Learning to be a Vampire

by Throwaway1971

Definitely very secret

42. A Matter of Fact

Reappearing inside the room you used to jump out of in the first place, you take a moment to use your various enhanced senses, scanning your surroundings and making sure everything is exactly the same as when you left.

Satisfied with your immediate safety, you give everyone a look, figuring you may as well see what they'll be doing now. Nora, for one, smiles at you happily, mentioning she'll laze around for a few days before getting back to business as normal, a sentiment mirrored by Kate, though Sarah laughingly states she'll be busy in the near future, as will you, from what she knows.

That only mildly worries you, totally.

Okita, on the other hand, is busy pouting, complaining she lost the ability to speak English naturally and already sounding out words again.

It is with a heavy heart that you, once again, come to the conclusion that asking the Maid to help you train is not necessarily the best of choices, at times.

As evidenced by the fact that, when you decided to try applying what you learned about your own weaknesses during your spar with Okita, the Maid simply began throwing bodies at you again, like the last time you made a comparable request.

Up and down the palace you went, doing your best to avoid being dogpiled by the infinite amount of bodies following after you like a tide of maidliness, doing your best to keep reacting to the tackles and grabs coming at you from any possible direction all without access to any of your powers.

Suffice to say, you're actually fairly proud you only spent only half your training time having sex, in the end.

Creating another undead for the sake of ADAM creation, this time you do not need to bother with taking detours in the vein of making it produce modified blood, simply going straight for the useable substance straight away. Similarly, you don't need to feed a gaggle of little girls with it, so all you really need is to install a tank and a tube and you're done on that account.

Oh, sure, actually creating the fleshy sack you're using for this is a bit of a pain, given you're working primarily with animal leftovers, your stores of human corpses long since running low making this a bit of a time-consuming pain, but you can still do it perfectly fine, and designing and building a sizeable container arrangement that can be accessed by a robot doesn't take you too long, at least.

And with that, you have a steady supply of ADAM to work with. Nothing shall stop the... the Teacup Initiative or whatever funny name you decide to give it!

"Hey Cuppy," you greet the diminutive woman that somehow ended up being in a leadership position in your gang, "how you doing?"

"I'm not a Cuppy! At least call me Cupcake if you won't use my actual name." Turning towards you from where she was carefully weighing a variety of substances, Cupcake gets off the stool she has to use in her lab due to her status as... vertically challenged. "You need anything?"

"Oh, just wanted to talk. You've been with us for a while now and we've fucked, so I consider it my responsibility as your boss to at least attempt to make sure your personal goals and aspirations have a chance at coming true."

Cupcake, blushing up a storm when you so callously mention your intimate relationship with her, crosses her arms as she looks away from you, the pout on her face obvious. "And what if I dun' wanna talk about that, huh?"

"Well, in that case I might just have to find a way to make you, won't I?" You tease her, squatting down for a moment to bodily pick her up and bring her up to your height, ignoring her surprised squawk as you chuckle and begin kissing her, her arms brought up as though to fend you off but not actually pushing against your actions.

Peppering her face with kisses regardless of how she turns it in mock opposition, you ultimately nuzzle the top of her head, her sputtered demands to be returned to the ground already ceased.

"See? I can just torture you until you do as I say... though I don't think I have to, hmm?" Lightly groping your Cupcake's behind as you carry her towards the little resting area next to the lab, you sit down on a comfortable chair and keep her on your lap.

"But only because you asked nicely!" Cupcake insists, puffing up her cheeks as she pushes her front against your chest, her legs spread wide to let her get closer towards you. "... What was the question again?"

Laughing lightly, you stroke her medium-length black hair without releasing her from your hug. "What do you want, Addy? From life? From me? From being part of the Crypts?"

Burying her face in your embrace, Addy's silence goes from sullen to quiet, her difficulty in putting what you're asking for into words obvious.

"I don't really... have any one thing I want. I kind of just live day to day, you know? So long as I'm doing fine and have fun, I just don't really care about anything... bigger, like that. Never did well with large plans and obligations and all that crap."

Mhm... So she's just more of a kid deep down than she'd really like to admit, in summary, isn't she? Beneath the totally grown-up putting up a facade of childishness, that is.

"That's totally alright, Addy. Doing all of that shit sucks, anyways. If you just want to do your thing, that's perfectly fine, not like you particularly need to have a plan."

Still not looking up, Addy wiggles a bit on your lap. "Really?"

"Really."

"Really really?"

"Really really. A lot of people kind of just... go with the flow, honestly. It's perfectly fine. Heck, don't you kind of have a stable job already, with us? That's already better than many can say for themselves, isn't it?"

Puffing a little, she shakes her head. "Anyways, I answered your question. Let's just... do something more fun than talk this crap out?"

"What do you have in mind?" You ask, not having ceased moving your hand along her head this entire time.

"Oh, I'm sure we can think of a few things." Finally meeting your eyes, you don't miss the impish grin on Addy's face, nor the hand wiggling under your pants in search of her treat.

"Oh, sweetie, you're a hundred years too early to try and distract me." Giving her another kiss on the head, you start undressing her yourself. "Count yourself lucky that's exactly what I was going to do in the first place."

---

You have a lot of 'fun' with Cupcake, fooling around and talking out what plasmids and tonics may come in handy for her in-between giving her the thorough dickings she's come to associate with your presence by now.

Or while doing it, she certainly doesn't seem to mind having to keep thinking while riding your lap.

All good things have to come to an end, however, which is how it comes that you're actually hearing something you rarely ever have so far; your phone's ringtone.

Quickly putting a hand over Cupcake's mouth to make sure she stays quiet, the two of you continue as you were, her small body bouncing on your cock in an easy rhythm, taking more than you'd expect into her pussy on every downward stroke, even while your thumb now strokes her cheek, as you loathe to give up an opportunity to convey physical intimacy like this.

Taking a look at the unknown number displayed on your screen, you swipe your finger along its touchscreen, turning the radial towards the right. Call taken.

"Yes, hello?" You ask, knowing that almost everyone who has this number could and would just call you telepathically instead, meaning that the list of possible callers is fairly small.

And only one of them would really have a reason to call you right now.

"This is... this is Bug Girl," Bug Girl responds, obviously still not having thought of a cape name to give out. "Can we... can we talk?"

"Oh, sure, I have a moment. What's up?"

The line is silent for a long moment, and you wonder if she may have heard something, after all- Cupcake isn't exactly being all that quiet, though that may or may not be because of your enhanced vampire senses.

"They- they released Gladly."

"So they did." You did expect this to happen, but not anywhere quite this soon. Not that you're about to actually say as much, though. "I take it you haven't done it, yet?"

You both know what you're talking about, and she wouldn't sound anywhere this hesitant if she'd already offed the guy.

Desperate, determined, maybe even hysterical, but not hesitant. She's wavering.

"I-I know I said I would do it, and I will. I just- I'm not sure I can." Interestingly, that last part was spoken with... dispassionate conviction, if you had to describe it. Curious.

"Then why are you calling?" Leaning forwards a little, you flex your waist, your dick digging deeper into your current lover, much to her appreciation.

"I wanted to make sure you knew what was happening and ask for advice."

Well, isn't she just precious, even while speaking with all the emotional depth of a brick. Suppressing her emotions somehow?

---

Shooting off a quick thought at Sarah and receiving a confirmation in return, you keep concentrating on the matter at hand, speeding up your upwards thrusts into Cupcake while keeping your phone stable.

"Where are you right now, and where is Gladly?"

"I am at corner 7th and Cross Street, Gladly is in his apartment right now. I found out where he lives through the library computers and took a look at the place with my bugs."

"How sure are you it's him?" You don't have much more time, so you suppose you may as well give Cupcake one last load of frosting before you rush off.

"I'm sure. He keeps pacing and squashing any bugs he can see."

Well, youre just going to take her word for it.

"Alright, stay where you are. I'll meet you at a nearby alley and we'll take things from there, alright?"

"Got it."

Hanging up real quick, you slide your phone back into your pocket, grasping Cupcake's legs with both hands instead and letting her moans ring forth, even as you raise her up a little so you can rail into her while standing.

"Looks like I'm going to be busy for a bit, after all, but I'm sure you don't mind, right?"

"Laahhhgh..." Cupcake's tongue hangs out, making it even harder for her to pronounce words, not that she looks like she'll be capable of actual speech for a while yet, your seed from your hard 'work' so far dripping and squirting out of her with every thrust.

Honestly, this is why unvamped girls are so cute, even if they just can't keep up for all that long, normally.

---

Well, with Cupcake fucked stupid and everything else ready, you suppose you might as well get on it. Recalling the map of Brockton Bay you memorized a... long time ago, you estimate where you need to go- the place Bug Girl is waiting is a decent ways off towards the north from where your secret lair is hidden under the earth, not too far away from Winslow High School, in fact, something that really shouldn't be too surprising, given one Mister Gladly's profession and workplace.

Now, you could just use one of your many usual methods of transportation, but where would be the fun in that when you have something new and interesting to try out instead?

That's you you chant Step through the dark into the light! towards a light shadow thrown by the laboratory lights, feeling yourself pulled towards it as your perception of your surroundings begins to change, yourself turning into a black mass of shadow hopping right through.

In this state, you can't quite see the way you normally would, though your perception of blood still functions as normal, instead perceiving the world from the perspective beyond shadows, each fleck of contrast against light a portal for you to step through and return into reality.

You can't stay in here, not for long, not this way, at least... but you do have a moment to see what is happening as you move through this realm of darkness where no light can ever truly intrude, slipping through between shadows towards the direction you were taking.

Catching distorted glimpses of the world outside, you use the visions of various gangmembers undertaking various tasks or just hanging out as guides, your path not quite linear and yet not quite curved, the oddities of this dimension letting you travel faster than you should be able to and emerging inside a shadowed alley above your base in a flare of darkness.

This... feels kinda trippy.

It takes a few repetitive jumps through this newly revealed shadowrealm, but while time seems to be going weirdly inside of it, that is a fact you can simply use to your advantage, your trips taking little subjective time for you, but even less objectively speaking, the transition between one place and the next nearly instant.

What this means is that within less than two minutes of hanging up on Bug Girl, you're jumping out of the dark, once more using the many shadows cast by all the dumpsters of Brockton Bay to your advantage even as the sun is shining its baleful rays into your current destination.

Stepping out while adjusting your suit a little, you take a look around, soon seeing an unnatural cluster of cockroaches makes its way through the area.

Smiling, you step on one lightly. That should be clear enough of a sign.

---

Taylor Hebert wasn't having the best of days.

Maybe it was because of what she'd seen and felt, both herself and through her bugs, over the last few days... mainly after her near-death experience when she fought Lung, the rollercoaster of adrenaline and emotions the only thing keeping her going through the night of horrors that followed. Maybe it was because she went back to school the following monday, going right back to the usual in that place. Or maybe it was the visceral way seeing Mister Gladly at the time, doing... that, had brought her back from being a cape coldly executing everything that needed to be and returned her to plain old Taylor mode.

And suddenly, everyone she'd killed that night went from faceless monsters to horrible, horrible people that deserved all they'd gotten and more, but still people.

It was all she could do to keep from vomiting until she came home, promising to the terrifying criminal looking into her eyes striaght through her lenses that she would see things through in regards to her disgusting teacher, one way or the other.

Well, here she was. Gladly had been released as soon as he could be, simply because the 'authorities' could get away with it and he wasn't worth the bother to them.

So much for justice.

Pacing a little on the roof she'd taken refuge on, Taylor tried her best to keep calm as she waited for Cain to arrive, having called the man from a payphone not far from where she was waiting- this time, her lack of a mobile phone wasn't impeding her too much, after all.

Yet another reason to berate herself over, not bringing a cheap burner along on her first night out. She really should've just gotten over her distaste for the things before going into a situation she may desperately need one at hand.

Still, it took hardly any time for Cain to just... appear out of nowhere, nudging some of her bugs as he stood in a dark alley. Blushing under her mask, Taylor hastily began climbing down the fire ladder she'd taken to get onto the roof in the first place, not wanting to waste the uncomfortably attractive man's time.

Cain was standing right where she first felt him, his face obscured by his usual shadowy mask and dressed in his usual impeccable suit. As she came closer, though, Taylor could see the way he was holding himself, the sense of smug superiority she somehow couldn't say was ill-fitting on him exuding from the man drowing out everything else in-between the dirtied walls.

Somehow, seeing him in person never ceased to be overwhelming for a few moments, at least.

"There you are. So, Gladly's been released and holed himself up in his home, hasn't he?" He asked, cutting straight to business.

"He has," Taylor confirmed, pushing her emotions into her bugs so she wouldn't embarrass herself in front of him.

"I take it you have eyes on him, then. Figuratively speaking, anyways."

"I do. As I said, he is pacing inside his apartment, aggressively squashing any bugs he can see."

"Meaning he does remember what the two of us talked about well enough. I do wonder why exactly he was let go- I'd have thought he would beg to be imprisoned just to save his own skin, at least until he remembered what they do to kiddie fiddlers in actual prisons."

"Maybe," the known serial murderer said, "it was the fact he knew a Ward's secret identity, too, hm? They just didn't want him blabbing where other inmates could hear it."

Something in Taylor's mind switched its attention's focus, the way Cain was saying it striking a chord inside her, but she was too preoccupied with what he'd said to pay attention. "Don't the Wards all go to Arcadia?"

"O, right, you wouldn't know. Most of them do, yeah, but one is attending Winslow instead, and the teachers have to know whose absences they have to excuse in case there's an emergency or something of the kind, so they do know who it is. And I guess the PRT just didn't want to deal with the possibility of Gladly blabbing, so they made sure he was released, just in case. Would explain why he got free this soon, anyways."

Great. So one of the Protectorate's junior league's members was attending Winslow and in all likelihood knew about the... the bullying, if what Cain was saying was right. "How would you even know about something like this?"

"Oh, didn't I tell you last time?" Taylor did her best not to think about the 'last time'. "I have widespread access to the PRT's files. Moles, digital access, everything. Hell, I'd say I know more about their operations than they do themselves. I have the identities of literally all the heroes around Brockton Bay, save the few independents that tend to pop up here and there, and they weren't even hard to get."

And wasn't that just a barrel of laughs to hear.

"In fact, want to know who the Ward at WInslow is? Normally, secret identities are treated with at least a veneer of protection, but it's not like anyone with even a modicum of power really gives a fuck either way, so long as they aren't fucked with themselves."

"I am not sure I want to implicate myself like that," Taylor said, trying to distance herself from this discussion, even as she couldn't deny a sense of curiosity welling up.

"Oh, come on, not like knowing means you'd have to act on it. And I can always deny being the one to have told you if it ever comes up, so it's not like I'm putting myself at risk here, either. Still, all up to you."

Leaning his shoulder against the dark wall next to himself, Cain crossed his arms, seemingly content to wait until she'd made her decision. On the one hand, she wasn't sure she should ask, the topic of secret identities being what it was. On the other hand... what could knowing really do? As Cain had said, it was still her choice, so as long as she chose to just keep this knowledge in mind without doing anything about it, she'd be-

"Fine, I want to know."

"Heh, knew it." Pushing himself upright again, Cain straightened his suit out for a moment, the movement bringing to mind the smooth, steely muscles hidden underneath the garment, as she knew from the time she'd seen him naked in the aftermath of fighting Lung. "The one Ward slumming it at Winslow is none other than one Sophia Hess, also known as Shadow Stalker."

What.

"From what I read, she insisted she wanted to stay at WInslow after becoming a Ward, something about not wanting to leave her friends, I think."

What.

"Funny, considering the fact I literally filmed her trying to set the corpses of those nazis she killed on fire, but alas. One can only hope the 'heroes' are keeping a closer eye on her nowadays."

What.

Moving his head to the side a little, observing the small swarm of flies wildly flying in circles, as Taylor only now realized she was making her bugs live out her emotions to hide them instead of screaming and punching the wall right now, Cain shrugged.

"Hey, are you doing alright? Do you need a moment?" Cain asked, the unbearably accepting tone of his voice feeling like scathing water pouring over Taylor.

Clenching her hands, she did her best to keep it all inside, pushing more and more of the emotions seething within her into her everpresent swarm. How dare he ask her that? Here? Now? While about to make her kill a person?

How dare Cain be the only person to have asked her that ever since mom died?!

Heaving and breathing hard, Taylor realized she was having trouble keeping herself focused by pushing things off into her bugs. There was just so much she was trying to ignore, to push off until sometime later when she didn't care anymore anyways, and each of her bugs could only slam itself against a wall so much, and before she knew it, she was stumbling towards the only person that actually gave a rat's ass about her anymore, even if it was just a front or something.

Catching her with unbearably strong and reassuring arms, Cain pulled her towards himself, even patting her back, the prick. "There, there... Let it all out," his incredibly smooth and resounding voice said, his hands on Taylor's hair not even bothering her as she began sobbing, her helmeted face pressing against his broad chest as she crumpled his fine suit in her hands, the steely muscles underneath not even distracting her from her issues anymore.

Each sobbing breath she was taking shaking her whole body, Taylor leaned into him, his presence grounding her in the ocean of questions and fears surrounding her.

The death of Lung. The death of all the people they came after once he was gone, the way she could feel herself digging into, eating away at them with a million mouths every time she closed her eyes.

The things she'd seen and felt in the places they'd gone to, the look in the eyes of the girls and kids they rescued. The... stuff oozing out of the one in Gladly's room, the one they pulled him out of.

The heroes, time and again doing nothing but obstruct them, only to claim the recognition for their work themselves.

Emma, turning on her as soon as she had a new, better best friend. All the ways she hurt Taylor, big and small, with what she knew about her, the two of them growing up and sharing everything.

All the stupid bullshit at school, the snide remarks, stealing her homework, the pencil shavings dumped on her, the pointless, inconsequential everything.

Sophia.

Sophia was Shadow Stalker, apparently. And now she couldn't even call herself the better person, after all, considering she'd also killed people.

All of this broke over Taylor, overwhelming her as she stood there in the stupid, dirty side alley, clinging to the villainous monster she knew Cain to be because for all his bloodthirsty selfishness, the vampire-cape was still a better person than anyone else she knew.

That thought had her chuckle and cry into her mask at the same time, the gentle stroking of her hair Cain had transitioned into never stopping once.

"Feeling a bit better?" He asked, his deep voice vibrating on her face thanks to the resonance of her helmet on his chest.

"... No," she decided, callously choosing to take advantage of this opportunity to stay like this a little longer.

"Would you like me to stay quiet while you take your moment?" The gentle question came, Cain completely ignoring Taylor sobbing into his perfectly sculpted chest for the past ten minutes or so.

"... No." His voice was really nice to listen to.

"Okay. Well, I don't really know what to talk about, but would you like me to tell you what I think about you? We don't really know each other, but I figure you could use a bit of a pep talk."

Heh, right. She was already a wreck anyways, his opinion of her couldn't sink much lower at this point, so why not?

Staying silent, Taylor just waited for him to get on with it.

"So, from what I know about you so far, you're a young woman that's very much determined to do the right thing, except you don't really know what the right thing is or should be. Whether your aspiration to do that stems from a sense of justice or desperate escapism from whatever situation you're in outside of your costume, I'm not really sure. Could be either. Or both."

Right. That's why she went and murdered a few dozens of people on her first night out. Taylor knew which of these possibilities her money was on, and, well, thinking about it, it wasn't like Cain was wrong.

Not that she'd think about it if she could help it.

"When push comes to shove and you feel you have to act, you act, for better or worse. Some might call that courageous, or decisive. Others, on the other hand, would call it reckless or stupid."

"Wha-gh, what would you call it?" Taylor asked, her curiosity overriding her sullen reluctance to speak on account of the way her throat was still clamming up.

"I'd call it being a teenager. Everyone's been there and done that. Honestly, with your power and situation, the fact that only a bunch of rapists and worse were stung to death is kind of a statement as to your character, and it's not actually a bad one."

Taylor did her best to ignore the way her cheeks were burning under her mask.

"Aside from that, well, as I said, I don't know you that well yet." And she couldn't really summon up any outrage at the implied fact he would be changing that. "So instead, I'm going to talk about how pretty you are."

... "'m not pretty," was all she could say, trying to debate letting go of the hunky guy whose arms she'd been occupying for a while now with herself and absolutely losing out.

"I can't tell, haven't seen your face yet, after all. But what I can see is your gorgeous hair," Cain said, unfairly commenting on the one part of herself she liked the most and immediately raising her spirits. "It's obvious you're taking great care of it, it really shows, and it feels great to the touch, too."

Taylor was pretty sure he had to be able to feel the heat emanating from her face by now.

"Beyond that, you have really nice and long legs, the kind that has your ass at just the right height to-"

"Okay, enough, I got it!" Flustered, Taylor retreated, the well-muscled arms of Cain releasing her easily as she movedd.

"Oh, so you're feeling better? That's nice to hear." And all of a sudden, the smug grin was back in Cain's voice, the man gesturing towards her. "Don't tell anyone, but I grew up with siblings. I know exactly how to cheer a girl your age up."

"Wait a moment, do you mean-" Taylor asked before she could stop herself, Cain just chuckling in response.

Shaking his head, Cain took a few steps deeper into the alley, knocking against the wall. "Seriously, though, you obviously have a lot on your mind. Now, I'm probably not the best person for this, but if you want to talk, I always have an open ear. Offer's there."

Sighing, Taylor followed after him, leaning on the opposite wall. "Okay..." Honestly, she was feeling more... drained, than anything. She didn't really feel like refusing at this point. "What do you want to know about?"

"If you're asking me, then... let's start with why finding out about Sophia Hess' extracurricular activities had you go into a meltdown? There has to be history there."

Of course. Made sense he'd ask about it. "This is... Okay, context. So me and this other girl, Emma, the two of us basically grew up together, right? We were like sisters, telling each other about everything, playing together, all that stuff," Taylor explained, downplaying the sheer depths of the bond she felt her and Emma shared as children. "I even used to call her parents uncle and auntie, and she mine. But then, one day mom died in a car accident, dad never really recovered and things went to shit in general. Her family helped us through it a bit, but none of us ever really went back to normal."

"Makes sense," Cain threw in, his voice sympathetic. "A death in the family always sucks, especially if you were actually close."

"So with that established, one summer before high school, dad sent me off to summer camp, figuring he wasn't really in any condition to take care of me while at work all day over summer vacation, so there I went. Summer camp was nice and fine, I had loads of fun and all, but the moment I came back, something was... wrong with Emma," Taylor poured out, never having told this to anyone before. "She had a new best friend and treated me like shit out of nowhere, and nothing I tried got her to return to normal."

"I'm guessing that's where Sophia comes in, then," Cain suggested, earning a nod from Taylor.

"Right. The worst of it, too, is that I could've gotten into Arcadia via sponsorship, but I didn't want to leave Emma, so I went to Winslow to stay with her instead. Bad choice in hindsight, of course, and with pretty much all my homework stolen by the lackeys, I just don't have the grades to transfer," Taylor sighed, appreciating the bitter irony of Sophia staying in Winslow for the same reason. "So anyways, Emma and Sophia bullied me. Are bullying me," she corrected.

"And knowing a nominal hero is treating you like shit isn't a nice feeling, hm?"

"Exactly. Going to the teachers never did anything, they're kissing the trio's asses- there's a third one I add as the ringleader for the minor shit, Madison- and no matter what I tried, they didn't stop. So I just tried to wait them out, until they got bored and moved on, except they didn't. It all kind of came to a head this January, when vacation was over and school began again."

Steeling her resolve, Taylor took a few deep breaths, the damp insides of her helmet reminding her that it didn't really make any difference how much she said here by this point. "They gathered used tampons and shit like that, stuffed it into my locker- not like they didn't keep breaking into it all the time anyways- and let it all sit over the winter, then Sophia locked me inside when I opened it to see what was stinking so badly and had to gag once I opened the door."

And she wouldn't ever quite forget... that.

"The worst part was, nobody let me out. I must've been in there for hours, banging against the door or just screaming before my throat went raw, but the only reason I ever actually got out was because a janitor was called to figure out what was stinking up the hallway towards the end of the day. In the end, I was in the hospital with toxic shock syndrome, the police 'investigation' never came to anything, and-"

"And you found yourself with the power to control bugs."

Blinking, Taylor looked at Cain, silently wondering how he knew when she got her powers. "What you just described is a classical example of what we commonly call a trigger event, or a crisis point if you want to be particularly fancy and have most capes look at you confused. A stressfull moment of your life that, one way or another, brings you to the brink... and is also the moment you gain powers. It's a very touchy subject for most capes, really, for obvious reasons."

Giving him an expectant look, Taylor got an idea. Moving her hands up, she fiddled with the straps keeping her helmet in place for a moment, eventually getting them off so she could pull it upwards and to the front, removing her mask and baring her face to Cain, making sure she didn't tangle her hair all the while.

"I figure you could find out my identity easily at this point, anyways, so... here I am. Just call me Taylor."

Huffing out a small laugh, Cain drew a hand across his own face, the shadow before it fading away as it passed, revealing...

Well, Taylor had seen him naked except for his face before, and she'd thought he couldn't exactly be hotter than that, from an objective point of view. But standing there as the handsome face of a (surprisingly?) young man smiled at her, the very air seeming to lighten up at his smile, she had to revise that line of thought.

Seeing his body had been hot. But seeing him like this, fully clothed in a well-fitted suit and brown mane falling over exquisitely sculpted features, the obvious warmth put into them, this was breathtaking.

"Name's Gabriel, but feel free to just call me Gabe if you're more comfortable with that." Holding out a hand, he shook Taylor's own when she mutely stretched hers out, too, except he didn't let go, instead joining her on her own wall opposite from where he just stood and holding her hand.

Taylor wasn't sure what to do about this, so for the time being she just held his hand back.

"So, guess it's my turn to share, then. My trigger honestly wasn't all that intricate, it all happened pretty quickly in the end. First off, my parents were and are huge pieces of shit," Cain began, already keeping her attention in an iron grip. "They honestly didn't care about anyone but themselves, and I'm pretty sure the only reason they got married was because of societal expactations and not needing to keep up pretenses with each other. That's also why they had first me, then my two siblings."

Cain, or rather, Gabriel, seemed really fond of them, his voice dripping with happy memories as a light smile, different from the one he'd directed at her, played around his lips. "One little brother and one little sister. I took care of them for the most part, just out of spite for my parents at first, but I eventually found myself enjoying it for its own sake. Or rather, theirs."

Looking back at her, his smile morphed right back, never seeming to reduce in intensity. "On a side note, taking care of newborns is a chore and a half, and the reason you should never have kids without the determination to damn well see it through."

