Pick Your Poison
The Valkyrie
[Sunday, December 5, 2010]
It was a fairly normal apartment. Plain white walls. Tan carpeting. Nice and boring with only a few cheap pieces of brown furniture including a microfiber couch in the small living room across from the wall with the large if old TV. All that separated this small living space from the kitchen was the countertop extending from the wall. It also had a single full bathroom and two bedrooms with queen beds, the biggest luxury this place had.
On one of these beds in one of these nearly bare rooms laid an extraordinarily beautiful blond woman in a lazy blue blouse and a short skirt with assets to make most women jealous and legs long enough to make her seem taller than she was.
With a sigh, Jessica Biermann turned over on her side and looked over at the alarm clock on the bedside table with her deep blue eyes, and then groaned as she sat up at seeing it was about 9AM, nearly 12 hours since most of the parahumans in the city made a mad dash to Karachi. Nearly 12 hours of her holding down the fort in one of the few remaining secret Empire safehouses while her sister Nessa and their young charge Cassandra took advantage of the lack of patrols to try and find any intact caches the rest of the splintered gang may not have found.
After all, with Medhall gone and the Empire with it, she and Nessa hardly had a form of income. It got worse when the Anders family was brought under FBI investigation, which quickly spread to the Biermann family, and then most of the families in the Herren Clan past them. With the FBI so far up their asses, she couldn't even call for assistance without outing herself and her family. If that wasn't enough, that traitor Veronica was sitting pretty in a Protectorate holding cell, likely singing like a canary to keep from being caged.
But honestly, jess couldn't fault Veronica for surrendering. After Reverb blew up Medhall and killed Victor, she'd lost both her husband and her cause, and the Herren Clan wasn't fond of failure, even unavoidable failure. She would've probably been re-married to some other Aryan stereotypical man and forced to make super-powered blonde-haired blue-eyed white babies.
Jess knew such a fate likely awaited her and her fellow female compatriots now that they've so gloriously fallen from grace, and the thought sent a shudder through her before she got up and idly stretched before heading to the kitchen. She paused in the hallway to look herself over in the mirror next to the small alcove for a washer/dryer, and couldn't help biting her lip at appreciating her own body. She did prefer women after all….
"Jess!" At hearing the familiar voice of her twin sister Nessa screeching like a banshee from the front door, she jolted out of her narcissistic fantasy and ran into the living room, already having grown in size from her usual height of about 5'6" to 7 feet, ready for combat, only to see her more uptight identical twin in her more conservative green blouse and slacks with their charge Cassandra with her blue-dyed hair and her quite casual jeans and graphic T-shirt that said 'Bite Me' entering with arms full of reusable canvas shopping bags. "Damn it, cut that out before the neighbors downstairs hear you stomping around like a neanderthal!"
"Damn it Nessa! I thought something bad was going on! Don't scream so damn loud next time!" Jess snarled back as she calmed down and let her powers fade away, shrinking herself back down to her usual 5'6". "How much did you find?" Jess asked as she took some bags from the beleaguered Cassandra and looked inside to see it was filled with canned foods.
"Plenty. Most all the low-security safe-houses have been made, so we kept going when we saw the warning tags. This place might be the best one left among the more secret ones though, even the penthouse in Uptown is on watch." Nessa groused as she started emptying her own bags into the cabinets.
"Yeah, Empire's pretty fucked." Cassandra eloquently summarized as she began emptying and sorting her own bags along with Jess helping her. Jess appreciated the rebellious young girl's blunt attitude unlike Nessa. Also, she clearly wasn't as indoctrinated as most of the Empire and their mutual family.
"Tch. Doesn't help almost all that's left of the crew besides us are empty-headed fanatics and idiots too blind to see reality." Jess commented in agreement. "Any news on Night and Fog?" Jess asked of her sister, who sighed and shook her head.
"They refuse to aid us anymore without Purity, and keep asking us to get her in contact with them. Race traitor she may be, but I'm starting to think Kayden did the right thing jumping ship just before everything went to hell." Nessa grumped as she finished putting away the food. "Especially if Gesellschaft and those two freaks are still insisting on keeping tabs on her."
