Arimai
Curmudgeon
Who is mppi? I can't find that name here
My Life as a Teenage Juggernaut... (Worm AU x Marvel)
- Thread starter Kryslin
- Start date
- Crossover Superhero
FaerieKnight79
Verified Pixie
- Location
- The Internet
MP Pi, aka mp3.1415player. It's a play on the MP3 file format, and Pi, the mathematical number for a perfect circle.
Arimai
Curmudgeon
Aahh. I did not think he still wrote. The last thread of his I am following last updated on 2022. I'd feared he had died in the pandemic
FaerieKnight79
Verified Pixie
- Location
- The Internet
Bugs in the System just updated over the weekend with a new chapter.
- Location
- I'll never tell...
Look up his latest created story. Taylor has all the Fyre.
Kinsfire
Verified {Redacted}
- Location
- New Jersey
The kind of voice that, when she speaks in a bar, guys are asking "Why are my pants suddenly tight?" *laugh*
Knew someone years ago who could NOT sing ANYTHING without accidentally turning it into a torch song ... made for some amusing renditions of children's songs ...
FaerieKnight79
Verified Pixie
- Location
- The Internet
Not sure what Nintendo Help Hotline your parents let you call. But
05 - 'Naut a Clue
Kryslin
[Has Delusions of Authorship]
- Location
- Mythic Iowa
The day's activities came and went as they usually did recently, which for her was a distinct improvement over the past couple of years. Taylor was currently sitting in her small apartment (noting it seemed smaller due to her size), enjoying the feeling of having eaten some leftover pizza and vanquishing the dreaded homework monster. Also, managing to throw her martial arts instructor more times than she'd been thrown made her feel like she'd accomplished something.
Her next daunting task was to go through the pile of paperwork that was her Wards agreement by Sunday morning. She had the re-revised contract, her father's notes and the notes from Quinn Calle's office. It was still a pile of paperwork, though much reduced once the more legally dubious and questionable portions of the agreement were removed or replaced after some negotiation with the PRT. Legally it wasn't her problem as she was a minor, but everyone (including her) agreed it was best if she understood it as much as possible.
"At least there were no problems with my cape name," Taylor stated to the air in her room. "I thought they'd try for something more 'family friendly' or 'approachable'."
She could imagine the Public Relations department running around in a panic somewhere in the PRT building and quietly chuckled to herself. There wasn't a costume they could make that would stand up to the abuse she'd subject it to, couldn't change the colors of the costume she already had, and the name!
She'd actually expected a fight about the name when she had it registered. Surprisingly, no one had used that specific cape name, though there had been a cape in India that had used the Hindi version of it. Even more freaky had been when she'd submitted the alternates she'd come up with, everyone agreed that the only name that really worked was Juggernaut.
Hell, she even expected a lawsuit from whoever held the old IP rights to the comic book character, but that was Legal's headache. Assault had pointed her at an old set of images about a character that had almost her exact powerset, along with a weakness to mental attacks if caught without a helmet. She was also glad she looked nothing like that fictional character.
Of course, all this meant that anyone who encountered her was bound to try to see if she lived up to the moniker and was truly unstoppable. She'd have to come up with a plan to make non-fatal examples of the first couple of idiots, to scare all but the most stupid into staying away.
Locally, that meant at some point Lung would come looking for her, to test her strength if nothing else. He was known to do things like that. A couple of others would give it a shot as well, including at a minimum the Empire cape Hookwolf. And probably before she signed on with a group, which was looking to be the Wards. With all that, she was preparing for something of a wild weekend. She couldn't bear the thought of staying inside, it was supposed to be pretty nice for the end of January. Sadly, going out enough to enjoy it was likely to attract so much attention, some of it the wrong kind.
She considered the capes in town that she thought might cause her problems. Ironically, the stupidest cape in town, Skidmark, would probably cause her the most problems with his redirection fields. Victor would be next, if he could steal her basic motor skills like walking. Assault would be third, with his kinetic absorption powers and experience; fortunately he was a Protectorate hero and unlikely to start anything. She wouldn't put it past Uber & Leet to come up with some insane tinkertech gadget that would work once before exploding and turning everything fluorescent paisley. And finally, Labyrinth, who could simply drop her into an alternate world, though the PHO description of her power said the girl was supposed to end up in there with her. Taylor had no wish to have to hit the girl, or fight the rest of Faultine's crew.
