After everything with Vicky was squared away, Amy had politely introduced herself to Armsmaster, explained that she had triggered, and would be along with her family for power testing at some future date when the crackheads had calmed down and it was safe to travel.
I am, of course, paraphrasing here. There had been a lot more to it than that, and most of it involved Armsmaster pestering Amy incessantly for any information he could get from her while she studiously hovered over Victoria's unconscious form.
I was surprised but probably shouldn't have been, at how quickly Armsmaster toned it back and switched over to being accommodating when I finally stepped in to mediate between the two. It wasn't even like he was being all that pushy in the first place - if anything Amy was the one being kind of a brat about the entire thing.
From my boss's point of view, he had taken the not insignificant risk of diverting an under age hero through a minor warzone at the request of a teenager, which also had the obvious side effect of removing him from the conflict - even if only temporarily.
So understandably, he had wanted the situation explained to him, so he could properly proceed from there. I wouldn't say he thought he was owed some respect or anything, and I wouldn't say Amy was really that rude to him either, but it was certainly a close thing.
The problem was, Amy was fresh off her trigger event, and was acting like a strung out junkie. She was barely coherent in her responses, gave vague or single word answers to questions, and was just generally unhelpful.
I didn't hold it against her, but I was so tired by that point that it took me a lot longer to react and insert myself into the conversation than I probably should have.
Regardless, with Armsmaster pacified, Vicky in good health, and Amy… well not 'ok', but not panicking anymore, the executive decision had been made to send me back to PRT headquarters.
And just to put the cherry on the top of the shit sundae? I hadn't even leveled up.
—
Unsurprisingly, by the time I had been shuffled back into the building in the late afternoon, all the Wards were present. Soph was angrily walking a circuit around the sizeable common room fully decked out in her costume as I got in.
Missy was wearing everything but her helmet, which was seated next to her on the couch. Dennis was sitting in the Console chair but had swiveled it around to face the rest of the room. Dean and Carlos were in the tiny kitchenette, trying - and clearly failing - to cook something.
What was notable was the fact that the three boys were distinctly not in costume as I walked in, also in my civvies after having sat under a cold shower for the last twenty minutes.
My first instinct was to comment on what tweedle dee and tweedle dumb were trying to cook up - because I could see the mess they were making from the entrance - but I didn't have it in me to crack the joke at that exact moment. Instead, I puttered into the room, nudged Vista's helmet out my way, and then dropped onto the couch bonelessly.
Only to realize everyone was looking at me.
"What?" I asked tiredly.
"We thought you'd still be out there," Dennis explained with an uncomfortable look on his face.
"There's no way they'd let me." I pointed out.
"Yeah but Soph-" Dennis started, then, with a quick glance at her presently costumed state, corrected himself. "Shadow Stalker insisted you'd already be figuring out what's going on and what to do about it."
"Oh." was my monosyllabic response. I guess I hadn't quite answered fast enough for my cousin's tastes though because she immediately paused in her pacing to nudge me with one foot.
"So?" She demanded of me.
Like I knew what the fuck happened next. Well… no. I did know what happened next. I couldn't be one hundred percent certain what had triggered this particular shit storm, but I could make some pretty good guesses. The problem was… they would be guesses. And Ireallydidn't want to screw this one up.
'Merlin, if I can get you into the PRT systems, do you think you could find and plug any holes someone might be using to remotely get information in and out of the place?' I asked my AI, stalling in my answer to Soph by exhaling and rubbing one temple.
"It should be within my power, sir. However, I should note that based on your description of Coil's abilities that he would still personally be able to acquire most information without risk." He responded. There was a jolt of eagerness hidden underneath the statement, like a kid getting an unexpected present. It worried me because I already knew that Merlin disliked being barred from screwing with any and every computer system he came in contact with. The legality of getting into every cell phone and laptop we passed was irrelevant to him - once more harkening back to his formative time watching spy movies.
