I'm pretty sure most readers are sitting in some dark corner waiting for the next chapter.
Wolf Spider (Worm) (Complete)
- Thread starter The Laurent
- Start date
- Pronouns
- They/Them
I mean more how I've apparently lost, like, 20 readers between 5.3 and 5.4. *shrugs*
I'm sensitive about that sort of stuff.
Could be a slow down from school. I know I forget to up vote some chapters when I'm busy.
Vindictus
XENO
- Location
- Texas
Preparing mentally for the coming semester
- Pronouns
- They/Them
I don't even have an alarm clock yet.
- Location
- Somewhere!
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Okay so, I think I probably mentioned this before, but has anyone noticed that Bitch soloed an Endbringer for a tiny bit during 8.5?
Keep in mind this is at least partially weird because Rachel doesn't usually use that many dogs, that I remember. She has some sort of limit on how many she can ramp up at once, or how strong they can be if she uses more, and it seems to take time and focus to do each one? This is her using 8 dogs at once (they're counted off later). And this could be just splitting the usual strength up more, but those dogs aren't noticeably weaker than usual. They're hitting with enough force to shake him around, biting hard enough to do cosmetic damage. These are probably fully powered dogs, or close to it.
They fold like anyone else to an Endbringer, they don't do more than cosmetic damage, but they kept Leviathan locked down for more of the fight than most capes get alone? I'm inclined to think that this is a weird thing, like Taylor's range extending during tense moments. But this is still probably the highest mark for her power?
Keep in mind this is at least partially weird because Rachel doesn't usually use that many dogs, that I remember. She has some sort of limit on how many she can ramp up at once, or how strong they can be if she uses more, and it seems to take time and focus to do each one? This is her using 8 dogs at once (they're counted off later). And this could be just splitting the usual strength up more, but those dogs aren't noticeably weaker than usual. They're hitting with enough force to shake him around, biting hard enough to do cosmetic damage. These are probably fully powered dogs, or close to it.
They fold like anyone else to an Endbringer, they don't do more than cosmetic damage, but they kept Leviathan locked down for more of the fight than most capes get alone? I'm inclined to think that this is a weird thing, like Taylor's range extending during tense moments. But this is still probably the highest mark for her power?
Feral 5.5
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Feral 5.5
Most of the people with her took the chance to leave. Ultimately, that was what I'd expected. But about thirty or so people, mostly her relatives and their employees and closest friends, had enough cause to believe in what Parian was doing that they wanted to go with her.
The bulk of Monday was filled with tasks for which I wasn't really suited. Rachel's dogs could help carry things for the evacuation, but all I could do is serve as a sort of watcher. Amp was here and there, the girl trying to heal anyone hurt in the evacuation, and testing another aspect of her power: whether her regeneration worked on illnesses. I knew the answer as soon as she did: it couldn't cure cancer, though at least as far as the patient could tell, it didn't do some nightmare scenario result such as just make the cancer grow faster.
I had no idea how it worked, but she was still learning, and I knew it'd be months or more before she had a full understanding of what she could do.
Parian was everywhere too, taking references and making sure that anyone who left, left with her blessing.
"I'm sorry I can't go with you, but I have a family, and I…" an older man said. "You saved me from a bunch of them."
"I couldn't…"
"Listen. You do your best." The dark-haired, but greying man gave a shrug, as if this was all that could be expected out of the world.
The Protectorate was helping, at least, and Tuesday found us still nervously going from site to site as the evacuations continued. The refugee camps, which were far more orderly than ours, though also a lot more spartan, as if they'd been designed for a minimum of resources, had just started to drain of people allowed to go back to their ruined homes and pick up their lives.
The people were a sea, a gathering of people just like my camp, and watching them made me hope that my camp was safe. I had to go back and forth between the two, as often as possible. Flechette was helping to protect the camp when we were evacuating people.
I knew to them I was some weird distant figure that they'd perhaps heard of, once or twice. They whispered about me, not sullen but tired after all of the time running, and then thinking they were safe, only to be sent scattering once more.
And in that simple movement of a few days, I pushed myself. Things changed. I got to see more of Dad…
*******
I was working until midnight on Monday, just patrolling and making sure that nothing was left behind, and then hurrying to the camp to watch over it in case the Merchants noticed.
My head hurt when I lay down to sleep, and when I woke up, I felt as if someone had stuffed my nose with cotton, and my arms and legs ached from all of the walking.
"Get up," Rachel said. "Got shit to do."
"Ugh. Sick."
"Need… soup?" Rachel asked, frowning down at me. I felt really cold, and I moved forward to hug her. Of all the times to wind up a little bit sick, now? I needed to get through this, because I had another eighteen hour day, or more, left to get through. Maybe more after that. I didn't know.
"Yeah, that'd be great," I said.
Rachel nodded, and it was heartwarming to see the concern on her face.
So I just lay there, and then I started thinking. Maybe I could get Charlotte. I glanced around, trying to figure out what time it was. My mouth felt dry, and my thoughts seemed to skip and hop around.
Stefanie came with Rachel, who was holding a big bowl of warm chicken soup. She'd heated it up or--
The bugs seemed everywhere now, their sensations stronger, and I almost wanted to lose myself in them. It was a lot better than the aches and discomfort of feeling sick.
Stefanie reached a hand out and felt my forehead. "Arachne…"
"Get Char," I said.
"What? Oh, of course!" Stefanie hurried out.
Rachel frowned a little, tensing as she looked down at me and offered me a spoon full of soup. I leaned up to take it in my mouth, barely tasting it. Taste and smell were tied together. My human nose wasn't working, though my bugs could smell compost and refuse, and a leaking toilet that would have to be fixed. And someone having an early-morning smoke. "Thanks, Rache," I said.
"Get better," Rachel said. She glared over at the tent entrance, looking annoyed. Then she offered me more soup. I didn't know what she was thinking. Her offer of soup was nice, but if Charlotte could stop a cold--and it might work better than with cancer--then that's what I should be doing. Even if the idea of putting my head in Rachel's lap and just letting her spoon me full of chicken soup was a little tempting.
"I'll try." I took another few bites of the soup. My empty stomach felt a little queasy, but I figured the soup couldn't hurt it much, and considering how much I had to do. I didn't want to think about it, but it kept on pulsing through my head. Only the most vulnerable people had been evacuated so far. Those who would probably be hurt and couldn't run if the E88 went back on their word.
Today was the day I needed to get Parian here, and make sure she was ready to start holding down the fort. I didn't know whether she'd want to immediately go after the Merchants, but at the least she could stay behind to make sure there wasn't any sort of sneak attack. More hands meant we could divide up more without things going wrong.
******
"Hey, Rachel," Charlotte said with a smile that seemed designed to set Rachel off. "Taylor, I'll try to help you, but you really do need to take an hour or two off."
"No. I need to get to work," I said. "Maybe if it doesn't work, I'll take a few, see how I feel?" I coughed a little, but it was fine.
For one, I wasn't coughing blood, and my Dad had worked through a lot worse than a little bit of unwellness. I didn't want to let people down. Heck, even just showing the weakness at all was the first problem. You gathered people around you, you knew that they were buying what you were saying… but then if you got smashed again and again like the Merchants were, then no wonder they had started to throw away an impossible advantage.
I didn't want to do that, and the first step of failing to do that was failing to put in the work. It was already a fact that Stefanie was doing a lot of the work for this too. I didn't want to make it worse.
Stefanie was waiting outside.
"No," Rachel said.
"If you were sick, would you stop taking care of your dogs?" I asked.
Rachel looked away, crossing her arms. She didn't have an honest answer, because of course she'd work through the sickness. And of course she wouldn't necessarily trust other people to do it for her. "Taylor," she said.
"What if the hour or two was spent with Rachel?" Charlotte asked. "That way…"
"She's not gonna agree," Rachel said, her voice frustrated. "Not for me, not for you."
"I can try, I guess? Give reasons." Charlotte let out a sigh. "It's important. She needs to not push herself too hard. She's important.":
"Yeah," Rachel agreed. I smiled a little as Charlotte got closer.
"Taylor, please nod."
I nodded, after a moment of uncertainty. Then I felt a little bit of a buzz in my body, as if I were being shaken apart. My head cleared a little, and I felt a bit less clogged up, but that was all. "It's doing… something?"
"More, then?" she asked.
"Yes."
"Touch your nose again, then."
This time she went all out. This time it felt almost good, as if it'd gone through the valley of being weird into some other side of things. I felt warm, but not in a bad way, and after a moment I was able to breathe. Smells came back, and I could more easily ignore what my bugs were smelling. Now that I had other smells to focus on. My bugs seemed to allow me to ignore problems like that a little… or make them worse. Either way, I wondered how well I'd be able to block out pain with practice doing something like that.
"Huh," I said.
"Taylor, you need to stay in the tent for an hour or two. Just hang out with Rachel, relax… it's important because you need to be in control, and that means not being overwhelmed. What little I've seen is really amazing. If you just stayed with your girlfriend, we can handle the setup. You know that the Dockworkers came out in force to move furniture? Or they will. Pelter got a message saying so. That, and the people online… we have it covered. You could focus on greeting Parian, relaxing, and--"
"Fine," I said. She made good points, and I didn't have it in me to argue.
"Huh," Rachel said.
"What?" I asked.
"Whatever," Rachel said.
"So… Charlotte. Amp. You can handle things on your end?"
"Yeah. I'm going to keep that regen on you in case it comes back afterwards. Though I wish I knew why it worked and cancer didn't."
"Maybe it's time? Cancer is something you've had for a long time, so it's harder to get rid of? You haven't tried replacing a long-severed limb or curing the blind-from-birth yet, have you?" I offered.
"Oh, great idea," Charlotte said. "Though I don't know where I'd get them. So, I'll be doing what you said. Helping the sick people and maybe a few people who might be in danger. I think… I had an idea for the resonance and frequency. I'm still testing it."
I remembered her talking Pelter about it. 'Strength, obviously, but what if strength is an extension of the same vibrations that cause toughness. But backwards?' Pelter had given an uncertain thumbs up, tired herself, overworked herself.
"Well, go to it, then."
"Aye aye," Charlotte said, with a formal nod. She always treated me a little different, though it was hard to tell what it meant.
Charlotte left, leaving Rachel and I. Rachel stepped over towards me. "You wanna play games?"
"Nah," I said. "What about reading. I have some of the books of Mom's. I could just read to you. Not even practice, just relaxing."
"Nah. What about if I read to you?" Rachel asked.
"Do you think you're ready for it?"
Rachel tensed, and then said, "Won't know if I don't try." Which actually made a lot of sense. Rachel was learning a little bit at a time, but learning to read well was going to be a matter of months. People spent years trying to relearn this. But she was very dedicated to it.
