Chapter 52: 4-5 Seal

Seal 4.5

2010, November 26: Damascus, Syria

Brockton Bay's medical contingent consisted primarily of villains: Othala, Victor, Newter, and myself. By contrast, only Panacea and Clockblocker represented the heroes. All the others had gone to the hazard management or search and rescue division, including, to my surprise, Shadow Stalker.

She had apparently insisted on attending the fight, not just showing up after the fact like us prey animals, so she could see the best predators in the world in action… or something… Regardless of her motivations, it was just about the only unambiguously good thing I'd ever heard of her doing, so out of character in fact that I actually forgot she attended this in canon, if this wasn't some weird butterfly effect.

When I caught up to the others, they were in the midst of receiving another explanation from a different volunteer who spoke in a thick accent.

"Behemoth emerged thirty miles from the pipeline and walked due east through the city," he said. Once he reached the pipe, he traveled north, breaking everything for another twenty miles before the heroes drove him off. A series of medical stations have been set up framing his trail without entering the irradiated area."

"Where does that leave us?" Victor asked.

"You will be working at medical station B-3 and rotate with the team there. If your power needs special preparation, tell the volunteers at the station."

Things moved swiftly after that. The station the guide mentioned was the picture of organized chaos. The lobby of a conveniently located hotel had been stripped of all furniture in favor of laying out more beds and portable dividers for triage purposes. Volunteers hauled everything from pallets of water bottles to extra blankets and bandages. Medics shouted for one thing or another but were drowned out by the groans and screams that made up the general drone of the atmosphere.

There, one of the tired nurses recognized Panacea and rushed over. "Oh, thank God you're here, Panacea," she said with a relieved sigh. "We'll get you a station immediately. Do the rest of you know what you should be doing?"

"I can do anything," Victor said smoothly. "Triage, surgery, doesn't matter. Othala can grant low-level regeneration and will assist me."

"Very well. Bilal! Come here!" she yelled. A young man who couldn't be older than twenty rushed over. "Get these two space. Surgical tools. Room for two beds."

Clockblocker stepped up next. "I can stop time for whoever I touch, but I won't know when they'll unfreeze. Can be thirty seconds or ten minutes. They won't get worse, but no one else can treat them either."

"Go back to the front. Tell them Mariah sent you for emergency triage. Explain to them what you can do. They'll put you to use. And you, orange boy."

"Ah, I put people to sleep. If you touch my sweat, it'll knock you out for a few hours. No side effects."

"Tested against medication?"

"All the common ones in America," he confirmed. I believed him; Faultline was thorough if nothing else. "Actually, do you have a jacket? So I don't rub my arm against anyone on accident?"

"Yes, stay. I will lead you to the beds and you will put them to sleep. Then go join the clock boy outside. Maybe I can hear myself think then. And you, sentai boy?"

Amy spoke up for me. "He's with me. Says he has healing tech. I'm going to make sure he doesn't kill anyone then send him back to you."

"Good. Good to work with you again, Panacea. Now let's move!" She rushed us to a corner occupied by a conventional trauma nurse of some stripe. "Samuel! You've been working too long! Panacea is here to take over, get out!"

The nurse, a bleary-eyed blonde with a German flag on his lapel, nodded. He dropped the sutures where he was and allowed Mariah to manhandle him out of the partitioned room.

Amy turned to me with her typical scowl. She tapped the man who'd been getting sewn up on the spine, sedating him instantly. She then proceeded to rip up the sutures with careless disregard; it didn't matter anyway now that she was here. "Alright. Cliffnotes. What the fuck is 'healing tech?'"

"Alchemy. Turning one thing into another thing. Transmuting someone's injury into regular flesh and bone," I said hurriedly. "As long as all the pieces are still here, I should be able to put it all back together. I can't regrow anything though. I'm also uncomfortable doing brains."

"Good. You should be. Heal him."

