Mist of Shadows
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Boosted Villainy Part 25
🕑 Added 2022-08-23 03:33:21 +0000 UTC"This would be easier if the boss had let us bribe the inspector," Lisa complained as she watched the dockerworker run some tests on the electrical system that Uber had installed.
"Most of them don't stay bought," Henry replied as he finished testing the tinker enhanced batteries to make sure they weren't dangerous or at least weren't causing problems with the system. "Are you sure you don't want to just connect things to the grid? I can make a couple of phone calls and you'd be up and running tomorrow morning."
Lisa glanced at the heavy duty wires that went from the batteries to a blank section of the wall where Leet was planning on installing the shield generators. "I'm sure."
"Everything looks fine," Henry assured her as he checked the display for the batteries. "You're probably going to have a hell of a time getting insurance on the place, but I'll file the paperwork for the city so they won't bother you about the wiring and the plumbing."
"Thanks," Lisa replied. "With any luck, we'll have everything up and running by New Years."
"Best of luck. How much are you charging per plate?" Henry asked, fairly sure it was going to be out of his price range considering the money they'd probably sunk into repairing the place.
Lisa grinned as she thought about the various ways they were saving money. "We're going to try to keep everything reasonable and make our profit off the drinks and the fact that we aren't paying for power."
"I'll have to check it out. Do you need anything before I take off?" Henry asked, looking forward to getting home and telling his wife that they'd be able to catch up on some of the bills.
"Nope," Lisa replied as she handed him a check for the work, along with an extra two hundred dollars.
"What's the cash for?" Henry asked after glancing at the check and confirming that it was the correct amount.
"Working the day after Christmas," Lisa replied.
"Thank you," Henry replied as he pocketed the money, happy to accept the tip as it wasn’t a bribe.
"You earned it," Lisa assured him, knowing he could use the money.
"Stay safe." Henry left with a smile on his face and a spring in his steps.
"That's the plan," Lisa replied as she headed to the office to finish crunching the numbers.
0o0o0
Myst jumped when he heard an explosion through his headphones and the bridge his character was on collapsed, sending his character into the abyss. "Yeah, because that's fair."
"It's not my fault you didn't notice my character planting the explosives," Rose teased him as the door to the RV opened and Rose walked inside.
"Explosives?" Amy asked as she followed Rose inside the RV, pausing when she noticed a pair of naked and extremely attractive blonde haired teenagers on the couch making out. 'Should have been a rogue,’ she told herself, fairly sure she'd be doing a lot better mentally if she was getting paid.
"Myst found the power armor, I had to get creative," Rose explained as Vicky flew inside and looked around with a large grin on her face at seeing how much space had been added to the interior of the small RV.
Amy glanced at the screen showing a destroyed bridge. "Ah, right."
"Can you do this for closets?" Vicky asked hopefully.
"Technically," Myst replied as Taylor climbed in and shut the door behind her.
"I can practically hear Dean's wallet crying," Amy teased, glad that she didn't have to cover her sister's shopping habit. 'At least I can joke about it.'
"I'm not that bad…" Vicky trailed off as she realized she was probably taking advantage of her boyfriend, before dismissing it as she had the dozen or so times before she’d had that thought.
Myst glanced at the gloves Rose was holding. "Any trouble with the gloves?"
"Nope," Rose replied as she tossed Myst the left power copying glove. She changed the right glove into a bracelet then slipped it on. "Everything went like clockwork, including the stamp."
"Cool." Myst turned the glove into a bracelet and slipped it on his left wrist.
"It's a relief not having to worry about being mastered because some random stranger showed up and said a couple of words or made eye contact," Amy admitted.
C. Rune looked up from kissing Alice. "At least someone would track you down and kill the assholes; you're a healer, the rest of us weren't that lucky."
"I'd rather avoid the entire situation," Amy argued, thinking of some of the stories she'd heard about Heartbreaker's victims.
"Independent?" Vicky asked as she looked at the pair of blonde teenagers that looked like they'd stepped out of a movie or a photoshoot. 'I don't swing for the other team, but damn!'
C. Rune floated off Alice and the couch. "My previous boss was a prick."
Myst smiled as he thought about the look on Kaiser's face when he'd kicked him through the portal. "I blame his father and no one hitting him with a newspaper when he was being a smarmy little shit as a child."
