A/N:
Whooo this was a bit heavy to write. I had to do some rewriting here and there, but I think it finally came out exactly how I wanted it to.

Hope you all enjoy!


Ch 3: Testing Phase

Dax sighed as Hatsume's workshop/home came into view. Given the frequency of her visits to the place over the last several weeks, she had requested a passcode or key for getting in, but Mei had shot that down, insisting that she just interface with her home-made optical scanner instead. At first it had confused the girl, until she noticed the gradually increasing difficulty of hacking into the scanner and fabricating credentials for herself every time. It seemed that her pink haired friend was using her frequent, and authorized, security breaches to test the ever-tightening security she put on her own front door.

Most people would likely find this behavior annoying, including Dax if she was less experienced with breaching security systems due to her… prior training. But Dax took it as a compliment to her skills and an opportunity to train. So far she had yet to be stopped by Mei's advanced security, though she was sure the day would come eventually. The time it took to crack was getting longer though. At the beginning it took only a few seconds, ten at most. Now she would sometimes take up to a minute when encountering a new version.

Lucky for Dax, Mei had not gotten around to upgrading the system again since her last breach, so it only took about thirty seconds before she heard the locks disengaging. She stepped inside, closing the door again behind her, to find a very dirty looking pinkette hunched over her workbench and staring intently at a diagnostic terminal as tiny green numbers and letters blazed by at a speed Dax could hardly begin to keep up with.

Dax stepped up behind Hatsume, lightly brushing against her as she peered over the girl's shoulder. This proved to be a mistake.

Mei jumped and whirled around, her irises spinning and her pupils growing larger as she plucked a blowtorch from her belt, which Dax had already concluded just seemed to spawn whatever tool the girl needed at any given time, and turned it on, aiming it at Dax.

The brunette jumped backward with a yelp, raising her good arm to shield herself. "Hatsume-chan! It's just me! Calm down!"

The torch died out and Mei visibly relaxed. She let out a sigh as she put the torch back on her hip and crossed her arms over her chest, glaring up at the taller girl.

"What's the deal with sneaking up on me like that? Say something next time! What if I had been welding and you made me mess up our baby? What if I had burned you and had to make a whole other arm for your other side!?... Actually… How attached to that left arm are you, exactly?"

Now a couple months ago, that comment would have unnerved Dax. Now though, she knew Mei meant nothing by it. Or she at least hoped the inventor meant nothing by it. She gave a nervous chuckle and gestured toward the large metallic rolling door to the workshop, raising an eyebrow.

"How could you have possibly not heard that thing? It makes enough noise to wake the dead when it opens!" She paused, relaxing as she strode back up toward the bench, eager to see the fruits of their mutual labors over the past several weeks. "Anyway… You said it's ready?"

Mei's demeanor changed in an instant, as it frequently did, and she was beaming and bouncing with eager joy as she spun back around, double-checking that the diagnostic she had been running was complete and found no errors. It was the third she had run on the arm since completing it with no errors found yet, but she had to be sure. When she was satisfied, she nodded, disconnecting the arm from the cable linking it to her terminal and cradling it like a mother would her newborn child.

"She isn't just ready, she's perfect! The most advanced baby I have created to date! She had a built-in chronometer so you can seamlessly check the time with only a thought, long-lasting, lightweight battery packs so you shouldn't have to worry about taking her off to charge unless you really overdo it, and she has all the mobility and functionality of a regular human arm! I even packed in some of the lower grade sensors we dug up so you can feel impacts to the arm and get an idea of temperature readings in addition to just getting basic tactile feedback from the fingers and palm! And I even went a little plus ultra and gave her a slick all-black paint job so you can wear her to school and everything!"

Dax was impressed. She had been expecting the arm to look like a cobbled together mess because, frankly, it was just the prototype and it kind of was a cobbled together mess, but it came out looking sleek and professional. Almost like they had pulled it from an old pre-quirk era science fiction film. The extra chronometer feature was nice as well as the temperature sensors, but all Dax could think about was how amazing it would feel to be able to use both arms again. She'd been without her right arm for nearly eight months and, while she had adapted fairly well, there were certain things that just needed two hands to do properly.

