Cans of Worms

by Louis IX

You end up in an endless corridor with numbered doors. Most of them lead to another version of Earth Bet, where the nexus that is Taylor Hebert experiences life differently - sometimes very badly. Others reflect upon other characters.

67. Pirate Ride

CANS OF WORMS
by Louis IX

Check first chapter for disclaimer and global warnings. I don't own anything you might recognize.

Pirate Ride

In the city of Brockton Bay, Winslow High school was where the poorest students went. Without generous donation from happy (and rich) parents, it was quite underfunded, when compared to the other schools.

However, sometimes, some influent people would take that situation into account when trying to curry favours with the largest population. Such as during elections.

In that, nothing had changed much since the Middle Ages, when high-ranking individuals were very obvious when giving a few of their gold coins to the poor – while those coins were but a paltry sum in comparison to their estate. In comparison, when an ordinary man would donate a silver coin, it would represent a larger part of his income… and he would still be ashamed not to give more. That's not even speaking about peasants giving one of their meagre copper coins. But I digress.

All this is to say that, sometimes, people with money look at the sorry excuse for a school and donate money. And since it must be obvious and immediate… they use it to send the kids on a trip. To Disney World.

Normally, even the overgrown kids held back at Winslow would be happy to live such a happenstance. There was one girl who absolutely dreaded the upcoming vacation, though.

Her name was Taylor Hebert.

Since she joined the school, Taylor grades had plummeted nearly as fast as her social status, and, in the eyes of the administration, it meant that she was one of those poor ones for whom the trip was organized. Attendance was mandatory, for her.

Her bullies could have skipped it, going elsewhere, but they chose to pay a bit to join, instead, smiling like sharks.

Because, even in their harshest "pranks", the infamous Trio had never played outside of the school walls. Taylor always made sure to leave discreetly, to stay in the bus near the driver, and to use different roads to go home. Emma knew where said house was, but Emma also had a visceral fear of the reaction of Taylor's dad, should they escalate that far.

In school, they had worked hard for their word to weigh more than hers, in the ears of the administration. She knew that, outside, it wasn't the case. Yet.

But a school-sanctioned outing? One that Taylor couldn't dodge, as she had the previous ones?

You can understand Taylor's uneasiness, now, right?

They didn't even wait until they had arrived to start, upending a bottle over her head in the airport toilet stall. This time, it wasn't fruit juice, and most people turned their nose at the badly-smelling girl traipsing around the terminal in search of a place to clean up. She almost delayed her flight, too.

She was unable to rest, in the plane, and fled through the gates of the park as soon as she could, putting as much distance between herself and her bullies.

She hadn't counted on them to coordinate, using the miracles of technology each of them had – and not her. Phones. With many girls playing in the "seeking" team of the hide-and-seek game in progress, Taylor had no luck at all. She tried to stay near crowds, instead, hoping that some good people would deter her personal terrorists. But her still-stinking clothes pushed them away, isolating her even further.

Those theme parks being quite big, they had two days to spend there, with a night spent in the cheapest hotel they could find. Being near Disney World, it was still a package deal, and their luggage has been sent directly to their hotel rooms. Of course, Taylor ended up delayed enough that, when she arrived, she saw it open and its content dirtied even further than her piss-poor clothing.

And if you think she had a room to herself, too, you'd be quite wrong. She was stuck with Emma, who whispered evil words all night long. Well, maybe not the whole night, no. But when she fled and took refuge in the small bathroom, trying to sleep in the small bathtub after locking the door, she was awoken by quite a cold shower, and when she got out, unlatching the lock, it was only to face a frowning teacher and a smirking Emma.

She still didn't know how Emma could have started the shower without entering the room.

Her breakfast plates ended up on the floor, and she was forced to clean it, before heading back into the park. Light-headed from the lack of food and sleep, and in despair from the whole situation, Taylor found herself hounded yet again, and tried to find refuge in crowds again. Thankfully, it worked a bit better, because her soiled clothes had dried a bit from the day before – for obvious reasons, she couldn't put on those she had brought.

