[David Lucas]

Lights flared, the bright blue of the welding torch, the orange of the cutting torch, the soft red of metal as it cooled. The sounds of the ocean were interspersed with the sounds of metal on metal, of flame, of plasma. And beneath it all was a steady and unwavering beat, like a heart beat. The source, however, was absolutely artificial. Hidden from the street, except when the flames and flare of the torches cast his shadow to the windows above, David worked with inhuman efficiency. Metal was heated, cut, molded, and fused with a precision that some machines couldn't match. The device he was working on was slowly taking shape. At the moment it was a gutted mess of disjointed parts, the warehouse was filled with the things he had stripped to gather his materials. A rusted car sat in one corner, chunks of metal missing from it's frame and body. A small pile of appliances surrounded the area he was working in, the needed components torn out and the remnants mindlessly discarded.

Unaware of how many hours had passed, David muttered to himself. "36 teeth spinning clockwise... 29 pounds of pressure feeding into... with blades here and here..." his hands moved unerringly to where he needed them, adjusting various components so that they fit together just so. His body was beginning to lag. He hadn't eaten since... was it yesterday? When had he slept last? He briefly considered going home to recover before finishing this contraption, but the thought was barely half formed before a more pressing concern forced itself into his mind. "Where is my socket wrench?" he asked no one in particular. Half of his body hanging from the forming machine, he twisted himself around to search for the missing tool.

[Brian Harris]

Disability was great, but it wasn’t perfect. Make no mistake, it was much better than living on the streets. He actually had a roof over his head, and for once it wasn’t the roof of a psych ward. And while it did provide him with more than nothing, it didn’t provide him with much. Brian had money for a sparse amount of food and the shittiest apartment in all of San Francisco. It had enough room for a bathroom, a kitchen, a bed, and Lily’s miscellaneous toys, bowls, and a tattered mattress she’d adopted as a dog bed.

Needless to say, Brian was feeling cooped up.

”Like a chicken.” Dennis teased.

”Bawk!” Clara added oh so helpfully.

His therapist and psychiatrist both agreed it would be good if he took a couple more months before he went job hunting, just to make sure he was stable. With nothing to do, Brian had been carefully testing his medications, seeing how much he could take before it got too much, as well as trying that exposure therapy that’d been touted to him all his life. So far, the most he’d managed was a Starbucks when they started selling pumpkin spice lattes for the season. He didn’t buy one, of course, he didn’t have the money. Lily, despite the looks she got, was the greatest help he’d ever received. He doubted he’d be able to leave the apartment without her.

At that moment, he was feeling restless, antsy, but he didn’t want to challenge himself. No exposure therapy today. No, he just wanted to go for a walk. Somewhere there wouldn’t be any people. Somewhere he wouldn’t feel anxious or paranoid. Somewhere nice and quiet and empty.

”Where will you possibly find somewhere like that in San Francisco?” Sasha questioned.

”I have an idea…” Brian muttered as he picked up Lily’s giant, red vest with the words ‘EMOTIONAL SUPPORT’ displayed in large, white letters. Lily perked up from her spot on the mattress, leaving a pool of drool where her head was laying. ”Come here, girl.” He called. She got up and pranced over to him, standing obediently and he put on the vest, her stubby little tail wagging as best it could. He smiled, giving her a pat on the head as he attached the leash. The leash was unnecessary; she would stay by his side no matter what, but it was illegal in some places to have a dog without a leash, so he put one on just in case.

”You are going outside.” Tect commented as Brian left the apartment, giant, drooly dog at his side.

”So exciting!”

”Your aura was getting stuffy anyway.”

Brian scratched Lily on the head; she was perhaps the only dog he could reach without having to bend over. She tilted her head up a bit to lick his hand with her large, flat tongue and it made him smile. They walked past the shitty apartments, down an alley, through a street, down another alley, and on and on. As he walked, the buildings became more empty, derelict. He got to the part of town that had been abandoned years ago, the part no one dared venture.

”Disgusting.”

