Linda checked the schematic and nodded to herself, tracing out one of the power paths to make sure she had it right. With the amount of energy in the thing, doing it wrong would be both loud and painful. When she was happy with the next step, she slid back under the original mech which was sitting on a stand with one of the arms and both legs removed and picked up the special torque wrench Saurial had made for her. Placing it over the fastener in question, she removed it, then the next two as well.
Shortly she had the correct cover off and was poking around inside the secondary power module connection block with a meter, listening to the tones as she probed contacts. "Yeah, that's the one," she smiled, putting the probe leads down over her chest then taking the next tool from between her teeth and applying it to the connection. A few seconds work had the first power lead connected and the junction torqued up properly.
Moving on to the next one, she repeated the process. This happened five more times, then she slid out again and rechecked the printed documents, comparing the new ones to the first version. "OK, that's the primary field coil feed connected, and the injector unit too," she muttered under her breath, a claw-tip following wiring paths. "Accelerator coil phases next. Let's see..." Sticking her head back under the mech she carefully scrutinized the neatly laid out wiring, nodded, and went back to the documents. "Oh. Yeah, that would be better," she commented to no one as she pulled a pen from the pocket of her overalls and made a couple of hand-drawn changes. "Tap off there, the field density will be slightly higher, and the stability goes up… maybe three percent? Good enough for now."
She hopped to her feet and went to get the next part, which was soon lifted into place and connected. So the process went for another forty minutes, until she stood back, inspecting her work with satisfaction. "Done. Flight system installed, rail gun installed, marine drive system finished… Almost nothing left to add now."
A knock on the door roused her from her ruminations and caused her to drop the rag she'd been wiping her hands with onto the nearest workbench, then go to see who it was. "Hi, guys," she said with pleasure when she opened the door to see Randall and Kevin outside. "How's it going?"
"Great, thanks," the Tinker replied. He was holding a box, while behind him Randall had half a dozen of the reusable DWU food containers in his hands. "I finished it and thought you'd like to have a look, and maybe something to eat."
"That sounds good," she smiled, waving them in then closing the door. "I've more or less finished the upgrades to the prototype mech too. Got the flight system in now, and I've mounted the rail gun so I can test it."
"Never know when you might need a hypersonic railway spike, right?" Randall commented with a grin as he put the food down on one of the benches. She laughed, nodding.
"We must be very careful not to turn the power up too far," she replied, winking at him. "OSHA rules."
"Misuse of tools is one of the biggest causes of workplace accidents," Kevin agreed soberly, before snickering.
"The remaining parts of the underwater systems are installed as well, so I'm going to try it later and check everything works properly." She nodded to a cupboard on the wall. "There are some forks in there, and help yourself to drinks." There were now a couple of fridges like the ones at the BBFO office installed under a side bench and a similar although not quite as elaborate coffee machine on top of it, next to the sink.
"Thanks." Retrieving some forks after putting his box down, Kevin came back and handed her one, while his friend turned the coffee machine on. Soon they were sitting around a free-standing table eating. "How's it going here otherwise?" he asked a little later.
She looked at him, then around at the room, idly tapping her fork on the rim of the container of beef stew. "Good. Really good. This is the best time of my life so far, and it's getting better. Compared to before..." Linda sighed. "No, I can't compare it to before. If Metis hadn't found me I'd be dead, and probably that was the lucky way out."
Kevin and Randall both looked sympathetically at her as she remembered her former life. "Those lizards saved me and I owe them everything," she went on after a pause for rumination. "Even if I didn't like them, that would be true. But I do like them, very much, and everyone here too. I still can't believe how lucky I was to end up in this place. Honest work, good food, nice people who don't ask things about my past, friends… Real friends, not the sort that abandon you when shit happens." She shook her head, remembering her childhood. "And then they just gave me all this," she continued, indicating the room with her fork. "Best Tinker workshop I've ever imagined and they just said, 'Here you go, have fun.' It's fucking bizarre but I'm so grateful for it I don't know how to thank them."
The two young men glanced at each other. "I sort of know what you mean," Randall nodded. "We didn't have the shit you had, but they've been amazingly generous and friendly. Everyone here, and the Family too. Meeting Raptaur was the best thing that ever happened to us as well."
"They're so weird, but so nice and helpful," Linda mused, her head propped up on one arm as she picked at her food with the fork. "I still don't understand them at all in some ways. But I like them, and I trust them. And that broken matter creation ability is the best power I've ever even dreamed of. The things I'll be able to make..." She smiled absently, her mind full of plans and schematics.
"I know what you mean," Kevin nodded, looking thoughtful. "Not to mention their relationship with Dragon. Managing to duplicate my tricorder… shit, that was impressive. If she can do that with other things, the sky's the limit."
"Not even that," Linda said softly, thinking about some of the really cool things she had in mind. "Oh, yeah, thanks for reminding me. That tricorder is fucking amazing." She looked over at the mech and the collection of tools around it, where one of the devices sat. "Thanks very much for it."
"No problem, we've got plenty of them," Kevin replied, smiling at her.
She finished with her food, then put the fork down. "Let's have a look at your thing here, then. Did it work the way you thought it would?"
He nodded, appearing pleased. "Almost certain it did. I wanted to go over it with you cross-checking me in case I made some idiot mistake somewhere, but I'm almost sure it's good. And it could be useful for your work here too." Pulling the box closer, he opened it and lifted out several items of equipment, which she began examining with interest. "These power units of yours are really good," he added, picking up the device in question. "Not as much output as the similar design I came up with a couple of years ago, but reliable and a little smaller too."
"Saurial helped me a lot with that," she remarked, taking it from him and looking at it. "She had some ideas to make some of the components smaller, which worked perfectly. But even she doesn't know how it works."
"Yet," Randall noted, from the other side of the table where he'd been quietly eating and listening. Both of them glanced at him. "I wouldn't put it past those lizards to figure it out sooner or later, possibly with Dragon's help. They're crazy good with math."
"Yeah," she agreed, nodding. "Good point." Looking back to the rest of the equipment, she pointed. "Those supercaps are something she could easily make, they're basically chemistry and good engineering. And the flywheel is her design anyway. We might end up able to make the entire thing ourselves."
"That's what I think," Kevin replied. "Actually, this part is one of the easier bits to duplicate, compared to some of the other stuff I have."
"You mentioned a shield generator?"
"Oh, that thing. Yeah, it's in pieces on the bench right now. I think I know what's wrong with it but it needs Saurial or Raptaur to make me some new parts. The material I used just wasn't good enough. And that superconductor of yours will be perfect for replacing part of the main space fold mechanism."
"Cool. If we can fix it, and work out how to make more, they'd be perfect as an additional protection system for the mechs," she smiled. "Want to give me a hand to finish this and put the thing back together? Then we can try the flight system and see if it works as well as I hope it will. We can go over this later."
"Sure." Kevin put his devices away again and got up, heading eagerly towards the partially disassembled machine in the middle of the room, with Linda and Randall right behind him.
Vicky looked at Amy, who peered back, seemingly slightly embarrassed and rather worried. "Funny story," she said. "You know how I'm a healer?"
Vicky nodded.
"I'm not a healer."
Vicky stared. Then she quirked an eyebrow. "I'm pretty sure you are, Ames," she said with a smile. "I mean, based on the number of people you've healed. Everyone else would probably agree."
Amy sighed and laughed a little at the same time. "OK, let's put it another way. I'm not only a healer."
"What are you?"
"I'm not entirely sure." Her sister shrugged while she kept looking at her. "Healing is part of it, true, but it's a small part. A very, very small part. I can do a lot more."
Vicky frowned slightly. "Like what?"
"Well..." Reaching into her pocket, Amy pulled out… an onion?
The blonde looked at the vegetable with a certain amount of confusion, then at Amy's face, which was showing mild amusement as she cupped the thing in both hands. "That's an onion."
"It is an onion, yes." Her sister snickered. "My power likes onions."
"Your… power… likes onions?" Vicky echoed, her confusion not diminishing at all. Amy nodded, amusement being added to the still present worry. She was looking at her sister like she was petrified that something she was about to say or do would drive the other girl off, which Vicky didn't like.
"Yeah. They're easy to work with."
"I don't get it." Vicky frowned.
"Watch."
She did. Then she yelped, startled, as the onion… melted.