W-why was he looking at her like this while talking about children? Turning her eyes away, Taylor silently hoped her hair would hide her blush.

"So yeah, my siblings and me. I did my best to bring them up properly, and the moment I was old enough, I left them behind to come nowhere else but Brockton Bay. My parents, you see, they wanted me out of the house as quick as possible, never pretended otherwise, because while they needed children to look like they were just a normal couple doing normal couple things, they were mostly just annoyed at the costs of having children. So I came to this city, got a place in college and started going for parahuman studies, funnily enough. I didn't really give a fuck exactly what I'd end up doing so long as it paid enough for me to have my siblings come live with me away from our parents and, hopefully, happy."

There, he sighed despondently. "Of course it didn't exactly work out that way. Turns out my brother eventually couldn't take it; no idea whether I could've kept him from hanging himself if I was there for him, but, well... It's one of those things you just won't ever find out, I suppose."

Just barely keeping herself from choking, Taylor simply held onto his hand harder. That was... pretty fucked up, she would admit. Probably sucked even harder than her own... than the locker.

"I immediately tried to get back home, of course, for the funeral and to make sure my sister was okay. The two never quite got along the best, but they tried, and that's what counts, or so I'd like to think. But 'try' is the operative word for all of that, considering I never actually made it."

She didn't like where this was going...

"You see, I was taking a taxi to the train station, didn't exactly trust myself to be able to drive with the way my hands were shaking at the time. So I can say with complete confidence that when the truck barrelled straight into the car, it was the fucking truck driver's fault."

Taylor was grasping Gabriel's hand so hard it had to hurt.

"Everyone aboard the vehicle immediately died, of course; I don't remember the actual event that well, because next thing I know, I wake up inside my coffin months later. For all I know, that's how long it took my power to get me back online, but yeah, that's basically how I triggered."

"That's awful," Taylor squeezed out, now actively clinging to his side. Thankfully, he didn't seem to be that bothered by it.

"Oh, it's not all bad. I actually found my sister again, later on, she's part of the Crypts now. So you don't need to be sad, alright?"

Taylor just shook her head, only now realizing she was pushing her face into Gabriel an awful lot for how much she usually tried to avoid body contact with... anyone.

"Alright," he just said, his free hand opposite from her moving to stroke her hair again reassuringly, "in that case, just stay like this a little. However long you want to."

It was unfair, Taylor realized at this point. Completely unreasonable, just how considerate and just straight up nice Gabriel was, especially what else she knew him to be capable of.

---

"Oh, right," Gabriel eventually exclaimed after a few minutes of stroking her hair just like that, "we still did need to take care of Gladly."

Come to think of it, he was right, Taylor realized. Somehow, in all this emotionally exhausting discussion their meeting had turned into, she had completely forgotten its original purpose.

Not that it really mattered now, anymore.

"Right, I'll get right on that," she assured Gabriel, the amused smirk on his face showing at her antics somehow weirdly reassuring.

"Are you sure you want to go through with this? I understand what happened last time around was adrenaline-fueled, in the moment, but you've had time to think things through by now."

Shaking her head, Taylor just closed her eyes, concentrating on what was going on inside the slightly messy apartment she'd been keeping a figurative eye on all this while (even if she didn't quite need to, doing so made it clear she was doing something.) "No need for that. Gladly did what he did, and he knew exactly what it was. The police or the PRT or whatever may not really care, but I do, and though I'm maybe not quite comfortable with judge, jury and executioner in this case..."

A sizeable swarm, already slowly gathered over the course of the conversation, her attention split into several tasks easily enough, moved into position, ready to viscerally end a life.

"It's really quite clear what needs to happen in this case. Also, I promised, didn't I? I'd like to think that's worth something."

With that, it happened. Taylor may have been wavering earlier, unsure how to go about doing things, but at this point, she'd regained a measure of... of equilibrium, of stability, she hadn't known for longer than she could remember. As it turned out, the talk with whom she now knew to be Gabriel really had helped, clearing the sense of... everpresent self-doubt, she would call it, up, just a little.

And thus, Mister Gladly had to die. Not simply for what he had done, but for what he may do in the future; the authorities refused to put him behind bars, where he could possibly be... rehabilitated, or something of the sort, and so it fell to others to ensure no further victims would have to suffer under his perversions.

"If you're sure," Gabriel shrugged, simply petting her hair a little more. She couldn't say she disliked the feeling, at least. "Oh, right, I'm actually planning to stream later today, Painting with Cain can never rest, after all. Would you like to come with me, take a look at the base? Or at least decide on the theme for the first drawing of today."

A screaming and flailing figure was trying to get to his apartment's door, a thousand mouths taking miniscule bites out of his flesh even as dozens of pairs of fangs injected venom and dozens of stingers ejected their payload into him and, unbeknownst to this doomed individual, the door's lock was sealed tight with copious amounts of spider silk, gathered beforehand and carefully applied over the last minutes.

"That sounds good, Gabriel."

---

Richard Gladly moved through his apartment, a nervous eye swerving around his surroundings before returning to the clock hung above the door of his living room.

He'd made it through monday, after the cops refused to let him stay in the cells where it was safe, even if they'd been really full, admittedly, having purchased bug spray and getting his newspapers ready and rolled up for a sustained war. He'd seen what those bugs did to people, there was a reason he was arming himself to the teeth!

It wasn't even his fault! So what if he had... tastes, it wasn't like he actually went out and raped anyone! That's why he went to those places in the first place, to let off a little steam in safe ways! The girls were trained and experienced, they never struggled, so it wasn't rape, to boot! This was all a huge misunderstanding!

But he wasn't exactly given a chance to talk back in the moment, with those cold, emotionless compound eyes staring at him as the cape proclaimed a death sentence. Of course they wouldn't put him in prison, he was innocent! Everyone agreed that going to those places was perfectly fine and not strictly illegal, he'd asked the people there!

The cops hadn't listened, of course, when he'd asked them to protect him from the inhuman, insectile cape. He'd done everything correctly, told them everything he knew, but they'd been completely unreasonable. He thought they might not even have believed him, why else would they send him to his death?!

"Haah!" Swinging his trusty newspaper, Richard smacked yet another insect out of the air, a fly that had come to spy on him. But he wasn't fooled, no, not at all!

He had to be prepared. He had to steel himself and survive the first true attempt on his life, not these... these scouts, spies and occasional kamikaze attackers in the odd wasp or two he'd sighted ever since he was thrown into danger, and use the camera he had set up as proof that his life was in danger. Then they would have to believe him and put him into... into protective custody!

He was prepared. He had fortified his home, used carton to stuff up any ways to enter he could find and used his weapons to eradicate any possible spies or attackers that made their way inside anyways. He was outnumbered, as was natural, but he wouldn't give up that easily, no!

Richard Gladly was prepared to fight the good fight. He couldn't possibly die here, after all! He hadn't done anything wrong! And just thinking of all his students, suddenly deprived of their favorite teacher, how crushed they would be... he couldn't possibly do that to them. The deaths of people one knew always struck deep, he knew this from experience, after all, and he liked to think he was fairly close to many of them.

Thinking of his (younger) students, his eyes darted to where he stored his treasures, carefully collected and curated over years of effort. He had made an art form of sneaking into the locker rooms while gym class was in progress at random times, and the lockers were laughably easy to open if one knew how... as it was to hide certain cameras in unobtrusive spots.

He would have to hide them just in case before he went to the PRT for help. He was a teacher, but he was fairly sure these would have people ask questions if found, so... better to head that off bef-

"HIIIH!" Explosively spraying his secret weapon, Richard made sure to stomp on the enemy's vanguard, the cockroach as tough as he already knew they were. Hyperventilating, he did his best to survey his surroundings, but it seemed the time wasn't upon him... yet.

Just as he took a moment to sit down, doing his best to slow down his breathing while he thought about how regretful it was he couldn't at least jerk off to keep himself calm, but refusing to let his guard down that easily, however, it happened.

First, there was an indistinct sound. Quiet, at first, to the point he had trouble really making it out. But once he realized it was happening, it became impossible to ignore. Buzzing, chittering movement, coming from all around him, the walls, the ceiling, the floor.

The skittering was enough to drive a man mad on its own.

Knowing the moment to act had come, the unjust attempt on his life proceeding in full right then and there, Richard Gladly dashed over to the phone, knowing it was now or never. Picking up the speaker with shaking hands, he hastily slammed in the number combination for...

Shit, the cable! The cable was cut! It had to have been sabotaged beforehand!

Barreling over into his bedroom, Richard made for his nightstand, his mobile phone there to charge just in case, but... it was missing. Damn, fuck, shit! He'd been had!

Right back to hyperventilating through his open mouth twice as hard now, Richard considered his options. He could... he could run, right? Get help. Someone had to be able to help him, and he had his spray with him, so-

The everpresent chitinous skitter stopped, for just a moment. Then, before he could try being relieved, it exploded, both in volume and into movement in the corner of his eyes. Forcefully keeping his mouth closed, Richard slowly turned around... only to see a humongous mass of insects gather in his living room.

Slowly, very slowly, he moved towards the walls, keeping them at his back as he kept as quiet as possible, but right in the middle of it all, halfway towards the exit of this hell his place had turned into, it turned out it was all for naught.

First, the flies and moths flapped around in his vicinity. Then came the crawlers. Then came the groups of spiders, dropping onto him from above and covering him in sticky shit, his suddenly hasty run towards freedom and safety complicated by the pain blooming all over him as the hellish things surrounding him covered every inch of skin, crawling and biting under his clothes where they concealed it.

Now crying out in agony, Richard did his best to bolt anyways, none of his millions of enemies capable of physically stopping him except for the pain and the webs, but he wasn't giving them time to cover him, ignoring it all the best he could as he opened the door, just moments from help and heroes that would stop the horrible, horrible monster plaguing him.

Except it didn't budge.

Panically tearing at the handle, Gladly realized what had to have happened. They had to have locked the door! They were learning! They were going to overtake humanity, and he would be their first victim! They would eat him from the inside and use his skin to disguise themselves!

Screaming his head off through the layer of cockroaches and spiders streaming inside as soon as he did, Richard Gladly turned around, running towards and into his living room window. Once, twice, thrice the short man's shoulder slammed against the glass, before his mind, poisoned by venom, panic and pain, realized he needed another way, opening it with a quick flip of the handle.

He needed to get away! He needed to warn them all!

But ultimately, all he achieved was to elude the team of PRT agents kicking open his door just as he flew out and into the open air, making a mess of his eventual autopsy.

---

"Any luck?" Agent Petrovsy asked, securing the site as per the usual protocol, the plastic band with 'PRT INVESTIGATION - KEEP OUT -' written on it slowly shutting off the crime scene, or at least the part of it that happened to splatter itself across the street.

"Nothing, nada, zilch," came back from Agent Arens, the man feeling for a puls for the sake of pure formality. "Pretty sure it'd been too late even if he didn't jump- just a few specks of skin left by this point, and I'm seeing bulging protrusions where venom was injected all over the body. No need to wait for a toxology report, we've seen enough of this already. Crypts cape going wild, like the report said."

Grimacing under the glass concealing any of her features, Petrovsky nodded. "Writing this report is gonna be a bitch. Why'd the idiot have to jump, seriously." They both knew that keeping the... bloodier side of cape affairs out of the public eye was a part of their job, one they and the rest of their squad had failed at in this case, even if there was nothing they could have done to change this particular outcome. Not to mention she already had to wave off more traffic than optimal for moments like this- they were still waiting for the second team to arrive with the usual barriers and equipment.

Safe to say they weren't actually going to be moving the body. That was stupid in a crime scene, and doubly so in a parahuman crime scene. As any trooper could tell you, powers were bullshit.

"How's it looking down there, over?" Came over their radios, Gonzales playing the dutiful squadleader as always.

"Body secured and watching right now. How's it looking up top, over?"

"Not a speck of chitin in sight up here, unknown musta cleaned up. Phone line was cut, we're gonna need to have someone look into the wiring at some point. This boogey is just getting worse, over."

Not everyone agreed with the casual identification of unknown or unnamed capes, but nobody was going to complain about it, either. "Heard you loud and clear, Gamma Lead. Keeping watch for anything unusual as always, over."

Honestly, keeping watch for several days now over this sick filth just to watch how he was executed felt extremely unsatisfying, but hey, a job was a job. Now all they could do was hope it was worth it, that the eggheads would pick up on something new. They hadn't caught heads nor tails of the insect master, so that was the best they could get from here on.

Sometimes, her job sucked, Petrovsky thought to herself, trying not to look at the mutilated body. As did her entomophobia.

---

The way back to your underground lair is fairly quiet and subdued, even through Taylor telling you what she thinks are PRT agents swarming the area. Though, truthfully, you aren't actually moving at this point yet, instead simply waiting for Sherrel to arrive to take you and your new guest back.

You do have faith in her speed, not like a bunch of guys two blocks over are going to find you hiding where you are, the two of you having repositioned to a nearby rooftop just in case any passerby might come around, not that this area really is that populated at the best of time- that'll probably change soon enough, this being a residential area and traffic usually picking up once rush hour begins.

Taylor already knows the invisivan, having rode it last time, too, and so all that happens is that she introduces herself to Sherrel, the curvy mechanic just laughing and slapping her shoulder in response as she drives on.

Oh, and she begins discussing what you should do first thing in the stream you told her about, because nothing can ever be easy and she refuses to just say the first thing that came to mind, for 'some reason'.

You can't see anything in her expression, but you certainly can notice the odd insect acting erratically as the van drives onwards.

"You sure you don't want the owl? I'm sure it'd look lovely," you say, gauging Taylor's reaction. It isn't that she's been particularly obvious about it, her body language still doing her thing with the bugs, but she does seem strangely opposed to the topic... but more in an embarrassed way than anything else, you feel.

"Just do a nice beach with a sunrise, it's a classic for a reason," she insists. Oddly enough, she doesn't actually object all that hard, just giving a few simple platitudes to argue for her suggestion.

"Hmm... Really sure? Reaaally?"

"..."

"Because for some reason, I really, really want to draw a cute little owl to start off today's stream."

Pointedly looking out of the window, Taylor exhales a long breath. "Just do whatever you want, then."

"Sure, Taylor. Will do." And wonder of wonders, she doesn't complain the slightest bit when you stroke her hair again.

---

Taking Taylor along to one of the empty meeting rooms, you telepathically ask your sister to join you, bringing her up to speed on everything that's happened with Taylor so far.

On the way, she asked about how pretty much only women were walking around the base, leading to you explaining how nearly all of the Crypts' core members were women simply by virtue of gathering in the first group that wasn't made up of assholes of one color or another, which you simply took advantage of back when you first established the group as such.

What follows is, perhaps unsurprisingly, a barrage of questions about how the Crypts first came to be, how the organization is structured and how what works. Looks like Taylor has given up all pretenses of holding back, though, so you just humour her easily enough.

That said, it doesn't take long to arrive, and once Sarah joins the two of you, you all take a seat at one of the smaller tables inside. At Taylor's questioning look, you go ahead and introduce her. "This is my sister Sarah, you may remember her; she is also a vampire. Sarah, this is Taylor, our bug girl."

"Nice to meet you," Sarah smiles at Taylor, stretching out a hand and receiving the same in return.

Huh, she seems subdued in response to Sarah, though. Hard to read with her emotions thing, though.

"Now then, before we proceed, are you doing alright, Taylor? Anything I can get you, something to drink?"

"No, thank you," the dark-haired girl replies, her helmet resting on the table.

"Very well, so, while we're here, I would like to extend a formal offer; would you like to join the Lord Street Crypts? Not to brag, but we do pay rather well, both in money and... other services."

She must be reading something in your smile, seeing how she blushes prettily at that, though it goes away in short order.

"I... It's a bit too late to think that kind of offer over, I suppose. So yes, I would like to join. Just..."

The thought Sarah sends over to you can be summed up as 'leave it to me', though she's using more feeling that words to get this across. "Don't worry, just spit it out. Your power is strong and versatile, and even if it wasn't, capes are valued highly enough most groups that aren't idiotic in the first place will spend some serious resources for them."

Swallowing, whether out of nervousness or just in general, Taylor nods. "I... I want to deal with the trio. Emma Barnes, Sophia Hess and Madison Clements." She looks you in the eyes, determination shining through. "I don't want to have to deal with their shit. I'm kind of afraid I might just... kill them, or beat them or something, I don't know, and I refuse to sink to their level. Even if I probably should."

Taking in her darker muttering, you and Sarah share a look as you lean over to Taylor, stroking her hair again.

---

"Hmm..." Making a show of deliberating, you use your enormous strength to simply pluck Taylor out of her seat, smiling at her going still, before simply plopping her down on your lap. "Well, there are various ways we could get you out of that situation; we sure aren't going to make you stay in it. The first step towards improvement is always to free yourself with these kinds of things, whether it's a matter of bullying or domestic abuse."

Taylor tries to say something, but you just keep on speaking straight away. Best to get this all over with in one swoop. "For one, you aren't staying at Winslow. We could get a transfer arranged, or some kind of homeschooling- the latter could double as a cover for your activities as a cape with us here. It would both give you personally a lot more flexibility and get you away from those three."

Obviously unsure about sitting on your lap as you continue patting her, but unwilling to say anything about it, Taylor instead just sounds unsure about another thing entirely. "Is it bad if I... don't want to give them the satisfaction of winning? I don't really care all that much about it anymore, not after... the weekend... but it would still suck."

Chuckling, you shake your head. "As you said, it's really high time you cut your losses. That said, there's nothing wrong with wanting to win out over them, and I hope you're already considering being with us gives you quite a few... alternative ways you could approach the issue."

"I'm not sure I'd want to just run to someone else to deal with my problems like this." And you really appreciate she's a good girl that just tells you things like this straight without you having to pull it like teeth.

"Don't worry, if you don't want to, nobody is going to go 'over your head' to do anything, so long as you're doing fine. Though, just saying, Sophia may be landing in some hot water in the relatively near future, there's a scheme or two I may or may not be working on that will have her all kinds of fucked."

"Yeah," Sarah grins at the two of you, a hand playing with Taylor's hair, "it'll be a hoot, and hopefully give us an opening against the Empire. I can fill you in on what exactly we'll be doing later."

"Noted."

"That said, if you really want to, I'm sure nobody would mind helping you out kidnapping the other two and turn them into helpless pleasure-slaves or something, and we can talk about Sophia at some point, too."

---

At first, you think you might have overdone it with that last suggestion; after all, it isn't every day someone suggest you take people that you have a problem with and basically permanently rape them for the sake of your own pleasure. But as you keep observing, you soon realize the way Taylor is locking up isn't in some form of panic reaction or disgust, no, instead, you make an amusingly cute discovery.

Taylor is drooling.

Chuckling, Sarah wipes said drool away, a now surprisedly blinking Taylor watching as she coquettishely licks the finger she used for it.

Cue atomic blush.

"I see someone likes that idea," you drawl, drawing your palms along her nicely muscled thighs to harvest even more desperate blushing as her eyes dart between yourself and your sister.

"A-are you... I mean," Taylor says, taking a deep breath as she steels herself, "are you really siblings? Because..."

Smirking, you let your head pass right by hers as you lean over her shoulder, deeply kissing your lovely sister who doesn't think twice about returning the gesture, the interplay of your tongues taking a delightfully long moment before you break it up again to speak.

"We are."

Caught between your bodies, Taylor can't exactly do anything to stop the two of you from making out a little, though she certainly doesn't seem to complain about being pushed against by two hot people from both sides.

"Don't worry, though, it's not like anyone on base really cares about anything in that direction, or if they do, they know to keep it to themselves. So, what about it? Should we make sure to mark one of the empty rooms for your use? Maybe the old cells the original owner of this underground base left for us..."

Taylor, bless her heart, seems entirely overwhelmed by this whole situation, so she just awkwardly sits there as she keeps on looking at either of you, then away and to the next sibling. It's endearing, really.

Aisha, you doing anything important right now? You send as you and your sister lead the newest member of the Lord Street Crypts through the halls of your base, a certain destination already in your mind.

Just fucking around with someone, that's all. You need something?

I've got a new cape joining up and she's totally into me and Sarah. Wanna join in on the fun?

Don't need to ask twice. Your room?

My room.

With that sorted out, it doesn't take long until you reach the right place, going through the doors to arrive in the hallway delineating the no-clothing zone of your inner sanctum from the rest of the base.

The look on Taylor's face when both of you start undressing says it all.

"Surprised? Sorry, but beyond this no clothes are allowed. It's a rule that was instated when someone," you playfully pat your sister's head, "decided that everyone inside my place should be naked all the time."

Grinning impishly at her widening eyes, you lean in closer to Taylor, stage-whispering at her. "Special dispensation is allowed for certain articles of clothing, though. Mainly fetish gear, thigh-high socks, the like."

With that, you shrug off your shirt, revealing your abs to the world and immediately having Sarah come over to pat them with a contented sigh, as she's taken to doing lately.

"It's really a shame these beauties can't be on display all the time. You really don't get much better eyecandy than my brother."

---

It takes a moment, but in the end, you don't actually have to tell Taylor to strip down, she moves to do so herself... though she's resolutely looking downwards, to avoid seeing either of you. Doesn't stop you from doing the same to her, though, yourself and Sarah quietly undressing as you observe the impromptu stripshow the girl at most a few years younger than Sarah is giving you.

Piling her clothes in a corner, the blushing virgin (or so you're assuming, anyways, not that that's a thing you can pick up via scent) works her way from top to bottom, her grey-black costume requiring her to unfasten a zipper at her back to give her the space to move her arms and upper body out of it, revealing pale skin and reasonably short fingernails as she goes about ridding herself of all coverings.

Taylor remains visibly hesitant, but still tugs the folds of stretchy cloth down her chest and midsection, a featureless white bra keeping her A-cups in place. You and Sarah don't even need sibling telepathy to convey your thoughts about this- she won't be keeping anything like this. She may look a bit plain herself, but that's no excuse to wear something like that; she'll leave wearing some acceptable underwear or none at all.

Still, a slim waist and similarly boring white panties later, Taylor gets to her legs, bending over as she rolls the legs of her costume down to her knees, entirely unknowingly accentuating her thighs and just how long those legs are.

Once she's shaking her feet loose of her costume, though, looking up for a moment, maybe because she gathered her nerves in the meantime or maybe because she just forgot what situation she was in for a moment, she is confronted with the sight of yourself and your sister, naked, displaying your bodies proudly.

She immediately blushes and looks down again.

"Oh, don't mind us," Sarah encourages her, "go on. We like what we see."

"But you're both so much prettier than me..." Taylor finally mumbles, legitimately fiddling with her fingers, still not looking at either of you directly.

"Nonsense," you use your voice to fill the hallway, "if we didn't want you naked and more, we wouldn't have brought you here, after all."

With that, you're on her, Taylor's big, teary eyes on yours as you give her a hug... before using the opportunity to start fiddling with her bra. "Oh, do we need to give you a hand?"

"Because we don't mind, really," Sarah agrees with her hands on Taylor's hips, "not at all."

Suffice to say, it doesn't take long for a pair of perky little tits, cute little butt and a hairless, just slightly puffy little pussy to be revealed.

"Aww... aren't you so cute?" Sarah asks, gently stroking Taylor's sides even as you nod, pulling the girl's chin up a little so she can't try to hide her eyes again.

"She really is. Our pretty little princess, hm?" It doesn't matter how true it is, though you do think she looks just fine... for a baseline human, anyways. Your standards may be deviating from the norm, actually, considering you only really surround yourself with vampires, thralls and prettied up mortals nowadays.

Doesn't stop you from pressing your lips against hers, her somewhat wide mouth quivering at the intimate contact.

---

In the end, you and Sarah both take one of Taylor's hands to lead her onwards, both to let her know you both want her here and to keep her from covering herself up, the lanky girl's naked body shown off as the rules of your place demand.

Once you've passed the office, the currently vacated room serving to show off your casual wealth and degeneracy (After all, why would the place you allegedly work require everyone inside to be naked?) and make your collective way to your bedroom, Taylor just blushing more and more all the while, you finally meet Aisha, the nearly naked shorter girl lounging on your bed and playing with her phone.

All she's wearing is the collar you gave her, and her free hand is busy with the absolute mountain of sweets of various kinds she has lying on your nightstand, threatening to fall off. And that nightstand isn't a small model, either, so that's saying something.

"Hey boss," she says when you come in, spreading her legs to show herself off to you, her chocolate-colored skin looking almost inviting enough to busy yourself playing with her instead of your current project.

But no, having her help play with Taylor will be just as sexy.

"Hey Aisha, how you doing? Anything interesting happen?" You ask, taking a seat and casually groping her surprisingly big for her age breasts.

"I've been great, Gabe, 'specially with the soul condom thingy. You know," she tries to explain at your confused look, "putting a soul over yourself?"

You just snort. "Just call it overlay, less confusion that way."

"Oh yeah, that makes sense. 'nyways, been messing around fucking with stuff a lot. And taking all the candy. Wanna see?" Holding out her phone for you, you can see Aisha has been looking at photos of things she's done with her power, apparently, everything from just running around naked and stealing department stores' worth of candy she seems to be piling up in unused rooms of your base to randomly stripping people in the streets and sexually abusing others she seems to have taken umbrage with (you never thought you'd actually see a nazi with a steel pipe up his ass, but here you are) .

"Honestly? We should go out and play together one of these days, this looks like a ton of fun."

"Hey, I'm all for it, just tell me when you can. That the new girl?" Aisha asks, the non-sequitur not particularly bothering you.

Looking over at where Sarah has been keeping Taylor busy while your hand steadily wandered downwards over Aisha's stomach to gently rub at her dark lower lips directly, you nod, smiling at the way your new subordinate is blushing cutely. "She is. Her name's Taylor, new bug cape you might have heard of. Bullied, self-esteem issues, the whole nine yards. We've taken her here to build her up a bit while having fun, you up for joining in?"

"Mhm, looks pretty plain for your standard." Leave it to Aisha to say whatever's on her mind.

"She is, but she's cute when she's blushing like this, and it's not like that really matters once she's thralled up for a good bit."

"You think she'll go along with it? Not doubting you, just wanna know what you think about her."

"Oh, no worries on that account. We're pretty much the first people she's really felt connected to for a long, long time. To the point I nearly feel bad about how eagerly she's going along with anything either of us say."

"But not quite, right?" Aisha grins at you, enjoying the feel of your fingers between her legs. "Alright, let's have some fun, then."

---

Taylor, to little surprise, hasn't gotten over her blush by the time you wave her over to the bed, Aisha moved around a little so she doesn't take up too much place.

"So, Taylor, I'm sure you've figured out why we've brought you here," you say, resting a hand on the girl's shoulder and smiling down at her, "but we don't want to pressue you into anything. So I just want you to know that if, at any point, you feel uncomfortable or want to stop, you just need to say so. Can you do that for us?"

