#stone was fun to do though did you spot metal sonic

[robiinurheart33]

WIP - brownie points to those who can tell which movie poster this is from

[chaosworthyarchive]

                                                             8.26.3227                                                                                                                                Location ¦ Starlight

                                                       ---------------------

     How much time had passed, even Sonic didn't know. Turns out it really was easy to lose track of time, not only in the throes of fun but in a place that had no clock, or windows for that matter. He had no idea what time it was when last call was announced, nor when the music started to die down and people filed out of the building in droves. All he knew was that it was late and he, like the rest of his team it seemed, was exhausted. In good spirits, but drained. 

     Which made the next notable event of the night a tad troublesome. 

     Stepping out into the dark streets of the city, the first thing the hero noticed was the quiet. Being some of the last to leave, The Freedom Fighters were met with nearly empty streets, minus a few groups chatting along the sidewalk. Perhaps it was for the best. It made it easier to spot the small group who had been on their tails all evening as they walked along the deserted street, Sonic and Johnny exchanging a glance before ducking into an alleyway, goading the rest of the team along. It didn't take long for questions to come, but one look from the hedgehog seemed to be enough for the others to realize something was up. 

     And, sure enough, once they had gotten mostly down the dead-end alley, the hero turned to face the four almost silhouetted figures who had followed them inside. And they were...an odd bunch, to say the least. A female wolverine with long orange hair covering half of her face and donning a masquerade style mask, a grey bat with half their face obscured by another style of mask, a skink with a black full bodysuit and...well, Sonic couldn't place the last one but he didn't need to in order to know that the last member had them all beat when it came to height and sheer size. They were colossal. 

     Moreover none of them looked familiar, not in the slightest, and yet there was a heavy feeling in the hero's stomach. One he couldn't place but spoke of ill tidings as the two groups stood there for a few moments, staring at one another. By this point the rest of The Freedom Fighters seemed alert, cautious. Tense. 

     It was Sonic who broke the silence, eyes shifting between the four strangers, unsure whose idea he had to blame for this meeting but clearly unimpressed. “I don’t suppose you want t' do this the easy way, do you? It would save us all a lot of trouble.”

     It had been a test, an attempt to see what the foursome wanted and the hero did not like the way they all seemed to sneer in perfect unison. It was the female who replied, her boots clicking on the pavement as she stepped forward, ruby eyes boring into the hedgehog. There was confidence in her stance, a self-assuredness that was as telling as it was troublesome. 

     “Your wish is my command, handsome.” The last word was sickeningly sweet (and Sonic was pretty sure he heard the faintest growl from Mina at his side) and came with a narrowing of her one visible eye. Her entire demeanor spoke of trouble. “I’d say it’s an honor to meet you all, but I wasn’t raised to be a liar.”

     “Who are you?” Johnny was far less polite with the matter, and no one blamed him for it. 

     It was the bat who scoffed, wings twitching almost anxiously behind them. “We're the Fundamental Four, and unless you give us what we want we’re going to be the worst people you’ve ever met.”

     The Freedom Fighters exchanged looks, each as clueless as the next. None of them had heard of the foursome, much less what they wanted, and Amy was the next to respond in less than friendly tones. “At the risk of sounding cliche, what do you want?”

     The female, again, smiled, her tone deep and with purpose. “The Chaos Emeralds.”

     This time, Sonic was certain he heard his partner growl and it was a frightening sound indeed. “How...?”

     There was a shift in the air as it grew heavy with strain, one side agitated and the other giving off a boldness that seemed far too certain. Sonic could see his team bracing, ready for what had to be an inevitable confrontation. Johnny was already subtly reaching for his pocket, Amy had tensed with Tekno right beside her. Mina had shifted her stance ever so slightly and Porker...had actually taken a step back towards the rabbit. Along with everything else, the pig had never been a fighter either.

     The skink scoffing only made those actions stick out tenfold to the hero, and emerald eyes would meet beady black ones with a dangerous spark. “It doesn’t matter. Give them to us, or else.”

    “Fat chance. You don’t know who you’re messin’ with, do you?” Johnny’s words were punctuated by an all too familiar metal rod making a very public appearance, one click of a button bringing the rod to its full length and already sparks danced along its ends. The first die was cast, and the foursome looked pleased.

     “Oh, we have a pretty good idea,” the female seemed unimpressed, but eager. Her eyes were dead set on the blue hedgehog and him alone as her teammates stirred behind her with hostile intentions. “Too bad it won’t help you.”

     The next few seconds were nothing but chaos, in the most literal sense. Had things not turned so dire in the blink of an eye Sonic would have reprimanded the rabbit for forcing open that door, though he had to wonder if it even mattered. Nonetheless, it didn’t change that they were vastly unprepared for what they were met with. The female had rushed forward so fast that even the hedgehog was startled, which meant there was little to no time for Mina to react to the very solid ball of fire that had been launched in her direction thanks to the wolverine. 

     Fire teeming with an all too familiar energy, a tainted power.

     Whatmore, her teammates offered more of the same. Too preoccupied with not meeting a wall of flames head-on, Sonic wasn’t entirely sure what was happening beyond that. He saw smoke, stones and water all making a straightaway for his team out of the corner of his eye, all originating from the mysterious trio and all with lethal intent. The only relief came when he saw his partner, singed but otherwise looking unharmed, joining the fight. Which left him alone with the female and the fire surrounding the two of them like a menacing snake. 

     Ignoring the swelling nausea in his stomach, the hero turned his attention to his opponent for the time being, his eyes sharp and tone even colder. His team would be fine, he knew. She had gotten him alone for a reason, and he wanted answers. 

     “Who are you?”

     “We’re the new kids in town, so you better get used to us, Blue.”

     It was all she offered, moving again with a speed that betrayed her appearance. Unfortunately for her, the hero had already seen her trick and met her head-on. She was easy to read, he could tell her speed wasn’t natural that it came from her apparent ability to manipulate fire. It was sluggish, but still dangerous because of those flames that served as an offense and defense. It was a problem, took away the possibility of a real physical attack. Luckily, the hero had the wind on his side.

     It was obvious she hadn’t expected the burst of air that erupted between them, giving a much-needed distance to the hero. The shock was only temporary, her composure regained as her hands lit with bright red flames. Sonic didn’t know whether to count himself lucky that the next few fireballs aimed in his direction were smaller than the initial one, smaller even than the ones he was used to dodging from his brother, but they were rapid. Where he dodged one, he had to slice through another with razor-sharp wind or risk getting burned and then repeat the process, all in a matter of seconds. It would have been an easy task any other day but the excess of negative energy was making the hero dizzy, causing his body to shake, and he mentally cursed. 

     He was vaguely aware that things seemed better for his team on the other side of the walls of fire, but how much was something he wasn’t certain of. Nor did he have time to even think of breaching the wall to regroup. The fire-wielder was determined, not letting up for a moment before rushing him again, covered from head to toe in flames that never seemed to hurt her. A Mobian torch.

     It was a mistake. 

     There was a common rule in science that fire, when exposed to air, had a habit of expanding, growing uncontrollably, and that was what the hedgehog had been banking on. 

     Fire met wind with a timely explosion, though the hero had easily gotten a good portion of it all. Momentarily blinded by embers and smoke, eyes and lungs burning, he coughed as he wisped the grey fog away. It was just in time to see the female, clothes burned and expression outraged, mere inches from his face. It wasn’t enough to stop the oncoming, flame-covered kick, nor the white-hot pain that erupted in his side. In spite of himself, the hero cried out. 

     Be it the blinding pain or a sense of urgency, even as he fell to his knees, the hero raised glowing green eyes to the wolverine. The rage in them seemed to jar her, more so than the shift in the air. In one fell blast, a wave of energy and wind washed over the alleyway. It was violent, a galeforce, that sent the elemental foursome slamming into the nearest walls with audible cracks. Yet, it never touched The Freedom Fighters, all of whom had paused at the sudden show of intensity, only to turn towards the source a second later. 

     “Sonic!” Seeing their leader on the ground was enough to kick them into gear and they all rushed over. Again, there was relief felt on Sonic's part seeing that they all seemed okay, battered and a little bruised (and damp, oddly enough) but alright. The same couldn't be said for himself, or the Four. 

     Yet the bat on the opposite end of the alley had gotten to their feet, dazed but not as wounded as the rest of his team, unfortunately. One look at The Freedom Fighters, one look at the blue hedgehog nearly baring his teeth in pain, and they were quick to gather their teammates and pull out a golden ring. A warp ring, and one that was soon activated where the bat stood, where he gave the heroes one last, seething look. 

     “We'll be seeing you all again real soon.” And with that, the other prostrate three were unceremoniously dragged through the ring, and they were gone. Like a bad nightmare; and no one went after them. Had it not been for the state of the alley, fractured, burned and soaked, it almost would have been easy to believe it was just a dream. Almost, if not for the sound of discomfort that came from Sonic just a moment later. 

     Mina wasted no time kneeling at his side, her expression just as worried as his own as he looked her and the other’s over. “Are you okay?”

     It was a dumb question, everyone there could see as much, but the hero still held up a hand to signify that was the case. It wasn't fooling anyone, not between the blue one's heavy breathing and pained expression, not to mention the coughing that came every few seconds, but there was another pressing question. 

     “Who were those guys? And what the hell did they do to you?”

     A slightly better question by Johnny, and one Sonic would have loved to have the answer to. He had undoubtedly gotten hit, his side was in too much pain to suggest otherwise, but that was the problem. It was in too much pain. The hero had been burned before, had been shot, stabbed and a great number of other things, but this? It didn't feel...right, and he didn't know how else to explain it. And maybe that was why he felt the compulsion to move his hand and look at the damage. 

     He regretted it the moment he did.

