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th3w00ds · 8 months

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Let’s Fix That with a Controlled Shock

@red-balloon12 @nwtbobsessedemo @colourfulmes

Fandom: Youtuber Egos

Trigger Warnings (if any): Character goes through a lot of pain, electrocution, betrayal, angst

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Natemare sighed as he approached the run down building that two of his… “friends” had told him to go to for some meeting. Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza. He looked up at the decaying walls, the plant life growing on them making it clear that the pizzeria hadn’t been open for quite some time. He walked closer, opening the doors and stepping inside. The inside of the place looked even worse than the outside of it did, tables knocked over, the floors littered with garbage. Why the hell would they invite him here, to this shitty place?

Natemare continued his walk inside the pizzeria, inspecting what he could see. No sign of either of the two. Were they even going to show up? He wouldn’t blame them if they didn’t.

Suddenly, the lights on the main stage flickered on. Natemare snapped his head towards it, and he looked for any sign of a person. Both the ones who invited him had electricity powers, so it could be either.

“Hey! Anyone there?” He called out loudly. A chuckle rang throughout the room, and bolts of purple and blue electricity arced onto the center of the main stage, forming a person amid the broken animatronics. The form was center stage, standing in front of the withered Freddy animatronic. The one stepped closer as he formed, and Natemare recognized him.

“Natemare! It’s been far too long, my friend!” Dawktrap exclaimed, hopping down from the stage in front of Natemare. The Brit wiped at his purple vest after, making sure he was immaculate as always. His glowing blue and purple eyes slowly dimmed back to normal as his powers weren’t being used.

“It’s good to see you too, Dawktrap! Where’s Anti? Have you seen him?” Natemare asked, looking around the room once again.

“The bastard will be here soon. He’s always late to these,” Dawktrap answered, also looking around for any clues to Anti’s appearance.

A couple of seconds after that, a flash of green electricity happened. Natemare had to blink rapidly for a moment to get his vision back to normal due to how bright the flash was. When he opened his eyes, he saw Antisepticeye in front of him and Dawktrap.

“You two seriously expected me to be here at the same time you were?! I was running late, Seán’s other egos were being assholes and tried to fuckin’ stop me from leaving! Can you believe that?!” Anti said, his voice glitching sporadically. Anti growled, and began to fiddle with his knife. “Who do they think they are?!”

Anti was one for tantrums when things didn’t go his way, he always was. Dawktrap giggled, and Natemare smiled. The three of them hadn’t had a reunion like this in quite some time. It was nice, but out of the blue like this was very strange, and especially at being at Freddy Fazbear’s.

“Anti, calm the fuck down, will ya? Remember, we’ve got something to show Mare!” Dawktrap said, still giggling. “And put the bloody knife away, you’re so attached to that thing.”

Anti glared at Dawktrap, “I’ll put it away when I fuckin’ want to.” Anti stepped closer to the both of them, and gazed around the building himself. Natemare shifted on his feet, wondering when Dawktrap and Anti would get to what they wanted to “show him.” It was vague and quite odd, Natemare thought.

Dawktrap began to walk to an open area in the room, ushering Natemare and Anti to follow him. Anti picked up his pace to walk parallel to Dawktrap, leaving Natemare to walk behind them. They reached the area, stopping their movement.

“Now,” Dawktrap said, clasping his hands together, “Me and Anti wanted to show you something, Mare! You want us to?”

Natemare was confused, but nodded nonetheless. “Sure I guess,” He said.

“Great.” Dawktrap said, smiling. Natemare noticed a glint in his eyes as they started to glow. He tensed up, and took a step back. He wasn’t so sure about their intentions with this meeting anymore.

“What are you guys going to sho- AGH, FUCK!” A sharp pain erupted from below Natemare’s shoulder out of nowhere. He quickly turned his head to see what had happened, and it was Anti. Holding a knife that was lodged into his back. They were planning on fucking attacking him?!

Natemare started to breathe in, preparing to sing in order to control them both and get them to stop attacking him. He could do it despite the pain, he knew he could.

“Ah ah ah! No!” Dawktrap said, aiming his right hand towards Natemare. Natemare saw, and tried to prepare himself for what he knew was about to happen. Blue and purple electricity shot out of Dawktrap’s hand, and onto Natemare. It felt very painful, like many knives stabbing into him at once, but he could take a shock from one of them.

Anti let out a deranged laugh, which made it seem like he was enjoying this. Anti placed his free, left hand on Natemare, and it let out electricity as well. Now a mix of blue, purple and green electricity was arcing over and into his body, his muscles beginning to spasm. Taking a shock from one at a distance was doable, but he couldn’t take a shock from both of them, especially with Anti’s hand having direct contact with Natemare.

He began to feel lightheaded, and was breathing erratically. It hurt so much. He wanted it to stop, to STOP, but Natemare had no idea how long they would keep up their sadistic fun.

Natemare was on his hands and knees on the floor, breathing in and out at a fast pace, and he felt nothing but pain. Sharp, electric pain. It was too much. He could let it out, maybe it would relieve his pain. Natemare took a deep breath in, and started to scream in pain.

