Charm Learning Shard (Worm/Exalted) (COMPLETED)

You arrive at school half an hour early and find Emma waiting for you at the doors, looking nervous. The hallways are deserted, and no one spots you transferring the contents of her locker to yours. She then hurries off to intercept her various friends and orbiters as they arrive, presumably to spin them some tale of increased scrutiny since the locker incident. 'Good thing I got the tipoff, better go easy on Taylor for a while,' etc.

Isn't friendship great? It's amazing how one person can be the difference between hell on earth and a normal everyday...

---

...unspeakably boring school experience. This time last week you were discovering things that would leave Manton himself staring in awe, playing with the power of the gods, etching words of power into the firmament with letters of golden fire.

Algebra just doesn't measure up.

---

Well, here's a pretty puzzle to distract you. Sophia, aka Your Remaining Problem, showed up to administer your daily dose of abuse. You expected that, but the strange part is Emma, next to her, currently describing how you're so ugly that you have to wear a paper bag over your head whenever you go out to sell blowjobs, which is frequently. You could have sworn you fixed this last night.

Well, Lisa did say that resisting would be hard, not impossible, and apparently Emma feels passionately enough about the challenges you face as a part-time prostitute to fight back against your power.

She doesn't seem very sure of herself, though. When you meet her eyes and smile, she falters and quickly wraps up her narration. You'll have to do some more research tonight.

---

The way Emma keeps glancing about indicates a certain apprehension, but the way she didn't change her route home tells you she is resigned to the inevitable. She still lets out a small scream when you reveal yourself, but she is not truly surprised. She still botches the landing when you push her down, though.

"I'm confused, friend," you say.

"I didn't want to do it! I had no choice!"

"There is always a choice, friend."

"Sophia said, she wanted us to- I can't stand up to her, Taylor, I just can't."

"Ah. And since your despicable cowardice can't be helped, you shouldn't be punished for betraying me? Is that what you're saying?"

"N-no. No, I deserve it. For being weak."

You hesitate. It's not that you disagree with her conclusions (though your reasoning differs slightly). You just don't know how to do this part. 'Nothing that leaves any marks' is a cliche of a hundred gritty police dramas, but the camera generally cuts away to muffled screams from behind a locked door at that point. You never bothered to research the exact mechanics. Is that even what you want?

Various scenarios flit through your imagination, from the childish to the sickening. You could pull her hair. Make her kiss your feet. Grind her face into the dirt. Cut her. Break her arm. Pull out her fingernails. You don't know what you want. Repaying in kind one hundredth of the grief she has caused you over the years shouldn't be this hard.

But... this isn't even your enemy any more. You fixed that. This is your minion, and it disgusts you. It's not working properly, and what you really want is for it to never have been born.

For a moment there you almost forgot that the universe hates happiness. Like an idiot, you thought you could have a taste of victory without it turning into ashes in your mouth.

You have to do something. Emma is staring at you. "Taylor? Are you-"

You scream in frustration and kick her in the ribs. When she whispers "thank you", it's all you can do to keep yourself from running away right then and there. Instead you bend down and help her to her feet. You have to get back in character.

"Much of the fault is mine, friend," you tell her as you help brush the dirt from her jacket. "I should have realized what would happen."

A quick check with sorcerer's sight shows that her Loyalty is a bit battered, but essentially intact. That's good. A more worrying thought occurs to you, though. Her Loyalty is contingent on you meeting her soul's price, and there were two parts to that. You're fighting back plenty, but you've sort of been neglecting the 'friends' part. If you're not careful it might just wink out of existence completely, and then...

To be honest you have no idea what would happen then, because you don't know what mixture of unnatural servitude and all-natural bugfuck nuts is resulting in her current behavior. But better safe than sorry.

"Wanna hang out?" you ask with a smile. A much friendlier smile than the ones you've been using so far.

"What?"

"It's what friends do, isn't it?"

Emma cautiously essays a small chuckle. Meeting no retaliation, she tries a smile as well. "Yeah, it is. Let's."

---

You adjourn to her house. Her mom is happy to see you, at least. Oh Taylor, is that you, it's been so long since you were around, how tall you have grown, etc, etc. She is adorably innocent, in every sense of the word.

