Guardian
a Worm/Destiny Crossover
Chapter 9: Out of Time
Less than a day. That had to be some kind of record. During her initial research frenzy Taylor had come across hints of what seemed like a kind of conspiracy of ineptness. In cities like hers, the heroes didn't try very hard to keep the lower key villains locked up. Instead of jail time, arrest was treated more like being tagged in a game of capture the flag; temporary at best. She hadn't given the idea much consideration, seeing as the internet's credibility wavered around 'spotty', but it was looking like that was one of the things that was absolutely correct. While useful, knowing did nothing for the blind fury slowly tightening a fist around her gut.
She had wanted to go after them immediately. Wanted it so badly she could almost taste it. Even without the Hunter in her screaming to go out and put that smelly bastard right back where he belonged, and be damned to hell anyone that got in her way, she felt a strong sensation of failure. She had failed to capture Mush. The solace she had taken from his capture had more or less soothed the sense of failure from letting him get away. His escape, or his being broken out, had taken that from her. She'd been riding a pretty good emotional train since her Ghost found her, and she didn't much care for this little bump in the tracks. She'd been dressed in her scratched, scuffed armor, scarf around her nose, knife at her back, and almost out the door when her dad had stopped her cold.
It had been a year and a half since she'd had any real parenting from him. The shock of it was enough to jar her from the more blinding heat of her anger. It had cooled enough to let her remember how tired she was, enough for her to realize that going after Mush without information, alone, and under-equipped was tantamount to abject stupidity. Something Taylor tried to avoid, as a rule. Now, laying atop her bedsheets, no longer so intent on sleeping, her mind had been given all new things to chew on. "Hey, Ghost?"
"Guardian?"
Her mouth worked as she tried to put her thoughts in order and failed. "...never mind. It's nothing."
Her Ghost chirped, whirred, and passed a low orbit over her bed. It came to a halt in the air by her nightstand. "You can talk to me, you know, even if you don't think it's important. I'll always listen, and be more than happy to tell you if you're right."
"Even if I don't know what's bothering me?"
Her Ghost bobbed up and down in the air, something approximating an emphatic nod. "Even if. But I think you've got a pretty good idea."
"I feel like I failed." Her words rushed out, forced, applying the same principle to her confession as one to tearing off a Band-Aid. "Like I should have been good enough to keep Mush from escaping in the first place. None of this would have happened if I'd been...better."
"I wouldn't say that."
She growled lightly as a moment of resentful frustration lanced through her. "Then how would you put it?"
Another low-altitude orbit over her bed, putting her Ghost by her desk. "As a damn good start. You took out eight armed men without serious injury on either side, by yourself without them ever noticing. Mush went down without ever knowing who knocked him out. That's got to be bothering him quite a bit. He doesn't know, Guardian, who beat him, and that's the only thing worse than knowing." It wiggled from side to side, as if shrugging. "It'd bother me, I know that much."
Taylor hummed thoughtfully. "Yeah." Then something occurred to her, and it brought a smile to her face. "I mean, imagining the look on his face when he figures out he got beat by a ninety pound girl helps more, but..."
"I wish I'd thought of that. Well, his days as a free man are numbered, Guardian, starting when you wake up tomorrow."
"Yeah, yeah, I'm going, I'm going."
=+= Chapter 9: Out of Time =+=
New day, new plan, this being the fouth since her Guardianship began. She hadn't slept well last night, which she had expected. She had slept, which was a nice benefit, and she hadn't dreamed, but for one reason or another she'd found herself waking every hour or so with a gasp and reaching for her knife. What this meant was that while shadows hung below her eyes, they were not as dark or deep as they could have been. Something of a blessing, she supposed, stumbling into her morning routine. Bathed, clothed, and of clean teeth she made her way downstairs to pilfer her dad's office for a form of Hunting that most did not consider.
