Realignment [Worm]

[Lotor]

Niiiiice.

Can't wait to see what PanPan is going to get for her new secret identity. A lot of fun possibilities there. Considering her abilities are so vast, she could do a LOT of non-lethal stuff for takedowns and with a suit of biological armor she could be the Brute of the team.

 

[Shadelight]

Illumination 2.8
▲
Lisa​

Several rays of sunshine peeked through the somber clouds, making the city look less depressing than it usually did this time of year. Cars drove past as I locked the front door, wind lashing across my face and a chill already getting to me. Were it not for the promise of fun with some friends, I would've stayed inside at least until late May.

I double-checked my pockets for some bills, a taser and pepper spray. Confirming that they were there, I nodded to myself and hea-

I fell face-first onto the ground. Fucking doorstep.

Picking myself up and rubbing the dirt off my cheek, I vowed to gently remind dear sweet Taylor of the hazard.

Anyways, I headed towards the bus stop, trying to ignore the pain.

Due to yesterday's news on the fate of my former team, I had decided to change my civilian disguise in hopes of not getting noticed — a pair of non-baggy jeans appropriated from Taylor's wardrobe, a dark green hoodie procured from the same location… Definitely not my style, but I had to endure it regardless. The hoodie actually being comfortable was certainly helping with that.

…Despite having a new disguise, though, my fears were barely quelled. My eyes kept darting around, analyzing everyone in sight, and even with trying to keep a lid on my power I still felt the buzz of a headache waiting to happen. I'd already frozen up one time, tensing for just a moment when I saw someone who looked like Alec crossing the street. Double-checking with my power had confirmed that it wasn't him, but what if it was? What then? Of all my former teammates, he was probably the most dangerous.

I took a deep breath to steady my nerves, ignoring a stray cat that ran past me into some bushes.

When we were still together, the Undersiders usually went to the Boardwalk when in civvies. This was partially because of my knowledge of the area — especially since I had lived there prior to getting Coil'd — but also thanks to the entertainment factor: the place was rife with all kinds of tourist traps, expensive joints and other things to dump money on. Considering we were villains, money was never an issue.

Now, though? I had to be careful; avoid the area like the plague. Oh, and the middle part of the Docks, too: the loft was there, Rachel's dog shelter was there…

The bus' arriving screech broke me out of my musings.

I paid my fare and found a free seat, taking out my phone and opening the messaging app. My version apparently had some annoying settings enabled by default, but me, Taylor and Amy collectively fixed that yesterday.

We also spent some time theorycrafting about the latter's power, and how it would be expressed during the times she'd put on a mask. The biggest point of discussion was the fact that we were heroes, which meant that we needed to try and look non-threatening to the public. Black Rose's costume and power looked villain-like already, so there was a need for Amy to help me offset the bad optics. She seemed to agree with me as well, so we went in a more whimsical direction.

While the costume for Amy's new identity was still far from set in stone, we did decide on a theme for her — magical plants and mushrooms. Half an hour after that, the candidates for her cape name were narrowed down to just two: Nymph and Briar. The former ultimately won due to sounding more benevolent, with the other being recycled for her username in our group chat.

Speaking of which, I opened the thing up. Taylor had scrubbed it clean of cape-adjacent activity — which mostly entailed my mention of our costumes — as we agreed to keep such things off the books, just in case. Three new messages apparently laid within, ones that caused me to raise an inquisitive eyebrow.

TwistedBriar: hey Lisa, is it ok if I drag V into this?
TwistedBriar: to the arcade I mean
TwistedBriar: she's moping about Dean

Huh.

As interesting as it would be to get more dirt on the rich boy, I had to consider the implications of Victoria first. Having her near Amy would be… eh. Okay, it probably wouldn't be that bad. And refusing would likely look bad for all of us. Oh well.

EyeSea: Sure, go ahead. (on the bus btw)

A reply came several seconds later.

PetitHibou: Nice! We just got out of class.
PetitHibou: Amy says "Cool."
TwistedBriar: cool
TwistedBriar: god damnit

The edges of my mouth twitched upwards.

EyeSea: Should be there in a few minutes.
EyeSea: o/

And yes, I was indeed riding towards Arcadia. The Wards-infested school was the halfway point between home and the arcade, so going there to catch up with the others was the obvious course of action.

A minute or two later of me listening to music, I exited the bus and began approaching the meeting point. I hummed to the tune of Fireflies, watching a horde of students leave through the front gates, and by the time I got there I spotted Taylor and Amy sitting on one of the outdoor benches. They were turned away from me, both holding their phones, and their attention was on Victoria Dallon, who was enthusiastically explaining… something.

"-which could probably be used for resource gathering too!" I heard the blonde say. "If the stuff doesn't disappear, anyway."

Currently discussing non-combat utilities of powers. Mention of potentially-disappearing resources suggests either Labyrinth or Barrow.​

Well that's an interesting topic.

I tried to look inconspicuous as I walked up behind my two friends. Amy noticed her sister looking at me and squeaked after following her gaze, surprised that I was right next to her, sporting my usual grin. The sound made Taylor flinch as she was thinking of a response to Victoria, and she, too, joined the 'Staring at Lisa' game, looking a bit conflicted.

"Christ, Lisa. Seriously?" Amy grumbled tiredly.

"Yup. Hey, you two."

Taylor gave me a small wave and a smile. "Hey, Lise… Uh. What's up with your cheek?" What was- Oh, right.

"Your doorstep attempted to kill me," I deadpanned while crossing my arms.

"Oh, shit! Sorry! We keep forgetting to replace it." …And now she was looking away from me.

I sighed. "It's fine, Taylor. Really. Just be glad that it didn't succeed."

She hummed noncommittally. "Remind me to tell dad later?"

"Sure." I gave her a one-armed hug.

Amy, meanwhile, had silently grabbed said arm's hand, and a warm sensation spread through me as the pain was washed away. Grateful for the gesture, I nodded, and she shrugged when I whispered a 'thanks'.

"So," said the older Dallon sister, eyeing us all with amusement. "Is this the famous Lisa that I heard so much about?" Oh god, did those two talk about me? They better not have said anything stupid!

"Nothing bad, I hope?" I queried, raising an eyebrow.

"Nah." She waved in dismissal. "All they said was that you were smart."

…Now, I didn't exactly have the world's largest ego, but I never said that it was anywhere near the smallest, either. So far, it was pleased, and I was pleased in turn.

"What school do you go to? I didn't see you here, so… Winslow? Clarendon? Immaculata?"

"None of them!"

The girl blinked twice in rapid succession. "Say what?"

"None of them," I repeated, letting smugness ooze into my voice as I sat next to Amy and sandwiched her against Taylor. "I got my GED, no need for me to bother." The former just rolled her eyes.

"Careful there, professor." The healer smirked at me. "You might even get a Thinker rating."

Victoria snorted, oblivious to my sudden unease, and her small smile widened into a proper one. She stretched out a hand over the table. "Nice to meet a fellow intellectual, then. Victoria Dallon."

"Lisa Wilbourn."

"Arcade time?"

"Arcade time."

⬆▲⬇
Taylor​

Mobius' Trip Arcade was a surprisingly large place, and already teeming with customers by the time we got there. The floor was a step lower than ground level, the carpets were as dark as Lisa predicted, the air was filled with game noises and the atmosphere felt just right. While I wasn't big on video games, I could say one thing for certain: this definitely seemed higher quality than the place I visited with Emma.

After a brief stop by the change machine to get quarters, we split the coins and started looking around. I wasn't sure about the others, but I could still see sadness warring within Victoria, so my primary goal was to fix that somehow, draw away her attention. Knowing what Amy told me about her sister, she liked punching problems in the face, but since she couldn't punch her boyfriend due to him moving out of town, it had to be dealt with in other ways, ways I was still trying to find.

Actually…

"Hey, uh. Victoria?" I called out hesitantly.

"Hm?"

"Thoughts on this one?" I pointed at one of those games where you have to punch as hard as you can.

For some reason, the bummed-out blonde cringed and looked rather… bashful? Her sister let out a giggle, though. I wondered what that meant.

"She's banned from that one," Amy said, grinning. "Broke two machines, both in the same week!"

Victoria gasped and turned to look at her, embarrassed. "Ames! How could you!"

"Easily and with grace."

Lisa snorted.

Not deterred by this amusing complication, I tried pressing on with a different approach. "Maybe you can teach me, then?" I looked to Lisa for support, who stood behind Victoria, only to find her giving me a double thumbs up. Amy looked at her with confusion before getting whispered what I assumed was an explanation, at which point understanding had bloomed on her face. She nodded too, so I was doing something right.

Victoria, for that matter, took a second to consider things. "Sure, why not. Are you two coming too?"

"Hah," Amy managed. "No. Absolutely not." She took a moment to take stock of the games that were close enough to us and the punching game. Seemingly spotting something of interest, her eyes lit up and the grin widened.

"Hoo boy," Lisa said with resignation.

"Hey. Hey, Lisa," Amy began sweetly.

"Please no."

"Guitar Hero."

"Oh god." Lisa groaned.

"Come on! You against me, three songs in total!"

"Ooh, Taylor, wanna bet on who wins?" Victoria asked eagerly, still watching the others.

I did have ten dollars in a pocket somewhere still…

"Ten bucks on Lisa." I said.

"Ten on Ames."

"You're on."

⬆▲⬇
Amy​

Lisa, apparently, already knew the basics, so the first song we went for was Deftones' Hole in the Earth. While she had a rocky start, she got into the whole thing pretty quickly, nearly overtaking me, but 'nearly' wasn't enough. I managed to pull through, mostly thanks to experience, and scored my first win while wiping her grin off her face.

The second song was her choice, and a pleasant surprise at that — No More Sorrow by Linkin Park, a band that I listened to relatively frequently. We were pretty even the whole length of it, until I choked at the final three-note sequence, so the victory went to the Thinker this time around.

Just a setback.

For the finale, the tiebreaker, we decided to flip a coin. Not to determine the winner, though, but to choose the final song. Lisa's choice was This Is A Call by Foo Fighters, and mine was Matchbook Romance's Monsters. Yes, I wanted to raise the stakes a bit, but who could really blame me?

The coinflip's result was tails, which meant that my choice had won.

With a grunt of annoyance, my foe had finally fallen. Both of us screwed up on that one, multiple times even, but she did so a bit earlier which meant that she got left with less points. I pumped my fists up into the air, stretching my fingers out to make them stop aching.

"Yusss," I hissed to myself.

Lisa set down her guitar and walked closer to me, pouting. "You totally cheated."

"Nope, you just suck."

"Energy drinks count! I saw that Legendberry!"

I resisted the urge to facepalm but she probably knew I was thinking of it. "That is a sports drink."

"Exactly!"

"No, Lisa- Ugh."

"Pretty sure there's a difference between a sports drink and an energy drink." I heard Taylor say as she and Vicky approached.

I just smiled while pointing at the knowledgeable girl.

Lisa sagged and sighed. "Fine. Close game."

"You did good. Don't worry about it, Lise." I spread my arms in an exaggerated shrug. "I'm just better."

"Yeah, yeah. Gloat some more, why don't ya." She turned to Taylor and Vicky. "And what about you two? What seems good to you?"

"Well," my sister said smugly, "It seems like I won ten dollars." She closed the distance between us and gave me a hug. Ruffling my hair. "Great job, Ames! I knew you could do it!"

…Cue internal screaming.

