People tend to stick to Taylor, infrequently targeting Greg as a MC. Still gets picked more often Aisha. Anyway, Greg wakes up one day to find a gemstone lodged in his body...)

Starting Out

Greg Veder was many things. A coward, a lazy layabout, a procrastinator, and at seemingly random times a massive introvert. He liked to talk and would do so till the cows came home if anyone so much as gave him half a chance.

He was a pubescent, normal teenager. The computer in his room had oft been used for a less than wholesome past time, but a quick history deletion helped keep his mom from grounding him. Again. He had learned from the first time, a 'good' boy did not look up such 'filth', and certainly didn't set any pics from suspect sites as his screensaver.

All one would find if they were to check its history would turn out the random site hopping of a typical cape follower. PHO, YouTube, a couple webcomics that had sprung up over the years. 'The Wonder Wards' was a particular favorite, following a secret sect of under aged capes that participated in battling crimes all without the supervision of the Protectorate. They hadn't updated in over two months, but Greg was ever hopeful.

Something that Greg most certainly was, was a plain, B negative blooded male.

That claim was currently being challenged, as Greg attempted to carry out his morning ablutions. Standing in front of the toilet, his off hand vainly searching for his member to properly guide his morning stream away from hitting outside the porcelain bowl.

Vainly, for as far he could tell it was no longer there.

He peered downwards, blinking blearily through the gunk crusting his eyelashes. Seeing what was and what wasn't currently there, his poor, sleepy mind decided there was only one truly helpful course of action

Seconds later found his mother rushing into the bathroom, eyes wide in barely restrained panic. This expression quickly morphed first to derision, then to a tired resignation.

"Damnit Greg, I do not have time for this," she groused, covering her eyes and averting her gaze. "It's nothing I haven't seen before, I did change your diapers, but you're getting a bit old to be showing that off to me, aren't you?"

Greg blinked owlishly, hands already in motion to shield his groin.

"I… It was… My junk…" He stuttered, trying to put his dilemma into words. "It's gone…"

His mother, instead of giving him verbal comfort let out a titanic sigh.

"We really don't have time for this," she reiterated. "You need to hurry and wake up, breakfast is on the table. Eat and brush your teeth, we leave in ten."

She promptly left, shutting the door with slightly more force than needed. Greg was left alone once more, hesitant to look downwards in fear of what he might find. A slight wiggle reminded him of his ever pressing need to relieve the pressure, his hand finding purchase on a limb he could have sworn had disappeared previously.

"And quit screeching so loud!" His mothers' voice penetrated the bathroom door, "The neighbors will complain. I told you before, if you upset the Watersons they'll call the cops on us again... Do you WANT to embarrass your poor mother? Huh?"

"No mom…" Greg conceded, the liquid pouring freely in sweet release.

He could hear his mom muttering to herself as she retreated, heading downstairs.

"Friggin kid, give me a freaking heart attack why don't you? The neighbors will think I have some sort of secret love child if he keeps yelling like that. He's a teenager, his voice should be getting deeper, not higher…"

Greg finished, quickly flushing and proceeding to wash his hands. Not for any real desire to rid his hands of germs, but for the fear that his mom would smack him upside the head for his slovenliness.

Was it simply a lingering vestige of his slumbering mind? A dream that crept into the waking world, tricking him into thinking his mini me had taken a vacation?

Another quick poke revealed that yes, he still was if not generously endowed, endowed in the strictest sense.

It must have been his imagination.

School had been fine, if normal. Normal in its own, brutally horrible fashion. The goddess of his dreams, Taylor Hebert, was once more onset on all sides by the vicious bullying campaign from the popular girl trio. Today would have been the day, Greg would stand up and take Taylor's side. The bullies would be taken totally aback, they would lay off forever in shame and Taylor would absolutely want to date him.

It would be awesome.

Except it didn't happen. The trio still bullied Taylor, sure. That was common, an everyday occurrence. Greg had girded himself, preparing to stand up and help her.

Except he didn't. Greg had been metaphorically glued to his seat, mysteriously unwilling to move, to even squeak out a protest to her treatment. His words, unspoken, sank to the depths of his stomach and congealed in a frigid lump. Plans of retorts and actions flashed to the forefront of his mind, only for the perfect moments to pass. Then the less than perfect moments. Then the chances were gone.

He was as he was always, pitiful. Unable to even garner a passing resistance to the trios verbal bile.

It should have gotten better, after the locker incident he thought they might have backed off. How do you top stuffing a classmate in a locker filled with borderline hazardous material? How could tormenting his chocolate haired goddess still entertain them, when they had already raised their 'antics' to such heights?

Still they persisted. Still they threw their poisonous words, as if it were perfectly normal. Still Greg continued on, head down. Out of sight, out of mind. Unable to so much as help, to raise alarm to such a horrendous occurrence.

As he walked home, he placated himself with a rose tinted lie.

He'd speak up tomorrow. He'd tell them off, and it would all be better.

Wouldn't it?

Greg felt a cold ball of shame sink into his stomach, filling him with a bitter sadness as he realized it would never change. It would never get better.

Greg was no hero, he was simply Greg Veder.

Coward.

Cowards don't get the girl.

Cowards don't get anything.

To console himself, he deviated from his homeward path and headed towards the local eatery. Fugly Bobs wasn't the healthiest foodery, but what fast food place was, really? It wasn't supposed to be good for you, but it sure was good comfort food.

Nothing like a greasy burger to bury ones self esteem.

What little there was left.

There was some things that even a copious amount of french fries couldn't help.

Being shot at by a squad of armed nutsos with laser rifles ranked pretty high on that list. It wasn't like he had been looking for them. It wasn't like he had a choice of running away, either. Not unless he wanted to just leave a poor, defenseless little girl to whatever cruel fate await her at the hands of the aforementioned nutsos. Okay, so she was a cape, so she wasn't defenseless, but she really didn't strike Greg as a combatthinker. Thinker powers were impressive, but they could only do so much against lasers.

