Danny

The brakes squeaked as Danny pulled into the driveway, slowing to a stop. His truck rubbed under him as he absently stared at the dashboard. If he never looked at the house, he could pretend Taylor was there and happy. That it wasn't some caricature of what it once was.

Danny turned off the truck and sighed before leaning back in his seat and closing his eyes. He sat there, hiding from the guilt and feeling of failing. The final nails to the coffin of his fathering career were being hammered in. Every day Taylor spent away from home and away from him made her happier. He understood why; avoiding terrible memories was something he chased.

The door clicked as he pulled the handle without opening his eyes. Only after the door swung open did he look at the house, because it hadn't been home in years. Then, to his surprise, the first-floor lights were on. Danny blinked, confused, but shrugged anyway as a tiny spark of hope settled in. Maybe today they would connect.

Danny grabbed his work bag, keys in hand, and made his way without raising his hopes too much. He paused at the front steps, noticing that the rotten top step had shattered under someone's weight. Then further up on the entryway was a face print in the wood, an actual indentation. Huh.

That couldn't be Taylor. A strong wind could blow her over, and he wasn't even sure she'd broken that step by standing on it. More than two shadows moved behind the curtain, and a bevy of voices reached him. Danny did his best to school his face, scratching his faint stubble. It had been a long day, and he didn't know if he could deal with anything official today. Another check showed a distinct lack of vehicles in the driveway, so maybe it was Taylor's friends?

Danny stepped over the broken step, slipped his keys into the lock, and opened the door with a sigh. The voices fell quiet as the door swung open. He avoided looking into the living room as he hung up his coat before taking a steadying breath. One glance was all he needed to look away and go straight for the kitchen. That required a beer.

Against a wall stood the largest man he had ever seen, his head just under the ceiling, with a glowing crown clipping through it. What might be worse was how he was dressed in a bedsheet that hid little. Worse was someone that looked like a buff young Annette saddled up against him with her own glowing crown. On the couch, a "cat" snuggled up to a young girl he didn't recognize, and lastly, his daughter was petting a spider bigger than he was. There was an obvious point in life where you gave up and went with the flow, questioning nothing, and this felt like it.

Danny grabbed one beer and looked back into the living room before grabbing two more and tucking them under his arm. He cracked open the first, taking a long swig before sighing again. The living room stayed silent as they waited for him, and he had to face the roses at some point. He finished his open beer before cracking open another and walking into the living room, sitting in his recliner and turning on the TV on instinct.

The TV sprung to life and showed a clip from a bank robbery, and two people, suspiciously like the two leaning against the wall, were caught leaving after grievously injuring a ward. They also wore almost nothing and carried a villain on their shoulder whose hair he recognized. He flipped channels, and on this one showed a picture of a young girl and an image of the woman who was accused of kidnapping the mayor's niece. The young girl on his couch was that girl, and the woman who kidnapped her was in the room too.

Danny drank his beer and turned off the TV before covering his eyes. If he couldn't see them, they weren't his problem.

"Uh, hi, dad." Taylor started.

Silence hung in the air as it surprised him that Taylor actually acknowledged him and called him dad. The past week was just good mornings and good nights. "Taylor, I saw you brought home some friends. Where did you meet them?"

Taylor nervously laughed. "Well, a funny story about that."

Danny pulled his hand off his eyes to give her an unamused look to see his daughter being stared down by the woman wearing his daughter's clothes that absolutely didn't fit.

Taylor squirmed in place as the man against the wall snorted, then oofed as the woman elbowed him in the side.

"Okay! I, um, might've robbed a bank." Danny didn't miss the interaction between Taylor and the woman. "With powers. I'm a cape, okay. Please stop giving me that look."

Any other day would have had him off the rails as his temper erupted after learning that Taylor had gone villain. But today, it only sputtered out and died an inglorious death as he deflated in his chair. A long line of failures made by him ended with this. A monument to his failings.

He didn't even have to say anything as Taylor buried herself in the spider's fur. She refused to meet anyone's eyes as a slight tint of red-colored her pale cheeks. He might never know just how his daughter made those decisions.

"I think it's time to introduce ourselves." The woman started, her voice sending shivers down Danny's back.

A melodic tone perfectly tinted with hints of his deceased wife's voice. It urged him to bow down before the goddess, who had his fingers twitching and his legs itching. Yet he held it together, taking a shaky sip to disguise the feeling.

"I'm Rose, and this guy is Miles."

He heard the words she said, but in the back of his mind, he heard others. An Empress and her Emperor. It was what they were both in the title and being. He was like an ant before them. A truth that echoed in his soul. It would only take a single command, and he would do whatever they required. It is both terrifying and enlightening. They were meant to rule, and the people were to be ruled.

"We pulled Taylor away from falling further down the rabbit hole, so to speak. It would be a shame if she fell in with the Undersiders."

Danny nodded, agreeing with Rose, not offering a word of protest.

"I was undercover!"