"Holy shit, what happened to it?"
"I need the biomass," Amy said, apparently concentrating. Moments later the mass of semi-transparent goo that filled her palms quivered, changed, and grew.
There was silence as everyone looked at the little plant that was now sitting in her hands. It had blue leaves which glowed visibly and were shaped extremely oddly, the edges seeming to not quite properly be there, and a scent of jasmine filled the air. Taylor silently handed her a pot that appeared out of nowhere and Amy carefully put the plant into it. The other girl then filled it with something that looked like potting compound, which poured out of her hand into the pot over the roots of the plant. When she'd finished, Amy handed Vicky the pot.
"Nice job on the leaves, they're getting pretty close to a fractal geometry."
"Thanks."
Vicky, very slowly, took the offered pot and stared at the contents for some time. She wonderingly touched one of the leaves, which curled around her fingertip in a friendly sort of way, which made her jump. It didn't seem to cause any problems though, so she only pulled away a little, watching as the leaf relaxed again.
"It's only ornamental, it gives off some relaxing pheromones in small quantities," Amy said quietly when Vicky raised querying eyes to her face. "The bioluminescence is nice, though. It'll make a pretty nightlight."
"Fucking hell, Amy. You're a biotinker?"
Her sister shook her head. "No. That's way too limited. I'm a biosculptor, if you want to put a name to it."
"She's not a Biosculptor, she's the Biosculptor," Taylor grinned, echoing the comment from earlier in the other direction, making Amy chuckle.
"You mean… Like Ianthe is?" Vicky's confusion wasn't diminishing, it was fair to say.
"Very much like that, yes," Amy grinned, in a somewhat weird way. "Come with me."
Her mind whirling at the latest revelations which had yet again thrown all sorts of things she thought she knew out the window, Vicky got out of the chair as her sister turned and headed back into the main room. Everyone else followed behind, all the way to Ianthe's workroom at the far end. Amy produced a key and unlocked the door, then went inside, turning on the lights en route. "Please try not to over-react again, Vicky," she said.
The blonde went inside after her sister, looking around curiously and still holding the little glowing plant that the other girl had apparently made out of an onion. The room had a long workbench down one side, with storage cupboards under it as well as above it on the wall, and there were a number of racks of shelves around the place, along with a number of doors on one wall. Like the impossible room she'd just come from, the place was far larger than it should have been, being not far off the size of the main office. Which was weirdly impressive since from the outside it was a fifteen foot cube or thereabouts.
She had flashbacks to an old British SF TV show she'd seen a few times years ago when she was a kid.
On the bench were a number of extremely strange looking and organic items, some of which were making odd gurgling sounds, particularly the small bush-like things in weird pots that seemed to be plugged into outlets above the bench. They were the least bizarre things there.
"OK, this part is where it gets a little peculiar," Amy said, her hand on a door handle in the middle of the wall, her eyes on Vicky. "And this is the part where if anyone finds out, my life is fucked good and hard. So please don't say anything to anyone."
She opened the door and waved Vicky over. On the way, the girl put the plant pot on the bench, then moved to look inside the second room.
"What…?" Vicky turned an uncomprehending look on her sister. "Why is Ianthe sleeping on the floor in here?"
Amy sighed a bit. "Don't panic, OK?" Going inside the room, she sat on a chair and took her shoes off, then stood up and removed her shirt as her sister watched, not knowing what was going on. Absently Vicky thought that Amy was in much better condition than she'd realized, showing a nice set of abs and real muscle under the skin.
Then she shook herself and asked the obvious question, overcoming her incomprehension. "Why are you taking your clothes off?"
"All will become clear in a moment," Amy smiled. She reached down and touched the apparently asleep Ianthe between the eyes.
Vicky watched what happened next with her hand over her mouth, stunned rigid.
"Hello, Vicky," Ianthe said as she stood up. "Nice of you to visit."
"What?"
The violet lizard looked past her round eyes to Taylor, who had been watching from outside the room along with her demon and Metis. "Spell still on?"
"Oh, yeah, sorry. We'll modify it, hang on a sec."
"Holy shit! What the fuck?!"
Vicky suddenly found her mind connecting dots that had been in front of it all along which for some bizarre reason hadn't quite come together. "You're Ianthe?!"
"Yes," her currently reptilian sister said, although the voice and body language was nothing at all like Amy, or even a human. But somehow Vicky could tell it was her. Why she hadn't been able to put two and two together before, even though she'd watched Amy actually get inside the huge reptile, made her extremely puzzled indeed.
"It's the cloaking spell I told you about earlier, the one that hides Amy's and my tails," Taylor said from behind her, correctly divining the source of her confusion. "We use it to prevent anyone linking Ianthe and Amy. It adds another layer of protection."
Vicky looked back at her, her face blank, then at 'Ianthe' who waved a little. Then she turned and walked out of the room to stare at the plant on the bench.
Eventually she turned around once more to see the violet reptile was now standing next to Taylor, having moved so silently she hadn't heard anything at all even though the creature must have weighed close to half a ton. It was a sobering reminder of just how scary the other members of the Family actually were.
She pointed. "Amy. That really is you in there, right? I'm not having a hallucination?"
"No, it's me. Or, like Taylor, my mind is in here. The body is entirely Ianthe, and not human at all." Her currently reptilian sister smiled in a somewhat amused fashion.
Vicky nodded slowly, then looked at the plant again. She prodded one leaf, watching as it moved a little, then shook her head. "Are you trying to tell me… You made Ianthe? Out of onions?"
Amy-Ianthe grinned. "Yeah. Cool, right?"
Feeling dizzy Vicky leaned on the bench and just stared blankly for a while. Then she slowly looked at Metis, who was smiling too. "Oh, god. You made them all. The Family, the ones who aren't her," she pointed accusingly at Taylor, "are your creations!"
"That's right."
"The Family is made of onions."
It sounded entirely stupid and nonsensical.
The violet lizard wordlessly moved to another door and opened it, then stood aside. Vicky, somewhat cautiously, peered in, to see it was entirely full of what must have been tons of fifty-pound bags of the vegetables. A small and rather unsteady giggle came from her. "Onions. Everything is made from onions."
"Not everything, but they're very good for making some things," Amy agreed, the Family accent in her familiar but definitely not human voice making it sound particularly satisfied.
"Oh my god. Mom would have an aneurysm."
"So we don't want her to find out, do we."
"No. No, we don't."
Feeling a sense of unreality that came close to dwarfing the one she'd had after Taylor's revelations, Vicky stared at 'Ianthe' incredulously. "Unbelievable. It's like you're really a lizard." Even close up she couldn't see any indications at all that the Family member was other than everyone thought she was.
"I am." Amy shrugged. "Right now, I really am. Amy Dallon is in here, perfectly safe," she tapped her chest, "but at this particular moment in time, I am Ianthe. In a very real way, I'm currently no more human than she is." Her sister waved at Taylor. "All my mental processing is happening in the brain inside my head, the human Amy is completely shut down for now. And as safe as I can make it." She held out an arm while Vicky tried to get to grips with what her sister had done. "EDM scales, foamed EDM bones, a regenerative ability like you wouldn't believe, immunity to any disease on the planet, able to survive in a vacuum for weeks, or at the bottom of the sea, or for a certain amount of time swimming in lava. Although I wouldn't want to try that if there was an alternative, I'm not Taylor."
She grinned. "And I'm always improving it. Superconducting nerves are the next big modification along with some energy upgrades. The senses are better than anything else on the planet other than her again, I'm strong enough and tough enough like this to beat Hookwolf to a pulp without even straining, and so on. Fast, too."
"Plus the dart launchers, the electrical ability, the bioceramic extruders, and all Panacea's abilities on top of it," Metis commented with a smile. "And the Family healing thing too."
Not knowing what else to do, Vicky slumped against the wall and just stared. She seemed to be doing a lot of that at the moment, she dizzily mused. "My god, you…" She shook her head in wonder. "You would scare the PRT as much as she would."
"Probably more so, in fact," Metis sighed. "They have no real understanding of how powerful a demon and a half demon actually are. But they do have prior experience of Biotinkers, and that experience was not good. They are terrified of them. Nilbog was bad, in some ways Bonesaw could have been worse if she really tried, Blasto is an idiot but potentially fairly dangerous… Amy, on the other hand… She makes all of them put together look like they're not really trying hard enough."
