Silence is Not Consent

[justanothercat]

Her eyes were green. That was the first thing I noticed. Wide and green and staring at me across that shitty apartment down the path carved through her swarm. Her chest was heaving, the echo of her voice rang out against the near-silence of the insects drawning back to give us privacy. Her jaw was clenched tight enough that I could see the muscles straining under her cheekbones; her wide mouth was drawn into a tight, thin line. She looked like she was struggling to keep something in that could tear her apart.

I could understand that.

God, did I understand.

The tear tracing down her cheek drew my attention to the angry red marks left on her face by the elastic and plastic of her mask pressing into it. I don't know why it surprised me to see them. I had been around her so much; I knew she realistically couldn't be taking off the mask for much more time than it took to sleep. Of course it was going to leave marks. But somehow… they still stood out against her pale skin. Maybe that was just my image of the invincible, untouchable Skitter taking another hit.

"Well?" She said, taking a step closer. "Answer me, Victoria. Tell me what this was for. You're the hero; you're the one with the experience here."

Her laugh was as bitter as cyanide, and just as short-lived. "You clearly know better than me, anyway. So tell me why all this happened. Why am I here? What was the point?"

My heart clawed its way up into my throat, choking my words before they even made it out of my chest. The heat rose too; my cheeks flushed with the squirming, humiliated anxiety of a test failed, a rule broken. But this was worse than any bad grade or scolding from Carol. I had pushed her too fast. I'd been trying to help her, to prompt her to interrogate her own feelings on what had happened. But I'd gone too far without meaning to. I had to try and backpedal, but I didn't know how.

"I can't tell you that," I signed shakily, grasping at anything to turn the conversation around. "I'm here to talk and to listen, Skitter–"

"Taylor."

My hands froze in the sign for 'protect', and slowly fell apart. Her lips twisted into a derisive facsimile of a smile.

"You heard Tattletale earlier. You've seen my face. What does using a different name matter now?"

I swallowed. "Because you didn't give me permission. That doesn't make it right."

"Hah, that's rich," she said. "A hero, finally recognizing my right to privacy. Oh that's too good. Fine. Consider this permission then."

I tried not to flinch at that. At the bitterness and anger and history that dripped from that word. At the way she'd thrown my attempt at respecting her boundaries back in my face. If she needed someone to be angry at right now… I could be that for her. I wasn't exactly blameless here.

"Fine. Taylor then." I used the same sign as earlier, replacing the S with a T. If she noticed, she didn't comment.

I took a moment to think over how to approach this. Skitter–Taylor–wanted to know what she'd done it all for. What she'd accomplished. I obviously couldn't answer that directly, and on some level, I was pretty sure she knew that. Hell, that was probably why she was asking the question. She didn't want an answer. She wanted a justification. She wanted there to have been a reason for what she did. She wanted to stop feeling betrayed by how unfair it was that the solution ended up being that simple.

I could sympathize with that. If I was honest, I'd felt the same way about Skitter driving off Amy, in my darker moments. Was that all it had really come to? Coincidence? Was that the only reason why this Villain, this person, had done all this for me? Was my life worth that little to everyone around me, that I was only saved by chance and the whim of a stranger?

I took a deep breath, closing my eyes. I listened to the quiet hum of the swarm around us. This close I could hear the wings and legs rustling on the walls. The chirps and scrapes of mandibles on wood. It was muted compared to its usual volume. Sk-Taylor was holding it back, stifling her power–whether consciously or otherwise–as she wrestled with her principles.

Slowly, my heart rate returned to normal.

The answer to her conflict was the same as it had been to mine: it wasn't that simple or clear cut. Skitter herself had acknowledged as much by accident while explaining what I'd missed the first day of this mess. She'd found me at Arcadia. And while she could've stayed… she'd done what let her save the most people. Even if that had meant leaving someone suffering alone right in front of her.

It wasn't that my life hadn't mattered to her. She'd expressed regret, even before she'd really known me, that she hadn't done more. But as was always the case, she hadn't been able to make the perfect choice. Just the best one she'd had.

Maybe… maybe that was how I could reach her.

"Taylor?"

She was looking out the window now, her eyes hidden behind the curtain of her hair, a black veil between her and the world. But the slight change in the drone around us told me she'd heard.

I swallowed, and tried to choose my words as carefully as I could. "I don't think it meant anything."

She whipped back around, fangs bared, so I quickly signed, "Let me finish."

Taylor bit her lip and swallowed back the venom she'd been about to let loose. Her hands curled into fists at her sides. Her mouth was drawn so tightly her lips looked almost bloodless. Her eyes… I couldn't bring myself to look at them for longer than a second. No wonder she had a full face mask.

"Fine," she ground out. "But if you blame me for this, we're done."

I glared at her, my previous hesitance forgotten. "Give me more credit than that."

"I'm. Trying."

The courteous separation of the swarm was breaking down. Bugs flooded back into the gap she'd opened up as she took off her mask like water pouring back into a gulf. Between the beetles and spiders coating every surface and the ants and wasps and midges flying dizzying arcs through the air, it was hard to see the walls anymore. I was sure that the furious drone must be audible downstairs. But Taylor didn't seem to care, and I wasn't about to bring it up.

"I don't think all of this had to mean anything. Just like…" I swallowed. My chest ached. I brushed my cheek, and found it wet. "Just like you saving me, didn't mean anything more than what it was."

Taylor opened her mouth, maybe to say something, but I looked down at the floor. My vision was blurry. A stone sat in my throat.

"But I'm not blaming you. I'm not saying that you were doing anything less than the best you could."

There was a pause. The silence drifted between us, so tangible I felt like I could reach out and brush its spine.

"Clearly my best wasn't very good then," Taylor finally said.

"Mine either. It never is."

I could hear her shifting in place. I didn't look up.

"What do you mean?"

I pushed down the heat and tightness in my throat, and continued. "I mean that… this is how I feel all the time. With everything. It's how I felt when I set off my aura by accident, and you had to take the fall. How I felt when Flechette pinned you to the wall and suddenly the only person that gave a shit about me in the past month was dying and I couldn't do anything. When–"

I hissed as my fingers cramped. Taylor stepped forward but I retreated instinctively, moving back towards the wall. She stopped, and waited while I shook the feeling back into my hand.

"...when I let Amy get a hold of me in the first place."

The insects rose from the walls in angry protest, keening soft promises of murder that rose to a crescendo. My stinging eyes weren't blurred enough, or turned down so far, that I didn't see Taylor's fists clench.

"Don't talk like that, Victoria. That wasn't on you."

I looked up at her, the lump in my throat aching like a broken bone. "Wasn't it?" I demanded. "When she had me, healed me from Crawler… she asked me, you know? If I wanted to be let go. And I told her no. Seems pretty obvious to me."

Taylor's form was wavering, whether from my tears or the insects I couldn't tell. "She was controlling you," she said gently. "You can't be held accountable for that."

"That's my point though!" I signed, frustrated, chopping at the air. "Our best isn't enough all the time! Do you really think you're alone in that?"

She froze, her arms crossed protectively over her chest.

I kept going. "What could you have done differently, Taylor? Tell me who would have believed you about Dinah before you had the reputation you did as Skitter? How you would've known to go to another branch of the PRT for protection? How you'd get to another city in the first place? How you'd know to contact Dragon? Any of it."

The swarm ground a thousand mandibles and dragged shrieking fingers down the walls, but I didn't let the harsh noise dissuade me. The words wouldn't stop; my guts spilled out into the air between us, raw and visceral. "Tell me, knowing what you do now, what you would've done differently; could've done differently, knowing what you did then. Tell me that, and maybe I'll condemn you. But I can't."

Taylor's lips drew down into a snarl. "There's always a better way. Always something more you should do. If there's a gap between what you have and what you need, you need to fix it yourself."

My vision spun. The corners of the room narrowed until it was just her against the writhing black. Just Taylor; her furrowed brow, her green eyes, the tight angry slash of her mouth across her face.

"How can you think like that? Do you really think that any of us have all the answers? By that logic, I'm responsible for every death in the city since the moment I triggered!"

She looked away from me.

I took another step forward.

"Do you think the Protectorate and New Wave work in teams for the PR? We do it because no one is enough on their own! Why would you be with the Undersiders if that wasn't true?"

She opened her mouth, and paused. I let her take her time. What felt like a full minute passed before she spoke. "The Undersiders… they're my friends. I care about them. But they weren't in it for Dinah. Not really. Tattletale wanted Coil taken down. So did I. That's about where it ended."

I drew my aura in tight against my skin before it had the chance to explode out of me. Jesus. I knew she was in a team of Villains, this shouldn't surprise me, but fuck. That… that was going to have to be a conversation for another time.

"You're missing what I'm saying," I signed. "Why did you take down Lung that first night?"

She cocked her head at me. "Really?" she said, an edge of hysterical laughter in her voice. "That's what you want to know?"

I refused to back down. "Trust me?"

She stopped. So did the swarm, stilling itself and silencing its hideous screeching. Taylor looked at me for a long moment, her face unreadable. I watched the swarm from the corner of my eye, but every bug was motionless, every tiny head turned toward me. Faintly, somewhere outside the window, I heard a buzz. Her bugs were still reacting for her. But they weren't doing it here.

