My Super-powered Diary Chapter 24 The Look By Amethyst When Maddock Ainsley gets involved in a rescue operation with his unit things go horribly wrong and his life is forever changed. Can the newly minted Merida cope with being a girl and a teenage super hero?

I was laying naked on a cold stone floor, the chill seeming to seep into my very bones. I looked around in confusion for a moment, trying to place where I was. It was familiar and somewhat scary, and even in the darkness I felt claustrophobic, like the room or maybe the darkness itself was closing in on me. “Fawn? ‘Nessa? Mom? Is anyone there?”

“Me? Oh, this wasn’t me, I’m dead remember. No Merida, this was all you.” She laughed hysterically as I noticed for the first time the scorch marks around me, the blackened stone and the sight and smell of burnt flesh.

I awoke screaming and shaking, my heart racing and tears running down my face as the world exploded around me. The anxiety attack and the heaving sobbing as I struggled to breathe eclipsed the world around me, leaving me assaulted by the thoughts that had latched onto my mind like a rabid dog that refused to let go. “How can I keep doing this? I am a danger to everyone around me. Everyone would have been better off if the Zeta bomb had killed me. Why did I live when almost my whole team and all those girls had been killed by that bomb? Why did some genetic fluke have to protect me? Those girls all had lives ahead of them, how is it fair that they died while I still lived?”

“It was just a nightmare. I’m here Merida, I’ve got you.” Fawn’s voice barely registered through the miasma of dark thoughts, pain, guilt, and fear that threatened to consume me. The sound, and the light touch of her holding me as tight as a Fairy can, distant and yet reassuring.

“Fawn? A nightmare?” A small light of hope pierced the darkness and I tried to shake off the dark thoughts that bound me. “Yes, I am a danger to people around me, but that’s why I’m trying to learn control, so I don’t have to be. If I had died what would have happened to my sisters and Blair/Mom? It was because I had been there that we were able to escape and that the girls found a family with us. They’re happy now, and I helped them with that. No, it wasn’t fair that others died while I lived, but I know better than anyone that life is seldom fair. I can’t give those girls their lives back, but I can try to make the world that they would have grown up in a better place.”

With each argument the darkness lessened and soon I had shaken off the chains of my fear and doubts, for the moment anyway. I concentrated on controlling my breathing, slow deep breaths that would calm me and slow my heart rate. By the time I had myself under control again the tears had mostly stopped and I looked at Fawn through bleary and tear-filled eyes. “Thanks Fawn, I dinnae ken where I’d be wi’out ya.”

“You’d do the same for me Merida, I know you would,” the Fairy said without a hint of doubt as she hugged the side of my face. “That’s what best friends do, we help each other through the hard times.”

“Aye, I would,” I agreed as I nuzzled her with my cheek. Then I took a quick looked around me. As usual the energy shield on my princess bed had contained the explosion to within the frame without even a scorch mark on the frame itself or the curtains. Sadly my nightshirt and panties were shredded and scorched, but my mattress, pillows, and sheets were still fine. I had to hand it to Mom for coming up with ways to not only protect everyone around me from my nightmare fueled powers, but also making me feel like I could almost live a somewhat normal life. Well, relatively anyway, I was well aware that with Fairies and superpowers my life would never be truly normal.

That Sunday was fairly busy for us. After I had woken the others for our morning training session and put us through our paces we all had a nice breakfast that Mom had prepared, though I had to eat several heaping bowls of oatmeal as well to feel full. After that the day was mostly shopping, so I’ll try not to bore you too much with the details. My sisters got a lot of clothes and a few personal items to help them feel more at home including surfboards and the necessary accessories from Surf n’ Turf. I didn’t get much other than a new memory card for my phone, a pair of headphones, three hundred dollars in iTunes cards, and a practice bow and arrows for when I started archery. Mom and I had decided that it would be better to get all my clothes made by the Taylors so I wouldn’t have to worry about half destroying them if I suddenly had to use my powers or had an ‘accident’.

Once we had dropped off the clothes at home there was even more shopping as Mom and Andy wanted to do some major grocery shopping at one of the local wholesale stores. It made sense for a family of seven, especially with my appetite, and they not only wanted groceries to last a while, but also stuff for our birthday party on Wednesday. We bought enough food and household goods that we didn’t even try to fit it all in the SUV, but had Shu open a pocket dimension to store it all in until we got home. She opened it inside the back of the SUV so to those looking on it would look like we were just loading it there and it seemed to work well enough and not gather too much attention.

We spent that evening together at home as a family; watching movies, playing board games, and talking about things like work, school, and preparations for the party on Wednesday. We called it a night fairly early though since we had another busy day coming up and Mom hadn’t gotten much sleep after getting home from finishing the dimensional gate generators that sent the corpse of the massive monster that we had defeated back to its own dimension. Still Fawn and I spent a bit of time before sleeping just snuggled in bed together and talking about what school would be like, since the Fairy had never been to school and it had been over a decade for me.