The rest of the evening not exactly easy or comfortable. You used to be best friends, then you were worst enemies. Now you're sort of both, but the other way around? Relationship status: It's complicated. There's a whole lot of unexplored social territory here, is what you're trying to say, that may or may not contain dragons and sea monsters.

But you've endured a lot worse (and whose fault was that?). If life insists on giving you ashes, you're going to make some goddamn ashonade. And you're going to choke down that bitter brew no matter what happens, out of sheer spite if nothing else. You hear that, uncaring forces of a materialistic universe that somehow have it out for you in particular? Fuck you!

---

Of course you didn't actually solve anything, and the very next day Emma is back to insulting you with Sophia at her side. Sophia must be really dense not to pick up on Emma's fear and unhappiness, but you guess she just doesn't know her the way you do. Aside from these obvious tells, with sorcerer's sight you're also able to see her Loyalty fraying in real time as she fights against it. At this rate it might last another week, but certainly not two.

You really, really need to come up with a permanent solution to your remaining problem. But it remains true what you said, you don't want to kill her. Well, mostly true. Kinda. You want to not want to kill her. So you won't!

You are distracted from your dark thoughts by your new phone informing you of a text message. Yes! Lisa will save you from this unbearable high school drama.

< meet @ old market aftr school

After school, she says. You shake your head. At no point did you give her any indication that you would be going back to school. Fucking Thinkers.

You let that last word bounce around in your head for a bit. Thinker. Right. You don't think her power is good enough to figure out how you met Panacea just from looking at you. Are you healthier than normal now, after she worked you over? In a noticeable-to-Sherlock-Holmes way? But, you realize with a sinking feeling, that won't even matter. Lisa clearly doesn't think you can take care of yourself (the fact that she's at least partially right really sticks in your craw), and she'd clearly disapprove of your methods.

And she'll easily spot that you know that you did something she'd disapprove of, and then she'll have opinions.

Well, there's your enthusiasm curbed, that's for sure.

---

You call Emma's house while she's still on her way home.

"Miss Barnes? It's Taylor. Is Emma home yet? Could you give her message? Tell her I know she expected us to hang out again tonight, but something important came up. I'll come by tomorrow night instead, if that's all right with you."

Yeah, you could tell that she expected you to 'hang out' again after your encounter today. At least leaving Emma stewing in dread overnight is cheering you up a little bit, you guess.

---

The old market is crowded, but spotting a parahuman in a crowd is not a problem for you. You beeline straight for the glow.

"Taylor. Good to see you again. Sorry about the delay."

You wave away her apology. "Think nothing of it. I managed to keep busy."

Lisa shakes your hand, does not go for the hug. An astute observer would probably read something into that. A very astute observer would wonder about the quick little expressions flashing across her face as she approached and greeted you.

You don't wonder. You have magic eyes, and you've studied her power enough to build your own bootleg version from scratch. You can not only see it activate, but read off each conclusion as it's presented to her. Never mind her face, her mind is an open book to you.

That curiosity is where she sees that you have something to hide. A flash of concern: She does figure out how you went about acquiring Panacea's soul price, impressive. Brief sadness as she finds out that no, you'd see an invitation to join the Undersiders for the obvious attempt to 'save you from yourself' that it would be. But thanks for being so quick to label you unsound of mind and in need of a caretaker, no really, thanks a whole fucking lot.

Now that juicy wince is when she realizes that you're getting all this, probably clued in by your own facial tics. Yeah, two can play at this game. Are we going to pretend that none of that happened? Because you'd be down with that. We are! Excellent.

Lisa leads you off towards the less scenic parts of town. Excellent lair territory, you note, since the recession has left plenty of abandoned industrial properties and workshop/studio apartments for the aspiring villain.

"There are some things you should keep in mind," Lisa tells you as you walk. "Rachel is willing to deal, she could use some help around the lair-"

"Rachel?" you interrupt. "Rachel Lindt?"

"Yeah, that's her."

"Hm," you say.

You remember her from your cape research. Rachel is a homeless person with superpowers. Well, not homeless anymore since she's apparently got a lair now, but yeah. Her villain 'career' has consisted of wandering from city to city, sleeping in the streets, stealing food and fighting off anyone who tried to bother and/or arrest her with her giant mutant dogs.

