Jackie’s face was still buried into her palm, but she rose her face from a side, to let her question to be heard.

“How the fuck did we manage to break superpowers, Mr. Homer--?”

“Well, first things first—” that was the thing about Leslie, that Jackie couldn’t get a good read on. As if he used dickishness constructively, like a Severus Snape. “I apologize.”

He motioned to his raised wrist, an ORACON watch device that had local news feeds collected into files.

“It… It felt too quiet. I had to check, just to be sure…”

Before Jackie could say “understandable”, she was cut off by all people, River.

“I’m no medical know-it-all that only knows things because they did a search the night before for facts—but isn’t having distractions in your work room… The bad?” she asked.

Leslie gestured, his palms facing upwards in a shrug. “Welcome to the oh-so-healthy state of the health care system. If you need something to combat your mind slowly eroding due to cosmic space nothingness. I’ve talked with an eye examiner that ‘has’ to eat pizza now during procedures—”

“I’m sure that was an X-Files moment with Scully or something—” River replied.

“We get it Brooke, sell those tapes you keep digging up and give yourself something good for once—” Maddie chimed in, crossing her arms as her face settled into a pout.

“Anyways…” Leslie cut the banter with his sharp and dry wit. “Let’s give a quick summary.”

He grabbed a canister and motioned towards the ceiling. A massive white projector formed from the ceiling and lowered itself towards Leslie, opened the compartment and shoved the canister within.

Soon, the very room became a virtual Planetarium, A.R. projections of data swirling and whizzing about everyone’s heads, as Leslie had his own arms crossed, looking up with his rocky disposition.

“siVis,” Leslie began his lecture. “Is an amoral phenomenon brought forth 30 odd years ago. Some call it an abnormal response to the Shift Noumena, which normally overwhelms the human senses due to constant exposure to the things we can barely understand.”

“WE KNOW THIS ALREADY,” Aiko shouted out of boredom, which only just started a few seconds ago. “KINDA OUR WHOLE LIVES HERE—"

“Clearly not, if you managed to break something,” Leslie had a sly tone to his bite.

“He’s enjoying being a shithead, don’t worry,” Maddie waved her hand at him.

“Oh maliciously,” Leslie grinned briefly before settling back to his default expression. “But you forgot to add ‘a correct shithead’ to that. Annnyways…”

A diagram of the human body appeared, and instantly it was put in a disarming wave of a Shift—with the cosmic waves going forward yet attacking them on all sides.

The human grabbed their head, twitching, coiling as they shuddered within the wispy vortex. The “camera” so to speak, kept zooming, closer and closer, towards their shut-tight eye.

“The Good Doctor and Modern Mother, Gia Taber, discovered and founded this phenomenon being trapped within the worst Transitional Shift ever recorded. As everyone lost their minds to the over sensory and got wrapped by the waves in mere seconds, she… Gained enlightenment. And while not exactly the first siVictim, she saw something beyond, and gained that knowledge.”

The human’s eye opened as soon as he finished, as a colored ring formed along their pupil. Only to scream out, their eyes blaring an intense unhealthy glow. Trailing tears carrying that said light.

Jackie winced a bit, holding her own forehead.

Quick flashes, of her own eyes glowing out of control, at her own screams, drowning out her own parents’, as they discovered her destroying her room in an overpowered frenzy.

It should be so distant, that day, now. The girls and she were so traumatized they can’t remember very certain bits of it. But she guessed that the remains left were all that mattered. That clearly painted the self-destructive picture of a very, very stupid decision they all rushed into.

“When presented with the madness of existence, the surreality of the universe, the human mind is forced to realize that—and all at once, realizes everything else it tried to either understand or ignore. Ego, knowledge, your sense of self breaks down… And reconstructs itself with this new level of knowledge. Enlightenment that brings you to this next level. Everything that you could’ve spent a lifetime barely tapping into, all unlocked.”

The human, now shifting its pieces to become a silhouette of energy, jumped high and controlled its trajectory landing on the side of a mountain. Their arm was so stiff and hardened, it acted as a makeshift pick to dig and hold on.

“Enhanced human senses, enhanced human physiology, unlocked mental capacities, refined motor control, and unlocked biological control of the body. All determined by the user themselves.”

As the human basked in their newfound power, they looked at their free hand as it started to jumble, and fall apart.

As they panicked more and more, soon their body fell to pieces in their wake.

“But it is at the mercy of the siVictims’ mental state. Despite having the capacity to deal with it, siVis is both too enlightening and too impressionable. Everything about the person, their lives, everything around them has the veil of ignorance ripped away. How they deal with it, is up to them. That alone plunged siVictims into a fume state. And the people who can’t find peace… Well.”

He looked at the girls sternly. His playful spite was erased from his face now, his intense stare retained.

“I don’t have your permission to get into the details of the Breakdown Effect, do I?”

