I've finished the first drafts of chapter 9 and Interlude 1, so here's Chapter 8! I have to re-write chapter 9 and then edit it, so it'll probably a few days before I post the next one. The Interlude marks the end of Arc One of this story, bringing the journey of miserableness that our heroine's had to go through to a close. Poor Taylor... most people's trigger event is the worst days of their lives, but hers was smack-dab in the middle of the worst
three days of her life. Please ready and review!
Immortals
A Worm Fanfic
Chapter 8: Coming Full Circle
Mom and I watched the building for a few more moments, our bodies crouched behind a row of short bushes. We were hiding around two hundred feet from The Hangout and the rest of the cabins; I hoped that our distance and stealth would prevent anyone down there from detecting us.. Besides the camp cabins and the Great Hall, the building we were observing was the only structure of note on the entire campus… at least that I
knew of. It would make sense if the rest of the nine were holed up here.
Walking a little ways around the circle of buildings revealed that two of the smaller cabins had lights on inside of them as well… clearly someone or
something was here. Either that, or someone wanted us
to think that the lit structures were inhabited. I frowned; would the Nine be obvious enough to turn the lights on in the middle of the night? Was this some kind of trap? I
really needed more information before Mom and I acted.
"Mom, how does the targeting for your teleportation work?" I asked. Ideas swirled through my head like a maelstorm.
"I…" she paused, a look of frustration coming over her face. "Sorry honey, I'm not sure how to explain it. I guess I just think about
where I want to teleport to, and I can sort of 'feel' if it's safe to go there. I don't really get any information about where I'm trying to teleport to, I can just kind of tell if it's a good idea to transport over or not." As my mother struggled to explain her innate ability, a plan of action began to coalesce in my mind.
"Do you think you can teleport into the big building, the one that's in the middle of those other cabins? I have a strong suspicious that when you're in your blue light form, there's not much that can harm you. If you can get in and out of the building in less than five seconds, I don't think any of the Slaughterhouse members would be able to hurt you." I frowned, my mind bending in strange directions as my power worked furiously. "
Maybe Winter could do something, but according to all the information I have on her, her Shaker power is supposed to take time to build up before it's really effective."
Mom looked startled, concentrating for a moment as she mulled over my plan. Her next words revealed that she'd used whatever supersensory power that she possessed to see if my idea was viable.
"Yeah, there's enough space inside of that building to teleport inside. Are you sure this is a good idea, sweetheart?" Mom was clearly nervous about the idea of possibly coming face to face with more Slaughterhouse Nine members. I didn't blame her for the caution; the two that I'd faced had been
terrifying, even if I did win on both occasions.
"I think it's the only chance we have of finding out if
that," I said, pointing at the group of buildings below, "is a
trap… at least without dying," I told her grimly. My mother winced, her face paler than normal in the wan moonlight. She nodded.
"What should I do?" she asked, ceding control of the situation to me.
"I can see through the windows right there," I said pointing, "The second floor is a loft, and there doesn't appear to be much up there; it looks like the entire building has a completely open floor plan. I can make out a railing that overlooks the first floor, right next to a set of stairs
there. I think your best chance of getting in and out without being seen is to appear in the loft area, right next to the railing. When you transport in,
don't land or change out of your light form… Just take a quick peek, and then pop right back over here so you can share what's going on. You
should be completely immune to any biological agents or physical injuries while in your alternate state, so there's not much of anything the remaining members of the Nine can do to hurt you." Mom nodded along as I explained my plan, indicating that she understood what to do.
"Wish me luck," she said. I mumbled and agreement before giving my mother a quick hug. She switched to her alternate form, and then disappeared. I watched through the windows in The Hangout as Mom reappeared a fraction of a second after she winked out. She was hovering a few inches off the ground, exactly where I'd asked her to teleport to. I saw her disappear again after observing the interior of the building for 6.53 seconds, before reappearing beside me once again. Mom lowered herself to the ground, her body transitioning back to normal as she landed. She looked shaken.
"Bonesaw's inside." She practically barked out her words. "And she's working on something… on some
one." Her eyes were wild. "I had a clear view of nearly the entire interior, and there weren't any other parahumans that I could see... " She hesitated before continuing. "There were more
things in there, Taylor. Smaller ones, and quite a few of them… maybe ten or twenty. It looks like she turned some of the campers into monsters." My power cranked away furiously as I formulated a plan, trying to come up with the safest way possible of rescuing the poor souls that Bonesaw had twisted using her prodigious Tinker power.
"There's more, sweetheart," said Mom quietly. I looked back up at her, surprised. "I think the person Bonesaw's working on is Jack Slash." I paled; could Bonesaw actually
bring people back from the dead!? Jack Slash coming back to life was a nightmare scenario.
"We've got to move quickly," I bit out. I knew on some level that if Bonesaw managed to resurrect Jack, that nothing my mother or I could do would be enough to take him out. He'd survived too many encounters with powerful heroes, gotten away clear from so many traps… His blade projection didn't
sound like a very powerful parahuman power, but Jack Slash had survived having a kill order on his head for almost twenty years for a reason. He was slippery, and by all accounts luckier than the devil himself. Besides the evil that he would do, there was an even more important reason that I couldn't let him be revived…
I didn't want Carlos's achievement to be meaningless. The boy I'd barely known, who I thought could have been a friend shortly, had done
something amazing when he defeated a monstrous cape without even possessing a power of his own. I wanted to
preserve that achievement, to make sure that it
continued to mean something. I was ready to do whatever it took to make sure that Jack Slash remained dead and gone. Mom interrupted my thoughts with a simple statement.
