Disclaimer: Worm and its characters belong to Wildbow. The Beyonder and The Infinity Gems belong to Marvel Comics.

Taylor and The Infinity Gauntlet

Chapter 1

Taylor Hebert woke up screaming. She was sitting upright now and she stopped screaming as she looked around where she was. She seemed to be in a very nice room. She had been laying on a very nice and comfortable bed. She quickly stood up and looked around then looked herself over. She wasn't trapped in her locker. Her clothes were clean, her fingernails were not chipped or broken from trying to escape the damaged locker. There were no scrapes or bruises on her skin. She was perfectly fine.

That's when she noticed the golden multicolored gem encrusted gauntlet on her right hand. She stared at it.

"Ah, you're awake. Excellent.", a voice spoke.

Turning, she saw a man. The man was a caucasian in appearance, looking to be in his thirties with curly black hair. He was wearing a solid white business suit.

"Greetings, Taylor Hebert.", said the man.

Taylor said, "W...W...Who are you? Where am I? How did I get here? What is this thing on my hand?"

The man gave a reassuring smile. "Relax, I mean you no harm. But, while time is short, I will answer your questions. I am The Beyonder. You are in a room that I have created so that we may have this conversation. I pulled you out of that metal construct you were imprisoned in, healed you of your injuries, and brought you here. Finally, I have gifted you with a very powerful item, I'll explain in a moment."

Taylor asked, "The Beyonder? I've never heard of you. Are you a new Cape?"

The man chuckled. "My dear Taylor, I am not what you would call a Cape. But, I am indeed powerful. As for why I helped you, well I did it because someone I once met in another place and another time once said, it's the right thing to do. Now, as I said, time is short. I cannot stay here much longer."

Taylor looked distressed. "But..but!"

The man gave a placating gesture. "I wish I could stay here and give you that full long conversation, but my presence here is technically a 'violation of the rules'. Suffice to say...I have chosen you to be the wielder of an Artifact of Great Power. You now possess all of the Infinity Gems and they have been placed into the gauntlet you are wearing. Each of those gems is a powerful artifact of its own right, but together….you possess power unrivaled."

The man calling himself The Beyonder walked up to Taylor and gestured her to lift her gauntlet covered hand. The Beyonder pointed at each colored gem.

He pointed at the orange gem first. "This is the Time gem." Next, he pointed at a purple gem. "This is the Space gem. Moving to a blue colored gem he said, "This is the Mind Gem," Then, he pointed at a yellow colored gem and said, "This is the Reality gem." From there he pointed at a red colored gem and said, "This is the Power gem." Finally, he pointed at the green colored gem. "This is the Soul gem."

The Beyonder stepped back and said, "As I said, each of these artifacts are powerful all by themselves, masters of the domain I just described. But, with one person possessing all of them? Well.,.the wielder possesses Power Unrivaled. What you choose to do with it, is up to you. This planet and many, many more just like it is threatened; will you save it, or destroy it? You possess that power. But, be careful, you may possess these gems now but there will be those that will no doubt try to take them from you, Protect them. You are not a Cape, without these gems, you are an ordinary human. Unless….well, I'll let you figure it out."

With a dramatic bow, the man said, "My time here is at an end. Any longer and those that could find me would be finding me very soon and then there would be…well...nevermind. Not important. But, I must leave. I shall enjoy watching what you do. I'm sure I will not be disappointed." There was a flash of light followed by a "pop" sound and the man calling himself The Beyonder was gone.

Taylor had a shocked expression on her face. She looked around, the room she was in was very nice. The bed had been very comfortable and looked expensive. There was a nightstand with a glass of what looked like water. A vanity was against the wall. She looked at the mirror and noticed that she wasn't wearing her glasses but could see perfectly. She touched her face with her finger thinking it was an illusion but she felt her finger on her cheek. She turned her attention back to the gem encrusted gauntlet and noted how each of the colored gems glowed but their glow was dimmer than when the man calling himself The Beyonder identified them. Each time he identified one of the colored gems, the gem shined brighter. She examined each of the colored gems in their sockets, naming each gem as The Beyonder had said and thought what it meant.

Taylor started walking towards the door that was at the front of the room. Opening the door, she looked ahead and saw a street. A street she recognized as the street she lived on. Stepping out, she heard a wind chime sound and when she turned around, she saw that the door had closed and that she was standing on her porch. She was home. She did a doubletake and to make sure and she turned around and went inside. Looking around, she confirmed again that she was at her home. She looked at the clock, it was a little after 3pm,

She looked at the gauntlet, thinking about what The Beyonder had said. 'Each gem is master of the domain it is named for.' She thought about that statement. A thought came to her mind. She dismissed it. Then the thought returned. She looked at the gauntlet, specifically at the green gem that The Beyonder had called the Soul gem.

