Turn 11

--- Maya ---

She groaned as she rolled out of bed, her body still hurting from pushing herself to get used to Izzy’s morning runs.

“You okay?” Izzy asked giving her a concerned look.

“I’m fine, just… taking a minute to wake up.” She told her little sister as she forced herself to her feet, barely wincing as she did so.

Izzy frowned at her, before pushing her chest, and sending her toppling back onto her bed.

“What was that for?” She growled.

“You’re exhausted.” Izzy told her bluntly.

She gestured to the alarm between their beds. “It’s like six a.m. of course I’m exhausted!”

(We really shouldn’t have stayed up so late working on our COMP.)

Izzy watched her for another moment before shaking her head. “Yeah, you’re not running with me today.”

She couldn’t help the way her eyes narrowed. “Why not?”

“Like I said, you’re exhausted. I don’t mind you running with me, but if you keep pushing yourself like this you’re going to hurt yourself.” Her twelve year old sister told her.

She rolled her eyes. “A little exercise isn’t going to kill me.”

“No, but if you don’t give your body a chance to rest you could strain a muscle or something.” Izzy argued.

She frowned. “Maybe, but someone has got to keep you safe in the mornings!”

“Maya, we both know I can kick your butt any day of the week.”

(Not if we brought out our Hand Cannons.)

(No, no zapping our siblings!)

(Just a little zapping, it’ll be like a static shock! With real lightning.)

(No.)

“Look, Maya, I get that you want to be the good big sister and all, but you need to take care of yourself.” Izzy told her, pressing on Maya’s shoulder to force her to lay back down.

“Mmm, I’m the big sister I’m supposed to be taking care of you.” She whined, already feeling slumber’s sweet siren song.

Izzy rolled her eyes, though she did wear a fond smile. “Fine. Then, I don’t know… help me with my homework when school starts up again.”

She glared sleepily at her little sister before giving one last huff. “Fine… but I’m getting you an A+ if it kills you when I do!”

Izzy snorted. “Wouldn’t expect anything less.”

---

“Having a late start, hon?” Her father asked as she stumbled down the stairs, having finally woken up after Izzy had sent her back to sleep.

Henry Williams was a tall man with brown hair and blue eyes, who had a tendency to wear white button up shirts even on the days he wasn’t working. And if you discounted his glasses, he looked like a thinner and taller version of Tommy, or rather Tommy looked like a shorter more filled out version of him, depending on which one you met first.

“Mm-hmm.” She nodded to her father’s question, her feelings still a little mixed in regards to her parents due to the fact they, (didn’t realize we were fucking kidnapped!)

She forced herself to ignore the voice screaming in her head and glanced around the living room. “Mom’s not here?”

“She’s taking Seamus out to some pre-pre-school playdate… thing.” Her father explained. “Why did you need her for something?”

“No, I’ve just been so caught up with this project I’m working on that I haven’t really seen too much of you two the last week or so.” She explained with a half-truth.

Her father grimaced, always feeling bad whenever he or his wife accidentally neglected one of their kids. “Ah, sorry about that… It’s just we’ve been busy with work, Seamus, and Izzy’s summer tournament thing, and then there’s Tommy’s gigs and-”

“It’s fine.” She cut her father off as gently as she could, knowing full well she’d tell him to prioritize her siblings over her, if she was given the option. “Like I said I’ve been caught up in my own thing. So, I haven’t really noticed.” (Besides, I’m the one who’s been avoiding you.)

“Really, well, what are you working on?” Her father asked, eager to show interest in one of his kids’ lives.

“Oh, uh, I’m working on-” (hacking reality) “putting together my own computer.” She told him with another half-truth.

“Is your old one not working?” Her father asked with concern. “It might take a bit, but I’m sure me and your mother can work up the money to get you a new one for your birthday.”

“What? No!” She shook her head. “My laptop works perfectly fine.” (More so since I upgraded it.) “I just figured it’d be cool to try and put together my own from all of the broken ones we have in the basement. You know turn them into a sort of Frankenstein’s computer, or something.”

“Oh, well that’s good.” Her dad looked a little relieved, knowing their already tight budget wasn’t going to be stretched any thinner.

“Yeah, that’s actually why I was heading out.” She outright lied. (Quiet you!) “I needed to get a couple of things that I couldn’t just work out on my own.”

“I see, well do need any money?” Her father asked, pulling out his wallet.

“No, I’ve got it covered.” She waved him off.

Her dad gave her a look, before pulling a twenty from his wallet. “Actually, that reminds me. I guess, since you were so busy working on your little project, you forgot to pick up your allowance.”

“You, uh, you don’t have to do that.” She told him, not feeling right taking money, when she knew they were just paying the bills for everything as is.

Her dad smiled at her. “Honey, the other kids all got their allowance. It’s only fair that you get yours too.”

Part of her wanted to put up a bigger fight, but at the same time she knew she wouldn’t really get anywhere if she didn’t accept the money, and she still had places to scout if she ever wanted to get her base set up.