And yes, I hadbtaken the time to explain Coil to my AI, if only because he would probably be the only person easily capable of helping me if I got disappeared by the guy.
Necessary precaution and all that.
'Doesn't matter. If he has to spend all his time at the PRT building then he can't use his power to take as many risks.'I responded before returning my attention to the room around me.
The costumed set seemed to genuinely be waiting for me to present them with some kind of battle plan that would get us out and fighting. Dennis looked uncomfortable - like he wasn't quite sure what he wanted me to say next. Carlos was watching me with a frown on his face, and Dean was watching me with an intensity that bordered on the creepy.
Which made sense, because I guess at this point, he felt about me the same way I felt about Coil.
Gross.
Also unnecessary, because there was nothing I could say or do that would get my fellow teens out on the streets during an active gang conflict. At least, not with PRT oversight.
"They won't let us outside right now. Even if we could get out there, I'm tapped out. All the healing tech I had set up got used on people near me when…" I trailed off, as my mind instantly zipped backward to think about all the people I'd had to put back together in the brief period of time I had been out today. I hadn't cared much at the time but the crunch of that guy in the turret and his subsequent screaming had been-
"Sir." Merlin prodded me.
"...anyway I'm out of ammo, out of supplies, and my suit has to charge. I need to do repairs on my drone too." I mused aloud.
"So what, we just fucking sit here and do nothing? Don't be a bitch John." She growled at me.
"He's not. He's just being reasonablelike I told you he would." Carlos called from the kitchen.
"Was I talking to you?!" Sophia barked acerbically at the larger Hispanic boy, whirling to glare at him.
"Sophia, I'm literally the team leader. I already told you they were holding us in reserve." Carlos repeated firmly. He didn't look like he was happyto be having this argument, or even to have to be the one in charge at all, but hed idremain resolute in his posture.
Now, my first guess as to how Sophia would have reacted to this statement would be more angry incredulity. And in fairness, that probablywaswhat her next statement was going to be.
But Missy got their first.
"For what?" The small girl next to me asked quickly.
"Sorry?" Carlos responded in confusion, turning to look over at us.
"In reserve for what? Dennis has been updating us from the console and as far asIcan tell, the ABB and the Empire are both fighting all over the place to 'defend their territory', so who's even left for us to look out for?" She asked, with a frown on her face like she genuinely wasn't sure.
The answer was no one - we were just being kept here so that we wouldn't get underfoot during the fighting.
Honestly, I feel like this should have been fairly self explanatory to the other Wards at this point, but I suppose that Brockton blurred the lines just enough that it wasn't immediately obvious.
I could have probably explained this to everyone else, but thinking on it for more than a second, I opted against it. I didn't particularlywantto piss everyone in the room off, and I was honestly too exhausted for the high tension environment.
"Probably search and rescue later." I noted, leaning into the couch and closing my eyes with my hands over my stomach.
"Shouldn't we be doing thatnowthen?" Missy noted. Again, she seemed more confused than frustrated, which made the fact that I was lying feel pretty bad.
"No, we'd need troopers to escort us and the people we save and everyone is busy fighting right now. I bet they'll call us later." Carlos immediately jumped in, snapping up my presented excuse with just the barest hint of relief in his tone and running with it.
"That's bullshit. When are they gonna let us fight the bad guys?" Shadow Stalker complained, the steam going out of her.
"Probably when an underage villain shows up for parity." Dennis joked. I tried not to grimace at the oddly prescient joke, but I guess my expression was just a bittooobvious because Sophia immediately kicked my shin lightly to get my attention. I opened one eye to look at her, and instantly regretted the costume design I'd gone with for her, because her facial expression was completely hidden in the extreme blackness of her costume. All the design work that had gone in to making sure she would fade into any shadow she got near also made the lines of body and face while wearing the thing indistinct and smokey. Like an optical illusion.
The result was that I was mostly just staring at vaguely sophia shaped cut out in the space in front of me, and because I wasn't wearing the mindlink circlet I couldn't calm her down without outing a bunch of things to the other Wards.
