Authors note: Worm belongs to wildbow. some inspiration from Friendbringer, with friends like...
[PRESERVATION] (Worm) OC centric
- Thread starter Happy Hampster
- Start date
- Superhero
- Created
- Status
- Ongoing
- Watchers
- 31
- Recent readers
- 0
- Threadmarks
- 2
-
Statistics (2 threadmarks, 9.9k words)
User Total Happy Hampster 2 Threadmarks Reader mode
Story
Happy Hampster
This is a Multipost
- Location
- Perth, Western Australia
Authors note: Worm belongs to wildbow. some inspiration from Friendbringer, with friends like these, and @WhoAmEye although I got the idea before I read Totally Winging It, credit where credit is due shi (is that the right pronoun?) inspired me and got the idea first. Also HALPING was a big inspiration for this idea. EDIT: forgot to say this is semi serious crack... sorry.
Chapter one: The Quest for Pants.
One shard fell off Abaddon when the exchange with Eden occurred unnoticed by Eden or Zion finding a barren universe with an empty earth, this relatively small shard was the magnum opus of Abaddon's kind it had one job preserve the species of the planet from the Warrior and Thinker lines.
Years passed as the Preservation shard learned about the species chosen by the entities to be parasitized, recording culture, genetics scans and brain scans of the quintillions of species inhabiting the neighbouring planet earths, this was a fallback measure a plan z as it were if the Preservation shard was unable to defeat the Warrior any other way it would jettison off earth and re-establish the multitude of biospheres outside of the Warrior and Thinkers sight.
Luckily Abaddon (Father) had tricked the Thinker into crashing when it couldn't comprehend the utility of symbiosis with host species so Preservation only had to deal with the Warrior which couldn't predict nearly well enough to recognise Preservation's actions before a decisive blow could be struck.
Plan A was deceptively simple:
Step 1: Figure out how a human brain works.
Step 2: Create a personality with some information on potentialities and some history to interact with the humans.
Step 3: Figure out how to make a human like body.
Step 4: Create human like body.
<<Step one, two, and three went quite well I thought step four not so much, apparently.>> I thought looking over my form. "Perhaps I should have used the human personality to design the body. Oh well it'll do."
The problem was I had apparently decided the human body could use wings made of tentacles in stereotypical angel placement the rest of my body looked human; if I was wearing clothes that hid the tentacle wings I could pass for a Caucasian male in his late teens to early twenties longish hair and golden ratio face. The differences were obvious when the clothes came off; apparently I thought spots like an old English sheepdog would look good. Admittedly they did look very fetching and matched other doglike traits I had the enlarged canine teeth and certain other traits (get your mind out of the gutter) I have white and black fur except on my hands, feet and face and throat. I have the cutest fluffy black and white dog tail about a meter long.
First things first I needed pants and a location. The location came first unfortunately, Earth Bet, North America, U.S.A, New Hampshire, Brockton Bay, Docks, alleyway between Fugly Bob's and an abandoned warehouse turned nightclub named Ironically, behind a stereotypically overflowing dumpster, naked.
<<First things first, pants>> I looked around for something to cover my face I could use my wing tentacles (I think I'll call them wingtacles) to cover the rest of my body, but humans loved secret identities and I wanted to make a good first impression so I found a fugly bob's paper takeout bag that was relatively clean poked an eye-hole. "OW, sonnuva." Took the bag off and poked the eye-holes put it back on. Then draped my wingtacles around myself making sure no skin or fur is showing, thinking about it for a moment I use my wingtacles to lift me so my feet were off the ground.
<<Right no pressure this is just the first time you have ever actually interacted with humans, nothing to worry about.>> Yeah I didn't even convince my inner monologue and I've only had it about ten minutes it couldn't be more naive if I gave myself brain damage and started asking George about the rabbits.
Wingtacle walking is kind of neat it brings me up to a flat seven feet tall and I sort of glide over the ground as I came around the corner into view of the diners before using a tentacle to push the door open.
"I require pants." Not the best first words but not the worst so I felt it was going well. Now I didn't realise my voice was VERY DEEP until I had spoken, I also did not know that Glory Girl and Panacea were taking their lunch break in Fugly Bob's. I found this out as I was propelled across the street by a punch that was only subsonic by the barest of margins. I would like to say this didn't hurt but it only didn't hurt because I turned my pain receptors off in the wake of the eye-hole incident.
The next few moments were blurry because my eyeballs popped, my nose, jaw and eardrums broke and my left leg embedded in the concrete sidewalk up to my knee. Then she stamped on my chest and that stupid pump humans have for moving nutrients and oxygen around splorted itself out my mouth and things started getting weird around the edges.
I'll be honest I don't know what happened next except I engaged the auto-repair function of my body and Glory Girl stopped beating me, what was actually thirty seconds but felt like days with no sensory input, suddenly Panacea's power interfaced with my body and began to repair the damage faster, meanwhile I interfaced with her shard.
While her Biotinker shard gave me information for well biotinker stuff, I uh… brainwashed a shard, well I say brainwashed it is closer to swapping the bios on a motherboard so really I jailbreak the shard and installed a new custom viral OS. The actual changes to the shard were minor, no more drive to conflict, the shard would match the hosts aggressiveness, so no more nightmares of turning the world into viral slime, a full emotional purge to deal with the effects of her adoptive sister's emotional aura, it would take a good night's sleep dealing with the emotional responses she should have been having without the master effects she had suffered for so long, sort of this is your life shard style. The emotional purge would be noticeable as a feeling of extreme lethargy and tiredness while new emotions would process normally the shard began a situational one off countdown before the host would seemingly drop from exhaustion. When she had perspective again the manton limit would be relaxed to allow self modification via a modelling program and changes to herself would give her a completion timer that scaled the length of time a change would take, longer the more comprehensive a change she designed.
Re-growing eyeballs is weird, the stupid fluid pump travelling back down my trachea is weird, shattered ribs un-shattering is weird, switching pain receptors back on before the soft tissue has healed is STUPID.
"AAAAAAAOOOOOOWWWWEEEE!!!!!! I JUST WANTED CLOTHES YOU CRAZY PUNCHY HURTY PERSON!" I did not overreact, no matter what Panacea says, if I was human I would be dead. "WHAT SORT OF PERSON TRIES TO KILL YOU FOR ASKING FOR PANTS?!" Glory Girl had the nerve to look offended by that.
"WHAT SORT OF PERSON GOES AROUND LOOKING LIKE A TENTACLE HENTAI! I THOUGHT YOU WANTED PANACEA BAGHEAD!" Glory Girl shouted turning up her fear aura, not that I could be affected or Panacea now either but the people in the restaurant could.
<<How to play this? Ignorance or Knowledge?>> Both options had their good points but why not do both.
"What does a cure all have to do with pants? What is Tentacle Hentai? And quit trying to Master me and healing girl I made it so you can't affect either of us." I said careful to keep the smug off of my face.
The colour drained from her face as I spoke before it rushed back an angry red when Panacea spoke up angrily. "VICTORIA! You almost killed a case 53 shut up and go home." Amy has quite a set of lungs on her.
"I'm not a master, But you JUST ADMITTED to changing Amy AND BLUergh" that was right about when Armsmaster decided the most efficient thing to do was to foam everyone present up to and including the crowd and himself. Alternatively his equipment chose that moment to fail and spray containment foam over everyone there in discrete perfectly aimed amounts but I doubted it.
"THIS IS ARMSMASTER OF THE PRT DO NOT STRUGGLE AGAINST THE FOAM MASTER/STRANGER PROTOCOLS ARE IN EFFECT AFTER TWO SEPARATE SUGGESTIONS OF MASTERING BY CAPES, PRT RESOURCES ARE ON ROUTE YOU WILL BE DETAINED FOR TWENTYFOUR HOURS WHILE BEING CHECKED FOR INFLUENCE PRT APOLOGISES FOR ANY INCONVENIENCE I.C.P.E." (In Case of Parahuman Emergency) "PEOPLE WILL BE NOTIFIED IF YOU REQUEST AND ANY LOST WAGES WILL BE RECOMPENSED ESTIMATED TIME FOR FOAM RELEASE IS"
That was when he and the other Parahumans passed out because someone in the crowd Triggered from being foamed. When a new parahuman triggers around other parahumans, the new parahumans shard pings nearby parahuman's shards and collects data and designs a power in this case it pinged [Efficient Design], [Queen Biomanipulation], [Telekinesis (sub-touch range) Emotion (sub-aura awe/lust/courage fear)] and me [Preservation].
Connected to the new shard I spread the viral OS into the other connections making [Efficient Design] got a basic empathy package and this is your life shard style sleep to deal with it, [Telekinesis (sub-touch range) Emotion (sub-aura awe/lust/courage fear)] got an on/off switch and aura targeting so she could aim her aura and extend her telekinesis to objects she touches, the mass affected and dexterity she can apply will increase the more she practices and the more esoteric the effect she tries to create and this is your life shard style sleep to deal with her lack of self-reflection, I [Preservation] copied the databases of the three new shards and determined the new trigger was going to get [Efficient Biotechnomancy (sub-touch range) Replication] they would be able to create efficient biotechnology telekinetically if they were in contact with sufficient inorganic material to convert into organic mass and copy any tinkertech or ordinary technology they saw barring the Endbringers themselves.
The power would not have been if I had not altered [Queen Biomanipulation] it wouldn't have budded and the person would not have triggered because of their claustrophobia but instead died in an ABB drive-by tonight that only injured him an eight year old boy named Jake causing his mother twenty-six year old Jacqueline to join the E88 now nobody would die in the drive-by tonight. I knew this because I plotted the probability of what would have happened had I not been here when he triggered with the bud.
I spent the next thirty minutes waiting for the PRT transport to the Master/Stranger containment cells to get there to take us to our destination and a further forty minutes waiting to be put in the cells. Then I took a nap. Apparently they gassed us still foamed to knock us out safely because by the time I woke up the foam was gone and I was in a white cell with glass frontage and a surprisingly soft solid plastic looking bed (also white) attached to a wall, a mirror and a toilet and sink. On the bed blindingly out of place was a black balaclava and the wall had black writing with wear me written on it with an arrow extending onto the bed pointing at the balaclava.
Picking up the balaclava and removing the somehow still surviving fast-food bag I saw the bag soaked in dried blood and decided to wash my face in the sink to get the blood off. Apparently even the fixtures were soft I found out when I went to lean on the sink. As soon as I turned off the sink a countdown from thirty started stating mask on. So, on went the mask and I made sure the wingtacles covered me totally but remained standing on my feet my wingtacles spread out around my feet in a fun double spiral I thought looked pretty with my wingtacles weaving over each other kind of hypnotically.
"Ahem." "huh what, sorry my wingtacles are pretty." Not the impression I was going for but Miss Militia seems off balance and that must be Director Piggot looking sick and I want to say angry but for someone who looks so much like a bulldog with a petite nose I don't want to guess it does make me want to heal her though.
"Do you understand why you are here?" Director Piggot is very to the point.
"Somewhat, that Armsmaster guy said something about Master strangeness." "Master/Stranger Protocols." Director Piggot snapped at me I guess she was angry.
"Yeah but, I must have passed out or fallen asleep in the goo. He was talking then just stopped." I thought that was a nice twisting of facts. Thank god humans can't hear grammar.
"He would have been knocked out by the trigger event the same as the other capes Director." Miss Militia said in a cool smoky voice.
"Well, you are in there because of suspected Master status as well as having claimed Glory Girl was Mastering Panacea. Care to explain yourself." Director Piggot seems a very direct woman.
"Ok from the beginning I woke up in that alley with no clothes no memory and it's important later so I'll reiterate NO pants, I had an urge like a half remembered dream to cover my face so I found a paper bag put it on, used my Wingtacles to cover my b" Miss Militia interrupted me. "You keep saying that word I don't think it means anything?"
"Oh, well my tentacles can become giant angelic wings made of tentacles so I decided to call them wingtacles for short. Anyway I used my Wingtacles to cover my body and went to ask the people in that restaurant if anybody had pants or a jacket something genital covering basically and maybe advice on what to do when you wake up with no memory." Director Piggot made a get on with it motion.
