RP [Phoenix Team] - Because we Can

Because we can can can!
Because we can can can can can can can can can!
♫ Fatboy Slim - Because We Can ♫

Sargasso, Featherwell, Panda Candy Factory
Mid-Morning, overcast with southerly winds - clearing this afternoon

A black sedan pulled up at the gates of the factory, engine coming to a stop as doors opened and men in blue suits approached the reception area of the factory campus. Throughout the lobby and behind the manager's desk they were led to by a helpful receptionist, the logo for the Galacta Candy brand of confections was hung, sweet and bright, contrasting the manager's dour mood as the two men approached the desk.

Something about the way the two Mindeye men approaching the front desk were dressed was giving the serpentine Oddbody second-in-command named Abhiya a sense of unease, the overwhelming amount of blue on their persons bordering on garish. "Hello, we'd like to speak to Mr. Isbala," The first man, a blonde with smooth and indistinct features said, jovial, carefree, and completely unaware of how blue he was.

"We would like to discuss how we think partnership with the Blue Sky Society-" the other man, a redhead completed his friend's sentence, smiling along. Upon their blazers, buttons and crystals were pinned through the lapel - eliminating any further doubt as to the organisation the two belonged to: All these little indicators and markers of these little 'local initiatives' bankrolled by the introspective think-tank.

A practiced response fell out of Abhiya's mouth. "Galacta Candy is currently not seeking partnerships of any sort due to the profitable and wide-reaching joint venture with Cloverpaw. I suggest coming back after the end of the fiscal year when the contract is up for negotiation if you have a better bid to play."

Her enhanced eyes focused on their little details as she spoke, slowly losing her tired air for a more apprehensive one. A finger casually traced under her desk, feeling different buttons for specific and varied purposes. Company security, personal security, impersonal security, and her personal favorite, the one marked with a picture of a cartoonish villain laughing. How distasteful. Missionaries.

The two men raised their hands. "You'd be doing your local community a disfavour!" the blonde interjected, still upbeat and wide eyed with a salesman's smile - but tightening at the edges, "You'd be missing out on some great benefits, friends, and trading partners-"

"Yes, yes; Yes." The redhead appeared to notice his and his partner's welcome being overstayed, "not to worry, you shall hear from us in future," he settled for flicking a card towards Abhiya's desk, a twinkle sending the card spiralling into the desk.

"Due to our exclusivity deal with Cloverpaw, we cannot enter into any partnership-" Abhiya stopped mid-sentence as the card struck her ledger with a thunk. The lamia internally settled her train of thought and said, "And we do our local community plenty of good by giving back to all of our employees in numerous benefits, all of which you can read about in the pamphlets available on your way out."

She'd ended her sentence with a flick of her forked tongue. The two men were on their way - able to grab the aforementioned pamphlets and benefits provided by the Cloverpaw/Galacta partnership - and as they were walking across the lawn, a beeping noise could be heard, followed by a green laser point appearing on the back of the blonde, and tracing circles around the feet of the redhead, who looked up and double timed.

"Daryl, this one's on the naughty list," the redhead sighed, piling into the sedan before the factory's sentry security decided to turn the safeties off.

"Oh yeah." Daryl replied, loosening his tie as he got behind the wheel - a warning shot at the bonnet splattering a film of taffy into the paint and the windshield. "Couldn't get a good read on her - too much wetware," he sighed - but all he could figure out for sure about the manager was that she didn't like them.

Once pulled away and a couple of streets out of sight, Daryl pulled over, leaning forward into the dashboard and transmitting his findings about Galacta Candy via 'touching in' to Blue Sky's network. "We do the usual?" He said, scrolling through his usual list of contacts for trouble with a thought.

The redhead grimaced at his friend, "put your phone down, relax, I already left the calling card." A notification pulsed throughout the literally neural network - a new hotspot had been activated, and 'Galacta Candy' was now fair game for the Blue Sky Society...


