Mist of Shadows
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Tinker of Fiction Part 6
🕑 Added 2023-07-15 08:30:59 +0000 UTC"Did you kill the Simurgh?" Taylor asked as she walked into Myst's room.
Myst looked up from the operating system that he was trying to cobble together on his laptop so he could run a basic version of the Doctor's mobile emitter. "Not that I know of."
Taylor stared at her cousin when she realized his lips were curled up in a faint smile. "Not that you know of?"
"There's always a chance that my math was off and that using a tachyon bomb to slingshot it a hundred thousand years into the future destroyed it but I doubt we're that lucky, so no, I didn't kill the Simurgh," Myst admitted.
"You tossed it through time?" Taylor asked, wanting to make sure he wasn't just being sarcastic.
"Technically the explosives tossed it through time but yeah, Danny told me that I couldn't build a space base until the Simurgh was dealt with, so I dealt with it," Myst replied, doing his best not to laugh at the look of shock on Taylor's face.
"Can you deal with Leviathan and Behemoth the same way?" Taylor asked hopefully as she sat down in the chair.
Myst shook his head. "I doubt it. Leviathan is fast enough to dodge and Behemoth puts out enough radiation that I'd have trouble getting a target lock. Even if I could destroy them, I'm not sure destroying them is a good idea until we've built up a decent fleet of starships."
"Why not?" Taylor asked, thinking about the cities they'd lost over the years.
"Because someone or something made the endbringers. What happens if we end up with something more dangerous?" Myst asked.
"Like what?" Taylor asked.
Myst frowned as he thought about Noelle. "How about something that creates plagues or something that creates evil duplicates of people?"
"Never post that idea, anywhere," Taylor ordered, images of evil versions of the Triumvirate dancing in her head.
Myst smiled when his laptop beeped, letting him know that he had a message on PHO. "I wasn't planning on it."
Taylor glanced at Myst's laptop. "Who are you talking to?"
"A test subject," Myst replied as he pulled the message up from Greg. 'Okay, I believe you, when can I get super powers?'
"What are you testing?" Taylor asked, wondering what her cousin was testing.
"My power includes a number of permanent super soldier formulas, I was curious if we could give ourselves phenomenal cosmic powers," Myst replied with amusement.
Taylor shook her head. "Yeah, because that doesn't sound sketchy at all."
"Which part, meeting someone that I met online or giving some random stranger powers?" Myst asked, doing his best not to laugh at the glare Taylor was giving him.
"Both," Taylor replied dryly.
"I need a test subject and I'm not crazy enough to run the initial tests on myself or my family, do you have a better idea?" Myst asked.
"Have you considered asking the PRT?" Taylor asked.
"Let's assume for a second that they'd even consider letting me experiment on people, they'd want the formula. I'm not giving a government agency the formula, they'd use it and make an army or someone would steal it and make an army and then we'd have a bunch of super soldiers running around causing trouble," Myst complained.
"This isn't a joke," Taylor snapped. "They could toss you in prison for experimenting on people without jumping through a mountain of paperwork."
"By the time anyone in the government figures it out, I'm going to have a fleet of spaceships and space stations," Myst argued, worried about the PRT's reaction when they realized he could basically mass produce capes.
Taylor shook her head. "That doesn't make it right. Just replicate thirty force fields for the PRT and ask them if they'll consider fast tracking the super soldier tests if you can talk Panacea into helping."
Myst considered Taylor's idea for a minute, weighing his options. "I can't see the government leaving me alone if they find out I can make super soldiers."
"You can make starships and replicators, I think that ship has already sailed," Taylor pointed out.
"That's fair," Myst admitted as he pulled up the PHO page and started a message to Panacea.
Taylor frowned as she thought about someone capturing her father to use as leverage. "We should probably get Dad a force field belt."
