Wish [OUTDATED]
- Thread starter Viri
- Start date
- Novella
-
- Tags
- worm time travel
Surviving was never an issue, unless you are talking about their reputations and pride. They'll live. They might wish they didn't, but Skitter would try to leave them alive.hmm injured Skitter VS whole Wards team?
Well, atleast they have a chance to survive the encounter
- Location
- Te Ika-a-Māui
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I very much suspect that this is Lisa and Tay pulling a sneaky.
Discrepancies, 2.5
The rain was still pouring down, and I was trapped. A sheer brick wall behind me and several Wards in front of me. Two brutes, one of which was essentially invulnerable, a tinker, a blaster, and potentially a shaker.
And I only had a can of pepper spray, a police baton, a combat knife, my swarm and a broken left forearm.
Not the worst odds I've been up against.
"Vista, can you explain to me what happened here?" Aegis asked, turning his head to face her, voice projecting authority.
Vista gritted her teeth and clenched her fists and sat up, leaning against the brick wall dividing the alleyway and the bank's car park. Panacea hissed something at her, and was still holding onto the other girl's wrist.
"Because I fell off the roof you decided to stick me on, even after I objected to that, and that asshole," She bitterly responded, pointing at me, "saved me from dying, and got Panacea to heal my broken spine."
"Well, uh, that seems to be the case, then. You have my apologies for putting you in such an unsafe position, Vista." The captain coughed out, trying and failing to keep up the authoritative bravado, and I could see that he seemed to be blushing, judging the small amount of skin around his eyes.
"Why did you save her, anyway? You could've used Vista falling off as a distraction to leave, but you didn't." Gallant asked me, as he repositioned Browbeat's arm, trying to sidestep the tense atmosphere between his teammate and captain.
I stayed silent for a couple of moments, thinking about how to respond. Skitter argued to stay uncompromisingly silent; to force them into making a mistake that I could capitalise on, to make them fear and respect me. Weaver argued the opposite, that there was a possibility that I could leave without having to resort to any of Skitter's tactics. I did save one of their teammates, so I could convince them to let me leave, potentially.
After a few more moments, I settled for trying out Weaver's approach. I needed to show that Khepri was reasonable, and that she could compromise; something I couldn't do if I went with the Skitter approach.
But I still had the latter option available as a last resort.
"Because the rest of you were too distracted by my team, and I was the only one in a position to save her."
"How do we know you didn't deliberately make her fall?" Aegis replied, stepping forward towards me, and I internally rolled my eyes at him.
"Yeah, sure, I made her fall just so I could get my arm broken and have my back to a literal wall."
Aegis' eyes narrowed, glaring at me, while his teammates behind him glanced at each other.
"Let Clockblocker unfreeze himself and then surrender. You're five against one with your back to the literal wall, and you new 'teammates' left you behind in favour of running off with the money. Do you really want to crawl back to people like them? How would you know they wouldn't do it again?"
"Uh, Aegis?" Kid Win nervously asked, and his teammates all turned to face him, "Maybe you should stop channelling your inner Armsmaster? Because I don't think going for the hardball approach is going to work on him."
"Or her. Or them. Well, technically the official PRT guidelines state to use gender neutral language for any cape that has an unconfirmed or ambiguous gender." Gallant added.
"Oh my god, you are such a nerd, Gallant. No wonder why you get along with my sister." Panacea muttered under her breath.
"That's a good point. Hey, creepy bug person, what's your gender?" Browbeat asked me.
As much as I wanted to try and keep my civilian and cape personalities apart so people couldn't link Taylor Hebert, the normal high school girl who had a bullying problem, to Khepri, the weirdly experienced, mysterious new villain in Brockton's cape scene. But I didn't want people to think of me as a guy, though. Something about that rubbed me the wrong way.
"Female."
There was a brief pause.
"Holy shit, you're a girl?" Panacea replied, her face genuinely bewildered.
"Enough!" Aegis yelled to his teammates, and then turned back to face me, "Listen, if you do surrender here, I'm pretty sure there's a good chance that you can sign up to the Protectorate or the Wards instead of going to jail. You beat Lung, you didn't take hostages, and you saved Vista, all very good things! So there's an extremely good chance you can avoid any jail time if you just surrender."
I felt someone re-enter my range, approaching at a high speed. It was time to wrap this up, and quickly. I unsheathed my knife and pointed it at Aegis.
"No."
"But your teammates-"
"Who said my teammates left me behind?"
All of them tensed up from that, finally realising the implication, as I unsheathed my combat knife from my utility belt. Browbeat took his arm off of Gallant's shoulder and adopted a martial stance, while Gallant had summoned another two spheres of energy. Kid had upholstered his two pistols, but kept them facing the ground. Panacea and Vista, who were both still sitting on the ground, looked afraid and pissed off, respectively.
"So you saving Vista really was a distraction for the other Undersiders to leave with the money, then. Which means that you deliberately planned for her to fall off." Aegis accused me, his eyes rage and misplaced justice.
"Aegis, you massive idiot, it wasn't Khepri's fault I fell off," Vista hissed, "She asked me to step away from the edge because she didn't want me to fall, and I was so surprised that I slipped, which might I remind you that it was your idea to put me there in the first place!"
Aegis hesitated, but then went back to glaring at me. Why was he being so forceful here? Was he embarrassed that I saved Vista, or because he was the one to put her there, or both?
"Regardless, you have two choices here: you can either fight me and lose, or just let me leave."
"But how would we lose? You've literally got your back to the wall here!" Browbeat responded, taking a few steps forward so he was next to Aegis.
"Because that fight just then, with the other Undersiders? That was me fighting nicely."
"You weren't playing 'nice' with Clockblocker." Aegis accused.
"…Because my team didn't have any other way to deal with him safely. I wouldn't have done something like that if I had an alternative, so you can give him my apologies for it later."
"What's it like when you don't fight 'nicely', then?"
"Well, you all probably heard what happened to Lung, right?" I replied, pointing my knife at Panacea, "Just ask her. She had to be flown in by her sister to heal him after he tried to fight me and failed."
"Um, he had enough venom in his veins to kill several people at once. His regeneration was barely keeping him alive when I got to him." She said, raising her hands in surrender, "And, uh, if it comes down to a fight, I'd appreciate it if you didn't hurt me. Non-combatant, right?"
"I don't want any part of this either. Don't get me wrong, I still hate you, but you did sort of go out of your way to save me, and I'm not going to bother trying when I know we aren't going to win." Vista added.
I gave the two of them a single nod, and turned my head to the other Wards.
"That goes for the rest of you, too. If you don't fight me and just let me go, I won't do anything."
The other Wards looked confused, glancing at each other, silently communicating something to each other. Kid Win eventually shuffled forwards and whispered something to Aegis.
"Whatever you choose to do, we'll back you up on it. Either fighting her or letting her go."
He turned his head, glancing at his teammate, and nodded once before he went back to glaring at me.
"You know, I really hate villains like you," he remarked, tilting his head upwards, still glaring at me, "The ones that are so self-assured that they can win any fight, run from any situation, that they'll never be caught, and act like they still have morals or decency. You can say that you're sorry for Clockblocker, or that you had it in your heart to save Vista, but if you were actually a good person, you wouldn't be a villain."
Oh my god, he was actually monologuing at me. I reached into my swarm and saw that a certain person was only a block away and was rapidly approaching.
"Time's up. I have places to be."
"Alright, if you wanna do it the hard way-" Aegis replied, moving into a fighting stance, but was cut off from the insects I've been amassing since I got into the alley, and since the office building shielded the alley from most of the rain, I was able to form a proper swarm.
The sheer density made it difficult for any of the Wards to see more than a more than an arms length away in front of them, and with that many eyes, I could see everything impossibly clearly; every bead of sweat, every nick and cut, anything as slight as a twitch of a finger.
I dodged to the side, avoiding Aegis' tackle, causing him to crash face first into the brick wall behind me. I unsheathed my knife from my belt, and as I moved to my first target, I quickly glanced at the two girls huddled together on the ground, and parted my swarm just enough that they could see me. They both snapped their heads to me, and I gave them another single nod, hoping that they would understand I wasn't going to hurt them.
Browbeat was trying to wade through my swarm like one would through deep water, trying to find where I was, his telekinetic shield prevented most of my bugs from biting and stinging him. I formed a clone near him, using bees, hornets and wasps to mimic the gold of my armour. He tried to punch it, exposing his back to me. I slashed him twice, enough for him to cry out in pain.
Gallant at this point had already let go of his teammate, trying to keep his composure in the face of the screeching and buzzing. He was glancing around, trying to yell out to his teammates, but was unable to get a response. I formed another fake clone, just in between Browbeat and himself, making him fire his emotion blasts at his teammate, mistaking him for me. He started sobbing in response, as he sat down and curled up, confirming another suspicion; That Gallant's ability to see emotion was based on line of sight, and my swarm was thick enough to block it.
Gallant then tried walking towards his teammate, completely oblivious that I was standing near him, exposing what I was looking for. I'd been around Defiant and Dragon enough to get a good grasp on how most things made by tinkers work; things powered by a battery of some kind have systems and mechanisms that activate if the power source gets tamped with, to prevent the user from being blown up.
Gallant's power armour was pretty crude, probably not made by Armsmaster. Kid Win probably made it, then, if the PRT didn't source it on the cheap from some other tinker.
The battery of the power armour was located on the back, which was exposed due to the damage done by Angelica. It was too easy to slash some of the wires, making his power armour shut down. He stumbled, still trying to reach his teammates, and promptly fell over, too heavy to move it under his own power.
Kid Win, as soon as I flooded the alley, looked like he'd wanted to bolt, but remained completely frozen in place, undecided between trying to help or running. I grasped my knife, curling my hand around it into a fist, and punched his exposed jaw, and kicked him, making him drop to the ground like the rest of his teammates.
I walked out of the alley to where Bitch was, waiting on top of Judas. Her short, auburn hair drenched from the rain, missing her plastic bulldog mask. I dissolved my swarm, and looked back at Aegis, horrified at how his other teammates were all on the ground, and the two girls who were still huddled together.
And they saw me, standing right outside of the alley, with fear and awe on their faces.
"The fuck happened to you?" Bitch asked.
"Long story, I'll explain everything when we're back at the base. Broke my arm, though." I replied, holding out my good arm towards her.
She glanced at my sling, and she whistled at Judas, making him squat down. She tightly grasped my hand with hers, leaning down to put her other hand under my arm and picked me up, and I used some of the spikes jutting out from Judas' flank as a step. I sat behind her, my one good arm wrapped around her waist, as she whistled something which caused Judas to go into a full sprint, leading us back to the loft.
"That was really fucking stupid of you. They're going to tear you a new one once we get back." She stated.
"Is everyone ok, though?" I asked, mumbling into her shoulder.
"Ok. Some cuts and bruises. Nothing big."
"Good. I can handle being scolded if everyone got out ok. How are the dogs?"
Rachel turned her head slightly, looking at me from the corner of her eye, and then went back to looking forwards again.
"They're a little roughed up. They can handle it, though. Made sure of that."
I closed my eyes, my body too exhausted from the fight to keep them open. Another dissonance between my younger and older bodies.
"That's good, too. They're a part of the team."
She'd just grunted in response, and we fell into a comfortable silence as Judas made his way to the Loft. I quickly fell into a light sleep, the exhaustion catching up to me.
"Wake up. We're here."
I urged my eyes open, realising that I fell into a deeper sleep than I intended to, and attempted to rub my eyes but my mask was in the way.
Rachel had ordered Judas to lean down closer to the ground, and she was staring at me from the corner of her eye. Not a glare, though.
I sat up straight, and Rachel dismounted. She then reached out her hand, helping me get off without hurting myself. She kept her hand on Judas though, slowly taking away the bone, scale and muscle. I gave him a pat on the head, and turned around to see my other teammates.
