The girl that got stuffed in the locker hadn't quite understood yet that she was a girl.
Vitrification [Alt-power][TransFem Taylor]
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1.1
- Pronouns
- she/her
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It took three days before I trusted myself enough to admit that I was being followed. With the amount of time I'd spent over the last two months looking out my window, I knew every car that belonged to my neighbors. The grey sedan wasn't one of them. Some part of me felt the need to insist that I was just being paranoid, that perhaps the car was new or that someone had relatives visiting.
The third day was cold and rainy. I had a dark grey raincoat to cover most of my body and a scarf to cover my mouth and nose. My hair was just long enough that I could have it cover half my face. Between all of that and the inherent darkness of the early morning, I hoped no one would notice that my normally pale skin was a glazed white. Or that there was a hollow black void under my hair where my eye should have been.
I began my daily morning run, going down the street and turning a corner. The eye I had left behind on the grey sedan showed me that it'd started up to follow me. That proved it. No sane person was awake at five thirty in the morning. Now I had to figure out why someone was bothering to follow a teenage boy.
Half my vision was the rainy sidewalk in front of me, the other half was the back of the car. My eye was nestled in the groove between the rear window and the trunk. It was a sphere of white with my iris and pupil painted onto it and I could rotate it freely to look at landmarks and keep track of my stalker.
Mechanically, I kept running. My body in this form did not tire and did not breathe. I wanted to turn back to myself, to stop and hyperventilate. My heart should have begun racing, my skin should have broken out into a cold sweat, and I should have become dizzy from the panic attack I should have been having.
I turned onto a street of condemned houses, a remnant of the shipping industry that once was. Most of them were completely forgotten by the banks that owned them and had been given over to squatters. Before my stalker could turn the corner, I had rushed into the one home I knew would be unoccupied. The roof had caved in years ago and it was completely useless as a shelter.
I rushed upstairs, paying no mind to the shattered bottles or other assorted trash. Broken glass couldn't hurt me. The car slowed down as the driver realized they'd lost sight of me. I made it to the second floor just as the car was about to pass the house, I did not stop running. The caved in roof had a hole in it big enough to crash a small plane through. I jumped, the rotted floor cracking beneath me.
The car's windshield shattered and the roof caved in. My eye rolled up the back window of the car and into my waiting hand. I pressed the eye back into my face and blinked as it adjusted itself. It had not been the most elegant landing, but it'd done its job of scaring the shit out of the driver. I crawled forward and looked down at him from where the windshield used to be. A bald white man wearing a black collared shirt stared back at me. He had the stocky look of someone who had played lots of highschool football and then had spent too much of his adulthood sitting down to quite maintain the look.
"Why are you following me?" I said in a voice that to my ears, sounded too hoarse to be threatening. The man's eyes were wide with terror all the same. Gravity pulled my hair out of my eyes. My face, like the rest of my body, looked like it was made of porcelain. I pulled my scarf to my neck so that the terrified man could see that I didn't have to move my mouth to speak. "Well? You follow teenage boys professionally or is it just a hobby?"
The man sputtered. I reached my hand in and hit the roof of the car, letting him see my flat palm. My fingers and hand were porcelain and held together with ball joints. This terrified him enough to scream.
"Answer the fucking question," I said, tilting my head in exactly the way the monsters in my mom's favorite horror movies would. Perhaps I was enjoying it too much, but it was fun being terrifying.
"I-I'm a private investigator! I was just hired to follow you, that's all!" Terror had turned the man's voice high pitched. He was trembling, actually trembling. I'd made a grown adult tremble. "I didn't know you were a cape, I swear!"
"Who hired you?" I asked, continuing to keep my mouth closed and my expression impassive as I talked. The PI only had my unblinking eyes to focus on. "And why? Does this have to do with my dad?"
"I don't... I don't..." The PI was shaking his head. I wondered if he'd actually piss his pants. The sound of a vibrating phone surprised us both. The PI glanced at a smartphone that was mounted against his air vent and said, "That's him, morning check in."
I held my hand out, I could have just reached forward and grabbed the phone, but it was more satisfying to make him do it. He was a smart boy and handed it to me. I put the phone to my ear and answered the call.
There was silence for a few seconds and then a modulated voice said, "Well then...Hello Taylor. Pronouns?"
I blinked. "Excuse me?" My mouth was moving with my words now, I was too confused to bother being creepy.
