AN: Here it is! The long awaited return of Wyvern and the Warhawk. Today with one of our all time favorites, Power Grid!
AtW: Yay. Whoopee. Now all we need to do is update everything else XD. Speaking of, we'll probably be posting a one off for Flask next, Nephilim, OWIM, and maybe an epilogue for Heracleidae. That idea seems to be growing stronger in our minds again, despite its low popularity (hint, hint), so we'll probably play with that more.
CW: As always, leave us your reviews and feedback. It nourishes our souls (not really), and will one day make us immortal (not likely).
AtW: And please remember the most important thing of all - have fun.
Now then, into the reading!
Power Grid - Chapter 5
"Guns down! You're not under arrest!"
The world seemed to take a sudden, shuddering breath as the first responders, understandably on edge, hesitated for a moment. However, it was a testament to the story, the legend behind the man that they ultimately obeyed. He had no rank, no title, no former power beyond that of Veteran Ranger. Technically no different from a discharged soldier or marine. And still, they acquiesced.
Currently shirtless and wearing the tattered remains of his jeans, not to mention splattered with blood, mud, and other synthetic lubricants, Oliver slowly walked up to Taylor.
SEQUENCE PAUSED.
"Oh thank God."
She relaxed into the rubble she was currently sprawled on top of.
Entirely uncomfortable, but Taylor was hurting too much to move right now. Instead she just tried to stare at the chiseled abs of the puppy crush of half the continental United States.
"Alright, gentlemen, we all saw how the shoulder pad was blinking, right? And heard what the nice… not evil?"
Taylor shook her head.
"Ok, the not evil Ranger that kindly helped us take down a hostile cyborg despite an unpleasant first meeting with myself and my current team. And their suit clearly has a self destruct function. How big is it?"
'That's… a good question. How big is the explosion again?'
IN ORDER TO ENSURE THAT THIS UNIT IS NOT CAPTURED, IT WILL BE AS LARGE AS NECESSARY.
'And how big is that?'
BIG ENOUGH.
"Big enough."
Tommy winced, taking a shirt from an EMT.
"Understood. With that said, can everyone back up a bit? I'll handle it from here."
"You're not going to arrest me?"
"Are you going to blow up if I do?"
"Probably."
"How much control do you actually have over the morpher?"
"Umm…."
He sighed, wiping off a bit of dried blood.
So a complete civilian was dragged into the life of a ranger by the unchecked power of a morpher from unknown origin for an unknown purpose. And it just turned out to be a teenager with attitude.
The irony was not lost in Tommy.
"So basically none. Was the combat you, at least?"
Blushing, and knowing she'd had all the grace of a headless turkey slamming into the ground, she gave another nod. Her back, however, politely told her to stop doing that.
"If it makes you feel better, I've seen fully trained rangers do much, much worse in their first simulated mission. Never mind actual combat. Also, uh, sorry about beating you up? I kind of over reacted. By the way, how… ok are you? Is anything broken, how effective is the armor? Can you even tell if you're synced with the Grid or just running on fumes?"
Honestly, Taylor had no idea what she should say. So, in the end, she just said nothing. Not a bad choice when she didn't know how to answer the questions in the first place.
She also happened to be a bit starstruck.
But no, it was definitely the headache that caused her to not speak. And the uncomfortable warmth under her helmet. Headaches were a sign of fever, right?
Fortunately the legendary ranger spared her further embarrassment.
"You know what, how about I just give you a call. I think we both know that we both know who you are. And I don't wanna cause an… incident. So why don't I just turn around, take another look at something important, and you just… skedaddle?"
It was almost adorable how flustered and excited the veteran Ranger seemed to be, a total reversal from what he had been like when fighting.
"Thank you."
Spinning in place, Oliver strolled over to a downed cyclobot and began staring at it intently, as if he would be able to decipher the secrets of the universe from that one ruined helmet. The rest of the troopers took the hint to, rushing over to various other locations and helping as needed. Some simply falling in line and securing discarded weapons, segregating evidence, and taking care of the hundreds of different little things that needed to be handled for a crime scene.
The young woman simply boggled at the image of the legendary hero in a tweed coat and ruined jeans, intently staring at the cratered head of his destroyed enemy. But, then, she saw the bodies too. A smattering of civilians, a half dozen of the armed individuals who'd responded, and even the troopers who'd fallen in battle. While the machines hadn't aimed to kill everything that moved, explaining how some wounded had managed to survive, that had still reaped a bloody toll on the normal, unarmored and unenhanced humans who'd tried to stop them.
She felt sick to her stomach.
She felt guilty that she'd brought this down on them - why else would they be here if not for the morpher?
She wanted her mom.
But ultimately, she was starting to feel numb. Her entire body ached and it was with a final, confused grunt of pain that her wings flickered out and she buzzed away, wondering how long it would take for the feeling of being one big bruise to fade.
'Healing functions?' She dared ask of the murderous deathwatch.