Oh and also, the reason she was homeless in the first place? She killed her foster mother. Probably some abuse going on there, trigger events don't happen on their own after all. But still. In order to keep you safe, Lisa decided to introduce you to a literal murder hobo? That's interesting.

When you think about it like that, you begin to suspect that you are in fact going to be perfectly safe - that Lisa picked Rachel, the girl with a spicy hint of dangerous psychopath, over one of her more well-groomed villain friends precisely to counteract your obvious resentment at being coddled.

You catch Lisa's power informing her of your line of thought, but she keeps her face impassive. You don't know if you guessed right or not, because your own brand of mind reading only works on things she didn't already know.

"Is it going to be a problem?" Lisa asks ambiguously.

You shrug. It's a combat power, a missing link in virtually all of your infiltration plans. You're not going to complain.

"What kind of help?" you ask instead.

"Regular manual labour, not enough for a full-time henching gig. Taking care of her dogs. She's willing to give power demonstrations in exchange. It's up to you to discuss the exact terms. There's room for negotiation, but if you push too hard she's likely to call the whole thing off.

"If you end up working for her, don't complain or argue about any task she gives you. She'll set her dogs on you if you do. But don't let her push you around on anything outside the agreement, either. She'll try, just to see how you react. Always speak plainly, don't try to be funny or clever. Oh, and don't make eye contact, she doesn't like that."

There's the spicy hint of danger, all right.

"How are you friends with this girl, again?" you ask.

Lisa grimaces slightly. "With some difficulty," she admits.

---

Rachel's 'lair' is impressively shitty. A half-finished building, open to the elements. The floor, such as it is, has of patches of bare concrete here and there, but consists mostly of dirt and scraggly grass. There are maybe a dozen dogs wandering around freely. Does she live here? You see plenty of places for dogs to sleep, but nothing resembling a human bed.

Rachel herself is, well, even further from being pretty than you are. Even without the weathering from years of hard living, there's just no helping that bone structure. If she can be said to be making a statement with her choice of clothes, that statement is 'I can sleep in the street without freezing to death'. You see a mask poking out of a coat pocket. You guess masks are just the done thing, even for someone whose identity is public knowledge.

Lisa greets her with a wave when you step inside, which she doesn't acknowledge. She stares and you, and you remember not to meet her eyes.

"Well?" she asks.

It takes you a moment to realize that she's waiting for you to offer terms. How much should you be asking for? You have no idea about the villain favor economy or common henchman wages.

Crap. Now that you consider it, you can't actually think of any deal that you'd both agree to. Rachel wouldn't go for one-for-one on time spent working versus demonstrating, she'd be no better off than doing the work herself. You wouldn't go for two-for-one, it would take weeks to get her power that way. Maybe a whole month, since you're wasting time on going to school again. Compromise? Rachel would still have very little to gain, and she doesn't strike you as person who'd appreciate more complicated fractions anyway.

Maybe... "Can you show me your power?"

Rachel crosses her arms. "If you work."

"I need to see the merchandise before I buy." That's how professional criminals do it, right? At least in the movies.

It seems to work, at any rate. Rachel calls one of her dogs over and lays her hand on its head. Spines of bone erupt from underneath its fur, then a layer of leathery flesh grows to partially cover the bone, then more bone, etc.

It's fascinating. The dog isn't really growing. The extra flesh and bone is just covering it, like some sort of biological power amor. The dog itself is cradled inside, somehow hooked up to the nervous system(?) and bloodstream(?) of the mutant beast growing around it. This is going to take so much study, you love it.

Rachel removes her hand and it stops growing. Her power doesn't maintain any sort of connection to the dog, so she's not a Master in the sense of controlling anything. But just like you hoped, the dog itself is still thrumming with power. You can tell that it's already fading, though, and will need regular topping up from Rachel. You can work with this.

"I'll work for free as long as you keep a couple of them empowered at all times," you say. How's that for an offer you can't refuse?

Rachel grunts. "Why'd you want to stare at my dogs anyway? You some kind of weird pervert?"

Good thing Lisa coached beforehand, or you would have flubbed this interview question. "None of your fucking business," you reply.

"Fine, you're hired. But if I catch you touching yourself I'll kick your ass. Come on."

Rachel wants a friend who she can understand.