It felt like forever, like the pain was forever and he was screaming FOREVER. HE COULDN’T TAKE IT, SO HE CONTINUED TO SCREAM.

IT FELT LIKE IT NEVER STOPPED.

AND HE CONTINUED.

TO.

SCREAM.

The pain began to dim, slowly fading, and he noticed that the electricity arcing across him had disappeared, but the tingling and the pain had not yet gone.

He opened his eyes and let out a shaky breath, looking up at Dawktrap and Anti, who were looking down at him.

“Pathetic,” Anti sneered, “You were one of the most powerful egos of your group! And now look at you, Natemare… A worthless, useless, GODDAMN FAILURE OF AN EGO WITH NO POWERS ANYMORE!” He shouted at Natemare.

Natemare’s breath hitched and his eyes widened. No powers? W…What the fuck did he mean, no powers?! He had powers! He could control people with his voice!

He tried to speak, but nothing escaped him. Nothing. NOTHING?! THAT SHOULDN’T HAPPEN, THAT- This couldn’t be happening! Had he seriously lost his voice?! Anti had said no powers anymore, so… did that mean Natemare would be without his main ability permanently?! No, no no no!

“Natemare, you must understand, we simply… how shall I put this, thought you were too weak as you were. With your voice being your one and only power. We’ve helped you, see. You can adapt, you’re the type of person who adapts to anything. I’m sure this will be no different.” Dawktrap said, looking down at Natemare.

Adapt? To this?! To having his main power stripped away from him?! Yeah, sure, he totally could! Natemare glared up at the two. Then another jolt of pain coursed through him, and he flinched. The knife was still lodged into his back.

“And I’ll take this back,” Anti said, gripping the knife and slowly tearing it out. Natemare tried to scream in pain, but his voice didn’t work.

“We’ll be going now,” Dawktrap said, “I assume we’ll be seeing you.” In one last flash of electricity, Dawktrap and Anti disappeared, leaving Natemare alone in the abandoned pizzeria.

…Abandoned.

Like he was.

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crystalninjaphoenix · 2 months

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Breakthroughs and Breakouts

A JSE Fanfic

SepticHeroes AU: Part 32

First Part | Previous Part | Read on AO3 at CrystalNinjaPhoenix

I almost called this chapter "Jackie's Bad Day" but then I realized that, as funny as it is, it doesn't encompass everything in this chapter. I'll just get right to the summary. Jackie goes to check on Dr. McLoughlin, to see if the other's suspicions have any weight. While there, McLoughlin tells him about his accident. Afterwards, Schneep gathers everyone up to ask for their help. And yeah. Enjoy the chapter! ^-^

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Something had been bothering Jackie lately.

Alright, several things had been bothering Jackie lately. The situation with JJ and the Vault, the visit from Kinetics yesterday, the daily stress of being a Hero—even though no major villains had popped up since he defeated the Puppeteer, petty crime would never fully stop—there was a lot to be bothered by. But something that was nagging at him beyond the heavy anxiety of the more serious problems... was Dr. McLoughlin.

Why did McLoughlin have those modified SAMs? If he didn’t make them, why were they in a hidden room in his lab? Marvin’s insistence that McLoughlin was shady kept running through Jackie’s mind... was it true? He couldn’t deny that McLoughlin had several suspicious things surrounding him. The scans of the Puppeteer mask being different than they should be, the way Anti-Virus targeted SepTech, his company, and now this. Maybe... maybe he really was working with Anti-Virus?

But Jackie refused to jump to conclusions. If his recent experiences had taught him anything, it’s that people were more than how they appeared. He should at least give McLoughlin the benefit of the doubt. He should at least check it out on his own.

He walked into the North SepTech location with some slight nerves, but McLoughlin had said Windstorm could visit whenever he wanted. Surely he wouldn’t have a problem with Jackie stopping by now. He let the front desk know he was there, just to be polite, and then headed down the hall to the elevator to the lab.

This was the third time he’d been in here, and it looked the same as it did the last couple times. The conveyor belts, the robotic arms, the monitors everywhere. Everything seemed so close together despite the high ceilings of the large room. “Dr. McLoughlin?” Jackie called. “I know you can hear me! You have cameras and stuff!” He paused. “Are you here?”

After a moment, a nearby monitor turned on and showed the words INTERCOM SYSTEM ACTIVATED—just like last time Jackie was here. “Hey Windstorm!” McLoughlin’s voice came from the speakers. “Come on in! I’m in the middle of the lab.”

“Thanks.” Jackie jumped into the air to get a good look at everything. Once he spotted McLoughlin he flew down, landing next to him.

“Good to see you again!” McLoughlin looked up at Jackie and smiled. He was sitting at a table, with various mechanical parts spread out in front of him. Jackie recognized the spherical exterior of a SAM, cracked open like a coconut with one half to the left and the other to the right.

“Yeah, good to be here again,” Jackie said, putting a smile on his face as well. “What are you doing? Fixing a SAM? Isn’t that uh... a bit beneath you?”

