Ryuko tried to groan as her eyes slowly fluttered open, but she didn't have the strength of voice. Feeling a familiar softness pressed against her entire body, she managed - barely - to get a word out. "M...Mak-ko...cha..."

"Don't speak, Ryuko-chan," Mako whispered urgently. "You're too weak."

"W...why...?" Ryuko tried to demand, though it only came out as a plea. Her eyes wouldn't focus.

"Because you continue to be an overconfident fool," Satsuki stated harshly.

Ryuko's eyes managed to focus. She was floating in...something...in Iori's lab, and Mako was pressed up against her naked. Satsuki and Rias were both standing over her, Rias looking worried and Satsuki looking pissed. The gaze she had locked on Ryuko looked like she'd cut her to pieces herself if Ryuko said a wrong word...which Ryuko recognized as how she controlled just how worried about her she was. She tried to say something, but no words came out.

"It's your Life Fiber nature," Iori spoke up from nearby. "Now that it can absorb magic, it attempts to absorb any magic you come in contact with to strengthen you and continue feeding into the D-Fibers of your outfit...though I'm still struggling to determine why your inner energy is making that such a priority. And you keep coming in contact with Light Magic, which is presently toxic to you. As a result, it takes longer for that energy to cycle out of your body than it does for any other Devil of whatever power."

"But...kept figh..." Ryuko managed to get out.

"Because you're just that powerful," Rias explained, the worry palpable in her voice. "It takes that much more to be genuinely debilitating...and your body doesn't actually notice injuries or weakness until it reaches that level. Because of this, you burn through your energy reserves much faster."

"By my estimates, you've been functioning at...80% normal power ever since your initial transformation, and each exposure to Light Magic dropped your output by about 10%," Iori explained calmly. "With all the injuries you received, you were at about 5% when you transformed."

"Trans...formed?" Ryuko asked, finding her voice coming back.

Satsuki's eyes remained hard. "What do you remember of what happened at that house?"

Ryuko blinked as she turned her mind back. "...clients were dead...sick freak zealot exorcist got the drop on me...fought dirty...Asia...Asia was there..."

"Asia?" Mako asked curiously. "Who's that?"

"Cute stray...nun..." Ryuko managed to say. "Has Twilight Healing..."

Rias gasped in surprise. "That's a potent Sacred Gear. If she's working with the Fallen Angels-"

"Not with..." Ryuko interrupted. "They've got her..."

"They won't let her go, then," Rias observed worriedly.

"She wouldn't...let the guy cut my head off..." Ryuko managed to say. "...couldn't think how to explain my brain had already moved..."

"It what?" Satsuki demanded, being the first to speak as everyone turned to stare at her.

"So that's what this is!" Iori spoke in amazement. "It seems all your internal organs...can now shift at will to avoid serious injury...or even spread their functions throughout your body at need."

"That's...amazing..." Rias murmured in awe.

"So what happened then?" Satsuki pressed.

Ryuko turned her mind back...and felt her anger building. "Freed...he...Asia..." Her fists clenched as her blood began to heat, her arm twisting-

"Enough!" Satsuki barked out, snapping Ryuko out of her thoughts. She sighed as she rubbed the bridge of her nose. "I suppose it was too much to hope for that the scars we were left with wouldn't influence your magical nature now..."

Rias sighed as she nodded, recognizing what had happened. "Devil magic responds very strongly to emotions. That's why discipline and control is so important...and why those who cast it aside end up so altered when they become Stray Devils. I'm...surprised you were able to reverse Ryuko's transformation completely..."

"It wasn't the first time she transformed like that," Satsuki explained calmly. "Though it wasn't alone last time..."

"How did you reverse it then?" Rias asked curiously. "It could be important to know-"

"Mako slapped some sense into her," Satsuki explained with a slight smirk.

Rias blinked. "Well, was there a specific tech-...oh, you meant literally..."

"With how fragile she was this time, we thought a gentler approach was needed," Iori explained. "Thus the capsule of liquid magic they're soaking in."

"But...Mako..." Ryuko managed to say, worried what that would do to Mako when she didn't have magic and did have Life Fiber energy.

"Yes?" Mako asked as she perked up, lifting her head to look Ryuko in the eyes.

Ryuko blinked, seeing...D-Fiber energy throughout Mako's body. "Wha...?"

You didn't think I'd let her kill herself to help you, did you partner? Ddraig whispered in her mind.

Ryuko managed a smile...only for it to leave her face as realization hit her. "Asia!" she barked out as she tried to sit up. "I need to save Asia-" An odd plop drew her attention. Turning, she saw that her left pinky finger had fallen off her hand - barely held on by a thread - when she lifted it out of the liquid magic.

"You aren't going anywhere!" Satsuki snapped out. "Uzu and Houka are already scouring the city for signs of the girl to ensure her safety. Right now you're barely holding your own body together, and according to Iori's scans you're at less than 2% normal energy levels! That's barely enough to keep your body going, and that transformation you underwent strained your regenerative properties!" Stepping forward, she pushed Ryuko back into the liquid. "So stay there and learn to not be so reckless...or if that's impossible for that lump of knots you call a brain, at least how to dodge!"

Ryuko wanted to speak up and complain...but she could already feel herself slipping back into slumber as the liquid magic enveloped her once more. She tried to fight-

Sleep now, partner, Ddraig instructed firmly in her mind. You can't do any more than that until you're strong enough to hold body and soul together. Sleep...sleep...slee...