Anniabal sat on her stupid couch, in her stupid living room, in the hero league’s stupid member apartments, Clair was over, and they were watching a cute animated movie that was usually one of the princesses’ favorites. The witch had put it on just to cheer Anniabal up, but she couldn’t bring herself to enjoy it right now. Stupid Stormburst. it would have taken him no effort to take her request to the higher-ups. It was just the next building over, and it's not like he had to walk up the stairs. He could fly god damnit! She slumped into her sulking more before remembering she had company, even if it was just Clair, and straitening her posture.

“You know you don’t have to do that, right?” Clair asked.

“I will act on the values I was raised with, thank you very much.”

Clair snorted “Oh? I got you talking now? Let me ask this then, Why are you so bummed about this?”

Anniabal tried to glare at her fiancée but her face softened without her permission.

“I just feel like no one on the team, excluding you, appreciates me. Especially Stormburst. Did you see how dismissive he was? And no one bothered to stand up for me!”

Clair looked guilty at that.

“Sorry, I should have said something. It's just dealing with Captain SB is the worst ya’know. But that actually wasn’t what I meant, why don’t you just go to the branch head and ask yourself?”

Well, that was obvious. She wasn’t supposed to. Only team leaders are supposed to see the branch head directly, security reasons.

“I can tell what your thinking just by your face, Annia nothings really stopping yo-

“Anniabal.” Anniabal corrected.

“Anniabal, nothings really stopping you, people who aren’t team leaders go to ask for stuff all the time. No one cares about that rule.” Clair said rolling her eyes.

“You say that. but nothing good ever comes out of doing that kind of thing”

“except getting what you want,” Clair said with a smirk.

Anniabal hesitated.

“Listen, Hun, I know you’re hesitant to do anything that ‘breaks the rules’. I honestly only want you to be happy and strong enough to stay alive, I think it’s the best thing you can do, but think on it.” Clair told her, her smile softening “For now, let’s finish the movie”

The next morning Anniabal and Clair made their way to the mission center to report in for their weekly patrol.

This week Anniabal was paired with Ziporound, a tall-ish slender Asian man, who’s hero costume consisted of a green and blue tracksuit with a ‘Z’ on the chest and back and The Insane K-9, a mutant-cyborg beast created by an evil organization bent on fusing the intelligence and cold calculation of machines with the instincts and wild ferocity of wolves, the eight previous incarnations of the experiment had all been driven truly mad by their warring duality, but by focusing on his memories of his pack, who had been murdered for his capture, K-9 was just barely able to hold his sanity together. After destroying the organization that had done this to him, he had eventually joined the hero’s league. Clair always wanted to pet the “big puppy’.

Despite both of them being on her team, Anniabal didn’t know either personally, and she was still a bit miffed about them silently agreeing with Captain Stormburst yesterday, but still, etiquette stated that she should greet them as she approached.

“Hello, K-9, Ziporound.”

“Ah, Greetings Geyser. It is a delight to be grouped with a fine pack today. I am quite excited for the hunt.” The wolf growled, a device in his neck automatically translating it to English.

“Uh…What he said…. Hey, Geyser.” Ziporound muttered a confused look crossing his face.

Anniabal Smiled at her hero name. Geyser as a name had been Clair’s idea and was part of how they first met. She also thought the name was just cool on its own. It was punchy and Had a sort of ‘snap-snap’ to it, all the qualities of being memorable, she thought it would be good for merchandising and the like, all in the future of course.

“Now that we’re all here,” Ziporound said impatiently “We should hit the road soon, the sooner we start the sooner our rounds are done.”

“I would like to remind you that there has been a string of robbery’s by metabeings in the areas we are set to patrol. We will have to be on alert for any evidence of that.”

“All the more reason to leave now,” Ziporound added

With a nod of agreement from his teammates, they were all soon out the door.

The city, Caliber city, was beautiful as always, ever since she had come to this world, even with all its flaws, she couldn’t help but be in wonder of the things humanity and the other races of beings that lived in this realm had created. As they patrolled Anniabal made sure to take in as many sights as she could, hundreds of outings, and she still enjoyed every second of it.

While they walked K-9 was constantly sniffing the ground for anything out of place. While Ziporound zoomed into alleys or any other out of the way areas at superspeed to search there. Anniabal just stayed alert with her powers, she was the group's heaviest hitter and she needed to be ready to go on any alert from the others.

For two hours they walked about their route with little cropping up, the only thing that happened was a mugging that Ziporound stopped without Anniabal even having to think about using one of her abilities. They even had time to strike up some light conversation.

