AN: So, I want to try and do something… different. Granted I'm always trying to do something different which is how we ended up in New York. In this case I mean something fundamentally different to the fandom. Generally speaking, we get an interlude at the end of every arc to show something about the story we couldn't normally know from Taylor's POV…
It's a good formula, it works, it's interesting when done properly… I don't really want to use it though. I'm going to try and only use Lily's POV for interludes. Why? Mostly because it keeps the focus closer to home. As a fandom, we spend a lot of time getting wrapped up in who is plotting what and why it is all aimed to make Taylor's life worse. Screw that noise, it'll come up when it's relevant. And really, I need to get a better grasp on Lily as a character.
Right now, she feels like an empty shell I'm slowly filling in. In canon when she got to BB she was shocked and offended by Shadow Stalkers overly violent takedowns. Which, you know, fair. Stalker is a psycho, but that's just so, idealistic, I guess. Then a few weeks later she pinned Skitter to the floor with a steal dart she left buried there to defend Parian... when all Skitter wanted to do was talk. She's not fleshed out enough in canon or in my mind yet. So, I'm going to work on that. Which would go better if Red Hood and Legend would stop hogging all the dialogue! Selfish shits. Here I am trying to develop a character and they have to up and steal the show.
Anyway. Enjoy the update. And Merry Christmas to each and every one of you!
{}{}{}{} Lily POV; Wards Weady Room 6PM
I was puttering. I didn't like the word or the implication that I was just wasting time, but when the boot fits… I hadn't seen Taylor since she stormed out last night. Not that she had been mad at us. Just, worried, and upset at the situation in general. She was great like that. Didn't even think about being angry at us. She just saw the situation, decided what she was going to do about it, and kicked into high gear.
I tried waiting up for her, but I'd been exhausted enough that even the couch felt heavenly. Waking up under a fluffy purple blanket had been nice. Especially once I realized Taylor must have traced it for me. She wasn't the best with words… Well that wasn't true. If you let her get going on a topic she felt strongly about, she could be really convincing. But when it came to people? She tended to be quieter. But the food, the little gestures like my new blanket, the way she always had time to listen? She cared about all of us. She just wasn't the best at saying it.
I didn't want her to go.
It was selfish of me, but I didn't want Taylor to run off to a dying city and leave me, us, behind. The way the paperwork tended to slow everything down it would likely still take a few days for any transfer to go through. Especially after an Endbringer attack. Maybe I could offer to go with her?
Closing my eyes and leaning against the counter. I tried not to shudder at the painfully fresh memories of walls of water bearing down on me. Or the inhuman shape of Leviathan obscured by dark curtains of pouring rain. Even knowing that thing would not be there waiting this time, the idea of going back to that city was intimidating.
Still, if I could help support Taylor while she looked for her Dad? I had to offer. Only problem with that was that I hadn't been able to find her. She'd been gone when I woke up. I hadn't found her in the offices upstairs though that was apparently because Leviathan had killed our supervisor. She hadn't been in the gym or training room. Not hidden away in a corner of the tiny base library. A quick check of her PHO thread was enough to confirm she hadn't gone out to shoot her target either.
It was possible she'd gone out in civvies just to get away from the base, but she almost always left a note when she did that.
I'd knocked on her door hours ago, but got no response. It was possible she'd just decided to bottle herself up in her room but that didn't seem like something Taylor would do. She wasn't one for pointless moping. If there was a problem? She blew through it, or went around it. If she was holding out in her room… Well that was probably a bad sign all around.
Mind made up I headed for her door.
"Taylor, you in there?" I gave the door a few firm raps with my knuckles. All quiet. Well not all. There was, some faint giggles coming from Dani's room. I very carefully pushed away any feelings of jealousy to rap on the door again more firmly. "Taylor, I'm just worried about you. Can we talk?"
Still nothing.
Feeling a bit frustrated I reached out and grabbed the door knob, fully expecting it to be locked. To my immense surprise it turned easily. I hesitated there, with the door open only a crack. I didn't want Taylor to think I was being pushy or invading her privacy. But I was worried about her. With a deep breath I inched the door open giving ample time for her to protest if she really didn't want me around. But the room remained silent. And once the door was fully open and I stepped in I realized why.
