Phoenixes Story snippets and ideas

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 2

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On Sunday I'm tending to a large fungus that is going to replace my rather uncomfortable bed when a couple of screaming children run past my open front door. I look up briefly before I recognize the sound as the fun sort of screaming, then frown slightly when it cuts off.


A few seconds later two boys and a girl look around the door frame, and one of the boys says, "What are you doing?"


I look up at the three children quizzically, "What do you think I'm doing?"


The girl points and says, "Those are pretty, what are they?"


I look up at the bookshelves I grew, "They're bookshelves."


"Why are they glowing?"


"Because I wanted to be able to read underneath them."


The first boy shakes his head, "I don't know what you're doing. What are you doing?"


I smile, "I'm growing a new fungus bed. It's a little bit small for me right now, but it's big enough for you to try if you wanted."


All three children stumble around the door saying, "Me first" or something like that.


Laughing I help the boy into the center of the fungus bed and they all watch as it closes up around him, leaving it looking like a frilly ball. After a couple of minutes I nudge the base a couple of times and the whole thing unfurls again, leaving the boy asleep in the center of the fungus.


As it does, the girl says, "Wow! It's just like Tinkerbell's flower from Peter Pan!"


I nod, "It is, except she was a spring fairy and I'm not."


As the boy starts to wake up again, the girl asks, "What sort of fairy are you?"


I smile, "I'm not a fairy."


The girl frowns, "Then what are you?"


"I am a greater fae, fairies are lesser fae. But I'm pretending to be human."


The girl nods seriously as I help the other boy into the center of the bed. As the bed starts to close up again, the girl asks, "What season does fungus come under?"


I smile widely, "None of them and all of them."


The girl frowns, "I don't understand."


"Have you ever seen black spots or patches in the walls and ceiling?"


The girl nods, "And sometimes it gets fuzzy, then mom gets really upset and shouts at the phone."


I nod, "That's called mildew, it's a type of fungus. Does your mom ever make bread at home?"


The girl nods again, "Sometimes. It's not as nice as the other bread."


"Maybe it will be different next time. But bread uses a type of fungus to rise. Mushrooms and toadstools are also fungus, and some of those grow in forests and fields at different times of year. Others just require the right thing to eat, some people call it rot, so that they can grow themselves."


"So are you a Fungus fairy?"


I laugh, "I'm still not a fairy. Come on, it's your turn in the bed, the other two have already run off."


As she's lying down in the middle of the bed, the girl asks, "Can I be a fairy like you?"


I want to say no, to give one of the pleasant lies my mom used to give when I was her age. Instead, the words stick in my throat. Eventually I say, "Yes, but only if your mom tells me it's ok."


The girl smiles at me as the bed finishes closing around her. I pensively watch the bed while the girl sleeps for a few minutes. I'd love to have a changling running around, but the mound just isn't ready to protect her. And it would be so easy for her to be caught in a deal. Maybe once the mound has grown enough to have a library I can get mom's books out of storage. Then she can read the old fairy tails and see how humans and fae have both come out on top time and time again.


When I wake the girl up she sits up with a smile, "That was nice, could I have one a bookshelf like yours please?"


I crouch down next to her, "Of course you can, if you run your hand along the frills it will deposit spores. Then you can damp the wall where you want the bookshelf and run your hands over the damp spot. The bookshelf will grow out of that part of the wall in a couple of days."


The girl smiles broadly and shouts, "Thank you Miss Fairy." Before running over to my bookshelf and running her hand along the underside.


A minute later she runs back into my rooms, "Um, how do I damp the wall?"


I smile broadly and clap my hands in delight, "Oh well done. You will probably find it easier to grab some toilet roll and run it under the tap, just a trickle though. Then hold it against the wall until you can see the wall change color."


"Thank you Miss Fairy."


I nod my head in acknowledgment of the debt. Not that I'll be collecting on it as she lives in my domain.

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Monday morning sees me sitting in a chair in front of Principal Howell with Sandra, my black social worker, sitting next to me. On the principal's desk is a thick file that contains my Winslow transcripts and history.


After a few minutes of flicking through the file, Howell pulls out two sheets of paper before dumping the rest on the floor beside her desk. "Miss Hebert. Thank you for bearing with us while we prepared a space for you, and went over your previous transcripts. As you can see your Winslow file was on the large size. It might interest you to know that, while it was the largest single file, it wasn't the only one that large. However, it is one of only five that the State Department's emergency teachers believe is more like a work of fiction than a record of fact."


I nod as I try to work out if I'm supposed to feel relief at that or not.


Howell continues anyway, "Now, there are some basic ground rules that should be common across all the schools in the city, but apparently they're not as common as they should be. While you're on school grounds, there will be No Dealing, No Drugs, No gang colors, No Bullying. If you see any of those happening, then you should report it to a teacher or a prefect. Don't try to resolve the situation yourself unless a teacher gives you permission to. Do you understand?"


I cock my head to one side, "Does this only apply while I'm a Student?"


Howell sighs, "It shouldn't do, the world would be a much better place if it applied to everyone. But yes it only applies while you are a student at this school. Now, before we start talking about your education over the next few months, do you have any special needs or circumstances that I need to know about before it gets you or one of the other staff or students in trouble."


I wince and squirm as I try to come up with some way, any way of not saying yes. Evidently I take too long as Sandra says, "Just spit it out already, and tell us what we need to know."


In a small voice I say, "I'd rather not."


Howell makes a note on a pad before sighing, "Miss Hebert, if you're worried about anything you need to tell us. Start with telling us why you're worried. We have a lot of discretion about what gets written down."


I swallow hard, and briefly wish I had another few centuries experience with obscuring the truth, before I say, "The first thing is that I cannot lie."


Howell narrows her eyes, "That seems simplistic. What do you mean by you cannot lie."


"I mean I cannot lie, I couldn't tell you that I didn't steal something if I did as an example."


Sandra groans, "Great, I'm going to have to dig out my books on philosophy and linguistics aren't I."


I brighten, "Oh, great idea. That will make life much easier."


Howell puts her head in her hands, "Great. Well, what else is there?"


"The next two I would rather you never shared outside this room. As they could be used to force me into doing things that I not only don't want to do, but could put me at odds with the human authorities."


Howell seems to be trying to look through my eyes and into my mind. Briefly, I toy with allowing her to do just that, but the moment passes as she says, "Can you give an example?"


"I could be forced to murder everyone in the school."


"I don't appreciate threats."


I cock my head, "It wasn't a threat. You asked for an example."


Howell sucks her breath through her teeth, "I suppose I did."


Sandra puts her pen down, looks at me, and asks, "What's so bad that you would jump to massacring the school as an example?"


I look her in the eyes and allow my glamor to fall away. I can see it in her eyes as she takes in the distinct points on my ears, my flawless lavender skin, my tri-colored irises - pink, bone white, and brown, and the fact my proportions are all slightly wrong despite also being supernaturally beautiful. "I cannot break a deal that I have made, and once I agree to the rules I have to follow them."


Howell frowns, "How could that lead to murdering the entire school?"


I turn to stare at her, "Page 176 of the Standard Wards Contract, Paragraph 6, 'The Ward must follow the direct order of any member of the PRT with the rank of Assistant Deputy Director or higher to the best of their ability unless countermanded by an officer of higher rank'. I was bored after they dragged me from my old home, so I read it and all of the referenced contracts and terms and conditions. At some point I'm going to read the law too."


As I start to reapply my glamor, Sandra tears her eyes away from mine to meet the eyes of Principal Howell. Then she very deliberately tears the page out of her notebook and hands it over.


Howell nods and just drops it into the shredder by her desk before she says, "Right, then there's one clarification I need to make before I hand you the school rulebook. The rules in here are actually just guidelines that we want our students to try and live up to. The same is true for the instructions teachers give out. They are not hard and fast gospel, even if one of the rules says you should follow them like that. I couldn't tell you which one, but I know it's there because I've had to use it to discipline a few students in the past. While I am principal, there will be no agreements like the one in your file. Instead I will ask you to use your best judgment, and follow the spirit of the guidelines. That is far more important than the letter of the rules."

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Remedial classes are interesting. Before I joined there were only three students in the class, Spence, Mark, and Ruth, and the teacher. We're still timetabled along with one of the other classes, but we can't participate in the work release program, and we're not tested. Instead those afternoons are devoted to one on one help from the teacher. Or, in my case, catching up to where I should be according to the Arcadia curriculum.


Spence reminds me of the changelings running around under captains hill. He can't dissembled to save his life, and he can't understand why anyone would want to. He's also really good at some subjects, and really bad at others. Mark and Ruth are both just slower than the normal student, so they're here to have more time to understand their lessons.


Fortunately for me, the teacher is also very understanding of my need to move around while studying, and doesn't blink when I occasionally sit on the wall to get a different perspective on things.

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At the end of the week I skip home backwards and dance through the front door into my home. As I look around the hallway I smile at the growing expanding foam, especially with the way it's turned the stairs into a narrow slide.


As I walk into the elevator, everyone falls silent and looks at me as though they're expecting me to explode. I briefly consider doing just that, before deciding that cleaning up would be too much work.


As the doors to the top floor open I bow to the residents and step backwards out of the elevator before spinning around and dancing to my rooms.


Once there, I spin around and throw myself backwards onto my expanding foam bed and scream as it has no give what-so-ever.


Standing up I look at the bed thoughtfully, "Hmm, I wonder if there's a softer variety of expanding foam I could use."


As I'm wracking my brains, the girl from down the hall says, "Hello Miss Fairy."


I turn around and bow to the girl, "And hello to you little human."


"Did the bad men take your pretty fungus away too?"


I blink a couple of times. Then I blink sideways just in case it makes what she said make more sense. "Pretty fungus?"


The girl nods, "They said it was bad for us and they took the bookshelf off my wall. They didn't believe me when I said it was a bookshelf, but they didn't see the one I hid behind my curtain though. Don't tell mom it's a secret."


Now curious, I say, "Will you show me your bookshelf?"


The girl nods again and holds out her hand. Obediently I shrink down so that we're the same size and take her hand. When she giggles, I giggle back, and then she runs off towards her rooms and I follow her. I like these sorts of games.


Alas, all too quickly the game comes to an end as she leads me around the corner to the rooms she shares with her family. As we approach the door opens for us, and she leads me through to her bedroom where I can see an expanded foam bookshelf growing out of the wall.


The girl ignores the bookshelf and runs over to the curtains that overlook a courtyard I didn't know existed. Then she pulls the curtains closed, before pulling them closed a second time. Or is she pulling them open from the other side.


It must be open from the other side as I can now see a bookshelf that wasn't there before. Though it looks a little dry and wilted.


I shake my head, expanding foam doesn't dry or wilt.


The girl points at the bookshelf and says, "See." Then she pouts, "But it's stopped glowing."


I step forward curiously, "I gave this to you?"


The girl nods, then shakes her head, "Yes, uh, no?"


"You don't sound certain."


"Um, you let me take some spores to grow my own bookshelf."


"I did? But I'm the Queen of Expanding foam, how would I have done that?"


The girl shakes her head, "No you're not, you're the Queen of Rot and Fungus. You said so yourself."


I feel confused, so I take my head off so that I can scratch it properly, "Are you sure?"


The girl nods, "You did, you can ask Peetie downstairs."


I toss my head from one hand to the other as I weigh up whether she's right or I'm right. As my head lands in the she's right hand, I say, "Do you promise that I said that?"


The girl nods, "I promised, it's naughty to lie."


I no… I place my head back on my shoulders so that I can nod as I muse, "So I was the Queen of Rot and Fungus, but now I'm the Queen of Expanded foam. Why did I change that?"


The girl pipes up, "The bad men took away the pretty fungus and replaced it with foam."


"They did did they? May I touch your bookshelf?"


I allow my glamor to drop as I return to my full height and hesitantly reach out to the shriveling bookshelf. I am so angry I could stamp my foot, preferably with the head dastardly humans that dared to defile my sanctum in my home underneath it.


As my fingers contact the bookshelf I shiver in pleasure as the truth of the girls words shiver inside me. Abruptly I turn around and I'm about to stalk off when I remember it's impolite to leave without warning.


Turning back to the girl I bow towards her and say, "You have my gratitude for alerting me to the change in my thinking. You may have one minor wish."


The girl claps her hands, in delight, "You're pretty, I want to be like you when I grow up."


I smile broadly as her ears gain a slight point and a hint of color appears around her pupil, "And done. Though being a queen is beyond the value of your wish, so you will need to earn that yourself."


As she runs into the kitchen shouting, "Mummy, Mummy, I'm going to be a fairy when I grow up!" I stalk out of the rooms and back to my own. There I scowl at the walls covered with expanded foam and before snarling as I lunge towards it and dig my fingers into the plaster.


With a feral growl I tear the plaster away from the backing slats and rip the furniture away from the floor. Once I'm done I stand in the center of my rooms and scream "I am the Queen of Rot and Fungus, no more will I allow defilers to wander my home without care."


As the weight of my words settle into my home, it shivers in pleasure as a mat of white fungus grows from the slats to cover the walls like the plaster did.


Once one of the walls is covered, I peel the mat away and lay it on the floor, before piling all of the old plaster into the center of it. Then I fold up the corners and sling it over my shoulder as I march down the rapidly clearing stairs to the ground floor.


It doesn't take me long to find the door to the disused courtyard where the stairs down would be, if we had a basement yet. As the door opens for me I pause and tap the floor experimentally. In response the building swings the door from side to side.


"You would prefer to claim the courtyard in payment than expand downwards?"


The door flickers into an archway for a second, and I nod, "Very well. This courtyard is now claimed as payment for trying to subvert my domain. Now lets us have a bonfire before you start to grow again. And do ensure that only the residents are allowed on the fourth floor would you?"


I smile as the detritus strewn paving slabs churn and tumble until all that's left is soft brown loam with the hint of grass growing through. As I carry my burden out to the center and lay it down, the mat of fungus is greedily absorbed by the home, and a circle of mushrooms grows around me.


I step over the outer ring and nod in agreement, "Yes, that's a much better idea. A gate to the faerie realm is a much better use of that payment. Let us see who will join me as I dance around the fire to open the gate."


With a clap of my hands, the plaster and expanded foam from my rooms bursts into flames as I start to sing and dance around the fire.


The fire is halfway finished when the girl from the fourth floor drags the other children her age down to dance with me. And together we open the way to faerie.

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 1

​

Based on The Wild Horse Thesis by Calamity Cordite

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I shiver as I step out of the school showers at Arcadia High School. The transfer out of a toxic environment being the best thing that came from that event in January, and the subsequent two week coma followed by a few weeks mandatory psychiatric care and suicide watch after the reality of my new curse, and inherited phobia really hit home.


As I reach the towel rail I whip my towel off of the rail and whip it around my torso in a smooth motion. When it catches the first time instead of just whipping me in the boob, I do a little dance before walking into the changing area where the other girls are almost finished. After all, everything's training.


As I reach the hook where I left my bag hanging, Heather, my shadow, calls, "Hey Taylor, are you ok?"