It seemed Sasha hadn’t entirely lost her snobbery, despite the therapy and medications. That was fine though. He could deal with a bit of negativity from his voices. With Lily at his side, he could deal with anything. The aforementioned therapy and medications didn’t hurt either. He looked down at her again, and she looked up at him, big eyes, a large puppy dog smile on her face, her tongue hanging out of her mouth, drool dripping from her jowls. He smiled back at her, feeling a sense of peace and happiness that had eluded him for so much of his life.

Then he heard a noise.

”What’s that?” Clara quivered.

Brian froze. People weren’t supposed to be here. All the buildings here were abandoned. The only people that were here were homeless or junkies or both.

”People like you.”

People that needed help. He’d put aside his side hobby of...well...one could very generously call it vigilantism. Ever since his release from the hospital, he’d been focusing on bettering himself. ”What do you think? Should I go check it out?” He asked Lily. She licked his hand and grinned back up at him. Brian took a deep breath. ”Alright then.” He started walking toward the noise.

He wasn’t entirely sure what he was hearing at first. The closer he got, the more distinct it became. He could hear metal clashing on metal. As he neared a warehouse, he saw lights flashing in the windows.

”What in god’s name is going on in there?”

”Let’s find out.” He said, trying to hide the fear in his voice. Lily pressed closer to him; her warmth comforted him as he walked into the warehouse. ”Um, hello?” He called out. He followed the noise to a man working on what looked like extremely intricate machinery. ”Huh.” He said. He wasn’t quite sure what to make of this. It was far from what he what expected.

”Oh it’s um… He walked delicately towards the man’s workstation, an uncanny confidence spurred on partially by Lily, partially by the oddness of the scene. ”It’s right here.” He picked up what he hoped to god was a socket wrench and handed it to the man with a tight smile on his face, trying to hide the anxiety that was slowly bubbling up inside of him.

David Lucas
Jack Fontaine

[Jack Fontaine]

Nobody Don't you know who I think I am? + David Lucas + Brian Harris

Jack made a habit of keeping an eye on metahumans. Of course that had been theoretically much easier before the Event, but they had been much more moderated in terms of what they had been permitted to carry out. Their father had always admired ambition and initiative, but not, it seemed, when it came to his youngest child. Now though, their resources were considerably less limited, the Fontaine family was extremely wealthy, but the patriarch kept a tight grip on the reins of that fortune. Now Jack's money was their own. Several patents under various pseudonyms and the simple game that was the stock market meant they were rarely wanting for anything. Although getting hold of strontium-90 had been a little less convenient. Now though, their routine checks and scanning's of San Francisco had turned up something interesting. David Lucas had already been on the radar, albeit at a low level. There had been several references to concerns about him in emails, private messages and the like that had perked Jack's interest, though not enough to maintain it when there were so many other things to follow. This was why they had created Erys, though that project had ultimately proved too much of a success to allow to continue. Erys would have been able to further investigate individuals like David once Jack lost interest. No, Jack's internet scrapers, simple dumb routines programmed to identify unusual traffic and activity had noticed a certain uptick in the young man's searches for scrap metal, ordering of appliances and the like. That and several large purchases on a credit card had perked the young meta's interest. After all, who needed three different microwaves, two clocks, an iron and a half-dozen blenders. Mr Lucas was building something. That made things much more interesting. Gadgets weren't particularly common metahumans, and they certainly hadn't been respected before the Event. To find another one was a rare pleasure, though usually that pleasure soured when Jack realised they were simply that, Gadgets. Jack's ability had developed so early that it had become inextricably a part of who they were, developed their intellect to a point that there were few individuals who could hold their attention for more than a few minutes at a time. It didn't stop them looking all the same. And so they found themselves outside the warehouse. It should have been empty, there was no one registered to the lease, and hadn't been for at least five years. That much was obvious, as even from outside one could tell the state of disrepair it had fallen into. Yet the lights were on, and a steady, two beat thump could be hear from somewhere deep inside. Pulling their bag around and extracting a small circular device with wires trailing from it, Jack stepped inside. They felt their heart quicken as they stepped inside. Though their was a large device in the centre, and two figures beside it, that was not where their gaze was first drawn. In the corner, connected to a generator was a small device of archaic and clearly metahuman origin. It was clockwork, whirring mass of metal, gears and springs. It was that device that was apparently the source of the heartbeat. Jack saw few things they couldn't understand instantly, but this was stretching even their mighty intellect. Eventually, and with some effort, they pried their eyes away from the machine, turning them back to the two individuals and the new machine taking shape. It seemed the larger man was clearly not the Gadget at work here, judging by the tool they had picked up instead of a socket wrench. Jack mentally ran through the metahumans in San Francisco, finally turning up a Brian Harris that seemed to match the description, though they weren't sure why they had a dog. Presumably a new development they hadn't bothered to avail themselves of when he had turned out to be uninteresting. "That's a block plane, he won't be tightening anything with that."

