Amelia, Worm AU [Complete]

Amelia, Ch 329- Liam


Christ having a normal job sucks, I told myself for what felt like the hundredth time. Suppose I shouldn't be bitching too much, at least I had a job. In an industry that didn't have a lot of demand, and a city that had a real nasty problem with unemployment. All those fucking spics took up the rest of it. Shit, be easier just to quit and handle my real job full time, but the bosses didn't want that. Said it made us too conspicuous.


I stepped into the shower and blasted the water at the hottest it would go. Took a lot to hurt me, a lot more than a piddly ass apartment water heater could pull off, so I just enjoyed the steam while I lathered myself. Had to rinse the smell of ozone and blood off before going to work. Construction workers understood that staying clean wasn't exactly in the job description, but that would have raised unnecessary questions. Plus my supervisor was also my other supervisor. He'd be pretty fucking pissed if he thought I was dragging evidence around.


"Here's your mask," a woman's voice spoke casually, tossing a cloth cowl over the shower curtain.


"Gah!" I exclaimed. "Who the fuck!"


"Pants, too," she responded, and a pair of jeans sailed over.


I caught them, and hit that metal bit that switched from bath to shower. "Who the fuck are you?" I pulled my mask on right away. Wonder what it said about me that I found that the higher priority than my pants.


"I'm Victoria," she responded. "Y'know, local celebrity, beach babe without a beach, and all around beacon of awesomeness? I thought you'd remember me from the last time I kicked your ass."


"You can't be in here!" I shouted. "There are rules!" Meanwhile, I was struggling to get my soggy jeans on.


"Those rules are stupid," she dismissed. "Besides, you invited me."


"Bullshit!" I exclaimed. "Get the fuck out of my bathroom!"


"Did you, or did you not, as of April Thirtieth, when I last caught you, announce to the Channel Nine and Channel Eleven news crews that if it weren't for my battle armor you would kick my teeth out? Any time, any place? And then you went on to claim that after you were done putting me in my place you would, and I quote, 'show that bitch how a real man treats an uppity whore'?" She spoke in a deadpan voice the whole time. "Not the friendliest offer I've ever had, but somehow still far less creepy than most. And you did it publicly, instead of through anonymous comments online. So I'm giving you an 'E' for 'Effort'. The fact that this is still better than most should tell you something."


I had my pants on now, and was charging up my powers. The water on my pants and mask started to rapidly evaporate.


"Which brings me to the point. I've had a really, really frustrating last couple weeks. Like I can't even begin to describe how wound up I am right now," she continued. "And then I remembered your challenge, and how you broke out while I was busy fighting an Endbringer. Real puss thing to do, by the way. You told me to pick a time? I pick six thirty five in the morning, May fifteenth. As for place? I pick your bathroom. And guess what? I'm not wearing my armor."


I smiled. Okay, that I can work with. I focused my power toward where her voice was coming from. The curtain exploded and burst into flames as I pumped enough electricity out to turn a normal person into charcoal. Didn't expect it would kill her, but it should fucking hurt. I started charging up my body, bulking it for what promised to be a long fight. She was faster than me, but I knew I was tougher. If I kept it to closed spaces, I could win this.


She burst through the smoke and dust, landing feet first against my face, and my head slammed hard against the linoleum, shattering it. No way in fuck am I getting that security deposit back. I grabbed her legs and threw her to the ground, where she landed on the edge of the tub with a very satisfying clang. The tub cracked and splintered. Damn cheap fiberglass ain't worth shit.


She caught me with a kick in the jaw, causing me to lose my grip. Then she rolled back and onto her feet. She was panting, damaged. Smoke rose from her clothing and hair. I knew I got her with that blast. Glints of light appeared through her wounds, then vanished along with the injuries.


"Very nice," she smiled wildly. "But I know you can hit harder than that."