"You know what pronouns are. Oh. Okay good, Tony's whimpering in the background. Think you could sit up a bit so he can't hear? I'll let you hear my actual voice and tell you what mine are as a show of good faith."
Dumbfounded, I sat back up on the roof of the sedan.
"She/her," said a suddenly feminine voice over the phone. I didn't know what I was expecting but she sounded like a teenager. Her words radiated the most obnoxious kind of confidence. "Hell, I'll do you one better, in the name of equality. My name is Lisa."
"Ummm...They/them," I said, my bewildered brain supplying the best reply it could. I'd never actually said that out loud before. Whoever this Lisa was, she terrified me.
"Huh, okay," Lisa replied, sounding like she was unsure about something. She quickly changed back to her regular smug tone of voice. "So okay, sorry about Tony, sending him was kind of my bad, but I wanted to be sure about you. Don't worry, with what I've got on him, he's never gonna rat out what you are. Jeez, what did you do to his car? Oh wow, okay, so you aren't the subtle type. Good to know."
I looked around for cameras. "Are you watching me?"
"I'll explain later. Look we'll meet up at the boardwalk okay, you know Ellie's?" Lisa spoke very quickly, I wasn't sure if she had to breathe or not.
"The coffee place?" I asked, feeling more and more like my participation in this conversation was just a formality. "By the wedding boutique?"
"Yeah, we're going to meet up there at like, three. Rain should be done by then. That sound good?"
I inhaled, which was an action that made the appropriate sound but involved no air for me. "Why would I just listen to someone who-"
"Sent a PI to stalk you?" Lisa completed. "Well if I was tacky I'd point out I know where you live but I've got more class then that. Just hear me out, Taylor. If you say no you'll never have to deal with me again, I promise. It's still a big coffee shop with windows in a public place, it'll be safe."
A couple of minutes ago I felt powerful, now I felt lost and confused and it was all because of this girl. I was very familiar with being lost and confused. I thought about it objectively for a moment, the lack of physical feedback from my body made it much easier to clear my head. "Fine, but I better not see Tony again."
I heard Lisa clap her hands over the phone. "It's a date. See you there!" And then she hung up.
It took three days before I trusted myself enough to admit that I was being followed. With the amount of time I'd spent over the last two months looking out my window, I knew every car that belonged to my neighbors. The grey sedan wasn't one of them. Some part of me felt the need to insist that I was just being paranoid, that perhaps the car was new or that someone had relatives visiting.
The third day was cold and rainy. I had a dark grey raincoat to cover most of my body and a scarf to cover my mouth and nose. My hair was just long enough that I could have it cover half my face. Between all of that and the inherent darkness of the early morning, I hoped no one would notice that my normally pale skin was a glazed white. Or that there was a hollow black void under my hair where my eye should have been.
I began my daily morning run, going down the street and turning a corner. The eye I had left behind on the grey sedan showed me that it'd started up to follow me. That proved it. No sane person was awake at five thirty in the morning. Now I had to figure out why someone was bothering to follow a teenage boy.
Half my vision was the rainy sidewalk in front of me, the other half was the back of the car. My eye was nestled in the groove between the rear window and the trunk. It was a sphere of white with my iris and pupil painted onto it and I could rotate it freely to look at landmarks and keep track of my stalker.
Mechanically, I kept running. My body in this form did not tire and did not breathe. I wanted to turn back to myself, to stop and hyperventilate. My heart should have begun racing, my skin should have broken out into a cold sweat, and I should have become dizzy from the panic attack I should have been having.
I turned onto a street of condemned houses, a remnant of the shipping industry that once was. Most of them were completely forgotten by the banks that owned them and had been given over to squatters. Before my stalker could turn the corner, I had rushed into the one home I knew would be unoccupied. The roof had caved in years ago and it was completely useless as a shelter.
I rushed upstairs, paying no mind to the shattered bottles or other assorted trash. Broken glass couldn't hurt me. The car slowed down as the driver realized they'd lost sight of me. I made it to the second floor just as the car was about to pass the house, I did not stop running. The caved in roof had a hole in it big enough to crash a small plane through. I jumped, the rotted floor cracking beneath me.
The car's windshield shattered and the roof caved in. My eye rolled up the back window of the car and into my waiting hand. I pressed the eye back into my face and blinked as it adjusted itself. It had not been the most elegant landing, but it'd done its job of scaring the shit out of the driver. I crawled forward and looked down at him from where the windshield used to be. A bald white man wearing a black collared shirt stared back at me. He had the stocky look of someone who had played lots of highschool football and then had spent too much of his adulthood sitting down to quite maintain the look.
