“ | I mean, you ask when you approach other groups, and it’s like you’re holding a gun to their heads as you ask, or you ask at a time when it’s hard for them to say no, because all hell’s about to break loose. [...] Let’s just say you make a decision by yourself, and then you use others to get help carrying it out. That’s not really you asking for help, is it?
我的意思是,当你接近其他团体时,你会问,就好像你在用枪指着他们的头一样,或者你在一个他们很难拒绝的时刻问,因为一切都快要失控了。[...] 让我们说你自己做了一个决定,然后你利用其他人来帮助执行。这并不是真正的请求帮助,对吧? |
” |
—Tattletale to Taylor, Speck 30.1 |
“ | A nameless cape. Taylor Hebert. Skitter. A bug controller from my hometown. 一个无名的斗篷。泰勒·赫伯特。斯基特。来自我家乡的虫子控制者。 We were too spooked at the idea that we might draw her attention and start that whole engine back into motion to mention her by name. 我们对可能引起她的注意并重新启动整个事件的想法感到太害怕,以至于不敢提到她的名字。 Best to leave it alone. 最好让它保持原样。 |
” |
—Victoria, Beacon 8.11 — 维多利亚,灯塔 8.11 |
Taylor Anne Hebert[1] (pronounced "Hee-bert"; IPA:/ˈhiː.bɝt/[35]), known in her primary cape identity as Skitter, is the main protagonist of Worm.[36]
泰勒·安·赫伯特 [1] (发音为“希-伯特”;国际音标:/ˈhiː.bɝt/ [35] ),在她的主要超级英雄身份中被称为 Skitter,是《Worm》的主要主角。 [36]
Personality 个性[]
Background 背景[]
Taylor is initially a shy and awkward teenage girl with an interest in capes. She read cape magazines for a few years,[37] though this only taught her basic facts about local heroes.[38][39][40][41][42] She looked forward to the part of her World Issues class where they discussed capes "since the start of the semester".[43] She had seemingly never heard of Trigger Events, but this may have been a mistake by the author.[44]
泰勒最初是一个害羞而笨拙的少女,对披风感兴趣。她看了几年的披风杂志, [37] 尽管这只教会了她关于当地英雄的基本事实。 [38] [39] [40] [41] [42] 她期待着世界问题课上讨论披风的部分“自学期开始以来”。 [43] 她似乎从未听说过触发事件,但这可能是作者的一个错误。 [44]
She was "'surviving', for lack of a better word," from the point her mother died, and then surviving from the point she started getting bullied -- she just wanted to get by. She responded to stress with silence and withdrawal.[45] She was starved for touch.[46] She suspected that she would hurt herself before she hurt the Trio.[47] However, Wildbow has stated that if she hadn't triggered, Taylor would likely have simply stopped going to school rather than harming herself.[48]
她从母亲去世的那一刻起就“‘在生存’,因为没有更好的词”,然后从她开始遭受欺凌的那一刻起也在生存——她只是想活下去。她用沉默和退缩来应对压力。 [45] 她渴望触碰。 [46] 她怀疑自己会在伤害三人组之前先伤害自己。 [47] 然而,Wildbow 曾表示,如果她没有触发,Taylor 可能会选择不再上学,而不是伤害自己。 [48]
She was afraid of illegal drugs, saying she "had this sense" that they were like "an unstoppable black hole". Just the idea of being around someone that was high made her mildly anxious.[49] She disliked taking painkiller pills because they never seemed to make a difference.[50]
她害怕非法药物,称她“有这种感觉”,觉得它们就像“一个无法阻挡的黑洞”。仅仅是想到和一个吸毒的人在一起就让她感到稍微焦虑。 [49] 她不喜欢服用止痛药,因为它们似乎从来没有什么效果。 [50]
She was familiar with navigating computers from a young age thanks to her mother.[51]
她从小就因母亲的缘故熟悉使用电脑。 [51]
She was a "nonbeliever", as opposed to an 'atheist', when it comes to religion, as the subject was not something she put a great deal of thought into and certainly not to the point where she'd label herself an 'atheist'. Due to her habit of blaming the people in charge when things started becoming bleak and messed up, it would be a stretch for her to be faithful in a world with poor conditions like Worm.[52]
在宗教方面,她是一个“非信徒”,而不是“无神论者”,因为这个话题并不是她深思熟虑的事情,当然也没有到她会给自己贴上“无神论者”标签的地步。由于她习惯在事情变得阴暗和混乱时指责掌权者,在像《Worm》这样的恶劣环境中,她要保持信仰是很困难的。
Disliked the idea of having her bodily autonomy taken away even before she triggered.[53][54]
不喜欢在她触发之前就被剥夺身体自主权的想法。 [53] [54]
Taylor was canonically heterosexual.[55]
泰勒在官方设定中是异性恋。 [55]
Story Start 故事开始[]
She has shown some insecurity in her femininity, describing her long, dark curly hair as her "only feminine feature".[43] Used to regularly spent time in front of a mirror, fixating on the flaws and things she didn't like about herself to the point where she would see a stranger in her reflection.[56] She would always stress over choosing her clothes.[57]
她在女性特质上表现出一些不安,称她的长而深色的卷发是她“唯一的女性特征”。 [43] 她曾经经常花时间在镜子前,专注于自己身上的缺陷和不喜欢的地方,直到她在镜子中看到一个陌生人。 [56] 她总是对选择衣服感到压力。 [57]
She had a tendency to throw herself into danger without considering the consequences to herself, that could easily have resulted in her death had it persisted.[58]
她有一种倾向,常常不考虑后果就投身于危险之中,如果这种情况持续下去,很可能会导致她的死亡。 [58]
Taylor considered joining the Wards, but felt that "the notion of escaping the stresses of high school by flinging myself into a mess of teenage drama, adult oversight and schedules seemed self-defeating".[59] She had no trust in organized institutions, and felt happier having some independence and control.[60]
泰勒考虑加入 Wards,但觉得“通过投身于一团青少年戏剧、成年人的监督和日程安排来逃避高中压力的想法似乎是自我挫败的”。她对组织机构没有信任,觉得拥有一些独立性和控制感让她更快乐。
She had increasing difficulty attending school.[61] Sometimes she would make deals with herself to attend for part of the day, then convince herself to attend for more.[62]
她上学越来越困难。有时她会和自己达成协议,先上学一部分时间,然后说服自己多待一会儿。
Taylor became very self-conscious when she was physically close to people, worrying if they could smell bad breath or body odor to the point of stopping to breath just in case she had bad breath.[63]
泰勒在与人身体接近时变得非常自觉,担心他们是否能闻到口臭或体味,甚至会停下来呼吸,以防自己有口臭。
Tattletale mentioned that Taylor was "observant, detail oriented and focused", and that she watches, observes and then acts with careful, surgical precision.[64] Brian describes her as "analytical", going through points step-by-step like checking things off a list.[65] Taylor doubts these observations.[66][67]
Tattletale 提到 Taylor 是“善于观察、注重细节和专注的”,并且她会仔细观察,然后以小心、精准的方式行动。 [64] Brian 形容她为“分析型”,逐步检查每个要点,就像在清单上勾选一样。 [65] Taylor 对这些观察表示怀疑。 [66] [67]
Tattletale also noted, later on, that she seemed to "gravitate toward solitude", and that she seemed oblivious to people staring at her as Skitter, perhaps because she had spent so long assuming everyone was staring at her as a result of her poor self-confidence. Tattletale believed that Taylor would be better at using Tattletale's power than she was.[68]
Tattletale 后来也注意到,她似乎“倾向于孤独”,而且她似乎对人们盯着她看毫无察觉,作为 Skitter,或许是因为她花了很长时间假设每个人都在盯着她看,这源于她的自信心不足。Tattletale 认为 Taylor 使用 Tattletale 的能力会比她更好。
Post-Leviathan 后利维坦[]
She suffered from nightmares.[69] Shocked by the city's devastation, Skitter focused on establishing her new territory and finding a way to retain "employees", despite other demands on her time such as negotiating with Coil over future plans.
她遭受噩梦的折磨。 [69] 对城市的毁灭感到震惊,Skitter 专注于建立她的新领地,并寻找留住“员工”的方法,尽管她还需要花时间与 Coil 谈判未来的计划。
Post Slaughterhouse Nine 屠宰场九之后[]
She was known for reviewing previous fights to see how she could have done things differently or if some new trick she learned could have taken care of the situation.[70]
她以回顾之前的战斗而闻名,以查看自己可以如何做得不同,或者她学到的某些新技巧是否可以解决这个问题。
Taylor started to take the lead more in engagements the Undersiders participated in. Eventually taking over as the leader of the Undersiders when dealing with Dragon.
泰勒开始在与 Undersiders 参与的交战中更主动地领导。最终在与 Dragon 的交涉中接管了 Undersiders 的领导权。
Was described by Director Piggot and, to a certain extent, the PRT as "reckless, shortsighted, capricious, violent, even vicious… but not stupid."[71]
被皮戈特主任以及在某种程度上,PRT 描述为“鲁莽、目光短浅、反复无常、暴力,甚至恶毒……但并不愚蠢。” [71]
Post-Echidna 后艾基德娜[]
Taylor had time to reconnect with her dad, but still had some guilt about the distance in their relationship. She met Emma at school and was surprised to see how her view of her tormentor had changed because of recent events.
泰勒有时间与她的父亲重新建立联系,但对他们关系中的距离仍感到一些内疚。她在学校遇到了艾玛,惊讶于她对自己施虐者的看法因最近的事件而发生了变化。
After Dragon's return visit, while angry she tried to find a way to compromise after the event by turning herself in. It didn't go well. But eventually her faith in the system was restored somewhat.
在龙的回访后,尽管她很生气,但她试图在事件后通过自首找到妥协的办法。结果并不顺利。但最终她对系统的信任在某种程度上得到了恢复。
As the negotiations turned into extortion and interrogation, a crisis started to form. However it was defused and in its wake, Taylor had achieved what she felt was necessary: a stronger front against the Endbringers and End of the World scenario. She stated “This is what I want to do, above all else," and would commit to joining the effort under the new name of Weaver.[72]
随着谈判变成了勒索和审讯,一场危机开始形成。然而,它被化解了,随之而来的是,泰勒达成了她认为必要的目标:对抗终结者和世界末日情景的更强阵线。她表示:“这是我最想做的事情,胜过一切,”并承诺以新名字 Weaver 加入这一努力。
Post-Timeskip 后跳跃时间[]
She is noted to be cold, distant, exceptionally driven, and even ruthless by many characters.[73]
她被许多角色认为是冷漠、疏远、极具驱动力,甚至是无情的。 [73]
She became concerned that her passenger was influencing her behaviour.[74][75][76] She even blamed ordinary emotions on her passenger.[77] She tried hypnosis and bartering with it to control it, to no avail. Eventually she made a kind of peace with it.[78]
她开始担心她的乘客在影响她的行为。 [74] [75] [76] 她甚至将普通情感归咎于她的乘客。 [77] 她尝试了催眠和与之交易以控制它,但都没有效果。最终,她与它达成了一种和解。 [78]
Gold Morning 金色早晨[]
Taylor's sanity begins to rapidly fracture after her Corona pollentia was 'de-regulated' by Panacea. Panacea's alterations reduce the range but dramatically increase the power of Taylor's control, at the cost of the 'limiter' on Queen Administrator that prevents Taylor's powers from harming her. The consequences of the loss of the 'limiter' are fundamental. She immediately loses the ability to speak, read, or write and continues to degrade over the course of Gold Morning, eventually losing the ability to understand spoken dialogue.[79]
泰勒的理智在她的 Corona pollentia 被 Panacea“去监管”后迅速崩溃。Panacea 的改动减少了泰勒控制的范围,但大幅提高了她的控制力,代价是去掉了限制泰勒能力不伤害她的 Queen Administrator 的“限制器”。失去“限制器”的后果是根本性的。她立即失去了说话、阅读或写作的能力,并在 Gold Morning 的过程中继续退化,最终失去了理解口语对话的能力。 [79]
Shards have a pre-programmed drive to cause conflict. The loss of the limiters on Taylor's Queen Administrator shard cause this quality of her power to excessively bleed into her personality. She loses the ability to understand basic human emotional cues and bodily language, ultimately interpreting nearly any and all forms of human interaction as fighting or conflict. Driven into near-total insanity by her powers, she resolves to take over the disparate Earths in order to finally have peace, but is convinced to peacefully retreat into a self-imposed exile by several heroes, including Narwhal, Rachel, Imp, Tattletale, and Glastig Ulaine.[80]
碎片有一种预设的驱动去引发冲突。泰勒的女王管理员碎片失去限制器后,这种能力过度渗透到她的个性中。她失去了理解基本人类情感暗示和身体语言的能力,最终几乎将任何形式的人际互动都解读为战斗或冲突。由于她的能力几乎使她陷入完全的疯狂,她决心征服不同的地球,以最终获得和平,但被包括 Narwhal、Rachel、Imp、Tattletale 和 Glastig Ulaine 在内的几位英雄说服,和平地退回到自我流亡中。 [80]
By the end of Gold Morning, the boundaries between Taylor and the Queen Administrator shard have worn thin. Queen Administrator is able to speak and communicate through Taylor, using Taylor's own voice. [81] Contessa compares her to other parahumans who have lost control of themselves due to the personality bleed-over from an unleashed shard, such as Echidna, Glaistig Uaine, and the Ash Beast as examples of parahumans that Taylor now resembles. Taylor has by this point become so degraded that she mainly communicates through the assistance of powers, and needs to exert effort in order to be able to communicate as herself instead of allowing her shard to speak for her.[82]
到《金色早晨》结束时,泰勒与女王管理员碎片之间的界限变得模糊。女王管理员能够通过泰勒说话和交流,使用的是泰勒自己的声音。 [81] 康泰莎将她与其他因释放碎片而失去自我的超能者进行比较,例如艾基德娜、格莱斯蒂格·乌安和灰烬野兽,作为泰勒现在所类似的超能者的例子。到此时,泰勒已经退化到主要通过能力的帮助进行交流,并需要付出努力才能以她自己的身份进行交流,而不是让她的碎片代替她说话。 [82]
Taylor ultimately expresses regret for the long chain of decisions she's made, starting from her first meeting with Armsmaster, and culminating in Scion's defeat. At a certain point the losses of friends and the moral compromises became too much, though not even she knows when or where the balance was tipped. Taylor says, in the end, that if she had a way to do it all over again, she would find a way to be a hero differently, a way to do it all better and not pay the prices she was forced to pay.[82]
泰勒最终对她所做的一系列决定表示遗憾,这些决定始于她第一次与武器大师的会面,并 culminated in Scion 的失败。在某个时刻,朋友的损失和道德妥协变得太过沉重,尽管连她自己也不知道平衡是什么时候或在哪里被打破的。泰勒最后说,如果她有机会重新来过,她会找到一种不同的方式成为英雄,一种更好的方式去做这一切,而不是支付她被迫支付的代价。
Post-Gold Morning 后黄金早晨[]
After being seemingly exiled by Contessa to Earth Aleph (which is isolated from the multiverse) alongside her father, an unpowered Taylor aims to pursue a normal life, but struggles to find peace now that she has it after all the decisions she's made and how nothing she'll ever do will ever come close in importance to what she did before. Taylor also questions why Contessa spared her when she asked for death, forcing her to come to terms with her regrets and causing her to doubt things could be going well for her and her dad. After the talk, she decides that, although that she has a lot of stuff bothering her, she's dealt with worse and could maybe deal with it and learn to be okay.[83]
在被 Contessa 似乎流放到与多元宇宙隔绝的 Earth Aleph 后,泰勒和她的父亲一起,作为一个没有超能力的人,旨在追求正常的生活,但在经历了所有的决定后,她发现自己很难找到内心的平静,因为她所做的事情再也无法与之前的成就相提并论。泰勒还质疑为什么 Contessa 在她请求死亡时放过了她,这迫使她面对自己的遗憾,并让她怀疑自己和父亲的生活是否真的会好起来。谈话后,她决定,尽管有很多事情困扰着她,但她经历过更糟的情况,也许可以应对这些问题,并学会接受。
Relationships 关系[]
Civilians 平民[]
Taylor had a strained relationship with the students of Winslow High. Because she was bullied extensively by "other girls and a small handful of boys" with the "trio" - Madison Clements, Sophia Hess, and Emma Barnes[43] acting as the ringleaders, she was reluctant to make friends and believed that boys didn't like her.[43] She speculates that the few boys that bullied her sought approval from three of the prettier and more popular girls.[43]
泰勒与温斯洛高中的学生关系紧张。因为她遭受了“其他女孩和少数男孩”的严重欺凌,其中“三人组”——麦迪逊·克莱门茨、索非亚·赫斯和艾玛·巴恩斯 [43] 充当了主导者,她不愿意交朋友,并相信男孩不喜欢她。 [43] 她推测,那些欺负她的少数男孩是为了获得三位更漂亮、更受欢迎的女孩的认可。 [43]
As Skitter, Taylor had developed a fearsome reputation as a powerful cape and supervillain due to her exploits against the ABB, Empire 88, Coil's criminal empire, the Slaughterhouse Nine, the PRT, and the Protectorate, whilst assimilating much of the territories and assets of the three former groups into her own criminal organization. Effectively becoming a warlord that ruled Brockton Bay. When Dragon publicly outed Taylor under Director Tagg's orders, Taylor used her exploits to urge 100 of her classmates to help her escape from Arcadia and flee from the heroes. Within the relative confines of her own territories, she was able to walk in public with impunity prior to her conditional surrender to the PRT and Protectorate. With her resources, Taylor funded multiple projects to rebuild the city after Leviathan's attack, though much of this goodwill was overshadowed due to her reputation.
作为 Skitter,泰勒因其对 ABB、帝国 88、科尔的犯罪帝国、屠杀九人组、PRT 和保护者的行动而建立了可怕的声誉,成为一名强大的超级英雄和超级反派,同时将这三个前组织的领土和资产大部分纳入自己的犯罪组织。她实际上成为了统治布罗克顿湾的军阀。当龙在塔格局长的命令下公开揭露泰勒时,泰勒利用自己的成就促使 100 名同学帮助她逃离阿卡迪亚并逃避英雄。在她自己领土的相对范围内,她能够在公众场合自由行走,直到她有条件地向 PRT 和保护者投降。凭借她的资源,泰勒资助了多个项目,以在利维坦袭击后重建城市,尽管由于她的声誉,这些善意大多被掩盖。
As Weaver, Taylor's chafes under the directives she's mandated to follow as a probationary Ward, limited to the use of non-venomous bugs. She visits Ms. Yamada for therapy. Due to her killing Alexandria, Taylor's been looked upon distrustfully. The public start to see Weaver as a hero following the New Delhi battle.[citation needed]
作为 Weaver,泰勒在作为试用 Ward 被要求遵循的指令下感到不适,限制使用无毒的昆虫。她去找山田女士进行治疗。由于她杀了亚历山德里亚,泰勒受到不信任的看待。公众在新德里战斗后开始将 Weaver 视为英雄。 [citation needed]
Teachers 教师[]
Taylor disliked Mr. Gladly viewing him as one of the ‘popular kids' who had become a teacher.[43]
泰勒不喜欢格拉德利先生,认为他是那些成为老师的“受欢迎的孩子”之一。
Mrs. Knott, who taught Computer sciences, was Taylor's favourite teacher.[84][85]
教计算机科学的诺特夫人是泰勒最喜欢的老师。
Taylor's Bullies 泰勒的恶霸[]
Madison Clements, Sophia Hess, and Emma Barnes - The Trio of students responsible for bullying Taylor. Emma was Taylor's best friend from first grade to middle school, the two girls stayed at each other's houses every weekend.[47] Upon entering high school, Emma suddenly abandoned her for Sophia and Madison. The three then tormented her - Sophia physically, Madison superficially and Emma emotionally. Because Emma was once her best friend, she was the only one of the three that could truly harm Taylor, using information that Taylor once confided to her to psychologically harm her, such as the death of Mrs. Hebert. Taylor resisted attacking the trio with her powers, no matter how much she wanted to.[43] She considered the thought of her father's disappointment on seeing that she had attacked the Trio "daunting" but less than her anger and frustration with them.
麦迪逊·克莱门茨、索非亚·赫斯和艾玛·巴恩斯 - 负责欺负泰勒的三名学生。艾玛是泰勒从一年级到初中的最好朋友,这两个女孩每个周末都住在对方家里。 [47] 进入高中后,艾玛突然抛弃了她,转而与索非亚和麦迪逊交往。然后三人开始折磨她 - 索非亚在身体上,麦迪逊在表面上,艾玛在情感上。因为艾玛曾是她最好的朋友,所以她是三人中唯一能真正伤害泰勒的人,利用泰勒曾向她倾诉的信息在心理上伤害她,比如赫伯特夫人的去世。泰勒抵制用她的能力攻击三人,无论她多么想这样做。 [43] 她考虑到父亲看到她攻击三人时的失望感,觉得“令人生畏”,但这比起她对他们的愤怒和沮丧要少。
After facing the likes of Coil and the Slaughterhouse 9 Taylor was able to overcome Emma's emotional attacks; following Taylor's public outing as Skitter Emma broke down. Emma Barnes' parents and sister blame Taylor for their daughter's eventual death.
在面对像 Coil 和 Slaughterhouse 9 这样的敌人后,Taylor 能够克服 Emma 的情感攻击;在 Taylor 公开身份为 Skitter 后,Emma 崩溃了。Emma Barnes 的父母和姐妹将女儿最终的死亡归咎于 Taylor。
Madison would ultimately come to regret her actions after learning that Taylor had become Skitter, feeling somewhat responsible for the path of violence that Taylor had taken. She would ultimately reach out to various heroes hoping to gain more information but was rebuffed. Eventually Victoria gave her some answers, saying that she would never know whether her actions had ultimately saved the world or not.
麦迪逊最终会后悔她的行为,因为她得知泰勒已经变成了 Skitter,感到对泰勒所走的暴力道路有些责任。她最终联系了各种英雄,希望获得更多信息,但遭到了拒绝。最终,维多利亚给了她一些答案,说她永远不会知道她的行为是否最终拯救了世界。
Danny Hebert 丹尼·赫伯特[]
They develop a somewhat strained relationship after she becomes Skitter, but repair it over the time she acted as Weaver. She always saw his teachings as a source of strength.
在她成为 Skitter 后,他们的关系变得有些紧张,但在她担任 Weaver 期间修复了这种关系。她一直将他的教导视为力量的源泉。
Territory employees 领土员工[]
After saving Charlotte from the Merchants, she loyally looks after Skitter's base and reports daily to her. While Skitter is thankful for her help and loyalty, but isn't sure how to show her appreciation to her.
在救出夏洛特脱离商人后,她忠诚地照看着 Skitter 的基地,并每天向她报告。虽然 Skitter 对她的帮助和忠诚表示感谢,但不确定如何向她表达感激之情。
Parahumans 超人类[]
Before becoming a cape, Taylor was, in her younger days, a big fan of Alexandria and Armsmaster. As a member of the Undersiders she becomes close friends with Tattletale, Grue, and Rachel (Hellhound/Bitch). She has a somewhat more distant relationship with Regent, due to being somewhat unsettled by him.
在成为超能力者之前,泰勒在年轻时是亚历山德里亚和武器大师的忠实粉丝。作为地下者的一员,她与 Tattletale、Grue 和 Rachel(地狱犬/贱人)成为了密友。由于对 Regent 感到有些不安,她与他的关系相对较远。
Taylor and Grue become romantically involved after the events of the Slaughterhouse Nine arc, but the relationship is short-lived and fizzles due to dramatically different levels of potential investment in the relationship, as well as the prevalent, tumultuous circumstances looming over both their civilian and cape lives . Where Grue was unwilling to make it a 'serious' relationship, Taylor very much was. Nonetheless the two remained on positive terms.
泰勒和格鲁在屠杀九号篇章的事件后开始恋爱,但这段关系短暂且因双方在关系中的潜在投入水平差异巨大以及他们的平民生活和超级英雄生活中存在的动荡环境而逐渐冷却。格鲁不愿意将其发展为“严肃”的关系,而泰勒则非常希望如此。尽管如此,两人仍然保持着良好的关系。
Taylor and Clockblocker share a vaguely respectful mutual relationship despite being enemies, a connection forged by fighting with or against one another several times. This connection becomes obvious to the point that civilian rumors begin to circulate of a romantic relationship between the two. Taylor is also close to Golem, serving as something of a mentor figure. She also spends a large amount of her time with Chicago wards but is considered not to be as close with them as she is with the Undersiders. As Weaver, Taylor visits Ms. Yamada for therapy. The civilian public begins to see Weaver as a hero following the Behemoth battle and Glenn Chamber's unauthorized release of her POV video of the battle.
