Taylor Hebert, Dungeon Girl (Patreon)

Taylor Hebert hesitantly reached out and grabbed the doorknob. ‘Not a dungeon, not a dungeon…’ she opened her bathroom door and sighed with relief as the door opened and revealed her bathroom rather than a dungeon. “Not a dungeon, probably.” She took a breath then walked into the bathroom and glanced around, to make sure that it was actually her bathroom and not a bathroom shaped dungeon. “Okay, no blue glow, the towels are in the right place, the rubber duck is on the back of the toilet and the vase is on the counter. I really wish Dad would stop closing all the doors.” She walked over to the sink and washed her hands then her face as she tried to forget about being trapped in the dark and creepy supply closet in the school.

She turned the water off and stared at her reflection. “I made it through school, I have the weekend to figure out what the hell is going on with my powers.” She glanced at the open door in the mirror then bent down and opened the cabinet door. She jumped back as the door opened into a small tunnel rather than the cabinet it was supposed to be. “Damn it.”

She studied the translucent blue film over the tunnel entrance. “I’m not crawling in there.” She shut the door then carefully opened it again, relieved to find the inside of the cabinet. She reached in and grabbed the first aid kit then closed the door again. She walked back to the livingroom and over to the end table where she’d set her backpack and hard hat. “Extra food, first aid kit, flashlight and extra batteries.” She put the first aid kit in her backpack then zipped it up and slipped it on. She knew she was crazy for wanting to explore the dungeons her power created especially after the first time with the damned shadow monsters but she had a flashlight this time and a baseball bat. “Besides, if I don’t figure out what I can do the trio will just keep torturing me.”

She picked the orange hard hat she’d ‘borrowed’ from the basement and put it on. Other than her boots, her armor consisted of her safety hat and an old jacket she’d layered over an old sweater and a sweatshirt. She wasn’t sure it would actually help against the various creatures in her dungeon but it wasn’t bulky enough to hurt. She picked up the baseball bat her father kept near the door and walked over to the broom closet. “Okay, dungeon, dungeon.” She reached out and opened the door then scowled as it revealed the interior of her broom closet. “Damn it. Work already!” She closed the door then opened it again. She slammed the door shut when it was once again her broom closet. “Stupid bitches, defective power, work!” She opened the door and sighed in relief when she saw the blue translucent glow covering the doorway. She gulped as she realized she was going to willingly step back into one of her dungeons. 

She took a breath then let it out and stepped into her dungeon. She blinked as she found herself stepping out of a supply closet in the school. She shivered as she saw half a dozen girls that looked like Emma. “Shit.”

The closest Emma lookalike turned, raised her arms and charged her while shouting, “Die!”

“What the hell?” Taylor brought baseball bat up and around and swung as hard as she could at Emma’s head. She wasn’t prepared for the health bar to appear over Emma’s head which showed that Emma was at half heath. She also wasn’t prepared for Emma to slap her which felt a hell of a lot worse than anything Emma or even Sophia had managed before. She kicked Emma in the knee which decreased her health bar a sliver then brought her baseball bat down on her head and kept hitting her until she turned into pixels and vanishing dropping a pair of red shoes. She blinked as she stared at the girly shoes sitting ‘innocently’ in the hallway. She turned and looked at the glowing door that she was hoping led back to her house. She turned her attention back to the shoes then walked over and picked them up.

Taylor blinked as a popup window appeared showing with a small picture of the shoes with a description next to it. “Basic girls shoes, +1 cuteness… what the fuck? This would help if I had an inventory. Inventory? Please?” She sighed. “Yeah, that would actually be useful. Character sheet?”