AFFIRMATIVE
Well, that was nice to know.
'Well, that was about as much confirmation as I needed.' Tommy couldn't help but marvel at the timing.
When he left to talk with the Hebert girl, he considered the possibility that she might have been the rogue ranger he had met at the scrapyard. In this day and age it was just too difficult to keep a lid on something like parahuman abilities.
So he'd expect her to either play clueless about it, or try to lie her way out of the meeting.
Stuff that might point to her being involved.
What he didn't expect was for a sudden attack by a villain of all things.
And her actions had been quite telling.
Anyone trying to hide something would have taken the attack as their cue to run away. Instead, she'd joined him in trying to stop the attack before anyone else could get hurt. Risky, considering she had no training and a very basic understanding of her abilities.
But definitely a point in her favor. The kind of point that got people to calm down and stop considering things like plots to destroy the planet or a precursor of an alien invasion - both things that, while rare, were actual issues that had to be planned for. In the end, if she was just some dumb kid, unlucky and without any malice, not too different than some of the first rangers in truth, she'd be treated like that. There was no need to scare a random civilian if she just had bad luck.
The morpher, however, would be an issue.
Morpher technology was tightly regulated, with a hefty penalty befalling all those who tried to replicate the advanced combat and support gadgets in the past. The MRS made it one of their top priorities to prevent the technology from being used for nefarious purposes.
Of course, they didn't always succeed. But it had been a long time since the latest rogue morpher was confiscated.
'I think they were called the Psycho Rangers?'
One of the troopers walked up to him, a small tablet clutched between his hands.
"Sir, we have recovered some of the footage of the attack." The man announced, handing him the portable screen.
"Do we have an identification on our suspect."
"Yes, sir. He was listed on the database as Chandler King, known alias Ironspike. He is marked in the system a mutant terrorist. Several offenses, including repeated strikes on the Ranger Team posted at Silver Hills"
That rang a bell.
"Wesley's unit?" Tommy took a moment to chew on that. "But that doesn't really make sense."
"Sir?"
"Nothing trooper. Thanks for this. Make sure it moves up the chain of command asap."
"Yes sir!"
The veteran ranger didn't like this. Not one bit. Because Ironspike hadn't been seen in months. Nearly a year. Rumors he heard from his friend suggested that he'd been killed when Ransik's group was torn apart. As many as a half dozen mutants, even some that were officially good guys, had been slaughtered. The entire mutant activist front in the state was decapitated. And no one had managed to figure out who was behind it.
"Wait. Crap. Crap, crap, crap, crap, crap." He sighed. "Ok. Who to call first? Wesley? No. No, no, no. Maybe… crap. Who do I call?" Tommy snorted. "The Ghostbusters." Chuckling, he shook his head. "Ok. First things first, this is a gut instinct, meaning I need to talk to someone that's going to take that at face value and who isn't involved with telepaths. Someone who can gather information, who can deal with mutants, and can be discrete."
"Oh. Them of course! Solves all the problems."
After all, when you needed discretion, what was more discreet than a literal ninja?
Ironspike did not fear much.
He feared being imprisoned.
He feared going back to a life of waiting behind bars in a padded room.
Those he considered simple fears. He did not fear battle and carnage. He had long since outgrown that taint of humanity. Something made that much easier by the extensive modifications done to his body to aid in the cause of mutant supremacy.
Pain was meaningless.
Failure, however… was unforgivable.
And so it was with slight trepidation that the armored mutant stepped back into the abandoned warehouse his faction had been granted as a temporary base, hoping against hope that his superior had been too busy to notice the utter blunder that had taken place just a few minutes ago.
"Returned, at last? And without the morpher, I see."
Alas, he had no such luck.
Frax lumbered towards him, the gilded robot wearing the same leering facet as always.
"We faced a setback. Some sort of off duty ranger was present and interfered."
The robot's faceplate creased in mock curiosity.
"A single ranger fought and bested not only you but an entire unit of Cyclobots?"
"He received aid from the rogue morpher." Ironspike grunted.
It was a flimsy excuse, and they both knew it.
There was no use in lying. Not to Frax.
The mutant had never figured out what sort of technology they'd used to build it, but it always seemed too intelligent. Able to understand when it was being lied to and spiteful enough to punish you for it. Had they not been working under the same leader, Ironspike knew the robot wouldn't be as… cordial.
"It is… peculiar that the E-0 would prioritize you as a threat over a ranger. Though if they weren't morphed, it might explain why it attacked you instead of them."
"Is the signal still being broadcasted?"
The gilded robot shook its head.
"Unfortunately not. The E-0 was programmed to respond to active threats according to the level of Grid energy present. Without any rangers nearby, it will fall into dormant mode in order to save energy."
And that meant they had no immediate way to track it.
"So, machine, what is your plan?"
"My plan? You're the one tasked with recovering the device."
