(Un)Happy Family [Worm/Elden Ring]

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The problem with a story like this is that you better know your lore about elden ring, which I'm not that strong on. Then you can't have a huge cast because then you need a chart as big as the infamous shipping chart to know what in the hell is going on. 😩 😩
 
Nyarky said:
Wildbow's WOG of her degree of control in Worm really didn't imply that much, guess it's the synchronization with what her shard wants (which could apply there, coming to BB is being more active than she is normally) that helped or him changing his mind, wouldn't be the first time.

Anyway, thanks for the info.
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pretty sure her control issues are in *triggering* her power, IE; it's on a hair trigger, than controlling the size/shape of the blasts? either way she's protected from her own power due to the manton limit
 
4.1 Be Thou Mine Greatest Conflict
  • Threadmarks
    • Forging is just precision arson.
    Special thanks to prime beta Lucky38, Canon Overlord @Ganurath, @hellgodsrus for being my loveliest wife and co-author, and @SolarFlare for being our wonderful supportive girlfriend! And our many friends on the Totally Chatting It discord for their fantastic livereads!
    Enjoy and gib feedbacc!



    Be Thou Mine Greatest Conflict
    4.1
    -.-.-​

    After a solid week and a bit of even more training, I was finally ready!

    Kinda.

    I'd been ready before, to an extent - the trip to Boston had shown that. Even if Dad and Ranni thought I wasn't, and made good points about how I wasn't, and that if I didn't know what five furlongs were I should have just asked instead of stewing in confusion and then teleporting to Boston. And that from my account of the fight I'd been pretty unaware and let people keep hitting me and if I did that against someone who could actually hurt me, then I'd be incredibly fucked, that I'd basically only won because I was an outside context problem who'd literally appeared out of nowhere.

    Training had had its ups and downs, bleak and rhythmless. I'd gotten to the level where I felt like I was… alright with a knife? By the standards of people who weren't Dad and Ranni.

    But on the other hand, practise with my buzzsaw spell I still had to name had gone wrong, and Dad had had to save my life again, carefully pulling thin needles of crystal out of my bloodstream and flesh from where they'd manifested. I still got phantom pains in my wrists, my shins.

    But on the other other hand, Atlas had shown me how to call meteors. Or at least, that's what I thought they were. I'd managed to summon one right into my own face, and when Ranni had finished laughing she'd commented on its density, and spent the next hour chattering my recovering ear off about the things she could do with this.

    Which had lead to the discovery that the basement had an illusory wall in it.

    "What." I stared at what looked like an entire forge - there was a furnace, a set of those squeezy-air-things I couldn't remember the name of, an anvil - "How… why?"

    "Before my conquering days, I was an artisan." Dad's smile was a little hesitant, flecks of gold on her lips and teeth. "While not as furnished as many forges I have worked in, it is not bad for a simple set up I made primarily for maintenance rather than creation."

    "Not that, the…" I gestured to where the wall had been. There were still shelves just - standing in the open, now. Should probably fix that… "The wall."

    "Wouldst thou trust a five year old around a furnace?" Ranni asked oh-so-innocently as she strode along the top shelf of the set I was moving. "As for thy request of Glintstone Gauntlets - I cannot help beyond preparations for casting as I did the staff. Father, however…" There were slabs of metal, stray weapon hilts, what I thought might have been half a crossbow… I wondered for a moment how the smoke of being a damn blacksmith was dealt with, but the answer was probably 'magic'. "As with most Empyreans, thy body is already at its peak, thus we will only ever need one set of measurements. Assuming that it is not thy desire to be devoured by a serpent or some other such foolishness." Ranni waved her hand and I was suddenly staring at a mirror image of myself.

    "It was a totally normal snake." I pouted. "... in an aquarium, but still. Mundane amazon rainforest anaconda. Or python - one of those ones that crushes prey."

    "Given our durability…" Dad started, looking over the image with a critical - no, not critical, but something equally intense in her gaze - eye. "Some of the heavier armours I know how to make is likely unnecessary. The fighting I have been teaching you emphasises speed, flexibility - and while well made plate allows for that, your endurance still requires some work. So, something strong but lightweight - and given your desires to involve yourself in cape stuff, some kind of face concealing helm will be a necessity."

    "Perhaps garb akin to that of the assassins of the Ravenmount? Though we would likely wish to remove the various iconography of the Deathbirds."

    Deathbirds - "Wasn't that one of the sorcery types you mentioned?"

    "Indeed, but they draw upon the dead who have sworn oaths. They are unlikely to answer thee in this foreign realm, should they be able to answer at all." Ranni gestured at the hologram and suddenly the other me was wearing a hooded mask that looked like a skeletal facehugger, and a cloak seemingly made of feathers.

    "Mm. My sole issue is that it seems ill fitting to garb Taylor in what is, effectively, a bandit's leathers. Perhaps some scales, akin to those we gave our Knives… or akin to Vagram's armour…" Dad gestured and the hologram shifted, subtle armour plating sprouting across the torso, the cloak's feathers shifting to the dappled brown and white of an owl, shortening and shifting back, the helmet shifting from bars of bones to something almost viking-like. She tsked, and it shifted again, the chainmail over the mouth shifting aside, the angles of the eye holes becoming sharper. "Your thoughts are welcome, child."

    "Hmmm… well, the bone mask thing was pretty cool, but… I can kinda see how that might freak people out, given I'm trying to be heroic. I like the torso parts of the second set, but drawing too much on things similar to vikings might get people thinking I'm with the Empire…" I grimaced. "Until I get rid of them, anyway."

    Ranni swished her hands and the image swished through several other armour sets. Crucible Axe Guardians, Crucible Knights, Carian Knights, something called Fire Monk robes that made Dad grimace… Kaiden sellswords from the frozen north, with a wolf pelt over the shoulders. Haligtree Knights, several wide brimmed sorcerer's hats accompanied by a mouthless silver mask that made Ranni grimace,

    "Were these all common in the Lands Between?"

    "No, but my dear Consort acquired a wide collection of armour, since she could never decide on a single combination to wear. At first, at least." Ranni hummed, before immediately clapping her hands together in inspiration. "The Black Knives! I cannot believe I forgot -" another swish, and I was face to face with a tall, dark, mysterious and imposing version of myself. A ghostly cloak over dark scales and chainmail, leaving only a void for a face and a sense of otherworldly beauty to the ensemble. "They wore no mask beneath their hoods, but - we could craft such for thee, or enchant the hood to prevent perception underneath it when worn."

    "That does sound tempting…" I bit my lip. "I can see how the fighting style went into designing the armour."

    "It is rather dark though. I do not care for it myself, but I am aware of how public perception influences the life of those who do this caping." Dad bit her lip. "Perhaps Nox -? " She gestured and the image dissolved into banded iron and bronze armour, draped in white cloth. "Not the headpiece, and while I do think it would look better if you wore a proper surcoat showing your allegiance…"

    "What house sigils would she even wear? She is of Caria and the Tree but also not. I do not have time to create a whole new set of heraldry." Ranni made a little face. "Even so, I do see thy point."

    I bit my lip. "Would the kind of - the sigils that sorceries or incantations make work?"

    "... perhaps, but it is kin to offering a weapon to whoever can read it." Ranni huffed, leaning forward and kicking her legs in the air. "Though spell knots were often incorporated into heraldries… and thy garb should assuredly hold garnets - "

    "For the positive sorcerous interactions, obviously." Dad nodded. "But perhaps less visible. I do not know how - gilt and jewel studded Taylor wishes to be. Perhaps not as much as a traditional Carian knight?"

    "I uh. Wasn't expecting any gemstones or gold to go into armour at all, to be honest. Maybe glintstone trinkets, if anything, but…" I shrugged. "It'd probably be a bit too gaudy to go out looking like I robbed a jeweller's."

    "Subtle, then." Dad nodded. The image shifted into something between the Black Knife, Carian Knight, Nox, and the original Ravenmount stuff. Banded scales of bronze, soft white cloth draped across it, a faintly visible symbol of some kind in blue hidden in its folds, silver and garnet chains holding it in place. A soft grey cloak of feathers, hooded over a half-helm covering the upper half of my face. Chainmail and heavy engraved greaves, shimmering faintly in the light. "Is this… good?"

    I waved my hand and my image was wearing the gauntlets in my imagination, too, clawed tips on the fingers at the ready and heavy glintstone chunks on the back of my hands, looking as imposing as the greaves and shimmering just as much. "It's amazing."

    And then I realised what I'd done.

    "How in the -" I huffed, and glared at the ceiling. C'mon, Paradise Lost, warn me sometimes? All I got was the feeling of enthusiasm from the back of my head. "Nevermind." I was going to practise this on my own later, illusions would be a great tool in combat. And for… other things. "Eden approves, too, I guess."

    "With the materials gained from your mishaps, we should have plentiful resources for enchantments." Ranni hid a smirk behind her hand. "I've always wanted to play with meteoric obsidian, but Radahn took it all for his swords before I had the chance."

    "Is meteoric obsidian that rare?"

    "Somewhat, but mostly it was that his swords were… excessively large."

