Trigger Warning: Mentions of past suicide attempts in this chapter. If you have any such thoughts or concerns, please talk to someone or call your national helpline.

End of the Rope - Aftermath 03

Two weeks ago

"Please just…leave me alone," I whispered. Crouching down over my meal I let my hair fall over my face and tried to ignore Sophia sitting down across from me. Fugly Bob's wasn't full today, not by a long shot. There were only a few other people here; it was little wonder she had found me. I tried to ignore and concentrate on the food instead. The burger was good. It was really good. It was probably the best meal I'd had in weeks. It was probably the first full meal I'd had in weeks.

I had been skipping too many meals lately. Lisa had helped me to understand that I needed to eat and keep my strength up if I was going to keep buffing everyone. Forgetting to eat because I was sleeping instead was just making things worse. Maybe I should've listened to the PRT doctors more. But I didn't want to talk to the researchers. They were so…clinical. None of them seemed to care. They were doing their job, and that was it, to them I was just a curiosity. Armsmaster had said he would have time to help me figure out what my problem was. I wouldn't mind talking to him.

He would be able to help. It wasn't unusual that he had to keep rescheduling. It had only been two months. He was just busy. He was trying to run the whole Protectorate on top of Tinkering. He was just busy. He didn't have a problem with me. He was just…busy.

I hunched over further and took another bite.

"I'm talking to you, Hebert. The least that a little bottom feeder like you can do, is listen when I talk."

"I'm trying to eat. Please, go."

"Our conversation wasn't done. You ran away again. Like a fucking coward."

I glanced up, my eyes narrowing as I scowled at her. "I said no, Sophia."

"See, your words say 'no', but your voice and your manners say 'yes'. Come on now, Hebert, we both know that you're going to cave and give me what I want."

I set the burger down and let out a slow breath. I had been practicing with Lisa. I could stand up for myself. I could. "Apparently me passing out last time wasn't enough for you? You want me to do that to myself again?"

Sophia just grinned. "Aww and here I thought that that was from being hit by a villain. Did you -" she gasped, holding a hand over her wide smile, "- lie to Piggy? Whatever am I going to do? Why…I guess you'll just have to come out with me next time so that I don't go and tell on you."

"You're supposed to stay away from me. You're supposed to leave me alone." This was going well. This was going amazingly. Just…arrrgh! I screamed internally.

I wasn't going to be able to get away with just calling Lisa after this. I was going to have to go to her apartment; or have her come to mine. I couldn't stomach having her go to my house yet. Not…not yet. Not until Dad was better. He would get better. I was getting better so he would get better too. Amy couldn't make him well, but Kurt and Lacey could. They said he was doing good now. He would be fine soon. Then I could go home and I could bring Lisa and she could meet Dad and…

I couldn't go home. I couldn't face those stairs or that beam again. I couldn't.

"Aww, you can't even threaten me without crying!" Her smirk was like a physical slap.

"What did I ever do to you?" I whispered.

"You existed, Hebert," Sophia snarled, her facade fading for an instant. She glanced around, yet, to my eternal dismay, none of the people here were close enough to have overheard her slip up. Nobody ever was. She was careful that way.

I should take Lisa up on her offer to get a recording device I could start wearing.

Sophia leaned over the table, glaring at me with narrowed eyes. "I would've left you alone, Hebert. I would've let you drown in your misery. But you had to go and mess with the only person who understood me in this godforsaken city."

"What?"

"You stole Emma from me. You poisoned her. Your dad tried to kill himself and my best friend suddenly decided that you were worth something again. I would've said you Mastered her, but we both know your powers are fucking useless."

"So that's why you're torturing me? That's why you won't leave me alone?" I gasped. My hands flew to my mouth, and I sat up ramrod straight, my food forgotten.

"You stole the only friend I had from under me, you fucking bitch!" Sophia hissed. "If I have to play on your idiot hero complex until you kill yourself to get my justice, then that's just what I'll fucking do. Who's going to stop me?"

"I'll tell Armsmaster," I whispered.

She scoffed, her face splitting back into the maniacal grin as she fell back against the seat. "Oh please. Beardy McUseless isn't coming to your rescue. Everyone can see how he avoids you. Do you know why, Hebert? He thought you might be a biotinker that he could take under his wing, but you're not; you're just a pathetic little excuse for a Trump that can't even use her power more than five times in a row without nearly killing herself. So let's go for a record on patrol tonight, huh? What do you say? I'm sure we can hit six."

