Sonata 2.2.1

I ended up hiding the sword under my bed.

…In my defense, it's a perfectly good place for long pointy objects that would otherwise stand out.

I probably should have left it back in the Graveyard, but by the time I thought of that I was already two-thirds of the way home, and I didn't have any time to circle back and make it home before dad to make dinner.

So I'd simply wrapped the thing in cloth made from my nanomaterial and made it look like, well, something long wrapped up in cloth on my way home.

Definitely less conspicuous, right?

Right?

The small bit of remaining irritation I'd felt over the Uber and Leet situation had bled off as I'd made stir-fry, but that didn't mean that I'd entirely forgiven them. I'd argue that it was one of the more harmless videos, considering my durability and such, but they hadn't known that, much less what my limits could be. Which means they'd put a potentially killable person in almost certain mortal danger without knowing what could go wrong.

Intentionally.

Which was either downright villainous, or really, really thoughtless. With them, I was leaning towards the latter.

The video had already been posted —I'd checked as I'd cooked— and it was popular. Like, already having more views than both their previous videos combined.

Most of the comments were questions about who I was (and then people making guesses, and then other people finally getting it and linking to my wiki page), gaming purists complaining about how I didn't truly follow the original strategy for defeating the dragon (which I now knew was some "Deathwing" character from an Aleph game that had only come out five months before), and others arguing that it didn't matter if I didn't solve it 'right' because I'd been close enough and it had still been —and I quote— "absolutely freaking awesome."

Yes, my ego was feeling quite good, thank you very much.

Apparently my sword wasn't even from the same game as the dragon —or even a game at all— but I couldn't care less where it came from, because in the end I still now had a sword. A sword that was perfect for my strength and durability. It might not have been Chevalier's absurd cannonblade, but I didn't need something like that when my own body and technology were more than adequate to compensate.

I stirred the food I was cooking, mixing it all together, and shifted my focus to going through whatever was new on PHO.

What I found surprised me.

While I was at the boardwalk, skipping school, there'd been an honest-to-god bank robbery happening. And I hadn't even known about it.

Guess who was responsible.

The Undersiders. Yeah, those guys I'd thought were soft-core villains and stuff? They'd taken a bankful of hostages and everything. It felt a little weird, because they'd done robberies before, but hadn't taken any hostages, which begged the question why'd they done it midday, when they could have followed their usual m.o. and done their work at night.

Because, apparently, this new change in behavior had not ended well for them. Four small-time villains against the entirety of the Wards, Panacea –who'd actually taken one of them down herself— and Glory Girl? The chances of them getting away were practically zero.

It was so unfair it wasn't even funny.

Though, Glory Girl had caused some property damage, but considering her sister had been one of the hostages, I couldn't exactly blame her. Property damage would probably be the last thing I thought about too, if someone was holding my dad hostage.

Moving away from that thread to the rest of the Brockton sub-forum, I quickly found a thread dedicated to my fight that linked to the video in the first post. The comments on it were fairly similar to the ones I'd seen on the video, though.

On a whim, I checked the creative sub-forum and was pleasantly surprised to find that Greg had actually gone ahead and posted his sketches and drawings in a new thread, including the ones he'd (unknowingly) done of me.

Most of the first comments on the thread were compliments, though a couple people were being dicks and saying that the poster couldn't be the same person as usual. Further down were some actual critiques, and I decided to comment as well if just to be nice, considering I'd been the one to actually give him the idea.

Now that those designs were out, though, I could start looking at reworking my costume. It'd take some work, but probably not much considering what I could do with my nanomaterial.

I was drawn out of my thoughts by the front door opening and closing, the familiar jingle of keys landing in the little bowl and Dad's steps through the hall towards the kitchen where I was.

"Smells great, Taylor."

I turned around and smiled. "Thanks, Dad."

He moved around me, reaching for the cabinets and getting out a couple plates and then the silverware, moving back to the table and setting it. "So how was school?"

I flinched and debated whether I should lie or not. I didn't want to. "I, ah, didn't go today."

I could practically feel him staring at my back. "Taylor…"

Sighing, I put the spatula down and turned around to look at him. "I know, I know. I just… needed a day off."

He matched my sigh and stepped towards me, drawing me towards him and wrapping his arms around me, hugging me.

