The fight is over, you can relax now, right?


CW: Dean being a fuckhead, Nazi bullshit. In his defense, it's at least partially external factors.

I'd once again like to remind everyone that just because a character says, thinks, or does something doesn't mean that I condone that statement or deed.

I might also be a little off on the way that Echidna clones are supposed to be characterized with Styx, and to that I say again: the Runes cheat.


Taylor rubbed at her bleary eyes, resolutely deciding to ignore both the fact that she had fallen asleep in Vicky's lap and the blush that that brought to her face, visible under the lower edges of her helmet. "How long was I out?"

"About fifteen minutes," drawled Styx, the claws of her bear form sunk into a piece of rubble almost as tall as the nine-foot shoulders of said bear form that she was holding over her head with what looked to be negligible effort. "PRT finally got off its ass and we're working on cleaning up some of the shit that got broken while we wait for them to send more than a prisoner restraint team. Most of the other fights that cropped up around the city have more or less died down, but they're still stretched thinner than normal trying to deal with those incidents."

"Prisoner restraint? Who do they have?" asked Taylor, tensing her whole body slightly and releasing the tension to shock herself back to full awareness.

"Coil, the soon-to-be-retired Shadow Stalker, the world's number one Noelle simp, and a couple of the clones that didn't get offed," the Breaker replied, jerking her head off to a side street where flashing lights were visible. "Everyone else either skated out or got dragged out by their friends."

Taylor pressed her lips together, contradictory urges warring in her head- did she go confront Shadow Stalker or Coil over what they'd done to her, or-

"C'mon," said Vicky, nudging up against Taylor in the direction of the lights, and then she pressed up against her girlfriend no no too soon the other hero with her shoulder, actually exerting force. "We should at least see them once, and if you're anything like me, if you don't go and confront something like this now, you never will."

Taylor sighed, then stepped forward, sending Vicky sliding off and startling her, if what garbled visual signals from bugs she could get were getting through clearly. "Fine, I'll at least go and see her," she said, almost dragging her feet before realizing that was a bad idea given the already damaged asphalt and concrete she was walking on.

All too soon, the three of them had arrived at the place where the capes were being held. Immediately it was obvious that there was a difference in how the three preestablished villains were being treated and the Echidna clones- for starters, Coil and Sophia had been stripped of their masks, revealing their faces and the expressions contained therein, while Trickster's hat was jammed down over his eyes (something that made Vicky smirk victoriously), and all three were bound with both heavy cuffs and odd collars as well as leg irons. In contrast, the Echidna clones were almost perfunctorily bound in standard-issue handcuffs and looked to be almost uniformly in shock over the realignment Taylor had forced onto Division.

Coil was calm and collected at first blush, but as Taylor looked at him for longer, she began to see and hear what looked like an echo of Coil, alternatively attempting to escape and to bargain before what looked like a bolt of lightning or a small orb of flame dispelled the echoes in question and caused that Coil to change tactics, with the last echo coming after a particularly egregious threat against her father and merely vanishing with the sound of a bell tolling.

Taylor dismissed him from her attention (still leaving a number of bugs in discreet and not-so-discreet places on his body- there was no need to be uncautious about things, after all), and turned her focus to Sophia.

Unlike Coil, she was very visibly agitated- some aspect of her brain (probably one that had paid attention when talking heads on the radio or TV had mentioned Trigger theory) mentioned how Mover aspects to powers hated to be confined, so this had to be wearing on Sophia from that angle.

"So, Hebert," she all but spat, "come to brag about how you brought bad old me down?"

"Believe it or not," said Taylor, curiously detached from the situation even as her bugs writhed and chittered out of sight, "you were at best a secondary concern here. My concern, first and foremost, was getting Amy and my dad to safety, and dealing with whoever endangered them in the first place wasn't really an immediate priority." She leaned in, feeling an odd feeling against her eyes as a pressure seemed to settle down on Sophia, who pressed herself back against the PRT van in a vain attempt to escape from Taylor. "You would have come after, when we could have afforded to devote our… full attention to you."

Sophia shuddered as Vicky cracked her knuckles behind Taylor, her aura unfolding from her like the wings of a particularly displeased angel.

"What do you want," she hissed.

"A great many things," said Taylor, leaning back as the pressure on her eyes dissipated. "But at this point I think the most pertinent is the knowledge of why you and Emma decided to come after me so hard."