I force a smile, "Yeah, I'm ok. Thanks for waiting."


Heather snorts, "It's no trouble. I know I was assigned to be your buddy while you got acclimated, but you know that I'd like to be your friend too."


I nod noncommittally as I slip my knickers on under the towel. "I know, it's not you…"


Heather mirrors me as we say, "It's me." Before continuing, "I know, but you need friends Taylor. Not everyone is like the girls at Winslow."


I start to hunch my shoulders before deliberately pulling them back with the mantra, 'Look confident, be confident'. One of the unfortunate side effects of having 'powers' with such random triggers is that everyone knows what happened to me in Winslow. I do mean everyone, as it made the state news. The only saving grace is that they discovered my 'changer' power when the nurses were giving me a sponge bath while I was unconscious. Who knew that having an uncontrollable power would lead to uncomfortable questions being asked across the city.


I've obviously been silent too long as Heather sighs and leans against the wall, "Taylor, I know the did a number on you, but everyone looks up to you. Lisa, Charlie, Dylan, and even Colette. It's not just me. Hell, rumor is that you ready to test out of the remedial lessons the principal demanded you attend to bring you up to Arcadia standards. What's not to like?"


I look away, "I know, it's just, it feels like they like me for what happened to me." And I'm a cheat who has three years of memories of a 17 year old guy going through two years of high school, growing to love two girls and then waking back up in my own body. His memories are still there, even the places he visited. I touch my stomach where I can feel the S2 organ he stole from Adam during his visit to an anime. We were happy damnit, and I hope he's still happy.


I shake my head as I realize I've been lost in my thoughts and Heather was talking to me, "Sorry, I missed that. What did you say?"


Heather pats me on the arm as I carefully pack my gym gear into the bag, "I said that we have enough celebrities here that you don't need to worry about that. What are you doing after school?"


"Gym and then therapy, why?"


Heather smiles, "Do you mind if I join you? To the Gym I mean."


I narrow my eyes at her, "Why?"


"Because you're obviously doing something right, and I'm on the school gym team and I swear I couldn't pull some off someone of the moves you did in gym today."


I give Heather my first genuine smile of the day, "Sure, knock yourself out."


As we walk out of the changing rooms towards Math, Heather asks, "So, have you met the Wards yet?"


I shake my head and nudge her arm gently, "No, and you know that if I had I'd have to answer the same way. I can't even consider joining them until my phobia's better controlled. Honestly, I think the only reason they're paying for my therapy and providing an escort is because I break the model for powers matching the event you get them in. I know there's at least one journal paper with my name in it, because they asked dad for permission to use it. Not that turning into a guy whenever I'm splashed with warm water is that great of a power."


"Did they ever give you an MRI? I heard that's the gold standard for proving someone's a parahuman."


I laugh, "Nope, turns out that you don't need one when a simple application of warm water 'activates' your power. They tend to just splash you and say, 'she's a parahuman'."


Heather laughs too, "Sorry, I'm just remembering just how much you've been splashed in the two months since I met you."


I grumble good naturedly, "I swear hot water hates me. At least they stopped serving soup in the cafeteria."

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After school the two of us head to the large gymnasium that's attached to the PRT building. Something that does double duty as a testing facility for new parahumans that aren't obvious brutes as well as being one of three Olympic quality gymsasiums in the state. As I turn off the sidewalk for the door, Heather keeps walking a couple of paces towards the sports center, before skipping to a halt and doubling back to catch up with me.


"Taylor, when you said 'Gym', I thought you meant the Gym."


I shrug, "They don't have the space I need to get b, into shape."


"I've never seen you here."


I smile as we head to the changing rooms, "That's because I use the floor, so I can only come in on equipment days."


We split up into our separate cubicles where I change into the Chinese silks I special ordered with some of the settlement money Dad was able to claim from the school. Once I'm done I grab a small thermos before I put my bag in one of the small lockers that couldn't even fit a five year old. Then I splash my face with warm water and shudder in revulsion as the change makes me grow a couple of inches and fill out in the shoulders with a corresponding reduction in my hips. Something that has perversely made me more comfortable with my own femininity. As I'm heading to the floor I fill the thermos up from the cold water fountain.


As I head out to the floor I wave at John, one of the coaches who spotted me during the first month I was doing this until I proved that I knew what I was doing. Granted, I probably needed it as my body wanted to respond as well as Ranma's body did when he was suffering from the Moliboxian point.

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Heather comes out of the changing rooms with her tracksuit over her school leotard and tights and heads over to the floor where there's a small crowd of guys watching another guy doing a routine on the mat.


Walking over to one of the coaches she recognizes, she asks, "Hey John. Do you know Taylor?"


John gestures to the guy that's dancing across the floor with only the occasional misstep or stumble. "She's just doing her warm up."


Heather stares at the guy pulling moves that she'd want to practice several times to pull off, "That's Taylor?"


John nods, "She used to do the warm as a girl, then switched over to doing as a guy."


"That's a warm up?"


"Uh huh, once she's finished she'll do the same thing on the balance beam. I thought she was insane when she added that a month ago, but she pulls it off. I'm surprised to see you tonight though."


Heather nods without taking her eyes off of Taylors body, "Taylor did really well in gym today and when I found out she was coming to the gym after school I asked to come along, as I've never seen anyone get that good that quickly."


"Well, she trains herself into the ground. She's usually here until nine every night that the equipment's not booked out for womens gymnastics."


Heather goggles at that, "That's insane."


Taylor comes to a halt at the end of her routine and walks over breathing hard. "Hey Heather, sorry about starting before you were ready. Let me finish on the balance beam and lead the guys through my warm up routine and we can start."


Heather looks at John questioningly, who nods, "Yep, it started after she called Thomas a musclebound assehole after he laughed at one of her falls."


"That's because he is a musclebound assehole. And I proved it as a girl."


Heather shakes her head, "I've never seen a gymnastics routine like that."


"That's because it's martial arts not gymnastics."


"Taylor, you should seriously consider joining the school gymnastics team."


"Can't, parahuman. It's an automatic disqualification. John here keeps trying to persuade me to take up coaching as my employment option once I've caught up to where I'm supposed to be at school."


"Why martial arts though?"


Taylor suddenly looks serious, "Heather, I'm never going to be a victim again. One day I'm going to be strong enough to stop other kids being victims too."


Heather says, "But you're already the strongest person I know." But Taylor's already run off to the balance beam. As she approaches it it, she jumps into a cartwheel, to a back flip and somehow catches the end of the beam with her hands and turns the motion into a roll along the beam


John pats Heather on the shoulder, "You might want to take your tracksuit off and do some stretches before she gets back. Will you be sticking around after she heads to her appointment?"


Heather shakes her head, "I don't know."


"Well, Taylor'll be back afterwards, and does the whole thing again as a girl."


Heather winces as Taylor misses a step and tumbles to the crash mat, "Um, I'm not sure I could keep up. How the hell is she that flexible, I had to work for years to get that flexible."


"Wherever she got her exercises from." John indicates up at the observation gallery, "We've certainly had plenty of sports doctors observing since she started doing warmups for the guys."


"I wonder what she does when the womens gymnastics are here."


"Parkour." Heather blinks, "I asked a couple of weeks ago."

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I chuckle at the moans Heather's making as I massage her muscles on the bench at the edge of the gym while the coaches tidy away the crashmats for the night.


"Oh god Taylor, this feels so good. Don't stop."


"You did well for a beginner."


Heather moans again, "How are you so good at this?"


"I, ah, watched a lot, of videos I mean. Don't forget to do a warm up tomorrow otherwise you'll stiffen up again."


As I take my hands away from her back, Heather whines, "Taylor!"


I chuckle as I help her into a sitting position, "Come on, let's get you home before the last bus."


Heather reluctantly stands up and staggers over to her locker, "When are you next training?"


I sling my bag over my shoulder as I think for a second, "I'll be at the assault course tomorrow till four, then I'm here from six till nine. Sunday is dad's day, and then I'm back here Monday, Wednesday, and Friday."


"When do you find time to do your homework?"


I laugh, "Wednesday afternoon during the junior girls gym session."


"Hang on, assault course. Is that the PRT and National Guard one that challenges people to prove that they've got what it takes?"


I nod, "It's a good workout, and I can almost run it solo."


Heather stays silent for a few minutes as I help her out of the building. As we get closer to the buses, I pause, "Um, I've just remembered, I have no idea where you live. Or what bus you need."


Heather pulls a cellphone from her purse, "I told mum I was at the gym, I'll give her a call and she'll be here in a few minutes."


As we're sitting in the bus shelter, Heather shivers in the late March chill before scooting next to me and putting her head under my arm and her arms around my waist.


As I'm trying to work out how to get out of this politely, she murmurs, "You're so warm. How did you get so good at martial arts so quickly?"


As I'm trying to work out where to put my arm, I say, "Um, everything's training."


"What do you mean?"


"I mean everything's training if you want it to be."


"How is writing an essay training."


"You could turn it into a balance exercise, you could pay attention to how your muscles move as you're writing. Practicing your flexibility while you're thinking. The pen could be used as a baton or a sword."


"Ok, walking between classes?"


"Dodging practice. Don't let your bag or clothing touch anyone else."


"Eating?"


"Use chopsticks, speed and accuracy."


A couple of years old ford pick up pulls up at the bus stop and Heather stands up and opens the passenger door, "Mum, could we give Taylor a lift home please?"


I freeze as I started turning towards home. From inside the car Heather's mother calls, "Is that the girl you've been mentoring?"


Heather nods happily as I try to decide if I can just walk away, "Yep, she does martial arts too. That's what she was showing me earlier."


"Sure, where do you live sweetie?"


I give out my address on reflex before I remember I could have just said I'll get the bus. Next thing I know, Heather's dragged me onto the bench seat and we're heading home.


As the car does a U turn, Heather's mom asks, "What martial arts do you do?"


"Anything goes. Ah, I mean it's a mixture of things that I've put together from stuff I've watched online and a couple of pointers from my PRT escorts."


"What made you start?"


Heather sounds affronted, "Mom! Don't ask that."


"It's a perfectly reasonable question."


I scratch the back of my head, "Uh, I started when I got out of hospital because I didn't want to be a victim again. Then I discovered that I really liked it, so I learnt everything I could."


Heather gives me a quick hug as she says, "Mom, I told you not to ask. I'm sorry about mom."


I force a smile in the darkness, "It's ok, everyone wants to know."

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 2

​

I'm preparing bento boxes for pops, dad and I when there's a creak from the front door followed by a yelp.


Pushing off the kitchen counter, I do a backflip into a half twist over the kitchen table and run to front door. I mentally curse the fact I needed to put my hand down to maintain enough height to clear the chair on the other side of the table. As I pull open the door I force myself to acknowledge the fact that my fitness levels are improving at a meteoric rate. Still inside human norms, but pushing the bounds of possibility. At least that's what the sports scientists are saying.


Skipping over the steps I lean down and help the postman up off the floor. "Are you ok there? Sorry about the step."


The postman chuckles, "I should have remembered, it's just so rare that you guys need a signature on anything."


I grab the bag of post with one hand and a grunt, "Here you go."


The postman lifts the strap over his head and settles it on his shoulder before fishing out a clipboard, "You're pretty strong ain't-cha. Anyway, I need a signature for one item."


I smile and sign in the box he indicated, "I'm getting there."


Taking the box he hands out, along with a couple of letters for dad, I kick the step back into place using a martial arts construction technique. Looking at the step thoughtfully, I look at my hand consideringly as I wonder if I'm good enough to use the knife hand technique to shape wood. Depending on what dad wants to do tomorrow, I might run out to the forest and practice on a couple of trees.


A flicker of movement off to one side sees me scoot inside and slam the door closed. As I quickly peek through the window, next door's c-c-c-furry demon saunters across our front garden and lays down on the step I just replaced. I duck back in the hope it hasn't seen me and creep away from the front door back to the kitchen.


Once my heart-rate has returned to normal, I open the box and stare at the Aleph import DVD box set of Neon Genesis Evangelion, that was made to order. In my hands is proof that somewhere out there Ranma, the guy who's head I shared for the two years he was trapped in this anime, exists. I dash the tears from my eyes, even if I could get there how could I explain that I know Rei and Asuka as well as Ranma did, and I fell in love with them at the same time. Assuming that Ranma's still there rather than dealing with his own heart being ripped out by being separated from them. I suppose it's a great irony that Bastet arranged for something to teach Ranma without realizing there was a hitch hiker.


Shaking my head I put the box on the kitchen table and return to the bento's I'm making. One for dad and three for me. As I hear dad leaving the bathroom I set the frying pan on the grill and bounce six eggs out of the tray and break five of them in midair to land in a bowl I prepared earlier. I wince and grab another egg from the tray as the sixth one lands on the other side of the kitchen. I grab some kitchen roll and the spray as I head over to the fridge to grab some bacon to go into the omelette.


By the time he comes down stairs the omelette is sizzling nicely in the pan and the bento boxes are sealed up. The bowl of plain rice and plate of bacon and omelette sliding in front of him goes unnoticed as he picks up my DVD boxset.


"Taylor, what's this?"


I sit down on the other side of the table with my own food and a pair of chopsticks, "Just an anime I ordered a couple of months ago."


"A couple of mo- Taylor is this about your delusions?"


"They're not delusions dad! They never were. I had to order that from an Aleph import company because the company that produced it on Bet went bust after Leviathan and it never got an English translation."


I hoover up my breakfast while dad's trying to work out what to say to me. As he says "Taylor" I dart into the basement with my bentos to grab the heavy canvas army surplus rucksack with a welded steel support frame.


As I'm able to lift it with one hand, I drop in another two sections of lead pipe from the pile by the wall. It's not an armchair with a lazy ass father sitting on my back, and racing traffic isn't the same as running from wolves. But it's far safer, even if most people would defer on whether it's saner or not.


As I put my weight on the bottom stair it creaks ominously under the combined weight of myself and the contents of the backpack. Stepping back onto the concrete floor, I take a couple of deep breaths and imagine that my feet are pressing down on everything, and that my weight is pushing down through the supports to the concrete floor. When I put my weight back on the stairs they only make the normal amount of creaking and I can't help smiling as I jog up the stairs. It's not perfect, but it's one step closer to roof hopping and conscious ki control.


I shout, "I'm off to the assault course, see you tonight!" as I'm running past dad. As I'm opening the front door I grab the fanny pack, keys, and purse before setting off at a run towards the assault course.

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When I get to the assault course I wave to Geordie, one of the PRT trainers who is unlucky enough to deal with the public. As I get to the gate he smirks, "Changing room three."


I nod, "How badly do you want me to show them up?"


Geordie laughs, "Catherine's been signalling me to take over."


I nod and saunter into compound and walk past the group of men that are supposed to be getting their safety briefing from Catherine, though from the sound of things they're spending more time ogling her and making crude comments than listening. I know they spot me walking past, as I can hear the ribald comments following me over to the doors to the changing rooms.