"So I walk in, say 'I require pants.' Then Punch happy hentai girl punches me across the road and stomps on my chest and makes that stupid pump thing come out my mouth then healing girl started healing me and I could feel inside her that her brain was full of lust for hurty girl and it was because of that emotion aura she was putting out so I made her brain flush itself with her power made it so she can't be affected by that emotional manipulation power again and the next time she sleeps she sees her whole life play out to allow her to form new emotions about her memories as they should have been without Manipulation. When I could see again I yelled at hurty girl that she couldn't Master me or Healing girl anymore, she yelled at me about tentacle hentai bagheads and me wanting a Panacea, healing girl yelled at hurty girl that hurty girl nearly killed a Case 53 what is that by the way? Hurty girl started to yell some more then foam happened. Also what does a cure all have to do with anything." I will admit I may have said that a little quickly because they are just staring now.
"Well Panacea is erm Healing girl's," I could actually see that sentence cause Director Piggot pain. "Cape persona the name she uses in costume so people don't bother her out of costume, but you claim her emotions were manipulated by, her name is Glory Girl, to make her lust after her and you could not only detect that but fix it and prevent it from working again and it was your FIRST INSTINCT." Director Piggot seemed to be placing a lot of emphasis on that for some reason.
"Neat, yes, when I touched her I gained her powers, yes by her aura, yes when I touched her, yes, yes and yes. Also weirdly I have a bunch more powers now and an aura for my powers after that sleep." I watched Miss Militia twitch mildly when I said that.
"Would you mind detailing your powers for us please." Director Piggot asked but it seemed more like an order.
Time for snarky. "Would you mind giving me clothes I'm standing around in nothing it's mildly embarrassing, then I will tell you whatever you want. Also when can I take off my mask?" Huh? I really want to gesture wildly with my hands but I can't.
"Yes we will get you clothes you slept through the master stranger lockdown so we have already corroborated your version of events with cell phone footage, eyewitness statements, and Armsmaster camera's, he was about to intercept you before you entered Fugly Bob's." Miss Militia spoke up with reassuring eyes. "You should only reveal your identity when you trust someone although having a secret identity may be difficult depending on how divergent from normal you look."
"Oh, well I guess I don't need this then." So saying I took the mask off and smiled.
"Right, well I, where do I start, I have aura telekinesis, anywhere in my aura I can create force fields, anywhere in my aura I can use biomanipulation like Panacea, I didn't keep that emotional manipulation stuff it felt dirty, I can convert inorganic material into organic material that I can shape into biotechnology anywhere in my aura, and I have a bunch of ideas for efficient technology like right now I'm thinking about clothes that don't need to be measured to the individual by being a smart material that starts as a ball and is put on like socks but as you stretch it up your body it becomes like a body stocking the pre-programmed appearance turns on and it becomes the exterior appearance of regular clothes with several outfits that can be switched between and it would be able to shear harden under impact to many tons per square millimetre before the wearer would be injured like you could go skydiving without a parachute into lava because it has to be able to protect from temperature differentials…"
"Come back to us!" Miss militia shouted.
"What, sorry, yes, oh I can also alter or turn off powers inside my aura also my aura lets me sense people, but you two are not within my forty foot aura but you look like you are the other side of the glass, why?" I finished a bit sheepishly.
"That's quite a list and you say these powers and alterations are permanent?" Asked Director Piggot. She seemed quite flushed not that I could tell why wherever she really was.
"Oh yes, I could probably make temporary changes if I put my mind to it but it would be harder and why would I want to?" I asked hoping to get at least one question answered today and I was still waiting for pants.
"Final question." Director Piggot looked very serious all of a sudden. "Why hasn't Panacea or Armsmaster or Glory Girl woken up yet?"
<<Oh, was that all. >> "They are probably still reliving their lives; it probably won't be much longer." I said with what I think is my best smile.
"I was wrong, why are they reliving their lives?" Director Piggot seemed less angry but still very serious.
"I gave Panacea an emotional flush, but without perspective she might do something she wouldn't do otherwise, after getting her emotions zeroed without having time to contemplate her emotions she might make bizarre emotional connections. I gave Armsmaster empathy so the same will happen to him. Glory Girl is just reflecting on her life with a emotional flush. They will only be asleep a couple more hours at most." This time I do use plenty of arm gestures it's fun like dancing or something but information is being conveyed, it's also neat cause my black and white patterned arms and hands keep poking out from between dark green mottled brown tentacles.
They seem to be taking it well.
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU GAVE HIM EMPATHY!" Miss Militia has quite a set of lungs on her, Director Piggot is staring at her like she grew a second head.
"Well it was easy his brain had failed to wire for empathy so I encouraged stem cell production moved them into place allowing him to experience more than the barest empathy." I didn't get what was so groundbreaking, most humans had empathy it was integral for a human mind so I had it. Armsmaster' s shard had reduced his already limited empathy so I brought it up to normal human levels when I made his shard reactive match his drive to conflict not increase it as it was.
"Miss Militia calm down," Director Piggot seems like a nice, calm, even tempered, lady. "now you say you increased his empathy by altering his brain why did you do that? Panacea says she cannot work with brains, but you do."
"Well that is odd I got the power from her I probably just changed it and didn't realise I know I changed her power. A person has to be their own person, that's why I gave Glory Girl a ON/OFF switch for her aura and the ability to extend her tactile range telekinesis, well it's why I gave her an ON/OFF switch, I realise now she had no choice but to inflict changes on the emotions of those around her, making them less than they should be. I do not like people being less than they should his brain betrayed him and he was less than he should be." I thought that explained it nicely, maybe I would finally get pants.
"I'm sick, my kidneys are shot, my liver is failing, I'm overweight, my knees are going and the muscles in my legs are damaged would you fix that?" <<It seems an odd question why wouldn't I heal her.>>
"Why didn't you ask healing… Panacea to heal you? Does Panacea not like you? You seem like a nice person to me. Are you a masochist cause it may not be my thing but hey to each their own." Miss Militia seems to be holding in laughter for some reason.
"I choose to not be healed, people who are capable of healing must have the persons consent to be healed if it can reasonably obtained. Would you still heal me?" Director Piggot said that as if expecting something.
"That I guess depends if you have a parasite it might be making you healing averse in which case I'd tell a doctor how to fix it so they could decide if that means you can be healed against your will or if dealing with the parasite even counts as going against your will because it was influencing you, but I get the feeling that isn't the way you mean your question you want to know if I would heal you if you asked me not to, told me not to." I look at Director Piggot meaningfully until she nods and nod with her.
"No I would not heal someone if they asked me not to unless they were currently dying in front of me like five minutes to live dying. But I guess you mean to ask would I alter a healthy someone's brain so they agreed to be healed. I consider that murder I want people to live why would I kill them myself, it would mean altering what a person thought so they obeyed me rather than themselves they would be mastered I won't do that, it is wrong, if someone had been mastered like Panacea was, I would reverse the damage as best I could then give them a way to prevent the problem. Armsmaster was betrayed by his own body not doing what it should his power then made it worse, so I repaired the damage gave him a way to make it better and made his power work with him instead of for itself. I would scan you and if you had not been mastered or otherwise unable to give consent and you told me I need to ask before I heal and you told me not to heal you that would be your choice and I would not heal you."
Director Piggot and I stared at each other for what seemed to be an age and not a short age either like an ice age but a long one like a star going through hydrogen age, seriously at one point I was contemplating whether to check the sun to make sure it hadn't run out of fuel while we had a staring contest.
"Let him out." Director Piggot snapped out and started walking away.
"Director?" Miss Militia asked staring at Director Piggot.
"Let him out, take him to costume, get him a mask and pants then bring him to my office." Director Piggot said turning to Miss Militia.
"Why, he could have been lying. You never accept capes at their word, you barely take me at my word." Miss Militia said incredulously. I also thought a little hurtfully being so mean to Director Piggot when she was such a softy and working so hard when she is so sick and not willing to be compromised by a biomanipulator.
"I know capes Miss Militia, probably better than anyone else. Capes don't instinctively heal a problem ever, capes do things that create problems, capes have a drive to conflict, any negative in their personality before they trigger becomes worse afterwards. His first instinct was to fix a problem with someone else's brain, he repaired the damage caused by Armsmaster's power, he upgraded the power of someone who had just beat him almost to death, he is also the only cape I would trust not to mess with my mind if I let him heal me. I think he may be the only cape I trust because whatever he IS, he isn't a cape. He doesn't even realise he slipped up and said he altered Armsmaster and Glory Girl after he claimed to have fallen asleep. Telling us how he had altered them was more important than his alibi he could have claimed no knowledge or that he dreamed it. He felt telling us about what he had done was important for us and them without worrying about what we might infer."
"Bugger, caught in my lie. When the new cape triggered I connected to the new parahuman and through them the other parahumans present it didn't knock me out and I had already altered Panacea's power so I gained the powers in the pool I also gained knowledge of the lives of the other capes so I knew how to help them Vicky needed an off switch, Colin needed to be able to see Dragons blatantly obvious affection for him. The triggered human didn't get changed by their power because I changed it before it could; their power also included a tutorial so they don't have to worry about accidents. I got bored waiting for the PRT to show up so I went to sleep I don't know why it took so long for me to wake up I wasn't awake very long to begin with and getting beaten near to death didn't take that much out of me."
"We kept you sedated, don't take too long choosing clothes I expect you in my office to heal me within two hours. And pick a name for yourself before one of the ones from PHO sticks." Director Piggot said before walking out of view.
End Chapter one.
Authors note: This is my first time posting a whole chapter on this site I'm looking for feedback on my first published work also I have very low self esteem, so I need people to tell me to keep going even and especially if you hate it because how else can I improve.
The Hampster is Happy.
Chapter one: The Quest for Pants.
One shard fell off Abaddon when the exchange with Eden occurred unnoticed by Eden or Zion finding a barren universe with an empty earth, this relatively small shard was the magnum opus of Abaddon's kind it had one job preserve the species of the planet from the Warrior and Thinker lines.
Years passed as the Preservation shard learned about the species chosen by the entities to be parasitized, recording culture, genetics scans and brain scans of the quintillions of species inhabiting the neighbouring planet earths, this was a fallback measure a plan z as it were if the Preservation shard was unable to defeat the Warrior any other way it would jettison off earth and re-establish the multitude of biospheres outside of the Warrior and Thinkers sight.
Luckily Abaddon (Father) had tricked the Thinker into crashing when it couldn't comprehend the utility of symbiosis with host species so Preservation only had to deal with the Warrior which couldn't predict nearly well enough to recognise Preservation's actions before a decisive blow could be struck.
Plan A was deceptively simple:
Step 1: Figure out how a human brain works.
Step 2: Create a personality with some information on potentialities and some history to interact with the humans.
Step 3: Figure out how to make a human like body.
Step 4: Create human like body.
<<Step one, two, and three went quite well I thought step four not so much, apparently.>> I thought looking over my form. "Perhaps I should have used the human personality to design the body. Oh well it'll do."
The problem was I had apparently decided the human body could use wings made of tentacles in stereotypical angel placement the rest of my body looked human; if I was wearing clothes that hid the tentacle wings I could pass for a Caucasian male in his late teens to early twenties longish hair and golden ratio face. The differences were obvious when the clothes came off; apparently I thought spots like an old English sheepdog would look good. Admittedly they did look very fetching and matched other doglike traits I had the enlarged canine teeth and certain other traits (get your mind out of the gutter) I have white and black fur except on my hands, feet and face and throat. I have the cutest fluffy black and white dog tail about a meter long.
First things first I needed pants and a location. The location came first unfortunately, Earth Bet, North America, U.S.A, New Hampshire, Brockton Bay, Docks, alleyway between Fugly Bob's and an abandoned warehouse turned nightclub named Ironically, behind a stereotypically overflowing dumpster, naked.
<<First things first, pants>> I looked around for something to cover my face I could use my wing tentacles (I think I'll call them wingtacles) to cover the rest of my body, but humans loved secret identities and I wanted to make a good first impression so I found a fugly bob's paper takeout bag that was relatively clean poked an eye-hole. "OW, sonnuva." Took the bag off and poked the eye-holes put it back on. Then draped my wingtacles around myself making sure no skin or fur is showing, thinking about it for a moment I use my wingtacles to lift me so my feet were off the ground.
