[COMMISSION] ORIGIN BOXES (A WORM/MARVEL CROSSOVER FANFICTION)

The first thing Armsmaster noticed about the video was that Leet had stopped talking.

It was a small detail, easily overlooked beneath the shaky footage and the excited shouting of whoever had recorded the fight. Leet was usually incapable of keeping his mouth shut when he thought he had an audience. And even in the middle of a confrontation, he had a habit of narrating his own cleverness, making jokes at his opponent's expense, or shouting something that would have sounded considerably more impressive if he had managed to win.

In this recording, he said almost nothing.

He watched Dauntless approach, moved out of the way of the first attack, and immediately put his opponent on the defensive. When Dauntless changed tactics, Leet adjusted. When Dauntless attempted to create distance, Leet anticipated him. There was no obvious trick to it, no sudden deployment of an elaborate weapon, no conveniently timed intervention by Uber.

Forty-seven seconds after the recording began, Dauntless was on the ground. Leet, meanwhile, wore a small but noticeable smirk, his satisfaction evident as he looked towards whoever was recording the fight.

Armsmaster reached for the controls to pause the video. One of the four mechanical appendages behind him shifted, its tip settling against the console, and the movement drew several glances from the others. 

"... Must be pretty useful to have extra limbs, huh, Armsmaster? Or is it Armsy now? Hehe.” Assault chuckled, earning an eye roll from Battery.

Armsmaster offered no comment. He was somewhat relieved when Piggot intervened to keep everyone on task, though he suspected he’d have to answer questions about the appendages later.

“Again,” Director Piggot said.

He restarted it.

Around the conference table, nobody complained. They had watched it several times already, and nobody had come up with a satisfactory explanation. That was why they were here.

The video ended.

"How certain are we that this is the same Leet we've been dealing with for the past year?" Assault asked.

Battery gave him a sideways look, though her expression was inscrutable. "Unless Brockton Bay has two villains with the same name and general appearance, I'd say we're reasonably certain."

In lieu of a response, Armsmaster brought up a second recording, this one taken from a different angle. It showed the opening of the fight, though the view was partially obstructed by a parked car. Then he spoke:

"Both recordings are consistent with Dauntless's report. I've also spoken to him directly. He confirmed that Leet displayed previously unknown traits and that he was unable to adapt quickly enough to regain control of the fight."

"Did he say how he lost?" Piggot asked.

"He said Leet seemed to anticipate his movements. He would commit to an attack, and Leet would already be moving to counter it. Dauntless initially suspected a precognitive ability, but he couldn't establish whether that was the case."

"Precognition," Assault repeated, looking at Leet as if he were seeing him for the first time. "Leet?"

"That's one possible interpretation."

"Sorry. I'm trying to picture it."

"Picture whatever you like after the meeting," Piggot said. "For now, I want an assessment."

Armsmaster stopped the video on a frame showing Leet turning towards Dauntless.

"My assessment is that his cognitive abilities have changed substantially. His reactions were faster than expected, but that alone doesn't account for his performance. He adapted to Dauntless's tactics almost immediately, and his decisions were consistently accurate."

"Could he have prepared for the fight?" Miss Milita asked.

"Certainly. We don't know what happened before the recording began, and the footage doesn't show everything that occurred. However, his ability to adjust when Dauntless changed tactics suggests that preparation alone wouldn't explain the outcome."

"What about building something to help him?"

"Possibly. We haven't recovered any equipment that would account for the difference, but that doesn't mean it wasn't involved."

Battery looked at the frozen image. "Then we don't actually know what his… new power does."

"Not precisely."

"Can we at least say he's more dangerous now?"

"Yes."

Leet had never been harmless, exactly. He was a villain, and a Free Tinker besides, which meant that even his less successful projects could present problems for the people unfortunate enough to encounter them. But his limitations had always been fairly apparent. His equipment was inconsistent, his plans tended to fall apart, and he had never been particularly impressive in a direct confrontation.

Now he had defeated Brockton Bay's rising star, and the video was spreading across the internet.

"How long has this been circulating?" Piggot asked.

"Since yesterday evening," Armsmaster said. "The original upload has already been copied to several platforms besides PHO. We have no reliable way to remove all the copies, and attempting to do so would only attract more attention."

She rubbed her forehead. "Then we need to account for the public response as well as the ability itself. Have we received any reports of people searching for the boxes?"

The question drew everyone’s attention, particularly Armsmaster’s. He wasn’t the only one with reason to be concerned though. Everyone in the room had already watched the second video, posted not long after Leet’s victory over Dauntless, in which Uber eagerly showed off a strange box and spoke at length about what it did.

