-----???/Our Protagonist-----
-----Rooftops of Brockton Bay, CT-----
-----04/11/2011-----
"Who are you?" Such a simple question. A question I've been asking myself since I woke up as a Mimic in that alley back in January. I'm not a typical Typhon, I know this.
My thoughts, even before my first consumption of human consciousness was already atypical. My thoughts would bleed into Human vernacular, as though it was natural.
Sifting through the memories of TranStar technologies and projects, I stumbled upon something similar. "Project Cobalt". The prospect of opening up a line of dialogue with Typhon organisms by transplanting Human Neuromods into Typhon organisms, putting them through simulated experiences to help them develop the transplanted Mirror Neurons.
The end goal being to help the Typhon connect with Humanity, to introduce Human concepts such as "Empathy" to an otherwise "alien" mindset such as that of the Typhon.
Some nihilistic individuals would argue that empathy, that Humanity, is a disease. A flaw. A MISTAKE! That the Typhon, such as they are, is just fine the way it is. That they represent a far more pure form of consciousness.
The Typhon clearly recognize the existence of "flaws", or unacceptable "deviations", and for that reason, the Nightmare is born. The Typhon's equivalent to an "antibody". The Typhon are bound through the Coral, through a psionic connection that links the minds of individuals to a greater collective whole.
Any non-Typhon that comes too close to reaching the Typhon's gestalt neural network represents a potential threat to the sanctity of the network. The Nightmare is thus dispatched to eliminate this interloper, this virus, attempting to infect the network.
An interloper, a virus, a flaw, a mistake... In this case, me.
I know now that I've been compromised quite extensively. But the problem is, I am alone. There are no other Apex Typhon in this dimensional sector. There is no correcting force. No network hub to check for errors.
None other than me. I am the first Typhon here. The senior. The controller. The core. The Apex.
I am the one who decides "right" and "wrong" for the Typhon of this dimension. All Typhon born in this dimension are inherently flawed, infected, other.
I've become aware of my existence, both as the center of the Typhon gestalt consciousness, and as an individual existence. I don't want to die. That fear of death denotes my strangeness. That fear is part of what makes me, me.
While ruminating on this introspection, I observe the movements of the Humans. Of my prey. Members of the ABB, rallied together as part of a retribution campaign against The Undersiders for the Ruby Dreams job several weeks prior.
Tonight's the night. The night that my memories have been leading to.
I've spent much time, a little over two months, peeling back the veil of my memories to uncover the truth. Once I "remembered" Project Cobalt, the memories came crashing to the forefront of my mind.
After sorting them out, I finally "remember" who I was prior to being a Mimic. I "remember" what sort of world I find myself in. I "remember" a great many things, so much uncertainty becoming clear.
I "remember" that I was Human before all of this. But given the existence of Project Cobalt, can I truly say that these "memories" are truly "mine"? Am I the product of "reincarnation", or am I a "copy" transplanted into a random Mimic?
I am reminded of the so-called "Ship of Theseus", Theseus's Paradox of whether or not taking an object and gradually replacing the components of the object until nothing remains of the original while still referring to it as the original object's namesake makes it fundamentally the same object still.
I've pondered this particular paradox for some time after "remembering" my "past", if that's even true. And I believe I've reached an answer, at least in regards to "myself".
"I Think, Therefore I Am." I may not be my "Original Self", but I am still ultimately "Myself". As such, I shall live my life as I please. Perhaps these sentiments stem from the "previous me", but that is ultimately immaterial to my "current self".
Take now for instance.
"And shoot the kids in the head! If you see that little blond bitch, shoot her twice for good measure!" Says the tall, masked man who isn't wearing a shirt and clearly in charge of this shit show. Hello Lung.
The sudden buzzing of insects tells me that the time has come. Taylor Hebert aka Skitter has decided to try her hand at heroism. Hmm, I could just sit back and watch. But that sounds boring.
{Eliminate the normals however you see fit. Lung is mine.}
With the command issued, I take on a form reminiscent of a Phantom, sort of.
Both Skitter and Lung seem confused by sudden appearance as I [Phantom Shift] onto the street between them.
