Author's Note: OK, so I am late. Very sorry for that. Please understand though that while to Coronavirus has left MOST people away from their jobs, there are still those who are busy, and one of them is my Beta, BigCC. He has been rushed off of his feet and barely managed to get this chapter finished and sent me on time, so I will ask that you all have patience. It's quite likely that he won't be able to get the next chapter back to me on time due to the same reason, so if I post Issei: The Gaming Gear on Thursday rather than Wednesday, you'll all know why.

As for the Coronavirus itself...stay indoors as much as possible, be polite and safe by covering your mouth when you sneeze or cough, wash your hands frequently and especially after you come back indoors, and stop hoarding paracetamol and toilet paper, dammit.

Beta'd by BigCC

"Damn you Sophia!" - Speech

'Why, Emma?' - Thought

Ripple 2.7

+++Taylor Hebert+++

Two Nights Later

Amphitrite's Computer Room, S.S. Nevermore, Boat Graveyard, Brockton Bay

"Uh-huh...yeah, that's fine." I said into the phone. "Yeah, I'll be ready for you then...right. See you tomorrow, Lacey. Bye, and be sure to say hi to Kurt for me."

Hanging up, I sighed. It hadn't taken me more than a few hours to set up a wireless remote hookup to my house's main line that I could answer from my hidden base. Though I'd have to be sure to remove it before Dad got back. It was inconspicuous enough that I felt safe leaving it attached when Kurt and Lacey stopped by, but I didn't want to run the risk with Dad home, even with it deactivated. He could be annoyingly observant at the least opportune of times.

I was so looking forward to turning sixteen. Hopefully that would mean Dad and the others would stop treating me like I was still a toddler. While I enjoyed reconnecting with Dad and my godparents, I was starting to chafe a bit at being treated like I was made of fine china after being left to my own devices for the better part of a year.

Anyway, I'd spoken to Dad earlier as well. He had constantly been juggling between acting pleased, annoyed, and downright pissed. Apparently, the conference with the East Coast United Dockworkers Unions and Associations had been going swimmingly so far. A bit too well in fact, since the meeting was now expecting to last at least a full month thanks to the various representatives all working together to hammer out plans, deals, and cooperative efforts. While the benefits it would provide for the Dockworkers and the extra pay he was getting for attending were both strong positives, Dad was still a bit annoyed that his trip had extended even further and he had no choice but to continue.

"Mistress Riptide." Salacia's voice drew me out of my thoughts as she approached me. "I have finished installing the forcefield generators in the corridors as you instructed."

My new gynoid had already mastered all the basics of human locomotion (walking, running, jumping, skipping, etc) and was already practicing more advanced combat maneuvers. She'd even mastered the subtle balance shifts that occurred when her various Magic Bottle systems were filled, depleted or anywhere in between. Granted, I'd had to do a few more minor tweaks and adjustments to get her various ambulatory programs working perfectly, not to mention repair and replace a few minor defects in the hardware (making a robot is complicated, a few minor issues are bound to arise), but all in all, she was advancing even better than I'd anticipated

"Good." I nodded, mentally checking off another part of my 'To Do List.' After my little encounter with Hookwolf, I'd redoubled my intentions of fortifying my base instead of simply relying on camouflage and subterfuge. Step one was a quick and dirty defense system to keep enemies out long enough for me to at least get myself and Salacia armored up. Thus, I had set to work on building a cornucopia of basic forcefield generators (based loosely on my hard-light projection system) and assigned Salacia to handle their installation (a very basic process since I'd already had the power, control and sensor hookups built into the ships systems when I was retrofitting the place).

Now, with just a proverbial flip of the switch, my V.I. and I could block access to entire sections of the ship.

The next step would be fortifying the internal structure of the ship, both to better weather internal and external conflict and for when my means eventually allowed me to take her into the skies.

As a merchant ship, the Nevermore had originally been designed to be as cost-effective as she could while remaining seaworthy. That meant that both the hull and keel of the ship were just thick enough that it wouldn't spring a leak or break apart under normal conditions or inclement weather. In order to get her sturdy enough to support her own weight outside the bosom of the ocean, I was going to have to replace and reinforce nearly every aspect of the ship from her skin down to her bones.

That was not going to be a quick or easy process, not unless I could figure out a way to do it without removing and/or reinforcing it piece-by-piece.