A couple of weeks later...


CBD, Palmtree Park
Afternoon, sunny with a light westerly breeze

♫ Phoenix #2772 - Rollerblade ♫

Just northeast of City Hall in Sargasso was a stretch of parkland which provided the more built-up section of Sargasso with some greenery, some visual breathing space from the skyscrapers and arcology-like Unit constructions, and above all else, somewhere to congregate and relax.

On a day like today, citizens were enjoying it - whether laying on the grass and watching the sky or jogging down the path, which wove through manicured palms - leaves shaking and rattling lightly in the breeze while the sound of hustle and bustle - particularly from hovercars, shopping, crowds of workers mingled with city officials for lunch break.

Amidst a cluster of mixed-development structures overlooking this park, the logo for the Blue Sky Society was visible, growing from a seed and blooming into a lovely tree upon repeat. The company was based out of four - allegedly five - floors of a tower they'd bought outright. They employed and paid a full staff, and everything seemed alright on the surface.

But the materials, wealth, credit, and clout for owning a slice of tower that large didn't come easy given the relative wealth of the surroundings. "...I wonder who has that sort of money?" Luca wondered aloud, on the phone to Seiren as he contemplated a picture of his mark: a blonde lady and business owner who was reported missing a few weeks ago. The only lead being she was a member of the Blue Sky Society, having joined a few weeks ago.

"The kind who either spoofs or steals employee badges. I've had to shut down for a week, now. But the kind of things that happened at the factory after their little visit were too organised." Seiren replied, at the helm of his factory as he tried to keep things under control. "My systems should have had them down in an instant, but instead I've got several lines missing key parts or mysteriously broken when they were just replaced. Whoever these guys are, they did their reading first."

"Sounds like you got a bad case of street samurai," Luca said, watching men in blue suits across the road trying to preach their dictum to passers by. The thing which creeped him out the most was the way they all seemed to walk and talk together, keeping on finishing each other's sentences and moving like a pack with synchronised marching, "got any other security for your place?"

Seiren's voice paused, then continued. "Corporate ninjas, rather. I've put word out to my contacts at Cloverpaw and they agreed to lend me some MBFs for security detail from here on out, so that much is safe - hopefully. I haven't heard of anybody hacking a dog, yet. Oh, and if you want one for yourself I might be able to swing a discounted rate. Them and their 'good faith' deals for those of us in the heroing business."

Taken by surprise, Luca coughed, "uh, I'll think about it," he thought the idea of a dog-shaped android doing patrol was incongruous. "Anyway, I've been keeping an eye on their building, taking note of who goes in and out," he said, noting a few common threads amongst the members - mostly young people, college aged. "I'm having trouble getting a good vantage point for their fifth floor - the glass is double-paned, prism tinted, and my glove reports psionic static generators concealed around the building's exterior."

"And this is why I never bothered seeing if I could psionics. Idiots like that slapping down blockers for cool powers. Can't turn off an electrical capacitor, though. Tech all the way~" Seiren taunted.

Luca shook his head, "these ones aren't public-security grade observe-and-report dealies - I have the feeling they've got plenty of other countermeasures rigged into the building," his professional pessimism and experience leaked in.

"The good stuff? Well, it fits the MO. Or evidence. Or whatever the right word is." Seiren finished. Not a second later, a loud crashing noise was heard on Seiren's end - and subsequent fumblings of the communicator.

"Seiren? What happened?" Luca asked, looking at the spectrogram from their end. He saw a face near the entrance to the tower the Blue Sky Society ran out of. They were watching him, and they saw his reaction to the sudden change in conversation.

"Some idiot just crashed a semi through the outer wall." He said, examining the damage from his balcony. "From here, it doesn't look so bad - to the truck, not the wall - and oh fuck why now."

Luca narrowed his eyes at the guy staring back at him, standing up and heading towards where he parked his bike. "Why what now?" he asked, mounting.