"I understand. Just… don't make a habit of it, alright?"

I hugged him back, nodding into his shirt.

Even as inhuman as I was, diamond and metal and nanomachines and antimatter, he somehow still managed to make me feel like I was five years old again at times like this.

He let me go and I turned back to the food, turning off the burner and moving the pan onto the hot pad on the table. Dad started serving food, and I got out a glass and filled it with water for myself before sitting down.

Dad looked at me from over the food. "So what'd you do if you didn't go to school?"

I tried to keep myself from reacting, but I wanted to wince. "I just hung around the Boardwalk, mostly."

I hated needing to lie to him like this, about this. I hated needing to hide it, and hated that I couldn't share what I'd done, what I'd achieved.

My teeth ground together.

I felt like I was betraying what we'd gotten back since January. I'd hid what had happened to me, but nothing had really been as big as this, as impacting, at least to me. I'd been able to justify hiding my fight against Lung as not wanting to worry him, and the one against Squealer hadn't been anything to talk about and probably hadn't even gotten any notice. But my jet and the fight against that dragon…

I hated having to hide what I was from the one person who deserved to know, who I wanted to know, who I wanted to affirm and tell me that I was still me.

"Uh, Taylor? You're crushing the fork…"

I blinked and looked down at the utensil in my hand, and sure enough, my fingers had started to deform the metal.

I wanted to laugh, both in relief and at the sad irony, because suddenly the decision was out of my hands and I didn't have to worry about it anymore.

Outed by a fucking fork.

Maybe I could hide it, avoid the question, fix the fork with my nanomaterial and lie. 'It was probably a trick of the light' and all. But if I didn't take the chance now to confront this, to come clean and stop all the deception, when would I?

I put the fork down on the table.

"I… I think I have something to tell you," I said nervously.

He raised an eyebrow. "It wouldn't have anything to do with you squeezing a fork like cheese, would it?"

I laughed lowly, thankful for the effort at lightening the atmosphere. "Yeah. Yeah, it would."

I hugged my arms to my chest, looking down at my cooling food, and took a deep breath. "I'm…" not human. just software. not the girl you had with Mom. "I'm strong," I finally settled on. "I'm strong and fast and I can't get hurt or forget anything and I don't need to eat or sleep or any of that and I can make things. Things like you couldn't imagine."

I looked back up, waiting for… I don't know, shock? Revulsion? Fear? Anger? That would have made sense. Instead I just got placid thoughtfulness, though I was sure at least part of it was a mask.

"So like… Alexandria? Except more Tinker?" he asked, and I was a little surprised at how calmly he was taking all of this, and the fact that even knew what a Tinker was.

"Not… not exactly. I don't think." I knew. I was the only Fog on this world. "I'm—" I took a deep breath. "My body isn't… normal anymore. Just, just… here."

I held my right hand up and reverted my entire forearm to the default silver, Dad's other eyebrow rising to join the first. I separated my nanomaterial into spiraling strips and then unwound them from my around hand and arm dramatically, leaving just the dull grey metal of my skeleton and the dark black of my "muscles" behind.

My dad's eyes widened as I moved my fingers around, showing how the artificial muscle moved and flexed. With a thought, the strips of nanomaterial wrapped around my elbow and then flowed up and over my hand until it looked the same as it had, applying the correct skin tone.

"One day I was flesh and blood, and the next… I was like this," I said hesitantly.

Well, not exactly, but close enough.

"But you're still Taylor, right?" he asked, and I could hear the layers to the question.

I winced, because he'd nailed one of the things that I was still struggling with. "I-I think so?" I ran through thousands of thoughts anxiously, before finally settling on one. "Do you know about the Ship of Theseus?"

He shook his head, looking confused.

"So, um, you have a ship, right? If you replace one thing on the ship with an identical thing, it's still that ship right? What about ten things? A thousand things? When is the ship no longer the original ship, but something different?"

His expression became thoughtful again.

"It's like that, I guess. I still feel like me. I still have my memories and stuff. I'm just a little bit… different now." But was I Taylor? I was undeniably more, being Relentless, but that wasn't an answer, and the question still plagued me.

Still, it seemed to satisfy Dad, because he nodded. "When? When did it happen?"