Licking her lips nervously, Taylor does her best to even out her breathing, having been increasingly jittery ever since you stripped her, though she's been suppressing her emotions again. Eventually, she just whispers in a quiet voice, quiet enough you imagine it is only your enhanced senses let you hear her.

"It's my first time."

Chuckling, Sarah just embraces her from the side, pushing her breasts onto her shoulder and causing Taylor to freeze up. "Oh, don't worry," she whispers in her ear, "the first one will be over quick. And it'll only get better from there."

It does help that it is around this time Aisha begins playing with Taylor, a dextrous hand fiddling with her privates as she reaches around her hip. Exhaling with less and less control over her actions, it is all Taylor can do to nod.

All it takes is a quick push and she's lying on your bed, Sarah quickly climbing after her and pinning Taylor under her own weight even as you move around to the top of the bed, pulling the shackles still dangling from the holes in the headboard out and around.

Kissing Taylor's cheek even as Sarah grinds against her, you give her a charming chuckle before telling her what's going on. "Guess who is going to be chained to the bed and ravished by the perverted siblings, hm?"

Taylor just whimpers as she stretches up her arms for you, soon almost entirely incapable of moving them of her own volition.

"Now that's what I like to see," Sarah smiles at her, prompty kissing Taylor as she monopolizes her body, only to be nudged to the side when you take your own space, your face buried in the crook of Taylor's neck and planting kisses all along it.

And Aisha, of course, is still playing with Taylor, putting all her presumed practice to good use.

Slowly, but surely, the pair of you moves downwards, kissing and nibbling soft skin and collarbone until you arrive at her breasts, any free hand rubbing and grabbing at her and each other as you play with them.

"Mhm, a bit small, but she has time to grow, so they're not bad," Sarah posits, rolling her nipple under her thumb. You, on the other hand, just smile, shaking your head once your lips let go of hers.

"I don't know, they could stand to grow a bit, but they're already sizeable enough to be a lot of fun as they are."

"True enough, true enough. How are you doing, by the way?" Sarah asks Taylor, the blushing girl staring down her body at the two of you.

"I... I'm fine. It's just a bit... much."

"Oh, don't be overwhelmed already, now," you drawl, lifting yourself up and leaving Sarah to flick every switch she can reach before doing the same, "we haven't even gotten to the fun part yet."

Taylor's eyes immediately zoom in on your dick, now that you're on your knees and giving her a free view on it, along with the rest of your body.

"So big..."

""That's what she said,"" everyone else in the room says at once, which is why you're all chuckling and smiling as you reposition yourself.

In the end, Sarah is lying next to Taylor, helping her hold up her head so she can see where you're approaching her from below.

"I need you to spread your legs for me, Taylor. Can you do that?" You ask gently, already knowing what she'll do. And lo and behold, after a few false starts as her legs shiver and halt, Taylor's long legs open up to welcome you, her sopping wet pussy spreading open just the lightest bit.

"Aww, you've been waiting for this, haven't you?" You ask as you come closer, gently prodding her entrance with your engorged tip.

"Please..."

"Don't worry, I'm giving you what you want," you assure her, softly, but insistently increasing the pressure of your movement until you're just pushing against her, "and then I'll keep going until you beg me to stop, except I won't."

And with that, you're in, your rod slowly spreading the teenaged virgin's cunt around itself as it sinks deeper and deeper inside, her legs coming to clamp onto your sides, but their strength insufficient to so much as momentarily halt your advance deeper inside.

Taylor gasps, moans and shakes as this goes on, the breaking of her hymen just an afterthought as the sensation of your penetration fills her, and soon enough you're halfway inside, taking a moment to tease and toy with Taylor.

"Can you feel that? That's me, inside you. How is it? Can you describe it for me?"

"It's... it's good. So, hah... full, and hot, and... haah..."

"That's good, Taylor. That's very good. Now what would you say when I tell you this," you flex your waist a little, your length moving inside her and causing her to spasm under you for a moment, "is only half of it?"

Her legs begin tensing even harder than they already were. "DunnooOOH!"

And with that, you're back at it, drilling inside Taylor in several long, hard thrusts until you reach the wide-eyed screaming teenager's womb. Not wasting any more time, you begin properly fucking her, keeping her on moaning and shouting in short, hacked-off sounds while Sarah and Aisha join back in, fondling your eager toy and touching yourself all over, whispering filthy promises and scandalous thoughts to her as they kiss and tease her all over.

It isn't long under this treatment until Taylor comes, clenching down around you both inside and outside her body, but you just take her orgasm as an invitation to pound into her harder, lifting her waist so you have a better angle and slamming your entire dick into her in long, hard strokes over and over again, elongating her experience every time your balls slap against her buttcheeks.

But you don't stop there, even as her fluids spill and spread onto the bedcovers from where your tool is plundering her purity, keeping her nice and wet for you.

Again and again you impose the same on the now former virgin, her legs eventually ending up locking into each other behind you, though she doesn't have any power to put into them and frequently just lets them fall onto the bed instead, each orgasm you milk out of her changing the look in her eyes, from disbelieving pleasure to pleasure to mindbending pleasure.

Eventually, you decide to stop holding back, however, and so you look deep into her eyes as you lean forwards, your equally aroused helpers pushing her waist up and into you as they realize what's about to happen.

"I'm about to come, Taylor, and I'm going to fill you up with everything I have. And when I'm done, I'm going to do it again, and again, until it's clear for all the world to see you're mine forever."

A bit of possessive dirty talk never hurt, and you cut off Taylor's pleasure-addled babbling with a kiss as you lean over her, your hands on her shoulders and holding her down (not that you need to, but it's nice) as you jackhammer into her, Sarah and Aisha taking turns fondling and holding your balls as they make out with each other, having moved behind you so they don't get in the way while silently expressing their support for what you're about to do.

Keeping almost your entire length inside her, you rapidly thrust the last few inches you can't fit around, repeatedly hitting her deepest depths at frantic speed before you come, your seed spurting out in long bursts and layering itself inside your newest property, filling up what little space you leave for a long moment before your next thrust pushes it back, making way for the next load, Taylor's cute little pussy squeezing and massaging as the sensation and situation have her cum for one last time.

When her spasms die down, you let up on her mouth, withdrawing the tongue you've been using to play with her own limp one and letting her hastily breathe in again, slowly pulling yourself out of her as you note the very slight bulge your cock is making in her lower stomach... before pushing yourself right back inside, driving what little air she could get out of her lungs, her wild, wide eyes confused for a long moment before her brain restarts.

"Come now, didn't you listen earlier, Taylor?" You ask as you slowly pick up speed again. "A little fun fact about my power, it gives me unlimited stamina. I could keep doing this for hours on end."

Taylor just gapes at you, the snickering from behind you as Aisha and Sarah come back around not serving to reassure her of her continued sanity at all.

---

"Seriously, Gabe? Seriously? How does something like this even happen?"

"I dunno, this's pretty neat."

You just sigh, wordlessly taking your lovers' comments. It's not like Sarah is wrong to honestly question the results of your actions, but-

"Her eyes are rolled back! That doesn't happen normally, you know?! This is not how people work! So why. Did. That. Happen."

"I don't know, okay? It just did. I just fucked her like I do normally, and paid attention to how she'd feel based on what I remember from trying out my female form with Kate, so-"

"God DAMMIT Gabe, why? Why do you do this to me?"

Holding back the chuff of laughter at your little comedy routine, you scoot over on the bed, taking your pouting sister into a one-armed hug, her face resolutely turned away from you. Aisha, in the meantime, curiously pokes Taylor, the passed-out girl hanging in her chains with your thick seed slowly oozing out between her legs.

"Hey, anyone mind if I..."

Reaching over to pat your pet's head, you just smirk. "Go ahead, but be gentle, okay? First time and all, she'll be really sore when she wakes up. And we probably should get her a bit more comfortable first."

With that, you move around to actually get her out of the shackles, the purely recreationally designed manacles actually openable by the hands wearing them so long as they aren't locked, and carefully slide the glasses of Taylor's face, folding them together and depositing them on your nightstand by summarily claiming a package of cookies for glasskind.

"You have to be careful about cutting off circulation and stuff like that, so it's best to massage wrists and ankles after a session like this to make sure she'll be alright in a few hours," you explain to Aisha, the impish girl listening carefully at the unexpected wisdom you're dispensing.

"How do you even know about this kind of thing?" Sarah asks, her curiosity overwhelming her imaginary pout.

"Oh, I knew a teacher back in high school that was really into this stuff. She insisted I got into the chains at first, but it didn't take me long to talk her into trying for the 'other side' at least once," you chuckle to yourself. "Didn't take her long to insist on the whole master/slave thing in a much more reasonable composition."

Frustrated, Sarah throws up her arms. "Since when exactly have you been living in some cheap porn version of reality without anyone noticing?!"

"Yeah, mghn, not gonna lie, that sounds a lot like you've always been weird about this even before going cape or however that worked," Aisha throws in, already busily licking up your cum like it's a delicacy of some kind, eyeing her portable candy stash all the while.

Taken aback by your these new questions, you try to think back, going through your whole life with a fine-toothed comb. "Well, there was this kindergarten teacher way back-"

"Wait, what?"

"-that always insisted on making sure I was 'properly cleaned' every time I came in from outside or went to the toilet, so she'd personally made sure mini-me's dick was wiped by fondling it. She always muttered something about it being her job and duty, but she was obviously just saying that for the sake of her conscience and all. Come to think of it, she was how I had my first blowjob as soon as I was physically capable of getting erections, huh?"

In the sense of stunned silence at your exploits, you continue on, stroking your chin in the classical thinker pose as you continue. "Then there was the lady next door just a few days after that happened, not sure what she really wanted when she asked me to come into her home, but one way or the other, we ended up having actual sex on the kitchen floor, which was how I lost my virginity. Then there's the mother of that other kid that caught me and the teacher and ended up joining in and coming back for more later, the elementary school teacher that just started in the same year I went to school, the pair of twins I got to know there that wanted to play adult games with me, the school nurse that-"

"Please, just stop," Sarah interrupts you again, her face buried in her hands. "So what you're saying is, it's always been like this for you?"

"Well, I have been getting better at satisfying women ever since I rose from the dead," you clarify, "but otherwise, yes. In fact, when I died, it took me just a few days of wandering around confusedly before I found Kate and we pretty much started banging as soon as we settled into the warehouse I stashed you before getting this base, if you remember."

Before you can continue, Sarah glomps onto you, her arms around your shoulders and head next to yours. "That explains so much, Gabe. Now and from before. I always wondered why all those older women were so nice to us."

"Yeah, Miss Donnower's cookies always were the best."

"Just shut up, Stupid Gabey. I'm having a moment."

"Oh, sure. Go ahead." Confusedly, you simply embrace Sarah back, feeling like you've come to an understanding of some sort, though for the life of you you couldn't say what about.

---

Sarah Livsey resisted the urge to rest her face in her palms, instead choosing to drag one of the laptops she made sure to keep in the room at all times out from under the sizeable bed lovely Aisha was still languidly stretching on, slowly but surely taking her toll on the newest cape recruit of their little gang.

Gabe was about to launch into another of his streams, after all, and she wasn't about to miss the show, even if her thoughts were somewhere else.

"So, not gonna say I'm surprised, but that was pretty fucky," Aisha piped up as she waited for the thing to boot up, the pet she shared with her brother and their other lovers looking up from where she was crouching between Taylor's legs.

"You're telling me," Sarah groaned, keenly aware she would be starting to get a headache right then and there if she wasn't beyond such mortal foibles by now. "I know Gabe's childhood wasn't exactly easy, no surprise there, but the child molestation in his direction is news."

And while she may believe that some could have just thought up a story like that, as some kind of macho mechanism, a 'look at how manly I was from the time I could walk', one, her Gabe would never knowingly lie to her, and two-

Telling the truth/telling the truth as he knows it/genuinely confused at your reaction/does not consider his experience strange or out of the ordinary

Conclusion: Truth, considers childhood experience to be normal

-her power completely agreed with her conclusions.

"So you really didn't know? That's kind of weird, innit? Like, I didn't know you before you got together with him again, but you'd think Gabe sleeping around like that would be obvious sooner or later."

"I think it's a double-layered normality bias. You know, for him, it was completely normal to have sex from before he really should be able to, and for me and Reggie it was normal for him to be missing for a while every now and then. It's just something you don't really think about, I guess," Sarah explained as she leaned over to rub Aisha's ass, her brother's mild fixation on Aisha's butt something she ever so slightly found herself sharing.

It was indeed very cute.

"Mhm. Still weird, though. Guess it explains why he's totally up for having sex with younger girls, at least, not that 'm complainin'," Aisha grinned up at her, her lips smeared with the delicious seed she was occuping herself with.

"Don't I know it," Sarah snorted, opening the browser once the operating system of her portable internet access got itself together. "Granted, I don't really care about what he does nowadays one way or another, that kind of thing doesn't matter to you once you go full vamp, but I just can't help but wonder what all of this means for Gabriel. Like, how was he influenced by being pretty much raped by a bunch of women from a young age?"

"Are you kiddin'? I'd say the influence is pretty fucking obvious, what with how much he's just approaching everything with sex."

"I mean, yes," Sarah waved her off, "but that's just the surface layer of this particular area of fuckery, isn't it? I mean, did Gabe even think about arranging things like this, with several lovers that all know about each other and get along, or did he just assume we all would work out like this?"

Adjusting the angle of Taylor's legs to let them rest easier, Aisha gave off a sigh as she heaved herself upwards, so as to speak properly. "With him, chances are it's both, isn't it? I mean, come to think of it, how likely is it that the mindfuckery you and the others got was based on his mindset?"

Surety of his assertions/constant contact to others/obsessive pleasuring of others/semi-casual way of handling relationships/subconscious attitude adjustments based on audience

Conclusion: Gabriel is subconsciously terrified of losing those close to himself/Gabriel will go to extreme lengths to ensure happiness of lovers in an attempt to keep them happy with himself/Gabriel considers consensual sex as a way to establish rapport/Vampirization inflicts mental adjustments based on turning vampire's worldview and preferred relationship types

Groaning, Sarah closed her eyes again. "Yeah, it's both. And I'm pretty sure you're right, going vamp doesn't just do some default changes, our minds were actually adjusted so we'd find ourself fitting into Gabe's harem."

"Cool." There was a long beat of silence before Aisha spoke up again, long enough for Sarah to open the webpages she would be paying at least a little attention to shortly. "So, how's it feel? Any real bad differences or...?"

"It's actually a pretty benevolent change, all told," Sarah huffed out. "Pretty sure we're all ultimately happier for it. The process also seems to make minimally necessary changes, and if anything, Gabe was affected the most out of all of us."

"Oh, really? How was he before, what changed for him?" Aisha asked eagerly, obviously curious about Gabe. As well she should, few things were as interesting as Sarah's brother.

"Oh, there's a few things, each of them small by themselves, but some also make much more sense now that I know what his deal was from before he could even get a boner up." And really, Sarah was kind of busy recontextualizing everything she knew about her Gabe. The unexplained absences, all those women and girls, some even younger than she was herself, being strangely nice to herself and Reggie, frequently asking how her Gabe was...

"Well, let's get to telling childhood stories, then. Gabe was always the best brother someone could ask for, though I'm kind of wondering how things would have turned out if he didn't apparently decide to wait for me to initiate and just gave so much as the slightest suggestion he'd be open to that kind of relationship..."

Aisha giggled at that. "What, so the incest isn't even anything new?"

"You kidding?" Sarah snorted. "Have you seen those abs? If anything, it's a wonder I didn't try jumping him half a lifetime ago. Though I was hardly in a position to try anything at that age- don't tell anyone, but I was a completely anxious wreck at that point of my life. Even if I got the idea to pine after Gabe into my head, I'd never have been bold enough to actually try, even if any other boy obviously was, is and will be inferior to my big brother."

Suffice to say, Big Gabey was a great topic of conversation; you never got bored of talking about him.

---

Director Emily Piggot, PRT ENE, scowled at the report she was reading, as she so often found herself doing.

The minor operation to reveal more information about the Lord Street Crypts' new member had been a flop, though it really couldn't have been helped; they needed to find out more to keep the situation under any semblance of control, and the PRT was behind in terms of information on Crypt capes badly enough as is.

Fuck's sake, they had no damn confirmation as to how many capes they even had, except a vague 'more than we're comfortable with'. A marked departure from the way gangs and, it hurt to admit, the PRT went about things, making sure to announce any capes they had as a way to assert influence over other local groups, using their numbers as deterrents and threats alike, while these guys were content to let everyone else stew in the unknown.

Hell, they weren't even really sure what Cain's power really was, contradictory reports putting all they knew into stark contrast with the confirmed information they had on literally every other criminal in Brockton Bay.

It was ridiculous. Sure, quite a few capes held something back; a trick or power application they usually hid and pulled out in dire situation, to turn a fight around or get away with their lives by doing something their opponent did not expect. Not all powers lent themselves to something like this, but enough of them did that it was something to keep in mind.

But here they had a gang that kept whole capes secret, and Emily couldn't even call it a bad decision, considering their power projection was already sufficient to keep all other groups at bay after the way Lung had died to Cain. And, she suspected, to keep the eyes of the PRT at large pointed at their own problems for the time being.

The fact of the matter was that few of the PRT's information could be properly confirmed, but they knew about Cain, a possible biotinker of some kind, one or several tinkers of uncomfirmed specialties, a weapon-based striker and a changer with pyrokinesis of some stripe and the insect master, and most of that information came from the failed Empire intrusion into Crypt territory (which had since enlarged even further, of course).

Add in even less confirmed sources, such as the possible bluff against Dauntless and the parahumans seen patrolling in Crypt colors and they were looking at upwards of a dozen additional capes. Pure lunacy, of course, but they could not confirm the situation one way or the other, and Emily refused to send any of her people into a possibly hopeless fight if it could at all be avoided, even before considering Mister Cryokinesis That Also Breaks Tinkertech. And normal technology, too, if what investigations of the warehouse full of Merchants he butchered before the Dauntless Confrontation revealed was true.

So they were back at square one. Information. Well, Operation Bugsting (she simply couldn't find the strength to send threatening messages to whoever named it that) had revealed that the insect-based master had a larger reach than their best guesses had estimated, allowing them to make good on their threat without ever being sighted by their observers.

That was about all the good news to be had from this whole fiasco, however. Keeping the news suppressed entirely was impossible the moment the bait had thrown itself out the window, being free for all to see as he was swarmed by a deadly amount of insects. There was even a picture of this Gladly mid-flight circulating around the internet, though they already had people on photoshopping it around in both subtle and obvious ways to cast doubt on the whole thing.

It was actually somewhat impressive just how thoroughly this unknown master had stealthily sabotaged the entire apartment; webbed-up locking mechanism, chewed-through phone cables, several holes quietly made in the walls allowing access through massive amounts of minions... it was unknown just how long it took to do all this, but none of the observers spotted anything while this happened.

Threat assessments were going to be a bitch, but that was why they had experts on payroll. Speaking of which, Emily pulled up the file on Cain; his threat assessment was, at best, rough, but no thinkers had been able to provide detailed support one way or the other, so it was what they had.

Provisional Shaker 6, Striker 3, Mover 2 and Master 4, just to cover their bases, with a note explaining that these weren't final ratings and likely to be revised once further information was available. Meaning, they didn't know crock shit and were wildly guessing.

Guesswork and suppositions, but they were what they all had to work with. At least she didn't have to deal with some madman calling himself the Alabama Ranger anymore, the insane cape having disappeared following his first appearance so far.

If there was a god out there, he'd stay that way, but Emily wasn't getting her hopes up.

Speaking of which, it was about time for something to go horribly wrong, as the knock on her door indicated.

"Emily, it's that time of the week again," Renick greeted her, his hands disappointingly empty.

"And I see we're not even getting drunk this time?" Emily asked with a raised eyebrow, her mood already hovering around where it usually did for these occasions.

"You heard the doctors as well as I did, no alcohol for the next two months. I can get you a coffee at most, but otherwise it's snacks and water for us."

Director Emily Piggot, Director PRT ENE, let out a long, drawn-out sigh. So much for keeping her position tolerable in the long term.

---

"Hello everyone," you exclaim in your usual voice for these occasions, "and welcome to Painting with Cain! Let me be honest with you, I've been a little... busy... lately, but that doesn't mean we can't have fun as usual. Now, let us begin!"

As per your promise to Taylor, your first picture of the day is centered around an owl, with you opting for a snow owl, not quite pure white but with a few blue-ish colors mixed in, looking backwards at the viewer as it sits on a gnarled branch, largely bare woodwork around it slowly shedding leaves as winter sets into the world.

You'll also need an appropriately scenic background, of course, and so you have your work cut out for you.

"You know, I get the feeling we just really, really don't look at natural landscapes and motives anymore, for artistic purposes or otherwise. There's a certain kind of serenity and peace you just don't get in today's hectic hubbub. Not saying we should all go out and become hippies, of course, but when was the last time you've really been surrounded by nature, if you live in the city? Just a random thought."

Keeping the background relatively indistinct and fuzzy, you reserve the majority of attention for the centerpiece, taking special care to give the bird piercing, blue eyes as you work on the colors of the sky visible above, sunset just setting in and its rays visible behind a distant mountain range, but the first stars already poking out where its light cannot quite reach the canopy of clouds.

And, of course, drawing out all these feathers and coloring them just right is a huge pain, though one you'd consider worth it.

"Here, isn't this just a beauty? You don't really see animals like this around, normally, but I think this is something we can be satisfied with."

"But enough about my ramblings and melancholy for a time when landscapes like this had people pay attention and focus their imagination, let's see what we shall draw next, hm?"

---

Uyehara Yoshiaki sat down in the place that'd come to be known as their unofficial meeting room, the newest developments requiring a full meeting of their little 'council', what little of a governing body the disembodied souls caught in this place had insistent on keeping track of things like this so they could set an 'official policy' for how to interact with their malevolent overlord, not that they could really make any of the others do what they said.

Still, it was something to do and gave the hundreds of aimless dead people walking around something to gossip about, or at least those amongst them that had a mind to do so.

Looking around, it seemed Philip-Sensei and Kirion-Sensei were already in attendance, chatting with each other in hushed whispers. The latter was, along with himself, one of those souls summoned for the longest stretches of time, sharing the dubious honor with... Nolan.

Whom thakfully wasn't part of their council. Having to tolerate the madman's existence was, at times, the worst part of this whole situation he had found himself in.

Quietly watching as the rest of their membership filed in one after another, arrival times thankfully quite rapid due to the psychopathic maids filling this entire world, as far as any of them had found out.

They still teleported people around on request, so everyone availed themselves to their services; honestly speaking, just getting around this gargantuan place would make moving from one place to another an enormous chore, otherwise.

Just because none of them got tired, hungry or thirsty didn't mean they wouldn't get bored, after all.

Speaking of which, it looked like the crowd of former administrators, do-gooders and the odd psychologist were all there, so it was about time they began, if he was reading Philip-Sensei right (and he really should drop the honorifics one of these days, even if he really respected the guy for what he'd done for all of the summoned).

Clearing his throat, Philip rose, bringing the chatter filling the room to an end. "I see everyone has arrived; good. Before we begin with the topic of this meeting I am sure all of you are aware of," he said, throwing a glance at the corner of the room where one of the many monitors set up throughout this whole dimension was relaying their collective killer prattering on about some unrelated topic while drawing something on stream as though showcasing his artistic talent would make him any less of a monster, this one at least looking to be made of wood rather than some of the more outlandish (and organic) designs he'd seen, "let us walk through what little we have done recently and go from there."

Worse, it was working to affect people's opinions... somehow.

"First of all, posting a guide at the armory's entrance to greet any newcomers has been a great help in cutting down on lost and confused souls wandering the halls for days on end before stumbling into someone to tell them what is going on, though any massive influx like we saw in Rapture is still hard to deal with for just one or two people, which is why I would like to propose we instate reserve guides to act in case we can see... the entrance to this place... acting up and bringing in larger groups."

It still baffled Uyehara that apparently nobody wanted to just call things as they were, but he held his peace.

A quick vote later, the motion passed and the additional duties were handed out, a similar scene repeating several times where someone brought a motion up and, after a quick discussion at most, it was voted upon, being either accepted or rejected and implemented accordingly. It was all fairly boring and trivial, but that was how these things just tended to go, after all; it wasn't like their council was any 'official' governing body, nor could they actually enforce their resolutions on anyone.

They were all unwilling slaves to their master, in the end, all equally bound to his demands and his alone. Not like anything they did here was that terribly important, either, just helping things along for the newbies, mediating conflicts if someone sought their help out for this purpose and dealing with issues in general.

There'd been an uproar when the fancy dining rooms first manifested themselves, the steadily but slowly regenerating food far from enough to easily feed everyone and leading to very intense arguments over food distribution between huddled non-survivors breaking out all over the place.

Still, it didn't take too long to get to the meat of the matter for this full meeting, Uyehara normally preferring to avoid the minutiae of leadership as he very well knew his strengths not to lie in this direction.

"Next on the docket, what you have all been waiting for... Analysis of the new information on our 'keeper'."

Cheeky old fuck just had to use his old moniker, didn't he?

Clearing his throat, Uyehara nodded. "Simply put, we're fucked."

When he didn't follow up on those words, the other participants of the meeting began shuffling uncomfortably for a bit before the look Kirion was giving him caused Uyehara to relent. "Alright, to be more precise, it looks like it isn't enough we're stuck inside the head of a monstrous mass murderer and worse, our walking talking prison was also heavily molested as a child, which may very well have something to do with his current mindset. Now, I'm not exactly a psychologist, but I do happen to be the one guy he seems to consistently keep summoned and interacts with that isn't an insane serial killer or worse and I've been surreptuously using my power of analysis on him whenever I could. With that in mind, let us sit down and figure out if there isn't some way to use this new information to steer the big guy towards hopefully being less of a monster."

They didn't exactly like the way he put things, but they couldn't exactly object, either. And honestly, it wasn't like Uyehara couldn't intuit how Gabriel Livsey's earlier experiences formed the insane man he knew- compulsively trying to manipulate his surroundings to keep the control he didn't have during his first sexual experiences, which heavily bled over into how he approached sexuality and relationships, followed by the whole polyarmory thing if he understood what little they got before the man's sister interrupted him correctly and, of course, the fact he didn't really view anyone he wasn't personally involved with as, essentially, background filling serving only to be used for his plots or eaten.

Okay, that last one was kind of a stretch, but combining a shitty childhood with parents he hated with him finding solace only in getting women (and girls, apparently) to have sex with him and his siblings, it kind of made sense.