"He said he was going to kill kids," she finally said. Her words came slowly, in a tone that I almost wanted to call some form of twisted nostalgia. "He was bragging about it to his guys, egging them on, telling them not to hold back. I wasn't going to do anything before I heard that. After, though… I didn't have a phone. Didn't have anything other than pepper spray and bugs. But I had to do something."

I smiled softly at her, trying not to squirm under the rapt gaze of a million compound eyes. "That's exactly what I'm talking about. That's why we do this. We see something wrong, and we try to fix it. And it's those messy first experiences that lead us to asking others for help. So we can do better the next time."

She laughed again. It wasn't a nice sound. "Some first try that was. I only learned after the fact that the 'kids' he was talking about were the Undersiders. After they'd committed a crime. Pointless."

God her whole career really was as bad as I'd feared. But that didn't disprove my point. "It's not about what happened, it's about why you did it."

She looked up at me. "And what does that mean? I can't exactly be a hero now."

"Why not?"

Taylor looked at me like I'd gone mad. I wasn't totally convinced she was wrong. "Why n– you know damn well why! My reputation is in the trash! I'm a warlord and a monster! I held up a bank of innocent people! I attacked the Mayor's son in his own home! I took over a fucking city! The Protectorate can't stand me, and the feeling is mutual!"

"No, you're missing what I'm saying," I countered. "I'm not telling you that any of that stuff was okay. Even if it had been 'needed' to save Dinah, it wouldn't have been okay. But we just got done talking to Defiant. Are you really telling me that there's never been a case of a Hero making a public mistake, and rebranding to step away from that?"

I paused, and tried to put my thoughts together. "Even that isn't what I'm trying to say though. You don't want to rebrand and that's… beside the point. No. What I'm trying to say is that it's not about being a Hero, it's about being heroic. It seems to me like that's what you were always striving for."

Taylor looked at me for a long time, her green eyes searching my face. If she was looking for something to disagree with, she didn't find it.

"Do people even care about the difference?" she muttered, but I could tell I was getting through to her. I smiled encouragingly.

"The ones that matter do."

After another moment, all the energy seemed to leave her. The bugs relaxed from their unnatural stillness, settling back onto the walls, into her hair, down her back. I breathed freely for the first time since she'd taken off her mask.

"Fine. Fine. I… fine."

She sounded so… defeated. Her gaze had drifted to the floor. We stayed like that for a minute. I didn't know what to say, or how to reassure her. I wasn't sure words existed for what I wanted to convey.

So instead I took a slow step forward. She didn't react. Inch by inch, step by step, I walked closer, until I was right across from her.

She still didn't react. I took the final step, and reached out to take her hand in mine. She looked up into my eyes. This close, even though she was taller than me, she looked small. Lost. I squeezed her hand.

It was all I could do.

"I didn't know your eyes were blue," she said, after a long moment.

I blinked. She… what? I cocked my head.

Taylor smiled. "I know it sounds stupid. It is stupid. But I just. Hadn't realized, I guess." She looked at me for another long moment. "I like them. I'm glad we didn't have to get you those contact lenses."

I smiled softly. I was too. It would've been a pain to switch those out constantly, if nothing else. I squeezed her hand one last time, before stepping back.

Silence fell again, but it was… calmer, now. Safer. Something we were choosing to share together. At one point I might not have known the difference, but I did now. I still wasn't sure where this left us, exactly. I still felt like I'd messed up earlier. Pushed too hard, too fast. But–hah–just like I'd told her, I didn't know what else I could've done, at the time. Taylor was so impenetrable, so impossible to read at the best of times, that I'd already gone way over the line by the time I realized it was there.

Her phone rang, startling both of us out of our thoughts. I waited as she pulled it out of her pocket, and looked at the text. Her smile died and her face grew even more pale. Fuck. As if today hadn't been long enough.

Finally, Taylor looked up at me. Her lips were pursed, as if trying to find words for what she was about to say.

"The PRT is making an announcement about how they took Coil down tomorrow at 10. Tattletale says we need to see it."


A/N:
Some of you pointed out last chapter that Victoria was treading very close to the line insofar as Skitter vs Taylor was concerned, and you were right! That was 100% intentional, and I tried to start addressing that here. An important part of the story to me is that Taylor and Victoria are not perfect. Yeah their trauma matches up a shocking amount of the time, but not always. Sometimes they go too far or don't trust one another enough, and that shows. I'm aiming for "super unhealthy to start and slowly accidentally falling into something better", and this is a part of that.

In the meantime, more character development! Taylor shares bits and pieces of how she got here. Victoria tries to address what went wrong and earns an iota of trust back for her effort. Bugs! And that announcement at the end. I'm sure that'll go well.

The informational post is actually directly story relevant this time, Tips for Writing Victoria Dallon by Ridtom himself. Regardless of what you might or might not think of the poster, these are some very accurate and detailed notes on how to do the character justice that I wish more would refer to. I fell into writing Victoria correctly almost by accident, and while I'm glad I did, I also would've been very grateful for a resource like this earlier. Passing it along seemed like the right thing to do.

 

[Tun Tun]

Brightness 4.2 fanart. When the end didn't require the means.

 

[justanothercat]

It was still hard to believe the PRT was making an announcement about Coil, even as we were mulling about Taylor's room the following morning. The timeframe on this was too soon. It was less than a full day after the operation – hell, it was probably still wrapping up!

I looked at Taylor. She seemed... distracted. Lost in her bugs perhaps, swarming as they were on the walls. But she spared a brief moment to meet my eyes, and nod at my own uncertainty.

A creeping electric tingle danced a sinister beat its way up my spine. Something about this was wrong. This was a civilian announcement at 10 am on a Sunday. The PRT didn't like to make calls this early. Public opinion was fickle, and it was too easy for new information to result in blowback. To do this meant they must have been totally certain of how the operation was going to go, even before it started. There was no other possibility. I knew the amount of time it took to put a press conference together from my time in New Wave. Carol was frighteningly good at that sort of thing, and it usually took her days.

Whatever was going to come to light from this, it was desperately, critically important to the PRT to stay ahead of it. Tattletale was right; we needed to watch.

Taylor turned to me. "Where do we get a hold of a broadcast? There's no TV in the apartment."

I stared at her. Where to– she had a computer! It was right there! "...use your laptop?"

She looked away. If I didn't know any better I'd think she was blushing. "I... couldn't find it earlier."

I opened my mouth, then closed it. My fingers twitched to start signing, but stalled for lack of anything to sign. Even if I'd had my voice, I wouldn't have been sure what to say. It really, really wasn't the time to be thinking about this sort of thing, but... seriously, this was ridiculous. Skitter, the de facto warlord of Brockton Bay, who considered herself on even odds with Dragon, didn't know how to use a computer.

... fuck it, I decided. I could deal with that later. Without another word I turned to the laptop, pulling up the PRT homepage.

Upon looking at it, I had to sympathize with Taylor. Maybe she wasn't completely computer illiterate. Maybe it was just this fucking website. Because god, it was government owned and it showed, with a format and design that felt vintage 2000. The nested tabs were straight up hyperlinks with no formatting or image preview, which made it near impossible to find what you were looking for unless you already knew where it was. There wasn't even a search function!

"What are you looking for?" Taylor asked as she peered over my shoulder.

"When they do a press release like this, there's usually some sort of video or at least a summary news thing on the home page," I signed absentmindedly. "But I can't find anything. Are you sure that Tattletale said there was an announcement?"

"Yes," she said tersely, "though she didn't say where. Maybe I could–"

She paused mid-sentence. I stopped typing and waited. After ten seconds or so she slipped her mask back on, turned around abruptly and quickly walked to the stairs. "One of the kids is listening to a radio on the ground floor."

I nodded, grabbing my notebook and following her down. The PRT had a radio channel open 24/7. It was mostly unused by average citizens, but after Leviathan and the Nine it had become an easy and civilian-accessible way to provide information and news. I was surprised I hadn't thought of it earlier.

Sure enough, when we got downstairs, Charlotte and the kids were crowded around the small handheld radio set on the low table in front of the couch. I had no idea where she'd gotten it from, storage maybe? One of the kids' belongings? It didn't matter.

Charlotte perked up as we approached. "Boss? What's going on?"

"My radio is busted and the PRT are making that announcement," Skitter said. "We need to hear."

She looked over the couch, which was currently a bit crowded between Charlotte and the kids. "Could you make room?" Skitter said, jerking her head towards me.

Wait, she wanted to give me a spot to sit on the couch? Why was that even–before I could say (sign) anything, Aiden looked up from the radio and saw me standing across from him. Without a word he shuffled over, and patted the newly open spot next to him.

Well. I couldn't exactly deny him now. I carefully made my way over, stepping between Dominique and Martin sitting on the floor, before sitting as far to the edge as I could so as to not squish Aiden. Judging by the way he nestled up next to me, he didn't mind the contact.

