*** I do not own anything in here, except maybe... nope, I got nothing. ***
Taylor had been in the midst of beating on her locker in an attempt to either draw help or get out on her own, she didn't really care which, having screamed herself hoarse. That was when the first window appeared.
[DESTINATION?]
[AGREEMENT]
[TRAJECTORY?]
[AGREEMENT]
[DESTINATION?!]
[...AGREEMENT]
[TRAJECTORY?]
[AGREEMENT]
She paused in her frantic efforts to escape when a window suddenly popped into existence. It was a semi-transparent blue. Clear enough not to significantly block her vision unless in large numbers, but not to the extent that she'd have difficulty reading the text. It probably had something to do with her sudden calm. She was still logically aware that her current condition was... not good and quite possibly counted as a biohazard. Like, she wouldn't be surprised if she got some kind of horrible disease from the dirt and bugs... at least one of which was currently crawling through her hair. That, or she'd lost her mind and/or had started seeing things. Considering what the dictator-Capes in Africa were like, they might not be mutually exclusive. That said, she'd operate on the assumption she'd Triggered since hallucinations would probably be less coherent considering her current state.
'Welcome Gamer! You're probably wondering what gaming has to do with your situation, as most Capes Trigger with a power that has something to do with their Trigger. A Cape that watched their family die in a fire might get pyrokinesis, for example. You happened to Trigger with 2 separate powers, the ability to live life like a game, which is the one currently explaining itself to you, and a Master power over invertebrates. However, we're getting ahead of ourselves.'
Huh, she didn't know that was how it worked. If people got superpowers from hideous trauma, then the number of villains suddenly made much more sense. She felt a bit like she'd cheated, getting her powers fairly easily compared to the example she'd gotten, though she supposed that some of it was simply 18 months of bullying boiling over. Also getting betrayed by her best friend right after losing her mother, slowly becoming more and more distant from her father, and not getting any real closure in regards to any of it. ...Suddenly she didn't feel like she'd cheated. Although, she wasn't sure if getting multiple powers was how it normally worked. The wording implied that it was abnormal, and grab-bags weren't exactly normal, but did they have multiple of whatever gave people powers, or were they all from one source? Questions for later.
'You're game-power allows you to learn at an accelerated rate, adapt to anything used against you that doesn't kill you, and improve both your base abilities and learned skills quickly and permanently, never atrophying. Your Master power allows you to control invertebrates, ranging from insects to sea sponges. In theory, you could control trees if they had complex nervous systems. About the only limit is that it can't have an endo-skeleton, though that makes most large life-forms off-limits.'
That could be incredibly useful. It sounded like she'd gained a variant of Uber's power, in addition to the ability to control a large portion of all lifeforms. Sure, Master powers were heavily stigmatized, but she couldn't control people, hell, even most pets were outside her jurisdiction. That should set most people's minds at ease. She'd be careful about telling anyone though. She wasn't going to tell people at random regardless, but she'd be more willing to tell people about the game-power first. Considering Lung's power turned him into a dragon for... some reason (Huh, why did that happen?) she didn't think it was the weirdest power imaginable. A lot of Tinkers did things with technology that made little sense with conventional physics, for example. It would be best to figure out a bit more about her power first though.
'Now, let's go over your powers in more depth. The Gamer has several main facets. Stats, Skills, and Inventory. Your other power will be explained along with Skills. As for Stats, they're fairly simple. They measure your abilities and condition. How much damage you can take, how much power you can put into strikes, etc. Many would say they are the most important factor in an RPG, having a large effect on everything, either by determining how effective your Skills are, or being the base they build off of, and everyone knows that a good foundation allows for a taller building.
Level measures how experienced you are, though for everyone else they are a measure of their combat ability. Someone with a black belt might have a Level three times that of your average Joe, despite not having that large a Stat gap. As your Level increases, Exp awards will decrease, so despite the fact that the requirement is the Level number multiplied by 1000, it will become significantly more difficult to Level up as you go. Each Level gives you 20 HP/MP, and 5 points to spend on your Stats as you see fit. Note that spent points cannot be reclaimed, so some hoarding is advised.
