Fun Sized 02

Taylor sighed in relief as her father left. It had been emotionally draining to have to go through everything that had happened with her father, everything she had hidden from him, not wanting to worry him about something he couldn't do anything about anyway. Thankfully, Wasp had been with her sending her comforting thoughts… in between homicidal rages.

'I don't want to become a murderer,' Taylor thought nervously, as a variety of cruel and unusual assassination techniques, using simple insects to deliver poison or lay eggs in various bodily organs, flowed through her head through their connection.

Wasp took a deep breath and slowly released it, pushing his anger down. "Homicidal thoughts are fine, it's the actions you take that matter," he said, sliding down her hair to sit on her collar bone.

"Thoughts can lead to actions," Taylor pointed out.

"Yes, but we can 'Taylor' our actions to use just the precise amount of force needed," he punned, making her grin despite herself.

"Like?" she asked curiously.

"Social assassination," he said with a grin. "With our ability to control insects we can deliver a little tit for tat."

"You can control insects?" Taylor asked, surprised.

"My helmet allows me to control ants and wasps," he explained, blueprints and scientific theories flowing between the two effortlessly, her every question about them answered before she could ask.

"Whoa!" she exclaimed as she felt his connection to a local hibernating ant colony and discovered her own connection to far, far more.

"Whoa is right," he said in awe, as he felt her reaching out and controlling an incomprehensible amount of insects, far beyond what he'd ever dreamed was possible, her attention split between every single one as she ran multiple parallel thoughts processes.

"I… have the most awesome powerset ever," Taylor whispered.

Wasp grinned as he listened to Taylor's mind as she ran through everything she knew about well-known capes and their power classifications, comparing them to her own. He was amused with her desire to be a flying brick, as he mentally labeled the Alexandria powerset, his own mind showing her the various possibilities of what the two could do together compared to just being able to fly and punch things.

Taylor slowly pulled back her consciousness, focusing on Wasp as his mind seemed to wrestle with itself, designing a more broad-spectrum insect control helmet, but continually having to adjust it as his Tinker ability kept suggesting modifications that, while definite improvements, would prevent mass production. She found it fascinating to witness as he finally gave in and simply designed two helmets, one Tinker-tech and the other far less powerful but easily reproducible. "That's a lot of gold," she said as he started making a list of what he'd need to build them.

"I can set ants to collecting flakes of gold from the sand at the beach," he replied. "At the size I'm working with it's really not that much."

"A chunk of gold the size of your hand is pretty small," she realized. "The other stuff is probably easier to get, but we have to be careful or we'll be sending up a big flare announcing there's a Tinker about and smart money says someone will be watching for that."

"I can raid junkyards for most of what I need," Wasp said thoughtfully. "See, I am going to have to build everything I want from the ground up as it has to be sized for my use. Thankfully my utility belt carries a number of useful tools, but that only takes me so far." A portion of his brain started arguing with his Tinker ability again while Taylor eagerly soaked up everything they communicated, trying to fit it in with what she knew.

Someone knocked on the door, opening it before she could respond and causing Wasp to dive into her cleavage, so it was a heavily blushing Taylor who found herself face to face with the world's top healer, Amy Dalton aka Panacea.

"Hello, Miss Hebert," Panacea greeted her, sounding both tired and bored, the dark circles under her eyes and the way her brown hair hung limply showing she'd been working long hours for far too long. "Do I have your permission to heal you?" she asked, walking over to Taylor's bedside.

"I thought you already had," Taylor replied, confused. Her father had been quite open with his praise of Panacea for saving her life.

"I did," Panacea agreed, "however your body was critically low on the necessary vitamin and nutrients I needed to insure your recovery, so I had to wait until now to finish up."

Taylor's eyes drifted to the rack of IV bags they were feeding her with. "Yes, thank you," she said quickly, her embarrassment forgotten, thought she could feel Wasp trying to distract himself from thinking about where he was.

