Hey bro," She rasped out, suddenly blinking back tears, "Thanks."
His face twisted even further in concern, and he stepped a bit closer and held out a hand to her. She almost ignored it out of habit, but she did cautiously place her hand in his, stepping away from the wall and starting to shake. Next thing she knew, Brian's arms were around her and she was pouring great, messy, sobbing tears all over his shirt. I'm ruining my makeup, she thought, but that didn't stop her. God, it had been ages since she felt like this. She didn't have a word for it, at first, but eventually managed to dig it out of a pile of discarded childhood dreams. Aaaah. Safe. The word was safe. She was safe.
Bond Forged: Brian Laborn. He hasn't always been there for you, but he's doing his damnedest to change that now.
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You avert your gaze from the noisy reunion happening in front of you. You've never been comfortable with showing affection, even before the training of Drearburh banished it behind prayer beads and cloistered solitude, and this was no exception. Even the idea of being that open with someone was terrifying, in fact, but you weren't cruel enough to make them stop, so you stood there. Awkwardly.
After about a minute, the young man your master calls brother carefully scoops his little sibling up into his arms, still crying, and turns to look at you. "You're the friend she mentioned?" he says, a note of caution in his voice.
"I am," you answer, doing your best to hide your discomfort at both the scene and your blatant lack of paint and robe, "Harrowhark Nonagesimus, heir of Drearburh and your sister's parahuman power."
He squints at you in disbelief. "Really. So, what, you're a projection?"
"Precisely." You resist the urge to shuffle your feet.
"Sure," he says with an unamused air, "And you're sentient?"
"The proper term is sapient, but yes." Holding his gaze is getting increasingly uncomfortable.
"...Why should I believe you?" He asks, and before you can answer, "I've seen projections before, they're nothing like you."
"Well," You say huffily, feeling your temper rise, "I did save her from those moronic ritualists."
His mouth opens, closes, and opens again, and his brow furrows in consternation, "You saved her from what?"
"Ritualists, I believe," You explain, "Twelve of them in matching black and red colors. They had her kneeling in the middle of their group and had told the youngest to execute her, though without a ward to channel her Thalergy into Thanergy I don't know what they expected to accomplish. Not that it matters anymore, given how dead they are."
Brian starts swearing violently, only for Aisha to shift in his grip and make him cut himself off, "That was an initiation, Harrow. Surely you know what those are? And how dead are they?"
You raise an eyebrow, "Of course I know about initiations, but I've never come across one this violent. It would be seen as wasteful. And they're very dead." You expend a scrap of Thanergy to make the bone you'd hidden under your clothes stick out and form just enough of a hand to wave at him.
He stares at your display with plain surprise, and then at you incredulously, leaving you with the distinct impression that you're missing something.
"Do you know what the Empire 88 is?" He asks finally, and you shake your head, "What about Nazis?" A second shake, "White Supremacy?" A third, "World War 2?" A fourth, "Fuck."
He tilts his head back to glare at the flat, gray, winter sky, and seems to spend a moment rethinking all his life choices. Then he mutters, "I'm taking you to Tattletale. Either you're telling the truth or this is a con so big I can't catch it myself." You're not sure you were supposed to hear that.
He looks back at you with fresh purpose and jerks his head at the car, and you nod and follow him over to it. Once there, he tries to put Aisha in the back, only for her to whimper and tighten her arms around his neck. He grunts, and you stifle a laugh.
"I don't suppose you know how to drive?" He asks, and sighs when you shake your head. While you do have vague flashes of spending time on a world with ready access to cars, at no point were you required to drive one or taught how.
"Aisha," he whispered, and she tightens her grip again. You frown, your mind working quickly. While likely a poor substitute, you should be able to make something to take his place. It'd leave you alarmingly short of Thanergy, though, possibly even to the point of needing to dirty your hands with physical violence to remedy it over the escalating wave of power you preferred.
Brian, oblivious to your schemes, keeps talking. "I'm taking you back to base, ok?" He says gently, "But to do that I need you to let go. It'll just be for a bit, and then you can meet my teammates. You've wanted to meet them for a while, remember?"
Aisha sniffled. "Yeah," She groaned, loosening her grip enough for Brian to place her in the middle row of seats, "Yeah, I did. Thanks, bro, that sounds great."
"Anytime," He jerks his head at you, but you're still lost in your calculations enough that he has to come up and wave his hand in front of your face to get your attention. You get into the passenger's seat with burning cheeks and fumble the belt buckle twice before it slides home, letting your little group get on its way.
