Worm To The Infinite Escalationverse

by OverLord Wang-Yu

Synopsis/Plot: Inspired By SeerKing's Asylum for Plot Bunnies That Won't Stop Bugging Me. Many characters from Earth Bet are summoned to witness the many possiblities of the future Savior of Humanity and the Omniversally Acknowledged Queen of Escalation, the one and only Taylor Hebert. SLIGHT AU, OC AND OOC!

Worm To The Infinite Escalationverse

Franchise(S): Worm. Elements Of Other Series.

Synopsis/Plot: Inspired By SeerKing's Asylum for Plot Bunnies That Won't Stop Bugging Me. Many characters from Earth Bet are summoned to witness the many possiblities of the future Savior of Humanity and the Omniversally Acknowledged Queen of Escalation, the one and only Taylor Hebert. SLIGHT AU, OC AND OOC!

Pairing(S): None So Far.

DISCLAIMER: Worm Belongs To Ward. Any Other Elements And References Belong To Their Respective Creator(S)/Owner(S). SeerKing's Asylum for Plot Bunnies That Won't Stop Bugging Me Belong To SeerKing. All Fics Used Here Belong To Their Respective Authors/Writers. I Only Own The Plot, Original Worlds-Scenes And OCs Here.

NOTE/WARNING: This Chapter Uses Scenes And Elements From SeerKing's Worm: The Rise Of Skitter Drabbles From His Asylum Idea Fic, Thus Equal, And Even Greater, Credit Goes To Him As Well. The Same For Any Other Fics And Scenes From Other Authors/Writers Sans Those I Make Myself.

Prologue/World 0: To Witness It All...

(?, ?:? ?)

"Welp, time to do this again..." Sighed a male with pale skin, brown-reddish eyes and an amused grin in his average yet handsome, if not cute, face covered by a knight like mask only showing the eyes through a visor, a distinct knight-like themed body with a long coat. His color scheme predominantly features white with black in the center of the torso and the face of the head. He has long, pale pink hair rising from the top of the helmet that reaches his feet. He has detachable arms, which feature gigantic hands with black spiked wrists and razor sharp claws, which held a giant, body sized pink three-pointed blade. "SO COME ON THEN!"

(OW: My Avatar Photo basically)

*SLASH! CRACK!*

"KYAAAHHH?!"

"HOLY SH-!?"

"WHAT THE FUCK?!"

"CRAPBURGERS!"

"OH COME ON!"

"WHY ME!?"

"EEEEEKKKK!?"

"MOTHERFUCKER!"

"OWWIIEEEE!"

"DAMN IT ALL!"

"Oh dear...!"

At the several screams and curses followed by falling in front of him, the figure could only chuckle amused because, little wince of pity or not, he definitely LOVED that part of the job. "Heh, definitely worth the trouble~! Now to make sure they don't kill each other...maybe just yet..."

And so after clapping in order to "shut down" the powers of most of the presents, the mentioned all got up, some grumbling while other winced or even cursed, before looking around until seeing each other then...needless to say, all chaos broke up not a moment too soon:

"OH SHIT, IT'S THE WARDS!" Cursed the one and only Grue as he and his team, the Undersiders, consisting of Tattletale, Bitch, and Regent, were in the middle of the place between not only the forementioned Wards, but also both New Wave and even the Protectorate on the other side with some civilians near them, including- "A-AISHA?!"

The mentioned looked startled upon hearing her name coming from an apparent Cape as she glanced at the one who called her. "How the hell you know my name?!"

"W-Well, you see..."

"Wait a minute...you do sound familiar...BROTHER?!" She cried out in the end, when it finally hit her, getting a hushed curse and attempted denial from the mentioned.

"Welp, Cat's outta the bag it seems, Grue." Chuckled amused the renaissance reject known as Regent despite the situation they found themselves in.

"Alright, let it go Regent, we have more serious problems here!" Quickly shushed Tattletale, not only from the multiple persons in the room, but also from the fact that, SOMEHOW, her power was barely working when compared to before, as if somehow...limited.

Meanwhile, the other groups were trying, and failing, to get a grisp of their situation due to mainly some of the more..."hyperactive" members of said teams going wild trying to find a way out of there or, in a certain case-

"WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING AROUND HERE?!" Roared Shadow Stalker as she was trying, and failing, to escape the weird place she was in due to her power somehow not working at all, much to her disbelief as well as rage and hidden fear.

"Calm down, Shadow Stalker. We must make sure to know exactly how many of us are around here as well as their state first." Reminded her a serious Armsmaster as he put a hand on her shoulder which made the Ward in Probation, reluctantly, stop. "THEN we might look around for answers and a way out."

"That's a good call indeed, Armsmaster." Said a female voice familiar for him and the others members of the PRT as they looked at a young woman with long brown hair and eyes, caucasian skin and wearing a green and black tinker like armor suit. "Hmmm, is something wrong?"

"...Is that you, Dragon?" After a few moments, the Tinker veteran asked with a tone of surprise on his voice.

"Of course it's me, why would-?!" She began only to freeze up as she felt herself moving, and looked down at her body in atonishment, as if it was the first time she ever saw it, if her staring at her arms then at her comrade, and close friend, back to back a few times before blinking. "This...is rather unexpected, to be honest..."

"...I can see as to why, Dragon." Sighed the old, obese woman known as Emily Piggot, the current Deputy Head of the Parahuman Response Team of East North East located in Brockton Bay, as she understood the true nature behind just how unexpected and even maddening the situation they were all in was really like.

In fact, the only reason as to why she herself wasn't letting her infamous temper go around was because she was trying her best to get a read on the situation before deciding what to do next, especially with not only some villains there but also several civilians in the area. "At the very least, we can finally meet face to face for the first time in person, don't you agree?"

"Indeed..."

"While it's good to see you despite our circumstances being...less than ideal, but right now we need to make sure that everyone here, regardless of current alignment, is safe and unharmed." Chimed in Miss Militia as she finished cheking on all the Wards presents.

"That's indeed a good call there, Miss Militia." Nodded the one and only Director Costa Brown, glancing at the Deputy Director from Brocton Bay whom looked now briefly more sour before the heroine saw her fellow Triumvirate companions, Eidolon and Legend, at her side with the latter checking on his husband and adopted child.

Speaking of the civilians, they were mostly in their own group near the wards as, thankfully for them, the supposed group of villains were leaving them alone with the exception of that young african-american whom seemed to know the now panicking leader of the group.

"To be honest, I'm actully somewhat surprised yet saddened by what I'm looking at..." Admitted one Danny Hebert as he glanced at the scene in front of him. "For someone so young to be forced into the life of villainry, just to help his family..."

"I agree there, Mr...?" Began the woman publicly known as Kayden Anders nee Russel, whom was also the former villain known as Purity, as she held her children, Theo and Aster Anders, by her side as they looked around.

"Danny. Danny Hebert, and you Miss?"

"Kayden Anders, a pleasure...despite the situation we're in." She sighed as he nodded, watching her hold her young daughter as her step son looked around amazed at seeing so many heroes and even the villains there in one place.

"Eh? M-Mister Hebert?!" Called out a familiar voice to the mentioned in a surprised tone, making him turn around to see his daughter's (EX) best friend, Emma Barnes, whom was alongside a nervous young petite girl, Madison Clements, as well as the Ward Shadow Stalker, whom managed to convince the older heroes to go "check out the civilians for safely" which they accepted with the condition of her being supported by a pair of Wards, those being Vista and Gallant, the last whom ended up joined by Glory Girl and Panacea.

"Ah, it's good to see you around Emma!" The director of the dockworker's union answered in a relieved tone despite the situation, making the red head flinch as if struck by some reason...must be nothing. "Oh, and who is your friend over there?"

"O-Oh! W-Well, Mister Hebert, I-I'm Madison Clements, a fellow friend of Emma's and student at Winslow!" Quickly replied the nervous girl, which is understandable because of the strange circumstances of how they ended up there.

"It's a pleasure, but please call me Danny, since I'm not one for formalities..." Chuckled amused the blonde haired man. "So I guess since you're friends with Emma, it means you're also a friend of my little Taylor, right?"

That question, however, caused the duo and even Shadow Stalker to flinch briefly before they recovered, suddenly finding the floor very interesting, in case of the civilian duo, while the Ward glanced around angrily as if looking for a way out, unaware of the sudden curiosity of the other Wards and even the duo of New Wave.

Still, despite the apparent happiness on Danny's tone, he couldn't help the inner worry he had inside him, remembering how just a week after THAT incident lead to him discovering that his dear child was bullied, and he was unable to do anything about it in his depression from Anne's death, which made him feel worse even if he got better.

Even so, he hoped to find a time to speak with the young girls in front of him and ask them if they somehow knew anything about Taylor's situation at school, because since Emma was his daughter's best friend it means she should know whom was responsible for that sadistic torture excused as a prank which lead to her ending up in the hospital where she managed to recover without any apparent trauma aside from a slight case of claustrophobia, as far as he knew...

"Well, it's good to see that at least there are some known faces around here!" Chuckled the blonde Alexandria package heroine trying to ease the apparent tension she saw, if the quaking forms of the two civilian girls in front of her was anything to go by. "Speaking of which, where is your daughter, Mr. Hebert?"

"I can explain that, Victoria Dallon, if you would allow me~!" Sang a new voice, getting everyone's attention as they all turned to see the one responsible, only to see a Knight like figure sitting on a sofa like throne watching them with an amused vibe, if that was what was shown from his visor and mask covering his face.

"WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU?!" Screamed the Ward in probation as she tried once more, and failed, to use her power before being held back by the other Wards near her and even Emma from going against the newcomer.

"Wow, I knew you had issues, but still it's something else to witness it in person..." Admitted the Knight in an amused tone as he glanced at the rest with mirth and raised his voice. "Now now people, I'm not here to harm you or cause any kind of disgrace, for I just want to help you and entertain myself in the process~!"

"...Is that so? Then why would you want to help us? And what would you even gain from all this?" Finally asked a woman in the back walking forward revealing herself to wear a business suit and a hat that didn't stopped her long flowing hair, whose mere presence caused a few of the presents to shiver upon looking at her while the rest looked between surprised and worried.

"In order, to prevent a dark future from coming to pass in your world..." Began seriously the knight, making everyone look even more surprised, worried or disbelieving until he chuckled. "That and because I win some entertainment out of all this~! He he he he~!"

That last part got a lot of disbelief and deadpanned glances sent at the chuckling summoner.

