The Skittering Chaos Chapter 1 (Rewrite)
After some critique was brought forward about my extremely rushed piece The Skittering Chaos (did it in an afternoon) and I gave it some thought, I've decided to revise the piece to be more reflective of post golden morning Taylor, especially since I realised after that Taylor knew that the bullets were coming and all she did was make it more convenient for Contessa to kill her. Thank you megamiaouh for the critique and ToxinTurian for the information about Taylor during and after her time in the Wards and any others that have given me information since I wrote this note. While I am going to be keeping Taylor as a moth demon that doesn't mean that she won't be mistaken for something else. Look up the Metalmark Moth and you'll find something interesting. Taylor won't be a specific species of moth however but more a generalized moth demon. Also I've changed the perspective to first person as to make it more like a continuation of the final scene in Worm.
Inspired by this post:
WannaBee (Worm/Hazbin Hotel)
Feedback is highly appreciated and I try to take it all into account.
Edit: Broke up some of the larger paragraphs to increase readability.
Edit 2: I've tried to fix up the tenses so that they are more consistent and to increase readability.
<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
I looked away.
I looked
up. My eyes were wet.
So many stars. The universe so vast.
We're s- so very small, in the end.
The first bullet hit me from behind, where my mask offered no coverage, and I slowly toppled. The second hit me before I could fall, before there could be any pain.
<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
I wake up. I'm face down on some concrete and the first thing I notice is that I can't feel my bugs. Mentally, I search for them; but, I feel nothing. As I start to get up, I notice a few things, one being that something light is laying over top of me, I suddenly have an extra pair of arms, and finally that I don't have a stitch of clothing on me. I touch the thing on top of me and realise that I can feel through it, and I can feel my own hand grabbing it as if I were grabbing another body part. I feel tugging at my back at two points as I pull on the strange thing on top of me. I flex muscles I didn't realise I have and I feel the blanket, or rather wings, move. At a glance they look like moth wings, specifically female silk moth wings. My new wings are large, fuzzy, and white. Gingerly, as I get up, I wrap them around me like a poncho using a combination of my hands and a flexing of my new muscles. At least I'm now somewhat dressed.
I look up and take in my surroundings.
I've woken up on a sidewalk of some not-so-well-off neighbourhood. The buildings all around me are either made of some dark red concrete or red brick. None of the buildings in this part of town reach higher than six stories but all were at least two. The windows of all the first and second floors in the neighbourhood are either smashed or boarded up. None of the street lamps are functioning and only about half of the neon signs above the shop fronts glow. All of the shop names are some sort of reference to hell or something evil. Names like Demonic Groceries, 666 Laundromat, The Villain's Pub, and Satan's Pawnshop to name a few. Judging by the names, the large amount of red, the
massive glowing pentagram in the sky, and the fact that not even five minutes ago I had just been double tapped, I...
...I'm in Hell.
I give a single note chuckle and smile a little bit. It's funny how Hell looks a lot like Brockton Bay. Granted, in Brockton there wasn't nearly as much red or references to Hell and Satan, but when you ignore those, this street could have been any old street in Brockton Bay…
So... now I'm dead. What now? Everything I had done will be my legacy, and everything I had left unfinished, no longer mattered. I curl my legs in and rest my head on my knees. The mission was over, the world is saved. All it had cost me was my chance to be with my friends again, my sanity, and my life. Obviously it didn't make up for what I had done before in the eyes of God. That, or there isn't a God and everyone just ends up here.
It would make an unfortunate amount of sense. Wasn't there supposed to be an apocalypse or something in the Bible? Maybe the apocalypse I had been trying to stop was the prophesied biblical doomsday. I remember there had been a preacher on the corner of one of the intersections in Brockton. He always had a microphone and a speaker, and he was always talking. The preacher would talk about the bible, about God, and how it wasn't too late to save your soul. He had always been annoying to listen to, especially since I was only in middle school when I had first become properly aware of him. The preacher would interrupt the music I would play when Mom would drive me to school on her way to the university. He had said once when revelations or something comes, all who have not accepted God into their hearts will be left behind by God's light.
I guess that means that I've been left behind.
