Taylor set Victor into motion immediately, rushing to her aid. He would be the one with the most medical training among them, and would be expected to tend to her wounds. Her shoulder was a ruin, twelve gauge HESH round fired from a shotgun turned revolver. Inaccurate as hell, but Melissa had been close enough it didn’t matter.
Sophia, who had been watching the entire thing let out a low whistle when she caught sight of the damages. Taylor did her best to ignore the girl, for Motoko’s sake, at least until the Nine run was finished. She fully planned to confront that mess, though Jacob's twisted advice still made a sick sort of sense, even if it was toxic. That didn't invalidate her feelings, but it did help her to understand.
Purity's breaths were coming in short, ragged gasps as Night held her arm and Victor's hands worked to seal the spurting blood vessels. The problem, Taylor realized, was that her specialty was to replace, not repair, and she needed the knowledge of how to actually fix such an injury. In a panic, she invited Riley and Amy into a call.
“You don’t know how to treat this,” Amy said after barely a moment, looking at the monitor that was displaying the feed from Victor’s eyes.
“Neither do you,” Riley said, though for her she was there, looking through Victor’s eyes. “Oh, this is a toughie. Melissa messed her up good.”
“Less commentary, more help,” Taylor said. A step-by-step guide began to form, as well as what she could appropriate as impromptu tools. “Thanks.”
“Seems a bother to keep this charade,” Riley said. “Why not just activate my surprise?”
Victor worked according to Riley’s design, Taylor’s own ability telling her bits and pieces. She wasn’t saving the woman, she was just making it look like the attempt was being made. Kayden Anders would bleed out, and Purity would die.
“She’s unconscious,” Night said, her voice heavy with something that sounded like grief being expressed by someone who had never felt the emotion. Acted, expected. “She can’t die. Think of her daughter, she needs a mother.”
Taylor’s heart would have twisted if she didn’t have a list of each and every person killed by Purity over the literal decade and a half she was active. It wasn’t a short list by any means.
The Major’s purpose at Medhall was fulfilled, and thus Motoko returned to Toybox. She set the rifle aside before taking her seat next to Sophia. Taylor was grateful for the lack of physical affection being shown. Just because she now understood Sophia’s circumstances didn’t change how she felt about the woman.
She owed her a punch to the face, bare minimum.
Purity was already beyond saving, unless Amy got to her in the next five minutes or so. She would not, of course. She was sitting in her bedroom, watching the shitshow unfold on her laptop. The girl even had a bowl of popcorn which was more than a bit unsettling. Somehow Amy had escaped notice during the PRT escape, likely through clever use of Grue’s darkness, and Carol hadn’t accused her once of assisting villains.
With a heavy sigh, Taylor stood. Lisa squeezed her hand before drifting back to the screens. Taylor could multitask well enough to handle Victor’s role from there, she had a part to play elsewhere.
Taylor stepped through a shimmering portal and back into Brockton Bay for the first time since she had been gunned down. Taylor Hebert was dead, but she still had use for the future. Hannah was waiting for her, bandanna around her neck rather than covering her face. There was no point hiding it, as Calvert revealed her identity during her fucking funeral.
“Taylor,” she said briskly, falling into step with her as she did. “The Dockworkers are all present.”
She nodded, not trusting her own voice. The Union was on its last legs after her father’s death. Vultures had circled and word was that someone had accepted an offer from the Empire. That wouldn’t be allowed to stand. She had a name, and it wasn’t one she was pleased to hear.
Kurt and Lacey were some of her father’s oldest friends, and he had bent the knee, out of fear no doubt, but it mattered little. Taylor wasn’t an innocent girl anymore, she willingly joined a band of murderers, sanctioned or not. The woman beside her accepted the same bargain in the end, Jacob was convincing like that. Neither would shy away from what would be the next step.
“The Undersiders?”
Hannah looked at her, stride flinching for a moment as she did. “Grue will be there along with Hellhound.”