"She's at least an S-class threat from the point of view of the PRT," the demon wearing the Saurial body added soberly. "I would suggest that in real terms your sister is quite likely one of the most dangerous Parahumans on the planet. However, she is also one of the best people I have ever met, and one I trust implicitly to do the right thing. Especially since she joined forces with Taylor and overcame some of her emotional problems." The lizard-girl looked apologetically at Amy as Vicky watched, trying to think what to say. "I'm sorry to mention it, but it's relevant."
"I don't mind," Amy said. "It's true." She turned back to Vicky. "I was in a really bad place when I literally tripped over Taylor's tail. It was the luckiest thing that ever happened to me. I met my best friend, found something I love doing, and I can help people more like this than I ever could have done as Panacea. It's fucking amazing fun too." She smiled, and even through the teeth and the scales, Vicky could see her sister, who genuinely was as happy as she'd ever been.
"Wow." The blonde simply sighed and shook her head, awe overcoming the shock. "I had no idea. I wish you'd told me you were having trouble, Ames. You're my sister and I love you. Even like this." She looked the other girl up and down. Mostly up. "I still can't believe it."
"You see why we absolutely can't let the truth out to anyone we can't completely trust, though, right?" Amy asked quietly. Vicky nodded slowly. She could, all too well. Their mother was the least of the potential issues. The PRT would indeed pop a gasket and hugely overreact, she had no doubt at all from learning about Nilbog and similar threats. From what they were telling her, and she could see, they were entirely right that Amy would be seen as a far larger potential problem, even though in her heart she was certain that her sister would never do anything like that. But the Family could get away with it, since it would be put down as something those crazy lizards did and therefore, if not actually normal, still something less worrying.
For a given value of 'Less worrying' of course.
She was fairly sure there were entire departments in various governments devoted to worrying about the Family, but as long as they stayed away, she was fine with it. And the public, at least going by PHO, was mostly in favor of the reptiles, while the ones that weren't were clearly nuts.
A thought suddenly hit her, making her abruptly fall over giggling.
"What?" Amy looked at her with her head on one side in a mannerism so similar to both Taylor and Saurial that it only made her laugh harder. The other four exchanged glances then patiently waited for her to recover.
"Sorry," she finally gasped, sitting against the wall and shaking her head. "I suddenly had flashbacks to those crazy people on PHO who say it's all a plot by demons, or aliens, or demonic aliens."
"Or alien demons, remember," Taylor grinned, threatening to set her off again.
"And it's actually true!" Vicky shook her head again in disbelief. "We must make sure Void Cowboy never finds out. The smug would break the internet."
The others all laughed as well.
"No, I feel it's probably best that we ensure that particular person stays in the dark about the truth," the demon said wryly. "You're probably right about the end result."
"Hey, what do I call you?" Vicky asked, getting up and looking at 'Saurial.' "I mean, when you're not Saurial, or Taylor, I can tell you're someone distinct. Somehow."
"I am Varga, Victoria, also known as the Varga, as I am singular and unique. It's a pleasure to finally meet you properly," the reptilian aspect smiled, holding out a hand, which she shook. "You can refer to me as that if you wish. But remember that only a few people know the truth, and treat it in the same way as any secret identity."
"It's important," she added, in Saurial's normal voice.
"Yep, it really is," Taylor's voice said from the same mouth.
"I would have to agree with that," the Varga said out of Taylor's mouth.
Vicky looked between them, then blinked.
"That is going to take some getting used to," she muttered, causing them both to grin identical grins.
"They like confusing people, don't worry about it," Metis remarked with an amused look.
"I'm starting to understand that," she sighed. "And Amy's probably as bad. How are you doing that Ianthe accent and all the right body language like that so convincingly?"
Her sister explained how she'd designed an entire auxiliary brain which was installed into the human body and allowed the constructed one to interface to it. At the same time it acted as a filter to ensure that whatever human was actually in there acted like the identity of the body itself. She just stared in amazement again, the level of thought that had gone into the entire operation was just unbelievable, and vastly past her own ability to properly understand. And it was more or less all the work of two people.
"Holy crap. That's incredible."
"I've got a lot of other things I've designed, although I haven't made all of them yet," Amy smiled.
Abruptly realizing something she'd missed up to now in all the excitement, Vicky's mouth slowly opened. "Oh, my god," she breathed. "You invented those healing things!"
Amy nodded.
Vicky grabbed her in a hug, heedless of the reptilian body, which was warm under her arms. "Thank you for fixing Dad," she whispered.
"You're welcome, Vicky," Amy whispered back, returning the hug carefully.
After a few seconds they released each other. The blonde girl was feeling much less worried now that she'd had time to become accustomed to the entire bizarre situation although it was still hard to believe that her sister was inside the enormous violet lizard. "So have you made anything else that cool?" she asked curiously.
"Oh, a few things, yes," Amy grinned. "Have a look at this." She moved to yet another door and opened it. Walking over Vicky looked inside and gaped.
Then she turned to her sister.
"You made a dragon," she said flatly.
"I did do that, yes."
"You made a dragon!"
"Yeah." Amy shrugged. "I mean, if you could make a dragon, you'd make a dragon, right?"
There was no answer to that other than 'Of course I would' Vicky decided after thinking it over carefully.
"Does it actually work?" she asked. "Like Taylor's one?"
"Sure. What would the point of a dragon that didn't work be?" Amy asked entirely reasonably. "And it's she, not it. This is Nike. No one else has seen her yet, so be nice."
Entering the room, Amy touched the much larger reptile and it stirred, then lifted its head. Vicky took a step back, suddenly unsure. "Who's inside it… I mean, her?" she asked cautiously.
"No one right now." Her sister looked back over her shoulder at her and smiled, then returned her attention to 'Nike,' stroking the dragon on the neck. The huge lizard seemed to preen under the attention, before looking at Vicky with what she'd swear was curiosity. And a lot more intelligence than she expected from some sort of meat robot or whatever she was. "This is my sister," Amy said to the dragon. "She's a friend."
It appeared to study the blonde for a few seconds, as Vicky returned the gaze uncertainly, then blinked and rested her head on top of Amy's Ianthe one, appearing contented.
"Holy shit. How smart is she?" Vicky said in a low voice. "She looked like she was going to say hello or something."
"She's not really sapient, although we're not entirely sure that won't happen," Amy replied, still stroking her dragon. "Not like you and I are, at least. But she's easily as smart as a really smart dog, and all the bioconstructs are definitely getting brighter. I'm not completely certain why yet, but it's interesting."
"I suspect it's because you really are that good at this, Amy," the Varga said behind Vicky. "Your work is remarkable."
"Thanks," her sister smiled.
Yet again, Vicky found herself wondering what the hell was going on. Every time she learned something new about what her sister and friend had been doing, the entire situation got weirder, and it had started about as weird as it was possible to get. She suddenly realized that Taylor's joking comment about there not being a civilization of alien lizards under the waves, yet, might be more true than she'd thought at the time…
"How many of these… bioconstructs… have you made?" she asked, still trying to come to terms with the latest information.
"Ianthe and Metis, Nike, and another dragon we haven't come up with a name for yet," Amy replied. "I've got at least three more to make soon too, and there are dozens of ideas I have for others. But this is a long term project so there's no hurry."
Stepping back into the outer room Vicky walked over to the bench and stared at the small potted plant for some time, thinking. Then she turned around and looked at her companions. The Varga was watching her with what seemed to be an understanding look in eyes that seemed ancient, Taylor was smiling a little like she usually did but also appeared sympathetic, 'Ianthe' was leaning on the doorway studying her, and Metis was doing much the same only more neutrally somehow from the other end of the room.
Nike was also staring at her over her sister's shoulder, her green gaze oddly intent.
"This is all just..." She shrugged, unable to put it into words. She'd come seeking knowledge and got way more than she'd expected, or right now could really handle. It was going to take her some time to be able to deal properly with everything she'd learned. One thing was very clear, though, which was that her friends were putting a lot of trust in her, trust she decided that she wasn't going to betray for anything.
"A little much all at once?" Metis suggested.
"Yeah. That."
She shook her head. "The entire thing is crazy. But somehow you've made it work. I still can't figure out how."
