FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Calamity sat in the waiting room outside the emergency operating theatres of Millennium hospital, nervously fidgeting in the soft leather lined couch. She'd been here before on many occasions, back when other team mates had been harmed, but she'd never felt this... nervous. She was worried, quite rightly so; as a once leading scientist in biological technology, she knew life-threatening wounds when she saw them, having trained in medical sciences extensively. An indicator beeped in her armour, and she looked down at it. She didn't realise she'd been here as long as she had, and she took a small box of pills from a compartment in her armour.

Her unique condition forced her to rely on her armour to protect her from outside contagions, like bacteria and viruses; her skin literally having been replaced by the bodysuit she linked to her armour with, her immune system was violently reduced as a result. After Frostfire returned, he'd presented her with an alternative solution to the environmental suit; powerful immunity boosters.

They tasted like ass, and were made from chemicals and substances that, if not for the very precise way they were mingled, were toxic. She'd been nervous about first taking them, but after a whole day without her armour on and only casual clothes instead and receiving no illnesses, she'd taken to them. She only had to take one a day, at roughly seven in the afternoon, and it would bolster her immune system enough to last another twenty four hours without need of her suit, as if she still had her real skin.

She took a single pill from the box, each one only about the size of an individual PEZ candy, and quickly forced herself to swallow the horribly bitter, foul tasting medicine. A nurse at a nearby counter watched her take the pill worriedly.

"Pain tablet..?" The nurse offered, wondering what on earth a superhero would need with medicine.

Calamity shook her head. "Immunity booster," She informed, tucking the pill box away. "I have no skin."

The nurse seemed disbelieving, and Calamity pulled off a gauntlet, standing and stepping over. She put the gauntlet on the countertop and showed the nurse her seemingly gloved hand.

"All that fabric on my hand?" She mumbled making sure the nurse was paying attention. "Yeah, that's my skin. I was... in an accident, and now everything except my neck and head are covered in it."

She tugged the gauntlet back on her hand, sealing it tight.

"I can't even have children anymore." She mumbled. "I have the organs, but my immune system is too vulnerable..." She sighed. "I probably wouldn't survive to term, let alone the child."

The nurse nodded in sympathy. "I apologise for putting you on the topic." She said honestly.

Calamity shook her head with a sigh. "It doesn't matter," She said, moving to return to the couch, "At the moment, only Gisele matters." She stepped over to the couch and sat down, leaning into the leather while folding her arms behind her head and staring at the ceiling. She gave a sigh, partly of boredom, but also to try and release her built up stress. Something was still bugging her, nagging at her mind relentlessly.

When she'd last seen Gisele, before the device detonated, she was taller than herself. Calamity only came up to the reptile's eyes at the very top of her crown, but now Gisele was much shorter, only about four foot eight, and she even looked younger. For a moment, Calamity considered that the device had distorted time, reverting Gisele back to an earlier age, but she shook her head at this notion; Gisele had been grown, not born; she hadn't been aware, probably not even having gone through the period of childhood she was currently aged at.

She didn't have long to think, as Rhapsody, Frostfire and Myst soon entered the room, taking her attention.

"Calamity how is she? Is she going to be alright?" Rhapsody asked, hurriedly sitting at her side.

"I don't know yet," She answered honestly, "She's been in the theatre since we arrived a little over two hours ago. Her back was gashed open, and she had third degree burns that had all been bleeding, possibly for a long while before I returned; she was very weak." She gave the table in front of her a firm scrutiny, something about her silence translating back to Rhapsody.

"There's something else, isn't there?" Rhapsody pushed firmly. "Something you're not telling us; what is it? What's wrong?"

Calamity gave her a worried gaze. "Rhapsody... you've been around magic far longer than any Earthling alive, right?"

Rhapsody shifted uncomfortably, the subject of her extensive age not something she liked to dwell on often. "Longer than many of your best spell casters collective ages combined." She grumbled. "My race lives a very long time; I am still fairly young compared to the eldest that were alive at the time of my banishment, as I'm sure I've told you before."

"In all your years of experience in magic, have you ever known of a conduit to rebuild its connection to reality after it has been destroyed?"