"Yes." He growled, wincing as his powered armor pulled and cut and bit into his flesh. "And I'm telling you, I know you have a plan. So what is it? Or would you prefer I simply start pulling data cards out of your skull until I find it!"
"Oh don't strain yourself. You'll blow out something important." Turning away, and utterly dismissing Ironspike as a threat, the golden machine began pulling up various scanner readings. "At the very least, we know what the exact energy signature of the E-0 is when active. Before we were working on theoreticals and decades old data. So, if nothing else, we can look for areas of ambient Grid activity, find the frequency that matches either the old data or the newest readings, and extrapolate from there."
He paused for a moment.
"There is one thing you could do to aid me. Assuming you're capable of being discrete."
"I will-"
"You will listen."
And just like that, Ironspike's blood froze on his veins. The armored mutant going rigid as a very familiar woman stepped into the warehouse, the clacking of heels echoing on his ears much as her voice, which carried a distinct commanding tone despite its youthfulness.
Despite being in 'disguise' and lacking her usual white armor, swapping it for a simple business suit. The pink hair was unmistakable.
Nadira.
Ransik's daughter.
"You are early, general. Your visit was only scheduled a week from today." Frax as always, was unflappable.
"And it was a good thing that father sent for me earlier. Care to explain what that was, Ironspike. We selected you for the express purpose of retrieving a flawed prototype from a near neophyte. For a man of your caliber it should have been as easy as stealing from a child, yet it seems you'd struggle even with that."
The mutant commando kept silent.
Amongst Ransik's followers, one of the main rules was to never piss off the pink-haired woman.
"There were extenuating circumstances." He meant to explain but stopped cold.
All it took was a single glare.
"I don't care if the entire Brockton Bay corps was present. You were built to fight the M.R.S., not flee from them. Whatever would father think if he heard that one of his commanders ran with his tail between his legs from an unmorphed ranger."
The woman sighed, taking the seat offered by the robot without ever taking her eyes from him.
Ironspike felt an invisible weight press on him.
Failure was unforgivable, he knew. And here was a person who would not hesitate to dismantle him for parts within the blink of an eye. Nobody would contest it. Ironspike certainly knew he couldn't.
"You will be pleased to learn that the E-0 still remains at large." Frax interjected. "It was programmed to self-destruct should it fall into unauthorized hands. And while we cannot track it, it is still marked as functioning."
"A small blessing." The obnoxious woman clicked her tongue in disappointment.
Which meant he hadn't failed. Not yet.
"We still have a chance to retrieve it then. We need only prepare for any… eventualities during my next attempt." He concluded, hoping to sway the general.
"There IS no next attempt, commander." She cut him off. "The MRS has likely already obtained footage of your attack and traced you back to our operation in Silver Hills. Any other attempts to retrieve the E-0 will likely be seen as an organized operation rather than a one off incident."
Which meant the MRS would send for reinforcements.
Making their mission that much more difficult.
"Instead, we will allow the dust to die down and conduct an investigation of our own. So long as the morpher stays at large, we will have more opportunities to retrieve it. It will also keep us from squandering our resources on a meaningless manhunt."
She looked at him pointedly.
"But you will be reporting for upgrading."
Ironspike swallowed. There it was. The tinge of fear was coming back.
Rory swallowed.
"All I'm saying is that we need more firepower. Not just the rifles, but maybe an M203 or something? I know we've got the authorization for them and I've made sure all of the team is cleared for explosives. Plus we just finished quals on hand grenades."
Piggot's lips simply turned down even more.
"No. And that's final."
"But-"
"Exactly. You've just qualified for access to hand grenades, something Rangers aren't even issued normally. Now you want access to equipment my own troopers don't have. And besides, the Nation Guard Act of '99 means we'd need the Governor's permission to issue anything heavier than hand portable weapons. I can't even legally give you some of the squad support gear I have and no one says anything because we just had a cyborg attack."
And wasn't that an issue all of itself.
A villain attack in broad daylight wasn't something out of the ordinary for cities with a major presence of villainous organizations. It was expected, even, that something would go wrong or something would be off.
Brockton Bay was NOT one of those cities.
They were, above all else, a training facility where retired rangers worked on training new teams so they could be stationed in more volatile cities.
It had been that way since Allfather's time.
Unfortunately, that didn't seem to be the case anymore.
"You can't expect us to not be involved if that cyborg comes back. Mr Oliver is still having his hands looked at and we are the only ones with morphing authorization."
"So you want me to forgo the last pretence of you not being a child soldier? Trainee Christner I thought you were the one who wanted to keep your team safe."
"So the city can go up in smoke while we sit on our hands? Director, with all due respect, this is what we were selected to do and have been trained to do. The BBPD doesn't have the means to confront Ironspike, and only managed to drive him away because Mr Oliver and a rogue element interfered."
The older trainee sighed.
"And that's not even going into that rogue morpher. Were you gonna tell us at all about it?"
Rory wasn't someone who liked to suspect people. Especially people he was supposed to trust with his safety like the MRS and his teacher. But when the squad's attention was focused on one party over the other, it meant that there was a known variable involved. Namely a morpher unconnected to the organization.
