-/ Chapter 7: Breath /-
He screamed like a girl as he rushed out the bug infested building. About two hundred and forty seven thousand ants and cockroaches surged out of the open doorway after him moving along the floor and the walls alike. John Cassidy raced across the street and into the alleyway while hitching his ill-fitting pants up. He got about seven feet into the alley before tripping over a cord of spider silk that had been hefted off the ground just ahead of him by flying bugs. Spiders leapt off the walls landing on his prone form and he struggled to swat the arachnids away. He got to his feet just to trip fall back down finding his shoes covered in spider silk and already being bound together by the orchestrated movements of a few hundred tiny spiders. The cockroaches and ants flowed into the alleyway like an inexorable wave.
"I'd just give up if I was in your position," I intoned the swarm around me creating an inhuman voice by coordinated use of the swarm's individual noises. I sat about six feet above my victim resting on the sheer surface of the wall with my arms crossed over my chest.
The stunt was possible thanks to a fair imitation of Spider-man's wall clinging ability I had built into the latest boots and gloves of my costume. I don't know how the comic book web swinger actually pulls it off, well I knew a few different explanations given over the years in various media, but I used something called electroadhesion. That's essentially electromagnetism at the molecular level if I understood it correctly. I had tried using the various mechanisms actual bugs used to pull the stunt but there were problems pretty much all around. Van der Waals forces, which are responsible for the adhesion, has no off switch so clinging forces had to be high enough to hold the target weight yet not so high that I couldn't pull myself free. Bugs somewhat circumvented the issue by simply having ridiculous high proportional strength and a very specific design of the foot.
Electroadhesion on the other hand created the clinging effect by use of alternating charge electrodes spaced across the contact surface and despite the fact that it needed power to function it was far easier and faster to implement into my costume then my failures with Van der Waals forces had been. The power requirements weren't even that high, I could conceivably wall crawl all day and night for several days on a single watch battery. Not that I'd be caught dead actually wall crawling around. I had tried my hand at it in the lair and I looked… ridiculous. Until I was more limber and dexterous enough to better emulate the web-head's movements I don't think I'll use the capability for more than just perching in some unusual spot like I was now.
Mr. Cassidy yelped and jumped, or rather did some sort of approximation of a jump given he was on the asphalt with his feet already bound. He scrambled as best he could away from me while stuffing his right hand into his coat. Thanks to an earlier swarm attack I already knew he had a thirty two caliber revolver stashed in a shoulder holster. I also knew what he was figuring out now as he fought to pull the weapon free, it was stuck pretty well in the holster thanks to webbing some of my weaver wasps had stuffed into the space.
"Seriously. At this point it's more of a matter of how badly hurt you will be before you stop resisting than if you're going to get away. You're not escaping justice this time. Those children you molested will be avenged."
The gun finally came loose as he screamed a barely decipherable curse at me and fired. He didn't have any problem hitting me; I was after all very close to him. Say what you will about how crappy of a caliber the thirty two is, it still hurts to get hit by it. The shock of the impact flooded my mind with pain and I accidentally disabled my cling pads. When I dropped off the wall in a heap the shot must have looked like a winner.
The crawling tide of my swarm engulfed me and in moments I knew beyond a doubt he'd not been even as fractionally lucky as he likely thought he was. The bullet had skipped off the chitin of my forearm and impacted the area just above my collar bone where I had no chitin enhancing my defense. Still there were about five layers of spider silk in the way so while the impact had hurt it hadn't even had a snowball's chance in hell of penetrating my suit.
Even worse for him when he pulled the trigger a second time the gun jammed. Well more specifically the chamber wasn't able to cycle a fresh bullet into position. Too much web was gumming up the works. The only reason the first round had fired was because he manually cocked the weapon as he drew it. If he had simplify pulled the trigger the gun wouldn't have fired, the trigger would have gotten stuck at about half pull or so when it failed to cycle the chamber like it was now.
"That stung," I growled out as I stood back up right. I could feel the ants and cockroaches falling off me as I rose. I imagined it would look a bit terrifying even without the knowledge that I'd just been shot. When I closed the gap he screamed again; I could hardly blame him.
I lashed out clawing the child molester. My talons shredded his coat and flesh as I relived him of his weapon. I was methodical in my brutality. By the time I moved on from his arm both his elbow and several fingers were bending the wrong way and many tendons had outright been shredded by my claws. Next the talons found his throat and I throttled him has I repeatedly lifted him up before whipping his head back against the pavement. And that didn't even account for the dozens of ant bites or wasp stings being delivered. After about the fourth time his head impacted the asphalt I let him drop.
I wanted to hurt him more. Not because of he shot me, that hardly factored in, but because of what he had done to those children. None of them had even been teenagers. I felt like no matter what I could do to him, what state I'd leave him in it wouldn't be enough punishment for what he did to those kids. I had offered my assistance to the police after hearing about the latest incident and his following evasion of the local PD on the news. I shouldn't have read the transcripts of the interrogations during his previous arrests; or the medical reports of his victims. I had my web spinners start wrapping him a cocoon as I got some distance and forced myself to calm down. About half a minute later I was calm enough to call the police.
"Officer Keller. It's Skitter," I identified myself needlessly. The swarm's voice was a big enough giveaway, "I've captured John Cassidy. We're in an alley on Baker Street, between 1487 and 1489. I…you'll need to send paramedics. I went a little overboard."
"Thank you Skitter. Care to stay on site until I arrive?"
"Ye...Yes ma'am," I stuttered as the adrenaline finally started draining away.
The pain came back full force with the ebbing of the adrenaline. My breath hitched and shortened. I forced myself to focus to remember that this wasn't the worse I'd been injured this was in fact relatively nothing. I had been shot before, actually I had been shot several times before, one of which was in this life. And this was nothing compared to being sliced in half or losing an arm. Hell, nothing was comparable to Bakuda's pain inducing grenade. Drawing on those memories did help put the pain in perspective and diminish it.
It was about six minutes before an ambulance arrived. The paramedics looked frightened as they worked on the man. I couldn't really blame them, after all not only was the person responsible for the brutal assault on their patient casually perched on the facade of 1489 Barker, but there were well over a million bugs skittering to and fro. Luckily I had finished recording and splicing the narration of the event to the video my mask had captured of the encounter before they arrived so it wasn't like the had to listen to me detailing exactly what I had done to the …scum, I couldn't call someone like that a man. Shortly after their appearance Officer Keller and her partner, an overweight cop that basically played the donut eating stereotype of cops completely straight, arrived.
"How bad is it?" Keller asked one of medics.
"He was unconscious when we got here. The injuries are generally worse looking than they are but he won't be using his right arm any time soon."
The officer nodded and walked over to where I was perched. She gave me an amused expression as she gazed up at me. I was a decent ways up the wall; my knees and hips were at about her chest level. I pulled a cheap thumb drive from the back of my costume and handed it off, "My statement and video of the entire encounter from my perspective."
"Alright," She said accepting it with a gloved hand before dropping it into an evidence bag her partner had produced, "mind telling me what happened?"
"He shot me. And I got carried away in my reaction."
The officers shared a look between themselves that spoke volumes of what the partners through of that before looking back to me. The overweight officer commented, "Sounds perfectly justified as self-defense to me."
"I know it doesn't look it but my costume's pretty good at protecting me. Outside of a few isolated spots he couldn't hope to seriously injure me with the gun he was packing. That's um, over in the alley still."