“Hey, Geyser. So… What’s it like being made out of water and stuff?” Ziporound asked without prompting.

“Excuse me?” Anniabal responded raising an eyebrow.

“Sorry, that was rude. It's just that your body is shaped like a human’s but, it's water. I find myself wondering what that’s like.”

“I don’t know. I’ve never experienced anything different. Good in most aspects, I would assume. There are some disadvantages to having a body made of liquid held together by magical force but there are also benefits” she said bending her forearm backward in a way impossible for a human. “I don’t have bones to break, is one. What is it like being made out of meat”?

“Oh, it sucks.”

“yes, I assumed so, I heard as much from Clai- I mean Wickid. Awful name… What about you K-9, what is it like being half robot?”

“My every moment is suffering. Every second consumed with both physical pain and the torment of my mind slowly shattering. I was once just a wolf, just an innocent pup and now I am the monster that stands before you, not broken enough to die but far from whole. You cannot imagine what it is like to lose everything and then to lose yourself in an endless agony of being torn apart and put back together, endlessly for only the scientific curiosity of others. For your thoughts to be stretched with intelligence your kind should never possess. I am no longer what I w-“

“So, it sucks” Ziporound interrupted

“Yes… ‘It sucks’” the beast growled baring his teeth at the speedster

“My apologies for asking” Anniabal bowed slightly to show her regret, “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

The three lapsed into silence after that, about thirty more minutes later K-9 spoke up.

“I have caught a scent that is abnormal in this area of the city.”

“What is it?” Anniabal asked.

“I do not know, it smells like it may be a metabeing or group of metabeings. But they seem to be out of place. I am getting a heavy scent of jewelry and electronics along with them. We may need to investigate. Agreed?”

Anniabal readied her power with a nod and Looked at Ziporound, who was jogging in place at a speed that made him a blur.

“I’m nice and warmed up, let's go”

K-9 led them as he followed his trail, the trio stopped when the trail clearly led into an abandoned building. The structure was disheveled and clearly seemed to have been out of use for some time now. The windows were boarded up, the paint had long since fallen off leaving the rotting wood and chipped brick exposed. It seemed to have once been a shop based on the unreadable faded sign but the years of being ignored had left it a dingy husk

Ziporound frowned, “How many are inside?”

“There are many, I can not be sure of the exact number but there are no more than twenty, most of them are normal humans. Only about a third are metabeings

Anniabal prepared her pressure beam. It was essentially a laser of water, kept precisely straight and so pressurized that, if she put everything into it, it could level a small building or two. Even with the comparably little power she used now, it would be perfect for breaking open a door while also dealing a first strike. She glanced at her teammates both of whom gave her a nod. With their conformation, she pointed her arm forward and released her power at the door of the building. Water vapor was pulled through the air, condensing at her palm until a large orb was formed. The orb began spinning. With a short hum like a weapon charging up, A stream of water laced out of it, so fast that even to Ziporound’s superspeed powered eyes it was probably a blur. The beam rammed into the door and there was barely even a creak before the door flew off the hinges. Receiving a few cries of surprise confirming that there were indeed people hiding here.

Anniabal moved the attack from side to side trying to neutralize as many enemies as she could from outside, before ending the attack and slumping a bit, that ability always took a lot of her energy, and she needed a second to rest. As she caught her breath, Ziporound and K-9 ran into the old shack.

With one final deep breath, Anniabal followed behind them. Inside of the building, several suspects were already out. Clearly knocked unconscious but thankfully not dead. She had started to think she might have overdone it with the pressure beam, especially since these people weren’t confirmed to be involved with the robberies… there were five people down, eleven were still on their feet either having avoided or not being put down by her attack,

“Hero’s league! You are suspected of breaking and entering and robbery. Come peacefully for questioning” Anniabal shouted as she entered the room.

A gigantic man laughed as he stepped forward “No thanks, bitch. Heroes my ass. What are you going to do? Make us slightly damp until we submit? Have your puppy nip us?” he chuckled louder “I’d rather take my chances. Get ‘em!”

Anniabal looked around quickly.