"Seriously? That's what's so fucking important to you?" asked Sophia.

"She wants to hear it from ou-your lips, Stalker," said Styx, the shadows around her feet writhing under the influence of her power.

"Fine, whatever. It's because Emma wanted to… I dunno, prove herself strong? Either way, it was the way to handle things that fit… best, I guess, and you were a convenient target at first. Then, it became habit. But then, you fought back."

"And then I fought back," said Taylor, purposefully breathing deeply in an effort to control her temper.

"Yeah, at that point it got… personal. I can't afford to let anyone get away with fucking with me, or else all the wannabe Empire bastards at the school are gonna think that they can, so…" Sophia shrugged.

"You also got her good and pissed off, so when Emma suggested going after you in your bed, she went along with it with only a little bit of nudging from her power," said Styx, almost matter-of-factly.

"Why you little-" Sophia started to surge to her feet only for the shadows around her to coalesce into a bladed ring, all pointed inwards.

"By all means, Stalker, if you think you can go shadow fast enough to dodge me, feel free to try. Of course, then you have the wonderful prospect of facing off with the cape who can shoot lightning hard enough to scare off the Simurgh." Styx's voice was soft, the threat of violence nevertheless evident in every word she said.

"Fuck you all, then," snapped Sophia, collapsing back to sit against the van.

Vicky turned to Styx. "What was that about her power?"

"Later, once we're not out in the street for any Tom, Dick, and Harry to overhear," said Styx.

"That's not enough, Sophia," said Taylor, making eye contact with the restrained parahuman.

"What're you gonna do about it, Hebert?" Sophia snarled.

"Don't bother with her," said Styx before Taylor could respond. "I can tell you all the things she can without her being all pissy, and you won't have to do it out in the open."

Taylor looked from Styx to Sophia and back again, then nodded, before turning on her heel and walking away.

"You need somewhere to stay? I know Mom's not likely to let it slide, but Aunt Sarah might-" started Vicky.

"Nah, don't worry about it. I'll catch up with you… at some point tomorrow, probably." With that, Styx broke off in a jog towards Vista and Quarrel, a "Hey, Atalanta!" the last thing Taylor heard before she turned her attention away from the capes.

Vicky nudged Taylor. "Come on, Volur, let's go home."

Taylor took in a deep breath and let it out, deflating slightly, then nodded. "Yeah, let's go home."


A night (and some of the morning) of sleep did Taylor a world of good, leaving the brunette bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. That said, alertness was often a double edged sword, and with it came a stunned reaction to the bathroom mirror.

"Huh," said Taylor, prodding at her (far more muscular than she remembered) arm and watching her finger stop while leaning into the mirror. "That's not how I remember it." She straightened up, then frowned. "And… huh." She turned to the doorframe that she had almost religiously marked her height on at the start of every year and every birthday, and confirmed her hunch and then some. "Six foot three? I… wow."

She was pulled from her stunned staring by the sound of the home phone ringing, which was followed by her father calling up with a cry of "Taylor! It's for you!"

Taylor descended the stairs at a rapid clip, then took the offered handset from her father, holding it up to her ear and saying "Hello?"

"Hey, Taylor. Did you have any plans today? If not, we're going out shopping, you need some… additional tools… for your side job, and also more clothes with how you're shooting up like a weed, I think," said Vicky.

"I, uh… wow, good timing, I was just thinking about that last part. Hang on," Taylor replied before turning away from the phone and towards her dad. "Is there anything in particular you wanted me to do today?"

"Not really," said Danny. "Victoria trying to set something up?"

"She wants to take me shopping…"

"Ah, okay. Go ahead," Danny replied, opening his mouth as if to say something else but visibly deciding not to.

Taylor relayed that to Victoria, who responded with exuberance. "Ah, great! Amy's out at the bookstore with a new friend, Marth or something like that, so we might run into them at some point today."

A few more minutes of pleasantries on the phone led to Taylor hanging up, and before much longer, she was on her way out the door with a "Stay safe, Taylor!" from her dad.

Thanks to the runes speeding and concealing her journey, she arrived at the mall in short order, and only moments after Taylor sat down in the food court with a cup of Irish breakfast tea from a tea shop (which, for some reason, didn't feel right to be drinking- it had no bite, sweetness, or spice, even if Irish breakfast tea had been her favorite tea for years and expecting those out of it didn't make sense), Vicky arrived, somewhat more subdued and slumped over than Taylor expected.