Hit Points (HP) measure of how healthy you are. Taking damage from attacks, shrapnel, or some kinds of conditions, such as one of Bonesaw's diseases, will cause it to drop. Barring special circumstances, one's HP hitting 0 will generally mean death. The maximum is calculated by taking Vit and multiplying by 10, then adding your Level multiplied by 20. You regenerate one percent of this value per minute.
Mana Points (MP) measure your reserves of energy for special abilities. Mana, KI, chakra, psi, nen, prana, etc. all fall under this. It is consumed through special actions, though you may encounter entities that can drain it. The maximum is calculated in the same manner as HP, but with Int in place of Vit. MP Regen, however, is determined by dividing Wis by 10, then using that as a percentage value regenerated per minute. Currently, it is 2% of your maximum value.
Strength (Str) measures your ability to push, lift, or break objects, and otherwise apply or resist physical force. Resist as in avoid being moved, not avoid being damaged. It also determines how strong physical attacks, such as punches and kicks, are.
Intelligence (Int) measures your learning speed, memory, the power behind attacks that use MP, and the speed at which you process things, affecting your reaction time as a byproduct.
Vitality (Vit) measures how healthy, tough, and energetic you are. It affects disease/poison resistance, stamina, resistance to pain, and reduces all incoming damage by one.
Dexterity (Dex) measures your overall speed and dexterity. It affects your speed, mobility, reflexes, hand-eye co-ordination, and stealth.
Wisdom (Wis) measures your mental and emotional control. It affects your ability to think logically, your self-control, emotional awareness and resistance to hardships, and control over your mana. It also provides .05% resistance to magic/energy-based attacks per point.
Luck (Lck) measures your luck, as you might guess. It won't particularly affect large events unless it's very high or very low, nor can it be relied upon heavily. However, it is best to have at least a little more than a normal person, as every little thing that is affected by random chance will be affected by how high it is relative to others. Chess, for example, will be more or less unaffected. Flipping a coin will be heavily biased towards the person with higher Lck, by comparison.
Now, let's see what your Stats are, keeping in mind that 10 is the average for non-Capes.'
Below a picture of her face, there was a list of pertinent information about herself. She looked the window over, and suddenly her luck in life made so much more sense.
'Name: Taylor Hebert.
Age: 14.
Gender: Female.
Class: Gamer/Master.
Level: 1
HP: 100. HP Regen: 1.0/min.
MP: 170. MP Regen: 3.4/min.
Str: 7.
Int: 15.
Vit: 8.
Dex: 14.
Wis: 20.
Lck: 1.
Unspent Points: 5.
Note that your Stats can be raised through training, weight lifting for Str, studying for Int, etc. and this will grow more difficult as they increase.'
Seriously, did the universe actively dislike her or something? Her Lck made her expect a bolt of lightning to suddenly hit her for no apparent reason, or would that be 0 Lck? Anyway, she was dumping her points in that. Sure, she was still well below the average, but she was no longer abysmally so. Now, her odds of having someone stumble across her, while still fairly low, weren't effectively nil. She'd also need to get lucky in order to train it, and a tenth of the average person's Lck didn't lend itself to that. Now that she thought about it, the Trio would probably have a harder time finding her all the time when the universe wasn't conspiring to make her miserable.
'Alright, now for Skills. Skills are various abilities that can be obtained through several means. Using Skill books (though this will consume the book) is specific to you, though special or repeated actions can also grant you Skills. Trainers/teachers will allow you to learn new Skills at an accelerated pace, some Skills can't be taught however. For instance, most Capes will not be able to give you even shadows of their powers. Unless you get a bud from them, but you are unlikely to associate with anyone that closely, as most people who get buds are family members, or otherwise spend hours at a time in close proximity.
There are three types of Skills. Active, which activate at your discretion and usually have some form of cost, Passive, which activate under relevant circumstances, and Sustained, which are always active to some degree regardless of your input. Some skills may have Stat requirements to learn them. In addition, Skills that hit their maximum Level may Prestige, evolving into a new Skill, creating a new Skill, or both. This usually requires a lot of effort though, as each Skill Level requires exponentially more effort to reach, much like your personal Level.
Gamer's Mind. Sustained. Level Max. This Skill gives the user the detachment of a Gamer, allowing them to think calmly and logically no matter the situation. It also renders them immune to hypnosis and similar mental effects, such as Glory Girl's Fear Aura. Illusions and the like will still work if they are actual physical effects and not tricking the target's senses into perceiving something that doesn't exist. Bending light will work, making your brain specifically perceive something will not. Mental fatigue is severely reduced, though it is still possible to become bored or stir-crazy.'