Battery, pressing onto the matter, glanced at her notes. "Three so far. Two are probably people trying to get attention, but the third came from a patrol near the waterfront. A group of civilians were searching an abandoned storage yard after someone posted its location online, claiming another box had been seen there."

"Was one found?"

"No. The report came in about an hour ago. The patrol cleared the area, but there was no sign of a device."

"Did they disperse?"

"Eventually. A few people argued that the PRT was confiscating the boxes and keeping them for itself. One of them was filming the officers."

Piggot resisted the urge to sigh out loud. They barely understood what the objects were, and people were already searching for them on the strength of an online rumour alone. The location had been a false lead this time, but that offered little reassurance about the next one.

"Make sure the incident is documented," she said. "I don't want patrols treating every person who asks about a box as a threat, but they need to know what to do if a crowd forms around a reported discovery."

Battery nodded.

“Let’s establish what we’re actually dealing with,” Piggot said. “Armsmaster?”

Without turning around, Armsmaster extended one of his newly gained mechanical limbs towards the boxes, drawing attention to the very objects that had caught Brockton Bay’s attention, for good or ill.

They were roughly the size of small suitcases, with smooth surfaces and no visible fastenings. There were no markings or serial numbers, nothing to suggest who had made them or what they were supposed to contain. When Piggot had first encountered one, she’d assumed it was some sort of equipment case. The second had raised questions. By the third, the department had begun to suspect that the resemblance to ordinary luggage was misleading.

"Para-Power Imbuers," Armsmaster said.

Assault looked at him, obviously amused. "You're serious?"

"It's a provisional designation," Armsmaster replied, his expression remaining unchanged. "It's descriptive, and it makes no assumptions about their origin."

"Right. Para-Power Imbuers." Assault glanced at the nearest box. "I give it a week before someone starts calling them magic boxes or something else."

"People online have started calling them Origin Boxes," Battery said.

Piggot turned to her. "How widespread is that?"

"It's appearing in discussions about Leet's fight and after Uber's video about it. People are connecting his new ability to the boxes, though there's very little agreement on what they actually are. Some think they're Tinkertech. Others think they're alien technology. There are even people claiming the fight was staged."

"Can we establish whether the boxes are responsible?" Miss Milita asked.

Armsmaster rested his hands on the table, the four mechanical appendages behind him remaining still. "I acquired my additional appendages after an encounter with one of the boxes during patrol. Vista's abilities changed around the same time she came into contact with another. Leet's case appears consistent with ours, although we have considerably less information about what happened to him."

"That's still circumstantial," Piggot said.

"Yes. But three cases with similar circumstances are difficult to dismiss as mere coincidence."

Piggot nodded slowly. "Then we treat the connection as probable, pending further evidence. I don't want speculation presented as fact, either internally or in anything we release to the public."

Armsmaster nodded and brought up a set of photographs.

"The three devices in our possession have similar external characteristics. We've examined them using several methods, but we haven't been able to determine their composition conclusively. Our attempts to activate them under controlled conditions have also been unsuccessful."

Armsmaster had already spent several hours examining the devices, with little to show for it other than exhaustion. He could study their surfaces and inspect what little he could access, but nothing he found offered an explanation for how they worked, let alone how they produced such extraordinary effects.

He expected that he could eventually understand the boxes themselves. The catalysts that had given him, and likely others, these newfound abilities were another matter entirely. He still had no idea how they worked.

Thankfully, his own transformation had been easier to investigate. A basic scan confirmed that the additional limbs were fused with his body through a harness of sorts that now wrapped around him, and he could test their strength, range of motion, and practical limitations. He was beginning to understand what they could do, but how they had become part of him in the first place remained a mystery.

The same couldn’t be said for Vista. He noticed her flinch as he looked in her direction, and he couldn’t blame her. The poor girl had been left wearing an outfit that was hardly appropriate for a twelve-year-old, predominantly black, with a spiked headdress and thigh-high boots. She now wielded powers that seemed more fantastical than any they had encountered so far, and he doubted she was any happier about them than she appeared.

Then there was the giant sword that had come with her powers, currently stored in his armory. He still had no idea what to make of it.

"Have we tried destroying one?" Assault asked.

"No," Armsmaster said.

"Why?"

"Attempting to destroy a Tinker-Object with unknown mechanisms and volatile energies is ill-advised.."

"Have we tried opening one?"

"Yes."

"And?"