泰勒和时钟阻挡者尽管是敌人,但彼此之间有一种模糊的尊重关系,这种联系是通过多次相互对抗或合作而建立的。这种联系变得明显,以至于民间开始流传两人之间有浪漫关系的谣言。泰勒与戈伦关系密切,扮演着某种导师的角色。她还花费大量时间与芝加哥的守护者们在一起,但被认为与他们的关系不如与地下者们亲密。作为编织者,泰勒去找山田女士进行治疗。在比希莫斯战斗之后,民众开始将编织者视为英雄,尤其是在格伦·钱伯未经授权发布她的战斗视角视频之后。
After the time-skip, she is close to Golem, serving as something of a mentor figure. She also spends a large amount of her time with Chicago wards but is considered not to be as close with them as she is with the Undersiders. After recovering from her injuries during the oil-rig battle, Taylor collects a team of parahumans with a semi-rotating membership from capes she had known in the past. This group includes Lung, Tattletale, Shadow Stalker, Cuff, Tecton, and Canary at different points.
在时间跳跃后,她与 Golem 关系密切,充当某种导师角色。她还花费大量时间与芝加哥的守护者们在一起,但被认为与他们的关系不如与 Undersiders 亲密。在从油井战斗中的伤势恢复后,Taylor 组建了一支由她过去认识的超能力者组成的半轮换成员团队。这个团队在不同的时刻包括 Lung、Tattletale、Shadow Stalker、Cuff、Tecton 和 Canary。
Armsmaster 武器大师[]
He was the first real Cape that Taylor worked with and admired him when she was younger. After Armsmaster's actions during the battle with Leviathan, which also culminated in him revealing her status as a mole to the Undersiders, she loses her respect for him, and they later become bitter enemies. After gaining perspective, Armsmaster, later rebranded as Defiant, apologizes to her (which catches her off guard.) Afterwards they're able to have a civil (if not friendly) relationship.
他是泰勒第一次真正合作并崇拜的 Cape。在与利维坦的战斗中,Armsmaster 的行为导致他向 Undersiders 揭露了她作为内奸的身份,这让她失去了对他的尊重,他们后来成为了 bitter 敌人。在获得新的视角后,Armsmaster,后来更名为 Defiant,向她道歉(这让她感到意外)。之后他们能够建立一种文明(尽管不友好)的关系。
Alexandria 亚历山德里亚[]
Alexandria was Taylor's favourite heroine when she was a kid.[86] When she was nine, she went through a phase where she wore an Alexandria t-shirt and had her mom help her look up pictures of Alexandria online; the only time she had ever been a fan of a particular hero.[87]
亚历山德里亚是泰勒小时候最喜欢的女英雄。 [86] 当她九岁时,她经历了一个阶段,穿着亚历山德里亚的 T 恤,并让她妈妈帮她在网上查找亚历山德里亚的图片;那是她唯一一次真正喜欢某个特定的英雄。 [87]
She developed a fractious relationship with the hero which turned dangerous a bit before Taylor began her career as Weaver.
她与这位英雄的关系变得紧张,直到泰勒开始她的编织者生涯之前,这种关系变得危险。
Lisa "Tattletale" Wilbourn
丽莎 "Tattletale" 威尔伯恩[]
Lisa is one of the first to trust Taylor from their first meeting and eventually becomes her closest friend. Despite some a few later misgivings over Tattletale's morals, especially when she suddenly unveils her more audacious plans, Taylor generally accepts her reasons and trusts her to do the right thing. In turn Lisa is somewhat protective of her because of two reasons: her past, and her involvement in recruiting Skitter.
丽莎是从第一次见面起就最早信任泰勒的人之一,并最终成为她最亲密的朋友。尽管后来对 Tattletale 的道德有一些顾虑,尤其是当她突然揭示出更大胆的计划时,泰勒通常还是接受了她的理由,并信任她会做正确的事情。反过来,丽莎出于两个原因对她有些保护:她的过去,以及她参与招募 Skitter。
Brian "Grue" Laborn 布莱恩 "Grue" 拉博恩[]
Taylor develops a crush on him and the two date for awhile. After the timeskip, though they have long since separated, she is still surprised to see that he had moved on with someone else.
泰勒对他产生了好感,两人约会了一段时间。然而,在时间跳跃后,尽管他们早已分开,她仍然惊讶地发现他已经和其他人走到了一起。
Rachel "Bitch" Lindt 瑞秋 "婊子" 林特[]
The two initially have a rocky relationship, but by the end of Worm, Taylor is one of the few Rachel could call a friend.
最开始两人的关系很紧张,但到《Worm》结束时,泰勒是瑞秋为数不多的可以称之为朋友的人之一。
Taylor eventually came to think of Rachel by her name instead of her cape appellation.[88]
泰勒最终开始用瑞秋的名字来称呼她,而不是她的斗篷称号。
Alec "Regent" Vasil[]
Taylor is wary of Regent's ways. She knows that he's sociopathic and considers his membership on the Undersiders a necessary evil.[citation needed] She acknowledges his power is useful, but doesn't fully accept its moral implications.
泰勒对摄政的方式感到警惕。她知道他是反社会人格,并认为他在地下者中的成员身份是一种必要的邪恶。 [citation needed] 她承认他的能力是有用的,但并不完全接受其道德含义。
Aisha "Imp" Laborn 艾莎 "Imp" 拉博恩[]
Taylor thinks she's annoying, but tolerates her out of respect for her brother. They develop a close personal relationship later on.[citation needed]
泰勒认为她很烦人,但出于对她哥哥的尊重而容忍她。后来他们发展了亲密的个人关系。 [citation needed]
Aiden Tate 艾登·泰特[]
Taylor was only around Aiden for a short while,[89] not long after his parents died.[90] As a warlord, she paid Charlotte to look after him and the other orphans;[91] Aiden spent more time around other Undersiders like Grue than he spent around Taylor.[92] However, she did make enough of an impact on him,[89] such as possibly giving him a mug of hot chocolate,[93] for her shard to bud onto him.[94]
泰勒和艾登在一起的时间很短, [89] 在他父母去世后不久。 [90] 作为一个军阀,她付钱给夏洛特照顾他和其他孤儿; [91] 艾登和其他地下者如格鲁在一起的时间比和泰勒在一起的时间要多。 [92] 然而,她确实对他产生了足够的影响, [89] 比如可能给他一杯热巧克力, [93] 使她的碎片在他身上萌芽。 [94]
Coil[]
Taylor is extremely distrustful of Coil because he involved the Undersiders in a kidnapping (albeit indirectly), but depends on his funding and supplies. As his plan to dominate the city comes to fruition, their conflict puts her increasingly on edge.
泰勒对科伊尔极度不信任,因为他间接地让下层人参与了一起绑架,但她依赖他的资金和物资。随着他统治城市的计划逐渐实现,他们的冲突让她越来越紧张。
Skitter works to save Dinah Alcott. While unfortunately she works for the PRT, she harbors no regrets or ill will towards the thinker.
Skitter 努力拯救 Dinah Alcott。虽然不幸的是她为 PRT 工作,但她对这个思考者没有任何遗憾或恶意。
Travelers 旅行者[]
Skitter comes to know and talk with all of the Travelers, who cautiously respect her. She first meets Sundancer while fighting at the ABB warehouse, but unnerved her by disfiguring Lung. Likewise, she doesn't seem to get along too well with Trickster nor Ballistic, who don't trust her motives and are suspicious of her. Genesis is more neutral but later sensing Skitter's agitation with Coil, becomes guarded.
Skitter 开始了解并与所有的旅行者交谈,他们小心翼翼地尊重她。她第一次在 ABB 仓库与 Sundancer 交手时遇见了她,但因毁容 Lung 而让她感到不安。同样,她与 Trickster 和 Ballistic 的关系似乎也不太好,他们不信任她的动机,并对她心存怀疑。Genesis 则比较中立,但后来感受到 Skitter 对 Coil 的不安,变得谨慎。
Panacea 全能药[]
Complicated. While she disliked the Undersiders due to the bank argument, she would later come around. Because of the Nine, she gifted Skitter with Atlas and Relay bugs to cover her weaknesses. Though these were meant to be temporary they helped her escape the firebombs.
复杂。虽然她因为银行争论而不喜欢 Undersiders,但她后来会改变看法。由于九人组,她赠送给 Skitter Atlas 和 Relay 虫子以弥补她的弱点。虽然这些本 intended to be temporary,但它们帮助她逃脱了火焰炸弹。
Miss Militia 米斯·米利西亚[]
They would cooperate to some extent, Miss Militia's attitude as leader of the local heroes more amenable than that of her colleagues. During the Echidna fight Skitter often informed her of urgent developments and did get understanding if not acceptance from the pragmatic hero. Like Defiant, she was sympathetic to the worst of Skitter's treatment as a cape, including the PRT order to unmask her. Thus she would be somewhat involved in Skitter's Surrender, although Skitter begrudged her decision to avoid influencing the ongoing negotiations.
她们会在某种程度上合作,米莉西亚小姐作为当地英雄的领导者,其态度比她的同事们更为温和。在与艾基德娜的战斗中,Skitter 经常向她通报紧急情况,并得到了这位务实英雄的理解,尽管并未完全接受。与 Defiant 一样,她对 Skitter 作为 cape 所遭受的最糟糕的待遇表示同情,包括 PRT 下令揭露她身份。因此,她在 Skitter 的投降中会有所参与,尽管 Skitter 对她避免影响正在进行的谈判的决定感到不满。
Defiant[]
Despite his earlier betrayal, Defiant becomes something of a friend to Taylor, or at least a respected colleague. He and Dragon work to create her equipment and ferry her from place to place, at least partly as an apology. Their relationship is purely business.
尽管他之前背叛了她,Defiant 变成了 Taylor 的朋友,或者至少是一个受人尊敬的同事。他和 Dragon 一起为她制作设备,并在各个地方接送她,至少部分是作为一种道歉。他们的关系纯粹是商业上的。
Appearance 外观[]
Civilian Identity 平民身份[]
Taylor was a tall,[95] stick-thin,[96][97] young woman with long, curly black hair[98][96][99][100] and glasses. She had a thin-lipped, wide, expressive mouth she inherited from her mother, and her large eyes and gawky figure made her look a lot like her father.[43][101] According to Wildbow's Patreon art, she has brown eyes.[102] She was approximately 5'8 at the story's outset,[35] but grew to 5'9 at the time of her Wards physical,[103] and then later 5'10.[104]
泰勒是一位高挑、 [95] 瘦弱的 [96] [97] 年轻女性,拥有长长的卷曲黑发 [98] [96] [99] [100] 和眼镜。她继承了母亲的薄唇、宽大而富有表现力的嘴巴,和她的大眼睛以及笨拙的身材让她看起来很像她的父亲。 [43] [101] 根据 Wildbow 的 Patreon 艺术,她有棕色的眼睛。 [102] 在故事开始时,她大约身高 5 英尺 8 英寸, [35] 但在她的 Wards 体检时长到了 5 英尺 9 英寸, [103] 然后后来达到了 5 英尺 10 英寸。 [104]
Taylor didn't wear clothes that showed skin, or bright colors. Emma presumed this was an unconscious effort to blend in or hide.[98] Lisa Wilbourn came to a similar conclusion.[105] At various times, she wore a brown hooded sweatshirt over a green t-shirt.[43]
泰勒不穿露肤或鲜艳颜色的衣服。艾玛推测这是她无意识地努力融入或隐藏。 [98] 丽莎·威尔伯恩得出了类似的结论。 [105] 在不同的时间,她穿着一件棕色连帽卫衣,里面是一件绿色 T 恤。 [43]
As time went on and under the influence of Lisa Wilbourn, she began to vary her wardrobe more. Learning to vary her appearance to blend into situations. She also grew taller and gained some muscle from her training regime and activities as a parahuman.[106] The fact that she didn't need to turn her head to look at things gave her a false appearance of extreme confidence.[107]
随着时间的推移,在丽莎·威尔博恩的影响下,她开始更多地改变自己的衣着。学习根据情况变化自己的外貌。她也变得更高,因训练计划和作为超人类的活动而增加了一些肌肉。 [106] 她不需要转头去看东西的事实给了她一种极度自信的假象。 [107]
Parahuman Identity 超人类身份[]

As Skitter, Taylor wore various costumes made of spider silk.
作为 Skitter,Taylor 穿着各种用蜘蛛丝制成的服装。
Initially, she wears a black-and-grey spider silk bodysuit with armor panels made out of insect shells and exoskeletons augmented with more spider silk. [47] She dyes it black with grey paneling before she goes out.[108]
最初,她穿着一套黑灰色的蜘蛛丝紧身衣,配有由昆虫外壳和外骨骼制成的盔甲面板,并用更多的蜘蛛丝进行了增强。 [47] 她在出门前将其染成黑色,配有灰色面板。 [108]
The yellow lenses of her mask are durable, high-end swim goggles tinted to help filter out bright lights, with lenses from an old pair of her glasses sealed inside with silicon.[109] Her mask leaves the back of her head uncovered and her hair free to fly behind her.[110]
她面具的黄色镜片是耐用的高端游泳护目镜,经过着色以帮助过滤强光,镜片是她一副旧眼镜的镜片,用硅胶密封在里面。她的面具让她头部的后面没有覆盖,头发可以自由地在身后飞扬。
The costume lacks the full extent of the armor paneling she planned, including protection for the back of her head, but the armor covers her face, chest, spine, stomach and major joints (including wrists, shoulders, elbows and knees).[108] Each had "layers" resembling a pillbug.[111] The mask design features dull yellow lenses and sections of armor designed to imitate a bug’s mandibles.[112][113]
这套服装缺乏她计划中的全套盔甲护板,包括对后脑的保护,但盔甲覆盖了她的脸、胸部、脊柱、腹部和主要关节(包括手腕、肩膀、肘部和膝盖)。 [108] 每个都有类似于蜈蚣的“层”。 [111] 面具设计具有暗黄色镜片和模仿昆虫下颚的盔甲部分。 [112] [113]
She kept her costume clean by having bugs eat and clean any waste and wiping it down with a cloth.[114]
她通过让虫子吃掉并清理任何废物,以及用布擦拭,保持她的服装干净。 [114]
The spider-silk fabric is too tough to cut with an x-acto knife, although it can be slowly cut through using wire cutters.[47] It was mostly waterproof.[114] Prior to dying, the costume's prototype had fabric that was a dirty yellow-gray color, and the armor was naturally a dark mottled brown-gray.[47]
蜘蛛丝面料太坚韧,无法用 x-acto 刀切割,尽管可以慢慢用钢丝钳切割。 [47] 它大部分是防水的。 [114] 在死亡之前,服装的原型面料是肮脏的黄灰色,盔甲自然是深色斑驳的棕灰色。 [47]
Taylor has a detachable[115] utility compartment for storing necessary items, weapons, and insects in the shape of a spade-shaped armor panel that covers her back.[112] Taylor's backpack contains "a set of EpiPens, a pen and notepad, a tube of pepper spray meant to hang off a key chain and a zippered pouch of chalk dust."[112] In Queen 18.3, Miss Militia takes a look at the contents and sees: A handgun (Trickster's spare), a length of spider silk fashioned into a long cord, pepper spray, a change purse, containing cotton swabs (to muffle the noise), needles, smelling salts, and change, a collapsible baton, and a combat knife (sturdy enough to be used as a crowbar if needed).
泰勒有一个可拆卸的 [115] 工具舱,用于存放必要的物品、武器和以铲形盔甲面板形状的昆虫,覆盖在她的背部。 [112] 泰勒的背包里有“一套 EpiPen、一支笔和一个记事本、一管挂在钥匙链上的胡椒喷雾和一个装有粉笔灰的拉链袋。” [112] 在《女王 18.3》中,米斯·米利西亚查看了内容,看到:一把手枪(小丑的备用)、一段蜘蛛丝制成的长绳、胡椒喷雾、一个零钱包,里面装有棉签(用来消音)、针头、香料盐和零钱、一根可折叠警棍,以及一把战斗刀(足够坚固,可以在需要时用作撬棍)。
When her costume was damaged fighting the Nine, she added a makeshift silk skirt[116][117] and a cape/shawl.[118][119][120][121]
当她的服装在与九人组战斗时受损,她添加了一条临时的丝绸裙子 [116] [117] 和一件斗篷/披肩。 [118] [119] [120] [121]
在艾基德娜事件之后,她部分重新设计了她的盔甲,更换了磨损的部件,并改变了其外观,使盔甲面板更加凸起,整体轮廓更加锐利。 [122] 其中的变化包括增加了爪状指尖。 [123]
She first wears a generic version of her costume created by Dragon, which lacks the armor of her earlier costume simply being a light grey bodysuit with cleaner, slim dark grey armor panels. The mantle around her shoulders and the cloth hanging from her belt are marked in electric blue with her personal gang emblem (a beetle facing downwards) in miniature at each corner, flipped upside down so that it faces upward.[72]
When she deployed against Behemoth in New Delhi, she temporarily re-used her old Skitter costume so she would have proper protection.[124] as she hadn't had the time to make a new costume yet.[125] Defiant also equipped her with a flight pack which she would use for the rest of her career, replacing her utility compartment. The flight pack has antigravity wings resembling dragonfly wings which fold at the joints, antigravity panels on the bottom and sides, and mechanical arms. There are controls hidden in her gloves, as well as redundant control systems inside operated by bugs.[124]
After The Timeskip Weaver was properly outfitted with a heroically themed costume. It had more armor in comparison to her Skitter costume, with a coil of silk hidden beneath an armor panel at the back of the hand.[126] Wildbow had her down in his notes as 5’8″ (175 cm), 125 lbs (56 kg) during her stay in prison.[127] According to her Wards physical, she was five feet and nine inches tall.[103] She later described herself as a hundred and thirty pounds and 5'10".[104]
After the start of Gold Morning, she began wearing a black bodysuit again, with white armor panels and lenses. She carried mostly symbolic weapons - a handgun, taser, and pepper spray - and kept her flight pack.[126]
Later, she was given a nano-thorn knife by Defiant, which she carried in a knife holster.[128]

Khepri by Superwhity
Recovering from the Oil-rig battle Taylor wears a black bodysuit with white armor panels and lenses.[126] As Khepri she is missing her right arm, and appears to not be able to control her body very well. Throughout the fight with Scion, she usually had Doormaker and Clairvoyant attached to her, though when Doormaker ran out of energy for his power, she left him behind.
The name of Khepri was first seen when Contessa refers to Taylor as such, after the fight with Scion has concluded. [82]Abilities and Powers 能力与力量[]
Taylor possesses a form of telepathy that transmits and receives information via yet-unknown channels[129] that grants her total control over most arthropods.[130] So although she usually controls a variety of insects, she can also control a number of sea creatures such as crabs, lobsters, and krill,[131] some Mollusca like slugs and snails,[132] and can even control certain in-body parasites such as heartworms.[133]
泰勒拥有一种心灵感应的能力,通过尚未知道的渠道 [129] 传递和接收信息,使她能够完全控制大多数节肢动物。 [130] 因此,尽管她通常控制各种昆虫,但她也可以控制一些海洋生物,如螃蟹、龙虾和磷虾 [131] ,一些软体动物,如蛞蝓和蜗牛 [132] ,甚至可以控制某些体内寄生虫,如心丝虫。 [133]
Double Trigger 双重触发[]
According to Number Man, Taylor has had a Double Trigger, where a person triggers twice back-to-back; the sheer trauma of her first trigger causing a second one. As such, she is unable to have a Second Trigger to become more powerful, since she already had one.[134]
根据数字人所说,泰勒经历了双重触发,即一个人连续两次触发;她第一次触发的巨大创伤导致了第二次触发。因此,她无法再有第二次触发来变得更强大,因为她已经经历过一次。 [134]
Had she not undergone this double trigger, her bug control would have been much cruder and less skilled, being like how Chicken Little controls birds but with insects instead.[135]
如果她没有经历这个双重触发,她的虫子控制能力会粗糙得多,技能也会差得多,就像小鸡小鸡控制鸟类一样,但控制的是昆虫。 [135]
Based off what has been shown of Aiden's control, this could likely mean that she'd be unable to precisely operate and her insects, instead controlling them more like a 'wave' that she 'pushes' and 'pulls' using a sort of invisible 'rally points' with the capacity to give additional orders like to attack on the way while the bugs are being drawn to the point, and likely could not control them and co-opt their senses at the same time. Additionally, any fine and precise control of insects she does have would most likely be limited to either a single bug or at least a much smaller number than her full swarm, at the cost of becoming unable to have any control whatsoever of all the other insects in range, instead of being able to micromanage and skillfully direct all the insects in her range like in the story proper.
根据艾登的控制能力,这可能意味着她无法精确操作她的昆虫,而是更像是通过一种看不见的“集结点”来“推动”和“拉动”它们,能够发出额外的命令,比如在昆虫被吸引到集结点的过程中攻击,并且可能无法同时控制它们和利用它们的感官。此外,她所能进行的任何细致和精确的昆虫控制很可能仅限于单个昆虫,或者至少是比她的完整虫群要小得多的数量,代价是无法对范围内的所有其他昆虫进行任何控制,而不是像故事中那样能够微观管理并熟练地指挥她范围内的所有昆虫。
Control 控制[]
She can make her minions do things that they would not normally do, and push them to the limit where they end up harming themselves with how much effort they put in.[136]She can make them destroy themselves to accomplish tasks,[137] produce so much web silk that they physically couldn't produce any more[138] or stinging while injecting little[139] to no venom.[140] She doesn't require "organized" insects. Once they leave her range and she stops controlling them, her bugs revert to their normal behavior patterns.[130] However, if she has given a command to them while still in her range, she must intentionally dismiss the instruction she gave them or give them a new one, or else they will continue to fulfil their last command. This resulted in the accidental murder of Director Tagg when she was knocked unconscious, as her last order to 'sting him' was not interrupted by her, so her insects stung him to death without her able to stop them.[141]
她可以让她的爪牙做一些他们通常不会做的事情,并将他们推到极限,以至于他们付出过多努力而伤害自己。 [136] 她可以让他们自我毁灭以完成任务, [137] 产生如此多的网丝,以至于他们身体上无法再产生更多的丝 [138] 或在注入几乎没有毒液的情况下进行刺击。 [139] 她不需要“有组织”的昆虫。一旦它们离开她的控制范围并且她停止控制它们,她的虫子就会恢复到正常的行为模式。 [130] 然而,如果她在控制范围内给了它们命令,她必须故意解除她给它们的指令或给它们一个新的指令,否则它们将继续执行最后的命令。这导致了当她被击晕时,意外杀死了塔格主任,因为她最后的命令是“刺他”,而她没有中断,所以她的昆虫刺死了他,而她无法阻止它们。 [141]
Her power designates what classifies as a "bug", and thus what she can control, during her Trigger Event based upon her understanding of the term and the human knowledge of parahuman hosts within Shard Network. As such, Taylor's notion of a 'bug' is nebulous and sometimes inaccurate.[142] Her power doesn't work on creatures below a certain size, such as skin mites[143] or nematodes, which prevents her from sensing people through the microsophic insects on or inside the human body, nor could her power affect squid.[132] At different times, she speculated that she could control anything with an exoskeleton or shell -- which wouldn't explain how she could control earthworms -- and that it was the subject having a non-complex nervous system.[144] It's possible that she could control bugmen, depending on their brain makeup and chemistry.[145] However, she could not control bug-like Case 53s,[146][142] Breed's creatures,[147][142] or any insects cloned by Echidna.[148][149]
At one point, Taylor attempted to distract a foe underwater by forming simulated bodies out of sea creatures.[131]
她的能力决定了什么被归类为“虫子”,因此在她的触发事件中,她可以控制的内容取决于她对这个术语的理解以及人类对 Shard Network 中超人宿主的知识。因此,泰勒对“虫子”的概念是模糊的,有时也不准确。 [142] 她的能力对某些小于特定尺寸的生物无效,例如皮肤螨 [143] 或线虫,这使得她无法通过人类身体内外的微小昆虫感知人类,也无法影响鱿鱼。 [132] 在不同的时间,她推测她可以控制任何具有外骨骼或壳的生物——这并不能解释她如何控制蚯蚓——并且这是因为对象具有非复杂的神经系统。 [144] 她可能能够控制虫人,具体取决于他们的脑部构造和化学成分。 [145] 然而,她无法控制类虫的案例 53, [146] [142] Breed 的生物, [147] [142] 或任何由 Echidna 克隆的昆虫。 [148] [149] 在某个时刻,泰勒试图通过用海洋生物形成模拟身体来分散水下敌人的注意力。 [131]
She was able to control Atlas, a horse-sized beetle, and have her range extended with relay bugs by roughly three hundred feet around each relay.[150] Both of these were courtesy of Panacea. Like all of her other bugs she saw them as tools, though Atlas did have some sentimental value.