She pulled something out of a bag in the corner that I hadn't bothered to look in, a battered book like the one I'd read to her, to begin with.
She patted her lap. I felt all better, but I didn't want to jinx it. But as long as it was just reading, and not the prelude to something more.
I slipped into her lap, feeling her body against mine, and humming I prepared to listen to a story I'd heard before. It didn't matter. The words weren't why I was there. Whatever tension she had, as if it was wrong that I'd not been tended to by her, she'd get over it. See sense, if we just moved past it. So that's what we did.
******
It was moments like breathing in and feeling, at the same time, her breath on your shoulder. It was the warm feeling of just taking a few minutes off, and the way her hand ran up and down and through my hair, playing with it. Mussing it up, but that didn't really matter to me, not then. It was something natural and just that simple.
The tension left her, somewhere, and I listened. She stumbled over words, but she was too stubborn to let that stop her. Onward she ploughed through the book, even if slowly, and often needing little bits of correction. It was fine, it was all fine.
And then two hours later, we had work to do.
*******
"Hey," Rachel said to Pelter, in the middle of the final transfer. Parian was at the head of a group of refugees that were now making their way to our camp. We handed the supplies to them, and the Dockworkers were glad for something to do, even if it was a charity case.
Charity was the right word. More reporters came, clustering around like a mob of hungry birds, wanting to be fed stories of heroism and deprivation, and it was annoying. I was glad they didn't try to question Rachel too much. She was too clearly not in the mood for it, perhaps, though I was shocked that it stopped them.
"Yes?" Pelter asked. She looked down at the clipboard she had, considering everything.
"Puppies are coming soon," Rachel said.
"Yes?" Pelter repeated, sounding baffled.
"Any of the people need some time…" Rachel shrugged, making an off-hand gesture. It was actually a good idea, I thought, right in the middle of monitoring the trek from afar, to make sure nobody ambushed it.
"Oh. Right. When are the puppies coming?"
"Few days," Rachel said. "Have a few small dogs too, at the shelter."
"Oh, right. I was wondering about that: could we maybe start up adoptions?" Pelter made sure not to smile, having finally figured it out, though it wasn't natural on her, and she didn't seem to do it consistently. Well, less finally figured it out, and more finally started to manage it.
Rachel shrugged.
"My idea is that you personally talk to anyone adopting, and then you can check in every once in a while," she said. "It only makes sense."
Rachel nodded. "Sounds good," she admitted, as if this was a surprise. Pelter didn't really pick up on the tone, just interpreted the words as a good sign.
"Do you need anyone else to help out at the shelter?"
"Nah. There's enough," she said. Rachel looked at Pelter for a moment, then said. "Too many, sometimes."
"Ah, well. I guess you weren't really used to it?"
"Nah. Not used to people giving a shit," Rachel said, with another, even more expansive, shrug. "It's new."
"Well…" Pelter said. "I'm not used to this either."
"Huh," Rachel said, and she sounded almost thoughtful. I wondered what she was thinking, because I knew that she wasn't used to interacting with people. But she managed Cassie and the Shelter workers every day.
Maybe that was changing.
"So, we're almost done, can you get… Judas?"
"Brutus," Rachel corrected, but she sounded a little less dismissive than I thought she would have, after that kind of mistake.
"Brutus. To carry just a little more. We're almost done here."
*******
Greg found me with my hands on my hips, looking across at the room we'd made for Parian. We'd made sure it had electricity and working toilets, and we'd gotten what we could together, combined with her furniture, to create something that would feel like home.
Home, for Parian, was a lot more frilly than anything I would have been comfortable around. She had a lot of dolls, and only some of them were actually used for her powers. She also had a lot of books, a lot of posters… just adding up all of the stuff around made the room feel small and cramped to me.
I saw Greg coming, but of course I couldn't have known his purpose, or I would have probably found a way to get distracted.
"Hey!" he said. "So, you're adding another member to the… I guess they're still working on a name. Cassie said that they hadn't thought of one online. Right now you're just Team Arachne and company."
"Well, okay then." I shrugged. "Team names are pretty far down on the list, though."
"That's not it. If you're making a team, and you're searching for people to join up to fight the Merchants…"
He trailed off, staring at me with wide, dark eyes, clearly hoping I knew what he was thinking. I did, actually. I just didn't approve. It sounded like a really bad idea. "No. We're not going to use the vials yet. You know that Bryce, who took the vial, is having trouble staying phased in. He's falling through the floor. He's not eating. These aren't safe, or at least, they can go very, very wrong, and you're one of my best friends."
Greg frowned, pouting as if that would get him what he wanted. "It's a risk, sure, but what else do I have, anyways?" Greg hesitated a moment then said, "Um, Taylor. You kinda weren't there, but… I met someone a little while ago that said that my Mom was probably dead. She was in one of the buildings where the elevator broke during the quakes, and most of the people above a certain floor weren't able to get away."
Greg bit his lip, his eyes watering.
"And that's why you want to risk your life?"
"I could be a hero!" Greg added. "I could fight evil and save people and stuff, like in the movies."
I turned my head away, glad he couldn't see the look on my face. He was being so earnest, but what was this except a retreat.
"Do you have relatives?"
"Yes. But I don't want to live with them," Greg said, twitching and jittering around as he circled me, as if trying to find an angle of attack. "Any more than you live with your Dad."
"It's not the same thing."
"Yeah, I guess," he said with a shrug. "C'mon, Taylor, it's not like you don't have more of them."
I didn't know a lot of things, but giving it to him felt like a mistake waiting to happen. Besides, we had five capes now, and Flechette was probably going to hang around as much as she could justify with her near-fulltime job of dealing with all the problems that were cropping up.
"We're good right now. Things are under control," I said.
"Yeah, and you know it," Greg said. "Everyone talks about how amazing you are and it's really cool, but then I'm here and what about the Butcher. She's, like, overleveled? How will you stop her?"
"We'll figure something out," I said bluffly. In truth, I had no idea what would even work against someone like the Butcher. I wasn't sure whether my bugs could do anything to them. At least, none of their known powers seemed to involve being able to tank, say, Purity. They were more durable, but it was at the extreme of human, more being able to shrug off a few bullets than being able to shrug off a few destroyed city blocks. If I were thinking about things in the context of one of Greg's games, she was hard to hit, hard to hurt, and apparently you could break her leg and she'd work through the pain. But did she need to breathe?
If I did get enough bugs on her, would they be taken by the teleportation? I didn't know. Either way, one possibility was… huh.
Now that Greg had me thinking, I had a lot of ideas, but most of them were going to take time. Right now, though, the Butcher wasn't even on the list of targets. Ultimately, as long as the Merchants distracted the Butcher, I didn't think she'd go after us. It'd draw too much attention to her, too early, and she'd already been around long enough that this had to be something more.
I wasn't going to give up hope while we still hadn't even fought her. "Yes," I repeated. "Thanks for offering, Greg, and I'll keep it in mind."
"Aww… but thanks and all. Is Rachel around here, btdubs?"
I wanted him to never say that again. "No, she's at the shelter."
"Oh, alright. I wanted to talk about maybe playing a little more with her. She's a lot of fun, kinda? I mean, like, she cares about what I'm saying."
"Oh, that's great. We can talk later," I said, a little distracted.
******
I asked Rachel about it.
"He's annoying. But he's good at the games." Rachel shrugged. "So I talk to him.."
Well, that was something, at least.
*******
It was nearly dinnertime when Parian arrived, alongside the rest of the refugees. They looked around at the food and dived right in. Oddly, we weren't eating that much worse than they'd been in Dolltown, because while we had worse access and more people, we definitely had more money to throw around.
Stefanie explained it to me, a little, last week. "We have to rely on donations, and even with all of that…"
"We're spending a lot," I said.
"And taking in a lot. This isn't a moneymaking venture," she admitted. "We're just three heroes working for nothing." She was less stressed then, but she also didn't have Charlotte to help her out. "But.. it's working out so far?"
"I don't know how we could really do anything to make it better," I said. I gave a shrug. "It kind of just happened."
"You see that sometimes, with charities," Stefanie said. "Something just takes off, and you don't know why."
It frustrated me, not being able to be sure. Not knowing why. But what could I say? I said the only thing I could think of. "Well, I do know why, sort of. Cassie's a big part of it."
"She is pretty impressive, yeah," Stefanie said. "My Dad jokes about adopting her." Stefanie shook her head, trying not to smile around me but failing.
I nodded. It didn't hurt that it was clear by now that Rachel wasn't responding to any of the slightly too lingering gazes sent her way. So I could drop any residual jealousy--I totally could, and would soon, I swore!--and focus on what she was helping. Which definitely put things in context.
"You okay, Taylor?"
"Fine," I said. "Just wondering what goes wrong next."
"I worry about that kind of thing too."
*******
On Wednesday morning, after a hard night of rain, the city felt very humid and miserable, but I pulled myself up anyways, and began getting ready for the meeting with Parian. I'd been watching her the whole evening, but that wasn't the same as meeting with her, and somehow or other I'd managed to avoid it.
But I figured that as soon as she got up would be a perfectly good time to come over.
I even had bribes, once I'd asked around.
Stefanie's Mom actually was making cookies and donuts as a sort of unhealthy breakfast, in celebration of… Stan's birthday? I think that's who it was. He was a teenager who had showed up last week, all alone, and didn't like to talk about his family.
So I clutched that tight in my hands, my costume on but more just so I'd be recognized, as I made my way towards the building. Everyone had a room, or at least every family, and Parian actually lived separately from the rest of her family, just now waking up.
I could see her brushing her teeth, and smiling in the mirror. I could see her humming as she went through her morning, getting dressed and stopping to look over an old magazine, flipping through it with thoughtful pauses.
I watched all of that while I moved, keeping track of everyone in both camps, waking up in their own time. Going about their day. There was still some work to be done with the second new apartment, and then everyone was going to get to work on fixing up the first apartment and the second for excess people.
The goal, I'd been told, was to fill up all two apartments before moving onto the third.
People turned to look at me as I jogged up the stairs. I hadn't been exercising recently, but dealing with the dogs and running around being a cape had been enough that I wasn't breathing hard by the time I reached Parian's room. I knocked on the door, and watched her hesitate, looking around, and then go for the door.
"Oh, Arachne," she said, stepping back. She wasn't wearing her costume, and I knew I loomed over her. So I reached up and took off my mask with one hand, while proffering the donuts and cookies with the other. "Ah, well. Thanks."
"Don't worry," I said. "And call me Taylor. It's not a big deal, knowing that much. As long as you don't spread it around. I just wanted to see how you were settling in."
"Don't you know? I saw your bugs?"
"Sorry," I said, though I wasn't sorry at all. I glanced over at the table where she'd spread paper, pencils, magazines… all of the ingredients for costume designs.