A simple motion of the head from Keller and her overweight partner went into the alley to collect the weapon. I helped him find it by forming a few arrows with my swarm. I could hear him chuckle at the sight. I even pointed out where the bullet he had fired ended up.
"Anyway, I didn't need to hurt him so bad to capture him. But I did. I…" I trailed off I wasn't exactly feeling remorse, rather I was worried. I was trying to be a hero and I had let my control slip. I slipped into that eye for an eye mentality and use of disproportionate force that had made me a villain before. I didn't want to slip back into that role. I wanted, maybe needed, to be a hero.
"Look kid, you might be bulletproof but that doesn't mean shit to the law, as far as it's concerned you could have killed him after that and you wouldn't be guilty of anything but having a temper."
"But it wasn't because of that. I was angry because of what he did to those kids."
"Good."
"Good?" I echoed back confused.
"Yeah, good. You get angry over what he did, that means you're a good person. You came to us to help catch him to keep him from doing that to anyone's kid again. Yet, as angry as you must have been you still didn't kill him. You even called us to get him medical treatment. That speaks volumes about you. Tells me someone raised you right."
"I guess," I said unsure. Truthfully I wanted to kill him, wanted to visit upon him every horror that plagued my dream memories. It felt all kinds of wrong that after thinking that I was being told I had done good and was a good person, "I'm not going to argue that I wasn't raised right. But it feels wrong to be praised for hurting someone like that, no matter how justified it could be."
"Again I'll say it. You are a good kid."
I slipped away shortly after that. Brockton Bay Police Department was actually rather welcoming when it came to local heroes offering their aid. Their own requirement for me when I went to the station to review what evidence they had was simply not to bring an army of bugs in with me. I had done them one better; I brought the local roach infestation with me when I left. I guess that they were so accommodating because of how outnumbered the good guys were. Maybe they wanted to create a rapport with the new hero to make sure I didn't have reason to slide into villainy or to give me something of a support net that would keep me active and alive for longer.
I had gone to the police Friday night to offer my assistance in the hunt for John Cassidy and it had been my focus for all of Saturday and this morning. I had ranged across a fairly large portion of the city during that time. I did feel bad for having asked Sara to cover for me; she sold the fiction to my dad that I was staying over at her place for the weekend. Dad had sounded disappointed that I hadn't asked him first but it seemed he was more than willing to overlook my indiscretion because I was with a friend. Something we both knew I desperately needed. I guess to Dad it looked like Sara was my new Emma, I always seemed to be running off to 'hang out' with her and she was the friendly sort that didn't seem to have a judgmental bone in her body.
According to my phone it just a little before eleven in the morning that gave me plenty enough time to get to the meeting place for my second encounter with Panacea and Glory Girl. I had been debated on whether or not to take Atlas out and test him in real world conditions when I woke this morning. I had actually spent the night in my lair and had performed the finishing touches on the five hundred pound bug this morning. Ideally I wanted about a week to make sure the last major modification I made was functioning correctly. I was more than a little concerned about it because as far as I knew there was no bug, probably no organism that had the same functionality. That said he was ready to perform in the role of my mount. Well. I also needed to finish making the saddle but that was beside the point.
Why was I hung up on Atlas? Well I'd probably have looked a lot less lame when I walked into an Arby's and ordered my lunch. After all I was still fully garbed in Skitter's regalia. I could have used the drive-thru at least so I wouldn't have disrupted the normal activity in the dine-in section of the joint. One thing I did know by the time I left was what the people in that general area thought of me. Apparently I was a monster, villain, or an anti-hero. I needed to work on my public image. Maybe once I started using at least I could patrol for longer that way people could see me as more of a protector; it wasn't like I hadn't been pounding the beat a little every day or so.
Once I got away from the civilians and the lone paparazzi that happened to be on location at the time I climbed the sheer wall of a nearby building and ate. I had actually considered eating in the restaurant. After all you never saw superheroes or villains just doing something normal. They were either saving the day, spoiling it, or being part of a media circus. No when capes were going to do something normal they almost always did so in their civilian guise or behind closed doors. As such they ended up looking larger than life. I was still trying to figure out how I wanted to present myself to the public. The criminals were easy enough; I wanted to be their worst nightmare. The public not so much. A reason I hadn't eaten in public was because as of yet only a bare few even knew my skin color, and even with my new mask when I had to open it to eat I exposed a good bit of skin.
That sounds saucy.
A flash disrupted my thoughts and I closed the mandibles of mask with a command and turned towards the source. Apparently I hadn't lost the paparazzi after all. He got bonus point for looking up the side of the building I was adhered to. Most people never looked up. Still it was annoying, especially since I couldn't just turn and crawl up the rest of the façade without him snapping pictures of my admittedly horrible crawling technique. Spider-anything I was not.
"Do you mind?" I asked with the swarm, "I'm trying to eat in peace."
"Just doing my job."
"Do your job somewhere else. I'm hungry."
"Never said you had to stop. No one gets shots of capes eating," camera jockey said as he snapped more pictures unknowingly echoing my previous thoughts.
I sighed and wished I could smash his camera. That I knew was probably the worst thing I could do, then I'd have this guy hounding or accusing me of damaging his equipment. Neither was very conductive to building a positive public image. Reluctantly I packed my food into its bag, rolled it up, and stashed it in my utility compartment before dropping down to the ground.
The ten foot or so drop made my legs sting, I ignored it as I spoke, "Okay. Seriously I'm not trying to be rude here or anything, I just want to eat in peace. So what do you want?"
"Anything I can get. No one really knows anything about you or have good pictures. Right now pictures of you are worth about as much as shots of Dauntless and Glory Girl."
I let out another sigh, this one audible enough for him to hear, "That's because I don't know how to handle myself in public. Criminals I can deal with easy enough. Punch them in the face. I'm still trying to figure out how I want the public to view me."
"Sounds rough," he said though his voice didn't really sound all that sympathetic. He had at least lowered his camera.
"So you want pictures?" I asked.
"Yep."
"Go ahead snap a few. I really don't have time to deal with this and eat. I've got an appointment to keep."
"Alright this will just take a second," he brought his camera up as I pulled my personal swarm in closer to make it dense enough to really stand out. The camera's flash all but blinded me and I was grateful for the polarized anti-glare lens of my mask. As he snapped away he asked, "So this appointment of yours?"
"Can I go with no comment?"
"Sure I can deal with that. I'm not a reporter or anything I just take pictures," he replied chuckling as he checked his camera's history to make sure the shots came out alright. I had bugs positioned behind him in order to try to see myself, but whoever designed the small screen never intended for bugs to view it, it was just a bright blur, "Were you trying to get your bugs in the shot with you?"
"Did it screw up the shots?"
"No, no. I mean most of them are just blurry shapes, but I think you just upped the price I can sell these at."
"Good. Do you mind showing me the first shot?" I asked. He nodded and quickly manipulated the controls. He shifted to allow me a view. After asking him to blow it up to full resolution I was sure he hadn't been able to actually see the exposed section of my face; the mandible obscured it. Now sure that my identity was still as well concealed as before, I spoke up, "Alright, you have your photos. Now please, stop following me. At least for now."
He chuckled, nodded, and walked off. I kept track of him with my bugs as I ascended the building again to finish eating in peace. He had given me something to think on though; the public didn't have any idea who Skitter was. Not just who I was under my mask but they didn't know if they should be running from me or giving me a pat on the back. If they were hearing the rumors that were no doubt beginning to circulate of my activities then all they'd know is I'm violent and probably an Antihero. I knew the PRT had a PR department but I needed to build up a reputation without and before chaining myself to them. I needed my own agent or something.