Once settled, I turned my attention to the radio. It had been broadcasting a continuous transmission of "PRT to make announcement soon, stay tuned," for the past few minutes, which was probably what Taylor had heard from upstairs. I glanced over at her, but Taylor was nowhere in evidence; it was Skitter standing there now, every inch of her masked and guarded once more.. She looked almost awkward, standing apart from all of us. I motioned to the armrest of the couch next to me (maybe she could perch there?) but she didn't move. Fair enough then.

The rolling announcement droned on as the minutes dragged out. I could appreciate advance warning, but this waiting was almost making it worse. What was the PRT going to say? Was Coil dead, or just imprisoned? What had happened to Dinah? Was Dragon staying in the Bay for longer?

Dominique and Martin got fed up less than a minute in and started talking quietly to each other. I couldn't help but overhear, and listened with half an ear as a barely-teenage boy drilled a girl his own age for details on how to help his little sister with her hair. It would have been cute, how much he obviously cared about Tia, if not for the looming absence of her parents hanging over all of it.

Fuck, they were young. Only four or five years younger than me, but it felt like decades, seeing the maturity they'd been forced to take on too early. A twelve-or-thirteen-year-old kid shouldn't be listening to PRT broadcasts they expected to affect their lives. They should be playing while their parents did the worrying. The injustice of it burned. I had no idea how Charlotte managed to look after them all without breaking down or screaming.

Maybe she did, and I just hadn't noticed.

Just as I was getting ready to sign Skitter and ask what she thought the PRT was doing, the broadcast cut out with a crackle, and a voice that I was well familiar with replaced it.

"This is Director Piggot of the PRT ENE, speaking to you live. We'd like to inform the general public and those unaware, that the supervillain Coil has been captured in a joint raid on his base."

Alright, nothing we didn't know before. Skitter had dropped enough implications about Coil's operation for me to know that anything capable of prying him out of the fortress he'd holed up in had to be beyond the logistical capabilities of the ENE alone. Even hearing about him second-hand, the man was very clearly paranoid. Only having the intel advantage over the local Protectorate branch with no fallback seemed unwise. And he was known to employ mercenaries with Tinkertech weaponry on top of that.

I clasped my fingers together, trying to think. Piggot had used the word "joint" there. That was no accident. We might know what that meant, since Dragon at minimum had to be involved, but lots of civilians didn't. That meant that she was sharing credit with other parahumans. If the Piggot I was familiar with was anything to go by, she likely had no choice there.

"We've been coordinating this raid for the better part of the last month, and we'd like to thank the many PRT employees, Watchdog personnel, Protectorate heroes, and independents who made this strike possible."

I glanced at Skitter, who discreetly shook her head when she caught my eye. So as I suspected then, they definitely didn't know about Coil before this whole debacle started. It would have been a nightmare to get an operation like this coordinated and acted on in the timeframe they did. I suspect it was only Dragon's direct support and logistics that made it possible at all.

"Coil has been a scourge on our city," Piggot continued. "Most don't know the extent of his influence, as he preferred to work through third parties."

Fuck. I didn't dare look at Skitter. This was it, the point where she might name the Undersiders as direct collaborators. She wouldn't even be technically wrong to do it. It would go against the spirit of everything I'd been taught or believed in… but a cruel part of me saw the calculus in the decision. An easy way to shift public ire onto a known enemy, and away from the PRT's inaction.

I clenched the arm of the sofa, careful not to accidentally dig through the soft wood beneath. The next few moments would determine if we had fallen out of the frying pan, and into the fire.

"He used… ordinary men and women to exploit vulnerabilities in our security," she said. I couldn't quite parse the tone over the crackle of the radio, but I would've bet she was speaking through clenched teeth. "He sought to take control over the city. He diverted funds from the reconstruction after Leviathan, and repurposed an unfinished Endbringer shelter into his own personal hideout."

I slowly let my grip go. An equally good distraction, then. Link his actions to the PRT's inability to maintain order or meaningfully address the state of the city infrastructure in the last month, and then neatly point out that they'd just solved the problem. The public ire over that shelter comment alone would have most people too angry to see straight.

I slowly took a breath in. It wouldn't have saved them anyways. They chose what they did. Can't focus on it now.

"He held a minor in his base against her will for months as his personal slave."

The breath left me in a rush. Focus. The information. Piggot was deliberately dramatizing here, and that made sense. The real choice of note was that she'd said anything at all. Privacy laws prevented her from naming Dinah even if she wanted to, and the Christners would make their displeasure known as well. But evidently she judged that worth it for the boost in PR. I couldn't say she was wrong.

"I know that a lot of you are familiar with, and…" she paused. That definitely wasn't scripted. "Tolerate the presence of villains in your day to day lives. But this wasn't the kind of evil that could stand for one moment longer than necessary. I am immensely proud of what the men and women standing here with me today have accomplished, in removing this threat from our city."

Now that was interesting. Piggot wasn't just declining to mention the link between the Undersiders and Coil, she was putting them at odds with one another. A nod to our unspoken deal with Dragon maybe? Or just the result of pragmatism when announcing that a previously mostly unknown Villain had been abruptly (and violently) taken down?

"In particular, I'd like to thank Dragon of the Guild. Without her, this operation would not have been possible."

There was a pause, and then a new voice came on the air. "Thank you, Director Piggot. As you just said, we won a great victory for justice today. It's said that for evil to exist, good must do nothing. Often, as much as we hate to admit it, that isn't true."

I leaned forward. This was new. There was no way Dragon's speech hadn't been preapproved, but it was still a public break with the rules of PR I was familiar with. If she was going where I thought she was with this at least…

"Often good is powerless; hamstrung, blind, or mute." I closed my eyes tightly. "But sometimes, sometimes good is enough. And it is thanks to the brave people here, and many more besides, that we were able to make this happen. Today, a little girl gets to go home to her family. That alone is worth celebrating."

My breaths were hot and sharp.

I didn't look at Skitter.

"Thank you, Dragon," Piggot said after a moment. "Well said. I'd like to take the time now to recognize a few other heroes who were instrumental in this operation, starting with Horizon of Boston…"

I gradually tuned out. The names and accolades washed over me, through me. Noise. My awareness narrowed down to the walls, the air, my field, my skin. Aiden sat beside me, warm against my right arm. Skitter's–Taylor's centipede crawled playfully between my fingers. Each tap of a leg felt like a whisper across my skin.

Slowly, my breath returned to normal. In and out. I finally looked up at Skitter. She hadn't moved this whole time. She wasn't looking at me, face still turned at the radio as the details of the raid continued. But a lone firefly lit up in her hair. A small star against the blackness. Winking in and out. After a moment it opened its wings and flew away, drifting towards me.

I didn't dare close my eyes. Couldn't. There was something in the air, something I couldn't quite name. But as that firefly touched my cheek for an instant, it felt like safety.

"And finally, Brandish of New Wave."

The firefly winked out. My eyes shot to the radio. What? She was involved?

Before I even had time to get my bearings, her voice was coming through into our living room. "Thank you, Director. As you know New Wave has taken some… losses, in the past few months."

I closed my eyes, hunching over. But I didn't cover my ears. I had to hear this.

"But when the Protectorate asked for our help in managing a dangerous asset that Coil had locked away in his shelter, we didn't hesitate for a second."

Wait, a dangerous asset? What could that refer to–

"Panacea was instrumental in helping mitigate and rehabilitate that threat, and we are immensely proud of her work."

I–

"Which is why, after a short break, she will be available to heal on her previous schedule at Brockton Bay General Hospital."

My heart stopped.


A/N:
I normally don't do these types of things, but I feel like it's important. I, like many people I've seen in the comments, have issues with reading prolonged angst and personal trauma when I can't binge all of it. My mind goes to all the worst places. Ironic, considering that I'm writing this, I know. I'm not in this to write pain for the sake of it, but with that said, if you're like I am then this is your warning. The rest of this arc (almost 20 more chapters) goes in hard on trauma and interpersonal issues. If you aren't able to read that week by week (and I'm not shaming that), this is your cue to wait for a backlog. Just thought I'd put that out there.

As far as this chapter goes, that ending announcement was always the plan. I'm not looking to make the PRT into a caricature, that goes just as much now as it did when I started writing. As always, there are many layers behind why people do what they do. But at the same time, it's important to recognize that what this looks like to Victoria is what's going to affect her in the immediate term.

With that out of the way, happy pride month! This is a reminder that every single person in this fic is queer unless directly stated otherwise. I'm sure that won't come up as the story progresses.

Today's essay rec is from Ridtom again, specifically the Victoria and Amy Timeline. I know a lot of people missed the subtleties in the text the first time through, and I admit I have my own thoughts on how explicit things should've been. But that issue aside, this does a fantastic job of putting together exactly what happened, and who knew about what when in an especially chaotic time in Worm. Be warned that given the events it covers and the quoted lines of text, it isn't light reading. But especially given where this chapter leaves us, it might be worth looking again at exactly what Victoria went through. I referenced this post extensively when writing SiNC. Normally I'd say "happy reading", but given where this is headed, take care of yourselves.

 

[justanothercat]

C/W: this chapter contains graphic depictions of a panic attack, a PTSD-induced flashback and descriptions of minor self harm.