"I'm doing fine. So are the people that followed me. I'm going to start moving to set up a perimeter soon. Cassie mentioned that some people said it'd be a good start."
"Probably heard it from PHO," I said, with a shrug, gesturing to the couch. "Want to sit there and eat?"
"What type of donuts are those?" Parian asked. "I should be on a diet." She frowned a little. "Though it's easy when you don't have that much to eat. But hard when it's all processed." She shook her head. "Sorry if I'm talking about trivial things."
"No, don't worry, it's fine. I don't really think about it anymore," I said. "There's not really time."
"I know, it's a silly thing to worry about," Parian said.
Especially since, and it didn't take anything but me having eyes, but she wasn't fat. Or pudgy. Or even anything other than pretty thin. "You worry about what you worry about. I hope you might find time to do what you love," I said, trying to lay on the charm as I walked over to the couch and flopped down. "Oh, and they're donut holes and glazed. Nothing special. I think…" I opened up the bag.
The smell of donuts was strong, and I breathed them in for a moment, glancing down. "There's cookies too, and I think a bagel, somewhere? If you want something a little more plain. I know you have food here, but I felt…" I trailed off, offering the bag to her as she sat down right next to me.
She took it and pulled out an oatmeal cookie of all things and began to nibble on it. I grabbed a donut, taking off my gloves to do so, and then ate it quickly. It was gooey and warm and delicious, but it did mean I'd have to wash my hands before I went and touched anything. The cookies, on the other hand, were a lot less messy than all of that sugar glazing that had had to be made for it.
So I took a chocolate chip.
"Thanks, really thanks."
"How are you holding up?" I asked, nibbling as I watched her.
"I'm alright. I… hope I can work a few things out. I can make costumes if you want. Or at least help you with some of that. For… Amp, and Pelter?" She bit her lip. "Pelter's costume is pretty… basic."
Even with all I'd tried to do it, it was true. I didn't have the time or energy. "I suppose so. If you're willing to help out, that's good. I didn't know you made costumes."
"I don't, normally," Parian said. "But maybe it'd be fun. It's another way I can help out."
"Part of what you can do is just be present. Once you have all of that thread set up, it means that even when I'm away, there's still warning enough to call the Protectorate," I said. "That's the idea, at least."
"It's a good idea," Parian said, though I felt a sort of shift in her mood. She didn't want to talk shop, or not just shop. "And if you're wondering, the people that came with me seem willing to work, and contribute."
I nodded. "That's good. What about you? What are your concerns? What's bugging you? Anything we can do better?" I felt like I was some sort of survey-taker, trying to run down problems, but I did want to know.
"Well, you know, Flechette…" Parian began.
"Yes?"
"She's going to be around here a lot," Parian said in a low voice.
I frowned, trying to see it from her perspective. "Do you want me to drive her off?"
"No! No. Plus, she can help protect the camp, if she's here." Parian waved a hand, frowning a little bit and squirming as she tried to figure out what to say and how to say it. "It's… can we just talk? In a way that's not about the camp or ambitions or the like? Girl to girl?"
I was a girl, so… hopefully I'd be able to do it? The last person I did 'girl talk' with was Emma, though, and I was out of practice. That and I could feel my stomach curl at the idea of it, at the possibility that it might all be part of some trick to get close to me and betray me. Again.
"Of course," I said.
"Your face doesn't say that," Parian said, then shook her head. "Back before I triggered, there were guys who were nice to me and then expected me to date them. Or more. Because of it." She was frowning, and looking around, as if making sure nobody else was there. "I hated it. I hated the way it felt."
I bit my lip, and then wondered how to indicate to everyone… well, maybe there were particular someones. "I never quite felt that, but there were people that were nice and--"
"What?" Parian asked.
"Nevermind. So, he expected things." I thought for a moment. "Is Flechette like that?"
"She's everywhere. She keeps her distance when I tell her to, but it's that look in her eyes, as if she's a knight about to lay down her life for me if I wave a hand. Or something." Parian frowned.
"A knight?"
"I guess. She's powerful, and good at what she does. And she's fighting for the good guys. Or at least, the Wards," Parian said. "I don't think she wants to just pressure me into going out with her on a date, but I still feel pressured."
"Oh. I think she's afraid of that," I said.
"She should be," Parian admitted, shaking her head. "What was it like for you?"
"I should wash my hands. I'll tell you if you really want to know. It's not some big secret. But, Parian. Do you want to date her? That's the first question: are you interested?"
"Yes. Yes I am. But I don't want to wind up… she comes in, she's helpful, she tries to protect me from the E88 and the world, and I don't know what I'm supposed to say to all of that." Parian shook her head. "She's like me, but not like me. New York, not Brockton Bay. Sansei, not second-generation from a family that…" she shrugged.
"No, go on if you want. I sorta get that," I said. "Though also not." I walked into the kitchen and washed my hands, glancing down at the water. I didn't know whether there had actually been any radiation damage to the aquifer. Nothing had been announced either way. Perhaps all of the water we were using was subtly contaminated.
I wouldn't even know, and considering how dangerous around here it was, it wouldn't be an immediate concern.
I was also considering something else: how to lie. My history with Rachel was far from toxic, but it was personal, and we barely knew each other. Yet the more I thought about it the more I tried to think about Rachel. Her attitude, if not her opinion, in this case. She wouldn't want me to act ashamed, wouldn't see anything shameful or odd about it, even if she wouldn't be sharing the story with everyone.
So I took a breath and said. "I was a new cape, going out on the town. I wanted to be a hero, but didn't even have a name. I found a dog fighting ring, and decided to attack it, but Rachel was there too, for the same reason. And I managed to convince her to work together to do it." I knew I was probably softening it a little. "Then I got her to agree to let me help the dogs she rescued. There was something about her that drew me." I paused, aware that I was about to get way too deep into personal opinions. I walked back over towards Parian.
"How did it happen?"
"I didn't even realize that I was staring. But she noticed it, and then only two weeks into knowing her, she asked me if I wanted to have sex."
"What?"
"That's what I asked. And I turned her down, and she didn't freak out, or… she just wanted to have sex, and the way she told it to me later, she figured that if she offered to someone she liked, then they'd either accept or start thinking about it." I shrugged, aware of the incredulous look on Parian's face. "Less than two weeks later, I took her up on the offer. It's a longer story than that, but it's kind of after that that I kept on getting closer to her. And closer." I shook my head. "I know that's not really something you can do."
"I don't know how well I'd do with, uh, that level of commitment."
"There was more connection than you think. We were already close friends by two weeks in," I admitted. I shook my head. "I didn't even realize I was crushing on her. But no, I'm not telling you to go ahead and have sex with her because what could it hurt?" I flushed. "God, it sounds so not-me, doesn't it?"
"I wouldn't know," Parian pointed out. "You're very bold."
I snorted at that. "Ha. That's as much pose as anything. Admitting it to you is better than admitting it to the people I'm protecting, isn't it?"
"I suppose so," Parian said. "I was always a little… open with them? The mask helps, though, sometimes."
"It does," I said.
"Anyways, that's not something I can do," Parian said, and then paused. "A part of me wants to try it, but it'd be dumb. I'd make a mess of it. And that temptation, it's more like… how sometimes you see a cake and you want to just taste the icing a little?"
"Are you comparing Flechette to a cake?" I asked. Though it was true she was rather pretty.
Parian giggled a little nervously. "I guess? What I really fear is that she'll get power over me. She'll be a 'partner' or even someone I owe and have to…" she trailed off, and shrugged. "I don't want to listen to other people telling me what to do."
"Is that why you aren't staying in the same apartment as your family?" I asked. A little blunt, but she was being pretty open with me. I wasn't going to get anything by being subtle.
"A little, yeah," she admitting, frowning. "Thanks for telling me. It doesn't help that much, I'm a very different person from you, or Rachel either. Older, for one. Supposed to be more responsible."
"How old are you?" I asked.
"Twenty-one," she said.
I didn't gape or take a second look at her face, but it really was impressive, I thought, pacing a little bit, glancing at her. She could legally drink, and she'd been in college. She'd graduated high-school, while I was still dealing with problems there. "I guess I look like a kid," I said. "Me and Rachel, and… hell, everyone. Charlotte, Stefanie, we're all teenagers."
"Maybe. Though so is Flechette," Parian said. "She's only seventeen. I'd be robbing the cradle." Parian smiled. "I don't know why I almost like that thought?"
I frowned. "What do you mean?"
"The… power? The control? I want it all to be on my own terms."
"I understand that," I said. I really did. Wanting control, that was something I totally understood, though it wasn't a concern between Rachel and I. Things were going great there, but I could get how wanting to be the one with more of the power and control would make things complicated.
"You seem to be in charge," Parian said. "And I admit, I don't think of you as someone who is only sixteen or seventeen."
"I just turned sixteen on Sunday," I said.
"Huh," Parian said. "Pelter seems older too. I suppose it's just being out here, taking care of yourself. Perhaps I could--"
"Wait." I held up a hand. "One moment."
At the edge of my vision, I could see Lisa. Lisa, not dressed up as Tattletale, but also just as clearly not trying to hide. She was walking from building to building from the south-west, which was the safest way to come here, the one that we used for moving people. She smelled as if she'd bathed recently, and she was humming to herself, clearly confident as she strode forward.
"Someone's coming," I said. "I'm not sure why, but I bet they want to meet with me."
"Who is it?" Parian asked.
I hesitated, and then decided to tell the truth. "So, Rachel used to be with the Undersiders. Back before she left them, I met a few of them as well. They're criminals, though there are… worse ones out there. Though also better ones, I suppose. They're all a bunch of teenagers, and one of them is Lisa."
"The name rings a bell," Parian said. "You know her?"
"We were close for a while. Still are, I guess. She tells me a little about what's going on in the streets, and I don't think she's a mean person." I bit my lip, since 'mean' and 'bad' weren't the same thing at all. "She's also still giving me info, and it's helped so far. So, if she's showing up here, she wants to talk." I bit my lip. "Is Flechette going to show up today? Tattletale is a villain, but I don't think that means we need to immediately arrest her right now."
"Really?" Parian asked. "Are you sure…"
"Sure of what?" I asked. "I want to hear out what she has to say, and she has knowledge that could be pretty useful."
Lisa was going pretty fast now, jogging even, and she was within a block of the camp. It wouldn't be long now, just a few minutes.
"I... " she hesitated, and then said, "I have veto."
"What?" I asked.
"You just told me about her. I could tell Flechette. I don't think I will, but why not have the meeting here. I'll just watch, to be sure." Parian nodded, apparently liking the idea.
Meanwhile, I took a breath. Fury licked at my limbs, anger that seemed to come from nothing to overwhelm me. I was losing control, or at least… the truth was that I was a member of a team now. But I expected to mostly get my way. I didn't know why I'd expected that, but we'd gone from three to five members in the span of a week.