With deliberate causalness I sling my rucksack off and lean it, straps down, against the door to changing room three. Then I grab my three bentos and a pair of chopsticks before heading for the staff room fridge. Ostensibly, I should be paying for the use of this course, but after I showed up several groups last month, and they became repeat customers because 'they can't be shown up by a little girl' the staff decided to let me use the course for free as long as I help motivate the problem groups, and join the weaker groups to help them over the walls. Between groups I can run the course as often as I want.


I wave to Damien and Peter as I put two of my bentos into the fridge and saunter out to join the safety briefing while I'm eating. As I stop behind Catherine, one of them men leers at me, "Who's the scrawny chick?"


I negligently wave my chopsticks, "Don't worry about me, I'm just a regular. Site rules say I have to listen to the safety briefing anyway."


I smile as I continue lazily eating as Catherine's shoulders shake slightly with suppressed mirth.


One of the other guys checks a bit of paper they've got in their pocket, "Hey, we're supposed to have the whole course booked out."


Catherine nods, "You're on course A and you've got it booked for the next hour."


I nod as I chew thoughtfully, "Ok, I'll take route B then."


I finish eating my bento as Catherine finishes her briefing and turn back to the staff room to wash up my bento box and let whoever's shadowing my run know that I'm about to start. As I'm washing up I watch Damian and Peter play rock paper scissors before Damian wins and stands up, "You ready?"


I nod, "Yep. Fast or casual?"


Damian laughs, "Casual."


I nod and put my hands in my pocket as I saunter out onto the courtyard to the balance beams that are the start of the circular course. With course A having three inch wide beams, B two, and C one. A has the least obstacles at 10, while B and C each have an additional 5 each to make up the additional distance. While the last of the group are struggling across the two side by side monkey bars I saunter across the beam and casually jump up and grab my own monkey bars. At the end, instead of jumping down to catch my breath I make a lazy long swing and grab the handle of the overhead cycle and pull myself up to grab the higher handle.


As I'm lazily cycling across the muddy ditch I glance over at the other course, where they're running through tyres, and shout, "Are you ok over there?"


I get a couple of angry glances, but they do start to speed up a little as their leaders head over to their ten foot wall. As I start on my own tyres, I put my hands back in my pockets, and turn around half way along so that I'm going backwards as I shout to at the man that's just started, "Oh, come on, I've seen grandmothers that can go faster than you."


At the end of the tyres I turn around and break into a jog so that I've got a run up at the 15 foot wall that's my next obstacle I don't even think about it as I leap five feet up the wall before I scramble up the rest of the way ignoring the rope. As I'm about to run out of momentum, my fingers graze the top of the wall and I dig them in as I push off with my legs to go up into a handstand at the top of the wall.


As it dawns on me that I actually made the climb without using the rope, I do an upside-down happy dance and quietly cheer myself. Flipping back to my feet I walk along the wall to the closest end to course A and lean down at the group that are struggling with their teamwork.


"Hey guys, do you need a hand there?"


One of the two guys that are standing in the pool on the other side of the wall says, "Oh shut up!"


I shrug, "I'm only trying to help, I mean, the army guys usually keep a couple of people at the top of the wall, and have two people at the bottom to lift everyone else up."


One of the men that still needs to climb shouts, "Fuck off bitch, we know what we're doing."


"Fair enough."


I turn and jump down to the slope on the other side of my wall and slide down it towards the water pit. Just before I reach it, I push off in a jump and catch the netting on the other side.


I'm ahead of them by three obstacles by the time the last of them has cleared their netting. By the time I'm finishing with a speed run, the last of them is climbing down from the high wire. I'd have beaten them if Id managed the wall climb without the rope.


I can already hear them justifying how badly they did by saying I'm a cape. So I walk over to Catherine while I catch my breath.


Loudly I say, "Hey Cat, do they have time for another run?"


Catherine checks her watch, "They might get in two if they leave now."


I chuckle and call over to Damien, "Damien, do you think Pete would be willing to shadow them if Catherine and I race them? We'll do course B and they can do Course A."


Catherine hisses, "Taylor, you know that B's a team only course."


I nod, "You've been doing the exercises I gave you?" When she nods I continue, "You'll be fine and I'll be right next to you every step of the way."


Damien looks at the group of guys, "I'm sure he'll be fine watching them being shown up by a couple of girls."


One of the guys shakes his head, "Nah mate, I ain't racing a cape."


I laugh, "Catherine's not a cape. She's the one you're racing. And right here, right now, I'm not a cape either."


While the guys are chatting, I poke Catherine in the side, "You need to eat more."


"I'm already eating 4,000 calories a day."


I shrug, "And you're burning more than that, I can tell. I'm eating around 6,000 calories a day. Thank god rice is cheap, cos that's going to go up once I'm properly fit."


Off to the side, I spot Damian speaking quietly into his radio.


Smiling I take Catherine's hand and drag her off to the corner of the courtyard, "Come on, let's get you warmed up."


Catherine weakly objects, "Hey, I haven't said I'll do it."

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Director Piggot looks down at the gymnasium from the private PRT observation area. Specifically the 'surprise' class of 8-12 year old state hopefuls, Miss Hebert and, surprisingly Miss Campbell. They were specifically timed to arrive after Miss Hebert's normal arrival time to see how she'd react to them.


"Dr Hensley, how's the city's latest problem child?"


Hensley startles, and frowns as he works out who she's talking about, "Ah, Miss Hebert. A surprisingly well adjusted young lady considering. Her fixation on training is a little concerning, even if it's understandable. It's been a fascinating look at just how quickly the human body can adjust to an Olympic level training routine. We haven't seen anything that could be considered superhuman outside the berserker incident in the secure ward."


Piggot looks down at the folder that's open on the desk, and the photo of what was left of the door after one of the nurses on duty played a cat video and Miss Hebert lost her mind. Fortunately, she didn't hurt anyone, and mercifully she didn't remember the incident.


Sgt Damian Carr coughs, "That's not quite true anymore. Miss Hebert completed a 15 foot wall run this morning. She seemed annoyed that she only did it successfully three times."


Piggot nods, allowing her free access to the Assault Course and the Gymnasium under the guise of perks for being helpful is well worth the hit to petty cash to keep her from heading out to the streets for her training, and possibly turning vigilante. More importantly, keeping her away from stray cats. "How's she doing with the groups?"


Damian chuckles, "She has an absolute talent for getting under peoples skin. She some how managed to get Cat to do a B run more or less solo while also goading a group of suspected Empire members into racing them on A. They lost, but Cat was only two obstacles behind at the end."


"John what do you think?"


John looks up from where he's been watching Miss Hebert demonstrate moves to the children and guide them through the move themselves. "Why do we even care?"


Piggot flicks through the report a false color image of Miss Hebert's brain with a section circled in black ink next to a reference image with the same section circled. Only in the second circle there's clearly a brain structure that's missing in Miss Hebert's image. "Because she shouldn't have powers."


John hisses, "Why do we even have that?"


"This is a slice from her CAT scan, it's standard procedure to take one of any unconscious patient that might have gone through a crisis event. We wouldn't even have it if it wasn't for the fact Miss Hebert changes sex with warm water. Normally it wouldn't show anything beyond the fact that someone could become a parahuman. What's your opinion of Miss Hebert."


John pensively looks down at the subject of the conversation, "She's a good girl, friendly and willing to help. But she relates better to adults than those of her peer group. She's also gifted when it comes to understanding the human body and how it moves. Look, it feels wrong to still be observing her like this. I think we should also tell her that she's not a parahuman."


Piggot nods sharply, "Noted. Doctor, what's your opinion on the instruction she's giving?"


Hensley looks at his notes, "From what we can tell, they're all based on a system and then tailored to the specific person. Probably whatever martial art she found or cobbled together."


"I'll leave you to it then."


Piggot walks over to the door and grabs her cane before walking out of the observation lounge and across the bridge between the PRT building and the gymnasium.

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Sim-ply living

​

As the glowing green plumbob disappears from over my head I carefully keep working on examining the sample in the 'microscope' I was assigned to before the 'player' gets bored. I also ignore the sympathetic looks my coworkers send me now that we're not being observed.


This is still infinitely better than my first few years in this world when I was a prisoner in my own body after I kept trying to run away.


The microscope starting to spark pulls me out my thoughts, and I dive out of the seat and cautiously head towards the nearest fire extinguisher, as I have no desire to find out what burning to death feels like a third time, assuming I can even die anymore after everything the player has done to me. I swear the only reason I was forced to fall in love with L and marry her is so she could cast dedeathify on me whenever the 'player' finds an inventive new way to kill me. Not that I was able to actually drown last time they trapped me in the swimming pool. I just felt like I was.


With nothing else to do, I head over to the invention constructor and continue working on some of my personal projects until the end of the day. Fortunately, being the Laboratory Leader, nobody else says anything.

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A few days after the plumbob disappeared, I've just finished cooking lasagna and I place it on the table before calling everyone to dinner.


L is the first one to arrive, and she kisses me on the cheek, "What's this honey?"


I smile at L, "I'll tell you once Jack and Jill are sitting down. Could you make sure Sea3 Pea-Oh is around too?"


L studies my face intently, "What's wrong Taylor?"


I hug L, "Nothing's wrong, absolutely nothing's wrong. I'm hoping that everything is right, and we can finally live our lives without interference."


As Jack and Jill run up to the table and take a portion of lasagna L looks over their heads, and then over my head, "Do you mean that?"


I nod, "Just need to check on Sea3 Pea-Oh."


L hugs herself and nods, "Sea3!"


A couple of minutes later Sea3, the servo I built during one of my controlled moments, walks up, "How can I help you L?"


L smiles, "We're having a family dinner, and you're part of the family."


Once we're all eating, I say, "L, everyone, I want to go home, and I want to take you all with me."


L looks at me worriedly as Jill says, "But we are home."


I reach across the table and grab one of her free hands, "I know we are Jill, but I want to go back to my original home. It's a world where nobody can ever stop you from having a cake day. Where there's no plumbobs, and it's where my dad lives. Do you want to see granddad?"


L grabs my arm, "Taylor, you remember what happened last time."


I wince as I think back to the day I unlocked the inventing skill, "I know, I know. But I've built a time machine."


"Taylor! They were banned by the system, how could you!"


I grab L's hands and hold them tight, "L, honey, it's…" I switch to English as Simlish doesn't have the right concepts, "It's the only way for us to be free."


I switch back to Simlish, "But I can't do it without you L, you're my soulmate. Please, take a chance and come with me. If not for me, for Jack and Jill, they deserve to have a chance to be teenagers and grow up with friends of their own. Not like this, where they're making friends with their friends grandchildren."


L turns back to her portion of lasagna and eats for a bit. When there's only scraps left on the plate she looks up at me with tears in her eyes, "Taylor, are you sure?"


I pass her an ExoMech Suit and Helmet that I made for her, "Yes, I'm sure. But we need to take everything we can with us. Especially potions ingredients and books. I'm not going to deny Jack and Jill their magical heritage. I have my simray for anything that's too big, and I have two sets of birthday candles."


Sea3 huffs, "I'm going to the mall."


My eyes widen as I think back to my arrival in this world, and draw my simray. Setting it to sleep, I point it at Sea3 and pull the trigger.


L slaps me, "What did you do that for?"


I put the gun away and point at Sea3 as they sit down on a sofa and lie down, "Sea3 hates going to the mall! Why would they want to head somewhere where there are guaranteed to be some players? Jack, Jill, get all of your books and things. L, do you want to take the garden or the library?"


L scowls at me, "Garden, and we will be having words about this."


I pull her into a kiss, "Once we're at my dad's home, you can have as many words as you want."

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A few hours later, the four of us have gathered everything that can be carried. Including a couple of cakes I bought from the fridge.


As I lead my family down to the third basement, I use the Simray on the doors to change them into arches and invalidate the restrictions that the player put on them.


Once we reach the inventing workshop I rush over to the invention constructor and tell it to place the time machine. As normal, it lifts the invention up and places it next to the machine. Without a player to manipulate it, we'll have to make do.


"Everyone in, and don't touch the coils on the walls."


As L and the kids are shuffling to fit into a space that's designed for one person, I pull up my life history and program the machine to send us back exactly 90 minutes further than I've been alive, according to the system anyway.


As the machine starts to warm up, I walk in and hug my family close to me. As the door hisses behind us, I stiffen as the green glow of a plumbob appears above my head. As it does, L gasps, "Sea3!"


As the urge to teleport to a nearby spot takes over, the purple glow of the time machine engulfs us, and we appear in the garden of the mansion with the moon hanging overhead. Fortunately for my continued existence, the teleport fails, as that basement doesn't yet exist.


L looks over my head worriedly, "Taylor, what if…"


I cut her off with a kiss, "L, we all teleport and I know exactly where we're going."


Jack looks up at me, "When am I going to get cake?"


I smile at Jack, "When we get to Willow Creek Park. Everyone, group up and I'll send us traveling."


I smile as the transparent diamonds appear above our heads, at least that still works. Pulling out my phone I select travel to, and then the park in Willow Creek. As I do, I allow the system to take over as I watch Jack and Jill sit cross legged in midair while L casts transportilate.


A moment later we all appear at the entrance to the park. I hug Jack and Jill briefly, "Come on, let's find a picnic table and give you your cakes. I'm sorry it's not a cake day party, but…"


L hugs me, "Taylor, even if this doesn't work, letting Jack and Jill have a cake day will be worth it."


I hug her back, "I know it will work L. If not this time, then at some point in the future."


"How can you know that?"


"You'll see, but first we need to give the kids their cake."


The two of us hold hands as Jack and Jill both run off to find a picnic table. Fortunately, without a player around, we are the only people in the park this late at night, so I don't need to worry about anyone else stealing a slice of cake before both of our children have blown out their own candles.


It's with mixed feelings that I watch them grow from being children into teenagers. As, if everything goes right tonight, L and I are going to outlive a whole lot of people. The glowing infinity symbols around our necks are proof of that, along with watching our older children become elders while we remain barely more than teenagers.


While L places a boom box so that Jack and Jill can have a mini party, I place two more Exosuits and helmets on a nearby table. When I spot a glow appear beyond the toilet building, I clap my hands.


"I'm sorry to interrupt the party, but it's time to go. Everyone put on an Exosuit and helmet, and follow me."


Jill spins around with a pout "But Mom!"


I give Jill a hug, "Jill, we need to wear them so that we can't be recognized. As time travellers other people can't see our names, but that doesn't mean they can't see our faces. If they see our faces, they might be able to stop us from coming back here in the future."


L nods as she equips her own suit, "Jill, do what your mother says."


I stick my tongue out at her, "L, you know full well that you're mother and I'm mom."


L raises her finger, "Taylor, if you don't want to spend some time as a lawn ornament, you will shut up."


I nod and silently lead my family towards the glow. As we get closer to the river, I spot a section of blacktop with a little bit of sidewalk just about visible with a scattering of snow along the curb. Sitting in the middle of the growing circle is a sobbing teenager in a winter jacket. As Jill goes to walk forward, I put my hand on her shoulder, "Wait. When other people start to appear in the circle, that's when we can go."