“What? Beneath me?” McLoughlin laughed. “What d’you mean?”

“Well you own the company and designed the SAMs yourself, it seems like you’d have people to fix the individual Machines,” Jackie explained.

McLoughlin pulled his hands out of the parts, brushing them against each other. “Well I’m not fixing it in the first place. I’m looking to see if there’s anything I can do to improve things. There’s always room for improvement, they say.” He pointed to a nearby cluster of monitors, all of which were showing various blueprints. “I can’t just work on stuff in writing, I need to be able to dig into things and mess around with them physically.”

Jackie nodded slowly. “Do you... work on a lot of SAMs in here?” he asked.

“Sometimes,” McLoughlin said casually. “I also tend to mess around with stuff while I’m doing something else. Heh, sometimes I have SAM here project the blueprints so I can watch something on the monitors.” He stood up from the swivel chair he was sitting in. “Anyway. Anything I can do for you?”

“Oh, uh... I just wanted to get more familiar with your lab,” Jackie said. “Could you give me a tour?”

“A tour?” McLoughlin brightened—but then dimmed again, looking a bit hesitant. “Um... there’s not much to explore, really, I-I’m sure it would bore you.”

“I’m sure it wouldn’t. I mean, I might not understand a lot of what you say, but I’ll be happy to hear about it,” Jackie said.

“You sure?” McLoughlin asked. “I mean, I don’t even know what’s going on here half the time. I have a million things that I started and then didn’t stop, and so much shit in the storage rooms that I just put away and let the computer keep in the database forever.”

Jackie chuckled. “I’m sure. Just walk me through what you have, I’d appreciate any of it.”

McLoughlin nodded slowly. “Alright. Well, um... to start with, uh, a lot of these conveyor belts move things around—uh, obviously they do, that’s what conveyor belts are designed for.” He laughed nervously. “But I mean, there are a lot of parts involved in stuff and sometimes it’s easier for me to let the robot arms do stuff in one location then send it over to me in another...”

They started walking around the lab, going in a zigzag pattern towards the back. McLoughlin explained what each of the robot arms do—some of them are general purpose while others are designed for more specific things, like the ones that have devices on the end to screw things in, or even a couple that have blowtorches on the end! He started explaining the various projects he’d made in the lab. Finding unusual ways to construct computer towers, designing hologram projectors, creating hoverboards—the longer he talked, the stranger his accomplishments became. And the more excited he became about them, until he was absolutely gushing about how he came up with the idea for the SAMs.

“It was so hard to propose that to the board, let me tell you that,” McLoughlin said. “They usually can’t justify the cost of a lot of my designs. But I figured that if I combine all of my favorite ideas together, then market these as assistants, then the board would go for it. And I was right, haha!”

“So... when did you decide to sell them to the League?” Jackie asked.

“Well I figured that if anyone needed an assistant, it would be Heroes, right?” McLoughlin said. “I was willing to give them for free, but the board insisted. They’re all about profit, you know.” He shrugged. “But I don’t mind. I can’t work on everything all the time, even if I want to. I couldn’t build all the SAMs myself, or even supervise everything. I automate a lot of stuff.” He frowned. “Which... might’ve been a bad idea. After all, maybe if I’d been more, uh, hands-on, our systems wouldn’t have been hacked.”

“It’s not your fault,” Jackie assured him. “I’m sure you have a great firewall. One you didn’t expect would ever be breached.”

McLoughlin sighed. “I guess... but still.” He paused. “I did think that nothing would be able to defeat the—”

“New camera installation completed,” a robotic voice said.

“Gah!” McLoughlin jumped in surprise, then sighed and leaned against the nearest conveyor belt. “Whaddafuk?”

“New camera installation completed,” the voice repeated.

Jackie frowned. “You... didn’t know you were... installing new cameras?”

“I, uh... forgot, I... I guess.” McLoughlin let out a breath. He rubbed his eyes, then reached into his lab coat pocket and pulled out that remote with the single button. “When did I request the infrared cameras?” he asked into it.

“Yesterday at 11:29 am, after the motion detection at 2:01 am two nights ago,” the robotic voice said.

“Ohhh.” McLoughlin nodded. “Yeah, I would do that. Honestly I probably should’ve put in new cameras a long time ago.”

Jackie stiffened. Didn’t Schneep say he snuck into SepTech recently. “So, uh... what motion detection?” he asked, trying to sound casual.

“Oh, the system woke me up at 2 am recently because of a supposed intruder,” McLoughlin explained. “I have a little bed area set up in Storage Room 18, you know cause I practically live here.” He chuckled. “And there’s a camera in there, you know, for security. The system is set up so that it alerts me of suspicious movement.”

“Was there someone in your room?!” Jackie said, alarmed. Did Schneep really sneak into McLoughlin’s bedroom?! Well, not bedroom, but still, it’s similar, isn’t it? It felt like a breach of privacy.

“Nah,” McLoughlin dismissed. “I toss and turn a lot when sleeping, so I have a blind spot set up over my bed for the motion detection. I must’ve just passed out of the blind spot and triggered the alarm.” He shuddered. “God. What a fucking way to wake up, though. I hate the alarm sound.”