"Taylor, we
are not going in there until you've come up with a
damned good plan. There's over a dozen monsters, and I'm sure several of those spiders things you told me about are lurking somewhere as well." I could tell that she was completely serious; unless I had a way to level the playing field there was no way she was going to let me get close to The Hangout. It's a good thing for me that I already knew what to do. I gave my mother a dangerous smile.
"I've already got a plan," I told her. "Help me gather some branches." I began searching the ground underneath a nearby stand of hardwood trees. "Long thin ones," I told my mother, holding up a long, thin one that I had found as an example. A collection of broken branches began to accumulate in my arms as Mom joined me in my search. Soon enough we had nearly as much kindling as we could carry. I took off my coat and zipped it up, tying the sleeves
just so to form a holster for the sticks.
"Mom, I want you to convert one of the sticks into blue light and throw it at that tree," I said, pointing at the trunk I wanted her to target. Mom's power might be similar to Legend's… but she just didn't have the firepower that the famous Blaster did. Despite the astounding level of utility her power brought to the table, it
was a little light on 'out of the box' offensive ability. If things worked out as expected, though, my idea
should make up for her lack of lasers… at least to a degree. If I have my way, then with
my help Mom will eventually be
stronger than Legend.
"Alright honey," she said, not even bothering to argue. Mom shifted just her hand to blue light this time, and then converted the stick that she was holding. She threw the glowing blue stick at the tree I'd indicated. I smiled when her eyes opened wide in astonishment as the stick punched through the pine tree's trunk like it wasn't even there. Under the effects of Mom's power the piece of wood she'd thrown bored a hole through the tree and flew out the other side. It hadn't been slowed down in the slightest. I had a feeling that they would be able to punch through
anything, no matter what material impediments were made up of.
The projectile continued to travel in a straight line through the air for exactly 2.78 seconds from the moment she'd thrown it. While it flew, the mostly straight stick had ignored gravity and inertia, mass and friction. When mom's power faded from the piece of wood the small branch was passing through
yet another tree. We both rushed over to see what had happened. We found the broken piece of a tree branch stuck tight, apparently melded with the tree it had been passing through. I walked over to examine the curious sight; it looked like the matter composing the stick had merged perfectly with the trunk perfectly, causing the two separate objects to form a new, denser material than either of the originals. 'Now doesn't
that have applications!' I thought gleefully. I couldn't
wait to study Mom's power further.
I was
pretty sure that Mom's power had a component that allowed her to avoid destructive interactions
herself when she touched people or objects in her light form. My
own power had informed me that a thrown or otherwise launched object might have allowed her to bypass that restriction, thus the test we'd just performed. I'd smiled grimly when my power was proven correct.
I pulled out my revolver, which I had reloaded during our walk from the thicket to the ring of cabins. I had mom phase phase
me for the next test. I looked back and forth between my weapon and the perforated tree trunk that we'd used previously, before lining up the shot and firing my revolver. The bullet shot from my pistol noiselessly, as
everything was under my mom's power, before going straight through the trunk. The round continued on a completely straight course through the air without dipping or slowing visibly for exactly 2.78 seconds, just like the stick had.
The tiny bit of lead went through everything in its path like the objects
weren't even there, and much faster and more precisely than Mom's through piece of wood had. I grinned ferally, my canine teeth shining in the nearly nonexistent moonlight. Suddenly, the enemies in The Hangout didn't seem like that much of an obstacle. I reloaded the gun while Mom and I talked strategy for a moment, getting our plan completely straight. Four minutes and forty-one seconds after she'd returned from scouting, we winked out of existence.
We reappeared five feet behind Bonesaw, who was working on the body in front of her feverishly. I looked at her work, my eyes widening when I realized that it
really was Jack Slash on her operating table. The tiny Tinker didn't notice our presence, didn't slow down her work at all. My roving eyes noticed something else… Next to where she was working, invisible from the angle my mom had observed Bonesaw from earlier, was a
second body. I looked into the glassy, pain filled eyes of
Carlos, my mind filled with shock. His head
wasn't attached to his body. It was mated to a Tinkertech device, with the rest of his body parts being stored in a glass aquarium that had
yet another piece of Bonesaw's work attached to it.
The hispanic boy's body appeared to have been messily disassembled. His head was alive, connected to a crude Tinkertech device which I my power told me was a life support machine. It also appeared to do something
else, something that reminded me of the crystalline shards I'd seen in space earlier in the evening when Mom triggered. Something to do with
powers? Carlos's eyes stared at my glowing blue face, both of them opening wide in surprise. A vicious grin erupted across his face, and I nodded at him, letting him know that we were here to help.