Did that mean that Mom is in Heaven, or is she down here? We had never really attended church, beyond an Easter ceremony and other events like that. Church and religion had never been a central part of our family, especially to me. There was always something else of concern that mattered more than my immortal soul and where it would end up. I know I have sinned, everyone has, but had Mom sinned enough to be sent to Hell? I've done some terrible things in the past. I don't regret them, not really. It's understandable though that from the perspective of some all knowing and all powerful deity, my actions weren't justified, considering that some of them I can't even properly justify myself. Why should I have to slave myself to another being's morality though? I accept my actions, I accept that I deserve Hell, and if given a second chance, I'd probably not change enough to get into Heaven.
Mom though, Mom was a good woman, and a better mother. She had raised me, loved me, and we had been a nice and happy family. While Mom might have associated herself with some radical feminist types, she left the group before it became violent. Mom couldn't have sinned enough to make it into Hell, unless of course, there was no Heaven at all. Perhaps that's all there is, Hell. Though if there's a Hell then it stood to reason that Heaven should exist, otherwise where did Hell come from? What is one without it's diametric opposite? Maybe I can ask around? Find out if God and Heaven do indeed exist.
I sigh heavily. Sitting around isn't helping my situation, I should get up from this curb. I probably looked strange just sitting here. Just another minute though, then I'll go. I pull one of my four arms up, and note that I no longer have my white complexion; rather, it's now a light grey. I feel some of my hair fall forward and luckily it's the same dark colour as before. Despite realising how irrational it is, relief fills me as it's still the same. I go to push my hair out of the way and then realise that I don't have my glasses anymore, yet I can see fine. Apparently ending up in Hell fixes your vision.
My perception of my surroundings has been slowly increasing while I examined myself. I can sense things, through something on my head. Consciously, I move whatever is on my head downward so that I can see them. In front of my face are two massive feathered antennae. They look very much like moth antennae, specifically antennae from the same kind of silkmoths that my wings look like. I move my feathered antennae back up and resume sensing my surroundings. Pedestrians walk down the sidewalks around me and I can sense them through a combination of scent and sound, but it has nothing on my now lost bug senses.
I rise from my seat on the curb and join the flow of foot traffic. I find myself quickly getting lost int he crowd. I use the time to explore my new sensory powers that my antennas provide me with. They're definitely inferior to my bug senses, which is unfortunate, but considering that I was dead now, it was certainly better than just waking up with nothing. When using my bugs, I'd been able to create 3D mental maps of my surroundings just using bugs. That mental map would be a constantly evolving 3D image of the battlefield that I had continuous access to. I could also hear through my bugs and project my voice anywhere within my range.
With my antennae on the other hand, I can hear out of them as well as smell from them. Both of them are much more sensitive than my regular senses and luckily work in conjunction with them. Drawing on my experience with the massive amount of cape powers I had at my disposal at the end of my life, I'm able to make better sense of my new sensory sensations. With my new senses I'm able to almost pinpoint most people within the crowd by using both the sound that they are making as well as their unique scent. There's a sort of fuzziness I can't quite figure out, however. The intensity of the fuzziness increases the closer to a person. It doesn't interfere with my other antennae senses; however, so I can ignore it for now, I can test that particular sense later.
As I practice with my senses, I can perceive something else as well. I sense this sensation more inside me than out, but there's also sort of feeling around me as well. Whatever is around and inside me feels similar to the fuzziness that other people have around them. It isn't dissimilar to some powers I controlled near the end of my life. Some powers came with the sense that there was a well of energy that I could have a cape draw upon to use their power. Not many of them had this going for them however. Most usually found that their power, if it came with a drawback, usually was some kind of cramping of hands, or it would just stop working. I briefly think of tapping into the energy, seeing what would happen, but I shake my head at the thought. There is a time and place for testing out mysterious power sources; a crowded street is not one of those.
So I settle for continuing to walk along with the large, monstrously shaped, crowd. I continue to sense and pick out the various monsters and demons that are walking alongside me. None of them even appear to be human. The size and shapes of all the different monsters and demons varies from as tall as to tower head and shoulders above me, to as tiny as to come up only to my knees. The smells are strange too; some are wholly unpleasant, such as one that smells so strongly of sulphur that I've slowly been navigating away from the source, to the familiar smell of wet dog.