The site I had chosen to meet with the Dallon sisters the rooftop of an apartment complex that sat on the edge of the Azn Bad Boys territory. This time I had arrived well in advanced of Panacea and Glory Girl, normally this would mean I had ample time to set up some sort of theatric entrance. No, instead I had decided to just simply be here already when they arrived. As such when Glory Girl flew in carrying Panacea they were greeted by the sight of a few million bugs flowing across every surface of the flat roof and myself sitting on the sheer side of the bulkhead housed the access stairs. My swarm made a clearing for them to land as I finished the sketching I had occupied myself with while waiting. More ideas on how to get some of the designs I'd been working on to function properly.
"Hi, Skitter," Amy called out as she walked over to me. Even though most of her was concealed by her costume she looked exceedingly better than she had the last time I saw her.
"Amy, Victoria," I answered by giving each a nod.
"When did you get the ability to cling to walls?" Victoria asked as she casually floated closer.
"Thursday? Friday?" I asked myself, "Not really sure which. It's a function of my costume. Electroadhesion allowing me to act as the proverbial fly on the wall."
"Neat."
"It is," I agreed with Glory Girl's assessment.
"So what's the plan for today?"
"I've got a notebook full of ideas to show Amy, and I'm tracking more than a few dozen ABB gang members. Also I wanted to run an idea by you."
"Let's start with the idea," Panacea said as she sat down on the bit of ventilation across from me. I had actually chosen the spot specifically because the features would allow us to sit across from one another like this.
"Well, I mentioned last time that I had modified bugs specifically for making my costume," I stated as I extended my arm out between us. A massive spider crawled down my arm stopping on the palm of my hand, "This is a widow weaver, a black widow that I made able to produce a notably stronger silk several times faster and for longer periods. These are responsible for my body suit."
"Alright," Amy said as she reached out and touched the top of the arachnid cautiously, "Also beyond the obvious size enhancement you gave it a tougher carapace and modified its' chelicerae, giving it a second set of venom glands?"
"Right, the second set contains a drastically watered down version of its venom so if I have it bite something I can chose to have it inject whatever poison better fits the situation. On their own they'll almost never use the venom that the widow is known for. I've also made a number of modifications to their behavior instincts. Less territorial, more communal, etc., etc."
"Interesting, should I ask why?"
"I had these in the basement of my home for the longest time I wanted them to not kill my dad or something while I was out of range of them."
"Makes sense. So why are you showing me this?" She asked as another weaver widow unzipped the duffle bag I had sitting under me.
"I was thinking of making spider silk costumes for capes as a way of earning some extra money. And I think I'd have no problem getting customers once it gets out just how touch the material is. It's stronger than Kevlar of similar thickness by a factor of ten," I explained as a line of bugs crawled out of my bag carrying a few inch long and inch wide strip of spider silk to panacea. When they got to her instead of, climbing up her leg or something of that sort, I had the bugs swell upwards bringing the strip up to her waist level, "I want you to take this and hand it off to your mom or whoever. Get it tested to prove that it's as tough as I say."
"I can do that," Amy said as she took the strip of cloth from the bugs as she eyed the formation wearily. I mentally kicked myself for forgetting that not all people were as comfortable with bugs as I was.
"Ten times stronger than Kevlar?" Victoria asked the surprise evident in her tone and posture.
"Yeah. It's based on the silk of Darwin's bark spiders, the strongest known spider silk in the world," I explained before motioning to the damage on my shoulder and stated, "I've been shot a few times since I started heroing here. I can safely say I've proved my armor's durability in real word conditions."
"That's pretty awesome," the blond bombshell responded.
"About time."
"What?" Victoria asked surprised by the non-sequencer.
"I've been scanning the local with my range boosted by more than a few relay bugs. Particularly keeping an eye out for trouble so you'd have something to do besides listen to us talk shop and boring you to death."
Amy chuckled and Victoria smirked as she asked, "So?"
"How'd you like to bust up a drug deal?"
"Point me to it."
"Done, head north and keep an eye out for arrows. They'll lead you to any crime my swarm finds."
Glory Girl let out a whoop as she launched herself into the air. Amy shook her head while wearing an amused smile.
I repositioned myself next to Amy opening up my notebook, "So I've got tones of ideas in here."
"Yeah. To be honest I've been curious to see what you cooked up."
"Well most of these designs have their obvious flaws. Either I'm missing some key piece of biotech to get the idea off the drawing board, or there's engineering problems to deal with, or, and this is where you can help me, I can't get the parts to work together. Shall we that with the last group?"
One of my ideas came to fruition as soon as she saw it, "What's this one?"
"A thorn fly. Basically it's a heavy carapaced powerful flying bulk bug; I add it to my swarm to give me a little more punch. I've sent my bugs through old glass windows during some of my raids and while a typical tendril can shatter glass with just the forces they can deliver the process usually kills a significant number of the fliers. Putting thorn flies at the head of a tendril will allow a much larger percentage to make it inside the target to attack."
"Why haven't you made this one?"
"I tried a few times. I even used mantis shrimp carapace to try to get around my main problem. Chiefly, if I make the carapace strong enough to survive what I want it to do then it's too heavy for it to fly fast enough to actually perform the actions. Then theirs size concerns, I want the bug to be rather small, not nearly as large as some of my other custom stock so I can carry a sizeable portion."
Amy simply nodded and held out her hand. I had a small cluster of bugs land. She clasped her hands together while looking over the blueprints. My bugs ceased to exist all together for a few moments before I felt my power reestablish connection; of the dozen or so I had given her there were now only three. I felt them with my power; the compounds making up their carapaces didn't exist in any of the bugs I had ever felt with my new power, but beyond that they were exactly what I wanted. I noted that part of the way she had managed to make the thorn flies the size I had wanted was by compacting their organs to such a degree that I would have been worried about the organs not having enough room to function or something. The fairly large fat stores were still present, important given that these bugs were designed for long duration flight; in fact the idea was that they'd never land.
I smiled. Amy might not realize it but she was also inspiring me and providing new tricks for me to use while modifying my swarm. The new carapace compounds would get a thorough testing before I used it for the purpose, but I could see replacing the underlying base plates of my costumes chitin with it. The upper layer I was already thinking of intentionally making it into a sort of ablative armor. If I made all the armor plates a living organism I could use my power to maintain the plating instead of the time consuming and somewhat expensive method I used to make my current platting.
We spent the next two hours discussing everything from how to make a bug that could release an electrical charge and not fry itself in the process to various methods of launching projectiles or sprays. She even helped me with some of the structural engineering problems I had like suggesting ways to arrange the muscle layer I wanted to add to my costume that wouldn't see it snap my body apart like a twig. It was amazing working with someone who was not just giving input on how to make something happen but who seemed to be enjoying working with her power in a different way. What had to be the neatest thing was watching her morph members of my swarm into a proof of concept for an idea. We had come to the conclusion that since my power gave me migraines Amy would handle most of the manipulation with me mainly just watching and inputting suggestions. That's not to say I didn't participate, but what I did was usually rather small refinements.
When Glory Girl landed on the roof she was all smiles; with me guiding her from crime to crime I bet she was giving Vigilant competition for most crime stopped in a single hour or something. She walked over to us, the swarm parting to make a path for her, with a grin on her lips, "Skitter I still can't believe there was an actual cat up a tree. I thought that happened only in comics."
