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Mutant Edie and Emily in Wormverse
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It's not every day that you find a warehouse full of a tinker's old projects just lying around for the taking.

...well, to be fair, that also didn't happen today. Lacie didn't find anything, she heard someone else had and came to explore. Only to find a full-on fight happening, more's the shame. However, she is not one to miss opportunities like that, and besides, not being aligned with any of the teams in play means she might be able to just sneak past them.

She presses a few buttons on her armband in an order no one else would be able to guess in advance, covers her head with a greenish-silver hood, and she's nearly invisible. Not completely invisible, she hasn't quite cracked that nut yet, and also not completely inaudible, but she has adaptive camouflage and sound muffling and really, when there are explosions and screams everywhere who's even gonna notice?

No one, the answer turns out to be. No one until, that is, she grabs the most portable-looking valuable object she can find and tries to pry it from its perch. It makes a keening noise which somehow disables her cloaking and flashes extremely bright—

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And a pair of alarmed teenage girls fall through a sudden, brief hole in reality.

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The girl in a greenish-silver costume with a mirrored mask in front of them is also alarmed, if you go by the way she dropped the heavy metal box she was carrying and shrieked when they arrived. Or that could be just the way a lot of people who look like they are in a fight have suddenly stopped said fight momentarily to stare at the three girls.

"Who the fuck are you?" asks a man in blue armor with a long halberd half a second before he has to use it to parry an attack by something that can best be described as a wolf made of sharp whirring metal bits. Taking that as their cue to resume the fight, the other participants take various actions too numerous for this margin to contain in their entirety. A few examples include, however, a large lizard-y man trying to set someone on fire, a person in a blank mask shooting at another man in armor, said man in armor making a metal cage appear around the three girls, and a girl sending a crate skidding against that cage not a second after it emerges from the ground.

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The metal cage liquefies and becomes a shield around the newcomers.

"I'm Emily and this is my sister, Edie. Where are we?"

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Spooked girl has decided to be spooked by whoever just managed to melt Kaiser's blades.

"Uh, um, Brockton Bay, Earth Bet? Uh, your Earth might not have a Brockton Bay if it's not Aleph, I don't know about other ones and what they have..." She glances at the box at her feet then back up. Not the time to worry about the incredibly valuable tech there.

(Also a buncha blades start sprouting from the ground just beyond the shield to separate the fight from the part where all the tech is.)

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Those blades are left alone.

"Earth Bet? Earth Aleph?"

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"Multiple Earths? ...I assume you're from an Earth, since, American English and all. This place, a tinker—uh, they might not have those names—someone with tech powers, his specialty was interdimensional stuff—uh..." She looks down at the box again.

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"Tech powers?"

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"Does your world not have those? I guess Bet has the most powers—they—us—we can build ridiculously advanced technology. Like my, uh..." She looks at her armbands, tries to touch its screen a few times, and frowns at it. "Well, it's on the fritz, great," she sighs.

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"--We have people with powers. Just not--tech powers? I mean, there's Beast, but he's just really smart, the inventing stuff isn't a specific power."

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"Yeah, no, here it's a specific power, people get specialties, mine's weird but today I got something akin to invisibility except this stupid box fucked with it—" She moves as if to kick it but then thinks better of it and decides to take a step back instead.

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"Huh. So what's with all of the, uh, violence?"

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"This particular tinker was arrested a while ago and no one knew about this warehouse and now people are fighting over his tech. Uh, there's at least two gangs plus the good guys."

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The other one purses her lips. "Which ones are the good guys?"

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"The one who swore at you is one of them, the lady with the weapon that's lots of weapons is another—there's a magnet guy, I don't know him, he must be new—uh, I didn't look at all of them, I was focusing on not being caught."

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Everyone except Helpful Explainer, swearing guy, weapon lady, and magnet dude suddenly falls unconscious.

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Helpful Explainer does not immediately notice this, but the others do.

"...what just happened?" asks weapon lady after a few seconds.

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Edie raises a hand. "Hi, we're incredibly lost."

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...the three remaining awake people walk up to them carefully. "Who are you?" asks weapons lady.

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"My name's Edie and this is my sister Emily."

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"—are those your actual names?" asks Magnet Guy who sounds like a teenager himself.

"How did you manage to be lost in the middle of a cape fight?" weapons lady asks, bemusedly. They still haven't introduced.

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She points at the machinery. "Something went off by mistake? Or something? Five minutes ago we were at home."

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"Yeah, they're our actual names, why wouldn't they be?"