"Cassie and Alice," Myst said as he pointed at Rune and Othala's clones.
"New to the Bay?" Vicky asked, trying to figure out if they were new capes without mentioning triggering.
"Technically," Cassie replied with a grin.
"We're clones," Alice offered as she twisted around and sat up, putting her feet on the floor and spreading her legs a touch to give them a nice view.
Amy pulled her eyes off Alice and looked at Rose. "Shadow clones?"
Rose glanced at Myst then shook her head. "Actual clones."
"You're cloning people?" Vicky asked in surprise.
"Don't worry, he asked," Cassie assured them. "My original got a couple of powers out of the deal and I got a sugar daddy and a nicer place to live."
"Sugar daddy?" Myst asked in annoyance.
"You're giving me cash to stick around and taking care of me," Cassie replied with a grin.
Myst glanced between Amy and Vicky then focused on Cassie. "My power created you, it wouldn't be right tossing you on the streets."
"Which means I get to call you daddy," Cassie teased him.
'Not touching that,' Myst thought, making a mental note to track down a shrink for the girls to talk to.
"Can I check your DNA?" Amy asked, curious about the cloning process.
"What do you think?" Cassie asked Myst.
"Go for it," Myst suggested, curious what Amy would find as she had a lot more experience with her power. "I couldn't find anything weird when I checked your DNA but that doesn't mean Amy won't."
Amy walked over and poked Cassie's hand with her finger, checking her biology. "You're healthy and if I didn't know better, I'd assume you were a normal teenager or at least a normal teenage parahuman with perfect health, most likely the result of someone healing you. You're Rune's clone, aren't you?"
"Try not to hold that against me, I'm a lot saner," Cassie assured her.
"Are you sure?" Vicky asked.
"She liked causing trouble and hated the world," Cassie pointed out.
"And you don't?" Vicky asked suspiciously.
"Nope, I just want to fuck it," Cassie joked, causing Amy to shake her head. "Yes, that's a joke."
Vicky shook her head. "I rest my case."
"Considering her parents wouldn't let her make friends for various reasons, she could have been a lot worse," Cassie argued.
"Not really helping your case," Vicky argued.
"Just because I have her memories doesn't mean I have her baggage, so yeah, I'm a lot more stable than she is," Cassie assured them.
Amy pulled her attention away from Alice. "How many powers did you give Rune?"
"Regeneration, durability, night vision and enhanced reflexes," Myst replied with a grin. "I also sent her to a world that doesn't suck."
"I'm not a villain and my power is nicer, how much would you give me?" Amy asked, wondering what she could get.
"Various types of tinker powers without the urge to actually tinker, near invulnerability, regeneration that would make Alabaster jealous, the ability to project a large dog that you could ride or the power to give yourself or up to five people cryokinesis, invisibility or augmented agility for up to five minutes at a time, split between the five people," Myst offered.
"Augmented agility would be nice," Vicky said, thinking about the number of times she'd miss judged a turn. "Can you toss in expanding my closet?"
"Greedy, much?" Rose teased.
Vicky glanced between Rose and Myst. "How long would it take to increase the size of the closet?"
"Not the point," Rose argued, ignoring Vicky's smirk.
"Sure," Myst replied with amusement, not seeing a problem with expanding her closet a couple of times if it meant he could 'officially' copy Vicky. "Tinker yes? Regeneration, augmented agility and an actual brute rating, right?"
"Cryokinesis, pyrokinesis, invulnerability and the ability to hand out invisibility, cryokinesis and augmented agility would be amazing," Vicky suggested, giving him a dazzling smile.
"Deal," Myst replied as he reached out, poked Vicky's arm with his left index finger and started giving her powers, wanting to get everything squared away before Vicky changed her mind.
Amy glanced between Alice and Cassie. "Do you have a power that boosts people's appearance? I don't remember Rune being this busty."
"Lies and slander," Cassie complained as she posed for Amy, unable to keep from laughing.
Myst glanced at Cassie, knowing that five minutes with Oliver's power had turned Rune into someone that could have passed for a model or movie star. "Technically."
"Technically?" Amy asked, not pulling her attention off Cassie.