Taylor wasn't in her room. In fact, a lot of Taylor's things weren't in the room either. Her drawers and closet were all open and at least half their contents missing. Various knives, darts, and throwing stars were left scattered about, along with what few pictures she'd had her Dad bring her.
It didn't take me long to put the pieces together. I'd left rooms in similar states a time or two. The fact she had left the pictures was encouraging. Even then it was rather obvious. Taylor had packed some essentials and run.
I was banging on Dani's door in seconds. There was a slight delay in which I realized what I was likely interrupting. Felt embarrassed about it. Then discarded that all together because this was more important than interrupting my teammates make out session. It was just enough time for Dani to stick her head of very tousled hair through the wall and pout at me.
"What, Lily?"
"Taylor's clothes are gone, and her room's a mess. I think she's run away!" I nearly shouted.
Dani's mouth hung open in shock and a muffled cry of "What?!" came from the other side of the door. A moment later Jason threw open the door, even as he was struggling to get back into his shirt.
"Are you sure, Lily?" He asked somehow managing to sound serious, and not at all embarrassed.
"Unless she got her transfer and left without saying goodbye?" I answered nervously.
Jason just cursed. "I would have gotten notification if she was being transferred, and so far, I haven't. Masks on. Costumes can wait. We need to report this to Icebreaker, now!" He was already passed me and heading for his room.
"Icebreaker didn't make it back!" I called after him and just like that Jason stopped on a dime.
"Damn it. I forgot about that. Shit, I'm going to miss that… No, not the time. Later. First we need to deal with this." He muttered shaking his head.
"Get into full costume. We'll need to report directly to Legend at the main office. Leave Fred be for now. He said he would need at least a week to get his gear up and running again. We'll talk to him once we know more."
{}{}{}{}
Phantom and I had automatically fallen in behind Red Hood. When he got into a mood like this it was just so easy to be swept up in his pace.
"We need to speak with Legend immediately. We have a time sensitive issue that has the potential to develop into a full blown emergency."
The secretary looked torn. "I'm sorry Legend is in a meeting right now, but-"
"Is he meeting with the Youth Guard?" Hood cut her off.
"No, but"
"Good. Then interrupting won't make things worse." And with that said he headed straight for the door, knocked twice, and walked in without waiting for a response.
Following in his wake I shared a grin with Phantom. I might not care for boys, but in moments like this, it was easy to see what she admired about his personality.
"Sir, I'm sorry to interrupt," Hood sounded completely unapologetic. "but we've got a situation and it can't wait." The offices occupants were only Legend, and a large screen mounted on the wall showing the Chief Director. I swallowed my nerves, but Hood didn't so much as flinch. "Arsenal may have gone AWOL."
Legend closed his eyes and cradled his head in his hands, elbows resting on his desk. "Damn it." He tiredly muttered.
Costa Brown narrowed her eyes for a moment before shaking her head. "We've covered the major points. The rest can be sorted out later. Handle your situation, Legend." As she finished speaking the monitor shut off.
For a moment the office was silent. Legend took a deep breath and straightened in his seat. He looked exhausted. "You're sure?"
"Her rooms been half emptied." I spoke up. "And she's not answering my calls. I'm not sure if she tossed her phone, or just isn't answering…" I understood why she might not answer my calls, but the thought still stung a bit.
"Damn. She's been so restrained in the past, I'd hoped…"
"Boss?" Hood questioned.
"I had to reject her request for transfer. There's too much external focus on her at the moment to put her back on active duty early. Never mind transfer her somewhere we expect to see heavy fighting." Legend admitted. "If she waited a week or two, I could have gotten her transferred… I hoped she'd wait. She held still for three months before this!" He rubbed his temples.
Hood shook his head. "Boss, last time she had nothing to gain and everything to lose. This time… I won't say it's the opposite, but I can't blame her for putting her family first."
Legend nodded tiredly and tapped away at his computer. Moments later he cursed. "How on earth did she get that far so quickly?" Before we could ask the screen that previously displayed the Chief Director switched back on to show a map of the eastern seaboard. The single dotted line on it traced a path from New York to Brockton Bay where the signal was lost.
"Cell reception is going to be spotty in Brockton Bay, so I'm not surprised we lost her phone's tracker. I'm sure it's on the list of things to restore, but drinking and wastewater are going to be the top priority." Legend muttered.