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"It's not customary for people with powers on this Earth to use their real names. I go by Miss Militia, this is Armsmaster, and this is Magnet Master."

"I'm not very creative, okay? And I wasn't originally from Brockton Bay," the boy defends his name.

"Did you two do that?" the one called Armsmaster asks, gesturing at the passed-out people with his halberd.

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"That was me."

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"I mean, the grownups have codenames and stuff, but they're mostly for fun. Our dad's called 'Magneto,'" she offers to her presumed conpotent.

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"Aw mannnn Magneto would've been a much cooler name," he complains.

"That was very impressive," says the one called Miss Militia to Edie, trying to keep the conversation on track. "What are the side effects on your targets?"

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"--Uh, confusion? As to how they were suddenly knocked unconscious? I didn't contuse their brains or anything."

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Miss Militia's eyes are visible enough that they can see her frown. "And side effects on you?"

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"...Why would there be side effects on me?"

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    "Ah, most thinker powers have associated side effects on the thinker herself, but in your case I guess that's not necessarily what's happening," she explains. Then she looks at Helpful Explainer. "Did you come with them?"

    "I—ah—yes?" she tries.

"I saw her walk in through a side door," Armsmaster comments while walking between the unconscious bodies.

    "...then no?" she tries again.

    Miss Militia frowns. "Armsmaster, have you called the PRT?"

"Yes."

    "Will the three of you come with us to the PRT building?—ah, the PRT is the organization responsible for parahumans—people with powers—in this world," she explains to the extradimensional girls. "And Magnet Master, would you make sure all everyone else here is securely contained?"

    "Yes, ma'am," he says, and grabs a futuristic-looking device from his belt.

    "Wait, so did I get it right? Were the three of you the only heroes around?" Helpful Explainer asks.

"Yes, why?" wonders Armsmaster, pausing to look at her.

    "Oh, no reason."

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"...Alright. What do you mean by--organization responsible for parahumans?"

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"It's a bit complex, but the general idea is that the PRT and the Protectorate jointly represent the arm of the government that's in charge of dealing with all things parahuman-related, from making laws to dealing with parahuman-originated incidents like this one through providing parahumans with guidance and support when they need it," says Miss Militia, her eyes glinting with fierce pride. "It's responsible for parahumans in the United States and Canada—I'm sorry, I'm not sure whether our countries will be the same, are those familiar?"

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"Yeah, we're from New York. The state, not the city."

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"In that case, the PRT and the Protectorate act mainly in the US and Canada, although Canada has a mirror organization called The Guild to deal with the specificities of their government. There are other similar organizations all around the world, but we were the first and are the largest, both in terms of number of operatives—parahumans and non—and in terms of effective resources. We're a major force for peace in the world." Again with that fierce pride—and given how she has a US flag around her lower face and decorating her costume, maybe it stands to reason.

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"Huh. Well. Not going to make any long-term promises at this point, but we'll go with you for now."

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"It would certainly be premature of us to want to recruit you, no, we'd just—" There's a sound of vans outside and a few people in full-body kevlar armor walk in. "And here they are. Do you want a ride or do you have any other forms of transport?"

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The girls exchange glances.

"I can fly, but this seems less conspicuous."

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"Probably," she concedes.

The people in armor start spraying a liquid on the unconscious parahumans and said liquid quickly becomes a form of yellowish-white foam that encases them completely, head to toe.

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Huh.

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A different liquid is used to unglue them from the ground and then they are all carried to the vans.

Miss Militia gestures them to follow, and Helpful Explainer starts following. "I didn't catch your name," she adds.

"I, um. I don't have one yet."

Miss Militia eyes the armband. "Tinker, too?"

"Um."

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"We don't have Tinkers, where we're from."

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"Do you have lots of parahumans where you're from?" Magnet Master asks curiously. "'Cause Tinkers are sorta rare and if your world doesn't have many then maybe sheer chance..."

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"I don't know how many is lots, comparatively."

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"There are about one in eight thousand in urban areas, and about one in twenty-six thousand in rural areas," Magnet Master answers immediately.

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"--A little less common than that, but not by much."

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"Huh. Then it's weird you don't have tinkers."

Miss Militia finishes talking to the Helpful Explainer, who seems subdued and resigned, then turns to the newcomers. "So, are you all ready to go?"

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"Mhm."

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Into the vans! The twins are in the same van as Miss Militia, Magnet Master, and Helpful Explainer, while Armsmaster has a high-tech-looking motorcycle.

