Worm is owned by Wildbow, and Exalted is owned by White Wolf Games Studio.
"This is talking."
This is thinking.
(These are technical terms being fed by Taylor's Exaltation)
Charms/Artifact Names
/
"Oh, hey dad," I said, taking off my now redundant glasses and looking at him. "How was work?"
"Normal," he replied curtly. "Don't change the subject. You were standing staring into space and ignoring the world for at least the last 10 minutes, and then you grow crystals out of your forehead and wake up. Your hair has changed colour, your skin is paler, and you've filled out from this morning. Don't get me wrong, the new look is amazing. But. What. Happened. To. You?"
"Dad, I'm fine. In fact, I feel better than I have been in a long time. Here, read this," I said, handing him the letter written in English. "When I got home, there was a package on the table. These letters were inside, and there was a crystal in the box. When I touched the crystal, I Trig-" (Exalted) "-Exalted. I know the letter doesn't explain much, but that bit about the 'Manifold versions'? I think that has something to do with the theory of Multiple Earths. Kind of like how Earth Aleph is a version of our world, just without capes. Whomever sent that to me must be able to see multiple worlds, and must know there is something big coming. And that I'm going to be in a place to affect the outcome? Gah, too many variables," I continued, before taking the letter back again and blinking. I could read the symbols at the bottom.
"Divine Minister Kadmek? Humble sounding guy. Anyway, don't worry about me getting hurt. At the moment, most of my powers are based around gathering information, so I'm not going out to be a hero any time soon. First, I have a lot of research to do before I even think of going out, some training to do, and equipment to buy. And a bank account – I can boost my intelligence, one of my charms gives me high speed internet access with my mind, and another called an Imprinted Data Cluster allows me to temporarily become a specialist in anything I choose. With them, I should be able to make some money on the share market. It'll be a fine line between making enough money to be useful, and not tripping any Tinker/Thinker protection they have, though. But I'll make you a promise – I'll fully armour up before patrolling, I'll let you know every time I go out, and I'll get a phone so I can contact you if I need to. Oh, and I'm claiming the basement. I'll clean it out, and use it as a workshop."
"Uhh. And that... stuff growing out of you? Won't people notice?" Dad said, looking somewhat out of depth from my explanation.
"As for my Charms, watch this." I said, activating my Integrated Artefact Transmogrifier with a smile, causing all overt signs of my Exaltation to neatly slide beneath my skin with a ticklish feeling and my dad to gape in surprise. "Hehehe, you look overwhelmed by it all. Tell you what, you sit down and I'll cook dinner. I want to see how my Charms interact with real-world situations."
It turns out using Augments while cooking makes Spaghetti Bolognese taste amazing.
/
As the next day was Saturday, I spent it cleaning out the basement. It was easier than I expected – being nearly inexhaustible and able to easily carry over a hundred pounds helped. Once that chore was finished, I spent an hour opening myself to the martial arts katas stored in my Sixth Dexterity Augmentation before returning upstairs to clean up. Looking at myself in the mirror as I stepped out of the shower, I realised dad was right. I did look amazing. Gone was the spindly, plain looking teenager. My hair had changed from brown to a jet black that had very dark green undertones in the right light. My skin had paled, becoming almost alabaster. My eyes had changed to the same dark green as the undertones in my hair, my lips were a shocking ruby red, my body was lined with strips of some black metal (soulsteel), and an oval gem the same colour as my hair in the centre of my forehead. And I had curves now. While the whole effect was somewhat eerie, and very gothic, it worked.
Hmmm. I need a new wardrobe. Yet another thing to add to the list. I thought, looking at myself for a few more seconds before dressing, grabbing a notebook from my room and then heading downstairs.
Dad was sitting in the living room, watching a documentary about capes. He looked over as I approached.
"Hey kid," he said.
"Hey Dad," I replied, moving to the couch and lying down with my notebook on my chest. "Interesting show?" I asked.
"Kind of, in an 'Oh crap, what has my daughter gotten herself into?' kind of way," he replied. "I knew capes had amazing powers, but some of them are something else. According to this show, one of the local gang leaders, Lung, fought Leviathan on even terms once? Are you sure you want to do this? Fight people like him, the Endbringers, the Slaughterhouse Nine, or whatever?"
"Yes, dad. How does that Earth Aleph quote go? With great power comes great responsibility? I want to use this power to protect people. Anyway, wouldn't you rather I told you about this instead of going behind your back?"
"Why not join the Wards, then?"