"Fine. We can do that."
"Please don't pout," Parian said. "Sit down and have another donut. Do you think she'll come to us, or do we need to tell her where we are?"
"You should get your mask on. I bet she knows exactly where I am."
*******
Lisa hesitated only a dozen or two seconds before turning towards Parian's apartment building and walking in, still humming. She was dressed in a long, flowing brown skirt that looked familiar, and a white blouse. If she'd ever looked more like an office worker, it'd have to be her wearing glasses.
"She's coming," I said. "You ready?"
"Yes," Parian said. She sounded interested. No doubt wondering what this was going to mean.
A minute later, a few cookies still saved, there was a knock on the door.
I went to answer it in my mask. "Hey, Tattletale. I hope you don't mind company. My teammate insisted."
"I'd heard about that," Lisa said. She nodded, managing not to smile. She looked good, like she'd showed, slept, and was finally finding her groove. But there was something nervous about the way she looked around. "Now you have a team of five members. It's very impressive. How have things been with you?"
"Fine. A lot has happened. Especially regarding… news. I've heard that you and your team have started setting yourself up as Warlords." I nodded at her, and gestured over to Parian, whose mask hid her expression.
"...some of us, yes. I'm just looking around. If they're wondering what territory I own, it's because I don't own any. Information, and figuring out what's going on. Watching things: Accord and Coil are talking a lot, aren't they?"
"I did notice that," I said. I bit my lips. "Have you been talking to Accord?"
"He's been talking to everyone. I'm surprised he hasn't sent a representative to your camp. It's as if he believes he can deal himself into his position. He probably has contact with the Protectorate too." Lisa shrugged a little, and then moved towards the bag. "Any cookies left? I'm actually really hungry."
"You can have them," Parian said, a little uncertainly.
"So while Accord and Coil play their games, and my teammates set up their castles and territories… there's two different wars going on. The E88 is warring with the Protectorate. I can't know how well that'll go. But… it's what you might suspect."
"What?" Parian asked. She sounded suspicious.
"Are you willing not to spread this around?" Lisa asked. "But it's very clear that something's driving the E88 to be far more aggressive, even more offensive, than they were before. They'd probably have still tried to push you out, Parian, but it doesn't make sense."
"They're nazis," Parian pointed out.
I nodded. "But it could be that new cape? Do you think that she's like Dose?"
"Honestly, probably? But it doesn't matter too much, not right now. What actually matters is that the Merchants and Teeth are fighting. If the Teeth win, then you have to go up against Butcher. I'm not sure how long the Merchants can last, but if they even hold out another week or three, it'd help you a lot."
"How?"
"Time to gain allies. You've already gained two new capes, right? In a few weeks you could have more gear for each of them. And find ways to work together," Lisa said, expansively. "I know it's a big vision, but I really do believe in it."
"You know, you're probably not helping the suspicion that I'm working with the Undersiders. Or even am one."
"That you're gaining territory through a nice way as some sort of secret member?" Lisa snorted. "Yes, I know the kinds of things they probably say. But they're not getting traction… I just came here because I had some information and advice. I've helped you before, and you're doing pretty well."
"The Undersiders are too," I said. "Almost too well."
"Not well enough, in some ways. Though we do have a new member. Nobody you'd know, though." Her smile quirked into a smirk for some reason as she said that, tilting her head as if surveying her own joke.
It made me tense a little. "Oh?"
"But what I wanted to talk to you about is how to balance the two sides."
I didn't have to speak my suspicion. If Dose, the new cape in the E88, and the Undersiders were all working for Coil, and Accord was working with Coil, then every faction out there except the Butcher, as far as the villain underground went?
They were his.
"Oh? By attacking the Teeth?" I wondered what Coil would think if all of us died harming the Teeth. If the Teeth actually did capture and kill or enslave hundreds of people in some big camp massacre, that'd be all the excuse the authorities needed to come down with multi-city force. If she was an agent of Coil here, then I wasn't sure if I could trust anything she was saying.
"Yes. We'd do it ourselves, but that'd raise too many questions. I want your camp to continue to exist. I want all of you to be alive and opposing the Butcher over here. It fits my plans. Our plans. But it also fits with what's right." Lisa nodded, looking around. "Which is why I have some information about the war that I thought you could use."
"What?" I asked.
"There's an apartment building and nearby areas that were just taken from the Merchants last night. It has become a forward base for the Teeth. That means there will be a few of their capes there, and a lot of their thugs."
I crossed my arms. "And you want me to attack it?"
"You finally have the numbers to both defend the camp and go out on a limb, and if you wait, the Teeth are just going to get stronger."
"Maybe. Let me think about it. I'll have to talk with other people. What else is going on?" I asked. "What do you know about New Wave?"
"They haven't been having Panacea to support them lately. She's been withdrawn," Lisa said, thoughtfully. "I'm not sure why, but her sister's death hit her even harder than I would have thought." Lisa shrugged, "I have a… suspicion, but it's not worth saying. But either way, she has showed up at the edge of Grue's territory at least once to talk with the people there."
"About?"
"Grue wasn't sure. She left when he moved to confront her, and it seemed like she had a cousin there to back her up just in case. But I don't know where it's all going. However… the good news is that the Protectorate talked to New Wave early yesterday, and most of them are working together to try to put the lid on the E88."
I didn't know whether I'd trust that, or not. "Huh," I said. "But I'll talk about it."
Lisa was eating a cookie, and held up a hand, finishing chewing. "Thanks. That's all I'm asking. I just think that we can do something here. And it'll make the camp safer. I… know you don't have reason to trust me. But I want what's best for you, this city… I want a lot of things." She shook her head. "So just consider it. And thank you for the peanut-butter cookie. I was delicious."
"Then why are you a villain?" Parian asked.
"A long story, beginning with family, but ending with it being none of your business," Lisa said, with a slightly catty smirk. "It's complicated, though." Lisa sighed. "I don't mean to… it's personal."
"Okay," Parian said. "I… if we have the information about who is going to be there, then I approve, but I'd be staying back behind. To protect this place."
"That's alright," I said. "We still need to discuss this among ourselves. Thanks for visiting us, Lisa." I nodded at her, trying to keep my voice even. "This isn't a trap, right? If it is, I'll get out of it, and I'll go after you."
"No. The Butcher should be distracted, and she can't be everywhere, and the rest of the Teeth? I think you can handle them." Lisa smiled wide at that, but I got the feeling she believed it. I didn't know who all of the rest of the Teeth even were, but that's why if we did anything, it wouldn't be now. It'd be tomorrow.
"I think we might be able to either, but I know just who to ask to check up on that," I said.
******
Rachel was frowning when Cassie came in with her papers and notes. Cassie was dressed a little nicer than when I'd last seen her. Not dressed in clothes she was willing to get dirty in helping Rachel. "You sure this is a good idea?" Rachel asked.
"Yes. You can vote no if you want," I said.
"Voting? Words. Words. More words." Rachel shrugged. "I trust you. Plus, I wanna see just what the Teeth are."
"Well, I hope this helps," Cassie said. "So the first thing you need to know about the Teeth is that they're nomadic, which is confusing because they should be moving out of here within a week. Or less. But they're not. They're digging in, and I'm not sure why. There has to be a cause, but--"
"People are weird," Rachel said.
"That could be part of it. Another question is whether it's the power patches," Cassie said, waving her hand a little as if to indicate them. "They could be very useful if they were in the hands of the Teeth, because it'd allow each of their members to be a cape. And they're what the Merchants are trying to be, in some ways."
"That could be it," I said.
"Yeah. You wonder what the catch is?" Rachel asked. Which was a good point: could the drugs really have no consequences? It was something to think about.
"I guess so. But who do they have right now? If they choose to go away next week, that'd be great, but I'm not counting on it."
"Which is a good idea, Arachne," Cassie said, with a nod. She'd learned already not to smile too much, and I'd seen her asking around with the refugees to see what they said. About what capes there were. "So, from what I can tell, they have either six, or seven, capes. It depends on what certain stories mean. The Butcher you know, right? I've printed out a list of her observed powers, though."
"Yeah. She has a ton, doesn't she?" Rachel asked, frowning. "They don't have healing, right?"
"No. If we can break her leg, it's going to stay broken," I said.
Rachel seemed to settle down at that, thinking through how she could do it. I had ideas, too, but I didn't want to spend too long hesitating. Still, if I could give her some kind of non-communicable disease, or a festering wound (of the exact type that she could make in others), that'd do a good job in convincing her to fuck off.
That's all I really wanted. I wasn't that ambitious. If she went somewhere else, I'd be fine.
"So, her capes include… Animos. He can transform into a monster that's… not that huge, but is large, four-legged, pretty dangerous. He has a scream that can cancel powers."
"Would it work on my bugs?" I asked.
"It seems like it only affects the person with the powers. If you were in range, you'd lose bug control for a while," Cassie said, flipping through her notes. "But the bugs themselves don't have powers."
I frowned at that logic. It wasn't targeting powers so much as a person's ability to use them? "Wait, so would Rachel's dogs be fine?"
"Maybe? Who knows," Cassie said.
"Good," Rachel said, nodding along at that.
"Hemorrghia can control blood, and she can turn it into cutting weapons or use it to scab over her own wounds. She's dangerous, and the more blood is shed in a fight, the worse it is."
I nodded. "Take her out quickly, then?"
"Maybe," Cassie said. "I'm not going to tell you what strategies to use."
"So, three more?"
"Spree can spawn temporary clones. A few dozen at a time is about the max, because they devolve rather quickly."
"But I bet they can all bleed," I said.
"Ah," Rachel said, getting my point.
"And take up space and get in the way," Cassie said. "Him, combined with Vex, mean that if you give them time it's going to be hard to get through to them. She can make a large number of tiny, razor-like forcefields to add up to a hostile version of a regular forcefield. There's jokes online about her power being barbed wire," Cassie admitted.
I bit my lip. That sounded pretty dire, but thus far none of them sounded like they were going to be immune to what a few well-placed bugs and giant dogs could deal with.
"Any others?"
"Finally, there's Reaver. He's stronger than he should be, but more importantly, if he strikes someone fast enough, even with something he's wielding," Cassie said. "They can start to disintegrate. It works better on objects than people, but he has killed enemies before."
I nodded, glancing over at Rachel. "What do you think?"
"We can beat them," Rachel said.
I considered that for a moment. It was a mistake to be too confident. But…
It was also a mistake not to project as much confidence as you could muster. "I think so too. Let's do it."
******
A/N: Thanks to @NemoMarx. I start Grad School tomorrow.
Age Gap, Mentioned Violence, Bad Language
Most of the people with her took the chance to leave. Ultimately, that was what I'd expected. But about thirty or so people, mostly her relatives and their employees and closest friends, had enough cause to believe in what Parian was doing that they wanted to go with her.
