Mist of Shadows
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Celestial Worm Part 7
🕑 Added 2024-11-26 06:55:21 +0000 UTC"We should call in sick today," Amy muttered, finding it hard to take her eyes off her sister who was playing in the water in her birthday suit and blessing her sunglasses for hiding that fact.
Taylor glanced at Amy who was sitting next to her in a beach chair with a canopy that she'd borrowed from a beach in Mexico, rather amused that Amy had let her sister talk her into stripping since they were on a deserted Caribbean island where no one was around to see them. "Or you could teleport home and avoid giving your mother a reason to complain, since she probably has a hangover."
"Probably," Amy agreed, not all that interested in sitting through her classes when she could learn just as much or more just reading the books. "What are you planning on doing with your time off?"
"I'm sort of torn between being lazy and lounging on the beach and going shopping for new clothes and a new computer," Taylor admitted.
"You have the money," Amy replied with a grin as Vicky floated out of the water, making her wish she had a camera and a viable excuse to use it.
"You should buy the island," Vicky said as she flew over, enjoying the warm weather and the fact that there wasn't anyone around to snap pictures of her which would get back to her mother and cause a lecture about proper behavior.
Taylor turned her attention to Vicky, rather enjoying the view. "That sounds like it would leave a papertrail."
"So? You collected the bounty as Supergirl, I mean, Copyright Infringement Lass, you might as well show people what they expect to see, a hero that made it big and retired," Vicky argued. "Your molding and crystallization powers means you can turn large creatures into nearly indestructible crystals that you can use to create a base that could survive a hurricane and your ability to teleport or to give someone teleportation means you won't have supply issues."
"You're also a tinker which means you should be able to set up a satellite system for the net which will keep everyone happy," Amy pointed out, onboard with any project that would let her see her sister running around in her birthday suit rather than just the occasional glances she got at home. "Besides, if you buy the island, you can probably set up your own government which means you can set the rules."
"That sounds like a lot of work," Taylor whined.
"Pay someone, you have the money and you can hand out powers," Amy pointed out. "Accord would probably love the chance to design a country from the ground up and he'd probably benefit from getting the mental resistance power. There are thousands of architects that would sell their firstborn for the chance to use the molding power to create a crystal city for you, even if they only get to use the power for a year. It would also save us a hell of a lot of hassle and frustration if we set up the clinics that make people younger on the island."
"Just think of the movie stars we could invite for a bit of cosmetic work and a vacation," Vicky offered.
"Being on a small island would make it a lot harder for people to reach us," Taylor pointed out.
"It also makes it harder for religious fanatics to firebomb the clinics because we're breaking the natural order," Amy argued, thinking about some of the weird mail she'd gotten after she became a cape. "Besides, you can give people the ability to teleport, it shouldn't be all that hard to hire people that are willing to teleport around the world to pick people up."
"Fine, I'll look into it," Taylor agreed with a groan.
"We should probably get dressed so we can get back," Vicky admitted as she flew over and grabbed her towel and started drying off so that she could get dressed.
"Sadly," Amy admitted, fairly sure she wasn't going to be able to focus.
0o0o0
"You're fucking dead bitch!" Ralph screamed when the black bitch he'd been chasing vanished into thin air in the middle of the alley.
'So much for keeping tabs on her,' Brian thought as he walked toward the teenager that had been chasing his sister with a knife. "She's like that."
Ralph turned and twitched when he saw a broad shouldered black man stalking toward him holding the baseball bat that he'd dropped when the bitch had kicked him in the knee. "Stay the fuck away from me!" he shouted as he waved the knife at the Brian.
Brian stopped seven feet away from the other teenager, adjusting his pace so that his right foot just happened to end up next to the empty wine bottle on the ground. "Why were you chasing the girl with a knife?" he asked, figuring there was an outside chance that he actually had a legitimate reason to be pissed at his sister, though he doubted it since she'd only stepped outside of the bakery for two minutes.
"The whore flipped me off," the teen replied with a smirk when Alabaster stepped into the alley, 'blocking' the exit. "You're fucked."
Brian kicked the bottle at the teen then lunged forward and swung the bat at the kid's wrist that was holding the knife while he was distracted by the bottle, causing him to drop the knife and scream in agony thanks to the shattered bones in his wrist. He kicked the asshole in the chest, breaking several of his ribs then turned to check behind him.
"Hey fucker!" Alabaster shouted as he charged the man beating the shit out of his friend.
