Goddamn Teenagers (Worm, AU/time travel)

[dc2008]

Tagg looked her directly in the eye. "Who the hell are you?"

Dr. Weaver sighed and, after at glancing at Kamil, set the jamming device on the table.

"This is the most sophisticated and effective anti-eavesdropping device known to exist, and incorporates techniques known to PRT, along with techniques drawn from various rogue and villainous groups, including some whose existence we do not officially recognize. I am a temporally displaced dimensional refuge from an alternate world line containing its own iterations of Aleph, Bet, etc. I am telling the two of you this so as to reduce the amount of time and resources expended investigating the sudden appearance of," she gestures to herself, "some strangely knowledgeable woman who has been graced with inexplicably high levels of trust and authority."

Tagg looked at her skeptically. "Prove it."

"Unfortunately other!you and I were pushed into a fatal confrontation which you did not survive. Anything I know about you was thus learned either by observation or hearsay and is thus useless as direct evidence. If it is any consolation, you likely would have prevailed in our confrontation but for ill-advised meddling by a parahuman who really should have known better. You already have the views of Costa-Brown and the Triumverate. Thinktank is compromised, but you can ask indirect questions such as whether I can be trusted and what my intentions are." She turned to Kamil, "as for you, I believe this should suffice."

She slid a folded slip of paper to the man who glanced at it and blanched. After clearing his throat, he said "I believe her."

Tagg adopted a calculating expression. "Jack Slash."

"Yes," replied Dr. Weaver. "Other interventions as well. In my worldline, well, a few of us survived the succession of apocalypses, but Bet was rendered effectively uninhabitable."

"The Endbringers?"

"Among other things. The worst was when Jack Slash convinced Scion that human extermination would be fun, but there were other incidents as well."

Tagg's face hardened. "I see."

Dr. Weaver shrugged. "Steps are being taken to avert the truly existential risks, but wide-scale clean-up is being delayed for now to preserve the value of future knowledge. This group is part of the ground work for that clean-up."

Kamil leaned forward. "We will have questions."

Dr. Weaver nodded. "Yes, and you will need time to prepare them. To ensure information hygiene you are both being protected at the same level as myself, and this room will remain secure, but needless to say this information must remain tightly controlled."

---

Notes: Taylor likes Kamil and all but thinks he is a bit of a softie sometimes. Sometimes you just have to clusterbomb the village of mastered orphans, and Tagg, despite his many problems, at least understands that.

Taylor is a woman who will crawl a mile over ground glass to save the life of a child who spat in her face the day before. But if that same child is a threat to those under Taylor's protection, she'll pull the trigger herself. She will feel awful about it later, but she'll do it.

 

[dc2008]

"The hit and run killed a child, you say?" The aged mobster looked almost bored.

"Yes, and the mom was hilarious, just bawling everywhere, waving her one arm around—"

"Stop. You killed the child of a one-armed woman?"

"Yes?"

"Describe her."

"Tall, fit, intense eyes, dark curly hair."

"How old?"

"I don't know, she probably would have been a late teen when GM happened—"

Bang

The man looked down in surprise at the hole in his chest.

"Fffather?"

"Fool. You did not kill the child of a woman. You killed the child… of Skitter. We can merely pray that your death will satisfy her, and save the lives of your wife and my grandchildren."

 

[dc2008]

"Can I ask you something?" Taylor asked, nervously.

Her counterpart looked up. "Of course."

"Ah we, uh, gay?" Taylor blushed.

"Excuse me?"

"It's just, I like guys I think? But I also notice some girls are pretty? And I noticed when you talk about the future you never mention a boyfriend or husband but you do talk about women who you spent a lot of time with and maybe live with? And that people kept giving you lilies, which the internet says is a gay thing?"

Older!her stared at her in shock. "Wait they mean what? I just… why go didn't Lisa tell me? I thought that was just a joke on Lily's name since she and Sabah got them too but…." Taylor had never seen older!her look so flustered.

Older!her shook her head. "Sorry, I did have some boyfriends but nothing long-term, and I never had a girlfriend but I was friends with some women who I at times lived with, although we never did anything, well not like that, but we… huh."

Well this is awkward.

Her older counterpart was at this point mumbling to herself. "Wait, that's what Ashley meant that time, the lanky bitch, and I wondered why Keith invited me to help with the LGBT outreach thing off-world…"

"Uh? Do you need time to think about it?"

---

Notes:
Jaded!Taylor has had a lot of fucky experiences, and still lives a cape!adjacent life. It's damn hard for her to find people she can relate to as a peer. And damn hard for her to find people she can really trust. And her formative years were a traumatic mess. And her issues around trust and vulnerability are truly mind-blowing.

If you put a gun to my head I'd say this Taylor is probably Demisexual with a slight heterosexually leaning, with a lot of unresolved trauma mucking things up. It certainly isn't something she has thought much about at all beyond saying if asked that she's straight and all these girls she shares her not!commune with are friends and teammates. For good or ill she's basically detached emotional intimacy from sex, and has pretty much given up on finding a long-term romantic partner. She had her found family, and however unconventional it might have been it was hers.