Rhapsody thought about it, raking through her thousands of years of experience. It was an odd question, the reason for which she figured would be stranger still, but she didn't want to press that particular question before answering the one presented her. Her race had always had a close tie to magic, she herself was a very powerful mage, but she didn't use her magic often as she knew she could only use it to destroy.

She had no grasp of offensive magic that could do anything less than mutilate.

"I... I've never seen it myself, but I remember being told, a long time ago, about a stone that the royal mages possessed. They'd scried that it was a conduit, and were using it to fuel their, and the city's own magic.

"There was a story that the stone was impossible to destroy. It could be crushed, atomised, vaporised, but within an hour it would be exactly how it had been before. There were theories as to why this might happen, the leading of which was that the mana that the stone seeped lingered long enough to gain a memory of the stone, and that the magic would recreate the stone to continue the flow of mana, but I don't personally know what to believe about it.

"I always figured they just got a new rock and pretended that it was the original conduit stone." Rhapsody admitted. "After all, a rock is a rock."

Rhapsody turned her gaze back on Calamity. "Why do you ask?"

Calamity seemed to flinch at this, possibly not expecting to be asked the question, but she quickly recovered herself.

"When the device went off, there had been nothing in the room at all except the door that I had sent across the other side of the room myself." She said. "No mist, no energy, just a big empty room. The shrapnel shard I handed you I found embedded in the wall by the door, far side from where I had been standing. I had to enter the room to get it, I assure you, there was nothing in there.

"But... when I found her in the room, she was hidden underneath the door, even she couldn't move that fast. She was burned terribly, and had deep gashes in her back, there's no way she could have moved with those injuries, not as far as she had."

"She's a magic user, maybe she-"

"NO!" Calamity snapped, cutting Rhapsody off. "It's impossible, even counting magic!" She stamped a foot on the linoleum floor angrily, accentuating her outburst. "It was physically stuck to her flesh, she'd have to have taken it off, camouflaged and then hidden from me when I entered the room! I've seen how her camouflage works; she cannot maintain it when out cold; why would she hide from us if she were injured? How would she hide her injury, it couldn't possibly have been camouflaged, as only her scales change! Besides, she..."

Now Frostfire was curious, and he leaned in himself, eager to press her on what she had trailed off on.

"She's... younger." Calamity said.

"I don't understand it myself," she continued, now turning her attention to the floor, avoiding their disbelieving faces, "but she's the size of someone in their early teens, even her facial structure has changed to appear younger. I am unsure about her mind, she may still be the Gisele we knew, but she's not the same in appearance.

"It... I don't understand what's happened. She was too weak to say anything to me before, when I found her in the sewers, she could barely stay awake."

"Maybe the magic immortal stone story is true?" Rhapsody offered. "In which case, Gisele was simply resurrected by the mana that was going to flow through her into the world."

"But mana has only a solid memory, not morphic." Myst pointed out. "It should have returned her to how she was the moment she died."

"But the moment she died, she had a weapon fused with her body." Rhapsody pointed out. "Maybe the mana, knowing this, changed her to a younger state of being to avoid that problem? It could have protected as much of her as it could, and used that to recreate her in a diminished, preadolescent form?"

"It sounds more plausible," Myst mumbled, "but I doubt it's possible..."

"She's a living conduit," Rhapsody reminded her, "She's essentially made of mana. Who knows what she could be capable of..? She could be a walking time bomb for all we know."

"Knowing what we do know about her has only made her more a mystery, raising yet more questions for every answer we get;" Frostfire mumbled, "And the only people who would know are Grand Mage Maloak-"

"He's been dead ten years." Rhapsody pointed out.

"Or Gisele herself," Frostfire finished, unfazed by her interruption.

"She's in no state to tell us anything at the moment." Calamity grumbled. "And I don't think she'll be well enough to tell us for some time."

The group stayed in agreeing silence, staring at the floor. Only Calamity knew the extent of Gisele's injuries, the others assuming less or worse; she hadn't told them the extent of the damage to their companion only that she hadn't been harmed herself when Frostfire had worriedly called her radio to check up on her.

An orderly stepped out of the door to the theatres and turned to them.

"Breakers?" He asked, referring to their group not their names.

"That'd be us," Frostfire's voice rumbled gently, none of them rising from their seats.