I studied the patient on the table. There were multiple lacerations on his body, from what, I didn't know. I hated blood back in my old life, but the knowledge I gained from Marcoh and other fleshcrafting alchemists took over. I quickly diagnosed him to the best of my abilities; I didn't need to fix everything, just fix enough to keep him alive. I put my hands on his chest and began to draw the energy from the earth's core.

Funny, that the lava monster who caused this mess and the power to heal him came from the same place.

The back of my right glove began to glow with a silver light. Overlapping circles and pentagons, each inscribed with script too small to see, came to life and acted as channels filled with the planet's energy. How this shit wasn't magic was beyond me, but according to Fullmetal Alchemist, it was science, with clear laws and principles that had to be obeyed.

As we watched, the man's wounds began to stitch themselves together. In a matter of seconds, he was whole again.

Amy took her hand off the patient. "Okay, that, that was fucky. But congratulations, you can fix lacerations. You didn't do anything about his liver, I noticed."

"He had a bad liver?"

"Drinking. Shit's not our problem. You need to be told what the problem is? No super-Google to diagnose for you?"

"Gave that away for search and rescue," I said with a shrug.

"Dumbass."

"Nah, it'll save more people out there. Besides, it's too big once unfolded to fit here."

"Fine, whatever." She peeked outside and yelled. "NEXT!"

Two volunteers rushed in and picked up the man. They must have run out of gurneys because they just grabbed him by the arms and legs and hauled him out of there like a sack of rice. Another pair immediately came back, this time with what looked like a piece of a fence rammed through his chest cavity.

Amy touched his head. "Brain death hasn't set in yet. Fix him."

I nodded. There was no time to argue. I ripped out the fence post as gingerly as I could and began. "Collapsed right lung. Sternum broken. Coastal ribs, third, fourth, and fifth shattered." I continued to examine and recite the wounds. It took me a minute. Without Amy keeping him stable, there was no chance in hell I would have saved him in time. "Did I get everything?"

"Yeah. Now do that glowy thing. All the pieces are here."

"Okay… Inflating lungs… Connecting blood vessels… Nerves… Restructuring muscles… Bones…"

"Good. You can remake organs and bones."

"Yeah, that's all I'm comfortable doing. I could eliminate diseases and cancers too," I told her. Diseases and cancers were easy. Just find the cells that didn't belong and convert it all into red blood cells. Or constituent compounds. Or any number of harmless chemicals the body can process on its own. "I'd need to be told where and what's wrong though."

"If they bring you someone without an arm, can you close the wound?"

"Yeah, I can. I can build them automail later."

"What? Never mind; it doesn't matter. Burns?"

"Yes. Poisons too."

She nodded and rushed out again. "Mariah! Creed's good to go! Give him someone to triage for him!"

I walked out with her. The chaos hadn't died down any, but the lobby was infinitely quieter. Or maybe not, but it seemed that way without all the screaming.

I was quickly given a separate bed next to Amy and told to get to work. We had no time to talk; my first patient was already being rolled in. She was a cape of some stripe with an eye-searingly yellow leotard. That it had been melted to her skin didn't exactly make it any more endearing.

A medic stepped into the room to greet me. He set a walkie-talkie onto a shelf. "I'm Patrick Wilshire, a paramedic from Britain working with the Suits. I'll be outside to prognose incoming patients. You'll hear it through the walkie-talkie as they come in to save us some time."

"Thank you. Creed. Glad to have you," I spoke as I alchemically separated the cape's costume from carbonized skin. Her suit was still a lost cause and the regenerated skin was as pale as my Irish ass, but she'd live. "Done."

"Gotcha. NEXT!"

And so my day passed in a blur of patients. It was exhausting. I was once again reminded why I'd avoided the surgery track in school. Maybe because this fifteen year old body wasn't as used to the all-nighters of grad school, but I didn't remember my ER rotation being half this bad. Then again, my world didn't have endbringers.

They didn't completely trust Amy at her word. Panacea or not, world's best healer or not, we were rushed and power testing in under ten minutes would be unreasonable at the best of times. Throughout the day, they brought in a variety of different patients, each with unique injuries ranging from conventional trauma to radiation poisoning. The only two rules they kept in mind were "no brains" and "all the pieces must be here."