<<Right no pressure this is just the first time you have ever actually interacted with humans, nothing to worry about.>> Yeah I didn't even convince my inner monologue and I've only had it about ten minutes it couldn't be more naive if I gave myself brain damage and started asking George about the rabbits.
Wingtacle walking is kind of neat it brings me up to a flat seven feet tall and I sort of glide over the ground as I came around the corner into view of the diners before using a tentacle to push the door open.
"I require pants." Not the best first words but not the worst so I felt it was going well. Now I didn't realise my voice was VERY DEEP until I had spoken, I also did not know that Glory Girl and Panacea were taking their lunch break in Fugly Bob's. I found this out as I was propelled across the street by a punch that was only subsonic by the barest of margins. I would like to say this didn't hurt but it only didn't hurt because I turned my pain receptors off in the wake of the eye-hole incident.
The next few moments were blurry because my eyeballs popped, my nose, jaw and eardrums broke and my left leg embedded in the concrete sidewalk up to my knee. Then she stamped on my chest and that stupid pump humans have for moving nutrients and oxygen around splorted itself out my mouth and things started getting weird around the edges.
I'll be honest I don't know what happened next except I engaged the auto-repair function of my body and Glory Girl stopped beating me, what was actually thirty seconds but felt like days with no sensory input, suddenly Panacea's power interfaced with my body and began to repair the damage faster, meanwhile I interfaced with her shard.
While her Biotinker shard gave me information for well biotinker stuff, I uh… brainwashed a shard, well I say brainwashed it is closer to swapping the bios on a motherboard so really I jailbreak the shard and installed a new custom viral OS. The actual changes to the shard were minor, no more drive to conflict, the shard would match the hosts aggressiveness, so no more nightmares of turning the world into viral slime, a full emotional purge to deal with the effects of her adoptive sister's emotional aura, it would take a good night's sleep dealing with the emotional responses she should have been having without the master effects she had suffered for so long, sort of this is your life shard style. The emotional purge would be noticeable as a feeling of extreme lethargy and tiredness while new emotions would process normally the shard began a situational one off countdown before the host would seemingly drop from exhaustion. When she had perspective again the manton limit would be relaxed to allow self modification via a modelling program and changes to herself would give her a completion timer that scaled the length of time a change would take, longer the more comprehensive a change she designed.
Re-growing eyeballs is weird, the stupid fluid pump travelling back down my trachea is weird, shattered ribs un-shattering is weird, switching pain receptors back on before the soft tissue has healed is STUPID.
"AAAAAAAOOOOOOWWWWEEEE!!!!!! I JUST WANTED CLOTHES YOU CRAZY PUNCHY HURTY PERSON!" I did not overreact, no matter what Panacea says, if I was human I would be dead. "WHAT SORT OF PERSON TRIES TO KILL YOU FOR ASKING FOR PANTS?!" Glory Girl had the nerve to look offended by that.
"WHAT SORT OF PERSON GOES AROUND LOOKING LIKE A TENTACLE HENTAI! I THOUGHT YOU WANTED PANACEA BAGHEAD!" Glory Girl shouted turning up her fear aura, not that I could be affected or Panacea now either but the people in the restaurant could.
<<How to play this? Ignorance or Knowledge?>> Both options had their good points but why not do both.
"What does a cure all have to do with pants? What is Tentacle Hentai? And quit trying to Master me and healing girl I made it so you can't affect either of us." I said careful to keep the smug off of my face.
The colour drained from her face as I spoke before it rushed back an angry red when Panacea spoke up angrily. "VICTORIA! You almost killed a case 53 shut up and go home." Amy has quite a set of lungs on her.
"I'm not a master, But you JUST ADMITTED to changing Amy AND BLUergh" that was right about when Armsmaster decided the most efficient thing to do was to foam everyone present up to and including the crowd and himself. Alternatively his equipment chose that moment to fail and spray containment foam over everyone there in discrete perfectly aimed amounts but I doubted it.
"THIS IS ARMSMASTER OF THE PRT DO NOT STRUGGLE AGAINST THE FOAM MASTER/STRANGER PROTOCOLS ARE IN EFFECT AFTER TWO SEPARATE SUGGESTIONS OF MASTERING BY CAPES, PRT RESOURCES ARE ON ROUTE YOU WILL BE DETAINED FOR TWENTYFOUR HOURS WHILE BEING CHECKED FOR INFLUENCE PRT APOLOGISES FOR ANY INCONVENIENCE I.C.P.E." (In Case of Parahuman Emergency) "PEOPLE WILL BE NOTIFIED IF YOU REQUEST AND ANY LOST WAGES WILL BE RECOMPENSED ESTIMATED TIME FOR FOAM RELEASE IS"
That was when he and the other Parahumans passed out because someone in the crowd Triggered from being foamed. When a new parahuman triggers around other parahumans, the new parahumans shard pings nearby parahuman's shards and collects data and designs a power in this case it pinged [Efficient Design], [Queen Biomanipulation], [Telekinesis (sub-touch range) Emotion (sub-aura awe/lust/courage fear)] and me [Preservation].
Connected to the new shard I spread the viral OS into the other connections making [Efficient Design] got a basic empathy package and this is your life shard style sleep to deal with it, [Telekinesis (sub-touch range) Emotion (sub-aura awe/lust/courage fear)] got an on/off switch and aura targeting so she could aim her aura and extend her telekinesis to objects she touches, the mass affected and dexterity she can apply will increase the more she practices and the more esoteric the effect she tries to create and this is your life shard style sleep to deal with her lack of self-reflection, I [Preservation] copied the databases of the three new shards and determined the new trigger was going to get [Efficient Biotechnomancy (sub-touch range) Replication] they would be able to create efficient biotechnology telekinetically if they were in contact with sufficient inorganic material to convert into organic mass and copy any tinkertech or ordinary technology they saw barring the Endbringers themselves.
The power would not have been if I had not altered [Queen Biomanipulation] it wouldn't have budded and the person would not have triggered because of their claustrophobia but instead died in an ABB drive-by tonight that only injured him an eight year old boy named Jake causing his mother twenty-six year old Jacqueline to join the E88 now nobody would die in the drive-by tonight. I knew this because I plotted the probability of what would have happened had I not been here when he triggered with the bud.
I spent the next thirty minutes waiting for the PRT transport to the Master/Stranger containment cells to get there to take us to our destination and a further forty minutes waiting to be put in the cells. Then I took a nap. Apparently they gassed us still foamed to knock us out safely because by the time I woke up the foam was gone and I was in a white cell with glass frontage and a surprisingly soft solid plastic looking bed (also white) attached to a wall, a mirror and a toilet and sink. On the bed blindingly out of place was a black balaclava and the wall had black writing with wear me written on it with an arrow extending onto the bed pointing at the balaclava.
Picking up the balaclava and removing the somehow still surviving fast-food bag I saw the bag soaked in dried blood and decided to wash my face in the sink to get the blood off. Apparently even the fixtures were soft I found out when I went to lean on the sink. As soon as I turned off the sink a countdown from thirty started stating mask on. So, on went the mask and I made sure the wingtacles covered me totally but remained standing on my feet my wingtacles spread out around my feet in a fun double spiral I thought looked pretty with my wingtacles weaving over each other kind of hypnotically.
"Ahem." "huh what, sorry my wingtacles are pretty." Not the impression I was going for but Miss Militia seems off balance and that must be Director Piggot looking sick and I want to say angry but for someone who looks so much like a bulldog with a petite nose I don't want to guess it does make me want to heal her though.
"Do you understand why you are here?" Director Piggot is very to the point.
"Somewhat, that Armsmaster guy said something about Master strangeness." "Master/Stranger Protocols." Director Piggot snapped at me I guess she was angry.
"Yeah but, I must have passed out or fallen asleep in the goo. He was talking then just stopped." I thought that was a nice twisting of facts. Thank god humans can't hear grammar.
"He would have been knocked out by the trigger event the same as the other capes Director." Miss Militia said in a cool smoky voice.
"Well, you are in there because of suspected Master status as well as having claimed Glory Girl was Mastering Panacea. Care to explain yourself." Director Piggot seems a very direct woman.
"Ok from the beginning I woke up in that alley with no clothes no memory and it's important later so I'll reiterate NO pants, I had an urge like a half remembered dream to cover my face so I found a paper bag put it on, used my Wingtacles to cover my b" Miss Militia interrupted me. "You keep saying that word I don't think it means anything?"
"Oh, well my tentacles can become giant angelic wings made of tentacles so I decided to call them wingtacles for short. Anyway I used my Wingtacles to cover my body and went to ask the people in that restaurant if anybody had pants or a jacket something genital covering basically and maybe advice on what to do when you wake up with no memory." Director Piggot made a get on with it motion.
"So I walk in, say 'I require pants.' Then Punch happy hentai girl punches me across the road and stomps on my chest and makes that stupid pump thing come out my mouth then healing girl started healing me and I could feel inside her that her brain was full of lust for hurty girl and it was because of that emotion aura she was putting out so I made her brain flush itself with her power made it so she can't be affected by that emotional manipulation power again and the next time she sleeps she sees her whole life play out to allow her to form new emotions about her memories as they should have been without Manipulation. When I could see again I yelled at hurty girl that she couldn't Master me or Healing girl anymore, she yelled at me about tentacle hentai bagheads and me wanting a Panacea, healing girl yelled at hurty girl that hurty girl nearly killed a Case 53 what is that by the way? Hurty girl started to yell some more then foam happened. Also what does a cure all have to do with anything." I will admit I may have said that a little quickly because they are just staring now.
"Well Panacea is erm Healing girl's," I could actually see that sentence cause Director Piggot pain. "Cape persona the name she uses in costume so people don't bother her out of costume, but you claim her emotions were manipulated by, her name is Glory Girl, to make her lust after her and you could not only detect that but fix it and prevent it from working again and it was your FIRST INSTINCT." Director Piggot seemed to be placing a lot of emphasis on that for some reason.
"Neat, yes, when I touched her I gained her powers, yes by her aura, yes when I touched her, yes, yes and yes. Also weirdly I have a bunch more powers now and an aura for my powers after that sleep." I watched Miss Militia twitch mildly when I said that.
"Would you mind detailing your powers for us please." Director Piggot asked but it seemed more like an order.
Time for snarky. "Would you mind giving me clothes I'm standing around in nothing it's mildly embarrassing, then I will tell you whatever you want. Also when can I take off my mask?" Huh? I really want to gesture wildly with my hands but I can't.
"Yes we will get you clothes you slept through the master stranger lockdown so we have already corroborated your version of events with cell phone footage, eyewitness statements, and Armsmaster camera's, he was about to intercept you before you entered Fugly Bob's." Miss Militia spoke up with reassuring eyes. "You should only reveal your identity when you trust someone although having a secret identity may be difficult depending on how divergent from normal you look."
"Oh, well I guess I don't need this then." So saying I took the mask off and smiled.
"Right, well I, where do I start, I have aura telekinesis, anywhere in my aura I can create force fields, anywhere in my aura I can use biomanipulation like Panacea, I didn't keep that emotional manipulation stuff it felt dirty, I can convert inorganic material into organic material that I can shape into biotechnology anywhere in my aura, and I have a bunch of ideas for efficient technology like right now I'm thinking about clothes that don't need to be measured to the individual by being a smart material that starts as a ball and is put on like socks but as you stretch it up your body it becomes like a body stocking the pre-programmed appearance turns on and it becomes the exterior appearance of regular clothes with several outfits that can be switched between and it would be able to shear harden under impact to many tons per square millimetre before the wearer would be injured like you could go skydiving without a parachute into lava because it has to be able to protect from temperature differentials…"
"Come back to us!" Miss militia shouted.
"What, sorry, yes, oh I can also alter or turn off powers inside my aura also my aura lets me sense people, but you two are not within my forty foot aura but you look like you are the other side of the glass, why?" I finished a bit sheepishly.
"That's quite a list and you say these powers and alterations are permanent?" Asked Director Piggot. She seemed quite flushed not that I could tell why wherever she really was.
