Disclaimer: Neither WantonConstruct nor I own Worm. Worm is the property of Wildbow.
About a year ago, I started running a Weaver Dice Campaign where my players replaced the canon Travelers with their own merry band of mercenaries. What followed was the greatest case of emergent gameplay and character development we'd ever seen, and the player who played Crown ended up starting a novelization on SB.
This is a crosspost to to provide readers of Convergence Theory with some nuance and understanding of the setting Convergence Theory!Taylor originates from.
The man lying on the couch began to stir slightly from his sleep. He groaned as he opened his eyes and adjusted his vision. His limbs still felt heavy with sleep. As he fixed his gaze up at the ceiling fan and adjusted to consciousness, the first of many questions floated across his mind.
Where am I?
He tried to remember what had happened.
BLAM
He tried to anticipate the gunman's actions, knocking the barrel of the pump action sawed-off shotgun away rom his head. The adrenaline running through his system certainly helped increase his reaction time. He succeeded for the most part, but the shot still grazed him on the right side of his torso. He felt the outside part of lower two ribs on his right side crunch and shatter as the deer slug tore its way through.
The pain was incredible, even after being deadened by the adrenaline. The shock of the impact overrode the natural reaction to scream. He recovered just as the gunman chambered the next round. About a yard from me, no room to dodge, no cover to duck behind, and he's standing in front of the doorway. Fuck everything.
The gunman leveled the shotgun once more.
Shit.
He reached out to redirect the barrel once more
BLAM
This time he was less successful. The second shot broke his collarbone and exited through his back, just knicking the shoulderblade on the way out. Through no small miracle, he did not fall backward. Letting his right arm hang uselessly at his side, he found the strength to swing his left arm at his attacker, barely remembering through the pain to make a fist.
It connected with his attacker's neck, and carried enough force to stagger the foe. The gunman's next shot fired without being aimed.
BLAM
CUNT FUCK SHIT FUCKING SON OF A TWO DOLLAR WHORE
His mind screamed obscenities while his mouth made little more sound than a bloody gurgle. The third shot hit on the inside of his right thigh, and bounced off the femur before exiting, breaking it in the process. Losing balance, he fell forwards against the wall near the doorframe, impacting his already injured right side. The pain from that impact was not nearly as intense as he'd expected however. Which meant he was losing blood, and quickly.
"You're a tenacious fuck, I'll give you that," the assailant said as he primed the weapon once more.
As the gunman took aim once more, the injured man played his last card. Using all the remaining strength he had, he kicked out with his good leg at the leading knee of his opponent, and fell backwards. The shot did not hit center mass.
Instead the impact caused the barrel of the gun to redirect to his left arm.
BLAM
The round smashed straight through the middle of his left upper arm, shattering the bone and nearly severing the limb entirely. He landed on his back, coughing up a fresh glob of blood from the impact.
The gunman moved to stand over his defeated opponent, kicking the fractured limb just for good measure. He leaned over. "Was it worth it? Trying to be a fucking hero?"
A gurgle and a stare was the response he got.
"Well, this is what you fucking get for it. I'd finish you off, but I don't want to waste the round. Just because you chose to die rather tell me where he's hiding doesn't mean I can't still find him. Have fun
bleeding out."
The gunman closed the door behind him.
I can't fucking die here thought the injured man. He felt himself losing more blood by the second, and his limbs were failing to respond to instructions. He tried to work his right hand closer to his pocket with his phone in it, try to call 911. Just….a little...closer...ow….
His vision began to darken and blur even more. He briefly recalled reading somewhere that the process of actually dying is peaceful, and the brain releases various endorphins and hormones to make the process suck less. Apparently his brain missed that memo; all he felt was rage, fear, and despair.
If only he'd been a little quicker, a little closer, along with a million other little things.
Fuck...you…..I….refuse…...to….
I'm fucking dead. I bled out and I died.
He rubbed his eyes again, and tried to come to terms with the conclusion. It didn't work; the anger merely intensified. He looked around at the dilapidated room he found himself in. The paint was peeling off the walls at the ceiling and floor, and there was a strange odor present that he couldn't place.
So, this probably isn't hell, and I'm not about to call it heaven, so that makes it purgatory? It'd explain why my arm is back in place.
