Shard of Magic [Worm crossover]

by blake0831

Chapter 7

Taylor yawned as she leaned back from the basement worktable. The table was littered with loose leafs of paper and cheaply bought crystals, mostly clear quartz. The papers were filled with diagrams, illustrations and geometric shapes. All in pursuit of seeing if Taylor could have an innate pseudo Tinker power.

The days between her telling her Dad about her power and the test flight last Saturday were filled with researching for reasonable options for her heroing career. And it turns out, despite it being laden down with the government bureaucracy, its' manpower and resources being stretched thin to protect a city with many more villainous capes and mundane criminals than its' size would suggest and that the local Wards had a much higher than normal chances (especially when compared to the Wards branches in Boston and New York) of getting into fights with villain cape and gang members, joining the Brockton Bay Wards looks to be the most reasonable option Taylor and Danny has.

The mess on the table was the result of one of the brainstorming sessions Taylor and her Dad had since Saturday. Her Dad had taken note of something that Taylor has been denying. That her power kept insisting on terms like 'spells', 'mana' and 'magic'. He had pointed out a possible avenue for Taylor to go into. Magic or Enchanted items, like The One Ring from Tolkien. If Taylor could create artifacts like that, she'll qualify as a Tinker.

And that's where Taylor found the limit to her power-granting power. When she had asked for a Tinker power to create or enchant artifacts, all she got was a mental 'blank look'. Different phrasings from both her and suggestions from her Dad didn't change things. It took a while to realize. Her power wasn't blocked or restricted from giving Tinker powers. It had honestly couldn't understand the very concept of a Tinker, of an ability to create tools and machinery that far surpassed current technology and yet unable to be reproduced by mundane means.

Taylor was a bit stumped by the roadblock, considering her 'Tinker-fugue' like trance and ability when she had made her costume from mundane materials. But, thinking deeply, it wasn't quite like a Tinker, was it? Her entire costume could be done by anyone how had the right knowledge to combine mundane materials and common chemicals to get the right properties, and have an ability to finely weave together the entire thing, which Taylor had achieved by using her telekinesis and sewing skills from her power.

Fortunately, they found a work-around the limit. After nearly an hour of fruitlessly trying to get somewhere, Taylor had asked in exasperation (Her dad commented that it looks a bit strange to see Taylor talking to herself out loud like that.) how to enchant something with her HardLight Shield power....

And the power eagerly showed her. In minute and pain-staking detail. Like it was eager to teach Taylor the minutiae of how that particular power worked and how it could be 'translated' into an artifact. As it turns out, if Taylor wanted to 'enchant' something, first she needed to have the power itself before she can 'transcribe' it as a physical matrix into something with a regular structure in them. Like a crystal.

Hence the current mess on her table. Taylor shook out her fatigued hands, having transcribed everything she could onto paper. Geometric shapes, runes like circuit diagrams, formulae filled multiple pieces of paper. Complex equations and explanations filled the margins of the papers. Most of it went over Taylor's head, she had simply transcribe what her power is trying to teach her about how each part work and the basic principles behind them. She wondered if she's somehow breaking into a new field of science here or something. Maybe she can ask someone like Armsmaster to help decipher them.

Oddly, there were empty spots here and there. At first, Taylor had feared that this where the infamous 'Tinker Black Boxes' would go. But upon further investigations, it wasn't. Those were simply spots where is required 'user input' aka her. Things like 'shield shape' and 'amount of force/damage the shield could handle'. She hadn't realized before how much of the shield power variables where handled by her thoughts. If she wanted to turn the power into a Tinker Tech-esque device, she'll need to manually define and lock in the variables into the matrix. On the plus side, she could reduce the size of the matrix and reduce the overall 'energy' costs.

Taylor sighed as she turned and picked a different batch of paper. The original power uses the 'energy' within Taylor to create the shield and maintain it. Obviously, it'll be impractical if she wanted to have other people use it. It took some prodding, but her Thinker power provided the plans for a battery/charger that seems to use... something esoteric that went over her head. Something about dimensional higher energy states and needing it to be around living organisms to gather 'energy' (She's just relieved that the part didn't draw 'energy' from living organisms like some sort of a vampire...). In any case, the battery would constantly recharge itself around living organisms (plants will do at least, being around people will charge faster.) and store the energy ready to be used.

It took a lot of work to tweak the matrixes into something that could 'fit' into the thumb-sized clear quartz (the most flawless she could sense (she can tell how a crystal is with a touch now?).) that her Dad had managed to pick up. As it is, the final project plans resemble a thick watch, with one small crystal in the 'watch face' containing the main 'Hardlight Shield' power matrix, a smaller one on the opposite side to press against the skin to act as a control switch from the user, and a largest piece of crystal she had, about two-finger wide and length wide be the battery/power source, all connected to each other other by thin strands of copper in fine, delicately made pits in the crystal pieces.

Taylor tiredly cleaned and sorted the papers and crystals. She had working on this for two days and was exhausted. She get started on the actual 'enchanting' later tomorrow after school or something. At least the changed social situation at Winslow had given her a bit of reprieve. Sophia's sudden absence (rumour has it that she's been transferred out) had Emma acting despondent, and the sharks started smelling blood in the water. Lacking Sophia's muscle (and viciousness that cowed older students despite being the same age as Taylor), Emma's position as the school's 'Queen Bee' was getting precarious, her looks and (half-decent) high school social acumen only barely keeping the status quo stable. As a result, Taylor was left alone as Emma and her remaining cohorts were too pre-occupied to harass her.

Once Taylor had finished the 'Shield Watch', she and her Dad will go and apply to the PRT Wards soon after.

**************************

They ended up postponing the trip to the PRT.

Taylor and Danny sat in the living room, watching in slight horror at the news coverage of the aftermath of the Simurgh's attack on Canberra, Australia.

The short but devastating attack by the third Endbringer had been brutal, with severe casualties and a wreaked city. Compounding the problem was the fact that the city would be quarantined to contain any 'Simurgh Timebombs' left behind. No one wanted to take any chances, even to the point of imprisoning any civilians who had the misfortune of being in the wrong place too long within the area of effect of Simurgh's Scream. The surviving capes and defense forces that had survived were heavily scrutinized before being released.

Danny was pale as he watched the screen. Taylor bit her lip as something occurred to her. "Dad..."

Danny snapped his face towards her. "No, Taylor. You're not going to join to fight Endbringers."

"But-" Taylor protested. "But maybe I can help-"

"No." Danny said firmly, but there's an fragility in his stance. "I-, I can't lose you too. Not to them. Not like that."

Taylor choked up, and murmuring softly. "But... I can't just sit by...."

Things were silent between them for the rest of the night.

**************************

As Taylor drifted off to sleep that night, her mind sleepily wandered to the Simurgh. How the third was considered far more terrifying compared to the other two, simply on the basis of its mind warping powers. Villains with similar abilities like HeartBreaker and Nice Guy were feared as well. As Taylor was lapsing to sleep, she half-consciously wished that...

She wished there was a way to protect the mind, maybe a whole group of people at once. And she wished that there's a way to help people that had been afflicted by mind control. Cure or restore them or something....

As Taylor slept, a part of her mind came active and started rummaging and cross-referring. And if Taylor could see within her mind, she'll see a heavy vault door, with a 'lion paw and eagle claw'-written sign on it labeled 'The Fun Stuff!' opened and the contents added to the slowly assembling spell matrixes.

Author's Note:

The concept of mana batteries and roughly how they work came from the excellent fanfic The Maretian. Check it out!

Comments

[Cheshirek4t]

[Insert discord eating popcorn gif]
Dis gon be gud