I love how some people are like "Taylor's happy? Uh oh… [prepares for impending apocalypse]". You guys. So silly. What could possibly go wrong?
In all seriousness though, I'm glad people are enjoying the brighter chapters. Like Bl4nk noted, I'm not really going for Warhammer levels of grimdark ("life sucks, the world sucks, and you're never going to be happy before you die horribly at the end of a chainsaw").
I'm going for KnK darkness, which is admittedly pretty dark at points but more supernaturally dark ("omfg he's eating people!"), not characters getting their lives torn apart at every possible moment. I think the worst the Nasuverse ever gets is Matou Sakura. But I value contrast. Contrast is important. Dark content balanced by fluff. If everything is dark, you get inured to it, and boredom is the last thing a writer wants in their story.
Dissociation 1.x
April 2011
Lisa Wilbourn
Lisa massaged her temples, still trying to integrate all of the information she'd gotten in the past few hours as she stared at the laptop screen in front of her. It was full of text, text that relayed what had happened and what she'd seen tonight, as well as her own personal thoughts.
"So… knife girl seemed pretty cool. We gonna ask her about joining?"
The blonde looked up, turning to face Alec who was sitting on the sofa. "No." It would be a terrible idea to even try to involve the girl –Taylor– as a cape.
"No?"
"No," Lisa repeated.
The door to the hideout opened, Grue entering and closing it behind him as he removed his helmet. "No what? All I heard was 'no'."
"TT over here doesn't think we should invite knife-girl to join the club," Alec complained.
Brian's expression became stony. "I agree." He turned sharply to walk to his room.
"What? Wait. Hey! You can't just say something like that and then leave!" Alec yelled after him. "Why the fuck shouldn't she join?"
The taller boy turned around. "Did you see her? That wasn't some random girl or new cape. She wasn't even upset over the fact that she killed a man tonight. In fact, I'm pretty sure she enjoyed it. And I don't want someone who would rather kill than incapacitate on the team. She could be a serial killer for all we know," he said harshly. "There's something seriously wrong with her."
Was extremely disturbed by casual killing. Thinks Taylor is mentally unstable. Thinks Taylor could be a major risk. Doesn't want Taylor on the team. Thinks that if Taylor joined, Undersiders would be considered a greater threat due to her presence and become targeted by Protectorate.
Lisa looked over at Alec.
Is aware of Taylor's abnormalities. Doesn't care. Finds Taylor intriguing. Is a sociopath. Thinks Taylor might be a sociopath. Wants to understand her.
Great.
Brian continued to his room, not saying another word.
Taylor wasn't a sociopath, as evidenced by the emotions that Lisa had seen her show tonight, but she had been extremely blasé about everything that'd happened. Lisa knew that she hadn't killed anyone before tonight, but if Taylor had to do the same thing tomorrow, she'd do it with absolutely no regrets or feelings other than excitement and satisfaction.
A natural killer.
Alec looked over at Lisa. "C'mon Lisa," he whined.
She just turned back to her computer, causing Alec to groan and splay out on the couch, his head tilted back to stare at the ceiling. "You guys are boring. Fuck all of you."
Honestly she was just as disturbed as Brian was about Taylor, but her feelings were less disgust and more… concern. Taylor had issues, even if it seemed she was well-adjusted in most ways.
It wasn't a big problem now, but if the girl ever lost touch with her humanity, lost the ties that kept her sane and grounded, Lisa's power told her that Taylor could easily become the next Black Kaze.
And Lisa didn't entirely know what to do about it.
"She… she killed Lung."
Tattletale just stared at the tall, disheveled girl on the side of the street in shock. The girl's head was tilted forward, hiding her face under the failing yellow streetlamps that illuminated the scene like something out of a noir film. But that didn't prevent Lisa from reading her body language.
Killed Lung. Did not intend to. Is satisfied with result. Enjoyed it. Would do it again.
"Wait… what?" Regent questioned.
"Killed Lung," Tattletale repeated mechanically, climbing off of Brutus while surveying everything around her: Giant amputated arm in the middle of the road. Slightly sagging asphalt at the same place. Stress fractures in the road at various spots around it.
Christ.
She walked warily over to the dark-haired girl, and then noticed the hand creeping towards the knife embedded up to the hilt in the chest of the giant, scaled man who lay unmoving on his side.
Is extremely dangerous. Thinks we might be enemies. Would fight us. Would seriously hurt us. Could kill us.
How?
Tattletale looked at the stump of Lung's arm where warm blood flowed lazily onto the concrete, pooling in dark puddles.
Negated regeneration factor. Cuts caused permanent damage. Cuts have zero resistance.
She turned back to the girl. For just a moment, the girl's eyes flashed electric-blue, a purple ring around the pupil.
Evaluating us for weaknesses. Is a k̶̴͢il͝lσ̵͝κ̧͘ο̛͡τ̢͞ώ͠͡σ̸́ε̴̨͢ιm̶̛͞e̕͜m͠b̕u̕͟n̴u͠͡h杀́z̛͞u̡ţ͢ǫ̴̨̈t̀͡en̡ق͠ت̧̧ل̛у̀б͜͠ѝ̵т͠ь killer. Sees dɢ̶̴͡1̷̕0̸͢7̴̨̧̛́α̡͏҉͜И̛̛χ͠͞͏̨̧ʏ͘͏̢͟β̷̧̡҉͡β̨̨͝Δ̵̡̢̛͡ʏ͟5̀͟͠4҉͡͠͡͡ʓ̧͜͠Ƶ̵̴̡χ̷͝Ѳ̴̀͠ʌ̸̸̨͞Ƨ̨͝ω̴̕̕ʓ͜͢͢͟͡ʌ̢͟͞͡Ѵ̴̷̡́͢Ʋ͢͟Ɯ–
What.
What the fuck?
She didn't even get a headache from that, her power had just… failed. It was like she'd been listening to a telephone conversation and then suddenly a fax came through on the same line.