"Is that why you're not coming at me harder?" I growled. I wasn't complaining about the advantage she was giving me. My muscles warped and gained density while my forcefield reacted with my bioelectricity to give me even more strength and durability.


"Yup, I know how you work, Eel," she responded, leaning back against the all that my electricity and her body had broken. She casually patted out a small fire. "Used to have a sparing partner with powers similar to yours. But more TK, less zappy. His name was Browbeat. I still talk to him every once in a while, but he never did get his powers back after being restored. Pity, but he says he's happier without them. Me? I couldn't live without mine."


"Well, guess I can't argue with that," I chuckled. Not the weirdest fight I've ever had, but close. I felt the last set of altered musculature pop into place. Finally, full str-. She was right there, punching her hands through my shield and grabbing my head. A moment later, her knee was in my gut. Then she headbutted my face hard enough to break my nose despite my reinforcements. I stumbled back and landed in the wrecked tub. "How the fuck?"


"Electricity versus electricity," she answered, sparks dancing along her fingertips. "All I did was use my power to redirect yours. Oh, wait, no one knows I can do that. Please promise to blab to the press. If someone comes up with a way to counter my powers, maybe I'll even get an interesting fight."


I grabbed the shower rod and swung it at her, hoping to distract her, but she ignored it entirely, instead blocking my punch. I'm still stronger than her. I barreled forward, slamming her hard into the back wall. The shoddy construction gave before our bodies or momentum did, and we tumbled combination kitchen/living room. But I was on top. I punched down at her face, only for her to twist out of the way. The downstairs neighbors got a brand new skylight.


She elbowed me in the side of the head. Not having a lot of options, I bit her arm. My teeth warped into something sharp and wolflike. I had her, twisted to her side and pinned. I was going to win!


And then I slammed into the ceiling. By the time I even realized what happened, a glowing foot appeared through he haze of dust from the cheap ceiling tiles collapsing all around me, and I was kicked back into the bathroom.


She stood there, a glowing white silhouette of a girl. Her clothing disintegrated, but there wasn't anything interesting for the eye to enjoy. "You're not the only one with a transformed state. I sacrifice almost all my sensory powers. I get even more strength, speed and durability. Now get up and hit me, already!"


I lunged upward, connecting hard with her stomach. And by hard, I meant for me. Joints and bones gave way under the colliding force, and my hand broke. Then she backhanded me. I only traveled a couple feet before crashing into the toilet, shattering it. My concentration broken as badly as pretty much everything in my bathroom, I started to power down. Couple more hits like that and she could kill me.


"That was so unsatisfying," she muttered. "Maybe I should have waited longer to use my warform. Tell you what, how about next time I give you five minutes."


Next time!? I just lay there trying to pull my head together, water from the back of the toilet pouring all over me. Fucking concussions are the worst.


....


"So, as I see it," Chevalier sighed, looking at me. "And as the media sees it, by the way. You invited her to come find you, to say nothing of threatening sexual assault. You really don't have a leg to stand on."


"Then send me back to prison," I muttered. I was back to full strength, but they had those damn tinker-cuffs on me. Any attempt to draw on my powers would result in them hitting me with a dose of drugs. And not even the kinds of drugs that were fun, just shit that made me feel like I was going to throw up, pass out, and then throw up some more. "I'm man enough to know when I got my ass handed to me. We'll see how long my pals take to break me out."


"Uh... about that," his voice sounded more embarrassed than smug, but it still sounded smug. "Vicky's kinda on the warpath. After she knocked you out, she may have put the pictures of it online. You might want to look at this."


He handed me a picture that was obviously printed from a shitty copying machine. It was me, very much unconscious, laying in a shattered toilet. A minor burst of electricity, too slight to alert the cuffs, and the paper burst into flames. "That unbelievable bitch."


"She has her moments," he responded. "Either way, pictures like this are all over the internet, along with challenges to your buddies. I'll spare you the details until you're fully recovered from your injuries. Suffice it to say, I don't think anyone's going to help you out this time."