As you head down the street, you surreptitiously dissolve the bone ash you'd left gumming up the now empty police car. You'd hope he'd be smart enough to keep his mouth shut, but that wasn't a problem anymore.
You space out, looking out the window for the rest of the trip, simply taking in the experience of being in a large city. You've spent most of your life either in a small, isolated coven, a small, isolated research facility, or a small, isolated space station, and the few times outside of that were either spaceships or a complete blur in your memory. A city with hundreds of thousands of people, seen by your own eyes while in your right mind, was… novel. And noisy. And bright.
By the Emperor, was it bright, especially with the skyscrapers you were driving past. You were beyond thankful the sun wasn't out at the moment, otherwise you'd have been completely blinded. It almost makes you wish for a copy of Gideon's sunglasses, before you came to your senses and remembered how utterly hideous they were, and how'd you rather die painfully again than willingly apply them to your face. Instead, you pulled out your veil and looped it across your eyes, providing just enough coverage to keep from having to squint in the glare.
Brian glances at you, and nods in approval, then pulls out his cellphone and dials.
"Burger, Lemon," he says, and waits. "Hey Tats, can you make it to RPG night? The others too, and make sure to get dressed."
Another pause. "Not sure yet. The GM pulled out a new NPC and I'm not sure what to make of her. Also got a new player, but she doesn't know what to run yet. She's totally green, only started playing today. Can you help?"
Pause, "Yes, perfect, thank you. See you soon."
He hangs up. You're absolutely certain he was speaking in code there, but you don't know how to translate and aren't about to ask. No doubt you'll find out soon enough.
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Lisa hated her power at times. This was not one of them. She smiled privately after Grue hung up, relishing the chance to flex her investigative chops, and went to grab the others. She pranced out of her room at base and down the hall into the rec area, where Alex was on the couch swearing at a game like usual, and Bitch was in the kitchen messing with a water filter for her dogs. Said dogs were sitting at her feet and giving her their deadliest puppy eyes, though she seemed oblivious to that part.
"Got a mission, guys," She said with a grin, slapping her hands together, "Brian's with a fresh trigger who might be joining the team, and we need to make sure everything is on the level. We're meeting them at Rally Point Gamma, so suit up. That means you Alec, no you can't stay behind and yes, you need to put on your entire costume."
"Geez, you're so mean Lise," Alec grumbled, putting another bullet in some poor kid's avatar and otherwise not budging an inch, "Can't a guy get any peace around here?"
"Not when you're playing games like that," Lisa snarked at him, rolling her eyes, "But if they counted then you've had peace for the past 6 hours. Time to do your job."
He groaned dramatically, rolling off of the couch to flop pathetically onto the floor, though he did pause the game and seemed to be inching his way towards his room. Rachel, by contrast, grunted and put down the filter, then whistled to her dogs while pulling her mask out of her jacket pocket.
"Don't want another teammate," She said simply, " Not enough money."
Lisa winced. "I'm not sure we have a choice," She said slowly, and when Bitch (not Rachel, not in this mood), frowned at her, added quickly, "I'm pretty sure the new cape is Brian's little sister. He was way too stressed for it to not be personal."
Rachel blinked once, then nodded, "Huh," She noted, then turned and headed down the stairs.
"Wait," Rachel stopped and glowered over her shoulder, "Please be nice. We don't need another Spirefire incident," Rachel stared for a moment longer, then turned and left without a word.
Is considering your request, Her power whispered, and she hoped Rachel would agree to it.
Meanwhile, Alec had stopped inch-worming across the floor and was, in fact, ambling towards his room at a decent clip. Lisa slipped past him in the hall and back into her room as well and grabbed a fresh catsuit out of the closet. Some new foundation, lipstick and eye black later (plus a mask), Lisa had become Tattletale, and sashayed down the stairs to Bitch's waiting dogs, already grown to riding size. Regent was right behind her, to her pleasant surprise, instead of making them wait for almost an hour like one infamous time about 2 months back (That Grue had dragged him onto the sparring mat for 7 hours the next day to 'improve team cohesion,' was totally a coincidence.)