This explained why she was taking all of this so calmly. She knew that she disliked her current situation, but she felt no panic over it. Her emotions were still there, but they were a bit duller, and it was more like she was watching someone she empathized with experience them, like she was playing a game character. If the latter effects worked how she thought they did, then this was actually pretty big. She was effectively an anti-Master. Someone could still take physical control over her nerves to force her to do certain things, but that would be fairly obvious, and if the information she'd gotten so far was accurate, then she would get harder to control as time went on. She was uncertain if that extended to Simurgh though. Simurgh's power was... sort of like hypnosis from what the PHO boards and official sources could tell, but could make people do things they'd never do normally. Hypnosis couldn't make you commit suicide, Simurgh could. She should have a resistance to it, but best to test it under relatively controlled circumstances.
'Gamer's Body. Sustained. Level Max. This Skill gives the user the body of a video game character. The user regenerates both health and mana relatively quickly, have more stamina than a normal person, and recover said stamina extremely quickly. As long as they have HP, wounds will not appear on their body. Should their HP hit 0, they will enter a state known as Death's Door, where injuries show up normally. Their durability will not decrease, but getting their neck snapped will probably kill them, unless their Vit is ungodly high. Death's Door will expire in 1 minute unless damage is dealt in that time. A higher Vit will decrease the interval. Food and rest are not required, though they will drastically boost recovery. You now possess limited adaptive evolution in regards to attacks. If someone hit you with a lightning bolt, you would gain resistance to electricity, assuming you survived.'
That was... illuminating, though now she was curious what it took to cause enough damage to bring her HP to 0. She'd need to know her limits, even if those limits would rise over time. If she assumed that each point of Str let you do 5 damage, then someone would need a Str of 36 to take her HP out in one hit, though she was sure Lung could reach a number like that in short order. All three Endbringers would have the necessary Str value as well. She was just starting out though.
'Observe. Active/Sustained. Level Max. This Skill allows the user to gain insight into the world around them. Active use provides significantly more information. The exact amount of data depends on your relative Level (though objects will also reveal more information at higher Levels) the Skill's Level, and how high Int/Wis are. Passively shows the HP bars of those around you.
Invertebrate Control. Active. Level 1. This Skill allows you to control anything with a nervous system which lacks an endoskeleton, within a certain range at least. You may borrow the senses of the creatures you control. You can also give orders to creatures that will be going outside your effective range, though they will need to be relatively simple. The longer they are outside your control, the more the imperative to obey you fades. Increasing Wis and Skill Level will boost the effectiveness of this Skill.
All invertebrates within 10 meters will be under your complete control.
The senses of sight, smell, and hearing may be borrowed.
Creatures who have been ordered to do something will obey you for ten seconds after leaving your range.
Multitasking. Passive. Level 1. This Skill allows multiple mental and physical processes to be run simultaneously, with relatively little loss of efficiency. Currently, up to 5 tasks may be done with a 50% reduction in efficiency.'
Huh, these powers seemed rather unrelated, why did she have both? She could remember heading towards delirium before Gamer's Mind and Body cleared her head. Her exact thought processes were a bit fuzzy, but she believed that she'd been thinking that if she'd been smarter, or stronger, or even tougher, then maybe she wouldn't have lost her best friend, or been bullied for a year and a half while any attempts to reach out to authority was either rebuffed, or outright ignored. Meanwhile, here she'd been having insects crawl through her hair and over her body. Speaking of which... she sent the insects out through the slits in the door, though she kept them within range, just in case. She was careful to scatter them around though, while they might attract attention, having them stay a distance of at least 10 meters from her would be suspicious.
Anyway, considering her mindset, she was unsurprised she'd Triggered with the power to get stronger, and with all the insects in there with her, making her mental state worse, Triggering with the power to control insects, if not specifically, made some sense. Perhaps this was how grab-bags worked? Instead of one big thing, there were multiple smaller ones that added up? Like, if you cranked a terrible morning up to the point of traumatic events, then someone Triggering from that might gain minor terrakinesis to prevent getting splashed with mud, minor control over birds, a minor power that made them more difficult to move regardless of relative mass, etc. Unless something completely different was going on. She doubted she was special enough to warrant something special though.