"She is really damn powerful." Cassandra commented as she made some hand gestures over a couple cans and used her powers to lazily levitate them into the cabinets, no longer wanting to bother bending or kneeling to put the rest of the food away. Which, of course, earned her a smack to the back of the head from Nessa.
"Don't waste your powers on something so lazy! Just keep putting everything away." Nessa ordered before gesturing for Jess to follow her out, likely for another haul from the car. Jess had to stop to slip on her sneakers though, but that only took a few seconds. "Ugh. I can't stand that lazy runt. She's always complaining. Never stops with the sarcasm."
"She's a teenager Nessa. Remember that we were teenagers not too long ago." Jess reminded her sister, as they were only in their mid-twenties.
"But we were never such disrespectful tramps like she is." Nessa declared as they got into the central and only elevator of the small apartment building.
"Speak for yourself." Jess rebutted. She remembered her mildly disrespectful behavior with the Clan fondly. What little she could get away with without getting the cane that is.
"You were always the black sheep between us Jessica. Can't you just-?" Nessa was interrupted by Jessica's mercurial glare as she jabbed the ground floor button.
"Not. Now." Jess snarled. Her sister had absolutely no tact or respect for sensitive topics as usual. An elevator ride to get groceries was not the time to discuss her sexuality damn it.
"I'm just saying it's not natural-." Before Nessa could continue, Jess slapped her to remind her that the topic she was broaching was none of her business.
"I decide what's natural for me!" Jess asserted. It was bad enough Nessa always had Max to back her up before, and the threesomes...ew. The only thing that made having sex with that, that, pig, bearable was having Nessa involved. Funny that Nessa never noticed or thought it weird how much Jess ravished her when in those awkward and unpleasant situations the two forced on her. But now, with that hypocritical loveless trash gone, she wasn't about to let Nessa continue to suppress her. Not when it seemed she might finally be able to get out from under the Clan's thumb soon.
"...Say that to the Family…." Nessa mumbled as she rubbed her reddened cheek. "If, no, when they finally find out, I'm scared what they'll do to you." Nessa admitted, and Jess sighed before pulling her sister in for a hug.
"I know sis. I know." Jess admitted, and broke off the hug when the elevator, damn old thing, finally reached the ground floor from their apartment's level on the eighth floor. However, any thoughts of getting the groceries halted when they saw the stream of panicked civilians entering the lobby from the streets, frantic cries of fear and confusion flooding them, and the two sisters suddenly had to fight a tide of people trying to press into the old elevator.
Thankfully, they didn't have to do anything too drastic to get out of the elevator before it filled up, and watched for a moment as those who couldn't squeeze into the elevator began following the majority up the stairwell. "Hey! What the hell is going on?!" Nessa demanded of a terrified older man of indistinct heritage.
"The Rig! Something's sunk it! There's fires coming from Downtown and police are scrambling, ordering everyone inside." He then pulled out of Nessa's now-stunned grip and followed the flow of humanity up the stairs with some help from some concerned younger citizens. The sisters looked to each other in horror, and ran outside while wrapping a domino mask they both kept on their person over their eyes, and once outside, shot up to their full height of 50 feet within several seconds, and Jessica's heart sank like the Rig at seeing it on it's side and sinking more.
"Veronica!" Jessica screamed desperately, immediately sprinting towards the shore, stepping over traffic and jumping intersections, ignoring her sister's following pleas for her to stop. Veronica might be a traitorous bitch, but she was still family, more family than most of the Clan anyway. On the way to the shore, she coughed and her eyes watered as smoke from Downtown blew into her elevated face, and she nearly tripped, which at her size was a death sentence for anyone unfortunate enough to be under her, but she stumbled into a deteriorated and empty storefront and recovered before continuing onward.
Once she reached the shore near the Boardwalk, she had to pause. She'd never gone into water while at full size. Never tested if she would float or sink, how to swim. She shifted from side to side, watching the Rig continue to sink, it was almost fully submerged now. The Bay was around a couple hundred feet deep at its deepest right? The Rig was maybe as tall as the bay was deep then, the place wasn't able to take really big ships. "Fenja!"
Jess spun around to see her sister had caught up, and she seemed equally concerned for the sinking platform. "Menja! We have to save Othala, what do we do?!" Jess turned back around and reached out imploringly at the sinking Rig in the middle of the bay.