She blinked as screen appeared with a picture of her and her current clothes much like a game character. “Weapon baseball bat, containers, backpack, pockets…” she trailed off as she tapped the backpack icon and a small window appeared showing what she had in her backpack as well as two empty slots. “Hopefully I can find a better backpack.” She smiled as she stuck the shoes in the empty slot for the backpack and they vanished. “Okay, that worked.” She glanced at the closest Emma lookalike who seemed to be ignoring her for the moment then slipped her backpack off and opened it. She wasn’t terribly surprised to find the red shoes in her backpack. She slipped her backpack back on as she muttered, “Great, I’m a video game character. Skills? Menu? Stats?” She frowned as nothing she said brought up another menu. “Great, I’m a knockoff video game character.”

She turned her attention back to the nearest Emma. “Okay, you vanish and you have a health bar, you’re obviously just a projection.” She smiled then charged the nearest Emma lookalike then viciously smashed her in the head with her baseball bat until she turned into pixels and vanished leaving behind a five dollar bill. “I could get used to this.” She turned her attention to the next Emma with a grin then charged.

0o0o0

Taylor wasn’t sure what it said about her mental state but she was enjoying smashing Emma and Madison’s faces in with her baseball bat as she worked her way through the dungeon version of her school. She frowned slightly as she entered the cafeteria and saw Sophia on the stage with two dozen of their random followers scattered around the room as odd almost ominous music started playing. She frowned slightly as she tried to place the music, she knew she should know the song but it she didn’t have a name for it. She stepped back out of the cafeteria and frowned as the music cut out. She stepped back in the cafeteria and frowned as the music started again. “Great…” she trailed off as she finally placed the music, it was from a boss fight from a game clip that she couldn’t remember the name of. “She’s a fucking boss, great.”

She opened the trash bag filled with clothing and assorted weapons that she’d picked up off the various girls she’d defeated. ‘No guns, a couple of knives and a set of brass knuckles off some of their followers. Nothing that’s going to help, considering the reach my bat gives me. How am I supposed to do this?’ She mentally went over what she remembered of video games. ‘Okay, they’re either part of the fight or they aren’t. If they are, I’m screwed, if they aren’t I should be able to take them one at a time. Hopefully they don’t respawn.’

Taylor glanced at her trash bag filled with loot. It wasn’t much in the grand scheme of things, mostly clothes but she’d fought for it and even bled for it when one of the Madisons had gotten lucky with a claw attack, she wasn’t going to leave it behind. “Screw it, I have time.” She made her way back to the entrance of the dungeon. 

She reached into her bag and grabbed a pair of shoes then tossed them through the doorway back to her house. She smiled as she saw the shoes fly through the portal and land on the living room floor. “Ah, good, that works.” She transferred her collection of knives to her pockets and backpack then tied the top of the bag together. She tossed the bag through the door then headed back to the cafeteria.

Taylor grabbed the ugliest knife she had from her pack then stepped into the cafeteria and tossed it at the closest girl. She winced as the knife missed the closest girl and hit two of the girls which caused half a dozen girls to pull out knives and charge her at once. “Shit.” Taylor turned and ran, she was less than amused when they followed her out of cafeteria and down the hall. She winced as one of the girls hit her in the back with a knife, thankfully it was only the handle but it still hurt like hell. She dashed around the corner then turned and readied her bat. She swung as hard as she could at the girl’s legs when she cleared the corner then turned and ran.

Taylor screamed as one of the girls that looked like one of the other track girls managed to catch up with her and slam her into the wall. She winced as her bat went flying out of her hand. She reached into her pocket and grabbed one of the knives then stabbed the girl repeatedly hoping to kill her before she got stabbed. She ignored the pair of gloves the bitch dropped when she was defeated as she dashed over to her baseball bat. She grabbed the bat with her left hand then sprinted down the hall and headed toward the entrance to the dungeon. 

Taylor made a mental note to work on her endurance as she ran down the halls with the group chasing her. She was fairly sure several of the girls stopped chasing her at some point but she wasn’t going to stop long enough to check. She skidded to a stop once she got to the entrance and turned to look back down the hallway at the girl chasing her, the girl’s health bar had a missing sliver which meant that she was probably the girl her knife had hit when she’d thrown it.

