They certainly didn't develop what felt like a lifetime's worth of mastery in just days.
A lifetime's? I frowned at my choice of wording for that thought as I drove a pair of Empire thugs away with illusions of their worst fears. Why had used that to describe it? I'd had these powers barely six months. Not a lifetime, or even close to one. But I couldn't let go of the thought. It meant something, I was sure.
So Taylor's growing closer to why she has her power.
A wince followed that thought and I drew in a slow breath, then crumpled every single gun into scrap and let them drop to the ground. Oddities like that. Holding the guns using my power at the people I was fighting. Like I had done that… no, I had seen that done before? But when? I couldn't place exactly, though the sense of deja vu was almost overpowering.
Old habits die hard.
What did it mean? I stopped outside the building, trying to remember if there were any other moments like that. I hadn't even thought about it as something odd, but now, I couldn't figure out why I had overlooked it. After a long moment, I sighed and lifted off from the ground. Whatever this was, I needed to look into it and I wasn't going to get anything else done while it bothered me.
I get why Taylor's mentality is what it is here, but as the amount of plot threads and problems she abandons piles up, it's hard not to get frustrated.
"What I would like to know is why you allowed that to be printed," Glenn said, his tone reasonable even if the statement was really a demand.
"And for the last time, I don't answer to you, Mr. Chambers," the editor of the Brockton Bay Journal replied. "What gets published in my paper isn't influenced by the group of jackbooted thugs you work for. I felt Ms. Konita had valid points and the Journal doesn't require the mandate of the PRT. Good day."
Looks like this'll spark a real anti-PRT movement.
Someone had connected her to the incident that led to the complete collapse of Coil's power base. They didn't have the full story, but it had only enhanced her reputation. Sighing, Glenn looked over the reports, disliking the developing trends and the impact they were having on his plans. Piggot had ceded the situation to him, but it was rapidly becoming apparent that something needed to be done soon. Public interest on Sirin was inevitably going to lead to people digging and the fact that she was registered as a Ward would come up.
That would make this an even worse mess and if there was one thing Glenn had learned, it was the things you didn't want publicly known always became so at the worst possible moment.
Pentagon Papers, PRT edition anyone?
This had started out as a lot more fun at first. I had powers, I could fight back against Emma and Sophia and I was able to go out, to be a hero. Somewhere, it ceased to be fun. Maybe when everything blew up in my face? I scowled, wishing, not for the first time, that I had never laid eyes on the blonde twit. Oh, I wasn't sure that she had, in fact, set me up, but it made me feel better to blame her.
Gotta love and hate that Taylor semi-irrationality.
Vicky stood in the doorway, looking for once, as something other than meticulously perfect in appearance. Her hair was plastered against her scalp and most of her clothing was more than a bit damp.
"Are you alright?" I asked, honestly alarmed at her condition. She was so careful with how she looked that to see her this bedraggled and with a haunted look on her face had me worried. "Have… have you been crying?"
"No," she said quickly before her expression crumpled and I found myself with her in my arms, bawling uncontrollably against my shoulder as I surge of sadness and despair rushed outward.
I wonder if this is how her aura feels like? I sighed internally at the thought, carefully tuning out the flood of emotion while gently, if awkwardly, sending comfort toward her in hopes that it would settle her nerves.
So Vicky's had a bad day. This'll be interesting.
"You've smoothed things out before, right?" I asked, nudging her foot with one of my own to get her attention. "It'll work out here too, I'm sure."
My words of reassurance did not appear to have the effect I had hoped for as Vicky's scowl returned. "Don't say that! Don't be understanding! You don't know what he said!"
Telepathy does not equal social charisma Taylor, and you can't do social without some sort of shard assisting you.
"Not to mention, it takes time to do that." I added, lifting a slice of pizza out to my plate. "If I got that caught up in looking at the future, I'd never get anything done today, I'd only have time for that." Which was what Coil had wanted me for. The reminder of my earlier thoughts made me frown for a moment.
"No, I guess not," Vicky agreed after a moment, looking anywhere but at me. "God, I must sound so stupid. Coming to you and going 'Can you tell me if I'll get back together with my boyfriend?' Like some stupid girl in a book who runs to the local fortuneteller and gets in trouble."