Skitter's centipede exploded in my hand. The brittle exoskeleton shattered inwards, pulping its delicate insides into an unrecognizable mess. Hemolymph and gore spilled out over my fingers, coating my hands in slime and sickening fluids. Its legs twitched spasmodically, nerves misfiring in futile response to the force that had torn it apart.

My world narrowed to the sticky mess on my skin and the twitching death throes of the little life I'd just snuffed out. Horror gripped me. I couldn't focus on anything else. I couldn't move. I couldn't breathe. A vice tightened around my chest, squeezing the air out in shallow, frantic gasps. There was no noise. No sound. Just the pounding of blood in my ears and a high-pitched ringing somewhere outside my head. I dug my nails into my palm, feeling my shield flicker from glass-smooth to warped, swirling distortion under them as my fists tightened. Hard. Harder. Warm blood welled up. It didn't help.

The world was distant, tumbling away from me as I fell backward. My stomach flipped, nausea swirling, a fist clenched tight around my gut, twisting…

There was color. Movement.

None of it mattered.

Nothing made sense; nothing was right. I gagged, feeling my breakfast try to force its way back up, but nothing came. I wished it would. If I was sick then maybe I wouldn't be floating and dizzy and clammy and shivering and cold and-and–

There was. Something important. That I was supposed to be doing right now. Someone I needed to warn about… it wouldn't come.

("Vi... are y... oing...?")

"We are immensely proud of her work."

I flinched. No, I cringed; curled in on myself convulsively, drawing my shoulders in, tucking my chin down like a beaten animal. Hands. Hands on my wrists on my shoulders on my chest on my face holding me down holding me tight holding me in place I could feel them I couldn't get free. I thrashed, or tried to thrash–tried to struggle, tried to escape. There was resistance. Brief. Like cobwebs. I tore through it, but nothing changed. The hands were still on me, fingerprints molded into me like clay. I was still marked. Trapped.

My ears were still ringing. A distant keening wail, like an air raid siren; hurting my head, humming through my skull. I was raw. Flayed. Like I had shed my skin, and was now soft and open and weak and vulnerable. The air stung like nettles brushed along bare nerves. I could feel my body shuddering; a keening thing of mismatched parts and exposed tissue sucking in shaky, shallow, irregular gulps of air and losing them again just as quickly.

("... oria... ell me wh... ear m...?)

The PRT hadn't done anything. They'd known about Amy. We'd told them weeks ago. Miss Militia had admitted they'd had suspicions. They weren't... they were meant to... when one of their Heroes or affiliates got accused of something like this, they had to investigate, they had to look into it! It was standard protocol! I had refreshed myself on it months ago, after a discussion with–

They had to have followed up. In the time since. There was no way they hadn't. And yet. They called Amy. To help with this. They gave her credit. In front of the whole city. Director Piggot herself vouched for her.

My cheeks were warm. Wet. The air around me was still and quiet.

("... eed you t... own and loo...!")

"Amy will be available to heal."

I forced my lungs to work, sucked in a gasp that strained my ribs and made my diaphragm ache. Breathed in. And in. And held it.

Waiting.

Waiting.

Waiting until my chest was burning, screaming, until my eyes watered and my ribs ached and I couldn't hold on anymore, my vision was fadingoutandeverythinghurtandIcouldn'tseeSkitterIcouldn'tseeanythingwherewasIwherewassheplease–

It punched its way out of my lungs like a dam breaking. I gasped, hacked, coughed, retched. Like a sick woman puking up her guts. Like a drowning girl desperate for air.

Maybe I was. Drowning.

("... isten to...")

…no one would know. What she did. The PRT wasn't saying anything, and Carol certainly wasn't going to after that performance. She'd be given other patients. Other victims. Other people put under her power. Under her touch. Shifting and sliding and changing until they looked just how she wanted them–

Wetness, slick and hot against my skin. My hands, one, two, three, five, ten, grasping at the bedsheets, trying to find solid ground. Trying to hold on. My torso, warping and changing into some sick imitation of what I used to be. What she wanted me to be. And all throughout it. Her. Above me. Smiling. Never letting me forget what was happening. What she'd made me ask for. How she'd never stop. How I would beg for more.

I screamed. And screamed. And screamed. Until my voice broke and gave out into a harsh, choked whisper.

My skin felt smeared in it. In her. Like she'd crawled inside my body and made a place for herself there. A disease living between me and my skin. A parasite laying eggs of sick devotion. I thrashed and bucked and beat my head against the ground, clawed at my arms, my sides, my legs, but it wouldn't go away; she wouldn't go–

"Victoria!!!"

I jerked away into what was left of the couch, the splintered backrest snapping in two against my spine. And then there was silence again, save for the cracking of plaster against my back and the rattle of splinters falling to the floor.

I opened my eyes.

Skitter, Taylor was in front of me. Six feet away. Mask off. Eyes looking into mine. Charlotte was gone. So were the kids. I didn't know when. Didn't care.

(Did)

"Victoria," Taylor said, drawing my gaze back towards hers as it darted skittishly away, a nervous animal flinching from every shadow. "Victoria. Focus on me."

I stared at her, not blinking, not breathing. My eyes hurt. My chest felt tight.

"Are you with me?"

I blinked. I couldn't stop trembling. Clammy sweat soaked my clothes; they clung to me, cold and heavy. My guts churned, nausea rising and falling in swamping waves, worse than the worst bouts of flu I'd ever suffered through as a kid. Spit flooded my mouth, thick and cloying and sour. It was a battle not to gag.

Taylor sighed, slowly rocking backwards on her heels until she was sitting on the floor. She didn't move an inch closer. "Can you sign?"

I blinked.

"Okay, can you hear me? Blink twice for yes."

Two blinks.

She closed her eyes for a moment. "Good. That's good. Thank you, Victoria."

There was silence again. I forced myself to swallow, sucking in another breath of clean air over my tongue to air my mouth out. It didn't help.

"Okay. Two blinks for yes, three for no."

Two blinks.

"Thank you. Do you know where you are?"

Three blinks.

She smiled at me encouragingly. Probably. "You're in the hideout. Charlotte and the kids left. No one here will hurt you. You're safe."

Three blinks.

Taylor's brow furrowed. "There's someone here you're scared of?"

Three blinks.

"Have you forgotten where the hideout is, how you got here?"

Three blinks.

She paused for a long moment. Her eyes slowly turned down. She breathed in and then out, and I followed along with her automatically, matching inhale to inhale, exhale to exhale. The world settled. A little.

"...do you not feel safe here?" she asked.

Two blinks.

The breath left her in a huff and I reeled for a moment, cast off from my lifeline. She noticed–of course she noticed–and started up again, saying nothing more for a moment while I settled.

"Okay," she said after ten more breaths in and out. "Thank you for telling me, Victoria. Is there something I can do to help you feel safe?"

Three blinks.

Taylor's lips thinned. "Would you prefer I go? To let you handle this on your own?"

Three blinks; panicked, fast and clumsy. My vision blurred. My breathing started to stutter–

"Okay," she said softly, propping her arms behind her and leaning back. "I'm not going anywhere unless you want me to. If anything or anyone wants to hurt you, they'll have to go through me."

She closed her eyes and waited. Maybe reaching out to her bugs. Forming cordons. Surrounding the house. Guarding us.

I took a raspy breath in, watching her chest move as she sat there. Then let it out as she did. In. And out. My vision was slowly creeping back, the room swimming into focus again. I could feel the weight of my hoodie on me, soft but stifling. It was bunched up around my neck. I could feel the cracked plaster digging into my spine. I could feel the sweat clinging to my skin, smell the sour reek of terror, taste the bitter, metallic red in my mouth.

I shut my eyes and tried to focus back on Skitter's slow, steady in-and-out.

They were going to give Amy more people. More people she could screw up, toy with, change in a thousand tiny ways they'd never notice. And the PRT was enabling her. Carol was enabling her. If there were any doubts I'd clung to about exactly where… Mom… stood, they were gone now.

It. Hurt. Like a knife in my chest, a gunshot to the stomach. Was I worth so little? To her? To them? That what happened to me was just collateral? Something to be swept under the rug? Forgotten until convenient?

My stomach twisted violently. This must have been how Skitter felt, all those months ago. When she'd looked at the Heroes she'd idolized and saw them for what they really were. Carol had told us the truth of the PRT a long time ago, how they were entirely willing to cover up "inconveniences" so long as they were never made public. How fitting that she was the one to finally make that lesson stick.

I bit my lip, grinding my teeth down until I tasted hot salty metal on my tongue again. The pain grounded me, centered me.

She hadn't let me feel any pain.

Okay. Focus on the... the actionable stuff. Facts. I could deal with facts. Facts couldn't hurt me. If I got the facts all lined up in a row, I'd... I'd know what was happening. And once I knew what was happening, I could work out what to do.

So. Fact: Amy was going to be healing at the hospital. Fact: Carol had said so.

Fact: The Protectorate had called on her to do something with her power during the Coil attack. Fact: Whatever it was, it had worked. Helped. Contributed somehow.

Fact: Amy was going to be put in a position of power over others. Like she had been over me. Fact: The people she'd be treating wouldn't know. What she was. What she'd done.

