Chapter 3:

Chrysalis 1.2

It's being a really hard week, though gratifying. Every night, running through the city, fighting criminals with my bare hands, forbidden to use my actual power. Everything in order to train and reinforce my self-control, focus and awareness, to keep me alive in close combat while my real skills remains undetected, diverting attention from them, making my enemies doubt about what I could or couldn't do.

Useless in my opinion, since I am a long range fighter, hardly ever seen by anyone. But, if that made dad happy, who was I to take him out of his delusion? It was just a little price to pay for him to allow me go do my thing unmolested.

The first night out was the worst. On my first real fight I got scared and made myself ethereal when surrounded, it was just for a fraction of a second, but dad noticed and scolded me, even if it wasn't technically a power. A few hours later it was on the net, and a bit latter someone figured out I had used some kind of shadowfication, so I was rewarded with 12 straight hours of energy manipulation training, which I actually like to do, followed by 12 hours of 'dodge the punch to the face', which I don't like that much. Dad was restraining himself (and I was cheating), but still, even if the hit itself would heal part of the damage dealt… every fail was painful. In retrospect I knew it was good for me, especially because I didn't want to be hit by real enemies, even more because I now understand how to fix my own injuries more or less, in a few days I'd be able to do it, maybe.

Unfortunately, dad discovered somehow that I had been keeping part of my concentration focused to keep Sophia from using her powers and scolded me again. After a heated argument I convinced him that no one knew it was me, nor it could be traced back to me, or else it would have already been by now. I promised I wont do it again (unless I really needed to), and in exchange I'll be allowed to go out on February the twelfth, if I keep training with him every afternoon until then and if I met his expectations by then.

After that, the training sessions got harder, but with more multitasking capability available to me it got easier all around. It had been only 9 days since we began, but I am quite proud of my improvement, probably I am now able to handle a one on one with one or even two gang members on my own without using my power, given enough time, mostly because I am not much of a hitter.

Tomorrow will be the first day of my new live as a brand new Arcadia high student. Hopefully I'll be able to get myself some friends or at least meet some acquaintances who don't actively try to make me break down. The PRT even got me some new books, but I'll have to catch up on my own, not that one and a half week out of school would make such a big difference, even less knowing no one will be dampening my progress. If mom were here, it would be just perfect. Maybe I should carry the flute tomorrow as a charm? No. I mustn't get too attached to it until I can use its power more safely. Besides, I was lucky enough to find it the first night after it was taken away to risk it being stolen again, even if now I am confident enough in my recently improved skills to find it again if needed.

"You still awake Kiddo? It's late and you must get up early tomorrow. Won't want to arrive late on yours first day, right? I'll wake you up at 6 so you can do your morning routine, its important to keep one's body fit, even more when you are still developing."

"Said the pot to the kettle. When was the last time I saw you do ANY exercise at all? I bet you would be troubled if you had to move the fridge on your own while we have any guest."

Dad smiled me back at that "Well, I used to when I was your age and there should be some advantages of being a martial master, right? Besides, my strength do not originate from my physical strength alone but from a combination of mental and physical discipline and self-consciousness… something you already know. Now, stop the idle chat and get asleep already. Night kiddo" silently, he closed the door, leaving to his room. Once again, I wondered what is it that he do there all night, without a computer or a simple television, not that I will try to discover it, he deserves his privacy and I wont be the one to deny him that.

OOO

I was woken up before the sun raised, dad wasn't wearing the same clothes he had on last night so he had probably taken a shower already. Half fried bacon's smell reached me when I was traveling the path to the bathroom, so I hurried in order to have breakfast while it was still hot. The hot water flowing over my body was such a nice sensation after all the exercise I did yesterday I'd stay there forever, not that I could do that, not if I wanted to have a nice hot meal and go take a run before school time.