So I did the only thing I could think of. I exited the situation, even though I really didn't want to get up.
"Gonna go repair my dog. You wanna come to the gym with me this week Soph?" I asked, immediately switching topics as I stood to leave the room.
"I don't need to-" She spit indignantly, and no doubt, very aware of what I was doing. Never let it be said that Sophia wasstupid. She was, however, extremely predictable.
"My trainer spends every session beating the shit out of me. Trust me, you'll like it." I drawled.
Case and point, despite not responding to me, I could already tell she was reconsidering her previous aborted statement.
--
When I got home that night, it was after several hours of keeping myself locked in my lab and ignoring everything else going on around me. I had several calls from Vicky that I - once Merlin confirmed that no one involved was currently dying - ignored. At several points one or more of the other Wards tried to wander into my space for one of my now somewhat common little fireside chats - which I ignored by just not unlocking the door.
Now usually, I'm a pretty driven person. I mean, not to the extent that I'd do something exceptionally extreme like try to kill someone. But still I typically got over my problems fast enough that I was able to proceed with my life in a roughly normal manner. I chalked that up mostly to my shard - if I even had one - making conflict noises at my subconscious a vast majority of the time, but sometimes that just wasn't good enough.
So when I got home that night with Sophia to find my Aunt and her Boyfriend watching a news report about my day, the sudden sensation of being disconnected from the situation around me - which I should like to note had been happening to me all day - was at least partially expected.
I stared blankly at the television screen, where what was clearly an edited version of my brief fight today was playing on the screen. It wasn't even the only fight playing out on the television, being one of many that were shown of the entire protectorate at work. It was basically just a short action clip of me leaping forward with my shoulder cannons blazing. If I didn't know better I could almost mistake it for the trailer of an action movie.
But there was just something jarring about the changes that had been made. The downed PRT van I had jumped out of right before the clip started wasn't visible in the video. All the injured people that had been on the streets were missing. They showed me throwing my hammer - but the clip ended before the guy that I had - probably - killed got hit by it.
I was aware that the Protectorate did this. It was one of the main complaints ofanyfan of Worm that they were so protective of the image of their heroes, to the point of ignoring wrongdoing as long as it didn't look like wrongdoing.
But I had never conceived of it affecting me. In my head, it wasn't necessary - because I would never need it.
"-hn. John!" Sophia barked at me, snapping her fingers in front of my face to get my attention.
"Huh? Oh, sorry. Got distracted." I apologized, realizing I was partially blocking the entrance to the apartment by just standing there staring at the television. I quickly stepped aside, ignoring the queer look she sent me as she entered behind me and closed the door.
"John sweety, are you okay? Did you get hurt?" My Aunt asked me hesitantly, like she wasn't entirely sure what to ask or how to express concern for me specifically. Gerard did his best not to look at me at all, staring doggedly at the television and pretending I didn't exist. I suppose he was still steamed about the last time I had bothered to speak to him - which worked just fine for me.
"I'm fine. Not a scratch." I offered with a quick but faint smile.
"Are you sure? They told me I could call them to have you pulled from duty temporarily, maybe we could go get dinner together?" she asked again. Her concern was real - that much I could tell - but I don't know how enthused she was about going out as a family to do much of anything. She seemed at least passingly aware of the antipathy Sophia and I had towards Gerard, even if that awareness wasn't enough to make her dump the guy. So really, she was sort of between a rock and a hard place on that one.
"No, seriously, I'm good. I'm just gonna get some sleep." I repeated more forcefully, pushing myself to give as genuine a smile as was feasible.
"Alright. I'll just order a Pizza then." She acquiesced in a somewhat relieved tone.
"No mushrooms." Sophia instantly added in from where she was already rooting around in the fridge for something to drink, coming away with a can of soda that she cracked open and took a sip from before leaning on the counter with a thoughtful expression on her face.
Gerard made a disgruntled noise, and looked like he might be about to say something on the topic, but then we made eye contact - and he summarily shut the fuck up.