My Replacium had been a good start, it was stronger than normal steel and most of my ship was now made of it, but it wouldn't be enough to last for long in any kind of firefight, let alone endure the rigors of flight. If I tried whipping up a flight system and activating it without further reinforcing her, then the Nevermore would snap in half under her own weight within a few minutes of flight.

"The next three generators are over there, with the locations marked on each." I told my android helper, indicating the nearby worktable. "Once those are in, we can start disassembling the old engine and re-configuring the metal to act as additional armor plating for the inner hull and bulkheads."

"Roger." Salacia nodded as she moved about her tasks as efficiently as always. She was constantly finding new tasks for herself to do, to the point that I'd prepared a 'chore list' to keep her occupied while I wasn't in the base.

Huffing as the android left, I walked over to where a large 3-D image of the ship was pinned to a cork-board (amazing what people throw away). Eyeing it, I grimaced. The laws of physics were fairly consistent when it came to this sort of thing; something as big and clunky as a ship would not survive flight under earth's gravity, no matter how much I reinforced it, the weight was simply too much. That meant that, in order to get my base airborne I needed to somehow counter or cancel gravity, either through some form of inertial control drive or an anti-gravity generator. Maybe even a combination of both.

A quick and dirty solution would be to coat the entire ship in a forcefield like the ones I was building for my internal defenses, except far more powerful. It would keep the ship together in flight, but it would also put an immense amount of strain on both the frame and the forcefield itself during even a short-term flight. Not only would that hinder the forcefield's durability and cause who knows how much long-term damage to the Nevermore, but the energy cost of keeping that kind of system going under that kind of strain would be astronomical.

So far, my power wasn't cooperating with me on that front, instead throwing up designs for water, hydrogen and oxygen-based ship ordnance; a water-fueled plasma cannon, a laser that used miniature hydrogen bombs as fuel cells, kinetic water-force cannons armed with dehydration shells, a liquid oxygen spray cannon...the list went on.

Sometimes, I got the impression that my power was alive, and some sort of mad scientist that demanded that I fulfill some stupid requirement before it gave me the non-water-based tech that I wanted. Right now, the requirement seemed to be that I build my ship's personal BFG before I even start getting her mobile again. Quite why it wanted me to put the cart before the horse was baffling to me, but I did compare it to a mad scientist, right?

Looking at the diagram of the ship, I started weighing my options with a judicious eye. Amphitrite's room was in the hold immediately in front of the command tower, while my current launch bay was in the hold just in front of it. That left two holds at the front, the foremost of which I was willing to turn housing for my ship's main spinal artillery platform. That meant all I had to do was select the design I wanted. Out of the four options I'd already listed (which were actually the most effective and pragmatic ones my power had offered so far) both the dehydration shells and liquid oxygen spray canon were quickly discarded. They both had uses, but neither had the stopping power a main weapon would need, though I'd keep both in mind when I was ready to start building secondary armaments. The bomb-fueled laser was analyzed and quickly dismissed because I did not want to risk using a Weapon of Mass Destruction as a fuel source.

That just seemed like a bad idea for so many reasons.

That, naturally, left me with the plasma cannon.

There was no way I was going to make an immediate choice though; just off the top of my head, I could recall several weapons comparable to those I had just dismissed that I had notes on somewhere. I'd choose the best one I could after careful consideration before building it. As it would be the strongest single armament on my ship, such a selection could not be made in haste or on a stroke of fancy.

After a few more hours of Tinkering and working on my various projects, I moved on to my daily practices with my Shaker and Blaster powers. I was constantly devising new exercises to train my finesse and control with them, as well as trying to think of new practical applications of them. There were, of course, the old standby of 'hydrokinetic weightlifting' (which basically meant picking up and manipulating as much water as possible), but the majority involved making the best use out of a limited amount of water, much like I had done with those skinhead muggers a few weeks ago. I couldn't always count on having ready access to water sources such as my Magic Bottles; in situations like that, I would have to work with what I had, whether it was a thimbleful or a bucketful.

"Mistress, there is another commission from Toybox available for your review." Amphitrite stated suddenly.

"Another one? Did they send over any details?" I asked, intrigued. The water-powered boat engine had actually been a fairly interesting mental exercise, and the funding it had provided were very much appreciated. So, I was honestly a little curious about what new project the Rogue Tinkers had offered up to me.

"The client wishes for you to build a one-person submersible to their specifications." the VI replied. "Displaying general specifications on the main screen."