At any rate, she'd like to finish up here. She'd already been stuck in here for nearly an hour, and the sun set early in January. She'd like to get home before sunset to keep her father from worrying, and ideally take a shower to wash all of... this off of her. She might be able to tell him about this soon, but she figured she'd wait a few days to get into the groove of her powers. If she actually had some understanding of them, then she'd be able to get some say in where she went from there. She loved him, and she knew he loved her, but he'd swung from extremes ever since her mother died. Either they'd barely interact, like immediately after the funeral, or he'd practically smother her in bubble-wrap. If she let him know she had powers, she could almost guarantee he'd say 'Wards or nothing' because, theoretically, that would be the safest place for her. Blackwell and the rest of the faculty at Winslow had given her a deep-seated mistrust of authority figures, and she kind of doubted the Wards were as wonderful as they were portrayed in the media, since they had a whole PR team dedicated to making them look good.
To be fair, she could kind of see where the faculty was coming from. When death threats almost always got carried out, and more than a quarter of the student body wore gang colors or were literally waiting to be old enough to join one of the gangs spread across town, an introverted girl who barely talked to anyone except when necessary and who didn't have stellar grades couldn't have been high on their priorities. She still didn't like them though. Oh, she'd save them if they were about to die in front of her, but even Emma was higher on her list of 'people I'd be okay with being stuck in a room with for a week' than most of them. She didn't hate Emma exactly, but she was willing to give up on her friend ever coming back after this stunt... right?
Her emotions were more confused than she'd thought. She hated Sophia, and definitely disliked Madison, but she couldn't bring herself to go past 'apathy' when it came to Emma. That didn't make sense, though, maybe it had something to do with Observe letting her obtain information. Huh, she was actually kind of curious why Emma had betrayed her, even though she should have had every last shred of empathy beaten out of her by now. Was it Gamer's Mind at work? She supposed knowing things like this would probably help in the long run.
'Through introspection, you have gained 1 Wis.'
A plus, but she was getting side-tracked. She could worry about that after she got out of here. Time to see what her Inventory was about. A window with 7 slots on it appeared.
'Your Inventory is a pocket dimension only accessible to you. Each point of Str adds a slot to it, and each slot can have 9999 of the same or similar items stacked in it. Note that items can only be taken out in the order they were put in. Any items placed in your Inventory are placed in stasis, coming out in the exact same condition they entered. However, things that are still alive cannot be placed inside.'
Okay, she'd have to experiment with that. Did something in a backpack count as a separate item? She'd also have to be careful what she put in there. Restoratives would probably be top priority. At any rate, she seemed to have finished her tutorial, or whatever that was. Now, let's see about getting out of here. She started banging on the door again, which hurt a bit less than it had earlier. She knocked off a couple points of health each time though, since she wasn't anywhere near as tough as metal. However, 10 minutes of effort brought her Str and Vit to 9, and slowly made the locker door bulge outwards.
By the time another 10 minutes had passed, she'd formed enough of a gap to comfortably put her hands between the door and the locker wall, then she started levering the door the rest of the way open. That only took 5 minutes. She had made much better progress this time, as she wasn't just banging randomly. She finally freed herself as of about 4:15, according to the clock in the nearest empty classroom. She wrote off her jacket as a lost cause and left it in the locker, but her backpack was nearby, abandoned in her frantic attempts to avoid being pushed into her own locker with the filth Sophia had somehow gathered. She knew Sophia must have been the one. Madison hated to get dirty, and Emma was more a follower than a leader.
She grabbed her backpack, and unzipped the front pocket. She kept some tissues in there, mostly to help herself clean off as store-bought packs of tissues were still better than the dirt-cheap paper towels the school used, and the napkins were often 'conveniently misplaced' when she got tripped or splattered with something in the cafeteria. Always 'accidentally' of course. After cleaning the worst of the gunk off of herself, she went to find a shower. She didn't want to leave a trail of filth behind. Knowing this school, they'd put the blame on her and avoid listening to more than ten words of her story.