© seadra of gs

[David Lucas]

In the depths of his power driven fugue, David barely noticed the man that offered him the tool, instead he took it, examined it silently for a moment before saying, "No that's not it." in the same tone of voice one might use to say that it was a bit windy outside. Carefully he extricated himself from the forming device, setting the block plane down before digging around the nearest pile of scrap for the socket wrench. "Ah ha!" he exclaimed, finding it and a few other components he needed. The needed components were quickly extracted from the plastic which contained them, likely one of the many blenders he had already partially cannibalized.

Somewhere in his mind a voice was trying to get his attention. Something important he wasn't seeing. It could probably wait. "Now the.." he looked around, finding what he was looking for, and saw another person near it. Strange, he hadn't hired helpers. Had he? That voice in his mind grew more insistent but the first stage was so close to completion. The second person had said something. Was it to him? Didn't matter. So close. He produced a large spring, seemingly taken from a car's axle, though modified. Instead of merely one thick twist of metal, the "spring" was likewise a twist of metal. Much like a rope made from thinner threads, a spring made of thinner springs. He tossed the contraption to the second figure.

"Plug that into the engine until it's taut" he instructed, his expression growing manic as he felt his pulse quicken. Excitement? Must be. But what was this other thing he was feeling? Fear? Anxiety? Not useful. It could be ignored. He turned to the first person. Lacked technical knowledge. Why was there a dog here? Irrelevant. "You! Come!" He motioned the man to the machine. He pointed at what had once been the metal rim of a tire, with a handle welded on. "When I give the signal twist this counter clockwise."

If the first person had followed his instructions, which should be simple enough there was only slot appropriately sized for the spring on the engine, it should be halfway taut. The device would transfer its movement into pressure, pulling the spring's structure until the foot long "tube" shape had been condensed to just under two inches, with thousands of pounds of pressure stored in the complicated structure.

In a moment of clarity, David realized he was not alone. It wasn't that he hadn't been aware of it, but while there were components to build or pieces to tighten- he made a note he still needed to tighten that component now that he had the socket wrench in hand- his power had driven him to ignore that realization. His heart dropped as he forced his power away from his conscious thoughts. His manic smile shifted to a nervous grin as he turned to the man with the dog. He looked at him as though seeing him for the first time, despite having been working around him and essentially bossing him around. "Oh. Uh, sorry about that I got so distra-"

His face filled with fear. The engine. He had sent someone to it, hadn't he? His sentence interrupted he clambered over the piles of junk to put the other figure and the engine into view. He wasn't completely sure he could build another one of those if he lost it. He needed to make sure he kept it safe without letting on how valuable it was. He needed to take charge of the situation.

Damn shame all he could think to say was "Uhm... Hi..."

[Brian Harris]

Brian felt his face go red. ”Oh, sorry.” He didn’t know where he got the idea that he could possibly assist this man in his invention. He wanted to help, and so he tried his best, but, as always, his best wasn’t enough. Luckily, it seemed this man wasn’t bothered by this intervention. Quite the opposite. It seemed he was hardly cognizant of Brian’s presence. The more Brian thought about it, the more strange it seemed. This was not a safe place. Any person would likely be a threat. But this man wasn’t scared of him. He appeared to be hardly aware of his surroundings. Brian felt a growing sense of concern for this strange man. Was he okay?