"Panacea reached out and took Taylor's hand, her eyes widening in obvious surprise before she released Taylor's hand and got up to close the door to her room.

Taylor licked her lips nervously, countless insects buzzing around in a panic as the swarm absorbed her fear, leaving her clear-headed, or somewhat closer to it.

"Gaining powers for a first-gen is always traumatic. My professional advice is that they see a psychiatrist to help them deal with their issues," Panacea explained. "I also suggest they sign up on the Parahumans Online board so they can read the unwritten rules and avoid some of the common mistakes that new capes make."

"Unwritten rules?" Taylor asked, both her and Wasp focused on her words.

"It's a code of behavior that capes follow, one of the most important rules being you do not unmask other capes," Panacea said seriously. "I get the irony of a member of New Wave, the only group that refuses to hide their identity, telling you this, but it's one rule both sides agree with, civilian identities are off-limits."

"Ok," Taylor said with a relieved sigh, as she realized Panacea had no intention of outing them… erm, her.

"That being said…" Panacea trailed off shyly before clearing her throat and asking, "Would you mind telling me about the tiny man in your cleavage?"

Taylor bust out laughing, causing Wasp to slide down her chest and into her belly button.

"Give me a second to find my way out," Wasp said, startling Panacea.

"He's a projection," Taylor said as Panacea extended her hand, a clear offer to finish healing her which Taylor immediately accepted.

"Freedom!" Wasp called out as he escaped Taylor's hospital gown and unfurled his wings.

Panacea released Taylor's hand and held her palm out flat for Wasp to land on, hoping to get a clearer read on him, as reading him through Taylor was distracting.

"What's wrong with my eyes?" Taylor asked, before taking off her glasses and looking around her in wonder.

"Being a hero is hard," Panacea said as she held the palm Wasp was sitting on close to her face, "it's harder when you have eye problems. Get some glasses with clear glass or just claim you got contacts, it'll help hide your identity."

"Thanks," Taylor said, amazed at how much clearer everything was. Even with her glasses on she'd never seen everything this sharply before.

"Except for size, you are as normal as the next Brute," Panacea said with a grin, happy to 'see' something new with her power.

"He's not made of energy?" Taylor asked, surprised.

"One hundred percent flesh, just tiny," Panacea replied with a grin.

"I prefer the term 'fun sized', thank you very much," Wasp joked making Panacea laugh and Taylor bite her lip.

The intercom made a ping sound and Panacea sighed and waved for Wasp to take off. "I have to get back to my rounds, there are always more injured to treat."

"Thanks again," Taylor told her, "you've helped me out a lot."

"Don't mention it," Panacea said, "just remember to hit the PHO board. Bye."

As the door closed behind the departing healer, Wasp retook his spot on Taylor's collar bone.

Taylor frowned. "I should have seen if she's increase my breast size," she said thoughtfully.

"Are you kidding?!" Wasp demanded. "They're huge! It'd take me a good ten minutes to jog around each one!"

Taylor laughed, feeling that maybe, just maybe, everything would be alright again. A second after she thought that she froze in horror, positive something horrible was going to happen.

Wasp sighed and sent her comforting thoughts. "Maybe seeing a shrink wouldn't be such a bad idea," he suggested.

"It'd cost money we don't have," Taylor said, relieved to have an honest reason to turn down the idea.

"Fine, I get the money, we go," Wasp said.

"Only after all our other bills are paid," Taylor bargained.

"Deal," Wasp agreed. He tapped the side of his helm and flipped open a panel on the side of his gauntlet revealing a keyboard and started typing, gaining access to local wifi and then the net in a matter of seconds.

"What are you doing?" Taylor asked curiously.

"Seeing what needs to be invented," he replied. "You see, it's not enough to just invent something, you have to know what needs to be invented."

Emotionally wrung out, Taylor drifted off to sleep while Wasp typed away, looking for a niche he could fill with something simple. There were a number of websites offering money for solutions to various problems that would have been easy to answer, but he figured they were simply traps to catch rogue Tinkers, and ignored them.