“Well, uh... th-that must be—that must mean it’s working, then.” Jackie forced out a laugh, trying not to think about Schneep possibly breaking into a room while someone was sleeping.

McLoughlin frowned. “I... I guess. It just... brings up... bad memories.”

Jackie blinked. “Bad... memories?”

McLoughlin glanced at him. “Um... you know what? Come over here.” He turned and walked to the side, going around tables and robot arms. Confused, and slightly concerned, Jackie followed him.

They reached the corner of the room, where a bunch of control panels on counters were pushed against the walls, along with four large monitors. At first glance, it didn’t look too different from anywhere else in the lab... but then Jackie saw something. The walls around these counters were stained black. He’d seen patterns like this before. Sooty impact lines. There had been a fire here. Maybe even an explosion. “What’s this?” he asked.

McLoughlin pulled a swivel chair over and sat in it. “Why did you decide to become a Hero?”

Jackie started. What did this have to do with anything? “Uh well... I-I wanted to help people.”

“Why?”

Jackie gave a little laugh. But McLoughin’s usually relaxed expression was different now. Serious and intense in a way the scientist had never been before. “Well... Why does anyone want to help people?” He sighed. “Sorry, that’s not an answer.” Leaning back against the counter, he thought about what to say. “Well if I have to boil it down to one thing, it’s that... It’s just that I don’t want people to be hurt. And when you can do something to help people, you should.”

“What if helping others gets yourself hurt?” McLoughin asked.

Jackie blinked. “Well, it depends on the stakes and how much you’d get hurt. I’ve like, broken bones and twisted ankles and stuff. It sucks but it heals. But if it’s something like... getting shot and dying to some random criminals stealing jewelry or something... then I’d really prefer if that didn’t happen. At least let me die doing something cool like saving the world.” He laughed. The sound slowly fades as he looked back towards McLoughlin. “Why d’you ask?”

“I wanted to figure out how much you’d get what I’m about to say,” McLoughlin explained. “Cause like... I think if you can really change the world, it’s worth it, y’know?”

Jackie nodded slowly. He was beginning to suspect something. “Is this about the accident you were in?”

“Yeah. Yeah it is.” McLoughlin rolled his head back, resting it on the back of the chair as he looked up to the ceiling. “I really like working with robots, but something that’s always annoyed me is the programming side of things. The software and stuff. Doesn’t matter how fucking sweet your robot is, if the computer in its brain has some variables crossed, it can’t do anything with its design.”

“Makes sense,” Jackie said.

McLoughlin grinned. “About three and a half years ago, maybe closer to four now, I was working on this really intense programming project. Something I was sure would help people. It’s kind of hard to explain—and it failed anyway so it doesn’t really matter what it was, I think. But I really think it would’ve helped people. It would’ve made programming things in the future so much easier, we could’ve used it in software to help detect cancer a-and launch space probes and—and so much!”

Jackie raises an eyebrow. “There’s really some program that could’ve done that?”

“Well it was more like a bunch of programs all working together in a big super program, but yeah. I think so.”

“...how does something like that lead to an accident that cost you an eye and an arm?” Jackie asked.

McLoughlin raised his head and turned his chair towards Jackie. “Cause a project that intense takes a lot of computing power. Like a lot. Like... this whole corner here was just walls and walls of hard drives.” He laughed. “I think the power I was using single-handedly caused a couple rolling blackouts. Don’t tell the board I said that. They’d be so mad about the bad PR. Anyway, I kept trying to shrink the program and increase my computing power. The project wouldn’t be any good if it took a whole city power grid to run. For months, it was just that. Shrink the program, boost the power. Shrink the program, boost the power. Shrink the program, boost the—you get the point. Going back and forth making adjustments for like half a year.”

Jackie whistled. “That... sounds like a lot of work.”

“Oh it was. But it was worth it... or at least, that’s what I thought.” McLoughlin sighed. “Then, right when I was on the brink of getting something sustainable... The constrictor burst. And everything just—” He made an explosion sound with his mouth, moving his hands outward to indicate something blowing up. “I was right in the middle of it. I was lucky that I just lost my arm, eye, and all that surface stuff.”

“Holy shit,” Jackie whispered.

“Tell me about it,” McLoughlin said. “But see here’s the thing. I could have left sooner. But I was busy trying to salvage what I had programmed, so it wouldn’t disappear when the hard drives blew up. Transferred it to an external drive. Standing in the middle of everything, hearing that alarm go off around me while I waited for the transfer.. .” He shuddered. “Bad memories. I hate that alarm sound.”

“Yeah I don’t blame you, fucking hell.” Jackie shook his head. “That was really worth risking your life for? Worth losing your arm and eye for?”

“Well... I thought so at the time,” McLoughlin said slowly. “But, uh... what I got away with wasn’t really what I wanted.” He shrugged. “Still, it worked out in the end, I think. I used some of the code from that project for a lot of other stuff, like the SAMs. And I do like what I came away with in the end.”

