3.7

“The summons are telling me that I am quote, ‘weak and squishy,’ and that I should quote, ‘claim thy strength’. I don’t think they understand quite what they are talking about.

Still, better efficacy at hand-to-hand combat would be useful. I don’t know how much I will be able to learn over a shorter time frame, but I don’t expect this to be a quick endeavor.”

— Vincent Hall, Encoded Notebook; Section 8, page 9

I rack my brain, combing through hours upon hours of background news stories trying to identify this guy. His suit’s definitely memorable, there’s no way I would have missed him, but —

I’m coming up blank.

I unhook my tonfas.

Yellow Suit Guy notices, and quickly shifts into a more threatening stance. “Stop! Under Article 6 of the Bennet Accords, Brightheart incorporated reserves the right to —“

“Beeline,” Chloe mutters under her breath, hefting her bolt gun and scanning the exits. “High mobility, brief invulnerability, low impact. Dodge and scram.”

“Bit on the nose,” I whisper back.

She chuckles, and Beeline wraps up his monologue.

“— Will be detained! Drop your weapons!”

“Nah,” Chloe says, unclipping a net trap from her belt. Beeline drops into a runner’s stance just as she sends it skidding across the tiled floor.

The net springs, and we bolt, immediately sprinting towards the front entrance. I shoot a glance back in time to see the net touch Beeline — and then fall through him as a bright yellow flash of light erupts and suddenly he’s standing on the other side, unimpeded.

I narrow my eyes. Teleportation? Intangibility? Either would be a pain to deal with.

Chloe kicks open the glass doors, cracking them against the outer concrete walls, and we both practically throw ourselves into her jerry-rigged vehicle.

Back inside the lobby, I watch Beeline start to run.

I hear a clank from the car’s engine. It doesn’t start.

“Oh c’mon, not now!” Chloe growls.

I glance at her nervously. “Did you break something?”

Beeline reaches the front doors, and slams them open with both hands.

“Of course not! Just gotta…” She shoves something into place with another metallic thunk.

The engine whirls, crying out in a flurry of mechanical clicks, and the wheels grind against the tarmac. The vehicle explodes into motion, moving just fast enough to speed past Beeline as he erupts into another blinding flash and a brilliant yellow beam spears out from where he was standing.

We reach an intersection, Chloe drags the car into a sharp turn, and I watch the beam flash again, restoring Beeline at the end of it.

“Did we lose him?!” Chloe shouts, and I see another flash.

A yellow streak of light shoots out past the intersection, briefly blinks back into a humanoid shape, and bursts into another blinding stream, this time chasing us down the street.

“No!” I inform her. Beeline’s shining form casts a harsh glow across the surrounding buildings.

Chloe grunts, and takes a hard left, tires screeching against the pavement. Beeline is fast, and even as he pops back into existence to reorient, he’s gaining on us quickly.

“Keep taking those turns!” I shout, hauling myself out of the seat and planting my boots on either side of the chassis below me.

Beeline approaches, rapidly closing in on the back end of the vehicle and slowly coming closer to the road —

Chloe takes another violent turn, and I drop down, slamming my tonfas against the railings for support.

I look up, and Beeline blinks back into place in the middle of the road, whips his head around, and bursts back into his light form.

I blink. Does he need to be looking?

Refocus. Either way, he’s still gaining, that maneuver didn’t gain us more than a second of leeway.

This close to the back of the vehicle, light against the surroundings seems more dim — like taking a photo next to a lamp. The exposure is distorted, and I can feel a steadily increasing heat, even under my mask.

“Can’t shake him — we’re on a highway! No more turns!”

I swear under my breath. I need some way to throw him off track —

The blooming star in front of me snaps, and Beelines boots emit a clang as he clings to the back of the car.

Our eyes lock. I can’t see his eyes, but his lips are set in a firm line.

He throws the first punch. It’s sloppy, but obviously considered enough to not throw him off-balance. I brace my legs and pull up a tonfa, deflecting the blow. Quickly, while his other limbs are occupied with holding on to the car, I lash out with my other tonfa, striking him in his chest.

My heart drops into my gut as soon as he lets go — the blow was enough to dislodge him out of shock if nothing else, and I watch in almost slow motion as he falls backwards, mouth dropping open as he turns his head to stare at me —

A bright flash, a second later, and again he’s gripping the car’s railings at the back.

I grit my teeth. He needs to look at where he’s going, right?

This time, I throw the first punch.