His thoughts drifted back to the gunman. He found it strange that he couldn't recall the man's face, even though it wasn't hidden. One would think that'd be a detail I'd remember. He did recall that the man was big; about 3 inches taller than him, and looked to be around 60 pounds heavier. Considering he himself stood 6'4" and weighed 210 pounds, that was saying something.
He felt the residual anger welling up once more. The strange odor intensified, and was soon joined by the smell of burning plastic. Where the fuck is that coming from?
He looked down at his left hand, which was curled into a fist resting on the faux-leather cushion.
Ok that's new.
His fist was wreathed in some sort of purple flame, and arcs of electricity danced about inside the substance. He stared at it in disbelief, lifting it off the couch so he wouldn't continue to melt the couch. Ok, seriously what the fuck. What is this?
He studied it a little more. It almost looks like those little plasma doohickeys you buy in museums and-
He stopped, putting two and two together. Alright. I have plasma around my hand for some reason. Now how do I g-
Almost as soon as he formed the thought, the effect was dismissed. That's pretty handy.
A few minutes of trial and error later, he found that he could shape and concentrate the effect with relative ease around either hand, and more generally, wherever on his body he wished. It didn't feel draining to conjure or dismiss the effect, and took little concentration to maintain it.
He stood up from the couch and stretched a bit, then felt something in his pocket. A wallet. And a phone. He reached down and pulled everything out, and began inspecting the contents, laying them out on a nearby coffee table. The phone's date read April 6th, 2011.
Driver's license. Social security card. Passport card. $500 in 100s, $300 in 50s, $200 in 20s. And a folded up note. He picked up the license first. 'Olrikssen, Gabriel Edgar.' That's doesn't sound right. At least I don't...think….so….
He looked at it a few moments longer before realization hit him like a frieght train.
I can't remember my own fucking name. I actually don't know what it should be. Holy fucking shit. He tried to recall other personal details and found himself wanting in every category. Date of birth, age, family, relatives, friends, birthplace, neighborhoods, homes, girlfriends, schools, field trips, road trips, etc. Nothing. He couldn't recall a single detail about any personal experience he might have had.
Including the identity of the person who's hiding place he died trying to protect.
Even stranger, there were personal details he could recall; he knew which foods he liked and disliked, and what they tasted like, despite not being able to remember a single instance of eating them. He could recall the songs he liked, musicians and bands he was a fan of, movies and books he enjoyed, all without being able to recall any act of actually listening to or seeing or reading anything.
What the fuck. What the fuck, what the fuck, what the flying fuck. 'Gabriel' felt his heart rate quicken, and felt a wave of existential terror washing over him. More alarmingly, he also felt a sheen of plasma begin to form along his neck and shoulders, down to his forearms. He shook his head and concentrated on dismissing the power. He decided to read the note.
Hello Gabriel. Welcome back to the land of the living, specifically Brockton Bay, MA.
Few men receive second chances at life.
What will you do with yours?
P.S. a warning: your personality is mostly intact, but your temper
is notably shorter, and the consequences of losing it are
…considerable.
So I'm not dead. I've just been sewn back together again...somehow...and now can bathe myself in purple fire. Not sure what to make of the second part.
Gabriel walked over to the bathroom and washed his face to try and calm himself down. True to the note's warning, he was feeling an unusual level of anger, although it was understandable. He'd had a man succeed in killing him for all intents and purposes. All the experiences that made up his life had been wrenched from him; the man he was before effectively dead not only to the rest of the world, but to himself.
The shirt he was wearing was slightly burnt from the earlier outburst, so he took it off and ran it under the water for a bit to try and remove some bits of charred material, and deaden the smell. There was one last surprise for him; on his left shoulder there was a sizable tattoo; a large stylized letter 'C'. Branded like a goddamn bronco to boot. Awesome.
He felt a fresh wave of anger wash over him once more, before a small thunderclap followed the sound of a hard explosive impact shook him. He jumped, looking down at the fresh pool of molten linoleum tiling, in the general direction of where his hand was pointing. It looked rather deep, cut about 5 inches into the floor. Need to be far more careful, then, he thought. Time to get some food anyway.
