The Butcher hones his enemy just that little bit more.
Bet you weren't expecting to see me again so soon, eh? I was struck by inspiration for this chapter and just had to get it out, and then I blinked and all of a sudden I had a 2k word fight scene.
I definitely meant to get around to updating the WoG post on the threads, but I got a little tied up with this chapter. Oops?
Disclaimer: there's mention of the legal system in opposition to a government agency moving really fast. This is not representative of the actual US legal system and is more an artifact of this particular case and the people (and supernatural entities) surrounding it (and also me trying to compress the timeline for plot reasons). I am not a lawyer or other legal professional and you probably shouldn't take this for an attempt to showcase the operations of the actual US legal system.
Warning: Butcher. He's not as bad as some of the other characters in terms of slurs, but he does use some coarser language and some nasty threats.
Some small part of Taylor's mind was grateful for Victoria's outburst and the chance to deflect attention away from them that it had brought, since it very well may have saved her civilian identity.
The rest of her was scrambling to combat readiness, assessing the situation, and activating the runic combination that summoned her armor as she shoved the remnants of her ice cream into her mouth, chewing, and swallowing with frantic haste.
As the enchanted chain mail settled over her body, she invoked gebo to pull a simple boar spear out of nowhere, then invoking tiwaz on the chance that it would grant her the combat ability of the war god it symbolized.
The gamble paid off as she spun the weapon with both hands, settling back into a stance that would allow her to spring into action at the drop of a hat, which she promptly did.
Animos, the wolf-dog thing immediately behind the Butcher, was the biggest immediate threat. Beyond being a relatively tough Brute in his own right, his roar also had the ability to disrupt parahuman powers, which had been shown to great effect when he had almost killed Bastion almost six months ago (the news clip of which had gone somewhat viral in its own right) which she had seen when she looked up the Teeth at the library before joining the Dallon sisters on the Boardwalk in an effort to be aware of the disposition of her enemies in the city.
Taylor flowed around the Butcher's attempt to block her off to hit the Changer like a wrecking ball. The spear's tip skittered left off his abnormally durable fur from a poor impact angle as the villain dodged to her right, but she managed to redirect the attack into a spin of the spear, slamming Animos into the wall of the alleyway with enough force to daze him before she leapt out of the alleyway, easily clearing the Butcher's attempt to smash her out of the air with his club and landing in front of the two members of New Wave, cracking the asphalt under her as she did so.
Now that she had time to assess the situation beyond removing the immediate threat, she realized they weren't quite as screwed as she had thought they were. Even beyond the advantage in positioning they had with the Teeth being within an alleyway and the mobility advantage of what was probably rune-granted enhanced jumps as well as Glory Girl's flight, the Teeth had only brought three capes: the Butcher, who was glaring balefully out at them, Animos, who was still swaying on his paws, and the blood manipulator she'd fought earlier in the week nibbling on her thumb, who she now knew was named Hemorrhagia, along with a small number of ordinary gang members with guns.
"Oh, goodie," said Glory Girl, rising into the air and cracking her knuckles. "I was hoping for some stress relief and what do we get but the second most acceptable targets in the city."
"Second?" asked Hemorrhagia, glaring up at the Alexandria package.
"Everyone loves kicking a good Nazi," she replied before exploding forward towards the Teeth.
The Butcher snarled, eyes glowing red as he turned his glare onto Glory Girl, causing only a minor hitch in her flight before her aura flared and pushed back whatever effect he was trying to use.
"Nice try, old man, but I'm Master-proof!" She slammed into the composite cape with all the force of a particularly displeased bear, sending him sprawling into Animos just as the canine cape was drawing breath to scream.
Hemorrhagia hadn't been standing around with her thumb in her mouth for no reason, however, and lashed out with a whip of blood that swiftly deformed once it hit Glory Girl to form a thin film over her nose and mouth.
"Start fucking shooting, idiots!" screamed the Butcher, pushing himself off of Animos and grabbing a garbage can lid to hurl at Taylor.
That was… not ideal.
Before he had become the thirteenth person to lead the Teeth, the cape known as Leverage had had an odd form of superstrength. It didn't offer any particular physical enhancements, but it didn't particularly need to since what it did was less actually super strength and more alteration of weight. Based on publicly available videos, PHO had managed to figure out that as far as he was concerned, the things that he held were weightless, which allowed him to throw them at terrifying speeds given his history as rising baseball player James DeFranco before giving up and throwing in with the Teeth. Inheriting the superstrength of multiple Butchers before him had done nothing to weaken the man's arm, and the matter reshaping ability that Reforge had had allowed him to turn even an aerodynamically terrible object into the perfect projectile to pierce a person.