Tattletale noticed the girl was still inching towards her knife and raised her hands up. "Hey, easy, we're not going to do anything to you, we just wanted to see what was going on."
The girl halted, and then deflated slightly. Believes me. Doesn't want to fight. Is injured. Would fight if necessary. Could be ready to fight in under a second. Could kill us.
Alright. She could do this. Tattletale wasn't usually the one who would be defusing a situation. Usually she'd be getting under the other person's skin or trying to find weaknesses. …That wasn't what she wanted here. No antagonizing the person who'd just killed one of the strongest capes in the world. That would be bad.
"I'm really sorry about all of this. Nobody else was supposed to get dragged into it," the blonde apologized. She decided that would be a good place to start out.
The girl on the sidewalk looked confused.
Tattletale smirked reflexively, thinking about why Lung had been so pissed and the haul they'd gotten. …And then she remembered that it had gotten this complete innocent involved.
"This was between us and Lung," she explained. "He was aiming for us because we hit one of his casinos. We were trying to figure out how to deal with him, but it looks like we didn't need to bother, huh?" Can't get much more 'dealt with' than 'dead'. "…Thanks for that, by the way."
She looked over at Grue, trying to prompt him to start talking. This was definitely more his thing than hers. C'mon! You're supposed to be the leader for crying out loud!
He must have felt her glaring at him, because he glanced up at the brunette and then went back to staring at Lung's body. "Oh. Yeah, thanks." Is stunned. Is uncomfortable. Is disturbed by dead body. Is disturbed by girl casually sitting next to dead body.
Well, he could at least pretend to act normal.
Tattletale rolled her eyes, turning back to the girl. "Ignore Grue. I'm Tattletale. That's Regent." …Who was playing with the giant amputated arm in the middle of the street. Fantastic. "…And behind me is Bitch. Or Hellhound if you want to be PC," she introduced.
Bitch growled, but other than that was being almost surprisingly subdued compared to how she normally acted around new people. Sees girl as lone alpha. Does not want to challenge authority. Does not want to get in fight. Knows she would lose.
Would wonders never cease. Regent was quiet, Bitch was practically amicable, Grue was speechless, and Tattletale herself was trying to placate someone. It was like a mirror-world from a lousy Aleph B-movie.
Regent had apparently grown tired of prodding the scaled arm, because he walked over to where she was. "So who're you supposed to be? You got a name?"
Tattletale wanted to stare at him. He knew better than to ask an unknown cape not in costume for their name. Either one. And this girl obviously wasn't in any kind of outfit, since she was just wearing street clothes.
Doesn't want to be a cape. Doesn't want to go out as a cape. Didn't intend to get in fight.
Then how did she? The blonde studied the other girl's face. There were dark circles under her eyes, like she hadn't gotten a good night's sleep in a while.
Taking a walk because of nightmares. Nightmares most likely related to trigger event and/or caused by powers.
Tattletale wanted to wince. That was something she had experience with.
The girl in front of them opened her mouth to respond. Is going to give real name. Real name is Taylor Hebert. Oh shit.
Goddammit Alec!
"Of course she doesn't," Tattletale preempted, interrupting Taylor. "Can't you see the way she's dressed?"
"Hey, I was just curious," he said nonchalantly.
The blonde sighed in exasperation, looking back at Taylor and going over the girl's state and cataloging her injuries. Burned hands in fight. Cannot feel with hands. Nerve damage. Twisted ankle. Has extremely high pain tolerance. "Either way, you should probably get those looked at. Go to a hospital or something." Will not regain full use of hands without parahuman intervention. Will be permanently scarr–
Fifteen minutes since start of fight. Lung's heat signature did not go unnoticed. Protectorate aware. Protectorate inbound. Armsmaster arriving in less than five minutes.
"Damn," Tattletale hissed, looking in the direction of the Rig. Great. Just great.
Taylor would be detained. Taylor would be questioned. Taylor would be forced into Wards. Taylor does not want to be a cape. Taylor is extremely unsuited for Wards. Taylor would eventually suffer psychotic break and k̶illk̶͡í̷l̀l̸͘k͡i̧̛ll͏͟ḱ̡il̀͠l̷̶͞k̡̀il̢l̵ḱi̸͡ĺ̴͞l̢̛͞k̴i͏l̸̀͝l̨kill–
Oh fuck. Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck.
She was not going to let that happen if she could help it. It was the least they could do to pay her back for saving them from Lung's wrath.
Just "…Fuck," she cursed. Tattletale looked back at Taylor. "Alright. C'mon. We're not leaving you here to deal with them yourself just for saving us. Will you let us take you somewhere, at least?"
Please say yes, please say yes.
Taylor nodded slowly. "Okay."
The blonde villainess grinned, thankful she hadn't had to resort to anything else. Crossing the gap between them, she reached down for Taylor. "Here, I'm going to help you up, okay?"
Not waiting for an answer, she hoisted the taller girl –for it was obvious as soon as she stood that she was much taller– to her feet, and then also helped her walk when it became apparent that even if she couldn't feel the pain very much, her ankle still wasn't in good shape.
Tattletale's mind spun. What else, what else? Evidence. "Regent, grab her knife. Grue, stop staring at the dead man and help me get her up on Brutus." Because there was no way she was going to be able to lift the hundred-fifty pounds of solid muscle that Taylor seemed to be made of.
Grue finally responded, and he hurried over to the pair of them as Tattletale climbed onto Brutus and helped pull Taylor up by her forearms so that she was sitting in front of the blonde.
"Where're we taking her?"
"Home," the purple-suited girl answered, fully aware of how Grue would feel about her plan, but it was necessary. "It's not like we can take her to her house like this, it'll be easier if we drive her home." She sighed. "And yes, by we I mean you. If it really bothers you that much you can keep your costume on. But we really need to go. Now."
Armsmaster arriving in less than a minute.
God they were cutting it close.
