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Huntress [Taylor unpowered]

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My first fic. Be gentle. Or not, whatever, it's a free country. Except for those of you where it...
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First Blood: 1.1
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    • Silver719

    Silver719

    Location
    Somewhere, probably Earth
    Taylor doesn't end up triggering at all, and instead has to deal with the aftermath of the locker and all that happens without being a parahuman. Naturally, she still escalates things.
    My first fic. Be gentle. Or not, whatever, it's a free country. Except for those of you where it isn't. I'm just some guy on the internet.

    Yes, this is a crack fic to some extent. And yes, it'l probably get pretty dark. No, I am not proofreading anything, really. If I screw up something from canon outside of what's intended, let me know.
    *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*First Blood*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-

    Screaming, the scent of blood, of waste and sickness. Pleas for help unheard, in the cramped darkness, the only presence the skittering, crawling, infestation. Would be better cold.

    Screaming, echoing, ignored. No trajectory, no destination, no agreement. Not worthwhile. There is no solace, no change made for her. No help. Screaming more, and more, and more, skittering up the neck, over her lips, into her mouth. Burning as a thousand tiny legs pierce her throat as they crawl.

    -----------------

    More screaming, but this time in a bed. Taylor Hebert, regular human, wakes up in her own bedroom. Not in the locker, certainly not in the hospital. "Taylor!" her father yells, rushing into the room for the hundredth time in as many nights. His panic certainly hadn't leveled after all this time. In a moment, he's by her side, holding her gently without restraining her, and soon she's calm again.

    "Nightmares again?" he asks once her heart rate returns to something almost normal. A brief nod answers him, and he replies in kind with a gentle, reassuring embrace. He might have failed before, not noticing what he should have, but he's done everything he can to be there for his daughter. Taylor, somewhat surprisingly, forgave him. If only to stave off the loneliness. "You gonna be alright?" he asked, full of worry. And again, a small nod in response. No hiding the effect they'd had on her, not anymore.

    He took a deep breath and nodded himself. "Alright. If you need me, just yell. Do you want a pill?" Medication, clinically prescribed. Dreamless sleep. She nodded again, and in a few minutes she had one of the little blue capsules and a glass of water. Both were gone moments later. Smiling, her dad ruffled her hair, gave her another hug, and left with a "Goodnight, Taylor."

    He's really been trying hard, Taylor thought to herself as the pill slowly started kicking in.

    Almost a shame she still had secrets to keep from him.

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    When she woke in the morning, it was still only 7 AM. Not the 6 in the morning she'd prefer, but still early enough. Those pills were only to be used after the nightmares hit, after all. Clothes changes, running shoes on, hoodie up. Morning running was a habit the therapist had suggested, exercising as a form of stress relief. And it wasn't just running she'd done. Diving into the habit of weight lifting with the weights downstairs, a good 2 mile run every day, and sometimes getting into a street scuffle with some gangbanger wannabe. She was plenty athletic, maybe even more than Sophia had been last she saw her.

    Which was last week.

    She stopped at the library, bringing up the Shadow Stalker page again as was her habit. After a few moments, reviewing the video of her and the other wards, she'd finally started working out the bitch's patrol pattern. Oh, it'd been a surprise when she snuck into Winslow one day, broke into Sophia's locker looking for payback, and found a certain bag with a certain outfit in it. But then, it only made sense. The final piece of the puzzle, clicking into place. A thread she made on PHO, carefully avoiding any specific terms, even told her why it would happen after some weeks of debate. She definitely couldn't fault the logic behind having as many meat shields as possible for the Endbringers, in fact she even agreed to a point.

    The issue wasn't with Sophia, or even the PRT and Protectorate for defending her. Sophia was a gnat in the grand scheme of things. The PRT and Protectorate just fighting for "The Greater Good." No, the issue lay with Parahumans. All Parahumans. The world was dying, thanks to the Endbringers and the current Parahuman-centric world culture. And the Endbringers didn't really WANT to destroy humanity. We'd already be dead if that were the case. Three of them, with no resting or retreating or time between attacks? The world couldn't survive. No, they wanted to keep humans nice and contained.

    See, Taylor had gotten this nagging theory from a comment she'd heard her dad say in frustration, after a fight between the E88 and ABB parahumans ended up with several members of the Dockworker's Union crippled. The world would be better off if noone had any powers. She took that to heart. That's why she's been training. That's why she's been studying parahumans.

    And that's why she never told her dad about the things she stole from an old Marque storehouse she stumbled upon on one of her runs, barely a week out of the hospital.

    Sophia Hess. Shadow Stalker. I know where you live, where you patrol, your routine, Taylor thought to herself as she ran off to her stash. You fancied yourself a predator. Maybe you are.

    But I'm a Huntress.

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    So, that's the first chapter. Thoughts, criticisms, concerns, death threats?
     
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    • The "unpowered Taylor" has been done before in Troubles With Me (Worm AU). However, there she is working with Shadow Stalker, while here she looks to be going a Punisher route against the parahumans. Certainly worth watching I think.
     
    A nice premise with some nice lines, and I like how Taylor's mindset is presented. I can easily believe this could, under the right circumstances, be something the Taylor of canon might have thought/decided.
     
    I hope this turns out as epic as the beginning chapters of Midnight Sunlight.
    (It has a (accidentally) badass-normal Taylor who shoots gangsters and runs Lung over with a stolen ABB van, all the while freaking out and running for her life)
     
    merv said:
    I hope this turns out as epic as the beginning chapters of Midnight Sunlight.
    (It has a (accidentally) badass-normal Taylor who shoots gangsters and runs Lung over with a stolen ABB van, all the while freaking out and running for her life)
    Click to expand...
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    That sounds awesome. Link?
     
