Sometimes when you fight the impossible, you just end up losing. In this case, losing meant that I was going to die. I knew this fact was true, as surely as I knew my name was Taylor. But even as I made the connection that death awaited me, something else occupied my thoughts. You know that old saying, "Your life flashing before your eyes"? Yeah, talk about corny.
Hundreds of people have claimed that it's true though; people who've survived against Endbringers or other disasters like the Nine. I never thought it was real, thought it was just some made up phrase that gets overused. Now, in this exact moment...
Well suffice to say, I wasn't prepared for what it would be like.
Time seemed to have slowed down, moving at a glacial pace as I lost myself in memories. They came at different speeds, slowing down in moments that I could still remember, skimming past the days where nothing happened. Some came even though I thought them lost; the sound of my mother's voice. A family vacation when me and Emma were still friends, a few other things. Not all of them happy, especially the later years. It all changed after my mother passed away, and Emma began to bully me.
Emma and the rest of her new friends featured prominently. I must have spent ages remembering every time they hurt me. Then came the worst day of my life, the day I got my powers. At the same moment the memories all seemed to warp. Smaller images picked up where I could remember using my powers, memories of the things I saw through my bugs. It followed through to the latest week or so.
As Lung's hand (more paw than anything resembling human) made its way towards my face, I remembered.
"What's the matter Taylor? I think purple looks great on you." The snickering of Emma's two friends echoed in the small bathroom stall. It was bad luck that they had found me during lunch, I knew they were building up to something all day. Their laughter and mirth hit me like a kick in the gut. No. What hurt the most was the deep cutting blade of betrayal every time Emma did something to hurt me. That sting never faded.
These three had turned what should have been a normal high school experience into something akin to hell. Today they had trapped me in the very stall I was hiding in, and then drenched me in soda and juice. I could see it dripping on my glasses, and the open bag on the seat behind me must have been utterly drenched.
"At least if she smells like grape, no one will notice her stench!" Madison cried in between her choking laughter. "Oh wait, everybody already knows how bad she stinks, shuts down the whole school with how gross it is."
That was their fault, not mine. I rose taller, about to defend myself, mouth opening; when Sophia chose that moment to shove me down. I was already stuck in the tiny stall, so I could only fall into the large puddle of orange and purple that was on the floor.
"Shove it, loser. Don't even bother talking, all you do is sound like an idiot." Sophia sneered at me, as tears began to well in my eyes. With how easy the morning had been so far, I had been hoping they wouldn't attack me today, at least not emotionally. It seems that my luck had run dry though. I was fighting myself not to burst out crying, or to allow the piles of bugs in the walls and vents a chance to break free of my iron control.
"Shit, lunch is almost over. C'mon, I wanna bum a smoke from someone before it ends." As quickly as that, they were gone.
A moment passed, before I quietly began to cry. Tears ran down my face, they tasted faintly like the soda that had been sprayed on me. I stood to gather my bag, before falling back down as I began to shake. Not from the sadness, although I was crying. It was mostly from the amount of effort it took to hold back Swarm. It took a long moment, and someone even walked in the bathroom and saw me. It was only after they left too that I was able to stand and lock the door. Instantly Swarm was there, stepping close to me for a hug.
Most people wouldn't want to hug an amorphous cloud of insects. Even if that didn't turn the average gal away, the fear of thousands of flies, ants or mosquitoes biting you would be scary. Not to me though, and not with Swarm. He was completely under my control, except when he was given the limited free will I was capable of giving him.
In truth, Swarm was just a collection of bugs I had assembled and given a name. It probably said a lot about my current mental state; that for last few months, my best friend was a horde of insects which bent to my every whim. At this moment, that whim was a hug and a shoulder to cry on. Swarm was eager to accept that.
One of the good things about a mass of insects shifting over and around your face was that they made great cleaners. With the door locked behind me and the bell that signalled the end of lunch ringing I knew I wouldn't be disturbed anytime soon. Swarm continued his unspoken mission, and within moments most of the soda was cleaned off of me and my things. It didn't bring back my project that was sitting in my bag, now completely ruined, but it gave me a shred of dignity back.
"Okay. I guess I'll just go back to class, late. And missing the midterm project that was due today. Shit," I said to myself. Another wave of despair washed over me, before fading quickly. "Fuck this, and fuck Emma. I'm going home." Decision made, I left the bathroom and made my way out of the school and towards the bus stop.
It was easy, almost too easy, to just skip half the day. I told myself that it wouldn't happen again, no matter how bad it got. Yet the Friday night had gotten to me, the crisp air beckoned my bugs and I was having a bad day. Even on the bus ride home I knew what my two days off would entail. The rest of Friday would be completing my setup, finalising some plans and then finally, finally, I felt I would be ready for my debut. A weekend to make my mark, a new cape in the Bay. Once I had a name for myself (and wow, I still hadn't come up with a name yet), I would join the Wards, get into Arcadia and never see the likes of Emma again.
The trip home was rather quiet, giving me time to think. A few people gave me odd looks and one person asked me if I had school, but the simple excuse of a doctor's appointment was enough to ease their suspicion. In Brockton Bay (especially in the half of the city where I lived), you don't just bother someone on their business. Almost anybody could be a gangbanger in disguise, or if your luck was worse, someone with powers like me.
They had appeared suddenly, without warning, several decades ago. People with abnormal abilities all came out of the woodwork at were human, but also more. They had what others did not. They were called Parahumans. Capes, if they used their powers in public. A few parahumans shared their story, of how they went through some traumatising event that changed them and how they had powers ever since. Many did not.
I now knew that events such as those were ultimately devastating. Moments where one thinks they will die, or are so mentally scarring that they break in the most horrible of ways. I know, because it happened to me.
The ultimate betrayal of your best friend can do that to you. Not on it's own, but over the course of two years of physical and mental abuse? The targeted attacks against me, cutting at my insecurities I had once entrusted to a close friend? Those hurt.
The past year had been the worst yet, with high school starting and not a day going by where the same three girls, Madison, Sophia and Emma, all made my life a nightmare. Shoving me down stairs, smearing paint or other substances over my possessions, theft, name-calling, insults, spreading lies about me in the school- it was all fair game to them. I thought it was bad when they stole my mother's flute one time, only to find a note explaining it was buried in piles of animal feces. It was defiled, a broken reminder of the torture they could inflict on me. I still had it, cleaned over and over again but never losing that disgusting smell. It never lost the reminder of what they had done to it; to me.
Then, the day I got my powers. When a horrible prank went too far, with no proof who did it. The school was shut down so it could be sterilized, and fumigated. Thousands of insects had made their way into the school once I unlocked my powers, answering my call for somebody, anybody to rescue me. I only remembered flashes of the locker, filled with things worse than the flute was. I spent a week in the hospital because of those three girls, and they didn't suffer a thing for it.
Ever since, I was able to freely control the bugs. It was a huge power, compared to a regular person. In the cape scene, heroes and villains fought with whatever they had. The things I could do with the bugs amazed me, and made me afraid. Afraid I would use it against Emma, ruin the small part of myself that screamed "You did nothing wrong," and destroy my life before it could improve.
The locker incident had broken the rest of me that was still fighting. I had nothing left, I was but an insect in the grand scheme of things. I had no roads before me. To die without making an impact was my destiny, like a mosquito that never even got a chance to bite. Getting those abilities made me realize that there was another path, something to look forwards to. I was powerful now, and damn if Emma took that away from me too. My goal, to work hard until I became what was once a childhood dream, a dream that almost died at the hands of Emma. To become a superhero.