Look at these clowns, the man in the yellow costume thought to himself. He was watching the infamous duo of Uber and Leet mid-job, biding his time for the opportune moment to strike. Currently they were fighting several handfuls of Merchants on enemy turf. And losing. The pair of villains had a earned quite a bad reputation over time, as almost every single crime they pulled backfired, or simply failed.
Impulse watched as Uber and Leet tried in vain to stay on-script and hold back the now sizable tide of encroaching gangsters. Impulse sighed to himself. Taking on this many guys at once. Really? Cape or no cape, you're gonna have a bad time, especially when half those guys are probably on PCP to boot.
Given their absolutely dismal rate of success, one had to wonder how they stayed active in the first place. There were several factors to consider when answering that question, the first of which was their fanbase. Most of the time, when people commit crimes, it's in the perpetrators' interests to make it quiet. This particular villain pair did exactly the opposite; grandstanding the entire time and live broadcasts for fuck's sake. Even though they had an abysmal success rate, the ad revenue from their fans kept them afloat. One should never underestimate the draw power of good old fashioned schadenfreude.
In addition, each and every job they undertook was performed with a video game theme in mind. Grand Theft Auto, Mario Bros., the Zelda franchise, and so on and so forth. In fact, watching them work, one quickly comes to the conclusion that staying in-character and in-theme is higher priority than actually succeeding with whatever theft or robbery was being perpetrated.
This week, the pair had gone for a Fallout theme. Uber was dressed as an Enclave soldier in modified power armor, while Leet opted for the a reinforced ranger duster. Both had stun guns modeled after laser rifles. Their target this week was the Merchant's 'caps, jet, and psycho.' Unfortunately for them, they'd underestimated how much resistance due to sheer manpower they were going to encounter. After about 5 minutes, the pair were signing off in full retreat.
Impulse had located the getaway vehicle, and stood waiting just out of sight, his entire body coiled like a spring. The live broadcast had cut short, and he estimated it would be roughly 90 seconds before Leet rounded the corner. He was after one thing and one thing only; the Pip-boy 3000 replica that Leet had constructed. Definitely could try and hawk that for a pretty penny; certainly know of a few people who'd be more than willing to part with upwards of $1500 just for the novelty of the thing.
Massive clanking footsteps told Impulse his quarry had arrived. Leet paused for breath while Uber began removing his armor.
Now.
Impulse kicked off, accelerating nigh instantaneously to his top speed, a bright blue stream trailing him. Leet had no time at all to react as Impulse lunged and tackled him to the ground. The armor Leet was wearing prevented the blow from outright breaking several ribs, but he was no doubt going to be sore for several days after the fact. After the initial impact, the pair skidded for several yards along the concrete, the NCR leather duster taking the brunt of the damage.
During the skid, Impulse had set about removing Leet's Pip-boy; it was secured very simply in fact. Only clamped around his arm by rudimentary mechanical locks in two places. Impulse had it removed in all of 2.3 seconds. Of course, to him, it felt more like 10, but then again, he was the speedy one. Pip-Boy in hand, he was effectively home free.
Taking off down the street, he ducked in and out of several side streets, changing direction almost at random. Even if they had been following him from the start in a vehicle, even with Uber's ability to pick up any talent on a whim and hone it to peak-human levels in minutes, they wouldn't be able to catch him. Some of the streets and alleys were simply too narrow for a car to fit through, and Uber's power didn't let him break the laws of physics.
Impulse however, could. He took another hard turn and the blur behind him kinked at a perfect right angle.
He took a few more precautions to make sure that there was no possibility of being tailed, and triple checked to make sure he was in one of the CCTV blind spots before removing his costume. As he returned to his apartment, he inspected his new ill-gotten bauble. Looks like it could work well enough. Alright mister thingy, lets see how much potential buyers think you're worth.
Johnny had gotten about halfway through drafting up a description when the device's screen emitted a loud *pop*. Recovering from the initial shock, Johnny inspected the device. Sure enough, the screen had been destroyed completely, along with what looked like the motherboard. The casing of the device also had a few nasty cracks in it.
Whether intentionally or not (Leet's power limitation meant many of his devices failed in spectacular fashion should they resemble too closely something he's previously constructed), the Pip boy was rendered worthless.