Soul's price is reflexive for you at this point. Interact with parahuman, get price. And look at that, underneath her gruff exterior Rachel is just a big softie who wants a friend who underst- wait, who she can understand? Right, mental issues, of course. Not uncommon in the homeless.

You give Lisa a wry smile and a wave goodbye before you follow your new employer. You note that the Thinker hasn't said a single word since she entered the building. Which is probably her secret trick for maintaining their unlikely friendship.

When you catch up to Rachel she hands you a small shovel and a plastic bag.

"There's shit in the grass," she says.

"Empower your dogs."

She grumbles a bit, but complies. You start shoveling shit. You'd do worse things for a power like hers.

=====

Spoiler: Updated status

Quests:
Tattletale: Bring me the head of Coil
Panacea: Turn Glory Girl into an incestuous lesbian
Shadow Stalker: One get-out-of-jail-free card, please
Bitch: Wants a friend she can understand

 

Every dog comes up to sniff you at some point as you work, but most quickly lose interest once their curiosity has been satisfied. The exception is a young Labrador ('Bubbles', according to Rachel) who decides that you are his new best friend and that you should never leave his side again.

It probably says something depressing about you, how gratified you are to receive a scrap unconditional love like that, even bestowed randomly by a dumb animal. But you just can't help loving him back a tiny bit. He is so adorably jealous of the attention you're paying the transformed dogs ('Brutus' and 'Judas'), you can't even be annoyed at how much he's distracting you.

The monster dogs in question seem a bit bemused as they wander around, as if they are wondering why they are so big when there's no one to fight. They are keeping a wary eye on you as well, probably suspecting that you're the one they are supposed to protect their master from. But they are clearly well trained, so you don't worry about them attacking you. Unless you piss off Rachel, of course.

But never mind all that. The whole point of being here is to study monster dogs, and monster dogs are freaking weird. In the first place, if you hadn't seen them being made, 'dog' would not have been your first guess. More like 'post-apocalyptic rat-lizard hellbeast'.

The power surging through them, you quickly realize, does absolutely nothing to make them stronger or tougher. No, they seem to be exactly as strong as you'd expect a critter made out of a ton of solid muscle to be. And yes, you do mean solid. There's a reason real animals don't consist of 100% muscles, and Rachel's power is working really hard to ignore that.

You're not a biologist, so you can't name and describe every system that is being papered over with... let's just call it magic, because that's essentially what it is. But there's a lot of them. Do they eat? No, their muscles spring into being pre-loaded with, uh, muscle fuel. Do they even breathe? Uh, maybe? You'll come back to that question later.

Freed from the menial parts of dog care, Rachel spends her entire time training them. Once you're done scooping poop she has you feed and water the dogs, then groom them. She doesn't trust you to check their health, but she tells you exactly what she's doing and what she's looking for while she does it. She's clearly training you as well.

All the while, you keep studying. Brains, nervous systems? Not really. Rachel may not be Mastering her dogs, but her dogs are essentially Mastering their meat suits. Completely lacking a physical means of transmitting nerve impulses from the chewy dog center to the crunchy monster exterior, her power makes do with metaphysical means.

You also get a good look at Rachel's end of things, as she has to regularly infuse more power into the dogs to keep them monsterized. Just as planned. Villainous laughter, etc. At first she keeps calling them over and touching them to top them off, but a few hours in she grows tired of this and starts broadcasting her power across the room. You can't quite hide your surprise the first time this happens, but you don't think she noticed.

It brings up an interesting point. Even Rachel, the least sophisticated person you know, initially tried to hide the full extent of her powers even from someone trusted to know the location of her lair. Between that and Lisa keeping her power largely secret (and claiming to be psychic when you first met), you begin to wonder if sandbagging and misdirection isn't another unspoken keystone of cape life. Makes you wonder what other capes are hiding.

You're going to find out, of course.

When it becomes time to go home you ask Rachel to stop empowering the dogs, as you want to watch them return to normal before you leave. As the muscle fuel runs low, it is concentrated deeper in the body and the outermost layers of muscle are reabsorbed. Once a certain critical point is reached the whole thing falls apart and the dog itself emerges, wet with rapidly evaporating - no, vanishing - amniotic fluid(?).

