Collateral Damage Pt 6 (Patreon)

Part Six: Accidentally (Taylor)

[A/N 1: This chapter beta-read by Lady Columbine of Mystal.]

[A/N 2: This chapter continues the theme of unintended consequences of power being thrown around.]

Taylor

It was nice to be in the open air on the Boardwalk, just strolling. Thoughtfully, I tucked the necklace Dad had given me into my shirt. No sense in drawing too much attention just yet. There would be time for that later.

Nobody seemed to be looking twice at me, which was good. I still had the bone-deep anger roiling inside me, and the urge to break something, but the interlude at Winslow had helped a lot with both. Despite it being midwinter, Brockton Bay’s famously warm climate was in full swing. The sun was bright, the breeze was only a little bit chilly, and I was able to enjoy myself and forget about the bullshit of the world for just a little bit.

“This is total bullshit!”

Well, it had been nice.

I looked ahead to where an argument was going on between a teenage girl and her parents. They looked vaguely familiar, but I was pretty sure the girl didn’t go to Winslow. Emma would’ve definitely had a rival for queen bee if she did. Another girl, probably the first girl’s bestie, was leaning against the rail nearby, looking bored.

“Mind your language, Victoria,” the woman said sharply.

“Well, it is,” the girl retorted petulantly. “Ames and me should be able to help if we want.”

“I said no and I mean no!” The girl’s mother made a chopping motion with her hand. “End of discussion. We can’t risk either one of you.”

Just as I was beginning to parse that statement, the girl turned away from her parents. “Bull fucking shit!” Raising her foot, she stamped on the wooden boards. One cracked through with a loud report.

“Victoria Dallon!” snapped the blonde woman. “If you can’t restrain yourself, you are grounded!”

Puzzle pieces began to drop together in my head. Brute strength … Victoria Dallon … shit, that’s New Wave!

That was as far as I got before Victoria Dallon punched a light-pole with a loud “Grrrah!” of frustration, leaving knuckle-marks in the metal. All around, passers-by recoiled, either from the display of violence or possibly from something else. At the same time, I also felt … something. A gentle wave of sensation that was there and gone in an instant. And Victoria Dallon screamed and fell over, clutching at her head.

“Vicky!” shouted the frizzy-haired girl I had taken to be her bestie. If they were New Wave, and Victoria was Glory Girl, then that made her Panacea. She hurried to Glory Girl’s side and knelt down. Placing her hand on Victoria’s face, she concentrated.

“What is it?” asked the guy … if that was Victoria’s father, that would make him Flashbang. He’d spent the entire previous conversation saying nothing at all, but now he was looking outward, a glow building around his hands. “Has she been attacked?”

“Looks like an aneurysm leading to a stroke,” Panacea said curtly. “A bad one. Lots of bleeding in a short time. I’ve sealed off the arteries and reclaimed the blood, but I can’t do anything about the damage it did before I got to her.”

“An aneurysm?” The woman stared at her. “How could you have not detected this coming? And what do you mean, you can’t fix the damage?”

“I didn’t see it coming because there were no signs!” Panacea pointed at Glory Girl. “She went from nothing to a total intracranial aneurysm in the last two minutes! And I can’t fix it because I can’t do brains!”

The blonde woman took hold of her shoulders and shook her violently. “TRY!” she screamed, from a range of about six inches.

I wanted to walk away. I really did. This shit was not my problem. But right now Panacea wasn’t a superhero who could handle herself. She was a teenaged girl who was being bullied by someone bigger and stronger, that she couldn’t fight back against. That pattern had repeated itself far too often in my life, and now I couldn’t stand to see it happen again.

 “Hey!” I said sharply. Stepping forward, I grabbed the woman’s arm. Brandish, I vaguely recalled. “Leave her the fuck alone, you bitch!”

I hadn’t actually intended to swear like that. It was just how it came out. On the upside, it certainly got Brandish’s attention. This was the only upside.

Without even looking, Brandish pulled her arm free of my grip and backhanded me. It was almost certainly an instinctive move, gleaned from countless combats. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, it would’ve been the right move. This was the hundredth instance. The necklace flared under my shirt and a blast of kinetic energy knocked Brandish ass over teakettle, sending her tumbling half a dozen yards along the Boardwalk.

“Hey, you okay?” I asked Panacea, who was standing there looking a little shell-shocked.

“What the hell … who are you?” Panacea blurted, staring at me. “How did you do that?”

“Name’s Taylor. I’m Ragnarok’s daughter.” I glanced at where Brandish was picking herself up, looking decidedly more ruffled than before. “Word of warning? She attacks me, she dies. Just saying.” I didn’t much care either way, but it had sucked to lose Mom, and I figured a shitty mom was better than none at all.

