Fanfic / Here Be Dragons

"Unless I was willing to take it to the extremes I could, there was nothing I could do except take it until they ran out of steam, which they thankfully seemed to be starting to. But I had to ask myself the same question I did every time this happened—how long could I keep this up? How long could I keep my power in check when it grew harder every day? How long before something made me snap?"

— Taylor, chapter one, Tempting Fate

A Worm fanfic by Ryuugi written on the Spacebattles forums.

There are many fanfictions for the Worm fandom. Most run on some combination of three principles — fixing what went wrong in the canon continuity, Rule of Cool, and Revenge Fic. Here Be Dragons is a fic that does all three at the same time. At its core, it is a For Want Of A Nail fic with the premise that Taylor received Lung's Scale to Threat power.

The fic opens with Taylor Hebert's last day of school and the straw that broke the camel's back...

If you're looking for the Star Wars/Sword of the Stars crossover series of the same name by Hiver, go here. And go over to Literature namespace for the Craig Alan novel.

Warning: Full story provides spoilers for canon.

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This work provides examples of:

• Adaptive Ability: Taylor's power becomes this after her second Trigger event, letting her adapt her body and abilities to create solutions to conflict and obstacles. However, the conflict is based upon her own perception as to what she considers a problem, not necessarily what will hurt or wound her, and she also doesn't need to be exposed to a injury to begin adapting to it like Crawler. She merely need to think about a potential problem and her body will respond to it, such as her inability to talk and so she grows a voicebox. It works even better and faster if she has an idea for a solution to the problem herself instead of just letting her power solve it by itself.
• Alternate Universe Fic:
  • It's not particularly obvious In-Universe but Word of God confirms that Kenta never triggered into Lung, which is why Taylor is an Outside-Context Problem even before she starts testing the uses of her power.
  • Empire Eighty-Eight is described as essentially running crime in Brockton Bay for over a decade thanks to the lack of the Azn Bad Boys to counterbalance them. Assembled at full strength, they manage to put on a better show than either the Wards, local Protectorate, or New Wave against Taylor, nearly managing to kill her.
• Bullying a Dragon: Literally, though only Taylor knew that.
• Curbstomp Battle: Taylor vs almost everyone. Eidolon does pretty damn well before Contessa does her thing and gives Taylor a second trigger.
• Dead Fic: Has not updated in some time.
• Genius Bruiser: Taylor manages to produce an enormous variety of effects from pyrokinesis early on, notably flight by using it as rockets and battlefield surveillance by sensing distortions in the fire, to even causing No Conservation of Energy when she runs out of oxygen to fuel her flames, instead multiplying more fire from the previous fires to ignore the issue; Eidolon theorises that she's actually drawing upon oxygen from an external source, possibly another dimension courtesy of her Shard. She later upgrades her flames to Technicolor Fire of the much hotter blue and then white flames, can control streams of flame to bend and change directions sharply, can condense them to act like lasers of pure heat, then later figures out how to evolve her power to thermokinesis, allowing her manipulation of heat itself. She uses this to perform cryokinesis through absorbing heat from water to make ice, atmóskinesis from manipulating heat in the air to control how steam and water vapour moves, and hydrokinesis through absorbing heat from steam to turn it to water, which she could then turn into ice if she so chooses. And, after her second Trigger, her thermokinesis had evolved to the point that it's basically a part of her; she was able to use heat around her and in people as a form of clairvoyance, allowing her to see without eyes and hear without ears, even able to gaze back at her own body with the heat. Her pyrokinetic powers gained an increase in precision and lethality, such as her having her fire produce deadly fumes to choke and poison, burning all the oxygen in the area to suffocate opponents, guiding her flames and heat to cook someone inside an ice barrier without melting the ice by forcing the heat energy to not be wasted melting something she didn't want to, absorbing so much heat that she generates liquid nitrogen on her body that she moulds into additional armor that, again, she controls to not melt in the slightest, or compressing a massive amount of heat and fire into the size of a marble and having it zip through her targets at speeds most capes can't dodge, let alone survive the marble. Her regenerative powers had evolved to the point where she doesn't need a beating heart, can grow new limbs in seconds, and can adapt to whatever problem she faces. Who knows what she'll come with if and when she starts producing plasma like Lung does when sufficiently transformed.
