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Hey sweetheart. Why don’t you come with us? Ow, hey—get her arms! None of that now.
Shadows cut with the harsh glare of streetlights vanish behind the shoulder grinding against my face. My hands are trapped behind my back, my shoulders wrenched painfully together, and I can’t see—
Let’s see what you’ve got here…then we’ll take a nice little stroll…
The reek of sweat and cigarette smoke fills the air I manage to suck through the fabric bunching around my face. I know I should be kicking, screaming, but they’ve got my legs tangled up and I don’t have any air and I am so dead.
You don’t carry much, do you? Check her back pockets.
I do the only thing I can think of and work my mouth open. I know it’s useless, there’s too much fabric, but it’s all I can do; I get my jaw free and now I can taste the stench and I almost gag, but I have to do something so I let out a muffled shriek and bite—
Blood explodes in my mouth.
I jerk awake.
I feel like I should come out of these dreams sweating and trembling, but instead there’s only a slight hitch in my breath as my eyes fly open to take in the predawn dimness of my bedroom. A bright square on the wall, cast by the yard light shining through my window, sends a stab of remembered fear through me as I’m reminded of the harsh, lancing shadows of the dream. This light is softer, though—yellower, with its outline broken by the pattern of leaves shifting in the quiet hush of the wind.
I spend a moment contemplating the ceiling before summoning the energy to twist around in bed and prop myself up on the pillows, staring out the window. The farmyard below is quiet; the white faces of the outbuildings reflect the lone yard light cleanly, stark and pale against the pits of shadow that lie between them. The sky is still fully dark, no hint of light yet showing through the shadowy mass of trees across the pasture.
The stillness of the yard helps to banish the mindless panic of the dream, leaving me only vaguely uneasy and, unfortunately, altogether too alert for...4:30 in the morning, I find, glancing at the clock.
It’s not as bad as it could be, really. It’s late enough that I don’t feel obligated to try to get more sleep, but I’ve gotten enough rest that I’ll at least be functional. Good thing, too—I’ll need whatever alertness I can get.
After all, it’s not every day that you become a superhero.
As I reach over and turn on the lamp, shielding my eyes from the glare, I find my thoughts circling back to the same topic that has dominated them for the last few weeks.
The Sidekicks. That’s not the group’s official name, of course. The structure of the Bastion Junior Division, however, focuses on partnering young capes with experienced Bastion members for training purposes. The similarities to old fictional heroes and their young companions are pretty unavoidable; by now, official documents and pompous bureaucrats are just about the only ones who use the division’s actual title.
The variety and quality of powers among the Bastion membership directly affect the organization’s overall ability to keep down crime (both villainous and mundane), so they’re always eager for new allohumans; I’ve seen several of their recruitment drives at my school. While they do accept older recruits directly into Bastion, most of their members start out by joining the Sidekicks in high school. However, to me their presence has always been distant, irrelevant to everyday life. I never thought I’d be joining them.
Eyes adjusted, I sit up in bed and listen carefully for any movement from my parents’ room. It’s not really that I’m secretive about the nightmares, I just don’t see the point of all of us losing sleep over them. Those dreams are part of the reason, though, that today will be spent filling out a whirlwind of paperwork and assessments at Bastion Twin Cities HQ. Well, not the dreams themselves, but what they represent.
Things are different now. That night three weeks ago that repeats in my dreams—the city stroll that should have been safe, and everything that followed from it—isn’t something I can just forget, because its consequences will be with me for the rest of my life.
Contemplatively, I hold my arms out in front of me. I pause for a moment to take a deep breath—and then, with a twitch of thought, I send fur racing from my elbows down to my wrists. It prickles slightly as it grows, bringing a sense of heat and weight—as if I’ve put on a pair of wrist warmers.
I stop when the “fur coat” is long enough to brush the bed, hanging down in twin sheets from my still-extended arms. I open my eyes and contemplate the dangling curtains for a moment. Then I let my mind relax, and the excess hair vanishes. The extra follicles melt away, and the remainder reclaim their original places and dimensions without any thought on my part. The new mass vanishes back to wherever it came from; it breaks all sorts of physical laws, but then, powers often do.
I suspect that I can change far more than superficial features like my hair. I’ve refrained from doing so, though, because I have no idea whether or not I’ll be able to do it safely. It may be that I’ll instinctively avoid harming myself with my power, but then, it may not. If I have the level of control that I think I do, I could restructure my heart, or my brain—what would happen then? And if I made a mistake, would I be able to fix it before it killed me?
Some kids see the Sidekicks as a path to admiration, respect, a way to help their community or make an impact on the world. Others pursue it as an ordinary part-time job, taking advantage of the relatively well-paying position their unique skills let them exploit. I look at that massive network and I see resources. Training from serious instructors. Labs equipped to study allohumans, helping them analyze their powers so they can use them to best effect. Counseling for the difficulties associated with cape life. People who understand powers—well, as well as anyone does.
This ability is part of my life now. While its inherent dangers frighten me, the potential I can vaguely sense is staggering, and I need to know more. The Sidekicks are my way to find out.
