A Bad Choice
When I filled out a CYOA out of boredom, I never expected a ROB to take that as an invitation and drop me in it. Oh god, I really should have picked something that made me harder to kill! To make matters worse, I wasn't just dropped in, oh no, now I have the god damn Nazi's chasing me for my powers!
And we're back! Nothing to say here, other than enjoy!
Chapter 6
With the first big event out of the way for now and the ball in Taylors court, I decided that I might as well start on my plan to help out another girl who desperately needed it. I wasn't done with Taylor of course, but I hoped that I'd hear from her eventually. If not...well, I'd deal with that issue when it came up. For now, I had something a lot more important to deal with. Namely, getting legal representation, just in case.
To that end, I asked Kayden if she knew anyone and she directed me to the attorney who had helped her get Kaiser of her back, who in tern put me in contact with someone who specializes in Cape law. It took some time to set up a meeting, mostly because of my age, but the guy seemed nice enough and was certainly competent. I'd mentioned that I wore a camera when in costume and he encouraged me to keep it up. I also brought up the possibility of possibly getting the PRT to look at the potions I made, albeit wrapped up in the illusion of asking for someone else and he said he'd look into it and have detales for when we met in person. He'd also given me the go ahead to help out at the hospital, so long as I kept my camera active.
With that in mind, I filled a bottle with Magically purified water that was perfect for healing and Apperated a short distance from the hospital. I decided that I might as well walk the rest of the way rather than flying. The Flight spell wasn't exactly energy intensive, but healing was and I wanted to make sure that I had plenty of Magic available, just in case. I'd stick with my Waterbending for the most part, but it would still be helpful to have access to my Magic as a just in case.
My choice to walk rather than fly got a lot of attention from the general public, along with a fair few phones getting pulled out and aimed in my direction. I had to employ my Occlumency to maintain my casual and nonchalaunt gait to prevent the nervousness that came from being the center of attention from showing.
"Hey, Avatar, wait up!"
I paused at the familiar voice and turned as Aisha came jogging up. I was about the greet the girl, right before I spotted the impressive black eye she was sporting.
"Impressive shiner," I said, "Are you OK?"
Aisha winced and gently probed her bruised face.
"I'm fine," she said, "I just...got into a fight."
I didn't need my Seismic Sense to know she was lying, but I decided not to ask.
"Hold still," I said, pulling some water out of the bottle at my hip.
Aisha did as I asked as I gently applied the water to the side of her head. It took less than a second for the swelling to go down. The girls eyes fluttered shut as my Bending did its work and she let out a soft sigh. Well, at least it wasn't a moan like that old cliche. That didn't stop her from following my hand a little as I pulled the water away before she blinked and shook herself off.
"Hoo boy, that felt weird," she said.
"Does the job though," I said, "Try not to get into any more...fights, OK?"
Aisha twitched slightly, but hit it under a cocky grin.
"OK dad," she said cheerfully, "Anyway, I gotta go. Thanks for the heal!"
I rolled my eyes as the irrepressible girl jogged off, apparently ignoring the looks she was getting.
"I think I know how Grue feels now," I muttered as I continued on my way to the hospital.
It didn't take me long to arrive and I immediately walked up to the front desk, ignoring the staring crowds and the security guards who tensed and moved their hands to their weapons as I did. I had to wonder just how much help they thought they'd be if I was there to make trouble.
"Hi, I'm Avatar," I said to the receptionist, who was frozen with a cup of coffee halfway to her lips.
She slowly put it down, eyeing me warally.
"Um, I see," she said, "Can I help you? You don't look injured…"
I smiled and shook my head.
"No, I'm not injured," I said, "I'm actually here to offer my assistance. I'm a healer, among other things and, while I'm not as good as Panacea, I can still do a lot to help."
The woman blinked, her mouth opening and closing a few times, before she shook her head and cleared her throat.
"I see," she said, "Well, I'll need to call the Director, but I'm sure we can work something out. Please take a seat."
I did as I was told and started shifting through the stack of magazines on the small table next to me. It was mostly garbage of course, but I was never good at just sitting around doing nothing. I sighed and instead pulled out some of my backup paper. For reasons I couldn't explain, I'd picked up an interest in origami over the past couple of days, having found myself absently folding surprisingly good cranes, dogs and flowers considering I'd never done it before. I think it had something to do with my ability to manipulate paper, but I wasn't going to complain. An interest in paper folding was far from the worst side effect of powers and it helped pass the time.
As I finished the bird I was making, I spotted a couple of kids watching me with wide eyes and smirked as I held up the little paper creation and blew on it. A slight application of my power had the bird taking off and fluttering around the kids, making them gasp and laugh happily as they tried to catch it.
The clearing of a throat drew my attention away from the kids to a man in a lab coat who had approached me.
"Mr Avatar?" he said.