Brian turned and slammed the baseball bat into the pasty white guy with white hair and completely white eyes, sending him crashing against the wall with a cracked skull. He hit the cape a second time then stared in disbelief when the cape vanished without a trace. 'That's new.'
"They're going to kill you," the injured teenager taunted, having missed the fact that Alabaster had vanished into thin air and his backup wasn't coming.
Brian walked over and kicked the asshole in the head, knocking him unconscious then grabbed the asshole's phone that had partially fallen out of his jacket pocket. He scowled when his gloves prevented him from dialing 911. 'I wouldn't bother but you're not worth the potential murder charge,' he thought as he used the teen's index finger to dial and push the button for speaker phone mode so he wouldn't have to touch the phone.
"You've reached 911, what's the nature of your emergency?" a male voice asked.
"There's an unconscious gang member that got the shit kicked out of him in an alley near 7th and North, near the record shop, you might want to send someone to pick him up," Brian told them.
"Can you stay at the location?" the voice asked.
"No but I can leave the phone, it fell out of his pocket," Brian told him then dropped the phone and baseball bat on the ground, not interested in doing more for the idiot than the bare minimum. He blinked when he went from being in the alley to standing on a tropical beach with his sister and an attractive young woman in a black and white Supergirl outfit. "What's going on?"
"You're late," Alec called out from where he was lounging on a beach chair, enjoying the heat.
Brian glanced over at Alec then shook his head when he realized his teammate wasn't wearing anything. "Seriously?"
Lisa glanced up from the document she was reading on her phone. "Ignore him, we've only been here about fifteen minutes."
Alec smirked as he lazily flipped Brian off. "Piss off, we're on a tropical island and our host doesn't care."
"It's fine," Taylor assured them, rather enjoying the view if she was being honest since Alec was hot enough to be a model. "I was borrowing Lisa and she mentioned needing to check on you, I saw Aisha had managed to get herself into trouble so I rescued her."
"What happened?" Brian asked, doing his best not to stare at the Supergirl knockoff that wasn't wearing a mask and had curves in all the right places.
"You told me to wait by the car, I was waiting by the car when the asshole walked up with a baseball bat and told me to give him a blow job or he'd cave my fucking skull in," Aisha complained. "I stomped on his foot and bolted."
"Do we need to go back and fuck his day up?" Alec asked.
"No, he has a shattered wrist, a possible concussion and at least a couple of broken ribs," Brian admitted. "He had a knife on him…" he trailed off and turned when he heard screaming coming from somewhere behind him. He watched as the pale skinned man falling out of the air vanished half a second before he hit the ocean. "Was that Alabaster?"
"It sort of looks like him, doesn't it," Taylor said thoughtfully.
"Is there a reason you're trying to drive him insane?" Brian asked.
Taylor shook her head, not even bothering to keep a straight face. "I'm afraid you have me confused with Teleport Girl, I'm Copyright Infringement Lass and I shoot people with laser beams from my eyes."
Brian glanced around the mostly empty beach, pausing for a second when she saw Rachel with a couple of dogs a couple of hundred feet down the beach. "Do you honestly expect us to believe that?"
"Not really, but there are laws against teleporting Nazis into the air and letting them almost hit the ocean which means that some evil cape is trying to frame us, it happens all the time," Taylor explained as she used the projection she'd copied from the Siberian to create a projection behind Brian then quickly covered it with an illusion to hide the stripes and to give her a white lab coat and an alien blaster.
"Any idea what the evil cape is planning on doing with him?" Brian asked, deciding to just go with it.
"I'm going to drop him in a cell," the projection offered, causing Brian to spin and look at the attractive pale skinned teenage girl with curly red hair that was wearing a white lab coat and nothing else.
Brian pulled his attention off the girl's body and tried to focus on her face and the alien blaster but found his attention drifting back to her body despite his best efforts. "Who are you?"
"I'm Teleport Girl," she replied absently as she adjusted the setting on her teleportation gun using a small screwdriver that she pulled out of her lab coat. "One second," she said as she raised her device and shot Alabaster before he could hit the ocean. "Excellent, he didn't explode."
"That's an option?" Alec asked warily.
The projection shrugged. "It's less than one percent, don't worry about it."
"What did I say about testing alien inventions?" Taylor asked, rather amused that Lisa wasn't sure what to make of the new cape.
"File the proper paperwork," the projection admitted.
"Is everything filed?" Taylor asked.
"Ninja Vanish!" the projection shouted as she quickly grabbed a marble sized sphere from her pocket and tossed it on the sand.
