"So, you took my offer, Little Mouse."
Amy glared at Merlin. She'd cut her volunteer work short at the hospital, and come stomping back to his quarters. The others weren't here.
"I left people who need help."
"No matter, they'll be replaced by tomorrow," Merlin said, consulting a vial of glowing goop. "That's the curse of your power, isn't it? As great as it is, the need for it is like an ocean…and you are just a small mouse, barely able to keep your head above the water."
"You've been talking to people!" Amy said. "Who?"
"You mean, have I been going behind your back?" Merlin laughed. "My dear Little Mouse, I do not need to. I have heard the troopers and the people. Panacea did this. Panacea did that. Did you hear about my cousin, the one with cancer? Panacea cured him. I wonder if Panacea would cure my erectile dysfunction and give me a larger organ, my wife isn't satisfie—" he looked down and shook his head. "And you are so used to that request that you don't even blush. All the people coming to you to beg for healing, and behind them… a thousand fold more."
"People need healing," Amy said.
"Yes, and don't you resent them for it?"
"Not… No." Amy looked up at Merlin and the older man snorted and went back to his potions. "Sometimes. Right now, Vicky's angry at me because I didn't jump to help Kenji. He was helping move slaves!"
"And he turned, turned when he knew what awaited him," Merlin said. "I've known knights with a thousand victories to their name who would have murdered their own kin before they made such a decision… But well, who am I to wonder about that? We have the Little Mouse who shall stand at the gates of heaven, judging the righteous and unrighteous alike."
"I could have healed more people!" Amy said.
"Yes, you could have," Merlin's voice wasn't judgmental. "So why are you angry? It is your power. Your decision. Make it as such."
"You don't understand…" Amy said. "I can't heal everyone."
"Oh, I do." Merlin looked over at Amy. "It's strange that this power came to you. Why not a surgeon, someone who has spent years wrestling with these questions? Why a child?"
"Powers don't choose like that."
"No, they rather seem more inclined to make the wrong choice." Merlin glanced out the window. "A boy who can stop time—for other people, never himself. He speaks rather loudly at times, and says things he perhaps shouldn't, like how his family member is doing with the cancer he faces. A smiling mask painted over a crying face, and a power that allows him to do… Well, not what he would have wished for. Why didn't he gain the power to heal?" Merlin shook his head. "On my excursion to free the Grey Boy victims, I spoke to more than a few people and the stories were mostly the same. Always telling how their powers solved some problems, but made others. Like yours."
"And what does this have to do with me?" Amy asked.
"If you would become a Lion, Little Mouse, you must first make this power your servant, not the other way around. You are not just a healer, are you?"
"You've been—how?"
"Oh, simple enough. The PRT believes you might be more capable than you're letting on. You were able to work around the Trollhunter's unusual biology on the fly, where a simple healer would have been lost… And you threatened to make my beard fall out, which is both different from healing and a very directed form of attack."
"I… People don't like Bio tinkers like Nilb—ow!" Merlin had whacked her on the head. "What was that for?"
"Do you have a burning desire to kill all in this city?"
"No!"
"Create a plague to make all your servant?"
"No, and I couldn't, I mean, you couldn't tailor a single bioweapon to do that, I mean, maybe you could come up with—what am I saying!" She shook her head. "Ever since I worked on Jim, I keep having these thoughts to do different things, bigger things…"
"Interesting, but you have no urge to do so, do you?"
"No!"
"Then why do you worry?"
"I have this power!"
"And most officers carry guns. I doubt they spend their days worrying that they may just happen to walk into a store and shoot all within."
He put a flower in front of her. "Change the color."
"Wh—" Amy glared at him. He already knows. She touched it and felt the same odd thrill that had accompanied her work on Jim, the feeling of excitement of trying to make that strange biology work.
Slowly, the pink rose turned purple. Then she had an impulse and did some more work… and slowly, the purple rose started to glow. Amy couldn't keep a grin off her face.
"There."
"Well done, Little Mouse." Merlin paused. "And the seeds?"
"No. I mean, I could but if I messed up and released an organism into the biosphere…" Amy looked up. "Why didn't you hit me now?"
"Because that is not a foolish fear. Murdering someone, I doubt. One day casually forgetting just how great your power is? That I accept as a danger. It is one I face after all." He nodded. "Very well. I accept."
"Ok-wait, what? What are you accepting?"
"Why, you're apprenticeship, of course. It won't be the same as the Fair Claire's—your power isn't magic, it's mechanical, and she has far fewer mental issues than you do."
"Wait, mental issues!" Amy shrieked.
"Why yes, what could be more monstrous than to threaten this fine beard?" Merlin looked at her. "Now… for your duties. Once a week, you shall do no healing at the hospital. You and I will be working together to learn just what your power can do, what its limits are."
"But…"
"There will always be more," Merlin's voice wasn't mocking this time. "If you learn anything, whether as my apprentice, or just walking under the sun, learn this: You are not a god, and it is no sin to accept that self-evident truth." His old tone came back. "Now, from the records I consulted, you are adopted, correct?"
"How did you—"
"The Internet. How many restraining orders does your family have to take out?"
Amy winced. "More than you know."
"Yes. But for your first lesson, find out who your birth family is. We cannot know where we're going until we know where we started from."
"Carol doesn't talk about them."
"Well, how unfortunate for her. I suppose she'll have to learn how to talk about them. If not, I expect there are others, you do have a large, if someone odd, family."
"I—wait, I didn't even say yes!"
"Very well, are you going to say yes?" Merlin asked.
Amy looked up at the old man. Asshole. That's what everyone called him, and they were right.
On the other hand… She glanced down at the softly glowing flower and ran a finger over it.
"Okay, but I can always change my mind."
"Oh, Little Mouse, we can always change our minds. What we can't do is change the consequences of our acts."
"Wait—Little Mouse? What happened to me becoming a Lion?"
"Why, first you have to learn to roar, Little Mouse." Merlin chuckled. "That's why you're here, isn't it?"