The bulk of Monday was filled with tasks for which I wasn't really suited. Rachel's dogs could help carry things for the evacuation, but all I could do is serve as a sort of watcher. Amp was here and there, the girl trying to heal anyone hurt in the evacuation, and testing another aspect of her power: whether her regeneration worked on illnesses. I knew the answer as soon as she did: it couldn't cure cancer, though at least as far as the patient could tell, it didn't do some nightmare scenario result such as just make the cancer grow faster.
I had no idea how it worked, but she was still learning, and I knew it'd be months or more before she had a full understanding of what she could do.
Parian was everywhere too, taking references and making sure that anyone who left, left with her blessing.
"I'm sorry I can't go with you, but I have a family, and I…" an older man said. "You saved me from a bunch of them."
"I couldn't…"
"Listen. You do your best." The dark-haired, but greying man gave a shrug, as if this was all that could be expected out of the world.
The Protectorate was helping, at least, and Tuesday found us still nervously going from site to site as the evacuations continued. The refugee camps, which were far more orderly than ours, though also a lot more spartan, as if they'd been designed for a minimum of resources, had just started to drain of people allowed to go back to their ruined homes and pick up their lives.
The people were a sea, a gathering of people just like my camp, and watching them made me hope that my camp was safe. I had to go back and forth between the two, as often as possible. Flechette was helping to protect the camp when we were evacuating people.
I knew to them I was some weird distant figure that they'd perhaps heard of, once or twice. They whispered about me, not sullen but tired after all of the time running, and then thinking they were safe, only to be sent scattering once more.
And in that simple movement of a few days, I pushed myself. Things changed. I got to see more of Dad…
*******
I was working until midnight on Monday, just patrolling and making sure that nothing was left behind, and then hurrying to the camp to watch over it in case the Merchants noticed.
My head hurt when I lay down to sleep, and when I woke up, I felt as if someone had stuffed my nose with cotton, and my arms and legs ached from all of the walking.
"Get up," Rachel said. "Got shit to do."
"Ugh. Sick."
"Need… soup?" Rachel asked, frowning down at me. I felt really cold, and I moved forward to hug her. Of all the times to wind up a little bit sick, now? I needed to get through this, because I had another eighteen hour day, or more, left to get through. Maybe more after that. I didn't know.
"Yeah, that'd be great," I said.
Rachel nodded, and it was heartwarming to see the concern on her face.
So I just lay there, and then I started thinking. Maybe I could get Charlotte. I glanced around, trying to figure out what time it was. My mouth felt dry, and my thoughts seemed to skip and hop around.
Stefanie came with Rachel, who was holding a big bowl of warm chicken soup. She'd heated it up or--
The bugs seemed everywhere now, their sensations stronger, and I almost wanted to lose myself in them. It was a lot better than the aches and discomfort of feeling sick.
Stefanie reached a hand out and felt my forehead. "Arachne…"
"Get Char," I said.
"What? Oh, of course!" Stefanie hurried out.
Rachel frowned a little, tensing as she looked down at me and offered me a spoon full of soup. I leaned up to take it in my mouth, barely tasting it. Taste and smell were tied together. My human nose wasn't working, though my bugs could smell compost and refuse, and a leaking toilet that would have to be fixed. And someone having an early-morning smoke. "Thanks, Rache," I said.
"Get better," Rachel said. She glared over at the tent entrance, looking annoyed. Then she offered me more soup. I didn't know what she was thinking. Her offer of soup was nice, but if Charlotte could stop a cold--and it might work better than with cancer--then that's what I should be doing. Even if the idea of putting my head in Rachel's lap and just letting her spoon me full of chicken soup was a little tempting.
"I'll try." I took another few bites of the soup. My empty stomach felt a little queasy, but I figured the soup couldn't hurt it much, and considering how much I had to do. I didn't want to think about it, but it kept on pulsing through my head. Only the most vulnerable people had been evacuated so far. Those who would probably be hurt and couldn't run if the E88 went back on their word.
Today was the day I needed to get Parian here, and make sure she was ready to start holding down the fort. I didn't know whether she'd want to immediately go after the Merchants, but at the least she could stay behind to make sure there wasn't any sort of sneak attack. More hands meant we could divide up more without things going wrong.
******
"Hey, Rachel," Charlotte said with a smile that seemed designed to set Rachel off. "Taylor, I'll try to help you, but you really do need to take an hour or two off."
"No. I need to get to work," I said. "Maybe if it doesn't work, I'll take a few, see how I feel?" I coughed a little, but it was fine.
For one, I wasn't coughing blood, and my Dad had worked through a lot worse than a little bit of unwellness. I didn't want to let people down. Heck, even just showing the weakness at all was the first problem. You gathered people around you, you knew that they were buying what you were saying… but then if you got smashed again and again like the Merchants were, then no wonder they had started to throw away an impossible advantage.
I didn't want to do that, and the first step of failing to do that was failing to put in the work. It was already a fact that Stefanie was doing a lot of the work for this too. I didn't want to make it worse.
Stefanie was waiting outside.
"No," Rachel said.
"If you were sick, would you stop taking care of your dogs?" I asked.
Rachel looked away, crossing her arms. She didn't have an honest answer, because of course she'd work through the sickness. And of course she wouldn't necessarily trust other people to do it for her. "Taylor," she said.
"What if the hour or two was spent with Rachel?" Charlotte asked. "That way…"
"She's not gonna agree," Rachel said, her voice frustrated. "Not for me, not for you."
"I can try, I guess? Give reasons." Charlotte let out a sigh. "It's important. She needs to not push herself too hard. She's important.":
"Yeah," Rachel agreed. I smiled a little as Charlotte got closer.
"Taylor, please nod."
I nodded, after a moment of uncertainty. Then I felt a little bit of a buzz in my body, as if I were being shaken apart. My head cleared a little, and I felt a bit less clogged up, but that was all. "It's doing… something?"
"More, then?" she asked.
"Yes."
"Touch your nose again, then."
This time she went all out. This time it felt almost good, as if it'd gone through the valley of being weird into some other side of things. I felt warm, but not in a bad way, and after a moment I was able to breathe. Smells came back, and I could more easily ignore what my bugs were smelling. Now that I had other smells to focus on. My bugs seemed to allow me to ignore problems like that a little… or make them worse. Either way, I wondered how well I'd be able to block out pain with practice doing something like that.
"Huh," I said.
"Taylor, you need to stay in the tent for an hour or two. Just hang out with Rachel, relax… it's important because you need to be in control, and that means not being overwhelmed. What little I've seen is really amazing. If you just stayed with your girlfriend, we can handle the setup. You know that the Dockworkers came out in force to move furniture? Or they will. Pelter got a message saying so. That, and the people online… we have it covered. You could focus on greeting Parian, relaxing, and--"
"Fine," I said. She made good points, and I didn't have it in me to argue.
"Huh," Rachel said.
"What?" I asked.
"Whatever," Rachel said.
"So… Charlotte. Amp. You can handle things on your end?"
"Yeah. I'm going to keep that regen on you in case it comes back afterwards. Though I wish I knew why it worked and cancer didn't."
"Maybe it's time? Cancer is something you've had for a long time, so it's harder to get rid of? You haven't tried replacing a long-severed limb or curing the blind-from-birth yet, have you?" I offered.
"Oh, great idea," Charlotte said. "Though I don't know where I'd get them. So, I'll be doing what you said. Helping the sick people and maybe a few people who might be in danger. I think… I had an idea for the resonance and frequency. I'm still testing it."
I remembered her talking Pelter about it. 'Strength, obviously, but what if strength is an extension of the same vibrations that cause toughness. But backwards?' Pelter had given an uncertain thumbs up, tired herself, overworked herself.
"Well, go to it, then."
"Aye aye," Charlotte said, with a formal nod. She always treated me a little different, though it was hard to tell what it meant.
Charlotte left, leaving Rachel and I. Rachel stepped over towards me. "You wanna play games?"
"Nah," I said. "What about reading. I have some of the books of Mom's. I could just read to you. Not even practice, just relaxing."
"Nah. What about if I read to you?" Rachel asked.
"Do you think you're ready for it?"
Rachel tensed, and then said, "Won't know if I don't try." Which actually made a lot of sense. Rachel was learning a little bit at a time, but learning to read well was going to be a matter of months. People spent years trying to relearn this. But she was very dedicated to it.
She pulled something out of a bag in the corner that I hadn't bothered to look in, a battered book like the one I'd read to her, to begin with.
She patted her lap. I felt all better, but I didn't want to jinx it. But as long as it was just reading, and not the prelude to something more.
I slipped into her lap, feeling her body against mine, and humming I prepared to listen to a story I'd heard before. It didn't matter. The words weren't why I was there. Whatever tension she had, as if it was wrong that I'd not been tended to by her, she'd get over it. See sense, if we just moved past it. So that's what we did.
******
It was moments like breathing in and feeling, at the same time, her breath on your shoulder. It was the warm feeling of just taking a few minutes off, and the way her hand ran up and down and through my hair, playing with it. Mussing it up, but that didn't really matter to me, not then. It was something natural and just that simple.
The tension left her, somewhere, and I listened. She stumbled over words, but she was too stubborn to let that stop her. Onward she ploughed through the book, even if slowly, and often needing little bits of correction. It was fine, it was all fine.
And then two hours later, we had work to do.
*******
"Hey," Rachel said to Pelter, in the middle of the final transfer. Parian was at the head of a group of refugees that were now making their way to our camp. We handed the supplies to them, and the Dockworkers were glad for something to do, even if it was a charity case.
Charity was the right word. More reporters came, clustering around like a mob of hungry birds, wanting to be fed stories of heroism and deprivation, and it was annoying. I was glad they didn't try to question Rachel too much. She was too clearly not in the mood for it, perhaps, though I was shocked that it stopped them.
"Yes?" Pelter asked. She looked down at the clipboard she had, considering everything.
"Puppies are coming soon," Rachel said.
"Yes?" Pelter repeated, sounding baffled.
"Any of the people need some time…" Rachel shrugged, making an off-hand gesture. It was actually a good idea, I thought, right in the middle of monitoring the trek from afar, to make sure nobody ambushed it.
"Oh. Right. When are the puppies coming?"
"Few days," Rachel said. "Have a few small dogs too, at the shelter."
"Oh, right. I was wondering about that: could we maybe start up adoptions?" Pelter made sure not to smile, having finally figured it out, though it wasn't natural on her, and she didn't seem to do it consistently. Well, less finally figured it out, and more finally started to manage it.
Rachel shrugged.
"My idea is that you personally talk to anyone adopting, and then you can check in every once in a while," she said. "It only makes sense."
Rachel nodded. "Sounds good," she admitted, as if this was a surprise. Pelter didn't really pick up on the tone, just interpreted the words as a good sign.