"Sorry," Lisa, meanwhile, told the loser of the bet.

"It's your money," Taylor retorted.

"...I'm not sure if I should feel better or worse from that."

Taylor just shrugged and turned her head to me. "So. What now?"

And just like that, an idea struck me.

⬇▲⬆
Taylor​

When I asked Amy about our next destination I had to admit that I didn't think things through. After a moment or two of thinking, she just got this odd, expectant smile and started dragging me somewhere, Lisa and Victoria left standing behind. The last thing I heard from them was the latter suggesting Skee-Ball. We waded through crowds of gamers and game systems, and all I could do was commiserate with past Lisa. An Amy with a goal was an Amy to be reckoned with.

I felt her stop and looked at what stood before me — a colorful arcade cabinet decorated with crystals. The cabinet and title screen both had 'Depth Crawler' in big, shimmering letters, and a recording of some gameplay was playing in the background. Connected were two controllers, one already held by Amy, who was watching me intently as I hesitantly grabbed the other.

"So… what is this?" I asked with slight confusion.

"Well, it's a game I like. How familiar are you?"

I shyly looked away, because I honestly wasn't prepared. "Not at all, sorry. You remember my computer, right?"

She blinked, then frowned. "Right. That thing. What about Lisa's laptop?"

"Huh. I hadn't thought of that." But then again… "I don't really play games, though."

"Hmm, I see…"

"You two gonna play yet?" I heard from my right.

Two guys were looking at us, clearly unimpressed. One of them held a drink, while the other was openly ogling me. Suppressing a shudder, I looked at them with indifference.

"Yes," Amy said. Her voice was filled with loathing. "Yes, we will, actually." I heard her drop a quarter into the machine, and our controllers vibrated.

The drink nerd scowled and turned around to his partner. "C'mon, Jake, let's play a real game." 'Jake' grunted and took a last look. Luckily, they didn't linger, and left in the direction of an internet cafe.

Ignoring whatever that was, I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding. I faced the screen and pressed 'A', prompting a cutscene which detailed the game's story. The closest comparison I could think of was Dante's Inferno, except the goal wasn't love here, and the Depths were less demonic — both players and other characters seemed to covet some sort of gemstone, which was hidden deep underground beneath layers of deadly environments. There were ten of them in total, each divided in ten parts. Said parts were apparently the game's levels, which sounded like quite a lot.

"Do you really plan to go through all of them?" I asked my co-player in bewilderment.

"Huh? Oh. No, just the first layer." Ah. Phew. "The game is hard enough already, and we don't have enough time for more than that." …And now I was scared again.

Oh well. I could do this. How hard could it really be?

There were several classical archetypes which each of us had to choose from, fit with more blurbs of sweet lore. Amy snickered at me reading everything, but I couldn't really help it. Eventually, I settled on being a rogue, with her locking in the mage almost instantly, and we finally synced our button presses to enter the selected layer.

The first level was an underground portion of the forest that the characters were picked from, filled with roots and plant-based monsters which were simple enough to kill. If either of us got close to one, a cone appeared, slightly blurry, and became more and more visible with increased proximity to said monster. That, Amy explained, was a cone of sight, and it was important for later stages. Apparently, stealth was important here, which was part of why she picked the game for me.

Through that place we waded unimpeded, and the same was true for two more levels. The fourth, though, had an underground civilization, annoying me with its smart inhabitants. I managed to get caught sneaking several times by them — twice from someone hearing footsteps, once for colliding with a pot. That last one caused a cascade of alarms, almost killing us with sheer numbers of enemies.

Neither of us had died though, so we marched further on, ever-deeper.

"Alright… Flip that lever, Tay. I almost got my CDs up."

"Need to knock out the guards for that. One second… There."

We were currently holed up in an ancient-looking elevator, waiting for it to stop and anxious about what's next. This was level nine, a magic-infused ancient city. One that vehemently worshiped sunlight even though it was deep below the surface. Mirrors were prevalent here, and while I managed to redirect some magic light onto a crowd of enemies, both of us got caught by some in several other parts of the level.

Overall, I was actually having fun, and I could definitely see the appeal of such games.

The elevator opened, and we finally stepped out. Sneaking through the tunnel, I found no enemies at all, and the reason for that was all too clear — this was the boss area, just like with the levels before. I took a quick peek at Amy, meeting her gaze with my own.

"This one's pretty annoying… I think I'll summon some help." Amy reached into her pocket and produced a… trading card? Really?

She swiped it across a rectangle under the screen, and Victoria- ahem, Glory Girl had appeared next to her in-game. Her costume looked a bit weathered, though, which seemed like a stylistic choice..? Regardless, this whole concept just… grated me. For some reason.

I turned to Amy. "Isn't this cheating?" I asked, pointing at the hero.

"Cheating? You too?" She sighed. "Tell me, please, why would it be?"

"You're using something from outside the game. Something that gives you an advantage."

"Well, yeah, I guess. But I don't really think that counts?"

I shrugged, walking in circles in-game. "It just feels… unfair to me. Not everyone has cards, you know?"

"Eh, fine. I can unsummon her." She did just that. "But keep in mind that the boss here isn't a pushover."

"Duly noted. Shall we?"

I stepped a bit further, close to the glowing gates, and opened them with a long button press. What laid beyond was an enormous, crown-shaped mirror suspended above a void. The outer cavern walls pulsed with streams of color, and the mirror itself served as the arena we had to fight in. There was no boss visible yet, but it was only because I wasn't close enough. That, I knew, would change soon.

Amy and I pressed on, side by side, and stood in the center. The ground seemed to shake, and I could see rubble falling from above. A slithering sound was coming closer and closer, and finally culminated in a giant worm-like creature peeking out from the depths below. A 'Coruscaith'.

It didn't look happy.

Then again, I couldn't really tell — it had no head, but a tiny replica of the arena instead. Its body consisted of rings full of sharp, reflective needles, and each of the rings rotated haphazardly without reason. It must've used them to dig, drill through the earth like earlier. There also appeared to be some goo-like stuff between each one, transparent and yet glowing, and I guessed that said goo would be the monster's downfall.

It shot out a beam, closer to me than Amy. I sidestepped it and began using my abilities while it was busy. Amy walked to the side, staying further away from the boss, and I dodged yet another attack. So far, so good.

The Coruscaith hid under the mirror, then emerged from one of the five points of the crown shape. It propelled itself through the air, fast enough to knock Amy back, and landed beyond the edge as if nothing even happened.

The fact that Amy took damage so early was quite annoying — both of us were damage dealers, and only had one Health Scroll each. We had to keep up with our dodging, or the game would be over quick.

As the monster's health dropped to eighty percent, the second-to-last point from the right of its crown head began glowing, a pastel rainbow. I shuffled in one place, not knowing what to do, but as the worm's goo increased its luminance I saw Amy retreat to the left of me.

I attempted to follow her, but I simply wasn't quick enough — my sprint ability was still recharging when the boss headbutted the floor. A full strip of it shattered mesmerizingly, and I realized what had just happened — instead of telegraphing the attack on the floor, it had done so on the creature's 'face'.

Clever.

I wouldn't get hit by it twice, though.

The broken slice of the floor was now formed out of many small shards, two of them being bigger than the rest. They were the only ones which retained the rest of the mirror's reflectiveness, while the others softly glowed in a myriad of colors. Going by past experiences — even if all of them were from today — it was most likely that the glowing areas were somehow harmful in nature.

Permanent area denial? Now that really did feel annoying.

We managed to weather the assault relatively steadily for two more mirror breaks before disaster struck. Every time a strip of mirror had been broken, the time between attacks decreased by a small margin. This wasn't really much of a problem by itself, but paired with the need to parkour? It was deadly.

Our enemy fired a beam. But not at the floor, no — at a wall. It reflected, aiming for me, but I managed to actually dodge it. The beam kept on going, though, and Amy…

Well, Amy was still standing there, casting one of her fuck-off spells.

"Take that, you worm!" She grumbled at the screen, hurling a fireball the size of a car. "Oh shit- GOD DAMNIT!" Her character evaporated. "Piece of shit fucking boss!"

"I can do this," I muttered. "It's fine. I can do this."

"Yeah, kick its ass!"

I dodged a wide-range tail swipe.

"That is the plan. Well, that, and 'don't die', I think."

Unfortunately, though, in the end, I didn't really have it — the Coruscaith was just too nimble, and I was still new to the gameplay. I managed to whittle its health down to only twenty percent, and a single stupid misstep led me right into some glowing shards. Amy complained about 'tuning' and 'lazy-ass developers', I simply listened to her while leaning against the railing, and even though we had failed to even get to the tenth level, I still had an enjoyable experience.

Maybe I wouldn't mind another go, sometime.

As the both of us stood there, gazing at the 'game over' screen, I looked at my teammate once more. Amy was watching the worm bash our corpses, lit up by hundreds of ever-changing colors.

"That was pretty fun," I told her with a smile.

"Glad you agree," she replied, closing her eyes. "Gotta say, as much as I hate it, this crystal dipshit's visuals are pretty soothing to look at."

"Mmm. Yeah. Like a kaleidoscope or something."

She raised a single eyebrow, then frowned and opened her eyes. "Huh. Speaking of…" She got closer, whispering the rest. "Do we have a name for the team yet? That sounds kinda nice if you think about it." It did have a ring to it… but no. Too lengthy.

I shook my head, glancing at the screen and then back to her. "No, but it's a mouthful. I do like the concept, though."

Amy stepped back a bit and hummed, clearly lost in thought. "There was some other word like it… Or similar enough, but not really."

"Hmm. Mirage?"

"No."

"Phantasmagoria?"

She looked at me with surprise. "Hell no, you bookworm. Think simpler, jeez. It was something to do with geometry…"

Oh! Right! "Fractal!"

"Yes!" She nodded twice. "Perfect! Yes!"

Fractal sounded… It sounded just right. In my opinion, the word gave feelings of mystery and complexity both, and all three of us had them, all in equal measures. It didn't seem intimidating enough, and was easy enough to memorize…

I nodded. "I like it. Let's see if Lisa does as well."

▲​

We found Lisa and Victoria at the air hockey table. Both of them were grinning, hitting a puck back and forth, and somehow still continuing the discussion we had from earlier.

"I don't think Lung would agree to become a decorative barbeque grill," Lisa said with amusement as she defended her side from attacks.

"Okay, then how about Spitfire?" Victoria asked in turn.

Lisa distractedly shook her head, still too focused on the game to notice us. "Nah, doubt it, her power's too strong for that. If it can easily melt through steel beams and stuff, wouldn't it also decimate pork?"

"Mmm. Maybe. Lung's stronger, though."

"If he ramps up — and he's not that strong all the time. And I'm pretty sure he can regulate his flame output regardless." At that, she managed to score a goal. "Gotcha."

"Damn. You win, then."

"What's the score?" Amy asked, and it would be innocent were she not grinning.

"Ah!" Lisa jumped. "Fuck, Amy. Hey."

"That's payback."

"Yeah, fair. I deserved that."

"So…" I walked closer. "Score?"

"Seven to five in my favor. How was whatever she dragged you to?"

I shrugged, but smiled slightly. "We died, but it was nice."

"She did better than I expected," Amy added.

Victoria quirked an eyebrow. "Oh, did you two do Depth Crawler? Ames and I beat seven layers. That thing is crazy hard." Holy shit, seven? Did they do it with cards, or does it get easier for some weird reason?

"We died at the level nine boss," I said, crossing my arms in defiance.