"Thats me," I said as I turned to the man.
He was elderly and impeccably dressed, with slicked back gray hair and a rather twitchy looking bald man on his heels who looked like he'd rather be anywhere else. I blinked a couple of times. I swear I know those two, but for the life of me I had no idea where from.
"My name is Dr Kelso, the Chief of Medicine," said the older man, "I understand your here to offer help like Miss Panacea?"
"Um, yes sir," I said, "I'm not as powerful as she is and I can't heal everything, but I can do most things, so long as it does not require directly regrowing things. I can even affect the brain to a degree, although that is a little more limited."
"I see," said Kelso, "Well, I see no reason to turn down the help. Lord knows we need it...Ah, Dr Cox!"
I blinked and glanced over my shoulder as a tall man who looked like he'd been trying to sneak past unnoticed twitched and slowly turned, a look of resignation on his face.
"Whats up Bob?" asked the Doctor.
I frowned. Wait a moment, this seemed oddly familiar.
"I need you to take Avatar here around the Hospital," said Kelso, "Hes offered his abilities to help empty some beds. If possible, get Panacea to check his work, not…"
He turned back to me.
"That I think you're incapable, but we do need to be sure."
I waved off the apology.
"Its fine," I said, "I understand."
"Excellent," said Kelso, "Do have fun."
He smiled at Dr Cox and walked away with his shadow on his heels. The tall doctor sighed and turned to me, eyeing me up and down with an unimpressed look in his eye.
"So, your a Healer?" he asked.
"Yep," I said, "I can't restore anything thats missing and I'm not entirely sure what the limits are yet, but I'm willing to try."
Cox sighed and turned away.
"Alright, fine, lets get this over with," he said, leading me out of the lobby and towards the lift, "As if I don't have enough to deal with with all the useless Interns…"
I raised an eyebrow as he trailed off into incoherent mutterings. More and more I got the impression I'd stumbled onto something that was part of something very different from your standard Worm fair.
I quickly decided that it wasn't worth getting involved with and focused on doing my job, which was basically fixing the ailments of the apparently random patients the Doctor led me to. It was an eclectic bunch, ranging from broken limbs to a variety of illnesses. Some I healed in moments, others would need more sessions to fully heal (or a subtle use of Magic), mostly the broken bones. Most of them were thankful, although a couple were a little put out at essentially being used as guinea pigs for my power and one old man kicked up a fuss over not being healed by Panacea and giving out such a nasty aura of highly inappropriate lust over the idea that I put a minor bad luck curse on him and refused to do anything to heal him, instead walking away. If he didn't want healing, I wouldn't be doing it.
Eventually, we arrived in a ward where Panacea was hard at work and...oh dear. It took one look and I could immediately tell that she'd been here all night, even with her hood up and scarf around her face. I glanced at my watch. It was 2pm, so she was probably on the Vocational time Arcadia allowed for the students, but from the looks of her, she should have been fast asleep in bed.
A sharp intake of breath beside me made me glance at Dr Cox, who had just spotted Panacea and had a rather annoyed look on his face.
"Whats she doing here?" he muttered as he started towards the other Healer.
I quickly followed him over to where Panacea was stepping away from her last patent and turned, only to pause at the sight of the annoyed Doctor. Up close, she looked even worse, with clammy looking skin and dark bags under her eyes. Impressive considering I'd seen her just a couple of days ago and she looked fine. I had to wonder if her power took more out of her than I thought.
"Oh, good afternoon Dr Cox," said Panacea, blinking blearily as her head drooped slightly.
"What are you doing here?" said the Doctor.
Panacea looked a little confused, although that could have been the exhaustion.
"My job?" she mumbled.
Dr Cox sighed.
"Amy, you were still here when I left yesterday," he said, "At 9 o'clock. Carla said that she had to literally chase you out at gone midnight, just like every day in the last week."
I blinked. Good god, that wasn't good! I sent a general Diagnostic spell her way and found pretty much what I was expecting, extreme exhaustion brought on by running for about five days straight without sleep. Not only that, but I was picking up signs that she'd been smoking, although most of the toxins had been flushed (not that that shifted the tar build up) and a rather powerful Magical core...of for fucks sake, not another one!
I shot a few more Diagnostic spells at the people in the Ward, but got back a lot of Muggles and one absolutely tiny Core that barely counted as a Squib. Right, so not everyone was capable of Magic. I'd have to check some Capes later to be sure it wasn't something to do with that.
"You need to take some time off and get a good nights sleep," finished Cox.
"B-but I can't just leave!" protested Panacea, now visibly swaying on her feet.
"You can and you will," said Cox, "In fact, I'm going to call your sister to pick you up and you will not come back in for at least a week. Understand?"
"But…" started Panacea, but before she could voise her protest, her body finally gave in and she passed out.