The one organization trusted worldwide with handling them.
So while the media was having a field day delving into the mysteries of this new 'masked morpher', the MRS was as tranquil and serene as always, their only worry being the escape and possible return of a known mutant terrorist.
Meaning they didn't see the rogue morpher as much of a threat.
Meaning they've probably encountered it before.
Which meant he and the team were being kept in the dark about it despite being the only ones in the city with the tools to safely contain that threat. And as the Director put it, it was his job to make sure the team was safe.
"Unless it becomes a threat, no." Her tone turned flat. "Classified doesn't begin to cover it. Dismissed."
Chris frowned.
"What do you mean it's 'classified'? That's bullshit. Morphers are classified as WMDs by the UN. Are we supposed to just pretend one isn't loose in our backyard?"
The trainee almost said something rude when his team leader just shrugged.
"What I said. She made it clear the conversation was over. I left. What was I supposed to do?"
He threw up his hands.
"I don't know! I mean, we can't just ignore this. That's both irresponsible and dangerous. And with Mr. Oliver-"
Rory sniggered. Chris just glared at him.
"Yeah, yeah. I can't manage to call him T- by his first name. Laugh it up. The point still stands. Colin and Hana are both major badasses, and he's a cyborg, but they're our trainers. They can't just expect us to let them run headfirst into gunfire without backup. And those cyborg things were packing major heat. It'd be suicide to take them on without heavy weapons. At least a blaster or particle gun or something."
"I brought that up, but he wouldn't budge. Said she can't give instructors equipment not even the troopers have access to. But if you were to ask me…."
"It's all about shitty red tape."
Rory nodded.
That's why he liked chatting with Chris. Even if he wasn't the most mature of their little group, he at least understood his frustrations with the system.
"So, let me see if I got all of it. We have a mutant cyborg terrorist running around the city as well as an illegal morpher being used by zordon-knows-who to do whatever they are up to. The police and the troopers can't handle them and we are being told to sit it out because we aren't old enough to kick ass?"
"Sounds about right."
"This sucks." Was the teenager's mature reply.
"Well… that sucks."
"That's what I said!" Chris crowed, breaths coming off in short puffs as he dashed on his treadmill, shirt sporting a rather sizable sweat stain as it clung to him uncomfortably. Across from him, working on one of the other machines was his good friend, silent muscle, and hopefully future wingman, Thompson.
Though he'd rather go by Browbeat.
Kinda weird, but it wasn't that unusual for people to go by nicknames and the sort.
Just look at the villains!
Though it would be funny if those were actually their real names.
'Jared? Erik? Forget about those old names. Ironspike is where it's at!' The ranger traineed snorted out a laugh, careful not to trip over his own feet.
Ranger training wasn't easy.
Not by a long shot.
Between the need to maintain academic excellence, physical excellence, and a whole other slew of very restrictive averages, there wasn't much time left for leisure. You only got a single day off every week and had to keep just about everything about the M.R.S. secret from the public.
Really, it felt like going to a futuristic boot camp.
"Should we be doing this though?" He called to his silent friend.
"What?" Came his monosyllabic response.
"You know, training and studying and junk? The city just got attacked by a mutant cyborg and all the head honchos want us to do is turn our homework on time."
Thompson grunted, arms straining to lift his weights.
Probably too much for a world record competing adult.
Definitely too much for a teenager.
"They must have reasons."
Low and behold. A response with more than two words.
"Oh yeah. Definitely. Seeing Mr Oliver breaking his hands over and over again fighting those robots was very reassuring."
"Cyborgs."
"Semantics, Browbeat." Chris huffed.
"We're not ready to fight."
"If not us then who, Brow?" And it all came back to that question. How in the name of the holy Tigerzord was a group of teenagers who could outrun, outlift, and outsmart both olympic gold medallists and adult specialists not be ready to deal with threats that made armed cops look like walking peashooters?
"Reinforcements?"
Sure, that made sense. Call in a team from a different city to deal with their little problem. Only one issue with that.
"They deal with Mesogog yet?"
His silent friend shook his head.
"Then it's unlikely. They got, like, half a dozen teams across the pond trying to bring him in. The rest must be on call just in case things go south." He worried his lip. "I mean, that's gotta be it, you know? Unless they're hunting the Three Bitches. Hopefully those freaks get caught. Didn't a team out in Cali manage to almost seal them away or something?"
Grunting, keeping his focus on the weight, Thompson slowly brought the bar down to rest just above his chest. Exhaling, he pushed it up, arms rippling with muscle as eight hundred and fifty pounds of metal lifted above his chest.
"Yeah." Racking the bar, the whole room filling with the clang of metal colliding with the bench press machine, he dusted off his hands and walked over to the weight rack. "Maybe. Does it matter?"
