A few minutes ago…

Sarah stared at the yuppie in chrome in front of her.

It reminded her of the girl Lark, only this person took it to the next extreme, and then the level above that.

Shiny metal fixtures, synthetic muscles made of some flexible metal that she had never seen before.

The cannon’s that were over her shoulders were glowing a hot white, sizzling on the ends with the barely contained payload.

Her face was human, if you didn’t account for the metal jaw.

The eyes were glowing blue orbs, filled with clockwork materials that made a soft ticking noises after Sarah stared at it for a bit.

“Come on, let's dance angel girl!”

Sarah cycled through her gifts, choosing the best to deal with an empowered cybernetic.

Reinforced tungsten bones.

Heat rays for her eyes.

Super heat absorption.

Three of the standard perpetual engines to feed her bio energy.

The reinforced muscle package.

And finally, the one that would seal the deal.

Technopathy.

“Hey, did you know this?”

The cyborg stared back at her with a confused look.

“Know what?”

Sarah turned her thoughts to the pieces attached to the cyborg.

“Say, could you guys go and lockdown for a minute? I just need to talk to your owner for a bit.”

Oh, well why didn’t you say so!

Yeah, that’s no problem.

She hasn’t even oiled me in days! I’m taking a nap!

Wait, since when could we talk?

About now-ish?

Whatever, sentience sucks.

The cannons, legs, arms and body modifications all began to shut down without a fight, and the cyborg fell to the ground like a ton of bricks.

“W-What’s going on?”

Sarah walked up to her, a tendril aimed at the half-machines neck.

“You should really take care of your limbs and body.”

One stab later, and the borg was sleeping.

Sarah confirmed with the parts of the cyborg to make sure they didn’t move until the ‘glowing girl’ arrived, and moved to join Chimera in the secret passage.

Only for Lark to come out with a bunch of people without clothes on.

“Oh, you got May, always hated that bitch.”

“Yeah… she hardly put up a fight. So… survivors, I'm guessing?”

Lark nodded, “Chimera and some drunk guy are still down there fighting Mr. Flesh!”

Sarah gritted her teeth.

“Okay, there’s going to be a girl named Glow here soon, tell her that these people need help, and while she’s busy, get away.”

“W-What about Chimera?”

Sarah pinched Lark’s cheek, “don’t worry about that, we can find each other later. For now, this place is dangerous. You need to get these folks out, that's what you can do.”

Lark grumbled, “I used to be in a gang you know? I can fight too!”

Sarah nodded, “so make sure none of the other members find these folks, or barring that, take them out. You got tendrils now, and powers. Use them.”

Lark nodded slowly as a yellow tendril emerged from her hair to point ahead.

“Huh, that sorta tickles.”

Sarah giggled, “you get used to it.”

“Alright… you better make sure my Chimera’s safe.”

Sarah gave her a thumbs up as Chimera shot out of the ground, a massive draconic man chasing her and headbutting her into the ground.

“Shit!”

She rushed over, only for Chimera to send out her clones to assist.

Sarah meant to assist, but the rather large bomb implanted into the massive beast was telling her she might want to wait back first.

She turned to see that most of the people were still near the site of the underground area below, so Sarah moved in front of them and dug into another power.

The Earth powers they had taken from Terralord.

She lifted up a wall of concrete and bricks, held together by rebar that she was bending.

That confused her for a bit.

Terralord’s power doesn’t work on metals… so how…

She searched the metal to find a clue as she reinforced the concrete wall to protect the innocent civilians.

Metal… electricity?

It’s not that I’m bending metal… but the electrical current that is traveling through it is magnetically bending them to my will.

Kind of silly that I only just found that out… Meghan’s been doing that magnetic levitation thing.

How else could she unless she was doing something like this?

Sarah smiled.

Another quiver for my bow, I suppose. Now to use it.

She grew her makeshift shelter as the bomb exploded, rocking the structure, but otherwise sparing the folk a painful death.

Sure they were scratched a bit, but some of those were probably from the medical horrors below.

“Is everyone alright?”

“Miss, hurry, one of the concrete blocks fell on Laslo!”

“Ahh Fuck, it… it broke my damn foot!”

Sarah moved around to check the man, only to see Lark stab the guy's ankle with her tendril.

