Armory 4.2
Taylor decided to tidy up a bit, since Amy was coming over. It was basic manners.
That mainly consisted of sweeping up any remaining tile shards and wiping up the occasional blood splatter, but it was the principle of the thing.
When that was finished, she moved back to the forge and eyed her unfinished silver sword critically.
It still needed a cross guard, grip, and pommel. Plus, it wasn't fully sharpened.
She moved to the belt grinder and sparks lit up the lab.
…
Amy frowned at the closed door to her sister's bedroom and tried to work up the motivation to make herself knock.
She had already been standing here for an awkward amount of time.
Why the fuck did I think this was a good idea?
Oh right, she knew why. Because climbing back through her window with a villainous blood Tinker in tow and finding Carol standing in her room was easily in the top five worst things that could possibly happen, period.
The last time Taylor showed up at her window, Amy at least had the excuse that she had arrived uninvited.
It definitely had nothing to do with Vicky thinking that she and 'Anne' were dating. Why would she even think about that?
Amy knocked on the door.
"Sup, Ames?"
Victoria floated in the doorway, as always. Amy idly wondered if she ever touched the ground without being reminded.
Their poor, poor drywall.
"I have a… request, I guess. Can I…" she glanced into Victoria's room.
"Sure! Yeah, what do you need?" Victoria glided backwards and closed the door behind them.
Her room was always annoyingly clean. Amy wouldn't even recognize her own room without the piles of clothes and random shit everywhere.
It was absurd that she was about to ask Victoria this favor. It had literally always been the opposite.
The amount of time she spent sitting in random coffee shops while her sister was out messing around with that sanctimonious shitstain-
"So, you know how you owe me, for, like, a whole shit-ton of stuff," Amy started slowly.
"Uh huh…" Victoria said, raising an eyebrow.
"Well, I'm collecting. Just a bit. You still owe me," Amy said pointedly.
"Sure," Victoria floated over to her bed, still eyeing her curiously.
"What are you doing tomorrow night?" Amy asked.
Oh God, why the fuck am I doing this to myself…
"I dunno. Probably go somewhere with Dean. It's Friday night. Why?" Vicky's eyes narrowed suspiciously.
"I'm hoping you could… um… I want to meet up with Anne, and I don't want Carol or anyone else to know," Amy finally said.
Victoria's smile grew both excited and smug, which was mildly infuriating. At least this time, her sister's vicarious meddling was helping Amy accomplish her goals.
Vicky may think those goals involved secret gay shit, but it was actually experimental blood tinkering in an abandoned hospital.
Although, technically, Amy was involved, and it was secret, so that kind of made it secret gay shit by definition. She wondered if Taylor-
Shut up.
"Oh my God, I thought you would never ask. Yes, yes, I will absolutely, 100% cover for you while you go 'meet up' with Anne," Victoria said, probably louder than was advisable given the subject.
Also, Amy didn't need to hear the quotation marks, because Vicky made an obvious gesture with her fingers to make sure it was clear just what she thought of their 'meet up'.
Amy managed to avoid grinding her teeth, since Vicky was agreeing to this stupid plan, but it was a close thing.
"Don't get a big head over it," Amy grumbled.
"I just… this is so exciting. Going on an actual… um… totally not-date! Ah! They grow up so fast. What are you going to wear?" Victoria buzzed around the room like an overexcited hummingbird.
Hunter will probably bring me a stupid hat and overly edgy cloak or something.
"I was thinking something along the lines of 'clothes'," Amy deadpanned.
"No. No, you are not allowed to take this away from me. We are finding at least one cute outfit for you," Victoria said sternly.
Amy groaned but followed Vicky out of the room and into her own bedroom to raid her meager closet anyway.
I should have just risked my neck with Carol.
…
The unwanted surveillance issue irritated Taylor. Who was trying to monitor her father?
And what was the best path to resolve it? How could she get the information that she needed without giving up the advantage?
Maybe she could bug their car? Victor knew a decent amount about basic wiring and electronics. It had certainly helped her wire up the HVAC system and lab equipment.
But that introduced its own problems. Bugs could be found and tracked. She would need to place them without being seen, and she wouldn't know if the information was accurate. If they noticed her or the bug, then they could feed her false information and she would never know.
Victor was well versed in espionage and counter-espionage tactics. It was one of the reasons that she had purposely bought the most basic flip phone available, despite Amy's amusement. The more simple the technology, the less likely that a more advanced Tinker could out-maneuver her.