Chris wanted to laugh as his friend added another four hundred pounds to the bar, the bar itself looking like a toothpick compared to the young man working on it. But, taking the hint, he finished his warm up too. Cranking up the treadmill to forty miles per hour he zoned out. The only thing that was real was his breathing, the pound of his shoes against the treadmill, and the whir of the machine's engines. Even Thommy Two's grunts of exertion faded into nothing.
Blinking, stumbling, he almost fell when the alarm on the treadmill started beeping.
"Crap! Not again!"
"Stripped the motor?"
Shooting the silently laughing boy a glare, Chris kept his legs moving long enough for the energy left in the belt to bleed off. Thankfully he hadn't cracked his head open again.
"Probably. Not that you'd know. When was the last time I caught you in the workshop?"
"Nerd."
"Jock."
"Geek."
"Roid raged Hulk looking mother fucker."
"Toothpick. Male anorexia model. Pretty boy. Dweeb."
"Meathead middle school repeating spaz."
Punctuating every insult with a grunt, Browbeat hadn't even slowed down his reps as he kept the iron moving. Chris, however, ended their teasing very maturely. By flipping his friend off. Thompson just chuckled lowly.
Rolling his shoulders, Thompson gave his buddy a pat on the back.
"See yah later big guy. Save me a spot in the mess."
He didn't need to respond. Chris was good like that. The little guy got what he was trying to say without needing it spelled out. For someone as… reticent as he tended to be, that meant a lot.
But, admittedly, even he was a bit frustrated with the current situation.
Sure, he understood why they weren't running around, flipping sofas over to try and find some rogue cyborgs. Yet it still galled him that a bunch of old timers who hadn't seen action in a decade or more felt they had a right to criticize an active team's readiness rating. Aside from a few… emotional conflicts, their scores were perfect. And even more than that they'd never needed a Section Thirteen review once.
Griping was pointless though.
So, making his way down to the shooting range, he signed in, nodding to Barney, a large black man who a former Marine - and had the tats to prove it - and checked out an M4 Carbine, a Glock 17, a Benelli M4, and, his personal favorite, a special job, that had once been an M107 before Mr. Wallis had gotten ahold of it.
Now it was a box fed, fully automatic, self stabilizing wall of death spitting good afternoon.
"Wonder when the .75 will be done?"
Murmuring to himself as he stripped, inspected each piece of, and then reassembled all of the weapons, he looked up when Barney pulled a small piece of paper out.
"No idea. But take a look at what we're getting."
Skimming the manifest the supply sergeant had given him, he noticed it immediately.
"Battle rifles?"
"Yup. Chambered in .338. Gonna replace the M4s we have since it looks like the lobotomites are packing armor. And, uh, you haven't heard this from me, but after Marseille we might be getting new sidearms too. 10mm stuff from Blackwell Armories over in Canberra. They're even talking about issuing overpressure rounds too."
"I thought that was illegal?"
"As of sixteen hours ago, by executive order, no."
"Oh. What happened?"
"No idea. But according to the guy that sent the manifest over, there might have been another attack that was missed out west. A research lab, one of the Toybox people, was found. It was bad. Like the Black Pharoh bad."
"The sarcophagus site or Cairo?"
"A thick red paste that covered the walls."
"Are we getting flamethrowers?"
"Hah! I wish big guy. Still, don't let me keep you any longer. Get your range time in. I'll sign off on your maintenance proficiency."
Nodding, he double checked his reassembled weapons and stepped into the shooting gallery.
"Hey Thompson. Heading in?"
"Yeah."
Carlos smiled at him, eyes lighting up when he saw Samantha.
"She really is a beauty you know. I'm glad Colin finally got approval for you to take her out."
Hefting the modified Barret in one hand, Browbeat's lips curved up.
"She's a good girl."
"That she is man. Anyways, don't let me keep you."
As the other trainee turned to go, the rather incredibly muscular young man stopped him, handing him the slip of paper Barney had handed him. Carlos read it in a second and sucked in a breath.
"So something happened they're not telling us about. Fuck a duck on a boat with a coat. Ok, I'll let the others know."
Patting the bodybuilder on the back, he handed the paper back and checked out. Browbeat just smiled and nodded, making sure his ear protection was firmly in place, and then aimed his baby down range. Depressing the trigger slightly was all it took to make her bark, the muzzle not even jerking as his impossible strength held the fully automatic stream of armor piercing rounds on target.
A target that lasted about half a second before being reduced to nothing but a fine mist.
It was a good thing that the gallery's walls were six feet thick.
Training ran late, as it usually did.
Not that Carlos minded. He enjoyed it, actually.
The sense of responsibility. The knowledge that he was doing something to help others, preparing himself to one day fight the good fight and keep people safe. It was well worth the extra hours of grueling work and study. They had to prepare as much as they could for the day they went out and fought against the monsters and villains of the world.
It would take time. But they would get there.
Now if only the others could see it that way.