"...Are you serious...Erm, what's your name?" Asked flatly Tattletale with a resigned tone of voice.

"Yes, I am. As for name, you may call me OverLord Wang-Yu, or just either one." He replied back with a bow. "As for your previous question, Mr. Hebert, and Miss Victoria, or Vicky if you prefer, I can assure you that Taylor Anne Hebert is safe and sound where she has been last time the former saw her in her Hospital Room, resting from her...Unfortunate Fate."

What the deity said got a mix of relief and self-loathing from Danny as well as the curiosity and suspiction of the others, all while a certain trio felt shivers coming to their backs.

"While that does bring some relief, we would like to know why we're here, OverLord..." Questioned Dragon as she and Armsmaster stared at him alongside the older Capes.

"Alright alright, I'll tell you the truth." He told them with an amused tone before it got serious. "Tell me, what do you know of the Multiverse Theory?"

This got many to look either surprised or confused until the woman in the fedora answered "It's pretty much what experts call the hypothetical set of finite or infinite possible universes, counting the historical universe that people regularly experience, each one made from a single choice, like what if we woke up on a different side of the bed to even...what if Scion never came to Earth Bet, right?"

"Exactly, that's pretty much the basic explanation, Contessa." Nodded the amused OverLord to the now grim faced woman as he continued. "However, I prefer the more glorious, Abridged summarization of it...For Multiverse Theory's A Bitch!"

That got some glares from the more serious people while others chuckled amused at what the knight said.

"Anyway, I'll explain why I called you all here, but be warned that it's not gonna be pretty, especially since it has to do with the fate of not only your world, but your "Multiverse" as well..." Admitted serious the summoner, making everyone pay rapt attention at him, even the now more unsettled figures like Shadow Stalker. "After all, you all here have an important role to play, especially when related to the [Queen Of Escalation]..."

"A-A-And whom is that, exactly?" Questioned a nervous yet surprised Emma at what had been revealed so far, getting a dark chuckle from the figure, as if laughing at some sort of joke that only he understood.

"Why, none other than TAYLOR ANNE HEBERT!" Declared in a proud, loud tone the knight, getting everyone to shiver from the enhanced sound coming from his worlds before what he said registered within them...

...

...

...

...*CRACK!*

"WWWHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAATTT?!"

"*Phew* Gotta admit, despite how loud they were, it was indeed priceless!" Admitted yet again OverLord with a grin as he saw the priceless reactions going around in front of him, even if many haven't learned yet about whom Taylor was until that moment.

"WHAT THE HELL?!"

"HOW CAN MY DAUGHTER BE INVOLVED IN ALL THIS MADNESS?!"

"THAT'S WHY YOU BROUGHT US ALL HERE?!"

"WHY IS SHE SO IMPORTANT?!"

"HOW DO WE KNOW YOU'RE TELLING THE TRUTH?!"

"WHAT THE FUCK?! THERE'S NO WAY THAT FUCKING HEBERT IS THAT IMPORTANT! SHE'S PREY!"

"[ENOUGH! SHUT UP AND SIT DOWN!]" Finally declared the knight in a dark tone that made everyone froze up as they stared at his now BLACK AND RED eyes that reinforced his Absolute Order, which they complied all while feeling an unnatural cold in their bodies until it faded alongside THAT look. "My apologies, normally I'm more calm but some stuff said there by you got me briefly...reminded of what needs to be fixed in your world..."

"I-It's alright, we...overreacted...and thus we apologize. I promise it won't happen again." Sighed back Alexandria as she checked around and saw the rest of the presents calming down, even the more wild ones like Shadow Stalker and Hellhound/Bitch put into submission by the feeling of being near something just as, if not more dare she say, dangerous than an ENDBRINGER!

"It's alright." Chuckled Wang-Yu now more calm before getting serious again. "Now then, if you allow me I'll show you all why things came to this point, especially since there's still time to prevent many of these events from occuring in your world..."

Everyone nodded at that after a few moments, each one taking a seat over the appearing couches and chairs that weren't there until recently, showing some more of their "Host's" power.

"And to clear things up, all time is frozen outside here so when you eventually leave, it will just be like nothing ever happend albeit you'll have all the memories of the events you'll witness here, for better or worse..." Revealed the Knight before a screen appeared in front of the group, having a size similar to that of a cinema screen.

Appearing on the screen was a picture of the planet Earth that then multiplied and split into countless duplicates that stretched into the horizon. Then a familiar fedora-wearing woman's voice spoke up.

The multiverse. Infinite alternate versions of Earth and the other planets of the universe. Any possible reality that can possibly exist, does.

"Is that me?" Questioned the surprised Contessa upon hearing her own voice.

"An alternate version of you, but yes. Now shush that it's getting good."

"Sheesh, she's being more cryptic than before." Vista remarked.

Suddenly, the camera panned over a countless number of Earths before coming to rest on one in particular, with the rest fading away. Then, Taylor Hebert's voice spoke up.

This is Earth Bet. On this particular version of Earth, in 1982, an amazing thing happened. The advent of the world's first actual superhero…

The image on the screen zoomed in until it showed the sight of a golden man flying across the sea, away from a boat.

…Scion. After this, the advent of Parahumans came upon us, not only on Earth Bet, but in Earth Aleph and other alternate worlds. The future looked pretty bright, or so I'm told.

"T-That's Taylor's voice!" Gasped Danny as he heard his daughter speak, even if she wasn't there with him, getting a couple of pitying glances from others.

"…why is she giving us a history lesson?" Aisha asked blankly.

"Context, when spoken simply."

The scene on screen showed four very familiar figures hovering in front of a rising sun. Taylor continued her lecture.

The greatest of the heroes to rise were a team that would later come to be known as the Triumvirate once other events came to pass. Alexandria, the indestructible flying heroine; Legend, a man capable of firing impossibly powerful beams; Hero, the most famous inventor of parahuman tech that existed; and Eidolon, the man with interchangeable powers.

At that, three fourths of the mentioned group stared at their younger selves with their old, deceased teammate, remembering briefly brighter, more hopeful and optimistic times.

Sadly…with the light, comes the darkness.

"Welp, ain't that fucking ominous..." Deadpanned Regent, getting a shush from his other teammates.

The image of a costumed man being clubbed over the head flashed across the screen.

The so-called 'Golden Age of Parahumans' came to an end with the violent death of the first parahuman besides Scion, Vikare, in a riot in Michigan, in 1989. His real name was Andrew Hawke.

Everyone flinched at that, understanding the grim reminder of what could happen to any cape since, powers or not, they were still human.

Even before the death of Vikare, things had been getting darker. The Slaughterhouse Nine, a group founded by the Parahuman called King, was brutally taken over by Jack Slash in 1987. With the death of the Second Parahuman, though, things went from bad to worse.

The scene changed to that of a dry, sparse mesa…and a chillingly familiar sight rampaging across it.

"Fuck! Behemoth!" Tattletale cursed, taken aback by the sudden appearance of the hero-Killing Endbringer alongside many of the presents.

In 1992, on December the 13th, the First Endbringer, initially known as Hadhayosh, appeared in the Khuzestan Province of Iran, near the Marun Oil Fields. Although all four members of the Proto-Triumvirate were present, they had only been present for earthquake relief. The fight was ultimately a draw, with several local heroes being slain. The year after, the Triumvirate were sworn in as founding members of the American Protectorate.

The screen shifted, showing another large, familiar figure rampaging through a large coastal city.

The Second Endbringer, called Jörmungandr initially, struck at Oslo on June the 9th, 1996. With Hadhayosh being the only one to attack thus, far, the defenders were caught off guard and great damage was done to both the city and its populace.

"Understatement if ever I've heard it." Armsmaster muttered. Dragon placed one hand comfortingly on his shoulder.

The screen shifted once again, this time showing three of the Triumvirate gathered around the bloody and shattered body of Hero.

In the year 2000, the Slaughterhouse Nine fought against the Triumvirate, resulting in The Siberian killing Hero and destroying one of Alexandria's eyes. The Triumvirate splintered with Hero's death, never to be truly united again.

The Triumvirate could only stare hollowly at the scene that showed their group's downfall and the demise of their teammate and closest friend, all thanks to the damn nine...

"Hero..." Mumbled out Alexandria while Legend was hugged by his husband whom tried to comfort him, all while Eidolon just floated alone as memories went through his mind.

"That makes it sound as if Hero was the one keeping the Triumvirate together." Parian mused.

"It isn't uncommon in social groups, as well as superhero/villain teams, for there to be one or more person to act as the glue keeping the group together." Tattletale replied. "Hero's death probably affected the Triumvirate badly, Eidolon and Alexandria especially."

The mentioned could only flinch at what they heard, yet they couldn't deny that...not after what they did following Hero's death.

The screen changed again, showing an angelic, multi-winged female floating over a city.

The Third Endbringer, initially called Israfel and Ulama, appeared over the capital city of Switzerland, Lausanne, in December of 2002. Corrupting the entire populace and necessitating the deaths of every man, woman and child in the city. One man who was a part of this operation was James Tagg of the Parahuman Response Team.

"Is it me, or did Taylor's voice sound pissed when she said that bastard's name?" Tattletale mused as she eyed the image of the Simurgh warily.

"Probably. The guy sounds like an ass." Aisha snorted, with Bitch snorting in agreement despite Grue's attempt at telling his sister to not use said language.

"Unfortunately he is..." Sighed bitterly Piggot, remembering her meetings with the man and that even she, despite her justified dislike of Parahumans, couldn't stand him when he went on and on with his anti-parahuman rants and demands.

Soon, the Endbringers came to be known by their more common names…Behemoth, Leviathan and Simurgh. Both individually and together, these three bringers of destruction did what nothing else could; forge agreements between Heroes and Villains. The Endbringer Truce, which basically halted all criminal activity and fighting across the globe, was established. In every battle, the heroes and villains of the world banded together and fought them with everything they had…

…it wasn't enough.

The scene changed to a familiar cityscape, one that all of those present were familiar with.

This is Brockton Bay, my home. In the aftermath of Leviathan, sea trade shrunk to a trickle. Losing its lifeblood, the city started to degenerate into the form I know today.

Images of the flags of the three big gangs of the Bay appeared on screen. Each coming forwards as Taylor talked about them.

In the Bay, the Empire Eighty-Eight, the Azn Bad Boyz and the Archer's Bridge Merchants rule the underbelly. Neo-Nazis, Pan-Asian Supremacists and drug-addled drug sellers. There were more Capes in the three gangs than in the local branch of the Protectorate, even with the backing of the Protectorate Wards and local PRT.

