“How would that even work?”
“I don’t know, some kind of super advanced technology maybe.”
“Technology? The monsters can be crafty but they aren’t that smart. And they don’t have cultures or language or do anything other than attack anything that moves.”
“That’s not true; they’ve observed monsters who will ignore pets or farm animals completely. They only target humans.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah, why would I lie?”
“I’m not saying you would, it’s just… who is they anyway?”
“I don’t know, monster research scientists? I can text you the study if you don’t believe me. There’s videos too.”
“No, I believe you, but it’s still not really proof that they’re aliens, is it? I never heard of any giant spaceships coming down and dropping off their pet monsters.”
“It doesn’t have to be a spaceship. They could be from another dimension.”
“Another dimension.”
“They have to come from somewhere. Think about it. How do they show up? They manifest. But from where? Things just don’t appear. That would break the conservation of energy.”
“So? Superpowers do that, don’t they?”
“We don’t know that.”
“How do we not know that? You can make things float, I can make things rust, and Phoenix can create mini suns. I’m pretty sure Newton’s laws are buried next to him by now.”
“And what happens when you push your power too far?”
“What?”
“When you use your power too much, what happens?”
“I… get sore and sleepy?”
“Which implies that you’re using some kind of energy. One we can’t detect, but one we use. It’s what powers our cores. The more energy you have access to, the higher class your core is. Didn’t you ever study meta-theory after getting your powers? Not even a youtube video about it? This isn’t a new theory.”
“New to me.”
Caladrius shook her head and took another bite of her tuna sandwich. Talking to Ozy about these kinds of things sometimes felt like talking to a brick wall. At least he engaged, though. There were few people who were willing to have a conversation about monsters, especially now, and especially here.
Caladrius sat on the remainder of a tall concrete wall. One of her legs dangled off the side. The heavy boot on her foot swayed back and forth as she ate. The elevation gave her a decent view of the city around her, though there was little of interest to see. It was still in ruins, even after a week. Officially, the search for survivors wasn’t over, but all the rescue workers knew what they were really doing by now. They were just looking for the missing bodies. Those who had survived had been underground or in basements, and they’d all been found by now.
Ozy sat on a fallen steel beam. He wore a gold and white costume that bore a few brand names and logos, though much of it was dusted gray from their searching. She’d been glad to see him working on the rescue operation. They worked well together and got along well enough. Like her, he was an Epsilon-class Super, the lowest category for metahumans. Of the tens of thousands of metas in the United States, nearly seventy percent were like them.
As she was about to continue their discussion, Ozy frowned and stood up. His mask covered his eyes with a golden visor, but she could see the confusion in his expression anyway. She tensed, tapping her chest and using her power to allow her to gently float down.
“What is it?”
Ozy cupped an ear, spinning slowly. He stopped facing deeper into the collapsed building nearby.
“Heartbeat… fast, weak,” Ozy said.
Caladrius felt the hairs on her arms stand up. She hadn’t found a living survivor in over three days. She didn’t ask any questions, and Ozy didn’t wait for her either. He took off toward the building.
He pointed out a spot, and they began to dig. She used her power to float large chunks of debris out of the way. They soon came to a strange sight. A chunk of metal.
“Is that a safe?” She asked.
“Either a giant safe or a small vault. Was there a bank here or something?”
“Not sure. Is there someone inside?”
Ozy held a hand up, asking her to stay quiet. He focused for a few seconds, then nodded.
“Stand back. I’ll use my power. It’s gonna take a lot out of me, though. You’ll need to call for assistance.”
He put his hands near the safe’s round handle. A shimmer pulsed around them through the metal, and it began to decay. Black paint peeled away into dust, and the exposed steel underneath began to rust. Ozy held his hands to the slowly decaying metal, even as the effect slowed and his hands began to shake. After nearly a minute, he fell to the side, panting. He tried speaking but only managed a grunt. He shook his head and gestured at the door.
Caladrius grabbed the handle, which hadn’t corroded nearly as much as the area that had been nearer Ozy’s hands, and braced a foot on the safe. She pulled, but nothing happened. She tried twisting the handle sharply, then yanked on it, then twisted some more. Finally, she felt the handle begin to give. With one last jerk of the handle, she felt a pop and heard a metallic snap. Whatever mechanism locking the door snapped, and the handle began to spin.