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"So what's your power like, exactly?" Emily asks Magnet Master. "I mean, the specifics, the generalities are obvious, but I've got a handful of differences from Dad, so..."

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"I'm actually a tinker, I don't have any magnet-related powers directly. I, uh, build stuff that's related to magnetism—it's a bit more specific and complex than that..."

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"Huh, okay. Specific and complex in an explainable way or a weird way?"

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"...bit o' both? If you guys don't have tinkers you won't get it, um, so the way we work is that we get into this—fugue state—during which we completely understand what we're doing and can build lots of things but then when we try to explain to other people it mostly doesn't make sense because sometimes we made a decision that we don't know why we made it it just felt right at the time and does seem to work and does seem to be important in an impossible-to-understand way to the fundamental functioning of it... But usually tinkers have, uh, more-or-less explainable specialties?"

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"Huh."

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"So my specialty is magnets and more specifically intermittent magnets that do things."

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"What kinds of things?"

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"Well for instance I have this rope thrower except it has magnets along its length that turn on and off in a specific pattern that makes them sort of trap someone much more completely than regular rope throwers I like it a lot I made it last week."

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"Neat."

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"Yeah! And this suit, it's all magnets, there's nothing that's, like, really attached, so I can rearrange it—"

It starts making a noise, but then Miss Militia interrupts him with a "Not in the van, please."

The noise stops. "Oops. Sorry," he says, sounding sheepish.

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Giggle. "That would be why I wear fabric, I can mess with whatever metal I want underneath without risking indecent exposure." She holds up an arm and a quicksilver tendril of steel snakes out of her sleeve, then thins and lengthens into a thick wire with a round part at the end of it, that blooms into a steel rose. She offers it to him.

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"Ooooh." He accepts it.

"It's not the indecent exposure, it's that his suit takes up some space while changing and space is currently at a premium," Miss Militia explains, gesturing around with a smiling crinkle in the corner of her eye.

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"Ah. I don't have that problem either."

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"I'll show you when we arrive," he promises.

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"Awesome."

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"How about you, what's your thing?" asks Magnet Master, his visor pointing in Edie's direction.

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"Telepath."

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"You're fucking joking," says Magnet Master. Miss Militia and Helpful Explainer Who Still Has Not Said Her Name look equally flabbergasted.

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"...Noooo...telepathy is actually relatively common as these things go..."

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Miss Militia frowns. "True telepathy is thought to be impossible."

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"Well. Empirical counterexample, hi."

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"When you say telepath," Helpful Explainer asks, a quaver in her voice, "you mean..."

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"--Uh, I can read minds and affect them in some ways? Like switching them from 'awake' to 'asleep' or talking in their heads or shielding them from other telepaths or helping sort out addictions and stuff."

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"What am I thinking?" says Magnet Master, sounding more curious than anything.

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"--Is that consent, I don't read minds without consent or a really good reason."

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"Yeah, that's consent," he says, bouncing a bit on his seat.

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"You're thinking about ponies."

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"—no fucking way," he says, sitting back down.

"Language!" Miss Militia admonishes him weakly, now that she's not too stunned.

"Do it again! You'll never guess now."

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She giggles. "The number 198,002,471."

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"Wow. Wow. She's the real deal. Can you say stuff in my head?"

"Please don't do it to me," says Helpful Explainer in a small voice.

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"Read your mind or say stuff in your head?"

Yeah, I can totally say stuff in your head, she says privately to Magnet Master. 

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"Both," she says.

"This is so cool—do you have any idea you just turned everything upside down—maybe the people saying the Simurgh—"

"Let's not try to get ahead of ourselves," Miss Militia interrupts him. "The Simurgh's never shown—anything to that level."

"But the song, maybe it's—"

"It's not useful to speculate," she interrupts him again.

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"I won't," she says to Helpful Explainer, and to the others: "Who or what is the Simurgh?"

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"Giant monster with sort-of psychic powers but no telepathy as far as anyone knows, especially 'cause everyone thought it was impossible," Magnet Master explains.

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"Huh. What kind of psychic powers, then?"

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"She emits a psychic song," Miss Militia starts explaining, "that's felt, not heard, and people exposed to it for too long become—ticking time-bombs, acting normal for days and then suddenly going to work and murdering everyone and returning home as if nothing was wrong." Helpful Explainer looks down at her feet and swallows. "She has fine and large-scale telekinesis and flight, and the most advanced forms of pre—and post-cognition recorded so far."

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"Uh. What."