One of the people-things in the room, a misshapen two-headed creature that might have been a pair of teenage girls at one point, let out a horrendous screech when it spotted the two of us hovering in the air. The tiny Tinker spun around, her eyes darting wildly around the room until they landed on Mom and I. Were were still in Mom's energy from, floating in the air together, connected to one another by our held hands. I barely needed my power at all to realize how dangerous fighting Bonesaw would have been, had we been susceptible her cadre of biological tricks. My power informed me that Mom's power should be proof against biological agents and standard physical attacks.
I was surprised to see the sorry looking state the golden haired parahuman was in. The Tinker's eyes were bloodshot, and there were huge, dark bags underneath them. Her face was way too pale, and I could see a plethora of cuts and bruises on the exposed portions of her hands and arms. The body she'd been working on was a mess as well… Between the bio-spider mechs I'd seen three days ago and the work I was looking at now, my power had a pretty good grasps on Bonesaw's Tinkertech. Enough, at least, to recognize that Jack Slash's body was nearly unsalvageable. It looked like she'd performed at least a dozen operations on it; there were seventeen separate devices keeping his brain oxygenated and the tissues fresh… All the things necessary to resurrect him, like some kind of Frankenstein's monster. The problem, it appeared, was not his body, which should be able to sustain life, but his
brain.
Jack Slash's exposed brain, which had been run through by Carlos using the psycho's own knife, had tissue from at least a dozen different sources grafted onto it. I learned in that moment that my eyes were sensitive enough to notice details like that… The slightly different coloration, grain, and patterns on the various sections of hastily connected neural tissue was enough for my power to inform me that they'd come from
several different individuals. It made my blood boil when I realized that this disgusting
parody of a
child had killed at least twelve people to try to bring her piece of shit, murderer of a boss back to life. I nearly killed her right there, but I held myself back.
I'd been smart enough to realize that Bonesaw's had probably set up some kind of biological booby trap that would go off when she died. I was counting on Mom's power to fix that… Once the Tinker been teleported, any viruses, bacteria, or other harmful organisms on or around her body should be neutralized... as well as any implants she had in her body. A useful byproduct of restoring her body to 'optimal' health. We'd have to be careful going forward when transporting Tinkers and the like… anything they'd implanted in their own bodies would probably be removed when they were reintegrated from energy to matter.
Mom and I each drew a stick, preparing for the onslaught of Bonesaw's creatures. Under the effects of my mother's power, we must have looked like glowing angels with fiery blue swords. I didn't want to kill the creatures, as we might be able to revert them to human with Mom's power. If it came down to it, though, Mom and I had agreed that even
that would be preferable to having Jack Slash brought back to life. We hovered in the air in front of the murderous little girl and her pack of twisted creations, waiting for the inevitable attack. Over a minute passed without anything at all happening; a lifetime in battle. I was ready to start the fight myself, only wariness of some kind trap or hidden surprise holding me back. Mom and I continued to stare down at the little Tinker warily.
The fight never came. The dozen ogre-like creatures didn't attack. Bonesaw just stared up at us with her jaw quivering, looking so,
so tired. I noticed that she was using the edge of the table that contained Jack's body to support herself, her short legs trembling like they could barely support her megre weight. The dress she wore was absolutely filthy, it and the apron she had over it caked in oil and gore. Finally, the preteen cape broke the strange deadlock.
"You're not Lengend," she accused, her speech slightly slurred. "Who
are you? Why haven't you killed me yet?" She let go of the table, dropping onto her butt on the blood splattered floor. Under my incredulous gaze she actually
began to cry. I had
no clue what to do.
"I wish Mr. Jack was here," the blond girl sobbed, fat tears rolling down her pale cheeks. "But I can't get his brain working! Not even when I connected his body to that mean regenerator guy who killed him…" she stared at the floor, as she sniveled, her little hands twisting and pulling on the hem of her disgusting apron. I had no trouble believing that she'd been trying to resurrect the leader of her gang since the very moment he'd been killed… The little girl was so bone weary that I doubt she properly understood what was going on around her.
Mom looked at me, my power helping me read her expression through the obfuscation caused by her energy state. I shook my head no, grief and hatred warring with simple human compassion in my heart as I took in the piteous form on the tiny monster in front of me which wore the disguise of a sad little girl. Mom cocked her head, the parts of her face which were usually eyes and mouth shifting slightly. I nodded 'no' again, more vehemently this time. Mom shrugged her shoulders, and then blatantly ignored our previous plan as she disobeyed the instructions I'd just given her. I had no way to stop her, no way to disagree; my body only had as much freedom as she allowed it to while under the influence of her power.
Mom drifted over to Bonesaw and bent down. She lifted the unresisting child using her free arm, converting the Tinker into blue light as she picked her up. When she hugged the tiny blonde girl to her chest, I was shocked to see a look of contentment come across the child's face when my mother embraced her, just before she was converted fully into energy. Bonesaw clung to Mom as if her life depended on it, the outline of her small body completely still. I fumed in silence, as I had to, shocked and worried at my mom's actions.