"...We swim." Nessa resolved, and ran out into the water, Jess following, cringing at the biting cold of the winter ocean water. Not even a quarter of the way out, the water was deep enough to reach their hips, halfway they were already swimming, which was surprisingly easy. Maybe their Breaker effect extended to physics and not just combat? Either way, they swam out as easily as if they were their normal sizes, and grabbed onto the sinking formerly-floating building.
"Shit!" Jess cursed, it was even heavier than it looked, but it seemed their powers were in their favor, since whatever they grabbed and held onto gained their own properties, but only for a certain amount of mass, the rest of the Rig beyond the immediate areas they were grabbing were unaffected.
Desperately, the sisters kicked and swam with their burden towards the shore, getting harder the whole way as the interior likely filled with water, Jess pleading to whatever god may listen that the cells holding her cousin still had enough air until they got to shore.
By the time they finally, thankfully, reached some footholds under the water, the sun was already higher in the sky, and with that, moving the Rig became laughably easy, and they pulled it up and out of the water as they neared the shore. "MOVE! Damn it! Move!" Nessa screamed at the gathering paramedics and other emergency response crews at the nearest bit of shore as the sisters had to drag the draining and flotsam-covered mess of a building onto the sand.
Once it was ashore enough that it wasn't about to backslide into the water, Jess collapsed, coughing and wheezing as her teeth chattered and she shivered violently, only now realizing how blue her skin was. "Ma'am! Ma'am! Shrink down! We have thermal warming equipment!" Jess shook and looked down at the paramedics who had approached her with an emergency blanket and boxes of gear.
Realizing how weak and at risk she was, Jess silently nodded and shrank down, unfortunately her center of mass was still halfway in the water, so a few paramedics ran into the shallow water to pull her the rest of the way onto shore and away from the wet. Jess then lost track of her surroundings. It was so cold. She couldn't get enough air. Where was she? God why was it so hot? Jess tried to take off her already scant clothing, but something kept stopping her.
Why was someone kissing her? Mm, they tasted good. They didn't mind when she slipped some tongue, so she tried to grab onto them, but her arms weren't responding. Why so wobbly? Heh, wobbly arms. No, wait, she was wrapped in something. But why? She was so damn hot why would they wrap her? Hot! Why are they making her drink boiling water?! Ew! Despite her slurred protests, the scalding hot liquid was poured down her throat. Then someone kept shouting at her and smacking her. Rude! She wasn't up for BDSM! Gotta get past the third date for that!
Wait...what's going on? "Ugh…." Jess weakly groaned, dizzily looking around. The sun seemed to have set and it was dark outside, she was in a hospital bed, tightly swaddled in a blanket. "Wha…?"
"Good to see you awake." Jess blearily looked towards the speaker, and was both shocked and horrified to see the familiar visage of Miss Militia sitting in a chair, looking exhausted and wary. "Glad you survived like your sister. You two did something incredible today."
"What?" Jess asked in confusion, her terror being replaced with apprehension.
"Hypothermia. Your powers lessened the effect on you, but the paramedics made the wrong call and asked you to shrink down for treatment, which only worsened your conditions. Thankfully they were prepared enough to get you dry and warmed up before moving you to the hospital." Militia extended her right hand, and Jess instinctively flinched, only for Militia to lay her hand gently where under the blanket her own right hand rested. "Today. You became a Hero."
"W-what?!" Jess replied, it seemed to be the only word she could get out apparently.
"You're likely still confused, but I'll try to be frank. Your actions today during the time of the Truce, although not at the Endbringer Battle, have proven that you and your sister are truly capable of being more than Villains…." Militia stated as if in wonder, squeezing Jess's hand through the blanket, and Jess couldn't help the quick up-down scan she gave of the quite attractive heroine before she felt her face flush with warmth.
"Uh...we...we didn't do it to save everyone on the Rig. Just Othalla." Jess didn't know if they were holding Cricket at the Rig too, considering she was nearly crippled when Reverb smashed in their limo's engine block that fateful night, and they had to leave her at a hospital and hope she would survive.