Before Dax could even respond to Mei's expository explosion, however, she found herself being aggressively stripped by the shorter girl. Her jacket was all but ripped off and the long sleeved dress shirt she wore beneath it lost three buttons before she managed to halt Mei's assaulting digits with her trembling left hand, a hearty blush conquering her face as she spoke.

"H-Hatsume-chan! I can just r-roll up the sleeve a little more… I don't need to be topless to test an arm!" She sighed, re-buttoning her shirt and rolling her sleeve up to her shoulder. "Besides, I've managed to go two months at school without anyone seeing the rest of the scars and I'd like to keep it that way," she mentally added.

Hatsume relented and went back to bouncing on her heels, the thick pink dreadlocks she had her hair in bouncing along with her.

Dax reached up, rubbing the end of her remaining limb, flinching reflexively despite the lack of pain. In preparation for this day, she'd conducted extensive research into how to prepare the body for a prosthesis. As a result of that research, she had been massaging the end of the limb nearly every night, stimulating the musculature and building up calluses. The process was unpleasant. Ranging from uncomfortable at best and horribly painful at worst, but she knew it had to be done. She wasn't sure to what extent the need for shaping and forming calluses extended to her, considering she'd be interfacing with the arm using her quirk instead of wearing it like a traditional prosthetic,but she wanted to be prepared just in case.

After a moment she let out a long breath, a look of pure determination in her eyes as she offered her remaining right arm to Mei for her to attach the prosthesis. The pinkette eagerly complied, holding up the arm and making sure it was rotated properly before touching it to Dax's skin.

For Dax the experience was… strange. She was accustomed to interfacing by putting her fingers or hand inside of something, or melding her phone to her thigh, or, in one instance, sinking both of her arms into a server databank. But interfacing like this, starting with the highest part of her upper arm, felt odd but not uncomfortable. She closed her eyes, concentrating on identifying all the individual components and signals the arm could send and receive. They hadn't put their best sensors in it for the prototype, saving those for the final design, so she knew to expect any tactile feedback to be dull at best. Eventually, she finished the interface, opening her eyes and lifting her new arm. It was heavy, weighing on her shoulder more than she thought it would. She'd need to do strength training to get used to the constant weight if she wanted to wear it without being constantly sore.

She tried to bend her elbow, at first saddened by the lack of reaction from the arm. She tried a couple more times before remembering she needed to rethink the way she moved her elbow. She tapped into the interface, figuring out exactly the right signals to send to the arm and squealed with excitement as it slowly bent upward. She flexed the joint a few times, getting used to the idea of controlling her body through the interface. Then she moved to her fingers, concentrating as she slowly touched each of her artificial digits to her new thumb. The sensation was… odd. Her brain was working hard to turn the sensory data signals into actual sensations and, given the low quality of the data to begin with, it ended up feeling like she was touching her fingers together while wearing thick gloves.

For Mei's part, she was starry-eyed and bouncing on her heels, watching her baby come to life before her eyes. She rushed forward after Dax finished with the finger test, tapping on the shell of her baby and looking up at her friend with an expectant grin. "Well well?! How's it feel? Dull right? Sorry for the lack of sensory data, but we did save the good sensors for version two! It should still feel like something though! Right? Right?!"

Dax chuckled, feeling the taps again like they were coming through several thick layers of clothing. She nodded, her smile stretching from ear to ear as tears welled in her eyes. "Yeah it's dull but… but... " She sniffed, the tears beginning to flow. "It's the most wonderful thing I have ever felt… I thought I'd never feel anything from my arm again… But now… Thanks to you… Thanks to you, I get to live again…" She practically threw herself on Mei, wrapping her arms, both flesh and steel, around her in a tight hug. "Mei-chan, you're amazing!"

Mei was frozen for a moment, the gears in her head spinning out of control as she processed the contact. She frequently got close to people, much to their chagrin usually, but was still unaccustomed to being hugged. Even less accustomed to being called by her given name. After she had processed what was going on for a few moments, she brought her arms up, wrapping them tightly around the taller girl and smiling contentedly.