I could see that the rest of the team was waiting for us at the top of the stairs, already changed into casuals. Brian looked irritated, but softened slightly once he saw my sling. Lisa was uncharacteristically antsy, while Alec gave me a wave, sporting his usual smirk.
I waved back with my good arm.
"Took you fucking long enough. Now can you explain what the hell happened?" He yelled out.
"I'll explain further once I'm changed and showered, ok?" I replied, making my way up the stairs, grasping the stair rails for support, Rachel following behind me with a regular sized Judas next to her.
"No. We need to understand what happened." Brian tried to inject authority into his tone. "You ask us to leave you behind, and you come back with a broken arm?"
I waved my good arm at him, too tired to reply back. I knew he wasn't actually mad at me, just concerned.
Hopefully he wouldn't get suspicious, though. Although I was trying to hide the contradictions about myself, given that I was supposed to be a fresh cape but fought Lung, and came back from facing several Wards by myself unscathed.
Lisa already knew the truth about me, Alec probably thought something was up but didn't care to do anything about it, and Rachel wouldn't given her hatred of anything complicated, straightforward and simple as she is.
I hobbled my way to sit on the middle couch where it was covered in towels, and Lisa was kind enough to have gotten me a glass of cold water. I took my mask off and placed it on the coffee table, and immediately sculled half of it, only realising now how parched I really was.
Rachel sat down on the couch on the right side, her dogs already powered down to regular size, and Lisa handed me my glasses and sat down next to me. With my sight restored, I could see that Alec had laid down on the left couch, while Brian stood in front of the tv instead of sitting down, arms crossed, still looking upset with me.
"Alright, you said it was broken, so lemme take a look at it." She said, and I started unfurling my sling, hissing out in pain as I moved my arm. The chitin plate was still wet and covered in grime, but still intact. She lightly pressed down at different places along my forearm, humming in thought occasionally.
"My power is telling me that there's a chance it's fractured rather than broken, but I'll take another look at it once you get your costume off."
I gave her a weak nod, and she gave me a gentle smile and patted my hand, careful enough to not touch my forearm. I glanced around the room, and saw that they were all staring at me, so I leaned into the couch, closed my eyes, and started speaking.
"The worst places you can fight in is somewhere you can't easily escape from. Like the rooftop of a building if you don't have a mover ability, like flight or teleportation."
"What's that got to do with anything?" Brian asked.
"Because as soon as I realised that Vista was on that rooftop, there was a chance she could've fallen off it, especially because it was raining. She could've used her space manipulation to save herself, but I kept an eye on her, just in case."
"When I tried to stop her from manipulating the space around the street, I told her to get away from the edge and she must've been so surprised that she slipped and started falling. I got there in time to break her fall, but she fell at an angle, hitting my left forearm first, which broke it, of course. Managed to find a straight piece of wood that I split into two to create a makeshift sling."
"But why did you need us to run off like that, then?" Alec piped up, staring at me.
"For several reasons. One, because Panacea was still hanging around at the back entrance, and I needed her to come over and heal Vista. She wouldn't have trusted me if any of you were around, or if the fight got too close to the alleyway. Two, I needed time to make a sling and gather another swarm. Three, I needed something to make the Wards not immediately fight me, so making them think you left me behind in favour of running off with the money was the only option."
"I know it was a good thing, what you did, but she's a…" Brian asked, his question trailing off.
"And four, because a Ward dying or getting that seriously injured would put us on the shit list of the heroes and public," I opened my eyes and looked at our leader again, whose expression had softened a bit more, and was no longer folding his arms.
"How did you manage to beat them, then?" He asked.
"They were already weakened. Morale was bad because of what happened to Vista and Aegis' bad call to put her on the rooftop to begin with. Clockblocker was still frozen. Chatted with them for a bit, gave them a warning about fighting me, brought up what I did to Lung. It was really only Aegis who was committed to fighting me, the rest of the Wards were too unsure or conflicted."
Brian looked really conflicted at that, but sighed and sat down next to me.
"Remember what I said a couple of days ago? On Monday?" He asked, turning his head to me.
"To not do anything stupid in fights?" I mumbled. He nodded his head.
"Like, I get it. You've just joined a team, you wanna impress them. But please, please, promise me you won't do something so stupidly reckless again?"
"I promise." I lied, mumbling. He looked satisfied, and awkwardly patted my shoulder's armour plate, wiping his hand on his pants when he realised my costume was still wet from the rain.
"Well, with the heavy stuff out of the way, we can actually celebrate, lady and gents!" Lisa excitedly said, clapping her hands together, "Because after counting what we got, we managed to steal fourty fucking thousand!"
Alec had yelled out, getting up from his sitting position, and held out his hand to Brian for a hi-five. Brian did so, and turned to me and pumped his fist; I weakly cheered out and raised my arms out. I looked over to Rachel who had a feral grin on her face, her dogs alert from the noise the others were making. Lisa gave me a wink and pointed behind her.
"Taylor, you can go and have a shower and get changed. Then we can go out and get food together, ok?"
I nodded in reply. There was something she needed to talk to me about, and to me alone.
I stared at the reflection of myself, my skin still slightly warm from my shower. Still the same puppy-dog brown eyes, long black curly hair, the mouth slightly too wide for my face, the A-cup chest and distinct lack of curves.
It was still me, even if I was a couple of inches shorter, or the lack of scars that I'd accumulated over time.
There was a neat pile of clothes sitting on the basin, alongside my makeshift sling. The two pieces of wood were still bound to my broken forearm with silk. It still hurt, but pain was something I was used to at this point. The new clothes were sneakily bought by Lisa yesterday, when we went shopping together after my tour of Arcadia. She claimed that they were all in my size, and would 'accentuate my physique', and she was thorough enough to take all the price tags off.
The clothes included a padded sports bra, a pair of comfortable looking underwear, a loose, white coloured tank top that seemed to end at my midriff, and a pair of black cargo pants that had a silver chain hanging from the left pocket to the back.
I had my doubts that I looked good in these clothes, but I trusted Lisa enough that she wouldn't pick anything that would look awful on me, and when I began changing into them I reflected on the fight at the bank.
It was a lot better than I was originally expecting, honestly. We didn't need to resort to taking hostages, which was going to be important for getting the heroes and general public to trust us as a team further down the line, especially after Leviathan. Lisa didn't subject Amy to a mental breakdown, which was another step in my plan to try and befriend her. The thing with Vista would hopefully show that Khepri wasn't a big evil villain, and was someone who could be reasoned with, at least compared to Skitter.
And judging from Lisa's reaction, I'm assuming Dinah didn't get kidnapped either. Which then meant we can help her avoid another attempted kidnapping, and potentially be able to ally with her at a later point.
I finished getting changed and stared back into the mirror again. The pants gave me the look of having hips, and the crop top clung to my torso in such a way that showed off my toned stomach and arms, and the padding wasn't obvious. The sling didn't really help, but that was something temporary.
I did look good in these clothes. Maybe I should ask Lisa for some makeup advice at a later point.
I saw Lisa waiting for me just outside of the bathroom, typing something on her phone while she leaned against the wall. With a little spring in my step, I opened the door, and she looked up and gave me a massive grin.
"I told you that you would look good in them."
"Yeah, I do. Thank you for picking them out for me, Lisa." I said, as I resisted the urge to itch my right arm. "Although I don't know much about fashion, but maybe we could go clothes shopping together?"
"Of course I'd want to do that. We're friends, aren't we?" She replied, with some genuine affection in her voice, "Anyway, we gotta go and get your arm looked at, and there's some stuff that we need to discuss."
I nodded, and we both walked into the main area of the loft. Alec was doing his usual thing of playing video games, and Brian was lying down on the couch, looking at something on his phone.
"Alright, Taylor and I are heading out. We'll be back in an hour or two." Lisa stated to the others.
"Why will you be so long?" Brian asked, looking up from his phone.
"Because there's a doctor that's connected to the boss, and he can help get her arm healed up. After that we'll get some food to celebrate. Something fancy, I'm thinking." Lisa replied, picking up her handbag.
"Why can't we go to a restaurant or something, then?" Alec asked, still focusing on his video game. He seemed to be running around shooting at people, and I couldn't tell what game it was.
"Because then Rachel would have to be left out. And if she gets left out, then I'm not coming." I replied. Rachel had left during my shower, taking her dogs with her. Must be checking her territory or on a walk.
Alec hummed in response, but didn't say anything.
After Lisa and I said our goodbyes, we walked down the stairs and out of the decaying building, far away enough that the two boys couldn't overhear us.
"So, what was it that you really wanted to talk to me about?" I asked, as we both got into Lisa's car, the same one she had when she picked me up at Arcadia. It was one of the smaller models, built for driving in a city, with only two seats and a boot, and was covered in scratches and marks.
"Oh, you have no fucking clue. First of all, we're going to get your arm fixed. You probably know the dude already, from your future vision."
I hummed in response as she turned the car on and started driving.
"Two, we'll need to talk to the team about Bakuda. Her bombing started tomorrow in the previous timeline, so if we want to stop her we'll have to hit her hard and fast before she does."
"And-"
"And I've already done some research on her, and came up with some explanations to pitch it to our team, don't worry about that." She said, cutting me off.
"You seem excited about something." I said, raising an eyebrow at her.
"Oh, that'll be the last thing. The third thing: what you did at the bank? Already making waves online. The PRT couldn't cover up the fact they had fucked up and you were the one to save Vista. I'm so going to hack them for that video of you and show it to the others."
"Get to the point, I know it's about Dinah." I replied. Judging from Lisa's excitement, it was a safe assumption that she didn't get kidnapped.
"Ok, ok, hear this: I talked to the boss about it, and boy was he fucking pissed about it. For whatever reason, he wasn't able to kidnap her, and he doesn't suspect us of being involved with it at all. Thinks that whatever happened was a coincidence. A coincidence he couldn't have controlled or planned for."
"Which meant the note worked?"
She shook her head and gave me a so-so gesture.
"Maybe it did, maybe it didn't. Here's the other thing: she was at her school when we were robbing the bank. Which meant someone stopped him from kidnapping Dinah. Someone who was there, at least from his perspective, because of coincidence, and someone he couldn't deal with mercenaries alone."
I turned to her, realising what she was implying.
"Taylor. Who wasn't at the bank, but was there in the first timeline?"
Victoria Dallon.
"She's like me." I whispered.
Well, there's a reason I tagged this as a Ward fic.
And I only had a can of pepper spray, a police baton, a combat knife, my swarm and a broken left forearm.
Not the worst odds I've been up against.
"Vista, can you explain to me what happened here?" Aegis asked, turning his head to face her, voice projecting authority.
Vista gritted her teeth and clenched her fists and sat up, leaning against the brick wall dividing the alleyway and the bank's car park. Panacea hissed something at her, and was still holding onto the other girl's wrist.
"Because I fell off the roof you decided to stick me on, even after I objected to that, and that asshole," She bitterly responded, pointing at me, "saved me from dying, and got Panacea to heal my broken spine."
"Well, uh, that seems to be the case, then. You have my apologies for putting you in such an unsafe position, Vista." The captain coughed out, trying and failing to keep up the authoritative bravado, and I could see that he seemed to be blushing, judging the small amount of skin around his eyes.
"Why did you save her, anyway? You could've used Vista falling off as a distraction to leave, but you didn't." Gallant asked me, as he repositioned Browbeat's arm, trying to sidestep the tense atmosphere between his teammate and captain.
I stayed silent for a couple of moments, thinking about how to respond. Skitter argued to stay uncompromisingly silent; to force them into making a mistake that I could capitalise on, to make them fear and respect me. Weaver argued the opposite, that there was a possibility that I could leave without having to resort to any of Skitter's tactics. I did save one of their teammates, so I could convince them to let me leave, potentially.
After a few more moments, I settled for trying out Weaver's approach. I needed to show that Khepri was reasonable, and that she could compromise; something I couldn't do if I went with the Skitter approach.
