NO PLUMBERS ALLOWED: Shroom 3-2

Jubilee wasn’t so bad, Tess had decided. She was far too talkative, but she paid attention when Tess talked back and her cheerfulness was infectious. She was even not completely useless, what with the watering can balanced precariously on her head yet never falling. Tess wasn’t sure how Jubilee managed that, even after watching her work, but she did a good job regardless. The day passed quickly after that. Tess set herself up a cot in the corner of the warehouse and slept fairly peacefully.

The big purple one joined them the next day. Grape wasn’t able to contribute much, but he was quiet and didn’t take up as much space as you’d expect looking at him, so Tess let him be.

These two were much better company than the pair of mopers were at any rate.

The crops were growing about as fast as they’d expected. Tiny blue shoots had appeared in one planter, which was a good sign. They were growing fast enough that Tess could actually see them pushing dirt aside if she watched long enough, which meant these were almost certainly going to be super shrooms rather than mini mushrooms. Which on the one hand was good, but on the other meant more work for her. Regular Shrooms were fairly low-maintenance, needing only a periodic watering and a tiny pulse of energy that Tess could provide without much effort, but the higher in quality the shrooms needed, the more attention they’d need in turn.

“Uh, Tess?” Jubilee called. “It’s happening again.”

And then there was the weird one. One specific planter box was behaving oddly. Every time they checked on it the soil was bone dry, and flaky. She’d changed the topsoil out several times, and every time she came back to it it had gone bad again.

Whatever was growing in this box was leaching nutrients out of the soil faster than they could provide them. Tess supposed this is what happened when there wasn’t enough magic in the environment to supplement the nutrients. She hoped it was an entire box of Ultra Shrooms, which would be a miracle this early on.

But Ultra Shrooms wouldn’t explain the way the box rattled on its table every now and then. Tess had an inkling as to what was growing there, but it was too early to make any assumptions.

They emptied the watering can into the plot and watched as before their eyes the soil dried out again.

“Tch.” Tess shook her head. “This is ridiculous. Let’s see if we can find a hose. Maybe if we just give it a constant stream it’ll settle down.”

“Okay!”

While she ran off to find the hose, someone knocked at the door and a dockworker entered carrying a bucket of leaves.

“You, uh, wanted this, miss?” he asked, eyeing the PRT guard sheepishly.

“Aye. Give it here.” Tess took the bucket and set it down near the table where the Fire Flowers were growing. “Either of you got a lighter?”

The dockworker patted his pockets but came up empty. After a moment, the guard shrugged and produced a pocket lighter. “Here.”

“Thank you kindly.” Tess set the leaves on fire and blew on them until they started smoking. “Fire Flowers like smoke. And then afterwards I need to mix the ashes in with the soil.”

The dockworker left in a hurry, but the guard leaned forward. He looked at the little flower buds, with a hint of red already poking through, and hummed.

“Hey, uh, Miss Tess? How is it that you know how to do all this but Toymaker didn’t?”

“Hah!” Tess waved at the smoke to push it in the flowers’ direction. “The princess has a black thumb. She’s more concerned with gears than growth.”

The guard blinked. “Okay. But that’s not really my question. How do you know this when she didn’t?”

Tess sent him a flat stare. “I was made to garden, of course I know how to. I’m here specifically because the Boss can’t.”

The guard let out a frustrated grunt. “Okay. That still doesn’t explain--”

“Tess!” Jubilee called, sounding frantic.

They looked over, and even Grape woke up to see Jubilee getting flailed about by an out-of-control hose, spraying water everywhere.

Tess tilted her head. “How are you holding onto that?” she yelled.

“How am I--?!” As if waiting for the question to be asked, logic abruptly reasserted itself and Jubilee went flying, knocking out a window on her way out.

Tess winced. “Is she--?”

“I’m okay!”

Grape breathed a sigh of relief. Or maybe it was exasperation.

---------------------------------------

The DWU offices were contained in a five-story building made of gray brick. Once upon a time it had been painted blue and white, but age and neglect had caused it to fade. Only the bottom floor was still kept painted, touched up every few months to keep the dockworkers busy when things got slow. The upper floors had a few splashes of blue here and there, but by and large the building looked as dead as the rest of the Docks. The top two floors weren’t even used anymore, there not being enough clerks left to manage every office.