It shocked him to hear Taylor speak up against Empress, he meant Rose. He blinked his eyes. "Taylor, please let Rose speak."

"But!"

"Taylor."

"This was such a bad idea." Taylor reburied herself in the giant spider while crumpling into a ball that hurt his spine to even think about.

She thought this was a bad idea, but robbing a bank with villains wasn't?

"Well, we snatched her away before she made the situation even worse, and now she's on our team. So she doesn't have any more bad ideas, like joining a villain gang with a powerful thinker who knew her plan the whole time and would've tempted her into doing worse." Rose continued, not upset about his daughter's interruptions.

Yet, the part about Taylor joining their cape team broke through the haze. "I'm sorry, but Taylor isn't joining any team," Danny said, despite his heart racing to even deny them.

"I'm sorry to say this, but it's out of your hands now." The Empress demanded.

A weight of thousands weighing down. Of course, she was right. Taylor would be best in her hands, and it was an honor to do so. Whatever they wanted. They would raise her best.

"It might be best that I truly introduce myself. I'm Taylor Hebert too. About twenty?" She glanced at Emperor, no Miles, and he shrugged. "Twenty or so, and from the future."

Danny mustered up his waning will and pointed at the man behind her. "Who's he?"

Rose shrugged. "Boyfriend, husband, tolerated toy," "Hey!" "Whatever you want to call it, we're together forever, even if we didn't want it. Not that I could even imagine being apart."

Miles kissed the top of her head as a small smile graced her face, and she snuggled closer. Danny quickly glanced at Taylor and saw her watching with razor-sharp focus, even behind the fur of the spider. Of course, that would cause problems, but who didn't have eyes on the Empress and Emperor?

But the bit about being from the future ignited a tiny spark of hope. "Can you time travel?"

"No, I wish we could. I would've saved mom already."

"Oh, okay." The spark winked right back out. He pulled his mind away from her by turning to his enraptured daughter. "What are your powers, Taylor?"

She blinked once and then twice. Danny saw the struggle as she forced herself to stop staring down Rose and Miles. Wordlessly, a couple of bugs flew away from the walls before forming a ring in front of her.

"I control bugs."

Danny glanced at Empress for confirmation, who nodded.

"I lost mine after getting shot in the head twice."

"Oh," Danny muttered as he watched Rose double tap her forehead as Miles snorted. "You seem to be doing well."

This time, Miles let out a deep laugh that threw Rose around, and she didn't look the least bit bothered by it. At least it wouldn't happen to Taylor now that they were here. He assumed that sticking with the Undersiders led down that path.

"School?" He asked, voice wavering.

"Taylor's not going back to school. Trust me, it will not matter in a few years with how things are going." Rose said.

"If it helps, we're some of the most intelligent people on the planet now and could teach her things no one else knows. Of course, being intelligent doesn't mean being wise or creative." Miles said, speaking up for the first time.

"The technology of a civilization a thousand years in the future is at our fingertips, and that is exactly what we'd be teaching Taylor." Rose finished.

Danny nodded, holding up his unopened beer and nonverbally asking them if they wanted one. Both shook their heads. He cracked it open for himself.

"So, is the technology tinker tech?" He asked.

"Nope, but we won't be patenting or selling it," Rose said.

"Why?"

"Because it's ours, nobody will take it from us!" Empress thundered out before Miles squeezed Rose and Danny struggled to not bow down and beg for forgiveness. "Ahem, sorry. We didn't gain power without cost."

Danny curtly nodded, not trusting his voice. He looked down at his beer and spaced out after that frankly disturbing display. At least he knew why everyone labeled them as villains so quickly; they were terrifying.

"Why are you standing by the wall and not sitting?" Taylor eventually asked while patting the space beside her.

Danny snorted at the obvious ploy, but it was something he also wondered about. At least she wasn't withdrawing as much as before.

"Don't you dare say it." Miles said, giving Rose a scathing look.

She smirked at him. "Miles' fat."

"Gah."

"He broke our last couch..." A hand clamped around her mouth, cutting off whatever Rose was going to say and staying firmly in place.

"Ah-hem, not fat, just well muscled."

"Mhm." Danny was going to ignore that.

"As for our other companions, the young girl is Dinah, the mayor's niece, and she is sticking with us for protection. The alien cat is named Sam, and the pain in the ass spider is Queenie."

"Hello," Sam said, not shocking Danny as he was far past running out of fucks to give.

"Fuck off, Miles."

"Hi," Dinah mumbled.

"Say, you work at the DWA."

"Yes, I'm the spokesperson."

"Do you know of any warehouses in good shape that are up for sale?" Miles asked.

Danny leaned forward, setting down his beer. Plans ran through his head as ways to help both of them formed. The union did have several deeds to abandoned warehouses after companies refused to pay their dues. The problem was that no one was buying or setting up shop to sell them to and recoup their losses. That always left the union to cover the workers' pay while taking the property. If he could sell one or more to Miles and Rose, that would be perfect.

"I do."