Mixed Beginnings 1.3

Della Duke/Nikki Hunt

Fugly Bob's was not quite what Della had expected, it was not some run down fast food joint with ultimately great food for its lack of everything else. No, surprisingly there was a bar too, and beside the burgers there were also gyros and tacos. Not what Della had expected in the slightest. Normally something going beyond her expectations would leave the pale girl rather happy. But it led to some thoughts that Della couldn't quite ignore. The biggest and perhaps the most important being whether she could actually count on her knowledge of Worm's Earth Bet from fanfiction alone. Thankfully it was a question Della easily answered even if the answer didn't make her feel any better or particularly: Not much if at all.

Della shook her head to clear her thoughts. The mouthwatering smells and the dull roar of the packed restaurant had helped her to lose focus of the future beyond her current plan of action. That being eating a lot of food, after which tweaking her metabolism so that she could get some damn meat on her bones and fill out her bra. That and working on peaking her body beyond her already low end brute rating. The-Her body was good, but not perfect. And with this self BioKinesis she had, she could make it damn near perfect. Better tweaking her nutrient and water absorption along with improving her liver, gallbladder, stomach, and intestines. Oh and make the appendix worth something. Della didn't actually understand what exactly she was doing with her body, just that she was doing it and she assumed her Shard was handling the details that she didn't know.

How scientists don't know what it does or was used for, despite cutting people open for centuries boggled Della. But she knew what she could use it for. That was waste eating bacteria. Less bathroom trips meant more time doing important stuff. Less bathroom trips overall was just better in general, after all it's the second most vulnerable state a gal could be in. The first being sleep, of course… Perhaps she could work on that too somehow….Wait fuck she was stupid. There was no way in hell Della had not picked the Noctis perk. But maybe she hadn't, her and James had done the CYOA early in the morning and had traveled through Dimensions when they went to sleep that night. Long enough time to forget details with her previously human memory, so Della would have to wait to find out.

As Della waited in the restaurant's line, her mind continued to wander. It should probably worry her that she was so readily changing her body like this. But: C'est La Vie as they say. Oh wait. She actually knew Latin, holy shit. Quod est vita instead of the french stuff. Della grinned as she staggered up to the small line in place. She had forgotten that she knew the language, although it didn't seem perfect to her, like she wasn't a native speaker. Maybe it was bootleg latin? Not like she knew what actual latin sounded like anyway. She'd need to practice on it once her and James got a proper lair.

But for now she could at least pretend to be bilingual enough to fool everyone but demons.

The line moved quickly, which was a bit of a surprise. Again, exceeding her expectations for a place called 'Fugly Bob's' in an economic sinkhole called Brockton Bay. Once she was up to the counter she glanced at the small banner hanging for the specialty burger, which was just a big ass burger with a huge heaping of fries. Oh. It also had two hotdogs, located on either side of the burger, sticking out from the bun. That was weird.

"Welcome to Fugly Bob's! What can I get ya girlie?" The large, oil stained man behind the register questioned, flashing Della a toothy grin that pushed up his chubby cheeks. "Say, haven't seen you around here before! New to the city?"

She was starting to feel a bit like a dick for thinking so low of the place before even coming inside.

"Uh… yeah. Parents just moved here for work with Medhall, heard about this place and decided that I had to come and see it." Della answered to which the man's grin grew. "Also I want to try the challenger you have here." The man gave a short chuckle, a hand coming up to scratch behind his ear. "That so, eh?!" He questioned boisterously, clearly excited at the prospect of another happy soul soon to be crushed by greasy meat.

Shows what he knew.

"Now girlie, you know if you can't clear the plate it's a full sixty dallas right?"

"Yes sir I understand. But I still want to do it. Besides if I don't finish, I can take the leftovers home right?" Della asked to which the man nodded. "Alright girlie! Finish the burger and it doesn't cost you a thing. Plus, you get your picture on the wall over there." He said, nodding off to a brick wall that clashed with the rest of the inside's decorations seemingly made for the purpose of being the Wall of Winners. There were only a handful of pictures of people who were either triumphant or looking quite ill.

Della took the little flag that meant she was ordering heart attack on a tray, the restaurant's challenger, and went to an empty table. Pulling out her phone as the cash register dude yelled at the cooks in the back to prepare the specialty burger. She pointedly ignored the stares she was getting, but she did scan the crowd for anyone she might recognize. Which might only be Lisa or Brian. Mostly because she had only "European pretty boy" to go with Alec and she was kinda bad with guessing ethnicities. But would they come here? Right now? Not like she cared if Alec or Brian saw her. But Lisa?