But I still had the latter option available as a last resort.
"Because the rest of you were too distracted by my team, and I was the only one in a position to save her."
"How do we know you didn't deliberately make her fall?" Aegis replied, stepping forward towards me, and I internally rolled my eyes at him.
"Yeah, sure, I made her fall just so I could get my arm broken and have my back to a literal wall."
Aegis' eyes narrowed, glaring at me, while his teammates behind him glanced at each other.
"Let Clockblocker unfreeze himself and then surrender. You're five against one with your back to the literal wall, and you new 'teammates' left you behind in favour of running off with the money. Do you really want to crawl back to people like them? How would you know they wouldn't do it again?"
"Uh, Aegis?" Kid Win nervously asked, and his teammates all turned to face him, "Maybe you should stop channelling your inner Armsmaster? Because I don't think going for the hardball approach is going to work on him."
"Or her. Or them. Well, technically the official PRT guidelines state to use gender neutral language for any cape that has an unconfirmed or ambiguous gender." Gallant added.
"Oh my god, you are such a nerd, Gallant. No wonder why you get along with my sister." Panacea muttered under her breath.
"That's a good point. Hey, creepy bug person, what's your gender?" Browbeat asked me.
As much as I wanted to try and keep my civilian and cape personalities apart so people couldn't link Taylor Hebert, the normal high school girl who had a bullying problem, to Khepri, the weirdly experienced, mysterious new villain in Brockton's cape scene. But I didn't want people to think of me as a guy, though. Something about that rubbed me the wrong way.
"Female."
There was a brief pause.
"Holy shit, you're a girl?" Panacea replied, her face genuinely bewildered.
"Enough!" Aegis yelled to his teammates, and then turned back to face me, "Listen, if you do surrender here, I'm pretty sure there's a good chance that you can sign up to the Protectorate or the Wards instead of going to jail. You beat Lung, you didn't take hostages, and you saved Vista, all very good things! So there's an extremely good chance you can avoid any jail time if you just surrender."
I felt someone re-enter my range, approaching at a high speed. It was time to wrap this up, and quickly. I unsheathed my knife and pointed it at Aegis.
"No."
"But your teammates-"
"Who said my teammates left me behind?"
All of them tensed up from that, finally realising the implication, as I unsheathed my combat knife from my utility belt. Browbeat took his arm off of Gallant's shoulder and adopted a martial stance, while Gallant had summoned another two spheres of energy. Kid had upholstered his two pistols, but kept them facing the ground. Panacea and Vista, who were both still sitting on the ground, looked afraid and pissed off, respectively.
"So you saving Vista really was a distraction for the other Undersiders to leave with the money, then. Which means that you deliberately planned for her to fall off." Aegis accused me, his eyes rage and misplaced justice.
"Aegis, you massive idiot, it wasn't Khepri's fault I fell off," Vista hissed, "She asked me to step away from the edge because she didn't want me to fall, and I was so surprised that I slipped, which might I remind you that it was your idea to put me there in the first place!"
Aegis hesitated, but then went back to glaring at me. Why was he being so forceful here? Was he embarrassed that I saved Vista, or because he was the one to put her there, or both?
"Regardless, you have two choices here: you can either fight me and lose, or just let me leave."
"But how would we lose? You've literally got your back to the wall here!" Browbeat responded, taking a few steps forward so he was next to Aegis.
"Because that fight just then, with the other Undersiders? That was me fighting nicely."
"You weren't playing 'nice' with Clockblocker." Aegis accused.
"…Because my team didn't have any other way to deal with him safely. I wouldn't have done something like that if I had an alternative, so you can give him my apologies for it later."
"What's it like when you don't fight 'nicely', then?"
"Well, you all probably heard what happened to Lung, right?" I replied, pointing my knife at Panacea, "Just ask her. She had to be flown in by her sister to heal him after he tried to fight me and failed."
"Um, he had enough venom in his veins to kill several people at once. His regeneration was barely keeping him alive when I got to him." She said, raising her hands in surrender, "And, uh, if it comes down to a fight, I'd appreciate it if you didn't hurt me. Non-combatant, right?"
"I don't want any part of this either. Don't get me wrong, I still hate you, but you did sort of go out of your way to save me, and I'm not going to bother trying when I know we aren't going to win." Vista added.
I gave the two of them a single nod, and turned my head to the other Wards.
"That goes for the rest of you, too. If you don't fight me and just let me go, I won't do anything."
The other Wards looked confused, glancing at each other, silently communicating something to each other. Kid Win eventually shuffled forwards and whispered something to Aegis.
"Whatever you choose to do, we'll back you up on it. Either fighting her or letting her go."
He turned his head, glancing at his teammate, and nodded once before he went back to glaring at me.
"You know, I really hate villains like you," he remarked, tilting his head upwards, still glaring at me, "The ones that are so self-assured that they can win any fight, run from any situation, that they'll never be caught, and act like they still have morals or decency. You can say that you're sorry for Clockblocker, or that you had it in your heart to save Vista, but if you were actually a good person, you wouldn't be a villain."
Oh my god, he was actually monologuing at me. I reached into my swarm and saw that a certain person was only a block away and was rapidly approaching.
"Time's up. I have places to be."
"Alright, if you wanna do it the hard way-" Aegis replied, moving into a fighting stance, but was cut off from the insects I've been amassing since I got into the alley, and since the office building shielded the alley from most of the rain, I was able to form a proper swarm.
The sheer density made it difficult for any of the Wards to see more than a more than an arms length away in front of them, and with that many eyes, I could see everything impossibly clearly; every bead of sweat, every nick and cut, anything as slight as a twitch of a finger.
I dodged to the side, avoiding Aegis' tackle, causing him to crash face first into the brick wall behind me. I unsheathed my knife from my belt, and as I moved to my first target, I quickly glanced at the two girls huddled together on the ground, and parted my swarm just enough that they could see me. They both snapped their heads to me, and I gave them another single nod, hoping that they would understand I wasn't going to hurt them.
Browbeat was trying to wade through my swarm like one would through deep water, trying to find where I was, his telekinetic shield prevented most of my bugs from biting and stinging him. I formed a clone near him, using bees, hornets and wasps to mimic the gold of my armour. He tried to punch it, exposing his back to me. I slashed him twice, enough for him to cry out in pain.
Gallant at this point had already let go of his teammate, trying to keep his composure in the face of the screeching and buzzing. He was glancing around, trying to yell out to his teammates, but was unable to get a response. I formed another fake clone, just in between Browbeat and himself, making him fire his emotion blasts at his teammate, mistaking him for me. He started sobbing in response, as he sat down and curled up, confirming another suspicion; That Gallant's ability to see emotion was based on line of sight, and my swarm was thick enough to block it.
Gallant then tried walking towards his teammate, completely oblivious that I was standing near him, exposing what I was looking for. I'd been around Defiant and Dragon enough to get a good grasp on how most things made by tinkers work; things powered by a battery of some kind have systems and mechanisms that activate if the power source gets tamped with, to prevent the user from being blown up.
Gallant's power armour was pretty crude, probably not made by Armsmaster. Kid Win probably made it, then, if the PRT didn't source it on the cheap from some other tinker.
The battery of the power armour was located on the back, which was exposed due to the damage done by Angelica. It was too easy to slash some of the wires, making his power armour shut down. He stumbled, still trying to reach his teammates, and promptly fell over, too heavy to move it under his own power.
Kid Win, as soon as I flooded the alley, looked like he'd wanted to bolt, but remained completely frozen in place, undecided between trying to help or running. I grasped my knife, curling my hand around it into a fist, and punched his exposed jaw, and kicked him, making him drop to the ground like the rest of his teammates.
I walked out of the alley to where Bitch was, waiting on top of Judas. Her short, auburn hair drenched from the rain, missing her plastic bulldog mask. I dissolved my swarm, and looked back at Aegis, horrified at how his other teammates were all on the ground, and the two girls who were still huddled together.
And they saw me, standing right outside of the alley, with fear and awe on their faces.
"The fuck happened to you?" Bitch asked.
"Long story, I'll explain everything when we're back at the base. Broke my arm, though." I replied, holding out my good arm towards her.
She glanced at my sling, and she whistled at Judas, making him squat down. She tightly grasped my hand with hers, leaning down to put her other hand under my arm and picked me up, and I used some of the spikes jutting out from Judas' flank as a step. I sat behind her, my one good arm wrapped around her waist, as she whistled something which caused Judas to go into a full sprint, leading us back to the loft.
"That was really fucking stupid of you. They're going to tear you a new one once we get back." She stated.
"Is everyone ok, though?" I asked, mumbling into her shoulder.
"Ok. Some cuts and bruises. Nothing big."
"Good. I can handle being scolded if everyone got out ok. How are the dogs?"
Rachel turned her head slightly, looking at me from the corner of her eye, and then went back to looking forwards again.
"They're a little roughed up. They can handle it, though. Made sure of that."
I closed my eyes, my body too exhausted from the fight to keep them open. Another dissonance between my younger and older bodies.
"That's good, too. They're a part of the team."
She'd just grunted in response, and we fell into a comfortable silence as Judas made his way to the Loft. I quickly fell into a light sleep, the exhaustion catching up to me.
"Wake up. We're here."
I urged my eyes open, realising that I fell into a deeper sleep than I intended to, and attempted to rub my eyes but my mask was in the way.
Rachel had ordered Judas to lean down closer to the ground, and she was staring at me from the corner of her eye. Not a glare, though.
I sat up straight, and Rachel dismounted. She then reached out her hand, helping me get off without hurting myself. She kept her hand on Judas though, slowly taking away the bone, scale and muscle. I gave him a pat on the head, and turned around to see my other teammates.
I could see that the rest of the team was waiting for us at the top of the stairs, already changed into casuals. Brian looked irritated, but softened slightly once he saw my sling. Lisa was uncharacteristically antsy, while Alec gave me a wave, sporting his usual smirk.
I waved back with my good arm.
"Took you fucking long enough. Now can you explain what the hell happened?" He yelled out.
"I'll explain further once I'm changed and showered, ok?" I replied, making my way up the stairs, grasping the stair rails for support, Rachel following behind me with a regular sized Judas next to her.
"No. We need to understand what happened." Brian tried to inject authority into his tone. "You ask us to leave you behind, and you come back with a broken arm?"
I waved my good arm at him, too tired to reply back. I knew he wasn't actually mad at me, just concerned.
Hopefully he wouldn't get suspicious, though. Although I was trying to hide the contradictions about myself, given that I was supposed to be a fresh cape but fought Lung, and came back from facing several Wards by myself unscathed.
Lisa already knew the truth about me, Alec probably thought something was up but didn't care to do anything about it, and Rachel wouldn't given her hatred of anything complicated, straightforward and simple as she is.
I hobbled my way to sit on the middle couch where it was covered in towels, and Lisa was kind enough to have gotten me a glass of cold water. I took my mask off and placed it on the coffee table, and immediately sculled half of it, only realising now how parched I really was.
Rachel sat down on the couch on the right side, her dogs already powered down to regular size, and Lisa handed me my glasses and sat down next to me. With my sight restored, I could see that Alec had laid down on the left couch, while Brian stood in front of the tv instead of sitting down, arms crossed, still looking upset with me.
"Alright, you said it was broken, so lemme take a look at it." She said, and I started unfurling my sling, hissing out in pain as I moved my arm. The chitin plate was still wet and covered in grime, but still intact. She lightly pressed down at different places along my forearm, humming in thought occasionally.
"My power is telling me that there's a chance it's fractured rather than broken, but I'll take another look at it once you get your costume off."
I gave her a weak nod, and she gave me a gentle smile and patted my hand, careful enough to not touch my forearm. I glanced around the room, and saw that they were all staring at me, so I leaned into the couch, closed my eyes, and started speaking.