I clenched my fists and squeezed my eyes shut, breathing hard. Armsmaster didn't think of me like that. He wasn't avoiding me, he wasn't. And it wasn't my fault that Emma had tried to apologize after Dad had…After I had…After she had walked in on me…It wasn't my fault! I had tried to help her even! She had started therapy, she was getting better!

"Come on, Taylor. You're going to have to come with me. And I just know that I'm going to get into fights where it is vitally important that I get buffed up. And you're going to have to help me, because if you don't…what happens to Wards that refuse to help their teammates again?" Sophia mocked, tapping her lip. "Oh, right! They get docked pay. How is your dad by the way? Still drowning in medical bills? Are Kurt and Lacey still in debt trying to help out?" She gasped, her own hands covering her mouth. It did nothing to hide her smirk. "Don't you keep sending home money to try and help support all of them? Why, whatever would happen if you refuse to help little old me?"

"I'll talk to Director Piggot. Or John," I whispered. It wouldn't work. John talked a big game when he introduced the Youth Guard and their responsibilities. He made a good pitch, it sounded wonderful, I bought into it at first. Then I had tried making use of their 'benefits' and 'assistance'. They should be refiled as a criminal organization as far as I was concerned.

"The day that Piggy gives a passing shit about any of us capes is the day that I screw Grue." She didn't even mention the Youth Guard threat. "So, we patrol at 8 normally. I was thinking we should leave at 7. Better to be safe than sorry, right? You don't mind the extra hour do you? I've already okayed it with MM."

She was trying to get me to kill myself. To make it stick this time. And it was going to work. I couldn't refuse to buff her. I couldn't. I had to - I had to -

There was no one else I could talk to.

I stumbled out of the booth, my head swimming and my eyes hot. I needed to get away. I needed to call Lisa. I didn't have anyone else. I didn't -

"Where the hell do you think you're going, Hebert?" Sophia hissed, her hand clamping on my shoulder and slamming my back into the brick alley wall just outside Fugly Bob's.

I cried out, collapsing to the dirty concrete, holding my aching shoulder and staring up at her as she loomed over me.

"Please…"

"Beg all you want. It doesn't make any difference. How many times do I have to tell you before you get it through your thick skull, Hebert? No. One. Cares. About. You! You're useless, I'm useful. You're a victim, I'm a predator. You're weak, I'm strong. You stole my friend away from me and you're going to fucking suffer for it."

She dropped to her knee and punched me, all of the air going out of my chest in an instant. Half a second later, I bent over, hurling up the half of a burger that I had managed to eat before Sophia had found me, the acid burning my throat and bringing more tears to my eyes as I choked on the bile still in my windpipe.

"Emma needed help," I whispered, once I got my breath back. I tried to crawl away from her, but I couldn't get around her; she was blocking the mouth of the alley. The guy standing just past the alley with his phone out didn't seem to want to help either, he just wanted to record it. Probably for posterity.

"I was helping her. Now you're going to get up, you're going to tell mama dearest that you're fine with working with me, and then you're going to pump me up at least six times tonight. After that, we're going to do the same thing in three days, except you're going to hop me up seven times then. We'll aim for eight the next time."

"No!" I shook my head, my hair whipping across my face. I finally managed to pull myself level with the garbage bin. That was a mistake. Sophia kicked my side and smashed my arm against it, leaving my left side numb from her kick and my right arm aching from the dumpster.

"What did you say?"

"Leave me alone!" I shouted.

Sophia knelt down in front of me. She grabbed my hair, her face morphing into something barely recognizable as human. "Did I fucking stutter? There's no argument here. You're going to do it. One way or the other."

I bared my teeth at her like Lisa had taught me. "And how are you going to explain how I got hurt?"

"Good thing I was here to stop the thugs from roughing you up huh?" Her grin was back. In the face of the monster it looked completely unnatural and just served to make her even more terrifying. "We've already established that people don't listen to you. They sure listen to me though. I'm the poster case. I'm a golden child. I'm a success story. My word against yours. Guess. Who. Wins." She chuckled. "Actually, since you are already roughed up…"

My eyes widened and I tried to jerk away, but I wasn't strong enough to break her hold. She jerked my head to the side, slamming me into the garbage bin. The world spun, and there was red over half of my vision. Was I actually seeing red? Shouldn't it be blurry instead? I was pretty sure that my glasses were broken.

