Vaudevillain

Chapter 111: Anticipation

Creating the Zloppelin required a few other additions to Dr. Zlo's list of factories and devices, namely a storage container for Sciencium. Initially, Dylan didn't think his power would let him store the material since the description specifically mentioned using the resource. But Jack's insistence on experimenting with Cass came back to him. If it weren't for her urging, Dr. Zlo would never have realized how secretly strong Cass could be.

Cass wasn't conventionally strong, not by a longshot. He'd never be able to take on Mabel, and facing any NPC hero is a square fight was right out. But the butler was stronger than his Jacques and could make unlimited alcoholic beverages. Well, maybe not unlimited, but Jack hadn't found a limit when they tested.

There were limitations, however. Cass couldn't make anything outright dangerous, and he couldn't make drinks that didn't exist on Earth. Health potions and similar elixirs were impossible for the butler, much to Jack's disappointment. She had really wanted Cass to break some kind of mechanic. Personally, Dylan thought an unlimited supply of alcohol was broken enough.

Cass's secret power had made Dylan wonder what else he'd missed out on. Did his power of mad science let him make Phlebotinium? Or Alienite? How flexible was his power, truly? With all sorts of new questions in his head, Dylan went to work building a laboratory. Right now, everything sat in his inventory; he'd set it all up once he created his lair in Skyline's underground.

The first thing he tested was a Sciencium storage device. He started with a small container, only holding a single piece, and worked his way up to push the limits. He found that the materials required for the storage device scaled with the amount stored, up to a million pieces. After that, the requirements needed increasingly esoteric materials and more Phlebotinium than he had on him. Dylan settled on making a few one hundred piece storages to keep them in his inventory.

He tested a few other creations in the days leading up to the big eventthings like Phlebotinium growers and detectors, plus similar ideas for Alienite. Detectors were possible, but they weren't accurate. They could give a general direction but couldn't pinpoint areas. At least it confirmed a source of Phlebotinium on Resource Hill. Growing the material was impossible, for both Alienite and Phlebotinium.

Dylan's experimentation did lead him to a discovery. It turned out that he could make Alienite. All he needed was depleted Phlebotinium, and some Quli blood, which felt so much like mad science Dylan immediately gave an evil laugh when he discovered it. The idea of an alien suspended in a pod inside a laboratory brought him back to the depictions of crazed scientists in labcoats.

There were a few other experiments Dylan tried, mostly at the behest of Jack. She wanted to see if he could make magical items (he couldn't) and if he could make a general enhancement invention (he could). The latter now sat inside the invention hub in Skyline. Jack had spent the past day inside tossing power sources and Alienite into the machine, ignoring everyone else in the process.

"Mabel, how are we looking?" Dr. Zlo asked his minion.

"The Jacques are almost done loading everything, hon," Mabel replied. "But are you sure we need all of this?"

"We're about to take on three whole cities, Mabel! I say there's plenty of need. And as I've heard, there's no kill like overkill."

Dr. Zlo watched as the Jacques loaded up the last of his payloads. To keep with the event's theme, Dr. Zlo and Jack created a series of explosives that caused nautical mayhem. The more strange devices were all Dr. Zlo's creations and limited in scope. But Jack's blueprint ability created factories which, in turn, mass-produced weapons. Weapons that all the villains could have if they chose to work with the villains.

An alarm went off in Dylan's head. It was time for him to wake up. The villain took one last look at his minions and smiled.

Sweet Dream sat inside the OOC Lounge with Riptide, the two holding hands and relaxing before the big event.

"You nervous, babe?" Riptide asked.

Sweet Dream shook her head, "Nah; this should be fun. All my gadgets and minions are prepared, and I know what target I want to hit first. How about you?"

"No way. I can't wait to use all this new stuff."

Caroline looked at the broad smile on her boyfriend's face. "You know," she said, snuggling into his arm, "I never expected to do something like this."

"I know, right!" Riptide grinned. "I never thought you'd be the one to snuggle up to me."

Sweet Dream blushed and pinched her boyfriend's arm, playfully, "Quiet. You know what I meant."

Liam laughed and put his arm around his girlfriend. "You're right. I'd still be surfing waves of water if Dr. Zlo didn't make a giant crab robot attack the beach I was on."