"January," I said quietly. "I'm sorry for not telling you, but I was still trying to figure it out and we were…" I trailed off awkwardly, though he seemed to understand as he looked slightly guilty and regretful. "Before Monday, I couldn't even do any of this, I was just… me, made up of different stuff."

"I'm sorry too, you know."

I just nodded, accepting it for what it was worth. I'd been more upset back then, but now that we were doing so much better I'd slowly forgiven him for being so absent after Mom's death.

"So what does all this mean?"

I shrugged. "I… I want to help people."

"How? I'm not sure how I feel about you joining the Wards," he said, with obvious reluctance and discomfort.

"Yeah, I don't think I want to join them," I told him honestly, and he let out a visible sigh of relief that made me want to laugh. "Apparently they're trying to get me on the Protectorate, though," I said, and this time I couldn't restrain my laughter.

Dad spluttered. "T-the Protectorate?"

I nodded. "They think I'm older than I really am and I haven't felt like correcting them," I said, grinning.

"How do they even know about you?" he asked slowly.

"Oh. Uh." Shit. "I might've run into them a couple times? Well, actually just once, but the Wards a couple times after that," I rambled.

"And how exactly did you… 'run into them'?" he questioned, and I would've sworn that the room was getting warmer if I knew it wasn't, and that my own surface temperature was a constant 98.6°F.

I looked down at my plate. "I'm a cape, Dad. As in the 'go out and do things' type."

"Taylor…" he started, and I heard the frustration in his voice.

I looked back up, wanting to stop him before he got started on what I knew would be one of those parent-speeches. "Dad, I can do so much. I'm as hard as diamond, I can exert forces over four hundred tons, I can run faster than a car, I can't forget anything, I don't need to sleep, and I'm smart. Like Alexandria smart, dad. Do you know how hard it's been knowing I could do something but holding off since January? I waited four months."

My dad sighed, pushing his glasses up as he massaged the bridge of his nose. "I know. I know. But I'm still your father, Taylor. You can't expect me not to worry. Knowing those things helps, but my gut reaction is still worrying about you."

I forced myself to relax a little and relented. "I…I know. Sorry." He was being much calmer than I expected, and I could tell how much of a struggle he was going through.

"So if you're a cape, who are you? There hasn't been any news of any new capes…" he said.

I rubbed my left arm. "My name's Relentless. I'm independent. Really new. Nobody really knows about me yet."

"So what… you've already got a costume and everything, then?" he asked. "You have to, if you met the Protectorate and the Wards, right?"

I nodded. "Yeah. Armor over a black bodysuit. Total coverage."

He looked like he was fighting with himself for a moment. "Can I… see it?"

Rather than respond, I shifted into my costume and altered my appearance.

Dad's eyes widened and his eyebrows rose before he coughed. "Wow. Uhm. I can see how the Protectorate thought you were older."

I shifted out of the armor and back to my default appearance. "Yeah. Well."

"And you can just… change like that?"

"Yeah. It's apparently creepy when I look like someone else, and I don't really like to. It feels… weird."

He just nodded.

"To be honest I'm really really lucky," I told him. "It's rare to get a power that's so versatile or complete."

Dad leaned back in his chair, looking at me. "What is it, exactly?"

"What?"

"Your powers."

I hesitated, and decided to keep it simple. "You know the silver stuff I've got?" I removed the coloring of my arm to show it again, and Dad nodded, leaning forward to get a better look. "I have total control over it. It can emulate almost anything, and for the things it can't I can use it to take things apart or put them together."

I collected a glob in my hand and made it look and act like a golf ball from what I knew of them, fake logo and everything. I tossed it to my father and he fumbled to catch it before pushing up his glasses to look at it closer.

"If I hadn't just seen you make this I would have sworn it was a normal golf ball," he said, turning it and twisting it in his hand. Suddenly, he threw it at the floor. It clicked loudly against the tile when it hit, and he caught it on the rebound. "Hell, it even acts like one too." He looked it over for a few more seconds before passing it back to me. "That's pretty cool, Taylor."

I reabsorbed the nanomaterial in a blink and made my arm normal again.

"So um. Yeah. Ta-da?"

Dad chuckled under his breath before getting up and starting to clear the table. "And that's what you want to do? Make golf balls?"

"Not golf balls, Dad. There's so much mor—" I stopped. "…You're teasing me, aren't you?"