Greg had almost made it to Fugly Bobs, if he had only been able to get in through the front doors... As it so happened, an errant piece of trash was all that had waylaid Greg's forward momentum, treacherously forcing him into an uncontrolled stumble down a nearby alley. This alone might not have been a tipping point, but Greg's wild attempts to regain his footing led him headlong into the side of a grimy dumpster. Face first, he slid slowly to the ground while his arms groped blindly for purchase.

Finding nothing more than a slick (albeit filth encrusted) surface, Greg promptly gave up and braced himself against the ground. It certainly helped more than touching the disgusting dumpster, that was for sure.

Greg stared downwards, gaze locking onto his outstretched arm. Specifically, the miscoloured flesh that covered said limb.

"I... What?"

[hr]

His hand was green.

His wrist was green.

His arm was green!

THE REST OF HI-

Greg, -naturally, assuming that some sort of horrid gunk had somehow managed to envelop his extremity without his noticing, most likely from the dumpster he had previously had a face to face with- 'freaked the hell out'. Well, in a controlled manner, at the least. One thing his mother had instilled in him at an early age was that one 'did not have a temper tantrum or otherwise embarrass mommy in public'. This included but was not limited to- Loudly yelling for no reason. Flailing his limbs about with no regard to anyone near him. And finally, doing ANYTHING that managed to get a police officer to come over and ask 'is something wrong'.

So, for Greg -unlike say, a normal, well adjusted human being- his freak out consisted of him stretching his arm as far away from himself as he could managed, all the while choking down what he KNEW was going to be a shrill sounding screech. Slowly, his brain rebooted and allowed him to better inspect what was covering his hand, all for the self preservation of getting whatever the hell it was off.

A finger reached out, and poked his right hand. It was at this moment that Greg realized his OTHER hand was covered in the stuff as well. And that whatever it was, it didn't feel like anything. Just felt like he was tapping a finger against his bare hand. Flesh against flesh.

Also, Greg was sure something was wrong with his eyes. His hands looked... smaller?

One hand rubbed against the other, trying to make sense to Gregs poor belabored mind. There wasn't anything on Gregs hands. His hands were green. His flesh... was green? His flesh, his skin was green.

"Why am I green?" Greg asked out loud, trying to rationalize what his eyes were telling him. He started, hearing an unfamiliar voice spill out from his mouth. Whipping his head from side to side in the vain hope that it had actually been someone else speaking, he was met by an empty alley. Couple rats not giving a shit, munching on something that looked suspiciously like trash from the nearby Fugly Bobs. Besides carrion, nobody. Nothing intelligent, anyway.

"Aaaaaaah," Greg sounded out, his mind distracted momentarily from his discoloured skin. "Aaaaah. Baaaaah. The clever fox- holy shit that's weird whatthehellhappenedtomyvoice?" His remaining words spilled out in a disorganized tumble, barely even making sense to Greg himself.

He reached up to cradle his head, an unconscious coping method he had developed to combat the errant moments of stress he was occasionally overcome by. -His dad was never coming back, daddy would never hurt him again, mommy said so, the courts said so, they'd never let him- scratching at his scalp made his mom worry that he was going to cause himself a bald spot, but he hadn't had anything like that happen. Yet. Probably wouldn't happen. Probably.

Greenish tinged blonde hair spilled past his fingers, framing them in an eerie halo past his eyes. Uncomfortable seconds passed, before he dredged up the courage to drag a strand of hair into closer inspection before his eyes. A momentary contact with a thin see through visor confused him even further -he definitely wasn't wearing that earlier- before he refocused on the important thing in question. 'What happened to his hair' might have been less pressing than 'why is my skin green' but it was the sequence of events that took Gregs attention. The hair seemingly happened the most recently, so it was the most important.

It was blonde, yes. That being said, it was not the same tint of Gregs own. Whereas Gregs hair was at easiest claimed a 'dirty' blonde, it had never been this tint before. Reaching ever upwards -studiously ignoring the sight of his arms, one thing at a time- his hands encountered a veritable bush of hair spanning outwards. His hair had grown. Why? What the hell could slamming ones face into a dumpster have to due with spontaneously growing an afro? Okay, so it really wasn't an afro persay, the multitude of strands were almost slick, thin and straight as they 'poofed' outwards. It was just so thick, was he going to have to get his mom to take him to get a haircut?

Mom.

Greg froze, fingers constricting in a rictus as he tried to contemplate what his mom would do if she saw him like this. What would she say? What would do? She would probably ground him. Yep, there was no question about it, his mom would take one look, and then she'd shut off the router. Or at the very least she'd unplug his line. Dang it, he was going to be grounded forever, he hadn't even done anything! This day sucked, the only way it could get any worse is-

Greg stopped, his fingers brushing against something on his forehead. Probing further told him next to nothing, beyond the fact that he apparently had a polished piece of rock superglued to his face.

Greg was very close to suffering from a mental breakdown, so he decided to do something slightly intelligent. He took a deep breath, and let it out. Then he took another. Another. Once more.

"Okay," he muttered, sagging inwards as he leaned up against the nearest wall. "Let's... try to figure this out. My arms are green. My voice sounds weird. My hair is weird. I'm wearing... some weird set of sunglasses. I-"

Greg unfortunately spent the next few seconds hyperventilating, having looked down to see that he was no longer wearing his typical 'cool' outfit of slacks, spits, and a hoodie over an Armsmaster branded tshirt. Instead, he appeared to be wearing what looked like a skintight jumpsuit. Onesie. Leotard. Thing. The legs and wings of the vest were a deep green, darker than his skin now was. Patterned across the chest was a chevron, a V whose flat black tips disappeared over his shoulders.

'His' being subjective at the moment, seeing as Greg could see his body quite well under the confines of his new... 'Onesie', and did not like what he saw.

Greg had never been particularly muscular, a result of the copious amounts of junk food coupled with a lacking exercise routine. His paunch was gone, replaced by a flat, childlike stomach that perfectly allowed him to see the absence that had so distressed him earlier that morning. A quick, frantic pat of the area reconfirmed this fact, forcing him to freeze once more.

It was gone. Straight, just... GONE.

Greg pinched his cheek, flinching at the burst of concentrated pain.