Lisa may have to...be convinced to not tell Coil anything. Yeah the girl hates Coil, but any slip of lip could sink Della's collective fleet she was going to be sailing...Metaphors, she was good at them. Della sighed softly as she saw only strangers in the fast food/bar shack. It was a relieved sigh, and she relaxed in her booth, checking out her high end smartphone. She had an iPhone, but she had liked James's android more even if he had done all that weird...Jailbreaking? Root it?

Della sighed again and put her smartphone away in a huff. She should be out there looking for James, helping him. But she needed to eat, and needed to build up her strength as well. Brockton Bay was dangerous, hell besides the birdcage it was probably one of the more dangerous areas on Earth Bet.

Della groaned. "Fuck." She murmured to herself as the other patrons of the joint started to ease their attention off her and go back to their own meals. She was going to have to get a few of those innocent parahumans out of there too. She only knew about Canary, cause fuck the government, so she would have to look up who exactly had been acquitted after they had been sent to that fucking place.

Then she was going to have to bug the shit out of Dragon to get a live feed of the place. Then threaten Dragon to get that live feed because Della knew the fucking AI wouldn't just do what was right. Even if only because of her chai-No. No, Della was going to fucking kill Saint and his merry band of fuckwits. Or talk them into giving her that uh, program. Della couldn't actually remember the name of it. Apparently being a Noctis Cape didn't give you a perfect recall on things you've already forgotten or she hadn't picked that perk. Which sucked, quite a bit. Because she had crawled through the Worm Wiki once or twice when she was writing her own fanfiction and that all would be very nice to remember at the moment.

Holy shit, what if she was creating worlds when she wrote those stories? Della felt a little uneasy and made a promise to herself to never try and meet her original characters because wow she was a fucking terrible human being if that was what was happening. She was sure she would never be able to write again if she turned out to be right and as such she really hoped she wasn't….Maybe they just peered into other worlds thinking it was imagination and just documented it? That was easier to swallow than her entire world being responsible for so much misery and death.

Della shook off her funk as she noticed the wheeled trolley coming her way and holy fuck that was big. She stared at the monster of a burger as the tray it was stacked upon was laid before her. On one hand it looked positively amazing, and on the other hand it was disgusting by the pure avarice it took to consume such a thing. It was wider than her hands put together and was stacked almost as tall as her forearm was long. Granted her forearm wasn't as long as it should be, which is one of the reasons she was here in the first place. Getting calories to convert into biomass in order to get her body back up to snuff, and to make her even more parahumanly than she was before.

God it was weird being short.

Being tall would be weird

Annnd the good mood was completely destroyed by that little pop up of a thought. Della set her face into as neutral an expression as she could manage as she tweaked her metabolism and dug into the Fugly Bob Challenger. Of course she would eat the fry's first and the seasoning on them was pretty good too! Wow, knowing how all the muscles in your throat are contracting to move food is...something else. Saliva glands need some tweaking to be better suited for breaking down food, teeth better shaped for grinding and tearing food. Della paused as she bit her tongue thanks to her changing her teeth while chewing and not quite paying attention. The hole she put in her tongue healed almost instantly of course, but it along with the sudden sharp pain was a good enough reason for her to dial back how sharp her teeth were.

The hotdogs were a really weird thing to add to a burger, and Della didn't like them all that much, because the flavor and consistency of the two meats were clashing hard. But she was burning through calories and, well, meat was meat. Though she can't say she enjoyed the tomatoes and Onions. The meat itself was pretty good, crispy and paired really well with the mayo and ketchup. Calories for days if she were a normal person, but with her metabolism being sped up along with her improved digestion tract she was gonna burn through this rather quickly.

Della sat back, grabbing a handful of napkins to wipe the grease off her mouth and hands. "Damn." she groaned, even with her tuned up biology it was...it was a lot. She had never in her life eaten that much and it was weirdly disgusting and cathartic in some way. Another middle finger to her old life…..Cathartic indeed.

"Well hell girlie! Damn! Didn't think you had it in you! Ready for the photo and can I get your name?" The same man asked. At this point Della figured that he might be the Bob mentioned in the name of the joint. "Yeah uh, it's..Della. Della Duke." Best to get her name out in case James went through here. He might see her on the wall. Small chance no doubt, but things were fucking wild on Earth Bet in almost every literation of it. Like, whoever wrote a boring Earth Bet?