Smelling that I feel my lips tug into a bitter sweet smile. I'm reminded of Bitch and all her dogs. I feel my heart throb as I remember what I had sacrificed so long ago. Rachel, Lisa, Brian, Alec, Aisha. They had all been my teammates and friends, I had loved them, still love them, and I had abandoned them. I didn't even say goodbye to them when I left, too scared that they would try and convince me to stay and that they would have managed to succeed. Were I able to go back now, just to that moment, when I was deciding to give myself up, I'd have never have gone. There were more important things in life than needless sacrifice. What had I gained from sacrificing them, and consequently sacrificing my happiness? I had gotten a few new acquaintances that I barely spared the time getting to know, a few bits of Tinker tech and some Wards training. All of which I could have gotten without throwing everything away.
In the end, it had never been worth it, had it?
I let my mind wander away from my regrets and just follow the crowd. I start to near a three way intersection when I notice the sound of gunshots and the smell of gunpowder coming fast towards the intersection from the street on my left. I stop walking and turn my head towards the oncoming sounds and smells, then move against the now light crowd towards the corner of a nearby building. Some others in the crowd are starting to perk up as well as I shout out.
"Gun fight incoming! Left street!" Some monsters and demons hear me as a car comes, gunning it towards the intersection. Some demons and monsters are already running for cover, others are just standing in the open like idiots, pulling out phones and starting to make videos of the car chase. Fucking civilians were the same in every damn world apparently.
The two vehicle chase has two demons in the lead car, one firing backwards to the pursuing car, meanwhile the pursuer is firing wildly with a submachine gun. Bullets fly from the vehicles hitting all around the street. Windows in dirty parked cars shatter and I see a bystander get hit with a few bullets. I can feel my face twist into an expression of aggravation at the idiot civilians that didn't have the proper sense to actually move out of the way. I run out of my cover and grab the nearest idiot, pulling him hopefully out of harm's way. It's one of the demon looking guys.
"Hey the fuck you doing!" the idiotic demon shouts at me as I pull him into cover behind the building corner. The lead vehicle enters into the intersection and tries to turn onto our street but instead skids and flips over, rolling into a store front. My view of the scene is blocked however as the demon guy gets in my face.
"You bitch! You ruined my shot!" He grabs onto my wing poncho before I use my lower right hand to sucker punch him. While I knock the wind out of him I use my two upper limbs to pull his hands off of my wing poncho then throw him to the ground.
"Would you rather I let you get shot?" I ask the gasping demon. The demon glares but takes a moment to regain his breath. While had knocked the demon guy out of the way the two people in the car being chased have pulled themselves out of the ruin that once was their car and were wildly shooting towards their pursuer, who himself had exited his own car. The monster looks like a jacked deer man armed with an oversized Tommy gun. He hides in cover behind his car's engine block and exchanges shots with the people he had been chasing.
"What... the fuck... does it matter?" The demon gasps out at me. The demon watches my face and must see my bafflement. Realisation spreads across his and annoyance soon follows as he face palms.
"Of course… you're a fucking newbie. You can't die in Hell, bug brain. So who cares? I'll heal, and then I'd have sold the vid to the news and made cash money. But you fucking ruined the shot!"
the demon man seems to have recovered his breath now and was just glaring at me. Slowly as he had been talking I had started to hear more and more gun shots from more than just the original three combatants. I look around the corner and realise that most of the civilians who hadn't run yet had either joined the fray or are trying to film the gunfight in progress while staying behind any cover available to them. Some of the new combatants are shooting at the original combatants, some are shooting at random people across the street.
This… is getting too hectic for me, especially since I don't have my bug powers, and unless the demon is lying, no one will actually die. Discretion would probably be the better choice over valour at the moment, especially since I don't exactly know what the rules are around here. I quickly retreat from the ongoing gunfight and duck into an alleyway. I sense the demon getting up from his prone position and pull something from his jacket, another set of shots begin to fire off closer than the previous ones. It seems the demon man had entered the fray.