"Okay... Calm down, need to calm down, freaking out won't do me any good...Logically. Have to think about this logically," Greg trailed off, opting to pace back and force to try and focus his thoughts on a helpful subject. "My skin is green. It's my skin, not something ON my skin. My hair is wrong, my voice is wrong. Holy shit, am I a case 53?"

Greg stopped, before running down the alley to look stealthily at the surrounding area. Noting what he saw, he once more retreated further into the alley, away from questioning eyes.

"I'm right where I was. Case 53's don't remember anything either, so that can't be it. At least, I think I remember everything," Greg muttered, taking a moment to try to remember as far back as he could. He couldn't think of anything he was forgetting, but wasn't that the case of forgetting something? "I remember who I am. Greg. Greg Veder, I am a normal," debatable, "teenager. Soooo... Did I trigger? Do I have powers? What the hell does being green mean, power wise?"

Greg took the chance to punch the nearby wall, wincing in pain as he cradled his now aching hand.

"Okay, not brute. Definitely not brute. God, why did I think that was a smart idea?" A couple curses went through his mind before being discarded, such thoughts weren't helpful. "Tinker? No, tinkers have thoughts, blueprints and stuff that flitter through their heads. Fugue states. Mover?" A couple hops back and forth and he discarded his latest guess. "If anything, I think I might be slower. Striker? Blaster?"

Greg thrust his hands out at the wall that had dared to attempt injuring his hand. Yes, it was all the walls fault, and ha nothing to do with his own shortsightedness. A few seconds passed, no energy beams forthcoming. After a couple more seconds of frantically waving his hands in the desperate attempt to make something happen, Greg gave up.

"Nothing. Not even a weird feeling. So not striker or blaster. Could still be a master or a stranger..." Greg looked around, realizing he couldn't really test either one of those without a 'willing' test subject to help. "Master would be bad anyway, no one likes masters. So that only leaves..."

A manic spark lit in his eyes, and a wave of hope arose in his chest. "Changer! That would explain everything! Although, why changing greenwould be a power is beyond me..."

Any further musing was cut off by a compact missle of flesh and hair impacting with Gregs side, knocking both himself and his attacker to the ground. A frantic bout of movement quickly separated the two of them, allowing Greg to roll to his feet.

It was... a giant child. Like, absolutely gargantuan. She looked like a normal kid proportion wise, a young girl about eleven or twelve. Beyond that, she was as tall as Greg was. That in itself was unthinkable, Greg was the gawkiest the of the gawky, having just finished going through a growth spurt earlier that year. he was close on the heels of the 6" height mark, already having outstripped his mother and leaving her with a plethora of 'short jokes'. She had dropped plenty on himself as he was growing up, he only felt they were deserved now.

The girl looked around wildly, slowly getting to her feet as her gaze locked onto Greg. She stared, staying silent for several seconds before she belted out "Ninety Seven point Eighty Two percent."

[hr]

Dinah Alcott was having a decidedly off day.

For the average twelve year old, an 'off' day usually consisted of a scraped knee, a close friend 'being a butt', or a parent committing the unspeakable crime of 'being mean'. Perhaps if Dinah were an average child, these might be of her concerns.

Dinah Alcott was not an average child. Being the niece of the Mayor meant a certain amount of attention was at the feet of her parents, which in itself led to a harsh degree of stress. One would assume that a normal lawyer married to a normal dean of justice would not be allowed their own privacy. One would assume that with all the cape activity in Brockton Bay people would have more interesting gossip to focus on.

Dinah had first hand experience as to the stress her parents chose to vent, most times in loud voices towards each other. There was many a night the scrappy twelve year old wished the walls of their house weren't the width of a piece vellum gilded paper.

All in all, Dinah was not unfamiliar to the darker aspects of the world she lived in. She knew the city they lived in wasn't the best, that there were several gangs that called its boundaries their home.

A week previous had been the worst, Dinah's parents had raised the decibel level to such an extent that she couldn't drown out their squabbling with her MP3 player. She had curled up in a ball on her bed, hands flattened desperately against the sides of her head. Why couldn't they just get along? Why did they even stay together at all if they hated each other so much? Why? Why? Why…

Then it happened.

Dinah could have sworn the world collapsed around her, shattering into fragments of broken glass. Her body burned, but an icy chill spread outwards from her hands. An endless abyss stretched out in front of her, her eyes gazing out into the infinite aether. She could see out and within of herself, and everything… clicked.

Dinah had woken back up, her parents still screaming at each other. Lost in their pointless troubles. She didn't feel any different, aside from her hand itching for a second. It was then that she discovered her power.

Such a pointless question. Such a disheartening answer.

'Will my parents ever be happy with each other?'

'Zero point oh oh oh oh three three nine percent.'

It was an interesting power, although not a very impressive one. Dinah quickly learned its limitations, mostly by using the power to ask questions about itself. This of course also led to the discovery that using it too much was in itself a baaaaaad thing.

Ice cream headaches had nothing on it.

Dinah swore to only use her power sparingly, especially after having asked three pointed questions and receiving three very worrying answers.

'Chances that joining the wards is a good thing for me.'

'Seven point oh oh two percent.'

That had been disappointing, the wards in Dinahs' mind were the place to be for any superpowered youths. I mean, she could have tried to join the Youth Guard or New Wave, but neither of those options were very appealing to the young girl.

'Chances that being an independent or a rogue would be good for me.'

'Thirty point five nine percent.'

That had been slightly better than the results of her previous question, but still was nowhere as high as she had wanted. Perhaps it had been the fact that she asked about multiple aspects in a singular question.

'Chances that I'll survive the year if I don't join a team."

'Zero percent.'

That answer had sent Dinah into a panic attack, desperately flinging additional questions at her power until the pain had knocked her unconscious. She had flung team after team at her power, exhausting the possibilities from an online list. She even went down the line from teams that weren't even local to Brockton bay.

The following days had been an ever continuing puzzle, leaving Dinah without the answers she so desperately desired. She couldn't tell her parents about her newfound power. Seven point three percent chance she lived out the year if they learned of her power from herself telling them.