It was also a very good test for the Ultra Boots.

Taylor ran home the second the bell rang, barely taking the time to change into her costume before jumping in the pipe.

Rigel hopped in a circle around her. “Yep, you just crouch like that… little more, lean forward a bit… Okay, do you feel anything?”

“I feel silly.” Taylor adjusted her feet so they were spread a bit further apart.

“I mean aside from that,” the starbunny said. He pulled a paper from his vest and squinted at it. “The technical manual says that if you’re doing it right, you should feel a sort of… tension, from your knees to your ankles.”

Taylor considered that, looking down at her legs. “I mean, I feel that, but I’m pretty sure it’s just because I’m standing weirdly.”

Nobel kicked his own boots against the ground. “Do mine do anything special?”

Rigel glanced at them. “Aside from being yellow? No, they’re just normal boots.” He jumped onto the fire escape’s landing, about ten feet up. “C’mon, Taylor! It shouldn’t be hard, jumping is like a basic skill, like running.”

Taylor grimaced. Taking a moment to stretch, she fell back into a crouch and bounced on her toes, searching for anything that felt like what Rigel described. She knew how to jump, of course she did. She was almost certain that the boots shouldn’t be this hard to work.

Well, the only thing to do was to give it a try. Taylor tensed, and--

“Taylor?”

--misfired, was the only word that sprang to mind. Her legs uncoiled, but she stumbled in surprise and tumbled heel over head, sailing over the fire escape and falling in a heap onto the fourth-floor landing. She groaned, rubbing her head.

“Taylor, what the hell?!”

Turning over to look down (glasses only slightly askew), Taylor saw her dad on the ground, staring up at her wide-eyed with a hand over his chest. Taylor sighed and walked down the stairs to where Rigel was. And also, Nobel somehow. Taylor stared at the bomb questioningly.

“...He startled me too, Boss.”

Taylor rolled her eyes and vaulted the railing, dropping down next to her Dad and folding her arms.

Danny took a moment to get his breathing under control, staring at her in shock. “What… was that?” he asked slowly.

“Testing.” Taylor tapped her boot’s heel against the ground, showing them off. “I realized I never tried to see what these can do. Is that okay?” she asked, a bit more bite in her tone than she might have intended.

Danny blinked, eyes wide, before he composed himself. “I--Yes, actually, I think that’s a good idea. A great one, actually.”

“Oh.” Taylor paused. “Really?”

“Of course? It only makes sense.” Danny nodded to himself and reached up. After a moment of hesitation, he clapped the hand over her shoulder and gave it a quick squeeze. “...I just saw you back here when I stepped out for some air and wanted to see what you were doing. Glad to see you found a way to occupy yourself.”

They stood there awkwardly. After a few seconds too long, Danny removed his hand and nodded stiffly. “I guess I should get back now. Town Hall’s looking for someone to fill in potholes on Captain’s Hill, and I’m hoping I can get us the job. We’ll talk later.”

“Sure Dad,” Taylor said, unenthusiastic.

He stood there a bit longer before finally turning and leaving to go back inside. The moment he was out of sight Taylor let out a deep sigh.

Nobel fell down beside her with a clatter. “All good, Boss?” he asked, wobbling on his side.

Taylor helped set him upright and frowned, thinking. “...Is it weird that I kind of don’t want to do this now?”

The black bomb blinked. “...No? Why?”

“Because Dad approved of it,” she said, flushing. Saying it out loud made it sound… bad.

“I knew a guy like that once,” Rigel chimed in. “He was a purple Lu--uh, Starbunny, who got really mad over something and started doing things specifically because Mama said not to.” After a moment’s thought, he finished with, “He’s a black hole now.”

Taylor and Nobel stared at Rigel, then turned back to each other without acknowledging him further. “But you’re right, it’s silly,” Taylor decided. “Let’s see if we can figure this jumping thing out.”

“Right! You almost had it,” Rigel said, “You just need to--”

Taylor jumped, soaring past Rigel at speed.