“Fine.” She eventually caved in, accepting the money, before giving her dad a hug. “Like I said, I’ve got that thing to do, but I should be back by dinner time.” She told him, only the second half of that statement being true.

“Alright, honey, have fun.”

“I will.” She promised.

---

“Okay, I’m not having fun.” She told the voices in her head as she made her way through the abandoned Beacon hospital, seriously rethinking her life choices with this place.

Prior to the reveal of Deviants to the world, it had been a fairly well built and popular hospital for all of the town’s residents. At least until a Deviant doctor went psycho-slasher, killing and possessing the hospital staff and having them kill a fair number of the patients. Leaving the hospital to be abandoned as no one wanted to step foot in a building with a body count that high.

“Did you really have to remind me of all of that?” She asked, her desperation for a new base the only reason she was stepping foot here. “I mean, the place already looks like some psycho is going to jump out and stab me without the horror history lesson.”

(On the bright side, the police did a lovely job of cleaning up all of the blood.)

(That and the only real risk of discovery here is if some teenagers give each other a stupid dare.)

“Which given all of the graffiti on the walls… Is somewhat likely…”

(True, but the hospital is large enough that it shouldn’t be too hard to find an out of the way place to set up shop.) Her inner reason pointed out.

“I guess so…” She sighed, before continuing through the ominously quiet and decrepit halls of-

(You’re not helping.)

(Sorry.)

Continuing through the hospital halls, she found a number of vandalized rooms across the first floor. Though as luck would have it the second floor was actually fairly untouched compared to the rest of the hospital she’d seen.

(Guess most people visit the basement first.)

“Sounds about right.” She admitted, before noticing a red box covered in dust sitting in one of the abandoned rooms. “Oh, what do we have here?”

(Looks like an old first aid kit.)

“Think it’s still good?” She asked, popping the lid open. “I mean a first aid kit, is on the list of things we need to get if we’re going to be a mask.”

(With a bit of maintenance perhaps we could use it, though we might be better off flat out replacing it.) Her inner logic warned, before continuing as something else occurred to her. (Actually, speaking of, aren’t a lot of doctors M.A.D.s?)

“Now that you mention it, some of the more famous ones are.” She agreed, thinking of a number of medical advancements that had been made by M.A.D.s in one fashion or another.

(Ooh, and the infamous ones are the guys who make all the Deathpunks!)

She shivered as she was reminded about the stitched together ragdolls she’d seen when first researching M.A.D.s “Yeah, but I’d rather not have anything in common with those patch-workers.”

(Even if we don’t take things that far, it still might be a good idea to investigate just what kind of medical advancements we could contribute.)

“Maybe…” She hedged, before jumping as a rat skittered by. “But uh, let’s get out of here before we consider that.”

(Agreed.)

(Wussies.)

---

“Damn it…” She cursed. “I can’t find anything.”

(Too be fair, we’ve already salvaged a number of computers, game systems, cell phones, and musical equipment.) Her inner reason listed, before continuing in a grim tone. (And that’s not including everything we swiped for our COMP before that.)

“Gah! This still sucks!”

(Look there’s a couple of old house phones over there!) Her inner logic pointed out helpfully.

She looked around before spotting what her inner self was talking about and grimacing because of it.

(Dios mio, those things are so old they still have chords!)

(Look it’s better than nothing, so suck it up buttercup.)

---

Taking her haul back upstairs with her, she threw everything onto her desk and got to work on another upgrade for her hand cannons.

Right now, her primary offense was unleashing a burst of electricity, and while this would be enough to drop most regular people, odds were she was going to need more than two shots if she ran into any real trouble.

And so, with this problem in mind she got to work on an upgrade that would allow her to release her blasts in segmented bursts rather than all at once like she was now.

The trick to this was to create a series of limiters that would pull off the power past a certain threshold and send it back into the battery. While this did lower how much power her Cannons could fire at a time, it actually did her a favor by bringing it into a range less likely to cause permanent damage to her non-powered targets.

“Which is good, because I cannot afford a lawsuit.”

(Meh, that’s the point of the mask, to help us avoid the po-po!)

(Yes, but we should still maintain a certain level or accountability, and not crippling people is a fairly decent place to start.) Her inner reason pointed out.

(Pfft, we’d only cripple the bad guys.)

(Yes, but what constitutes a bad-)

“Yeah, we’re not having this conversation.” She told the angel and demon on her shoulders. “Right not we’re testing out our Cannons new ammo circuit.”

(Ooh, combo dakka!)

After making sure no one else was on the second floor, she gripped the reload triggers on her Hand Cannons waiting for the minute it took each one to reload, during which she listened to the satisfying humming sound effect she’d based on the PS1’s start up sound.

(There really hasn’t been a greater console intro since.)

As the final chime of the sound effect went off, she struck her fist out sending a burst of electricity crackling through the air. Smiling at the crackle of electricity and the two LEDs still glowing on her Hand Cannons, she followed this blow up with another charge punch and another and another, until she’d drained all six shots of power in her cannons.

(Hyper! Ultra! Combo!)

“Oh, I’m going to have so much fun with these things.”