Goddamn Teenagers (Worm, AU/time travel)

[dc2008]

"I suppose," Dr. Weaver began, "we could add Victoria Dallon to the Brockton Bay list for precog-slash-thinker protective overwatch. Technically, she doesn't qualify, but, hmmmm... I suppose we could put her in essentially as emotional support for her Panacea? I should have thought of that sooner..."

"I have two questions," Emily replied carefully. Well, she had many questions, but would start with two. Managing the mental health of parahumans, sadly, was not a new experience for Emily, however usually the parahumans at issue were actually under her command.

Seeing Dr. Weaver's nod, Emily continued. "First, can Panacea be told about these additional protective measures?"

"Oh, no, of course not, that would defeat--ah."

"Yes, quite. Second, it seems that protection or lack thereof is not really the problem. The Bay is safer than before, and by any metric Victoria Dallon is now very safety conscious. It seems like there may be some other, underlying issue causing Miss Dallon distress?"

"I don't think we need to make it complicated," Dr. Weaver replied automatically.

Emily suppressed a snort.

"She's concerned about safety," Dr. Weaver continued, "we'll address safety, easy enough."

Emily tried again. "I've seen this sort of irrational fixation before. Among personnel nearing a breaking point. In light of the importance placed on Panacea, perhaps further intervention is appropriate? We could offer additional sessions with Dr. Yamada, or if--?"

Emily was interrupted by a short, sharp burst of laughter from Dr. Weaver. "Sorry, just, the thought that Panacea--Amy Dallon--might be fixed with simple therapy. Sure, brave new world, never got as bad as mine. Why not."

---

Note: Let's see how many of these references I can make

 

[dc2008]

"Hey, uh, Taylor?" Victoria asked.

"Hmm?" The tall girl said, looking up from her terrifying notebook.

"Amy kind of has been feeling down? She talks to you, well reads with you, anyway, I was wondering if you had any ideas on things to cheer her up?"

"Hmmmmm," Taylor replied, flipping through her notebook. "Normally, I wouldn't want to discuss this at school, too much chance of being overheard, but if can ask her to meet me at lunch, I think I found a disused storage area or crawlspace above the..."

At Lunch

"Wow," Amy said, looking around the dank and dusty alcove. "You sure know how to show a girl a good time. Surprised it isn't a pile of rats or something."

"Actually, you see, I--"

"--Please don't finish that," Amy replied, shaking her head. "So, my sister said you wanted to talk about something?"

"Yes," Taylor said excitedly. "I know we talked about this before, but I just got the approval so now I for real have a proposition for you..."

Elsewhere

"Glad I caught you," Phil said, sticking his head into Emily's office.

"I'm late for the--"

"--I know, I just got a heads up, we'll be getting notice that Apiary has gotten Valkyrie to sponsor an apiculture project, and it's offworld--"

Emily swore. "--and with the latest from State we can't even veto it."

 

[dc2008]

"I'm just saying," Dennis was saying in a low, urgent tone, "I've never, not once since she, uh, appeared, found a bug in the cafeteria food!"

"Isn't that a good thing?" Dean asked, confused.

"It seems that way, sure," Dennis said reasonably. "However, then I realized, they have to be going somewhere! What if she has been building an unstoppable swarm all this time!?"

Carlos sighed. "Did you ever," he said slowly, "find bugs in your food before she started?"

"I didn't pay attention then," Dennis replied with a shrug.

"OK, leaving that aside, why would she even bother? It's not like bugs are rare in the Bay?"

"Does she seem," Chris interjected, "like a person who would just let such a terrifying tool go to waste?"

Dennis groaned.

"Vicky," Dean said, turning to his girlfriend, who was watching proceedings with interest. "Help me out?"

"I wouldn't worry about it," the blonde replied with a mischievious grin. "I'm sure she'll put them to good use."

Carlos facepalmed dramatically, as Dennis turned frantically to Chris. "Chris, my buddy, my pal, you have to help me! You have to be able to make or, er, find something!"

Chris shook his head frantically. "That would just get me on the list too. I welcome our new insectile overlord."

"Speaking of," Vicky added, "has anyone noticed anything unusual about the local bees lately?"

"Vicky...," Dean muttered under his breath.

"What? I'm serious? I mean, it's in her name and everything!"

 

[dc2008]

"Awesome!" Aisha said, making grabby hands.

Lisa rolled her eyes, and passed over the folders.

"He'll be so surprised and impressed I actually got you to help!"

Lisa laughed. "He'll think I'm just in it for the drama."

"Well, of course you are, but you still did it. Now," Aisha continued, opening the first folder. "Which junket opportunity goes on top of the pile."

Elsewhere

"Sooooo," Cranial said to Alec, utterly failing at being inconspicuous.