Desperately, Taylor invoked algiz between her and the Teeth. Fortunately, the shield formed at the speed of thought, which was more than enough to meet the bullets and metal spike with a barrier.
The spike managed to punch through the shield, but fortunately none of the bullets managed to pass through the hole it left in its wake before it managed to close up on its own and enough of the projectile's momentum had been bled off by the defense that, given that it tumbled thanks to being nudged by the shield's reformation, it struck Taylor broadside across the chest, which wouldn't leave much more than a bruise.
Once the hail of bullets petered out, Taylor let the shield dissipate and repeated her earlier tactic: namely, she invoked eiwaz and sent the non-capes to sleep while slowing down the Teeth capes.
With that advantage, Glory Girl managed to break free from Hemorrhagia's restraint and send the blood manipulator into the wall with a backhand, then rose higher into the air.
Or at least, she started to.
The Butcher seized her by the ankle before she could make it more than about six inches higher into the air, and then started slamming the younger Brute around the alleyway, her flight slowing his efforts but not enough to prevent something about her power from giving way and allowing his second and third swings to break bones before rearing back and sending the battered blonde hurtling into Taylor's shield, thankfully not breaking more bones since her power was working once again.
"Vicky!" screamed Panacea, darting around the shield and laying hands on her sister, whose harsh breathing immediately eased.
Still, that left the two of them out of commission for at least a little while (not that Panacea had been able to contribute a whole lot to the fight thus far, but the point stood) Taylor was alone against two of the stronger Brutes in the Bay.
Fortunately, she was packing some serious Brute force of her own thanks to tiwaz, so she didn't hesitate to leap back into battle, leaving behind a thick screen of bugs to obscure the Dallon sisters from the Butcher's line of sight as she let the barrier dissolve in favor of the strength of the bull by way of uruz.
This time, when Taylor lunged in, the Butcher was ready for her speed, meeting her spear's haft with his club in an attempt to snap the weapon in two. The conjured weapon was tougher than it looked, though, so the strike merely deflected the blow to sink deep into Animos' shoulder instead of the Changer's rib cage. A firm shove lodged the weapon up to the crossguard in Animos's shoulder, and one twist of her hips later the Teeth's second-best Brute was hurtling out towards the bay, spear and all.
The Butcher wasn't standing idly by while she did so, slamming a brutal blow with his club into her back that would have shattered her if not for both the magic running through her and the armor spreading and cushioning the impact.
Taylor turned, the instincts offered by tiwaz guiding her hands as she trapped the club under her arm and set her self, bringing her other fist around in a textbook cross.
Unfortunately, the Butcher was smart enough not to directly take the hit, choosing to teleport away to disengage and swing his club straight for Panacea, who had been dazed by the explosion he made when reappearing behind her.
Glory Girl beat him to the punch, shattering his club a few inches above his meaty fist and then spiking a punch upwards with her other hands, sending the Butcher in a brief parabolic arc that ended in a classic three-point landing.
"You're a persistent bitch, aren't you. Not to worry, I'll mount your skull on my wall sooner or later," he snarled, eyes glowing red once again.
This time, the attack was targeted at the other two capes arrayed against him, and Panacea shrieked, falling to the floor and writhing in pain.
Taylor was much less impressed by the magnitude of pain that the attack caused, being bolstered directly by two runes that vastly improved her physical endurance. However, she was aware of how quickly she was approaching her limits in terms of the amount of runic power she could channel through her body at the moment. She had maybe two minutes left with both runes active, maybe five if she dropped to one, before she would have to rely on her armor, her human body, and her bugs.
With Hemorrhagia lying concussed on the floor, her constructs degrading slowly, the only major threat left was the Butcher.
Instead of bullrushing the composite cape again, Taylor took a moment to allow the mantle of Tyr the Even-handed to guide her.
After a few seconds, she moved around where the Butcher was clearly toying with Glory Girl, swatting away or tanking her blows with impunity and almost not even bothering to throw his own strikes.
Taylor moved relatively quietly, which thankfully worked enough against the Butcher, who was occupied with telling Glory Girl what he'd do to her before he killed her.
Glory Girl screamed, aura flaring beyond what Taylor had experienced before, and lashed out with a heavy strike in what was probably the best opportunity she was going to get to get her own hit in.