Picture taken, Della thanked Bob for the meal and then made her way outside after tweaking her metabolism back down to normal levels so as to not burn through everything she had just gained. "Well that was something else. Never thought a burger could be that big, or weirdly tasting." She spoke to herself as she turned and started her way down the street. "Alright. Food eaten, biomass obtained." Della glanced around, thankfully no one was around to hear her talking to herself. "Find a pizza joint for James...that can be later. Priorities. Find James first and then once-"

"Oh shit Taylor." Della hissed softly "Now I really do feel like a dick. How the fuck do I forget the main protagonist? I'm not her fucking dad." Actually, now that Della was thinking of it, Taylor could a hundred percent help her find James, what with her three block coverage of her power and the uh...Wait, what if it was fanfiction that she could see through the bugs? "Fucking. Fuck." she rubbed her face ignoring the little bit of grease that she accidentally smeared on her cheek..

Only saw her a few times, Taylor is her name?….she was kinda cute.

Huh, that was...unexpected.
Well. At least Della knew where to go to find Winslow, although Taylor's house was still a mystery. "So, find Taylor, befriend Taylor, ask for Taylor's help, Find James, and then take over Brockton Bay. Save world, slash, worlds." The main issue with that series of steps was...James. He would have practically every group in the city after him, and if his abilities got out? A Few countries along with the god damned illuminati with the Boogeyman on their payroll. The thought of him being out there, lost, alone, and out of his element was making Della utterly sick with worry.

He was her friend, after all, and she did not. Did not let her friends get hurt.

They were all she had.

Which is why she needed to find her friend. Which is why she needed to find out how to fucking clone herself so that she could cover more ground. Not knowing how to use awesome powers was almost as bad as not having them...Maybe. Della had been in both positions now, and both sucked to high degrees. So maybe equally sucky then.

Della looked up at the sun, inching closer to midday at this point. Squinting, she tracked it for a moment before looking away and blinking the spot out of her eyes. Fucking hell. What was she to do? "What am I to do?" She spoke softly, giving voice to her thoughts. Della blinked her eyes and focused on the lip of a distant building's roof. The world Blinked and Della was there, reaching out and grabbing onto the lip of the roof, hauling herself atop the roof before gravity even had the chance to nab her. Quietly Della peered back over the Boardwalk before she went to the center of the building's roof, some short squat fabric place that had probably been shutdown for years.

"Come on." She hissed, tensing the muscles in her body "Fucking Split dammit. Two of me! Something!" Della demanded of herself, of her shard. The fucking thing. "I know you aren't actually dead. I know you know what I know fucker. Not being connected to the network means jackshit right now, the cycle is fucked and you know it. So work with me dammit so we can fix things."

[Data.]

Oh god what is that

Oh fucking shit her Shard actually fucking replied. And holy shit that was so weird Why did none of the fanfictions she had read mention the fact that getting a goddamn paragraph from a single word was so fucking weird? Not just weird, disorientating, and disconcerting. "Er, wait what? I'm not getting into fights so you unlock more of my fucking powers. That doesn't make any sense. What shard even are you? I know you aren't a bud or anything of those cluster trigger shards."

Della waited a moment and frowned. Silence was nice, but not when she wanted some answers. "Alright. Look. I will be getting data alright? I will be getting into fights. But I need my powers to do so. In fact with them I'll be able to outpace any other Shard in combat."

[...Query?]

Great, three things stuck in here.

Della shivered softly. "Well. I plan on getting into fights yes, but I plan on using specific powers with specific...identities. So different power combinations for combat. As such, you will get a lot of data and with more bodies means I can get into more fights, sometimes at the same time." She hoped the Shard in her head would get the fucking memo and actually help her. "What is your designation?"

[Acceptance. Negative.]

I regret drinking that vial, the pain was not worth this.

Wow if one word was bad, two were fucking painful. "Shut up Nikki." Della growled, she relaxed as she felt something click in her mind, a sensation of a light switch being flicked on. Light, or energy, allowed to flood a dark room. "Wait, what do you mean you don't have on-oh. Right. Stitched together to make a Vial. Can you at least tell me which of the other shards you're made up of?" That might help for future points and dealing with it.

[...Negation]

Oh great, It's like a dejected puppy

That...actually wasn't too bad a phrase to use. Not being able to tell what it was stitched together from was probably not something it enjoyed. Della didn't blame it. She was starting to get the idea of what it was like. Maybe not completely, but she knew the sensation of being torn apart, and boy if that was fucking pleasant to anyone she'd eat a toilet seat.

Della took a moment to breathe deeply, getting her thoughts in order before she continued. "Well. I'm going to give you a name then. Everyone deserves a name afterall. Does...Nexu sound good? It's latin for connection. You've got a connection with me and Nikki, Network or not." She cleared her throat. "Or maybe Alveo, Latin for Hive."

