Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

I woke up to weeping sounds. Far above me and all around me. Is it my funeral? Was my first thought. And who is mourning me? My second. I opened my crusty eyes, wiping off some sort of gunk from my face. The sight that greeted me was not the one I was expecting. Eyes, dozens and dozens of disembodied eyes, each several feet wide, floating on stalks of flesh, were weeping salty tears on me, trying to fill up the pit I found myself in. I screamed in horror and pain as the tears that landed on me started sizzling and stinging my skin. And by the time I climbed out of the pit, I was almost knees deep in those acid tears. I had no bright hopes that it was some localized cape stuff, I don’t think I’ve heard of a local fleshwarper cape outside of Nilbog. And that dude was behind fifteen feet of concrete, under a dome thirty miles out of Brockton Bay. If the trio somehow managed to drag me all the way there, break through the blockade and drop me off without me waking up or them getting caught? I would willingly keel over and die on the spot. Because how the fuck- I calm myself down. No need to panic. I can break down crying when there are no hundred foot tall eye trees watching my every move and crying acid tears to… what? Digest my resulting juices through their flesh roots? That’s so much acid wasted though! There is no way I’m enough sustenance even for a single flesh eye tree. When I get up on my stinging feet and look around, I am finally convinced that I might not be in Brockton Bay anymore. Because no matter where I look, I only see all shades of red and pink stretched to the horizon.

Okay. Okay. Even breaths, Taylor. I need to take stock of my belongings and what is available to me. The soles of my sneakers are burnt through, only their top part dangling from my feet. Cosplaying Toph Beifong was not in my to-do list today, but what can I do? Can’t even complain about the feeling of squelching meat under my feet ‘cause acid might have burnt off my nerves there too. My clothes are… not in the best condition either. Aside from being soaked in old period blood and puss, acid tears also tore a bunch of new holes in them that make wearing them probably less decent than being just naked. I try not to hyperventilate when my eyes fall on a fist-sized maggot sucking on my tummy. I tear it off and throw it right at the acid tear pit, clutching the tiny hole it ate through my skin. I look around the valley and spot the pale blue blotches of yuck that are maggots slowly congregating in my direction. Oh, sweet. I break off into a run, to get as far away from this valley as possible. It’s too open, too… crowded. Too many eyes, literally, are on me here. My run doesn’t last long as a patch of flesh I step on blinks and sprouts two long bone spikes that impale me on the spot.

I wake up to weeping sounds. Far above me and all around me. My flesh stings but from the fresh acid tears that begin falling on me. I don’t waste time and rush out of the pit. Okay. I’m in some kind of fucked up cursed groundhog day loop. I wipe the gunk off my face and look at my new situation. Clothes are more fine, sneakers are fine, no grub on my stomach. Then my fresh corpse enters my vision, hanging on a pair of curved spikes. Oh. Not groundhog day. Not groundhog day at all. I watch as it slowly dissolves under the weeping gazes of the eye trees and walk off in another direction. I keep an… eye out for weird bumpy slits on the ground and lightly kick one of them. A pair of curved spikes shoot out of them. Oh! I’m on a minefield. Yay.

Aside from the eyes connected to the flesh trees, or the eye bouquets tethered to the ground, I see eyes that are slowly floating towards me, disconnected from any mass of flesh. I don’t want to know what they’ll do to me once they catch up. Yeah. This valley is so totally not safe for me to be in. I keep my vigilance up as I carefully walk through the fleshy hills towards the bone forest I see in the distance. All the maggots on my way I kick towards the acid puddles and the eyes… the disconnected ones are still following me. So I test my luck.

Pressing a foot to the base of the lumpy slit, I grab onto the bone spike that juts out of it, not letting it retract back into its fleshy home. I yank at it, hard and feel it pull back. The flesh beneath my feet stretches and tears as I hug the bone spike closer and yank and twist and pull. I tear it off in the end, with all the muscles and sinew attached to one of its ends. Right on time too, as the first eye reaches within several feet of me, close enough for me to swing the bone spike. Its skin tears under the sharp bone and I get showered in eye juices. A clear off-white fluid dripping from its side, it keeps flying at me, the blood vessel-like tendrils at its back stretching forwards. I pull the bone spike and swing again, digging its sharp end deeper into the eye as it releases a weak, high pitched shriek and deflates like a balloon. I stand up panting. One eye popped, a dozen left. But I feel a barely noticeable surge of… stamina or energy when the ball pops. An unknown instinct makes me reach into the popped eye, my hand sizzling from its acidic insides. What I get from it is… a smaller eyeball. Human-sized. Clean, with no blood vessels at its back, just one uniform white eye with brown irises. I know what it's for. I know what it does. I just don't know if I have the strength and will to do it. I pocket it and continue my slow and inefficient purging of the valley from its horrible, horrible floating eye infestation. In the end, I've gathered so many eyes that my hoodie pockets are bulging from their sheer quantity. They've cried on me, dug their veins into my softened flesh. A couple grubs took me by surprise when I stopped paying attention to the ground. They have nothing. They're empty and useless and even the tiniest energy they give me when I kill them in any other way than kicking them into acid is not worth the effort. But I hate them. They're disgusting, they make my stomach churn and my intestines twist. Bugs.

I take one eyeball out and, before I start second guessing myself, pop it into my mouth. I chew on it once and try not to shudder when it pops like a tiny balloon and its juices spill into my throat. My burns subside just a bit and I pop one more eyeball, and another, until all my injuries are gone. I know for a fact the large ones aren't edible. The ground, despite feeling, smelling and looking like flesh, is not edible either. But whatever I kill? I can eat. Whatever I kill is mine.

What I find out about the bone forest that grows past the valley is a bit more appealing than the eye valley. First, it’s not a bone forest. It’s a teething forest. The trees here are covered in enamel, there are honest to god teeth growing on the ground that make me so glad my sneaker soles are back. And there are these giant molars that… I feel like if I smack them enough, they'll crack and there'll be smaller molars inside. Just like with the eyes. But what I like about this forest the most? Nothing here is trying to kill me. Nothing! Not even the weird fleshy mammoth thing lurking deeper in the forest. It's… docile! I fall to my knees, ignoring the soft bites of the forest floor and weep. Now, it is only me. Only my cries and my non-acidic tears. No grubs, no floating eyes or eye trees. Just… teeth. They cut through the grubs’ soft membrane, killing them if they try crawling towards me. The toothy lianes and thick tree branches pop the eyeballs that float in the air. There is nothing truly edible here for any other creature to enter it. I found my safe haven. I climb one of the trees, finding a spot that doesn't bite, and fall asleep. Or try to. My eyes close, my breath evens out, but sleep doesn't come. I don't even feel fatigued after several hours of gruelling battle. And the sounds outside are freaking me out. Something like a whale song but amplified ten times over, stretched out and twisted in the world’s worst sound editor, washes over the forest, the valley and far past it. I look towards its source, spotting the creature immediately. It's enormous, a mix of whale and squid with five unsymmetrical fleshy wings, its skin dark purple, dotted with a line of yellow eyes on both sides of its body, its mouth sprouting hundreds of tentacles, each tens of yards long. It flies over the eye valley, each tentacle grabbing onto the eyestalks and pulling them into its bristly mouth. I shudder, wondering if it would eat me too if I hesitated for even five more minutes before entering the forest.

Something else I figured out while sitting on this tooth tree? I… might be a Tinker. Because the moment I touched one of its sturdier branches, a flood of ideas filled my mind. Okay. Okay. That's cool. That's awesome. I can make fucking… medieval tools. It's still better than nothing. I console myself in the knowledge that these tools provide a promise of improvement. They'll let me make better tools out of better materials. And those better materials. They will let me get out of here. They'll let me escape this hellish pit. I'm never calling Winslow a pit of scum and villainy ever again. This… this place takes the cake.

A stump of a tree will do as my first bench to Tinker on. Or.. I can't call this Tinkering. Any self-respecting Tinker would spit in my face if they hear me calling my work Tinkering. But I can't call it anything else. It is some kind of reality warping miracle power that lets me turn bones and teeth into a workable tool. I spend an entire hour whacking the giant molars and fangs to get the tinier teeth from their insides, then I black out and wake back up holding a prospector hammer, a lumber axe and a chisel, all made of enamel. Oh I know they're not made to last but I don't need them to last. They are my tools that I need to get the materials for better tools. And my next destination is the mouth of a rocky cave I found between the eye valley and the tooth forest.

🫀🫀🫀🫀🫀🫀🫀🫀

Amy did not like late shifts. She didn’t like staying at home more, though. So she tolerated late shifts. But they always left her tired. More tired than usual. Despite the quadruple espresso shots she took every hour, the repetition killed her. And by the end of the shift, she’d be on her last legs, shaking and swaying from side to side.

The best part of the late shifts was how out of it she was when Carol berated her for missing dinner. She’d find fault in anything Amy does nowadays. She’s home on time? What’s she doing here when kids are dying from cancer? She’s home late? What was she doing out there? Kicking puppies? Did she do the dishes? Oh, she did? Why? Does she think Carol can’t do them on her own? She didn’t? What a lazy, lazy girl she is.

But right now? In the buzz of exhaustion, Amy can’t hear a thing. She did well today. She was good. You can’t call healing people evil. That’s the opposite of evil. So anything Carol faults her for today is invalid. She imagines Carol patting her on the head and saying she’s proud of her. That’s what she does to Vicky when she saves a kitten from a tree. So anytime Amy does something heroic, she deserves a pat too. A mental one, of course. Carol would never touch her if not necessary. Not after Amy confessed what her real power was.

So when her head hit the not too soft not too hard pillow, Amy passed out. She didn’t put on her pajamas, just plonked on the bed in her robe. She’ll have a proper shower in the morning. It was time to change the bedsheets anyway. 

Amy woke up instantly, exhaustion forgotten, as a massive network of STUFF entered her mind’s eye. In her pillow’s place, her head was resting on a pile of skin. Living skin. With giant pimples and blackheads. She screamed, her voice raspy from apparent dehydration. She rushed to her feet and wiped her hands and face on the robe.

“Wh-what the fuck?!” Amy screamed, and the only response she got was a keening whale song in the distance, not unlike someone’s stomach grumbling amplified a hundred times over. A feathered creature, a mixture of squid, whale and nope all jumbled together flew lazily towards her. She took several steps back, almost slipping on the sweat and grease of the skin. She crouched down and touched the fleshy pale beige ground, intending to make SOME kind of protection. Something to defend herself with. But the land resisted. It didn’t shift and mold to her will like most flesh does. It just… stood there. Doing nothing. So she stood up and ran. Ran away from the giant flying five-winged squid-whale. Because if the ground here ignores her power, who’s to say the creatures aren’t immune to her either? The creature’s tentacles stretched towards her, their shadows visible to Amy even if she had her back to the aberration. One of its tendrils wrapped around her ankle and pulled, making her fall to the ground briefly, before being lifted up into the air. The creature’s mouth, now horrifyingly close and too detailed in Amy’s mind. She screamed as her mind tried to make sense of its inner biology. It was way too big and unwieldy to be able to fly, nothing in it indicating any form of flotation organ either. It wouldn’t even be able to swim in water, let alone fly in the air.

Amy’s moment of death was postponed as something whistled past her and slashed the creature’s tentacle, the one holding her ankle. A glistening gray axe cut through several of its tentacles and lodged itself on the creature’s thick skull. The creature dropped her, of course. Amy let out a scream as she dropped a full three stories’ height. Despite her landing on a soft lump of skin, she felt like she hurt all over. She raised her head just in time for another axe to come flying and cut another of the creature’s tentacle.

Then came a spear, striking it right in one of its many eyes. The creature cried out in pain and started flying towards its offender - a tall raven haired girl wearing a dark metal breastplate and dark metal greaves. Over her shoulder hung a quiver of spears, from which she took one spear after another to throw at the creature, all while jumping backwards in retreat, back into a jagged looking treeline. And they were gone soon, the monster hot on the girl’s heels, crushing the toothy trees in its wake.

So Amy wasn’t alone. There were other people here. In the forest, maybe? Maybe it was her who was out in the open? So she ran towards the forest. A bit off course of the five winged monster. And ten minutes later, she finally found the girl. She was digging through the body of a now dead monster, happily humming a tune. The monster was wrapped in spiked vines, the spikes digging deep into it and holding it a good foot or two above ground.

“Gonna get your heart, your heart, your lungs and spleen and kidneys~ gonna get your eyes, your liver, your stomach and intestines~ hm hm hmmm, hm hm hmmm” She sang as she tore away its massive ribcage and did something to it that hurt Amy’s eyes as surprisingly small organs fell into her hands and then into her skin-bag.

