Enter the Wyrm Chapter 8: Over the Rainbow, a Shadowrun + Worm Crossover fanfic

A/N: Thank you all for reading. I'm glad you're enjoying. One of the reasons why I decided this was going to be a novella rather than my normal novel-length stories was because, as a humor fic, jokes can get old. There are only so many variations of "Dragons are awesome" I can do before the joke gets repetitive. So, rather than risk running the story into the ground, I'm ending on a (hopefully) high note. Which means two more chapters after this one.

Thanks again for reading.

Chapter Eight: Over the Rainbow

The entire front page of the paper was about Danny's daughter. Some brave, stupid person caught a picture of the end of the fight. Of course, video of it made the evening news and ANN had 24-hour coverage of it.

Oddly enough, none of the news outlets were really covering the fact that just the day before, Taylor knocked down the wall of her school gymnasium using another student as a club. It was, if Danny allowed himself too long to think about it, a terrifying statement of just how much power the PRT had over the media.

That power was even more eloquently illustrated by the fact that not one single reporter dared approach Tiamat's house.

The sound of heavy steps and wood against linoleum made Danny fold down his paper to see his daughter furiously pouting. "Should I ask?"

"My first patrol with Vista was cancelled," Taylor said. "'No patrols until the OpMan is finalized!' I was going to let her ride on my back while I went and ate Kaiser. Now I'm bored."

"You could…I don't know…read a book?"

"I read all my books last night," she said peevishly. "Mother's too."

That was another thing that Danny struggled to comprehend. His daughter's reading and comprehension speed was as fast as a computer. "Well, think of something that won't get you in trouble with the PRT, and then do it."

She visible perked up, and the hint of a smile exposed one of her steel-like fangs. "Really?"

Before Danny could eat his words, she ran from the table. Moments later, she returned with a large coffee table book from Annette's collection. "I'm going to Malaysia, then. If you want me to buy you anything, you'll need to give me some money."

It was interesting that his daughter's travel plans scared him more than Lung's death threats. He stared worriedly at his daughter's inhuman golden gaze. "Putting aside all other questions ...why?"

In answer, Taylor handed over the old coffee table book called Lost Treasures of the World. "Page 122," she said helpfully. "Read it last night."

Danny folded his paper down, took another desperate swig of his coffee. He then turned to the page in question. "The Flor de la Mar?"

"It was a carrack on the East Indian spice route," Taylor explained. "It participated in the Portuguese sacking of a town called Malacca. Just off the Northeast Sumatran state of Pase, it went down with its treasure. The article says it had two life-sized lions and a throne, all made of gold, with more coins and gems."

"It also says the treasure has been claimed by three separate countries."

She waved that concern away. "Doesn't matter what they say if they can't find it. That one's mine. I was going to take one of the empty containers from the train yards to carry it back."

Danny's mind raced as he tried to think of reasons for her not to do what she planned. "And where did you plan to keep all this gold?"

"I was going to dig out a lair up in the mountains," she said. "When I have enough gold I can grab Aegis and Triumph to be my toys. They can fan me and feed me grapes or diesel engines or something. It'll be awesome. I already have their loinclothes picked out, and lots of vitamin E oil. Gallant said that's much healthy for my toys than motor oil."

"Isn't there something in the Wards manual about violating international borders or law?"

"Nope, not for dragons! So, want anything?"

"No, I'm good."

"Bye! Love you!"

She transformed into a dragon and flew away the moment she walked outside. The billows of air from her wings made all the windows in the house rattle. He pulled out the cell phone the PRT begged him to take and hit the one and only programmed number.

"Phil, this is Danny. Yeah, I'm afraid you're going to have to revise the manual again. She got bored. Yeah, afraid so."

~~Wyrm~~

Taylor blasted south across the Atlantic with the empty old shipping container in her claws. She caught every gust of wind, and could almost feel the southern jet stream calling to her with the promise of a fast flight east.

She flew high enough to make the sonic booms less painful, though the heating along her wings actually made her fly faster and easier.

An eddy of disturbed wind flow made her turn her head slightly so she could focus one eye on her company. It was a man in a skin-tight sky-blue costume lined with what looked like lightning bolts and a mask that left his hair and chin exposed.