"You realize Vista and I have been changed because of it?"

Assault frowned at the nearest box. "So they're indestructible boxes that randomly give people powers."

"We haven't established that the boxes are indestructible," Armsmaster said. "Only that our attempts to damage must be done under controlled factors, which we have yet to do."

"Fair enough." Assault leaned back in his chair.

Piggot let the exchange pass before asking, "How many people have we identified so far?"

"Five potential cases," Armsmaster said. "Vista and I are confirmed to have acquired abilities in circumstances involving the boxes. Leet has demonstrated an unfamiliar ability, though we still need evidence connecting it to the devices as he appears normal, even if his tactics have changed. We also have evidence suggesting that two teens, Greg Verder and Taylor Hebert, may have acquired powers through them."

"May have?"

"Verder demonstrated an unusual capability at the city's waterfront, but we haven't confirmed how he acquired it. Hebert's case is less certain. Her apparent acquisition coincides with an incident at Winslow High, but we don't have a complete account of what happened."

"Then we have three confirmed cases of new abilities and two suspected cases involving the boxes," Piggot said. "Keep the distinction clear. I don't want our reports treating an inference as an established fact."

Miss Milita glanced at her notes. "Have we searched the suspected locations where the abilities first appeared for the boxes?"

"Where possible," Armsmaster said. "The difficulty is that we don't know whether the boxes can be moved freely before someone finds them, or whether their appearance follows any pattern. We have three in our possession, but we can't establish how representative they are."

"Could the boxes be intentionally distributed?" Battery asked.

"Possibly."

"Any suspicion?"

"Many, but we lack evidence." 

While he and Vista could give their accounts, there was no real data to indicate someone placed them knowing the two would find them or not. Thus he kept it as a hypothesis for now.

Piggot made a note, then put the pen down. "Can we identify someone whose abilities come from one?"

"Not reliably," Armsmaster said. "We can document the resulting abilities and compare them against existing records, but there may be no obvious way to distinguish them from normal parahuman abilities. My own case is unusual enough that the physical changes are apparent. That won't necessarily be true of every recipient."

"So someone could acquire a power, keep it hidden, and never come to our attention?"

"Yes."

Piggot looked towards the boxes. "Then we have two problems to solve. We need to locate as many of these devices as we can, assuming there are more in the city, and we need a reliable way to distinguish abilities granted by the boxes from ordinary parahuman powers."

Miss Milita nodded. "I'll prepare a response plan for recovering additional devices. We should have a team ready to handle discoveries without pulling everyone off regular patrols."

"Good. Include procedures for approaching people who have already used one. I want the first version tomorrow, even if we have to revise it later."

Battery tapped her notes. "I'll coordinate with the patrols and look into the reports from the Boardwalk. We should also review the existing threat assessments. If someone's ability has changed substantially, our old information may no longer be useful."

"Start with the known cases," Piggot said. "And please, for the love of god, keep the confirmed cases separate from the suspected ones."

Vista had been listening with her hands folded in her lap, saying little. She was only here because she was a confirmed case of someone affected by one of the boxes, and the PRT wanted to discuss her situation and arrange further testing. Under other circumstances, she might have taken pride in being the only Ward present. Today, she had too much on her mind to give it much thought. She shifted in her seat, the costume, for lack of a better term, pulling against her body.

"Can I ask something?"

Piggot turned to her. "Go ahead."

"Are we assuming everyone who gets one will want to work with us?"

Nobody answered immediately, so Vista continued, glancing at the boxes. "I mean, if somebody finds one and uses it, they might be scared of what happens. Or they might think we're going to take it away from them. If we show up and start asking questions, they could run before we even get to explain anything."

"That's a possibility," Miss Militia said.

"Or they could decide they need to defend themselves," Battery added. "Especially if they've seen the video and think the PRT will treat them as a threat." 

This wasn't even mentioning if someone with ill-intent managed to find one.

Piggot nodded slowly.

"Then our approach needs to account for that. We don't treat someone as a criminal simply because they've acquired the box or gained an ability, regardless of what it is. We assess the circumstances, establish what they can do, and determine whether there's a reason for intervention."

"And if they refuse to cooperate?" Assault asked.

"Then we deal with the situation as it develops. I won't have our teams provoking confrontations because someone has a power we don't understand."

Vista seemed relieved by that, though she still looked troubled.

Piggot noticed the way she kept adjusting her pauldron. "How are you managing, Vista?"

The question caught her off guard, but she was quick to reply. "I'm fine."

Piggot waited.