Despite the hounds at her heels, Taylor turned to the rides again. And, that day, she was able to hide and delay her pursuers, because the crowds waiting for the rides were quite thick – in both mind and body, but also immovability and reluctance to others getting around them. For some reason, once the queue entered the darkened insides, Sophia was still able to overcome that particular hurdle… and sit right next to Taylor, right after the gangly teen had taken the last seat and lowered her security harness.

That particular ride wasn't very fast, or dangerous. Still, it was dark, noisy from the rowdy song and faked cannon shots, and dank from the water. Everyone had a harness securing them to the ride, one that couldn't be lifted until said ride was completed.

Or when a shady parahuman used her power to unlock it. "I tire of you." would be the last thing Taylor heard as her harness opened right before the biggest drop, and, being at the back she was propelled in the air and slightly to the side, falling in the water where many mechanisms were at work for the ride. Her damaged pants got stuck in a couple gears, which pulled and thankfully only kept her stuck instead of crushing her. She was still underwater.

The peak despair made her trigger into a parahuman, finally. Still, she almost died. The first thing her power granted her was the ability to breathe underwater, because she was still trapped. But since Queen Administrator had already seen fit to answer another call, it was a completely different power that answered. And the ability to breathe underwater, at the barely half-foot she was under the surface, manifested by the ability to transform part of her body into tubes to reach above the surface.

Her hair became tentacles.

Aaaand… that's all. Unless you count as a positive the fact that, in order to achieve this, her power had needed to change her skin too, into a greyish and vaguely leathery, and sticky, elastic matter. On top of those negatives, the tentacles didn't even reach into her lungs, and she had to push one over her nose so that she could bring the much-needed oxygen back into her body.

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A Pirate's Life For Me

We pillage, we plunder, we rifle, and loot
Drink up, me hearties, yo ho
We kidnap and ravage and don't give a hoot
Drink up me hearties, yo ho

Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me

"That would be the Trio, not me." Taylor muttered to herself as the song continued all day long. She took a bottle nearby, thanked whatever details-obsessed set decorator who insisted that the rum bottles were to be filled with rum, and pulled.

We kindle and char, and inflame and ignite
Drink up, me hearties, yo ho
We burn up the city, we're really a fright
Drink up, me hearties, yo ho

Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me

"I know, I know." she said, nodding along, her tentacles moving in sync. And then, with a very liquid belch, she threw up the very rum she just drank. Towards one of the open flames on the set. The jet of fire that followed frightened the visitors, who then applauded. "I'm popular." she tried to sing, only for the pop song to be drowned in the ambient music. Always the same. Although she replaced, in her mind, the politically correct version by the original verses. Besides, they were more in tune with her current activity.

We extort, we pilfer, we filch, and we sack
Drink up, me hearties, yo ho
Maraud and embezzle, and even high-jack
Drink up, me hearties, yo ho

Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me

"Yeah, yeah. Sorry about that. Took long enough for me not to drown in your hellish ride, thank you very much." Because, yes, nobody stopped the ride when they discovered that she was a goner. The employee, an acne-ridden undergraduate student even thinner than her, failed at intimidating Sophia, for some reason, and let her leave. No body was found floating in the water, for the simple reason that Taylor spent hours underwater, her jeans slowly eaten by the mechanical gears. In the meantime, she adapted further. Apparently, the stickiness of her skin had a use, as she discovered when an errant fish got caught… and started to be digested. By her skin, yes.

We're rascals and scoundrels, we're villains and knaves
Drink up, me hearties, yo ho
We're devils and black sheep, we're really bad eggs
Drink up, me hearties, yo ho

Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me

"I'm not a villain. I'm not." Taylor swore through tears that threatened to fall. Her time since she had finally escaped the gears, by digesting her own clothes, was spent walking through the ride and playing the intermittent baddie. With her tentacles, she even had quite a likeness to the Davy Jones character. Thankfully for her modesty, her new skin didn't include overtly sexual characteristics, and her digestion of clothes was only voluntary. Going through the various mannequins in the set, she succeeded in getting a perfectly acceptable outfit. And not eat it.