Breakfast was nice as always, a couple of eggs, some sliced fried bacon, sausages, some toast with jam and butter, pancakes with syrup and a cup of black tea. Some would say it was a bit too much, but dad insisted I needed the calories and, since I could really do with some more fat onto my bones, there was no point in complain about it. If I was lucky enough, maybe some fatness would chose to take residence in those places where I were most lacking. That would be certainly nice, mom's woman attributes weren't that developed either, but hope is the last thing you lose... right? I had never heard about any women from dad's side of the family and there was hope there.

When I was halfway through mine dad was already done and ready to left for work. He had being under work exemption since that call from the hospital and now he had plenty of work to do. Apparently, some empire thugs had been compelling the substitute to hire more real Americans and fire those who were stealing the work from proper citizens, taking advantage of dad's absence. I truly hope they were not around when he got there. Even if they were Nazis, I wouldn't want them to have to deal with dad's stress, not knowing I was the one who got him like that. Hopefully, they will see his car parked outside and change their minds… unless they are new guys, if that's the case, dad will beat their asses back to their base, as he usually do with the new gangsters wannabe.

When I was done with the eating and the cleaning, it was already six thirty, so I got dresses with a dress dad had insisted to buy me the previous Friday. It was a long sleeved black/grey dress with little colored dots on it, and I actually liked it. Dad really had an eye for those things. It actually did quite a good job hiding how flat and skinned I was. Somehow, the poly/spandex material it was made of gave the impression that I was more…. developed on the right spots. That and the leather boots with the leggings hiding how skinny I was made me look almost cute... even if I was the only one who would probably think that. After that, I spent some time fixing my hair, no point in leaving my best quality go unattended.

By the time I was done it was already seven. I should probably ask dad to wake me up sooner, but I could still make a swift jog to school, not that I will sweat on my way there. If I got there soon enough maybe I could do some recce on site.

When I arrived to Arcadia it was already twenty past seven, so I just went straight to the principals office, stated to be on the second floor in my school guide. Really, this school give its students an actual guide with the school rules, maps and class schedules? In Winslow you got to find it by yourself if you were unlucky enough to not have any acquaintance there who already knew the place. The only complaint I could have is that I lost my phone signal once I got into school's boundaries, besides that, the place was polished conscientiously, no one was giving me more attention than the normal 'who is that' glance and there was even air conditioning units that could be seen on the roof. There was always the chance that another ward tried to bully me, but here they would probably be more cautious, and the PRT will probably be keeping an eye on me anyway. Anyhow, until they prove me wrong, I'll keep powers out of the scene within the school. It wont be fair for them to got spotted at school without any previous affront on their side.

After I got a lecture about everything I already knew from the manual, and a slightly bigger stress over the bulling part and how it wont be tolerated inside or outside of the school walls (probably something the PRT asked for), I was allowed to leave to my first class of the day. I waited outside the door for a good fifteen minutes while the teacher was explaining to my future classmates that no, the protectorate was not getting lazy with ward's identity protection because I wasn't a ward and that yes, the school actually got some people from the waiting list in from time to time, even if it was a slow process. When the matter seemed to be solved, I was called in and required to introduce myself to my class mates by an old looking white haired woman.

"Hello all, I'm Taylor Hebert and uhm... I'm glad to be allowed to meet you all and...well… I hope we all get along well?" thoughts about how laughs would fill the class accompanied by some nasty commentaries about how retarded I was filled my mind.

Instead, all I got back were some curious gazes, as if waiting for me to suddenly burst out in flames or something like that, alongside with a few smiles from them and giggles from some girls who reminded me of Madison with their childish look.

"I think you already got your books, right?" I quickly nodded to her "then take that empty seat over there so we can begin with the class."

I got into my new desk, while she was searching through some king of folder as old looking as she did herself, which was a huge change for the best from my last one, and shacked the hand that the guy there offered me. It was weird to be greeted in some way at school.

"Hi!, I'm Christopher Thomas, but you can call me Chris. Pleased to meet you, but I would like to ask you something if there is no problem with it" Tentatively I nodded him to go on, there came the other shoe as expected." How did you managed to get in here? I mean, I've heard that only when some new wards join their ranks people is allowed to join after the school year has already started, not to say in January." well, that wasn't really that bad.