That is to say, she'd live if they found out from a source that wasn't her. That her chances went down a full four percent when she tried to cheat by having her parents learn from a roundabout method was only the icing on the cake.

A week passed, every day a stressful event that passed without a single preambling threat. Dinah jumped at every shadow, to the extent that even her parents managed to draw themselves out of their collective funk and pay her a modicum of attention.

That led to the day at hand, where both had somehow managed to pass off the semblance of a happy couple long enough to take Dinah out for a bite to eat.

This would have been pleasant.

If only life weren't such a capricious bitch.

Dinah's father had plopped facedown at the table, a dart with a fluffy red tail sticking straight up out of his neck. Her mother had followed shortly, having managed to let out a single piercing shriek before she capsized the table with her bulk.

Several armed men came strutting out of the woodwork, tinkertech weapons cradled loosely in their hands.

"Got the parents, target secured," the man in the lead spouted, reaching a thick gloved hand out to grab her.

Dinah threw her coffee in his face.

Chances that getting coffee was in her best interest despite the fact that she despised the bitter drink?

Ninety five point eight percent, for no discernible reason. Not that she was complaining.

She ran, kicking over a chair and hearing one of her pursuers trip over it as she fled. They didn't seem to care about drawing attention to themselves, doing nothing to silence their pursuit.

She threw questions at her power, barely managing to keep her lead as she turned down street after street. Person after person she asked of her power-

'Chances I'll live out the year if I ask them for help.'

-and time after time her power gave her startlingly low numbers. So she ran onwards.

She turned down another alley, gaze drifting behind her to see how close the men had gotten. If only she could find someone. Anyone! Heck, she'd take Chubster if he was available, where the heck were all the capes when you really needed one-

She ran into what felt like a wall. A small, squishy, squeaking wall, but a wall nonetheless. Whatever she had hit tumbled to the ground with her, letting out a pained grunt as they hit the the filthy alley floor.

Dinah quickly scrambled to her feet, heart pounding in her chest. She looked up, freezing in place as she finally noticed whom she had collided with.

Green skin.

It was a cape.

Dinah gulped down a hurried gasp of air, forming the question in her mind.

'Can this cape help me?'

[hr]

Greg was simultaneously good, and horrible at running.

Good at running from a potentially troubling situation? Of course, just let me slowly sidle out of the room...

Physically moving fast enough that ones lateral momentum could be considered 'running'? Oh good god no. P.E. class was Gregs bane, sweating and groaning like a gorilla in heat was not his favored method of spending his time, much less something he would posit as a past time.

Still, being shot at does wonders for ones motivation. Really just takes the procrastinator out of their hideyhole and kicks them right 'tween the goalposts.

The girl had spouted off her random string of numbers -confusing Greg to no end, it wasn't the typical interaction that he had imagined as his first bout of superherodom.- and shortly after the end of the alley had been filled with an abnormal sight. More so than his own green tinted skin, at least he could explain that away as 'powers be weird, yo'. No, this was abnormal in the normal sense. If that made sense.

Six men, dressed in a spattering of different outfits ranging from a business suit to one who was wearing camo fatigues. Each of them had something in common with the other though, due to what they had all been carrying. Guns, standard rifle looking components that gave way to less than standard looking tinker modifications. To add to that, the guy up at the front of the group was actually the odd man out, carrying a rather normal looking rifle. Greg recognized it as a tranq gun, having seen the weapon in use during a four hour marathon on the Animal Planet.

What. He had been hanging out with Sparky, and the relatively normal life of animals living on the Savannah was oddly relaxing.

Gregs immediate response to seeing the men food the alley was to put himself in between them and the obviously distressed girl.

Which in turn allowed him a small revelation. The girl wasn't gigantic. He was now tiny. Relatively, at least. The men quite obviously towered over the two of them, having the proportions normal to a typical adult. It was slightly galling, to know his power not only stole his junk but also shrank him to the average size of a middle schooler. It certainly didn't give him much confidence regarding his upcoming confrontation, if only his changer power had made him the size of a small house. Then they wouldn't be leveling all of their weapons... at his... in his general direction... Oh shit, they were going to shoot at him!

The man in the lead shouldered his tranq rifle, pausing to unholster a blatantly tinkertech pistol from under his coat. He momentarily spoke into a handheld radio, the distance between Greg and the group making it so he couldn't hear what was being said. The man gave a short nod, then pointed his gun at Greg and fired.

A freaking LASER shot out near instantaneously, not giving Greg a chance to dodge even if he had had the forethought to. Fate smiled on young Veder however, when instead of a two inch diameter hole being bored through his forehead the blast of light hit the gem above his eyes and... slipped inside of it.

The process was not altogether unpainful, Greg would later equate it to similar straights as the one dentist his mom used to go to. The unlucky bastard had forgot to give Greg anesthetic before he started drilling, scaring himself and Greg to pieces when the young lad had started screaming bloody murder. His business had taken a small hit that day, culminating in an out of court settlement in favor of Gregs mother. It hadn't helped his public image any either, and the last Greg had heard of the fellow he was supposedly moving to a different state.

What did you expect when your dentist was named Fredrick Paine, though?

The moment passed, sensation dulling and evaporating from his forehead as he blandly stared down the equally nonplussed assailant.

The man reached for his radio once more, barking out in a volume the Greg could discern from across the alley.

"Target is a cape, confirmed!" The man dropped the radio back to his hip, snapping out at his accompaniment, "Tech in the visor absorbs shots. Aim for center mass!"

Welp.

Greg didn't stick around to see if his torso was similarly resistant to laser beams. He grabbed the girl by her right hand, booking it for the nearby exit of the alley and back to the city street proper. Thankfully it seemed that the girl had even less compunction about sticking around than he did, quickly matching his pace.

"What the he...ck do they want?" Greg verbally stumbled, trying not to cuss in front of a young girl. If his mom found out he polluted the mind of not only someone she would consider to be a young child, but a girl? He'd be grounded till he was twenty, and that was if she went easy on him. Copious amounts of soap awaited his mouth, at any rate. Better not to risk it.