"The worst places you can fight in is somewhere you can't easily escape from. Like the rooftop of a building if you don't have a mover ability, like flight or teleportation."
"What's that got to do with anything?" Brian asked.
"Because as soon as I realised that Vista was on that rooftop, there was a chance she could've fallen off it, especially because it was raining. She could've used her space manipulation to save herself, but I kept an eye on her, just in case."
"When I tried to stop her from manipulating the space around the street, I told her to get away from the edge and she must've been so surprised that she slipped and started falling. I got there in time to break her fall, but she fell at an angle, hitting my left forearm first, which broke it, of course. Managed to find a straight piece of wood that I split into two to create a makeshift sling."
"But why did you need us to run off like that, then?" Alec piped up, staring at me.
"For several reasons. One, because Panacea was still hanging around at the back entrance, and I needed her to come over and heal Vista. She wouldn't have trusted me if any of you were around, or if the fight got too close to the alleyway. Two, I needed time to make a sling and gather another swarm. Three, I needed something to make the Wards not immediately fight me, so making them think you left me behind in favour of running off with the money was the only option."
"I know it was a good thing, what you did, but she's a…" Brian asked, his question trailing off.
"And four, because a Ward dying or getting that seriously injured would put us on the shit list of the heroes and public," I opened my eyes and looked at our leader again, whose expression had softened a bit more, and was no longer folding his arms.
"How did you manage to beat them, then?" He asked.
"They were already weakened. Morale was bad because of what happened to Vista and Aegis' bad call to put her on the rooftop to begin with. Clockblocker was still frozen. Chatted with them for a bit, gave them a warning about fighting me, brought up what I did to Lung. It was really only Aegis who was committed to fighting me, the rest of the Wards were too unsure or conflicted."
Brian looked really conflicted at that, but sighed and sat down next to me.
"Remember what I said a couple of days ago? On Monday?" He asked, turning his head to me.
"To not do anything stupid in fights?" I mumbled. He nodded his head.
"Like, I get it. You've just joined a team, you wanna impress them. But please, please, promise me you won't do something so stupidly reckless again?"
"I promise." I lied, mumbling. He looked satisfied, and awkwardly patted my shoulder's armour plate, wiping his hand on his pants when he realised my costume was still wet from the rain.
"Well, with the heavy stuff out of the way, we can actually celebrate, lady and gents!" Lisa excitedly said, clapping her hands together, "Because after counting what we got, we managed to steal fourty fucking thousand!"
Alec had yelled out, getting up from his sitting position, and held out his hand to Brian for a hi-five. Brian did so, and turned to me and pumped his fist; I weakly cheered out and raised my arms out. I looked over to Rachel who had a feral grin on her face, her dogs alert from the noise the others were making. Lisa gave me a wink and pointed behind her.
"Taylor, you can go and have a shower and get changed. Then we can go out and get food together, ok?"
I nodded in reply. There was something she needed to talk to me about, and to me alone.
I stared at the reflection of myself, my skin still slightly warm from my shower. Still the same puppy-dog brown eyes, long black curly hair, the mouth slightly too wide for my face, the A-cup chest and distinct lack of curves.
It was still me, even if I was a couple of inches shorter, or the lack of scars that I'd accumulated over time.
There was a neat pile of clothes sitting on the basin, alongside my makeshift sling. The two pieces of wood were still bound to my broken forearm with silk. It still hurt, but pain was something I was used to at this point. The new clothes were sneakily bought by Lisa yesterday, when we went shopping together after my tour of Arcadia. She claimed that they were all in my size, and would 'accentuate my physique', and she was thorough enough to take all the price tags off.
The clothes included a padded sports bra, a pair of comfortable looking underwear, a loose, white coloured tank top that seemed to end at my midriff, and a pair of black cargo pants that had a silver chain hanging from the left pocket to the back.
I had my doubts that I looked good in these clothes, but I trusted Lisa enough that she wouldn't pick anything that would look awful on me, and when I began changing into them I reflected on the fight at the bank.
It was a lot better than I was originally expecting, honestly. We didn't need to resort to taking hostages, which was going to be important for getting the heroes and general public to trust us as a team further down the line, especially after Leviathan. Lisa didn't subject Amy to a mental breakdown, which was another step in my plan to try and befriend her. The thing with Vista would hopefully show that Khepri wasn't a big evil villain, and was someone who could be reasoned with, at least compared to Skitter.
And judging from Lisa's reaction, I'm assuming Dinah didn't get kidnapped either. Which then meant we can help her avoid another attempted kidnapping, and potentially be able to ally with her at a later point.
I finished getting changed and stared back into the mirror again. The pants gave me the look of having hips, and the crop top clung to my torso in such a way that showed off my toned stomach and arms, and the padding wasn't obvious. The sling didn't really help, but that was something temporary.
I did look good in these clothes. Maybe I should ask Lisa for some makeup advice at a later point.
I saw Lisa waiting for me just outside of the bathroom, typing something on her phone while she leaned against the wall. With a little spring in my step, I opened the door, and she looked up and gave me a massive grin.
"I told you that you would look good in them."
"Yeah, I do. Thank you for picking them out for me, Lisa." I said, as I resisted the urge to itch my right arm. "Although I don't know much about fashion, but maybe we could go clothes shopping together?"
"Of course I'd want to do that. We're friends, aren't we?" She replied, with some genuine affection in her voice, "Anyway, we gotta go and get your arm looked at, and there's some stuff that we need to discuss."
I nodded, and we both walked into the main area of the loft. Alec was doing his usual thing of playing video games, and Brian was lying down on the couch, looking at something on his phone.
"Alright, Taylor and I are heading out. We'll be back in an hour or two." Lisa stated to the others.
"Why will you be so long?" Brian asked, looking up from his phone.
"Because there's a doctor that's connected to the boss, and he can help get her arm healed up. After that we'll get some food to celebrate. Something fancy, I'm thinking." Lisa replied, picking up her handbag.
"Why can't we go to a restaurant or something, then?" Alec asked, still focusing on his video game. He seemed to be running around shooting at people, and I couldn't tell what game it was.
"Because then Rachel would have to be left out. And if she gets left out, then I'm not coming." I replied. Rachel had left during my shower, taking her dogs with her. Must be checking her territory or on a walk.
Alec hummed in response, but didn't say anything.
After Lisa and I said our goodbyes, we walked down the stairs and out of the decaying building, far away enough that the two boys couldn't overhear us.
"So, what was it that you really wanted to talk to me about?" I asked, as we both got into Lisa's car, the same one she had when she picked me up at Arcadia. It was one of the smaller models, built for driving in a city, with only two seats and a boot, and was covered in scratches and marks.
"Oh, you have no fucking clue. First of all, we're going to get your arm fixed. You probably know the dude already, from your future vision."
I hummed in response as she turned the car on and started driving.
"Two, we'll need to talk to the team about Bakuda. Her bombing started tomorrow in the previous timeline, so if we want to stop her we'll have to hit her hard and fast before she does."
"And-"
"And I've already done some research on her, and came up with some explanations to pitch it to our team, don't worry about that." She said, cutting me off.
"You seem excited about something." I said, raising an eyebrow at her.
"Oh, that'll be the last thing. The third thing: what you did at the bank? Already making waves online. The PRT couldn't cover up the fact they had fucked up and you were the one to save Vista. I'm so going to hack them for that video of you and show it to the others."
"Get to the point, I know it's about Dinah." I replied. Judging from Lisa's excitement, it was a safe assumption that she didn't get kidnapped.
"Ok, ok, hear this: I talked to the boss about it, and boy was he fucking pissed about it. For whatever reason, he wasn't able to kidnap her, and he doesn't suspect us of being involved with it at all. Thinks that whatever happened was a coincidence. A coincidence he couldn't have controlled or planned for."
"Which meant the note worked?"
She shook her head and gave me a so-so gesture.
"Maybe it did, maybe it didn't. Here's the other thing: she was at her school when we were robbing the bank. Which meant someone stopped him from kidnapping Dinah. Someone who was there, at least from his perspective, because of coincidence, and someone he couldn't deal with mercenaries alone."
I turned to her, realising what she was implying.
"Taylor. Who wasn't at the bank, but was there in the first timeline?"
Victoria Dallon.
"She's like me." I whispered.
Well, there's a reason I tagged this as a Ward fic.
Ngl, I sincerely hope Taylor is wrong. Because there's no way in hell Vicky from the future would agree to stay under the same roof with Amy even for one damn second...
- Location
- Sweden
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Damn, that changes things. Also explains her not backing up Amy, thought that was weird.
- Location
- United States
Unless she got her memories on the day of the kidnapping.
Nah, I don't think so, just re-read the chapter where they meet at school, she definitely knew. She reacted to the name Khepri and she recognized Taylor too. Fuck this is so hype.
Nice touch with her breaking up with Dean too, if she is from Ward she is in her mid 20s, so it feels right to her character to feel weird dating a teenager, + he being her dead ex too...
@Viri absolutely aced the subtle clues about the whole thing.
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- Location
- Te Ika-a-Māui
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Yeah, I don't think Vicky would be willing to project her issues with post-S9 Amy on to early-canon Amy, who hasn't done any of that shit yet.
- Location
- US
I'm not sure she could really avoid it. She IS Carol's daughter.
That said, she's definitely going to figure out Khepri is chrono-divergent
I'm enjoying seeing where you're going with this and now I'm really looking forward to some future Vicky interactions. However I think Taylor pulled her knife out a few too many times in that fight.
- Location
- Te Ika-a-Māui
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I mean, that's true, but the scene with her and Amy showing Taylor around Arcadia suggests she's not acting especially outside the norm of pre-Wretch Vicky, as does Amy's assumption that she'd show up to shut down the bank job.
Probably already has, simply from Taylor showing up at Arcadia so early.
Awakening, 3.1
Consciousness came to me, far too sudden for my mind and body to catch up.
My head felt like it was about to burst from the pain' every breath a short, shallow gasp. I writhed in place, and my hand grasped something soft, something plush, and pulled it towards my chest as I curled into it, waiting for this migraine to pass. My mouth was dry, and the clothes that I was wearing stuck to my sweat drenched skin. After what seemed like hours, the pain subsided enough for me to think clearly.
I'd chosen to fall asleep in our old Breakthrough headquarters, the one that my team had staked out when we were just getting ourselves together. A place I knew full well had a good chance of being my final resting place.
Which meant this must be the connected dream, our last ditch attempted to beat the Titans by polluting the information our agents stored. But my instincts told me something was off; things felt too solid, too real.
When the pain of my migraine ended and I unfurled myself from the foetal position, my joints still felt unresponsive and my skin sensitive like I had a particularly bad cold. It was then that I realised that the plush, soft thing in my hand was Lye-Leo, his black button eyes staring back at me.
I pulled myself into a sitting position and looked around. Various framed posters of heroes lined the walls, of which there was one of the Triumvirate, with Legend in the middle with Eidolon and Alexandria to his left and right specifically. The other one was of the local Brockton Protectorate, with Armsmaster, Miss Militia, Assault, Battery and Dauntless all in classic 'battle' poses. They both looked old, with fraying edges and corners ripped off from how I used blu tack to hold them up until my mum went and got frames for them.
The last one, however, looked relatively new. It was Gallant, wearing his tinkertech suit of armour, his name written in a futuristic font. When we first started dating, he said it would be embarrassing for him if his girlfriend had merchandise for him, so I bought the poster as a way to tease him.
This was my room back at Brockton Bay, no doubt. Same desk, same posters, same bookshelves filled with books about parahumans and powers. My bedside table had my phone, in the same place I'd charge it every night and a framed photo of Amy and I when we were kids, and was one of the few times I could remember seeing her be unabashedly happy.