“Uh… hey!” Amy decided to call out to the girl.

“Woah! You’re real!” Exclaims the girl, jumping up from her crouching pose and twisting around to face Amy. Now that she’s closer, Amy could take a much better look at her. Her skin was lightly tanned, most likely from being out in the open under the sun. Tatters of a hoodie peeked from under the dark, sharp looking breastplate. Her legs were lined with muscles, like a taut bowstring ready to fire at any moment. Her arms - a weird hue of red that was more metallic than flesh, and it sure wasn't blood. Amy has spent enough time in the hospital to have seen blood in all of its states. She looked… familiar to Amy. Like one of the last patients she just treated. But those blurred together in her mind to begin with. And even then, she would a hundred percent remember someone who looked like that. So maybe Amy was just going crazy. How else would she explain where she is right now? 

“I thought I was hallucinating when I saw you getting nabbed by the Marrow Whale. Thought you were a Husk at first, or like a Smirk that somehow left the cancer hills.” Says the girl, looking off into the distance.

“Hol- hold on. A husk? A smirk? Cancer hills?!” 

“Oh, yeah.” The girl chuckles nervously and begins climbing down from the creature’s corpse. “See, I’ve been dying, like, a lot recently. Trying to kill a certain guy, you see. And he’s a tough fucking nut. So there’s like a whole pile of my corpses over the hill. And sometimes they just rise up and walk around, trying to find the real me and strangle me to death. Those are Husks… or Hollows, but that’s such a cringe name. The Smirks are a bit different. They just appear naturally in the cancer hills and when you look at them, you kinda go blind for a couple seconds? Shifty little fuckers, them. Look like humans from a distance. Oh, and there’s Splits too. Also look human until you get too close. And then boom, split right down the middle into a giant sharp toothed mouth!”

“O-okay. That’s- I can’t affect anything here.” Amy confesses the topic of her utmost concern. That's right. Utmost. It was concerning her far more than just ending up in a totally unfamiliar place that doesn't exist on Earth Bet.

“Well, duh. You don’t own it.” The girl shrugs.

“No, you don’t get it. My power… it doesn’t work here!”

“Again. Duh. You don’t own it. Kill it and it’s yours.”

“My power only works on living things.” She growls. Why can’t this girl understand?

“Okay. Kill it and bring it back. Simple as that. Hold on.” She takes out a heart, a patch of skin, several clumps of dried blood and a handful of pimples and blackheads and does… something to it, Amy’s vision blurring again when the girl’s hands move. And a moment later, she’s holding a spherical object in her hands, pulsing and moving. “There you go. I can give you a bit of my stuff, a skinray is cheap stuff anyway.”

“... What is that?” Amy points at the sphere.

“A skinray embryo.”

“There is no way this is an embryo.”

“It is. Look, it’s even going through the blastocyst stage already.” The girl points at unnaturally large, visible to the naked eye cells quickly multiplying inside the sphere. “And it’s a fetus now.”

“Wha- that’s- no! That’s unnatural! How the fuck is it so big?”

“Just roll with it. Shit’s weird here. Take it, plant it on the ground or… just place it there, and it will hatch.” The girl handed Amy the ‘embryo’. Its biology blooms in Amy’s mind, unnatural like always. And she places it on the ground. The sphere sinks into the fleshy ground and a pale blue manta ray emerges shortly after. “Well, there you go.”

“Are you doing this? Is this… are you some kind of fucked up cape that’s kidnapped me in my sleep?” Amy still grabs the manta ray and feels it mold under her influence.

“Well, no. First of all, I don't know you. I should at least know who I’m kidnapping, right?” The girl says, and Amy shoots her the most baleful look she can manage at the moment.

“I’m Panacea?!”

“Oh shit! For real?”

“... Did me talking about my power not working here not clue you in?” Amy asks incredulously.

“Well, sorry? I haven’t slept the whole time I’ve been here, and I’m kinda dreading waking up.”

“That sounds like a contradiction.”

“Well it’s not. See, this is my nightmare and I’m pretty sure my dying throes as my real body slowly rots away in the locker.” That gives Amy a pause. She… did heal someone familiar today!

“You’re the locker girl! I healed you today! Your body was kind of rotting at the extremities and there was a nasty infection in-” She swallows. “Nevermind. You’re fine now, is all I can say.”

“Oh.” The girl drops her bag and approaches Amy. “Can I hug you?”

“What? No!” She recoils and takes a step away, the manta ray following her like a loyal puppy.

“Okay, if this really was a dream, you’d have jumped into my embrace and maybe kissed me.” The girl muses, making Amy’s cheeks glow red. “But since you insist, this is a real- uh- thing. Maybe like Labyrinth? You know, the cape in Faultline’s crew?”

“Uh, yeah. You said you know how to get out?”

“Yep. I know how to, but I’m kinda pussyfooting around about it.”

“... Why? Isn’t anything better than staying here?”

“Weeellllll.” The girl’s voice gains a higher pitch. “You kinda gotta maybe sorta plunge a dagger in your heart?”

“Pardon?”

“Straight into your heart. Yep. And I kinda only have the one dagger I made five days ago… or was it half a month? Hard to tell. The sun doesn’t move here.”

“You were in the hospital for a week.” Amy says, remembering her info sheet.

“... Huh. Okay. Five days it is then. Sorry, I’m kinda going mad here from all the…” She points at everything.

“Okay. Well. How do you know that’s how it works?”

“That’s what my power tells me.” The girl explains. “I thiiink I’m a Tinker? I kinda get images in my head of what I can do with whatever I touch.”

“And most of what you have touched so far are organs and flesh…”

“Yep.”

“So you’re a biotinker.” Amy reached for the girl’s hand. She gladly took it, intertwining their fingers together. “Don't make it weird.” Fingers unintertwined.

“Okay. I'm… is that what I am? I guess?”

“Hero or villain?”

“Considering I had no idea I could leave this place safely? Heck yeah, hero time!”

“Didn't you just say-”

“I knew how to. I didn't know if my body was okay on the other side. Also how do you suppose I go about tinkering in Brockton Bay when my main resource is organs?”

“Oh darn. Yeah.” Amy thought of an opportunity. “What if I make them for you? I mean, get them for you?”

“Huh. Ethical organ gathering. I like that.” She looks down to the teething ground and points. “Anyway, your manta ray is all grown up now. Play with it or something while I finish up my tinkering, kay? We can leave once I kill Baal.”

Amy pauses. That whole series of sentences was a rollercoaster on its own. The manta ray Has grown up to its full size and Amy still couldn't figure out how the hell it could fly. Also, it could fly just like the Marrow Whale and even had its back bones shaped in such a way that you could put your feet in them like on a snowboard. Why? And most importantly, how? But even more importantly, “Did you just say… fucking Baal?!”

“Yeah?”

“Like the biblical demon?”

“Yeah. Called himself that, kinda super murdered me on the spot the first time we met.”

“... Super murdered.”

“Oh yeah, so like I died to his super edgy sword, right? Then I came back to life and immediately died again in the most gruesome manner. And then I died five more times. Super murdered.”

“So what, he's an actual honest to god biblical demon?”

“I mean, yeah? He got horns and all, goat hoofs, a broken halo behind his head, six fucked up arms each holding a sword. And like three penises.”

“Three- why were you looking at his crotch?”

“Eh it was on my eye level? Also he shot laser beams out of them.”

“I- wh- fucking- I think I'm actually dead and this is my personal hell.”

“Ayyy, up top! I had the same thought a while ago!” the girl holds her hand up. Amy does not slap it. “Ah poo. Party pooper.” She drops it back down. “So what do you think? Wait around for me for a couple hours and we go back home?”

“I can do that, yeah.”

“Sweet! I don't even really need to kill him, to be honest. Just gonna rip his heart out. That's all I need out of him.”

“And it won't kill him?”

“No?”

“I- you know what, just go ahead and do it. I'll explore this forest meanwhile.”

“Okay, here.” The girl takes out one of the toothy clubs out of her bag. “Smash those giant molars. It might give you a minor power boost. Did to me. So might as well, right?”

Amy decided to just roll with it. She had nothing to lose, her sanity already reaching rock bottom by the time the girl described Baal.

And so the girl left, hefting her spear quiver and axe. Amy was all alone in the world’s largest rage room, with a sturdy looking bat… or club.

So Amy listened to the girl’s advice and went around smashing the giant molars. All she had to do was imagine Carol in her ball form being a giant tooth. She came back to her senses when the club broke. Around her, piles of broken teeth lay motionless, trees toppled and upturned, and her breath ragged and her robe torn. The girl passed by her a dozen times, giving her a happy wave each time. But it has been a while since she passed by the last time. So Amy drops the remains of her club and starts stalking in the direction she's seen the girl run to, her skinray floating behind her. A bit past the forest, in a beet red valley of eyes, she saw the girl surrounded by craters and her own corpses, giggling on top of a hulking figure. She turns to Amy then, expression jubilant.

“Panpan, you'd never guess what just happened!” Amy scowls at the casual nickname and examines the body. It's red, with a tuft of hair on its chest. It has horns and what looks more like a crescent shaped circuit board behind its head, rather than a halo. She does not look at its crotch, but she notes its goat hoof feet.

“So? What happened?” The girl starts giggling again.

“So one of its attacks is a homing orbital bombardment, right? Like a beam of light from the sky.”

“Uh huh.”

“Once he activates it, it never misses. But there is a slight delay, and the point of origin is always right through his halo. So I dived right under him and he shot himself in the dicks. And when it was paralyzed in shock and pain, I stabbed a gorerot laced spear right into the… the crotch wound! I rotted his crotch off, Panpan!” The girl shouted happily, while plunging her bare hands into the demon’s chest. “And I got both of his hearts!”

“... Good for you?”

“Great for me! You know, those Marrow Whales? They drop one. One feather. Each of them. And I've gathered six of them. And with one heart, I can finally do what I always wanted if I ever got powers. I can fly!” The girl took out said crimson feathers and one of the hearts and did the incomprehensible hand motions again, the heart and feathers expanding in size into full sized red wings. She put them on her back and flapped, suddenly soaring into the sky. She landed shortly after making one sky pretzel and whooped. “It's all worth it now!”

“... You couldn't ride a skinray?”

“Well it'd be the skinray flying, not me. I'd just be a passenger. But this? All me.” She gives the wings a shake and they fold into themselves and disappear into her back. “And they're retractable!” 

“Okay. That's cool. Can we get out now? I hate it here.”

“Is that cause you can't -”

“I can't do shit here! I hate it! I'm tired but I'm not! I'm injured but I'm not! I just spent two hours smashing shit and yet none of my muscles are sore!” Amy huffs heavily and sits down on the soggy cratery ground. “I wanna go home.”

The girl sits beside her, not too close but close enough.

“Sorry about that. I thought maybe I can't come back here and- this way we don't need the dagger thing?” She offers, taking out the second heart. “Baal will come back to life eventually so it's no big deal. You just plunge the dagger into this heart and you'll be out in no time.”

“But you spent the other one.” Amy notes.

“Well yeah I'm just crazy enough to stab myself.”

“W- how long till he wakes up?” Amy points at the demon.

“This one? In a day maybe. Buuuut, we can take a short trip to the meat tunnels. Kill a certain bad boy there and use his blood to speed the process up. What do you think?” She stands up and offers her hand. Amy looks at it but doesn't take it.

“The way you accentuate meat in meat tunnel gives me the creeps.”

“Oh yeah that's cause its full of these dick-shaped, dick-colored fungi that explode if you come too close to them and you resurrect in utter agony and are paralyzed by pain for like a full minute, which the eye stalks fucking love and would cry rivers of acid tears to digest you while you're unable to do anything but roll around the pit you woke up on.” She rattles out, completely unfazed.

“Oh.”

“Yeah. Just stab the fucking heart, Panpan.”

“It's Amy.” She huffs. “Not Panpan. Don't call me that.”

“Okay. I'm Taylor.” She offers her hand. “Nice to meet you.”

“... Sure.” Amy takes her still bloody hand and shakes it.

“Well, introductions over with, godspeed.” Taylor places the still beating heart and a pristine looking dagger in Amy’s hands.

“So I just… stab it?” Amy asks hesitantly, looking up at Taylor.

“M’yeah.” She bounces on the balls of her feet. “Just a heads up. If we meet again, I might not act like I'm acting now, and maybe use a slightly different style of speech. You see, right now I'm filled with adrenaline, confidence and teeth. And I still think, just a little bit, that this is a dream.”