"Magic, misdirection, a lot of work, and more luck than we deserve," Taylor smiled. "I'm sorry you're having trouble with it. And I'm also sorry that you were getting so worked up over the last few weeks over all the things you noticed. If we'd known earlier we'd have let you in on it at the time."
"I didn't want to risk upsetting any of the Family," Vicky pointed out. "Both because they're friends, and I didn't want to get eaten." She smiled a little wryly. "But I've spent a lot of time getting really, really puzzled, and some of the nightmares were horrible."
Coming over to her, the reptilian form of her sister put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed gently. "I wish that hadn't happened, Vicky. I'm sorry too."
"It's not your fault, Ames, I did it to myself," she assured the other girl with a sigh. "My imagination got away with me. Again." She looked around at everyone watching her. "Although I'm really glad it's you guys and not someone evil. I hate to think what you could do if you were villains."
Taylor actually looked worried for a moment, and mumbled, "So do I."
After a second, Vicky said, "One thing that I'm still wondering about?"
"Which is?"
"Who is that?" She pointed at Metis, who grinned widely.
Mike looked up from his attempt to out-cheat his colleague as they both heard a strange sound. They exchanged a glance then stood to look out the window of the guard hut at the gate.
The almost subsonic purring hum grew louder, and green and red lights appeared from around the corner. They watched as Vectura's original mech, arms and legs furled against the underside, tail out behind it, floated over the gate about ten feet up. Navigation lights showed on port and starboard in the appropriate colors, while a flashing beacon was visible on the underside, and reflections off the buildings showed there was another on top.
The cat-woman inside waved to them, then the machine gently accelerated down the street, before disappearing around the corner at the end at about the two story level.
Seconds after that, Über and Leet rolled up on a pair of those incredible light cycles, helmets on their heads. The mirrored visor of the Tinker turned to them. "Cool, isn't it?"
Without a word, Mike hit the button to raise the gate. Both men zipped out in pursuit of the flying mech. When the gate was down again, Mike sat back at the desk and picked his cards up.
"I heard a rumor that Dragon is romantically involved with Armsmaster," he said conversationally.
Art stared at him. "Armsmaster? With Dragon?" He thought for a moment. "Huh. Yeah, I could ship that."
They went back to playing cards.
"What do you mean?"
Vicky turned to Amy. "You told me they're not sapient. Therefore, someone is inside the Metis body. Who's that? Who else knows about all your shenanigans and is trusted enough to get to be a lizard?"
Amy was looking distinctly amused, as was Lisa. Taylor laughed quietly. "You've met several times. Blonde, nearly as good at being smug as I am, knows too much?"
"Nearly as good at being smug as you are?"
"Quiet, she's thinking."
They could all tell when she worked it out. "Tattletale? Of the Undersiders? An ex-villain?!" The blonde girl looked outraged. "You let an ex-villain be part of the Family?"
"We did." Taylor grinned. "Don't worry, she's a very ex-villain."
"I wasn't in it by choice, Vicky," Lisa said. "I got press-ganged by Coil. These guys rescued me and the rest of the Undersiders, and saved all of us."
"I knew they'd got you all out of that shit with Lung but I didn't get all the details," Vicky said, still looking somewhat suspiciously at the large black lizard. "How did you end up rating a Family membership?"
"Good breeding?"
"Yeah, right."
'Metis' snickered. "Right place, right time, in a sense. Taylor pulled our asses out of the fire, pretty literally, and one thing led to another. I ended up becoming a friend."
"A good and trusted friend," Amy smiled. "She's smart, fun, insightful, and thinks she's the responsible one. No one wants to tell her she's as crazy as the rest of us."
Vicky leaned on the workbench and thought it over. If both Taylor and Amy thought Tattletale was trustworthy, she was. And she remembered meeting her back before the tanker move and thinking the other blonde was probably someone she'd like.
A moment later, another thought struck her, and she slowly looked up, her eyes slightly widened. The black reptilian female grinned. "Worked it out, didn't you?"
"You're Danny's assistant Lisa."
"Yeah, I am. Keep it quiet, though, the Rules and all, you know?" Lisa didn't seem particularly fussed about it, but Vicky felt mildly embarrassed about blurting that out.
"Shit. This is just getting more and more complicated."
"It does seem to have grown rather more involved than we expected."
"How do you keep track of who knows what?" she asked, sighing.
"Taylor has a chart," Amy giggled, which sounded odd in that much deeper voice.
"A chart?"
"Yep. I could draw it out again, but you still don't know some of it, and I'll have to check with the other people involved to make sure they're OK with you knowing about them." Taylor smiled. "Don't worry about that for now, though." She glanced at Amy. "What do you think?"
Amy studied her sister, who looked back, feeling overwhelmed again. "Hmm."
"Hmm? What 'hmm?' Why are you hmming at me?" she demanded. Absently she noticed that the dragon in the other room was still watching her and she could swear it looked like it had thought of something funny.
"Just wondering something." Amy moved past her to the bench and started pulling a few things out of cupboards under it, including a pot containing more onions. "We've got a lot of other things to tell you, and some of it is a bit strange."
Vicky couldn't help it, she burst out laughing. "Some of it is a bit strange," she echoed weakly, when she'd calmed down a little. "What part of any of this isn't strange as fuck, Ames? I mean, my own sister is a seven foot tall fucking alien lizard!"
"That's not strange, that's pretty common around here," Taylor chuckled.
Vicky just gave her a look, which made her grin again.
When she turned back to watch Amy doing whatever it was that she was doing, she found her lizard-sister was in the process of making a thing. What that thing was, she had no idea, aside from it looking like a bigger version of those one-shot healing spores.
"What's that?" she asked curiously.
"A Mark seventeen, modification six symbiote," Amy replied, still concentrating on the small object in her hand.
"Which means?"
Apparently finished, Amy turned to her, smiling calmly, and held it out. "Which means, I was wondering if you'd like get the latest in Family medical care biotech? Best on the market. Not that it's on the market."
Vicky looked at her for a long moment, then down at the small thing in her hand. "What does it do?"
Her sister seemed remarkably pleased with herself. "Cures you."
"That's what the one-shots do. How is this different?"
"It's not a one-shot."
After several seconds, the blonde realized with a jolt what she might mean. "You… It keeps going?"
"Yep. Once you have one of these, you'll never get sick again. It will heal you from practically anything, put you into biostasis in the unlikely event that it can't heal you so you can be helped later, and so on. It was my first invention and this is the most recent version."
"Fuck me." She looked at the little biodevice with awe. "That's incredible."
"Everyone with one so far seems pleased with it." Amy offered it to her again. "Just stick it on your skin and press. It only takes a few seconds."
Slowly, and a little uncertainly, still shocked, Vicky reached out. Coming to a decision after a couple of seconds, she picked the thing up and put it on the back of her hand, pressing firmly with the other one. There was a small squeak. "I trust you, Ames," she said calmly.
"Thanks." They all watched as the small organism rapidly disappeared into her skin, leaving no trace.
"I don't feel any different."
"You won't, but if someone manages to hurt you, it'll heal almost instantly." Amy studied her, then held out a hand, in which a rod made of that weird gray-black ceramic-like material grew. Vicky watched with interest, not having seen the process up close, although there was video of the Family members doing something similar on PHO. The process wasn't as fast as Taylor's matter generation power but was still implausibly quick. "Hold still." She raised it and took aim, grinning somewhat peculiarly.
Vicky leaped back. "What the fuck?"
"I want to check it works and prove to you it does, but your force-field is in the way," her sister explained in reasonable tones. "I just need to make it drop for a second. So hold still."
Staring at her, Vicky shook her head quickly. "Nope. Hit someone else. I know how strong you are like that."
"Aww, come on, I won't hurt you. Much."
"Amy, no!"
"Amy, yes!"
Much faster than she could avoid, her lizardified sister whacked her on the shoulder with the rod, hard enough to have broken the arm of someone not her. She felt her force-field flicker. Instantly, Amy, who was grinning, poked her on the arm with the end of the thing which turned out to be extremely sharp.
"OW!" Vicky slapped her other hand over the small puncture, while glaring at her sister. Lisa, Taylor, and the Varga were laughing and even Nike seemed to show a level of amusement. "That hurt."
"No it didn't, you big baby. Anyway, it's all better now," Amy replied, still grinning.