"Ah," the heroine managed. "Yeah, that guy is annoying."

"More like overtuned," Amy murmured, still salty.

"Ames, you say that about every boss you die to."

"You know I'm right though."

"Debatable."

"Meh."

My stomach suddenly grumbled, and Lisa's answered in kind.

"Considering we're all done… Where do we go from here?" I asked.

"Pizza?" Amy suggested.

"Sounds good to me," was Lisa's answer.

Victoria piped up. "I know a spot!"

Lisa slightly tilted her head. "The one that's two blocks from here?"

"Yup."

"Good choice."

It was then that I noticed some girl running up to Victoria. "Oh. Em. Gee. Excuse me? Glory Girl?" All of us turned to her. "Can I get an autograph? Big fan right here!"

"Sure!" Victoria chirped and sauntered off to the side.

As the literal fangirl began rummaging through her bags, Amy dragged me towards Lisa, eager to exploit the diversion. We huddled together, though not enough to warrant suspicion. Hopefully we didn't look too ridiculous from the outside.

"Did something happen..? No. What is it?"

"We got a name," I said.

"Oh? As in, the three of us?"

Amy nodded. "Yep."

"Shoot. I'm all ears." Lisa leaned against the air hockey table.

"Amy suggested 'Fractal'. I like it. Do you?"

Our Thinker's brows flew upwards, and a familiar smirk appeared. "Ooh! Yeah. Yeah, that one's good. Got mystery and style, but not too tacky or bland." Exactly!

"So… Are we sticking with it?"

"If all of us agree, yeah."

Amy just gave her a silent thumbs up, with me doing the same a moment later. After a snort and a roll of her eyes, Lisa gave us two in return, which prompted a giggle from the healer. Of course, that only escalated when I spotted Victoria sliding in too, looking at each of us with bemusement, uncertainty, and two thumbs up of her own.

Okay, we definitely looked ridiculous from the outside. No question.

"Am I doing this right?" She asked with a confused smile.

We descended into laughter. Yeah, today was good.

 

[blitzgamer]

Fun. Love the little references.

 

[QroGrotor]

That was fluffy and adorable. Enjoyed every moment of it!
Thank you for posting the chapter, it was a pleasure to read!

 

[Dust shaker]

Hm, I wonder what kind of shit the trio will stumble into, take out all the merchant capes maybe? Kick Hookwolf's ass? Or have a clash with New wave to give Brandish an aneurysm?

 

[Lotor]

I do love the little comments and the names of their chat. Hee. Good names.

And I definitely think Brandish is going to have... issues... but she can go sit and spin.

Fractal is an excellent group name. And Nymph is a good name for Amy to use in costume. Though possibly lewd... ...might be interesting depending on what she makes her suit look like.

Amy's little moment of panic when Vicky hugged her was a delight.

It is always wonderful just seeing them be teenager girls and friends. Going to love seeing what Vicky thinks of Amy going out and about. Should be exciting and fun.

I admit I missed any references of the game or anything of that sort. But still a fun little excursion for everyone.

I also admit, when Lisa was out on her own at the start... I was almost waiting for the boot to fall. Fucking Coil. Looking forward to seeing how he and the NewSiders with Sophia are dealt with.

 

[Shadelight]

Interlude 2.E
▲
Emily
⧗
3 Days Ago​

Director Emily Piggot watched as Armsmaster entered the conference room. As usual, the punctual Tinker had arrived exactly when ordered, with the wall clock displaying 1:00 PM and everyone else being already present. Just in case, she made another quick mental headcount. Yes, everybody was here.

Which meant it was time to begin.

"We have several things to address today," Emily started, annoyed. She was still completely furious about the sheer size of her failure with Stalker. A scandal related to her civilian identity, one that unmasked her as well? That was difficult enough to recover from by itself. But no, the little shit decided to turn villain, too!

When the PR team got the news, the local head of Image instantly filed for resignation. Ever since then it had been absolute chaos, with the soccer moms of Youth Guard being the least of Emily's problems. Rebecca Costa-Brown herself decided to 'let her go', with the change of power finally happening on Monday. Just four more days and it would all be finally over…

Emily took a deep breath. "So. Let's get to it. Armsmaster?"

The man changed his pose and nodded. "First of all, we will be discussing the breakout that happened last night." He gestured at the projector screen, where camera footage was already rolling. "At 2:07 AM, Shadow Stalker was seen phasing into the PRT ENE Headquarters…"

Emily tuned out the Tinker's narration as she watched the footage herself: Stalker, still in her Breaker state, walked down the hallway unimpeded. Even like this, when she could barely be seen, her left arm was noticeably shorter; the severed hand still unrecovered. Instead, there was something else attached, spanning across the whole forearm — something mechanical, by the looks of it. The shadowy silhouette prevented Emily from discerning its purpose, but she guessed that it must've been a weapon — Stalker's signature crossbow was missing, and she wouldn't go anywhere unarmed.

Emily blinked at the unintentional pun. She shook her head and continued watching.

The ex-Ward stalked towards the door to the central stairwell, stopping before entering to quickly check her surroundings. Satisfied by the knowledge that nobody (in person) was watching, she stepped right through the door.

The footage then changed to one from a different camera: tucked near another, similarly-painted door. The bottom of the walls had a red horizontal strip, which meant that this was the cell floor, the place where the villains were held.

As Shadow Stalker approached her objective, Emily gritted her teeth.

With a swift, practiced motion and a flicker out of her Breaker state, the hooded figure took a small cylinder out from her belt. She primed the grenade — an EMP, as told by Armsmaster — and lobbed the thing in front of her before sprinting away. It went off two seconds later, thankfully not reaching the camera, which was when the alarms finally kicked in, tinting everything in red.

Stalker whipped around and shot several things at the ceiling, using whatever she had attached to her arm. Must've been jamming the foam dispensers, Emily thought to herself. The fact that they needed replacements definitely supported that theory.

Beelining straight towards the holding cells, ignoring the blaring alarms, her right hand reached behind her as the teen villain pressed on further. She fumbled with only one arm — clearly not used to her handicap — as some odd, distinctly tinkertech objects tumbled down from her belt to the floor.

Crouching — and probably cursing — Stalker unfolded them all. Each was the size of a napkin with a light blue metallic sheen, and each was attached by their owner to a door with a villain inside.

Said owner stepped back for a moment. She checked her surroundings once more. The charges were then activated, and the doors swiftly melted away.

The first one to step out was Circus, greeting Stalker with an upward nod. Regent, Grue and Hellhound left their own cells right after that. As per regulation, all were in PRT-issued prison sweats: black, with the word 'Villain' printed in two different places in white. There was no sound to the recording, but it was obvious that there was some tension — Grue looked wary of his savior, who didn't seem too comfortable either.

Regardless, the five of them backtracked, and stopped at the door to the stairwell. With a push to the panic rail it opened, and all of them rushed out of view.

Yet another change of camera placed the action in the middle of the gift shop — the farthest wall had melted, giving the villains an easy escape. The squad of PRT officers surrounding the area from the outside tried cutting them off to no avail, as Shadow Stalker fired at them through the shop windows before passing by. If only they had more funding…

Emily seethed as the escapees made short work of Clockblocker, weaving past Kid Win's shots while Circus danced around with Battery. In fact, the clown also downed Vista with a particularly nasty trick: after evading yet another Battery charge, Circus jumped to the side and right into Stalker's line of fire. One of the ex-Ward's projectiles ricocheted from a hammerspace'd throwing knife, flying straight towards the neck of the space manipulator. The needle was, thankfully, non-lethal — and wasn't that odd to point out — but it still managed to connect with the target, knocking her out in mere seconds.

With the biggest obstacle to their escape down, Shadow Stalker yelled something at Grue, looking around. The darkness generator nodded and his shadowy smoke began to billow, spreading across a large area until the camera could no longer see them. Beyond the gift shop's windows there was literally nothing but black, and when the obstruction had finally dissipated…

…The villains were nowhere in sight.

Emily sighed, ignoring the feeling of her left eye twitching. "Thank you, Armsmaster." She then looked at everyone present.

All of the Wards were in some state of distress, obviously still reeling from such a nasty betrayal. The last week was certainly not kind to them, or anyone else for that matter — first the Lung disaster, then that thing with Hess… And then, when Browbeat's death was revealed to the public, the Stansfields had, understandably, snapped.

Suffice it to say, Gallant's sudden transfer was taken quite badly.

Meanwhile, the adults were looking as serious as ever: Miss Militia had furrowed her eyebrows, Armsmaster was clenching his jaw. Triumph and Velocity just seemed tired, while Battery appeared outright pissed. Hell, even Assault had kept quiet — that's when you knew things were dire.

"We will be going over your mistakes in more depth a bit later," Emily announced with a cold tone. "For now, let's just point out the obvious."

"She's a villain now," Clockblocker stated, getting slapped by a still-sleepy Vista.

"Yes, Clock. She is."

Kid Win raised his hand, and Emily motioned for him to speak.

"She's, uh. She's still one-handed? A-and without her usual crossbow?"

Armsmaster nodded. "True. While the footage we have isn't ideal, it's clear that she has a new weapon." The recording rewinded back to a still shot from the gift shop camera. It then zoomed in on Shadow Stalker loading something into her forearm. The picture was still grainy, but Armsmaster sharpened it after a few seconds. "Much like her crossbow, this new contraption accepts bolts as ammunition. While it is probably some sort of tinkertech, it does not make use of electricity — I hope it is obvious as to why. These here," he stepped closer to the projector screen, pointing out two long indents that were parallel to the flight groove, "are most likely retractable blades. While this melee option was not seen being used yet, it would be wise to be cautious regardless."

"So, like- Ow! Really, Vista? I'm asking." Clockblocker whined.

"What's your question?" Armsmaster queried.

"Would the blades be like in that Predator movie from Aleph?"

The other Wards collectively groaned, but the adult hero raised a hand to silence them.

"That's a smarter question than all of you might think," he said. The picture zoomed in a bit closer. "No, Clockblocker, they wouldn't be. Or, at least, Dragon and I don't think so: while the Predator gauntlet extends its blades forwards, Shadow Stalker's likely does so outwards."

"Huh." Then silence.

"We're entering speculation territory," Emily decided to nip the distraction in the bud. "Anything else that is concrete?"

"She looks strangely annoyed by Grue?" Vista half-asked.

Armsmaster rewinded the footage to when the villains had only just left their cells.

"Yeah, over there!" She pointed. "It's almost as if Grue is scared of her!"

"I mean, Stalker did have a hate-boner for the guy," Clockblocker drawled. Emily's eye twitched at the vulgarity, but she ignored it and focused on the task.

Triumph slightly tilted his head. "Mind expanding on that?"

"Well, you know how their powers interact weirdly? How her Breaker state isn't intangible if it's inside of Grue's smoke or whatever?" A secondary weakness, Emily noted. It wasn't too relevant before, but… "I guess she was angry that she was vulnerable." Clockblocker shrugged. "Dunno."

"Why would she break him out, then?" Kid Win asked, clearly confused.

That was when Calvert decided to make himself known. "She's being paid by someone."

Armsmaster nodded. "Yes, I'm afraid that is true. Her prosthetic-slash-weapon, her equipment and targets: all of it points to someone with power. Stalker didn't even look at the holding cell labels — she knew where the prisoners were contained."

Aegis hummed to himself. "She's obviously not with the Empire…"

"Not the ABB, either," Vista continued. "I doubt they would take her."