    "It is also rarer than Ranni indicates. It was more common in the Lands Between, but since we left I've seen it rarely. And given its use…" Dad gestured and the chainmail links and banded armour darkened a little. "There. That should be how it appears. It will resonate extremely well with gravitic magic, should you wish to weighten or lighten yourself."

    "Is weighten even a word?"

    Dad just shrugged, flipped her hammer around so the spike of codex was facing away from her anvil, and started up the forge. "Would you… like to learn some forging with me?"

    I couldn't keep the grin off my face if I tried.

    -.-.-

    "Mads, not that I'm doubting you or anything, but…" Emma looked over the 'costume' Madison had gotten for her. She was almost certain it came from a halloween knick-knack shop.

    "Look, skirts are a freakin' classic. And I know you love that magical girl shit, you do not hide your old posters as well as you think you do. And it's blue to match the colour of your petals! It's perfect!"

    Emma winced. "It's very short. And those are…" it was always difficult to talk about outside of her own head. "Queen's petals. Mine are…" she triggered her power herself, a blooming little rose in the palm of her hand, pink like cherry blossoms. "Not blue."

    And then they drifted down to the floor, and she struggled to catch them all before they could fall too close to Madison, hurt her. A couple of them slipped out of her grasp before dissipating entirely.

    "... huh. Why didn't you show me those with the blue ones?"

    "Because these ones melt people, Madison?" She'd realised, to her horror, exactly what they did shortly after she'd worked out how to trigger her power herself. And what it meant - that being a hero, that doing anything heroic, was entirely under Queen's control. That the blue petals - that Queen's petals - were the ones that wouldn't hurt people, and she was left at Queen's mercy to actually be a hero.

    Queen's petals were solid, for a little while. She could hit things with Queen's constructs, or make platforms to jump from, even if they dissolved into a storm of something that acted like razor wire to objects, thankfully leaving flesh unmarred. They were more… versatile. More heroic. Her own - they were soft to the touch, like fruit that had been left for too long. When they broke apart, the petals devoured any living matter they touched, greedy, hungry. Rotten.

    Like her.

    "Welllll, it's only your first night out whenever you go. If you look back, everyone who doesn't, like, immediately get corporate sponsorship looks kinda like a dork when they put on their gear at first. And even then - I like Legend and Eidolon, but those men have no drip. Look at it this way - if you hit a drug den and swipe some cash, I might be able to commission someone for something nicer looking." Madison shuffled until her back was against the wall, sitting cross-legged on Emma's bed, and pushed open her laptop.

    "And how do you plan on doing that without giving away my identity?"

    Madison shrugged. "Eh. Say it's a sex thing."

    "Mads!"

    "There's a whole market for like, weird costume stuff. I mean, when I picked this up -"

    "Please tell me you didn't buy this as a sex thing."

    "Hah, no. This was just at a general, like, dress up shop. Even so, I had to flip past a bunch of 'sexy' Rime and Battery costumes. And some Glory Girl ones, which cannot be legal. And those are somewhat socially acceptable - once you get onto freaky internet shit, there's all sorts of options."

    "Okay, Battery and Glory Girl I can understand having sex appeal, but isn't Rime's costume… not that?"

    "It was a sexy version, so it was like an ice-crop top and skirt covering the important bits and not much else." Madison grinned lazily. "You know they're not accurate to the source material."

    "So who's sexed up costume is this then?"

    "Generic sexy maid?"

    "Mads."

    "Bust up a drug den, get me some cash, I'll get you a proper costume."

    "Okay but - how? How do you have the contacts for this?"

    "I dunno, you run into people online who just know stuff and if you have the cash are willing to provide." She shrugged, an easy up down of one shoulder as her fingers continued to clatter on the keyboard. "Like, this one guy who does these scarily accurate costumes, down to the most minute detail - outright refuses to sex them up, gets really pissed off if you ask. Charges through the nose, and goes after resellers like he's a major corporation instead of some dude in a basement or something."

    "So… he's reliable about not sharing IDs?"

    "I'd hope so, given that I'm around eighty…three percent sure he has hired goons to burst through people's doors and stop them from modifying his work. Or maybe that was just the resellers?" Madison shuddered hard enough the bed shook a little. "I'll flick him a message and get a quote for you. So we know what to work towards."

    "Uh - sure?" Emma wasn't even sure what she wanted in a costume. Appearance wise, at least. Madison - or her contact - would be more informed than she was about anything practical regarding it.

    "So, style time. When you get me that cash, do you want an armoured breastplate or an armoured push-up bra?"

    "Wouldn't an armoured push-up bra hurt to wear? And kind of… defeat the point?"

    "Wouldn't hurt if you were a Brute. I heard Alexandria has metal underwear."

    "I'm not Alexandria."

    "Yeah, but you've got better assets."

    "And they'll look great on my slab at the morgue." Emma rolled her eyes.

    "No boob window, gotcha."

    "I just - " Emma sighed. "I want to do this because I want to - to help. To help people who bad things happened to, like - happened to me. And to maybe make up for some of the bad things I did."

    "Nobody said you can't enjoy yourself while you're doing it -" Madison reached out and put a hand on her shoulder, squeezed gently. "In a shithole like Brockton Bay, you kinda have to. Otherwise you'll get burnt out faster than you say 'Fleur and Lightstar'."

    "That's pretty morbid. She died."

    Madison pulled Emma into facing her. "Every now and then, one of my friends on the local LGBT forums goes offline, and never comes back on. Brockton Bay is a pretty morbid place, Emma."

    "Y-you - can't be sure -" She stared into Madison's quiet, solemn face, all that mirth and energy gone from it, imagined it, imagined calling her and getting no reply - "Fuck." Emma slumped. "Gods, I hate this city. At least - at least Lung's gone, though that'll - probably only encourage those Nazi fucks."

    "That's the spirit! Now - maybe not tonight, cause it's late, and you're not sure about the costume, but later this week, you're going to get out there and kick Nazi ass. Make 'em regret even thinking of being bigoted! Smack 'em around and slice 'em up and dissolve all their wacko white power shit into rose petal goo!"

    "I'm… not sure if I can kill."

    "We've arguably done worse to people who didn't deserve it."

    "And I'm trying to make up for that, Mads."

    "Just saying; these ones do deserve it. But - fair enough, most heroes don't do killing stuff, so just - beat the shit out of them. Hurt 'em a bunch and let 'em get arrested."

    "I barely know how to - to fight or do anything."

    "Then we'll practise. And, besides, you've got - whatsername, Queen, your power looking out for you. Yeah?"

    |"Apologies for my lateness. I will protect you, Emma, even if we are still - at least a little - at odds."| A ghost of a smile on her neck. |"That said, martial combat is… not my forte. I would recommend finding someone to teach you, until I can get Variable Excellence to join the Network."|

    "Yeah." Emma sighed, and flopped back on the bed herself. "And she says I should find a teacher."

    "Convince your dad it'd be good for everyone's peace of mind if you got self-defence lessons, then. Here." Madison started typing. "What's daddy's budget?"

    "Do not call him that, I swear to god -"

    "What's Father Dearest's -"

    "Madison!"

    -.-.-

    Making armour was… much more involved than any media had prepared me for. Simply hitting the metal repeatedly was a part of it, yes, but that wasn't the be-all-end-all of it. Dad had tasked Ranni with helping me do the finer details on the gauntlets I wanted, and turning my glintstoned flesh into the cores.

    She taught me how to sand them down to size, but 'like hells I'm letting thou do this untrained'. Which wasn't a jab at my skill, but rather she wanted me to be safe and not turn more of myself into glintstone, intentionally or otherwise. Which was sweet of her.

    Collecting the glintstone dust was important too, apparently, since that was going to be combined with the heraldry threads and spell knots. She agreed it was amusing that 'spell knots' were often literal when it came to enchanting - even her own body was made up of spell knots!

    "What do we do about the feathers?" I asked, gesturing to the hologram cloak.

    "That…" Ranni hrmed. "Normally, through culling the owl population - "

    "Nooo," I whined, "Don't hurt the poor things!"

    "We can limit the hunt to a single owl, but unless we have a way to sedate it -" Ranni looked to Dad. "We can pluck it and heal it as many times as necessary, and it will only recall a nightmare."

    "That seems kinda cruel…" I sighed. "But less cruel than killing a hundred of them just for a cloak." I hummed. "Hey - I kinda count as a princess too, right? Does that mean I could put a crown on my armour?"

    The steady beat of Dad hammering in the background stopped. "That would be… a crown is warranted with strength, is what my first husband always said. But it was an odd statement, for the crowns of the Lands Between were symbolic."

    "We of Caria had something akin to a crown - "

    Dad sighed. "Yes, but - you know I love your Mother dearly but she is the only person alive who could pull off wearing a the Moon cap and not look a complete fool. And even then, it is a close thing."

    Ranni stuck out her tongue.

    At my look of confusion, Ranni waved her hand and for just a second, Dad was wearing what looked like an artistic hat-rendition of a flamingo neck on her head and I had to clap my hands over my mouth to hold back laughter. It wasn't easy. "A-ahem. Um. Dad, did - did you have a crown of your own?"