     He had expected the charred fur and skin, expected the black and red dots that came with it. What he hadn't been prepared for was the sickly ashen color around it all, nor the unnatural black spider-like veins that clashed terribly against the parlor, creeping up his side a few more inches until they were obstructed by kempt blue fur and the remains of his shirt. It all hurt, burned, terribly so. It almost looked dead.

     Looking between his teammates, the hero could see the same confusion and wariness in their eyes as they looked from it back to him. With the question hanging in the air, he could only think of two words. 

      “Nothing good."

[sonicringbond]

Sonic Ring Bond: the Journey - Scene 23

And with a lengthy little scene, we have moved away from the exposition for now. Or at least most of it. Rosy still has some exposition to give every scene just due to the story structure, but we actually have things getting started started again in this scene so i hope everyone enjoys...

    ~The biggest thing I love about adventuring is all the new people I meet and all of the wonderful places that I see. Sometimes though the people I meet need help, or just want a favor in exchange for a service. Tee-hee~♥ This time the people I met are little meaner though.

    ~To people who rely on Rings, they are irreplaceable. They do so much, and we rely on them so much. I don’t even think I really thought about it until I ended up in these strange lands with that little planet watching me every day. When I first discovered that most people here didn’t trust Rings it was so unnatural. Yet to them it was perfectly normal. Or so I thought until I met the Engineers.

    ~They were the first people here who actually used Rings like I was used to, but when Rings are treated as bad, they have to keep it a secret. It makes Ring Thieves even worse than they are back home. Stealing Rings is so hurtful, even helping a Ring Thief will get you hurt. I’ll have to talk Gill into changing his way of life when I finally catch up with him.

    ~Fortunately, though I was afraid that knowing Gill would have lost me an opportunity to catch up with Zooey, the cloud sailors were very understanding. They just didn’t trust me, or Draw, so they sent us out on a little quest to prove that we were trustworthy.

    ~Hmph! I think it’s ridiculous since they saw the photo with me and Zooey both in it. It should be obvious. But Gill did steal Rings from them, so it makes sense to help them gather Rings. I’m kind of excited too as I haven’t had a Ring gathering job in what feels like forever! Hee-hee! It’s what I used to do back home so it’s a nice little reminder of who I am. Which is fortunate too under the circumstances.~

    An airship that was barely more than a deck, cabins, and a hold wrapped around a metal balloon and further wrapped in sails, rigging, propellers, and wings soared across the jagged terrain. The mountains were unusual in that they almost appeared like domino tiles that had fallen on top of each other. The geography resulted in the top side of the mountains being covered as far as the eye could see in lush grasslands where sheep roamed, and Rings spun about on their axes arranged in any number of patterns. Despite being high enough for clouds to drift across the meadows the temperature was warm and balmy. From the deck railing Rosy watched the scenery passing by below with a huge and excited smile.

    “Ooh~! It’s so perfect! There are so many places to run, and so many Rings too! I bet there are all sorts of interesting things to find down below the cliffs too!”

    “You’re awfully excited considering they’re making you do their work,” Draw looked at Rosy wryly before a smirk adorned his face. With a shrug he closed his eyes and turned away. “But I guess I shouldn’t be surprised when dealing with a weirdo girl like you.”

    “How many times do I have to tell you stop calling me names!”

    Rosy complained and Draw snickered before Rosy stuck her tongue out in retaliation. It earned them both a good laugh, but Rosy felt it would be rude not answer the implied question from her koala companion. Wiping a tear from her eye she explained her excitement.

    “Believe it or not, but this is what I did back home,” Rosy demonstrated vaguely drawing a doodle in the air with a finger. “My job was to collect Rings and I went all over the place doing it. Me and my best friend. Ooh~ I haven’t seen Tails in forever and I miss him so much. I really hope he’s okay.”

    “I’m surprised you haven’t forgotten him with how long you’ve been searching. It seems like something you’d forget.”

    Hopping off the railing, Rosy sat down on the deck beside Draw and pulled her knees to her chin. It made her look very small, even next to the younger and smaller koala.

    As Draw continued to clean his bow, he looked at Rosy wondering if she was upset about something. The mischievous grin she wore hidden behind her knees told him otherwise and he leaned in closer as she motioned to him with a wave of her hand.

    “Well that’s the thing,” Rosy whispered excitedly, her wagging tail thudding against the deck giving away her enthusiasm. “I’ve noticed that the things I’m most likely to forget are things that aren’t associated with what I normally do. I think that’s why it’s so important for everyone to have the defined roles that they do. It helps you stay you, I think. But adventuring is what I do, and what my friends do too so most of those memories are just kind of fuzzy now, but I can still remember them. That’s why I’m not worried about helping the Engineers out.”

    “I get it,” Draw contemplated as he absently rubbed down his bow. “They aren’t trying to have you repay the stolen Rings, they’re trying to use how everyone always forgets things to make you loyal to them.”

    “That’s what I was thinking too,” Rosy beamed as Draw had caught on. “But I know it won’t work on either of us. First and foremost, I know that the Rings will always remember. Secondly, they think we’re dumb because we’re kids.”

    “Well you’re certainly a weirdo girl,” Draw countered Rosy’s attempts to build up their confidence. She puffed up her cheeks at him and he simply flashed her another playful smirk. He did not prompt her to go off topic however and stayed quiet.

    “But they shouldn’t look down on us like that. I know you’ll be fine too because practicing to hunt golems is what you do, and I’ll be fine because I’m going to be doing what I always do. They won’t beat us so easily, and we’ll still help them and get to hear more about where Zooey is.”

    ~I felt like my belief was spot on. Why wouldn’t it be? This strange land may steal people’s memories, but I’ve been doing my best to pay attention and protect my precious memories as best as I could. I had gotten Draw involved too so it was important that I protect his memories too. The thing is though, I wasn’t prepared for how bored I was going to be. And after it looked so exciting too.

    ~Overlooking one of the best views I ever saw of the wide openness of the world was a weird little tower that was as much a part of an old ruin as it was something that looked like it grew out of it. It was like a smashed together building built from a windmill, a water tower, a lighthouse, and a giant boiler chimney. There were pipes everywhere and covered almost as much as the ivy and other plants that covered the stone brick building. But there was nothing else of interest.

    ~A kitchen, bedrooms, and a lookout post. Even the weird little arch that served as the airship port was just quaint. The old guy who worked at what they called an Engineer’s waystation was nice enough too, but he laid down a very strict rule about never going further out than he could see. And so, by the afternoon of my second day there, I was so bored and turned desperately to Draw to help me chase away the boredom.~

    “It’s your fault for collecting the Rings so fast,” Draw remarked dismissively as he fired off a practice shot into a target he carved into the side of an old tree within the outer wall of the ruin that held the waystation.

    “I know, but I get so excited!” Rosy whined. “It really is like back home. Rings show up in random places and patterns every day and I just can’t help myself. It’s so much fun but being limited on where I can run makes it so boring. I know they don’t trust me, but it’s still unfair.”

    “And why do you think I can change their minds?” Draw asked as he fired off another arrow.

    “I don’t,” Rosy admitted as she clasped her hands behind her back and began swaying her body back and forth. “I was just hoping you could help me chase off my boredom for a little bit.”

    “Why do I have a bad feeling about this?” Draw asked as he eyed Rosy wearily.

    Her cheeks puffing up, Rosy energetically defended herself. “It isn’t anything bad! Really! I just want to practice my fortune telling. I may consult the cards every morning, but I know so many other ways of reading fortunes too. Like I can do a really simple one right here and now. All I need is for you to show me you hand.

    “And if I say I don’t want to?” Draw challenged.

    “Don’t be like that!” Rosy fussed and snagged Draw’s hand in both of hers.

    “Why do you care about my future anyway?” Draw pressed as he yanked his hand away, not noticing that Rosy drew her thumbs along his palm as he did. “Or do you think I can’t beat your golem–?”

    Draw stopped short as he noticed Rosy’s mischievous grin had returned and he frowned in disgust and fear. “What did you just do?”

    “Nothing,” Rosy swayed playfully, teasing the poor koala. “Just read your fortune is all~♥”

    “What! That easily?”

    “I’m really good at it,” Rosy laughed as she shook a playful finger at the bewildered Draw.

    “No way! What did you learn!”

    “Well…,” Rosy started enthusiastically, but she seemed a bit perplexed and looked down at her thumbs. Draw swallowed loudly afraid something bad lay in store for him, but Rosy dismissed it as she reached into one of the shoulder puffs of her leotard. “It’s kind of confusing so I’m going to ask my cards to help clarify for me.”

    Without missing a beat, Rosy flopped onto the ground, her legs forming a “W” like shape in front of her as she withdrew the small waterproof container. Carefully extracting her tarot cards Rosy split the deck and paused a moment before shuffling. Giggling, she lay the two halves on the ground in front of her. “I better give them a Ring first. I don’t want them getting worn out. They’re my oldest friends you know.”

    Draw gave Rosy a doubting look, but she ignored him and cheerily pushed a Ring into her cards. With a twinkle of golden motes of light, the Ring vanished as quickly as it had appeared from Rosy’s person. Her cards seemed no different, but it was obvious that they still looked brand new. Testing the snap of the cards Rosy smiled wider as she began to shuffle them.

    It was a mundane action, but a sudden breeze blew one or two free and Rosy gasped in apologetic surprise.

    “Ah! I’m sorry!”

    Scrambling to catch the errant cards, Rosy looked like a child chasing butterflies and Draw hung his head and sighed. The sudden urgency in Rosy’s voice as she spoke to him again though caused him concern as he looked back up at her.

    “Draw, we have to go.”