她能够控制阿特拉斯,一只马大小的甲虫,并通过中继虫将她的控制范围大约扩展到每个中继周围三百英尺。 [150] 这两者都是潘妮西亚的恩赐。和她的其他虫子一样,她将它们视为工具,尽管阿特拉斯确实有一些情感价值。
Multitasking 多任务处理[]
Taylor has an almost limitless ability to focus on multiple insects at once, or to focus on other things while also using her insects.[139][151] She can give general instructions, in which case she is only vaguely aware of their movements, or guide individual insects through complex tasks, in which case she is more precisely aware of their movements and environment.[152] However, she could be distracted by the difficulty of focusing on her insects' senses,[153] and by Panacea's modified insects providing contradictory signals.[151][154]
泰勒几乎拥有无限的能力,可以同时专注于多只昆虫,或者在使用她的昆虫时专注于其他事物。 [139] [151] 她可以给出一般指令,在这种情况下,她对昆虫的移动只有模糊的意识,或者引导单个昆虫完成复杂任务,在这种情况下,她对它们的移动和环境有更精确的意识。 [152] 然而,她可能会因为专注于昆虫的感官而分心, [153] 以及因为潘西娅改造的昆虫提供矛盾的信号而分心。 [151] [154]
Behind the scenes, Taylor's shard handles this multitasking so that she can independently control those in her swarm. Outside of this ability, Taylor's power does not give her augmented multitasking: despite controlling multiple swarm-clones with her power, she was only capable of holding one conversation at a time.[155] Her power can also perform actions automatically that Taylor did not intend to do. For example, Taylor was so focused on listening to a conversation that her bugs reacted to her irritation and revealed that she was eavesdropping.[156] Her power would sometimes perform actions by habit,[76] when she was incapacitated,[157] or when she was in an altered mental state,[75] without her conscious instruction.
在幕后,Taylor 的碎片处理这种多任务,以便她可以独立控制她的虫群。除了这个能力,Taylor 的力量并没有增强她的多任务能力:尽管她用自己的力量控制多个虫群克隆,但她一次只能进行一场对话。 [155] 她的力量还可以自动执行 Taylor 并不打算做的动作。例如,Taylor 专注于倾听一场对话,以至于她的虫子对她的烦躁做出了反应,暴露了她在窃听。 [156] 她的力量有时会在习惯下执行动作, [76] 当她失去能力时, [157] 或者当她处于改变的心理状态时, [75] 而没有她的意识指令。
Emotions 情感[]
Taylor would sometimes use her bugs to "channel" her emotions and body language, lending her an "aura of indomitable calm".[74] This ability gives her a partial Anti-Thinker resistance, even against powerful Thinkers like Alexandria, Tattletale and Jack Slash, or Emotion-readers like Cherish. This can be seen with Alexandria's interrogation, when Taylor was able to attack Alexandria off-guard as the latter was not prepared because Taylor had offloaded all of her emotional and social cues into her bugs and thus appeared calmer than she truly was.[158] Armsmaster's lie-detector and Cherish's power also had partially bad reads on her emotions, even Jack Slash can get incorrect reads on her. Even those close to her have trouble understanding her at times, even a powerful Thinker like Tattletale.[159]
泰勒有时会利用她的虫子来“传达”她的情感和肢体语言,从而赋予她一种“不可动摇的平静气场”。 [74] 这种能力使她对思考者有部分抗性,即使是对强大的思考者如亚历山德里亚、塔特尔泰尔和杰克·斯拉什,或情感读取者如切瑞什也有效。这可以在亚历山德里亚的审讯中看到,当时泰勒能够趁亚历山德里亚不备进行攻击,因为后者没有准备好,因为泰勒将她所有的情感和社交线索都转移到了她的虫子身上,因此看起来比她实际要冷静得多。 [158] 武器大师的测谎仪和切瑞什的能力对她的情感也有部分错误的解读,甚至杰克·斯拉什也会对她产生错误的解读。即使是那些与她亲近的人,有时也很难理解她,甚至是像塔特尔泰尔这样强大的思考者。 [159]
Senses 感官[]
The sensory input from her bugs is "fuzzy" and difficult for humans to interpret.[152][160] She can sporadically hear and see clearly, but the "signal quality" is unreliable.[160]
她的虫子传来的感官输入是“模糊的”,人类很难解读。 [152] [160] 她可以偶尔清晰地听到和看到,但“信号质量”是不可靠的。 [160]
Practicing doesn't seem to produce results.[153] However, over time, Taylor does learn to more reliably hear through her bugs.[160] In her last day as Skitter she was unable to understand a phone message heard with her bugs, but was able to identify it was a recording. She was only able to discern tone of voice at "rare moments".[161] Her ability to interpret sensory data from her insects seems to increase during periods of stress that match the emotions of her Trigger Event: in one such instance, she was able to clearly see and hear everyone in a room and beyond in detail with just a single butterfly, identifying both her dad, the PRT officers, details of their appearance, what room in the house they were in, and what exactly they were saying.[162]
练习似乎没有产生结果。 [153] 然而,随着时间的推移,泰勒确实学会了更可靠地通过她的虫子听到声音。 [160] 在她作为 Skitter 的最后一天,她无法理解通过虫子听到的电话信息,但能够识别出这是一个录音。她只能在“罕见的时刻”辨别出语气。 [161] 她从昆虫那里解读感官数据的能力似乎在与她的触发事件情感相匹配的压力期间增加:在一次这样的情况下,她能够仅凭一只蝴蝶清晰地看到和听到房间内及其外部的每一个人,并详细识别出她的父亲、PRT 官员、他们的外貌细节、他们所在的房间以及他们具体在说什么。 [162]
Based on the combined sensory input of large numbers of insects, Taylor can gain a very clear mental picture of whatever they're interacting with.[152] She can also sense the biology and location[129] of every bug she can control.[163] This gives her enhanced aim[164] and the ability to dodge attacks with supernatural reaction times.[165] However, in environments where bugs are scarce, or when dealing with materials that they don't interact with well, her image of the area can become less reliable.[citation needed]
基于大量昆虫的综合感官输入,Taylor 可以对它们所互动的事物形成非常清晰的心理图像。 [152] 她还可以感知她能控制的每只虫子的生物特性和位置 [129] 。 [163] 这使她具备了增强的瞄准能力 [164] 和以超自然反应时间躲避攻击的能力。 [165] 然而,在昆虫稀少的环境中,或者在处理它们不太能良好互动的材料时,她对该区域的图像可能会变得不那么可靠。 [citation needed]
Taylor also receives some knowledge of her bugs' biology from her power,[166] giving her an understanding of their limits, capabilities and the effects of adaptions such as any venom they have.[167]
泰勒还通过她的能力获得了一些关于她的虫子生物学的知识, [166] 使她理解它们的限制、能力以及适应性变化的影响,例如它们所拥有的任何毒液。 [167]
Range 范围[]
Taylor has a limited range around, above and below her, of about a tenth of a mile,[168] and later about 3-4 city blocks with a block being 300 feet.[169] During periods of stress that are close to the feelings of frustation and hopelessness she felt during her Trigger Event, it would increase, once reaching over six and a half blocks,[162] which also came with her bugs responding faster to her commands[170] and getting better at interpreting their senses, such as when she could clearly see and hear everyone in a room and beyond in detail with just a single butterfly.[162] However, these power boosts are not permanent and will fade as her feelings return to normal, and with it her Range.[171] Nevertheless, her base range did slowly increase over time as she won more conflicts;[172] starting at two blocks radius early on,[173][174] up to three blocks radius when she began to claim territory,[175] and up to a base range of five blocks by the time she surrendered to the PRT, a fact supported by her in-depth Cast profile describing her range as being nine to fifteen hundred feet around her around her time as a warlord,[113]which would extend if she felt 'trapped'.[176] However, sometimes she would get increases in stressful situations even though she didn't feel 'trapped';[162] she later states that her power gets stronger when she feels either 'trapped', 'despair', or 'betrayed'.[177] By the time she fights Behemoth as part of the Chicago Wards in India, she mentions that her range is now a radius of one thousand, eight hundred feet,[178] which is roughly six blocks and makes her full range at the time to be double that at a three thousand, six hundred feet diameter.
泰勒的有效范围大约在她周围的十分之一英里, [168] 后来大约是 3-4 个城市街区,每个街区为 300 英尺。 [169] 在接近她在触发事件中感受到的挫败感和绝望感的压力期间,这个范围会增加,一旦超过六个半街区, [162] 这也使得她的虫子对她的指令反应更快 [170] 并且在解读它们的感官方面变得更好,比如当她能够仅凭一只蝴蝶就清晰地看到和听到房间内及其外部的每一个人。 [162] 然而,这些能力提升并不是永久的,随着她的情绪恢复正常,她的范围也会随之减小。 [171] 尽管如此,随着她赢得更多冲突,她的基础范围确实随着时间的推移而缓慢增加; [172] 早期的有效范围为两个街区半径, [173] [174] 当她开始宣称领土时增加到三个街区半径, [175] 到她向 PRT 投降时达到了五个街区的基础范围,这一事实得到了她的详细角色档案的支持,描述她在作为军阀时的范围为九到十五百英尺, [113] 如果她感到“被困”,这个范围会进一步扩大。 [176] 然而,有时即使她并不感到“被困”,在压力大的情况下她也会获得增强; [162] 她后来表示,当她感到“被困”、“绝望”或“被背叛”时,她的能力会变得更强。 [177] 当她在印度作为芝加哥警卫的一部分与贝希摩斯战斗时,她提到她的范围现在是半径一千八百英尺, [178] 这大约是六个街区,使得她当时的全范围是三千六百英尺直径的两倍。
She had a temporary range boost while in the area-of-effect of The Yàngbǎn's power-magnifying field, increasing her range by several blocks and growing, which she used to contact Phir Sē in his basement. The exact extent of her range increase under the field is not mentioned.[179]
她在 The Yàngbǎn 的增幅场的作用范围内时,获得了暂时的射程提升,射程增加了几个街区并不断增长,她利用这个机会联系了在地下室的 Phir Sē。关于她在该场域下射程增加的确切程度没有提及。
Skills 技能[]
Taylor has come up with a multitude of creative uses of her power. For example, she can produce and manipulate large quantities of spider silk, coat her insects in petroleum jelly and capsaicin to use them like pepper spray, deploy groups of bugs to create humanoid figures,[180][181] mask her movements, and clear out rat infestations. She was able to catch containment foam on glass carried by her bugs and stick it to her attackers.[182] She can disguise or project her voice by having her insects buzz and chirp together.[183] Over a two year period she learned how to read braille so that she could read with her bugs.[184][185]
泰勒想出了多种创造性地使用她的能力。例如,她可以产生和操控大量的蜘蛛丝,用石油胶和辣椒素涂抹她的昆虫,以便像喷雾器一样使用它们,部署一群虫子来创造类人形, [180] [181] 掩盖她的动作,并清除老鼠 infestations。她能够让她的虫子携带的玻璃上粘上封闭泡沫,并将其粘在攻击者身上。 [182] 她可以通过让她的昆虫一起嗡嗡作响和鸣叫来伪装或投射她的声音。 [183] 在两年的时间里,她学会了盲文,以便能够与她的虫子一起阅读。 [184] [185]
She even had some tricks she wasn't consciously aware of learning. For example, she would occasionally use her bugs to cover her while she moved without noticing, making her difficult to track.[186]
她甚至有一些她并没有意识到自己学会的技巧。例如,她偶尔会利用她的虫子在她移动时为她掩护,而她自己却没有注意到,这使得她很难被追踪。 [186]
Taylor had an unusually high pain tolerance, which she blamed on her exposure to a pain-bomb of Bakuda's.[187]
泰勒的痛感耐受力异常高,她将此归因于自己接触过巴库达的痛苦炸弹。
Post-Timeskip, she is an exceptionally accomplished martial artist; her bug-swarm-enhanced senses enable her to react to events faster than a normal human should be able to. She can easily defeat even other experienced parahumans in hand-to-hand combat. The boost to her senses and coordination due to her swarm also allows her exceptional accuracy with firearms. Personality-wise, she is noted to be cold, distant, exceptionally driven, and even ruthless by many characters.[188]
时光跳跃后,她是一位非常出色的武术家;她的虫群增强的感官使她能够比普通人更快地对事件做出反应。她可以轻松击败其他经验丰富的超人类进行徒手搏斗。由于虫群的增强,她的感官和协调能力得到了提升,这也使她在使用火器时具有卓越的准确性。在个性方面,许多角色认为她冷漠、疏远、极具驱动力,甚至是无情的。
Classification 分类[]
Taylor was rated by PRT analysts as a Master 5,[31] which was later upgraded to an 8. A rating of Thinker 1 was officially added when Emily Piggot deduced she could see through her bugs in a limited fashion.[189][190] Piggot suggested that this should be upgraded when Taylor admitted she came up with the plan to raid the PRT to stop Dragon and demonstrated the ability to anticipate incoming attacks through her bugs,[191] but she was still classified as a thinker-one after Piggot had left office.[32]
泰勒被 PRT 分析师评为大师 5 级, [31] 后来升级为 8 级。当艾米莉·皮戈特推断她可以以有限的方式透过她的虫子看到时,官方增加了思考者 1 级的评级。 [189] [190] 皮戈特建议在泰勒承认她想出了突袭 PRT 以阻止龙的计划并展示了通过她的虫子预测来袭攻击的能力时,应该将其升级为更高等级, [191] 但在皮戈特离任后,她仍被归类为思考者 1 级。 [32]
Later Director Tagg ordered for her to be treated as a Master 10, Thinker 3 with an additional rating of 2 in every other category; in order to make sure his soldiers didn't underestimate her[32] and to authorize additional means of containing her.[192]
后来,塔格主任下令将她视为大师 10 级,思考者 3 级,并在其他每个类别中额外评定为 2;以确保他的士兵不会低估她 [32] ,并授权额外的手段来控制她。 [192]
Taylor's trigger event, which involved both an environmental stressor and a thinker stressor, led her primarily Master power to have Thinker and Shaker overtones.[193]
泰勒的触发事件涉及环境压力和思维压力,导致她的主要主控能力具有思维者和震动者的色彩。 [193]
Khepri[]
In order to combat the end of the world during the Gold Morning, Taylor gave Panacea instruction and permission to remove the safety restrictions and regulations on her power through the Corona Pollentia and Gemma. The result of this was later known as "Khepri". Taylor's range became significantly reduced to a radius of three hundred feet,[194] making her diameter double that at six hundred, which she could extend through the use of her relay bugs.[195] While her control over insects was still present, and she could still sense their presence and have them react to her subconscious thoughts, this control was reduced in precision to an unknown extent, her bugs using more swarm tactics than her usual calculating attacks, nor could she communicate through her bugs. Furthermore, her size limit has increased, as she comments on there were bugs in her former swarm that are now too small for her to control.[196]
为了在黄金早晨对抗世界末日,泰勒给了潘西亚指示和许可,通过 Corona Pollentia 和 Gemma 去除她能力上的安全限制和规定。这个结果后来被称为“Khepri”。泰勒的范围显著缩小到三百英尺的半径, [194] 使她的直径增加到六百英尺,她可以通过使用她的中继虫来扩展这个范围。 [195] 尽管她对昆虫的控制仍然存在,她仍然可以感知它们的存在并让它们对她的潜意识思想作出反应,但这种控制的精确度在未知程度上降低了,她的虫子使用更多的群体战术而不是她通常的计算攻击,也无法通过她的虫子进行沟通。此外,她的大小限制增加了,因为她评论说她以前的虫群中有些虫子现在太小而无法控制。 [196]
To contrast this, Taylor gained a crude control of nearly every sapient and sentient creature that enters within nearly sixteen feet (fifteen point nine-eight feet to be precise)[196] making her full range a diameter of nearly thirty-two feet. This most notably includes parahumans and, subsequently, humans,[197] as well as a focused sense and awareness of their bodies. This range cannot be increased through periods of stress mirroring her original trigger event, as her Corona no longer connects to the parts of her brain related to emotions or similar concepts. She also slowly began to lose control and awareness of her own body, unable to communicate directly, move as fast or as well as she used to, only able to focus and perform one bodily function like breathing at a time, and losing touch with reality. Her Shard was able to to obtain some control over her body, emotions and thoughts, and would perform actions without her conscious or reflective command in an effort to help her, trying to learn how the two can work together. All of which grew worse as time went on and the barrier between Taylor and her Shard became thinner and blurred, losing understanding of what people were saying and interpreting all actions as conflict to fight.[196]
为了对比,泰勒获得了对几乎所有进入她近十六英尺(准确来说是十五点九八英尺)范围内的智慧和有知觉生物的粗略控制 [196] ,使她的控制范围直径几乎达到三十二英尺。这最显著地包括超人类,随后是人类 [197] ,以及对它们身体的专注感知和意识。这个范围无法通过与她最初触发事件相似的压力期来增加,因为她的 Corona 不再与大脑中与情感或类似概念相关的部分连接。她也开始慢慢失去对自己身体的控制和意识,无法直接沟通,无法像以前那样快速或有效地移动,只能专注于执行一个身体功能,比如一次只进行呼吸,并逐渐失去对现实的触感。她的 Shard 能够对她的身体、情感和思想获得一些控制,并会在没有她的意识或反思指令的情况下执行动作,以帮助她,试图学习两者如何协同工作。 随着时间的推移,泰勒与她的碎片之间的障碍变得越来越薄,变得模糊不清,失去了对人们所说话语的理解,将所有的行为都解读为冲突来进行战斗。 [196]
This control is not automatic, and Taylor, in brief periods of lucidity, can choose not to control someone in her range. People who are in her control are capable of feeling emotion, perform steady breathing, feeling tense and perform slight, subconscious usage of their powers like Lung; all of which Taylor is capable of sensing, along with sensing other inner workings like their well-being, where a person was sore, how fit they were, and most importantly how their parahuman powers works. Taylor can also co-opt their senses like she did with her bugs, allowing her, for example, to see and hear through multiple people. However, the people are completely unable to move despite their feelings and attempts as they are, in Taylor's words, "Waiting for instructions". Any control that Taylor does exert on them is crude, but a bit more fluid than her control over her own body at that point, allowing Taylor to give them somewhat more precise commands. This ability also causes Taylor and those she controls to suffer shared experiences; feelings felt by one bringing up different memories from each person that are associated with those emotions, and those memories being exchanged between them and Taylor, as those she controls become an extension of herself. Control and senses over their parahuman powers is more precise and efficient, though Taylor remarks in the case of Bitch that controlling her would not give her any special knowledge of Bitch's whistles or commands, or her instinctive understanding of the dogs.[196]
这种控制不是自动的,泰勒在短暂的清醒时刻可以选择不控制她范围内的人。处于她控制下的人能够感受到情感,进行稳定的呼吸,感到紧张,并进行轻微的、潜意识的能力使用,比如龙;所有这些泰勒都能感知到,以及其他内在运作,比如他们的健康状况、身体的酸痛、身体的适应性,以及最重要的,他们的超人能力是如何运作的。泰勒还可以像对待她的虫子一样利用他们的感官,例如让她通过多个人的视角和听觉来感知。然而,尽管他们有感觉和尝试,他们完全无法移动,因为在泰勒看来,他们是在“等待指示”。泰勒对他们施加的任何控制都是粗糙的,但比她对自己身体的控制要流畅一些,使得泰勒能够给他们下达稍微更精确的命令。 这种能力还使得泰勒和她控制的人经历共享的体验;一个人感受到的情感会唤起与这些情感相关的每个人的不同记忆,这些记忆在他们和泰勒之间交换,因为她控制的人成为了她自身的延伸。对他们的超人能力的控制和感知更加精确和高效,尽管泰勒在谈到比奇时指出,控制她并不会让她获得关于比奇的口哨或命令的任何特殊知识,也不会让她对狗的本能理解有所提升。 [196]
Taking command of Doormaker and Clairvoyant, Taylor was able to round up and control roughly five thousand two hundred Parahumans and over ten quadrillion insects from dozens of different Earths to combat Zion, using the latter to find parahumans and insects, and to keep track of the battle across alternative Earths, and the former to open portals within her range to other parahumans so that she can control them. Taylor comments that, had she the time, she could control over ten quintillion bugs; the total number of insects on the entirety of Earth.[195] With these she coordinated the fight with Zion while launching a number of psychological attacks against him, taunting Zion with his dead partner, and sequestering a vast number of Tinkers away to construct a form of tinkertech interdimensional battering ram to kill The Warrior's main body when his avatar was destroyed and a portal was opened to it.
掌控了 Doormaker 和 Clairvoyant 后,Taylor 能够从数十个不同的地球中召集和控制大约五千二百名超人类和超过十万亿只昆虫来对抗 Zion,利用后者寻找超人类和昆虫,并跟踪不同地球之间的战斗,前者则在她的范围内为其他超人类打开传送门,以便她可以控制他们。Taylor 评论道,如果她有时间,她可以控制超过十千万亿只虫子;这是整个地球上昆虫的总数。 [195] 有了这些,她协调了与 Zion 的战斗,同时对他发起了一系列心理攻击,嘲讽 Zion 与他已故的伙伴,并将大量的 Tinkers 隔离开来,构建一种 tinkertech 跨维度攻城锤,以在他的化身被摧毁并打开传送门时杀死战士的本体。
Though a full list of creatures Taylor can now control is unknown, there are a number of beings she cannot that is known. She could not control Zion or the Endbringers, nor the Three Blasphemies. She seemed to be unable to control Imp or Dragon for unstated reasons. She was temporarily able to control Glaistig Uaine, but she was able to escape Taylor's control by swapping the control on her over to one of her ghost projections. Finally, she did not control the Sleeper, though this was not due to an inability to control him but rather because doing so would be more troublesome than it was worth.
