Price of Blood [Worm fanfic] (Complete)

... will be fixing. Because I thought of better phrasing than 'teenager whisperer'.

 

I didn't realize it when I read this before, but reading this now (to re-familiarize myself with the story before reading the new chapter) it struck me how closely Sophia's situation mirrors Taylor's. The main difference being Sophia burned her own bridges, rather than having Armsmaster burn them for her.

Then I read the new chapter and you basically trout-slapped us with the parallel.

Ummm... Isn't Lady Photon the leader of New Wave, not Brandish? Wouldn't that mean Brandish can't kick Panacea off the team?

Also, an investigation into Panacea's files and home life might just end up with Brandish facing charges, there were a LOT of things Brandish did in relation to Amy that skirted the lines of legally acceptable treatment of a minor.

Perhaps we'll get to see Lady Photon's reaction to realizing that when Carol told her she'd never be able to love Amy, she was completely serious, and bemoaning the fact that she didn't adopt Amy herself.

Come to think if it... Has there ever been a fic where Amy was raised by the Pelhams rather than the Dallons?

Oh god, you're not...

Oh god you did... This is gonna be interesting (in the Jack Slash vernacular of the word).

Glad Lisa finds this as funny as I do!

Why do you think she's laughing so hard? She already knows!

 

Such As?

Very few people have been demonized as much in the fandom as Carol Dallon.

 

The use of "sinecure" here doesn't match my understanding of the word - AFAIK it means an office or other position that pays a salary without much real work.

 

That's weird. I could've sworn it was also a synonym for "cinch" or "shoo-in", but the only sources I can find that use it like that are thesauri, not actual dictionaries.

 

That would be Amy-in-name-only. Different family connections, different outlook on life, no crush on Glory Girl, different or even no powers.

 

Isn't that just Intrepid?

 

It does if you look at it from the point of view that defending her from those charges is a job that doesn't require much in the way of effort. Yes, it's a once-off rather than an ongoing employment, but you still get the benefit (Taylor going free) without doing much more than showing up and pointing out the obvious.

That would be if it was a sinecure. Which it ain't

 

Powers would still happen, given that she got her shard bud from Marquis before she ever met the Dallons. They might show up slightly differently, depending on trigger circumstance, but they'd probably show up all the same.

 

As Swift says, the fanfiction Intrepid by Cerulean has Amy raised a Pelhams rather than the Dallons. It is still clearly Amy.

 

In that case, it should be something like 'Even if Taylor were subsequently acquitted of all wrongdoing—the job would hardly be a sinecure, given the current atmosphere surrounding the Canary case', since 'sinecure' applies to the position of employment, not the task itself.

I think you're vastly underestimating the degree to which her Trigger circumstances shaped her powers. She Triggered from her sister getting lethally shot in front off her, and she got healing powers. (Not just healing, but still something that's perfect for the job.) I doubt that was a coincidence - most likely her powers could have expressed themselves in any of a variety of radically different ways, had she Triggered differently.

 

Mostly abuse via neglect. Depending on how you look at it, and the specifics of the situation, a case could be made for child exploitation as well (not the sexual kind, the kind child actors sometimes experience).

Honestly, she's mostly demonized because Wildbow did such a good job getting people invested in caring about Amy's situation, and we see some of it happening. Much worse parental-related things happen in Worm (Aisha/Brian's parents, Sophia's step-father, even Alan Barnes to an extent), but because we didn't get as invested in, or don't like, the characters... we don't care.

Amy's Shard was the Shaper, the shard in charge of regulating the Entities biomass. Amy will always get a biomanipulation power in one form or another. Honestly, in the fics where she gets auto-biokinesis she's scary as fuck.

 

There are a lot more options under 'biomanipulation' than 'biokinesis' and 'auto-biokinesis'. Just off the top of my head:

• Lifeform creation (like Blasto, but a Shaker or Striker instead of a Tinker)
• Organic disruption and/or destruction (i.e. EMP for living things and/or death aura)
• Poison Ivy-style plant control
• Necromancy (not really raising the dead, obviously, but reanimating dead bodies under her control)
• Pharmacology Tinker
• Organic technology Tinker

 

Cite?

Cite?

I thought Amy got a bud off of Marquis.