Taylor quickly put her knife in her pocket then grabbed the bat with both hands and waited until the girl was in range and swung at the knife the girl was holding. She felt like cheering as the knife hit the floor which left the girl to try to slap her as she brought her baseball bat up and around. Thankfully it was rather easy to defeat the girl now that she was disarmed. She quickly grabbed the leather jacket the girl had dropped. She grinned as she saw the armor rating on the jacket, it wasn’t great but it was better than zero which is what most of the rest of her clothes had.

Taylor had barely managed to put the jacket on when the girl she’d hit in the knees earlier limped around the corner. She waited a few seconds to see if there were more girls waiting to ambush her then dashed forward and slammed her bat into the girl’s head which caused her to vanish and drop a pair of leather pants and ten dollars. “Weirdest power, ever.” She picked up the pants and the ten. She stuck the ten in her pocket then looked at the pants. “Sexy leather pants, +1 armor… yeah, better than nothing. I’m not swapping my pants in the middle of a fight, actually wait, character sheet.” 

Taylor brought the pants up to the pants slot and grinned as her jeans appeared in her hand and the leather appeared on her. “I could get used to that.” She tossed her pants through entrance carefully headed back toward the cafeteria stopping when she found the gloves sitting in the hallway. She glanced around then picked up the gloves and looked over the popup. “Badass fingerless gloves, +1 strength… farming an actual costume is going to suck.”

Taylor pulled the gloves on then continued toward the cafeteria. She was rather pleased to see Sophia’s pack of bitches were missing three girls. ‘That worked better than I thought.’ She pulled out the next crappiest knife then stepped into the cafeteria and tossed it at the girl furthest from the others. This time she managed to hit the girl though only with the handle. She smiled as the girl pulled out a knife and charged her without the rest of the pack. ‘This could work.’ She ducked back out the doors and lined up her shot. She hit the girl twice then smiled when she dropped a book. ‘That’s new.’

Taylor picked up the book on knife fighting and opened it. She blinked as a popup appeared, “Learn knife fighting? Yes?” She blinked as the book vanished and she realized that she actually knew how to fight with knives and even how to toss one and hit a stationary target with the blade. “Weirdest power, ever.” She pulled her second to last knife out of her pocket then stepped back into the cafeteria. She tossed her knife at her next target and frowned as it sunk into the girl’s neck and vanished with the girl leaving a dollar. ‘Fuck.’ She frowned as she looked at the remaining thugs. ‘This could take awhile. I need something else to pull with… there are rocks in the courtyard.’ She turned and headed for the courtyard. 

Thankfully it didn’t take all that long to collect a decent amount of rocks and work her way through some of the girls she could hit without pulling the rest. On the upside, she found, 27 dollars, three cans of soda and several pieces of leather clothing that functioned as something resembling armor. She wasn’t sure how stamina recovery would actually translate into reducing her tiredness over the long term but it seemed to work quite well over the short term and gave her a bit of a sugar high. It took another ten minutes of carefully running around before she’d managed to clear the rest of the room so it was only her and Sophia. 

“Okay, bitch. You’re going down.” Taylor raised her dagger and tossed it at Sophia. Her jaw dropped as Sophia turned into shadow and the dagger flew through her. “Shit!”

Sophia laughed as she jumped down from the stage and pulled a crossbow out of thin air. “I’m going to enjoy this.”

Taylor turned and ran trying not to think about the fact that her dungeon version of Sophia Hess had powers or the mad laughter that followed her as she ran toward the exit. She screamed as something sharp and rather nasty grazed her arm right before she turned the last corner before the exit. She put on a burst of speed then dove through the dungeon exit.

Danny Hebert stared in shocked disbelief as his daughter tumbled out of the open broom closet wearing leather clothes he’d never seen before and an old hard hat. “What the hell?”

Taylor turned and lunged for the door to the broom closet and slammed it closed. She turned and looked at her father’s thoroughly unamused look. “Ah… I can can explain?”

