38

Extension 1

I spent all the time before our move to Concord pre-expanding my bots in the direction of the new city. With nearly every bot I could spare, I was churning through the materials of the local landfill and sending bots migrating west. The materials I needed wasn't really an issue; it was the distance. While I could probably produce enough brains to cover the distance between Brockton Bay and the new city in a day, moving them that distance without being noticed was the real problem. My bots worked best together – moving them individually, they couldn't even match the speed of an ant, a giant group larger than Abyssal could move together at highway speeds. It really was a matter of how much I was willing to risk being noticed. For now, I was moving them in small groups the size of little animals; even if someone caught something from the corner of their eye they probably wouldn't think much of it. I just needed to drop another clone brain every quarter-mile or so to maintain the network.

Physically, I spent most of the day with Lisa, trying to figure out her brain. With very little to pack, I spent most of my day with her after talking with the doctors at the hospital. She was recovering, but not fully conscious. Every once in a while her eyes would open and she might speak a few words, but she was incoherent and not fully cognizant of where she was. And more than once, I messed up a few connections and she would go into a seizure.

I was desperately hoping I was actually helping more than harming her. Sure, I was using my own brain as a general template, but the number of ways to connect and replace a billion neurons was still massive and it was taking a whole lot of trial-and-error.

Dragon was extremely interested and helpful. In fact, she used her computers to help me keep track of what I had tried, being even more accurate and precise than me with a few thousand human-like brains. It seemed like she was happy to gain this research even though it wasn't the main reason she had wanted to collaborate with me.

Amy dropped by after her last shift at the hospital, mostly to maintain Lisa's general health. She also brought along some nutrient solution to keep her fed intravenously.

All that work left me with a little bit less attention to spend on patrolling the streets with Abyssal, but most of the major fighting had died down. I was still dealing with the occasional Empire member or wannabe who was trying to snipe us from our homes, but I tended to catch them so quickly they could barely be charged with a crime. As for the rest of the city, there wasn't much left that the PRT and Protectorate couldn't handle, as Lung was being quiet for now.

In fact, they were out on patrol pretty aggressively – possibly in an attempt to produce more good news after Armsmaster's disastrous mistake. I certainly didn't mind, because it let me concentrate on more immediate issues. Like moving.

Dragon was understandably precise. She had to be, when she was a tinker who was simultaneously coordinating dozens of factories, monitoring the most secure prison in the world, managing S-class threats around the world, AND still had time to invent new things. And she still had time for me.

When I told her we would be ready at two o'clock, my bots watched the unique, boxy vehicle get into gear at three-fifty, expertly navigate traffic, and pull up in front of the Dallons' home at 1:59. The vehicle stopped and its doors opened at precisely when the numbers on my phone's clock changed over.

"Dad, Dragon's here. I'm going to go ahead, then!" I had briefly mentioned the plan earlier in the day, but I think he may have been distracted. He was leaning against the counter, sandwich in hand, trying to parse the words that had gone into his ears. After we had finished packing and loading, we were all sitting around a bare kitchen, having random leftovers to finish whatever we could out of the fridge.

"Wait, you're getting a ride from Dragon? The Dragon?" Eric exclaimed.

"Yeah, she's outside," I said, pointing my thumb over my shoulder to the street.

Eric rushed to the window to look. He got there just in time to watch the vehicle unfold, parked right behind the moving van. Satellite dishes and antennas rose from the top, the sides expanded, robotic arms stretched out. A door opened from the side to an empty chamber I hadn't seen before.

A small version of Dragon's drone suit stepped out, waving. "Hello, Eunoia. Shielder. And everyone else in New Wave. Eunoia has asked me to be here to help you with moving? The cargo bay of my mobile workshop isn't as large as it seems, but I'm sure it can carry a fair amount of your luggage, if you need it."

"Hi Dragon!" Crystal said, floating out of the house to join her brother. "Umm, would you like anything to drink?"

Dragon laughed. "Sorry, but this suit doesn't drink anything other than coolant and synthetic lubricant," she said. "I can't actually be here, due to my... condition. But thanks for the offer."

I wondered what exactly was the condition she had. I never asked, because it seemed impolite. She was always vague about it. I got the sense she wasn't keen on sharing it, so I didn't push. Maybe she had some kind of immunodeficiency? Or maybe it was psychological. Agoraphobia, maybe? If it was, maybe if I got even better with brain issues, I could help her with that.