She nodded at Bitch, who nodded back, then clambered onto Brutus's back behind her, wrapping her arms around the buff girl's waist. Regent hopped onto Angelica's back instead, and they were off, bounding up through the roof access and out into the city. Rally Point Gamma was the roof of an empty strip-mall that made for an excellent vantage to strike at downtown, so they went Southwest to reach it, moving away from the docks in a zigzag to better cover their tracks and avoid Armsmaster's patrol route, which would have crossed their path if they'd gone in a straight line.
Tattletale was especially proud of the hack that gave her access to the PRT's schedules, though going in for another prize would absolutely get her caught. That was fine though, they had what they needed, and it would let them get to the meetup in peace. Speaking of, she quickly pulled out a disposable flip phone and called Grue to give him directions. Wouldn't do for his car to get profiled.
88888888
Aisha bounced in her seat, two hairs away from dying of boredom. Brian had said they'd be there in ten minutes ten minutes ago, and she was done with being in this car. She wanted to meet his teammates, dammit! Even Harrow looked stressed, though that might be from trying to reapply her makeup in a moving vehicle. The woman seriously couldn't go half an hour without face paint, and to be honest it was kind of adorable. Or pathetic. Or both.
I'm not pathetic! Harrow snapped at her, taking a moment to glare into the rear view mirror at her before going back to the paints. To be fair, the extra bone brushes and fingers were likely the only reason she could do this at all, as without them the jostling would have been far too much. With them, however, everything only ended up a little smudged, which was then fixed with a bit more paint.
You didn't deny being adorable, Aisha sang, and Harrow blushed, though the only reason Aisha could tell was her mental sputtering.
"We're here," Big Bro said, pulling into an empty parking lot for an empty strip mall surrounded by empty offices, "Aisha, put your seatbelt back on. I haven't parked yet."
"Fiiiine," Aisha groaned, then looked out the window. No sign of any supervillains yet, but they were likely being discreet.
"Ok, done," Brian said, bringing the engine to a halt, "We're walking the rest of the way, so it'll be a few more minutes. Bup bup, no complaining! If this car gets tied to my cape I.D. we're both in deep shit, got it?"
"Nope," Aisha said flippantly, hopping out of the car and stretching her arms, "I'm going to be a cape full time, Bro. CPS can't do shit with Harrow here to scare them off."
"What!?" Brian screeched even as he started leading them to the rendezvous, "But, but the whole point of this was to get you away from our parents! Don't you want that?"
"Of course I do! I'm never going back to Mom's and you can't make me," Aisha explained easily, then let her usual cheeriness drop, "I'm free, Brian. I don't have to worry about any normal shit ever again. No more shitty parents, no more shitty school, no more shitty racists trying to kill me in the-"
Her voice faltered, giving Brian a chance to reply. "Aisha," He said gently, turning around and crouching slightly to look her in the eye, "Your civilian life is important too. Full time capes don't last very long, you know? They start out strong, get a bunch of stuff done, and vanish. No one really knows what happens to them, but I think a lot of them end up dead. And even if Harrow is the strongest cape ever, you're still you. You can't rely on her for everything."
"Actually," Harrow cut in, making both siblings glance at her, "My main purpose is as a teacher. I'm supposed to pass my powers along to Aisha and swap out for someone else, not do everything for you."
Brian goggled at her for an eternity of a moment, then threw up and his hands and said, "Well, never fucking mind then. I guess instead of having to balance your life like a normal person you hit the power jackpot, sis. Congratulations!" If the sarcasm in his voice had been any thicker it'd have poured out onto the street and started filling in the potholes.
"I'm a trump?" Aisha asked. She'd heard the rhyme before, from Brian repeating it ad nauseam as part of his training, and knew Eidolon was one, but hadn't really considered the term beyond that. "Wicked. So, what are you going to teach me first?"
Brian grunted, having seemingly given up on the topic, and reached into the cubby between the seats. He pulled out a motorcycle helmet with a skull on the front and a black riding jacket and started moving again, with Harrow and Aisha a step behind.
"Normally I'd say that depends," Harrow began, as Brian shrugged the jacket over his shoulders and zipped up the front, "But in this case, everything you could learn requires you to be a necromancer first, to be able to see and shape the Thalergy and Thanergy that surrounds us. I suppose I could give you a rundown on the basics?"
"Sure!" Aisha said eagerly, while Brian groaned and muttered something along the lines of, "So now she's interested in her education."
Harrow, for her part, adopted a lecturing pose identical to any Aisha had seen in her classes and began with, "Thalergy is life. It's produced by all living things simply by them being alive. Everywhere life exists, Thalergy does as well. Thanergy, by contrast, is Death. It is created by living creatures dying, specifically cellular decay, and while in theory it should be just as prevalent as Thalergy, in practice it exists only as a reaction to Necromancers."