"Your cousin." Jess tensed at Militia's declaration, and tensed more when the heroine pulled down her patriotic mask. "Hello Jessica Biermann. I'm Hannah." The middle-eastern woman's smile was so radiant and beautiful, that Jess felt her heart rate spike at the beautiful woman's earnest and kind visage, her hazel eyes captivating.
"H-hi…." Jess squeaked, all nerves. "Um...so I'm not under arrest?"
"Not a chance. The Truce period has been extended here in Brockton Bay considering the violation by the MS13, and even if not, you and your sister have already redeemed yourselves. Neither of you have outstanding charges outside of property damage and you've only killed a few people on accident at best." Militia stated reproachfully, and Jess had the decency to feel ashamed of her criminal activities. She only deliberately killed one person in her life, a 'lesser race' man as part of her upbringing in the Herren Clan. She didn't really have a choice back then though.
"...So, about Veronica?" Jess asked in concern, and Militia looked sad.
"She was in worse condition than you two. She's still recovering, but thanks to her prison cell's hardlight security and the containment foam sprayers going off when the Rig began to sink, she survived long enough for some PRT EMTs to get to her and provide aid." At Hannah's news, Jess felt all the tension just leave her body, and she slumped into her bed.
"Thank god. It wasn't for nothing." At Jessica's words, Hannah gave her hand another squeeze, and she looked back up to the heroine, who was looking stern now.
"Even if she didn't make it, you still would've saved over a hundred lives Miss Biermann." Hannah insisted, and Jess felt ashamed for being so selfish, but wasn't everyone entitled to consider their family first? Still, she felt warm inside at the beautiful heroine insisting she was a Hero for doing something so stupid and impulsive as to nearly sacrifice herself for...people she didn't even know….
"...Call me Jess." Jess meekly requested with a shy smile, and Hannah must've caught on to her intentions, because her cheeks dusted a little red and her smile crinkled her eyes in such a delightfully expressive way.
"Very well Jess. We'll talk more when you've recovered fully. You get your rest, you're safe here." At the oddly reassuring words of the dusky-skinned woman, she stood and left, and Jess bit her lip at the eyeful of the woman's pants-filling toned booty. Damn. Even in combat pants that woman was a 10 out of 10. "And thank you." Jess shot her eyes up to Hannah's eyes, blushing more at being caught ogling, but the woman's teasing smile before she pulled her mask back up and that she didn't turn around fully told her that it wasn't unwelcome, especially if the hand resting on a cocked hip which emphasized her butt more was any indication. "You've shown me that Villains can be redeemed, and that not every Villain is a monster." Militia winked, and Jess felt her head heat up more before the woman left and closed the door.
What a tease.
With that, Jess was alone in her hospital room, and she reached her hand up, hissing at how sensitive her skin was at the burning-hot flesh of her hand meeting the seemingly-freezing air of the room, and she rubbed her face to see she still wore her domino mask. She hadn't noticed, but her hair was wrapped in a towel and draped up over the pillow, likely to keep her hair away from her head so her body would have an easier time regulating her temperature. Or something. She wasn't well-versed in medicine.
She wasn't handcuffed, that was something, and the room did have PRT guards outside the door from what she saw as Hannah left. Then her thoughts immediately shot into the gutter and she pulled the blanket over her head in embarrassment at so quickly imagining getting into Hannah's pants. "Slow down Jess. You don't even know what's going to happen now." Besides, the Clan and Gesellschaft obviously weren't going to just let her go legit without trying to kill her.
But maybe...this could be a new chance at a better future? No more pointless posturing? No more threatening people just because they didn't share her skin color? No more repressing her desire for female companionship? And the possibility of landing herself a girlfriend like Hannah? Well, if she didn't misread the patriotic heroine that is.
But what about Nessa? She couldn't just leave her. What about Cassandra? The girl was aimless, lost, trying to find her niche in the world. Jess fretted, what could she do? She and Nessa might be in the clear, but Cassandra, Rune, was still a Villain with no good merits to her name and a criminal background to boot.
Now worried and hopeful at once, Jess closed her eyes and decided to let sleep stall the situation. This morning, her life was fairly terrible. But now, things might finally be looking up.
Jessica Biermann. A Hero. She...liked the sound of that. Jess fell asleep with a faint smile, and the warm thoughts of dusky booty on her mind.