Her speciality lay in the arcane, in blood and steel and pain. She couldn't rely on mundane electronics.
Taylor tapped her finger against the table in frustration.
Her gaze fell on Sophia's remaining bones and her power buzzed behind her brain.
A new pattern, a new idea. Something that hadn't been available to her before consuming the essence of her tormentor. A way to get what she needed, without the risk of being given bad information.
Also, a different kind of problematic, from a moral standpoint. How deep was she willing to go?
But she needed to know who was after her father. Needed to find out who had discovered a gap in their armor of secrets.
It was worth it.
She would need a few of them. She didn't know how many hostiles would be in the car.
Taylor grabbed two tibias, a humerus, a few vertebrae and a bottle of spinal fluid, and got to work.
…
The sun was just starting to set when Taylor carefully picked her way through the graveyard of rusted cars in front of her factory.
She had gone to Kurt and Lacey's early today, once again dodging the annoying surveillance team. Her solution wasn't quite ready yet. Maybe tomorrow.
She was heading out to meet Amy and Victoria on the Boardwalk. Taylor wore her civilian clothes, just a thick burgundy sweater and black slacks. Her hat, coat, and scarf were tucked in a backpack along with a bundle of clothes intended for Amy.
All of which meant that it was an extremely inconvenient time for three massive, hulking beasts to slink out from between the buildings and block the street in front of her.
Well… Shit.
The monsters were enormous and brutish, each easily the size of an SUV. Thick plates of bone and wicked spikes lined their bodies, and long prehensile tails whipped back and forth behind them.
A Cape in a heavy jacket and a cheap plastic dog mask rode the largest of the creatures with confident ease.
Taylor sighed and straightened from behind the crumbling cars, walking until she stood tall in the middle of the road. The stranger obviously knew she was here, so there wasn't really a point in hiding. Part of her wanted to make a break for her workshop and get her sword, but she resisted the temptation. She didn't want these beasts destroying her lab if she could help it, even though she hated being unarmed.
The street was silent except for the evening wind.
"Who're you?" The Cape called, her voice rough and standoffish.
Taylor kept her gaze level, never taking her eyes off any of the beasts. She might need to quickstep at a moment's notice.
"Hunter. You?" She called back. Hopefully no one else was within earshot. It didn't seem like it.
"Bitch."
Taylor couldn't tell if that was the Cape's name or if she was insulting her. It didn't really matter.
"How did you find me?" Taylor asked. She would need to be more careful in the future.
"Dogs," Bitch grunted.
Oh. Yeah, that would do it.
Also, those things were dogs?
"Why're you here?" Bitch asked, glaring down at her from behind the mask.
"I live here," Taylor said honestly. "You?"
"Dog shelter," Bitch jerked her chin to the west.
Huh.
They stared at each other in silence for a moment.
"You the one who fucked up those Empire assholes last week?" Bitch said.
"Yes."
"You want to fight me?" Bitch asked. It really did sound like she was asking.
"No. Do you want to die?" Taylor said coldly.
Bitch didn't answer.
"You gonna fuck with my dogs?" She said eventually.
"No. Are your dogs going to fuck with my workshop?" Taylor demanded in return.
"No."
The wind whistled between the buildings. Stray trash tumbled down the broken sidewalk.
"Animals, or people?" Bitch said suddenly.
"What?"
"You hunt animals, or people?" She clarified gruffly.
Taylor raised her eyebrows.
"People."
"I got some Empire fucks that need killing," Bitch said.
Taylor smiled savagely. Bitch and the demon dogs growled menacingly at her in response, but she didn't care.
"When and where?" Taylor asked.
…
Taylor left the knapsack in an empty parking garage a couple blocks from the boardwalk. No reason to give Victoria a reason to ask questions.
She seemed like the type who would definitely ask questions.
Running her fingers through her hair to work out the worst of the knots from the run over, Taylor slipped between two buildings and made her way to the meeting spot.
They had agreed to meet at one of Victoria's favorite boutiques. Apparently, the manager let Victoria and Amy come and go through the back door to avoid any especially avid fans. One of the many problems with being a public hero, according to Amy.
Since she wasn't a public hero, Taylor just wandered in through the front door.
She caught sight of the sisters near the back of the store and picked her way over. This definitely wasn't the type of store she would have ever gone to, even before she died. It was a strange experience, wandering through the shop in civilian clothes after so many late-night 'shopping trips' in her costume.
It was also strange seeing Amy out of her Panacea robes.