    Path to Victory said:
    Violent vigilante that uses a crossbow and martial arts. No powers.
    She's very heavily vengeance driven. Kinda like Batman, except she is far more likely to kill.
    Click to expand...
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    Oh. Nah, she's basically just going to shoot people. Alot.

    Anyone can practice with a gun on their own. Learning martial arts over the course of a few months, among everything else? Though I'll grant she's been in an ideal place for it.

    Due to being malnourished more than a bit, and is now eating healthy and exercising plenty, it's an ideal time for her to rebuild her musculature in a way that lets her be flexible.
     
    First Blood: 1.2
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    • The Mosin-Nagant M1891/30. At least, that's what she assumed the rifle used to be, after looking up some pictures. While still a bolt action rifle, the formerly outdated weapon had since been modernized. Or Tinkered upon, more likely. She wasn't sure who, exactly, Marquis had gotten to work on the rifle, or even why, but even she could respect the quality and care that went into the weapon. The pride jewel of the storehouse, it was. An elongated barrel with an integrated silencer, no less than fifty full clips of seventeen specialized rounds each, and a scope with four different levels of zoom, from 4x magnification all the way up to 100x. Whatever ammo it used, it remained accurate enough for such a huge magnification to actually be viable.

    Ever since she found the rifle, she'd made a mark in her 'Kill all Parahumans' logic that Tinkers always, by definition, had something good to contribute to society. In fact, the conflict-heavy world they lived in was in large part responsible for the retardation in human advancement. If it came to it, she'd easily kill them just the same...but there was still so much good they could do without ever entering a battlefield.

    It made her acknowledge how much of a shame it was that Squealer and Leet would have to die.

    But she's getting ahead of herself here. Checking the time, it was almost 1 in the morning. Almost time for Shadow Stalker to go on her regular Saturday-night Enthusiastic Walk. She had several rounds of ammunition, a pistol in case that went to shit, and a taser in case everything else failed. She really didn't have much hopes where the taser was concerned. If her first shot missed, she had no doubts that Sophia would happily kill her. She'd seen enough merchants with crossbow quarrels in them to be certain of that.

    Shouldering the rifle and covering herself in the thin, black, see-through shroud, she looked out from her perch. With the rifle at 50x magnification, she scanned the rooftops, looking for the telltale flicker of shadows in midair that would give lie to her quarry. It took half an hour of patiently waiting, but...

    There you are...Taylor thought to herself. Seven blocks away, perched on the corner of a building like some wannabe gargoyle. Smiling, she looked at just what her one-time tormentor was up to. Apparently, she'd spotted some drugged up hobos trying to take advantage of a poor woman. For a few seconds, she wondered if Sophia would jump in to help, but even though the bitch had a clear shot on the druggies...she did nothing. A small snarl crossed the normal human's face as she wondered just what could possibly possess someone to watch while someone else was violated. How deeply disturbed someone must be to adhere to a 'Predator Prey' philosophy over helping their fellow man.

    In all honesty, it made pulling the trigger easier.

    One second, the rifle jumped. There was no sound beyond a faint gust of air.

    The next second, Shadow Stalker's face exploded inwards, mask shattered.

    The third second, she fell from the roof, collapsing on the ground.

    The three merchants who were assaulting the woman turned towards the falling hero, and their quarry managed to flee while they were distracted. One reached over to touch the body...a grimace crossed Taylor's face at the look on his.

    Well, he was technically guilty...the click-clack, clack-click of the three-piece bolt, then the rifle jumped in her grip again, and the merchant's hand was dashed away by the bullet ripping through it. His horrified scream made the others back off. Taylor nodded to herself, and started packing up. A cloth over every surface she touched, careful inspection for cloth fibers, followed up by spraying bleach water over everything to remove any chance of identification via skin flakes.

    The PRT wasn't just going to let one of their Wards die like that. She had to be careful. And she was. In fact, she had a receipt from Fugly Bob's that put her halfway across town 45 minutes ago. Given that she was working on three miles a day for her run, rushing over here and catching her breath had been done within the time-frame needed. All she had to do was act like the recovering trauma victim she was when the PRT and Protectorate came knocking, and she was set. That and clean up the scene.

    Briefly, she almost went back on her choice not to just burn the whole building down. But in this part of town, that could go very bad, very quickly.

    An hour after Fugly Bob's, she nodded in satisfaction, grabbed the bag she'd packed her rifle in, and walked out. Honestly, it all seemed too easy. Sophia was skilled, she was a parahuman, she was a monster in a fight. But in the end, she took a bullet to the face about as well as anyone else tended to.

    Maybe...

    Maybe I need to hunt some bigger game...

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    AN: And there you have it. Our Lady of Escalation has decided she wants to hunt something bigger than Shadow Stalker.
     
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    • Silver719 said:
    No, the issue lay with Parahumans. All Parahumans.
    Click to expand...
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    I almost don't want to say this, cause I love the premise, but you said this was a little crack, so...



    Is it wrong that I think of this guy?

    Othar: No, the issue lays with Sparks. All Sparks. Thus my mission is to kill all Sparks, and when the task is done, myself.

    I couldn't find the actual quote.
    Edit: Imped by OP
     
    doruma1920 said:
    I almost don't want to say this, cause I love the premise, but you said this was a little crack, so...



    Is it wrong that I think of this guy?

    Othar: No, the issue lays with Sparks. All Sparks. Thus my mission is to kill all Sparks, and when the task is done, myself.

    I couldn't find the actual quote.
    Edit: Imped by OP
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    ...yes.

    If she ends up triggering, which may still happen I don't know yet (I'm playing it by ear really), that's basically what she'll do. "I will kill all parahumans and when there are no more I kill myself.)
     
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