Fuck. Fuck!


"Now, thus far your crimes have been relatively minor," he continued. "The worst is threatening civilians with a parahuman ability, but you've managed to avoid ever carrying out that threat, so you're not birdcage bound. Yet. But you're close. One more mistake, including the mistake of breaking out, and you get to spend the rest of your life around lunatics like Glaistig Uaine, Lustrum and Acid Bath. Let's be honest, you won't survive, not around psychos like them. You don't have the instincts for it, and they're not going to give you a chance to learn them."


"You have another suggestion?" I asked. I knew the hard sell when I saw it.


"We can provide you a new identity," he offered. "Let's be honest, you'll probably never want to be known by your old moniker again, anyway. Not after you see the news stories being run right now."


"Doesn't seem like that great a deal," I muttered. "Fuck, the fact that you're offering anything at all means I'm valuable to you. I can do my dime if I have to, I'm a big guy, and I have powers. No one's gonna fuck with me in a normal prison. Ten year vacation courtesy of Uncle Sam, then I'm back out and can move and get a job and all that shit. So why would I want to go through all the trouble of working for you, instead of that? I ain't what we'd call eager to go fight the fuckin' Endbringers or such shit."


"According to Vicky, you have a secondary power that makes you immune to her combat precognition," he responded. "Put together with your other powers, this makes you the only person she's ever met that she can fight for real. Take the job. It's a paycheck, and fresh air, and you get to have regular rematches against her. Maybe one of these days, you'll even figure out how to win."


Huh. "Well, when you put it that way..." I paused for a second. "Go fuck yourself."


====================


A/N- Some people are easier to convince than others.

 

Amelia, Ch 330- Nelson


"Go fuck yourself," Eel spat at me. I spared a glance at the large birdlike creature next to him, electricity dancing from its eyes. With Victoria's help, as well as some insights from Minerva and a couple other Thinkers, I'd started learning how to understand the apparitions. They were a sort of mental translation of what my power was seeing about their powers. A hallucination, but one with a pattern. One caused because my human brain couldn't comprehend the actual concepts being shown, and simply gave me an approximation. Of the source of powers, the Passengers, and how they interacted with their hosts.


Good. "Well, that is unfortunate," I sighed, feigning disappointment. "I'll let the officers to know to put you in a cell overnight. We'll hand you over to Feds whenever they feel like picking you up."


His Passenger shifted, as if preparing to attack. Puffing itself up and spreading its plumage. Lightning jumped between feathers. I'd been learning to read their responses, the subtle ways they responded and what that meant. In a way, it made me an effective empath, as long as I was smart about it. A way to read someone's subconscious, as long as they were a parahuman. This one was angry, longing to prove itself and redeem its prior humiliation. He'd accept an offer, if not immediately.


Director Dunn would probably be slightly annoyed, if only because a sell by me meant she could skip the trouble of sending more talented recruiters to talk to him. She was very much a by the books type, a military woman. She wanted this asshole in a cell just as badly as I did, whatever her orders might be on the subject of recruitment. In her world, the Protectorate would be a disciplined and well oiled machine full of professionals, patriots, soldiers and nothing else. There was no room in Director Dunn's Protectorate for criminals like Eel. Or, for that matter, troublesome outsiders like Victoria and her mother.


As for myself, well, I accepted the reality that we didn't really have the option of being picky right now. And I tried to ignore the part of me that was jealous that he managed to force Victoria to use her war form. Even when we managed to win against her in our sparing matches, she rarely entered her transformed state. And certainly none of us managed to force her into it during a solo match. I was far more willing to acknowledge that the way he talked to or about about her pissed me off. Because I could allow myself to hate any man who would talk about any woman that way.


"What? I don't get my lawyer?" He asked.