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"She turns people into Rube Goldberg machines, basically," Magnet Master says. "—uh, do you have a Rube Goldberg where you're from—?"

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"Yeah, just--that sounds, uh. Really. Really. Bad."

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"Oh yeah she's absolutely terrifying I hope I never get anywhere near her," he agrees immediately.

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"She does rather sound like a problem in need of solving."

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They all nod.

"She has two siblings, too," Magnet Master adds. "Or, well, two other indestructible giant monsters that periodically attack places. But they're not psychic."

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"That sounds...better than them also being psychic..."

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"One of them is a speedster and has macrohydrokinesis, the other's a dynakinetic," he supplies helpfully.

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"Eugh."

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"Succinctly put."

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"Well. I guess we'll see if they're indestructible mentally as well as physically."

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"That's the spirit!"

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"Our parents fought a dynakinetic once, but he wasn't indestructible."

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"Your parents are parahumans, too?"

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"--It's genetic. Recessive, mind, there are lots of kids with powers who have baseline parents, but yeah."

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"Your kind...feels different."

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"'Feels'?" asks Miss Militia.

"Genetic?" asks Magnet Master. "I mean, we used to think so too but then there were those things with adopted kids..."

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"--So I don't read minds without permission but I can sort of feel the general outline all the time, I can't turn that part off, and our kind--it's definitely genetic, the gene responsible has been identified--we feel different from baseliners, and you do too but in a completely different way."

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"...telepaths, no tinkers, feel different, are you saying you're not actually parahumans?" asks Magnet Master. "And what do you mean by 'the gene,' there's no way a single gene does both telepathy and metalokinesis."

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"--There's a gene that makes you a mutant, what kind of mutation you have is based on a bunch of other genes."

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"Well, it's not any weirder than Suddenly Superpowers in the eighties," he shrugs.

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"In the...what year is it now?"

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"It's January 2004?"

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"For us it is--was--July 1981."

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"That's before Scion even showed up," mutters Miss Militia. "No one had powers yet, back then."

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"Mutations have been around for--hundreds of years, at least, it's just it's only now that people have the ability to organize in low-density groups over large distances. And we seem to be getting more common."

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"Your world might be farther from ours than I thought," she says.

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"It does kinda seem like it."

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The van slows down to a stop.

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"I assume this is where we've been going?"

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"It is," Miss Militia agrees, and someone opens the van doors for them. They're in a garage, the doors of which are guarded by people in suits similar to the ones worn by the officers who took the downed villains during the fight. The other vans are nowhere to be seen, but Armsmaster's bike is parked there, although the hero himself isn't. "The Director or the Deputy Director will probably be the ones to talk to you about what we'll do, they're the ones in charge of this branch of the PRT and therefore the Protectorate, but for the moment we can at least offer our hospitality."

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"Thanks--is it weird that part of me is going 'ooh, fancy future hospitality'?"

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Miss Militia's smile is visible moving her bandana and her eyes. "It sounds very reasonable."

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"I am excited about fancy future amenities!"

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She laughs and starts leading the way.

"If you don't have tinkers it must be even more of a shock," Magnet Master comments. "'Cause like, even consumer electronics got a boost from those so when your world gets to now it won't be as advanced, and this building has lots of tinker tech."

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"Neat."

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"It is!!" he agrees enthusiastically.

Here's a door that leads to a corridor that leads to a cylindrical elevator with smooth glass doors. The doors open as soon as they arrive.

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Both of the twins do a disproportionate amount of looking around, but with sufficiently neutral expressions that it doesn't cross over into Weird Gawking.

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Parahumans are maybe slightly proud of their future amenities. One parahuman, in particular, is concentrating most of this pride.

The elevator ride is probably the smoothest ride they've been in: noiseless, continuous, pretty much no feeling of acceleration, fast. Two levels above the garage it shows them a view of a two-story-tall reception room slash museum of sorts: there are various couches and sofas, two statues of heroes, various posters and images, flat-screened televisions showing news and parahuman documentaries and children's shows, various reception desks, a full quarter of the room is dedicated to a gift shop. There are children in a school group gawking at the hero paraphernalia (mini Armsmaster bike! Miss Militia and Chevalier action figures! themed children's costumes! a Dauntless action figure with separately-purchased weapons and equipment! Echo toy grapplers!), and more PRT officers hanging around near exits unobtrusively.

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"What's up with that?"

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"With what?" Magnet Master asks.

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"The, uh, toys and stuff."

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"What about them?"

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"...Why?"