虽然目前尚不清楚泰勒可以控制的生物的完整列表,但已知有一些生物她无法控制。她无法控制齐昂或终结者,也无法控制三大亵渎者。出于未说明的原因,她似乎无法控制小丑或龙。她曾暂时能够控制格莱斯蒂格·乌安,但她通过将控制权转移到她的一个幽灵投影上逃脱了泰勒的控制。最后,她并没有控制沉睡者,这并不是因为无法控制他,而是因为这样做会比值得的麻烦更多。
Had Jack Slash been active at the time, his secondary power would be better at sabotaging her compared with the typical parahuman.[198]
如果杰克·斯拉什在那个时候活跃,他的辅助能力在破坏她方面会比典型的超人更有效。
Shard 碎片[]
Taylor's powers are the result of receiving a crippled Administrator shard from Scion. In its non-crippled form, Scion uses the Administrator to coordinate and control his shards such as deciding their configurations before handing them out.[199] Unlike Eidolon's shard (i.e., Eden's counterpart shard to the Administrator) which can administrate shards,[200] Scion intentionally cripples Taylor's shard before handing it out and even largely destroys it to completely prevent its host from using it in this fashion during the Cycle.[199]
泰勒的能力是因为从斯凯恩那里获得了一个受损的管理员碎片。在其未受损的形态中,斯凯恩使用管理员来协调和控制他的碎片,例如在分发之前决定它们的配置。 [199] 与艾多伦的碎片(即伊甸的管理员对应碎片)不同,艾多伦的碎片可以管理碎片, [200] 斯凯恩故意在分发之前使泰勒的碎片受损,甚至大幅摧毁它,以完全防止其宿主在循环期间以这种方式使用它。 [199]
After being limited, the Administrator shard explicitly specializes in coordinating control over large numbers of smaller lifeforms.[201] Thus, the powers that it hands out will generally have some Master element of controlling many minions.[202]
在被限制后,Administrator shard 明确专注于协调对大量小型生命形式的控制。 [201] 因此,它所授予的能力通常会包含一些控制众多小兵的 Master 元素。 [202]
Like Taylor, the Administrator shard has a drive for control:[203][204] it desires to dominate all Earths and control everyone completely,[205] including Taylor.[206] Similar to the typical shard,[207] the Administrator shard follows a set goal[208] and is intrinsically conflict-oriented:[209] it typically frames situations in context of violence.[210][211] As a result, Taylor losing herself à la Khepri and giving the Administrator more control over her actions is not a good thing.[212] After Scion's death, Taylor's shard agrees to release its remaining thralls because it realizes that acquiescing here would give it more control over Taylor and grind away at Taylor's sense of self.[204] Indeed, had Contessa done nothing to Khepri or someone else (e.g., Defiant) had the final conversation with Khepri and then that individual failed to, as an example, kill/place Taylor in a coma, Taylor would have fully lost control: the Administrator would completely subsume Taylor's mind and then resume its plan to put everyone under its thrall.[213]
像泰勒一样,管理员碎片有一种控制欲: [203] [204] 它渴望主宰所有地球并完全控制每个人,包括泰勒。 [205] 与典型的碎片类似, [206] 管理员碎片遵循一个既定目标 [207] ,并且本质上是以冲突为导向的: [208] 它通常将情况框定在暴力的背景下。 [209] [210] 因此,泰勒像凯普里那样失去自我,并让管理员对她的行为有更多控制并不是一件好事。 [211] 在斯科恩死后,泰勒的碎片同意释放其剩余的奴仆,因为它意识到在这里妥协会让它对泰勒有更多的控制,并侵蚀泰勒的自我感。 [212] 确实,如果康特萨对凯普里没有做任何事情,或者其他人(例如,反抗者)与凯普里进行了最后的对话,然后那个人未能,例如,杀死/让泰勒昏迷,泰勒将完全失去控制:管理员将完全吞噬泰勒的思想,然后恢复其让每个人都成为其奴仆的计划。 [204]
Scion refers to Taylor's shard as Queen[199] or the administrator shard.[25] Contessa similarly calls this shard the administrator.[206] Glaistig Uaine refers to Taylor's shard as queen administrator.[24] She also claims that this shard was on par with her shard as a noble along with other shards such as those possessed by Amy and Eidolon.[26][214]
Scion 将 Taylor 的碎片称为女王 [199] 或管理员碎片。 [25] Contessa 同样称这个碎片为管理员。 [206] Glaistig Uaine 将 Taylor 的碎片称为女王管理员。 [24] 她还声称这个碎片与她的碎片在贵族层面上不相上下,以及其他碎片,如 Amy 和 Eidolon 所拥有的碎片。 [26] [214]
Chevalier sees Taylor's power as a bright glowing membrane or network of cells surrounding her person, with an uncountable number of tendrils extending out. These tendrils were only made distinct by highlights rushing down them as she gave conscious direction to her bugs.[215]
切瓦利耶将泰勒的能力视为一个明亮发光的膜或细胞网络,环绕在她的身边,数不胜数的触须向外延伸。这些触须只有在她有意识地指挥她的虫子时,沿着它们流动的高光才显得明显。
History 历史[]
Background 背景[]
Taylor Anne Hebert was born in June 1995, arguably on the 12th[216] (i.e., a week before the 19th[217]) or the 11th (i.e., about a week before the 19th and the date Worm began).[218]
泰勒·安·赫伯特于 1995 年 6 月出生,可能是在 12 日 [216] (即在 19 日 [217] 前一周)或 11 日(即在 19 日和《虫子》开始的日期前大约一周)。 [218]
Growing up, Taylor's parents showed concern for her safety. They warned her to stay on the Boardwalk and avoided the bad part of town, a command she scrupulously obeyed.[108]
在成长过程中,泰勒的父母对她的安全表示担忧。他们警告她要待在木栈道上,避免去城里的坏地方,她严格遵守了这个命令。 [108]
When she was around five or six, she saw a meth addict freak out on the bus, making enough of a ruckus that the driver had to stop and force him off. This fright permanently affected her.[49]
当她大约五或六岁时,她在公交车上看到一个吸毒者发狂,闹得司机不得不停下来把他赶下车。这次惊吓对她产生了永久的影响。 [49]
Her mother, Annette Rose Hebert, died in a car crash later attributed to texting while driving. As a result of the incident, Taylor becomes closed off and rigid. Her previously strong friendship with Emma Barnes became strained due to this change, but it still served as an emotional pillar.
她的母亲,安妮特·罗斯·赫伯特,在一次后被归因于开车时发短信的车祸中去世。由于这一事件,泰勒变得封闭和僵硬。她与艾玛·巴恩斯之前强烈的友谊因这一变化而变得紧张,但仍然作为情感支柱。
A year and a half before the story begins, just before they enter high school,[43] Emma unexpectedly abandoned Taylor to befriend Sophia Hess and later Madison Clements. The Trio then began aggressively bullying Taylor, including one event in early January[219] that causes Taylor to trigger. They send her vicious e-mails, upend trash over her desk, and steal her mother's flute from her locker.[43] Others join in, ‘accidentally’ skipping her when passing out assignments and adding their own voices to the taunts and emails.Taylor begins lying low in the bathrooms during lunch and comes to view it as "refuge ... a place I could retreat to, a place where I was off their radar".[43]
在故事开始前一年半,正当她们即将进入高中时, [43] 艾玛意外地抛弃了泰勒,去结交索非亚·赫斯和后来麦迪逊·克莱门茨。三人组随后开始对泰勒进行激烈的欺凌,包括在一月初发生的一起事件 [219] ,导致泰勒触发了能力。她们给她发送恶毒的电子邮件,把垃圾倒在她的桌子上,并从她的储物柜里偷走了她母亲的长笛。 [43] 其他人也加入其中,在分发作业时“意外”跳过她,并在嘲讽和电子邮件中添加自己的声音。泰勒开始在午餐时躲在洗手间里,并将其视为“避难所……一个我可以退避的地方,一个我不在她们雷达上的地方”。 [43]
In January 2011, she arrived back at school to find her locker had been filled with used pads and tampons, and then someone shoved her inside. She triggered after enough time had passed to realise no one who'd seen what happened was trying to help,[220] and was freed from the locker by or before the end of first period.[221] While she recovered in hospital she was visited by the PRT in case she had triggered. She was overwhelmed by the sensory input of her power and didn't notice.[222] Her near catatonic state kept them from drawing any conclusions.
在 2011 年 1 月,她回到学校时发现她的储物柜里塞满了用过的卫生巾和棉条,然后有人把她推了进去。经过一段时间,她意识到没有人试图帮助她,于是触发了能力,并在第一节课结束前被解救出储物柜。她在医院恢复期间,PRT 来探望她,以防她已经触发。她被自己能力的感官输入压倒,没注意到。她近乎昏迷的状态让他们无法得出任何结论。
Three months before the story begins -- once Taylor recovered from her trigger event -- she started to prepare herself to become a hero.[47] She exercised, honed her abilities, doing research and preparing her costume. Her training schedule consisted of running every morning and every other afternoon.[108] She resisted using her power in school for three months, restricting it to a faint buzzing sound at the edge of her consciousness.[43] She conducted practice sessions, "far from prying eyes", to determine the extent of her power.[43]
故事开始前三个月——在泰勒从她的触发事件中恢复过来后——她开始为成为一名英雄做准备。 [47] 她锻炼身体,磨练自己的能力,进行研究并准备她的服装。她的训练计划包括每天早晨和每隔一个下午跑步。 [108] 她在学校抵制使用自己的能力长达三个月,仅限于在意识边缘发出微弱的嗡嗡声。 [43] 她进行了“远离窥探者”的练习,以确定自己能力的范围。 [43]
At some point, her backpack was stolen from her locker by the Trio and stuffed in a trash can. She bought a new one for twelve bucks. This incident alerted her to the risk of someone reading her notes, and she rewrote them in code. Around the same time, she began hiding equipment for her superheroics in a boarded-up coal chute in her basement.[47]
在某个时候,她的背包被三人组从她的储物柜里偷走并塞进了垃圾桶。她花了十二美元买了一个新的。这起事件让她意识到有人可能会阅读她的笔记的风险,于是她用代码重写了它们。大约在同一时间,她开始在她地下室一个封闭的煤斗里藏匿她的超级英雄装备。 [47]
Story Start 故事开始[]
On April 8th, 2011,[219] Taylor was discovered in the School bathroom, ruining her hiding place. The Trio drenches her clothes and bag in juice. She then throws her bag against the wall in anger, her midterm project -- due that day -- is destroyed. She finally lets her defenses drop and is automatically swarmed with bugs responding to her emotional distress, but she resists killing the trio.[43]
2011 年 4 月 8 日, [219] 泰勒在学校的洗手间被发现,藏身之处被破坏。三人组把她的衣服和包浸泡在果汁中。她愤怒地把包扔向墙壁,她的期中项目——当天到期——被毁了。她最终放下了防备,自动被回应她情绪困扰的虫子包围,但她抵制了杀死三人组的冲动。 [43]
At home, Taylor discovers the juice also ruined many of the contents of her bag, including notes on her eventual superhero career. This event pushes Taylor to stop putting off the start of said career.[47] That weekend Taylor completes her costume and on Sunday night goes out in costume for the first time, crossing into the "bad part of town" just after midnight.[108]
在家里,泰勒发现果汁还毁坏了她包里许多物品,包括她未来超级英雄生涯的笔记。这一事件促使泰勒停止拖延,开始她的职业生涯。 [47] 那个周末,泰勒完成了她的服装,周日晚上第一次穿着服装出门,刚过午夜就进入了“城里坏地方”。 [108]
On that first night out, Taylor notices a group of ABB members, including Lung (who she recognizes immediately from the news and online). She hears them discussing killing "children".[108] She fights Lung alongside the Undersiders.
在第一次外出时,泰勒注意到一群 ABB 成员,包括隆(她立即从新闻和网上认出他)。她听到他们讨论杀死“孩子”。 [108] 她与地下者一起与隆战斗。
Having been seemingly mistaken for a villain, Taylor joined the Undersiders, intending to gather information as a mole. She helped them rob a bank and attack a fundraiser, embarrassing the heroes.
由于被误认为是反派,泰勒加入了 Undersiders,打算作为内奸收集信息。她帮助他们抢劫了一家银行并袭击了一场筹款活动,让英雄们感到尴尬。
She was concussed when the ABB ambushed them. Bakuda launched a wave of bombing against the city to free Lung, forcing the other villains to unite against her. Skitter personally defeated Lung after he defeated Kaiser, Fenja, Menja, Bitch and Sundancer.
她在 ABB 伏击他们时受了脑震荡。巴库达对城市发起了一波轰炸,以解救龙,迫使其他恶棍联合起来对抗她。斯基特在龙击败凯撒、芬雅、门雅、比奇和日舞后亲自击败了龙。
She fought the Endbringer Leviathan when he attacked Brockton Bay, helping to track his location and rescue wounded until her communicator was fried. She was nearby when Armsmaster duelled the monster and picked up his Halberd when he fell, using it to wound the monster and help other heroes clear rubble.
她在末日使者利维坦攻击布罗克顿湾时与其作斗争,帮助追踪他的位置信息并救助伤员,直到她的通讯器被烧坏。她在武器大师与怪物决斗时就在附近,并在他倒下时捡起了他的戟,用它来伤害怪物并帮助其他英雄清理瓦砾。
Post-Leviathan 后-利维坦[]
Taylor discovered that the hero Shadow Stalker was in fact Sophia Hess, one of the girls who had tormented her. In the ensuing conversation, Armsmaster was revealed by Tattletale to have fried her armband in order to prevent her giving away the beast's location to other heroes, which would have prevented him duelling it one-on-one. In revenge, he revealed Taylor's status as a mole to the Undersiders.[223]
泰勒发现英雄影子追踪者实际上是索非亚·赫斯,她是曾经折磨过她的女孩之一。在随后的对话中,Tattletale 揭示了武器大师为了防止她将野兽的位置泄露给其他英雄而烧毁了她的臂章,这本来会阻止他与野兽进行一对一的决斗。作为报复,他向地下者揭露了泰勒作为内奸的身份。
Nevertheless, she rejoined the Undersiders, disillusioned with the heroes. She agreed to Coil's plan to take over the city, claiming a territory. There she fought the Slaughterhouse Nine.
然而,她重新加入了 Undersiders,对英雄们感到失望。她同意了 Coil 的计划,接管城市,声称一个领土。在那里,她与 Slaughterhouse Nine 作战。
Post-Slaughterhouse Nine
屠宰场九之后[]
Spearheaded winning strategies against Dragon's suits.
主导了对抗龙的战斗服的获胜策略。
On June 19th, Coil completed his takeover of the city by faking his death and discrediting Emily Piggot. He claimed he was going to release Dinah Alcott, as agreed, but instead attacked Skitter. After the Undersiders defeated Coil, Taylor killed him.[224]
在 6 月 19 日,Coil 通过假死和抹黑 Emily Piggot 完成了对城市的接管。他声称将按照约定释放 Dinah Alcott,但实际上却袭击了 Skitter。在 Undersiders 击败 Coil 后,Taylor 杀了他。 [224]
Post-Echidna 后-刺猬[]
Taylor felt increasing pressure from the authorities, who revealed her secret identity to the public during a confrontation at Arcadia, in which Dragon publicly outed her in a cafeteria with hundreds of her classmates and some faculty present. Though she revealed no secrets, she managed to sow distrust in the Protectorate by indicating her knowledge. Taylor's already-shaky confidence took a blow when Dragon revealed that Dinah Alcott had helped the PRT by determining that the odds of them capturing Taylor was 96.8 percent, high enough for the PRT and Protectorate to willfully violate the Unwritten Rules. Though hurt by this, Taylor didn't waver, and managed to leverage the heroic actions she had done to convince over a hundred students to help her successfully escape the Protectorate. Within the safety of her own territories, Taylor continued to operate in Brockton Bay alongside the Undersiders.
泰勒感受到来自当局的越来越大压力,他们在阿卡迪亚的一次对峙中向公众揭露了她的秘密身份,龙在一个有数百名同学和一些教职员工在场的自助餐厅里公开揭露了她。尽管她没有透露任何秘密,但她通过暗示自己的知识成功地在保护者中播下了不信任的种子。当龙透露迪娜·阿尔科特通过确定他们抓住泰勒的几率为 96.8%来帮助 PRT 时,泰勒原本就不稳的自信心受到了打击,这个几率足够高,使得 PRT 和保护者可以故意违反不成文规则。尽管受到伤害,泰勒并没有动摇,成功利用自己所做的英雄行为说服了超过一百名学生帮助她成功逃离保护者。在自己领地的安全之内,泰勒继续与地下者一起在布罗克顿湾活动。
After learning that Dinah predicted the world's survivability was dependent on Skitter surrendering to the Protectorate, Taylor attempts to manage a conditional surrender to the PRT in the hopes of bringing about reforms that'll better their odds. This initially fails, but after she eliminates the PRT's local and national leadership by killing Tagg and Alexandria, with the details of their demises subsequently fabricated, she was proclaimed a hero, and is rebranded as "Weaver".[225]
在得知迪娜预测世界的生存能力取决于斯基特投降给保护者后,泰勒试图向 PRT 进行有条件的投降,希望能带来改善他们生存几率的改革。这最初失败了,但在她通过杀死塔格和亚历山德里亚消灭了 PRT 的地方和国家领导层后,随后伪造了他们死亡的细节,她被宣称为英雄,并重新命名为“Weaver”。
Taylor is then charged as an adult due to the amount and severity of her crimes. PRT requests for leniency during the trial result in her being sentenced to probationary membership in the Chicago Wards, along with imprisonment in a medium security facility when off-duty. When introduced to the Wards, Taylor begins to chafe under the restrictions imposed on her, being limited to PR campaigns and a limited range of non-venomous insects when engaging in any serious operations, in addition to the wariness and mistrust in her by her teammates.
泰勒因此被作为成年人起诉,因其罪行的数量和严重性。PRT 在审判期间请求宽大处理,结果她被判处在芝加哥警卫队的试用会员资格,同时在非值班时被监禁在一个中等安全级别的设施中。当被引入警卫队时,泰勒开始对施加在她身上的限制感到不满,她在进行任何严肃行动时被限制只能进行公关活动和使用有限范围的非毒性昆虫,此外,她的队友们对她也充满了警惕和不信任。
Took part in the battle against Behemoth in New Delhi.
参与了在新德里对抗 Behemoth 的战斗。
The Timeskip 时间跳跃[]
Taylor spends the timeskip as a member of the Chicago Wards, participating in many Endbringer fights. She helped her team expand their operations into neighboring cities.
泰勒在时间跳跃期间作为芝加哥警卫队的一员,参与了许多终结者的战斗。她帮助她的团队将业务扩展到邻近城市。
Together with Golem, they studied and trained relentlessly in preparation for the end of the world and Jack Slash's challenge.
他们与 Golem 一起不懈地学习和训练,为世界末日和 Jack Slash 的挑战做准备。
She participated in the fight against the Slaughterhouse 9000.
她参与了对抗屠宰场 9000 的战斗。
Gold Morning 金色早晨[]
Taylor was mortally wounded during the Oil-rig battle and, after being healed by Panacea, spent two to three days unconscious.[226] Was present for the interrogation of Saint shortly after waking up. Going off of what Dinah told Taylor about what she saw in her vision of the end of the world, she and the Undersiders collected company and went to convince the Endbringers to help humanity in the fight against Scion.
泰勒在油井战斗中重伤,经过潘西娅的治疗后昏迷了两到三天。 [226] 醒来后参加了对圣人的审讯。根据迪娜告诉泰勒的关于她在世界末日的异象中看到的内容,她和地下者们聚集在一起,去说服终结者帮助人类对抗斯凯恩。
Attended the cape meeting in the ruins of Agnes Court's settlement.
参加了在阿格尼丝·库特(Agnes Court)定居点废墟中的斗篷会议。
Got irrationally annoyed when the Simurgh, who was following the Undersiders, was tethered to Tattletale instead of herself.[227]
当追踪 Undersiders 的 Simurgh 被绑在 Tattletale 身上而不是她自己时,她感到不理智地恼火。
Spent an hour saying last goodbyes to Charlotte, Forrest, Glenn Chambers and Quinn Calle.
花了一个小时向夏洛特、福雷斯特、格伦·钱伯斯和奎因·卡尔告别。
Was reminded of Dinah's second message by the Simurgh when she visited Tattletale.
在 Simurgh 访问 Tattletale 时,想起了 Dinah 的第二条消息。
When Doormaker was incapacitated she led a strike team to investigate the Cauldron Compound, and to find a viable weapon or a solution against Scion. She and her strike team killed a significant amount if not most of the Irregulars's leadership, including Mantellum.[228][229] She made her team taunt Scion with his partner's corpse before dropping the entire Cauldron compound on his head.
当门制造者失去行动能力时,她带领一支突击队调查了锅炉房,并寻找对抗 Scion 的可行武器或解决方案。她和她的突击队杀死了相当数量的,甚至可能是大部分不规则者的领导层,包括 Mantellum。 [228] [229] 她让她的团队用他伙伴的尸体嘲弄 Scion,然后将整个锅炉房砸在他的头上。
After having successfully exfiltrated what remained of the Cauldron compound together with her team and the surviving Cauldron personnel, and with no clear-cut solution in sight, she asked Panacea to modify her Corona Pollentia as a move of desperation. The expression of her power changed drastically, gaining the ability to control nearly any living being in a short radius around her, at the cost of most of her control over her body, written text, speech, and a stark reduction in the range and precision of the control of her bugs.
在成功与她的团队和幸存的 Cauldron 人员一起撤离了 Cauldron 基地剩余部分后,面对没有明确解决方案的局面,她请求 Panacea 修改她的 Corona Pollentia,作为一种绝望的举动。她的能力表现发生了剧烈变化,获得了在她周围短距离内控制几乎任何生物的能力,但代价是她对自己身体的控制大幅下降,书面文字、言语的能力也受到影响,同时她对虫子的控制范围和精确度显著降低。
An attempt was made to seal Khepri in a cave far away from the fighting, but was met with failure as she figured out her newfound powers. After her escape, she started experimenting, trying to figure out the powers of the people she could control. She talked with Glaistig Uaine, who pressed her on the importance of Anchors: People and places that she would need to remember lest she risked irrevocably losing herself to her power.
有人试图将 Khepri 封印在远离战斗的洞穴中,但由于她发现了自己新获得的力量而失败。在逃脱后,她开始进行实验,试图弄清楚她能够控制的人的能力。她与 Glaistig Uaine 交谈,后者强调了 Anchors 的重要性:她需要记住的人和地方,以免她冒着不可逆转地失去自我的风险。
After connecting herself to the Clairvoyant and Doormaker, she breached the world the C.U.I was hiding in with the aid of Teacher's tinkertech to control the Yangban. With her mental state deteriorating, she fought Dragon over the remaining Birdcage prisoners, and again after she faked her death. She momentarily lost control over her army when Dragon deployed a drone that scrambled Doormaker's portals.
在将自己连接到 Clairvoyant 和 Doormaker 后,她借助 Teacher 的科技突破了 C.U.I 隐藏的世界,以控制 Yangban。随着她的精神状态恶化,她与 Dragon 争夺剩余的 Birdcage 囚犯,并在她假装死亡后再次交手。当 Dragon 部署了一架干扰 Doormaker 传送门的无人机时,她暂时失去了对她军队的控制。
Free of hazards and enemies that could stop her, she finished building her army, pulling capes from all around the world and even different ones with her to fight Scion. She had long since stopped being able to comprehend languages, and she started forgetting the identities and faces of the people she knew, losing her anchors one-by-one.
没有任何危险和敌人能够阻止她,她完成了自己的军队,从世界各地招募了超能力者,甚至带着不同的超能力者与斯凯恩作战。她早已无法理解语言,开始忘记她所认识的人的身份和面孔,一个个失去了她的依靠。
She tried one strategy after the other on Scion, temporarily trapping him in a world using one of Teacher's devices. She used the bought time to re-organize her army, to hit him with a constant variety of different powers to deny him adapting to any one of them.
她对 Scion 尝试了一种又一种策略,暂时将他困在一个使用 Teacher 的设备的世界里。她利用这段时间重新组织她的军队,以不断变化的不同能力攻击他,阻止他适应其中任何一种能力。
Thanks to her omniscience and support from dozens of Thinkers in her thrall, she could react to Scion's attack near instantaneously. As a result, casualties were relatively light. She had to switch gears and use Canary's power to induce calmness into her army after Moord Nag got a stroke. Her control didn't extend to the mind, and everyone started to succumb to the stress.
由于她的全知和数十名被她控制的思考者的支持,她能够几乎瞬间对 Scion 的攻击做出反应。因此,伤亡相对较轻。在 Moord Nag 中风后,她不得不转换思路,利用 Canary 的能力让她的军队平静下来。她的控制并不延伸到心智,所有人开始屈服于压力。
Meanwhile a massive tinker project, a collaborative effort of hundreds of tinkers whose powers had been distributed among themselves by Null, was built and finished by Khepri's subconscious. It was meant to break through the dimensional barrier hiding Scion's true body. It didn't succeed.
与此同时,一个庞大的修补项目,由数百名修补者共同努力,力量被 Null 分配给他们,由 Khepri 的潜意识建造并完成。它旨在突破隐藏 Scion 真实身体的维度屏障。它没有成功。
Scion, using his own path-to-victory power, started going after her specifically. Despite linking up every precog with Null's power, partially circumventing his precog immunity, Khepri didn't succeed in throwing him off her tail. In a last ditch effort, she had Foil and Ballistic use their powers on a rock, and observed how Scion broke off his pursuit to dodge the projectile. She theorized that Scion had fail safes and contingency measures in place that would override his existing path should he be placed in a situation where he could be threatened.
斯凯恩利用他自己的胜利之路能力,开始专门追捕她。尽管将每个预知者与虚无的力量连接起来,部分规避了他的预知免疫,凯普里仍未能成功摆脱他的追踪。在最后的努力中,她让 Foil 和 Ballistic 对一块石头使用他们的能力,并观察斯凯恩如何中断追击以躲避投射物。她推测斯凯恩有安全措施和应急措施,可以在他面临威胁的情况下覆盖他现有的路径。
Keeping him busy with capes tough enough to withstand him, she organized the Tinkers to rebuild their dimensional breach device into a weapon.
她让他忙于对付足够强大的披风,同时组织了 Tinkers 将他们的维度裂缝装置重建为武器。
After observing an artificial construct resembling Scion's partner and his emotional reaction to it, Khepri figured out Scion's weak point. With an actual plan in hand, she started sending every cape under her control to New York. Unfortunately, she had used Doormaker's shard to such extent it had run out of power, closing every portal she had created. She lost control of most of her army beyond her personal range.
在观察到一个类似于 Scion 的伙伴的人工构造及其情感反应后,Khepri 找到了 Scion 的弱点。手中有了实际的计划,她开始将她控制下的每个 cape 派往纽约。不幸的是,她已经使用了 Doormaker 的碎片,导致其耗尽了能量,关闭了她所创造的每一个传送门。她失去了对大部分军队的控制,超出了她个人的范围。
Khepri's mental state deteriorated rapidly from this point onward, but retained enough awareness to notice her brain swelling and changing.[230] Regardless, after instilling confidence into the battlefield with Canary, relayed through every available phone, she started building up an army consisting of Changers and Shakers with the help of Labyrinth's and Scrub's powers. She recreated parts of the partner's body and their face, which Scion would prioritize destroying before fighting.