Monday morning was basically a repeat of the day before. I woke up screaming and shaking in damaged nightclothes from another nightmare until Fawn had managed to calm me down and pull me out of the dark thoughts I was having. Once I was recovered from that I woke up the others for our morning workout and training session before showering, going through the rest of my morning routine with Fawn, and eating a big breakfast.

Mom and Andy were going to be busy at the school for most of the day, Andy working on implementing new cyber security measures and working with Garret’s dad Sam on making sure that the various forms of electronic security and surveillance were completely up to date. Mom would be spending her day at the medical clinic getting to know her team, finding out where everything was, going over procedures, and making sure that everything would be running to her satisfaction once school started. She also wanted to meet some of the other Tinkers that she might be working with at the research labs that she hadn’t met already.

Before all of that though, we needed to go to Costa Verde’s City Hall to get our licenses for hero work and our permits to carry weapons. I didn’t think that I would need the latter much, but I did like to be prepared for anything and I did have the certificate saying that I had passed the course. We showed up in costume of course since they would only register us by our hero and team names. This was to protect us so that only the school would know our real identities, so long as we stayed on the right side of the law.

The process of registering was a tedious overuse of red tape, but after filling out the paperwork and paying nearly two hundred dollars each in registration and license fees we were all given two copies of our licenses and carry permits. The first were regular paper versions for our personal records and the other was a digital version that we could take to the school headmistress to upload to our school ID bracelets, allowing them to project holographic versions of the documents if we were asked for them. Mom had gotten hers too, registering Gadget-Girl as an reserve member of G-Force since she wasn’t sure that she would have the time to be with us all whenever we had to put our costumes on, especially with her new job and still having a tech contract to complete and deliver on for the HAA.

With that finished we went to the school and changed out of our costumes before reporting to Dr. Edwards to let her know that we had gotten it done as requested and so she could add the new documents to our ID bracelets. Then I, my sisters, and our Fairy friends had the day to ourselves. For the morning the others went off to entertain themselves since I had plans already. Fawn and I left them to their own devices and promised to meet them in the Grotto for lunch before heading to visit the Taylors.

The bell over the door rang as we entered and the pair looked up from the fashion magazines they were reading to smile at us. Melanie was dressed somewhat casually in jeans and a cream colored blouse while Meghan was dressed not too differently from me, though she wore sneakers where I had my combat boots on. Melanie was the first to speak. “Merida! Fawn! It’s nice to see you both again, we weren’t expecting to see you again for a while. What brings you here today?”

“Well,” I began uncertainly. “Ya see, I dinnae really ‘ave much fer clothes a’ the moment. We bought a bunch fer ma sisters yesterday, bu’ Mom an’ I both thought tha’ it would be better if’n I came tae you instead. I’ll go through a lot o’ clothes if ma powers slip an’ since Meghan ‘as such great fashion sense an’ I’ll prob’ly wan’ all ma clothes protected agains’ damage, it’s better tae dae it this way. An’ Fawn could use some extra clothes fer the same reason. Mom said tha’ this should be enough tae ge’ started, an’ I thought tha’ it’d be better tae dae this afore school starts an’ ya ge’ busy with uniforms an’ stuff.” I reached into my purse to extract the envelope that Mom had given me. She had told me that there was a cashier’s check inside, but she never told me how much.

Melanie took the envelope and let out a small whistle. “Merida, this is enough for a whole wardrobe for both you and Fawn, including enchantments. What are you looking for exactly? This could take a while, so let’s come up with a list of what you’ll need and what you’d like.”

We decided that most of my casual clothes would be in a punk style, or at the very least clothes that could lend themselves to that style. So there was a lot of distressed jeans of various styles, skirts, t-shirts, crop tops, and a few hoodies, vests, and accessories that would work well with my chosen style. We also decided that I would need several sets of exercise clothes, a few things for special occasions, a swim suit or two, a pair of sunglasses, some sneakers, and shoes. Waking up in half destroyed clothes every time I had a nightmare lately had also demonstrated the need for more of the basics as well, such as socks, a few nightshirts, and underwear for both exercising and everyday use.

As Meghan got to work I had to get completely undressed this time, since this time I needed underwear too. Fawn was getting the same treatment since she would likely need clothes with the protective enchantments as well. While we started on the underwear, Melanie enchanted the clothes that I had come in with, including my combat boots. I wasn’t sure that fawn and I needed over two dozen underwear sets each, but the Taylors knew girl clothes and I had place myself and my Fairy friend in their capable hands.

As morning went on we got the basics and some of the stuff for special occasions, swimsuits, exercise clothes, and accessories out of the way as Meghan generated complete outfit after complete outfit on both me and Fawn, and we disrobed again after each one. Meghan had great fashion sense and everything looked good, fit comfortably, flattered our figures, and came in shades meant to go well with our individual coloring. It seemed like a lot of clothes, but we were going to be splitting some of it between home and our dorm room.