Thankfully, Grue and Regent managed to get on Judas quickly enough, and they left with thirty seconds to spare, Armsmaster's motorcycle just becoming audible as they departed.
It was a short trip to the factory, and when they got there Tattletale slid off first, offering a hand up to Taylor. The girl must have misjudged her ankle injury, because she almost fell off of Brutus with the blonde barely managing to catch her and stand her up.
Taylor glanced back at Tattletale, her face flushed. Is attracted to females. Is bisexual. Finds me attractive. Well that was flattering. The blonde couldn't help the grin that spread across her face, and Taylor turned away. Is embarrassed.
Sometimes her power gave her really redundant information.
Taylor was quickly distracted by the giant dogs returning to their usual size, however, and watched them interact with Bitch until Tattletale grabbed her wrist to get her attention. When the brunette looked back at her, she tugged on her arm. "C'mon, over this way."
Taylor took a step, and then hissed. Oh. Duh. Tattletale helped her after that, guiding the two of them along to the shed that stored their communal car while Grue trailed behind them at a distance.
"Hey, Grue, can you get the door?" The leather-clad boy grudgingly complied, and Tattletale led Taylor to the passenger side, helping her in.
"Alright. A couple things," Tattletale began. "First: you didn't meet us. We were never at the Docks, and you want to hide whatever happened from whoever you're going home to." Father. Mother deceased. Mother died three years ago. Mother died in car accident.
Tattletale barely managed to keep herself from wincing at that, forcing herself to continue instead. "So, two: Stay at home or play sick or something tomorrow so they don't find out about tonight."
And now for the big one. "Third: tomorrow night, Brockton General, six o'clock." Tattletale had Panacea's schedule completely memorized, just in case shit really hit the fan. She already felt bad about Taylor getting involved in all of this, and the girl clearly didn't need permanent scarring or nerve damage on top of everything else. "If you go there then, you'll get treated, okay? Take a cab or something, you can do that, right?" Family is lower-income. Does not have extra spending money. "No, of course not."
Tattletale bit her lip, and unzipped the hidden pocket on the right side of her costume, pulling out a few of the bills she kept there for emergencies. This definitely counted.
Peeling a hundred off, she tucked the rest away. "Here, use this for the fare. Least we can do. Seriously. You don't know just what you saved us from." Tattletale held out the money, and then winced. Hands. Right. She put it in Taylor's hoodie's pocket for her. "Put some ice on your hands and ankle as soon as you get home. In ziplock bags or something. Try and keep it there overnight if you can." That should help with some of the swelling and numb what was immediately painful.
Taylor nodded in acceptance of the advice.
"And… for what it's worth, I'm sorry about getting you into this. Really." Tattletale smiled at her. She didn't believe this completely made up for what the girl had gone through, not in the slightest, but it was a step in the right direction. "But it was nice meeting you, even considering the circumstances."
Grue climbed into the other side of the car, still in his leathers and helmet, and started the car. Closing the passenger side door, Tattletale walked out of the garage and watched as they pulled out, moving onto the road and then out of sight as quickly as possible.
Once they were gone, she let out a sigh.
Taylor Hebert. She'd heard that name before, somewhere.
Hebert. Hebert, Hebert, Hebert.
And then it came to her. Three months ago. The Winslow incident. It'd been quickly covered up, but something had happened and a student –Taylor– had been hospitalized. The upper administration had been found to be criminally negligent towards students and ended up being dismissed. She hadn't seen any information about what had happened exactly, but she also hadn't really been looking.
Tattletale made her way into the factory, peeling off her domino mask once she was inside. Wearily ascending the stairs, she thought of what this night meant for Brockton Bay, and more specifically, for Taylor.
The purple-suited girl sighed, knowing there was no way she could leave the girl alone now that she knew everything about her.
Stupid guilt-complex.
Lisa stared at the screen in front of her, and her nearly finished report for Coil. She'd ultimately decided to completely omit Taylor from it, only explaining that they'd found the body and what it had been like. Only bad things could come of him knowing about her. Plus, keeping her a secret meant she would have someone who might actually be able to help her in her plan to escape Coil's clutches.
She'd tell Brian later, once he wasn't as upset about the whole Taylor vs. Lung situation, but as Coil wasn't even in contact with anyone on their team other than her, the information should be safe. If she could keep this girl from the same fate as her, she would.
Not to mention Lisa had a feeling that Taylor would not react well at all to any attempts to force her to do what she didn't want. She wouldn't hesitate to kill anyone in her way if she had to. How her power worked was also a complete unknown, other than the fact that it had negated Lung's regeneration and allowed her to cut through scales as strong as steel with a cheap knife.
Blinking, Lisa looked up at Regent. "Regent, do you still have her–" He was playing with it, flicking the blade in and out with the little slider on the side almost hypnotically.
She sighed.
They'd need to return that tomorrow. Or maybe… maybe she could do one better.
She started pulling up knife websites. If Taylor's power relied on a knife and it was her only method of self-defense, she definitely should have something better than that dinky thing.
And then she'd start planning how to really help the girl out.
Colin Wallis
Colin Wallis' night started out uneventful. It was a Sunday, and Sundays were typically patrol nights for him, barring anything unusual that came up with the Protectorate or Wards
As usual, he was on his motorcycle, following the streets that were part of tonight's route. It was one of his first projects over twenty years ago, actually, and unlike his halberds, which he had a number of for different circumstances, it was special to him.
"Console to Armsmaster." Assault's voice came through the earpiece in his helmet, a direct encrypted link to the Rig that he'd worked on himself as a side-project a few years ago.
"Yes?"
"Heyyyy Armsy." Armsmaster suppressed the eye-roll that rose at Ethan's usage of his favorite nickname for Colin. "The computers here just registered a heat pattern that your program said is Lung."
"That's… odd. There hasn't been much activity from him or the ABB lately. Do you have a location?"
"Do I have a location?" Assault scoffed. "'Course I have a location. You should know, you wrote this thing. It's in the South Docks. Here's a marker." A dot appeared on the HUD in his visor, and the software he'd worked into it drafted a navigation route to the coordinates.