"I probably will, though that will be one of the topics I will be researching. I want to see how they treat their members, how they pay, what the local Wards are like before I join, and what sort of support they provide. Things like that. Anyway, even if I don't join the Ward's I'll co-operate with the police and PRT."
"Oh, well then. You seem to have thought it through, though I do still say you should go to a hospital or something."
"Yep. I have. And dad, I'm fine."
We then lapsed into a comfortable silence, Dad watching TV while I used my Metanural Upload Link to surf the internet for information on the local parahumans, cape laws, and anything else that grabbed my attention. The experience was fun, if somewhat weird, with the cursor and windows flitting around my vision by concentrating on them.
Sunday was spent shopping for new clothes, and then experimenting with my powers. It turned out that when I swap charms, I lose most of my powers for five hours per charm I swap, while it only takes an hour of lost power to change the information in my Imprinted Data Cluster.
The next week was school. After jogging to school, I spent the day with a live feed of the stock market in the top right of my vision, where I watched it and tried to work out any patterns I could exploit. I also avoided the banes of my life, namely my ex-best friend Emma Barnes, and her friends Sophia Hess and Madison Clements, excluding a few times that I used to start to bait a trap I was setting up. Due to my improved abilities, this was significantly easier than before my Exaltation. Of course, my newly improved senses made it easier to hear the whispers behind my back about my changed appearance. "Boob job" got bandied about a fair bit, as did "Emo Freak". Still, it was somewhat less than what I have had to deal with over the previous year and a bit, so, while hurtful, I ignored it. Evenings were spent training, researching, and planning, as was the next weekend.
It was during this time, I found that I had two pools of (essence), one large (peripheral essence pool) and one small (personal essence pool). Spending a couple of (motes) of the larger pool caused my soulgem and any active charms to start glowing. Spend more, and the glow (anima banner) gets brighter, my Charms start emitting smoke streaked with dark green lightning, ghostly faces and handprints appear in the souslteel of my body, and I start leaving flakes of soulsteel behind. Eventually, the smoke coalesces into my (Iconic banner): a mechanical Lady Justice that follows my movements. It then takes several hours for the glow to recede completely. I'm glad that I had blackened out the windows of the basement before trying that experiment, because the glow is bright. Like, spotlight in an empty field on a moonless night bright.
By Sunday, I was sure enough of myself to start buying my first shares. I picked out the shares I wanted, and used a website to set it up so that they were bought as soon as trading opened on Monday. Most of the shares I bought were ones I expected to make a good earning quite quickly, though I did promise myself to spend some of my money on shares that would stabilise, if not improve, Brockton Bay's economy.
Monday was school again. Unlike last week, as I started to approach the locker room I smelt a horrible stench in the air. With a grimace, I channelled a small surge of essence to activate the metal nerves that made up my Fifth Dexterity Augmentation. While not enough to cause the Charm to start sparking, it was enough to make me noticeably more graceful as I glided into the locker room and approached my locker, concentrating on my surroundings. It was full of rotting garbage, as I had expected as soon as I smelt the miasma. Had I not been Exalted, the stench would have probably caused me to vomit. As it was, I used one of the benefits of my altered state and just stopped breathing. As I stood there, looking in my locker in disgust, I heard someone running behind me. Neatly stepping to one side, my unexpected reaction caused Sophia to stumble and put her hands into – through – the mess. As I saw this, my eyes narrowed.
Sophia just phased through stuff. I thought. From my research, the only local parahuman who can do that is one of the Wards, Shadow Stalker. Well, that explains a few things. They've been protecting the school Ward. I wonder if the PRT knows?
Leaning down to pick Sophia up, I whispered in her ear. "I saw that, Shadow Stalker. Play along, or else." I got a glare in response, confirming my theory.
"Why Sophia, thanks for trying to stop me from falling in. It's almost like you knew about this in advance. You're a real hero." I said, loud enough for the crowd that had gathered to hear, using my First Manipulation Augmentationto thread a touch of essence through my words, giving them the right intonation to sway the crowd to my side. This caused most of the crowd laugh, and Emma to twitch at the emphasis I put on the word "hero". Strangely, my essence pool refilled slightly as the crowd reacted.
And that explains much of the rest. That boost of essence was interesting, though. Think about it later. I thought, as I saw her reaction.
"I'm sure you'll continue the good deeds and help me clean this crap up, right Sophia?" I continued.
"Yes." Came the grudging, hate filled response.
"I'll help too," chimed Emma.