<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
The alleyways are a twisting mess of corridors and small little open areas. Fire escapes are rusted to all hell, gang signs and graffiti litter the walls of the back alleys, and gangs of large animals are prowling the deepest parts of them. I can hear through my antennae the chittering and yowling of a fight going on between a mischief of rats and a clowder of cats a few alleys over. In another alley I can hear someone running frantically from a pack of dogs. The fleeing person quickly ducks into a doorway, opens the door, and slams it shut as the dogs reach the door. The dogs let out a howl that even my normal ears can hear. I stop for a moment in the middle of one of the open areas. The place is fairly empty and would be a good enough place to test out this energy I had access to.
As I walk, I concentrate on the pool of energy that I feel inside myself. Mentally, I command it much like I had my swarm. Pushing at it, pulling at it, and just releasing it. The energy seems to generate wind wherever I direct it. I'm only using a small amount so it does little other than push some dust around. I feel I increase the power to possibly make a stronger gust. So far it hasn't done more than move a can around but just releasing some of the energy inside of me barely seems to drain my pool of energy, if there isn't a limit to it's output, or the speed of which I release energy perhaps I can make a powerful blast of force with it? A sudden strong gust of wind can topple an unprepared person, and if I'm able to sustain it, I could keep someone knocked down as I get closer and dealt with them.
I smell a large amount of different scents coming from down an alleyway, like when I was in the first crowd of pedestrians. I turn down it and see someone at the entrance of the alleyway. The person is some sort of scantily clad butterfly woman who is touching up her makeup in a vanity set up in the alleyway. It looks like something that a high school drama class would have for their acting students to freshen up at, lights surround the mirror while the base is just a set of wooden shelves. The butterfly person looks over briefly before turning back to her make up.
I stop releasing the energy I feel inside of me as I don't want to disrupt her while she was putting on her makeup. I never bothered with it since before High school but that doesn't mean I don't realise that it would probably be hard to put it on while there is wind and dust flying around. As I get closer the butterfly woman seems to finish touching up her makeup, and then I feel the fuzziness around her coalesce into a familiar bit of power. I realise what that fuzzy feeling that others had around them had been. It's very similar to what I feel inside of myself. Unlike when I was just using it to generate wind however, the butterfly person is using it differently.
The butterfly woman's wings move inwards and she sticks her hands out towards it. I can feel what the woman is doing to her wings with her own power, and can kind of follow along with what's happening. I watch as she uses her power to start to transform her wings. They quickly morph into a long pink coat that she adjusts a bit as it settles on her form. She ties a belt around her waist and starts walking towards me. As we near each other, she sneers.
"Yeah yeah yeah, don't get your panties in a twist bitch. My shifts over so don't flare ya fucking magic at me," before walking past. I look back but she doesn't even spare me a glance. Magic? Was that what I was feeling what I'd been feeling this entire time? Magic… it leaves a strange taste in my mouth at first, it's weird to be seriously considering that my powers might be magic. Though my power actually being magic made a fair amount of sense I guess. Demons are supposed to be mythological creatures versed in magic of all kinds. Mephistopheles from Doctor Faust comes to mind as well as the cultural references to deal making devils. I am in Hell after all; it would make sense that I'm now a demon what with my altered appearance. Considering I could follow along with what she was doing with her power and how similar it felt to my own, it could just be magic.
Approaching the mirror I spare a glance at myself. The person that stares back at me isn't a complete stranger. My face is generally the same, the same jaw-line, the same expressive lips. My eyes have changed though. They had grown larger than they had been before. They look curious and inquisitive while they take in all the details of my new face. My skin tone has darkened into a light grey, and I obviously have my feathered antennae.
I flex my wings and unfold them from their poncho like form, and then I focus on my energy… my magic. Remembering what the butterfly person did, I start to manipulate the energy as she had. My moth wings start changing somewhat like the butterfly's had, morphing from a pair of wings into a long coat. Unlike the butterfly's coat however, mine is more like a very plush white fur coat. I wrap the fur around myself and just feel the coat on my body, enjoying the pleasant sensation as I ran my hand through it. So soft… The coat, other than being extremely comfortable and fluffy, is also much longer than my previous improvised poncho. Where my poncho was barely decent, this coat is a fair bit longer. The poncho had stopped mid thigh on me, where as the fur coat stops just above my knees. I turn street ward and make my way out of the alleyway.