"Do you need anyone else to help out at the shelter?"
"Nah. There's enough," she said. Rachel looked at Pelter for a moment, then said. "Too many, sometimes."
"Ah, well. I guess you weren't really used to it?"
"Nah. Not used to people giving a shit," Rachel said, with another, even more expansive, shrug. "It's new."
"Well…" Pelter said. "I'm not used to this either."
"Huh," Rachel said, and she sounded almost thoughtful. I wondered what she was thinking, because I knew that she wasn't used to interacting with people. But she managed Cassie and the Shelter workers every day.
Maybe that was changing.
"So, we're almost done, can you get… Judas?"
"Brutus," Rachel corrected, but she sounded a little less dismissive than I thought she would have, after that kind of mistake.
"Brutus. To carry just a little more. We're almost done here."
*******
Greg found me with my hands on my hips, looking across at the room we'd made for Parian. We'd made sure it had electricity and working toilets, and we'd gotten what we could together, combined with her furniture, to create something that would feel like home.
Home, for Parian, was a lot more frilly than anything I would have been comfortable around. She had a lot of dolls, and only some of them were actually used for her powers. She also had a lot of books, a lot of posters… just adding up all of the stuff around made the room feel small and cramped to me.
I saw Greg coming, but of course I couldn't have known his purpose, or I would have probably found a way to get distracted.
"Hey!" he said. "So, you're adding another member to the… I guess they're still working on a name. Cassie said that they hadn't thought of one online. Right now you're just Team Arachne and company."
"Well, okay then." I shrugged. "Team names are pretty far down on the list, though."
"That's not it. If you're making a team, and you're searching for people to join up to fight the Merchants…"
He trailed off, staring at me with wide, dark eyes, clearly hoping I knew what he was thinking. I did, actually. I just didn't approve. It sounded like a really bad idea. "No. We're not going to use the vials yet. You know that Bryce, who took the vial, is having trouble staying phased in. He's falling through the floor. He's not eating. These aren't safe, or at least, they can go very, very wrong, and you're one of my best friends."
Greg frowned, pouting as if that would get him what he wanted. "It's a risk, sure, but what else do I have, anyways?" Greg hesitated a moment then said, "Um, Taylor. You kinda weren't there, but… I met someone a little while ago that said that my Mom was probably dead. She was in one of the buildings where the elevator broke during the quakes, and most of the people above a certain floor weren't able to get away."
Greg bit his lip, his eyes watering.
"And that's why you want to risk your life?"
"I could be a hero!" Greg added. "I could fight evil and save people and stuff, like in the movies."
I turned my head away, glad he couldn't see the look on my face. He was being so earnest, but what was this except a retreat.
"Do you have relatives?"
"Yes. But I don't want to live with them," Greg said, twitching and jittering around as he circled me, as if trying to find an angle of attack. "Any more than you live with your Dad."
"It's not the same thing."
"Yeah, I guess," he said with a shrug. "C'mon, Taylor, it's not like you don't have more of them."
I didn't know a lot of things, but giving it to him felt like a mistake waiting to happen. Besides, we had five capes now, and Flechette was probably going to hang around as much as she could justify with her near-fulltime job of dealing with all the problems that were cropping up.
"We're good right now. Things are under control," I said.
"Yeah, and you know it," Greg said. "Everyone talks about how amazing you are and it's really cool, but then I'm here and what about the Butcher. She's, like, overleveled? How will you stop her?"
"We'll figure something out," I said bluffly. In truth, I had no idea what would even work against someone like the Butcher. I wasn't sure whether my bugs could do anything to them. At least, none of their known powers seemed to involve being able to tank, say, Purity. They were more durable, but it was at the extreme of human, more being able to shrug off a few bullets than being able to shrug off a few destroyed city blocks. If I were thinking about things in the context of one of Greg's games, she was hard to hit, hard to hurt, and apparently you could break her leg and she'd work through the pain. But did she need to breathe?
If I did get enough bugs on her, would they be taken by the teleportation? I didn't know. Either way, one possibility was… huh.
Now that Greg had me thinking, I had a lot of ideas, but most of them were going to take time. Right now, though, the Butcher wasn't even on the list of targets. Ultimately, as long as the Merchants distracted the Butcher, I didn't think she'd go after us. It'd draw too much attention to her, too early, and she'd already been around long enough that this had to be something more.
I wasn't going to give up hope while we still hadn't even fought her. "Yes," I repeated. "Thanks for offering, Greg, and I'll keep it in mind."
"Aww… but thanks and all. Is Rachel around here, btdubs?"
I wanted him to never say that again. "No, she's at the shelter."
"Oh, alright. I wanted to talk about maybe playing a little more with her. She's a lot of fun, kinda? I mean, like, she cares about what I'm saying."
"Oh, that's great. We can talk later," I said, a little distracted.
******
I asked Rachel about it.
"He's annoying. But he's good at the games." Rachel shrugged. "So I talk to him.."
Well, that was something, at least.
*******
It was nearly dinnertime when Parian arrived, alongside the rest of the refugees. They looked around at the food and dived right in. Oddly, we weren't eating that much worse than they'd been in Dolltown, because while we had worse access and more people, we definitely had more money to throw around.
Stefanie explained it to me, a little, last week. "We have to rely on donations, and even with all of that…"
"We're spending a lot," I said.
"And taking in a lot. This isn't a moneymaking venture," she admitted. "We're just three heroes working for nothing." She was less stressed then, but she also didn't have Charlotte to help her out. "But.. it's working out so far?"
"I don't know how we could really do anything to make it better," I said. I gave a shrug. "It kind of just happened."
"You see that sometimes, with charities," Stefanie said. "Something just takes off, and you don't know why."
It frustrated me, not being able to be sure. Not knowing why. But what could I say? I said the only thing I could think of. "Well, I do know why, sort of. Cassie's a big part of it."
"She is pretty impressive, yeah," Stefanie said. "My Dad jokes about adopting her." Stefanie shook her head, trying not to smile around me but failing.
I nodded. It didn't hurt that it was clear by now that Rachel wasn't responding to any of the slightly too lingering gazes sent her way. So I could drop any residual jealousy--I totally could, and would soon, I swore!--and focus on what she was helping. Which definitely put things in context.
"You okay, Taylor?"
"Fine," I said. "Just wondering what goes wrong next."
"I worry about that kind of thing too."
*******
On Wednesday morning, after a hard night of rain, the city felt very humid and miserable, but I pulled myself up anyways, and began getting ready for the meeting with Parian. I'd been watching her the whole evening, but that wasn't the same as meeting with her, and somehow or other I'd managed to avoid it.
But I figured that as soon as she got up would be a perfectly good time to come over.
I even had bribes, once I'd asked around.
Stefanie's Mom actually was making cookies and donuts as a sort of unhealthy breakfast, in celebration of… Stan's birthday? I think that's who it was. He was a teenager who had showed up last week, all alone, and didn't like to talk about his family.
So I clutched that tight in my hands, my costume on but more just so I'd be recognized, as I made my way towards the building. Everyone had a room, or at least every family, and Parian actually lived separately from the rest of her family, just now waking up.
I could see her brushing her teeth, and smiling in the mirror. I could see her humming as she went through her morning, getting dressed and stopping to look over an old magazine, flipping through it with thoughtful pauses.
I watched all of that while I moved, keeping track of everyone in both camps, waking up in their own time. Going about their day. There was still some work to be done with the second new apartment, and then everyone was going to get to work on fixing up the first apartment and the second for excess people.
The goal, I'd been told, was to fill up all two apartments before moving onto the third.
People turned to look at me as I jogged up the stairs. I hadn't been exercising recently, but dealing with the dogs and running around being a cape had been enough that I wasn't breathing hard by the time I reached Parian's room. I knocked on the door, and watched her hesitate, looking around, and then go for the door.
"Oh, Arachne," she said, stepping back. She wasn't wearing her costume, and I knew I loomed over her. So I reached up and took off my mask with one hand, while proffering the donuts and cookies with the other. "Ah, well. Thanks."
"Don't worry," I said. "And call me Taylor. It's not a big deal, knowing that much. As long as you don't spread it around. I just wanted to see how you were settling in."
"Don't you know? I saw your bugs?"
"Sorry," I said, though I wasn't sorry at all. I glanced over at the table where she'd spread paper, pencils, magazines… all of the ingredients for costume designs.
"I'm doing fine. So are the people that followed me. I'm going to start moving to set up a perimeter soon. Cassie mentioned that some people said it'd be a good start."
"Probably heard it from PHO," I said, with a shrug, gesturing to the couch. "Want to sit there and eat?"
"What type of donuts are those?" Parian asked. "I should be on a diet." She frowned a little. "Though it's easy when you don't have that much to eat. But hard when it's all processed." She shook her head. "Sorry if I'm talking about trivial things."
"No, don't worry, it's fine. I don't really think about it anymore," I said. "There's not really time."
"I know, it's a silly thing to worry about," Parian said.
Especially since, and it didn't take anything but me having eyes, but she wasn't fat. Or pudgy. Or even anything other than pretty thin. "You worry about what you worry about. I hope you might find time to do what you love," I said, trying to lay on the charm as I walked over to the couch and flopped down. "Oh, and they're donut holes and glazed. Nothing special. I think…" I opened up the bag.
The smell of donuts was strong, and I breathed them in for a moment, glancing down. "There's cookies too, and I think a bagel, somewhere? If you want something a little more plain. I know you have food here, but I felt…" I trailed off, offering the bag to her as she sat down right next to me.
She took it and pulled out an oatmeal cookie of all things and began to nibble on it. I grabbed a donut, taking off my gloves to do so, and then ate it quickly. It was gooey and warm and delicious, but it did mean I'd have to wash my hands before I went and touched anything. The cookies, on the other hand, were a lot less messy than all of that sugar glazing that had had to be made for it.
So I took a chocolate chip.
"Thanks, really thanks."
"How are you holding up?" I asked, nibbling as I watched her.
"I'm alright. I… hope I can work a few things out. I can make costumes if you want. Or at least help you with some of that. For… Amp, and Pelter?" She bit her lip. "Pelter's costume is pretty… basic."
Even with all I'd tried to do it, it was true. I didn't have the time or energy. "I suppose so. If you're willing to help out, that's good. I didn't know you made costumes."
"I don't, normally," Parian said. "But maybe it'd be fun. It's another way I can help out."
"Part of what you can do is just be present. Once you have all of that thread set up, it means that even when I'm away, there's still warning enough to call the Protectorate," I said. "That's the idea, at least."
"It's a good idea," Parian said, though I felt a sort of shift in her mood. She didn't want to talk shop, or not just shop. "And if you're wondering, the people that came with me seem willing to work, and contribute."