Light poured into the massive safe as the door opened. It was easily seven feet tall and at least as wide. There were shelves along the walls and all kinds of jewelry and metals on display. Her eyes were fixed on the man lying on the floor.
She pushed the door open all the way, making sure it wouldn’t close behind her, and rushed to the man. His breathing was shallow, and his pulse was too rapid. Caladrius looked around the man and saw two empty water bottles on the ground. Smart. He either kept them in the safe for emergencies or had taken them with him. Either way, the water had likely saved his life, if he indeed lived. She wasn’t sure how close he was to death, but he didn’t look good.
She reached out to heal the man but hesitated. Her healing did best against physical injuries. It wasn’t a typical healing power; it was best at binding and knitting. She wasn’t sure using it on the man would help. It might even do more damage than good.
Instead, she radioed in for transport, then jogged over to where she and Ozy had been having lunch. She picked up her jug of water and brought it to the man. He didn’t wake up, and though her instincts told her to try force-feeding him the water, she resisted, knowing that might just make him choke. Instead, she poured the water over him, which would cool him down.
Ozy was unconscious and snoring, his body pushed to exhaustion from the exertion of using his power so much. They’d already been on the job for hours, and he hadn’t been conservative in using his powers. He’d be fine. She was more worried about the stranger. She sat next to him and waited for help to arrive.
______
The subway echoed with the hushed whispers of conversations and soft beeps of machinery. As most of the topside was destroyed, emergency responders had refashioned the city’s metro into massive underground shelters and hospitals.
Around Caladrius were dozens of cots, each sectioned off into small curtained-off areas. Nurses went around the many patients, checking their conditions and attending to them.
Caladrius had just finished talking to a doctor, giving him a rundown of how she had found the man and all that she knew about his condition. Now she was sitting by his side, filling out paperwork. It wasn’t much, just a description of what had happened, where, and at what time.
She’d found out the man’s name was Bertrand Duval from his ID. He was incredibly lucky. Just under ten thousand people had been found alive on the surface, and this man would likely be the last.
As Caladrius wrote the report, a woman approached. Caladrius had seen her coming. For some reason her eyes had been drawn to the stranger. The woman scanned the field of bodies. She was tall, and her light blonde hair was pulled back into a ponytail. When she saw Caladrius, her eyes flickered to the man lying on the bed and went wide.
The woman walked briskly towards her. It looked like she was holding herself back from sprinting. As she grew closer, Caladrius realized she wasn’t slowing down. The stranger opened her arms and pulled Caladrius into a tight hug. It was really, really tight. She grunted as the air was expelled from her lungs. If she had any air left, she would have yelled in shock and pain as a few of her ribs threatened to break. She tried pushing herself away. The woman gasped and let her go.
“Oh God, I’m sorry, I’m still not used to—Are you alright?”
Caladrius coughed, feeling her ribs. None were broken, but some felt like they’d be bruised.
“I’m fine,” She said. She looked back up at the woman. With the ease she had displayed that strength, it was clear to Caladrius that the woman was a super of at least Gamma-class: that was the class where metahumans began having passive super-strength. “I’m okay.”
The woman took Caladrius’s hand, with a much more delicate touch than before. “Sorry. I’m so grateful. I knew he was alive; I could feel it. Thank you for saving him. You’re one of the heroes who found him, aren’t you?”
Caladrius scratched the back of her head, her fingers curling through her dark hair. She wasn’t used to this kind of praise or attention. Usually it was real supers who dealt with this kind of thing.
“It was me and my partner. You know this man, then?”
The woman nodded. “He’s my husband. Is he alright? The doctor said he’s stable, but…”
“He’ll be fine. We’ve got healers here who are doing what they can to help everyone, and the doctors are taking care of the rest.”
“Why can’t the healers help him now?”
“The top-class healers left a few days ago. Most of the injured and sick are stabilized now, so they weren’t needed. And before we let most healers use their power, we need to be certain we know what’s wrong with him. Healing powers can be tricky, especially for lower-class supers. Sometimes they work great for one condition, but then they aggravate others. Unless it’s an emergency, protocol is to avoid using healing until a full evaluation is done.”