Carlos didn't feel very strongly about his team either way, on a professional level at least. He wasn't displeased with their training and its results. They were hand picked for a reason. The issue was that they were also impatient in a way.
They all came in with some idea of how life was going to be like.
Thinking of the glory, the adventure, the fame.
Being a Ranger also paid well and many aimed for it with that in mind sometimes.
However, fundamentally, they didn't consider the danger involved. Not all looked at the statistics and saw just how many failures were needed to perfect this system. Why so many of the old teams were small five-man bands as opposed to their batch. Why so few lived to old age, where adults like Mr. Oliver were already retired.
Being a ranger was a monstrous challenge and Carlos wanted to help them make it through it.
All of them.
"So why don't you take your bitch boy and fuck off!"
Sophia included. Thankfully, she wasn't screaming. That wasn't her style. But she was doing her level best to provoke a fight with two people who wouldn't put up with her crap.
"Listen here you unbalanced, hormone addled freak, you can take your attitude, shove it up your ass, and spin on it. But there's no way I'm going to let you pull crap like that and get away with it!"
Amy wasn't much better at times. Her mousy hair a bit frazzled and her eyes burning with almost as much anger as Sophia's. The problem was that while small wisps of darkness were beginning to gather around the athletic black girl, small tendrils of creepers were growing up from where it looked like a lunch tray had been dumped onto Theo.
"As much as I like seeing peas evolving in real time, take it down a notch, both of you."
"What the fuck did you just say to me!?"
Rounding on him, Sophia looked ready to kill. Grown men would have flinched, knowing she probably could actually rip their head off. Carlos just raised an eyebrow.
"Hit the showers Hess. Or I'll convince Piggot we need a SHARP briefing. And a civilian interaction briefing. And another anger control program."
"You wouldn't dare!"
She flinched, visibly fleiched at the thought of having to sit through that much everything.
"It'll be Hell for the team. They'll hate me for it. But it'll break you. And that will make them love me."
Not saying another word, but still managing to throw a final glare over her shoulder, Sophia slunk away. Amy, looking rather smug, opened her mouth to make a comment. Carlos raised a finger.
"You're not new to the team either, Johannes. Sophia is in mandatory therapy, that means we don't feed her temper by reacting. Report the incidents to an on duty security officer, Colin, Hana, or Rory. Do not engage." He waited just long enough for the girl to start getting that defiant look in her eyes. "But well done. Don't let her walk over you."
Clapping her on the shoulder, he left Amy confused before turning to the other young man.
"Did she hit you Theo?"
"Nah." He scraped at some mash potatoes on his shirt, even as he tossed the last of the creepers into a trash can. "Just knocked my tray over. School bully type shit."
"You wanna get changed or do you wanna hear the scuttlebutt first?"
That caught his attention.
"Showers are on the other side of the Rig so I might as well have something interesting to mull over on the way."
Carlos smiled thinly.
Typical Theo, always giving excuses for socializing with the rest of the team.
He'd make a team player out of him yet.
"Long story short, we're getting issued new weapons, tinker tech base got hit, and someone on high thinks it's about to start raining."
"Crap."
"Yeah."
Amy piped in.
"Wait, what tinker tech base got hit? Shouldn't we have been briefed?"
Shrugging, Carlos simply rolled with it.
"Why? It's a maybe. And it might have been one of Toybox's. And it might have been connected to what happened in Europe. But it was out in California."
"Isn't San Quentin still holding the survivors from the Master's attempted summoning? You think it had anything to do with them?"
Theo's question was a bit out of left field but, thinking about it, it might have been.
"We do know the Three Blasphamies are looking for their sisters. So maybe someone's stocking up for a prison break? Heck, what if there's more going on. Other little incidents that haven't become gossip yet." Carlos nodded. "That's a very good point. I'm gonna go give Taylor a call."
"Ooh. Gonna call your girlfriend?" Amy snickered. "If you do, ask her about the time her team fought Ransik. Assuming that someone, or something, is looking to stir up trouble in the Bay, we could use her advice."
Taylor Earhardt was not his girlfriend. Carlos was very adamant. She was an attractive senior ranger he deeply respected and was glad to have made her friendship.
She also happened to be halfway across the world leading her own squad against Mesogog and the blasphemies. Which hace, understandably put him on edge for the best part of the past week as his mentor simply didn't have the time to communicate with him.
"No way. Carlos over here, he'll start making puns before he fraternizes with a superior officer."
He wasn't sure whether he appreciated Theo's support or not.
At least it made for a good distraction from his own thoughts.
"We may only be subject to the UCMJ during wartime or combat operations, but it's best not to get into the habit of investing too heavily into a long distance relationship with another Ranger. Doubly so when she's an adult and I'm a minor." He reeled it in two notches. "But yes. I'll make sure to ask her about the mutants. If nothing else, her time as a pilot might mean she has a better understanding of those VTOLs than most people."
It wasn't like they could ask the squad most involved with Ransik's initial capture.
They were too busy time traveling, or so he'd heard.