No one said anything. I knew Taylor was driven and resourceful. And sure, I knew where she was heading, but to get there in… what eight hours? Less? I'd underestimated her.
"...We need to go after her." Hood spoke tiredly. "She's got issues with the East North East branch, right? They're the ones who put her in M/S confinement in the first place. She might cooperate enough to stay in touch in case they find her Dad first… But anything beyond that?" He shook his head.
"She'll assume they just want to send her back here?" I only half asked.
"Probably." Phantom agreed sounding just as dejected.
Legend gave us odd looks. "That would be their intent yes. They might have to foam her to bring her in, if she refuses to cooperate, but I'm sure they could lock her down without your assistance."
Hood looked to the ceiling as if asking for patience. I didn't make a show of it like he did, but I agreed with his sentiment.
"Sir, with all due respect the ENE branch have more pressing matters to deal with than trying to hunt down Arsenal. And if they tried, I'm fairly certain she would cut through the troopers like cardboard."
"Hood, she's not a villain. I highly doubt she would stoop to hurting LEO's."
"Even if they're picking a fight with her? A fight that she's not going to have the patience to deal with? Sir, she's never once cut loose in a fight or a spar. Even with Step I doubt we saw what she's capable of. You back her into a corner and she'll fight. Which is beside the point because they're not going to want to risk turning a friendly hostile with all the other shit on their plates."
"And you don't think the local heroes could get her back if they can't talk her down?" Legend asked, incredulous. "Hood, she's had her powers all of four months. The cities surviving capes have years of experience on her."
"And she's got a copilot who made a living running black ops." Hood shot back heatedly. "You try and arrest her to be shipped back here, and who knows how she'll react. More importantly, if you try to bring her in like a naughty child, any hope of getting her back into the Wards dies right there!"
Legend opened his mouth, then stopped and closed it as his face became thoughtful.
"You think you can soft sell her back into the Wards? I'll be honest, while it would be good to get her back onboard, if she's willing to go AWOL I'm not certain there's much point in trying."
"Maybe not." Hood admitted. "I can't tell you exactly what's going on in her head, Boss. She's angry, scared, and desperate. Maybe that bridge is burned, but if you try to capture her like some villain? That's just salting the earth. If she's going to come back it has to be her choice."
Legend was silent for a moment. "It's more complicated than that. If her father is dead, as a member of the Wards she would become a ward of the state. If that's the case, we can't be seen allowing her to run loose."
I cringed. If Taylor was ready to walk out because the Protectorate wouldn't let her search for her Dad, forcing her to stay with legal authority as her new guardian? She'd never accept that.
"The Youth Guard would use it as an excuse to stir up trouble. Even if her father is alive, she's our responsibility while her father's status is undetermined. Glenn's already going to throw a fit about the kind of damage she can do to our image. And that's just by existing outside of the Wards, never mind if she starts actively working to damage our reputation."
"All the more reason to try and fix this without pissing her off any more." Hood cut in sharply. "Boss I've read her file. I've talked with her. She's good with words when she wants to be." I guess I wasn't the only one to pick up on that. "All she has to do is record herself telling her story without bias and she'll have set off a shitstorm for the ages. I'm sure Glenn can do something to bury a scandal, but don't give her another reason to start swinging."
Legend looked us all over. "Do you honestly think you can convince her to come back?"
I glanced at Hood when he didn't answer immediately. I wanted to think we could convince her to come back, the pictures she left behind made me hopeful. But I couldn't be sure. I didn't even know what she was thinking beyond wanting to find her Dad.
"I don't know, Boss. But we've got a better chance than the locals."
Legend tapped a finger against his desk. "You do realize the city could very well become worse than Chicago ever was? And even if you can convince her to come back, I'll have to leave you all stationed there at least until the city stabilizes."
I winced. Though I'd never gotten all the details, the broad strokes of Red Hood's debut hunting down a street gang weren't pretty. From what I understood he was still on probation. And would continue to be so even after graduating from the Wards. If excessive force got him in trouble in the first place, repeat offenses would only make things worse.
In spite of that Hood only straightened his shoulders.
"All the more reason for me to go. You say it's going to be worse? Then it may very well come down to choosing who gets to walk away from a fight. You want us to let Arsenal run headlong into that shit without a friendly face to be found? You want some Ward who's never really hurt anyone to get tangled up in it? If nothing else, I at least know when to tell the regs to hang."
