A/N: Warning-treasure comes in many shapes and sizes. Even human size. Do not try to take anything from a dragon. Especially not freckled redheads.
(Or, Sophia learns what a real predator is).
Chapter Four: The Power of Friendship!
"Honey, that was Mr. Hebert. Taylor's on her way over!"
Emma frowned where she sat on her bed. Lounging in her beanbag across her floor, Sophia snorted. "You mean she has her daddy call to come over? Sheesh, you were right. You need to dump that bitch."
"Oh, I will," Emma declared. Still, she couldn't help but frown. Mr. Hebert never called for Taylor. He hadn't called since before Mrs. Hebert died. So why was he calling now?
"Remember," Sophia said with the same intensity as the night they met. "You're a survivor. You're strong, and you can't let weak-assed kids keep pulling you down."
"Damned right." Emma took a deep breath. It was going to hurt; she knew it would. The same as pulling off a band-aid. But she had to do it. She couldn't be that Emma any more. That Emma was too weak to survive. And she couldn't be the new Emma with her sniveling, teary-eyed childhood friend holding her back.
The doorbell rang. Emma took her time, with Sophia a few steps behind. That was what made Sophia such an awesome friend. She'd have Emma's back, but only if Emma was worthy of it. Sophia was a predator, but she was good enough to help Emma become one too. Better to be the hunter than the prey.
Emma would never be the prey again.
"Are you going to get the door, honey?" Emma's mother asked as they came down the stairs.
"I've got it, mom," Emma said with her patented trust me, I'm an angel smile.
It always worked on dad, especially now. Mom didn't look entirely convinced, but the thing about Mom is she wouldn't say anything if she wasn't sure about something. So Emma continued toward the door. In her mind, she rehearsed what she'd say to make Taylor understand that she wasn't wanted. It would be like throwing stones at a dog that wouldn't go away. A little pain now for less pain later.
She opened the door, the words on her lips, only for them to sputter and die.
"Emma!" a terrifying, bi-tonal voice said. The voice came from a shockingly tall, beautiful woman that kinda-sorta looked like Taylor, but different. Taller, stronger, with golden eyes and sharp fangs, it looked like Taylor in the most extraordinary makeup ever. Even her hair was different-the rich curls had loosed to elegant black ringlets, with a narrow streak of silver hair that almost glowed against the coal-black of the rest of her hair.
She wore new clothes-jeans that hugged a body even Anne would have been jealous about, and low-cut gold-colored blouse that revealed an ungodly amount of decollage. Abruptly she found her face buried in that valley as powerful arms grabbed her into a stifling hug. "You won't believe what...who are you?"
With her face forcibly shoved against Taylor's chest, Emma couldn't help but feel alarm at the way Taylor's voice echoed from within her. In that last question, it deepened to something primal and threatening that made the hair on Emma's awkwardly bent neck stand on end.
Emma wiggled free, having to take a deep breath, and said, "Taylor, stop! We're not doing this. Sophia is my friend. My real friend. She's strong. I am too. I'm too strong for a...a…"
Taylor ignored her and growled at Sophia. "Emma is mine, bitch."
Emma had never seen Sophia look so tense. She kept waiting for the other girl to slap Taylor down, but instead she stood frozen. "You're a cape," she accused.
"I'm a fucking dragon," Taylor hissed. Her voice deepened so much it made the windows vibrate. Emma's mom walked into to see what was happening and froze.
"What did you do to Emma? Why does she smell so scared?"
"Taylor, sweetie, what's wrong?"
"Emma smells scared. She smells wrong, like she was broken. And this bitch was involved. Who is she? Why is she here with my Emma?"
"I'm not your anything!" Emma said. Her voice grew shrill, almost screaming.
"You're mine," Taylor snapped back. She looked back at the tense Sophia. "Emma is mine. She's been mine for years." She lifted her hands, and for the first time Emma noticed that her fingernails were long, terrifying black claws. "Get in my way I'll rip out your heart and eat it."
"Taylor," Emma's mom said carefully. Not angry, but...scared. "Please don't hurt anyone in my house."
Abruptly Taylor's entire countenance changed. "Aunt Zoe! Guess what? I'm a dragon!" She walked over and hugged Emma's mom, lifting her off the floor easily. "They signed me up for the Wards yesterday. Armsmaster's mad at me for eating his motorcycle, and I think Miss Militia's mad because I want Triumph and Aegis as my personal boy-toys, but Vista is awesome. Our first patrol I'm going to let her ride on my back and I'm going to go eat Kaiser!"
In that moment, Emma could see an echo of the old Taylor-the excited, exuberant chatterbox. But that subtle undertone to her voice made the hair keep standing up on her neck. What did she mean dragon, anyway…?
Oh.
