Upon their horses sat the horsemen, the vanguard to the end, the harbingers of her last judgement. War. Famine. Death. Let them come, she thought as she stood. She'd fight, as War willed. She'd hunger then, as Famine willed. And she'd die, at last, as Death willed. The fourth mount strode bereft of its rider, Conquest, but that suited her just fine. She'd die unbowed and unbound, of her own free will.
"Wait. We just came to talk." The one in black and grey raised one hand, mollifying. Hadn't Famine been the one who spoke? The divider of people, it who raised the price of bread but not of wine? Yes, she thought she remembered that, but the abstract knowledge could be wrong.
"Like hell." It didn't matter whether Skitter spoke truths or not. She spoke too much. Talk, talk, talk, it didn't matter if it was the bug-girl or her, Amy was done with it. She had had enough of words. Words had hurt Amy more than even Leviathan had ever managed to.
Humiliation Shame Heartbreak
joy
What the hell did you do!?
Congratulations!
anger
pass
"I don't want to hear it." And who said the villain in front of her could be trusted in any way? The girl who wanted to be a hero and was a villain, running with her old teammates again. What had she done to be accepted again after such a betrayal?
out of reach shouts
You can't
"Panacea..."
"Don't call me that." She growled out. Lies, lies and lies, nothing but lies she had woven over the years. Illusions in white, futile attempts at blinding herself from the evil within, at bleaching away the ugliness until she actually became what she said she was. They were lies because they hurt less than the truth, but like all lies, they were also fake. Inevitably the truth comes afore.
PASS
Skitter was quiet for a few moments. "Grue, Bitch, give us some space, yeah? Check out the surroundings."
"Trouble?"
"Not yet."
Hellhound spurred her mount away without waiting for anything else to be said, Grue following after giving Skitter a nod. And the two of them were left alone. If Amy tensed much more, she would start shaking. Then Skitter dismounted and crossed over to Amy's side, leaving the hellish dog behind the chain link fence.
What? For a moment, Amy's resolve faltered. What was Skitter doing? She couldn't hurt her with her bugs, both of them knew that. More, Amy was actually capable of turning them against her. Amy caught up with her own thoughts the next instant. She couldn't actually do that to Skitter's insects anymore, although she could just beat her physically instead. But, she noted in a quick sweep of the battleground, the bug-girl was keeping all her minions at a respectful distance. She didn't know about her second trigger then, secure in the knowledge that she could overwhelm her in a fight where Amy couldn't make skin contact.
Oh, how wrong she was.
Or was she?
she said she was a hero
planning from the start to betray her teammates
What if she knew? So many had seen her use her new powers to fight Mannequin, they could have told the Undersiders. Tattletale could have figured it out, would have figured it out. And unless they had specifically been looking for her, which wasn't any better, the volunteers would have been to ones to call for help. So Skitter could know, she could even be here precisely because of that. All the precautions she was taking could be no precautions at all but ruses, designed to get her off guard. Amy could see the buffed up dog behind the villain. One bound would be all it took for it to reach her and Amy was certain that she didn't have enough strength to beat one of Hellhound's dogs when they were that big. Not to mention that Hellhound herself and Grue, the other two Undersiders surely ready to jump in at the slightest sign of trouble.
Amy clenched her teeth. What was the correct option? What true and what was trickery? What should she do?
No. She breathed in, then out, forcing herself to relax. She wasn't afraid anymore. She didn't feel pain. If anything, she wantedthis fight. The possibility of paying back to the Undersiders even one tenth of the pain they had inflicted on her had been a pipe dream for months, a wild fantasy in which she showed them just how much it hurt. And now, regardless of consequences, she had that opportunity. She didn't even have to make herself feel bad for wanting to hurt them anymore.
She wasn't trapped with Skitter, Skitter was trapped with her.
The black-clad girl stopped close enough for a conversation but outside Amy's range. Previous range. "Is this better?" She kept her hands visible.