Danny stared at his daughter’s crazy outfit and the gash on her arm. “You’re bleeding and you jumped out of an empty broom closet.”

“It’s just a scrape?” Taylor asked warily

“I’ll get the first aid kit then you can explain.”

“It’s in my backpack.” Taylor opened her character sheet and pulled the first aid kit out.

Danny stared at the first aid that just appeared out of nothing. “Right, what were you doing in the broom closet and where did you get the strange clothes?”

Taylor forced herself to smile. “I was beating up monsters.”

“In the broom closet?” Danny asked with disbelief.

“I can apparently make dungeons where I can kill monsters for loot.” She gestured at her trash bag filled with loot.

Danny blinked a couple of times. “You’re parahuman… Start from the beginning.”

The words tumbled from Taylor’s mouth, about coming back from camp and about Emma turning on her, about the crap the trio put her through for the year and change and about coming back from break and being locked in a supply closet and wishing desperately for a way out. He’d asked for clarification in a couple of places and raged at the idea of Emma turning on her but mostly let her talk which was good because she really didn’t like dredging everything up. Her memories of the first shadowy dungeon that she’d ran through to find the way out of the supply closet were a bit fragmented but she tried her best to describe the place without freaking out her father too much. Considering the look of horror on his face she was fairly sure that she’d failed.

Danny twitched as he remembered her frantic rambling in the hospital about a nightmare filled dungeon. “Why would you go back?”

“The broom closet led to a dungeon version of Winslow with a bunch of mostly mindless versions of the trio that I beat up for therapy.”

“Beat up?”

“They’re not real, they vanish when you defeat them.”

“If that’s the case, why did you jump out of there like the hounds of hell were on your tail?”

Taylor winced. “The boss monster had powers and a crossbow. I didn’t want to get shot.”

“Shot? How dangerous are your ‘dungeons’?”

“Less dangerous than walking across town?” Taylor asked hoping he wouldn’t press the issue.

“What section of town?” He asked suspiciously as there were places where you actually could cross the city without too much trouble in the middle of the day.

“Most of the monsters just tried to punch me, I had a baseball bat. Besides, hitting an Emma lookalike was cathartic. You can’t tell me that you wouldn’t love to beat up a dungeon filled with Alan lookalikes.”

“I’d like to but I’d be lying.”

“Exactly.”

“So… you’re a parahuman?”

“Apparently,” Taylor agreed.

“What type of loot did you get?” Danny asked.

“Money and clothes, some gloves that make me a touch stronger which probably means that I’ll be able to find better gear. Oh and I got skill book that increased my skill with knives.”

Danny resisted the urge to flat out demand that his daughter never go into another dungeon as he looked at the trash bag. “Let’s see the loot then we’ll talk about better gear because you’re not going back there without something better than a baseball bat.”

“Sounds fair,” Taylor quickly agreed as she opened the trash bag and started sorting through her loot.

0o0o0

Taylor frowned slightly as she double checked the price of one of the skirts she’d looted and got a similar figure that seemed way too high. She stared at her computer screen. “Okay, 45 to 49 dollars used, new 79 to 89 depending on the sale and the store, right, why the hell would you pay that much for one skirt?” She marked the prices on a tag then stuck the tag on the skirt then set it on the stack as she heard her father’s car in the driveway. “Moment of truth I guess.” She got up from the computer and headed back to the living room.

Danny wasn’t sure how to feel as he walked into the house and saw Taylor looking at him hopefully. “The money you gave me to test checks out with the counterfeit pen and no one at the bank noticed anything weird when I asked them to check it because the person that gave it to me looked suspicious.”

“Hey, I don’t look…” she trailed off as he started laughing. “Hey.”

“You’re wearing a hard hat and leather clothes.”

“Okay, maybe I look a little weird,” Taylor admitted.

Danny set his bag on the table then pulled the forty dollars Taylor had given him to check and the counterfeit pen out of his pocket and handed them to Taylor. “You probably shouldn’t tell people your power drops cash.”