Amy started laughing in response and I just shrugged, "I saw the cat in the tree while I was waiting for the dealers a few blocks over to make a sell for you to stop."
She nodded in understanding, both of us had a mind for dramatic entrances and part of that was a case of timing things just right. Amy got herself under control and asked, "Skitter, how can you keep track of all of that at once. You seemed completely engrossed in our stuff."
"I'm pretty sure it's an aspect of my power. I have pretty much unlimited multitasking capability. I've got close to twenty million individuals in my swarm right now, I can process inputs and commands to and from each bug individually while not even distracting myself from what's going on around my body."
"That sounds like a pretty awesome thinker power to me. Not 'powerful' but awesome," the healer said making finger quotes as she said the word powerful.
A half hour of sneaking through the underground or shadowed alleys later I was closing in on my lair. At least I was until Skitter's cell phone vibrated against the small of my back. I accepted the call making a noise with my throat to announce myself instead of actually speaking as either of my personas just in case it was Dad.
"Taylor?" Sara's voice came over the line.
"Yeah."
"Do you want to hang out?"
"I was going to go to the lair and get some work in…probably setting up some terrariums or something. Why, what's up?"
"Nothing really. I just wanted to hang out and everyone else I know is gearing up to hit the club circuit right now."
"And you're not really into clubbing so you figured I'd be a good choice?"
"Yeah. No. I just want to hang out with you."
"Any idea what we'd do?"
Sara made one of those cutesy negative sounds in response before elaborating, "Was going to let you take the lead on that. If you'd already let me in on the location I'd say let's set up that stuff you were talking about. But I know the lair's your place and you're not really into sharing it, at least not yet."
"Yeah. Maybe a movie or something? How about we do a dinner and a movie with Dad."
"I guess. Yeah, that sounds good. When?"
"I don't know say," I paused checking the clock on the phone, "Say a six thirty meal and the seven o'clock movie."
"Sounds good. Suppose I should finish reading my book. I've got a report on it due Tuesday."
I laughed, if it was one thing I knew about Sara wasn't she wasn't too much into reading assigned material. She'd go through any number of books a friend suggested, but make her read a book for a course and she'd put it off until the last possible moment, "Yep and it'll give me a few hours to work in the lair."
"Hey…I've been meaning to ask," Sara said switching gears.
"Then ask silly."
"What's up with Aegis?"
"He found out about the bullying," I admitted. The hero had been acting more cautious around me since he had shown up with the other Wards at Winslow. Personally it really annoyed me. I liked the way he had treated me before, whether he realized it or not he usually acted more like himself, or rather how he acted in the cape classes. When we spared he held back a bit less, seemed to not worry as much about hurting me. Not to say he hadn't been somewhat careful but he was no more cautious with Taylor than he was with me when I was masked or when he was up against Jamie or Felix. It was like he saw me as something approaching an equal to the other girls. Or at least he had; now he was too busy walking on egg shells. It grated on my nerves.
"Um. Taylor."
"Yeah?"
"I meant with how he treats Skitter. He's been asking questions and he pays way more attention to your cape persona then he used to. I thought you guys had crossed paths in costume or something. Especially with the way you've been going full tilt when sparing with him." Sara said throwing me completely for a loop.
I hadn't noticed that change likely because I was so annoyed at his change in regards to Taylor that when I donned the raiment of Skitter I was more focused on venting my frustrations through violence. I had been so aggressive that last Wednesday I pushed him too far and he lashed out with enough strength to crack one of the mandibles on my mask. It had been a good thing that I had been working on a new mask. Instead of having to replace the mandible I had simply finished the second version of my mask and started wearing that over the weekend.
"What? No. Are you sure? I've been noticing him doing that to me. You know plain old Taylor."
"He's doing it to both aspects?" There was surprise in the werecat's voice. She mustn't have noticed because Aegis is always cautious in the regular classes. He only really cuts lose any during the cape class and even then he's largely holding back from what I understood.
"Crap… what if he knows?" I asked. Aegis figuring out I was Skitter wasn't exactly something I had a plan to deal with. It wasn't so much that it was him figuring it out as the fact that someone had pieced together enough to link my two identities despite the amount of work I had put into to obfuscating them. How had he even found out?
Well. If I thought about he'd probably had the most 'clues' to the poised riddle. He knew both personas having meet and talked with them both while at Peerless. There was the obvious connection of Skitter turning over evidence that Taylor had collected to the PRT. I had been careful in muddling the connections between Taylor the bullying victim and Skitter the investigator that anyone looking for links in the evidence would find the opposite. Still, Aegis didn't actually have access to the material itself so he only saw the macro-level connection there. What else? In Peerless there was any number of ways that he could have linked the identities together. My personas' fighting styles weren't that similar. As Taylor I fought using only the generic Kung Fu that Nakamura taught the normals while Skitter mixed Krav Maga and Eagle Claw combat styles to varying degrees. I made an effort as Skitter to speak differently, not just in using the swarm's voice to mask my own but in my word usage. I tried to use different mannerism even.
"Is it such a bad thing?" Sara asked.
"I don't know," I admitted. He was friendly enough, considering how strong he could be I knew he was excessively restrained, and he wasn't pervy. The one time his hands got anywhere close to touching somewhere you wouldn't in polite company he had been all apologies for a an entire week. But that didn't mean I liked the idea of him knowing who I was.
"Aren't you planning on joining the Wards eventually?"
"Yeah. Probably."
"So what's the problem with a future teammate knowing ahead of time?"
"I…I've already done a lot of subterfuge to hide my identity. I've lied to their faces. And…"
"And?"
"About a third of the Wards know Taylor as the scrawny loser who gets bullied daily. If they link my personas they'll question my motives in regards to Skitter's investigation of Shadow Stalker. They'll see it as petty revenge. And they'll ask themselves if they want someone like that in the Wards," I explained. I also couldn't help but wonder if by obfuscating my identity as Skitter I was damaging the relationships I'd have with the Wards in the future. Would they not trust me because of how much I had lied to hide my identity?
"I don't think anything you've done would be considered petty, Taylor."
"Which could be worse," I observed, "I...I need to think this through. Do some planning. Contingencies. That sort of thing. Talk to you later?"
"Yeah see you around six thirty."
After Sara hung up I dialed home, on the third ring Dad picked up. He sounded distracted when he spoke, "Hebert residence, Danny speaking."
"Hey Dad."
"Hay is for horses, kiddo," he replied smoothly.
I couldn't help but smile at that as I asked, "Anything going on tonight?"
"No. Not really, just watching the news. Apparently your friend helped capture that child molester that was on the news earlier."
"Neat," I said trying not to sound like I already knew it had happened, "Listen, Dad Sara and I were thinking to eating out and taking in a movie. Want to come?"
"I'd...you sure you want me around?"
"Yes," I said dragging the word out for emphasis, "I wouldn't be asking you if I didn't."
"Alright. What time are you two thinking of doing this?"
"We're going to hit the seven o'clock movie so six thirty for the food. I was thinking a Chinese buffet, family restaurant, or something."
"Sounds good. I let you go so you two can get back to talking about boys or whatever it is you do," Dad said making me laugh. It just went to show how much time I had been spending with Sara that he thought I was in her company be default. I was actually kind of glad; it meant I didn't have to come up with an excuse for where I was or what I was doing. I was still giggling when the phone indicated my dad had hung up.