The whole thing strikes you as incredibly baroque. But on the other hand, you do know enough biology to know that evolution isn't all that sexy up close. It's not inconceivable that this was the most expedient way to fulfill a sudden demand for completely reversible monster dogs, the same way that the human retina is welded on backwards.

Just how this bit of natural selection was plucked from its ancestral environment and stuffed into Rachel's brain is another question, though. It's the question in parahuman studies. All things considered, 'God exists, and he's a bit off' might be more plausible than an evolution-based explanation. Scion exists after all, and there are people that claim that he's God and/or the source of powers. He's certainly a bit off.

"Come back same time tomorrow," Rachel says, startling you out of your unproductive ruminations.

"Tomorrow is Saturday," you point out.

"So?"

"No school. I can come by much earlier if you want."

"Yeah. Do that." With that she turns away, leaving you to find your own way out.

---

"Where have you been?" your dad asks when you get home. When you get a bit closer he wrinkles his nose and furrows his brow. "What's that smell?"

"I was volunteering at a dog shelter," you say. It's almost entirely true, and an after-school activity that is unlikely to be forbidden. "Lisa knew one that needed some help and introduced me."

His relieved smile proves your assumptions correct. "Did you have a good time?"

"It has its ups and downs. And by downs I mean dog poop. I'll stick with it for a week or so at least." God damn, are you good at telling your dad the truth or what?

---

You arrive bright and early the next morning, ready for a full day of menial labour and phenomenal cosmic power acquisition. Rachel doesn't even say hello as she hands you the poop shovel, but Bubbles greets you as if you had been gone for a month. He's simultaneously unwilling to leave your side, and so excited that he can't stand still. He compromises by running in tight circles around you, bumping into your legs at least once per lap. Once again his behavior mysteriously fails to annoy you.

Taking care of a dozen dogs is not a full time job, but you don't really want to leave early when there's studying to be done. Your agreement didn't specify anything so formal as hours per day, and Rachel doesn't object as your contribution gradually shifts from working to helping with training to just plain playing with the dogs. Late in the afternoon she shakes things up, though.

"Wanna go for a ride?" she asks.

You blink in confusion before you notice that she's gesturing at Brutus and Judas. You've seen smaller horses, now that you think about it (you have not seen larger horses). You suppose they could serve as riding beasts.

"Sure," you answer. It's not like you're going to turn down quality time with her power.

Rachel climbs up on Brutus' back with practiced ease. You, uh, you had expected saddles, and reins and stuff. Which is silly, where would a homeless person get specialized tack and gear like that? Judas is looking at you expectantly, and you gaze back with a certain apprehension. There are enough bony spurs and protrusions that climbing up does not look overly difficult, but by the same token his back is not going to be very comfortable.

You mentally chastise yourself. You're not here to be comfortable. You scramble your way up and take a seat. The ground feels improbably far away, considering how short the climb was. You let out a small yelp when Judas starts moving, making his way over to Rachel and Brutus at a leisurely pace. You grab hold of some conveniently positioned bone spurs to keep yourself from falling off.

For your next trick you'll try to relax your white-knuckled grip somewhat. You can do this. A slow walk around the yard is no problem at all. When you think about it, this is no different from the pony rides you loved when you were little. Except the girl leading the ponies around the track back then wasn't a mentally unstable murderer (as far as anyone knew).

Then Rachel shouts "Up!", and Brutus gathers himself and leaps four meters straight up, clearing the half-finished back wall. Judas starts running towards the same wall.

"Waitwaitwai-oof!" Your protests are cut off as the force of the launch knocks most of the air out of your lungs. You get about half a wheeze in before the landing, predictably, finishes the job. You spend some time just lying on top of your mount, gasping for breath.

When you look up, you see Rachel grinning at you. It's not a very nice expression, for all that she's clearly amused. Seeing that you've mostly recovered she clicks her tongue, which has Brutus set out at a trot. Judas dutifully follows.

"Rachel, wait!", you shout. "I can't be seen like this! I still have a civilian identity!"

She stops long enough to hand you her mask (a cheap plastic thing, depicting a dog face), then she's off again. Halfway down the street she gives another command, and Brutus turns, leaps, clings to the side of the building, and leaps again to land on the roof opposite. You brace yourself and hold on for dear life as Judas follows suit.

