Tiamat: A Mother Adrift on the Sea

The first thing on my mind was the sound.

If I wasn't in massive pain, I would think it was oddly beautiful, a bell in slow motion. As it is, I guessed it was the sound of my skull ringing. That was good, to use a cliché, it meant I was still alive. And for me, being alive probably meant being alive a while longer.

Using what little coherence in my thought process that wasn't oh God the pain, I willed the more catastrophic damage in my body to, against normal laws of probability, become merely bad, the door adjusting so that my lung detangled itself from it and "randomly" slumped into a form that was only punctured rather than collapsed. Next was the steering wheel, which dissolved into ribbons as I stole structure from it to transfer into myself and rebuild
my body. As the pain cleared, my mind went down a mental checklist.

Okay, the car came from the side, means I'll have to leave that arm broken until natural healing sets in. Probably deserve it, I'm the one who texted while driving. Second, I can feel that scar regrowing, so I'll need to explain why it was only there for, oh, two days, and then suddenly healed. Third, stop that annoying…ringing….

My mind's gears (hah) stopped when I realized the ringing hadn't gone with the pain. In fact, it was getting clearer. Or closer.

Almost on instinct, I reached into the door and transferred the force of my shove into its center. I grunted in pain as it flew open, tearing out of my chest with a disgustingly wet pop. I rolled out onto the side of the road as what I could only assume was a one-in-a-thousand chance of the engine spontaneously lighting due to a random spark occurred in just the right way to cause it to explode.

As the fireball cleared, the ringing intensified, then suddenly silenced. For a moment, the only sound was of my burning car, but then the sound of slow, uneven footsteps on the pavement joined it.

Trying to ignore my arm, I rolled on my back, and got a good look at my attempted assassin.

"Murphy," I croaked, grinning to avoid giving him the satisfaction of knowing that I was genuinely scared for my life. "Fancy meeting you again."

"It is a pleazurre." The man before me looked like almost the platonic image of the town drunk. Shabby clothes, disheveled hygiene, empty bottle in hand, and the stench of alcohol clinging to all of it-he could do more than a passing impersonation of the alcoholic he played to get close to his targets and away from the scene of the crime. He knew I wasn't fooled anymore, nor did he need to fool me at this point, so one look in the eyes would tell you half of the truth; this man was sober, alert, and currently filled with sadistic anticipation. "Yer on' of mah…more entertainin' quariezz…"

"Aw, I can't possibly be as entertaining as watching your repeated failures, Murph. Heh heh..." I knew it wouldn't get under his skin-it never did with hunter-angels, they were programmed better than that-but I knew from even the first time I fought him that Murphy was made to be a hunter of big game. He was constructed for terror tactics and demoralizing the unfortunate currently in his sights, usually while making his existence known to as few people as possible. It only made sense that he was built to have the kind of personality that got off on fear and pain after much patient waiting, and I could at least go out denying him that. Not hard for me.

Not that he cared, either. He laughed, an awful wheezing sound. "Big man upstairs doesn' mind. I'mma loyel knigh' o' God...and often sukcessful' on' too. Yer…my onl' livin' outliah." He tapped his bottle to his head, giving a lopsided smirk. "Not…anymore, thou'. You wouldah…be dea' if I got tha' misshon." Inwardly, I breathed a sigh of relief. The Esteemed Opposition still only trying one specific mission one time, which given how Murphy kept on being sent to Brockton Bay on different missions for some reason, the ring wondered if maybe he was emblematic of some kind of upgrade. "I'm…requestin' tha' ya…leave."

Okay…that was new. I let confusion show on my face. "Leave? Why?"

It's amazing what the Cover of a drunk could do to show honest confusion.

"Right. Not your department. Stupid of me. But why would I want to? I mean, I'm not exactly the most stupid of Saboteurs, I don't have bombs lying about everywhere."

He said nothing. Instead, with faux-unsteady hands, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a smartphone, showing its screen to me.

And the picture on it.

My blood turned to ice. "You wouldn't dare."

"An' I though' you wer th'…angel ekspert'. I'mma not som' parahuman cape boun' by ah petty codah honor…I don' haff a life beyon' the ordars uhf the Masheen…"

He leaned as close to me as possible, so close I could smell the refined ethanol under the cheap alcohol scent on his breath.

"Leave now, fer three yearz and three dayz, or your daughter losez her fathe', too. Or ya outliv' ya own chil'. Az th' mood takez me."

…Checkmate. I sighed and cradled my head. "…I need time, I need to figure out a way-"

"You'r goin' to fake yer own death."

A doll, the kind paramedics use to teach first aid, materialized out of Twilight.

"I haff made the…pretecks. You mak' the…Gahget. Aler' the copz when yer ready. Toodlez."

And with that, a smirking Murphy vanished into the immaterial layer of existence as well.

Making my expression as neutral as possible, I began my work, feeling out the dummy as I altered its fundamental reality to sustain a Cover. Seeing as how Gadgets were my Interlock focus, this was not at all difficult for me.

Then, came the hard part. Feeling like I was ripping apart my own heart, I began to wiggle my demonic self out of my current shell, a biomechanical hermit crab.

Slowly, the pain in my arm began to numb, then my sense of it vanished altogether as I registered my Aetheric arms becoming active. New colors the human eye could not normally perceive began to present myself and the ones that they normally did became clearer as my true eyes came online. My perception of time slowed as the neural circuitry of my cranium eagerly restarted. Finally, and most bittersweet of all, my tail uncoiled out of its spatial rift, and began to instinctively probe the surrounding environment for a place to attach.