She couldn't place exactly why, but this felt… good. It felt right. Kind of like when she finished a new baby she had been pouring all her waking hours into, only without the lack of sleep and pangs of hunger. If this is what it felt like to be hugged and called 'Mei-chan' then she supposed she was okay with that. "Does this mean I should be calling her by her given name now?" she pondered briefly, deciding to address that question at a later time.

Eventually the two parted and Dax raised her left hand to wipe the happy tears from her eyes. It was only after all this time and their embrace that Mei noticed something odd about Dax's appearance.

The girl had four light, horizontal scratches along her neck, as if made by a knife's edge. She looked down, noticing for the first time that Dax had quite the disheveled appearance. Her hair was tousled, her socks at unequal heights, her skirt torn open on the side… Her eyes took on a worried look as she started scanning Dax in detail, her hands now performing a mechanical and, rather thorough, physical examination of her taller friend, much to Dax's dismay.

"Mal! What happened to you? You look like crap! Were you attacked? Was it Reina again? Was it a villain? Did you kick their butt? Were you hurt? Is your throat sore? They didn't do anything did they? If they did anything I'll build an HK unit and have them eliminated!"

Dax was confused for a moment before she looked down at herself. In all the excitement since she had arrived, she had all but forgotten what had happened to her in that alley and the talk she'd had with Kaldash under that tree. She couldn't help but feel flattered that Mei seemed to care so much about her wellbeing… that was pushed to the side though when Mei's hands went up under the back of her torn skirt to search for injuries. Her face immediately blushed a deep crimson as she squeaked, leaping back and nearly smacking into the workbench.

"Mei! M-Mei-chan I'm okay! Really! I um… I got assaulted in an alley on the way here and the guy had these knife fingers and he was going to… a-anyway I got saved by this nice vigilante… He made me promise not to tell anyone about him though, so I can't really go into detail…"

Mei finally relented, looking into Dax's eyes like she was reading her very soul. The girl felt her blush get a little brighter at the eye contact and shuffled on her feet awkwardly, reaching up and twisting a tiny bit of her short hair. "Seriously. I am so regrowing my hair so I can get my braid back…"

The pinkette seemed satisfied by Dax's explanation after another few moments of processing and gave a nod. Quickly she shifted gears back to her newest baby, looking at Dax's arm affectionately. "Alright! Time for the first test then!" She extended her right hand for a handshake, smirking up at Dax. "Let's test your grip control!"

Dax was about to accept the handshake when she paused, thinking about how dull the sensations she felt from the hand were. "But if I squeeze too hard, it'll destroy your hand, Mei-chan…"

Mei gave her an incredulous look, as if that had somehow insulted her mother. "My baby is perfect! The only way you destroy my hand is if you want to destroy my hand!"

Dax hesitated a moment longer before finally nodding and taking Mei's hand in her new robotic one. The thick glove sensation was still there as she squeezed. Going for a firm, but not painful amount of pressure and grip on her friend's hand. She studied Mei carefully, watching for any sort of painful reaction, but relaxed when her smile remained. It took her a second to coordinate maintaining her grip and moving her elbow for the shake itself, but eventually she got it down.

The pair spent the rest of the night trying out different exercises and tests to ensure the arm was in full working order; Testing the heat sensors, blind impact location testing, dextrous digit manipulations, calibrations of various kinds…

By the time they had finished, it was nearly three in the morning. The two had just enough energy to collapse on to Mei's cot together and toss a blanket over themselves. They passed out like that, snuggled together on Mei's tiny cot out of necessity like two sardines in a blanket covered tin.