After cleaning herself off, throwing her ruined clothes away, and putting on the gym clothes she'd left in her gym locker (which were safe because she kept the days she did so random), she found a janitor. It was fairly easy, since there were so few people at school at this point, she could make her way around relatively quickly since she didn't have to constantly be on the lookout for large groups of flunkies or the Trio themselves. She'd gotten fairly fast, though her stamina had been poor before she got her power. She could also use the insects that made their homes in the school to look for other humans. As the only other people in the school building were teachers who'd stayed behind for work and the janitorial staff, that narrowed it down a bit. Of course, it took a few tries not to be overwhelmed by the alien sensory information, as many insects could see colors that humans couldn't, or otherwise had major differences in how they saw the world.
She also noticed that the HP bars she saw were almost universally full. The green bars floating inches above people's heads didn't raise any alarms, so she had to assume she was the only one who saw them. That was good. If they showed up in everyone's view, it wouldn't immediately get her outed, but it wouldn't take very long either. As soon as she informed a janitor, funnily enough, named Janet, she hurried home. With how much more stamina she had now, she could run most of the distance home fairly quickly.
She couldn't help but notice she didn't really feel the cold. Despite wearing short pants and a short-sleeved shirt, as opposed to her usual baggy pants and hoodie, she was not particularly cold even though it was early January. It must have been an aspect of Gamer's Body. A single point of Vit couldn't possibly have had this much effect, even if it was an eighth more than what she had originally. Therefore, she could assume that unless the temperature was high or low enough that she'd take damage, she wouldn't feel it. She didn't seem to be working up a sweat either, as despite running several blocks at a time, she remained precisely as sweaty as when she started, which was 'not at all.' Nor did she seem to need air, as holding her breath didn't make her feel the need to breathe again. Both would be useful. The former suggested she wouldn't have any obvious changes to her body occur due to Stat gains, which would make hiding her powers easier. The latter would make drowning her or similar attacks through the air futile, provided she was aware of them.
Since she couldn't study at night without risking awkward questions, she would exercise as quietly as she could. If she didn't need to sleep, then she should make use of the time. That ought to get her Vit and Str up, though getting Dex up in the relative confines of her room might be troublesome. Perhaps the basement? She'd need some kind of clock to let her know when to leave to avoid her dad catching her, but she'd have more room and could afford to be a bit louder. She could study by day, and perhaps look into getting some of those Skill Books her power had mentioned. Running would probably help with her Dex, so she ought to take up jogging or something to train by day. She'd already been spamming Observe on everything she had the time to use it on without slowing down, and she could continue to do so on such hypothetical runs.
She even got a Skill out of this by the time she got home. 'Running. Passive. Level 1. A Skill for moving at an accelerated pace for a prolonged amount of time. 5% boost to running speed. 1% reduction to drain on stamina. 10% boost to physical attacks when you get a running start.' Which was pretty decent. She got in just as the sky started to turn gold. She really didn't live that far away from the school. Luckily, dad wasn't back yet, so she decided to use the computer that was set up on the ground floor. It was a cheap thing nearly half her age, but it worked well enough. She started looking over official sources of information. If studying raised her Int, then she wanted an immensely high Int. It would e best if Int and Wis were both high, but she didn't have the means to reliably raise the latter. A Sudoku book might work, but she could do that on the bus or at school.
She also took the opportunity to browse the PHO boards to refresh her knowledge of the Cape scene. The faint hope of becoming a Cape was all that had kept her going through the bullying campaign she'd suffered through. She could recognize that she'd been one more really bad day away from just giving up entirely, but now she had the potential to make a difference. She'd tell her father soon, but first, she'd like to have a decent amount of power, so she could avoid being forced into the Wards 'for her own good' and getting stuck with more high school drama and a legion of red tape determined to prevent her from being effective.
Interestingly, she managed to learn a few Skills from the information she accumulated. The three main sciences, Chemistry, Biology, and Physics, as well as a bit about Anatomy. She also learned Economics, just in case. Winslow wasn't doing a very good job of teaching her things, but getting transferred to Arcadia hadn't worked the first time. Possibly due to her grades taking a nosedive, possibly due to interference from Blackwell, though both wasn't outside the realm of possibility. She was normally a good student, but constant sabotage and having her enthusiasm for... life in general gradually chipped away had dropped her from A's to C's. Arcadia was a good school, and it was well-known that the Wards went there, so the school received much better funding than Winslow. In addition, the Trio would be hard-pressed to bother her there, for much the same reason they couldn't bother her at home. The local authorities were both more competent and less likely to take their side than Winslow's.