That was something a villain would do, and she was going to try to avoid that. Hurting children, kicking puppies and kittens, laughing maniacally (unless you were Assault, but people already thought he was crazy) – those were all on her list of things to not do.
She was then hit with the realization that once she resolved to not do them, she was going to wind up doing them anyway. If only by accident, because the universe was perverse like that.
"Murphy, you bastard," she said to the empty room.
Hopefully they'd all happen when people were realizing it was justified or even just pretending. And as unlikely a confrontation with Faultline and her mercenary capes was, improbable things were apparently a fact of cape life. Carefully, she flopped down on her couch, looking up at the ceiling which might have been in style when her dad was young.
She had a couple of hours before calling it a night, so what to do? She could read PHO – something that was usually both entertaining, informative and cringeworthy, sometimes all at once – but for now she'd had enough of VoidCowboy, Winged_One, and AllSeeingEye going round and round and round, winding everyone up before one of the moderators stepped in. And those were only the worst offenders. The site seemed to attract that type.
The few books her dad had brought over'd been read, she'd been warned about working too far ahead in her homework, and really, the only things left to do in her room were either read legal papers, watch TV, listen to the radio, or go to sleep.
Not being tired, she didn't want to sleep. Because the reception was crappy, she could only get the talk radio or punk rock stations, neither of which appealed to her sensibilities. And network TV? There was nothing on, and you could only watch reruns of even the quite good mysteries on PBS so many times.
It then occurred to her that it had been a while since she'd done any jogging, and she had access to the training facilities, so she grabbed her gym bag and headed for the indoor track. If nothing else, she should find out how her physical changes would affect that.
There were a couple PRT troopers watching the place, mainly because they were on restricted duties due to injuries. From the security station they were monitoring the track, where the girl who'd been staying in the residential annex had checked in for a bit of jogging before turning in for the night.
"She doesn't appear to be slowing down," one said as the girl ran another lap.
"Nineteen point nine five," the other noted from the automatic performance tracking unit. "She's getting faster."
"How many laps has she completed?"
"This'll be ten."
"She's on track for a near five minute mile. Very impressive."
"The other thing is she's not showing any strain."
"Really?"
"Really. She appears to not be breathing hard, isn't sweating, and according to the timer she's getting faster. Nineteen point eight two seconds this lap. Might be a power thing."
"I wonder how fast she could go if she tried?"
"Probably wouldn't be a sprinter, too much mass to get moving for those quick starts."
"If she was a normal girl."
"True. Since we both know she's a brute, it's a moot point. She can't compete in competitions. And then there's the problem at the other end."
"Yeah, stopping." The first trooper shuddered. "I saw what was left of Squealer's urban assault vehicle after it hit her and then there's the remains of Winslow, with large, vaguely human shaped holes punched through brutalist architecture like some weird Looney Tunes knockoff."
"Still, I wonder how long she can keep it up?"
"Parahuman, so – you buy the drinks if she goes more than an hour?"
"And you buy if she goes less? You're on."
Taylor leaned back into her bed after a quick shower once she'd finished spending an hour jogging around the track. She'd managed to relax and think about nothing except putting one foot in front of the other. It'd been oddly nice. She reached over, turned out the light, and went to sleep.
"Good morning, Director." Miss Militia greeted as she sat down for her morning meeting with the woman.
"Two of those three words are correct," Emily groused. "As in, it's morning and I'm the director. Good? Remains to be seen. What do you have for me?"
"A relatively peaceful night," Hanna began. "No major cape actions took place. Some activity over in the Merchants' claimed territory, where several unpowered dealers got run off by Uber & Leet of all people. A couple reports of an Empire dog fighting ring getting hit by Hellhound and the usual assortment of independents stopping or committing robberies and muggings. Panacea doing more extra work at Brockton General. And a report from the fitness center staff."
"What has Miss Hebert broken now?" Emily asked.
"Possibly regional athletic records for the one mile and ten kilometer events," Hanna continued. "At least unofficially. Was down to five minutes, ten seconds a mile. Apparently she needed to unwind last night and decided to jog around the track for an hour. Nothing damaged or broken, and a quiet night overall. She's scheduled to be moving back home over the weekend."
