RavensDagger I got 99 stories but I'll finish none Subscriber Oct 31, 2019 Add bookmark #3,069 Chapter Twenty-Five

Taylor hesitated at the walkway leading to the Dallon house. It was a pretty walkway, all cobbled stones with flat heads, bits of gravel between each crack and not a single weed in sight. Both sides of the path were lined with little wooden boxes filled with freshly tilled dirt and a few green shoots that would presumably turn into flowers at some point.

The house itself was very nice. Nice from where she stood still on the sidewalk with her sisters all around her. It was so nice that she decided that she was going to stand there a bit longer to admire it.

An insistent tugging of her hand had her looking down and towards Remedy who was bouncing on the spot. “I need to pee.”

Like the floodgates opening, all the others started voicing their complaints. “I need to pee too.”

“I am hungry, Onee-sama.”

“It’s a bit nippy outside, don’t you think, Big Sis?”

Taylor sighed, squeezed the two hands she was holding onto, and gave up any pretense of stalling forever. “Okay, fine.” She took a deep breath and crossed the threshold towards the house.

***

Victoria heard the knock at the door and was instantly off the couch and in the air. “Amy!” she called across the house. “Mini-you is here!”

She heard an indistinct grumble from Amy’s room, but it was the sort that meant that Amy was coming down, eventually. That was good enough for her.

“No flying in the house,” Mark said from his La-Z-Boy. His eyes never really wandered from the TV. “Are we having guests?” he asked.

“Yeah!” Victoria said. “This girl we met the other day and her little sisters. They’re the most adorable thing ever.”

“Hrm,” he said before nodding. “Well I’ll leave you to it.” That said, he lowered the foot of the sofa and stood up. With one final nod he crossed the living room and headed towards the stairs leading to the second floor.

Victoria wanted to insist that he stay. After all, if anything could get someone out of a funk it was a few teeny tiny versions of their own kids, but the knock sounded out again and she had to answer.

“Coming!” she shouted at the door before zipping over to it. It wasn’t breaking the rules if no one saw her doing it, after all. With a quick flick, she unlocked the door and opened it wide, letting in a chilly spring breeze and taking in the sight of five girls, most of whom didn’t even reach her collar. “Hi!”

“H-hey,” Taylor said. She was a little wide-eyed in the middle of her circle of little sisters. Victoria inspected them each in turn, her smile growing so much that it started to hurt her cheeks. There was Taylor in the role of the Big Sister, in a frumpy hoodie with snacks stuffed in the pockets and mom jeans that didn’t suit her at all. There was a tiny little girl in a victorian style dress right behind her, half hidden by Taylor’s legs, a little asian girl who looked like she should have been chilly in her little yukata but was too busy fiddling with her sword to care.

And then Victoria took in the other two. Little Amy she recognized immediately. The girl was beaming up at her, nose and cheeks nice and red to show off the freckles dotted across both. Next to her was a shorter black girl in a onesie, the hood pulled back to reveal a pair of realistic cat ears sticking out from her messy hair.

“Oh, you are all so cute,” Victoria said. She had to resist the urge to squeal and start pinching cheeks.

Taylor joined her crowd - herd, group, Victoria couldn’t decide on the right word for a gaggle of tiny capes - in blushing. “Ah, thanks,” she said. “Can, can we come in? A few of the girls need to use the facilities.”

“Right right, come on in,” Victoria said as she moved out of the way. All five of them plodded into the entranceway, wide eyes searching around and staring at everything. “The living room is just over here. And the bathroom is that door right there.”

The group split apart, two of the girls racing towards the bathroom and almost fighting at the door before one of them phased through it and left the other waiting. Taylor didn’t even notice, or if she did, she was so used to it that she didn’t let any signs show on her face.

Victoria moved her dad’s La-Z-Boy around so that it was facing the longest couch where Taylor was sitting down, her little ninja sister on one side and the one in the dress on the other.

“Can I sit on you?” Victoria looked down to find tiny Amy looking up at her, face incandescent and lips wobbling into a smile. “T-there’s no room around Big Sis.”

Victoria grinned like the cat that caught the canary and nodded. She patted her knees and suddenly found herself with a lapful of tiny Amy. The girl squirmed for a bit, then leaned back into Victoria’s chest and let out a long sigh. “You’re a bag of bones, aren’t you?” Victoria asked.

“T-that’s okay,” small Amy said. She was looking down at her hands, fingers twiddling together. “When I grow up, I’m going to be big, and strong, and super pretty, just like you.”

“Oh, you’re just too much,” Victoria said before squeezing the girl close with a hug. Amy chose that moment to walk into the room. She paused by the archway leading to the kitchen, took in all the girls on the couch, then narrowed her eyes at the one sitting on Victoria’s lap.

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” she asked.

“Huh?” Victoria said. “Are you afraid of her, Amy? C’mon, she wouldn’t hurt a fly. She’s just like you, but small.”

“Her name’s Remedy,” Taylor said. “Um. That’s the name I, we, chose. Because she can heal. She’s a big fan of yours, actually. She wants to join your fan club.”