Next time. Next time that happens you won't scream like a little girl.

---

You're not going to claim that it wasn't exciting, or even fun once you got used to the gut-clenching terror and bruising impacts. But when Rachel leaps off her dog still able to walk, you're prepared to grant her an honorary Brute rating.

One larger than yours, certainly. You slide off Judas and land in a heap, whimpering slightly as your butt touches the ground. Look, there's Bubbles again. You protest weakly as he walks all over your prone body in his eagerness to welcome you back.

Rachel snatches her mask off your face. "Same time tomorrow," she says. Was that humor? You're pretty sure Rachel just did a humor at you. You nod weakly at her. Bubbles takes the opportunity to start licking your face.

Eventually you summon the wherewithal to get to your feet. If you make it all the way home you'll be impressed. If you get out of bed tomorrow, you'll be amazed. You're going to go home and soak in a hot bath for hours.

Picturing the steamy bliss ahead of you gives you some comfort as you walk. Then you remember that you promised to hang out with Emma today. Fuck! Ok, home, quick shower, then up and at them again. You really shouldn't complain. Somewhere out there, other capes are having lasers shot at them right at this very moment. Your career so far has been much less stressful than theirs. Probably. Maybe.

---

Your dad looks a bit surprised at your bedraggled appearance. "Tough day at the dog shelter?" he asks.

"You have no idea," you tell him truthfully, but decline to elaborate. Shower, now.

---

On you way to Emma's place your thoughts turn back to your problem at school, and it occurs to you that you've been an idiot. Again. You've been so focused on reverse blackmail that you completely forgot about the regular kind. You had the solution in your grasp all along.

After greeting Emma and retiring to her room (and roughing her up a bit for her ongoing crimes against friendship - you didn't want to bother, but she insisted), you share your brilliant new plan.

"On Monday we're going to go see the principal," you say, "and we're going to tell her that you're willing to confess everything and rat out your friends."

Emma goes pale. "I can't, Taylor! Sophia would kill me."

"It won't come to that," you assure her.

"No, you don't understand! She's killed before. I've seen her do it!"

Huh. You knew she was headed for prison, but murder? And the heroes still found it acceptable to recruit this person. You're not even pretending to be shocked any more.

"It won't come to that," you repeat, "because you're not actually going to confess. Your friends have powerful friends, and Blackwell does not want to disappoint them. She'll offer us a deal in exchange for your silence."

Emma looks at you searchingly at the mention of powerful friends. Suspicion, not confusion, which means that she knows about Shadow Stalker. You had been wondering about that.

Emma has no further objections to your plan (that she dares voice), and proceeds to ask about your day. You spin her a tale of dog shelters, featuring cute dogs and smelly poop. Emma hesitantly asks if she could come along and experience it for herself. How gratifying, your minion is working maintain adequate friendship levels on its own.

You consider the scenario of Emma meeting Rachel. Prognosis: Fucking priceless. You promise to ask tomorrow.

---

"You trust this girl?" Rachel asks.

"Oh yes," you say. "She's supernaturally loyal." Rachel doesn't get the joke.

===

Spoiler: Author's note

A note about OCs:
The idea behind this story is 'what if Taylor could learn charms from other parahumans?' What charms would they give? What would she do with them? If I could just add new parahumans willy-nilly whenever I wanted her to have a specific Charm, that would ruin the whole point. I hereby vow that this story will contain no more than two plot-relevant OCs.

Bubbles is one of them.

 

Spoiler: Emma-o-vision

I can't suppress the queasy feeling as Taylor and I wait outside the Blackwell's office. Taylor is going to blackmail the principal. Taylor is going to blackmail the principal. I steal a glance at my friend. To all appearances she's still the same victim she pretended to be all this time. Dark shapeless clothing, shrunk into herself, trying to hide from the world.

"Taylor Hebert and Emma Barnes to see principal Blackwell," the secretary announces. It's far from the first time the two of us are here. In the past I always managed to get off scot free, or even shift the blame onto Taylor. This time... I have to trust that she knows what she's doing.

When Taylor mentioned powerful friends, it became clear to me. They were always protecting Sophia, I was just riding her coattails. Just a pretty face in a world full of pretty faces. Does Taylor know that Sophia is a cape? Is that why she doesn't want to confront her openly? Or did she just pick up on the protection, without discovering the reason for it?