"Hey, Vicky, everything okay?" asked Taylor.

"Huh? Uh… kinda? Mom was… not particularly chuffed about last night, and she wasn't shy about expressing it either," said Victoria, simmering emotions buried under the chipper funt she started putting up.

Making the decision to avoid the topic, Taylor went for the one thing that she thought she'd be able to use to redirect the conversation. "Chuffed? What, are you English now? Coming to Brockton to sell some tea we're gonna throw into the harbor?"

The joke tore a laugh out of the blonde, which prompted her to respond with "Oi, the East India Company has the right to sell tea to all of you colonials! Just because you can't handle the taxes isn't our problem!"

"Yuk it up, limey," replied Taylor, "we're not gonna pay it!"

Once the laughter died down, the duo remained at the table long enough for Taylor to finish her tea, then departed for a clothing store.

"So," said Victoria, "what kind of thing are you looking for? Do you want to maintain your current wardrobe in bigger sizes, do you want to go for something a little bit flashier, or something else?"

Taylor shivered with the sensation of something unnervingly cold on her feet, then shook her head more purposefully. "No idea," she said, covering up her indecision with forced nonchalance. "I mean, I kinda changed over to the drab and baggy aesthetic because the better I dressed the more likely Emma and them were to do stuff that would ruin my clothes, and since Emma and Sophia are out of Winslow that isn't something I have to deal with as much, but on the other hand it's one of those things that I've been working with so long that I'm not sure how to go about shifting things around…"

She trailed off as she saw Vicky looking at her with pity and respect in her eyes. "I, uhh… right, we're changing your style," the blonde said. "I think we should start with Hera Fashion Boutique, over here…"

Vicky all but dragged Taylor away after a moment of initial resistance, leaving the spirit of Odin to trail behind them, trading meaningful glances with Taylor's shadow (which was rippling slightly, in a manner that a viewer could be forgiven for thinking to be angry).


"Victor! Charles! Come in, come in. Oh, is that little Tammi I see?" Marcus Stansfield opened the door widely, allowing his son to see the representative for Medhall, a classically handsome Nordic man, walk in, followed closely by his brother, who was much shorter and contrasted his brother's intense air with the kind of grin that all but radiated sincerity, and an almost arrogant-looking blonde girl, whose face lost some of its disdain when her eyes fell on him. "If you'll follow me to the parlor, Eleanor already has tea started."

"Actually," said Victor, his gregarious grin not wavering even as something about him shifted, "we kind of brought Tammi so she could keep Dean occupied while the grown-ups talk. We would have brought Theo along, but… well, far be it from us to get in the way of father-son bonding time."

"In that case," said Marcus, smoothly adjusting his plans on the fly even as his emotions shifted almost imperceptibly to Dean's eyes, "Dean, why don't you show Tammi to the second parlor. I'll have Ava bring out some tea for you two as well."

"Right this way," said Dean, leading Tammi to the parlor his father had referred to.

The girl spun a full circle upon entering, taking in the tastefully understated, hardwood-focused decor of the room and slowing slightly to take in the gold accents. "Not bad," she said, concealing her physical reaction (but not the flash of greenish-yellow envy his power revealed).

"Yeah, well," he replied, a little on the back foot. "All of us worked together on this parlor, sort of as a way to have family time. Mother says I need to be well-rounded, so that's one of the things I'm trying out while I have the spare time."

"Admirable," said Tammi warmly, her emotions flaring in a tangled knot of overlapping colors that Dean decided to interpret as respect and some small degree of envy.

"It's, ah, not all it's cracked up to be," he said, mind drifting to the difficulties he'd had with people before he'd taken his vial and how similar they were to the softer arts his mother had forced him to spend time on. "There's so much that's subjective about interior design, or flower arranging, or so many of the other subjective forms of expression there are like fashion, that it's hard to keep track of all the different interpretations that are in vogue, let alone the way that all the different dynamics interact across different fields and shift over time."

Tammi nodded politely, then shook herself, the indigo of awkwardness leaching into her aura. "Not to change the subject, but, uh… I don't exactly have the breadth and depth of knowledge to keep up with you on this."

"Ah, my apologies," said Dean. "Is there, ah… something in particular you'd like to discuss?"