“Yeah, that.”

At the top of her jump, she just barely managed to crest the top of the building. The sudden speed had surprised her, so she almost forgot to move, but at the last moment before gravity grabbed her again she reached out with one foot and stepped smartly onto the roof. It was so unexpected that all she could do was burst out laughing.

Rigel jumped up the fire escape to join her. “Nice one!” He grinned. “This is gonna be fun, now I get to teach you wall-jumps, and spin-jumps, and backflips, and dives, and--”

“Ha, let’s try to see if I can do that again, first, yeah?” Taylor smiled, tuning out Rigel’s chatter as she climbed back down the metal stairs. “Maybe I should join a gymnastics class or something.”

“Oh, oh!”

Taylor watched as Rigel jumped straight from the roof to the ground, ignoring the drop as if the fall was nothing.

“I know! You want to practice jumping, the best way to do that is some good old fashioned obstacle courses!” Rigel said, hopping in circles.

Taylor glanced at her boots, shrugged, and jumped from the third floor. Hitting the ground with both feet produced nothing but a tiny jolt that didn’t even hurt. Her power was awesome.

Nobel tapped his foot in thought. “Obstacle course… Well, that could take some doing,” he mused, “but there’s plenty of material to work with around the Docks. Maybe we could move some construction equipment around, pile up some cinder blocks… I bet Clay would like the challenge, and Sterling might even help him. This seems like the kind of thing he’d approve of.”

“Oh, actually, I was thinking we’d go hopping across the rooftops,” Rigel said.

“...Oh.”

-----------------------------------

Not too much later, Danny found himself outside the office again, leaning against the rails by the steps with Kurt. It was really a lovely day, and part of him rebelled at the idea of being indoors when the sun was shining.

Danny took a sip of his mug and grimaced. The office coffee maker was older than he was… maybe he could ask Taylor to do something with it.

The clash of metal on stone rang across the pier as Cici bounced and rolled around, chewing on a piece of scrap metal. Danny’s mood fell at seeing the dog-thing, and then even further at the words on his coffee mug proclaiming him the World’s Greatest Dad.

He sighed. “Kurt, I don’t have any idea what I’m doing anymore.”

His friend looked at him from the corner of his eye and shrugged. “I think you’re doing fine. Lord knows how I’d deal with a parahuman kid.”

“I thought things were going great. Taylor and I were working together, she was happy, I was feeling pretty good about this whole thing. We’re making money, Taylor thinks she can make Brockton better and I believe she can too.” Danny hung his head. “Then this mess with Squealer, and Taylor just doesn’t get it.”

Kurt leaned back, watching the Chomp. He knew Danny well enough to know he wasn’t done talking yet.

“What am I supposed to do? The entire Bay saw that race that only happened because she thought leading Squealer on a wild goose chase was a better idea than calling the cops! And that wasn’t even the first time she’d fought her! And she doesn’t seem to get why I grounded her!”

Danny began gesticulating halfway through, until a significant portion of his drink splashed out onto the concrete. He glared at his mug accusingly.

Kurt grunted to let him know he was still listening. He watched in fascination as Cici separated a length of rebar from the scrap and began using her tongue to bend it into a rough heart shape.

“She’s not listening to me. At least she’s still listening to Nobel, mostly.” He sagged in place. “At least she’s not moping in her room now. She’s testing out those boots around the back now, which--I didn’t know those were something that needed testing, but if they are then I’m glad it’s being done.” Danny set his mug on the ground and stared at the guardrail. “She just… keeps rushing headlong into everything. I can't see her get hurt, and she will be if she doesn’t slow down.”

“She’s definitely her parents’ child,” Kurt snorted. At Danny’s glare, he held up his hands in defense. “Hey, I’m not sure what you want from me, Dan, me and Lacey never had kids. I’m not sure why you aren’t asking Lou, or Paul.”

“They aren’t friends like you are,” Danny admitted. “I trust you to tell me when I’m fucking up.”

“Oh.” Kurt considered that. “What about Barnes? He works with Brandish, doesn’t he? Maybe he has some insight.”