I drop down, throwing out a strike to his gut. He reacts immediately, seemingly on-guard, now, and pulls in his left arm to block.

I pull back the tonfa and strike again, watching as this time he winces, shifts his position, and grabs the tonfa at its base.

I jerk the weapon, experimentally. It slips, slightly, but not enough to dislodge it. The rumble of the clockwork machine underneath reminds me that any unnecessary harsh movements would be unwise.

Shit. Beeline grunts, and takes a heavy step up the back of the vehicle.

Reinforcing my grip on the tonfa, I lean backwards, dragging him closer, and throw a couple strikes to his skull.

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He tenses, yanking on my other weapon and twisting his neck to avoid the attacks, all the while keeping his face trained on me.

“Red! Any longer and he’ll have reinforcements!”

I grunt. Time’s up. I’m beginning to think I should do something drastic.

“Just give up! You’ll be given a lighter sentence if you stop resisting!” Beeline shouts.

He’s close enough that I think he’s getting spittle all over my mask.

My head is throbbing, my legs are killing me, and I feel my resolve start to crumble.

“Get off —”

I grunt, pulling back my tonfa and slamming it into his gut.

“The fucking —“

Another grunt as I strike again, in the same area, and he tries to move his arm to block.

“Car!”

I pull back the tonfa, but instead of going for his gut, I aim higher. The stick cracks against his jaw, twisting his head sideways from the impact —

He reels, and I seize the opportunity. I yank back harshly on the tonfa he’s holding onto, lift my leg, and kick him in the chest.

Beeline falls, his leg cracks against the tarmac, and he disappears into a beam of light aiming straight into a nearby alleyway.

“Go, go, go!” I shout.

“You lost him?!”

I watch as a flare of yellow erupts from the alleyway, even as we keep gaining distance. “Yeah, for now! Drive!”

“Oh, I’ll drive alright,” I think I hear Chloe mutter over the roar of the clockwork engine.

Abruptly, the straightaway ends, and Chloe makes another harsh turn — we’re visibly entering an area closer to downtown. The roads wind more, and shortcuts become dirtier and harder to track. Slowly, I stop seeing flashes of light at random intervals coming from just behind us.

Finally, I let out a slow breath, watching the buildings speed past. No sign of any heroes. I can’t even hear sirens.

“I think he’s gone,” I call out.

“Thank fuck.”

“…What now?”

Chloe grunts. “We’re stashing the car. Can’t be too careful.”

I sigh, and settle down in the back seat, letting the wind brush against my hair.

“Are you sure we can’t just… get a job?”

Chloe barks out a laugh. “You’re ambitious, I’ll give you that!”

—

Large stacks of tied-together banknotes, antique watches, jewelry, assorted paperwork and important-looking documents — there’s more variety than I was expecting, especially seeing it all laid out on Chloe’s desk.

To be fair, I’m not entirely sure what I was expecting.

“And we’re just gonna… sell it?”

“Not all of it,” Chloe explains, running through her pockets yet again and somehow finding another trinket that she sets down onto the desk. “I’m gonna need to sort through it all and find out what’s valuable. The money is fine, obviously, just need to sell it to someone who can remove the marks.”

She lifts a stack of banknotes off the table and flips through them. “The jewelry is a little more complicated. Can’t sell all of it at once, and it needs to be appraised. I’ll try and do an initial pricing myself, and separate it into groups, take each group to a different shop.”

I step closer to the desk, combing over the assortment of items.

“And the… the documents?” I ask, inspecting a decorated one near me that seems like… a title? For a vehicle, it looks like.

“Sometimes you get contacts that go out-of-city, and they usually like that sort of thing, but it’s not consistent,” she mutters. “If I can’t find one, there’s a couple people I know that specialize in ransom, and they’ll pay to get a hold of basically anything irreplaceable.”

I blink, and turn to her. “…Ransom?”

Chloe nods, sorting through some of the remaining documents. “Yeah, withholding personal documents or other items for money.”

“No — I know what ransom is, I just — is this ethical?”

She rolls her eyes. “This whole superhero schtick better not be infectious.”

I scowl. “I’m serious. I don’t wanna steal the deed to someone’s car or whatever…”

“Too fuckin’ bad,” Chloe grunts. “That’s how things work around here. You want money, you gotta take it from someone else.”

I sigh. “Was it at least a rich people bank…?”

“Rich people banks have two minute response times, not five. Too high profile.”

I don’t respond.

