Issue 1 Downtime

Cal and Bobby had an advantage Needles couldn't have known about in looking for the parts on the list: Cal had worked there, and knew where the things SHOULD be. So they made their way through with a purpose, ducking any cameras and making fairly good time through the building. "God, that guy's a dick, you know?" Cal mused, looking over the list as they walked.

"What the hell is your problem?" Bobby replied, cross.

"Hey, sorry. If you like him, I'll keep my mouth shut," Cal said, holding up a hand in a surrendering gesture.

"You know as well as I do that he can be the biggest arse in the world, but that doesn't matter! We deal with it, and keep our cover intact, and save the city! Christ, All of a sudden the X-Men can't do subtle any more?"

Cal chuckled at that, then he turned to Bobby. "Sure we can. And we need to not act like X-Men for this to be believable. Would some crook sit there and let a peon like Needles try to take out his fuck-up on them? No. Needles isn't the guy we need to impress." He started walking again. "Whoever's really calling the shots is who we have to impress. And they won't be impressed if we let some idiot like Needles scare us or intimidate us."

"What we need to do is keep our eyes and ears open, and not get our heads blown off by fighting with the asses we are investigating. We get kicked out, and we can't fix this. Needles may be scummy, but he's still got enough trust from his bosses to run things his way!"

Bobby shifts fully back to his brass form, punching a wall.

"Hey, what's the worst that'd happen if I pissed him off too much? He tells one of you to kick my ass, I take a fall, and things keep going on. I mean, hell, we're lucky that all of us got in anyway."

"And I don't think it's trust so much as 'nothing important enough to need too much oversight.' Mostly. What do you make of this list?"

Bobby glanced at it for half a second.

"Nothing that can make a sweet car conversion?" He replied, still a little angry.

He did show a flicker of recognition, though.

"That's for data storage," Cal said, pointing to one part. "Like, really labor-intensive data storage. That piece, I know the school uses for something, I'm running through blueprints to remember what."

"Well, that," Bobby added, pointing at a line, "That's a pretty powerful transmitting rod, but it doesn't look like a regular antenna. That.. that's an energy holding chamber, my dad had one in his lab back at ESU... psychic energy holding chamber, maybe? Shit.."

Bobby was trying to connect the dots.

"Shit, you're right. That part's in the controls for Cerebro. I'm not sure what it does, because all that psychic stuff is Greek to me, but it's the only thing in the school that uses that part."

"There's still a ton missing.. none of this stuff really connects directly..."

"Yeah, but I doubt this is the first shopping trip. Or the last. We're not looking at the full list of parts, just the ones they don't have, or the ones they don't have that they're ready to use next."

"Well, that's pretty obvious. Make a copy of the list, and get it back to the University via the net, ok? We need to get this info out."

"Already copied it. I'm not sending anything out in this place, though. This is probably the least secure place in the city to be throwing stuff out in the airwaves, with all of Dr. Tomorrow's super-sensor shit."

Bobby nodded, looking around the hallways. "Good point.."

"Here, there should be the exocylic sander behind that panel," Cal said, pointing to a slightly damaged sheet of metal across the room. "Let's get this wrapped up and get the stuff back to Captain Douchebag, so he can tell his boss how he did such a great job getting the stuff he needed, despite the idiots he has working for him."

"Just be patient, ok? No more fights that might blow our cover?"

Bobby shifted his arm into a crowbar and screwhead, prying and removing the panel to get the component underneath.

Cal chuckled. "Oh, a fight won't blow our cover," he said. "Seriously, what about starting a fight with an asshole says 'hey, this guy really isn't a crook'?"

"We get in a fight, people start looking at us closer. You know how this works!"

"No, not 'us'. Just me. Unless everyone jumps up to defend me. And what's wrong with them looking closer, don't you have a cover story for this kind of stuff?"

"Not really- I'm on reserve status. I'm an entrepreneur now. I'm doing a favor for someone who saved my life once."

"All right, then you need to not have them dig too hard," Cal allowed.

"Look, just take it easy. I'll back you up if we get into trouble, just try not to be the one to throw the first punch, ok?"

Cal smirked. "No, that's the point. Don't back me up. Hell, if something like that happens again, help him kick my ass. I mean, hell, how else am I going to justify not completely humiliating him too soon?"

Bobby raised an eyebrow, smirking back.

"Kick your ass? That I can do."

"Please. You wish, Tinman," Cal scoffed with a smirk.

"We'll see. But let's wrap up here first.."

Hoisting out the exocyclic sander, he gently cradled it to avoid damage.

"Got it. Let's scram."