Oh shit.
Oh shit! "That was you?" Emma whispered.
Taylor turned and stared with golden eyes. "Me what?"
"On the news! On Parahumans Online! Everywhere! The...the dragon that ate all those cows was you? The forty-foot long fire-breathing dragon?"
Taylor actually looked dreamy. "They were so good! I never understood why dad liked steak until now."
"You ate a tractor!"
"It's good for my teeth. Like a dog biscuit, if a dog's teeth were steel." She smiled, revealing terrifying, sharp teeth that were a shiny white, like platinum. The smile dropped instantly as she turned toward Sophia. "So, you leaving yet, or do I have to eat you too?"
Sophia was a predator. She was strong. She wasn't stupid. "Yeah, catch you later, Ems." She walked out the door quickly.
Taylor grabbed Emma's hand. "Come on! I'll tell you all about the Wards! If you want, I can take you flying later!"
Eeep!
~~Wyrm~~
~~Wyrm~~
The words tumbled out of Emma's mouth as if someone else was controlling them. The tears stung her eyes and her chest hurt. She found herself staring down at how her hands were cradled in the black claws at the tips of Taylor's hands as she confessed what happened while Taylor was at summer camp.
"I'll fucking eat them," was Taylor's response. Not, I'm there for you, Emma. Not, You're strong, Emma, I know you'll overcome this. No, just a quick and intense declaration of intent.
"Won't that get you in trouble?"
"They hurt you," came Taylor's fierce, indignant response. "You're my friend! They hurt you, and I'm going to make them hurt back. Until I swallow them. I suppose they'll be dead by then."
"That...doesn't bother you, to kill someone?"
"Why should it? You're mine, and they hurt you. So, I'm gonna eat 'em."
Perhaps for the first time in her fourteen years of life spent with Taylor Hebert as her best friend, Emma found herself in the novel position of being the level-headed one. "Um, I appreciate that. But what would...your dad think?"
"He'd get over it."
"But...what would Alexandria think?"
"She can get her own ABB to eat. The ones that hurt you are mine!"
"Taylor, I don't want you to eat them."
"What?" Gold, draconic eyes blinked at her in surprise. "But...but why? They hurt you!"
"Because you would get in trouble." Just as the words tumbled out earlier, confessing how the ABB gang-members attacked and threatened her, so now did Emma realize that no matter what Sofia told her, she still loved her best friend. "Because you're my best friend. And I don't want you to get in trouble."
"Fine," Taylor muttered. "What about...just hurting them a little?"
"A little?"
"You know, like eating their feet or something. Not killing them, but letting 'em know not to hurt my friend. It's important, you know. Like spraying water at a cat. You've got to train them, you know."
Emma might have been the more level-headed of the two, but she would never admit to herself that with this new Taylor, being the more level-headed of the two was a very low bar indeed. Her grin matched Taylor's. "I...could go for hurting them. A little."
~~Wyrm~~
~~Wyrm~~
"How come no one's staring at you?" Emma's breath came quick from the terrifying, exhilarating flight in the massive claw of an even larger beast. The moment they landed deep in ABB territory, the beautiful, massive beast was replaced by her friend. Taylor wore the same jeans and blouse as before, but now somehow wore a sun hat that somewhat hid her ears.
"I cast a spell," Taylor said. "Made us invisible until now."
"Oh. That's...wow. Is there anything you can't do?"
Taylor's blush darkened her cheeks almost a violet color. "I can't use a normal toilet. You don't want to know."
She grabbed Emma's hand just like they used to, and started walking.
It was the middle of the day. And even if the area was ABB territory, at first glance it just looked like a Japanese version of New York's Chinatown. It used to be a typical middle-class area of brownstones and local shops, but after Leviathan's destruction of Kyushu almost four million Japanese refugees immigrated to the US. A fair number of them ended up in Brockton Bay.
Taylor's stomach growled-it sounded like a stampede of dinosaurs. "It smells so good," she whispered. The two girls walked down the sidewalk, and Emma couldn't help but be aware of how completely they stood out. With her red hair and pale complexion, and Taylor's...whatever she was, now-it made them both stand out as if they had signs over their heads proclaiming them to be outsiders.
Taylor dragged Emma into a shop with Japanese symbols on the windows, but a wonderful smell within. It proved to be a small restaurant. The owners looked like a withered, ancient couple. The woman went to meet them, speaking in very halting English, when Taylor responded in a flow of gibberish that sounded Japanese.
The woman grinned and bowed her head, and before Emma knew it they were seated. "What...you speak Japanese now?"
"I guess. So, was it around here, where they hurt you?"