"Dragon. Nice to see you here," Mrs. Dallon said. "If I may ask, what are you doing here?"

"Oh, I've been collaborating with Eunoia on a few projects. Since you're all moving, I hope you don't mind if I come along."

"I suppose not. It's always good to see heroes working together," she said. That was honestly the most courteous I'd ever seen her. At least, outside of her professional work. Then again, Dragon commanded a lot of respect.

Dad was just staring. I realized he hadn't responded to me. I nudged him until he got the idea.

"Uh. Yeah. I guess Dragon's pretty trustworthy, huh? Go ahead and ride with your… friend."

"I suppose I should ride with you," Amy said. I got the sense that she just didn't want to be stuck in a car with her family instead of the desire to be in Dragon's workshop. I was glad to have her, though.

"There's probably going to be a lot of tech talk along the way," I warned her.

Amy shrugged. "I don't mind."

"Can I ride too?" Eric asked eagerly.

I paused. I didn't want to show him Lisa as I was operating on her. I gave Dragon a hesitant look, and she seemed to understand quickly. "Sorry. Despite the size of the vehicle, the interior space is quite limited and there is some sensitive equipment inside. Two passengers is probably the limit."

Eric let out a huge sigh and floated back to the house.

"Have you considered letting the rest of your team know the extent of your abilities?" Dragon asked as the we set out. Amy looked at me as well, interested in my answer.

"Um… eventually. But only when I'm ready. Or, more like, when I'm confident I know what the extent of my abilities actually are," I said. "Amy, how am I doing?"

"I think the signals to the limbs are working properly now. Can you slow down the conduction more? It's still a little too fast. I think it's causing a little overstimulation, and I think the hemispheres of her brain are having problems keeping things synchronized."

"Oh, right," I said. I continued to tweak Lisa's brain for a while. I knew we were close, there were only a few minor things to fix. I couldn't get everything perfect, but hopefully I was close enough and the brain's natural adaptability would do the rest for Lisa's recovery.

"I think this is pretty close. As far as I can tell, her brain activity is close to normal for someone sleeping," Amy told me a few adjustments later. "I'll wake her up."

We all watched as Lisa's eyelids slowly fluttered open. It took several minutes before it looked like she was conscious enough to recognize me.

"Lisa? How are you feeling?" I asked.

"Like shit," she said. I could tell she had a slight lisp now. I think she noticed it herself as well. "What happened to me?" She looked at her own hand like she was seeing it for the first time, opening and closing her fist. Her movements were somewhat jerky and unsure, and I feared I may have done something wrong. I was keeping track of what she was attempting to do, as well as trying to compare the left and right side of her brain to see how much more fine-tuning I needed to do.

"You got shot in the head," I told her.

Lisa opened and closed her mouth a few times without a sound. Then, she said, "Well, in that case, I feel great. What's going on?" She spoke slowly, and the lisp I heard earlier was already being corrected slightly. Seemed like Lisa had to re-learn how to control some of her body. At least that would only take time; the good thing was that she did seem to be thinking straight. I still had some room to make corrections.

"Maybe we should start from the last thing you remember," I said.

"Getting ready to take that fucker out. The, uh… fuck, how did I forget his name? The asshole, you know who…" she struggled slightly. I knew who she was talking about, obviously, but I let her work it out herself to monitor how much the injury had affected her memory and cognitive function.

"Well, I have good news and bad news for you. The good news is that I raided all his bases simultaneously and we turned him over to the PRT. The bad news is he released the identities of all of the Empire 88, blamed it on you, and enough people believe it's a secret New Wave revenge plot that we're moving to another city for safety."

"…fuck it, my head hurts too much to use my power. Give me the long version."

It took the rest of the ride to Concord to actually explain what had happened to Lisa.

"There's something very fishy about this," Lisa said. "Let me take a nap… and then food… and coffee… and I'll think about it more." Tired and lethargic as she was, I let her sleep.

Amy and I stepped out of the vehicle in front of our new temporary home. The others were already there. Dragon had driven more slowly than the moving Dallon and Pelham cars, mainly because of the vehicle's size. Despite leaving earlier, the others had arrived first. "Thanks, Amy. I couldn't have done it without you," I told her.

"You know, I didn't have enough time to appreciate when Lisa's not talking," Amy said. "Can you still modify her speech centers?"

"Ha ha. Come on, let's help unpack," I told her. The moving van with most of the cargo was only just starting to pull into the neighbourhood.