"oh…. Uhm… well, pleased to meet you too and… lets say I'm not sure if I should actually talk about it?"

"Come on! I wont tell anyone, promise!" 'yea sure, you wont until you felt like betraying me' I thought, tempted to read his mind and find out what he was really thinking, but I wasn't at Winslow anymore, I had to give them the benefit of the doubt. If I was betrayed again, well, I had means to take revenge with no one being the wiser.

"Will you be satisfied if I tell you that the PTR thought I had triggered, which I hadn't, and fucked it up?"

"I knew it! Would you mind if I tell my friends it was you? There are some rumors on the net that they screw it all up badly while trying to fix Shadow stalker problem during an interview with a non-cape suspect" My new founded hope in humanity plummeted. I knew he would spread it and still gave him the information he was looking for.

"I'm not sure I want it to be spread. Please, don't tell anyone, please."

"Ok, OK, relax. I wont tell them." he said while raising his hands protectively, as if trying to placate me or calm me down "Its just that some of them would love to know. But, the second you don't care about it any more, I'm the first one to be told, deal?" tempted again, I diverted my train of thoughts, still wanting to believe that there was people trustworthy out there.

"hum… Sure?"

After that odd interaction, the professor found the page she had been looking for and began the class, with everyone pretending to be paying attention. It was revealing to see how different this place truly were. Apparently they had been told to read Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare that weekend. Most, obviously haven't. The professor had been asking questions about it to random students or asking for interpretations. Only a couple seemed personal interpretation while the others were clearly drawn from the net and memorized (or written down on cribsheets), with a bunch of them obviously being slightly variations from one another.

Chris seemed to be on the last side of the statement. He had download some pre-analysed text commentaries and was obliviously reading them from his phone. When the teacher was pleased enough about his obviously professional deconstruction of the play and got its claws on another student he turned to me and whispered me while smiling.

"I really hate this subject. Reading that book felt as if I were trying to build a nuclear reactor with only a screwdriver and some gum. Besides, she can't even see us because she hardly ever carry her glasses, you could actually take out your laptop and do the searches to answer her questions while she does them." Even with his awkward metaphor, seeing them be lazy gave all this a more mundane appearance, making it feel more like the school I knew, but righter at the same time.

OOO

After the bell rang, while packing our own stuff he asked "So, which is your next subject?"

"I think its computer science, why?" what does he want now, and why is he smiling? Maybe planing some prank? Agh... I'm doing it again, focus Taylor, focus.

"Me too, I can take you there if you want me to." I stared him straight in the eye for a few seconds until he kept talking. "Oh, well, you know, you are new here and I can play the guide for you. We only have five minutes after one class end to get to the next one and the best seats are usually taken fast."

"I… I see, that's nice of you, thanks."

Following him we reached the classroom in no time, apparently among the first ones to arrive. The class was obviously better supplied that the one back at Winslow, the computers were obviously tinker-made or very close to that. At least forty ultra-flat screens no smaller than 21" if I was right, evenly allocated around the class. The blackboard was actually a touch-sensitive projection linked to the teacher's computer if what Chris told me was true. While I was being dragged to the rear end of the room by him, someone else got inside. It was a mousy brown haired girl. I had the feeling of knowing her, but couldn't put a name to her face at the time. When she saw us, I notice recognition in her eyes, thought she said nothing to us until Chris waved his hand to her, a gesture she acknowledged and returned.

When Chris was done pulling me and we sat down he began to speak again.

"This are the best seats. When you are done with your assignment, no one will notice if you surf a little online and, if you want, I can give you a hand with yours." How nice of him. Trying to help the transferred student.

"Thanks for your offer, but I'm quite proud of my computer skills." does he seems… disappointed?