We're beggars and blighters, and ne'er-do-well cads
Drink up, me hearties, yo ho
Aye, but we're loved by our mommies and dads
Drink up, me hearties, yo ho

Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me.

"Mom. Dad." Taylor muttered, the tears rolling, finally. "What would you think of me, now?"

"Hey! Jones!" one of the visitors harangued her. "What are you doing? Sleeping on the job?"

Without looking, Taylor threw her almost-empty bottle at the voice. She missed, of course, because she hadn't gotten athletic powers or anything like that. Or a sudden ability to aim correctly. She had a few more muscles than before, though, and the bottle sailed too high, the remaining alcohol being dumped above the noisy visitors. Them being young men, they loved it, and cheered.

Taylor imagined that her new strength came from the almost-constant exertions. And her night-time explorations of her surroundings, and theft of food from the trash. Apparently, her digesting skin had no sense of taste, thankfully. And it didn't seem to care about illnesses and such when "eating" rotten meat and fish – although, for some reason, she got more from the latter. When she was tired, she also found a hiding place, often stuck under a ceiling or another high place.

What she didn't know was that the park owners knew she was there – there were cameras everywhere, after all, recording even at night time. Parahumans were not that rare, and since she mostly stayed in place and participated in the success of the ride, they accommodated her, leaving more food and drink around than normal, and cashing in the visitor entrances.

It all changed when one of the visitors, whom she didn't recognize at first, came not to see her… but to drop flowers in the waters where she fell. Since he did so repeatedly for two whole days, there was a non-null chance for them to meet. And for her to recognize him.

"Dad?"

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Hoist the Colours High

The king and his men
Stole the queen from her bed
And bound her in her bones
The seas be ours
And by the powers
Where we will, we'll roam

Apparently, when Taylor hadn't returned from Disney World, her father Daniel had raised quite a stink, proving Emma true on her fear of his character. Like a dog after his bone, he dug and disturbed quite a number of influential people – most of whom he knew from his dogged work for the Dockworkers and their Union.

With the Mayor leaning heavily on the School District, which in turn asked uncomfortable questions to Blackwell, the fact that Taylor was bullied and murdered made the news. The name of her bullies was only withheld because of their age… and the revelation that Taylor wasn't actually dead.

Yo, ho, all together
Hoist the colours high
Heave ho, thieves and beggars
Never shall we die

Even Alan Barnes realized that, without that little detail, his erstwhile friend Daniel would have had nothing to live for but revenge. And he thanked the heavens for that small mercy. And leashed Emma.

Sophia disappeared, too, the higher-ups in the PRT deciding that her numerous felonies weren't anymore covered by "good behaviour", quite the contrary. She was "gifted" with a surgically-inserted pacemaker that prevented her from using her powers, and flushed into the normal prison system for violent women.

Some men have died
And some are alive
And others sail on the sea
– With the keys to the cage...
And the Devil to pay
We lay to Fiddler's Green!

When Taylor and her dad met, he was surprised, of course. He didn't believe the tentacled creature to be his daughter, even, and she had to cite a number of private happenstances so that he could believe her. And bring her home. The PRT, still in their ass-covering mode, offered a transfer to Arcadia and a place in the Wards. And given that Taylor hadn't made the link about Sophia being one before they cleaned the house, as it were, she accepted.

And that created quite the quandary for the PR teams because her power was almost useless, and her appearance quite ugly. Even if a Tinker made a full armour for her, she wouldn't be able to maintain it – Gallant had, at least, an interest in the thing that had made him progress enough in mundane tinkering to know what he was doing with the armour he had. She could have a bodysuit, like Clockblocker. But she had no outstanding power to use in battle.