"A few blocks over," Emma said. Caught up in the whirlwind of her friend's passage, the trauma of that night seemed somehow distant. The food started coming out shortly after. And then more, and then more. Taylor ate everything, in massive quantities, to the point where Emma began to realize she'd probably already consumed hundreds of dollars in food.
"Taylor, um...I don't have my bank card. How are we going to pay for this?"
Taylor grinned at her around an inhumanly large bite of chicken. "Wards gave me a card for food. No limit, as long as it's for food."
"But...oh, right." She remembered the cows. And the tractors.
The owners were beginning to look a little frazzled until Taylor showed them a black credit card and said something in Japanese. The frazzled look was replaced by more happy smiles, and more food came.
People drifted in and out. Though most were Japanese, not all were. Emma saw a spattering of other ethnicities, but none as pale and freckly as she and Taylor. Taylor did not care in the least. When she stopped eating finally, Emma began to suspect it wasn't because of hunger, but time. Checking her phone, Emma was astonished to see they'd been in the restaurant for two hours.
Her friend's look of longing prompted a laugh.
Taylor winked at her. "Okay, they know we're here now."
She called out something to the owners, who called back in friendly voices, and then took Emma's hand and dragged her from the small restaurant. "How do you know they know we're here? Who're they?"
"I can hear some lady talking about you," Taylor said. "Was there a lady?"
Lao. "Yes."
Taylor must have heard something in Emma's voice, because she turned to face her. "You're mine," the taller, dragon-girl whispered. "You held me after mom died. Your mom fed me when Dad just stopped. You're my sister. You're mine. No one hurts you, ever. Right?"
"Sophia said I had to be strong."
"You are strong," Taylor said. "You're here, now. You're going to face the people who hurt you. And you'll watch me beat the ever-loving shit out of them. That's strong, right?"
"Right! You're right."
"Then let's go."
They found the gang members in an old, abandoned park filled with Azn Bad Boys tags and graffiti. Twenty of them, all in their late teens and early twenties. Among them was a woman with her black hair shaved to her scalp on one side, and an ABB tattoo on her neck. She was wearing Emma's green jacket.
Mouth, nose or eye.
"That's my jacket," Emma said. "They took it off me, and she was going to cut my face before...before Shadow Stalker came and saved me."
"Didn't save you good enough-they're still walking," Taylor said.
By then the youths were watching as Emma and Taylor walked into the park. They laughed and called out to each other in Japanese, and Emma's stomach began to clench right up until a hatefully familiar figure stepped out to meet them. Yan.
"So, what can I...?"
He got no more words in before Taylor grabbed him, lifted him off the ground, and then bit his hand off.
Holy shit, she bit his hand off.
The whole crowd stood frozen...Yan lifted the stump of his left arm and stared at it in shock before screaming. Taylor threw him away contemptuously and pointed to Loa. "She's the one with the knife?"
By then, the others were yelling "Cape!" but it didn't matter. Taylor moved so fast she blurred, and in a second had Lao off the ground in an iron grip.
"Hand or foot," Taylor said.
The woman stuttered. "The fuck? The fuck! What the fuck?"
"You hurt my friend, there," Taylor said. "So, I'm going to hurt you. You made her choose. Now you choose. Hand or foot."
"Ahhh...fuck….foot!" And then she kicked Taylor in the face.
Taylor answered by grabbing her leg and then biting her foot clean off. "Hmm, Japanese food," she said, before she threw the girl across the part to slam into the ground next to Yan, where she proceeded to scream as loud as Yan did.
All Emma could think was what a terrible, Dad-joke like crack that was. It felt vaguely racist, though it was hard to articulate why. Following after was a niggle of doubt as to whether Taylor was joking at all. A second later, a demon-masked figure appeared right in front of Taylor and stabbed at her with a knife. Taylor punched out, and the figure shattered into ash.
Oni-Lee!
The ABB teleporter was infamous. He had at least twenty confirmed, public murders to his name and a hundred more rumored. Taylor blurred into motion again, but this time slashing down her hand at a figure right behind Emma.
Emma hadn't heard or felt anyone there. She yelped in alarm when she felt ash on her and ducked away. Oni-Lee appeared again right in front of her, but Taylor spun and shouted something in Japanese that made the air shimmer, like over a fire. The figure stood frozen, shaking as he held a long, wicked knife in one hand and a grenade in the other. Taylor walked right up to him, snarled in a way that made Emma's lungs shake, and punched a hand through his chest.
This figure didn't turn into ash. Emma turned and vomited as Taylor pulled his heart from his chest. Around the park, those ABB members who hadn't fled stared in horror as Oni Lee flopped backward to the ground. Taylor looked around, her golden eyes flashing, as she very deliberately ate the man's heart in two massive, bloody bites, and then licked the blood and viscera from her arm.