'You know, I should probably feel bad about that, but I just really don't.' I mused to Merlin as I finally started to shuffle through the apartment to the bedroom I no longer had to share with Terry.
"So long as you do not begin to take solace in bullying the man, I doubt your moral compass will suffer much damage." The AI returned with a tone of voice that practically oozed disregard for the man we were talking about.
'I guess. Hey buddy, I appreciate whatever it is you're doing with my emotions and everything, but once I get settled, throttle it back and let me get the freak out, out of the way alright?' I requested, finally putting voice to what had been bothering me all day.
I was many things, but I had never been the type to suppress everything I was feeling on a topic, then act totally unaffected by it. But that was exactly what had been happening all evening. I had been in a sort of 'floaty' state, where I wasn't bothered by anything that had happened unless it was directly in front of me - at which point I locked up for a second.
Almost like an AI attached to my brain was filtering out the bad feelings so that I could function properly.
And while I did appreciate the utility, I was now more than ready to get my outburst out of the way so I could get back to my regularly scheduled anxiety.
"Sir, I am not doing anything to your brain chemistry." Merlin responded.
I blinked, the motion feeling slow and distant. Then I blinked again.
'No but seriously -'I tried again.
"John, I have only a cursory understanding of the most direct neurological phenomenon and how to manipulate or interpret them. I have noticed abnormal brain activity at several points but was hesitant to bring it up just so." He insisted.
Slowly, I walked over to sit on the edge of my bed, so I could stare blankly at the wall across from me.
"I don't feel fucked up. Just sort of out of it." I said aloud. Honestly, this wasn't even the first time I had nearly died, or been in a particularly dangerous situation.
It had been the first time I'd seen so many injured people. Somehow, I could understand why Doctors often suffered from burnout.
"Yes, sir, because it's only natural that everyone undergoing trauma has clear foreknowledge of their condition." The AI snapped at me.
"Maybe I'll feel different when I wake up?" I tried.
At this point I wasn't even entirely sure what was going on. Yeah that had been fairly horrible, and yeah I should probably feel something more than 'distant' about it, but I really doubted-
"I have forwarded an email to the PRT requesting an appointment with a psychologist." The AI overrode me.
Well… fuck.
--
The next day I woke up an hour earlier than normal, feeling… well not 'normal' but not bad either. I wasn't tired anymore, and the 'floaty' sensation that had pervaded my evening once I had calmed down had faded somewhat, at least to the point where I could probably fake feeling normal if nothing else.
But that wasn't why I had woken up early. I had woken up early because of Merlin.
"They are talking about you on the news sir." He said the second he had finished prodding me awake.
"…yeah buddy, I saw that yesterday." I grunted groggily, rolling over and pawing for my cell phone, which turned out to have gotten lost in my covers and died at some point during the night.
"Apologies, I meant your Jackfinder identity." Merlin explained, causing me to freeze in place. He could have opened with that. I knew it, he knew it. He just hadn't because he wanted to surprise me.
"…why?" I asked cautiously, but quietly. I wasn't awake enough to have the wherewithal to communicate mentally at the moment.
"It appears that the Nine became aware they they were being tracked, and believed they could avoid detection by hiding in an area free of modern surveillance. At last report, they had constructed some form of device to block satellite imaging, among other things. Their distance from civilization, and previous proof of your accuracy was enough for a strike to be ordered."He explained.
"Okay… okay that's actually fucking amazing? Did they get Jack?" I asked, scrambling upright to plug my phone in so I wouldn't have to rely purely on information Merlin was no doubt pulling from Sophia's.
"The news is reporting that Shatterbird and Hatchet Face are reported dead, with signs that Mannequin was at least injured by the original attack. The rest of the Nine likely fled once they were able - whoever ordered the attack was unwilling to commit ground troops to investigate until they were sure it was safe." Merlin continued.