Plus, capes -of the hero variety anyway, villains seemed to have no such restrictions. Not like they were trying to set a good example or anything...- were not supposed to cuss. They took down villains with a mixture of wit and integrity. Greg didn't want to be labeled as a 'bad' hero right off the bat.

"No idea," the girl responded, gasping down a quick breath of air as they ran. "Whatever it is, it isn't good for me. Zero percent chance I live out the week if they get their hands on me."

Greg paused in his internal musing, puzzling over the girls choice of words.

"Percent? How can you possibly know that though..." Greg trailed off, the answer coming to the forefront of his mind with little prompting. "Oh, duh. Parahuman. Thinker power, with percentage based values to grant you a comprehensive version of precognition?" Greg flinched, wondering at the words that were spilling from his mouth. Since when did he start talking like a total teachers pet? Greg was well known for running his mouth, but he had some sort of propriety. Better to be known as the nerd than the geek. One had weird hobbies and interests, the other was a prime target if a bully wanted to get a string of B's on homework for the classes they were struggling in.

"Y... yeah," she choked out, dodging with Greg as they weaved around an adult that upon taking one look at who was chasing them, averted his gaze and hurriedly scurried away. "My power... It said you could help me!"

"Well..." Greg reasoned, thinking furiously as he cussed out the man in the safe confines of his mind. Bastard, sees a girl and a cape running from a group of gun toting nutjobs and doesn't do anything. Absolute asshole. "I'm kinda new at this. Literally just today, actually. Didn't even know I could do the whole sucky thing with the concentrate light emission. Didn't feel all that great either, so I don't exactly want to go repeating that."

"Of course," the girl grumped, clutching at her side with her left hand. "I'm being chased by bad guys and I somehow manage to latch onto the only cape who's even newer at this than I am. Of course. Couldn't get Assault, Miss Militia or Glory Girl, I have to get the Spectacular Green Girl. Wow. Do you even have a plan?"

Greg ducked to the side, seeing a glint of metal out of his peripheral vision as he made to turn down a street. He managed to juke at just the right time, barely avoiding the lance of brilliant light that someone in the group behind them had fired at them.

"Nyeeeaaaah!" Greg yelped, tenderly grasping at the line of molten fury that had erupted from his chest. A thin line had traced it's way across his chest, cutting through the fabric and burning the flesh underneath. Greg felt a slight tugging from his forehead, a cold shiver that melted across his body and left him feeling drained. After this sensation awaited, Greg noticed that the tear across his chest was gone, replaced once more with unblemished fabric. "Holy shit, cmon!"

They cut across a parking lot, Greg slowing as he huffed desperately for breath. "We can't keep running," Greg admitted, glancing around to see if the group had caught up yet.

"We can't just stop and give up, either!" The girl rebutted.

"Not saying that we... should..." Greg trailed off, the barest traces of a plan starting to form in his mind as he took in their immediate surroundings. "C'mon!" He belted out, grabbing her hand once more as he drug her along. "No... No... Too old, too new, import, alarm system, someone's been sleeping in this one, locked," Greg groused, tugging on the handle to a seemingly random car.

"What the hell are you doing?" The girl asked, eyes wide with confusion. Oh sure, Greg wasn't allowed to cuss, but she was. Some people were just too privileged.

"Looking for something easy, that won't nessasarily ruin suin someone's life," Greg explained, finally spotting his quarry. "This!" He crowed, dragging her to the door of a nearby truck. "What's your power say about this one?"

"What?" the girl retorted.

"Is this a good one? Will us taking this mess up a good person?" Greg reiterated.

"I..." The girl paused, closed her eyes for a couple seconds. "Seventy three point oh eight... No. This one won't hurt anyone that matters," she affirmed.

"Then c'mon!" Greg barked, hauling the truck door open.

"Zero percent... and zero percent," the girl muttered, before snapping attention back to Greg, "There's no key, you won't be able to start it, and hiding won't work!" She protested.

"Just get in," Greg rebuffed, grabbing her around the waist and raising her into the cab. She didn't resist, scooting over to the passenger seat as Greg clambered in alongside her. Being small again suuuuuuuucked. Everything was made for adults, making maneuvering even in the simplest sense a chore.

Greg slid off the edge of the seat, squeezing into the space where ones feet would usually be free to manipulate the pedals. He banged at the aged plastic under the wheel, cracking the fragile material until he managed to peel it back and away from the myriad of wires it had been protecting underneath.

"Do you know what you're doing? Agh!" The girl flinched, clutching her head in a moment of pain. "The hell does 'N.A' mean?"

Greg paused, caught in the moment as he considered her words. What was he doing? He didn't know how to hotwire a car, how the hell did he even get this far? He peered at the shadowy confines of the under space, splinters of sunlight illuminating his hands. It was so simple though, all he had to do was strip the insulation from these two wires, that would bypass the ignition process that was required for any key bearing moral individual...

Greg stopped, mind agog as the veritable schematics for his chosen vehicle slid across his mental processes. He knew what a four cylinder engine was, how it worked, how to make it better. It was galling to be restricted to such mundane tech, but even restrained by such barbarically limited resources she was sure she could pump out a mobile platform that could overtake anything else on the road. Add in some gem tech, and she could even make the stupid thing fly. Affix a modular arm unit, and she could even have a cycling energy dispersal canon at her disposal-

Greg started, flinching as he pondered the two wires in his hands. The hell was that? He then smiled, an earnest grin that crept across his face.

"I'm a tinker!" He crowed, shoving the two wires against each other to punctuate his statement as the engine rumbled to life. He scrambled back up onto the seat, grinning broadly as he took the wheel.

Seconds passed, and Gregs smile slowly fell.

"You can't reach the pedals," The girl observed.

"No I can not."

[hr]

Thomas Calvert was a patient man.

He had a near infinite number of attempts that he could make at his fingertips, so he could damn well afford to be.

He stared down at the moniter before him, watching the live feed on one of his mercenaries helmet cams. Thinkers were truly a pain to deal with, and this Dinah Alcott was proving to be no different. A precocious child to be sure, but a surprisingly resourceful one at that. To think, she had only escaped originally due to Marcus not wearing face protection.