    "No." The steady beat of the hammer resumed. "I was Queen Marika the Eternal. What need did I have of a symbol of royalty? To whom would I be indicating my authority? I was ruler above all simply by my existence." She gave a dry laugh. "Or that was the idea at least."

    Huh. Thinking about it some more - I'm pretty sure I only expected crowns to be a thing in the Lands Between because they were a thing here on Earth. A crown is warranted with strength. I wasn't sure I believed that, wanted to believe that. It felt like something Sophia might say, or something Kaiser might say.

    But strength certainly helped.

    -.-.-
     
  • Threadmarks
    • WhoAmEye said:
    I was an outside context problem who'd literally appeared out of nowhere.
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    Then again, that's what OOCPs are wont to do. :V

    WhoAmEye said:
    "... perhaps, but it is kin to offering a weapon to whoever can read it."
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    Make it one that will explose in their face.

    WhoAmEye said:
    All I got was the feeling of enthusiasm from the back of my head.
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    I'm Halping!

    WhoAmEye said:
    If you look back, everyone who doesn't, like, immediately get corporate sponsorship looks kinda like a dork when they put on their gear at first.
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    Question: Does *given the costume by your former god queen father* counts as corporate sponsoring or not?

    WhoAmEye said:
    Like, this one guy who does these scarily accurate costumes, down to the most minute detail - outright refuses to sex them up, gets really pissed off if you ask. Charges through the nose, and goes after resellers like he's a major corporation instead of some dude in a basement or something.
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    I give it a 90% chance that it's Accord.

    WhoAmEye said:
    Madison pulled Emma into facing her. "Every now and then, one of my friends on the local LGBT forums goes offline, and never comes back on. Brockton Bay is a pretty morbid place, Emma."
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    And the E88 is still allowed to parade anyway.

    Fuck Nazis.

    WhoAmEye said:
    I would recommend finding someone to teach you
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    Taylor would be absolutely ok with a *spar*.

    You may not get out of it in one chunk though.

    Also, Tay and Emma are totally going to go on patrol the same night, and run into each others, busting some nazis kneecaps and bonding then recognize each others.

    Mark my words.
     
    Nyarky said:
    Also, Tay and Emma are totally going to go on patrol the same night, and run into each others, busting some nazis kneecaps and bonding then recognize each others.
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    Not only that, emma is apparently going to be out and about in 'sexy maid but cape' style. Taylor is 100% going to thirst at her as well before realizing who she is. That is going to lead to a real "wtf are you doing, hormones" moment for taylor on top of everything else.
     
    Have to admit I have grown less interested in the story since the whole Emma gained power, less because it's Emma and more because I felt it was slightly diluting what I wanted to read about the story (PRT and Taylor+family interaction with each other) so much so that I've only skimmed more than read the previous few chapters.

    It's probably just me, and this is only my own opinion not a critic, but I've really wanted to say it for a handfull of chapters already.
    I'll think I'm going to hold off reading until there a handfull of chapters to read at once and decide from there.
     
    Nyarky said:
    Make it one that will explose in their face.
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    You don't put "I prepared exploding runes today" on your own clothing since it's the runes that explode.

    You put runes of madness that make gazing into the abyss seem tame and invite Shub-Niggurath into the readers mind on your clothes where you can't see them, but observers can.

    Nyarky said:
    Question: Does *given the costume by your former god queen father* counts as corporate sponsoring or not?
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    Corporate sponsorship: no. Divine sponsorship: yes.
     
    4.2
  • Threadmarks
    • Sorry for the delay. Getting my med dosages fiddled with in an attempt to have the ability to focus again. On the other hand, here, have what *was* two chapters in one go!
    Special thanks to prime beta Lucky38, Canon Overlord @Ganurath, @hellgodsrus for being my loveliest wife and co-author, and @SolarFlare for being our wonderful supportive girlfriend! And our many friends on the Totally Chatting It discord for their fantastic livereads!
    Enjoy and gib feedbacc!

    Be Thou Mine Greatest Conflict
    4.2
    -.-.-​

    I loved my new gauntlets. I loved my new armour. And Ranni had even worked what to do about talking to me while I was out caping. A little bead of stellar iron covered in tiny runes and glyphs that would let me share my senses with her, one way so I didn't get distracted in the middle of a fight. If it weren't for my visible mouth, you'd have no idea that my skin was made of stone.

    And, despite everything, it was surprisingly comfortable. Ranni had subjected me to a withering lecture when I'd said that. I guess it made sense that you'd want armour to not suck to wear, but I'd always kind of thought of knights as sort of clanking around, heavy and uncomfortable. Apparently though, that wasn't how armour worked, even heavy plate armour - the only exceptions were for jousting where the immobility was an advantage, apparently. Otherwise you could apparently still do backflips in the stuff - Dad had summoned some, heavy and golden, and demonstrated. The issue was normal people would get dehydrated fairly quickly sealed in heavy metal armour, but apparently we didn't have to worry about that either.

    The main issue with the armour actually was how long it took to put on. I wouldn't be doing any dashing out in civilian gear and ripping open my shirt to reveal my armour, not with all the elaborately arranged cloth draperies, and buckles, and clasps, and more buckles. Even the vanishing storage trick Ranni was still teaching me couldn't help with armour. Well, it could, it just… was a lot more complex and prone to failure of the lethal kind than summoning an unmoving inflexible weapon to your hand. Get the weapon thing wrong and it fell to the ground embarrassingly, or didn't appear. Get the armour thing wrong and you could end up with parts of it trapped inside your internal organs, or even outright replacing them.

    I didn't want a repeat of the glintstone liver incident.

    >Hey V, wanna meet up?
    <sure, not like prt can bst up family privileges more than they already have, sigh
    >sorry about that :(
    <not your fault
    <and idk wtf they're doing with everything the way it is
    <amster still so hurt isn't allowed out in public
    <abb remnants going nuts
    <empire going nuts
    <even heard there were sightings of the fucking teeth other day
    >All the more reason to take the fight to them, right?
    >Bust a few drug dens, break a few weapon caches…
    <i'd need to sneak out or mbbe…
    <would u be up for meeting me near St Frideswides?
    <the hospital i mean
    <dropping ames off there in a few, could b good cover?
    >Sure! See you there :)

    Now - where the heck was St Frideswides? I was about to go looking for a map online when Ranni's voice in my ear made me jump.

    "Thou art not far away. Head northwest."

    "Thanks, Ranni." I paused. "Or - since I have to answer verbally -" I started Reaching across rooftops, my gauntlets making the action almost like climbing a rock wall, or pulling open the curtains of reality. "- do you want a cape name too?"

    "Lunar Scamp."

    "I'm not calling you that."

    "Bah." I could almost hear her stick her tongue out at me. "If thou must address me by some fictitious name, then, speak to me as Renna, Witch of Snows."

    "Like my middle name?" Weird, but - "Okay. Thanks, Renna."

    "Witch of Snows!"

    "It's gonna be awkward if I have to say that every single time, y'know."

    She definitely blew a raspberry at me this time, before pausing. "Father says good luck and not to do anything… well, that's not a concern, she doesn't even realise herself yet -"

    "Realise what?" I made another hop and then frowned. "Renna?"

    "Nothing!" It absolutely was not nothing, but I could interrogate her on that when I got home. In the meantime, I started trying to wiggle my armour to scratch an itch on the back of my shoulder. "Father says good luck."

    I'd already moved to a slightly nicer bit of town before I texted Victoria, and now I found myself heading into a pretty middle-class bit, nearer the boardwalk. St. Frideswide's wasn't a hospital I was super familiar with - the main one I knew about was Brockton General, obviously - but the sparse rooftops made using Reach the best way to travel without attracting attention. And I was still able to chat to Ranni, obviously, tossing over where I might have gone wrong with the meteorite thing, math wise, the sun going down as evening arrived, staining the world thick orange.

    The last jump made, I was torn between standing on the roof of the actual hospital - which I was sure I'd get in trouble for - or perching on a nearby appropriately tall rooftop, which I might still get in trouble for, but not as much trouble.

    My choice was taken from me as the comforting fuzz of Victoria's aura brushed my mind as she swooped down, dropping a white robed person I assumed was her sister a few feet back and surging forward before she stopped ten feet above and in front of me in midair, arms folded. "If you're a villain here to go after my sister, you've really picked the wrong fucking day, asshole."

    What? I didn't look that… villainous, did I? A quick glance at Panacea, Amy - she was half-hidden in her robes and heavy, fawn-brown curls, with bags under her eyes and a generous smattering of freckles across her face, looking at me with… probably grump. "She's cute, but I'm here for you, Glory." I grinned, spreading my arms and ignoring the subtle gagging sound from Ranni.

    The aura faded and Victoria blinked at me. "T - Empyrean?"

    "Yup! Like the new threads?" I did a little twirl, making my cloak swish delightfully. I'd say I was geared for war - probably a Lands Between war - but… okay, yeah, I was decked out for war.

    "... those are seriously high quality for you to be going straight from just a sweatshirt to that." Victoria hovered lower, then her eyes widened. "Oh, um - Empyrean, this is my sister Panacea. Ames, this is Empyrean."