The street I enter onto is in somewhat better shape than the street I woken up on. There are more neon lights and they're all over the place; most of them belong to night clubs or other similar things. There's a large crowd of people coming and going as they walk the streets and cars blaze past at speeds that ruffle my coat. I cross my arms over my coat before I once more join the pedestrians.
My thoughts return to my current situation. The afterlife exists and I am in Hell. Not only that but if I'm in Hell that means that everyone who dies goes to the afterlife, be that Heaven, Hell, or whatever else there might be. Everyone has to die some day. None of my friends have led charmed lives, very much the opposite in fact, same as me, and as far as I know they had never really been religious. So there would be little forgiveness from those who decided where they went, if there was someone deciding at all. So my friends will be dying eventually, and I'll get to see them when they find their way down here to Hell. Though I hope they don't end up here too soon. They should have the chance to live full lives up above before they come and join me down here.
I guess that means I should get ready for them somehow. They will need a place to stay as they get themselves back up on their feet. Though how am I going to do that? I don't exactly have many job prospects, especially since I never even finished high school. While I am smart, up on Earth that didn't mean much if you didn't have the paper proving you graduated. Funny how my job prospects only matter after I've already died. I can see about becoming a mercenary, or I can just become a villain once more. I had been very successful as Skitter, and considering that this is Hell, it probably wouldn't be hard to find a person that could do with a shake up or a robbery. If you can't die in Hell then I wouldn't even have to care about keeping them alive. I could just shiv them, take the money and be gone before they healed back up. I had done my fair share of silent take downs before during my times in the Wards, this would hardly be any different.
Though would that be a good idea? Hell so far had the feel of Brockton Bay for sure but was that true? For all I know I had just been in the back ends of it, and the place overall was a lot less lawless than it appeared. Not just that but would it even be right? I'd be hurting someone who was probably just as desperate as me. Then they would be desperate and probably do the same as what I had just done. Besides, even if they some how deserved it, like being a mass murdering psychopath or a serial rapist, that doesn't make it right.
I sense a group of three heading straight for me and I move to the side to let them pass, they don't pass however. They have their full focus on me as three lizard demons slowly surround me. The largest one is to my front and the crowd is quick to scatter as soon as they notice what is going on.
"Heeeeey baby." The leader of the gang announces himself in a sleazy sounding voice. The large lizard is dressed up in a leather jacket that has a heart stitched to each of the sleeves. The other two lizards that are surrounding me are smaller than their leader. They both have jackets like their leader, though the one on my left has some lipstick and a pink bow on their head as well.
"Hows about we step off the street for a while, you and the three of us. We'll make you scream all night long." Do they think that I'm a whore?
"No thank you." I say outright. The lead lizard however, doesn't take my refusal with grace. He reaches forward and while I try to move my arms out of the way, they're in an awkward position for moving away and he manages to grab a wrist with ease.
"I don't think you understand ho. In case you're blind, this patch here," the looming lizard points with his other hand at the heart sewn onto his sleeve. "Means that we're with Valentino, and since we're with Valentino, and you're one of Valentino's girls, that means you can't say no. Kapeesh?" I begin focusing on my magic, ready to release it at a moment's notice. Knowing about gang land territory was essential in Brockton Bay so I already knew what was going to happen now that I had crossed them and their boss. Either I submit like they want, or I'll have to beat them down. Despite being outnumbered, I'm confident enough with my close quarters training in the Wards and my practical experience in the field as both a villain and a hero to get me through this. I just have to hope that the leader isn't too high in this "Valentino" person's organization to incur some kind of wrath upon me.
"I'm not with Valentino." As expected, the lead lizard man's eyes widen for a second. The leader's eyes quickly narrow however, and the lead lizard starts baring his teeth as his smile morphs from a sneer of superiority to a malicious grin. The gang of lizards surrounding me all let out cruel sounding chuckles.
"You must be a newbie if you're trying to work in Valentino's territory without being one of his ho's. You see bitch, you're either with Valentino, or you're going to be very soon. Now we're going to take you to the boss, but first, we're going to teach you a lesson, a nice long lesson on why you don't come to other people's territory and try to muscle in on their business. Mmmkay?" The lizard starts licking his lips in an exaggerated show of his intent. His two companions are giggling in turn; one is even rubbing his hands together in a stereotypical villainous way. I prepare myself to let out my magic power all at once to hopefully blast back the lizard trio, when I notice just behind the lead thug a dirty black van pulls up and a figure gets out.