"Coil?" Assault made a guess.

"With the heavy usage of tinkertech? Yes, I can see it." Armsmaster shifted. "We might need to increase his priority."

Emily agreed. "You have my clearance to do so."

"And the Undersiders?"

"Yes, go ahead. And just in case, Circus too." At least Cricket and Stormtiger hadn't escaped yet, Emily thought.

Armsmaster nodded. "Done."

"Good." Emily looked around again. "We will return to this later." She turned her head back to Armsmaster. "Now, about the vigilantes."

The Tinker cleared his throat. "At around 2:15 AM, we received several distress calls about a possible cape fight near Ferry Station South. Miss Militia and I were then dispatched to the location…"

▲​

"...Additionally, an hour prior to their run-in with the Empire — at 1:19 AM, according to the BBPD — they managed to stop an armed robbery in the northern end of Downtown. The victim they saved had confirmed it."

Emily shifted in her seat. "So, what are your thoughts on them?" She asked.

"They're clearly new, as evidenced by the condition of one of the robbers. Panacea was still at Brockton General Hospital by the time he was delivered to it and, according to her and the paramedics, the man's right hand was pierced by a pointy triangular object." Armsmaster paused. "Which, of course, lines up with Black Rose's thorns." Or, as per the PRT-assigned codename, 'Nail's nails', Emily remembered. Whoever came up with that one needed to be fired, effective immediately.

"Did she have a reason to maim him so extensively?"

"Possibly," Armsmaster grunted. "The police stated that there were shattered remnants of a Glock 19 at the scene, so it was likely that this was self-defense."

Emily nodded. "Continue."

"It's worth noting that when I confronted them about their potentially-villainous attire, Black Rose immediately rebuffed it by stating that they were heroes. According to my lie detector, she was telling the truth." Good, Emily thought. That was good. She just had to be careful with the recruitment…

"Armsmaster, how would you rate them?"

He took a moment to consider the question. "I'd peg Black Rose as a mid-level Trump-slash-Shaker. Maybe a low-level Blaster as well, considering what she did to the robber." Mentally, Emily agreed. "As for Nebula, though… I'm not so sure. There's another thing I want to mention."

"Oh?"

"I may be completely wrong here, but I'm almost certain that Nebula is Tattletale."

Well that was quite a bombshell, Emily commented to herself. She looked at the others' reactions, noting the amount of surprise. Assault especially looked intrigued by the idea — he used to be a villain himself, after all.

Emily motioned to continue.

"Their height and build match, at least." A comparison between two still shots was displayed on the projector screen. "Even if we barely have any footage of the latter." This complicated things.

"Shouldn't we be happy for her?" Assault asked. "That's one less villain we have to fight, after all."

Emily, meanwhile, was not that convinced. "We shouldn't be too reckless. If this is true, the girl is a Thinker — who knows what she could be planning?"

"What if she's the one who paid Shadow Stalker to spring the Undersiders?" Clockblocker asked. A surprisingly good question, too, considering the thoughtful silence now enveloping the room.

Armsmaster hummed. "That's possible. Her and Black Rose's fight against Cricket and Stormtiger might've been a distraction, something to divert a few heroes from the situation at the PRT HQ. The timing tracks." He crossed his arms. "Even with the event that we'll be discussing after this."

"We're not done yet, Armsmaster," Emily said. "How would you rate Nebula, with everything you had just mentioned?"

"If we're going with the theory that she is indeed Tattletale? A mid-level Thinker. Otherwise — a low-level Trump." The Tinker turned back to the screen again, where a piece of footage from his helmet had just been pulled up.

"And what do you do, exactly?" Came Armsmaster's voice from the video. Both the blonde and her partner were standing outside with Armsmaster, while Miss Militia could be seen at the side. The gun cape was pointing a nasty-looking shotgun at an angry containment-foamed Stormtiger, who was surrounded by PRT officers attempting to load him in a van.

"Well…" Nebula trailed off before turning her head towards Black Rose.

The latter met her eyes, blinked and then nodded. "Right." A thorn manifested between the two of them, pointing downwards.

"...I do this!" The galaxy-themed girl grinned before putting her fingertips on the object. She seemed to suppress a slight wince at the same time the thorn began glowing, withdrawing her hand from the construct and watching it float in the air. Just like with Nebula's hair, the thorn now contained little stars, popping in and out of existence with no apparent pattern.

Had Glenn not written off the ENE branch as a failure, he'd be pulling out all stops right now, Emily mused. Whatever the girl's power was, it certainly looked rather pretty.

Armsmaster stopped the video. "She gave no explanation beyond describing the effect as 'enhancement'. She wasn't lying, either, hence the Trump classification."

"So we have two new potentially-benevolent Trumps running around?" Emily asked.

"Correct, Director."

"Christ." She paused. "Anything else on the blonde girl? Or was that it?"

"No, nothing. Judging by their retelling of the fight, Nebula didn't exhibit any other abilities beyond creating a glowing thorn like the one on screen."

Emily took a moment to think, rubbing at her temples. Either the 'enhancement' granted more than just light, or Nebula was hiding something — powers weren't usually so weak. "Give her a Stranger zero as well, just to be sure," the Director said. "Mostly as a reminder about her potential ties with Tattletale."

Armsmaster nodded. "Done. What about the rest?"

"What about the rest?"

"Do I assign the Thinker rating too?"

Better to be overprepared than underprepared, Emily reasoned. "Do it." She paused again, thinking. "What about the Wards pitch?"

Armsmaster's posture tightened, becoming a bit more guarded. "They rejected it," he said, then played another clip.

"You did well tonight," Armsmaster spoke to the vigilantes. "Though you, no doubt, must understand how dangerous it was."

Black Rose had frowned somewhat. "Is this where you give us the Wards pitch?" Her voice sounded rife with distaste, at which Emily furrowed her brows.

"Yes, actually," Armsmaster stated. "Do you wish to join?"

"No," the black-clad cape answered. The silence that followed was tense.

"...Care to explain why?"

Nebula grabbed her partner's wrist. "We'd rather be independent."

The video ended right after.

"Do note that both of them are Trumps, Director. Since most Trumps trigger from an altercation with other parahumans, it is likely that Black Rose and Nebula would rather limit such interactions." No replacement for Gallant, then. Emily scowled.

"Or because Nebula's still Tattletale, perhaps?" The other wards looked at Aegis, who spent most of the meeting in silence.

"Or that, yes." Armsmaster nodded.

Miss Militia took a step forward, looking at him. "Or maybe her partner is one of Shadow Stalker's victims." She turned her head towards Emily, her eyes uncharacteristically cold. "In her civilian identity, that is. I trust you kept the diary?"

It all comes full circle, the Director thought with annoyance. "Yes, the evidence is secured. Along with a ton of copies." Just thinking about all the nasty things Hess had done made Emily's blood pressure skyrocket.

Militia's flickering weapon had finally settled on a knife. She nodded and slowly stepped backwards.

Emily sighed, then looked back at Armsmaster. "Did you mention the mortality rates at least?"

"...No," he said, hesitating. "I decided not to in the case that they'd take it as intimidation."

"...Fair." Emily glanced at the wall clock. "Five minute break," she announced.

▲​

"The third event," Armsmaster started, "took place within the same time frame as the two previous ones. Unlike with the others though, there isn't much information at the moment."

"Tell us what we know so far," Emily ordered. What little she heard already had felt like a headache and a half.

"At 2:21 AM, a fire was reported near the Commercial District. After dealing with the hazard and investigating the house in question, it was discovered that it was broken into beforehand. The stairs and bedroom — what was left of them, anyway — also showed signs of violent struggle, covered in blood and littered with bullet casings, while some other parts of the building, such as the living room, were vandalized with ABB iconography."

"And how, exactly, is this relevant to us? If we had to investigate every unpowered gang member attack, we'd…"

"Only one body was found, Director," Armsmaster interrupted. "Victor of the Empire. Othala was most likely kidnapped."

"Oh shit," whispered one of the Wards.

Emily sputtered, taken aback by the reveal. "Why the hell did you not say that earlier?!" She yelled as her subordinates winced.

"Ma'am, I did."

"No, you told me about Skidmark." Or did she simply forget?

"Skidmark as well, but I told you," he emphasized.

Emily, clearly, was far from amused. She took a deep breath, then prompted the Tinker once more.

"Part of the retrieved evidence was a reinforced stash of military-grade weapons, and most of them matched the ones seen being used by Victor. The other things of note were his and Othala's costumes, only partially lost to the flames — the latter's signature eyepatch, for example, was left basically unscathed."

"You said there was only one body?" Emily asked.

"Yes." Armsmaster nodded. "Victor went down fighting, the CSIs are certain of it. If he actually managed to kill anyone, though… Unknown."

A pregnant pause. "I see." Emily adjusted her jacket. One less nazi to worry about, she thought. "Is there more?"

"No, not at the moment."

Emily swept her gaze across the conference room. "The Empire will retaliate. I expect you all to be ready for when that happens." Waiting for a moment, satisfied by everyone's nods, the Director slumped back in her chair. She looked, yet again, at the Tinker. "Since you decided to mention him: what's the progress on Skidmark's autopsy?" The foul-mouthed drug user had bit the dust just several days ago, and the way he had died was concerning, to say the least.

"It has concluded," Armsmaster answered, looking at her.

"And?"

"Wh- Uh, excuse me?" Velocity interrupted, raising a hand. "What happened to him in the first place?"

"Right, you were out of town," Emily acknowledged. "Armsmaster?" The man nodded.

"Adam Mustain, better known as Skidmark, was discovered dead in an alley of the lower Docks two days ago. His body was severely mutilated, missing a large chunk of his upper torso. This included his left arm, left lung, half of his right lung, and his heart. Two fingertips — of his left hand's pinky and thumb — were found on the ground nearby as well." Armsmaster shifted again, unsurprisingly uncomfortable by what he was describing. A quick look at the peanut gallery revealed a few of the Wards looking ill too.

"Continue," Emily prompted. The faster it was over, the better.

"The autopsy report had described all of his wounds being 'impossibly clean' — not in the sense of bacteria, but precision. A good comparison would be him being a drawing that was partially expunged by a wet eraser."

Emily blinked. "Wet?"

"The corpse was drenched in water."

"Ah."

"We strongly suspect that the murderer is an unknown cape, codename 'Acrid'. Dragon's theory — with which I agree — is that Acrid is a dangerous Striker-Breaker, functioning similarly to the Empire cape Fog. Unlike Fog, we think that Acrid transforms into a humanoid water shape which removes any biological matter it touches." Armsmaster paused. "That last bit is mostly due to the pavement still being unscathed, as well as common sense when it comes to the Manton effect."

"Right, because otherwise he'd just fall through the ground," Clockblocker managed.

"Yes."

"Cool." The Ward replied dryly.

"I assume that's all?" Emily asked, hoping for 'yes'. She wasn't in the mood for more near-baseless speculation.

"Yes." Bingo. "Unless you want to address something else..?"

Emily surveyed the room again, inspecting her 'troops' one by one. All of them looked plain exhausted… Better to stop here for now.

"No, I don't think so. Thank you, Armsmaster." With that, the Director turned her head towards the others. "Both gangs will begin to escalate, of that I'm pretty certain. Prepare for the worst and be careful. Dismissed."

Just four more days…

---

 

[QroGrotor]

Interesting...
PRT members have the gears turning in their heads. Should lead to some shenanigans.