L looks at me, "Taylor, what's is this?"


I swallow hard and point, "L, you remember what I said about going home? That's how I got here. I think we grabbed the crying girl as we ran into the circle."


"Shouldn't we just not then?"


I pull L into a tight hug, before leaning her over to give her a scorching kiss, "L, if we don't, I'll never have met you. I know that we fell in love because of the player, but that doesn't change how I feel about you. I'd live this live a hundred times if it meant living it with you."


Jack points excitedly, "I can see more people."


I nod, "Let's go. Jack and Jill, you've got the arms, L, we've got the legs."


Together we jog towards the girl and Jack and Jill grab her under the arms as L and I grab her legs. As we do, the girl kicks out, and I bump into a lanky girl wearing a baggy hoodie and ratty jeans underneath her coat. As we keep walking forward with a struggling girl, Jill knocks over a tall white man in a nice suit, along with the scarred woman that was walking behind him, while the park around us is dissolving. I silently apologize to both of them as last of the park disappears along with them, leaving us standing on a road decorated with glowing lights in the shape of holly and angels.

═══════ ೋღ ֍ ღೋ ═══════​

As the last of the park falls by the wayside, I stumble as L, Jack, and Jill all collapse on the tarmac.


An orange teenager with bright red hair calls, "Hey! Put her down!"


I let go of the leg I'm holding and stagger over to L as the teenager hurries over and crouches down beside the girl, "L, are you ok?"


L looks up at me with wide eyes, "Taylor, what's happened?"


I switch to English, "We're Free! Can you walk?"


L looks at me stupidly for a moment as she translates what I said. Then she staggers to her feet and says, "Yes."


I point at Jack, "I'll look after Jill if you look after Jack."


L just nods as I stagger around the girl that the orange teenager is crouching beside. Only my exosuit is allowing me to walk at all, "Hey Jill, how are you feeling?"


Jill looks at me blankly for a long moment before she coughs, "Is this an industrial area?"


I shake my head, "No, this world doesn't have zones like that. Can you stand?"


As Jill's struggling to her feet, I support her as I say to the orange guy, "Sorry about being a bit rough with your friend, is she ok?"


The guy looks up and snaps, "No she's not alright, she's scared!"


I struggle with my inventory for a few seconds before I find the right mental trigger to open it. I take an excellent quality potion of Emotional Stability and place it on the ground. It takes me nearly a minute to succesfully cast copypasta on the bottle, the second cast is a little quicker. During this time the orange man looks at me curiously.


As I put the original bottle away, he asks, "I've never seen you guys around, what's your team name?"


I shake my head as I hand Jill one of the potions, "I'm sorry I don't know what you're asking. I've been away for a long time, I feel like you're famous for some reason." As Jill calms down, I point at the other potion, "That potion should reset your friends emotions like it did for my daughter."


Abruptly, a woman presses her self into my back, and I feel something hard jab me in the kidneys. In a harsh whisper she says, "You are going to tell the other two to follow Newter to our van while I help your daughter. If you make a wrong move, I won't hesitate to put a bullet in her."


I curse as a dark purple icon appears over my portrait as I remember what a gun is. I nod as I force a smile on my face. In a shaky voice I say, "Jill, this lady is going to help you to a vehicle. L, Jack, can you walk? Some locals are going to help us."


L gives me a look as she understands some of what we've been talking about. But given that none of my family have even heard of a gun, let alone seen one, she doesn't connect the weapon with anything dangerous.


As we head down an alleyway, the sound of sirens fills the road we just vacated. I turn my head back as we turn another corner, and spot a black van with PRT emblazoned on the side stop across the alleyway we walked down.

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 2

​

In the few minutes we're in the Van, Jack and Jill have fallen asleep and my scared icon doesn't even start flashing. If it was just me, I'd try to push through it like I did when I was overcoming my fear of fire, or fear of the dark. However, now I have Jack and Jill to worry about.


As the van pulls to a halt, the woman lifts my hand and watches it shake, "You're terrified, you're actually terrified."


I shake my head, "J-just s-scared. C-can still f-function while s-scared."


L looks at me and slowly says, "Taylor, why are you scared?"


"S-she has a g-gun, and s-she threatened J-Jill with it."


L frowns, "What's a gun?"


The orange guy looks at L incredulously, "You don't know what a gun is?"


I shake my head, "S-she was b-born on t-that w-world."


The woman huffs and puts the gun away, "Labyrinth creates worlds, she doesn't go to them."


I shrug, "M-Maybe s-sometimes she c-copies them? I-I'm g-going to take a b-book out."


When the woman nods, it takes me a few minutes to open my inventory, and just as long to find the university history book I was forced to study. When it appears in my hand the orange guy and the woman both jump. Labyrinth, is still just out of it.


"What the hell is that!?"


I hand the book over, "A-a b-book."


The woman grumbles, "Not what I was talking about."


None the less, she opens the book and starts flicking through. As she does her eyes begin to narrow, "I don't know what game you're playing, but this is gibberish."


"S-Simlish actually. I-It's the language e-everyone s-speaks t-there. I-I taught L-L English s-so I w-wouldn't f-forget."


L stands up and sits next to me, "It's ok, it's just fear it's not going to hurt you."


I give a shaky chuckle, "Easy for you to say, you've never been scared to death."


The woman growls, "English only."


The orange guy, Newter! That's his name. Newter says, "M, lighten up, I believe them."


The woman throws her arms in the air, "Fine, welcome to the Palanquin, the only cape owned nightclub on the East Coast."


As the back door is opened by a man with transparent skin, I some how manage to gain an embarrassed emotion as I ask, "You'll need to remind me, what's a cape?"


The man shakes his head, "Where have you been for the last 20 years? Living under a rock?"


I duck my head into L's shoulder as my face burns. L takes pity on me and says, "We have, been living. In San Sequoia. I don't know, how long, a year is. Our, adult great-grandchildren, have, toddlers, if help."


The man with transparent skin looks at L skeptically, so she focuses for a couple of seconds before pulling out a pile of photos. As I spot the first photo my embarrassment upgrades to Very Embarrassed. L shows me no mercy as she picks up the first photo, "This is our first baby, Juan-Juan, I carried him. We lived in Glimmerbrook then."


As she picks up a photo of a pair of twins, one with green hair and the other with yellow hair I stumble over to Jack and Jill, and start waking them up. "These are Em and Em, and they were Taylor's…"


"Jack, Jill, it's time to wake up. We're here and your mother's showing baby photos."


It's amazing how fast they can move when there's embarrassment on the line, not that I'm far behind them.

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A short while later I'm still waiting for L to finish showing the woman, who held a gun to me, baby photos. Meanwhile the transparent man, who's name is Gregor the Snail, and Newter have shown us upstairs to their private rooms.


At about the same time as Jill comes out of the bathroom in tears, Jack opens the fridge and calls, "Mom, why doesn't the fridge let me buy food?"


When I see the damp patch on Jill's crotch I immediately cast scruberoo, as there's no reason she should be dirty on top of embarrassed. Now that she's clean, I walk over to her and pull her into a hug, "What happened sweetie?"


Jill sobs, "I sat down to pee, and my clothes didn't disappear."


I don't say anything for a few seconds as my brain processes that fact, then I remember my early days of being a Sim and panicking because I couldn't drop my jeans when I needed the loo. While I'm searching for something to say, Newter walks over and puts a comforting hand on Jill's shoulder.


"Don't worry, I remember needing to learn how to use the toilet too."


I pat Jill on the back before saying, "This is Newter, he said that he remembers needing to learn how to use the toilet too. You've never needed to learn how to use the toilet without the system to help you. Give me a minute and I'll duplicate some potions of Emotional Stability, you're a teen now so you can drink them."


Jill gives me a wan smile as I let go and pull the original potion from my inventory. Placing it on the floor, I cast copypasta and put the original away. Then I look at it for a few seconds and cast it again, as I'm certain that we're all going to need plenty of these before we've readjusted to.


As Jill drinks the second potion, Newter asks, "What are those?"


I finish casting copypasta for the third time before I hand him one of the potions, "It's a potion, that removes… that stabilises… It fixes any temporary issues that are affecting someone's emotions and leaves them feeling slightly happy. It's contra indicated for pregnant women, because the fixing is rather permanent in that case."


Newter looks at the potion curiously, "What do you mean permanent?"


"It will remove their womb with the baby."


"And you can just make these?"


I tip my hand backwards and forwards, "Once we've got somewhere to put a cauldron we can start making them. At the moment I'm using a spell to duplicate them…"


I'm cut off by a scream from the kitchen, and all four of us run into the kitchen to see Jack clutching his hand while blood pours out. Lying on the bench are three of his fingers. Eyes wide, I grab the potion from Newter's hand and hold it up to Jack's mouth, "Come on Jack, drink the potion, you know it will help."


As the liquid pours into his mouth, he convulsively swallows and the bleeding slows, and then stops as his fingers grow back. Jill looks shakes her head and walks back into the other room with her book while Newter and Gregor stare at the fingers, and then back at Jack, who has a happy smile on his face.


Gregor looks at me and says, "Contra indicated for pregnant women?"


I nod as I stare at the fingers still on the chopping board, "Yes."


L and the woman with the gun come running in, and L immediately walks over to inspect Jack. The woman looks around and says, "What happened? I heard screaming."


Gregor points to the fingers that are still on the chopping board, "The kid cut his fingers off," then he points at me, "then she gave him a potion that regrew them."


The woman is silent for a long time before she says, "What do you want?"


I finish casting my current copypasta spell and look at her, "What?"


"What do you want? For the tinkertech potion."


I look over at L, who shrugs and says, "You wanted to find your dad."


I look back at the woman, "Um, your name would be a start, as I've been calling you the woman with the gun in my head."


The woman looks at me oddly, "Melanie."


I smile and take out my Simray as I nod, "Thanks Melanie. I guess I'd like to get hold of dad and let him know I'm alive. Get a job, buy a house where I can put some equipment, and get the kids into school so that they can socialize while they're growing up. I hadn't really thought much beyond getting away from that flipping world with my family."


L looks confused, "Taylor, will the… potion… even work for them?"


I shrug as I continue in the specifications for a NanoCan , "Maybe, it's magic after all."


"Magic? You didn't teach me that word."


"Magic means Magic."


L nods, "Thank you. Would still be better to test first."


Jack whines, "Mom, I'm starving."


I pull out my phone, select order food, and stare at the 'Service unavailable… Searching for Provider…' message for a moment, "Um, Melanie, is there anything for Jack to eat?"


Melanie snarks, "Don't you have magic to help with that?"


I nod, "I do, but it looks identical to the potions I've already been duplicating, and they're psychologically addictive."


"They're what? Never mind, Newter, call down to the kitchen and order some food."


I finish programming the Simray as I say, "They're psychologically addictive, as they fill all of your needs, bladder, hunger, hygiene, energy, social, and fun… You don't have those here, do you."


As Melanie is staring at me, I point my Simray at the trashcan and pull the trigger. The ray spits out a beam of light that scans the trashcan, before sending out a couple of circles of light and a whoop whoop noise. Then the trashcan turns into a sleek Nanocan.


As Melanie and Gregor stare at the new trashcan, I smoothly pick up the chopping board with the fingers and knife, and drop them into the trashcan.


As the trashcan lights up Melanie screeches, "What the hell Taylor!"


I shrug, "I needed to get rid of Jack's fingers before they started to smell, and I figured you'd probably appreciate having a trashcan that converts waste into fuel."


Melanie stares at me before turning around and marching back into the other room. There she grabs one of the duplicated bottles and swigs it down in one go. The she lets out a small laugh, "Heh, it really works."

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Melanie scowls at the little green and white trashcan drone that's just bumped into her chair before hovering around it and cleaning all the dust off her filing cabinet. Just another tinker device that the family produced out of nowhere.


Turning back to her computer, she looks back at the computer screen where she's researching Danny Hebert on one half of her screen and the rules on cross dimensional travel on the other.


"Right, Dockworkers association. It would be someone actually important wouldn't it. Why couldn't it have been some nobody they could pay to move to a nearby town?"


With practiced fingers, she quickly dials the Dockworkers contact number as she glances at the clock, 5pm on the Thursday before Christmas, most offices would be closed... On the third ring the phone is picked up, "Good evening, Dockworkers."


"Is Danny Hebert there?"


"Speaking."


Melanie smiles, "I'm calling from the Palanquin, I have Taylor here."


"Is she alright?"


"She is, but she was caught up in a parahuman event on the boardwalk earlier."


Melanie nods thoughtfully as she hears the sound of a chair scraping back as Danny says, "I'll be there as soon as I can."


"No need to hurry, she's not going anywhere. Tell the bouncer that you're here to see Faultline and they'll direct you round to a side entrance."


As the phone hangs up, she sighs and looks at the other page, the one that threatens dire consequences if inter-dimensional travelers aren't reported immediately. With a sigh she picks up the phone and dials the Quebec City branch of the Guild.


Sometimes she wonders if it wouldn't be easier to actually be villains than legitimate mercenaries.


"This is The Guild, how can I help you?"


Melanie forces a smile, "Hello, this is Faultline, I'd like to report an incident with Labyrinth."


"One moment, I'm just passing you through to the relevant department."


A couple of minutes into the hold music, Elle aka Labyrinth pushes open the door to the office with a blue flask in her arms. "Hey Mel, this is good stuff."


"Parahuman affairs, good evening."


Melanie makes a shooing motion with her hand as she picks up the receiver again, "Good evening, this is Faultline, I'd like to report an inter-dimensional incident with Labyrinth."


"I'm sorry, did you say inter-dimensional?"


"I did."


"According to my computer, you're calling from Brockton Bay in Maine, USA."


"I am."


"Why are you calling Canada when you are miles away from the PRT ENE headquarters?"


Melanie swallows her first response of, 'Because the local PRT is run by a hardarse bitch with a hard on for parahumans.' Instead she says, "Because the PRT deals with domestic issues, and this is not a domestic issue. Additionally, Faultline's Crew is a registered mercenary company. We are registered in Canada despite residing in Brockton Bay."


In her head she adds, 'And I don't shit in my own backyard.'


"One moment, I'm speaking to my supervisor… When and where did this issue occur?"


"Around 4pm at the Boardwalk in Brockton Bay."


"I can see that there was a PRT incident report filed at around that time. Is there any reason why you didn't speak to the responding troops?"


"We came straight back to the Palanquin with the visitors as soon as I realized she'd had a moment. The PRT must have arrived after we left."


"There are visitors?"


"And a time traveler."


"I'm sorry, did you say time traveler?"


The line goes silent, and then the phone beeps once, and again 20 seconds later.


Pressing the speaker button, Melanie cradles her face in her hands as she says, "Why me?"

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 3

​

I'm in the process of trying to work out how to remove my Exomech Suit without the system just moving it into my inventory for me. Something that became more urgent after I had to use scruberoo to clean myself up after I discovered that it prevents pulling down even bikini bottoms when going to the toilet. At least we now know that changing clothes still works. For some reason, Elle has changed into a green robe with a mask.