OoOoOoOoOoO

Wasp awoke and stretched. He'd been sleeping somewhat comfortable underneath the phone on the nightstand.

Taylor felt his surprise and embarrassment as she got dressed and realized he'd just woken up and gotten an eyeful. She sent back calming thoughts, not at all concerned with a projection of her psyche seeing her naked. She did however send an enquiring thought about how she looked. His embarrassed reply was filled with hormonal overtones that made her grin. "We're telepathically linked," she said aloud, "a little nudity is no big deal."

"Private time is going to be completely different," he realized.

Taylor considered that. 'Is it sex, masturbation, or narcissism to do things with your projection?' she accidentally sent.

A series of possible scenarios flew back and forth between the pair as Taylor's thoughts about a giant woman with a regular sized man were met with Wasp's thoughts on the mechanics of a couple able to alter their size at will.

"I am such a perv," Taylor said, shaking her head at the things they'd come up with when she caught his thoughts on… Pym Particles.

He mentally walked her through the process to create Pym Particles and the training and acclimation needed to prevent mental side-effects that could be caused by their regular use. Her excitement over the possibility of changing size at will were tempered by his thoughts on the equipment needed to create and collect the specific subatomic particle. It was another project that would take years to work up to, but it could be done.

'It is the use in the field or the bedroom that's got you so excited?' he teased.

'Sixty-forty,' she sent back with a grin. It may not be mentally healthy to treat her projection like a completely separate person, but she knew he'd never hurt her or leave her, never turn on her or stab her in the back, he was safe, she could trust him.

'We are so getting therapy,' Wasp swore while sending her a mental hug and plotting the complete destruction of three teenage girls.

Taylor just smiled, happy to have someone she could trust and share everything with. If he'd been her size at that moment she probably would have hugged him so hard he'd need to use Panacea's services. It was an indescribable relief to realize she never needed to fear being alone again.

'Lots of therapy,' Wasp decided, wondering how the shrink would relate to the pair of them and wishing he was actually large enough to give Taylor a hug she could feel. The world lurched around him and he found himself several inches tall. "Must have had a little left in my system," Wasp said, recognizing the feel of Pym Particles at work.

"Parahuman powers are so weird," Taylor said with a grin, happy to see Wasp was now the size of a Ken doll and wishing her power had given him enough Pym Particles to make him human-sized, though maybe a bit shorter than her.

"I'll be able to work with full-sized electronics rather than making everything from scratch," he said, thinking they could raise some money quickly by buying broken electronics and repairing them.

Taylor held open her toiletry bag so he could climb in. "We can start with my computer, it's a dinosaur."

"Sounds like a plan," he replied, laying down on a tube of toothpaste. "Wake me when we get home."

"Will do," she promised before closing the bag and looking around to make sure she hadn't forgotten anything. Thanks to Panacea she was feeling healthier than she had ever felt before and thanks to Wasp she was feeling happier. She knew she was broken in some ways, Wasp was a clear sign of that and could point out her problems easily, but she was leaving the hospital with something she hadn't felt in a long time, hope.

Typing by: Jarreas

AN: Welcome to the first chapter of #7 of the proof of my serious case of ADHD, hope you enjoy it!

Typist's note: People don't just wake up from a nap and walk out of the hospital – I figure that at a minimum a nurse would pop in after Panacea with a comment of, "The paperwork's all done, so just dress and stop by the desk when you leave." I understand that the focus of the story is on Taylor's introspection so an entire paragraph on the "everyone leaves the hospital in a wheelchair" trope might distract from that, but I think a sentence or two on her leaving would make the story more grounded in realistic medical practices.

Author's note: She's getting ready to leave the room, she hasn't left yet. I'm planning on skipping all the boring tropes and paperwork and such. I'll start the next scene when she's at home in her room. … Fine I'll at least mention it.