But my initial instincts were right; something definitely was off. Agents weren't this good at recording memories, not to this level of detail. I looked out of my window, and saw the familiar sight of Brockton's skyline, except without the damage from Bakuda's bombing or Leviathan or any of the things that happened to it. Same skyscrapers, same sky, framed with the orange of the rising sun. A bit earlier than I would usually get up at, I could tell.
But before I could think further, someone quietly knocked on my door.
"Vicky?"
I froze. No, no, no, fuck off, there was no fucking way she'd be here, why the fuck was she here-
The door opened slightly, as Amy let herself into my room. But before I could yell at her, scream at her for pushing my boundaries, for still trying to be in my life again, I noticed something off, much like everything else.
Amy was a little bit shorter, and her face was still marked by the freckles she has, but it was rounder, softer almost, like she regained the baby fat she'd lost during her time in the Birdcage. She was wearing a loose pair of pyjama bottoms and matching singlet, and the dressing gown I'd given her for one of her birthdays. Her hands were blank, missing the red that she tattooed on herself as a reminder of the 'blood' on her hands.
Bleh.
"Are you ok? I heard you yell out, but I don't think it was loud enough for mum or dad to hear though." She asked me, concern written all over her face.
She set me more on edge. I was used to Amy cringing away from me in guilt, never meeting my eyes. The Amy in front of me was looking at me more like the sister I used to know, before she betrayed me. With my suspicions rising, I leant over to my bedside table and turned on my phone.
6:05 AM. Sunday, April 10th, 2011.
What the fuck.
"...Just a bad dream, I think." I replied.
She gave me a smile, one that almost made me shudder, and she opened up her arms.
"Oh, do you want a-"
"Go back to bed, Amy." I said, interrupting her. She looked caught off guard from that, and a little hurt, but gave me another nervous smile and slid past my door to her own room. I sighed and laid down on my side, disconnecting my phone from its charger and opening it. I opened up the web browser and browsed the PHO phone app.
There was a thread about the latest Endbringer attack now that Canberra's quarantine had finally finished, another about the recent movement of the Slaughterhouse Nine, and another about the Machine Army. For Brockton though, it was more or less the typical threads from 2011. A thread about the local Protectorates and Wards, one for movement of the various gangs and tips to avoid them.
And a small thread about a small gang of thieves called the Undersiders, and how they robbed the Ruby Dreams casino back in January.
Searching Capricorn came up with a thread about Team Reach, as well as one for Case 70s. Damsel of Distress resulted in a thread about her, the villains of Boston, and the Boston Games. Optics resulted in nothing. I looked at Sveta's PHO account, and it seemed like she was still using it regularly, with the latest comment being on a thread about Weld posted yesterday.
I let out another sigh and sat back up, rubbing the sweat off my forehead. This couldn't be a dream, or a reconstruction of a memory. My first assumption was that there was some sort of interaction between powers, or how reality started breaking at the seams, that led to me being here again. Perhaps this is one of the many alternative Earths, mostly similar to Bet, with Gimel being somewhere out there.
Becoming the Wretch. My friendship with Sveta. Breakthrough, and the friendships I've made with my teammates. All the effort and work I did as Antares.
I choked down a sob.
I'd never see Sveta's reassuring smile or Kenzie's bubbly excitement, or seeing Rain's persistence on improving himself. I'd never see Byron and Missy's relationship develop, and the chance of seeing Tristan or Ashley come back from the dead. Hell, I'd even settle for Tattletale's snarkiness, but her and everything else was up in the air since I was four years back in time.
A pair of arms settled around me, down past my neck and joining the hands together at my chest, like a hug from behind. I felt a weight settle on top of my head, and another pair of hands on my own, intertwining our fingers. I tilted my head up, and saw my forcefield in the shape of my head and face staring down at me, but it wasn't see-through like it usually was. My forcefield was now a soft gold colour, reminiscent of stained glass, gently reflecting the rays of the early morning.
The Fragile One. She'd come back into the past with me, somehow.
"That's a neat trick. Did you learn it from when I was in Shardspace?"
Her face, blank of any features except for two eyes that didn't have any pupils. The two 'eyes' had scrunched up, like she was squinting at me, and the head robotically bobbed up and down.
It left me with the impression that she was giggling at me.
I let out a quiet, rueful chuckle of my own. After a few moments, Fragile had stopped moving, giving me a small squeeze, and settled back to covering me, just a few millimetres away from my skin, the colour returning back to its original transparency.
"Love you too, Fragile." I whispered.
I felt relieved that she had somehow come back to the past with me. I looked out towards the city, my hometown. There were still so many problems it had, and so many things that would happen in the future, but it still felt like home, covered in the soft golden rays of the early morning. There was still so much to prepare for, if I was going to take this chance. The gangs ripping the city apart, Leviathan, the Slaughterhouse Nine, whatever resulted in Echidna. But since I was here again, there was the opportunity to try and prevent many of these tragedies, which also included a specific someone.
Taylor Hebert. The girl who ended up becoming Khepri. Although I was close to the Undersiders, I knew next to nothing about her outside of my own experience. Sure, there was the video of her at Arcadia, the leaked video of her fighting Behemoth, and the things she did as Weaver, but I knew nothing about her as a person.
I didn't know why she killed Alexandria, outside of the PRT's public response; I didn't know why she chose to become a Ward, why she took over the city, or the choices she made that led to her becoming Khepri.
And then there was my own sister, possibly. But that was something I couldn't think about right now, not just afte-
My phone vibrated, and I heard the familiar sound of a cat meowing that I used as my notification sound. I picked it up and opened it, and saw it was a text from Dean.
Deanamino's: Hey bby, amy just texted me saying you were having a bad morning, and since my parents are out of town, you wanna come over and chat? : )
That almost sent me into another spiral. Since everything else that happened was erased, reset, that meant he was alive again. God, I mourned him, I cried every night after I'd lost him, and then that got ruined from what Amy did to me, but then after I was fixed I tried to move on, but so many things reminded me of him, and I thought I was getting better but now I'm in the past and he's alive again-
Breathe. Everything is going to be fine.
I closed my eyes, and focused on the sounds around me. Some cars going past, the barking of some dogs a distance away, someone who seemed to be mowing their lawn this early in the morning.
Dean was alive again, that was good. Even ignoring the romantic part of our relationship, he was someone I could absolutely trust. Someone I could explain everything to, someone to help share the burden of the knowledge of the future. I picked up my phone and texted him back.
I got up and started preparing to leave. I took off my pyjamas, and got out a pair of jeans, a t-shirt and an old New Wave hoodie that I got when they first started merchandising. I would usually take more effort into my appearance, but I didn't care. I grabbed a tote bag that was hanging on a hook on my bedroom door, stuffing my pencil case and a spare notebook into it, as well as my wallet and spare house keys. As I unplugged my phone, it meowed again with another notification.
Deanamino's: Gotcha. See you soon babe :3
I closed it and stuffed it into my bag. With everything I needed, I quietly opened my window and let myself out. I didn't want to go out of the front door, not with the risk of waking up mum or running into Amy again. I tied my bag's handles into a knot, and flew up into the morning sky, following the five minute route I always took to get to Dean's place. From this height, it was easier to see most of the city and it was odd seeing the absence of the 'scar' from Bakuda's bombing and the lake Leviathan had made.
I made my way over to his place, a monstrous five story mansion that looked more like an apartment building than a home. Dean had the top floor to himself, which was more like an apartment, with its master bedroom, kitchen and lounge room. He always complained that his parents never gave him privacy though, like how the doors always had to be open whenever I visited.
Yeah, Dean's parents never liked me much.
I saw him on his balcony, leaning against the railing and still wearing a singlet and a pair of boxer shorts. He looked up, smiling once he saw me and waved. I landed right next to him and enveloped him in a tight hug, smooshing my face into his shoulder.
"Oof, someone seems to have missed me," He wheezed out, lifting his arms and returning the hug, "So what happened to Victoria Dallon that made her upse-"
I grabbed the sides of his face, and tilted his head down to look at mine.
"Dean Stansfield. You know that I love you to pieces, but there's something I need to tell you, and it isn't going to make any sense, but you'll have to trust me, ok?"
"Yeah, I love you too Vicky, but you might actually crack my ribs, and also how are you holding onto my face and hugging me at the same time?" He asked, trying to look behind him as he said that. I forced his head to keep still.
"I'm from four and a half years into the future."
"What."
I took another sip from my bottle of iced tea, sitting down on one of the bar style chairs that faced the small kitchen, as Dean's 'apartment' didn't have enough room for a proper dining table. Dean was pacing around the kitchen soaking in everything that I just told him, waiting for his expensive imported tea to cool. Two plates of half eaten bacon and eggs on toast sat to the side, both of us not having the appetite to eat the rest.
While I was waiting, Fragile was combing through my hair with one of Dean's hairbrushes in preparation for braiding it. Eventually Dean stopped pacing, took a sip of his tea and sighed.
"It's a lot to take in, honestly."
I shrugged my shoulders. He gave me a gentle smile, one that he always had whenever I went to him to complain about my parents or school, and reached over the counter to hold my hand. I moved it slightly so I could intertwine our fingers.
"However, thank you for telling me. I know what you went through must've been hard, with losing me to an Endbringer, what Amy did to you, the world almost ending because of Scion and the attempt to rebuild afterwards."
"I still don't really know or how to feel about being here again. The fact that you're still alive, my family is still alive, and that this Amy hasn't done anything to me is…"
"Feels like all the effort you put in was erased, rendered null?"
I nodded weakly.
"Well, that's not entirely true, I think. Just because it technically didn't happen because of time travel shenanigans didn't mean everything you did was for naught," He said, giving me a wink and a teasing smile, "and I'm for certain that you're still Victoria Dallon I've come to love, just older, wiser, more beautiful-"
"Dean!" I admonished, lightly slapping his shoulder. He chuckled at me, and took another drink from his tea, but I could tell he was forcing himself to keep the mood light, at least for my sake.
"Well, I guess I have a thing for older women now." He teased, waggling his eyebrows at me.
"I'm only twenty-one, you moron."
"Yeah, but it cheered you up, didn't it?"
I gave him my best glare while he continued to smirk at me. After a minute or so we both let up and laughed.
"Ok, ok, that's enough. Now we gotta get to the important part." Dean said, walking over to the nearby couch with his tea, gesturing me to follow. I placed the hairbrush on the counter and sat down next to him. Fragile started to braid my hair, the parts of my forcefield she was controlling now coloured gold again, and Dean squinted at her.
"Still not used to that, I think." He muttered.
"Get used to it. If you love me you'll have to love her, too."
"Ah, of course! 'Twas not my intention to insult the fair lady! It wounds my pride as a knight to have accidentally sullied a lady's name!" He replied in an awful british accent, shuffling in his seat so he could face me and bow. I gave him a playful shove and he rolled his eyes in response as he picked up the notepad and a pen from my bag.
"So, what would be the most important things that need to be done?" He asked, tapping the pen against his forehead.
"That's the problem Dean, there are so many things that are going to happen, but I only know half of it, so I have no idea how to solve them."
"Let's break it down, then. What're the important things that happen this week?"
I closed my eyes, and looked back to what happened the first time around.
"Lung gets captured by Armsmaster later tonight, which leads to Bakuda bombing the city on Friday. The Undersiders robbed the Central Bank on Thursday, but they were really hired by Coil as a distraction so he could kidnap Dinah Alcott."
He hummed at that, and jotted down some notes judging from the noise.
"How much do you know about the Undersiders and Coil?"
"Coil is a mastermind, and there was precious little information about him, even after the Undersiders killed him. Hires mercenaries directly, but hires capes in case he needs something, like a distraction. I'm thinking he has some links to the PRT, because he knew that the Protectorate heroes were going to be out of town at the time, or he hired Tattletale to get that information for him. Nothing is known about his ability, though he's some sort of thinker judging from other masterminds like Accord.
