ffutures | Fanfic - Worm / The War of the Worlds

Continuing my Worm / War of the Worlds crossover story.

The previous chapters are archived on these sites:
On Twisting the Hellmouth - https://www.tthfanfic.org/story.php?no=33872
On AO3 - https://archiveofourown.org/works/39112812
On Fanfiction.net - https://www.fanfiction.net/s/14083560/1/The-Martian

See chapter I for disclaimers.

III: A Princess of Mars

"Okay... so... Let me get this straight... Aunt Hannah is Miss Militia? And you didn't know?"

"Of course I knew," said Dad, "I was trying to remind her that you didn't know. And surprised that she revealed herself like that."

"Your sister is Miss Militia, and you didn't think it was a good idea to tell me? I know capes have to keep secret identities, but it's kinda important. What if you'd needed me to cover up in some way? I wouldn't have had a clue what was going on."

"This is where it gets complicated," said Dad. "Basically, Hannah isn't my sister. She needed a cover ID when she came to Brockton Bay, and we agreed to help."

"I was born in the Middle East and came here in eighty-five," said Hannah. "When I was in New York that wasn't a problem, there are plenty of Martian-Americans with that background there so it wasn't hard to keep a secret identity, but it meant that I wasn't really up to speed on American-born Martians. When I transferred here I had to come up with a better cover, if I'd used my old one it would have been too easy to track me down. Annette was one of the teachers that helped me with that, and we became friends. I was able to help her and Danny with some problems, and they helped me with my cover."

"Problems?"

"You had to say that?" said Danny.

"It's probably time she knew anyway. Could we have some privacy for a few minutes?"

"Call me when you need me," said Armsmaster, and headed for the door.

Danny's tentacles knotted and unknotted, and the chromatophores in his skin turned purple and back to the usual green, a sure sign he was upset or embarrassed about something. "Okay... let's just say that your mother and I had some reproductive issues, it isn't that uncommon... The Martian population is still pretty small, there's been a lot of in-breeding, and all of our ancestors were exposed to radiation during the trip to Earth, heat rays, weird chemicals and every other kind of crap that the invasion threw at us. Annette and I, we tried it both ways, didn't make any difference if I was the male or she was. Our embryos just weren't viable, they died within a couple of weeks of fertilization."

"How did you fix it?"

"We couldn't. About all we could do was ask a friend to help, someone who wasn't a close relative."

"You and Hannah?" It wasn't hard to put the pieces together. Something similar was part of the back-story in Veronica Mars, though they never went into details.

"Not exactly," said Hannah. "We tried a couple of different things, and in the end one of them worked. Let me put it this way... Taylor, I am your father."

OK, wasn't expecting that. "And you really think a Darth Vader joke is the way to tell me?"

"Did it work?"

"Damned if I know. It just feels weird, like everything I know is wrong."

"Annette really was your mother," said Danny, "and trust me, if you think this is weird, it could have been a lot worse."

"Dare I ask?" asked Hannah.

"It's a little before your time, but Annette and Lustrum had a thing before we were married, they stayed friends until a few months before Lustrum was sent to the Birdcage. If she'd still been around there's a pretty good chance that she would have ended up as Taylor's mom or dad."

"TMI, Dads!"

"Now that's going to get confusing," said Dad - Danny, that is.

"Don't worry," said Hannah, "she's messing with you. You do all the Dad stuff, not me, I really wasn't cut out to be a parent."

"Are you okay with it, Taylor?"

"I guess. Just to check, do I have any brothers or sisters out there?"

"No. I've been asked a couple of times but it's never worked out."

"How about you and dad?"

"Same problem as Annette," Danny said softly. "It's me that has the genetic issues, and to be honest we really don't think about each other that way."

"Not to mention that everyone thinks I'm his sister," said Hannah, "that's not really something we can change at this stage."

"Good point. Okay, one last question... with you as my father, am I going to end up with powers?"

Hannah shrugged a few tentacles. "We had you checked after you hatched. You have the brain structures that make it possible, and you're my child, both lower the odds quite a bit. But if you're careful you need never be in a situation where it's likely to happen."

"Okay... another last question, could whatever this about be aimed at you, not me? Could someone have found out about me being your daughter?"

"I don't see how," said Hannah, "we kept it pretty quiet. All the paperwork says you're Danny and Annette's child."

"You had me tested, that's one way someone might have found out. Did you tell anyone why you were having it done? Like your good friend Alan? Or your doctor?"

Danny thought for a second. "No, definitely not. Annette and I didn't tell anyone that you'd been conceived until it was obvious your egg was developing normally, by then the trail should have been pretty cold. We said we'd been taking red weed concentrates, that stuff's horribly expensive but it does sometimes help. A post-natal scan's recommended if you use it, because it can sometimes have side-effects, so we were covered there."