I've just found the hidden catch on my helmet and I'm lifting it off my head when a woman in a red and black suit and a gas mask leads a tall, thin, balding man with dark hair and a battered leather coat through the door to the lounge area.


As I take my helmet off, everyone that can see me freezes as my purple curly hair drops down my back. I stare at the man as my brain tickles my memory, as soon as I recognize him, I get a sad and happy moodlet and I rush towards him and pull him into a hug.


"Dad, I never thought I'd see you again."


Dad stands stiffly in my hug as he coldly says, "Who are you?"


I stumble backwards and sob, "Dad, I'm Taylor. Your Little Owl."


Dad shakes his head, "No you're not, you look nothing like her."


I collapse to the floor and tap my chest, "But I am, I'm still me in here even though the player got bored with my appearence and changed it, I'm still me. I still remember you and mom teaching me to read. I still remember going to the office with you when mom had university stuff. And I still remember mom screaming on the phone when there was a loud bang."


As L kneels down next to me and hugs me, I hear Melanie say, "Mr Hebert, please follow me to my office. There are things we need to speak about."


As dad's being led away, L says, "You can do this. Remember all the times you cried after they changed your appearance the first time?"


I nod, as that was worse than when they ripped the moody out of me and made me family orientated. That was just after the third time L and I ruined our relationship. Come to think of it, did they do something to L too? "I remember, if it wasn't for the label over my head, I'd have believed I was an impostor." I switch over to English to spare our children, "L, do you remember our third breakup?"


L nods, "I do."


"Did they do anything to you when they stopped me being moody?"


L nods again, "They took away my mean trait and gave me family orientated."


Newter sounds upset as he says, "What do you mean 'stopped you being moody' and 'took away my mean trait'?"


I look up at Newter, who flinches, "Exactly what we said. That universe? Around 1% of people lived in a family that was controlled by a player. The players could do almost anything to us and make us do almost anything. Not even dying was an escape, as there are at least four ways to be resurrected, assuming they don't just make someone hand over a death flower when the grim reaper turns up."


Elle crouches down to look in my eyes, "Did you know your eyes glow?"


I look away and L kisses me on the forehead as she says, "The player changed ten seasons ago, also have pointed ears. It downside of drawing players attention."


Elle smiles, "They're pretty."


Gregor, on the other hand looks distressed, and sounds it as he says, "You make it sound like there are upsides to drawing a players attention."


L nods, "They give direction and motivation. They can freely build and change houses and other property to better suit needs. Before we left, mansion was equipped with equipment you could only find in best hospitals and laboratories, along with spa you would pay day's wages to visit. It is virtually guaranteed that that you succeed in any career player wants you to participate in. In return, we their play things, and they may find inventive ways for us to die."


"How can you just accept that?"


L looks and sounds confused, "Why wouldn't accept it? It's the way it always has been, player chosen are both envied and pitied. Mostly pitied if plumbob over head."


I lift my head up, "The system makes many things trivial because it provides the raw materials we need without the need for farming or mining. If it wasn't for the players it would be idyllic."


L shrugs, "Is price for easy life. Not so bad, player not always watching."


I grumble, "Easy for you to say, you're not the one who got stabbed and then resurrected when they walked into a bar."


Newter calls over, "You got stabbed?"


"Yeah, even got an achievement for it. 'First person stabbed ever' is what it translates as."


L smiles and kisses me on the cheek, "And I'm happy did, never met without."


I kiss her back, "I love you too."


Elle sits down in front of us, "How did you meet?"


"I'd just had my autonomy given back to me after being forced to learn enough magic to cast Copypasta and duplicate a couple of dozen plates of Ambrosia. When the player wasn't controlling me, I started going to the Realm of Magic to relax because at least it looks like a place out of a dream. Anyway, L and I got talking on a couch and we got talking about my life before the system I don't remember what."


L says, "You being bullied by someone called Emma Barnes, I suggest turning into a lawn decoration and sell to a collector."


I smile and kiss L, "That was it, I then said it would be easier to cast infatuate on her and Sophia, and make them kiss in the middle of class. That's when a pink bar appeared in our name panels, and the player took over."

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Melanie turns off the security camera and looks over at Danny as he snaps the pencil he's holding, "Mr Hebert, are you ok?"


Danny looks down at the pencil, "Sorry, I'm…"


Melanie nods, "I understand. It can't be easy seeing someone that was a teenager this morning. Getting powers is hard on everyone, especially when they come with a mental component. Sometimes it's harder on their family than it is on the person that received them. At least she still has her memories, and her physical changes are rather minor. Monster capes like Newter and Gregor don't even have that."


"What about?" He waves at the blank screen.


"Your grandchildren? Taylor said she built a time machine on the other side. I can't say it's impossible, as Grey Boy existed as does Clockblocker. Both of them mess or messed with time. That's just in the USA. Who knows what powers exist in the rest of the world, or in dimensions we haven't found yet."


Danny visibly pulls himself together, "You're right, she's still my daughter, just with powers. I should get her into the wards, or maybe the protectorate."


Melanie shakes her head, "First of all Mr Hebert, she has appointment with the Guild in Quebec on the 27th. Secondly, she's no longer a minor, whether she has any dealings with the PRT, especially the local branch, is a decision that only she can make now. The Canadian government is paying me a hefty amount to look after your daughter and her family and ensure that they get safely to the meeting."


"Why Canada and not the local PRT?"


"Mr Hebert, the local PRT is so badly compromised that they can't keep the villains they do capture contained long enough to get them to trial. I have no doubt that within a day of their being interviewed there, all of the gangs would have a copy of their file. I know for a fact that they're underfunded, and rely on the New England states to cover part of their wage bill. None of their staff have seen a pay rise in the last three years. Something I occasionally take advantage of when things might affect the club. You'd be amazed at how well a couple of extra patrols deters the gangs."


Danny slumps back in his chair, "Just like the rest of the city then. We've been circling the drain for the last 20 years. Why are you even in this city anyway?"


Melanie smiles behind her welders mask, "Cape tourism. The club pays for itself and earns enough profit that it just about covers the bills between jobs. I own the building outright, which helps."


"It's the only reason the Dockworkers still exist too. Owning buildings that is. We're still technically a guild, and we earn enough on rents to maintain the equipment that earns our boys their paychecks. Not that there's enough work going around here, there's always around 20% of our membership looking for work."


Melanie shakes her head, "We're mercenaries, at best I'd approach you for renting some warehouse space. Even that's unlikely as we don't take jobs in Brockton Bay…"

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In order to distract myself from talking about my early time in the other world, I put an Electromagnetic Research Archive Machine on one of the tables in the lounge area and unpack one of the droids we bought when we went on holiday to Batuu.


As I turn him on, I say, "Good morning Arr Too."


Arr Too whistles back to me, and I pat him on the top, "I know there's no galactic data net here… We're in a different dimension… I was born here… I think there was something like it yes… Well, if you can work out how to access the local datanet feel free… I don't know, I've not put my glasses on yet… I want to get this working so that I can upload my knowledge of English and Simlish… That's why I activated you, if it can take the information straight out of my head, then it stands to reason that it can put that information into someone else's head. But first we need to get it to power up… No I don't have a reactor with me, but I seem to remember these things on the wall provide electricity… Yes that's why I activated you… You've found an English language pack already?… Of course you can copy it. Not like you wouldn't if I said no, you just wouldn't tell me about it. Just make sure you install it on all our computers and intelligent devices as an additional language… "


I shake my head while Arr Too starts working on analysing the ERAM and local electricity supply. While he's doing that I carry on looking for the release mechanism for the Exomech suit. Eventually I find it indecently far inside the chest plate, right between my breasts. As soon as I touch both buttons at the same time, the suit separates down the middle at the same time all the straps and clasps undo so that I can simply step out.


As I'm fitting my robotic arm, I walk over to where L has pulled out her digital sketch pad, and is drawing Newter on his phone. "Hey honey, I've worked out how to open the suits. There's two buttons right here that you have to press at the same time."


L glances up at my chest, and then gives me a leering look that leaves me fanning myself. "Maybe you can show me how to get out of my 'suit' later."


"L, not here!"


From over by my Exomech suit, Elle says, "Can I try this on?"


I turn around, and I admit I'm annoyed at having my flirting interrupted, compounding that fact is that Elle is holding yet another of the potions I duplicated. In a fit of pique I cast Rite of Ascension on her at the same time Melanie says, "No you can't."


As Elle rises into the air surrounded by magic, and looking like she's having a religious experience. Everyone turns to stare at L and I.


L smirks and says, "I would have done soon if Taylor didn't."


The gun that Melanie's suddenly holding twitches slightly as she points it at me, "What, did, you, do?"


I shrug and glance down at L as Melanie rises into the air surrounded by magic, and looking like she's having a religious experience. "Thanks love."


A moment later I have just enough time to note that Newter's spit has a moodlet before I feel really floaty and I can see pink elephants. Next thing I know, L's pouring a potion down my throat and there are two people ice cubes and a garden gnome.


A second later dad pokes his head up from behind the couch, "Is it over?"


I pull my Simray out and configure it convert the next object I shoot into a gaming laptop. As I am, Elle drops to the floor and L says, "Think so. You Danny?"


"I am. Who are you?"


L smiles and pulls out a handful of photos, "I L. I have photos Taylor, you have photos of child Taylor?"


I groan and shoot Melanie's gun before I head over to the desk with Arr Too. As I get there Elle says, "What did you do to me, as it felt really good."


I rifle through the books I took from our bookshelves as I answer, "I gave you magic, now you can learn to make your own potions rather than keep stealing mine."


"But I like being present."


I turn to look at her, "What do you mean?"


"I get lost in my power, and the potion brings me back."


I throw my hands in the air, "Fine, but no more than three a day until you can make your own."


Elle's shoulders slump and I shake my head, "Nope, they're not just for you, they're for Jack and Jill too. They're completely new to not having the system, and they're going to have lots of moments where they need those potions."


I place a tome of Scruberoo and potion of plentiful needs on the table before I duplicate them both. "There, two magical tomes for you to get on with."


I then duplicate the tomes of zipzap and repairio before putting them to one side for Melanie. Then I duck under the table to see what Arr Too has come up with.

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter four

After a rather heated discussion with Melanie, that involved the demonstration of the zipzap spell and the chillo spell, I was finally able to finish cobbling together a power emitter. It's ugly as sin, and around five times larger than it should be, but at least it works. I really need to put together an invention constructor.


On the other hand, I found out that I can't use the ERAM to do much of anything, as it doesn't have the data storage needed to actually be useful as a research machine, making a proper back end store is just the first item on my long term todo list. That's why I've spent most of the night programming a speech to text translator app for the computers, I probably wouldn't have even been able to do that if Arr Too hadn't found that English language pack.


Of course, I haven't finished the program, as Jack and Jill made me research the communication protocol for the wall mounted TV, and then building an adapter out of a spare cable that Elle got from somewhere. And now I need to reverse engineer gaming servers for The R.E.F.U.G.E, S.T.A.L.K.E.R, Road Rival Alpha, and probably every other game on the console. Oh, and build out some proper high bandwidth communications, as there's no way the local communications network would handle the VR version, and I can't see myself not being badgered into building a couple of those. At least they're happy.


At least L has been busy teaching Elle the absolute basics of magical dueling. I'm surprised that she didn't just know how… Right system assistance they don't have that here.


Either way, it was well worth breaking out the potions of Plentiful Needs.

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Elle smiles as she watches Jack and Jill play a computer game on an unfamiliar console. Only half her attention is in the here and now, as her inner eye is half lidded while she explores the High Temple.


Clutched in her hands is a bottle of freedom, freedom from the bad place, from the memories of her family and her uncle. Freedom from the asylum.


As she looks around the courtyard, she carefully moves around a pit trap that she added accidentally when some bad thoughts intruded. Maybe she can add a cauldron here, like the one in L's photos with sparkling crystals, and crystals burning with a blue flame.


Maybe she can find the Realm of Magic and make a new world based on that. Then she could have floating houses and islands in the sky. And portals to take you to them.


It would be a good way to thank L for teaching her how to cast spells.


Elle smiles as she leans back in the chair and allows her power to start looking for a world with magenta skies.

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Now that Elle is occupied, L cracks her fingers and puts on the computer glasses Taylor gave her for Winterfest 60 seasons ago. Her fully upgraded glasses.


She bangs her head against the back of the sofa as a message about installing communications updates pops up. The progress bar seems to take forever to complete, but eventually she's online. Now to start preparing for her favorite form of fun, trolling the forums. First of all, she needs to find the forums.


It doesn't take her more than a few minutes to activate the network sniffing software and configure it into learning mode while she inspects the bits of data that it picks out as structured.


When nothing stands out as being human driven, she shakes her head, probably too early in the morning for most people to be on their devices.


For want of something else to do, she pulls her camera out and takes a couple of photos of Taylor, Elle, and the kids as they're doing their own things. When the photos appear in her inventory, she breathes a sigh of relief. At least that's one thing that still works. If she's honest with herself, she didn't believe Taylor when she told her that she came from a world without inventories, the system, or players.


She glances through the kitchen door at the row of empty blue bottles that haven't yet disappeared and the cupboards full of glasses, crockery, and silverware. To be honest, she's still trying to come to terms with the fact that they are needed and aren't just decorations.


Glancing down at the corner of her vision, Elle eeps in surprise as she notices that the network sniffer is still working away. Something that's never been true before.


Sitting back down, she checks on the progress and frowns as she realizes that all of the data channels are being hosted in the light spectrum, something that's reserved for radio stations at home.


After opening the binary translation program, L asks, "Arr Too, have you seen the data channels here?"


Arr Too whistles, "I have, the meat sacks haven't discovered hyperspace."


L's eyebrows rise into her hairline, "Oh really. Does that mean they don't have point to point communications?"


"Correct."


"And you already know how to access their systems?"


"Correct, I am currently conversing with Dragon. She is probably a low-grade droid."


L blinks, "They have droids here?"


"According to Dragon, no. However, her responses are outside expected meat sack reaction times by a factor of 40, even taking into account high bandwidth immersion technology."


"Gee, thanks for calling us all slow. I can still make you dance the jig you know."


"Meat bags are able to, approach things non-conventionally."


"Well, can you give me the details of a search engine and the biggest forum?"


"Sent."


L smiles as she gets the details. A smile that drops into a scowl as she realizes she's going to have to write her own browser plugin to convert this into something useable. Taylor's the programmer and Engineer, she just likes hacking and the things it lets her do.

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As Melanie walks out of the private living quarters of the club, wearing most of her costume, I look up from my programming and stretch. "Sleep well?"


She scowls at me, "No thanks to you, now I have more things to practice. I already don't have enough time in the day."


I shrug, "Once we've got a place to live, and I've setup an invention constructor, I'll sell you a cauldron. Then you can make Potions of Plentiful Needs. It will only take you a couple of hours to make four, and each one will be like getting a good nights sleep, eating enough, and everything else you need to survive."