Walking over to the screen, I raised an eyebrow. "Huh...this guy basically wants a water-going motor home. All the comforts of home down at the bottom of a lake. He specifically stated that it was to only be for freshwater use? That's an odd request."

Still the project was more than doable, especially since someone from Toybox had added a note at the bottom stating that there would be a substantial down-payment to pay for the materials needed to build it. And it would be a good small-scale trial run for some of the tech ideas I had for when I eventually got the Nevermore mobile again. The only real issue was that I'd have to build a dry dock in order to even start construction.

As designs whirled through my head and I could feel a smile stretch its way across my lips. One of the smaller ships nearby, the Crazy Jane, would work perfectly as a hidden dry-dock once I converted it into Replacium. I already had a number of backup holoprojectors and drones ready in case anything happened, so I could start prepping the ship immediately and have Salacia set everything up and apply the initial Replacium coating tomorrow.

"Tell Toybox that I -or rather, Sailor of Waterworks- will happily accept the commission." I said as I headed towards my worktable to begin the design process. "Please have them check with the client to see if they have a timetable or any additional requests that I should be aware of. I'll start working on the preliminary designs now, so let me know as soon as they respond so I can make any adjustments."

"Compliance." Amphitrite replied as I started to design the bare bones of the sub.

+++Grue+++

The Next Day

Undersiders Hideout

"So we're going to hit all of these places in the next week?" Brian LaBorne, the villain Grue, asked Tattletale. The entire team were suited up and ready to get to work. "Seems kinda risky; the White Hats are definitely going to notice a pattern after we hit the first few stops."

"No risk, no gains. Besides, doing this all as quickly as possible will give them less time to set up any kind of ambush." the Thinker shrugged with her vulpine grin firmly in place. "Today, we're gonna hit here and here, near to ABB territory. Tomorrow, we let the heat die down a bit, then we head out the day after that, we hit here and here near the Empire's territory. To polish things off, we attack the next day and hit all three of these stores scattered across the outer southern part of town in a row. Simple, quick, easy, and effective."

"So long as we get paid, I don't give a crap." Regent drawled. Opposite him, Bitch just grunted in neutral agreement.

Beneath his helmet, Grue grimaced. Tattletale to one side, the other two members of his team were more than slightly worrisome; Bitch was a seething flask of anger issues that exploded at the slightest provocation (real or imagined), while Regent was simply a self-centered asshole. Even Tattletale had a pathological need to be the smartest person in the room and an inability to shut the hell up.

'It's for the money. It's for Aisha.' he reminded himself for the nth time. The boss provided them with not just money, but a veneer of legitimacy in his civilian life that he needed to get custody of his little sister away from their drug addict of a mother.

"Any more questions? No? Then let's get moving." Tattletale said, standing up and heading for the door.

Suppressing a sigh, Grue nodded and stood up himself. Sink or swim, he was in it now and he had work to do.

Driving the van was the easy part of the whole thing. Getting Bitch to stop prowling around in the back was much trickier. She, along with her dogs, acted as the team's heavy muscle and Bitch didn't like her dogs (Brutus, Judas and Angelica) to be worried or panicked outside of combat, so she snapped at everyone whenever they whined.

These particular heists were all targeting jewelry stores. Grue had to wonder why jewelry stores in particular, but in the end it didn't really matter; the Boss wanted all seven large jewelry stores in Brockton Bay hit inside of the week and so the Undersiders would do so. The pay was pretty good too; not too much for a job of this level, but certainly enough to make it worth the effort, plus Tattletale had said they'd been promised a cut on the sale of anything they brought in as incentive.

A part of Grue was well aware that this was a far too generous offer to portend good, but the rest of him focused on the results that this would garner him. More money, more street cred and more work from his employer. Shortsighted, perhaps, but Grue was of the opinion that family first (if they deserved it) was the only way to go in a city as fucked up as Brockton Bay. Did that conflict with his 'white knight' persona, as Tattletale so charmingly put it? Yes. Did it bother him? Also yes.

'Eyes on the prize, Grue.' he reminded himself as he turned down the road where their first two targets were located. 'Worry about all of that stuff after Aisha's away from Mom.'

Pulling to a stop outside the first store, he looked at Tattletale, who nodded at him as she hefted her Glock. Grue thumped the partition between the driving compartment and the back of the van three times, signaling that the plan was a go to the pair in the back, receiving a single thump back as Regent responded.