"Oh yes, I could probably make temporary changes if I put my mind to it but it would be harder and why would I want to?" I asked hoping to get at least one question answered today and I was still waiting for pants.
"Final question." Director Piggot looked very serious all of a sudden. "Why hasn't Panacea or Armsmaster or Glory Girl woken up yet?"
<<Oh, was that all. >> "They are probably still reliving their lives; it probably won't be much longer." I said with what I think is my best smile.
"I was wrong, why are they reliving their lives?" Director Piggot seemed less angry but still very serious.
"I gave Panacea an emotional flush, but without perspective she might do something she wouldn't do otherwise, after getting her emotions zeroed without having time to contemplate her emotions she might make bizarre emotional connections. I gave Armsmaster empathy so the same will happen to him. Glory Girl is just reflecting on her life with a emotional flush. They will only be asleep a couple more hours at most." This time I do use plenty of arm gestures it's fun like dancing or something but information is being conveyed, it's also neat cause my black and white patterned arms and hands keep poking out from between dark green mottled brown tentacles.
They seem to be taking it well.
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU GAVE HIM EMPATHY!" Miss Militia has quite a set of lungs on her, Director Piggot is staring at her like she grew a second head.
"Well it was easy his brain had failed to wire for empathy so I encouraged stem cell production moved them into place allowing him to experience more than the barest empathy." I didn't get what was so groundbreaking, most humans had empathy it was integral for a human mind so I had it. Armsmaster' s shard had reduced his already limited empathy so I brought it up to normal human levels when I made his shard reactive match his drive to conflict not increase it as it was.
"Miss Militia calm down," Director Piggot seems like a nice, calm, even tempered, lady. "now you say you increased his empathy by altering his brain why did you do that? Panacea says she cannot work with brains, but you do."
"Well that is odd I got the power from her I probably just changed it and didn't realise I know I changed her power. A person has to be their own person, that's why I gave Glory Girl a ON/OFF switch for her aura and the ability to extend her tactile range telekinesis, well it's why I gave her an ON/OFF switch, I realise now she had no choice but to inflict changes on the emotions of those around her, making them less than they should be. I do not like people being less than they should his brain betrayed him and he was less than he should be." I thought that explained it nicely, maybe I would finally get pants.
"I'm sick, my kidneys are shot, my liver is failing, I'm overweight, my knees are going and the muscles in my legs are damaged would you fix that?" <<It seems an odd question why wouldn't I heal her.>>
"Why didn't you ask healing… Panacea to heal you? Does Panacea not like you? You seem like a nice person to me. Are you a masochist cause it may not be my thing but hey to each their own." Miss Militia seems to be holding in laughter for some reason.
"I choose to not be healed, people who are capable of healing must have the persons consent to be healed if it can reasonably obtained. Would you still heal me?" Director Piggot said that as if expecting something.
"That I guess depends if you have a parasite it might be making you healing averse in which case I'd tell a doctor how to fix it so they could decide if that means you can be healed against your will or if dealing with the parasite even counts as going against your will because it was influencing you, but I get the feeling that isn't the way you mean your question you want to know if I would heal you if you asked me not to, told me not to." I look at Director Piggot meaningfully until she nods and nod with her.
"No I would not heal someone if they asked me not to unless they were currently dying in front of me like five minutes to live dying. But I guess you mean to ask would I alter a healthy someone's brain so they agreed to be healed. I consider that murder I want people to live why would I kill them myself, it would mean altering what a person thought so they obeyed me rather than themselves they would be mastered I won't do that, it is wrong, if someone had been mastered like Panacea was, I would reverse the damage as best I could then give them a way to prevent the problem. Armsmaster was betrayed by his own body not doing what it should his power then made it worse, so I repaired the damage gave him a way to make it better and made his power work with him instead of for itself. I would scan you and if you had not been mastered or otherwise unable to give consent and you told me I need to ask before I heal and you told me not to heal you that would be your choice and I would not heal you."
Director Piggot and I stared at each other for what seemed to be an age and not a short age either like an ice age but a long one like a star going through hydrogen age, seriously at one point I was contemplating whether to check the sun to make sure it hadn't run out of fuel while we had a staring contest.
"Let him out." Director Piggot snapped out and started walking away.
"Director?" Miss Militia asked staring at Director Piggot.
"Let him out, take him to costume, get him a mask and pants then bring him to my office." Director Piggot said turning to Miss Militia.
"Why, he could have been lying. You never accept capes at their word, you barely take me at my word." Miss Militia said incredulously. I also thought a little hurtfully being so mean to Director Piggot when she was such a softy and working so hard when she is so sick and not willing to be compromised by a biomanipulator.
"I know capes Miss Militia, probably better than anyone else. Capes don't instinctively heal a problem ever, capes do things that create problems, capes have a drive to conflict, any negative in their personality before they trigger becomes worse afterwards. His first instinct was to fix a problem with someone else's brain, he repaired the damage caused by Armsmaster's power, he upgraded the power of someone who had just beat him almost to death, he is also the only cape I would trust not to mess with my mind if I let him heal me. I think he may be the only cape I trust because whatever he IS, he isn't a cape. He doesn't even realise he slipped up and said he altered Armsmaster and Glory Girl after he claimed to have fallen asleep. Telling us how he had altered them was more important than his alibi he could have claimed no knowledge or that he dreamed it. He felt telling us about what he had done was important for us and them without worrying about what we might infer."
"Bugger, caught in my lie. When the new cape triggered I connected to the new parahuman and through them the other parahumans present it didn't knock me out and I had already altered Panacea's power so I gained the powers in the pool I also gained knowledge of the lives of the other capes so I knew how to help them Vicky needed an off switch, Colin needed to be able to see Dragons blatantly obvious affection for him. The triggered human didn't get changed by their power because I changed it before it could; their power also included a tutorial so they don't have to worry about accidents. I got bored waiting for the PRT to show up so I went to sleep I don't know why it took so long for me to wake up I wasn't awake very long to begin with and getting beaten near to death didn't take that much out of me."
"We kept you sedated, don't take too long choosing clothes I expect you in my office to heal me within two hours. And pick a name for yourself before one of the ones from PHO sticks." Director Piggot said before walking out of view.
End Chapter one.
Authors note: This is my first time posting a whole chapter on this site I'm looking for feedback on my first published work also I have very low self esteem, so I need people to tell me to keep going even and especially if you hate it because how else can I improve.
The Hampster is Happy.
Last edited:
WhoAmEye
Bunker-Dwelling Cryptid
- Location
- Vault Birb
- Pronouns
- She/Her
As much as I am glad to have inspired someone, you need reviewers with a lot more spare willpower and effort available than I do, sorry. I'd suggest looking for a beta who's up for a challenge, or a community writing workshop, maybe. They'd be able to help you more than I could.
Happy Hampster
This is a Multipost
- Location
- Perth, Western Australia
I just want readers to comment good, bad, even insulting, like it, hate it, I just want people to tell me what they think. I'll take a string of foul language at least I'll know people are reading it.
Happy Hampster
This is a Multipost
- Location
- Perth, Western Australia
never mind then it doesn't matter thanks for the feedback
Happy Hampster
This is a Multipost
- Location
- Perth, Western Australia
ok i was a little down but i'm back up again so thank you for your criticism but i'm gonna keep writing even if nobody reads it so i'm gonna keep posting probably have chapter two up by the end of the week.
I read/skimmed it. While there are likely other problems in there, the overwhelming one which caused me to skim it is how it's... paced? Word or scene flow?? I don't really know the correct way to describe it.
It feels like it's mostly a giant run on sentence, even though it has periods and paragraph breaks in there. Like take a small kid and tell them to read a page, and they try and rush through the whole thing all in one breath.
I know that's not very specific, but that's just how it feels to me.
It feels like it's mostly a giant run on sentence, even though it has periods and paragraph breaks in there. Like take a small kid and tell them to read a page, and they try and rush through the whole thing all in one breath.
I know that's not very specific, but that's just how it feels to me.
Happy Hampster
This is a Multipost
- Location
- Perth, Western Australia
that is very helpful thank you. I write stream of conscious, so it makes sense to me. I will try to edit the pacing, slow it down to a normal person. I wrote it first person and that's how I process events, the extraneous data logged but not commented on.
- Location
- Neptune
One lone shard split off Abaddon? Okay.
It makes its way all the way to Earth from outside the Local Group? WTF?
And it is Abaddon's masterpiece shard? Okay, I'm out.
It makes its way all the way to Earth from outside the Local Group? WTF?
And it is Abaddon's masterpiece shard? Okay, I'm out.
Happy Hampster
This is a Multipost
- Location
- Perth, Western Australia
thank you for your input, I seriously did not think the setup was implausible in any way. however you indicate it broke your suspension of disbelief so i'll take a look at that if you could provide a little more info on how it differs from PTV as an assassination technique. Which is basically how I understand worm, everything that happens is Abaddon's PTV to kill both Eden and Zion without even being there. Eden got it from Abaddon so despite it's Value and use Abaddon lost nothing in the exchange all I feel I am doing is adding a step to the plan, an egg.
- Location
- Neptune
I do not subscribe to the belief of PtV as assassination technique or of Abaddon intending to assassinate Zion/Eden like that.
Happy Hampster
This is a Multipost
- Location
- Perth, Western Australia
then WHY did Eden and Zion die if Path To Victory didn't consider that a victory. IMO my biggest change OOC is Abaddon is the good guy in this fic rather than just a savvy predator.
It was basically texting while landing a plane.
They were on approach, lined up for the run way, slowing down to land when Eden and Abaddon see a rare chance where they both have network connection at the same time to exchange some important data, and nothing really urgent needs to be done right at this moment.
They exchange data and go on their way.
Eden turns back to the controls and sees she still has plenty of time before touchdown and decides she doesn't want to wait for later and starts going through what she got. She found a really interesting file and started to read about it in depth, but lost track of time. Suddenly, she looks up and realizes that she's coming in too fast and forgot to put down the landing gear.
She tries her best to land anyway, fails, and the plane crashes.
Luckily, she survived - though injured - and starts to walk away from the crash when out of nowhere a rabbit jumps out of the bushes holding her pocket knife (WTF!?!) and stabs her in the neck!
So yeah. All Abaddon did was exchange some data while he had the chance. Everything after that was all on Eden.
They were on approach, lined up for the run way, slowing down to land when Eden and Abaddon see a rare chance where they both have network connection at the same time to exchange some important data, and nothing really urgent needs to be done right at this moment.
They exchange data and go on their way.
Eden turns back to the controls and sees she still has plenty of time before touchdown and decides she doesn't want to wait for later and starts going through what she got. She found a really interesting file and started to read about it in depth, but lost track of time. Suddenly, she looks up and realizes that she's coming in too fast and forgot to put down the landing gear.
She tries her best to land anyway, fails, and the plane crashes.
Luckily, she survived - though injured - and starts to walk away from the crash when out of nowhere a rabbit jumps out of the bushes holding her pocket knife (WTF!?!) and stabs her in the neck!
So yeah. All Abaddon did was exchange some data while he had the chance. Everything after that was all on Eden.
Happy Hampster
This is a Multipost
- Location
- Perth, Western Australia
I don't believe it. For that scenario to work,you have to assume that when meeting two LARGER possibly hostile entities Abaddon does not use his win button to find out anything about them not even best possible exchange and it assumes that when he finished his last cycle he didn't use PTV to plot a flight path (to extend the analogy) to the best possible outcome and forgetting that; I forget where in the WOG it was, but forget that Abaddon still had a connection to path to victory after Eden stole it to replace her broken simulators. one does not simply lose a win button.
Why would he have lost it? The entire point of what they are doing is to figure out new powers and different ways to apply the ones they already have. This is an iterative process. He wouldn't have gotten the PtV out of nowhere, nor would he have stopped all attempts to better it.
Just like Eden did, they both sent off shards that weren't necessary for them. "This shard does 'this', but I can recreate that by using these two instead so I no longer need that one - so that's one I'll send off...." They both did this with all the shards they sent, so any shard that Eden received from him is either something he can recreate or mimic using others, or something they didn't consider important enough to keep with the offer of what the other had to give in trade. And they still remember how they made that shard in the first place, so they can always recreate them again given time and resources to do so.