Between the infighting of the gangs, the Cape battles between the gangs and the Protectorate and the slow, inexorable death by inches that the city was going through, the everyman on the street struggled to keep their heads above the water.

"I know it was bad when I arrived, but…is it really as bad as Taylor is making it out to have been?" The foreign Ward Foil asked.

"Yup." Tattletale answered before the native Brocktonites could. "Everyone here is mostly either not in the Bay, have a steady job or went to Arcadia or Immaculata. Taylor apparently goes to Winslow, where wearing gang colours openly is the norm if you're a member. From what I can guess, she saw the worst of the city there. She saw how bad it was."

"Hey." Glory Girl said, offended.

"It's not a reflection on the Protectorate or New Wave, considering the former was being deliberately left understaffed and undermined thanks to fucking Cauldron." Continued OverLord, looking with dark amusement at the screen as the ones aware of the organization flinched wide-eyed at their mention. "Not to mention the need for strong Parahumans for the Endbringer Battles."

"Excuse me, Mr...Wang-Yu, but what do you mean by Cauldron?" Asked seriously Piggot, noting how her superior and even the fedora wearing woman were doing their best to glare discreetly at the mentioned knight.

"You'll learn soon enough of them, but right now we're gonna see why Taylor is so important for your survival."

This made everyone curious and stare at the screen, even if a certain trio were not liking where this was going, looking by the amused, if dark tone in their supposed Host's voice.

On the screen, a scene appeared on the screen, of Taylor, younger than the others were familiar with, dressed in a black dress, next to her father, Danny. They were standing, heads bowed, in front of a grave. The camera zoomed in to show the epitaph on the gravestone.

Annette Rose Hebert

1969-2008

She taught something precious to each of us.

My mother, Annette Rose Hebert, died in a car accident a year before I started highschool. My father, Daniel 'Danny' Hebert, loved her with everything that he was. He fell into a depression that he couldn't escape from. It took his old friend from college, Alan Barnes, to even try to take care of me, but sometimes he couldn't.

As for me…I was…surviving, for lack of a better word. My mom's death had torn a hole in our family, leaving two devastated people behind. We stopped using mobile phones, because mom had died while texting. It was stressful, and I withdrew and became quiet as a result.

"By the sounds of it, her mother was similar to Hero in that she was a stabilizing influence on her husband and daughter." Brandish observed.

"From what is described of her mother as a physical presence in the screen so far..." Tattletale sighed. "Taylor really loved her a lot, as does her father."

"...Yeah...I haven't stopped loving her ever since that day, and I never will..." Answered Danny in a reminiscing tone, remembering his departed wife before he felt a hand on his shoulders, making him see Kayden with an understanding smile while holding Aster with her other arm, getting an appreciative look and nod from the man.

Shadow Stalker eyed the screen, a little part of her with her survival instinct telling her that she was not going to enjoy what was about to come.

She wasn't the only one as Emma and Madison were feeling the same, or perhaps worse, as the former recalled how devastated Taylor looked in the screen and her memories before trying to shake it off, and failing, while the latter was remembering what she did to her once she started attending Winslow...

I went off to Summer Camp after graduating from Middle School. When I came back…my personal hell started.

At that the Trio's feelings got worse as Danny stared straight at the screen, now hopefully yet dreading to finally get an actual answer as to WHOM was responsible for his daughter's condition.

The rest of the presents couldn't help but feel that they weren't gonna like what was to come next, all while the author sighed and drank some Coke he summoned to calm himself down.

The screen changed to show three figures standing in a run-down school corridor. One was Shadow Stalker…or rather, Sophia Hess, to those whom knew her outside the outfit. The other two were teenage girls as well. One was a redhead wearing fashionable clothes, while the other was a cute-looking brunette, who looked to be a late bloomer.

Emma Barnes, my childhood friend, had changed a great deal in the few weeks I'd spent away at Camp. She rejected our friendship and started hanging out with a girl called Sophia Hess…a name I would soon come to curse.

Everyone aware of her real identity stared at Shadow Stalker. Which mean that two of the Undersiders, Tattletale and Bitch, with disdain and dislike, while the other Wards, her superiors, and even many like Parian and Foil looked suspicious while the rest stared at Emma and Madison, mostly at the now nervous redhead despite her attemtps to calm down.

"You're fucked, Psycho Stalker." Tattletale said flatly. "Just hope you know that."

"Fuck you, bitch." The former vigilante and former Ward snapped at her.

"Wait, so she's Sophia?!" Gaped a shocked Madison staring at the Ward in probation, whom cursed at that.

"Enough, we'll discuss the matter of her identity later! Now let us see the rest of this!" Growled Piggot, wanting to save face while wanting to know just what had that idiot of Hess done to the girl on the screen.

That made everyone stare back at the screen, even if some were looking ocassionally at the trio with suspicion, especially Danny.

I had a full academic scholarship to Arcadia, but I had turned it down in order to go to Winslow with Emma before going to Summer Camp. That is a decision that I would come to regret. For about a month after school started, things were normal…but then the bullying started.

"BULLYING?!" Roared Danny as he glared at the trio with such force that even the normally hot blooded Stalker trembled until he was, barely, calmed down by Kayden, whom was staring at them, especially at the Ward, in disgust.

Each of who I called The Trio had a role to play; Madison Clements, a cutsie-girly-girl, was in charge of the immature, juvenile pranks, like 'accidentally' tipping shavings from her pencil sharpener over me on her way to the bin, putting glue on my seat and other things like that.

The mentioned now just wanted the earth to eat her up and never let her go, especially as she didn't only felt the glares of many of the presents at what she did, but also her remembering what she did to Taylor, of whom she now learned how much she suffered BEFORE she started the damn mess!

Sophia was the physical one, tripping me up, pushing me down stairs, jabbing me with her elbow as she passed, deliberately throwing dodgeballs too hard at me, that kind of thing.

"Pfft, of couse you had to be such a bully, you Psycho Stalker!" Scoffed Grue, looking in disgust at the other shadow Parahuman whom glared at him. "It's people like you that give the damn Empire excuses!"

"FUCK OFF!" Growled the dark skinned girl while, unknown to most, Kayden flinched as if struck while Rune frowned at hearing that.

Of the three, it was Emma who hurt me the most. I could ignore or overlook what Madison and Sophia did, but with Emma, she knew every psychological weakness I had, every secret I had told her…and she used the against me ruthlessly.

As Taylor spoke, images of everything that the three girls had done to her appeared on the screen, making the watching occupants growl with anger.

"WHY EMMA?!" Screamed yet again Danny, as he tried to not jump at his best friend's daughter, even if said idea was getting more tempting the more he saw and heard what happened on the screen.

However, the redhead herself refused to answer, trying to keep her hands to her ears and eyes closed as more and more memories of what she did to Taylor, before and after THAT DAY, came to her mind.

But to her disbelief and horror, she felt her body move on her own and thus she was forced to stare at the screen, unable to close her eyes or move her arms.

"Now now, after all the trouble I went through to show you all this, I'd like if You Would Kindly See And Hear EVERYTHING Till The Finale, PLEASE!" Mock asked sadistically OverLord with THOSE eyes, making anyone glancing at him shiver as he made sure that the other two bullies were in the same position as Emma, all to make them witness the Truth.

The bullying wasn't just restricted to the Trio, of course…I wasn't that lucky. Eventually, after a year-

The video paused as Brandish cursed loudly. "A YEAR?! What were the teachers doing?!"

"Keeping a Ward on the premises. If memory serves, the PRT pushed Principal Blackwell to be lenient with her. I suspect she might have taken that a bit too literally, with the staff taking their lead from her." "Helpfully" supplied the giggling OverLord as Danny stared darkly at the PRT members, whom flinched briefly at why he was doing so.

"I can assure you, Mr. Hebert, that we NEVER intended for ANY of this to occur! In fact as soon as we're out of here, that damn Blackwell will get thrown by the books!" Tried to reassure firmly Piggot, as she especially HATED Parahumans whom used their powers to harm others, and what Sophia did pressed all her buttons to say the least.

"Y'don't say?" Glory Girl eyed Shadow Stalker with displeasure. "I don't like following orders, I'll admit, but at the time she didn't deserve any of that. What the hell were you thinking?!"

"That Hebert was weak and fucking prey." Stalker snarled. "Look at it like that, Glory Hole!"

She then cursed again as a familiar armor covered fist punched her flat onto her face.

"Like a friend of mine would say: True enough, but a war criminal who saves a country is still a war criminal. You're out of prison because of the amnesty given to all young parahumans and the PRT's desperate struggle to get as many Capes as possible since they don't have back up thanks to Cauldron, but I do believe that you are worse than those you struck down both as a vigilante and as a Ward. I think it's only a matter of time before you find yourself in trouble with the law again once you leave this place. Either that or you'll rage at someone who has no tolerance for your brand of bullshit." OverLord flatly told her, getting a growl from the girl with the now broken face as the higher ups aware of Cauldron thought briefly of perhaps sending some more back up onto Brockton Bay if things got so bad with a Probationary Ward.

-almost every student of Winslow, of every year, was complicit in the act of bullying me, either by action or by inaction. The teachers mastered the act of watching without seeing and I withdrew further and further into myself. Somehow, the Trio had gotten into my locker and stolen my mom's flute, destroyed it and then befouled it. It was repairable, but the cost would have been too much for me to pay by myself, and I didn't want to bring Dad into it.

"...What?" Was the flat tone in Danny's voice as everyone stared at the mentioned, whose look was starting to darken more and more as he glared at the now terrified Emma. "Not only...My daughter...but my Annette's Flute...BrOkEn?!"

At this some of the adults could barely hold down an almost hysteric Danny from going towards the Model Aspirant and her friends, with the redhead seeing just how badly her actions were affecting her uncle in all but blood as the memories she had of Taylor and her family before the Summer Camp was starting to overwhelm her...

'Upupupupu! Just some more!' Inwardly cackled the knight as he used some of his power to calm the single father down "enough" to continue looking at the screen, leaving the death glares towards The Trio aside.

Oddly enough, by the time the Christmas Holidays of 2010 came around, the pranks had died off. I was a social pariah, sure, but that was leagues better than being bullied by the whole damn school. I had hoped that they had lost interest and moved onto other things.

Unfortunately…the beginning of 2011 heralded immense change, both for me personally and for Earth Bet as a whole.