Some part of her mind noted the tendril of blood running along the floor to wrap around Panacea's ankle, but when it splashed down into a puddle and Hemorrhagia abruptly relaxed into unconsciousness, she set it out of her mind and refocused on the Butcher.
The Butcher blocked Glory Girl's punch with a grunt.
The noise released when Taylor drove her fist up into his abdomen just under his sternum was half shock and half expelled air, sending the composite cape flying before he managed to teleport back down to ground, wheezing.
"Fuck you," he choked out, hefting the unconscious form of Hemorrhagia with uncharacteristic gentleness. "Animos knows your scent, you can't hide from us!"
With that, the two capes vanished with the sound of a distant explosion, abandoning the unconscious gang members strewn across the alleyway.
"Well then," said Taylor tiredly. "That happened.
After a moment, just in case the Butcher returned unencumbered, Taylor let her hold over the runes she was using to enhance herself go, and almost staggered from the rush of lightheadedness.
"Whoa, you okay?" asked Glory Girl, offering one muscular arm (now bare, because the Butcher had somehow managed to rip both sleeves and a portion over her midriff off of her blouse) to help stabilize Taylor.
"Fine, fine," said Taylor, pushing herself upright and powering through the sense of heaviness in her limbs. "Just pushed a bit too hard too fast."
"I'll be the judge of that," said Panacea, grumpily and also wearing a fair amount of her affogato all over her (thankfully dark grey, at least as far as hiding the stains went) hoodie. After sliding two fingers up Taylor's mail sleeve, Panacea frowned. "I think you're going to be all right after a good night's sleep."
"I'll take it," replied Taylor.
"Good. Now get ready, I think we're about to have to fill out one of Armsmaster's special reports," said Panacea, jerking her head in the direction of the rumbling of a motorcycle engine.
Taylor just sighed. "Great, paperwork."
Odin, newly reappeared from wherever he went during her fights, shook his head, chuckling ruefully.
"Judge Myra, good to see you again."
"Mr. Truth! What interesting matter do you bring for me today?" asked the judge, a rotund man with a long, white beard that couldn't conceal the infectious smile on his face.
"Something interesting in the sense referred to as Chinese, I'm afraid. You are aware of the… shall we say, the return of Vadderung's position, I take it?"
"Ah, what trouble has the new Rúnatyr gotten herself into?" returned the judge, smile dimming somewhat.
"Not quite the case, old friend. It's… well, I think it would make more sense if you read the file directly." Hades turned over a manila folder to the judge, who took it and immediately started scanning the pages at a surprising rate.
When he finished, he sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Well, the one thing I can say about this case right now is that it's the right time to bring it up."
"How do you mean?" replied the ancient god of death, perhaps a touch curious at what his friend was playing at.
"With the Teeth in town, any disruption to the local PRT's operations will be… I can't say it will have no impact on the situation as it stands, but between your new friend, the other gangs, and the breakaways, I suspect that the impact will be relatively minimal, and could be patched up by borrowing a cape or two from Boston if need be, since they have recent experience with the Teeth."
"So… you're saying you'll hear the case?"
"Indeed," replied the judge, nothing jolly left in the old man's smile. "Piggot's been naughty, trying to subvert judges to legitimize her own extralegal actions. I think it's high time we stop her lest we deal with worse issues in the long term."
"Glad to hear you're on board, old friend. I'll do my best to smooth the way on my side."
"I'll do what I can to speed things along on my end as well. Hopefully we'll be ready to see you by the end of the week, but if not, Monday should be the day."
"Excellent. I'll see you around, Bari."
"And yourself, Pluto."
And that's that!
For those wondering why I had Taylor invoke Tyr's rune instead of Odin's for combat prowess, given Odin's association with the spear, it's because I (and Taylor) see them as representing two different aspects of war: Odin is the more strategic side, focused on move and countermove, while Tyr is more focused on the individual battles, which was more useful here.
Also, for anyone who wants to complain about how the Butcher's danger sense should be stronger… it isn't. It's not an Annihilator-level defense even with the teleportation, like it is for Obliteration of the Reckoners Saga, because the danger sense from Butcher III is weaker (shorter range in terms of how far ahead it can see) and not automatic. Stacking attacks like what Taylor did is one way around mid-to-low-level precogs like this, especially when starting off with a hit that deals minimal or no damage.
That's about it, so read, review, enjoy, and have a nice day!