'Chemistry. Passive. Level 1. The study of how various elements and compounds interact with each other. Grants a 5% boost to chances of successfully mixing chemicals to get a desired result.
Biology. Passive. Level 1. The study of living things and how their bodies work. Grants a 5% boost to likelihood of scoring a critical hit or a non-lethal take-down, depending on the user's intentions.
Physics. Passive. Level 1. The study of the physical laws of reality and how they interact with each other and the world around us. 5% boost to accuracy of projectiles and combat pragmatism.
Anatomy. Passive. Level 1. The study of the body, from it's strong points to it's weak points. 5% boost to attempts at healing others or the user, damage to humanoid targets, and chances of scoring a critical hit on humanoid targets.
Economics. Passive. Level 1. The study of the patterns and flow of commerce, from supply and demand, to inflation, to the stock market. 5% boost to Int when making investments, and to chances of successful barter.'
When 5:30 rolled around, she started dinner, just macaroni and cheese, but it apparently counted for the Cooking Skill. 'Cooking. Passive. Level 1. This Skill allows the user to cook meals of varying quality depending on the ingredients and effort put in. 5% boost to taste of dish and any benefits it might apply.'
She was rather interested in what might happen if she used prime ingredients with a high-level Cooking Skill. Would she be able to impart benefits the food normally wouldn't possess? Like, food that healed people who weren't herself? Of course, they'd probably test it thoroughly before clearing it for use, and creating a healing technique might very well be easier, and would likely be faster in the long run.
At any rate, by 6:00, the macaroni had started getting cold, but dad finally got home. He looked more tired and worn down than usual. Though he brightened a bit when he saw her. He frowned when he saw that she'd made dinner because he'd taken too long, but it passed quickly. He thanked her for dinner, though they didn't really talk much besides that. They'd been drifting apart for more than a year, so she wasn't really surprised. She doubted he could do anything to help, and telling him what had been going on wasn't likely to do anything besides make him worry.
She knew that the economy was pretty bad, especially around here. The harbor had been the lifeblood of the city, but the risk of Leviathan attacking virtually eliminated the shipping industry. The Docks and the Boneyard were testaments to this. The former was slowly decaying as the workers were laid off because there was neither need nor money for them, and the latter was a grave marker for the shipping industry in the form of rotting ship hulls. Danny Hebert fought a losing battle every day to try and prevent the Docks from completely collapsing, but he was only delaying the inevitable, and both he and his workers knew it.
She wasn't sure what they'd do when he lost his job, but maybe she could make some money with her powers. There was a ton of legislation seemingly designed specifically to make it more difficult for Capes to make an honest living though, which had led directly to the formation of the Elite, a group of Villains dedicated to profit. She could see the reasoning behind it to some extent. After all, Capes that picked a side ceased to be unknown variables. She just questioned the wisdom of alienating so many people who didn't want to fight and adding to the number of Villains, who already outnumbered heroes 2:1 in most places. Seriously, was there some grand plot to turn people against each other she was missing, or did the people who made laws just not get the masses?
At any rate, she went back on the computer to study some more after dinner, then when she went up to bed. She snuck downstairs, netting herself the Stealth Skill. 'Stealth. Passive. Level 1. This Skill allows the user to avoid the notice of others. 5% reduction to chances of auditory, visual, or odor detection by others. The visual component is doubled in shadowed areas.' She grabbed the nearest clock that detached from the wall. This one had batteries that needed changing every month or so, and they'd been changed last week, so she should be fine. She kept an eye on the time, while exercising as much as her increased stamina allowed. Then she'd check the time while using Observe to pass the time.
She'd started by organizing what little there was down here, so there was a fair amount of room, and her father never came down here, so there was little chance of her activities being found out. Especially considering she barely left any evidence in the first place. What? Was he going to ground her for organizing a room he visited once a month if that? Anyway, she checked her Stats when 6:30 a.m. arrived.
'Level:1.
HP: 170. HP Regen: 1.7/min.
MP: 200. MP Regen: 4.2/min.
Str: 15.
Int: 18.
Vit: 18.
Dex: 16.
Wis: 21.
Lck: 6.'