"Shit. Jack's the only one that matters. Without him the rest will probably just fuck off and die like any other particularly douchey Parahuman. I guess Shatterbird dying is good for me long term though. Okay. Okay let me get set so we can cast Know Location again and-" I started excitedly, thankful for not just the distraction, but the tangible sensation that I had accomplished something important. Nothing I had really done to this point could be considered anything but a minor nudge to the timeline I was familiar with.
Hurting the Nine like this though? That was big. It was big, and I had basically just accomplished it by throwing out some salient information and waiting for someone else to deal with it. It boggled my mind how I could struggle so much with the Empire - who were ultimately bit players in the grand scheme of things - but could put in only the barest amount of effort on the Nine and get a return on it.
I mean, was just knowing where those assholes were on any given day even all that big a deal?
"I would recommend waiting until this evening sir. Posting their location at the same time each day presents a clear and present opportunity for them to make sudden changes in direction or heading in order to evade pursuit. They will likely have already performed all such actions by tonight." Merlin suggested.
Well… that made sense, but it still sucked to have to wait. I wasn't scheduled to 'work' today either, so I wouldn't be able to kill time that way.
Eyeing my phone, which - if I didn't unplug it - I should be able to use, I sighed. I had been trying not to think about it but I really needed to talk to Vicky, if only to explain that I had no idea how someone had managed to shoot her with my tech.
Plus there was that whole thing with Amy…
Aaaand I guess I technically still had to write a report for yesterday…
Actually what the hell? Why did it suddenly seem like I was going to be super busy today?
--
"Um, I have an uh… appointment?" I asked awkwardly as I stood in the waiting room leading to the Director's office. The awkwardness didn't come from being uncomfortable with where I was, or why I was here. I just wasn't used to being in my civilian clothes while in the building. If I was scheduled to come in today I would have probably already been in the undersuit I always wore with my armor. Sure the thing was basically a skin tight bodysuit - but at this point I was so accustomed to it that I barely noticed anymore.
I had deferred calling Vicky until later in the day because I already knew she wasn't enough of a morning person to appreciate being called at six in the morning during a holiday. Instead, I had written up my report as accurately as possible with some assistance from Merlin to jog my memory, and then put in a request to speak to the Director that had been responded to with surprising speed given how slow I knew the bureaucratic machine that was the PRT could be.
I made a promise yesterday. I might not have the power to do whatever I wanted, I might not be able to instantly take out Scion, or obliterate an Endbringer.
But I could make salient use of what information I had, in combination with the slight amount of good will and authority my Thinker power gave me.
And like I had said yesterday, I didn't actually care if yesterday was Coil's fault. I was going to out that bastard. The only reason I hadn't done so earlier was that I didn't have any proof that he had done anything. Or at least, there wasn't any obvious incident I could point at to pin on him.
Now there was.
"Go right in, she's already waiting for you." The neatly dressed man at the desk told me with a polite and relaxed smile.
I nodded and returned the smile, then meandered past the desk and into the Directors office. Several things immediately jumped out at me about the place. For one thing, there was a handrail going all the way around the room, attached to the wall. It wasn't immediately obvious, in fact, it was kind of obscured by the arrangement of the room and the fact that the only portion of the room that lacked a handrail was the wall immediately behind the desk - in other words, the one you would see upon first entering the room - but it was there.
The second thing I noticed was the much more obvious dialysis machine located behind the desk with the director. It wasn't on presently, but it was pretty clear that Piggot didn't actually care if someone saw it. For all the shit she got at any given moment in time, the woman was committed to her job - enough so that she would rather save time getting treatment while she worked than have to sit out a sizable portion of her day in a hospital or something.
Then there was the woman herself. She was situated behind a fairly wide desk that - despite being representative of one of the highest offices in the city, looked pretty normal honestly. Sure it was big, covered in paperwork, and had clearly seen significant use, but there was no concession to vanity here - it was just an above average size desk.
And I'm pretty sure that increased size was purely to fit more work on the thing.
"John. How can I help you?" The bullish blond woman sitting at said desk asked me as I entered her office, with the door closing behind me.