Although he was facing away at the sink, I could still hear his smile. "Guilty as charged."

"Daaaaad," I whined.

"I just found out my daughter's got superpowers and controls magical… stuff. I think I'm doing pretty well, all things considered."

"…Nanomaterial," I muttered.

"What?"

"It's called nanomaterial. Not 'magical stuff'," I said, pouting. "And it can do more than just make golf balls."

He laughed. "Like what?"

"Anything, Dad. Anything. That's the whole point! Engines, computers, chemicals, lasers, buildings, space ships, anything."

"How about fixing that loose board on the front steps?" he asked with a light tone.

"You could do that with a hammer, two nails, and five minutes," I said, rolling my eyes. "There's no need to bring advanced polymorphic materials into it."

"Touché."

I shook my head and rested my cheek on my fist. "So how's work going?" I asked, changing the topic. It gave us both a break from all the revelations and a chance to breathe, falling back into familiar patterns that actually made sense.

"Oh, you know…"

The rest of the evening before I went upstairs was spent just talking about trivial things, but it was still nice to have this easiness with my father that had been missing for so long.

I wouldn't have given it up for anything in the world.

Sonata 2.2.2
10:12 PM EST, Thursday, April 14, 2011

I stood at the top edge of the Century building, staring down at the dark streets and the cars that lit everything up like fireflies. The light of a waxing moon shone down on everything, casting it in an eerie paleness.

I wasn't afraid of heights anymore. I simply… wasn't. A combination of knowing that at this point I'd probably be able to survive atmospheric reentry stark naked and could create Armor panels mid-air that were usable as a solid surface, I suppose.

"Don't do it!"

I barely had time to look to the right towards the source of the words before they impacted me, dragging me off the lip of the building and towards the center of the roof.

"Don't do it! There's so much to life worth it, even if it's hard now! There's no need to kill your…sel…" the figure who was currently holding me against the roof of the building trailed off slowly. "Wha…?"

I blinked, staring up at a face I recognized easily. Platinum-blonde hair framing an attractive face, with a band of golden metal that had small spikes coming off of it on her head.

Victoria Dallon aka Glory Girl looked back at me.

"Who are you?"

"Relentless," I replied flatly. "Could you please get off me?"

She was leaning over me, holding me to the cement roof of the building by my wrists, straddling my midsection. A rather compromising position, to be honest, and more than a little embarrassing.

There were probably people who would die to be in the position I was in right then.

…I was not one of them.

"What were you doing!? It looked like you were about to jump!"

"Well I wasn't. Can you let me up?" I asked.

There was a tingling feeling around my wrists where her hands were, an odd sense of energy that I could feel and would have been more curious about were I not in the situation I was.

"I've never heard about anybody like you and I know all the capes in the Bay!"

I sighed. It didn't look like she had any intention of moving anytime soon, and I wasn't exactly keen on being held down like this.

At all.

Well, at least this would answer a question I had?

Without saying anything, I tried lifting my wrists from where she was pinning them down.

For a couple seconds nothing happened, there was no give at all, and I began increasing the force I was exerting without any results. And then suddenly the tingling energy I'd felt was just… gone, along with any and all resistance. I had to instantly tone down how hard I was pushing, as it felt like nothing compared to the ten or so tons of force I'd been pushing up with only a second before.

It felt… like pushing against a normal girl, actually.

I twisted my arms out of her grasp and used them to push myself up.

Glory Girl's eyes went wide, and she was looking a little pale as she quickly backed off of me.

"Y-you… you…" She looked down at her hands and then back up to me.

That had been weird. Literally impossible to move and then no resistance at all.

In moments, I saw the slight fear on her face turn into anger, the heroine starting to rise until she was actually floating upright, staring down at me. "Who are you!?"

I glared back at her from my place on the roof. "Relentless. I already told you that."

For a moment it looked like she was surprised and a little confused. "How are you doing that?" she asked, her voice sounding mildly irritated but also curious.

I just stared at her. "Doing what?"

"That! Being calm!" She waved her hand in my direction. "You can't feel it? At all?"

I blinked, trying to figure out what she was talking about… and then remembered that Glory Girl was supposed to have this aura that made people either love her or fear her. And I couldn't feel it. At all.