 

But where in the text is this shown? I'm not disputing that Carol was a bad mother to Amy, but that things are wildly blown out of proportion because most of the fandom is in love with Amy. Which I personally don't get at all. Amy is a huge bitch with a black and white world view who is the cause of most of her own problems. Carol went through far worse shit than anything Amy ever did before the Slaughterhouse 9. Another fun thing is when people accuse Vicky of mind raping Amy into loving her based on an unconfirmed theory. In the story, only one Dallon sister specifically mind raped the other and that was Amy.

This might be a pet peeve of mine.

 

I'll try digging around for one, but I KNOW Fairy Queen called Amy's Shard "The Shaper."

*edit- These are the direct cites I could find with GU naming the Shaper Shard. Both from Extinction 27.4.

https://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/worm-quotes-and-wog-repository.294448/page-4#post-15267907
That has a quote from Wildbow confirming Amy/Marquis has The Shaper.

You can also search "Shaper" on Panacea's wiki page to find a few more references and such.

*edit2- And as long as I'm grabbing cites: https://forums.spacebattles.com/posts/15028199/
Wildbow talking about Panacea's Trigger.

Would need to figure out which of the Worm drafts he's talking about to re-read it and find the full story/more detailed cite.

 

Here. It doesn't actually specify 'fatally shot' - that might be fanon, or it might be additional detail given in the Worm draft referenced there - but she definately triggered due to Glory Girl's injury.

Citation: "[Carol] Treating [Amy] like a monster might be a little overboard, but they're accurate in reading scenes where Amy was neglected."

Citation.

 

GU called it 'Shaper'. GU was also known for putting a wildly fantastical spin on things and talking out her ass on more than one occasion.

The quote you reference does verify that Amy's shard came from Marquis', only less limited (given the workout he gave his shard, are we surprised?)

Possibly one he never posted.

 

After he finished Worm, he posted links to all the various drafts he has done, I think there were 6 or 7?

*edit- https://wildbow.wordpress.com/2013/12/28/snippets-drafts-of-worm/

 

Your citations agree with me. Carol was a bad mother but didn't do anything criminal or treat Amy like a monster. And Wildbow did not confirm the theory or go into any details about any effects long term exposure to Vicky's aura would create.

In general the fandom demonizes Carol and Vicky while ignoring any flaws Amy has. Flaws which make her a more interesting character. It's irritating.

 

Child neglect is a crime. The severity of the neglect, and amount of injury the child receives as a result determine if it's a misdemeanor or a felony.

Carol/Amy's case would be felony level given the amount of sustained mental trauma Amy has dealt with as a result (including her burning out).

 

Did you read the second citation link?

 

Wildbow specifically says Amy was not mistreated. Carol was a bad mother but not a criminally bad one. Amy's issues are mostly her own doing. You are making massive assumptions that aren't backed up by the text.

Yes. Many times. There is nothing saying the poster was right. There is nothing about any details or extent of the effect. Just the implication that there was some long term effect. And yet people constantly make up ideas and state them as fact.

Here is a fact: Amy Dallon knowingly mind raped Victoria Dallon into only being able to love Amy. She regretted it instantly but she still did it.

Here is another fact: This is a derail and I'm shutting the fuck up. Sorry Ack.

 

Okay, let's not ignore the fact that Vicky repeatedly beat the living snot out of perps so badly that she had to call in Amy to fix them before anyone found out.

Carol spent ten years basically tolerating her, at best. She never grew to love or trust Amy. Never. Never hugged her, probably never praised her. Disliked her because she reminded Carol of Marquis, who in turn was conflated in Carol's mind with her kidnappers. Never made an effort to like her or get to know her, or to even just sit down and talk out their issues together. Almost certainly never acknowledged those issues. Always referred to Vicky as "my daughter". Amy didn't even get that.

Given that Mark had a (canonical) habit of forgetting his meds, Amy only ever connected with Vicky, which probably was a factor in the whole "falling in love" thing. WB himself, when asked about the aura, said "I wondered if anyone would notice that." It isn't a definite yes, but he's got the habit of trolling people like that.

In short, not mistreated, but it's definitely emotional neglect.

She also did it under the effect of extreme emotional stress.