Before I could said anything else, people hurried inside followed by a thirty-something man, whom I assumed to be the teacher. He sat down and the blackboard came to life. After a fifteen minutes explanation and some guidelines he prompted us to do our assignment. It was an easy enough to program prime number generator, which would increase the final mark of the subject by 0'5 for the 5 (working) best. Apparently, he did that a lot. Having done it before just for fun, it took me just a couple of minutes to finish it confident enough about final code. Apparently, Chris had one already on his memory stick so he just needed to copy it into the computer. Cheater. But I could focus on the bright side, I had more than one hour to do whatever I wanted online since the teacher wouldn't notice it. I should show Chris some gratitude for it afterwards, he's the first person to be nice to me, without been required or forced to do so, in almost two years after all.

There was a new entry in PHO from Aegis stating that Shadow Stalker was fully recovered and back to her duties, accompanied by tons of post about their failure on locating the culprit and the fact that no statement had been made about how she got better or how she lost her powers in the first place. There were even some post suggesting that the S9 was the responsible and accusing the PRT to hide it. Not my problem, since they deserve it as a karmic retribution. Besides that, the most relevant thread today was about Uber and L33t last feat. Even without sound, it was hilarious to see, so much that I was pinched a few times by Chris to call my attention about my noisy giggles.

When the class was over, I asked Chris for some tips about the cafeteria menu, leaving after I declined his offer to introduce me to his friends. I was not ready to interact with that many people from day one, not after almost two years of hearing others' nasty thought about me. I was going to need some time to got accustomed to that place before I could make some new friends.

The rest of the day passed smoothly, Chris wasn't in my last 2 subjects and only a couple of girls made any effort to interact with me. They were nice, but lost most of their interest in me after I assured them I was not a new member of the wards who had not been yet introduced to the public, nor I was a parahuman. That afternoon went on exactly like the previous two ones, even if there was a little difference: Sophia had been stalking me all night. Dad noticed someone on the other side of the street, on top of a tree, and asked me to check it out discreetly. Apparently, they were going to be there as long as they thought we hadn't noticed. I could have called the PRT to remove Sophia from there, and ask for some compensation or a restraining order, but I didn't want her to be sent away, not yet anyway. If she was close, I would have another chance to kick her ass sooner or later. Emma was there too, which was the real problem. She was more dangerous than her little minion. I was planning to just wait and see if she kept coming too. If so, I would make a call to the PRT with my worries about how Shadow Stalker was stalking me all night, making it harder to for them to spy on me again.

OOO

My first week as a normal, if shy, high school student has almost went by and I have made some acquaintances. Maybe even a friend if I count Chris as such. From time to time he says or does something weird but, overall, he's funny and nice to be with. Today, I have agreed to meet with his friends, something I should have thought about better. He was leading me to a high populated table while a lot of other student were glaring at me with what could be understood as envy. There were 4 guys on that table and 2 girls. The issue was that one of those girls was Victoria Dallon, alias Glory Girl, with easily a dozen of cronies on her back, keeping a too short of a distance for my taste from them, gossiping. The other one was her sister, who shared one of my classes and I was in good terms with already.

"You ready Taylor?" he asked on a low voice. I obviously wasn't, but nervously gave him a signal to go on. I would have to do it sooner or latter if I wanted to have any sane-alike social life "Well guys, this is Taylor. I have already told you all about her so..." he took a pause to glare one of the boys, who was apparently going to say something but didn't. "Taylor, they are from right to left: Carlos, he's a nice and reliable guy" the boy with long black hair and a nice tan nodded smiling back to me. "I guess you know who she is because well, she cant even sit down like a normal person" he added while pointing to one of the girls.

The gorgeous blonde, floating slightly over what was meant to be her seat, waved at me "Pleased to meet you! We definitely could do with some more girls on this group, right Amy?" Amy made the smallest possible movement to agreed with her sister before she resumed her meal right after showing a small smile in my general direction.

Chris just went on ignoring her. "The Blonde cutie Vicky is attached to is called Dean, followed by our personal body builder, also known as John. On the other side we got Amy, who I thing you already know and last, and definitely least, we've got Dennis." the previously glared guy made an irritated funny expression.