I forced the bile back down my throat and continued to work. I'd adapt. It was amazing what the human body could get used to. Entrails now out-trails? That's fine. Shove it back in and move on. Electrical burns leaving fractals that weep blood and pus? Just fix the internals and leave them with a sick scar to show off. Move on.

I didn't know how many people I saw by the time my shift ended five hours later. It could've been only a few dozen. It could've been thousands. They all blurred together until they became as featureless as Truth.

I failed a couple times. No, more than a couple times. Sometimes, I was too late and they'd already succumbed to their injuries. Other times, both Patrick and I missed one critical injury or another that continued to fuck them up even as everything else was fixed. Alchemy wasn't Shaper's miracle biomancy, no matter how many times people compared me and Amy. It relied on my knowledge, not some eldritch alien whale-fragment.

Those were the hardest to accept. Those were the ones I could have saved. If I had more knowledge, more experience, I knew some of those people would be alive. Had Behemoth attacked even a week later, I would have gotten fully through everyone in Amestris, maybe even started on Hohenheim and Father's knowledge base.

But he attacked now. Today. And time was one of the few things I couldn't bend with alchemy.

'On the plus side, at least they'll get to look pretty for their funerals,' I thought tiredly. Then I immediately felt like scum for thinking it. There was something about this bone-deep weariness that seeped into my head and brought out the worst in me.

I stayed on shift for five hours. Then I went back to Amy's section and watched as she damn near brought someone back from the dead.

She was about to stick her head back out to call the next guy when I jabbed her in the side with a weak Thunder Wave, just enough to give her an unpleasant jolt. I grabbed her by the scruff of the neck and began to drag her out of the hotel.

"What the hell, Creed?" she yelled.

"Nope. We're taking a break. Mariah! Patrick! We're gone for an hour!" I called.

The head nurse? Operations director? She just nodded and waved us off. "Water's to the left. Got some granola bars and coffee too. Bathroom's to the right. Good work, kids."

Amy hung limply in my arm as I skated along. Her arms were crossed in an annoyed pout but didn't actually struggle. Personally, I thought she wanted it this way, wanted someone else to understand the experience, and for that person to still tell her, "Enough." Because then, it wouldn't be some nobody. It'd be someone who knew what this was like.

I was still tired, mentally as much as physically, but I allowed myself to feel a little better about today knowing I'd gotten a bit closer to breaking through to my best friend.

I ignored the refreshments and led Amy to the resting area set aside for the volunteers. Halfway there, she started to walk back.

"Amy-"

"Bathroom. Or are you going to follow me inside and make sure I don't start healing people's period cramps in there?" she bit back.

"Fine, but don't you go back to work. One hour."

"Ugh, I'd say you're as bad as mom, but we'd both know I'm lying. You're worse."

"Good. Because I'm sure your sister would do the same here," I said. Was it emotional blackmail to namedrop Vicky? Absolutely. Did I care? No.

A few minutes later, Amy joined me as promised. The resting area was a small coffee shop set aside next to the hotel lobby. It hadn't been stripped down when the lobby was converted into an impromptu hospital because the booths were too heavy and even medics needed to sit down once in a while. The cafe was filled with people from our shift who'd likewise decided to take a break for a bit.

The two of us probably looked a little strange, one of the most respected heroes in the world getting forced into timeout by a self-professed villain. Granted, most people had better things to do than pay attention to us, but I felt like it'd get on that we got along a bit too well. Panacea and Creed weren't supposed to know each other.

"Thank you," I said, a tad louder than strictly necessary. Amy raised an eyebrow in unspoken question. "For agreeing to validate my healing tech. I owe you for that, as does every person I saved today."

"What are you talking about? It's truce. That's what I'm supposed to do," she scoffed.