"Jockeys."


♫ GTAV - Wanted Theme 12 (4 Stars) ♫


The view swung back from Luca to overlook all of Sargasso for a brief moment, then shot to where Seiren was watching a worst-case scenario unfold. To onlookers, it looked like a ram raid - and a well executed-one. The truck had barrelled through the outer layer of Seiren's factory compound, and hot on its heels as it started reversing away - opportunists had swooped in, dressed in leather and smelling positively odious as they raided the facility for the promise of 'free candy'.

The worst part was, however, that the most convenient way of dispensing candy to those who wanted it (at very high velocity) was out of order.

"Luca, I'm going to need to call you back. I've got hounds of hell to let loose," Seiren sighed, pulling out a whistle.

"I'll talk to you face to face soon, and save some for me this time!" Luca replied, hanging up and kicking into gear with a roar and a wheelie. Along the way, he sent out an alert to other Phoenix Team members nearby to give Seiren a helping hand. After all, the he felt as though team had to look out for each other - because he'd do it for them.

Seiren meanwhile had blown the whistle, summoning his team of 8 small, dedicated dog-synths from the facility, all armed with adorable-sized riot control weaponry firing rubber slugs, restraining gel, and tear gas. The Apachoppers who were making a raid on the compound with crude melee weapons consisting of bike scrap and homemade guns and rifles.

Luca would arrive by next post; try as he might, he and his bike could not outrun the speed of the plot. There was also a traffic jam on Sargasso's highways, forcing him to find a longer route to Galacta Candy.

 

Featherwell, Galacta Candy Factory, Grounds
Seiren watched the dogs of war get to work while the help was on its way. A pup levelled a weapon with a tube running from just behind the handgrip, leading into a tank carrying the weapon's ammunition: A rapidly-expanding, heat-activated, hardening sticky foam intended for riot control and crash protection. A whoosh of compressed air propelled the first in a volley of gel projectiles into some of the incoming Apachoppers. The intended targets were bottlenecked the hole in the wall, meaning one spray could net multiple targets.

When initially struck, the bikers were hit by a wad the size of a fist and slowly ballooning. Grabbing it meant getting it stuck on the hand, and more sources of heat upon the gel aggravated its expansion, growing and forming a hardened outer crust. This bound limbs, and multiple applications across other targets could mean forming a barrier out of a crowd, rooted to the ground and each other. And the gel became brittle after a couple of minutes.

The dogs knew first step in getting control of the situation unfolding in the parking lot was to cut off further access into the factory grounds. Hot on the restrainer's heels, the follow up was for ranks of other dogs begin firing rubber bullets at the revheads who'd trespassed, while tear gas was launched over the wall to begin dispersal of the rest of the group. Cameras around the property got a count of about twenty to thirty belligerents, with seven or eight of them stuck into place around the first breach.

The gang retaliated by creating another hole with their makeshift ram - or attempting to at any rate. The exterior wall bulged as their battering ram vehicle smashed into it again. The first time, they had speed and a downward slope on their side. Here, they only had a length of the street. Leaving the engagement to get a run-up ran the risk of being cut off by police or road barriers.

The crushing and grinding noise of concrete scraping and screaming against metal were obvious signals for the pup brigade to anticipate further attackers. Bottles and glass flew over the wall along with strong language, obscenities, shards of glass littering the ground as the smell of urine, blood, and petroleum rose in the summery air.

What neither side saw coming were the Chelti and their half-tracked monster machine, arriving where the second attempt to smash through the factory's walls was taking place. At first, the Apachoppers mistook the incoming rider was one of their own, but their dynamic entry confirmed their suspicions the Chelti was not on their side for this one. Half of the Apachoppers were neutralised (either by canine, or Chelti), and the fringes of the crowd were backing off when tear gas came into the picture.

