Selena was glad the slipspace generator was part of her, integrated with her body enough that they didn’t take it from her when they disabled it. It was hers. That place was hers. Now, even when they didn’t want her to use it, she still could. She may not be able to keep the device fully maintained without their help, but that didn’t mean she was an idiot. She had figured out how to reboot the device long ago, and how to turn it off again so that the technicians were none the wiser. Even so, she still needed them if she wanted to keep the place alive and hers. She needed to prove to them that she was worth keeping around, that it was worth keeping around. That thought in mind, she got up and left her room.
—
Rick: Dude check out the news article, looks like you really dodged a bullet. [link]
Rick: Apparently there were security cameras that totally could’ve exposed your secret identity, but the footage is gone.
Keegan: The shooter probably took care of that herself. So unless she kept a copy of it, yes I figuratively dodged a bullet.
Keegan: But there was also a literal bullet that I most definitely didn’t dodge.
Rick: Oh yeah, you got shot in the head didn’t you…
Keegan: That I did.
Rick: So you remember that? You used to forget every time…
Keegan: I do. I haven’t had any memory issues since I figured out the mental binding thing.
Rick: That’s good.
Keegan: Well, at least none as far as I’ve noticed…
Rick: So what did it feel like?
Rick: Getting shot in the head?
Keegan: Honestly it didn’t feel like much, I didn’t have enough time to process it before I was already gone.
Rick: Oh.
Rick: Well I gotta get ready for work, I’ll see you there.
Keegan: Alright, see you.
Keegan opened the article Rick had sent him. There were a couple images of the area. One showed the place where he stood when the shockwave occurred, with the lamppost split in two behind a hole in the walkway. Oddly, it appeared that each half of the post lying on the ground was a complete post. He had indeed burned right through the bricks, and even some of the dirt beneath. He couldn’t find out what kind of brick the walkway was made of, but based on what he could tell from a quick search, he had to be at least 2000 degrees Fahrenheit.
He held his right hand out in front of him and stared intently at it. Imagining pain, he focused it on the hand. It began to spark and from underneath the skin emitted light like that of a burning coal, but did not disperse. He glanced quickly around, unsure what to do next. Keeping his flickering hand outstretched in front of him he walked to the kitchen sink, where he let a stream of water fall onto his hand.
“Huh, well whadaya know…”
—
Selena dug through the files in archives. She had heard about an experiment that had leaked a few months ago when the development of her suit was temporarily interrupted first by a move and then by an accident. The details of experiment and the accident were unknown to her, but she knew it happened very close to the place where her mission brought her last night and the target had never been found.
“Here it is,” she said to herself. “Experiment number 57005…”
For several minutes she flipped through the files, but it soon became clear that, while the leaked experiment at least mostly matched up with the stranger’s abilities from the night before, seeking him with the available information was pointless.
“Of course it’s dead end, they would’ve found him and brought him in already if it wasn’t.”
She put the box back on the shelf. The footage she had collected from the local security after the fight had also been a dead end, an unclear mess full of bright flashes. She needed something else, some new angle that hadn’t been available before. She looked down to the weapon holstered at her side.
“Hold on…”
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