The house itself was huge – a duplex, actually. It sat on the western edge of the city, in a neighbourhood that was cheap for the size, but not particularly convenient. No nearby stores, a long way from any schools, and a long walk to the nearest bus stop. That probably contributed to its lower price. It was a spot where you needed your own transport to get around. Not a major issue for a family where most of the members could fly.

There was a lot of room inside – the building was old, but sturdy enough. Dad inspected it as best he could; while he wasn't a homebuilder he had enough basic knowledge to know what to check for. I went over it myself with my bots as well, making sure there wasn't anything catastrophic like leaking pipes or toxic mold or termite-infested columns.

All in all, it was… not much to talk about. Honestly a decent house for something the PRT organized on short notice, and rent was cheap considering the amount of space we were getting. The others were inside already.

"Oh, this room's mine!" we heard Vicky's voice from upstairs.

"Then this one's mine!" Eric yelled.

"What? No, that's gonna be Amy's! You have to choose from the other side!"

"I'm claiming this entire side of the house for the Pelhams! YOU go to the other side!"

I decided to let the two families battle it out and claim territory; I didn't have any problem with taking whatever was left over. On the other hand… if nobody was using the basement, maybe I could take up some of the crawl spaces for bot storage…

Inside Dragon's workshop, she wasn't wasting any time at all with her tinkering.

"Eunoia, you're still present, correct?"

"Here," I told her through my bots.

"Excellent. I'd love to study the design you used to save Lisa. But first things first. I've got replicas of the bots you sent me," Dragon said. "I've made them as precisely as I could manage. Shall we begin the experimentation?"

"Go ahead."

Carrying boxes was somewhat mind-numbing, and I was glad to have something to actually think about while repeatedly going back and forth from the van to the house.

Dragon unveiled a tiny clump of bots sitting on a scanning device. "Could you control these bots that I made?" she asked.

I hadn't even noticed the bots were there until she pointed them out. I reached with my power as much as I could, but there was no response. When my own bots wandered through the pile, it was like wading through a pile of dead bodies. The shape, the materials, and other things were correct, they were just… dead. They just didn't work.

"Nothing. No control," I told her.

"I see," Dragon said. "Could you check if I made them correctly?"

I dropped a bunch of my own bots on the scanner and had them basically play around and pull apart the bots that Dragon made. As far as I could tell, they were identical, except they were dead to me. Like the difference between a person and a rather warm corpse. Which didn't quite make sense, since the bots were barely more than a clump of molecules, not a huge complex creature.

"Made correctly."

"Good to know that my nanobot forge is in working order, at least. We'll just chalk it up to 'powers' for now," Dragon said. "That makes our collaboration slightly more difficult, but there's still a lot we can do together. If you wouldn't mind, I'd like to study how you control the bots first. It's the main issue I've been having with my own designs. I've got a broad-spectrum wave analysis scanner here, so if you just control the nanobots on the scanner as I tell you…"

I moved the bots around on the scanner, getting them to do a few laps and other simple movements. Dragon kept switching the settings over and over, but got nothing but noise. Despite all the failure, Dragon had a knowing smile. "Don't worry, Taylor. Reverse-engineering other Tinkertech is my specialty."

At that point, Lisa woke up again. She yawned and stretched out her body. Again I noted odd asymmetries and reduced control on one side of her body. "Well, that was a good nap. How's it going with the Tinkerettes?"

"Taylor's inside the house at the moment. We're still experimenting," Dragon told her.

"Ugh. Where's the nearest cup of coffee around here?" Lisa asked.

A machine emerged from the wall near the desk. I heard the sound of flash-boiled water.

Lisa stared. I would have stared if I had been in there. "You have a coffee machine in this thing? But you aren't even here in-person!"

Dragon seemed almost embarrassed. "I was expecting to work with Armsmaster on occasion. He's very picky with his coffee."

Lisa took the fresh-made cup and took a sip. "Huh. He's got good taste. I like mine with a bit more sugar though. Speaking of which, what happened to him? You mentioned a friendly fire incident?"

"I can't give you many details, because I don't have them. Armsmaster was fired from the Protectorate. Dropped completely. My access to the PRT ENE was revoked for potential security concerns," Dragon said.

Lisa rubbed her head, then stopped when her hand went over the scar tissue of the bullet wound. "Wait. That's such a disproportional response. There was clear villain interference."

"I think so too, but it's still within the director's rights. Brockton Bay has always been on the extreme end of parahuman issues, and extremes may become the new normal for that city."