Oh. That was blood in my eye.

Sophia slammed my head to the side again, her laughter echoing in my ears. "Hey, do you want to get started on buffing me now, TayTay? Maybe I can make this quick for you instead then? I'm sure that you don't want to suffer for long."

Images flashed in front of my eyes. My dad. The swinging tie. The swinging jump rope. Emma. Missy. Vicky. Lisa. Dennis. Kurt. Lacey.

The hamster I had accidentally killed while testing my powers.

The switch flipped. The current reversed.

Sophia laughed. I grabbed her arm, clamping on with both hands. My lips pulled away from my teeth.

"You want my power?" I spat. "Well I want yours!"

Present

Lisa fishtailed as she swung into the PRT parking lot, though she was able to maneuver the skidding car into the semblance of an open space. She had barely gotten it into park and the keys out of the ignition before she was being lifted into the air, squawking.

"Taylor, put me down! I can walk to the elevator!"

"Too slow and I'm not letting you out of my sight yet. Stop squirming." Her girlfriend clutched Lisa tighter to her chest and she had to squeeze her eyes shut to avoid the pain of the wind whipping against them. She heard a burst of noise and risked a glance through slitted gaps.

Stairs. The noise was shouting from the agents on duty, and the containment foam being released as Taylor passed.

Oh, so Taylor was fast enough to outrun containment foam now. Well that was…Lisa curled against Taylor, tightening her death-grip on the brunette's shirt. She was the only real support left for someone who could become an S-Class threat if properly motivated. Where had she gone wrong in her life? She wasn't equipped for this! Being the smartest person in the room didn't make her a goddamn therapist!

Maybe this was hell? She had died after all. Maybe she hadn't actually gotten back up and started to walk around again. Maybe trying to keep her girlfriend from taking the crazy train even further along was her penance? It would make sense. Lisa knew she wasn't exactly a 'good' person.

Taylor certainly deserved better than her. She had screwed up everything. Again.

Abruptly, the wind cutting into her skin stopped. Her stomach lurched forward, yet Taylor's arms held her in place. A moment later, Taylor was lowering her to her - shaky - feet amidst shouting and yelling. "Are you okay?"

"Please never do that again," Lisa gasped. She let the wall support her weight as she tried to calm her rebellious stomach. "I think I'm going to be sick."

"I'm sorry, I can -"

"No. Go, go do your thing. I'll be fine. Just…just give me a minute to keep my stomach contents inside."

"Taylor?" Gallant's - no, he had his mask off, it was Dean right now - voice cut through the noise. It was quiet, barely audible, yet somehow that single word carried across the entire breadth of the hallway. Lisa and Taylor both looked up, zeroing in on him. "QUIET!" his next shout wasn't nearly so soft or so confused. The nearby PRT troopers with half-raised weapons and the Protectorate members who had been racing around the corner all stumbled to a halt. Dean strode forward through them all, grabbing Taylor's hands. "Braid, are you…"

"Where is she, Dean?"

"Second room on the left. Carol is in there with her. She won't let anyone else in. There's something wrong with Amy too. I-I don't…"

"Lisa, help Dean keep Brandish outside after I kick her out."

"Taylor, wait! You can't just - and she's gone." Lisa scowled, her hair blowing to the side in the wake left by Taylor's movement.

Dean just stared at the empty space that had been filled with a golden-eyed Taylor Hebert a moment earlier. "Where did she -" He cut off as Brandish fell to the floor next to them, Taylor scowling.

"Stop hitting me! I'm trying to help!" She looked to the side and shouted, "Velocity, I need all of the plants and spare lab animals you can find! My reserves are too low to make it stick for longer than five minutes."

The speedster snapped a quick salute and was gone in a blur as Taylor also vanished. Armsmaster and Manpower finally joined the little gaggle of capes as Carol regained her feet. The woman's eyes were locked onto the door of the room the Taylor had disappeared into, but at least she wasn't moving towards it.