"That's well and good," Emily admitted. "How goes the Wards paperwork?"
"A quick talk with her father had him going through what's hopefully the last few problematic clauses in the contract, and he should have a counter-proposal for us on Monday morning."
"At least he can see both sides and is actually fixing things instead of just pushing the problems around so they favor him. Getting that finished should get Costa-Brown off our backs," Emily muttered.
"I can see her point, though," Hanna continued. "She doesn't want the gangs to recruit her."
"I'd actually like to see a forced recruitment attempt," Emily said with something that could generously be called a smile. "In someone else's city."
"The few thinkers we have access to say that collateral damage will be an unfortunate fact of life for her," Hanna finished.
"I gathered that from her power testing," Emily added. "Might mention that to the Chief Director as a reason to increase our budget. I'd better let you get back to work."
In Brockton Bay, there's a location where few people dare to go, crazy, sane, or cape. The old visitors' center near the ferry station closest to the Archer Street Bridge. It had been closed the year after the riots which caused the Docks to suffer excessive damage. Shortly after that it'd become the domain of the Teeth, and as such had been hazardous to life, limb and power to be around.
When AllFather's Eighty-Eight and the March decided the Teeth had overstayed their welcome, the entire Docks area had become a war zone for about two weeks. During that time, the three groups in that area – Teeth, March, and the Brockton Bay Dockworker's Association – had slugged it out while the Empire harassed and ambushed the Teeth everywhere outside of the Docks. The DWA had mainly fought to defend their area, and AllFather and Marquis respected the DWA's neutrality in the matter, neither attacking them nor trying to pass through where they defended. They also respected the Oerlikon and Bofors guns the Union had salvaged from decommissioned Navy destroyers and had made operational over the years.
Three of the Teeth's capes found out that twenty and forty millimeter high explosive rounds were overkill against gang members, even non-brute parahumans, and that most technicals couldn't take repeated hits from an Oerlikon, let alone a Bofors quad mount gun. After the Teeth had fled Brockton Bay, the guns had quietly disappeared into the labyrinth of the DWA facility and hadn't been seen since, much to everyone's relief.
The area had been deserted not long after that, the aftereffects of using heavy weaponry and the arrival of a new cape who'd united the various Asian gangs under one banner making the area almost as dangerous yet for some people far safer than when the Teeth had been controlling it.
It was into that void that Adam Mustain and his girlfriend, Sherrel Bailey, had decided to stake their claim and set up shop, using the old visitors' center as a lair. First as drug dealers for the area around their little territory, and then getting into the manufacturing of recreational pharmaceuticals. With his girlfriend's stealth tech in their smuggling vehicles, they'd had no problems bringing in materials or merchandise and making payments.
And life had been good. They'd slowly expanded their business, been reminded by the Empire and ABB where the lines were, pissed off the police, PRT, and Protectorate, and partied like it was going out of style.
Then, on a test / munchies run, Sherrel'd attracted the attention of the police and PRT and then hit a new, unknown cape. Who turned out to have been completely unaffected from getting hit by the transport vehicle, and then ripped it in half bare handed.
He'd been scaroused at that.
Then Sherrel'd been taken into custody. That pissed him off.
Adam Mustain, better known as Skidmark, contemplated what action to take. He'd normally send one of his flunkies who didn't have a record to pay the bail and that would be that, and they'd ignore the court date. Couldn't do that until they set her bail, though.
He was one cape, in a city crawling with them. He'd need to recruit more. And figure out how to get his girlfriend out of the PRT holding cells if they were stalling.
Then he could see about recruiting.
He cackled a bit, attracting the attention of a few stoners and tweakers around the old building, and then went back to check on the inventory to see what he needed to order and what new shit he could push on the street to his dealers.
Her next daunting task was to go through the pile of paperwork that was her Wards agreement by Sunday morning. She had the re-revised contract, her father's notes and the notes from Quinn Calle's office. It was still a pile of paperwork, though much reduced once the more legally dubious and questionable portions of the agreement were removed or replaced after some negotiation with the PRT. Legally it wasn't her problem as she was a minor, but everyone (including her) agreed it was best if she understood it as much as possible.