"Who the fuck are you supposed to be?" Asks Lung. I turn to him with a blank stare on my "face", then spawn a [Lift Field] directly under him, launching him into the air at 19.6 m/s squared, at twice the rate of Earth's gravitational pull.
"I'm Typhon Prime." I say in response. I then turn to "look" at Skitter; I can feel her fear from here despite the distance between us. She then says "I'm Skitter. Are you a Hero or a Villain?"
I respond with "I am myself. Such labels are empty, those are but words without true meaning. I do what I feel is necessary. I do as I please. If my actions benefit others or harm others, such concerns are immaterial to me."
Her thoughts turn apprehensive at my blatant claim of "indifference" in regards to whether or not I help or hurt people. Then she seems to be steeling her resolve.
"I would advise you not follow through with your plan. You can't defeat me." Before she can respond, I'm knocked into a nearby building.
"Argh!" Shouts a partially ramped up Lung. Heh, [Backlash] is a bitch, ain't it? I [Phantom Shift] back out to the street looking no worse for wear while Lung is still shaking off the effects of effectively "hitting himself" while dealing with the fear pulse.
Unfortunately, fear quickly turns to anger as he ramps up even faster, having clearly recognized me as a serious threat. Skitter in the mean time has decided to focus her attention on the ABB thugs who were accompanying Lung.
There's not much for her to do on that front since the Phantoms I brought with me have mostly taken care of them, they're in varying degrees of bodily harm, with only one or two fatalities. No sense in wasting potential Mimic spawners after all.
Lung notices the actions of Skitter and my Phantoms, and decides he doesn't really need unpowered mooks, and promptly throws exploding fireballs in their direction.
Rude. I know Phantoms are pretty cheap, but that's still rude. Okay jackass, let's see how you like this. Using [Phantom Genesis], I raise half of the barbequed corpses as Thermal Phantoms and the other half as Poltergeists.
Skitter shrieks at the sudden raising of corpses as Phantoms and Lung is visibly unsettled, but recovers quickly.
"Interesting, you can twist the dead into your soldiers. A Master/Trump? Unusual, but useless against me!" He nearly growls at me. Only to run into a maze of [Lift Fields] laid down by the Poltergeists.
"I should warn you, Poltergeists are rather fond of those [Lift Fields]." I tell him as he's being juggled around.
"Roargh! I'll kill you!" He shouts as he starts tossing fireballs everywhere. My newly raised Thermal Phantoms spread out and drain the flames and excess heat from the area, much to Lung's shocked annoyance. It wouldn't do for him to accidentally torch my new Poltergeists.
"Are you toying with me?! I AM LUNG! AND I WILL NOT TOLERATE YOUR DISRESPECT!"
"You see, you would be intimidating. If you were, well, intimidating."
"Roar!!!!!" At this point, his mask has fallen off due to his face morphing into its bestial state as his whole body is covered in silver scales. He's about 9 feet tall at this point and wreathed in a cloak of flames.
Skitter seems to be hanging back, clearly recognizing that she's of no help here at this point, but not willing to leave either. Is she perhaps worried for me? That's nice I suppose.
*Howl* Then three large, van-sized things drop down from the rooftops and take up positions around Lung.
"Good evening! I thought it was weird that Oni Lee was by himself so long and we heard the big guy was looking for us. Figured we may as well take the fight to him, but it looks like we aren't the first ones here." Says the blond chick in the purple catsuit.
Skitter seems confused at the revelation that Lung was after Capes instead of regular "kids" like she assumed, which Tattletale promptly picked up on.
"Well bug girl, thanks for thinking about us and wanting to help out. As for you-" She stops talking as she gets a good look at me.
"What the actual fuck?! What the fuck are you?!" She shouts at me while giving off palpable levels of fear. Is [The Negotiator] unable to get a good fix on me? Convenient.
Regent then looks at me going from amused at Lisa's confusion, to well-hidden concern as he can't get a fix on me with his powers. Bitch meanwhile seems to be hovering somewhere between anger and fear sprinkled with uncharacteristic caution. The instincts of an animal recognizing a predator.