"Miss Wilbourn?" Armsmaster said, moving to Lisa's side and blocking her view of the rest of the corridor. Lisa swallowed and lifted her head to meet his gaze. "Are you, well?"

"I'm walking around. I'm surprisingly lucid for someone who had a .50 caliber bullet splatter her brains. I'm -" Lisa bit her tongue and ran a hand through her hair. The breath she let out was shaky, almost wheezy. "No. I'm not okay. I'm not okay at all. I was murdered in front of my girlfriend and said girlfriend resurrected me. No part of that is okay. None. Not a bit. But if you're asking if I'm stable and healthy and no longer dying? Yeah, that is accurate. I'm no longer dependent on Braid."

Manpower grabbed her arm, forcing Armsmaster away as he pulled her closer, his eyes wide. "Dependent on Braid? How dependent? Braid is - she's helping my niece right now isn't she? Is Victoria going to be…"

"Tied to Braid for a bit? Probably. Yes. Maybe. I don't know, okay! It's not like we experimented with killing and resurrecting! I've been trying to calm her down for the past few days and I've only gotten her to sleep yesterday. I thought that was great progress, so excuse me if I don't have all of the rules for her power bullshit figured out! I know for sure that for me Taylor needed to keep feeding me a drip stream of her Essence every few hours. Victoria is probably going to need the same, but for longer because she's been dead longer. I can't give you a time frame, I don't know!"

Armsmaster looked her over from head to toe, his mouth a thin line. "Would you be willing to sit for several medical tests?"

"Honestly, I would love to. It's your turn to convince Taylor that it's a good idea. I'm exhausted."

"Convince me of what?" Taylor asked, stepping out of the door to the infirmary. Her eyes were back to dark green and she was leaning heavily against the wall.

Lisa pushed between Armsmaster and Manpower, slipping underneath Taylor's arm and catching her before helping her slide down to rest against the floor. Everyone else seemed to be collectively holding their breath as they stared at the open door.

Before Lisa could ask - or look through it - Velocity blurred to a stop a few feet away, five potted plants clutched in his arms and a jangling cage hanging from his fingertips. "Found some! Is this enough?"

Taylor nodded, and reached over to the plants as soft, hesitant footsteps sounded from the threshold just behind. Even knowing what to expect, it wasn't enough to prepare Lisa. Her eyes were wide as she looked up at Victoria Dallon, clutching a bed sheet around herself with one hand, the other pushing against the wall for support as she shuffled through the doorway.

"Mom? Was I…"

Carol's inarticulate shout could have shattered eardrums.

"I just don't understand it, none of this makes any sense," Armsmaster murmured as he put his stethoscope away. He shook his head and sighed. "Miss Dallon, as far as I can tell, you're perfectly healthy. Hit the call button when you start to feel lethargic again, I'll run a few more tests for as long as Miss Hebert considers it safe to do so. Perhaps we'll make some progress at that point."

"You won't have much time to get your tests done. There's only a minute or two that I feel comfortable letting it go before I'll have to give her a booster," Taylor said. She yawned and curled around her pillow, making sure that her foot extended across the linked hospital beds to touch Victoria's. "And if I'm sleeping you won't have any time at all, because I'll do it by instinct. Found that out with Lisa."

"Be that as it may, we'll make do with what we can." He stood, resting a hand on her shoulder. "Taylor, I'm still not certain what part I played - or didn't play that I should have - in the events leading up to your break from us. For whatever slight I caused you, I am sorry. When you are feeling up to it, I would like to discuss things."

Taylor nodded, but didn't seem able to bring herself to speak before Armsmaster left. Victoria looked over at Taylor, trying for a wide smile, that worked until she started coughing. Finishing her fit, she shook herself and tried again. "So, uh, I'm not sure I got around to, you know, thanking you with the insanity of the past two hours."

"You did. You're welcome. Again."

"You didn't have to come back."

"You're my friend. I…don't really have many…" Taylor curled around the pillow, burying her head. It didn't really hide her dimly glowing eyes. "Do you know if anyone has checked on my dad? Did anyone tell him what happened?

"I think Miss Militia talked to Kurt and Lacey when you first ran away after, um, well, your power-up."

"So they knew I was okay at least."

"Well they knew you were alive. No one was sure if you were okay. We were all actually pretty convinced that you were as far from okay as physically possible. Some people were tossing around predictions that the Nine were going to show up trying to recruit you, you were looking that broken."