Yo, ho, haul together
Hoist the colours high
Heave ho, thieves and beggars
Never shall we die

Taylor's ability to stick to walls got her a threat rating of Stranger 0, for infiltration, just like a trained human would be. Her slightly increased muscle tone got her Brute 0 too. And her appearance got her Changer 0… because she couldn't change back. She also realized a few things, due to her testing and training with the PRT and the Wards, the foremost being that she could not eat or drink normally anymore. Apparently, not only was her power not that great, it was also continuing to change her. As if it was a bit retarded, in comparison to the others who gave their holders a complete set of powers they could use immediately.

Now, she could only eat through her skin… and drink that way too. That realization came when, after a full day spent without stopping to take a bath, her skin was crackling and slowly oozing something that, being thick and black, resembled tar more than blood. Thankfully, getting a shower helped, and a bath afterwards healed any scar that could have remained. Not that it improved her appearance, or made her more human.

The bell has been raised
From it's watery grave...
Do you hear it's sepulchral tone?
We are a call to all
Pay head the squall
And turn your sail toward home!

Arcadia was home to several heroes, and Taylor had met Panacea (who had confirmed that she couldn't do anything to her power-induced biology changes) and Glory Girl already. She wasn't in their classes, though, so she mostly kept to herself, while in school. She didn't even join the students enjoying the swimming pool, after having several complain that her unnatural appearance made them queasy about using the liquid enclosure afterwards.

Besides, it had too many chemicals for her to be comfortable in it. She preferred the sea. In fact, she hadn't noticed it, but the Pirate ride in Disney World contained sea water (to give off that particular scent) and had been her preferred bathing place… until she fell in the Bay – because voluntarily plunging into the polluted water was anathema to all inhabitants of Brockton Bay, normally.

Yo, ho, all together
Hoist the colours high
Heave ho, thieves and beggars
Never shall we die!

But for her new biology, that was an ideal environment. Her skin-stomach was kept content with the various organic elements floating around (and the water she "drank" that way, too), and her skin was kept whole.

It was during one of her many forays into the waters that she felt a boat approaching. Since she was, by then, right between the Boardwalk and the Rig, it was the small ferries taking people to the Protectorate HQ and back. Knowing that, and wanting to ask a few questions to Armsmaster, she approached. The first question, and also one that was angering her father, was this: why was the man relinquishing to the PRT the role of overseeing the "Protectorate" Wards? Especially if it was part of his job and he was paid for it?

They had ended up noticing the absence of Shadow Stalker, and Taylor had made the link between her tormentor and her Ward identity. That had made her father furious, and he was still searching for a guilty party to latch on.

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My Jolly Sailor Bold

Upon one summer's morning, I carefully did stray
Down by the Walls of Wapping, where I met a sailor gay
Conversing with a bouncing lass, who seemed to be in pain
Saying William, when you go, I fear you will never return again

My heart is pierced by Cupid
I disdain all glittering gold
There is nothing can console me
But my jolly sailor bold

Taylor easily reached the moving boat.

Testing and training was usually done on the ground, but, underwater, she was quicker and generally more efficient. In addition, her tentacles could help her move by swallowing water from in front of her and expelling it behind her. She was quickly training herself up to a grand total of Mover 1… in a terrain where capes rarely fought.

In fact, most capes needed to breathe, and she didn't. Not anymore, that is. For some reason, Taylor's internal organs failed one after the other, but without impacting her life. The stomach and whole intestines had been the first to atrophy, when not filled because the refuse she was eating was better absorbed through the skin. Said skin had evolved over time, too, and was now also able to absorb oxygen from the air… and the water. She only kept her lungs so that she could speak.

Her skin didn't only digest things, it could also eat through things. As she had done with the clothes she had worn when triggering, she could absorb almost anything pressed against her skin. But some matters couldn't stay absorbed for long, and she had to excrete the unsavoury matters through the same skin – thankfully, it was only unsavoury for her biology, and others didn't question why, sometimes, scales were forming on her skin. She would then shed them and continue as normal.