Mom gestured to Carlos's severed head and detached body with her head; I nodded 'yes'. I was absolutely
furious at her over her betrayal, but I wasn't about to leave him behind. I slowly picked up the pieces of Carlos' body, which had been kept fresh, if not alive, by a type of Tinkertech invigoration field. I tucked each piece of his body under my arm, thankful for their lack of mass as they were converted into blue light. I picked up his bewildered looking head last, holding it in such a way that it was kept in contact with all the other sections of his body. I hadn't missed the significance of Bonesaw's words; evidently my acquaintance had triggered as well, as some kind of regenerator. I guess the device that had been keeping his head alive had also suppressed his powers; either that, or his regeneration was limited enough that it couldn't cope with the loss of the rest of his body. We hadn't used Mom's power to heal someone whose body was
dead before… I hoped Carlos's living head would allow the other parts of his body to re-integrate with it successfully, despite their non-living state.
When I was done collecting my friend, I signaled Mom. I slowed down my perception of time again, finding it slightly easier this time to view her portal forming. I actually caught a glimpse of the event horizon of the circular opening before we were sucked in and spat out on the other side. I replayed my memory of the event, delighting in the extra information I'd gleaned this time. As we landed, this time in a small park that was a mile or two from my house, I combined my knowledge of Mom's power with several pieces of Armsmaster and Bonesaw's technology using my 3D technology power, trying to see if I could use my store of information to creating a machine to replicate Mom's power. I put the thought exercise on hold when we returned to flesh. I prepared body and mind once more for a fight, not sure if Bonesaw was planning to attack us once we were vulnerable.
As Carlos's repaired body tumbled to the ground, I drew my revolver and pointed it at Bonesaw. I was hoping that the murderous little girl would give me an excuse to kill her… After all of the terrible things she'd done, she simply didn't deserve to live. Carlos climbed to his feet, looking at the sleeping blonde girl with contempt in his eyes as my mom cradled her limp body to her chest. Mom glared at the gun I was pointing at the little girl's head until I put it away. I snorted in derision; I didn't
like killing, but as far as I was concerned Bonesaw had it coming to her, due to her evil actions. I should have realized what would happen when she eventually came across Bonesaw, knowing how Mom felt about kids… It still hurt, though, knowing that my mother was willing to let the villain live, even
after she'd seen the horrifying things she'd done to all those people.
"Not that I'm ungrateful for the rescue and the healing, but I'd
really like to know what's going on here." said Carlos. He kept looking down at his body, which by all measures was perfectly intact and working once again. He was flexing his arms and legs and twitching his fingers between giving my mother and I searching looks. He studiously ignored Bonesaw, taking pains not to set eyes directly on her unconscious form. I was surprised that he hadn't attacked her, or even Mom, after what had been done to him. I know that
I would have in his place. I was a little unsure of what to say to the boy who I'd thought killed over two days ago, but I had a good idea where to start. Pulling down the bandanna covering my lower face and tossing back the hood or my jacket, I turned to smile at the surprised looking boy.
"Hi Carlos." I said shyly. "It's me, Ta-" I didn't get to finish, because the wide-eyed teen rushed forward, moving so quickly that his form
blurred. I braced myself for a punch or a kick, figuring that he would rightly be furious at me for abandoning everyone that first night. No attack came. Instead, strong arms wrapped around my body, and the tall latin boy pressed his face into my shoulder as he began to sob.
"Taylor…" he whispered, pulling back after a moment. His eyes were still wet. "
You came back for me." he said, his words filled with significance. I managed a timid nod. I was pleased to note that he kept his arms around my waist after the initial embrace. So many different emotions and thoughts were going through my head that I didn't know what to do or think. Mom cleared her throat loudly, reminding the two of us that she was still present. Carlos let go of me and took a step back, his face a little red. He gave me a quick smile, which I returned, before the two of us turned to see what my mother wanted.
"We still have some unfinished business," she said. "I'd like to get some information from
this one," she said, gesturing down to the little girl in her arms. "Once we know whether or not there are more members of the Nine back at camp, we need to either head back and finish rescuing the survivors, or call in reinforcements." she said.
"I'm really grateful to you both, but where in the world was the Protectorate?" asked Carlos. He had a baffled look on his face. I felt a sudden surge of anger.
"When I finally escaped that hellhole earlier today, I contacted the PRT first thing. The bitch Director here in Brockton Bay didn't believe that the Slaughterhouse really attacked camp," I spat. Carlos looked incredulous.
"Seriously? They didn't even send someone up there to take a look?" he looked sick as he finished his sentence, like he couldn't believe what I was saying. I nodded, staring at the ground. It hurt to meet his eyes afterward. Mom piped in.
"As soon as we've done all we can back at the camp, I'll be
having words with the PRT," she said. Her tone was venomous enough to cause Carlos to stiffen slightly.
"So, you triggered too, I take it?" I asked the young man beside me casually. He'd taken a seat on a nearby park bench that the three of us had drifted over to. The well built young man was flexing his legs while running his hands over his calves. A strange look came over Carlos's face at my question, his eyes appearing to look
through me.
"Yeah." He said, chuckling humorlessly. "I can regenerate from anything, and I'm really strong and fast. I can also jump
really well…" He paused for a second, his tone going flat. "It seems like every time I regenerate from an injury, I get a little faster or stronger… and I can jump a little higher, or further," he finished slowly. I winced; there was no good way to find
that out.