“Yeouch! Lady, you can’t just stab a man’s foot like that!”

“Ah pipe down, I’m healing your stupid foot.”

Sarah’s eyebrows went up as the foot’s regeneration was almost instant.

The bones and sinew grew, the skin came back in a flash, and a yellow energy was working inside the ankle, no doubt helping with the bleeding within.

Even Chimera and I can’t heal that fast…

Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.

She opted to see what Lark was doing, and moved over to place a hand on her shoulder.

It was… incredible!

Her body was filled with stem cells, and another thing that resembled a grabby hand with a metal cap on the end.

Wait! Those were…

“Lark, since when did you have nanites in your body?”

The yellow blob girl stared up at her with confusion.

“What do you… oh, you mean Lefty?”

Sarah thought back to their earlier conversation.

“You mean your prosthetic arm?”

Lark smiled, “yeah, the little guy said he wanted to help, so I grabbed a few pieces of metal from down below and fed it to him. Then he started making little versions of himself inside my body.”

Lark held out her hand, as a tiny orb of silvery metal appeared.

“Meet Lefty 2.0, now with healing tech. Isn’t he precious?”

Sarah was trying to wrap her head around that when she saw a glob of… something hit the ground next to the group.

“AAHH!”

“Oh hells! It’s him!”

“Get me out of here!”

The hostages started running from the blob of flesh, terrified of the now moving and squelching flesh ball.

“Shit, that’s got to be Mr. Flesh. Don’t touch that shit, or he’ll eat you.”

Lark backed away from the flesh orb as it tried to make its way back to the now destroyed warehouse.

Sarah on the other hand.

“Let’s see what he’s made of.”

She grabbed it and dug her own tendrils into its flesh.

Her mindscape opened, to a horror filled slaughterhouse.

People were hanging on meat hooks, with huge plastered smiles on their faces and piles of money in their mouths.

Meat was everywhere, all of it pulsating and rumbling like a living being.

The ground was veins and arteries, all leading to a massive brain that pulsated and wriggled with each pump of blood.

And the people were being dropped into those arteries and veins.

Sarah shook her head.

“Nope, this is a whole can of nope.”

She changed into a blob and devoured the entire flesh blob.

As she dissolved the mass and broke it down, she could see the faces of the people in the mindscape staring back at her.

The money fell from their mouths, showing their genuine smiles.

T-Thank you…

Nice lady, thanks!

Ah… to be free of this nightmare…

I’m never eating bacon again!

Sarah felt a tear roll down her cheek as her avatar in the mindscape world watched the place be destroyed.

He keeps them lucid… they all were still alive as he grafted them to his body…

Sarah felt her rage build at that.

He needs to die.

As the last of the flesh dissolved, she created a new ball in her hand with all the data from the flesh.

At least I know how to kill the fucker now.

Present…

Sarah gave the ball to Mimi as she gulped it down, a flood of data showing through their link as Mimi digested it.

“I’ll swallow you whole, you little delights!”

Sarah met him head on while Mimi started creating a greenish orb in her hands.

Two arms became four, then six as she grappled the monstrous maw and held it open.

“Mimi!”

“Right!”

Mimi launched the green pulsating orb into Mr. Flesh’s mouth with a gulp.

“Mmm, delectable morsel!”

Sarah turned the six arms into clawed whips as she released a few barbs of glowing green energy at the massive maw, the skeleton holding up an almost cartoonishly large face now.

“Gimme more!”

Mr. Flesh smashed into Sarah, not giving her time to continue the ranged attacks, and biting down hard on Sarah’s left side.

“AHH!”

“Mmhmm, I can taste the fear on ya mademoiselle! Hehahahahah!”

Sarah gritted her teeth as she pried open the jagged maw to release her hands from the grinding teeth.

The way they moved inside his mouth was almost enough to make Sarah wretch.

“Sarah!”

Sarah backed up to see that Chimera, Clonemera and Copymera were back on their feet.

As she was wrestling the massive mouth, she had her tendrils shoot three identical balls at her fellows.

“We need to keep doing that! Get moving and help out Mimi!”

Her friends… more like sisters really, spread out to assault the flesh abomination, each carrying a glowing green orb.