“Ugh. That’s another thing I need to figure out,” Danny muttered. “I know something happened between Taylor and Emma, and Alan doesn’t want to talk about it. Maybe I should just march over there and make him tell me…”

Silence fell between them, and Kurt took the opportunity to pull out his phone. He logged into PHO and started browsing. Getting an account had seemed the prudent thing to do, what with them working with a cape now.

He squinted at an article titled “Hellhound: Last Seen?” when Cici bounded over and dropped her efforts in front of them. It was a crude metal statue that had been chewed into the shape of a bone, with the rebar heart on top.

Kurt smiled. “Wow, good girl. It looks great.” He gave her a pat.

“ARF ARF!” Cici beamed and bounced away happily to find more scrap.

Danny looked the statue up and down, faintly impressed. “How’s Rachel settling in, by the way?”

“Oh, she’s doing fine. Took a while to open up, but you know Lacey, she loves animals. Once the dogs started wagging their tails Rachel relaxed too. I think I saw her smile at dinner yesterday.” Kurt grinned, though it fell quickly. “We finally got a bed set up for her, but she still prefers sleeping in the den in a big pile with the dogs. It’s cute, but also kind of worrying.”

“Mhmm.”

Kurt scrolled through the forum for a bit, looking for anything interesting or Brockton-related, when Danny spoke up again.

“Maybe I should make a peace offering. Let her go ahead and upgrade the phones… Or, or maybe a day out. She used to like bowling, maybe we could--”

“I wouldn’t,” Kurt cautioned, refreshing the page. “Rumor is that Starlanes is an Empire money laundering scheme. Maybe try tennis, Arcadia Courts is pretty cheap considering where it is.”

“Tennis?” Danny made a considering face. “Why tennis?”

Kurt shrugged. “I don’t know, I just get the feeling Taylor’d enjoy… it… uh.” Kurt frowned as he took in the most recent article, posted less than a minute ago.

Toymaker Sighting: The Bay’s Newest Cape.

Kurt tapped the link and the article consisted mostly of a video taken off someone’s phone. It was shaky and had crap quality, but it was pretty clearly a video of Toymaker jumping off the Medhall building to land on the next building over, carrying a black ball and followed by a blur of blue and white.

“...Danny, you might want to see this.”

--------------------------------------

Taylor landed hard on the next building, rolling forward back onto her feet with Nobel still firmly held against her chest.

“I don’t like this Boss!” Nobel said, voice tight.

Rigel bounded past, laughing, and Taylor smirked under her mask. “Get back here!”

“Can’t catch me!” Rigel twisted in midair to pull his eyelid down and stick out his tongue, completing the turn in time to land on the next roof.

Jumping around in these boots was an interesting experience. She could still feel the force behind each landing, the longer falls sending jolts up her legs, but nothing came of the feeling, no pain or injury whatsoever. If she had to compare it to anything, the landings after the longest falls felt like a split-second of pins and needles, or maybe goosebumps?

Taylor still didn’t have any idea how these boots worked, but they really really did. I should really start figuring this stuff out soon.

The next building was close to five stories shorter than the last, and Taylor found herself laughing as the wind blew past her face. “Ya-hooooo!”

“Boss, I would really like to be put down now!”

Her landing was enough to put cracks in the roof, and Taylor winced as the force of that finally managed to hurt a little. Not much. About the same as if she’s just missed a step at the top of the stairs and put her foot down too hard. “Yeah, okay, we can stop here for a bit,” she said, setting the bomb down gently. Turning around, Taylor took in how far they’d traveled by roof-hopping. The Medhall building was already a few blocks away, and the previous rooftop loomed overhead to cast them in its shadow. “Wow, that was a pretty big drop, wasn’t it?”

Nobel staggered to the side, eyes wide. “I don’t think I’m cut out for this kinda thing. I like being on the ground a whole lot better.”

“Do you know how fast we were going?” Taylor asked. “We must have gone five blocks in less than a minute!”

“I was too busy fearing for my life, Boss,” Nobel said, sounding a little reproachful.