"Your companion has taken an entire body's worth of blood, and we've healed her wounds as best we could; after we cleaned them out, they seemed to start healing themselves at a heightened pace, so we've stitched them shut and bandaged her burn after cleaning and scouring off the charring.

"Even her burn seemed to start healing on its own, so we've almost left well enough alone. She should be fully healed within a day or so, but she's to take it easy for another twenty four hours after that. One of our Druid healers commented that she seems to have a lot of residual magic from her injuries, despite her being a conduit, whatever the hell that means, which has centred on her major organs

"From what he could tell, the magic seems to be restorative in nature, but of a scale far greater than that he's seen in anyone, even the Arch Druids." He looked up from his paperwork at them. "What did you say had happened to her?"

Calamity grimaced. "She died." She mumbled to his disbelieving face.

"Yeah, pull the other one, it's got bells on," The orderly laughed in reply. "No, really, what happened to her?"

Calamity stood and stormed over to him, backing him into a wall while she clenched a fist.

"A device, magical in nature, affixed itself to her here," She snapped, punching him where the weapon had stuck itself to Gisele, "It wouldn't come off, no matter how hard she pulled. I, now being forced to watch her frantically panic to pull it off, was stuck behind a force field as the device went critical and vaporised her before my own eyes!

"Now, if you don't believe me, I still have footage of it in my suit that you could watch; you tell me that she didn't die after watching what I had to!" She had her other fist against his chest angrily clutching at his shirt, and she thumped him against the wall. "Well?!"

Frostfire's hand found itself on her forearm, and she followed it up to his face. He shook his head at her.

"He's just an orderly," He said, pulling Calamity's hand off of him, "He doesn't know any better; calm yourself or you won't be allowed to see Gisele."

Calamity resisted, still burning through her anger, but eventually relented, acknowledging the words and calming down.

"I'm sorry," She mumbled apologetically.

The orderly went to speak, but was cut off by Frostfire.

"Don't respond," He snapped, "You brought that on yourself and she shouldn't have to apologise; just tell us where Gisele has been roomed."

"T-the observation ward, one floor up at the other end of the building, she's in bed 3A."

"Thank you." Frostfire growled, leading Calamity out of the room. Myst followed close behind, and Rhapsody brought up the lead, stopping only to talk to the orderly for a moment.

"You dodged a bullet there, boy. I've only seen mothers this upset at losing someone before." She warned as he cringed from her. "Bedside manner; work on it."

And with that, she followed her fellow heroes up the stairs, her tail cutting a swathe in the air behind her.

The orderly gave a heavy exhale, his nerves shot to tatters by the encounter, and the nurse at the nearby counter gave a hearty chuckle at his expense.

============

Gisele was lying in a bed near the middle of the observation room, and had her middle wrapped in bandages to hold cloth patches to her back and side, there to soak in any bleeding or weeping her wounds might have done. She was lying on her unharmed side, her comfort being seen to by a nurse who moved her gently on the bed so that as little pressure or tension would be put on her wounds as possible. She was still out cold; despite the sedative she had been given having little effect, she had been too weak to be awake, and as such she slept through her operation with little more than a wince when her burn had been scoured.

"She's looking better," Calamity commented quietly.

"I'm sure she looked very pale in the ambulance." Rhapsody quipped with a giggle. Calamity glared at her, and Rhapsody fell silent once more.

"Quite." She grumbled. "She was barely breathing when she was taken from me."

The four sat and stood about Gisele's bed in silence, each unsure what to say. The one they all longed to talk with was Gisele, but she was currently passed out on the bed, and would probably stay that way for hours.

Eventually Frostfire stood up, pulling a tape measure from a pocket. He gingerly moved the sheets to get a measurement of her arm, continuing to get measurements of the serpent's sleeping anatomy, even managing to get inside leg measurements and her tail discreetly. He motioned a nurse over and asked for a strip of paper, and he pulled a pen from another compartment, writing down the measurements and some details before motioning to Myst.

"Myst, come with me downstairs, let's get her some clothes made up while she's sleeping so that she doesn't have to leave here in a hospital gown."

Myst only nodded, following Frostfire back out of the room, turning only for a moment to check on Rhapsody and Calamity.