Abruptly, she turned into her dragon form. People screamed in terror as she reached down, lifted Oni Lee's unmoving body with her front claws, and finished what she started. She leaned down her massive head and looked around the park. "LEAVE BROCKTON BAY."
The words reverberated painfully in Emma's mind, and the way the ABB people clutched their head and screamed, she knew it hurt them more. Moments later Taylor lifted Emma in a claw, flapped her massive wings, and shot into the sky.
Only when they were in the air did the sheer enormity of what just happened settle in Emma's mind. She was seized with a sudden fear that her friend was going to be sent to jail. She was so wrapped up in her fear she didn't see Shadow Stalker on a nearby roof below. If she'd been closer, she would have smelled the fact that Sophia wet her pants.
Taylor, of course, smelled it and laughed. Draconically, of course.
~~Wyrm~~
~~Wyrm~~
Taylor sat in Emma's kitchen laughing and eating cookies like nothing had happened when the Protectorate arrived. There was no sign of blood anywhere, as if changing to and from the dragon got rid of the evidence. The entire time, Emma laughed and played along while waiting for the PRT agents to come kicking down the doors. Instead, the Protectorate announced itself with a ring of the doorbell. Emma's mom was on her feet as if expecting the sound, well before Emma could move. Rather than be concerned, Taylor took the opportunity to snatch the last ten cookies.
In other words, the whole plateful.
When Emma's mom came back into the kitchen, a real-life superhero followed her. Emma felt her cheeks flush brightly as she saw just how pretty Miss Militia looked in real life. She wore combat pants and a tactical vest that somehow still looked sexy. Her expression, though, looked far from sexy. Though Emma couldn't see her mouth, from the woman's eyes she knew she was frowning.
Taylor didn't seem to care. "Hey, Miss Militia," the dragon-girl said. "Sorry there aren't any cookies left." As she said that, she shoved the remaining five she hadn't already consumed into her mouth.
"Taylor, do you know what you've done?"
The woman even sounded sexy. Emma wished she could get her voice that deep and throaty. Taylor pointed to the plate. "But Aunt Zoe said I could have as many as I wanted!"
"Taylor, you killed someone!"
"Well, yeah. So? He tried to kill Emma, of course I killed him! Section 1047 Paragraph Two of the Protectorate Operations Manual: a member of the Protectorate is authorized to use deadly force only when it appears reasonably necessary to protect a Protectorate force officer who believes him or herself to be in imminent danger of death, or when it reasonably appears to be necessary to prevent the commission of a serious offense against a person in circumstances presenting an imminent danger of death or serious bodily harm."
Miss Militia stood frozen. "Taylor, you weren't in costume and you're a Ward!"
"The definition of Protectorate member included Wards, and didn't make a distinction between Costumed or not," Taylor said. "Anyway, he's the only one I ate."
Emma's mom paled.
"And you maimed two other ABB members!" Miss Militia said.
"Well, yeah, that's just because they're the ones that were gonna hurt Emma. I only took a small nibble! I even let the girl choose which part I was going to bite off! She seemed cool with it."
Miss Militia looked as if her hand was shaking. The green cloud of her power began flitting through various weapons, some of which were really big. "Taylor, you'll need to come with me."
"Okay." Again, the dragon girl didn't seem bothered at all. She stood and gave Emma's frozen mom a hug. "Thanks for the cookies, Aunt Zoe! They were the best. And if anyone else gives you a hard time, Emma, you let me know. I'll take care of 'em."
"Okay, Taylor," Emma said. Really, what else could she say?
Taylor bounced as she followed Miss Militia out the house. Emma heard her talking as she left. "Could we stop by the Wing Shack? I could kill someone for some…." The door closed behind her.
When she was gone, Zoe sank back down in her chair. Emma waited for her to blow up; instead her mom started laughing. Only, it was the same type of scary laughter she had after her sister Anne had that accident last May. A stupid accident that still almost got her killed.
The laughter eventually turned to a sob and Zoe covered her face.
"Mom, are you okay?"
She looked up, her eyes and nose red. "You never told me what happened. Alan never gave me details. Those two people who Taylor hurt...Emma, what did they do?"
Despite herself, for the second time that day the story came out. And when she was done, she was astonished when her mom nodded.
"Then they got what they deserved," she said softly. "Your Uncle Danny warned me, Emma. They think that...Taylor doesn't have human morality any more. We just saw it. But that means she'll protect you. Better than that Sophia girl ever could. In this town…." She shook her head, stood, and stepped to the high counter near the fridge. She returned with a bottle of her father's 17-year aged single-malt and two shot glasses.
To Emma's shock, she poured a sniff in each. "Mom, are you sure?"
Zoe laughed. "What better time will we ever have?"
It burned so much going down, Emma coughed and choked.