Her… friend? Yes, she was reasonably confident that they were actually friends now, was wearing a light gray jacket over a black sweater and jeans. It was a totally normal outfit that wouldn't have stood out under any other circumstances, except that Taylor had only ever seen her in hooded robes or pajamas.
And she'd been pretty delirious from sleep deprivation and blood loss during the whole pajamas incident.
Taylor couldn't help but smile as she approached. There was something weirdly satisfying about meeting friends somewhere other than a rooftop. She hadn't really planned on ever doing that again, after she died. Not that she got a chance to do anything like this before, either.
Fucking Emma.
"Hey, Amy," Taylor said once she made it past the last of the racks.
"Hey, Anne," Amy said. It was a good thing Amy remembered, because Taylor had momentarily forgotten about her fake name.
Amy had that forgetting-to-frown smile, again. Her face was even more perfect when it wasn't shaded by her heavy hood, freckles and-
"Holy shit, what the fuck happened to your face?"
Oh right, Victoria was also here.
And Taylor had definitely forgotten about her Hunter's Mark. And the scar from Sophia's first crossbow shot.
Whoops.
From the expression on Amy's face, she had forgotten about them as well. Since she was the one who actually had to look at the scars, Taylor didn't feel all that bad. It's not like she had a mirror.
Maybe she should steal one next time.
"I ritually branded myself. Like a tattoo, but cooler," Taylor said casually. "And this one was an archery accident."
It wasn't like she could think of any better reasons.
Amy pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed.
Victoria looked like her face couldn't decide what expression to go with. It was kind of funny.
"That's… um… well, maybe Amy could…" Victoria stammered.
"Hey! Don't go offering my services to every idiot who fucks up their own face," Amy snapped.
"I just-"
"It would kind of defeat the purpose anyway," Taylor shrugged. "I'd hate to have to go through the pain again to put it back."
Victoria gaped like a goldfish for another long moment before closing her mouth and glancing sideways at her sister.
"Is this what you meant about her enabling your unhealthy coping mechanisms?" She asked Amy seriously.
Taylor snorted. That was ironic.
"No." Amy said, straight-faced.
The silence was definitely awkward. Taylor was enjoying it immensely.
It looked like Amy was too, so that made it even better.
"Right! So, um, yeah, I'm gonna go…" Victoria said uncertainly.
"Thank you for helping us out with this, I really appreciate it!" Taylor smiled at her, both because she was actually appreciative and because she apparently enjoyed throwing people off their rhythm.
"See you at eleven, Vicky," Amy said.
"Okay, just text me if you need any-"
"Bye, Vicky" Amy cut her off.
Victoria glared at her sister and shot Taylor an unsure look before making her way out of the store.
"So…" Amy said once her sister was definitely out of earshot. "Why'd you actually carve up your face, anyway?"
Taylor smirked at her.
"It's a long story," she said.
"I hate you sometimes, you know that?" Amy turned and started walking towards the staff exit, uncaring if Taylor was following.
"I don't think you do, actually," Taylor fell into step beside her.
"Lies. You are an especially unique blend of irritating," Amy said, but she glanced over and the half-smile was back, so Taylor didn't mind.
They made it out the back and walked down the alley. Taylor was just starting to head towards the parking garage when her enhanced perception caught a flicker of movement that briefly blocked a few stars near the horizon.
"One slight problem with this plan is that your sister is definitely following us," Taylor said casually.
"What? She promised not to interfere… oh who am I kidding, this is Vicky, I should have expected this from the start," Amy scowled and stopped, turning to glare up at the sky.
She pulled out her phone and hit the top contact.
"Vicky. Uh huh… Yeah, don't bullshit me. I can see you… I can to. We had a deal… Well, I don't care. I'm perfectly safe… Go hook up with Dean in the back of his Audi or whatever… Sure you don't… Uh huh… Yeah, love you too. Bye."
Amy hung up the phone and groaned.
"Okay, keep an eye on the sky, but I think she's actually going to leave us alone now.
It's not paranoia if they're actually out to get you.
Taylor didn't quite get how Amy and Victoria's relationship functioned, but it wasn't her problem.
She scanned the sky one more time and didn't see any sign of fliers, so she led the way over to the parking garage where she stashed the extra clothes.
"Okay, so, your outfit is nice, but we need to make sure that no one accidentally recognizes you," Taylor said.
"You brought me an overdramatic coat, didn't you?" Amy sighed.
"Even better. I brought you an overdramatic cloak." Taylor grinned at her expression.
