It was a nice day at the end of February; not too cold (not that it bothered Taylor anymore), and it was mostly sunny, just enough sunshine to make it pleasantly bright, but not blindingly so. The weather forecast had the entire day like that, with only mild winds, so it was one of the better days.
Taylor wouldn't call it a
good day, because the Simurgh had attacked three days prior, and Canberra was about to become another containment zone. Which was a bad thing.
Thus we find our protagonist standing at a bus stop, waiting for the city bus that would take her downtown, and from there, to Arcadia.
"Mornin' Taylor," the bus driver drawled when the doors to the bus opened.
"Good morning, Mr. Stanley," she replied as she hunched over and twisted sideways to get in the bus. Once inside, she pulled out her pass, which got scanned.
"You're good, Taylor," the man acknowledged when the light on the scanner flashed green.
Taylor made her way to the seat she normally sat in, but remained standing until everyone else had boarded, so they could file past her to choose their seats. There were problems being nearly seven feet tall, and at the moment that meant her legs stuck much farther out into the aisle and that people would be more likely to injure themselves if they stumbled or tripped over her feet. Her father had labeled them gunboats, which had made her chuckle.
"My feet are not mere gunboats," she'd corrected at the time. "They're battleships."
"Point," Danny had answered.
The bus ride was uneventful, a few of the regulars greeting her by name, and a few of her acquaintances making small talk, complaining about homework assignments, and what things were popular amongst teenagers (both boys and girls) at that specific moment. You almost needed to be a thinker to keep track of the minute to minute popularity of things; what was popular in the morning could be on the way out at lunchtime, and utterly reviled by the world by the evening, only to be popular again by the next morning.
Personally, Taylor blamed social media and the decreasing attention spans worldwide for the fickleness of things. PHO may be crazy, and its posters were nuts, but at least things were relatively stable and well ordered. She tried to stay away from certain boards and archives of the site, mainly because she'd already seen some of the mature capefic that had been written about her (using versions of her that were aged up by the author to avoid getting slammed by the underaged sex with adults rules) and decided that a number of people would always sink to the lowest level. That was confirmed when she'd found the Rules of the Internet.
Her shoulders slumped as she realized her fairly nice mood had been darkened by the idiots on the internet. By that point, they'd arrived at school, and had another day of education to deal with.
As she waited to exit, she'd wondered if Dennis had finished the essay assignment given a week ago.
- - - - - - - - - -
Lunch was the usual; more of the small talk and gossip, a few funny pranks (both for the pranker and the prankee – that seemed to be the guideline for practical jokes and pranks around Arcadia, in that it had to be funny to both parties, otherwise it could fall under the bullying and harassment policies and no one would have any fun).
"So, Dennis," Taylor asked, "did you get that history essay done?"
"I did," he answered. "Used some of the downtime after the Canberra attack to write it."
Dean arched an eyebrow. "Who are you, and what've you done with our friend?"
"Ok, a lot of things have been weighing on me before Canberra," Dennis admitted. "However, when Amy got off her break afterward, my dad came up on her list. He's back home now, and doing great. So thanks, Amy."
"You are most certainly welcome, peasant," Amy snarked in a lofty tone. "One does what one can to keep the rabble content." She snickered a bit. "Seriously Dennis, you could have just told me at any time, instead of waiting on that interminable list. You're a friend."
"Didn't want to be seen as taking advantage of that," Dennis admitted. "Don't think I've seen that choker before?"
"Eh, a souvenir from my short lived 'bad girl' days," Amy admitted, while Vicky snickered. "It lasted for about a month. Since being a 'good girl' wasn't getting my crush's attention, I tried being a bad girl doing good. Still didn't work, but the brief bit of rebellion somehow solved a lot of problems at home. I still have a couple of the outfits I bought and I like the amethyst rod of Asclepius I had made. Armsmaster put a tracker in the setting, since I've been told someone tries to kidnap me about once a month." She paused to eat some of her lunch. "I usually only see one attempt every five or six months? Most capes who hear about one deal with the stupid before it ever reaches Brockton Bay."
"Learn something new every day," Taylor said. "Dennis can do his homework, Amy had a 'bad girl' phase, and most capes will beat the stupid out of people trying to kidnap a White Mage. Anything else surprising happening?"
"I heard that Squealer got released on bail," Carlos added. "It was on WBBR's police blotter," he continued after looking at everyone's reactions. "She had a bench warrant for an egregious amount of moving violations." He chuckled. "Most of them are reckless driving."
"Huh," Taylor wittily responded. "I'd thought there'd be a few more felonies in there."
"Apparently not," Chris cut in. "She's not known to be actually involved in the drug trafficking part, just making armored junkpiles that piss off Armsmaster and create one hell of a distraction while the rest try and do something else. Not that they are at the moment."
"While Skidmark and Squealer have been cooling their heels in jail," Vicky said, "the police have been quietly dealing with what's left of the Merchants. I've heard about half of them have been picked up and are awaiting hearings.
"I still don't understand why the police don't like me," she continued with a frown.
"It's because your last interaction with them involved getting punched by Krieg through a police cruiser," Amy deadpanned.
"Yeah, yeah, laugh it up," Vicky grumped. "At least my forcefield recovered after taking the hit from Victor, who was trying to snipe someone."
"Which was why they were annoyed instead of upset, and didn't charge the cost to replace the cruiser to the Victoria Dallon Collateral Damage fund," Amy replied. "Part of which comes out of the fund the hospitals pay into for me healing people."
"How does that even work?" Taylor asked.
