Amelia walked out of the police station feeling relatively good about the whole situation. Between her report and the video, and the photographic evidence she had gotten from her own adventures and the information Jason had given her, hopefully this would be a slam dunk of a case and she wouldn’t have to worry about it.

  “Yeah, I just finished what I was doing.” She said into the phone, talking to her best friend. “I’m going to go do some readings at the library, and we will be on for tomorrow's anime marathon.” She assured Reyna, not wanting for a second to let her friend think she’s leaving them high and dry.

  The two chatted for a bit longer before Amelia hung up, enjoying the evening breeze as she walked to the library.

  Despite checking for enemies multiple times or seeing if there’s some monster lurking in the corner, an embarrassing near laser shoot out in the bathroom when someone knocked on her stall, Amelia survived the whole day at the library without anyone assaulting her.

  “I’ll come by again next week?” Amelia asked the librarian as she walked out into the night air, greeting her with the delightful kiss of the cold.

  “Come by next week!” The librarian replied.

  Happily done with her day, Amelia skipped to a bench to eat the snack she had prepared for herself.

  Eating her sandwich, she pulled up the news on her phone, checking to see if by any chance there’s a story about a massive kidnapping ring bust and that everyone’s been captured and accounted for.

  There isn’t a story like that, but who is surprised? They probably needed to call in some supers so that they could do this properly, and that’s if they actually believed her.

  They will though; Amelia is planning on visiting them every week until something gets moving. And if that fails, maybe bully Jason into getting his powers to where he can phase with other people so he can slowly begin rescuing everyone.

  It wouldn’t be hard; his self-loathing about leaving that little girl there was all she needed to press.

  The thought of it all made her hands clench in barely suppressed rage.

  But as upset as she was, she wasn’t mad at Jason. She couldn’t blame him. The situation was shit, regardless.

  But eventually the food is done, and that meant depressingly Amelia must walk back home.

  Curse past her being a silly goose and deciding to walk everywhere today to get some steps in and work off all the doughnuts she’d been having recently. That accursed grindset is a really strong force sometimes.

  Amelia walked through olde town on her way home, wanting to see if any of the cute little stores had anything fun she would want to buy. Who doesn’t deserve a little bit of retail therapy after a productive yet equally stressful day?

  Touring olde town is definitely just what the doctor ordered because, damn, did it cheer up Amelia quickly.

  So much so that she didn’t notice the van pull up behind her and a group of large men in bulky clothes get out and trail behind her, led by a man with nearly glowing red eyes.

  As she rounded the corner to the next street, ?hands wrapped around Amelia from behind, and she immediately responded by slamming her elbow into the head of whoever was attacking her.

  The grip loosening from the blow, she darts forward, pulling the small box Jason had given her. With a click, the box whirs, shaping into the laser pistol.

  Twisting her body around, she lined up the gun with the bastard's chest and pulled the trigger three times, sending three pulses of energy into the dude.

  “Did y’all really think I was doing this unprepared, dumbasses?” Amelia sighed, holding the laser gun in her left hand as she looked around at the other goons.

  She desperately tried to not sound afraid. If she sounded afraid they’re going to attack.

  Well, they’d probably attack regardless, but the point is Amelia wanted to be in control of the situation and by establishing herself as a badass bitch ready to take names, hopefully they’d think twice before trying to ice her.

  “We just wanted to talk.” A tall man with reddish eyes said, stepping over the body of their fallen comrade, who continued to writhe in pain.

  “And I want to go home, so how about you talk? I ignore you, and then I can go. We cool?” Amelia said, not aiming the gun at him yet.

  Maybe she could get out of it with her smooth-talking skills. Doubtful but just laser blasting, the person who grabbed her seems to have put most of them in a willing to talk mood.

  “How did you know about us?” he asked, ignoring her first statement. “Did you really just happen upon seeing us a couple of times and took some photos and video? Or…” He trailed off, and Amelia had a sinking feeling in her stomach. “Did someone tip you off? Subject Forty-Three by chance? Or maybe you are him and you’re a shifter now.”