Khepri 的心理状态从这一点开始迅速恶化,但仍然保持足够的意识来注意到她的大脑肿胀和变化。 [230] 尽管如此,在与 Canary 一起在战场上注入信心后,通过每部可用的电话传递,她开始在 Labyrinth 和 Scrub 的力量帮助下建立一个由 Changers 和 Shakers 组成的军队。她重建了伙伴的身体和面部的一部分,而 Scion 会优先摧毁这些部分,然后再进行战斗。
After repeated taunting by both Khepri and others who had started copying what she was doing, Scion released an indiscriminate destructive blast. She offered her friends, whom she could barely name at this point, a way out which they declined. Glaistig Uiane, with Doormaker's shade, opened up portals to evacuate everyone but Khepri, leaving her alone. Khepri survived by making her own portals with Labyrinth and Scrub, using Narwhal's forcefields to propel them out of range.
在 Khepri 和其他开始模仿她所做的事情的人反复嘲弄后,Scion 释放了一次无差别的毁灭性爆炸。她给她几乎无法称呼的朋友们提供了一条出路,但他们拒绝了。Glaistig Uiane 与 Doormaker 的阴影一起,打开了传送门,疏散了除了 Khepri 以外的所有人,留下了她一个人。Khepri 通过使用 Labyrinth 和 Scrub 制作自己的传送门,利用 Narwhal 的力场将它们推进到安全范围之外,从而幸存下来。
In the immediate aftermath, Khepri created a portal right next to Glaistig Uiane, taking temporary control over her and Doormaker's shade. She delivered the killing blow to Scion by opening a portal between him and Oliver, whose power made him resemble his dead partner, making him feel a brief moment of hope before it faded away. He didn't resist Foil's arrows tearing into him and, in perfect synchronization, the tinkertech interdimensional gun that destroyed his true body.
在紧接着的事后,Khepri 在 Glaistig Uiane 旁边创造了一个传送门,暂时控制了她和 Doormaker 的阴影。她通过在 Scion 和 Oliver 之间打开一个传送门,给予了致命一击,Oliver 的力量让他看起来像他已故的伙伴,让他感受到一瞬间的希望,随后又消失了。他没有抵抗 Foil 的箭矢刺入他体内,完美同步的是摧毁他真实身体的跨维度科技枪。
Almost immediately after, Khepri's mental degradation was complete. She couldn't remember her own name or past, and she mistook the people cheering for Scion's defeat as them fighting amongst each other. Conflict followed, where Khepri tried and failed to flee with as many people as possible with the intention to re-assert control over the world when she recovered. Her friends tried to talk her down, using the pepper spray can she had used earlier to prove her identity.[231] It failed, she could neither recognize the can or her friends.
几乎在此之后,Khepri 的精神退化已经完成。她无法记起自己的名字或过去,并且误将为 Scion 的失败欢呼的人们视为彼此之间的争斗。随之而来的冲突中,Khepri 试图带着尽可能多的人逃跑,打算在恢复后重新掌控世界。她的朋友们试图劝说她,使用她之前用过的胡椒喷雾罐来证明她的身份。 [231] 但这失败了,她既无法认出喷雾罐,也无法认出她的朋友。
Chased by a small army of flyers, Khepri was herded towards Glaistig Uaine, who offered her a portal to an empty world to escape to. Her passenger managed to convince Khepri to let go of all the capes under her control before entering the portal and letting go of the Clairvoyant on the other side, going unconscious for days as a side-effect of using the Clairvoyant's power.
在一小队飞行者的追赶下,Khepri 被驱赶向 Glaistig Uaine,她为 Khepri 提供了一个通往空旷世界的传送门以便逃离。她的乘客设法说服 Khepri 在进入传送门之前放弃对她控制的所有斗篷,并在另一边放开了 Clairvoyant,因使用 Clairvoyant 的力量而昏迷了几天。
When she roused, she came face-to-face with Contessa, who tracked her down to the world she was in. They had a meaningful conversation, aided by Contessa's power, about past events, legacies and regrets. Contessa gave her the choice of two options, and, as a result of the unexpressed self-depreciation for herself, Taylor chose death.[232] Contessa then shoots two bullets into the back of Taylor's head.[82]
当她醒来时,她与追踪到她所在世界的 Contessa 面对面。他们进行了有意义的对话,在 Contessa 的能力帮助下,讨论了过去的事件、遗产和遗憾。Contessa 给了她两个选择,而由于对自己未表达的自贬,Taylor 选择了死亡。 [232] 然后 Contessa 向 Taylor 的后脑勺开了两枪。 [82]
Post-Gold Morning 后黄金早晨[]
Against Taylor's wishes, Contessa appears to have spared her: the two bullets seemingly disabled Taylor so that Contessa could arrange a power removal.[233] Contessa then appears to have exiled the unpowered Taylor with her dad to a world sealed from the multiverse. Taylor now possesses an artificial right arm she is learning to get used to, and her long hair is cropped short. She also has two dime-sized dimple scars on her forehead (and presumably the back of her head as well) from the gunshots. She meets an alternate version of her mother there who is still alive, had married someone other than Danny and had two young sons. Taylor aims to pursue a normal life, but struggles to find peace now that she has it after all the decisions she's made and how nothing she'll ever do will ever come close in importance to what she did before. Taylor also questions why Contessa spared her when she asked for death, forcing her to come to terms with her regrets and causing her to doubt things could be going well for her and her dad. Taylor expressed the difficulty she was having in reconciling the past, and the doubts she was having for both the present and the future.[83]
违背泰勒的意愿,康泰莎似乎放过了她:两颗子弹似乎使泰勒失去了能力,以便康泰莎能够安排权力的移除。 [233] 然后,康泰莎似乎将失去能力的泰勒和她的父亲流放到一个与多元宇宙隔绝的世界。泰勒现在拥有一只人工右臂,她正在学习适应,而她的长发也剪短了。她的额头上还有两个硬币大小的凹痕伤疤(可能后脑勺也有)是由于枪伤造成的。她在那里遇到了一个仍然活着的母亲的另一个版本,她嫁给了除了丹尼以外的人,并且有两个年轻的儿子。泰勒希望追求正常的生活,但在经历了所有的决定后,她发现自己很难找到内心的平静,因为她所做的事情再也无法与之前的事情相提并论。泰勒还质疑康泰莎为何在她请求死亡时放过她,这迫使她面对自己的遗憾,并让她怀疑自己和父亲的生活是否会变得美好。泰勒表达了她在调和过去时所面临的困难,以及她对现在和未来的怀疑。 [83]
Confiding in her mother about her identity and her troubles, they agree to meet again for more casual conversation. As Taylor leaves with her thoughts more clarified from her talk, she spots a boy that reminds her of Alec, but dismisses the similarities as minor if entirely absent. Meeting up with her dad, who has a new chance to be a parent to her in aiding her recovery in their new life, Taylor states that, although she has a lot of stuff bothering her, she's dealt with worse and could maybe deal with it and learn to be okay.[83]
向她的母亲倾诉自己的身份和烦恼后,她们同意再次见面进行更轻松的交谈。当泰勒带着更清晰的思绪离开时,她看到一个让她想起阿莱克的男孩,但将这种相似性视为微不足道,甚至完全不存在。与她的父亲见面后,父亲在帮助她恢复的新生活中有了重新做父亲的机会,泰勒表示,尽管她有很多烦恼,但她经历过更糟的事情,也许可以应对这些问题并学会好起来。
After Gold Morning, speaking of or mentioning Taylor by any of her names was considered taboo by most parahumans. Her survival or demise was unknown to wider society: Taylor is gone.[234][235]
在金色早晨之后,提及或提到泰勒的任何名字在大多数超人类中被视为禁忌。她的生存或死亡对更广泛的社会来说是未知的:泰勒已经消失。 [234] [235]
Chapter Appearances 章节出现情况[]
Trivia 琐事[]
- Wildbow's favourite line in Worm is "This was it. Finally, everyone was working together.", mentioned by Taylor in Speck 30.4, and which Wildbow considers the summation of her.[236]
Wildbow 在《Worm》中最喜欢的一句话是“这就是了。终于,大家都在一起工作。”这是 Taylor 在 Speck 30.4 中提到的,Wildbow 认为这是对她的总结。 [236] - An underappreciated part of Worm is that, given its first-person perspective, the viewpoint character can shape readers' perceptions. As a character, Taylor lacks self-awareness and is not infallible to emotional biases, trying to fool herself, or more importantly, compartmentalizing. TV Tropes calls this an Unreliable Narrator.[237][238][45]
《Worm》中一个被低估的部分是,由于其第一人称视角,视角角色可以塑造读者的感知。作为一个角色,Taylor 缺乏自我意识,并且并非对情感偏见免疫,试图欺骗自己,或者更重要的是,进行分 compartmentalizing。电视 tropes 称这为不可靠叙述者。 [237] [238] [45] - Taylor's bullying experiences can invoke near-universal life experiences; thus, many readers could read into the text elements in a way Wildbow did not intend.[239] For example, the author wrote Taylor as a cisgender heterosexual; however, many readers read Taylor as being some presentation of LGBTQA+.[240]
泰勒的欺凌经历可以引发几乎普遍的生活体验;因此,许多读者可能会以一种 Wildbow 未曾意图的方式解读文本元素。 [239] 例如,作者将泰勒写作一个顺性别的异性恋者;然而,许多读者将泰勒解读为某种 LGBTQA+的表现。 [240] - Taylor likely triggered Monday the third of January 2011 as it was described as the first day of school in the new year.
泰勒很可能在 2011 年 1 月 3 日星期一触发了,因为这被描述为新年开学的第一天。 - Clones of Taylor made by Echidna are called variously Chitter or Scurry, both words can relate to rats just like skitter, her villain name, can relate to insects. Scurry being the movement of rats while chitter is more of a vocalization, and not solely related to rats.
由 Echidna 制造的 Taylor 克隆被称为 Chitter 或 Scurry,这两个词都可以与老鼠相关,就像她的反派名字 skitter 可以与昆虫相关。Scurry 是老鼠的移动,而 chitter 更像是一种发声,并不仅仅与老鼠相关。 - "Khepri" is a god in ancient Egyptian religion connected with the scarab beetle, because the scarab rolls balls of dung across the ground, an act that the Egyptians saw as a symbol of the forces that move the sun across the sky.
"Khepri" 是古埃及宗教中的一位神,与甲虫有关,因为甲虫在地面上滚动粪球,这一行为被埃及人视为推动太阳在天空中移动的力量的象征。 - Taylor's surname, "Hebert," would most likely be pronounced "Ai-bear," as it is a French name. H is rarely pronounced in French, especially at the beginning of a word, and a final consonant is also rarely pronounced without a final "e" after it. However her surname is canonically stated to be pronounced "Hee-bert".[35]
泰勒的姓氏“Hebert”最有可能发音为“Ai-bear”,因为这是一个法语名字。在法语中,H 很少发音,尤其是在单词的开头,最后的辅音在没有最后的“e”后面时也很少发音。然而,她的姓氏在官方上被认为发音为“Hee-bert”。 [35] - Taylor is fond of sweet and savory food, prefers tea over coffee and doesn't like anything spicy or sour.[241] She likes her tea black[242][243] with sweeteners,[244][243] and particularly honey over sugar.[245]
泰勒喜欢甜食和咸食,喜欢茶而不是咖啡,不喜欢任何辛辣或酸的食物。 [241] 她喜欢黑茶 [242] [243] 加甜味剂, [244] [243] 特别是蜂蜜而不是糖。 [245] - Taylor's blood type is AB.[246]
泰勒的血型是 AB。 [246]
Quotes 引用[]
- (To Lung): "Don't underestimate me."
- (To Triumph): "Sorry. I didn't want this to go this far."
- (To Doctor Mother): "I know what that's like, I've walked down that road. Maybe not so ugly a road, but I've gone that route. All the way along, I told myself it sucked, but I wouldn't do it differently. I did everything I did for a reason. Except now, having reached the point I was working towards, I finally do regret it all. The last two years, the way I treated my teammates, leaving the Undersiders... I'd change it all in a heartbeat."[247]
- (To Tecton): “Being good or bad was never a thing for me. Not really. It was all about the actions I was taking and why."
- I didn’t follow that stuff, didn’t buy into the hero worship. I’d always found the capes interesting, I’d followed the non-gossipy news about them, but with the exception of a phase around the time I was nine where I’d had an Alexandria t-shirt and had my mom help me find pictures of her online, I had never really got giddy over any particular hero. - Tangle 6.7
Fanart Gallery[]
References[]
- ↑ Jump up to: 1.0 1.1 My name is Skitter, I thought, Taylor Anne Hebert. Sixteen. Born in Brockton Bay. Student at Winslow High. Ex-student. Member of the Undersiders. - Prey 14.8
- ↑ “New clothes, you’re angrier, lying to me, missing school, this cell phone… I feel like I don’t know you anymore, little owl,” he used my mom’s old pet name for me. I flinched a little. - Tangle 6.9
- ↑ “Yes. You’re the locker girl. I almost didn’t recognize you without the glasses, but everyone at school knows who you are. You’re with the Merchants now?”
“You’re thinking of the wrong person,” I said, with a note of irritation in my voice.
“No, I’m almost positive. You were that girl that got shoved in that rank locker with all that stuff they carted away in biohazard bags. The girl who went so mental they had to have a group of cops and paramedics haul you away for the first month of the semester.”
[...]
“We came here for an errand,” Lisa answered her, “Up to ‘locker girl’ here to decide if you can tag along.” - Infestation 11.5 - ↑ “Well, Bug, a cape is gonna show up in less than a minute. You did us a solid by dealing with Lung, so take my advice. Someone from the Protectorate shows up, finds two bad guys duking it out, they’re not going to let one walk away. You should get out of here,” She said. - Gestation 1.5
- ↑ I shook his hand, he wasn’t shy about shaking my hand firmly. I said, “You can call me Bug, I guess. At least, until I come up with something better, or until I decide this isn’t an elaborate trick.”
He shrugged, “Cool.” There wasn’t the slightest trace of offense at my suspicion. I almost felt bad. - Excerpt from Insinuation 2.6 - ↑ “If the new girl is okay with it, let’s stop by our place,” Lisa suggested, “See if Rache is there, celebrate the new recruit and get her filled in.” - Excerpt from Insinuation 2.7
- ↑ “Way to look good in front of the new girl, gimpy!” Alec mocked his teammate, laughing. - Excerpt from Insinuation 2.9
- ↑ Except I couldn’t help but see myself from their perspective. Warlord of the Boardwalk. I’d rotted off Lung’s manhood and carved out his eyes. I’d played an undefined role in Armsmaster’s downward slide. I’d robbed a bank, terrorized hostages with poisonous spiders, attacked their headquarters and used insects dipped in capsaicin to cripple their junior heroes with incapacitating pain. All the while, I’d acted with a seemingly ambiguous morality. Was I a good guy doing all the wrong things? Or did they see me as dangerous and unhinged? - Snare 13.7
- ↑ “When I looked at her with my power, before, I called her the Worm. She spent some time being as low on the food chain as you can get while still being able to move under her own power. As low as someone can get while still having an identity of their own. But she’s realized she’s poisonous, dangerous in her own unique way. She’s useful, like a silkworm we harvest or an earthworm who works our gardens. She’s even realized she’s not alone, so long as she looks for friends among other dirty… contemptible creatures. Speaking of which, I forgot to say hi, little brother.” - Plague 12.4
- ↑ “Poetic,” Jack said. “I take it Skitter is this clever worm?”
“Yup.” - Plague 12.4 - ↑ “Where is he?” I growled.
“As if I’m going to tell you. To think Jack called you the clever worm.”
“Don’t call me that.” I felt a flare of irritation that bordered on anger. Was that me, or was it her power at work? - Snare 13.7 - ↑ “I can still kill tall, dark and eerie and the alien girl,” Burnscar said.
“Bug girl,” I corrected.
“Don’t really care. Bitch, the test is an old one, but it’s good. We don’t get to do it often enough, because it requires research. Got to do it with Cherish because she gave us the necessary info. Wasn’t very bright, but she did. Now that she’s on the team, she can give us all the info we need.” - Snare 13.4 - ↑ “More or less,” Clockblocker said, handing the combat baton to Miss Militia. “Unless our local Supervillainess-in-chief wants to pursue further debate. I think I was ahead by one. Two-one.” - Excerpt from Queen 18.3
- ↑ “Not at all. Ignore the thug that’s sitting over there. I’m a queen, a goddess of my own realm. Or I was.”
[...]
“Do you have a response to the Queen’s allegations, Jack?” Nilbog asked. He reached up to adjust his floppy cloth crown. Creatures were arriving to deposit the meal on the plates. It looked like purple vomit.
[...]
“You wanted a tie breaker?” Golem asked. “This is it. Do what Weaver is saying. Do what the Queen is suggesting. Stay quiet, enjoy what you’ve built here. Attack, and the entire world will take it away. Then, even if you’re strong enough to survive that, which you may be, then Jack will still betray you.”
[...]
“You dare disturb the peace!?” Nilbog screamed the question. “Kill the queen! Kill the Golem-man!” - Sting 26.4 - ↑ “I think the bug queen here should explain how she came to nobility,” Jack said.
[...]
“Our apparent rivalry aside, have you been well, bug queen?” - Sting 26.4 - ↑ “Why this fixation on ending the world?” I asked.
“Nuh uh uh,” Jack answered me. “Not going to get bogged down in a discussion. We have a situation. I’m going to walk away in about fifteen seconds, unless you want to have a duel. Knife against knife, or gun against knife, if you prefer. You win here, it’s a coup for the world. What better option for the make-believe queen?”
The make-believe queen?
Maybe a name Cherish had given me. I tightened my grip on the gun, but I kept my finger off the trigger. - Excerpt from Sting 26.6 - ↑ “There’s a cape by the name of Goddess. Also the Blue Empress, Blue Lady, the Woman in Blue. Once situated on Earth Shin, she was brought here for the fight against Scion by a strange, unnamed player who has since been classified as a threat on par with any Endbringer. Or with Goddess, as it happens. Unfortunately, this anonymous figure didn’t put her back.”
“A strange, unnamed player?” I asked.
“So it happens,” Tattletale said, with a grin. “With only a select group of top Wardens and major players really tracking what really happened. But we were talking the woman in blue. She got powers and was relocated to Earth Shin before she could… grow to full potential. Relocated by a certain secretive agency.” - Pitch 6.8 - ↑ “We won,” Tristan said. “If you have any doubts about how we were ‘programmed’, look to the scholars for answers. It’s subtle if it’s there at all. Focus instead on the fact that when it all came down to it, we concentrated our efforts, looking past petty squabbles. It took a nameless cape to grab us all and drag people from every corner of reality to reinforce. That cape tried to keep us, but when we broke free, we kept fighting him, and we fought as one.”
I nodded at that.
A nameless cape. Taylor Hebert. Skitter. A bug controller from my hometown.
We were too spooked at the idea that we might draw her attention and start that whole engine back into motion to mention her by name.
Best to leave it alone. - Beacon 8.11 - ↑ When the world had ended, the mind controlling entity that had seized us all and coordinated us for one phase of the attack had used me for this purpose. To take a hit from Scion. It had been almost absentminded. - Dying 15.5
- ↑ “Your move, Bug girl,” Tattletale said, reaching forward to put a hand on my shoulder - Agitation 3.7
- ↑ “Bonesaw,” I growled.
“Skitter, was it? Bug girl! I really want to find out how your power works! I’ll take your brain apart and find the mechanism so I can copy it! Is your costume spider silk? That’s awesome! You know the right materials to work with! No wonder my darts didn’t work!” - Snare 13.8 - ↑ “Count yourself lucky, bug bitch, that your costume covers your entire body,” Panacea murmured to me, “Or I’d maybe give you a heart attack. Or cancer.”
I swallowed hard. I wasn’t counting myself as particularly lucky at this point. - Agitation 3.11 - ↑ That swearing swiftly became a stream of curses aimed at ‘that fucking bug bitch’.
[...]
“Everything with red tape is highest priority,” Topsy said. “Load it into the trucks first. We can take a loss on the rest, pay the fucks back and claim intervention of bug bitch.”
[...]
“They want us pissed enough to fight,” Watch said. “Don’t. Also… yeah. Bug bitch tagged us. Here.” - Scarab 25.3 - ↑ Jump up to: 24.0 24.1 “The end of the world, you mean,” I said.
“The end of all things, queen administrator,” she said.
Queen administrator? What? - Excerpt from Scarab 25.5 - ↑ Jump up to: 25.0 25.1 The female with the administrator shard had long since fled, covering the retreat with her small army of lesser lifeforms, more traps snapping into place in her wake. - Excerpt from Interlude 26
- ↑ Jump up to: 26.0 26.1 “You view us both as queens, Faerie Queen?”
“I do. But let us drop the titles when we talk.”
“Okay… Glaistig Uaine. Anyone else?”
“There are others who stand shoulder to shoulder with us, but queen is the wrong word, Administrator. The champion, the high priest, the observer, the shaper, the demesnes-keeper. Why do you ask?” - Excerpt from Extinction 27.4 - ↑ Best to deal with the other subject first. Three minutes before the girl with her bugs arrive here. - Interlude 28
- ↑ “See you, Taylor. Have a happy birthday.”
“Thank you,” I said, hanging up.
Eighteen, I thought. - Scarab 25.6 - ↑ “I called the school to get an update on how you were doing, and they said you hadn’t been to class in some time, and I didn’t know what to do. I just- I felt completely lost. I called your Gram.”
I winced. Gram was my mom’s mother, an austere woman who’d never fully approved of my dad as a match for her daughter. It wouldn’t have been easy for him to make that call.
“She convinced me that maybe I’ve been too focused on being your ally, and not focused enough on being your parent. If she’d told me that a week ago, I would have hung up on her. But after talking to your school, realizing how badly I failed you-” - Tangle 6.9 - ↑ Jump up to: 30.0 30.1 “And my dad?”
“Gramp liked him, but not enough to admit it to Gram.”
“Oh. My mother refused to let my children call her Gram.”
“I think my mom and dad encouraged it with me as a kind of subtle payback.” - Excerpt from Interlude: End - ↑ Jump up to: 31.0 31.1 “She’s a villain,” the PRT uniform cut me off, touching his way through some blackberry device with his free hand. “Designation Master-5, specifically arthropodovoyance, arthropodokinesis. No super strength.” - Extermination 8.5
- ↑ Jump up to: 32.0 32.1 32.2 32.3 "Arthropodokinesis, arthropodovoyance," the Deputy Director said. "She's on record as a master eight, thinker one. The thinker classification is key here: ex-Director Piggot noted Skitter can see through her bugs' eyes."
[...]
Director Tagg nodded slowly, then rubbed his chin again. The movement of his wrist against his armrest nearly killed the bug I had in between his dress shirt and jacket. "Agreed. I already informed each of my officers to treat her as though she had a two point classification in every category, or two points higher in cases where she's already received scores. Brute two, mover two… all the way down the list. It won't do to underestimate her." - Excerpt from Cell 22.1 - ↑ Confirming what had been a lingering suspicion. A link they didn’t want us to know about.
Between Chicken Little and Skitter, who had become Khepri, who had become public enemy number one and a legitimate class-S threat when she had taken over the minds of thousands of parahumans in the final confrontation against Scion. - From Within 16.7 - ↑ “I don’t necessarily agree with the Director’s line of reasoning, Dinah,” Miss Militia said, “But Skitter’s a known criminal mastermind, with an emphasis on the latter. She’s a capable strategist and a battlefield tactician. As far as we were aware, she was well situated as one of the more powerful villains in North America, judging by her control over this city. In the past week alone, she’s … two villainous organizations and folded a third into her own. There’s no reason for her to surrender. The only way any of this makes sense is if there’s a greater plan at work.” - Excerpt from Cell 22.1
- ↑ Jump up to: 35.0 35.1 35.2 How tall exactly is Taylor? in comparison to the Wards ENE?
I think I mention it in the story, but you wouldn't be too wrong if you said she's 5'7" or 5'8" (corrected from 5'6") at the story's outset, taller than Battery, who's maybe 5'3" or 5'4". The only one who'd be taller than her would be Browbeat (using his power) or Aegis (who's a tallish male about to turn 18).
Taylor's last name is pronounced 'A bear' right? I ask this because I recall Victor calling Skitter 'heb' and she having a panic attack because she thought he knew her last name. Did I miss something?