The last image vanished as a wave of insects swept over the picture.

"Oh crap, wasn't that ominous at all..." Deadpanned Clockblocker, having a feeling that he won't enjoy what's coming next.

"That's what I said!" Supported Regent before they were both shushed.

Meanwhile, Madison, upon recovering from Danny's most recent outburst yet, panicked some more because she had a feeling of what was going to be shown. 'Please not that! Please not that! I swear I never wanted THAT to happen to anybody, not even her!'

3rd of January, 2011

Winslow High School, Brockton Bay

The screen changed to show a pair of feet walking across tarmac and concrete before halting. The camera panned up and zoomed out slowly to reveal Taylor Hebert looking up at Winslow Highschool with a look of trepidation on her face. She was dressed in drab, dowdy clothes that practically forced her into the background. The camera then moved to Third Person perspective over Taylor.

"This brings back memories." Danny sighed. "Yet why is she wearing such clothes? I thought she had gotten some more...femenine like ones that she brought a while ago...before summer camp."

"A common effect of bullying is that the target becomes convinced that they are not pretty or attractive." Dragon said coolly. "Frequently, they dress down to try and avoid attention. That is the case here, I believe."

They could the figure of Taylor walk towards the front doors of Winslow, even as almost every person she passed looked at her. A few even smirked at Taylor, making her flinch away and speed up for a moment to get past them.

"OK, that's creepy as hell." Aisha stated, getting several nods.

"They know that Shadow Bitch and her two flunkies are planning something." Glory Girl said in disgust. "Look at this place! Gang colors worn openly, gang tags on the walls…I think those metal detectors are broken too. What a shithole."

"Vicky, language." Brandish said absently. "I do agree with you though…Winslow really is an appalling school."

"I think Taylor once mentioned that the gang kids carrying knives wasn't entirely unheard of." Danny remarked hollowly as he saw the figure of his daughter go through the corridors of the highschool.

I knew that something was up that day. The way people looked at me that day wasn't the typical 'oh look, it's the pariah' looks I usually got it was more like 'oh look, it's the pariah, let's see what's going to happen now' kind of look. Had I known what was gonna happen…I'd have skipped school.

That caused The Trio to tremble, one of rage while other was of denial and the last was from regret, since they knew what was going to happen.

"Just to warn you, this is not going to be pretty." OverLord warned everyone else in a serious, hollow tone.

Taylor's figure drew close to her locker and she eyed the nearby figures of Emma, Sophia and Madison with nervousness.

Taylor wrinkled her nose as she caught scent of something disgusting coming from her locker. 'So they put something foul in it this time? A bit of a backslide, so maybe it was Madison's idea. Well, let's just get it over with.'

"N-NO! IT WASN'T! IT WAS NEVER MY IDEA! I WOULDN'T HAVE AGREED TO SUCH THING!" Screamed madly the petite girl, looking horrified as everyone else looked at her in shock and disbelief. "RUN DAMN IT! RUN AND DON'T LOOK BACK!"

"Nope, sorry can't hear you." Sighed OverLord looking at her with some pity, before having a resolute look on his face. "After all, as much as even I hate it, No One Is Above The Consequences."

Grabbing the lock, she spun it open and flung the steel door wide. The sight of what lay within horrifying her. The locker was full of used tampons and pads that were rotting and covered in bugs.

"HOLY SHIT!" Screamed both Regent and Clockblocker in horrified tones.

"WHAT THE FUCK?!" Gaped Aegis, showing how dire the situation was.

"Great good god!" Panacea gagged.

"Fucking Christ!" Glory Girl agreed, jumping up with a hand over her mouth as Gallant, despite his perturbed mood, tried to calm her down.

"O-oh no! E-Ewewwwwww!" Chilled Dinah as she was hugged by a disgusted Aisha and an angry Grue.

"That…is utterly disgusting!" Parian shuddered. "Oh god, I think I'm gonna hurl…!"

A bucket appeared next to her. "Use that. Anything placed into it won't emit a smell."

Gratefully, the former Rogue used the bucket, with Foil rubbing her back comfortingly. The rest of the presents each managed to hold on to their lunches, albeit with great difficulty.

"NO NO NO NO! NOT AGAIN!" Cried out Madison.

"E-ENOUGH!" Screamed Emma, feeling her mind beginning to crack.

On the screen, Taylor leaned over and threw up from the sight and smell of the horror that was the contents of her locker, as well as her own disgust. Then the camera moved back to show Sophia moving in and reaching a hand out to grab Taylor's hair.

"No…you didn't!" Panacea recoiled in horror before whirling around to glare at Shadow Stalker for a moment, who seemed utterly unmoved by what her past self was doing on the screen.

"No, please no..." Barely managed to beg Danny as he could feel his remaining sanity fail over what happened to his daughter, what he let happen, while Kayden was hugging him and glaring openly with hatred at the dark skinned girl before looking at the screen.

'It might seem that HE was right after all...'

Grabbing Taylor's hair, Sophia picked her up and threw her into the mess inside her locker before slamming the door shut and locking it. The crowd around the locker started laughing as Taylor started to shriek and scream in horror. Then the bell for Class and Homeroom rang…and they just left her there.

Inside The Locker, I could barely breathe without wanting to throw up. I actually did throw up until all I could do was dry heave. I shrieked at the bugs crawling over me and gagged at the foul stench within the locker. It was so small that my arms couldn't move from my sides and I couldn't turn around.

All of that was bad enough, but it was when I realised that people had watched me get shoved into the locker, had seen exactly what I had been thrown into…and they let it happen. As time passed, I realised that I had been abandoned by them all.

Then…

-[Destination]-

Two massive beings entwined together in a spiral…

/[Agreement]/

Always together, unable to be separated…

-[Trajectory]-

Splitting apart, they would one day return to their former selves…

/[Agreement]/

Taylor hung in the air as two jeweled pieces of glowing light separated from each, spinning together into one as it sped towards her, the light engulfing her vision before she blacked out.

-/[Intersection!]/-

"Holy…!" Armsmaster swore. "That's very similar to the vision that Miss Militia described to me once!"

"That's true! What does it mean anyway?" Asked the mentioned, her tone of voice barely containing the sheer rage she felt upon witnessing Taylor's TRIGGER EVENT thanks to A WARD!

"The Trigger Vision, as it is called, shows The Warrior and The Thinker, known better to you all by the names Zion/Scion and Eden, during their arrival at Earth Bet. Miss Militia is the only person to remember her Trigger Vision due to her perfect memory." Admitted OverLord in a serious tone, despite the trembling fist he held upon witnessing the event.

"But...what of an AI?" Dragon frowned. "Would they forget? Technically, they have a perfect memory too."

"Only Parahuman perfect memory abilities can negate the memory-erasing abilities of the Shards of the Entities, I suspect."

Panacea didn't really care much about that. "Hess! Why did you do that?!" she growled. "Do you have any idea how close you probably came to killing her?! There's a reason why used feminine products are discarded separately!"

"What could have happened?" Glory Girl asked with a frown.

"Blood poisoning, numerous diseases and infections…and that's just if they had been fresh!" the healer shuddered. "That locker looked as if they'd been left to rot and ferment for weeks! That wasn't just used feminine products anymore; that was fucking toxic waste! I'm amazed that I wasn't called in to heal her! it's even more amazing that she didn't go into system shock!"

The utter horror in the girl's voice convinced the rest of the occupants of her sincerity, who glared at Shadow Stalker, with Regent and Tattletale struggling to hold Bitch back, making Armsmaster go over and help, despite his own glare at his subordinate.

But then...

-[Destination]-

Two massive beings entwined together in a spiral…

/[Agreement]/

Always together, unable to be separated…

-[Trajectory]-

Splitting apart, they would one day return to their former selves…

/[Agreement]/

A figure hung in the air as two jeweled pieces of glowing light separated from each, spinning together into one as it sped towards them, the light engulfing their vision before a black out.

-/[Intersection!]/-

'AND THERE WE GO!' Mentally cheered out madly the OverLord as the parahuman presents briefly lost consciousness before recovering confused, looking between shocked and aghast at what couldn't have yet did happen.

"A FUCKING TRIGGER?!" Gaped Shadow Stalker before cursing as she jumped away, because at the place where she was a few seconds ago, now it was infested by summoned Rats!

"EWWWW! RATS!" Gagged Vista in disgust as the rest of the Capes got alert, looking at the source before staring at the responsible with shock and disbelief as they saw that it was Danny, whom now had a murderous look on his face.

"WhAt...DiD...mY...dAuGhTeR eVeR dId To YoU?!" He roared in a guttural tone that made many tremble and get ready to either fight or run due to their situation as he glared murder at the trembling Trio, all while his summoned Rats hissed.

"Enough..." Called out OverLord's voice as he made the Berserk Danny look at him and stare into his visor-helmet, with the rampaging adult suddenly feeling his rage vanish as the rats dispersed into the shadows, to the relief of many. "I know the feeling, but you cannot do anything right now. So calm down, lest you lose your chance to see your daughter again due to your rage..."

Luckily that did the trick as the grown man sighed tiredly and fell back into his seat, soon being hugged by a worried looking Kayden whom despite her situation symphatized with the poor man.

"...For someone like him to trigger...especially at that age..." Started a wide eyed Rebecca looking at the almost broken man with a mix of disbelief and pity.

"There's nothing that a parent wouldn't do for their children..." Grimly said Legend with pity while hugging his shaken son alongside his husband from the experience he witnessed, feeling sad for the fellow father.

"...Pitiful." Simply stated Eidolon before he saw the Trio whom, despite not seeing his face, could feel his disgust for them. "Pathetic."

"OK People, I know that's bad, but gotta finish this at least before having a break, alright." Called out Wang-Yu as everyone got into position, with the Trio getting a wide bert and many glares raging from disappointed to disgust to even rage and death threats.

I don't remember anything from after that, but I discovered later that I was locked in that accursed and foul metal box for over an hour; a janitor found me and got me out just before First Period ended.

"Christ…!" Brandish blanched. "An hour in that hellhole…I'm surprised that she didn't develop claustrophobia!"

"She had a small case of it, but recovered..." Barely managed to answer Danny.

"Had I not said anything to the Janitor...she would have been there longer..." Everyone stared at Madison after she said that, a dead look on her crying face, much to their disbelief and anger.

"WHAT THE HELL, MADISON?!" Screamed Sophia, only for the young girl to glare at her making the african-american track star get silenced from shock.