  Amelia tried her best to keep the rage out of her expression as this bastard shit-talked her best friend. “No, you guys are just ass at your job. The rumor mill’s already flying. I just found proof, bucko.” She bluffed.

  “Well, how about you join us instead? We give you superpowers, and you stop spreading the story. After all, it would be a lot better for your family and friends if you didn’t keep pushing this story.” He said, blackmailing her.

  “I don’t give a shit about what you do to my family. They disowned me.” Amelia barked, wishing she had taken a normal way home, one that didn’t take her down a bunch of side streets where nobody else goes.

  “But you do care about your friends. Has one of your friends been kidnapped? Maybe we can strike a deal. We’ll give you them back when we’r—”

  Amelia doesn’t let him finish.

  She shoots him in the face.

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  “Kurt!” one of the others shouted as they also reached for their gun.

  For good measure, she shoots him too. “Red shirts aren’t supposed to speak.” She quipped as she turned tail and ran, aiming to round the corner and hide somewhere she’s still working on that last part.

  As she rounded the corner, Amelia fumbled with her right hand, trying to extricate her phone from her left pocket while running and looking for a place to hide. At least her hair isn’t in her face today; wouldn’t that be dreadful if it had been loose.

  “Thank god for fingerprint identification.” She rasped out, panting for breath as her phone unlocks and she immediately goes to her contacts. If she can call Jason, then he can rescue her. Even if she gets captured, he’ll know where to go.

  A burst of wind hit her hand and sent her phone tumbling away is not the ideal situation for that.

  “If you cracked my screen, I’m going to kill you!” Amelia yelled, twisting around to fire the gun twice more, desperately praying it won’t run out.

  It’s a cool sci-fi laser pistol, so that means it’s never going to run out of energy blasts, right? Right?

  Scrambling, Amelia ran again, cursing the loss of her phone but not willing to stay in one place long enough to find it.

  At least that was her plan until her feet stopped coming into contact with the ground.

  After trying and failing for a second to run in the air, Amelia’s body is spun till she’s facing a guy who looks incredibly angry. At least she thought so?

  Very hard to tell someone’s mood when they’re missing a good portion of their face, but if she was missing most of her face, she would be pretty ticked off about the whole ordeal too, so the jump isn’t that hard to make.

  “I shot you in the face. Shouldn’t you be like dead?” She asks as a red energy seems to flare around her left arm.

  Amelia has a really bad feeling about this.

  The light flared bright, and she felt her arm being ripped apart as if multiple sections were being twisted in different directions, pulverizing the limb.

  Amelia lets out an ear-piercing shriek of pain before losing consciousness. The pain and shock of the situation were too much for her to handle; her body resorted to shutting down than continuing to endure that endless torment.

  Kurt’s eyes flare with light as crimson words fill the air. “Get her to the van. We need to leave.”

  “What about Jimmy?”

  “Leave him his fault for getting shot by that bitch,” Kurt replied.

  No longer lifted by the man's power, Amelia crumpled to the ground, whimpering in pain.

  The other goons took Amelia and placed her in the van before helping their fallen comrade into the car. They’re criminals, sure, but they aren’t leaving one of their own left for dead when they can save him.

  Well, Andromeda and Vertiga could save them.

  The car drives in silence, entering the compound. The moment they’re parked, Kurt stormed off to go get his face fixed, and the two of them helped their severely wounded comrade in the same direction.

  Leaving only one of them to carry the writhing body of Amelia to Andromeda and Vertiga.

  “Is she the one that found us out somehow?” Andromeda cooed, looking over the body as she poked the mangled remains of Amelia’s left arm. “I guess it’s on me to make something that will make her lucid, right?” She muses before splitting into three.

  One Andromeda went over to prepare the chemical cocktail to bring Amelia back to some form of sense.

  Another continued to play with the bloody lump of flesh as if it’s Playdough of some kind.

  And the third Andromeda begins to bind Amelia so that when she woke up, she can’t do anything.

