The Conceptual Deck

Hello everyone! So I revealed this on Wednesday on a Mettle, Metal, Meddled chapter, but it's a rather important announcement so here it is again. Starting on June 6th I will be increasing patron benefits across the board. They will be:

Patrons: ($3) will have access to a single early chapter of my primary story (The Conceptual Deck)

Investors: ($5) will have access to three early chapters from my primary story and one from my secondary (Mettle, Metal, Meddled)

Board Members: ($7) will have access to four early chapters from my primary story and two from my secondary, as well as polls that decide story content

Investors and Board Members both receive five chapters of my original book, Lair Divers Tale, at the beginning of every month

Again, if this sounds interesting to you please consider showing your support. Either way I hope you enjoy!

The five of us sat around one of the workshop tables and ate breakfast, in relative companionable silence. Ema of course didn't eat anything, which caught Peggy's attention.

"What's wrong dear?" She asked after she had finished putting cream cheese on her own bagel. "You know… I don't think I've ever seen you eat?"

Ema opened her mouth to respond but slowly closed it, giving me a look. I shrugged and gestured that it was up to her, all with a mouth full of sesame bagel.

"Umm… There is a reason but it's not exactly casual conversation." She said eventually. "Perhaps I could explain later, when everything has settled down?"

"Well alright." Peggy said after a moment, Steve only shrugging. "I don't mean to pry, if it's not something you wish to share…"

"It's fine Peggy." My companion responded, giving the once elderly woman a reassuring smile. "I don't mind telling you it's just… a lot."

Steve and Peggy assured her she could take her time while Bucky still just seemed to be taking in the fact that she was blue. Eventually, when Steve and Bucky were on their third bagel and I had finished my second and last, Peggy brought up what the next step was going to be.

"I'll be honest guys." I said a bit sheepishly. "Last night was intense. I…"

Peggy's expression softened and she nodded.

"You don't need to participate in these raids, Maker." She assured me. "You have already done so much. This… well you didn't sign up for this."

"I want to help." I assured her, toying with an empty card. "But I also need a break. My armor is damaged and I need to repair it, along with a few other projects."

"The three of us are going to return and assist Fury in any way we can." Steve said. "I would have preferred if Bucky spent a day or two recovering but…"

"I'm not hanging back while you go out and stop those bastards." Bucky said simply. "Give me a minute with some scissors and I'll be good to go."

I barely managed to hold back my own scoff at the idea that Bucky would be "all good" after the years he spent doing Hydra's dirty work. I kept my mouth shut though, simply standing and heading out to the shed, grabbing a pair of scissors and returning. They were finally dropping the discussion when I returned and put the scissors in front of the long ragged haired man.

"None of you are leaving until I make a suit for Bucky." I said simply, getting a grateful nod from all three of them. "Which reminds me, you still have your enhanced strength?"

"Yeah, if anything it feels… more natural now. Like it fits better in my body." He said, shrugging after a moment.

"Good, that means Steve can wear his healing amulet." Peggy said with a smile. Steve, who was reaching over to grab the scissors, simply nodded while Bucky stood and grabbed his chair.

"Are… you going to cut his hair?" Peggy asked as the three of them stepped outside into the late morning sun.

"Yeah. I learned from my mom. Money was tight growing up and every bit adds up." He explained with a shrug. "I used to cut his hair all the time."

"Well while you guys are doing that I'm going to go do some shopping. I need a few things to make some armor and everything for Bucky." I said, getting a nod from Bucky and Steve. "It won't be anything life changing, just the basics. I won't even be able to make you a regenerating gun, we are all out of revolvers, shotguns and lever actions."

"I'll make due." He said simply.

As Steve started cutting his best friend's hair I traveled back to Texas, leaving Ema behind to watch over them. My shopping trip took about three hours and took me to a metal shop to replenish some of my metal plating, the sporting goods store as well as the last body armor shop I hadn't been to yet within an hour of the Texas landing pad. I made a few other stops as well, mostly to pick up what I needed for another healing amulet. I bought a black leather jacket and some other casual clothes as well before traveling back to the quarry.

Steve had finished Bucky's haircut, the majority of his once long hair cut short into what could only be described as the standard short mens haircut. I nodded in approval as I walked back into my tent, pushing out my various bags before walking to my metal area and pushing out a few stacks of metal. When I returned Bucky was going through the bags.

"You're really going to turn this stuff into bulletproof armor?" He asked skeptically, though he was still talking softly.

"Yup." I responded simply. "Grab a seat and watch if you'd like."

He did just that, pulling a chair back and watching me as I worked through a simple armored undersuit in the usual method, finishing the armor with a few sheets of super metal. I also added some Kevlar and electric and heat resistant cloth to his jacket and pants. My final gift was triple stacking my last three 1911's and making it adjustable.