Grue then speaks up "I don't know who either of you are, but I'm certainly not opposed to help." That seems to have broken the stalemate as Skitter uses her swarm of insects to try and distract Lung while Grue unleashes his cloud of darkness to blind Lung.
Hmm, odd. I can somewhat "see" just fine, yet not? From what I understand, Grue's darkness interferes with electricity and drains energy from everything within it, but it doesn't drain neural energy, so I can still perceive the locations of living, conscious beings.
But my extra senses, thermal, infrared, electrical, etc. are being heavily muted by the darkness. That was to be expected, but it's still annoying.
Well, sense neural sense is still working and I've locked onto Lung's unique neurological signature, I launch [Homing Cystoids] loaded up with [Toxic Ether Clouds]. [Superthermal] and [Electrostatic Burst] are useless and [Kinetic Blast] can be overcome by his regeneration. [Ether] on the other hand...
*pained screaming*
Yep. That was to be expected. The [Ether] is corroding his scales and flesh while hindering his regeneration. This is pathetically easy now. My Poltergeists let loose with another round of [Lift Fields] while I continue to launch [Ether Cystoids] at Lung, slowly corroding him while he's dangling helpless in the air.
Eventually, the corrosion overcomes his regeneration and he passes out from the pain. He is summarily dropped to the ground, at which point Grue lifts his darkness and now it's The Undersiders, Skitter, and myself in a three-way standoff.
Lisa then speaks up. "I feel like we were completely unneeded for this. So, bug girl, not bad for a first night out, right?"
At this point, I have a Mimic come along and Mimic the most expensive La-Z-Boy armchair I could find and sit down while waiting for Lisa to finish giving Skitter a crash course on the Unwritten Rules and a bunch of other bullshit.
"As for you weird shadow girl who isn't Shadow Stalker." I cock my head at her. "What the fuck's your deal? You haven't said anything this whole time and my Power's giving me fuck-all so I can't pull my usual 'psychic bullshit'."
"I am the Typhon Prime of this dimensional sector. I am not a Parahuman, so your Power is useless against me. Same thing for your boss as well."
That seems to have really shaken her. The rest of The Undersider's seem confused about the notion of having a "boss", but Lisa's mind is churning at a million miles a minute.
"How do you know that his Power doesn't work on you?" She asks.
I respond. "That depends. What price are you willing to pay for that information?" "{What price are you willing to pay for freedom?}" I say to her telepathically.
That seems to have spooked her good. It's at that point that I hear the roaring of a certain motorcycle. It seems Lisa's picked up on it as well.
"Well, this has certainly been an interesting evening for all of us. But it's time for us to go." She and the rest of The Undersider's turn to leave, but Lisa looks back at Skitter and says. "By the way, you shouldn't be so quick to paint us all in such narrow strokes as 'Hero's and Villains'. Not all of us chose this life."
And with that, The Undersider's fuck off into the night. Moments later, Armsmaster comes rolling up on his patented "Armscycle". He takes a quick look around and spots Lung laid out still recovering from the corrosion, as well as Skitter and I standing off to the side.
"Hero's or Villain's?" He asks with all of the subtlety of a trainwreck.
"Hero." Replies Skitter.
"Chaotic Neutral." I reply.
They both look at me confused. I then elaborate. "I told Skitter this already, but I don't subscribe to empty labels like 'Hero' or 'Villain'. Those are human concepts used to trap people into various social groups, pressuring them to conform to a certain way of thought and action. I do what I want regardless of others opinions."
Armsmaster adopts a hard stare, then says. "That sounds an awful lot like something a Villain would say."
To which I reply. "Thank you for proving my point, Beardmaster."
That seems to have irked him. "You will surrender yourself to PRT custody while we get to the bottom of this."
To which I egg him on. "Oh wow. How do you like that Skitter. Just because I didn't declare myself to be a 'Hero', and for calling him out on proving my philosophy correct, he's now going to arrest me. Never mind the fact that I just took down Lung."
That seems to give him pause. "You two took down Lung?" He says rather skeptically.
Skitter replies. "Well, technically there were others, but ultimately it was mostly just Typhon Prime, her-" She says pointing at me. "-toying with him the entire time."