Taylor tried not to squeal. "Hi, Legend! I love your costume. Do you want to be one of my boytoys?"

The question caused him to slow down enough that she lost sight of him. He quickly caught up, careful of her nearly red-hot wings. Even with a voice amplifier, he had to yell over the wind. "No, I don't think so. But thank you. I was on my way back from Morocco when I saw your contrails. May I ask where you're going?"

"I'm picking up some gold. I need gold for my lair, it's really important."

He appeared to have difficulty flying while talking. "You know, it's hard to talk like this."

"You can ride on my back if you want."

He considered the offer a moment before smiling. "If you don't mind, I'm going to take you up on your offer."

"Okay."

He carefully wove his way between her flapping wings until he found a perch just past her shoulder blades. It felt like a tickle between her wings. "So, what's this about a lair?"

"Dragons have to have lairs, Legend. It's a moral imperative. And you can't have a lair without gold to sleep on and roll around in."

"I see," he lied. "Tiamat, I know we haven't met yet, but I've got to ask. Where are you getting this gold?"

"An old shipwreck in the Indian Ocean."

"I see. It sounds like something a lot of people would want to find. How do you know where to find it?"

"It's gold, and I'm a dragon. Silly question. Oh, awesome. Jetstream!"

Legend gripped the ridges along her back as she turned her head, adjusted her wings, and fell into the southern jetstream. "This is much better! I love flying in jetstreams! Don't you?"

"I've not given it much thought. I usually go a little faster than this."

"I know. You're really fast. You'd make a great boy toy for me. I could say, Legend, go fetch me grapes from France, and you could get them in minutes. It'd be great."

Legend actually laughed. "Maybe, but I'm a happily married man."

"I don't care about stuff like that. I just like pretty things, and you're very pretty."

Legend shook his head. "So, about this…"

"I smell gold! Better hop off or hold your breath!"

Taylor dove and felt the older cape float off her as she plunged into the Indian Ocean. The smell of the gold was like beef and gasoline and copper and all the best-tasting things she could want. She slid through the water with serpentine undulations of her long body, her wings folded close to her back to reduce the drag, until she reached the bottom of the ocean.

Her eyes pierced the gloom with ease as she reached out a foreclaw and began to dig through the accumulated silt. She used one wing to fan the silt and debris away as she continued to dig until she spotted old, rotted wood preserved in the sea floor.

When she broke through, she found herself face-to-face with the ornate, beautifully carved face of a stylized lion. The golden eyes stared back at her alluringly. I am for you, the golden lion said.

Yes you are, my pretties! While she didn't speak the words, she thought them very loudly.

Shaking with exhilaration, Taylor plopped her shipping container down and began loading the vast, beautiful treasure into it. The silver was all covered in verdigris, but the gold was still just as shiny and beautiful as ever. The gems sparkled under the gleaming light of her eyes. The throne was heavy enough that even she had to struggle briefly to pull it free. But free it she did.

When her nose told her she had all the treasure she could find from that particular ship, she started to swim up when her nose hinted at other treasures. The Indian Ocean was ancient, after all. Why would there just be one lost treasure?

She swam around the ocean for hours, all with one long breath, and found five more treasures, though none were as magnificently large as the first. Even so, she had a respectable hoard of gold, silver and gemstones when she at last decided to take a breath.

Her head breached the ocean about a hundred and fifty feet away from the grey hull of what looked like a small military ship. She blinked in surprise at the ship, only to duck when a missile slammed into it with a brilliant cloud of orange-black fire and black smoke. Men screamed as they fell from the ship to escape the flames.

Confused, she looked and saw other ships with multiple different flags all cruising around each other. The air buzzed with helicopters, a pair of jets and enough flying capes to look like swarms of insects in the sky. No matter where she looked, people were shooting at each other.

One of the capes must have seen her. The woman wore a dull grey military uniform despite being a cape, and when she hovered a few feet above Taylor's head, she started screaming at Taylor in heavily accented but perfectly legible English.

"You have stolen the property of the people of Malaysia! Whatever you recovered from the sea belongs to us!"

"Liar!" Another cape came, this one a man in a bright red costume. "That treasure belongs to the people of Indonesia!"