"At least there were no problems with my cape name," Taylor stated to the air in her room. "I thought they'd try for something more 'family friendly' or 'approachable'."
She could imagine the Public Relations department running around in a panic somewhere in the PRT building and quietly chuckled to herself. There wasn't a costume they could make that would stand up to the abuse she'd subject it to, couldn't change the colors of the costume she already had, and the name!
She'd actually expected a fight about the name when she had it registered. Surprisingly, no one had used that specific cape name, though there had been a cape in India that had used the Hindi version of it. Even more freaky had been when she'd submitted the alternates she'd come up with, everyone agreed that the only name that really worked was Juggernaut.
Hell, she even expected a lawsuit from whoever held the old IP rights to the comic book character, but that was Legal's headache. Assault had pointed her at an old set of images about a character that had almost her exact powerset, along with a weakness to mental attacks if caught without a helmet. She was also glad she looked nothing like that fictional character.
Of course, all this meant that anyone who encountered her was bound to try to see if she lived up to the moniker and was truly unstoppable. She'd have to come up with a plan to make non-fatal examples of the first couple of idiots, to scare all but the most stupid into staying away.
Locally, that meant at some point Lung would come looking for her, to test her strength if nothing else. He was known to do things like that. A couple of others would give it a shot as well, including at a minimum the Empire cape Hookwolf. And probably before she signed on with a group, which was looking to be the Wards. With all that, she was preparing for something of a wild weekend. She couldn't bear the thought of staying inside, it was supposed to be pretty nice for the end of January. Sadly, going out enough to enjoy it was likely to attract so much attention, some of it the wrong kind.
She considered the capes in town that she thought might cause her problems. Ironically, the stupidest cape in town, Skidmark, would probably cause her the most problems with his redirection fields. Victor would be next, if he could steal her basic motor skills like walking. Assault would be third, with his kinetic absorption powers and experience; fortunately he was a Protectorate hero and unlikely to start anything. She wouldn't put it past Uber & Leet to come up with some insane tinkertech gadget that would work once before exploding and turning everything fluorescent paisley. And finally, Labyrinth, who could simply drop her into an alternate world, though the PHO description of her power said the girl was supposed to end up in there with her. Taylor had no wish to have to hit the girl, or fight the rest of Faultine's crew.
That was something a villain would do, and she was going to try to avoid that. Hurting children, kicking puppies and kittens, laughing maniacally (unless you were Assault, but people already thought he was crazy) – those were all on her list of things to not do.
She was then hit with the realization that once she resolved to not do them, she was going to wind up doing them anyway. If only by accident, because the universe was perverse like that.
"Murphy, you bastard," she said to the empty room.
Hopefully they'd all happen when people were realizing it was justified or even just pretending. And as unlikely a confrontation with Faultline and her mercenary capes was, improbable things were apparently a fact of cape life. Carefully, she flopped down on her couch, looking up at the ceiling which might have been in style when her dad was young.
She had a couple of hours before calling it a night, so what to do? She could read PHO – something that was usually both entertaining, informative and cringeworthy, sometimes all at once – but for now she'd had enough of VoidCowboy, Winged_One, and AllSeeingEye going round and round and round, winding everyone up before one of the moderators stepped in. And those were only the worst offenders. The site seemed to attract that type.
The few books her dad had brought over'd been read, she'd been warned about working too far ahead in her homework, and really, the only things left to do in her room were either read legal papers, watch TV, listen to the radio, or go to sleep.
Not being tired, she didn't want to sleep. Because the reception was crappy, she could only get the talk radio or punk rock stations, neither of which appealed to her sensibilities. And network TV? There was nothing on, and you could only watch reruns of even the quite good mysteries on PBS so many times.
It then occurred to her that it had been a while since she'd done any jogging, and she had access to the training facilities, so she grabbed her gym bag and headed for the indoor track. If nothing else, she should find out how her physical changes would affect that.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
There were a couple PRT troopers watching the place, mainly because they were on restricted duties due to injuries. From the security station they were monitoring the track, where the girl who'd been staying in the residential annex had checked in for a bit of jogging before turning in for the night.
"She doesn't appear to be slowing down," one said as the girl ran another lap.
"Nineteen point nine five," the other noted from the automatic performance tracking unit. "She's getting faster."
"How many laps has she completed?"