By the end of it, I was looking at the face of Annette Rose Hebert as she merged with the dummy. Shortly thereafter, the Gadget came online, and I had the less-than-comforting sight of the face I had painstakingly built and lived l be burned and crushed to near unrecognizability.

I couldn't care if that sociopathic excuse of an angel was watching anymore. I finally allowed myself to cry.

Goodbye Annette. Among all the faces I wore, you were the most loved.

….And this is how I repay that love.

I hate being a demon.

"So, we go to Brockton Bay now?" Mr. Sun adjusted his relief worker shirt as he looked over his tools. Not that he had the slightest clue how to use them, as this was just a temporary Cover that could resist the pointed question of why anyone would be headed into the city at this point.

"Contrary to popular belief, Sun, asking 'are we there yet' repeatedly is not a method to induce a speed boost in the spatial relationship of a carpool to its destination." Mr. Star, who was normally a doctor in one of his favored Covers, glared at his impatient compatriot. "Some of us actually have work to do, rather than stand around in a white uniform."

"Hey, I already got the skills I need! In fact, let's turn it around; while you're in a nice, relatively dry shelter, old Mr. Sun here has to go out in the wet, supervillain-infested streets and spend all day looking for cryptids."

"The shelter which is coated with Infrastructure and regularly patrolled-"

"Oh, stop it you two." Ms. Lion barged in wearing her nurse's uniform. "We need medical supplies for whoever needs our help, and our smuggling disguise for our own cryptids. We do not need our Ring to go in wanting to murder each other as much as the God-Machine does."

So says the Turncoat, Mr. Star thought. But she had a point there, so he kept his mouth shut.

"…Speaking of which," said Ms. Lion said as she shoved a furious mothman into his cage, "where's Forge? She's normally at her work bench when we're preparing for a road trip."

"Beats me." Mr. Sun had pulled out his smartphone and was now engaged in the fine diversion of Parahumans Online flame warring. "She's been really scarce ever sense Leviathan attacked, and given how she used to live there, I figure it's better to not press. You know how she gets when you try to pry into her past."

Mr. Star stood up. "Really? She's the one who suggested this little trip. Frankly, Sun, for a Psychopomp, you can be awfully clueless at social-"

"Ahem."

"Typical." Mr. Star turned around to face his redhaired fellow. "Why Mrs. Forge, how kind of you to join the outing you begged us to go on-"

"Snark later. Question now." Said fellow looked worried. While "looking" was a fool's errand when it came to the Unchained given their perfect control of autonomous reactions, Mrs. Forge kept her expressions notoriously calm. Mr. Star's snark died on his tongue. "Ask away."

"Okay, you see this girl here?" Mrs. Forge held up a photo of a teenage girl with a boyish build covered, head to toe, in a costume that was somewhere between a android designed by HR Geiger and a clock turned inside-out and humanoid.

"Yeah, that's Oscillator, the leader of the Undersiders." Mr. Sun had joined in. "They broke into the PRT HQ and completely trounced everyone there, Protectorate and Ward, before declaring large portions of the city their personal kingdoms. Oscillator apparently has the ability to affect the concept of 'tools' and play havoc with Tinker-tech, while she's not shabby herself in that department and can use her powers to buff her own stuff. Most of it has a biomechanical clockwork theme, hence the name."

"Uh-huh, got that. Well, you know how I used to live in Brockton Bay before the angels kicked me out?"

"Yes?" Now all of the Ring not telling the story was interested.

"Well, I had a daughter." Mrs. Forge pulled up the Parahumans Online wiki page on Oscillator. "And I quote, 'According to the PRT, Oscillator has the ability to affect the use of any form of technology-she has been reported to make field repairs on her robots with a thumb tack, and Kid Win reports a tendency for his guns to malfunction suddenly when encountering her, making them much less effective.' Now, who does that sound like?"

A dead silence passed over the Ring. Finally, Mr. Star cleared his throat. "Mrs. Forge, while this is intriguing, I doubt if we should rush to conclusions-"

"I know. That's why I've been in my room for that past couple weeks. I still have a few contacts in the city, and I had one take a sample of Oscillator's DNA after a bad fight she had with Mannequin, and then some from the Cover I had when I had a baby, which he filtered out to make sure it was her blood and my cells. This is what returned." She held out a paper with the logo of the Paternity Testing Corporation on it.

There were a lot of diagrams and charts, but the demons' eyes were drawn to the summary the overseeing doctor made. Specifically, the words "mitochondrial DNA match."

The silence lasted over a minute. Then, Ms. Lion coughed awkwardly. "Well, at least she isn't dead?"

Mrs. Forge buried her face in her hands. "Taylor…what have you done?"

-A Demon: The Descent crossover by Leliel-

Want me to continue it? I'm sure I can pile on the heartache even more when Taylor realizes that her still-living mother is horrified by her choice in careers.

Also, Murphy isn't the angel's name, although he recognizes it. He doesn't have a name, it's a nickname given his influence over the concept of Accidents ("Murphy's Law"). He looks and sounds like a drunk because drunkenness is associated with being a victim and cause of accidents. The ringing is a product of his Ban, a ritual behavioral weakness-he has to warn people when using his Influence, which he does by making the bottle vibrate so it rings.

Mrs. Forge herself is a Guardian/Tempter, or for those not versed in Demon, an Unchained (demon) with power over the concept of guarding things and tool use, and whose motive is to have a good life at the center of human social networks.