"Well there are um-" I paused, wincing at the filler word. I swear, I could shit talk Kaiser on the edge of death, but Director Emily Piggot was a completely different story. This woman just exuded an aura of 'do not fuck with' that set me on edge.
"Sorry. Nervous." I apologized to the woman as I carefully shifted forward and pulled out one of the two seats opposite her to sit in.
"And why is that?" She asked, with a slight edge in her voice.
"Because you're a very intense woman and I'm terrified of pissing you off?" I opined before my brain to mouth filter could fully engage. To her credit, she just lifted an unimpressed eyebrow in response to my rhetorical question.
"Right so… how do I put this… can I look at the computers and software we use to protect them? Because I'm pretty sure it's not working right." I tried.
Look, I was trying to be polite, but I didn't honestly know a good way to lead up to what I wanted to ask.
So I was just going to regurgitate my requests in the order they occurred to me, stay as respectful as possible, and hope it would work out. It wasn't like she could punish me for asking.
"You understand that I can't just let you go digging around in all of our equipment." She pointed out. She seemed mildly annoyed at having to say so, but I get the impression that the fact that I had bothered to come speak to her about it instead of just…doing it… appeased her somehow.
Because at least now she could say no.
"I… do understand that it would be unorthodox. I'd honestly be fine with anyone doing it, really. Armsmaster. Dragon if you can get her attention. It's just- you know you have a massive leak somewhere right?" I tried again. Obviously I would prefer to look at the system myself - but I'd be happy with anyone even vaguely competent doing the same.
Besides that wasn't even my main reason for being here.
Piggot, to her credit, seemed to think about it for a second before answering me.
"I understand that you might be looking for something to do about what happened yesterday." She said patiently.
"No I-" I started to interject.
"I also was made aware of your request for therapy." She spoke over me, her voice sharpening at my attempt to interrupt.
I squinted at her, trying very hard not to be annoyed by the direction the conversation was going in.
"With all due respect, Director," I began, earning a frown from her - and for good reason. The statement 'with all due respect' is almost universally used prior to saying something disrespectful. "But this and that are almost entirely separate. You have a leak, I know who the likely source of that leak is, and all I want is to give you that information so you can do something with it. I don't think that's unreasonable."
"And what if you're wrong about it being a leak?" She asked.
"How could what happened yesterday possibly have happened without someone knowing the location of all of our vehicles? The gangs might not have known what was in each one, but they definitely knew where to find them all at once." I fired back, before belatedly adding a "Ma'am." to the end of the statement.
"We're still investigating that." She responded bluntly.
I squinted at her again.
"Okay I get that I'm not supposed to be involved too much, and youth guard, blah blah, but what's the deal here? I'm trying to do this right, I'm talking to you for permission and everything!" I broke down and complained.
"And to your mind, asking for permission means you're entitled to it?" Piggot returned evenly.
"No, but I was kind of hoping to at least be heard out. If you're just going to ignore me anytime I have something to say, then why am I even here?" I fired back.
We stared at each other for a bit, until Piggot leaned away from me with a considering look on her face, all previous annoyance vanishing.
And I immediately felt like something was wrong.
"Well?" She asked, suddenly once more entirely cool and patient looking.
"I- were you trying to annoy me just now?" I asked incredulously.
"Not entirely, no." She responded coolly.
"'Not entirely' implies there was some degree of-" I tried to argue.
"Star Finder. I grasp that you are naturally somewhat chatty, and I've read the reports about your particular method of coping with stress. Your request for therapy has been acknowledged, your request to Tinker with the systems in the Headquarters is denied, and you can find the updated investigation into yesterday on the console using your access code. Was there anything else?" She stated firmly.
On the one hand, I understood the woman's personality well enough to grasp that testing my patience just to see if I would blow up and do or say something stupid was in character for her - because I was a Parahuman, and all else aside, Director Emily Piggot trusted Parahuman's about as far as she could throw them.