"Are you sure that you want to touch my buttons Chris? I'm sure your little girl... friend would love to know th..." and he suddenly went mute while changing his whole facial expression. A weird combination of fear and sadness mixed with untold hate. He was discretely looking to Dean. Probably the guy got hit under the table or something. What was he trying to say? Do I want to know? Before I could did or said anything, he was standing and, without any further commentary, he left.

"Sorry you had to see that Taylor" Dean said softly "He's a nice guy, but got a mouth too big for his own good and an even worst sense of what to say, when to say it or even how to say it. Don't worry about him, before you even notice it, he will be back with a well planed revenge, and one of us will hate him because of some random out of place remark."

Chris sat me next to Amy and offered to treat me to something from the school cafeteria, leaving me with them. They seemed nice enough and, when he came back, Dennis was trailing and pestering him about something while poking his side incessantly.

School was getting better on a daily basis. If it keep up long enough like that, I may even make some more friends within the group, even if Amy only reacted to Vicky questions when she was around, John were lost in his own thoughts most of the time and everyone made a point of ignoring Dennis.

When I was about to leave, Chris invited me to go with them to Flugy Bob on Sunday.

I'd been needing fewer food lately, but it didn't mean I couldn't enjoy it with my new self called friends. It wouldn't be bad to add some fat to my bones here and there and I could really use some kind of socialization outside of the school yard, something dad would approve of.

Like that, the days went on peacefully.

OOO

Tonight is the night. All my hard work will be rewarded with dad's faith. I'm going out for the first time on my own, but I need to be careful to not be injured. Tomorrow I'm going to go with the guys again to Flugy's and it would be hard to explain why I am injured. I still need to chose a name but, since I'll be avoiding para-humans, there shouldn't be a need for one just yet. The costume, on the other side was something I have had to create. I have done some research and the best material I could use to craft it was the Darwin's bark spider's silk. At first I thought about having a bunch of spiders doing it, but it would take months if I had to wait for them to finish it. The second option was a bit more dangerous but incredibly more efficient and, taking some safety measures, it should be fine. Beside, I could use some practice if I intended our business to work out smoothly at any nearby point. Dad got some silk samples for me to work on. While he was trying to get his hands on them I made some more research and decide to make a helmet and a breastplate resembling the material limpet's teeth are made of.

The final product was awesome. I may have inherited mom's dressmaking talent, even if I needed to use the flute's power to create it. The costume was a one piece gray bodysuit made out of silk and smalls plates of highly reinforced goethite nanofibres within a softer chitin matrix all over the vital organs and the helmet, with a dark gray wriggly pattern over it and dark grey lenses made out of spinel ceramics wrapped around my spare pair of glasses, resembling a huge eyed woman's face. At the end, I had made a costume twice as strong as a kevlar one, but with less than one fifth of its weight, with enough reinforcement on the vital areas to withstand the most common armor-piercing ammunition. It would be extremely painful, yes, but pain fades. Besides, the fact that dad has approved of it gave me some reassurance about its capabilities.

When I was on my way out, dad was there waiting for me, with something on his hands.

"You ready kiddo? Take this with you and be safe OK?" he said while handling me a mobile "and left yours here, I have already memorized mine in this one and assigned it to the nine fast call options. Press any number for more than two seconds and I'll be right there. Understood?" just my luck. And I thought dad had gotten over his overprotective self.

"Yes dad. I've got it. But, if anything goes wrong, I'll be here before anyone knows what's going on but... dad, really? All the fast call buttons?"

"I'm your dad, worrying comes as a free perk with the job. Now, bear with it and be back safe and sound soon, promise?"

That said, I nodded and he gave me a kiss on the forehead, wishing me luck before leaving to his bedroom. I observed him slowly climbing the stairs until he was out of sight and then, I was gone too.

It was easy to leave through the backyard of the house unseeing with thewaxing crescent moon and, with the new moon having been only 2 days ago, I got a fairly dark night to cover my movements.