Hee-bert. A-bear would be the French pronunciation, but her family uses the American pronunciation. The slur is 'heeb', short for Hebrew. - Comment by Wildbow on Spacebattles - ↑ Skitter – The protagonist. A bug controller, she wears a black spidersilk costume with gray-black speckled armor panels. If you’ve forgotten who she is, you have a problem. - Cast (spoiler free)
- ↑ Brian nodded, a small smile playing on his lips, “Nope. Now, how on the ball are you, as far as knowing what we’re up against?”
I blinked a few times, then hedged, “For other local capes? I’ve done research online, read the cape magazines religiously for a few years, more since getting my powers… but I dunno. If the past twenty four hours have taught me anything, it’s that there’s a lot I don’t know, and will only find out the hard way.”
Brian smiled. I mean, really smiled. It made me think of a boy rather than a nearly-grown man. He replied, “Most don’t get that, you know? I’ll try to share what I know, so you aren’t caught off guard, but don’t be afraid to ask if there’s anything you’re not sure about, alright?” - Excerpt from Insinuation 2.7 - ↑ His trademark and weapon was his Halberd, which was basically a spear with an axe head on the end, souped up with gadgets and the kind of technology you generally only saw in science fiction. He was the kind of guy who appeared on magazine covers and did interviews on TV, so you could find almost anything about Armsmaster through various media, short of his secret identity. I knew his weapon could cut through steel as though it was butter, that it had plasma injectors for stuff that the blade alone couldn’t cut and that he could fire off directed electromagnetic pulses to shut down forcefields and mechanical devices. - Gestation 1.6
- ↑ Battery and Velocity were both speedsters of a sort, giving them the ability to move at a ridiculous pace. They were very different kinds of speedster, though. As I interpreted it, from all the stuff I’d read online and in the magazines and interviews, Battery could charge up and move at enhanced speeds for very short periods of time, sort of like how Bitch’s power pumped up her dogs, but concentrated into a few brief moments. It was a physiological change, altering her biology and then altering it back before it became too much on her body. The actual act of moving at the speeds these guys could manage was an incredible strain on the body. There were only one or two parahumans on the planet who could manage that kind of movement without any workarounds or limitations, and Battery and Velocity weren’t among them.
Velocity, in contrast to Battery, was more like Shadow Stalker. He changed states, and while I had no idea what this meant exactly, whether it was him shifting partially into another dimension or altering the way time or physics worked in relation to himself, I did know that it made him able to move very fast, without needing to rest like Battery did. Fast enough that my wasps couldn’t really land on him, and those that did were dispatched before they could start stinging. - Tangle 6.6 - ↑ When I looked at our remaining escape route, Dauntless was at the other end of the alley. Brockton Bay’s rising star. It would have been easy to peg him as a tinker, but he apparently wasn’t. His power let him, according to details he’d leaked when he’d appeared on TV and in magazines, imbue his gear with a little bit of power every day. Thing was, every bit of power he parceled out had permanent effects. Every day, he was just a little bit stronger than he’d been the day before. A little bit more versatile. It was expected that he would eventually surpass even the likes of Alexandria, Legend and Eidolon, the ‘triumvirate’ of the Protectorate, the top dogs. That kind of made him a big deal in Brockton Bay, a hometown hero.
I didn’t follow that stuff, didn’t buy into the hero worship. I’d always found the capes interesting, I’d followed the non-gossipy news about them, but with the exception of a phase around the time I was nine where I’d had an Alexandria t-shirt and had my mom help me find pictures of her online, I had never really got giddy over any particular hero. - Tangle 6.7 - ↑ A scattered few independent heroes and villains were around as well. Few I could name. I saw a girl dressed up like an old fashioned doll. Parian. She was local, and she wasn’t hero or villain. A rogue, who only used her powers for business or entertainment. She could sometimes be seen doing some promotion for a store downtown, giving life to some massive stuffed animal or a store mascot. She’d done an interview in a magazine I’d read back before I had powers, and I knew she was a fashion student, though she wasn’t revealing just who she was until after she was more established. - Extermination 8.1
- ↑ Worse, if by some small miracle two capes managed to find comfort and support in each other, there was no guarantee that those other two points that Sundancer had raised wouldn’t ruin things. The intensity of our lifestyle and the sheer violence. Lady Photon had lost her husband in the Leviathan fight. Glory Girl had, if the magazines and papers were any indication, maintained an on-and-off relationship with Gallant. He’d died too.
So this? Lying here beside Brian? It was sort of bittersweet, with maybe a 60-40 split on the sweet vs. the bitter. - Colony 15.4 - ↑ Jump up to: 43.00 43.01 43.02 43.03 43.04 43.05 43.06 43.07 43.08 43.09 43.10 43.11 43.12 43.13 43.14 Gestation 1.1
- ↑ Being completely honest, even as the author, I'm a little surprised Taylor didn't know or even voice that she'd come across the idea while on ParahumansOnline. I thought I remembered the dialogue going more like, "Do you know what trigger events are?" "I've heard of them, but..."
I suspect I may tweak it just a bit when I return to the chapter while doing the edits for the polished final version. - Comment by Wildbow, archived on Sufficient Velocity - ↑ Jump up to: 45.0 45.1 Wildbow: Early Taylor responds to stress with silence and withdrawal.
[...]
logiccosmic: Anything else you remember from the shit show?
Mishie: back
Wildbow: The big issue is it doesn't feel like Taylor.
Wildbow: When writing a character, you gotta start from the motivations. Taylor, starting out, just wants to get by.
(logiccosmic scribbles furiously)
Wildbow: She was 'surviving', for lack of a better word, from the point her mom died, and then surviving from the point she started getting bullied.
Wildbow: She compartmentalizes things, but she's very prone to having her perspective skew like crazy.
Wildbow: (I really want to emphasize this more in the rewrite, for the initial arcs) - Wildbow on IRC, archived on SpaceBattles - ↑ Lisa, though, put one of her arms around my shoulders and gave me a one-armed squeeze of a hug. She was a little older than I was, so she was just tall enough to be at the perfect height to do it. What caught me off guard was how nice the gesture felt. Like I had been needing a hug from someone who wasn’t my dad for a long time. - Excerpt from Insinuation 2.7
- ↑ Jump up to: 47.0 47.1 47.2 47.3 47.4 47.5 47.6 47.7 Excerpt from Gestation 1.2
- ↑ People keep saying suicide, but that isn't quite it.
Taylor likely would have stopped going to school. She was already on that road. - Reddit - "What would've happened to Taylor if she'd never triggered?" - ↑ Jump up to: 49.0 49.1 Hive 5.8
- ↑ Brian insisted I take two Tylenol, though the pain was still limited to a mild ache in my arm. I grudgingly obliged. I’d never liked taking pills, and never felt they made a real difference. - Excerpt from Insinuation 2.9
- ↑ I knew my way around computers, my mom had made sure I had one since before I could read and write, but I would be lying if I said I could tell if I was being hacked or do anything about it. - Excerpt from Insinuation 2.5
- ↑ Comment by Wildbow on RPG.net
- ↑ That was disturbing. I didn’t have a better way of putting it. I’d almost been paralyzed by Leviathan in the Endbringer attack, but even before that, the idea of being left conscious but unable to move of my own volition had always spooked me.
I’d never had a relative in the hospital suffering from anything like that, and I couldn’t remember seeing any movies or shows on television that might have put the idea in my head at an impressionable age. Still, it was one of the first places my mind went when I thought about worst case scenarios and horrific fates. It had been in my thoughts more over the past two or three years, and the idea had been showcased in more than one nightmare over the past two weeks.
Maybe it was more general than that. Not a fear of paralysis, specifically, but of helplessness.- Excerpt from Parasite 10.3 - ↑ “You… voluntarily gave him control over you?” I asked.
“Little while back,” Imp said. “I wanted to see what it was like. Could come in handy. Did come in handy.”
It’s Regent, I thought. I’d fought beside him in life and death scenarios and I would never have allowed him to take control of me. Couldn’t fathom it.
Was there a way I could diplomatically say as much?
None I could think of, right this minute.
“I can’t imagine submitting myself to that,” I said. - Excerpt from Imago 21.3 - ↑ Wildbow on Spacebattles.
- ↑ To say I barely recognized myself was.. how could I put it? It was true, but I could also remember myself months ago, when I’d look at my reflection and I would be so focused on the flaws and the things I didn’t like about myself that I never felt familiar with the person I was seeing in the mirror. It was as though it was always a stranger I was looking at, and I would be left vaguely surprised at the combination of features across from me. - Excerpt from Infestation 11.1
- ↑ “Don’t you?” She asked. She turned her attention to my selection of clothes piled on the bed. “You’re paying a lot of attention to what you’re going to be wearing.”
“I always do, even when I’m just going to be hanging out with you and Bitch. I second guess and stress over the clothes I’m wearing if I’m walking to the corner store by my house to buy milk and bread.” - Excerpt from Tangle 6.2 - ↑ Taylor isn't suicidal but would have dropped out of school.
Depends on your definition of suicidal. I've fairly sure I've dropped WoG (That's noted in the archives) that states Taylor would not live in a lot of AUs because she was liable to tailspin into self destruction (the thought 'I want to die' not crossing her mind even as she put herself into dangerous situations) in a lot of scenarios where she didn't have the same outside influence. - Partial comment by Wildbow on Reddit - ↑ Gestation 1.6
- ↑ As Taylor states, “I had considered applying to join, but the notion of escaping the stresses of high school by flinging myself into a mess of teenage drama, adult oversight and schedules seemed self-defeating.”
In brief: The Wards could easily be everything she’s trying to get away from.
Beyond that, she has no trust in organized institutions (school has failed her badly – see the next chapter for more on the subject), and she’s happier having some independence and control (personal power, freedom, escapism) in circumstances where she otherwise has none, than she would be as another rank and file member of the Wards. Or, perhaps to phrase it better, she’s more afraid of being unhappy in the Wards than she is of being unhappy on her own.
So why not just fly solo for a while, right? - Comment by Wildbow on Gestation 1.6 - ↑ Kicking myself even as I did it, I turned away and walked back down the hall towards the front doors of the school. I knew it would be that much harder to go back tomorrow. For one and three-quarter school years, I had been putting up with this shit. I'd been going against the current for a long time, and even though I was aware of the consequences I'd face if I kept missing school like this, it was so much easier to stop pushing so hard against the current and just step in the other direction. - Agitation 3.1
- ↑ I stared out the window of the bus, watching the people and the cars. On days like this, after being publicly humiliated, getting myself to the point where I was willing to walk through the door was about making deals with myself and trying to look past the school day. I told myself that I would go to Mrs. Knott's computer class. None of the Trio would be there, it was usually pretty easygoing, and I could take the time to browse the web. From there, it was just a matter of convincing myself to walk down the hall to Mr. Gladly's class.
If I just made myself do that, I promised myself, I would give myself a treat. - Agitation 3.1 - ↑ “Relax. You’re allowed to breathe.”
I laughed lightly at the realization I was holding my breath, which resulted in a nervous, chuckling exhalation that only added to the awkwardness I was feeling.
He was smiling, “You okay?”
What was I supposed to say? Admit I didn’t know how to deal with being around a good looking guy?
I stared down at the ground, at the table leg I was holding. “I get nervous when I’m close to people. I think, you know, maybe I have bad breath, or maybe I have B.O., and I wouldn’t be able to tell, because it’s mine, so I hold my breath like that to be safe. I dunno.” - Excerpt from Tangle 6.3 - ↑ “You and Brian are similar, but I wouldn’t say he’s cautious. He’s… pragmatic. You both are. The difference between you two is that he’s been doing what he does for three years, now. Two years of experience, before he joined the group. So a lot of what he does is automatic. He doesn’t give a second thought to the little things he’s done dozens of times already. He takes a lot for granted.”
“And I don’t?”
“You’re observant, detail oriented and focused. More than any of the others. You watch, you interpret, and then you act with this careful, surgical precision. That’s a strength and a flaw.” - Excerpt from Shell 4.2 - ↑ He didn’t speak, giving me a chance to continue, “I think you’re good looking, I like you as a person. I respect you, more than any of the others, because you’re smart about what you do, career-wise. You know. And because you’re so comfortable in your own skin, so confident. I admire that.”
“You sound so analytical,” Brian offered me a slight smile, but he looked a little pained, “Going through the points, step by step, like you’re checking things off a list.”
“That’s not- I’m not trying to.”
“I’m not criticizing you. I’m saying it seems very you.” - Excerpt from Buzz 7.6 - ↑ “It makes the most sense. You have the best grip on who’s in play and how to use our abilities. You think tactically,” she murmured.
[...]
“Just because we’re putting you in charge doesn’t mean I can’t still handle that stuff. If you want to delegate to me at any point, that’s fine. It’s just a question of who we turn to when we need a spur of the moment decision.”
“I’m not good at those. I’m only good when I can plan, consider everything that’s at play.”
“I don’t think you give yourself credit. I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again, you’re good at improvising.”- Excerpt from Colony 15.5 - ↑ "Come on, you know me pretty well. All the others describe me as careful and cautious, though I’m not entirely sure why. Do you really think I’d pick something as important as a dog, a new addition to my family, without researching, first?” - Excerpt from Buzz 7.3
- ↑ Interlude 8.y
- ↑ I know the dream sequence is sort of a tired bit, but it struck me that I’ve mentioned a few times that Taylor has nightmares, earlier in the story, and there’s the stress over Dinah, her dad and Sophia, and I wanted to sort of touch on that without getting into pure exposition. Showing rather than telling. So I went with the dream.
All in all? I’m ok with how that part turned out, personally. Though I welcome any complaints/criticisms/praise to let me know if I hit the mark & should leave that option open for another story/book in another year. - Comment by Wildbow on Infestation 11.1 - ↑ Colony 15.2
- ↑ “I said it earlier, I think, but you’re not a stupid girl, Skitter. Reckless, shortsighted, capricious, violent, even vicious… but not stupid. I’m hoping you have the sense to realize how dangerous your current position is. There will be more mechanical suits coming. There will be heroes coming to Brockton Bay to assist us. You can’t afford to hold this city, and we can’t afford to let you. Not in the grand scheme of things.” - Excerpt from Monarch 16.3
- ↑ Jump up to: 72.0 72.1 Excerpt from Cell 22.6
- ↑ Cell 22.2
- ↑ Jump up to: 74.0 74.1 I was using my bugs to channel my feelings, even with my concerns about my passenger and how it might be merging with me. I was wearing that aura of indomitable calm, even though I wasn't sure I liked the Taylor of this past year and a half, who had been doing just that as a matter of both habit and necessity. - Excerpt from Extinction 27.3
- ↑ Jump up to: 75.0 75.1 Passenger, I thought. Been a while, trying to figure out how to make peace with the fact that you're there, that you're affecting me somehow, taking control whenever I'm not in my own mind. I think we've made strides. I've sort of accepted that you're going to do what you're going to do, whether that helps me or hurts me. - Excerpt from Sting 26.2
- ↑ Jump up to: 76.0 76.1 Had I? Not wholly consciously. I'd set up the string, but how much of that was intentional? Was it habit, now, to have a measure on hand when dealing with any weapon?
I focused on the swarm, focused on the cords and threads that traced the room. One in the doorway, one at each of Phir Sē's feet, just waiting for me to finish the deal and bind him. Others extended between us, spiders poised to cut the threads or tie them, as the situation demanded.
The passenger, or was it me, being wary?
"I guess I did," I said. I made the spiders cut the threads between us.
[...]
My heart was still pounding, my mouth dry, and it wasn't just the Phir Sē thing, or the teleporter. The passenger. - Crushed 24.4 - ↑ "It's been a bad day, in case you haven't noticed. You're allowed to feel bad. It's kind of normal."
Normal.
I'd been thinking of my feelings as being off-kilter, out of control, unreasonable and irrational.
Were they just regular feelings? Emotions that weren't being reined in by my discipline and bottling everything up, by distraction and disconnection?
Somewhere along the line, I'd stopped thinking about my feelings as being mixed up or fucked up and stopped concerning myself with them altogether. On a level, I'd blamed my passenger.
But I wasn't sure I could justify that with what I was experiencing now. Why would the passenger take away, gain ground in subsuming my identity and then give it back, all like this?
Was it just me? - Excerpt from Extinction 27.3 - ↑ Sting 26.4
- ↑ Speck 30.7
- ↑ Speck 30.7
- ↑ “I don’t-” I started. What had I been saying?
Not me. The passenger. I had to relax. Allow myself to speak. - Excerpt from Speck 30.7 - ↑ Jump up to: 82.0 82.1 82.2 82.3 Speck 30.7
- ↑ Jump up to: 83.0 83.1 83.2 Excerpt from Interlude: End
- ↑ Computer class was one of the few parts of the school day I didn't usually dread. For one thing, it was the one class in which I was doing well.
[...]
Mrs. Knott was an alright teacher, if not the most hands on; she was usually content to give us advanced students an in-class assignment and then focus on the more rambunctious majority for the rest of the class. - Insinuation 2.2 - ↑ I looked at my teachers. At Mrs. Knott, who I'd even say was my favorite teacher, "Don't you see how fucked up this is? He's blackmailing us right in front of you, and you can't understand that this manipulation has been going on from the beginning?"
Mrs. Knott frowned, "I don't like the sound of it, but we can only comment and act on what happens in school." - Hive 5.4 - ↑ Without taking the box, I tilted my head to get a better look at the front, "Alexandria. She was my favorite member of the Protectorate when I was a kid. Is the lunchbox collectable?" - Excerpt from Insinuation 2.6
- ↑ I didn't follow that stuff, didn't buy into the hero worship. I'd always found the capes interesting, I'd followed the non-gossipy news about them, but with the exception of a phase around the time I was nine where I'd had an Alexandria t-shirt and had my mom help me find pictures of her online, I had never really got giddy over any particular hero. - Tangle 6.7
- ↑ Queen 18.5
- ↑ Jump up to: 89.0 89.1 But this was the kind of thing they needed. Alliances, solidifying ties. When people were hurt, they needed to be taken care of. He’d learned that sort of thing from Charlotte and Forrest, from Sierra, and from people who had passed more quickly through his life. Taylor had only been around for a short while, but she had made an impact too. - Interlude 10.z II
- ↑ “I think about her once in a while. Skitter, I mean. Weaver. Taylor. I go a month without thinking about her at all and then I’ll get really curious because-”
[...]
“-she was there not long after my parents died. But I think about her less and less. You can only ask the same questions so many times, you know?” - From Within 16.7 - ↑ “This is what she was doing, all that time? Taking care of these children?”
“That was only a small part of it. She mostly paid me to look after them and make sure people got the food they needed. She looked after everyone. When they were all in the worst situations they’d ever faced, struggling for food, worrying every hour if they would be attacked or preyed on, she stepped up.”
“You’re trying to defend her. To justify what she did.”
“Only a little.” - Interlude 22.x - ↑ “Tattletale says some stuff, but she’s biased. I barely remember her. I spent more time around Grue than I spent around Skitter, and-” - Interlude 10.z II
- ↑ As Chicken Little approached it, I could see the scene unfold.
Chicken Little, much smaller and younger, sitting in a tiny kitchen in a narrow house.
And with him was a girl with a tumble of black hair, wearing a tank top and pyjama bottoms. Round spectacles.
[...]
Little Aiden sat on a stool, and Taylor Hebert, Skitter, Khepri, gave him a mug of what might have been hot chocolate, before sitting beside him, rubbing his back. - Infrared 19.8 - ↑ Aidan sat off on his own, a pigeon sitting on his knee. He opened and closed his hands, and the bird hopped from the one knee to the other, then back again. Something had happened there, but it wasn’t a focus. Not right now. - Extinction 27.1
- ↑ Broomstick arms and legs, gawky, with a wide, guileless smile, her eyes just a fraction larger behind the glasses she wore, a little too old fashioned. Her long dark curls were tied into a loose set of twin braids, one bearing a series of colorful ‘friendship braclet' style ties at the end. Only her height gave her age away. - Excerpt from Interlude 19.z
- ↑ Jump up to: 96.0 96.1 A girl with curly black hair and glasses, stick thin, hugging a red-haired girl. The body type was a match.
[...]
The goal was always the same: to look for the girl with the slight build, curly black hair and glasses. Taylor Hebert. - Excerpt from Interlude 10.5 - ↑ A girl, skinny, but not in the attractive way you saw in magazines. Spindly. - Excerpt from Sentinel 9.6
- ↑ Jump up to: 98.0 98.1 Taylor kneeled in the middle of a massive puddle of juices and sodas, some of it still fizzing around her. She was drenched, head to toe, trickles still running off of the lengths of her hair. Her style of dress had changed over the past little while, in ways Taylor probably wasn’t fully aware of. She wore darker clothes now, cloaked herself in sweatshirts and loose fitting jeans. Her long hair was a shield, a barrier around her face. All measures to hide, signals and gestures of defeat.
More than that, she’d changed in behavior, had stopped fighting back. She’d stopped reacting, for the most part. Her expression was impassive. It took some of the fun out of it. It was almost disappointing. - Excerpt from Interlude 19.z - ↑ Skinny teenage girl with black curly hair entering and leaving the same building that the skinny teenage villain with black curly hair was operating out of? - Excerpt from Infestation 11.1
- ↑ Her expression was masked behind a shifting mass of bugs that moved in and out of her hairline. Sierra couldn’t even tell where the bugs ended and the scalp began, as the small black bodies crawled into and onto the black curls. - Excerpt from Interlude 14.x
- ↑ Interlude 22.x
- ↑ Close-up of Taylor pic.
- ↑ Jump up to: 103.0 103.1 Scarab 25.1
- ↑ Jump up to: 104.0 104.1 Sting 26.2
- ↑ Your personality is reflected in your fashion choices. Muted colors. Brown, gray, black, white. If you are wearing something with color to it, you’re wearing it under a sweatshirt, sweater or jacket. Never anything that would stand out. Never showing much skin. While most people our age are picking clothes with the intention of defining an identity for themselves, fitting into a clique, you’re focused on staying out of sight and not attracting attention. You’re being too cautious, overthinking things you don’t need to, always making the call to play it safe. - Excerpt from Shell 4.2
- ↑ The casual display of emotion was startling. It was equally startling when, in the moment Emma’s dad slowed the car down, Taylor’s head turned, her eyes falling on them, her head and upper body turning to follow them as they passed.
She didn’t even resemble the person Emma had known way back then, not the girl who’d approached her house after coming back from camp, and not the girl who’d been drenched in juice. The lines of her cheekbones and chin were more defined, her skin baked to a light tan by the sun, her long black curls grown a touch wild by long exposure to wind. Light muscles stood out on her arms as she held a box, her dad standing back to direct.
Even her clothes. She wasn’t hiding under a hood and long sleeves. A trace of her stomach was exposed between the bottom of her yellow tank top and the top of her jeans. The frayed cuffs were rolled up at the bottom, around new running shoes, and neither Taylor nor her dad seemed to be paying any attention to the knife that was sheathed at her back. - Excerpt from Interlude 19.z - ↑ She wasn’t in costume. It was odd, seeing her approach from a distance, observing her uninterrupted over a longer span of time. She conveyed an eerie kind of confidence that he knew she didn’t have at her core. Some of that was how she unflinchingly looked forward. She didn’t react as the wind blew her hair across her face, didn’t turn to look around the street as she crossed an intersection.
He might have to say something about that. If that was her using her power to assess her surroundings and keep an eye out for trouble, she should avoid doing it when she was in civilian wear.
She stopped a short distance away, holding grocery bags in one hand and tucking her hair back into place with the other. She wore a black tank top, jeans and rubber boots, with a sweatshirt tied around her waist. That last article of clothing would be to conceal weapons, he guessed. Her glasses caught the light from the sun to the west, turning almost opaque in the glare as she looked his way. - Excerpt from Interlude 15.y - ↑ Jump up to: 108.0 108.1 108.2 108.3 108.4 108.5 Excerpt from Gestation 1.3
- ↑ Extermination 8.5
- ↑ Hive 5.10
- ↑ Alas, I’m not a talented artist, or I’d be able to sketch out the armor in proper. I’ve got two pieces of work that I’ve yet to sit down and finish; one being a sketch of her armor, as she might have drawn it in her notebook (see arc 1, chapter 2) and the other being a drawing of Taylor herself, which stalled because I can’t draw hair in a way that satisfies me. I may get it done if I find a good reference image that I can build off of, as well as the mood to draw at a time to actually do said drawing.
But yeah. Keep in mind that her armor features that spade shaped compartment over her back – sort of like a beetle shell, about the size of a small backpack. There’s also shoulderpads, elbow pads, wristguards, chestguard, kneepads, etc. Each having layers in the style of insect chitin (pillbug, etc), that adds to the bulk (and internal capacity, as it happens), without making it too ‘loose’.
