Needless to say, both Paintball and Flea had more than a few questions for Paige after she showed them that the ‘people’ she had been killing were really what amounted to cyborgs. Worse, cyborgs with no real personality or minds. According to her, they were essentially drones who followed the instructions from their creator. And their instructions at that moment were to stop (or even kill) Paige before she managed to complete her goal of destroying the warehouse. This warehouse, where her father’s creations were made, and the main source of what power he still had within Detroit. She had to destroy it, and her father was hell-bent on making sure that didn’t happen. Which meant sending every drone he had to the place. And now that both of the other girls had been seen in this place, they would be targets as well.
All of which meant that, for the moment, all those questions would have to wait. The incoming drones weren’t going to be nice and give the three girls time to talk about everything they needed to. They would have to put it aside and focus on surviving the next few minutes. And on helping Paige finish what she had come here for. It was the only way to stop the factory from producing an endless supply of the automatons.
Despite just how much she was obviously reeling from confusion and a rush of questions, Flea immediately gave a short nod. “Paintball, put your helmet back on. Paige, where--” In mid-sentence, she spun around, drawing one of her swords and throwing it in the same motion. The blade shot through the air before impaling one of the biolem drones straight through the head, pinning it against the nearby wall. It sent up a shower of sparks as the orb inside was cut in half.
“Ahem,” Flea finished while taking a step that way to yank the sword free. “Paige, where are we going? Let’s move before more of these things show up.”
Paintball, who had put the helmet on and adjusted it, stared at the biolem as it slumped to the floor once the sword was removed. Her voice was a bit weak, after seeing just how instantly the Conservator Star-Touched had reacted to the drone’s entrance. And what that reaction had been. “I guess it’s a good thing you guys choose not to be lethal most of the time.”
Paige, meanwhile, was already pivoting to stride quickly toward the opposite side of the room full of computers. “We have to get to the main server! That’s the only place where I can plug in and tell the whole place to self-destruct. And… and when I do, I’m gonna be helpless. I have to shut down my body to get into the system. Which--”
Cassidy grabbed the other girl’s arm, blurting, “Did you say plug in? Shut your body down? You mean…” She exchanged a quick glance with Flea, whose expression was hidden by her own mask.
Stopping by that doorway as she faced the person who had once been one of her only friends, Paige hesitated before giving a short nod. Her voice softened slightly from what it had been a moment earlier. “Cassie,” she managed, “If we get through this, I’ll explain. I--everything. I’ll explain everything, but--”
“But that’s for later,” Flea interrupted. She was already moving past them, checking the hallway ahead with a sword in each hand. “And believe me, there will be a later, for all three of us. So lead the way. Paintball and I will cover you while you do what you need to. And then we’re all getting out of here together.
“I’ve got questions, and if you think I’m gonna let you get out of answering them by sacrificing yourself to blow this place up, you’ve got another thing coming.”
******
So, they kept moving. Paige led the other two to the main server room. The system had already tried to protect itself by slamming the vault door shut, but Paintball showed the other two exactly how her pink paint worked, and they quickly put a hole in it big enough for Paige to work her way through. Which left Paintball and Flea outside to deal with the incoming drones.
And deal with them they did. Any hesitation Cassidy might have had when it came to killing what looked like normal human beings was not shared by her older and more experienced companion. While Flea’s ability to drain the health and stamina from living beings didn’t appear to do much to the biolems, her enhanced speed and strength matched with the sheer skill she wielded her swords with made her more than a match for any of the drones by herself. And when Paintball added a few shots of her enhancement paint into the mix, the biolems didn’t stand a chance. They were woefully unprepared for the grinder they were walking into, given what a terror to behold a Flea with boosted strength and speed was.
But the drones also weren’t stopping. They kept pouring through the corridor no matter how many of them were killed. They were, quite literally, mindlessly attacking in a rush to stop Paige from completing her mission. Again and again, they charged toward the vault door. And again and again, they were cut down.
Finally, the blonde girl pushed her way out of the server room, landing lightly on her feet before looking at the pile of bodies that littered the floor. Her voice was terse. “We need to go, now. I gave us plenty of time to get out, but--”
In mid-sentence, a series of deafeningly loud clangs filled the air, as thick steel doors slammed into place throughout the facility, including right in front of them.