My lair was coming along slowly. I had bought an extremely comfortable, far too big for me chair that was the same sort I use to have in my lair when I was running the Boardwalk in my last life. Beyond that and some general cleaning up and boxing things up I really hadn't done much besides infest the place with every conceivable bug in the area. I had plans made out for what to do with each area…generally but there were problems I hadn't expected.
I had to be careful with acquiring items, especially things that would be tip offs for anyone looking. The sort of terrariums I wanted, for example, were fairly expensive and I required a lot of them. If I showed up as Taylor and tried to buy any number with cash uncomfortable questions would be asked and links back to Skitter could be established not that showing up as Skitter wouldn't have its own problems. Buying things online was not without its own difficulties. I couldn't pay for anything myself; Skitter didn't have a legal identity yet so I couldn't get a credit card or open a bank account in her name. And, of course, the reasons why Taylor couldn't do it were pretty much the same as physical purchases. Luckily I had Sensei Nakamura to help me out on this front. I charged my purchases to his credit card and gave him the money. Further my purchases could be delivered to Peerless; from there Gui or Sara would bring them to a secured drop off point and I'd cart them to the base.
There had also been a surprise waiting for me when I started working off the documentation to get the bank of monitors online. I had to rip open a lot of the wall to get at all the cables that had been secreted away and found that they extended into the floor…which turned out to be a good five feet off the actual bottom of the concrete structure. I already had plans for making an absolutely massive hive of bugs down there and replacing the flooring to include a more sectional design that incorporated numerous vents. This way if I ever had to fight here I could literally call a tide of bugs up through the floor to come to my aid.
The other thing I learned regarding the massive amounts of tinker tech in the base was that the tinker, Gadget, had been decades ahead of the technological curve, but that was more than decades ago. Technology marched on since the electronics were installed to the point that a fair portion was actually outdated. Some of the stuff used cables and plugs I hadn't seen since I was five. Clearing out the tinker paraphernalia that littered the lair was going to take a while yet. I was weary of moving anything that I hadn't gone over the documentation for since I knew that there existed a distinct possibility for booby traps. Further outside of just boxing it up and moving it to a room I wasn't using yet I didn't have anywhere else to really put stuff. I toyed with the idea of turning the material over to the Protectorate or Wards given that they actually had tinkers who might be able to make sense of all the mess.
What was coming along nicely was the swarm. I had set up several of the terrariums in anticipation of a few purchases I had made in Sensei Nakramura's name. Others were already housing some of Brockton Bays more rare specimens, like the brown recluses or unmodified black widows. I had several hornet nests, beehives, ant colonies, and similar well on their way to producing a sizeable population. My modified stock, widow weavers and waver wasps, were similarly growing at an exceptional rate.
The pest and undesirable members of the swarm I had brought with me gleefully made themselves feed for my developing swarm as I sat down in my big comfy chair to plot. Correction: plan. Heroes plan, villains plot. I had to figure a way to dissuade Aegis and others from making the connection between Taylor and Skitter. I considered the old having Skitter impersonated trick but I ran into problems there. The only one I trusted enough to do it would be Sara and well, we aren't even close to the same body type. She'd have an easier time disguising herself as Shadow Stalker. I could use a Swarm form, but the PRT already knew I could make them so I'd have to do something more convincing than putting a mass of bugs in front of Aegis and yelping that we weren't the same person. I almost wish I could just stuff a swarm form into my costume.
I'd have to come up with something. I knew that much. The problem was that Aegis knew my various personas better than almost anyone. The only one ahead of him in that regard was Sara. That posed its own problems, acting out of character in regards to the Taylor he knew would only draw attention to my attempts to dissuade his line of thinking. The same went for anything I did as Skitter. God I hate secret identities.
About an hour later I shook myself out of the line of thought. I needed to clear my head of that before I headed home. Being morose around Dad without being able to explain it wouldn't be a good thing considering all he strides I'd been making with keeping us less estranged than we'd been in my previous life. I considered going out and doing something cape related. Follow up on the hours of surveillance for any of the fifteen or so gang building I had found, 'patrol' as Skitter, or even attacking one of the aforementioned buildings. I didn't really have time for any of those, only about forty five minutes before I should head home.
What I did have time for try some bio-manipulation; I did after all have a bunch of ideas for new bugs or costumes. I walked over to my work bench and drew out my note book I'd been making sketches in, paging through I couldn't help but notice how...elaborate or outright difficult some of these designs would be. If it was one thing about Amy and I's brain storming it was that we didn't do things by half measures beyond just the complexity of the biological modifications that would convert a bug into an entirely new creature there were lists of behavioral modifications the subject would undergo. Most of my bugs would actually be fully realized creatures ready to be introduced into the ecosystem while the more…potentially problematic were designed with safeguards. One might be unable to breed with me flipping the metaphorical switch, another could be specialized in its choice of prey, prey that it just happened was another of my bugs, or they needed something else. Safeguards to assuage fears when people started to notice my swarm wasn't utilizing only common insects.
This complexity was also present in my costume designs. I had mentioned before things I wanted to do with the body suit; muscle layers and living carapaces, things like that. But the real complexity came in the variations of my gauntlets, boots, and masks. I had six or so variations of the gauntlets in my notebook and about the same number of pieces of bio tech to work out just to get through the designs already present in my notebook. The envenomed claws and cling pads would become a 'standard but the other parts would differ from gauntlet to gauntlet. The boots and masks were more of a constant evolution like the bodysuit in so far as I'd simply be adding elements with every iteration, or as my current mask attested to replacing parts that hadn't worked out so well.
My current mask featured a number of 'sub eyes' around my goggles like I had in my old Weaver costume, only the sub eye clusters contained a pair of cameras and microphones and a few bioluminescent lamps. The majority of the lamps were actually stand-ins that would be replaced down the line with actual bug eyes and other sensory organs in later versions. All of these used the lenses I had found a while back being sold on the Boardwalk. I was a convinced that the old lady I bought hem form was a tinker of some sort; I had tried to break some of the off colored pieces and had so far had no luck. I even had Atlas, now several tones heavy, try stomping on them; they just deformed with the pressure and popped back to their original state after a few seconds. Not that I was complaining but it was odd just how useful the lenses were for my purposes.
The biggest difference between my new mask and old, however, was that I was returning to a 'standard' mandible jaw guard. The new mask incorporated chitin covered musculature around the area that served to retract the mandibles to still expose my mouth on command so I could eat while masked. Rather hilariously the mandibles had a rather high 'bite force' able to sheer through spider silk when they snap closed. The idea was simply to make it close quickly in case I got attacked while eating or something. I had plans to incorporate a sort of rebreather gas mask combination into the design as an optional piece that fitted between and held securely by the retracted mandibles.
Considering the line of thought that had consumed me for the past hour, however, I flipped through my design pages until I got to the section containing all my modified bug ideas. I did have an idea that I could use to draw off attention from the Skitter/Taylor connection, but I wasn't sure if I could actually pull it off, the past few times I had tried making the most complex part I had either lost control of the resulting creature or it failed to reach my expectations. Time for try seventeen.
I got home at about six twenty and proceeded to change to something a little more colorful. My grey hoodie and black shirt combo was nice for when I was trying not to be noticed but I didn't want to seem like the glum member of our three man band tonight. At the same time I had the bruise from where I'd been shot to hide, it was close enough to my neck that I worried it'd be visible if I wore a normal shirt. Good thing it was cold enough out that I could wear a turtle neck without a second glance. I ended up layering an orange t-shirt over a relatively thin grey turtle neck. More than enough color.
On my way back downstairs I heard Sara's voice float up to me, "Yep, Watch."