"It doesn't come with any way to reverse the transformation and it changes your appearance based on your subconscious perception of beauty," Myst warned Amy as he finished giving Vicky the powers she wanted.
"Mom would freak," Vicky warned her.
"I'm aware," Amy admitted, fairly sure she'd end up looking a bit too much like Vicky if she used the power which would open a can of worms she didn't want to deal with.
"Speaking of things that will cause your mother to freak, you're good for powers, ready to have a twin?" Myst asked, giving her one last chance to back out of things.
"Go for it, I need someone to hit the mall with that actually likes shopping," Vicky told him, hoping she wasn't making a mistake but wanting the extra powers and someone to hang out with that shared her interests.
'Fun loving bisexual nudist with no issues having sex with Amy and a touch of exhibitionist tendencies,' Myst mused, trying to get a decent mental image of the personality he wanted her to have. He used his copy of Noelle's power, creating a naked duplicate of Vicky.
"You didn't mention she'd be naked," Vicky complained as she studied her clone. "Shopping spree?"
C. Vicky glanced down at her breasts. "No pockets, no wallet."
Myst used Anne's power to create a shadow robe and tossed it to Vicky's clone, trying to avoid Vicky flipping out. "Not my fault, I just copied Noelle's power."
"No worries," C. Vicky told Myst as she pulled the robe on, not in the least bit bothered about showing off. She smiled at Amy. "You're next, are you sure you don't want tinkering? It would give you something to do when you're not at the hospital."
"I can toss it if I don't like it, right?" Amy asked, wanting to make sure.
"Sure," Myst replied as he updated his Vicky shadow clone, so she'd have the extra powers and memories.
"Okay," Amy said as she reached out and touched Myst's hand, fairly sure Carol was going to blame her for everything, despite her recent bout of sanity.
Myst smiled as he gave Amy a copy of Leet's database along with Kid Win's specialty, figuring that would cover just about everything she'd need. 'Temperature normalization, pyrokinesis, invulnerability, the whole works,' he mused as he sorted through his list of powers.
"How do you feel?" Taylor asked Vicky's clone as she made a copy.
"Like I need to spend a couple of days getting used to my new powers," C. Vicky admitted, wishing she had some type of interface that let her keep track of everything.
Amy blinked as she thought about tinkering and realized she had thousands of schematics in her head or at least at her fingertips as she could mentally pull them up along with what she had to do to make them work. "I'm pretty sure Armsmaster would kill for this tinker power."
"Pretty sure he'd kill people for a Klondike bar," Myst muttered absently as he continued adding powers to the collection of powers he was giving Amy, wanting to make sure she had a decent collection.
"He's not that bad," Taylor argued.
"Too much paperwork for ice cream," Amy agreed, fairly sure he'd toss a truckload of villains or dead hookers in the bay for the schematics that Myst had just handed her and not lose any sleep over it. 'Power armor, healing devices? That would certainly cut down the amount of time I'd have to spend at the hospital.'
"When are we going after the gangs?" C. Vicky asked, looking forward to playing with her new powers.
"I've been working on setting up the marina and buying property for when I remove the cargo ship," Myst said as he finished giving Amy all of the powers he thought she could use.
"How are you planning on doing that?" C. Vicky asked, fairly sure it would fall apart at this point if someone tried raising it or pulling it.
"I'm planning on cutting it apart." Myst turned to look at Amy. "Ready to have a twin?"
"Go ahead," Amy told him.
'Less jaded, nudist, and not obsessed with Vicky.' Myst used his copy of Noelle's power and created a copy of Amy. "Hey."
Amelia glanced down at her breasts then looked at Amy. "Do you want me to fix your hair…" she trailed off as she realized she could sense everyone's biology and that she had a database of traits that she could modify that was quickly expanding as her power copied the 'data' from the people around her.
"Something wrong?" Amy asked as she stared at her clone, trying to ignore the fact that her clone was naked and Myst could see her.
"I can sense everyone's biology, including my own. I'm picking up bits and pieces, hair type, color, height, breasts, I could mix and match things and heal people but I don't think I have the same amount of control that I used to," Amy admitted.
"Your powers changed?" Vicky asked in surprise.