"Yeah, actually. This might come across as a little bit insensitive, but you and Glory Girl haven't been seen together all that often of late. Is that a new development, or just schedules not matching up?"

Dean winced. "That's, ah… a little bit of a sensitive topic," he said.

"If you'd rather not talk about it, then I won't push," Tammi said, more awkwardness coloring her silhouette as she rubbed her arm.

"No, no, it's…. Well, it's not public information, per se, but it's not exactly private either. Vicky and I… we had a fight, and we're on break right now, but… well, she and I have very different understandings of 'on break', I guess, because she went out on a couple of dates with the locker girl, even if it was from pity." Dean worked his jaw, releasing some of the tension in the joint.

Blue-green curiosity started overtaking the awkwardness in Tammi's aura. "Locker girl?"

"The girl who got crammed in a locker back at the beginning of January. She got all kinds of infections, and even Amy wasn't able to save her eye, and she dragged Vicky along with her when she started hanging out with the girl, and then when I asked her to spend some time with me instead of a suspected villain who's involved in Shadow Stalker going off the reservation… well, that's when the fight happened."

"Suspected villain?" asked Tammi, even more curious now.

Dean weighed the risks in his head. On one hand, telling anyone outside the Protectorate or PRT about Locker Girl's suspected status was against regulations, and while they could be bent for allies like New Wave, random civilians were wholly unkosher on that front. On the other hand, his new friend seemed quite trustworthy, and he remembered hearing something about her uncle Gladly being a teacher at Winslow, and despite his unfortunate name (sharing a name with a villain was always unfortunate, especially one with as bad a public reputation as an Empire member) having someone else who could keep an eye on her would be helpful.

One of those outweighed the other, and so he started to talk. "You didn't hear this from me, okay?" Once he saw Tammi nod, he continued. "Okay, so according to some analysis done by an independent consultant who works with one of the PRT Strike Commanders here in Brockton Bay…"


"How did it go?" asked Clausewitz once the car's doors had closed. "I wasn't sure how far to push it with him, even with Victor eroding away his self-restraint."

"Better than expected," Rune replied. "He didn't even realize he was outing himself. On top of that, it appears that Coil left some groundwork behind that we can take advantage of, since he had some of his deniable assets working on dragging down her reputation within the Protectorate, and they've managed to convince some people that she did something directly to alter both Vista's and Shadow Stalker's behavior patterns."

Clausewitz nodded. "Piggot's paranoia and distrust of capes who aren't under her thumb are working against her more than I had anticipated, even with the former Commander Calvert's manipulations. Anything else relevant?"

"Gallant appears to be even less well inclined towards Hebert than their faction as a whole, since he sees her as having stolen Glory Girl away from him."

"Hmm. Interesting," Victor said. "That is a potentially useful emotional lever that we could use to maneuver him."

"I agree," replied Clausewitz. "Rune, you may be needed to play a honeypot role with him in order to leverage him more efficiently."

"Yes sir," she said, absolutely flatly. "What was the status of the primary mission?"

"Inconclusive. The Stansfield group may be interested in developing closer ties with Medhall, but they are unwilling to commit without directly negotiating with either Krieg or Kaiser in their civilian identities," said Clausewitz.

"Understood," replied Rune.

The remainder of the car ride back to Victor's house was silent until the very end.

"How are we going to handle Hebert's… deviancy?" asked Rune.

"The same way Gesellschaft handled Night and Fog's," said Victor with finality.


And that's that!

Why yes, Coil and Sophia being unmasked but not Trickster is important (even setting aside the safety implications of giving Trickster line of sight on anything else), why do you ask?

One thing I'd like a little feedback on is the mental changes some of the characters are undergoing. I'd prefer not to bias anyone's perceptions, so I won't ask about specifics, but I'm curious to see what people do and don't notice on that front so I can see what I need to emphasize more (and this isn't limited to just this one chapter- if anyone's up for a reread, I'd appreciate that breadth of perspective).

In other news, I'm officially looking for beta readers for Incense and potentially other unnamed sci-fi and/or fantasy serial projects to come, so if anyone's inch rested in that, shoot me a PM either here or on discord.

Also, at some point before the next chapter, I'm gonna update the WoG/AU elements post on SB/SV, so be on the lookout for that one.

That's about it, so read, review, enjoy, and have a nice day!