"Why are you following me?" I said in a voice that to my ears, sounded too hoarse to be threatening. The man's eyes were wide with terror all the same. Gravity pulled my hair out of my eyes. My face, like the rest of my body, looked like it was made of porcelain. I pulled my scarf to my neck so that the terrified man could see that I didn't have to move my mouth to speak. "Well? You follow teenage boys professionally or is it just a hobby?"
The man sputtered. I reached my hand in and hit the roof of the car, letting him see my flat palm. My fingers and hand were porcelain and held together with ball joints. This terrified him enough to scream.
"Answer the fucking question," I said, tilting my head in exactly the way the monsters in my mom's favorite horror movies would. Perhaps I was enjoying it too much, but it was fun being terrifying.
"I-I'm a private investigator! I was just hired to follow you, that's all!" Terror had turned the man's voice high pitched. He was trembling, actually trembling. I'd made a grown adult tremble. "I didn't know you were a cape, I swear!"
"Who hired you?" I asked, continuing to keep my mouth closed and my expression impassive as I talked. The PI only had my unblinking eyes to focus on. "And why? Does this have to do with my dad?"
"I don't... I don't..." The PI was shaking his head. I wondered if he'd actually piss his pants. The sound of a vibrating phone surprised us both. The PI glanced at a smartphone that was mounted against his air vent and said, "That's him, morning check in."
I held my hand out, I could have just reached forward and grabbed the phone, but it was more satisfying to make him do it. He was a smart boy and handed it to me. I put the phone to my ear and answered the call.
There was silence for a few seconds and then a modulated voice said, "Well then...Hello Taylor. Pronouns?"
I blinked. "Excuse me?" My mouth was moving with my words now, I was too confused to bother being creepy.
"You know what pronouns are. Oh. Okay good, Tony's whimpering in the background. Think you could sit up a bit so he can't hear? I'll let you hear my actual voice and tell you what mine are as a show of good faith."
Dumbfounded, I sat back up on the roof of the sedan.
"She/her," said a suddenly feminine voice over the phone. I didn't know what I was expecting but she sounded like a teenager. Her words radiated the most obnoxious kind of confidence. "Hell, I'll do you one better, in the name of equality. My name is Lisa."
"Ummm...They/them," I said, my bewildered brain supplying the best reply it could. I'd never actually said that out loud before. Whoever this Lisa was, she terrified me.
"Huh, okay," Lisa replied, sounding like she was unsure about something. She quickly changed back to her regular smug tone of voice. "So okay, sorry about Tony, sending him was kind of my bad, but I wanted to be sure about you. Don't worry, with what I've got on him, he's never gonna rat out what you are. Jeez, what did you do to his car? Oh wow, okay, so you aren't the subtle type. Good to know."
I looked around for cameras. "Are you watching me?"
"I'll explain later. Look we'll meet up at the boardwalk okay, you know Ellie's?" Lisa spoke very quickly, I wasn't sure if she had to breathe or not.
"The coffee place?" I asked, feeling more and more like my participation in this conversation was just a formality. "By the wedding boutique?"
"Yeah, we're going to meet up there at like, three. Rain should be done by then. That sound good?"
I inhaled, which was an action that made the appropriate sound but involved no air for me. "Why would I just listen to someone who-"
"Sent a PI to stalk you?" Lisa completed. "Well if I was tacky I'd point out I know where you live but I've got more class then that. Just hear me out, Taylor. If you say no you'll never have to deal with me again, I promise. It's still a big coffee shop with windows in a public place, it'll be safe."
A couple of minutes ago I felt powerful, now I felt lost and confused and it was all because of this girl. I was very familiar with being lost and confused. I thought about it objectively for a moment, the lack of physical feedback from my body made it much easier to clear my head. "Fine, but I better not see Tony again."
I heard Lisa clap her hands over the phone. "It's a date. See you there!" And then she hung up.
TortugaGreen
Constantly out of the loop
- Pronouns
- She/Her
What was Taylor (assuming the main character is still named Taylor at this time) planning to do if there wasn't a bigass hole in the house's roof on the correct side? Just yeet themselves out a window? Or complete the escape now that the car had lost track of them?
TortugaGreen
Constantly out of the loop
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Ah, it being pre-planned definitely makes sense, then.