"Hood, that's my point! You can't just 'tell the regs to hang.' You could lose your probation, you could and end up in jail!"
"And following regs could leave people to die because we ran! Or get us killed because we held back against people trying to kill us!" Hood outright snarled. "Damn it, Boss. You think I'm the only one who sees it that way?!" I shifted nervously and glanced over to find Phantom similarly uncomfortable. I wanted to be a hero, I didn't really want to hurt people. Even criminals.
"I guarantee you if she's pressed hard enough Arsenal won't worry about criminals living to stand trial." Hood said coldly.
I closed my eyes and failed to not think about it. He was right. I'd spoken with her about it a few times since she joined. She didn't begrudge me my desire to not hurt people, but there was a certain conviction that she wore openly. She expected things to go bad. To eventually require that sort of force.
Coming out of that bust to find her mostly composed after cutting off a man's hand had been unsettling. That she'd done it to save a man's life helped, but there was a disconnect there. Part of me wanted to claim she should be better than that, but I'd seen her helmet footage. It was a small miracle she'd been fast enough to save the officer at all.
I didn't want to think about that, and yet here I was. Ready to run off to a city where that kind of decision might just be necessary.
My eyes opened wide as something else hit me. Legend wasn't denying what Hood had said. He was angry about it, sure. But he wasn't denying that it might come down to fighting all out or letting people die.
"And what about your teammates, Hood. You seem to think you are ready to make decisions of life and death for others without any kind of oversight." Legend face and body language screamed disapproval. "And you want to put that same burden on your teammates." His voice was scathing.
For the first time since we walked in, I actually saw Hood hesitate.
"No, sir." Phantom and I glanced at each other before looking at our leaders back. "I won't ask them to go. If they think they can handle it, that's their choice. If they don't… I can respect that." He turned to look at both of us and there was a tired pain in his eyes, that I'd never seen before. "It's…" He actually seemed to struggle to find the words. "It's a shitty thing to live with." He finally settled on. "Even if your right. Even if it needed to be done… And it's so very easy to go too far… That's even harder to live with." He shrugged awkwardly before turning back to Legend.
The admission seemed to throw Legend off of his game if the look of surprise was anything to go by.
Could I choose who lived and died? Could I just decide for myself what was appropriate force and when retreating to leave others behind wasn't something I could accept? Could I leave Taylor to face that on her own, along with everything else she had to be dealing with?
"I'll go, sir." The words tasted like ash and hope. I didn't want this. I wanted to help people not hurt them. But Taylor was a friend. Dense as a brick, and too serious for her own good, but amazing all the same. She had been burned time and time again, I wouldn't let myself be added to that list.
"If Hood is going, I'm going too." Phantom cut in. "He means well, but he needs someone to keep him out of trouble." She stepped forward and hip checked her boyfriend lightly. Following her lead, I stepped up beside them as well.
Legend was silent for a time and we simply waited quietly for his decision.
"What about Gigawatt?" Legend finally asked.
"He's out of action for at least a week." Hood said carefully. "A lot of his gear was either lost or damaged in the fight, and he needs that long to get it all fixed or replaced."
Legend nodded slowly. Then tapped away at his computer for a time. Finally, he sighed and stood up resting his hands on the desk before him.
"Phantom you will need parental permission for this transfer. If you do not receive permission you will not go, is that clear?" I didn't look away from Legend but I assumed Phantom nodded her consent.
"You three just got through an Endbringer attack, and I'm not at all comfortable with you jumping right back into active duty. It's already been a day… I'm ordering you to take tomorrow off as well. I'll have transport to Brockton Bay arranged for you three the day after. Be packed and ready to go. This transfer could be as brief as a week, or it could last for a month or more."
I nodded in spite of the feeling of my stomach trying to rise up through my throat. It was exactly what we came here for, and I wasn't entirely sure I was happy to get it.
"Gigawatt will remain in New York. Even after his repairs are completed. You three will aid the Protectorate East North East branch with the ongoing crisis, and attempt to reestablish friendly contact with Arsenal. Try and convince her to rejoin the Wards."
"Yes, sir." Hood said neutrally and then turned leading us out of his office.
And just like that, I was committed.