Thanks for the chapter, it was a pleasure to read!

 

[SensibleMalarkey]

"I may be completely wrong here, but I'm almost certain that Nebula is Tattletale."

Click to shrink...

Dammit Armsmaster, you just haaaaad to pull a Batman didn't you? Just haaaad to go all detective on the situation. It was all happy go lucky hero-fun-times, but now, NOW! Unless this is a rare-unicorn PRT ENE that actually has operational security; every gang in the city is soon to be aware of "two" trumps.

Stupid fucking Tinkers!!!

 

[One-who-reads]

Dammit Armsmaster, you just haaaaad to pull a Batman didn't you? Just haaaad to go all detective on the situation. It was all happy go lucky hero-fun-times, but now, NOW! Unless this is a rare-unicorn PRT ENE that actually has operational security; every gang in the city is soon to be aware of "two" trumps.

Stupid fucking Tinkers!!!

Click to shrink...

Coil was in the fцсking room. Thomas Calvert was the one to comment that Shadow Stalker was getting paid by someone.

 

[Rhyasial]

PRT shitting all over the bed as usual.

 

[TheLastTalcBender]

"I may be completely wrong here, but I'm almost certain that Nebula is Tattletale."

Click to shrink...

Really did not take them long to start "halping." I cringe every time the PRT is even slightly effective, because they're so bugged that they may as well put in on a billboard.

Wasn't this the one where Lisa staged her death? If so... What good is that even when the ONE detail that the heroes should have noticed is somehow ignored, but they, off of a total WAG and apparent ignorance, realize it's her after all?!

I'd hope it's fanon that they even try to do their jobs but somehow don't notice or are unable to fix the mole problem, but this is Worm we're talking about.
Or they're patronizing *bleeps* that think everything they do is for the Greater Good and they need to snoop on people nevermind the harm it causes... wait, that's just normal government we're talking about here.

 

[Madgizmo99]

Really did not take them long to start "halping." I cringe every time the PRT is even slightly effective, because they're so bugged that they may as well put in on a billboard.

Wasn't this the one where Lisa staged her death? If so... What good is that even when the ONE detail that the heroes should have noticed is somehow ignored, but they, off of a total WAG and apparent ignorance, realize it's her after all?!

I'd hope it's fanon that they even try to do their jobs but somehow don't notice or are unable to fix the mole problem, but this is Worm we're talking about.
Or they're patronizing *bleeps* that think everything they do is for the Greater Good and they need to snoop on people nevermind the harm it causes... wait, that's just normal government we're talking about here.

Click to shrink...

We don't know exactly how bugged the PRT is to my knowledge. aside from Coil and his power is damn hard to counter when you don't know what it is, or that he's in the fucking room. It's pretty reasonable for Armsmaster to identify Tattletale, and an important thing to mention in a meeting.

 

[SensibleMalarkey]

Really did not take them long to start "halping." I cringe every time the PRT is even slightly effective, because they're so bugged that they may as well put in on a billboard.

Click to shrink...

It is like a bizarre Twilight Zone effect. That when the PRT are competent it's not good for our protagonists. And when the PRT are incompetent… it's also not good for our protagonists.

Fanon I would say exaggerates a little bit, but we really didn't see much 'behind the scenes' in Canon. And frankly, Brockton Bay is a perfect storm of bullshit for maximum intrigue.

 

[Lotor]

...God damn it, Colin.

Still, I knew Coil would be finding out and there would be more issues involved. It'll be damn interesting to see how it plays out.

And the deeper look into Sophia's actions is interesting. The meeting between her and Taylor is going to be intense. Though one wonders how it will go.

I am concerned, but then with Amy, Taylor, and Lisa all working together... I kinda pity the people they are going to take down because those three working together are fucking amazing.

 

[SmollGenocide]

Really did not take them long to start "halping." I cringe every time the PRT is even slightly effective, because they're so bugged that they may as well put in on a billboard.

Wasn't this the one where Lisa staged her death? If so... What good is that even when the ONE detail that the heroes should have noticed is somehow ignored, but they, off of a total WAG and apparent ignorance, realize it's her after all?!

I'd hope it's fanon that they even try to do their jobs but somehow don't notice or are unable to fix the mole problem, but this is Worm we're talking about.
Or they're patronizing *bleeps* that think everything they do is for the Greater Good and they need to snoop on people nevermind the harm it causes... wait, that's just normal government we're talking about here.

Click to shrink...

This is the one where Lung got to the Undersiders before Taylor could distract him. She did manage to save Lisa though and they're going to have Amy as a third member of their little team. Though Lisa only just now found out she wasn't the only survivor.

 

[Shadelight]

Interlude 2.V
▲
Victoria
⧗
3 Days Ago​

Victoria groaned in her pillow and wrapped it around her ears, failing to ignore the music that woke her up just mere seconds ago. It was far too early for Dean to be calling her, she reasoned. Why couldn't he wait at least another hour more?

"I got a feeling~"

Then again, she did ask him to call her as soon as he could. The boy didn't answer the whole day yesterday, which worried her, and his hasty 'very busy sry' didn't make her any calmer.

"That tonight's gonna be a good night~"

In the end, her worry won her over. Victoria yawned and began to float, her face still facing downwards — she was too lazy to bother performing such inhuman feats as rolling over, and it wasn't like her mom was here to scold her for flying inside the house.

"That tonight's gonna be a-"

Her blindly-grasping limb finally found the offending noisemaker. She didn't bother stifling another yawn as she finally answered her phone, "Dean? Wha-"

"H-Hey, Vicky, I'm sorry if I woke you up but I only just got some time to call you. So, uh." Victoria heard a faint exhalation. "Hi?" She was surprised by how… meek he sounded. Not panicked, but definitely distressed.

Victoria sat up, sleep utterly forgotten. "What happened and who do I punch?" She glanced at the window, wondering if she could sneak out without anyone noticing. The digital clock on her nightstand displayed 6:49 AM and holy fuck was she not in the mood for school right now.

"No one, Vicky, I'm fine," Dean answered tiredly. "...Physically, at least." Another faint breath, as if he was psyching himself up for something.

"Physically. Not mentally?" Victoria frowned.

"I'm out of town."

…What? His abrupt answer threw her in for a loop. Didn't they plan on going to the movies tomorrow? "You're… What?" She quietly asked.

"As in, I moved."

Victoria's stomach dropped. Moved? Moved away? Away from the Bay? No, this couldn't be happening…

She clutched her phone harder. "What do you mean… 'moved'?" She failed to hide the sudden waver in her voice.

"I-I didn't even know we were moving until yesterday. I tried calling you earlier but father just grabbed my phone and sent me packing." Dean sighed. "I'm so sorry, Vicky."

Cold realization settled over Victoria. "You're not coming back." His parents weren't the nicest, even if they pretended to be for appearances' sake. She knew they took advantage of him dating a hero, for example — she wasn't stupid. But what caused them to leave so readily?

The silence stretched.

"I don't know," Dean finally said. "I- maybe they'll let us visit each other? I really don't know. Fuck."

Yeah. Fuck.

Victoria rested her head against the back of the bed. "Why?" She had her suspicions. "And where are you now? Boston?"

"New York," he answered glumly, and Victoria's eyes widened at the distance. "As for why… Remember how I told you about my parents freaking out about Browbeat?" A pause. "Yeah."

"Wait, did they take you out of the Wards?!" She asked with incredulity — she couldn't imagine herself staying calm if she were told she could no longer be a hero. Getting grounded was always temporary, but cancellation? A full-on ban? She'd fight against it, hard.

"No." Oh. "Director Piggot arranged for my body double to participate in some of Brockton's fake patrols for a few more weeks, at which point…"

"...Your birthday comes soon after," Victoria finished. Regardless of distance, she would visit to celebrate. Of that she was certain, all restrictions be damned.

Her eyes stung.

"Yeah. I met Director Wilkins yesterday, and she said she's ready to accept me into the Protectorate. Somewhere in early June, I think. Unless I'm still needed for the investigation."

"The what?"

She heard him hesitate. "I… There's been something weird going on in a few of the city's neighborhoods. Something that spooked even the local Elite branch. Director Wilkins mentioned that my power could be of use, so I agreed to help." He scratched his temple. "I'm, uh, not really supposed to talk about it, but I'm basically part of a secret operation now. Not that I know much yet — they're keeping most details under wraps."

Victoria blinked. "Wow. I can't even imagine…" She trailed off. "Please don't get hurt."

"That's the plan," he agreed. "Wish you were here too, though." The tone was meant to inject a bit of levity into the conversation, but…

"Yeah…" Victoria answered. "Well, that's…" She couldn't say 'good'. She just… couldn't. Victoria knew that it was good for him objectively — the New York branch was the biggest one! The most famous! Heck, Dean's now living out his superpowered detective fantasies! People need him! — But her feelings said otherwise; her stupid, selfish feelings. "I'm happy for you," she said. A sob had almost escaped her then.

"Vicky…" Dean trailed off. She knew that he knew she was lying.

"Shut up, just… Why did you have to go?" She whined.

A sigh. "I just told you why." He paused again. "Look, Vicky, do you honestly think I wanted this?"

"...No."

"Exactly."

"But you still transferred." Victoria sniffled. "I know that they need the Ward's agreement for that stuff. I've done my research, Dean."

"Vicky…" He did it again.

"Don't 'Vicky' me, Dean! You agreed! You didn't have to, but you did! You could've stayed!" She forced herself to lower her voice after the wall separating her and Amy's room was knocked on from the other side. "You could've stayed…"

"It was either that or getting banned from cape stuff completely!"

"You could've easily stayed as a vigilante or something!"

"Not everyone has the ability to fly, Vicky. I can't sneak out without someone noticing." Okay, now he was just being ridiculous!

"You know I can carry you just fine, Dean! You don't need flight when I could just pick you up instead."

Dean, for his part, huffed. "Either way, father would've skinned me alive for going against him. You know how he is." Yes. She knew.

"You co-"

"Vicky." His voice sounded full of exasperation and defeat. "Just stop. I'm sorry. I really am."

A tear rolled down Victoria's cheek, and then another. She didn't answer.

She heard him take a deep breath. "I'll understand if you want to... end things." Her heart skipped a beat. "Between us."

"No!" She shouted. "No. Please, I- We can do long-distance?"

"I'd like that." Both of them exhaled. "I wish I could've warned you sooner." A faint knock was heard a second after. "Shit. One second."

The small exchange that followed wasn't loud enough to hear through the phone. Victoria did recognize Mary's voice, though; the Stansfields' live-in maid. So the whole family moved, then? What about his father's business?

A door closed, and Dean was back on the phone. "Sorry, uh. They're waiting for me. Breakfast. I'll… call you later?"

"Yeah," Victoria whispered. She didn't want this call to end. But the universe didn't care about feelings, she knew that now intimately well. "Okay. I love you."

"I love you too, Vicky. Bye."

"Bye."

The call had ended, and Victoria curled up in her bed. Hiding beneath the sheets, she let the dam finally break.

 

[blitzgamer]

SHE NEEDS HUGS STAT

 

[QroGrotor]

An unpleasant situation to wake up to I'd imagine. Still, this has potential to go in a few interesting directions.
And there's something that managed to spook the Elite too.
It was a wonderful update.
Thank you for posting the chapter, it was a pleasure to read! Looking forward to seeing more!