Definitely not premeditated, barely even deliberate.

 

You must not be reading the cites on here... In WoG Wildbow directly and Specifically says Amy was neglected:

You do realize that forum post that was cited was posted by Wildbow, the actual author, not just some random poster... right? I doubt he's wrong about his own work.

While we're on the topic... I don't think I've seen you post a single cite, just criticize cites and conclusions everyone else has... Here's a challenge for you, provide one single cite, from canon, of Carol being a good mother, or emotionally supportive in any way, to Amy.

Back up your own conclusion with proof, as we have.

And no, the realization just before Amy is Birdcaged doesn't count.

And just to be sure... You do know the difference between child abuse and child neglect, right? Because you seem to be saying she wasn't abused every time we say she was neglected...

 

I never said she didn't. I never said Vicky was a saint, just that people demonize her. She is casually violent and almost never thinks things through when she really really should.

My exact point.

I agree. But people constantly go on about Vicky mind raping Amy into loving her. Vicky's aura likely had an effect, but what exactly it was was never confirmed, just implied there was one. Amy, in the text, explicitly did do that to Vicky. It was a moment of weakness but she did it. The hypocrisy annoys me to no end.

In the same paragraph where he says she was not mistreated. You are the one saying she should be criminally charged with a felony for her treatment of Amy. I'm not saying she wasn't neglected or that Carol was a good mother, just that people blow things way the fuck out of proportion for Vicky and Carol while ignoring any flaws Amy has. And in doing so usually turn Amy into a boring shell of a character.

I know exactly what he said. When he said "that" in his reply, what exactly was he referring to? The post he replied to was quite long and involved. So what parts of it was he referring to? Wildbow has been known to offer short and vague replies to things.

Why would I do that for something I haven't been saying? My whole point is that people in the fandom demonize Carol and Vicky and attribute things to them that the text does not support. At the same time they ignore the flaws that make Amy an interesting character and turn her into a one dimensional character. So all three characters are turned into one dimensional caricatures of their canon selves.

Yes. Yes I do. I've been an observer of both of those things far more often than I would wish on my worst enemy. I've spent hundreds of hours in schools, hospitals, doctors offices, court rooms and parking lots with police dealing with it. Most of the time feeling powerless to help someone I love. Having how uncaring the system is shoved in my face over and over again. Carol Dallon is a bad mother but what happened in the Dallon household wouldn't even qualify as a Tuesday for me.

 

OK, seriously, read the damned cite again, it's obvious he was referring to abuse-type mistreatment, because the entire rest of the post is about a criminal level of child neglect.

Just because you've (reportedly) dealt with worse cases IRL, so you might be a bit jaded on the topic, but that doesn't change the fact that it was a criminal level of neglect.

And don't take one or two fics portrayal of Amy and color the entire fandom like that. I've read far more fics portraying her as the bitch she can be in canon than those portraying her as a saint. We all know she has her problems, that doesn't change the fact that most of them are directly or indirectly Carol's fault, canonically.

 

Which is an amazingly bad attitude for someone who can bench press a cement truck. Just saying.

Or were you referring to the fandom attitude to her? Which isn't far off the mark, but you forgot 'oblivious to obvious clues' (never seeing that Amy's attracted to her), 'has a very black and white attitude toward wrongdoing' (when Amy does the mental adjustment, refuses to believe her when she says she wants to change it back), 'serious anger issues' (willing to threaten the Birdcage for Taylor & co, kicks a dumpster at a fleeing suspect).

One of her core problems is that she really, really sucks at empathy. In the bank, with a knife at her sister's throat, she refuses to de-escalate, and in fact threatens two teenage girls with the Birdcage (doesn't matter if she can't follow through; the threat is enough). When Amy's refusing to heal Mark, she doesn't even try to understand why Amy won't do brains. It's "You won't help Dad, I hate you now." Afterward, once Amy heals him, she's happy again, even to the point of offering to help Amy make it as a family as just the two of them, even as Amy desperately tries to tell her to back off. And you can see how badly that ends.

If she'd listened to someone else, tried to think things through from another person's perspective, even once during the story? Things may have turned out very differently.

Yeah, true. A moment of weakness. Like no other human being ever had a moment of weakness.