"I think the girls might need a moment," He said as they walked out the door, "They... this whole ordeal left them quite distraught. They need some time."

"What about you? You seem to be taking it quite calmly..?"

Frostfire shook his head. "Everyone feels the pain of losing friends and family, some more than others; but those girls have been through this pain only once before, nearly losing me, and I can understand why they would be so distraught. I'll allow them their space.

"I've suffered the pain of loss on more occasions through my life than I care to mention; I've burdened sorrows that've stopped me in my tracks, over time, I've just become able to keep it inside. If the enemy can break your cool, tug at your heart enough to make you unable to continue, then they've already won the battle they set out for. Our enemies, as heroes, are not out to simply kill us, or get us out of their way; they want do destroy us utterly, to make us question why we became heroes, to break our resolve and make us do something that we can never forgive ourselves for doing. Crushing our heart through those we care about may seem cowardly, but evil has never been brave."

Rhapsody and Calamity were still up with Gisele, Rhapsody having stopped a nurse to ask how she was doing and what had been done in detail while Calamity simply sat and watched the albino reptile sleep. She was only half listening to what the nurse was saying, but she picked up enough to know that Gisele should be well enough to leave by the morning, possibly even beforehand, depending on how well her wounds healed between now and when her bandages were changed in two hours. For Rhapsody, that had been good news.

Calamity just thought it a godsend that Gisele was alive.

She still bore a slight paleness to her tongue, an indication that she'd lost as much blood as she had, and she was sleeping with her mouth slightly open, breathing the slow, easy breaths of someone who would probably sleep for hours still, regardless of whether people moved, nudged, or made overtly loud noises near her. She didn't snore, though she did wheeze a little. She had never snored, Calamity had noted to herself; sometimes it was impossible to tell whether or not she was asleep until she'd grumble, or it could be seen her eyes were closed in that peaceful expression everyone takes while sleeping. Calamity smiled slightly when Gisele mumbled in her sleep and gently moved her mouth, a cute animation that she'd not seen the serpent do before.

The nurse mumbled something, and Rhapsody tugged at Calamity's arm.

"Fortune, visiting hours are almost over." She said.

"I... would like to stay until she is aware again." She replied. "If she wakes up in the night or tomorrow morning, it'd be better if a familiar face was there to greet her, she's not been this seriously injured in years, I'm unsure how she'd react. If she wakes and is alarmed or panicked, it'd be better if she isn't put under again, as that would only delay her return to the waking world and the news she is to receive."

The nurse seemed to regard the request for a moment, gently adjusting the sheets on a nearby bed as she thought.

"We can permit you to stay, but if we ask you to leave the room, you must comply, do you understand?"

Calamity nodded. "Of course, I wouldn't dream of interrupting your work; I trust that I wouldn't be in your way if I stayed here?"

"No, we have room to access her from the other side of the bed when we change her bandages." She replied. "Try not to doze off until late, about eleven thirty, but other than that, you are free to remain."

"Thank you, nurse."

"Hey, I'll see you tomorrow, alright?" Rhapsody said, waving to Calamity faintly. "You keep an eye on her, she's been through more n' she deserves."

Calamity nodded. "I shan't leave her side." She said. "This I swear."

============

Gisele knew she was dreaming, she knew the waking world and how it worked, and she knew that, in her dreams, things always looked off, like she were seeing them through fog or a misty window. Though dreams were nice reprieves from her dangerous every day life, she didn't dwell on them much. They had a tendency to ramble on pointlessly, or break the laws of physics beyond what even magic could do, even in her hands.

This dream was different though, if only slightly.

Normally, her dreams were foggy and greyish, impossible to recall unless they were particularly strong or were frightening. Nightmares often consisted of beasts from the Nether, the realm of pure Mana, where all magic originates. Nether beasts were semi immortal, insanely powerful, and were almost immune to all forms of magic; thankfully, they couldn't leave the Nether without a powerful field of magic to sustain them, and even then they couldn't last long.

She knew this wasn't like those dreams; she didn't have control of her body, except her eyes. She was down in the sewer tunnels, waiting with Calamity outside the door that Peacebringer was hiding behind, and she nodded to her. Without warning, Calamity shot the door with a blaster mounted on her wrist, revealing the nine foot tall mechanical monstrosity that was Peacebringer.