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"There are lots of layers to the answer," Miss Militia says. "It helps fund some stuff in lieu of using government funding is the most direct one."

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"...Okay."

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"There's lots of people with powers, heroes and villains," Magnet Master adds. "If people just associate 'powers' with 'destruction' then that's no good, so it helps to have more positive associations."

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"Like toys. Okay, that makes sense."

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Elevator continues to go up and stops at the next floor, where the doors open to reveal a smaller reception room and a corridor, only different than something Edie and Emily would be used to in decoration and perhaps the computer the person at the desk has and the television hanging in a corner.

The receptionist looks up at them and says, "Oh, hello. Director Piggot will be with you in a moment."

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"What's that?" she asks Magnet Master quietly, nodding at the computer.

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"That's a computer. Personal one." His helmet does not reveal the grin he's sporting in anticipation of the cultural shock.

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"Oh. Neat. What can it do?"

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"Lots of things, I couldn't list them all—"

"Magnet Master, do you think you could keep them company while they wait for the Director?" Miss Militia interrupts. "I need to talk to our friend here," she continues, gesturing towards the other girl, who seems to be pretty miserable.

"Ten-four." Back to the twins. "So, there are video games, of course—did you already have the internet in the eighties?"

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"The what now?"

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"Oh man oh man oh man I'm gonna tell you about the internet it is so awesome—" (Miss Militia and Helpful Explainer return to elevator). "So the basic concept here is that there's this virtual network that connects all computers in the world. Why is that good, do you ask? What does it do? Well, computers can do lots of things, like storing huge amounts of text and images and video and sound and playing them back to you, and manipulating them and editing them and all that. So what happens when all computers are connected? All the publicly available knowledge in the world..." His suit makes a few noises and the area around his legs rearranges itself a bit while the glove on his right hand peels itself back. He grabs a mobile phone. "Accessible in my pocket, wherever I am.—also cat pictures."

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"...Ooh."

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"What's the ratio of text to not-text? I can't watch television, I'm wondering how much that's liable to be an issue."

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"Why can't you?"

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"I mean, it's not can't cant, but it's weird in a bad way. There aren't any minds, there, so the characters are...boring at best and disturbing at worst."

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"Oh. Well, we have a massive encyclopedia that has all the encyclopedias in it and summaries of every video?"

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"Gosh."

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"It's really cool, and you can talk to people across the globe from you, and every book is there—well, almost every book, lots of books—and it gets better and faster and cooler every year—"

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"Oooh."

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"Here, let me show you—"

"The Director will see you now," receptionist person says.

"—oh. Guess you should go do that."

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"You can show us after," she says as she gets up to go see the Director.

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Director Emily Piggot is a large, austere woman who looks very at ease in the suit she's wearing. She offers to shake their hands. "Hello, and welcome to Brockton Bay. Earth Bet, I suppose."

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"Ours doesn't have a name, sorry."

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"It's my understanding that most don't know there are other Earths. Did yours?"

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Headshake.

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She nods. "I'm afraid we don't have much of a direct solution to the problem, here; we've only found out about alternate Earths due to this one tinker's technology and he is now in jail, and it's unclear how much his access to Earth Aleph was intentional versus a malfunction of his usual less grand designs."

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"Mm."

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"I'm sorry. But in the meantime we'll try to offer you as much comfort as we can. Is there anything in particular you two want or need?"

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The two glance at each other. "Nothing...special, I don't think. Books. Food. Clothing."

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"Those can definitely be arranged. Would you prefer to room together or separately?"

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"Together."

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She types some things into her computer. "That'll be arranged. I'll have someone show you a room and then around the building and the city if you'd like. I'd also like you to consider joining the Protectorate, even if temporarily."

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"...We'd need a lot more information first."

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"Yes, of course, we'll provide you with all information you might want. I just wanted you to know that this was a relationship we'd be interested in pursuing."

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"Mhm."

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"Are there any direct questions you want to ask right now, or should I send you the informational pamphlet?"

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"The informational pamphlet would be good."

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"Very well. Is there anything else you'd like to discuss?"

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"Can you advise us on what would be a good way to look into the progress of miscellaneous civil rights movements since nineteen-eighty?"

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"You should find information on that on the internet. Your room will have a computer, Magnet Master can tell you where to find that."

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"Okay. Thank you."

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Magnet Master is waiting for them outside.

"So, guess who got assigned tour guide?"

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Deadpan: "Armsmaster."

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"You would be begging for the sweet release of death before the day was out." Pause. "Twenty bucks says I never said that."

