Death 1.5

I staggered and stumbled towards the pair, but they didn't notice me until I fell on my broken arm and yelped. Glory Girl's head whipped around, and she moved almost instinctively between myself and Panacea who looked at me with a mixture of anger, resignation and something else. She huffed, and made to move past Glory Girl.

"Amy" She hissed. "We don't know who she is, what are you doing?" Amy scowled and said "She's injured Vicky. I'll be fine." She examined me and sighed. "Do I have your permission to heal you?" She asked, approaching me at a brisk pace. I tried to say something, but all that came was a painful cough, which became an agonizing fit, which left me wheezing on the ground. Still, I looked for the elusive hint of danger. Where was the threat to Panacea's health?

It occurred to me that I'd do better with healing, so I nodded weakly. She reached out and touched my skin. There was a sense of prickling, and twisting. "What. The. ACTUAL. Fuck." Amy said flatly after a while. I glanced up at her, and saw her gazing off into the distance. Then her gaze turned to me, oddly predatory. I resisted the urge to gulp. She couldn't hold me after all. Nothing could if I didn't want it. Still, she was almost painfully clear to my sight, and there was still no danger.

I got up, looming over Amy, who still had her hand on my wrist, and started frantically looking around. There was nobody. "You're coming with me" Amy declared suddenly. "I... What?" I was confused. So was Glory Girl who said "Amy! You can't just bring her home!" For some reason that made Amy blush, and she started arguing with Glory Girl again but I was too busy looking around for any sign of danger.

Try as I might, I couldn't spot it. Then a clear path sprang up to a nearby window that a child was looking out of, and I was moving. I had only taken a dozen steps when Glory Girl came after me, yelling... something? It didn't matter, I had a path to follow that wasn't so confusing. I jumped and began scaling the wall. The child backed away from the window, and I saw a stereotypical boy's room before I smashed through the window. The door opened a moment later to reveal a behemoth of a man, reeking of alcohol. He stared at me stupidly and silence fell before the remainder of the window was demolished by Glory Girl's entrance.

The tension in the room rose massively as I examined the man. The young boy was threatened. The man was drunk, and seemingly violent. There was a path leading past him somewhere else and I began edging around him. Glory Girl was taking in the scene still when my movement caused the man to twitch. He howled and lunged for the boy and -

TERROR.

I screamed then, tears springing to my eyes. The child was screaming, the man was screaming. Glory Girl was frozen, terror pouring off her. I followed the path to find the other scream. I quickly found the woman and dragged her out of the house, then ran back inside and upstairs. I had mere moments to breath between screams, when I saw that the man was clear in my vision now. The boy had faded back into a blurry mess, and Glory Girl had stayed that way, but the man... Wasn't getting a break to breathe. Glory Girl was looking at him furiously and drifting ever closer. How she could ignore the racket I didn't know but...

I punched her. I don't know which one of us was more surprised, but the all-consuming terror faded almost instantly. I didn't think she had even felt it, but the man collapsed, smelling even worse than before.

We waited outside for the emergency services to come. I saw paths spring up and vanish, but I forced myself to wait. The run-in with Glory Girl had helped clear my mind a bit, and Panacea was still perfectly clear to my eyes. If she was in danger, saving her would allow the saving of so, so many more.

Glory Girl was looking confused and angry, and a gamut of other things, but not guilty. Panacea just looked tired. Velocity arrived first, and had a brief talk with them before coming over to me. He looked somewhat sad. "Ms. Hebert." He sighed and took a deep breath. "I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to come with me. You are under arrest on suspicion of murder, assault with a parahuman power, physical assault, breaking and entering, resisting arrest, and a host of other minor charges. Do you understand?"

I looked at him silently, and then pointed down one of the paths. "Someone's in danger down that way." I pointed in another direction. "Someone is in danger in that direction." I was silent for a while and then said. "I understand that you want to arrest me. That that is what you are told to do. There are... sixty people in range that I could go to and help. Panacea is the closest and is in danger from a source I cannot identify."

I started down a path, not moving particularly quickly. "So. Why should I submit to arrest, when there are all these people that need help?" Velocity frowned, walking next to me. "Do they need your help though? There are others, and you have committed crimes in the process of helping everyone from gangbangers to children to dragging a suicidal man out of the sea."

I was silent. I couldn't help but feel I was missing something in what he was saying. Ultimately, it did not matter. "This... saving... is all I have?" I asked. I wasn't sure, there was something, some sense that I had forgotten something. Velocity seemed confused. "What about your father?" He asked gently, and I stopped dead.

"My... father... Dad..." Tears welled up again, stinging my eyes but doing nothing to reduce the clarity of those newly accursed paths. I had lost myself in them after seeing a man get shot. After returning, somehow, to the Locker. After being tazed by one of the people who worked for the heroes. "Can I see him? Will he see me?" Velocity paused. "If you come along with me, you'll be able to see him fairly soon... He's in protective custody right now." He seemed uncertain how to proceed, and was falling back on his orders.

He gestured for me to come and I, turning away from forty people whom I could have avenged or saved, followed him. It broke my hearts.