"Okay that just looks… weird," Dad responded to whatever Sara was doing.
"Well it's loads better than tripping over my feet in the dark," the werecat responded as I reached the bottom of the stairs, even from the profile view of her I had I could tell she had morphed her eyes into those of a feline. She gave me a warm smile I couldn't help to return.
"I suppose," Dad said before notice me, "Ready to go, kiddo?"
"Yep. Where are we eating?"
"Fridays," Sara announced, "I've been craving it all week. It really doesn't help when the snack machines at school have those awesome potato skins."
Dad chuckled, "But its Saturday!"
"Every day's Friday," I replied smoothly reciting my mother's side of a long running inside joke. Mom loved eating out at the restaurant so much that when deciding where to eat she'd always suggest the place. Dad came up with the idea that we could only eat there on Fridays; later that week Mom replaced the calendar in the kitchen with one that had every day of the week labeled as Friday.
The closest Fridays was actually not that busy despite it being a Saturday night so we had a rather quite setting for our dinner. For appetizers Dad and I shared an order of barbeque wings while Sara got an entire Jack Daniels sampler for herself. That was somewhat indicative of our individual meals Dad went for the Jack Daniels ribs while Sara and I ordered New York cheddar and bacon burgers. Sara got two. I wasn't as surprised as Dad was, we had eaten out together before and Sara had told me her appetite was actually adjusted for her full on werecat form, which was a little over six foot tall and weighed in at four hundred and eight pounds.
Despite the amount of food she consumed Sara almost entirely carried the conversation herself. Considering how socially awkward me and Dad were it was probably for the best, "So Professor Andrews's big assignment is what's referred to as the Secret Identity Lottery. Basically you pick a local cape and name two people in class who could possibly be that cape. You then give a list or reasons why each person could be that particular cape and why they couldn't. The assignment is actually meant to discourage identity hunting as there's a massive number of people who could typically fit as any particular cape."
"That's interesting," Dad said as he worked his ribs over.
"It seems reckless to me," I stated, "what happens when some like Vigilant whom we know is attending AU takes the class and someone starts comparing his civilian identity to his cape one?"
"Taylor does have a point. It's not something that should happen though there over forty known capes in the city, the odds of someone picking the right identity matching it up to the person behind the mask would be rather low."
"At least you don't have to worry about it too much being a rogue with next to no reputation."
"Yeah, most people don't even know I exist. I like it that way."
"So what's the biggest thing you've done as a cape?" Dad asked.
"I stopped a convenience store robbery the other night."
"The other night?"
"Yeah I like to go for walks at night. I'm nocturnal, ever since I triggered anyway. So I'm out walking and I stop in at the local convenience store to grab a coke. Right after I got out the door this guy produces a gun and starts ordering the clerk around."
After separating another piece of his ribs he asked "How'd you stop it without them figuring out it was you?"
"I hoped on the roof went beast," Sara said as she munched on fries.
"On the roof?" I asked.
"I didn't want to do that in an alley and I wasn't about to ruin a good pair of clothes," Sara supplied with a roll of the eyes.
"Wait…what?" Dad started. I couldn't help snicker at the look on his face, I had heard all about how she changed into her werecat form.
"You know the Hulk character from Earth Aleph."
"You wouldn't like me when I'm angry?" I quoted to jog my dad's memory.
"Oh the comic character. Yeah. I watched the last movie," he admitted. I couldn't remember which of the more recent movies were which I just knew that in each movie he seemed to be played by a different guy. How hard was it to find someone who could do tortured wimp scientist right?
"Yeah well, he and I have the same problem when we change. Not that surprising considering my body shape changes. Besides if I went in there wearing the scraps of the same outfit it'd be the same situation as if I just morphed a few bits and attacked."
"Seems like the whole hero thing takes a lot more thinking than I normally assume," Dad admitted.
"Yep, and I'm not even a real hero. I was just playing good samaritan. Besides, the store's like two blocks from my home, imagine what could have happened if I let the punk get away."
Dinner was to say the least good. Good food, good company. That sort of thing. I was happy that I was getting to spend time with both Dad and Sara. Dad and I really only spent time together around meals, the rest of the time I was out the house doing things either at peerless or more directly related to my cape life. With Sara at least I could hang out with her while I was running unmasked recon activities. Sometimes it'd be a jog through the docks, other times we'd sit and chat in a restaurant. Hear now, they had my almost undivided attention. I was still habitually keeping an eye or six thousand on the surroundings, but I was giving them the lion's share of my attention.
We drove a few blocks over to the nearest theater, the Cornell Theater had been open since before my dad was born. It was pretty much a fixture in Brockton Bay. I remember the short time it had been closed during my third grade year when it was expanded and retrofitted with features one would expect in a modern theater. The owner had kept the old façade but now it was something like three times as large as before allowing the theater to offer a rather large collection of movies at any given time. This was good since movie theaters nowadays they tend to not just show movies made here on Earth Bet but also a collection of the year's movies from Earth Aleph. I'm not complaining; Earth Aleph tends to put out some really interesting movies.
For example Tron Legacy, Ironman 2, Twilight: Eclipse, and The Book of Eli were the collection from Aleph right now. The Dilemma, No Strings Attached, Red, and Despicable Me were the arrangement from our movie studios. We ended up watching Ironman 2 because to quote Sara, 'Robert Downing Jr is hot' while Dad wanted to watch stuff blow up that he wouldn't have to fix or 'anything besides Twilight.'
We weren't about to subjugate ourselves to that movie series either. I had read the books; they weren't amazing like the legion of fans would have you think, and the movies from what I had watched didn't even do them justice. Sara had been rather vocal on her thoughts of the series, specifically how it was unhealthy for teens to take someone like Bella Swan as a role model given her reckless nature and near stalker mentality. Her words not mine. I just thought the character needed a hell of a reality check.
I swear there was a tinker in the audience given the comments from somewhere behind us. The funniest of which had to be 'now THAT gives me an idea' followed almost immediately by someone else telling him he wasn't allowed to have ideas. Of course given that only I and Sara seemed to hear them I'm pretty sure they were actually talking rather quietly and our powers were giving us the ability to hear them. I'm pretty sure said tinker was Kid Win. He sounded close enough.
It wouldn't have surprised me either if it was, the movie was practically a tinker's wet dream. Lots of armor suits, high technology, dumbed down jargon, a focus on technology porn, and summer blockbuster spectacle. I bet many tinkers wish they were Tony Stark...or with him. Personally, my favorite part was anything that included Rhodes, especially the scene where Hammer was offering him loadout options. That was gold.
I think I was happier than I'd been in a long while. I had good friends; most of them were capes that didn't know who I really was, but good friends none the less. The meal and the movie had been nice and my relationship with my dad was on the mend. Finally, things were generally going my way. Soon enough I'd be attending Arcadia and the terrible trio would be getting the rewards for their behavior.
I did have something to do before I could settle down for the night. I needed to go back to my lair and check on how my work was developing. I gave Sara meaningful look on the way home receiving a nod in return. A few minutes later Dad's truck pulled in next to Sara's Camaro.
"Hey Dad," I called out drawing his eye, "would it be okay for me to stay at Sara's again tonight?"
Dad glanced to Sara probably to make sure I wasn't just inviting myself over. Thanks to the bug hiding on her head I could tell she nodded in return without looking at her. He sighed, "Sure, I have an early day tomorrow meeting PRT legal."
"Thanks Dad."
"You make sure she stays safe, alright?"
"Sure, Mr. Herbert."
