Trigger: Day 6

Word Count: 36,013

Summary of Events:

Spencer came to the conclusion that he needed a disguise of some sort in order to be able to wander around downtown Kynaston and see about combating crime. Further thought about the topic led him to believe that a superhero-style costume would be the best because it would cause his crimefighting identity to be unconnected to his real-world identity. After finding a company that he was certainly hopeful would be able to help him create such an outfit he set about planning what he would want it to look like, drawing his inspiration from the Great Horned Owl he'd seen the other night . . .

Excerpt of the Day:

Ideas in mind, he set about drawing tall, strong boots with protective, but lightweight metal plating down the shins to keep his legs from being broken and enhanced foot cushioning just in case he had to jump from higher-than-normal places, or maybe even to help him push off with good momentum if he wanted to glide, and steel toes so that he could kick hard and cause pain.

He made sure to include tough kneepads just in case the situation necessitated him getting onto his knees for some reason or another, and he put the gun’s hiding place on the side of his thigh.

To make things balanced he decided maybe he could put a gun-shaped grappling-hook launcher on the other leg that featured one of those collapsible grappling hooks, that would help him get up to high places he wasn’t willing to just use his hands and feet for.

He drew up the belt with solid compartments, sort of like hard-shelled travel luggage, except on a significantly smaller scale.

Remembering knives, he went back down to the boots and added places for as many as five knives per boot — not that he was altogether sure he needed that many — and one more by each gun.

The chest part he did pretty much just all bulletproofing; on the upper arms it was the same, but the forearms he covered with thick, metal-reinforced gauntlets — like the boot shafts — with room for a couple knives each, and he made sure that the gauntlets were attached to the gloves, with permanent hooked claws on the fingertips.

An idea jolted him: what if he had at least a claw or two have a small quantity of sedative in it and a changeable short hypodermic needle to inject the sedative? There would only be enough in the claw for one dose and then he’d have to change the needle and refill the compartment later.

If there was the technology for it maybe he could even have a claw that could inject a microscopic tracking device under the skin of someone he wanted to keep tabs on. That would be fun too.

He’d probably want some way to activate and deactivate the injectors, though, because what if he wanted to just grab someone’s shoulder and not hit them with a tracking device and a dose of sedative?

Maybe he could have it that it depended on whether his fingers were close together or far apart, or maybe the switch could be on the outside of his forefinger where only the thumb could hit it — and not accidentally either — with notice of its activation sent to the translucent screens that were the giant circular eyepieces.

Thinking of his helmet again, what if one of his horns was a transmitter and the other was a receiver? Or one was a microphone that could pick up sounds and the other was a sensor that could pick up telecommunication signals?

The possibilities were almost endless.