Fact: The Protectorate were letting her–

I squeezed my hands and held my breath in. Focus. Focus. I could do this. My instinct was to jump to that conclusion. It felt better. Easier. But I was safe here. I could be honest with myself, even if it hurt.

The Protectorate was enabling Amy.

Speculation.

My entire body tensed at that thought, flinching like I'd taken a hit without my shield. But it was important. I couldn't take anything for granted right now. Especially now.

Fine. Fine.

But.

The Protectorate wasn't taking a public stand against what Amy had done to me. Either they were unwilling, or they were unable. But either way, they weren't taking my side.

... Fact.

The thought closed like the lid of a coffin. I couldn't escape it, couldn't find another explanation, couldn't reason my way out of the truth. The Protectorate knew what she'd done. Knew that letting her do this would give her clout, public support, leverage... and gave her a platform anyway.

Those were the facts. Which meant...

I was expendable.

What would happen next? Would Dragon stay to collect me? Send me back to my family so that they'd stop complaining? Would Defiant break down the front door? Polish his ruined reputation a little by rescuing the poor little Master victim? Or would it be Assault, finally able to pin some moral sin on the Undersiders? Would Piggot even care if I said no? Would anyone–

"–toria! Victoria! Vicky!"

An animal noise tore out of me and I scrambled back, kicking out, fending her off. My heart jackhammered in my chest. No! Nonononononono not that name never that name please no I couldn't–

"N-n-n-n-no," I forced out, bile sour on the back of my tongue.

Silence. Stillness. Then.... "Okay. Not that name. You weren't responding to Victoria. Do you want me to–"

I shook my head, clenching my eyes tighter. No. That name right now was too much. History and expectations and failures and.

No.

"Okay," the voice, Taylor, said in front of me. "Does Tori work?"

I grasped the offer like a lifeline, nodding frantically. A new word. A new name. Something to set me apart. To pretend that this was all happening to someone else. If I could be Tori right now, it meant I didn't have to be Victoria anymore.

She hurt too much.

"Okay, Tori," Taylor said, as gentle as I'd been with her... with her centipede. My centipede. I looked down at the viscera smeared across my palm and under my fingernails. My eyes stung uselessly. Misery pulled at my mouth. I'd killed her. She wasn't a pencil or a table or a doorknob. I couldn't replace or repair her. What... what was the point of crying for something I couldn't fix?

Tears cut cold tracks down my cheeks.

But they couldn't cut deep enough.

"Tori?" I flinched again, curling in on myself, trying to hide my hand behind me as if it would keep what I'd done from her; a shameful, sordid secret. She let me pretend. Kept talking. "I'm going to… I'm not good at words, but I'm going to have to ask something of you. Something big."

My ribs clenched, digging into my sides.

"Can you look at me?"

I drew in a shuddering breath, and looked up. Taylor hadn't moved closer. But she filled my vision anyway. Her wide mouth pursed. Eyebrows slanted and angry. Green eyes harsh and sharp. But her tone was gentle.

"Thank you. I want to tell you something. Something important. Is that okay?"

I nodded.

"Good," Taylor said. She closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them, mask or not, I knew it was Skitter looking at me. "I know you're hurt. And you have every right to feel that way. But I want you to know that one way or another, I am never letting her hurt you like that again."

Her voice was sharp. Dangerous.

Safe.

"I don't care if I'm fighting Defiant, or Miss Militia, or Dragon herself," she said, as if she could chisel her words into reality through nothing more than force of will. "Nothing is getting between us. Not unless you want to leave. That is your choice, and I will fight to keep it that way. If you don't trust the PRT, don't trust the Undersiders, don't trust me, that's fine. But at least trust this."

Skitter took a deep breath. "When I found you, I forced Amy to leave at gunpoint. Next time, I'm pulling the trigger."

My vision blurred, narrowed, sharpened until it was just her. Just the girl in front of me. Thief. Villain. Warlord. Skitter. Guardian. Friend. Taylor.

I leapt across the space between us, knocking the breath out of her. I barely remembered to pull my speed so I didn't fracture her sternum. My arms came around her, and I clung. I dug my face into her neck, pulled her close until I could feel the silk against my cheek and listened to the pulse in her throat, the furious hammering of her heart.

We stayed like that for a minute. Two. More. Slowly, Taylor brought up an arm and rested it across my back. Not encircling. Not holding. Just… resting. Reminding me that she was there.

I let out a breath and finally, finally started to cry.


A/N:
So here is where I would make some joke about how "the centipede finally died" or something. But the mood seems off for that.

I've been sitting on this chapter for almost three months. And to this day I still think it's one of the best I've ever written. It's the culmination of a lot of things. Tori's trauma and refusal to examine how much Amy has really taken from her. Her relationship to Taylor, and realization that what she wants now is permanently different. Who she wants to be going forward. I could go on.

Today's rec is in a similar line to all of this, Victoria and the Broken Bird. It's an analysis and comparison about how Taylor is a traditional YA power fantasy inverted, while Victoria is effectively a side character given her own story and narrative center. It makes for good reading, albeit with Ward spoilers in broad strokes.

There's one more thing. A short interlude was written by one of the betas that I'm posting right after this, so keep an eye out for that. Other than that… take care of yourselves. This chapter was a lot, and while I'm not looking to wallow in angst, there's definitely more of it where this came from.

 

[justanothercat]

The centipede had never felt anything like this. A call. A summons. Put one forcipule in front of the other. The centipede couldn't explain. It just knew it had to follow. It had to go. Whatever mysterious force commanded it was all that mattered. A large spider crawled next to it. The centipede should run. It was food for this predator. Nearby, a silverfish crawled. This was food for the centipede. It should attack. It did not. The centipede marched onward the spider and silverfish next to it, none giving in to the instincts of predator or prey. They and thousands of other insects joined the horde heading towards where the force directed them. This was all that mattered now.

ϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕ<

The creature it was crawling along was far too big for the centipede to eat. It was far too big for the centipede to hurt. Still, it launched its claws into flesh. Attack. Attack. Attack. That was all that mattered. It had done this before. The centipede had no measure of time or numbers. It did not matter. Attack. Attack. Attack. The centipede and thousands of other insects took their orders. They did not care about the writhing creature beneath them. Attack. Attack. Attack.

Later, when things were calmer a feeling would wash over the centipede. It did not have the brainpower to understand. And yet some part of its small insectoid brain grasped. It should not have attacked. It wished it had not attacked. Soon this feeling passed and the horde continued on. The force was done here.

ϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕ<

It was rare for the centipede to not be part of the horde. But the force had given it a new set of impulses. The force wanted it to depart the swarm and it did. It separated and crawled gently onto a creature, smaller than the one from before but still roughly the same shape.

Its movements were delicate. It couldn't explain these things running through it, but it knew it needed to be comforting. The centipede didn't know what these feelings meant but put one forcipule in front of the other as the force directed. One two. One two. It didn't know how much time had passed after it moved on to the creature but it curled itself around a protrusion and felt pressure on itself. The centipede should run. The centipede should bite. It did not. The force was comforted by the touch, and so the centipede was too.

But it wasn't long before the force became unsettled. The centipede couldn't help itself. The force commanded it and so it raced across the creature. No biting. Just running. Scurry. Scurry. Scurry. Soon, it was back where it started and there was the pressure and the force was comforted so the centipede was too. And then it was back. No place to move. Writhe. Wriggle. MOVE. It took some time before the force was calm again. But now the creature was pressing down on it. It would be enough to hurt. To crush it if the pressure continued. The centipede should bite. The centipede should run. It did not. The force told it to stay so it did until beetles picked it up to return it to the horde.

ϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕ<

It was asked again to leave the horde and rest on the creature. The force felt comforted by this command and the centipede did as well. A protrusion brushed across its body. The centipede was comforted by this. It was feeling warmth and affection? For the creature. The force was feeling this and so the centipede did too. The centipede stayed like this while noises whirled around it. It did not have the safety of the horde. It had the safety of the creature. There was agitation from the force and the centipede felt it. A protrusion rested against it and the agitation quieted. The agitation stayed until a noise brought in something new. The centipede didn't know what this was at all but the force wanted it to wrap around the protrusion and so it did. The force was grateful and so was the centipede.

As the noises continued around it, the force knew it needed to protect the creature. Its protectiveness continued to bubble. There was a creature that had shown itself to be a predator. The centipede crawled into view and did the only thing it knew when faced with a larger predator. It hissed. The predator did not respond, but it did not matter. The force was satisfied and soon the centipede tapped twice on the protrusion as the force commanded. The force needed the centipede to do this so the creature understood. The centipede did not know why but the force was satisfied and so was the centipede. The creature was safe.

ϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕ<

The centipede flew through the air landing on the creature. It was rewarded with several strokes across its trunk. The force was uneasy, but calmed once the centipede was nestled into a crevice on the creature. The force was happy and so was the centipede. The centipede felt a name burn into its head for the creature. The force's thoughts were bleeding in. It was too big. Too big. It grabbed a piece of it and latched onto it. A bent leg. V. V was all the centipede could grasp. There was more to the creature but it did not matter. The centipede would be there for V.

ϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕ<

The centipede nuzzled into V's flesh. No biting. No attacking. Just calm. Peace. V moved and noises filled the space. Soon the force thought back to something it wished it hadn't done. The feeling overwhelmed the centipede and it curled around V's large protrusion. It stayed there as V moved, focusing its attention on a second creature. The creature the force came from. The force felt better, more at ease, less tense and so the centipede did too.

ϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕ<

V was wet when the centipede leapt onto it. Not soaking wet but enough to be noticed. The centipede didn't care. The force didn't care so neither did the centipede. The force was impatient and so the centipede wrapped itself around V's protrusion and extended its body. V understood what the force wanted and followed. The force was distressed and so was the centipede. V seemed to lessen these feelings of distress from the force when it was around the force and so the centipede hoped it would do so again.

ϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕ<

The centipede stayed on V. The force was determined not to miss a thing and so was V and so was the centipede. It stayed calm and still. A larva was missing. The centipede wouldn't have understood why a single larva was important but to the force and V it was and so it was important to the centipede. They had managed to find the larva but a larger creature guarded it. The centipede stayed on V waiting. Noises echoed through the area from the larger creature and the larva. At one point the force urged the centipede to get V's attention. No biting. Pushing worked though. Soon, they left the larger creature behind and returned with the larva. The force was happy. V was happy. The centipede was happy.

ϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕϕ<

There was a loud whirr of noise and the centipede tensed. The force was uneasy and V was also uneasy. There was confusion. A big predator had left them instead of eating them. It would have been easy. Why were they still here? The centipede nervously ran up V's arm as the force directed.

There was noise from the force and other creatures. The larvae needed to be protected. They were going to migrate elsewhere with the larvae. And then there was a ringing and more noises. And then they had settled and things were… calmer. There was no longer a rush to save the larvae. They could stay. The force spilled out rough feelings of worthlessness and inadequacy and a crushing feeling of loss. The centipede did not understand but it was distressed.

V and the force communicated and the feeling changed and dulled and the centipede felt happier. It continued to play among V's protrusions even as more noise came from something in the room with them. V and the force grew uneasy about the noises. The centipede tapped on the protrusions passing the messages of reassurance from force to V. Then something happened. Things got worse. V was becoming more and more distressed. The force wasn't sure what to do. The centipede would help. The centipede would protect. V would be safe. V would be safe. The centipede would protect. The centipede would–


A/N:
This chapter was originally an omake written by Dysole, but I decided it was too good not to directly canonize, and asked her permission to post it officially. If you like this writing, check out her work The Third Door on ao3.

 

[Tun Tun]

The centipede would protect. V would be safe. V would be safe. The centipede would protect. The centipede would–

Click to shrink...

It's not over yet. There is still hope. We can rebuild cenpai. We have the technology!

 

[justanothercat]

Thank you to the incredible CasualCarnation for this piece of fanart, I'm seriously beyond words. This is incredible. Totally not crying.

 

[justanothercat]

It took a long time for me to feel comfortable letting go. For my heart to slow down and my breathing to calm and the screaming sense of sicktwisteddangerthreathurt to ebb away. For me to hear anything but the steady thump of Taylor's heart against my ear. I came back to myself half slumped over a gangly, bony lap. Tears and snot stained my face and my hair was strewn over my eyes and stuck to the corner of my mouth. A pair of slender arms wrapped around me, and the comforting hum of the swarm buzzed away in the background, muffling the rest of the world and holding it at bay.

Her knee was digging into my side, I was pretty sure I'd been squashing her legs long enough for them to go numb, and from the awkward way she was rubbing my back and the jittering of the nearby bugs, she had no idea how to comfort a crying girl on top of her.

In this moment, here and now, it was perfect.

I slowly pulled back far enough to look at her face. Her arm slipped off the side of my back automatically, but I didn't let that distract me. Her eyes… there was a violence there. One I was familiar with. But for once it felt like the heat of a hearth at my back. Like a promise.

I closed my eyes and slowly leaned forward. Taylor didn't stop me. After what felt like minutes but must have only been seconds, my forehead gently touched hers. I felt her breath ghost over my face. Matched mine to hers. In, and out. In and out. Together.

I was here. I was safe. Amy was a problem, but one that could be solved later. Right now, only this mattered. Us in our hideaway, absent the world.

"Thank you," I whispered, barely enough air scraping past my lips to carry the sound to her.

She didn't say anything. But her hand squeezed mine–my clean hand, the hand not still curled miserably around a sticky mess that my thoughts shied away from as too much right now to bear. Her fingers curled in to tuck my palm as close to hers as possible, and tightened with gentle pressure; not enough to hurt, aiming just to reassure. She'd heard me just fine.

I took a deep breath and rolled back onto my knees, then pushed myself upright, never letting go of Taylor's hand the whole way. She understood what I was doing, and let me pull her up until we were standing again. I gave her hand one last achingly careful squeeze in return–my heart pounding like I was pinwheeling at the edge of a cliff at how fragile it was, how easily broken, the risk I was taking just for comfort–then reluctantly let it go.

"Are you okay?" she asked softly. "Do you need anything?"

Did I… I needed a lot of things. For any of this to get better. For this complicated, twisting heat in my stomach to go away. But I tried to focus on the immediate.

My head was, if not clear, then clearer. As good as it was going to get right now. Better than it was likely to be for a while, honestly. But the rest of me felt awful. My skin was sticky with sweat and stress. Much as I loved this hoodie, I'd been wearing it for a day too long and it smelled like it. My hair was dirty and stringy, the grease clumping the strands together. And my hand–

I needed a shower.

I needed a shower.

"All the showers are occupied except mine," Taylor said after I finished signing as much. "Do you want to go now?"

A soft noise escaped me, either sob or humorless laugh. 'Want' fell woefully short of what I felt right now. If I had to feel the filthy violation of her touch on me for much longer, I'd tear my own skin off. And I couldn't risk waiting even if I could bear to. Running water was rare after Leviathan–one of the sick little ironies you didn't appreciate about the aftermath of an Endbringer attack until living through one. There was no telling when the plumbing would decide to stop working for the ninth time this week.

But all of that wasn't the real reason. I was… scared. Terrified. That as soon as Taylor left, as soon as I was alone, as soon as my clothes came off, everything would come rushing back. That I'd be back there again.

Helpless.

I took a deep breath, pictured a point beneath my heart and imagined it pulling me down. Rooting me to the ground–tethering me to the earth so I wouldn't be blown away by the breeze. I was better than this. Taylor helped. But I could do this.

I looked up, and nodded.

"Okay then. You can go first, I'll be outside. If you need something, you can knock on the wall?"

I dug my nails into my palm. We had done this before. The first time she'd seen me in that bathtub. We had a system. It worked, more or less. I could do this.

I reached out and squeezed her hand once more, dizzy at my own recklessness, before making my way to the bathroom and closing the door. I took a moment, and closed my eyes. We had done this before. I knew that Taylor was aware of everything for blocks around her, nevermind two rooms away. If I made any noise of any kind, she'd hear, and come to help.

There was nothing to worry about. It was fine.

I could do this.

I reached forward and started the water. It was probably bad practice to let it warm up before showering given how little we had, but I decided to let myself have this one thing. My hair wouldn't wash itself, and the water had to be warm for me to–

I froze.

She liked my hair. She'd said it was nice when she was with me. When she'd pushed me down onto the bed and started to peel me out of my–

I yelled and slammed a fist into the mirror, shattering it and just barely avoiding going through the brick.

Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. Two seconds in and I was already a wreck. Why? Why was I still here? Why was it so easy to spiral back into thinking about Amy at the slightest opportunity? Why couldn't I just move the fuck on?

"Tori?" Taylor's voice, through the door. "Is everything alright?"

I froze.

It would be so easy. To ignore her. To not say anything. To just wait until she stopped asking and assumed that I was fine. Like everyone else did.

"If you need something, knock on the wall three times."

I floated in my body, disconnected, as it slowly reached up and knocked three times on what remained of the mirror.

"Do you need me to come in? One knock for yes, two for no."

My fist–the clean one, the one not held in a trembling curled-up claw at my waist, held away from touching anything or anyone–floated dreamily over the fractured glass and brickwork. I watched it hover like one of Skitter's bugs, waiting for orders I couldn't hear.

One knock.

"Okay. I'm coming in."

The door opened, and there she was. Taylor, still in her silks, staring right through me with that intense green gaze. I wondered what she saw. A hero reduced to someone else's sidekick? The brainless Brute from the bank, too angry at her reflection to leave a simple mirror intact? A helpless girl, hopelessly out of her depth? Maybe all of them; all bloodstained, fractured facets of a broken glass figurine.

I didn't know which I hated more.

"You need to tell me what you want. I can help, but I need to know how."

"You."

We both froze. I was mortified. Of all the times for my hands to work, why was it now?

"No I mean–can't–need to shower." It took a few seconds for my left hand to join in, and it did so half-heartedly, slower and less expressive. I kept my eyes on Skitter's face rather than look at it. But I couldn't stop signing. The words spilled out like a broken faucet. "I know it'll look bad if I go out smelly and dirty even though we have clean water so I need to get in," someone please stop me, "so I need to do it but I can't because my stupid head keeps remembering her and every time I close my eyes it gets worse," my fingers burned, "and I haven't even gotten my clothes off I don't know how I'm supposed to do this and–"

"Okay."

