Disclaimer: All respected characters and properties belong to their owners.

Fate's Intervention

By Corvus no Genmu

A Heart May Conquer

Director Emily Piggot was not one to admit to weakness. Her kidneys all but destroyed, the muscles in her legs barely in enough pieces to allow her to stand let alone walk, and not once would she be seen flinching in pain. Not ever would she succumb to temptation and ask for help by those willing and capable of it. Yet now, more than ever before and certainly not for the first or last time, did she desire such aid if only so she could partake in something that contained a substantial amount of alcohol.

It had been all of five days since the Messenger, as both official and unofficial channels had taken to calling him though Director Piggot had a far more vulgar name for him, had made his declaration to the world. Since then, she had been dealing with a damn near literal shit storm the likes of which left her utilizing words that she was sure most of the Wards searching dictionaries for their proper definitions.

It had begun with Shadow Stalker's confession, if one could call the girl having a full blown mental breakdown in the midst of a training session with the other Wards. Reviewing the security footage and hearing the witnessed accounts of the other Wards, it had apparently been the result of Shadow Stalker spotting a plush toy sitting in the midst of the training mats. A toy that security footage had shown was not there until Shadow Stalker had entered the room and had disappeared the moment she had her breakdown.

It took both Miss Militia and Armsmaster working together to subdue the girl and even then, it had required more than a liberal use of sedation to get her to calm down enough to be understood and her words, tearstained and frightened for her very life, did not earn her any sympathies from Director Piggot.

Not when the girl had admitted to breaking her parole at every opportunity, not when she had openly stated that she had been actively trying to commit murder in the first degree to a villain who had no strikes to his name, and especially not when she all but confessed to brutally tormenting a girl, a normal human, for over a year to such a degree that said girl had ended up in the hospital.

Director Piggot liked to think herself a fair woman. She made it no secret that she hated parahumans and thought nothing more than children playing with fire. Yet, for all her distaste, for all her aggravation, Director Piggot was a fair woman. She followed the unwritten rules to the letter and did her damnedest to cut through all the political red tape that constantly kept her from utilizing her forces to their full potential.

She had accepted Shadow Stalker because of her abilities and had made the mistake of not keeping as close an eye on the girl, as she should have. A mistake that she immediately rectified with all of her power and more besides because mere words from a frantic parahuman were enough to earn the ire of the Director of the Brockton Bay PRT.

The hospital records earned Shadow Stalker her full and undivided wrath.

By its own volition, the music box on her desk began to play. Problem was, she didn't own a music box. In the back of her mind, Piggot faintly recognized the musical tones of the song when the music box suddenly cut itself off. She flinched, honestly expecting it to explode or worse when the lid suddenly popped open to reveal a bone white mask nestled within. A mask that bore a large grin despite the violet tears that trailed down from its eyes.

A mask that steadily arose steadily upwards as a Man of Shadows stood from the depths of the music box. The lights in Piggot's office exploded one after the other as the storm outside roared with another blast of lightning and thunder.

She did not flinch.

Not even when the velvet clawed hands were on her shoulders and His gimlet stare mere inches from her own. She looked into the eyeholes of His bone white mask and saw a nothing but Darkness in the depths. His grip tight enough to have her attention but loose enough to allow her to breathe despite the sheer frigidness of the touch; He brought His masked face close to her ear and whispered softly into it.

Lightning flashed once more and Director Piggot found herself sitting in her extremely well lit office and her phone and computer sitting alone atop her desk. She was about to pass it off as a mild hallucination. A brief bout of insanity brought on from a severe lack of sleep and far too much work these past several days. Not for the first time and definitely not the last, Director Piggot craved a stiff drink.

Especially when her computer pinged her once more that Chief Director Costa-Brown had sent out another PRT-wide email in regards to the Messenger and the first of his… She reread the line of text once more with a small frown.