Upon the hill Ravnir was jogging over, he could see Galacta Candy about a hundred yards away, with a view of the siege of the candy factory. The Apachoppers had more immediate problems to deal with than an arriving Raiken on the horizon. From behind, Ravnir could hear a motorcycle screaming at full pelt, and saw a red blur leap over the hill and down the road, leaving a wavy skidmark on the road as they came to a stop.

Luca had arrived stylishly, but he was keeping his distance - squinting at the Apachoppers who were breaking away from the main group to try scaling the wall themselves. Any attempts would be met with five rounds rapid of rubber, as one bandit wearing a biker's helmet ended up with his visor smashed in - knocking themselves out when they fell back down. "Seiren, I'm here," he signalled, "I've got a view of the back of the group-"

He caught sight of one guy getting a run-up to fling a lit molotov over the fence and shot in their direction - one laser pulse connected and caused the would-be lobber to drop the home made bomb behind them as they fell ahead. "I have a view of a bonfire now - and everyone's invited!" Luca appended as a fire begun to spread through the ranks. It had the effect of burning Snuffle's nets, and the fiery captives retaliated by lashing out and flinging themselves at the Chelti and trying to overwhelm them by sheer numbers - grabbing and trampling in their blind panic.

 

Seiren, since the broccoli men incident, had always kept his grav-gauntlet on his person. So, when this all went down, he'd gotten it ready for use. Thankfully for him, reinforcements arrived quickly to help quell the parade of idiots oncoming.

"Do try not to kill anybody! I don't want to deal with a homocide investigation after all of this crap!" He called to the others, pulling in a chunk of rubble to then pulse back at one of the interlopers getting dangerously close to the factory. Even from his balcony, he could hear the sickening crack of the man's leg. "Breaking limbs is fine, though!" he hastily added. Seiren made his efforts more focused - taking the larger pieces of rubble the Choppers were using as cover and throwing them away so they were left coverless to be dealt with by his allies.

 

Featherwell, Galacta Candy Factory
Between the tear gas Seiren's dogs were launching and the pepperball rounds Breyja was attacking the throng with, Luca hung back. "We'll find the ringleader soon," when a section of rubble was lifted away by Seiren, Luca had some clear shots to take the heat off of Snuffles. Speaking of elevated temperatures, he saw a red streak fly through the air, crashing against what was left of the crowd. Being on fire discouraged what was left of the eight or so Apachoppers who still had enough wits to flee, and the dogs moved in with water cannon and started cuffing the miscreants with loud, aggressive borking.

"On ya bikes, dickheads!" Luca taunted, giving a couple of the runners the finger as he watched them rout southwards and northwards. As tyre smoke lingered in the air, something occurred to Luca once the fighting had died down and the Apachoppers without a chest were gone, while those present were being borked upon.

"Where are the cops?" He looked down the streets, and around the corner - he couldn't hear the sirens over the sounds of pain from the Apachoppers or city bustle, or see any red and blue lights. A small crowd of bystanders had accumulated though, a few with cameras in their hands recording the incident. Noticing this, Luca had a question for the crowd: "Did it occur to any of you to call the police?"

A handful of people raised their hands, with a Hagblood woman piping up: "I called them a couple of minutes ago. They should be here by now..." She looked up, and didn't see the police drones nearby either. Following her gaze, Luca couldn't see any aerial surveillance - not even news drones.

The idea that the cops weren't responding was worrisome, but he would have time to contemplate why later. "Did any of you see which way their truck came from?" He asked, indicating towards the smashed van. The crowd remained quiet. "Don't be shy - I am an EAD called Phoenix, and this is my Team. We're here to protect Sargasso." He caught himself getting into character for these people, striking a pose with his fist, and unable to suppress the grin of cocky confidence he wore when he was in the zone.

That Unit was right. Old habits die very hard. Even if Jirou had told him to stay low, there was no ignoring the problems that the city was facing - especially if they were directed towards his friends.