At least Victoria's semi-aware she can be thoughtless.
"Are you kidding? Amy reads worse." Vicky's expression brightened a bit. "The hospital nurses got her hooked on those trashy romance novels to start with, but her tastes get weird sometimes."
Not touching that with a ten foot pole, not touching that with a ten foot pole...
It was days like today, Armsmaster observed, that made him glad for one of his inventions over any of the others. The Rain Repellent Spray was incredibly useful in allowing him to work in rainy conditions like this. There was something to be said for the atmosphere created by such weather, but when he was following up on work that required time spent either outdoors or in buildings exposed to the weather, it was invaluable.
Tinkertech waterproofing, heck yeah that's good stuff.
"The firehouse at Eight-Ninety Fifth Avenue has been abandoned of any occupants for roughly two weeks, judging from the damage and how exposed it has been," he said aloud, his suit's audio systems recording while he carefully navigated the damaged floor. He scanned the area with a wary eye, not overlooking a single detail. "The majority of the damage to the interior was done by explosive devices, flashbangs, smoke and noise bombs. An attack, I think, aimed to disorient a thinker that has to be taken down quickly to have any chance."
He frowned and looked around the shattered space. "The tactic is similar to one the PRT uses against Thinkers when containment foam isn't immediately viable. There aren't any independent agencies operating within Brockton Bay that use such tactics. The only mercenary group that would have done so was Coil's. Faultline's group is, other than some of the guards at her club, a parahuman force. Neither the Empire or the ABB's non-powered members have the training to execute something like this."
Armsmaster has found Taylor's old hangout, and is possibly even on track to finding out Coil's identity.
"A dresser apparently survived the assault intact," he remarked into its recording. "The contents are a young woman's clothing, possibly that of a teenage girl, judging from a cursory glance. Why they are left behind is a puzzle, but perhaps…" Frowning, he reluctantly shifted some of the clothing to one side, drawing out a leather bound journal that he recognized.
"Dresser was used as a hiding receptacle for a journal," he commented. "It is one I have seen before. Despite the exposure of the building's interior to the weather, being sheltered within the dresser has permitted it to remain mostly intact. I last saw this in the possession of Taylor Hebert. Conclusion: Prior to her disappearance and presumed captivity, she was living out of this firehouse."
The PRT's probably going to want to look over this stuff in a bit more detail, but Armsmaster's idea of dropping the clothes off with Taylor via A&B is something that's nice to see. Too many one-dimensional jerks with halberds up their asses, not enough efficiency focused mindsets.
A cover opened at the back of his motorcycle and it was deposited, sliding into a spatially folded compartment that could contain more than it appeared to.
The fact Armsmaster's motorcycle has a TARDIS backpack is far more amusing to me than it should be.
The last few pages were a mess of assorted images with no rhyme or reason connecting them. A visor, covering the eyes of barely visible lineart for someone's face. Pieces of other costumes? There didn't seem to be any unifying elements to any of them. A few were even more out of place; an outline of a man's suit, ruffled at the neck. Nineteenth Century, if he was correct. A woman's outfit that would not have been out of place in a lingerie catalog.
Perhaps some sort of hopes for fashion design?
Memories of other Mutants and... oh hell no.
It was devoted to one picture, a clearly mechanical construct shaded with bits of purple and maroon. A yellow light was drawn on its chest, some sort of power source, perhaps?
The image was almost ridiculous, the impression of its size was that it was quite large and the materials required to make it durable and mobile would have made it so heavy that it could barely move. Still, there was an almost palpable feeling of dread as he stared at it. Below it, in penmanship that suggested confusion, were a few scrawled words.
'Sentinel?' was the first, followed by 'What is this?' Armsmaster stared at it for a moment, his frown growing before closing the notebook and stowing it away. Something to look into later, perhaps he could even inquire of Hebert directly. He mused on that as he climbed onto his motorcycle once the drones had settled in their appropriate places.
Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck, that is the biggest Chekov's gun I have ever seen, that is a horrible idea, and Either Armsmaster or Cauldron's going to be all over it.
