Brockton Bay was a mess, as always. Every day that passed Lisa and the PRT lost people to Heartbreaker, and the situation immediately got worse when Dragon was suddenly pulled away for an emergency in Italy. Something that only the higher ups in the PRT knew about. And the only thing worse than the Heartbroken were the Fallen.Valefor was constantly attempting to kill Butcher. Or whatever remained of Butcher now that Regent had full control over her. Tattletale's phone rang. One of many phones, this one meant for communications with the PRT."Hello, overworked villain speaking," at least making fun of the heroes kept her in a good mood.But Miss Militia had no time for jokes."The Mathers are coming to Brockton Bay. Two members of that branch have already been seen, unclear when the rest are coming.""FUCK. What the fuck is up with all of these Masters?!? Did I miss a 'mind-fuck-con' or something here in Brockton Bay?""I share your frustration. Other Protectorate and PRT branches have approved our request for additional aid and more heroes are coming soon. The Triumvirate may make an appearance if the situation gets worse."That wasn't good news for Lisa. That was juuust barely not bad news. She, and the rest of the undersiders, were still villains, even if they now worked in more 'legal' and moral ways. Having the greatest heroes in the world in town wasn't something good.Relief; thankful that finally they'll receive the aid the city needs. Conflicted; doesn't want to betray the Undersiders, but recognizes her own bias. Lisa sighed. Right, thanks Miss MIlitia. At least you're not Piggot.Just as she was about to speak up, another phone rang. One that wasn't meant to ring except in the best of cases."Sorry, gotta go. Something came up!" She quickly hung up on Miss Militia and leapt towards the other phone. The caller ID came up as unknown, but that wasn't a problem. Only two people knew of this number.She answered.The voice on the other side hit her like a shot of cocaine straight through the nose."Tats. I'm alive. We've done it." Taylor spoke calmly, with her usual monotone voice. Lisa spun on her chair and pulled up all the news she could find from Italy. Which was nothing. The Italian government and the PRT were still keeping everything under wraps. And Dragon had quickly shut down any and all leaks that could appear online."Wait, you mean… You killed the Blasphemies?! Holy shit Taylor, that's some actual superhero stuff. Didn't know you had it in you." She lied. Tattletale had always known Taylor was a better hero than most."Blackwall did, I helped. Dragon and Arsenal helped too.""Good good, since you're at it, can you please beg Dragon to come back? We're just about drowning in shit over here. And we could really use an unstoppable unthinking mech warrior. Shit's fucked.""Okay-" A brief silence. "I told her. She was already on her way back."Anticipation; looking forward to something.Taylor was coming back as well."Oh. You're coming back too! Finally-"Hesitation; is not coming back for you, or the Undersiders."-I was getting tired of avoiding your father's calls. When are you arriving?""Are you in a safe place?"A weird question. Tattletale's powers didn't immediately explain the reasoning behind it."Yes, why?" Just as she spoke, she got the answer from her power.Ah. A few steps in front of her, in the center of the room, cracks began to appear in the air. Like shattered glass, spreading. Red in colour. Within the cracks a portal began to form, fully dark.Taylor stepped out of that portal unharmed, to Lisa's relief.Blackwall followed.Lisa glanced at the mysterious not-a-human woman, the one that wanted to fucking kill Scion, and somehow became more scared than ever.Blackwall had changed. A lot. Lisa's power began picking up on so many details, so many irregularities.Then Blackwall glanced towards her.And Lisa's power went quiet. Not deactivated by some weird power interaction, no, Blackwall simply changed her stance. Her skin - crystal imitating a human body rather than metal or flesh - shifted and began to hide even the smallest details.There was simply nothing for her power to pick up on."Hey Tats. How have you been?" Taylor spoke up, noticing the strange mood.And as much as Lisa was scared of Blackwall, all of it went out of the window the moment she looked at Taylor.At least her friend was safe.