"Both of you are fools! This entire area has been claimed as the national waters of the Chinese Union Imperial!"

Third cape's declaration didn't go over well with the first two. Then a fourth cape arrived, and instead of making his own declaration, the fourth cape just went straight to trying to murder the Chinese cape. The Indonesian and Malaysian capes actually joined him, all of them trying to kill the Chinese cape.

This set off another round of fire from the various ships, planes, helicopters and capes in the air.

"You people are crazy," Taylor decided. She took a deep breath, slipped back underwater, and began swimming toward the nearest underwater current to cross the Pacific.

Maybe if she was lucky, she'd run into a whale. She just had a feeling a whale would taste like bacon.

~~Wyrm~~

Taylor wasn't sure why the people on the beach screamed so loud when she climbed out of the water. She thought they were being silly, but didn't care that much. What mattered was that she climbed onto the beach and lifted her treasure chest out of the water to let the shipping container drain.

Not all the people ran away screaming. A few fainted, but a few also stayed on the beach with cameras. Taylor looked at the nearest of those. "Hey, yellow shorts! Where am I?"

The man blanched to the color of bone and juggled his phone in shock. "What…what? Are you talking to me?"

"Do you have on yellow shorts?"

"Yeah."

"Then yes. Where am I?"

"Uh, this is Laguna Beach, dude."

Taylor bit back the urge to flame the man. "Do I look or sound like a dude to you?"

"I mean, you're a dragon, right?"

"Exactly." Taylor turned her massive container over when she was sure the water had drained, and started to dry her wings when Alexandria slammed down into the beach a few feet away from her in the classic three-point landing that made a crater in the sand.

Taylor transformed into her smaller, itchy form. "High, Alexandria! This is so awesome. Is this about Legend? You can't have him, he already said he'd be my boytoy."

Alexandria rose from her iconic landing and strode through the sand…awkwardly. It was hard to have a dignified, imposing stride in beach sand. "Tiamat, do you know what you did?"

"I sure do! And it's awesome. I don't think anyone else could swim the Pacific Ocean in one breath! I even took a break to eat a whale, all in one breath!"

Alexandria stared at her for a long time. Taylor stared back unblinking. Dragons could go a long time without blinking their eyes, and even if she had to blink, she had nictating membranes anyway, so she could blink without even really closing her eyes anyway. Being a dragon meant winning staring contests. Always.

"Taylor, there is now a state of war between India, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Chinese Union Imperial."

Taylor tried to understand why that mattered. It seemed important to the other woman, though, so Taylor said, "Okay. Do you want me to send them a card or something? I bet dad would be willing to spring for one."

"People are dying!"

"So, flowers too?"

Alexandria shook her head. "Taylor, I refuse to believe you're that obtuse."

Taylor shrugged. "I support your right to believe whatever you want. Can I go now? I need to go dig a lair."

Finally, the hero got to her point. Unfortunately, it wasn't a very good point. "That gold does not belong to you."

"Of course it does. I found it, it's mine."

Alexandria pointed one gauntleted hand toward the container. "That treasure was claimed by multiple nations. You taking it is theft. I'm going to be taking the container, and we're going to let an international court to determine its final disposition."

Taylor was done with this conversation. She let go of her irritating smaller form and leaned down to look Alexandria in the eye. "Better go ahead and try to kill me, then. I am a dragon. That is my gold. Anyone who touches my gold better kill me, 'cause otherwise I'm going to eat them. Though it'd be cool if I could have an autograph first, just in case I win and eat you. Autographs are worth more once you're dead, right?"

Alexandria didn't attack at first. She just stood staring up at Taylor's magnificent draconic form. "You'd really fight me for it, wouldn't you?"

"People who take my stuff get eaten."

"Do you really think you could beat me?"

"Doesn't matter. It's my gold. People who try to take my stuff get eaten."

The air shimmered behind and to the right of Alexandria, and suddenly Eidolon appeared out of nowhere. "Alexandria," he said with calm assurance. "What seems to be the problem?"

"Tiamat asked for my autograph in case she actually beats me and kills me while defending her stolen gold," Alexandria said. She said it oddly, as if narrating a story for a little child who wouldn't believe anything she said.