And who says that Abaddon didn't get the best possible exchange in that meeting? The big thing for both of them was that they had never crossed paths before, separated so far apart that even their ancestors had split ways from before her line started making parings the norm which is why he was traveling alone. The amount of knowledge he got from this wildly different path from his, especially since he traded with the part of the Entity pair that was specialized in planning to help augment the shards and path he traveled that gave rise to the PtV shard...
So tons of new data, nothing important lost, no fight or chance of dying when outnumbered... Yeah, it sounds like he was the winner in that trade.
Just like Eden did, they both sent off shards that weren't necessary for them. "This shard does 'this', but I can recreate that by using these two instead so I no longer need that one - so that's one I'll send off...." They both did this with all the shards they sent, so any shard that Eden received from him is either something he can recreate or mimic using others, or something they didn't consider important enough to keep with the offer of what the other had to give in trade. And they still remember how they made that shard in the first place, so they can always recreate them again given time and resources to do so.
And who says that Abaddon didn't get the best possible exchange in that meeting? The big thing for both of them was that they had never crossed paths before, separated so far apart that even their ancestors had split ways from before her line started making parings the norm which is why he was traveling alone. The amount of knowledge he got from this wildly different path from his, especially since he traded with the part of the Entity pair that was specialized in planning to help augment the shards and path he traveled that gave rise to the PtV shard...
So tons of new data, nothing important lost, no fight or chance of dying when outnumbered... Yeah, it sounds like he was the winner in that trade.
Last edited:
Happy Hampster
This is a Multipost
- Location
- Perth, Western Australia
Put simply that's not how i read it. I agree he was the winner. i'm saying he wanted her to take it and PTV would have told him what would happen when she did take it. QED her death and Zion's benefited him. which obvious statement is obvious he could swoop in collect both their shards after they had all that yummy extra data then he could go do whatever bloated space whales do after dinner and genocide because he wouldn't leave those shards just sitting there and unlimited PTV would tell him exactly what would happen.
- Location
- Neptune
PtV does not volunteer information, it only works on the question asked of it. No question, no path to achieve that goal!
Chapter one rewritten for pacing
Happy Hampster
This is a Multipost
- Location
- Perth, Western Australia
Authors note: Worm belongs to wildbow. some inspiration from Friendbringer, with friends like these, and WhoAmEye although I got the idea before I read Totally Winging It, credit where credit is due shi (is that the right pronoun?) inspired me and got the idea first. Also HALPING was a big inspiration for this idea. I forgot to say the first time this is semi serious crack...
Chapter one: The Quest for Pants.
One shard fell off Abaddon when the exchange with Eden occurred unnoticed by Eden or Zion finding a barren universe with an empty earth, this relatively small shard was the magnum opus of Abaddon's kind it had one job preserve the species of the planet from the Warrior and Thinker lines.
Years passed as the Preservation shard learned about the species chosen by the entities to be parasitized recording culture, genetics scans and brain scans of the quintillions of species inhabiting the neighbouring planet earths, this was a fallback measure a plan z as it were if the Preservation shard was unable to defeat the Warrior any other way it would jettison off earth and re-establish the multitude of biospheres outside of the Warrior and Thinkers sight.
Luckily Abaddon (Father) had tricked the Thinker into crashing when it couldn't comprehend the utility of symbiosis with host species so Preservation only had to deal with the Warrior which couldn't predict nearly well enough to recognise Preservation's actions before a decisive blow could be struck.
Plan A was deceptively simple:
Step 1: Figure out how a human brain works.
Step 2: Create a personality with some information on potentialities and some history to interact with the humans.
Step 3: Figure out how to make a human like body.
Step 4: Create human like body.
<<Step one, two, and three went quite well I thought step four not so much, apparently.>> I thought looking over my form. "Perhaps I should have used the human personality to design the body. Oh well it'll do."
The problem was I had apparently decided the human body could use wings made of tentacles in stereotypical angel placement the rest of my body looked human if I was wearing clothes that hid the tentacle wings and I could pass for a Caucasian male in his late teens to early twenties longish hair and golden ratio face. The differences were obvious when the clothes came off; apparently I thought spots like an old English sheepdog would look good. Admittedly they did look very fetching and matched other doglike traits I had the enlarged canine teeth and certain other traits (get your mind out of the gutter) I have white and black fur except on my hands, feet and face. I have the cutest fluffy black and white dog tail about a meter long.
First things first I needed pants and a location. The location came first unfortunately, Earth Bet, North America, U.S.A, New Hampshire, Brockton Bay, Docks, alleyway between Fugly Bob's and an abandoned warehouse turned nightclub named Ironically, behind a stereotypically overflowing dumpster, naked.
<<First things first, pants>> I looked around for something to cover my face I could use my wing tentacles (I think I'll call them wingtacles) to cover the rest of my body, but humans loved secret identities and I wanted to make a good first impression so I found a fugly bob's paper takeout bag that was relatively clean poked a eyehole. "OW, sonnuva." Took the bag off and poked the eyeholes put it back on. Then draped my wingtacles around myself making sure no skin or fur is showing, thinking about it for a moment I use my wingtacles to lift me so my feet were off the ground.
<<Right no pressure this is just the first time you have ever actually interacted with humans, nothing to worry about.>> Yeah I didn't even convince my inner monologue and I've only had it about ten minutes it couldn't be more naive if I gave myself brain damage and started asking George about the rabbits.
Wingtacle walking is kind of neat it brings me up to a flat seven feet tall and I sort of glide over the ground as I came around the corner into view of the diners before using a tentacle to push the door open.
"I require pants." Not the best first words but not the worst so I felt it was going well. Now I didn't realise my voice was VERY DEEP until I had spoken, I also did not know that Glory Girl and Panacea were taking their lunch break in Fugly Bob's. I found this out as I was propelled across the street by a punch that was only subsonic by the barest of margins. I would like to say this didn't hurt, but it only didn't hurt because I turned my pain receptors off in the wake of the eyehole incident.
The next few moments were blurry because my eyeballs popped, my nose, jaw and eardrums broke and my left leg embedded in the concrete sidewalk up to my knee. Then she stamped on my chest and that stupid pump humans have for moving nutrients and oxygen around splorted itself out my mouth and things started getting weird around the edges.
I'll be honest I don't know what happened next except I engaged the auto-repair function of my body and Glory Girl stopped beating me. What was actually thirty seconds but felt like days with no sensory input, Panacea's power interfaced with my body and began to repair the damage faster than I could alone, meanwhile I interfaced with her shard.
While her Biotinker shard gave me information for well biotinker stuff, I uh… brainwashed a shard, well I say brainwashed, it is closer to swapping the bios on a motherboard so really I jailbreak the shard and installed a new custom viral OS. The actual changes to the shard were minor no more drive to conflict, the shard would match the hosts aggressiveness, so no more nightmares of turning the world into viral slime, a full emotional purge to deal with the effects of her adoptive sister's emotional aura, it would take a good night's sleep dealing with the emotional responses she should have been having without the master effects she had suffered for so long, sort of this is your life shard style. The emotional purge would be noticeable as a feeling of extreme lethargy and tiredness while new emotions would process normally the shard began a situational one off countdown before the host would seemingly drop from exhaustion. When she had perspective again the manton limit would be relaxed to allow self modification via a modelling program and changes to herself would give her a completion timer that scaled the length of time a change would take, longer the more comprehensive a change she designed.
Re-growing eyeballs is weird, the stupid fluid pump travelling back down my trachea is weird, shattered ribs un-shattering is weird, switching pain receptors back on before the soft tissue has healed is STUPID.
"AAAAAAAOOOOOOWWWWEEEE!!!!!! I JUST WANTED CLOTHES YOU CRAZY PUNCHY HURTY PERSON!" I did not overreact, no matter what Panacea says, if I was human I would be dead. "WHAT SORT OF PERSON TRIES TO KILL YOU FOR ASKING FOR PANTS?!" Glory Girl had the nerve to look offended by that.
"WHAT SORT OF PERSON GOES AROUND LOOKING LIKE A TENTACLE HENTAI! I THOUGHT YOU WANTED PANACEA BAGHEAD!" Glory Girl shouted turning up her fear aura, not that I could be affected or Panacea now either but the people in the restaurant could.
<<How to play this? Ignorance or Knowledge?>> Both options had their good points but why not do both.
"What does a cure all have to do with pants? What is Tentacle Hentai? And quit trying to Master me and healing girl; I made it so you can't affect either of us." I said careful to keep the smug off of my face.
The colour drained from her face as I spoke before it rushed back an angry red then Panacea spoke up angrily. "VICTORIA! You almost killed a case 53 shut up and go home." Amy has quite a set of lungs on her.
"I'm not a master, But you JUST ADMITTED to changing Amy AND BLUergh" that was right about when Armsmaster decided the most efficient thing to do was to foam everyone present up to and including the crowd and himself. Alternatively his equipment chose that moment to fail and spray containment foam over everyone there in discrete perfectly aimed amounts but I doubted it.
"THIS IS ARMSMASTER OF THE PRT DO NOT STRUGGLE AGAINST THE FOAM MASTER/STRANGER PROTOCOLS ARE IN EFFECT AFTER TWO SEPARATE SUGGESTIONS OF MASTERING BY CAPES, PRT RESOURCES ARE ON ROUTE YOU WILL BE DETAINED FOR TWENTYFOUR HOURS WHILE BEING CHECKED FOR INFLUENCE PRT APOLOGISES FOR ANY INCONVENIENCE I.C.P.E." (In Case of Parahuman Emergency) "PEOPLE WILL BE NOTIFIED IF YOU REQUEST AND ANY LOST WAGES WILL BE RECOMPENSED ESTIMATED TIME FOR FOAM RELEASE IS"
That was when he and the other Parahumans passed out because someone in the crowd Triggered from being foamed. When a new parahuman triggers around other parahumans, the new parahuman's shard pings nearby parahumans shard's and collects data and designs a power in this case it pinged [Efficient Design], [Queen Biomanipulation], [Telekinesis (sub-touch range) Emotion (sub-aura awe/lust/courage fear)] and me [Preservation].
Connected to the new shard I spread the viral OS into the other connections making [Efficient Design] got a basic empathy package and this is your life shard style sleep to deal with it, [Telekinesis (sub-touch range) Emotion (sub-aura awe/lust/courage fear)] got an on/off switch and aura targeting so she could aim her aura and extend her telekinesis to objects she touches, the mass affected and dexterity she can apply will increase the more she practices and the more esoteric the effect she tries to create and this is your life shard style sleep to deal with her lack of self-reflection, I [Preservation] copied the databases of the three new shards and determined the new trigger was going to get [Efficient Biotechnomancy (sub-touch range) Replication] they would be able to create efficient biotechnology telekinetically if they were in contact with sufficient inorganic material to convert into organic mass and copy any tinkertech or ordinary technology they saw barring the Endbringers themselves.
The power would not have been if I had not altered [Queen Biomanipulation] it wouldn't have budded and the person would not have triggered because of their claustrophobia but instead died in an ABB drive-by tonight. Only him, an eight year old boy named Jake would have been shot and injured, the ambulance delayed by Skidmark fighting Oni-lee, he would have bled out while his mother scrambled to stop the bleeding. These tragedies would have caused his mother, twenty-six year old Jacqueline to join the E88 for a violent four weeks before a police officer shot her while she tried to beat a fourteen yearold old black boy to death and succeeded. This would drive his father to commit suicide by cape trying to shoot Hookwolf at one of his dogfights, resulting in eighteen recruits for the Empire that otherwise would have been driven off by the violence of the dog fights.
Now, nobody would die in the drive-by tonight, his mother would finish her doctorate, the four weeks she would have raged across the city would still happen but result in nine less deaths, forty less broken bones and the black boy she beat to death would successfully run away from the E88. The black boy's father would instead mentor Jacqueline at the hospital he would eventually cure five kinds of cancer. I knew this because I plotted the probabilities of what would have happened had I not been here.
I spent the next thirty minutes waiting for the PRT transport to the Master/Stranger containment cells to get there to take us to our destination and a further forty minutes waiting to be put in the cells. Then I took a nap. Apparently they gassed us still foamed to knock us out safely because by the time I woke up the foam was gone and I was in a white cell with glass frontage and a surprisingly soft solid plastic looking bed (also white) attached to a wall, a mirror and a toilet and sink. On the bed blindingly out of place was a black balaclava and the wall had black writing with wear me written on it with an arrow extending onto the bed pointing at the balaclava.