Noelle began twirling a some keys around her finger. "Sort of. Krouse means well, but sometimes he gets a bit clingy, especially with recent events. Right now, though, he's, ahem, otherwise occupied and not likely to get away."
I arched an eyebrow, looking from her to the keys spinning on her finger. What did that mean? I figured out the answer a moment later from a particularly vivid image in her mind and flushed. "Ew. Too much information."
"Don't want to know, don't go peeking," Noelle shrugged,
That may make some good feedback therapy for taylor, focusing on things she finds disgusting if she pries without permission, but I've seen too many psychics go crazy over constantly seeing nothing but the worst of the human psyche.
"You've been busy lately," Noelle said after a moment. "Even with this… whatever it is, lingering between us and what I pick up from it, I've been following the news." She half-turned to face me and there was no attempt on her part to hide what she was feeling right now. Worry.
"I've felt what you've been feeling and thinking during these times, Taylor," she stated. "And I get where you're coming from with some of those thoughts. The way I was… before you did your thing, there were times when I wanted to really let loose and make everyone feel the way I did."
I turned so I was staring away from her, inexplicably irritated by her words. "I don't think it's the same thing. I'm not a ravening monster twisted by the Simurgh and powers in a bottle."
"But you are angry and you've got a lot of power," Noelle said, ignoring my jab at her condition. It had stung, I could feel that, but she was refusing to let it distract her. "You know, I looked up some more about you once I was able to."
So here comes the talk of 'yeah, you're kinda out of control'.
"Don't you think that maybe, being called out on going too far by a Neo-Nazi, reformed or not, was a sign that you might in fact be going too far?"
I snorted. "Do you know some of the things they've done? Purity, of all people, doesn't have any stance from which to throw stones over anything I've done. Especially anything I did to Cricket."
"And Stormtiger? How does what Cricket did matter there? Or with those guys last night that you terrified so badly? Or with Ashley?"
I winced, but didn't turn in her direction. "Thought we weren't picking up from each other as clearly anymore."
"Most of the time, no, but when things bother you, or you feel them strongly, it's clearer," Noelle said. "And that bothered you. A lot more than you're willing to voice. Especially with how you tore into Stormtiger after."
"If he'd just told me what I wanted to kno—" I began.
"Set aside the fact that they're Neo-Nazis, or white supremacists, or any of that," Noelle interrupted. "They may be scum, sure and do I care if you beat the living crap out of them? Honestly, no, I don't. The fact—"
"Then why are you—"
"I'm not finished, so please don't interrupt me," Noelle said firmly. "I don't care about them. I do care about what doing these things to them is doing to you."
And Noelle is rightfully concerned, since she knows Taylor going bloodthirsty and unrestrained could spill over the connection between the two of them and poison Noelle's mind, bring back Echidna. Additionally, the session wasn't as productive as I would have liked, but I'm not looking to have Taylor scale back over just one or two of these talks. Therapy doesn't work like that, and this really is therapy for Taylor.
"I want to believe that," I said quietly, taking a deep breath as I let her words sink in. It was something to think about, truly. Maybe I was going a bit far. But it wasn't a topic I wanted to topic about any further.
Did you mean to say 'talk'?
It had infuriated him, to see his followers brought low by someone who was barely worth his notice. The insult was compounded by the fact that the media seized on it, those who opposed his Empire for ideological reasons using it as a rallying cry to take action against him.
That had been infuriating, but other matters had claimed priority before he could see to putting some upstart in her place. Reclaiming what had been taken from him took precedence. Only then could he to teaching the little chit where she stood in the scheme of things.
Usually I object to Kaiser being portrayed as an idiot, but given the total lack of information on Sirin, I'm fine with his current opinion being uninformed.
What the appropriate response to her defiance should be occupied his thoughts since. The girl was powerful, clearly, but he could not abide the continued slight to his authority. She would be curbed and it had to be in such a way that spoke boldly, illustrated that no one defied his Empire. Lung was tolerated; he had power, despite his tainted stock. But no others could be permitted, especially not one who was barely worth his notice, a vigilante unaffiliated with the Protectorate.
Sirin would bend her neck to her betters, or she would be broken.
Well the E88 is dead.
Good chapter chibipoe.