“But he’ll be okay?”
“He’ll be okay. He should be up and about in a few days.”
The woman sighed, the worry on her face easing. She stepped forward and went for another hug. Caladrius tensed, but the hug was gentle this time. The woman pulled away, hand still on Caladrius’s shoulder.
“Thank you again. Oh! My name is Ciana. I forgot to introduce myself, sorry. But really, if there’s any way I can repay you, let me know.”
“I’m just glad we were able to help. My name is Caladrius.”
Caladrius lowered her voice and leaned in close to Ciana.
“You’re the woman who snapped during the attack, aren’t you, the one who saved over a hundred people at the hospital?”
Ciana’s eyes went wide. For a brief moment she seemed like she would deny the accusation, but she relented quickly.
“I… am,” she whispered. “I’m not supposed to let anyone know that.”
“Maybe we can go somewhere else to talk? I’m staying in the train. We can talk a bit more frankly in my room. I can make tea or coffee, if you like.”
Ciana’s eyes fell on her husband. “I should stay here.”
“He won’t wake up for at least a few hours. The doctors want him asleep while he gets rehydrated.”
“Okay…” Ciana said. The two began walking away from the triage. After a minute, Ciana asked, “Was he alone? My husband?”
“He was. Why?”
Ciana sighed. It was the sigh of a person who had lost far too much far too quickly, a sigh that threatened to break into sobs. It was an all too common sound in the emergency shelter.
“My daughter. She’s still missing. I talked to one of her teachers a few days ago. He said she didn’t show up that morning. Apparently she’d been missing a lot of school lately. I don’t know where she could have been but… I know she’s out there.”
Caladrius felt a stab of pity. It was a big enough miracle that Ciana’s husband had survived. If her daughter was still missing, the chances that she was alive were next to nothing.
“I’m sure she’ll turn up,” she lied.
“She will,” Ciana said, reaching towards her neck. She fingered a small silver necklace with a golden cross hanging down the center. “I don’t know how I’m going to tell him though… he wouldn’t know yet.”
Caladrius didn’t remark on the fellow super’s faith. Religions had taken to the news of metahumans in strange ways. Some atheist historians wondered if reported miracles had been the work of ancient metahumans rather than deities, while some religious scholars claimed that their prophets or ancient figures were blessed as metahumans, which was proof of their holy nature. Some people disregarded the existence of metas completely with their faith, and there were a few who had begun a new religion centered on metahumans.
Caladrius had never been very religious, but she also figured there had to be something behind all this. She just didn’t bother trying to appease whatever that something was. She decided when she was young that she would try to be a good person. That way, if there was an afterlife where she was judged, hopefully her intent and actions would be judged satisfactory.
This past week, however, it was becoming hard to believe that whatever designed this world had any good intentions.
______
Eliana’s temporary room in the emergency shelter was a hollowed-out section of a subway train car. GOH, the hero organization that employed her, had gutted and furnished the entire train. She’d only moved in a few days ago, when many real superheroes had left to return to their own jurisdictions.
It wasn’t much, but it was luxury compared to what most had here. There was a heater to help with the cold, insulated wooden walls, a tiny portable stovetop with a few accessories, some food to cook, a power outlet, a twin mattress, and even a radio.
Eliana’s mask was tossed on a small shelf, which was really just a subway chair that hadn’t been removed. After wearing it for hours, she couldn’t wait to take it off. Technically she wasn’t supposed to do that around anyone when she was still in costume. Secret identity rules were pretty strict even for auxiliary heroes like herself. Eliana doubted Ciana was interested in outing her identity, though.
The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
Ciana cradled her cup of tea, sitting with legs tight together. It was a red plastic cup, hardly appropriate for drinking freshly brewed tea, but it wasn’t like Eliana had time to pack up her china when she’d been called to the field. Her various teacups were hundreds of miles south, back in New York. She was eager to get back, not because she missed her cramped but cozy apartment, but because this solemn remnant of a city was becoming too depressing for her.