"Servants? Who's the idiot who came up with that?" She wondered aloud before closing the email. In the end, it didn't matter. The Chief Director's sudden obsession with the Messenger and his oddly named Servants could wait. She had far bigger priorities to worry about after all. And so Director Emily Piggot went back to work, all the while singing softly under her breath.

"I've got no strings and now I'm free…"

The Assassin standing in her shadow smiled beneath His masked visage. "There are no strings on me."

The room was a survivor of multiple fires, vandalism, and Near outright obliteration with numerous holes, small as a mouse to as large as a man's fist, decorating the floor, walls, and even a rather noteworthy spot up in the ceiling, just past the precariously hanging fan. If it were capable of speech, you'd best believe that most if not the entirety of its words would consist of numerous cusses and slurs with the attitude to match. It had seen a lot of things for all of its short life of a mere hundred or so odd years.

Yet it had never seen anything the likes of the Messenger.

He sat in a broken chair in the farthest corner of the room though that was a stretch of the word. He was slouched over one arm like a ragdoll tossed haphazardly aside by an uninterested child. His breathing was labored, his every gasp pained and every sigh one of relief. His one true eye was staring listlessly at nothing but the other?

Oh but how it shined with Power and tears of blood.

"You should have waited." A hand pressed a wet cloth upon his cheek, wiping away the bloodied trails. "A few days more at least."

"Time," He grunted as he pushed him more upright, waving aside her argument, "was one ally I could not win to our cause"

"Yes, so I have seen." Her response was equal parts bemused and sarcastic, but it got a small smile from the Messenger so she supposed that was a victory in her favor. "I'd be impressed at your results if they didn't prove so costly. Fear makes a powerful ally but that one… How much did you have to pay for one such as that?"

"Equivalent Exchange," he took a deep, pained breath, "is as much a bitch as Karma in my humble opinion."

"So I have learned." The cloth in her perfectly manicured hands so soft and gentle suddenly rendered coarse in a steadily tightening grip. Her answering smile, a piece of Perfection only the gods of old could hope to mimic, was without conviction. There was no happiness in her eyes. There hadn't been since the first moment where immortal hands played at the strings of her heart all those centuries ago.

He managed enough strength to stand on his feet and make his way to the sole window to the outside world. He leaned against the windowsill, peering out past the surprisingly pristine glass and out towards the city skyline of the night.

He never understood why it was that the Night was feared, if not reviled, by so many still in this modern era. Monsters can lie in wait within the shadows true, but so do Mysteries and Wonders that cannot be met in the light of Day. The pale light of the moon, an ever vigilant eye gazing lazily down upon the mortals below, watching the histories of mankind through the ages. Yet, as a species, humanity has always feared the Dark and fought against it any way they could since they mastered fire, the most versatile of the elements.

Here, in the heart of this most wretched of cities, their attempts have failed. Oh yes, there is still plenty of light here and what few stars that can pierce this artificial veil pale in comparison to the brilliance of mankind's ingenuity. Yes from near the top of the highest tower in the city, Brockton Bay could almost be mistaken as Heaven being brought down to the Earth, man's light shining in near perfect mimicry of the sky.

But Brockton Bay is no Heaven.

It's a Hell of its own design.

A city that's slowly but surely self-destructing on itself with gang wars, racism, and monsters both literal and figurative pulling the strings from the dark and the light. In time, this place would become a ruin, a scar upon the Earth when the Leviathan would arise from the depths of the World's Oceans and bring to fore the full force of the seas.

And though Time was no ally of his, he had others to call on.

"I suppose that I should get going then? Monsters to save and all that, yes?" She asked with an air of one discussing the weather rather than the saving of countless lives. He had expected it of her for she, much like the Assassin before her, was never any such thing as a Hero in the strictest definition of the word.

If anything, she was a Victim. A Plaything to the whims of the forgotten gods that delighted in the pulling of strings and the games they played with mortal lives. A part of him missed their absence from this era, for while it may have been infamously known as the Age of the Gods, so too was it the Age of Heroes.