Taylor gasped, her head snapping towards Victoria. "What?!"

"They're known for going after utterly destroyed people, Tay. Especially people with powers that could be used for really amazing things. That's part of why everyone was looking for you so hard. We wanted to make sure that those bastards didn't start sniffing around while you were still recovering."

"And then you got into a fight with the Empire."

She shuddered. "I think they did it intentionally. I-I was off my game. Worried, distracted, upset. I ran across the Valkyries and Kaiser and…One of them hit me just after Kaiser sent a metal shard into my back. It shattered my force-field and the giantess, she-she -"

"You don't have to say it, Vicky, I - I saw it. When I was channeling Essence into you. There wasn't anything for Amy to work with was there? That's why I could still see everything."

Victoria swallowed hard, her hand closing on the guardrail of the bed. It squealed under her grip and she yelped, quickly letting go and wrapping her arms around her chest instead. "I don't know. I would think so. Dean said that Amy's still out of it. I'll try to see her in the morning if I'm feeling better. You said that your friend was stronger after a few hours?"

"Yeah, but she was only out of it for a minute or two. You might take a few days before you're well enough to leave the bed."

"That's still better than dying, so I'm not going to complain, Taylor." She paused, grimacing and visibly peeling her fingers away from her biceps. "Better than dying permanently I mean. God this is so fucked up. Honestly, name what you want and I will get it for you. You want me to buy out Harrods, I will buy out Harrods. You want Fugly Bob's for life, you got it. Hell, you want a foursome, I'll make sure Dean is up for it. Literally anything, except killing someone, and it's yours."

Taylor was silent for a long moment. Finally she rolled over and met Victoria's gaze. "I just wanted my friend to live." Victoria felt moisture gathering in her eyes and she hurriedly blinked it away. "But I won't say no if you want to buy me a burger too. I'm kinda broke and I'm pretty sure I could take the Challenger right now."

"You got it girl."

Taylor was about to quip back when the door to their room swung open. Lisa walked in, dropping into the chair near Taylor and leaning her head back until it rested against the wall. "Tay, you have a visitor," she said in a dull monotone. "Taylor Hebert, aka, Braid, this is Alexandria, aka Rebecca Costa-Brown, PRT Chief Director. PRT Chief Director Rebecca Costa-Brow, aka Alexandria, this is Braid, aka Taylor Hebert. Whoop Dee Doo. We all know each other. Great. Fantastic."

Victoria's mouth fell open as the Triumvirate member herself walked into their room and stood at the foot of the bed, her helmet off, and the face of the Chief Director staring back at the three of them. Beside her Taylor sat up, eyes narrow.

"What's going on?"

"Taylor, Alex here wants you to resurrect her boyfriend and she's throwing all of her cards on the table in order to beg at your feet. I'm sorry, I can't deal with this right now. Conspiracies are breaking my brain. My head hurts. Vicky, you're tagged in."

"What?" Vicky asked.

Alexandria was thankfully less fazed by the Thinker checking out and the shell-shocked Brute; she was rolling with the punches instead. "Your friend is correct, Miss Hebert. My organization is quiet on the matter, which I am taking to mean that I can make my plea with no repercussions." She held out a photo and a folder. Taylor took both, touching them as little as possible as if each had vipers hiding in the paper.

"What are they?"

"The folder is showing a creature that I believe can provide you all of the Essence you would need to bring back someone who has been dead for several years. The remaining pages are for proof of why you shouldn't worry about the morality of draining this thing of its remaining life force. The photo is of myself and my associate, Hero; in better days - before the Endbringers, before the Nine."

Taylor flipped open the folder, her eyes growing wide. She glanced between the pages as for a few moments, her eyes finally lifting to meet Alexandria's, the question unspoken.

"I'm fairly certain that my associates think your ability can be supercharged and used to take out a problem that is an existential threat to our species across countless worlds. But, to be completely honest Taylor Hebert…Right now, I don't care if you're useful for killing Scion." She sighed, "I've sacrificed so much. I've lost so much. I've hurt so many people I no longer know if it has all been worth it. I've tried to do the best I could, but it was never enough and it never will be. And right now, right now…

"I just want my friend back."