“Bitch,” Taylor said. “At least call her by her proper name.”
“Right,” Hannah said. “Regent will be on overwatch with me. Hopefully we’re enough for security.”
“What about Imp?” Taylor asked.
Hannah’s entire person seemed to hitch, as if she had been hit by a power effect as she stumbled. Her face had fallen blank.
Lisa snorted. “We’re shielded, she isn’t. Add in the dimensional gap and her power can’t work on us.”
That explained it. Hannah declined a cyber brain upgrade on the grounds that it might be seen as a Bonesaw addition. She wasn’t wrong at least, that was a very real fear and it wasn’t as though they would trust Amy on her word alone. Other tests were expected, between mundane doctors and other healers they wouldn’t miss the lump of metal in her head.
The DWA building loomed ahead, the sole occupied building in an otherwise rundown area of the waterfront. Not far in the distance, the graveyard loomed, broken hulls jutting from the shipping lanes. They weren’t expecting company, or at least not the kind Taylor would be bringing.
With a weary sigh, Taylor shifted back to the subject at hand. “Hopefully the guns won’t come out, but regardless, wait for my signal before revealing yourself. You’re going to be a Nine puppet, so we need to play into that.”
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“I’ve mentioned how much I hate that plan,” Hannah said.
“And I’ve mentioned how little I care,” she answered sharply. “You dated my dad for all of a month, you’re lucky I’m even giving you a seat at the table. You’re alive because it fucked over Calvert to save you.”
“Being used,” Hannah hissed. “You’re using me just as he did.”
“You were given the choice,” Taylor snapped, her frustration from having to play Victor bleeding over. “We’re all going to do things we hate before this is done. Either fuck off or do what you agreed to.”
Taylor picked up her pace, leaving Hannah behind. She was doing her best to ignore the screaming and yelling back in that Medhall office as it became clear that Victor hadn’t been able to save Purity’s life. Such a tragedy and all that, could they just move on already so they could get to the next stage of the plan?
Riley had been right, their little surprises within Victor would be so much easier, both on the whole and for her own sanity. Even playing the part of a Nazi was grating on her, and how casually they dropped slurs as if that made them better, it was too much. They weren’t as focused on Victor, not after she had him start muttering about Ethel this, his fault that.
It was so tiresome.
Thankfully, she had a pitch prepared and was going to make it. Her father’s work wouldn’t be undone just because some Nazi pricks threw some money around and threatened the right people. She entered the Union office as she had done many times before, knowing exactly where they would be holding a meeting of such importance.
“Ugh, I wish I could be there for this,” Lisa whined. “You know I live for this shit Tay!”
Taylor chuckled, letting it bleed some of her frustration away. “I know, Lise. You’re our trump card though. Calvert believes you to be dead and we really need to keep it that way, at least for now.”
The truth was, he likely had men inside the DWU, and revealing that Taylor Hebert was alive was already enough of a gamble. She was needed simply because of the connection to her father. People there knew her, and that was the key to getting through to them without needless killing.
Taylor was a killer now, and the weight of that was lessening with each life taken. Just because she and Motoko were now separate people didn’t change that they weren’t in those early days. That was a justification that Taylor refused to make as it would be too easy to pass the blame along. Everyone that died in the coming days would be on her, even if she didn’t pull the trigger herself, because these were her plans in the end. That was something that she accepted, even if she didn’t like it.
Not even sixteen and already she could feel the weight of her choices upon her shoulders. Blonde hair, green eyes and adorable freckles had drawn her in, and she decided she would do anything to protect them, and now she was paying for it. Calvert’s head was the prize she sought in taking that first step even if she didn’t realize it, and soon Lisa would have it. Taylor didn’t regret it for even a second.
“—This is horseshit and you know it!” someone yelled from down the hall.