Thomas sighed, pinching his nose in frustration. At the very least, this timeline had supplied him with knowledge of the existence of yet anothercape that had managed to crawl out of the woodwork. How very annoying. Some sort of green midget with breaker or tinker powers. He made a mental note to send another group to apprehend the cape after he split the timeline again, if the childlike appearance was anything to go by she could very well be trained like any other.

Tattletale was such an example, if a roundabout one. Thomas knew she was reluctant, always slinking around behind his back and scheming her way to a prospective freedom. In that way she was actually trained far better than any dog. Her power saw to it, actually. It could see that he was willing to kill her within the span of any breath if she so much as sneezed wrong at him. This in turn led to a delicious seesaw effect on her part, sending her teetering from arrogant dismissal to hurried platitudes from one second to the next.

It was through one of their near daily meetings that had led to the discovery of his soon to be newest acquisition. She had started off just as proud, as defiant as any time before. With the first finger separated from her hand, she had quickly spat out every little bit of information she thought he might find important. Of course by the time she was out of fingers she was a sobbing wreck, unable to amount any form of subtle resistance.

When he violated her further, she had gone catatonic. Or it might have been the blood loss. Regardless, it was as Thomas preffered. When his partners moved around too much beneath him or made too much unnessasary noise, he found it to be a horrendous put off.

Of course he had collapsed that timeline directly after, it wouldn't do to let all that blood seep into the carpet. That mess would be almost impossible to get out after it dried.

Also it would be a waste to just be rid of Tattletale at this time. She still had a level of usefulness, and was truly a godsend for stress relief.

It had brought with it its own spat of useful information, chiefly that of a new parahuman that Tattletale had happened upon in the middle of the local mall. The young strumpet had been blithely using her power out among the masses, invisible to any normal mud raking human going about their business, but a radiant beacon of light to the sight of Tattletale power.

Served her right. Mumbling under one's breath out in public was just plain rude. Thomas let himself have a slight smile, he would teach her a measure of manners soon enough.

Not as Thomas Calvert, but as his true identity. Coil. It was truly astounding, how free the simple act of putting on an ornate mask liberated him so. How truly confined and chained he became every time he slipped back into his disguise of Thomas Calvert, average PRT office worker.

It was at back near the start of this whole debacle, the moment that Coil ordered his men to fire upon the cape that he felt a twinge of disappointment flutter in his chest. It really wasn't cost efficient, and he could better handle the situation the next-

The cape didn't die.

The bolt of energy was absorbed into the capes visor, prompting her to grab young Alcott and take off running.

"What are you doing?!" Coil snapped, flipping the switch on his intercom. It wouldn't do to have him fumbling with a common hand radio, after all. He could have gotten a model that was activated via button, but he found that having a switch to flip was just oh so much more satisfying. "Am I paying you all to stand around, or are you going to get the damned girl?"

"On it, boss," came the curt reply.

Coil sighed, pawing away at the flesh of his chin.

Minutes later and they still hadn't caught the girl, Coil was leaning towards just closing the timeline and calling it a loss. Still, no other capes had been attracted to the duos mad flight from his men as of yet. So it could very well be salvaged.

"Sir!" Marcus barked out, his voice coming across in a strained tone over the intercom. "The targets are fleeing in a pickup, should we continue pursuit?"

Coil watched the screen in a mixture of disbelief and begrudging amusement. The little green girls hair could be sticking out from the top of the drivers seat, as the truck haphazardly weaved its way out of the parking lot. Coil wouldn't admit it out loud, but he... honestly wanted to see where this scenario was heading.

In the other timeline the families order of food arrived, the young girl having predictably neglected partaking of even a sip of her drink as she poked daintily at the food on her plate. So she had only ordered the coffee in order to escape the mercenaries. Coil wanted her even more than ever.

"No capes inbound, but be on guard," Coil told him. He could have simply ordered him once more to get on with it, but it was surprising how much the most obedient pawn would rebel if they thought they were being railroaded. "Pursue and take them down. I don't care if the package has a couple broken bones, feel free to run them off the road or whatever else takes your fancy."

"Understood," Marcus acknowledged. The group quickly reconvened with the two drivers, continuing the chase and quickly closing the distance that the green cape had managed to secure. One of the men in the lead car leaned out the passenger side window, taking potshots at the fleeing trucks rear wheels in between shots at the driver.

"Holy shit! Tobias!" Marcus belted out with equal parts surprise and horror. Coil was simply confused, the hell did the man just do?

"Marcus, report," Coil ordered.

"It's... Tobias, sir! He just jumped out of the window! Just jumped right out, got ran over by a eighteen wheeler!"

Coil kneeded at his brow, a headache forming at the incompitance of his hired help. Couldn't even have a proper car chase, had to go flinging themselves headfirst out of car windows. Like goddamned teenagers. Or college students. Both were equally stupid in his eyes.

He flipped the switch on the intercom, allowing himself a measure of respite from their idiocy. "Okay. Mental note. Apparently Tobias has a death wish. I'll have to remember that. His suicidal tendencies have to be useful in some regard."

Looking back down at the screen only compounded his mental pain, a report that his lumbering goons had drawn the attention of the Protectorate, specifically that a green skinned cape driving a truck was being shot at with tinkertech rifles. Miss Militia and Assault inbound.

Time to cut his losses.

Coil reached out, intent on collapsing the timeline.

Blackness permeated his existence, stretching on to infinity. Coil gasped, a turgid sound that was swallowed up by the inky abyss. The pressure was immense, a chastising hand that none too gently grasped at his power and gave what he could only describe as a 'waggling finger'. All was black. All but the eyes.

They stared down at him, cowing him with their majesty. The blood red eye watched on, fury dwelling deep within its churning depths. The violet gazed on with a measured patience, labeling him as nothing more than a mere annoyance.

It was the last, the Azure tinged globe of sapphire that demanded his attention. It peered down at him, disapproving and disappointed. It was then that Coil felt the reaching icy fingers of... something grasping, clawing at him. It took hold of his power and twisted.