“What you... came away with?” Jackie asked slowly.

McLoughlin didn’t answer right away, facing away from Jackie. Then he snapped out of whatever trance he was in and turned back to him. “My cool cybernetics,” he said, grinning.

Jackie laughed. “You’re happy about that?”

“Fuck yeah I am. I mean, it really sucked to get them. I...” His smile slipped. “I don’t think I’ll ever be in so much pain... ever again...” Then it returned. “But these are basically the same thing. The synthetic skin even feels stuff. It was real fucking hard to get the artificial neurons to work right. Don’t get me started on the eye—it’s basically a camera but it was so hard to hook up, I had to turn everything upside down. But at least the vocal synthesizer was easy. All the pieces were already in place.”

“Vocal synthesizer?” Jackie repeated, standing up straight.

“Oh yeah, my vocal cords got shredded,” McLoughlin said casually. “I know, I don’t sound like a robot, do I? I already had voice samples to work with. I basically sound the same as before.”

“So, like... you work with voice synthesizers a lot, then?” Jackie asked. “You’re really familiar with them?”

McLoughlin tilted his head. “Uh, I guess, yeah. Why do you ask?”

“I was just thinking... about the Puppeteer mask,” Jackie said slowly.

“Huh? You mean the synthesizer the Puppeteer used to speak?”

Jackie nodded.

McLoughlin stared at him. He stood up. “Do you think I should’ve recognized that there was a synthesizer in there?” He sighed. “They’re really small, Windstorm. It’s hard to identify anything inside that mask with just your eye. It’s why I let the computer scan it. Besides, it was inserted behind the plastiglass surface and hidden from view. Yeah, maybe if someone hadn’t messed with the scans, I could’ve recognized it. But they did.”

Jackie nodded. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to offend you or anything.”

“Offend me?” McLoughlin looked confused.

“I don’t know, you might’ve thought I was implying something.”

McLoughlin paused for a moment more, then his eyes widened. “Oh! You mean—oh.” He laughed. “No, I mean—I would suspect me of something too, if I was in your shoes. No worries.” He shrugged. “Besides, if I was really working with the Puppeteer and this Anti-Virus guy, I would’ve given them a better synthesizer. One that didn’t make him sound so robotic.”

Jackie laughed. “I guess. If you could sound like a real person, why wouldn’t you?” That all made sense to him. But... remembering the modified SAMs Schneep had seen, he stayed a bit cautious. He wanted to ask more about McLoughlin’s project that led to his accident. But he had to remember what he was here for. “Hey, can we keep looking around? Or is the mood ruined?”

“We can keep going,” McLoughlin said. “But we’ve been here for a while now. Is there anything, like, specific you want to see?”

“Uh, I think you mentioned storage rooms?” Jackie said. “What’s in there?”

“A bunch of stuff, really. I don’t even know what I’ve shoved into those rooms.” McLoughlin laughed. “We can check it out together. C’mon.”

The two of them walked to the edge of the room, where the doors lined the walls. McLoughlin explained that there were twenty rooms on each side, adding up to a total of forty rooms. Hearing that made the task of checking all of them seem daunting, but he had to do it, didn’t he? So he went with McLoughlin as they checked the rooms one by one

“Oh. Huh.” After a while, McLoughlin pulled at the handle of one door—Storage Room 10. “This one’s locked.” He pulled out his remote and spoke into it. “What’s in Storage Room 10?”

“Spare parts for the production of computer towers,” the computer replied. “Including graphic cards, fans, water cooling—”

“Okay thank you,” McLoughlin said quickly.

Jackie frowned. “Is it... normal to have locked storage rooms?”

“Oh yeah, all the time. I think Rooms 30-40 are always locked.” McLoughlin shrugged. “You don’t need stuff from there all the time, you know?”

“Hmm...” Jackie thought about it. “Can we go in anyway?”

“Huh? You sure?” McLoughlin looked doubtful. “I mean... there’s not much exciting stuff in the Storage Rooms in general. You want to look at a bunch of spare computer parts?”

“Just... humor me on this?”

“Uh, sure.” McLoughlin gave him an odd look, but then spoke into the remote. “Unlock the door to Storage Room 10.”

“Unlocked,” said the robotic voice.

Jackie reached for the door and tried to pull it open—but it didn’t move. He tried to push it, but it still didn’t move. He tried to slide it. Same result. “It’s not unlocked.”

“...weird,” McLoughlin muttered, confused. He spoke into the remote again. “Unlock the door to Storage Room 10.”

“Unlocked.”

Jackie tried again. Still nothing. “No dice.”

“Really weird,” McLoughlin said. He spoke into the remote once more. “Uh, hello? Storage Room 10 is not unlocked. Why are you saying it is?”

“Unlocking Storage Room 10 now. Unlocked.”

“Is something wrong with this?” McLoughlin shook the remote, then turned it over and over to examine it.

Jackie’s superhero instincts were going crazy. This could be a weird glitch with McLoughlin’s remote—or it could be a cover-up of some kind. “Which way does this door open?” he asked. “Inward or outward?”

“Inward, why?”