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"Aww, you don't need to bribe us."

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Chuckle. "Okay, so first thing I should take you to your rooms so you know where to crash." Elevatorwards. "Also Piggot said something about the internet?"

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"We want to know how far Civil Rights have progressed since nineteen eighty."

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"Oh! Bunches, yeah, you can find about all of that and the history and stuff on the Wikipedia." The elevator stops. "Rooms are here, lemme show you yours and then how to use a computer."

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"Awesome."

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Their room is number 121. It has two beds and a large desk and two computers and an ensuite bathroom. Magnet Master whistles when he walks in. "My room doesn't have a bathroom," he says, a tad enviously.

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"Well, are you sharing?"

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"Room, no; bathroom, yes, with everyone else."

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"I did mean room."

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"To be fair I don't live here, my room is only to crash after a mission or whatever, so I guess it makes sense that you'd have something nicer." He shrugs. "Okay, computers one-oh-one." He walks up to one of the computers and presses the button to boot it up. It takes ten seconds.

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"Man, computers change so much."

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"Right? Okay so you use the mouse—this bit here—to control this cursor, and the keyboard to type, this is the internet icon—there's the Wikipedia, it's that huge encyclopedia I talked about—you can look for things here, like," and he types 'women's rights' and opens the appropriate page. "There's also Google which is a pretty general-purpose search tool that, uh, looks for things on the internet." Google!

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Ooh, Google. 

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"It's pretty fantastic, isn't it?"

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"Yes. Yes it is."

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"So, d'you wanna be shown around or use the wonderful internet?"

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"Mm...internet can wait."

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"Okay! ...do you wanna have, like, secret identities?"

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"Is there much point, with our family in another universe and perfectly capable of taking care of themselves besides?"

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"Well, if you ever hang out with one of us when out of costume people might put two and two together," he suggests.

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"I guess." Sigh. "This isn't a problem we had back home."

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"No secret identities there?"

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"Not really. Codenames, sometimes, but--those weren't really secret."

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Nod. "I guess I could just go out without my costume," he says dubiously. "It's not like I'm too attached to my identity staying secret from you two anyway."

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"--Oh, people keep that secret even from other heroes here?"

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"No—I mean, some, Wards don't know the identities of the adult heroes, and sometimes some people prefer to keep it a secret even here, but—you two are not in the team. Yet, anyway." Shrug. "But that's why I'm not too attached."

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"Oh, I see. Sorry."

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"Whatever." His suit starts making noises and moving and slowly opening up to reveal a fifteen-year-old boy with violently orange hair and freckles. The suit collects itself into a metal suitcase. "I'm Jake. Nice to meet you."

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"Nice to meet you."

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"Nice to meet you--a thought occurs to me but it seems like it could be reasonably interpreted as threatening."

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"Well it's disclaimed now," he says, grinning.

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"To Edie, everyone has a unique mental signature. If she meets the same person in and out of costume, she'll recognize them if she noticed them particularly before."

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"Oh. That's actually reassuring, I'm way more comfortable with my decision now. Let's go?"

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"Okay!"

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"So, building tour first or city tour first?" he asks, leading the way out.

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"Let's go with building."

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"Okay!" Outside. "So this corridor has the rooms, most of us don't actually live here but our patrol times are often all over the place so it's good to have a place to crash. And we sometimes need to keep stuff here that we can't keep at home if like a friend visits or something."

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"That makes sense."

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"Upstairs there's some labs—I dunno if I can take you to them, probably not all of them—and the gym, there I can probably take you." To the elevator!

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"Ooh, I wonder how your gym will differ from ours. Gyms designed to deal with people with enhanced physical abilities are interesting."

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"It's mostly just really big and has lots of stuff? Stuff gets added when new people join the team if they need anything special. There's—well I'll show you. What are yours like?"

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"Wind tunnel, reinforced targets--like really reinforced--a treadmill that breaks the sound barrier--some stuff with flying targets..."

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"Treadmill that breaks the sound barrier, that sounds cool, we have a speedster but he works by going all super fast so the world looks slow and also he gets super light, he can just run around normally."

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"...Huh. That seems like an odd way for a speedster to work."

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"We don't really have power duplicates," he says, and now they're in the elevator. "So speedsters all work in different ways."

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"--What, none at all?"

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"Not, like, the whole package. Lots of people have, like, flight, but Legend's the only one who can fly and become light and shoot all those lasers."

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"So flight is usually an and but speed tends to come on its own?"

