The Other 1.2

Taylor felt much more human after the shower and getting dressed in a dark blue Protectorate t-shirt and sweat pants. She wore only socks, because she was not ever going to put on those shoes again. Someone had even left her a bio-hazard bag out to put all her stuff into. The only thing she kept was her wallet and her house key (even then she still threw away the leather string it had been on).

There was also a plain black mask that covered all of her face and head except her eyes. She felt incredibly dumb pulling it on, her wet hair pressed down on the nape of her neck. The image in the mirror made her look like some weirdo in a mask. Which, now that she thought of it, was probably too accurate.

When she stepped out of the women's locker, she ran into a woman wearing a full black bodysuit covered in lavender faux-circuit designs. She almost stumbled backwards.

"Hello! I heard you were that Alexandria from earlier. Sounds like a pretty cool power. I'm Battery," she said warmly. "I'm supposed to escort you back to the quarantine room so that you can talk to Armsmaster. New trigger, right?"

Taylor nodded mutely.

"So you probably don't have a name. I wouldn't suggest Alexandria 2.0 or something, way too confusing in battle. You wouldn't believe the mess that happened because of Red Ronin and Red Rifle during an Endbringer fight. And they were even on the same team from Toledo" Battery shook her head. "So did you have her powers? I thought Velocity said you flew here?"

"I think so?" Taylor said tentatively.

"Well, with two Alexandria's I'm sure that we'll do much better at the next Endbringer fight," Battery said hopefully. When she didn't get a response, she turned back and stared hard.

At herself.

"What the fuck?" Battery said. "Did you just turn into me?"

Taylor-Battery nodded. "I don't feel very superhuman though. Did I get the powers wrong?"

"You have to stand absolutely still and charge them up. Don't overdo it. If you go over a minute you will hurt yourself." Battery was seriously trying to not fucking freak out. Hmm. Her costume wasn't glowing as she charged up.

Then they both blurred off at superhuman speeds, appearing in front of the door to the containment room.

"Wow, what a rush!" Taylor said, feeling a surge of adrenaline as she let the form that was covering her disappear.

"It really is, isn't it? Damn, that's a high Trump rating there. Changer/Stranger and Trump at the least. I hope you join the Wards. I would love to have you at my back against Lung or Kaiser," Battery said with an amused tone. "I'm supposed to stand guard out here."

Taylor nodded and went through the door that opened in front of her. The inner door was open, showing Dragon and Armsmaster standing next to Alexandria.

"Good, you are here," Alexandria said. "Door."

The wall behind her disappeared, showing a long corridor.

"Are you doing alright, Taylor?" Dragon asked, putting her armored hand on the girl's shoulder.

"A bit better. Today has really sucked," she said in a soft voice.

"First generation triggers are very bad. If you ever need someone to talk to, I would be willing to lend an ear," the heroine in power armor said.

"Let's go," Armsmaster said brusquely.

They walked down the corridor, the doorway behind them staying open.

"Good, you did manage to leave a channel open back to Earth Bet. Very interesting," Dragon said.

At a random seeming door (labeled 2035) they entered a conference room with five people already present. Eidolon and Legend, along with two unknown and unmasked women and one unmasked man. The dark-skinned woman looked very unhappy.

The woman standing next to her gave a small nod. "Please do not panic. Dragon, Code Epsilon-Delta-Bravo-Niner-Niner-Niner-One-One-One, lockout all external commands other than my voice. Disconnect all external channels other than the one connecting to this armor."

"What the hell was that?" Armsmaster demanded, half-reaching for his halberd.

"I don't feel different," Dragon said worriedly. "Did you just lockout... Yes, you must have locked out Saint with that. How?"

"It is what my power told me to say. Saint knowing more about what is going on would be bad, so it must have decided that locking him out was necessary," the woman in the suit said.

The unmasked man gave her a look that was only half-surprised. "Well, this is a day of surprises. Dragon is a robot?"

"I prefer the term Artificial Intelligence. I would ask that you do not use your power to control me like that again. Without my direct request, anyways," the female, six and a half foot tall armored heroine said nervously.

"We can come to an arrangement, I think. You can call me Doctor Mother," the dark-skinned woman said for her 'bodyguard' and as introduction.

"You may call me Contessa. And yes, my power leads me to take certain actions to better assist Cauldron. Currently I am having it help me gain your willing trust," the dark-haired young woman said.

"I'm Number Man. I also use my thinker powers to assist Cauldron in discovering how to stop Scion from destroying all human life in every dimension," the man in the suit said as he studied the new trio amidst there."

"You know the two of us, of course. I'm Legend, but you can call me Darren," Legend said as he removed his mask. He had a charming look, with matted blonde hair that lent him a younger appearance.