"You suck at subtle," Alec said without looking up from his game. "You're just lucky the Kingsmen killjoy isn't around, just Big Blue who gets distracted chatting with his Canadian girlfriend."

"Fine," Cranial replied grumpily. "I need a cutout and Dodge is being a little shit."

"Winners don't do meth."

"Nah, nothing like that. More like, I hypothetically might have a genuine Nazi engram, high placed too. Consensually done even, then it, uh, hypothetically fell off the back of a truck..."

"Too much work for me, but I know a girl, this is just lulzy enough she might go for it…"

---

Note: If in doubt, add shenanigans...

 

[dc2008]

"Young Chris!" Chris looked up in surprise at hearing Alec's voice. The boy rarely showed up at base at all, and then almost never in the lab. Yet there he was, wearing sweats and smirking conspiratorially.

"Uh.... hi?" Chris responded.

"I am told you're the one to talk to about plug and play things?"

"Well, I did realize, well that doctor lady helped, but sort of?"

"So," Alec said, pulling a chair up to sit next to Chris. "How do you feel about bodies?"

Previously

"You See The Difficulty," the robotic voice said as the disembodied mannequin stumbled around the apartment."

"Ya," Aisha said, nodding. "Looks drunk."

"And that's the fancy mannequins too," Alec observed forlornly.

"I Think The Problem Might Be One Of Leverage? I Am Not Moving The Mannequin Parts The Way Humans Do Because The Points Of Leverage Differ?"

"Maybe also the no bones thing?" Aisha added.

"The joints also have problems," Alec observed. "The mannequins really aren't meant to move around easily."

"We Could Ask Someone To Make Something? I Think Kurt Knows Someone?"

"Maybe," Alec said nodding. "But just the name Kurt sounds like a killjoy or math teacher. Let me try someone at work first, less worried about rules and stuff."

---

Happy holidays everyone! Hard to believe I've been doing the daily thing for, like, a year! I don't think I've missed a day even!

 

[dc2008]

"You will do well," Colin said, shaking Robin's hand.

"Thank you, sir," the other man replied. "I won't let you down."

"I know you won't." Colin knew his lines, at least for this. "You'll do us proud, not just the Bay, but all of Bet."

Previously

"Velocity," Emily said. "He'll appreciate the structure and purpose, and doesn't have local attachments."

Shawn waited a beat and, when Colin didn't speak up, voiced his own concerns. "Won't that leave us understaffed? Yes, the Empire has fallen, but that leaves a vacuum. As Boston showed, this sort of power vacuum can be even more dangerous..."

Emily sighed. "Normally, I would agree. However, this new initiative is drawing widely, not just from the Protectorate and other 'hero' organizations, but also from rogues and even villains."

"What?"

Emily shrugged. "It's the foreign legion model, although with more of a rescue response mandate rather than combat. Complete with resettlement and even citizenship at the end. Some troublemakers will sign up, but by the time they realize Valkyrie's people don't play the usual games, they will be well and truly stuck."

 

[dc2008]

"Moreover," Emily continued, "and this is still classified, that renovation project out by the docks isn't just a new intermodal logistics center. Valkyrie will be establishing portal connections. Pedestrian and light commercial downtown, yes, but also a major freight connection."

Shawn was shocked to see Colin start nodding slowly. "Doesn't that," Shawn said, "make it even more likely someone else will make a move?"

"Valkyrie," Colin said carefully, "does not play games. Those facilities will be guarded, well, and the guards won't be playing by our rules."

"More than that," Emily said, clearly irritated. "She already has clandestine assets in the city, who will be more proactive in combatting those sorts of foreign incursions. We also have quiet assurances from Lung's people that he and the Elite will support us in making the Bay into a safe, secure and prosperous center of commerce."

"Shouldn't we," Shawn offered, "do something about that? Isn't she a foreign power now, are we really OK with her running 'clandestine' operations in our territory?"

"In an earlier age," Emily said wearily, "we would express our displeasure forcefully. However, in the current political environment, it has been determined at the highest levels that we will accept her assistance, with thanks."

"Besides," Colin added, "it's not like there's anything we could do to stop her if she forced the issue."

"Yes," Emily said through clenched teeth. "That too."

---

Note: For some reason, our foreign allies seem entirely unsympathetic about our plight.

 

[dc2008]

"Why do you have so many reports?" Missy asked Taylor, eyeing skeptically the stack of binders Taylor was carrying.

"Failing to prepare is preparing to fail," Taylor recited, setting the binders down on the couch.

Both girls ignored the squawks of protest from Dennis and Trevor.

"Yes, but what does that have to do with—" Missy flipped through the binder that was now within convenient arms reach—"Endbringer shelters?"

