Northern Wyoming, July 5th, 01:47.
High up in the sky, a single decommissioned Bell UH-1 Iroquois helicopter, more commonly known as the 'Huey', a helicopter designed and mass produced during the Vietnam war, can be seen hovering in place.
Inside, there are only two occupants, one being the pilot, and the other being a small girl wearing a bunny mask with a red, clown nose and marching band outfit, ears poking up through the brim of a flat-top, feathered cap, with a fancy rapier at her side.
The girl doesn't seem to even be in the latter half of her teen years, and yet of the two of them, only the pilot shows signs of nervousness, while the girl in question, March, is simply on her phone, typing out a text.
'𝘏𝘦𝘺, 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘶 𝘪𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘦 𝘷𝘢𝘯?'
She sends of the message with an image attached featuring the view from her window, specifically the van in question below her.
Less than a minute later, her phone pings and she checks it to see that it's a text from an unknown number.
'𝘐𝘵'𝘴 𝘚𝘪𝘣𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘢𝘯. 𝘗𝘳𝘰𝘫𝘦𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯. 𝘔𝘢𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘳. 𝘒𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘷𝘢𝘯.'
"Huh," she says after reading the message twice, just to be sure, "the Siberian's a projection? Didn't see that coming."
She doesn't sound surprised at the request to 'kill the van', as she knew ahead of time that she could end up having to do some fighting against the Nine, and she was prepared for that.
Though, even with how notoriously dangerous the Siberian is, March doesn't seem to be all that concerned, either due to childish naivety or overconfidence, no one knows.
"Alfred!" March suddenly shouts, "down boy! Down!"
At her demanding words, the pilot, Devin, obediently starts bringing the helicopter down, not saying anything about being treated like a dog.
He's a smart man after all, and you don't survive working for capes for as long as he has without learning a simple fact.
They're all crazy. Every single one of them, is crazy. But they're crazy people who can pick up cars, figure out your social security number with a glance, turn invisible, fly, or build weapons capable of blowing up the moon, though that last one is a recent development.
As the helicopter gets closer to the ground, March opens the door and sits on the edge, eagerly awaiting the landing.
So eager is she, that she doesn't even wait for the helicopter to touch the ground, instead, she jumps off, timing her jump perfectly to be as high as it can be without causing her any damage on her landing, which is also done in perfect form, allowing her to roll to her feet as if she didn't just jump from a hight of multiple stories.
With a pep in her step, she starts making her way over to the van, only to pause as the Siberian suddenly appears in front of her, swinging a clawed hand at her chest.
But March dodges with ease, doing a backwards handstand for added theatrics before flipping back to her feet and drawing her rapier, which immediately starts to look odd, the blade subtly shifting, as if a thin membrane of energy is surrounding it, making it look just ever so slightly off..
"Hey there Zebra! Your zoo called animal control, so I'm afraid I'm gonna have to put you down, terribly sorry.~"
The Siberian doesn't respond to her words with anything more than a snarl before launching herself at March, intending to rip her to pieces as quickly as possible.
But March dodges with ease, spinning and flipping around the animalistic woman, as if she already knows everything the Siberian is going to do before she does it.
A moment of dodging later, and March finally decides to return the favour, bringing up her weapon and jabbing it forward in a simple thrust, meant to capitalise on the Siberian overextending.
Yet, the instant the blade makes contact with the Siberian, she simply winks out of existence, making the young cape pause in confusion.
"Eh?" March mutters, only to jump slightly when the Siberian reappears, a baleful scowl of frustration on her face.
"Heh." A smug grin makes it's way onto March's face as she starts approaching the van, remembering her order to 'kill' it.
Doing so causes the Siberian to attack her again, but just like last time, she can't touch March, and it only takes a single hit to pop her once more.
This repeats a few times, with March getting closer to the van every attempt, no matter how the Siberian tries to go about her assault, nothing gets past March.
Inevitably, March reaches the van, and a single swing of her sword cut's the front passenger door off it's hinges, sending it clattering to the ground as she side steps the falling door, simultaneously swinging her sword behind her right as the Siberian reforms, popping it immediately.
Inside of the van is a dishevelled, gaunt man, with sickly, untamed hair down to his shoulders, an unkempt beard and a pot belly, likely a result of all the empty pot noodles scattered about on the floor and a lack of exercise.
"W-wait! H-help me! T-they w-won't let me g-go!" The man fearfully screams as soon as he sets his eyes on March.
Unfortunately for him, she both doesn't buy the act, and also just doesn't really care.
"Uhuh, shame that," is all March says before casually throwing a rubber ball into the van and turning around, walking back to the helicopter without looking back.
Meanwhile, back in the van, the ball she threw bounces off of the dashboard and into the back of the van, causing the man to panic and rush for the open door, only for the ball to bounce again, hitting the side of the van right next to the door, and bouncing into his face, whereupon it immediately explodes.
Just like that, the Siberian, famed for fighting the entire Triumvirate and winning, even killing one of the original four, dies to a girl who didn't even properly understand why she was so formidable.
Making her way back to the helicopter, March only feels slightly disappointed that her fight wasn't really much of a fight, while the pilot is staring at her with his jaw dropped, struggling to comprehend that he just saw the death of one of the most powerful and infamous capes on the planet.
All at the hands of a young girl, barely in her teenaged years.
All of which really only confirms one thing for Devin. Capes really are crazy.