And this World was in desperate need of them, now more than ever in that misbegotten era of turmoil and strife.

He continued to stare out into the city as he spoke to the other sole occupant of the devastated room. "I know that you do not think that the task I have given you one worth your time or efforts. In point of fact, given what you are capable of, one could say it's beneath you to even try. But there is no one else I know that can do this."

She tilted her head at him, long locks of hair trailing down over one shoulder as she regarded him with a shrewd stare. "I am not so arrogant to think that I am the greatest that there has ever been in my craft and you have proven adept at calling upon those of a more… unique… persuasion."

He turned to her then, his face an unreadable mask as he regarded her for a long, silent moment. "Because I trust you to do the right thing."

Her shoulders stiffened at his words but her face remained in its mask of indifference. "You claim to know me. Who I am and what I have done. Was that all a lie?"

The Messenger shook his head. "I may not speak the Truth outright but I don't lie. I know you. Perhaps more than you know yourself."

She bristled at that, her face sneering into a scowl. She could not believe his arrogance. "Then if you are so knowledgeable, you know that I will not take your words at face value. Any of them."

He smiled and she took an apprehensive step back. A smile such as that was not one she had seen for a very, very long time and did not belong on the face of a stranger. It belonged with family, with friends, to those close and dear to her heart, and not on the one who dragged her back to this world to aid those who could not help themselves.

"I trust you," He said once more. The light above flickered and in between the darkness and the light, he was gone. She stared at the spot that he had stood for a long moment in silence before she too disappeared though not without a subtle blowing of wind and the flaring light of magic.

If there was one thing that Noelle Meinhardt knew with absolute certainty it was that the very heart of Hell itself awaited her. The only close second to this was a fact, a cold and unyielding truth. That she was a monster the likes of which could never be redeemed, could not be saved from the damnation she set upon herself by a single, solitary mistake. A part of her was human still, her upper body and perhaps some semblance of what remained of her heart but that was all that was left. The rest of her was hideous, horrendous, and every bit the stuff of nightmares.

So here she was, in a chamber, a prison, of her own choosing though Francis said many a time it was no such thing and to never think of it as such. Francis… Her friends… They were all that kept the humanity in her alive, the memories that her monstrous body allowed her to recall mere fragments of wood awash in a sea of blood. What she could remember of who she had been and what she had were minute to what whispered to her in the back of her mind, what came to the forefront every time she closed her eyes.

Noelle knew that it was not her fault, that her monstrous form possessed a consciousness, a will, of its own but that did not abstain her from the crimes it had committed. Her hands were red with the blood she had purposefully allowed to be spilled and for what? For clarity in near forgotten memories of a life she could no longer have? For the sweet, blessed silence from the ever-growing grumblings of hunger that ravaged her gargantuan form at every moment?

Francis assured her that the gate was for her protection that the chamber was nigh impenetrable by anything short of an Endbringer and more besides to keep her safe. She loved him then and loved him still but even love could not blind her to his lies. For though she tried her hardest to ignore it, to fight it, Noelle's monstrous form was ensnared deeply by an insatiable hunger, a ravenous need for consumption. She had to be fed close to an hourly basis and with ever increasing quantities or what little of her human side remained would be lost to the ravenous rampages of a hellion beast.

The other Travelers knew this.

So did Francis no matter how deep he buried the knowledge.

Noelle knew it too.

The camera that was attached to the ceiling above her flickered into motion, a tiny red light shining as the sound of static emanated from the hidden speakers in the room before a voice that she did not recognize addressed her by name. She turned her head to face the monitor placed just beneath the camera and saw nothing but static.

"Noelle? Can you hear me?"

"Yes…" She murmured, her voice rough and grating to her ears. She swallowed reflexively, ignoring the insistent murmur to quench her thirst with something warm and red, "Who is this…?"