As I think on it, though, it is a rather high number. If I recall, it was a placeholder I put in there while I didn’t have access to the web or a library for research, and I never thought to change it while doing sweeps of edits & whatnot to the subsequent drafts. I’ll change that. - Comment by Wildbow on Tangle 6.6 - ↑ Jump up to: 112.0 112.1 112.2 Gestation 1.4
- ↑ Jump up to: 113.0 113.1 Taylor Hebert, Skitter– A 16 year old native of Brockton Bay, Taylor gained the power to control arthropods and other simple lifeforms, sensing what they sense to varying degrees. With a wide range (spanning nine to fifteen hundred feet around her) and the power to individually control each insect, she relies on versatility and strategic thinking to seize the advantage in battle.Her powers manifested in January 2011, triggered by a bullying campaign by her former best friend and two other girls. She found a measure of escape with her dream of becoming a superhero, but things didn’t quite work out that way. She’s now one of the controlling powers in Brockton Bay, a villain warlord in charge of the Boardwalk, with a small contingent of followers working under her, and leader of the Undersiders.
.
In civilian guise, she’s skinny to the point of being scrawny, with glasses and long curly hair she maintains as a desperate grasp at a single feminine feature. Her gawky or nerdy appearance is marked by a wide mouth and large eyes.
.
As Skitter, she wears a costume of black spider silk and gray armor panels, a yellow-lensed mask that features a mandible-esque design around her jaw. Her hair blows free. Depending on the situation and the state of her costume, she occasionally wears a skirt or shawl of black spider silk with ragged or torn edges, for protection, concealment, and to offer more surface area for her bugs to crawl on. When battle ready, bugs crawl over every surface of her costume, including her hair and mask. The carapace-like panel of armor at her back serves as a utility compartment, holding her weapons and various items. - Cast (in depth) - ↑ Jump up to: 114.0 114.1 Easy peasy. There’s bugs that eat and clean the waste of other bugs (pillbugs, for example) and she can suppress or time their need to create the waste in the first place (at least for the, say, pillbugs, who would therefore not be making mess as they clean it up).
As the armor’s mostly waterproof (see chapter where she mentions trying to give Newter first aid, for this), all she’d need is a wipe-down with a wet cloth and some pillbug attention. - Comment by Wildbow on Tangle 6.6 - ↑ I reached over my shoulder, slowly, and unbuckled my utility compartment. Tattletale grabbed it for me as it came free, and the straps fed out through the rings beneath the shoulder panels. She handed it to me, and I drove away the bugs I’d gathered inside. When they were gone, I sent away the bugs that were nestled in the midst of my hair, beneath each of my other armor panels and the ‘skirt’ of my armor, where it covered the scorched leggings of my costume. - Excerpt from Queen 18.3
- ↑ My bugs had finished connecting the tattered pieces of fabric. It wasn't pretty, but a few tugs to test it showed it was as sturdy as anything I'd made. I draped it over my lap. Until my legs healed, I'd be wearing my new costume for my upper body, with the tattered cloth as a skirt to protect my burned legs. - Snare 13.6
- ↑ I was wearing only my old costume and the built-in makeshift skirt to cover me where the fire had eaten away at the leggings. - Monarch 16.13
- ↑ I was put in mind of the moment I donned my costume, of being Skitter the Warlord, with her half-cape, half-shawl. There had been a kind of power to the gesture, to draping myself in the cloth and assuming the title and the role. - Speck 30.3
- ↑ She wasn't in costume, but her glower was intense enough that she might as well have been in her full garb as Skitter, complete with shawl, skirt and the carpet of insects crawling on her. - Interlude 24.y
- ↑ Skitter sat at the end, backed by her forces, looking over the room. Bugs swarmed her from the shoulders down, but Accord could note a shawl and hints of protective armor. - Interlude 20.y
- ↑ I draped the shawl-cape over my armored shoulders, and then covered it in bugs. - Chrysalis 20.1
- ↑ Some of my mask, the back compartment of my armor and my gloves were more streamlined. Or less streamlined, depending on how one looked at it. Sharper lines, convex armor panels that flared out more, gloves with more edges for delivering damage if I had to get in a hand to hand fight.
I’d only done some of the armor, pieces of my costume that were already battered and worn. My gloves, my mask and the back compartment of my armor tended to take the most abuse. I’d update the rest later. - Imago 21.1 - ↑ The core costume was the same, but the details, the features… clawed fingertips of Skitter or the extra armor of Weaver’s, with a spare coil of silk hidden beneath an armor panel at the back of the hand? - Extinction 27.4
- ↑ Jump up to: 124.0 124.1 Drone 23.5
- ↑ “You’re wearing your old costume,” Grue said, finally.
“Haven’t had a chance to make a new one,” I said. - Excerpt from Drone 23.5 - ↑ Jump up to: 126.0 126.1 126.2 Excerpt from Extinction 27.4
- ↑ In my notes, I had her down at 5’8″ (178 cm), 125 lbs (56 kg). Pretty close! - Comment by Wildbow on Drone 23.1
- ↑ The knife won’t degrade too much in the next day,” Dragon said. “And we have spares, thanks to Masamune.”
“You didn’t make this much of a fuss with my flight pack,” I said.
“I included documentation,” Defiant said.
“Thank you,” I said. I found the holster for my old knife, then put it through the belt at my back, holstering the new knife. - Excerpt from Venom 29.3 - ↑ Jump up to: 129.0 129.1 In truth, when they’re quoting the scientists as saying “There’s no telepathy, it's impossible.” they’re quoting something where the scientists theorized that thought-transference wouldn’t work. Which is similar but different.
Yes, Taylor is telepathic – she transmits information via. yet-unknown channels to her bugs, who respond, and through these same channels, she gets very frequent (to the point that it feels real-time) updates on her bugs’ positions, biology/status, etc. in what’s sort of a very rapid, hyper-detailed echolocation.
Meanwhile, thought-transference is more the ‘put thoughts in other people’s heads, or take thoughts out of other’s heads and understand them.’ - Comment by Wildbow on Extermination 8.4 - ↑ Jump up to: 130.0 130.1 Ah, but the control & organization of the bugs she controls don’t necessarily matter. She maintains absolute control anyways. The only convenience would be, say, that they could cooperate in her absence. (As opposed to black widows which have to be isolated from each other as they’re territorial enough to kill one another). - Comment by Wildbow on Plague 12.1
- ↑ Jump up to: 131.0 131.1 Simple lifeforms. If there were none above the water’s surface, I’d use the ones below. A glance above me showed one of the flying heroes above the water’s surface, watching. Good. We’d be able to coordinate an attack.
We were too far from the ocean floor for me to find crabs or lobsters, but there were others.
Krill. Two inches in length, at best. But they were alive, and I could move them. I could use them. Another swarm decoy, another combination attack. - Excerpt from Extinction 27.5 - ↑ Jump up to: 132.0 132.1 Comment reply by Wildbow, archived on Spacebattles - Questions: A) Has she used her ability on snails or slugs? Probably not due to their lack of combat utility, but it would interesting as whilst still ganglionic, Mollusca nervous systems are a whole leap ahead of arthropods and annelids.
B) Trying to use her power on squid would be even more interesting as they have actual complex brains in addition to a ganglionic nervous system. If she can bypass their brains it would imply all sorts of things of what she could do to higher animals. What is the sinoatrial node of the vertebrate heart if it isn’t a very stupid ganglionic subbrain?
[...]
D) At the other end of the scale, can she pick up the signals of nematodes? They are more closely related to insects than insects are to worms, and they do have discrete nervous systems. If yes then she effectively has a ‘life radar’ as every single vertebrate has millions of the things in their gut all the time. Ditto every patch of soil and plant. Not useful offensively but would still be pretty amazing to have. Same question obviously with Rotifers, which certainly have as much brain as tapeworms and are near as ubiquitous as nematodes.
Wildbow : A) Yes. She can control them.
B) Squids are out of bounds.
D) Not stated outright in the story, but her inability to sense people suggests that she can’t sense/control nematodes (or dust/skin mites for that matter). Not saying it’s definitely for sure, but a probable reason would be due to size constraints. A minimum size.Not stated outright in the story, but her inability to sense people suggests that she can’t sense/control nematodes (or dust/skin mites for that matter). Not saying it’s definitely for sure, but a probable reason would be due to size constraints. A minimum size. - ↑ Buzz 7.2
- ↑ "But I'm afraid that power you're digging for is out of your reach, Weaver."
I looked at him.
"Or it's already in your reach. You can't have a second trigger because you already had one," he said.
I blinked.
"Given the signature, it's very possible you had two trigger events in quick succession. Not uncommon. The horror of manifesting your power, it prompted another trigger."
"No," I said. "There's got to be something."
"If there is, a second trigger event isn't it," the Number Man said. - Excerpt from Venom 29.7 - ↑ /u/Edello: [SPOILERS FOR WORM] What if Taylor...
...hadn’t double-triggered?
/u/Wildbow: She'd be Aiden, but with bugs. - Comment by Wildbow on Reddit. - ↑ Comment by Wildbow on Sufficent Velocity
- ↑ I sent the roaches after him, the PRT uniform. They landed on him, individually squeezed into the pouches on his belt and bandoleer.
Found the keys on his belt.
Getting the keys out of the pouch was harder. I had to be smooth, and the keychain was heavy enough that the roaches couldn’t pick it up with their mouths. Instead, I tried lifting it up with the middle of a roach’s body, supported by the rest. No luck, it slipped free off of the convex exterior of the cockroach’s shell.
I turned it upside down, instead, used the more textured underside to catch the loop of metal. The rest of the roaches latched on, hauled the roach up and out of the pouch, squeezed it through the flap-covered opening, breaking it nearly in two against the metal of the ring as they drove it through the too-narrow gap. One roach dead, but the keys were falling free of the pouch. - Excerpt from Extermination 8.6 - ↑ Comment by Wildbow on Prey 14.4
- ↑ Jump up to: 139.0 139.1 Colony 15.9
- ↑ Tangle 6.7
- ↑ - Excerpt from Cell 22.5
- ↑ Jump up to: 142.0 142.1 142.2 Chiro: I was wondering as of late, why Taylor can't control Breed's parasites? Is it because they as lifeforms don't fall into the portfolio of creatures Taylor controls, or because Breed controls them already?
Kyakan: might be as simple as them not being around when Taylor's power was defining what counted as "bug"
Wildbow: Kyak has it right. Bonesaw talks about how shards conceptualize their idea of what X is when the trigger happens.
It's why Taylor's notion of what a 'bug' is remains pretty nebulous, including some things (crabs, earthworms, arachnids, insects) and bypassing others (skin mites, bug case 53s).
And it's not just Taylor- it pulls from the shard network of wider human knowledge across hosts. - Conversation with Wildbow on Discord, archived on Spacebattles - ↑ It’s been stated in the comments, but Taylor’s power doesn’t let her control bugs below a certain size. It’s why she can’t sense skin mites. - Comment by Wildbow on Colony 15.1
- ↑ “I used to think I could control anything with an exoskeleton or shell. But I can control earthworms too, among other things, and they don’t have shells. I think all it takes is that they have to have very simple brains.” - Excerpt from Agitation 3.1
- ↑ Um the Muse: Hmm, I wonder if Skitter could affect the various bugmen? I know that she said that it had to do with the size of the brain involved, but how certain is that?
wildbow: Probably would depend on their brain makeup & chemistry.
But I think the real concern wouldn’t be so much ‘Is it possible’ as the ethics involved. - Comment by Wildbow on Interlude 5 - ↑ thetntm: I don’t know if it was a word of god or a head cannon or something, but I remember reading that because Taylor’s power went off of her mental image of “creepy crawlers” when determining what counted as a “bug,” she could have controlled a sufficiently bug-like case 53.
My question is, could Aiden do the same, but with birds?
Wildbow: Bonesaw talks a bit in Worm 11.h about how the shard reaches out and uses hosts & hosts' connections to other hosts & the hub to suss out definitions and categories.
Aiden's (and the collective unconscious's) perceptions wouldn't include a part-bird, part-human because they wouldn't be familiar with such and it wouldn't be regularly in that initial, "Think about a bird!" instant connection.
For taylor, pulling more from the rest-of-the-world perceptions, crabs sorta kinda fall in that bucket, atlas falls in that bucket, while we aren't aware enough of skin mites or Hercules the beetle C-53 to really grok it. - Wildbow on Reddit, archived on Spacebattles - ↑ “Breed’s creatures. Can you control them?” this from Revel, taking advantage of the stunned silence.
I glanced up at the body the things had invaded. I tailored my response so both Revel and the Undersiders could make sense of it. “I can’t control those things, and I can’t sense them either.” - Sting 26.1 - ↑ I might have missed it if I hadn’t had the bugs pressed together to contain the rats. I had missed it already, countless times. Wasps, hornets and cockroaches were crawling free of the slurry of flesh that Noelle had vomited into the building’s lobby. They were attacking my bugs and any people they found.
I couldn’t sense them, and I couldn’t control them. - Queen 18.7 - ↑ “She’s been absorbing my bugs. She’s spitting out some, and I can’t control them. They’re methodically destroying my swarm, and they’re hunting down people and attacking them.”
“She probably absorbed some before she even ran into us,” Tattletale said. “And she just needs one of a given type to make copies. I wouldn’t blame yourself.”
“Did she absorb hornets, black widows, brown recluses?”
“Maybe not,” Tattletale admitted.
“Okay,” I said. “Because there’s homicidal hornets and spiders out there now. Because of my fuck-up.” - Queen 18.8 - ↑ Prey 14.3
- ↑ Jump up to: 151.0 151.1 Re: Skitter’s power, she’s yet to demonstrate the inability to control some bugs because she was focusing on others or focusing on something else. Well, there was the bank robbery, but that was Panacea’s interference at work. It’s unstated, but multitasking abilities come part and parcel with her power, as far as her facility with her power is concerned. - Comment by Wildbow on Infestation 11.2
- ↑ Jump up to: 152.0 152.1 152.2 Taylor’s power is fairly nuanced, and I guess I haven’t really elaborated enough on that aspect of things. I tweaked the sweaty crotches part of the chapter just a tiny bit, and will strive to explain a little better in a later chapter. Long story short, Taylor’s sensory input from the bugs is vastly different depending on whether she’s giving them a general ‘find your way to me’ impulse or whether she’s focused enough on them individually to have them navigating their way into somebody’s underpants. In the former case, she’s drawn her bugs in while really stressed (such as when Bitch attacked her) without really noticing she was doing it. Things are that thin, that easy to block out.
You said “not at all recognizable from the ‘human’ perspective except by a good deal of piecing together of clues.” – Except she’s got a helluvalot of clues. Even fuzzy, blurry clues add up to a pretty strong mental picture when you’ve got enough of them. When there’s also context, with Taylor knowing in advance what her bugs are doing, there’s going to be (even if Taylor doesn’t really want to) a framing of those clues in a particular way. - Comment by Wildbow on Shell 4.3 - ↑ Jump up to: 153.0 153.1 Comment by Wildbow on Prey 14.4
- ↑ Agitation 3.12
- ↑ I focused on my swarm-clones, staying totally still while he worked on removing the metal end of the dart. They were largely composed of flying bugs, but I was bulking each of the forms out as more bugs arrived, giving them a more solid mass. I used my free hand to pop my ear-buds in.
[...]
Sierra had been coordinating everyone, trying to put people with experience in charge of people who were lacking it. It was interesting, trying to hold multiple conversations at once with the various project leaders. Difficult, too. For one thing, my speech with my swarms was somewhat lacking, missing consonants, but I could still make myself more or less understood. For another, my ears could only process one thing at a time. I managed by talking with one or more swarm-clone while listening with one at a time. After too many misfires and moments of confusion, I scaled down my efforts to a single conversation at once, simply standing silently by with my other selves.
I made a mental note to try to practice with that. Exercising the range of my power hadn’t done anything for me, and there didn’t seem to be any upper limits to how many bugs I could control at once, but there had to be other ways I could train my abilities. Multitasking was one I hadn’t tried yet. Trying to interpret the senses of my bugs was another, though I feared it would take a more concerted effort to effect any sort of change. - Excerpt from Colony 15.7 - ↑ “Guys!” Miss Militia stood from her chair, the feet screeching against the ground. She raised her voice another notch. “Look.”
She pointed at the window.
I moved my bugs to check for whatever it was she was pointing at, then stopped.
She was pointing at the bugs. They’d reacted to my irritation, and were swirling just beyond the window of the conference room, clustering on the glass surface.
“Is she making a move?” Tagg asked.
“No. They’re… just there. Reacting,” Miss Militia said. “To this. Here.”
“She’s watching,” Tagg said.
“Watching what? There’s nothing to look at,” Miss Militia said. “Think about it. What this is to her.”
“She hears,” Mrs. Yamada finished the thought.
I shut my eyes, swore under my breath. I’d let my guard down. I’d been too focused on what was going on inside the building, letting bugs cluster on the outside, that I’d given my reactions away. So much for gathering intel. - Excerpt from Cell 22.1 - ↑ Hey, passenger, I thought. Do me a favor. If I get taken out of action and you step up to fight, work on taking out Jack, alright? - Sting 26.4
- ↑ Wildbow - Had Taylor broken, raged out, in the sense of chapter one, they would have had a scapegoat for everything that happened in Brockton Bay. She could have tapped Cauldron resources and been on the alert. But Taylor offloaded all cues to her shard. She appeared far calmer and more subdued than she was, Alexandria calibrated her approach with this in mind, and things tilted off differently.
Wildbow - Taylor was absolutely not a killer at that stage, unless she had a reasonable target, and Alexandria presented herself as that target. Alexandria looked at Taylor, talked to her, and saw someone different. All of the profiling and information worked -against- her.- WoG from Spacebattles - ↑ Armsmaster's lie detector.
Cherish gets a partial read on Skitter, but extrapolates wrong. Jack remarks on this on two occasions, especially how (he feels) if the read had been correct, he could have convinced Taylor to kill Battery.
Powers set aside, she expresses frustration at people misreading her motivations, especially at the meeting with Accord/Valefor/the Teeth. Virtually everyone around her has trouble grasping what she's doing and why: her dad, Emma (most recent encounter), D&D, Grue, even Tattletale at times. - Partial comment by Wildbow on Reddit - ↑ Jump up to: 160.0 160.1 160.2 Well, she can’t quite hear through her bugs. As she says in 2.6, noises break down to weird and irritating pitches that she can’t quite make out.
The one real exception to this occurs at the conclusion of the ‘Shell’ arc, where she was overhearing music through a moth. But that’s an exception, not the rule. - Comment by Wildbow on Tangle 6.1 - ↑ Cell 22.4
- ↑ Jump up to: 162.0 162.1 162.2 162.3 It wasn’t long before I was close enough. My range was longer, now. Odd. It was supposed to get longer when I felt more trapped, but ‘trapped’ wasn’t the word I would have chosen.
My bugs rose at my command, tracing over the area. It wasn’t so unusual, that there were flies, bumblebees and ants about: the heat of summer, the humidity, the imbalanced ecosystem… Nobody paid them any heed.
A small butterfly found its way into the house. It traced over the glossy smooth armor and helmets of PRT officers, touched the badge on the chest of a police officer.
It touched my dad’s shoulder, moved down his bare arm to his hand. He was sitting at the kitchen table, his head in his hands.
[...]
“Taylor,” he said.
Six and a half city blocks away, I replied, “I’m sorry.”
The butterfly and I took off at the same time. - Excerpt from Chrysalis 20.5 - ↑ He doesn’t have a conventional brain, but his system isn’t so simple that Taylor can take it over. If she could have, her power would have detected & sensed him the way it usually does bugs. - Comment by Wildbow on Sentinel 9.1
- ↑ Sting 26.6
- ↑ I didn’t hear the rest. Behind my back, Assault moved to kick one of the desks. It went flying into the air in the same instant I threw myself to the ground. I could feel the rush of wind as it passed over me, hurtling into a cubicle. I scrambled for cover.
“Prescience. Interesting,” the Director called out, as I ducked low and used the cubicles to hide. “We assigned you a thinker-one classification, but perhaps we fell short.” - Excerpt from Monarch 16.2 - ↑ Prey 14.6
- ↑ “Yeah,” Lisa raised an eyebrow, “You do know which bugs you had biting him, right? Black Widow, Brown Recluse, Browntail Moth, Mildei, Fire Ants-”
“Yeah,” I cut her off, “I don’t know the official names, but I know exactly what bit him, what stung him and what the venoms do.” - Excerpt from Insinuation 2.6 - ↑ I was steamed and I could hardly focus on the lecture, as my power crackled and tugged at my attention from the periphery of my consciousness, making me acutely aware of every bug within a tenth of a mile. I could tune it out, but the extra concentration that took, coupled with the anger I felt towards Madison and Mr. Gladly, was distracting enough that I couldn’t focus on the lecture. - Excerpt from Insinuation 2.3
- ↑ Wildbow: She’s described her range as 3-4 city blocks. A city block is about 300 feet long.
- ↑ Infestation 11.4
- ↑ Wildbow: The range increases aren’t permanent. - Comment by Wildbow on Infestation 11.3
- ↑ Much like Taylor's achievements went hand in hand with a growth in her capability and flexibility with her power (on a blunt level like the waxing & waning max range, in terms of being able to see/speak with them, and on an abstract level, like how the shard is helping more in the background or when she's unconscious), - Comment by Wildbow on Armsmaster's growth.
- ↑ I wasn’t just grabbing every creepy crawly in a two block radius, though. I was being selective, and I was gathering quite a few.
It would take time for all of them to arrive. Bugs could move faster than you thought when they moved with purpose in a straight line, but even so, two blocks was a lot of ground for something so small to cover. - Excerpt from Gestation 1.2 - ↑ I generally measured things in city blocks – I’ve never been good at eyeballing distance – and I would say my range usually sat at around two blocks. - Excerpt from Hive 5.5
- ↑ Generally speaking, there were two routes I tended to go. The first put me in one spot, drawing my bugs from the area. A three block radius made for a good number of bugs.
[...]
Today wasn’t one of the days my power was working double time, with double the range. I’d wanted to make sure to reach as many as I could, so I’d started drawing the arrows and words with the bugs early. - Excerpt from Infestation 11.2 - ↑ My power's range was about five blocks. It should have been larger, going by the running theory that feeling ‘trapped' extended my reach, but I was in here by my own device. I couldn't necessarily force it. - Excerpt from Cell 22.1
- ↑ “Yeah,” I said. “I triggered while I was in a locker. I’ve been thinking, I get just a little stronger when I feel trapped, or when I despair, or when I feel betrayed. My range extends.” - Drone 23.1
- ↑ Crushed 24.1
- ↑ Crushed 24.4
- ↑ I took a page out of Grue’s playbook and gathered a group of bugs together into a densely packed, vaguely humanoid shape. - Excerpt from Hive 5.6
- ↑ Infestation 11.3
- ↑ Parasite 10.5
- ↑ Pinkhair:
I figured that Taylor did the voice trick to disguise herself, now that she knows that Sophia might possibly recognize her by voice.
Wildbow:
We have a winner. - Comment by Wildbow on Sentinel 9.6 - ↑ The moment the wind died down, I bid the bugs to shift position, carrying the pages to me, sorting them into the appropriate order.
I bent down and began collecting the pieces of paper. I could feel the raised bumps on the pages as I brushed them free of specks of dirt and leaves. Each set of bumps corresponded with a letter or punctuation mark, which had been printed over the dots in thick, bold, letters.
I gathered the pages into file folders, then clipped them shut, stacking them on the patio chair. I made my way to the patio table, bending down to collect the pages as they made their way to me. The writing on these was different; the letters were drawn in thick, bold strokes, fat, almost as if I’d drawn them in marker. My notes: thoughts, things that needed clarification, ideas. - Excerpt from Sting 26.2 - ↑ When the bullying had started, books had been an escape. I’d be exhausted at the end of the day, feeling a low that counterbalanced the higher adrenaline and stress of the time spent in school. Curling up with something to read had been a refuge.
Maybe that had lapsed when I’d become a cape. The costumed stuff had become an escape of sorts. But I’d gotten back into it in prison, and on some of the stakeouts. I’d taught myself braille, so I could read with my bugs, and take in more. - Excerpt from Speck 30.2 - ↑ All around me, PRT employees were howling in pain, their cries silenced by the lack of an audio feed. Either the camera hadn’t picked it up, or Glenn had muted it. They thrashed. One reached for me, for the me on the screen, and I could see how I moved out of the way without even glancing at him. The swarm concealed me at the same time, briefly obscuring the Skitter in the video from both the man on the ground and the security camera. When it parted, she had shifted two or three feet to the left. A simple step to one side in the half-second she couldn’t be seen, but it misled the eyes.