"JUST SHUT IT! I WAS NEVER AWARE OF THAT DAMN "PRANK" UNTIL YOU DID IT, UNLIKE YOU AND EMMA!" She screamed back. "THAT'S WHY I TOLD A JANITOR AS SOON AS I COULD ABOUT SOMEONE BEING TRAPPED THERE! WHAT IF SHE DIED THEN, SOPHIA?! EMMA?! TELL ME!"

"And before you both say anything, in some universes, Taylor did indeed die from that incident." Revealed OverLord, getting everyone to stare at him wide eyed. "So while Madison did indeed do the right thing, and even show actual regret, it still changes nothing about her prior actions to The Locker, just like me and my friend said before about Sophia..."

That made the others understand as they stared back at the screen, with Madison ignoring the glaring Sophia and shocked Emma at what she revealed, just wanting to atone for how badly her actions affected Hebert, especially after witnessing how badly the Locker really was.

I figured out my power while I was in the hospital. Bug control. I could absolutely command all of the bugs within my range. After going through Silence of the Lambs-level crap, all I could do was control the little bastards that had crawled over me in The Locker.

God, was I pathetic or what?

That didn't stop me though. I was going to be a hero, even with a pathetic, low-tier power like insect control. I'd just have to be smart about it. So I wasn't an Alexandria-type like I'd always secretly wanted to be; big wow. If I couldn't fight harder…I'd just have to fight smarter.

The mentioned heroine stared at that, actually impressed by the young woman's conviction even if saddened by how she had to earn her powers in the process.

"That is an impressive resolve." Dragon sighed. "After everything she was put through, she wanted to be a hero. What next, do you suppose?"

"What you're looking at is one of the Main Possibilities where her Triggered Power was Anthropod Control, or Queen Administrator as it's actually known, a VERY useful power if used right." Answered a grinning knight. "After this it's pretty much 3 Months forward after the incident in which she learned to master her powers and use them to become a Hero."

"...Then she went to apply for the Wards?" Questioned a serious looking Piggot, whom glared bloody murder at the Ward in Probation, promising herself that as soon as she got outta here, that bitch of Hess was going straight to Juvie, no If, And or Buts! The Youth Guards could kiss her Old, Damned Ass!

"Yea-about that..." Giggled amused the Host.

The scene transitioned to an abandoned warehouse. The place was full of broken and disused equipment, boxes and the like. Taylor's voice spoke up again, pain in it.

After a week in hospital, during most of which I was almost catatonic, I was let out. The school paid for my medical treatment, but we weren't able to sue them or The Trio because no witnesses came forward…big surprise there. People didn't like Sophia; they were scared of her.

I thought about what to do with my power. The Protectorate Wards was something I considered…

"Fucking conspiracy of silence." Tattletale muttered as the first paragraph was spoken.

"She…actually considered joining the Wards at first…?" Vista said slowly, as if hearing them would make more sense to her. "OK, wow."

"She obviously chose not to even attempt it." Brandish mused. "I can guess why, although hearing her reasoning would be preferable."

"Agreed." Dragon nodded.

…but decided against it. I just felt that the notion of escaping the stresses of highschool by flinging myself into a mess of teenage drama, adult oversight and schedules was self-defeating. I had enough teen drama at Winslow as it was; I did not need any more of it.

Plus, my ability to trust authority figures and organized institutions had been basically destroyed over the period before my powers had been awakened. I wasn't going to give up what little independence and control I had left for anything.

"As I suspected." Brandish sighed. "A typical Master in personality; the craving for some measure of control and independence. Not entirely without reason though. Very good reasons in her case."

"Indeed." Dragon agreed. "Given what she went through, I'm surprised she trusted anyone at all."

"Taylor is stronger than a lot of people gave her credit for being." Tattletale remarked airily, throwing a pointed look at Shadow Stalker, who scowled.

"And what the fuck part of Hebert was strong before she fucking Triggered?"

"Her mental strength, Hess." OverLord sighed, like he was dealing with an unruly child throwing a tantrum.

"Haah?" the crossbow-user sneered. "How the fuck is mental strength that isn't telekinesis strong?"

"I'll field this one." Dragon said before OverLord could. "She was mentally strong, Hess, in that no matter what, she kept moving forward, despite going through some things that should have broken her, repeatedly."

"Quite correct, Dragon. Now to once again quote my friend SeerKing: You, Sophia Hess, continually mistake physical force and action for the sole indication of strength. That isn't entirely wrong, but it isn't the only kind of strength. Indeed, nor is it often the best kind of strength. When given the choice between basic physical fighting ability and the strength to keep getting up, no matter how many times you are knocked down, I would personally choose the latter, nine times out of ten." The Author declared proudly.

"How is constantly taking abuse without fighting back any kind of strength?!" the black girl jeered. "You can't change anything that way!"

"She didn't need to change anything, in regards to you at least…all Taylor had to do was endure you and your minions' abuse until you all graduated. Then she could retake her courses, get a job and move on with her life, leaving your infantile actions behind in the past where they belonged. Rather than fight you, Hess, Taylor would have simply dropped out of school and studied to take her GED at home." Revealed OverLord in sadistic glee at shattering the foolish hypocrite's view of the world. "In other words, you were like a storm that she had to endure. Irritating in the present, but one that would eventually pass her by if she had enough patience."

Shadow Stalker growled angrily at the idea of being seen as something someone like Hebert could just brush off like a fly or something!

Tattletale just rolled her eyes at the obvious thoughts from the Breaker that she didn't need her power to read. Stalker was as easy to read as a child's book to someone used to reading people like she was.

"OK...How did that Psycho even made it into the Wards again?" Questioned Regent, getting several nods from his teammates and some of the civilians.

"Long story short, after the PRT got evidence of Stalker almost killing a thug, they send Armsmaster to make her join the Wards in exchange of said evidence not coming into light, but Halbeard naturally ended up capturing her instead, which made her aminosity increase thricefold and thus focus it on Winslow, and by extension Taylor or any other unlucky sap to be her bullying victim." OverLord revealed yet again, getting a pair of glares from the mentioned Capes. "Thus once again she proved her dear ol' daddy right about her."

That got a scream of rage from the girl before she was force shut down on the mouth by the Host.

Onscreen, Taylor walked into the warehouse and started walking into the middle of the warehouse, where a space had been cleared.

I started training to become a hero; exercising, researching, testing and honing my powers, not to mention throwing a costume together. My power was very wide-ranged…

Immediately, the screen went grey, radiating out from Taylor. The camera panned out, leaving the warehouse until the grey area covered what looked like…

"Two blocks…" Armsmaster breathed. "Even before she practiced, she had that kind of range…!"

Once the 'Swarm Sense' field was up, hundreds of blue pinpricks of light appeared within the radius of it, followed by a rising number of in the top right-hand corner of the screen that eventually stopped at 3487.

"Gross…! I can't believe that there were so many bugs near her." Glory Girl shuddered.

Arthropods Within Swarm Sense:

Black Widows: 172

Cockroaches: 1567

Flies: 309

Brown Recluses: 159

Moths: 57

Butterflies: 35

Mosquitos: 460

House spiders: 457

Assorted Beetles: 271

"…cockroaches need to die." Foil said after recoiling and blanching at seeing the number of bugs that there were near Taylor.

All the other girls (excluding Bitch) nodded in agreement.

My range varied between two and two and a half blocks if I really stressed it. As to how many insects and the like I could control though…I don't think I actually had any limits. The more insects I had under my command, the more I could think and plan, meaning the more insects I could command…it was a loop.

I also got a general sense of what any given insect could do; their species-unique traits, their physical abilities…quite a bit, actually. Best of all, I remembered all of it…although, come to think of it, I was always connected to at least some part of a swarm, so maybe that's why?

Onscreen, they saw the commandments given to Taylor's swarm, in both absurdly small detail and with a massed swarm, as well as both together, as well as experimenting with which type of spider web to use to make her costume. The final part was using her insects to fully build her costume out of spider silk.

"OverLord, are the capabilities displayed here accurate?" Dragon asked abruptly as onscreen, Taylor looked the completed costume, the initial iteration of the outfit of her cape identity, which she named Skitter.

"To within a more than accurate degree that would have a supercomputer whirring in envy." He answered amused,

"Then Taylor could in fact force spiders to spin web until they couldn't anymore?" Armsmaster asked.

"Yes." Tattletale answered with a shrug.

"That's a very small degree of bio-manipulation, I think." Foil said, catching on to where the two were going.

"It isn't." The blond Thinker refuted with a shake of her head. "Taylor apparently has absolute command over any and all insects within her swarm, including things they couldn't instinctively control themselves. She can make them walk into fire despite their normal survival instincts normally dictating they flee from the heat, for example. All she did in the case of the spiders was removing the limiter that prevented their spinnerets running dry for good. No bio-manipulation necessary."

"She's right." Panacea said shortly. Being the resident bio-manipulator, her word carried quite a bit of weight. "Even if it was bio-manipulation, it wouldn't rate a single point on the PRT Threat Rating Scale."

"Hmmm, I wonder...If she has those abilities in our world...Mr. Hebert, sorry for asking, but could I please speak to your daughter as soon as we leave to ask her if she'd be interested in a partnership?" Asked curious yet worried Parian, getting a surprised look from many including the father before he sighed.

"...Just, let's just make sure she doesn't feel forced to do anything she doesn't want to do, please..." The Rouge/Neutral Cape nodded at that response and stared back at the screen.

That shut everyone up and they returned to watching the screen, which showed a still picture of Taylor walking through Winslow's corridors, in the middle of Sophia tripping her up with a sneer on her face.

Despite what had happened to me, it was back to business as usual at Winslow. Same old shit, just on different days. A part of me wanted, so badly, to use my powers on them, to get the smallest bit of revenge…

"She did the first one, right?" Glory Girl asked knowingly. "I would've done that."

"Victoria!" Brandish scolded her.

"Mom, she was being practically tortured!"

"She didn't." Tattletale shook her head sadly.

Quite a few people blinked in a mix between shock and disbelief.

"She…didn't attack them?" Parian asked in surprise. "Like, at all?"

"Nope." Tattletale said with a sigh. "You'll see."

…but refused to do anything, subtle or overt. Subtle things, like sneaking bugs into their food or giving them lice, or overt things, like having them being ambushed by a swarm, would be easy to trace back to the girl who had practically been swarmed with bugs very recently. Not to mention the fact that if I, let's say, gave them crabs, they'd take their anger and irritation out on me.