I froze. Blinked.

I didn't understand.

"Do you need to take a shower?"

Slowly, I nodded; the barest dip of my chin.

"Can you do it on your own?"

I shook my head mutely, eyes not leaving hers.

"Do you want… help?"

I… surely it couldn't be that easy. Would she even–she'd only unmasked to me earlier today! Even if it felt like years ago. She couldn't possibly be implying what I thought she was.

I took a deep, shuddering breath, and slowly let it out through my nose.

If this was any other day. Any other time. Any other person asking this, I'd say no. Hell no. But my skin still felt slimy and raw. My hair lay plastered to my scalp. I couldn't even look at my left hand. If I spent any longer like this, I'd flay myself just to get it to stop. With my strength and the panic clawing at the insides of my ribcage, it wasn't an idle threat.

I needed to shower. It wasn't an option. And… after what I'd just been through, I didn't have it in me to go through a flashback again. Couldn't. Maybe that was weakness, but right now I didn't care.

I took another breath, and nodded.

"Would you feel comfortable with me helping?"

I looked at her. Eyes serious, locked on my face like she could find the solution to all our problems if she just looked hard enough. Eyebrows furrowed in concentration as she broke down the problem in front of her. Wide mouth pinched, pulling down at the corners as she took in the state of me.

I nodded again. Her. It had to be her.

"Are you sure? I'll need to take my clothes off too."

I closed my eyes, and god help me, I nodded.

Taylor closed the bathroom door. Nothing changed, but the room was suddenly hotter. The walls pressed in. The steam coming off the shower was stifling.

"Alright," said Taylor. "How do you want to do this?"

I swallowed, my throat dry. Taylor had this way of just, cutting through all the nonsense to get at the heart of wherever she needed to go. It was intimidating, but right now I was thankful for it. Better this than me making a fool of myself by begging.

I pointed at her.

"I'll go first then."

And with that, Taylor started to take off the rest of her costume. First came her bracers and chest plates – an involved process, with lots of straps and buckles holding the whole ensemble together. I'd seen her costume weather blows that would put almost anyone else without a Brute factor on the ground, but I'd never thought about the practicalities of how it worked. It made for a good distraction from actually looking at Taylor as she stripped off her armor and defenses.

Next came the silk body glove itself. She'd coached me through taking this off before, when changing the dressing on her shoulder. The material was thin, but deceptively strong. I'd never tested it myself, but I'd done some research after the Flechette incident. My phone had enough reception for that much in the downtime between crises. Spider silk's strength to weight ratio was frighteningly high. It made up her whole costume; lightweight and cut resistant. I looked away as she peeled the last of it off, the material making a faint rustling noise as it pooled on the floor.

And then it was over, and she stood in her underwear, bare in front of me while I was fully clothed. It barely felt real. Even Skitter's poker face couldn't mask her feelings completely. Her hair fell forward over half her face, not-quite-hiding a faint colouration of her cheeks. Her arms had half come up to hide her, and I could see her tensing her stomach out of the corner of my eye.

But her embarrassment was nowhere in her voice, and she didn't hold herself defensively or turn away.

"Okay," she said flatly. "Your turn now."

I tensed immediately, my hand reaching for the zipper on my hoodie. My fingers gripped the metal tab and… they wouldn't move. They were stuck. I was stuck.

My teeth clenched. Come on, Tori. It was just a stupid zipper. She'd seen me in worse before. This was no time to be shy. I'd asked for this.

Taylor reached for me. I stepped back instinctively, my back bumping into the sink, and she paused. We looked at each other for a long moment.

"I won't look. But she isn't here. She won't touch you. Knock three times when you're ready."

And with that, she turned around and faced the door. I let out a long breath, emotionally exhausted already, and pulled the zipper down. It was surprisingly easy to zone out without her looking at me. I tried to treat it like a task I was doing, divorce myself from context. I knew how to take off my clothes. I could do that.

It was harder to take them off one-handed. But my left hand stayed clenched. Signing had used up its nerve. It wouldn't uncurl for this.

Still, eventually I found myself knocking on the wall three times. Without so much as a glance Taylor turned around, walked past me, and got into the shower. She'd tied her hair back out of her face while I'd been undressing, I realized. After so long seeing her hair loose, the low ponytail looked strange. She'd taken her underwear off too, and her bandages, matching my state. I kept my eyes on her face, and swallowed.

"The water is fine, you can come in when you want."

I took a deep breath and stepped into the shower with her, my body as taut as a bowstring. There was something in the air that I couldn't name, but Taylor seemed determined to bulldoze past it with her trademark stubbornness.

"Here," she said, and reached for my hand.

My left hand.

My soiled hand.

I hesitated. She waited, fingers spread invitingly beside my wrist. The spray washed over her, soaking her hair, running down her skin. The scar on her shoulder still looked angry and red, if not quite as bad as when I'd changed it.

I'd probably need to help change it again, I thought numbly. At least this counted as cleaning it. Even if it must be stinging like mad.

Slowly, reluctantly, as if someone else was moving it, my hand drifted into hers. Her fingers circled my wrist the way her centipede had, and squeezed reassuringly.

"It's okay," she said.

And guided my hand into the spray.

It tore a wrenching sob out of me. But only one. I breathed through it, eyes stinging, breathing in and out in slow, steady, shaky gasps, and she kept one hand on my shoulder and the other loose and gentle around my wrist until I was through.

If this was what losing a pet felt like, a distant corner of my mind observed, I never wanted another.

"Do you want to wash your hair?"

I nodded. That was the most important thing now that my hand was clean. I couldn't stand the sticky, greasy strands one minute longer. Not for the first time in my life, I considered a haircut. Maybe later. Maybe as soon as I got my hands on some scissors. For now, though…

"Do you want to wash it yourself, or would you rather I do it?"

I bit my lip. Washing my hair was… private. Intimate (as if this isn't intimate already, a part of me laughed hysterically). But I knew what would happen if I closed my eyes. Like I had to when washing it out. I knew what would be waiting for me. There was no other choice.

I pointed at her. Taylor grabbed the shampoo in the corner, squeezing some of it out in her hands and started lathering it up. It was a nice smell. Lilac and lavender. Familiar and soothing.

She gestured for me to turn around. I did, tensing as her hands drew nearer. It was okay, I told myself over and over. I was safe. She was safe. I'd asked for this. If I wanted her to stop, she would.

She would.

My fingers dug into my palms hard enough to leave marks. It helped.

Finally, her fingers sank into my hair. I froze for a moment, before relaxing. Taylor's hands were… both softer and harder than I imagined.

Skitter's movements were always sharp and precise, almost machine-like (or insect like, I thought, barely holding in a snort). Every step she made felt premeditated and considered.

This was not that. Taylor's hands were gentle as they combed through my hair, spreading the suds of the shampoo through my roots. The motions felt practiced and sure, even as she treated my long hair with more reverence than I'd expected. Certainly more than I ever had.

As if reading my thoughts, Taylor started talking, "Your hair is so long, I have to be careful while washing it, so it might take a bit longer than you're used to."

I flinched. My breath caught in my throat. I knew Taylor wasn't Amy, that she'd never be her, but she'd said that when she'd had me in the bedroom, when she'd sunk her fingers into my hair and pulled, when she'd made it grow out of my arms, my legs, my toes, my–

Taylor's hands paused in my hair. "Breathe," she said evenly, "slow and deep."

I choked out a gasp, coughing as one of her hands slid down and pressed firmly into my back. My breath caught and I hacked up what felt like some small bit of breakfast that was stuck in my throat from earlier, coughing it down to where the swirling water around our feet caught it and sent it spinning down the drain.

There went my dignity, I thought. Whatever was left of it, anyway.

Once I'd collected myself, Taylor resumed combing through my hair as if nothing happened.

"When I was a kid, I wanted my hair to look just like my… mom's."

She paused. I didn't dare reply, or even move. Any response might make her decide to stop sharing. Taylor almost never talked about herself, and suddenly I wanted to know more.

"I grew it out for years before I was satisfied," she said wistfully. "So much of it came out in the wash it felt like it would never grow."

Her hands caught on a particularly nasty knot and I groaned at the tug on my scalp. She paused, then continued more gently, coaxing the twist in and around itself until it started to unravel.

Taylor hummed absently as she continued to tease the mat out. "Even… after, I still kept it. Stupid of me, really. Anyone could've seen that it didn't cover for everything else," she snorted.

I wondered at that. At what she meant. But she continued before I found the words to ask.

"I wanted to look like her so badly, I designed my whole costume around it. Left the hair out and everything. Idiotic. Lung almost burned it all off the first night I was out and I would've deserved it. I mean, what kind of moron–"

I winced as her hands caught on another snarl of hair. She paused again, murmuring a 'sorry' under her breath I barely caught before she kept talking.

"I guess I just wasn't willing to give up that part of myself, in the end," she said quietly.

I reached back and caught her hand, and kept hold of it as I turned around. She was warm against my palm. Pressed close inside each other's space in the cramped shower stall, almost nose-to-nose, I ignored the hand still in my hair and looked at Taylor; really looked for the first time since this strange companionship had started.