"Anything else?"
"Mmm… Not that I can see. Just give me a call if it gets too serious and you need backup or something. This is Lung we're talking about, after all. Console out."
Hopefully he wouldn't. He'd been working on a fast-acting sedative that was extremely potent, specifically concocted for countering class-A regenerators like Lung. As long as the gang-leader wasn't too far gone, it should knock him out cold. The problem was administering it, especially if Lung had gotten to the point of full-body scales. If that was the case he'd have to go for mucus membranes like the inside of his mouth or his eye, which would be …difficult.
Never let it be said he wasn't up for a challenge, though.
Even going as fast as he could and following the path his Navy system had set, it took him thirteen minutes to get to the place Assault had tagged. Once he was only a few blocks away, he popped open the compartment that held his alternate halberds and swapped out the one on his back for the one with the sedative. It had a couple other tricks for someone like Lung as well, but those would be even less effective if the gang leader was at the point of being fully scaled, primarily because of how hot his fire could get at that point.
Pulling up to the location, he propped his bike up and surveyed the scene: flickering orange streetlights, graffiti-stained walls of abandoned buildings, cracked cement sidewalks.
But no Lung.
Getting off of the bike, he moved forward cautiously, holding his halberd in front of him and keeping an eye out for any sudden movements or the glow of Lung's pyrokinesis.
However, there didn't appear to be anything, and everything was dead quiet. Extremely unusual for Lung, considering the amount of damage he caused and how loud any fights involving him typically were.
Armsmaster kept moving forward, and it was only around twenty feet that he finally noticed something out of place. There was an odd lump in the middle of the road, and it was only at ten feet away that he could finally make out the object.
An arm. A large arm with metal-like scales. Blood stained the area around the stump, speckled spots around it in a splatter pattern that showed it had been severed cleanly where it was. A depression was next to it in the asphalt, looking recently melted.
He looked around for any other signs. Anything that could shed light on what had happened, because at this point it seemed like the fight was already over and done with, though he still kept his weapon ready just in case.
It was twenty feet to his right that he found something, something he hadn't expected at all. Haphazardly splayed out on the sidewalk, lay Lung himself.
His grip tightened on the halberd, and he warily moved closer towards the prone figure.
Within five feet, everything was visible
The thick pool of blood spreading over concrete. The stump of an arm that hadn't even begun to heal. A deep gash on his right leg. And perhaps most importantly, a knife wound in the man's chest, a trail drying blood immediately drawing attention to it.
Still on edge, he moved to Lung's neck, placing two fingers over his jugular and feeling for a pulse to confirm what all of his equipment was telling him.
There was none.
Lung was dead.
Lung was dead.
Lung was dead.
Fuck.
Armsmaster hastily looked around. The person who'd killed him could still be in the area. But his proximity and infrared heat sensors informed him there was nobody, only himself and Lung. Who was dead.
The blue-suited man lifted a hand to his earpiece and pressed the button that would connect him to the Rig.
"Armsmaster to Console."
"Console here," Assault's voice came through. "'Sup Armsy? You get the big bad dragon?"
For a moment he struggled with what to say, and then decided the simple facts were probably best. "Lung is dead."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. What?"
"Lung's dead," Armsmaster repeated, understanding Assault's disbelief. Hell, he was still trying to believe it.
"You can't drop a bomb like that without some details! What happened? You do it?"
"…No. It appears to have been done by an unknown," he said, eyeing the strange wounds on Lung's body.
"Huh. Well, that's not concerning at all. Alright, I've alerted the PRT and shot off a memo to Piggot since she'd probably be interested in this. You got anything else?" the former villain asked.
"No," Armsmaster reported, looking around and double checking, but he still saw nothing out of the usual other than Lung.
"Okay, seeya." The line went dead, leaving him in silence.
Folding his halberd and attaching it to his back, he crouched down, examining the body in front of him.
Infrared told him it was still warm, and he'd only been alerted to Lung using his pyrokinesis fifteen minutes ago, which corroborated with everything else he could see. The stump of Lung's right arm was a clean cut, almost disconcertingly clean, and running a quick analysis with his visor showed that it was a perfect planar division. If he hadn't known any better, he'd have sworn that this cut had been performed by the experimental blade he was developing with Dragon.
But that didn't explain the lack of regeneration. The cut on Lung's leg was through the scales, and was a cut the man should have healed from within seconds, but he hadn't. And Lung had been known to replace missing limbs before, hell, he'd seen it happen, but that meant that the arm's stump should have begun to show signs of cell growth, which it didn't.
And even stranger still was the stab wound on Lung's chest. It would have only punctured the man's lung, another wound that should have healed near-immediately with Lung having reached the point of becoming scaled.
The sound of engines and sirens came from behind him, and Armsmaster stood, turning towards the source.
A set of large vans appeared, their headlights temporarily affecting his vision before his visor adjusted to compensate for the brightness. They stopped fifteen feet away, the rear doors opening and PRT officers spilling out. Unexpectedly, Miss Militia also stepped out of the first truck along with the company.
Armsmaster walked towards her, nodding in greeting. "Miss Militia."
"Morning, Armsmaster," she returned. "I was at the PRT building when the notice came in. You're the one who found him?"
"Mmm," he hummed in affirmation, looking back towards the body.
"Any idea of what did it?"
He shook his head. "There's a number of knife wounds, but nothing that should have been fatal to Lung."
The woman walked towards the body, looking it over. "That's …odd. And it almost looks like he wasn't healing," she noted.
"I came to the same conclusion."
Miss Militia nodded absently and pulled out the green combat knife at her back, the weapon shifting fluidly between different knife shapes while she stared at the various cuts across the dead man's body. The weapon eventually stopped changing when it became a rather thin blade that could only be five inches long at most, attached to a rectangular handle.