• I Shall Taunt You: As the Protectorate is fighting Taylor after considering her a baby Endbringer, Dragon notices that the Simurgh is facing directly towards Brockton Bay. However, Dragon is very much aware that it could simply be a bluff (or double bluff, or triple bluff, etc.), but notes in a report that it could potentially be more evidence on Taylor becoming an Endbringer. Though she subnotes that it could be the Simurgh being a bitch.
• It Only Works Once:
  • This Trope is invoked after Taylor gets her new powerup.
  • Even before then, this is largely in effect, as Taylor turns pyrokinesis into an insanely flexible power.
  • With her second Trigger, any attack used against her she will adapt to, sometimes instantly, sometimes after a short minute.
• Mundane Utility: One of the powers Eidolon picks up allows him to manipulate liquids, so he mixes drinks with it.
• Mythology Gag: The "Birdcage" trick Vista and Gallant attempt on Taylor is similar to how the C.U.I. tried to confine Lung in canon.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero:
  • Vista and Gallant's "Birdcage" trick of trying to confine Taylor. Unfortunately, the emotion Gallant blasted was despair, which reminded Taylor far too much of the locker she triggered in. Things only got worse from there.
  • Photon Mom tried to confine Taylor too. That only made her more desperate. Cue creating flames from flames.
• Oh, Crap!: Several capes have this reaction to Taylor. Tattletale has it to the arrival of Contessa.
  Lisa's power: Can’t win. Can’t run.
• One-Winged Angel: By the end of the Eidolon fight Taylor has two heads, has a additional pair of Blade Below the Shoulder limbs, and is Multi-Armed and Dangerous. She is also rated as Brute 12, at least, along with an equally high Blaster rating. And that's just the basics...
  • In addition, unlike Lung who eventually powers down, Taylor seems to be incapable of transforming back into a person, making her current monstrous form semi-permanent; the "semi" referring to any further growth she could attain. This inability is likely due to her Second Trigger.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: Eidolon. He's the only person who tries to help Taylor at all.
• Red Herring: Legend, among others, mistakes Taylor for a burgeoning Endbringer, and see her as heralding the end of their lives as they know it. Because Parahumans everywhere will automatically be suspect now that (they think) they know the origin of Behemoth, Leviathan, and the Simurgh. The thought of becoming such monsters is also demoralizing.
• Required Secondary Powers: Eidolon notes after getting caught by Taylor's Super-Speed that the Manton Effect doesn't protect her from the sudden acceleration and deceleration, which turned her organs to pulp and causing her to vomit blood. But her Healing Factor barely makes this an issue. It appears to no longer be a problem after her second Trigger, her bones become dense hollow shells while filling with an unknown fluid that makes Taylor incredibly light and seems to protect her from her own velocity.
• Serial Escalation: Yes.
  • Legend's internal narration in Chapter 2.1 notes how each Endbringer unveiled a new level and dimension of horror. First was Behemoth, who provided an enemy that massed legions of capes could only barely hold off, and that with horrifying casualties, who taught the heroes that there were forces against which even they were helpless. Then there was Leviathan, the Second. He showed that Behemoth was not an isolated enemy, that there were two and there could be even more to follow. And then came the Simurgh, who introduced the idea of not merely being killed, but being subverted, turned against those you loved and made to destroy everything you valued. And continuing the trend, Fafnir, who proved what everyone had desperately hoped was not the case: that the Endbringers were broken capes, that any of them might some day become the next Behemoth or Leviathan, that humanity's only defense against the Endbringers was also the source of the Endbringers themselves. As Legend's internal narration puts it:
    No matter how much he wished it wasn’t, he could believe this was a fourth Endbringer because it was horrible enough to be.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: Contessa somehow manages to be even more detestable in Here Be Dragons than she was in canon.
• Took a Level in Kindness: Eidolon, to quite a few readers' surprise.