But he wasn't going to just tell the others the facts; instead, he'd simply convey what he knew and his analysis had gotten him and let them made their own conclusions from there. He'd learned his lesson by now- people instinctively refused being told the truth unless they were just given the puzzle pieces to it to assemble it themselves, so that was what he was going to do.

---

"Oh, Transition Of Time, huh? That's... a fairly vague term, especially so in a still medium like this. But let's see what we can do..."

Well, one obvious solution, just draw something that signifies the passing of time. You're not necessarily above working with metaphors, even tortured ones, to get your point across.

WIth that in mind, you guesstimate the proportions of what you want and get to work, carefully choosing your color palettes moving forwards.

"Luckily enough, artistic freedom exists to let us work around issues like this. Now, how close do you think day and night can come to each other in nature? Because we don't really need to care for our purposes."

Drafting up yet another natural landscape, you go for a nice, shallow body of water with stones scattered throughout it and surrounded by a bit of vegetation, mountains rising into the sky on both sides, mostly to give a little more contrast for the division.

To the left, a morning or evening sky, heavily clouded and kept in a brighter orange, while the right contains a clear night sky, a crescent moon shining as a pleasant blue clashed with its opposite.

"In the end, we can easily work around pretty much most problems like this by simply getting a little creative. One thing I can't emphasize enough; keep an open mind and think until you find a solution that satisfies you. And, of course, can have fun with! Less advice for drawing and more for life in general, but I suppose it works, huh?"

---

"Huh. 'Crystal Apocalypse', hm? I'm not sure what any of you expected to come from this one, but sure, let me give it a try."

Interestingly enough, you've already drawn something along these lines before, inside your inner world, and so all you really need to do is repeat that earlier work.

Not exactly riveting nor exciting, but hey, you won't exactly complain about easy work.

"You know, it is kind of hard to really work through something as mildly esoteric like this, but I certainly can get something. The biggest issue, of course, will be the lighting- crystals refract and all, as I'm sure you can imagine, which is why the sky will have to be full of clouds for this one. Oh, and we're using a highway as a metaphor for modern human civilization- that just has a lot of power as an image, hasn't it?"

And so you go, working your way through a dilapidated construction visibly falling apart and far too many individual crystal growths, cropping out everywhere and being their green crystal selves.

"Kind of foreboding and all, but I suppose it was requested, more or less. Either way, make of this what you will, but it's time for the next picture!"

---

"Apparently, you guys really took my earlier comments way more seriously than they were meant," you say, letting off a light chuckle. "But sure, we can work with 'Serenity of Nature' as a theme. Now, let's see..."

Alright, so you'll need some way to express nature in some way, and add in maximum peacefulness without seeming forced.

Actually, screw that, time to force it as hard as you can and take refuge in audacity. The strategy hasn't failed you yet, you see no reason to avoid it.

So. A giant floating buddha statue. With... a waterfall flowing out of its hands. Religions in general kind of took a nosedive with the advent of parahumans, but certain cliches stuck around, and you're certainly going to make use of them.

Oh, and the statue has to be sitting on a floating island, too, of course!

"Luckily enough, there's loads of images and themes that you can find throughout humanity's history if you just take a moment to look, which I suppose is another good lesson to take away from this stream."

A tree here, a tree there, a tree everywhere, and another little island floating behind the statue's head. The waterfall falling into a small pond in... a barren mountain region, grass and shrubbery only now starting to grow, the implication of the lifegiving water freely flowing from the semi-divine figure clear.

"Oh, and a few birds following along, to round this little depiction out. Can't go wrong with a few of them, did you know that birds, in nature, spread plant seeds far and wide, allowing them to spread further out than they could by themselves? It's a kind of light symbiosis, allowing the plants to reproduce more effectively and over larger areas and giving the bird's species more feed in the future, once they have grown. It's really quite amazing what nature can come up with without any actual intelligence to direct it, isn't it?"

Add a few of these... cloth thingies similar imagery is often decorated with, and a fitting background, and there you go.

"Here we are, here we are. Unfortunately, this will have to be the last thing we do for today, as it seems time has run out already! I hope you all had fun watching, maybe learned something and see you next time."

---

Missy Biron sat on her bed in the Wards headquarters, having come there as soon as the alarm on her phone alerted her to the stream currently playing on it.

Was it just her or had Cain become even more handsome under that mask of his since the last time?

"You know, I get the feeling we just really, really don't look at natural landscapes and motives anymore, for artistic purposes or otherwise. There's a certain kind of serenity and peace you just don't get in today's hectic hubbub. Not saying we should all go out and become hippies, of course, but when was the last time you've really been surrounded by nature, if you live in the city? Just a random thought."

And yes, he was totally right, for an exceedingly handsome and muscly villain anyways. If civilian identities weren't a thing, Missy would love to use her power to just travel through the countryside one day, just step out of the city and right into elsewhere, wander through forests and mountains and along rivers before she walked right back downtown.

Just... take a break from it all. Not that she was likely to ever get the opportunity; not with her parents and the responsibility of being a Ward keeping her where she was. Mom and dad may not agree on anything else, but as soon as the prospect of Missy being taken away was brought up, they magically were of one mind.

And for all that she was scared of being taken away, she was rapidly losing patience with them anyways. Why couldn't they just get the divorce over with and leave her alone already?

Shaking her head, Missy concentrated back on the screen she was holding, the scenery forming up under the steady hand of Cain taking her mind off her usual troubles.

"Here, isn't this just a beauty? You don't really see animals like this around, normally, but I think this is something we can be satisfied with."

And as she kept watching on, she began imagining what else those hands might be doing... could be doing... should be doing.

To herself.

Because say about Cain what you wanted, but he was good at making you think of other things, Missy pondered to herself as she slowly slid her own fingers under her costume, a quick look at the door assuring her it really was locked.

---

Contessa requested a door, arriving in the room her co-conspirator was occupying at the moment. Following the comforting certainty of her power, she nodded at him, taking a seat opposite Eidolon as he kept an eye on his computer screen.

Presumably the source of the disruptions, given the Path ended here.

"Is it done, then?" Eidolon asked, offering her a bar of chocolate she accepted without a second thought. The Path was already throwing itself into chaos, a clear sign Cain's regular ministrations were in full effect. In other words, for the next two hours at least, she would be effectively powerless and, as such, 'off the clock', so to speak.

"It is," she confirmed, taking a small bite of chocolate and pushing it to the roof of her mouth to let it slowly melt. "Although my power becomes largely useless as soon as it starts, I can still path the actions and efforts of surrounding actors, as this experiment has shown."

And she could still affect herself, and the Path To Speaking Clearly While Eating Chocolate was proceeding without issues.

"Good. And I can see the effect- I am assuming the unrelated day/night thing is your doing, too?"

"It was needed to assure the next step's success, yes." Pathing around Cain's wide-ranging effects had its limits, though they were making progress, at least.

"I can see that," Eidolon smirked, his face visible under his cowl as his mask lay on his desk, "the votes for our ultimate goal are already climbing."

"Was that really necessary?" Contessa asked, enjoying her unscheduled treat. "I worry about Alexandria's continued sanity at this rate."

"She'll be fine," Eidolon waved her off. "Worst come to worst, you still have your path running to ensure none of us snap, but even aside from that, I'm keeping an eye on her in general. So far the worst she's done is fill up a conspiracy board's worth of space with pictures and scribbled notes, and I'm confident she isn't going to take action one way or another without talking it through, so worst come to worst we can just talk her out of it. Want some?"

Taking the proffered selection of canned soft drinks, Contessa picked out another one she hadn't tried out yet. "If you say so. I still feel we should at least try to keep her speculation within certain boundaries, however."

Luckily, she could still path on a smaller, personal scale even with the storm of interference throwing the future into confusion, so she could avoid spreading her drink everywhere as she opened its container.

"Have you heard her talk lately? Rebecca is completely off her rocker about Cain, and nothing can convince her there isn't something to him. I say we just let her get it all out and hope she can contain herself to our meetings."

"So why incite her even further?" Contessa asked, the particular form their little experiment to her limitations where Cain was concerned concerning her.

"Because it's hilarious and gives her something obvious to focus on. The easier she finds it to formulate her crackpot theories, the less time she spends on reasoning herself into a frenzy. And it's hilarious."

Nodding, Contessa agreed with the point.

"Speaking of which, I'm bringing popcorn again, but is there anything else you would like for the meeting?"

"I am good, I already ate when it became apparent he was starting." The ability to simultaneously manipulate people over the internet and order fastfood was paying off.

"Alright, then let's just watch what's going on so we can focus on Rebecca later. Let's see what our rogue entity or entity hunter or transcended parahuman or whatever it is today is up to."

Watching as Eidolon had the projector in his office play the livestream, Contessa brought out her drawing supplies, having kept up her practice so far. Working on this without her power was hard, but she hadn't cheated even once, having found the quiet concentration required for this to be soothing when she found herself with free time to spend and had already secured sufficient amounts of snacks.

Something looked different about Cain this time, but she just couldn't quite put her finger on it...

---

Bonesaw watched the monitor Mannequin had whipped up, the other tinker not specialized in this direction, but still far better suited to working with 'simpler' technology than herself.

At least without human tissues involved, and nobody had wanted to deal with the smell in the long term.

"Luckily enough, artistic freedom exists to let us work around issues like this. Now, how close do you think day and night can come to each other in nature? Because we don't really need to care for our purposes."

Speaking of which, everyone that fit into the truck they were taking was watching, having taken a break some distance into the woods off the highway to avoid any curious eyes. Ned was using the chance to stretch his legs, his bulk the reason they needed to steal larger vehicles like this if they were moving around for longer distances.

Glancing around, Riley could see the others and what they were doing. The Siberian was off, doing something out in the woods, while Hatchet Face was just sitting off to the side, bored and looking over his equipment.

Uncle Jack was staring at the screen, a strange look on his face. Riley had no idea what it was about, but elected not to ask him what the problem was, while Burnscar was watching, too, with rapt attention.

Next to her, Shatterbird was sitting, getting along with Burnscar as always, though she wasn't as focused on the screen as her, instead grinding her teeth at-

"Would you fucking pipe it down, tinman?" Shatterbird asked, losing her temper at the way Mannequin was sharpening his fingers against each other at whom they were watching and producing a shrill sound every time he did.

Wagging his lethally sharpened appendages towards her, he nevertheless stopped doing that, letting them actually hear what was going on again.

"In the end, we can easily work around pretty much most problems like this by simply getting a little creative. One thing I can't empathize enough; keep an open mind and think until you find a solution that satisfies you. And, of course, can have fun with! Less advice for drawing and more for life in general, but I suppose it works, huh?"

Returning her gaze to the show, Riley went back to analyzing Cain. His mannerisms had changed somewhat, but she had trouble picking out how- and she kept getting distracted, the curvature of moving muscle captivating her whenever the camera showed him.

Riley was supposed to Be A Good Girl and make art out of people, but somehow, she couldn't think of any way to make him more beautiful.

"What's on your mind, poppet?" Uncle Jack asked, his eyes not straying from the monitor and startling her from her thoughts.

"I was just thinking about what to do with Cain," she replied, not daring to look back at Uncle Jack. Somehow, something was wrong with him, but she didn't know what. "What to turn him into if I can."

"Mhm, good enough." And that was that, it seemed.

Now Riley actually needed an idea, just in case she was asked later on. Because she was a Good Girl and Good Girls weren't allowed to lie. Maybe she could just... keep him intact, but put something in his spine that made it so he had to do what she wanted?

That was a nice idea. She could control minions easily enough, but she couldn't recall ever trying to avoid damage to her materials before... and she really wanted to try it now.

Then she could even make him give her rides everywhere!

---

Dinah Alcott poked her head out of her room's door, making sure neither of her parents were around before she went back inside, assured she wasn't about to be busted.

Sure, she was technically allowed to watch the stream (this one, anyways), but she'd also been to the secret underground lair of a villain and she wasn't about to start getting caught now!

"Kind of foreboding and all, but I suppose it was requested, more or less. Either way, make of this what you will, but it's time for the next picture!"

It'd been fun and exciting, using her power and deduction once it stopped working at all to find out where and when to meet Gabriel, and convincing her mom to take her out to play at the boardwalk at the right time had been child's play from there.

And once she managed to find him, she even got a reward! Ice cream, the trip to the aforementioned secret lair that was super cool and exciting and then she even got more powers when Gabriel made her feel good!

Though it was kind of ironic she had to watch what she was saying now, when before she'd just wanted everyone else to avoid asking questions and aggravating her power. But she didn't want to accidentally try to force people to do what she said because she spoke too loud and used her new powers without thinking.

Also, she was really strong now (as the bent door handle inside her room could attest to) and, most importantly, her power hurt way less afterwards! It both took longer before she got headaches and the headaches weren't as bad now, so she didn't want to jam a pair of forks into her eyes to scratch out her brain anymore.

Life had become better for Dinah... and it was all thanks to the man on the screen.

"Luckily enough, there's loads of images and themes that you can find throughout humanity's history if you just take a moment to look, which I suppose is another good lesson to take away from this stream."

Not to mention what he'd shown her she could do for more... fun. Speaking of which, after another quick look outside her door, Dinah carefully laid down the pillow she had chosen for this purpose, blocking the crack underneath her door and hopefully keeping any sounds she might make inside.

That done, she slipped under her covers and started rolling up her dress, the phone showing the ongoing stream held before her eyes with her free hand...

---

Rebecca Costa-Brown, PRT Chief Director and also known as the hero Alexandria, strode through the portal she'd requested, arriving at the usual meeting room Cauldron used for these occasions.

Her preliminary analysis already completed and new findings summarized in a completed report she carried inside with her, Rebecca took her place, finding everyone else already waiting for her. Giving everyone a nod (even David), she cleared her throat, signaling the beginning of the meeting.

Or, as she liked to call it, her merciless gloating.

"So, as some of you may know, Cain has revealed more information that may or may not play into his origings. To begin with, let me enumerate what we can deduce based on what he said during his latest communication, unless anyone would like to say something beforehand?"

Nobody raised any objections, and David just raised both hands. "Feel free, we can discuss afterwards."

"Very well. First off, Cain is obviously far older than he looks, based on his comments about preferring older trends of more common artwork, but more on this later- I believe he was merely alluding to looking younger than he should be to disguise his final message.

He also did that bit about crystals overgrowing humanity, but that's likely just a mention of the entities and the way Agents cause trigger events, inevitably causing chaos and destruction or maybe a warning about the Garden of Flesh- I'd like to recommend surveillance of the corpse to be increased just in case."

"An agreeable suggestion," Doctor Mother nodded, "we will simply have to install more surveillance equipment."

"The most interesting and worrying revelation, however, was hidden as part of his last picture. 'Luckily enough, there's loads of images and themes that you can find throughout humanity's history if you just take a moment to look, which I suppose is another good lesson to take away from this stream.'"

Having intoned the words he had spoken, Rebecca gave another look at everyone, doing her best to ignore the way David and Contessa were brazenly eating popcorn as they listened to her.

"'Images and themes throughout human history'. This in itself would not be particularly worrying, but he then continues. I am not going to quote him word for word, but the mentions of how birds and plants work, intertwined by their very nature? One allowing the other to spread much further in exchange for gaining more food sources? Combine this with the reports of Cain apparently drinking the blood of his victims, and a picture begins to make itself clear, but..."

Leaning forwards and looking David right in the eyes, she smiled triumphantly. "But combine this with the actual picture he was drawing, the waterfall bringing life to an until then lifeless place? The conclusion becomes obvious. Cain created humanity, planted the seeds, so to say, because he needs to eat humans, and now that the entities are threatening humanity, he has become active to stop them from wiping out his food source."

David was quiet for a long moment. Then, his face slammed against the desk with all his might, audibly denting it.

---

By the time you're done packing everything away and return to your room, greeting Sarah and Aisha with a kiss each, Taylor is slowly beginning to wake up, rousing in her exhausted sleep.

That said, you aren't above using the opportunity to tease her a bit, so you move to flick her hair into her face, the errand strands landing across her cheeks and nose tickling and irritating, judging by how she scrunches up her face.

Waiting for her to wake up, you instead make out a little with Sarah, your sister melting into your arms without hesitation as the two of you spend the time, Aisha already moving out now that theres nothing new and interesting to keep your pet's attention (though you do give her butt a spank to see her off, much to her delightful squealing as she ran off).

When Taylor finally opens her eyes, numbly brushing her distracting hair back behind her ears, she does it to the sight of you and Sarah exchanging as much saliva as you can, both of your extended tongues used to full effect between the lips being mashed against each other.

She gapes at you for a long moment before wincing, obviously regaining feeling in her body... her lower body, specifically.

"Hey, sleepyhead. How are you doing?" You ask, looking down on Taylor's reclining form.

"Sore... and hoarse," she brings out, her throat obviously not quite cooperating after how long she spent using it earlier. She really did get louder over time, to the point you'd only slowed down to make sure she got enough air back in herself eventually.

"Mhm, let's see if we can't help with the former, shall we?" With that, you maneuver yourself to carefully lift her up, bringing her into princess carry position, much to her embarrassed blushing.

"What are you doing?" Is all she has time to whisper before you carry her off towards the bath, Sarah following after you with an amused smirk.

"I, am bringing you to paradise, Taylor, or at least what little slice of it we have in our bathroom." Giving her head a kiss, you walk sideways for a moment to get her through the door, Sarah having opened it for you like the awesome little sister she is.

There's a reason you keep on kissing and cuddling her when the opportunity presents itself.

"You really don't have to-" Taylor begins, only to be interrupted by you.

"I want to. You were a good girl, we all had lots of fun, now you're getting pampered over it. And there's nothing you can do to stop us."

It is with the ring of an executioner's blade that Sarah opens the first bottle of lotion, having been the one to stock your bathroom despite it never really being used under most circumstances.

Yet another reason she's getting cuddled while you take care of Taylor, who is still blushing and trying not to look at either of you.

---

It takes about half an hour of intense massaging and physical intimacy with both you and your sister for Taylor to snap out of her funk, the teenager having seemingly gotten used to her situation and even reciprocating, the three of you lathering each other with the wide variety of shampoos, soaps, peelings and whatever else Sarah made sure to get for your bathroom.

The both of you have perfect skin anyways, but you don't exactly have an issue with thorough skincare, either, and Taylor obviously appreciates the care, melting into your hands as she does her best to return the favor.

The fact she spends a lot of time fondling your dick and tracing your muscles, or appreciating Sarah's boobs and massaging her ass isn't lost on you, of course, but she does at least try to hide it by paying attention to the rest of your bodies. Appropriate amounts of attention, so you let it slide.

Not that you're any better, of course, but you do keep things (relatively) chaste, the poor girl obviously still worn out from when you had your way with her earlier. Until, as you mentioned, Taylor blinks and goes rigid.

"What time is it?" She asks, looking around and squinting her eyes. Right, her glasses.

"Just past seven, why?" Sarah answers, smirking silently at her again. Really, she never changes, does she?

"Oh god, dad's about to get home. I can't-"

---

"Shh, don't worry, we can take care of this," you assure Taylor, rubbing her back. "How about you just call your dad, tell him you're staying over at a friend's or something?"

Taylor just looks a bit lost for a moment before firming up her features, giving you a sharp nod. Sarah, on the other hand, sighs and shakes her head at the both of you, getting up to walk out the door. "Can't leave this kind of thing to either of you. I'll take care of it, just take your time finishing up in here."

You and Taylor share a look as she vanishes, only for her voice to be heard a few moments later. "Mr. Hebert? It's Sarah, a friend of Taylor's. I wanted to ask if she can stay over today? It's getting pretty late and we don't want her to make her way back home alone, but my dad's working late tonight so he can't just drive her back."

"How does she know dad's work number?" Taylor whispers, currently in the process of being lifted into your lap where you're now sitting on the bathtub's edge.

"Never underestimate Sarah's ability to reach someone. She was like this even before she got her powers."

"Don't worry, she can come along to school tomorrow. So you don't mind?"

Suffice to say, Taylor will be staying with you tonight.

---

Ultimately, you finish up Taylor's drawn-out recruitment with the little sales pitch you've been thinking of for a while now; mainly because it'd be a waste not to use it at some point.

Which is how you find yourself giving her a tour of the base, aiming for the workshop first of all. "Now, don't let the reception you got fool you, but we're actually taking widespread employee benefits fairly seriously," you explain, seeing the renewed flow of blood to her cheeks through her helmet even if her face remains concealed.

Sadly enough, you couldn't exactly justify keeping her naked after you left your place, despite how nice of a sight seeing her walk around like that was.

"Towards that end, we have a semi-official employee package policy in place for anyone joining the higher-ups of the organization. Meaning, it's time for a few presents! First off, the simpler things; you're getting a small apartment you can choose from the places on base. More than a few of our capes live here, so it's just a matter of convenience. You also get to have access to these beauties," you explain, gesturing for the huge machine in the middle of the room as you open the door to the area your tinkers have all but taken over, robotic arms currently busy assembling some kind of intricate mechanism for someone.

"This, is a manufactory. It's fairly simple in principle; you put something inside and it takes it apart and/or stores it, then you can use the materials gained like that to make it create something else. It's how most of the others got their furniture, they just designed what they wanted in here and let the machines do the rest."

Gesturing for the row of other manufactories lining the back wall, you start walking towards one of the storerooms, specifically, the armory you have everyone keep leftover superscience weapons. "Now come along to receive your standard issue laser gun, then we can go have a look at the immortality pods and and the autodocs before we talk about powers." And hopefully Yoshi finished constructing the vita-chambers by now, lazy fucker had enough time before you recalled everything earlier.

Because like hell are you going to let the literal biblical plague walk out of your base without arming her to the teeth first. She's yours now, she's staying yours.

---

Taylor is immensely overwhelmed by the sheer barrage of options and possibilities you open up before her, not to mention you're pretty sure she's still pretty sore from earlier, which is why it is quite fortunate you talk her into sitting down for a while to be thralled.

She has to thoroughly question you on the process first, of course, but a proper explanation and the mention of the fact pretty much everyone you've turned so far was a thrall before becoming a vampire has her agree easily enough.

Seems someone has plans and aspirations, huh?

Anyways, while you do that, you also go ahead and talk to Taylor, clarifying details and going through the list of things you can equip her with, once she gets over the minimal apprehension of essentially using biological equipment in the form of plasmids and tonics.

All the while working over the skies a long, long way above you, of course. Looks like Brockton Bay is getting a stiff ocean breeze consistently blowing in tonight, with lots of mist generated by the temperature differentials...

---

"Hey Vicky, you free tonight?" You ask, having made sure Taylor is busy enough to keep out of trouble (aka playing with the ion laser gun you gave her) while you're busy elsewhere.

"Oh, um, hi Gabe! Yeah, nothing planned right now. Did you want to meet again?" You can hear something in the background, Amy's characteristically grouchy voice reaching you where her words do not.

"Amy also free? If so, we could have another double date, Sarah's been bugging me to get out of the house more often and all so I wanted to do something nice as a group."

Well, technically, your sister has been joking around about that time she forbid you to keep training, but you're just going to interpret it like that for convenience's sake.

"Yeah, totally! Where are we gonna meet?" Being entirely honest, you're fairly sure the eagerness in Vicky's voice is not entirely innocent... as is the snarky tone of voice you detect through your phone.

---

It doesn't take long to organize the trip to the boardwalk, and even less to ask Sarah to come along, thanks to the whole telepathy deal you have set up allowing you to talk to everyone... and everyone to talk to you, now. Not that you mind, of course; you can always shut someone off if they annoy you and they all know it, and so far it's mostly been Kate and Nora checking in on you while they were busy, with the others just chatting every now and then, which is just fine with you.

All it takes from there is a quick clothing change while you adjust your visible age to match what it was for the last time you met the sisters, then you go to pick up Sarah.

"So, any plans in specific this time around?" She asks you as the two of you walk towards the garage you usually use for this kind of thing.

"Nah, just creating opportunities to exploit. I'm looking to see how far I can push either of them, but there's no big rush either way."

Taking a look around, you tilt your head. "Now which of these cars should we take?"

Finding a place to park and making your way towards the location you agreed to meet at is easy enough, in no small part thanks to your perfect recollection and the fact you've been to the boardwalk a few times by now.

"Hey Gabe, Sarah," an upbeat Victoria greets you near the storefront you're steering towards, wearing a bit more subdued clothing than usual (presumably to avoid public recognition for this occasion, and succeeding).

"Hey Vicky, hey Amy," you return the greeting, giving each of them a nod before you wait for your respective partners to finish their own greetings, something Sarah does with a sardonic smirk even as you can see Amy visibly strain to hold herself back from bitching at everything in sight.

This can only go well, can't it?

---

Keeping Vicky talking while you make your way along the boardwalk is child's play, especially supported by Sarah as you are. Most of it is idle gossip you don't particularly care about, though she does mention the odd tidbit of... interesting information.

"So you met the Searfield twins at that art auction thing, I heard? Make sure you don't believe a word they said, okay? They're notorious for going around playing at being gold diggers. If only I wasn't... grounded... at the time, I'd have helped you out."

Oh how cute. "What's that, Vicky? Afraid I'm leaving you?" You smirk at her, working your best charming smile all the while.

Looking away with a blush on her face, oddly reminiscent of Taylor in that way, Vicky mumbles something to herself.

"What's that, I can't hear you?" You ask teasingly. though you totally could if you strained your improved hearing.

"Not like we're dating or anything," she pouts at you, surprisingly cutely for someone you spent your last meeting with railing until her belly bloated.

On the other hand, though, you can also feel the grudge gathering behind yourself, Amy's face darkening by the second as she can't keep her emotions in check. Fuck but if the girl can't keep herself under control if her sister is in sight. Time for emergency maneuvers!

"Mhm, before I forget, I wanted to do something fun today. How about we swap partners for shopping? You pick clothes for Sarah, I pick clothes for Amy, and we make them show off when we're done?"

"That sounds like fun," Vicky agrees, turning around towards her sister before your group can come inside the overpriced boardwalk shop. Giving Amy a pleading look, the ugly jealousy already wiped off her face, Amy can't do anything but agree.

"Alright, but you owe me one for this," the grumpy healerette grumps.

Distraction by way of Vicky is a success!

Geeze, Gabe, why do I have to play dress-up doll? You know I prefer it the other way around.

Yeah, but I needed something shiny to distract Vicky. I'll owe you one, okay?

Alright, but only because I love you.

---

"Trouble in paradise?" You grin at Amy once you're inside and out of hearing range of Vicky and Sarah, who huddled off in a corner as soon as they could.

"What would you know of that?" Amy mutters darkly, making to peruse the clothing on sale.