Alec snickered when the smoke pellet didn't burst, fairly sure she'd screwed it up intentionally. "It helps if the ground is actually solid."
"Apparently," the projection 'grumbled' then shot herself with the alien blaster and vanished when Taylor unsummoned her.
"Great, Aisha is going to be late for school," Brian complained.
"Don't worry about it, I'll track her down in a couple of minutes and you'll be on your way," Taylor assured him.
"Damn it," Aisha complained. "This is the first time I've gotten to spend more than a minute on a tropical beach, you're not going to ruin it."
Taylor used her illusion power to create an alien blaster under the chair she was sitting on then reached down and pulled it out and pointed it at Brian. "No worries, I've got this." She 'fired' the blaster and teleported Brian to his car. She turned to look at Aisha. "Tell you what, you're free to come back when you're done with school."
"Sweet!" Aisha cheered as she grabbed her jacket.
Taylor used her Power Creation ability to give Aisha durability and the skill boosting half of Oliver's power then 'zapped' her with her blaster and teleported her back to Brian's car. 'Between fixing the mental damage that caused most of her issues and the skill power, she should be able to ace her classes.'
Alec laughed. "That was awesome, do you think I can get a copy?"
"Not a chance," Taylor replied with amusement as she put the blaster back under her chair and let it vanish. "How much do you think I'll have to bribe the Haitian government for the island?"
Lisa looked up from the documents that she was reading. "Probably about fifteen million, the island is low and small enough that it basically gets flooded every time Leviathan does anything in the Atlantic and the government would jump at the chance to get a nice infusion of cash for an island that they can't regularly use."
"It's worth a try," Taylor told her, figuring they could always try another island if the Haitian government didn't want to play ball.
"You're going to need net access," Alec told her.
"I'm aware," Taylor replied as she pulled a notebook out of her bag and started jotting down ideas for ways to get decent net on a deserted island in the middle of nowhere.
0o0o0
Sophia jumped back as someone appeared out of thin air and slammed into the floor of the cell next to her at what must have been terminal velocity as the body sort of liquified from the impact, covering her with blood. "Gah!" Sophia sputtered and she spit the blood out of her mouth. "Racist blood."
The PRT agent that was supposed to watch Sophia stared at the body in disbelief as the body reassembled itself. "What the fuck?"
"God damn bitch!" Alabaster shouted, annoyed that the teleporter had dropped him into a cell after getting tossed back into the sky a couple of times to build up momentum. "What are you looking at slut?!" he demanded as he glared at Sophia.
"Pretty salty for a cracker behind bars but hey, at least I know what happens when someone drinks bleach while pregnant," Sophia replied without missing a beat.
"They don't pay me enough for this shit," the agent muttered under his breath as he activated the intercom. "Captain, someone dropped Alabaster into a cell next to the girl we have in custody, can someone get him out of here?"
"I'll send Assault, he can deal with it," the captain said.
"That would be appreciated," the agent said.
Sophia made sure that she was far enough away from Alabaster's cell that he couldn't hit her then just started making rude gestures, quickly driving him into a rage.
0o0o0o0
"I could get used to this," Lisa admitted as she sipped her raspberry lemonade, feeling content for the first time in years.
"Relaxing or having enough money that you don't need to worry about your next job?" Taylor asked as she teleported another abandoned ship to a hundred feet over the pile of ships that she'd already salvaged from the boat graveyard, taking a certain amount of pleasure in destroying the worst of the boats that people had left to rot in the bay.
"Both," Lisa admitted after the boat crashed into the pile of boats and shattered. "I keep expecting to end up in a cell once I'm done helping."
"Would it help?" Taylor asked. "You're not exactly wanted for crimes against humanity or mass murder and you're not a Master." She frowned when she caught Lisa's thoughts about Alec's father being Heartbreaker and the true nature of Regent's powers, something she'd already learned when she teleported him to the island. 'I should be immune to Heartbreaker's power because of my mental resistance power but I should probably avoid testing that like an idiot.'
"That's fair and the PRT loves flipping Thinkers," Lisa agreed, deciding that she'd take the opportunity to jump ship and get out of the villain business before she pissed the girl off enough that she dropped her in a cell.
Taylor used her clairvoyance to scry on Heartbreaker. She wasn't particularly surprised to find the man in an expensive looking bed screwing a girl that didn't look much older than she did. 'I'd check your head but that might count as a connection that would let you screw me over.' She focused and teleported Heartbreaker a hundred feet out and fifty feet down in the ocean, wanting to make sure he couldn't use his powers.