Was it because I didn't have a brain? Fear and awe were a result of chemical signals in the brain, and so her being able to induce those feelings at will meant that her power manipulated those chemicals in some way, at some level.

But I didn't have any chemical signals because I didn't have a brain. So… it sort of made sense that her ability wouldn't work on me.

I simply wasn't human enough.

…Actually, would any master effects? It seemed highly doubtful, now that I thought about it.

"Things like that don't work on me," I told her, as though I hadn't literally just found that out. "So… no, I don't feel it. …We are talking about that aura-thing, right?"

Glory Girl nodded while crossing her arms before she dropped the half-foot to land on the roof. "I've got it dialed up all the way, and you're not even twitching."

"…Ah."

Okay, come on, how else are you supposed to react to someone blatantly admitting they were trying to scare the ever-living shit out of you?

"So what are you supposed to be? Are you trying to be Dauntless' younger sister or something?" the blonde asked, eyeing my armor.

"No," I said strongly.

She got a glint in her eyes and uncrossed her arms, giving me the impression of a spring coiling. "Are you a villain?"

"No. Do I look like a villain to you?" I asked, incredulously. "And besides, why would I tell you if I was one?"

She shrugged, and I got the sense she was a bit off-balance without her aura to lean on and help her.

"Anyways, I'm not. I'm independent. You can check with the PRT if you want," I told her. "Or even online!"

Glory Girl eyed me. "Fine, I'll believe you… for now."

I wanted to throw up my hands in exasperation.

"If you're a hero, you won't mind sharing what you can do, right? So what are your powers? Obviously strength…" she said, looking down at her hands.

"Strength, speed, reflexes, senses, invulnerability, perfect memory, immunity to masters," I answered. "And a force field."

"Damn. Somebody got lucky…" she said, looking off to the side.

She couldn't exactly be talking when it came to getting lucky with powers. Alexandria-junior, swapping perfect memory for an aura that made people like you and enemies quiver in fear?

It was like her powers were made for being a superhero.

"Is this your first night out? I'm sure I could show you a few tricks…" she said.

I shook my head and held up two fingers. "Second night. First one was Lung."

Her eyes widened. "Wait, that was you? You're the 'new hero' they were talking about?"

"Yes?"

"Oh," was her response. "Well, I'm sure there's still stuff I could show you."

I shook my head and stood up, brushing myself off. With both of us standing up, it became obvious that I was taller than her by a good four inches, at least.

"I came out more just to think," I told her, walking towards the edge of the skyscraper and sitting down.

I heard the faint sound of wind moving quickly and then she was hovering in front of me, staring at me and then turning to look a foot or so to my right.

"Aren't you scared of falling?" she asked. "You didn't say you could fly."

"Invulnerable, remember?" I reminded her wryly. "And in any case…"

I manifested a panel of Armor under my foot and stomped on it, Glory Girl jerking to look down at the slight flashes of light it gave at the impacts. "Force field."

"Oh."

I let the expressed panels fade and she drifted in a circle until she was at the spot she'd been eyeing before, settling down on the edge.

I sat there silently for a few minutes as she gradually started fidgeting until she couldn't hold whatever she was thinking in anymore. "Soooo…"

I looked over at her. "So?"

She huffed. "So aren't you going to ask about what happened today!?"

I stared at her blankly. "What?"

"You know, the robbery, Undersiders, all that stuff?"

Oh. "Um… no?"

Glory Girl stared at me for a moment, an unrecognizable look in her eye, before turning away with something like a mix between a huff and scoff.

"Why, are you going to ask me about fighting a jumbo-jet-sized dragon?" I countered.

"What?" Her head snapped back to me. "There's no way Lung got that large! He didn't even get that large fighting Leviathan!"

"Not Lung. This stupid…" I trailed off and shook my head. "You know what, never mind."

"No, tell me!" The glint in her eye had returned.

"…" I was silent for a few moments, internally berating myself for even bringing it up. While it might have ended up being pretty cool, it was still more than a little embarrassing that I'd been caught like that in the first place. "Uber and Leet somehow found out about me and teleported me into this game-place to fight a giant dragon made of lava and rocks while they commentated because they felt the need to 'welcome' me," I told her, complete with air-quotes.

"So basically, they were being dicks like usual," she said.