"I'll put it on the list," Myst replied as he worked on the message to Amy. 'I have a couple of super soldier formulas that I'd love to test. Should I ask the PRT or should I just plan to make a couple trips to international waters? Can I talk you into helping make sure the testing doesn't result in horrible side effects? I'm willing to bribe you by giving you enough force field belts for the rest of your team. Unrelated, I could use help testing a device for removing scars and freckles. I'm willing to donate to your favorite charity or hand you a decent amount of spending money if you'll help me fast track the product?'
"Have you considered making some water filtration devices to help with disaster relief?" Taylor asked.
"Do you have any other ideas?" Myst asked as he grabbed his pocket notebook off the nightstand and wrote the idea down before he could forget.
"You should probably redesign the stun pistols now that you can replicate power cells," Taylor suggested. "Do you have anything that would let us fly?"
"Flight rings, wingsuits, jet packs or power armor with repulsors?" Myst asked as he started scribbling down ideas.
Taylor smiled as she pictured fighting in power armor. "How long would the power armor take to put on?"
"At least a couple of minutes without assistants and some type of framework," Myst replied as he started sketching a design for power armor in his notebook. "I should probably make a cloaking device."
"That would certainly help," Taylor agreed, looking forward to having actual armor when she was running around being a hero. "How long would it take to build the armor?"
Myst considered everything that would have to go into making a suit of power armor. "I'd probably need at least a week unless I can find a program to map a scan of a person to the armor and I'm going to need a couple of days to program the replicator. This would be a lot easier if I didn't have to deal with school."
"At least you don't have to deal with bullies," Taylor said.
"Not yet." Myst smiled when his laptop beeped at him. He pulled up Panacea's message. "Amy's onboard as long as we clear things with the PRT, apparently there are a couple of forms that I have to fill out."
"A couple of forms? That's it?" Taylor asked in surprise.
"Basically," Myst replied as he finished reading her message. "It would be a mountain of paperwork without Panacea helping but her ability to read people's biology means they can skip a couple of dozen expensive tests. She's also willing to help me test a scar removal device which means I can fast track selling it to various hospitals around the world."
"How much are you planning on selling the scar removal devices for?" Taylor asked.
Myst shrugged. "I'll probably ask Dragon for advice but I was thinking a couple of thousand to a couple of million."
Taylor stared at her cousin. "That's a hell of a range."
"I'm willing to give the hospitals a substantial discount if they're willing to set a reasonable price for scar removal. There's no reason to let the hospitals gouge people when removing a scar should take less than five minutes and wouldn't require more than watching a basic five minute instructional video for the nurses that would be operating the tools," Myst explained.
"What do you consider reasonable?" Taylor asked.
"Fifty dollars," Myst replied with a shrug. "You're basically paying to have a nurse run a wand over the scar or a couple of scars. Let's assume that it costs the doctor's office or hospital twenty five dollars for the nurse's time and the room, that's basically twenty five dollars of pure profit."
"They'd still have to pay for the machine," Taylor pointed out.
"Let's assume the numbers are reasonable, they'd be making a profit after they treat forty people with scars. The devices should last a couple of decades unless someone starts beating on them with a hammer. If they want to charge an unreasonable amount, I'm fine with charging an unreasonable amount for the device."
Taylor shook her head. "I have a feeling that most hospitals would rather pay a million for the device if it meant they could charge a thousand dollars to remove scars."
Myst punched some numbers into the calculator on his laptop. "Let's assume that the hospital manages to collect five hundred dollars on average, that's only about two thousand patients before most of the fee turns into pure profit and that's assuming that half of the people default."
"Wouldn't it be better to just charge the hospitals and clinics a percentage of what they charge?" Taylor asked thoughtfully.
"There are thousands of hospitals in America, I'd need a company just to keep everyone honest," Myst complained. "I'd rather keep the prices down to something reasonable and only make a few million."
"A few million?" Taylor asked.