She grabbed a quarter and an old Sudoku book from her room. The former to train her Lck and Dex, the latter to train her Wis. She tested the Sudoku book, and sure enough, after a dozen of the harder puzzles, she gained a point of Wis. By that time, it was 7:15, so she got ready for school. She'd been flipping the coin while doing the puzzle in order to train Multitasking, as well as her Stats. Flipping the coin gave her a point in Lck after every 5 or 6 correct guesses of which side it landed on, at least until it got to 10, at which point it became a lot slower going. She'd noticed something similar happen with Str and Vit, they suddenly took a lot longer to raise after they reached the bar for 'average' compared to when they were single digits.
She was still flipping the coin when she noticed something that made her stop cold. She had used Observe on Sophia out of sheer curiosity over what made the more aggressive girl target her, and discovered something very... interesting.
'Name: Sophia Hess.
Title: Shadow Stalker.
Level: 16.
HP: 300.
MP: N/A.
A probational Ward, formerly a vigilante. Shadow Stalker, AKA, Sophia Hess, underwent a psychotic break during her Trigger event, coming to see the world as 'predators' (Capes) and 'prey' (non-Capes). Sophia has convinced Emma Barnes of this philosophy, following a traumatic incident that ended with Sophia saving the girl. Between gratitude and her own psychotic break, Emma Barnes was easily influenced to follow her philosophy.'
She was torn between rage at the fact that her tormentor was a Ward, despair over the fact that Emma had apparently gone crazy while she was at summer camp, relief that Emma had been influenced by a poor mental state when she betrayed Taylor, a mix of surprise and guilt that she was feeling that relief at all, and a hint of vindication that Emma hadn't left her entirely because she decided Taylor was a loser and that she preferred Sophia. Gamer's Mind and her logic allied themselves with that vindication to snap her out of her momentary stupor and get her to her seat before the entire class noticed her staring. As it was, the glare Sophia was sending at her promised suffering if she didn't look away. She promptly broke eye contact, and started flipping her quarter to calm herself down.
So, the question was, what did she do about this? It was terrible that Emma had suffered a psychotic break, but that didn't mean she had to take on her savior's world view. Plenty of people had been saved by Scion, and he'd spoken less than ten words since he showed up nearly 30 years ago. No one was even sure what his world view was. She was also unsure if she even wanted Emma back any more. Who was to say she wouldn't decide to betray Taylor again as soon as it was convenient? That was assuming she could win Emma back at all. After what they'd done together, Sophia and Emma were probably pretty close, though she suspected Madison's link was a lot weaker. Then again, she'd thought she and Emma were close, and one incident had completely thrown that off a building.
Anyway, her first priority should be getting the bullying to stop. If Sophia had a modified version of 'kill or be killed' then maybe a show of strength would do the trick? She doubted that she could pull off a strong enough showing right now, but she didn't want to wait too long and get outed as a Parahuman for performing something blatantly impossible for a normal human. She could play the MAD card, what with knowing Sophia's identity, but that was iffy. Sophia wasn't the most stable individual from what she'd seen, and there was every chance that someone would push her and she'd blab, quite possibly without realizing immediately. Plus, violating the Unwritten Rules was a generally bad idea. Killing people in large numbers was a sure-fire way to get a lot of people willing to go straight for the 'kill on sight' option. While exposing someone's identity was a lot lower on the totem pole of 'don't do this' it was still a pretty bad idea.
Still, if they escalated any further, they'd hit attempted murder. They were unlikely to have anything planned for today since most sane people would have been out for at least a few days after what had happened to her. Ah, she had an idea. She waited until lunch, flipping her coin whenever she had the opportunity. Considering what some of the other students got up to, it was relatively tame, so almost everyone completely ignored her. With Multi-tasking, she had no trouble following the lesson in addition to her coin flipping. She also tested to see if she could control the bugs at the same time, and she could, but it suddenly became much harder to follow the lesson. It was probably because she'd hit the limit of how many 'tasks' she could focus on. Interestingly, focusing on her bugs' senses only counted as one task under Multitasking's rules. That would be useful.
During lunch, she went into the nearby girl's bathroom and sure enough, the Trio came in after her. "Ugh, does something smell?" Madison said, a smirk on her face and in her voice.