Eliana was used to the nearly overwhelming vibrancy of life in New York City. Parton was once similar, but now it was a corpse with only a few strings of meat left clinging onto its decaying bones. What really unnerved Eliana was knowing that it could have easily been her city that was now in ruins. Perhaps her city was next in line.
She wasn’t sure what to talk about. Asking about the woman’s life in the city seemed uncouth considering the circumstances, but Eliana didn’t know much about her. She was glad when Ciana started the conversation herself.
“So this superhero thing, how long have you been doing it?”
“Since I was eighteen, so… about ten years now.”
Ciana nodded. “Wow. Is that, um, normal? Starting so young?”
“It’s not unusual.” It was more unusual for someone as old as Ciana to become a superhero. Eliana wasn’t entirely sure, but she guessed that Ciana was in her mid-thirties. It was incredibly rare for someone over thirty to snap.
“Are you interested in working with the GOH?” Eliana asked.
Ciana set her tea down. “I don’t know. They want me to, and I’ve always felt like helping people was my calling; it’s why I became a nurse. But… I’m not a fighter.”
“You don’t have to fight. I don’t. I’m part of the auxiliary group. Occasionally I’ll fill out a combat support role in an emergency, but even then I’m never on the frontlines. GOH is a lot more than the flashy capes. For every cape you see in commercials and on TV there’s a dozen supers who help people in the background. Clean-up, charity work, community services, donation events… disaster relief; there’s plenty to do that isn’t fighting.”
Ciana looked down at her hands. She had them folded and was rubbing her thumbs together.
“That sounds perfect, but I don’t know if that’s what they want from me. They offered to do an evaluation. Apparently they think I could be strong.” She let out a short laugh. “Me, strong. It sounds crazy when I say it out loud, but none of this makes sense, really.”
“You should do it,” Eliana said. “GOH is a good organization, all things considered. Even if you don’t decide to do hero work, they’ll help you learn to control your powers and teach you the laws around using them. An evaluation isn’t a commitment to work for them; it’s just a way for them to learn the idiosyncrasies of your powers.”
“I guess it wouldn’t hurt. And they did offer to fly me to New York, which is probably where my husband and I will be going anyway. He has family down there. I’m just… I’m worried that if I do it, they’ll convince me to work for them, and I don’t think they want me for charity work. No offense. I’d rather do what you do.”
Eliana smiled politely. “No offense taken.”
She wasn’t lying, but she did feel a twinge of jealousy. How many times had Caladrius dreamed of being a real hero? She’d been given a taste of most people’s dream. She had superpowers, yet she wasn’t strong enough to be a superhero. No amount of training or wishing would change that. Once you snapped and got your powers, that was it. There was no getting stronger, only better at using what you had. And here was someone who had a chance to live that dream, and she was hesitating.
“If I decide I want to do what you do instead, is that okay? How much freedom will I have?”
Eliana shrugged. “I never got the chance to become a real cape. I was only offered aux duty. They might pressure you, but I doubt they’d turn you down if you’re really set on joining aux instead of the capes.”
Ciana nodded. “I guess I’ll have to speak with them, then.” She stood up. “Thank you for the tea. I should get back to my husband. Thank you again for saving him, Caladrius. I don’t know how I could repay you for what you did. And thank your partner for me too when you see him.”
“I will,” Eliana said.
Ciana gave her a warm but weary smile. She turned and pulled open the subway doors, sliding them shut behind her. Eliana sighed, leaning back in her small chair. She wished she was in her recliner back home, curled up and watching a nature documentary with a cup of chamomile. The only tea they had here was black.
Eliana sighed, then stood up and locked the door. She reached under the bed for her luggage bag. In a small internal pocket, she found what she was looking for.
The deep green stone was flecked with splotches of black, and light veins webbed across it. There was a sense of motion in its pattern, like stormy waters stuck in time. The stone hummed in her hand.
She started feeling the vibration from the stone a few hours after she found it. A few days ago, the stone had communicated with her. Eliana had no clue what the stone was. She didn’t know if it was made by some tech genius, a superpower, a secret government agency, or even aliens. What she did know was that the stone knew something she didn’t.