"All of the clones have slightly different powers. Let me check something," Myst said as he reached out, poked Amy's arm and copied her power, trying to figure out the specifics of her power before she turned everyone into giant slugs.
"Happy thoughts," Amelia muttered, focusing on not using her power.
"Huh," Myst muttered when the progress bar filled up and got the details on her power. "Your power has a bit of a learning curve, you're going to have to wander around if you want to fill up your database, watching Amy work will probably help."
"How far is my range?" Amelia asked.
"One hundred and three feet. You're not going to pick up bacteria or anything smaller than an insect," Myst explained.
"Can you get rid of my freckles?" Amy asked hopefully.
Amelia smiled as she cleared up Amy's freckles and skin, causing her face to get a lot paler. "Done, you had places where you don't have freckles and I have a lot of experience using your power so it was easy to cut and paste." She turned to look at Myst. "Can I get a magic copy of Amy's power?"
"Sure," Myst replied as he gave her a copy of Amy's power. "That should give you the best of both worlds."
Amy glanced between her clone and Myst. "Can I get a copy of her ability?"
"What do you think?" Myst asked Amelia.
"I’d appreciate it," Amelia said, wiggling her eyebrows.
“It works better if you flash your tits,” Cassie suggested.
“I’m naked,” Amelia pointed out dryly.
“Yeah, but flashing works better than simple nudity,” Cassie assured her.
"We need to hit the mall," Vicky said cheerfully, looking forward to filling several closets with all new clothes.
"Or I could just give you an ability to copy clothes," Myst suggested.
"We'd still have to hit the mall for patterns," Rose pointed out smuggly.
“Put your shirt back down!” Amy yelled at her sister.
“But I so want that power!” Vicky whined as Amy wrestled her arm back down as she tried to lift her shirt.
Vicky’s clone opened her robe and wiggled around to try and make her nipples go in circles. “You want to give us that power,” she said slowly, trying to make her voice calm and even.
“It’s not hypnosis,” Cassie said, between bursts of laughter.
“I don’t know, it seems to be working,” Alice argued as Myst’s eyes followed the movement of her chest.
Myst pulled his wallet out of his pocket, flipped it open and grabbed a stack of cash. He handed the cash to Rose, "You're in charge, I'm going to go punch some villains."
“I think a cold shower would work better,” Cassie argued.
“Power first!” Vicky exclaimed, grabbing his hand and placing it on her chest.
"Your wish is my command," Myst joked as he gave Vicky a copy of Anne's ability.
0o0o0
"Mirror, mirror, on the wall, show me William Manton," Myst ordered as he looked at his recently boosted magic mirror, hoping he wasn't making a mistake.
'What makes you different from the hundreds of capes they've ripped apart over the years?' S. Lisa asked, wanting to make sure he'd thought things through.
'Earplugs, immunity to fire, knowledge of how to kill the Siberian and the fact that I'm not a parahuman,' Myst replied as he studied the homeless man sprawled in the back of a van on an uncomfortable looking mattress. "One of the only people that has a legitimate chance to kill an Endbringer and you're running around killing people."
"Mirror, Mirror, on the wall, show me Bonesaw." He frowned when the mirror changed and showed a young blonde girl with her hair pulled back into a ponytail sitting on a swing in what looked like a state park. "Winter jacket, jeans and boots, yeah, I'd walk past her a thousand times and never notice."
He checked the GPS coordinates. "Within a mile or two of Manton, makes sense," he muttered as he adjusted the GPs coordinates in the remote so he'd appear further away. "Mirror, mirror, on the wall, show me Jack Slash." He frowned when he saw a clean shaven man sitting on a bench eating a hotdog. "Mirror, Mirror, on the wall, show me Hatchetface."
Myst wasn't surprised when the mirror barely shifted, putting the other person in focus. "Mirror, mirror, on the wall, show me Crawler." He glanced at the four legged monster and the mannequin-like figure that was sitting on a crate inside a moving van. He focused and zoomed the image out, giving him a decent look at the banged up U-haul. 'Okay, I'll just have to be fast.'
His common sense spoke up, 'You're fucking insane, you should make Cauldron clean up their mess. Fuck it, I'm not fighting a group that has Doormaker and speaking of Doormaker...'