Taylor turned her attention the most powerful cape in the world outside of Scion. "Oh, hey, could I have your autograph too? You're not as pretty as Legend, and you kind of smell like old onions, but you're famous, so your autograph might be worth something too if you fight me for my gold and I win."

Eidolon blinked at her. "Are you talking to me telepathically?"

"It's hard to use sound-talk with my jaws. You know how hard it is to make a P-sound when you don't really have lips and your tongue is forked?"

To demonstrate, she flicked her tongue. Unfortunately, a little bit of whale blubber escaped between her teeth and splattered against Eidolon's leg.

"What is that?" he demanded, horrified.

"I ate a sperm whale just east of Hawaii. I thought it would taste like bacon, but it was more like really tender beef. Or...oh, I know! It's like tons of veal. It was really good!"

Suddenly Alexandria started laughing. It started as a low chuckle, but it just kept growing and growing until it turned into a full-throated guffaw. "You are really prepared to fight me and Eidolon, to the death, over a container of gold?"

"Well, yeah. It's my gold."

"And you want our autographs first, just in case you win?"

"Sure! You guys are awesome. I had your lunch box and everything in school. You're not as pretty as Legend, but you smell a lot better than Eidolon."

That just made Alexandria laugh harder, while Eidolon began to smell a bit irritated. He deployed a vaporizing power to remove the blubber, then he did some weird power that caused his own breath to drive back to his face so he could sniff his breath. When Alexandria noticed, being one of the most powerful thinkers in the world on top of being a flying brute, she sat down in the sand as her guffaws almost turned hysterical.

"Do you have a power to fix crazy?" Taylor blinked her draconic eyes at Eidolon. "I think she might have had too much to drink or something."

Her question just made Alexandria laugh harder.

"So, are we going to fight? I told dad I'd be home before dark."

Alexandria just waved her away, still laying on the sand laughing. Eidolon dropped down to the sand and started arguing with her in a low voice. Probably trying to convince her he didn't smell like old onions.

Taylor gripped her shipping container in all four of her great claws, flapped her wings against the huge weight, and slowly climbed into the sky. It took a little magic to gain any speed, but soon enough her wings had a nice rosy glow as she broke the sound barrier and started making good speed for home.

She smelled home before she saw it. The familiar forests of White Mountain and its surrounding range called enticingly to her. She circled around as the sun hovered on the horizon behind her, until she spotted a dome of exposed granite that looked perfect. She flew down until she landed on the side of the rocky promontory looking over a narrow valley. She slammed one claw into the stone and cracked it enough to make a good sized divet. She continued to dig into the solid rock until she could squeeze her head in.

She took a huge bite of the stone. While it wasn't as good as a Subaru or a cow, it had a nice crunch. With claws and teeth, she continued to dig down deep into the mountain until she formed a nice cozy lair. She pulled the shipping container in under her, barely squeezing it through the passage before ripping one end off.

Beautiful, glorious gold, silver and gems spilled out across the space she'd' made. She stared lovingly at the golden lions, and placed the throne at the far end of her lair. She flamed the container until it melted, and then layered the molten metal with her claws and mouth to form a support ring around the mouth of her lair.

A few spells later to hide the opening of it, Taylor looked back down at her gold. It didn't form a pool like Uncle Scrooge, but when she landed on it the tantalizing, crisp feel of the gold against her scales made the efforts of the day totally worth it. Her scales gleamed perfectly with the gold massage.

She couldn't wait to show her lair to her boys.

~~Wyrm~~

The next morning, the front of the Dad's paper announced, WAR IN THE INDIAN OCEAN! It had a dramatic picture of missiles slamming into a navy ship while the Chinese cape everyone else hated was being pummeled by a dozen other capes.

It looked like China's attempt to take gold from the Indian Ocean was one tanka coin too many.

"Over four thousand dead so far," Dad said while keeping his face hidden behind the paper.

Taylor nodded as she ate her pork haunch and a piece of pig iron Kurt and Lacy brought over while she was away. "I told Alexandria you'd probably spring for a card or something. She seemed pretty upset at first, but then she started laughing when Eidolon came. I accidentally spit some whale blubber on him-she must have thought that was funny."

When dad lowered the paper, he was flushed red.