“Step back away from my girls.” Flashbang moved toward me, his hands glowing more brightly. “I won’t warn you a second time.”

I sighed. “Ragnarok’s. Daughter. Try to keep up.” Did having powers make people deaf and stupid? It really seemed that way.

“Dad,” Panacea said tensely. “Back off. I don’t think you can take her.” She glanced at Glory Girl, who was still unconscious on the ground, and back at me. “You hit her with ten times her aura, didn’t you?”

“I dunno. Maybe?” I shrugged. “I felt something just before she collapsed, but it never affected me.”

Panacea seemed to take that on board. “Did Ragnarok really blow up Brockton General and Winslow High School?”

“Nope,” I said cheerfully. “That was me. PRT dicks were bugging me in the hospital, and there were people in Winslow who really needed to die.” I waved my hand casually. “I left most of the hospital still standing. Just be glad it was me who got to the school and not my dad. A whole chunk of the city would be missing now if he had his way.”

“I’ve heard enough,” snapped Brandish. She had manifested a glowing blade as she stormed up alongside Flashbang. “You’re under arrest for … well, you’re under arrest. Surrender peacefully and you might just escape the Birdcage.”

I rolled my eyes and yawned theatrically. “I’m not under arrest and you’re not sending me to the Birdcage. Bored with this conversation now. I’m gonna walk away. Hope Glory Girl gets better.”

“There are ways of imprisoning you without attacking you,” Brandish snarled.

“Dad can teleport and pull me straight out of anywhere you try to put me,” I retorted. “And he will fuck the shit up of anyone who tries. Just like he fucked up the CUI for killing Mom. Wanna try your luck? Go right ahead.”

“Carol,” said Flashbang tensely. “Amy’s right. We need to stand down, right now.”

“She’s a villain!” shouted Brandish.

“A villain who was attacked by Vicky’s aura!” Panacea retorted. “I’ve told her and told her to tone it down. She never, ever does!” She stepped in front of the blonde woman, her arms out to her sides as if to bar her way.

“She doesn’t scare me,” scoffed Brandish. “By her own admission, she’s a murderer, probably several times over. She could’ve killed my daughter, just for having a little fear inflicted on her. That’s vastly disproportionate.”

“Hello?” I said theatrically. “Ragnarok’s daughter, here. Of course we do disproportionate. It’s how we roll. It’s the only way we can make sure idiots like you understand that it’s not worth trying to fuck with us. Because nothing else fucking works. Assuming they’ll understand doesn’t work. Asking doesn’t work. Telling doesn’t work. Screaming in their faces doesn’t work. Giving them back one for one doesn’t work. Going to the authorities doesn’t work. People still fuck with us. So we give them back ten for one. That works. Worked with the CUI, worked with Behemoth, worked with the little bitches who spent a year bullying me. You’ll notice none of them has fucked with anyone since.”

All around us, unnoticed by all except me, I was building my swarm up. None of the bugs were landing on anyone, and they weren’t clustering around peoples’ faces, but they were there all the same. It would only take me a second to empower them, and they would be capable of blasting any given foe into pink mist.

I stared Brandish in the eye. “I’ve been trying to tell you not to fuck with me. You haven’t been listening. Keep this shit up, and I’ll stop telling you and just let it happen. One way or the other, you’ll never fuck with me again. I guaran-fucking-tee it.” Lifting my hand, I tapped my chest, just over where the necklace sat under the shirt. “So make your move or back the fuck off. It’s all the same to me.” I began to turn away.

“You can’t threaten me. I’m immune to my own powers, you stupid child.” Brandish’s voice held more malice than I’d ever heard from anyone except Emma or her friends. “Get out of my way!”

“No!” shouted Panacea, at the same time as Flashbang yelled, “Carol!”

Something tapped me briefly on the right shoulder. The necklace flared, quite brightly. I heard a sound like the world’s largest bottle of tomato ketchup unclogging itself. A wash of warm air rolled over me.

Slowly, I turned around. Brandish wasn’t there anymore. Or rather, she was everywhere. Everyone within ten yards (except for me) was wearing her. There were no large pieces, no intact bones, no recognisable organs. It was almost as though she’d been spread like butter, or perhaps run through a woodchipper and sprayed evenly over the area.

Panacea was lying on the boardwalk, nursing her wrist. It looked like she’d been shoved roughly aside and fallen badly. She and Flashbang were both staring at me, eyes wide. Both were coated in a layer of Brandish. Intellectually, they’d known how dangerous it was to push me. But they hadn’t known.

She might’ve been immune to her power, but she wasn’t immune to my dad’s tech.

I know for a fact that I warned her.

Whoops.

I was pretty sure that nothing I could say would fix the situation, so I turned and walked away.

Well, that could’ve gone better.