 

[eeda]

Poor Browbeat relegated to be a foot note on both canon and fan made stories, even if just the description of his powers make him interesting. And now Vicky just sudently have free time to pester Amy about her new friends.

 

[GodOfPixies]

Just found this story (I almost never check the SFW stuff here since it has so few stories) and I'm loving the story so far. I think Taylor's power is very interesting, though it really could use some clearer explanation in-story. I very much like the plotlines diverging from canon in such a reasonable way, you've definitely avoided railroading things.

Only real criticism I have is that Lisa's power seems significantly nerfed; the usage of her power doesn't cause debilitating migraines like you've been having unless she pushes it much further. The basic surface level stuff that you've been describing when she uses her power should not be causing the rapid migraines you describe. I can understand wanting to avoid turning her into a Deus ex machina plot solver, which is definitely admirable, but jumping right to the migraines definitely makes her power way weaker. Canonically, one of the other main drawbacks to her power in the early days of Worm was how it could miss things or get stuck in a rabbit hole of ever-more-innacurate extrapolation. Given what I think you're aiming for with keeping her power from breaking the plot, that might be another method of doing so without crippling her power.

Anyway, enjoying the story and definitely enjoying where the gang plot is headed. Thanks!

 

[Shadelight]

I think Taylor's power is very interesting, though it really could use some clearer explanation in-story.

Click to shrink...

Feedback is useful. What do you think needs to be explained more in detail, exactly?

I very much like the plotlines diverging from canon in such a reasonable way, you've definitely avoided railroading things.

Click to shrink...

Butterfly effects are fun to play with.

Canonically, one of the other main drawbacks to her power in the early days of Worm was how it could miss things or get stuck in a rabbit hole of ever-more-innacurate extrapolation. Given what I think you're aiming for with keeping her power from breaking the plot, that might be another method of doing so without crippling her power.

Click to shrink...

True. I've not forgotten that, just haven't had the chance to implement it anywhere. Yet.

Anyway, enjoying the story and definitely enjoying where the gang plot is headed. Thanks!

Click to shrink...

Glad you like it! I've got... plans.

 

[GodOfPixies]

Feedback is useful. What do you think need to be explained more in detail, exactly?

Click to shrink...

So the main detail (and sorry is this has been talked about already, I just binged the threadmarks to catch up) is whether there is a time limit or "charge" limit on the thorns. I haven't noticed it mentioned in story, but I don't know why she doesn't use her power more, and why she doesn't keep the charged thorns around. Also, when copying Lisa's power, can she use it without the thinker headaches? Cuz if so why doesn't she just constantly have a thorn empowered with that ready? And when manipulating the thorns, what sort of range does that have? Until the fight with the E88 thugs there was no indication that she could manipulate them with so much force, so that was cool to see but very surprising since that seems like an important detail to find out so far along. So many mechanics of the actual usage of copied powers are unclear, though the fight with Cricket and Stormtiger clarified some it was mostly by reading between the lines.

I was excited about the power testing early with Lisa but they just figured out like two things and did zero additional testing. It just seems like they were incredibly unprepared to go patrolling, especially given Lisa's experience as a cape I'd have figured she would have pushed for a lot more preparation given her powers don't lend themselves to combat she'd want to make sure that the front line cape in their group was actually prepared to act as such.

 

[Shadelight]

So the main detail (and sorry is this has been talked about already, I just binged the threadmarks to catch up) is whether there is a time limit or "charge" limit on the thorns.

Click to shrink...

The lifespan of a thorn/spike is infinite, however if it takes damage* that splits it in multiple fragments, if the user hasn't paid attention to it for a while, or if the user manually dismisses it, it ceases to exist. (turning into the quickly-fading black sand, the same that appears to form new thorns)

What do you mean by 'charge' limit? If you're talking about thorn summoning time - which I doubt, but whatever - the formula is: [0.4 * (2 ^ t + 1) + 0.8 * s] seconds, where (t) is the amount of thorns currently active, and where (s) is the amount of spike components currently active.

* - for context, thorns/spikes are usually as durable as steel, however durability lessens in proportion to attention on the thorn/spike in question, and can fluctuate even further depending on the contained powers.

I haven't noticed it mentioned in story, but I don't know why she doesn't use her power more, and why she doesn't keep the charged thorns around.

Click to shrink...

While she mostly doesn't keep her constructs around simply to avoid getting clocked as a cape, it's also due to the aforementioned attention requirement. (so she technically could keep some around, she'd just have to spare a few seconds every five minutes or so giving a burst of active attention to each thorn/spike currently summoned)

Also, when copying Lisa's power, can she use it without the thinker headaches?

Click to shrink...

Negotiator's Amalgam expression is one more suited for combat, and thus instead of punishing the user with Thinker migraines it mostly just has increased passive and active attention requirements. A migraine would still grow eventually, though, provided the user makes heavy active use of said power expression in quick succession. The migraine's growth would also increase multiplicatively with the amount of Negotiator thorns/spikes in use, obviously.

Cuz if so why doesn't she just constantly have a thorn empowered with that ready?

Click to shrink...

See reasons listed above. Do also note that while Taylor is used to the barebones of her power, until the revelation in 1.8 she hadn't seen a reason to keep thorns/spikes summoned. As plot progresses, she'll learn the 'bursts of active attention for construct upkeep' habit eventually, along with a few others.

And when manipulating the thorns, what sort of range does that have? Until the fight with the E88 thugs there was no indication that she could manipulate them with so much force, so that was cool to see but very surprising since that seems like an important detail to find out so far along.

Click to shrink...

Default maximum control range is ~40 meters. Much like with canon's Queen Administrator, Amalgam facilitates temporary gradual increases to summon radius & speed, as well as thorn/spike controllability, durability, speed and control range during situations reminiscent of Taylor's trigger event. (this phenomenon is known as the Sechen range)

And note that Taylor attempts to avoid excessive use of force because her power is one that can be quite lethal.

So many mechanics of the actual usage of copied powers are unclear, though the fight with Cricket and Stormtiger clarified some it was mostly by reading between the lines.

Click to shrink...

Any of those that need to be clarified? Feel free to ask more questions.

I was excited about the power testing early with Lisa but they just figured out like two things and did zero additional testing. It just seems like they were incredibly unprepared to go patrolling, especially given Lisa's experience as a cape I'd have figured she would have pushed for a lot more preparation given her powers don't lend themselves to combat she'd want to make sure that the front line cape in their group was actually prepared to act as such.

Click to shrink...

They got too caught up in the hype about the power-combining aspect. In their minds at the time, they'd done everything they could - they didn't have Amy yet to be able to test out combinations, they weren't about to go cape-hunting either, and the real use of Negotiator's Amalgam expression had already been discovered in 1.4.

Of course, I'll attempt to display most, if not all, aforementioned information in the story as it progresses. Eventually.

 

[GodOfPixies]

What do you mean by 'charge' limit?

Click to shrink...

Ah, no I meant whether after copying a power does usage of the copied power a finite resource or can it be used as long as the thorn is manifested? Based on your further explanations I gather it's the second.

Any of those that need to be clarified?

Click to shrink...

I think you explained pretty well, nothing else in particular stood out as lacking explanation though I am sure there are hidden aspects I just don't know enough about to ask. Lol. I look forward to learning those as the story continues.

 

[Shadelight]

Ah, no I meant whether after copying a power does usage of the copied power a finite resource or can it be used as long as the thorn is manifested? Based on your further explanations I gather it's the second.

Click to shrink...

The latter. (unless stated otherwise)

I think you explained pretty well, nothing else in particular stood out as lacking explanation though I am sure there are hidden aspects I just don't know enough about to ask. Lol. I look forward to learning those as the story continues.

Click to shrink...

Fair.

 

[Shadelight]

Reaction 3.1
▲
Taylor
⧗
Now​

The arcade visit two days ago went off without a hitch, culminating in a short stop at the prize counter near the entrance. According to the attendant, the selection was expanded last weekend, which definitely seemed to be the case considering how interested the Dallons looked. The reward that gained most of Amy's attention was a Cthulhu plushie, nearly two feet tall and aquamarine in color, overlooking its gaming domain from the safety of the top shelf. We swiped that one immediately.

Lisa, of course, had her eyes on a smug-looking fox, sharing its grin when I handed it to her. While I found the thing cute as well, the one I liked even more was a similarly-sized flannel moth sitting next to it. It was just so damn fluffy, the floppy antennae especially!

We'd gotten it as well. Obviously.

I expected Victoria to get a plush too, what with our collective haul from Skee-Ball, Depth Crawler and that blasted punching machine, but she was fine with just two starburst hair clips, silently watching us with an oddly soft smile.

During the walk back home after stuffing our mouths at a pizza place, Victoria spotted some space warping and flew on ahead to investigate. The three of us found her talking to Vista with a forlorn expression, Kid Win floating above on his hoverboard in an ever-expanding circle. According to Amy, the green-clad Shaker knew Victoria's boyfriend as well, and had apparently taken his move nearly as badly as the older blonde herself. She certainly appeared rather rigid; way less cheerful than the media showed. Their hug didn't help much, either, so this was pretty serious.

I was still far too unsure about my judgment of the Wards; my feelings mixed and shifting, so many of them negative. Ultimately, I resorted to standing at a distance, stewing in my thoughts with Lisa and Amy keeping me company. At least I wasn't alone then, because otherwise I'd have just left.

The chat didn't last long, as the Wards were ordered to keep going. I wasn't surprised much when Victoria decided to tag along with them — she was quite enthusiastic with her coaching back at the arcade. I figured she still needed to punch something, and as long as she was careful? Beating down on gang members sounded pretty therapeutic.

Thus, it was just us three, left to our own devices.

Of course, arriving at my home with no supervision whatsoever, we did what any group of three perfectly sane teenage girls would do in our situation: kick off a lengthy discussion featuring numerous crimes against nature.

…Okay, not really. Almost.

In reality, me and Lisa spent a good twenty minutes catching Amy up on my power. While she did know the basics already, the fact that I could combine thorns into spikes was still new to her, for one — I was far from verbose back when I told her of our Empire encounter.

Another discovery was a formula, courtesy of Lisa — a fruit of experimentation, boredom and curiosity. It described how long it would take for me to summon a brand new thorn: for each one already active, the time was essentially doubled. Though I still had yet to memorize the effect spikes had on the equation, I knew from all my testing that the lowest was eight tenths of a second.

Victoria would've found this fascinating, there was no doubt about it, however I was set on avoiding any mention of my powers to anyone beyond my teammates. This was, of course, common sense — like with most capes that weren't unmasked, my team and I benefited from anonymity; the incredibly powerful ability to lead a double life. Were said anonymity threatened, anyone close to us would be in danger by default, and that extended to ourselves tenfold — in costume or not, it didn't matter.

It wouldn't be hard for the blonde Dallon to slip up somewhere, considering how prone she was to gossip about everything. And it didn't even have to be with civilians — just her mom would be more than enough to screw things up. Amy would get yelled at, and probably grounded until college. Judging from her stories, it wouldn't be much of a stretch to expect her to get banned from associating with us, either — we were encouraging the healer to be more creative with her powers.

Regardless, with the catchup completed, I suggested testing a new interaction: Lisa and Amy's powers, merged within a spike. I've been intrigued by the possibilities ever since Amy pointed out her biokinesis, thinking of different ways the combination could express itself: would it focus on Lisa's intelligence, offering ideas for augmenting brains? Draw from her 'intuition', granting even more innate knowledge of any living matter touched? Lean towards Amy's potential, showing ways of optimizing even the most complex of organs? Something completely different?