Dax awoke the next morning to a heavy weight on her chest. At first she thought it might be her new arm, considering it did weigh a couple kilos, but then she remembered she had taken it off to go to sleep. She wondered for a minute, thinking over what the strange weight could be. Her left hand came up, patting at her chest, finding something soft at her fingertips. It felt like a bunch of soft, silky ropes… as if they were made of… "Hair…"

She opened her eyes and looked down, blushing deeply as she realized what had happened in the night. Mei, who was a good six inches shorter than Dax, had somehow ended up laying on top of her, using her modest bust as makeshift pillows. Dax could feel the heat coming off her cheeks as she looked down at the sleeping inventor, her thick pink locks scattered over the pair. She hesitated a moment, biting her lip as she thought about how she could possibly get out of the situation without awakening her friend… "No, my best friend," she internally amended.

Eventually she resigned herself to her fate of being trapped until the girl woke up, unable to bring herself to wake her. According to the clock on the shop wall, they still had plenty of time before they had to leave for class, so there really was no rush.

Dax brought her hand up again, this time carefully combing it through the pinkette's hair as a soft smile spread on her own lips, enjoying the peace of the moment. "You know, when she's not speaking a million words a minute and causing massive explosions, she's pretty cute…"

Eventually though, she did have to wake the girl up. She couldn't very well have a tardy or absence on her record if she wanted to have a chance of making it to UA in two and a half years or so. She gently nudges the inventor, whispering to her with increasing volume, hoping to wake her gently. "Mei… Mei-chan… Hatsume Mei… Come on… wake up… We'll be late…" She tried this tactic for a couple minutes, eventually letting out a sigh of defeat.

Then an evil idea came to her.

She cleared her throat and then spoke with false concern in her voice. "I can't believe the Mecha Arm 3000 broke after only one day! I thought Hatsume Labs was known for quality!"

Mei's eyes opened faster than the bullet train traveled. She sat bolt upright, now straddling her taller classmate and making the brunette's blush come back with a vengeance. "WHAT DO YOU MEAN BROKEN AFTER ONE DAY!?"

Dax recoiled, holding her arm over her face defensively. "N-nothing! I just couldn't wake you up! The arm is perfect! Absolutely perfect! Our baby is wonderful, okay? But we gotta get up or Ms Goto will give us detention for sure!"

Eventually the pinkette calmed down, seemingly unfazed at any point about their rather intimate position. She climbed off Dax and unzipped her jumpsuit on the way to the bathroom. "Right! Better get up, Mal! Err… Dax! Don't wanna be late!" With that she vanished, leaving Dax reeling on the cot. She felt a strange warmth in her chest and her eyes started to get a little wet in the corners again.

"D-Dax… She actually called me by my name…" As Dax thought about it, not only had her unrivaled best friend called her by her given name, but she was the first person who had ever done so. It felt… nice. Really nice… And she hoped it would continue to feel just as nice in the future as well.


Hatsume had been kind enough to loan Dax a skirt, given the current state of the one she had been wearing when she arrived at the shop. So Dax knew for certain that the confused stares she was receiving from… pretty much everyone she passed in the corridor had nothing to do with her attire. The scratches on her neck had almost vanished overnight and were only visible if you knew to look for them, so that possibility was out too. Which only left one possible reason that everyone was staring at her like she was walking around with a Oni camped out on her shoulder.

The one armed outsider that invaded their school had sprouted a new limb.

She grinned to herself at the looks she was getting, not really one for drawing attention to herself normally, but reveling in the feeling of being one step closer to whole too much to complain. Ms Goto was even surprised, dropping the chalk she had been writing with when her formerly lop-sided student entered the classroom. The student in question making a point of raising her metallic right arm and waving to her teacher enthusiastically.

"Good morning, Goto-sensei! I should be able to go back to wearing the tie with my uniform soon, just gotta get used to fine motor control again." Ms Goto nodded dumbly, her mouth hanging open just a bit until she came to her senses and gave a curt nod, retrieving the chalk and returning to her writing.

As Dax made her way back toward her seat beside Mei, she could feel the stares of the students on her right side, her cheeks flushing a bit as the attention finally started to get to her. There was one stare that felt far colder than the rest though… the one coming from a certain girl with curly blonde hair and piercing amber eyes; Matsuda Reina.