System Online
Admin Status: Unkeyed
Admin Settings: Undefined
Access Granted
New User Detected
Note:
Spirit damage detected. Spirit Sequencing necessary prior to calibration.
Warning!
Spirit damage beyond safe threshold for Sequencing. Spirit Sequencing may result in permanent Spirit scarring and possible death. Spirit Healer assistance is recommended.
Begin Spirit Sequencing?
Y/N
Eliana looked over the warning for at least the hundredth time, familiar by now with the strange mental menu. Though she didn’t know what the stone was, she had a feeling she knew what the Spirit it referred to was. Most metahumans called them cores. It was the thing every metahuman had: a source; an energy that fueled their powers. When their core got close to running out, they became incredibly exhausted and sore, like what had happened to Ozy just a few hours before.
If what the stone said was accurate, then her core was damaged. Was that why she was so weak? If it fixed her, could she become a real superhero? The kind people cheered for?
Fear had kept her from finding out. “Possible death.” Was she really willing to risk dying for more power? A few days ago she’d have said no. Now, after days spent shifting through rubbles only to find corpse after corpse, due to an attack the heroes couldn’t have stopped… If she could do something that would make her even slightly more useful against the threat humanity was facing, wouldn’t that be the right thing to do? Was she simply trying to justify doing what she wanted? Did it matter if the results were the same either way?
Did it matter if the world was slowly being destroyed?
Eliana’s grip tightened on the stone. She focused on the screen—focused on confirming her choice.
Spirit Sequencing Confirmed
Process will begin shortly.
Eliana swallowed, feeling nervous. Had she thought this through enough? She still wasn’t completely sure what would happen if—
Her thoughts evaporated in a flash of pain. The world became meaningless as something burned inside her like the bite of red-hot metal against flesh. She wasn’t sure if the ringing was her screams or an illusion. She couldn’t tell if she was actually thrashing or if her muscles could even work still. Whatever she was doing, it wasn’t working. The feeling was inescapable. It was getting worse. Deeper. Spreading through her core. Her skin felt like it was being doused in impossibly cold water while her bones were turning to fire.
She was dying. She knew it. There was no way someone could survive this.
Except she’d felt something like this before. The sixteen years melted away in an instant. Eliana was a twelve-year-old girl again. The night she snapped; the night she’d gotten her powers. The most excruciating pain she’d ever experienced.
Had the past sixteen years been nothing but a dream? Maybe they were. Had she been here all along? Had she gone insane and escaped into a delusion? Do it again. Needed it again. Focus. Couldn’t anything. Much. Too much. Pain. Too much.
______
She heard the noises before anything else. No laughter. Only quiet murmurs and hushed conversation, and a silent weight you could feel in the pauses between each word. Soft rustling of blankets and gentle footsteps on stone.
She reached for her face. Her mask was on. Hadn’t she taken it off? Her eyes blinked open; the dim lights seemed too bright and caused her eyes to water. Her body was sore, as if she’d been scrubbed with a steel wool brush until she was raw.
“Oh, she’s up now, see?” A voice came from nearby. A man’s voice.
Eliana looked around. The world was blurry, but she was pretty sure she was lying in the triage, on a small cot. There was an IV drip in her left arm and a pulse oximeter on her hand. She looked to her right, where the voice had come from.
Eliana pushed herself up, arms shaking from the effort. Her body was sluggish, and it felt like there wasn’t any energy left in her. She’d felt the feeling before. It was the same feeling when she overexerted her core.
Someone stepped closer, and Eliana recognized the blonde woman. Her name was…
“Ciana? What happened?”
“I think the doctors would like to know that,” Ciana said. “They couldn’t figure out what was wrong with you. You scared the hell out of me, too. I heard you screaming after I left. I came running back, and it looked like you were having a seizure. You’ve been asleep for nearly a full day. You don’t remember what happened?”
An entire day. Eliana remembered the stone. Had it worked? Had it fixed her core? She lifted a hand, staring at it as she flexed her fingers. She didn’t feel stronger.
“I’m not entirely sure what happened. I thought I was going to die.”
Ciana looked troubled by that. As Ciana opened her mouth to say something, she was interrupted by the man’s voice from before.