“Okay, sure. I'm also not batshit crazy and full of anger issues in real life… This can be our little secret?” Her sentence ends on a high note, Amy herself unsure of the statement.

“I'd like that.” Taylor smiles. “Now do it, coward!”

And Amy plunges the dagger into the heart with no hesitation. The moment its tip touches the flesh, her vision cracks like spider webs, and the web lines begin twisting around the heart, pulling Amy into the darkness at its center. She wakes up hyperventilating, covered in sweat, but still in her room. Her window is dark and nobody seems awake at the moment. Except for the happily cooing skinray on her lap, and a bloody dagger in her hands.

“Oh god. Carol’s gonna kill me.” Amy mutters, gently patting the crime against nature on its flat head.

Chapter Text

I watched as Amy twisted into herself and disappeared in a flash of black and white, her skinray gone with her. Time to go down into the caves and to make a new sacrificial dagger for me. Or I might as well take that trip down the flesh cave and weather some Marauder harassment to get two more Baal hearts. I actually wanted to use one of them to get my hands on the Ragesplitter, his second favorite sword. Or maybe the Hategutter. They're both good. And with two hearts, I could get them both. If only he had a bit of a better naming sense. I'd be so embarrassed to announce my weapons as Ragesplitter and Hategutter. Oh they can be cool as fuck, but who cares when you call them the edgiest names in the world?

Finding the meat tunnel entrance, I slide down its sloped mouth. A Marauder is waiting for me already, hiding behind one of the flesh strips. I stab a spear into it before it has time to set itself off. Don't get me wrong, it will blow up no matter what I do. But this way, I won't be at the epicenter.

The explosion rocks my skeleton, but I'm far enough away that just one eye popped in my mouth is enough to heal my injuries. I go down further, killing any Splits and Husks that get in my way. Deeper into the tunnel, I start meeting Gorehounds. I'm not sure why my power calls them that. They're just… people with no lower halves, their arms elongated and ending in a pair of sharp claws. Their mouths wide open, almost broken, to reveal square yellow teeth. I hate them more than I hate Marauders. They're fast and annoying. They can smell me from further away and their dumb fucking barks attract other creatures. And they're creepy, okay? I am allowed to be scared of creepy things.

The end of the tunnel is in sight. There, a big boy awaits. I call him Baal Junior because he has the parts necessary to summon Baal in the first place. I killed him three days ago and spent the past three days trying to kill Baal. I begin understanding why Alabaster is a cape now. If I was just a normal guy with powers to revive, I'd fucking stay home and do nothing. That is, hypothetically. But now? Knowing that I can never be truly killed? At least in this dream? I'm loving it. I might need to figure out ways to make Alabaster regret having powers. Agonymauler might be the best axe for it, super death and all, but I don't wanna waste a heart against the stupidest cape in the Empire.

I dodge the big boy’s swing and stab my sword, my regular sword, into his thigh. He buckles from the sudden pain just low enough for me to cut his throat. This never kills these bastards, just makes them scream less. But that's all I need right now. I don't want any Gorehounds congregating on me once I kill the big boy. He reels from the wound and tries swiping his enormous bone club again, this time sending it low, giving me no avenue to dodge. That is, if I couldn’t fly. I flap my wings, which I found out is a purely aesthetic move, lifting myself several yards up, right above the big boy’s head, where I slash the other side of his neck. His head hanging on a literal thread now, big boy lunges at me, trying to cover me with his whole body, but I fly up again, making him miss me miserably. The fall ends him, sending his body parts tumbling across the mini arena he lives in.

His heart and organs harvested, I put them away and began my arduous trek to the surface. Climbing down was always so much easier than climbing up. Now the creatures of the tunnel have had ample time to find my scent and gather in my path. So the way out is fraught with danger and curses, and a fair number of explosions. But I’m out now, my bag full of the explosive gel from Marauders that I mix with refined plasma, the one I got from mixing raw plasma and stomach acid, into sticky bombs. They’ll come in handy when dealing with Baal. Back at the site of his corpse, I insert the newly harvested Baal Junior’s heart into his chest and watch him rise up into the sky under a crimson lightshow and revive in a mad explosion. That is, the explosion that I’ve set up, filling his intestines with the sticky Marauder bombs. He falls down screaming, clutching his stomach.

“You nasty bitch! I’ll fuck your corpse into minced meat once I’m done with you!” He screams, voice barely recognizable in a garble of flesh and blood. I don’t dignify him with a response, throwing my axe at him instead. He doesn’t quite respond to what I do, just spews profanities and calls his weapons the nastiest names. “I’m gonna choke and stroke your legless body!” He screams again, rushing at me with all his weapons raised. I jump back, avoiding being turned into a shish kebab on his Dickskewer the Sounding Prod, a gnarly rapier wrapped in spiked wire. And yes, that is its full name and he has to cry it out before using it each time. But I guess I jumped too far away because he pointed the rapier right at me and screamed “Dickskewer the Sounding Prod!” And a flash of crimson shot out of the blade and right through my crotch. I fucking hate homing attacks, did I already tell anybody about that? I hate them with a passion.

I reach into my pouch and grab a handful of eyes. Stuffing them into my mouth I begin chewing. The hole in my crotch quickly closes up, letting me dodge the next swing made by Baal. “SEEEEEMEEEEEN!” He shouts, rising up into the sky to use Ragesplitter, lifted up by would-be angelic spectral hands, and shouts “Ragesplitterrrrrr!” As a glowing circuit stretches across the sky. And I lunge right under him, leading the fuckoff beam of light right towards Baal himself. This time it only catches his thigh, tearing the whole leg off his body. But no dickshots. Sad. I still die on the spot as the beam continues in its path right through my cranium and I wake up screaming in the eye valley pits. My head splits open again as the residual energy from the beam sears through my flesh once again and I wake up screaming in the eye valley pits. Okay, time for my least favorite part. Running to Baal before he regenerates too much. This time I have an advantage in the form of Marrow Wings, they let me cut the usual twenty minute run down to a single minute flight. I could go faster, I feel, if I do a bit of Tinkering on it, with more Marrow Whale parts and another Baal heart. But that's a whole heart wasted!

I fly at him, plunging my arm into his chest. My hand feels one of his beating hearts and I pull. “It’s time for my three pounds of flesh!” I scream and he laughs.

“Yes! Yes! Look into my eyes when I stare at you!” He screams back, grabbing me by the neck and squeezing. I wake up screaming again and rush back at him. Grabbing a bone spike on my way, I stab it into the hole I tore off his heart from, crushing two of his ribs and scratching one of his three spines. We plummet together as he raises Agonymauler. Oh boy. I hate super death. He finishes screaming out its name just as his head hits the sharp end of a brittle rock and I wake up screaming and I wake up screaming and I wake up-

I stare at half a dozen of my corpses as they slowly come to life. Their bodies are torn to shreds, their guts spilling to the meaty ground. The first time my corpse didn’t get digested by eyestalks, I kinda danced with it until it turned into a Husk and bit off my throat. A bit of a consolation, maybe, like someone I could hug safely around here. Right before it’s not safe anymore. I stab each and every one of them with a bone spike and let them dissolve in eye acid.

Back at the Skin Sands, I find Baal and my corpse lying on the jagged rocks. He has one of his arms deep in my mouth, digging through it to remove my teeth from the other side, breaking through the back of my skull. The rest of his body seems to me unresponsive, paralyzed. He spots me and throws the corpse away, chuckling. “Maybe you're weighing the moral pros and cons but let me assure you that OH MY GOD STAB ME IN THE GODDAMNED FACE!! WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR!?!" He yells out as I do what he asked for, burying the bone spike in his skull. He falls limp, dropping his weapons, them dissolving into primal flesh like always. Everything he says is like a pre-recorded line. It doesn't mean he has sentience. Just real good context clue detecting algorithms.

I dig through his chest for his second heart. Now, what do I want to make out of them? Baal is a speedster, despite him almost never using his speed. He always stands in one place when calling out his attacks. Maybe that’s just his quirk or he’s also slowly going insane in this Pit. If he was sentient to begin with.

He only dropped his rapiers this time. So my choices are between Dickskewer and Assrape, and even then I can only own them if I pick them up using his hearts. Both god awful names for the most broken abilities… well, all of his abilities are broken. All of them except for Agonymauler have some kind of homing aspect to them. And even Agonymauler only needs to hit you once to keep hitting you every second afterwards. I try crying out their names, to see how I would sound. But they were both so horrible. But- but-but! Ranged options! I want them but I don’t want to cry out their names each time… I weigh my options and there is one way. There is a way and maybe I could do something about it. Yeah. I grab Assrape and stab one of Baal’s hearts with it. It pulses to life and I gain a sudden detailed awareness of its properties. Yeah. I can do it. I grab Baal’s liver, intestines and brain and descend into the rocky caves. I’ve got Tinkering to do.

I came to my senses holding a metallic red fabric with pale beige circuit patterns. This is my solution. Instead of it being a separate weapon, I can implant it on me and use it innately! Now I only need to- I pass out and wake back up holding dark metallic surgical tools, a sack of stomach acid, a lump of fat and a makeshift disinfectant. Five minutes later, my left hand is wrapped in glowing foreign skin and I am gobbling on a cooked liver. Five more minutes later my entire arm is wrapped in it too and I am chugging brain soup to recover. An hour later, I finish eating the last serving of eyeballs. It is done and I still have a heart left. Now I can go out hunting Marrow Whales with no fear. The one I saved Amy from was kind of terrifying, because I usually lured them into the Skin Sands and got them trapped in the follicle cacti. But I awakened Baal in the Skin Sands so I couldn’t really do that for a while. But now? Marrow Whales beware!

And a five minute supercut of me inflicting irreparable damage to the sky whale population of this flesh cesspit, I am done tinkering. With my Marrow Wings upgraded to their next tier, I was ready to depart. Holding the dagger facing my heart, I stabbed myself and felt the world around me crack and felt myself being flipped inside out as I woke up gasping, with the dagger still in my heart.

🩹🩹🩹🩹🩹🩹🩹🩹

The skinray successfully hidden, Amy went to school. It was Tuesday so she had no excuse to skip. Nobody fought on tuesdays. Not a single gang. It was a blessing and a curse sometimes. A sudden gang fight to skip school and spend the whole day at the hospital would be nice. She wanted to do it, especially today. She wanted to see if Taylor was still there. If she has woken up. So she spent the entirety of the school day anxious and spaced out.

When the final bell rang, she rushed out of class to find her sister. Vicky was floating again, just a couple inches from the ground. She always liked flight more than walking, especially when she was in a good mood. And she was always in a good mood when talking to her friends. So when Amy tugged at her sleeve, her sister turned to her with a wide smile.

“Hey Ames, what's up?”

“I need your help.” Amy says solemnly. “It's of grave importance.”

“Okay. What's up?” Vicky turned her full attention to Amy. She didn't say that something is important lightly. Amy would prefer, actually, to never direct anyone's attention to her business.

“Could you give me a lift to the hospital? There's something really urgent I need to do there.” 

“Sure!” Vicky then turned to her friends and agreed on some outing later today.

The flight to the hospital only took five minutes, Vicky pulling all the stops. After all, air traffic who? Speed limit what? Carrying Amy was like turning on the signal lights on an ambulance. Nobody would stop them even if there were air traffic laws.

Down in the hospital, Amy walked straight towards Taylor’s ward, after confirming with the nurses that she has been moved from emergency care to regular care ward. Vicky, for some reason, decided to follow her there. And there laid Taylor, still in the same state Amy remembered. Pale skin, thin muscles. She looked nothing like how she looked in Amy’s dream. Was it a dream? The skinray told her that no, it wasn't quite a dream. But maybe she created it in her exhausted delirium and pushed all the responsibility into some manic dream girl who talked about super death and giant embryos. It didn't make sense either. Amy touched the girl’s hand. There it was, her active corona poletina and gemma. And there were the scrapes and old bruises that Amy didn't usually heal. There was that scar tissue on the inside of her cheek, self inflicted probably, from nervous chewing habits. That would cause her to develop jowls… Amy frowned and smoothed the scars up.

“So, mission accomplished?” Vicky asked, startling Amy from her reverie.

“I- I don't know. There was this dream I had this morning…” Amy debated if she wanted to tell Vicky more. They shared all their secrets. But Amy already had one secret she'd never share. And now this. Didn't she tell Taylor that this'll be a secret of theirs. That's when Taylor lit up like a Christmas tree and rose a good half a foot in the air. Angelic music played with no apparent source as her hands reddened, her muscles expanded and refined. Then she thudded heavily on the bed, making it creak and shake. Letting out a loud gasp, Taylor sat up, a dagger sticking out of her chest. “What the fuck?!”