"Ah, Francis didn't tell you? No, I suppose he didn't, Coil has him and the others running ragged these days, yes? Something to do about paying for your —ahem— luncheons?"

Noelle repressed a grimace as something that was neither tentacle nor tail lashed out and with grinding teeth crunched down upon a piece leftover from her last meal. She had only just eaten minutes ago and already she could feel the pangs of hunger. She'd need to call for another meal soon, one preferably much larger and livelier than a pig to sate her hideousness.

She pushed down the faint rumblings and did her best to focus on what was, or rather wasn't, right in front of her. "There's something wrong with the camera… I can't see you."

"Ah, I'm afraid it's the same on this end. A technical error that we'll have to deal with for now." The speaker was a woman by the sound of her voice, probably a few years older than she was. "I'm afraid that I am rather pressed for time at the moment so please allow me to be frank. I believe that I have a means of curing you of your affliction."

She froze. Every monstrous tendril and misshapen limb, every twitching eye, every gaping maw slavering with drool, every piece of her, human and monster alike, stiffened at the girl's words as something sparked in her that she hadn't felt in a long time… A feeling called…

It was called…

It was… called…?

…?

Oh God, I can't even remember what this feeling is anymore…!

Ignorant of Noelle's horrified realization, the young girl behind the door continued, "But first I need you to clarify some things for me, Noelle. I had spoken with Francis and the others but I need your side of it too and you must be completely honest with me. Do you understand?"

"Yes… yes… whatever you need, just please… Please…." She chewed on her lip, her and the multitude of other mouths. What could she say?

Help me?

Save me?

Such words were unbefitting when used towards a monster damned to the Black Heart of Hell. A stray thought tickled at her mind, a memory of a human life once lived, and a game that she loved to hate just for the constant pain of tapping at a mouse and keyboard until her fingers nearly bled. She wondered for a moment if they'd welcome her like some lost sibling, those Prime Evils that ruled over the Hells Below…

"Noelle? Noelle, can you hear me?"

She shook her head. Focus… Focus, goddamn it. "Yes…"

"As I see it there are two options of ending this state you're in. One is, as I'm sure you can guess, deadly in its application. It will kill you as little else in this world can. That is, if you'd rather die as a human being, by your own choice, rather than succumbing entirely to the thing attached to you. All it will take is one, single shot from a rather… specialized type of ammunition. One shot, and the nightmare will be over, Noelle."

Noelle swallowed, her arms hugging her middle tightly as she once more imagined the embrace of Death about her person and the shrieking screams that accompanied such thoughts that tried to drown them out. The shrieking always won before and was already winning now as she whispered just loud enough for the microphone to pick up, "What's the second option…?"

"The second option is getting you full and absolute control over your powers. The means of doing so is simple in its application. You need only to consume the rest of the Travellers and take their combined powers into yourself, which will stabilize your own."

For a long moment, she did not move, her brain sluggishly trying to process what the man was saying, to put the words and make them into a cognitive thought.

"… What?"

"The vials weren't meant to be taken separately by different individuals. There were prototypes so to speak. An experiment to see if a combination of abilities could be split amongst individuals safely. It had a one in six chance of failing, and quite spectacularly at that. It was poor luck that it was you who drew that straw really."

Luck? It was LUCK that she was LIKE THIS?!

Her tendrils and hideously thick limbs started to thrash with her rising rage when the woman behind the door continued.

"Your friend Marissa for example would have been wholly incapable of controlling the size of her suns and one would have either expanded to match the one already present in our solar system or have contracted down into a black hole. Either way, the complete and utter destruction of this planet and everyone on it would be assured.

"Jess could be stuck in a coma-like state as her powers force her to create a new body every time she loses physical consciousness. However, considering that her powers work only when her body is unconscious, she'd eventually be driven insane from being incapable of sleeping as her mind would be in a constant state of activity without peace or rest."