"The Undersiders were a small gang that used the repeated chaos to gain influence and territory, getting most of it after Leviathan, the Slaughterhouse Nine, and Coil. I'd originally thought Tattletale was behind most of their success, but Foil, who you would know as Flechette, told me it was Skitter who was behind most of the 'take over the entire city' thing."
He hummed again, and I opened my eyes to look at him.
"I think I have an idea. A starting point, at least."
I gave him a questioning glance.
"So, we know when and where Dinah gets kidnapped. So, you can go near her middle school during lunchtime and keep watch from a distance. But the important thing is that you need to make it look like it's coincidental that you're there."
"Why's that?"
"Because if Coil doesn't get Dinah, he's going to be looking as to why, so if you look like you were there on purpose, he's definitely going to do something about it since you aren't supposed to know about his plans."
"Good point. What about Skitter, though?"
"Honestly, no clue. You said that she eventually became a Ward, so maybe when I'm fighting her I can convince her to stand down. Best idea I have currently. Other than that though, we can easily prevent Amy from being ther-"
"You can handle anything about Amy, for the time being. I'm not ready to do anything about her myself." I said, interrupting him.
Dean gave me another reassuring look and wrapped me in a side hug, something I happily leaned into.
"You wanna talk about it?" He murmured to me.
I shrugged my shoulders and leaned into his hug instead. I didn't want to talk about her, I didn't want to think about her. I'd admitted to myself and to others that Amy was in an awful place, even before her altercation with Tattletale.
I just needed some time to think about what to do with her. To remind myself that this Amy was closer to the girl I had grown up with, rather than the Red Queen.
After a few quiet minutes, I spoke up again.
"I miss everyone." I whispered, "And I'm glad that you're in my life again, but there were so many other people in my life that I can't see anymore."
Dean shushed me, and gently rubbed my back. After a few moments he let go of me, and moved so he was lying down, his head leaning on the armrest of the couch, and gestured for me to cuddle up to him. I laid down on top of him and hugged his midsection, while he wrapped his arms around my shoulders.
He then kissed the crown of my head, as we both adjusted to get comfortable.
"But they're out there, aren't they?" He asked, quietly.
"Kenzie already triggered, I think. Byron and Trisitan are members of Team Reach. Sveta's still in the hospital, but I know her PHO account. Jessica is still employed by the PRT. Rain would still be with the Fallen. Ashley, though…"
"The Ashley you knew was a clone of Damsel of Distress, right?"
I murmured in agreement.
"Even if you were friends with her clone, I have no doubt you can be friends with her again, because that's just the type of person you are, Vicky."
"...Thanks, Dean."
He kissed my head again and gave me another squeeze. After another few minutes of quiet, only interrupted by the rumbling of cars, I could feel his chest rise up and down slower and slower, and we both relaxed into each other's arms. However, there was something that I needed to bring up with him.
"I know the truth about your trigger event." I whispered.
His eyes immediately flung open, and he almost scrambled to sit upright, pushing me off in the process. I looked into his eyes, moist from the sheer panic, alarm and guilt he would be feeling.
"I couldn't. I'm sorry. They said they'd kill me if I told anyone."
Rather than replying, I laid down on my back and gently grabbed his shoulders, forcing him down so his head was resting on my chest, a reverse of our previous position. He seemed smaller, like this, the way that he leaned into my chest, unsure if wanted to cry or not.
I was annoyed that he didn't tell me about it. That there was something that even he hid from me, when we both agreed to not keep any secrets from each other. But he was just a regular teenager, wanting a way to be able to help people and to distance himself from his parents.
After some moments, his breathing slowed down, and his arms that held me in a vice-like grip loosened.
"I'm upset with you for a lot of things Dean, like how you kept that from me, or that you lied about your trigger event, or how you didn't tell me anything about Amy." I murmured to him, and he tilted his head to look at me, his eyes puffy and red.
"Victoria, I'm so fucking sorr-"
I shushed him, and covered his lips with my index finger.
"But I don't blame you, either. I know they would've absolutely killed you if you told me, and Amy…"
I let out a sigh, and stared straight up at the ceiling.
"A lot of people failed her, at this point in time. Not that justifies everything she ended up doing, but for this point in her life, there were so many things you, my parents, or I could've done to help her."
Dean shuffled a bit so he could wipe his eyes with his arm, and then looked at me.
"Do you think she can be helped? That we can prevent her from becoming the Red Queen?"
I gave that question some thought, and after a few moments I replied.
"Yeah, I think so." I whispered. "I need time to differentiate Amy and the Red Queen as separate people, but the problem is that she doesn't have time. If I don't try and help her now, she's just going to end up making a mistake and spiral from it."
Because I had to continue moving forwards, step by step, day by day, just as I did after Gold Morning. Despite the loss of my team, friends and allies.
Because I had no other choice.
"You're so strong, Victoria. The strongest person I know, and I'm so, so proud of you for it." He whispered back.
"But I'm so sick of being strong all the time," I gritted out, "And now I have to carry this burden of knowing what's going to happen, and I wish I just had more people to help me carry it, or something, I don't know. It's hard to translate what I'm feeling into words."
He nodded into my chest, and we both fell into a comfortable silence. As I stroked the back of his head, I just realised that this was the most emotionally open and vulnerable that I've ever seen him. For my sake, probably.
"Well, not to bring the mood down, even further," He spoke up, "I'm assuming that things between us…"
"I love you so much Dean, but I spent four years mourning you, and now that I'm somehow back here again, it just feels like I'm too much of a different person, now. I'm essentially twenty-one, and you're still seventeen, I've changed, but you've stayed the same to me."
Instead of replying, he leaned over and playfully shuffled my hair, partially undoing my braid. As I tried to push him away, he committed to messing with my hair even more, using two hands instead of one, which ended up with the both of us in a heap from laughing, with him straddling the top of me.
"I love you so much, Victoria. And yeah, I'm not mad or upset that you want to keep things platonic between us, especially with the whole 'stop the city from going to shit' thing we need to plan for." He said, but I could still see the hurt in his eyes from what I said.
I was going to reply to him, but then I could hear a particular ringtone coming from my bag. One of the basic, default tones that were just a series of beeps. With every other number on my contact list, I'd given them a unique ringtone, like a pop song they liked, but this one indicated someone in particular. A default set of loud, annoying beeps.
Carol Dallon. My mother.
With a groan, I gestured for Dean to get off me, as I leaned down and got my phone out, and pushed myself up into a sitting position before answering.
"Hello?"
"Victoria Dallon, why did you not tell me that you were going out of the house for an extended period of time? Your sister said you left before seven but didn't know where you were going, but you didn't even leave a note or a message?" She accused me, and spending time with Dean had made me forget what she was like before everything went to shit.
Strangely though, this is the second time Amy helped me out. First with messaging Dean when I woke up, and then lying about knowing where I went.
"I'm just hanging out with Dean. I woke up early and decided to have breakfast with him at his place."
"But you didn't even leave a message for me, Victoria. I need to know if you're leaving because I woke up and almost had a heart attack thinking you got kidnapped until your sister told me."
I bite down on my tongue to resist sighing.
"Yeah, ok. I'll remember to make you a note next time."
She hummed at that, but I knew her enough that wasn't a confirmation type of hum, but more like a 'I'm judging you for your choices' type of hum. It was odd, seeing her like this again when the last time I saw her she was crying, apologising over and over again about her affair with Uncle Neil, reaffirming that I was Mark's daughter and not his.
Bleh.
"Regardless, you need to come back and help me clean the house up since we have a team meeting later tonight."
Mum called them meetings, but it was really just a get together with Pelhams, usually for lunch or dinner once a week, but she called them meetings so it sounded more professional, I think. From what I can remember, we did have a meeting on this date in the first timeline, too.
"Alright, I'll be home in twenty minutes or so."
"Ok. Give my regards to Dean. Goodbye."
"Yeah, see you soon."
As soon as the call disconnected, I covered my face in my hands and quietly screamed.
"What happened? Carol being Carol again?" Dean asked.
"Well, not too much just now. It's that a lot of things happened that made me realise that my mother is a very messed up woman. Anyway, we have another 'team meeting' tonight and I gotta get back and help her with it." I replied, getting up and giving Dean one last hug.
"I can't say I envy you. Also, I'm assuming you aren't going to tell them the truth?" He asked.
"Yeah, there's no way in hell I'm going to. Dad has his depression, Amy would immediately have a breakdown, and I have no idea how Mum would react. Which also means I need to try and act as Glory Girl era Victoria, which won't be fun." I grumbled into his shoulder.
He chuckled at that and stepped away from the hug.
"Anyway, text me about how things go, and I'll see you at school tomorrow?"
I let out another groan. I'd completely forgotten that I had school again. Just another problem added to the pile that I'd have to just deal with.
I walked outside, grabbing my bag on the way, and gave Dean one last look, as he went back to the counter to continue drinking his tea. I gave him one last wave and flew into the clear blue sky.
My head felt like it was about to burst from the pain' every breath a short, shallow gasp. I writhed in place, and my hand grasped something soft, something plush, and pulled it towards my chest as I curled into it, waiting for this migraine to pass. My mouth was dry, and the clothes that I was wearing stuck to my sweat drenched skin. After what seemed like hours, the pain subsided enough for me to think clearly.
I'd chosen to fall asleep in our old Breakthrough headquarters, the one that my team had staked out when we were just getting ourselves together. A place I knew full well had a good chance of being my final resting place.
Which meant this must be the connected dream, our last ditch attempted to beat the Titans by polluting the information our agents stored. But my instincts told me something was off; things felt too solid, too real.
When the pain of my migraine ended and I unfurled myself from the foetal position, my joints still felt unresponsive and my skin sensitive like I had a particularly bad cold. It was then that I realised that the plush, soft thing in my hand was Lye-Leo, his black button eyes staring back at me.
I pulled myself into a sitting position and looked around. Various framed posters of heroes lined the walls, of which there was one of the Triumvirate, with Legend in the middle with Eidolon and Alexandria to his left and right specifically. The other one was of the local Brockton Protectorate, with Armsmaster, Miss Militia, Assault, Battery and Dauntless all in classic 'battle' poses. They both looked old, with fraying edges and corners ripped off from how I used blu tack to hold them up until my mum went and got frames for them.
The last one, however, looked relatively new. It was Gallant, wearing his tinkertech suit of armour, his name written in a futuristic font. When we first started dating, he said it would be embarrassing for him if his girlfriend had merchandise for him, so I bought the poster as a way to tease him.
This was my room back at Brockton Bay, no doubt. Same desk, same posters, same bookshelves filled with books about parahumans and powers. My bedside table had my phone, in the same place I'd charge it every night and a framed photo of Amy and I when we were kids, and was one of the few times I could remember seeing her be unabashedly happy.
But my initial instincts were right; something definitely was off. Agents weren't this good at recording memories, not to this level of detail. I looked out of my window, and saw the familiar sight of Brockton's skyline, except without the damage from Bakuda's bombing or Leviathan or any of the things that happened to it. Same skyscrapers, same sky, framed with the orange of the rising sun. A bit earlier than I would usually get up at, I could tell.
But before I could think further, someone quietly knocked on my door.
"Vicky?"
I froze. No, no, no, fuck off, there was no fucking way she'd be here, why the fuck was she here-
The door opened slightly, as Amy let herself into my room. But before I could yell at her, scream at her for pushing my boundaries, for still trying to be in my life again, I noticed something off, much like everything else.
Amy was a little bit shorter, and her face was still marked by the freckles she has, but it was rounder, softer almost, like she regained the baby fat she'd lost during her time in the Birdcage. She was wearing a loose pair of pyjama bottoms and matching singlet, and the dressing gown I'd given her for one of her birthdays. Her hands were blank, missing the red that she tattooed on herself as a reminder of the 'blood' on her hands.
Bleh.
"Are you ok? I heard you yell out, but I don't think it was loud enough for mum or dad to hear though." She asked me, concern written all over her face.