- Location
- United States
- Pronouns
- She/Her
So, Taylor with a doll-like changer form with enhanced strength/agility/toughness/etc and detachable body parts. The latter bit, in particular, sounds like it could have some pretty versatile applications. Assuming they can disconnect more than just their eye.
I'm very curious what Lisa wants, here. I'm assuming that Taylor is a relatively new trigger, so I guess it could just be a recruitment pitch for the Undersiders. But sending a (presumably blackmailed) PI to stalk Taylor is an interesting choice, if that's it.
Seems like a solid start, so far!
I'm very curious what Lisa wants, here. I'm assuming that Taylor is a relatively new trigger, so I guess it could just be a recruitment pitch for the Undersiders. But sending a (presumably blackmailed) PI to stalk Taylor is an interesting choice, if that's it.
Seems like a solid start, so far!
Twei
I have a face!
- Location
- the land where they write things
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Yes, good.
So Taylor is a doll and they can toss around their own eyes. I wonder if that applies to the rest of their body, and we'll see em leaving hands around and stuff like that? Interesting power for sure.
And interesting, original start. c:
So Taylor is a doll and they can toss around their own eyes. I wonder if that applies to the rest of their body, and we'll see em leaving hands around and stuff like that? Interesting power for sure.
And interesting, original start. c:
The Ao3 tags for this are absolutely amazing.
Also I can't imagine being a doll changer is going to be a great look as far as PR potential goes. I mean Parian works out with her look being just a costume but I rather suspect that Taylor is too close to Mannequin for their own comfort. At least they can take comfort and being a decent brute.
Also I can't imagine being a doll changer is going to be a great look as far as PR potential goes. I mean Parian works out with her look being just a costume but I rather suspect that Taylor is too close to Mannequin for their own comfort. At least they can take comfort and being a decent brute.
MaimakteriAnn
(Verified Sleepy)
- Location
- Enormous And Round Terran Homeworld
- Pronouns
- She/Her/Dr
I'm very in. Please do not let this be dead
- Location
- North America
This is the Taylor Hebert this city needs, and the story we probably don't deserve, but would really like to see continue on anyways. Please? More queer fiction is always a positive thing.
1.2
- Pronouns
- she/her
I left Tony whimpering in the remains of his car and walked back home. I had no idea how he'd go about explaining the damages once he got his car towed. Lisa's blackmail meant that he was probably also a victim of this situation but I couldn't begin to care. It was a vindictive thought, but it was easy to be vindictive when I was porcelain.
Dad had already gone to work and I passed no one else. Skipping past the broken step, I let myself in and went up to my room. My domain was a mess of clothing piles and notebooks. It was safe to become myself.
There wasn't enough air. I fell back to the bed, my chest tightening as my heart raced. I grabbed at the crumpled bed sheets underneath me and pulled a blanket over my face. The patter of the rain was too loud, the light of the grey sky was too bright and I wanted to compress the world to just my bed.
I was a jobless and friendless highschool dropout. There was nowhere I was wanted or needed. I was going to spend the next few hours laying down without a choice in the matter. Dad was often like this too. On mornings when he didn't have work, he'd spend hours just looking at the half of the bed that would never be occupied again. Usually he'd stay there until hunger forced him downstairs.
I glanced at my clock. It was noon now exactly. I forced myself up, grabbed my glasses from my nightstand and put them on. They were cheap and ugly squares of black plastic containing scratched lenses. There was a bit of a stumble in my step and I had to hold tightly to the banister as I walked down the stairs. I didn't stumble when I was porcelain, but I needed to be myself for later and I had to get all the stumbling out of the way now.
There were scrambled eggs on the plate in front of me that I barely remembered making, I'd put on too much salt. It wasn't that I was losing time. I felt the same nothingness at every action and so each discrete event was blurring together.
It shouldn't have surprised me that a smug teenage girl would out me. I had super powers, I wasn't in school anymore, and somehow nothing had changed. It was half past one and I was making a third pass over my jaw with the razor. There was still a shadow that refused to go anywhere, but I'd also managed to cut a line under my chin so I gave up trying to make any more progress with that.
Lisa had specifically mentioned wanting to be 'sure' about me. Whatever she wanted from me, it was absolutely related to my powers, there was nothing else anyone could want me for. I pressed a hand against the chipped shower wall, steadying myself with deep breaths. I kept the water cold for the sake of my hair, I concentrated on that and let that ground me. I could feel my power beckoning to be used, feel the temptation to replace my body. I pushed that urge down. My scrawny and ugly flesh needed to be clean if I was going to be somewhere as crowded as the boardwalk.