"Why's that?" Aisha cut in, and snickered at the eyebrow twitch her interruption caused.
"The reasons are long and complicated," Harrow hedged, "but the short version is that Thanergy didn't exist until the birth of the King Undying 10,000 years ago. The 1st House, our homeworld, blessed him with the power to wield death, unlike any that came before, and with it came the ability to transform Thalergy into Thanergy. It is, in many ways, artificial, though a natural progression of the existing universal order."
"So the 1st House is Earth?" Aisha asked, "Because that's the planet we're on right now."
Harrow stumbled and stared at her, "This isn't a colony?" She asked warily, then shook her head, "No matter. Pay attention, this is the important part: Thanergy is your greatest strength and greatest weakness in one. With it, you are unstoppable, able to do almost anything you put your mind to, but above all else, it. Is. Finite."
Aisha frowned in disappointment. Of course her awesome new powers had a catch.
"You must have Thanergy to perform Necromancy of any kind," Harrow continued, while Brian slipped the helmet over his head and clicked the chinstrap together, "And it has to be generated out in the world. Currently, this planet has none outside of what I personally create, and until that changes your ability to do the workings will be limited. It's why I had to use Gideon's sword to kill your first assailant-"
"Who's Gideon?" Aisha interrupted, making Harrow's nostrils flare.
"My Cavalier, who I care deeply for and rely on like no other, and someone you are not going to meet. She's not around, and to be honest, given what I was like last time that happened I probably should care a lot more than I do. Now, where was I. Right. Using the death of the first as fuel, I was able to stop the second's heart with a gesture and wipe out the others with a barrage of bone. Thanergy dealing death to generate Thanergy to deal more death, like a great engine. You must prime it every time, but after you start the cycle it can grow as large as your control and fuel will allow."
Harrow grimaced at that, "Alternatively, you could deal a blow to the soul of the planet itself, causing it to die slowly over centuries and generate more Thanergy than you could ever need, but I believe that would do far more harm than good."
"Planets are alive?" Aisha cut in and at the same time Brian, no, Gure now said, "Planets have souls?"
"Of course they do," Harrow answered, looking up at the sky, "Us humans are vast colonies of bacteria within a body, and a planet with an ecosystem is simply a body on a grander scale. They are not like us, in thought, form, or deed, but they are alive, and slaying this one would be a horrible idea. While your society wouldn't fall apart immediately, as the damage progressed all life would turn to undeath and rot and the entire biosphere would become unsuitable for habitation. Without another world to evacuate to it's simply not worth the risk."
"Yeah, I'm going to have to agree with the scary bone lady," A young male voice snarked from above, "I like my planets unslain, thank you very much."
"We're actually here now," Grue said belatedly, even as Harrow and Aisha jumped and looked up at the roof of a nearby strip-mall. Aisha bit back a squee as three massive animals leapt down to meet them at ground level, crunching concrete under their clawed feet, greedily taking in the sight.
Two older teens sat on the back of one of the hulking beasts, one the model of sexy blonde supervillains everywhere in a skintight purple suit, save for her bone white complexion and fixated gaze on Harrow, and the other a buff, stocky girl glaring at the two of them with the intensity of a dying star. Meanwhile, a dainty boy draped himself across the back of a second animal with an air of nonchalance despite his previous comment. Between them, Aisha was struck with a glaring, horrific problem. How could she not have realized what this would mean!?
"Briiiiiiiiaaaaaaaan," Aisha whined, "Why are all of your teammates hoooooooot?"
Their reactions were perfect. The blonde girl flinched, hard, almost falling off her mount, while the boy burst out laughing and was genuinely sliding onto the ground. The buff girl, for her part, clinically looked Aisha up and down, then said, "You're too young. Ask later," which only made boy laugh harder even as he landed ass first on the sidewalk.
Aisha snickered. Bullseye, she thought. Wish I had a camera right now.
Spare me Harrow ground out, then curtsied formally to the group.
"Greetings, I am Harrow the 1st, servant of the King Undying. I'm told you're to be our new associates?"
The blonde girl blinked a few times, then rallied with a hastily slapped on smile, "Oh, yes, we are. I'm Tattletale, this is Bitch," She gestured at the buff girl, who had dismounted and was now walking towards them, "And the asshole over there is Regent. Also, Grue, she's legit, and the comment about killing the planet was legit too. Can we never ever mention doing that again? Pleeeeeaaaase?"