"It might take a couple of months but I doubt I'll have a problem selling a couple of thousand devices which should give me a couple of million in profit. I can probably get twenty to thirty million by slightly jacking the price and selling devices to Canada and the British Isles. I can jack the price for South America and make at least that much, same thing for most of Europe. I can probably sell a couple of hundred devices to China for a million each."
"Any particular reason you're gouging China?" Taylor asked.
"They had horrible human rights policies before capes showed up and they've only gotten worse, so yeah, I don't have to be nice or fair. Besides, they're the type of people that would try to reverse engineer my device so they could sell knockoffs," Myst complained.
"Which device?" Danny asked from the doorway.
Myst turned to look at Danny, wondering how long he'd been standing there. "I have a device that can remove scars, freckles and moles that I want to get Panacea to help me test. I was planning on selling the devices for a thousand dollars if the buyers agreed to keep their prices down to something reasonable."
"That's extremely cheap for medical equipment," Danny pointed out.
"I don't have a board of directors that wants to squeeze blood out of a turnip, I just need a couple of million to buy some abandoned warehouses, an empty lot and a marina."
"Why do you need an empty lot?" Danny asked.
Myst replied as he swung his legs around and stood up. "The Bay needs something to turn the economy around. I can clear the boat graveyard and the cargo ship using transporters, tractor beams and replicators but that's not going to be enough. We need something that will grab the world's attention, we need a spaceport or a hub for dimensional travel."
"The Simurgh…" Danny trailed off when he realized that the Simurgh was gone.
"Won't be a problem for at least a hundred thousand years which means there's no reason not to make a spaceport," Myst replied with a smile.
"Did you…" Danny trailed off, not sure how to ask if his nephew had killed an endbringer.
"You said I couldn't build a spaceship until the Simurgh was gone, I dealt with it. We have a chance to turn the Bay into something amazing, I'm going to take it. If that requires making a deal with the PRT, then I'll make a deal. If it requires lighting the heavens on fire that's what I'm going to do."
"It shouldn't be your responsibility, you're a kid," Danny argued.
"Life isn't perfect and no one said it was fair," Myst replied as he pulled his cell phone out of his pocket. "I have thousands of inventions in my head that could light the world on fire. I want to see the endbringers die and I want to see humanity scream, 'We will not go quietly into the night!' Maybe humanity is doomed to fade away, maybe we'll build an empire that crosses the universe. I'm going to try to give them a future so we can find out which it is."
"If you build something to make the world a better place, Mannequin is going to show up to stop you," Danny warned him.
"I refuse to live in fear. By the time the Nine get to the Bay, I'll have enough drones to scan the city for capes and I'll have a transporter that can teleport the Nine into orbit without having to get near them."
"Do you honestly think that will work on the Siberian?" Danny asked, worried about the Nine paying the city a visit if things started to improve in a major way.
Myst shook his head. "I have a friend that's a precog, the Siberian is a projection. Her master isn't immortal or indestructible, he's just a crazy bastard that went insane and drives around in an old van."
"Have you told the PRT?" Danny asked.
"I don't have any proof and my friend is worried about getting kidnapped if the moles in the PRT find out who they are so I haven't mentioned anything about their existence. Even if you assume they're wrong about the Siberian being a projection, I should have everything in place to deal with the rest of the Nine in a couple of days."
'He's right, we can't live in fear and it's getting harder to find jobs,' Danny admitted, if only to himself. "What do you need?"
"I wouldn't mind a ride into town," Myst admitted. "I need to bring a couple of cases and boxes of belts and stun pistols."
Taylor glanced between her father and Myst. "What if someone recognizes the car?"
"We can park a couple of blocks away," Myst said cheerfully as he called Armsmaster.
Danny nodded. "I know a couple of places where there aren't cameras."
"Spark?" Armsmaster asked, wanting to make sure he hadn't lost his cellphone.
Myst activated the voice changer he'd programmed into his phone. "You said to call if I fixed the problem with the belts."