Amy rolled her shoulders, loosening them. She had to get her head in the game. She adjusted her grip on the blade. "Like your teammates aren't lurking around the corner. Or like the dog won't jump me. Sure, it's just fine."
Skitter ignored the dripping sarcasm and tried to placate her. "We didn't come here to pick a fight."
"What if I feel like picking a fight?" She snapped back.
Surprised or unnerved, Skitter was silent for a second before stating, calmly. "You wouldn't win."
"Maybe," Admitted Amy with a shrug. "but I'd hurt you enough before you put me down."
"We're not here to put anybody down." Skitter almost snapped. Her voice was level, controlled, but the swarm had buzzed, activity spiking. She had gotten to her. "Amy. I don't know what what happened, but please..."
"Oh, shut up." She interrupted Skitter. "There's nothing you can say that'll change my mind so why don't we just," Already coiled, all Amy had to do was unleash the power of her rebuilt body. She lunged. "get down to it!"
Same feint as with Mannequin. Nobody expected Panacea to initiate hostilities, not like this. Skitter managed to take half a step back and twist slightly out of the way, turning a full-bodied tackle into an awkward grapple. Amy's weight itself wasn't enough to send her down but the momentum was. They hit the ground, rolled, landed on a puddle, Amy half-splayed on top of Skitter, head just below the taller villain's chest armour.
The swarm around them spasmed, reaching for her before stopping and holding itself back. Oh well, better for her.
She tried to straddle the struggling villain, sitting on her hips. It was hard, Skitter having size and weight on her. But Amy had pure strength on her side, an entire body built for the fight, all dedicated muscle and flexible tendons. It was optimized for a mobile fight, not a contest of strength, light and fast to match Mannequin. But still, it equalized things. With difficulty she managed to find leverage, toes digging in the mud, one hand digging into the curve of an armour plate and pressing down on Skitter's collarbone. She reared back, ready to strike with her right, the blade still held backwards in her grip.
And then the monster dog bowled her over.
Gigantic fangs clamped down on her arm, a canine as long as a short sword sinking into the flesh of her shoulder, and she was thrown away like a ragdoll. Or more appropriately, shaken like a dog's toy. The world blurred with the movement. All Amy had time for was gripping the villain under her, fingers tightening like a steel vice around her biceps, before becoming airborne. And Skitter along with her.
They got shaken twice before the villain managed to snap out an order.
"Lucy! Stop!"
Almost comically, the dog's head stopped in its tracks. Both of them got slammed back on the ground, Amy managing to more or less keep her footing, but leaving Skitter in an awkward half-upright half-prone position. She didn't need enhanced hearing to catch the hiss that escaped the girl's lips behind the mask. Her eyes darted to where she still held Skitter, flesh deforming under her fingers. Amy didn't need skin contact to know some heavy bruising had to be forming under the black silken bodysuit. Her eyes moved up a fraction. Nor to see the way the shoulder was distended. Amy had locked her muscles on pure instinct and still gotten micro-tears; Skitter didn't have that option.
The former hero loosened her fingers, letting her fall to the ground, but caught herself before her free hand came up to her enemy's neck, looking for bare skin. She couldn't heal anymore. And it wasn't like she wanted to heal her anyway. Amy adjusted her grip for a better grasp without pulling on the muscles. She'd almost let go. She caught Skitter's eyes through the tinted lenses of her mask, the bugs usually crawling over it conspicuously absent. Had she been looking at her shoulder, where she should have been bleeding but wasn't, the wound sealed almost immediately?
Not breaking eye contact, Skitter rose, her arm still held loosely by Amy, and commanded the dog to let go with one word. "Off." The dog snarled very softly, a vocal rumble for its size, but opened the beartrap of its jaws nonetheless. The fangs left healed-over holes in the flesh that Amy didn't bother closing. It was a tunnel burrowed into her flesh, but nothing more. "Are you hurt?"