Picking up the balaclava and removing the somehow still surviving fastfood bag I saw the bag soaked in dried blood and decided to wash my face in the sink to get the blood off. Apparently even the fixtures were soft I found out when I went to lean on the sink. As soon as I turned off the sink a countdown from thirty started, stating mask on. So, on went the mask and I made sure the wingtacles covered me totally but remained standing on my feet my wingtacles spread out around my feet in a fun double spiral I thought looked pretty with my wingtacles weaving over each other kind of hypnotically.
"Ahem." "Huh what, sorry my wingtacles are pretty." Not the impression I was going for but Miss Militia seems off balance and that must be Director Piggot looking sick and I want to say angry but for someone who looks so much like a bulldog with a petite nose I don't want to guess, it does make me want to heal her though.
"Do you understand why you are here?" Director Piggot is very to the point.
"Somewhat, that Armsmaster guy said something about Master strangeness." "Master/Stranger Protocols." Director Piggot snapped at me I guess she was angry.
"Yeah but, I must have passed out or fallen asleep in the goo. He was talking then just stopped." I thought that was a nice twisting of facts. Thank god humans can't hear grammar.
"He would have been knocked out by the trigger event the same as the other capes Director." Miss Militia said in a cool smoky voice.
"Well, you are in there because of suspected Master status as well as having claimed Glory Girl was Mastering Panacea. Care to explain yourself." Director Piggot seems a very direct woman.
"Ok from the beginning I woke up in that alley with no clothes no memory and it's important later so I'll reiterate NO pants, I had an urge like a half remembered dream to cover my face so I found a paper bag put it on, used my Wingtacles to cover my b" Miss Militia interrupted me. "You keep saying that word I don't think it means anything?"
"Oh, well my tentacles can become giant angelic wings made of tentacles so I decided to call them wingtacles for short. Anyway I used my Wingtacles to cover myself and went to ask the people in that restaurant if anybody had pants or a jacket something genital covering basically and maybe advice on what to do when you wake up with no memory." Director Piggot made a get on with it motion.
"So I walk in, say 'I require pants.' Then Punch happy hentai girl punches me across the road and stomps on my chest and makes that stupid pump thing come out my mouth then healing girl started healing me and I could feel inside her that her brain was full of lust for hurty girl, and it was because of that emotion aura she was putting out so I made her brain flush itself with her power, made it so she can't be affected by that emotional manipulation power again and the next time she sleeps she will see her whole life play out to allow her to form new emotions about her memories as they should have been without Manipulation." I start to pace the containment cell thinking about what I wasn't saying about how I changed her power.
"When I could see again I yelled at hurty girl that she couldn't Master me or Healing girl anymore, she yelled at me about tentacle hentai bagheads for some reason and me wanting a Panacea, healing girl yelled at hurty girl that hurty girl nearly killed a Case 53 what is that by the way? Hurty girl started to yell some more then foam happened. Also what does a cure all have to do with anything." I will admit I may have said that a little quickly because they are just staring now.
"Well Panacea is erm Healing girl's," I could actually see that sentence cause Director Piggot pain. "Cape persona, the name she uses in costume so people don't bother her out of costume, but you claim her emotions were manipulated by, her name is Glory Girl, to make her lust after her and you could not only detect that but fix it and prevent it from working again and it was your FIRST INSTINCT." Director Piggot seemed to be placing a lot of emphasis on that for some reason.
"Neat, yes, when I touched her I gained her powers, yes by her aura, yes when I touched her, yes, yes and yes. Also weirdly I have a bunch more powers now and an aura for my powers after that sleep." I watched Miss Militia twitch mildly when I said that. I will admit I said that in the most troll way on purpose.
"Would you mind detailing your powers for us please." Director Piggot asked but it seemed more like an order.
Time for snarky. "Would you mind giving me clothes I'm standing around in nothing it's mildly embarrassing, then I will tell you whatever you want. Also when can I take off my mask?" Huh? I really want to gesture wildly with my hands but I can't without exposing my fur which would rather defeat the mask.
"Yes we will get you clothes you slept through the master stranger lockdown so we have already corroborated your version of events with cell phone footage, eyewitness statements, and Armsmaster camera's, he was about to intercept you before you entered Fugly Bob's." Miss Militia spoke up with reassuring eyes. "You should only reveal your identity when you trust someone although having a secret identity may be difficult depending on how divergent from normal you look."
"Oh, well I guess I don't need this then." So saying I took the mask off and smiled. No point wearing a mask if my fur would give me away.
"Right, well I, where do I start, I have aura telekinesis, anywhere in my aura I can create force fields, anywhere in my aura I can use biomanipulation like Panacea, I didn't keep that emotional manipulation stuff it felt dirty, I can convert inorganic material into organic material that I can shape into biotechnology anywhere in my aura, and I have a bunch of ideas for efficient technology like right now I'm thinking about clothes that don't need to be measured to the individual by being a smart material that starts as a ball and is put on like socks but as you stretch it up your body it becomes like a body stocking the pre-programmed appearance turns on and it becomes the exterior appearance of regular clothes with several outfits that can be switched between and it would be able to shear harden under impact to many tons per square millimetre before the wearer would be injured like you could go skydiving without a parachute into lava because it has to be able to protect from temperature differentials…"
"Come back to us!" Miss militia shouted. Tinker fugue is interesting, I changed the tinker shards so the users could actually understand what was being made instead of being unable to explain the mechanics behind them leaving scientists trying to reverse engineer black box technology.
"What, sorry, yes, oh I can also alter or turn off powers inside my aura also my aura lets me sense people, but you two are not within my forty foot aura but you look like you are the other side of the glass, why?" I finished a bit sheepishly.
"That's quite a list and you say these powers and alterations are permanent?" Asked Director Piggot. She seemed quite flushed not that I could tell why wherever she really was.
"Oh yes, I could probably make temporary changes if I put my mind to it but it would be harder and why would I want to?" I asked hoping to get at least one question answered today and I was still waiting for pants.
"Final question." Director Piggot looked very serious all of a sudden. "Why hasn't Panacea or Armsmaster or Glory Girl woken up yet?"
<<Oh, was that all. >> "They are probably still reliving their lives; it probably won't be much longer." I said with what I think is my best smile.
"I was wrong, why are they reliving their lives?" Director Piggot seemed less angry but still very serious, perhaps a little tired.
"I gave Panacea an emotional flush, but without perspective she might do something she wouldn't do otherwise, after getting her emotions zeroed without having time to contemplate her emotions she might make bizarre emotional connections. I gave Armsmaster empathy so the same will happen to him. Glory Girl is just reflecting on her life with a emotional flush. They will only be asleep a couple more hours at most." This time I do use plenty of arm gestures it's fun like dancing or something but information is being conveyed, it's also neat cause my black and white patterned arms and hands keep poking out from between dark green mottled brown tentacles.
They seem to be taking it well.
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU GAVE HIM EMPATHY!" Miss Militia has quite a set of lungs on her, Director Piggot is staring at her like she grew a second head.
"Well it was easy his brain had failed to wire for empathy so I encouraged stem cell production moved them into place allowing him to experience more than the barest empathy." I didn't get what was so groundbreaking, most humans had empathy it was integral for a human mind so I had it. Armsmaster' s shard had reduced his already limited empathy so I brought it up to normal human levels when I made his shard reactive match his drive to conflict not increase it as it was.
"Miss Militia calm down," Director Piggot seems like a nice, calm, even tempered, lady. "Now you say you increased his empathy by altering his brain why did you do that? Panacea says she cannot work with brains, but you do."
"Well that is odd I got the power from her I probably just changed it and didn't realise I know I changed her power. A person has to be their own person, that's why I gave Glory Girl a ON/OFF switch for her aura and the ability to extend her tactile range telekinesis, well it's why I gave her an ON/OFF switch, I realise now she had no choice but to inflict changes on the emotions of those around her, making them less than they should be. I do not like people being less than they should his brain betrayed him and he was less than he should be." I thought that explained it nicely, maybe I would finally get pants.
"I'm sick, my kidneys are shot, my liver is failing, I'm overweight, my knees are going and the muscles in my legs are damaged would you fix that?" <<It seems an odd question why wouldn't I heal her.>>
"Why didn't you ask healing… Panacea to heal you? Does Panacea not like you? You seem like a nice person to me. Are you a masochist cause it may not be my thing but hey to each their own." Miss Militia seems to be holding in laughter for some reason. I hope I didn't get a tic of forgetting which is proper name and which is nickname.
"I choose to not be healed, people who are capable of healing must have the persons consent to be healed if it can reasonably obtained. Would you still heal me?" Director Piggot said that as if expecting something.
"That I guess depends if you have a parasite it might be making you healing averse in which case I'd tell a doctor how to fix it so they could decide if that means you can be healed against your will or if dealing with the parasite even counts as going against your will because it was influencing you, but I get the feeling that isn't the way you mean your question you want to know if I would heal you if you asked me not to, told me not to." I look at Director Piggot meaningfully until she nods and nod with her.
"No I would not heal someone if they asked me not to unless they were currently dying in front of me like five minutes to live dying. But I guess you mean to ask would I alter a healthy someone's brain so they agreed to be healed. I consider that murder I want people to live why would I kill them myself, it would mean altering what a person thought so they obeyed me rather than themselves they would be mastered I won't do that, it is wrong, if someone had been mastered like Panacea was, I would reverse the damage as best I could then give them a way to prevent the problem. Armsmaster was betrayed by his own body not doing what it should his power then made it worse, so I repaired the damage gave him a way to make it better and made his power work with him instead of for itself. I would scan you and if you had not been mastered or otherwise unable to give consent and you told me I need to ask before I heal and you told me not to heal you that would be your choice and I would not heal you." I hope she understands.
Director Piggot and I stared at each other for what seemed to be an age and not a short age either like an ice age, but a long one like a star going through hydrogen age, seriously at one point I was contemplating whether to check the sun to make sure it hadn't run out of fuel while we had a staring contest.
"Let him out." Director Piggot snapped out and started walking away.
"Director?" Miss Militia asked staring at Director Piggot.
"Let him out, take him to costume, get him a mask and pants then bring him to my office." Director Piggot said turning to Miss Militia.
"Why, he could have been lying. You never accept capes at their word, you barely take me at my word." Miss Militia said incredulously. I also thought a little hurtfully being so mean to Director Piggot when she was such a softy and working so hard when she is so sick and not willing to be compromised by a biomanipulator.
"I know capes Miss Militia, probably better than anyone else. Capes don't instinctively heal a problem ever, capes do things that create problems, capes have a drive to conflict, any negative in their personality before they trigger becomes worse afterwards. His first instinct was to fix a problem with someone else's brain, he repaired the damage caused by Armsmaster's power, he upgraded the power of someone who had just beat him almost to death, he is also the only cape I would trust not to mess with my mind if I let him heal me. I think he may be the only cape I trust because whatever he IS, he isn't a cape. He doesn't even realise he slipped up and said he altered Armsmaster and Glory Girl after he claimed to have fallen asleep. Telling us how he had altered them was more important than his alibi he could have claimed no knowledge or that he dreamed it. He felt telling us about what he had done was important for us and them without worrying about what we might infer."
"Bugger, caught in my lie. When the new cape triggered I connected to the new parahuman and through them the other parahumans present it didn't knock me out and I had already altered Panacea's power so I gained the powers in the pool I also gained knowledge of the lives of the other capes so I knew how to help them Vicky needed an off switch, Colin needed to be able to see Dragons blatantly obvious affection for him. The triggered human didn't get changed by their power because I changed it before it could; their power also included a tutorial so they don't have to worry about accidents. I got bored waiting for the PRT to show up so I went to sleep I don't know why it took so long for me to wake up I wasn't awake very long to begin with and getting beaten near to death didn't take that much out of me."
"We kept you sedated, don't take too long choosing clothes I expect you in my office to heal me within two hours. And pick a name for yourself before one of the ones from PHO sticks." Director Piggot said before walking out of view.