What she intended to do, her grand plan, was to delve through all available information – and some that was slightly less than available – to find out exactly where the Merchants had gone to ground. Then...well, she'd probably end up calling Armsmaster and telling him. They'd met before, and her actions yesterday morning had most likely reached him by now, so she was guessing that she had some amount of credibility with the local establishment of heroes. If she could do this; track and find the Merchants before they could scatter once more, it might be possible to take the entirety of the gang's base of power in one, surgical strike. She had to snort at that, an almost-laugh at her own audacity. Less than a week, and she was shooting higher than most independents ever tried.
She found a covered plate on the stove, with a Post-It attached to the napkin. It turned out her dad had been called in early again and that she had better eat this food before heading of to school. School...shit. That this was, in fact, a school day had escaped her entirely. "Ghost, why didn't you tell me today was Monday?"
"I thought you knew. I may be versatile, Guardian, but I refuse on principle to become a day planner." A perfectly reasonable, if somewhat sassy answer, but something about the way it was said tugged at her. Monday was important, to both of them, for reasons that had absolutely nothing to do with systemized education, or whatever it was that she got at Winslow. But what was it?
Monday, Monday, Monday...why did it stick so? What was it about this day, of all days? Granted, school was a chore, and she'd rather not, but it wouldn't cause her stomach to sour as it was. It wasn't school, and it wasn't anything to do with her status as a Guardian because –
...Ah.
Of course.
How could she have forgotten? The better question, perhaps, was where had the time gone? So much had gone into four days that it seemed almost a lifetime ago that she was falling ass-first out of a filth-filled locker. That didn't matter, either, because this...this had nothing to do with her. Nothing at all. It was Monday, the day that her Ghost had given her those long days ago as its last.
"Guardian?" Her eyes stung, Ghost's concern clear and a wound on her fragile heart. She squeezed them close and breathed a short, harsh breath in through her nose, shaking her head to the inevitable follow-up query of, "Are you all right?"
Her voice, when she was able to make herself speak, was high and reedy and not at all steady. "Why – why didn't you tell me? It's today, isn't it?"
The answer came, delivered upon a synthetic voice of quiet, sad humor. "I was hoping you'd forgotten, honestly. I didn't...I didn't want to be selfish."
=+= Chapter 9: Out of Time =+=
The phone rang. It was ignored while a single, seemingly harmless sentence caromed around the inside of Taylor's skull. She scrubbed her hands over her head, bringing them to cover her face as she hissed a deep, steadying breath in. The burn in her eyes threatened to spill into tears. Pushing the pads of her fingers against her eyelids held them off. If she started crying now it would all come tumbling out; her fear, worry, disbelief, anger, and a razor-wire ball of something in her gut. It would all come out, and then this would be about her.
She'd sooner...well, it wasn't going to happen. The rasp in her voice and the fact that her world was rapidly blurring did nothing to help her composure. "You... are the least selfish person I've ever met! You should have said something." She swallowed, failing to clear the lump in her throat. What came next did as a whisper. "You should have said something."
"What would you have wanted me to say?"
"Something!" She threw out her arm. "Anything! Anything would have better than...not."
"I'm sorry, Guardian. I – "
"Don't!" her eyes shot up, something like lightning crackling in her gaze, as she glared. "Don't you dare say you're sorry! You don't have to – there's nothing to be sorry for. Not...not today." The fingers in her left hand began to shake, no more than a minor trembe that her curling them into a fist. With that came the desire to strike, to lash out until she was as empty within as she wanted to be.
"Guardian..." Ghost's eye flickered from side to side, as if searching for the right thing to say. Taylor knew, even if he didn't, that there was no such thing. Not in a time like this. Finally, he sighed, a sound akin to two pieces of metal rasping over each other. "I didn't want to tell you, because I didn't want to hurt you, and it seems I have anyway. I don't like that. How can I make this better?"
"Stop dying." It came out closer to a plea than the command she meant it to be.
"We both know I can't do that, Guardian."
"There has to be something we can do!" Suffused with energy, she began to pace, snapping her words as she stormed to and fro. Her mind raced, a thousand directions at once, a hundred ideas whirring across the surface of her thoughts. "What if – what if Igave you back the Light? Just...went back to being me?"