Taylor picked up her pace, arriving at the room just in time to see the divisions in stark contrast, she had all of a second to make a decision. On one side a man with a shaved head stood at the front of a group, she noted with some sadness that Kurt and Lacey were behind them. On the other side stood Alexander, a man in his twenties, skin dark and hair the color of dancing flame. Behind him were the other people the Empire frowned upon, and a few others besides.
They were outnumbered, that much was clear.
Taylor didn’t hesitate, her gun cleared the shoulder holster under the leather jacket that Lisa had bought her what felt like a lifetime ago. Motoko had returned it, as it was a gift from Lisa to Taylor and she didn’t feel right keeping it. She had no idea how much that actually meant to Taylor.
She didn’t need to truly aim, the software took care of it for her as the bullet line crossed over the man.
She fired.
His bald head burst like a melon, the bullet exiting at an angle deflected off bone. Half the room dropped to the ground, others stilled, and still more pulled guns of her own. Each was identified and she leveled her gun on the one that didn’t belong.
“Evening,” she said, not breaking eye contact with the second Empire man in the room. That he was tucked in with Alexander’s side spoke of the shape of how things would unfold. “Drop the gun, because I’m not above killing more Nazis today.”
The silence in the room was only marred by the spasms of the dead man on the floor, whose heart still hadn’t quite figured out that he was already dead. She swept her gaze across the room, and settled on Lacey.
“I must confess to being disappointed,” she said with steel in her voice. “My father fought for the Union his entire life, and this is how you honor him in his death? By selling the Union to the Empire?”
Her gun hadn’t left the man, but he must have thought her distracted enough to try and pull his own gun. She shot him down without a word spoken.
“Four,” she said coldly. “Anyone want to make it five?”
“Taylor, you’re alive?” Lacey asked.
“Thanks to Panacea,” she said. “My father took a bullet to the back of the head shielding me, she couldn’t do anything to help him.”
It tore her up to say it, even weeks later. Lisa’s avatar reached out for her even as she sent information from the Empire meeting to the others. The Empire needed to respond to the challenge that was issued and inform the Protectorate that the Nine were back in the Bay.
She made Victor sigh. “While I do agree they must be informed, we need a show of strength to remind the people that we are not weakened.”
“You have a suggestion?” Kaiser asked.
She had him nod. “A rally. Make it public but secure. Invite loyal members of the Empire to line the rows. Broadcast the speech, the Protectorate will get the message all the same.”
“We would be inviting the Nine to attack,” Hookwolf said. “We are strong, but not invincible.”
“An attack will happen, we simply prepare for it and put it down. If we kill a member of the Nine, it will count as a victory even if we lose three people for it. Symbolic, yes, but that will matter more in the long term.”
“Very well,” Kaiser said, his voice hollow. “I will leave the details to you. I am sorry for Ethel, truly.”
“Thank you, Max.”
Taylor shivered, she wanted nothing more than to be done with that farce. Soon, but not yet. She refocused on the standoff with the Union, many trembling in fear from her little display. She ignored Kurt, as the entire thing was his idea. That he shared a name with one of her friends irritated her. Jacob’s Kurt would never side with Nazis, even under pain of death.
“I’m glad to see you carry some of Danny’s fire in you,” Lacey said with a sigh. “Though, you have more of Annette’s drive for justice.”
“No Pasaran,” Taylor said, smiling savagely. “It was practically the motto of the movement by the end. I’ve adopted it as my own in honor of her memory.”
It was a decision that Taylor had arrived at in the wake of the attempt on her life. All the influences on her home would be removed and she would put people in place that would enforce a peace upon it. On that signal, Grue stepped in behind her, darkness billowing off of him.
“The Nazis’ time has come, and soon they will all be dead,” Taylor said cheerfully. “Congratulations, you get to be the vanguard for the battles to come. The Undersiders will claim territory, and you will help them hold it.”
“What about Lung?” Alexander asked, though she could see him considering it.
Taylor smiled, and there was nothing kind about it. “Leave that to those best suited for slaying monsters.”