    Panacea stared at me for a long moment then blurted, "Yeah, hi."

    "Pleasure to meet you." I waved with a smile. I wasn't really certain what else to say. She was one of the few capes I'd known about before all this, the only healer I'd heard of. Maybe she could help Mom wake up, but… I got the feeling if she could do that, Dad would have already done it herself. And I got the feeling she wasn't quite running on all cylinders right now, what with the eyebags and the flat glare.

    "Aww come on, both of you can sound a bit more enthusiastic." Victoria swooped over to her sister, pulling her into a hug as Panacea stiffened. "Seriously, you look completely dead on your feet already. You don't have to pull this shift if you don't want to."

    She was still and stiff in Victoria's grip for instant before wriggling free, starting to life like some kind of mechanical toy set into motion. "I'm sure that'll be great comfort to the families of the crop in urgent care." Amy rolled her eyes, setting her curls bouncing. "Just, 'oh, yeah, sorry, she didn't feel like it today'."

    "Ames!"

    "Can't help anyone if you kill yourself overworking." I grimaced. Maybe a Lord's Heal could help her? It was meant to be big magic, for healing armies or at least small squadrons, reinvigorating them in the middle of combat, as opposed to smaller magics. Go big or go home, right? But I wasn't sure how to offer it without that being weird or - fuckit. "I could try something that might help, if you want?"

    Amy shook her head but Victoria said, "What did you have in mind?"

    "One of the healing incantations I know - or there's the Law of Regression but I haven't gotten that one right yet -" Maybe I shouldn't have said that. "Anyways, just - heals up the body, eases the aches and pains and exhaustion, and is good for healing any physical injury short of a missing limb." And even that, if I use Lord's.

    "What's the saying - beware Trumps baring gifts?"

    "Ames!" Victoria floated closer to me. "You sure it works? No side effects or risks to you or her? No…" Her voice dropped to a whisper. "Crystalised liver or anything like that?"

    "That's sorcery, no healings from that," I said, wincing, voice equally low. "Ahem. But yeah - the side effects for casting it are on me. Allies around me just benefit as a side bonus." I wasn't sure what the potential effects of Erdtree incantations were, but they weren't noticeable so far.

    "Hrmm." Victoria's eyes scanned across my face for a moment, before huffing out a breath. "Okay. If Amy agrees."

    The girl in question was still staring at me, half turned away, but on being addressed she straightened up a little. Well, turned towards me more, her shoulders actually hunched in further like she was bracing against an invisible wind. "You want me to believe you basically have 'a good night's rest' on demand?" She snorted, seemingly more from habit than anything else. "I'll believe that when I feel it."

    "So… that a yes then?"

    "Victoria seems to trust you, even though you murdered people in front of her. And made Mom lose her shit at her."

    "Nazis. Totally different." I coughed, trying not to notice how tense Victoria had gotten when she said that, the way she'd drifted away from me just a little. "And - sorry about that. The mom losing her shit thing. Didn't mean for that whole thing to happen, I promise."

    "Fair enough." Panacea's eyes flicked away. "Fine. Try it."

    A couple of steps closer. She flinched, but held her ground. I rolled my fingers - it was neat how the seal came out above my armoured palm, instead of half-way through it - and murmured the words. By the Grace of the Erdtree, the Lord will be Whole. Raised my glowing fist -

    There was a soft flash, the knot laid out on the rooftop under us, gold energy flickering like fallen leaves as the glow engulfed us. The itch in my shoulder vanished, the tension I hadn't realised I'd been carrying relaxed - I just felt better. Maybe I should do this first thing on waking up in the morning more often.

    Amy had stiffened more though, her face lit sallow by the golden light. She squinted against it for a moment - then as it faded she snapped her head away, as though looking at me hurt.

    "Panacea? You good?" I would have reached out a hand, if it wasn't for my claw gauntlet nails that could be seen as a threat - ugh, I hadn't thought that fashion choice through, had I -

    "Yeah. Mm - I'm fine." She shook her head a little, as if to clear water from her ear. "I'm fine."

    "Feeling better?"

    She paused, blinking a few times but still not looking near me. "... yeah. Physically, at least. So… thanks."

    "Yeah, that was amazing. Better than coffee after a nap. I feel like I could take on the world." Victoria floated between us, shadowboxing an imaginary opponent. "Are you sure you want to go on patrol instead of hanging out here and healing people?"

    "PRT would make that more trouble than it's worth to the people she heals, lock them up in red tape and M/S screening." Panacea's mouth was shifting, like she was running her tongue over the back of her teeth. "You should - drop me off and both do your thing. I'll cover for you."

    "Okay. Love you, sis." Victoria swooped down and scooped Amy into an airborne hug before scooting away to the rooftop of the hospital.

    I hoped Panacea was alright. Something was clearly bothering her - it wasn't my place to pry, but… I still wished her the best regardless. "So…" I started when Victoria returned. "I… didn't really have anything planned beyond showing off my new armour. Where should we go?"

    "I mean, it is pretty fucking great armour." She smiled, a little lopsided, and floated lower. "And - what Amy said. You don't - I saw how you fight in Boston and you did pretty damn well. We'll handle the PRT reaction later, I guess, but for now… let's try and do some good."

    Hopefully, things would go even smoother this time with the incantation Dad taught me after I'd complained about my lack of options at the aquarium - I couldn't kill people with it if I tried. "So, where should we hunt?"

    Her face went through a few expressions when I said 'hunt', but her shoulders lifted in a shrug. "Well, there's the old ABB territory, though it's kinda a constant hotspot of various splinter groups fighting for turf. Nothing I'm really aware of in particular, but we could definitely swing by and see what we can find. Empire's pushing in as well, so a lot of their normal territory's surprisingly lightly defended, though catch anyone actually pushing the advantage on that. Hookwolf has these dogfighting rings, I've heard - "

    And I didn't hear the rest of what she said because Ranni hissed in my ear, "End Hookwolf immediately."

    I held up a hand. "Sorry - Renna?"

    "He is a stain upon the concept of wolves and I will not stand for this. Taking beloved pets and wasting their lives in a bloodsport arena is -" there was a hiss of… static? Could magical walkie talkies even make static?

    "Renna?" Victoria floated a little closer, head tilted. I mouthed sister at her and she nodded.

    "If you will not, I will."

    "Looks like we're taking on the dogfighting rings." At Victoria's raised eyebrow, I explained further. "Renna's… going to do it if we don't, and I'd rather not reveal her yet."

    "I guess my only question is that I thought your sister's name was Ranni?"

    "Never know who might be listening."

    "So she's using the cape name… Renna. Instead of Ranni. She's changing literally two vowel sounds and that's it." Victoria shrugged. "Well, refuge in audacity is a thing."

    "Give me her number, Taylor."

    "No."

    "Huh?"

    "I only wish to offer constructive criticism."

    "I'm suddenly understanding why the whole 'two fingers against the ear' thing is a thing in movies." And I did just that. Tnktnk.

    "Ohhhh, okay." Victoria floated round to my other side with a giggle.

    "Why do you deny me this, sister?"

    "We'll talk about it when I get home. Don't you want to watch a blender get blended?"

    A moment of silence. "It would be valuable to learn how thy primal sorcery interacts with living flesh."

    I nodded and lowered my fingers. "So. Hookwolf's dogfighting rings. Where would we find those?" I asked with a vicious grin.

    "Follow me."

    -.-.-

    It was kind of awful to think, but for a brief moment, before she'd worked out who it was, Victoria had almost been grateful for an unknown cape to beat the shit out of. Thank fuck, something simple, some awful part of her had said.

    And then it had been Taylor and that had brought everything back to being complicated.

    "It's a good costume," she offered, sliding through the air alongside Taylor across the rooftops. "How did, uh. How did you go from what you had before which was pretty… low key, to this?" That was a safe topic, right? Helping Taylor with hero stuff, and PR. Because the costume was incredible, from the feather cape to the banded brass to the embroidery, clearly made by someone who knew genuine craft of medieval-esque stuff, but different enough that it was clearly - maybe clearly? She didn't want to assume - from her family's original culture in its design aesthetics.

    It was a good look. In theory. In practice Victoria could see all the weak points where press and people online would tear it apart, from the 'tacky and violent' clawed gauntlets to the cloak that someone would inevitably start a fuss about where she'd gotten the feathers from -

    Or maybe Victoria was just tired after a week of dealing with Mom's anger, and the stares and whispers of people at school, and a Calculus test she hadn't remembered was happening, and not seeing enough of Dean to be able to talk to him about how she'd been haunted by the glimmering shape of Taylor in the firelight on the beach -

    "Well - y'know how I can do a bunch of esoteric things? Apparently, one of those things is summon meteors, which can have a surprising amount of useful stuff in them."