I wore a black hoodie and jeans. I wanted to have the hood up but that would draw attention from the enforcers in charge of keeping the docks presentable for the tourists. A tall and scrawny white boy would barely justify a second glance. I felt my steps slow as I walked past the window to the wedding boutique. I looked down at the floor and kept walking, not letting myself be distracted by dresses I would never wear. My heart was beating very quickly, not so much hammering in my chest as sputtering.
I heard a bell ring, the sound made me look up at the door to Ellie's. Stepping out of the coffee shop was a very pretty girl with green eyes. She had her dirty blonde hair down and there were freckles along her nose. My first instinct was to look away before she caught me staring, except she was looking right at me with a look of dread.
She opened her mouth and then froze, unsure. She was holding a covered cup of coffee in each hand, after a moment she held one out to me. "Here, vanilla soy latte," she said in the strained tone of someone who was not quite coping with the situation.
"You're Lisa?" I asked, my voice was a dry croak. I hadn't been talking very much lately.
"Yes." She was staring at me like I was a bomb that might explode. She winced. "Fuck. No, it's not like that at all. Look Taylor please just take it, my arm is getting tired and I know for a fact this is your preferred order. I promise, I didn't fuck with it."
I took the drink and she sighed with relief. Both my hands were on the cup now, the warmth helped me get my thoughts in order. For an apparent blackmailer, Lisa wasn't what I expected. She was wearing a graphic t-shirt and a grey skirt, looking for the world like a normal teenage girl. "I haven't been to a coffee shop in...a long time" Years, no one to go with. "How did you know what I'd order?"
"Really good guess," She glanced around and then said, "We can talk about that more inside. That sound okay? I meant what I said earlier, it'll be safe. The owner owes me." She didn't have the smugness she'd had over the phone. There was a note of pleading in her voice that made me decide it was okay to nod and follow her in.
Ellie's was one of those expensive coffee places that put a lot of effort into looking unfinished. There were exposed ceiling beams and lights hanging from wires. The place was completely empty and the sign at the door marked it as closed. Lisa led me to a booth in the back. We sat on opposite sides, with her having a view of the door.
"I'm going to start by apologizing." Lisa enunciated the last word, like it wasn't a word she was used to using. "I was working with incomplete data."
"Incomplete data." I said, not asking a question, just making a statement on absurdity. I started to take a sip.
"So okay, powers, mine." She took a deep breath. "My power is intuition. It's how I knew you'd order a soy latte even though you don't actually like the taste."
And like that I became self conscious about the grassy aftertaste I had been trying to make myself ignore. I scowled, she smiled. I glared, her smile withered.
"Anyway, the point is, I can fill in gaps in what I know with stuff my power intuits, except if I'm working off bad data my power can end up being wrong. I was missing some data when I talked with you this morning, and well..." She chuckled to herself and then plastered a wide grin on her face with no happiness behind it. "So here is where I fucked up with Taylor Hebert. I look into young people who are possibly recent triggers and haven't been snatched up yet. Turns out the PRT visited a teenaged boy in Brockton General, they were supposed to do a followup visit when that boy wasn't catatonic but that got lost in the bureaucracy."
Lisa kindly did not comment on my look of shock. That week had remained an indistinct blur that only ever reformed to give me nightmares. A PRT visit was news to me.
"I dig a bit deeper and find out that they were bullied into the hospital and that they're white. Given Winslow and all the Nazi children there, my best guess was that they were probably bullied for being jewish, gay or both."
The coffee mugs had the logo for the shop, the word 'Ellie's' in red cursive with green vines snaking between the letters. Lisa snapped her fingers.
"Taylor, please stick with me, I'm trying to apologize here but I need you to understand what exactly I did. Do you see what I mean by incomplete data?"
I couldn't open my mouth, my limbs were shaking and I wanted nothing more than to curl up, I nodded. "Asking for my pronouns was what? Data collection?" I asked, thinking back to the terrifying conversation we'd had over the phone.
"Yeah. Once I realized what your powers were I realized I was wrong about a couple big things... and seeing you outside confirmed how wrong I was." Her grin fell completely. "Did you know your power was about to out you?"
I looked up at her from the coffee mug. I was grasping the mug tightly now, leeching whatever heat was left. "Out me how?"