“He won’t let us leave,” Paige whispered, her voice stricken. “He’s… he’s locked everything down. He can’t shut off the self-destruct, but he can trap us in here.” She had been… not fine, but at least accepting of the plan to sacrifice herself in order to stop her father’s plan. Resigned to it after years of attempting to find another way. But the thought of losing not only her own life, but that of these two as well, was too much. The thought of leading Cassidy and Irelyn both to their deaths with this mission made her freeze up. She wasn’t angry, she wasn’t sad, she wasn’t… anything. She couldn’t be anything at that moment.
Empty. The thought made her empty.
Fortunately, Flea was not so-frozen. “Paige!” She snapped. “We’re not done yet. Paintball, put a hole in that door, we’re getting out of here. How much time?” She added that with a quick glance to her adopted sister while Paintball immediately began to spray a pink circle against the steel door that was blocking them.
“I--” Shaking herself violently, Paige shoved her moment of panic and grief aside. Anthony. She had been thinking of Anthony just then. The prospect of losing these two brought up that memory. But Irelyn was right. They weren’t dead yet. They just had to move. “Seven minutes! We’ve got seven minutes, and-- and a lot of doors between us and any way out of here.”
“Then let’s stop wasting time,” Flea replied while rearing back to slam her foot into the pink circle that Paintball had made. Her powers enhanced her arm strength somewhat. But they enhanced her leg strength to the point that she was able to leap dozens of feet into the air. That single kick was enough to knock out the entire section that had been painted. “Go!”
They went. Paige scrambled through the hole first, before the sound of a brief struggle on the other side filled the air. It was so brief, in fact, that by the time Paintball managed to push through and landed in the next room, the drone was dead on the floor with Paige standing over it, knife in hand. She gave Cassidy a quick glance, but said nothing before jogging toward the far end of the room. There was nothing to say. Not yet. Not until they were safely out of this place.
Flea joined them even as Cassidy started to move after Paige, and the three quickly continued onward. Together, they worked their way back through the facility to the nearest exterior wall. Drone after drone, door after door, they kept going. With Flea’s help, it took only four minutes to find a wall. Unfortunately, even as the timer ticked into the final three minutes, another problem presented itself.
“Forcefield!” Paige shouted, after they had ripped out the pink-painted spot of the wall. They were all faced with the glowing energy shield. “He… he put a forcefield around the building!”
“Move,” Flea ordered while drawing one of her swords once more. As the other two got out of the way, she ran her thumb over a hidden switch on the weapon’s hilt. Instantly, the blade began to hum, as a series of greenish-blue electrical sparks played over it. With a grunt, she shoved the weapon against the shield. There was a brief series of bright flashes, before the barrier blocking their escape faded.
“What?” the woman replied as the two younger girls stared at her briefly. “You think it’s the first time someone tried to stop me with a forcefield?” Checking something on the hilt of the sword, she grimaced. “Won’t overload it for long!”
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She didn’t have to say anything else. Paige was already yanked Cassidy by the arm, hauling her to the hole. Without another word, she simply unceremoniously shoved the other girl through to the other side before pivoting to the older woman. “Your turn!”
“You first,” Irelyn retorted. When Paige’s mouth opened, she interrupted. “I’m your big sister, do as you’re told!”
For a moment that seemed to last forever, Paige stopped short. She stared that way, the woman’s words cutting through every denial or argument she could possibly have made. And in the end, she pivoted and dove through the hole. Landing on the pavement beyond, she was helped to her feet by Cassidy, before both of them stepped aside as Flea hauled herself through.
“Forty-five seconds!” Paige snapped, hands already grabbing the other two by the arms as she started to run.
That lasted for all of a few steps before Flea caught both of them around the waists, braced herself, and leapt. The lunge wasn't as far as she could get by herself without being weighed down, but it still carried them a good sixty feet forward. Another lunge took them another sixty, and they were out to the street beyond the parking lot. The woman gathered herself once more, adjusted her grip on her charges, and launched upward over a hundred feet to land on the roof of the building across the street.