Not to mention the fact I was very angry with all of them. If I started…I didn't trust myself to stop.

There was silence from the room, before Brandish shook her head slowly.

"I don't know if I can call that admirable, stubborn or mature." She said slowly "As Victoria showed, any normal teenager wouldn't hesitate to get revenge if offered the opportunity, even if it was something petty. Yet she…Taylor…rose above it, for reasons both moral and practical."

"Call it a mix of all three." Dragon said as she looked pityingly at the downtrodden image of Taylor Hebert onscreen. "She was far more merciful than anyone could have imagined. With even her initial control over insects, she could have slaughtered the student and teacher population of Winslow within a few minutes if she had time to set up Black Widows and Brown Recluses to drop on everyone at the same time."

"Not to mention using other bugs as distractions and herding swarms. Such as flying insects like flies, wasps and hornets." Armsmaster added.

Back on the screen, a short video of Taylor eating her lunch in a girl's bathroom stall was interrupted by The Trio forcing the door closed and then pouring various cups of juice onto her, making her sopping wet, ruining her lunch and coming very close to crying.

"That is just….why go so fucking far on one person?!" Parian shook her head in disgust.

"Because Stalker's scum." Foil grasped the rouge capè's hand tightly.

Squeezing back, the Rogue shook her head. "I mean, why only Taylor? Surely she wasn't the only person those bitches were bullying. Did they go this far with all of them? If not, why focus on Taylor so much?"

"Emma Barnes was likely a driving force in that regard. Something happened to her that was Trigger-worthy but she didn't Trigger; instead, she suffered a mental breakdown and latched onto Sophia, the one who stepped in to save her, as a coping mechanism. Anyone who was familiar with Master/Stranger Protocols would have called it as soon as Taylor described the differences between Emma the last time Taylor saw her and Emma when Taylor came back from Summer Camp. Adopting Sophia's Predator/Prey attitude, Emma likely wanted to bully Taylor as a way to prove her strength." OverLord revealed with a disgusted scoff, glancing darkly at the shivering red head. "And even now, she didn't trigger unlike dear ol' daddy..."

"…that is so fucked up that it makes sense." Tattletale shook her head. She'd barely met Emma Barnes, but what OverLord said did stand to reason, given what she did know now about Taylor's former best friend.

"...What was it?" Everyone stared at Danny curiously, whom stared back at the Host. "What kind of bloody excuse does that damn BITCH have to do ALL THOSE THINGS TO MY DAUGHTER?!"

"No need to scream, for all you had to do was ask~!" Laughed sadistically the OverLord as the scene briefly changed to show a younger looking Emma, around 2 years ago inside a car with her dad Alan Barnes, speaking on her phone while they drove through the suburban areas of the Bay, near ABB Territory.

This made the older red head look shocked before looking at the knight with a horrified look on her face, "Y-You wouldn't...P-PLEASE NO!"

"Too late...two years too late, just ask dear Taylor!" Replied sadistically OverLord as he and the rest turned to the screen.

The next thing they witnessed, was the younger Emma talking to the phone to Taylor before the call was cut short by the appearance of a couple of thugs from the ABB, and soon enough one of them held her against a wall with a knife close to her eye.

"Now then, which eye should I stab out?" The thug mock asked with a sadistic look, only for a bolt to end up buried on the arm holding the weapon, making him scream in pain while releasing both knife and girl! "AAAARRRGGHHH!"

"Yan! What t-ACK!" Tried to call out his companion only to be hit in the back by a familiar looking Rogue whom quickly incapacitated both thugs before being revealed to be Shadow Stalker herself.

Finally they saw her hug and "comfort" the shaken up Emma, all while the dark wearing Cape told her about how to become "truly strong".

"Then once Taylor returns from Summer Camp worried for her then bestie, the now "Mastered" girl proceeds to pretty much ruin her life, even behind the scenes by making sure no one helped or befriended her in her "attempt" to "purge out all weaknesses"." Continued the disgusted OverLord after the scene ended. "All while believing the idiotic idea that her ex-friend would join the group as soon as she "stood her ground and fought back" as said by the hypocrite Stalker."

"HEY! TAKE THAT BACK!" Screamed the mentioned, too angry to focus on the soon to be inminent breakdown of the now shaking red head, whom could barely hear what was going on.

"I want you to be Honest with all of us, Sophia Hess." Began seriously the summoner, as his eyes briefly shone like the mentioned female, with no one aware of it. "Had Taylor Hebert actually fought back, even if only once against you and the others during her torment, would you have had actually welcomed her into your group...or would you have had actually sought out retribution over the "offense" done to you?"

Unaware of the fact that her eyes were glowing briefly, put under a compulsion to tell the Absolute Truth, the sneering dark skinned female answered. "The weak stay weak no matter what. What made you think she had the potential to be strong in the first place?'

...

...

Upon realizing what she had said, the now wide eyed Sophia saw how everyone looked at her with emotions ranging from disbelief to shock, anger, disgust and incredulity.

"Welp, somebody better get me a phone..." Started with dark amusement the armored figure before laughing. "Because I fucking called it!"

"B-But...th-hen t-that means..." Emma's shaky voice barely managed to whisper, as she remembered everything that she had done.

"That you betrayed, bullied and made suffer your former best friend and sister in all but blood for absolutely nothing..." Finished, surprisingly enough, a disgusted Dinah in a cold tone that surprised many albeit they agreed with what she said.

-[Destination]-

Two massive beings entwined together in a spiral…

/[Agreement]/

Always together, unable to be separated…

-[Trajectory]-

Splitting apart, they would one day return to their former selves…

/[Agreement]/

A figure hung in the air as two jeweled pieces of glowing light separated from each, spinning together into one as it sped towards them, the light engulfing their vision before a black out.

-/[Intersection!]/-

"Thanks a lot, Stalker! You made things so much easier!" Chuckled darkly the OverLord as he and the others, after the Capes recovered from the brief Trigger Effect, how Emma's hair was floating upwards, making her already unstable expression seem even more perturbing. "Welp, gotta make sure she doesn't go on a rampage...yet."

With that said, the knight quickly appeared in front of the now shocked female and STARED at her, with his visor glowing yet again, making her eyes glow the same colors until slowly, but surely, she calmed down as her hair returned back to it's normal shape and finally she merely stared at the screen, not being able to look at...the one whom she had thought as a friend before.

"People, I know the feeling, but let's finish the viewing alright? There's after all a reason as to why I'm showing you all this stuff, Y'Know?" Saying that, he and the rest of the group stared at the screen albeit many glared at the now uncomfortable looking Sophia.

Three months passed and my ability to endure the Trio's attacks grew thinner and thinner before one day, April the 10th, juice was poured over me in the bathroom while I ate lunch. Then my bag was stolen and stuffed into a trash can. It also had my journal of heroics in it, so this was a wakeup call for me. I bought a new one for twelve bucks and rewrote my notes in code to prevent people from reading them.

It also made me lose what patience that I had. I decided to go out that night and start my career as a hero.

"I'm actually surprised she didn't went on a rampage after that. I would certainly have." Regent admitted, his respect for the girl in the screen growing up even if he didn't want to admit it.

"She has not only a strong will, but strong morals too."

An image of Taylor in her bedroom, putting her costume on, appeared onscreen. The black-and-grey spider silk costume, with armoured panels went on, followed by Taylor picking up her mask and looking it in the eyes for a moment before she turned it in her hands and slid it onto her head. The camera then switched to looking her straight in the face as she raised her head.

"That's intense." Aisha laughed. "Damn, Tay's pretty intense."

"It's her first night out." Tattletale pointed out. "You may think we take the Cape lifestyle with flair, Aisha, so it may not occur to you that to other people, masking up for the first time is a big deal."

Danny couldn't help but glance worriedly at the sight of his daughter dressing up as a Cape, going to be out there, without him being able to do anything to help...but then again, right now he had obtained powers, no? Perhaps...

'A thought for another time.' He shook his head, paying attention and hoping that his little girl didn't got in too much trouble.

Transitioning to the next scene, Taylor in her costume stood at the end of her street. Onscreen, the not-yet-named Cape started running down back alleys, gather bugs as she went, the fliers picking up the slower ones and following.

"Did she really think she'd need such a large swarm?" Panacea frowned.

"Her entire shtick is pretty much 'massed waves of expendable troops' Panacea." Tattletale replied dryly. "She seems to be gathering more than enough for when her swarm gets damaged. Good thing too."

As Taylor entered the Docks area of Brockton Bay, gang tags became more prevalent, as did the dilapidated and abandoned look of the buildings. Broken glass in the windows, an air of neglect and abandonment over what had once been a prosperous and bustling area of the city. Now a bleak and moldering remnant of a past long gone.

Many of the presents, Capes or not, frowned at how the once bright city was now filled to the brim with criminals despite the best efforts of the supposed heroes.

"How is she not running into gangbangers right now?" Glory Girl asked with a frown. "The Docks are usually covered with them at that time of night."

"The area Taylor's in at the moment is purely ABB and they were, mostly, securing their assets after the Ruby Dreams Casino was knocked over." Tattletale said casually.

"That and Taylor had the best worst luck (or is that worst good luck?) in history when it comes to things like this; avoid a heap of low-level scrubs, get a Boss to the face."

Bitch snorted at that, with Aisha and a few more snickering along. Even Parian and Foil let out a giggle at Wang-Yu's words.

"Also, she was looking for people breaking the law." The knight added in as an afterthought. "She saw probable-hookers, gang members and druggies on her way through the Docks, but none that were actually breaking the law when she saw them."

It was as Taylor drew close to a corner that she heard some sounds, making her get close as possible to the wall.

After Taylor flattened herself to the wall, she peered around the corner to see a group of Asian men wearing the green and red colours of the ABB gathering around a shop, about half a block away, with a large man stepping out of it. Six feet high, bare-chested and displaying a lot of dragon-oriented tattoos, he wore a metal dragon-mask over his face.

"Wait…" Glory Girl said slowly. "She fought LUNG?!"

"E-Yup. But don't worry, she survived without any fatal wounds, and you'll see how." Answered the Knight, mainly to calm down the panicking Danny, not that he could blame the poor man.

Lung. At the time, I had based all of my research on what was available on Parahumans Online, or PHO as everyone called it. All I knew about him from that was that he had entered the Bay, kicked the living shit out of the Protectorate and then formed the ABB. The powers that I knew about were his ability to transform, his ability to get stronger the longer a fight went on and his pyrokinesis. Other than that, I was just glad that I saw no sign of his flunky, Oni Lee.