    “Eh! What!” Draw stepped back surprised, but Rosy’s face was desperate with seriousness. Still, he needed clarification as she hurried to put her cards away. “But if we leave… I mean won’t they never help us find your friend if we go now.”

    “They probably won’t,” Rosy conceded, but did not linger as she offered Draw her back so she might carry him piggyback. “But I know seeing them and how protective they are that Zooey is safe. I want to see her. Really, I do. But… but right now, someone else needs our help and we have to hurry before it’s too late!”

    “How did come up with that?” Draw guffawed at the absurdity of what Rosy claimed.

    “The cards told me!”

    Rosy’s claim baffled Draw even more and he gave her a doubting look and began to mouth a response but Rosy cut him off with a stern look as she forewent an explanation. “I know you don’t believe me, no one ever does at first, but my cards never lie to me. And right now, someone needs our help more than Zooey, so we have to go.”

    “Well… If you… argh! Fine!”

    With a shout Draw gave in and soon found himself whisked away at speeds he could not comprehend across the meadowed mountain sides.

Scene 23 · CLEARED A Tiny Voice, to be continued

-----

And with that, Rosy is chasing after trouble yet again. Draw seemed to have mellowed out this scene, but hopefully not jarringly so. I definitely need to get some excitability into him again. But we’ll leave that for the future.

Thank you for reading everyone! i hope you enjoyed!

-----

Special Thanks to Cutegirlmayra Story by @JoshTarwater/SonicFanJ Inspiring Song – What Makes the Sky Blue – Tsutomu Narita – Granblu Fantasy Original Soundtrack: Promise

Fair Use Disclaimer

Sonic the Hedgehog and all affiliated characters and logos are the express property and Copyright© of SEGA SAMMY HOLDINGS used without permission under Title 17 U.S.C Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976 in which allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. “Fair use” is use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be considered copyright infringement. The Sonic Ring Bond: The Journey alternate universe (AU) consumer written work of fiction is a non-profit transformative work primarily for personal use and can and will be taken down without warning or prior notice at the request of the copyright holder(s) should it not be recognized under “fair use”.

*Sonic Ring Bond logo created by DEE Art – twitter.com/daryliscute.

Sonic Ring Bond AU and Sonic Ring Bond: The Journey are the creation of Joshua David Tarwater/ynymbus/sonicfanj/@Joshtarwater and is to be, including all contents herein considered for all legal purposes the property of the Sonic the Hedgehog intellectual property (IP) and copyright owners, SEGA SAMMY HOLDINGS. All story contributors via prompt, suggestion, written scene, art, and all and every other contribution acknowledge that all contributed material is forfeit for legal purposes to SEGA SAMMY HOLDINGS upon official request from SEGA SAMMY HOLDINGS.

[cinnamonrollorder]

Nerve Pains

(PROMPT 2 FROM THE GLORIOUS LIST @annikatti cooked up! :D)

Being infected was no fun. Now, one might think that’s an obvious statement. Of course it’s no fun, you’re infected. The thing was that most people who got infected lasted about ten minutes before they were gone. Tangle was an exception, Sonic would guess, as was he. He didn’t know when Tangle got infected, but she had lasted a longer amount of time than anyone else.

He was getting off-topic. Bottom line, no one really experienced the infection. They didn’t get the chance to feel how your skin would just go cold, even when it was fine, or how your thoughts started feeling weird and icky and gross. (No, Sonic, you are NOT going to punch that person, and you are INSTEAD going on a RUN.) They had maybe a little bit of that experience. It didn’t stop for them. Maybe that was worse, since it all happened at once. They didn’t have to feel themselves slipping away bit by bit; they just lost themselves.

The other problem with prolonged infection was when you weren’t feeling nothing, you felt everything. Sonic felt every nerve scream at him, all his organs protesting the very act of living, and all his muscles fighting to just stop functioning. It was like his body collectively decided they’d very much like to be dead. Turns out, basically every part of you turning from flesh to metal to flesh and back again in an endless loop messed with your body.

Sonic sometimes forgot he’d just gone running because his arm felt so cold and dead. It’s not metal, but it feels like it is, and the part that can still feel is burning because it thinks it’s next. He hated it; he hated all of it. He wondered if that was what Tangle felt like.

He wondered if he deserved to feel it.

The telltale twinge in every fiber of his being, like he’d just pulled a muscle stretching and it was about to explode in pain, told him that it was about to happen again. Gritting his teeth, Sonic hurried away from the main room of the carrier. He wasn’t able to go for a run right now. He found a small storage thing, maybe a closet, and went inside. He stayed and waited.

And then suddenly a tidal wave of agonizing pain blazed up inside him.

It had started at his heart, his poor, tired little heart, and rapidly extended to his everything. His hands twitched in uncontrolled energy and pain, clenching and twisting in painful ways. His lungs fought to work, scrabbling for any bit of air they could obtain, and were failing. His legs just gave out. They crumpled like all those pieces of paper that littered Tails’s desk. His head… oh gosh, his head.

The worst part was always with the head.

It was like it wasn’t him right then, it wasn’t Sonic. Part of his thoughts believed that it was over, that he was a zombot and he had to start finding people. It screamed at him to move to go get them but wasn’t strong enough to move his useless limbs. The other half was just panicking, unsure of where he was or who he was or who was around him. He remembered Eggman’s prison cell. He remembered those 6 months of endless torture that he just refused to talk about. Was he trying to stop the ARK? In a book? It was a jumbled mess that all resulted in a nearly irresistible urge to scream.

But Sonic didn’t scream.

He stayed like that until it passed.

-----

Amy, whenever she had the chance, liked to keeps tabs on who was where. It wasn’t often, but it was some sort of comfort in this whole situation. Tails was easy; he was either in his lab or with the survivors. Well, “lab” would be better, as it’s just a small area where Tails wrote endless scientific formulas and sketched some machines until he passed out. Whisper… was always alone. Cream was always with a group, but quiet and looking like she didn’t want to be there. Espio was with everyone else, as was Silver. It wasn’t hard to locate everyone.

Which made her wonder why she could never find Sonic.

She didn’t blame him for always being absent; he had to run almost all the time now. She thought now that everyone was stuck in the carrier that she could easily find him, but it seemed that Sonic was still an expert at avoiding her. A part of her said that she shouldn’t bother with finding him, that she had taken enough of a break and should go back to thinking of plans and checking supplies. The other part said shush the heck up. Amy decided to listen to the latter part.

Since she’d already checked on everyone else (Tails was asleep, and she took a small detour to give him a blanket), she knew where the blue blur wasn’t, at the very least. That left the storage room, the makeshift infirmary, and a few random spots here and there they hadn’t found a use for yet. She checked the storage room first. After all, Sonic might’ve gotten hungry. No one was supposed to take supplies (including food) without express permission, but Amy tried to be understanding.

The only thing in the storage room was what was already there. A bunch of crates and stashes of whatever people could salvage. The room was too orderly to look normal, a side effect of having a bunch of nervous, tense people on board; if there was something to clean, it would be cleaned. That left the infirmary and random spots.

The infirmary was bare, save for one unfortunate survivor who’d twisted his ankle during evacuation, and his wife who was watching him as he slept. Amy briefly paused her Sonic search in lieu of making sure the male was still doing OK. After ensuring all was well, she left.

That left the random spots. Amy wasn’t able to think of why Sonic would be there, but she could ask when she found him. Amy checked two random little rooms before she spotted cobalt blue out of the corner of her eye. She turned and saw none other than Sonic the Hedgehog, looking like he’d been run over by a truck. She would’ve gone to talk to him, but Silver caught her attention. He thought one of the control screens for the aircraft was glitching. Which, to be fair, it was glitching, but it was just from overuse, and Amy fixed it quickly. It did, however, mean that she had to get back to work.

So she let Sonic be, just this once.

------

By the time they actually got to Angel Island, Sonic felt ready to die. He couldn’t feel anything in most of his body, which was a blessing, but that meant the little part that could still feel was on fire. The second he was free, he abused the numbness in his legs to run all of the infection away, until he could remember all the smaller pains that still plagued his body.

His chest protesting the workout and little energy to sustain it, his calloused and probably bleeding feet lamenting the overuse, and his legs shakily trying their best just to keep up from collapsing. Even his arms were tired, and all they did was be arms. He had to keep running, though, he had to keep running.

And so he did.

He ran until finally he was clean and could head back. When he finally got to everyone, though, he felt it again. Had he pulled something during the run? It shouldn’t be happening again so soon. His body didn’t seem to care, though, as he could feel parts of muscles starting to tense and lock up. Sonic hastily retreated back into the cover of trees, hoping no one saw him. He kept going for maybe a minute until his lehs shut down and he fell onto a very fortunate slab of stone. Or, probably a collection of rocks and dirt.

------

Amy had been waiting for Sonic to return, and she didn’t miss it when he did. She’d stood up and made her way over, only for him to get a foggy look in his eyes and run off again. Confused, and honestly a little annoyed, Amy ran after him. He was faster than her, even now, but he didn’t make it far before falling over.

Wait, falling over?

Amy picked up speed and rushed over to the hedgehog’s side. Sonic looked to be having a seizure of some sorts, but also not. He was clearly in pain, and the spotted tiny patches of the virus grow and shrink.

“Sonic! What’s happening?”

He looked at her, as if he hadn’t noticed her run up to him (had he not?). He looked scared, but Amy was more concerned about the clear pain in his eyes. The tears, the bloodshot eyes, and the bags. His pupils were little pinpricks. He opened his mouth, as if to speak, but nothing came out.

Amy’s hands twitched, anxious to hold him and tell him that it was going to be alright. She couldn’t do anything, though.

“Sonic, help me!”

“I can’t!”