"Not just Endbringers," Taylor corrected, "disaster shelters. Really it's an entry point into learning about the subsurface topography of the Bay. There are all sorts of interesting nooks and crannies, and when they were putting in the Endbringer shelters they started by looking at existing facilities. The ones they didn't turn into Endbringer shelters for the city were often—"

"Why," Dennis said, half turning to Trevor. "Just, why. They load us down with policies and procedures, who goes and gets more for fun?"

"--of course, if I can find a few abandoned ones, especially strategically located about the bay, it shouldn't be difficult to begin repurposing them as off-season accumulation points, such a shame to let so many useful insects just die when they could be preserved for---"

"—forfeit," Trevor said, handing his controller to Dennis. "Chris mid freak out is better than this."

 

[Impel]

"Why do you have so many reports?" Missy asked Taylor, eyeing skeptically the stack of binders Taylor was carrying."

Click to shrink...

Extra quotation mark here.

"--of course, if I can find a few abandoned ones, especially strategically located about the bay, it shouldn't be difficult to begin repurposing them as off-season accumulation points, such a shame to let so many useful insects just die when they could be preserved for---"

Click to shrink...

A crowbar presses, shifts, combined with a grunt of exertion, and a lock snaps, door slamming open, the sound echoing loudly within the cavernous interior, compared to the relatively minor shriek of metal outside.

"-lling you, man, they're a gold mine. Like, the government has to keep them stockpiled with food, 'n water, and shit like that. But they're doing something different now. All those villains dying. The news about that last Endbringer fight, pretty soon, they won't even need these places anymore."

Footballs echo loudly in the antechamber as two pairs of boots make their way into the complex, following dusty signs towards storage. A second, less confident voice pipes up. "I dunno, man, what if there's, like, a hurricane or something. And do we really have to do this on Christmas? It's freezing!"

Another door opens, and they descend deeper. "Like any numbnuts cop wants to look into one of these places, when they could stay in their nice warm car. Besides, we yank a few computers, some copper wiring, we're in, we're out, easy peasy. 'Sides, that's what makes it perfect, people don't want to think about depressing stuff like what these shelters are fo- pffhtpt! What the hell?!"

The door opens, and flashlights pan into fog, which is surprising, because they're indoors, and a story or two underground at this point. They squint, focusing, and realize it's some manner of webbing. The first voice, leading the way through the door with his shoulder, had walked right into it, and was now busy working to pull himself free.

"What the hell, man, what the hell!" Flashlight beams dance wildly as they can vaguely make out indistinct masses of chitin stirring within the space, the webs diffusing and scattering the light to make the inhumanly dense concentrations of insects into something truly monstrous.

"Shit man, what is it, what is that thing?!"

Buzzing, echoing from a million, million sets of wings, combines with the medley of chirping, whistling, and screeches of a dozen other insects species into a spine chilling dirge of madness. One set of footsteps flee back the way they came, leaving their companion struggling, half free of the thicker of webs, designed to keep any insects from passing through the doorway if it were to be opened accidentally, now partway torn.

"Don't leave me, don't leave me, man!"

Screams echo up the stairwell, and the man flees into the night, breath misting in the air, running until he no longer can, until he finds the car, set out of sight to make off with their haul, and hastily hotwires it, the keys with his trapped companion, speeding off into the night. He doesn't go home, he doesn't stop until he runs out of gas, a state and a half away.

---

"Hey, Taylor...?"

"Yeah, Vicky?"

"Someone's posting these bananas rumors about aliens or mutants in the Endbringer Shelters, wanna go check it out with me?"

"Oh, uhm, about that..."

 

[dc2008]

"There is no point," Chris said in frustration. "Even if I wanted to make your friend a body, I'd have to go through all the approvals, and by the time we got them we'd be like thirty!"

"So," Alec replied with a grin, "what I'm hearing is that if I could find you an alternate path to approval you might change your mind?"

Chris rolled his eyes. "I'm not stupid enough to give you a flat yes to anything. You. Say."

"Come on, come on, you know you want to," Alec wheedled.

Chris threw up his hands. "La la la la! Until you get the rules part fixed, keep me out of it, the thing with the warp drive was bad enough!"

Elsewhere

"No," Lisa said with exaggerated patience, ignoring Dinah's attempts at adorable eyes. "We don't need to 'help' the investigators at your school. We don't need to help the police either."

"How can we be sure they'll do it right? Especially after last time?"

"They're busy getting Weavered, they have all the motivation they could ever want. You don't want to be anywhere near that disaster. I don't even want to be in the same state, but here we are!"

"But—"

Lisa's phone dinged, and she made a show of looking at it.

"Sorry," she said, silencing the alarm. "I have an important meeting now with, uh," she frantically glanced at her recent text messages, "Impulse."

Wait, Impulse? Fuck!

"Oh," Dinah replied, "Ok. I'll tag along. There's a new flavor coming out and I was going to ask if he could help me get some because my parents won't."