"The weapon was either a fixed-hilt knife, or more likely, considering how prolific and easy to acquire they are, an out the front switchblade." Miss Militia frowned, her knife shifting back to its initial shape which she replaced in its holster. "In either case, the blade would barely have been long enough to cause this," she said while pointing to the arm-stump, "Did you see any knives in the area?"
"I didn't, but I'll admit I wasn't looking for one. It seems unlikely that whoever did this would have left the weapon behind, though," he said.
Miss Militia nodded. "Well, perhaps the MEs will be able to tell us something more." She glanced back at the PRT personnel who were standing behind them at a distance. "We probably should let them get to their business."
Armsmaster stepped away from the scene, allowing the other men and women forward to do their jobs.
Both he and Miss Militia remained in the area for the entirety of the clean-up, the woman dealing with a nosy reporter that had somehow found out about the event within twenty minutes. Armsmaster frowned in annoyance as he thought about the most likely reason: that over-confident blonde teenage villain who thought she was smarter than everyone else. Tattletale.
How she'd have found out he had no idea, but it was almost certainly her, even if nobody on the Undersiders had been involved in this. As much as he was loathe to admit it, killing didn't fit their MO at all. They were small time criminals, almost exclusively involved in robberies, and they intentionally avoided harming others when possible, only incapacitating at most.
The rest of the night passed quickly, as everyone was involved in the after-event field report and there was little time for much else as plans had to be considered and fallout to be prepared for. The fall of the leader of the ABB was not about to go unnoticed, and it would have the gang in turmoil. The problem was there was no guessing the actions of Oni Lee nor the bomb-tinker Bakuda that they'd heard rumors about.
In the end, all they could do was wait and see.
Colin stared at his halberd on the workbench in front of him, but for once he wasn't actually working on it.
"Colin?"
A voice came out of one of the screens at his left, the avatar of a young woman appearing.
"Morning, Dragon."
She smiled slightly. "How are you?"
Colin sighed, resting his elbows on the metal surface in front of him and rubbing his eyes. "At a bit of a loss," he admitted. Dragon was one of the few he felt truly comfortable with and could relax around.
"I read the report. It's quite the mystery, isn't it?" she asked, sounding slightly excited.
"Yeah," he agreed. The lack of information they'd gotten from the crime scene was frustrating, but there wasn't really anything that could be done about it. He turned to the computer screen. "It makes no sense."
"Well, there have been stranger things known to happen," Dragon said. "But I can understand how this might be worrying."
"The cuts look they could have been caused by a monomolecular blade. Like the nanothorn project," he said, turning around in the swivel-chair and looking across the room where the blade they'd been iterating on sat.
"Yes," Dragon agreed, and Colin could have sworn her eyes were twinkling in excitement. "Isn't that interesting though? If someone managed to achieve what we've been working on, but sooner? A tinker with a specialty in bladed weaponry, perhaps."
Interesting might not have been the first word he'd have used to describe it, but he couldn't deny that he was curious. New tinkers were rare, and one that could achieve an effect like the nano-thorn blade could potentially be very helpful, all things considered.
"That still doesn't explain the lack of Lung's regeneration," he countered.
"Hmm." Dragon looked thoughtful. "What if they specialized in fields? Force fields, area-of-effect, etc.?" she mused. "If that were the case, they could have created a field that suppressed cell division, and then used a cutting tool with a force-field edge like Narwhal's. He could have bled out, then."
Colin had to admit that it was the best explanation he'd heard so far tonight, and accounted for how the man had actually died, unlike the other leading theory.
"The PRT think that it might have been a Striker/Shaker, one that could have triggered directly in response to Lung himself. A field that stopped his regeneration, and a power that lets them the cut through any biological material. But that wouldn't explain the cause of death. If it was just his healing being negated and not his growth, he shouldn't have bled out because he'd be constantly replenishing his blood cells."
Dragon nodded. "I saw that in the notes, it was how I came up with my theory. But until we find more evidence, that's really all they are."
Colin sighed, and the woman on the screen looked at him fondly.
"You should get some sleep. How many hours have you been awake?"
"…thirty-eight," he mumbled, admitting the fact evasively.
Dragon looked at him in exasperation. "Go. Get some sleep, Colin. You shouldn't do this to yourself. Maybe it'll help give you a fresh perspective."
For once, Colin just nodded, taking a deep breath and beginning to turn off the many monitors around him.
"Have a good night," Dragon said, her avatar winking out a few moments later.
"…Good night, Dragon," he said quietly to the empty screen, turning it off a moment later.
He got up from his seat and walked to the door, shutting off the lights and then heading down the halls in the direction of the Rig's garage so he could go home.
"I know it's early and you've all got school in less than an hour, but considering the circumstances I thought it would be best if you all were informed, instead of having to find out second-hand." Armsmaster took a breath and pointed to the board at the front of the room which had a map of Brockton with a single dot on it. "At approximately 12:18 AM, Lung was found dead, on a sidewalk on East Cypress." He looked at his audience, evaluating their reactions.
They all appeared to be stunned.
"Lung bit it?" Dennis was the first to recover. "Holy shit."
But it was Dean who managed to gather his wits enough to ask the question Armsmaster had been waiting for. "How?"
"It looks like he was in a fight with another parahuman and died from knife wounds he acquired in the fight. He couldn't heal his injuries, but they still shouldn't have been able to kill him, only incapacitate him at most."
Unless Dragon's theory is true.
"Could it be some kind of power-negation? A Trump ability?" Carlos thought out loud.
"No. Lung was still able to grow and manifest scales. The PRT thinks it could be an anti-healing power or effect of some sort, but there aren't any capes we know about in the area with that kind of ability."
"…But if the person triggered right then, they could have gotten whatever powers they needed to survive," the boy reasoned, and Colin was a little surprised that he had come to the conclusion so quickly.
"That's one of the leading theories, yes."
"So what, now we've got to deal with Jack Slash 2.0?" Dennis asked. "Well, I'm not going to be volunteering for patrols anytime soon. I'll be happy with the console, thank you very much."