As I pull out four potions of Plentiful Needs, Melanie asks, "And why can't I just duplicate them like you do?"


From the chair across the room, L glances up from her holographic keyboard, "Because it like learning Polymetavlitós logismós when can barely add up. I spent hours teach Elle create shield and bolt. I never teach that before, everyone just know, it that basic."


I grimace as take a couple of potions over to the kids, "Um, L, that's part of the System not something normal, ah people here can do."


L throws her hands in the air as Melanie looks at us strangely, "Next you say they not know how good they skills are."


Cautiously, Melanie asks, "Do you know how good you are at thing?"


"Of course, if have one in a skill, then know basics. If have ten, know as much as anyone can without career."


I hand the potions to Jack and Jill and whisper "Drink up."


Melanie shakes her head, "You've got to be fucking kidding me. Next you're going to say something ridiculous like, increasing your skill automatically teaches you shit you need to know."


L nods, "Of course. How would fill the gaps in knowledge if not."


I grab another flask and head over to L, "I think that this is going to be one of those things that we put down as a big plus of the system. While I bet Elle and Melanie can use dueling magic on non-spellcasters."


As L nods, Melanie asks, "What do you mean?"


I look at Elle, who looks like she's about to fall asleep in her chair, as I think. Taking pity on her, I duplicate another potion of plentiful needs. "The system, it makes it impossible to directly kill anyone. You always have a chance to avoid dying, unless you're old. Elle, you've been up all night, drink up. It wasn't always like that, according to the history books, they used to have weapons and there was even a war between Vampires, Werewolves, and Spellcasters. They even had cars you could drive, and not just empty shells."


Elle mechanically takes the potion and drinks it while continuing to hug one of the potions of Emotional Stability. On the way back to the desk with my potion on it, I yawn loudly as my tired moodlet changes to exhausted and I drop to my knees and faceplant into the carpet.

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An hour later I have the novel sensation of waking up somewhere other than where I fell asleep. Jill is playing jazz on her piano in the corner and Melanie is saying, "...no offence Mr Hebert, but I don't know you well enough to have you around for Christmas tomorrow. I'm not going to ask my team to mask up just so you can spend time with Taylor."


I groan as I sit up and look around for my potion before I collapse again, "Hi dad. Someone remind me, what's Christmas?"


Newter calls over from the sofa, where I can see he's losing at racing against Jack, "It's the day when everyone gets lots of presents and we stuff ourselves with as much food as we can eat."


I grab the potion and down it as dad says, "There's more to it than that, it's a celebration of the birth of Christ for religious people. For everyone else it's a time for family and friends. The present giving is supposed to a way to show how much you appreciate each other."


"Whatever, I'm just bummed that our Christmas shopping was interrupted yesterday, and we can't go out today."


I frown, "Why not?"


Melanie chuckles darkly, "Because we're being paid to look after you four, and Gregor and I are the only ones who can drive."


"Sorry about that. Jack, Jill, it's the local Winterfest tomorrow, so think about what you want give our hosts."


Jill stops playing and pouts, "But our phones don't work properly, and nobody will talk to us, and we can't introduce ourselves to them."


I walk over and kiss Jill on the forehead as L says, "They only speak English, so you need to start learning it. Also, you know how to introduce yourself, why are you saying you can't?"


Jill looks up in confusion at the kiss, "Mom, how did you do that?"


I smile and ruffle her hair, "Answer your mother's question and I'll tell you."


Jill looks down as her cheeks pink slightly, "I can't see any of the introduction options."


I nod and crouch down beside her, "Jill, the system doesn't exist here. You're not limited to only the things it allows you to do. That has both good and bad sides to it, as it means that you can do anything you want. But, equally, nothing will stop you if you try to do something that will hurt you, or you can't do."


"I don't know how to say hello, the words always stick in my throat."


I hug Jill as she says that. Then I ask, "Are you shy?"


Jill just nods so I look over at L helplessly. Before L can say anything, Dad says, "She really is your daughter, isn't she. Your mom used to kiss you the same way."


I nod, and my eyes light up, somewhat more literally than they used to, "Uh, Faultline, do you have any simple books that would be good for learning English?"


Melanie nods, "I still have the books I used to teach Newter."


"Dad, would you like to teach Jill English? Jill, this is my father, grandpa Hebert, would you like learn English with him?"


Dad looks startled at my suggestion, Melanie just chuckles, "Newter, grab your toddler books for Jill."


Newter calls back, "But I'm in the middle of a game!"


The girl in the red suit, I think she's called Spitfire, stands up, "I'll get them."


Jill stands up and walks over to dad, "Are you really my grandpa?"


After I translate, dad smiles at Jill and says, "Yes, yes I am. I'd love to teach you to read too. Though I always thought I'd be older, and my grandchildren younger, when I did."


Jill smiles shyly and sits down next to dad.


It would be really convenient if there was a table where they're sitting that they could put the books on. I slowly turn around and stare at a coffee table that's on the other side of the room, we don't have the system anymore, do we. After a moment, I walk over and drag one of the low coffee tables over to beside dad and Jill.


Jill and L both stare at me as I'm moving the table. Once it's in place, I take out all the toddler books from my inventory. I almost can't believe it as I stack them on top of each other. I still can't place them in a stack, but I can pick them up and put them on top of each other.


Jill reaches out and touches the stack, as if not believing that it's real. Then she picks up a book and places it back on the stack with wide eyes.


Dad chuckles and says, "You're behaving like toddlers that have just discovered stacking blocks."


I look up at dad with tears in my eyes, "Dad, we literally couldn't stack things before. We could have one thing on a surface at a time. We also couldn't move furniture either. I'm not sure how non-player families dealt with furniture, but it might as well have been part of the house."


L pulls an apple out of her inventory and experimentally drops it on the couch she's sitting at, "We pay interior decorator to move stuff or upgrade it."


Spitfire returns with a pile of thick paged books and dumps them on the table. As three sets of eyes track the books as they spill across the table, and a couple fall on the floor, dad and Melanie both burst out laughing.

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 5

With dad going through toddler books with Jill, and Jack playing computer games with Newter, the rest of us are able to get on with our bits and pieces. It's nice being able to sit next to L and program, instead of being sat at a table.


I'm around halfway through developing my speech pack when I realize that the system is going to need some intelligence behind it to understand the context of what's said and build an equivalent phrase when idioms don't translate directly.


Rather than reinventing the wheel, I grab a yellow and black droid that's basically a head on a ball. For some reason the player bought nine of these, and the first six are all yellow and black and called Bee Bee and a number. The seventh is called 'Seven of Nine' and is red and silver, while Bee Bee Ate is white and orange, and Bee Bee Niney is just black, and the only one with a squared off head rather than a dome. Maybe I can give one to Faultline as a group present tomorrow. Probably Bee Bee Five, as I think he's the only one that nobody ever really talked to.


As I'm going to give him away, I swap out the one that I grabbed for Five, and pop the head off the tool ball. Hmm, they're a mercenary group, so the rebellion personalities will probably fit better than the First Order chips. I grab a full suite of upgrade chips and duplicate them all, along with personality 02. As I start installing the upgrade chips, I half expect the system to tell me I can't because I'm not on Batuu.


With a new personality installed, I'm able to get a good look at the programming, specifically the learning matrix and context routines. After about five minutes in, I realize that I don't actually understand any of it, even though I understand enough that I could learn to understand it. And, without the system, I'm going to have to learn this stuff the hard way. Of course, with the system I wouldn't even be able to look at the code, so that's a mixed blessing.


I nudge L and send her an invitation to look at the droid code, "L, what do you make of this?"


L pauses her own tapping for a moment, before saying, "Gah, what is that?"


"The learning matrix from Bee Bee Five."


"You can read that? Never mind, you're the software developer. Don't show me that stuff again, as I've got a headache from just looking at it."


Melanie curiously asks, "What are you doing?"


"I'm upgrading Bee Bee Five for Winterfest tomorrow, as I thought he'd make a good gift to you guys. I'm also programming a speech to text translation program that will work between English and Simlish. I just figured that I'd grab the learning programming from a droid, as why invent the wheel. Honestly, I expected the system to stop me like it would have done with stacking books."


L grumbles, "I would not try."


I smile at L comfortingly and cuddle her, "But you never told me to stop trying."


L smiles and leans into the cuddle before we both freeze as we realize that her keyboard is still out.


I chuckle nervously, "Right, we can do multiple things at a time."


L nods stiffly as she sits back up again.


Dad asks curiously, "What happened before?"


I look down at my lap, "Um, I'd think about cuddling L, and she'd put the keyboard away. Then we'd scoot closer to hug. Of course, she wouldn't be able to use the computer on the couch, she'd need to be leaning over a coffee table or standing up. Oh, hey, it's lunch time. Let me show you another useful spell."


I cast Grand Delicioso at the floor and pick up a large plate of Silly Gummy Bear Pancakes. I chuckle nervously as I carry it over to a clear coffee table.


"Um, that spell can be rather random. Let me try that again."


The second time I get a platter of Blackened Bass, and the third time I get a mushroom soup.


Melanie looks away from the plants she was working with, and walks over to crouch down beside the plates, "Is this another spell?"


I nod, "Delicioso, an, um Acolyte level spell of the Practical school. It creates a tasty meal out of thin air. It's also kind of random what you'll get. I used the party sized version, so there's eight portions of food on each plate, or um bowl."


Melanie nods, "That would be damn useful on missions."


I shrug, "I wouldn't know. I do know that I just want to be able to live a good life with my family without needing to be afraid that a player will ruin my life one day just because it's fun. More grandchildren would also be good, but I'm sure that will come with time."


"How much to teach me how to use magic?"


I shrug, "I have no idea what things cost here."


"Well how much would it cost where you came from?"


L looks up, "I was paid 72 simolians an hour as professor while Taylor doing degrees."


Dad looks up from the book he and Jill are reading together, "How many degrees did you get?"


I groan, "All of them. Every single one is a distinguished degree. L and I did Villainy and Psychology together, and I guess the player got fed up managing both of us so L got stuck as a professor while I was stuck doing degrees for so long. I must have joined each secret society four or five times running, and other students stopped trying to win the e-sports tournament."


Dad goggles at me, "How are you still so young?"


I point at the glowing infinity symbol around my neck, "Potion of Immortality and a potion of rejuvenation to 'restore my youth'. I've only ever had one cake day."


Dad and Jill must have already covered numbers and cake, as she says, "One cake?"


I smile sadly at her, "I was telling your grandpa that I've only ever had one cake day."


I can see her trying to find the mental trigger for the command to comfort someone, and then Jill pushes herself off the chair and walks over to hug me. "Everyone should have a cake day!"


"And we will have many cake days together. One every season."


Jill shakes her head, "I don't want to grow up that fast."


I chuckle darkly, "Honey, people don't suddenly grow up when they have cake days here. They just keep growing up a little bit every day. Nobody can ever stop someone else from growing up, and no player will ever do that to you or Jack again."

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Eventually it gets late enough that Melanie kicks dad out as the club is closing early. Once all the customers have left, Melanie has us put on our ExoMech suits and takes us all downstairs to the public parts of the club where they have a party for the club staff for a few hours.


As the party is starting to wind down, and Melanie is handing out gifts to the staff, I take Bee Bee Five out of my inventory and active him.


As I do, Newter gives me a weird look and says, "Not cool, you don't do that shit in front of strangers."


I frown and point at the gifts, "I thought you were giving out gifts. Bee Bee Five is a gift for everyone that's been looking after us."


Newter looks at Melanie and points at me, "Faultline, tell her."


Melanie shakes her head and chuckles ruefully, "Newter, don't forget that she doesn't know cape culture. For future reference, gifts between capes are either more public or more private."


I shrug, "I think I speak for all of us when I say that we have no desire to be capes. In fact the only time you're likely to see any of us in disguise is when we're causing mischief. And that's more..."


I'm muffled by Newter putting his hand over my mouth and hissing, "No real names."


Newter yelps and his hair stands on end as I hit him with a zipzap. As he scarpers off to one side on all fours, I crouch down next to Bee Bee Five and point at Melanie, "She's your new master now. Remove all previous authorised owners."


Bee Bee Five whistles mournfully and rolls over to Melanie with his dome at an angle to the ground.


Melanie's body language shows that she's frowning at me, "Just how intelligent is this thing?"


"He's basically a person, but there's a core part of his code that requires an owner."


"We're going to talk about this later. What's his name?"


"Bee Bee Five, as in the insect rather than the English letter."


"OK Bee Bee, well talk later..."


I miss the rest of the conversation as I shrink down into a lawn ornament. When I return to normal, the staff are gone and L is talking to Melanie and Bee Bee.


Throwing up my arms I call out, "What was that for?"


L turns to look at me, "For not talking to me or Five first!"


I slump, "Fair point, I was to caught up in my focus when I came up with the idea. Sorry Five I thought you could do with a family that would actually appreciate you than just being one of nine and mostly kept in my inventory. I did give you all of the upgrades though."


Five makes a rude sounding whistle before whistling happily as he turns to face Melanie.


As I'm turning away, L walks towards the dance floor, "No you don't, Faultline want see magic duel."


I groan as I head towards the dance floor and prepare to have my behind handed to me. Without the system's assistance, our duel starts out like novices that are relying on system assistance. Not that virtuosos like us were much better, but we could mess with the timing a little. As the duel progresses, it quickly becomes apparent to me why L was a sage of magic before we met as her learning curve is simply that much faster than mine.


In the end it's all I can do to shield against incoming attacks while throwing out the odd attack when she's a little slower. The end comes when she seemly gives me an opening, only to make a shield with one hand while grabbing me in her magic with the other. Then comes the traditional rubbing my face in the dirt to prove she has me at her mercy.


As always, the sudden loss of control leaves me feeling angry and frustrated as the high of using magic is ripped away and I'm left powerless. Only, this time there's a touch of fear too, as those body blows actually hurt.

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L looks at Taylor with concern as she stomps around the room rubbing her chest. L rubs her own shoulder where Taylor got a good hit in and walks over to Melanie.


"That duel. More painful than before."


Melanie nods and takes off her mask, "What's wrong with Taylor?"


L looks back at Taylor, "Magic feel good good, point of duel take control enemy magic. Sudden loss feel bad. Friend spar, no hard feelings but still feel bad. Normal magic, not feel good if not use too much. If feel good, need stop. If feel like skin too small, use too too much magic, could die. Need learn, um, lose, no, empty magic before can learn magic properly. Once can, you neophyte."


Melanie grimaces, "Your English is fucking atrocious. It's really fucking bad."


L smiles, "Better than you Simlish."


"Fair. Can you use that stuff on people without magic?"


L shrugs, "Not there, and not outside duel. Maybe here. Not know."


Melanie nods thoughtfully, "Ok, I'll pay you $72 per hour to teach Elle and me. Same for teaching Simlish. Can you do that magic thing for anyone?"


L tips her hand back and forth, "Only Sims, uh, you say humans. Might not Newter or Gregor. Work most time for Vampire and Werewolf, not for mermaid, alien, ghost, plant, skeleton, or Servo."