"No… there's something more to it," Lisa said. "What happened to the girl that we saved?"

"Taken into PRT custody," Dragon said. "After that, I don't know."

"But not the hospital? The PRT medical bay wouldn't have what they needed for her. That's more for field injuries and such."

"Never in hospital. Or Panacea," I confirmed. While I didn't work at the Children's Hospital, I did maintain watch with my bots and hadn't seen her brought there either.

"And no news about Dinah Alcott? Mayor hasn't said anything?"

"Dinah Alcott remains listed as missing. What are you thinking, Lisa?" Dragon asked.

"That girl was Dinah Alcott. I'm certain of it. Oh, fuck, this is worse than I thought," Lisa said. "Can you show me a picture of the new PRT ENE director? His whole body, if you have one?"

Dragon did one better and showed multiple photos of the new director and a video of him giving a short speech on stage as well.

"God damnit. Coil is the director. We caught a body double," Lisa said.

"What?" Dragon was surprised.

"WHAT?" Even I felt the need to shout through my bots.

"Armsmaster was getting fired one way or another, as soon as possible. He just needed an excuse. He also took Dinah and moved her somewhere else, probably outside the city. You've been locked out as well, because all the incriminating evidence in there is on the PRT servers. I bet he's deleted them already, but either you or Armsmaster have the ability to recover deleted data. That's why he needed you gone," Lisa said.

"I need to contact Armsmaster about this. Are you sure, Lisa?" Dragon asked.

"As certain as I can be. Unless, of course, Eunoia messed up my brain completely," she joked. I wasn't nearly as amused, but I double checked her brain activity again to be sure.

For most of the team, the cape-life was temporarily taking a back seat to life-life. Getting settled into our new home, cleaning things up, shopping for groceries, figuring out our directions, making sure our utilities all worked – that was going to take up our first few days. Couldn't fight crime without a warm shower to come back to, after all. Lady Photon and Brandish also had to work out the proper registration and other paperwork for independent hero patrols in the city. They were trying to sort out a schedule and route with the local police, as well as meeting with the major hospitals to figure out a visit schedule for me and Panacea.

While the others could easily fly off and explore our new neighbourhood on their own, Amy and I were mostly stuck at our new home until the bureaucracy was sorted out. I had the benefit that there was plenty of work for me to do with Dragon, who was parked right in front of our door.

Amy insisted on a checkup with Lisa – probably out of sheer boredom. I suspected part of it was just so that she could surf the internet using one of Dragon's computers. Our home internet still hadn't been connected; the service guy wasn't booked until tomorrow.

Lisa hadn't left the workshop, and I couldn't blame her for being paranoid. The fewer people who knew she had survived, the better. Dragon herself was interested in Lisa's recovery just as much. She was of great help, too, giving Lisa random exercises and video games that tested her perception and memory, helping her ease back to normal and finding possible faults in her memory and brain function for me to fix.

Meanwhile, there were several things for me to manage simultaneously. First, I was rapidly expanding my network of bots between here and Brockton Bay. In my rush to expand my control to Concord as fast as possible without losing control during the move, I had to stretch my control as thin as I could, literally. In some parts along the highway, there were long lengths and regions where brains were essentially lined up in single file at their maximum range from each other. A single car crash or lightning strike or other random event could completely knock out my control of everything in Brockton Bay. I had to fix that right away and make sure there was some redundancy, so most of my bots were focused on replication.

Secondly, I had to keep watch on Lisa to make sure I hadn't made any long-term mistakes. I would be "finalizing" my bot configuration soon, completely locking them into their functions and relinquishing all my control over them. I needed to be sure I had things right first.

Lastly, Dragon was eager to continue tinkering. Funnily enough, Lisa was happy to join in and help. Not that she had much else to do while she hid in the workshop. Dragon let her borrow a computer and internet connection, but she wouldn't allow her to use any of it for illegal activity – like hacking the PRT servers, or retrieving confidential bank records. Lisa was basically limited to searching for publicly-available information that supported her theory, which was quite sparse.

"Well, is there anything I could help you with? I mean, we worked together pretty well against Behemoth," Lisa said hopefully.

"Maybe a non-Tinker perspective may help. I'm still trying to determine the control method that Eunoia uses for her bots," Dragon said. "Does any of this make sense?" She showed Lisa all the data and graphs of all the readings she attempted to make on my bot-control.