Dean glanced over at the younger boy. "That's not funny, Dennis."
"No, seriously," Dennis defended. "Out of the blue, some new guy appears, and the first thing he does is kill Lung? I don't care what you say, that's not an accident, that's a statement. They're telling us they can take out capes like Lung easily. I don't want to go up against someone like that on any day."
Colin admitted that Dennis had a point. It had come up during the emergency Protectorate meeting the night prior. "In any case, we've figured out that the person responsible is between five-eight and five-ten based on the injuries Lung sustained. They've been labeled 'Switchblade', and have a tentative rating of Striker 4."
"Four? Shouldn't it be higher?" Dean questioned. Personally, Colin agreed. But the PRT was hesitant to label threats higher than a four –which would require parahuman assistance– without evidence that it was actually warranted.
"It looks like Switchblade requires a tool, but there's really no knowledge of how their power works other than it allows them to cut biological material perfectly," Colin told them. "And if you somehow come in contact with them, for God's sake, do not approach. You are to immediately retreat and notify whoever's on console.
"The biggest problem Lung's death presents is the extremely high likelihood of a gang war breaking out from the sudden power vacuum. If that occurs, you are to either come here or go to the PRT building, whichever is closer, and not attempt to fight. Is this understood?"
Everyone in the room nodded.
"Alright, good. Dismissed."
Claire Hanazawa
She couldn't believe it. She couldn't fucking believe it. She'd only been in this gang for two and a half weeks and already their fucking leader was dead.
Fucking Lung was dead.
She wouldn't have even considered it true except for the fact that one of her moles in the PRT had confirmed it, the entire organization in an uproar over the event.
And now all of the sycophantic assholes in the ABB were scrambling over themselves like some snotty kid had come and kicked over an anthill.
Pathetic.
Of course the first person they turned to was her. They had no idea how to manage themselves, and Lung had always been the one at the top, a cape. So, like the idiots that they were, they came to 'Bakuda' to save them.
Oni Lee was completely useless. He had less emotional capacity than a nematode. All he could do was act as a front-line combatant, not a competent leader, which is what they needed.
Claire wasn't about to let this opportunity pass. With Lung gone, she could finally have a chance to show what she could do. To show Brockton why she was to be feared and respected, and that she was now the leader of the largest gang in the Bay.
…The biggest problem was that the other gangs were practically foaming at the mouth to destroy her own, and that was not something she could allow to go unanswered. They wanted a fight?
She'd give them a fucking fight.
They wouldn't even know what hit them.
Bakuda's specialty may have been explosives, but that was about the only limitation. As long as an explosion was somehow involved, she could build things that would make Kaiser shit himself in fear.
And that was exactly what she was doing.
Time-locks, singularities, sensory deprivation, sensory overload, pain-receptor agonist, molecular decohesion, absolute-zero freezing, acoustic sonics, plasma, EMP, bombs that exploded into personal force-fields, she could do it all and more.
And with Oni-Lee to deliver them, there was an effectively infinite supply as long as she built at least one of each.
She needed to make an initial statement, too, of course. Let Brockton Bay know who was the new leader of the ABB. Wouldn't be good to do all of this without anybody knowing who had done it.
The other thing she needed to do was draw out the asshole who killed her former boss and return the favor. Couldn't have people thinking they had a chance going against her.
That plan she'd let stew for a few days. She wanted to come up with something… special for them. Maybe something that replicated Gray Boy's punishment. But she'd figure it out.
But for now, she needed to show her poor, ignorant underlings exactly why they should fear her. Which was why she was currently knuckle-deep in some poor bastard's cranium. Cool thing about brain surgery: no nerves. No need for pesky anesthesia that could accidentally end up killing whoever she was working on.
Picking up the small pill-like explosive device from the stainless-steel tray at her side, Bakuda pushed it into the guy's skull, so that it was sitting right between the two hemispheres of his brain. Taking the coin-size piece of bone she'd cut out, she put some medical glue around the edge and stuck it back where it had come from, replacing the small flap of skin and gluing that down as well.
Moving around to the front of the man she'd been working on, she looked at his wide, fearful eyes and smirked. Unclasping the ball-gag in his mouth, Claire put a single finger against his lips, keeping him silent. "Do you understand your situation?"
The man nodded quickly, as much as he could with the head brace in place, which was barely anything, but it was enough. "Good." He looked like he was about to piss himself and pass out. Patting his cheek, Claire smiled. "Don't worry. If everything goes according to plan, nothing'll happen to you and your friends, wakaru?" He nodded again, causing her smile to become a grin. "Excellent. Just remember: no funny business or pan!" She mimed an explosion with her hands, and then started undoing the straps that held him in place.
He stood up slowly, and began shakily walking towards the door until she pushed him forward to hurry him along.
She had a hundred other assholes to do this to, and no time to waste.
And then she'd get to show the world her art.
Amy Dallon
Standing in her darkened room, Amy sighed, laboriously removing each part of her costume and hanging it up in her closet until she was down to her underwear. Reaching around her back to unclasp her bra, she threw it in the hamper and got out a pair of pajama pants and a t-shirt, putting those on and then climbing into bed.
Staring at the white stucco ceiling didn't do anything for her, but it gave herself something to focus on since there was no way she was about to fall asleep.
The day had started weird and just gotten stranger.
First, there was the news that Lung was dead. Lung. Dead. The man who had personally driven off the entire Brockton Bay Protectorate. And it was only after Victoria had asked Carol about what happened that they found out he'd been stabbed. Stabbed in the lung (talk about poetic irony), a wound that should have been non-fatal to most people, and especially to the Dragon of Kyūshu.
It made no sense. Brandish had told them that the PRT was thinking it was a new trigger, someone who had triggered in response to Lung himself, gaining a power that allowed them to perfectly counteract Lung's abilities. It made sense, and the cape had been labeled a Striker based on the damage to Lung's body.