I can sense something with my antennae as well. Along with the person that got out there is the fuzzy feeling of magical energy at around shoulder height. Round and hollow, almost like a large tube that he is carrying on his shoulder. I hesitate, and stall my attack. I don't know what this new person's carrying, but when he had jumped out of the truck, it had looked a bit like a rocket launcher. I might have to bide my time for a bit if he's their back up.
"Oh I can't wait to get at dat ass!" The one on the right exclaims in a shrill and squeaky voice. I wince a bit at his unfortunate voice.
"With a mouth that size I bet she'd make a great carpet muncher." The lizard with the bow growls out in a deep smoker's voice. These two… have rather unfortunate voices. With the feminine lizard's comment I'm suddenly struck with how similar a situation this is. I've barely thought of Winslow since… How long had it been? It must have been when Mr. Barnes had accused me of putting Emma in a coma or something ridiculous like that.
"Hey fuck sticks!" I hear from the person who had gotten out of the van. He's somewhere down the sidewalk behind the lead lizard. "Get a load a this!" There's a
shunk, and then suddenly the lead lizard's head explodes in a shower of gore. Wasting no time, I let out all of my magic at once and the two others fly back from me as if they were at ground zero of an explosion. I hear a grunt from the deep voiced lizard woman as she impacts against the wall, while the other flies out onto the street. As the lead lizard's body falls forward onto me I feel some sort of handle press against me from inside his jacket. I zip down the jacket and pull out from it a large bowie knife. Throwing the headless corpse to the side I stalk towards the lizard woman. She'd impacted against the wall hard and is groaning in pain. I don't know how the lizard man in traffic is doing so I have to end this quickly. Luckily, if that demon hadn't lied, I can just slit her throat rather than have to resort to slicing up her limbs.
I grab onto the lizard woman's head, push it roughly back into the wall, and then slam the knife straight into the woman's throat. There is a squelch and my knife stops as soon as it hits bone. I pull at my new knife and it comes out with a bit of resistance as it unsticks itself from the lizard woman. I'd probably gotten a decent bit into the spine. I turn towards the lizard that had been thrown into the street, planning on taking him out too but the van that had dropped off my mysterious ally slams into the lizard, sending him flying a few yards. With my antennae I can hear his wet gurgles as his rib cage has probably collapsed into his lungs from the vehicular assault. I swap focus from the now incapacitated enemy to instead focus on the man who had helped me.
The man at first glance looks like a massive cockroach. His hair is shaped like a cockroach's shell, and he has two large antennae, slicked back to follow along his hair. He wears a bandanna mask that only covers the top of his face, leaving the rest of it uncovered, displaying a brown skinned and stubble adorned chin. Other than that he simply wears a dirty white muscle shirt and some jeans. The man hefts what looks like some sort of home made rocket launcher on his shoulder, though instead of rockets, it looks like it had some sort of tube filled with baseballs that let gravity drop the balls into the firing chamber. The magic I had felt shrouds the front of the rocket launcher and the handle looks to be more like a lever, probably to push the baseballs into the magical field. The use of magic power, or at least the end result, is fairly familiar looking. The entire front of the lethal baseball launcher glows a soft blue. I file that away as simply a coincidence.
"Wooooo! Holy mother fucking shit, god damn bitch, they bled all over your ho ass. God damn, and that shit with the knife. Fuckin' brutal! Hahaha! Anyways, come on girl, we need to get out of here before more of them Valentino boys get here, ya dig?" The masked bug man shouts with a wide smile on his face, his adrenaline high likely contributing to his excitement. The door to the van is still open and the bug man runs over and hops in the back.
While I'm walking over to the van I notice that on the side of the van there was some graffiti spray painted in the shape of an M with two horizontal lines striking through it. I stare at it while I make my way to the passenger's door of the vehicle. I definitely know that symbol. The Merchants, especially after Leviathan, had become a major powerhouse in Brockton Bay for a short period until the SlaughterHouse Nine had shown up in the city. It's becoming increasingly obvious who had saved me at this point.