Another thought came to her, and she looked at the orange and blue gems, the Time and Mind gems. She then looked over at the purple and yellow gems, the Space and Reality gems. With another thought, she located the person she was thinking about. The gems glowed on the gauntlet as the thought came to her mind and with a flash of purple light, Taylor disappeared.

Emma Barnes was sitting at her desk in her room just starting on her homework when there was a flash of purple light in her room. She turned around and was stunned to see Taylor Hebert in her room.

"Hello, Emma."

Emma was stunned. She couldn't believe what she was seeing. She left Taylor stuffed into her locker before school started and she had not let her out nor had she told anyone to let her out. She looked at Taylor, she appeared to be fine, her clothes were clean, she wasn't covered in the filth Sophia and Madison had stuffed the locker with. How she got out, how she got into her room she didn't know.

As she looked Taylor over she saw the golden gauntlet with glowing gems. Before she could scream out for her mother Taylor raised that gauntlet covered hand and placed her index finger on top of Emma's lips and said, "Hush, I'm going to talk first and you're going to listen."

"You were my best friend, Emma. We had known each other since we were in kindergarten, we did so much together growing up. I called you my sister, for you were as blood to me even though we weren't related. You called me sister too. You were there for me when mom died, without you I wouldn't have made it. Then, I go away to camp. I didn't want to go, but dad made me go. That last phone call we had, the call that cut off. I tried to call you back. I tried calling you many times but you never answered. I come back from camp and I come to see you as soon as I got back. You destroyed me that day. I went to Winslow out of loyalty to you. That you betrayed me as you have, that you made every day of my life at school the hell for the past two years and you culminate it by filling my locker with filth and shove me inside it. I want to know why."

Taylor had kept her finger on Emma's lips and pulled it back and the blue gem on the gauntlet glowed brighter.

Emma found herself talking.

"That day we were talking on the phone, my father and I got trapped in an alley by the ABB. They attacked us. That's why the phone cut out. They pulled us out of dad's car. One of them was a girl. She hurt me, threatened to cut me. She tried to make me choose what part of my face she'd cut off; an ear, my nose, my lips. I lost it. I started to fight, took her by surprise and that's when she sliced off some of my hair. That's when Shadow Stalker appeared. She hurt them. She made them feel pain. She hurt them bad."

Emma paused for a second. "After she rescued us, I was I a bad place. I didn't leave my room, I didn't eat. I felt so bad about what happened. Days go by. One day, Sophia shows up at my house. She helped me get through my pity parade. She told me I was strong, that I was a predator for fighting back that day. She told me who she was."

Taylor's eyes narrowed. Then she hissed, "Sophia Hess is Shadow Stalker."

"Yes."

Taylor looked furious. "You ended our friendship because you made friends with a Ward!?"

Emma said, "She wasn't a Ward back then. That happened more than halfway into our freshman year. Dad got her the deal to make her a Ward."

Taylor's anger was still on her face. "Now, now it makes sense. You with your dad's money and influence. Sophia being a Ward, Madison being all cute. No wonder I couldn't get Blackwell and any teacher to listen to me."

Taylor looked at Emma with fury in her face. She had kept her gauntlet covered hand raised at Emma, the blue gem glowing the brightest. Taylor said, "You are going to tell your parents everything you, Sophia, and Madison have done to me. You will leave nothing out. You will tell them the truth. When you return to Winslow High, you will go to Blackwell and confess to everything you, Sophia, Madison and all your friends have done to me. Any evidence you've got, you're going to surrender it to the authorities. When charges are brought against you for putting me in the locker, you will plead guilty. You will follow the instructions I have given you but you will not remember we had this little chat. I was never here. Goodbye Emma."

Taylor backed up and the purple gem on the gauntlet glowed as Taylor disappeared.

Emma blinked. She couldn't figure out what that noise was but it wasn't important. What was important was that she needed to go downstairs and tell her mother to call her dad. She had something important to say to them.

Author Note: Figure here's a good stopping point. This plot bunny got stuck in my head. The Infinity Gems here are the Marvel Comics version, specifically they are pre-nerfed version of the Infinity Gems.. They work as I say they work. This will be a fairly short OP romp.