There were a few who were obviously metas, the big man was around nine-feet-tall with bulging muscles, his biceps each bigger than her waist, he wielded a metal beam like a baseball bat. A curvy woman whose hair was made of fire, her arms were covered in flames that whipped and leaped, she would be the easiest for her to take out, plus decorum be damned, the water elemental wouldn’t mind seeing her shirt wet. Next, there was a man who looked like he was half insect, having six extra legs extending from his back and insectoid limbs and claws from the wrists and knees down, he had most likely been bitten by something radioactive, that’s how these things usually went, and a mech containing what looked like a little girl, Anniabal didn’t know if the mech was part of her or if she was just inside it, either way, she really didn’t want to punch a child. She had no way of knowing if the rest might have powers, but she assumed if they did, they were minor ones since they all had firearms (by that she meant guns, not literally like the hot girl)

She made all these assessments in about ten seconds and sprang into action.

Using her water shaping, she enlarged her fist and extended her arm, throwing a punch at the large brute. The blow sent the man stumbling backward. Ziporound ran at the bug man a car-like speed. K-9 had activated his weapon systems, canons extended from his sides, energy blasts began flying at the gun wielders, stunning each person they struck. The fire girl shot a ball of flames towards the bionic beast which Anniabal blocked with her new wave shield, water rose from seemingly nowhere cresting to block the attack, steam hissing as they collided, before crashing back to the ground. The water elemental then shaped a club trying her best to close and smack the flame wielder with it, the woman avoided every strike, but as Anniabal remembered who she was fighting she simply flexed her power to pull as much water from the air as she could, to drench the woman. While the fire user was forced to stumble back by the sudden cascade, when the steam cleared her flames were still lit, it wasn’t as if the water had missed. her clothes were soaked. (and the view was just as nice as expected) and the furious look on her face was evidence enough that she had been doused as well but her fires hadn’t even flickered, in fact, they seemed to have spread further up her arm along with a black substance Anniabal was just noticing for the first time.

“Oil fire, Damn.” she thought as she tried to figure out what to do. The fire woman sent another fireball her way, Anniabal created another shield allowing her to tank the hit and struck back with whips she formed from her own back.

These fast-moving strikes were much more effective than her club had been but still only about two out of every five lashes landed on target, the woman was agile she would give her that.

Rather than return with her fire balls, the flame wrapped meta did the unexpected, she grabbed one of the whips in her burning hand instantly bringing the living water to a boil

Anniabal hissed in pain, instinctually pulling the weapons back into her form.

“Need some help?” Ziporound asked from across the room. He was continually evading the punches and swipes of the strongman and his weapon. His speed was allowing him to get some hits in-between, but they didn’t seem to do much damage, if any at all. The big guy just shrugged them off. “Switch?”

Anniabal let her body lose cohesion as she slipped away from several more flame bolts, letting Ziporound rush her assailant, she reformed facing the big brute and fired a pressure beam directly into his stomach. He let out a cry and stumbled with the force of the attack, taking advantage of his lapse she formed the puddles from her earlier attacks into one large ball and sent it flying towards him. This time he seemed more prepared, only letting out a grunt as it struck him. He glared at Anniabal who couldn’t help but smirk.

“How’s that for slightly damp?” she quipped, taking a fighting stance.

She took a second to look around checking on her teammates

K-9 was battling the Mech which had miniguns extended from Its wrists, the bullet flew as the wolf danced around them returning fire with his energy blasts. The robotic armor was left charred and dented where the blasts landed. The child inside the mech pouted and pressed a button. One arm of the machine clicked and hissed, shifting the weapon into what looked like a laser rifle. The kid began to fire the energy beam at K-9, who jumped away, then forward. landing on top of the machine to begin ravaging the glass protecting the cockpit trying to pry his way inside.

Anniabal didn’t get to see what happened next as she found herself suddenly lifted off the ground by a crushing force. Damn, she had gotten distracted and the strongman had grabbed her and picked her up, trying to crush her to death.

While she did feel some pain from his grip, it didn’t really harm her. She let her body relax fully, becoming a shapeless mass of liquid that leaked through the villain’s hands.

“What kind of moron tries to grip water?” Anniabal asked as she took her normal shape.

This innocent question only seemed to make said moron more angry as he brought his steel beam down at her like a hammer.

“you’ll pay for making me look stupid!”

Summoning another wave shield Geyser blocked the blow. She noted that the defense was much harder to summon the third time.

“Dear, you’ve been doing a pretty good job of that by yourself.”

She was readying another pressure beam, when she heard a sound like ‘Tic Clic Tic’ from above her. She looked up. The bug guy was on the ceiling walking upside down on his back leg’s, right towards her. She had completely discounted him thinking Ziporound had taken care of him already. He was looking to ambush her. She canceled her beam. It was getting costly in energy anyway; she would have tired herself out soon is she had continued how she was going. She blocked another punch from the big man and landed one of her own in his jaw, admittedly to little result, before the half-insect-man dropped down in an attempt to land on top of her. Anniabal was expecting this and rolled out of the way, avoiding the sharp claws that would have eviscerated her liquid flesh. The multilimbed man quickly rose to his feet, the drop having barely knocked him off balance, he stepped forward with a flurry of slicing attacks from his claws and back legs trying to drive her further into the giant's range, the hulking bastard stepping forward to finish her off.