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"You could've just picked my brain instead of hers. I'm full of good ideas!" Regent joked."Oh my god, shut up." Tattletale was one bad pun away from choking the life out of her teammate. "It's either this or you have to continue keeping Butcher under you until she dies. And then you become the next Butcher.""I think I'd simply stay sane." Regent scoffed."You wouldn't." Blackwall commented from the other side of the curtain. "It's not a matter of strength of will. Or discipline. The Shard erodes at your sense of self until- Imp, don't touch that.""Ah. Sorry." Imp skittishly fled away from the operation room."Aisha! Your brother is going to kill me if…" Tattletale's sentence lingered, before coming to a stop. She lost her train of thought, which irritated her. Not because she knew why, but because she knew she would be irritated once she knew why.Beyond the curtain, Blackwall continued to operate on Butcher's head. A good dose of Newter's power combined with some anesthesia were keeping the insane parahuman still and unable to feel what was happening. Blackwall herself was being extremely careful, trying her best to avoid any long term damage. Not because she was worried of becoming the Butcher, no, but out of true empathy towards the mass-murderer.Blackwall continued to create surgical tools out of the crystal that now made up her body: with a thought she could create tinkertech now, which was scary to say the least. The crystal tinkertech would rapidly decay and break if it got too far away from Blackwall, and she was limited to what she could create in terms of size, complexity and materials. Though Lisa didn't know the specifics, aside from that anything not made of silicate was harder for her to flash-Tinker into existence.Basically she's become Simurgh Jr. At least she's on our side…As of now she was carefully poking around Butcher's brain, looking for her Gemma, while being careful not to hurt her or to fatally injure her. Tattletale didn't know why Blackwall had been so interested in Butcher, but she didn't complain. Not like the leader of the Teeth deserved much better. It was already particularly humane of Blackwall to use anesthesia to make the process totally painless"...as I was saying," Blackwall continued, "Butcher's possession power doesn't seem to be an intended part of the power. Rather, it's a glitch, an error. I believe that not even I would come out unscathed if I got infected… And that's it, I'm done. Call Newter."Tattletale walked to the side of the room and pressed a button, calling for the Case 53. Blackwall stood up and pushed the curtain aside. She had no need to clean her hands as the blood simply… slid off her fingers.Externally Blackwall looked much more like a human now. Her chest even moved in tune with her breath.But Tattletale knew that deep down Blackwall was more like an Endbringer than a human. Layers of crystals that became denser the more you injured her, centered in a core that was hidden somewhere within her body. Though unlike an Endbringer the external crystal wasn't for appearance only, rather it was much more connected to the core. In other words, Blackwall still felt pain.Blackwall snapped her fingers in Tattletale's face, bringing her back to the present."You didn't hear my question.""No, sorry, I was contemplating the pocket Simurgh that was in my base."Blackwall didn't react at all to the joke."I asked: how is Noelle doing?" As she spoke she strode out of the doorway, nodding towards Regent and waving towards someone Tattletale couldn't spot."She's better. Krouse is a pain in the ass - nothing like Regent, but still annoying-""Hey!"Ignoring her teammate, Tattletale continued, "- but the other Travelers have been a great addition, if only to keep the base safe as they keep Noelle company. I think I've begun to figure out what's wrong with her, and I have the slightest ideas on how to fix it, but I'm not sure. I wanted to ask Accord but the fucker ran with the tail between his legs the moment we got our hands on Butcher."This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon."Unfortunately I cannot help you with her." Blackwall sighed, "I'm rather impressed that you made so much progress, I have to say.""Well, it wasn't easy figuring out a way to keep her asleep and-""No," Blackwall interrupted her, "I meant everything. Brockton Bay is steadily recovering, and if it wasn't for the Fallen and the Heartbroken then it would've become the third city in America."The first one being Houston, because of Eidolon, and the second one being Los Angeles. The latter was the closest example to Brockton Bay, in fact, a place kept safe by the unwritten cooperation of the Elite and the PRT. Ideally Brockton Bay would become like that as well, a place where the Undersiders could continue to hold control over the criminal world while also keeping the really bad shit out.Tattletale had eventually gotten around to the idea that actually, human trafficking was bad. It had been a big hit on her finances dismantling the systems the Chosen and Coil had put in place, but in exchange the parahumans under her became that much more loyal. Nowadays only Regent was a flight risk, and not really because of his messed up relationship with Imp. Which Grue thankfully did not know about."Uhm. Yeah. You did threaten to kill me if I didn't handle all of this shit.""If it helps, I regret doing that. I should've trusted Taylor's judgement.""It doesn't help.""Mh." Blackwall hummed thoughtfully.They walked all the way back to the command room, where tens of computer screens had been set up. On the other side, attached to the wall, was a board with multiple papers and notes pinned all over, connected with multicolored silk threads.Blackwall walked to the board and glanced at everything. Her eyes lingered on 'Cauldron', and 'Number Man'."I stopped looking too deep into them, as you asked.""Wise decision. But that's no longer necessary." She reached for a USB near the computers and plugged it into her neck, a port suddenly appearing over her pale skin. Then she handed it back to Tattletale. "Here, everything you need to know. Sorted by info that you can share to others, and info you really shouldn't.""...why the sudden change?""A lot is going to come out in the next few months. After the next Endbringer attack. I want you to prepare your organization and the heroes of Brockton Bay. There is a lot to prepare.""Sounds like the world is ending sooner than expected." Tattletale nervously chuckled."It is."Blackwall walked away, not offering any explanation.Tattletale stood there, expression frozen in a stiff smile.