“Big Sis!” Remedy whined. “You’re not supposed to talk about fan club. It’s the first rule.”

“Ah, right, sorry,” Taylor said. The slight smile she was wearing hinted that she really wasn’t. “So you know Remedy already. This is Pop.” She patted the Asian girl next to her on the head. “And this is Crochet.” She did the same to the girl in the dress.

“Me too!” came a yell from the corridor before the fourth girl came barreling over, jumped, turned to smoke, and then rematerialized in time to crash onto Taylor’s lap. “Pat me too!” she demanded.

Victoria saw the girl roll her eyes and give the cat-eared girl a few head scritches while the other two pushed her feet away. “And this,” Taylor continued as if uninterrupted. “Is Cheshire.”

“It’s nice to meet you all,” Victoria said. She began running her hands through Remedy’s mess of frizzy hair, trying to straighten it out even though she knew from experience that it was in vain.

“Yeah, wonderful,” Amy said from where she was leaning against the doorframe and staring at her smaller counterpart.

Victoria was going to have to ply her with ice cream and nagging later to see what was bugging her, but that was for later. She started to bounce her leg on the ground with restless energy, making Remedy giggle at the motion. “So, we uh, wanted to talk about a few things.”

“The kidnapping, and my sisters,” Taylor said.

“Yeah, that,” Victoria said. “I told mom, and aunt Sarah about it already. They should be back from work in, like an hour and a half. I’ll have to text them to make sure the show up here, but yeah...”

“So they can help us?” Taylor asked. She hunched in on herself a little, hands holding onto the girl in her lap with almost reverent care. “I mean, help me make sure my sisters are all okay?”

“Maybe?” Victoria said. She didn’t want to make promises she couldn’t keep. But Taylor seemed harmless. She couldn’t fit in the Empire with the diversity of her sisters, and the ABB would be the worst place for little girls and Taylor didn’t seem the sort that would allow anyone to hurt her siblings. So obviously she wasn’t a part of any gang. That didn’t mean that she wasn’t using her powers, but Victoria would have heard stories if a group of little girls went around in-costume.

That meant that Taylor was probably just minding her own business. That was good. Seeing the kids get hurt would have been hard for anyone to handle.

What wasn’t so good was the amount of power Taylor and her sisters were accumulating. One parahuman was enough to get the PRT to stick their noses where they weren’t wanted. Five in one household would have them snooping around nonstop, and then Taylor’s peaceful days would be over.

“What are you planning on doing with all your sisters?” Victoria asked. “You going to go out at night and do the whole hero thing?” She couldn’t decide which would be better. That Taylor insisted on being left alone or if she tried to make a mark as a hero. It would certainly help to have more heroes around, but they were all so young.

“Heck yeah!” Cheshire said with a pumped fist. “We’re going to go out and kick butt.”

“What Cheshire is trying to say,” Taylor said as she started brushing the bangs out of the girl’s face. “Is that we’ve been thinking about it. Maybe. Honestly, I’m kinda tempted to join the Wards. We’re not the most… well-off family. So four more mouths to feed, and all the clothes and stuff, plus my little sisters should really be going to school.”

“What!” Cheshire shrieked.

“No! Big Sis, I don’t want to,” Remedy was quick to add.

“I will disappear from school. Unless it is ninja school?” Pop asked.

“There are other options than the Wards you know,” Victoria said. She saw Amy’s head whip around from the corner of her eye but dutifully ignored it. “But I’ll let Aunt Sarah give you the sales pitch.”

Taylor shrugged one shoulder. “I’ll give it a listen.” She looked around the living room. “So, they won’t be here for another hour or so?” she asked.

“That’s about right,” Victoria said. She had maybe been a bit enthusiastic with her timing. “Maybe we could go out for coffee or something?”

“I would love to have coffee with you,” Remedy said as she bent her head way back to look at Victoria. She got her cheek pinched for her efforts.

“Don’t you have homework to do?” Amy asked. “And do you really want to be with that many kids in a coffee shop?”

“Dang,” Victoria said. She didn’t pout but it was a near thing. “Then you should go with Taylor, Amy. I’ll stay here with the brats--” she paused for the brats to finish protesting that they were not brats. “--and you can bring me something. Taylor looks like she’ll need the caffeine to have any sort of conversation with mom.”

Amy hesitated for a moment. “I... guess?”

“I won’t leave all my sisters here,” Taylor said. “But I wouldn’t say no to a walk and a bit of fresh air. Maybe Remedy can stay with you? She’s well behaved, and a fan.”

“I’m gonna stay too,” Cheshire declared. “That Glory Hog’s an apex predator, so I need to show her her place. I need to find the food chain and beat her with it.”

“You can keep Cheshire too,” Taylor decided.

Victoria had something of a sinking feeling in her gut as Taylor got up and left the little black girl sitting across from her and grinning with a fang poking out of her mouth. “Good luck,” Amy said with the little smirk she wore whenever someone did something stupid and were about to pay for it. Victoria had the impression that she was the stupid one in the equation.