"Every group wants to be legitimate. The merchants are just out to have a good time. Those Asians on the east side are looking after its own. The Protectorate is a bastion of law and order. You, too. Gets old."

"Does it? What do you think about all of these groups?"

The Protectorate is sending someone. Hopefully. Stall.

"The Merchants are lying, selfish, filthy bastards. The smaller gangs are all racketeering thugs. The Empire I don't know as much about but I'm sure there's something besides casual racism. The Protectorate is a lot less effective than it needs to be."

She sits on the ground, glancing mournfully at the hole in her gear, and reaches for it.

"Ah ah ah, no tricks, we're having a polite conversation," he says—

—and then immediately looks up at someone who's just arrived behind Hopper. "Kaiser," Armsmaster says.

She turns around to look - she can grab a few particular wires out of Kaiser's view - 

And Hookwolf is on Armsmaster—no, he's swatted aside, that pole is really effective, but Kaiser casually starts making several more blades sprout from the large crowbar—Armsmaster breaks it—

She yells out in fear - rolls aside, reaches down, crosses wires and yanks something important-looking out - 

She could use a big distraction. Slip away and call to apologize later.

She connects a wire from the left leg to the right, opens them both to release her as they fold into unnatural spiky lumps that don't look like legs - kicks them towards the center of the fight and starts sprinting away as an electric whine builds - 

"What—" There is a loud electrical noise.

Followed by a BOOM.

Oh shit I did not expect it to be that powerful - it started fires...

Is Armsmaster okay - she glances backward - Hookwolf's still here. No gear. Nothing but my mask.

...She hesitates, then stands back up and keeps running away.

Armsmaster, Kaiser, and Hookwolf are both stirring clumps on the ground. Hookwolf reforms first and is on top of the hero.

Also cars nearby seem to have had their ignitions set on fire and fuse boxes seem to have been blown. So that's nice.

There's very little she can do about that at the moment!

Indeed! She can hear the fight resuming just before she's too far to actually discern anything through the regular background noise.

All the way back to her little 'base', which takes like twenty goddamn minutes, and she gears up and pulls out the other burner phone.

...Does she call them?

Yeah. She has to apologize to Armsmaster.

"East-North-East Protectorate Office, how can I help you?"

"Uh... I'm a tinker. Er, the tinker who was just involved with a thing with the Empire and Armsmaster and I need to say sorry."

"Hold for a moment, please."

She's wandering around the general area. If they're going to track her - tinker intuition says they can't, not easily - no sense giving them a postcard.

She holds, feeling terrible.

"When are you free?" the person on the other side asks, cautiously.

"...Now. A couple hours from now. Saturday. I mean, I want to say this before anything else even if you don't know the situation, I had no idea it would be that powerful. I was just hoping for a distraction."

"...a couple of hours from now is tentatively good. Where is best for you?"

"By phone is best for me. Kaiser found me last time I tried to go talk to you guys... Sorry."

"I don't think by phone is possible at all."

"I'm- I can't. I was on my way when that whole thing happened and now... Ugh."

"We could meet you somewhere."

"...I guess you'll want to come in force so I don't ambush you or something. Or maybe I'm being paranoid all of a sudden. Can I name an intersection and you pick an address nearby, for a couple hours from now?"