I nodded. "That's good. What about you? What are your concerns? What's bugging you? Anything we can do better?" I felt like I was some sort of survey-taker, trying to run down problems, but I did want to know.
"Well, you know, Flechette…" Parian began.
"Yes?"
"She's going to be around here a lot," Parian said in a low voice.
I frowned, trying to see it from her perspective. "Do you want me to drive her off?"
"No! No. Plus, she can help protect the camp, if she's here." Parian waved a hand, frowning a little bit and squirming as she tried to figure out what to say and how to say it. "It's… can we just talk? In a way that's not about the camp or ambitions or the like? Girl to girl?"
I was a girl, so… hopefully I'd be able to do it? The last person I did 'girl talk' with was Emma, though, and I was out of practice. That and I could feel my stomach curl at the idea of it, at the possibility that it might all be part of some trick to get close to me and betray me. Again.
"Of course," I said.
"Your face doesn't say that," Parian said, then shook her head. "Back before I triggered, there were guys who were nice to me and then expected me to date them. Or more. Because of it." She was frowning, and looking around, as if making sure nobody else was there. "I hated it. I hated the way it felt."
I bit my lip, and then wondered how to indicate to everyone… well, maybe there were particular someones. "I never quite felt that, but there were people that were nice and--"
"What?" Parian asked.
"Nevermind. So, he expected things." I thought for a moment. "Is Flechette like that?"
"She's everywhere. She keeps her distance when I tell her to, but it's that look in her eyes, as if she's a knight about to lay down her life for me if I wave a hand. Or something." Parian frowned.
"A knight?"
"I guess. She's powerful, and good at what she does. And she's fighting for the good guys. Or at least, the Wards," Parian said. "I don't think she wants to just pressure me into going out with her on a date, but I still feel pressured."
"Oh. I think she's afraid of that," I said.
"She should be," Parian admitted, shaking her head. "What was it like for you?"
"I should wash my hands. I'll tell you if you really want to know. It's not some big secret. But, Parian. Do you want to date her? That's the first question: are you interested?"
"Yes. Yes I am. But I don't want to wind up… she comes in, she's helpful, she tries to protect me from the E88 and the world, and I don't know what I'm supposed to say to all of that." Parian shook her head. "She's like me, but not like me. New York, not Brockton Bay. Sansei, not second-generation from a family that…" she shrugged.
"No, go on if you want. I sorta get that," I said. "Though also not." I walked into the kitchen and washed my hands, glancing down at the water. I didn't know whether there had actually been any radiation damage to the aquifer. Nothing had been announced either way. Perhaps all of the water we were using was subtly contaminated.
I wouldn't even know, and considering how dangerous around here it was, it wouldn't be an immediate concern.
I was also considering something else: how to lie. My history with Rachel was far from toxic, but it was personal, and we barely knew each other. Yet the more I thought about it the more I tried to think about Rachel. Her attitude, if not her opinion, in this case. She wouldn't want me to act ashamed, wouldn't see anything shameful or odd about it, even if she wouldn't be sharing the story with everyone.
So I took a breath and said. "I was a new cape, going out on the town. I wanted to be a hero, but didn't even have a name. I found a dog fighting ring, and decided to attack it, but Rachel was there too, for the same reason. And I managed to convince her to work together to do it." I knew I was probably softening it a little. "Then I got her to agree to let me help the dogs she rescued. There was something about her that drew me." I paused, aware that I was about to get way too deep into personal opinions. I walked back over towards Parian.
"How did it happen?"
"I didn't even realize that I was staring. But she noticed it, and then only two weeks into knowing her, she asked me if I wanted to have sex."
"What?"
"That's what I asked. And I turned her down, and she didn't freak out, or… she just wanted to have sex, and the way she told it to me later, she figured that if she offered to someone she liked, then they'd either accept or start thinking about it." I shrugged, aware of the incredulous look on Parian's face. "Less than two weeks later, I took her up on the offer. It's a longer story than that, but it's kind of after that that I kept on getting closer to her. And closer." I shook my head. "I know that's not really something you can do."
"I don't know how well I'd do with, uh, that level of commitment."
"There was more connection than you think. We were already close friends by two weeks in," I admitted. I shook my head. "I didn't even realize I was crushing on her. But no, I'm not telling you to go ahead and have sex with her because what could it hurt?" I flushed. "God, it sounds so not-me, doesn't it?"
"I wouldn't know," Parian pointed out. "You're very bold."
I snorted at that. "Ha. That's as much pose as anything. Admitting it to you is better than admitting it to the people I'm protecting, isn't it?"
"I suppose so," Parian said. "I was always a little… open with them? The mask helps, though, sometimes."
"It does," I said.
"Anyways, that's not something I can do," Parian said, and then paused. "A part of me wants to try it, but it'd be dumb. I'd make a mess of it. And that temptation, it's more like… how sometimes you see a cake and you want to just taste the icing a little?"
"Are you comparing Flechette to a cake?" I asked. Though it was true she was rather pretty.
Parian giggled a little nervously. "I guess? What I really fear is that she'll get power over me. She'll be a 'partner' or even someone I owe and have to…" she trailed off, and shrugged. "I don't want to listen to other people telling me what to do."
"Is that why you aren't staying in the same apartment as your family?" I asked. A little blunt, but she was being pretty open with me. I wasn't going to get anything by being subtle.
"A little, yeah," she admitting, frowning. "Thanks for telling me. It doesn't help that much, I'm a very different person from you, or Rachel either. Older, for one. Supposed to be more responsible."
"How old are you?" I asked.
"Twenty-one," she said.
I didn't gape or take a second look at her face, but it really was impressive, I thought, pacing a little bit, glancing at her. She could legally drink, and she'd been in college. She'd graduated high-school, while I was still dealing with problems there. "I guess I look like a kid," I said. "Me and Rachel, and… hell, everyone. Charlotte, Stefanie, we're all teenagers."
"Maybe. Though so is Flechette," Parian said. "She's only seventeen. I'd be robbing the cradle." Parian smiled. "I don't know why I almost like that thought?"
I frowned. "What do you mean?"
"The… power? The control? I want it all to be on my own terms."
"I understand that," I said. I really did. Wanting control, that was something I totally understood, though it wasn't a concern between Rachel and I. Things were going great there, but I could get how wanting to be the one with more of the power and control would make things complicated.
"You seem to be in charge," Parian said. "And I admit, I don't think of you as someone who is only sixteen or seventeen."
"I just turned sixteen on Sunday," I said.
"Huh," Parian said. "Pelter seems older too. I suppose it's just being out here, taking care of yourself. Perhaps I could--"
"Wait." I held up a hand. "One moment."
At the edge of my vision, I could see Lisa. Lisa, not dressed up as Tattletale, but also just as clearly not trying to hide. She was walking from building to building from the south-west, which was the safest way to come here, the one that we used for moving people. She smelled as if she'd bathed recently, and she was humming to herself, clearly confident as she strode forward.
"Someone's coming," I said. "I'm not sure why, but I bet they want to meet with me."
"Who is it?" Parian asked.
I hesitated, and then decided to tell the truth. "So, Rachel used to be with the Undersiders. Back before she left them, I met a few of them as well. They're criminals, though there are… worse ones out there. Though also better ones, I suppose. They're all a bunch of teenagers, and one of them is Lisa."
"The name rings a bell," Parian said. "You know her?"
"We were close for a while. Still are, I guess. She tells me a little about what's going on in the streets, and I don't think she's a mean person." I bit my lip, since 'mean' and 'bad' weren't the same thing at all. "She's also still giving me info, and it's helped so far. So, if she's showing up here, she wants to talk." I bit my lip. "Is Flechette going to show up today? Tattletale is a villain, but I don't think that means we need to immediately arrest her right now."
"Really?" Parian asked. "Are you sure…"
"Sure of what?" I asked. "I want to hear out what she has to say, and she has knowledge that could be pretty useful."
Lisa was going pretty fast now, jogging even, and she was within a block of the camp. It wouldn't be long now, just a few minutes.
"I... " she hesitated, and then said, "I have veto."
"What?" I asked.
"You just told me about her. I could tell Flechette. I don't think I will, but why not have the meeting here. I'll just watch, to be sure." Parian nodded, apparently liking the idea.
Meanwhile, I took a breath. Fury licked at my limbs, anger that seemed to come from nothing to overwhelm me. I was losing control, or at least… the truth was that I was a member of a team now. But I expected to mostly get my way. I didn't know why I'd expected that, but we'd gone from three to five members in the span of a week.
"Fine. We can do that."
"Please don't pout," Parian said. "Sit down and have another donut. Do you think she'll come to us, or do we need to tell her where we are?"
"You should get your mask on. I bet she knows exactly where I am."
*******
Lisa hesitated only a dozen or two seconds before turning towards Parian's apartment building and walking in, still humming. She was dressed in a long, flowing brown skirt that looked familiar, and a white blouse. If she'd ever looked more like an office worker, it'd have to be her wearing glasses.
"She's coming," I said. "You ready?"
"Yes," Parian said. She sounded interested. No doubt wondering what this was going to mean.
A minute later, a few cookies still saved, there was a knock on the door.
I went to answer it in my mask. "Hey, Tattletale. I hope you don't mind company. My teammate insisted."
"I'd heard about that," Lisa said. She nodded, managing not to smile. She looked good, like she'd showed, slept, and was finally finding her groove. But there was something nervous about the way she looked around. "Now you have a team of five members. It's very impressive. How have things been with you?"
"Fine. A lot has happened. Especially regarding… news. I've heard that you and your team have started setting yourself up as Warlords." I nodded at her, and gestured over to Parian, whose mask hid her expression.
"...some of us, yes. I'm just looking around. If they're wondering what territory I own, it's because I don't own any. Information, and figuring out what's going on. Watching things: Accord and Coil are talking a lot, aren't they?"
"I did notice that," I said. I bit my lips. "Have you been talking to Accord?"
"He's been talking to everyone. I'm surprised he hasn't sent a representative to your camp. It's as if he believes he can deal himself into his position. He probably has contact with the Protectorate too." Lisa shrugged a little, and then moved towards the bag. "Any cookies left? I'm actually really hungry."
"You can have them," Parian said, a little uncertainly.
"So while Accord and Coil play their games, and my teammates set up their castles and territories… there's two different wars going on. The E88 is warring with the Protectorate. I can't know how well that'll go. But… it's what you might suspect."
"What?" Parian asked. She sounded suspicious.
"Are you willing not to spread this around?" Lisa asked. "But it's very clear that something's driving the E88 to be far more aggressive, even more offensive, than they were before. They'd probably have still tried to push you out, Parian, but it doesn't make sense."
"They're nazis," Parian pointed out.
I nodded. "But it could be that new cape? Do you think that she's like Dose?"
