I had...so much trouble with this chapter, and it was only because Temporal Knight was unerringly patient with me that it got finished. It is short but it was sort of meant to be, this is Taylor being pulled into the game and the first step in her partnership with Madison. I am making no promises since my life is chaotic but I hope to have another, longer chapter ready for you guys later today. So while it is the shortest update thus far, I hope you all enjoy it, take care!


The denizens on PHO talked about Trigger Events (capital letters intended, apparently) causing people to gain super powers with a bit of trepidation and a sense of veiled concern; no one who had experienced a Trigger Event wanted to discuss it with the unwashed masses and they tended to get a bit shirty if pressed on the subject.

The reason they did not wish to speak about said event was in all honesty rather simple; to gain a super power one had to experience the worst day of their life, survive it, and have the venom and vigor to make everyone responsible for said triggered super powered upgrade pay for it, be it present, abstract, or arbitrary.

Taylor Annette Hebert was different from most trigger victims since she blamed one person, and one person only for her Trigger Event.

Herself.

Causing her mother's death via a freaking cell phone call.

Alienating her best friend through her grief who she had…felt more than friendship for before being pushed away to the point that she had betrayed Taylor for a psychopathic jock's whims.

Stubbornly taking the years long hazing as she tried to avoid the fact that her dad was oblivious to her social problems, the school being complicit in her being bullied, and the student body just simply not caring about her, yet Taylor soldiered on all while praying that Emma would...come back to her.

Then all the torment had stopped.

Nearly a weeks' worth of peace, and it had been…not necessarily pleasant, more an unsettling calm before the storm, but the change was welcome.

The day before Christmas break Madison, the annoyingly cutesy member of the bitch trio that had been torturing Taylor bumped into her while muttering, "Watch where you're going nerd," while shoving a slip of paper into her palm.

Taylor simply stuffed it into her pocket and ignored it until she got home, readying her clothes for the washer she found the wadded piece of paper and on a whim unfolded it and it simply read 'I am so sorry, I never wanted this,'and Taylor blinked in confusion.

Huh.

She ignored it, threw the paper away, and moved on.

Two weeks after a very awkward and bleak Christmas break spent with her dad Taylor returned to school with a hint of trepidation in her step.

This sense of trepidation continued on up to the point that she opened up her locker and was shoved into the enclosed space filled with rotting biological waste by an unseen laughing force, and had the door slammed behind her.

Lucidity was...so…so overrated

It was in said enclosed space that Taylor experienced the worst moment in her life, she felt the insects crawling across her pale sensitive skin, skittering, chittering and biting as she vomited on herself and scrambled to find her way out of the bloody refuse when suddenly she saw…

EVERYTHING

Taylor panicked but she paused in mid motion as she saw every object that cast a shadow move across the Bay in near wonder, then she shuddered in horror.

She witnessed a group of merchants beating down an addict who owed them for his latest hit of a drug they themselves had forcibly hooked him on to before finally letting him free as he agreed to their 'deal'.

She witnessed a group of ABB thugs readying themselves to rape a young girl as her father watched in impotent horror, held back by the gangbangers present while they readied themselves to sample the struggling girl's flesh, pulling her father's arms to his side as he bucked back in forth in an effort to stop them.

She saw the Empire Eighty Eight drag a black man before a crucifix as they gathered containers of kerosene, all chanting about burning the sinner, burning the race traitors, immolating the unclean.

Taylor… well… She felt...things, about all these observations and...wished to...act on them.

To be the Hero, to...stop the horrors she was forced to witness.

The shadows behind the ABB thugs shifted and rose out of the wall before collapsing back into their previous positions as the aforementioned thugs released the girl and ran in open fear. Simultaneously, the moving shadows cast on the ground by the torches of the E88 seemed to grow gnashing teeth momentarily before they too dissolved back into normal shadows causing the holders of said torches to drop them and jump back in fear, giving their victim just enough time to headbutt his captor and make a run for it. Partially formed eyes faded into the shadows surrounding the laughing Merchants, the palpable rage of their manifestation causing the druggies pause for a brief moment before they shrugged it off as jitters.