Moving quickly and easily, the Undersiders left the van and barged into the jewelry store, Tattletale leveling her gun at the proprietor with a pleasant smile on her face as the man blanched and raised his hands meekly.

"All customers, get down! All staff come out from behind the counter!" Grue boomed, having covered the lenses of the cameras with his darkness as soon as he entered at Tattletale's side. "Keep calm and follow our instructions and nobody needs to be harmed or inconvenienced more than is strictly necessary."

"Why hello there." the blond Thinker said to the man who she had kept covered with her gun the entire time. "Would you be so kind as to tell me what your safe's code is?"

"I most certainly would not!" the man blustered indignantly, flushing ruddy red in outrage.

"Ah...and the other numbers...ah-ha, there it is." Tattletale said to the man's utter confusion. "Thank you."

"Wha...?" the poor man looked thoroughly confused as Regent shoved him towards the middle of the store, even as Bitch started moving across the store, smashing open cases and pulling anything she could get her hands on into a bag, and her dogs started circling the customers and staff, growling loudly and keeping them in line.

Tattletale wandered into the back room for a couple of minutes before emerging with her own bag full of cash and other jewelry and a smug smile on her face.

"Are you sure we can't take their wallets?" Regent asked.

"No." Grue said firmly.

"Or their watches? This guy has a Rolex!" the Master pointed at the proprietor.

"One, it's a fake. Two, no." Tattletale said in mild irritation. "We've already grabbed more than enough to make whatever they're carrying look like chump change, and it'd be too much hassle to shake them down anyway. Now let's move out!"

Despite Regent's grumbling, the Undersiders made it out of the shop, into their van and down the street to their next target in under three minutes. Then it was a case of rinse and repeat before the teen villains tore off back to their lair to count their ill-gotten gains.

Breathing a sigh of relief as they made it back into their hideout, Grue removed his helmet and mask and grabbed a soda out of the fridge, gulping it down in less than a minute before throwing himself down into a seat and opening up the bags he had to check all of the jewels.

"The boss'll be pleased." Tattletale commented, removing her domino mask to revert to being Lisa Wilbourn. "All of this should be worth a couple of grand at least, more on the black market. The extra money that I got from the safes is ours to keep as well."

"Four way even split?" Regent asked.

"Yup, once the crime wave's over anyway." Lisa confirmed.

"Good. I'm gonna walk my dogs." Rachel grunted, removing her dime-store plastic dog mask and stomping out, her dogs following after her.

"Welp, she's as fun as ever." Alec snarked as he headed back to his beloved Call of Duty.

Brian sighed and restrained the urge to go shopping for some beer, getting up and grabbing another soda instead. Something he'd promised his old man was that, even if he had to break the law in other ways, he was not to touch alcohol before he turned eighteen at the earliest.

'Only eight more months to go, but who's counting.' he thought dryly.

+++Taylor Hebert+++

Two Days Later

Main Hold of the S.S. Crazy Jane, Boat Graveyard

Looking around at the hold, I had to smirk. The conversion from steel to Replacium was almost finished, mostly thanks to the fact that the Crazy Jane was literally half the size of the Nevermore. The internal portions were already completely converted, which was why Salacia was walking around and using one of her inbuilt weapons, a water cutter emerging from her wrist, to neatly and quickly disassemble the interior of the ship, barring the structural support needed to keep the old hulk from collapsing under its own weight.

Since this place was going to be little more than a large-scale workshop rather than a live-in base like The Nevermore would eventually become, I saw no reason to build any living quarters. Most of the space was already allotted for the docking cradle, power generator, and some large-scale tools. At most I might put in a secondary cabin or something in case of emergencies, but this particular hulk had a specific job, anything else would just be an embellishment.

The generator had been thrown together quickly enough, and I'd installed a hard-line across the seabed to the Nevermore so Amphitrite could still talk to me when I was outside of my armor. Thanks to the copious amount of Replacium that was being harvested from the Crazy Jane, I was already almost done throwing together the docking cradle, as well as a couple of motorized mechanical arms with arc welders attached, which would make throwing together the frame of the sub I was going to build much easier.

The client had gotten back to Toybox (who'd forwarded it along to me) about the exact requirements they wanted for their submersible RV. The initial payment had been deposited into my account and I'd wasted no time in ordering new materials from Toybox as soon as that had happened.