“Stand back.” Jackie walked backwards, making sure he had a clear path to the door.

McLoughlin’s eyes widened. “Wait, what are you—”

With a yell, Jackie ran forward, the wind pushing him to speed up. He concentrated all his force in the point of his shoulder, and sprinted into the door.

WHAM!

He bounced backwards, shoulder smarting with pain that ran into his neck too. “Owowowow! Son of a bitch!” Jackie cursed. The door hadn’t even jiggled a bit.

“Holy shit, Windstorm!” McLoughlin gaped at him, shocked. “You don’t need to get in there that badly!”

“Dr. McLoughlin, trust me when I say that I do,” Jackie insisted.

“Alright, fine, let’s find some other way to open it then, fucking hell,” McLoughlin grumbled. “SAM?” The custom SAM of his, which had been following them this whole time, darted off. McLoughlin’s fake eye shifted color, going from a normal greenish to a glowing, acidic green instead. “I’m looking around for some tool or something... do you think a screwdriver would help?”

“Hmm.” Jackie examined the door. “What, are you saying we should take off the doorknob? I guess that might work. These screws are cross-shaped.”

McLoughlin looked at the screws on the doorknob. “Yeah... I think this will fit.”

“So you can see through the camera on your SAM?” Jackie asked, impressed.

“Yep. It really comes in handy. But I don’t recommend it all the time. You get a bit motion sick.”

The SAM flew back over, its peripheral wrapped around a small screwdriver with a gray handle. Jackie took it and started trying to unscrew the doorknob. McLoughlin stood by the side and watched silently. It took an infuriating few minutes, but eventually, Jackie had the doorknob in pieces, dangling on either side of the metal door. He tried to push the door open again. It felt stuck, but this time, he could tell there was some give. So he gritted his teeth and shoved it hard. With a few seconds of effort, the door flew open, and Jackie stumbled inside.

He looked up... and his jaw dropped. The room was full of deconstructed SAMs, many with their attachments out. He’d been in this hero business long enough to recognize guns and other weapons when he saw them. They were piled on tables and shelves, in the middle of being constructed. Slowly, Jackie turned back around, looking at McLoughlin. “...care to explain this?” he said quietly.

“Huh?” McLoughlin stepped up, looking into the room. “Oh... That’s not computer parts.”

“Yeah no shit!” Jackie said. “What is this all doing here?!”

“I guess I mislabeled the SAM parts,” McLoughlin said.

“Not the SAMs! Well, not just the SAMs! All the—the fucking weapons?!”

“The what?!” McLoughlin pushed past Jackie into the room, head spinning around. His face drained of color. “Wh-what the fuck? When did—why—wh-what are—Weapons?!”

“Are you saying you don’t know what these are doing in here?!” Jackie demanded.

“Yeah, that’s exactly what I’m saying!” McLoughlin said. “I don’t—I don’t even remember the last time I checked this room! Ohhhh fuck. Oh god.” He rubbed his face. “Why the fuck is it always me?”

“You have to know how this looks,” Jackie said, glaring and crossing his arms.

“Yeah of fucking course I know how it looks! Shit!” McLoughlin shook his head. “Windstorm, I swear I didn’t know anything about this. I-I swear on my life. On—on every SAM we’ve created! I don’t know why there’s a room full of weapons in my lab, but I have nothing to do with it!”

“Okay, so how did they get in here, then?” Jackie asked. “Did someone sneak them in?”

“I—I guess? I-I don’t know how, since... this is my lab...” McLoughlin trailed off. “I, uh... I usually keep the doors locked while I’m not in here. But some people in the building have the clearance to unlock it. Maybe they came in while I was out? Oh!” His eyes widened. “Or maybe—maybe that motion detection thing wasn’t a false alarm! Maybe someone—someone with superpowers or something, maybe they’ve been working on the SAMs in here secretly!”

Jackie shifted on his feet. That “false alarm” was Schneep, it wasn’t someone sneaking SAMs into McLoughlin’s lab. But still, didn’t it open up the possibility? If Schneep was able to break in, what if some other superperson could? But... “The problem is, why would someone break into your lab to secretly put weapons on SAMs?” Jackie asked.

“Maybe they need the equipment? I don’t know.” McLoughlin shook his head. “But I promise you, Windstorm, I swear on everything I have, I didn’t know anything about anything in this room.”

Jackie scanned McLoughlin’s face. He didn’t see any malice or general shiftyness in his expression. But that didn’t mean anything. McLoughlin could simply be very good at deception, at hiding his true feelings. He seemed like an open person, but was that a facade? Even so... Jackie couldn’t jump to conclusions. He couldn’t. He had to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. But this was so, so, so, SO suspicious. “You know I’ll have to tell the League about this, right?” he asked.

McLoughlin nodded. “Of course, of course.”

“You’ll probably be put under some sort of watch. You know that?”

“Makes sense.” He laughed. “Though I don’t really go anywhere interesting for people to watch.”

“All these SAMs will be taken away.”