“I’m glad you didn’t. I wouldn’t be able to thank you for saving my life.”
It was the man she had saved: Ciana’s husband, Bertrand Duval.
“Just doing my job, sir.” Eliana replied, leaning back on her habitual job-speak. She felt a bit guilty for the disingenuous response and quickly added, “Besides, it’s really Ozy you should thank. He was the one who found you and weakened the safe. If it was just me, I don’t think I’d have found you.”
“You have my thanks anyways. If he were here, I’d thank him too.”
That’s probably why he isn’t here, Eliana thought. Ozy was worse with people than she was.
“How are you feeling?” She asked.
“Better than when I woke up. Well… I feel better at least. I thought my situation was awful, but it seems things were even worse for everyone else. The doctors still aren’t sure if there’s liver damage. We’re waiting on the results. If they’re good, I’ll just be given a few prescriptions and be on my way. If not, they’ll need to look for an available healer or start dialysis.”
“I hope it’s good news then,” Caladrius said. She looked to Ciana, then noticed a doctor approaching. He walked with a slight limp. Caladrius sat up straighter.
“Ah, it’s good to see you up, Miss Caladrius.” The doctor said. He quickly looked over the monitor machine attached to her. “How are you feeling?”
“Sore and tired, but aside from that I’m alright. I might have gone a little too far with my powers out in the field earlier.”
The doctor nodded, scribbling words on a clipboard. The excuse wouldn’t have worked on a metahuman. Core fatigue was an immediate reaction, not a delayed one. Very few people, except for metahumans and those who worked closely with them, were aware of that. The majority of people didn’t even know what core fatigue was. It wasn’t a secret per se, but metahumans didn’t talk about it in public. While the system of superheroes had made humanity accept and even, to a degree, embrace the reality of metahumans, there were still some people who saw their existence as a threat. Having their major weakness a well-known fact to those people was something no metahuman wanted, be they hero, rogue, or villain.
“I heard that we had quite a few cases of that in the first couple of days. We all appreciate what you heroes do, but don’t forget to look after yourself too.”
“I’ll try,” Caladrius said with a polite smile. “Am I clear to go? I feel fine, and I don’t want to waste any more of your time.”
The doctor frowned, flipping through pages on his clipboard.
“Nothing of note on your records, and you seem healthy. We have no reason to keep you, but—”
Caladrius pulled the needle out of her arm, then unclipped the pulse oximeter from her finger. She stood up from the bed. The doctor sighed but didn’t try to stop her. He simply opened a drawer of the plastic nightstand by the bed and pulled out an adhesive bandage. He gestured to her arm, and Caladrius offered it to him. He stuck the bandage where a drop of blood was pooling from the needle.
“Be sure to stay hydrated and avoid using your powers or straining yourself for the next twelve to sixteen hours. We have enough patients already; don’t give us another to worry about.”
Caladrius forced a smile. “Wasn’t planning on it. Thank you.” She turned to Bertrand and Ciana. “Hope your recovery goes smoothly, Bertrand.”
Caladrius gave Ciana a nod. She wasn’t sure how much the woman had told her husband, and Caladrius didn’t want to accidentally blindside him with the revelation that his wife had become a metahuman during his entrapment. Ciana waved goodbye.
Caladrius left the triage for the second time in what felt like, to her, an hour. Waking up to find an entire day had passed was disorienting, but she supposed it was better than waking up dead. She reached the train station and made her way to her train car. The retrofitted lock on the sliding doors had been left unlocked. She made sure to lock them behind her as she slipped inside the room.
Eliana pulled off her mask, dropping it on the floor. Her small bed caught her as she fell into its too-firm embrace. Given how her limbs felt like lead, it didn’t matter how shitty the bed was. She preferred it to her bed back home in that moment.
Idly, Eliana reached into her suit’s pocket. Her heart skipped a beat, then pumped panic through her body along with blood. The stone. What had happened to the stone?
She stood up, patting down the pockets she had and scanning the floor. She got on all fours and peered under the bed.
There was a knock at the door. Eliana cursed under her breath.
“Caladrius? Are you still up? Can we talk?”