    A meteor?! "Like - rock from the sky, giant crater, that kind of meteor? How does that lead to - all the fabrics and armour and - "

    Taylor chuckled and rubbed at the back of her helmet. "It uh. When you grab it from space instead of letting it fall a lot more of it survives impact, and then - you know how meteorites have metal and stuff in them? So it turns out Dad was hiding an entire smithy in the basement! Which was really shocking, if I'm honest. I'm not sure where the rest of the materials came from other than the feathers and the glinstone -" she tapped at the shining oval gemstone on the back of one of her hands - "So I guess they just had stuff on hand? And were able to put it together really quickly." A hint of a proud, happy smile, a touch of shyness under her helmet.

    Shouldn't be noticing that, shouldn't be noticing that, need to talk to Dean before anything else - "Really quickly, I guess." It made Victoria a little embarrassed to be there in her own, kind of outdated costume, with the tiara she'd thought would look pretty and cool two years ago, and the cloak she and Aunt Sarah had sewn together - god, she still had the family meeting sitdown Mom had promised to look forward to.

    Can't I just enjoy going out and doing hero work with a friend?

    But Taylor was - fuck the whole thing was too fucking complicated for her to be just a friend, because Victoria was sort of her heroic mentor or something, and the stuff she still had to talk to Dean about…

    " - thankfully the poor bird won't remember a thing, but I still feel guilty." Taylor sighed, swishing her cloak.

    Pay attention, dumbass! She mentally clipped herself over the head. "Does it all - mean something? Culturally, I mean. What with you being royalty, and your family having made it for you - like, the symbols." She pointed at the not-quite-celtic knotwork across Taylor's tabard. "I'm guessing those aren't sponsorship logos." Weak joke. Pathetic. Come on.

    Taylor snorted, shoulders shaking, as she gasped out "O-only by technicality -" After a moment and a cough, she elaborated. "I - uh. These ones - " she tapped the designs hanging from her shoulders, draped over her chest, and a momentary shimmer of blue surrounded her , " - are protection, granted by the stars my sister rules over." She paused, and then put her fingers to her helmet - guess her sister's checking in. "No, that would be nepotism, sponsorship - oh. Right, sorry." Fingers away. "Ahem. I'm not paid, so it's just signs of nepotism." She gave a small, wry smirk.

    "Appropriate for royalty, I guess." Her lips twitched into a smile, almost despite herself. "But seriously, it's a really impressive costume. Above professional quality."

    "You could almost say the quality is… divine? Eh? Eh?" Taylor mimed an elbow nudge, but between the roof hopping and floating to stay at eye-level, she was far out of range. Ridiculous enough it pushed a chuckle out of Victoria's throat. "There was absolutely some meta-physical fuckery going on when Dad and Ra- Renna - made it for me. I can imagine any other reason for reality to hiccup every time the hammer hits the anvil."

    "Hiccup?"

    "Like the whole earth shook but you are keenly aware it's only in your head. Like a microsecond of that squeeze on the way to Boston."

    "Ah. Yeah that's - alarming. Or probably was alarming to be around." Yeah, she was getting increasingly worried about Taylor's Dad. Who had to have been his world's equivalent of Eidolon, or something like that, what with the teaching 'spells', and casually making some kind of imbued, Tinkered equipment in a handful of days, and just -

    God, I hope I was fucking wrong when I kept thinking of him as a villain and it was just cultural difference stuff like Taylor talked about.

    "It was an amazing effect when I brought in the radio and played something to match the tempo." She seemed so excited. "The bass drop became literal. I've never been to a party but I think it'd feel something like that."

    The couple of parties with kids her own age Victoria had been to had mostly just been kind of disappointingly cramped and sweaty. Not really any room to talk to people, music no-one really liked but no-one really hated.

    Then again, that was better than the parties her parents dragged her to, mostly. And probably better than not really going to anything at all. Fucked up to think it's a grass is greener thing, but it kind of was. Victoria had hated no-one liking her and then found out popularity sucked, and now Taylor wanted the same things, and part of her wanted to grab those armoured shoulders and shake her, but she hadn't had a chance to know better because of -

    Why couldn't things be simple with her? The whole tangled mess of everything that was Taylor, and now Victoria was caught in it, was - if Mom was to be believed - dragging her family underwater with it.

    One thing at a time. Arrest animal abusing Nazis first. Go back to moping and having a crisis afterwards. "So - the protective spells that are woven in. Is that just hardening, or like a forcefield…?"

    "I'm not entirely sure? I think it's more force reduction? Or minimisation? Something like that. It's technically the same part of my gear that allows me to do this." She clenched a gauntleted hand, crossing it over the bronzed bands of her torso and lighting them up with fat purple sparks before kicking off the roof - not quite taking flight, but definitely moving further and faster than she had before.

    And promptly overshooting the rooftop she'd been aiming for and bouncing off the fire escape, "Shit!" the wall, "Fuck!" the fire escape again, "Damnit!" and then landing in a soft crumpled heap in the alleyway.

    Victoria did not laugh at her friend. Did her best not to anyway. "You good there?" she offered as she floated down. "Cause that was an impressive wipeout." It was good, to laugh like that, to watch Taylor try something out. More - innocent felt loaded, but simpler? Simpler to just be fucking around with a friend.

    "Me? Sure. My pride and dignity?"

    "Assuming you had any to begin with." See? Banter. Normal banter.

    Taylor groaned, rolled over onto her back, and flipped her the bird. "I mean, accurate, but ow." The glow around the bands faded as she clambered back to her feet, impressively not tripping up on her cloak. "Gods, I hope that doesn't end up on PHO…"

    "Eh." Victoria floated up, and Taylor followed her back to the rooftops with a teleport. "Even if it does, there's worse things that can end up on there. And besides, it's part of the biz. People will catch you eating a sandwich or something eventually. Just, uh. From experience, make sure it's not one with mayo in it? Or you'll get some really creepy photo edits made of you."

    Yeah, Taylor's rapid paling was completely understandable. Getting those taken down and the users banned and arrested because she'd been fourteen at the time had been something she and Mom had been super grateful to have the PRT's help with. "That's…" she paused, before hissing, "Ranni! We talked about cursing people through the internet!"

    "Oh, if she can do that to creeps, that's good. Maybe not as good as my whole family coming after them legally, but pretty damn good." Victoria rolled her shoulders. "C'mon. We're getting close now."

    Taylor crouched down - not that it really did much, given her stature - "If we come across capes, what's the plan? Ran - Renna says Hookwolf has a Birdcage order and a bounty on him. I'm not entirely sure if it's actually dead or alive or if he's somehow offended her enough she's putting her opinion in."

    "It's alive. It's not an official bounty - those are generally 'dead' - more like a western movie sorta reward. I doubt he'll be here tonight. There are easily a dozen of these rings, I'm pretty sure. This is just one of the three I know about." Victoria floated forward, lying down in the air on her stomach til she was just peaking over the edge of the building. "There."

    Below, at the back entrance of an old clothing store, orange light and faint sounds of conversation drifted out into the early dusk. A guy was posted up outside, leaning against a stack of pallets, baseball cap pulled low.

    "Weird tactic." Taylor muttered, rolling her fingers. "Lookout that blinds himself?"

    "Better than the Nazis being smart about it." Victoria muttered right back. "You're the one with more variation available in what you can do. Got a plan in mind?"

    "I…" Her mouth twisted into a frown. Muttered something and a soft steel glow came from the eyeholes of her helmet. "Can I… share this with you?"

    "Don't tell me you have X-ray vision on top of everything else." Victoria rolled her eyes and offered her hand.

    "Heh, not - not quite, but close." Empyrean clasped her hand, murmured something under her breath and -

    "Oh." The world lit up in sparks and shapes of gold, like someone had coated the landscape in shimmering dust. Sparks within the dust, afterimage shapes of insects, of rats… and larger shapes too. Dogs, lots of them, stacked atop one another in a deeper basement, likely in cages. Two in a clearing of people, and - Christ, the people. She knew that no matter what the bust was, there were always some who managed to slip the net, but seeing how many there were beforehand - "Didn't think it'd be bumping this hard this early already, fuck. Maybe Hookwolf will be there if there's already so many people at six in the evening." She blinked again and shook her eyes at the brightness of the world.

    Taylor's thumb rubbed over the back of her hand in soft motions. "Yeah, I - I didn't know what to expect, but I'm just horrified it's this popular. The dogs in the cages - they aren't fighting breeds. They look like people's pets. I'm pretty sure the third from the left on the top row is a chihuahua." She sighed. "So - I think I can see the separate exits. If we take out the guards, collapse the exits - you bust in through the roof to grab attention while I swing in behind with the flamethrower?"

    "The what."

    "Sleepthrower."

    "That is not what you said." Frustration at Empyrean wasn't productive here, had to - calm it down and try to explain how obviously counterproductive in every way setting everyone on fire would be -

    "It's a flamethrower that puts people to sleep?" Taylor shrugged. "Apparently there was a literal saint of naps in the Lands Between. Who - might have been my sister? Brother? Not important. I have a flamethrower that puts people to sleep."

