A crossposting on my fanfiction and QuestionableQuesting accounts.

Chapter 1

Clink!

The sound of silverware softly bumping into plates filled the air as three people sat around a table in a modest house eating plates of pancakes. The oldest and tallest was an older man by the name of Daniel Hebert, already dressed in his work clothes as he read a newspaper and ate his food. To his right was his increasingly withdrawn daughter, Taylor Hebert, dressed in a way that suggested she wanted to disappear from the eyes of the other kids at her school.

Across from Taylor was a boy around the same age as she was. His brown hair was short, just barely past his ears and his green eyes stared down at his pancakes with hunger as he wolfed down his breakfast. He wore a simple ensemble, brown pants, a light blue shirt, and a long lab coat.

"Mm, I gotta say Mr. Hebert," the boy said as he continued to stuff his face. "These pancakes of yours are amazing."

"You like them?" Danny asked with a smile. "I've never been an amazing cook but I have managed to perfect that recipe. Old family secret."

"And you've done a great job! Is that cinnamon I taste?"

"Heh, just a bit," Danny finished his own food and set the paper down to go and wash the dishes. Taylor wasn't far behind with her own meal and moved to follow her father when she was done.

"Don't worry about washing those!" The boy interjected, quickly getting up from his seat. "I'm the guest and you're letting me stay here practically for free, it's the least I can do!"

"Come now Edward, I can't let you do that," Danny tried to protest. "I know losing everything in that Endbringer attack must have been hard for you. I can't put a good friend's son to work before he can get through everything."

Edward clapped his shoulder with a grin, "No! No, I won't hear any of that! You go out there and provide for this household of yours! And hey, maybe working with my hands will do wonders for my health!"

Danny sighed with a small shake of his head but smiled and relented at this small thing, grabbing his keys and with a farewell and a kiss to his daughter's forehead he left to go to work. Taylor just placed her dishes in the sink on top of her father's, and went over to her bag to finish getting ready for school.

"Have a good day at school Taylor! I'll be in the garage, I've almost cracked the code, I can feel it!" Edward smiled at the girl who just briefly lowered her head upon hearing the first thing he said.

She turned away from the boy, doing her best to hide her grimacing expression at the thought of school. Once her bag was secured she hunched a bit at the weight of it before muttering, "Yeah… I will."

Without another word Taylor left her home for an additional day of torment at Winslow. Her second school year just started, but she had a gut feeling that it was going to be more memorable than last year. For good or bad she wasn't able to tell, Taylor just had a feeling that Edward was going to be a part of most of it.

There was also a nagging thought constantly needling in the back of her head, Did her father even have close friends that died in a recent Endbringer attack? Was there even a recent Endbringer attack in America?

(Taylor)

I thought school was the worst part of my life.

Not because of any typical teenage drama or because I didn't like the thought of spending hours of my day doing math and studying. It was because of the constant bullying campaign that was launched against me the start of last year by my former best friend Emma Barnes.

Whispered rumors, shoving in the hallway, glue or soda covering my seat in class, ruined or stolen homework, juice and soda poured over my head, insults, stealing and breaking my mother's flute.

Nothing seemed to be off limits to the terrible trio with how psychopathic they seem to get at times. It wouldn't surprise me if they had some sort of big plan being cooked up in those twisted minds of theirs. I had no doubt that they'd just keep on escalating the bullying until I'd get seriously hurt.

For a while at the start of everything I had hoped that I could've gotten through to Emma, breaking the spell that bitch Sophia had on her. She was my sister in all but blood, we spent so many years knowing each other that if someone looked at us from the outside we'd look like siblings if they ignored the physical differences between us. I had clung to that small hope for so long before it was brutally crushed after losing my mother's flute.

After that I just did what I did best, I withdrew even more, even if that only seemed to spur the three on. I didn't want to fight them, that'd just bring me down to their level, right?

Sophia got even more physically violent the more I tried to ignore everything.

Madison got even more petty with her little pranks.

And Emma… she twisted the knife at just the right time with just the right words. If I was being honest, it was those knife twists that hurt me the most.

It was why ever since school started the bullying began last year I spent every day constantly waiting for school to be over so I could go to the library or home. Now though… there was a new reason that I wanted to leave as fast as possible.

Edward Williams, the new boy that recently moved into my house a few months ago during the middle of summer break. He was… a strange guy, but I think that he's been a positive influence on my father. Ever since mom died my dad had been closing himself off, not really being a father anymore. Now, well, he's smiling and laughing a bit more now. It did hurt a bit that that only happened when someone we don't know came into our lives instead of his only family, but I think I can live with it.

When Ed had first arrived he showed my father and I some super science stuff he brought with him, like the toaster that turns any bread put into it to the perfect toasted level that the person who put in the bread liked.

I was certain that he was a cape and he triggered when he lost his family, it was obvious tinker tech after all. When I tried to mention that to him Edward was… a bit mad and went on a twenty minute rant about tinkers. He claimed that everything he made was not tinker tech, it was actual technology that could be reproduced and didn't need constant maintenance by a tinker. Edward even described with extreme detail how to make his freeze ray and though I didn't understand most of what he said, the fact that I could grasp a few things here and there gave him a bit of credence.

