Amelia, Worm AU [Complete]

Amelia, Ch 243- Riley


Victoria walked into the meeting room looking almost solemn. "Everybody, I have an announcement to make," she started.


"She got her ass handed to her at the poker game last night, and now she's moving to California," Lisa interrupted. What? Oh no.


"What?" Amelia and I asked together.


"First, those two events are completely unrelated," Vicky started. "Second, you're a bitch. And third, how was I suppose to know my powers didn't work on poker games?"


"Well, if I were you, I would have tried playing poker before challenging three high end Thinkers to a game," Lisa repied.


"Let's just back the conversation up a minute," Taylor interrupted. "What's this about moving to California?"


"Alexandria invited me," Vicky answered. "We got into the conversation about the Elite being a pain in the ass, and how our alliance of indie groups pretty much stops around the halfway mark in the country. Since it's physically painful how boring it is around here, I'm going out west to start my own team. Y'know, kick around a few villains, take a few names, video tape my fights and put them online. Why did you guys stop doing that, anyway?"


"That's actually a pretty good idea," Taylor agreed.


"Mom is going to flip out," Amelia added. From the tone of her voice, that sounded like an approval of the plan.


"I'm going to miss you," I told her.


"Don't worry about it, Mushroom," Vicky insisted. "I'll have Eric bring me back on the weekends. In fact, I'll take him with me so I can come back whenever I want. It'll be like I'm not even gone."


"Wait, when did I agree to any of this?" Eric asked.


"You became the property of the most attractive woman in the room when you gave up the power of boobs," Vicky retorted. "Besides, this is LA we're talking about here. You're not going to convince me that you don't like the idea of hanging out on the beaches. Maybe you'll be discovered by an agent and become a movie star or something. Then you'll have all the girls throwing themselves at you."


"Make you a deal," he replied. "Instead of trying to get me set on fire, how about you try asking nicely?"


"Well, sure, if you want to take all the fun out of it," Vicky sighed. "So, would you like to join my totally badass team? Crystal's going to be there. Plus Lily and Sabah. I'll talk to them after they're done with their hangovers."


"Oh, sure, take pretty much every adult on the team," Taylor remarked.


"Well, I can't take the kids," Vicky argued. "You need the Tinkers to do what they do with the whole world ending shit. Zach's going to stick with Emma. Maybe I could talk Theo and Missy into coming along." My heart jumped. Not them. "But that ruins Zach and Theo's bromance. And now that I'm done with school, it's up to Missy and Clarice to represent how awesome we are at Arcadia. The legacy must go on. Besides, they're going to have to show Dinah the ropes when she get there next year. The three of them are going to be too adorable to contemplate."


Taylor and Amelia looked at one another, and their eyes flickered as they conversed via Taylia.


"We'll need to set some ground rules," Lisa replied. "Assuming Crystal even wants to go, that means she's in charge. Eric and Lily are too valuable to the Exodus project to go with you. Not that it really matters, you're already more than strong enough to hold your own. If anything, with the Elite's focus on Master and Stranger capes, Lily is too much of a liability. Plus Faultline is putting a lot of effort into recruiting Eric, I wouldn't want to disappoint her."


Eric spoke next, his voice controlled, but it wasn't hard to recognize anger and hurt. "Are you saying-"


"No, Spitfire is totally on the level," Lisa replied. "Faultline, on the other hand? Well, she is a mercenary, what would you expect? Also, she's almost as much of a manipulative bitch as I am, so just keep that in mind. I'm just letting you know all this so you don't wind up accusing your girlfriend of being part of this when her boss inevitably makes an attempt to lure you over to the dark side or whatever."


"I understand," he replied.


"Good," Lisa added. "So, that's settled. We have a contract with Dragon for industrializing KEB armor for her combat suits. It's pretty generous, all considered, and Rey can handle pretty much the entire thing on his own. You just have to sign it. Oh, and we'll be giving him a raise. Need that signed, too. And Riley has some news about the conversation she had with Dinah last night."


I stood up started to talk about our discovery of Prism's new powers, while trying to ignore how happy Victoria sounded to be leaving.


....


"Welcome back to the garden, Mushroom," Emma greeted me as I arrived in the labs. "Excited to be returning to school?"


"Yes," I answered, acting more excited than I was. When was it that I started having so much trouble pretending to be happy? I spent five years with the Slaughterhouse Nine, and I even convinced myself that I enjoyed it. Now I had real friends and family, and I had to fake cheer. It didn't really fool Emma, her powers made her too alert for me to beat without specifically preparing for them.


"Yeah, I never liked school much, either," Emma replied. "But you get to see all your other friends, too. I'm sure everyone missed you over the holidays."


I smiled. She's right, I did have a lot of friends who would be happy to see me. No, those are Clarice's friends. If they knew who I was, they'd run screaming.


Emma frowned. "That bad, huh?" she asked.


"Yes," I admitted. Emma set down her work and picked me up in a hug. I was definitely going to be a tall girl, and in fact was only a couple inches shorter than Emma at this point, but I was slender and her altered physiology made her strong enough to easily lift me.


"Don't worry, it'll get better," she insisted. "You don't need a boyfriend to make yourself feel better."


"I know," I agreed. "I'll be fine."


It was all a matter of hormones altering my emotional desires, creating new feelings that my neurology has not yet adapted to handling in a reasonable and calm fashion. Coupled with my Trigger age altering my natural brain development in a number of ways that would exaggerate the natural teenager tendencies toward poor impulse control and emotion management. I knew all this. I could even turn it off if I wanted to, with little difficulty. But doing so, turning off my feelings for Theo, it felt like a betrayal.


I slowly extricated myself from Emma's hold. "Prism called yesterday. We're going to have to review all the tests and questions you'll need with her." I changed the subject.


Meanwhile, Clarice was making her way to school via rooftop. The Endbringer materials built into her design made everything so much easier, I even managed to wedge a teleporter into the build, though it was an energy hog. I was still using the SEB tissue for Clarice. It was in most ways inferior to Khonsu's, but the forcefield generating effects of KEB tissue couldn't be removed and that was inconvenient in normal tasks. It worked for the Zerg, they existed only as weapons of war. But Clarice was how I experienced a normal life, she needed to be more than a weapon.


Classes were fun, as always. I had discovered a real love for the arts and humanities. Something that, in many ways, was in spite of my Passenger. My powers didn't understand music and literature. They were things I had to put actual effort into, instead of allowing my Passenger's alterations to my brain fill in the gaps, the way it did for math and science.


The Entities, based on everything we knew, couldn't comprehend art. Didn't want their hosts to care about such things, they didn't advance the cycle of conflict and evolution. If I hadn't been found by Jack Slash. If I hadn't Triggered. I imagine I might have become a singer or musician. I even had the natural good looks to make it as a popular performer, and if my popularity in school was a measure of success, I had the charm for it as well.


By the time school was out, I was honestly cheerful again. I couldn't be seen heading home with Missy, unfortunately. The cold weather made it hard to claim we were simply hanging out like we might if it were warmer, and Missy still had a secret identity to protect. Instead, I would simply shunt over and take the route through Avalon. I just had to go outside, first. Shunting could be done indoors, but it was really much better and safer for the environment to be outside first. Less chance of breaking something.


The moment I stepped out onto the roof, a number of alerts flashed on my display as space distorted around Clarice. It took a few seconds for me to map the new vectors of space, when everything went back to normal. Missy was now standing in front of me, wearing her costume. She held up my silk scarf between her pointer and middle fingers.


"So," she started, sounding less than pleased. "I recently found out you have a crush on my boyfriend."


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A/N- DRAMA!