"Back again, are we?" He rumbled, turning around. "You couldn't stop me last time, what makes you think you stand a ghost of a chance this time, little girl?"

"We know what you're up to, Peacebringer!" Calamity snapped, stepping up to the larger opponent fearlessly. "Give up, and we might be lenient."

"Give up? After last time? Surely you jest, what makes you think you could possibly oppose me?!"

He shoved Calamity back out of the room, and Gisele magically shoved him across the far wall.

"I think we both know how this is going to end, don't we?" He rumbled, holding up a little sphere. It seemed to vanish from his palm, and Gisele looked down at her flank, finding the device stuck to her side, where it started glowing brighter.

"This time, stay dead!"

Gisele's eyes snapped open, and she sat up in the bed with a shriek, her body shivering in fear. Her breathing was fast and erratic; her heart feeling like it was beating a million miles an hour. Frantically she fumbled at her side, desperate to get the device and remove it, only to have her hands stilled by Fortune's own, now not covered by her gauntlets.

"Gisele- Gisele!" Fortune snapped at the frightened serpent, "Gisele, breathe; calm down, you're safe! We're in Millennium Central hospital, calm down or they'll have to sedate you!"

Gisele's eyes snapped onto Fortune, now leaning partly over the bed, her face worried, but welcome. She gulped a large lungful of air, slowly calming herself.

"That's it, you're alright," Fortune mumbled reassuringly, waving down the orderly who had hurried over with a needle of sedative. "Don't be afraid, I'm here."

"F-Fortune..?" Gisele breathed, "H-how... what happened..? I..." She couldn't manage to say any more, now coming down from her fright she was unable to help but break into tears. Fortune carefully wrapped her arms around the weeping reptile, who hugged back for what comfort it would bring.

Fortune held her at arms length and looked worriedly into her teary eyes.

"Gisele, what do you remember?" She asked earnestly. "Before I came and found you, what do you recall?"

Gisele sniffled, trying to lay back into the bed, having to roll to one side to avoid pain from her injuries. "I... I remember the device," she said, her mind's eye flickering onto the weird thing that had stuck to her skin, "And... I remember saying goodbye to you; and then blackness. I... I awoke in the sewer under the door, unable to move. I was bleeding heavily, a large burn on my side, but I passed out for a little while in the darkness.

"After that, I awoke again in pain, my back and side felt like they were on fire, I still couldn't move much, and I heard someone coming. I... I thought that it was one of Peacebringer's minions, or maybe even a gang recruit, so I hid myself by camouflaging my scales to match the floor. I even closed my eyes, afraid of whom or what I might have seen.

"When the door was lifted off of me, I worried, and my breathing hastened, you have no idea how relieved I was that it was only you who found me."

"Only me?" Fortune asked, mocking offence at her honest statement. "Why, it's almost as if you wanted me to leave you there. Gee, this is the thanks I get for saving someone's life, I don't know..."

She gave Gisele a cheeky grin, it wasn't often she could make a joke at the serpent's expense, and she was relishing in the look on her face.

"How do you feel, Gisele?" Fortune asked gently.

Gisele shifted uncomfortably for what she could, sliding her tail to a less painful position. She didn't have to sleep through surgery often, and the bed she was in was unyielding in its toughness.

"Now that the fright from my nightmare has worn off, stiff." She admitted. "And something is constricting my torso..."

"Don't fiddle with them, youngun," Calamity warned, gently slapping Gisele's hands as they moved to the bandages around her middle, "those bandages are keeping your back from bleeding all over the sheets."

Gisele exhaled heavily, her eyes looking about the room. Fortune didn't ask her what she was thinking, she'd seen Gisele's expression before; a calm, yet pensive look, brimming with concentration, she was getting her bearings and sorting her thoughts. Her eyes flicked onto Fortune's face again, this time slightly concerned.

"Fortune... what happened to me?" She quizzed, sniffing at the air sharply. "You... you smell like you've been worried sick..."

Fortune grumbled inside, hoping that Gisele wouldn't ask that very question, but she hadn't counted on her heightened sense of smell... No... there was something else that had twigged Gisele to it; maybe the exhausted yet relieved look on her face had done it? It could have been the way that Fortune was talking to her, even? Fortune sighed, wondering how she would word what she now had to tell the somehow younger yet still mature snake had happened.