"True enough, but this is about more than the truce. You know how rare healing powers are. Yourself excluded, healers almost always do so incidentally, as a side effect or unorthodox application of their powers. Today has opened up a market I could not capitalize on. People would naturally be suspicious of any form of biotinkering. But with your validation and this trial by fire…"

"You're a greedy son of a bitch."

"I am a mercenary. This is business."

"Is that why you came? To meet me? For a 'business opportunity?'" she interrogated. There was real hurt in her eyes and I realized I was laying it on a bit thick.

I tapped the table with a finger. When her eyes trailed to my glove, I pointed subtly at the people who were watching. "To meet you? Yes, I suppose that's one reason for my sudden bout of charity. There is a great deal I can gain from events such as this that cannot be bought with money."

Amy gaped like a fish. Her mouth moved up and down but no sound came out as she connected the dots: Bryce Kiley and Amy Dallon were friends. Creed and Panacea? The merc and the single most altruistic cape alive? Logic said we ought to be at each other's throats.

"What do you want," she growled, a little less overtly hostile now that she knew what I was doing. Her annoyance was still very much audible.

"To express my gratitude," I said again. I dug around in the expanded bag on my hip and pulled out a sandwich and thermos before offering them to her. "Want one? I owe you a fair bit more than a meal, but this is a start."

"What's in it?"

"Pastrami, swiss, grilled onions, sauerkraut, and horseradish-mayo on a ciabatta roll."

She eyed the parchment-wrapped bundle as if it was a pipe bomb. Still, she knew the food was fine. Even had I not been a friend, poisoning Panacea at an endbringer cleanup would be the single fastest way to get on everyone's shitlist.

Just as well, because I happened to know this was her favorite sandwich. "Fuck. Fine, yes. Thermos?"

"Coffee. Enchanted honey mixed in, should give you a lot of energy. Drink sparingly."

Amy narrowed her eyes. Clearly, she'd put together that this was technically a biotinkered creation but was too drained to bite my head off over it. For the moment. I figured that now, when she was tired and had already accepted my bullshit alchemical healing as being an objectively good thing, was the best time to force open her doors just a bit.

Besides, she clearly needed the drink.

She poured out a few drops onto the table. Then, as if it was a puddle of lava and not sugary caffeine, she stuck her pinky in it. Her eyes flew open with naked surprise. "What the fuck did you make?"

"It's coffee, as promised," I said, allowing my voice modulator to carry a bit more of my usual smugness.

"You made a complex sugar that wraps around itself, sheathed it in an enzyme that regulates its access to free-floating water molecules, and arranged it so that it dissolves over time to extend the sugar rush for hours. There's also an enzyme that keeps the body from getting desensitized to it. This complex sugar is a chemical chain of hundreds of simple sugar molecules. How?"

"Is it dangerous?"

"Creed, how the fuck did you make this?"

"Is. It. Dangerous?"

"I-No. It's not, it's just an insane energy boost. With a crash that isn't any worse than from a normal sugar high. You… How long have you had this?"

"It's a tinkering aide," I said evasively. I wondered just what Shaper felt seeing this. I hated to rely on a Shard's goodwill, such a thing didn't actually exist, but hopefully, seeing this would make Shaper nudge Amy in positive directions. "You know, for late nights."

She poured some out into the cap and raised it gingerly to her lips. It was like she didn't trust her own power. No, not like, that's exactly what this was. She didn't trust herself to have missed something that might fuck her over later.

I pulled down the chin guard of my helmet, wrapping it around my throat like a gorget. I then reached over and took the thermos before taking a nice gulp. The comforting aroma of coffee filled my nose as the intense sweetness of the honey sank in. I'd only included a fraction of a teaspoon for this entire bottle, but the flavor of the enchanted honey, manmade but processed using royal jelly harvested from vespiquen hives, still came through.

Amy eyed me carefully, probably to make sure I wouldn't turn into an alchemical monstrosity like Lab Rat. When nothing happened, she took a tentative sip. Her face lit up. For the briefest moment, so fast I would've sworn I'd imagined it, she smiled. Smiled. At a biotinkered concoction.