Carlos was bending his toes now, flexing each individual joint as he did so. I was very glad Bonesaw had left the tattered remnants of his clothing on his body; having the boy I was crushing on appear naked in my arms on top of everything else would have been
beyond embarrassing. His shirt and pants had been repaired just as thoroughly as his body had. His feet had been bare, hence the lack of shoes.
"I'm mainly a Thinker, though I got a handful of other little powers as well." I told him, reciprocating. Carlos looked at me curiously; apparently he wasn't acquainted with the PRT shorthand for superpowers. Heck, the only reason that
I knew the little that I did was due to the bits and pieces of information I'd heard or seen over the years being put together into usable information using my power-given perfect memory.
"Thinkers have mostly mental powers, or enhanced senses." I explained to him. "I can see
really well, even in the dark. Thanks to my powers, I'm also smarter than I ever imagined a human being
could be. My reflexes are ridiculous, and I'm a lot stronger than a normal girl my age has any right to be, though my strength isn't really 'superhuman'." I took a breath, and then continued explaining.
"I have a perfect memory, and I can easily pick up new skills and fighting moves in seconds. Also…" I paused… wondering if I should I tell him about my 3D technology power. Would Carlos dislike me if he knew that I had something in common with Bonesaw? After a long second II decided to go for it; he had been truthful with me about his own powers, after all.
"I also think that I might be a Tinker, like Armsmaster… Every time I see a machine or a piece of Tinkertech, all the parts of it I can see sort of get scanned into my head in the form of a three dimensional blueprint. Afterward, I can understand what the machine's purpose is, and how it was built. I think that with enough information I
should be able to actually construct the machines I've scanned in… but I haven't really had time to build anything yet."
Carlos looked at me appraisingly. "That sounds like a really cool power, Taylor. I sounds a lot more interesting than mine." The handsome boy grinned at me while scratching the back of his head sheepishly. I shot him a quick smile in return, before shifting back into business mode. I turned to Mom and asked her an important question that had been weighing on my mind since we'd captured the little Tinker that she was holding.
"What are we going to do with Bonesaw after she answers your questions?" I asked Mom. She looked down at the little girl thoughtfully for a moment, a frown on her face. She didn't give me an answer right away… I didn't know if she
had one. Carlos scowled, turning his head away.
"That monster pretending to be little girl killed most of the people at camp, you know." He spoke casually, refusing to meet my eyes. "Either that, or turned them into those
things that you saw back there in her workshop. Her and Crawler are the one who made me get powers." He scowled, angrily continuing his story.
"I was able to get away after I killed Jack Slash…" His eyes were distant; I could tell that Carlos was reliving the memories of what had happened to him as he spoke. "I was running through the woods when Crawler and about a dozen of those spiders of hers started chasing after me. They were
playing with me, running me down like some kind of fucking animal. I tripped, and I thought I was
done. I was laying there, praying to Jesus," he said, pronouncing it 'hey-soos'. "Suddenly I'm climbing to my feet again, and this time I could
really move. I was running faster than I could go on my bike, maybe as fast as a car." Carlos appeared a little excited as he recounted the details of discovering his powers for the first time, but eventually excitement gave way to anger and fear.
"There was a patch of bushes were in my way, and I jumped
clear over them! I cleared ten feet of air, easy, and like... twenty, twenty-five feet of distance in
one jump." He continued to stare down at his legs, going quiet for a few seconds. "That's when Crawler quit playing with me. He'd been laying down for some reason, but he got to his feet
quick. He was
a lot faster than me... caught up to me in about a second and
tore off both of my legs." He shuddered at the horrific experience he'd gone through. I gave him a small smile and squeezed the tall boy's shoulder reassuringly.
"The fucker
ate em'." Carlos said softly while wiggled his toes, as if to reassure himself that they were still there. "Bonesaw's spiders were all over me about a second after that. One of them injected me with some kinda drug, but it didn't do nothing to me. The spider started picked me up and started hauling me back to camp… only my legs grew back in like a minute or two. I hit the spider once,
hard, and the fucking thing shattered to pieces." He smacked a fist into his palm, generating a surprisingly loud sound. "There was
a human head inside of it. Every one of those spiders is
a person that she killed, and that
little bitch has
dozens of them." He was staring right at my mom when he recounted the last part, his face hard.
"They kept playing with me
for hours. Crawler would run me down, or a spider would tear off a piece of me, maybe a finger, maybe a foot… They'd let me grow it back, and then they'd be after me again. When they were finally finished with their little game, Crawler
ate my whole body,
everything from the neck down. Fucker bit my head right off, but it didn't kill me. Then
little bitch had one of her spiders do something to me, hooked me up to some kind of machine that kept my regeneration from working." The anger drained from his face, replaced by fear and revulsion.
"She'd been taking apart the other kids and the adults from camp… Trying to put that
puta I killed back together using pieces of their bodies. When Crawler brought me to her, I realized she hadn't even
been there when her spiders were chasing me… she'd been remote controlling them while she was working. Like tearing me apart and chasing me all over the woods was some kind of fucking up
video game." He seemed angrier about Bonesaw's absence than Crawler's cannibalism… I guess that the casual inhumanity she'd displayed really pushed his buttons for some reason. I sat down on the park bench next to Carlos and put and arms around him. He leaned into me, putting his head on my shoulder. He kept speaking, needing to tell us what had been done to him. Carlos' voice was softer than before when he continued his tale.