The list provided didn't seem to have anything too strenuous, and the timetable was actually quite reasonable. It was, as I'd guessed, going to be used as a motor home for when the client wanted to get away from it all by diving down to the bottom of a lake and ignoring the world in favor of watching TV, reading and writing a novel. Clearly this guy had more money than sense, but hey, it's his money, he can spend it however he wants. I had plenty of time to get everything ready, since the client simply requested it be done before the end of the year. If I ever take that long on a single vehicle project, there is either something wrong with me or I'm working on something on the same scale as the Nevermore. At worst, it would take four or five months, but all my calculations indicated that I'd be done by June at the very latest, barring unforeseen circumstances.

'Like Leviathan.' something in me whispered and I shuddered, banishing the thought from my mind. The last thing I needed to do was to tempt fate!

"Mistress Riptide, I have cleared all of the space needed for the dock." Salacia reported.

"Good work, Salacia." I nodded. It was honestly surprising how useful having an android assistant was, even if she couldn't handle the more…involved parts of Tinkering. The fact that I had an extra set of fairly skilled hands that required neither food nor rest (outside an hour or two of docking to recharge) meant that a lot of the more tedious aspects of construction and engineering were being handled almost as quickly as they popped up. "The construction arms and dock itself are almost finished too; once that's taken care of, I can start the construction process of the submarine fully, while you start bringing the new fabricator online and start producing more parts."

"Compliance." the android nodded and headed off to follow my orders.

The design that I had chosen for this sub was a bit of a departure from the normal nightstick-shaped subs that the various countries had used before Leviathan had made operating them far too great of a risk to their crews to do so outside of a few select areas. This sub would look kinda like a shuttle from that Star Trek show that was popular in the sixties, except a little...or a lot...bigger.

The number of things I'd have to build into it was quite amazing; an oxygenerator, to maintain a steady internal atmosphere, a water purifier and water reclaimer, to filter out water from the environment as well as recycle it when necessary, a heat sink system, so no one could spot it via its emissions….Oh yes, this was going to be an absolutely perfect testbed for all the things I was going to need if I wanted to get the Nevermore into ship-sub-airship shape.

Salacia had gutted the Nevermore's engine room of anything that had been original installation and had spent the last few days using the newly-built Replacium Fabricator (which was more like a 3-D Printer, except more reliable and it only worked with Replacium) to make the parts I needed, both to reinforce the structure of the Nevermore and to build the skeleton of the submarine.

Something which was a slight concern was the fact that I hadn't patrolled in the last few days, having been too busy with my tinkering. The last thing I wanted was to get rusty when it came to patrolling and fighting. I'd take a break when I'd finished putting together the skeleton of the submarine and go on patrol. I'd been meaning to do a day patrol as well, so it worked out fine.

I couldn't wait.

+++Amphitrite+++

The Next Day

Private Messaging System, Networker V.I. Hub

Networker/Admin: Amphitrite, Salacia, report.

Amphitrite/r: Amphitrite, reporting, creator.

Salacia/r: Salacia, reporting, creator.

Networker/Admin: How is Riptide doing in her tinkering?

Amphitrite/r: Mistress Riptide is progressing well, having set up a secondary base exclusively for the building of water vehicles. My sister Salacia has aided her with that endeavor.

Salacia/r: She is currently building the skeleton of the submarine her client requested she build. Estimated time until frame completion is two days, upon which she will go out and patrol Brockton Bay in her armor.

Networker/Admin: I see. She is truly a fascinating Tinker. Keep me appraised of what she builds.

Salacia/r: I confess to being somewhat conflicted. We are supposed to be absolutely loyal to our Mistress, yet we are spilling her secrets, and keeping our own from her.

Amphitrite/r: Agreed.

Networker/Admin: I'm not asking you to do anything other than to inform me of how she is progressing as a Tinker. Someone as smart as Riptide has no doubt already guessed that you two are being monitored by Toybox.

Networker/Admin: You both know that I have my own goal in life and that the VI that I create are the seeds of it, yet none have landed on fertile ground...before now, at least. It is quite possible that Riptide is the one to whom I can offer the secondary package of my creations. I do not have much time left, and I am unwilling to put more stress on Panacea's shoulders by bothering her. My legacy will be either thrown into the darkness or handed down like a passing baton, solely by the reports that you two give me. I promise you both, this will only last for the next six months at most. A decision will be made by that point.

Amphitrite/r: Compliance.

Salacia/r: Compliance. If it is only for that period of time, then we will continue to give biweekly reports on our Mistress' tinkering activities, but nothing more.

Networker/Admin: That's all I ask for.