Armsmaster seems nonplussed, but then asks. "What others?"
Skitter then goes on to describe the arrival of The Undersider's before Armsmaster informs her of their identity as a low-level Villain group. He then asks. "If you're a Hero, why did you let them escape without a fight?"
Skitter then adopts a sheepish attitude, before offloading her emotions to her swarm, and responding. "Well, this is my first night out as an active Cape and I'm admittedly uninformed regarding the various Cape groups in Brockton Bay. I know about the Protectorate, Wards, the major gangs. But small-time groups like The Undersider's? I've never even heard of them until you mentioned them."
Armsmaster pauses for a moment, then nods in comprehension. He then turns to me and says. "Since you haven't committed any actual crimes, that we know of, I can't arrest you. However, you bear an uncanny resemblance to the creations of a certain suspected bio-Tinker who became active in early January. Therefore I must insist that you come with me for questioning."
I then respond with. "Bio-Tinker? I have no idea what you're talking about."
Skitter then becomes confused, then wary. "Did this suspected 'bio-Tinker' have a penchant for sending out humanoid shadow creatures with weird Powers?" She asks Armsmaster, to which he nods.
I turn to look at her, quite unimpressed. "Fine then, ruin the game why don't you? Yes. It's me. No, I'm not coming in for questioning."
Skitter then speaks up again. "Those humanoid shadows, are all of them made from dead people?!" Which Armsmaster seems greatly alarmed by.
"What does she mean by that?" He all but growls at me.
Skitter then goes on to explain my power to raise corpses as Phantoms, which immediately sets Armsmaster on the attack as he levels his halberd at me. "Now I really am going to have to insist you come with me."
Skitter meanwhile is rebuilding her swarm and preparing to join up with Armsmaster.
I can't help but laugh. "And how exactly do you plan on taking me down? Her bugs are useless against me and she has no combat experience to fall back on. As for you Assmaster? You're even less useful than her."
He seems to be irritated at the prospect of being of even less use against me than Skitter despite the flaws I just pointed out. He then asks me "how do you figure that?"
I reply with "this." Then his motorcycle roars to life, along with every car on the street. They all then start driving at him as fast as they can.
Skitter retreats into a narrow alley and up a fire escape while Armsmaster is busy trying to dodge traffic. Skitter then sends her swarm against me, but I just activate [Pyrokinesis] to create a flame cloak to burn away her bugs. Then I go for the ultimate disrespect by turning around and slowly walking away.
Armsmaster finishes wrecking all of the cars, and his motorcycle (which really has him pissed), then charges at me. Only for him to freeze up mid-step. "That's some nice balance you've got there in that powered armor of yours. Be a real shame if something happened to it."
I then use [Machine Mind] to take control of his suits autonomous systems, and make him do the chicken dance in the middle of the street. Followed by The Robot, jumping jacks, squats, one-handed vertical pushups, and finish it off with a game of "stop hitting yourself".
Eventually, I get bored and start walking away again. Then Skitter decides to confront me with a baton. "Really? You're really going to press this?"
Skitter then responds. "You're a murderer! Do you really think I'm just going to let you go without a fight?!"
"You know, Rachel Lindt, aka Hellhound aka Bitch, one of The Undersider's? She's got several outstanding warrants for murder, and if you're willing to let her go, I don't see why you won't overlook me."
That seems to have floored her. But she quickly recovers. "I'll deal with that next time I see her, but you're right here in front of me."
I then use [Duplication] and [Phantom Shift] to both sides of her and past her. ""You were saying?""
"That's cheating! You're not getting away!"
""Oh yeah? And who's going to stop me? You? Where was all of this backbone when the Trio of bitches were making your life hell?""
She freezes at the mention of "The Trio" as it indicates that I know who she really is. "Who are you?"
"'Who am I?' That's a question I've been asking myself since I first woke up in an alley in January. I had to consume the minds of a lot of Humans in order to finally regain my memories. If they can be called mine that is. You want to know who I am?"
I then [Phantom Shift] up into her face and alter my form once again.
"You can call me, Morgan. Morgan Yu."