Vicky checked. Under the small amount of blood there was no trace of any wound at all. She gaped a little. "That's incredible."
"Good, right?"
"Sure, but your doctor-patient relationship is shitty," she grumped, not really able to stay annoyed.
"Who said I was a doctor? I'm a biosculptor, we use direct methods to check our work. It's in the Guild charter." Amy giggled. "Oh, I need to remember to write the Guild charter at some point. Remind me, will you, guys?"
"OK," Taylor agreed.
With a sigh, Vicky glared a little, then relaxed. "You are definitely still you, Ames."
Her sister smirked a bit. "Right, I'm going to use my mystical powers of The Amy to transform into… A human being!" She trotted into the first side room. Her sister watched her go, then looked at the others.
"It's nice to see her happy," she said, a little embarrassed again.
All of them smiled. Even the fucking dragon, she was almost sure, but when she checked again it was just watching her.
A few seconds later Amy came back, buttoning her shirt. "Come on, we have a lot of other things to explain," she said, waving Vicky out into the main room. "And I'm getting hungry." She turned to Nike and made a couple of hand signals which resulted in the dragon turning around and going back into her room, where she appeared to go to sleep.
Still feeling somewhat bewildered with the speed at which so many things had abruptly gone peculiar, Vicky followed them out into the main office.
The next hour showed her some really impressive things. Watching her sister, who was three inches shorter than her, pick up a weight that she could barely even move, was the least of them.
The PRT technician turned to look back at Emily. "It's moving at just under Mach one at flight level one six, on a bearing of zero nine eight, straight out to sea. It took off somewhere in the docks near the DWU facility two minutes ago on a course down the middle of the bay, outside our air control zone."
"Is it Saurial again?"
"No, the radar return is weird, but it's not the same as the one we got that time. A bit bigger, or possibly partially stealthed." He thought for a second, then suggested, "Or made of that EDM stuff. That would probably cause this effect to the radar, I think."
"I've got a picture, Director," another operator called from across the room. "We found a camera that was pointing in the right direction when it went past on the initial climb-out. Hold on, I'll put it on the main screen." He prodded his keyboard a couple of times.
Everyone looked at the image that popped up there. After a pause, Emily sighed heavily.
"Oh, god, she's got them flying now."
The now-familiar image of one of Vectura's mechs, which currently looked like a crab that was hovering in the air in exactly the same way crabs don't, was clearly visible in the photo. There was a little motion blur but overall the image was nice and sharp, and showed the machine had the proper navigation lighting and even an aircraft registration number on the side of the hull.
Someone else typed for a few seconds, then said, sounding a little impressed, "That number is valid, it was registered two days ago with the FAA. Experimental Tinker VTOL aircraft, out of Brockton Bay Dock Worker's Union. Filed by someone called Lisa Wilbourn from the DWU in the name of Vectura."
"Transponder ID matches, Ma'am," the first tech added. "She's now thirteen miles out, flight level two two zero, accelerating hard and climbing… Mach one... Mach two...Mach three… Holding steady at Mach four at flight level four five zero, bearing zero nine zero."
Despite herself, Emily was genuinely impressed. That was a remarkable achievement for something that wasn't really aerodynamic in shape, and was actually a construction machine. Vectura clearly had considerable trust in her own work too, since an accident that fast and high would be difficult to survive.
"Turning now, coming around to zero zero six, still flight level four five zero. She's going up the coast towards Portland, forty miles out." Thirty seconds or so after that, he resumed, "Another turn, now heading two three one, directly back to Brockton Bay. Still Mach four."
A little over a minute and a half later they heard a thump as the sonic boom of the hypersonic Tinker overhead went past. "Decelerating hard just inland, and turning again. Subsonic now," the operator reported, watching his screen carefully. "Directly over the DWU yard at twenty thousand feet and descending vertically."
Everyone waited, watching the tracking data on the large screen. Moments later a live image from a camera on the roof of the PRT building picked up the hovering machine, which slowly and gently disappeared from view behind the taller buildings.
"Lost the track in the ground clutter, Director. She was positioned perfectly for a landing at the DWU." The tech looked up at her again. "Impressive flight characteristics."
"Apparently Vectura can do much more than walking robots," Emily replied with a shake of her head. "Forward the data to Armsmaster, and if the Air Force calls again, tell them it was another Family test."
"Ma'am." He tapped on the keyboard as she turned and headed back out of the room, wondering what the next surprise from that particular source would be.
Linda lowered the mech to the ground, opened the canopy, and jumped out, landing easily in front of Randall and Kevin who were both clapping. A number of DWU workers were gathered around watching and they clapped too.
"It works perfectly," she smiled broadly, hugging each of them in turn. "Forty five thousand feet and mach four. The inertial cancellation system made it smooth as silk, it was quiet and comfortable too, and the heat dissipation was even better than I calculated."
"Fantastic job," Kevin congratulated her. "Really fucking excellent."
"It looked good from here too," Randall added with a smile in his voice. "Seemed very controllable."
"It is," she agreed, turning to look at her machine with pride. "I could go higher and faster but the antigrav drive wasn't really meant for hypersonic travel. It can do it, but that's because the mass is so low."
"How much will it lift?" he asked curiously.
"Couple of thousand tons if we can work out the best way to anchor it to the load," she replied, turning back to them. "That's something I haven't figured out yet. But it can grab something pretty heavy and lift it with the claws as it is. Should be helpful moving some of that stuff from the Ship's Graveyard to here for a start."
"Yeah. Sounds like a plan." Kevin nodded a little. "Good test. Let's celebrate with some coffee or something."
With a smile she walked over to the mech, pressed the make-it-go-away button Saurial had added, then a couple of seconds later bent over and picked up the small sphere the machine now was and slipped it into her pocket, feeling very satisfied indeed.
The applause from the small crowd made her grin, and think that life was good these days.
When Amy and the others finally finished explaining the things Vicky's sister had invented in the last two months, and demonstrated enough of it to make it very obvious that they were being entirely truthful, Vicky sat and stared at the other girl for several minutes,
She was totally stunned by the entire thing. Her sister had taken the concept of whatever the hell 'Bioshaping' was and run away with it, and seemed to be steadily accelerating. Vicky got the definite impression that what she'd seen so far was barely scratching the surface. And that very little of her sister's body was as issued.
It was just nuts. Amy was stronger than her, faster than her, had vastly better senses even in her so-called human body than her, could zap people with enough electricity to make them light up like a Christmas tree, had the same ability to make that bioceramic stuff from her hands that 'Metis' and 'Ianthe' did… In some ways her tail was the simplest change.
Which reminded her...
"Why a tail?" she asked.
Amy looked at her, then down and back. "Why not?"
"You know what I mean," she sighed.
Her sister giggled. "My best friend has one, so solidarity? And it looks cool, as far as I'm concerned. It was also a good first test, and is a lot more useful than you'd expect. At first I was only planning on having it for a few days to see how all the systems worked but I liked it so I kept it."
"It helps a lot with Family-style martial arts too," Taylor said.
Curving the muscular scaled appendage around, Amy added, "Look, it even has an optional thagomizer!"
They all watched as four extremely sharp blades grew out sideways from the end of the thing, reaching full size in ten seconds or so.
"Fucking hell," Vicky squawked. "That's terrifying!"
"And cool." Taylor looked approvingly at her friend.
When she'd recovered, Vicky asked, "Are you going to keep it permanently?"
"Probably. I can't see any reason not to," her sister smiled. "Like I said, I like it and I'm used to it. And no one else can see it anyway, so it's not like it really matters from that point of view."
"Huh." Vicky thought it over, then shrugged. "Fair enough. Weird, but OK."
"You want one? It doesn't take long." The other girl grinned mischievously.
"I'm not Lucy," Vicky giggled. "She would take you up on that so fast you'd get whiplash."
"I could do something else, it doesn't have to be a lizard tail. Although lizards are sort of traditional around here," Amy wheedled.
"Let me think about it," Vicky hedged, not sure she needed a living fashion accessory growing out of her backside. Although she had to admit that after a few hours of watching both Taylor and Amy, it seemed oddly normal.
"OK." They shared a smile.
There was another silence for a while, this one contemplative. Eventually, Vicky came to a decision.
"I think I want in."
"In which way?" the Varga asked.