As we're about the step into the office, she turns to me. "Let me do the talking," she says. The victim is gone. The real Taylor stands before me now, her voice perfectly calm, gazing at me like I'm a bug she could crush at will. Because I am.

I always knew deep down that I was the weak one, that pretending otherwise wasn't helping. I can admit that now. But Taylor, with her mask cast off, she takes my breath away.

For over a year, she endured the most hellish existence I could contrive, and now she's just going to cash it in, without a second thought, without even a hint of emotion. She's even willing to take pity on me and be my friend again, because it's no big deal to her.

I would do anything to stay by her side, to bask in her strength, to worship her as the person I could never be.

You can tell that Blackwell is not exactly happy to see you. Oh look, it's Taylor come to whine some more about the abuse that must be covered up. What a drag. The gall of you, poking at the blackened remains of her conscience to no purpose.

You ignore the frosty reception, take a seat and pull a notebook out of your bag.

"Mrs Blackwell. I have documented here over one thousand separate incidents of bullying" - there is a slight gasp from Emma at this - "directed against me. Including, of course, the famous locker incident. Miss Barnes here has realized the error of her ways and is prepared to confess to all of them." You catch her gaze and hold it. "Including naming accomplices."

Blackwell averts her eyes from you in order to give Emma a look of disbelief, containing equal parts 'how could you do this to me?' and 'what the hell is wrong with you?' The motto of Winslow, right there.

"What do you want?" she asks through clenched teeth. She's not stupid, you'll give her that. She instantly figured out which way this conversation was going.

"Immediate transfer to Arcadia," you say.

"I don't think you realize-"

"Oh, you'll have to call in some favors I'm sure. But no one is corrupt for as long as you have been without accumulating some."

She stares at you. "You think Winslow runs net positive on favors?"

For a moment you almost empathize with her. All along, Winslow was her personal hell too.

Almost. That the devil was cast down against his will is scant comfort for the damned souls in his charge.

"I guess you'll have to go further into debt," you say with a shrug.

There is a brief staring duel. When she shows no signs of giving up, you decide to raise the stakes.

"Miss Barnes could always go straight to the media," you note. "She is consumed by remorse and will stop at nothing to make amends."

"...Fine. I will have the papers for your legal guardian to sign ready by the end of the day. The transfer itself will take at least two weeks arrange. After all," she adds when you start to object, "neither of us want to invite any special scrutiny here."

"Fair enough," you say.

"You will of course have maintain a perfect attendance record until the transfer takes effect."

Oh look, she's trying to claw out a small moral victory to salve her wounded pride. Does she get to do that? You don't think she does.

"Very funny," you say. "You meant to say, of course, that you will maintain my perfect attendance record." You grin at her. Well, you show her your teeth. "In fact, I believe you will find that any absence that was reported at the beginning of the semester was merely a clerical error."

Blackwell is clearly trying to develop laser eyes, that she might burn you to death.

"Fine. Ruin your education. See if I care. The less I have to see of you, the happier I will be. Now get the hell out of my office, both of you."

---

Once you're outside, and alone, Emma collapses against the wall, trembling.

"Holy shit, Taylor," she whispers. "I can't believe you did that."

You smile at her and squeeze her shoulder.

"I appreciate your help in this matter, friend," you say.

You leave before anyone can spot the two of you together. Once you're around the corner, and alone, you collapse against the wall, trembling. Holy shit. You can't believe you did that.

You pull yourself together and indulge in a grin that would make Lisa proud, or possibly even jealous. Your plan worked perfectly, and you solved all your problems. Not only do you no longer need to worry about Sophia, you also launched operation 'Infiltrate the Wards 2: Arcadia Boogaloo', and you scored yourself a free vacation to spend more time with Rachel's dogs. You clearly triggered with the power to own the shit out of bitches, in addition to all the other bullshit.

---

After school you meet up with Emma again and guide her to Rachel's lair. Judging by look on her face she is less than comfortable strolling through lair territory, even in daylight.

"Not everyone can afford to live in unofficial Empire territory," you chide her mildly. Heh. Now she's nervous and embarrassed.