"When
Bonesaw got her hands on me she stopped killing the others for parts, at least. She did something to make it so that I couldn't move, and then cut pieces of my body off, making me re-grow them over and over…
Little bitch was farming me for body parts. It was
really bad, but I think I'm immune to pain now or something, because it didn't really
hurt. That's
something, at least. After a while, she hooked me up to her
puta boss with some wires and shit. I think she was trying to get my regeneration to work on him." Carlos stared
through me, an odd look etched onto his face.
"She had the phones at camp set to ring in her workshop. A couple hours ago there was a phone call, and after that Crawler and the others all bugged out... all of them except little bitch and Hatchet Face… I think she has some kind of control over him… I saw her giving him orders like she did to her spiders and the monsters she had in her workshop. She had him fetching and carrying for her, shit like that. When the rest of the Nine took off, little Bitch wouldn't leave. I think she was scared that her boss-man, or daddy, or whatever he was to her, would've died for good."
Done telling his story, Carlos deflated, pushing his face further into the space between my neck and shoulder. I held him a tight as I could, hugging the boy with my full strength now that I knew he was a more powerful Brute than I was. I wanted to let him feel something other than the fucked up emotions I knew were running through his head… I'd felt the same way just after I got home. He needed to know that he wasn't alone anymore; that there was someone who cared about him and wanted him to feel better.
Mom stared down at the little girl in her arms as I held Carlos, her face inscrutable. I could tell by the little girl's heart rate and respiration that Bonesaw was still unconscious... or else she was doing an
amazing job of faking it. I was glad to note that there were no overt signs of Tinker technology or artificial enhancements present in her body. There had been quite a bit of internal Tinkertech integrated into her body back at camp. It looked my power-assisted conclusion had been correct, and that Mom's teleportation had removed any implants or upgrades that Bonesaw had built into herself. I don't know if it would've even
been possible to safely contain her, had her upgrade still existed. Maybe after I'd spent a while studying them, but
definitely not on short notice. On the other hand, if she'd been a ticking time bomb, then Mom might have been forced to kill her, rather than to treat her like an ordinary child, and not the mass-murdering supervillain that she actually was.
I wanted to end Bonesaw even more than I had previously, now that I'd heard the details of what she'd done to so many innocent people. The problem with
that was the my traitorous mind kept replaying the memory of a sad little girl sobbing on the floor, looking so
incredibly broken. At that moment, I
desperately wished that my power had some way of helping decide what the moral thing to do in my situation was. Was Bonesaw beyond truly redemption? I didn't know. What I
did know was that giving her the benefit of the doubt could potentially result in hundreds or thousands of innocent people dying in agony and terror.
According to the government Bonesaw's life was already forfeit; the 'kill order' on her head meant that legally, for all intents and purposes, the child was already dead. All that was left was for her execution to take place; afterward her killer would
not only be praised for the deed, but would
also be given a fat bounty for doing what law enforcement could not. I stared at her. Bonesaw's heinous actions were completely at odds with the image she presented now, as she lay sleeping peacefully in my mother's arms. Mom cradled the curly, blonde haired child like she was actually a normal little girl, and not someone who the entire country feared and wanted dead. I stared at the peaceful expression on her face, uncertainty filling me from head to toe.
Carlos ended our embrace and rose to his feet, his face looking unsteady despite the fact that the formally clumsy boy's balance was now picture perfect. The young cape looked around the night-time landscape of the small park we were currently resided, his eyes roaming around the dimly lit playground equipment standing in a pit of bark chips nearby. He looked downward for a moment, once more staring at his hands. Clenching his fists tightly, he lifted up his head. His chocolate eyes bored into my own, before moving on to meet Mom's.
"I want to go home so bad I can taste it... but I wouldn't be able to live with myself if we didn't rescue the other people who are still back at camp. You said earlier that you were going back… I want to come with you." The well muscled teen continued to stare at Mom while he made his request, knowing that she'd been the one to teleport us here. There was no getting back with her, I knew, at least not in an actionable timeframe. I remembered my mother's earlier words about us needing help, and the way I had bullied her into continuing our self-appointed mission after I'd had to kill Hatchet Face. I honestly didn't know how she was going to respond. To my surprise, Mom immediately nodded to him in affirmation.
"You're sure the rest of the Slaughterhouse has gone, Carlos?" Mom asked her question in a no-nonsense tone. I was surprised that my mother was handling the rapid, life-altering changes that had happened to her as well as she was. The poor woman had just triggered a few hours before, after having some kind of terrible, fucked up breakdown. Since then, the events that had taken place had been nothing short of violent and chaotic, any one of them enough to send most people into a bout of depression or existential quandary.
I built a mental model of my mother's mind using the staggering amount of information I had on her, using my power-granted hypercognition. According to my power, she
should not be doing nearly as well as she was. I thought about her power, and it's ability to restore her body to perfect health every time she teleported… Was that the reason why she she seemed to be so mentally and emotionally stable? Mom
had made several reckless, sub-par decisions that night, but that was
nothing at all compared to the mental problems that should have been cropping up from the traumatic experiences that she'd experienced.