After an hour of drifting around I found some thugs. They were a couple of druggies bulling a scruffy young girl. It wont be on any first page nor drag attention, so dad should be fine with it. Slowly and stealthily I approached the pair from behind them while hammering their mental defenses down, not that they weren't almost non-existent, but better safe than sorry. The girl noticed me and called for help when I was still a bunch of feet away, making the merchants twist around.

"Hey ya! We'rar yeer goin little bitch? Wanna get some go'd shit? Or her' to've fuuun with us?" half said one of then, which was holding a tiny butter knife on his shaking hand while making obscene movements with the other. The other one was just staring at me… or maybe somewhere behind me, I wasn't sure, with a lecherous look on his eyes. Perverts.

I should have probably give them some heroic speech about why they must be punished. "what? No! I'll fucking kill you bastards!" OK, there goes my speech. I definitely needed some practice, or to memorize something so I didn't have to improvise it. I should have brought a small notebook to take notes about everything I came up with before I forget it.

When they literally felt to the ground laughing, I kind of had a bad reaction. Probably destroying their conscious minds was not the right thing to do, but they were already halfway there, so I just gave them a friendly push. I had overdone it a bit, but that way they wouldn't hurt anyone else. It was definitively the right thing to do. While staring at their soulless bodies, I realized that they could come in handy.

When I was done checking them, and throwing away their phones, I left the girl there to recover and took them home through the sewers. After a bit chat with dad about my new idea, which he happened to love, I left and kept pacing around. The night was young, and so was I.

OOO

When I was already growing bored, I found a big group of Asians. Unexpectedly, they were talking in English, most of them at least. They were not a valid target, but a peek wouldn't harm anyone, or so I thought. One of them was a parahuman, probably the leader. The other thirty seven were not, but some had guns and the rest carried blunt objects, like pipes or a variety of bladed objects. Definitively not an acceptable target.

When I was about to leave, their leader raised his voice to say something worrisome.

"…alou it! Dose kids will learn to not to play us… ...pain and death will teach 'em!"

Maybe it wasn't to specific, nor coherent, but hey, they were going to murder kids? Not during mom's watch, and certainly not during mine if I wanted to be half as good as she was. Not that I would run to fight them face to face, it had to be done properly, and dad had been really insistent on the need to misguide other about what you can and cannot do, even if he did not gave me any tips about how to do it properly.

OOO

They were walking through the middle of the street, half way to their final destination. Those bastards were going to pay and stay away from their territory, if they somehow managed to survive. When halfway there, they all noticed something was off. Hundreds of rats could be seen ahead, as if waiting for them. The leader stopped on his trail and the others began to mutter. Suddenly, the rats were surrounding them and closing the circle tightly. When the first one panicked and tried to run away was assaulted by them and, after a few bites, went prone. Lung shouted as hard as he could, ordering them to get ready, but the vermin was already falling onto them.

They were easy to kill, but from within the ones that the gangsters took down, cockroaches came to live, and those who touched them fell to the ground to be covered by the mass. Lung was already eight feet tall and mostly covered by scales and fire when it was over. The infestation vanished, with only his followers remained, most already standing and rearming themselves.

When all of them were up and ready something unexpected happened. One of them shot lung on the face, twice. Before lung could understood what was going on, the rest of them began their own attacks. He was surrounded by his own followers and being attacked. It was obviously the doing of a parahuman, but nothing could be done about it until they were disabled.

They were actually unable to harm him lastingly, some couldn't even do it at all, not for real, so he took his time with them, taking them down with the minimum amount of damage possible in an almost gentle wat. After a few minutes of fighting, he was already to tough and hot for them to be able to approach him without being burned, but they still did, getting burned or missing fingers when hitting him barehanded or with their feet, so he took flight the second he was able to, preventing his underlings to get any further injuries with their useless assault.

From the air something new was visible, something he had been unable to notice while on the ground. There was a spot on the road, probably where it all had begun, that was devoid of targets or damage. He had being obviously pushed and dragged out of there, while the rest of the road was heavily damaged. Maybe the master was hiding there within the sewers and it was worth a try.