From the bystanders, a few people had emerged, overcoming their fear of dangerous people and approaching Luca and Breyja. Ravnir seemed too intimidating to get to, and Snuffles - though doing the right thing - was perhaps sending the wrong message out asking if any of the Apachoppers were packing a semi.

"The truck came from Hellion Overlook," a blue-skinned humanoid alien with a tail, and yellow eyes pointed toward the northwestern mountain range which separated the city of Sargasso from its surrounding countrysides. "I saw it cut through the incoming lane to smash the wall."

"Thanks," Luca rendered a thumbs up With the truck abandoned and its engine still running, albeit sputtering, it was possible to investigate it further. The most immediate thing was the logo on the side, for a self storage company. Looking over towards where Seiren was, he gave the kid a wave, "Kid, we got some investigating to do."

Noticing that the dogs had also captured their fair share, there would be time for interrogations. "Get your secretary to squeeze some answers out of these malodorous bikers, I reckon." He radioed to the inventor.

 

Seiren hopped off his balcony position, easily landing on his feet thanks to his shock-absorbing shoes, once the fighting had died down and offered pets to the dogs as thanks for their services, all of them lining up for the treatment. Once all had desires sated, he began giving them new orders.

"Two of you guard the wall while two others get the metal foam to cover it up. The rest of you divide between rerouting the turret power and cleaning up the yard," he directed, sending each pup to their task. - but not before tossing his gauntlet to one of them to assist in cleanup.

"You all!" Seiren called, not entirely sure how to address the group of friends-in-arms, "Come up to my office in a bit. These assholes have messed with my business enough - It's high time we step up our game."

The inventor directed one of the dogs to hold the downstairs door leading inside open while he bounced back up to the balcony and back indoors. When the others followed the path indicated by the MBF guide, they were led to a fancy glass-walled office in a corner upstairs, overlooking the factory floor. The glass, however, was tinted so none could see through it. Inside, Seiren sat in his comfy chair, flicking things on an OLED screen on his desk.

 

Galacta Candy, Factory Grounds
A pair of Seiren's MBFs had started investigating the truck, hopping on each other's shoulders to reach the door handle, then jumping inside and fossicking about for anything of use. A moment later, a trucker's logbook had been produced, tossed towards Luca. "Ah, that's a start." He said, bending down to pick it up and skim it. "Good dogs." The book clapped shut and he tucked it under his shoulder as he begun corralling the others into Seiren's office.

To the Raiken's statement, Luca was quick to assure him that it was just the start. "We might have need of you yet. C'mon," he beckoned everyone over and into Seiren's office - while some didn't need coralling - Breyja and Snuffles already incensed to action. A scuffed bike was unforgivable, after all. With a whistle, Luca called his bike over and out of the street.

"As the kid says, we're stepping up our game!"


Galacta Candy, Seiren's Office
Sitting on a leather sofa with a saucer in one hand and a cup of tea in the other, Luca found the interior of Seiren's office 'quite nice', nodding as he looked about at the inventor's sense of style and decoration. "A bit posh for me..." he mumbled, sipping. Upon the coffee table, there was a bowl of sweets - perhaps freshly made since they were still warm and without wrapping. Some coffee table magazines and literature were left there too, with a TV guide open.

On the guide's page, there was an interview with Jirou Harridan, also known as the Galaxy Rider, Handsome. Blinking, Luca recognised parts of the costume of his former comrade, and eyed Seiren. Hmm, so that's where the kid gets his motifs from. Small world... he contemplated as Seiren was pressing some buttons on his desk.

"Warning, if you get motion sickness from elevators I suggest you focus on a fixed point on the floor," Seiren said while he placed his hand on his desk screen, waiting for a ring to fill around it. Once it had filled, all the windows went fully opaque as metal shutters rolled down over them and the door, and the whole room's floor began to sink downwards at a quick pace. Luca sipped his tea, focussing on the saucer in his hand as the office descended. The room itself was surprisingly stable as it moved, none of the fixtures or furniture in the office had budged, aside from the initial jolt.