    Victoria resisted her instinct was to grab her glowing body and shake it, because what the fuck was she talking about -

    No, Victoria - had to distract herself. Be nice. Was the gold dust all over them bacteria? Was this what Ames saw touching people? No wonder she got so weird about hugging. And Taylor herself was almost blindingly fucking bright to look at, and squinting didn't help. "In the 'set a man on fire he'll be warm for the rest of his life' sense?" Shit, that hadn't helped, deep breaths. Calm. "In future, call it a sleeping… I dunno, a sleeping mist or spray. Flamethrower's a sexier word, but it'll have fucked up implications."

    "In the 'I accidentally used it on myself and woke up two hours later' sense," Taylor grumbled. "Trust me, you'll understand when you see it in action."

    "If you're sure." Victoria took another deep breath and eyed glowing shapes of the potential guards - the ones on their own or near someone sitting down, facing away from the dogfighting. "There's a floor above the one the pit's on. Hm. I'll break a window to enter more stealthily rather than smashing through two floors. Bit too much risk of accidentally hurting someone too much."

    "Alright. Whenever you're ready." Taylor took away her hand, the brightness of it leaving afterimages on Victoria's eyes. "That'll wear off in a couple of minutes."

    Well, it was good that it'd wear off at least. "Okay. I'll close the far exit and the - medium distance exit. Ready?"

    "Ready." Taylor imploded, her portal opening up behind the front guard, arms coming out to put him in a sleeper hold. With their difference in heights she'd also lifted him a good foot and a half off the ground.

    Victoria floated up - slowly - then shot round the corner towards the other guards she could still faintly see shadows of. Quick and quiet - chop to the throat of the first, careful to slow it so she didn't break anything important, just kept him silent. Arm round the neck of the other, very careful in how she applied the hold. First had recovered enough for her to, as gently as she could, toss him away from the door into the wall of the alley, catch him so he only had one major impact injury, then apply the same careful hold - just had to cut off bloodflow for a little bit… there. Zipties and ducttape from the pouch hidden under her cape, restraining and gagging them - ah a dumpster! Nice and half full, and glimmering with squirming insect life and bacteria, perfect. Surreptitiously she checked the hinges on the exit - opened out, excellent - then put the two stirring Nazis into the dumpster, and the dumpster in front of the door.

    One exit down, one to go.

    -.-.-

    I wasn't sure how long I was meant to put mortal people in this hold for, so I stopped when he felt limp, letting him slip to the ground. Maybe a mistake, because when he started moving again I panicked, just a little.

    And sorta drowned him in St Trina's fire. Calling it mist instead was a good idea, but it also had the problem of being, well… it was fire. Plain and simple. Sorta purple fire, but still fire.

    It did take him down for the count though. So. Success!

    Through my echo vision, I could see that Victoria had shoved - would shove? - something in front of the first exit, and was swapping to the second one. Once the echoes and life there dimmed to unconsciousness and still breathing, I primed my seal in my clawed grip and stepped inside.

    It was dark, but as soon as I pushed open the door I could hear cheering, yelling, jeering, and dogs barking. Dogs fighting. See the echoes of spilled blood and teeth and rolling eyes and fear.

    It hurt deeply to know that these people were abusing those innocent animals like this. Throwing away their lives for nothing more than entertainment.

    I should have asked Ranni to make extra enchanted things so Victoria and I could communicate, but - that was something I could do later. Right now, it was go time.

    Victoria crashed through the roof the same moment I stepped back and kicked down the door. Inside it was packed and hot and sweaty and stunk of alcohol and blood - I'd been able to hear the music before but with the door down it was loud and incoherent, mixing with the yelling and the barking of the dogs. As chunks of the ceiling fell down, the crowd shifted into panic, into stampede, starting to trample each other - in their haste to get to the blocked exits, to get away from the flames billowing out my palm, they were dropping like flies, sleep clouding their minds as the fire burned through their brains.

    I did my best to keep Victoria out of the literal line of fire as I swept it across the room. I wasn't going waste time asking them to lay down and - fuck! Restraints! I'd forgotten to get any way to restrain them - it hadn't been a problem in Boston because the Protectorate showed up, and I hadn't needed to restrain a corpse before that -

    Victoria hovered above them. As the crowd's path to flight was blocked and the mood shifted to fight, she ducked low over the crowd, aura pushing out hard enough to make the teeth in my jaw ache a little - yes, I knew she was pretty and wanted to look at her, I didn't need the aura making that clearer, thank you - dodging thrown objects, grabbing the arm of the one idiot who'd tried to pull a gun and snapping his forearm in a quick twist before diving towards the bar where the bartender was raising a shotgun.

    It was harder to keep her out of St Trina's fire when she was moving, but I was starting to clear an area around me of collapsed, slumbering Nazis - I had to be careful stepping through them though so I didn't wake them up, but it was hard to care because Nazis.

    One of them rushed at me while my flame-hand was pointing the other way, seemingly forgetting I had two hands. I used my spare to backhand him with and oof, that crunch as he hit the wall didn't sound great. But he was still stirring and writhing in my shadow-future sight, so - I was going to hope that was non-lethal.

    I needed to ask Dad for a second seal. Could you cast two incantations at once? I wasn't even sure but - I doused the guy in fire and his future-movements sort of… fizzled out as if they'd never been, which was an odd experience. Like Paradise Lost was trying to alter my memories, but that didn't work because seeing him move was why I flamed him.

    It was distracting enough that an asshole was able to hit me in the back with a fire axe - it stuck in my armour but didn't penetrate, not a single feather cut - and I drove my elbow back into his chin, trying to make the motion smoother and less sharp and vicious. He still stumbled back with an audible crack, hunching forward to spit out a handful of teeth before I was able to sweep the purple fire onto him and he collapsed.

    Between the Nazis wailing in pain and anger, and the dogs being scared or upset, I think the dogs deserved my sympathy more.

    BANG!

    My head rocked back more with shock than the actual impact, though my head fucking rang from the noise against my helmet.

    I turned to look at the asshole with the shotgun - different asshole than the bartender, but Victoria was already swooping towards them, aura pulsing again as she slid into a smooth armbar, floating up out of reach of a guy swinging a plank of wood at her.

    I flicked aside the still smoking, crumpled slug from where it had fallen into my hood. It was kind of a pity. I really wanted to grab the guy's gun and smack him upside the chin with it - but I could do that to the idiot with the plank, at least.

    Splinters flew and sirens rang around us - wait, why would the Nazis have put alarms in their own dogfighting ring?

    Before I knew it, there was a trooper in full body armour and blank-faced helmet in the PRT's colours shouting at people to get on the ground. Oh, that explained the sirens. I assumed their shotgun had beanbag rounds - which now that I thought about it might even be marginally more effective against me than slugs just for the weight behind them.

    I cut off my fire upon seeing the extra torch beams from the other troopers, the flashing green-and-white lights bathing the entrance hall. Victoria hadn't called them, and I hadn't… shit, whoever called had probably heard me bouncing my way down the fire escape, only reason I could think of them arriving so soon.

    Bang!

    My head rocked back again - I was right, they did pack a bigger punch than the slugs against my armour - but I wasn't knocked off balance by it. "Hey, what the hell?!" I glared at him.

    "Uh -" the sheepish trooper paused. "Unknown cape, please identify yourself?"

    "She's Empyrean, you cretin," Victoria said, carefully dropping shotgun-man. "I'm counting several charges of animal cruelty and potentially trespassing you can level against these men, and probably drug holding and use of illegal firearms as well. Nothing directly cape related other than their gang affiliation, and their lawyers will probably insist they just happened to be gathering here for harmless fun, but that's your job now." She was hovering back towards the hole in the ceiling, and she shot me a look - oh, right, what she'd said about the Protectorate wanting to chat to me. Was her plan really just for us to run away?

    "Before you go -" This trooper sounded older, but behind the faceless mask gimmick, it was hard to tell. Maybe it was just the way they carried themselves more confidently than itchy-trigger. "- these ones on the ground. What'd you do?"

    "I put them to sleep." I shrugged. It seemed like a harmless enough question. "They'll wake up with a good jostle so don't trip over them."

    "... right. Noted. Empyrean, would it be acceptable for you to stay and discuss this - "

    "Nope!" said Victoria, swooping up behind me, wrapping her arms around me and lifting me off the ground and through the hole in the ceiling.

    The stars were beautiful tonight, but they couldn't hold a candle to -

    "I think we're far enough away now," I grinned as we approached a sufficiently high rooftop that I could make unfavourable comparisons to insects regarding the apparent size of the people on the street.

    "Oh good, cause you're actually really fucking heavy." Victoria gently set me down in the same way one would a cat, meaning dropped me two feet, winced, and shook out her arms. "Fuck, forgot to turn off my aura, sorry."

    "All good. If you give me a little warning next time I can do the lightening trick I failed at so badly with the fire escape." I sat down on the edge, splayed myself out a little. "You could probably throw me at the enemy after that." I chuckled.

    "I think that went alright. That sleep mist stuff is powerful. Though we were kinda lucky there were no capes there. Well. Semi-lucky. Those assholes will probably all be back on the street after a couple of days because of that, which'll fucking suck." Victoria sat down next to me, legs crossed, something tight and jumping in the set of her jaw.