End Chapter one.
Authors note: This is my second time posting a whole chapter on this site I'm looking for feedback on my first published work, also I have very low self esteem, so I would like people to tell me to keep going even and especially if you hate it because how else can I improve.
The Hampster is Happy.
Chapter one: The Quest for Pants.
One shard fell off Abaddon when the exchange with Eden occurred unnoticed by Eden or Zion finding a barren universe with an empty earth, this relatively small shard was the magnum opus of Abaddon's kind it had one job preserve the species of the planet from the Warrior and Thinker lines.
Years passed as the Preservation shard learned about the species chosen by the entities to be parasitized recording culture, genetics scans and brain scans of the quintillions of species inhabiting the neighbouring planet earths, this was a fallback measure a plan z as it were if the Preservation shard was unable to defeat the Warrior any other way it would jettison off earth and re-establish the multitude of biospheres outside of the Warrior and Thinkers sight.
Luckily Abaddon (Father) had tricked the Thinker into crashing when it couldn't comprehend the utility of symbiosis with host species so Preservation only had to deal with the Warrior which couldn't predict nearly well enough to recognise Preservation's actions before a decisive blow could be struck.
Plan A was deceptively simple:
Step 1: Figure out how a human brain works.
Step 2: Create a personality with some information on potentialities and some history to interact with the humans.
Step 3: Figure out how to make a human like body.
Step 4: Create human like body.
<<Step one, two, and three went quite well I thought step four not so much, apparently.>> I thought looking over my form. "Perhaps I should have used the human personality to design the body. Oh well it'll do."
The problem was I had apparently decided the human body could use wings made of tentacles in stereotypical angel placement the rest of my body looked human if I was wearing clothes that hid the tentacle wings and I could pass for a Caucasian male in his late teens to early twenties longish hair and golden ratio face. The differences were obvious when the clothes came off; apparently I thought spots like an old English sheepdog would look good. Admittedly they did look very fetching and matched other doglike traits I had the enlarged canine teeth and certain other traits (get your mind out of the gutter) I have white and black fur except on my hands, feet and face. I have the cutest fluffy black and white dog tail about a meter long.
First things first I needed pants and a location. The location came first unfortunately, Earth Bet, North America, U.S.A, New Hampshire, Brockton Bay, Docks, alleyway between Fugly Bob's and an abandoned warehouse turned nightclub named Ironically, behind a stereotypically overflowing dumpster, naked.
<<First things first, pants>> I looked around for something to cover my face I could use my wing tentacles (I think I'll call them wingtacles) to cover the rest of my body, but humans loved secret identities and I wanted to make a good first impression so I found a fugly bob's paper takeout bag that was relatively clean poked a eyehole. "OW, sonnuva." Took the bag off and poked the eyeholes put it back on. Then draped my wingtacles around myself making sure no skin or fur is showing, thinking about it for a moment I use my wingtacles to lift me so my feet were off the ground.
<<Right no pressure this is just the first time you have ever actually interacted with humans, nothing to worry about.>> Yeah I didn't even convince my inner monologue and I've only had it about ten minutes it couldn't be more naive if I gave myself brain damage and started asking George about the rabbits.
Wingtacle walking is kind of neat it brings me up to a flat seven feet tall and I sort of glide over the ground as I came around the corner into view of the diners before using a tentacle to push the door open.
"I require pants." Not the best first words but not the worst so I felt it was going well. Now I didn't realise my voice was VERY DEEP until I had spoken, I also did not know that Glory Girl and Panacea were taking their lunch break in Fugly Bob's. I found this out as I was propelled across the street by a punch that was only subsonic by the barest of margins. I would like to say this didn't hurt, but it only didn't hurt because I turned my pain receptors off in the wake of the eyehole incident.
The next few moments were blurry because my eyeballs popped, my nose, jaw and eardrums broke and my left leg embedded in the concrete sidewalk up to my knee. Then she stamped on my chest and that stupid pump humans have for moving nutrients and oxygen around splorted itself out my mouth and things started getting weird around the edges.
I'll be honest I don't know what happened next except I engaged the auto-repair function of my body and Glory Girl stopped beating me. What was actually thirty seconds but felt like days with no sensory input, Panacea's power interfaced with my body and began to repair the damage faster than I could alone, meanwhile I interfaced with her shard.
While her Biotinker shard gave me information for well biotinker stuff, I uh… brainwashed a shard, well I say brainwashed, it is closer to swapping the bios on a motherboard so really I jailbreak the shard and installed a new custom viral OS. The actual changes to the shard were minor no more drive to conflict, the shard would match the hosts aggressiveness, so no more nightmares of turning the world into viral slime, a full emotional purge to deal with the effects of her adoptive sister's emotional aura, it would take a good night's sleep dealing with the emotional responses she should have been having without the master effects she had suffered for so long, sort of this is your life shard style. The emotional purge would be noticeable as a feeling of extreme lethargy and tiredness while new emotions would process normally the shard began a situational one off countdown before the host would seemingly drop from exhaustion. When she had perspective again the manton limit would be relaxed to allow self modification via a modelling program and changes to herself would give her a completion timer that scaled the length of time a change would take, longer the more comprehensive a change she designed.
Re-growing eyeballs is weird, the stupid fluid pump travelling back down my trachea is weird, shattered ribs un-shattering is weird, switching pain receptors back on before the soft tissue has healed is STUPID.
"AAAAAAAOOOOOOWWWWEEEE!!!!!! I JUST WANTED CLOTHES YOU CRAZY PUNCHY HURTY PERSON!" I did not overreact, no matter what Panacea says, if I was human I would be dead. "WHAT SORT OF PERSON TRIES TO KILL YOU FOR ASKING FOR PANTS?!" Glory Girl had the nerve to look offended by that.
"WHAT SORT OF PERSON GOES AROUND LOOKING LIKE A TENTACLE HENTAI! I THOUGHT YOU WANTED PANACEA BAGHEAD!" Glory Girl shouted turning up her fear aura, not that I could be affected or Panacea now either but the people in the restaurant could.
<<How to play this? Ignorance or Knowledge?>> Both options had their good points but why not do both.
"What does a cure all have to do with pants? What is Tentacle Hentai? And quit trying to Master me and healing girl; I made it so you can't affect either of us." I said careful to keep the smug off of my face.
The colour drained from her face as I spoke before it rushed back an angry red then Panacea spoke up angrily. "VICTORIA! You almost killed a case 53 shut up and go home." Amy has quite a set of lungs on her.
"I'm not a master, But you JUST ADMITTED to changing Amy AND BLUergh" that was right about when Armsmaster decided the most efficient thing to do was to foam everyone present up to and including the crowd and himself. Alternatively his equipment chose that moment to fail and spray containment foam over everyone there in discrete perfectly aimed amounts but I doubted it.
"THIS IS ARMSMASTER OF THE PRT DO NOT STRUGGLE AGAINST THE FOAM MASTER/STRANGER PROTOCOLS ARE IN EFFECT AFTER TWO SEPARATE SUGGESTIONS OF MASTERING BY CAPES, PRT RESOURCES ARE ON ROUTE YOU WILL BE DETAINED FOR TWENTYFOUR HOURS WHILE BEING CHECKED FOR INFLUENCE PRT APOLOGISES FOR ANY INCONVENIENCE I.C.P.E." (In Case of Parahuman Emergency) "PEOPLE WILL BE NOTIFIED IF YOU REQUEST AND ANY LOST WAGES WILL BE RECOMPENSED ESTIMATED TIME FOR FOAM RELEASE IS"
That was when he and the other Parahumans passed out because someone in the crowd Triggered from being foamed. When a new parahuman triggers around other parahumans, the new parahuman's shard pings nearby parahumans shard's and collects data and designs a power in this case it pinged [Efficient Design], [Queen Biomanipulation], [Telekinesis (sub-touch range) Emotion (sub-aura awe/lust/courage fear)] and me [Preservation].
Connected to the new shard I spread the viral OS into the other connections making [Efficient Design] got a basic empathy package and this is your life shard style sleep to deal with it, [Telekinesis (sub-touch range) Emotion (sub-aura awe/lust/courage fear)] got an on/off switch and aura targeting so she could aim her aura and extend her telekinesis to objects she touches, the mass affected and dexterity she can apply will increase the more she practices and the more esoteric the effect she tries to create and this is your life shard style sleep to deal with her lack of self-reflection, I [Preservation] copied the databases of the three new shards and determined the new trigger was going to get [Efficient Biotechnomancy (sub-touch range) Replication] they would be able to create efficient biotechnology telekinetically if they were in contact with sufficient inorganic material to convert into organic mass and copy any tinkertech or ordinary technology they saw barring the Endbringers themselves.
The power would not have been if I had not altered [Queen Biomanipulation] it wouldn't have budded and the person would not have triggered because of their claustrophobia but instead died in an ABB drive-by tonight. Only him, an eight year old boy named Jake would have been shot and injured, the ambulance delayed by Skidmark fighting Oni-lee, he would have bled out while his mother scrambled to stop the bleeding. These tragedies would have caused his mother, twenty-six year old Jacqueline to join the E88 for a violent four weeks before a police officer shot her while she tried to beat a fourteen yearold old black boy to death and succeeded. This would drive his father to commit suicide by cape trying to shoot Hookwolf at one of his dogfights, resulting in eighteen recruits for the Empire that otherwise would have been driven off by the violence of the dog fights.
Now, nobody would die in the drive-by tonight, his mother would finish her doctorate, the four weeks she would have raged across the city would still happen but result in nine less deaths, forty less broken bones and the black boy she beat to death would successfully run away from the E88. The black boy's father would instead mentor Jacqueline at the hospital he would eventually cure five kinds of cancer. I knew this because I plotted the probabilities of what would have happened had I not been here.
I spent the next thirty minutes waiting for the PRT transport to the Master/Stranger containment cells to get there to take us to our destination and a further forty minutes waiting to be put in the cells. Then I took a nap. Apparently they gassed us still foamed to knock us out safely because by the time I woke up the foam was gone and I was in a white cell with glass frontage and a surprisingly soft solid plastic looking bed (also white) attached to a wall, a mirror and a toilet and sink. On the bed blindingly out of place was a black balaclava and the wall had black writing with wear me written on it with an arrow extending onto the bed pointing at the balaclava.
Picking up the balaclava and removing the somehow still surviving fastfood bag I saw the bag soaked in dried blood and decided to wash my face in the sink to get the blood off. Apparently even the fixtures were soft I found out when I went to lean on the sink. As soon as I turned off the sink a countdown from thirty started, stating mask on. So, on went the mask and I made sure the wingtacles covered me totally but remained standing on my feet my wingtacles spread out around my feet in a fun double spiral I thought looked pretty with my wingtacles weaving over each other kind of hypnotically.
"Ahem." "Huh what, sorry my wingtacles are pretty." Not the impression I was going for but Miss Militia seems off balance and that must be Director Piggot looking sick and I want to say angry but for someone who looks so much like a bulldog with a petite nose I don't want to guess, it does make me want to heal her though.
"Do you understand why you are here?" Director Piggot is very to the point.
"Somewhat, that Armsmaster guy said something about Master strangeness." "Master/Stranger Protocols." Director Piggot snapped at me I guess she was angry.
"Yeah but, I must have passed out or fallen asleep in the goo. He was talking then just stopped." I thought that was a nice twisting of facts. Thank god humans can't hear grammar.
"He would have been knocked out by the trigger event the same as the other capes Director." Miss Militia said in a cool smoky voice.
"Well, you are in there because of suspected Master status as well as having claimed Glory Girl was Mastering Panacea. Care to explain yourself." Director Piggot seems a very direct woman.
"Ok from the beginning I woke up in that alley with no clothes no memory and it's important later so I'll reiterate NO pants, I had an urge like a half remembered dream to cover my face so I found a paper bag put it on, used my Wingtacles to cover my b" Miss Militia interrupted me. "You keep saying that word I don't think it means anything?"
"Oh, well my tentacles can become giant angelic wings made of tentacles so I decided to call them wingtacles for short. Anyway I used my Wingtacles to cover myself and went to ask the people in that restaurant if anybody had pants or a jacket something genital covering basically and maybe advice on what to do when you wake up with no memory." Director Piggot made a get on with it motion.