"Unlike your muscle modeling work, I'm more directly impacted by the parahuman commerce laws," Amy explained. "The hospitals can't pay me directly, so they put what they would normally pay their doctors for the closest procedure to what I do into a trust fund, mainly to support people who don't have the funds to make it in or get treated. Some of that I get as an allowance for my expenses. Some goes into the 'fix things that Vicky broke' fund."
"It's not like I go around breaking things on purpose!" Vicky said. "It just kinda happens."
"But it happens often enough you have an unfortunate nickname," Chris stated.
"Don't go there," Vicky growled.
"I'm not," Chris replied. "I'm just stating the fact that you have one."
"I don't," Amy stated with surety. "After all, no one wants to annoy the healer."
"There was that one girl…" Vicky started.
"And what did we say about that?" Amy said, glaring at her sister, who actually recoiled in mild fear.
"That we should never talk about that again," Vicky recited, swallowing because Amy was still glaring at her.
"And what are you doing?"
"Uhm, talking about it?"
"Why?" Amy's glare intensified.
Vicky slumped in defeat. "'Body by Fisher, brain by Mattel'…" she muttered, reciting the words the two had previously agreed on.
Amy nodded. "What am I ever going to do with you, sister of mine?" she asked, letting up on the glare.
"Buy me some ice cream after school, but before your shift at the hospital?" Vicky said with a bright smile.
Amy shook her head, chuckling. "Only you, Vicky. Only you."
- - - - - - - - - -
Afternoon brought with it PE class (in which Taylor did not out herself, really), and found out that she still sucked at Gymnastics. At least when she flubbed a cartwheel and landed awkwardly it didn't hurt anymore. Unsurprisingly, she had no issues doing any of the 'power' moves now, her muscles having no problem supporting her.
Her last classes were her least favorites, but she still did fairly well in chemistry and history. She may not like the subjects, but she was determined to do well in them. Her plans for the future included attending college, so the better she did, the more likely she'd be able to score enough scholarships to cover most of the costs. In theory, anyway. The Protectorate might have a claim on her after she turned eighteen in two and a half years, but they usually allowed members to take college courses while serving. And, as it turned out, Dennis did indeed have his history essay done, and she got to enjoy all the dropped jaws when he turned it in on time to the amazement of most of the class, including the teacher.
= = = = = = = = = =
Dismissed for the day, Taylor eventually made her way to the PRT building and the Wards common area, getting ready for her evening patrol. Everyone else had arrived earlier, and one patrol run had finished already.
"What fun have I missed?" she asked.
"The usual," Carlos answered. "Some muggings, armed robberies, getting a couple of cats out of trees."
"Someone actually made it through Vista's space warping and hit her in the head pretty good," Chris added. "She's down in medical, awaiting Amy to at least seal up the wound and regrow the hair they shaved off to stitch it closed."
"Who managed to do that?" Taylor asked, willing her costume into existence.
"That's still an awesome side benefit to your powers," Chris said. "Don't know who it was, just some normal ganger. Hit her in the head with a rock, then immediately regretted his life choices as I hit him with a heavy stun. Twice. Whatever he was on, it made him resistant to the stun effect."
Taylor nodded, then turned to Carlos. "So what am I doing?"
"Since your evening patrol partner's sidelined, you've got a patrol with Assault. You'll have a stop at Somer's Rock because you've got a villain who wants to meet with you."
"Ok… At least the patrol should be mildly entertaining," Taylor said.
"You'll be meeting him down in the motor pool," Carlos added. "After that, you'll be patrolling near the ABB and E88 line, so things might be a little exciting. Fortunately, because you're basically a brute: yes and probably need to hit things, the Youth Guard has allowed you to participate on the more violent routes."
- - - - - - - - - -
"So here we are at the famed Somer's Rock," Assault cheerily stated.
"This place? " Juggernaut responded. "I thought it was notorious, not famous."
"Notoriety is a kind of fame," Assault reasoned. "I'm notorious, after all."
"It depends on what you're notorious
for," Juggernaut countered. "You're notorious for being a smart ass, prankster and bad joke addict. Somer's Rock is notorious for being a place where villains like to meet to discuss things."
"True," Assault answered. "Regardless, we're here, and it looks like the person who wants to meet you is here." There was a small compact car parked outside the bar.
Assault led the way into the bar and talked to the bartender, who pointed to a corner table where a busty blonde sat fidgeting. She was dressed in clean clothes, namely a pair of mechanics coveralls. "Hey," the woman said. "Thanks for coming. I didn't expect you to."
"A few things about the rules here for our new Ward first," Assault said. "Things you learn here, unless it's specifically information to pass on, stays here. No violence, this is considered neutral ground."
"Got it," Juggernaut acknowledged. "So, what did you want?"
"Basically to apologize for hitting you, and then shooting at you," Squealer said. "It was an accident, purely my fault. And when you started pulling my truck apart, you scared the fuck out of me." She pulled a card out of a pocket and slid it across the table. "I owe you a favor for not beating the crap out of me. You can reach me at this number."
Juggernaut retrieved the card, briefly noting the name and number on it. "Are you sure you want to do this?"
Squealer shrugged. "My identity's fucking outed, since my real name was used in court yesterday. Not like I've got a life outside the gang. It is what it is."
Juggernaut nodded. "I'll keep that in mind. Also, thank you for the apology."
"Eh, you're welcome," Squealer said, relaxing a bit. "Can I get you something to drink?"
"Ginger ale, if they have it."
"I'll have a root beer," Assault added. "No drinking on duty, after all."
"You'll have to pay for it," Squealer stated with a smirk. "I was buying hers, not yours."
"It's a fair cop."