"Fairly little, admittedly, not like me and my sister have any issues of that sort. But you stop that now, I'm supposed to pick something out that'll have Vicky gape at you."

Going still for a long moment, she just sighs. "Whatever. I'll be at the changing rooms, then."

"I'll be right with you, Amy. Right with you..." Now, here comes the big question. What, exactly, do you put together for Amy, and exactly how many curses are you trying out on it?

For a moment, you think about the kind of violation and breach of trust that is using largely untested magic on others that you don't have detained inside a laboratory or holding cell... before swiftly brushing that off. Time to play!

Alright, so here you are. A choker, a pair of bangles, a dark shirt and skirt, along with underwear in the form equally black bra and panties. You'd have liked to match a pair of shoes and possibly socks for this, as well, but this isn't exactly a shoe store.

Because shoes aren't clothing, hah. But ignoring the ploys of people that understand women well enough to know shoes are the best way to keep them occupied for the longest time, you pile everything up and ponder just how handy a make-up compartment in here would be- some purple lipstick would work with this, you think.

Anyways, a quick look around confirms nobody is close enough to listen in if you were to chant right now, so long as you keep it quiet... and you can physically touch everything you're bringing over while making it look like you're still picking out clothes.

Which, to be fair, you are- you can't quite decide between the black shirt and blouse for this, so you may need a bit longer yet...

---

The process of cursing all the clothes and accessoires you picked out for Amy doesn't take long, each being hardly more than a mouthful of words, and while you're at it, you critically eye the blood signature of the girl sitting near the changing rooms.

Well, only one way to find out if this is sufficient for your purposes. "Cursed objects are extremely comfortable, wear them."

Taking another look around, it seems nobody noticed anything, so you simply congratulate yourself on an operation well-done and get over towards where Amy is waiting.

"Took your sweet time," she gripes when you come around the corner, the wall seperating the little seating area and access to the changing booths serving its purpose.

"Only the best for the best," you reply cheekily. With a weary sigh, Amy gets up, holding out her hands to receive the clothing ordained to be worn by her. On the other hand, though, your powers do allow you to see that nobody is around to see you right now, and none of the other shoppers are coming nearby right now...

---

Hey Sarah, wanna make this a competition? Whoever seduces their 'partner' first wins?

Fuck no I don't. I've seen you at work, and I'd bet you're about to get Panpan naked anyways.

Well, I'm about to talk her into coming into a changing booth with me...

Fuck that shit, I'll take however long I damn well please.

Alright, alright. Well, see you on the other side!

Tuning back in after your deceptively short mental conversation, you look around suspiciously and put your best sheepish look on. "I actually wanted to ask you something," you stage whisper at Amy, "something to do with my power. Could we go inside and, you know, do the thing?"

Sighing again, Amy shrugs. "Normally, I'd tell you to get lost, but whatever. Come along."

Following the suddenly bossy girl into a changing room, you make sure the door is locked before you turn towards her, laying her clothes on the little bench inside before she proceeds to take charge of what's going on.

"Alright, what's the problem and when did you notice it?"

"Here," you respond, just holding out your hand, "you can just use your power to try and take a look. I don't think it's dangerous or anything, but I thought I'd better have a professional look at weird edge power cases."

As soon as Amy makes contact with your hand, you concentrate, triggering the change. Over the next five minutes, you slowly, torturously slowly, twist and morph, your body changing from one state to another.

Still, it isn't long before you're done, standing there in your previous clothes. Your hair is longer now, and darker, a rather nice black, and a thin layer of softness keeps your muscles concealed beneath your skin.

Blinking your long eyelashes at Amy, you speak as softly as you can. "Did you get anything?"

Your now starkly feminine voice tears Amy out of her minor stupor, the girl inhaling a shaky breath as her hand twitches before she decides to keep holding your hand. Swallowing hard, she steels her nerves as she looks deep into your eyes.

"I'm not- I'm not sure I caught everything that just happened, but I think I can guess. But to make sure, I'm going to need you to undress."

Tilting your head just so, you purse your lips, again just so. Turns out having experience in how women can be stupidly attractive without looking like they mean to (but totally do) does pay off every now and then, considering Amy's hitched breath.

"Are you sure? This is a little weird for me..." It isn't, not really with your power adjusting your mindset so you can deal with the bodily changes just fine, but hey, normally you're not the one jiggling their tits in situations like this. Close enough to count.

"Yes. It is my opinion as a medical professional you need to undress so I can inspect you for potential medical issues."

---

Deciding to go all in on this, you decide to channel the behaviour of a nurse you once knew that was really into this whole doctor/patient roleplay... with herself as patient, funnily enough. Thus, you swallow heavily before nodding resolutely. "Okay, doctor."

The result is immediate; Amy positively swoons for just a moment as you go ahead and shrug off your jacket, followed by wiggling out of your shirt.

"These are- ungh- really hard to get out of like this," you mention, moving this way and that in your efforts to get it over your stupidly large tits.

It is only with herculean effort that you finally manage to pull your clothing up over your head without just ripping it, having shown off your nicely muscled midriff in action for Amy for a bit before her attention is taken up by what you finally reveal; two healthy and perky tits topped with equally perky nipples.

"Phew! Here you are, doctor, can you see anything wrong?" Turning around once so she can admire your smooth back while you subtly move your arms, you take one of her hands into yours, pulling it against your breast as you pout worriedly right into her face.

This has the effect you were aiming for, of course; Amy swallows again, taking her other hand and applying it on the free source of happiness opposite the first one, lightly touching and fondling your rack while her eyes move in and out of focus.

Clearing her throat, Amy does her best to affect a serious look despite her blush. "I'm- I am not sure, something might still be wrong. I will need to conduct an in-depth inspection to be sure."

"Oh, please, doctor, you need to help me," you quietly babble as Amy once more has a hard time restraining herself, the scent of her arousal easy for you to detect by now, even through her clothes.

Once you've unbuttoned your pants, Amy's hands still lightly fondling you up top, you bend forwards a decent bit as you work towards shimmying your currently wider hips out of them with rhythmic movements.

It isn't easy, but once again your superior persistence pays off. Using the angle you're at by now to keep Amy from seeing quite everything as you bend over, guiding your pants down until gravity can take care of the rest.

Your face isn't actually that far from Amy's by now, so as you drop your last piece of protection, you throw her a kiss before you right yourself again, both hands layered above your vagina.

"Is there anything you can see, doctor?" You ask again, your voice decidedly deeper and more sultry this time around. Doing your turnaround again and forcing Amy to let go of your breasts, you let her stare at your perfect butt for a long moment before coming back around.

"I- I'm not sure, there are some things I can't quite see..." Amy stutters, only for you to smirk at her.

"Well, in that case, do you see anything you like, doctor?" Slowly, very slowly, you move a hand away, leaving only one protecting your 'innocence', to rest it upon Amy's shoulder.

"I do. I like what I see a lot," Amy mumbles, spellbound by your revealed body and yet even more so by what she can't see.

"Oh, but you can't examine me like this, doctor," you positively growl back, drawing your other hand up and down your lower lips for a long moment before dipping a middle finger inside, gathering a little of the moistness you can get by now. "Here, take a sample."

With that, you take your hand off entirely, giving Amy her first full look at your pussy before holding your hand in front of her face, middle finger raised slightly.

The invitation is clear for what it is, and so it doesn't take long for Amy to lick your juices off your finger, an almost religious experience if the emotion in her eyes is to be believed.

---

Amy couldn't believe her eyes. Or, really, anything that was happening.

At first, she'd been pissed at Gabriel when he started flirting with her sister- he already had sex with Vicky and she hadn't gotten her in bed yet- but eventually even she couldn't keep bitching at him, even though he did keep her away from the only reason she even bothered to come.

The suggestion she was going to show off for Vicky thanks to him didn't factor in at all. Not in the slightest.

Similarly, the mention of his girlfriend as his sister was... okay, Amy wasn't gonna judge. She was just going to wait for the right moment to bring it up again, because that was just weirdness and he may have a few hints for her own... situation.

Still, out of everything that she'd expected to happen when he finally got the clothes she was to try on (he wasn't as bad about this as Vicky, at least, and didn't need a handcart just to move his selection), it hadn't exactly been him asking her for help with a power issue. But after thinking about it for a moment, she got it- he didn't exactly have anyone else he could ask about this kind of thing, did he?

So Amy decided to do Gabriel a solid and make sure he knew he owed her afterwards. It was a little weird they would go ahead and do it inside a changing room, but hey, whatever worked for him. Not like she cared.

When Gabriel then proceeded to just ask her to take a look before (presumably) activating his power, she'd had problems making out what was happening at first; his unusual biology kept distracting her, shifting around in the weird ways she'd already observed before. But once she realized what was going on, the few parts of his DNA she could see spontaneously gaining additional chromosones over the course of a minute or so, she couldn't stop seeing it.

Somehow, his power wasn't actually rewriting his DNA; instead, it was adding parts to it that seamlessly inserted themselves in his genetic code, somehow existing simultaneously with the parts they were supposed to overwrite before the old bits and pieces were erased, his body somehow following suit and morphing before her very... senses, she was keeping her eyes closed for some reason, despite that not being how that worked.

When she opened her eyes, she could see the effect. Gone was the annoyingly handsome young man that just kept on luring her sister away from her; instead, Gabriel (Gabriela? Gabe? Gabby?) was now a girl.

A very beautiful girl. With the longest lashes and poutiest of lips.

When (s?)he started obviously flirting with her, it was all Amy could think of just how hot this whole thing was, with her making Gabriel undress herself bit by bit, the casual striptease the sexiest thing she'd ever seen (and Amy had seen Vicky naked from behind once or twice).

Once the heavy-lidded teenaged vixen before her let her 'sample' the changes directly, Amy was teetering on the brink of collapse without so much as touching herself even once.

Before she could really do anything, though, still suckling on Gabriel's finger, her surprising 'patient' leaned in close, capturing Amy's eyes with hers. "Doctor, I think we may have forgotten something..." With that, she pushed Amy back, forcing her down on that little bench changing rooms always had.

"You still need to change, but I'm sure I can help you along..." The leering smile on her face was enough to have Amy freeze up.

"I-I can dress myself just fine, you don't n-"

"Nonsense, I'm here already... May as well return the favor, right?" And with that, her warm hands were on Amy, disregarding her flailing struggles as she began taking her jacket off. "Oh, don't be a baby... Or don't you want me to get you naked, too?"

Oh, that pout was just unfair!

---

Being naked in the same tight and enclosed space as a gorgeous naked girl was absolutely nerve-wrecking; sure, Amy had been feeling up playing with checking up on Crystal's boobs regularly for a while, but that was completely different. That was just... well, 'just', Crystal taking off her top, the two of them engaging in the polite fiction that Amy playing with them as payment for her power's use wasn't some perverse form of prostitution.

Or something.

No, this was... deeper, more mutual. They were both naked, Gabriel gently teasing her flesh with such precise titillating motions Amy had trouble reigning her gasps in at the sensation, especially when the suddenly female Gabriel began nibbling on her ears, wandering down her neck and over her breasts, her sensitive nipples bare to the vicious temptress' predations.

"Come on, Amy," Gabriel eventually whispered into her ear after getting her full of lavishing kisses and lovebites onto her sensitive flesh, "still need to get you dressed."

"Haah... hahh... HH-NG!" Hastily suppressed gasps were all Amy could get out, doubly so when Gabriel decided she was taking to long and literally grabbed her by the pussy, a pair of fingers scissoring inside her delicates with a light, but insistent pressure bringing her to stand up.

"There we go, good girl." Giving Amy a paradoxically chaste kiss on her forehead, her tormentor(?) began sorting through her clothes, picking out the underwear first. "Now come on, one leg up, please..."

Being dressed by another woman was a weird experience, but not the bad kind of weird. If anything, Amy could see herself getting very used to this, though perhaps not quite like this- Gabriel was a very demanding and, for lack of a better word, dominant partner, while Amy figured herself being dressed by a cute maid hurrying to her every word instead. Not that she didn't enjoy this, but still...

It was a good thing Gabriel was somehow immune to her power, else she might have been tempted to... adjust, her a little. Not that she ever actually would, but...

Hey, it was already weirdly hot how she'd gone from this handsome guy to a buxom biker chick or however you wanted to call her. Amy wasn't going to demand more... right that moment, anyways.

Blinking, Amy realized she'd somehow ended up dressed in dark clothes, the jacket she'd worn previously slung over a blouse, a black skirt and all completing the look. Looking up, she saw Gabriel standing there, fiddling with a band of- a choker. It was a choker.

"Come on, Amy, chin up! Only one more thing and we're done." Amy tried, she really did, but she just couldn't muster any rejections right that moment. Maybe it was because Gabriel was still naked and the gentle swaying of her breasts kept her distracted, maybe it was how the clothes she was wearing were just so damn comfortable.

EIther way, she just had to acknowledge Gabriel actually had an eye for clothes as the choker snapped shut behind her neck.

"And done. But..." Gabriel muttered, putting up a troubled act, "just what shall we do next?"

A hand creeping up Amy's thigh, she just leaned back and let it happen with a heavy gulp.

"I could just ravage you now that I've got you in my grasp... but do you want me to stay like this? Or change again?"

The question confused Amy, her blood flowing anywhere but her brain right then from the feel of it, but after a moment she realized that Gabriel wasn't always a well-shaped girl.

"I... I don't know..." The admittance was concerning, but she actually realized she wasn't too sure about being an abhorrent lesbian over being an abhorrent pervert at this point, and the rough idea she did have of Gabriel's male body was... intriguing. But... "But Vicky..."

"Vicky won't get mad, she did the exact same."

And with that, her decision was made.

"Can... Can you change back? I w-want our first time to be the way I met you..."

Looking away, Amy cursed her inability to find something to cover her face with, and the blushing heat she could feel spreading over it.

---

Gabriel's transformation was still as fascinating as before, the strange replacement of not only DNA, but organic tissue all over his (her? their?) body, but for all that Amy was busy gawking at what was going on with his body, she was just as fascinated by the sight before her.

Suffice to say, she may have an undiscovered fetish for radical body changes. And somehow, she couldn't get herself to be repulsed by the well-muscled and nicely shaped form before her.

"Hey, Amy," Gabriel murmured for her, "want a kiss?"

Again, no objections from her. And with the naked guy looming over her, she had an easy time reaching for his... For his cock.

Somehow, actually touching the organ was very different from just perceiving it through her power. Of course, she knew the general how and why of how it worked... but feeling the slowly hardening rod in her fingers, the increasing amount of hard steel sheathed in soft velvet, to borrow the description from a trashy capefic she read at some point, the smooth skin of the ballsack and the clear signs of activity as they worked and prepared their load...

Oh god, he was going to cum inside her, wasn't he? There wasn't any risk to that, he couldn't knock her up, accidentally or otherwise, so-

Oh god, that was the tongue she'd spied earlier, wasn't it? And it was somehow even longer than she'd thought, her power supplying information as it seemed to just generate more tongue out of nowhere in the process of sweetly violating her mouth.

She tried her best, she really did... but she just couldn't keep up with the endlessly swirling intruder exploring her mouth, so she just accepted it inside while she kept up her 'evaluation' of the mighty pulsing tool in her hands, the engorged head and perfectly hairless skin taking up all her attention.

That said, as Gabriel's questing hands inched up her skirt, she realized where this thing was supposed to go again... and began trying to make sense of its size.

"This'll never fit, Gabriel!" She exclaimed in astonished surprise, only to be surprised herself when, all of a sudden, the door opened, Vicky poking her head in.

"What won't fi-" her sister began, the words stuck in her throat as she beheld the situation inside. Didn't someone lock the door or something?

Gabriel, on the other hand, just chuckled and waved her inside, the madman. "Come on, no need to give anyone else a free show. Amy was just telling me about how I couldn't possibly fit inside her; fancy helping me prove her otherwise?"

Staring in abject disbelief, Amy watched as Vicky blinked... and didn't leave. Instead, she looked back outside before shimmying inside, securely closing and locking the door behind herself.

"Okay, so what are we doing?"

Amy still couldn't believe her... eyes, ears, general senses?

"Amy mentioned this is her first time, so let's make this as nice for her as we can, 'kay?" As he spoke, Gabriel was still pulling her panties down her legs, his c-cock still in her hands easily visible to Vicky.

Who was licking her lips by now. Why were the two sexiest people Amy knew cornering her like this?

"Gotta make sure first, just in case. Are you sure you want this, Amy?" Vicky asked, gently patting Amy's head as she pushed herself closer towards her.

Amy just nodded, any words she could've squeezed out stuck in her throat.

"Alright," Vicky said, bumping into Gabriel and moving him over a little, "Just have to see..." Her hand wandering where Gabriel's hands just left not that long ago, she began rubbing the inside of Amy's thigh.

"Damn, girl, you're soaked!" And the look on her sister's face, coyly leering at her, had Amy grow even hotter than she just realized she'd been so far.

Her mental capacity reduced to panting lightly, it took her a while to parse the following conversation.

"Kind of a shame I'm not the one about to get railed by this bad boy," Vicky murmured as she joined a hand to Amy's, slowly moving along Gabriel's hard penis.

"Oh, don't worry, there's always later, or next time if Amy can't get enough."

"I know which one I'm betting on," Vicky laughed, moving over to give Gabriel a deep, deep kiss, only to then turn around and do the same to a wide-eyed Amy, her hot, hot mouth engulfing hers.

And her hand pulling the mighty rod closer...

Gabriel, on the other hand, began rolling up her blouse, fiddling with the bra he'd given her, once he finally slipped her new panties off one foot, leaving them hanging by the other one...

"Here, aren't they nice? Especially packaged like this," he said, his hands then moving down to her butt.

"They are," Vicky smirked in response, leaning over to give each of her nips a kiss and shifting her core from a blazing bonfire to a raging inferno.

But before she could grab Vicky and turn her small intestine into a big fat dick to spear herself on, something touched her pussy.

Looking down, she could see Vicky's hand hadn't been idle, and now Gabriel's big fat prick was in the process of moving right between her pussylips.

All of a sudden, she was hyperventilating, but the hands still touching the thing didn't push it away.

On the contrary.

Shivering a little, Amy pulled instead, the brunette shaking some of her frizzy hair out of her face as the cock slowly, but surely began pushing inside her, spreading first her lips, then her insides with its girth.

She was about to just let out a shout when she could feel something inside her break, an idle thought going out to her virginity, but Gabriel sealed her mouth with his, all the while Vicky began massaging her breasts.

"This is a bad angle... Give me a moment," she said, her blonde sister lifting Amy from where she was barely hanging on and moving her around so that Gabriel held her up by her butt, Vicky supporting her from behind and fondling her breasts.

Sandwiched between the two, Amy realized something. She was obviously dreaming. Either that, or she was in heaven, after all. Maybe she'd spontaneously died from a brain aneurysm and everything following meeting Gabriel had been a fevered hallucination of hers?

Ooof, nope, she thought to herself as Gabriel pushed inside her, her hanging legs twitching before Vicky started stroking her thighs. "I never knew you had such nice legs, sis," she mumbled into her ears, stroking and groping along them.

"I know, right? It's why I got her a skirt," Gabriel grinned, plucking at the skirt still folded over. He wasn't idle otherwise, though; flexing his muscles, he proceeded to push himself deeper into Amy, driving the air out of her lungs with every thrust and moving her to hold onto his shoulders.

By the time Vicky started to prod at her asshole after she lifted up the skirt on her side, the thorough, almost mechanical fucking she was receiving and keeping her from really breathing in for any length of time was all that kept Amy from screaming out in pleasure, doubly so once he'd opened her up all the way, leaving Amy completely unable to breathe and crosseyed when he knocked against what she was fairly sure was her womb.

Vicky slowly rubbing at her ass and sliding a single finger inside was the straw that broke the camel's back. She came, and she didn't stop coming as Gabriel finally started railing into her in earnest, spread open and rubbed and played with from everywhere, and she didn't stop coming for a long, long time, though she couldn't say how long.

When Gabriel buried himself inside her and filled her with his hot, hot seed, the twisted genetic material spreading onto and into her deepest depths, she came. When Vicky pinched her nipples so hard it hurt just hard enough, she came. And when she was moved around, held with her back to Gabriel as his rod continued to toy with her pussy and her sister pushed fingers into both her ass and occupied pussy, slobbering over her heaving tits, Amy came.

She came until she couldn't cum any more, and then some more. By the time she finally blacked out, filled with far more sperm than should be possible (though not as much as Vicky had been, she thought), Amy was thoroughly exhausted but had serious trouble keeping the wide smile off her face as she drifted off to sleep.

---

"Well, that's pretty much it for this date, then," you grumble good-naturedly to yourself, leaning a sleepy Amy against yourself as you slowly and carefully begin to pull out of her... before thinking better of it and just staying inside for a moment.

"Why's that, big guy only got enough juice for one girl?" Vicky asks leadingly, earning herself a rub on her head.

"Just being considerate, it's Amy's special day and all. I'm also going to need your help to keep all of this clean. As soon as I pull out, she's gonna leak."

Crinkling her nose, Vicky crosses her arms. "So what am I gonna do about that?"

"You, young lady, are going to go out and find Sarah, who I'm betting has been making sure we're not getting interrupted, and talk to her about where we can find something to clean all of this up with, for a start," you say, gesturing for the half of the changing cabin smeared with various fluids.

"Fine, fine, but next time I'm getting to play, too," Vicky complains playfully.

"It's a date... again."

---

The way back to your lair was surprisingly long and arduous, involving a pile of paper tissues, a wheelbarrow, a knocked-out dude and Sarah running damage control in the background throughout the whole thing, but eventually, you're finally back in the car and Amy is being carried off by her sister.

"You know, this was surprisingly fun," your own sister ribs at you, stretching her arms a little.

"Oh, how so? I'd have figured you'd be annoyed at what's going on if anything."

"You kidding? I got that one guy to punch out his best friend to distract them long enough for you to sneak sleeping beauty out. That alone was worth it; one of them will murder the other over this before the week is out."

Smiling, you just pat her head a little as you drive onwards. Sarah never changes, does she?

Anyways, it isn't that long before you're back in the underground bunker, though you aren't exactly splitting up with Sarah for the moment anyways. Oh no, the two of you are going to the same place... the same place containing Kate, Henley and, for some reason, Aisha.

"So, everyone," you clap your hands once you arrive, "let's talk about the nazis and how to poke them as hard as we can."

The plan, such as it is, can be summed up fairly easily. First, you murder Stormtiger wherever he lives, using your powers and simple preparation to ensure you look close enough to Shadow Stalker some camera nearby can take the right kind of footage. Then, once he's dead, you shoot his reconstructed corpse with a crossbow and proceed to widen the wound and recover said crossbow's bolt with a knife, as though Shadow Stalker tried to hide the evidence.

Once the murder's investigation (that you'll ensure happens, of course) is in full swing, you steal the coroner's report and leak it, together with the footage, to the public. Poke a few suckers in the media a little, maybe, to make sure the public gets wind of the... suspicious... circumstances of one Kyle Roose's death.

Slap on a suitable delivery, maybe something about an anonymous policeman, rather than a PRT agent as you first planned, worried more evidence about Shadow Stalker killing people will be made to disappear.

The switch in anonymous whistleblower is made due to concerns regarding the PRT's nature as a more-or-less elite taskforce, meaning there would be far fewer suspects and any investigation could be carried out in-house, whereas there are far more policemen, many of which could reasonably access a given morgue without arousing suspicion.

More importantly, any investigation would suffer from the poor relationship between departments present between the PRT and BBPD, so you gladly adjust your initial plans.

That said, you can't just up and do this; you'll need to finish up a few preparations first. You'll need a decently convincing copy of Shadow Stalker's costume, a crossbow that matches up with what she might be expected to use and, of course, a decent amount of information on the location, so you can stage this whole show properly.

That said, Sarah does warn you of somewhat suspicious movements on the E88's side; apparently, they've been making noise around the south side of town recently, though if any of their grunts knows what's going on, they aren't saying anything so far.

On the one hand, it's kind of to be expected they're going to move around the territory they've recently conquered; not like the heroes are especially content to just leave the nazis to control it. On the other hand, this could mean your target may be on the move at irregular times; whether this is a good thing or a bad one is another question entirely.

---

"Alright, time for tonight's chores chosen just for you," you announce, having summoned Yoshi again just for this purpose.

"Here we go again..." he mumbles in response, stuffing his hands into the pockets of the labcoat his 'armor' has chosen to be today.

"You are going to stalk a teenager on the internet and replicating her clothes and equipment well enough to fool an alert observer."

"Got it, got it, I was listening in on your talk earlier."

"Good, then you can also pull babysitting routine for Isabel while you're at it. She's a sweetheart and all, but she got really chatty by the time I told her about the telepathy thing, and I'm convinced she has found a way to have several conversations simultaneously. Now if you'll excuse me, I'll be off to observe the place a guy that never wears any tops lives in to plan how to best penetrate him."

Leaving Yoshi to grumble to himself as you walk off, you smile a satisfied smile. Yoshi disgruntled and mission accomplished. Now onto the next one.

Repeatedly shadowstepping through the city, you use your raven form to fly the last stretch to the area Sarah told you to go for, circling the building located in the less prosperous parts of downtown (not that they're poor as such, just closer to the commercial district and all, which is also where Hookwolf's crew tends to operate, if you understand this right).

Gliding closer towards the old, but reasonably well-maintained house, you observe it with all your senses, but aside from what you think is some old blood in the garage, there isn't any sign of a living being to be seen.

Looks like Kyle isn't home, after all. Fair enough, considering you know the E88 to be busy doing something.

Observing the surrounding buildings, you're confident nobody is about to come out and investigate suspicious bird activity, so you go ahead and take a look around.

The house has a basic alarm system in the windows and doors, presumably sending out an alarm if they're forced open, or at least if the stuff isn't disabled before you do so. Not that any of that is liable to be any real issue for you- whether now or when you come to murder this guy.

Other than that, you have to keep searching a little, but you find there actually is a camera placed overlooking the front yard and door, most likely put there by the owner himself. Looks like the E88 is actually taking this whole thing reasonably serious, after all.

Or at least Stormtiger does. You know for a fact Hookwolf doesn't even bother with an actual civilian identity and just crashes in whatever safehouse he happens to be in at the time.

Avoiding that whole thing wholesale for your own infiltration of the house (not that the camera is likely to be able to pick up on a literal shadow in the night, but hey), you climb the back wall as a shadow and squeeze in through one of the windows, making your way into what looks an awful lot like a bachelor's living room; a TV, a well-used couch and a few miscellaneous pieces of furniture, but it's quite obvious the only resident of this place isn't home all that often himself, as the thin layer of dust you can see here and there indicates.