She took a bite of pig iron. Talking around the snack, she said, "Wow, Dad, are you okay? Have you seen a doctor about your heart?"

"Taylor, you are responsible for the death of four thousand people."

She snorted. "No I'm not. I'm responsible for finding treasure no one else could find because they can't smell gold like I can, and digging out an awesome lair. I didn't make those people start fighting each other. I didn't grab anyone and tell them to go kill someone. They did it all on their own. And for what? They didn't have the treasure yesterday, and they don't have it today. Nothing changed except they decided to start killing each other."

~~Wyrm~~

People kept giving her strange looks at school. She didn't care. She followed her nose until she found the target of her attention.

Carlos almost fell off the bench of the cafeteria when she shoved her way between two of his friends. "I have a lair now," she said. "Do you want to see it?"

The other boys who weren't Carlos stared at her as if she were insane. Carlos stared as if he was terrified. "A lair?"

"Yeah! And it's filled with gold. On my next day off I'm going to clean all the silver coins, but the gold looks and feels great. I have a throne, and two lions, all made of gold! If feels so good against my scales. You should give it a try! Just don't dive into it like Uncle Scrooge. Gold's pretty hard, you'd probably break something."

"WILL TAYLOR HEBERT PLEASE REPORT TO THE FRONT OFFICE. WILL TAYLOR HEBERT PLEASE REPORT TO THE FRONT OFFICE."

"Oh, thank God," Carlos muttered.

Taylor grumbled to herself as she left the cafeteria. She tried to go over anything in the school she might have broken that they might try to make her pay for. Old Man Renick was actually waiting for her outside the door.

"Taylor," he said.

"I didn't do it, whatever it is," Taylor said.

"Taylor…"

"That whale had it coming. I mean, it swam right in front of me. What was I supposed to do, just not eat it?"

"Taylor…"

"It wasn't my fault I got whale blubber…"

"TAYLOR! Please come with me. There's someone who would like to talk to you."

"Why didn't you just say so?"

Renick took a deep breath and held it before turning and leading her out of the school. A PRT van waited for her with half a dozen agents. "Hey, Alvarez," Taylor said in a friendly fashion. "Where's the chicken?"

As had become tradition whenever they had to cart her around, Alvarez pulled out a Bucket 'O Strips from the Chicken Factory. They weren't the best place, but they believed in quantity over quality, and so were perfect for Taylor. When she opened it up, she found a few rods of aluminum inside, too. "Oh, sweet!"

She pulled a few of the strips onto one of the rods and ate it. "So, what's the deal?"

"You've got a VIP who wants to talk to you," Alvarez said. "Rubbing elbows with the bigwigs."

"Did I tell you I accidentally spit some whale blubber on Eidolon?"

Alvarez snickered. "Yeah, I heard about that. There's video."

"Really? The dude in the yellow shorts?"

"Yup."

"Huh." She wrapped the aluminum rod around four strips, making an aluminum pig in the blanket, only with metal and chicken strips. It tasted great.

The van didn't take them to the PRT headquarters. Instead, they continued to drive east out of the downtown area until they reached the old regional airport. Brockton Bay didn't have much air traffic any more-mostly people flew out of Boston or Concorde and drove, but it was there.

When Taylor stepped out, it was to have the actual tarmac meet her feet. She licked grease off her fingers as Renick led her around the truck toward a nice, expensive-looking jet that sat alone on the runway. Someone set up a tent right outside the jet that provided a little shade against the cloudless, early fall day.

This far inland, she could feel a nice brisk breeze blowing down from the mountains up north. The wind carried just a hint of her glorious, beautiful gold.

Under the tent, two men and a woman stood near a folding table. A single chair sat on the side nearest Taylor. All three were very well dressed, but one of them was shorter than the other two, with a shiny balding head and a thin mustache. Even though he was the shortest, he managed to stand with a commanding posture that the two other, taller people seemed to submit to.

When they arrived, Renick spoke. "Taylor, this is His Excellency Rajmah Mahmud Hussin, Ambassador to the United States from Malaysia. He's joined today by Mr. Michael Delapena, the United States Secretary of State, and Melissa Baumgartner, the United States Senator representing our state. Ladies, gentlemen, may I introduce Taylor Hebert."