"You guys are having a lot of fun, and helping people." Vicky looked around at them all, trying to put into words what she felt. "The Family does good things, and people respect them. Even Mom, and Director Piggot. I want to help." She shrugged a little helplessly. "I mean, I like being Glory Girl, and I like stopping criminals, and I love flying. But…" She glanced at Amy. "Being part of New Wave comes with a lot of baggage. I get why Mom and the others started the group, and I mostly agree. But in a way, neither Amy or I actually got asked if we wanted to be part of it, everyone just assumed that was going to happen. Same with Crystal and Eric."
She sighed slightly as the others listened quietly. "Sometimes it gets a little much. Mom is incredibly strict about 'Maintaining the reputation of New Wave' and 'Setting an example for Parahuman openness.' Stuff like that. Sure, it's a good thing, and it's noble and all that, but sometimes..."
"You just want to get away from it and see who you'd be if you weren't Glory Girl," Amy suggested with a knowing look.
"Yeah. You feel the same about Panacea, don't you?"
"I do. I like being Panacea these days, but three months ago, I fucking hated it. I was trapped in that life and couldn't see any way out that didn't either end really badly or cause Mom to go fucking insane. Which would also end badly but in a different way." Her sister heaved a sigh as Vicky nodded slowly, not entirely surprised. "Meeting Taylor saved my sanity and probably half the city. And the end result of that was Mom getting a lot easier to deal with, me finding an outlet for my power that's got it so happy it doesn't know what to do next, made me a hell of a lot happier, you name it. All it took was a demon and a tail." She grinned a little as Taylor snickered. "Nearly broke my fucking nose but that's a minor issue."
Spreading her hands, she finished, "Being Ianthe too, and part of the Family, that makes everything else worth while."
"That's kind of the way I feel sometimes," Vicky nodded, understanding very well. "You know how Mom was, I was the favored one. My aura didn't help, I think. I'm pretty sure it's fucked me over a bit, and other people too. It took meeting Saurial that time to make me start thinking about it and what was going on." She rubbed her forehead tiredly. "The flight, that's fantastic, and the force field, super strength, all the Alexandria package stuff. But the more I think about it the more I think the fucking aura is maybe more trouble than it's worth. Sure, sometimes it's useful, I can make a grown man cry in a corner, but it..." Shaking her head, she fumbled for the right words. "It's caused as much trouble as it's solved. And looking back, I think I got carried away with the popularity thing as a result."
"Teenagers are often not noted for their restraint and lack of ego," the Varga commented, not unsympathetically. She looked at him. "You are a good looking and intelligent female of your species, in the prime of your life, and would attract attention regardless. But I suspect you are correct that the aura may well have added to that rather more than is ideal. It takes considerable self-knowledge to realize this which impresses me."
"Thanks," she muttered. "But the point is, I have a feeling that some of the problems you had with Mom, Ames, might have been my fault. Which makes me guilty to think about. And I know that Mom always holds me to a ridiculously high standard, and gets upset when I can't stick to it and fly through a building or something." She half-grinned as they smiled. "Sure, that doesn't happen very often, but even if my costume wasn't quite perfect, she'd get upset and lecture me for ten minutes. She's lightened up a fuck of a lot since she had that talk to Aunt Sarah, and the ship move, that Coil operation, and all the other stuff. All that changed everyone. But I still sometimes wonder what would have happened if I didn't Trigger, or had different powers, or just wasn't part of New Wave."
The blonde picked up the can of soft drink at her elbow and finished it, absently crushing it into a small ball one handed. "I love my family, and I like being part of New Wave, and helping people. But there are times I'd like to be able to wander around without everyone knowing who I am. There's this image that I'm supposed to meet and sometimes I just get tired of it. I know what people say about me, and what a lot of them think of me. It gets annoying after a while. Sure, I know I'm an extrovert, especially compared to you, but that doesn't always mean I want every single person in sight staring at me all the time. I just can't avoid it."
No one said anything for a while when she finished.
Amy glanced at Taylor, then Lisa.
"You realize that none of the Family members are exactly anonymous," Taylor finally said.
"Of course. No one's going to miss a giant lizard," Vicky shrugged. "But the thing is they're not Glory Girl or Victoria Dallon. Might be a nice change." She looked around at them. "Maybe it won't be for me. But I won't know until I try, right? And even if it isn't, I get an interesting experience out of it and I'll know for sure."
After a minute or so, Amy stood up. "Igor! The table!"
Jumping to her feet, Taylor saluted clumsily and then dropped into an elaborate limping gait, making Vicky stare. "Yeth, Mithreth. At onth, ath you commandth." With great flailing of arms, she shuffled into the workroom block and disappeared.
Vicky gaped after her, before turning to look at the others. Amy seemed entirely unaffected, the Varga was laughing, and Lisa was shaking her head. "They seem to enjoy their little skits," she confided. "Best to pretend they're not happening. If you comment on it, it only encourages them."
With a giggle Vicky got up and followed her sister as she beckoned. "You're all nuts."
"Only a lot. Now, clothes off, face down on the table," her sister commanded, flexing her hands meaningfully. "I have the technology, I shall rebuild you in my image."
"Oh, shit," the blonde yelped as the other girl grabbed her and practically flung her onto the table.
Outside the room, she could still hear the Varga laughing.
Taylor watched with interest as Amy, who had slipped back into Ianthe, bent over her sister's prone and unconscious body, gently probing around the base of her neck. "How's it going?" she asked.
"Fine, got the basic neural amplifier in and working," Amy replied. "I'm trying to work out the best way to do this power regulator. I really need more time to make it right, but I have a few ideas I want to try now that should tell me a lot more about what's going on."
"We can at least train her on how to use a bioconstruct even if you can't disable the other powers," Lisa suggested, also watching closely. She was using her power to keep an eye on things and had already helped Amy modify some of her original ideas. From what she said, her ability was fascinated by this current project and being as helpful as it could be.
"That's a reasonable idea, Lisa," the demon, who was draped over Taylor's shoulder as the small dragon, nodded. "As long as we keep her out of the public eye we should be all right for now. I'm sure Amy will work it out."
"You have more confidence in me than I do sometimes," the violet lizard said under her breath, taloned fingers slowly moving over Vicky's neck and head.
"Nonsense, I merely give credit where it's due," he replied, smiling at her.
"Oh, whatever it is you just did, do it again," Lisa suddenly put in.
"This?"
"Yeah, that. OK, hold on… My power thinks you're working on the right path. It's basically telling me that suppressing the connection to the processor too much will cause it to either disconnect entirely and restart, or brute force the link which could damage the host. Which is us, I think. You need to turn it down just right and it should more or less go into standby, but otherwise be happy with life."
"That's a lot more than we ever got out of your annoying power before on this subject," Amy said, looking at 'Metis,' who shrugged.
"Maybe we didn't ask exactly the right question, or maybe whatever seems to be making the fucking thing more cooperative is still going on. But it seems sure of itself."
"OK. How about this?"
"Yeah, that… No, stop! Go back. Right. That's better. All right, try again, but slowly."
While Taylor and her demon observed, Amy and Lisa leveraged their abilities against each other for nearly an hour, until the healer straightened up. "I think that should do it as a first attempt," she said, sounding tired. "I can't guarantee it's perfect, and it might not work at all, but if Mr Thinky is right that should let me turn Vicky's power down to near enough zero. I concentrated on the aura first, since that's the really identifiable thing, and the flight second. The force field is pretty much irrelevant since the bioconstructs are tough enough no one would really notice anything. I'll leave that to last." Lisa was lightly glaring at her but didn't say anything.
"What next?" Taylor asked.
"May as well do the standard upgrade package everyone else got. It's easy enough now, but I seriously want to make a way to automate it since it's a tedious job. Can you get me some coffee?"
"Sure."
When Taylor came back, Amy was again bent over her sister, Lisa handing her some onions in a container which had her other hand in. "Here you go."
"Thanks." Amy paused to drink some of the coffee, then got back to work.
Blinking at the ceiling lights, Vicky wondered how long she'd been out. She felt fine, yet different in some difficult to describe way. A few seconds passed then Amy's Ianthe face came into view, smiling at her. "Feel OK?" she asked.
"I think so," Vicky replied, raising a hand to her head and feeling it cautiously. "How long was I out?"