She sighed as she had a mental image of being kidnapped by various gangs so they could farm her dungeons. “You’re probably right.”

“Now that we know your money passes basic counterfeiting tests and most of the loot looks worth selling, I’d like to see the dungeon.”

“Do you have a weapon?”

“You mean other than the baseball bat you stole?”

“Borrowed…” she trailed off as he raised his eyebrows. “Okay, I can use a knife.”

“I’m not sure I really want my daughter stabbing people.”

“They’re not really people, they’re projections,” Taylor replied firmly, the less he thought of them as actual people the less likely he would be to flat out ban her from using her dungeons.

“Let’s go before I change my mind. Is it always the same?”

Taylor walked over to the broom closet and grabbed the knob. “No idea, I’ve only went into two dungeons so far and I don’t really remember the first one all that well, I was out of my mind. For all I know, this one could have goblins in it.” She focused on opening a dungeon as she opened the door and was relieved to see the glowing blue film over the doorway at least until she saw that the door led to a darkened cave. “That doesn’t look like Winslow.”

Danny frowned slightly. “I should probably grab the gun.”

“Gun?” Taylor asked in disbelief.

“I keep it under the seat in my car, we live in Brockton Bay.”

Taylor blinked. “Why have I never seen the gun?”

“It’s taped to the bottom of the driver’s seat, you don’t drive or clean the car,” Danny replied as he headed back outside.

Taylor frowned as she tried to process the idea of her father having a gun, strangely enough it made her feel better about her father working in the docks area. She wasn’t terribly sure about her father walking into the dungeon without decent armor but the first room shouldn’t be too bad and it would serve to show him that she really did have powers. 

Danny came back a minute later with a handgun, an extra magazine and two sets of earplugs from the glovebox. He tossed Taylor one of the pairs of earplugs. “You’re going to want to wear these, guns are loud and it looks like we’re going into a cave.”

Taylor ripped the plastic bag the earplugs came in then put them in her ears. She walked over to the coat rack and grabbed Danny’s hard hat. “You should probably wear this if we’re going into a cave.”

Danny raised his eyebrows. “You’re expecting the ceiling to fall?”

“No, but I’m expecting something to try to hit you in the head.” She handed him the hard hat.

“Fine.” Danny slipped the magazine in the pocket of his coat then put his hat on and opened the package for his earplugs. “Ready?”

Taylor grabbed the baseball bat. “Ready.” She waited for him to finish putting his earplugs in then pulled her flashlight out of her pocket, turned it on then stepped into the dungeon. She twitched slightly as she shined the flashlight around and the beam of light caught a pair of glowing red eyes from down the corridor. 

The goblin screamed something as he darted to the side then forward at the source of light that had just tried to blind him. 

“Shit.” Taylor tried to track the goblin as it darted toward her with a wicked looking blade.

Danny stepped into the dungeon, then brought his gun up when he saw a creepy as hell figure moving toward them. He fired twice as Taylor’s flashlight beam managed to illuminate the goblin for a second. He was rather surprised when the goblin’s health bar dropped to about a ¼ of the way full from his first shot, sadly his second shot missed as did his third shot.

Taylor swung bat and cracked the goblin in the skull turning it into pixels. “Damn things are fast.”

Danny took a breath as he tried to get his heart to stop racing.

Taylor shined her light on the silvery looking dagger the goblin had dropped. “Looks decent.” She walked forward then picked up the knife. “Weird, why would you make a silver knife?”

“Are you sure it’s silver?” Danny asked.

“It doesn’t look like steel, it’s silvery and it says silver on my popup,” Taylor complained.

“Put it in your bag, I guess,” Danny raised his gun and fired twice at a new goblin as it charged down the darkened tunnel waving a pickaxe over its head. He smiled in relief as both bullets hit the charging goblin causing it to turn into pixels and drop the pickaxe.

Taylor winced. “That’s loud.”