Goddammit. Fuck. There goes my afternoon. He sat back, feeling more than a little annoyed. Welp, time is money, time to find a plan B.
"Quite a disappointing result indeed, Mr. Quick."
Johnny nearly fell out of his chair. He righted himself, and studied his new guest. She was a vaguely mediterranean woman, possibly late 20s to early 30s, dressed in a tailored suit and fedora, holding a briefcase. When she spoke, her voice was eerily neutral, with no hints of an accent of any kind. Johnny began speaking in a rapid, panicked manner.
"...How'd you get in my house?" he asked tentatively.
"If I was here to kill you, you'd already be dead," she said. She spoke with a pointed assurance that was characteristic of someone completely confident in their abilities. Either she's serious, or she's got the world's best poker face, thought Johnny. He was inclined to believe the former. And she still didn't answer my question.
"What do you want from me then?" he asked.
"That is the wrong question. I will ask you the right one. What do you desire in this world?"
Johnny thought for a second.
12.9 seconds. New personal best. Johnny was panting a bit with the effort. Not bad for a freshman.
The good feeling did not last very long. He could almost hear the dismissive voice of his mother as if she were standing next to him. 'One in a million even have a chance to be decent. You're definitely not that one.' Yeah, fuck you too mom. She'd never supported him through any of his efforts, and that pattern didn't change when he started to show an interest in track & field. But his mother's active discouragement in most instances was preferable to his father's silence.
His mother held a managerial position at the DMV. His father had been collecting benefits for the past 18 months after losing his position at the steel mill. They were average people living average lives for Buffalo, NY, and they did their damndest to make sure Johnny knew what life had in store for him. Disappointment was a bitter, bitter, pill to swallow. Hopefully reduced expectations could reduce the inevitable pain. That was the plan, anyway.
Truth be told, Johnny did have a bit of a penchant for running. At least the results of last couple of meets were telling him so. He'd placed at worst 4th in each one, and won two of them. One of those wins was against a senior, he remembered.
It didn't matter. His parents wouldn't give him credit for it. They'd point out that the competition he was facing locally was crap; that he'd get wrecked in the county and state level competitions.
Which was sort of true in hindsight. He'd made it to the state qualifiers in his freshman year, but didn't get anywhere past that. Sophomore and junior years went better, but Johnny still failed to place at the state level tournament. The only thing that pissed him off more than losing was the face his mother made; the face that said 'I told you so.' He couldn't stand it.
He practiced even harder in his senior year. He told himself that he wouldn't lose. He couldn't lose. He had to prove his parents wrong.
Perhaps somewhat unsurprisingly, his desire to win caused him to take some rather unnecessary risks. During April of that year, one of those risks would end his career; he refused to stop training despite the arrival of a violent lightning storm.
The bolt struck his spine, and he collapsed onto the ground mid stride. Strangely enough, the impact of the strike on his back almost didn't hurt at all. Johnny laid on the ground a few more moments in relief before the realization hit him.
I can't feel my legs. I can't move them
I'm paralyzed. I'm motherfucking PARALYZED.
A lifetime's worth of despair hit him like a tidal wave. Everything that he'd been working for was taken from him in that lapse of judgement. It was gone.
Then came the pain. He felt as if he'd been stabbed in the dead center of every muscle in his legs. Lightning streaked across the sky, illuminating an impossibly huge figure. It appeared to move through itself in mind-boggling rotations, shifting and morphing in a nauseating fashion. And it was massive; galaxies would have been like cells in comparison, spanning distances that were simply too large to contemplate.
And as quickly as the pain and visions came, they were gone. Johnny tried to move his lower body once more, and found that not only did it respond, but he felt alive in a way that he'd never felt before. He got up, and felt the urge to run; the destination didn't matter. He took off, at a speed not attainable by normal humans. He matched cars on the highway.
He was going to keep running, and never look back.
The woman waited patiently for Johnny's response while he contemplated.
"Its going to sound like a bad cliche, but I wanna be in control of my own future, damn it. I spent most of my life listening to people tell me what I can't do. Fuck that noise."
The woman nodded, then handed over the suitcase she was carrying.