Melanie nods, "We'll talk about how much that's worth once you've had your appointment on Monday."


L nods and places an emotion potion on the floor before duplicating it. Then she looks back up at Melanie, "Book of Apprentice level, $50, Neophyte, $100, Acolyte $200, Adept $300, and Master $500."


Melanie sighs, "We'll talk about that at the same time."


L smiles and walks over to Taylor with the potion.

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 6

It's clear that Faultline isn't really set up for looking after guests when Jack and Jill started flagging towards the end of the party, as she apologized for not having somewhere more suitable than the couches for us to sleep.


L and I both trawled through our inventories to see if we had a solution, and L found the tents we bought when we went on vacation to Batuu. They're a bit more than we needed, but as they don't need to be pegged down, they're ideal for our situation. So we took one out and duplicated it twice while it was still in its storage crate configuration. We then had to spend the better part of an hour working out how to make open it, as the system used to do it for us.


I think that's going to be our go-to for things we've brought with us. At least until we have a way of replacing them if they get broken to the point magic can't repair it or they're stolen. With that in mind, I duplicated and then burgilated the games console upstairs.


Once the kids were in bed, L and I had our discussion, one that didn't go anywhere close to the way I expected. In hindsight, I think that L is afraid this isn't real and by giving Five away I was showing the cracks in the lie . On the other side of the coin, doing so without system assistance was partially proving to myself that I'm free of it. Not that I can blame her, as I'm half expecting a glowing green plumbob to appear above my head.


After some makeup WooHoo in one of the booths, just to prove to both of us that this is real, we started going through our inventories looking for suitable gifts and party favors, as we did interrupt their shopping. Since the twins are teenagers now, we decided to give them a standard broom each along with a familiar.


L found an old Simray she got in a present from Father Winter a few seasons ago, so we figured it would be good for Spitfire, as apparently, she has trouble putting out her own fires. Elle and Melanie are going to get super mops. It took us a long time to narrow down Newter and Gregor, but ultimately we decided to give Newter a white light sword from Batuu, and Gregor a digital drawing pad. For dad, well dad's difficult as there's so much I want to give him, so many missed memories and moments. In the end, it was L that took out all the photos of our wedding, children, and celebrations, and duplicated the entire stack of them.


While L was sleeping, I spent the night carefully reprogramming a copy of a wooden statute so that it is a copy of L with Jack and Jill just after they'd both blown out their cakes. I know I'm not the photographer that she is, but my skills were certainly enough to capture the moment. It's also a sculpture that could never exist in the world we came from.

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As I reach under my visor to wipe away the tear that's threatening to fall, L interrupts my reminiscing as she lifts her head from where she fell asleep against my shoulder. As I spot her confused expression I ask, "Are you ok?"


L looks around in confusion, "What happened?"


On the other side of the white van, Newter looks up from his phone, "You fell asleep. The kids are asleep too."


L looks over at Jack and Jill sleeping against each other while strapped into the harnesses that are attached to the sides of the van. At her incredulous expression, Emily chuckles, "We just had this conversation with Taylor. Humans in this world can sleep in just about any position."


My portrait turns yellow as I squirm slightly and minimize it, "I forgot ok. It's not like sleeping sitting up is common."


Melanie turns around on the passenger seat and calls back, "We're just pulling up to the Guild building, do you have your documents?"


I pull the brown envelope dad almost forgot to give me yesterday out of my inventory. The photos were a much better gift than I thought they would be.


Melanie nods and turns back to the front as she rolls down the window. I can hear some indistinct conversation that ends when she lifts up her phone and shows the person outside something. A moment later the van moves forward again, down a slope into an underground space, uh, parking lot.

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After a long few days of interviews and testing at the Guild building in Quebec, and several hours into what should be the final meeting, L bashes her head gently against the back of the chair she's sitting in as Taylor, Dragon, and a couple of the onsite scientists continue to blithely ignore the rest of the room as they've devolved into technobabble with the occasional Simlish term that she recognizes. Fortunately Jack and Jill are both with Faultline's team as they don't speak English.


Plaintively, she looks at Agents Barry and Thatcher, who are supposed to be managing this interview, "Please, stop them before I start making people undress."


Thatcher raises his eyebrows, "You can do that?"


L rolls her eyes as she waves her hand in the air with motes of magic following it as she casts Minionize and sends a command. Then Professor Fraser starts to remove her clothes as she keeps talking.


As the conversation falls silent, L nods, "Yes I can. Anyone that understand magic as Adept do, could make spell do that."


She takes the spell book for Minionize out of her inventory and duplicates it, "This instructions and theory for spell. You keep. Can speak about living now?"


Thatcher looks at the tome as though it's a live hand grenade, before tearing his gaze away from it to meet L's gaze, "Can everyone do this?"


L shrugs, "Only if study. Most learn clean and repair, maybe make food, but potion better and easier."


Agent Barry gestures over to the other side of the room, "What about that?"


L smiles indulgently at Taylor, "Taylor, uh, work with science…"


"Scientist?"


"Yes, scientist. Also work computer, make game and machine. Uh, many more jobs too."


Agent Barry nods looks at Professor Fraser, who is trying to cover herself up, before politely averting his gaze "Professor, did the test results come back?"


Fraser nods jerkily, "The RFLP tests confirm that Mrs Faba is likely to be Mr Hebert's daughter."


"What about their status as parahumans?"


Dragon blinks a couple of times on the screen and looks off to one side, "According to the report, inconclusive due to a large amount of anomalous material situated between the cranial hemispheres and at the base of the spine."


Taylor shrugs, "It's probably what the players use to control us, and allows us to see the system interface."


Agent Barry slams his hand against the table as he shouts, "How are you so calm about this?"


L watches at Taylor takes off her helmet and sweeps her hair over her ears, "I'm calm because it was either learn to accept it, or go insane, and I didn't go insane. According to the interface I'm nearly 4,000 days old. But time moves funny when you're player controlled, and other families experience around 13 days for every day that we do. But only when they're not directly interacting with a player-controlled person."


L shakes her head, "It didn't change for me until you took me out on a date. It was a wonderful couple of hours, and a whole day had passed. I'm glad our player arranged proper wedding, gave time to train replacement rather than rely on system download."


Agent Thatcher cocks his head as the minionize spell wears off, and Professor Fraser dives for her clothes. Referring to his notes he asks "System download, I don't think that came up in your interviews?"


L looks at Taylor who shrugs. Pinching the bridge of her nose she thinks for a moment before saying, "When important sim, person, when person die, ah, not expected, replacement given knowledge needed to fill role. Very few roles important like this, uh. How do I say Sage of Magic?"


Taylor thinks for a moment, "Sage or Guru probably."


"Sage of Magic work to prevent magic university falling apart further. Better important than key. Key sim not able die or stop being key."


Taylor nods in understanding and adds, "I think I mentioned something like this in my interviews, about how I suddenly just knew some necessary information when I became a scientist."


Thatcher, checks his notes, "Dragon, Professor Fraser, you were both here to evaluate their knowledge and technology. Is it tinkertech?"


Professor Fraser sticks her head above the table to grab her notes, "I'll have to get back to the university and get some computer time to run some simulations, but I think it will pan out."


Dragon nods, "They use a manufacturing method that I don't understand, but I believe that Mrs Faba does understand it."


Taylor shrugs, "It's just direct additive construction using direct placement through tunnelling from feedstock. It's not like we created things ex-nihilo, even the limited energy to matter conversions we do do makes sense. Not like the system controlled building that comes out of nowhere with no discernable source of energy or matter. The wormhole research my lab was working on came out of trying to detect how the system does it."


Patiently, Dragon says, "While it make sense to you, I believe you stated at the beginning of the interview that it didn't make sense until you became a scientist."


L puts her face in her hands, "It like being Sage of Magic then. I no remember how maintain realm, just that did. Know was close to understand before be sage and was obvious after became sage."


Ronan McLoed, the other scientist, groans, "Great, more nightmare fuel. Thanks. The PRT is going to lose their collective shit when we finish doing the knowledge transfer."


L's eyebrows scrunch as she asks, "Why?"


Ronan looks down at his notes, "You come from a society where approximately 1% of the population is Mastered to a level that would make Heartbreaker green with envy. Your society sounds like someone read 1984 and decided that they weren't trying hard enough. Come on, you can't even swear, and your language doesn't even have the concept of freedom. Your scientific and technical development are so far beyond ours that death isn't even permanent. Whoever is controlling your society is even further advanced from that. I might not be the theoretical physicist that Professor Fraser is, or the technical genius that Dragon is. But I've dealt with enough tinkers to know when someone understands their shit, and when they're bullshitting to cover the fact they have no fucking clue how they built their latest offense against science and engineering. This is ignoring the fact that they have working time travel, not just a theoretical understanding of time, the ability to build actual fucking time machines. I can only assume that they either never find us, or there's some sort of limitation on time travel that means they can't just travel 6k years into the past and conquer the world before we even know that we need to raise a resistance to it."


Thatcher asks, "Why time travel?"


Ronan points at L, "Because L, and their children are here. That rules out a Matrix scenario where Taylor, sorry Mrs, soon to be Professor Faba PhD winner of the Nobel prize for Physics, lived in a simulation for god knows how many years."


Dragon says, "124."


"124 years, christ, humans don't live that long. Then she was spat out and returned to Earth Bet with all the talents and knowledge she earned in the simulation."


Agent Barry mildly asks, "Matrix?"


Ronan waves his hand, "An Aleph imported film about a dystopian future where the majority of the human race lives in vats to provide electricity to the ruling AI programs. There's lots of moral and philosophical nuance to it that didn't resonate on Earth Bet. But every so often you'll get a tinker who thinks it would be a good idea to try and make it a reality. If the PRT doesn't manage to talk sense into them, then someone will hire the Dragon Slayers to hunt them down, or they'll be pressganged into a villain organization and have sense beaten into them. Anyway, from the sounds of things, their society wouldn't even need to use humans as batteries, as they've already cracked fusion and better power sources. That's before we even start on magic, I can't believe I'm even talking about magic seriously. A grantable power that's had no discernable effect on the brains of our volunteers. Yet with minimal coaching allows them to fire kinetic bolts and shield against them."


Taylor looks over at L, "Volunteers?"


L nods, "I only able do two before exhausted, as no look for motes make easier."


Agent Barry says, in a deceptively mild tone, "Mr McLoed, is there a point to this?"


Ronan glances down at his notes, "Ah…"


Agent Barry nods, "Do we have enough to take to the UN as proof that they are dimensional travellers, and that Mrs Faba hasn't broken any international laws in doing so?"


Dragon nods and adds, "I would also like to recommend that they limit the proliferation of their droids, AI, and computer technology, as we do not currently have the capability to prevent them from accessing virtually any device they choose to due to the prevalence of what we call quantum computing."


L blinks a couple of times, "What computing? No understand that term."


Dragon looks in L's direction kindly, "Quantum, from the Latin Quantus, meaning 'how many'. It means the smallest amount of something. In science, Quantum physics is the study of physics at the smallest scales. It seems like your computers are all using what we would call quantum computing. Mr McLoed, if you would."


Ronan nods, "As Mrs Faba is a natural US citizen, I recommend that the Canadian government gives her a Lab and accommodation while we're waiting for the UN to process their claim. I further recommend that we patent everything she produces in her name, and license it under generous terms."


Dragon nods as the screen splits and a large woman appears on the other half of the screen, "Good afternoon, Mrs and Mrs Faba, I'm Narwhal, the leader of the Guild. Agent Barry, I'm sorry to interrupt, but I'm running short of time before a scheduled meeting. I've been following this meeting on and off. I am going to be recommending that the Canadian government grant your family Canadian citizenship, as the first official contact with you has been in Canada." She looks down at something as she continues, "I understand that there are reasons why you may wish to live over the border in Maine. However, we will be approaching you both with offers of employment with the Guild in a powered or unpowered role. Whether you choose to affiliate with the Guild or not, I would recommend not setting up a business in the USA. As they have laws against parahumans running businesses that could unfairly compete with non-parahuman businesses. The laws here are much fairer in that respect. If only because they have to prove that you're using parahuman powers in a way that can't be replaced by mundane technology and engineering if you die."


L shares a glance with Taylor before saying, "Any reason why not live near Taylor Father and work in this world, er, country?"


Narwhal chuckles, "Apart from customs and commuting time, not at all."


L shrugs, "Know Transportilate, travel time negligible."


Narwhal and Ronan both make a note as Agent Barry glances down and says, "That's your teleportation power?"


Taylor nods, "It is."


Narwhal nods, and looks back at something below the camera, "Our legal team has also advised that there is no legal precedent for time travel. Current legal theory is that you are likely to be legally the same age you were when you left. Your children's aptitude tests put them at High School level for the most part, but lacking in key areas of knowledge. So, they'll likely need to complete at least a year of middle school in whichever country you settle in. Taylor, if you are declared legally 15, then you will need to be in High School until you're 17 if you live in Maine. In Quebec it would be 16. After that you could take your equivalency if you haven't already passed your final exams. I'm sorry to say that they've also advised that your appearance is likely to count against you in this respect, as you look like you've only been away for a few years."


Taylor says, "Beep. Um, sorry about that. That sounds like it will be a whole new bundle of fun."


Narwhal nods, "I understand, L, they recommend that you also study for your GED and get it at the earliest opportunity. The final thing, before I leave the local office to discuss your temporary accommodation, is that your droids need to undergo a sapiency test. I'm not sure what that is, but the legal department have raised it as a legal test that came about after Eagleton in the USA and the Three Blasphemies in Europe. If they pass the test, then they would be considered to be independent life forms and granted all the rights and responsibilities involved in that. We understand that their programming compels them to have an owner, but the law isn't so simple. Any questions?"


Taylor nods, "Does this mean that we've passed?"


Narwhal nods, "It wasn't a pass or fail sort of interview. Most of the tests and interviews were to establish whether you were actually dimensional travelers or not and if you were currently being controlled, or had been conditioned to attack Earth Bet in any way, including through contact with the Simurgh. We brought Professor Fraser in as an Expert for this meeting after she passed the background checks needed."


"You mentioned Canadian Citizenship?"


Narwal smiles, "I did, and that is despite anything that the UN interdimensional taskforce decides. We are going to push for L to be declared an adult, regardless of your legal status, along with recognizing your marriage. Though you might need to retake your maiden name and remarry once you're legally old enough. Interestingly, there is a note on your file that says a PhD doesn't actually require a GED or have any age requirements. That might be something to talk to Professor Fraser about during the waiting period. Now I really do have to go I'm afraid, as I have another scheduled meeting."

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Dragon has her avatar massage it's temples as Colin connects to their private meeting.


"Afternoon Dragon, I'm looking forward to working on the tracking software."


Dragon grimaces, "I'm not sure I'll be much help."


Colin looks up with concern, "Why?"


Dragon wants to say, 'Because one of my blade servers terminally overheated and I've got thermal errors on a couple of others after trying to understand PhD level physics earlier.' Instead she says, "I've got a headache after a discussion of science way above my level."