"This'll be ten."
"She's on track for a near five minute mile. Very impressive."
"The other thing is she's not showing any strain."
"Really?"
"Really. She appears to not be breathing hard, isn't sweating, and according to the timer she's getting faster. Nineteen point eight two seconds this lap. Might be a power thing."
"I wonder how fast she could go if she tried?"
"Probably wouldn't be a sprinter, too much mass to get moving for those quick starts."
"If she was a normal girl."
"True. Since we both know she's a brute, it's a moot point. She can't compete in competitions. And then there's the problem at the other end."
"Yeah, stopping." The first trooper shuddered. "I saw what was left of Squealer's urban assault vehicle after it hit her and then there's the remains of Winslow, with large, vaguely human shaped holes punched through brutalist architecture like some weird Looney Tunes knockoff."
"Still, I wonder how long she can keep it up?"
"Parahuman, so – you buy the drinks if she goes more than an hour?"
"And you buy if she goes less? You're on."
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Taylor leaned back into her bed after a quick shower once she'd finished spending an hour jogging around the track. She'd managed to relax and think about nothing except putting one foot in front of the other. It'd been oddly nice. She reached over, turned out the light, and went to sleep.
= = = = = = = = = = =
"Good morning, Director." Miss Militia greeted as she sat down for her morning meeting with the woman.
"Two of those three words are correct," Emily groused. "As in, it's morning and I'm the director. Good? Remains to be seen. What do you have for me?"
"A relatively peaceful night," Hanna began. "No major cape actions took place. Some activity over in the Merchants' claimed territory, where several unpowered dealers got run off by Uber & Leet of all people. A couple reports of an Empire dog fighting ring getting hit by Hellhound and the usual assortment of independents stopping or committing robberies and muggings. Panacea doing more extra work at Brockton General. And a report from the fitness center staff."
"What has Miss Hebert broken now?" Emily asked.
"Possibly regional athletic records for the one mile and ten kilometer events," Hanna continued. "At least unofficially. Was down to five minutes, ten seconds a mile. Apparently she needed to unwind last night and decided to jog around the track for an hour. Nothing damaged or broken, and a quiet night overall. She's scheduled to be moving back home over the weekend."
"That's well and good," Emily admitted. "How goes the Wards paperwork?"
"A quick talk with her father had him going through what's hopefully the last few problematic clauses in the contract, and he should have a counter-proposal for us on Monday morning."
"At least he can see both sides and is actually fixing things instead of just pushing the problems around so they favor him. Getting that finished should get Costa-Brown off our backs," Emily muttered.
"I can see her point, though," Hanna continued. "She doesn't want the gangs to recruit her."
"I'd actually like to see a forced recruitment attempt," Emily said with something that could generously be called a smile. "In someone else's city."
"The few thinkers we have access to say that collateral damage will be an unfortunate fact of life for her," Hanna finished.
"I gathered that from her power testing," Emily added. "Might mention that to the Chief Director as a reason to increase our budget. I'd better let you get back to work."
= = = = = = = = = = = =
In Brockton Bay, there's a location where few people dare to go, crazy, sane, or cape. The old visitors' center near the ferry station closest to the Archer Street Bridge. It had been closed the year after the riots which caused the Docks to suffer excessive damage. Shortly after that it'd become the domain of the Teeth, and as such had been hazardous to life, limb and power to be around.
When AllFather's Eighty-Eight and the March decided the Teeth had overstayed their welcome, the entire Docks area had become a war zone for about two weeks. During that time, the three groups in that area – Teeth, March, and the Brockton Bay Dockworker's Association – had slugged it out while the Empire harassed and ambushed the Teeth everywhere outside of the Docks. The DWA had mainly fought to defend their area, and AllFather and Marquis respected the DWA's neutrality in the matter, neither attacking them nor trying to pass through where they defended. They also respected the Oerlikon and Bofors guns the Union had salvaged from decommissioned Navy destroyers and had made operational over the years.
Three of the Teeth's capes found out that twenty and forty millimeter high explosive rounds were overkill against gang members, even non-brute parahumans, and that most technicals couldn't take repeated hits from an Oerlikon, let alone a Bofors quad mount gun. After the Teeth had fled Brockton Bay, the guns had quietly disappeared into the labyrinth of the DWA facility and hadn't been seen since, much to everyone's relief.
