In Which Alexandria is Confused and Taylor Takes her Endbringer Out for Walkies

Rebecca Costa-Brown was a woman used to being blindsided. Every day, new cases passed her desk, either at the Protectorate Headquarters or in her little office within the confines of a Cauldron base. She could remember, in excruciating detail, the first battle against Behemoth, the first appearance of Leviathan and the day the Simurgh tore apart Lausanne.

There was never, truly, a sense that she had 'seen it all.' Sure, she was one of the strongest capes out there, and yes, as Chief Director of the PRT she had seen more than most, but she knew to keep herself grounded and expect the worse.

She pressed a hand to her right cheek, eyes unfocused on the screen before her. The call from Director Piggot--over an emergency line, no less--had been worrying enough. The report she was now reading didn't make things much better.

Taking a deep breath, she refocused and, with a few clicks, cleared her appointments for the rest of the evening and the next morning. She picked up her office phone and pressed a few keys, turning on a few Tinkertech anti-spyware programs. "Legend I need you in my office, as soon as you can get here," she said the moment the line was picked up.

"I'll be there in two," Legend replied, his voice unusually serious. He had picked up on her own tone.

Hanging up, Rebecca walked over to the window taking up half her office's wall and worked it open. Just in time, as a prismatic streak was cutting through Los Angeles skyline. When the hero slipped into her room, she shut the window and turned to him.

"What's wrong, Rebecca?" he asked, his brow knit in worry.

Rebecca opened her mouth to speak, then paused. "I'm not sure where to start, so I guess I'll start from the beginning. Did you notice anything strange during yesterday's battle?"

Legend seemed to consider this for a moment. "It was pretty standard. We got there earlier than usual, had time to set things up. And the city came out of it better than I had hoped or expected. Leviathan left at some point but no one was around to see it happen, at least, no one I spoke to."

Rebecca nodded. "That's because he never left the city." She talked past his surprised expression. "I received a report from Director Piggot from Brockton Bay, two of her capes ran into a young woman who was, and I quote' being followed by Leviathan as though it was her pet poodle.' That's from Assault who was on the scene."

"And it's real?" he asked.

"From what I've gathered, yes. She claims that she's not interested in joining the Wards, but she acted to stop an assault on a supply convoy by the Empire Eighty Eight. Legend, this girl is walking around free with an Endbringer at her beck and call."

He eyed her and she knew what he was going to say next. "'Becca, if she's got any sort of heroic inclination, we can't just... get rid of her. This is an opportunity."

"I know. Trust me, I know. We need this girl on our side. I don't know if her control extends to the others or not, but even if it doesn't, we can't let her just... wander around with that kind of firepower." She pinched the bridge of her nose. "I'm going to send word to evacuate the city, but for them to do it quietly."

"I want to meet her," he said.

Rebecca paused. On the one hand, he was a member of the Triumvirate. If anyone could get away from a hairy situation it would be him. And he was incredibly charismatic. Chances were good that if he opened a dialogue with this Queen Administrator girl, he would get her talking, and maybe convince her to join up where they could better control her. On the other hand, it was a risk. But then, it was no more dangerous that being deployed to any other Endbringer battle.

"Battery from the Protectorate ENE convinced her to show up tomorrow to talk with the PRT. The girl probably wants to sign up as an independent."

"And we don't want that?" he asked.

Rebecca made a so-so gesture. "We'd rather have her onboard than not. This isn't the kind of thing you can ignore, and we need to keep her safe from the Fallen, the Slaughterhouse Nine or the Yàngbǎn whatever she chooses. Contessa can probably help with that. But I would much rather she be under our thumb."

"'Becca, I'm not going to force a kid to join us. If she wants to be independent then we can help her without taking away her freedom. If we're kind to her she'll probably join us of her own free will."

The chief director shifted on the spot. "Fine, try it your way. If anything it will at least appease her and show that we're taking things seriously." She leaned back onto her desk. "But do be careful."

Legend gave her one of his signature smiles. "Don't worry, I'm sure everything will be fine."

***

"And this, it Mr. Fish!" Taylor said. She was in an excellent mood. Yeah, sure, she had to help at the dog shelter, but it wasn't any worse than doing chores at home and she got to play with the dogs a bit. She just hoped that Leviathan wasn't getting jealous of all the attention she was paying to the dogs.