“Oh hi, Amy. What's up?” Taylor greeted her like she wakes up with a dagger in her heart every day.

“Taylor, stay still.” Amy started, a hand reaching for her skin.

“Hold on, Amy, wait. I can do it myself.” Taylor pulled away from her, all the health monitoring equipment disconnecting from her.

“No, Taylor, the fuck you don't.” Amy jumped after her but Taylor climbed up the wall, fingers digging into the soft plaster.

“Amy, let's talk. Peace?” Taylor pulled the blade out of her chest, making blood gush out momentarily. “See? The dagger is out.”

“Oh my fucking god, Taylor please just get down. You're causing property damage that I won't be paying.” Amy reached the wall but fell short of catching Taylor when she climbed on the ceiling. “Taylor.” Amy scowled at her angrily. “I won't repeat myself, young lady.” She tried channeling Carol as hard as she could, her voice even making Vicky straighten her back momentarily. And slowly, Taylor got down on the ground, toeing the floor tiles, hands behind her back.

“Hi, Glory Girl?” Taylor tried deflecting Amy’s attention. She'd have succeeded if Amy was stupid and blind. But a quick glare pointed at Vicky stifled her “yay new friend!” energy. She made grabby motions with her hand and Taylor quickly intertwined their fingers together. “Taylor, I swear to god.” Fingers unintertwined.

“So, what the fuck did you do to your skin?” Amy finally asked after watching Taylor squirm long enough. Her skin wasn't tan anymore. It was more blood red and covered in beige metallic circuit patterns. Everywhere but her face. It was slowly subsiding, gaining her normal slightly tan color. But the circuits stayed. Taylor looked sideways at Vicky, and she got the message and flew out of the ward, gesturing to Amy that she’ll be back in ten minutes.

“Well, you see. Baal only dropped his Assrape and Dickskewer the Sounding Prod. I really didn't want to call out those narsty names whenever I wanted to use them so…”

“So you've sewn Dickskewer into your skin.”

“Assrape, actually.”

“... Wonderful. I'm getting it out.” Amy said, focusing on Taylor's skin.

“No! Amy, Amy please! I spent like two hours making it work! Then I spent ten hours doing full body skin graft surgery!”

“Then you shouldn't have. So you fought Baal. Again. Probably super died again.” Taylor flinched, confirming Amy’s guess. “If you used that damn heart to get out early, we wouldn't even be in this situation. Don't ever cyborg yourself! That's like a major taboo thing in the Tinker community.” She struggled to remove the foreign skin, it setting itself back in place the moment Amy relaxed. “What the fuck is going on? I can't fix this.”

“You don't own it?” Taylor tries.

“Don't test me.” Amy growls.

“But you don't! Maybe you'll just let it go this one time and I'll promise to never graft other people's skin into mine?”

“Grrrhhh. I hate your power! It's so stupid! I never had to worry about fucking… ownership before!” Amy huffs and lets Taylor’s hand go. Taylor reaches to grab her again but Amy slaps the offending hand away. “Fine. Keep your damn demon skin.”

“Well it's not really demon skin, you see, I used his rapier and nervous system to weave a thin fabric that I mixed with a metal mesh I melted out of copious amounts of blood, so technically it's demon brains and it's like a skintight chainmail, but living and breathing and super flexible and it lets me do this!” Taylor rattled off and suddenly shouted “SEEEMEEEEEN” as spectral red hands started lifting her up in the air. Amy rested her forehead on her palm, her fingers slowly sliding down to pinch the bridge of her nose and wipe her scowl into a deeper scowl.

“You told me you're less crazy in real life.” She finally said when Taylor looked at her for approval, still hanging in the air like vampire Jesus, held up by honest to god demon ghosts. Glaistig Uaine much?

“Uhh… I just woke up?” 

“Did you have to shout semen at the top of your lungs?”

“No, but that's what Baal shouted each time he did it… but he also said something about wearing my face like a condom so maybe I won't quote him on that…”

“Please, please don't ever quote him on anything.”

“I- yeah. Better not.” She chuckled sheepishly. At that moment, Vicky flew back into the ward and saw Taylor doing the vampire Jesus thing.

“Okay. Explain.” She says, resting her fists on her hips in a way that made her chest stand out. Amy boggled for a second before regaining her composure and shaking Taylor out of her reverie too.

“So, Taylor is… what powers do you have, again?” Amy asked.

“Well, I can’t call myself a Tinker, really. But I’m crazy good at making, finding and using improvised weapons. Also, I’m a fair bit stronger and faster than a normal human?”

“Oh? How much faster?”

“I’m pretty sure I can run at… well I haven’t tested. But I can fly much faster.” Taylor responds, unfurling her red wings that have gained a new layer of darker, longer feathers, now looking much more like proper bird wings.

“Woah! Wanna race me?” Amy was so glad her sister was easily distracted. “Wait, hold on. Why were you yelling “semen” just now?” Vicky suddenly frowns.

“Oh. That… uhh, I just… I’m a weirdo?” Taylor asks more than answers.

“You are a weirdo.” Amy nods.

“So why were you yelling?”

“... I heard a guy do that using a very similar power to mine.” Taylor confesses.

“The arms thing.” Vicky guesses.

“The arms thing.” Taylor agrees and furls her wings back in. “On top of that, I’ve got a slow healing factor and- uh. Something else.” She looks to the side.

“That’s fine. You don’t have to tell me everything you have. Everybody sandbags.” Vicky consoled her.

“Oh, no no. It’s just that I can shoot a beam of light that can pierce through… many things. Buuut!” Amy knows what’s coming. The name Assrape does not promise anything good. “It automatically homes into the target’s ass.”

“... Oh.”

“Yeah…”

“Okay, well! Now that you’re all well! Nice to meet you, Taylor. I’m Vicky!” She says, giving Taylor a quick one-armed hug.

“Nice to meet you too, Vicky, I'm Taylor.” Taylor responded, blushing slightly.

“So it was nice and all, but I’m really running late to a meetup now. Tell me more about how you met later?” Vicky asked, turning to Amy, then flying out of the closest window.

“Okay so that was a thing.” Taylor says, her nervous anxiety-ridden act suddenly evaporating into thin air. “I think I’m gonna dip too, you know, been out of it for a whole week and stuff.” She tightens her hospital gown and starts walking towards the exit from the ward.

“Oh no you don’t.” Amy grabs her by the elbow and drags her back to the bed. “You’re staying the night here. We’ll figure out what’s caused me to get pulled into your dimension.”

“... Okay. I’m down. Does that mean you’re staying?”

“Hmm.” Amy squints. This might be a great excuse to not go home. “Yes. Yes, I’m staying in the hospital the entire night. But you’re helping me heal.” Before Taylor can respond, Amy holds up a finger. “But first! Can you heal without feeding people the eyeballs?”

“Totally. I can do whatever a surgeon can do. And- maybe a bit more.”

“Okay. Let’s go. Show me.” She stands up and immediately remembers that not every cape is fine with going unmasked. “Mask?”

“Oh, fuck! Yeah, hold on!” Taylor reaches into a pouch she didn’t have a moment ago and pulls out a pale blue robe. “This is Skinray the Ist. I turned him into a-”

“No.”

“But-”

“No. You are not wearing a living creature to heal children.”

“But I made him like that after your robe! It brings comfort to kids! And like, it doesn’t even move that much!”

“Why is it alive?!”

“... So it doesn’t rot? Duh.”

For the second time today, Amy pinched the bridge of her nose. “I hate you.”

“But you also love meee?”

“No. Just hate.” Taylor deflates. “Okay, fuck it. That’s better than raw dogging it, I guess. Let’s go.”

It took no effort to convince the staff to let Taylor operate. She was vouched by Panacea, after all. And their first patient rolled in shortly, an old lady that was brought to ER after her neighbors caught her vomiting in front of her apartment door. Taylor set to work, her spectral arms grabbing the surgical tools.

“Wait, you aren’t going to diagnose her?” A resident asks. Taylor shushes him and makes a lightning quick incision on the woman before the anesthesiologist can even react. Amy quickly grabbed the woman’s arm and saw that she didn’t feel a thing. Even as Taylor started digging in her insides, made another cut and pressed something to seal the wound, then stitched the incision back up.

“Had known COPD, had suffered from bowel cancer before, had bowel cancer just now.” Taylor says, and only Amy sees her quickly putting the tiny cancer away. “Early stage, just in an unfortunate spot. Next?”

“She… came in with a seizure.” A resident mumbled, but was quickly shushed by Taylor.

They went through several more patients before Amy dragged her to the broom closet for questioning.

“So what the fuck was that?” Amy points a finger at Taylor’s nose, making her eyes cross to look at it.

“What? I fixed them.”

“Okay. You did. Why did you pocket their bits?”

“You think they needed those?” Taylor cocks an eyebrow. She takes out a chunk of cancerous flesh from her pouch. “I could put them back.”

“What kind of question is that? No! You don't put them back! Those go into biowaste!”

“But they can just not go there and stay in my pockets?”

“No?!”

“But-”

“No buts! They’re contaminants and you can’t just keep flesh bits in your pockets?!”

“Yes I can? It's a phase locked hammerspace! They won’t go bad or spread contaminants between separate entries!”

Amy pauses, wishing there was enough light here to see if Taylor was being genuine or if there was a stupid mocking smile on her face. But knowing the girl, she was probably being awfully too honest.

“Hammerspace?”

“Oh, right. I forgot to tell you. I have that. It’s where I keep all my stuff!”

“And how much stuff do you have in it right now?”

“Uhh, let me see. Around a hundred pounds of raw ferrum ore, not iron, it doesn't let me label it iron, a hundred pounds of special blood clots, ten pounds of plasma, seventy gallons of stomach acid, eighty pounds of fat. That’s the big stuff. I also have fifty or so eyes, two hund-ish teeth, a dozen livers, a dozen intestines, uhh.. Ribs, spines, cracked bones, brains, tongues, spleens, kidneys. Around six of each, give or take one or two. And like twenty ingots of processed ferrum ready for forging. And a fully functional crucible, hammer, anvil and tongs.” She finishes, looking off into the distance. “Oh, and the tiny cancer blob from the old lady, the cyst from that alcoholic guy who said it burns when he pees, and a patch of skin from the teen boy on chemo who had a rash. I also balanced their heart rate, blood pressure, body temp and removed any micro-symptoms and their causes. Used the spectral hands. Jazz hands~” She wiggled her fingers. Amy was unimpressed.

“Yeah. I saw that. Okay. Sure. I’m not even surprised anymore. Okay. You did fix them all, they didn’t seem to have any long-lasting debilitating effects on them, you actually did purge all the offending foreign and not so foreign bodies from their organisms. So you know what? I approve.” She finally said. “Now let’s get out of here.”

Amy was ready to spend the rest of the day healing patients. This time, she wasn’t even alone. Taylor was right there with her and doing a surprisingly good job at it too. If Amy ignored the occasional blatant flesh theft. She’d even hoped to just heal away in peace, until the PRT arrived.

Chapter Text

Armsmaster was the first to arrive on scene, his armscycle having broken 0 federal laws of transportation. Absolutely none. It just so happened that every traffic light he drove was green. It was prudent to show such haste when the report they received came so late, almost too late to do anything. A new parahuman popped up in Brockton General Hospital, and accompanied by Panacea, proceeded to perform surgery on fifteen patients. Director Piggot blew a gasket, fuming about the whys and hows. Why was there an unsanctioned healer supervised only by an associate hero? And how did they miss fifteen whole patients being healed before the alarms even went off? And why on god's green earth is nobody at the site already?

And so here he was, power walking through the hospital halls to the latest sighting spot of Panacea and the new healer. A door leading to a storage closet. Armsmaster paused in front of the door. All his behavioral analysis algorithms indicated that two teenagers hiding in a storage closet was something private and embarrassing to disturb. So he waited for them to finish whatever they were doing, still standing right in front of the door just in case somebody else tried entering the closet or he missed the healers leaving.