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"-and then she said, all serious, 'it is' like she didn't just drop a fucking nuke on my lap!""She can be like that." Taylor attempted to comfort her. The two sat at a table with the rest of the original Undersiders. Plus Aisha."It's good to have you back, Taylor." Brian spoke up, ignoring Lisa's rant. "How long are you staying?""A week, maybe less. Maybe more. I don't really know." Taylor answered, looking directly at Brian. The two had something in their eyes that made Lisa want to barf."Sooo, did you kill the Pope?" Alec asked, interrupting the moment the two were having. For the first time Lisa was thankful for her teammate's lack of social awareness."He was dead long before we got there.""You know what I mean.""...no, Blackwall was the one that shot him. I did stalk the Vatican for a long while though. And helped uncover a rather strange conspiracy at the heart of it all.""Ah!" Alec shouted, "I knew the Catholics had some nuke-sized skeletons in their closet.""It wasn't them.""Except it basically was. Yeah they were being mind controlled, but that doesn't really ruin the theory, does it?" Aisha jumped into the conversation to contribute to Alec's conspiracy theories."Aisha…" Brian almost began admonishing her.But before she could continue, the ringing of a phone interrupted their conversation. Lisa's phone. She quickly picked it up.It wasn't a call, but a message."Blackwall just took out a large group of capes to the west. I think-""No cape talk. Not now." Brian interrupted Lisa before she could continue."Right," She put the phone away, trying to ignore the whispers of her power at work, "what were we saying?""Something stupid. Moving on, what is going on with you two?" Taylor pointed at Aisha and Alec.Lisa froze, while Brian raised an eyebrow, questioning what she meant. He was confused more than anything.Right, he didn't know."It's not like there's any feelings." Aisha said, shrugging.That made Brian rather angry.
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It took a while for Brian to calm down after he'd found out that Aisha and Alec were… something? Lisa didn't have the bandwidth to use her powers to find out, already she was on the edge of a crippling headache. And frankly… she didn't really care. They were two grown and equally immature idiots, they'd figure it out. Or not.Whatever.After the conversations had died down, Taylor and Lisa briefly escaped onto the balcony of the hideout, to get some fresh air."You should've told him." Taylor said."No, it was better to keep it quiet. Not even my power can fully decipher what kind of fucked up relation Aisha and Alec are in. If anything…" I didn't know you still cared "...I'm surprised you picked up so fast on it." "I… had a lot of time to think about you guys. About my months as an Undersider. It was rather easy telling the difference. Blackwall taught me how to use my swarm to not only multitask better, but to sharpen my mind. To improve my memory, my senses. A lot of things that I couldn't notice before are now obvious.""Sounds like a pain in the ass.""It was, at times. But I'd lie if I said I didn't like it. Blackwall's training made me feel… Strong. In control, for once.""You always were strong. You fucked up Lung of all people on your first night out.""Strong, maybe. But in control? You yourself admitted that my actions were preordained by Coil and you that night."Lisa bit her tongue, not knowing how to respond."Then Blackwall came and explained the truth of the world. Of our powers. It made too much sense, and also no sense at all. I felt lost, a puppet controlled by my bugs instead of vice versa. Do you feel like that sometimes? Like your power is the one pushing you, rather than you using your power?""No." Yes."Mh. Good."Taylor sighed and turned around, looking at the city.Brockton Bay had changed a lot in that month. Dragon and Lisa both had a large hand in the reconstruction. The new infrastructures they'd each contributed to had quickly changed the external appearance of the city. Even the worst neighbourhoods of Brockton Bay now were lit up, even this late into the night. People walked through the streets carefree, not worried about being mugged or stabbed.Lisa watched as Taylor fully breathed in the air of her city. Taylor liked Brockton Bay, something Lisa couldn't fully understand. Taylor hated many places within it, such as her old school, or the remains of the Protectorate HQ down on the coast, but still she held affection for the city.Which was why it was so difficult for her to ruin the atmosphere with her next question."Did you… Did Blackwall find anything about Rachel?" Lisa asked, fearing the answer.Taylor closed her eyes and remained quiet for a while. In a way, that was an answer in itself."No. Even with her new strange abilities we are no closer to finding where the Nine have hid.""Okay." Lisa simply said, trying to think of something else. But again she asked: "Do you think that's… why Rachel was like that?""What do you mean?""The reason why Rachel was more comfortable with dogs rather than people. Do you think it was her Shard, puppeting her? Do you think that without her power, she'd be different?"Taylor immediately picked up on the implication of what she was saying. On the real question behind her words.Do you think we'd be still us without our powers?"The Shards only push us. Like alcohol. Or drugs. We are who we are. Nothing more. Nothing less." Taylor explained, trying to convince herself."Okay." Lisa nodded.The two remained silent as they glanced towards the horizon, where the sun was just beginning to rise.