Megan Tarash

Megan Tarash
by Jamie Knierim
Born	~19 years before Steelheart
Abilities	Epic
Aliases	Firefight
Groups	Reckoners
Birthplace	Portland
Homeworld	Earth (Reckoners)

Megan Tarash, also known as the Epic Firefight, is a member of Steelheart's inner circle. She infiltrated the Reckoners, a group that kills Epics, but later rejoined the group in Calamity.

“ Sometimes stupid is right. Hell. I hope nobody ever quotes me on that one. ”

— Megan before battling Prof.

History

Background

Megan grew up in Portland, Oregon. Her father believed that a nuclear apocalypse was on the horizon, a belief Megan scorned at the time, and trained his children in hunting and other survival skills. Her house burned down when she was very young, and she has nightmares about this. Megan joined the Reckoners sometime before the book starts. She appears to have a genuine hatred for Epics, but she is willing to accept Steelheart as a ruler because he maintains stability and order in Newcago. She appears to have joined the Reckoners with his knowledge (at least as far as no lenience is shown towards her or her cell from Enforcement or Nightwielder). She actively works with the Reckoners towards their goal to defeat Steelheart.

Steelheart

Meeting David Charleston

David encountered Megan while observing the Reckoners' attempt to assassinate the High Epic, Fortuity. When another Epic named Curveball appeared, David assumed that the plan was going awry and he intervened, ruining the entire plan. After Megan and David take down the two Epics, Megan takes the eager newcomer to her team. David found his interactions with her to be inconsistent and confusing; initially, she seemed impressed by his skills and suggested to Prof that they take him on, but later she dismissed his plans and arguments related to killing Steelheart as abusrd and generally treated him with irritation and disdain. Megan later explained that she became hostile towards David after he started convincing the other Reckoners to target Steelheart because she believed that killing Steelheart would do more harm than good. Eventually, she grew fond of him anyway, and the two developed a rapport.

Sudden Loss

Megan was killed while escaping from their Conflux hit on a motorcycle. David defended her and confessed his infatuation for her while she died. Prof brought her back to the hideout with David, and burned her with their base.

Reappearance

While fighting Nightwielder, David finds Megan and comes to the conclusion that she is the Epic named Firefight as reincarnation is one of her abilities. It is revealed that Megan betrayed the Reckoners as they began to target important parts of Steelheart's infrastructure by infiltrating the organization and feeding information to Steelheart. Initially, she seemed to be unable to recall any past events before her death as seen when she struggled to remember David's identity. Later, during the Steelheart hit, David found Megan listening to an audio recording of her death, including David's confession. She told him to stay away, however, or she would shoot herself, as it meant nothing to her anymore.

Firefight

Resurfaced

In the beginning, Megan is secretly helping David. Before David almost drowns after his encounter with Obliteration, Megan saves him despite the fact that the Reckoners believe that she killed Sam, another Reckoner that was part of Mizzy's team. David later finds Megan and decides to keep his encounter and her location a secret from Prof and the Reckoners. Megan makes several revelations about her powers and her current status. She reveals that her Epic ability to create illusions are actually the her reality warping powers. She also shares her fear that her reincarnation abilities may actually be resulting from her subconsciously pulling parallel existences of herself to replace her when she dies. David and Megan become closer and a romantic relationship between them begins to blossom. Megan later reveals that she came to Babilar in hopes that Regalia would somehow be able to remove her powers in the same way that she claims that she can gift and augment Epic powers. When David is trailed by Val, he is believed to have been working with Regalia all along and that Megan is seducing him. Prof, in the guise of David, texts Megan to meet her where she eventually dies trying to save David from a burning building.

Saving David

While David fights a corrupted Prof later in the book, Megan reincarnates and saves David from his battle with her reality warping abilities. Because she confronted her fear of fire, the corruption from her powers lessens greatly and she is able to use her powers more freely. Her fear of fire and it being her weakness leads David to believe that Epics' weaknesses are somehow linked to their past somehow. She, Mizzy, and David are the last remaining Reckoners in Babilar as Prof killed Val and Exel and Tia's status remained a mystery.

Calamity

Megan rejoins the Reckoners, with her Epic status being acknowledged and accepted by the other members, and aids David in his mission to infiltrate Nighthawk's base. Mizzy and Megan still have tension since Megan killed Sam while corrupted. Megan begins to experiment with her powers and learns how to bring corporeal or solid items to her reality. In attempt to free Prof from his corruption, Megan uses her powers to summon Tavi, Prof's and Tia's daughter from another reality that possesses similar powers to his own, to fight him. Unfortunately, Megan and David's tactic shows little results and Megan is nearly corrupted once more from the stress of her powers. Later, Megan fully accepts her powers and finally completely frees herself from the corruption of her powers when she refuses to run away from her powers and let Larcener take them away. This lead's David to conclude that Epics can only free themselves from the corruption of their powers by accepting their powers as well as confronting their weakness.

Appearance and Personality

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  Portrait of Firefight by User: Therustyrobot

Abilities

Reincarnation

Minor Essokinesis: Megan possesses minor reality warping abilities previously assumed to be the ability to create illusions.

• Parallel Existence: Megan possesses the abilitiy to exist in every parallel universe with or without a few differences as seen with her parallel existence, Firefight.
• Parallel Summoning: The ability to summon people as well as items, albeit typically in the forms of shadows before Calamity, from another reality. Megan uses this ability to summon Tavi from another reality to fight off Prof.

Major Essokinesis: Reality warping abilities bordering on omnipotence, for a very short time after reincarnating.

Weakness

Fire causes the shadows that Megan summons to be dispelled. She thinks that if she is killed by fire that she won't reincarnate.

Notes

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