Finally, they were as close together as she needed them.

Anniabal shaped her arm into a lasso roping the bug guy and pulling him closer while at the same time charging the brute at her top speed. The mountain of a man reacted in the expected way drawing his fist back and punching the elemental full-on, her not even trying to dodge it. She took the blow, letting go of the insect man. Blue light flared around her as her mage shield trait activated at her having taken enough physical damage to warrant it. The hit still hurt, but the shield kept her from splattering at the force of the blow. It still hurt though. A lot. (maybe that wasn’t the greatest plan)

Anniabal went flying backward and into the nearest wall, glad she hadn’t smashed right through it, her mage shield broke at the second impact, it would take around thirty minutes to recharge but if things went as planned and her teammates took care of their current opponents, she wouldn’t need it. Not giving herself another second to let the pain set in Anniabal let her split-second plan culminate.

With a twist of her power, she activated her only real area of effect ability. A large chunk of her remaining energy drifted out of her as the water around the room began to evaporate and mist. It rose and condensed forming a cloud above her two targets. The clouds soon turned a dark grey.

Her opponents looked above them, but it was already too late for them to run as the sound of thunder filled their ears, with no more preamble a downpour of rain began to crash from the cloud and onto the two. It was heavy, fast and most importantly each drop was sharp like a storm of broken glass, it wasn’t as sharp as it could have been, Anniabal had general control and had set it to be more of a bludgeoning attack, she didn’t want to kill them. Still, her enemies found themselves trapped under what was practically a waterfall made pointy. This was Anniabal’s rain needles attack. One of her strongest and her favorite by far. She had had to get way out of range because it couldn’t differentiate her from its other targets, and she had tried to avoid using it because of how much of her power it required. It felt like the equivalent of taking a ten-mile run and then getting back home only to be put through a four-hour-long weight training course only to, after that, have to do an intense cardio workout. Even with those weaknesses, it was a blessing when she needed to take care of multiple enemies.

The bug guy tried to make his way out of the rain, continuously being beaten down every time he rose, he stumbled and limped along. By the time he finally made it to freedom he was covered in tiny cuts, and fell over flat on his face almost comedically, clearly unconscious.

The Giant man was still standing inside the storm even if just barely. There was a grimace of pain and effort gracing his visage as to Anniabal’s shock and horror he stepped forward, and then another step, and another. he walked on despite the torrential downpour pelting him from all sides, not missing a step as he approached Anniabal.

What rank was this guy?! The water elemental tried to form another pressure beam but she was too tired, she had expected the rain needles to take care of the two she was matched against and had accounted for herself having time to recover, she had no strength to bring to bear right now.

Ziporound was busy dealing with the fire user and K-9 had gotten inside of the mech but was now in combat against the child, who seemed to have a myriad of gadgets and weapons to counter the beast. She would be getting no help.

Anniabal used the meager power she had left to bring water from the room to her call balling it up and launching the projectiles at the giant. Only really hoping to slow him down, but the force behind the attacks were weak and the brute just walked through it. He drew his weapon back, with a malicious grin.

Anniabal tried to pull up her wave shield again but the effort needed to call the ability a fourth time was undoable. She might as well have tried to lift a car with her bare hands. Her mage shield was still down for the count…

In one last act of desperation, Anniabal tried to deform her body once again but she was a second too slow, and the metal beam came down on her with a force like being hit by a bus

First, there was pain, a pain like nothing the elemental had ever felt, pain that seemed to go on for hours in a second, and then like someone had flipped a switch the world went black.