He thought back to that time before. If he never called out to Dr. Zlo, Riptide would still be sitting on Haven's beach, never knowing how awesome it was to surf in the air. Or how awesome it was to surf a laser.

"You never told me about that," Sweet Dream said.

Riptide looked down, "I didn't? Well, it went something like this"

Sweet Dream listened as her boyfriend retold the tale of Dr. Zlo fighting in a giant robotic crab. Boyfriend, now there was a word she never expected to say about Liam. The two couldn't have been more different. She was majoring in graphic design, and he majored in communications. Usually, they'd never have met, considering how different their degrees were. But all it took was one film studies course, and now look at them.

He'd been the one to pull her into World of Supers, too. Now that was something she never expected. Liam looked every inch the stereotypical surf rat, with salt-sprayed hair and tanned skin. In fact, his avatar in this world resembled Liam, but Riptide didn't have any of the Asian-American features her boyfriend had. Instead, Riptide had blond hair and looked like a pop star.

Of course, Caroline looked nothing like her avatar. She was a bit dumpy from all her time at a computer, and her metabolism never caught up to the amount of snacks she ate, especially sweets. Sweet Dream was a way for her to curb that feeling. Since sweets tasted the same here as in the real world, she could eat her heart out without ever getting fat.

She chuckled a little. It seemed she had found the next fad diet before anyone else.

"You listening, babe?" Riptide asked.

Sweet Dream started. She'd stopped paying attention to his story halfway through!

"Crap, I'm sorry. I got distracted with my thoughts."

"No worries," Riptide said as he squeezed her shoulder. "I wouldn't want to bore you."

"You could never," Sweet Dream replied, a bit more forcefully than she intended.

"Haha, okay then."

Caroline blushed again as she noticed how close his face was. "Come on; we should get up for classes," she said, changing the subject. "You've got that math assignment to work on, and I still need to finish some editing."

Shizuka scaled up the outer skeleton that was Skyline's skyscraper, hands gripping her ninja tools. She absolutely couldn't wait for this event to start, and the excitement was causing all sorts of impatient jitters. That was why the ninja decided to go for a quick walk, which became a jog, which became a full-on sprint, which turned into scaling the tallest building around.

Shizuka swung herself onto one of the steel girders the construction bots placed and took a look at the fledgling city. Clouds swirled around the city's edge, puffy marshmallows and cotton balls constructed to hide the city from view. Shizuka admired the calming picture for a second, taking in everything they accomplished over the past weeks. Who would have thought that a simple work agreement would turn into such a fun adventure.

Working for Dex started out as a simple way to kill time. Both players were early adopters of the game, and Dex was particularly cunning when it came to exploiting the environment. Shizuka hadn't cared about that; she was content with testing out this brand new world. Normally, they wouldn't be friends, but Shizuka changed that by showing up to a gang meeting and causing chaos. Dex was there too and had taken a shine to her off-the-wall personality, at least that was how Shizuka saw it.

She was fully aware of how over-the-top she acted but didn't care about what others thought. Shizuka was here to get enjoyment out of the game, and that meant new experiences. Besides, it was a game. It wasn't like there were actual consequences. Though she did hold the thought that World of Supers would become a death game at some point. She was sure everyone had that thought when Vert released the VIS. Humans spent so much time fantasizing about things that could kill them, after all.

Shizuka spawned a clone next to her and pushed it off the ledge, following behind it quickly after. The clone spread its arms to slow its descent, which let the ninja catch up. Shizuka gently stood on top of her clone's back and crouched down.

"Ten, nine, eight," she counted.

The ground zoomed closer, much faster than the woman anticipated.

"Seven, six, fivefourthreetwoone!"

Shizuka sprang off of her clone, slowing her momentum while accelerating the clone. With her trajectory changed, the ninja fell into a roll and spun across the pavement. She sprung up with both hands in the air as she landed, attempting to pull off a gymnast stance.

"Ta-da!"

The clone behind her hit the ground at the same time, turning into a blast of smoke that obscured the area for a second. Shizuka bowed to an imaginary crowd then started jogging once more.

Dextra messaged her a minute or so later.

D.Black:

Preparations are made

Since you're the one managing Haven, make sure to let me know if anything gets out of hand.

Shizuka messaged back with a, will do boss, and went back to running. She had a bit more energy to burn before taking a quick break.

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