Only then did she release the two, shoving them down while dropping herself with a snapped, “Shield your eyes!”
They all did so, dropping their gazes to the roof while covering their heads. No sooner had they done that, then a terrifyingly loud explosion filled the air. It sounded and felt, even from their distant position, as though the fist of an enraged god had slammed down into the Earth. When they looked up, half of the warehouse was completely gone, aside from a few pieces of it that littered the surrounding area. The other half was in flames. It was clear that, when he had set up the self-destruct system, Paige’s father had wanted to make absolutely certain that nothing could be recovered if he ever had reason to set it off. And, most likely, had wanted to catch the people responsible for forcing him to that end in the blast.
The police and fire siren sounds started almost immediately, while the three girls were still lying there staring at the burning building. Those sounds were enough to make Flea snap out of her moment of distraction, pushing herself up. “We can’t be found here,” she immediately announced. “Come on.”
“You… you just want to leave?” Paintball managed, voice a bit weak.
“Paige,” Flea quickly demanded, “You said there was no one else but those biolems in there, or anywhere near the warehouse?”
“Yeah, no one,” the girl confirmed.
Flea nodded once. “Good. Then yes, we leave. Let the fire department put out the flames. If we’re found here, there’ll be too many questions.” Pausing briefly, she gave Paige a look before adding pointedly, “And quite frankly, I want to be the one asking questions right now.”
Paige and Cassidy exchanged brief glances, before the latter gestured. “You’re right, we shouldn’t be found here. For more reasons than you think.
“And trust me, you’re definitely not the only one with questions.”
*****
So, the three of them left the sound of sirens behind, moving across the top of the buildings until they reached an area far from the scene of the burning warehouse remains. Soon, they stopped outside of a rooftop greenhouse that was mostly hidden from view of the nearby freeway thanks to a large billboard. It was about as much privacy as they could hope for at the moment.
Still, Cassidy looked around only briefly before focusing on Flea. “What about your car? We left it in the parking lot back there, if they find--”
Lifting a hand to point over the edge of the building they were on, the woman interrupted with a simple, “Look down there.”
Cassidy did so, and saw the car in question sitting below, parked in one of the nearby spaces.
“Autopilot,” Flea informed her with a small smile that was revealed even as she reached up to tug off her mask. “I sent it away as soon as it was obvious that we were gonna have to come out hot. Figured we wouldn’t have time to stop for it. And wouldn’t want to be at street level anyway.”
“Man,” Cassidy remarked, “you guys get all the cool toys.”
Raising an eyebrow, Flea replied, “That's funny, coming from a girl who could get any toy in the world just by asking for it. And speaking of which.” She gestured toward both of them, hand moving back and forth. “Which one of you wants to start explaining some of this?”
Reaching up to remove her borrowed helmet once more, Cassidy hesitated, glancing toward the girl beside her. “Well, obviously I don’t know the whole thing. Your video said some of it, but biolems? And you… you’re…”
Paige, in turn, gave a long, low exhale. “Okay. Cassidy, this is Irelyn. Like I said, she’s the Banners’... she’s my sister. Irelyn, this is Cassidy. Paintball. We-- we used to be friends. Back before I was… adopted. Back when--” She cut herself off, clearly attempting to find the right words before finally settling on. “Let me start at the beginning. With a man named Benjamin Pittman, and his daughter, Roxanne.
So, over the next few minutes, she gave both of them a fairly quick-yet-informative explanation of where she had come from. She told them about how Benjamin Pittman was a Tech-Touched focused on biological manipulation and cybernetics, how he had created those orbs to house people’s minds and personalities, their consciousnesses, after losing his wife. He had been so obsessed with never allowing anyone to die again that he created his ‘Project Owl’ (Organic Wonderwork Legacy) in order to functionally create immortality. Except he believed that he was the person who should decide who would obtain that immortality, while everyone else would be seen as… disposable. He envisioned a brand new world, full of immortal people whose minds were housed in those orbs, who could swap in and out of any bodies they wished. A noble goal, aside from his additional vision of himself as the unquestionable and unassailable dictatorial leader of such a world. That part was… problematic, to say the least.