Since, for some, it was still uncomfortable (especially when they knew what it was, to her), she resorted to excrete through the hidden parts of her extended skin: the lungs, and the hollowed mass of tentacles around her head. And she would spit things out in the toilets, like a regular human.

During her underwater forays, she remarked that, depending on what she was "producing", mixing sea water made things interesting. She could expel clouds that looked like ink, like some other underwater denizens. She could also do it above water, but the mixture solidified quickly… and became like a rope. Still, sometimes, it allowed her to act like the Aleph cape, Spiderman, solidifying her Mover rating.

However, since she had discussed the very topic of threat ratings with the other Wards, and learnt from Vista that it was to guide PRT and other military groups on ways to disable her, she wasn't keen on informing her "commanding officer" of her breakthroughs.

The rest of her body was slowly morphing into the same black tar that she oozed out when her skin was damaged. In fact, her bones and muscles were both transformed, and that got her able to ignore damage like broken bones or torn muscles. With time and training, her Brute status was climbing, too.

Upon grabbing the side of the boat, Taylor looked into it, and smiled, before frowning.

There were Assault, one of her favourite heroes, with Battery, whom anyone working with them knew as his wife. But she seemed in pain, for some reason. And, between them…

His hair it hangs in ringlets, his eyes as black as coal
My happiness attend him wherever he may go
From Tower Hill to Blackwall, I'll wander, weep and moan
All for my jolly sailor, until he sails home

My heart is pierced by Cupid
I disdain all glittering gold
There is nothing can console me
But my jolly sailor bold

Taylor had known of the Wards, before her trigger. She had known who they were, in costume and hero names. Once inducted, she also knew their civilian identity. The first had been Carlos, as team leader. The last had been Chris, or Kid Win, because he was late due to a failed test in maths. And he was the only one not wincing when he took in her otherworldly appearance. He even appeared genuinely interested.

For some reason, she thought she could ask him out, or get him to ask first. As to the peculiars of the situation, given her altered build… she thought she would have time to deal with it.

Here, in the boat, was a taller version of Chris. Like Adult Win or something. And his chiselled traits made her gape and lose her grip on the boat. Normally, she would have stuck her whole body to the material, but she hadn't thought of being surprised like that. Also, normally, her altered biology removed or reduced the influence of hormones upon her thought processes.

But there were things called "love at first sight", being "heads over heels", and "falling in love". Although, in her case, she fell out of the boat and back in the dark waters.

Come all you pretty fair maids, whoever you may be
Who love a jolly sailor that ploughs the raging sea
While up aloft in storm, from me his absence mourn
And firmly pray, arrive the day, he's never more to roam

My heart is pierced by Cupid
I disdain all glittering gold
There is nothing can console me
But my jolly sailor bold

"Who was she?" Adult Win asked, apparently as interested in Taylor as his younger self – unbeknownst to anyone and everyone, because it was one of his darkest secrets, the boy had found some tentacle erotica on the web, and was quite fond of it. He had also read Lovecraft stories and, despite the warning therein, he was also one of the rare ones who wouldn't become mad upon seeing gigantic otherworldly creatures appear from nowhere. With tentacles.

"Who was whom?" Assault asked.

"That's Taylor." Battery said, before wincing again. The pain she was feeling, right then, was because of her uniform. Some were rigid and tough, others were thin and skin-tight. Being somewhat squishy, at times, she had preferred some solidity, but realized now that it constrained her upper body… because said body was growing a bit larger. For an excellent reason, too. She just waited for Assault to realize why himself, before announcing it to everyone. Although everyone knew already – except Armsmaster, but it's because he doesn't look at these details. And he'd rather have you telling him things when you needed him informed, rather than lose valuable time hazarding guesses at social situations.

She was pregnant, is all.

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Unleash the Kraken

"WHO?"

"Taylor Hebert, our new Ward." Assault replied with a smile. "She was here?" he asked Battery, who was facing him, and who had seen Taylor's brief appearance. She nodded, pointing at the side of their speeding ferry.