Only a minute passed of Armsmaster impatiently waiting, coding on his wrist keyboard, for Panacea and another girl to come out of the closet. The girl wore a pale robe not unlike the one worn by Panacea. Her hands were covered in gloves that reached her forearms or further, deeper inspection obstructed by the robe’s pulled up sleeves. On her face was a dark red metal mask that revealed her lower jaw, the mask a smooth plane with two eye holes. They stared at him for a moment before Panacea, pulling the other pale robe wearing cape back into the closet and closing the door behind them. Armsmaster noted that he shouldn't pause for dramatic suspension when talking to teenagers from now on. If he got to the point, perhaps they wouldn't have fled. But that was alright, he could wait longer. In fact, nobody disturbed him in the hospital, unlike in the Rig. So he could wholeheartedly finish his next program just in time for the next Endbringer attack.

The closet opened once again when Armsmaster just finished a line of code. That was a very satisfying coincidence.

“Panacea, I am here on official PRT capacity to verify the new parahuman’s identity and alignment.” He said, without pause this time.

“Oh cool. Then we'll be going. Goodbye!” The girl beside Panacea said, dragging the freckled healer away from Armsmaster. But she only managed to take a couple steps before Panacea latched onto the storage closet doorframe and dragged the girl back.

“No. T- we're not going anywhere. Stay here and answer Armsmaster’s questions!” She commanded, visibly straining to stop the girl’s retreat.

“Hi, Armsmaster! Big fan!” The girl said, whirling around to face him. Her left hand shot out, and only his combat algorithm told him that she wasn't attacking. So he raised a hand of his own to shake hers. “Nice to meet ya! I have underwear with your face on it.”

His face tightened, the only visible indicator of his discomfort being his pursed lips. He thought he dealt with that particular PR nightmare. But his past mistakes would forever haunt him. There always will be someone who remembers. There was no way around it. But hearing these words from a teenaged girl, he started doubting his PR manager’s decision about his target audience. Wasn't he catering to young teens to young adult men that loved robots and knights, and engineering majors that loved robots and knights? Maybe he should think of a much more PG line of merchandise he could cater to girls? He had many iterations of his armor. Dressup dolls? No, that would be reductionist and sexist. A fully articulated doll that couldn't change its armor. Multiple lines of toys each with a different design. It wouldn't look good if he advertised it as tinker-level accurate and made it possible to undress the dolls. But detachable heads and hands? Maybe-

“Ahem. Your name and association?” He said after a momentary lapse of concentration.

“Do Not use your real name.” Panacea warned from beside her.

“I am Spirurgeon.” The girl- Spirurgeon said.

“Seriously? That's such a lame ass name.” Panacea grumbled into Spirurgeon’s ear.

“I don't see why not? I'm a spirit surgeon. I summon spirits and do surgery.” Spirurgeon shrugged. “What, naming myself Surgeon is cringe. Ew. If I named myself something like Remedy, that'd be copying you.”

“Remedy is also used to describe the legal means to enforce a right to seek redress for a wrong. Or a successful way to deal with a problem, difficulty or evil.” Armsmaster added after a quick internet search.

“Oh! Okay. I like Remedy then.” Remedy acquiesced easily.

“Very well. Hero or villain?”

“Dude.” Armsmaster didn't react overtly to the excessively familiar tone of the teenager, but he did frown, the gesture hidden by his visor. “I'm standing in front of you, not in cuffs or covered in containment foam. I take offense at being assumed even potentially a villain! I'm associated with Panpan!”

“I take offense at being associated with you.” Panpanacea grumbled.

“I will need a direct statement.”

“I'm a hero.”

“Very well. I will need to record and be present at a PRT approved power testing for your healing, using vetted volunteers on site in PRT HQ.” Panpanacea raised her head. “Your vouching alone cannot certify Remedy to heal in an official capacity.” Panpanacea dropped her head.

Remedy fixed him with a stare. Cocking her head to the side, she tapped her chin in contemplation.

“I hate seeking approval from an authority figure. That touches upon my very tragic superhero origin story.” Armsmaster tensed. “But sure. I'll go. If Amy’s okay with… going as well?” Armsmaster relaxed. Talking to people was too nerve wracking. Especially capes. They were a walking talking ticking bomb with three wires and you didn't know which would instantly detonate, which would postpone the explosion and which would leave you sleepless for many nights from a disturbing and deeply personal lore dump.

“Yea, I'm fine. We can go now.” Amy shrugged.

“Sweet!”

“I have requested armored transport to pick you up-”

“No need. We'll go by air.” Remedy said, unfurling two pairs of deep red wings, a bright crescent halo made of dense circuitry lighting up just above her head.

No discretion or restraint in showing off her powers, noted Armsmaster. He saw off Remedy flying away with Amy in a very protested bridal carry, then mounted his armscycle to rush back to the HQ. Once there, a quick request of Remedy’s arrival time gave him a rough estimate of her flight speed. Given the fact that she followed land traffic roads on her way here and an assumption that she took the shortest path, her speed would be anywhere between a hundred and a hundred and fifty miles per hour with a margin of error of five percent.

At the time of his arrival, Remedy was trying to convince Panpanacea to buy her a pair of Assault and Battery themed glowsticks.

“No. You'll stick them somewhere weird and then I'll be embarrassed for both of us.” Panpanacea reasoned.

“Panacea, Remedy. Follow me.” Armsmaster said just seconds before Miss Militia reached the healer pair. He shot her a victorious smirk on his way to the elevators, which was returned by an irritated crinkle of her eyes and what he knew was her sticking her tongue out behind the American flag themed scarf.

“Hi Miss M! I'm your fan!” Remedy beamed when she saw the military themed hero. “I couldn't find underwear with your face on it like I did with Armsmaster and panties with American flag print would be considered a felony by defacing the national symbol. You really need a logo.”

“Uhhh… thank you, dear. You must be Remedy?” Miss Militia didn't need to bend down at all to meet the new cape face to face, the freakishly tall teenager being completely level with the veteran hero.

“Sure! Man, this day is awesome. I got to meet my favorite heroes, I got to dig in people's intestines with their enthusiastic consent, and I found a nickel on the way here!” She happily shook Miss Militia’s hand and stood back behind Armsmaster as the elevator doors opened to lead them deeper into the basement floors, below the Wards break room and into the testing facilities.

Miss Militia, given her rigorous PR training, did not give the girl a double take on her second statement, nor did she look overly scandalized by her uncandid manner of speech. But she did shoot a nervous look at Armsmaster which he returned with a knowing, albeit barely noticeable, nod.

“Before you are three volunteers with varying degrees of injury.” Armsmaster said once Remedy signed appropriate documentation (after poring over them for fifteen minutes. It was two pages long! The inefficiency!). “Before you proceed with your healing, Panacea, could you please observe them pre-operation?”

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And so she did. The first volunteer had a recent, non-lethal laceration and a deep second degree burn and a fractured femur. Amy wondered for a second whether the injuries were caused in an actual accident or if some trooper took the man aside and gave him a beating. And Taylor did short work of the injuries by replacing the skin with… something, and stitching the laceration up with a thread of dubious origins that melded into the man’s biology in a way that didn't make sense to Amy for a hot minute. Oh! She used sinew that she somehow set up to dissolve into natural plasma once the injury fully healed. Completely unrejected by the man’s body.

Next was a woman with a failing liver and bone cancer. Taylor made short work of it as well, having cut out the parts that were harmful and prescribing appropriate prescription (albeit inaccurate medicine names) to recover the liver and bone marrow.

Third was a man with a congenital heart disease and Taylor threw her arms up at that. She couldn't fix genetic anomalies, only graft a new heart for the man, but it would also fail in due time and so Amy took over the healing and fixed him up.

The healing testing done, the volunteers were wheeled away. Armsmaster took frequent notes throughout the procedures and asked questions often. But almost every answer of Taylor's was “I’unno. I just pass out for a sec and they're fixed.” At some point, Armsmaster gave up on getting an answer out of Taylor about her healing process.

“This concludes the tests. We will contact you later whether or not you are allowed to heal in an official capacity. May I ask how often do you intend to… do so?”

“I'll think about it. I'm not going to give you a fixed number. That would only lead to high expectations and then disappointment if I decide to reduce my visitation rates.” Amy was kicking herself for not being able to say the same. Of course, now that she basically lives in the hospital, everybody expects her to be there when they're gravely injured or have a dying patient. She simply can't stop or else her entire life's purpose is over! Worse, Carol will yell at her for slacking! Worse! Carol won't yell. She'll just click her tongue, shake her head and say that that's what she expected of Amy when she finally got agency of her own.

“Yeah, I don't trust you with any other testing.” Taylor’s words pulled her out of the spiral her previous words put her in. Amy looked over incredulously at her fellow healer. What the heck did she mean ‘she doesn't trust’? Whom? Armsmaster? No, she was his fan, right? The PRT? The fucking government?!

“I recommend you take the tests for flight speed and muscle strength. It is best if you know your own limits.” Armsmaster insisted.

“I know my own body better than your machines do.” Was Taylor's curt response. Why did she suddenly become so hostile to him?

Whatever it was, Amy’s question was left unanswered once they left the PRT HQ. They weren't given a lift back to the hospital, but Taylor somehow managed to wheedle out a hundred and fifty bucks out of Armsmaster, all in one dollar bills. At Amy’s incredulous stare, she simply responded ‘cab fare’. They proceeded to spend some of that cab fare on soft ice cream from a Boardwalk stall, and a pair of hotdogs. Taylor devoured hers with great expediency, savoring only the aftertaste and looking very much wild.

“I've spent a month eating nothing but eyes, raw liver and teeth.” She explained. “You BET I missed normal food.”

And so they went around the Boardwalk trying every sweet they offered, which left Amy slightly bloated even after she started sharing most of her food with Taylor and only trying a piece or two just for the taste. Taylor, on the other hand, didn't even look full. Amy quietly cursed her genes.

“Oh, those aren't from genes. My skin is so tough that it bends, but doesn't quite stretch outside of my normal range of motion.”

“How tough?”

“Mmm. Pretty much bulletproof, I think. Gotta check to be sure though.” She said, beelining towards a gun shop off on the side street.

“You aren't seriously planning to shoot yourself, are you?” Amy ran after her, somehow glad that gunshot wounds were the most frequent injuries she healed.

“Well duh. How else would we check?”

“Don't you know your own body?”

“I- why do you ask? You didn't ask how tough my skin is for small talk. So I gotta prove it. You wouldn't just believe my word, would you?”

Well! Yeah. But Amy expected the girl to be at least mostly honest with her by now?!

“Hi! How much for one bullet and using one of your guns? It won’t even leave your shop.” She said cheerfully to the proprietor. He, seeing two capes, one of whom was Panacea, just stepped forward and put a gun on the counter.

“A buck.” He shrugged.

“Sweet!” Taylor didn't waste time, picking the gun up and brought it to her temple.

“Whoa! Whoa whoa whoa! Hold on now!” The proprietor AND Amy were panicking, flailing their hands near Taylor until she acquiesced and aimed point blank at her now bare stomach. A loud BANG deafened Amy’s ears, which she took as the signal to grab Taylor at the supposed gunshot wound and… Taylor was completely fine. Her stomach just had a slightly hotter spot at the center. And- wow. Those were some refined abs. The girl was SHREDDED. Must have been the full month of constantly being in danger and fighting tentacle monsters. Mm. Tentac-

“Um. Amy? You can let go now.” Amy’s hand shot up like she just touched a sizzling hot skillet.

“Whatever! Sure, you're bulletproof. I believe you now!” She huffed and walked out of the gun shop. Taylor caught up to her in no time and walked in silence for several minutes as Amy took that moment to process what just happened. That is, she refused to process it.

“Can you do it on others?” She asked when they reached the Boardwalk end.

“The skin grafts? Duh! I'll have to kill Baal though… again.”

“Oh. Nevermind then.” Amy deflated. She died so many times just to get the a heart to get Amy out, and if she wasn't around, Taylor would have two hearts to work with and wouldn't need to fight Baal again.

“Pfft. Come on. He's easy now! Every time we fight, I get stronger and he stays the same.” But Amy wouldn't listen. She kept walking, her internal autopilot leading her back to the hospital. “I can fly now?” Taylor tried again. “No, really. I died a hundred or so times in the first fight. Then just fifty times in the second! Imagine how scuffed the fight will be now! Soon, I could farm him like he's a common mob!”

“Taylor. Please. Just don't.” Amy finally said. She wasn't worth it. Why go to so much trouble? Even if Taylor died half as many times now, that's twenty five deaths! She imagined, dying wasn't so pleasant. And as far as she knew, and Amy knew, Taylor's pain receptors were working a-okay.

“What's his deal anyway? Is he a cape? He must be, right?”

“Dunno.” Taylor shrugged. “Capes have like… an organ in their brain, right?”