I added everything I'd observed about the matter repairing function of Mom's power to my mental model of the situation. Of course! Her power was probably fixing any chemical imbalances that it found. Every time her body reintegrated from an energy state her powers were likely removing stress hormones and restoring instabilities in her serotonin, dopamine, and norepinephrine levels. I blinked; if it was restoring her chemical levels back to normal, then there was no reason to think that her power wasn't likewise 'fixing' errors and problems on the
cellular level as well… The ramifications of
that were pretty crazy, especially if telomere deterioration counted as an error that needed to be fixed. '
That is something to think about later,' I told myself. The long and the short of the situation was, if Mom hadn't been using her power so much, then she'd likely be back at home in bed, crying her eyes out or having a panic attack.
I was once more incredibly grateful to have a Thinker power that allowed me to understand so much, and the ability to completely control my own bodily functions. 'My power is basically an amazingly effective coping mechanism,' I realized. I guess Mom's power was too, at least to an extent.
'None of the people that Mom teleported had been quite as upset as they probably should have been,' I realized in retrospect. Perfect healing is an utterly bullshit power. I hoped that Carlos was able to hold it together as well; the trauma he'd been through sounded even worse than what Mom and I had experienced. Hopefully his regeneration would turn out to be just as broken as mine and my mother's' powers. Still, he should be alright for tonight at least; thanks to the healing aspect of Mom's power, he would experience the same mood-balancing effects as we did.
"I'm pretty sure
most of the Slaughterhouse members are gone. A couple of those psychos tried to get Bonesaw to go with them, especially that freak Mannequin, but she wouldn't budge. I haven't seen the Siberian in awhile though, not since yesterday… That means she's either still at camp or that she left even before the others did. I know for a fact that Hatchet Face is still hanging around somewhere. That means the only two we have to worry about are him, and
maybe the Siberian."
"We don't have to worry about either of
them." I told Carlos haltingly. "Hatchet Face and the Siberian are both dead." Shame and regret burned through my mind and heart at the confession. Remembering the terrible, bloody way I'd had had to end the pair of Slaughterhouse members made me feel sick to my stomach. The only comfort that I had was that they'd both deserved it, and that both times I had at least been acting to save a life other than my own. I wasn't like
them; I hadn't toyed with either of the villains, or made them needlessly suffer.
I was never going to be like them. I intended to be a Hero, and nothing would stand in my way of achieving that goal.
"No shit?" Carlos asked, appearing impressed. "You'll have to tell me all about that at some point. If they're both dead, then
little bitch there was the last member of the Nine still at camp," He explained, gesturing toward Bonesaw. He suddenly looked unsure. "What are we supposed to do with her, anyway? We can't really take her
back there, and she might be able to escape if we try to stash her somewhere."
"Should we turn her over to the PRT?" I found myself asking. Fifteen minutes earlier I'd wanted to put a bullet through her brain, but after a little contemplation and self reflection I was no longer completely sure. I knew that turning her into the authorities would be tantamount to murdering her ourselves, thanks to the pre-signed kill order on her head. Evidently Mom had known about that as well, because she began shaking her head 'no' as soon as the words came out of my mouth.
"We are
not handing her over to those incompetent bunglers." said the older woman definitively. My mouth was set in a grim line when I next spoke. I was struggling to make sense of the moral dilemma the three of us faced, but I was
incapable of forgetting the terrible things she'd done. I hoped that my mother wasn't so caught up with the fact that Bonesaw was a young child that she was forgetting the atrocities the diminutive Tinker had committed.
"What do you think you're doing, Mom?" I asked her. Carlos blinked, looking back and forth between us. Confusion evident on his face, he idly scratched the back of his head. I blinked, realizing what I'd just revealed. Oops. I guess Mom hadn't actually
introduced herself to the teenaged boy, or even taken off her ad-hoc mask. Before my hasty comment, the only thing that might have given away our relationship was the similarity in our hair. My mother and I both had long dark hair that was cascaded it's wavy way down our backs. Had Mom been trying to keep her identity secret from
Carlos? Well, it wasn't like the boy was some unsuspecting member of the public or a villain. Carlos had also had
his own identity exposed to the both of us… it seemed only fair that he knew our identities, really.
"Tu
madre?" the latin teen muttered quietly under his breath. Bits and pieces of the Spanish language that I'd seen and heard over the years started coming together in my mind. Information that I
didn't even know that I had flowed together, quickly snapping into place to form cohesive whole. Thanks to the Spanish classes I'd taken in the sixth and seventh grades, as well as Mrs. Barnes' penchant for Telemundo soap operas, I was able to gain a moderate understanding of the Spanish language in seconds. And all of it was set into motion just so that I could translate two lousy words. 'My power is
totally bullshit.' I thought while blinking in surprise at my new multilingualism.
"Yeah," I said, replying to his semi-rhetorical question, "This is my Mom, Annette Hebert. Mom has a
thing about hurting kids… I don't think she's going to let us do anything that'll cause the little monster over there to come to harm." The instant the words left my mouth I regretted them. I didn't want to
hurt my mom... I was just pissed off that she was treating Bonesaw like she was some kind of victim, and not the incredibly dangerous cape that she so obviously was. It didn't take a Thinker to imagine all of the horrifying way things might go wrong if Mom tried to 'rehabilitate' her, or something along those lines. Bonesaw wasn't merely some poor, misguided kid who'd been led down the wrong path; the little psycho
murdered people for
spare parts, for Christ's sake. Doing anything but turning her over to the PRT, or killing her ourselves invited
all sorts of risks.