"How did you fix it?" Armsmaster asked.
"I managed to create a crystal that basically requires an antigravity device or a space station to grow that boosts the shield which should make it a lot harder to duplicate."
"Makes sense," Armsmaster agreed. "I doubt most engineers would look for other solutions if they saw the crystals."
"I have thirty of the force field belts for the PRT and enough for every hero in the city, can I drop them off? I want to talk to someone about tinkertech enhancement serums."
"Have you tested the formulas?" Armsmaster asked warily.
"No," Myst admitted. "I know what the formulas are supposed to do, but I'm not sure how much to trust my power and there's always a chance that someone has an adverse reaction to one of the serums. I talked to Panacea about it, she's willing to help run some tests to make sure the formulas and the helmet are safe."
"What type of formulas and how long do they last?" Armsmaster asked, wondering about the side effects and how effective they'd make him.
"I have three different formulas, a generic super soldier formula that increases strength, agility, and your reaction speed, a formula that gives you a couple of tons of super strength and gives you the ability to stick to walls along with enhanced agility, and a formula that gives people telekinesis, electrokinesis, and the ability to turn into a silvery blob."
"And back, right?" Armsmaster asked warily.
"Yeah," Myst assured him. "The formulas should be permanent, but as I said I don't know how much I trust my power."
"Just the three?" Armsmaster asked.
"I have a bunch of formulas floating around, the three were just the easiest to create and or safest. I figured I'd run some tests and use that information to help judge the rest of the stuff floating around in my head," Myst explained.
'At least he's saner than Lab Rat,' Armsmaster mused. "How do you feel about animal testing?"
"As a general rule, it depends on the animal. In this case, I have a bad feeling about testing two of the formulas on animals," Myst admitted. "I don't really want to see a rat that can use telekinesis or toss lightning bolts but that formula doesn't give me the sense of danger as the other two."
"How many doses of the formula do you have?" Armsmaster asked, wondering how many volunteers he'd have to find.
"I have thirty five doses of the telekinesis and electrokinesis formula and twenty doses of the other two," Myst said, hoping that would be enough to get a decent baseline.
"At least thirty five test subjects. I'll talk to the director, how long will it take you to get here?" Armsmaster asked, wondering if he could talk the director into signing off on the tests.
"Forty five minutes to an hour?" Myst asked, looking at Danny.
Danny gave him a thumbs up, figuring it would probably take close to thirty minutes once they got everything loaded.
"I'll contact Panacea and see you in forty five minutes to an hour," Armsmaster said then ended the call so he could contact Panacea.
0o0o0
Vicky glanced up from her hamburger when she noticed that Amy was staring at her phone. "What's up?"
"Armsmaster approved Spark's idea," Amy replied as she put her phone back in her pocket.
"To the Rig," Vicky said as she bounced up from her chair.
"No, we're going to the PRT building, there are more agents there and everything is set up for medical testing," Amy explained as she grabbed her milkshake and followed her sister away from Fugly Bob's.
Vicky scooped up Amy and flew towards the PRT building. "I wonder if they have extra formulas."
"Why do you care?" Amy asked.
"My shield isn't up all of the time and I wasn't thinking about myself," Vicky replied cheerfully.
"I don't need super strength," Amy replied.
"It's not about needing superstrength, it's about the joy in life that is tossing Nazis through walls," Vicky argued.
"That I then have to put back together,” she replied dryly.
“And wouldn’t you like to be the reason they need to be put back together for once rather than just cleaning up my mess?” her sister teased.
Amy opened and then closed her mouth and frowned. “I hate the fact that, that actually sounds like a good reason.”
0o0o0
Myst glanced at the costume that Danny had come up with which was a white sparkly jumpsuit with bell bottoms and a black mask that covered everything from his nose up, including his hair. He thought the high collar was a little over the top but figured they'd seen worse. 'That looks like something they would have worn in the seventies, I'm sure they've seen worse costumes.'