As I get into the passenger side of the van, any doubt that I might have had, would have been washed away. The driver is extremely familiar looking, and among the three of us, probably looked the most like how she had before she ended up in Hell. She even dressed the same. Squealer, the buxom white trash vehicle tinker that was one of the only reasons the Merchants were even a player in Brockton Bay before Leviathan. Just like in life, she wears a dirty white tank top and tiny jean booty shorts. The only thing different that I can see is that her mouth stays in an 'O' even now, she also looked a lot healthier, and wasn't wearing her Squealer mask.
"Come on woman! Drive!" The man that is likely Skidmark shouts at Squealer.
"I know Skiddy!" Squealer shouts back before her foot comes down hard on the gas. Squealer's mouth moves from it's 'O' as she speaks before returning back to it's more comfortable 'O' position. There's the squeal of tires as the van tries to get traction and I instinctively grab a hand hold before we shoot off, despite that, I'm nearly thrown from my seat as Squealer drives over the lizard man she had hit before.
"Woooo! Damn that was some good shit. You doing alright moth ho?" I ignore his foul language and derogatory name calling. Instead I focus on why I'm suddenly being saved by the Merchants of all things.
"I'm doing alright all things considered. So why did you help me?" Looking back at him, I see Skidmark's grin get even larger.
"Well you see, when I first saw ya, ya looked like a ho in trouble, but this is Valentino's territory so we were about to drive on by. Rules of the place ya know? But then I saw that you ain't even got shoes on. Who the hell walks around Hell with no god damn shoes on I wondered, then it hit me. You were a newbie! You probably hadn't even woken up a damn hour before you fucked up. So I was like shit."
"She don't want a play by play Skiddy, she wants to know why you saved her." Squealer helpfully informs her boyfriend.
"Hold your god damn horses Sherrel, I was getting there. Anyways, so what I'm saying is I knew you were new so I wanted to help you out. I scratch your back you scratch mine down the line, ya dig? Plus I was paying back an old dept. See some old timer helped me out when I was new too, helped me find my girl again, so I thought I'd do the same. Ya know, in his memory and all that shit." I hear Squealer mutter under her breath;
"Fucking angel fucks" but she doesn't elaborate. She probably meant it more for herself than for me. I'd have to ask her what she means about that later.
"I think I understand. So where are we going?"
"We're heading back to our shop a couple of streets over. We'll let you hang for a bit and you can decide if you wanna stay or go. I'll let Sherrel tell you about the rest, I gotta make sure we ain't being followed." With that Skidmark pulls his head from the front and starts making his way to the back, peering out of a back window of the van.
"Yeah, like Skiddy said we're heading back to the chop shop we got. I get some money from repairing vehicles and Skiddy's got a drug operation in the back." It seems like dying hadn't been the end of the Merchants and their drug running operation.
"Starting up the Merchants again?" I ask. Squealer… Sherrel does a double take towards me. I grip onto the handhold even tighter as Sherrel looks away from the road, but Sherrel doesn't list to the right even a little. Her eyes return to the road before she starts talking.
"Wait, you're from Brockton? Holy shit haha. That was some crazy shit that happened there, right?" Sherrel's face is alight with excitement as she realises where I'm from. I had seen it sometimes when I came across people from Brockton, more specifically those I had positively affected in one way or another during my time there. Those I had hurt during my Warlord days weren't too excited to see me however.
"Yeah, I was kind of in the middle of all that." I say. Sherrel starts looking contemplative as I say that. She looks over at me once more, looks at my hair and antennae before looking back at the road.
"I thought you looked familiar. You're bug girl ain'tcha? What was your cape name… uh, Skitter?"
"That's right."
"I never thought I'd meet another cape from Brockton. Hey Skiddy! This girl was bug girl, you know, from the Undersiders?"
"Wait shit, really!?" Skidmark's voice comes from the back and he pokes his head upfront again.
"Damn girl I heard you took over Brockton and shit." Skidmark is still grinning ear to ear. I note that like Squealer he's looking much better, and his teeth are fixed. "Well shit, welcome to Hell, took ya long enough!"