She clamped her hands over her ears. She didn't want to hear this, didn't want to even imagine this happening to her friends, her family, but the girl behind the door was relentless.

"Luke's control over motion would lack any sense of control to such a point that even his very breath would be capable of cannon-like force. He'd lack the necessary control to allow him to touch anything or anyone and he'd eventually die of dehydration or hunger. That is of course if he didn't end up leveling everything and everyone nearby.

"As for Francis… Well, I suppose I've already said enough."

She did. So much so that she didn't need to anymore. Noelle had been a professional gamer once, and earning such a degree of skill was not without its cost. She had played many a game, many a story, and could easily surmise what would happen to Francis if he lacked any control over his powers. Anything and everything that even remotely possessed a similar mass would be teleported to and fro at his gaze, even Francis himself. He'd be the titular Traveller, caught in a constant state of motion so long as his eyes were open…

Noelle didn't think that she could loathe herself more. The man's words proved her wrong. Still… She had to know for certain. "Are you telling me there is no other way to fix this…?"

"There is nothing from this Earth capable of it, no. So? Which will it be, Noelle? Will you become whole and live a normal"

"… Are they out there right now? My friends?"

"They are."

Even with her mind buried and befuddled by warring instincts of humanity and monstrosity, Noelle recognized what the woman was not saying. Her friends were there but were somehow incapacitated. She loved them, each and every one of them, but there was no way that any one of them would simply stand there and let her devour them even if it meant granting her control over the monster her body had become.

Francis would, but he was a fool in love and love made you do some pretty stupid, and oftentimes, selfish things.

How she loved him. How she loved all of them… Did that make it okay? Was it really okay for her to be selfish? Her body trembled not with emotion but a want, a need as ancient as Life itself.

"Do it. Open the door."

She was hungry and talking was doing little to sate a monstrous appetite. She swallowed reflexively, shivering and heaving in the same instant for how much she drooled, however unwillingly, at the thought of consumption.

"And make sure that one shot counts…"

The doors didn't open. She frowned, looking up at the monitor. The red light was still on, still transmitting, so why didn't her savior answer her plea?

"Can you hear me? … Kill me…"

Nothing.

"Kill me!" She screamed, human hands clutching tightly upon her shoulders as something wet and watery fell from her eyes. She did not remember what they were called and didn't care to try and recollect the lost knowledge.

She wanted the nightmare to be over.

She wanted to die.

"KILL ME!" Tendrils lashed at the walls, the ceiling, and everywhere in between. The multitude of mouths, slavering with saliva and gnashing teeth, roared a discordant chorus to match the human voice and soon drowned it out entirely with their own hideous sounds.

"KILLMEKILLMEKILLMEKILLME!"

The door opened to reveal an unlit hallway.

Silence.

"kill me…"

A whisper, some could call it but for her, it was so much more.

It was a prayer of hope.

A prayer that was answered by a sudden flash of pastel steel, curved and jagged like a bolt of lightning. She saw it all its glorified details for it was there, pointed tip buried into her breast where a human heart was pierced. She looked down at the blade, trembling hands grasping the hilt tightly but did not deign to remove it.

Instead, she looked out to the darkness of the world beyond her cage and smiled. Her head bobbed weakly in thanks as she gathered the breath to utter her last words.

"I love you… all of you… Remember that… please…"

She pushed the blade in deeper and the darkness tittering at the edge of her gaze came crawling forward like an approaching storm. She fell back with a thunderous crash but did not loosen her grip upon the dagger that pierced her heart even as the tendrils and limbs clawed and swiped and lashed at her. She bit hard upon her bottom lip until it bled to keep from screaming out in agony even as the mouths roared and shrieked and bellowed. The many eyes swirled in their sockets, closing slowly one by one until her own remained wide and unafraid of the encroaching darkness.

She remembered the word now.

Tears.

They were called tears.

The monster that once was a girl closed her eyes for the last time.

To Be Continued...