"What about inside the PRT?"

"It's in my confidential records," said Hannah, "but the only local access is Director Piggott and her deputy, and the chief medical officer."

"Okay... so it probably isn't you, can't see any reason why they should target me... maybe something to do with Danny? There has to be a reason for it. Why would Alan and Emma turn on us like that?"

"Wait a minute," said Hannah, "did Alan have anything to do with Annette's will?"

"He helped me execute it," said Danny. "There really wasn't much to it, a few donations to charities, everything else to family."

"Then he knows Annette's real name."

"Damn!"

I stared at him. "Dad... what's mom's name got to do with anything?"

"It's her full Martian name on the will. Eighty-odd syllables of it." He said the name - it was beautiful (to a Martian) and completely untranslatable. As he said it I felt something weird... like I was a better person, is the best way I can put it.

"Dad, nobody has a name that long. Even the last Supreme Leader only ran to fifty syllables or so."

"Taylor, who ruled Mars before the Supreme Leaders?"

"The God-Kings, I guess... are you kidding me? The Supreme Leaders wiped them out!"

"Almost," said Dad. "A handful went underground, pretended to be workers and tried to ride out the storm. Most of them were caught and executed, and so far as we know only one of the survivors made it to Earth. Annette's great-grandmother. You're her only surviving descendant."

"Why didn't anyone tell me?"

"Annette hoped the name would die with her. She only wrote it in the will because the form said to put in her full maiden name, neither of us thought that through."

"Any Martian reading it would know your ancestry," said Hannah. "There are all sorts of implications... hundreds of generations who regarded your ancestors as gods. Just knowing it... I'd known her for a couple of years before she mentioned it, at first it made me feel like I should be more formal, defer to her wishes. It's not quite like being Mastered, but there's something bred in. Maybe not as overt as what the Supreme Leaders did, but it wouldn't surprise me if our ancestors were bred for loyalty."

"I was like that at first," said Dad. "Fortunately it wears off."

"Could that be what's behind all this? It doesn't feel like a reason to abuse me, or try to frame me for murder."

"There are still people around that are blindly loyal to the Supreme Leaders, it was pretty much bred into them. Alan's never said anything to make me think that he's a follower, but it's possible. And the Supreme Leaders hated the God-Kings - they did the breeding loyalty thing first and did it better, if Annette's family had tried for a popular uprising the Supreme Leaders would have been toast."

"Why didn't they?"

"No idea."

"Too much risk of collateral damage," said Hannah. "The first Supreme Leader invented the Black Smoke, and took out two cities while they were wiping out the ruling God-Kings. Most of the survivors were killed in the pogroms that followed, the last few tried to keep their heads down and outlive the problem. Unfortunately the Supreme Leader founded a dynasty, and they could never build up the power base they needed to take the planet back safely."

"Okay," I said, "that's definitely a possibility, but I don't think we can do much about it here and now. Any other ideas?"

"Something to do with the union?"

"I can't think of anything," said Dad. "Like I said, Alan's helped some of our members with legal issues, but he isn't qualified for the sort of contract and labour relations work the union needs. We use a Boston law firm for that, they're specialists."

"Okay. If we're done with the private stuff, let me call Armsmaster back."

"How much of this does he know?" I asked.

"He knows about my cover, but he shouldn't know about any relationships beyond that."

"Okay. Might as well get him back, we need to work out the details of how we're going to handle this."

"Get him in," said Danny. "But I'll tell you now, Taylor stays out of jail. You can pretend you're questioning her, that's as far as it goes."

We got Armsmaster back in, and hammered out the details, which mostly amounted to written assurances that the PRT was in no way holding me responsible for any criminal activities despite the fact that I was going to be taken to the Protectorate for questioning, then Hannah called Carol Dallon on some sort of scrambled mobile phone and explained the situation. After that Dad called her law firm and gave her the cover story we'd agreed, and Armsmaster called for a PRT transport, which arrived a few minutes later.

I climbed into the back and reached out a couple of tentacles to help Dad get in when I heard a soft thud and he fell. Hannah made some sort of big gun with her power, while Armsmaster seemed to be scanning the surrounding buildings and one of the PRT guys started to give Dad first aid. It was the second time that day I'd seen blood, and this time it was green.

"Dad!" I tried to get out to help him, and another PRT trooper pushed me back. I started to scream...

CONSENSUS. DESTINATION. DECISION.

AGREEMENT.

...and suddenly everything changed.

TBC

And we're ending on a cliff-hanger. Ain't I a stinker?

Comments please before I post to archives.

Update Saturday - now posted to archives with a few changes. Most notably, I've made some changes to Hanna's cover story, see any of the archives above for the current version.