I had already seen it coming thanks to the Diagnostic spell and easily caught her, hefting the surprisingly light girl into my arms.
"I'll see if I can do something to help her," I said, "Do you have an empty room I can use?"
Dr Cox sighed and pointed at a nearby door.
"Thats empty," he said, "I'll call Glory Girl and get her to come pick her up."
I nodded and carried Panacea into the room as Cox walked away muttering about stubborn brats. I put Panacea on the bed and pulled out my wand, casting a Switching Spell to leave her in the Tshirt and leggings she had on under her robes. It was easier to work without all that heavy fabric in the way. With that done, I sent a locking and detection spell at the door before going to work.
Waterbending wasn't really suitable for this, although I could have used it to get rid of the gunk in her lungs, so I decided to go the way of Magic and started pulling potions out of my pouch. The first thing I did was banish a Pepper Up into her stomach and cast an Enervate, which caused Panacea to jerk awake with steam billowing out of her ears.
"Who, wha, where?!" she sputtered, jolting into a sitting position.
I caught her and gently forced her back down.
"No, your lying still," I said.
Panacea blinked, her eyes clearing, and frowned.
"Avatar? What are you doing here?" she asked, looking around the room, "Actually, what am I doing in here?"
"You just collapsed from exhaustion, so I need to make sure nothing's actually wrong with you before you go home and sleep," I said, "Its kinda my job as a Healer."
Panacea frowned.
"I'm fine," she said, "Now if you'll excuse me…"
She started to get up again, but I just pushed her down.
"No, your not going anywhere," I said, "Now lie still before I strap you to the bed."
A pair of shackles formed from ice beside me to highlight my threat. Panacea scowled, but lay still as I turned the ice back into water and pressed it against her head.
"I don't know why your doing this, I feel fine," she muttered.
"That would be because I gave you a little something a friend of mine gave me," I said, "Shes a Tinker who'd prefer to remain anonymous for obvious reasons, but is rather good at making medicines. The one I gave you will keep you on your feet for a couple of hours, but you'll crash spectacularly in about four hours."
Yeah, theres no way I'm letting the fact I was making the potions become common knowledge anytime soon.
Panacea's scowl deepened.
"You gave me untested Tinker drugs?!" she yelled.
"Of course not," I said, "They were tested extensively and my friend, who goes by Wiccan by the way, intends to have me approach the PRT about potentially marketing them. Anyway, your going to start choking in three, two, one…"
Panacea was about to say something, but was cut off as she started choking and coughed up a lump of yellow and black gink into a bucket I summoned from across the room.
"You really shouldn't be smoking," I said, putting the bucket aside, "You might not be at risk of getting cancer, but the tar doesn't do you any good."
"Um, thanks?" said Panacea, looking mildly disturbed as she accepted the glass of water I handed her.
"Welcome," I said, "Now, since you apparently can't be trusted to look after yourself, I'm going to do it for you. You need a solid week of proper nights sleep at least and your showing signs of not eating properly. To fix it, you get to be the first to be subjected to one of Wiccan's ragemes."
I pulled out two racks of potions, one purple and the other a rather toxic shade of green.
"The purple ones are Dreamless Sleep," I said, tapping the rack of viles, "Take one before bed and enjoy eight hours of pleasant sleep. The green ones are Nutritional potions that will help your body extract every bit of nutrition from food. Take one before dinner and make sure you do it quickly. They taste like absolute arse."
"Um, I'm not sure thats such a good idea," she said slowly.
"Well, if you don't take them I won't teach you a method of limiting your sleep time and resist mind altering effects," I said, "Speaking of which…"
I twirled my wand behind my back and hit the girl with a Finite Incantatem. According to the Diagnostic Spell, Vicky's aura was something similar to a mix of a Compulsion Charm and an Emotion affecting potion like Amortentia in spell form. It wasn't Magic of course, but it was close enough for the Counter Charm to work. Somehow. I wasn't going to question it.
Panacea jumped slightly when the spell hit her and looked around quizzically.
"Huh...that was odd," she said.
She shook her head.
"So, what were you saying about teaching me something?" she asked.
"Its a skill called Occlumency," I said, "Basically, it allows the user to take control of and organize their mind. It allows for better recall and as a side effect helps decrease the amount of sleep you need. I figure it could be helpful for you. Interested?"
"That sounds like a Thinker ability," said Amy.
I smiled and shook my head.
"Nope, entirely learnt skill," I said, "Some people will have an easier time and not everyone has the capability to learn it, but that would be the exception rather than the rule."
Amy hesitated for a moment.
"It'll probably make you resistant to your sisters Aura."
"I'll do it," she said.
"Great, in that case, come to this address tomorrow afternoon after you get of school," I said, pulling a card out of my pocket, "Oh, and since I know Glory Girl will be tagging along, let her know I'll teach her to. It'll hopefully teach her restraint if nothing else."