Myst felt for his energy pool and was relieved to find he still had a noticeable amount available. It took only a moment to expand the remote's portals to include in universe ones, a much less energy intensive function, which thankfully reduced the amount of energy needed to add it as otherwise he would have to wait another twelve hours and his common sense may have awoken by then.
All it took was some easily entered GPS coordinates and the push of a button…
Myst turned himself invisible, quickly glanced around to make sure he hadn't opened the portal on top of them, then stepped through into the freezing wind of the Tahoe state park. 'This isn’t the smartest thing I’ve ever done.' He closed the portal, stuck the remote in his inventory and flew up the path, trying to avoid anything that would let someone notice him, glad it wasn’t currently snowing.
He was a touch surprised when he spotted Manton's van after a quarter of a mile, parked in a scenic rest area with a good view of the lake. 'Okay, just a little bit-' his thoughts crashing when he saw something black out of the corner of his eye causing him to blast the shit out of the van with Sundancer's miniature sun, demolishing the van. He dodged backwards and froze when he realized that a fucking bird and his nerves had cost him a chance to pick up Manton's power. 'Fuck everyone in a mile probably heard that!'
Myst took a deep breath then let it out slowly as he stared at the burned out wreckage, trying to get his heart rate and nerves under control. It took a couple of seconds of staring at the wreckage before he'd calmed down enough to get everything under control. "Screw it, I'm alive and he's not," he muttered as he used his pyrokinesis to extinguish the flames that were consuming the wreckage of the van.
'Okay, I'm invisible and I have portals, just open a portal in front of the U-haul and send it through,' Myst mused as he flew through the air towards the nearly empty snow covered parking lot he could see in the distance. 'After that, take out Shatterbird, the rest should be easy.'
He paused over the lot as he glanced over the few people present, most looking around and wondering what the loud noise had been, using his glasses to double double check that the only parahumans present were the members of the nine he knew about. 'Okay, I don't see a bunch of bodies, so they must be lying low, not surprising considering Crawler and Mannequin are hiding in the back of a U-Haul.'
Taking the remote out he opened a portal to a world without any intelligent life and set the portal to swallow the U-Haul, figuring they were the most dangerous. He waited until the portal had swept over them then flew down and threw a rock with enough strength to go through the side of the truck. Crawler ripped his way out the U-haul, giving him a decent look at the pair to make copies as he cheerfully waved at them, forgetting he was invisible, before closing the portal.
A few tourists cautiously approached where the truck had been and waved their hands through the air, wondering where it had gone and what had just happened.
Avoiding the overly curious people he took to the air once more, scanning for where Jack and Hatchetface could be, before following the most commonly used trail and finding the pair by a duck pond, empty of ducks, tossing peanuts to the squirrels who were cautiously being fed by the few tourists who were present.
He slowly turned around, spotting the stand selling nuts to tourists, but didn’t see Shatterbird, Burnscar or Bonesaw. It looked like Jack and Hatchetface were on their own. A quick tap on the remote shut down their powers, making the two straighten up and glance at each other in confusion, feeling the change but not knowing what it was.
Myst blurred forward and grabbed Jack by his jacket and shoved him into his inventory. He did the same for Hatchetface, enjoying the look of disbelief on his face. He would have laughed, but he still didn’t know where Shatterbird was and she was still a threat to the general public if not him in particular.
“Jack?” a scarred woman asked, as she and her friend came out of the public restrooms, looking around for their friend and wondering if he’d changed his mind and decided to have some fun, despite the fact that they were supposed to be laying low to prevent people from tracking them when they turned east.
Recognizing her, Myst dashed after Burnscar and tossed her into his inventory then did the same to Shatterbird when she tried to sing… or at least took a deep breath, he wasn’t sure what the mechanics were of her using her power.
He checked to make sure his invisibility was still active, ignoring the panicking tourists who were clutching each other and yelling about Strangers, before searching for the playground where he’d seen Bonesaw earlier.
"I should have grabbed my mirror," he muttered as he gained some altitude to get a better look at the area, completely missing the park map that would have told him where the children’s play area was.
0o0o0
Comments
Mist of Shadows
Yeah, he's rather walk out of there than not...
Bable Zmith
And adrenaline makes fools of us all, when the time dilation kicks in...