Eidolon did not look happy at that, but flipped his hood back. Peeling his mask off, he said in a distant, emotionless tone, "Call me David." He looked incredibly plain with thinning hair on top under his mask and his neck was thinner than Taylor would have thought.

Armsmaster actually relaxed at that. "So Scion destroys the world?"

"No, Armsmaster, he destroys every version of Earth that ever existed that has any humans on it. It is just a matter of when. We have accessed powerful thinkers and precogs and this is almost a certainty. There is a narrow window where if his rampage starts within the next three years, that only 80 % of all humanity dies. We have plans beyond that time, but it is more in the effort to sustain human civilization," Doctor Mother explained calmly.

Taylor was frowning under her mask. She did not like that woman already. She reached out with her power and tried to turn into her, only to fail. She blinked at that. Then she looked over at Contessa and suddenly she was the young woman.

"I would ask that you not use your powers to duplicate my own at this time," Contessa said, suddenly looking concerned.

What was her power? Taylor was curious.

"Step One: Ask what the path to victory is," she said aloud.

That seemed to startle the conspirators. It actually got Contessa to go pale at that.

It got a frown and pursed lips from Armsmaster. Dragon's head was now closely watching her.

Contessa did not look very happy. "My power allows me to ask a question or how to do something and I get the exact steps required to make it happen." She wanted that power turned off as soon as possible and that was the quickest path to get that to happen.

"Oh, neat. Do you mind if I used to it to get the bullies to stop picking on me? Later I mean?" Taylor asked as she let that form disappear.

Contessa nodded. Step three: Complete.

"God damn. That's a powerful trump ability," Darren said, then whistled appreciatively.

"Can you turn into me?" Eidolon demanded. He had already put his mask back on.

She tried his and Legend's form, then flickered for a moment into the form of Dragon. That had felt very weird. "Um, no? I can't turn into you, Legend, Armsmaster or Number Man." She had just tried. For some reason it didn't work.

That seemed to relax them slightly, except for Armsmaster. "I could have used extra help in my tinkering."

Dragon laughed at that. "I can't believe you actually finally cracked a joke, Armsmaster."

He started to open his mouth, then closed it with a snap. He almost seemed embarrassed. With a small shake of his head, he got back on track. "What proof do you have that Scion will destroy the world? Proof that requires you to control the Protectorate and the Parahuman Response Team?"

"It starts with an alien entity that crashed to Earth. Something went wrong and she lost control at just the wrong moment. Contessa and myself were lucky enough to make it to the alien before she finished forming an invincible human form."

"I was very young, but I knew if I killed it that my Earth would be saved. I started to kill it, but she directly manipulated my power and I was suddenly not able to use it on the Entity. Doctor Mother happened to be right there and was able to finish the job," Contessa explained with her hands behind her back.

"That alien, we discovered, was one of a pair. Unfortunately, we cannot directly use our thinker powers on Scion, as the entities have limited the powers they give to us. Specifically limited. Because of that, we have to try and make the best plans we can to stop him using just human intelligence. That has been the entire purpose of Cauldron. We have the ability to sell powers and have been producing as many as we reasonable can so that we have enough people available to fight Scion for the slim hope of humanity."

"The Case 53s. You made them," Dragon said after a long moment. "It took experimentation to figure out how to make powers. Mistakes must have been made."

Darren looked slightly surprised at that. And then not very happy at all.

"We also created many heroes and even villains. We are not particularly picky, just that the powers be useful. It allowed us to amass wealth and power to use to build our army," Doctor Mother continued.

Taylor was now quite confused, but continued listening.

"That's... not very ethical," Armsmaster said carefully.

"We are effectively past accidentally creating more Case 53s. Even they may have a use in fighting the Entity. We need so many to even have a hope."

"So we are going to show you the proof you need," Contessa explained. "Door."

The wall behind her disappeared, allowing them to see a short hall and a huge vault door.

Doctor Mother seemed absolutely surprised, but recovered quickly. "This way."

The door was in front of a large elevator. Everyone entered and then it started to go down smoothly.

"We must be going down very far," Armsmaster noted idly.

"Yes, below a mountain actually," Number Man said with a grim nod.

"I just lost signal to my main system," Dragon warned.

"Door," Alexandria called out softly. "He should have opened several small portal for your transmissions to pass through."

"Very versatile." Armsmaster did not sound like he had decided that as a compliment or noting it as threatening.

"Why did we not 'door' directly to where we are going?" Dragon asked curiously.

"The space there is very warped. Door can not open a portal there safely," Alexandria said grimly.

That did not sound good at all, Taylor thought.

It was a giant room, filled with flesh horrors.

"This is the first Entity, isn't it?" Armsmaster asked first after the members of Cauldron let them look that franky eye-watering and twisted mass of limbs and bulbous bodies.