"Friends, allies, you're about to see something I've never shown anybody," the inventor continued as the room began to reveal a new area, clearly beneath the factory by this point. "Welcome to the Galacta Lab." Seiren swept his arms dramatically as the full extent of his workshop was revealed.

♫ Mega Man Zero 2 - Instructions ♫

The room revealed was quite expansive, with strange machinery occupying lanes upon lanes - likely all things to craft or experiment with. But, on one of the adjoining walls of the office-vator, a rack of various implements of destruction were lit by pale blue light.

"Well," Luca said, placing the teacup and saucer down as he drank in the sights of the kid's industry, oogling at the sheer amount of machinery and weapons, "got my home workshop beat by a county mile..."

"Don't sell yourself short!" Seiren said, popping out from behind his desk and striding over to the wall racks. "This took a LOT of capital to set up. Officially? This place doesn't exist. The basement for the old factory is filled in with concrete on the city plans. Took me a dog's age to get this all set up - and speaking of which, Cosmo!"

As Seiren called out, a starry patterned MBF with shifting fur appeared from behind one of the machine-lanes. The dog hopped over to him, ready and waiting with a wagging tail as he began to take things off the wall.

"We have..." Seiren declared as Cosmo held what appeared to be a rifle aloft. "Electro-shock sticky gun thing - I never named it but it fires a proprietary blend of electric projectile goo-fluid that I regret not being able to reduce to candy-eating use, a heat-spiker - uses another proprietary candy thing that allows it to fire superheated needles of ceramic-strength sucrose,"

Cosmo was grabbing each weapon and passing them to Seiren for demonstration, "a crazy multi-grenade launcher I never quite perfected but should do the job nicely - it fires grenades in a bundle through a small singularity and as the singularity wears out flings them in a wave forwards, A variety of foldup shields made of Hellenium for that light and easy to store - I suggest you take these since they include a divot for sticking your gun into for stability..."

With each new item taken he gave it a full flourish and display to his technically captive audience before handing it off to Cosmo to put back. Luca had eyes on it, tilting his head as though he was looking at something arousing. He gave Breyja a glance - gauging her reaction. Even so there was a nagging question. "Who bankrolls you again?" Luca asked unable to resist shooting the elephant in the room.

"Huh? Well, I had a sizeable paycheck from a job I did to fund my candy company, so I put the excess into my passions," Seiren replied, eyeing a hefty-looking gun that looked like a speaker mounted to a laser repeater. He decided against showing off that one, instead taking a buzzsaw-handaxe off the shelf.

"Most of this stuff is for dealing with those rock creatures we met about, but. . . I feel these will do nicely for any broccoli men or armored vehicles." Seiren said, plucking an octrahedron-shaped device off the wall.

"We're more likely to be dealing with much more squishier foes of flesh, blood, and poor hygiene," Luca pointed out, folding his arms, "though, if we encounter vegetables or a tank, I suppose we'll just deal with it, aye?"

The phone rung at Seiren's desk, coming from Abhiya's desk upstairs.

"Have a cryo-grenade-" Seiren tossed the device to Luca as the inventor rummaged through his pocket to pull out an earpiece and activate it. "Abhiya, what's up?" Luca weighed the bomb in his hand, tossing it up and down before clipping it to his belt.

"For a bunch of crude fools, they keep a relatively tidy logbook. I've loaded the coordinates to your comms for their point of origin into your comms. Otherwise, I'm calling out for the rest of the day. I don't want to be anywhere near this chaos." The oddbody told him.

"Fair, take the rest of the week off. I'll watch for the repairmen later," Seiren responded before cutting the call off. He tapped his earpiece twice, then pulled the paired comm device to pull out a small mag-striped card from it, then tossed it to Luca.