    "I'd say 'note to self, break more limbs next time so they reconsider being nazis', but they have a healer of their own, don't they?" I sighed, leaning back. "I get not every outing can be as successful as the Boston one, but - I was kinda hoping we'd make a difference. I didn't catch you with the fire, did I?"

    "Nah, I was able to float away when you got a bit too happy with it." She bumped her shoulder gently against my elbow. "And - that's still a lot of assholes off the street for a couple of days. Means they can't push for territory quite as hard, other gangs will be able to get more ground against them, and if you can come out tomorrow and we hit them again and keep hitting them, we might be able to do something a little more permanent. Maybe." Her smile was a little brittle, but genuine.

    "My schedule's as free as can be, for you." I couldn't quite keep my blush from spreading to my neck but - "Are you going to be able to escape the family again tomorrow night?" I wanted to offer my help, to kidnap save her from her room like a dashing teleporting knight so we could go kick ass together.

    "Maybe. My aunt's meant to be having a sit-down with me and my mom at some point - kinda a mixed family thing and business thing to sort out what the fuck's going on, and hopefully - well, we'll see. Worst comes to worst I can text you info on where to go."

    I put an arm over her shoulder and gently pulled her close. "It'll work out. Don't worry."

    "Even if I end up getting kicked out of New Wave?" she asked, voice suddenly low and quiet and heavy.

    "I've got disguise magic and can call materials from the heavens - and Dad taught me some forging. You can still be a cape, this time with a secret identity, if you want. We can still be heroes together."

    She was still and quiet for a while, just breathing, heavy and slow. Then, across my echo vision, then reality, her arm slowly wrapped round my back. "Thanks, Taylor."

    "Any time." I smiled, and shuffled my cloak around to cover her too. Looking up - the Currents were fast tonight, and Atlas was dancing through them, grabbing rocks and putting them through an unknown rigmarole of examinations, only keeping the occasional one to stuff into his chest, discarding the others. If I focused on him I could hear his happy little clicking.

    Victoria followed my gaze and blinked a few times. "Did… did the stars always look so vibrant?" She frowned. "They seem brighter than they were earlier tonight. Did you do that thing again?"

    "Probably just your eyes adjusting back to normal. I know I couldn't stand to even look at my phone screen for an hour after my first try with that life sensing thing."

    "Maybe." She shook her head a little. "It was kind of weird. That another, uh, spell - no, incantation, that's the name you use for it. Another incantation?"

    "Yeah. The Erdtree was a representative of life and death - kinda - so I called on it to see living things." I hummed. "Worked… too well the first time I tried." I shuddered. "You can never truly appreciate the fact that germs and bacteria and stuff are everywhere until you can see it." It had been utterly terrifying and six showers still hadn't been enough to feel clean. "I probably looked like a coke addict trying to calibrate it. Still haven't gotten it totally right, but linking intensity to life made it easier to filter through what was and wasn't single-celled. Better than everything in existence being blind-me-barbie gold."

    "Yeah, I - noticed what I thought were bacteria over everything but it was more like the world had just had way too hard a party and overspent on sprinkles, not christmas lights all over. Which, again, good - the crowd was near blinding enough."

    I grimaced apologetically. "I'll try to work on it some more. But this does mean I can potentially share other sensory enhancements - like handing out temporary little Thinker powers."

    "And what are the drawbacks?" Victoria drawled. "Beyond the near blinding thing. You might not even know about it, but it might actually have other components. Like what if everyone you - or I guess your Dad, since you said you got this stuff from him? Like what if everyone your Dad 'teaches' this stuff to gets kinda a little bit Mastered? Just sees him a bit more positively, a bit better…"

    "I'm… doubtful, of that," I hedged cautiously, "But uh. If you notice any of that in yourself, lemme know and I'll start a yelling match until I get answers. The last thing I want to do is hurt you." Like Emma hurt me, taking my trust and breaking it - her - me. "Actually, that's not even the last thing - if I could go my entire life without hurting you, I'd be pretty cool with that."

    Victoria laughed, something fragile under it. "That's - thanks. It's good to know you aren't harbouring a secret desire to stab me."

    "Depends on what you do the stabbing with, really -" I was cut off by a gagging noise and was swiftly reminded that Ranni was watching and listening in to all of this. "Ahem. Um. Please forget I said that." My face was burning and I couldn't even remember what I was thinking about when I said that.

    "You do remember that you've - " She stopped. "Uh, you've not met my boyfriend yet, actually, have you?"

    "Oh. Oh, shit, yeah that'll be." An experience. "Awkward." I almost took my hand away from her - but - I couldn't. I could only fight the desire to hold her tighter. "He probably knows you're a cape -"

    "Taylor, everyone knows I'm a cape."

    "- but - oh, I don't like thinking about this." I whimpered, putting my helmetted face in my hand and almost poking my own fucking eyes out with the claws I was starting to really regret adding to my gauntlets.

    "Hey. Dean's really nice. You two will probably get on like a house on fire, once the initial awkwardness dies down."

    "Flare up bright and fast and leave a burnt out shell and a homeless family behind?"

    She elbowed me, but didn't stop smiling. "He's a total sweetie about secrets and stuff. He'd be - he might have some ideas about how to help with. Everything. Hopefully. Not that I'd tell him you're Empyrean, or Taylor, depending on how you guys meet. Maybe once my infinite grounding is over, we can all grab a burger together or something."

    "That… that sounds pretty nice." The girl I like wants me to meet her boyfriend, who she already likes in the way I want her maybe and - this can only end badly, probably. I wasn't sure when I - when I had solidified that I did want Victoria like that. Or why. But it just - I hoped it was real, and not my emotions playing tricks on me, or me being so desperate for like-minded human contact - sorry, family, you don't count for that - that I was mistaking friendship for more.

    But I definitely wanted Victoria in ways that I could never admit out loud.

    "I mean, the infinite grounding needs to end first." She knocked her head against my side again. "And I should get going to pick up Amy."

    I didn't want her to go. I didn't want to say anything in case it made her leave faster, or made her stay and ruin her sister's evening, or - "If you ever wanna chat - about anything, cape or not - you've still got my number, yeah?"

    "I do, but I don't have easy access to my phone." She sighed with a slight slump against me. "Supervised calls only. I was only really able to text you because I got super sneaky. Which I could do again but it's not an all the time thing."

    I had an idea. It was an objectively terrible idea, and more than likely to backfire on me, but the distance between here and home wasn't that far - literally just a teleport away - but -

    I pulled off my helmet, rummaged around by the ear spot for the complex mass of symbols carved onto a nugget of iron, and pulled it out. "Sister?" I heard echoing from it as I put it up to my ear again.

    "Hey. just gonna lend this side to Victoria for a while, okay?"

    "... thou art lucky I am in a charitable mood after the ruination of that inhumane arena."

    "I'll make it up to you when I get home. Maybe hit myself in the face with a meteorite again."

    I passed the nugget over to Victoria - "Interesting…" she murmured, immediately looking over all the iconography on it. "This might be the weirdest damn bluetooth headset I've ever seen."

    I laughed. "It's sort of always on, as far as I know, so I'll just… keep the other end on me if you ever want to talk."

    "I will." She wrapped her arms around me in a tight hug, then tucked it under her cape. "Seriously. Thank you. You're a good friend. And - and a good ally too. Speak to you soon."

    "See you soon, Victoria." I hugged her back, then put on my helmet, and prayed to the stars that Ranni didn't give her a shovel talk before I got home.

    I hated to see her go.

    But I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy watching her go.

    Stupid hormones, stop - tormenting me like this. I needed to take a walk to clear my head, maybe cool down in the icy night air instead of simmering in my own mind. Then again, the last time I'd gone for a calming night-time stroll -

    I shuddered. Maybe I'd just head straight home.

    Reaching down to the streets - far away from the PRT vans loading up barely-awake Nazis - I stopped by the docks to just… walk along the coastline for a bit. It wasn't the boardwalk, not by a long shot. Barren, possibly derelict, rusted-by-the-sea warehouses instead of the expensive storefronts with windows laden with things non-tourists could only dream of affording, if they even wanted what was in there.

    The ocean was gentle, unlike my unquiet heart. It felt like every other beat was running on a different tempo as my thoughts of Victoria waxed and waned. Whenever I came across a gap, I just Reached across, almost on automatic, so I could continue gazing out to sea like the hopeless romantic I apparently was.

    It was odd, having what I guessed I'd call a crush. I'd had distant ones before - pretty teachers, Alexandria, normal stuff - but the last few years I'd been so busy being miserable I hadn't really had time for anything as soft and confusing as a crush.

    And it was - well, I was terrified. She was my only friend. The last time I'd only had one friend - and she had a boyfriend, and I didn't want to ruin this. But she was so kind, to me. Understanding in a way I doubted few people would be, kind to everyone, smart and sharp with it. And - really pretty. Even if - sometimes it felt like her kindness was a kind of weakness. Sometimes things needed to be dealt with permanently.

    Ugh, I'm a mess. Wish I could just cuddle her and say all of this.