"She's treating Lung like an ordinary Cape villain." Brandish shook her head in disbelief.

"Given what happens next, she would have fought him even if she's known every detail of what he could do."

"But what could have made her do so anyway, even if she knew how outmached she was?" Questioned a curious yet wary Alexandria, having some flashes to her younger self in comparison to how Taylor acted on the screen.

"You'll see soon enough."

Onscreen, Taylor detached herself from the wall and ghosted up the fire escape into the roof of a nearby building, very carefully moving around the gravel-lined rooftop via the lip at the edge of the roof, until she could listen in on the speech that Lung was apparently giving to his subordinates.

"…the children, just shoot. Doesn't matter your aim, just shoot. You see one lying on the ground? Shoot the little bitch twice more to be sure. We give them no chances to be clever or lucky, understand?" Lung said just as one gang member lit a cigarette, the light from his lighter's flame reflecting off of guns carried by the dozen or so ABB members standing and listening to their boss' speech.

'They want to kill kids?!' Taylor thought. 'What should I do…?'

"Obviously get out of there! There isn't much she can do, powers or not." Declared a worried looking Kayden, knowing just how tough the ABB leader could be like.

"I'm actually surprised she didn't call for back up from the Protectorate." Armsmaster admitted looking intently at the screen.

"Remember, Mother sadly died in Car accident, so no wonder neither she nor her father have Cellphones." OverLord reminded. "And that's without adding a certain event that killed her friendship afterwards."

That got a flinch out of Emma, whom was now staring with many mixed emotions at the events happening to her former sister in all but blood.

"And here's where her being stubborn about using cell phones is coming back to bite her." Glory Girl groaned.

"The chances of her running into Lung, of all people, on her first night should have been pretty low." Dragon noted. "I can see why she intervened though…I can't believe Lung actually wanted to kill children."

"Guy who fought Leviathan or not, that would have gotten him a Kill Order, no mistakes." Vista agreed.

Shadow Stalker scoffed. "At least Hebert had the balls to try and fight."

Everyone ignored her.

"So she decided to fight…because Lung would have gone off and killed kids -kids that she didn't know- if she didn't do something." Foil said in mixed disbelief and respect. Her opinion of Taylor got up a couple of notches after that.

"Thanks to Shadow Stalker and the other members of the Trio, Taylor had very little regard for her own life at that point. A lot of the drive to be a hero that she had was to prove to herself and to others that she wasn't worthless or useless. Ironic really, considering that even at her most villainous, she was more heroic than a lot of Protectorate heroes."

More glares were sent at the Trio, mainly at Stalker, to the point where the Cape shifted uncomfortably. "Fuck you all!"

"Let's go…Taylor." Tattletale whispered.

Fighting Lung will need all of the forces Taylor can muster. With that, the mentioned Rookie summoned as many Insects as she possibly could, preparing herself for the fight of her life.

Tattletale blinked as the number of insects Taylor had at her disposal skyrocketed.

"She really has no limits to how many insects she could command." Dragon said steadily. "I can only think of a couple of Masters with this kind of strength."

"Taylor's Agent, the Queen Administrator, is the opposite of Glaistig Uaine's own. It was the epitome of Master powers regarding the living. Even if she'd only Triggered once, she would have been powerful. As it is, it's highly likely that she Double Triggered in the Locker." OverLord revealed. "At least, according to several fellow "Authors" and "Writers" such as myself."

"What's that?" Glory Girl blinked.

"A Double Trigger is when a person Triggers, and then undergoes a Second Trigger Event almost immediately afterwards." Armsmaster stated slowly. "Rather than a 'normal' Second Trigger event adding, stretching or removing restrictions in the powers, a Double Trigger generally just reinforces the powers of the original Trigger Event, making it more powerful and wider-ranged. It's quite difficult to tell when someone's undergone a Double Trigger Event though, as the effects of a regular Trigger and a Double Trigger are almost identical."

"That poor girl…" Brandish shook her head slowly.

"That Locker must have been worse than we thought." Foil scowled at Shadow Stalker.

"Given how in several world she had fainted into a Coma or even DIED, you can bet Scion's Golden Glorious Arse that's pretty much an understandment." The declaration made by the Author got many to be wide eyed as the glares towards the trio, especially Sophia, increased several-fold.

Onscreen, Taylor finished assigning a group of the stinging and biting insects to attack the ABB grunts as soon as she could, while a lot of venomous insects were assigned to attack Lung upon a thought, as well as a secondary command to the first group to attack Lung at that point as well.

"Here we go." The Insect Master muttered and released hell upon the group.

Immediately, the perspective changed to view the group of ABB thugs and Lung, who found themselves besieged by a veritable plague of insects and arachnids. Screaming and wailing in pain, they futilely beat at their clothes, dropping their guns in their panic.

"Argh!"

"Where the -?! Who?!"

"Get 'em off! Get 'em off!"

After being bitten and stun a few times, Lung flared up with his pyrokinesis power, sending streams of fire out from his hands in an attempt to burn the swarm to ashes.

'He's a regenerator…he should be able to be bitten and stung by my other insects without dying…'

Taylor, taking that as her prompt, pressed forward with her plan and Lung was swarmed under by Black Widows, Brown Recluses, wasps, bumblebees and other biting and stinging venomous insects, not to mention the nonvenomous kind as well. The flying insects focused on his face beneath his mask and the ground insects, ants and spiders, focused on his crotch; the most vulnerable areas he had.

"Yikes!" Panacea winced. "That many bites and stings from that many poisonous insects would have killed anyone but a regenerator."

"And where she made those bugs bit him? Ouch!" Flinched Clockblocker as all men subconsciously held their own privates at the thought of suffering the castration the ABB Leader did.

With a roar, Lung let loose a large explosion of fire, killing all of the insects on him, as well as burning off his clothes and setting one of his men on fire as well. He then started attacking the bugs around him with his fire.

In response, at the right moment had Taylor send a wall of harmless insects at Lung to gain some time, before sending a wasp to sting his eye, making the Dragon of Kyushu scream in rage at the pain and unleash another explosive wave of fire, which made his henchmen decide to flee.

"OK, OW!" Vista winced. Being stung by a wasp was generally bed enough, but being stun on the eyelid? Sheesh, Taylor did not hold back at all if you were dangerous enough to warrant her going all out on you!

"...I am having so many mixed feelings right now." Admitted Danny as he witnessed his daughter risk her life, much to his terror, yet being able to push LUNG of all people back so far, which made him feel oddly proud, and hoping that she'd be able to leave soon, since he was worried of course.

Lung was steadily growing, a third of his body covered in metallic scaled armour, fingers and toes turning into metallic daggers and he had grown significantly since the start of the fight.

'He's getting too powerful. I have to finish this, quickly!' With that thought, she had a bumblebee deliver a sting right to the center of Lung's other eyeball. Then she had the bee sacrifice itself to sting Lung's tear duct on that same eye.

With a growl, Lung set himself on fire, making any further attacks against him with insects completely useless.

'Damn. I can't beat him.' They heard Taylor curse. 'I'd better withdraw. His thugs are either knocked out or running with their tails between their legs. He won't be going after any kids tonight.'

The camera panned back to Taylor, who took a step back as she prepared to leave, her foot crunching the gravel on the roof. The screen split, showing Lung whirling around with a roar as he finally found his tormentor.

"Aw fuckberries!" Aisha cursed.

"Like OverLord said, best worst luck imaginable." Tattletale grimaced as the mentioned nodded.

As Lung launched himself up, Taylor reached into her back pouch and pull out a small black canister of pepper spray, even as the sounds of Lung climbing up the building grew louder and louder. Just after Taylor crouched down, Lung appeared over the edge of the roof, looking like a demon. Covered in flames and metallic scales, with one eye swollen closed, the sheer fury coming off of him was almost palpable.

Yet Taylor sprayed him in the shoulder, creating a small fireball and eliciting a hushed curse from her. But the thought of survival had the girl adjust her aim and spray him in the face, right where his good eye was located.

Lung screamed in pain and clutched his good eye with his free hand while pulling himself up with his other one.

"Pepper spray? Against fucking LUNG?!" Glory Girl asked skeptically.

"Language." Brandish scolded her daughter absentmindedly.

"...And now I'm suddenly glad I gave her that." Danny barely managed to mutter, looking focused on the screen.

Towering eight feet high, he loomed over Taylor menacingly as she went bolting for the fire escape.

With a roar of 'Motherfucker,' Lung flung a wave of fire across the roof that hit Taylor and sent her crashing to the rooftop, frantically patting down first her costume and then her hair to make sure neither was on fire. The Rage Dragon limped forwards and flung out another blast, which Taylor reacted to by ducking down and curl into a ball to endure the flames.

The Dragon of Kyushu growled in frustration as he limped forwards slowly, turning his head from one side to the other. "Cock. Sucker. Move. Give me something to aim for."

'Yeah, like I'm gonna do that.' Taylor's mental voice snarked at him.

"She fucking blinded him, temporarily at least." Foil shook her head in amazement. "I don't think any one Parahuman had ever hurt Lung like that before this."

"They hadn't." Dragon said, eyes locked on the screen. "Lung had received grievous wounds before this, but not injuries directly to his eyes. By the looks of it, he also had superhuman hearing once he started his transformation, so perhaps a flashbang would have been an effective tool to use against him. Good data to use against him for future encounters with him."

Abruptly, Lung extended his arm, pointing it away from Taylor and blasted his flames at the rooftop opposite him. Taylor raised her head slightly and peered into the gloom, but could make nothing out.

In the next moment, a van-sized monster landed atop of Lung, covered in boney protrusions and built like a rhino. It started wrestling with him, falling off the building after he smacked it back and it rhino-charged him.

"Brutus!" Bitch exclaimed.

"I'm sorry?" Vista blinked.

"That's one of her dogs." Grue informed her.

Two more of the monsters appeared, this time carrying a pair of figures on their backs. One, wearing motorcycle leathers and a motorcycle helmet with the full-face visor sculpted to resemble a sneering skull, dropped down and approached Taylor, who was very shakily standing up.

"Hey, it's us! We're fucking famous dudes!" Regent exclaimed with a laugh only to cry out in pain after Grue slapped his head.

"Language." Was all the leader said while glancing at his sister.