She set me more on edge. I was used to Amy cringing away from me in guilt, never meeting my eyes. The Amy in front of me was looking at me more like the sister I used to know, before she betrayed me. With my suspicions rising, I leant over to my bedside table and turned on my phone.
6:05 AM. Sunday, April 10th, 2011.
What the fuck.
"...Just a bad dream, I think." I replied.
She gave me a smile, one that almost made me shudder, and she opened up her arms.
"Oh, do you want a-"
"Go back to bed, Amy." I said, interrupting her. She looked caught off guard from that, and a little hurt, but gave me another nervous smile and slid past my door to her own room. I sighed and laid down on my side, disconnecting my phone from its charger and opening it. I opened up the web browser and browsed the PHO phone app.
There was a thread about the latest Endbringer attack now that Canberra's quarantine had finally finished, another about the recent movement of the Slaughterhouse Nine, and another about the Machine Army. For Brockton though, it was more or less the typical threads from 2011. A thread about the local Protectorates and Wards, one for movement of the various gangs and tips to avoid them.
And a small thread about a small gang of thieves called the Undersiders, and how they robbed the Ruby Dreams casino back in January.
Searching Capricorn came up with a thread about Team Reach, as well as one for Case 70s. Damsel of Distress resulted in a thread about her, the villains of Boston, and the Boston Games. Optics resulted in nothing. I looked at Sveta's PHO account, and it seemed like she was still using it regularly, with the latest comment being on a thread about Weld posted yesterday.
I let out another sigh and sat back up, rubbing the sweat off my forehead. This couldn't be a dream, or a reconstruction of a memory. My first assumption was that there was some sort of interaction between powers, or how reality started breaking at the seams, that led to me being here again. Perhaps this is one of the many alternative Earths, mostly similar to Bet, with Gimel being somewhere out there.
Becoming the Wretch. My friendship with Sveta. Breakthrough, and the friendships I've made with my teammates. All the effort and work I did as Antares.
I choked down a sob.
I'd never see Sveta's reassuring smile or Kenzie's bubbly excitement, or seeing Rain's persistence on improving himself. I'd never see Byron and Missy's relationship develop, and the chance of seeing Tristan or Ashley come back from the dead. Hell, I'd even settle for Tattletale's snarkiness, but her and everything else was up in the air since I was four years back in time.
A pair of arms settled around me, down past my neck and joining the hands together at my chest, like a hug from behind. I felt a weight settle on top of my head, and another pair of hands on my own, intertwining our fingers. I tilted my head up, and saw my forcefield in the shape of my head and face staring down at me, but it wasn't see-through like it usually was. My forcefield was now a soft gold colour, reminiscent of stained glass, gently reflecting the rays of the early morning.
The Fragile One. She'd come back into the past with me, somehow.
"That's a neat trick. Did you learn it from when I was in Shardspace?"
Her face, blank of any features except for two eyes that didn't have any pupils. The two 'eyes' had scrunched up, like she was squinting at me, and the head robotically bobbed up and down.
It left me with the impression that she was giggling at me.
I let out a quiet, rueful chuckle of my own. After a few moments, Fragile had stopped moving, giving me a small squeeze, and settled back to covering me, just a few millimetres away from my skin, the colour returning back to its original transparency.
"Love you too, Fragile." I whispered.
I felt relieved that she had somehow come back to the past with me. I looked out towards the city, my hometown. There were still so many problems it had, and so many things that would happen in the future, but it still felt like home, covered in the soft golden rays of the early morning. There was still so much to prepare for, if I was going to take this chance. The gangs ripping the city apart, Leviathan, the Slaughterhouse Nine, whatever resulted in Echidna. But since I was here again, there was the opportunity to try and prevent many of these tragedies, which also included a specific someone.
Taylor Hebert. The girl who ended up becoming Khepri. Although I was close to the Undersiders, I knew next to nothing about her outside of my own experience. Sure, there was the video of her at Arcadia, the leaked video of her fighting Behemoth, and the things she did as Weaver, but I knew nothing about her as a person.
I didn't know why she killed Alexandria, outside of the PRT's public response; I didn't know why she chose to become a Ward, why she took over the city, or the choices she made that led to her becoming Khepri.
And then there was my own sister, possibly. But that was something I couldn't think about right now, not just afte-
My phone vibrated, and I heard the familiar sound of a cat meowing that I used as my notification sound. I picked it up and opened it, and saw it was a text from Dean.
Deanamino's: Hey bby, amy just texted me saying you were having a bad morning, and since my parents are out of town, you wanna come over and chat? : )
That almost sent me into another spiral. Since everything else that happened was erased, reset, that meant he was alive again. God, I mourned him, I cried every night after I'd lost him, and then that got ruined from what Amy did to me, but then after I was fixed I tried to move on, but so many things reminded me of him, and I thought I was getting better but now I'm in the past and he's alive again-
Breathe. Everything is going to be fine.
I closed my eyes, and focused on the sounds around me. Some cars going past, the barking of some dogs a distance away, someone who seemed to be mowing their lawn this early in the morning.
Dean was alive again, that was good. Even ignoring the romantic part of our relationship, he was someone I could absolutely trust. Someone I could explain everything to, someone to help share the burden of the knowledge of the future. I picked up my phone and texted him back.
Vicvicvic: It's hard to explain, but I'll be at yours in like 20 mins
I got up and started preparing to leave. I took off my pyjamas, and got out a pair of jeans, a t-shirt and an old New Wave hoodie that I got when they first started merchandising. I would usually take more effort into my appearance, but I didn't care. I grabbed a tote bag that was hanging on a hook on my bedroom door, stuffing my pencil case and a spare notebook into it, as well as my wallet and spare house keys. As I unplugged my phone, it meowed again with another notification.
Deanamino's: Gotcha. See you soon babe :3
I closed it and stuffed it into my bag. With everything I needed, I quietly opened my window and let myself out. I didn't want to go out of the front door, not with the risk of waking up mum or running into Amy again. I tied my bag's handles into a knot, and flew up into the morning sky, following the five minute route I always took to get to Dean's place. From this height, it was easier to see most of the city and it was odd seeing the absence of the 'scar' from Bakuda's bombing and the lake Leviathan had made.
I made my way over to his place, a monstrous five story mansion that looked more like an apartment building than a home. Dean had the top floor to himself, which was more like an apartment, with its master bedroom, kitchen and lounge room. He always complained that his parents never gave him privacy though, like how the doors always had to be open whenever I visited.
Yeah, Dean's parents never liked me much.
I saw him on his balcony, leaning against the railing and still wearing a singlet and a pair of boxer shorts. He looked up, smiling once he saw me and waved. I landed right next to him and enveloped him in a tight hug, smooshing my face into his shoulder.
"Oof, someone seems to have missed me," He wheezed out, lifting his arms and returning the hug, "So what happened to Victoria Dallon that made her upse-"
I grabbed the sides of his face, and tilted his head down to look at mine.
"Dean Stansfield. You know that I love you to pieces, but there's something I need to tell you, and it isn't going to make any sense, but you'll have to trust me, ok?"
"Yeah, I love you too Vicky, but you might actually crack my ribs, and also how are you holding onto my face and hugging me at the same time?" He asked, trying to look behind him as he said that. I forced his head to keep still.
"I'm from four and a half years into the future."
"What."
I took another sip from my bottle of iced tea, sitting down on one of the bar style chairs that faced the small kitchen, as Dean's 'apartment' didn't have enough room for a proper dining table. Dean was pacing around the kitchen soaking in everything that I just told him, waiting for his expensive imported tea to cool. Two plates of half eaten bacon and eggs on toast sat to the side, both of us not having the appetite to eat the rest.
While I was waiting, Fragile was combing through my hair with one of Dean's hairbrushes in preparation for braiding it. Eventually Dean stopped pacing, took a sip of his tea and sighed.
"It's a lot to take in, honestly."
I shrugged my shoulders. He gave me a gentle smile, one that he always had whenever I went to him to complain about my parents or school, and reached over the counter to hold my hand. I moved it slightly so I could intertwine our fingers.
"However, thank you for telling me. I know what you went through must've been hard, with losing me to an Endbringer, what Amy did to you, the world almost ending because of Scion and the attempt to rebuild afterwards."
"I still don't really know or how to feel about being here again. The fact that you're still alive, my family is still alive, and that this Amy hasn't done anything to me is…"
"Feels like all the effort you put in was erased, rendered null?"
I nodded weakly.
"Well, that's not entirely true, I think. Just because it technically didn't happen because of time travel shenanigans didn't mean everything you did was for naught," He said, giving me a wink and a teasing smile, "and I'm for certain that you're still Victoria Dallon I've come to love, just older, wiser, more beautiful-"
"Dean!" I admonished, lightly slapping his shoulder. He chuckled at me, and took another drink from his tea, but I could tell he was forcing himself to keep the mood light, at least for my sake.
"Well, I guess I have a thing for older women now." He teased, waggling his eyebrows at me.
"I'm only twenty-one, you moron."
"Yeah, but it cheered you up, didn't it?"
I gave him my best glare while he continued to smirk at me. After a minute or so we both let up and laughed.
"Ok, ok, that's enough. Now we gotta get to the important part." Dean said, walking over to the nearby couch with his tea, gesturing me to follow. I placed the hairbrush on the counter and sat down next to him. Fragile started to braid my hair, the parts of my forcefield she was controlling now coloured gold again, and Dean squinted at her.
"Still not used to that, I think." He muttered.
"Get used to it. If you love me you'll have to love her, too."
"Ah, of course! 'Twas not my intention to insult the fair lady! It wounds my pride as a knight to have accidentally sullied a lady's name!" He replied in an awful british accent, shuffling in his seat so he could face me and bow. I gave him a playful shove and he rolled his eyes in response as he picked up the notepad and a pen from my bag.
"So, what would be the most important things that need to be done?" He asked, tapping the pen against his forehead.
"That's the problem Dean, there are so many things that are going to happen, but I only know half of it, so I have no idea how to solve them."
"Let's break it down, then. What're the important things that happen this week?"
I closed my eyes, and looked back to what happened the first time around.
"Lung gets captured by Armsmaster later tonight, which leads to Bakuda bombing the city on Friday. The Undersiders robbed the Central Bank on Thursday, but they were really hired by Coil as a distraction so he could kidnap Dinah Alcott."
He hummed at that, and jotted down some notes judging from the noise.
"How much do you know about the Undersiders and Coil?"
"Coil is a mastermind, and there was precious little information about him, even after the Undersiders killed him. Hires mercenaries directly, but hires capes in case he needs something, like a distraction. I'm thinking he has some links to the PRT, because he knew that the Protectorate heroes were going to be out of town at the time, or he hired Tattletale to get that information for him. Nothing is known about his ability, though he's some sort of thinker judging from other masterminds like Accord.
"The Undersiders were a small gang that used the repeated chaos to gain influence and territory, getting most of it after Leviathan, the Slaughterhouse Nine, and Coil. I'd originally thought Tattletale was behind most of their success, but Foil, who you would know as Flechette, told me it was Skitter who was behind most of the 'take over the entire city' thing."
He hummed again, and I opened my eyes to look at him.
"I think I have an idea. A starting point, at least."
I gave him a questioning glance.
"So, we know when and where Dinah gets kidnapped. So, you can go near her middle school during lunchtime and keep watch from a distance. But the important thing is that you need to make it look like it's coincidental that you're there."
"Why's that?"
"Because if Coil doesn't get Dinah, he's going to be looking as to why, so if you look like you were there on purpose, he's definitely going to do something about it since you aren't supposed to know about his plans."
"Good point. What about Skitter, though?"
"Honestly, no clue. You said that she eventually became a Ward, so maybe when I'm fighting her I can convince her to stand down. Best idea I have currently. Other than that though, we can easily prevent Amy from being ther-"
"You can handle anything about Amy, for the time being. I'm not ready to do anything about her myself." I said, interrupting him.