Of course, the explanation of who Paige’s father was and what he wanted inevitably led to the question of who his enemies were. Which was an explanation that Cassidy quickly took up, giving her own story of what had happened to make her find out the truth about her family and what they did. After only a momentary hesitation, she told Irelyn exactly what her own father really did, including his alternate identity. When she found out that he was secretly Silversmith, the woman recoiled in surprise. A dozen different questions jumped it to her mind, but she pressed her lips tightly together and nodded for the girl to continue.
So, she did. Cassidy explained everything she could, with Paige jumping in now and then to answer a little more. Soon, Irelyn had a fairly detailed picture of what was really going on in the city. And it was far more than she could have reasonably thought. Despite all of her experience, she still had to raise a hand once they were done and ask for a minute. Then she stepped away and stared up at the sky while cracking her knuckles thoughtfully. She said nothing, remaining silently contemplative as she let herself absorb all of that.
Which left Paige and Cassidy standing a bit away, looking at one another. The blonde girl was the first to speak. “I know… I did too much to--” She cut herself off, face contorting slightly. “I’m sorry. My father, the orders he… it’s not something I--”
“I get it,” Cassidy interrupted. “Paige, I-- I don’t know how easy it's going to be for me not to look at you and see everything you said and did. But, I get it. I know why you had to do that. It doesn't exactly make it easy to shove all out the window and forget it. I can’t forget it. But I can forgive it. It just might take me some time to not have… impulsive thoughts whenever I see you.” Offering the girl a somewhat awkward half-smile, she shrugged. “Sorry.”
“No, that’s fair,” Paige agreed. She folded her arms self-consciously. “It's been a busy few years, and I've filled them with a lot of things I'd rather forget. I didn’t really ever think that I’d get to this point. I tried to think of ways around what I thought I had to do. I had one idea about reprogramming one of the drones and having it blow up the building without me. But they don't have that ability. It would be like trying to reprogram a computer by plugging a toaster into it. I mean, I could have made it a pretty motivated and enthusiastic toaster, but still.”
“You were going to sacrifice yourself to take out your father’s manufacturing plant and hub, or whatever,” Cassidy murmured thoughtfully before focusing on the girl. “But what would have happened after that? You’d be dead, and he wouldn’t.”
“He’d be stuck on Breakwater,” Paige replied. “That building back there was basically his hail mary. Everything was inside it. Without that, he’s… stuck there.” She gave a grim smile of satisfaction. “And he can rot there.”
“You really don’t like your dad,” Cassidy noted.
Before Paige could respond to that, Irelyn spoke up, turning to face them. “What about your other dad? He--our parents… I know they--” She cut herself off and sighed. “I know they bought you. But what--what happened to them? Where are they now?”
Paige offered a helpless shrug. “I don’t know, I swear. My father had the staff replaced with biolems over the past couple months, and they were responsible for making sure your parents weren’t around for the party and… and what was supposed to happen during it.”
“Well,” Irelyn replied, “I guess we have to find them then, don’t we?”
“What are you going to do?” Cassidy put in hesitantly. “I mean, about everything, all of this. What I… what we told you.”
“Nothing yet,” was the answer. “If you're right about all this stuff you've been talking about, and I think you are, then this isn't something that can be rushed. We have no idea who else is working for them, or in some other way compromised. My contacts are here in the city, and any of them could work for your family, even if they don’t know it. I want to say the people I trust wouldn’t do that, but you know what? I obviously didn’t know anything about this whole Ministry business. I was clueless about all of it. So, the last thing I'm going to do is say, ‘hey, this decades-old criminal conspiracy to run the entire city that I just found out about five minutes ago? I know exactly who we can trust not to be a part of that.’” After getting all that out, she put one hand on each of their shoulders. “We’ll figure it out, I promise. You’re not alone in this, not anymore. But we have to be careful. We have to take our time. And right now, the most important thing is getting to the bottom of where our mom and dad are.” She added that last bit with a look toward Paige. “So why don’t we start with that. We find our parents.
“Because I, for one, have a few choice words for them.”