Amy blinked and raised an eyebrow at Skitter's question. It was… rather surreal. She pointed it out. "Should you really be asking me that when you're the one with a dislocated shoulder?"
"It's not…" Amy pulled the arm an inch to the left and Skitter winced. "... that. Bad." Amy raised her remaining eyebrow, conveying how much she really believed that. She knew Skitter knew how much time she spent at hospitals. The girl wasn't fooling anybody.
They stood like that; the dog, Lucy, breathing down her neck. The tense silence stretched, stuck in an impasse. Was Skitter waiting for her to do something, thinking, about to speak, any thing? Was she actually in there at all, behind the mask? Amy wasn't going to let go, their positions the only thing that kept her from being dog food.
Ten seconds slowly inched by.
"Okay, fine." Amy quit. Every second the bug girl spent eerily still raised her hackles. It was too much like Mannequin. And she couldn't stay here. Sooner or later somebody else would come by and she had no desire to lose the safety of anonymity. At least, not more than she already had. She put just the tiniest bit of pressure on the other girl's arm, a warning, before letting go. "What the fuck do you want from me?"
Skitter didn't move away, didn't retreat or step back. "We heard Mannequin was testing a candidate and came to investigate. Was it you?"
"Yeah, it was me." Amy ran her thumb over the beginning of the blade he had gifted her, almost gently. "Still doesn't tell me what you want with me."
Again, Skitter raised her hands placatingly. "Look, Jack Slash has set a few rules…"
"I know about those."
"Right. What matters is that we actually have a chance to push back the Nine out of Brockton Bay." Amy felt Skitter was being a little too optimistic in the face of what the Nine were capable of doing. Of what they were willing to do. "We just need to keep the candidates alive." She paused for an instant. "I'm not going to ask why you're not with your family, or anything. But we can help you, protect you. Regent and Bitch are also candidates so when the Nine come for them, for you, we can be ready and drive them back."
She processed that. Skitter inviting her, by proxy, into her team. To work with them... So Skitter was trying to recruit her, instead doing her harm. Like it didn't throw
monster
as fucked up as your dad
everything in Amy's face all over again. She really had no choice, didn't she? Events just conspired to bring her to the dark side. Was it fate, destiny? Had New Wave's efforts, her own desperate struggles, been nothing more than a bump on the road she was inexorably rolling down? It certainly looked like the universe was telling her so. It was just plain useless to try and be good and righteous, to redeem herself. She was what she was.
Monster
Well, screw it. Amy was going to be a fucking hero, or die trying.
If I must die
I will encounter darkness as a bride,
And hug it in my arms.
The valiant never taste of death but once.
She felt herself relax, saw the tension draining out of her muscles. That was right. Amy couldn't be hurt anymore. She had nothing to fear. All she had to do was accept it. She felt metaphorically and literally lighter than she had in months. Years even. She was alone, the Slaughterhouse Nine were hunting her, villains were putting pressure on her to join them. By all rights, she should have been terrified. Instead, she felt ready to welcome them, all of them, with open arms. There was no other way.
Amy Dallon… No. Just Amy. Amelia even. Amy was going to be a hero or die in the process. Maybe even both at the same time. That was it.
Uncomplicated.
"No." She answered Skitter. "Let's put aside the fact that I don't want Tattletale's help here, first." The bitch only complicated stuff, brought it all down. If she opened her mouth, Amy might actually doubt herself, think twice, then thrice and so on until she was trapped by herself and the world around her, not moving by her own power but pressured into things. But it didn't have to be like that, because in the end it really was uncomplicated. "You can't help me. ...And what even makes you think I want to be protected?"
The teenaged super-villain didn't visibly falter, but the background chittering and buzzing gave her away. For a long moment, things were quiet. But Skitter didn't leave. She just watched Amy, taking in her posture, the slight quirk of her lips, how the skinless muscles of her torso flexed easily with each breath. "Are you... planning on fighting them?" Amy nodded. "By yourself?" Amy allowed herself a full, ironic smile. Skitter shook her head. "You'll die. Worse than that. They won't kill you, and even if they do, they'll give your body to Bonesaw and that's a fate much worse than death. Even if you can heal yourself."