=+= Chapter 9: Out of Time =+=
The phone rang again, trilling strident and insistent that the words it carried were more important than Taylor losing someone she cared for very much. Again. It seemed especially loud in the silence her suggestion had brought. Then it was broken.
"Even if I wanted you to, even if you could, I wouldn't let you."
"Why not?" Somewhere between a whine and a growl now, if she didn't stop soon she'd explode like she did two years ago. "I made it fifteen years without the Light, Ghost, I'm pretty sure I can go back!"
"No. You can't." As serious as Ghost had ever been, he explained. "You and your Light are not separate from each other. There isn't a divide through which you reach to act as a Guardian. You are the Guardian. Yours is the Light. Even if you could give it up, it would be like ripping all the blood out of your body at once. You would die. I refuse to let you die for me."
Taylor choked back a sob, halfway up her throat and feeling like puke. "But it's okay for you to do it for me? I'm calling bullshit. Bull-fucking-shit." The phone rang again, and something, a tiny, wire-thin fraction of what burned within, broke loose. She stormed across to snatch the handset from its cradle and slam it back down. Then she did it again, and twice more until the plastic cracked under the force of her blows. Her breaths came hard and fast through her nose, hissing and angry. "I will not let you die for me. I refuse."
Ghost chirped and whirred, the cracked front half of him spinning. It looked a lot like a helpless shrug. He was quiet for a long moment, only the faint dial tone from the upset house phone filling the tense silence between them. "I was dying when I came to this world, you know." He seemed like he was about to continue, but Taylor knew where he was going. That since it was before they'd met, it wouldn't be because of her. Good words, maybe even true words. She'd been through this before. It didn't matter. So she cut him off.
"I remember." Words like grinding stones, spilling over each other. "I remember, and I've been through this before. You think that because you were dying before we met makes this in any way better? You'll still be gone, and I'll still be here. Again." She was breaking her promise, the one she made to herself. She was making this about her. She didn't want to, and the shame of her failure scorched through her, but she could barely stop herself. Again, she repeated. "There has to be something. Anything." Quieter, "I don't want you to go."
"And I don't want to leave. You're my Guardian, and I'm your Ghost. I don't want to leave that. But there's nothing we can do."
The question bubbled out of her before she could stop it. "How long?"
There was no need to clarify.
"Until sunset."
The clock's merciless display said it was an hour to noon. Not enough time.
"What do we do now?"
Taylor shrugged, feeling more than helpless. Bitter amusement touched her as she copied Ghost's earlier move. "Whatever you want. It's your day, after all."
=+= Chapter 9: Out of Time =+=
There was a national park twenty miles west of Brockton Bay. A bus ran there and back every two hours, twenty four hours a day. It had a lake, small mountain, and any number of hiking trails leading to hidden places of natural wonder. On any other day, it would have been perfect. Her and a dear friend on their way up to roam around, breathe clean air, walk beneath leafy ceilings until they felt too loud, too saturated with the quiet and go home. Today she was hiding inside the deep hood of her sweater, seated as far back in the bus as it was possible to get. Her hand, inside the front pocket, was clenched tightly around her knife, sheath and all. Drawing not comfort, but stability, from the solid metal-and-leather beneath her fingers.
She didn't know why Ghost had chosen the park as the last place he wanted to see. She didn't really care. He could have picked the landfill for all it mattered to her. This was his chosen place, and this was where they went. School could fuck itself, for today and every day after. This was, and would always be, more important. Out the window she could the large asphalt and concrete visitor center, with cul-de-sac out front for buses like hers, growing close. The twenty minute ride had passed in silence. Jaw aching silence while inside she alternated between a storm of emotion and a curious distance from everything.
When she stepped off the bus, gravel crunching beneath her sneakers, she was somewhere between. Whether she wanted it or not, the wildness of the park was calling to the Hunter in her, soothing her heartache with the distracting notion of new things to see and places to find. She breathed deep, drawing in the contrasting scents of gasoline fumes and pine needles, and felt more settled when she exhaled. She wasn't happy, or calm, not by a long shot, but she could pretend to be until sundown. It wouldn't matter so much after that. "So where do you want to go?"