"Remember what I said about hating you?"
"I also brought you this hat!" Taylor pulled out a classic black top hat.
Amy looked physically repulsed. It was fantastic.
"Absolutely fucking not, what the fuck is wrong with-"
Taylor couldn't keep her expression straight any longer and lost it, her laughter echoing in the empty parking garage.
"You're fucking with me, aren't you," Amy deadpanned after a moment.
"Yeah, sorry, I saw it when I was buying my coat and I just couldn't help it," Taylor tossed the hat off the edge of the parking garage.
"That's it, I'm going home-"
"No, you're stuck with me until eleven," Taylor headed her off at the pass. "Sorry, really. I thought it was funny."
Amy just glared at her for a moment before rolling her eyes.
"I was promised a tour of a super creepy mad Tinker lab, but you owe me for putting up with this insanity," Amy said.
"Obviously," Taylor agreed seriously, handing over the cloak.
She hadn't been kidding about that bit.
"The cloak has a hood, don't worry," Taylor said.
Amy looked pretty good in a mysterious black cloak.
"I feel ridiculous. Is this what you feel like all the time?" Amy swished the cloak back and forth around her.
"Probably," Taylor shrugged. "If by ridiculous, you mean ready to confidently spread terror amongst the populace-"
"Oh my God, can we just go?" Amy whined, even though the smile was back again.
"Yes, although… it might take a while at your pace…" Taylor said, pulling on her coat over her sweater before grabbing her hat and scarf out of the bag.
"I live with Glory Girl, don't worry. I'm used to being the slow, squishy human," Amy said.
"Sure, sure," Taylor said. "So… um… piggy-back or princess carry?"
Amy looked conflicted for a moment.
"Piggy-back, please."
Once her precious cargo was secured, Taylor leapt from the edge of the parking garage and sprinted off through the night.
…
"You really weren't kidding," Amy said, their footsteps echoing in the empty hallways.
"No? It would be weird to lie about where I live and then invite you here anyway," Taylor glanced over at her.
"Well, yeah, but when someone says 'I live in an abandoned hospital', there's at least some part of any rational person that would think 'they're probably full of shit'," Amy said. Her eyes traced the broken and ruined exam rooms warily as they passed.
Amy suppressed an involuntary shiver.
There was something decidedly off about this place. Maybe it was just because she spent so much of her time in an actual hospital, seeing one desolated like this was… eerie.
Taylor seemed entirely at ease. Because of course she did. This was her home, her workshop.
Amy was both excited and apprehensive in equal measure. Would seeing Hunter in her element be the straw that broke the camel's back and pushed Amy back into her box of stagnation and endless torment?
No, no, she could do this. Even if Taylor…
Taylor opened the double doors at the end of the hall.
The first thing that Amy noticed were the candles.
There was something strangely mesmerizing about hundreds of little flames dancing in the dim haze. Taylor hadn't mentioned using candles. Amy knew that she had to steal a generator, but she hadn't thought…
Whatever she had pictured when she imagined Taylor's workshop, it wasn't this.
The complex maze of glass tubing and flasks reflected and multiplied the candlelight, crystal spires and interconnected webs branching over one of the wide lab tables.
It was weirdly… warm. And beautiful.
Even with the crimson liquid slowly working its way through a number of the cylinders. Maybe because of it.
Her eyes jumped to the forge, a rough box of paving slabs hooked up to a huge propane tank and surrounded by tools and metal. Even that fit here, somehow.
And, of course, the dead bodies.
Amy had expected it, but it still made her stomach clench. Here was all the concrete evidence she could ever ask for that her new friend was a murderer.
The corpses hung upside down, stripped to the waist, over large plastic tubs. Tubes ran over the edges into smaller receptacles to gather and consolidate the dripping blood.
Amy tried to look away. She didn't want to see the sunken, empty eyes…
Oh God, that one's eye socket is actually empty.
Did Taylor cut out his eye?
Amy ripped her gaze away from the spectacle and found the lab table covered in blankets and pillows.
Oh.
She knew that Taylor lived here, objectively. But there was just something… very, very broken, about imagining Taylor sleeping here. Waking up here, on a lab table, instead of in a normal bedroom in a house with a kitchen and a bathroom, with people downstairs and…
Something in Amy's chest twisted. She couldn't decide if it was unpleasant or not.
Her eyes continued their circuit of the room, moving to the weapons hanging on the wall above the forge.