"And the rogue morpher? Any word on what we'll be doing about it?"
Carlos sighed, already knowing where this was going.
"For now? Word is that they will leave it be. Ironspike is the main target." A known criminal with a laundry list of felonies, and a lot of murders, was a much more convincing target, after all.
"That can't be a good idea." Theo summarized.
"We are understaffed, and can't expect the veterans to split themselves up hunting down two enemies." His response was practiced and measured. The only one he came up with that sounded reasonable enough.
He didn't want to get into another argument about it.
"You can't expect us to swallow that pill." Amy cut in.
The vice-captain sighed.
'Well, at least I tried.'
Finding her mother was simple enough. Annette Hebert wasn't a striking woman, but nor was she plain. Most importantly though, she was paying attention when Taylor flew over head and touched down in a small, out of the way lot. Their reunion was a hurried one that very quickly saw them taking the bus home. It was… quite clear that her mother's death grip on her hand wasn't going to abate any time soon either.
Finally returning to the house she'd lived in all her life, Taylor did a few things.
The first being to throw up, mostly stomach acid and raw fear at this point.
Because that was the most terrifying thing she'd ever gone through.
Then she showered, brushed her teeth, and had something to eat - because fighting for your life against evil robot men tended to work up an appetite. Plus she hadn't really finished eating before jumping the armored mutant.
Just thinking about it made her feel queasy.
NO PHYSICAL ANOMALIES DETECTED
'Well, at least I'm not sick.'
That would just complicate things.
Her mother hadn't reacted much better. Even now she paced the living room. Going back and forth to refill her tea, leaving it to cool off, and then replacing it again. Taylor wisely chose to keep her mouth shut.
Though it was only delaying the inevitable.
Unlike her temper, which was volcanic and prone to prolonged boil and eventual eruption, Annette's temper ran cold and sharp. It could last for weeks, months, or even years on end as she honed it into something jagged enough to cut someone with.
And unfortunately, she was the only outlet available.
Still, it was better to disarm the bomb before it had any chance at going off.
"Look mom, I…"
"Not one word out of you, Taylor Hebert."
Shit. Her mom was really mad.
"Do you have any idea what you've done?"
She kept her mouth shut. It was a rhetorical question.
"Running off to fight one of those monsters. Having guns and worse pointed at you. Throwing yourself into danger for no reason?! I could barely see you because of all the smoke and the cloud of bugs you called down!"
Her mother's hands shook, eyes burning with unshed tears as her voice cracked.
"What were you thinking?"
"People were in danger. They were getting killed."
Taylor shrugged, trying to keep the hurt out of her voice.
"That's what the M.R.S. is for, Taylor. They deal with problems like those all the time. Your morpher might have gone off and blown up, we can't risk something like that happening because you wanted to play at being a Ranger."
And now she was pissed off.
"Playing at being a Ranger!? I saved lives! Maybe. I don't know! But I was trying to protect you!" Her voice was steadily rising, building as her indignation grew with it. "Do you think I was having fun? I was terrified. I was doing what I could because I could. Aren't you the one that preaches about people needing to stick up for themselves and not waiting to be saved!"
"It's not about saving lives, Taylor. It's about keeping you alive. I was terrified. I thought you were going to get shot down in a crossfire or blown up."
Realizing she was rambling, Annette let out a sigh.
"You are not your father, Taylor. You'll only get ki - hurt like he was if you try to be."
"Killed. Say it."
"Taylor, I-"
"It was years ago Mom." She was glaring now, well and truly indignant. Even if in the back of head Taylor knew she should be trying to calm down. "Dad got crushed by Leviathan when the Ranger's took him down. He died pulling a man out from under a shipping container, leading people to safety. He died a hero. And you can't even say it."
Annette gave her daughter a sharp look.
"You always throw that word around. Hero. Like it somehow makes up for him not being here. Like people haven't forgotten him after the M.R.S. dug up Leviathan's body and took it away. Daniel did something good. Something brave. And all that has ever gotten him was a name on a slab of stone."
Hissing out a breath, the older woman looked away.
"And then, all people ever talk about is how the Ranger took down Leviathan. And then Brockton Bay lived happily ever after. The end." She looked away, something bitter and resigned in her voice. "What about us? What about me? Taylor, I couldn't stand you getting hurt. The thought of it… keeps me up at night. Please, I'm begging you, I can't lose you. That's the one thing I could never come back from."
"Whatever." Even though she still felt like shit, Taylor refused to deal with this any longer.
Ignoring her mother, she walked away, not even bothering to turn around when Annette called after her. Five minutes later, her hair still a little damp, she'd changed into jeans and her favorite shirt and brown hoodie.
"And where do you think you're going young lady."
"Out."
"Like Hell you are!"
"Or what? Are you going to ground me? I know you haven't noticed but I don't exactly have any friends!"
"Of course you do, Emma-"
"For saying you can't stand to see me hurt, you sure don't seem to notice when my best friend suddenly disappears."