Throwing his massive body into the asphalt, he landed heavily and sank his claws deep within the pavement until he felt something tender on the other side. Then, he closed his paw and pulled it out.

It was a small man with dark filthy clothes covering him, desperately trying to get himself free and obviously in pain from his tight embrace, his skin and clothes burning with the contact. "'U 'll 'AY!" Lung stated. Without wait for an answer, he took a big bite out of his enemy, while all of his followers were again deeply burning themselves trying ineffectively to stop him. As he was swallowing his arm and probably his right lung too, the man passed out or more probably died. But his allies were still doing their best to suicide against him. Deciding he was not the master, Lung throw him away with a strong swift motion ready to take to the skies again but, before he could, something touched his leg. It was the man, standing there with a huge gap on he right upper torso. His heart, savagely beating, visible through the wound, holding a burned to the bone hand over Lung's scaled skin. After that slight touch, everything when still. Slowly, the man began to walk away form him. His costume half burned, but his pace steady. Here and there second-degree burns could be seen through the wrecked clothes. The PRT's siren could be heard rumbling in the distance, approaching. Big Shadows could be seen on top of the building's roof on its back, motionless. His own arms began to move. With will of their own, unchallenged.

Atrocious pain burst forth and, then, nothing.

OOO

The merchants were going to go down that night. It had been easy to orchestrate it with minimal effort on his part. Now, it was time to take advantage of it. While those Neanderthals were busy fighting each other, the Undersiders would steal everything not nailed to the floor inside the ABB main base, unaware that the real target was the information Lung was gathering from a new para-human he was planing to recruit. All left was to split reality. In one he would send the Undersiders to the ABB's base to pillage everything they could, while in the other they would wait in a safe position in the docks.

It all went according to the plan, at least until Tattletale phoned him.

"Something is wrong. We found an unexpected threat! Grue and Regent are dead! Bitch is following me right know with her dogs and murderous intent! I need assistance, it's a matter of time before they find me!" breathless, his underling said.

"Wait Tattletale, I need some details, how did they died and why is bitch chasing you? Hurry up and I'll fix it all with my power."

"Lung was fighting his own subordinates, or so we thought until he pulled that cape out of the sewers. We tried to join the fight as a distraction to rescue her, but our intentions were misunderstood! He's Some kind of master, stronger than regent and able to control anything alive, but needs to have physical contact with the target, he himself or any of his minions!And he must have some brute and mover rating, because….Rrrgggggg…..AAAHHHHHH…..." With that the call ended abruptly.

So the merchants had some new parahuman on their ranks, and a really dangerous one if her data was reliable, the question was why Tattletale said 'her' originally but them referred to her as him? Maybe it was due to her panicked state? But that he could thought about later. All left was to collapse this time line and…. There was a man, or at least part of one right in from of him. His burned hair was stuck to his back, eyelids retracted showing his charred eyeballs and the costume he was wearing, if those rags were a costume at some point. It was almost non-existent with the only remains of it half stuck to him with the solidified blood. His left hand was holding another arm attached to part of a driping human torso, probably his own. All of his body was covered in deep burns with burned bone exposed here and there, showing a clear image of his insides. The fetid, heavy smell, of a burned wet dog reached him while the man was slowly approaching him, letting his innards fall out, tainting the ground with half coagulated blood and boiled guts. A weird dark mist flowing out of the gaps, keeping it all together but wrong shaped.

When he tried to put his mind into words the world turned into a blurry of images. The man was inside of his mind, rummaging and twisting. Every passing second a nightmare of pain and suffering. And then, thoughts began to flow into his mind, alien thoughts of remorse. Unable to discard this reality he began to hurt himself in the other one, the one he wanted to keep. First one wrist, then the other, he desperately needed to die, to end the suffering anyhow, but when he was about to cut his own throat something connected, this wasn't his doing nor his own will, and the reality finally collapsed.

The base doctor was treating his self-inflicted wounds, but it was still disturbing. Then, a call came in from Tattletale. Before he took it, the realities were already split and he was half way to the garage in one of them before the call was answer in the other.