Amy glanced over at Taylor. The blood Tinker was just watching her, her expression unreadable even though she had pulled down her scarf.
"Is that a sword?" Amy asked incredulously.
Taylor's serious expression cracked and she chuckled.
"Yes, yes, I know. It's ridiculous," Taylor grinned.
"No, your cane is ridiculous. Your hat is ridiculous. Swords are cool," Amy said seriously. "You made that?"
Taylor snorted, but her smile widened and she nodded.
Good.
"So, this is the dastardly blood Tinker's lair?" Amy said, wandering between the lab tables and eying the complicated glass apparatuses slowly dripping ruby stars in a constant rhythm.
"The one and only," Taylor answered.
Amy reached out to catch a drop of concentrated ichor on her finger, then thought better of it at the last moment.
"I like the candles," she said softly.
"Me, too," Taylor replied.
It was quiet for a while longer, as she took in the ethereal space.
The feeling of separation was even stronger here, like they had stepped into another world. Like the workshop was real, and everything outside was a dream.
Or maybe this was the dream, floating far away from the cold beyond the hospital doors.
Taylor wandered over to one of the many unoccupied tables and took off her hat and coat, running long thin fingers through her midnight curls.
Amy's eyes caught on her willowy figure for a moment before flicking away to examine the rest of the lab.
One of the workbenches was up against a wall lined with shelves holding jars of various sizes and shapes. Even in the hazy liquid, Amy could see the remains of organs extracted and preserved for whatever Taylor's tinkering required.
Bottles of various bodily fluids. Organized stacks of dried bones.
It was the stuff of nightmares.
But it also wasn't. For some reason Amy couldn't quite place, this dream didn't feel like a nightmare.
"What's first on the agenda, then," Amy asked, breaking the silence and turning back to the blood Tinker.
Taylor leaned casually against the counter, eyeing her with a strange expression.
"I'm not sure. I kind of expected you to run away screaming," Taylor said. She grinned, but there were cracks underneath.
"I've seen worse in the ER," Amy waved her hand dismissively. "And those bodies were still screaming."
"Whatever you say," Taylor shook her head. "Well, okay, I wanted to talk to you about how your power works, if that's alright."
Amy was instantly on her guard. She had implied to Taylor that she could do more than heal, but she hadn't necessarily stated it outright, aside from the whole 'melting her organs' thing. At the very least, Taylor knew that she could perceive biology and cause harm just as easily as she could heal.
"Are you limited to just regenerating and damaging tissue, or can you change it? It occurred to me that both treating and inflicting cancer isn't quite as simple as just healing," Taylor said.
Fuck.
Did she want to tell Taylor the truth?
Taylor, the unrepentant murderer who extracted and tinkered with blood and organs and bones?
Amy didn't even know what her rules were, anymore. They had gotten twisted and bent and broken somewhere along the way.
What did it even matter?
"I can do anything," she whispered into the quiet workshop.
"Oh," Taylor said.
Oh, indeed.
"Well, that's neat. And quite helpful. So I was thinking-" Taylor started again.
"Wait, I don't think you get it," Amy cut her off. Taylor needed to know what she was getting herself into. "I have complete control over any living organism I come into contact with. I can manipulate it anyway I want. I wasn't kidding when I threatened to melt your organs. I can turn you into goop or a monstrosity with a touch."
"I know," Taylor said, looking at her strangely. "I got it. Biokinesis and comprehensive manipulation. Very fun stuff. Now-"
"No, I really don't think you 'got it', Taylor!" Amy snapped, trying to find the right words. How could she make her understand?
"I could create a plague that would consume all life on Earth before eating itself and leaving the planet a barren, lifeless chunk of metal floating through space. I could invent new, self-replicating organisms that would decimate the biosphere just by existing. I could twist and change and mutilate people until they're some kind of new, thinking, sentient creature like nothing we've ever even imagined before. And I could do it all in a million different ways and still find a million more afterwards!" Amy was shouting by the end, her voice echoing through the empty hospital.
Taylor stared at her for a long five seconds and then shrugged.
"I'd prefer if you didn't do the first one, since, you know, I live here," Taylor said casually.
Amy screamed unintelligibly and tried to resist the urge to smash Taylor's delicate glass equipment.
She didn't succeed, and swung her arms forward to sweep the shining, candlelit lattice off the table, as if smashing it would help drive away the knives.
Thin fingers with bones of iron caught her wrists before they could make contact with the glass.
Taylor's biology exploded in her mind's eye involuntarily, unbidden as always.