"Powers tend to be related to whatever triggered them. I think your power protects you from stress or danger by changing you into..." She gestured to me to finish her sentence.
"Porcelain."
She nodded. "You'd have changed in the middle of the boardwalk. You saw me as dangerous and you aren't wrong. I'm a bitch. I am dangerous. And I've crossed a bunch of lines capes aren't supposed to cross to even have this conversation. What I'm not is a monster... or I guess I don't want to be?"
We both let that statement sit in the silence. I eventually broke it. "Be blunt, I can take it. What are you apologizing for? Start with the words I'm sorry for." Even to myself I sounded rude, I sounded angry.
"I'm sorry for how I've treated you today..."
She trailed off again and then became a shapeless blur. I blinked and reached with porcelain hands to take off my glasses and pull up my hood.
"You've done this before." My voice was stronger now that it wasn't attached to my breathing. "Looked into someone's life and used that information to make them do whatever you want. What's wrong with doing that to me?"
"You're..." She froze again, trying to pick the right words.
"Yes?" I asked, her hesitation was starting to annoy me. I leaned forward, my fingers interlaced. The warm coffee cup was no longer helpful or needed. "What makes me so different?"
"You're not a boy," she said, using that to clear the fog in her head. "You're not a boy and you're definitely clinically depressed and I've been pushing in the worst way and I don't want pushing you over the edge on my conscience!"
I smiled. She winced and put a hand to her forehead. "Don't worry, it turns out I don't die if pushed over the edge." There was a brutal satisfaction in confirming that for her. If she wanted to dig into me then she would have to live with every ugly thing she found. "You said you were going to offer me something, I hope it's better than this apology."
"Right." She closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. "Either way I want to pay you to not talk about the PI thing, that's a big no no in cape culture. It'd be a few thousand."
Being Porcelain was nice. I could just not visibly react if I didn't want to.
"And," she continued, "I want to see if you'd be interested in joining a gang."
"Sell me on it."
"We're small and diverse... as ridiculous as that sounds as a selling point for crime." It was a good selling point all the same, the only integrated major gang was the Merchants and that was because hard drugs were a universal vice. "Mostly we do smash and grabs, it's about as low risk as you can get in this town and we get paid a retaining fee just to exist."
"Paid by who?"
"I can't tell you." Glaring subtly was a bit harder in this form, but a tilt of my head worked about as well. "Look I really can't, not my call. Look, point is, it's safer to be part of a team. You haven't gone to the Wards yet so I'm guessing that's off the tab-" She winced and I realized something about my reaction had given away parts of why. Maybe it was the way my fingers had tensed up or my teeth had clenched in my closed mouth. "I haven't talked about this with Grue yet but he'd probably love having a hard to kill cape on the team."
At some point she'd started grinning again. That seemed to just be what she did when she got nervous. I thought back to what I'd seen in January. To Sophia restringing a crossbow and Emma sitting on a bed behind her, holding a metal mask and wiping the dirt off. Sophia had said something as she inspected her crossbow, making sure that now parts were loose and no cracks were forming. Emma made a crude gesture to imply a dick and then laugh. I hadn't needed to hear to know that her laugh was cruel.
"I'll think about it." I banished the memory. "Can I meet the others today?"
Dad had already gone to work and I passed no one else. Skipping past the broken step, I let myself in and went up to my room. My domain was a mess of clothing piles and notebooks. It was safe to become myself.
There wasn't enough air. I fell back to the bed, my chest tightening as my heart raced. I grabbed at the crumpled bed sheets underneath me and pulled a blanket over my face. The patter of the rain was too loud, the light of the grey sky was too bright and I wanted to compress the world to just my bed.
I was a jobless and friendless highschool dropout. There was nowhere I was wanted or needed. I was going to spend the next few hours laying down without a choice in the matter. Dad was often like this too. On mornings when he didn't have work, he'd spend hours just looking at the half of the bed that would never be occupied again. Usually he'd stay there until hunger forced him downstairs.
I glanced at my clock. It was noon now exactly. I forced myself up, grabbed my glasses from my nightstand and put them on. They were cheap and ugly squares of black plastic containing scratched lenses. There was a bit of a stumble in my step and I had to hold tightly to the banister as I walked down the stairs. I didn't stumble when I was porcelain, but I needed to be myself for later and I had to get all the stumbling out of the way now.
There were scrambled eggs on the plate in front of me that I barely remembered making, I'd put on too much salt. It wasn't that I was losing time. I felt the same nothingness at every action and so each discrete event was blurring together.