Dean gave me another reassuring look and wrapped me in a side hug, something I happily leaned into.
"You wanna talk about it?" He murmured to me.
I shrugged my shoulders and leaned into his hug instead. I didn't want to talk about her, I didn't want to think about her. I'd admitted to myself and to others that Amy was in an awful place, even before her altercation with Tattletale.
I just needed some time to think about what to do with her. To remind myself that this Amy was closer to the girl I had grown up with, rather than the Red Queen.
After a few quiet minutes, I spoke up again.
"I miss everyone." I whispered, "And I'm glad that you're in my life again, but there were so many other people in my life that I can't see anymore."
Dean shushed me, and gently rubbed my back. After a few moments he let go of me, and moved so he was lying down, his head leaning on the armrest of the couch, and gestured for me to cuddle up to him. I laid down on top of him and hugged his midsection, while he wrapped his arms around my shoulders.
He then kissed the crown of my head, as we both adjusted to get comfortable.
"But they're out there, aren't they?" He asked, quietly.
"Kenzie already triggered, I think. Byron and Trisitan are members of Team Reach. Sveta's still in the hospital, but I know her PHO account. Jessica is still employed by the PRT. Rain would still be with the Fallen. Ashley, though…"
"The Ashley you knew was a clone of Damsel of Distress, right?"
I murmured in agreement.
"Even if you were friends with her clone, I have no doubt you can be friends with her again, because that's just the type of person you are, Vicky."
"...Thanks, Dean."
He kissed my head again and gave me another squeeze. After another few minutes of quiet, only interrupted by the rumbling of cars, I could feel his chest rise up and down slower and slower, and we both relaxed into each other's arms. However, there was something that I needed to bring up with him.
"I know the truth about your trigger event." I whispered.
His eyes immediately flung open, and he almost scrambled to sit upright, pushing me off in the process. I looked into his eyes, moist from the sheer panic, alarm and guilt he would be feeling.
"I couldn't. I'm sorry. They said they'd kill me if I told anyone."
Rather than replying, I laid down on my back and gently grabbed his shoulders, forcing him down so his head was resting on my chest, a reverse of our previous position. He seemed smaller, like this, the way that he leaned into my chest, unsure if wanted to cry or not.
I was annoyed that he didn't tell me about it. That there was something that even he hid from me, when we both agreed to not keep any secrets from each other. But he was just a regular teenager, wanting a way to be able to help people and to distance himself from his parents.
After some moments, his breathing slowed down, and his arms that held me in a vice-like grip loosened.
"I'm upset with you for a lot of things Dean, like how you kept that from me, or that you lied about your trigger event, or how you didn't tell me anything about Amy." I murmured to him, and he tilted his head to look at me, his eyes puffy and red.
"Victoria, I'm so fucking sorr-"
I shushed him, and covered his lips with my index finger.
"But I don't blame you, either. I know they would've absolutely killed you if you told me, and Amy…"
I let out a sigh, and stared straight up at the ceiling.
"A lot of people failed her, at this point in time. Not that justifies everything she ended up doing, but for this point in her life, there were so many things you, my parents, or I could've done to help her."
Dean shuffled a bit so he could wipe his eyes with his arm, and then looked at me.
"Do you think she can be helped? That we can prevent her from becoming the Red Queen?"
I gave that question some thought, and after a few moments I replied.
"Yeah, I think so." I whispered. "I need time to differentiate Amy and the Red Queen as separate people, but the problem is that she doesn't have time. If I don't try and help her now, she's just going to end up making a mistake and spiral from it."
Because I had to continue moving forwards, step by step, day by day, just as I did after Gold Morning. Despite the loss of my team, friends and allies.
Because I had no other choice.
"You're so strong, Victoria. The strongest person I know, and I'm so, so proud of you for it." He whispered back.
"But I'm so sick of being strong all the time," I gritted out, "And now I have to carry this burden of knowing what's going to happen, and I wish I just had more people to help me carry it, or something, I don't know. It's hard to translate what I'm feeling into words."
He nodded into my chest, and we both fell into a comfortable silence. As I stroked the back of his head, I just realised that this was the most emotionally open and vulnerable that I've ever seen him. For my sake, probably.
"Well, not to bring the mood down, even further," He spoke up, "I'm assuming that things between us…"
"I love you so much Dean, but I spent four years mourning you, and now that I'm somehow back here again, it just feels like I'm too much of a different person, now. I'm essentially twenty-one, and you're still seventeen, I've changed, but you've stayed the same to me."
Instead of replying, he leaned over and playfully shuffled my hair, partially undoing my braid. As I tried to push him away, he committed to messing with my hair even more, using two hands instead of one, which ended up with the both of us in a heap from laughing, with him straddling the top of me.
"I love you so much, Victoria. And yeah, I'm not mad or upset that you want to keep things platonic between us, especially with the whole 'stop the city from going to shit' thing we need to plan for." He said, but I could still see the hurt in his eyes from what I said.
I was going to reply to him, but then I could hear a particular ringtone coming from my bag. One of the basic, default tones that were just a series of beeps. With every other number on my contact list, I'd given them a unique ringtone, like a pop song they liked, but this one indicated someone in particular. A default set of loud, annoying beeps.
Carol Dallon. My mother.
With a groan, I gestured for Dean to get off me, as I leaned down and got my phone out, and pushed myself up into a sitting position before answering.
"Hello?"
"Victoria Dallon, why did you not tell me that you were going out of the house for an extended period of time? Your sister said you left before seven but didn't know where you were going, but you didn't even leave a note or a message?" She accused me, and spending time with Dean had made me forget what she was like before everything went to shit.
Strangely though, this is the second time Amy helped me out. First with messaging Dean when I woke up, and then lying about knowing where I went.
"I'm just hanging out with Dean. I woke up early and decided to have breakfast with him at his place."
"But you didn't even leave a message for me, Victoria. I need to know if you're leaving because I woke up and almost had a heart attack thinking you got kidnapped until your sister told me."
I bite down on my tongue to resist sighing.
"Yeah, ok. I'll remember to make you a note next time."
She hummed at that, but I knew her enough that wasn't a confirmation type of hum, but more like a 'I'm judging you for your choices' type of hum. It was odd, seeing her like this again when the last time I saw her she was crying, apologising over and over again about her affair with Uncle Neil, reaffirming that I was Mark's daughter and not his.
Bleh.
"Regardless, you need to come back and help me clean the house up since we have a team meeting later tonight."
Mum called them meetings, but it was really just a get together with Pelhams, usually for lunch or dinner once a week, but she called them meetings so it sounded more professional, I think. From what I can remember, we did have a meeting on this date in the first timeline, too.
"Alright, I'll be home in twenty minutes or so."
"Ok. Give my regards to Dean. Goodbye."
"Yeah, see you soon."
As soon as the call disconnected, I covered my face in my hands and quietly screamed.
"What happened? Carol being Carol again?" Dean asked.
"Well, not too much just now. It's that a lot of things happened that made me realise that my mother is a very messed up woman. Anyway, we have another 'team meeting' tonight and I gotta get back and help her with it." I replied, getting up and giving Dean one last hug.
"I can't say I envy you. Also, I'm assuming you aren't going to tell them the truth?" He asked.
"Yeah, there's no way in hell I'm going to. Dad has his depression, Amy would immediately have a breakdown, and I have no idea how Mum would react. Which also means I need to try and act as Glory Girl era Victoria, which won't be fun." I grumbled into his shoulder.
He chuckled at that and stepped away from the hug.
"Anyway, text me about how things go, and I'll see you at school tomorrow?"
I let out another groan. I'd completely forgotten that I had school again. Just another problem added to the pile that I'd have to just deal with.
I walked outside, grabbing my bag on the way, and gave Dean one last look, as he went back to the counter to continue drinking his tea. I gave him one last wave and flew into the clear blue sky.
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- Location
- Te Ika-a-Māui
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Amy is going to have a fun time trying to figure out why her crush sister is acting weird all of a sudden.
- Location
- Colorado
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Honestly there's a lot to commend here even though I'm super unfamiliar with Ward, but there's one big thing I wanna address. I like Vicky's complicated feelings about Amy, she's been irrevocably damaged by future Amy and she recognizes that present Amy doesn't deserve that baggage but she still can't quite fully separate this Amy from the one who traumatized her. It's good shit and super compelling to read!
Normally I'd say this is just parental guilt tripping but Carol might actually mean that literally, in addition to the guilt tripping.
- Location
- Canada
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I very much enjoyed this chapter. Vicky and Dean's interaction was great, I loved it, made the whole chapter IMO. Ward-Era Victoria is a fascinating character to me (even tho I've never read Ward lol) so I'm hype to have another story with her in it focused on backwards time-travel.
- Location
- US
I also can't wait for that.
Hmm, I'm conflicted on this chapter. That is mainly because I don't know Ward at all. After reading Worm and then reading summaries of Wildbow's other works, I decided that I will never read anything of his work at all.
I felt like Wildbow seems to enjoy writing about hopeless situations and dark themes. And with no lighter moments or positivity to try and counteract those themes. That, and the fact that I seriously felt like I lost the ability to feel any positive emotion while reading Worm.
But some of the stuff that is being introduced in Ward, like shardspace, seems so incredibly interesting. But it also means that I've got no idea about almost anything to do with the Ward-Vicky. No idea with almost all everything Ward.
Normally, I'd suggest introducing more descriptions to the paragraphs to cover the Ward stuff but that would be a lot of extra sentences. And I don't know if it is worth it. Maybe it isn't needed at all? Honestly, the best time to explain any of the Ward stuff (however briefly) would be in whatever scene where Vicky, Taylor, and Sarah (TT) ever get a chance to talk to each other and plan.
But, this isn't my story. I've been enjoying this story, so keep going.
I felt like Wildbow seems to enjoy writing about hopeless situations and dark themes. And with no lighter moments or positivity to try and counteract those themes. That, and the fact that I seriously felt like I lost the ability to feel any positive emotion while reading Worm.
But some of the stuff that is being introduced in Ward, like shardspace, seems so incredibly interesting. But it also means that I've got no idea about almost anything to do with the Ward-Vicky. No idea with almost all everything Ward.
Normally, I'd suggest introducing more descriptions to the paragraphs to cover the Ward stuff but that would be a lot of extra sentences. And I don't know if it is worth it. Maybe it isn't needed at all? Honestly, the best time to explain any of the Ward stuff (however briefly) would be in whatever scene where Vicky, Taylor, and Sarah (TT) ever get a chance to talk to each other and plan.
But, this isn't my story. I've been enjoying this story, so keep going.
I just had a terrible, horrible thought.
What if it isn't just Taylor and Vicky? What if it's anyone who has a good relationship/bond with their shard, including villains?
After all, there's that stupid, idiotic school of thought that if you give Frodo a lightsaber you need to give Sauron a Death Star to "maintain balance".
So that would mean that Jack Slash has returned as well and if he manages to meet Scion...
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_p73PZIDQuA
What if it isn't just Taylor and Vicky? What if it's anyone who has a good relationship/bond with their shard, including villains?
After all, there's that stupid, idiotic school of thought that if you give Frodo a lightsaber you need to give Sauron a Death Star to "maintain balance".
So that would mean that Jack Slash has returned as well and if he manages to meet Scion...
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_p73PZIDQuA
Ward is currently Wildbow's most optimistic work, though it might be supplanted when Pale ends. If for whatever reason you can't stomach it, the concept of shardspace is explored in the fic Rank in the more familiar setting of Worm.
Stratagemini
Totally a Fire Ferret.
- Location
- Central Park
- Pronouns
- He/Him/They/Them
Huh. are we getting the sequence from Vicky's perspective? cause I honestly think we could just get the school scene, a scene before it, and the Alcott kidnapping and be fine.
I do like this twist though.
I do like this twist though.