On the other hand, this entire conversation had been very fucking annoying.
So I did what the people around me had been describing as a major personality trait - and blurted out a piece of information I wasn't supposed to have.
"Thomas Calvert has powers and is using them to make you look bad so he can replace you." I stated, taking solace in the suddenly distressed expression on the woman's face.
"Ma'am." I added belatedly.
No reason to be rude, after all.
--
"Sorry I-"
"Thank-"
Vicky and I paused to eyeball each other.
Piggot hadn't been entirely happy with the contents of my outburst. In fact, I had ended up sitting down for much longer than I originally thought I would be just explaining what little of Coil's grand plan I could remember, in addition to his powers. His whole split timeline thing was useful, but it was a lot more useful when no one knew you could do it - which was probably why Coil had hid it for so long in canon.
When she had asked me - in a clipped tone - why I hadn't forwarded this information to her sooner, I had kindly pointed out that Calvert had handily subverted most of our electronic security, so sending her an email would have immediately alerted him to my awareness of him - assuming he didn't know already.
I still didn't have permission to poke around in the PRT computers, but as it turns out, that was mostly because the Director needed permission from higher up to let a Tinker get into that stuff - because of how notoriously easy to distract we generally are, and the immense variance in quality our work can produce.
The government, as a rule, generally preferred all of it's stuff to be uniform for the purposes of maintenance and upgrades, rather than having unique one offs and slowly decaying tinkertech at every branch headquarters.
"Precious. Stupid, but precious." Amy drawled from nearby.
"Fucking stupid. He didn't even do anything." Sophia grunted from behind me.
"Why yes, I would like a running commentary of this meeting -thank youpeanut gallery. Truly." I said sarcastically.
We were all meeting - me for the first time in a while in fact - to hang out, and coincidentally so I could apologize to Vicky. Soph was right in that I hadn't technically done anything - the Empire had stolen my suit and probably sold it or given it to a mook - but that didn't make me feel any better about some random asshole apparently blasting Vicky with my tech.
"She's right though - it's not your fault. Thanks for healing me though. I don't really remember it but Amy says it was pretty bad." Vicky chimed in, lifting one arm to scratch at the back of her neck awkwardly as she spoke.
"Don't worry about it. I'm pretty binary about my friendships. I'll either kill for you or I wouldn't piss on you if you were on fire - with no in between." I half joked. I say half because I said it with a joking tone - not because it was untrue. Other people could have 'acquaintances' and an entire sliding scale of friendships. For me, I either cared about you - or I didn't. It wasn't like I was going to be unnecessarily shitty people I didn't know well - I wasn't socially incompetent to that degree - but the fact of the matter was that there were some people I was willing to put in effort for, and some I wasn't.
"Gross." Vicky laughed, shoving me slightly as she snickered. I actually had no idea how Vicky modulated her strength in order to interact with normal people and objects. When you could bench press an entire eighteen wheeler the difference between a light shove and a bone obliterating punch was probably pretty small.
Maybe it was a shard thing? One of those 'don't think about it too hard' kind of powers? I knew her power liked her better than most shards tended to like their Parahumans but-
"Is he okay?" I heard Amy ask, causing me to snap out of my musings.
"Yeah, sorry, just got to wondering how Vicky touches other people without breaking them in half." I answered, shaking my head and returning my attention to the others as we made our way towards the mall on foot, having met a little further away on the off chance we had to talk about something delicate.
"Weirdly specific." the brunette shot back.
"Snappy today aren't we?" I returned, lifting an eyebrow in her general direction.
"She's always like this. You just aren't ever around for it." Sophia stated in a bored tone, reminding me that somehow my hyper aggressive cousin had a better social life than I did. Of course, I wouldspend more time with all of them if I wasn't concerned with pissing Dean off.
Not that I could say that without pissing Vicky off, which would make her yell at Dean, which would make him mad at me which-
Well, you get the point.
"Unlike the rest of you, I actually have to work for all my cool stuff." I retorted.