"The device," Fortune mumbled, choosing her words carefully so as not to upset herself or Gisele, "it... when it reached the end of its charge, it sort of... vaporized you."

Gisele blinked at this, not sure quite what to think.

"Ah." She said, her face now contorting into one of deep, yet distant thought. "How the hell am I here then?"

Fortune shook her head. "I don't know." She said. "We were hoping you might have been granted the information like when you were born?"

"Don't look at me; I've only just been made aware that I'm meant to be dead." Gisele snipped. "That isn't exactly something one reads too much into, unless they're a priest, anyway." She sighed a little, her eyes glaring at the floor before she heard Fortune sniffle. When her eyes stopped on Fortune's face, her breath caught in her chest. She was... crying? Gisele's heart sank; slowly she reached out an arm, putting it on Fortune's knee; she didn't know that Fortune cared quite so much...

"Fortune... please stop crying, I'm sorry; I didn't know it had upset you this much." Gisele admitted, trying to pull her back from her misery. "Please, Fortune, I'm sorry." It was now that Gisele noticed how much smaller her hand was compared to before she had died, and she stared at it in surprise. She shifted her gaze down the bed sheets, noticing how much shorter she was for the first time, and how her voice had changed from what she remembered sounding like. "Fortune... why do I sound different, and what the hell happened to my height?"

===========

An hour later, and a pair of nurses came into the ward, fresh gauze and cotton patches ready to change Gisele's bandages. They were impressed that she was awake, having thought that she would sleep through the night, and the changing of her bandages. Still, they asked Calamity to give them a little space, and she dutifully stood at the foot of the bed, watching patiently. She wasn't worried about Gisele being nervous with her there; it wasn't like there was anything that the snake had that she hadn't seen in the mirror before. At least, long ago anyway; and she knew that Gisele didn't mind, having told the serpent on many occasions that she knew most everything about anatomy anyway.

Gisele was surprisingly docile when the nurses started removing her bandages, even moving a little so as to help them reach around her. Once the old bandages were off, the nurses took note of how quickly she had healed, little left of her wounds but a blister and a pair of scratches, which also were still healing. Fortune would have been surprised, but she knew of the snake's rapid healing, and even cheerfully told the nurses that there probably wouldn't even be a scar left when she'd fully recovered. The nurses, impressed at her rather rapid recovery, called a doctor over to inspect the remaining wounds, and he soon signed the clipboard at the end of the bed to release her into Calamity's custody.

"She's to do no strenuous activity until at least tomorrow afternoon," The doctor droned in a boring 'been here, done this' tone, "And she is to get a good, hearty meal; she's got little meat on her bones. There are clothes that she can take at the end of the room; have a good evening."

And with that, they were practically rushed to the changing rooms. Gisele chose her usual style attire, simple clothes of jeans and a plain shirt, a belt to keep her jeans from falling. She was a good deal shorter than Fortune now, having to look up to see her face now, rather than down slightly. This seemed to annoy the snake somewhat, but nowhere near as much as when Calamity, now donned in her armour again, led her outside and picked her up as if she weighed nothing.

"I can fly you know." Gisele grumbled, trying to wrestle free of Calamity's otherwise firm grip.

Calamity shook her head. "Nu-uh, no can do, you heard the doctor." She said, practically singing the cheer of humiliating the snake in her voice. "You're hitching a ride with me and that's final, now hold on."

Gisele gave a tiny cry of fright when the thrusters in Calamity's boots started, and promptly grabbed her tightly around the neck as the pair launched into the air and across the city. Gisele wasn't that impressed; unlike a few of Calamity's passengers, she'd seen the city from above before, being capable of flight herself. Her eyes lit up as the pair flew over the recently built amusement park, it bright colourful lights still lit even at the late time they were passing. Calamity smiled a little at this, her grin hidden inside her helmet; Gisele had never cared for the amusement park before, maybe her younger form also brought with it a slightly younger view on the world...? She decided that she would find out in the morning; give Gisele a little returning home party. Her mind wandered, imagining the fun she could have with the serpent should she really be of a youthful frame of mind.

She'd always wanted a daughter...