It shouldn't have surprised me that a smug teenage girl would out me. I had super powers, I wasn't in school anymore, and somehow nothing had changed. It was half past one and I was making a third pass over my jaw with the razor. There was still a shadow that refused to go anywhere, but I'd also managed to cut a line under my chin so I gave up trying to make any more progress with that.
Lisa had specifically mentioned wanting to be 'sure' about me. Whatever she wanted from me, it was absolutely related to my powers, there was nothing else anyone could want me for. I pressed a hand against the chipped shower wall, steadying myself with deep breaths. I kept the water cold for the sake of my hair, I concentrated on that and let that ground me. I could feel my power beckoning to be used, feel the temptation to replace my body. I pushed that urge down. My scrawny and ugly flesh needed to be clean if I was going to be somewhere as crowded as the boardwalk.
I wore a black hoodie and jeans. I wanted to have the hood up but that would draw attention from the enforcers in charge of keeping the docks presentable for the tourists. A tall and scrawny white boy would barely justify a second glance. I felt my steps slow as I walked past the window to the wedding boutique. I looked down at the floor and kept walking, not letting myself be distracted by dresses I would never wear. My heart was beating very quickly, not so much hammering in my chest as sputtering.
I heard a bell ring, the sound made me look up at the door to Ellie's. Stepping out of the coffee shop was a very pretty girl with green eyes. She had her dirty blonde hair down and there were freckles along her nose. My first instinct was to look away before she caught me staring, except she was looking right at me with a look of dread.
She opened her mouth and then froze, unsure. She was holding a covered cup of coffee in each hand, after a moment she held one out to me. "Here, vanilla soy latte," she said in the strained tone of someone who was not quite coping with the situation.
"You're Lisa?" I asked, my voice was a dry croak. I hadn't been talking very much lately.
"Yes." She was staring at me like I was a bomb that might explode. She winced. "Fuck. No, it's not like that at all. Look Taylor please just take it, my arm is getting tired and I know for a fact this is your preferred order. I promise, I didn't fuck with it."
I took the drink and she sighed with relief. Both my hands were on the cup now, the warmth helped me get my thoughts in order. For an apparent blackmailer, Lisa wasn't what I expected. She was wearing a graphic t-shirt and a grey skirt, looking for the world like a normal teenage girl. "I haven't been to a coffee shop in...a long time" Years, no one to go with. "How did you know what I'd order?"
"Really good guess," She glanced around and then said, "We can talk about that more inside. That sound okay? I meant what I said earlier, it'll be safe. The owner owes me." She didn't have the smugness she'd had over the phone. There was a note of pleading in her voice that made me decide it was okay to nod and follow her in.
Ellie's was one of those expensive coffee places that put a lot of effort into looking unfinished. There were exposed ceiling beams and lights hanging from wires. The place was completely empty and the sign at the door marked it as closed. Lisa led me to a booth in the back. We sat on opposite sides, with her having a view of the door.
"I'm going to start by apologizing." Lisa enunciated the last word, like it wasn't a word she was used to using. "I was working with incomplete data."
"Incomplete data." I said, not asking a question, just making a statement on absurdity. I started to take a sip.
"So okay, powers, mine." She took a deep breath. "My power is intuition. It's how I knew you'd order a soy latte even though you don't actually like the taste."
And like that I became self conscious about the grassy aftertaste I had been trying to make myself ignore. I scowled, she smiled. I glared, her smile withered.
"Anyway, the point is, I can fill in gaps in what I know with stuff my power intuits, except if I'm working off bad data my power can end up being wrong. I was missing some data when I talked with you this morning, and well..." She chuckled to herself and then plastered a wide grin on her face with no happiness behind it. "So here is where I fucked up with Taylor Hebert. I look into young people who are possibly recent triggers and haven't been snatched up yet. Turns out the PRT visited a teenaged boy in Brockton General, they were supposed to do a followup visit when that boy wasn't catatonic but that got lost in the bureaucracy."
Lisa kindly did not comment on my look of shock. That week had remained an indistinct blur that only ever reformed to give me nightmares. A PRT visit was news to me.
"I dig a bit deeper and find out that they were bullied into the hospital and that they're white. Given Winslow and all the Nazi children there, my best guess was that they were probably bullied for being jewish, gay or both."
The coffee mugs had the logo for the shop, the word 'Ellie's' in red cursive with green vines snaking between the letters. Lisa snapped her fingers.