"About an hour and forty minutes," her sister replied. "It's nearly ten PM now."
"Does it normally take that long?"
"No, but I gave you the full package, and I was trying to work out how to shut down your Glory Girl powers, or at least the aura. I think I've done it, but we won't know until we get you into a bioconstruct, since I've keyed it to that. I could activate the regulator manually but I don't want to play around with it too much until we know how it works."
"Why shut down… Oh. I get it, otherwise people could figure out it was me," the blonde said, understanding coming to her. She sat up and swiveled around on the table with her legs over the side. She saw that they were alone in Amy's work room, the door to the outside closed. Putting a hand to the back of her neck she felt it again, not able to detect anything out of the ordinary.
"I've left the strength boost and the sensory package, stuff like that, turned off for now like I usually do. You'll need to get used to it and it takes a while. It seems to be easier if you have a go in a bioconstruct first, that sort of primes your brain and the neural amplifier. It's hard to explain but it works."
Vicky nodded, more or less understanding. "So what next?"
"We let you try out a lizard," her sister smiled.
After several seconds, Vicky nodded. The concept was still weird to her and she wasn't entirely sure even now she was completely OK with it, despite what she'd told her sister earlier. But she wasn't going to back out at this point. "Which one?"
"Ianthe. She's the original one and seems easier for a new operator to handle. Metis is a little more fiddly and Nike and the other dragon are the advanced model." Amy moved away and lay down, closing her eyes. Shortly the human version stood up. "OK, come over here and do what I say."
Somewhat uncertainly, the blonde hopped down, then followed the instructions with a little reluctance as it was very strange and somewhat offputting. When some three or four minutes later she opened her eyes again, she was looking down a definite muzzle.
"Oh my god, it actually works," she said in disbelieving tones.
"Of course it works, I'm a professional!" Amy said calmly. "OK, roll over, then stand up."
She did so, finding her new and much higher vantage point very strange. As was the overall look of the room, which seemed to have a hell of a lot more colors in it than it had before. There were also a vast number of sounds from a sub bass intermittent rumble she couldn't place that seemed to be coming from a significant distance, to incredibly high pitched whines from out in the main room. She could also smell everything. "Wow. This is freaky," she remarked, looking around, then over her shoulder at her tail, which after a moment's effort moved quite happily. "I can't believe it."
"Good, isn't it?" Amy chuckled. "OK, touch your index fingers together." She did so. "Excellent. Do it again behind your back without looking." That was also easy. Her sister put her hand on her scaled side and concentrated. "Fully integrated, host neural activity suppressed normally, no signs of issues… Great. Everything checks out. How do you feel?"
"Peculiar but at the same time really good," Vicky noted, feeling her face with her hands. "This is fucking bizarre."
"You get used to it pretty fast," Amy told her. "The neural amplifier and the brain of the construct work together to normalize all the functionality. In an hour it'll be like you were born like that. Seems to be getting quicker too, I think all the different people Ianthe has had experience of are improving the connection ability."
She headed for the door, waving her sister to follow, which she very carefully did. "We need to run you through some exercises in the big room. It's the best method to get accustomed to it."
Outside, Taylor and the other two were waiting, all of them in reptilian form. Metis had been joined by Raptaur and Saurial. "Hello, Ianthe," the latter said with a grin. "I haven't seen you around for over an hour."
"Do you do this to everyone you meet?" Vicky giggled.
"No, only people worthy of the honor," her friend replied happily. "Come on, let's get you all trained up. Then we can go for a swim. The water's nice this time of year."
Somewhat unsteadily but already improving, Vicky followed as they all went back to the impossibly large room, marveling at the entire experience.
Making an adjustment, Amy stepped back. "OK, try it again. Hit me."
Vicky appeared to concentrate. Amy waited for a few seconds, then smiled. "Nothing. I think that's got it."
"Impressive," the Varga said from beside her. "Very impressive. Is it a general-purpose solution to disabling powers or specific to Vicky?"
"At the moment it probably won't work on anyone else without a lot of tweaking," the healer replied, thinking it over. "And I suspect there are some powers it might not work on at all. But I won't know until I get more experimental practice in, which may take a while, since probably not a lot of people would trust me to poke around inside them. And we'd need them to know more about us than I want anyway."
"Yes, a somewhat vexing problem," he nodded, sounding thoughtful.
"But this is good enough for our current purposes," Lisa said from her other side.
"Yep. Now, what about the flight?" Amy studied Vicky, who was standing there listening. "Does that still work?"
"Not really," the current inhabitant of Ianthe said, frowning. "I feel lighter when I try lifting off but I don't go anywhere." She experimentally hopped into the air, coming down noticeably more slowly than she should have done, but definitely not in a way that said flight. "It's really weird and feels wrong," she complained.
"You're just lazy and used to floating everywhere," Amy replied, her hands on her hips and feeling vindicated. "Great. That works better than I thought it would. It should stop anyone connecting you to the Family at least. With the cloaking spell added too, that should do it."
She turned to Taylor who was sitting on her tail watching. "Time for a swim?"
"Sounds good to me," her friend smiled. "She hasn't tripped over her own tail for nearly half an hour."
Vicky scowled, while the rest of them laughed. The first time she'd done that it had been hysterically funny, as she'd gotten confused and not been able to disentangle herself for about two minutes, during which the others were rolling around laughing like lunatics. "Yeah, yeah, laugh it up," she grumbled. "I'm sure you had trouble too."
"A bit," Amy admitted happily. "OK, I'm going to get into Nike, then we can go for a trip."
"Where?" her sister asked.
"We know a few good places," Taylor said, coming over and joining them.
Amy headed off to the workroom to change. "Meet you at the tunnel," the healer called over her shoulder.
"Tunnel?" she heard her sister ask, sounding puzzled. With a smile she went into the store room and woke Nike, pleased that she was able to add someone else to the Family.
Lisa grinned as Vicky did an underwater roll, giggling as she did. "This is amazing!" she shouted. "OK, I have to admit, this is so fucking cool. I could do this all night." Her body was lit with bioluminescence and she appeared to be having enormous fun.
Swimming next to her, Amy laughed. "I'm glad you enjoy it," she said to her sister.
"I can't believe you've done all this, Ames," Vicky replied, looking around with interest. "It's just amazing. How deep are we now?"
"About six hundred feet, and something like fifty miles offshore," Taylor answered, coming up behind her in the aquatic Raptaur form. She currently only had one aspect manifested. "We're still over the continental shelf and it doesn't get a lot deeper than this unless you go about two hundred miles more that way." She pointed off to the side. "But even this is a lot deeper than a human diver can go without some really serious training and equipment."
"But it feels like we're in a swimming pool or something," Vicky remarked in wonder. "Just nuts, this entire thing. I can see why you guys like it so much."
"Think you would?"
"I'm still not sure, but it's a hell of a lot of fun, I'll admit that," the girl in the lizard grinned.
"Let's head back," Amy suggested. "It's getting late."
"OK," Taylor agreed, curving around to aim towards home. All of them did the same and they increased speed, Vicky still audibly marveling at the experience.
Lisa's power was telling her the girl, while she was having fun, was still undecided about whether she wanted to do this long term. But she was definitely happy to be doing something with her sister and vastly relieved by learning all the things she had. Confused even now, but relieved.
She smiled to herself. She'd felt the same for some time, and understood the need to escape from your normal life for a while, even in such an unconventional manner. Vicky might join them long term, she might only pop in occasionally, but whatever happened Amy's sister was in a much better state of mind than when she came in looking so worried and scared that afternoon.
Climbing out of the pool of seawater in the big room, Vicky watched as the others did the same, then the enormous iris over it snapped closed and merged seamlessly with the floor. "That was a lot of fun," she said, feeling relaxed and satisfied. "Thanks, guys."
"You're welcome, Vicky," Taylor said. "Hopefully you're feeling less upset than you were earlier."
"I'm fine, Taylor. It's been a weird day, but a good one." She looked down at her currently reptilian body. "I'm still not sure this is me. I'm going to have to think about it."
"No hurry, it's not like we need more people that badly," Taylor smiled. "If you want to join in, you're welcome, and Amy can easily make you a bioconstruct of your own. If you don't want to, it's fine too. You've got some neat upgrades out of it, which will probably come in handy if nothing else, right?"