“Yeah. A source of their power. Corona Poletina and Gemma. I'll… uh, I'll show you one day.”

“One day? Why not now?”

Amy looked at her like she just said something silly. Which Taylor did.

“Where would I find one now? I mean, once we have to do an autopsy on another independent who died to failed gang recruitment. The gangs keep their own capes’ corpses for burial. Or if they died in a gang fight, well… there might not be any remains.” 

That drew Taylor to a halt.

“Does that happen often?”

“Hm?” Amy stopped in kind, lokking back at her fellow healer.

“An independent dying?”

“Uhh… not that often. Once every three months maybe.” Amy shrugged. “Honestly, we might not get a body for half a year even. Mostly, independents disappear, actually. No corpse, no nothing.”

“Huh.”

“Why?”

“I mean. I'm an independent.” Taylor said. Which Amy found just slightly amusing.

“Heh. No. You're coming with me.”

“Umm. No. I don't think I am.” Taylor said defensively.

“I think you do. I'm inviting you to New Wave.” Well! She didn't actually have any say in who joins their team. It was very much a “keep it in the family” kind of gang. The only way to join New Wave was to be born into either the Dallons or the Pelhams. Or to marry into them. A blush flashed on Amy’s face, which she quickly took under control.

“I'm not revealing my civilian identity!”

“I'm not asking you to!”

“How do you suppose That will work out? They'll tell me ‘mask off or no deal’!”

“Come on! You'll just be.. like. In the healer division. That way, since you won't be in the action...”

“There Is no healer division in New Wave.”

“I am the healer division.”

“I don't find that convincing.”

Grrh! How stubborn is this girl?

“Okay. Fine. Don't join. Suit yourself!” Amy huffed.

“Fine! I will!” Taylor huffed also.

They spent the rest of the day healing people in the hospital, giving each other the silent treatment. Amy didn't feel right under the heavy lack of Taylor’s voice. She got used to her talking non-stop already. They still kept close distance, not letting the other off their sight. Just… just in case, you know? And they breezed through each ward. Fury fuelling Amy’s work, and novelty fueling Taylor’s. Until there was nobody left who was recovering from an operation or with a condition neither healer could fix.

“I guess that's it for today.” Taylor said, finally breaking the silence.

“I guess so.” Amy agreed. Her voice was hoarse. Not for any sentimental dramatic reason like she was on the verge of tears or something. She has just smoked a pack of cigs recently. Not like she cared. No, she didn't sigh in relief! She was out of breath! From all the smoking! She had a problem, okay?

“I'm technically not released from my stay here. I heard the school is paying for all expenses. So I'll stay a bit longer.” The tall girl said, stretching lazily, as her robes flew up and off her body. Right. Skinray. Fuck! Her skinray!

“Taylor. Do skinrays need to eat?”

“Huh? Not really. They're filter feeders. Just let it graze in the air for a bit. They do have retractable probosci tho. For blood or… well. Juice.”

“Did you design them?”

“No. Just got their schematics in my mind.”

“Okay. I just forgot mine in my backpack. I guess… I'll see you tomorrow.” She said, giving a weak wave as she turned around, her destination - the break room. “Gotta go… um. Get my skinray some juice to drink.”

“See ya.” Came a reply from behind her.

Chapter Text

“Hey Ames!” Vicky’s cheerful voice greeted her when she came back home.

“Hey Vicky.” Came her subdued reply.

“What's up? Had fun with your friend?” At that, Amy sagged deeper.

“No. Yes. I don't know. Had an argument with her at the end, but I think it's… okay.” Too much happened in one day for her to tell. She dropped her backpack on the hallway floor and shucked her priest robe off. Taylor was right. The robe limits movement too much. And she looks silly. Nobody else wears robes. She knows there is a reason for the costume choice. Its impracticality is a message of its own. That she can't fight and won't fight, so please, don't hurt the helpless healer. Well! Taylor is a healer! And she killed a Blaster with six different killer moves. Well. Temporarily.

“Amy made a new friend?” An unexpected voice came from the living room.

“Aunt Sarah?” Amy peeked into the living room to see most of New Wave gathered.

“How have you been, Amy?” Her aunt waved.

“Any… special occasion?” She asked warily.

“The family has gathered to discuss our… unattending member.” Carol said calmly.

“Crystal wants to split up.” Eric piped up, and for the somber news, he sounded oddly excited.

“She's having personal trouble and we will resolve this issue before it gets more serious.” Aunt Sarah corrected him.

“Oh. Well, don't let me distract you, then.” She bowed out, making a beeline to the kitchen.

“Stop right there, young lady! What makes you think you can flunk out of the discussion?” That was aunt Sarah. Carol, at these times, like family meetups, usually fell silent and gave the lead to her sister. Still, one or another, it made little difference in how hardass they were to Amy. She took a deep breath and turned back to the living room.

“What makes you think my opinion matters?” She said, instead of obediently sitting down on the corner couch like usual. Aunt Sarah, not expecting a bite back, quickly scanned the room for the rest of the team’s reactions.

“Amy Dallon! You are as much a part of the team as everyone else here! As a member of the team, you must contribute to discussions. And your opinion matters as much as any of us here!”

Right. The ‘everyone here is equal’ talk, when the only voices that truly mattered were Sarah’s and Carol’s. Until they won the argument, the argument would never end. And whenever Amy was forced to participate, she was either the weak vote of assent or an easy argument to win against.

“Alright.” She said, plopping down between Vicky and Eric. “I missed the Everything going on in this discussion. Fill me in?”

🧠🧠🧠🧠🧠🧠🧠🧠

As it turned out, Crystal got herself an exchange program internship at some university in London, and wanted to use this opportunity to mask up. Do hero stuff in Great Britain, incognito like every other goddamn cape in the world. She wasn't even leaving the team for real. Just running a side gig while taking the internship.

The argument wasn't even about whether or not Crystal was allowed to leave. She just didn't want her family to announce to the whole damn world that Laserdream is visiting London. That's it.

“That's just bullshit!” Eric mumbled, the kids were finally let go so the adults could have their debate on their own. They were sitting in Vicky’s room, eating cashews. “It really could have just been two sentences. ‘It’s alright, our dearest daughter. We won't raise a fuss about you leaving to do hero stuff incognito while you're on your year long internship, because we love you.’ But they had to make it a problem about her never wanting to come back to BB.” 

Amy sighed deeply, beside him, reaching out to grab another handful of nuts.

“That reminds me!” Vicky piped up. “Ames?”

“Huh?”

“Spill!”

“What?” She clutched her handful of cashews. “No! I'm not making a mess!”

“I mean, your argument with Taylor!”

“Ughhhhhh. No. I'm not making a mess.” She sighed.

“C’mon. It was nothing serious, right?”

“I asked her to join New Wave.” Amy admitted, hands covering her face and scattering nuts all over the bed.

“Shiiit!” Eric added very on-point commentary.

“Yeah. I panicked. She had nobody to team up with, and she's like oil and water with the PRT. I spaced out during her testing for a bit and when I started paying attention again, she was full on hostile to Armsmaster. Who she said is her top five favorite hero.”

“So you offered her an invite?”

“Yeah? She's a healer! Do you think gangs will let her scot-free if she doesn't join a team soon?”

“Shit!” Eric said once again.

“But she doesn't wanna unmask.”

“Well… she's- since she's a healer, maybe we could convince the team?” Vicky offered. “Nobody refuses a healer.”

“Except they refuse me everything I ask for and say they know best.” Amy corrected.

“I mean… they are the veteran heroes with twenty years of experience. Maybe they do know best.” Vicky shrugged. Of course she would defend them.

Amy closed her eyes tightly, then released a breath.

“They would insist. At least, they'll insist on meeting Taylor first. Then C- mom would vet her. And there will be a whole ass interrogation session in her private office. Taylor has exactly zero patience for authority and interrogations.” And damn was defiance attractive nowadays! Seeing Taylor being so nonplussed by Armsmaster playing social power games with her and just deciding to leave until he approaches her properly instead of looming over their only way out like that? She wanted… to do that too. To have no filter on her mouth and just say whatever she wanted to say, and do what she wanted to do. If only what she wanted to say usually wasn't some weak shit that could be deconstructed in seconds by her lawyer adoptive mother. And if only what she wanted to do wasn't sleeping with her own sister.

“Well. You could form your own team.” Eric shrugged.

“And have the same argument happening downstairs target me next time?”

“You won't be leaving the team. You'll just be a member of two teams at once. Spider-Man did it. Wolverine too.”

“They are fictional characters.” Amy deadpanned.

“Well I'm sure there are real life capes who do it too.” Vicky joined in.

“It's fine. Just… forget about it.” Amy sighed. “I'll take a shower and go to bed. See you, Eric.”

“Yea, good night.”

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And I was back at the flesh pit. The moment my head hit the pillow, I awakened right where I left. I gathered a dozen thick tooth tree logs from the teething forest and arranged them in a makeshift log cabin. Not for myself, of course. For Amy. The spot she blinked out of was in a rather precarious location. It was in the Skin Sands, just one dune away from where Baal was floating aimlessly now. If Amy somehow came back and was loud enough to aggro Baal, she'd be dead meat in seconds. So I did what responsible hosts do. I built her a house. A small one, five feet by five feet, with a single door and no windows. Her roof was a flat pair of incisors, and so was the door.

With the log cabin done, I approached Baal. He was just standing there, looking at the horizon, at the weeping valley. And whenever an eye floated too close to the desert, he would use his most powerful attack to utterly disintegrate the poor thing. Or rather, I started to suspect he didn't have a normal attack. Only ultimates.

Taking a deep breath, I brandished my spear. I laced it in a fresh batch of gorerot. Don't get me wrong, the name sounds edgy as hell, but that's how my internal sorting system classified it. And you wouldn't want to see what it does to human flesh.

Lining up the shot, I threw the spear as I myself began accelerating. He was already turning towards me, Hategutter in hand.

“Hategu-guckthr!” His words come out jumbled as the spear lodges itself in his mouth, and I halt my flight by landing heel first on the spear’s hilt, jamming its metal tip deeper down Baal’s throat. Still, that was apparently enough to activate the sword.

Hooks and chains materialize already embedded IN my skin, all the links connecting at my mouth and further down my digestive system. He yanks it forcefully and I feel a sensation that I know is my intestines, topologically also counting as the same surface as my skin and thus also covered in hooks and chains, tug. “Oh voy. He’e ‘e go.” I sigh through the chains in my mouth as I am scrunched from the inside out. 

I wake up screaming, this time, on the spot I reappeared in. Then I scrunch one more time, the hooks and chains twist once more to set myself back to having my skin outside. And I wake up screaming. Huh. Good to know that the respawn point updates every time I re-enter. Would save me time if I am fighting a tough nut like Baal, if I just stab my own heart a five second flight away from him.

Which leads to me throwing myself back into the fight. I see him pulling my spear out of his mouth, hands obviously busy, and I pull out another spear and take higher into the skies. Letting gravity and my own acceleration do the heavy lifting, I align the spear tip with Baal’s shoulder, right through where his heart should be and out of his ass. I stick the landing perfectly, the spear skewering him through his shoulder and out his ass cheek. Gotta hand it to the big guy. He blunts my weapons like crazy. Just a couple hits against him leave the blades dull and shineless. But his skin is great. I want his skin. And to do that, I need to finish this damn fight quicker!

Baal pulls out Dickskewer and, once again, I am crotchless and dead. And ten seconds later, I'm back in the fight! Just in time for him to aim Hategutter at me again and hooks and chains materialize on my skin and insides and in a split second I am turned inside out. Okay. It's slowly becoming my second most unpleasant method of death. I fly back to the fight, once again making an attack from above. He doesn't seem to look up often so I plunge another spear through his uninjured shoulder. Although, I get blasted again, now with a proper Agonymauler. The only reason I know Baal is a speedster is because he becomes one when wielding the axe. Don't need to be a blaster when you can get within melee range in milliseconds. So all I can do is sigh as the jagged axe simply touches me and I am torn to shreds and I wake up screaming and I wake up screaming and I wake up screaming-

I wake up once again. My re-entry point now littered with my own corpses, and the field around Baal littered with even more corpses. I guess that's how there's so much blood and flesh in this dimension. Everyone just keeps dying to this motherfucker. Even killing him once took thirty deaths of my own. And he still managed to land one last hit with Ragesplitter in his dying throes. A deep sigh escapes my throat. If I fought like usual, he'd actually be dead faster. But I had to be careful with his damn head because I wanted to bring it to Amy. Intact.