Was this what Sonic felt like back then? Useless? In the way? A hindrance? She bit back the wave of uncomfortableness that came with those thoughts. Right now, Sonic was in pain and he needed help.

“OK. Sonic, breathe, OK? In, out. In, out. C’mon, in and out.” She tried to coax him into normal breathing, but it wasn’t working. She could tell that he was obviously trying to, clutching his lungs and focusing so intently on her face, but he just couldn’t. She was no help.

She thought it had been about two minutes until Sonic seemed to recover himself. First, his hands stopped twitching, and the rest of his body seemed to follow suit. Sonic took a deep breath, coughed, and shakily got to his feet.

“A-amy, I can explain,” Sonic said. Amy gave him a concerned stare. “Stuff like this just happens sometimes. It’s alright, though. I can handle it. No need to worry-“

“Sonic, I think it is very obvious that I am going to worry.”

“I know, I know, but I’ve figured it out, so I know when it’s coming and I’ll just go away for a bit.” Sonic gave a shaky smile, as if that made it all better. It did not.

“No! That isn’t OK! What if something happens while you’re gone? We need to know where you are, Sonic.” Amy pressed.

“Heh, if you needed me when I’m like that, then I wouldn’t be of use anyways,” Sonic said bitterly. He seemed to catch himself. “But I’ll… try and go somewhere not too far.”

“That’s something, at least,” she grumbled. “Just promise me one thing.”

“Sure.”

Amy looked at Sonic in the eyes. “Make sure you come back after each one.” Sonic’s eyes widened in surprise.

“Of course.” He said.

That’d be a lie.

[comicgeekscomicgeek]

Their Hero Academia – Chapter 62: Final Exam Part 4: Short Essay

Presenting the next raw and unedited chapter of my on-going, next-gen, My Hero Academia fic, Their Hero Academia!    Please note, this chapter may undergo more extensive editing before it gets posted to AO3/FF.net, as there’s a lot of fight scenes that may need clarity editing.

Earlier chapters can be found here

The last blast of her Jetpack brought Sora to the ground, where some of her classmates, including Toshi, were waiting.  Ordinarily, she might remove her helmet in order to have a clearer conversation or to wipe the sweat from her brown, but with a potential sniper on the loose, it seemed an undue risk.  Instead, she used her tongue to adjust the small straw on the helmet’s right cheek and sipped from the juice it offered.  

Satisfied with that, she tapped the side of her helmet and activated the communicator.  “This is Jet-Red,” she announced.  “I spotted nothing on my sweep of the western sector and have returned to base camp.”

Her brother’s voice quickly followed.  “Jet-Blue responding,” he said.  “Eastern sector air sweep is complete.  No sign of any additional civilians or the Villains.  They appear to have gone to ground.”

“Slyde here, nothing on the ground sweep of the north sector either,” Haimawari reported.  “Heading back home.”

“You’re listening to Channel Stick ‘Em Up,” came Sero’s voice. “Nothing on my aerial view either.  Where the hell are they?  I didn’t expect to be playing Hide the Villain today.  Totally unfair!  Midoriya, I thought you said they were coming for us!”

Kirishima-Bakugo’s voice cut in.  She was up on the roof of the civilian defense shelter with Kaminari, Aoyama, Izumi, and Shinso.   Their ranged fighters, who could rain firepower down on any attackers or more easily shoot Raptor out of the air if it came to it. “Cut the chatter, you damn sorry excuse for a tape dispenser!”  

“Okay,” Toshi said, his communicator filled with static. She’d done what she could to repair it, but it had gotten very damaged when he’d smacked into the building. Hopefully, her patch job would hold. “When you guys get back, we’ll brainstorm a new plan.  With Shadow-Thief, they could be anywhere.”

As he clicked off the communicator, Toshi let out a sigh.  “So much for that plan.”  He was discouraged, she could tell.  It had been nearly thirty minutes since they had regrouped and he had dispatched the speedier and more mobile members of the class to look for where the Villains might be coming from and they had nothing to show for it.

So many times, she and her classmates looked to him for direction.  They always had.  Toshi had always been the one looking out for all of them, even when they were small, making sure everyone was getting along, making sure everyone’s needs were met.  With the fate of everyone’s passing being tied to this exam, it was little wonder he seemed to be feeling that even more strongly.

“When one hypothesis fails,” she said, “you must select another.”   Slightly cautiously, she put her hands on his shoulders.  He didn’t flinch away from the contact, which was good. Since they had last talked about it, he had been getting better about not being as anxious when they touched. “We believe in you, Toshi.  And we will figure this out.”

Toshi nodded.  “Okay, yeah, you’re right.  Thanks, Sora.”

“Of course,” she said. “One of the requirements of being your girlfriend is supporting you in your endeavors.”   She’d been reading excessively on “how to be a good girlfriend” on the internet.  Much of the advice was contradictory and confusing, but she was attempting to sort through it all.  If need be, there were more experienced sources of advice within the class as well. “Also, I am as invested in our success as a class as anyone.”

Above, she could hear Shinso’s sonar scream, sent out at regular intervals per Toshi’s directions, sweeping in a wide arc from west to east.  The noise would probably let any Villains know they were being watched, but it was better than being caught completely unawares.

“I think I saw something this time!” Shinso reported.  “Just a blip though.  Like when Shadow-Thief was doing her shadow thing! Big group though…  I think she’s moving all of them!”

“It looks like your hypothesis was correct after all,” Sora told Toshi.  “Your time scale was merely inaccurate.”

Time scale… time scale… That had to be important…

Oh no.

Sora looked up and tracked the position of the sun in the sky, relative to where it had been early. Her eyes darted to the buildings across the street, where long shadows were starting to draw.  Of course.  The Villains had waited until they had opportunity to use the shadows to their advantage.

“Aoyama!” she shouted. “We need as much light as you can muster!  Across the street!  Now!”

But it was too late. The shadows across the street rippled as four figures began to rise out of it.   The same Villains Shinso had identified before.   Jawbreaker.  Raptor. Kamuy.  Shadow-Thief.  

There was no time. The Villains were here.

“Okay, everybody!” Toshi called out.  “Just like we planned it!   Let’s take these guys down!”

***

Shinso, Todoroki, Aoyama, Kaminari, and Kirishima-Bakugo were still on the roof, ready to rain their firepower down from above.   Tensei Iida, Sero, and Haimawari were still out in the field, heading back to the basecamp.   On the ground, that left Midoriya, Sora Iida, Koda, Sato, Ojiro, Mineta, Tokoyami, and Daisuke.  He’d been tense, waiting for the moment when the Villains appeared.  He was strong, he knew.  He was no Deku, of course, but still powerfully built.  In training, he was used to be being able to take care of most simulated opponents with just a few blows.

Strength was hardly everything.  It was why he trained his reflexes and his senses to their utmost and why he tried to maximize the range and mobility his Extendo-Arms offered him.  He doubted that he would ever be a particularly highly ranked Hero, he shied away from the spotlight too much for that without factoring in anything else, but he was determined to be an effective one.

But for the first time, when fighting that Kamuy woman, his strength had been useless.  Worse than useless, it had been turned against him. She’d thrown all the strength of his punches right back at him.  Not a feeling he relished, nor one he hoped to experience again.

There was barely a moment between the Villains appearing, Midoriya’s direction, and the move by both sides to attack.  A barrage of ranged attacks flew forth first: focused laser beams from Aoyama, explosive-infused disks from Kirishima-Bakugo, electrical blasts from Kaminari, waves of sonic-force from Shinso, and gouts of flame from Todoroki.  They had the desired effect and the Villains scattered, with Raptor taking to the air on a giant gust of wind, Kamuy going right, and Jawbreaker going left.  Shadow-Thief vanished back into the shadows… something that probably wasn’t going to be good.

He saw Sora Iida jetting into the air to fight Raptor, with Tokoyami dispatching Frog-Shadow to fight alongside her.  He saw Mineta firing those sticky balls from her horns, trying to tag Kamuy. And before him, he saw Jawbreaker.

The Villain was more massive than Midoriya had described him, now made of both stone and metal, blending unevenly across his form.  Daisuke glanced briefly to his right and saw Midoriya, then nodded.

Daisuke was too tall to go low, but he darted this way and that, dodging out of the way of Jawbreaker’s fists. Even weighed down with the extra mass, the big Villain was fast.  He swung his second set of arms high and his third set of arms low and extended them out as fast as he could, smacking the Villain with a series of rapid-fire blows. Again and again, like pistons, he fired his four fists out, smacking hard against metal and rock.

“Argh!” He let out a cry of pain as his fists bounced uselessly against the Villain’s hide, not even denting the metal or cracking the rock.

“Was that supposed to hurt?” Jawbreaker taunted.  He launched a powerful blow, but Daisuke got all three of his right side-arms in place to block it.  That blow hurt too, but not as bad as it would have if he’d taken it full on.  He held his ground at least.

“Would have been nice if it had,” he said.  “But I’m just the distraction.”

Midoriya’s gravity enhanced fist smashed into the side of Jawbreaker’s head, sending him flying.  Daisuke would be lying if he said he didn’t envy the gravity-backed powers Midoriya could put behind his blows.  They made his best triple-haymaker look like a love tap. Jawbreaker skipped like a stone across the street for a moment, before digging in his fingers to stop himself. When he was stable, he jaw opened wide and he took a huge bite out of the street, his scoop like jaw shoveling in cement.  As he did, he got bigger still, patches of cement spreading across his body.

Midoriya gave him a concerned look.  “You up for hitting him some more?  We’ve got to get him closer to our ranged attackers.”

Daisuke shrugged.  He was definitely going to have sore knuckles after this.  “Might as well…”

***

Mika let out a whoop as her sticky balls successfully pinned Kamuy’s feet to the ground.   “In your face, giant lady!” she taunted, making a face. The massive woman was struggling to free her feet, shooting daggers in her direction.