"Yes Tattletale?"

"Reporting in, we saw lung fighting and approached to take a peek. He was disembowelling himself while a cape was looking at him. We are retreating, mission aborted. Wont engage with an unknown cape who did that to lung even if he lost an arm and his right lung in the process."

"That's fine Tattletale, you would be rewarded as promised, mission completed." but then he remembered "Was it a man or a woman?"

"Its a man sir, but now that you ask, he had a girly way to move, and seemed to be uncomfortable with his body size. It could be some kind of projection or body substitution power."

"Good job, return to your base. The payment will be on your accounts by morning."

Hanging up, he relaxed a bit. This cape was dangerous and would be kept under surveillance. She, or he, could affect him through the link, somehow, but was not able to retain whatever knowledge it got in the collapsed reality, hopefully, or he would surely be dead by then. That kind of situations made him nervous, was he making parallel realities each time he used his powers? Dooming himself in one to survive in the other? If so, what would happen to his self from the discarded one? Would he be suffering until that cape got satisfied? Better not to think about it. He had more important matters to attend. If she was an enemy, there had to be a way to destroy her, if not, there could be a way to drag her under his wings.

While he was plotting, scheming and planing, a gap in the room opened up. From it, a suited up woman came in and, without further introduction nor explanation, asked "What have you done?"

OOO

While on patrol duty with shadow stalker, kid win saw something disturbing. Lung was right in front of him. A few blocks away, true, but with his actual size the distinction didn't really matter that much.

"Kid win reporting in. Lung is fighting someone, he is already 25 feet long, at least, we require assistance right now! Shadow Stalker is already on her way there."

"NO, wait for reinforcement, Stalker, that goes for you too. Wouldn't want to have to suspend you again. Armsmaster is already on his way and the rest of the protectorate and PRT is being called in. ETA 2 minutes. Stalker WAIT for reinforces!"

SS stopped on her heels, and kid came closer to her. Both waited silently until everything got silent again, with only the far away sirens breaking the quietness. Soon enough, they saw Armsmaster's motorbike surpass them and pursued him.

The scene was grotesque at best. The street was battlefield alike, and burnt gore was spread everywhere. There were plenty of dead vermin, mostly fried rats and cockroaches, but there were also more than a dozen, burned to the bone, human corpses. In the middle of it all, there was a rip apart dragon. His insides were spread around him. His stomach laying a few feet away from him, unfold. Unexpectedly, his chest was raising up with every hard inhalation. His size decreasing, and his wounds slowly closing. Maybe too slowly.

It was going to be a long night, and nightmares would stalk him for a long time.

OOO

Dad was mad at me. After I found a place not to evident nor to hard to find, I left the druggy's body to die peacefully, I shut down the incredibly excruciating connection and returned to my own body to find dad there, waiting for me to wake up in order to yell at me, something he did while I was still feeling a residual phantom pain from the just suffered traumatic experience.

He saw the fire and went to check it, just to find me there fighting a parahuman just as he had forbidden me to do... and I had promised not to do. It was a long night with him scolding me until morning.

It seems I had not done that well as I thought that whole 'hide your true powers nature' thing from his point of view. I'd be classified as a master and the PRT would know exactly how to deal with me from day one if there had been even a single survivor. Not only I had shown what my powers can do, but I have also beaten someone able to go one on one with an Endbringer to the brink of death. If I was lucky, they would found that guy's body and frame him with the deaths. If there have been any witness or the woman I saved chose to talk, the PRT would begin to search for me and possibly place a level one threat mark over my profile. I would need to make a new costume and develop some evidently different skills from the ones I'll be suspected to have if I ever wanted dad to allow me to play cape again.

OOO

Simplified Character Sheet: Average Citizen

lvl: 0

Attack: 10

Dodge: 10

Block: 10

HP: 70

Running Speed: 9 feet per second

Sprinting speed: 22 feet per second (tiring)

One skill: 75

Five skills: 20

Feats:

None.