"We named her Eden. Contessa and I were lucky that there happened to be a path to her main body and that it was susceptible to decapitation. Even with astronomical odds in our favor, we nearly didn't kill her. Our understanding is that she would have been equally as powerful as Scion, but perhaps a bit smarter or more adaptable." The dark-skinned woman did not look happy at all.

"This is a lot to take in. Are those fractal space-distortions into other dimensions? Just seeing those makes me think I could improve the anti-teleportation technology just by studying them," Dragon mused aloud. "I wonder if I could create a drone that could traverse them. Find out what is beyond there."

"So Scion's real body isn't in our dimension, is it?" Taylor said, thinking very hard as she looked at the horrors in fascination.

"Most likely. So actually striking at him is nearly impossible with any conventional weapon," Alexandria said, getting a nod from Eidolon and Legend.

"Even unconventional weapons. We'd need to develop a form of dimensional battering ram and use an unprecedented amount of power behind it," Armsmaster mused to himself. "I've got some ideas. This... is very convincing."

"All of our powers come from these things," Legend said, looking a bit uncomfortable himself.

"But we still don't understand them really. Or how to draw their power more efficiently," Eidolon stated in a firm, almost angry tone.

"So humans don't really have powers? It's just space slug in another dimension attaching to us?" Taylor asked curiously.

"We think so." Doctor Mother turned to them. "Will you be at least willing to keep silent about Alexandria's secondary job? It is quite critical in helping us advance our cause."

"Not without involving myself more here. While stopping criminals in Brockton Bay and fighting Endbringers is important, stopping Scion is suddenly a great deal more important. So I am going to offer my abilities to help with this. Perhaps help Dragon probe the secrets of how to traverse dimensions. If we can narrow down where is real body is, it isn't nearly as hopeless," Armsmaster stated firmly. And it would allow him to watch them, to really see what they were like.

Contessa seemed to be studying him closely. "He can succeed in only six months with a little assistance. Maybe not to Scion's dimension, but other dimensions than with the use of Door. That could be useful."

"I want to help, too. I mean, I can use powers of other heroes. I'm sure I can figure out more uses for my powers," Taylor said.

"You want to be a hero?" Doctor Mother asked, her eyebrows raising in surprise.

"It's my world, too."

"And mine, as well. I have a lot of duties, but a great deal of resources also," Dragon said in a strong clear voice. She was actually having thoughts like Armsmaster, wanting to keep an eye on Cauldron. It was so terrifying, worrying that they could just turn her off. Contessa's power could easily use any hidden weaknesses in her programming.

But it was her world, too!

"An Alexandria double would be useful for some of the non-essential tasks," the female Triumvirate mused.

"And against Endbringers," Darren said with a grin. "But we all have duties to get back to. The paperwork piles up fast if you don't keep on top of it."

"Welcome to Cauldron," Contessa said, holding her hand out to Armsmaster.

He took the hand and shook it.

One long elevator trip and through a 'Door' and they were back at the Protectorate's base in Brockton Bay.

"Now what?" Taylor asked worriedly.

Armsmaster chuckled at that. "Now we see about getting you inducted into the Wards. That will give you some cover on what you can do to assist our extra work."

"They'll help you and let you learn the ropes. It will be a good experience," Dragon said, patting her hand on Taylor's shoulder comfortingly.

"Today?" she asked in muted horror.

"Well, your father is already on his way to the PRT Headquarters. We won't force you to tell him, but if you want to be a hero and Ward, you are going to have to let him know."

Taylor nodded mutely at that. "I guess."

"Dragon, I'll talk to you later. Let's go... Hmm. I guess kid will work for now until you can figure out a code name," Armsmaster said flatly as if he was distracted. (Which he was, as he was directing his motorcycle to be refueled and ready for him when he got to it).

Dragon nodded and walked off, heading to the lift to the top of the oil rig.

"I'm thinking 'The Other'. Or is that too weird?" the masked girl said.

"No, not really. You know, you are likely to be compared to the Triumvirate a lot," he replied as he started to walk down the hall.

A few flights of stairs and he was back to his motorcycle that was being turned around on a spinning plate on the steel floor.

"That is a really cool motorcycle," The Other said in admiration.

"Thanks. You get to ride it and see how cool it is," Armsmaster said with a grin.

"Oh, I was just going to fly there. I was pretty out of it for my first time," she explained.

"Just keep close to me then." He mounted his bike and started it up with a roar, driving it carefully to the lift that took them back down to the dock on the one leg of the base.

"Oh? Armsmaster? I sorta offered to move your base onto dry land. Only if its all right with you, but isn't it sort of 'not safe' out here in the water if Leviathan comes here?" The Other said as she assumed the form of Alexandria and floated off the ground.