I looked at her angled cheekbones and pursed lips, so afraid that I'd judge her for what she'd done to get here. Her eyebrows, angry and sure as she thought about her younger self. Her nose, crinkled with disgust.

I reached up with my hand and cupped her cheek. I looked into her eyes and tried to convey everything I couldn't say. How sorry I was that her life had turned her into this. How I thought her hair was pretty. How maybe her younger self was naïve for going out like that, but she was still brave. How I wished I could find it in myself to say any of what I felt out loud.

I couldn't tell how much she understood. But she smiled and squeezed my hand against her face. Perhaps that was enough.

She continued washing my hair after I turned back around, gently brushing the shampoo out. She kept up a constant stream of quiet conversation, telling me all about the inane things people were doing in her territory. I didn't know why she did it, but I was so, so grateful she did. Normally when I washed my hair I had to close my eyes. And right now I couldn't, because… But with Taylor talking, my brain couldn't convince me that anyone else was in the bathroom with us. I could be okay with that. I could face the dark behind my eyelids, and not drown in the horror that lurked there.

"… Charlotte's downstairs, sorting out an argument. Mikal and Josiah, I think. They used to be neighbors, did you know that? Fought a lot. They get along better now, since they wound up here…"

"… someone's playing a guitar a block west of us. They've drawn a crowd. A couple of people are dancing. The rest are clapping along. One's singing, from the way they're all turned his way…"

"… a bit more to the right… yes, that way. A couple of blocks out that way, someone's frying something for their kids. Bacon, maybe. Or hamburgers. Whatever it is, the kids are really excited; they're jumping up and down as they wait…"

"… the twins are playing with Tia downstairs. Drawing on one of the armchairs. I don't know why they didn't use a couch; Akiko has Tia half in her lap and Naoki's squashed up against her shoulder…"

"… ah. Trouble in the guitar crowd. Someone just tried to pickpocket a… woman? Or a man with a high ponytail." A pause. "I stung him on the wrist and she caught on. They'll deal with him..."

"… Aiden's reading in his room. He hovered outside for a while before leaving. Wanted to make sure you were okay…"

When she finished I stepped back out of the water instinctively, and bumped into her. The shock of skin contact all along my back made me yelp and stumble forward again, then let out a nervous giggle before slapping a hand to my mouth. Fuck, did I really sound like that? Like a goddamn schoolgirl. And yet I couldn't have a verbal conversation to save my life. A certified basket case.

I turned around, ready to defend myself, only to see the shape of gentle amusement curling her mouth at the edges. I felt my cheeks heat. Goddammit. I couldn't be mad when she looked at me like that.

"Tell no one."

"Scout's honor," she said before giving me a salute–a salute? Really?

I tried to glare at her, lips twitching, before losing the battle and breaking into helpless laughter. God, if only the Protectorate could see the dreaded Skitter now, giving me an honest to god boy-scout salute. I drew myself up to tell Taylor, only to peter off at the look on her face. Her lips were pursed, and she had that particular expression of needing to say something unpleasant but not knowing how to start.

After a moment, she decided to just bull through as usual. "We need to wash your body now," she stated bluntly. "Do you need help?"

I paled. I hadn't thought that far ahead. Into this… whatever this was. Now that my hair was taken care of, the clammy stickiness of my skin stood out even more, itching furiously, feeling like sweaty hands plastered over every inch of my body. Could I do this? Should I do this? Could I trust Taylor to do this for me?

I took a deep, steadying breath. Maybe I could do this much on my own. But… I didn't want to. Taylor was gentle with my hair. Tender. I needed that right now. To ground me. A reminder of where I was, and where I wasn't. She was offering to help. If she didn't want to, she wouldn't have done so. I had to trust that.

I gulped, balled my fists, squeezed my eyes shut. And nodded.

Taylor let out her breath in a whoosh, but when I opened my eyes again, her face was as calm and controlled as ever. "Okay," she said, and over the sound of the spray I thought I caught the faintest change in pitch of the swarm beyond these white-tiled walls. I could only imagine what it was doing in her stead. "I'm going to get the soap then." She bent down and picked it up, lathering it in her hands.

I tensed and closed my eyes. This was fine. It was better than me doing it. I could trust Taylor. I'd never be back there with her again. Taylor had promised. I was safe.

Taylor paused, and I cracked an eye open. There was something in her eyes I couldn't quite place. "I'm going to touch you now, but I need you to do something for me first."

I nodded, my throat hot and tight.

"I need you to know that I'm never going to touch you without asking. Not like this. I need you to tell me what parts you're okay with. Can you do that?"

I let out a shaky breath, and tried to ignore the water getting in my eyes. I didn't know why I was worried this would feel different. It was still Taylor. But for a moment…

I nodded and pointed.

"Thank you, Tori," Taylor said, before she stepped behind me and started to wash my shoulders and back. She had long fingers, I realized. She kept her nails short; getting in and out of her silks would've been a pain otherwise, but her hands were more a pianists's than a gym rat's.

Except a pianist wouldn't have had calloused knuckles and palms as she brushed over my back, or small scars on the back of her hands as she passed over my ribs.

The water was a benediction as she put my hair up out of the way and let it hit my skin. I'd had stronger showers, hotter ones, more spacious ones, but none of them compared to the relief of this. A thousand drops of hot, clean rain beat down against my skin, and it felt like I could pick out every warm caress. It was liberating. Rebirth in water, as the filth and grime that Glory Girl had died in washed away. I held on, bracing my hands on the tiles and breathing in ragged gasps as the smears on my skin melted and ran down in rivulets to the drain, as the touch of violation was stripped away by the hammering of the spray.

And through it all, Taylor was with me. She was gentle in ways I didn't expect. That I didn't know to ask for. "I'm going to touch your shoulders now," she'd say as she moved up my arms. "Nod if you want me to stop," she'd say when I tensed up. "You can close your eyes if you need to," she'd say as I flinched.

It was… easier than I thought it would be to let her handle me, mostly because it didn't feel that way. It felt like she was letting me use her to wash myself, like she wasn't involved at all. I couldn't even describe how thankful I was for that. It made the experience bearable.

Safe.

It was twenty minutes all told by the time we got out of the shower, shivering in the suddenly cold air. Taylor threw me a towel before grabbing one herself, quickly and methodically drying herself before starting to put her hair up in a turban. I glanced at her before attempting the same and failing miserably.

Taylor let out a gentle laugh as the towel fell down to the floor. "Here, let me–" she froze for a moment. I didn't move. Had I done something wrong? Crossed some boundary I wasn't aware of? God it could be anything.

After a moment she continued, her motions slower this time. "Can I show you how to do that?"

Oh.

I looked at the six inches between her hands and me as she hovered, and smiled helplessly, small and fond.

Then I nodded, and she took my hands and guided me through putting my hair up to air dry. Slide, twist, turn, pull; her fingers chased mine until before I knew it my hair was up and wrapped just like hers. She considered me for a moment, nodded, and then took the turban down and stepped back.

"Alright, now you try."

I faced what remained of the mirror and concentrated on looking at my hands as I put the surprisingly delicate arrangement together, folding my hair over in layers between the towel before pinning it in the back.

"Nice job," Taylor said from behind me. "Now hopefully you should be able to do that part yourself. But if you need me for it again just knock."

She moved to leave. A flash of panic went through me. No. I tensed and threw myself into her, knocking us against the door with a muffled thunk. The breath left her chest in a rush.

"Tori?!" Taylor said, sounding alarmed if slightly muffled.

I froze. I wasn't sure what I was doing. Why I was doing this. Any of it. All that I knew was that Taylor was about to leave this room, after giving me back something I never thought I'd have after the past few hours, and she was pretending it was nothing. I disagreed with that. Violently. I had to say something.

I took a breath.

"Thank you," I said, my voice raspy. Taylor went rigid under me, her expression freezing. "I just… thank you."

She didn't say a word. But–stiffly at first, then with gentle confidence–her arms came up to hold me as I cried softly into her shoulder.


A/N:
So I think this counts as technically Monday right? I don't think anyone is going to complain.

I know I've said that a lot of chapters are special. And they were. But this is the first thing I ever wrote for SiNC. My computer dates it as December 3rd 2022, and it wasn't even originally on a word doc. I was typing it out in discord one message at a time because I saw a prompt that infected me so hard I could barely keep it back. And here we are, one hundred and forty thousand words later. It still doesn't feel real.

I could say a lot about this chapter. About intimacy and trust. How labels don't always correspond to the boundaries we expect. How love often looks so different between people from one moment to another. How vulnerability sometimes isn't in what you say, so much as what you don't. But I think this speaks well enough on its own.

In case you wanted more on any of the above, there's a small essay on The Differences Between Antares and Weaver in appealing to people's better nature you might find interesting. And while I don't normally do this, there's a song by Mindy Glendhill that fits very nicely with all of this. Anchor. Give it a listen if you feel so inclined. Take care of yourselves out there.

 

[justanothercat]

More by casualCarnation, I'm in tears

 

[Tun Tun]

Forehead touched, breath synched, Taylor blushed. Brightness 4.5 fanart.