"Please call me, Danny," Dad said with me muttering the line just loud enough for Sara could hear.
She chuckled, "Okay, Danny it is."
A quick trip inside to grab my bag that contained my Skitter costume later Sara and I were pulling out the driveway. When we were at the end of the block Sara asked, "Where am I dropping you off?"
"Anywhere on the boardwalk would be okay," I told her before asking, "When you get up tomorrow, we could hang out some more?"
"Sure. Sounds like a plan. Will you have a migraine?"
"Probably depends on how the latest experiment developed while I was away."
"Was that Kid Win I was hearing in the theater?"
I sniggered, "I think so. I think the boy with him was another Ward from how they were talking."
"The other one was pretty hot," she admitted. I was somehow not surprised that she had actually looked at them.
"I never turned my eyes on them and even if I did, I doubt it would have been good enough for me to say if the guy you're talking about was hot or not."
-/ Interlude 7-1: Chris
"See you tomorrow, Chris," Dean called out as the aforementioned teen hoped out of the car. Chris waved a good bye before the vehicle sped away, likely going over the speed limit by a few miles per hour.
Chris sighed as he turned towards the apartment building that contained his home. He hoped his mother was already asleep. Not because he didn't like her or something, but rather he was just distracted. He had been since Tuesday when Carlos told him about the epiphany he had. Skitter was a second lifer. That scared him.
He climbed the stairs two at a time making the extra effort to help him stay fit, sure he got exercise in other ways at school or as a Ward, but when it came down to it the measure of a tinker was based on the hours they spent at the workshop. As such he had to work in ways to get in as much exercise he could to keep up with those who didn't need to work as much with their power. He had been disappointed when he found out that compared to Dennis the new evolution of his power he gained as a second lifer was lackluster. Sure there was a lot he could do combining Armsmaster's miniaturization technology with own modular tech, but neither were powers that he could just use. He would have loved to have a blaster power, thinker power, or, well, anything.
No use crying over spilled milk.
He keyed the door and slipped into his apartment. It wasn't as big as or well-equipped as the house his family used to live in before he lost his dad but it was what they could afford. What his mom could afford. She wouldn't let him help support her until he was a member of the Protectorate. The woman herself was asleep in the modified lazy boy recliner in front the TV. The news was on. Chris gave her a long look over to make sure she was keeping up with herself, after all he wasn't the only one in the family with ADD and in how disconnected he got at times and it would have been a full time job just raising him, but she had to work full time as well.
"-according to sources inside BBPD, the rapist was appended by the parahuman known only as Skitter," the voice of a news anchorwoman said from the TV as he headed towards his room.
"Or Weaver," Chris muttered correcting her. That was one of the things that scared him about the idea of Skitter being a second lifer; she had debuted with her villain name, not the one she used as a hero. What did that say about her? Maybe she had just always preferred the name Skitter. Admittedly Dean had been the one who gave her the nom de guerre in the past life. What if Skitter was a second lifer, but originated from another world besides the one he, Dennis, and Piggot shared. If that was the case Skitter might have originally been a hero and was simply taking the mantel up again like he and Dennis were. Or… well, the possibilities were pretty much endless.
If it was one thing that Chris liked about hanging out with the other wards it was they made sure he ate, he had a tendency after all to get so lost in his tinkering that he'd forget about things like that. That in turn meant when he got home after spending time with them he could go straight to the tinkering.
When he walked into his room he was greeted by the sight of his workbench with various bits and bobbles laid out around the half completed boot that would eventually be part of his armor. He sat the gym bag full of parts he had brought from headquarters with him on the work bench and started unloading it. He wanted to sit down and start working on it more right away, in another life he probably would have, instead when he sat down at the bench he turned his attention to the terminal he had mounted next to it so he could reference back to the schematics he had made.
He tapped away at the touch screen. The terminal was tied into the PRT's network as such he found that Armsmaster in his pursuit of always being ready had been working on a 'bug zapper' his latest attempt had been a failure but the elder tinker had uploaded the result to the network since it would be able to act as an anti-theft device for something with a larger power source than his halberd. Dragon had also gone over the schematics for his helmet design; there were over three dozen annotations to it.
He had set up a deal with Dragon shortly after he joined the Wards, he was aware that she was an AI, in return for her help on his projects he'd help her throw off her shackles and deal with Saint. It was a pretty good deal, Chris wasn't the best tinker in the world for programing problems by a long shot but all she needed him to do was find the specific lines in her programing that shackled her since she couldn't actually view her own code. She had another person Prodigy probably that would do the actual work.
He drew on his power and started marking out a few possible modifications to address the issues Dragon had noted about his helmet. He had about twenty for modifications hashed out when the computer beeped indicating he had a new private message in his Parahumans Online inbox. That was curious, not many people could actually get through the filters he had set up to reduce the amount of 'junk mail' to manageable levels. Or rather not many people that didn't have more secure means of contacting him. He froze when he read the by line and subject.
Kid Win, I'm not 100% positive but I believe I may have come across you tonight while you were in your civilian guise. If you were at the Cornell Theater for a 7 o'clock showing of Ironman 2 you need to add some sort of voice modulator to your costume.
- Skitter
Chris ran a trace on the I.P. Unfortunately it just lead to an internet café on the Boardwalk. Shit. Skitter had identified him apparently through his voice. Was she in the theater with him? He could probably get security footage and credit card transactions of the theater without much hassle but did he want to? She had simply sent him a message informing him of a vulnerability in his disguise. He could feign ignorance, if he didn't reply or add a voice modulator to his current load out she'd likely think he hadn't been at the theater. Yeah he could do that. Besides if he started using a modulator now, others would notice and it's not like there wasn't recordings of Kid Win's voice already out there. He'd be drawing attention to it. He'd put a modulator in the helmet of his armor, that wouldn't be too difficult given it already had a PA system.
He finished scribbling out the seventeen remaining alterations and corrections he had for the helmet and sent the amended schematics off to Dragon. She'd help him settle on which modifications he'd end up using. He tapped the screen a few times and brought up the schematics for his boots. Not many people considered things like boots to be all that important in a suit of powered armor, it was just something you had to make sure could support the weight of whatever you were putting together. Not Chris, oh no. he had all kinds of little gizmos already worked into the boot. Plasma thrusters, micro missile launchers, deployable stabilizer spikes, heavy threaded soles and knee guards, the same soles covered powerful electromagnets, and the inner shin even included a storage space of additional bits and bobbles. Yeah, it was time for fun.
-/ Interlude 7-2: Dean
When the gunmetal Mustang pulled into the garage at the Stansfield residence the only thing that was on Deans mind was that he hoped his dad had already gone to sleep. He keyed off the ignition and sat in the muscle car for a few minutes.
1970's Mustang coupe looked badass in his opinion even before Chris had taken to modifying it. It was pretty much impossible to spot the changes the tinker had made unless you popped the hood or knew where to look in the interior. That had been Dean's major request make the changes largely invisible, he could handle modernizing it with things like a thumb print ignition and locks, an MP player, a sweet sound system and similar things; but if it started turning into the batmobile he'd feel like the classic was getting butchered. Especially since it had been a gift from his uncle Mark, rest his soul.
So you had too really look to find the tinker tech. Some of it like the engine and associated parts were made to look and sound like the original even if it was absurdly more efficient and powerful once the limiter was released. Others made use of the modern bits to hide the tinker tech in plain sight. A good example was the radio which while including everything from CD and iPod support was the control console for the teleportation matrix built into the trunk. A few buttons and confirming his identity on the ignition's finger print reader and the contents of the trunk would swap with Dean's Gallant costume or vice a versa.