"We got our target. Grab what you want, if you have any questions about anything I haven't mentioned on the wall, just ask but otherwise I wanna get going." Seiren said, giving Cosmo a pat for helping with the demonstration. "And feel free to keep them for later use, like the goddamn broccoli men or worse - just don't let it fall into the wrong hands."

Luca nodded briskly, and approached the wall of armaments, rubbing his chin and positively spoiled for choice. "I'm like a kid in a candy store..." he chuckled, grabbing the candy spiker and giving it a heave, inspecting it himself, looking for what counted as the magazine release (which, instead of a magazine, held a colourful reservoir of the stuff in the middle of the rifle), cocking handle, and other elements, then aiming down the sights. Satisfied, he slung it over his shoulder and let it hang across his chest. "You heard the kid, grab what catches your eye, because we've got some truckers to crash!"

Even if nothing caught Ravnir's eye, the enormous lizard was practically a tank unto himself. Perhaps he could find some sustenance here at least, or some manner of arcane booster along the way. Some of the candy resembled gemstones, albeit made of crystallised sugar.

 

Galacta Candy, Seiren's Elaborate Underground Factory
Satisfied with what he'd picked up, Luca looked to the others - Snuffles and Breyja had taken their fills, and they both seemed pleased as punch. The Chelti had been mumbling something odd. Something was up, the yellow stare of the alien was looking at something past Luca, beyond the walls of the workshop - seeing red. Breyja's enthusiasm was much more understandable. A Maidenhand with a new toy and sufficient ire to see it put to use - lest she lose her head mishandling it.

"Rip and tear? Do you know how hard it was to get the smell of broccoli out of the safehouse?" Luca mumbled, scratching the back of his head - recalling the distinctly over-boiled stench of rotten vegetable. No one had stuck around the warehouse long enough to notice how persistent the stink was, even days after the incident.

The man in red found Ravnir away from the group. The giant had no need for any of the gifts Seiren was handing out - and Luca figured that he'd end up breaking them with his immense strength. Any gift for the Raiken had to be built as tough as they were. When they wandered back to the group (and it was noticed quickly - each step produced a light tremor), the man in red saw fit to gather everyone's attention.

"Alright, before we head out and get our just-worth, do you have any decent medical facilities here, Kid?" Luca asked, looking for any green crosses, or other medical symbols. "We might need them, and my warehouse isn't the best place for an intensive medical procedure, given what happened there last time..." He felt a tug on his sleeve, and spotted an MBF pulling at him. The robotic canine was wearing a white pair of coveralls, wearing a hard-cased first aid kit like a backpack.

Glancing towards Seiren and blinking at the choice of automaton the kid used to staff his mad-science venture, Luca figured it was time to go before he saw anything else. His question was sorted. "Close enough, good dog." He patted the robot and cleared his throat. "Ladies! Gentlemen! Snuffles! Shall we?"

Breyja, Luca, and Snuffles recalled leaving their motorcycles in Cloverpaw's garage before heading into Seiren's office - and while the inventor was demonstrating his inventions, the three vehicles received some canine care in the background. All three bikes received a topping-up of petrol on the house, while the scuff that provoked Breyja's ire towards the Apachoppers had been waxed away and smoothed out. Even so, the dogs were keeping distance from the half-tracked monster Snuffles called a bike - dragging the thing into the shop was enough of a chore.

 

Seiren invited everybody back onto the office-vator, including Cosmo who wore a well-fitted combat vest filled to the brim with the munitions for the weapons people picked up. The inventor himself was armed with electric goo launcher. Once everybody was aboard, he hit the switch and the group ascended once more back into the factory proper. Before they reached the top, Seiren went to a nearby cabinet and donned his grav-gear properly, including an overshirt that was a bit like flexible body armour.

Seiren helped the lot of them find the garage after the elevator reached its destination, and then clipped a pair of sphere-shaped skates onto his shoes and re-equipped his gauntlet. "I'll just be skitching onto one of your rides, don't mind me," he said, watchin Cosmo climb onto Luca's bikeseat.