"For what?" I asked. "You only get a lawyer for the purposes of trials and appeals. You've already been found guilty of over a dozen crimes and given a sentence. You don't get a trial, you just go back to jail. Maybe some pencil pusher will charge you with something new for your breakout, but that has literally nothing to do with me, and frankly I don't think you're worth the extra cost to the taxpayers. I'm just going to go congratulate Victoria for a job well done, and then do something important with the rest of my day."


"You suck at this bargaining shit, man," he responded.


"Bargaining implies that you have something I want," I dismissed as I opened the door and stepped out. Eel's Passenger squawking its silent rage at my dismissal. Director Dunn was watching from the other side, along with a couple of the PRT officers that handled closing negotiations.


"Interesting recruitment tactic, Chevalier," Dunn spoke, her face stern. Not disapproving, just stern.


"Thank you, Ma'am," I responded. "I anticipated an attack to his self esteem would be the best method at this time. It will take some time, likely a few days, but it is a strong first step. I don't anticipate he'll be able to stew for long before cracking."


"I'm sure my people will be able to exploit this psychological weakness," she mused. "We certainly didn't expect him to cave immediately, regardless. Good work. And while we're on the subject, please let Victoria know that the bounty is ready for her to pick up. I plan to watch the next phase of the interrogation."


"I'll be certain to," I agreed as I left the room. As I told Eel, he didn't concern me. Either he went to prison, and that was great. Or, much more likely, some other department in some other part of the country had to deal with him. Sometimes the former criminal recruits actually proved worth the headache. Eel's powers were a good combination of strong and generic, so I was sure someone would be happy enough to take him.


"Hey, Mike," Bonnie waved. She always called me by my middle name. Everyone did. "So what's the sitch?"


"Oh, nothing unusual," I responded. "I'm supposed to let Vicky know she has another confirmed bounty waiting around. I don't think she's collected on the pair from yesterday, either." Ever since we ran out of immediate cases to heal, Vicky's had a lot of nervous energy.


"Mrs. Dallon was in for them earlier," Bonnie responded. "She asked about you, by the way."


I suppressed the urge to cringe. "What about?"


"Oh, the usual," Bonnie walked with me as we went toward my office. "Victoria's been spending a lot of time at the PRT building. Is she being overworked? Is she lying about even being at work? Are we adhering to the contract? Nothing new."


"That's to be expected," I responded. "Although Mrs. Dallon has very little to work with in that regard. Feel free to remind her that Victoria is an adult, and an independent contractor for the Protectorate. We've been adhering to both the letter and spirit of that contract."


"I don't think it's the legal issues that she's worried about," Bonnie laughed. "But let's save that until we get to your office. Trust me, you'll be happier the fewer people actually hear this one."


"That bad, huh?" The question was entirely rhetorical. It was Carol Dallon, of course it was bad. We walked in silence for the minute or so until we got to my office. I opened the door and invited her to walk in first. "So where is Vicky, anyway?"


"Out hunting for more targets, something about only having a day or two window before they catch on to what she's doing," Bonnie responded. She waited until walked in and closed the door before she continued. "Your pet bombshell is proving to be quite the quite the useful irritation."


"Can't argue with that," I agreed, taking a seat behind my desk. "Wish I had more problems like her in my life."


"Oh, I bet you do," Bonnie teased. "So, anyway, back to her mother, who's equally irritating and far less useful."


I considered asking Bonnie not to insult Vicky's mother like that. Then promptly decided that the woman would likely find that comment to be a compliment. Vicky was here for a few reasons. Mrs. Dallon was here for exactly one. To make sure our handling of the healing interaction was done without any exploitation. Either of the individuals being healed, or of the healers. Specifically, her daughter. Perhaps she'd represent me if I requested it, but I certainly wasn't in the forefront of her mind here.


"Her exact words," Bonnie continued. "Were something along the lines of 'tell your boss that if he's sleeping with my teenage daughter in order to manipulate her into solving his crime problem for him, I will personally see to it that he goes to the Birdcage'."