A bit of everything, apparently.

Amy had christened it a 'tech tree', a term I remembered hearing from several of Greg Veder's monologues, both her and Lisa's excitement skyrocketing once I described my sensations in full. Touching a grape with the spike caused a web of options to bloom in my mind, some of them unavailable and locked behind others. I could make the small fruit bigger, replace all of its insides with seeds, remove the insides entirely, apply an addictive effect… Not counting the unavailable ones, there were at least twenty changes I could select from and, considering the 'test subject', it felt like barely even scratching the surface.

My first attempt was to enlarge the grape, and it was only then that I noticed the price — each alteration had one, marked by varying, vague feelings of volume. There were also fractions, but I ignored them for the time being, focusing on selecting enough biomass within the grape in my hand. The price for enlargement was small, about half of my subject in total, and, as soon as I had confirmed it, the aforementioned half disappeared.

…And then began growing back. And so did the grape after that. Amy's face was priceless as she stared at the resulting fruit. Lisa's evil cackles only added to the effect — the grape was the size of an apple, yet it was just as dense as before. Amy called my power bullshit, Lisa demanded a taste, and that was as far as we'd gotten thanks to Victoria crashing the party.

In hindsight, it was getting late, though we were still annoyed by the delay.

…Which brought us to now, two days later, Amy at my door; a tote bag over her shoulder, anticipation in her eyes. She was wearing a black Linkin Park shirt and a pair of denim jeans, sporting several holes that were probably intentionally made. While I never really got the point of that trend, she was certainly rocking the look.

"C'mon, let's do this. Where's Lisa?"

"Upstairs. Did you bring me some biomass?"

"Duh." Amy tapped at her bag. "You're doing the groceries next time."

I snorted and let her in, beelining towards the stairs. Two long days of waiting only made us more eager to continue.

While I and Lisa could've technically kept going, Amy was part of the team, and her power was part of the interaction. Even if I could resummon any previously-existing constructs, I still would've felt pretty bad, testing it without her.

Then again, I couldn't, so the point was moot regardless.

We stepped into my room, and Lisa looked up from her laptop.

"Took you long enough. Sup." She glanced at the bag and grinned. "You've come prepared, I see."

"Not like I'm letting you two violate nature without me."

"Oh?" The blonde raised an eyebrow. "Well, you're more than welcome to join."

I didn't need to see Amy's face to know that she rolled her eyes. "Screw you, Lisa. Scooch. What are you up to, anyway?"

"Oh, you know…" Lisa drawled with smugness, eyeing me and Amy as we sat by her sides on the bed. This thing was designed for one person, so Lisa getting squished was inevitable.

Not that any of us minded, really — those new wine-red fox-themed pajama bottoms made her even softer than usual. Though she could've gone without stealing the owl shirt from my wardrobe…

"...You're hacking the PRT again, aren't you," Amy guessed, exasperated.

"Guilty," was Lisa's answer.

Amy sighed. "God damnit."

"To be fair," I commented, "what she's doing is useful. We need all the info we can get, and we can't be everywhere at once." 'Yet', I avoided saying. I'd think of something, eventually — having more range would be invaluable for our safety.

"Also, without me, you wouldn't have known about Acrid," Lisa pointed out, still tapping away at her keyboard. "He might just be a theory, but better safe than sorry, right?"

She kept on periodically switching between several command prompt windows, mostly just keeping an eye on them as she rifled through PHO. And that was without even mentioning the dozens of browser tabs opened — I would've gotten a migraine just by trying to find the right one.

Amy groaned in response. "Yeah, I guess…" She paused for a moment. "Still feels…"

"Wrong to do this? Sure. It might, but think of it this way: Coil is also in on this — I'm just leveling the playing field." The Thinker huffed in annoyance, refreshing the page yet again. "Even with this, we're at a massive disadvantage. Probably always will be, unless we get an anti-Thinker." Which would be dangerous in its own right, most likely. "And we still need to deal with the mercs, and the Undersiders — wow, feels weird to say that — and whoever else the fucker has on retainer." She rolled her neck. "Lots to do, that's for sure."

I squeezed Lisa's free hand.

Humming in acknowledgement, Amy leaned back against the headboard. "Do we even have a plan for him yet?" Another pause. "'Cause I'm helping too."

I flashed a grateful smile at her, to which she answered with a shug. Even though she'd already agreed to join our team, I was still reasonably worried that she'd refuse to help with Coil. Hearing that she was willing to pitch in… It was like a weight being lifted from my chest. With her, we might actually stand a chance. With her, we had options.

Lisa, though, looked conflicted. That wasn't a good sign.

"Amy…" she began. The softness of her voice surprised me. "You don't have to do this. Really, you don't have to."

…What? I mean, she was right, but… why use such a tone? Did I not pick up on something?

Clearly, I didn't, because Lisa's words seemed to have struck a nerve.

"I'm helping. Shut up." Amy was almost growling, her freckles scrunched up in annoyance. "Shut up or I'll mute you," she added. What did I not see?

To that, Lisa just sighed, then passed her laptop to me. She turned around on her side, facing Amy's glare head-on.

"Amy."

"What."

"Coffee shop."

"What?"

I blinked, not following as well. Was this the monster thing again?

…No, doubt it. We haven't yet done any testing. Was it something about Coil? Fuck, I didn't know.

"Remember what I told you in the coffee shop, Amy. The first thing, not the second."

Hmm, 'coffee shop'… What else did Lisa mention? Shitty adoptive mother? Fear of turning evil? Fear of earning a kill order? Fear of us leaving for..?

Oh.

"Taylor already got it," Lisa said, confirming my guess. "Remember who you are — a person, not a power."

"Yeah, Amy, we're still here." I reached over and touched her hand, partially hidden by the crossing of her arms. "We won't leave. Promise." Not like Emma. Never like Emma.

Amy looked away.

"I don't want you boarding the 'fuck Coil' train in an attempt to be fucking useful," Lisa continued, now serious, and I found myself nodding to her. "Nor of obligation, for that matter. Of..? From..? Ugh, fuck grammar. Moving on." She sighed. "I'm only okay with you contributing if you actually, genuinely want to. Because, reminder — you don't have to. We won't suddenly run off. I get that living with Brandish made you think that you're just a tool, but that's not how people work." A pause. "Well, some do. Not us, though."

"But-"

"No buts, don't even think about it. Yes, your power is bullshit. Yes, it's extremely useful. But if you don't want to help out, then don't. Will I be annoyed? A bit, but I'll respect the choice, and I'll deal." Lisa shrugged with one arm. "Always have. Got it?"

Amy groaned again, both eyes closed this time. "You and your words. Jesus."

"Thinker five~" Lisa grinned. "And Trump. And Stranger, somehow." She shook her head, chuckling. "Dunno what they're on, but I want some."

Amy's lips have quirked upwards. "Still not sure where the Stranger bit came from."

Before we got completely derailed, I poked her in the shoulder. "Are you okay now?" I asked, not wanting to leave this unresolved.

"Yeah. I guess," she grumbled. "I still want to help you, though."

"Want?"

"Want."

"Okay," I agreed. "And thank you." I just hoped she knew what she'd signed up for…

She shot me a lazy thumbs up, then sat up, opening her eyes again. "Carol talked about you two yesterday, by the way." Oh. Oh dear.

Amy was smirking now, though, so it shouldn't be too bad. Right?

I was still mildly annoyed that we couldn't just text about this, but all of us have agreed to keep the cape stuff as secret as possible. If even one of us wasn't careful enough…

"Hmm? Oh." Lisa arched her eyebrows. "Interesting."

I rolled my eyes and lightly elbowed her in the ribs.

"Et tu, Taylor?"

I sighed. "Just let her talk, Lise. And stop using your power for everything — we still need it for the experiments." I looked at the laptop on my lap. "Oh, should I..?"

"Nah, gimmie. There. Not much new info yet, anyway." She closed the device and handed it to Amy.

"What do you want me to do with this?"

"You're the closest to the nightstand."

"You can reach it too, you know."

"Yes, but I'm lazy."

"You think I'm not?"

Suffice it to say, I burst into giggles. This was just all too much.

▲​

"...And I just sat there with a shitty poker face. Nobody noticed, I think. Fingers crossed?"

Amy's tale of her mother's antics was as entertaining as it was concerning. Mostly due to her paranoia, and her urgent warning to steer clear of Nebula. According to Lisa, the PRT logs didn't link her two identities outright, but the info Amy gave contradicted that — Brandish was informed by Armsmaster himself. That, of course, resulted in her alerting both Amy and Victoria, as she 'didn't want them to fall prey to the whims of an enemy Thinker'.

Lisa appeared amused by it, but I could tell that she was worried too.

"Welp. Better than having Halbeard showing up on our doorstep again."

Amy blinked. "Wait, what?"

"That was right after Sophia."

"Yeah, he came with Miss Militia," I clarified. "It's how I got into Arcadia, actually."

"Huh," Amy managed. "That explains it." She chuckled. "I like how you maimed a bitch and they still gave you a transfer."

I pressed my lips into a straight line. "She was one of my bullies. And I let them read my diary."

"Wait, you have a diary?"

"Sorta? They took it for evidence. And it wasn't what you would expect it to be — just a daily log of all their 'pranks'. There wasn't much else to write about."

"Oh," Amy said. "Sorry." She huffed in annoyance. "I'd hug you but Lisa's in the way. Blame her."

A giggle escaped me. "Sure, I forgive you."

Lisa, meanwhile, gasped. "You can climb over just fine, you know."

"That implies laborious movements," Amy retorted. "I came here to flip off Mother Nature, not… move. Eugh."

Lisa and I shared a glance. I could just… Oh, yep, she's gotten the same idea.

Some shuffling later, and the problem was no more.

"Better?" I asked Amy, with Lisa now behind me. The former had simply shrugged, then rolled into my embrace.

Being hugged by both of them, at the same time, was just… wonderful. All of my stress vanished, if only for a moment. Lisa and Amy, too, seemed to agree with my judgment, almost melting into me, no longer as tense.

Amy was the first one to break the cozy silence, her voice slightly muffled by my shoulder. "Weren't you there too, Lisa?"

"Wh-"

"During their visit. Did they not question you?"

"Ha! If they did, I'd not be here right now," Lisa answered smugly, and I could hear her grin. "No, don't worry, I hid. They never even saw me~"

"Maybe that's where the Stranger rating came from?" I joked.

Lisa snorted. "Doubt it."

"Hmm." Amy grimaced. "You think they will come back?"

Lisa's grip became rigid. "I sure fucking hope not."

Once again, I felt tension in the air, mixed with a fog of silence. We had far too many enemies to make plans against already, and adding the Protectorate to that list felt wrong… And yet, we had to, didn't we? Coil would surely exploit them. Pull some strings in the PRT, cause some effect by proxy, catch us unawares…

I shuddered.

"Um, how about we continue where we left off?" I summoned a thorn next to each of them, ending the double hug. "Not like we're gonna fight Armsmaster." And we needed a distraction. And resources. And weapons…

"Please don't jinx us like last time, Taylor." Like last..? Oh, right, the Coil mercs.

"Sorry?"

Lisa just waved me off. "It's fine, best not to dwell on it."

As she said that, I reached over Amy for her bag. Oddly enough, her plush was here too. "Why'd you bring Cthulhu?" I asked.