As if that won the argument, she tied her shoelaces and was out the door, hopping over the creaky stair, sneakers scraping against concrete, and down the road before she even realized her mother was crying.
Hood up, and slightly cursing herself for not blow drying her hair, Taylor… sulked her way towards the docks. Years ago, this had been one of the rougher parts of town, what crime they had mostly concentrated in the areas that had been hardest hit by the monster attacks. Nowadays it had a permanent police presence and was undergoing some pretty heavy gentrification.
"I suppose that means there's less abandoned buildings, at least."
Still sucked it cost her five bucks for a coffee.
"Sweet though."
It was syrupy with a chocolate drizzle and whipped cream and salt and other flavors she couldn't quite make out.
"Still stuck my foot in it though."
Sighing, Taylor spent about three minutes just angsting at a dead intersection before crossing. Stepping into a small park, blocked from outside view by a slatted fence decorated with a mural of the original Megazord, she followed the cobblestone path to a small grove of dogwoods.
"-and Tommy came home with an A today. You would be so proud of him, he's growing like a weed."
There was a man there, holding a small child in his arms, and speaking to the memorial stone. Taylor, already feeling guilty, stepped out of earshot and flopped down between a few roots of the steadily growing trees.
The Leviathan Memorial wasn't the most popular spot in the city. Most people didn't really visit it unless it was on the anniversary of the attack. But a few still did.
It was a smallish area, mostly grass, the trees, and a marble stone that had the names of every man, woman, and child who died during the monster's attack - as well as those who died fighting the alien invader too. Even then it wasn't huge, not really that much bigger than she was, and the plinth it sat on was surrounded by a small water feature that didn't actually have enough water in it to splash the stone.
Supposedly, the whole thing had cost the city five hundred grand.
In the end, she gave up. The man had sat down on one of the benches and his kid was sleeping in his arms. Taylor didn't have the emotional energy to do something as churlish as ruin what seemed to be a pleasant day out for a man and his boy - probably remembering someone dear to them both.
"I wonder… do I want the kid to remember who he lost? Do I feel happy that he doesn't have to carry that, or sad he'll never know them."
She swallowed.
"I miss you Daddy. So much it hurts." Her chest was like a giant knot and she couldn't take it anymore.
Letting her feet carry her, Taylor eventually left the park behind, coming instead to the junkyard.
There was no real evidence of the fight that had just so recently happened there - the little scrimmage paling in comparison to the mass shooting that had happened earlier. So, instead of fooling with the shiny new lock on the front gate, she climbed the fence.
"At least being freakishly tall is good for something."
Even the barbed wire wasn't real barbed wire, but just kind of slightly pointy metal stickers on otherwise perfectly normal corded metal. Easy enough to ignore since she could find a spot with a bit of distance between the stickers. Using her height to her advantage, she half stood up on top of the fence - the two strands of wiring not being enough to prevent her from getting her legs over - and then climbed down the otherside.
And all she had to show for it was a bit of scuffing on her palms.
"I supposed I should be happy they're so cheap about actually looking after this place."
It was a short jog through the stacks of metal to find the zord's head. Stopping short, she noticed two things. One, there was a small keypad on the outside of it and, two, there was a note taped to the outside.
Pulling it off, she gave it a read.
"Fixed the door and stepped down all the power systems. It's stable now and still producing enough juice to run the interior. Security code is the last four digits of your social security number. Colin Wallis.
P.S. Sorry about punching you."
She had absolutely zero idea what to do.
Like, even in the depths of her self righteous angst, Taylor couldn't even muster the teenage impudence to complain about someone violating her super secret sanctum. Or her privacy, for that matter, since he knew her social security number.
"Huh. I guess I better get him a card then. I… how do you thank someone for something like this?"
In the end, she threw her hands up, the last remnants of her anger towards her mother giving way to guilt and more than a bit of gnawing self loathing. That ugly feeling that had been with her since whatever had prompted Sophia to start bullying her and Emma to leave her. That being one of the two biggest questions that had been gnawing at her for a while.
The other being is if it made her gay that she'd been thinking about Hana - the female Ranger - a lot.
"Is it odd that I got kinda turned on when she was kicking my ass? Am I gay? Am I masochist? No, because I definitely appreciated seeing Tommy freaking Oliver like that. Fuck he looked like a badass. But it's not like I haven't looked before."
Fucking hormones.
"Sounds like you're having a problem honey." Spinning around, Taylor freaked out slightly when she saw a strange pink haired woman standing behind her. Flanked by a golden robot. "How about I help you figure it out?"
Her hand promptly split open, fingers peeling back and to the side as a long, ropey set of muscles and tendons spilled out - jagged studs of bone packed between the thick, corded meat. Screaming, Taylor jumped to the side, frantically stuffing the note in her pocket as she dodged the almost casual attack that still split the air with a crack, slashing straight through the scrap pile behind her.
"Come on cutey, I only bite a lot."