In the morning Zachary promptly awoke and found that breakfast, mainly cereal, powdered milk and fresh bread and toast, was available even at the relatively early time he had arisen. He found that because everybody had different duties everybody had to have breakfast at different times, so it was available early in the morning until some time approaching noon. He quickly ate his breakfast so he would be able to get busy with engineering to take his mind off the thoughts which had driven him out of bed.

After a few more hours of work, Zachary completed the device. The base was shaped like a large upturned bowl, and was actually significantly weighted to keep it on the ground when in operation. Out the top came the wind core atop a heavy metal spring, with a sheath of metal half-covering the spring. To be slotted into that sheath of metal is another metal covering over the wind core, which would direct most of the sound in the opposite direction. Out of the side of the device came an insulated wire about 5 meters long leading to a hand held switch. When not in use that wire can be coiled up and hung on a hook on the side of the device. At a flick of that switch, the circuit will be closed, a current will run through an oscillator and then to the wind core, producing air vibrations of about 2500 Hz with a loudness well over 120 dB.

That was in theory. It worked on paper, and his machine reading allowed him to ensure that there were no faults in the assembly, but certainty can only be obtained through testing. Tentatively, Zachary put on earmuffs and safety goggles, took the switch, moved the full five meters away then flicked the switch. Immediately he curled up to protect his ears from the sound, even though he was still wearing the earmuffs. Dust was shaken from every crevice of the shed and the device was vibrating so much that it was slowly moving. Less than a second later Zachary turned it off. With his ears still ringing and himself surprised with the effectiveness of his device, he approached the machine to inspect it for damage.

Satisfied that there was none, he had a modification to make. A weapon was no good if it was dangerous to the user as well as the target, so he extended the cable to ten meters, which would cut the intensity by a factor of four. Then for the next trial he attached the metal cowl over the air core, directed it away from himself and tried again. This time he did not recoil, although the sound was still very intense, but he did observe that the opposite wall was vibrating. A few seconds later he decided to turn it off.

As he checked again for any damage, he realised that the whole manor, indeed, the whole neighbourhood probably heard that noise. It did not matter. The surrounding neighbourhood was probably well under Winters' control. The project complete, Zachary removed his safety equipment, put his tools and scrap away, then lifted the sonic weapon off the ground and hauled it over to the manor.

Finding Matthias Winters was not hard, for he had heard the noise just like everyone else and had naturally come to inspect. Zachary explained the operation of the device, how it was not to be used at close range, how the cowl can be used to make the sound more directed, and where the battery is if it needs replacing before the rest of the device. With Matthias' approval, Zachary handed the device over to him, who would find it rather heavy, but still able to be carried with a reasonable amount of effort. Receiving his payment, Zachary bade Winters farewell and took his leave.
 
 
Zachary still had some business to attend to before all hell broke loose for a second time in this city. He needed to collect all his stuff and bring it to a central location, perhaps in the Winters household.

He had made it over a skyway and was navigating the streets when a military patrol of 8 soldiers was in his path. They noticed him nearly immediately, but so did Zachary so before they could start shooting him he dived into a side streets, and immediately he realised that he had made a grave mistake. The alleyway was a dead end, and before he could back out the patrol and run to the entrance. Zachary dived out of the drivers seat and took cover behind his carriage, which was now facing sideways, as plasma bolts seared down the alley. They embedded themselves into the side of the carriage, burning holes through the shell.

Zachary quickly took stock of his situation. The alleyway had no convenient doors to flee into, at least not without having to run half way out of the alley through the plasma fire, so he was trapped. There was a dumpster to one side which could serve as additional cover, and a rusted wreck of a carriage heaped with further detritus from the cataclysm at the end of the alleyway.

A sudden burst of molten metal droplets above his head made Zachary flinch. His carriage obviously wouldn't last long under constant fire like this. Quickly, he telemagnetically grabbed a few pieces of sheared metal from the end of the alleyway, peeked his head around the side of the carriage and then propelled them at the soldiers. While normally such projectiles might draw blood, fracture bone or knock over, the soldiers were largely unaffected, and Zachary realised that this was so because they all were wearing kinetic shield modules like his own. He heard shouts about him being a host, but that hardly mattered to him because they were going to shoot him either way. He needed to find another solution and fast.

[b][i]The plasma rifle. Now is as good a time as any to use it,[/i][/b] Kaa'is said.

Zachary had an aversion to using such a lethal weapon, but at the same time he knew that he was literally backed into a corner and there was little alternative. He was too far away to disarm them all. Suddenly there was a loud clunk as a plasma shot struck something important in the carriage and the front half of it fell to the ground. Hurrying, Zachary levitated the plasma rifle over the top of the carriage and started firing at the soldiers. Looking around he saw one soldier collapse as he was struck in the side and the rest make a swift retreat to cover at the entrance of the alleyway.

Now that they were restricted to firing around corners the rate of fire at him had dropped substantially, but he was not safe yet for they were still there. The man he had shot was dragging himself to cover, but Zachary did not shoot him again partly because he couldn't bring himself to, partly because he couldn't justify doing so, and partly because all his fire power was busy providing suppressive fire. He was busy trying to figure out his next move when a grenade rolled in front of his carriage. Swiftly recognising the threat, Zachary telemagnetically forced it away, and it bounced out of the alleyway and exploded somewhere outside the mouth of the alley. For a moment the shooting stopped, and he thought for a moment with a strange mixture of dread and ecstasy that he had killed them all. Unbeknownst to him the fragmentation had incapacitated three more soldiers, but the remaining soldiers were still well and able to fight and the barrage of plasma resumed moments later.

Maintaining the suppressive fire from his plasma rifle, Zachary and Kaa'is frantically tried to plan their way out of this corner without getting shot to pieces. The situation was not looking too well for Zachary, but the fire fight was also quite noisy and bound to attract attention.