Rachel took in the alleyway where the blue light of a rising sun was only just bright enough to highlight the shadows and hide the worse of the debris lining the walls. Then she looked up at the tallest shadow, at the four-eyed creature standing thirty feet tall and whose arms had descended onto either side of Taylor in an almost protective fashion.

"That's not a dog."

"Well, no, but he acts like a dog... sometimes." Taylor hugged Leviathan's leg and smiled up at the city-killing monster. "So, uh, you said that you wanted to go on patrol with your dogs. Could I bring Mr. Fish along? See, we're trying to be heroes too."

Rachel looked down from the Endbringer and stared at Taylor. "Will he hurt my dogs?"

"No! Well, not unless they try to hurt me."

She shrugged. "Okay, I guess. Does he need a leash?"

"Do you have one that's big enough?" Taylor asked back a little dubiously. Leviathan's neck was rather on the thick side.

"Yeah." With that, Rachel turned and made her way back towards the dog shelter, her three constant companions at her heels though they were sneaking looks at Leviathan.

The shelter was only just down the block from where Leviathan was hiding, so Taylor didn't have far to go to find her Endbringer. With a few quick motions, she put her bandanna back on and pulled down her hoodie, noting as she did that her clothes were getting a little scruffy.

"Come on!" she called over her shoulder.

{Understood.} Leviathan followed after her, his footsteps making the ground tremble.

Taylor, no, the intrepid heroine Queen Administrator and her plucky sidekick Unit Two, waited in front of the shelter and ignored the panicked screams from just down the road. Yes, Unit Two did look rather scary, but there wasn't much she could do about that... yet.

Rachel came out with a mask held in one hand and a length of chain dangling from the other. "Here," she said as she passed Taylor the chain and began to affix her mask. "We'll go around this block, then head west."

"Cool. Hey, do you think it'd be alright if we take something of a detour? I, uh, want to check on something."

"'S long as it don't take too long." Rachel tapped her dogs on their heads. Taylor watched, fascinated, as the dogs started to grow bigger and taller and boney spikes tore out of their bodies. In a few short minutes the dogs were the size of minivans and Rachel was climbing up the side of the biggest of them.

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"Wait, you're going to ride on your patrol?" Taylor asked. She couldn't see the look Rachel was giving her on account of the mask, but it was easy to guess. "Uh, okay, give me a minute."

Turning to Leviathan she gestured at the Endbringer, and when that failed to do anything tried speaking. "Hey, can you dip your head down a bit?"

{Complying.} he said as he lowered his head.

Giving him a smile in gratitude, Taylor looped the chain around his neck, then fastened it into a rough knot. "Hey, do you think I could ride on your shoulder?" she asked.

{Affirmative.}

"Awesome!" Taking a bit of a running leap, Taylor grabbed onto the slick fish-like skin along Leviathan's back and pulled herself up so that she was perched on his shoulder, then she grabbed onto the chain still wrapped around his neck and used it as a handhold. "Okay, okay, now stand up, but slowly."

{Understood.} Gently, Leviathan stood up to his full height and Taylor, perched on his shoulder and looking at the ground far below, giggled in a mixture of joy and vertigo. "Hey, if I fall, you'll catch me, right?"

{Additional Secondary Directive: Prevent Host-Queen_Administrator from suffering from kinetic damage in case of a fall. Directive Accepted.}

"Okay Rachel, lead the way!" she called out to her new buddy.

Rachel looked nonplussed but soldiered on with aplomb. "This way."

The first few steps were a little jarring, but some whispered instructions had Leviathan even out his pace so that he was slinking forwards like a predator stalking prey, rather than a giant in a fragile world. It also made Taylor realize something really important. "I need a sword."

{New Secondary Directive: Acquire 'Sword?'}

"Hrm, no, no, I'll find one on my own. You know, it's almost too bad that you splattered Kaiser, I bet he could make awesome swords. Ohh, and we should get you a costume. Or at least a hat!"

{New Secondary Directive: Acquire 'Hat?'}

"Yes. But later."

The patrol route that Rachel lead Taylor down was fairly simple. First, they cut out towards the Boardwalk where looters and scavengers were even now breaking into shops. Most of these fled as soon saw they saw Rachel's huge dogs. The rest ran screaming when they saw Taylor and Mr. Fish. It made her feel all warm inside, to know that she was helping protect the city, and only a couple of days since deciding to become a cape!

