Post 3: Aron Ralston 3

4:30 pm, January 3rd, Brockton Bay City Hospital

Panacea stepped past Dauntless and the armored PRT trooper and entered the room where Taylor Hebert was being treated. As she stepped through the door, and saw the absolute wreck that was Taylor’s arm, she didn’t even pause.

She’d become inured to even worse sights long ago.

“Do I have permission to heal you?” the tired hero asked.

“Sure,” Hebert replied with a slightly strained grin.

Then, when Panacea touched Hebert’s arm, something happened. Something she hadn’t experienced in a long time. She was shocked at Taylor’s medical condition.

“What the hell. How are you even conscious? And which idiot forgot to give you painkillers?” Panacea blurted out in surprise. She could see that there wasn’t anything strange with Hebert’s biology, with her nerves, and given the damage, and how long Hebert had been waiting…

Torturous was just the start of what she’d describe that experience as.

Hebert’s grin became a bit more strained. “They didn’t forget, I refused them. Pain is weakness leaving the body, and I’ve lost a lot of weakness today.”

“Is that your power? Gaining strength proportional to what pain you’re experiencing?” Panacea asked curiously as she began to fix the arm, the bone and flesh flowing and fitting together as good as new.

Hebert laughed, partially in relief. “No. Promise you won’t tell anyone? I’m not quite sure how things will play out with the PRT after this, and don’t want them getting a wrong impression.”

“Fine, so long as it’s not something that puts the hospital or city at risk,” Panacea agreed.

“I think my power is all about being a badass. There seem to be two parts. The first, and most obvious, is that I channel some badass. Their knowledge, history, abilities, attributes… basically, their legend. I’m channeling Aron Ralston right now, a climber who got trapped in a rockfall, cut his own arm off to escape, and then walked back to civilization.” Panacea’s eyes widened, but Taylor just continued. “The second is an innate sense on being badass, and a compulsion to do so. Though that last part might be psychological. When I was in the locker I was pretty fixated on how other, better people wouldn’t end up in that situation, wouldn’t be weak how I was.”

Taylor almost missed the look of sympathetic longing that flashed across Panacea’s face at that.

I wonder… Taylor thought to herself.

“Like you, for example. You’re pretty damned badass, and one of my favorite heroes.”

Panacea scoffed a bit self-deprecatingly. “You’re saying that because I’m healing you, but thanks.”

“No, I mean it!” Taylor protested. And Panacea could tell she did; she was still holding Taylor’s arm, and could see the truth in Taylor’s body. But that didn’t help against Panacea’s knowledge that she would never, could never, do enough, be enough. That she was always just a moment from falling, from becoming a monster.

“You have that whole, badass medic thing going on,” Taylor continued, flailing about with her poor social skills.

And then Taylor seemed to know what to say. “After all, you’re probably the most badass healer in the world. And even if you’re getting a little burned out, that’s fine. Even the most epic badasses need to take a break, and be badass some other way after a while to avoid badass burnout,” she said with a nod. “Like Ekaterina Mikhailova-Demina.”

Panacea looked a little confused at the reference, which wasn’t surprising. Prior to that day, Taylor had never heard of Ekaterina either, until her badass power made her know.

“Who’s she?” she asked, interested despite herself.

“She’s this totally badass Russian nurse from World War Two. She wanted to be a soldier, but was only fifteen so they rejected her. Instead, she joined up with the military hospital. After the battle-lines moved up, and the hospital got bombed and evacuated, she switched over to work as a field medic with the Red Army. Then, after a couple more years of being a heroic medic, she got bored. She needed to change it up, and be badass somehow else.

“So, after rejecting her application a few times, she was finally accepted to serve with the Soviet naval infantry, basically their marines. One time, on a commando raid, she single-handedly assaulted a fortified Nazi position, took fourteen prisoners, and still had time to treat seventeen men from her unit. Another time, her unit of fifty men had to do a diversionary attack. Only thirteen survived, all wounded, and at least half would have died if it weren’t for her. She, also injured, got double pneumonia. But that didn’t stop her from escaping hospital to rejoin her unit.

“She was the only Russian woman to get the Florence Nightingale medal, and was later made a Hero of the Soviet Union, which was the highest distinction they made.”

Panacea was smiling at Taylor’s enthusiasm, and at the comparison between her and this epic woman. Still, the sarcasm was strong with her. “I’m not exactly commando material,” Panacea noted dryly, gesturing at her relatively small frame.