The Ambassador was the one to move first, and leaned forward over the table to offer his hand. Taylor shook it. "Hi! Is this about the whale?"

Renick sighed. "Have a seat, Taylor."

She sat. The ambassador and the two suits with him sat as well. The short man studied her intently for several long minutes. "Did you know..." he began. He had a high, soft voice, but his English sounded lyrical. "Five hundred years ago, Portuguese came to our city, and sacked it."

Taylor nodded. "Because the opposing merchants there convinced Sultan Mahmud to betray the Portuguese trading mission that was sent first."

The man raised one elegant brow. "You know your history."

"I know the history of my gold," Taylor said. "I can feel it. The gold sings to me, and tells me its story. That's how I found it. That's why it's my gold."

Ambassador Hussin crossed his legs in a very proper fashion. "That gold was taken from the people of Malaysia, Miss Hebert."

"It was taken from the people of the Sultanate of Malacca, all of whom have been dead for five centuries. No one in Malaysia has had the gold since, and no one in Malaysia has missed it. So why does it matter now? Nothing has changed for the people of Malaysia between before I found it, and after."

"Listen here, Miss Hebert," Delapena said in his best dad voice. "That gold belongs to the people of Malaysia and you will return it immediately or there will be consequences."

Taylor glanced back at Renick. "It's only a thousand dollar fine to eat him, right? 'Cause, you know, I'm rich."

"The fine applies to self-defense, Taylor," Renick said. He wasn't sighing any more, he sounded terrified. "If you eat the Secretary of State of the United States, the entire Protectorate would be obliged to come after you."

Taylor shrugged. "I could take 'em. Except maybe Alexandria and Eidolon. They didn't fight me yesterday, though. And dad said he'd pay the fine if I had a really big fight."

The senator looked flustered. "Renick, is she…?"

"No, she's not," Renick said.

Taylor just shrugged and studied the Ambassador. Even though he was short and bald, he smelled strong and held himself with confidence. She found herself liking him. "I am a dragon," she said. She waived at herself. "This...this is an illusion. I wear this face to make it easier to eat chicken strips and troll people on PHO. Yesterday, I ate a sperm whale. Tomorrow, I'll find and eat an Orca, maybe. Or maybe the Slaughterhouse Nine. And then I'll go to my lair and I'll lay in my gold, because that's what dragons do. And I will eat anyone who touches my gold."

The ambassador actually smiled. "I see. There was reputed to be two life-sized statues of lions, and Sultan Mahmud's gold throne among the treasures. These are truly priceless artifacts. The value to the people of Malaysia is much greater than the gold."

Taylor blinked languidly. "You sure about that? The Lions are hollow, and the throne isn't all pure gold, but it's still around five and a half tons. The lions are 40 percent pure, but the throne back is 99 percent pure gold. It's worth at least a quarter of a billion."

"Of course she'd know the market price," Alvarez muttered from behind Rennick.

Taylor shrugged. "I can read a gazillion words a minute and have perfect memory. Like I said, I know my gold."

"Do you care about paper money?" the ambassador asked.

"Nope. It's just paper-fiction. Only gold matters. Or silver. Or gems. Or Legend in a speedo. I like pretty things."

Rather than snicker, Alvarez bit back a choking cough.

"Then let me offer you a trade," the Ambassador said. "There is a very wealthy man in Malaysia who wishes to see those lions and the throne returned to its proper place in Malacca. He is offering to pay you one hundred million in gold bullion, and another hundred million in raw, uncut diamonds, in return for the lions and thrones."

"Throw in fifty cows and you got a deal."

"Taylor..." Renick began.

"What? I'm hungry. It's been a long time since the chicken strips."

"It's been less than ten minutes!"

"You say that like I'm not right."

The Ambassador laughed. "Very well, Miss Hebert. We will make arrangements to have your cows, gold and diamonds brought to the city. It will take two months to arrange. Is that acceptable?"

"Oh, sure. Great doing business with you!"

"And you, Miss Hebert," the man said with a nod.

Taylor stood. "So, could we stop by the trainyard on the way back? Some rusty iron sounds really good right now. The rust is like pepper and makes it spicy!"