I thought you'd appreciate this more than anyone.
wet machine meat spot stitches lobotomy control system alert internal bone marrow transfusion
Amy blinked, shaking away the cotton webs of fear that remained from an entire life of being rightfully terrified of monsters like the Nine. She made a show of shrugging. "They can't hurt me." Not them and not the girl in front of her.
"What about New Wave?"
Amy's eyes snapped up to Skitter's yellow lenses.
Glad she had finally caught the healer's attention, the villain pressed on. "If they can't hurt you directly, they'll go after your family. And even if you do die, you're playing right into their hands and Brockton Bay is one step closer to being... penalized by the Nine." She paused, letting that sink in. "But we can drive them back. We can win against them, with you. You're probably the only person who can affect Crawler, maybe even the Siberian. Look, we need you. Bonesaw has some sort of plague ready to unleash if we don't follow their rules, but they'll probably use it if they feel like they're losing anyway, and we need you if we star-"
Amy snickered. Then she let it grow into a full-blown laugh, hollow and echoing. The mutated dog rumbled but she ignored it. Skitter obviously didn't see the humour in the situation and she was sure that if she could see her face, the bug girl would be slack-jawed. She decided to enlighten her. "You know…" She said. "You almost had me there. Almost made me think it was worth it at least trying something with you. But you want Panacea. Everybody wants Panacea! The miracle healer, the universal cure, the solution to all the fucking problems!" She was shouting at the end, her arms thrown wide open, dramatically. "Guess what? I. Can't."
Skitter almost seemed to struggle with words. "Why?"
Amy brought a hand up to tap at the hole that had been made on her shoulder not five minutes before. "My powers changed, that's why. My Manton limit… inverted. I could heal anybody but myself, before. Can't heal anybody but myself, now. So you see…" She lowered her voice and let her arms fall to her sides. "I'm not Panacea anymore. I can't do what you want me to, either way."
"How did it happen?" Skitter was quick to respond, re-orienting herself almost frighteningly fast.
"Second trigger event. Doesn't really matter." What mattered were the consequences. Amy no longer had any inherent value as a healer. Her options had been drastically reduced from an instant to the other. Ot maybe not. Maybe they had simply shifted from healing to killing. Shitty options, all in all.
A buzzing stopped the conversation in its run-down tracks. It wasn't the endless buzz that Skitter's flies and other airborne insects produced. It wasn't almost living, breathing, but artificial instead. Any teenager with a life would recognize it. A cellphone vibrating, hitting something while moving and being muffled. Amy drew her brows together in confusion; hadn't all electronics been killed by Shatterbird?
Skitter reached behind herself and after some hurried shuffling around, brought into view a blocky-looking phone. "Yes." The ambient noise that distorted every word she said dropped off to a minimum when she answered.
Amy strained her ears.
With the distance between them, she couldn't hear what was being said, couldn't make out words, but she could listen. The cadence, the tone… They said more sometimes. The sound came in short bursts, cut off before they could achieve dull expression. Fast words, halting and desperate, choked out. Repeated, stuttered. The volume of the one-sided conversation dropped almost to inexistence. Skitter tensed even more. Around them the insects swirled faster and faster, yet always fearfully silent. There had to be ways for Amy to improve her audition without compromising her current level of hearing. The eardrum wasn't an option. Maybe the ossicles could be tweaked. Hair cells were always a good starting point…
The next sound to be transmitted by the phone's speakers was unmistakably a loud clatter. It was also the last sound that it made.
Two seconds passed.
Skitter nearly crushed the hang up button. When she spoke her own voice was calm but the swarm betrayed her emotions. It raged in brutally efficient ways, rearranging itself and growing in size. "Mannequin is attacking my territory." Unsaid went the question: are you with us or not?
Amy smiled without humour. "Let me get my things."