By lunchtime we were all feeling a bit worn, so the Taylors joined me, my sisters, and our Fairies at the Grotto for lunch where Meghan seemed to eat almost as much as I did, okay maybe not quite that much, but easily double what everyone else at the table was packing away. “Using my powers a lot makes me hungry,” she said with a grin as my sisters and I saw how much she had on her plate. “Since we’re probably going to be all afternoon finishing your wardrobe Merida, I might as well refuel now.” I just nodded silently as I ate. I had heard that Generators were similar to EMs like myself in a lot of ways, so her appetite didn’t really surprise me all that much.

After lunch we headed back to the Taylors shop and got back to work, this time on more casual clothes. Most of these clothes were in the punk style I had adopted and I quickly discovered that Meghan hadn’t been exaggerating when she said that she could help me rock the look. She had good taste in music too and was able to make me several tour shirts from good punk and hard rock bands. She was even able to make me a pair of tight pants and several skirts bearing the Ainsley clan tartan once I had showed her a picture of what it looked like. All said I was very happy with her suggestions and the final products.

A good half of Fawn’s casual clothes were versions of her usual outfits, although the other half were miniature versions of some of my own casual clothes. Fawn wasn’t sure about it at first since she preferred being comfortable over dressing up, but she warmed up to the idea once she discovered that the clothes were fairly comfortable and Meghan had planted the idea in her head that we could match sometimes. She looked adorable rocking the badass punk Fairy look.

There were way too many clothes to carry so I called my sisters and had them meet us so Shu could place them in a pocket dimension before we all headed home for dinner. When they arrived I was wearing my new tartan pants with a black leather belt, my combat boots, dog tags, black fingerless gloves, and a black leather vest over a dark blue crop top that said, “Too busy being Awesome.” We had decided to dress Fawn in a matching outfit, because she liked the idea of matching and for the shock value.

“About time you finished Mer,” Vanessa said as they entered the shop. “That took forever, but I guess that’s to be expected when you need to have a whole wardrobe specially made. Nice outfit though, it suits you.” Then she noticed Fawn on my shoulder and let out a squeee. “OmiGod! You match! That is sooo adorable on you Fawn!”

“Thank you,” Fawn said, blushing a little. “I don’t know if I’ll wear clothes like these often, but it does help me feel closer to my best friend.” That of course brought up the subject of the other Fairies getting clothes similar to their ‘besties’ and the topic was eagerly discussed as we walked home together. We spent the majority of the evening after dinner in Mom’s lab with her using the costume designer to produce some casual outfits for the other Fairies to increase their wardrobes as well, based on the both their own tastes and those of their companions. It was actually kind of fun and all of the Fairies gave a bit of a fashion show afterward that was really cute. We all went to bed that evening in good spirits and feeling closer than we ever had before, which was good because the next day we would all face the Reaper.

‘ello agin e’eryone an’ welcome agin tae Merida’s Corner. Today I will be teachin’ all o’ ya aboot Generators. Generators are very sim’lar tae Energy Manipulators in a lo’ o’ ways. They kin generate matter an’/or manipulate it like EMs dae wit’ energy, bu’ like EMs they need energy tae dae it. There are four categories o’ Generators: Passive Generators, Direct Generators, Fixed Generators, an’ Growth Generators.

Passive Generators are much like their EM counterparts e’en though there are no sub-categories. They ‘ave digestive systems tha’ are hyper-optimized tae produce the amount o’ energy they need tae fuel their powers. They rely solely on energy produced by their own bodies, so they are seldom more powerful than Category two. Like True Passive Energizers, Passive Generators kin create matter a’ will, bu’ are limited by their own energy.

Direct Generators absorb energy from outside sources tae fuel their powers, like Mei or Meghan Taylor draw on magic energy. Some jus’ draw nat’rally on their energy source like Mei, while others like Meghan Taylor use up physical energy tae draw on their energy source. That is why Meghan gets ‘ungry when usin’ her powers too much, she’s usin’ a lo’ o’ physical energy an’ it needs tae be replaced. Tha’ means takin’ in some major calories.

Fixed Generators cannae create various types o’ matter like other Generators. They draw a set type o’ matter intae our dimension from another, like their EM counterparts dae wit’ energy. They cannae really control it’s shape or form, they jus’ materialize it in it’s nat’ral form like water. It’s almos’ more like matter-specific teleportation than matter gen’ration. They ‘ave similarly hyper-accelerated metabolisms an’ appetite issues as Burst Gate Energizers because movin’ the matter from another dimension takes physical energy an’ they only access their gates when they need tae.

Growth Generators are able tae gen’rate one specific type o’ matter intae various shapes an’ such as a biological function o’ their bodies. A good example o’ this is a young woman I ‘eard aboot in Toronto callin’ ‘erself Crystal. She kin grow crystals from ‘er body tae form weapons, armor an’ all sorts o’ other things an’ reabsorb them intae ‘er body when she doesnae need ‘em anymore. Usin’ these abilities seem to make Growth Generators ‘ungry, bu’ like a good workout since they dinnae seem tae show any signs o’ a hyper-metabolism.

Well, tha’s all tha’ I ‘ave tae say aboot Generators, so tha’s all fer today an’ I’ll see all o’ ya nex’ week tae talk aboot Shifters. ‘til then, this is Merida signin’ off.