"Honestly, probably? But it doesn't matter too much, not right now. What actually matters is that the Merchants and Teeth are fighting. If the Teeth win, then you have to go up against Butcher. I'm not sure how long the Merchants can last, but if they even hold out another week or three, it'd help you a lot."
"How?"
"Time to gain allies. You've already gained two new capes, right? In a few weeks you could have more gear for each of them. And find ways to work together," Lisa said, expansively. "I know it's a big vision, but I really do believe in it."
"You know, you're probably not helping the suspicion that I'm working with the Undersiders. Or even am one."
"That you're gaining territory through a nice way as some sort of secret member?" Lisa snorted. "Yes, I know the kinds of things they probably say. But they're not getting traction… I just came here because I had some information and advice. I've helped you before, and you're doing pretty well."
"The Undersiders are too," I said. "Almost too well."
"Not well enough, in some ways. Though we do have a new member. Nobody you'd know, though." Her smile quirked into a smirk for some reason as she said that, tilting her head as if surveying her own joke.
It made me tense a little. "Oh?"
"But what I wanted to talk to you about is how to balance the two sides."
I didn't have to speak my suspicion. If Dose, the new cape in the E88, and the Undersiders were all working for Coil, and Accord was working with Coil, then every faction out there except the Butcher, as far as the villain underground went?
They were his.
"Oh? By attacking the Teeth?" I wondered what Coil would think if all of us died harming the Teeth. If the Teeth actually did capture and kill or enslave hundreds of people in some big camp massacre, that'd be all the excuse the authorities needed to come down with multi-city force. If she was an agent of Coil here, then I wasn't sure if I could trust anything she was saying.
"Yes. We'd do it ourselves, but that'd raise too many questions. I want your camp to continue to exist. I want all of you to be alive and opposing the Butcher over here. It fits my plans. Our plans. But it also fits with what's right." Lisa nodded, looking around. "Which is why I have some information about the war that I thought you could use."
"What?" I asked.
"There's an apartment building and nearby areas that were just taken from the Merchants last night. It has become a forward base for the Teeth. That means there will be a few of their capes there, and a lot of their thugs."
I crossed my arms. "And you want me to attack it?"
"You finally have the numbers to both defend the camp and go out on a limb, and if you wait, the Teeth are just going to get stronger."
"Maybe. Let me think about it. I'll have to talk with other people. What else is going on?" I asked. "What do you know about New Wave?"
"They haven't been having Panacea to support them lately. She's been withdrawn," Lisa said, thoughtfully. "I'm not sure why, but her sister's death hit her even harder than I would have thought." Lisa shrugged, "I have a… suspicion, but it's not worth saying. But either way, she has showed up at the edge of Grue's territory at least once to talk with the people there."
"About?"
"Grue wasn't sure. She left when he moved to confront her, and it seemed like she had a cousin there to back her up just in case. But I don't know where it's all going. However… the good news is that the Protectorate talked to New Wave early yesterday, and most of them are working together to try to put the lid on the E88."
I didn't know whether I'd trust that, or not. "Huh," I said. "But I'll talk about it."
Lisa was eating a cookie, and held up a hand, finishing chewing. "Thanks. That's all I'm asking. I just think that we can do something here. And it'll make the camp safer. I… know you don't have reason to trust me. But I want what's best for you, this city… I want a lot of things." She shook her head. "So just consider it. And thank you for the peanut-butter cookie. I was delicious."
"Then why are you a villain?" Parian asked.
"A long story, beginning with family, but ending with it being none of your business," Lisa said, with a slightly catty smirk. "It's complicated, though." Lisa sighed. "I don't mean to… it's personal."
"Okay," Parian said. "I… if we have the information about who is going to be there, then I approve, but I'd be staying back behind. To protect this place."
"That's alright," I said. "We still need to discuss this among ourselves. Thanks for visiting us, Lisa." I nodded at her, trying to keep my voice even. "This isn't a trap, right? If it is, I'll get out of it, and I'll go after you."
"No. The Butcher should be distracted, and she can't be everywhere, and the rest of the Teeth? I think you can handle them." Lisa smiled wide at that, but I got the feeling she believed it. I didn't know who all of the rest of the Teeth even were, but that's why if we did anything, it wouldn't be now. It'd be tomorrow.
"I think we might be able to either, but I know just who to ask to check up on that," I said.
******
Rachel was frowning when Cassie came in with her papers and notes. Cassie was dressed a little nicer than when I'd last seen her. Not dressed in clothes she was willing to get dirty in helping Rachel. "You sure this is a good idea?" Rachel asked.
"Yes. You can vote no if you want," I said.
"Voting? Words. Words. More words." Rachel shrugged. "I trust you. Plus, I wanna see just what the Teeth are."
"Well, I hope this helps," Cassie said. "So the first thing you need to know about the Teeth is that they're nomadic, which is confusing because they should be moving out of here within a week. Or less. But they're not. They're digging in, and I'm not sure why. There has to be a cause, but--"
"People are weird," Rachel said.
"That could be part of it. Another question is whether it's the power patches," Cassie said, waving her hand a little as if to indicate them. "They could be very useful if they were in the hands of the Teeth, because it'd allow each of their members to be a cape. And they're what the Merchants are trying to be, in some ways."
"That could be it," I said.
"Yeah. You wonder what the catch is?" Rachel asked. Which was a good point: could the drugs really have no consequences? It was something to think about.
"I guess so. But who do they have right now? If they choose to go away next week, that'd be great, but I'm not counting on it."
"Which is a good idea, Arachne," Cassie said, with a nod. She'd learned already not to smile too much, and I'd seen her asking around with the refugees to see what they said. About what capes there were. "So, from what I can tell, they have either six, or seven, capes. It depends on what certain stories mean. The Butcher you know, right? I've printed out a list of her observed powers, though."
"Yeah. She has a ton, doesn't she?" Rachel asked, frowning. "They don't have healing, right?"
"No. If we can break her leg, it's going to stay broken," I said.
Rachel seemed to settle down at that, thinking through how she could do it. I had ideas, too, but I didn't want to spend too long hesitating. Still, if I could give her some kind of non-communicable disease, or a festering wound (of the exact type that she could make in others), that'd do a good job in convincing her to fuck off.
That's all I really wanted. I wasn't that ambitious. If she went somewhere else, I'd be fine.
"So, her capes include… Animos. He can transform into a monster that's… not that huge, but is large, four-legged, pretty dangerous. He has a scream that can cancel powers."
"Would it work on my bugs?" I asked.
"It seems like it only affects the person with the powers. If you were in range, you'd lose bug control for a while," Cassie said, flipping through her notes. "But the bugs themselves don't have powers."
I frowned at that logic. It wasn't targeting powers so much as a person's ability to use them? "Wait, so would Rachel's dogs be fine?"
"Maybe? Who knows," Cassie said.
"Good," Rachel said, nodding along at that.
"Hemorrghia can control blood, and she can turn it into cutting weapons or use it to scab over her own wounds. She's dangerous, and the more blood is shed in a fight, the worse it is."
I nodded. "Take her out quickly, then?"
"Maybe," Cassie said. "I'm not going to tell you what strategies to use."
"So, three more?"
"Spree can spawn temporary clones. A few dozen at a time is about the max, because they devolve rather quickly."
"But I bet they can all bleed," I said.
"Ah," Rachel said, getting my point.
"And take up space and get in the way," Cassie said. "Him, combined with Vex, mean that if you give them time it's going to be hard to get through to them. She can make a large number of tiny, razor-like forcefields to add up to a hostile version of a regular forcefield. There's jokes online about her power being barbed wire," Cassie admitted.
I bit my lip. That sounded pretty dire, but thus far none of them sounded like they were going to be immune to what a few well-placed bugs and giant dogs could deal with.
"Any others?"
"Finally, there's Reaver. He's stronger than he should be, but more importantly, if he strikes someone fast enough, even with something he's wielding," Cassie said. "They can start to disintegrate. It works better on objects than people, but he has killed enemies before."
I nodded, glancing over at Rachel. "What do you think?"
"We can beat them," Rachel said.
I considered that for a moment. It was a mistake to be too confident. But…
It was also a mistake not to project as much confidence as you could muster. "I think so too. Let's do it."
******
A/N: Thanks to @NemoMarx. I start Grad School tomorrow.
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- Location
- Wörms, the half continent
So, Taylor is slipping into her bugs, Parian has control issues, Lisa is playing every side against each other (probably at Coil's behest), and a battle with the Teeth is about to go down.
Things are certainly ramping back up again.
On the nice side: Pelter and Rachel are getting along better and that's nice.
Things are certainly ramping back up again.
On the nice side: Pelter and Rachel are getting along better and that's nice.
- Location
- New Yor\k
Merchants
cold OR bold
random extra punctuation
ever
handed?
your (Taylor is talking to Greg about him taking a formula, saying "my life" seems uncharacteristically self-centered.)
hell
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Fixed.
- Location
- Australia
*Squints*
Looks at The Laurent
*Squints some more*
I'll presume that wasn't deliberate for now, cause that was really, really, really, baaad.
So, I'm thinking it'll be plan 'Biblical Plague', with support by way of Flachete/Pelter on Dogs, who are van sized if anyone gets close.
- Location
- Malaysia
pantherasapiens
you were always my best friend
- Location
- somewhere over your shoulder
Weeeeeeeeeell I see Intimate Healing works
- Location
- North Carolina
Possible foreshadowing of Amp's power having a master effect?
I hate to make the obvious joke but I will.
It amuses me Taylor is so stubborn that if she relents at any point people think Master effect. It's completely possible that is the case though.
- Location
- Christchurch, NZ
Eh, what's a little mastering between friends?
I have never agreed with Taylor as much as I do now.
Well you saw how moody she got the instant Parian took a bit of control away, it's pretty in character
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Soo! Other thoughts?
- Location
- Wörms, the half continent
How long has it been since Levi? It's kinda unclear. I'm guessing a month, given that the teeth would usually be nomading elsewhere in a week, but I'm not entirely sure.
- Pronouns
- They/Them
It's earlier than that.
Remember, Taylor had a B-Day earlier, and it's only a few days after that. The Rabid Arc Timeline is up, and so Rabid ends on June 6th, with Levi attacking on the 26th.
(54, there's still a lot of people not here yet?)
- Location
- Wörms, the half continent
The teeth must have arrived in town nigh simultaneously with Levi's departure, then.
- Location
- Somewhere!
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Also, you both mean Behemoth. Unless I've gone crazy.
- Location
- Australia
It was Behe-
Ah, thank you. I thought it was. Also, Imp'd.
With Taylor going around unmasked, I wonder if the PRT found out her mom's past. She has an all female team and when she had the chance to recruit a male she sent him to the Wards. We know the reasons thanks to the chapter but the PRT can't read her mind. The PRT could follow canon's example and think Taylor is up to a lot more then she is.