"Oh, it's just Taylor, she's always like that, though she smells worse than usual today. How stupid do you have to be to get stuck in your own locker though? Really, no looks, no smarts, you don't even smell good. You'll never get a boyfriend at this rate. Hell, good luck getting a job!" Emma chuckled. Taylor hated to admit she might have a point with the boyfriend thing. Her hair was the only thing she really took anything resembling good care of, and that was mostly as a reminder of her mother. She didn't have very good looks anyway, though her dislike of admitting that Emma might be right was mostly a desire to prove her wrong than any actual caring about getting a boyfriend on her part. She'd had most of her desire to spend time around people beaten out of her about the same time she stopped trusting them.
"Well? Are you gonna say something, or just stand there and take it like always?" Sophia asked, grinning in a way you'd expect a cat that just caught a mouse to. Though there was something else in her expression. A hint of interest? Hm, maybe she considered coming back to school so quickly a sign of strength?
Taylor let Gamer's Mind and a quick pair of Observes on Emma and Madison guide her. "Aren't you guys tired of doing this?" she asked, surprising them. "I mean, doesn't it get boring? This is the most I've responded in the past month combined. Surely there are more entertaining things to do with your time." Sure, Christmas and New Year's vacation played a role there, but when they did this sort of thing almost every school day none of them were sick, or presumably out because of Cape business in Sophia's case, it added up.
"What are you- Don't you care about what happened yesterday?" Emma asked, surprised into breaking the script they'd clearly been following.
"To be honest, I think I might have had a minor psychotic break. My emotions have been deadened ever since the locker, and frankly I'm half-tempted to thank you. I can think so much more clearly now." she said with a shrug. Not a complete lie, but she'd thank them the day Sophia sacrificed her life to save her. Maybe if they thought they'd made her a relatively benign sociopath, they'd ease up.
Madison was staring at her in something akin to horror and concern mixed together. "What does that mean... exactly?" she asked, slightly nervous.
Taylor shrugged. "I can still feel fear and the like, but it's like I'm watching a character on a TV show. I don't feel like I'm the one experiencing the emotions, so I'm unlikely to retaliate or even particularly care unless you're trying to kill me." she explained. That was a fairly accurate of the effects of Gamer's Mind. It didn't stop you from feeling emotions, but it made them much less involved in the process of making decisions. Almost everything turned into cost versus benefit. For instance, trying to get her old friend back wasn't worth the effort when she would be occupied with her training, and she couldn't be sure Emma wouldn't turn on her again.
"So, you could hurt someone if you thought it would benefit you in the long run without hesitating?" Sophia asked, suddenly showing a mix of interest and guardedness. Considering Taylor had basically just said she ran on different thought processes than a normal person, that was not unjustified. Gamer's Mind and Gamer's Body had completely removed all the little tells she'd have had when lying. Her body simply didn't react.
"Well, I'd probably make a show of hesitating to keep people from labeling me as a psycho, which would cause me all kinds of problems, but yeah probably." she agreed, playing along with the persona she'd developed a few moments ago.
"So why are you telling us this?" Emma asked, something that might have been concern in her voice.
"Simple." Taylor said casually. "I'd prefer if you stopped targeting me for your amusement, as a) we all have better things to do, and b) I might eventually decide that I don't care about the consequences any more and go all Carrie on you. Not the psychic powers thing, but pretty much everything else is fair game. I'm sure no one here wants that." she said with a smile. That seemed to unnerve them more than anything. Good, if they backed off, then all she had to do was get through each day like she'd done before the Locker, only with considerably less in the way of interruptions.
"Hm, I guess you've got a spine after all, even if you only got it yesterday." Sophia said after a moment.
"Good, we've got an agreement then. You move on to other projects, and I get more time to myself. Of course, I'll still avoid you in public. If my behavior suddenly changed, people might think I've Triggered or something, and I'd rather not have rumors about me floating around. On that note, you should probably deescalate relatively slowly over the course of the next couple weeks rather than suddenly stopping, which would be suspicious." she recommended. Unfortunate, but she wasn't taking any chances. The PRT had tracked down new Tinkers by following odd purchases in the past. One major event could bring them in like sharks smelling blood, and one of their Wards suddenly acting differently might set off alarm bells for someone. Considering Sophia was a Ward at all, being a Ward might very well be worse than she'd suspected.
"...Yeah, something is definitely wrong with you." Madison said as the three girls left. Taylor was more or less unmolested for the day, so she considered the act a success. Now then, training time.