”He’s crazy”

He hoped so. Crazy, he was familiar with. Crazy, he could help with. The man could just be especially eccentric. Or perhaps he just had poor judgement and/or a significant lack of self-preservation. Not all strangeness was the fault of imbalanced chemicals. But he knew how to handle imbalanced chemicals. He didn’t know how to handle a person. It was something, however, that he was aiming to improve. So, with that goal in mind, he opened his mouth to speak when he suddenly heard a voice behind him.

”Ah!” Brian squealed as he jumped, the muscles in his arms increased inhumanly in size. Who was this person? How did they know where he was? What was that device for? What were they planning to do to him?

”They’re following you.”

”No.” He muttered. ”No, no, no, no, no.” His arms shrank as he reached down to give Lily a pet. She was perfectly calm, as usual. If Lily was calm, he reasoned, there was nothing to worry about. His racing, paranoid thoughts slowed, replaced with something more rational. Not everything was about him. In all likelihood, this person was there for the man working on the machine. He seemed much more important. Brian was likely just caught in the middle. ”Thanks for the reality check, girl.” He said quietly, giving her ears a scratch. She tilted her head into his hand.

His head snapped back up as the man commanded him to come over. He obediently followed his instructions. ”Um, okay.” He said nervously, voice shaking, putting his hand on the handle, glancing between the man, the machine, and the person that had definitely not been following him. Which way was counterclockwise? He desperately wanted to help this man with the machine. He wanted to do what he was told and do it right, but he really, really, really didn’t want to do it wrong.

As he waited for the signal and tried to work out which way a clock turned, he noticed something change in the man’s features. There was a clarity in his eyes. A recognition of reality in his features that Brian was all too familiar with. Brian gave him a tight, knowing smile.

”Snap back to reality, oh there goes gravity-”

”Don’t you dare.”

”...Mom’s spaghetti.”

Sasha let out a long, exasperated sigh. Brian ignored the chitchat of his hallucinations. He was more worried about the man, whose face had suddenly filled with fear. He was immediately worried that he had done something wrong. Though his fears were somewhat assuaged when the man moved over to the other individual. Lily took a seat by Brian, drool dripping onto the floor.

”What on earth is going on?”

Good question.

David Lucas
Jack Fontaine

[Jack Fontaine]

Nobody Don't you know who I think I am? + David Lucas + Brian Harris

The man was in a frantic state as he pulled himself out of the contraption he was building, setting the incorrect tool down as he did so, then moving over to one of the collections of junk that had clearly once been another set of household devices. Jack recognised the long handled shape of a socket wrench, then another few bits and pieces from the pile. With a strangely sudden movement they turned to Jack, taking a few steps and tossing a heavy spring to Jack. It was only surprise and luck that prevented Jack from dropping it instantly, even so, they dropped the device they had produced from their pocket, it clattered off their foot and they winced. Fortunately it didn't go off. That would have made whatever this was much worse, although it didn't seem particularly bad at this moment in time. The engine? Perhaps the device they had already observed? They certainly would not be complaining about a further opportunity to study it. Taking the heavy spring, they approached the strange ticking, whirring and beating machine that was powering the generator. It moved with absolute efficiency, no cog slipped, no gear missed its teeth. They tried to identify what was powering it, but there seemed to be no true power source beyond the clockwork itself, yet that showed no sign of slowing down. Almost as if the motion of the machine rewound its own spring. Could it be? If this Gadget had built a perpetual motion device then what other fascinating creations might they have tucked away? They resisted the temptation to prod at the machine, doubtless they would have lost a digit or two, and they doubted even their ability to reassemble it should they manage to pry apart its intricate gearing. Instead they found the point that seemed tailored to receive the strange spring they held in their hands, gently feeding in the end until it stuck, then suddenly began to be pulled from their long fingers. They started at the sudden response, stepping back from the beating device. Slowly the spring was being drawn into the machine, apparently disappearing though the device could not possibly hold enough space to store the foot-long object. Compression? There was no way the device also contained a pocket dimension in addition to its apparently inexhaustible energy. Before Jack could investigate further they were rudely interrupted by a voice, a slightly uncertain greeting. They turned their icy, shining eyes onto the other metahuman. "Hello David, forgive my intrusion, but when you stop paying your electricity bill and then buy a half dozen blenders on credit someone is bound to ask questions."

© seadra of gs