“Ah, maybe don’t taunt the giant woman, Mineta?” Sato suggested.

“Definitely not a good idea,” Ojiro agreed.

There was a non-zero chance they were right.  At the end of the day, her balls were very sticky, but they weren’t the universal sealant. On the other hand, seeing the woman fume was so much fun!

“When I get out of here,” Kamuy growled, “I am going to send you to the glue-factory, horse girl!”

“Oh, whatever,” she said, waving a hand dismissively.  “And I keep telling people, I’m a cow, now a horse!”  

She pointed to Kamuy, turning her head to their snipers.  “Todoroki!  How about you show her how to chill?”

Above, Todoroki pointed and ice began to form around Kamuy.  Mika wasn’t exactly sure on what her range was, but whatever it was, it was good.  Being able to draw in heat and form ice just by pointing was a damn useful talent.  

“Dammit,” Kamuy said. “Didn’t want to do this this early…   Going to make you regret it, kid.” She seemed to shimmer for a second, then slammed a fist into the ground.  The resultant shockwave rippled outward, blowing Mika, Ojiro, and Sato off their feet, and shattering both the her balls and Todoroki’s ice.

When Mika’s head stopped spinning, she could see Kamuy approaching her.  She looked noticeably smaller, though still just as tall and still built like a truck.  But noticeably less bulky all the same.   She’d probably had to expend a lot of power to do that shockwave then.

Shinso had been surprisingly light on the details of Kamuy’s Quirk.  She’d apparently only had a handful of public conflicts with Heroes before being imprisoned.  But if they could get her to keep expending energy, maybe she’d run out?  

She tried to prop herself up, but Kamuy was faster.  The giant woman lifted her by her neck, squeezing just enough to hurt, but not so bad that she couldn’t breathe.   Obviously, these guys weren’t allowed to kill them.  No matter how much Aizawa had threatened to kick all their asses over the course of the term.

“No smartass remarks now, huh?” Kamuy asked, holding her at eye level.  “You got me a little mad, but when I get mad, things get broken.”  She raised Mika up a little higher, ready to give her a toss.  “This is your last roundup, Hero.”

If she wasn’t about to get slammed into the pavement, Mika would really have appreciated the taunt. As far as those went, it was a good one. She kicked, ineffectively, slamming her hooves into Kamuy’s stomach.  Of course, with her Quirk, it wasn’t doing much.

“You know,” Mika grunted, “you’re forgetting something…”

“Am I?” Kamuy’s lips pulled back in a sneer.  “What’s that?”

“This close, I don’t gotta aim my balls. What goes up… comes down!”

She fired off a ball from her left horn and jerked her own head back.  It didn’t go far, but it did distract Kamuy enough to look up.  The ball smacked her right in the face.   It wasn’t a big one, barely the size of a softball, but it did cover one eye and hit her with a pretty solid plop!  The shock made her release Mika, who fell to the ground on her butt in an undignified heap.

Which was when Ojiro struck. Or at least, that’s what Mika assumed happened.  Something struck Kamuy’s legs anyway, causing her to topple over backwards into a hole that definitely wasn’t there before.  

“…What?”

“Sorry,” Sato said, suddenly at her side and offering her a hand up.  She noticed he had some dirt on his face around his lips.  The hole had to be his doing then.  Beside him, Ojiro came back into view.   “Didn’t mean for that to take so long.”

“Had to wait for a moment where we could actually do something,” Ojiro said.  “Even if she didn’t see me, not much I could do unless she was off-balance.”

Mika waved it off. “Nah, you guys did good.”

Unfortunately, all it had bought them was a brief respite.  Kamuy jumped out of the hole, landing with a solid thump.

She cracked her knuckles noisily.  “You little Heroes used up your shot.  Now it’s my turn.”

***

In the time between Tensei’s communication with the others and his arrival back at the civilian defense shelter, the scene had become a warzone.  Below, he could see Shoji and Toshi fighting with Jawbreaker, with even Toshi’s gravity backed ricochet blows having little effect on the massive Villain. Haimawari arrived on the ground moments later, peppering Jawbreaker with his blasts, but he succeeded in only distracting him long enough to buy Toshi and Shoji a moment.

Also on the ground, Mineta, Sato, and Ojiro were dodging out of the way of Kamuy, mostly looking like they were trying to avoid giving her any additional power.  Based upon his observation, she had decreased in overall mass by at least fifteen percent since his previous encounter with her.  Tensei winced as Sato narrowly avoided another of the woman’s blows, but let out a sigh of relief as Takuma finally arrived on the scene, temporarily restraining Kamuy with his tape.

And in the air… Raptor was putting up a valiant fight against his sister and Tokoyami’s Frog-Shadow.   According to both Shinso and Takuma, the winged Villain could not actually “fly” like winged Heroes like Hawks or Kestrel, instead relying on his ability to generate powerful winds to keep himself aloft.  It required a continuous expenditure and forced him to keep himself in motion, much like his and his sister’s Jetpack Quirks.

But Raptor’s wind blasts were enough to keep both of his attacks from reaching him.  Tensei poured on his speed as he watched his sister fire the capture rope built into her gauntlet, but it too was buffeted by the winds and fell back harmlessly.  

Fortunately, Raptor did not see him.  With one final burst of speed, he came up on the Villain and swung out a fist for a high speed punch.  It connected with a solid clang of armored fist on flesh, sending Raptor tumbling out of the air.  

“Good to see you are safe, Little Brother!” Sora said, as they both jetted after the Villain, who was flapping his wings and calling up a gale to right himself.

“As I must remind you, I am a statistically insignificant amount of time younger than you!” he snapped back.  “That appellation is highly inappropriate!”

“Hey, argue later!” Frog-Shadow shouted after them, being recalled by Tokoyami. “Sheesh, when I’m being the sensible one…”

A sharp blade of wind split the air between them, forcing both Tensei and his sister into evasive maneuvers.  The familiar was right.  It was hardly the time for arguments.  Instead, it was time for…

Tensei turned his head slightly to look at his sister, who, seeming to have sensed his intent, was now looking at him.  “Double Rocket Attack?” he asked.

“Double Rocket Attack!” Sora confirmed, confidently.

Both adjusted their flight paths so they were facing each other, then linked hands and fired an extra boost of speed through their Jetpacks.  It sent them spinning and both stretched their legs out as far as they would go. Spinning around and around, Tensei’s legs smacked hard into Raptor, followed immediately by Sora’s, again and again.

“And make way for me!” Frog-Shadow shouted.  Tensei and Sora backed off as, at what appeared to be Tokoyami’s direction, Frog-Shadow-swooped in and rushed Raptor, slamming into his mid-section, her arms and hands extending to grab his wings. Pinned, he seemed helpless as he slammed into the ground not far from Tokoyami.

Tensei touched down, Sora right behind him.  “Is he subdued?” he asked.

“I am afraid not,” Tokoyami replied. “He is… struggling still.”

She was right. Frog-Shadow was strong, of course, but Raptor seemed to be a rather powerful Villain as well.  And while she had pinned his wings enough to prevent them from use in flight, she could not grasp every feather… The tips of his wings snapped forward, hitting Frog-Shadow with focused and sharp blades of wind. The familiar let out a cry of alarm and pain one echoed by Tokoyami, and snapped back, allowing him to rise again.   Raptor got back on his feet in an instant, wings spreading out behind him for another attack.   They snapped forward, shooting out another blade of air. But it sailed over their heads.

“Ha!” Sora taunted. “You missed, Villain!”

Raptor simply sneered. “Did I?”

Tensei turned to look behind them, just in time to watch the wave of pressurized air slam into the roof of the civilian defense shelter, sending their classmates tumbling over the edge!

***

Koharu let out a sharp gasp as the members of Class 1-A who were on the roof were sent tumbling over the edge by the wind blast from Raptor.  The girl with the white and red hair—Todoroki, she remembered now—reacted quickly though, forming an ice slide that brought them down to the ground chillily and probably uncomfortably, but all in one piece.  The explosive girl, Kirishima-Bakugo, checked on Todoroki to make sure she was okay, but Todoroki pointed towards the fight.  With that, the students who had been on the roof joined the fight proper.

“Still waiting on that answer, Kocho,” Aizawa said.  “What would you do against these Villains?”

“Give the girl a break, Aizawa,” All Might said.  “She wasn’t expecting to get challenged like that.”

“Heroes have to think on their feet,” Aizawa said.  “If she can’t do that, she’s got no business joining my class.”

“She’s in the room, you two,” Vice-Principal Midnight reminded them.  

“It’s, it’s okay,” Koharu said.  “It’s a fair question.”   On the screens, she watched as Kirishima-Bakugo hit Jawbreaker with a series of explosive-backed punches, giving Midoriya, Haimawari, and Shoji a brief respite.  Even as he swatted her away, Shinso hit the Villain with a sonic blast of force.  

“That the best you can do, kid?” Jawbreaker taunted, looming large over the small boy, who suddenly seemed even smaller in the moment.  “You giving me the kid’s gloves treatment?”

There was a stillness in the room, a baited breath that told her this was a very important moment, even if she didn’t understand the context.

“Not… even… CLOSE!” Shinso made the word itself into a scream, hitting Jawbreaker with a much more powerful blast that knocked the Villain across the street.

“I knew he still had it in him!” Aizawa said, very nearly rising from his seat. Was he… proud? What was the story there?  All Might and Midnight were much less restrained, letting out louder cheers.

“Ahem,” Aizawa said. “Back to the question.”