The day flowed smoothly for Dax until she reached her phys ed class just before lunch. She had been dreading today for a while. They were doing a fitness test for all the girls in the gymnasium while the guys were playing dodgeball outside. She would be worried about Kaldash-san, but she couldn't help but notice she hadn't seen him all day. She wrote it off as him likely staying home after exhausting himself the night before.

She wasn't nervous about her performance in most areas. She could keep up a decent sprint, her jump range had always been decent, and she was fairly flexible. What had been worrying her were the pull-ups, push-ups, and rope climb… Upper body wasn't exactly her strong suit, not since her accident. Now though…

She grinned, flexing her mechanical fist and imagining that she could hear the popping of her knuckles. "Time to show them what the 'cripple' can do."

The only thing that still made her nervous though, was the locker room. She had talked with the school administration on day one about having a separate place to change and they had been fairly accommodating, letting her use the staff bathroom instead of the locker room. Today she almost had the confidence to walk in there, but a twinge of pain in her right side stopped her. She rubbed her ribs with her left hand and sighed. "It's okay. You're a first year. Got plenty of time to conquer that fear."

She turned and entered the staff bathroom, quickly changing into the school gym uniform of a white T-Shirt and charcoal grey shorts before hurrying out to the gymnasium.

The lower body sections of the test went just as well as she had expected them to. She didn't finish first in anything, but was still above average across the board. Then came the upper body section, starting with the rope climb.

In the center of the gym hung two seven meter long ropes, spaced a small distance from one another. Dax watched as, two by two, her classmates were called up to the ropes and raced each other to the top. The last ones to go before her were Mei and the red haired girl with the horns who had been with Reina the day she tried to attack Dax at lunch weeks ago; Wada Yae.

The pair stepped up to the ropes and put their arms up, gripping them tightly. When the whistle blew, they were off, Yae taking the lead right away. It wasn't much of a surprise to Dax. Mei, while talented and brilliant in so many ways, was not the most athletic person at base. She would rather spend time working on her babies than out training and Dax could respect that.

By the time Mei had made it to the top, her competitor had nearly finished her gradual descent, a smug, spiteful grin on her face. Dax rolled her eyes and gave a slight huff. Mei soon rejoined her in the huddle of girls and she patted the pinkette on the back, her smile returning.

"Good job, Mei-chan! We can do some physical training together this weekend if you want. I think we could both stand for a bit of prac-"

"Malcor Dax and Matsuda Reina!"

Dax was cut off mid-sentence by the instructor calling her name plus that of her attempted bully. She cast a glance down the line of girls, all of whom had suddenly ceased their quiet chatter and gossip as she and Reina approached the mats at the bottom of the ropes.

"Ready!"

Both students were glaring daggers at each other as they gripped their respective ropes.

The whistle blew and they were off. Dax pulling herself up with both her organic and inorganic arms as quickly as she could, her eyes locked on the metal ball at the top of the seven meter rope that represented her target. Pull, bend, lock with legs, repeat. Again and again. She didn't even glance over to see where Reina was, only focused on reaching the top.

Before she knew it, her hand slapped the metal ball and the whistle sounded again. About one second later she heard the whistle blow once more and she looked to the side, seeing the red and sweaty face of Reina glaring back at her as if she had just kicked her puppy. The girls descended and the instructor gave their times.

"Malcor Dax: 9.94 seconds! Matsuda Reina: 11.04 seconds!"

Dax grinned at the result, both proud of the time as a whole, as it was the fastest out of the class so far, and at the fact that she had beaten Reina by more than a full second. She turned, beginning to walk back to Mei's side.

"Well the cripple was cheating!"

She froze mid-stride and turned back around in confusion at the source of the voice.

Reina was pointing an accusatory finger at her even as she stood panting to catch her breath. The class broke out into murmuring and Hatsume looked distressed, her irises spinning to focus on the pair better.

"Excuse me?" Came Dax's reply, still processing what she had just heard. "How the hell was I cheating? I did it just like everyone else…"

"She has a robotic arm! If we can't use out quirks for the test, then she can't use that thing! It's stronger than a normal arm and she used it to cheat!" Reina had a vicious fire in her eyes, like a preacher identifying a witch to be burned at the stake. She wasn't going to take losing lying down, or at all it seemed.