“Don’t be a baby, you’ve got the same boots as everyone else, as long as you land on your feet you’ll be fine,” Taylor said, waving a hand. “Also, you’re made of metal. Anything you land on is going to be in worse shape than you.”

“Easy for you to say, you’ve got all those limbs and stuff for steering.”

Taylor frowned. “...No, that’s fair. Sorry.” She looked back up thoughtfully. “Still, that was fun, but I feel like something’s missing.”

“Yeah,” Rigel said, coming back from having gotten ahead. “I need to teach you how to build Blocks next, I think. It’d be a good idea anyway, since you’re preparing that order and everything. They’re good for storage, and they’re great as obstacles in a course.”

Taylor nodded. She had a vague idea of what he was talking about; she was pretty sure she had it in her sketchbook, but she couldn’t be certain. She knew it had to be something important, if he was saying Blocks with a capital B.

…She rubbed at her eyes, chasing that thought away. “I’m not sure that I’d be allowed to just scatter blocks across the city, but maybe an obstacle course could be good. Now,” Taylor said, looking up at the next building. “Where to next?”

The rooftop they were currently on was much shorter than either of its neighbors, and the next in line was as tall as the previous. The Super Jump was still finicky, and she was likely to lose control if she wasn’t careful, but even her highest “normal” jump couldn’t take her more than two stories high, let alone five. Luckily there was a fire escape climbing up the side, but then she had to face another problem.

Taylor strolled to the edge of the rooftop and tried to judge the distance. The alley wasn’t any wider than the others she’d jumped so far, but this building’s roof was shaped weird. The top, where she was standing, was perfectly flat, but there was a sloped section leading down towards her destination’s direction that was too steep for her to get any purchase on, and that left a gap she didn’t think she could clear.

“Ooh!” Rigel said. “Let me teach you the long jump!”

“The long jump?”

“Yeah, it’s great for clearing large gaps like this,” the rabbit explained. “First, you need a running start, then just before the edge you crouch and press A at the same time--”

“Press a what? Why would pressing anything help?”

“What?”

“What?”

“Wait, hold on.” Rigel slapped himself. “Sorry, I got confused. Just let me show you!”

The Starbunny hopped to the far edge of the roof and then broke into a sprint. Just before the roof started sloping away, he tensed his legs and leapt, legs extended in front of him.

He didn’t quite make it, until he did a spin in mid air that somehow gave him the extra height he needed to land on the fire escape. “Nothing to it!”

Taylor frowned. “What was that spin you did?”

“Just a spin jump,” Rigel said dismissively. “It’s a whole other thing. You shouldn’t need to do that, you’ve got way longer legs than I do so you should go further probably?”

“Probably?” Nobel asked, concerned. “Maybe we should just drop down and find a different way back up, Boss. Or, new idea, call it here and go home and get some light reading in. We tested the Boots well enough already, right?”

Taylor snorted, hefting the Bob-omb up in one arm. “Come on, Nobel, where’s your sense of adventure?”

“I left it on top of Medhall, just before you jumped,” Nobel deadpanned. “Can you even make the jump while carrying me?”

“Nope,” Taylor said, finishing the word with a pop. And then she threw him across the gap.

“Gah!” Nobel spun in the air and landed with a crash on the escape hard enough to shake rust flakes everywhere.

“Nice throw, Taylor! Seven out of ten!” Rigel cheered.

“Only a seven?” she muttered to herself, backing up.

Taylor judged the distance one last time, then took off. The instant her foot touched the edge, she bent her legs like coiled springs and then extended all at once, and it felt like she was flying. The alley opened up beneath her, her hair whipping back. She stretched her legs out in front of her like Rigel had, preparing to land…

…And bonked against the railing, bouncing off and falling into the alley below.

“Oops,” Rigel said mildly.

“Boss!” Nobel followed her with his eyes, and both him and Rigel blinked when they saw her fall directly into a wide, green pipe.

“...Huh,” the Starbunny said. “What’s that doing there?”

“Don’t worry Boss, I’m coming!”

Nobel hopped from the scaffolding directly into the pipe below. Rigel watched him go, nonplussed.

He waited a moment to see if they’d come back up. When they didn’t after a full minute, Rigel shrugged and jumped down too.