“Er, yes, sir,” Koharu said. “Jawbreaker…  He’s got to see, right?  So I’d probably try to blind him with my String Shot.  I’m not strong enough to hurt him and he doesn’t look like he breathes, so I couldn’t use any of my scale powders, like my paralysis agent or my poison, so… I might be able to restrain him or at least keep him busy until somebody with a different Quirk comes along.”

Aizawa did not give her any indication as to whether or not that was the correct answer.

On the screens, the fights went on. Sero and Mineta combined their sticky Quirks to restrain Kamuy, setting up Kaminari and Todoroki to join the fight.  Todoroki flicked a hand, sending out a wave of ice that covered her legs and temporarily immobilizing her, while Kaminari unleashed an electrical blast from her gauntlets.  Kamuy jerked under the attack for a moment, but then began to laugh.

“Oh, yeah!” she cackled. “That’s the stuff!”   She was growing larger and more muscular, breaking out of the ice easily.  

“Oh, no fair!” Mineta shouted, dodging out of the way of Kamuy’s blows.  “She can absorb energy too?!  I know Shinso didn’t say that!”

“In his defense,” Aizawa said, seeming to come to the boy’s defense, “it didn’t come up much.  All of her recorded battles were with Heroes with more physical Quirks.”

Koharu winced at Kamuy tagged Mineta with a heavy punch.  The horned girl went flying, went down, and did not get up.  Sero wrapped a strip of tape around her arm, but she flicked her arm and pulled him to her instead, smashing her other fist into his face with enough force to crack his helmet and drop him instantly.

“Um,” she said, feeling slightly bad watching 1-A get beat up like that. “Kamuy absorbs physical attacks. So I wouldn’t want to engage directly. But my scales would probably work. Keep her distracted, keep her fighting and breathing hard, and I could paralyze her or put her to sleep.”

Unfortunately, that wasn’t an option for the students fighting her.  Powerful blows quickly took down Sato, the poor guy not getting a chance to do much now that she was powered up and enraged.  Probably revenge for dropping the telephone pole on her. Kamuy turned her attention back to Kaminari and Todoroki, with Kaminari putting herself in front of the girl with the two-tone hair.  Koharu watched as she plugged her Extension Cords into other parts of her uniform, opening panels that revealed lights and speakers.  The resulting sound and light barrage stunned Kamuy for a moment, giving the girls a moment to retreat.  In the resultant confusion, Koharu realized she’d lost track of Ojiro…

On another screen, the Heroes fighting Raptor were doing a little better than the rest.  The glowing boy, Aoyama, had joined the Iida twins and Tokoyami, adding bolts of blinding light to the fight.  With Raptor disoriented, the twins both jetted around him, firing some kind of capture line from their gauntlets, circling him several times to pin his wings.  Tokoyami sent forth her frog thing again, and this time it let Raptor have it with a one-two punch that sent his head spinning, knocking the winged man down and out.

“And him,” Koharu said, “I’d probably end up fighting in the air, which isn’t great, even if I can actually fly and he’s just blasting himself around.  Because those winds could send anything I send at him back or somewhere else. I’m immune to my own scales, but other people wouldn’t be. Too risky.  He’s tough… but I might have to risk trying to out-fly-fight him. He doesn’t look like he’s meant for fighting someone who can stay up in the air with him.”

“Good answers!” All Might told her. The compliment made her smile.  “Two out of five down.  Think they can pull it off?”

***

Kimiko was about to do something incredibly stupid.  But Mineta and Kenta were down and nothing Todoroki or Kaminari were throwing at Kamuy was going anything to slow her down for more than a moment.  Plus, there was the whole absorbing energy thing to deal with, which nullified Kaminari’s best attacks.

She’d gone invisible as soon as the woman had started swinging.  It had kept her safe, but it wasn’t doing anybody else any good.  Kimiko considered herself pretty good in a fight and she was a master of hitting things (as Kenta and Takuma could tell you), but against Kamuy…

Todoroki unleashed a blast of flame and that was what finally made Kamuy falter, dodging out of the way of the fire.  Fire wasn’t really energy like Kaminari’s electricity was, so maybe she couldn’t absorb that?  Over her shoulder, she could see the group that had been fighting Raptor rushing to join the last two ongoing fights.  The Twins were jetting off to help Midoriya’s group, while Aoyama and Tokoyami were coming Kamuy’s direction.

Either way, she had an opening.  It was time to do something stupid.   Keeping herself invisible and silent, she took a running jump and landed on Kamuy’s back.

“What the hell?” Kamuy shouted, trying to reach back to dislodge her.  But as muscular as she was, she didn’t have the flexibility to dislodge her, especially since she couldn’t see her.  Her legs wrapped around Kamuy’s middle, Kimiko reached up and put her hands on Kamuy’s face and extended her Quirk.  Normally, when she extended her Quirk over someone else, if she did it right, she could allow them to continue to see, even though light was no longer reaching their eyes.  Some kind of layering thing, Doctor Izumi had said, where she wasn’t stopping all of it, just some of it.  

But if she pushed it just right…

She couldn’t see it, but she could only imagine the horror show that was Kamuy’s eyes disappearing from her face.   “I can’t see!” Kamuy screamed, thrashing this way and that to try shake Kimiko off, but she’d learned more than a few things from her dad about clinging like a monkey.   “Gonna kill you, brat…!”

“Hit her now, guys!” Kimiko yelled.  “Hit her now!”

“But, I can’t…” Kaminari started.  

“It would not be safe…” Todoroki added.

Right.  Dammit.  Kaminari’s electricity and Todoroki’s fire would probably hurt her too.  Her best idea yet in this fight and she hadn’t thought it all the way through!

“Then leave it to moi!” Aoyama called out.   She could hear a faint sound, growing louder, a high pitched whine as he powered up his light to intense levels.  “Blinding Dazzle Beam!” Focused on Kamuy, Kimiko couldn’t see him from her perch, but she could hear the sound of a powerful laser firing.

Tokokyami’s voice joined in. “Verdant Cross-Slash!”

“Here I go!”

Kimiko jumped off just in time to see the combination of Aoyama’s laser and Tokoyami’s Frog-Shadow strike Kamuy, taking the big woman completely off guard and knocking her down.

“All right!” Kaminari shouted, doing what Kimiko hoped was supposed to be a victory dance.  “Go team!  Take that, scary giant lady!”

“Um, Chihiro…” Todoroki began, looking behind Kaminari.

“Not now, Izumi, I’m doing my victory dance!”

“I really think you should listen,” Tokoyami said.

“And look behind you,” Aoyama added.

“And please stop dancing,” Kimiko said.  “It’s just embarrassing.  And really not the time…!”

“Okay, I don’t know what I’m expecting to see, but I’m going to turn around and… aw, dammit!”

Kamuy was getting right back up.  She was steaming and shrinking a little, maybe using some of what she’d absorbed to keep herself going… but she was far from down.  The giant woman clapped her hands together faster than the eye could follow, unleashing a massive shockwave.  

Kimiko only had time to scream before everything went dark.

[tardis-sapphics]

Thought I'd take a chance and throw out a Thasmin prompt. an accident involving a teleport and the TARDIS freaky fridayish but they have access to each other feelings and memories 😁

okay i know you wanted something funny but i’m really i’ve gone full throttle angst. i hope that’s alright lol. thank you for the prompt, i’ve had a lot of fun playing around with this!

this is going to be a four-parter, and this is the first bit. i’ll post the second bit when i get home from travelling, and the other two parts should be ready by tomorrow or saturday. as always, they’ll be up on ao3 soon, too, but in that case they’ll be a two-parter. keep a look-out for updates on here and on ao3!

i’d also recommend listening to this song during it. i know it’s for broadchurch but it’s the right mood ok

as always, below the cut.

Every step is a beckoning. It doesn’t help them.

Lately, Yaz has found herself wondering about how deadinside the action heroes are on the films back home. Eyebrows furrowed, deadthin lines for mouths, every limb fluid only to run, to jump, to pull a trigger.

How do they not cry? How do they not bluster and fluster andfall? Why don’t they grip onto each other when the going gets tough – reallytough?

Ryan and Graham have each cried three times in the lasthour. They’re the bravest men Yaz knows.

(Films are a lie.)

Explosions and gunshots are a constant shock to the systemfor a trio not brought up in war. Their deafening nearer, louder. Yaz hassqueezed the Doctor’s hand more times she can count. Even after all they’vewitnessed together, after seeing all the bodies that have littered theirjourney through this planet, Yaz finds refuge in the Doctor. Every time. Shehas held on tightly that she is at risk of melding their bones together; butthen, at least, there would be less flesh to locate, to target, to shoot.

Sight, not sound, betrays them. Every step is a beckoning,so they do their best to float. Silent breaths flee in bewildered spirals: everythingpained to be anything but reluctant.

Yaz can see goosebumps on her forearm, the sleeve of herhoodie only pushed back to prevent any more bloodstains. She will not groan forfear of discovery. Winces are all impassion. She has too much passion.

At least the Doctor’s hand is warm in hers. Hood up,grey-white and spoiled red against the rust red rock, she leads the way; theymust follow the ripped coattails, so sure on this trembling planet.

‘She’s got to be around here somewhere,’ she mutters, almostmerely mouths. More to herself or to her friends, there is no indication.

Time is the first victim that war’s first bullet claims. Wardevours history – arrogant, starved – and feasts on futures for dessert. Thisplace lost time long ago; it is up to them to find it.

Madness.

A shot, then a snarl. Must be a foot soldier, prowling. ‘Sniffout the fear and find the traitors,’ they’d heard all around them. Yaz isterrified that fear will fail them, but it wafts off them in waves. Every stepinto the unknown is a beckoning. Every step is a step into ending.

The Doctor dives behind the nearest free-standing rock and slamsherself into it; they obediently press themselves against its jaggedness andpray to gods they do or don’t believe in.