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"More or less. Speed is an and when it's straightforward, just being faster, but some people have speed as part of superstrength, and some people are like Velocity who only goes fast by interacting less with the world and that has some neat things to it."

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"Huh. That's interesting."

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"Yeah." Elevator arrives. "Come on, lemme show you the gym."

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"Sure."

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Gym! It is overall not as technologically fancy as Edie and Emily might be used to—it's got a fairly open area for sparring, several twenty-first century weight lifting machines (except these go to rather extreme values), and he can show them some of the fancier stuff like holograms or hidden dummies or traps.

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Holograms?

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Holograms! Absolutely no minds there, but otherwise they do look pretty lifelike. Maybe a bit desaturated.

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Well, that'll be useful for Emily, anyway. 

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Back to the elevator! "I'm gonna see if I can show you the labs. At least some of them."

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"Oooooh?"

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"It's mostly a bunch of rooms where people have stuff to test their powers with, and tinker stuff... Might not be able to show you that one, property rights..."

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"Does it change anything if my magnetoperception could pick up most of it anyway?"

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"...maybe, actually. Hmm. I should ask."

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"Of course I have no idea how much of this stuff is magnetically responsive."

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"All of my stuff is," he says wryly. "I think Armsmaster's is, too." Ding, elevator, and now a loooong corridor with lots of doors. "I'll see if Doctor Ferraz is here, she'll know it."

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"Okay!"

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He goes to the second door on the left and knocks thrice. "Doctor Ferraz?"

"Come in!" says a voice, and he opens the door and walks in. It's an office mostly reminiscent of a chemistry college professor's, with bookshelves and formulae written on the whiteboard. Doctor Ferraz is an elderly lady with greying blond hair and glasses that make her eyes look huge. She looks up at them and beams. "Hello! How can I help? I haven't met you, have I?"

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"I assume not, since we haven't met you."

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"Well, I'm Doctor Ferraz. How can I help you?"

"I'm showing them around, they're from another universe and might join up, we wanted to see some labs," Jake explains in one breath.

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"I do magnetism, and that includes magnetoperception."

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"Hmm. I suppose the labs with metal are a given, then. Don't show them the other ones, though." Pause. "You can show them the power testing labs."

"Yes, ma'am!"

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"Those sound fun."

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"Try not to break anything," Ferraz says, rolling her eyes fondly.

"Yes, ma'am! I mean no ma'am! I mean I won't break anything ma'am!"

"Go," she says, making a shooing motion.

Out goes Jake. "Okay, so I guess I'll show you my lab first, it has the most magnet stuff."

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"Eeeeeeeee!"

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She should be able to detect it from a distance—fourth door on the left from the office—and once they get there it's a veritable mess: pieces of machines with unclear purposes scattered over the floor; various desks with guns and tools and machines at various states of assembly and disrepair; three cupboards filled with different tools each; two metal suits hanging from the wall; the works.

"...you know, in retrospect maybe it wasn't such a good idea to bring you guys here," he says, slightly bashfully.

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"Aside from the weaponry ratios it's not that different from Hank's lab back home."

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He furrows his eyebrows. "Is his weapons ratio higher or lower than mine?"

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"Much lower."

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"Oh. I probably wouldn't do so many weapons if I weren't here, but the Protectorate kinda often needs them."

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"I guess that makes sense...if you specialize like that you probably can't come up with as much cool stuff tailored to your teammates' powers as Hank does..."

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"Oh I have some discretionary budget and time. But, uh, making cool stuff for other people is limited anyway, tinker inventions eventually break."

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"...Most things do, eventually...can't you just fix them?"

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"No I mean it breaks faster than most things, and in a way only I can fix, it's basically impossible to explain the stuff I make to other people and when tinkers try to teach other people to fix broken tinker tech it just doesn't work."

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"--Huh."

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"No offense, but it kinda sounds like Hank's more useful."

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"Well... that's fair. What's his specialty?"

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"...Useful...things? Uh, I don't know enough engineering to know if he has a specialty the way engineers measure things. He's made, uh, a telepathic amplifier, and a suit that focuses plasma blasts, and a pair of goggles that prevent incontinent eye beams, and a suit that lets someone fly with his voice, and a room that does holograms, and..."

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"...yeah that sounds like he doesn't have any. Maybe your powers just work completely different, you said there were repeats?"

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"Each of us has one of our parents' powers pretty much exactly."

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"'Pretty much'?"

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"I do magnetism slightly differently from Dad and it's hard to tell if it's a difference in powers or if it's more like a mannerism."

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"Oh that's cool! Different how?"