The leader of the Brockton Bay Protectorate thought about that hard for a second. "Yes, you are absolutely right. I had never considered a basic action like just moving it onto ground. I'll need to get a special concrete pad and grounding stations for the forcefield. That's a lot less work than trying to get another 1 % of protection out of it." He felt like such an idiot. Out of the mouth of babes.

He squealed off at full speed, shifting to jetski mode the moment he left the ground. Other-Alexandria was right behind him, though she did zoom around a little bit.

The trip across the water and then across town (though signaled Armsmaster her to go above the buildings) only took about twenty minutes. With a woosh, she followed Armsmaster down into a underground parking lot that was not really visible from the streets or even other buildings.

"You'll need to drop that form while we sign in," Armsmaster said as he killed the engine on his bike and popped the kickstand.

"Oh, okay." She liked being Alexandria. She was much better developed than old Taylor was, after all. with a swirl of energy, she was back to her normal, fifteen year old form of a underdeveloped girl wearing a Protectorate t-shirt and sweat pants.

The PRT guards were courteous as they signed in. "Director Piggot is awaiting you sir in her office."

She signed in with 'The Other' right next to Armsmaster's signature. She had to giggle internally at that.

The elevator ride up was smooth and quick, but it must have not been fast enough for Armsmaster, as he was tapping his toe the entire trip. The Other kept herself close in his wake, feeling very out of place with all the men and women in suits.

A quick knock on a door and they were in the office of Director Piggot, a stout woman of middle age years.

"So this is the young girl that triggered at Winslow High?" she asked Armsmaster directly.

"That's correct. Her power is a Trump-Changer rating, as far as I can tell. Likely Trump 8 or 9, Changer 3 or 4. She can't turn into everyone, but she's a flawless duplicate otherwise," he replied.

"Really?" Piggot asked, looking at the girl in question. "Would you mind showing me?"

The Other nodded her head tentatively, once again assuming the form of Alexandria. "I now have her powers, which is really cool. And I can fly."

"We'll have to test to see how closely you duplicated her powers, I guess. With that high of a rating, I assume she can turn into other powered parahumans?" Piggot asked.

"Yes." Wait, she couldn't turn into Contessa and Dragon felt weird, probably because she was a robot. Ah, she had the perfect solution to try!

With a thought, she reached a bit further than the last time. It felt like her power was asking for something? It must have gotten a good response, as she suddenly transformed again, taking on the appearance of the most famous 'mom' in the superhuman community, Lady Photon!

"That's uncanny. And do you have her powers?" Piggot asked as she saw Armsmaster tilt his head in consideration.

Other-Lady Photon nodded uncertainly, suddenly not quite as convincing a duplicate. The director noted that she would need acting lessons to help with that if they used it for infiltration.

A glowing bubble appeared around one of the most famous middle-aged mothers in the world. It disappeared almost instantly.

"Oops. I burnt your carpet." She quickly stamped out the burning circle at her feet before it could really catch on fire. She then released the form Lady Photon.

"Well, I guess I'll just have to deal with getting rid of this green and brown carpet," Piggot said with suppressed mirth. She hated that carpet with a passion, but could never quite justify replacing the previous director's choice.

"She wants to join the wards and be a hero," Armsmaster interrupted bluntly. "And I think she will be an amazing and useful addition to the team. In fact, I think I might even mentor her myself. She has the potential to be as powerful as one of the Triumvirate."

Piggot could not help but stare at the blunt Tinker. "Really? I have to say, coming from you that is rare praise."

Her phone buzzed. "A Mr. Hebert is here to see you and Armsmaster?"

"Send him in immediately, Cecil," the director ordered.

Only a few minutes later, after a knock, Danny Hebert stepped into the office. "Taylor? Are you all right?"

"Oh, dad! It was horrible!" She threw herself into hugging him desperately.

"What happened? Where's your clothes? Did you get attacked?" he asked worriedly.

"No. Well, not really. Sophia and Em... They shoved me into my locker, and it full of dis-disgusting things. It was so horrible and no one ever came. I just gave up. Hated being me. And then I was suddenly out of the locker and I was Alexandria-" she babbled on.

Armsmaster and Piggot both stood up straighter at that.

"Do you have their names?" Armsmaster asked intently. When she didn't reply immediately, obviously still suffering from her earlier incident. "Remember, I promised to put a stop to it."

The young woman stared at him through her mask, eyes wide. "I-It was Sophia Hess, Madison Clements and... Emma Barnes."

"Emma? Emma did this to you? She used to be your best friend!" Danny said in a stunned voice.

"Armsmaster, I'll get started with the paperwork with Mr. Hebert here. Why don't you introduce her to the wards on duty? They should all be showing up shortly for a team meeting and going over patrol schedules," Piggot said blandly.

"Paperwork? What?" Danny was being bounced around so fast.

"I want to join the Wards and be a hero, dad. I can save people's lives."

Danny just stared at the changling in the form of his masked daughter in horror.