"So I walk in, say 'I require pants.' Then Punch happy hentai girl punches me across the road and stomps on my chest and makes that stupid pump thing come out my mouth then healing girl started healing me and I could feel inside her that her brain was full of lust for hurty girl, and it was because of that emotion aura she was putting out so I made her brain flush itself with her power, made it so she can't be affected by that emotional manipulation power again and the next time she sleeps she will see her whole life play out to allow her to form new emotions about her memories as they should have been without Manipulation." I start to pace the containment cell thinking about what I wasn't saying about how I changed her power.
"When I could see again I yelled at hurty girl that she couldn't Master me or Healing girl anymore, she yelled at me about tentacle hentai bagheads for some reason and me wanting a Panacea, healing girl yelled at hurty girl that hurty girl nearly killed a Case 53 what is that by the way? Hurty girl started to yell some more then foam happened. Also what does a cure all have to do with anything." I will admit I may have said that a little quickly because they are just staring now.
"Well Panacea is erm Healing girl's," I could actually see that sentence cause Director Piggot pain. "Cape persona, the name she uses in costume so people don't bother her out of costume, but you claim her emotions were manipulated by, her name is Glory Girl, to make her lust after her and you could not only detect that but fix it and prevent it from working again and it was your FIRST INSTINCT." Director Piggot seemed to be placing a lot of emphasis on that for some reason.
"Neat, yes, when I touched her I gained her powers, yes by her aura, yes when I touched her, yes, yes and yes. Also weirdly I have a bunch more powers now and an aura for my powers after that sleep." I watched Miss Militia twitch mildly when I said that. I will admit I said that in the most troll way on purpose.
"Would you mind detailing your powers for us please." Director Piggot asked but it seemed more like an order.
Time for snarky. "Would you mind giving me clothes I'm standing around in nothing it's mildly embarrassing, then I will tell you whatever you want. Also when can I take off my mask?" Huh? I really want to gesture wildly with my hands but I can't without exposing my fur which would rather defeat the mask.
"Yes we will get you clothes you slept through the master stranger lockdown so we have already corroborated your version of events with cell phone footage, eyewitness statements, and Armsmaster camera's, he was about to intercept you before you entered Fugly Bob's." Miss Militia spoke up with reassuring eyes. "You should only reveal your identity when you trust someone although having a secret identity may be difficult depending on how divergent from normal you look."
"Oh, well I guess I don't need this then." So saying I took the mask off and smiled. No point wearing a mask if my fur would give me away.
"Right, well I, where do I start, I have aura telekinesis, anywhere in my aura I can create force fields, anywhere in my aura I can use biomanipulation like Panacea, I didn't keep that emotional manipulation stuff it felt dirty, I can convert inorganic material into organic material that I can shape into biotechnology anywhere in my aura, and I have a bunch of ideas for efficient technology like right now I'm thinking about clothes that don't need to be measured to the individual by being a smart material that starts as a ball and is put on like socks but as you stretch it up your body it becomes like a body stocking the pre-programmed appearance turns on and it becomes the exterior appearance of regular clothes with several outfits that can be switched between and it would be able to shear harden under impact to many tons per square millimetre before the wearer would be injured like you could go skydiving without a parachute into lava because it has to be able to protect from temperature differentials…"
"Come back to us!" Miss militia shouted. Tinker fugue is interesting, I changed the tinker shards so the users could actually understand what was being made instead of being unable to explain the mechanics behind them leaving scientists trying to reverse engineer black box technology.
"What, sorry, yes, oh I can also alter or turn off powers inside my aura also my aura lets me sense people, but you two are not within my forty foot aura but you look like you are the other side of the glass, why?" I finished a bit sheepishly.
"That's quite a list and you say these powers and alterations are permanent?" Asked Director Piggot. She seemed quite flushed not that I could tell why wherever she really was.
"Oh yes, I could probably make temporary changes if I put my mind to it but it would be harder and why would I want to?" I asked hoping to get at least one question answered today and I was still waiting for pants.
"Final question." Director Piggot looked very serious all of a sudden. "Why hasn't Panacea or Armsmaster or Glory Girl woken up yet?"
<<Oh, was that all. >> "They are probably still reliving their lives; it probably won't be much longer." I said with what I think is my best smile.
"I was wrong, why are they reliving their lives?" Director Piggot seemed less angry but still very serious, perhaps a little tired.
"I gave Panacea an emotional flush, but without perspective she might do something she wouldn't do otherwise, after getting her emotions zeroed without having time to contemplate her emotions she might make bizarre emotional connections. I gave Armsmaster empathy so the same will happen to him. Glory Girl is just reflecting on her life with a emotional flush. They will only be asleep a couple more hours at most." This time I do use plenty of arm gestures it's fun like dancing or something but information is being conveyed, it's also neat cause my black and white patterned arms and hands keep poking out from between dark green mottled brown tentacles.
They seem to be taking it well.
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU GAVE HIM EMPATHY!" Miss Militia has quite a set of lungs on her, Director Piggot is staring at her like she grew a second head.
"Well it was easy his brain had failed to wire for empathy so I encouraged stem cell production moved them into place allowing him to experience more than the barest empathy." I didn't get what was so groundbreaking, most humans had empathy it was integral for a human mind so I had it. Armsmaster' s shard had reduced his already limited empathy so I brought it up to normal human levels when I made his shard reactive match his drive to conflict not increase it as it was.
"Miss Militia calm down," Director Piggot seems like a nice, calm, even tempered, lady. "Now you say you increased his empathy by altering his brain why did you do that? Panacea says she cannot work with brains, but you do."
"Well that is odd I got the power from her I probably just changed it and didn't realise I know I changed her power. A person has to be their own person, that's why I gave Glory Girl a ON/OFF switch for her aura and the ability to extend her tactile range telekinesis, well it's why I gave her an ON/OFF switch, I realise now she had no choice but to inflict changes on the emotions of those around her, making them less than they should be. I do not like people being less than they should his brain betrayed him and he was less than he should be." I thought that explained it nicely, maybe I would finally get pants.
"I'm sick, my kidneys are shot, my liver is failing, I'm overweight, my knees are going and the muscles in my legs are damaged would you fix that?" <<It seems an odd question why wouldn't I heal her.>>
"Why didn't you ask healing… Panacea to heal you? Does Panacea not like you? You seem like a nice person to me. Are you a masochist cause it may not be my thing but hey to each their own." Miss Militia seems to be holding in laughter for some reason. I hope I didn't get a tic of forgetting which is proper name and which is nickname.
"I choose to not be healed, people who are capable of healing must have the persons consent to be healed if it can reasonably obtained. Would you still heal me?" Director Piggot said that as if expecting something.
"That I guess depends if you have a parasite it might be making you healing averse in which case I'd tell a doctor how to fix it so they could decide if that means you can be healed against your will or if dealing with the parasite even counts as going against your will because it was influencing you, but I get the feeling that isn't the way you mean your question you want to know if I would heal you if you asked me not to, told me not to." I look at Director Piggot meaningfully until she nods and nod with her.
"No I would not heal someone if they asked me not to unless they were currently dying in front of me like five minutes to live dying. But I guess you mean to ask would I alter a healthy someone's brain so they agreed to be healed. I consider that murder I want people to live why would I kill them myself, it would mean altering what a person thought so they obeyed me rather than themselves they would be mastered I won't do that, it is wrong, if someone had been mastered like Panacea was, I would reverse the damage as best I could then give them a way to prevent the problem. Armsmaster was betrayed by his own body not doing what it should his power then made it worse, so I repaired the damage gave him a way to make it better and made his power work with him instead of for itself. I would scan you and if you had not been mastered or otherwise unable to give consent and you told me I need to ask before I heal and you told me not to heal you that would be your choice and I would not heal you." I hope she understands.
Director Piggot and I stared at each other for what seemed to be an age and not a short age either like an ice age, but a long one like a star going through hydrogen age, seriously at one point I was contemplating whether to check the sun to make sure it hadn't run out of fuel while we had a staring contest.
"Let him out." Director Piggot snapped out and started walking away.
"Director?" Miss Militia asked staring at Director Piggot.
"Let him out, take him to costume, get him a mask and pants then bring him to my office." Director Piggot said turning to Miss Militia.
"Why, he could have been lying. You never accept capes at their word, you barely take me at my word." Miss Militia said incredulously. I also thought a little hurtfully being so mean to Director Piggot when she was such a softy and working so hard when she is so sick and not willing to be compromised by a biomanipulator.
"I know capes Miss Militia, probably better than anyone else. Capes don't instinctively heal a problem ever, capes do things that create problems, capes have a drive to conflict, any negative in their personality before they trigger becomes worse afterwards. His first instinct was to fix a problem with someone else's brain, he repaired the damage caused by Armsmaster's power, he upgraded the power of someone who had just beat him almost to death, he is also the only cape I would trust not to mess with my mind if I let him heal me. I think he may be the only cape I trust because whatever he IS, he isn't a cape. He doesn't even realise he slipped up and said he altered Armsmaster and Glory Girl after he claimed to have fallen asleep. Telling us how he had altered them was more important than his alibi he could have claimed no knowledge or that he dreamed it. He felt telling us about what he had done was important for us and them without worrying about what we might infer."
"Bugger, caught in my lie. When the new cape triggered I connected to the new parahuman and through them the other parahumans present it didn't knock me out and I had already altered Panacea's power so I gained the powers in the pool I also gained knowledge of the lives of the other capes so I knew how to help them Vicky needed an off switch, Colin needed to be able to see Dragons blatantly obvious affection for him. The triggered human didn't get changed by their power because I changed it before it could; their power also included a tutorial so they don't have to worry about accidents. I got bored waiting for the PRT to show up so I went to sleep I don't know why it took so long for me to wake up I wasn't awake very long to begin with and getting beaten near to death didn't take that much out of me."
"We kept you sedated, don't take too long choosing clothes I expect you in my office to heal me within two hours. And pick a name for yourself before one of the ones from PHO sticks." Director Piggot said before walking out of view.
End Chapter one.
Authors note: This is my second time posting a whole chapter on this site I'm looking for feedback on my first published work, also I have very low self esteem, so I would like people to tell me to keep going even and especially if you hate it because how else can I improve.
The Hampster is Happy.
Last edited:
Happy Hampster
This is a Multipost
- Location
- Perth, Western Australia
for contessa yes that's how it works when it is part of Abaddon i posit it works like a proper prediction engine that simulates whole worlds. Corollary: QA controls bugs> QA allows Entities to control all the shards.
PTV answers how to get one answer> PTV answers all the things.
- Location
- Neptune
Look Abaddon run out of energy halfway through the answer to all things, alone and cold in the dark.
Happy Hampster
This is a Multipost
- Location
- Perth, Western Australia
OK i was exaggerating for effect but a question you should ask before meeting the giant twins is how can i get their stuff and not die... it isn't a question I consider to require creativity.
Consider this Abaddon considers only himself, expressed as him travelling alone, Eden/Zion at least care about each other if no other life in the universe. Therefore he should be predisposed to rip them off by cavemen are assholes tropes.
also I feel this has gone just a touch off topic if we could talk about how I might improve my work rather than "I think differently than does the author about entities."
- Location
- Neptune
No. The question to ask is: How much can I gain? How much is worth gaining? What is the risk to myself?
With the answer being: Another meeting is extremely unlikely to occur. All possible gains have to be concluded in this single exchange. I cannot cope with the ideal maximum possible gains. Any hostility right now is too risky to myself. Any hostility with delayed effects has no worthwhile gains. A straight exchange is the most advantageous course of action.
WhoAmEye
Bunker-Dwelling Cryptid
- Location
- Vault Birb
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Please stop tagging me. Also, it might be useful for you to listen to some audiobooks - I feel like they may help you when it comes to your writing style. Find your favourite books, and study the way they are written. It should help your prose immensely.
Happy Hampster
This is a Multipost
- Location
- Perth, Western Australia
sorry thought i deleted that
Happy Hampster
This is a Multipost
- Location
- Perth, Western Australia
obviously we have different approaches to entities that don't mesh well and won't agree so we are just beating a dead horse please pick another problem.