They do not breathe.

There is no point in breathing.

‘Breathing is death; all is death,’ so the saying goes here.If they are to achieve the impossible – to defy all – then something as obviousas breathing would be a fool’s mistake.

Unfortunately, breathing is generally essential forsurvival, and Yaz can feel her lungs bursting with the effort to contain thecarbon dioxide building up.

Graham is going red as the rock that might save him.

A vein has started bulging in Ryan’s neck.

The Doctor is fine.

The soldier marches on, the two-beat rhythm quieting. Untilthe only rhythms they hear are their own accelerated heartbeats.

Exhalation has never been sweeter. Or more silent. Yaz feelsfuzzy and everything looks the same sort of red. The Doctor is fine. She helpsYaz to her feet and her gentle grip, slender fingers on the hook of Yaz’selbow, is central to everything.

‘You’re doing amazing,’ the Doctor whispers, hazel-greenpiercing into Yaz amongst the burnt blaze.

The words are so close that Yaz almost inhales them. Shestutters in her breath. Doesn’t want to let go, even though it doesn’t help herworldly disorientation. She nods, somehow.

The Doctor switches her attention to the two men, andgestures to them manically. ‘Come on, we’ve got to keep going,’ she adds, andthis, too, is more a shape than a sentence.

They move on.

Steps beckon.

The Doctor’s hand trails from Yaz’s elbow, via the undersideof the woman’s arm, to her hand, and squeezes. Yaz is shaking off herunworldliness but that touch still feels the most important thing.

One squeeze against countless. The inside pounding seems tobe in harmony with the relentless outside world. How Yaz wishes all therelentless stayed only inside their adrenaline.

A shot blasts off, a shot at someone, which lands inpainstaking acknowledgement. The world does not shudder. There is no one elseto perform the civilian’s ‘Last Post’ except themselves; no melody but the cry,no trumpet but the voice.

Yaz can hear Ryan’s reaction – something halfway between agrunt and a whimper. Graham whispers to his grandson, a wheeze of a sound, buteven then he cannot hide the tremble in his voice.

Yaz reaches out for Ryan, finds the teeth of the zip on hisjacket, and bunches the material in her hand. Ryan’s hand makes easy the uneasyjob to hold on – human warmth is preferable to cold material – and Graham completesthe line.

She turns her torso to face her friends. ‘You okay?’

They both nod. ‘You?’ Ryan asks.

‘No,’ is her reply, but there is nothing to say to it, sothey don’t try.

Still they trudge on, shielded by cliff edge and rockstructures. Shapes of stone and earth make this a labyrinth; they are yet to discoverwhether the promise of escape is just an illusion.

The Doctor didn’t flinch. Wars have gorged on time.

Yaz wonders – after the death in their movements on thebattlefields, where do the heroes go to cry?

Yaz wonders – where does the Doctor go?

They turn a corner as another shot rings out. The laser hitsthe rock next to Graham and he jumps, yelps.

‘Run, Doc, faster!’ The ground melts beneath Graham’sfootprints as he shouts and scatters. Quiet has failed them, so all, onceagain, is death. Graham is still defiant.

The Doctor gasps. ‘We found it! In there, go!’ She pointsher hand to her north-east, and ducks her body as they scamper in thatdirection.

Yaz yanks Ryan forward – his stumble, loud, is enough toyank Graham closer, closer to an opening inside the cliff they had not spottedbefore.

Disappearance is not death; they have defied it.

There are no lights for the disappeared, the unconsidered,so the Doctor procures her sonic screwdriver and keeps a steady finger on itsside. Its glow unearths an ice-cold cave: there is frost forming, stalagmitesand icicles spreading over each other. Red in colour; blazed by the orange ofthe alien light, they look aflame. Burning ice wouldn’t be the strangest thingon this planet.

The lack of the fire’s grumble banishes the illusion tofolly. Instead, the buzzing bounces off of walls to greet them louder than ever before, and Yaz’s wince evolves into irritation.

She hears Ryan groan at the sudden sound, and he lets go ofher.

‘Hello?’ the Doctor calls out.

‘Doc!’ Graham immediately hisses, and the Doctor turnsaround to blink at him in bewilderment. He’s standing to the side of the caveentrance, shaded from the light of the outside world. He and Ryan have releasedthemselves of held hands to favour recovery from the sprint. ‘What’re youdoing?’

‘You’re gonna get us killed!’ Ryan adds.

‘No, no, I promise, we’re quite safe now,’ the Doctor shakesher head, ‘as long that soldier hasn’t followed us.’ She stares at all three ofthem. ‘We’ll be leaving here soon, I promise.’

Her gaze lingers on the wound on Yaz’s arm, a scratchagainst enemy metal refusing to let up, and finally determination dissolvesinto remorse.

She takes off the hood with one arm and guides them deeperinside. Ryan and Graham follow, light treading.

Breath clouds in front of them all. The Doctor marches into herown mist. ‘Hello? It’s the Doctor. We came for a favour.’

They hear the sound of scuttling bouncing off the cave wallsbefore the sonic illuminates the source. A Viba in hiding, her four insect legsstruggling to find much purchase on the slippery rock ground. One leg slips,but she hurriedly rights herself. The clothes sewn around her humanoid torsoare ripped with giant holes, but there are no injuries underneath. Perhapsthey’ve healed, Yaz thinks. The planet has hidden her from certain death, fornow.

The two parties take a moment to study the other. Yaz cansee the details of the Viba’s sharp, jutting face. The bridge of her buttonnose flows into a wide brow; underneath, purple irises take up the entirety ofthe four eyes on show, and their pupils have receded in the sonic’s brilliantlight. Her eyes narrow as she regards the four of them: inhuman blinking on ahumanoid head – Yaz is reminded of cogs, working inside brains; a loadingscreen.

‘Plor,’ the Doctor addresses her. ‘It is Plor, yeah? CountessPlor. 3rd Andrun Battalion when you were 13.’

The Viba sniffs. Behind them, the soldier passes by theentrance of the cave, satisfied.

‘Doctor,’ Plor sighs. ‘You shouldn’t have come. Especiallywith them.’ Her head jerks towards the humans, visibly wounded and shaken,their lives dependent on the two aliens in front of them. Plor’s gaze drifts onthe Doctor and Yaz, and the little space between them.

‘I thought that I – we – could help,’ the Doctor admits. Hershoulders slouch but the sonic is still pointed forward, a sagging angle at herelbow.

‘You thought wrong,’ Plor cuts her off.

‘Clearly,’ but the Doctor’s words have no bite, unlikePlor’s.

‘We did help, though, Doc,’ Graham protests, ‘we helped abit.’

Plor’s four eyes pin him to the spot. ‘Yet the war stillrages.’

Yaz’s gaze gravitates to a stalactite near the Doctor’shead, copper alight, and the film rolls before her eyes. Crystal palaces.Honour and family. A helping hand, running, jumping, shelter and laughter.

(Films lie. The silence was terrible.)

‘So now you’re running?’

The Doctor nods. ‘This isn’t their war to fight,’ and Plorblinks. The Doctor continues, ‘Have you got the teleporter still? Give me acouple of minutes to work on it, and we’ll be out of your hair before you knowit.’ A drop of water echoes as Doctor considers the sight of her entirelyhairless alien friend. ‘Or, you know. Cave.’

Another shout from outside reaches their ears.

Plor blinks.

‘Come.’

Steps beckon freedom. Yaz treads tentatively, careful not toruin this blessing. The Doctor squeezes her hand again, a tense anticipationpassing from Time Lord to human, and although their threat of death has beenreduced since entering the cave, Yaz’s pulse is unrelenting.

It seems so loud in the silence.

They are rushed to another alcove deeper into the cave,where the sonic’s light becomes crowded by fire and alien technology. TheDoctor detaches herself and is immediately magnetised towards the lengthy blackbox and the pedestal at the centre of the room, caressing her sonic over itsedges. Both of the Viba mechanisms appear to be battered and aged, but still inworking condition. Working enough for the Doctor’s eyes to light up again. Thethree humans stand in the corner, useless but alive.

They can breathe now. Yaz tries it.

She swears she’ll never be silent again.

‘Well?’ Plor, sliding over to the pedestal, crooks aneyebrow at the trio. ‘Stand on it.’

They comply. Yaz strangely feels like she is stood on ahangman’s box. She taps it with her left foot, ungainly in her sturdy boots,and it clangs resoundingly. Yaz remembers the wound in her right arm andwinces.

The sound is met with a disgruntled hiss from Plor – it wasa disturbance enough for the outside world to listen in on, Yaz realises; acall to forget defiance. She might as well have walked out of the cave alone.But it’s sight, not sound, that defeats them, so Yaz is repentant butunworried.

She looks up to Plor, to apologise, and spots her scratchingincessantly, with long, unkempt nails, at a hairy patch on her left arm. A hairappears to be growing, in real time.

The Doctor looks over to Yaz with an apology in her eyes,but keeps her head down.

She takes only a minute more. Her persistent buzzing and afew keying in of commands on the pedestal’s interface has notified the TARDISof their location, she explains. The TARDIS will take care of them.

The Doctor plants her feet next to Yaz once her commentaryhas finished. A low humming immediately starts; their feet are forced intoimmobility on the box. The Doctor’s boots have knocked against Yaz’s.

‘There’s room on the box for you, Plor,’ she says as theViba types in more commands on the interface. It is a whole paragraph oftyping; the Doctor looking on with her brow furrowed.

To the untrained ear there would be no sound but hope in theDoctor’s voice. Yaz can hear the remorse that threatens the Doctor’sdetermination, the thin line of a mouth that speaks of future death. And sheknows Plor’s answer before she opens her mouth.