Danny finished reading the contract a second time. "It looks like a standard first refusal contract in exchange for the use of medical facilities and volunteers."
"It's as long as less than two hundred and fifty thousand per dose, we have the first right of refusal if you go into mass production," Armsmaster said.
"Considering I doubt it’d cost anything close to a quarter of a million for a gallon of each formula, I don't have a problem with that," Myst said.
"How much were you planning on selling them for?" Armsmaster asked.
Myst glanced at the three people that were unconscious after taking the spider formula. "I wasn't planning on mass producing the formulas but we have extra so feel free to provide more test subjects."
"Let's get started," Amy said as she finished checking the dozen PRT agents that had volunteered to test the formulas for medical issues.
"Who is going first for the GC-161?" Myst asked as he picked up the GC-161 injector.
"That's the electrokinesis and telekinesis, right?" a haired man asked.
"Yes," Myst replied.
"That would be Lorenzo, he won rock, paper, scissors," one of the other guys said.
Lorenzo stepped forward and held his arm out with his sleeve rolled up.
"All your paperwork is signed, right?" Myst asked, wanting to make sure.
"Yes," Lorenzo replied as Panacea grabbed his hand.
"Go for it," Amy said, looking at his biology.
Myst reached up and used the Star Trek like auto injector to inject the correct dose into the agent's arm. "You should get a reaction in less than five minutes."
"Ohh, huh," Amy said thoughtfully as she watched the changes to the man's genetics and brain, feeling strangely excited as bits and pieces of his genetics changed before her 'eyes'.
"Can we get more specific than huh?" Vicky asked.
“The nature of every cell in his body is changing, becoming more elastic and I’m not sure, but his aging rate may have slowed down by an order of magnitude. I’ve never seen anything like it and I suppose if I had a pen and paper and about half an hour I could draw you an accurate representation of changes but there aren’t actually medical terms to cover it, so you’ll just have to settle for huh and amazingly stable,” Amy replied, barely paying attention as she watched the changes ripple through his body at an insane rate, slight alterations in part of his brain both fascinating and frightening in turn.
Myst sighed in relief as he realized that the formula was working as intended. "Good to know."
“The changes are slowing down, mainly because they are running out of cells to change… and done,” she announced, tilting her head. “Stable, very stable, probably doesn’t need to worry about cancer or anything remotely similar.” Amy released his hand. “Give it an hour and I’ll recheck, but it looks to have done its job.”
"How do you feel?" Armsmaster asked.
"I feel fine and relieved," Lorenzo admitted as he raised his hand and pointed it at the test dummy. "How does this work?"
"No idea, you should have telekinesis and electro…" Myst trailed off as the man turned into what looked like a large puddle of mercury.
"Was that supposed to happen?" one of the guys asked.
"Didn't you read the release form?" Armsmaster asked.
"Yeah, that wasn't the formula I was going for," the guy replied.
"That would be the liquid form. He should be able to change back," Myst replied as the man changed back to his normal appearance.
"It's like a mental switch," Lorenzo said as one of the practice dummies moved a hand. "I might have figured out how to move things, you just sort of focus on it."
"The last one should be electrokinesis or at least the ability to zap things," Myst offered.
Armsmaster looked at Panacea. "He's tested his liquid form, can you check him again?"
Panacea reached over and checked Lorenzo's biology, having gotten permission for the duration of the testing. "I'm not noticing any changes and his brain chemistry is just as stable as it was."
"Excellent," Armsmaster said as he turned to look at the next volunteer. "We should probably go with the spider formula next since you'll be out for a couple of hours."
"Did you have to call it the spider formula?" the female agent.
"What else do you call a formula that allows you to shoot spiders from your hands?" Myst asked, amused by their horrified expressions.
"That wasn't in the paperwork," she complained.
"You are entirely correct, that's not one of the expected abilities but it would be really interesting," Myst mused.