Chloe’s eyes soften, slightly. “Listen, I… I know it sucks. Not everything’s gonna be as clean as you want it to be.”

“You just gotta push through. Keep going. Okay?”

I grunt, and cross my arms. “…Sure.”

She smiles. “Great! Now help me sort the trinkets!”

I huff, plopping myself down in the chair next to her. “You’re sure you’re not like, half bird, or half raccoon, or something?”

A chuckle, as she starts picking through our haul. “Trinkets are universal, Claire. Everyone likes trinkets. It’s the one thing everyone can agree on!”

“We’ll start sorting by metal — or color, at least, some of them might not be legitimate.” Her hands are deft, confident as she easily slides bits of jewelry out and into their respective piles, seemingly knowing from a glance what they’re likely to be made of.

I start poking through my own section, and find it’s more difficult than I expect. My hands are hesitant, slow to pick out the brass from the gold, the silver from the pearlescent. I make my way through, carefully.

The child’s hands, off to my right, dart out and snag something valuable from the desk. I turn to look at the interruption.

A shorter kid, dressed in almost-rags and covered in soot up to their elbows., hair stained black down to the roots and smudges dotting their face.

They snag another trinket.

I frown. “Hey.”

They look up, and tilt their head.

“You’re getting soot all over it, it’ll be harder to sell. Here,” I say, grabbing a nearby cloth and gently taking the ring from their hands. I polish it quickly but thoroughly, and start to hand it back.

The kid reaches, and I pull back slightly. They stop, grab the rag instead, and carefully take the ring and slip it into one of their many pockets.

“See? There you go,” I smile.

“Who’re you talkin’ to?” Chloe mutters absently, completely absorbed by her task.

“Dunno,” I answer. Then, I go back to picking through stolen jewelry.

It doesn’t take too long, with all three of us working at it, even as Chloe demands we switch to cataloging pieces that are more likely to be legitimate. Every so often I ask her about a piece I’m holding, and she’ll explain properties that might point her towards a specific decision.

Most of it flies over my head, but it’s relaxing after the adrenaline rush earlier.

We’re nearly finished, when I heave a short sigh. “I should probably do some maintenance.”

Chloe tilts her head, not looking away from her inspection. At some point, she’d started using the magnifier attached to the edge of her desk, and spending longer with each piece.

“What d’you mean?”

I don’t think she’s listening, but I explain anyway. “A large portion of my body is made up of custom structures; more efficient muscle construction, bone supports, stuff like that. Stuff that isn’t included in my DNA.”

“Whenever a custom structure breaks down, my body attempts to rebuild it in the image stored in my DNA, adding on obsolete structures to the crafted ones,” I say, stepping back from the desk and moving towards the more homely end of Chloe’s shack.

“If I want to keep my modifications, I need to either alter my DNA to include them, or I need to use my power to constantly repair them. DNA is too complex for me to work out, so I go with the upkeep method.”

I lean back on the couch, making myself comfortable. I’m going to be sitting here for a while.

“It’s mostly only necessary if I’m doing a lot of physical activity and my muscles degrade, or if I take an extensive injury during a fight, I have to use my power before I’m anywhere near full operating capacity.”

“Hm. You should keep that to yourself from now on,” Chloe mutters.

I blink. “But you asked…?”

She shakes her head. “No, I mean — that information is sensitive. Don’t go telling the specifics of your powers to someone you can’t trust.”

I hesitate.

“…I trust you.”

A pause.

Chloe snorts. “Sure.”

—

The self checkup goes well, initially. Only minor repairs seem necessary. My muscles obviously need tuning, after that much exertion, and a quick run-through with my standard modifications seals anything I might have missed. For a moment I consider trying to re-implement the blade I used during my escape.

Then, I notice something. Dotted around the outsides of my brain, which is likely why I didn’t notice it — I try to avoid changes to my psyche out of principal. Still, this is so intrusive that I have no idea how I haven’t been experiencing immediate effects.

A thin lattice of… something, spreads its way along the space between my brain and my skull, dotted with a few small nodes connecting it.

Experimentally, I try to destroy a chunk, checking to see if my power spits out an error — it would tell me if doing anything was directly dangerous, at least.

Nothing. The section of the lattice dissolves easily, and nothing else happens.

I destroy the rest of it, and deactivate my power. What could that possibly have been? It seemed intrusive, but I haven’t noticed anything changing about my mental state, and Chloe didn’t seem to notice anything either —

Wait. I narrow my eyes. That kid…?

“Hold on — !”