Anniabal didn’t know how much time had passed. At the moment she wasn’t really sure of anything. She was a mind, just a mind with no sensory input. Her existence didn’t feel quite real and she had no idea if the memories of a place called reality were just her imagination or not. It was cold wherever she was, even without a sense of touch she could tell that. And she somehow got the idea she was falling but she couldn’t tell how she knew. She was scared, terrified. this was not how she was supposed to be, being like this hurt. It hurt more than the blow she vaguely recalled spattering her across an abandoned store, more than the scalding touch of a flame wreathed hand, more than every injury she had ever had combined, it hurt more than when she had reached out to hold her lover’s hand only to receive a cry of pain in return, it hurt worse than seeing the burn her touch had left on Clair’s skin. Being like this hurt, not physically, but because she could feel the lack of… anything trying to rip away her sanity, trying to eat away chunks of who and what she was. She wanted to scream. To cry out. To beg. She wanted to dig her nails into the surface tension of her skin to feel anything, even just pain. But she had no form. No mouth. No nails. No skin. She couldn’t stand it. She wanted to get out. She needed to get out. She needed to get out! She needed to get out! She needed to get out! She needed to get out! She needed to get out! She needed to get out! She needed to get out! She needed to get out! She needed to ge-

Anniabal sat up with a gasp. She immediately wanted to scream before coming to the realization she could. She could breathe, she could see, she could feel. She looked around. Noting that she was in the bathroom next to her bedchamber.

The core! She had almost forgotten she had selected the trait. It had brought her back from death.

She shuddered at the memory of what she had just experienced. was that death? If she didn’t have the elemental core would she have been stuck in that conscious oblivion forever? Most likely not, but she didn’t want to take that chance. No, she never wanted to experience that again let alone permanently. She stifled a scream of recalled horror with the thought of the cause of her temporary stint with dying, all the memories were clear, nothing was blunted or hazy as it had been in her previous state of being. Everything was crisp like the edge of the page that leaves a papercut across your hand. The building, the enemies. The fight, she had thought she had been winning until the end, the helplessness as the gigantic man stepped out of her strongest attack. The agony, the mind-boggling pain that can only be experienced at the end.

Anniabal never wanted to die again, but she also found herself not wanting to quit being a hero…. She was distracted from her train of thought by a few notifications in her mind’s eye. She opened the new prompt and read over the information

[Congratulations! Through continuous use of your powers in a form outside of your current abilities or traits, you have adapted a new ability.

Torrential rush: ability (

"Crash like a wave"

allow your body to lose shape becoming a formless mass of water as you dash. Increasing speed, and your ability to avoid attacks. Current limit of dash one yard (this ability is under the domain of your Elemental form power)]

[Congratulations! Through continuous use of your powers in a form outside of your current abilities or traits, you have adapted a new trait.

Reformation: trait (

"Splash-proof"

survive all blunt force attacks. (crushing, smashing, fall damage, etc.) by your body dispersing upon taking a hit. You will stay alive and aware and may reform your body at will, this may take from 10-300 seconds depending on the amount of damage taken. Reformation time will shorten as this ability increases in strength. (this ability is under the domain of your Elemental form power)]

[5 non-metabeing enemies defeated:

(+10 STR each)

6 non-metabeing enemies defeated:

(+10 STR each) 3 for team effort

2 noncombatant metabeings defeated:

(Rank E10

+120 STR

Rank F7

+50 STR) 3 for team effort

Minor combatant defeated

(Rank C3

+ 200 STR)

Heavy combatant injured

(Rank B4

+130 STR for wounding a metabeing a full rank higher than yourself)

Total STRENGTH earned: 456]

[Defeated by heavy combatant

(Rank B4

-140 STR)]

Those upgrades would have been helpful a minute ago…

The last defeated seemed to glare at her from the page. She almost wished it was a person, so she could wring its neck and kick it in the balls a couple times. STRENGTH was just as easy to lose as it was to gain. It was strange as it seemed to be semi-finite when compared to the number of metabeings that existed. It wasn’t like the ‘EXP’ from the video games she watched Clair play, where they gave it out willy-nilly for every attack you landed or enemy defeated, and you just endlessly collected the stuff, the STR gained from a fight had to come from somewhere, and that was the defeated foe. She had heard stories of A-rank metas being brought down to C after an F ranked enemy found their weakness, while the weakling ranked up to C from the massive boost. You could gain STR on your own, yes. It didn’t require fighting or taking from others, but it was much slower usually, and had the tendency to be more difficult. For some it was as simple as training, for some it was exercise or meditation, some needed things like magical weapons, or massive amounts of electricity or even to drink blood. No matter what it was, usually just fighting was faster and easier but any boost would help.

For Anniabal that boost would come in the form of getting a much larger body of water for her source domain, she still wasn’t willing to do something like break into a lake park and claim it as her own, but who knows, she certainly had a personal meeting with the branch head in her future, rules be damned.

Anniabal didn’t want to quit being a hero. She didn’t want to give up. She didn’t want to hide. She didn’t want to cower. Anniabal didn’t want to quit, she wanted to get stronger.