Plor nods her head, too busy typing to look up. It robs hervoice of intonation. ‘My place is here, with the unconsidered. I am to themwhat you were to me, all those years ago. But thank you.’ She presses a buttonon the pedestal, and the process begins.

For a second Plor’s face contorts. To the untrained eye itwould be sadness, but Yaz has seen enough war now to read the signs.

The box starts vibrating, the thrumming louder and louder. Plorlooks at the Doctor’s friends. ‘This is old technology, long before the war. Icannot guarantee it won’t hurt. Brace yourselves, it won’t be long.’

‘Doctor, I don’t think—’

Yaz forgets how to breathe again. The thrumming becomes awhirring, and the sides of the box are suddenly aflush with white light –bright white light. She doesn’t want it to hurt. In the last moment before thetransfer, they hear the whoosh of the TARDIS – and, on instinct, Yazgrabs the Doctor’s arm.

[coruscantexpat]

Bonds Unbroken - Chapter 5: Into the Depths

The further Meetra descended toward the mining tunnels, the more accurate Atton's warning about the heat became. A long ladder connected the escape hatch to - presumably, as she still couldn't see it - the floor of the mining tunnels, and even halfway down, the temperature had risen to a level that registered as uncomfortable even through the thin undergarment.  She paused to rest for a moment, the air beginning to burn nearly as much as her muscles were. Between the fights with the droids and the long climb, her body was beginning to feel the decade's dearth of upkeep.

A burst of white noise in her ear nearly startled her off the ladder before it gradually resolved into Atton's voice. "Can you read me?" The transmission was tinny and shot through with static.

Meetra wrapped an arm around the rung in front of her, freeing a hand to touch the commlink in her ear. "Barely - there's a lot of interference."

"Probably caused by that explosion." A brief pause accompanied by the faint clicking of keys. "Looks like there's a route down to the fuel depot. Well, if the passages haven't collapsed. That explosion knocked out most of the sensors."

"Oh, good. I was thinking this wouldn't be a challenge."

"What would the fun be in that?" Atton chuckled. "There should be an emergency crate near the bottom of the shaft; you might be able to find something useful in there. And watch yourself. There's a lot of droid broadcasts in that area, but I can't pin them down."

Meetra glanced down, squinting in the low lighting. She could just make out the faint blip of the beacon at the top of her staff, presumably lying on solid ground. She'd tossed it from the top of the shaft earlier, both to test the distance and out of an inability to carry it with her. There didn't appear to be anything else down there with it. "Thanks for the warning. If you detect anything, signal me."

"Will do - and be careful down there." The static cut off sharply, leaving behind an echoing silence. Meetra continued to climb down, forcing herself to ignore both the rising temperature and her screaming muscles. Several long, almost agonizing minutes later, the ladder rungs ended and her feet found the floor of the shaft. With her eyes fully adjusted to the darkness, she scanned her surroundings, but for the moment, she appeared to be alone. Scooping up her staff, she moved forward until she reached a door, cycled it, and stepped through.

For a moment, everything was white, her vision blinded by the change in lighting. Meetra dropped into a defensive crouch, staff held protectively in front of her, but she neither heard or sensed anything nearby. Gradually, her sight returned, revealing a room similar to the ones she had passed through previously: sterile chrome and ceramic with little aesthetic design. In the corner stood a lone crate; no doubt the emergency supplies Atton had mentioned. She opened it, pulling out more medpacs, a headband and harness of some sort, a few energy shields, two handheld mining blasters, and an actual vibroblade. Setting these aside, she dug deeper in the canister, coming up with a swath of blue and gold fabric.

The commlink crackled to life. "Find the supplies?"

"Right where you said," Meetra replied, unzipping and stepping into the mining uniform. It wasn't quite her size - it hung loosely on her frame and the sleeves fell past her wrists - but it provided a welcome layer of protection... and decency. "I found some weapons and mining equipment. A uniform, too."

"Dammit." Meetra paused in the act of zipping up the suit, mouth curving up into a half-smile of bemusement at Atton's exhalation. He began to backpedal, as if only just realizing what he had said. "Uh... I mean, good - good to hear it. No sense in you running around half-naked, it's distracting.... you know, for the droids." She smothered her laughter and didn't reply, choosing instead to let him wallow in the faux pas. "A-anyway, what kind of gear did you find?"

"There's a harness; looks like it goes around my waist and shoulders." As she spoke, Meetra pulled it on over the mining uniform. "I also found some kind of headband. There's sensors on either side."

"Survey gear," he replied. "It's designed to spot and protect you against sonic mines. The safety harness will be helpful if you try to disarm them. Not that I'd advise it." Meetra filed the information away. She had experience disarming mines during the Mandalorian Wars, but she kept silent. She didn't want to make Atton any more distrustful of her than he already was, or give him a reason to become a threat. She slipped the headband on, allowing it to rest just above her ears. The sensors projected an overlay in front of her, though nothing registered at the moment. "Did you find any mining shields?"

"A few. Are they different from regular energy shields?"

"Not much. They're designed to protect the miners against lasers and heat. Should work against the droids. You still want to be careful, though. They're not as durable, and they won't last more than a few hits."

Meetra strapped one of the shields over her left wrist, slipping the others into one of the pouches on the safety harness, along with the handful of medkits. "Understood. Anything else?"

"Uh, just one more thing." The was uneasiness in Atton's voice. "I've narrowed down some of the ID signals. If the numbers are right... you're sharing those tunnels with a battalion of mining droids." Meetra groaned inwardly, muscles twinging at just the thought of more fighting. "They rely on thermal sensors to get around, and that explosion down there kicked up so much heat and steam that it may blind them a bit.. but not much. You could try to sneak past them, but it'll be risky."

"And if they do spot me?"

"That's why you took the big stick." It was easy to hear the smirk in his words and she smiled despite herself. Crass and full of himself Atton might be, but when he showed confidence, it was infectious. "Actually, there's got to be some central controller down there. Look for a terminal by the main access shaft; that'd be the governing intelligence. If you can reach that, you may be able to shut the droids down, or at least get them back on their original programming."

"I'll keep an eye out. Let me know if anything changes." Meetra tapped the commlink, cutting the broadcast. As much as Atton's chattering put her at ease, it would be harder to focus with him talking in her ear. She unbuckled the harness briefly and slid the mining blasters onto one of the straps, triple checking the safeties for her own peace of mind. The vibroblade she attached to the uniform's belt. Retrieving her staff, she headed out into the tunnels, the steam and heat causing a sheen of sweat to form instantly on her brow.

Before long, the metal hallways gave way to proper stone tunnels, fissures of steam bursting out of cracks in the rocks. Just ahead, Meetra could make out a few droids milling about. They hadn't spotted her yet, and she hugged the tunnel wall as she passed them, hiding her body heat in the steam. Further in, the corridor opened up into a wide room, effectively making it impossible for her to sneak past. Three droids patrolled the area, spidery legs creating an unholy cacophony against the stone floor. Meetra crouched at the entrance to the room, scanning their movements. When the nearest droid turned toward her, she lunged forward, making a sweeping motion with her hand as she ran. The Force answered as readily as it had before, and the droid flew forward, smashing into the rock wall. She was upon it before it could recover, bringing the staff down in a sharp strike and caving in the droid's faceplate. It twitched, spindly legs flailing, and she struck it again, the time with the spike.

The droid went still, but the commotion had attracted the other two. They clattered forward, raising their blasters, and Meetra slapped the energy shield on her wrist before rolling to the side. The shield hummed to life, a barrier rising around her. One of the droid's bolts struck it, fizzling out against the opposing energy. Though she was unharmed, the impact still sent Meetra stumbling, forcing her to plant her staff against the ground to steady herself. Another bolt glanced off the shield, causing it to flicker. Footing regained, she darted forward underneath the nearer droid's guard and levered her staff beneath it, flipping it onto its side between her and the remaining droid. Spinning the beacon, she stabbed its point into the prone droid, putting it out of commission before it could right itself.

The last droid scuttled from side to side, trying to get a clear shot around her makeshift cover. Keeping low, Meetra focused on a pile of rubble, reaching out with the Force. It still weak and small, nothing compared to the torrent it had been over a decade ago. It felt different, as well; before, the Force had flowed through her, a natural extension of her will. Now, it felt like it was echoing, ricocheting and distorting within her. Part of her was too relieved that she could use the Force again to care, while another part was terrified it meant that her returning control was only temporary. She managed to lift one of the bigger rocks, sending it slamming into the droid and crushing two of its legs. It struggled to pull itself free and Meetra leaped over the broken droid, slamming her staff into its trapped compatriot. She brought her staff down twice more before it stopped moving.

Leaving the droid massacre behind, she continued forward, coming to a sharp halt when a translucent dome appeared on her survey gear's overlay. As if on cue, a crackle of static preceded Atton's voice on the commlink. "Watch your step - I'm picking up a lot of sonic mines down there. Don't run unless you have to. Makes them harder to spot."

"You have impeccable timing; I'm looking at one now." She glanced down the hallway, frowning when more signals appeared. "Make that several. Why are there so many mines down here?"

"The droids," Atton explained. "They're designed to set and arm charges for mining. If they set the charges after they went rogue, they may have used them to try and kill the miners..." There was a long pause, and Meetra could guess his next words. "Probably might try to use them to kill you, too. Some of the droids, the excavators mainly, may try to use any undeployed charges as projectiles, so... yeah.” He cleared his throat, as if delivering bad news physically pained him. “Also, the super-heated steam I mentioned earlier? I’m reading pockets with temperatures ahead of you high enough to cook the skin off your bones.”

Meetra grimaced. “Thank you for that image.”

“Hey, would you rather me be honest or pleasant?”

”Point taken.”

Full chapter available on AO3 and FFN.