"Don't compare the things I make to-to those dollar store knock-offs of real technology! I don't have bullshit black boxes in the things I make that I don't purposely put there! And I refuse to be a-a slave to the parasites that live in their brains! Those things are the worst thing that has happened to humanity Taylor, they feed on our suffering and constantly work to keep the humans they bond with in a state of exploitation!"

He also thought that capes had parasites that gave them their powers… so that was a thing.

As I walked down the halls of Winslow to my World Issues class while doing my best to stay out of sight and ignore the whispers and muttering of the other kids I heard a voice I'd been dreading to hear.

"Oh my god! It's Taylor!" Emma gasped dramatically as I winced and turned my head to look at her, a hand was actually covering her mouth.

I was too distracted by the sight of my former best friend so I didn't see Sophia (I knew it had to be her) come up behind me. I felt a harsh impact on my side and ended up sprawled across the school's dirty floor while clutching my bruised ribs, the bitch didn't hold back.

I felt something, or someone, rummage through my backpack as I rubbed my hurting ribs.

"Oh thanks Taylor! I didn't have time to do Gladly's homework, I'm sooo happy for your help!" Madison chirped, completing the set.

I was just forced to slowly pick myself up while they stood around and mocked me. I did my best to ignore most of what they said but sometimes something just stuck. Like my appearance. I knew I wasn't the best looking girl, more frog than human, but that doesn't mean I want to hear about it all the time…

"She's so clumsy tripping over her own feet like that," Emma shook her head like she was dealing with some child. "It's not too surprising given who she comes from, even her mother forgot that people shouldn't be on their phones while-"

I didn't hear the last part as a commotion was going on somewhere behind us but I still felt the sharp stab of pain through my heart.

"Move! I said move you Neanderthals! Jesus Christ kids are packed like sardines here, this is why I hate schools!"

...Edward?

I saw my new house guest push past the stragglers just now going to their classes and ignoring my plight, cursing and ranting when they weren't moving fast enough. He was getting constant death glares and curses back but he seemed to give them zero mind, like they weren't worth a moment of his time. Not like me, even when I ignore the bullying some of it always gets through.

"Ah Taylor there you are!" He smiled and shoved Emma aside when he saw me. With a surprising amount of ease of strength he grabbed me by the arm and hoisted me back on my feet. "I need your help with something really important."

"I, uh, what?" My reply wasn't exactly intelligent. I wasn't even sure why he was here, he said he didn't need to go to school anymore. Something about how there was nothing to learn anymore?

"Important work," he said. "You and me. I need an extra set of hands to work with so I can finally start getting to the real shit I need to save this shithole section of the multiverse."

"Uh… I mean…"

"Hey!" Emma shouted, pausing our small talk. She got up to Ed's face with a snarl, Sophia not far behind with narrowed eyes. Madison hung back a bit but that wasn't surprising, she wasn't exactly a physical person. "You shoved me! And what are you even doing with that thing? Everyone at Winslow knows the deal!"

Ed gave her a bored look, "Yeah, look, I'm not dealing with this teenage drama bullshit you're getting off to. I've moved past that. Now fuck off I'm too busy to deal with you. I don't even go to this shithole of a school so I could not care less about your make-believe social hierarchy."

With that he shoved his middle fingers into Emma's face and waved it in the air for everyone else to see with a scowl on his face and then grabbed me by the arm to drag me out of school. I barely had enough time and thought to grab my backpack before leaving school early. Emma's shocked face at Ed's amazingly flippant attitude was awesome. Even Sophia was surprised, like the thought that someone wouldn't bend over backwards for them had even crossed their mind.

It wouldn't be the first time I've ditched school because of the bullying but I never had to do it because someone else was just stealing me out of it. Is this technically kidnapping?

"Wait, what are we doing?!" I was so out of my comfort zone here, Ed had never done this before and I didn't have anything to go on. Still, this was at least better than school, the bullying, and the stupid teachers that don't do anything about it.

"God, can't believe I have to use public transportation until I can finally make my car," he grumbled to himself. Ed turned to me, "Like I said, I need an extra set of hands to do something for me. I finally cracked the code Taylor! I've isolated the specific energy the parasites use to direct people's powers and everything else they can do with it!"

He was getting increasingly excited, with a big goofy grin that looked way too nice on him. Even if he was still going on about the parasite thing.

"And what does that mean exactly?"

"It means, Taylor, that I can build something to give myself immunity to all of those so-called thinker powers. No more worrying about people, shards, or that flying bird bitch trying to spy on me, total dark spot!" Ed stopped his animated excitement as we boarded the bus and drove back to my house. Some passengers gave us strange looks at the two obviously ditching kids (well, one, but they don't know that).

"I can build that shit into everything I make too! I've been spying on every Parahuman I could find, using everything I was able to make with the normal materials I can find on Earth…"

But besides the ditching thing and the implications of the massive breach of privacy that Edgar just told me, this was insane if true.

"If I get this thing done, Taylor, then I can finally get to the real shit I've been planning for! Are you ready for a real adventure?! Because we're going to need them to save the world!" He finally finished after spending most of the bus ride explaining how it worked, shaking me by the shoulders.

I hope I haven't gotten into something strange...