Taylor shook her head. "Don't mind him, his sense of humor needs work."
"Technically, I called it the spider formula because it generally gives people the ability to climb walls and enhanced strength, speed, and reflexes," Myst explained.
"You should probably lay down on the cot so you don't collapse," Armsmaster suggested, wanting to play things safe since Myst had mentioned it might knock the test subject out for several hours.
"Not a problem," the female agent said as she walked over and lay down on the cot. "Hit me!"
Amy walked over and grabbed the female agent's hand, curious how this particular formula would alter her physiology. "I’m ready."
Myst picked up the other auto injector and injected the formula into her arm.
"That's producing a reaction," Amy mused as the formula spread through the circulatory system and into the body, changing the density of her muscles and improving the conductivity of her nerves. 'It's like a road map of how to enhance people,' she mused as she watched the changes spread. "She's going to run a fever for a couple of hours, we should probably put her on a glucose drip so that she doesn't lose all of her body fat."
"That sounds like a great plan," the agent said, not wanting to lose a cup size and have to replace all of her bras.
"She seems stable," Gallant offered.
"The changes are slower so it's going to take longer to determine the extent of the changes, give me another five minutes then we can try the other formula, I'll keep checking Agent Johnson every ten minutes or so," Amy said, wanting to make sure that the agent didn't run into problems.
Myst listened to Panacea's running commentary about the spread of the spider formula, giving him a much better idea how to judge the rest of the formulas he could make. 'At least they're working as intended.'
Amy let go of Miss Johnson's hand and moved over to the next volunteer. "Ready?"
"Yes!" Johansen said enthusiastically, looking forward to being strong enough to lift a car over his head and run like an olympic athlete.
Myst walked over and injected the large Swedish man with the supersoldier formula after Amy grabbed his hand. "That shouldn't take more than a couple of minutes."
Amy stared at the changes as they rapidly swept through his body, improving everything and causing his muscles to become more compact. "You're going to be hungry," she warned him as she watched the changes, wondering where the additional mass was coming from since she was fairly sure he was heavier than he'd started. "And we're done," she said, rather impressed by how fast the changes had occurred. "Your brain seems to be working a bit better and your body got a tuneup and your muscles are a lot more dense, you should be careful until you have a better understanding of your current strength level."
"I'll keep that in mind," Johansen said as he walked over to the practice dummy. He punched the practice dummy and stared at the remains as the top of the dummy was missing. "Huh, that's new."
"Mid tier brute?" Myst asked thoughtfully.
"At least," Armsmaster said, pleased. "We'll have to run some tests."
"Why is it that I didn't feel like a lab rat until he said that?" Johansen asked with amusement.
Armsmaster smirked as he walked over to the weight bench. "Let's get started."
Amy walked back over to check on Agent Johnson, wanting to make sure the changes continued on a positive trend, fascinated by the pattern of alterations and feeling unusually cheerful.
“We still need to test them on capes,” Taylor reminded him.
“Yeah, but first we check general humans then we check altered ones,” he replied. “Remember safety third.”
“Safety third… small shiny objects and pretty explosions first and second?” Glory Girl guessed.
“Bingo,” Myst replied with a grin.
“Why am I not surprised,” Gallant said with a chuckle. “If the formulas all get cleared by Panacea I’ll volunteer to be your first cape test case.”
“Really?” Glory Girl asked.
“If Panacea is here I really don’t have much to worry about,” he reminded her.
Glory Girl nodded. “We are both awesome that way,” she said smugly.
Comments
Mist of Shadows
It seemed appropriate for a throw away costume.
Mist of Shadows
Fixed.
Michael Strickland
I love that you have Danny in an Vegas-Elvis costume.
Chichi son
"A managed to create a crystal that basically requires an antigravity device or a space station to grow that boosts the shield which should make it a lot harder to duplicate." I managed to? A friend managed to?
