Simurgh.

It had been the first thing to go through her head when she realized what she could do and she caught a whisper of the word in her father's mind before she cut the connection. It felt like it should have stung, that slight tinge of fear, but considering she felt it too, it was forgivable.

"That's not all, Dad. Um, watch this."

She gestured at her dirty plate, small drips of mustard dotting the surface, and muttered something under her breath. In a flash of golden light, it was clean. Spotless, in fact.

Danny reached out and gingerly touched the plate. "Is that what Scion did to you? Are you... copying him somehow?"

Taylor grimaced. "Not exactly. I'm not sure what power he used on me, but I'm pretty sure I can only clean small stuff. Like, a foot or less. And there's other stuff that seems tied into it. Like this," another gesture, the same mumbling, and the sound of windchimes briefly rang from thin air, "or this." Gesture, mumble, a small wooden yo-yo appeared in her hand with a golden flash. She yo'ed the yo a few times before it vanished back to whence it came. "It's all... the same thing? Like I'm picking up a handful of water out of a bucket and each thing is just a different drip from the same full palm.

"What Scion did to me was... different." A thousand-yard gaze filled her eyes before she shook it off. "I'm pretty sure nobody else was given their powers directly by Scion, though."

"What?!"

She paused so briefly as to almost be unnoticeable. "Dad, I suddenly get powers right after an unusual encounter with Scion. The power signature looks so much like Scion's that it's ridiculous. Of course he gave them to me himself. That's why I've got to be really careful what I do and when I do it."

She took a deep breath.

"And then there's this."

She reached under her shirt and pulled free a pendant on a necklace and let it lay against her chest. It was a large uncut crystal of some kind. It looked like a quartz point but was colored a translucent gold that had flecks of iridescent white flickering within it.

Danny had reached maximum surprise overload and just asked simply, "What's that?"

"It's... a focus. I feel like I have the potential for much bigger things and this will let me channel them. Or at least, channel them easier. If someone took it I would be... upset." A dark look came over her face

Danny sighed and rubbed his face. "So let me get this straight. My daughter is a cape. Scion himself gave her her powers. She has a magic crystal to help her access her powers. And she's going to go off heroing whether I want her to or not."

Taylor startled. "What? No! I'm not going to-"

Danny raised a hand to stop her. "Taylor, I'm not an idiot and I know you. You have your mother's sense of justice and fair play and my, well, my inner anger. You may not intend to right now, but sooner or later you're going to want to go out and use those powers to beat up some bad guys. And if that means sneaking around me, so be it." He sighed. "We've lost touch with each other so much and this is, for better or for worse, giving us a fresh start. Let's not start it with lies or equivocations."

Taylor slumped back and scrubbed her eyes with the heels of her palms."...Yeah, you're probably right. I won't be able to stop myself. Scion gave me these powers for a reason and not fighting the bad guys would be going against that reason."

Her father slapped the table with both hands. "Then we're going to do this right. Get you signed up with the Wards immediately. We can head over there tomorrow..."

He trailed off as he saw the hesitant look on Taylor's face.

"Or not. What's wrong, honey?"

"I don't know. I just get the feeling that joining the Wards would be a really, really bad idea. Like, 'someone ends up dead' bad. Besides, when was the last time a Ward actually got into a fight? You never hear about it and... I really need to fight some bad guys. I can't just be a pretty princess PR doll."

"Well, we can at least get you registered so they know who you are. And I say that out loud and realize how stupid it sounds. They already have you on their radar. Letting them know you have powers when you're not going to join them would probably be a less than wise idea."

"Yeah, probably. Hell, I don't even have a name for myself."

Danny snorted. "That's not really our biggest concern right now, is it?"

Taylor smiled wanly. "I guess not." She yawned wide. "Ugh. Today took more out of me than I thought. I'm going to head for bed." A pause. "I love you, Dad."

Another pause. "I love you, too, Taylor."

Sleep came hard for Taylor as she tossed and turned long into the evening. Her mind kept replaying those long minutes in the locker, choking on the stench, utter foulness squelching under her feet, the bugs crawling everywhere on her, her throat raw from screaming. And the moment that the door was ripped off and the golden god hovered in front of her. His gentle hands pulling her free of horror. Staring into his eyes. Seeing-

[DESTINATION]

[DISAGREEMENT]

[QUERY]

[PROPOSAL]

[QUERY]

[CLARIFICATION]

[AGREEMENT]

[HELLO TAYLOR]

She remembered all of it. The giant multidimensional creatures scattering pieces of their flesh across time and space. The argument as the pair of might as well be gods decided what to do with her. Scion offering her a choice, the first human to ever be granted one. And her response.

yes

And a golden flash as her being was rewritten.

Author's Notes

As you may have already guessed, Taylor is now a Level 1 D&D 5E Warlock, with Scion as her patron, a Great Old One. I mean, giant devouring space whale sounds pretty Cthulhu-esque to me, doesn't it? Anyway, her starting cantrips are Eldritch Blast and Prestidigitation. She hasn't revealed her level 1 spells. Yet. Need an appropriate target, after all...

I will be making Author's Notes infrequently, mainly to provide updates on Taylor's character sheet progression. We're using story event-based leveling rather than XP-based, mainly because I really don't want to have to figure out XP equivalencies for every mook and cape. I also played around with Taylor's stats using new 5E rules, so she's physically slightly more impressive than she is in canon. Now, for those of you following along at home, Taylor's starting HP is 8. Let's see how long she keeps those.