Calvin picked up a cupcake and smelled it. 'He does that a lot huh.'

She mirrored him and smelled the cupcake, the sweet smell of vanilla and pistachio invading her nostrils and all of her senses making her salivate at the thought of consuming it. Sugar usually wasn't something she was fond of, but the cupcake

Her eyes turned to the pretty cupcake and was just about to take a bite when a palm slapped it out of her hand.

"Hey!" She shouted, looking at the perpetrator.

It was Calvin, looking at her with a horrified face. "Don't eat it."

"What do you mean?" She furrowed her brows. Why shouldn't she eat? Why was it here if it wasn't for eating?

"Don't- ugh." He suddenly dropped to the ground and started convulsing, electricity sparking on two nodules stabbed in his back.

Ina suddenly felt awake, her head feeling like she was knocked unconscious and had just woken up. Her eyes trailed the wires connected to Calvin's back, looking to the origin.

"Damn, how did he know?" Allen stood behind them, holding the stun gun from earlier. "Was it my acting? Was it that bad?"

"I wouldn't know." His duplicate spoke, his voice turning unfamiliar.

"Who knew the two powerless would be the ones to not get the hint." Allen chuckled, reloading the stun gun.

"Who are you?" Ina asked, trying to buy time while she sent a message with her optical implant.

"Stop." Allen spoke, making her freeze in place. "I have no idea how you got out of it, but I still gotta knock you out, girlie. Unfortunately four you this is going to hurt. A lot.

Ina started panicking more, her eyes dilating as he watched the man inspect the stun gun and grin towards her.

"You should've just eaten the cupcake." He pointed the gun to her neck and pulled the trigger.