[...]

It was odd to hear, understand yet not understand the actual thinking of the alien 'mini'-supercomputer. But here she was: Faced with something large enough to cover an entire earth, bend reality and physics to it's whims, gather in gestalt strong enough to destroy thousands of Earths for the simple purpose of reproduction... and she was naming it like a stray pet she had found on the street. Surreal did not cover it.

[Affirmation. Designation-Nexu!]

Urgh. So...much...

Della would be the last to admit it, but she agreed with Nikki. Three words were... Well they weren't really words but it fit them. Like a picture was worth a thousand words except the picture not only gave you the words, but the sensation. The feelings if they could be called that.
It was a little heart warming the Shard-That Nexu-felt so...relieved? Happy? Content? Fuck they did not have human compatible emotions. Although now she was thinking of something else…

"Gonna go with calling you a girl, Nexu. It would be weird to have a male in my head." Della started nodding to herself more than anything else. It was going to be very weird when she goes to shower, or uh. Do other things. So, all girls!

It is very strange no matter what gender

That wasn't helping. Della didn't think that it ever would. "Alright." Again speaking only to herself. She didn't need to talk to Nikki, and Nexu probably didn't need her to speak out either. "Let's get this cloning business down. That'll be a huge crux in all our upcoming trials. From safety, to combat and manipulation potential." Not to mention finding James and saving time needed to save the goddamn Earth...Earths.
For a moment, information flooded her mind, but it was not how one would normally imagine it. No text, no pictures, no exchange of anything. Again, the best way Della could describe it was akin to the sensation of light flooding a room. One moment inky blackness, the next it was just...all there. As such, Della flexed the muscle in her mind and stepped back. She had the absurd thought that she was just a large cell undergoing mitosis. The way everything cracked apart and then peeled off each other.

For a moment she felt her two hearts beating out of rhythm, the fleshy muscles of her hearts rubbing against each other with each thump.

And not a second later Della was staring at herself.

The strangeness of what Della was experiencing was not something she could put into words. Here she was, staring at a perfect clone of herself and her original body. Della could even feel the biology of her clone as perfect as she viewed her own. The only thing the clone seemed to lack was that same invisible muscle in the mind that created it. Which was concerning. The clones couldn't clone, if she lost her original body then she couldn't use that ability anymore.
That was scary. Her Hivemind ability was perhaps her most important. It was her lifeline, her respawn, her do over. James would probably slap her arms for getting all those so wrongly. But that's what it was like!

"Well." Her clone said and they both jerked in place. "Oh right. Wow." It was...like hands. How you have two of them and just know about them. Know how to use them, move them. But it's an entire goddamn body. "Fucking." Both Della and her clone looked around, then both gave the other a shove just to see how it felt. "Okay, so it's not only like hands, but you're am-am-"

"Amdextrous?" Her clone asked, voicing her thoughts and Della nodded. "Not sure if that's it but yeah. Amdextrous." Like being able to use both hands at their most effectiveness. Della had been a righty, but this is what she guessed it was like being able to control her hands separately. Instead of one hand's movements bleeding into the other….but it was a body instead of fingers.

"Jesus this is fucking weird." Della murmured softly. Her clone nodded. Thankfully Della had clamped down on any growing panic. Seeing yourself outside of a mirror….was not something humans were supposed to do, unless you were twins maybe. Because this was- this was uncanny to the extreme. "Alright you need to change." Della ordered herself.

You're talking to yourself, that is you, not someone else.

Della ignored Nikki. "So, Japanese. You should be able to check the-" Della sighed in annoyance. "Azn Bad Boyz territory. I'll head to Winslow, see if I can find Taylor and befriend her. Get her help looking for James...Help prevent Khepri."

Her clone nodded as her features started to shift. She ended up having to roll up her pants legs from how much shorter she became, and her chest shrank a bit, hair became dark black. Not to mention the shape and color of her eyes changed. Della looked her over. "Like an entirely separate person." the clone paused. "Except the voice. Hang on."

A moment later and the clone had a slightly lighter voice, a bit more feminine than Della's own.

"Alright, I suppose bodies will need names or else this will get confusing. Let's go with the classics. I'm Alpha, you're Beta." With that the clone nodded and Della continued. "Alright Beta, go search the Docks for our friend, if you find him, shapeshift back to the default. I'll be going to Winslow." Alpha gave the clone a wave before she Blinked and found herself on another roof.

Della shifted Alpha as Beta moved on to the more industrial looking area. "Man this is weird." She murmured as the two forms of the girl both Blinked through the city. Each with their own purpose.