Amy frowned momentarily, but then seemed to remember something. "Carol kept glaring at him, so I figured I'd leave him here. Better than having him taken away for tinkertech analysis."

…What.

"Did you put anything inside him?" Lisa asked with an eyebrow raised.

"No..? The fuck?"

The Thinker shrugged. "Just asking. Thought maybe you'd smuggled some biomass."

"That's what the apples are for," Amy deadpanned. "And Taylor can grow more if needed. I'm not about to start gutting toys, Lisa."

"That's actually a good idea," I murmured.

…And now they're staring at me.

"Taylor, sweetie, what the fuck?" Lisa queried.

"Well, we could trap them? Or something? Just in case?"

"The last time you made a trap, its victim lost their ambidexterity privileges." …Low blow.

"Yeah, well… Yeah. But more options is good!"

Lisa just softly facepalmed, exchanging a glance with Amy. Why did they not agree? We weren't completely safe here.

"How about we stick to… tamer stuff, for now? Weaponizing plushies sounds like a last resort to me. At least start with entrances or something, I dunno."

Amy sighed. "Flipping off Mother Nature is more tame? …Yeah. Somehow, it is. God, you two are impossible." She grabbed an apple. "Fuck it."

▲​

In. Out.

In. Out.

In. Out.

Knot… Done.

Another hole repaired. Hopefully the last one — my fingers were getting numb… Looking over the costume, that seemed to be the case. Phew.

So far, the session was a success. Yes, I was nursing a Thinker migraine from Lisa/Amy spike overuse, and yes, we didn't make anything sentient, but we still grew a bunch of cool things that will be useful in costume and out. This was also a nice exercise in designing stuff with Nymph's theme, as we had to make a clear distinction between her and Panacea.

A good example would be the caltrop plant we created: its caltrops were green and purple, and pyramidal in shape. Well, with small thorns — not mine, the plant kind — sticking out from each point, but the comparison still worked. Each caltrop had many smaller iterations inside, connected to the previous ones through the aforementioned thorns. Much to Lisa's chagrin, Amy insisted on calling them 'fractrops'.

…I liked it, at least.

Additionally, Lisa suggested making them glow in reverse proportion to their size — nothing too noticeable in a fight, but easily identifiable when you knew what to look for. The idea was that Nymph's power had to make at least some part of every plant glowy, even already existing ones if she needed to touch them for something.

Of course, having a very conspicuous plant would be just asking for trouble — even dad would notice, and I didn't want that to happen. That was why, a handful of internet searches later, we decided on making the thing into a blue moonstone succulent instead — the fractrops would grow inside its leaves, which could be peeled apart like an orange, or an onion. As long as I kept it at my desk, the lamp and fairy lights would keep it alive.

Low watering requirements, too. I couldn't say no to that.

Currently, the caltrop plant was one of our two only renewable creations, with the small potted fern at my nightstand being the other. That was a potent anti-paralytic, mostly to counteract my new combat knife. It also worked with the Venus handcuffs I came up with, and most other conventional paralytic substances. Rubbing several leaves on the affected area was, usually, more than enough. For stronger and/or full-body impairments, though, the recommended course of action was ingestion.

There were some annoyances, however: the glow rule, for example, meant that the knife needed to glow at least sometimes, and I really didn't want that to be the case. The compromise we settled on in the end was applying bioluminescence to the paralytic agent instead, causing it to only light up when not on the knife itself. Theoretically, it'd also help me track my target, as each cut would leave a softly-glowing golden mark regardless of if it struck flesh or not.

…Might have to think of a way to prevent it from glowing while on me, though. Close-quarters combat could be quite messy, and allowing enemies to partake in the tracking aspect was far from the best of ideas.

Stretching in the desk chair, I stowed away the needle, placing it in the storage compartment of the silk generator nearby. It was still far from ideal, but even in its current iteration it saved us a trip to Parian — refill with biomass, put in the needle, have it auto-threaded and feel free to sew. While what we had now sufficed for repairs, I was already thinking of upgrades: tentacles with silk glands on each one, perhaps, having them work in tandem with each other? Would let me control the thing via power instead of manually, too.

Much like the patched-up costumes, I hid the bottle-shaped artifact far from prying eyes, then stood up, looking at the bed. Two pairs of eyes stared back.

"Any luck with the mushrooms?" I asked, sitting down next to my teammates.

"Nah," Amy answered, yawning. "I'll finish 'em some other time."

I yawned as well, followed by Lisa. "Fair." Speaking of whom…

"We may need your input, Tay," she said, then gestured to the thing stretched over her and Amy's legs.

Looking at the plant-based barebones of a robe, I shook my head. "Not now. Later?" It was far from done, and I was pretty exhausted… The migraine, too, had yet to fully recede. I couldn't imagine how she dealt with them near-daily.

The Thinker blinked, then nodded. "Yeah, you're probably right." She stretched, arching her spine.

"Wait, we're done?" Amy asked, bewildered. She was definitely the one who had the most fun out of all of us.

"We can pick this back up later?" I offered.

She looked at the robe, frowned for a split second, shrugged, then flopped backwards, bonelessly. "Eh."

"Guess that's Amy for 'yes'," Lisa commented.

Lightly, I smiled at nothing in particular, but then noticed the costume melting into one big glob of goo. "Uh. Amy?" That was her doing, right?

"Hm? Oh. Don't mind that." She waved me off.

Lisa saw my confusion first. "She can remember it, dork. Rebuilding shouldn't be hard." Oh, okay, right. Better than keeping even more obvious tinkertech, I supposed. And this wa- "Yes, Taylor, this counts. Wet tinkertech, but still. Also, ow." …Thinkers.

Amy poked her in the arm. "Stop thinking."

I nodded in agreement, then reached for another apple. Huh, only two left?

We sat in silence for another solid minute before Amy turned her head to look at what I'd been making. "Are those gummy worms?" She asked, propping herself up on one elbow.

I made them wiggle in my hands, courtesy of Amy's power. "Yup." My current goal was to make the flavor reminiscent of Fruit Gushers. The fact that I was playing around with genuine fruit tissue helped a bit.

She rolled her eyes and reached over, touching one and blinking. "Not bad. I'd do a few things differently, though." Well, I sure wouldn't mind some more tips.

I let her confiscate my potentially-biohazardous treats, then restored physical contact between them and Amy's thorn. Oh, I did miss a few things, interesting…

Lisa cleared her throat. "If you two are gonna do that, I'll be obligated to sing the song to annoy you." She was watching the gummy worms too, mildly put off by their squirming.

Amy, being Amy, made them wiggle even more in response.

"I warned you!" Lisa pointed accusingly.

"And I don't care," Amy answered with a grin. "Hell, I can even start for you."

"Oh god, what did I do," I heard Lisa whisper through her hands.

Ignoring my own chuckle, Amy sat up a bit straighter and started: "Nobody loves me, everybody hates me. Guess I'll go eat worms!~"

Lisa groaned.

"Come- on- Lisa and- join- the- fucking song," Amy sang to the tune, "Look at them wiggle and squirm!~"

I giggled.

Midway through tormenting Lisa — who was doubly annoyed by Amy getting one of the lines wrong 'on purpose' — we collectively heard the front door closing, heralding dad's arrival and spurring us to clean up.

"I'm home!" He announced from below. "With pizza!" That got our attention.

"Didn't we tell him that we had pizza two days ago?" Lisa asked me. "Ow!"

Amy, after casually elbowing her, offered a piece of wisdom: "Never say no to free pizza."

As someone who enjoyed it as well, I slowly nodded in agreement. Then I stood up to shout, "Coming!"

Once we double-checked my room yet again, we made our way to the bathroom.

An emergency appetite refresh and one flight of stairs later, we were settling into our places at the kitchen table with gusto. I was glad that dad brought two pizzas instead of one, because every single one of us was positively ravenous.

"Hello again, Amy," dad greeted. "Have you girls been having fun?"

Both me and the healer shared a glance and looked at Lisa.

"Yes," she answered dryly, pointedly ignoring our grins. "Tons. Loads, even."

"Turnabout is fair play," Amy commented, sticking her tongue out victoriously.

"What did you two d-" As dad's gaze wandered to me, he did a double-take and frowned. "Taylor, why are your eyes… greener?" Huh. He noticed.

Amy's offer to fix my eyes came out of left field, in my opinion — she was fiddling with her mushrooms at the time, while I was trying out more different spike-made modifications. Still, I took her up on it in the end. Though I always liked wearing glasses, enjoying their mask-like feeling of protection, my poor vision made me reliant on them, which my tormentors used to their benefit. On numerous occasions I couldn't do anything but lay there, unable to fight back because I couldn't see a thing. And yes, the bitches were gone — hopefully forever — but still, I had to be careful… I didn't have any willingness to become a target again.

Lisa, naturally, saw how torn I was on the decision. Her suggestion was to, instead of fixing my eyes outright, make them adaptive. I instantly agreed, as it offered the best of both worlds — the continued ability to wear glasses as well as perfect vision whether I had them on or not.

…As for the color change, that was originally an Amy slip-up, but I asked for her to just roll with it — both her and Lisa's eyes were much prettier than my boring brown. Lisa's were a darker shade of green, quite like an empty wine bottle, while Amy's were almost yellow, comparable to sun-soaked grass. I opted for something in the middle of the two, keeping a bit of the brown on the outer part of the iris.

Now, then, how to explain this… Truth would probably work fine.

"Amy healed my vision, and…" Right, uh. Color. Fine, small lie it is. "...that's a side-effect?" I turned to Amy.

"Yup," she answered tersely.

"Oh." Dad blinked. "I see."

Lisa snorted.

Trying not to groan, I reached for a slice of pizza.

Somehow, dad wasn't as easily misled. "Why are you still wearing glasses, then?" He asked me, motioning with his own slice.

"Uh." Succinctly put, Taylor. That wasn't suspicious at all.

"They're adaptive," Amy almost whispered. I could see how much it pained her to reveal that.

Dad turned to look at her. "Huh. You can do that?"

She just nodded, looking at her food. "Please don't tell Carol."

Dad, thankfully, didn't prod much further. "Okay, I won't," he nodded and took a bite. When he swallowed, though… "Oh, by the way, I spoke with her."

Lisa choked on her soda, and Amy stopped moving at all.

"What do you mean, you 'spoke with her'?" I asked.

"Well, she called me during my break, curious both about me and who Amy was spending her time with…" An audible gulp could be heard from the healer's location. "...Which is why she'll be coming over tomorrow for dinner. Her husband and daughters are invited too, of course."

My appetite withered and died irrevocably.

"Fuck," Lisa summed up our thoughts.

 

[Dragonslayer Ornstein]

Haha oh shit…

 

[SensibleMalarkey]

Yeessss shenanigans!

They need a comfort tech-tree. Knives? Caltrops? So violent. How about the perfect pair of fuzzy slippers! Super plush, self heating and cooling, and they follow you around until you want to wear them! Just… make sure you put them on at least once a day… otherwise they will aggressively stay on your feet.

 

[GraphiteCrow]

Yeessss shenanigans!

They need a comfort tech-tree. Knives? Caltrops? So violent. How about the perfect pair of fuzzy slippers! Super plush, self heating and cooling, and they follow you around until you want to wear them! Just… make sure you put them on at least once a day… otherwise they will aggressively stay on your feet.

Click to shrink...

oh no! emotionally clingy slipper Mimics!

Which would be a Hilarious way to trap the Hebert house. replace the furniture in the house with Mimics.