At school, it was all anybody could talk about. Speculation as to who could have done it, how powerful they were, what they were going to do now. Like if they were going to take over the ABB. Amy had snorted at the last one. But then, considering it seriously, she realized it could very well happen, and wouldn't be all that unexpected.
The news had even come up in the Parahuman studies class –which she was only taking because Vicky was too– and her history class. The first had recognized what had happened and teacher seemed resigned to the discussion, and they had talked about the morality of capes and why there were much fewer cape deaths in cape vs cape fights than there were collateral casualties. The second had used it as a tool to talk about major power plays, how little things could have huge effects, with a particular example being the death of Franz Ferdinand acting as the catalyst that pushed an already-strained Europe over the edge and into World War I.
Honestly, Amy hadn't really cared. Gang wars happened. It may be unexpected and unusual that the cape leader had been outright killed, but gangs had collapsed from fallen leadership before. It wasn't anything new.
And so the school day had ended uneventfully, and Amy had prepared herself for –yet another– visit to one of the local hospitals in the evening. Tonight had been Brockton General, and it was the same thing as every other visit she'd done. Smile mechanically at the doctors who thank her for doing such miraculous work, and don't show how tired she was of the continually monotonous actions: "do I have permission to heal you?", heal, move to the next, "do I have permission to heal you?", heal, next, ad infinitum.
The life-threatening cases had been first as always, and she couldn't even remember what she'd actually dealt with today, other than it seemed longer than usual. And then she'd moved to the non-life threatening cases, going through them just as robotically as she'd dealt with the ICU, plastering a fake smile whenever she got the inevitable "thank you" or something to that equivalent. And then she'd gotten to the last person.
It was a tall, lanky girl with curly brown hair who'd sat in dim lighting of the corner of the room. As with the previous patients, this one had started off as just yet another unremarkable healing. At least, until she'd actually touched the girl's hand.
"Do I have permission to heal you?" Amy asked the girl flatly.
It was ridiculous that she had to ask it in the first place. The people wouldn't even be here unless they wanted to be healed. But she had to in order to prevent any lawsuits from happening like that one comatose asshole she'd saved from critical organ failure due to alcohol poisoning who'd then turned around and sued New Wave because he apparently had wanted to die there.
"Uh, yeah, sure," the girl replied.
"Hand, please."
The girl reached out, and Amy could see she'd been badly burned. She idly noted that the girl didn't have a wristband, so she wasn't an inpatient, and the fact that she was wearing street clothes only further cemented the idea. As soon as the girl's damaged skin touched Amy's, her awareness exploded, every minute detail and process available.
The first thing she noticed was that the girl was healthy. Extremely healthy. No signs of previously broken bones, with the lung capacity and muscle density that you'd expect from a person who'd been playing sports since they were a kid. The girl had to be seriously active normally.
Clearing her thoughts, Amy pulled away from the big picture and looked for the damage she'd seen externally. She noted that most of the girl's nerves weren't functioning properly beyond either of her wrists, and her ankle was slightly swollen from an overextended set of ligaments.
Amy focused further on the hands, witnessing the constant cell division, the lymphocyte reactions handling any possible pathogens, the keratin structure buildup of the beginnings of scar tissue, the layering of new epithelial cells that were trying and failing to fully replace the ones that had been burned so severely. Everything pointed to these burns being nearly a week old at this point.
Why the hell hadn't this girl gone to the ICU? She would have expected with the way this girl had to take care of her body she would have immediately gone to see someone. But what she was seeing told her a different story: that this girl had waited until now to have them dealt with.
The healer looked up at the brunette's face, pinning her where she sat. "These burns are days old, why didn't you come in before now?"
The girl looked confused. "I… only got them last night."
No. No way. The girl had to be lying, and Amy didn't know why. Was she trying to hide something? Amy pushed the thoughts out of mind. If the girl wanted to hide something, let her. It didn't affect her or anything.
"Whatever. Here, they're done. Your ankle too." Even as she spoke, she manipulated the various molecular constructs and proteins, altering cells and repairing damaged tissue, turning keratin into proper skin. A slight pulse of activity traveled up neural paths when she reconnected the sensory and motor nerves.
Done, Amy looked up at the girl. And felt her heart nearly stop.
Instead of the dark chocolate brown they had been before, the girl's eyes were a luminescent, shockingly-bright cerulean with cyan-colored fibers woven within. A violet ring sat in the blue, circling just around the pupil and standing out violently from the rest of the iride. Wisps of color from the ring –purple and magenta and fuchsia and every shade in between– seemed to flow into the pitch-black pupil at the center, sucked into a void that felt like it could swallow you whole, never to be seen again.
The image was gone in a blink, brown eyes back as if there had never been anything else.
"You're–" Amy barely managed to cut herself off before she could finish with a parahuman, heart pounding with the thought that she'd almost outed a completely unknown cape in a public setting, with no idea of how they'd react.
She hadn't looked at the girl's brain before by habit, an action that was specifically so that situations like this wouldn't happen. But now that there was evidence, her suspicions were confirmed almost without thinking, the fully-developed Gemma nestled in the girl's brain becoming visible to her.
Something tugged at her memories, and Amy would have sworn she was experiencing déjà vu except for the fact that she knew it wasn't. There was something there, she just couldn't remember it, but it felt important.
Concentrating on the girl before her, she weighed the risks and decided that if the girl tried anything she could simply knock her out through the contact they still had.
"Do I know you?"
The girl blinked. "Uh, well, I'm in your history class," she answered innocently.
Amy looked her over again, and knew she wasn't lying. She could see it, and it felt like the girl's name was just on the tip of her tongue, out of reach. Something with a 't'. Tracy? Tabitha? Tara? But the healer also knew that it wasn't the connection she'd been looking for. There was something else. Something more, but the girl wasn't saying anything else.
"I see," Amy responded diplomatically, without any emotion.
She dropped the girl's hand, and was about to step away when the brunette opened her mouth again. "Um. Do you mind if I ask you something?"