I couldn't keep the smug, self-satisfied grin on my face. I'd done it, something almost as impressive as healing. I made Amy appreciate a biotinkered creation.

Then she saw my smirk and the smile vanished like the morning dew. "Shut up."

I raised my hands in defense. "I said nothing."

"Fuck you, you were thinking something stupid."

"I am grateful that you have validated yet another marketable product."

She raised a middle finger and pulled the thermos to her side with a scowl. "Fuck off. This is mine now."

"Of course, please enjoy your lunch."

X

I then got up and began to serve the other volunteers on break from the spare thermoses I'd brought, a cup per person. Eventually, halfway through her sandwich, Amy saw that she was the only one with a full thermos and grudgingly began donating her share as well.

I slid two paper cups to the Nazi pair.

"Oh? Are you done networking with Panacea?" Victor asked smoothly. His voice struck that delicate medium between respectful and amused. I wondered if he'd stolen the skill from an orator of some sort or if he'd always been this naturally smarmy.

"I have. Tinkered coffee, verified safe by Panacea. Tad sweet. Don't drink it if you're diabetic. Otherwise, it's an effective energy boost," I said with a professional nod.

"I'm surprised you would offer us your products. We've tried to reach out and you have been… silent."

"Don't get your hopes up. Like Faultline said, the truce is a form of contract."

"And we can expect the mercenary to respect the contract. Of course, how professional of you. Speaking of contracts-"

I held out a hand. "No. my pipeline is rather full at the moment. There is much left to do to refine my healing tech and several professional obligations I must juggle."

"Pity. May we know what those contracts are? Or perhaps who holds them?"

"The GOAT. All the rest are confidential," I said flatly. I began to walk away, "If you'll excuse me, I owe Newter and Clockblocker the same."

X

I found the pair outside, leaning against the hotel's fountain and pointedly not looking at the incoming patients. Their work wasn't physically draining, both could activate their powers with a touch, but it couldn't have been easy for the two most jocular capes in Brockton to be here.

Clock had his faceplate off, revealing the freckled ginger I ate lunch with. His only nod to the unwritten rules was a domino mask that was more about the message than any real attempt to hide his identity. He had a granola bar in his mouth and was doing his best to joke with the merc as if this was a normal outing.

For his part, Newter looked almost as drained as Clock. There were a handful of volunteers laid out around him, their minds somewhere off in outer space.

"Do I want to know what happened to them?" I gestured to the volunteers as I skated over.

"We're on break and we can all use a little relaxation," Newter said with a nod. He flicked his tail at me. "Want a lick?"

"Pass. I came to give you drugs of my own, actually," I chuckled. I quickly explained what my coffee did and handed both capes a thermos and a sandwich each.

"I swear, man, you make something new every time I see you," Newter grumbled goodnaturedly. "Seriously, what the hell is your specialization?"

"Bullshit. My specialization is bullshit. I can make anything so long as at least one cape around me would look at it and say, 'Fuck, that's bullshit.'"

"Wait… Is that possible? I don't actually know how specializations work."

Clock shrugged. "Don't look at me. I'm not the tinker on my team. Actually, about that, Kid Win has the biggest man-crush on you. Or The GOAT. Or he wants to kill you. I'm not sure which anymore. Just thought I'd let you know."

"Ehh, that's fine," I shrugged. "It was bound to happen. KW's got the potential to be one of the greatest tinkers, alive and dead. He deserves a bit of a leg up."

"Why? I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm happy you helped him out, but doesn't helping the heroes hurt you?"

"Not as much as you'd think. I'm all about selling tech and keeping the balance in the city, remember? I'm thinking that if the heroes get a little stronger, the gangs will be that much less likely to start shit."

"Makes sense. Say, about your healing…"

"Yes?"

"You take jobs, right?"

I frowned. Did Dennis have anyone he needed healed?

Then I remembered. He… He did. His trigger. He got his power when he felt helpless to save his dad. His dad had… cancer? Something like that. Dennis wanted to fix his dad but got a power that only lets him stop the situation from getting worse for a few minutes.