“Dr. Mikhailova-Demina wasn’t either. But no, you’re totally right. I think you’d be much better as a White Mage type, everyone knows not to mess with the White Mage. Or maybe a Deadly Doctor, using medical skills to save the injured and prevent the injury by smiting the wicked. Oh, maybe your powers would let you become a Beastmaster. Tigers are badass, so are gorillas. Everyone knows that.” Taylor nodded decisively, as if such things were obvious.

“I’ll think about it,” Panacea said, giggling despite herself. “And don’t think I didn’t notice when you said I was only one of your favorite heroes,” she mock-grumbled.

Taylor made her face look really serious for a moment. “I’ve wanted to be Alexandria since I was four. No one is more badass.” Then she relaxed her face, and they both broke out into laughter.

“Well, I’ve finished fixing you, so you can go get showered now,” Panacea said. “I’ve also taken the liberty of improving your immune system just in case, and fixing your eyesight. I can honestly say you’ve been the most interesting patient in weeks. I’m giving you my card, give me a call when you’ve worked everything out with the PRT, and we’ll see if you can help me become more of a badass, as you put it.”

“Alright. Thank you so, so much!” Taylor exclaimed. Panacea looked like she might say something else, but couldn’t think of anything, so just smiled, nodded, and left, closing the door behind her.

Her sister, Victoria or Glory Girl in costume, was outside chatting with Dauntless. “Hey, Sis,” she said as Amy left the room. “How’d it go?”

“Good. That girl has a crazy pain threshold,” Amy replied. “But I shouldn’t talk in front of these guys,” she said, gesturing to the PRT officer, Dauntless and Miss Militia.

They went up to the roof, then Glory Girl took hold of Amy and flew off towards their home at a relatively sedate thirty miles an hour so they could talk.

“So dish!” she exclaimed.

Amy smiled. “Well, you were right. She wasn’t bad.”

“I told you. If they’d locked me in that, I’d have probably done a lot worse.”

Amy hummed in agreement. “Still, that doesn’t mean she would be good afterwards. But her power is pretty interesting.”

Victoria vibrated in anticipation, her aura pulsing her happiness. “So, what is it?”

“Promise you won’t tell Dean?” Amy asked.

Victoria paused in indecision.

“Promise?” Amy pointed repeated.

Victoria sighed. “Fine.”

“Alright. Her power is being badass.”

“What.” Victoria deadpanned.

“No, really. That’s how she described it. Basically, her power makes her want to be badass, and helps her along. Plus she seems to channel badasses, and either knows about other people who have done ridiculously amazing things, or her power is giving her that knowledge. Today she was channeling Aron Ralston, who got trapped by a rockfall when climbing, and cut his own arm off to survive.”

“That’s pretty hard-core,” Victoria said appreciatively

“Yeah, especially for someone who isn’t a parahuman. Taylor ended up totally smashing her right arm, but still refused painkillers. It was basically hamburger. Shards of bone everywhere. Her nerves were lit up so much I was surprised she was conscious.”

“Taylor, huh?” her sister teased.

“Shut up. She was… nice? That’s not really the right word. Sort of unconventionally charismatic and friendly, and genuinely wanted to help me out when she realized I was tired.”

“Even under all that pain?” Victoria asked in surprise.

“Yes, even with all that.”

“So how did she try and help?” Victoria questioned.

“She tried to convince me that I was getting badass burnout,” Amy said deadpan.

Victoria laughed. “Badass burnout? I love that.”

Amy smiled. “That’s right. That I was a healing badass, but apparently needed to take a break and be a badass in some other way.”

“And what did she suggest as an alternative?”

“That I fight as a White Mage, or Deadly Doctor, or maybe a Beastmaster. I’m guessing those are archetypes of some sort,” Amy answered.

Victoria laughed. “Well, I for one love the idea of a pet tiger, so you should totally be a Beastmaster,” she joked.

But Amy was liking the idea more and more as she thought about it. “Maybe I will,” she mused quietly.

“What was that?” her sister asked loudly. “I couldn’t hear you over the wind!”

“Nothing,” Amy said louder. She needed to think a bit more before bringing anything up, needed to consider the angles. But she found Taylor’s concept of badass strangely appealing, and what Amy was already doing was killing her by inches.