He signed and got out the car. He might as well find out if there was any music to face, and if there was deal with it head on. Someone was in the kitchen, he could tell just from the rustle and bustle of the person preparing food. Despite Dennis' cracks the Stansfields didn't have a maid or butler or something to clean their messes or make their meals. It was one of the few things that Mom had put her foot down about because cleaning up after one's self helped ground us in reality…or something.
It was Adam. You could sum up Adam as 'underachieving man child' and you'd be mostly right. He was twenty seven and still living at home with mommy and daddy. That said he was doing so because he didn't see a point in moving out, neither of his folks required him to pay rent or utilities or anything and he actually worked from out his room. Digital artists could do that. Adam was also likely the reason why their father came down so hard on Dean. Adam was in no way ever going to measure up to what his father wanted in a son, so that 'responsibility' fell on Deans shoulder.
When Adam noticed him he was greeted with a simple, "Hey man."
"Hey," Dean responded. He didn't particularly like talking with his brother; he couldn't get a good read on his emotions. If he didn't know any better he'd bet he was a thump of some power.
"Rough night?"
"No, I got to spend some time with Chris."
"The tinker right?"
"Yeah."
"Cool, He made that armor yet?" He asked. Adam's real query was when am I going to get too see something I drew in real life. Chris had asked him to help come up with a 'look' for his armor's outer chassis. Dean didn't want to admit it but it was cool looking even on a computer screen.
"No. you know that's going to take a lot more time right?"
"I guess."
Adam headed off towards his room a plate of sandwiches in hand. Dean sighed as he watched lanky brother disappear around the corner. With no reason to be in the kitchen any more the empath grabbed a coke and headed off to his own room. As he mounted the stairs he absent mindedly checked his phone. He had put it on silent in the theater and the high priority numbers hadn't made it vibrate so he knew he hadn't missed any action.
Not to say he didn't have messages. Most were from Victoria ten in a row getting steadily more frustrated followed by a message from Amy that simply read 'crisis adverted. Ice cream really does solve everything.' Dean smiled at that. Those were followed a message from Sophia asking for his opinion on which of the three masks that PR had come up with for her would work best. The attached image was some of Adam's work showing three variations of a posed Shadow Stalker. He knew Adam had finished the piece last Tuesday. He picked his favorite and sent the reply to bad she'd never get to wear it. Following that was message from his civilian friends, a question from Chris asking if he left a tool in the car, and Missy's typical good night message.
Once in his room he booted up his computer and laid out both his night clothes and what he'd wear the following day. Tomorrow's attire would be simplistic since he was due to work much of the day and would visit with the others afterward. At six he'd have a hand to hand training session with Armsmaster; he wasn't looking forward to that. He'd been seriously considering joining Carlos in taking classes at the martial arts school. His armor might enhance his strength and durability to brute levels but it didn't mean anything if he couldn't land a blow on his opponent.
He logged to Parahumans Online to review the threads that had updated since he had last checked Friday evening. In another tab he opened his private message inbox and his E-mail account…both e-mail accounts. Most of the team was pretty active in interacting with the fans and forum goers on PO's forums so it wasn't that surprising that he had a number of things to look over. He popped the coke open and smiled; all things considered he had a good life.
-/ Author Notes:
It was brought up that one of the reasons why Worm was so good was because of how 'by the skin of their teeth' a lot of the combat was. I agree that the original was better for it. However a lot of the reasons why the battle against normal opponents (i.e. Not Endbringers, Slaughter House Nine, or Scion) were such clutch victories was because Taylor was often out gunned and/or outnumbered, less skilled and experienced than her opponents, or wasn't aware of how a cape opponent's powers worked.
By comparison so far in ToT She's gone mostly up against normals, which was a rare occurrence in Worm, and usually with a great deal of intel on the location and opposition strength. Her cape fights so far have been rather one sided as most of them had been relatively similar in the amount of power they could bring to bear in that battle or she was working alongside someone. I do intend for those by the skin of the teeth fights to occur but it's going to be a bit longer yet.
…In case you're wondering, Sara watches a lot of superhero shows and is well versed with Earth Aleph's Marvel and DC characters. As such her mention of her home being a few blocks from where she stopped the robbery was her referencing spider-man's origin. And yeah, he has a heroic streak in her just waiting to get out.
Oh what's this? Two interludes? Yep two interludes. Honestly I just wanted to flesh out the two Wards a little more and point out that yes that really was them at the movies. I was going to introduce Dean's father and mention how the pressure from the old man was what made Dean trigger. …Instead I introduced his brother. Whoops. Dean's Dad is pretty much Norman Osborn without the Green Goblin persona.
And yes Chris likes to trick out vehicles, unfortunately for him only Dean and Carlos have vehicles to trick out. Chris' mom can't afford one, Dennis' parents don't trust him with one, and Missy is obviously too young. ..Well so is Chris but that's beside the point.
You know, that brings me to something. None of the wards really have their ages directly mentioned. We know that Aegis and Clockblocker would be graduating rather soon thanks to the Wards Interlude. Clockblocker mentions only being leader for the summer after Aegis graduates and then Dean will be the lead Ward. Of course this progression gets shot to hell when Leviathan shows up and Weld taking command after the fact. What's odd is two years later when the S9 resurfaces Clockblocker is still mentioned to be a Ward; in fact I believe he's stated to be the leader of the Wards ENE team. So he's my idea everyone's age and what have you.
Aegis: Senior, Turns 18 before graduating from high school in the spring of 2011
Clockblocker: Junior, Turns 18 sometime during the summer. I mentioned that he failed Sophomore English and is retaking the class. Dennis doesn't give much attention to schooling because he's done all of it already.
Browbeat: Junior, 17. Attends Clarendon High. Honestly I think he might end up on a bus. His power set isn't all that neat and doesn't bring anything to the table for the Wards that they don't have already.
Gallant: Sophomore, 16.
Kid Win: Sophomore, 15. A bit of the reverse from Dennis, Chris completes assignments for classes as quickly as he can to get them out the way so he has more time to spend tinkering.
Vista: Turns 14 just before Leviathan is scheduled shows up. In her last semester of middle school.
Really this entire chapter was about character building. I did have a draft where a cape fight broke out just outside the movie theater and had Kid Win, Gallant, Skitter (with Taylor still in the theater with her dad), and even Felix getting in on the action. I ended up scrapping it because I got gallant's powers wrong (thought they were higher powered concussive blasts with an emotional side effect not 'wimpy gut punches') and a number of other bits. Most of all the battle didn't serve any kind of purpose beside 'hey look, a fight!' On the other hand I do now have a description of Felix's werecat form and transformation already written out and ready to go.
So things to look forward to. Next Chapter should have Shadow Stalker finally getting kicked out the Wards and Chapter 9 having Taylor start at Arcadia. Chapter 10 will probably be the end of the 'bully arc' if I even bother mentioning what happens at Winslow after Taylor transfers.
On an unrelated note. What would you folks think of me adding a 'Dev' section down here describing capes and their powers that haven't yet appeared and whose appearances may not even come to pass? I'd of course want input on them but I think it'd be better then say how Vigilant and Wraith have been met with some degree of disapproval. For example I'd want to run by my current versions of DarkStar and Jamie/BlackBolt as they are both high rated capes that haven't appeared yet. ...well Jamie's appeared but she hasn't debuted in costume yet.