"Yeah. Pretty much," I agreed. "It was nice not needing to hold back." I was still learning how to do that now that I had a real body and not just nanomaterial, which was more than evidenced by the fork that had outed me only hours before.

Glory Girl snorted. "I bet. That's all I've been hearing about lately. 'Be more careful, Victoria', 'Learn about proper applications of force, Victoria', 'Play safe, Victoria.' It's not that easy!" She turned to me, her voice having escalated in tension. "Right? It's not just me?"

I shifted uncomfortably at how intently she was looking at me, her eyes visibly darting between my own as though searching for something. "Right?"

I shook my head, hoping my response would calm her down at least a little. "I… crushed a fork on accident today." And outed myself to my father in the process. But I wasn't about to say that.

"Ha!" Glory Girl threw up her hands and stood so that she was standing on… nothing. Thin air. Only held aloft by her ability to fly, but she was as stable as if she were standing on the ground.

I'll admit that seeing that made me a little jealous. It was less the ability and more the casual usage of flight that triggered it more than anything.

"It's not just me!" Glory Girl crowed.

…Except you've been a hero for over two years and I've had a skeleton and muscles for less than twenty-four hours.

I didn't say that, either.

She turned back to me. "So what else've you done? On accident, I mean."

…

What the hell was I supposed to say here? And she was looking at me so expectantly. "U-um. I might've shattered a few guys' jaws?" Glory Girl nodded, making positive sounds and urging me on. "And I put my arm through Lung's chest," I admitted reluctantly, rubbing my upper left arm.

"Seriously?" she responded, and I couldn't tell if it was a good 'seriously?' or a bad 'seriously?'.

Still…

"He got better!" I defended.

"Hey, you aren't hearing any complaints from me. I probably would've done the same thing," she told me. "Fighting Lung one-on-one would be scary."

I nodded in emphatic agreement. "Right?"

"So how long have you been coming out? As a cape and stuff, I mean," she clarified. "I know you're new, but how new? Day two of… what?"

"…Just this week," I admitted.

"Huh. Well, that explains why I've never heard of you," she said, as though if I'd been around longer than that she definitely would have known who I was, which, okay, maybe it was true. She was a member of New Wave, and they probably made it their business to know what capes were in the city just on principle, if only so they could identify them.

There was a sudden musical ringing from the other side of the hero sitting by me, and I watched, curious, as she pulled a fancy-looking cellphone out of somewhere along her side. She glanced at the screen for a moment before swiping across it, holding it up to her ear. "What's up Amy?"

The voice on the other end was distinctly female, and young. "Weren't you going to pick me up tonight?"

Glory Girl blurred, standing up so quickly I might have missed it if I were still human. "Shit! It's already ten-thirty?" She didn't wait for a response before continuing on. "Sorry, I ran into this new cape and we got to talking and you know how it goes…" she trailed off. "Anyways. Yeah. I'll be right there. Sorry."

The girl on the other end was quiet for a moment before replying. "Thanks. See you soon."

"Bye Ames!" Glory Girl chirped, and then removed the phone from her ear, still hovering from when she'd jumped up as she turned it off and put it back from where it'd come from. She looked over at me. "Sorry, I promised to pick my sister up from the hospital tonight."

I waved her off.

"Anyways. Uh… I'm sure I've got one, somewhere," she muttered to herself, patting a couple areas along her ribs before slipping her fingers into another hidden pocket and drawing out… a card?

She held it out to me, and I took it, looking it over. It had her cape name and a phone number on it, along with New Wave's styled logotype. I looked back up, and she flashed a confident grin. "Us Brutes have got to stick together, right? If you ever want me to show you a couple things about how it's done, just let me know."

"…Okay," I said hesitantly, but trying to take the gesture for what it was intended to be: welcoming. "Thanks."

Glory Girl nodded. "Well, bye then!" She waved and dove off the side of the building, leaving me waving awkwardly after her at empty air.

Talk about whiplash.

Shaking my head, I lay back down on the rooftop, holding the card above me as I looked at the name and the number on it.

Victoria Dallon. Glory Girl. One more person who'd been simultaneously everything and nothing like what I'd expected.

I put the card away in a pocket I formed, staring up at the stars and wondering if every cape I encountered was going to be like that.

For some reason, I didn't doubt that they would.