Vista sighed. "The power is fine. Mostly. I still need to figure out some of the things it can do, especially the way it's affecting my original powers, but I can work with it."

"And the rest?"

Vista looked down at herself, muttering, "I didn't exactly choose the outfit."

Assault's eyes flicked towards her, then away again. Even he seemed to understand that this wasn't the time to make a joke, with the female heroes being the most sympathetic. 

Piggot's expression softened slightly.

"We'll arrange for you to be examined further and make sure there aren't any new complications. As for the clothing, we'll address those as well. For now, I want you testing your new abilities under supervision."

"All right."

"And don't attempt anything you haven't already discussed with Armsmaster."

"I wasn't planning to."

"Good."

Vista fell silent, apparently deciding that she had said enough.

Armsmaster returned to the report. "There is another concern. We don't know whether the abilities granted by the Para-Power Imbuers are stable, or whether they can evolve over time, let alone how they may clash against a Parahumans original powers. Leet's performance suggests a substantial improvement in his cognitive capabilities, but we don't know whether that improvement is permanent or whether it has limitations. Or even if that's all."

"Can we establish those limitations?" Miss Milita asked.

"Only through observation and testing. We can't compel every case to participate, and we have no reliable way to determine what their abilities are without their cooperation."

Battery looked towards the paused video.

"Then we should expect some people to exploit the uncertainty. Leet certainly will."

"He's already doing so," Assault said. "The video's being shared everywhere. Whatever he was like before, people are going to look at him differently now."

"That may be precisely what he wants," Piggot said.

She had little interest in speculating about Leet's motives, but the public consequences were obvious enough. A villain who had previously been dismissed as a relatively minor threat had defeated a Protectorate hero on camera, one with substantial power at that through nothing more than simple, yet efficient, movement and strikes. People would draw conclusions from that, whether those conclusions were justified or not.

"Armsmaster, continue your examination of the boxes and document your findings. Don't forget, I also want a preliminary assessment of the known cases. Maybe we can find more than circumstantial evidence this time."

"Understood."

"Assault, you'll assist Battery. I want the field teams briefed on what we know, not what people online think they know. If anyone encounters a box, they are to secure the area and request immediate assistance rather than attempting to touch or move it."

Assault nodded. "I'll make sure they understand."

Piggot looked around the table.

"We're not going to solve this in a day. We may not even understand what we're dealing with by the end of the week. But that doesn't excuse us from preparing for what comes next. We have a limited amount of information, and we need to make the best decisions we can with it."

She gathered her notes.

"That's all for now. Keep me informed of anything that changes."

The meeting broke up without much ceremony. Militia was already discussing personnel requirements with Battery as they gathered their things. Assault lingered long enough to ask Armsmaster whether the additional limbs affected his balance, then made an excuse to leave when Armsmaster began explaining the answer in more detail than he'd apparently anticipated.

Vista was almost at the door when she stopped and glanced back at the boxes.

"Do you think whoever made these knows what they're doing?" she asked.

Armsmaster's lips thinned as he considered the question. "The devices appear to function as intended. Whether their creator understands the consequences is another question."

Vista frowned. "That's not very reassuring."

"No," he admitted. "It isn't."

She gave him a small, rueful smile before leaving.

Armsmaster collected his notes. One of his limbs reached for the folder he'd left near the projector while another held the papers in place. He was already thinking about the next round of tests, particularly whether he could establish any connection between the boxes and the changes in his own physiology, when Piggot spoke.

"Armsmaster."

He turned towards her. Piggot had risen from her chair, moving more smoothly than previously, but seemed to have forgotten what she meant to do next. Her gaze moved briefly to the others as they filed out, and she waited until the last of them had left before looking back at him.

"Could you stay behind for a moment?"

"Of course," he said, putting his notes aside and waiting until the door had closed.

As for the three boxes, they remained on the table, their smooth surfaces reflecting the fluorescent lights. Somewhere beyond the PRT headquarters, people were watching Leet's fight with Dauntless, discussing what it meant, and wondering whether they might find one of the objects for themselves. Imagining the possibilities if the rumors were true that these boxes could grant powers.

And it wasn't just civilians discussing them either.

The department officially had three confirmed cases of new abilities and two suspected cases involving the boxes. But there were almost certainly more boxes out there. Some would be found by people who had no idea what they were dealing with, while others might end up in the hands of people who understood exactly what they could do with their new powers. Armsmaster could only hope the next person to find one would be less dangerous than Leet.

He had a lot of work ahead of him. They all did.