I took his two hearts, and assessed my loot. He dropped Dickskewer and Ragesplitter this time. Once again, I wasn't interested in Dickskewer. And so, picking Ragesplitter up consumed one of the hearts and now I had one more ingredient to reinforce my skin graft. Granted, I promised Amy not to do any more skin grafts. But I wasn't doing a new one. I was just upgrading my old one. Yeah. Totally not breaking my promise.

“...”

I decided to keep Ragesplitter for now. Aside from it being a much better weapon than a shoddy axe, and all my spears being completely ruined, its Blaster ability was the most lethal ranged attack I've seen. And shouting “Ragesplitterrr!” was a bit less cringe than crying out any other weapon names. And it looked fine. Unlike the jagged hooked flamberge that was Hategutter, Ragesplitter was much more tame. Two smooth black blades containing a burst of red energy between them, kind of like how sci fi books depicted rail guns. It still looked villainous as all heck, but at least I wouldn't be mistaken for a member of The Teeth if I brought it out.

The remaining heart I decided to use on a small project of mine. It would take up a lot of materials I painstakingly gathered throughout the past thirty days here. But if it works out, it will be worth it.

I took out the crucible and fired it up using fat cells I found in the shallow caves. Each cell, around a baby’s fist sized, could light the crucible up to melt an entire ten pounds of ore. Of course, given the mediocre quality of the ore itself, I'd only get a pound of iron out of it. But it was somehow More than just iron I could buy from a scrapyard for five bucks. It had the Identity of something that used to be blood. And somehow, that resonated better with my power.

I had been snuck upon so many times while I went spelunking in the tight caves to get all this iron. It was unbelievable! The fact that some creatures here perfectly melded into their environment made itself known when a cave I was squeezing through suddenly closed around me and digestive fluid began pouring out around me. That was a feeling I do not want to experience ever again. So the hundred pounds of ferrum ore, or rather the ten pounds of iron, were the only metal I'll have for a while. To fix that, I'll have to get my hands on Agonymauler. It tore apart the skin of the ground so easily, like a hot knife melting through butter. With it, I could finally begin my grand plan.

But alas, he hasn't dropped it a single time in the three occasions he died in. Which meant my chances of getting it the next time are… pretty high. And so, in preparation to one day getting it, I will be spending my entire stash of ferrum and blood clots to make an engine and transmission. Anything else, I didn't quite need to be metal. The frame? Teeth. The wheels? Also teeth. Maybe I'll even opt to make articulated legs for it instead of wheels. Yeah. Sounds about right. I haven't encountered a single bone still, but I'm sure there are bones somewhere in this hell dimension.

I just finished smelting the last piece of the ore and poured it into an enamel cast when I heard a door creak open. Amy stood at her tooth hut in her pajamas, the skinray clinging to her leg like a very affectionate rug.

“Oh hi Amy!” I waved, using a pair of disposable tongs to pull the metal out of its cast, quenching it in blood. Wow. The dark fantasy geeks would go crazy if they heard that sentence.

“Why am I here again?”

“I’unno. The first time was because you healed me. Then, after you woke up, you healed me again, right?”

“Huh?”

“From the… knife-in-my-heart wound?”

“Oh. I guess I did.” She eyed the makeshift forge I set up around me. “What are you doing?”

“Oh! You're right on time! Come here.” I ushered her to my side and unfurled the schematics I looked up using the hospital break room PC.

“Taylor…”

“Oops. That's the bucket wheel excavator. Sorry, wrong one.” I chuckled sheepishly and took out a different mix of letter papers. This one was a much smaller excavator, but instead of caterpillar wheels, it had eight legs. And one of its sides had a ten foot wide circular saw, while the other had an articulated bucket.

“Why do you need an excavator in the first place?”

“So I can dig! I need a lot of metal and a lot of blood clots for my projects. I won't say no to digestive fluid and… other bounties of the underground. The thing is… I don't quite have the Tinker instinct to make it. So I'll just have to improvise and translate an existing machine into a flesh abomination. And since we only have teeth as an alternative hard material in absence of metal, and I can't break them down to smaller pieces without compromising their integrity, I need your help shaping the frame and internal parts.”

“Taylor, I can't-”

“I know. You don't want to associate with wet tinkers. But-”

“No, Taylor. I told you already! My power doesn't work here!”

“But it did on the skinray, right?”

Amy paused, pulling the skinray up to inspect him. In just a couple seconds, it lit up in all colors of the rainbow and stopped at white and red, Panacea’s colors.

“Okay, yeah. I guess I can.”

“Sweet! Here!” I pulled out a dozen embryos out of my pouch.

“What the hell, Taylor? That's too many!” Amy retreated from the pile of giant embryos.

“They aren't skinrays. They're like… tooth crabs.” That seemed like an apt name. “And I'm not telling you to keep them all to yourself to raise an army of crabs. They're… material.”

“Huh. Okay. And you're sure they don't mind?”

“They have no will of their own. You bury the egg in the ground and wait for them to emerge. And that's it. They don't have any desire to multiply or… I don't know, learn. The skinray is as smart as a cat. But the crabs? Dumb as rocks.”

“Okay. Gimme?” Amy made grabby motion with her hand. I grabbed her hand and squeezed lightly. “The schematic.” I let go and put the roll of skin in her hand.

As Amy pored over the schematic, I busied myself with making more schematics. The first one was a rough sketch for reference, but now it was no longer a solo project. I needed to supply Amy with all the information she would need. One for the side, front, top, bottom and back. Same but wireframe, same but for each limb separately, same for the connection ports that I want to use to plug in a brain in a jar that I program to follow a certain set of commands, and all I'll need to do is give it coordinates for the starting point and waste disposal point and it could start digging a quarry on its own. Speaking of brains…

“Amy! Check this out!” I plopped the brain on the table in front of her. Her eyes widened but she didn't react otherwise. Her finger poked the still twitching brain.

“Brains don't twitch… especially outside the cranium. Also, it doesn't have a Corona. So that wasn't a parahuman. It was Baal’s, I assume?”

“Yea. Killed him again recently. Got this!” I pulled out Ragesplitter and also laid it down on the table.

“... Cool.” She tapped the sword for a second and pushed it away, her freckled face scrunching in distaste.

“Also, guess what.” I grinned, pulling out all the ingredients for the skin graft. I was going to use it on myself, but she asked me if I could do her. And heck, I could do her alright!

“Oh. N-no, you really shouldn't have.” Amy said, looking guilty and nervous. “I mean. You should probably use it for yourself. You know. So that you die less next time you fight him.”

“That's valid. But I got his sword already. It's bound to reduce my deaths to him by a bunch.” I shrugged. “I could do you right here, right now. And by the time I'm done, Baal will revive again.”

“Uhmm. But you'll have to replace… all the skin. Right?” Amy looked at me warily.

“Yeah. That's the point. How else will you get complete coverage?”

“... All the skin? Everywhere?”

“Yup. All the skin.”

“I… umm. M-maybe not?”

Hm? Ooooh! I got it. She's- ohhhh. She’s being shy?!

“Amy. You can tell if a disembodied brain has a Corona and Gemma. With a touch. I'm sure you get a complete 3D map of a person’s body by touch as well. Am I right?”

“Yeah? But-”

“So you've seen me naked.” Which, wow, hasn't happened to me since forever.

“Not with my own eyes!”

“But you have.” Which I'm still choosing to put away in a locked box because processing my emotions is a chore. There was no response from Amy.

“Would you act the same with your gynecologist?”

“I don't need one. I don't get infections or diseases. Ever.”

“Okay. But you were there with me during testing. Right?” Amy gave a nod. “I go blind when I start tinkering. It all happens on autopilot.”

“Oh.. wait! You weren't lying? I thought you just said that so Armsmaster would fuck off!”

“Heh. Well, I kinda did want him off my skin. He was getting real annoying. But he had a lie detector on his helmet. Anything I said better be the truth. So, whatever sensitive information I had, I just didn't divulge at all. That included me not lying in my physical tests. So I didn't do them.”

“Huh. I thought you were just being stubborn.”

“I was.”

“Mm. Okay. Fine! Let's get this over with!” She huffed angrily and started taking her pajamas off.

“Well hold on! I gotta prepare the operation table first.” I said, hastily raising the schematics stack to shield my eyes.

And so I raised a new tent, disinfected it and brought all my tools. A tooth bench was erected to hold Amy as I operated on her.

“Do you want to keep your old skin?”

“That sounds… yuck. Will I have the same senses or will my skin go numb? Wait, dumb question.” She must have remembered checking my skin graft. I had all my sensations. No use in pain tolerance when getting it would still result in me being dead and worse, I'll probably lose a bit of my humanity with it. The more detached I get from a normal human, the less empathy and connection I'm gonna feel for them. Even the ability to fly already made me despise walking on foot.

“Yup. I could tweak it for you though. Slightly higher pain tolerance?” Amy nodded at that. “Sweet. Just lie back, close your eyes and think of England.”

Amy did as she was told, and right as my hands began undressing my patient, I decided to follow suit. 

“Wait wait wait hold on! Aren't you going to anest-” My vision blacked out, and I came back to my senses to a beet red Amy. Or rather, her skin was now literally beet red.

“Wow!” It was almost hypnotizing to look at how the circuits shifted from invisible to visible depending on how the light hit them. And with Amy’s curvy body, light hit the circuits in all kinds of ways. The image promptly burned itself into my sclera. Wow. I did that. Errr. As in. I wasn't the engineer that designed this particular supercar. But I wrapped it in a nicer color. Yeah. I did that.

“You scared the shit out of me!” Amy yelled, pulling her pajamas in front of her. There was minimal blood, and surprisingly, her old skin was gone too.

“But it didn't hurt?”

“N-no.” Oh thank god! “I kinda fell unconscious the moment you picked up a scalpel. Which was weird.”

“Great! I did an awesome job then!” And that was what I wanted to hear from her.

“Turn around!” Amy barked instead, and so I did. I heard her grunting and fabric rustling behind me as Amy sometimes failed to navigate her new sense of touch and numbed skin. There was quite a bit of minor, very quiet sounds of fabric tearing from Amy applying too much force because her pressure receptors weren't used to her skin being so tough. “Will it stay red?”

“Nah. It'll blend into your natural skin color once it settles for good. Did I feed you already?” I was pulling out bowls of food of dubious origins regardless of her answer.

“I think healing from eating stuff here is your power. Not like… a general Thing that happens to everybody.” Amy said, and I heard the rustling behind me stop. She was back in her plain pajamas and was looking out of sorts. “I can feel my own skin…” 

“You couldn't… before?”

“I mean, with my power! I can feel it, but if I change it, it'll stop being- oh nevermind. It's done settling in. It's part of me now.” She said, her eyes slowly rising to meet mine. As she did, most of the red on her skin subsided, leaving only faint rosy circuit lines that reflected the light sometimes when she moved. And a raging blush that fas forming on not only her face, but her neck, shoulders and ears. For a moment, I thought the skin graft didn't integrate well and was causing a rejection fever, but no, Amy was just blushing.

“Well! Baal is back. You should still try this cooked liver, and the soup. If nothing else, it'll help you recover faster.” I set the bowls down, on the operating table Amy was still sitting on.

I was going to go fight him again. First, to secure Amy her way out. Second, to secure a second heart that will power the excavator. Or maybe, actually… I had different plans for the second heart.

“What should I do?” Amy asked, body shifting away from the bowls, still wary of local cuisine. She still held a single eyeball in her hand, rotating it with her thumb like a very squishy and wet fidget toy.

“Try finishing the body frame? I'll then work on raw material processing, getting muscles and sinew to work with your power, while you work on actuators and connectors? I'll tell you how it'll be structured and which port to connect to which muscle. We can work on programming the brain together then.”

“Okay. That's fine by me.” Amy nodded, moving around the operating table, out of the tent, and back to her horde of tooth crabs.

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If Amy was honest with herself, she was genuinely having fun for the first time in years. Sure, it involved quite a bit of embarrassment and panic on her end. But she was having fun. Never in her two years of parahuman life could she ever imagine using her powers on a whole ass excavator.

Logically speaking, if it was in the real world, Amy would have outright rejected Taylor’s plea for help on her project. After all, Taylor was a bona fide wet tinker. Like Bonesaw. And even associating with wet tinkers was dangerous. Doing something that would in itself be considered wet tinkering? Amy's shoulders shuddered at the thought. Yet here she was. Doing exactly that. She was wet tinkering. Turning giant mutated enamel-encrusted crabs into building blocks for a flesh machine. Actually, she even had ideas for improvement on the schematics. She decided to mention them once Taylor stopped waking up screaming and dying again in a loop fifty feet away from her. Or when she was done killing Baal.