As I sit in my lamplit bedroom, power exercises long forgotten in the directionless swirl of my thoughts, I find myself examining my hands, wondering…could I do it? Really change things? I’ve thought about going further than superficial features, looked up the required anatomy and considered details like how to move blood vessels safely, but I haven’t yet dared to try.
Now, though, the prospect of the morning’s commitment is making me bold—I want to experiment, to push at my boundaries. I still wouldn’t do it if I really thought it was unsafe, but I’ve made my plans and diagrams, I’ve imagined how it might work, and I want to do something with all of it.
So, reckless or not, I lean over to grab my folder of reference photos and carefully sketched illustrations—my ideas on the best ways to move muscle and bone, the required anatomical combinations that merge human and animal features to allow both to operate safely—and spread them across the bed in front of me. I ignore many of the papers and single out the more specific diagrams, all focused on the specifics of the human hand and feline forefoot. I read over them again, trying to absorb a thousand pieces of data, proportions and constructions…
Okay, mapping things out for the fiftieth time isn’t going to help. I force myself to stop over-analyzing the details, reluctantly tearing myself away from the safe familiarity of planning. I set my papers down in front of me, lean back against the headboard, and close my eyes.
At first I don’t try to change anything. I just relax, letting some extra sense (definitely not present a month ago) tell me where and how the structures of my body are situated. I’m briefly swamped by the sheer complexity of bones, muscles, nerves, all interacting in mind-boggling combinations; I scramble to locate my left hand amidst the massive quantities of data and then shut out everything above my wrist. Even so, I can feel a headache coming on.
Here, at least, the information load is…well, a bit more manageable. I take a moment to gather my thoughts, and then begin slowly laying the groundwork for my alterations.
The most important of these is what I can only describe as “replacement”—replacement, that is, of my normal tissues with perfect duplicates. The tissues I create can exactly replicate my own just as easily as they can form new ones—more easily, in fact, since I have a pattern to work from. These, however, can stand being stretched and twisted, their shapes and compositions altered.
After a few minutes concentration, I’m left with a hand that, while visually identical to my own, gleams in my mind’s eye, distinct from my “original” tissues. I experimentally wiggle the fingers, but I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference if it weren’t for that extra sense.
Now for the first of the actual changes. I shift my attention to the bundle of nerves in my wrist and, with a second’s thought, disable them.
All sensation vanishes from my fingers. Even though I was expecting it, I flinch at the disturbing lack of input and nearly lose my grip on the whole process. I take a breath and hold onto my concentration, telling myself that this is no different from local anesthesia. Alarming as it is, the process is necessary if I want to go on to make serious structural changes. Stretching tendons and moving bones isn’t going to be any less painful than it normally is just because I’m doing it on purpose.
I take a few seconds to study the seemingly-lifeless limb as it dangles, nerves severed. Well, there’s my answer on my ability to alter deep structures. With a last glance over my diagrams and a moment to refocus, I begin.
As I experimentally lengthen bones, reposition muscles, tighten some tendons and loosen others, I quickly realize just how far I’m in over my head. It’s hard—far, far harder than any of my earlier practice and planning. Even as I struggle, though, I can tell that it’s working. Not perfectly, not cleanly, but steadily, the structure of a paw slowly growing out of that of a hand.
Growing excitement pushes me to quickly finish off the toes, leaving only the relatively easy work of fur and claw. I crack my eyes a bit to get a glimpse of the now dramatically different limb, just in time to see the nails begin to lengthen, curve, and sharpen—
Ow, Jesus, what the fuck?
A shove tears my teeth from the bony shoulder.
She bit me, how the hell…?
I stumble as the push spins me to the side, but the twist also frees one of my hands from the hold of the man behind me, his grip slack with surprise. I’m too confused to punch or go for his face, the lingering taste of blood harsh and unexpected in my mouth, but I flail at his chest with my open hand—
Four ragged furrows follow the paths of my fingers, and I’m shoved away with a bellow of pain and surprise.
Fuck, she’s a cape!
Come on!
I’m left standing in the darkness as the two retreating figures break the clean lines of light and shadow, their pounding footsteps echoing off the high walls. The stillness left in the alley is surreal as my heart pounds with leftover adrenaline and the taste of iron lingers in my mouth. All I can do is stare down at my hands.
Blood drips from nails curved hard and sharp.
Claws.
A shuddering breath brings me back to my softly-lit room, bedspread clenched under my hands. Both hands—the left has returned to normal, with flat, blunt nails that barely leave a dimple in the quilt as I force myself to relax my grip.
Flashbacks. That’s new.
I lean forward to rub my temples, then have to take a ragged breath against the sudden threat of tears because I do not need this in my life. I have school, and chores, and friends, and—oh, come on, I have to start looking for colleges soon! PTSD, or whatever this is, does not fit into that equation.
After one more shaky breath, I do my best to talk myself down. I’ll relax, try to get some rest, tell my parents about this in the morning, join the Sidekicks, and get from them whatever help I need. Simple? Probably not, but it’s the best I can do at five in the morning. I start to put away the papers strewn over my bed with a determined steadiness.
Still, as I watch the sky lighten to the east I can’t help but think of night, and panic, and the feeling of blood under sharpened nails.