---

Searching the whole place (without actually tossing it), you mostly keep to your shadow form as you dart from one room to another, popping in and out of your flat self every now and then to poke at things where appropriate.

Aside from a whole bunch of sparingly decorated, but not exactly suspicious rooms, you don't really find anything of further import; until, that is, you make your way through the bedroom, taking a quick look through it.

Until you find a knife handle sticking out from under the bed's pillow.

Taking a closer look as you pull it out, you can see this is a very 'nazi' combat knife, with a little pommel in the form of a swastika made of steel, a comfortable-looking grip wrapped in layers of leather and a long, serrated backside to its sharp blade, glinting in the low light trickling through the window from the street lanterns.

It couldn't be any more stereotypically neo-nazi if it tried, honestly.

---

Smiling at your find and a few of the possibilities for using it down the line, you tuck it back under the covers and look over the bed. Come to think of it, may as well set a little something up while you're here anyways, huh?

Laying a hand on the bed, you strat intoning what you want it to do. "Sleeper sleeps much more deeply."

Simple and straightforward, but it will do what you want.

Turning away and making for the living room, you think about what other mischief you could get up to in preparations for later, only to be stopped by a telepathic poke from Sarah, who has been using her (and Coil's) powers to run mission control on the side.

Uh, Gabe? Just saying this, but you shouldn't cast anything on the camera. Precogged version tried and told me to smack you.

Noted, you think back, agreeing with your own point.

Also, more importantly, you should probably really, really come back as soon as you can. Something's happening.

Is it the nazis? I bet it's the nazis.

Yes, it's the nazis, Sarah sighs over your thought connection.

---

This whole thing was patently ridiculous, Vicky thought to herself, her head on a swivel as she kept to a height people wouldn't be able to make out details at.

All the better for it, too, because her sister wasn't a quiet sleeper and she kept poking an arm or legs out of the wheelbarrow she was carrying her through the air in.

Vicky crinkled her nose at the insides of said wheelbarrow. Amy was hot and all, but did she really have to leak all over this thing? Well, of course she did, she was fast asleep and didn't have a wonderful sister with a power that could help her not do that.

Taking one last look around, she flew downwards, leaving Amy stuck in a backyard tree for a moment. "You just stay here while I scout the situation, got it?"

Vicky's only answer was a quiet snooze, her sister still smiling in her sleep. Geez, but if letting her get her hands on Gabriel for her first time hadn't been a good idea!

Shaking her head, Vicky looked around, spotting nobody spotting her. That clear, she floated over towards the house, fiddling her keychain out of her pocket. What counted now was to make sure how it looked inside, whether mom was awake and-

"Hey mom, how're you doing?" Vicky asked as she came into the kitchen, her mother nursing a coffee.

"Oh, hello Victoria, I didn't hear you coming home. How was your date?"

Shitshitshit- "Date was fine, I think Amy might finally like who I'm trying to set her up with," Vicky improvised by the skin of her teeth, "or at least he didn't seem to mind how grumpy she was being. Speaking of which, she said she's taking over the bathroom for a while, just so you know."

They all knew Amy had bad periods on occasion, and she couldn't use her power on herself to uncramp that like she did for them, so nobody complained when she occupied the upstairs bathroom for an hour or two every now and then- the perfect cover for the next step in Vicky's plan!

"Alright, give her my best when you see her, okay?" Mom replied, draining the last of her brew. "I took enough work home to keep me occupied for the night, so don't mind me if I disappear for a while."

Leaving a kiss on Vicky's forehead (much to her indignified and pouting acceptance), mom went off to hole herself up in her office room- leaving Vicky to silently fly up the stairs at top speed, whooshing into the upstairs bathroom and locking the door.

Phase one, complete!

Now all she had to do was to open the window, smuggle Amy in there inside her wheelbarrow and hopefully wake her up with a spray of cold, cold water so they could clean her up.

And if she got to see Amy naked, well, all the better for it. Getting her hands on her cute sister was always a good thing as far as she was concerned, having actually considered what it would be like to be in... some kind of relationship with her.

And the hot sex with Gabriel, too. She'd never really considered how hot it was to see another girl get fucked, and even better to go in and take part in that herself...

---

"Alright, Sarah," you say when you emerge from the shadow under her desk, crawling up her legs and looking up at her, "what are we dealing with?"

Picking up her laptop, Sarah turns it around to show you the screen as she rolls her chair backwards. Coming to your feet, you take in the rapidly scrolling Parahumans Online board she was browsing, comments scrolling by rapidly with footage from crappy smartphone cameras showing scenes of carnage.

"So, the nazis are basically pulling a progrom day," Sarah explains.

You blink. You blink again. You then take a moment, clap your cheeks and shake your head before looking at her. "Okay, I'm going to need a few details here, what."

Chuckling, Sarah gets up, stretching her arms out for her device. "Okay, so simply put, the E88 has been fighting with the heroes over the south side of town that used to belong to the ABB ever since we went and offed it, but they aren't exactly well liked by the people there, yeah? Mostly asians, after all. So they just browbeat the people there for protection money until now, put their own dealers in place, but the locals grumbled a lot, yeah? No matter how much they sent skinheads to rough them up and keep 'em compliant."

Nodding, you indicate you're with her so far.

"But the situation was anything but stable, and it's pretty clear to anyone that looked. Didn't help the heroes were practically living in that part of town, of course, and the nazis have been fighting them way too often all over the place. So the situation kept escalating hard over the last few days, until we got... this. Best guess, the Empire was anticipating riots to happen any day and they kept preparing, now they're rampaging around the contested area while fighting all the heroes they can find, who naturally flock towards them in an effort to stop them. Almost all their capes are out in force, armed mooks everywhere, the works. They knew they don't really stand a chance in keeping the contested areas in the long term, so they're betting on beating out all other comers and cementing their hold on it the hard way."

"How bad exactly is this going to look in a few hours?" You ask, already thinking about what to do about this.

"Collateral damage is spiking, casualties are being tallied as we speak. This'll be another black mark on Brockton Bay's record by the time the day is done."

---

"Yoshi."

A sigh. "Yes."

"We are going to have to time crunch a bit, so show me what you have so far."

Yoshi, being the ever reliable soul he is, proceeds to type away at one of the computers lining the lab area you found him in after his desummoning, calling up first the record of his own experiences, then navigating to the 'After Death' category, scrolling over to 'newest entries' and finally accessing 'Shadow Stalker Research'.

It's always a marvel just how organized his mind is, for all that he acts like some sort of certified numbnut at times.

"Okay, so we have a decent idea of her costume here," Yoshi gestures at the screen, "so all we really need is to reproduce it realistically enough and stuff you inside it once you've shrunk down enough. Shouldn't be that difficult, really."

You're not too sure about his dismissive tone, but he isn't exactly wrong, either. Taking a considering look, you do have to agree the costume in question isn't too complicated; a dark cowl, some underclothes and a white mask portraying a stern woman's face. It really shouldn't be that difficult to recreate with a manufactory and a little time.

"So then, let's get to working everything out ahead of time. That's what unlimited materials to work with are for."

---

"Okay," you say once you open your eyes once more, having finished up with what you were using the accelerated time inside your inner palace for within five 'real' minutes, "let's see what we can do about the Empire. Realistically, how can we interfere with what they're doing?"

"Well, there's always the obvious," Sarah responds. "We take a bunch of our capes and mooks and go over to stomp their shit in. No complicated maneuvers behind this one, we're strong enough we could easily overpower the eighty-eight, especially with the ion weaponry to really kick anyone in our way down a notch."

"An easy way to do things, but it also reveals more about our capabilities. Good if we want to show off our power, bad if we want to maintain the element of surprise," you reason.

"Yup! Which is where other ideas come in. We could also just send in a few of our people, say, the Undersiders alone, to raid the E88's undefended territory; give them a reason to rethink large-scale action like this and steal everything that isn't nailed down. And then there's also always just sending you in to pull your bullshit, distract and befuddle them all while the heroes deal with the actual fighting. Or any combination of these plans, of course; we can be flexible on this so long as it works."

"'Distract and befuddle'?" You ask, raising an eyebrow as you smirk.

"Oh shut up, we both know that's how it works with you."

---

"Okay, here's the plan," you say after thinking for a moment. "The Undersiders go all in on the E88's turf while I fly over and try a new trick out on the E88's suckers. Shouldn't be particularly risky. Would you like to stay behind and run mission control again, or would you like to join the Undersiders for this?"

"Eh, it's been a while since I went out with them, why not? Gimme a few minutes to organize everything and I'll get this underway. Want us to take Spitfire along? She shouldn't really be recognizable as long as she doesn't use her owl form, after all."

"Sure, sure, whoever you want to take. Anything else?"

"What do I tell Kate and the others?"

"To sit down and wait. As long as the nazis stay away from our territory, we can just stay right under theirs while they sign their own death warrants."

And that, as it were, is that.

---

Of all the things you should have expected, gliding through the misty sky above downtown, finding Hookwolf and his little crew of assholes roaming around wasn't on your radar.

Then again, it isn't that surprising, either.

Anyways, here you are, following them after they emerge from a building, presumably having killed a bunch of people, judging by the amount of gore they're shaking off.

Never one to turn down opportunities like this, you perch atop a nearby roof, keeping an eye on them through the mist much thicker on this height via their blood signatures.

Well, well, well now... You figure if there's anyone in the Empire that's earned themselves some special attention, it's these three, especially Hookwolf. Not to mention the plan you have in mind for his good friend over there...

---

Transforming back into your normal form, you crouch on the roof you were perching on previously, keeping your silhouette in the mist as small as possible while you get to work. "Never hold back, for that is weakness."

That's Hookwolf done. Unfortunately, it seems Stormtiger and Cricket may have heard something, or at least they're moving in response to your muffled chanting... Meaning, you shadow out and down the wall of the building you were on, crossing the street and popping up on its other side. That is, the street opposite of where your targets are walking.

No reason to stay close now that you've seen them and can target them via their blood signatures, after all.

"Return home when it is sleeping time." Because yes, Stormtiger, you really should go home one of these days, there is absolutely nothing bad that could happen to you there.

Can't forget Cricket, of course. Now, what shall she get to maximize potential friction... "Mistrust those with power over you."

The less mutual trust is going on between Empire capes, the better, after all. You probably could've gone for something cooler, but it isn't like your curses can really do all that much yet, so you'd better just stay on theme and hope for the best.

You'd best leave the three musketeers be for now, though. You can't really see any details at this distance, but it looks like they've calmed down- probably deciding it's a false alarm, after all.

Best to get out of here and leave these guys to their 'fun'.

---

Using your compass soul as an overlay several times, you slowly, but steadily make your way through the misty city, the weather conditions you caused (and still are causing) dampening the sound of gunfire echoing through empty streets.

It isn't long before you can tell you're close by the way the direction the power you're using for this moves much more easily, thanks to the speed you're generally moving at, and soon enough, you find him, a man clad in metal armor you suppose is probably created through his power.

He is surrounded by a bunch of skinheads, armed with heavy assault rifles of some sort and determinedly moving through the streets. You would make guesses as to where they're going, but the sound of fighting drifting in from the distance makes that a fairly moot point.

---

Well, you know the drill by now. "You can not trust anyone."

It is questionable at best Kaiser actually really trusts anyone in the first place, but as far as paranoia-inducing wordings go, it should do nicely enough. Having to permanently question whether your underlings may or may not be plotting against or even just properly following your orders will have the effect you're aiming for.

If it's even noticeable in the first place. Your curses are a bit hit-and-miss so far, as you understand it.

Anyways, with that done (and no capes noticing you this time around), you turn into a majestic black bird and begin flying over the assembled group of skinheads, making sure you let your shadow meet each of them at least once before you turn and fly away, unnoticed by any on the ground.

---

Hey Sarah, how's things going on your end?

We had to steal a bunch of cars just to move the shit we're taking via teleporting them as a whole. Cash weapons, drugs, everything. Bitch is happy about a bunch of new dogs, too, though I think Brian's freaked out by the organized dog army she brought to help.

There's a reason I think she's adorable.

We're gonna have to stop soon, though. Pretty sure the nazis are wisening up and realizing someone is attacking them.

Annoying, but not too bad. Just go as far as you're comfortable with and retreat, so long as the suckers have to put manpower into protecting themselves our goals are fulfilled.

Gotcha, gotcha. You have any luck?

I've deployed curses onto all relevant Empire capes and fucked around a little, but that was pretty much it.

You staying any longer? I trust you can keep hidden in the fog you've conjured, but is there anything else you're actually trying to do left?

---

"Get fucked in the ass!" You're fairly sure, at least, that you can't actually cause this to happen, but it doesn't hurt (you) to curse these guys while you're at it anyways- with any luck, one or two of them will end up getting their asses torn open over the next few days.

That said, you honestly don't have anything else to really do, so after just a few casual curses, you move off of the group you hit on your way out. Time to return to your lair and continue with what you were doing before, then!

---

Growling, Bitch crashed through the door, the girl having used her power on herself to grow into the largest mutant lizard dog of them all. Sarah wouldn't complain about that, mind you; though she really could stand to be a bit more considerate of any possible passengers she was carrying.

Such as herself.

Sure, she was practically asking for it when she'd asked Rachel if she would mind her riding her, and after sniffing her, her brother's thrall had huffed and sat down as she grew, which she'd taken to be consent.

Now if only she didn't risk getting splinters everywhere every time Rachel decided to come crashing through walls. Seriously, she had literal dozens of dogs she was using her power on nearby, why couldn't they do it?

"Alright, I hope you all know how this works, gentlemen," Sarah intoned, addressing the room full of skinheads playing cards and carrying boxes with various kinds of contraband. "You all drop what you're doing and we don't feed you to the dogs."

As if on command (or rather, on command), more of Bitch's dogs slipped inside, hungrily eyeing the gangbangers inside just before Grue began slowly flooding the place with darkness as they all began inching closer to the nazi gangsters they were robbing.

"Fuck you bitch, we ain't-" was all one of them got out, waving his hastily drawn gun around before Sarah unleashed her aura, its fear-inspiring effects adding the sight of dogs from hell slavering over the prospect of eating these guys as she addressed him.

Afraid/trying to hide it with bravado

"You know what, I'm feeling merciful today," she smiled, her mouth uncovered by her costume's mask as it was, "so I'll even forgive you and let you and all your friends go if you go ahead and shoot your balls off. What do you say?"

Before he had time to think, rattled by... everything that was going on, the Empire goon pointed his pistol downwards, the recoil of the badly angled shot nearly breaking his arm. Not that he seemed in a state of mind to care about that, screaming over the sheer amount of blood he was losing from the newly made hole in his pants' crotch area and falling to the ground, holding the place his genitals used to occupy until recently.

"Now fuck off before we change our minds, all of you!"

It didn't take all that long for the warehouse full of guns and drugs to be cleared out, the dogs helping them carry the heavier crates with their mouths once she went ahead and pat a few snouts to make up for not letting them eat all the nazis. Maybe it was a questionable idea to let them get used to the taste of manflesh, but Sarah wasn't going to question Rachel's decisions regarding how she did her thing, just so long as she didn't have to deal with official investigations into lots of disappearances.

Bringing the goods out of the entrance Bitch made earlier, Sarah rode her by Brian, who still didn't seem entirely comfortable with... everything-

Uncomfortable/doesn't know how to react to Rachel being a dog and using her power on herself/doesn't know how to react to you riding her/insecure about all the powers others are showing they didn't have before

-but he would just have to deal. Out on the street they found the van Sarah had stolen earlier (Because who else among them would know how to hotwire one?) and began loading their stolen goods once she hustled Regent and Spitfire out of it to help.

"Come on, I was winning!" Regent complained, swiping up the deck of cards he'd brought along.

"Even if you were, what you weren't doing was contributing to our mission, so get your lazy ass in gear already." Seriously, it was like herding cats sometimes.

"U-uhm, sorry," Spitfire chimed in, looking down. "It was just, we didn't really have anything to do unless we wanted to risk burning this place down with my power, so-"

"Don't worry, sweetie, it's just Regent I'm upset with. Now let's get going and move all of this so we can hit the next place already."

They had a tight schedule to keep, after all.

---

Amy stumbled, nearly falling over her own feet as her legs refused to obey her while she fumbled with her stupid costume. Why the fuck did she have to be so damn sore?

"You okay, Amy?" Her sister came in to ask, floating through the door completely topless and adjusting her costume skirt.

Amy stared.

"C'mon, Amy, you have to get used to this at some point," Vicky complained, finishing up what she was doing and committing the criminal act of hiding her breasts behind the bra Amy just now realized she'd been carrying under her arm together with the rest of her costume. "Not like I won't let you see the girls again as often as you want."

"Bwuh," Amy replied in elaborate wordplay, still trying to untangle her leg from the bedsheet she'd accidentally gotten it trapped in when she woke up due to the emergency alarm ringing from her phone earlier.

"Here, I'll help you," the angel descended from heaven in the form of her sister said, coming over to gently help her put both legs on the ground. "Why are you being like this, anyways? You aren't usually this clumsy."

"Sore," Amy grunted, trying to repress the feelings welling up inside herself at Vicky's careful touch, "tired."

"Guess we'll just have to get you dressed enough for a coffee before we go take care of everything else, then," Vicky murmured to her, giving Amy a kiss on the cheek with her soft, wonderful lips and bringing back the memories of what they'd been doing before Amy went to 'sleep'.

"Okay," she exhaled, "but only if I can use your breasts as pillows whenever we're done. And you're carrying me."

Suffice to say, thoughts of her sister kept distracting Amy from how annoyed she was at the world right then and there.

---

Sometimes, her power really sucked. Not so much for what it could do and more for the situations she put herself into because of it. Sure, she could do a lot of good this way... but who really liked having to sit around the hospital covered in blood and the smell of disinfectants?

And she got a lot of blood on herself on nights like this. Normally, when she made her rounds around the hospital, that didn't really happen, but right now they were carting massive amounts of wounded from the wide area of repeated clashes between the E88 and the Protectorate, with the civilians caught between them more often than not.

The heroes did their best, of course, but the villains were deliberately targeting uninvolved bystanders, using the need to rescue them against their opponents. The nazis, on the other hand... well, they were nazis. The civilians were overwhelmingly asians, ones that used to live under the one gang they'd been fighting against for the longest time.

No big surprises, there.

Painstakingly stitching the legs of a crying little girl back on, Amy resisted the urge to wipe her brow, her hands covered as they were, and instead concentrated on keeping her legs under herself, the damn things still suffering to what she'd had done to her crotch. She wasn't going to complain about how things had turned out, but...

With the clarity of hindsight, she really would've chosen some other day for it. A friday, maybe, so she could have slept the appropriate amount of time after what she'd been through.

Disregarding her discomfort, Amy went on to shuffle to the next bedside, only to see it was empty. Looked like she'd gotten through all the especially urgent cases for the moment, after all, so she changed directions to move towards the door out, where a nurse was already shoving the hospital bed her last patient was lying on out.

Giving her a bit of space and exchanging a nod like only exhausted, tired and overworked hospital personnel could, Amy waited for her to get through before she proceeded to go wash her hands in the room opposite the one she'd been using her power in, the space requirements of storing the patients until she could heal them requiring several rooms in the ground floor of the hospital for ease of transportation.

Amy also really wished Vicky was there to keep on carrying her around, but she'd insisted she had to go help fight the villains, and by the time Amy realized she had to protest she'd already flown off. So she had to stay ground-bound as she scrubbed the blood off from under her fingernails.

"Next wave's incoming," she suddenly heard, turning to see an older nurse standing there. Probably just didn't hear her coming up.

"Coming," was all she said, politeness being entirely unnecessary in a profession that involved people's lives.

As before, her usual rooms were filled with the most critical patients, with several doctors and nurses applying first aid to make sure they would last until she got to them. Putting a hand on an exposed gunshot wound, Amy got to work.

And if one especially 'smart' neo-nazi tried to take her hostage with a sharp piece of wood half an hour later, she may or may not have silently reached for a nearby fire extinguisher while the skinhead with the shoulder wound was busy screaming at everyone nearby and beaten him unconscious with three heavy strikes to the head- one to daze him, one to knock him out and a third one for good luck.

By the end of it all, she was still sore and had difficulty walking, but she still felt marginally better.

---

"Hello, Miss Anders?" You ask into your phone, having gone out of your way to come up to the surface of the city, reception being a bit spotty in your enormous underground villain lair and all.

"Hello Mister Wilbourne, how are you doing?" Urgh, business greetings, with the associated politeness and all.

"Quite well, actually, business is going nicely this week. How about yourself?"

"Surprisingly busy, but you would like to hear about that, I suspect." Oh thank the Gabe, she's not about to beat around the bush for half an hour.

"Why, you wouldn't happen to have a first draft for the commission I hired you for, would you? Because if so, I would certainly like to have another meeting, go through everything- you would know more about how this usually works than me, of course."

"Certainly, Mister Wilbourne, when would you have the time? I would imagine you would like to begin renovations as soon as possible."

"I could squeeze a few hours in tomorrow, unless you have a prior appointment, say, around ten in the morning?"

"Of course, that works for me."

"Very well, see you then," you say in goodbye as you hang up. Seriously, you hate calling people for anything that doesn't involve phone sex; a thought that actually reminds you of that one girl you knew in high school...

But regardless, you have work to do. Speaking of which, as you return back inside your lair, you go to summon the usual suspects you delegate tasks to anyways- except, you do have them summoned a lot a lot of the time, don't you?

Far more time than they should need for what you tend to order them to get done for you. Luckily enough, you can just think up a vision of your library and read through what they've been doing with some effort to make it display what you want.

Yoshi, it seems, has certainly been busy; going by the story your automatic knowledge collection is telling you, he is using the time he has in the real world whenever your orders don't keep him busy to walk around your base, chatting with people and trying to make sure the level of atrocities committed is kept to a minimum, appealing to people's better natures at times and trying to take care of the women and kids that have taken to just living on base by now.

Nolan, on the other hand, makes a point of running after and annoying Yoshi, out of sheer casual spitefulness.

Good on them, really!

---

Tammi was more than happy to join you for some power practice, which is how you ended up here, in the wide, empty room Coil left behind for you for some reason, holding up a big plank of wood to catch a series of balls shot towards you.

All entirely telekinetically, of course.

Peeking over your target, you ascertain Tammi has run out of projectiles for the moment before you drop it entirely, instead gesturing towards one of the balls now lying on the ground, drawing it to float before yourself in a quick surge of movement before halting in the air.

"You still good to go?" You ask, waiting for the girl opposite yourself to raise her own target, the mutual control practice the two of you agreed on leaving her a liitle flushed and sweaty an hour or so in.

"I-I'm g-good, I'm g-good," she waves you off, "j-just haven't r-r-really d-done anyth-thing l-l-like this b-b-before."

"Really? I'd have thought the Empire would at least have someone supervise you while you played around with your power, to get used to it and all," you say, measuring up the distance as you've done a few times by now.

"N-nah, I think th-th-they j-just didn't w-want to r-risk anyone c-ca-catching w-wind of my p-power being used. You kn-kn-know, s-secrecy and a-all." True enough, Tammi's power tends to be fairly obvious when used, requiring her to trail her fingers along a surface and concentrate as she moves objects around.

She is also mostly limited to two objects being moved at once; though she can actively affect more distinct inanimate objects, her precision suffers for it, if not her strength.

Hence, this training exercise. Some scholars may proclaim that there was no point to doing this, that parahuman powers can never change or improve like that. To which you, in turn, would say that they're obviously not parahumans and mistake the ability to improve one's use of their power with the power itself, and should, furthermore, shut up and go become farmer, so their bullshit actually had a use as fertilizer.

But yes, maybe it's the motivation of actually improving in a tangible manner, maybe it's because you promised her that you would take off your shirt if she managed to hit with four or more balls at once, but Tammi is really putting her all into this.

Speaking of which, you yourself are also getting some good practice in; mostly in terms of precision, of course. Not that you even can affect more than one object at a time right now anyways.

"And that's the last one. You up for another try?" You smirk at Tammi, knowing full well that she will try to get you naked. Why, most of your 'points' so far you only got because you got her to push her limits like you did!

"Y-y-you b-bet!"

In the end, Tammi does, indeed, manage to hit you with four balls at once, mostly by abusing her power and affecting four at once, but only actively moving two at a time each. You still strip down for her, though.

And more, when she demands recompense for putting so much effort into practice with you. For a girl that has so many issues with her stuttering, she really does know how to use her tongue for other purposes, you'll admit.

---

You have, funnily enough, done quite a bit of testing with the teleportation technology you have access to and tinkertech, figuring that if you end up having issues teleporting the stuff, it'd be better to let someone else deal with the catastrophic failures tinkertech is so well-known for.

Preferrably someone else on some other continent, of course, though you would have been fine with someone in another state entirely.

Neither of those possibilities ended up being needed, in the end, though, as your test cases didn't spontaneously blow up or develop sentience or anything. Which is why you're here now, in an old quarry a decent way from Brockton Bay, but still within your signal's reach, helping Alice set up her bombs for explosive 'testing'.

You're still convinced she just wants to blow shit up, but hey, you ain't about to call her out on it. Not like you'd do anything else in her position.

"Alright, you ready, Gabeman?" Alice asks, fiddling with her mask as she speaks- an extensively modified gas mask she got the others in the workshop to help with.

"So long as I'm not standing anywhere you expect to go boom, totally," you answer with a raised thumb.

"Hmph." And with that, Alice starts to detonate her payloads, dozens of explosives from beefed up normal bombs to exotic physics in the form of a one-use blasts of exotic physics exploding at once.

---

Alice seems to be taking pleasure in blowing her tinkerbombs up sequentially, going from left to right through the wide area you seeded with them together. One by one blasts of electricity, surges of various fluids and exotic effects and, in a few cases, seemingly nothing appear, though your enhanced senses allow you to pick strange sounds and scents out of the general mayhem being unleashed.

A few of these things caught your attention in particular, though. One of the bombs bursts apart in a sonic explosion, rattling and all but disintegrating its surroundings, turning everything within its radius into finely-ground sand where it rested against the stone, a crater demarkcating the exact circumference involved.

Another is just a whole bunch of spontaneously created acid, though you note the way in which it spread through everything nearby until it was used up- some quality of the acid itself, or part of the explosive? Hard to tell with tinkertech.

The third one you take a closer look on seems to be some kind of... softness bomb? The stone near where it was planted is all squishy, buffeted by the other explosions and wobbling almost constantly, parts of it flying off and exhibiting the consistency of jelly.

Number four is just what seems to be the tinker equivalent of napalm, bright fire burning hot enough to slowly, but surely melt the stone nearby. Something to keep an eye on.