Tattletale batted her eyelashes so hard Aisha was certain she could feel a breeze, and nodded in unison with everyone else. That little tidbit was the kind of thing that got you a kill order, and for all that Aisha loved fucking the system, she wasn't suicidal.
"Sure," Regent posited, "If you explain what you mean by the Bone Lady being legit."
"Harrow is a projection," Tattletale sighed, causing Bitch to ignore her and shift her gaze entirely onto Aisha, "Aisha's the real cape here."
"Now," Tattletale said with forced cheer, "It's very nice to meet you and all that, but we really should get moving. The heroes are going to swing by in half an hour and I don't feel like getting into a fight if there's no money on the line. Care to hop on?"
"No one goes on my dogs I don't like," Bitch growled, "Judas, shake!"
The dog that hadn't been carrying anyone barked loud enough to rattle the glass shards in the windows and bounded forward. Aisha shrieked and sprang backwards even as Grue bellowed, "Dammit Bitch, stand down!"
Spoiler: DODGE!!
"Haaaarroooow!" Aisha screamed, continuing to backpedal at a shockingly fast rate.
Oh, wonderful, a training opportunity, Harrow said with no small amount of glee, See if you can feel the Death in your clothes. They'll protect you if you figure it out.
Fuck that, help me! Aisha shrieked, only narrowly diving away from the first lunge.
Here, I'm going to surge the Thanergy for you and share how it feels from my perspective. That should make it easy enough, Harrow continued happily, while Grue and Bitch started slugging it out in the background to Tattletale's dismay and Regent began chanting "Fight, fight, fight!"
You're a horrible teacher! Aisha yelled at her, even as an experience unlike any she'd felt before pinged on her senses.
I'm a competent teacher, Harrow replied with an eyebrow twitch, You'll learn fastest under pressure, and I'm not going to pass up a chance as convenient as this one. Now, cast!
With a roar that might or might not contained an extended, "FUUUUUUUUCK YOOOOUUUU!!!!" Aisha planted her feet, threw up her hands, and the maille responded. With a surge of raw death, her shirt and pants exploded into armor, bones stacking on bones to shield her from the charging superdog. Heel bones stabbed into the asphalt to anchor her against the charge. Hands the size of her head wrapped around and guarded her own tiny wrists and palms. A massive skull clamped itself down over her hair, feeding sight it shouldn't have from empty eye sockets directly into her own. Tibia, femurs, forearms, ribs, and a massive spine flowed into existence from the subtle pseudo fabric she'd been wearing, and with her new exoskeleton she caught the dog's open mouth and stopped it in its tracks.
I told you~, Harrow concluded smugly. Aisha wrestled the dog to the ground and bound it with more bone, then took a moment to flip her off with all four middle fingers. Behind them, Grue had Bitch in a headlock, Tattletale had her face in her hands, and Regent was cheering.
"Call him off," Grue ground out with a squeeze, and Bitch whistled, causing Judas to go limp even as he continued to whine.
"Lovely," Tattletale spat, cuffing Regent over the head to shut him up, "Now, if everyone is done with their dick measuring contest, we need to move. The patrol is only 10 minutes out."
Sure enough, Aisha could hear a faint siren in the distance. She frowned thoughtfully, then tried to collapse the bone armor she'd made back into a shirt. Nothing happened.
You're out of power, Master, Harrow told her, Relax your control and it'll crumble away.
Aisha did so, and the bone vanished, letting Judas back up and causing him to promptly shake the powder all over everyone present. Coughing in irritation, Aisha clambered up onto his back with Harrow close behind, while Grue joined Regent after cuffing him over the head a second time despite his protests, and Bitch and Tattletale returned to their mount. With a final sharp whistle, the dogs leapt onto the roof once more and sped away, the force of it almost throwing Aisha from her seat.
She had to admit, whenever she imagined meeting Brian's teammates or becoming a cape with them, it had never gone like this.
88888888
It is Saturday, April 9th, 2011. Choose one training action, one bond partner, and four activities, in a plan format. Normally it's only three activities per day, but you'll be receiving a free one as a flashback to the evening of April 8th. A one hour moratorium is in place.
You have 1 Omake Point. Vote if you wish to spend it and the second highest voted training will be included.
Spend Omake?:
[] Yes