"Taylor, please stick with me, I'm trying to apologize here but I need you to understand what exactly I did. Do you see what I mean by incomplete data?"
I couldn't open my mouth, my limbs were shaking and I wanted nothing more than to curl up, I nodded. "Asking for my pronouns was what? Data collection?" I asked, thinking back to the terrifying conversation we'd had over the phone.
"Yeah. Once I realized what your powers were I realized I was wrong about a couple big things... and seeing you outside confirmed how wrong I was." Her grin fell completely. "Did you know your power was about to out you?"
I looked up at her from the coffee mug. I was grasping the mug tightly now, leeching whatever heat was left. "Out me how?"
"Powers tend to be related to whatever triggered them. I think your power protects you from stress or danger by changing you into..." She gestured to me to finish her sentence.
"Porcelain."
She nodded. "You'd have changed in the middle of the boardwalk. You saw me as dangerous and you aren't wrong. I'm a bitch. I am dangerous. And I've crossed a bunch of lines capes aren't supposed to cross to even have this conversation. What I'm not is a monster... or I guess I don't want to be?"
We both let that statement sit in the silence. I eventually broke it. "Be blunt, I can take it. What are you apologizing for? Start with the words I'm sorry for." Even to myself I sounded rude, I sounded angry.
"I'm sorry for how I've treated you today..."
She trailed off again and then became a shapeless blur. I blinked and reached with porcelain hands to take off my glasses and pull up my hood.
"You've done this before." My voice was stronger now that it wasn't attached to my breathing. "Looked into someone's life and used that information to make them do whatever you want. What's wrong with doing that to me?"
"You're..." She froze again, trying to pick the right words.
"Yes?" I asked, her hesitation was starting to annoy me. I leaned forward, my fingers interlaced. The warm coffee cup was no longer helpful or needed. "What makes me so different?"
"You're not a boy," she said, using that to clear the fog in her head. "You're not a boy and you're definitely clinically depressed and I've been pushing in the worst way and I don't want pushing you over the edge on my conscience!"
I smiled. She winced and put a hand to her forehead. "Don't worry, it turns out I don't die if pushed over the edge." There was a brutal satisfaction in confirming that for her. If she wanted to dig into me then she would have to live with every ugly thing she found. "You said you were going to offer me something, I hope it's better than this apology."
"Right." She closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. "Either way I want to pay you to not talk about the PI thing, that's a big no no in cape culture. It'd be a few thousand."
Being Porcelain was nice. I could just not visibly react if I didn't want to.
"And," she continued, "I want to see if you'd be interested in joining a gang."
"Sell me on it."
"We're small and diverse... as ridiculous as that sounds as a selling point for crime." It was a good selling point all the same, the only integrated major gang was the Merchants and that was because hard drugs were a universal vice. "Mostly we do smash and grabs, it's about as low risk as you can get in this town and we get paid a retaining fee just to exist."
"Paid by who?"
"I can't tell you." Glaring subtly was a bit harder in this form, but a tilt of my head worked about as well. "Look I really can't, not my call. Look, point is, it's safer to be part of a team. You haven't gone to the Wards yet so I'm guessing that's off the tab-" She winced and I realized something about my reaction had given away parts of why. Maybe it was the way my fingers had tensed up or my teeth had clenched in my closed mouth. "I haven't talked about this with Grue yet but he'd probably love having a hard to kill cape on the team."
At some point she'd started grinning again. That seemed to just be what she did when she got nervous. I thought back to what I'd seen in January. To Sophia restringing a crossbow and Emma sitting on a bed behind her, holding a metal mask and wiping the dirt off. Sophia had said something as she inspected her crossbow, making sure that now parts were loose and no cracks were forming. Emma made a crude gesture to imply a dick and then laugh. I hadn't needed to hear to know that her laugh was cruel.
"I'll think about it." I banished the memory. "Can I meet the others today?"
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- Pronouns
- she/her
Sorry about that... existing on this planet became a bit more stressful then was okay in the last few months.
- Pronouns
- she/her
I legitimately didn't realize that was something I did... but also that movie gave me so many trans feels so I'm not surprised it snuck its way in here
MaimakteriAnn
(Verified Sleepy)
- Location
- Enormous And Round Terran Homeworld
- Pronouns
- She/Her/Dr
Yeah its been quite the ride. Hoping things get better and more consistent.
- Location
- Canada
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Ah! I'm super excited this is back!