Last but not least, you have, well...

"What exactly did that one do?" You ask Alice, being unable to make out anything but the scent of arousal from it, which is weird on a whole bunch of levels.

"Aphrodisiac bomb," Alice replies, making far too much sense all of a sudden, "just instantly ramps up arousal in its effect and melts fabrics into touch-based aphrodisiac lube."

"Then why did we even test it out here?" You ask, careful to word your question in a way that doesn't imply she could've thought this through better.

"Oh, I was think about testing it on you, actually," Alice states smugly, pulling something out of her pocket- a small ball of metal, much like all her tech has been looking ever since she got to use a manufactory. "'S why I brought extras."

---

Alice Nakamura weighed the bomb she made in her hand, finding it a nice weight to play with as she looked at her current (and, to date, both second and better) boss. Gabriel was fairly 'hands off', as far as his style of management was concerned, something that couldn't be said about his policy on fraternization with other highranking capes.

Maybe she should be concerned about that, but at least he had highly ranked women in his organization, and considering the way Lung had been 'hands on' with her face... Yeah, Alice knew which of those two options she preferred.

"You know, I'm reasonably confident I wouldn't be affected by most of those effects," Gabriel drawled, breaking her out of her moment of introspection and back to the matter at hand; getting into his pants.

Hey, she knew he was open to sex with his capes and that was some prime beefcake material under his clothes, so why wouldn't she?

"How much is 'reasonably'?" She asked, immediately wanting to put his claims to the test. Go and pretend her creations wouldn't work, will he?!

"Well, we are here to test your bombs," he pointed out, stretching out an arm to tap at her mask, at the place her headset was displaying the bomb's activation code.

"Point." And with that, Alice closed one of her eyes, the other one squinting at the bomb displayed in her visor while she scrunched up her left foot's toes. That was the minimum for any kind of work with dangerous explosives after a-

"AAAHHHH!" Okay, this thing really did have a kick to it. Feeling over the slowly warming fluid most of her body was covered in, Alice couldn't stop herself from curling up at the sensations washing over her, the aphrodisiac bomb wrecking her for a moment with its full effects.

Gabriel, on the other hand, just stood there, his stupidly good-looking smile all he was wearing in contrast to Alice herself, who at least still had her mask, seeing as it was made out of solid materials unaffected by her bomb's effects.

Not that it didn't suit him, as he came over and ran a hand over her back, ignoring the light pinkish sludge she was covered in while breathing heavily. "There, there... How'd it feel?"

"Good." They were testing, after all. "Too good. I need..."

Her heavy breaths didn't let her formulate anything more, the thick fluid burning her with need. Gabriel seemed to understand her anyways, a firm hand gliding down her chest and towards her stomach.

Alice always thought her tits could be bigger, but right that moment, she couldn't bring herself to care, strong hands gliding between their vale and along the one thing she did like about herself, what free time she had to herself taken up by maintainance of her body.

In other words, she had just a hint of abs, and that was the way she liked it... which was part of why she was so happy to see her boss in this situation, heh.

"You have a lovely body, by the way," said boss began talking, strumming just the right strings to make her happy, "toned and tight. Just firm enough to be fun to knead all over."

Matching up his words, Gabriel began touching Alice all over, digging his powerful fingers into her yielding flesh as the lube made it feel as though every little bit of contact left a trial of fire on her skin.

The good kind of fire.

As Gabriel worked over her front and back, the impromptu massage bringing her from heavy panting to outright moaning as he hugged her to himself and gently knead her butt, Alice could feel his hard, manly body... and a certain other thing, already all hard for her even as its owner wasn't affected by everything she was.

Somehow, that was the one thing that did it for her.

Grasping for Gabriel's big, fat dick, her hand clamping around it in the simplest of rubbing motions, Alice could hear him chuckle, somehow feeling more exposed between the two of them despite her mask intact. "Needy thing, aren't you? Suppose it's good I'm there for you, then."

Alice set about formulating a response through the fog of lust clouding her brain, but all she could muster was a simple "Mine," before she was lifted into the air, her manly boytoy's arms bearing her weight without complaint with a firm grip on her butt, carrying her off only to set her against the nearest wall, making for a nice cushion softened by her consistency adjustor as it was.

"No," Gabriel growled as he adjusted her height, his lower head nudging Alice's entrance as she hastily spread her legs for him, "mine."

That was how Alice lost her virginity, shortly followed by her consciousness. As it turned out, she couldn't really withstand several dozens of orgasms fucked into her by her boss' giant fucking cock in quick succession as he spread her until she fit his size, which was why she spent half an hour crawling into the workshop by the time she woke up in her own bed, tucked in and all, to access the autodoc inside.

She may or may not have thought she was dying or something before she woke up properly, though Sherrel going and letting Alice rest her head on her lap until she felt better once she came out of having a bunch of numbing agents smeared inside her genitals was very, very welcome.

---

Circus, as it turned out, isn't that hard for you to get in touch with, having her number and a spot of time once you're done putting Alice to bed.

It does help, of course, that she seems to consider herself your 'clown call girl', eagerly responding to any communications from you. When you tell her what you're planning to do with her, and the fact you could just telepathically call her up anytime once she's thralled to you, you hardly have the time to actually explain the other benefits of the whole thing as she starts to rush towards you... without knowing how to get inside your lair, of course.

You end up simply teleporting her to you, using the fact you can tell her to stay in one place for five minutes and her phone's GPS to actually target the teleportation properly, and so it comes that Circus spends the next few hours sitting on your lap making bad clown jokes you answer with random dad jokes the entire time.

You have a surprising amount of fun, even without having sex.

---

Flying over the city once more, the way known to you much better this time, you mentally go over your plan one last time as you near the house Stormtiger seems to be inhabiting every now and then.

The first step will be fairly easy, all things told; you're already transformed into a younger female version of yourself, your gait and figure adjusted accordingly, dressed in the costume you and Yoshi constructed, a crossbow with fitting ammunition strapped to its back under the cowl.

You even made sure the mask would be easy to take off, just so as to let you eat Stormtiger, or rather, Kyle Roose right now, easier once you've slipped inside the house.

Gliding along overhead, you confirm that there is, indeed, a single blood signature to be found inside the house you scouted out earlier, solidly placed in a single location and not moving anywhere.

With any luck, your curses should have helped make this happen.

Still, it's about showtime. Sarah is ready to provide full thinker support back in the bunker, everything else is ready, all you can hope for now is that the rest will come as easily as this.

---

Landing on a roof opposite the street from Kyle's front door, you detransform, chacking over yourself one last time before starting your first actually planned, large-scale operation against a rival gang... actually, make that two rival gangs, the PRT is going to be involved.

Anyways, you switch to the way of movement you've copied from what footage you could get of Shadow Stalker- it wasn't much outside of promotional events, but you did get something, enough to assemble a rough equivalence of her way of moving.

That done, you transform into your mist form and back a few times before you employ the next part of your plan. "Rise and become manifest!"

Pinching off a bit of the shadow thrown by the building you're standing on due to the street lanterns nearby, the rooftop you're occupying sufficient for your needs in this, you tuck the ball of darkness under your cowl, spreading it out a little so as to be as unauspicious as possible.

Showtime.

Jumping down onto the street, you stride forwards, suspiciously looking over a shoulder as you go along. Passing the camera you know to film the area, you make sure it gets a few shots of your mask before you subtly shuffle around your portable shadow, turning into mist and spreading it around your form to make it look like black mist instead of the off-grey that was all you could manage when you tried using it by itself.

It is thus that you plunge right through the front door, your misty form pushing through the cracks in complete silence. Once inside, you dismiss the shadow and converge into yourself once more, the memory of Kyle's house providing the route to the bedroom he is quietly sleeping in.

---

Sliding through the comforting dark of night, your eyesight not hindered in the least by the lack of light, you move through the quiet house, through the entrance hallway and the living rooms, up the flight of stairs leading to the second floor hallway.

You don't really have to pretend by now, so you simply turn into an actual shadow and slide right under the door to Kyle's bedroom... and there he is, the nazi of the hour himself, his quiet snores the guide you've followed to get here.

Creeping up to the bed, you frown as you behold Stormtiger's uneasy sleep. From the looks of it, you wouldn't be surprised if the curse you placed onto the bed is the only reason he isn't awake right now.

Probably shouldn't surprise you; this guy's a professional criminal, he's likely used to being awake at night and all. Still, he's asleep now, and that's all that matters.

Taking off the white mask sitting snugly in front of your face, you lean over this guy, carefully unlatching your jaw as you latch onto Kyle's throat, keeping your one power useful for this active- Stormtiger, as you know from a few experiments you've conducted just in case, is feeling something moving to the side of his neck, but not actually feeling any pain, as though a local analgesic were applied where you're biting him.

His sleep remains troubled, but asleep he does remain, until the very last moment, his eyes shooting open and a last, desperate movement as he gasps for air grasping for the knife under his pillow, achieving nothing more than touching it where he's got it ready to be drawn before losing the strength to do anything else.

Kyle Roose joins the souls in your stomach, and you get up to your full size again. That went well, you suppose.

---

Kyle Roose was not a particularly ambitious person. All he really wanted was to get through life decently enough.

That was why he ended up 'working' as a pit fighter in the first place- he wasn't really much for mental work, but he was strong and had a knack for fighting, not to mention what little inheritance his parents left him after the accident consisted of connections to a bunch of shady characters that could help him along in this direction, and so it was kind of a given.

It was either bloodsport or construction work, and only one of those he could get 'hired' for right away and pay was shit for either, anyways. And so what if he had to rearrange some poor fuck's face on the regular, so long as he could afford a decent apartment and good food?

He was good at it, too, eventually moving up the rungs of the ladders and meeting Brad and Melody, two of the few people he could genuinely get along with over their shared passion for violence, as he moved to different fight pits, the ones with the real fights.

Higher risks, higher rewards, and as a team, they were a powerful combination, often winning, rarely losing.

Things didn't stay the same forever, though. Eventually, well, things happened. Kyle got the power to fuck around with air, though he couldn't put power behind it further away from himself, and his best trick required time to pull off, so he used the wind he was gathering as claws until he could fire them off and let the accumulated air blow up hard. Melody got sound fuckery, and Brad, well...

It all happened in the middle of a match they were about to lose disastrously, so it shouldn't come as any surprise when the other contenders were reduced to chunky salsa by the time he calmed down again.

The three of them had to fuck off afterwards, but Brad knew someone that knew someone, as these things tended to go, and so soon enough they were the newest capes of the Empire 88. Being in a gang wasn't so different from being a pit fighter, really, all that changed was who they were chunking up.

People liked to talk shit about nazis, but in the end, they were just another group of people trying to make things they wanted to happen happen.

That was how they spent the next few years, working together and keeping the 'business' running well enough. Brad became a little fatter, but he never stopped being a terror on the mat, and Melody kept collecting more scars for herself. Enemies came and went, which was good enough to keep Kyle occupied and happy with the fights he fought...

Only for the final confrontation to not be a fight at all.

---

That's this guy dead, but you aren't quite done yet; not by a long shot. Reaching into your shadow, you pull out a few bones you grabbed for this exact purpose, getting started on adding them to Stormtiger's body as you repair the damage you caused, along with replenishing his blood and all.

This part just takes a bit of time, but isn't too complicated beyond that. Your prey was nice enough to try and struggle towards the end, so you take care not to move it as you work.

And once you're done, you take the crossbow you brought along and carefully aim it at the still target's chest. With a nice, quiet twang, a broadhead bolt buries itself in the approximate area of Stormtiger's heart, blood spurting out thanks to you making sure to put just a little too much of the stuff in his veins to simulate how a beating heart would pump it out for but a moment.

Not perfect, but it doesn't have to be.

Stretching a gloved hand for the knife halfway in your victim's hands, you bring it down to his chest as you pull on your bolt, violently repeating this process a few times to extract the 'deadly' piece of ammunition and ruining the wound itself, destroying the wound's inner shape with a few more cuts just to be sure once it's out.

Who knew handling human flesh like this while limiting oneself to the strength a human female of your current apparent age would possess is this hard?

Regardless, here you are, bloody knife and broadhead bolt in hand, respectively. Wiping the former on the bedsheets for a moment to get it clean while preserving enough blood splatters for your purposes once the latter is resting on your person once again, you grab the sheathe hidden under the pillow Stormtiger took it from and fasten it to your costume.

Just a few more things to do...

---

One of those things comes before you leave the room, a simple touch all you need to affect the dead body in the room. "Evoke memories of Shadow Stalker!"

Explicitly mentioning names, of capes or otherwise, somewhat weakens the effect of your curses, you feel, though in this case it doesn't really matter all that much; a minimal effect will suffice to reinforce the idea that Shadow Stalker was the culprit. That said, you move right onto the other curse you were planning to leave before fucking off. "Chill all onlookers with unease!"

There, that should do it, the entire house as a location causing unease and hopefully drawing the attention of the right people. With this complete, you finally shadow out of the room, only the matter of making sure your diabolical plan can proceed by way of the staged murder being discovered left.

Shadowing all the way out of the building, you rematerialize once you've reached the sidewalk outside, removing your mask and fumbling for your burner phone brought especially for this purpose.

Calling 911, you wait for a moment before a police operator takes up. "Hello, this is the BBPD emergency line, what's your emergency?"

Speaking in the perfectly replicated voice of a middle-aged man, you simper into the phone. "I-I just saw something, some weird cape shit, a-a human shadow thing just walked right into this house a-and I tried hiding, but then I heard a scream and I think it's coming after me now!"

"Sir, please remain calm and listen to my instructions. Where are you right now?"

"I-I'm-", pausing as though to take a look around, you give the police operator the name of the street everything has been taking place so far. "Please, hurry, I'm-" Crack, you make, imitating the dry sound of snapping human bones with your power to make any noise a human could produce via voiceacting, "UAARGGH! MY LEG!"

"Sir?" The policeman's voice comes from the ground, your phone having 'slid' out of your hand as your leg was 'broken'. "Sir? Are you there?"

"Pl-please don't," you snivel, scraping your shoe along the ground for a moment, "I-I-I can-"

And at this point, you stomp on the smartphone, forcefully cutting the connection. That went well, you suppose!

---

Taylor was having a good day.

Maybe it had something to do with the new powers she now had, the new possibilities opening up before her. Maybe it was the knowledge that she was part of something bigger now, the fact the Lord Street Crypts being this huge organization with massive amounts of resources to throw around, hidden in plain sight and unknown to everyone else.

Maybe it was Gabriel and Sarah taking what felt like a whole day just to spoil her. Definitely she would try to repeat, if she got a chance to; Taylor didn't think she'd felt this nice in years, if ever.

Oh, and sure, she was apparently bisexual now. No real way to get around admitting that after Gabriel's sister made it clear how... fun... other girls could be.

Best way to lose her virginity ever.

Even afterwards, though, membership with the enigmatic vampire-led gang (and wasn't that an interesting concept she still had trouble believing) proved to have its advantages. Drinking Gabriel's blood to get what was essentially a free trial of vampirism, as she understood it, without the need for blood or aversion to sunlight in exchange for only minimal powers added to her own.

Not that being better in every way was a bad deal, exactly, not to mention everything else. All she needed was a drop of blood from Gabriel every other month or so to retain those powers.

Add her very own disintegration laser gun and the additional powers tailored to anyone that was allowed to take them, and it was clear exactly why Taylor had no regrets over joining what was technically a gang.

They may be criminals, yes- but they were powerful criminals, ones that did the right thing more often than the heroes did.

Also, she could communicate with anyone else in what Gabriel called his telepathic network by simply thinking about them. And they with her, which came in handy when Sarah decided Taylor didn't have to go to Winslow unless she actually wanted and immediately hacked into the school's servers to excuse her for the whole week.

It, um, it gave her time to get used to her new powers? Not like she was really in a position to claim moral high ground over anyone by this point, with the sheer amount of people she'd killed. So there she was, using the facilities in the extremely expansive base Gabriel called his home to test her new abilities and actually train with them.

Making tangible progress felt extremely good, even if it was slow going.

Taylor could, in fact, keep on using her power while she was transformed into a shadow, the simple two-dimensional state keeping her hidden and safe unless exposed to bright light, whereas her immunity to bullets (tested initially with what the woman she'd asked for advice, Kate, called a pea-shooter) was both absolute and perfect, especially in combination with her costume made of spider silk.

Apparently, she could learn to extend this protection to her clothes, based on what Kate had told her, but it wasn't a priority for the moment.

She also had telekinesis, pumped into her veins like a vaccination, and it was great. She may or may not have spent a lot of time just juggling random stuff with it, throwing it into an empty room and drawing it to herself again before it hit anything, to the point she'd felt drained and exhausted from overusing the power.

It was something that could happen, apparently. There was a way to fill up her vaguely-existing energy reserves programmed into the manufactory she was using all the time, of course, as she found out thanks to a quick question, though she was worried how it looked when she solved all her problems by injecting mysterious drugs into herself.

The less she said about the power to just create insects for herself to control the better.

Incidentally, Taylor had also found a trick while practicing with her tinkertech gun; using a few bugs to 'calibrate' her shots, she could hit every burst of her laser gun without fail. All she needed were two insects perched on both ends of the barrel and one where she was aiming (or nearby enough, anyways).

Still, nothing had really prepared her for when she would be involved in the scheme that would involve Sophia Gabriel had mentioned to her.

Hey Taylor, you have a moment? Sarah's mental 'voice' asked her.

Oh, uh, sure!

Good. So, you wouldn't happen to be interested in helping Sophia's life get a little worse?

So much as a few days ago, Taylor would have balked at the idea. Knowing what she did now, having done what she did...

Sure, what do I have to do?

You're in the shooting range right now, right? Look to your left.

Turning her head, Taylor immediately saw the knife lying on the floor, a few red splotches on its handguard and grip, the swastika its pommel was formed after making it clear where the serrated blade had come from.

That knife used to belong to none other than Stormtiger, one of the E88's capes and Hookwolf's friend. 'Used to' because the guy died not long ago, by someone that looked a suspicious lot like none other than Shadow Stalker. I'm sure you can figure out where this is going, but yes, we're going to need you to plant this on Sophia as part of a bigger plan.

Swallowing, Taylor came closer to the nazi weapon, glad her costume kept her from spreading her fingerprints on it. Best she knew, it had its former owner's prints and blood on it, she wouldn't want to contaminate it.

So I need to smuggle this into her possession?

Yup! Doesn't really matter where or how, so long as it can be found whenever her stuff is searched, but hidden enough she doesn't realize it was planted on her for a day or two, at least.

Where would you suggest I hide it, then? Taylor asked, somehow weirdly aroused by this whole situation. What was it with her ever since yesterday?

Oh, there's a few places I could think off...

---

Aisha grinned, fondling the new cape. This job was gearing up to be a lot of fun!

Also, this silk stuff was really nice to the touch. Good thing nobody gave her back her underwear.

---

Sitting down and grabbing your drawing supplies from where you keep some inside your room (hey, randomly getting a nice idea and putting it to paper is quintessential part of the artist experience), you get to work sketching out a few designs, testing out how they look and if they match what you want in an 'officially' approved gang tattoo people would actually tattoo on their bodies.

You go through a few motifs, from everything you would expect from a gang like skulls and roses over to little crowns and dice, messing around with several additions to what you've decided to base a central theme around.

Coffins.

Unfortunately, nothing quite seems to be perfect, which is your requirement for this one. People are going to etch this into their bodies forever, it can't look anything less than the best!

Or, well, with autodocs, tattoos could be removed easy enough, actually, but still. No reason to do anything less than your best.

Incidentally, autodocs are also how you plan to have these these things applied, both for simple ease of use and to differentiate perfect ones from any made by hand, unless a given tattoo artist is particularly meticulous.

Ultimately, you settle on a picture just simple enough to be fitting for most occasions, the coffin rich in detail to complete the look next to some plant growth and an arc going over the whole thing, a simple band of cloth announcing the wearer to be part of the LSC.

Nice enough to actually look good while staying simplistic enough it can fit on most people.

---

Thursday brought with it another day of tedium and boring shit nobody actually cared about except for the sake of going through the motions. They went to the same fucking classrooms, chewed through the same fucking classes and had the same fucking unidentified shit at lunch.

Emma was being chatty as always, Madison was being a simpering whimp, Julia blabbered whenever there was a moment of silence... honestly, if she didn't require someone to keep her entertained during school hours, Sophia would've kicked everyone save Emma to the curb already, but as it was, they had their uses in prattling on and being minorly amusing, at least.

Still, eventually, school day was finally, blessedly over, and Sophia bid Emma farewell before she made for the car waiting to pick her up. Because of course some stupid shit had to fucking film her with a drone or something while she was busy cleaning the streets, not that she'd ever admit to jack shit.

The pencil pushers couldn't actually do anything much, but they could keep her from going out the best they could, and it was enough to be a pain in her ass. So what if she continued doing the same she did before she became a Ward? Not like anyone really cared, so fuck that shit.

Anyways, wouldn't be long before she was back in costume, and Sophia had a patrol scheduled later that night, so she would finally be back on the roofs again. Stupid rules and regulations had her spend way too much time prancing and sitting around and too little time free jumping through the night from rooftop to rooftop.

Except, as she got into the car that was supposed to take her to the PRT HQ, Sophia quickly realized there was someone inside aside from the usual driver, though she quickly calmed down when it turned out to be Miss M.

"What's up with the honor guard this time? You hitching a ride or something?" Sophia asked, adjusting the backpack on her lap as she made sure the door was shut tight.

"Not quite," Miss Militia answered, the constant presence of her power a combat knife sheathed at her thigh at the moment. "There's been a... complication. I'm afraid the situation in the city is continuing to escalate."

And wasn't that the fucking understatement of the year? The news were downplaying it, like they always did, but Sophia had a decent idea of how things actually looked like to have Battery downed with broken legs and all Protectorate heroes on deck 'round the clock since yesterday, but this sounded like the nazis were actually pulling something bigger... again.

Not like she liked to say it, but at least the fuckers were doing someth-

"Is that Hookwolf running down the street?" Sophia asked disbelievingly, the living mass of metal tearing up the asphalt as it sped along, ramming anything in his path out of the way.

---

"Hello, Miss Anders," you greet Kayden when she steps out of her car, having parked it on the sidewalk right next to the building you (or rather, your people) chose for the whole nightclub plan. "I hope traffic wasn't too bad for you?"

"Hello to you too, Mister Wilbourne, and it was only as bad as communting hours usually are around these parts. Morning rush tends to be a bit less dire, at least."

"I'm sorry to hear that," you begin, only to be interrupted by the mousy brunette before you can get further.

"Oh, don't worry, I was expecting it. So! Shall we get started straight away?"

Smiling, you proceed to unlock the door leading inside the property, looking sideways at the woman clutching a binder to her chest. "So eager? I certainly wouldn't have taken you for the type to long for working on a locale like this, Miss Anders" you joke.

"Please, as if you would object," she huffs in response. "Oh, and didn't I tell you to just call me Kayden? I distinctly remember us having this conversation before."

"Oh, we did," you agree. "Come on in, Kayden, and show me what you got."

Once more entering the main factory hall, you take a quick look around, reaffirming that nothing inside has been disturbed since your last visit. Old machinery, a thick layer of dust, everything looks in order.

"As we discussed before, this area is heavily predisposed to become the main public floor including the dance floor, so I prepared a few designs accordingly. With how much space we have o work with, I am mainly concerned with renovation costs for the sake of dividing it into several areas over anything else, though. Here, take a look."

With that, Kayden takes out several floor plans from her binder, explaining detailed room setups she designed for the purposes of making this a properly functioning nightclub. It will, by its very nature, be dark and filled with music, but anything beyond that is up to how you decide to use the space you have.

A large amount of it is reserved for the dance floor, as a bare necessity for anything like this, but an old factory like this has the space for a lot more, too. For one, you can easily agree to the suggestion of black floor tiles with those white streaks sparingly driven through them, not that Kayden needs to know you are totally planning on using actual marble for this (just because you can). The other stuff, though, does take some deliberation...

---

In the end, you decide against going for anything overly fancy, instead trusting in both Kayden's (and your own) abilities to make this something special instead.

For starters, you don't just want a simple, dinghy little bar for your place. No, you want a huge bar, stretching from one wall to another, which is saying something indeed given the context of the factory floor you're talking about, all nice and modern out of black material and stocked with enough drinks to give a small army alcohol poisoning with. You'll actually need several bartenders for it, of course, but it'll certainly be worth it, you reckon.

The bathrooms will be enlarged from the initial design concept, with small waiting rooms with seating arrangements supplied and hopefully enough toilets present to keep congestions to a minimum- you don't need to go to the toilet for any reason that doesn't involve vaguely unhygienic sex these days, but you remember actually having to hold it in what feels like an eternity ago by now.

Speaking of which, the space you're using for this will be made up for a little by additional comfy seating alcoves with these round seats around tables, really playing up the nightclub thing and removing a bunch of walls where various side rooms are currently sitting. You don't really need them for anything, so you may as well get some use out of the space this way.

And last but not least, cages. Not cages in the way you would like to use them, being essentially especially fetishistic stripper stages, just strategically placed around the dance floor and even the walls, giving you enough place for several dozens of strippers to ply their trade on the integrated poles and dance the night away.

Kayden blushes when she explains her designs on that aspect, but you don't interrupt her, intently listening to how she goes through her plans for what might be called sexual exploitation of sexy women, if one was so inclined.

Which you aren't, of course, but it's the thought that counts.

"With this finalized, shall we move on to the side rooms? I figure we may as well finish up this floor before we proceed."

"Oh, I actually already have a few uses for them in mind," you drawl as you think about your earlier thoughts on those same side rooms, the... inspiration, you had when you first sighted the industrial equipment left in there. "And don't worry about any additional costs or work times... I do happen to have certain 'connections' in the area, and getting a significant workforce involved won't be an issue with the kind of money I am willing to pay anyways."

"If... you say so, Gabriel, sure. Anyways, that takes the ground floor out of consideration, then, shall we move on to the upper floor next?"

"Gladly," and you can't help but smile at the memory of that one guy you got killed in the end almost as a casual afterthought, "wouldn't be much of a night club without a VIP lounge, after all."

---

The upper floor, being a lot more segmented and generally smaller than the ground floor, takes a lot less time to work through, mainly being broken up into public areas meant for any and all VIPs authorized to come up and the 'personal' rooms, mainly all-purpose VIP rooms aside from the medical areas you silently account for as Kayden goes through the setup planned out for the upper floor.

The public parts will mainly consist of a tasteful, smaller bar next to the equally tasteful loft area filled with seating for anyone up there to literally look down on the ground floor, with the entrance to the corridor network leading to the various less open rooms next to the bar, those same rooms filled with various suggestions as to their interior designs in Kayden's notes and floor plans.