"Keep a civil tongue in your head, young lady," snapped Mom. I winced. "This little girls is
maybe ten years old. Have you stopped to think about what kinds of things the other members of the Nine must have
done to her to
make her like this? Do you see other parahuman children lining up to join the Slaughterhouse Nine?" Mom looked at me searchingly for a moment, causing me to lower my eyes. I felt bad for the way I'd been acting, but I don't think there was anything that my mother could say that would cause me to trust
Bonesaw. Mom continued speaking, her voice full of passion.
"I've read quite a few news stories, and even a few crime novels about the Nine, Taylor. They
kidnapped this child, and slowly twisted her into what she is now. The minute Jack Slash had his hands on her she never had a chance. I'm not going to
kill her, or be a party to murdering her for the crime of being mentally abused until she was so broken that she thought doing all of those terrible things was right." I blinked, my mind sorting through what Mom had just said. She
did have a point, but I doubted reforming Bonesaw would be as simple as showing her a little compassion. Based on what I'd witnessed, I honestly doubted that Bonesaw had any value at all for human life. 'How do you even interact with someone like that?' I wondered.
"What happens the first time she kills again?" asked Carlos. I could tell that he was holding back his anger, trying to converse civilly with my mother. "How many people are you let her dissect before you turn her in? One? Ten?" The teenage boy's voice had a note of panic in it, but he was able to keep his hotly burning emotions under control. Mom stared down at the small child's sleeping face, which was partially obscured by a strand of curly blonde hair. She looked up and met Carlos's angry expression with a look of determination.
"I am
not going to let that happen," she stated. Her voice was like steel. I didn't know what to think at that point. I didn't know what was right or wrong when it came to dealing with Bonesaw. The only thing I
did know, was that we needed Mom's help to transport the rest of Nine's prisoners back from Camp. We
definitely needed Mom to help the people Bonesaw had turned into ogre-like monsters, if they
could be helped. Now was
not the time to get into a pointless debate, or to discuss what the long term plan for Bonesaw should be. All of that could be settled later.
"I know how we can secure her for a few hours," I said, addressing the both of them. "We can settle this after we've rescued the rest of the survivors at Camp Wanantakka." Mom and Carlos looked at me for a moment, and then back at each other. Mom gave the handsome teenager a nod, which he returned. At least we all agreed about
one thing. I took a moment to explain to Carlos how Mom's teleportation worked. The three of us joined hands to form a circle, and Mom activated her power. We slowly rose into the air, until we hovered three feet from the pavement walkway we had been standing on. A completely silent flash of blue light heralded our departure as we teleported away.
It was the work of only a few minutes to lock up the tiny BioTinker. I'd had Mom teleport us to her her office at the college, which I figured would be a good place to hold the little girl for a few hours.
I judged it
highly unlikely that the PRT or the police would show up at my mother's workplace for any reason at this point. The three of us secured Bonesaw as best I could using our various abilities. I tied her up using a roll of duct tape to start with.
I then asked Carlos to tear the legs off of an old steel-frame chair and twist the steel bars into a set of heavy manacles. Next, I walked Mom through using her power to merge the solid-looking manacles with the cement subfloor. When the manacles transformed from energy back to regular matter, the restraints, and Bonesaw, were solidly attached to the floor of her office. Studying the still sleeping child with my power, I estimated that it would take at least a mid-level Brute to break her loose. I decided that she was imprisoned well enough for the moment.
After a quick talk, Mom popped into a closed corner store and grabbed a package of Tylenol PM's. She left a twenty dollar bill on the little shop's counter, near the register, with a note detailing what she had taken. I crushed two of the sleeping pills before dissolving the resultant white powder into a coffee mug that I'd poured a little water into. Pinching the unconscious girl's nose while dripping the medicinal slurry into her mouth caused Bonesaw to swallow it down reflexively. My deft reflexes and precise fingers did their job so quickly and gently that the little girl didn't even stir.
At Mom's insistence, I had made up a soft bed on the floor using couch cushions from the sofa in her office before laying Bonesaw down on it. Her right arms hung just over the edge of the middle cushion, her wrist bolted to the floor by one of the steel manacles. Her left leg was similarly restrained. The young child drooled a bit as she slept peacefully; I had an idea that she'd been under an enormous amount of stress for the last three days, and that she wasn't going to wake up any time soon. The Tylenol PM's were for peace of mind more than anything else, though they might keep her asleep if it took longer than normal for us to come back for the little bio-Tinker we had captured.
Once the drugs hit her, I figured the benedryl in the pills should keep the little kid knocked out for at least six hours, possibly even longer than that. Without her little Tinker tricks, Bonesaw should be just as vulnerable to sedatives as any other ten year old. With the villain was adequately restrained, it was time to finally finish the job back at camp. In seconds the sole occupant of the English teacher's office was an unconscious ten year old girl.