“Oh fuck, yeah, take them. I’ll start moving them out right now, if you want.” McLoughlin took out his remote and pressed the button again. “Can we begin clearing out Storage Room 10?”

“Yes, Dr. McLoughlin,” said the robotic voice. Some of the arms started whirling to life, moving along tracks above and reaching down. Inside the room, more robotic arms pop out of the walls and start grabbing SAMs, passing them to each other, taking them out of the room and into the main lab.

“Oh!” Jackie started in surprise. “That’s... pretty elaborate. Why not just get some workers down here? Surely SepTech has employees for that.”

“Yeah, but why make people do it when you could build robots?” McLoughlin grinned. Then his smile fell. “I’ll fully cooperate with any investigation into this, you know. I... I-I want to know who would do this. This isn’t what the SAMs were meant for. It’s... not at all what they were meant for.” His voice became quiet at the end, his expression softening into a vague sadness.

Jackie nodded slowly. “I’ll call the League right now to get advice on that.” He started backing away, reaching into the pocket of his suit.

“You do that.” McLoughlin turned away, watching the robotic arms work.

After a moment of hesitation, Jackie turned and walked some distance away, out of earshot but somewhere he could still see McLoughlin. He jumped into the air, hovering about six feet off the ground, and took out the Red Line... and then something buzzed in his pocket. Jackie took that out, as well, checking the screen. A text from Schneep. Can we meet at Neun Park today?

A chill went down Jackie’s spine. He wasn’t sure if it was caused by fear, or anticipation, or something else entirely. He glanced around; there were definitely cameras in here, even if he couldn’t see them. Cameras that Anti-Virus could hack... if hacking was even necessary. Perhaps Anti-Virus always had access to cameras in SepTech. Anyway, the point was he’d have to wait until he was outside to answer that. For now, he put his phone back into his pocket.

===============

It was a while before the group could meet up. Jackie wanted to stick around to make sure that all the SAMs got moved out of McLoughlin’s lab. They did, and then they went into a different storage room up on another floor. Which wasn’t a perfect solution, since they were still within easy access for anyone who could get into SepTech, but at least it was out of McLoughlin’s lab. And even if Jackie wasn’t busy supervising all that, Chase had work for most of the day. So they had to wait for him to be done. By the time everyone arrived in Neun Park, it was starting to get dark.

“Stupid early sunsets,” Marvin grumbled. “I always hated them.”

“Yeah, it sucks,” Chase agreed.

“Can we get to business quickly?” Schneep asked, unusually nervous.

“Yeah, of course.” Jackie bounced on his feet. He’d just pulled his street clothes on over his supersuit, as he was planning on going back out on patrol once this was done. His patrols had been really lacking lately, as he’d been concerned with the whole... JJ in jail and Anti-Virus running amok thing. “Why’d you call us out here, Schneep?”

“Well, ah, Marvin has something to say first,” Schneep said.

Marvin nodded. “You know that van that took Dahlia away? My contacts found out what happened to it.”

Jackie stood up straight. “What? What happened to it?”

“Well I don’t know for sure, but I talked to someone who talked to someone,” Marvin said. “The van was purchased on the black market and modified at a client’s request. It was then picked up by a man in a mask and hood. About three days later, it was returned, along with a promise of more money if the modifier sold it somewhere out of the city. The modifier did so, and a packet of money ended up at their place of work the next day.”

“Hmm.” Jackie frowned. “I’m guessing the modifier doesn’t remember who the client was, or what the man in the mask looked like.”

“No, it was all done anonymously, over emails and phone,” Marvin said.

“Digital stuff, then,” Chase summed up. “And if it was sold out of the city... does that mean... that Anti-Virus is in the city?”

“I was thinking the same thing!” Jackie nodded vigorously. “Or at least—he was in the city at the time. If he wanted it out of here, then it probably means he wanted it as far from him as possible.” He paused. “I mean... it’s not... much of a lead. I was kinda assuming Anti-Virus was in the city anyway. And that... Dahlia was here, too. But it’s a lead!”

Marvin nodded. “I can ask for more, but I wanted to bring that up before Schneep said whatever he was going to—”

“We are going to break JJ out of jail,” Schneep blurted.

Silence.

“I’m sorry, what the fuck?!” Chase blurted. “Isn’t that—isn’t that fucking—illegal?”

Schneep laughed. “Why yes, yes it is.”

“Henrik!” Marvin hissed. “I didn’t agree to telling them!”

“Well I knew you would never agree,” Schneep said. “So I decided to go ahead.”

“You didn’t know that! You can’t just do this!”

“We need your help, Jackie,” Schneep continued.

“Don’t ignore me!” Marvin stepped in front of Schneep. “You can’t just tell him that! I didn’t agree to that! You can’t just steamroll me without talking about it!”

Schneep bristled—and then took a deep breath. “I suppose I... should not have... been so blunt. I am sorry. I just—I could not—w-we really need Jackie’s help, and I didn’t... I-I could not stand dancing around the subject any more, debating if we should or should not ask him.”

Marvin sighed. He looked at Jackie. “...well? How do you feel about that? About... breaking someone out of the Vault?”