Yes, Amy wanted to say. She wanted to get out of here. Away from this unknown new cape. Up to the roof where Victoria would pick her up and she'd get to enjoy the few minutes of being held in her sister's arms before she had to deal with being home.
But instead she looked back at the girl in annoyed resignation. "Fine."
"Why…" the brunette seemed to struggle with her words. "Why do you do this if you don't like it?"
Amy's thoughts halted. How did she know?
She managed to fool everybody, even Victoria, so how did she know that? And even for that matter, what business was it of hers? "What does it matter to you?" she questioned pointedly.
The girl cocked her head, as if trying to figure out the answer herself. "I… I don't know? I just… I guess I wonder why someone like you would do this if you didn't want to. I mean, I get that there's a lot of people you can help, but… why? If you don't like it, why?"
Amy snorted. Like it was that easy. This girl was seriously naïve. "What, so I should just give it up? Ignore everybody that wants to be healed by 'Panacea'? Fat chance."
"But, couldn't you like, do it less? Take a break or something? Just… I don't know, have time to recharge? I'm an introvert, and I know it'd be exhausting for me if I had to be around people all the time and live up to their expectations."
What, did the girl think she hadn't thought of that? Breaks didn't help. Every patient wore away at her, every day scraping away layer after layer until she felt like she'd be shaved down to the bone. At first it may have been rewarding, but now she saw how greedy people really were. She wasn't a person to them. She was just another cape. Another tool that was the solution to all of their problems. 'Panacea'. The universal cure.
Amy's eyes narrowed on the tall girl in front of her. "Don't act like you know anything about me." The other girl opened her mouth, but Amy was done with this conversation, and she cut her off before she could start. "Now, do you need anything else or can I go home now?" she asked harshly.
A shake of the head was the only response.
"Fine. Then I'll see you later, I suppose." And I'll find out how I know you.
"Good night," Amy ended with finality, turning around and walking out of the door, only a quiet "Yeah. 'Night" drifting behind her.
The girl's words wouldn't leave her mind. "If you don't like it, why?" They circled ceaselessly, and Amy was forced to admit to herself that she might have been harsher than she could have been. The girl had treated her like an actual human, not just a healing machine. She'd seen her as a person who had limits, and that was something Amy was unused to, and hadn't been prepared for.
The only people she saw as really doing that were Victoria (beautiful, perfect Victoria) and the one or two acquaintances at school. And even then, those were more Vicky's friends than hers. Before she'd thought of Victoria as being enough for her, that she was all she would need. But now she was wondering. Even normal people needed outlets, right? And… as much as she hated to admit it, she couldn't share everything with Victoria. Vicky had other friends, other people in her life.
Amy's thoughts immediately flew to Dean, and she pushed them out of her mind before the pain and depression and jealousy could set in, trying to ignore how her Victoria would never feel that way. Never return her feelings. Never want Amy like Amy wanted her. Wrestling with her spiraling control, she forced her thoughts back to the girl from the hospital.
Right before she'd cut the girl off at the end, reviewing the events she got a sense that the girl was about to ask if they could be friends. Amy wanted to scoff at the girl's sheer nerve and impulsiveness, but for some reason, the idea didn't seem all that disagreeable. In the heat of the moment she would have doubtlessly refused, but now that she actually considered it, she… she might accept if the girl asked again.
The loneliness when Victoria wasn't around could become crushing, especially in the house under Carol's constantly disapproving frown. The only escape Amy had was her healing, but even that had become something she resented, tainted by both Brandish's expectations along with the responsibility that she hated she felt. She knew that it wasn't her responsibility to heal every person in Brockton, but that didn't change Carol's unrealistic expectations nor the conscience that had been conditioned into her, constantly nagging and eating away at her.
"If you don't like it, why?"
The question that always came back around. Why the fuck was she doing this? Because of the overbearing "responsibility" she had, and the unrealistic hope that maybe, someday, she could get Carol to look at her the same way she looked at Victoria. But that did nothing for her.
"Can't you just… take a break?"
Hah. She wished. She wished she could. If only it were that easy. If only she could say "no". If only she could put her foot down and tell everyone how she really felt. But she couldn't, because she didn't want to bear the look in Victoria's eyes or the sheer disapproval she knew would come from Carol.
But this girl had been about to offer, hadn't she? About to offer to be something like that, someone who Amy could tell how she really felt, dump all of her feelings on to and rant all day.
It was unnerving how this one tall, lanky girl could get under her skin like this. But just like Amy had gotten irritated at her for presuming she knew about what she was going through, who was she to know what the other girl had gone through and dealt with? She was a parahuman, and first generation triggers could be horrific, terrible things.
Amy shivered, thinking about how she'd discovered what the other girl was.
Those eyes. Those hideously stunning eyes that felt like they could look into the very depths of your soul. It was like the image had been burned into Amy's mind. What would give someone a power like that? It had to be some kind of Thinker ability. They were the sign that this girl was a cape, but she'd never heard of any capes with eyes like that, and there hadn't been any recent transfers. It was completely possible that she simply didn't want to use her power publicly, that she didn't like it similar to how Amy was coming to resent her own. And that had a greater sense of rightness than the possibility that the girl was trying to hide her abilities for some ulterior motive.
The question became what should she do now? What should she do tomorrow? They'd be in a class together tomorrow, so it would be possible to learn the girl's name, which might in turn remind her of that annoying thing she couldn't seem to remember.
Amy decided she wouldn't actively seek the girl out, but if the brunette came to her she wouldn't be as harsh. Honey and vinegar and all that.
After all, what was the saying? 'Keep your friends close and your enemies closer'?
Potential, Amy amended. Potential enemy.
But even that felt wrong, and she tried to ignore the feeling. She'd figure out who and what this girl was, why she felt she could remember her.
And then she'd go from there.
A/N: Negotiator kinda derped there with the Root. But that's what happens when you try to understand the Akashic records without being conditioned for it.