Lisa answered quickly. "It's a Master ability, not Tinkertech that controls them, Dragon. This isn't something you can just figure out."

Dragon sighed. "Well, I was hoping there would still be some measurable signal I could lock on to. Powers aren't inherently inexplicable, they're just more exotic than we've been used to. My next guess is some kind of hyperfold-space signal, but this mobile lab doesn't have the right sensors."

"Well, what do you want to do next?" I asked.

"I suppose we can focus on the multitasking ability. How much has it enhanced your abilities?"

"A lot, but I haven't really measured it," I explained. "I definitely learn faster. I can read a bunch of books simultaneously and remember them more clearly. Fighting crime as while performing neurosurgery isn't much of an issue."

"Ah, I see. Abyssal was spotted fighting the Empire in multiple locations during your known work hours at the hospital. It definitely killed a few forum theories about you and Abyssal."

"Wait, what?" I thought that I had been pretty careful keeping our identities separate, especially with Lisa's help. I didn't even realize there was enough suspicion for an online discussion, aside from Dragon.

"Don't worry about it, Taylor," Lisa said, waving her hand dismissively. "The PHO forums are full of crackpot theories all the time. You know, the PRT is full of lizard people, Scion is an alien, New Wave is a secret government cape breeding program, Alexandria is actually Chief Costa-Brown, that sort of thing."

"Ignoring that, how difficult is it to do that, and how many bots did you need to achieve it?" Dragon asked.

"Oh, that's not even close to my limit," I said. "I didn't want to put any patients in danger. The main issue was the range, and it takes, I dunno, about ten billion of them to extend my range every quarter-mile."

"Thank you. If you make a fully-formed brain, can it think independently?" Dragon asked.

I paused. Dragon was a genius, and it really didn't take her long to extrapolate and figure things out. Now, how much should I tell her? "It's hard to explain. Here, let me show you," I said. I pulled enough bots from my costume and set them in front of the table, and recreated another one of my clone brains. "It's not exactly thinking on its own. I mean, I get thoughts from it, but it's in my own voice, you know? Kind of like... when you're deciding what to have for lunch and you talk to yourself internally? I just get more of that. It's not completely independent, just more of my own thoughts. And if I lose control of it, it goes completely inert. I figured that out when we went to Spain."

I guess I shouldn't have been surprised that Dragon understood immediately. "Ah, it's much like the left and right hemisphere theory. Each half of your brain can seem to have different personalities and even goals, and yet in the end they are harmonized and you never consciously notice the interactions between them, except in specific neurological cases."

"Oh yeah, I read about those," I said. People who had the corpus callosum cut could literally have the left half of the body disagree with the right half sometimes. Definitely one of the weirder things I came across during my research, although the stuff I had been doing with Dr. Kardon wasn't focusing on that.

"Well, it looks like you're basically adding more hemispheres. They might actually be capable of independent thought, and yet they remain a part of you and your personality."

"But this new design that you used for me, you made it so they could work on their own, right?" Lisa asked, tapping her head. "What if you made a whole entire brain out of this type of bot?"

The only brain I was confident in fully copying at the moment was my own. And what would happen? A fully independent version of myself? What would I do? What if I actually disagreed with myself? I wasn't ready for philosophy and ethics in the morning; I was here to design better miniature robots.

The "good" thing was that I had designed them with Amy, and they weren't capable of being completely independent. They still depended on a biological body, blood, oxygen, glucose, and other things.

But still…

"I don't think I'm ready to do that just yet," I told them. "I like them being either a part of me, or a part of someone else. I don't think I want to create an entirely new life form just yet."

"Well, I'm not advocating that you do, but it's still something I think we should study more," Dragon declared. "This is definitely a very interesting... a very..."

Her voice glitched for a second, the screens flickered, and the bot froze for a split second, but everything went back to normal just quickly. "Ah, sorry. Connection issues. Do you want to take a look at some of the ideas I've had?"

Amy looked up for the first time. She hadn't seemed very interested in Tinkering, but the interruption to her cat videos was something she noticed.

"Dragon? What happened?" Lisa asked. "You sure it was just a connection issue?"

"Yes, it happens occasionally. Now, let's get back to business. What were we talking about again? Right, I'd like you to take a look at this nanobot-based weapon I was designing with Armsmaster."

"Wait, weren't we-" I started to say, wondering why Dragon wanted to change the subject from brain-bots to weapon-bots. She hadn't been in a huge rush for the past few days.