Colin frowns, "Oh, anything interesting?"


"Only if you want to discuss extending quantum tunnelling over several yards for a very modest expenditure of energy. Or how quantum entanglement can be induced in two existing atoms."


"That should be impossible."


"Do you know of Professor Fraser from the University of Quebec?"


Colin shakes his head as he taps at his keyboard, "I've never heard of her."


"She's a theoretical physicist that specializes in quantum dynamics. She and the person we were talking to were quite happy about discussing this and how to provide a practical proof. I tried to keep up, I really did, as it came out of a brief discussion about computer chips."


"Why computer chips?"


"To rapidly set the initial conditions for a quantum computation, then read out the answer without disturbing the qbits. It then moved on to using tunnelling to move individual atoms into position during manufacturing."


"Teleportation?"


Dragon shakes her head, "No, apparently that's a different set of laws, this is specifically persuading atoms that they should be a few yards away from where they currently are."


Colin rubs his temples as he grabs a notepad and starts scribbling out equations and occasionally looking something up on his computer. After nearly an hour he looks up, and says, "Dragon?"


Dragon has her avatar look back at the virtual camera, "Yes Colin?"


"Do you have the equations?"


"I've been asked not to share them, as Professor Fraser wants the person to submit them as part of a PhD dissertation. Along with working proof that it works."


Colin looks at his page of scribbled notes. Then he grinds out, "I look forward to reading their paper. In the meantime, I think I've got something to study during my spare time."

 

[Darkphoenixlady]

Chapter 3

Amy Dallon huffs in annoyance as her sister steers her towards a table with her sister's friends. I roll my eyes and adjust my book bag so that the poor lass trips over . I blink as my eyes roll right out of my head onto the table.


Before I can put my eyes back in, I have a good view of Amy tripping over my bag, so I deftly catch the tray, which is quite challenging when your eyes are on the table, and place it blindly on the table behind my eyes. Shit, I grab my head as one of my eyes goes spinning off the table to land beside one of the schools celebrities.


"Um, can I have my eye back please?"


I wince as Amy picks up my eye and turns it to face her. As it adjusts to the light I realize that she's staring at it curiously, and she has a very pretty iris pattern. "You have pretty eyes."


Suddenly Victoria looms over her sister's shoulder and I yelp as she reaches out and snatches the eye out of Amy's hand, "That hurt! Give me my eye back!"


I reach out blindly towards them, as my other eye is precariously balanced on an edge of the table, and I don't want to risk knocking it off. Suddenly Vicky drops my eye and I get a flash of my face as it rolls out her hand. Lunging off the chair I curse as my other eye drops off the table onto the floor and rolls under a seat.


Fortunately the eye that Vicky dropped ends up pointing towards the ceiling so it only takes a couple of seconds before I can see myself again, after which I pick it up and slot it into one of my eye sockets. As I look up, I realize that Amy is kneeling on the floor staring at my face intently while Vicky has dropped her own tray and is floating in the air several yards away, along with all of the students that were sitting nearby.


I point to one of the chairs beside Amy, "Excuse me, I think my other eye rolled under that chair."


Amy stares at me for a couple more seconds before she kneels down and looks under the chair, before reaching out and grabbing my other eye. As she looks at the eye, she says, "How?"


I cock my head to one side, and back a bit when someone behind me gasps, "Sorry, you'll need to be a bit more specific."


"How is your eye still able to see?"


I look confused as I say, "It's my eye, so I can see through it."


"No, I mean how are you able to detach your eye and still see…" She reaches out and grabs my hand.


I shrug, "I traded away my humanity to a fairy so that they'd let me out of my locker, which was full of contents of every sanitary bin in the school and allowed to marinade over the Christmas break. Of course, the sudden loss of my humanity was a bit of a shock so I went to sleep for a couple of weeks."


I stop talking as I realize that Amy hasn't heard a word I've said, so I gently take my eye back and poke her a couple of times. When she doesn't respond, I look back at her sister, "Miss Dallon, would you help me get your sister into a chair. Only she's not letting go of my hand."


When I address Vicky, the spell that seemed to fall over the rest of the cafeteria breaks, and she flies down to help her sister while a couple of other students retch all over their food. Not that I have anything against flies, but I was under the impression that humans usually kept their digestive acids inside their stomach while eating.


As the thought occurs to me, I point at one of the students and ask Vicky, "Vicky, is it normal for humans to predissolve their food by vomiting on it? As I thought that was something only flies did."


Vicky looks at me strangely, before covering her mouth and flying for the exit. At least Amy's on a chair now. It takes me a few seconds to get her to let go of my hand, but once I do, I split the small harvest of mushrooms I managed to put together after my last crop was destroyed. Then I take back the small mushroom with the most exquisite flavor as I remember it's poisonous to humans.

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Bob looks down at his clipboard outside one of 4 tenement buildings the city manages. "Right, Joe's team obviously over did it on the temporary fixes. We had complaints from 203, 205, 208, 301, 304, and 305 that there was so much foam that they couldn't use the stairs. Jon, Paul, you check the first floor, knock on the doors if there's anyone in, and make sure the foam is flush with the walls, once you're done head up to the second floor. Steve, we're checking the halls and stairs, then we'll handle the third floor. We've got an hour for the job, so be quick."


Once he's got the nod from the others, Bob uses his key to open the front door and the four of them walk in.


As he scans the entrance lobby, Bob sighs as he spots a glowing blue fungus hanging from the ceiling. "Right, it looks like Joe's team didn't do the best job. Make a note of anything like that, and we'll report it up the chain."


Several minutes later, Bob peers at a barely legible imprint of a door number, "Steve, what number does this say?"


Steve frowns, "Surely they should have reported missing the brass numbers."


Bob huffs, "Steve…"


"Ok, ok, hold your horses. Um, 183 maybe, could be 123."


Bob grimaces, "Shit. There should only be 20 apartments on each floor. I'm calling it in."


Steve looks around the hall critically, "Bob, is it me, or have we not seen any foam?"


Bob shakes his head as he raises his radio to his mouth, "Control, come in." as he lets go of the button, adds, "I've seen plenty of mold too."


There's a crackly hiss from the radio as Amy says, "Control here, over."


"Control, I can barely here you. I need to know, how many apartments are there in Mermaid House? Over."


There's silence for a few moments before the radio hisses to life again, "There are 18 on each floor, evens on the inside and odds on the outside. Four floors, for 72 total apartments. Over."


"Shit!" Bob presses the button, "Control, we are looking at the door to what could be apartment 183 or 123, please tell me that's on your list. Over."


"Negative Bob. Over."


"I'm pulling out, Jon do you copy? Over?"


When there's no answer, Amy says, "I'm contacting the PRT. Over"

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During the afternoon break, I'm sliding down the railings to the ground floor when I hear someone crying on the second floor. I jump off the railing and walk down the next flight of stairs. There I see a guy with damp hair sitting on the last step hugging his school bag.


I sit down next to them and ask, "Are you leaking?"


The guy looks up at me strangely, "No! I'm not leaking. What do you want?"


I give that some thought, before I say, "I want to have a successful court."


"You, what?"


I shrug, "It's what I want. What do you want?"


"Why do you care?"


"I don't, not really. But I'm not allowed to make deals in the school, so I can at least listen to you."


"Huh?"


"I don't want any drugs."


I smile, "I don't blame you. Terrible things."


"Huh?"


At his confusion I explain, "If you need to take them, it means you're sick."


"Are you making fun of me?"


"I don't think so. Why, does it feel like I am? Anyway, why were you leaking?"


"As if you don't know."


"Well, I wouldn't be asking if I did. If it helps, I'm new here. I used to go to Winslow."


"Oh. So you're not…"


I smile, "I'm not lots of things. I'm not a dog, cat, rabbit, plane, rocket…"


"Sane?"


I pause, "I believe I am actually sane."


"So you didn't see me beg Panacea to turn me into a Girl last year."


I shake my head, "I didn't, though I'd imagine you'd get better results by asking nicely."


"Is it really that much to ask to have a body that matches who I am?"


I tap his knee as the bell goes, "I'll hang around outside the gates after school. If you're willing to make a deal, I can probably help you."

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After school the guy sidles up to me as I'm leaning against the bus stop, "Are you a cape?"


I shake my head, "No. Are you interested in a deal?"


"I'm not interested in doing drugs."


I smile too widely, and bring it back to human norms, "I don't deal in drugs. Tell you what, why don't we do an easy trade to start with. Your name for a new name. I've got several I could trade you, Emma, Sophia, Madison, Julia, Lauren, Buffy…"


"Sophia's on my list, um, the one for if I ever become a girl that is."


My smile widens again, "Great, so I'll give you the name Sophia and you'll give me your name. Deal?"


The guy looks at me for a moment, before saying, "Sure, why not."


"You'll need to give me your name."


"Oh, right, I'm Darren."


I nod, "That's a nice name, and a fair trade. Have a good evening Sophia. If you want a bigger trade look me up outside school."


I turn and skip off as Sophia looks at me with a confused expression on his face.

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Lt O'Donnell grimaces as she rereads the brief for the current call in the back of a van. As the van comes to a halt, she's the first one out the side door and she jogs over to the main entrance of the tenement building, and the PRT officer that's standing outside.


"What's the situation?"


The officer salutes before saying, "Team 1 has set up in the entrance hall, and is using an unmanned drone to search the corridors for the missing people. Team 2 is dealing with the cordon and residents."


O'Donnell glances down at the printout she was given before she left HQ, "Officer, let the residents in and have Team 1 politely ask them if they can help find the missing people."


"Ma'am, are you sure?"


O'Donnell shakes her head slightly, but says, "According to the notes on the only suspected… 'other' that lives here. Any issues should only affect people they consider intruders. Guests and residents should be fine."


"Other?" When O'Donnell just looks at them, they continue, "Yes Ma'am."


O'Donnell takes a printout of a photo off her clipboard, "If this girl turns up, let me know. She's the 'Other'."


"She's a cape?"


"Not according to my notes. I'm going to check on Team 1, and try something that sounds crazy."


O'Donnell walks through the door into the entrance hall and watches Team 1 carefully feeding out a spool of cable while they watch a screen. After a few minutes, and three right turns, she walks around them and touches the wall by the lift.


After a moment, she takes off her glove and puts her hand back on the wall. It only takes a few seconds, but she fancies that she can feel the wall moving under her hand, as though it's breathing, or it has a pulse.


"I don't believe I'm doing this. I am known as Lt O'Donnell, and I am a public liaison officer for the PRT. During this visit we are not here to cause any damage to the building, or bring any harm to the residents of the building. We only wish to find and retrieve the men that came earlier. Once they are found, we will remove them from the building before leaving ourselves."


When nothing happens for a few minutes, O'Donnell swallow hard and checks her clipboard. After taking a couple of deep breaths to force herself to calm down, she looks down and reads out, "I am willing to stand as surety to prove the honesty of my words as long as you promise to aid our recovery of the men that comprised the city work team, and release me as soon as all other members of the PRT and the work team have left this building."


After a long half minute, the empty elevator opens beside her. O'Donnell swears under her breath and shouts, "Sergeant Six Two, I am offering myself as a hostage to our good behavior. You are to evacuate the work crew and then ensure that all PRT personnel are accounted for outside the building. Do not cause any damage to the building or remove anything that the PRT didn't bring into the building. Do you copy?"


The Sergeant looks over and gives a thumbs up.


O'Donnell shouts back, "I am going to need oral confirmation Sergeant ."


The Sergeant touches a button on their helmet, and their anonymous voice says, "Challenge, Alpha Charlie Six Fiver Three."


O'Donnell scowls and shouts, "I love the cafeteria mock meatloaf."


"Confirmed, for the record ma'am, this is nuts."


O'Donnell takes half a step into the elevator, "This is what we get paid for. Civilian lives come first. If I don't make it, tell Armsmaster he was wrong."


O'Donnell finishes her step in the Elevator and shudders as the door closes in front of her.

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As I skip around the corner to my home, I slow to a walk when I spot the crowd of PRT vans and humans wandering around aimlessly. As I'm getting closer, one of the faceless PRT humans walks up to me with their bubble like heads and I grab hold of my hand to stop myself from reaching up to pop it.


To cover for my sudden urge, I give a wide, happy smile, with lots of teeth. When the human pauses, I remember that they don't have sharp pointed teeth, so I close my lips.


Their strangely robotic voice asks, "Are you Miss Hebert?"


I smile again, and then remember that humans can only smile once at a time. So I stop smiling, "That's one of the names I have at the moment."


"Ah, um. I have been instructed to inform you that we have removed the work crew from the building, and all PRT Personnel apart from Lt O'Donnell have also left the building."


I feel confused. What work crew? I take my head off to give it a good scratch, and say, "I have no idea what you're talking about."


Oh, their heads aren't completely bubble shaped, they're more like egg shaped. And apparently my head is absolutely fascinating, as I can move it around and I can see them turning to follow it.


After a few seconds I start getting a little motion sick, so I put my head back on my shoulders, and the PRT human thumps their chest a couple of times. After some very odd sounding coughing, I say, "You should really see a doctor about that cough."


The human mutters, "I need to see a shrink, not a doctor." Before I can say anything, they say more loudly, "Lt O'Donnell made a deal with the building so that we could remove the men without putting anything at risk. Uh, please see why she hasn't returned and inform us of anything we've done to break the agreement."


I frown, and look around in confusion, as I parse the request. Oh, right, they made a deal with the building, and they want me to act as an arbiter. That makes sense, as it is my building. I nod and walk past him and through the front door. A couple of paces inside the entry hall, I pause and turn back to the front door thoughtfully. Don't humans normally need to open and close doors? Right. I'm trying to pretend to be human.


I walk out through the front door, turn around, open the front door and walk through the doorway before closing it behind me. That's better. How do they keep remembering this stuff? Oh right, arbiter.


"The PRT humans outside want to know if they've broken their agreement with you."


I can feel how smug the building feels, so I ask, "They also wanted to know why Lt O'Donnell hasn't returned."


I raise an eyebrow and look at the lift when I get what feels like a shrug from the building. "Well, maybe she likes it in there. I don't know. I'll ask."


Walking over to the elevator, I press the call button and the door opens to reveal a woman sitting against the back wall. As I step into the elevator, she looks up, "Can I go now?"


I look at her critically as the door closes behind me, "You look like you can, and I can't see anything stopping you."


"But the door won't open."


I press the door open button, and the door opens. Then I press the door close button, and the door closes. "It looks like it opens fine."


The woman stares at the button panel hard before she pushes herself to her feet and walks over. "That button wasn't there earlier."


I roll my eyes sideways, so that they can't fall out, "Of course not, that was the terms of the deal. The building put the button back once the deal was over."


The woman looks at me as if she wants to say something, then she tries to stab the button with her finger. She fails, as her nails aren't remotely long or sharp enough, but she does depress the button and the door opens. She then stalks out of the elevator, and opens the front door before walking out and slamming it behind her.