Not surprising, really.

The honestly largest difficulty so far, it seems, is to keep the whole nightclub's design realistic while keeping the building codes it needs to follow in mind, an amount of effort you, personally, would have simply skipped over and later on bribed, browbeat or mind controlled any potential inspectors into ignoring.

Then again, that's why you hired a professional to do it for you, you suppose.

"And that's... that, I suspect," Kayden says as she makes a few last notations in the various papers she brought along, stowing them back in her binder before looking at you again. "All that's left now is the basement, though I should warn you any construction there is going to take even longer to complete than in the rest of the building on account of all the flooding and likely damage to the foundations that will have to be addressed first."

"Worry not and lead the way." And hey, if you deliberately stay back for a second or two to get some distance between the two of you, then all the better.

"Feel unsafe by yourself," you mutter darkly, satisfied when Kayden doesn't turn to look back at you. It's quite amazing how quietly you can chant various things nowadays, isn't it?

"Fear those you used to trust." And with that, you have used up both curses you trust yourself to place on a person, though you're fairly sure what you've done should suffice for your purposes.

Ah well, only time will tell, not that you're about to rely on curses alone to complete your plans for the woman.

"One thing of note, you should really see about re-installing an elevator at some point," Kayden mentions as the two of you take the stairs, the actual former freight elevator out of working order for a long, long time.

"Noted," you smile at her, knowing full well she isn't as composed she she's pretending she is. Her heart is beating a tad bit too hard for you to believe all this walking up and down the stairs is leaving her unaffected.

---

"Okay, and this," Kayden says, signing off on the last list of recommendations she put together for how to deal with the basement, "should be all. I must say it has been quite a while since I had to research this many details and regulations, but I definitely enjoyed it."

Taking in her coy smile, you can't help but to give back a grin of your own. "Oh, I certainly hope you did; I'd hate to disappoint a lady, after all. Why, I would have to carry you right off to bed and correct a lack of enjoyment, wouldn't I?" You growl, looking Kayden right in the eyes.

"Oh, really, you shouldn't flatter yourself... I had to play all by my lonesome for most of it, after all."

Well, someone gets the spirit now! Abandoned factory basements are the best places to flirt, after all, and you can even see the light blush on Kayden's cheeks as she tries not to look at you despite the crappy amount of light you have down here.

"That does it, it's a matter of honor now!"

---

Approaching Kayden, you swipe her off her feet before she can react, her surprised call echoing between the bare walls of the abandoned property whose decoration she was planning for you over the past few days as you proceed to carry her up the stairs.

"You know, I should slap you for doing this," Kayden huffs once she's recovered from the surprise, leaning her weight towards you.

"But you aren't going to," you answer, keeping your gait steady as you carry her back up the stairs the way you came in.

"I'm not going to."

"You know, that does make me wonder about my chances, regardless of the whole professionalism angle."

"I wouldn't go that far." But despite her words, you can clearly hear the smile in Kayden's voice as you make it up to the ground floor, taking a quick look around.

Nothing's changed inside the factory since you last looked, but you can see a trio of blood signatures outside the door...

Joking and lightly flirting a little on the way, you do let Kayden down before you open the door outside, waiting a moment to let her pat her clothes down and unruffle any that need to be.

"You ready? Caught your breath a little?" You ask, pulling the key out of your pocket again.

"Yes, I have. You really didn't need to do this, but thanks," Kayden says, silently accepting you doing this 'for her'.

You just smile at her a little.

Opening the entrance to your property, you take a glance outside before, contrary to earlier, not letting Kayden through like a proper gentleman and everything, instead getting out yourself.

"Can I help you fine gentlemen?" You ask, the very picture of a stern businessman having to deal with this shit.

---

Taking a look at these three clowns, they're standing there in dishevelled clothes, all fingering knives of some description. Thing is, they're also keeping the right distance between each other to let them cut you off as they spread out to surround you, looking to actually be trained in group tactics despite looking like hobos or something.

You also, in the corner of your eyes, spot the blood signature of another sucker in the warehouse on the other side of the street, standing near a window. You can't make out details, but it looks like you're actually being observed.

Also, you can see the edge of what looks an awful lot like a tattooed swastika peek out at the base of one fucker's neck as he moves, the collar of his clothes slipping around a little.

"Now see 'ere, fancy man, we dun'-"

---

Rapidly thinking at Aisha, you deliberately break out in a bout of chuckling, cutting off the nazi about to try something with you. "Seriously? You're trying something like that in Crypt territory? I mean, I knew the E88 was recruiting brainless naziboys on account of all the general idiocy needed to join in the first place, but since when do they recruit the mentally deficient?"

Oh, they didn't like your little rant, not at all. Though it did help do what you wanted it to- keeping them on the backfoot and giving Aisha time to act (once she's found the place you are, anyways).

"Now we dunno nuthin' what y'er-"

"I can see the swastika tattoo on your back, moron," you throw in unimpressed, melodramatically holding back laughter while Aisha keeps telling you about her progress.

The three idiots exchange a quick look before turning back to you as one.

"Fuck it," the one on the left says, "I say we just fuck 'im u-"

Fun fact, you did, in fact, make sure to program your biometrics into the turrets when you designed what little programming you could do at the time of the big cybersecurity update, as you like to call it. Well, and you made sure to upgrade it with the biometrics of your most commonly used forms later on, too, just to make sure and minimize the chances of them being used against you- anyone tries to shoot you with them, they're hardcoded to blow up in a seperate process to the other precautions you took at the time.

That means that, when you smile darkly and lift a hand to give the signal they're meant to receive and act accordingly, you do it with enough dramatic panache these little nazi pigs shut up and pay attention.

"There's a reason I set up shop in Crypt territory. You pay protection, you get protection," you announce loud enough to make sure Kayden can hear you before snipping your fingers.

For a long moment, nothing happens. Then, a dozen or so turrets pop up on the surroundings roofs, fully charged and opening fire from all directions.

The nazis last for two laser rounds from them before summarily dying, the third being the last that gets fired into the lifeless bodies now littering the ground.

---

When Gabriel moved out of the door, Kayden immediately realized something was wrong, the smooth businessman not insisting on holding open the door for her this time around.

Looking outside, she immediately saw what the issue was. Three homeless brandishing weapons in broad daylight, trying to intimidate Gabriel only to be alternatingly ignored and viciously talked down to.

Incidentally, they also were Empire, apparently? But that didn't make sense; this place was outside Empire territory, so why would they come all this way just to rob a white man?

"There's a reason I set up shop in Crypt territory. You pay protection, you get protection." And as Gabriel went and snapped his fingers, Kayden could see it, a machine of some kind unfurling on the roof opposite from where they were standing.

The next moments were filled with bolts of bright red plasma flying through the air, accurately blasting holes into the quickly defaced bodies now littering the asphalt. Kayden had somewhat of an understanding on what large amounts of exploding plasma did to a person, and she was fairly sure all three gangsters died within moments.

"So anyways," Gabriel said, turning back to her, "as I was about to say, would you be up for another dinner? My treat again, naturally," he smiled his charming smile at her.

Eyeing the dismembered corpses on the ground, the attacks from the obvious tinkertech having contained the gore to a minimum as anything being torn off by the projectiles was also immediately turned to ash. "Sure, I would be... glad to?"

Noticing her questioning tone and gaze, Gabriel just shrugged. "Oh, in case you were wondering, the Crypts went ahead and installed a defense system just in case anyone started trouble around my new club. I am keyed to the turrets, of course, but they should also automatically activate whenever someone tries to assault the building or otherwise needs to be taken down a peg."

Well, after this particular explanation, Kayden was certainly not going to fly over... anything north of downtown, really, unless she could help it. "You said they were Empire?"

"Yeah, here, take a look," Gabriel agreed, kneeling one leg into the dust to pull at one of the bodies' lapels (Didn't he feel any disgust at touching a dead body?) and peeling them back a little.

There, on what little skin the searing automatic fire had left, she could see what Gabriel had to have spotted earlier; half a swastika was left, cut off by an ugly black hole through the man's spine.

Kayden didn't gag, having seen the aftermath of her own power enough times to become inured to smells like this, though she still pulled a grimace.

"I see. Well, it seems your future nightclub is well in hand, but I'd better get home soon. Would you mind if I called your secretary again for details?"

Kayden had to get home. Right away.

"Sure, sure. Get home safe, okay?"

"I will, don't worry." And as soon as Kayden had secured Aster, she would have words.

---

Once Kayden has had a few moments to drive off and you're reasonably sure she won't be coming back spontaneously (She seemed in a hurry, whyever might that be?), you move on over to where you know the last of your 'opponents' this time around was hiding, pointedly not using any powers just in case you're still being observed somehow.

Breaking into the building is as easy as jumping through an empty window frame, though you're careful not to cut yourself unnecessarily on any sharp glass, and before long you're standing in front of what is best called Aisha bullying another disguised skinhead by repeatedly pulling his pants down, revealing his... well, shame at that size, to the world, the confused ganger's tricked out camera lying discarded on the window ledge as he's using both hands to try and keep his pants from 'slipping'.

Hearing you come in over Aisha's cackling giggle, the poor fuck turns around only to get his head grabbed and smashed against the nearest wall, your teeth soon following course as you violently bite into the side of his neck, your concussed victim simply too slow to react to what happens.

"Good work, by the way," you say once you're done feeding, giving your eager, mostly naked minion a thumb's up as Aisha poses for you.

"Anytime, but make sure to warn me a little earlier next time 'round. So I can grab a dildo and all."

Well, you aren't going to comment on her 'hobbies' overmuch, you think.

---

Hugo was never the really big guy in any group he was in, nor was he the smartest or best connected. What he was, though, was a sneaky little shit and enough of a suck-up nobody really complained about him, which was good enough far as he was concerned.

Going through life, his only real goal remained to be and stay part of whatever group was influental and popular enough him being part of it let him lord it over others just a little, a task that was made much easier thanks to his talent and 'passion' with a camera, sneaking quiet shots for blackmail and his fap collection as opportunities presented themselves. Eventually, his 'talents' were noticed by certain people and before he knew it, he'd become part of the E88, who were always interested in who was actually banging all the black chicks and who wasn't.

Continuing with his earliest strategy, Hugo became part of a certain group of fighters that were on the fast track to 'promotion', being trusted with a bunch of tasks ranging from direct and brutal over to discrete and subtle. He did his best to help out of course, though he also did his best to avoid actually being fucked up by anyone the others were supposed to fuck up, until one day, they happened to be ordered to try and stage a fight with the wrong person...

---

While you could just interrogate your newest victim without pulling him out of your inner world, you kind of like being able to personally look at whom you're talking to for these kinds of things, so you promptly breathe Hugo, as you glance the newly appearing book on the bookshelf inside your library documenting all souls you add to yourself being titled, out again.

Ignoring his antics as a newly dead soul (and the way he keeps staring at Aisha, now that he can see her), you proceed to tell him to shut up about being high up in the E88 in a doomed attempt at turning this situation around and instead make him tell you about everything he knows about what was supposed to happen in that little 'ambush'.

Somewhat unsurprisingly, it was all about Kayden; the E88 has no idea this identity is connected to Cain in any way. The original plan was to rob and beat you as you came out of the factory, Kayden's initial tail having followed the two of you the last time you showed her the place.

Somehow, you're not even surprised.

Anyways, the gangers would make sure you would get fucked over hard until either Kayden used her power to intervene, in which case this little shit would have gotten it all on tape and used it as blackmail for Kaiser in a longer plot to bring her back into the Empire, or she wouldn't, in which case you would have been beaten hard enough to either die and likely deny Kayden's current source of income or been laid up in the hospital for at least some time, during which another team was supposed to pressure you into dropping Kayden like a hot potato.

You have to say, it wasn't a bad plan as such, especially if you were a normie. Or, you know, at all human. But alas, you have completely murdered the opposition instead and put Kaiser into a really bad position, considering Kayden knows he was pulling the strings on this attempted scheme all along.

Whoopsie!

The explanation of what your new enslaved soul knows about all of this does halt every now and then as you continue to casually grope your cute little pet, though a few absolute orders keep him talking just fine. At the end of it all, you are quite amused and caught up on a bit of gossip 'in the office', so to speak; Kaiser, it seems, has been a lot more active over the last few days, the fights on the south side of town apparently litting a fire under his metal ass.

You'll just take that statement as it is, you think. In the meantime, you go ahead and dismiss the gossip nazi for the time being; you have more important shit to do yourself.

Sadly, it doesn't involve bending Aisha over to be railed hard for the next half an hour, no matter how your cute pet tries tempting you to do so. Though you do get her to share her bound soul's power with you, meaning the way back to the bunker ends up a little race between the two of you.

---

With the benefit of hindsight, you still can't quite tell whether this was a good idea or not.

"Hoot!" Emily hoots above you, sitting on your head as she is. Your current bout of training-induced insanity consists mostly of using your power to levitate yourself, combined with attempts to employ telekinesis aimed at none other than yourself to, basically, 'push' yourself upwards to actually keep in the air and in one place, all the while Emily, transformed into an owl as she is, flies around you, attempting to move you away.

Which, ultimately, came down to perching on your head.

Reaching up to pluck her from said perch, you smile at her as you begin cuddling her bird-self, knowing from experience that it feels quite pleasant to have your feathers scratched just right.

"Who's my pretty bird, hm? Whooo's my very very pretty bird?" Making sure to keep a secure grip on her as she stretches her legs out for you, you place a kiss on her head, her weight still just as easily able to push your weightless form downwards like this.

And hey, if Emily blushes and can't look you in the eye by the time you call a break and she transforms back, you aren't complaining.

---

Upon you asking what Sherrel would like to do if you, hypothetically, asked her out on a date, Sherrel responded with 'tinker together, duh'.

It's no big surprise, really.

So when you show up with a drafted blueprint for an integrated battery of ion laser artillary meant to slot into the doomtruck, she greets you with a deep-tongued kiss. You do know to bring something better than flowers if you want a date to get anywhere, after all.

Greeting Alice and Lea as Sherrel drags you across the tinker garage, you soon arrive in Sherrel's more personal part of the shared workshop, your gift thrown onto the main workdesk as your clothes are literally torn from your body, Sherrel's naughty smirk writ large across her face.

"You know, hypothetically, if my man did something I really liked, I'd certainly 'reward' him."

Chuckling as you mirror her motions, you unfasten her clothes, freeing up her tits and slowly inching her hotpants downwards. "So hypothetically, if you were to then take this stuff and apply it, how much would said man be allowed to help?"

Sherrel just grabs a wrench and turns around, pointedly pointing her butt in your direction. "You get three guesses, and the first two don't count," she says coyly, looking back at you with lidded eyes.

It takes you exactly half a second to sheathe yourself inside her, your cock already freed in her first frantic rush, and as you begin fucking Sherrel in an almost mechanical rhythm, you also help her implement the additions and changes, letting her tinker power take over where appropriate while you work on other parts.

Your spot of amorous engineering doesn't end until both of you came several times, Sherrel's tight asshole has been given the same treatment as her pussy and the both of you only belatedly realize you accidentally replaced the invisivan's laser minigun with an ion laser minigun instead of working on the doomtruck, being too preoccupied with sex to pay attention to details like that, but all in all, both you and Sherrel end up quite happy with how things went.

---

Having said goodbye to Sherrel with one last, sloppy kiss and a slap to her plentiful butt, you move on to your 'official' drawing room, checking over the cameras and your art supplies.

Seeing everything in order, you then proceed to take a moment to get into the right mindset; after all, Abel isn't the easiest person to properly act as.

Nevertheless, it isn't exactly long before your timer runs down and showtime begins.

"Hello, you little degenerates," you say in Abel's usual disparaging tone, "and please, don't even bother. Just turn off whatever device you are using to watch this and go do something productive! Read a book! Take a walk! Violently concuss your neighbours! All a better use of your time than... this."

"To begin with, I believe certain voices have complained claiming I had left out a member of a local parahuman group in my streams so far. Well, loathe as I may be to admit, there is a certain measure of truth to such claims, meaning it is high time we took to the person most decidedly not Lady Photon- and yes, that is her chosen name, she will be referred to as such- for a topic in this... distasteful display."

Sketching out the dimensions and proportions of your picture of Sarah Pelham (and you do, in fact, take issue at her first name, if only jokingly), you carefully balance her decently muscled waist and finely sculpted musculature in general with the somewhat plumper thighs you're planning out.

"We must, of course, consider the feelings of the people involved in this. I do wonder how many of you tasteless degenerates have simply wildly shed your fluids over certain pictures of the past and present without ever stopping to think about how certain parties may feel about certain fictional countenances widely available on the internet. And how many of you went ahead with it anyways."

Faux disappointedly, you shake your head. "Truly, I despair at the state of today's society."

Spending some extra attention on the face (because duh, it's the face), you make sure to give Lady Photon the poutiest, plumpest lips you can without making them look grotesque, her expression ending up very... bimbo-ish over the way you leave them open even as you work on almost comically big, blue eyes.

"I do have to say designing and drawing out a woman's hair never fails to be entertaining. It is just such a shame certain people insist on making it a sexual thing."

It's the truth, even; bringing up Sarah has imbued you with a healthy respect for women's hair.

Anyways, topping the generous chest you're going for with hard, pointy nipples and coloring in the details of the thigh-highs only serving to accentuate the woman's slim, cute vagina, you finish up the picture fairly fast thanks to your literally supernatural precision and endurance.

The background, by contrast, ended up more an afterthought than anything else, but alas, such is life.

"There, with unfinished business taken care of, shall we move on to the other... distasteful... parts of the evening?"

---

"What now, 'speed-draw a woman in a fedora in a perilous position'? I do not know where you degenerates get your strangely specific fantasies, and I truly do not wish to know now."

Alright, a few clicks of the mouse later, you have an in-stream timer prepared, five minutes counting down... now.

"Truly, I never quite enjoyed the concept of speedily drawing something for the sake of doing it. Art is something to be savored and enjoyed, on both the artist's and the viewer's side," you say rapidly, moving as though in fast-forward; you're definitely going to see people questioning if this is actually real, you're fairly sure.

Big fat fedora, sketched; simplistic background, bedsheets or something you only need a few lines for; centerpiece, woman with her hands tied behind her back.

"The essence of painting is to portray a particular motif through which the artist may convey an idea, emotion, scenery or concept, complicating this through an enforced time limit in what is usually a slow, meticulous process meant to draw out the essence of the artist's views and thoughts." You're even speaking as though you were in fast forward, lightly adjusting your voice to have that high-pitched, hurried quality to it.

Very slim waist, panicking look behind, breasts squished against the ground and a generous butt to 'round' things off, hahah.

Bit out of proportions, but it'll do, you're in a time crunch here so no time to refine the hair, dammit. Next off, coloring!

"Furthermore, I formally object to the inherent perversity in all offered suggestions made inside this context have to be derogatory ways to reduce women to sexual objects and officially apologize for the mindset of humanity in general."

On the fucking dot, you finish, a few details on the toes taking the last few seconds of your allotted time. "Regardless," you breathe, pretending to have run out of air mid-rant, "let us move on and never speak of this again."

---

"Oh great, yet another abhorrent fetish we need to air out," you gripe, mentally already measuring out your old Vista concept... just with less skin shown than some might prefer.

Not that you're about to actually say any of that out loud ahead of time.

"I simply cannot understand why some people are so obsessed over the mammary expulsions of a wholly different species, to the point of putting people of your own species inside clothing imitating their fur print."

So, technically, this is a younger girl, with a cow print bikini, a little headband and all... oh, how about a malformed cow plushie, too? As you can vividly recall thanks to the Little Sisters back in Rapture, girls love plush toys.

"And unfortunately for myself, I simply cannot bring myself to berate you overly much for your disgusting behaviour. After all, who can hold onto any amount of wrath in the face of... this?" Drawing the outline of the girl's face, you move on to her slender proportions, leaving no doubt about the age of the person you are sketching out.

Yes, superficially sexual but entirely wholesome on second thought, that's what you will go with for this one. Oh, maybe add a pair of heart-shaped earrings, a cowbell on a fluffly collar around the neck...a pair of ribbons, maybe, for twintails behind the headband?

Giving the girl properly defined, but by no means adult proportions, what is essentially a bikini... oh, and shorts to go over the bottoms, of course, those are a must-have for any young cow girl.

"Do note I am by no means happy about this, I am simply less unhappy than for most occasions."

"And that, as they say, shall have to be it, as my time is as short as the average reader's attention span and genitals. Do make sure not to like this stream, not to return next time and not to tell anyone about what a depraved pervert you are for watching this."

---

Carol Dallon was livid. No, truthfully, she was outraged at the sheer, blatant insolence displayed as she glared at the screen of her tablet.

"We must, of course, consider the feelings of the people involved in this. I do wonder how many of you tasteless degenerates have simply wildly shed your fluids over certain pictures of the past and present without ever stopping to think about how certain parties may feel about certain fictional countenances widely available on the internet. And how many of you went ahead with it anyways."

Cain was... straight up ignoring their bargain. Simply and openly...

Unless he did not count her sister's side of the family as part of it? She hadn't even thought about clarifying it in the moment, so used as she was to thinking of the Pelhams as part of the family. And of course Cain would immediately point at this... technicality to continue mocking her.

Nothing else to be expected of a villain.

She would have to correct this, of course. Ensure the disgusting man she had foolishly allowed to make a deal with her, as though he was worth dealing with in any way that did not involved a lengthy stay in prison, would keep to the spirit of their agreement rather than attempt to wiggle out through semantics.

"I do have to say designing and drawing out a woman's hair never fails to be entertaining. It is just such a shame certain people insist on making it a sexual thing."

It really was a shame she had been rash enough to confront him by herself; with her team by her side, New Wave could have scored a major win against the 'Undefeated Prince Of The Underworld', as some news outlets were already calling him, putting an end to his legend ahead of time. But instead Carol had to deal with the perverse beast's lusts until she could maneuver him into exposing himself without endangering her family's public standing overmuch.

His quickly building fame was, frankly, insulting to any of the many heroes doing their best to protect the innocent every day. Carol needed to get those paintings secured as soon as she could before they could do even more damage, preferrably without letting her daughters know (they were under enough pressure already just knowing those... pictures of them existed) so New Wave could act against him openly without risk.

Speak of the devil, though... Staring at the text showing on her smartphone, Carol ground her teeth against each other. It seemed her foe was in agreement, having offered a time and place to 'meet' again already.

Just he wait... Carol would have her revenge. For the indignities he'd inflicted on her and any that were yet to come.

---

Contessa frowned at her screen, idly watching it as she popped another piece of chocolate into her mouth. The far-reaching ripples Cain generated tended to be less intensive in this specific version of his stream, but she still couldn't quite trust the path to stay unaffected, so she was still staying at a secret base while it was ongoing.

"The essence of painting is to portray a particular motif through which the artist may convey an idea, emotion, scenery or concept, complicating this through an enforced time limit in what is usually a slow, meticulous process meant to draw out the essence of the artist's views and thoughts."

Path to finding whoever caused this topic to win?

Mentally following the few steps her power generated, Contessa once again frowned as she licked her fingers clean. Why would the Number Man-

Path to finding out Number Man's motivations in this?

Now she was getting somewhere. Thinking through the path, she could see as it built up; to put it simply, Kurt was attempting to see how far he could goad Cain into revealing any possible information he may or may not possess.

It didn't actually work, obviously enough; Cain was drawing someone else, some other woman with a fedora. Though the feminine shadow looming over the person he did draw was interesting...

Oh, now she was doing it, too.

"Furthermore, I formally object to the inherent perversity in all offered suggestions made inside this context have to be derogatory ways to reduce women to sexual objects and officially apologize for the mindset of humanity in general."

Contessa could hardly wait until the storm passed and she could see clearly again. She had her sweets ready to be eaten on the go, too.

---

Missy Biron grimaced, knowing she was defeated. She had given it her all, but HealingHand42 had proven themselves too powerful, after all, simultaneously countering her alt accounts with their own and convincing the other voters of their position faster than she could spam votes as soon as they realized she was working against the winning option.

"I simply cannot understand why some people are so obsessed over the mammary expulsions of a wholly different species, to the point of putting people of your own species inside clothing imitating their fur print."

Sighing defeatedly, Missy settled in to watch as the figure on the screen slowly began taking shape, being both what she feared and not all that bad. Sure, it looked... a little like her, but far from being recognizable as a reference, and it wasn't some insane lactation fetish thing as she was working under the assumption of.

Damn puberty was keeping her waiting and making everything worse. And so what if she couldn't actually get pregnant and milky yet? Was that really any reason to push the whole fertility angle all the damn time?

Opening her PMs, Missy used one of her oldest accounts, from before she began spamming them in the dozens, to send HealingHand a message.

'GG, asshole'

'Thanks, bitch'

'For rls, tho, this one just killed my libido'

'Wht, rly needed Panacea instead :(?'

'Nah, jst not into the whole cowgilr thing'

'Scks t b u, then'

Honestly, what was she even expecting from people on the internet?

'Yeah, yeah. Just, let's not fuck around with each other for stuff like this?'

'Sry, bt I rly din't want Panacea pic'

'Kay. Jst smthng t keep in mind'

With this momentary and tentative truce established, Missy went back to what was really impor- OHGODTHATLOOKSSOCUTEANDFLUFFY!

Thinking hard and deeply, Missy thought about the possibility of an actual plushy like that and how much she wanted it.

---

Humming to herself, Sarah nudged Kate with her elbow, getting the other vampire to look over at her. "Think we can add those things to the lineup? I'm thinking they would sell just fine."

Tilting her head, Kate hummed to herself for a second. "Dunno, wouldn't really fit into our lineup's themes so far, wouldn't they?"

"Who cares, they're cute."

"Eh, point," Kate acknowledged. "Any thoughts on this?" She asked Nora and Sherrel who were sitting closer together at the moment, both of the older women quietly talking about childcare and related topics.

"I'd be in favor, not like anyone can tell us not to sell them." "Agreed. Gotta do somethin' nice for the kiddies."

Ignoring the way both of them were gently stroking their bellies (they weren't even showing yet, even if vamps apparently could feel if they were pregnant or whatever), Sarah noodded. "There you have it. I'll go ahead and see about programming the cow plushies into one of the manufactories."

"Henley's gonna be on my case for the added fabrics we'll be buying, then," Kate sighed. "How about we also add a Cain plushie or something? Not like it'd be all that different."

"Agreed." "Agreed." "How about an adult version with a giant plush cock and all? Just for the hell of it."

Truly, meetings like this were an endless well of inspiration for the right topics.

---