Then, with a few grunted cues, Rachel led her deeper into the city into what was once Empire territory, but was now mostly a wrecked landscape. There were more normal people here, and they tended to shy away from the pair of capes but didn't always run screaming. A few even took out phones to take pictures and film their passing.

Taylor waved shyly at a few of them, but quickly found herself pressing into Leviathan's side to avoid the gazes of their cameras. "Are we going to circle back to the shelter now?" she asked.

"Mmm, not yet. Gonna go see one of my... friends first."

"Okay, cool. And, um, the place I wanted to go was that way. It's not too far, especially since we're moving pretty fast."

Rachel looked in the direction Taylor was pointing. "We could go by rooftop."

"Oh, that sounds so cool!"

"Later," she said before turning her attention back to where her pack was walking. They crossed the entrance to another shelter, this one taking up an entire church and a few community buildings as well as a large parking area that hadn't been too badly hit by the flooding, then Rachel led them off the main roads and through a winding path made up entirely of alleyways and passages through broken fences.

She slowed to a stop, whistling so that her other dogs did the same, just as they were nearing the docks. "It's there," she said, pointing towards a two story building that didn't seem to have been hit too hard by the attack. "Stay here."

There were maybe a dozen people hanging around the entrance from every ethnic group and age, which as far as Taylor knew was a good sign. A desk sat just outside, manned by a gruff older man with a military bearing and a pretty blonde girl.

"Lisa!" Rachel called out as she brought her dogs a little closer.

The blonde looked up and grinned at Rachel. "Heya Bitch, doing your rounds, I see," she said before turning to whisper something to the man next to her. "I'll be with you in a minute." She raced into the shelter.

Taylor, who was until then sneaking a peak around the corner, pulled back on Leviathan's leash and pointed off towards the side. "There," she said and the lumbering Endbringer shifted over to where she had pointed.

This day had been getting better and better. Hanging out with Rachel wasn't quite fun, but she was a nice enough girl and didn't pry much. Taylor wasn't sure if she could trust her yet not after... She shook her head. Anyway, Rachel seemed the same way, which, if anything, made her feel much better about herself. And later they would go by her house, maybe dad... but she'd better not think about that either.

"So, Leviathan, do you know any tricks?"

{Definition Request: 'Tricks.'}

"You know, like, uh, shake hands, play dead, stuff like that."

{Unit-02 capabilities include: Psychological Warfare, Macro Hydrokinesis, Flow Dynamics Manipulation, Ranged Sensing--}

"No, no, none of those are useful," Taylor said with a shake of her head. "I meant stuff you can do, you know, like, um, maybe you could use your Hydrokinesis for fishing, or something."

{Correction Understood. Unit-02 capabilities include: Mass Manipulation of Marine Biology, Promoting Conflict, Genocide, Temperature Manipulation, Weather Manipulation, Landscaping--}

"Oh, oh, could you make ice cream?"

Leviathan paused. That wasn't to say that he had been moving much, but his arms did sway a little and his head was always moving, now he froze on the spot. Half a minute later the Endbringer started moving again. {Affirmative.}

Taylor's grin was vicious. "Perfect. Now, I know people think you're scary, but I'm sure we could go and grab some ingredients and make some killer ice cream, then we can give it to all the kids in the shelters. Maybe start a mini-water park with your hydrokinesis? Yeah, I've got this PR stuff in the bag. Endbringer? Hah, more like... Ice-Cream-Bringer... we can work on that one."

"Taylor," came Rachel's voice from around the corner. "Lisa wants to talk at you."

Rachel and her friend, Lisa, came around the corner. The blonde was rolling her eyes at her friend's phrasing, a smug grin on her face. Then she actually looked ahead of her and promptly twitched so hard that she almost landed on her face.

Two wide eyes stared up at Leviathan, then raced up to the girl sitting on his shoulder. "Hi! You must be Lisa. Rachel... well, actually she didn't say anything about you, but that means she didn't say anything bad, right? I'm not very good at introductions am I?" she said. Then, in what might have been a suicidal move for a non-Brute, she shoved herself off the Endbringer and fell towards the ground.

Just a few feet before crashing to the pavement, a tendril of swirling water wrapped around her waist and gently caught her before lowering down to the ground and whipping back from whence it came. She extended a hand towards Lisa. "I'm Taylor, or Queen Administrator in costume. Pleased to meetcha!"

Lisa fainted.