    I'd been so deep in thought I'd completely lost track of my surroundings, so it was a bit of a jolt when I tripped over a stray brick, looked up, and realised I'd possibly walked into a battlefield of some kind. There were hunks taken out of the nearby buildings, like a set of roots or a cone or both had grown through them and left nothing behind. The distant sound of gunshots, odd bits of weird, blackened debris, and something else - a kind of sound I could only describe as inverted gunshots going off too, or like very quiet thunder.

    "What the fuck." I stared at the ruined buildings for a moment, before reaching, rushing to the sound of the gunshots and the what-the-fuck-shots going off. They ended before I got close enough to see who or what was fighting, but the damage just kept growing the more I looked. Shattered pieces of guns, and blood, and knocked down gang members in white shirts stained with blood - the most injured one was someone who'd clearly had the edge of their arm caught in one of the whatever-the-fucks that had damaged the buildings and weapons.

    I eventually found a wall that had just been completely shattered, and inside was thick smoke and the faint orange glow of a fire.

    I stepped through it cautiously. Maybe I could put out the fire before the whole block went up, if it wasn't something like a campfire - and winced. More bodies, these a little more bloodied, and I found what was burning - most of a huge pile of some kind of bagged white powder. I couldn't tell what drug it was, but - well… it was drugs. Burning them probably wasn't the safest way to destroy them, at least not burning them indoors, but it wasn't like I knew a better way of getting rid of them.

    So I just stood there for a moment, like a complete dumbass, watching a pile of baggies and maybe bricks go up in flames. "... I hope I'm not gonna get high off the fumes." I murmured, shifting my weight to my other leg as I frowned. Was I even -

    "Well." A shift of movement from behind me on my kinetic vision. "If you do, I'll have to charge you, I'm afraid."

    Her voice was low and rich - throaty, almost a purr. And damn did it make a feeling race down my spine. She was close to average height - so tiny, next to me - but something about the way she stood was… something. She wore a black, sleeveless dress that showed the wirey muscle of her arms and legs, heavy black boots. Her hair was a tangled mess of pure white, lifted off the back of her neck by her mask - I'd thought the cape in Boston had had a mask that looked like coral, but that had been artificial. This looked like actual coral, or burnt fragments of something organic, like the debris outside, interlocking pieces weaving together asymmetrically and up over her forehead into a ridged, armoured crest. More were locked around her arms like bracers.

    And her eyes were the same white as her hair - not flat white, there was texture still to each individual part, even the pupil still somehow looked like a gap, but all that same blank white.

    A little smile played around her lips as she looked at me. "I do wonder though… what possible catastrophe came crashing down from heaven and brought this stranger to my doorstep?"

    Oh no.

    Ohhhh no.

    -.-.-
     
  • Threadmarks
    • Okay, I'm lost. Just what is Taylor dealing with here?
     
    WhoAmEye said:
    guess it made sense that you'd want armour to not suck to wear, but I'd always kind of thought of knights as sort of clanking around, heavy and uncomfortable. Apparently though, that wasn't how armour worked, even heavy plate armour
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    View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzTwBQniLSc

    WhoAmEye said:
    or even outright replacing them.
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    Wait, you don't want armored internal organs? :V

    WhoAmEye said:
    Panacea stared at me for a long moment then blurted, "Yeah, hi."
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    *Raise eyebrow*

    "God she's hot" internally?

    WhoAmEye said:
    She paused, blinking a few times but still not looking near me. "... yeah. Physically, at least. So… thanks."
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    ...Definitely a spaghetti drop there, I feel.

    Did some of Panacea's shard problems got reduced? I don't think you are going with the fanon of *Vicky's aura is entirely responsible for Amy's love for her* (it is only partially via good old training, even if Wildbow can't understand how pavlov's dog work), so it shouldn't be that.

    WhoAmEye said:
    And I didn't hear the rest of what she said because Ranni hissed in my ear, "End Hookwolf immediately."

    I held up a hand. "Sorry - Renna?"

    "He is a stain upon the concept of wolves and I will not stand for this. Taking beloved pets and wasting their lives in a bloodsport arena is -" there was a hiss of… static? Could magical walkie talkies even make static?
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    If Marika had been listening, she would already be taking her hammer and asking for directions, I feel, for those that don't understand why, Red Wolves of Radagon, Blaidd and Marikesh, those are wolves, not false like Hook is.

    WhoAmEye said:
    Dean to be able to talk to him about how she'd been haunted by the glimmering shape of Taylor in the firelight on the beach -
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    I'm sure he would've loved that one. :V

    WhoAmEye said:
    Can't I just enjoy going out and doing hero work with a friend?
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    *In Carol's voice*: "NO!"
    WhoAmEye said:
    "Hiccup?"

    "Like the whole earth shook but you are keenly aware it's only in your head. Like a microsecond of that squeeze on the way to Boston."
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    I think reality was having flashbacks, they looked like this:



    WhoAmEye said:
    "Ranni! We talked about cursing people through the internet!"
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    Make sure to target the correct ones?

    WhoAmEye said:
    I'm pretty sure the third from the left on the top row is a chihuahua.
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    Don't remember the exact term, but he is almost certainly there to excite both other dogs before the true fights and the crowd with an easy slaughter.

    Yeah, this is that kind of practice.

    WhoAmEye said:
    Who - might have been my sister? Brother?
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    Both? Neither? Yes? No?

    WhoAmEye said:
    I needed to ask Dad for a second seal. Could you cast two incantations at once?
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    In another Dimension, the tarnished is getting ideas.

    Ranni is trying to restrain her from testing them.

    WhoAmEye said:
    "Uh -" the sheepish trooper paused. "Unknown cape, please identify yourself?"

    "She's Empyrean, you cretin,"
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    Agree with Victoria, he is a cretin.

    Also, really wondering if Coil isn't the one who called the PRT, timing is too good and fast....

    WhoAmEye said:
    Oh no.
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    Oh no... she's hot? :V
     
    Nyarky said:
    Don't remember the exact term, but he is almost certainly there to excite both other dogs before the true fights and the crowd with an easy slaughter.
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    I believe the term is a Feeder Dog, but do not quote me on that since I am merely using a term from another Worm story, Dark Star Rising by timelost.

    Nyarky said:
    Yeah, this is that kind of practice.
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    Yeah it is a horrible practice, then again Dog Fighting is a barbaric "sport" in general and anyone that practices it should [ITGing Redacted].
     
    Well, at least Damsel is in the right place to maybe get help from the Docks Family? Better help than Bonesaw at least… probably? The fact that I am not 100% sure is worrying.

    Let's see how Ranni feels about getting a new kid sister with an unstable anti-space shotgun. She has had worse siblings.
     
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    Yeah, medieval armor, especially full plate, did hinder the wearer, but not nearly as much as people like to pretend it did. It's enough to be a noticeable difference, but not enough to keep the wearer from moving quickly.

    I know that the intended ship is Vicky... but Damsel of Distress is hot.
     
    Okibruez said:
    I know that the intended ship is Vicky... but Damsel of Distress is hot.
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    I mean, you say that like it has to be one or the other. whynotboth.jpg?

    No seriously. Vicky and Ashley (well, her clone) have a canonical relationship, and this is Eye writing this story. I figure we have...eh, until the end of the arc? Beginning of the next one? Before the three of them meet and Taylor nearly dies of embarrassment and/or thirst, and/or Vicky and Ashley meet independently and have their own "oh no she's hot" moment.
     
    daniels220 said:
    I mean, you say that like it has to be one or the other. whynotboth.jpg?

    No seriously. Vicky and Ashley (well, her clone) have a canonical relationship, and this is Eye writing this story. I figure we have...eh, until the end of the arc? Beginning of the next one? Before the three of them meet and Taylor nearly dies of embarrassment and/or thirst, and/or Vicky and Ashley meet independently and have their own "oh no she's hot" moment.
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    fdslkghjfskdgfkd GET OUT OF MY NOTESSSSSSSSSSSS
     
    Okibruez said:
    Yeah, medieval armor, especially full plate, did hinder the wearer, but not nearly as much as people like to pretend it did. It's enough to be a noticeable difference, but not enough to keep the wearer from moving quickly.
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    The origin of the restrictive Full Plate meme comes from two points: First - a misunderstanding of Medieval Texts that show Jousting Armour, which was very much designed to prevent deaths and serious injuries during Jousting Tournaments and Second - Full Plate was very much customised for their wearers, have you ever tried wearing something that was tailored for someone else? yeah you not going to be as flexible or quick as the person the suit was made for.
     
    Okibruez said:
    So what you're saying is: Taylor has a chance.
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    Keep in mind this is pre-Slaughterhouse Damsel. So she still has her campy megalomaniacal supervillain personality and a Shard-driven need to establish her superiority to the point that calling it a complex would be an understatement.

    Unfortunately Damsel has run into Taylor the literal Demigod. So that whole trying to establish her superiority thing is not going to go well given Taylor being, you know, superior.
     
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    yacov said:
    Keep in mind this is pre-Slaughterhouse Damsel. So she still has her campy megalomaniacal supervillain personality and a Shard-driven need to establish her superiority to the point that calling it a complex would be an understatement.
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    Gestures at the megolomaniacal Goddess that is Taylors father.
    So basically she's already got the attitude she'll need down pat.
     
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