"No thanks. Sophia may be an evil sadist, but at least she never betrayed me. Hey, Mr Gladly," I said, dismissing her and looking at a teacher who had just walked over to see what the disturbance was, and causing another laugh from the crowd. Though, as I turned away I noticed a look of hurt on her face that I needed to spend another mote of essence through my First Manipulation Augmentation to over-ride my reaction, and control it nothing more than an internal "Huh?" and a promise to think over what the hell I had just seen.
"Is something the matter, Taylor?" the teacher said as he approached, grimacing as the smell hit him.
"Oh, nothing much. Someone filled my locker full of... stuff. Sophia has been kind enough to offer to help me clean it up. You know where we can get some garbage bags and gloves from?" I replied, with Sophia shooting me another glare.
"Umm, sure," he said, raising an eyebrow as he looked at Sophia glaring at me, obviously wondering how I had managed to pull that off. "You can speak to the janitor to get bags and gloves. I'll write out a pass so that you two can go back home and clean up after this."
"Great!" I replied. Turning to Sophia, I said "Thanks for your help, hero. You mind coming with me to get gloves so we can clean this stuff up?"
"Fine." She ground out in reply, following me as I shut my locker and walked away. The crowd, seeing the show was obviously over and wanting to get away from the smell, started to filter away.
I didn't say anything as we walked towards the janitor's office, letting her stew while I thought over what I wanted. Yes, it was petty, but hey, she had just tried to trap me in a locker. We returned to my locker just as the bell for first period rang.
After a few minutes of silently shovelling the garbage out of my locker into the bag, Sophia exploded.
"What the fuck do you want, Hebert?!" she all but yelled at me.
"Wow. You really do have some anger issues there, Shadow Stalker. No wonder you nearly killed that guy," I replied quietly. "Now, I'll be doing two things for you. I won't be sending emails to the heads of the local PRT, Protectorate, and Wards containing the video of you trying to push me into that locker or videos of your other attempts to bully me over this last week. I also won't be giving an anonymous interview with a number of blogs about how the Wards are aiding your campaign of terror. Even if it gets shut down, the backlash will be disastrous for you. Probably enough to get you investigated, and then sent to Juvie, from what I read on probationary Wards."
"What? How do you know about that?"
"It's amazing what's on the internet when you look hard enough. Now, as I was saying before you interrupted. I'm doing two things for you. In return, I want two things. Firstly, I want the bullying campaign against me to stop. You and your minions are also not to start on anyone else. Secondly, your Trigger event obviously broke something in you. So, you need counselling. The Wards program provides it free of charge. This is a onetime offer. Do both of these things and you'll be free to terrorise all the villains you want. Don't do one of them, and we'll see how quickly the PRT drops you. Personally, I think you should take the deal. While I hate you, and think you should be punished for the hell you put me through over this last year, your hero persona does do some good for the city. It can do more, though."
"You're bluffing. Out me, and the PRT will be on you like a tonne of bricks. And you don't have a video."
"Because outing Protectorate and Wards capes is illegal, I know. I'm not stupid enough to use your civilian name. As for the video... are you sure want to bet against that? There are several ways I could have acquired a camera to film this whole thing. Tinkers do sell their wares, some of them quiet cheaply if you know where to look." I used my final personal essence motes to make myself more believable.
"Fine. You win, Hebert. You are still weak, but you aren't prey anymore," came her reply after a few minutes of silence. I could almost feel the anger radiating off her.
Weak? Prey? Interesting responses there. More to think about later. I thought as I continued speaking.
"It's not about winning, Sophia. It's about being a decent person and doing what needs to be done to help the city," I said as I cleaned up the last of the crap from my locker, feeling giddy as the hell I had been put through was finally over. "Now, let's get those notes from Mr Gladly. I don't know about you, but I really want a shower after that."
We walked to the staff room. Well, I glided as my Dexterity Augmentation still active, and Sophia stalked her way there. As we left, I reminded Sophia of our deal, and then, due to the relief and adrenalin in my system, sprinted home. I sent a quick email to Sophia, containing a video to prove that, yes, I could take her down, and then had a quick shower and put my clothing in the wash, and jogged back to school, only stopping to buy a can of industrial strength anti-odorant for my locker.
The rest of my day went well. Sophia confined herself to death-glares, Emma kept staring at me with a wounded look, and the other girls in their clique were looking at me curiously, no doubt wondering what sort of blackmail I had over Sophia to get her to make them back off. Sure, there were probably going to be repercussions, and my plans had to change to take into account this new variable, but I didn't care. One way or another, it was over.