Amy took the card and frowned.
"This is in the Docks," she said.
"Yep, its where I've set up my hidden base," I said in a conspiratorial whisper.
Well, it was where I'd be setting up my base at least. I couldn't exactly keep operating out of home after all. I'd set up my Trunk in the warehouse under enough Wards to make Hogwarts jealous. I wouldn't put it under the Fidelius though since I might need to bring in someone I didn't want to key to the spell at some point and I'd also see about setting up a shop or something to sell my potions once they got the OK.
Panacea rolled her eyes and prodded me in the side. My armoured costume meant I didn't feel anything and just grinned back. Before Amy could do more, there was a knock at the door and I quickly removed the Locking spell and opened the door with an application of Metalbending, allowing a worried looking Glory Girl to float into the room. The moment she spotted her sister, she swooped across the room and grabbed her by the shoulders, checking her over as if she expected to find a gaping hole in her or something. While she was doing that, I shot a Diagnostic at her and found that she apparently had dormant Veela blood. How was that even possible? I frowned. This warranted investigation.
"Oh my gosh, are you alright Ames?" she gasped, "Dr Cox said you collapsed!"
"Don't worry Glory Girl, I've already made sure there's nothing wrong with her," I said, cutting across the babble as Amy started to go a funny shade of purple from how hard her sister was squeezing her, "Also, I don't think Panacea can breath."
"Huh?"
Vicky looked down to see Amy going limp in her arms, looking more than a little blue in the face. If I'd picked an Anime power, it wouldn't have surprised me to see her eyes as swirls and a ghost emerging from her mouth.
"Oh, sorry," said Vicky and let her sister go, allowing her to gasp for breath.
"Itsok," gasped Amy.
I rolled my eyes at their antics and cleared her throat.
"Just so you know, the method I used to treat her will wear off soon," I said, "Then she'll crash spectacularly and conk out for at least eight hours. Let your parents know so they don't panic if they can't wake her up."
Vicky shot me a strange look, but nodded.
"Alright, thanks for looking after her," she said.
I shrugged.
"Eh, you guys helped me the other day, so it was the least I could do," I said, "Still, I'd rather not have to do it again, so get some proper rest and food."
Amy rolled her eyes.
"Yeah yeah, I got it," she said.
"And don't forget these," I said, handing her a bag with the potions in it, "Dosage instructions are included. Now, off with you both."
"Thanks," muttered Amy, taking the bag and heading out the room with her sister on her heels, already asking about the bag.
With that done, I stood, stretched and headed for the door. Outside, I found Dr Cox leaning against the door.
"Thanks for that," he said, "I worry about Panacea. Shes always here, even more than the actual doctors. Its not healthy."
"I know," I said, "I'll do what I can to help her."
Cox nodded.
"So, do you want to do more work or head home?" he asked.
"Do you still need me?" I asked.
Cox looked thoughtful, before shaking his head.
"No, the rest we can treat on our own. So long as the Interns don't accidentally kill someone…"
He trailed off as a frantic looking young man came running down the hall.
"Oh, that can't be good," he muttered, "Whatever, you head home kid. Thanks for the help and feel free to stop by. I'll let Bob know your on the up and up."
I nodded and jogged off down the hall, waving over my shoulder as I went.
I left the hospital and paused just outside the doors to stretch.
"Urrg, right, next job, go set up my Trunk," I muttered and took off, heading in the direction of the Docks and the wearhouse I'd found in my extensive holdings.
It was currently empty, so I had a lot of work to do if I wanted to get it up to scratch. Oh well, at least it'd give me something to do!
And done. Sorry for the long wait, but, well, real lifes a bitch. I hate the Summer Season. Anyway, lets get started on my witty quips.
First of all, all the characters at the Hospital will be based on the characters from Scrubs, with some minor alterations. Theres no real reason for this and it won't tie into anything other than a bit of comic relief, I just needed some characters and why not?
I know Amy might seem a little to blase about accepting drugs from someone she just met, but shes currently a little out of it from exhaustion. They'll have a proper conversation about that in the not to distant future.
Incidentally, anyone not familiar with my habit of screwing with my characters head figured out what I have planned for Amy yet?
The idea of Vicky being part/full Veela is a concept I've been toying with for a while. Its mostly just to add to the world, but it will have some bearing on the future. For now I'll just say that Magic is not native to Bet.
Yeah, hes keeping the fact hes a 'Tinker' to himself for now. Hes already a powerful Shaker/Blaster, no need to paint a bigger target on his back.
I'm not entirely sure why I had Aisha approach him on the street, but it seems like something she'd do.
Anyway, I'm done. Next time, lessons and possibly a confrontation. Depends on how far I get. Don't forget to review!
