Time Stops For No Girl
(except maybe Taylor)
It wasn't immediately obvious when Taylor got powers. After finding her... defiled flute missing from the dumpster she'd found it in and endured the resultant vitriol Emma spewed when questioned about it, Taylor wasn't in much shape to notice anything.
She didn't notice how the wind didn't blow or the clouds move across the sky. Nor did she notice the pedestrians frozen in mid-step, or how the traffic didn't move. Blurred eyes tend to do that.
So she can be forgiven for not noticing anything amiss when she ran home to cry for what seemed like hours, only to come out and find nothing changed.
Taylor smirked as she put the finishing touches on her masterpiece.
Emma's smirking face had a wide red lipstick smile fit to make a clown cry, and so much eyeliner she looked like a raccoon. Added to the numerous soda stains adorning her designer clothing and, well she made for a frightful sight. Taylor looked across at a shaved-bald Sophia and a Madison who had been entirely painted green (puke green, to be precise), and sighed. Yes, it was petty revenge, but it felt good all the same.
She turned and left the school. After hitting up a local convenience store for supplies, she made her way home. It took her a while since she had to go out of her way to get to a store she hadn't visited before. She frowned. This wasn't sustainable. Hopefully, it would be finished soon.
She turned into her street, skipped the rotten step and entered her home. "Hey, Dad," she called. No response. He stood where she'd put him weeks ago in an attempt to alleviate her loneliness.
She walked to the kitchen and unpacked her bags. Microwave dinner after microwave dinner came out, still cold from the store's freezer. All but one (a particularly bland-looking shepherd's pie) went into the fridge/freezer. Taylor had found that nothing went off when left alone but old habits... The lucky dish found its way into Taylor's previous project - what used to be the family microwave oven.
Well, Taylor considered, it still was technically a microwave. She watched as the meal turned, her eyes drifting to land on the blue-white sphere of plasma-like energy held within a tight ring of circuitry and wiring. She smiled. She had been elated to find she was a Tinker, that the world-stopping wasn't her only power, (If it even was her power, spoke a traitorous thought).
She could create tech beyond mankind's wildest dreams, and with the time-stop, she had all the time in the world.
The microwave dinged, and Taylor retrieved her meal and sat across from her dad.
"Hey, Dad, how are you doing?" She smiled at him.
Danny said nothing. Her smile grew strained.
"Good to hear. Me? I had a pretty good day too. Found some parts I was looking for."
Danny continued to say nothing.
She gave a laugh that sounded fake even to her. "You wouldn't believe where I found them! You know that internet cafe near the Boardwalk?"
Danny did not indicate one way or another, but she ploughed on regardless. "Apparently they were getting better computers, so they dumped the old ones out the back. Can you imagine? A whole dumpster, filled with perfectly good computers!"
Danny continued his silence, as her smile grew more and more brittle until she gave up and it fell altogether.
"I know you can't hear me, but I wanted to tell you that I'm almost done. The Chrono-stabilizer is almost complete, so I'll be back with you soon."
...
...
...
"I miss you."
Taylor turned away, collecting her empty tray with one hand and wiping away tears with the other. The tray went into the trash, and she washed the little cutlery she'd used. She walked to the staircase, called out "I'm going up to bed!" without looking back, and ascended. She passed her room, instead settling in her father's bed after pulling blackout curtains that didn't quite blot out the sun that never set.
"Soon..." she murmured, drifting off to sleep...