“That red fuck will pay for this!” Taylor screamed as another one of her popped up in a burst of blood and gore of the previous Taylor, and another, and another, and another-. Ten minutes later, she was back, carrying Baal’s heart in one hand and a beige axe in another. It had a short one foot long handle and a broad axe head with a jagged, serrated edge, as wide as Taylor’s entire torso. She looked happier than- well, ever, really.

“Is that the Agonymauler?” Amy cringed at the name. Even if its effects were impressive, nobody in the real world Needed to die ten times. Dying one time, usually, was enough.

“Hehe. Yeup. I'm gonna need like ten more of those to get a proper bucket wheel excavator going, but for the smaller one? One is enough.” She put the axe down and simple contact with its blade split the ground- err- skin in a spiderweb pattern.

“Maybe keep it as a weapon for now?” Amy hedged. Taylor just died twenty or so times just to kill Baal again. Her bold statement that with every defeat, he'll be twice as easy to kill next time was a shameless lie.

“Hm. True. I'm keeping Ragesplitter for the ranged options already, so having a melee weapon would be nice as well. I actually have a- like a build in mind that could potentially give it a less powerful ranged option that doesn't have a thirty second cooldown. And besides, its ranged beam is so potent that most of its power is left over even after it hits Baal. Like it pierces right through and keeps going. So it's a major waste of energy, I think, to keep using it like that.” 

Amy has never been around Tinkers, despite Brockton Bay having two real tinker heroes and much more tinker villains. But Taylor babbling about what she could do with new materials and tech- it was a well documented phenomenon. As she surreptitiously poked Taylor's hand, she could feel all sorts of happy hormones exploding in her brain as she told Amy about what she wanted to do with her loot. She was positively giddy. It was one point in favor of Amy not being a tinker herself. Right. She didn't feel happy discussing, building or using new tech. She didn't even do tech. Her misery from continuously healing the same injuries and illnesses was not an indicator that she would be happier if she did something new. Like a living excavator.

“By the way. I had a couple ideas about the excavator.” Amy said for no reason whatsoever. “So technically we don't need the engine to feed all of its functionality, because its wheels were replaced with legs and it doesn't need the turret because it can just rotate with its legs. Just the circular saw, because it's more efficient to use tech than muscle for it. Muscle-powered rotation would need to be wound back up every few seconds while- hm. Well actually, there is a way, but it would take up more space and would cause more wear and tear- hm.”

“There is a way, yeah. Just gotta make it more of a flesh abomination than it already is.” Taylor grinned, drawing up a flywheel with pivots for muscle attachment like those on train wheels that connected to pistons. “And that'll free up the metal for more important applications, so I can melt down the engine and-”

“Well hold on! You spent so much time making it- what if there's- it's still compact and has its uses, right?” Amy stammered out. Thinking and talking about non-flesh stuff had that effect on her. She truly didn't have any ideas how to apply the engine on anything when there was the far more superior option of muscles.

“We actually need metal for the bucket and saw.” Taylor shrugged.

“And we can have the leftover crabs be the transportation! Like the excavator would dig, and instead of wasting time walking back and forth between the digging site and the storage, it can have a couple crab-trucks that'll do all the walking!”

“That's genius! Okay! Give me an hour to melt down the engine and the axe. I'll-”

“The axe?” Amy sighed exasperatedly. “Maybe power yourself up first before wasting weapons that have their own powers?”

“... Okay. Yeah. I'll go down into the cave to retrieve Baal Junior’s hearts to revive the bastard. Will you be fine doing the excavator now?” Taylor hefted the axe, most likely considering ways to make it less bulky or something.

“Oh yeah! I think the skin settled well.” Amy said, poking herself now. She couldn't feel it like she did foreign elements. But she knew it was working. She felt faster, sharper, stronger as well. She could maybe lift up one of the knee-high five foot wide crabs. They weighed like similarly sized boulders, which was far beyond what Amy could lift before the operation.

“Great. I'll be back in a minute.” Taylor waved, and flew off on her red feathered wings.

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Keeping Agonymauler was such a great idea. In fact, it was the best idea in the whole world. Baal Junior only took three hits from it, and dropped dead. Baal himself only killed me ten times now. That was… insane. Just ten deaths! And I had one more heart and another Ragesplitter! This one I was going to turn into a pistol and gift to Amy.

Amy was still fiddling with the now impressive looking excavator, it only needed the pre-programmed brain, the bucket and saw, to be properly functional. I’m glad Amy is having fun with this project. She looked utterly miserable while healing in the hospital. And she looked happy with all the little crabs crowding around her like baby ducklings, waiting to be turned into tinkering material. In fact, she looked happier than when we were walking around Boardwalk trying all the sweets.

I myself got busy reforging the Ragesplitters into pistols. One I would keep and another would be given to Amy. As a thank you gift for helping me with the excavator. It'd have taken me days to do it myself, and it wouldn't look as cohesive as what Amy was doing.

I spent quite a bit of Baal loot for it. His bones were the only kind of bone I could get here, actually, and his nervous system and brains were put to good use as well. The only parts of his I didn't touch at all were… well. You know. And now I had two ornate pistols with tall and narrow barrels that would shoot a red beam in a thin expanding line. It was an honest to god laser pistol! With a fuckoff “split everything in its path in two” mode, and a safer “cut through the first thing it touches and nothing more” mode.

“Amy, could you come over for a second?” I shouted, making Amy pause mid-crab-mutilation and run over to my tent.

“What?”

“Do you wanna fly?”

“You can get those wings-” she gestured to my currently bare back, “to work on me?”

“Yeah. Even better. I can make them into sandals.”

“Like Hermes?!”

“Yup.”

“W-well I don't want them to get taken away from me if you give them to me.” Amy said cautiously. Right. Her parents knew she's a cape. And were wary of other capes approaching her.

“I can meld them into your skin? The wings, I mean. I know you wear a bulky robe, so I can make them stick out of your ankles instead of your back.” Ideas! Ideas! So many ideas were popping up in my mind.

“Will they be… enough to lift me?”

“Yeah. I don't see why not? And if you want extra insurance, I have enough Marrow Whale feathers for a set on your back as well. So in any case, if you lose the robe-”

“Not happening.”

“Fair enough. But if you do! You’ll have… six pairs of wings!”

“I don’t like where this is going and the imagery I’m gonna be presenting if people find out…”

“I have more wing ideas.”

“Taylor, no.”

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Amy had wings now. She could fly! And nobody but Taylor will ever know that she faceplanted into a giant pimple the first time she tried!

“So, do you like it?” Taylor asked after she calmed down, tears from hysterical laughter still hanging at the edges of her eyes.

“Huff. Yeah. I love them. Thank you.” This was the most thoughtful and important gift anyone has given her. Well okay, Vicky gifted her stuff as well! But- well. None of her other gifts were an actual superpower… that didn’t come with emotional trauma.

“Also.” Taylor said, rummaging through her pouch and placing something in Amy’s hands. “I'm giving you this.”

“Taylor-”

“I know, you're not a fighter, but it's for self defense. After all, what if somebody invades your property or breaks into the hospital and there's nobody around to stop them from hurting you?”

“Taylor-”

“And I can help you practice with it! Granted, I don't have much experience handling firearms myself. But I get an innate understanding of how anything I make works!”

“Taylor, why does this gun have a brain?!” Amy said, having grabbed Taylor by the shoulders to get the tall girl's attention.

“Oh! That's the aim assistant!”

Amy groaned in exasperation. 

“Of course it is. How will it even assist me in aiming?”

“Well that's easy. The moment you properly hold the gun.” Amy did so. A crosshair appeared in her vision, and it moved when she moved the gun. “It will connect to your brain using your skin as the access port. However, nothing gets even read privileges when they connect to you this way. But you do. You get read, edit and admin privileges to anything you touch. So when before you only got edit privilege for biological objects-”

“I can do it with actual tech…” Amy finished for her. “That's how you know Armsmaster has a lie detector! Holy shit! I'm a tech Striker now!”

“More like digital Striker. Can't actually mold tech to your whims. Just the code.”

“I thought the circuits were just there for aesthetic reasons?”

“Um. Who would even see them except yourself?”

“Oh. True.” Amy fiddled with the gun in her hand and shot it once into the sky. A bright red bolt of energy flew out of the barrel and by the time Amy’s vision returned to normal, it was gone. She should probably get herself a visor… ohh, that was awfully close to owning an actual mask, and Amy loved that thought.

“It has two firing modes. Three, actually. Incapacitate, kill, super-kill. Oh and safety mode.” Taylor supplied helpfully, pointing at the nub that Amy had to turn to switch between modes. Amy vowed to never touch the super-kill mode. Unless Crawler jumped her or something.

“Umm. So, the excavator is done, by the way. I only need to finish a couple porter crabs for it.” Amy said, flicking the gun on safety mode and stashing it in her pajama pocket. “Once I'm done with them, I think I'll go back.”

“Oh. Okay.” It hurt slightly to see Taylor deflate like that. She'd be left here, alone, for god knows how long. But Amy couldn't stay in this cursed dimension any longer. It was nice, don't get her wrong. It was nice to just disappear from the real world and do whatever the heck she wants here. But Amy was worried that she might sleep through an emergency or something. What if a hero is gravely injured while she's merrily frolicking across hairy pimple fields? What if Vicky gets gravely injured?

“I'll come back next time? I like it here. Just… I don't wanna miss an emergency. I can't be woken up from the outside, right?” Comforting someone else felt… novel. But it also filled Amy with Emotions. She wasn't in the right mental state to label those emotions. No siree. But she was filled with them.

“Oh! Okay!” Taylor responded much more cheerfully. “Then, while you do that, I'll kill Baal again cause we just spent ALL the hearts we got from him the last couple times.”

“Good idea.” Amy said, still queasy from approving of Taylor killing herself a dozen times.

Amy lost track of time as she made the porter crabs. Just combining them eight at a time yielded rather chonky porter boys that could carry tons of flesh with each trip. Giant six-legged beasts of burden with their backs flat, curved like a deep bowl to hold all their cargo. Their legs were made long enough and strong enough to bend their body, spilling the contents of their bowls. Three of these porter crabs. That would be enough, Amy mused.

When she stepped back to marvel at HER creations, only lacking the rigorous programming Taylor would put in them, and crucial metal for actual excavation. Pride welled up deep in Amy’s chest. She made this. Well, she loosely followed the design provided by an actual Tinker and materials also provided by an actual Tinker. She was just a production worker. Yeah. But she was the one who assembled the things. So she made this. Yeah.

“Ready to go?” Taylor said from behind her. The tall girl’s body was riddled in cuts, her clothes in complete tatters. “Heh. The bastard yelled out one last Hategutter before dying, but didn't have time to pull the chains.” That explained the thousand tiny hooks sticking out of her skin. Taylor chuckled. “Yea I think I'll kill myself once just to get rid of these…”

“Did you get any good loot?” It was kind of addicting to find out what Taylor got this time.

“Oh, no. He dropped another Ragesplitter and Assrape. I thought they're not worth it. Here.” She handed Amy a still pulsing heart.

“Right. I'll just have to stab it, like last time?”

“Yup.”

“Okay. See you tomorrow?” She raised the dagger she kept under her pillow now. It got brought here with her, conveniently.

“See you in a couple days.” Taylor waved.

Amy plunged the dagger into the heart and watched as the world around her shattered, the heart turning pitch black as it sucked her in like she was liquid. When her vision cleared, she was back in her bedroom. Feeling around her body, Amy once again checked if it was just a dream. But she now had a gun in her pocket. And her skin was oddly smooth and tough. But most concerning of all was an eight foot tall, naked man with three penises standing next to her bed.

“Shhh.” He whispered, running a sharp claw across Amy’s cheek. “Salt the wound, slurp the blood.” He didn't yell the line like he did in Taylor’s dimension. Just said it so matter of factly. Like yeah, salt the wound, you know? Slurp the blood while you're at it.

Amy was frozen in place. Be it anybody else, they'd already be an insensate puddle on the floor if they ever touched Amy while naked. But she couldn't affect Baal, she realized.

“What the fuck?” Amy whimpered, quietly aiming the pistol, set at super-death, at Baal through the blanket. But before she could decide if it was worth it to aggravate the situation, the literal devil turned around, gently opened the window and flew away.

“Oh. Oh I'm so fucked if Carol finds out.” Amy whispered, harshly smacking the gun’s handle across her own temple.