 

[dc2008]

Aisha shifted uncomfortably. Why was Dr. Weaver looking directly at her?

"I am pleased with the results of your basic fitness training," Dr. Weaver told the group. "Starting next week, you will have the opportunity to participate in periodic self-defense training sessions taught by off-duty troopers. They are not being paid for this, so you will treat them with respect."

She shifted her eyes among the group until everyone was nodding, then she refocused on Aisha.

"As previously stated these sessions are proceeding on the basis that none of you, save New Wave, are parahumans, but that you may in the future become parahumans. Training will thus be conducted on an unpowered basis, and use of powers you may or may not have in this training is prohibited." She shifted her focus to Vicky, who had raised her hand, and continued. "Power nullifiers and trumps exist."

Vicky lowered her hand.

"Your training will be consistent with guidelines promulgated by experts regarding appropriate training procedures for your respective ages, weights, and so forth. It will focus on self-defense, defense of others, and disengagement. You will not be taught to 'fight dirty', and nothing you, I, or anyone we know can do will change the position of the PRT on this point."

She continued to look straight at Aisha. "Some of you may be able to through friends or family members arrange for supplemental training."

Right. Dad and Brian. Got it.

"Because this group is in some sense associated with the PRT, if the PRT becomes officially aware that you are, in an organized fashion, seeking from others training that the PRT considers 'inappropriate', I will be forced to act. I have no discretion in this matter." Her eyes seemed to bore into Aisha's soul. "I am sure you all understand."

Ohhhhhhh. Aisha's eyes widened. She carefully did not nod.

Across the room, Lisa suppressed a cough. Dr. Weaver ignored her. "There is another matter I need to go deal with. I will be back in no less than fifteen minutes. I am sure you can productively occupy yourselves for that time."

With final looks at Aisha and Lisa, Dr. Weaver left.

"Ok," said Charlotte. "Is it just me or was that weird?"

"No no no, it makes total sense," Aisha replied sagely. "I know a guy."

---

Note: You will recall that Dr. Weaver has already talked to Aisha's father about this.

 

[dc2008]

"Oh," Cassie said, looking around the apartment. "This is much nicer than my place!"

"Eh," Amy waved a hand dismissively. "It's a security thing, all hell will break loose if I abuse it."

"Anyway," said Taylor, setting an overstuffed folder on the table. "Operation kitty."

Later

Knock knock. Vicky looked up. "Come in!"

Amy slipped in. "Vicky," she said seriously, "we require your assistance with a matter of critical importance!"

Later Still

"And the mental health benefits are clear, as seen in these studies…"

"Victoria," said Carol.

"…and there are now good reliable not tinker tech automatic feeders and litter boxes…"

"Victoria, you—"

"…and the costs of acquisition are quite reasonable, especially as Amy can wrap a basic tune-up into the work she is already doing with the PRT…"

"VICTORIA YES WE CAN GET A CAT."

---

Note: Kitties are serious business!

 

[dc2008]

"James," Max interrupted. "It doesn't matter."

"But our members' beliefs have been subverted! We must find and make an example of this master!"

"Rune was a problem because 'I'm in the Empire to stick it to the man' is not a stable basis for long-term loyalty. Calling it a master effect saves face and prevents grunts from worrying about a witch-hunt. Like this one."

"How can you say it doesn't matter!"

Max resisted the temptation to roll his eyes. "Because ultimately it doesn't matter why they're loyal, so long as they are loyal. I've humored this long enough, we have more important concerns."

"What could be more important than a master undermining the very foundation of our movement!"

Max bit back his first, second, me third retorts. James was a true believer immune to rational persuasion. He tried a different track. "There is always a master, or a thinker, or some other ideological threat. So long as recruitment and retention keep up, we will prevail."

"But—"

"I'm more worried about the fact that we got hit last night, again, by suspiciously militaristic men in ABB colors!"

"The so-called dragon would resort to race traitors to—."

"Jesus, James, it's not Lung!" Brad interjected.

Right, he's here too.

Brad continued, "Lung doesn't fuck around with tactics and plans and shit. No, you can tell it's some thinker sniffing his own farts because the op, just like the prior ones, is way too fucking clever. It's Coil."

As James sputtered and protested, Max found his gaze drift to his expensive designer watch. However much the perks are worth it, this can be a real pain in the ass.

---

Notes: Hookwolf is not smart, and knows it. Sometimes, this is an advantage. In contrast, James and Max both know that they are, in fact, very very smart.

 

[dc2008]

Taylor looked at Tagg and Armstrong. "We've covered off the agenda, gentlemen, was there anything else you want to cover before we break?"

Kamil leaned forward, "We want in."

"I'm sorry?"

"Whatever group you are working with to address the 'existential' threats."