The timeline where the family sat outside the restaurant, 'happily' chowing away at their chosen meals collapsed, leaving Coil sitting and staring at the screen before him in disbelief.

It.. That was... How? She was supposed to be just a normal, run of the mill precog. She wasn't supposed to have this sort of power...

Coil flipped the switch on his intercom with wild abandon, snarling with his haste.

"Your pay is tripled, kill the girl! Use whatever methods you have to, just kill the fucking girl!"

[hr]

Greg thought his lack of thought was perfectly justified. People running after them, shooting guns that went 'pew pew pew', the whole 'running' thing, screaming, shouting, and did he mention the running?

"So uh," He mumbled, trying to form his thoughts in a coherent structure, "Probably should have asked this before, but things were kinda hectic so..." The girl stared at him with a bland expression stamped across her face, "What's your name? I can't very well keep calling you 'the girl' in my head..."

She appeared surprised at his question, before she screwed up her nose in amusement. "Dinah. Dinah Alcott. What's yours?"

Greg froze, brain going a thousand miles an hour as he tried to think up a response. He couldn't very well tell her his real name, for one that just wasn't done in the cape business. Plus, with his changer form providing the perfect disguise there was no way he was going to tie it back to his true identity by using the same name.

Dinahs face lit up in embarrassed understanding, "I didn't mean it like that!" She jabbered out hurriedly, "I meant your cape name... But if you're as new to this as you said you are you probably don't have one..." She cut herself off, averting her gaze as she took to rifling through the trucks glovebox.

"You can call me Void...uh..." Greg trailed off, his go-to screen of anonymity dying on his lips in transit. His online handle that he used on practically everything requiring a username had been for the past several years, 'Void Cowboy'. He couldn't rightly remember where he had come up with it from, the memories from before his father was laid off were jumbled and foggy.

"Voidah?" Dinah cocked her head to the side, having finished her intrusive searching in the midst of Gregs inattentiveness. A small pile lay on the floor of the truck, a mishmash of papers peppered with various junk and trash. Also, a tiny little handgun, like one a stereotypical woman would carry in ones purse. That also joined the pile on the floor, Dinah apparently being unwilling to attempt using the small firearm. Not that Greg knew how to use one either... "What's it stand for?" She asked, finally digging out a pair of worn looking driving gloves.

"Uum..." Greg stalled, trying to come up with a convincing lie. "Just... Came up with it. It sounds cool, right?" Greg gave her what he hoped was a placating smile.

"I don't get it," came the all too quick response. "You might want to give it a little more thought."

"Thats... I... Well what are you doing?" Greg managed to belt out, attempting to cover up his embarrassment as she scooted off the seat and onto the truck floor by his dangling legs.

"Well I'm not gonna touch these with my bare hands, you know?" She retorted, giving the gas pedal an experimental push. The engine revved, but no lateral movement was to be had.

Greg knew the problem immediately, a copious amount of hours playing a bevy of vehicle simulators gave him a frighteningly realistic idea of how driving such a truck worked. It had all been worth the multi hundred dollar setup of pedals and controls. All to pretend he was driving a tractor.

Aaaaaaall worth it.

Not only was the parking brake still engaged, but to Gregs further trepidation he noticed something he hadn't really considered to be all that big of a deal before succumbing to the horrible realization that his current stature wasn't lanky enough to to reach the ground bound pedals. The truck was a clutch based, manual gear system.

"You could just use your feet, you know?" He joked, watching as Dinahs head bobbed in sudden mortification. She quickly adjusted her position, shoulders between Gregs legs as she faced the wheel and leaned back against the seat. "Step on the far left one, all the way to the floor," Greg told her, watching with satisfaction as she followed his instruction. "It's a clutch, so," he reached out, letting the parking brakes own spring loaded switch disengage itself as he grabbed the handle. "You're gonna have to let it off slowly as you rev up the engine. Far right pedal."

"I know how a car works!" Dinah snapped back at him as she let off the clutch too fast, and stalled the engine. "I know how a real car works, not this stupid clutch thing..."

"Just let the engine build up some momentum before you start letting the clutch up," Greg calmly ordered, noting out the corner of his eye as the group of gun toting nutjobs trundled their way into the parking lot. "Not to put any pressure on you, but our friends seem to have caught up," he told her, rubbing the two wires together once more to restart the engine.

"I know, I know!" She snapped, jamming her foot down on the gas. The engine let out a keening roar, before the truck jolted into a general forward path.

Greg had never actually driven an actual car before. His mom had forbidden him from even trying, stating that if she ever got so much as word of him joyriding he would be scrubbing dishes in juvie till he was thirty. He'd try to get his permit once he was sixteen, and not a day earlier.

So it was with a sheepish expression that Greg numbly steered their chosen mode of transportation across the parking lot, skidding along the side and backs of several parked cars before they lurched out into the road proper.

"Do you wanna switch?" Dinah snarked, peering back over her shoulder and giving him an expression that could only be described as 'really?'.

"I got this," Greg assured her, before prompting her through engaging second gear. Their truck slowly built up steam, swerving through traffic and barreling right through a stop light. "Woops."

"Woops? Woops what?" Dinah demanded, having barely seen the stoplight out of the sliver of windshield visible to her.

"Ran a stop light," Greg suddenly cringed, jamming the steering wheel to the left as a solid 'whud' went through the truck. "Aaaaaand ran over a mailbox. Woops."

Their moment of guilt was undercut by a lance of cylindrical light effortlessly tunneling through the back window, leaving a scorch mark on the front windshield. Greg gave a glance behind, seeing the two CRVs that had closed behind them. In the front car Greg could see a tan skinned man with bared forearms leaning out the passenger window, aiming the weapon that had discharged the last bit of flying superheated death through their window.

"God, they won't give you a break, will they?" He groused, wrenching the wheel to the left once more. He cut across several lanes of traffic, including a couple that had been going the opposite direction. "Rev us up, I want to get to fourth gear now that they're riding our tailpipe. If they get up beside us they could run us off the road!"