The area had been deserted not long after that, the aftereffects of using heavy weaponry and the arrival of a new cape who'd united the various Asian gangs under one banner making the area almost as dangerous yet for some people far safer than when the Teeth had been controlling it.
It was into that void that Adam Mustain and his girlfriend, Sherrel Bailey, had decided to stake their claim and set up shop, using the old visitors' center as a lair. First as drug dealers for the area around their little territory, and then getting into the manufacturing of recreational pharmaceuticals. With his girlfriend's stealth tech in their smuggling vehicles, they'd had no problems bringing in materials or merchandise and making payments.
And life had been good. They'd slowly expanded their business, been reminded by the Empire and ABB where the lines were, pissed off the police, PRT, and Protectorate, and partied like it was going out of style.
Then, on a test / munchies run, Sherrel'd attracted the attention of the police and PRT and then hit a new, unknown cape. Who turned out to have been completely unaffected from getting hit by the transport vehicle, and then ripped it in half bare handed.
He'd been scaroused at that.
Then Sherrel'd been taken into custody. That pissed him off.
Adam Mustain, better known as Skidmark, contemplated what action to take. He'd normally send one of his flunkies who didn't have a record to pay the bail and that would be that, and they'd ignore the court date. Couldn't do that until they set her bail, though.
He was one cape, in a city crawling with them. He'd need to recruit more. And figure out how to get his girlfriend out of the PRT holding cells if they were stalling.
Then he could see about recruiting.
He cackled a bit, attracting the attention of a few stoners and tweakers around the old building, and then went back to check on the inventory to see what he needed to order and what new shit he could push on the street to his dealers.
Thanks for the chapter! The Taylor-naut always makes me happy when I see it pop up
Thanks for the chapter!😁
This was a fun chapter even if it was mostly set-up. It set things up well, at least. I do have one question though. Why would anyone give Squealer the option of bail if they know that she hasn't shown up to court in the past? Unless they haven't done this particular tactic before. But even then Skidmark says that:
This was a fun chapter even if it was mostly set-up. It set things up well, at least. I do have one question though. Why would anyone give Squealer the option of bail if they know that she hasn't shown up to court in the past? Unless they haven't done this particular tactic before. But even then Skidmark says that:
The keyword there being "normally," which would imply that he's done this before.
Thanks for the chapter and hope the weather doesn't get to bad.
grommile
nasty-minded old cynic
- Location
- NERV-Mercia
- Pronouns
- Traditional/Animate
Doesn't work; Taylor's not a blonde bombshell.
GreydonCreed
Man of Culture
- Location
- United States
At least it's not Disney. 😅
Only if Stan the Man is still around but current Marvel would sue for the name.
- Location
- poland
Current Marvel(the publisher) would not survive worm in any form.
Brightstone
Feral Goblin
Skidmark acting with restraint and not the Teeth-Lite bath salts using moron he's often portrayed as? Le shock!
If Skids is lucky, Juggy won't be at the PRT working out when he tries to breakout Squealer. If she's there, he's gonna get an unfortunate introduction to her new takedown skills. Watching her tromp through his diverting fields should leave him poleaxed enough that she can just go over and pick his ass up and toss him to the troopers. She literally can't be stopped, so once she decides he's a good target, shit's gonna go sideways quick.
I'm the Juggernaut, Skids. What part of unstoppable did you not understand?
I'm the Juggernaut, Skids. What part of unstoppable did you not understand?
Ah, good chapter is good. I liked and enjoyed.
- Location
- Iowa, United States
- Pronouns
- Him, His, He
Yeah we're on a tornado watch until 9 tonight.
Kryslin
[Has Delusions of Authorship]
- Location
- Mythic Iowa
Marvel Comics didn't survive Behemoth's attack on New York.
Worst of things missed us this evening, which is good.
FaerieKnight79
Verified Pixie
- Location
- The Internet
Glad to hear you're safe.
"She considered the capes in town that she thought might cause her problems. Ironically, the stupidest cape in town, Skidmark, would probably cause her the most problems with his redirection fields."
Apparently, Taylor herself considers Skids a viable threat. Either she hasn't quite realized her potential, or she's seeing something we aren't.