"That healing thing alone is worth the effort," the violet reptile laughed. "I don't get hurt that often but when I have, it's usually been pretty bad."
"Don't get carried away, it's not perfect," her sister warned, 'Nike' looking hard at 'Ianthe.'
"I know, you explained that. But it's a lot better than not having it, right?" Vicky smiled. "The other stuff will be useful too."
"I'll let everything settle for now and turn the rest on tomorrow, because it'll take time to get used to," Amy said. "And I'll have to teach you how to use it."
"I can wait," Vicky replied equitably. "It's not like I can show most of it off without making people get suspicious, and I don't want to fuck you guys up."
"We'll put a modified variant of the cloaking spell on you to make that less likely," the Varga, who appeared next to Taylor as Saurial, said. "I've also worked out a method to plug that particular loophole you discovered." He held out a small transparent glowing sphere. "This is basically a magical storage unit, or battery. The design is ancient, but I've modified it for this purpose. It holds enough magical energy to power the spell for months for a range of at least fifty feet around you. Both you and Amy can have one, which should prevent this sort of thing happening again. It will recharge in the same manner that the current one does, so mere proximity to Taylor occasionally will suffice. School should provide more than enough of that."
"It's pretty," Amy noted, peering at the glowing orb, which was only about half an inch in diameter. "But a little obvious, all lit up like that."
"Easily solved," he smiled, the sphere being replaced by a thin silver bracelet. "It's in a fractional dimensional pocket attached to this, as you've seen before."
"Neat." Amy nodded. "That should work."
"Can I have mine in gold?" Vicky requested. She smiled when the demon looked at her. "What can I say? I'm shallow and materialistic."
Chuckling, he nodded. "That isn't a problem."
Soon enough, Vicky was sitting at the table in the body she'd arrived in, a new piece of jewelry around her wrist. She admired it, thinking that the demon had good taste. "This has been… weird," she said, lowering her wrist and looking around at the other four. "The weirdest day ever, in fact. But I think it ended pretty well. Sorry to have caused so much trouble."
"It wasn't a problem, Vicky," Taylor said, smiling at her. "We're sorry we didn't realize why you were so worried."
Vicky waved that off. "How could you? I didn't say anything to anyone. Now I know what's going on, I'm not so worried. It's strange, sure, but you guys are helping people a lot more than almost anyone else ever has around here." She shrugged. "I still don't know if I want to join the Family like Amy has, but I'm more than happy to help out where I can."
"Are you serious about your aura?" Amy asked. "Because based on the experiments with the bioconstruct, I think I can probably turn it off, or let you disable it at will, without affecting the rest of your power."
Vicky looked at her for a long moment, then nodded. "If you can do that, I'll take it. If Mom notices I'll just tell her Ianthe worked out how to help me with it. I don't think she'd mind too much, since she's always complaining about it anyway."
"She might not actually notice for that matter," her sister pointed out. "You've been controlling it a lot better for weeks."
"True, but it's something I have to think about all the time," the blonde replied. "And if I forget it gets away from me. I've wanted real control over it for years, so if you can do that, I'd be grateful."
"OK." Getting up, Amy stood behind her sister and put her hands on her neck where the neural amplifier was. They waited for twenty or thirty seconds, until she nodded. "That should do it. It's off as a default, and you can turn it on if you want to by doing this." Vicky twitched as her sister did something.
"Shit, that's strange," she complained. "Do it again?"
"There you go."
"I think I've got it. Like this?"
"That's it."
"Really cool. Thanks, Ames."
Amy smiled and sat down again.
"I guess I've got a lot to think about," Vicky said quietly.
"Don't rush it. You can always change your mind," Taylor told her. "And you're always welcome here."
"Thanks, Taylor."
"Now all we need to do is figure out what to tell your boyfriend."
The other girl nodded, looking like she was thinking. "I don't know what to tell him but I don't think it would be a good idea to tell him what you told me. At least not all of it. I know you said he's aware of you, but telling him about Amy might cause problems."
"That's what we thought," Amy nodded. "But if we don't tell him, I have no idea how we'll explain Ianthe, Metis, Nike, or any of the others."
Vicky chewed her lip, then shook her head. "Me either. If I think of anything I'll let you know."
"Hopefully the lad will keep his own counsel for now," the Varga said.
"He has so far," Taylor noted. "And I can't see any reason for him to decide not to."
"Nothing we can do about it right now, so we'll just have to see how it goes," Lisa remarked. The others nodded. Glancing at her watch, Vicky saw it was nearly midnight.
"I'm going to have to go, I need to be up for school tomorrow and I still have some homework to do," she said. Amy looked at her with a raised eyebrow and she flushed a little. "I got distracted, OK?"
"OK." Her sister seemed amused again. "Tell Mom I'll be home soon."
"No problem." Getting up, Vicky retrieved her backpack and put it on over her coat. "See you guys later."
"Bye, Vicky," Taylor smiled, the Varga nodding and Lisa waving. Amy accompanied her to the door and unlocked it.
"Sorry to cause problems, Ames," Vicky whispered, hugging her sister.
"Any time, sis. See you later." Amy hugged her back, then watched as she lifted off outside the building, before closing the door behind her.
As she flew fairly slowly home through the dark, the blonde girl reflected on the strangest day she'd ever had, and wondered how things would work out in the end.
The four left behind looked at each other.
"Well," the Varga said, getting up and going for the coffee machine. "That was interesting."
"I think it went well," Taylor smiled. "At least we know why Vicky smelled so weird for the last few weeks. And worked out a loophole and a fix for it."
"Yeah." Amy nodded slowly. "I hope she doesn't tell anyone. I love her but sometimes she's not as discreet as I am."
"No one is as discreet as you are, Amy," Taylor giggled. "But she won't tell anyone."
"That's what my power says too," Lisa put in.
"There, see? Mr Thinky is sure."
"You're an idiot sometimes."
"Did Mr Thinky tell you that?"
Lisa gritted her teeth while Taylor smiled innocently at her, and Amy laughed.
"We didn't tell her about any of the Cauldron stuff, the Endbringers, or anything like that," Amy said when she stopped giggling. "Should we have done?"
"I don't think so, Amy," Varga said as he sat again with his mug of coffee in hand. "She had no idea about any of it, and has no real requirement to know about it right now. I suspect it would only worry her based on how upset she was when she arrived. Why add to her concern with information on a problem we don't yet know the answer to ourselves?"
"True..." Amy sighed faintly. "I feel a little bad about not being entirely open with her, that's all."
"We were very open, we merely omitted a few details that are currently not relevant," he smiled. "If they become so, we can tell her."
"I suppose so," she agreed in the end. Standing, she ran her fingers through her hair. "I need some sleep. I'll see you guys tomorrow."
"Sounds good, I could do with sleep too," Lisa nodded.
"I'll lock up," Taylor told them. Soon she and the Varga were alone, the sound of Amy's truck driving off barely audible. They exchanged a look.
"It will be interesting to see what happens," the demon commented.
Taylor popped over to the door and locked it from the inside, turned out the lights, then rejoined him. "Yep. We'll see."
A second later the room was empty.
Vicky climbed into bed and lay down under the covers, smiling to herself at the memories of the last few hours. It had started with her about as scared as she'd ever been and ended with her feeling closer to her sister than ever. All in all, it was well worth the experience.
And that swimming around hundreds of feet under water was amazing.
She still wasn't certain, having tried it, that being a part time giant lizard was for her. Even so, she was leaving her options open. Getting mad healing skills and the ability to turn her aura off properly out of the entire experience was fantastic, the rest was a bonus. And as Taylor had said, she could always go back.
One way or another though, she expected things would change quite a bit more than they had so far.
About to fall asleep, she suddenly opened her eyes again, then sat up. Reaching into her bedside table she retrieved her notebook and flipped through the scribblings inside it for a few minutes, reading a section here and there. Then she carefully ripped all the written-on pages out, tore them into tiny pieces, and went into the bathroom and flushed them down the toilet.
When she was back in her bedroom she reached under her bed and felt around, coming up with those deliberately irritating jeans. Holding them up she was unsurprised to see the tail sleeve was back and completely visible.
With a small smile, she folded them neatly and put them on the chair by the door to give back to Amy in the morning, went back to bed, turned the light out, and was asleep in seconds.