I felt like an idiot for forgetting. The worst part was that I vaguely remembered thinking about this at some point. It was in my notes somewhere, had to be, but that didn't help if I didn't review them often.

In the end, I decided to let him speak. I could speak over him. Or maybe receive a "call" from The GOAT using the voice modulator to increase the mystique of the thinker persona, but that didn't feel right. Dennis was a friend. We weren't close, but he tried his best as a hero and had gone out of his way to help me make an exercise plan when I first became a cape.

I owed it to him to hear the story from his mouth.

"I do," I said, "and with Panacea's greenlight, I suspect I will be able to charge a premium."

"How much? How much would it take to cure someone's cancer?"

"That depends on the person. I take it this is someone you know?"

He nodded shakily. "My-Sorry, I can't say exactly who… He's someone important to me. This power…"

"Say no more. I get the gist." If I remembered correctly, Amy would fix his dad following Leviathan's arrival. Except, that wasn't a future I could count on anymore. "Have you not asked Panacea? She is the better healer between us, and will always be for that matter."

"She doesn't take requests," he said with a sigh.

Fear. That's what it was. He was terrified of rejection, of finding out just how much their friendship was worth to Amy, of her deciding that it wasn't worth more than her personal creed after all. I wondered if he'd seen something similar play out before. He'd known Amy long enough for that.

Maybe, maybe he was afraid of what he'd do, the things he'd say to her when she said no.

And she would say no, just like she rejected helping Sabah's father directly. Canon Amy had slowly begun to break down her moral walls. Her respect for Dennis as a hero had likewise grown following an endbringer. But the way she had been a few months ago? She would have definitely turned him down.

I'd help; I wasn't heartless, but I did have an image to maintain. I hummed quietly as if in deep thought. Finally, I raised a single finger into the air. "One. One life, one favor. You won't know what this favor is. My only promise is that it will not be illegal. It may be unpleasant, humiliating, or even morally wrong despite its legality. However, you will do it."

"I-"

"Yes or no, Clockblocker. There are rules I abide by, my creed if you must. The foremost of these is reciprocity. There must be an equivalent exchange."

"Fine. Yes," he said with an explosive sigh. He muttered something about a deal with the devil.

"Then send this person's hospital room number to my PHO account. I will handle the rest within a week of our return to the states," I promised. I didn't have a favor locked down, for him or Glyph, but I had some vague ideas, things I couldn't do on my own. I'd simply have to learn to prioritize.

"I… Thank you."

"It is a transaction, no more and no less."

Newter chimed in at that. "So… Do we get the same deal?"

"Can you speak on behalf of Faultline?" I asked him in turn. "She has already expressed the desire to meet with me after."

"Yeah, that's fair. But she'd probably like a deal like this."

"I am open to such an arrangement." I could see the hunger in his eyes. It wasn't hard to figure out what he was thinking. I had to pop that bubble. "However, I am incapable of fixing Case-53s as I am. Your atypical biology will likely require case by case study on my part."

He looked disappointed. Could I make him a new body? There was an alchemical circle for soul transferral after all. Alphonse Elric. Barry the Butcher. It'd been done before.

No, that was a terrible idea. As much as I didn't want to disappoint him, bodies actively decayed and went mad when inserted with a soul that wasn't their own. I knew that for a fact from back when they found Barry's original body. There had to be a way though…

Just one more project to add to the pile…

Author's Note

Yes, I know Sophia attended the Behemoth fight. Yes, I did forget. Shoutout to Euth on Pat-re-on who pointed it out to me.

Radiation isn't like a virus. Someone who is poisoned by radiation isn't himself radioactive. The material will continue to be radioactive, but so long as he's not bringing that into the hospital, it's fine.

I'm sure that's not really how the body processes sugar. Please don't crucify me, nutritionists. As always, I don't need to be accurate with my technobabble, just good enough to sound plausible to a middle schooler.

On another note, how many of you forgot that Bryce made this weird honey-thing during his very first month?