"Now hold on just a-" the instructor began, before Dax cut her off.

"Cheating? You think that me having a second arm counts as cheating just because I beat you?" She paused, taking a step closer to Reina with a menacing tone in her voice. "Fine then!"

She reached up and gripped her metallic arm in her left hand, closing her eyes as she severed her interface and disconnected from the limb. She tossed it over to Mei who caught it and went straight back to cradling it as if it were her flesh and blood offspring.

Dax stepped back up to the rope and glanced over at the instructor, her hand on the rope as she raised her eyebrow expectantly.

"Malcor-san… You don't need to-"

"Just… just blow the whistle…"

After a moment's hesitation the whistle sounded again and Dax took off. While this task was definitely easier with two arms, she knew it was also possible with one… because she had practiced. She'd set up her own small training course in the woods not terribly far outside the city that she went to a couple times a week, including a rope climb of her own. She knew the fitness test was coming up and, given the lack of real timeline for when her arm would be finished, she had been training to do it all one handed. Frankly, this almost felt more natural to her with all the practice she'd had.

When she reached the ball and gave it a headbutt, lacking a free hand to smack it with, the whistle sounded and she began her descent. When her feet hit the mat and she turned to her instructor and her class she found faces that ranged from Mei's giddy smile, to stupefied shock on the majority of their faces, including the instructor, and blind fury on Reina.

She turned to her instructor, raising her eyebrow. She expected she was a little slower, but she still hoped she had at least beaten Reina. The instructor shook her head in disbelief before holding up her stopwatch.

"9.72 seconds…"

Everyone's jaw dropped. Everyone except Mei, who was too busy grinning like an idiot and literally petting the arm she was holding. Dax knew she had been training hard, but she didn't expect it to pay off this well.

She looked over at Reina, a smug smile on her lips as she held up V for victory with her good hand before walking back to Mei and re-interfacing with her arm.

The rest of the test passed peacefully with no further outbursts from the resident bully nor her cronies. Dax ended up scoring above average overall with the rope climb being her shining achievement as first in her class.


After all the students had hit the showers and changed, they went off to lunch. Mei and Dax were outside in the courtyard as usual, eating together on the bench beneath the big beech tree. Dax was having a little trouble with the fine motor control of her metallic hand as she tried, and failed, to operate a pair of chopsticks a few times before giving up and switching back to her left hand. She had always eaten with her left hand anyway, given that she was left handed even before her accident, but she still wanted to try out the dexterity of her new limb.

Soon though, the pair found their lunch interrupted by a familiar trio. Reina, Yae, and their other accomplice Yutsuba Lin; a lanky girl with long black hair kept in twin braids. Reina stepped up to Dax and Mei instinctively scooted to the side, having a feeling she would need to escape in the near future.

"Look here, you broken bitch. If you think I am going to put up with you humiliating me in front of the whole school like that, you got another thing coming!." She reached down, gripping Dax by her shirt and hoisting her off the bench and on to her feet. The blonde was seething, her free hand already flickering with tiny flames as she barely maintained her composure.

"Just because you got a new arm doesn't make you the hottest piece of shit to walk the earth. What was it you said to me a few weeks ago? Something about learning my place? How about you learn yours!"

Reina gripped Dax's metallic arm and let her quirk run wild, the normally dull temperature sensors lighting up brilliantly and screaming one single thing all in unison at Dax's brain.

PAIN!

Dax let out a scream as , for the second time in her lift, she was lit on fire, the outer plating of the arm starting to melt under the oppressive heat of Reina's digits. She tried to pull away, but couldn't get her arm to respond through all the pain and malfunctioning, overheating wiring. Her fingers twitched and spasmed outside her control as the wires inside the arm began to lose the battle with the heat, their insulation burning away and exposed wire crossing in places it was never meant to.

After several seconds of unrelenting pain, Dax managed to pull herself together, screwing up her face and squeezed her eyes shut as she concentrated and managed to sever the link to her arm, the pain going away instantly and replaced with rage.