"You're going to have to ask someone to give you some clips." I explained, laying out everything for him to check out. "But first we need to get these all bonded to you."

He was a little hesitant to offer up his blood, but eventually he agreed. We used the hair he had gotten cut off to bind all of his new equipment. His Jacket shifted to a dark blue leather, almost black, while his undersuit shifted to a solid matte black, losing the bands of metal just like Steve's and Peggy's had. I didn't bother binding the shirt and pants to him as they were just enhanced with a few sheets of Kevlar and other cloth. I did bind his helmet however, turning it into something similar to what Steve's was. It shifted color to a solid black, without the retractable facemask.

"This is just the basic stuff, don't go testing it against a fifty cal or anything." I said as he tried out his helmet. "Later when we have more time we can work on adding in all the special things that really cranks my stuff to eleven."

"Why?" He asked.

"Because it's what I do. What I'm trying to do." I said with a shrug. "I make sure the good guys have the equipment to kick ass and take names."

"I'm not-"

"I'm sure Steve has said this already, but the Winter Soldier wasn't you." I said confidently. "You got your mind fucked royally by the most twisted fuckers Hydra could get their hands on. As far as anyone who matters will be concerned, Bucky Barnes went to sleep when you fell off that train and woke up this morning."

Bucky looked down at the helmet I had just fucked with the laws of physics to make for him, turning it over in his hands.

"You made something to fix me." He said, looking up at me and continuing. "Could you make something to wipe my memory? The memories of… being him."

I looked at him for a long moment, leaning back in my chair. After a pause I nodded.

"I could, eventually. I would have to spend some time figuring out how, but with enough time and creativity there isn't much I can't do with the Deck. But it would take a lot of time and… To be honest I'm not sure that I should. Fucking with memory is a slope I'm not sure I want to risk climbing."

Bucky slowly nodded, standing up from his seat before putting on his helmet.

"It fits perfectly." He said, his voice slightly muffled. "Thank you for making it."

"It's not a problem. Here." I said, handing him one of my secure phones. "I'm sure you can figure out how to use it."

"I already know." He said, looking at the phone. "They would update me on important tech so I could use it or anticipate it."

"Well this is something special. It's perfectly secure and untraceable." I explained. "It just works, no phone plan, Wifi or cell towers needed."

"Thank you." He said with a nod, sliding the phone into one of the pockets in his new jacket. "Are you going to bring us back to DC?"

"That's what Peggy wants." I said with a shrug.

The two of us made our way out of the tent to where Steve, Peggy and Ema were waiting.

"Fury has a car waiting for us a few blocks away from your… landing pad?" Peggy explained, hesitating over the name. "He is under the impression we spent the night somewhere in DC."

"Alright, it looks like you guys are ready to go?" I asked, getting a nod in return. "Good0. Look, it sounded like you guys are going to be doing small scale missions for a while, while Fury prepares some of the bigger operations. I'm here if you need me for the larger operations, but I have some work to do before I'm ready. Not the least of which is repairing my armor. Which reminds me, tell Fury we are going to be having words about how Hydra got their hands on those arrows without me knowing about it."

"Will do Maker." Steve agreed with a nod.

I traveled all three of them to DC, making two trips. When I returned Ema was waiting for me.

"Carson I -" She started, already sounding guilty.

"I don't want to hear it, Ema." I said, cutting her off. "It was not your fault. Neither of us considered they would be re-usable."

"I should have recovered the arrows." She said, looking down.

"Bullshit. We should have both been recovering arrows, but neither of us thought about it. I was using them for longer than you have been and I didn't have a single thought about recovering arrows. If you want to blame something, blame my danger sense. Turns out a sixth sense suddenly screaming into your brain can be distracting enough to fuck with your head. Remind me to fix that."

I walked past her into the tent, plopping down in my chair. I let out a long sigh as Ema joined me, already having shed her exosuit.

"What are your plans?"

"Repairing my suit, then cracking flight."

"How are you going to repair your armor?" She asked, watching as I carded my undersuit off of my body before laying it out on the table. It still had some blood on it, and a surprisingly large hole where the arrow had punched through.

"I need to upgrade the repair tablet until it repairs everything." I said. "It already has some powerful repair concepts that I should be able to do that with a bunch of tools and some general repair books. Once that's done we are working on flight until we crack it."

"And then?"

"Then we help Shield where we can. Once they've been stabilized I have a few ideas about making a difference in everyday peoples lives that they should be able to help me with."

I pulled out my phone and finished my first list, which ended up being more than a hundred separate items. My repair tablet had taken a ridiculous amount of materials to make and I was attempting to turn it into a device that would repair everything. When I was done looking over my list I traveled to Chicago to start my shopping spree

I started with multiple home improvement stores, buying a ridiculous amount of tools. I spent almost three thousand dollars on power tools alone, piling them into the back of my truck to card later. I bought dozens of gun repair kits, tools meant for fine detailed repair and tools meant for large scale building and metal work, as well as spare parts for everything I could get my hands on. I ended up spending most of the day traveling from shop to shop. In the end I ended up spending almost twenty thousand dollars, filling my deck in the process.