It was Ciana.
Eliana went to the door and pushed the small curtain aside to peek out the window. The woman was alone. Eliana grabbed the key from her pocket and unlocked the padlock, undoing the latch that held the doors shut. They slid open.
“Hi.” She greeted.
“Hi. Can I come in?”
Eliana stood aside and gestured for her to come in. She didn’t say anything as the woman came in. She had a feeling she knew what the meeting was about. Ciana turned, looking at her with a stern expression. If Eliana hadn’t already known Ciana was a mother, that look would have given it away.
“What really happened to you? You downplayed it to the doctor.”
“You’ve had core fatigue?” Eliana asked.
“No, but I could tell you were lying.”
Eliana raised an eyebrow. Ciana folded her arms and raised both brows expectantly. Eliana relented.
“Yeah, I was lying. But I am fine.”
“You wouldn’t be if I hadn’t found you.”
That gave Eliana pause.
“What?” she asked.
Ciana looked over Eliana’s shoulder at the door, then glanced at each of the train car’s doors leading to other temporary rooms. She leaned in, speaking quietly.
“You were dying, Eliana. I’m pretty sure you would have if I didn’t help.”
Eliana’s jaw hung loose as she thought of what to say. She felt stupid, grateful, embarrassed, and scared. In the end, it was curiosity that took control of her tongue.
“What happened?”
“Like I said before, I heard you start screaming after I left, so I ran over. You were on the ground, shaking. Your core was being ripped apart. Whatever was happening, it was killing you. And there was smoke coming out of your body, like… like some kind of demon or something was possessing you.”
“You can sense my core?” Eliana asked. She could sense stronger metas’ cores, but there were few who could sense the cores of Epsilon-class metas.
“I did more than that, I think. I don’t know how, but I pushed your core back together. I didn’t know what I was doing, and I still don’t know, but once I started, you stopped thrashing, so I just kept doing it. After a while your core stopped. That’s when I carried you to the doctors.”
“Damn…” Eliana said. She didn’t doubt Ciana’s story. The woman didn’t seem like the lying type, and it was easy to believe that Eliana had been dying. Part of her was still surprised she was alive.
“So…” Ciana said.
“Huh?” Eliana looked up, having been lost in thought about what might have happened if Ciana hadn’t been there.
“Are you going to tell me what you did? Or do I have to ask you what this is?”
Ciana reached into the pocket of her jeans and pulled out a familiar small green stone. Eliana reached for it without thinking. The action surprised even herself. Ciana closed her fist around the stone and pulled it away.
“This thing almost killed you,” Ciana said. “I saw it reaching into your core, connecting to you. And it pulses, like it's alive with a little core of its own. Why do you want it back? Where did you even get this?”
Eliana had to resist reaching for the stone again. It would have been pointless, given how much stronger Ciana was than her. Ciana was a Gamma-class, which put her in the top five percent of all metas. No amount of Eliana's experience would overcome that gulf in power.
“I found it in the rubble. I don’t know what it is.”
Ciana grabbed the stone between her fingers, holding it up to look at it. Without warning, she tossed it to Eliana. Eliana’s hand shot out and snatched the stone from the air with the reactions only a meta could replicate. She looked at Ciana, confused.
“Whatever it is, I don’t think it’s dangerous. Or maybe it is, but not anymore. Not to you.”
“How do you know?” Eliana asked. She felt the same, but she wasn’t sure why.
“Because your core is healthier than it was before. When I first met you, it strained with every movement. It was jerked about, almost like it was in pain. That’s what every core I’ve seen moves like. But while you were asleep, yours started to change. It started flowing like water, or maybe steam. Whatever this thing did, I think it fixed something.”
Eliana frowned. She reached down, grabbing her mask from the floor. She reached for her power. For a scary moment, nothing happened. Then something happened.
[Levitate]
Saturate a person or object with your Spirit to counteract the effects of gravity for a short time.
Active Passive Skill
Eliana stared at the screen that appeared in front of her. She looked up to see Ciana staring at the screen, her eyes wide.
“What in the world is that?” She asked.
Eliana wasn’t sure, but she was going to find out.
How Should Arc 3 Begin?