Taylor's fist clenched and her breath hitched as her heartbeat shuddered. There was nothing she could do though.

She could only watch. She was forced to watch for days on end, she was forced to watch everything.

Still, she tried to tune out the horror show that her expanded sight was gifting her and focus on something else.

Anything else.

Something...closer to home.

Something that was more...hopeful. She focused down instead on the fact that one of her tormentors grew a conscious and tried to atone for what she had done. That Madison's note before the break hadn't been a fluke, that she truly did feel repentance for her actions. That it had meant something. That it had been a prelude to more. That she was there.

She had, after all been the one to call the paramedics that saved her life.

Taylor pushed down more and more of the detritus that was Brockton Bay, and the more she pushed down, the more she could focus on the fact that someone cared enough about her that they wasted their afternoons after school just to come and feed her soup and read her books while blasting their preferred music in the background.

Brockton Bay was loud and Brockton Bay was disturbing to watch. But...as more and more was shut out, it got easier and easier to remember why it was important to focus on the people who hadn't left.

Madison hadn't left her.

Then…then she was attacked by a nameless thug...

The shadows surrounding the ABB thug in question writhed as he toyed with the young girl before him crystalized Taylor's focus, then he was kneed in the dick, pepper sprayed, and left for the dogs to deal with.

The shadows broiled and turned on themselves, snarling teeth and burning eyes reached out at the cursing man, wishing for nothing more than to sunder, dismember, devour the fool before them as they settled down while he fell on his backside pissing himself as he watched the writhing mass of Nothing before him churn about sneering at him.

Taylor couldn't help but laugh deprecatingly, thankfully there was no one around to notice said action.

She fell back into her silent observation, a small, a barely visible smirk on her face as she resumed silencing the rest of the city. Only a few more blocks left to quiet down now and maybe she could finally get some peace. Her work was nearly done when shouting in her room drew the remainder of her attention.

Her dad had been angry and Madison was cursing him out.

While it was...actually kind of nice to see someone else getting upset on her behalf for once, she had seen her dad arguing with the school, talking to the lawyers and even forcing meetings with the Mayor so...he probably hadn't really deserved it for this particular instance. Not that he had helped his case by refusing to explain and just walking away. That was...actually fairly typical for the two of them now...huh...another thing to work on.

Madison cut off her strangled half-yell, half-sob as she collapsed into the chair next to Taylor's bed. The surrounding noise finally quieted enough that Taylor smiled, let out a tired sigh and murmured, "Yeah… Dad can be like that when he is well and truly pissed off, the Hebert Rage is…a thing…"

Madison's stuttering reaction was almost heartbreaking, "Ta-Tay-Taylor? Yo-You're awake?"

Yes? She'd always been awake. She'd eaten the soup after all so hadn't Madison realized that? Though, in hindsight, remaining completely non-responsive probably didn't really show that she was awake very well. But how to explain that she had been seeing almost the entire city and concentrating on just one small section and tuning out the rest was hard? Did she even want to? This was Madison after all.

Fuck it, no one else had bothered to come to the hospital and Madison had Triggered too because of this shit show. Taylor would just tell her the truth. One friend was better than no friend and Madison had started trying even before things had blown up.

"Damn girl, you look like you need a hug, come here."

The brunette's tired blue eyes seemed to light up as she gave Taylor a watery smile, and jumped into her arms without question.

A small part of Taylor wanted to call her pathetic, the other, far more prominent part whispered out, "Shh…It's alright, I get it, and I forgive you."

As Madison dug her face into Taylor's shoulder and began sobbing uncontrollably, Taylor couldn't help smirking in relief, all while resigning herself to the fact that she was going to have to get used to heavy metal music.