"Alright Alfred! Up! We still need to find Tear, she should be nearby."
With that, they set off again, taking a shot while to find anything, simply due to going the wrong way initially, but soon enough they come across a small clearing with a parked RV and a few people out front.
March sees Tear waving up at her and returns the favour, looking over at the scene curiously.
The first thing that she takes notice of is the corpse on the ground, because even with it being as ruined as it is, she can still recognise the face of Jack Slash.
Everybody in America probably knows his face, he's been in the news enough for that, even if the PRT does it's best to supress that, trying their hardest to keep the public's fear of capes as low as possible, with limited success.
The second thing she focuses on is the girl standing next to Tear, briefly glancing over the other two girls present in disinterest.
The girl looks like some kind of wanderer, with the poncho and boots, but as the helicopter touches down, March takes note of the blankness in her eyes, as if she is truly dead on the inside.
However that is swiftly ignored in favour of Tear, who, for some reason, is standing completely naked.
The helicopter lands, and March gets out, making her way over to Tear where she immediately asks the most important question, in her opinion.
"Why are you naked?"
"Why are you clothed?" Tear responds with a tilt of her head, as if genuinely confused.
March just nods in response, as if that was some kind of wise answer and moves on.
"So, what's up?" She asks, getting a grin from Tear.
"So glad you asked!~" She exclaims with a clap of her hands, "first of all, introductions!~ This is Lucy, formerly Crusher, formerly Carrot.~ Lucy, this is March, formally uh, well, no one, I guess.. This is March!~ Then, over there is Burnscar, and next to me is a work in progress.~"
March follows Tear's gestures to look at Burnscar, who looks like she's sleeping with her eyes open, and then down at who she recognises as Bonesaw, who looks equally as broken as Burnscar.
"Now, we've got to get going to Portland now, but we're gonna be taking these three with us.~ For now we're just waiting for the other two to make it back, then we'll probably be giving a lift to Bear too, but something tells me Crawler won't fit, so I guess we can just give him directions or something, maybe he can follow on the ground or something, I don't know how fast he is."
Nobody voices any complaints to her words, and March decides to break the ensuing silence first, nodding her head to Lucy as she does so.
"So, is she gonna be joining then?"
She doesn't specify what, but Tear clearly understands and answers with a smile.
"Well, that depends on her.~ Do you wanna be a Clown Lucy?~"
The girl in question squints at the two of them for a minute before cautiously answering.
"What do I get out of joining, and what would be expected of me?" She asks, both questions completely reasonable, so Tear has no problem answering.
In fact, she seems happy to do so, her tone almost. but not quite, bragging.
"In reverse order, all that's expected is that you help out other Clowns when they need it and you are able, unless you really don't want to, then you can just not.~ In return, you get the opportunity to make a bunch of powerful, knowledgeable and or resourceful people who can help you out with just about anything you need, and who you can share anything fun you're doing with.~ Oh yeah, that's also a requirement, you're not allowed to be boring.~ But you're all clear there, so don't worry about that.~"
Her answer causes Lucy to glance at her suspiciously, finding her answer too hard to believe.
"That sounds too good to be true. You realise those 'restrictions' are basically non-existent, and yet I'd still benefit from the resources of the others anyway?"
"Yup!~ This isn't an organisation after all, there isn't a need to expect anything much from anyone.~ I only started all of this so that fun people can have fun without being roped into the various organisations.~ You can basically just think of it as a network of friends with similar interests banding together for the sake of freedom and safety!~"
Despite the impassioned speech, Lucy still seems somewhat sceptical, though March nodding in agreement to Tear's words gives them at least the smallest amount of extra credit.
Yet, for all her pondering, she knew her answer was inevitable, and she lets out a put upon sigh before answering.
"Well, it's not like I have any other options, do I? I doubt I could convince them to get rid of my kill order, and I don't particularly want to join a gang. So, I guess I'm in?"
Tear immediately beams at her, jumping forward to hug her.
"Hell yeah!! I've even got an idea for what you can call yourself and your costume!~ At least for your Clown identity anyway.~"
Dislodging herself from the excitable woman, Lucy gives March a deadpan look, as if blaming her for Tear being Tear, but she just gives a blithe shrug in response, making Lucy roll her eyes before turning back to Tear.
"So, what's that name? I swear, if it's something dumb I'll put bleach in your coffee."
The threat only makes Tear laugh, which soon turns into a grin as she answers the question with a single word.
"Nutcracker.~"
=================
A/N: He~llo! Dear readers!
I just wanna say, but I didn't realise until writing this just how insanely lucky Lusia is that she knows 2 all-or-nothing capes. Because, like, Siberian i an all-or-nothing cape and that means she can only be popped by other all or nothing powers, of which there are like, 8 in all of Worm, one of which is obv march. But, the fact that Siberian ended up meeting 2 all-or-nothing powers in combat in the same day is insane, and I just want to point out that this isn't a case of the author forcing unrealistic situations for the sake of plot, this was genuine chance, and I didn't realise it 'till yesterday. this is literally just lusia being insanely lucky lol
Hey so I just had a terrifying thought for all my worm fans. Imagine if foil second triggered near jack? Sting+Broadcast... long range, invisible Sting slashes.... I think that'd probably be deserving of Blaster 12+ lol
(5+)Advanced chapters with the links below!
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