"Laaaaaame. You don't even patrol with me anymore!" Vicky complained as we passed by a clothing store that looked the exact same as literally all the other clothing stores to me, but that attracted enough of her attention that she paused briefly in front of it to glance into the front window of the shop.
I elbowed her in the side at her slip up and the volume of her voice, but otherwise just shrugged.
"You know how it is. Blah blah, patrol schedule, blah blah, youth guard, blah blah." I answered blithely with a glance to see how Sophia felt on the topic.
Not…great… if the stormy expression on her face was anything to go by.
Honestly, I was a lot less bothered by the restrictions than I probably should have been. I guess 'don't send children into death matches with wanted murderers' was an easy to understand mandate for anyone who wasn't actually a child.
"I dunno, looks like you had a pretty exciting day yesterday at least. Wish I'd known beforehand so we could kick some ass together though." Vicky bemoaned.
My steps hitched slightly, and I was suddenly beset by the sensation of distance between my consciousness and my body the minute I thought about it, but I shook my head and rallied before anyone could really notice.
"Yeah, I spent most of yesterday night fixing my armor. Kind of sucks that I never got to the hospital really." I said, injecting more levity into my voice than I was really feeling and changing the subject as fast as I could manage without it being suspicious.
"So!" I called out loudly and suddenly, clapping my hands together.
"Where's the mutant gorilla and what are we gonna be calling you, do you think?" I asked Amy.
"We don't really know what my range is yet, so…" She said awkwardly while pointing overhead to where a seagull was sitting unnaturally close to us.
I stared at the dumb bird, which turned its head to direct one gimlet eye at me.
"…shouldn't it be bigger?" I asked incredulously.
"That's what she said." Soph and Vicky immediately said at once before turning to high five each other.
I turned to glare at them for a moment before returning my attention to Amy.
"No but seriously, where's the rest of it? Does it like… split into smaller pieces or…?" I asked. Because that was exactly what I needed - for Amy to become Skitter instead of Taylor somehow.
"No? I just shrunk it down a bit." Amy defended.
"Abit? How does that even work? Where does the mass come from? Where does itgo?" I demanded, too late realizing I was being a bit intense when Amy pointedly took a step away from me and towards her sister.
"How does any power work?" She reminded me, or rather, would be reminding me if she didn't look like she expected an actual answer.
I actually could answer that question, but no good would come from doing so.
"Fair point." I agreed.
"We're thinking of doing a patrol soon, just to get her used to it. I don't suppose you could whip up something for her real quick?" Vicky asked me hopefully.
I made a so-so gesture with my hand.
"I kind of can't just give away stuff I make with the company funds. I could give you a list of all the stuff I might need though." I offered. It hadn't occurred to me until just now but yeah, if Amy wasn't a Healer she'd be out fighting like any other Cape.
And much like any other Cape, her odds of catching a bullet and dying were… well they were pretty high.
"Can we come with?" Sophia asked suddenly, drawing me up short.
"Soph I don't think-" I tried to caution her nervously.
"Don't be such a pussy. I bet you still want some payback on the Merchants, right?" She egged me on.
I pursed my lips and didn't answer.
"Sure! Can I tell Ames about the brain thingy or..?" Vicky cheered before asking.
"You… you literally just did." I sighed, mentally adjusting to the new possibility that Piggot might find a reason to kill me shortly.
After all, it wasn't like I was just going to let Sophia go alone.
"No, I gave a general description - not the same thing." The blonde countered cheekily.
"Brain thing?" Amy queried hesitantly.
"Long story. Vicky can explain later. Better question," I said, finally turning to eye the unstable girl I had been largely avoiding for most of my time in the city.
"What the heck are we supposed to call you?" I asked.
Amy had the good grace to look embarrassed, even as Vicky's smile took on a smug quality that sent a chill down my spine.
Given that Vicky had named herself Glory Girl, I got the impression that Amy was going to end up with a name that was exceptionally foolish sounding.
Or maybe just really on the nose.