And I couldn’t remember doing it. I’d never consciously added the trick to my repertoire. - Excerpt from Drone 23.3 - ↑ “Whatever,” Panacea said. “Works for me, actually.”
Then she touched me, and the pain went away. I relaxed so suddenly I felt like I’d suddenly become part liquid. I’d been so tense my head wasn’t even touching the countertop, my legs and shoulders tense.
“Thank you,” I said. “Thanks.”
“You have a high pain tolerance,” she said.
“One of Bakuda’s bombs, way back when,” I said. “I think it messed with my head, as far as my perception of pain. I found out what it’s really like to feel pain, real ten-out-of-ten pain. A part of me knew it was too much to be true, and other stuff’s affected me more because I knew it was tied with something real. Case in point, a burn is still a motherfucker.”
“Well, we’ll fix it,” she said. - Excerpt from Venom 29.9 - ↑ Cell 22.2
- ↑ Excerpt from Cell 22.1
- ↑ Queen 18.3
- ↑ Monarch 16.2
- ↑ Tagg slaps a '2 of everything' on Taylor because it gives full authorization for all special measures, and it's a constant reminder to his people that she's a threat in every department... Comment by Wildbow on spacebattles
- ↑ TFS Is the fact that Taylor was trapped a reason why her Master powers act the same way as Shaker powers do?
soulpelt| do tell
Wildbow Yeah, there's overlap.
[...]
soulpelt| Taylor is needing help from being trapped in a sucky environment.
Wildbow Environmental stressor, thinker stressor, more thinkery shakery master power. - Conversation with Wildbow on IRC, archived on SpaceBattles - ↑ I felt the range of my power halve, as though a guillotine blade had dropped down, cutting it off.
My control began to slip. It wasn’t so severe as the effect on my range, but I could feel it degrading. I was aware of my bugs in a general sense, and they were moving in reaction to my subconscious thoughts, but the end result wasn’t precise. I moved them, but getting them to stop had a fraction of a second’s delay.
[...]
My range was dwindling with every passing second, and so was my control.
[...]
I could feel Panacea working to give me that control, changing what she was focusing on. I felt the swarm moving more in sync with what I was thinking and wanting. But this… I could sense what was happening, feel my range plummeting yet again, the guillotine coming down. My range had been cut down further.
[...]
Stop, Panacea, I thought. Stop, stop, stop, stop…
My swarm attacked her, and it wasn’t because of any conscious command on my part. The attack was crude, more the swarming behavior of wasps drunk on attack pheromones than the calculated attack I was used to employing.
[...]
I looked at Amy, realizing the bugs were still approaching her. I pulled the swarm away, and I felt how hard it was to move them.
I was left with the ruins of my power. My range was maybe a third of what it might otherwise be, the control rough-edged at best. There were bugs in my swarm that I couldn’t control, too small. - Excerpt from Speck 30.1 - ↑ Jump up to: 195.0 195.1 Speck 30.3
- ↑ Jump up to: 196.0 196.1 196.2 196.3 Speck 30.1
- ↑ It belatedly clicked. Sixteen feet was the distance they needed to keep from me. - Excerpt from Speck 30.1
- ↑ Depression-the-Game: Alright so, Jack Slash doesn't lose against parahumans. What about shard controlled Parahumans? Like Ash Beast or Khepri.
Wildbow:For an analogy, think of boomers trying to use an app a bizarre sci-fi megacorp designed to kill an executive officer of that megacorp's company. And that megacorp is monitoring them and they control their internet, the data they see, and you're tracking them. The boomer, for whatever reason, can't ditch their phone (In setting, it's stuck to their brain).
Because they're boomers they don't really understand the tech and a lot of it is screened off from them, right?
Boomer has an app that mail orders feral bears? "I guess we have to deliver, but let's just order some really shitty bears and have the driver honk his horn to alert the CEO, and if our boomer makes any mistakes in the ordering and isn't focused then we'll just empty the truckload of bears right in front of him."
App to get someone killed? They hook it up to your boomer's pacemaker and reserve the ability to stop his heart when his lifespan (going by compiled insurance data from up to 150 providers) is halfway up, in exchange for giving him data to call in accurate hits. He just made that install and your tracking indicates he's intending to call a hit in on your CEO? Use just the two providers that give the shortest lifespan, cut that in half, (he should be in 4 minutes, according to sketchy companies A and B? hit that button to stop our boomer's pacemaker!) Or lean on your megacorp's subsidiary companies and track what he's doing on the internet to slow him down. Mess with his head.
Utilizing a shard-controlled parahuman is getting deeper into the megacorp's control.
The way it works is that you want to rely on someone who isn't using the megacorp's tech or who isn't tracked and monitored by the megacorp. Anything else is going to see the executive officer getting a courtesy phone call and your tech guys are going to do everything they can to mess with your potential threat.
Anything else is liable to be a "Gee, why can't I use my app from megacorp to destroy a megacorp executive officer?" - Conversation with Wildbow on Reddit, archived on Spacebattles - ↑ Jump up to: 199.0 199.1 199.2 When it knows the configuration is absolutely decided, it reaches for the last fragment it will cast off. This one, too, it cripples, even largely destroys, so as to limit the host from using it in the same fashion.
[...]
It could see the connection to the female’s shard, the activity as it broadcast signals, reaching out to contact lifeforms throughout the area, coordinating them.
[...]
The entity recognized her shard. The last one that had split off before the entity took on this form.
Queen. - Excerpt from Interlude 26 - ↑ HighSlayerRalton: Taylor is Eidolon's 'reflection'. Or rather, the Queen Administrator is the High Priest's reflection.
Taylor gets to administrate bugs, because Scion damaged and limited his Queen Administrator shard before distributing it.
Eidolon gets to administrate the pool of shards Eden was reorganising when she crashed (including the power-drawing ability), because Eden was still using her Queen Administrator counterpart to do that at the time.
The kid who controls bugs and the world's most powerful superhero are two sides of the same coin.
Wildbow: Yeah, pretty sure I already confirmed this elsewhere, but this is a great summary of it. - Conversation with Wildbow on Reddit - ↑ In devising the actual trigger, we actually figure this out in a way like we would a Cauldron vial. We know what the shard does, and the key thing to figure out is how that shard expresses its power and how it manifests.
The QA shard specializes in coordinating control over large numbers of smaller lifeforms. We see it in Skitter (bugs), we see it in Aiden (birds) and we see it in Chitter (rats). - Comment by Wildbow on Reddit, archived on Spacebattles - ↑ Dwood: Wildbow: can the QA shard add brute flavors to its triggers?
Wildbow:Generally QA is going to operate around the fulcrum point of being a 'controls many minions' master trigger and is going to seek out hosts that hit that note. In the most forced context, you'd probably get a 'mass/tower of rats' brute body. - Conversation with Wildbow on Discord, archived on Spacebattles - ↑ I watched that crowd with one eye.
Some of them would kill me the second they thought they could get away with it. Others would be scheming. I had power, they wanted that power for themselves. They’d take it like my portal man was taken from me. They’d take all of it.
My hand was clenched so hard I thought something might break. - Excerpt from Speck 30.7 - ↑ Jump up to: 204.0 204.1 I reasserted control.
Again, I tried to let my passenger take control, to set things on autopilot.
Again, the others began to descend. This time, the forcefield woman remained where she was.
[...]
I’d have a harder time taking control of things in the long term, but I was okay with survival.
[...]
Others were placed indiscriminately in the crowd below me. My swarm, returned to the place they came from.
I turned to go, and there was far less resistance.
[...]
Before it could go any further, I wrested control for myself. Easier. It was like it was weaker with every set of actions.
[...]
It kept wanting sacrifices in the short term. Responding to its desires had left me feeling more secure, made the ensuing resistance weaker. The implicit promise was that acquiescing would be rewarded with a surer footing. Footing that I could use. There were doors open to every world. If I could take time to heal, to build my strength. Eating well, resting… I could move on, carry out my plan.
The question was whether the cost was too high.
It was a gamble. I was risking myself, setting myself back. People would come after me.
But it meant more control, and it all came down to control in the end. - Excerpt from Speck 30.7 - ↑ A doorway opened beside her. She floated away a touch, as if inviting me through.
I hesitated, at first, because of suspicion. I had worlds filled with enemies, worlds I needed to bring under my thumb if I was going to be able to relax for even a moment.
I forced the worries aside.
I felt another stab of that not-fear sensation. That balking on the part of my passenger.
[...]
I stared at the portal. A point of no return. I could pass through, and I’d be able to take steps to get control, to carry out my plan.
-Again, that dissonance.
It was uncomfortable, distracting. I wanted to be able to pursue my goals unmolested. - Excerpt from Speck 30.7 - ↑ Jump up to: 206.0 206.1 “Because I think you have a chance to come back from this. Not much of a chance. Part of that rides on me. I could help you, or I could stop you from troubling anyone ever again. Part of that? It’s up to you to win the fight, to take control and keep the administrator from claiming everything you have, leaving you a shell.”
I felt a chill. Was part of it my passenger? Both of us? - Excerpt from Speck 30.7 - ↑ “It isn’t human, and it never was,” she went on. “Don’t expect it to have human rationales. Do expect it to have a program it follows, a set goal that may or may not be one hundred percent clear. It’s going to be somewhat predictable, but powerful enough that the predictability isn’t reassuring or an easy answer.” - From Within 16.8
- ↑ I needed to escape, I needed time and resources to analyze what I was up against, frame it all. I’d stabilized, I’d stopped degrading, now I could start building- rebuilding my knowledge base. Put everything into a context that I could grasp, with my mind working in a different way, with different priorities.
Then I could take control. Then I could eliminate the problematic elements.
Then everything would be peaceful.
A mission. I functioned best with a mission. My thoughts and actions had always processed best when I had a mission, a task. - Excerpt from Speck 30.7 - ↑ Con- conflict. I could function so long as there was conflict, so long as I was creating it or resolving it. Given the choice between paralysis and conflict, I wondered if anyone would really choose the former, committing to it over time.
Paralysis was a scary thing. There were a lot of forms of it, and they ranked up there as far as fates worse than death.
Conflict was better. Familiar. - Excerpt from Speck 30.7 - ↑ It had started.
The outcry was picked up by others. People grabbed one another, arms were thrown around necks, fingers dug into costumes and skin. They whimpered, screamed, shouted. I could see tears in eyes, faces contorted in emotion. Groups turned inward, focusing on one another, loners backed away, positioning themselves where they had space to maneuver. Madness, hysterical, chaotic. Grown adult and child alike, costumed and uncostumed, individuals dressed in white or in bright colors, individuals in black, they were part of the riot.
They held nothing back, emotionally. I saw fireballs explode in midair. People streaked into the sky, lightshows following after them.
But the yelling, the echoes of that first cry, they were what shook me, what shook everything. The only thing around us to block the sounds were people, and those people were making more sound. Thousands echoing of that one cry.
None of this surprised me, that they’d turn on each other the moment the real threat was gone. It was the way our species operated. A reality that had been writ over and over again in my experiences. I couldn’t remember the specific cases, but the lessons remained with me. - Excerpt from Speck 30.7 - ↑ I heard the voice in my ear. It was trying to sound soothing, gentle, but it was failing. I heard the fear in it. That fear was reassuring in its own way. It told me I was right. That the world did revolve around fear and violence. That I was doing the right thing, standing guard, being ready for a fight at any moment.
The madness around me continued unabated, the shouting fading, then starting anew, picked up by others, different factions, fresh sets of lungs.
I wasn’t going to listen to the voice. Not with all of the powers arrayed against me. it would be idiotic and foolish if I did listen, whether I understood or not.
The others, they were arguing amongst themselves, barking out insults, yelling, pointing at me. I’d taken control of them, and that was a fresh wound. - Excerpt from Speck 30.7 - ↑ Many breakers can go permanent breaker. Shadow Stalker, for example, doesn't have any strict forces in play that forces her to conserve the breaker state or balance her living & breaker state.
But it's still bad times for those who go that route, because they're forced to or because they prefer life in the breaker state to their ordinary life. Breakers have a closer connection to their passenger than any cape, and in the course of diving deeper into their breaker state and not, for lack of a better phrasing, surfacing for air, they begin to lose themselves and the shard gets more of a say. This is, very obviously, not a good thing. We see this sort of mentality in Khepri, and we can assume something like it in Night Hag.
[...]
The breaker document includes some examples (the Atropos breaker, the consequences for death breakers in general) of ways the passenger might seep in or that life might suddenly get harder, when one lapses fully into a breaker state.
So just wanted to point out that this is a thing that happens - and ego death often goes hand in hand with it. By the flip side of that same coin, to finally get around to answering your question - ego death, momentary, partial, or permanent, would destroy the Self and insert more Breakerness into the void that's left behind.
Most of the time they rampage - Ash Beast and Night Hag and the like. But if the shard isn't equipped to take advantage of the opportunity (Cauldron shards, Eden shards in general), maybe the self comes back and you get a Grumman. - Wildbow on Reddit, archived on Spacebattles - ↑ Wildbow: What's the context of the Colin talk though?
[...]
Or subject, or how do you lead from that to an ending? Do you have him shoot her two times to be sure she's dead?
Or dead/in a coma?
Kaisheng21: i guess
well in the hypothetical where i were writing worm, which is just mad to think about
i'd have taylor just sorta fade out from accumulating brain damage
and colin's there holding her hand
Wildbow: It's not really brain damage though. And he'd need an inspector-gadget style robo-arm to hold her hand because her revised QA power is still active at that point.
[...]
She doesn't fade out so much as she goes full Khepri again.
[...]
Or rather, Taylor does fade out, but simultaneously, QA fades in. - Conversation with Wildbow on Discord, archived on Spacebattles - ↑ “The high priest,” Glaistig Uaine admonished me. “You and I may be doing without the titles, but we mustn’t offend the others.”
“Right,” I said.
“As for his role, well, you should know.”
“I should know?”
“Yes.”
I could only think of one powerful individual who was on a par with the others she’d named. Contessa and Glaistig Uaine were easily twelves or higher on the power-ratings scale, and I could look to others with powers in that neighborhood to figure out who she was referring to. Panacea, Labyrinth…
Which raised two questions.
Why the hell was I on that list, for one thing?
And was Eidolon the high priest? He was the only one I could think of to fit the role. - Excerpt from Extinction 27.4 - ↑ His eyes settled on Weaver, surrounded by the nimbus of her power, which glowed with an intensity that surpassed any and all of her teammates. When she stepped forward, it was like she was pushing against a curtain, only it was a membrane, a network of individual cells, each with tendrils extending out, so thin he couldn’t make them out, except by the highlights that seemed to rush down them as she gave conscious direction to her bugs. - Excerpt from Interlude 24.x
- ↑ “It’s the nineteenth,” he said. “Your birthday was a week ago.” - Excerpt from Monarch 16.7
- ↑ “Will you state your name for the record?”
“Taylor Hebert.”
“Your date of birth?”
“June nineteenth, 1995.” - Excerpt from Scarab 25.1 (this was later redacted by WoG) - ↑ Assembler: In Monarch 16.9, Danny said that Taylor's birthday was a week before June 19th. However, in Scarab 25.1, Taylor said in court that her birthday was the 19th.
Maroon Sweater: I like it being the 12th because i like the beat where she blanked out on turning 16
Assembler: I find it interesting that about a week before the 19th is June 11th, and June 11th, 2011 is the day you posted Worm's first chapter.
Wildbow: @ Asse - I do believe that was the rationale for it being her birthday. But yeah, it's not the 19th. - Conversation with Wildbow on Discord, archived on Spacebattles - ↑ Jump up to: 219.0 219.1 Comment by Wildbow on Interlude 3
- ↑ Shell 4.3
- ↑ Taylor's classes are an hour and a half long, or an hour and fifteen minutes long, IIRC, with a bit of extra time for homeroom announcements and whatnot. She arrives at the start of the day and goes to her locker, she gets shoved into her locker and she has time to get a glimpse of people looking - and enough time passes that she realizes that those same people who saw didn't take any action on her behalf. She's not really in a position to bang, facing in, too cramped to turn around.
Not so much time passes that the next class starts - or it's as the class opens that people realize what happened and that's when she's let out. - Comment by Wildbow on Reddit - ↑ Wildbow: Generally the PRT will pay visits to likely triggerees - special cases, victims of extraordinary violence or disaster, etc. They paid a visit to Taylor in her hospital room, for example, though nothing came of that.
[Edit with afterthought: Crisis points, ftr]
[...]
Discreet: If she did get visited by a hero, I'd find it odd that she'd never mention it, especially when at one point or another she's fighting them later in the story or stuffing centipedes in their mouth
Wildbow: Taylor was near catatonic when she got a visit. - Conversation with Wildbow on Discord, archived on Spacebattles. - ↑ Extermination 8.7
- ↑ Monarch 16.13
- ↑ Cell
- ↑ Two days, at least, I’d been out, probably three, if I judged by the state of my hair. Rachel rubbing my head hadn’t helped. - Excerpt from Cockroaches 28.1
- ↑ But a small part of me had hoped that the Simurgh had picked me to follow. That same part of me had almost believed it, taken it for granted. It was horrible and scary and almost wrong, having an Endbringer at one’s beck and call, but I’d been prepared to shoulder the burden. I wanted to handle it, so people I cared about wouldn’t have to.
Another part of me? Maybe it had wanted her to be stuck to me, just to have one more tether keeping me connected, at a point where I felt like I wasn’t very connected at all.
And perhaps I wanted it to have the power so close to hand, so I could be relevant. - Excerpt from Cockroaches 28.6 - ↑ One pass. A lazy swoop with the swarm, the knife suspended by threads.
I couldn’t see, even with the camera, but I was aware of Mantellum stopping in his tracks. The boundaries of the circle stopped drifting in the general direction of the stairwell.
I waited, willed the lights to flicker. Time passed.
People were reacting, outside the circle. How much damage had I done?
The lights went out.
Another pass.
Mantellum’s effect dissipated. The blind spot filled in, a crowd, capes, blood spraying. My bugs could sense them all. - Excerpt from Venom 29.5 - ↑ Floret shrugged. “We could handle a computer, a lock, even a vault, no sweat. But not this. The plan was to wait for the group on the other side of the facility to forge their way through the steel, or around the steel, but someone gave the Custodian a tinker-made super death knife, and well…”
“That was me,” I said. “Nothing to do with the Custodian.”
“Ah, well,” Satyr said. “Good and bad to any situation. We’ll be able to assert control over that group more easily, with their leadership dead. And there won’t be as great a chance that they take the good Doctor out before we can get a word in… but progress will be slower, and we don’t have much time to spare." - Excerpt from Venom 29.6 - ↑ Except thinking was harder still. I was a husk, and things were rotting from the inside out. I’d hoped I’d recuperate some when I had less people in my control, but it didn’t seem like it worked out that way. Damage done was damage done. One section of my brain was swelling or creeping out to take over other sections, like it had overwritten dog-girl’s social perceptions. - Excerpt from Speck 30.6
- ↑ “I’m not getting enough details here to paint a picture. I trust the hell out of you, but I’m not sure this is you, Taylor.”
I pocketed my phone, then reached into my belt. I hesitated for an instant, then pressed my hand to my chest for long seconds. I knew I didn’t have time to spare, but… no. I didn’t have time to spare.
I opened a portal twenty feet above Tattletale, then opened my hand. The little tube of pepper spray dropped through the portal. Tattletale caught it. - Excerpt from Speck 30.2 - ↑ “A choice?”
“Life and death. Or so I thought. I chose death, and she gave me life, and I’m still trying to reconcile why.” - Excerpt from Interlude: End - ↑ Her hand touched her forehead, and she felt a pair of soft spots, each barely wider across than a dime. She ran her hand over her short hair. She didn’t know how it had happened, but she could guess. Bullets to disable her, surgery to seal her power away.
Cauldron, apparently, did have a means of locking powers away. Or maybe it was Contessa, doing the work, or perhaps she’d simply been kept alive, carted to Panacea or Bonesaw, who could fix things up.
But dwelling on those things wasn’t healthy, and it was pointless in the end. She’d likely never get a serious answer. She only had the two dimples or holes in her skull, the sole apparent casualty of some kind of brain surgery. - Excerpt from Interlude: End - ↑ Point_Me_@_The_Sky: Now she’s gone and you’re still here.
FlippinMad: Gone?
FlippinMad: she retired? Or she’s dead? Gone gone?
Point_Me_@_The_Sky: She is *gone*. - Glow-worm P.9 - ↑ ViVaVl29: Dropped ward a couple months ago. Just want to know do we ever definitively find out Taylor’s situation?
Wildbow: In Glow-Worm, it's stated outright that she's gone. - Conversation with by Wildbow on Reddit - ↑ Wildbow: This is probably my favorite line as the author, but for different reasons. It's the summation of Taylor.
Her frustrations from start to finish, the distorted narrative, the personal struggles and the struggles she sees elsewhere, and her view that it's because people aren't on the same page. She straddles the line between good guy and bad and vainly tries and fails to bridge it, like someone standing on a bridge, holding ropes attached to anchors on either side, striving to tie the two ropes into a knot. It's reflected in the coordination of the bugs and her inability to properly coordinate everything else. She views her successes as successes only if they help bridge the gap and coordinate people, she doesn't see genuine victories as victories unless they hit that mark.
That final moment, where she's torn down friends because they were in her way, and she's finally gotten everyone on the same page, just so happens to be when she reaches her crescendo, ceases being Taylor and starts becoming the shard. - Comment on Reddit - ↑ I've written more than one series with an unreliable narrator. One had a protagonist who lied to herself and self-justified well enough the audience got caught up in it. Some didn't quite 'get it' and took her at face value even as she did some reprehensible things, well past the series ending, or only 'got it' on a reread of the work. - Wildbow on Reddit
- ↑ Taylor, as a character, is painfully lacking in self awareness, and tends to compartmentalize and optimize. Throughout the story, as things are tense, she finds herself faced with situation after situation that sees her pursue her immediate needs and handling the immediate crises. - Wildbow on Reddit
- ↑
6. Taylor is a minority victim
I believe I said she would be at risk of becoming or being read as a minority victim, not that she was already one. My apologies if I was unclear.
7. Her sexuality is central to her character and would be on prominent display at school.
Not necessarily.
At school, she's being targeted and victimized. She's already hiding a great deal of herself already (masking herself with certain clothing choices, eating in the bathroom stall), retreating from the world. Failing to mention that she's hiding her sexuality (which she would be, given Emma or Sophia would target or use against her) would seem like an odd choice, making it read more like the sexuality was tacked on & that I had no interest in the deeper ramifications of a GBLT character, beyond the 'lesbians are story bonus points' mentality. Reviews then call out the story on this. Readers take it as a cue and then take that cue to a conclusion.
Mentioning it, conversely, would push things towards 'Worm is a story that starts with anti-gay bullying' in the public eye. I know you really want things to just be taken in stride, for it to be a non-factor, but that's not how it goes. - Wildbow on Spacebattles - ↑ Sexual preferences - Taylor is not a lesbian. Or bi. I would have made more of it if she were, because that sort of thing is an automatic bump in readers, but it's too easy and too cheap. - Answering Questions? (Wildbow, spacebattles.com, 2014-01-14)
- ↑ “It’s fine. I’m not offended, I am a villain. But I’m also a person under this mask. Someone who prefers tea to coffee, who enjoys reading, who…” I floundered. “…likes sweet and savory foods but dislikes anything spicy or sour. Point being, I’m someone who wants to make sure you get taken care of. Especially if you’re among the people I’m protecting in the territory I’m claiming. Go. Find a bed.” - Excerpt from Infestation 11.3
- ↑ “Details about you, your tastes and priorities. Maybe I’ll have tea ready the next time we meet. Black, green, herbal?”
“Black.” - Excerpt from Drone 23.4 - ↑ Jump up to: 243.0 243.1 “Green?” he asked me. “The others drink green.”
“Black. With milk.” - Excerpt from Venom 29.9 - ↑ “I’m okay,” Skitter said, without looking up. She removed her hands from her face and leaned back. There was no sign of tears – her eyes were dry. Just tired. “Could I bother you to make me a cup of tea? Milk, drop of honey.”
Sierra nodded, “I remember.” - Excerpt from Interlude 14.x - ↑ I sipped on the tea. My dad had made it with sugar, not honey. - Excerpt from Colony 15.10
- ↑ “Blood type?”
“AB.” - Excerpt from Colony 15.7 - ↑ https://parahumans.wordpress.com/2013/08/17/extinction-27-2/