She opened her eyes, emanating a killing aura as she brought up her left hand and chopped at the hand that held her by her uniform. And broke free, jumping back up on top of the bench and striking her combat stance.

Reina practically snarled, tossing the half melted arm away and not even noticing as Mei dove after it, screaming "my precious baby" as she did. She ignited both her hands and grabbed at Dax's legs, hoping to burn the brunette.

She was too quick and leapt up, using her opponent's shoulder as a stepping stone to get over her and land behind the trio. The horned girl, Yae, turned on her, apparently not content to be an observer this time around and held up her right hand to attack, her fingernails elongating to sharpened claws. The other girl, Lin, brought all of her fingers together into a tight cone that then merged together into a steely looking lance.

Dax dropped low, knocking Yae's feet from under her and delivering a practiced chop to her neck as she fell, eliciting a grunt from the girl before unconsciousness took hold. She then turned her attention to Lin and had to dodge as a sharpened lance nearly stabbed into her shoulder. She hopped backward toward the wall of the building before raising her middle finger at Lin, hoping the lanky girl would take the bait.

She did, raising one lance and yelling as she charged. Dax waited until the last possible second and dove to the side, hearing the sound of steel meeting brick as Lin collided with the wall, imbedding her hand in it and trapping herself. She seemed to immediately forget about Dax, instead focused on trying to get out of her new predicament.

Finally dax turned her attention back to the inferno that was Reina. The blonde's hands were white-hot as flames flickered from her fingertips, reaching out a good foot before tapering off. Dax took a deep breath, settling herself. She wasn't the biggest fan of fire, but she needed to end this and end it quickly.

She charged Reina, holding her arm out to feign an attack. When Reina moved to block it, she dropped into a slide, slipping underneath the girl and popping up behind her. She wrapped her arm around Reina's neck and got her lips right neck to the girl's ear, whispering in a low, threatening voice so only the blonde could hear her.

"It takes ten seconds to put someone out with a chokehold. After thirty seconds the brain goes into a panic state because the blood flow has been occluded and it's not getting any oxygen. After sixty, brain damage can begin to set in. After three minutes, it becomes irreversible. If you burn me, I will not let go. I will increase the pressure and we'll see how long I feel like holding it. Now if you want to give up and leave me and Mei alone, tap my arm. If you think I'm bluffing, just try burning me."

After a moment, Dax felt the ambient heat from Reina's hands disappear and there was a hesitant tap on her forearm. She let out a sigh, releasing her and stepping back, but not lowering her defenses. When no attack came after a minute, she relaxed, sitting back down on the bench beside Mei, who was busy fussing over her half-melted creation.

Reina didn't say a word, only held her hand up to her neck and rubbed it protectively, tears welling in the corners of her eyes. She went over and helped Lin pull herself free of the wall and the pair carried off Yae toward the nurse, leaving Dax and Mei alone once again.

Dax was uncomfortable with herself, shuddering a bit as her opponents made it back inside. She'd been trained to put people out with a chokehold. Had done it many times. She'd also been trained on how to permanently take someone out the same way. She had hoped never to rely on that particular skill again but… "It was like instinct… I didn't even think about it. It was just… natural… Yeah, real heroic, Dax…" She let out a long sigh, shaking the thoughts from her head. "I'll deal with that later," she told herself.

As Dax went back to eating she paused when Mei finally checked back in to the situation. "Daxie. Your arm. Our baby! She's ruined! I'm so sorry! She should have been more heat resistant! Don't worry! The final product will be able to handle anything that girl throws at her! We'll give Endeavor a run for his money! She'll be perfect! Even more perfect than this precious baby was!"

Dax could only smile, petting Mei's head as if on instinct to console her at her loss… Even though it was Dax's arm, but still. "I know she will be, Mei. I know she will be." With that the pair went back to eating, finishing their lunch in peace.


A/N:
I am not sure if I feel worse for Dax or Mei, honestly. I mean Dax is back to having one arm, sure. But poor Mei watched her baby burn alive! Sorta...

Anyway I hope y'all liked it! Tell me what you thought!

See ya next time!