The conversation had seemed distant until that question. Like it was happening at the end of the tunnel. But as Marvin directly addressed Jackie, he snapped back to the world, fully immersed in it again. “I... I just... why?” he whispered.

“Why do we want to break him out?” Schneep asked. He barked out a laugh. “You agree that he does not deserve to be there! It is injustice. He is being blackmailed, and they will keep him in there just because his powers are supposedly dangerous. They will not help him. They will not protect him. Because it is easier to have him stay there than do their jobs.” He shook his head. “It is not fair. If they will not do their jobs, then they do not get to keep him there. In that place. You know they keep the prisoners there injected with neutrinalin? Despite the side effects?” He swallowed a lump in his throat. “I... I know JJ will be reluctant to leave. H-he will be worried about Dahlia. But if we can keep this under wraps enough, if we can execute an operation so smoothly that the League decides not to cause a fuss, then things will be easier. And Jackie... the best way to do that is to have you help. You are a Hero. You could have information that the rest of us cannot.” He looked Jackie straight in the eyes. “Please... I know you would not stand for this, either.”

Jackie nodded slowly. “I... I’m a Hero...” he said quietly.

“Knew you would say that,” Marvin muttered.

Normally Jackie would’ve snapped at that, but he didn’t have the energy to. His mind was scrambling, his thoughts and emotions moving too fast for him to even identify. He took a deep breath, turning and walking away. He stared at the strange abstract statue for a moment, putting his hands behind his head as he thought. Everyone had been very blunt about JJ’s chances. He was a Hero. He couldn’t break the law. But he also couldn’t let someone innocent stay in jail, could he?

Then, after a moment, he turned right around and came back. “I can’t be directly involved in this,” he said in a low voice, pulling the three guys together. “I can get you information somehow, but I can’t do anything in the actual breakout part. If something goes wrong and I get caught, you lose your guy on the inside. In fact, try to keep me in the dark as best you can. Do you guys understand this?”

Marvin’s eyes widened in shock. Schneep nodded seriously, and after a moment, Marvin did too.

“So we’re really gonna do this?” Chase asked.

“You do not have to, Chase,” Schneep said.

“Well I... I know that I probably won’t be able to do much, but... if there’s anything I can do, I-I want to,” Chase said. “JJ’s still my friend.”

“I’m... sure he’d... appreciate that, Chase,” Marvin said awkwardly.

“We will see how things go,” Schneep said. “In the planning. Let us know what you can do, Chase.”

Chase nodded.

“Also, we can’t like... house JJ at any of our homes,” Jackie said. “We all have a bunch of electronic stuff that Anti-Virus can hack. He absolutely cannot know JJ is out. If he does find out somehow, he can’t know where he was. JJ needs to be somewhere without anything that connects to the Internet.”

“Kanchana can help with that,” Marvin said. “She has safe houses all over.”

“She huh?” Jackie blinked. “Why?”

“It’s for henches,” Marvin said.

“...henchpeople hiding from the police?” Chase asked.

“Sometimes, but usually it’s henches hiding from villains,” Marvin explained. “Sometimes a hench works for a particularly heinous villain, and they need to be protected while Kanchana gets HUAC ready to go after them. I’m sure she has something that can meet our needs.”

Jackie nodded. “That’s perfect.” He paused. “Uh... Schneep? What did you mean about... neutrinalin side effects?”

“I didn’t know, either,” Marvin muttered darkly. “Apparently if you have neutrinalin in your system for a couple days you start getting headaches and nausea. The League told SDER departments about this, but not Heroes, apparently.”

“...ah.” Jackie blinked. “I... Putting aside the... injecting harmful chemicals into people thing—”

“A big thing to put aside,” Chase said, looking alarmed.

“—why wouldn’t the League tell Heroes that? What if a villain kept injecting them with neutrinalin?”

“It does not make sense,” Schneep agreed. “There have been situations like that. Why not warn Heroes about that?”

“And they know about the side effects and keep putting it in the villains at the Vault!” Marvin said. “Surely there are better ways to restrain a super! Ones that don’t involve side effects! Fuck, the League makes me so angry.”

“Honestly, I... I see where you’re coming from,” Jackie whispered.

Marvin looked at him. He nodded. “Thanks,” he said simply.

“Now... we need to talk about what to do about the breakout,” Schneep said. “While we are here. Oh, but do either of you have anything to say?” He looked at Jackie and Chase.

“Nah, bro, of course not.” Chase laughed.

Jackie hesitated. He remembered everything that happened earlier that day. Everything with McLoughlin. But... he couldn’t bring it up. He wasn’t sure why. He just... he knew how the others would react. They would insist that McLoughlin was suspicious, but he knew that! He knew what he was doing. He wouldn’t be taken in, he would remain cautious, but he would not say that McLoughlin was, for sure, Anti-Virus. Even if he was doing something wrong, there was no proof of the Anti-Virus link. He would not accuse someone unrelated, even if they had committed a crime. He would not do what they had done to JJ.

“No, I don’t have anything else,” Jackie said. “Let’s talk about what to do now.”

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