(TAYLOR HEBERT) CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

The house looked expensive in the way Taylor expected. The part she hadn’t expected was how warm it felt.

The place sat in the more affluent part of the city, tucked behind clean hedges and streets without potholes big enough to lose a tire in. The windows were large, sunlight spilling through them in long strips across polished floors and furniture. Family photos covered entire sections of the walls; some were in costume, some weren’t, and a few looked old enough that even the colors had started fading at the edges.

It felt lived in, which somehow made the whole superhero family thing stranger.

Taylor stood awkwardly near the entrance for longer than she probably should have while Lady Photon disappeared into another room to get everyone. Her dad stayed beside her, arms folded tightly enough that it looked uncomfortable.

“You okay?” she asked quietly.

He gave her a look.

Right. Stupid question.

A moment later, voices drifted in from deeper in the house, followed by footsteps. Laserdream came in first, with Shielder and Manpower following behind her, broad enough that Taylor briefly wondered how the furniture handled him without complaint. Then came Brandish and her family, with Panacea at the rear, who looked like she would rather be literally anywhere else on Earth.

Taylor recognized her immediately from the news.

Panacea recognized her too, judging by the way her eyes immediately dropped to the watch.

“Huh,” Amy said softly. “So it really is that ugly in person.”

“Amy,” Lady Photon sighed.

“What? It is.”

Taylor looked down at the watch.

Okay, maybe a little.

The tension eased after that, though only slightly. Enough for everyone to sit down, anyway.

Unfortunately, the actual conversation started soon after.

“You want to fight Leviathan,” Brandish said flatly, like she still couldn’t believe the words even after hearing them twice already.

Taylor nodded.

“And your plan is what, exactly?”

“Hit him really hard,” Taylor answered before she could stop herself.

Nobody laughed.

“…Right,” she muttered.

Manpower rubbed a hand over his face. Lady Photon looked somewhere between concerned and exhausted already, which felt unfair considering Taylor had only been here for maybe twenty minutes.

Her dad, meanwhile, bowed his head to stare at the carpet.

“You fought the Simurgh once,” Brandish said. “That doesn’t mean Leviathan will go the same way.”

“I know that.”

“Do you?”

The question came sharp enough that Taylor stiffened slightly.

Brandish leaned forward in her seat. “Leviathan doesn’t fight like the Simurgh. He doesn’t play the long game. He kills people faster than they can think. Entire teams die fighting him.”

Taylor’s jaw tightened. “I know.”

“You’re fourteen.”

“Fifteen.”

“That is not the point.”

Honestly, Taylor thought it was at least a little the point.

The conversation kept going after that, about casualties, failed operations, and capes stronger and more experienced than her dying against Endbringers anyway. They brought up footage she had never seen before and statistics she wished she still hadn’t, showing her cities flooded beyond recovery, and rescue workers pulling bodies out of collapsed buildings days later.

There was a moment, just a moment, where she sat there staring at the table while everyone talked around her and seriously considered dropping the whole idea.

Then her brain wandered right back to Lung, to the trafficking, the drugs, and all the complicated, ugly parts of Brockton Bay she had absolutely no idea how to fix.

Leviathan was simpler.

Punch monster. Save people.

It made sense in a way the rest of this city didn’t. And maybe that said something bad about her, but Taylor found she didn’t care enough to stop.

“So that’s it?” Brandish asked eventually. “You’ve already decided.”

Taylor looked up.

“…Yeah,” she admitted.

As silence ensued, her dad sank deeper into the couch beside her with the air of a man being slowly abandoned by God.

Lady Photon sighed through her nose. “Then we’ll help however we can.”

Brandish shot her a look.

“What?” Lady Photon asked. “You think she’s going to stay home because we tell her to?”

“…No,” Brandish admitted after a second.

“Exactly.”

Manpower and Flashbang nodded once, resigned.

“If things go bad,” the former said, looking directly at Taylor now, “you retreat. No pride, no last stands, none of that crap. You understand?”

Taylor hesitated.

“Taylor.”

“…I’ll try.”

Brandish made a noise that sounded deeply dissatisfied.

“And if you’re injured,” Lady Photon added quickly, “Amy will heal you.”

Panacea looked deeply offended. “Wait, I agreed to that?”

“You were going to anyway,” Brandish said.

Amy opened her mouth, paused, then slumped further into her chair.

“…Yeah, okay, fair.”

Taylor smiled despite herself.

Her dad did not.

He’d barely spoken the entire visit. Every time the conversation circled back to Leviathan, he got this complicated look on his face she still couldn't decipher.

Taylor tried not to look at him too much after noticing that.

By the time they finally left, evening had started settling over the neighborhood, the sky washed orange and gold overhead.

Her dad walked beside her in silence for a while before speaking.

“You’re really doing this.”

It wasn’t a question.

Taylor adjusted the watch slightly on her wrist.

“…Yeah.”

Another long silence followed.

He looked worn down in a way sleep probably wouldn't fix. But even then, standing there with all the reasons in the world to tell her no, he still reached over and squeezed her shoulder gently before starting toward the car.

And somehow that felt worse than if he’d yelled.