"Can't say I didn't see it coming," I sighed. I opted to ignore the parts where the threat was obviously impossible to carry out, seeing as I was not sleeping with her daughter and it wouldn't be illegal, let alone Birdcage worthy, if I was.


"Yeah, well you could have warned me," she quipped. "Which leads me to believe that if you're sleeping with her for other reasons, it's cool. But I wasn't brave enough to get confirmation on that. Speaking of, are you still?"


"Under the influence of Gaea's power and all the hormonal imbalance that causes?" I finished. "Let's just say I'm glad my costume is fully face concealing. If it wasn't for her warning, I probably would have done something... unfortunate... by now."


It was true, this was far worse than I remembered it being when I was sixteen. Then again, when I was sixteen I didn't have an absurdly beautiful young woman with empathic powers around doing her level best to grab my attention every way she could imagine.


And sixteen year old me had other problems. My parents' injuries, the loss of my brother. My induction into the Wards. Trying to understand my phantom-sight, something I had only now, about two decades later, started to get answers for. Romance was certainly not on my list of priorities, at the time. And yet, somehow, Hannah and I figured it out. At least for a while.


"I think you should go for it," Rime finally volunteered.


"What?" But she hates Vicky. Well, maybe not hate, but certainly doesn't like her in the slightest. "What made you change your mind?"


"Would you believe it if I said she's grown on me?" she asked. "No? Okay, didn't think so. So how about we look at it smart instead of looking at it emotional? We already know you both want to, so that's a non issue. Now let's start talking politics."


"I'm pretty sure I don't like where this is going," I met her eyes.


"Neither do I," she admitted. "But it's going there. Everyone already assumes the two of you are together. Denying it is just going to make them think you're lying. Unfair, but true. Then there's the whole Pantheon connection. You can't deny that would be useful."


"And suddenly I know I don't like it," I responded. "I'm not-"


"No, you're not," she interrupted. "I'm just saying it's useful. What's more useful is... well, look what she's doing to this city. She's a one woman army who doesn't sleep and can track targets from half a mile away through walls. She's doing in Philadelphia what Alexandria did to Los Angeles. Crime's becoming unprofitable around here, and that means the professional criminals are finding new places to target. There's already talk of transferring out most of our team simply because they're no longer needed. They almost gave me the promotion in San Fran, and they certainly will offer me another city soon. When they do, I plan to take it."


My stomach jumped a little. Rime had been my second in command for years, I wasn't sure how I'd function without her help. "Are you sure?" I asked.


"I am," she insisted. "Well, unless they plan to send me to Alaska or something. There's not a lot left for me to do here. Crime's down, supervillains are down, celebrity superheroine is hogging all the photo ops. I can make a lot more difference than I am right now, but only if I do it somewhere else. The only thing that's keeping me right now is, well, you."


"Me?" I asked. What's she saying?


"You saved me during the worst point in my life," she responded. "Gave me a home. I know, you had your reasons. So did your parents. That I was, in a way, a replacement for... him." She looked down, having gone quiet.


"You aren't a replacement," I insisted.


"It's okay," she replied. "I'm okay with it. I'm even happy for it. There are no words for how much better my life is for having you to take me in, to protect me. That's part of why I agreed to join the Wards and Protectorate in the first place. To take care of you the way you took care of me. You don't need me to do that, anymore, and I'm ready to move on and have my own career outside of your shadow. Sort of. I guess you'll still be my boss, if indirectly. And you'll always be my brother and protector. But making my own way for a change would be nice. And I'd feel better knowing you had a woman around to keep you grounded."


"And you think Victoria's going to keep me grounded?" I asked.


"Well, yeah," she smirked. "One of you will have to be the level headed one, and it sure as hell isn't gonna be her."


===================


A/N- Wanted to write this from Rime's (AKA- Random Name Rolled as Bonnie) perspective, but couldn't find a voice for her in my head. Which is a pity, I think the scene would have been richer for it... maybe some day I'll revisit the character and have a proper vision for her...