Taylor sighed. "Rebecca will be insufferable about this. Honestly, the truth is far less satisfying than whatever you have imagined. There are various conspiracies across the worlds that try to help, but even the best are horribly under-equipped and under-manned. It's less a secret coalition saving the worlds and more a bunch of terrified children throwing things at the wall in the hope something sticks.

"It of course does not help that efforts to build a better organization inevitably draw unwanted attention from Endbringers or other more subtle threats. More of the same sort of thing that made Jack Slash particularly effective against parahumans. After all, it's not an accident that parahuman analysts so stubbornly failed to realize that powers might passively leak data or provide heightened vulnerability to certain threats.

Taylor paused a moment, before continuing "To be fair to Rebecca and the others, my perspective is colored by the mass casualties in my world line. I suppose the fact that any of us survived is a testament to their efforts, but it's hard to feel that way when after-the-fact we learned so much that could have gone so far to achieve a better outcome. Rebecca is still upset about it all, it was quite a blow for her to realize how badly both her organization and the PRT had been hampered by compounding subtle misunderstandings and blind spots.

"We'll have to schedule a separate session to give you a proper in-brief."

---

Note: You will note that Rebecca is not in these meetings. That is not an accident. Just be glad that both Taylor and Rebecca are Mature and Professional and would never let petty grudges interfere with important work nope nope nope.

 

[dc2008]

There is this recurring <em>thing</em> that Wildbow does where at key moments fundamentally unreliable speakers will say damning things and the fandom (and characters in world) just take them as gospel. Echidna clones have a variation on the original's powers. It would not be difficult to argue that a malevolent social or thinker power was used to come up with a lie that sounded horrifying even if not true. Even if you had multiple Echidna clones all agreeing with each other, they are all fundamentally untrustworthy and there is enough power fuckery that a reasonable explanation could have been found. Similarly, Scion while trying to kill Eidolen announces that the Endbringers are all actually Eidolen's fault, and David believes him. So do the readers.

Fandom has since explored various alternate less terrible takes on Cauldron, and there is a non-trivial number of fics that adopt the view that Cauldron's dumber shit was in some fashion driven by powers that were misused, misunderstood, or simply stirring the pot.

For what it's worth, the approach I'm taking here is that the Eidolen Endbringer thing is more nuanced (as has already been discussed), and Cauldron was stupid and desperate and well-intentioned but Fortuna is deeply fucked in the head, Doctor Mother is way out of her depth, every time they tried to recruit actual experts Ziz happened (or something equally horrifying, see Manton) and Alexandria is running on a shard VM and her engram is stuck on "teenager". Oh, and David's entire neural landscape is deeply fucked by all those boosters and he's probably reliant on subconscious power support or shard fuckery to maintain a facade of basic functionality.

 

[dc2008]

This Taylor views Tagg much like she views Coil or Alexandria. She doesn't like them, but they are each a very particular sort of tool that is undeniably useful. But annoying. So very annoying.

Coil, she views basically as dog shit that might be useful in some circumstances but if he ever stops being extremelyuseful he likes suffers a sudden case of slug/dead.

Alexandria is fucking annoying and so full of herself and yes she is useful but there is something fundamentally broken about her brain. But at least her heart's in the right place and her entire live is dedicated to public service to the point she might as well be doing public service in lieu of incarceration. So she gets to live and maybe even retire someday. But goddamn is she annoying. (Incidentally, Alexandria has basically the same view of Taylor).

Tagg is a deeply fucked up disaster of a human being but if you need someone to machine gun innocent children who happen to be Ziz bombs, he's your man. Sadly, that is a thing you need sometimes. And they are going to have to deal with the Fallen, and the Herren Clan, and the Gesselscheft reeducation camps, and countless other atrocities, and goddamn he would have been really useful on multiple occasions post-GM. So if someone has to deal with that shit, might as well be him.

 

[dc2008]

"Congratulations," Dr. Weaver said grimly. "You've been noticed."

"Noticed?" Lisa asked.

"By Accord."

"Oh." That was… wow.

Dr. Weaver shrugged. "Might have been one of Coil's men, might have been the PRT, there's just too many potential leaks. Whoever talked knew your actual capabilities, not the watered down nothing that went in the file."

Lisa's heart raced. She hadn't realized how accustomed she had become to the feeling of safety was until it went away again.

"It could be much, much worse." Dr. Weaver continued. "He has made it known that so long as you do not focus on his operations, he will run interference should less reasonable villains take notice of you."

It was made known to her. She had a face-to-face conversation with him. They have a good working relationship.

Lisa's heart skipped a beat. She tried to suppress the flinch. "Wait, what?" What the how the fuck?

Dr. Weaver shrugged. "Consider the alternatives. He at least can, if properly approached, be reasoned with." She paused, and made a note. "Which reminds me, I really should get Uppercrust taken care of, the work he's done for us is getting increasingly unreliable and he's not at present able to travel for maintenance."

Lisa put her head on the table. "Can't I go back to pretending it's just cops and robbers?"

---

Note: You hit the big time Lisa! You are being taken seriously! Isn't that wonderful! Why aren't you more happy!