"You really saved us a lot of trouble." The figure said in a deep, masculine voice slightly muffled by his helmet. He reached out a hand to help Taylor, but she jerked back reflexively. Withdrawing his hand, he thumbed over his shoulder at where Lung was fighting against the animal, which was swiftly joined by the other two at the whistled command of one of the two dismounted female figures.

"When we got word Lung was aiming to come after us tonight, we were pretty freaked. We were arguing strategy for the better part of the day. We eventually decided, fuck it, we'd meet him halfway. Wing it. Not my usual way of doing things, but yeah." The boy continued. "Wouldn't you know, his flunky Lee is there with a half dozen guys, but Lung and the rest of his gang are nowhere to be found?" he laughed at this point. "Lee's no slouch in a fight, but there's a reason he's not leader of the ABB. He got spooked without his boss there and ran. I guess you're responsible for that?"

Moving to the edge of the roof, he looked down and said to Taylor, "Lung is getting creamed. The fuck you do to him?"

"Pepper spray, wasp and bee stings, fire ants and spider bites." A familiar voice said from the screen as the Tattletale of the possible future came to introduce herself. Wearing a purple and black bodysuit, she also had windswept blond hair. "He's not holding up too well. Gonna feel a helluvalot worse tomorrow."

It was then that they introduced themselves to me. The boy in leathers was Grue, the leader of their team. Next was Tattletale, the girl in purple and black. The girl who had commanded the dogs was Bitch or, as the PRT called her, Hellhound. And, as Grue put it, last and certainly least was Regent, the renaissance fair reject with a white mask.

Little did I know it at the time, but these four would be my greatest allies and friends, ones who I cherished and cared for, even if I eventually betrayed them in an effort to make a difference.

Tattletale swallowed thickly. "Oh dammit, Taylor…"

Bitch looked irritated for some reason. "Tch. Idiot…"

"Wait...betrayed them? Why would she do that?!" Regent questioned.

"We'll find out by looking at the screen, so calm down." Grue reassured.

After talking for a few minutes more, and Lung getting knocked out by the animals of Bitch, the four who I would later know to be the Undersiders sped off on their rhino-dog-things. They were the 'kids' that Lung had been going out to kill. I had almost gotten killed trying to stop Lung from attacking other villains, ones who had mistaken me for a villain too.

I hate myself sometimes.

Tattletale had warned me that a Protectorate Cape was approaching and the one who showed up surprised me…Armsmaster. He was the leader of the Protectorate East-North-East, headquartered on the forcefield-shrouded island in the middle of the bay of Brockton Bay. He had action figures and all kinds of other merchandise…including Armsmaster panties. I knew; I had a pair.

"What on earth were you thinking when you approved those, Armsmaster?" Dragon groaned with a slight facepalm. Armsmaster had the sense to look slightly sheepish and embarrassed.

Given all of that, the first words he said to me when he arrived, after asking if I was going to fight him, were surprisingly hurtful.

"I'm a good guy." Taylor said to the blue and silver armoured Armsmaster onscreen.

"You don't look like one." Armsmaster replied.

"Were you stupid enough to say that to Alexandria as well?" Aisha jeered at Armsmaster.

"We all know the answer to that." Sneered the mentioned heroine while glaring at the now uncomfortable Cape.

"She would've punched him into next week." Tattletale smiled, baring her teeth in a predatory fashion. "He just has all the tact that a two year old does."

After a bit of back and forth, during which I told him about the entire fight (which he should have remembered when dealing with Lung afterwards, idiot) and about my meeting afterwards with the Undersiders, he told me about how the other two members of the ABB with powers, Oni lee and the new Tinker, Bakuda, would start gunning for me if they knew I had taken down Lung.

I recognised what he was doing. He didn't actually care about me; he wanted to claim the credit for taking down and brining in Lung.

Needless to say, most people went from glaring at Sophia, and by extension Emma and Madison, to the now nervous Cape, whom couldn't believe how badly his future self was screwing up the situation on the screen.

"We're going to have a good long talk after this, Armsmaster." Warned darkly Piggot as Dragon nodded.

"Why you…!" Foil sounded angry and incredulous. "You stole credit for her fight?! Oh come on! How did anyone believe this shit? The sheer number of bites and stings in him must have made SOMEONE twig to the fact that a bug controller was involved!"

"Dragon, surely you could have seen the list of Lung's injuries and felt something was amiss?" Panacea asked.

Tattletale snorted. "Lemme guess; He got in the shit because he injected Lung with a regeneration inhibitor and Lung's dick rotted off from the spider and ant bites. If she didn't know about that, considering she had free access to the Protectorate ENE's systems, I would be very surprised."

"I can't, actually." Dragon said stiffly. "I have restrictions preventing me from accessing government and private systems without specific permission at that time, and from what I can see Armsmaster didn't tell me about this. I am very disappointed in him for how manipulative he was here."

Shadow Stalker, who had been silent until this moment, just snorted. "Isn't as if Hebert actually took him down anyway. That was those freakish mutts-OOF!"

Bitch had stormed over to the Shadow Breaker and punched her in the solar plexus, hard. "Don't talk about Angelica, Judas and Brutus like that, you fucking cunt." The Canine Mistress growled angrily before stomping back to her seat, leaving Shadow Stalker wheezing as she fought both to recover her breath and to not throw up.

"Ignoring Psycho Stalker's idiocy for Armsmaster's, yeah, this is a fuckup of grand proportions." Parian shook her head. "Leaving aside the fact that he blatantly manipulated an inexperienced, wounded and exhausted hero into giving him credit for her hard work."

Then OverLord chimed in. "He also would have taken it out on her for Lung getting badly wounded and him getting a rocket for it when it was his own fault for stopping Lung's regeneration."

"I would have healed Lung after Armsmaster brought him in." Panacea said crisply. "Had he just waited a while before injecting Lung with the regen inhibitor, Lung would have been fine."

"It was standard procedure-" Armsmaster began.

"You just didn't think!" Brandish interrupted him with a disdainful look. "You never thought to connect the hundreds of bug bites that Lung was covered with the possibility the only thing keeping him alive was his regeneration factor. Seriously, why you were ever placed at the head of the Protectorate ENE is beyond me."

The Tinker Cape grounded his teeth slightly, but said nothing.

"And now I can see another reason for Taylor to not go into the Wards..." Grimly muttered Danny as he glared at the Cape that essentially blackmailed her into silence.

I let him take it. I was both mentally and physically exhausted, wounded and truth be told, the thought of having Oni Lee and Bakuda after me was something that worried me. More than that, Armsmaster was the leader of the Protectorate in Brockton Bay. Having him tacitly owe me one was a big card to play when things got desperate that I couldn't turn down.

"Well-reasoned, but it sounds more like a justification than an argument." Brandish mused.

"I think she just wanted to get it over and done with so she could get home, sleep and recover from almost being turned into flambé, Brandish." Vista said dryly. The revelation here about who had taken down Lung (for the most part) and why had shaken her, especially since seeing that Taylor Hebert had leapt in to fight LUNG, of all villains, because she thought he was going to kill kids, had given her respect for the girl.

More than that, her faith in Armsmaster had been shaken. Mainly due to the revelation of Armsmaster's words and actions towards a girl trying to be a hero, despite having every reason to go bugpocalypse on her shithole of a school hit her hard.

"We should continue, I think." Dragon said calmly. "We've only gone through her first three months as a Parahuman; we have a lot of ground to cover."

Nodding, with dirty looks being sent at both Armsmaster and Shadow Stalker, the rest returned their attention to the screen.

The next thing shown was an unmasked Taylor being in the lair with the rest of the Undersiders, as they seemed to playfully discuss about something.

However, the next I ended up meeting and then joining the Undersiders after they offered a spot due to me saving them from Lung, which I had accepted for several reasons, mainly that if I managed to learn who was their boss and captured them in the act, it would get me enough pull to become an actual Hero, especially with the favor I could obtain from Armsmaster...what a fool I had been.

"So she had planned to backstab us? Is that it?" Regent questioned while Bitch growled.

"Not exactly. She thought that if she took down your boss, you guys wouldn't have to resort to crime, especially once you got a hold of his resources. Heck, she had hoped that at one point you'd join the Wards and led better lives, especially after learning of why you became "Villains"." OverLord cleared up with a sigh, remembering how the poor girl's faith in the system was shattered beyond hope thanks to the following events.

"I can understand that. Not like it, but understand." Nodded Grue with the rest doing the same, albeit Regent and Bitch reluctantly at the thought of going with the PRT.

Then they saw the next scene show the Brockton Bay Bank and the people inside until the Undersiders themselves came in, getting the rest of the panicked people into a group as half of them went to steal the stuff there while the other half made guard in case someone tried to do anything, but the most notable person there aside from the Villains was a certain figure in white...

"AMES?!" Gaped Vicky as she and the others saw that, indeed, it was Panacea on the screen.

"I-It's me...?!" Could barely mumble the mentioned now paying more attention to the sight.

"Oh crap! With her there it means Collateral Damage Barbie will also come in!" Cursed Tattletale, inwardly having deduced that her "Boss" must have had something to do with this.

"Long story short, two days after the mess with Lung on April 14th, The Boss of the Undersiders decided to make them steal the Bank for several reasons aside from "A Test" for Skitter, whom is Taylor's Cape Identity by the way, and in order to further down his own agenda." Explained the Author with a look of pity at the end sent to Dinah, whose eyes were wide with shock and fear upon realizing the hidden meaning of the glance, even if not seen much by the helmet, as her powers, which surprisingly still worked unless she tried to use it on the Author led her to a conclusion that made her blood freeze over:

That was the same day her future self would be kidnapped.

...To Be Continued.\

OW: AND CUT!

Sorry I took so long to send this people, but Real Life has been quite the bitch to me. Still Thankfully I managed to obtain enough time to finish this idea, and speaking of which, this prologue will be cut into 2, hopefully not 3 or more, parts due to how long and hard it is to write down the entire Worm Canon into a 3rd POV Story.

But don't worry, because once this is complete, I'll start with the alternate universes with Alt. Power Taylors.

Now after this? Well, I gotta go to a 9 Week Special Training on another place to learn how to get better chances of obtaining employment and an actual love, and I might not be able to answer back until July, mainly pending of whenever my mother allows me to take my cellphone.

Either way, after that I'll focus on writing the second prologue for Dragon Saber, which will be a main focus onwards until I finish it.

As for info here, yes, this IS an AU, with Foil coming to Brockton Bay far earlier and Danny and Emma Triggering, so expect Canon to go fic I itself soon enough XD

GOOD LUCK!^^