For some reason, the revelation seemed to produce anguish in the adult version of Kid Win. "I have to get out of here." he muttered to himself. "Quickly, since she's already here. Build the machine, again, and leave. Jump. Find ways to protect the machine, too, to not have to build it again and again? In my own body?"

"What are you nattering about?" Assault asked. "Do you need another slap?"

"No! I'm good! Sorry, I know that I… well… I know the protocols, and I know I'll spend some time in M/S screening, while you ascertain if I'm really Kid Win from another dimension." He swallowed, hard. "But, in any case, beware of her. Do not anger her."

"Why?" Battery asked. "She's perfectly happy at being a hero."

"And her power is, to be honest, quite subpar." Assault added, frowning at the distraught young man facing him.

"It doesn't matter, you don't understand." Adult Chris sighed. "Taylor… Where I come from, she manipulated insects. The second reality I visited, she created them. At the beginning, it's always small and almost ridiculous. But it always, always grows out of control one way or another."

"Like… what?"

"In one reality, she could only produce sparks when she snapped her fingers, and only there. Trust her to get someone to make her an armour with copper wires redirecting the sparks to specific tanks. Those were filled by other capes, such as her version of Chubster, with flatulence powers or other ways to produce explosive gases. She made things explode, from these little sparks. The Bakuda I found in other realities weren't that inventive, after that."

"Heh. Flatulence." Assault grinned, proving his inability to concentrate when there was fun to be had.

"In another, she implacably obeyed every order she was placed under, because the PRT recruited her forcibly. Malicious Compliance, I learned it was called. In a month, the whole PRT and Protectorate was disbanded."

"What?"

"Believe me, the Taylor Heberts are the same, in all dimensions: they train their power to the utmost of its possibilities, and beyond. Then things go crazy. Or they start with crazy right off the bat."

Below the surface, and behind the boat, Taylor was hearing all this thanks to the water's uncanny ability to transmit sound. She was, of course, quite distraught at hearing the mature-looking version of her current crush discussing about her as if she was a dangerous villain. She wasn't, damn it!

She also was feeling quite angry about his all-and-mighty judgement calls.

"I have no power?" she asked the water around her, her tentacles moving agitatedly behind her. The speed was enough to make her skin crack slightly under the pressure, leaving some black tar out. But contrarily to the previous times, she wasn't above the surface. The tar reacted to the water by transforming into more skin.

This allowed a recurring phenomenon where her tentacles would swell, split, and new skin would cover its increased shape.

In her anger, Taylor caught the first thing she thought of and shook it so much that it broke and was then crushed to splinters. And she then realized that it was the very boat that had been speeding away from her. Assault had rebounded so much that his accrued energy had him flying straight over the Rig. Battery was bleeding from many wounds. And Adult Win was looking at her in terror.

"IT'S YOUR FAULT!" she yelled at him, and spittle (still looking and acting like beads of spider web) flew at him, almost coating him entirely. After all, while her tentacles had grown so much that they could grab at a fleeing boat, her body did too. And without a shape in head, it was quite indefinite and bloated. With tentacles. Like a Kraken.

He had just enough time to press a button on what looked like an emergency teleporter. The things that Leet would create. And it exploded. But not before whisking Chris away.

The Kraken was left to express its displeasure to the world. And the Rig. And then Taylor calmed, somewhat, and realized the horror of the situation.

Thinking that she didn't have much choice, she proceeded to seek Leviathan out, so that she could recover from the situation by eliminating a bigger threat to the heroes.

Or die trying.

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To be continued… yo ho!

Author's Notes: Of course I don't own Pirates of the Caribbean, nor the indicated songs.

I did say I would make something with more links towards mp3. 1415player's story "She Summons Things by the Sea Shore" – and the nod to Implacable is because I read an omake, there, where Adult Chris visited. This can be seen as another omake. Or a prequel.

I still have nothing to write about Miss Papercut, dammit.