As usual Bubbles is the first to notice your arrival, immediately launching himself towards you like he was shot from a cannon. You're ready for it. You catch him as he leaps up at you and half hug, half wrestle him to the ground and start rubbing his belly. Look at that tail go.

It takes some time before he calms down enough to notice that you brought company. By then several other dogs have come over to investigate the new arrival. Emma is taking it in good humor, letting herself be sniffed and offering head scratches to those who will accept them. You can tell that she expected a somewhat more upscale place, though.

When Bubbles rolls to his feet and approaches her, you perform introductions. "Bubbles, this is Emma. Emma, Bubbles." Emma offers her hand to sniff, but Bubbles ignores it, regarding her warily and growling softly. Good boy, excellent judgement.

"Emma is behaving herself," you tell him, "you have to tolerate her as long as she does." Hm, that might have come out a bit more autobiographical than you intended.

Then Emma yelps and practically leaps into your arms, causing Bubbles to scramble back and let out a single sharp bark. What- oh, Rachel just started turning Brutus and Judas into monsters. By touch, you note. Mugging for the fresh audience.

"What seems to be the matter, friend?" you ask. You were right, the look on her face is priceless.

"The dogs..."

"Yes?" You are the very image of polite confusion.

"That's Hellhound," she hisses.

"Yes? She runs the place, you know."

"I- you- she-" Tolerating Emma does have its high points, you must admit.

"I'm not sure what you're trying to say, friend." Emma opens her mouth to try again, but you keep going. "Are you saying that associating with a known parahuman murderer is not okay? Because that would be a very strange thing for you to say, don't you think?"

Emma slumps down and lets go of you. "...yes." Answering both your questions at once.

"Don't lose track of why we're here, friend," you say.

She just looks at you, uncomprehending. You hand her the poop shovel, as a hint.

"...oh. Right."

---

Emma never quite relaxes. She flinches away any time Brutus or Judas wanders too close, and keeps shooting nervous glances at Rachel. As you walk home through the mean streets of Brockton Bay, she clings on to your arm in a most pathetic fashion. You thought you had mastered the art of 'victim' body language, but she's showing you a few tricks you missed. Weirdly appropriate, she was the one who 'taught' you in the first place, after all.

You fight down a sudden urge to turn on her. Would it not be appropriate, to betray her trust as she is relying on you? To see the look on her face as all hope dies? You are in the perfect neighborhood for turning someone into a statistic...

You shake your head. Your minion is behaving, and must be tolerated.

Eventually you reach safer ground, and it is time for you to part ways.

"I don't think you should come back," you tell her, "Rachel didn't like you."

"Like me? She didn't talk to me once!"

"Yes, exactly. She could smell your fear." You're pretty sure Rachel can't do that, actually. It would have shown up on sorcerer's sight.

"I don't want to go back. Taylor, you never said we'd be working for a villain."

You clench your fists. You want to scream at her, about how her murderer friend, the hero, is the kind of person who would shove an innocent girl into a locker full of rotting tampons and how the fuck are those labels in any way meaningful?

But you can't. That's not who you are in this relationship. The person you are is always calm, and polite, and scary.

"You disappoint me, friend," you say instead, "but I suppose that is inevitable. Here, this is for you." You toss her your locker key. "You can have your books back. I won't be needing them."

"You meant it, then? You'll be skipping school until the transfer goes through?"

You just hold her gaze, saying nothing. The person you are right now would not say anything they did not mean to go through with. She should realize that.

"I'll, uh, I'll see you around I guess?" Emma tries.

"Yes." She guesses that. Although you probably should keep up this charade of friendship at least until you start at Arcadia, just to be safe.

---

The first thing you do when you get home is to hug your dad.

"You had a good day, I take it?" he asks.

"Oh yes. You know how I told you everything was all worked out at school? Well, that wasn't quite true. There was one girl who kept bullying me."

Danny gently pushes you out of the hug and studies you at arms length, trying to reconcile your words with your demeanor.

"But!" you continue, "Today I spoke to the principal, and she was so worried about that girl that she agreed to a school transfer. Here, you have to sign these."

He glances over the papers you hand him. "Arcadia? Taylor, that's amazing."

You nod happily. "I had Emma along to back me up. She could testify to everything that had happened, and the principal really had no choice but to agree."

The person you are right now would never tell her dad a lie.