'Yeah, that's Heartbreaker,' she mused as she used her Manipulation ability on his power to swap everything so that every time he flipped the mental switch that activated his power he'd free everyone he'd used his power on. She teleported Heartbreaker to the surface of the ocean a mile offshore and opened a telepathic connection. 'How many people have you screwed over?'
"What the fuck?" Heartbreaker sputtered out as he reflexively tried to use his power on the voice in his head, 'accidentally' releasing everyone he'd screwed over.
'Is anyone in your family actually loyal?' Taylor asked him, causing Heartbreaker to think about his oldest sons. She briefly considered ripping his head off and collecting the bounty before deciding that turning the bounty in would raise too many questions and she didn't need the money. She used the mental image in Heartbreaker to find his oldest sons and teleport them to the ocean next to their father.
"I can't really blame them considering everything they have to deal with," Taylor admitted, wondering if she could make something that could deal with the Endbringers. She focused on Lisa's phone that was sitting on a rooftop where it had a signal and smiled when she saw the message icon. "It looks like Accord responded."
"I didn't send it to Accord, I sent it to his assistant, she's less insane or at least unstable," Lisa replied.
Taylor teleported the phone to Lisa.
Lisa checked the message and smiled when she realized that it was a request for more details about the contract and a request to prove that her mysterious friend could deliver on her side of the deal. "He's going to want proof and I'm going to need a lift."
Taylor used her Power Creation ability to give Lisa enhanced durability and the ability to teleport herself for 460 days, wanting to make sure Lisa would survive anything Accord tried to pull if the deal went south. "Enhanced durability and the ability to teleport yourself, that should help prove that I can give people temporary powers and that there aren't master effects."
"Hopefully. I'll be back in a bit," Lisa promised then teleported to her room to hash out some details and get some lighter clothes.
Taylor glanced over at where Alec was sprawled on a beach chair. "So, if you had the chance, would you kill your father?"
Alec turned and looked at Taylor, realizing that she must know who his father was. "I'd rather stay the hell away from him, I have some resistance against his shit but it doesn't cover everything and he's a monster. If you can get rid of him, great but you're going to want to be careful."
"He's already screwed, I was going to knock him unconscious and turn him in for the bounty but I'm not sure I want the scrutiny," Taylor admitted. “One person handling all the S or A class threats draws attention I don’t need.”
"I have an idea," Alec replied with a smirk, one that leapt to Taylor’s face as he opened his mouth and began to speak.
0o0o0
Narwhal stared at the possible cape that had brought Heartbreaker and two of his sons in for the reward, all three drugged to the gills. She stared at the 'normal' looking man wearing a red and white striped shirt and wool cap along with thick black horn rimmed glasses and blue jeans. "How did you capture them?"
"Stranger Twelve," Taylor replied with a shrug.
"Twelve?" Narwhal asked suspiciously.
"Millions of people have looked, no one finds me unless I let them," Taylor replied, doing her best not to laugh at the entire situation.
"Cash or credit?" Narwhal asked, knowing most capes went for cash.
"Cash," Taylor replied with a smile.
“What name do I use for the capture report?” she asked, eyes narrowed.
Taylor just smirked. “You know my name.”
Comments
Mist of Shadows
The easiest method is probably a bit of searching for the chapter titles.
Danny R Brock
is there anywhere we can find all the chapters of your stories, since you don't have them in collections? Several of them start at like chapter 4 or 8. It takes a lot of scrolling to find chapters or different stories.
Mist of Shadows
To be fair, she doesn't really want people looking at her life and they'd be curious how she managed to pull things off, it's better if she just sort of collects the bounty and vanishes.
Mist of Shadows
That's the fun part of that sort of thing, yes.
Mist of Shadows
Thanks.
Mist of Shadows
Pretty sure she just let them fill things in. :)
Dark epyon
Ok that ending made me laugh I can just see the protectorate in a closed in meeting, looking chill and saying, where is this Waldo character but the better question did she call herself Waldo or because it’s Canada Wally
Bable Zmith
nice :)
James Thomas
Yes, use this persona to deal with several A and S class threats that Cauldron leaves around or protects to promote triggers. I want to see Becca flip her stack and yell out "Where's Waldo?!" Only to realize what she's said moments later.
ZeroLink21
Lol Waldo as a stranger 12 so makes sense if he was real and not Taylor messing with people tftc