  “Oh right. I need to test you!” The second Andromeda said, taking a blood sample from Amelia to run it through their system to see if the girl is a super, has potential or is just a pitiful normal.

  “I was sure it was your failure that told on us,” Vertigo remarked, pausing her project so that she could take a look at Amelia. “Why did Kurt pulp her arm?”

  “She shot a bunch of them! I’m patching them up in another room, and he is pissed,” Andromeda laughed in a sing-song voice.

  “Interesting. It would be good research to see what happens when we create a super via our tests while they’re gravely injured.” Vertiga trailed off as her computer began to chirp loudly.

  Vertigo races over to look at the notification as a look of joy pierces through her facade as disgust quickly chased after it before the expression of neutrality reasserts itself on her face.

  “Yes?” Andromeda asked innocently.

  “Wake her up now.” Vertiga demanded walking away from the computer to stare down at Amelia in fascination.

  “Why is that?” Andromeda chirped before looking over at the information on the computer screen in fascination. “Ohhhhh!”

  At that moment, the other Andromeda finished whatever she was doing and jammed a needle into Amelia’s shoulder before slamming the plunger down.

  Immediately, Amelia seemed to relax, her body no longer convulsing in pain. “I’ll go grab a control collar.” She said before wandering off.

  Amelia slowly came to her eyes fluttering open as her gaze focused on the room around her, looking around before finally setting her gaze on Vertiga with a glare.

  “You shouldn’t be too upset about this whole situation, dear girl. After all, right now you’re unfortunately something infinitely valuable to us, so no matter how much I might dislike you. I can’t do anything.” Vertiga grumbled.

  Amelia doesn’t say anything. Continuing her glare.

  Speech wasn’t possible through the gag anyway.

  “Though I hope you won’t take too well to the experiment. After all, you don’t have the potential to become a super. Your genetic code doesn’t seem to have anything special in it on its own.” Vertiga said trying to be scary and mostly failing.

  Not for lack of her being ?terrifying, but after having your arm turned to Playdough, it’s hard to muster any care for a situation.

  “You’re so much more interesting than a super.” Vertiga said, smiling down at the bound Amelia. “You’re a perfect enough match.” She said, looking at Amelia’s mangled left arm. “That also means that we don’t need to worry about fixing this either.”

  Amelia mumbled something through her gag at the green lady.

  “What was that?” The doctor asked, pulling the gag out of Amelia’s mouth.

  “Yeah, I said fuck you, you psychotic bitch.” Amelia remarked before slamming her forehead into the doctor's nose.

  “Gaah!” Vertigo screamed as a torrent of blood began to pour out of her nose.

  “Didn’t you see the shape of your goons, dumbass? I’m not trapped in here with you. You’re trapped in here with me. It’s just a matter of time before I beat you.” Amelia lied through her teeth as she tried to come up with literally anything that could turn this situation around.

  “Sorry, but that’s not very nice,” Andromeda said from behind Amelia, slipping a collar onto her before locking it into place. “Though now you have to be a good girl for us.”

  “Tough shit if you want to tell me what to do, you got-” Amelia’s response was lost as her entire body seized up in pain.

  “I’m going to kill,” Vertiga snarled, launching herself towards Amelia till another Andromeda intercepted her.

  “You can’t do that.” Andromeda reminded Vertiga. “She’s valuable to the boss, and she’s already fitted with a control collar. She’s going to be docile now, see?” She said, looking at the still convulsing Amelia.

  “Fine. You deal with her.” Vertigo growled, stalking off. “I don’t want to see her anymore.”

  Andromeda skipped on over to Amelia, turning off the collar the fight won. Amelia’s body still wasn’t listening to her; she couldn’t fight back or speak even if she tried.

  And she definitely tried valiantly for longer than she would like to admit as Andromeda watched her with joy in her expressions.

  “Don’t be upset at Vertiga; she’s upset because you’re only valuable to us because she fucked up. You’re going to enjoy Prisma, and you’re going to enjoy being part of Project Combo.” Andromeda assures her.

  “Who wouldn’t want to be part of the next generation where we bring power to everyone in the world?”

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