But Lisa shushed me really quickly and interrupted. "Right, right. Damn cell signals suck in this area, ha ha." She gave me a look implying I should play along, so I did. Amy looked even more confused.

"Anyone nearby?" Lisa asked as she tried to sneak through the house, while I walked through normally. I brought her to my room, where I still didn't have a mattress yet. Dad was looking into buying some along with Mr. Pelham. We sat down on the carpet, each of the three of us leaning against a different wall.

"No, it's just us," I confirmed. "Now what's going on?"

"Just have to get away from Dragon for a while. Can she hear us?"

"I'm pretty sure she can't from here. I don't see any listening devices from her. Why? Do you think she's going to turn you in or something?" Dragon had been very nice about it, and outright helpful with Lisa. Even so, I had enough experience with girls that put up a friendly front to stab you in the back.

"No, not exactly. I think she's under a Master effect. A subtle one. Or she's under duress, but hiding it. I don't know exactly what it is, but I'm going to figure it out."

"Dragon? Mastered?" Amy asked. "As far as I know, she seemed normal. I've worked with her more than you have. I think you're overly paranoid, it was probably an actual tech glitch."

"That doesn't explain her short term memory loss. And I don't think it's recent, or sudden. I bet it's the kind that takes months or years. It changes the person so slowly it's hard to say that they're 'out of character' or anything like that. It just becomes who they are."

"That's… I can't imagine," Amy said absently.

"Sure you can, it's probably exactly what's happening to you-" Lisa said, then clapped her hands to her mouth.

"What are you implying?" Amy said, her voice rising in anger.

"Nothing! Fuck, forget I said anything."

"This is about Vicky, isn't it?"

"I'll be honest, I do feel a light pressure to… like her more when I'm near her," I admitted. Thankfully my other brains weren't affected, and thousands of them were able to help me 'correct' for those minor emotional differences as soon as the effect wore off.

"I'm not… Vicky isn't Mastering me!" Amy shouted defensively. She backed away and ran down the hallway.

"You really think so? Are you sure?" I asked.

"Dragon or Amy?" Lisa muttered.

"Both."

"Amy, I'm sure. Dragon? Just a hunch. I got too much shit on my plate right now," Lisa said, sinking her head to her knees. I didn't know what to do other than pat her on the back.

"Just let me know what you want me to do. I'm the multitasker, remember?" I said. "On that note, I'm starting to keep watch on Director Calvert. Anything I else I should be tracking?"

"Well, look for the kidnapped girl, but I bet he's already taken her to some other hidden place," Lisa said. "The problem is finding evidence we can use. Dragon's willing to help but only if we do things by the book. Anything that doesn't stick, it'll backfire on us when a PRT director claims a villain is planting evidence, and tosses everything out because we acquired it illegally."

"Sit tight, we'll find something eventually," I told her.

"Well, I guess I should go back and hide with Dragon," Lisa said. "The family should be coming back home for lunch."

We went back outside to find Amy sitting with Dragon, chatting. I guess she didn't have anyone else to talk to if she was mad at Lisa… and me.

"…it's simply a matter of statistics," Dragon was saying. "I am only one person, and I can only do one thing at a time. Even if I was able to leave my home, I could only save one person at a time by patrolling out on the street. By mass-producing self-driving technology, I can save nearly a million lives per year from traffic collisions, if everyone adopted it."

"But wouldn't everyone be scared if they thought you were Mastered?" Amy asked. "All those things under your control…"

"Ah, they aren't under my control. That's the important part. I just manufacture them, or license out the technology," Dragon said. "Even if I were Mastered, at most people would only take control of a few remote-control suits."

"Right. Never mind," Amy said.

"Don't worry, Amy. Power jealousy is a common condition among capes and non-capes alike. Your power is quite unique and quite powerful. The fact that you've saved anyone at all already makes you a hero. Even I have very little in the way of medical tech. We need to cover each other's bases."

"Yeah. Nice talking to you, Dragon. I'm going to go lie down," Amy said as she left. She didn't speak a word to Lisa as she passed by.

"Very well. Welcome back, Lisa and Taylor. Ready for more research?" she asked innocently.

We both nodded together. We both knew that our research would involve a whole lot more about Dragon herself, as well as Coil or nanobots.

Author's Notes:

Man, it's been a super-busy week for me.

I guess this is mostly a set-up chapter, which I always feel like I have a hard time doing satisfactorily. I always feel like I'm trying to do too much and not enough at the same time.