Let's list her problems at that moment, because you apparently didn't look through them earlier:

1) At the end of her rope, [WB himself said that she'd been emotionally crumbling since before the bank job]
2) desperately lonely, [ten years of having only her sister as family, no mother or father figure worth noting, and hating herself for loving her sister like that. TEN. YEARS.]
3) haunted by her father’s shadow, ["Oh, hai. Your real father's a supervillain who went the Birdcage. Yay?" She'd been scared that her father was a villain, and that she would become evil like him for years. And she's just now gotten confirmation of at least part of that. How does she feel about that? Fucking terrified.]
4) her shame at being unwilling and unable to help Mark until now, [This is due to her one ironclad rule. "Don't mess with brains". Not because it was difficult. Because it was easy. And then she was faced with the impossible choice: to let Mark die, or to break her one unbreakable rule. So she broke it. And now she's hating herself because a) she didn't help him before and b) because she broke her rule. So there's that going in her head as well.]
5) the idea that one of the Slaughterhouse Nine thought she belonged with them? [This would fuck anyone up.]
6) She was losing everything so quickly. Victoria was all she had, and it was the choice between abandoning that for everyone’s good and keeping Victoria close. [She's faced with losing her one family member. Because now she's broken her rule, she sees herself as being on the path to emulating her father.]

Okay, just gonna say here? I'm an adult. I have more than thirty years of life experience over and above what Amy's had. But if I had that shit weighing on my mind, I cannot honestly say that I'd do much better. She's a teenager, with angst basically built into her character, who's had her entire world fucked up beyond all repair, and the one person she loves is hugging her and saying they'll make a life together -- but she knows Vicky doesn't love her the same way. All she's ever wanted was for Vicky to love her the same way. It wouldn't have been so much a choice to do it as a split-second relaxation of the determination not to do it.

As for the other side of the coin:
Vicky consistently and repeatedly exposed Amy to her aura from when Amy was in her early teens (a time when anyone is hormonally vulnerable) and was also her only dependable 'family'. The aura probably didn't do it all on its own, but I would amazingly astonished if it wasn't a factor.

After all, let's look at the evidence here:

1) Glory Girl's aura specifically makes her allies see her as amazing.
2) Amy loves her, despite not wanting to.

But wait, there's more.

There are several really big hints that something's wrong in this passage:

Amy thinks Vicky's using her power, but Vicky says she isn't. This means that either a) Amy's feeling the same emotions that the power normally awakens in people, or b) Vicky's lying.


If a), then:
1) Vicky totally fucking misses the fact that Amy feels that way about her all the time
2) It's really telling that what Amy feels about Vicky is identical to the feeling of being exposed to the aura.
3) Vicky totally misses that Amy believes she's immune because she's been exposed for so long. (Huge danger signal right there)
3a) When in reality, Amy simply never feels any differently.

If b), then Vicky is a lying, manipulative bitch who cold-heartedly uses her sister as a healing resource.

I'm inclined to go with a) (Vicky is a moron when it comes to the effect of her powers on her sister) but b) is still a possibility.

Who's saying that Carol should be criminally charged for her canonical treatment of Amy?

Pretty sure he was referring to the question. You know, where someone asked if Vicky's aura had an effect on Amy to make her fall in love with Vicky. He was wondering if someone noticed (perhaps) the correlation between Vicky's power and Amy's feelings toward Vicky. To say "I'm not sure which 'that' he was referring to, so I'm going to rule that answer as meaningless" is disingenuous and deliberately missing the point.

Such as? (Examples please).

Examples please.

 

I have. My own fucking stepdaughter whose custody was given to her father who physically and emotionally abused her. So attack me all you want but don't you fucking dare "reportedly" that.

Fuck it, I'm done. You won. This isn't worth digging that up again. My last comment here for a while.

Ack, I'm enjoying the story so I'm sorry for the derail.

 

I've (repeatedly over the years) said that Carol's neglect of Amy was at a felony level of criminal.

When judging whether a neglect case is a misdemeanor or a felony, it's decided by the amount of injury (physical or mental) the child suffered as a result. You gave a nice list of most of Amy's major problems last post, so I'm sure you agree the damage Amy suffered is severe.