Grappling with Mr. Flesh wasn’t easy though, as the morphologic bastard could just as easily abandon his bones to try attacks in unpredictable ways.

Sarah was matching the blows for now, but it was clear that he was starting to learn about her attacking style.

The whips got countered with forks that grew from his back.

Her attempts to force more green orbs down his throat made him belch out stomach acid, which she had to avoid.

He was crafty, and the attacks he made were starting to land on her once again.

“Oh my sweet peas, you sure know how to make a man’s mouth water! But, it’s time we end our little games!”

He jumped back, his mouth growing larger and larger.

The Teeth were now the size of concrete dividers, and the mix of molars and incisors were laced with diamonds, rocks, and some sickly looking power.

“Excuse my breath, if you would!”

A massive gulp of air started sucking the rubble, nearby trash and unfortunately.

Mimi.

“Mimi! Clonemera, grab her!”

Clone tried, her arm stretching out to seize her while she ran at her with super speed.

As she was about to, the ground rumbled, a wave of energy caused a thump that pulsed from Mr. Flesh.

It broke the ground, shattered the once flat surface, and tripped Clonemera as she tried to grab Mimi.

And pulling her in as well.

“NO!”

Sarah tried to reach them with her whips.

Chimera tried to race over to them.

Copy…

Copy was running into the maw!

“Copy!”

A manic grin was on the mad genius as she pulled out a glowing green bomb.

“FOR SCIENCE!”

Sarah watched in horror as Copy’s body was devoured by massive teeth and fleshy tentacles.

The suctions stopped, releasing the others from the inward vacuum.

“Copy!”

Chimera ran over to Mr. Flesh as he began chewing… loudly.

“Oh what a delicious morsel she is, so full of bright ideas and wonders.”

He turned to stare at them, “such a noble sacrifice too… all for nothing though.”

Mr. Flesh pulled out the green bomb, looking over the design as he touched the red button at the top.

“Wait… I didn’t do that…”

Sarah watched as Mr. Flesh gasped in horror at the five second timer.

He tried to throw it, but his hand was glued to the bomb.

He tried to sever his wrist, but the blow would always stop just before he could.

“Damnit! You little monster! What did you do to me?!”

In a flash, a blob shot out of the villainous flesh broker’s stomach, a remote in her tendrils as she shifted back into…

Copy!

“Never doing that again! To the realm of mediocrity with you, you rotten flesh bag!”

Laughing maniacally, Copymera pressed a button as the arm holding the bomb placed itself inside the open chest cavity that she flew out of.

“YOU LITTLE HEL-”

The bomb erupted in a pale green light as Mr. Flesh began to dissolve.

His screams were mixed with thousands of others, all drowning out each other as their flesh sizzled and popped.

“Don’t let up, we need to finish every last piece of him.”

The other’s nodded as they conjured up the acid concoction that Sarah discovered.

It became a simple thing, once Sarah realized what it was that Mr. Flesh was made of.

He was literally just that, sentient flesh.

That meant that he could be subjected by the same things normal flesh could, at least normally.

All those grafted powers that he bent to his will made both ice, and fire pointless.

But acid, especially a favorite that she often used in her own work, could definitely finish the job.

For example, Fluoroantimonic acid,

Even in the past on the home world, it was considered the fastest flesh melting agent created by man, and that hadn’t changed when they traveled the stars.

She often used it on samples of Crimson R that she used for testing, and it too, melted in a matter of minutes.

Supercharged and with five superheroes’ making it?

Mr. Flesh’s corpse was now burnt into a slop, the sizzling parts and pieces melting into nothing.

Sarah turned to check on Copymera as the clone stared at the results with enraptured glee.

“To think that a super acid like that could be created within our own bodies! How fascinating!”

Sarah nodded, “it was only due to Mr. Flesh’s genetic data. His unique gastric juices were able to break down people in moments. I… learned that from his flesh pustule.”

She turned back to make sure the last remnants were dissolved, lobbing more acid at the still twitching ones.

“Now those folks can rest in peace.”

All the girls nodded solemnly at that.

They all made their way towards the hole that led to the underground meat processing lab. Jumping in one by one.

They had the data that they needed now, the proof that they could use to find Dr. Pox.

Sarah felt the memories flood into her as she began to recall the Flesh Broker’s last thoughts before they fought.

…