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"I melt stuff a lot more than he does, mostly."

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"More? Like, faster?"

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"No, like more often. If he wants something to be in a different shape, he defaults to bending it, but I default to melting it."

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"Isn't that, like, just a personal choice?" he asks, scratching his chin.

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"To some extent, but--I was melting stuff in the womb, I wasn't choosing things then. Dad manifested when he was fourteen, and he bent a wire fence, he didn't melt it."

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"Huh. That's cool. I don't think that's how it works for us at all."

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"Oh?"

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"Well no one's born with powers, for one, but I mentioned before we have no exact duplicates too, so."

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"Mm. Prenatal manifestation is relatively common in cases where both mother and child are mutants."

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"We need a trigger event, like something real bad and traumatic, except kids of capes have an easier time of it."

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"--Oh. Wow. That sounds like it would have unfortunate knock-on effects."

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"Like what?"

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"I mean...if everyone with powers is traumatized? That seems like it would get you a whole lot more supervillains than if they were distributed in some safe way."

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"Oh. Yeah, probably, we're barely keeping up with them."

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"They're barely a thing where we're from."

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"Huh. That's... something to imagine."

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"Not every mutant actually gets something useful, and even the ones that do mostly just...go on with their lives. Especially if they look baseline."

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"Don't people wanna make a profit off their powers?"

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"I mean, sure, some people do, but most manifestations happen around puberty, most people aren't gonna start a business at puberty."

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"And anti-mutant prejudice is an issue."

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"Oh right without the Protectorate I bet there would be lots of that."

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"Iiiit's better than it could be, strictly speaking, we've put a lot of work into that, but yes. What does the Protectorate do, exactly, that solves this problem?"

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"We might be able to import it if it's not too dependent on local conditions."

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"Well we talked about the little memorabilia store downstairs, right, and I bet there's a lot of shady manipulation of media to make sure heroes are shown in the best light, they never allow official footage of the Endbringers to exist—uh, Endbringers are the giant monsters we talked about, don't remember if I said the name—but also some more benign stuff like pushing for legislation about power usage and giving young parahumans access to a good school and resources and there's the Branding department that makes sure we have cool costumes and names that work with the public... uh, what else... we sometimes visit schools?"

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"Pushing for legislation about power usage?"

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"Like, how to ensure parahumans can use their powers safely in regular jobs if they don't wanna be heroes or anything like that, or anti-discrimination laws."

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"Oh. We've more had to worry about pushing against de facto discriminatory legislation."

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"Yeah there's a bunch of groups that are worried about parahumans outcompeting regular humans at high paying jobs but I don't really keep track of that, dunno what the current, uh, political landscape looks like."

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"If more mutants than parahumans look unusual that might be a factor."

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"Yeah maybe. Many of those?"

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"Loads, yeah."

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"Yeah I think Case 53s are rare. ...uh, anyway, let me show you to places that are not my lab."

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"Your lab is awesome, but sure."

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Out they go! ...and he pauses. "Okay, maybe not Armsmaster's lab, he might skin me alive if he finds out I showed you his stuff, even with your magnetic thingy. Bet you can guess which one it is though."

Three doors down is the best guess for it, being the second most magnetically filled room, with more armed suits and halberds, as well as a truly staggering number of things fit into extremely small spaces.

...actually, more of those than should be strictly physically possible. It's kinda disorienting to pay attention to.

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"Yeah, and it's trippy. There are things in ways that are incorrect."

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"Huh?"

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"I mean, it's...there are things in more places than there are places?"

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"—oh! That's his specialty, it's fitting stuff into other stuff."

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"And it feels really weird."

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"Yeah, guess it would." Shrug. "Anyway, wanna go see a power testing lab?"

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"Definitely!"

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He leads them to a door—then pauses. "Hmm, okay, so, you got all sorts of magnetism things, right?" he asks Emily. "And you have mind stuff?" he turns to Edie to ask. "Do you have telekinesis or anything like that?"

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"...No? I don't have any kind of teekay, I'm just a telepath. Why?"

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"Oh mind powers just are kinda memetically associated with teekay here. And also it's what we can test in the labs, no telepathy testing labs. I don't know how that would even work."

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"I have a friend who can do both but, like, our parents know someone who's a telepath and a shapeshifter, it's pretty much a coincidence."

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"Yeah okay then I guess it's only Emily's powers."

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"What about just my powers?"

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"That we can actually test in the labs. Without, like, scheduling with people and stuff."

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"Oh, okay, sure."