The scars… her forehead, her cheek, the right side of her chest, her left shoulder, her hands…
And even deeper… There was something fundamentally wrong with her blood. Something that hadn't been half as pronounced when Amy had taken out those crossbow bolts last week.
"I'd also prefer if you didn't break my equipment, please," Taylor said quietly, her lips inches above Amy's ear. Midnight hair fell in waves around her face as Taylor loomed over her, gently lowering her manacled hands to her sides before letting go.
And just like that, the incandescent luminescence in her biosenses faded. Amy was left frozen and breathing heavily as the churning hurricane thundered in her chest.
She knew she should probably apologize.
She didn't.
Taylor was still far too close. It felt like heat was radiating off her body in waves, crashing into Amy and fueling the unpredictable storm.
Amy turned away and gripped the edge of the nearest lab table behind her hard enough to turn her knuckles white. One without spindly glass instruments.
It was silent, except for the endless drip drip drip.
"Do you want to talk about it?" Taylor asked eventually.
"No," Amy said. She sounded petulant, even to herself.
So she sighed heavily and decided to talk about it anyway.
"I have to stick to just healing," Amy said, turning back around to face Taylor, although several feet away now. She leaned back against the tabletop. "If I do anything else… I don't know what will happen. How do I keep from fucking everything up, when one wrong move could set off the chain reaction that kills everything?"
Taylor nodded slowly, black eyes burning into her own.
"But healing isn't enough. I can feel it, this urge, this poison, getting stronger every day. I want to hurt them, my patients. Twist them and change them, something, anything, other than just restoring them over and over. But I can't," Amy clenched her fists.
"That's why you're here," Taylor said, understanding dawning on her face.
"I need something more, and I didn't know how to get it until you came along. Something about the concoctions you create dampens the itch, even if it doesn't get rid of it completely," Amy said.
Something in Taylor's expression fell, even though she was clearly trying to hide it.
"I also enjoy our little chats, as well," Amy let her lips curve up at the corner. She didn't want Taylor to think that she was just using her for her blood.
That helped. Taylor's eyes lightened and the atmosphere became less tense.
"I guess… we should probably do some tinkering, then?" Taylor said, holding up her hands helplessly after Amy's tirade.
Oh, right. That's what Taylor had been trying to suggest before Amy started yelling and trying to break stuff.
"Yeah," she smiled back sheepishly. "Yeah, I guess we should."
…
The time passed more quickly than Amy could imagine, once they got started.
Taylor had several different types of blood cocktails that she was testing. Solutions that should heal more slowly than her standard blood vials, but leave fewer scars. Stimulants that would enhance and sharpen the mind, at the risk of damaging the body. Sedatives that had the potential to slow down, calm, or knock out even the toughest Brutes.
Amy felt like her presence wasn't strictly necessary, though. All of Taylor's concoctions had that underlying unnatural structure, an ever-changing cellular framework that was somehow alive and not at the same time.
Still, just watching and touching the various liquids soothed the restless ache in the back of her mind. It didn't matter that she couldn't truly enhance or change any of Taylor's inventions.
The only thing she could actually change was Taylor herself, and Amy had steadfastly refused to do so.
"Are you sure? I wouldn't turn down some improvements," Taylor grinned across the table from her. "Maybe just some claws or something?"
She could never be allowed to find out how tempting that was.
"Absolutely not. The goal is to avoid turning you into a nightmare monster," Amy said.
It was also unfortunate that Amy couldn't work on dead tissue. The line between living and dead was a bit blurry, since all multicellular organisms were really millions of different organisms mashed together until there wasn't really a difference. Humans were covered in bacteria inside and out, and when she got right down to it, each cell wasn't so functionally different from a hyper-specialized, single cell organism that just couldn't survive outside of its designated environment.
However, the bodies in Taylor's lab were very dead.
Taylor told her that she would let her know when she got fresh ones.
When, not if.
Amy wasn't quite sure what to do about that, so she decided not to think about it.
Ten-thirty arrived all too soon, and it was time to leave their little slice of dreamland.
I wish I could stay.
Amy was caught off guard by the thought. The workshop had its type of charm, but she really did want to sleep in her bed rather than on a lab table.
Taylor smiled at her as she put her hat back on, black eyes glittering in the candlelight. Amy suddenly realized that it wasn't really that she wanted to stay in the workshop, but more that she just wanted to stay with Taylor. Something in Amy's stomach twisted pleasantly and her chest tightened.
Oh no.
Not again.
…