Dinah complied, finding it easier to engage the clutch now that the stupid truck was actually moving. Their panicked acceleration was punctuated by several more bursts of light, some of which were getting entirely too close for his comfort.

He swerved right onto another street, wincing as another shot came close enough to sear the right side of his face. "Nyeeeeeaaah, friggin jerk wads!" He yelled back at them. They probably couldn't hear him, but yelling almost always made him feel better. Certainly helped when facing off against a veritable army of nine year olds from earth Aleph on Call of Duty. The subscription costs for transdimensional connection was triple that for local lines, but Greg thought it worth it.

Another shot traced it's way through the back window, scorching a small hole through his now bushy hair. With a restrained snarl of barely repressed frustration, Greg could feel him reaching back... Back past his fingers, past the truck, past the space in between their two vehicles. He felt... something in him grab onto something behind them, something that reeked of coins and gutters. He pulled, and felt that something jerk in his grasp.

The sensation faded, leaving Greg once more desperately weaving his way through various traffic. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a curious sight in their rear view mirror. The man that had been leaning out of the passenger window was doing his best impression of Alexandria, fingers tight around his weapon as he flew out of his car. He landed bodily, disappearing from view as the distance between them lengthened yet further.

"Holee-cooooow," Greg muttered, as the cars behind them let out squeezing peals of rubber as they tried to avoid the downed man. One large semi in particular, came to a screeching halt as it swerved off the road. "... I'm sure he's fiiiiiine."

"What happened?" Dinah barked, looking back at Greg as she let off the gas slightly. "I can't see anything from down here, what's going on? Did we lose them?"

Greg let her have a brilliant smile, brightness ratings : MAX.

"I have more pooooowers!~" he trilled, before hurriedly swerving through a crosswalk to avoid the people attempting to walk through it. "Magnikinesis! I yam de mastah of Magnesis, Magneto! Bwaaaahahahaha." He slowly ended in a deadpan tone.

"Should I call you that instead of 'Voida'? Or are you going to change it again in five minutes?" Dinah joked, feeling the telltale jitters as their truck made its way up, over, and back off of a sidewalk.

"No!" Greg quickly spat, before bashfully waving to a poor old woman who had abandoned her bag of groceries in his errant path. "I mean, I dunno. I was trying to make a joke. Like, Magneto? Marvel comics?"

"My mom doesn't like me reading frivolous things," Dinah admitted, marveling at the odd turn their conversation had taken. Being chased by gun toting super villains, and somehow they had ended up talking about comics. What wonders next?

"Friv- comics aren't, Nyeeah!" Greg yelped, weaving past one of their pursuing cars. They had somehow managed to cut them off, putting themselves in their immediate path before Greg shot their truck along a sidewalk. A sidewalk which up to that moment had been a crowdedsidewalk, but was now surprisingly devoid of individuals to run over. They had apparently decided that the open road was a far safer place for them to take cover.

Dinah suddenly tensed, her body constricting in a rictus of pain. Greg looked down and could see her contorting, eyes screwed shut as her mouth opened wide in a silent scream. Her hands curled upwards, grabbing at her forehead. She shot ramrod straight, jamming the gas pedal straight down to the floor.

"Dinah? Hey, Dinah! Hey! What's... Shit! What's happening, is something wrong?" He asked, looking desperately around for a place where they could stop. If Dinah was having a seizure or a stroke, there was frighteningly little that Greg could do to help her. Not that as of the moment they would be able to stop, what with her plunging the pedal down to the metal. A fact that the quickly tiring engine was only too happy to share with them.

Dinahs eyes opened wide, and Greg watched as they flashed a brilliant tinge of blue. She closed her mouth, then strangled out a single word.

"STOP," she intoned, and Greg felt a ripple of... Something pass over them. A curious sense of dejavu, that passed just as quickly. Dinah shook her head, her eyes quickly shifting back to their neutral brown shade.

"Uh... Really?" Greg choked out, shaking off the alien sensation. "Cause they're still chasing us, just so you know?"

She shook her head once more, peering up at him with an expression that clearly stated she didn't understand.

"What? I don't... UGHN. What just happened?" She asked.

"I dunno, you looked like you were having some sort of attack, then your eyes glowed blue, now they're-"

A bevy of shots followed them, quickly turning the passenger seat to a flaming briquette.

"The heck?" Greg muttered. "I mean, I'm glad they aren't the aiming at my head anymore, but did the seat insult their mom or something?"

Dinah grew still, letting up off the gas as the engine started groaning in protest. "Eighty Five point Oh Six Percent." Her gaze whipped back up to lock eyes with Greg, "They're aiming for me," she muttered.

"Crud," Greg muttered, weaving again through comparatively slower cars as they tried to pull off the side and away from their joyriding rampage. "Just... Just stay down there. I think I have an idea. Take the wheel!"

"What? No! Get back down here! Voidah!" Dinah yelped, clasping blindly at the suddenly vacant wheel.

Greg stood up on the seat, peering backwards at the trailing cars as they effortlessly matched their current speed. If only he could reconnect that feeling from before, if only he could reach out and grab it...

By now the upper portion of the cab was little more than metal and glass Swiss cheese, more material gone than was still left. Greg reached back with one hand steadying himself with his other on the seats high back. He reached out, desperately grasping for the forward part of the leading car with his power.

He felt it slide over the internal mechanisms, and tried lifting the entire car. The weight near buckled him, slipping out of his grasp as if it were coated in butter. It was too large. He'd have to go smaller. He reached out once more, grabbing at something, anything he could grab onto. A small knob of metal met his grasp, and he yanked.

The lead cars engine let out a metallic screech, smoke billowing from the hood as it swiftly slowed to a halt.

"HA! Take that you-" Greg cut himself off, sparing a glance back down at Dinah. He had managed to not get caught swearing so far, he couldn't very well lose his stride now... What could he yell out though? All his best insults were straight swears, what was decidedly child friendly?

"You... Clods!"

AUTHORS NOTES:

Reposting from Spacebattles, so the format might be a bit janky. I have no idea if this weird blacked out text thing is gonna stay once I post, if it does I'll be trying to remove it as soon as possible.