Ghost made himself visible, hovering near her shoulder to minimize chances of being seen by an errant passer-by. She heard him spin around, taking in the view with a quiet, almost awed regard. There was a whine to his movements, a sound like grinding gears that hadn't been present before. "I think...the mountain. The sunset would look glorious from up there, wouldn't it?"
Taylor hummed her agreement, then frowned. She wasn't sure they would make it in time. No. They would make it. Even if she had to run the whole way. If she ran up there, never stopping and going close to her top speed, she could make it. So she would. After drawing a deep breath in, filling her lungs with the cooling afternoon air, she began to run. Faster than she ever had in her life.
Very little of the run up was anything clearer than the pounding of sneakers into slightly-soggy earth, coupled with the race of her heart, and the rush of wind on her face. Her muscles burned as she demanded more and more from herself. If the aftermath of the death of Taylor's mom had been handled at all, least of all well, she would have been familiar with the idea of coping mechanisms. The idea of using an activity as a sort of funnel for emotion. As things were, she had no idea why she seemed to feel better as she ran, only that she did. It was all still there, the coiled barbed wire ball in her chest, but as the distance passed and the mountain summit grew closer the barbs dulled and smoothed, fading away.
=+= Chapter 9: Out of Time =+=
Sweat soaked her clothes and stuck them to her skin. Her hair had swung itself free from the rough ponytail it had been in, tangling in and on itself into a giant, sweaty tangle. There was a viewing area, no more than a slightly flat patch of clear stone, at the summit. Hollow metal poles had been driven in, with a chain stretched between to mark off the difference between the 'safe' and 'unsafe' parts of the mountaintop. There were no benches, just conveniently shaped pieces of stone scattered around. As she took slow, deep breaths, she checked to see how much time it had taken her to get there.
When she'd gotten to the park the sun had been on its way to setting, still bright and warm and yellow. Now closer to the western horizon, it had deepened into a red-and-orange glow, casting narrow beams of light across the slowly darkening sky. She could feel the beginnings of cold's bite on her hands and face. A dozen feet beyond the boundary, she saw a claw of stone spear out over a drop down to a gravel slope. It would be a great place to sit and dangle her feet, and better, it had a good view of the sunset. Once she'd sat, swinging her sneakers and folding her hands in her lap, Ghost made himself visible, appearing a couple of inches over her shoulder.
When he spoke, it was with a voice quieter and more strained than she was prepared for, and it hit like a physical blow. "I didn't think it'd be so different." Taylor made an inquisitive noise, not trusting her voice. "The Earth I came from had places like this, more or less untouched by development or destruction, but...they lacked something that this place has. I can't say what, exactly." He hummed, falling into thought, and she let the moments pass in silence. "Maybe...maybe it's peace. What do you think, Taylor?"
Her heart ached, then. A true pain like an iron fist clenching tight. There was a hot, tight lump in her throat, full of a desire to say something and lack of anything to say. She swallowed a few times, blinking hard, before trying. Her voice was as hoarse and weak as his. "I think – I think you might be right." She sniffed, brushing under her eyes. "There's definitely something."
He hummed, drifting slowly towards the ground. Taylor watched with fascinated horror. "I'm glad. Do you know why I called you Taylor, just now?"
She shook her head.
"Me neither. It just seemed...right. Is it okay if I call you Taylor?"
Her jaw ached. Her fingers were clenched so tight they were pale and trembling. A shuddering breath later, and she was able to respond. "It's okay. I don't mind." And then, because she could no longer stop herself, "How am I gonna be a Guardian without my Ghost?"
He laughed quietly as he settled gently to the ground. "You're going be fine, Taylor. In fact, you're going to be great. I guarantee it."
"I won't be half as good without my partner." Maybe if she goaded him into a discussion, he would stay longer. "Ghost?"
It didn't work. As the sun sank below the horizon, shrouding the summit of the small mountain in darkness, Taylor finally – finally let go of everything inside.
=+= Chapter 9: Out of Time =+=