“It’s worse without the earplugs,” Danny replied as he glanced around the old fashioned mine chamber they were in. Thankfully it looked like the goblins had claimed it rather than dug it because the tunnel was large enough that he didn’t have to duck.

“This isn’t going to close on us is it?” Danny asked warily.

“This is only the third dungeon I’ve been in but it should be fine.” Taylor was really hoping that she’d get some type of warning if she was in a dungeon too long.

“In that case, let’s take it slow, I have twenty five shots left, that should be a decent test of your dungeon.” He figured they could always come back later with more ammo for his gun and possibly something that worked as armor against knives.

“Sounds good,” Taylor replied as she walked over and picked up the pickaxe. “Oh, this allows me to mine metal deposits and get useable ore out of it, neat.”

“Shouldn’t it do it do that anyway?”

“This is only my third time using my ability.” Taylor moved back next to her father so she wasn’t in his line of fire.

“Point.” Danny carefully moved down the tunnel hoping they didn’t run into anything too nasty.

0o0o0

Taylor felt like giggling as she looked over the collection of gear that they’d managed to collect and haul back to the house. “Dibs on the boots that boost my running speed.”

Danny laughed. “I can’t see leather boots fitting the dress code at work so go for it.”

Taylor looked at the staff the shaman had dropped. “Is it a bad thing that I want to test out the staff that shoots lightning?”

“Probably.” Danny shook his head. Why did his daughter have to have one of the strangest powers he’d ever heard of?

“The book on mining was awesome.”

“It’s certainly interesting, do you think the dungeon will stick around while I get more ammo?” Danny wasn’t sure how much the coins the goblins had dropped were worth but some of them were gold. He could certainly afford several boxes of ammo to finish looting the dungeon.

“As long as I’m in range it should?” Taylor glanced at the glowing blue film over the entrance to the dungeon. “But again, I’m not really an expert on how my power works.”

“Just be prepared to shut the door if you hear goblins coming.”

“You should probably pick up some headlamps while you’re at the store.” Taylor pulled several twenties out of her pocket and held them out. “Here.”

Danny frowned slightly as he took the money. “You do realize I’m not broke, right?”

“Yeah but you shouldn’t have to pay for my power testing.”

“Fine, I’ll grab food on the way back, just be careful and shut the dungeon at the first sign of trouble.”

“We don’t know that the monsters can come out of the dungeon.”

“We don’t know they can’t either, considering you can take the loot out of the dungeon, I’m not willing to risk it on something that takes two shots to take down.”

“One if you hit them in the head.”

“Yeah, I’m not good of a shot,” Danny admitted.

“I’m sure you’ll get plenty of practice,” Taylor replied as she used her character sheet to swap her old boots for the nice leather boots that had dropped off one of the goblins.

“Probably,” Danny replied as he headed for the door. He’d rather not leave Taylor alone in the house with an open portal to a goblin cave but they’d cleared a decent section of the cave and the goblins hadn’t shown any signs of respawning so it was probably safe.

Taylor wasn’t sure where the goblins had found the greenish greaves that her power was telling her was elvish armor she wasn’t complaining as they were a hell of a lot better armor than her leather pants. She wasn’t sure she’d want to wear it on patrol or anything but it should be fine for running around in a dungeon. She picked up the staff and studied it. “Doesn’t say it has charges, maybe I should test that.” She glanced at the dungeon. “He didn’t say to stay here and I really should test things.” She headed back into the dungeon and waved her flashlight around to make sure none of the goblins had respawned or snuck back in or anything, thankfully they hadn’t at least in the first chamber. She raised the staff. “Work…? Zap? Activate?”

She nearly dropped her staff as she shook it and willed it work and it actually sent a blast of electricity down the tunnel. It reminded her a lot more of force lightning than a lightning bolt, mostly because it was a fan of bolts and horizontal. “Oh, neat.” She looked at the staff’s popup again. “Lightning staff, still no charges. I could get used to this.” She grinned as she worked on activating it when she wanted rather than by accident.