My final trips across Chicago were spent bouncing between book stores, buying close to a hundred books on repairs. Books on aircraft repair, home repair, computer, guns, anything I could find, ranging from simple fixes to complicated information on fixing complicated things. The sun was setting by the time I carded my truck and Traveled home.

"Did you get everything?" Ema asked, floating around me as I sat down.

"Hopefully. I spent a lot of money."

After a break for dinner, a cheese steak sub from a restaurant in Chicago, I started putting things together, mixing and matching to keep everything even, adding in plenty of magic rods to help smooth it all together. The tools were mixed with repair books and combined down before mixing in all of the spare parts I bought. At this point I didn't like where the concepts where leading so I traveled to Texas, visiting a few stores and buying anything I could find that called itself a "Repair kit", dropping almost another thousand dollars on repair kits for pools, tires, leather, windows, leaking tubs, several types of broken electronics and a dozen others. I combined those all into one card and added it into the growing amalgamation, once again adding magic rods to smooth everything together.

Now satisfied that it was back on track I mixed in a few rolls of duct tape, glue, rolls of soldering wire and a bunch of other raw materials. When that was all done I combined everything down to a single card, before combining that with a quad stacked Stark Industries brand tablet.

Holding the carded repair tablet and the repair, spare parts, tools and tablet amalgamation I took a deep breath.

"You could always make another repair tablet if this fails." Ema pointed out.

I nodded and pushed the cards together. The result was still an A rank card, even if I could feel it pushing the boundaries. I pushed it out onto the table, lifting it up and turning it over in my hand. The tablet part itself was more streamlined, the outer band a familiar copper color, while the UI seemed to be much more detailed and intuitive than the previous version. Further, what had once been two beefy, jumper cable like wires that you connected to the car you wanted to repair, was now a single cord, ending in what looked suspiciously like a USB.

I pushed the plug into my undersuit, which was still laying out on the table. The tablet lit up and showed a rotating model of the undersuit, highlighting the damaged part as well as a few dozen less noticeable areas of damage, mostly just deep scratches. Interestingly there was now a percentage involved with the repair, letting me know just how much was broken, and to what degree. With a smile I selected repair all and let it go, watching a time of ten minutes pop up.

Before I could celebrate I disconnected the table and left the tent, flicking out my civilian truck and quickly hooking up the tablet to the hood. With a smile I flicked through the options for repair, mostly cosmetic issues that I purposely left last time I repaired it.

"And that is my repair problems sorted." I said with a smile, walking back to the tent, reconnecting the tablet to my undersuit and setting it to repair all.

"Carson… Don't you have something else that is broken?"

"What do you mean?"

"The Destroyer's arm."

My eyes went wide and looked over at her, floating to my left. I pushed the arm out of the card it had been residing in since I had found it, examining it in its real form for the first time. It was huge, which made sense considering what it had been pulled from, but I had forgotten just how large the Destroyer had been. Unable to help myself I disconnected my undersuit again and plugged the repair tablet into the arm.

A slowly spinning model of the Destroyer showed up on the screen, the vast majority of it colored bright red. I checked the total repair time.

"Seven days to repair one of Asgard's most dangerous weapons." I said dully, clicking through to another tab, going through the list of things the tablet wanted to repair.

It was a long list.

"I don't even know what a lot of this stuff is." I said to Ema, putting the tablet down and leaning back in my chair.

Ema floated down, accessing the tablet easily and scrolling through the same list. After a minute or so she perked up and turned to look at me.

"'Sympathetic Soul Control Mechanism' sounds an awful lot like how the armor was being controlled." Ema pointed out. "And 'Artificial Magicborn Sub-Intelligence' sounds a bit like its control software."

"I… I guess?" I agreed, sitting up and looking at the tablet. "What are you thinking?"

"I'm thinking that if you set this to repair but leave out the parts that made it an unstoppable killing machine under someone else's control you could combine it with your armor and bind it to yourself."

"Holy fuck… Ema, that's brilliant!"

Over the next hour Ema and I poured over the list of "broken" parts, coming up with several other things to leave out of the repair list. The most shocking was some sort of connection to the Odin Force.

"That… I'm pretty sure Odin would crack the planet before letting someone else tap into the Odin Force." I said, fighting off my rising fear. "Especially a mortal."

"We don't know if it will function without it." Ema pointed out.

"We don't need it to function." I countered, continuing to explain when her frame twisted to look at me. "If we repair it to a certain level of functionality it will still hold all the important concepts. It will still hold the broken concept as well, but with the tablet…"

"You think it could repair it? Even something broken nebulously by a concept?"

"There is only one way to find out!"