“AND WE DON’T NEED ANY OF IT!” Tracy shrieked out. “PLEASE, CONTINUE—”

“Had a feeling,” Leslie turned his gaze back upwards. “Which brings us to our little-big problem here…”

He pointed up, and showed various diagrams of the human brain.

“See, siVis is considered semantics incarnate. The only group of people that can gain siVis are broken psyches, unstable psyches, and more importantly—at periods where a person… Well, on the verge of massive psychological breakthrough. Everything that you were breaking down, everything you knew you realized was little. So, people like us—‘normal’… Well, we deal and cope. And that not only eases the pain, but our psyches heal and we continue as we are. So, I can’t get siVis: I know who I am.”

River turned her head at Leslie, blinking.

“…I find it hard to believe that a group of teenage girls, one year or so before they become women, in a fucked up eldritch Earth, are stable enough to be considered normal-“

Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

Maddie could barely hold onto her mirth, and how sudden River’s point was. She doubled over, laughing in a cackle as her hair hung.

“Surprisingly, Ms. Brooke, when we think everything’s over and we wake up the next day—yeah, we think things have the capacity to be okay again. So that was your brain patching things up and moving along,” Leslie looked at her, which caused the poor girl to look at the floor too.

Tracy looked like she was on the verge of worry, fearing that he was going to confirm that they were some fucked up lab experiment. “So… How did we gain siVis, then? We shouldn’t have, right?”

“Well, I wondered that too. Remember—well, I’m sure you can’t forget—when I told you all I didn’t understand why you got siVis? Was going to launch further examination—"

“And then the hospital got taken over by one of the now-famous fucker that causes nightmares to come to life. Which also caused a Shift-thing to come out and wreck the island with a wall, stranding us for weeks on one side with shit luck and shitter powers.”

Maddie was done laughing, and just leaned on her bed, just in time to say that bit.

“See, knew you’d remember—” Leslie interjected, gaining control back. “Well, I wanted to know, that stumped me. That’s why I grilled you the way I did back then. And I WAS going to monitor your recovery as well, but—”

“The worse—and first—superpowered attack in history happened on that day, we went into the fray for some reason, got hurt more, but hey, things finally connected at least…” Tracy answered, rubbing her arm.

Leslie pursed his lips upward, having a dumbfounded look and letting that hang in the air.

“Putting it all together everything you went through in basically a month, it’s amazing how you all managed to keep your minds intact, never mind bodies—"

Aiko was practically jumping in place, the soft patter of her soles landing on the floor over and over. “Diagnosis us, Nurse Man—"

“Well, I misdiagnosed you all as Shattered, forceful siVis activation, and lacking structural integrity. Can be reversed, but the psyche makes that hard. Which… Isn’t what you all were…”

Jackie’s eyes enlarged with worry and panic. “Then… What are we…?”

Leslie sighed.

“We’re… Not sure. Everything about your siVis… Should not be possible.”

A silence fell over and filled the entire room for minutes.

“Greeeat,” Maddie erupted through the moment. “So, when are we dying, do we have two months or weeks--?”

“Please,” Leslie tried to ease them. “You’re not going to die. In fact, versus a Shattered, you DO have the important structural foundations now and despite everything you went through, you did make what should’ve been debilitating work.”

He pointed upwards, showing the “flow” of siVis activating on a leg, versus what Jackie assumed to be their leg.

“It’s not like you lack anything… It’s the impossibility of how everything connects and not that well. That’s the danger. The misshapen connections and how brittle it holds together.”

The regular siVis leg, it moved forward. The pieces crept along with the step, starting from the toes, and coursing up the foot, ankle, the leg. Enhancing the movement.

Their leg… It was a struggle, the leg have to flex and build up each segment in rough patterns.

Then finally, the leg of a Shattered appeared. The leg itself is broken at all sections, the knee completely jutting outwards and the underside of the leg still normal looking, but very malnourished. Mismatched.

Jackie glanced at the words, getting a read of each of their faces. Maddie’s expression tightened, but still seemingly unphased. Tracy’s doughy eyes were on the verge of tears. Aiko was sighing to herself, and River was rubbing the back of her head, slowly turning away from the graphs.

Leslie rubbed his chin, “So, here’s the possible solution. Regardless of any of these variations, when pushed at the boundaries, siVis responds and takes in the lessons learned and will be integrated as such. But it needs time, it needs energy, and it’s not always linear with that.”

He got up from the wall and turned towards it. A compartment opened in front of him, and he reached within the darkness.

Pulling out a tray, a series of crimson forearm braces aligned with each other side to side.

“Meet your CASTs,” Leslie unveiled. “You’re to wear them 24/7, weeks upon weeks, months merging into one another, until we detect that your ‘lesson’ holds up or not. If you push your boundaries, this will push right back… And I wouldn’t push hard if I were you all. But I know you, so don’t.”

“…Are these uh… T-tested…?” Tracy posed a question.

“You’re among the lucky few that are right now,” Leslie didn’t even bother to light the tone.

“We really are ‘the band of buggered’—” River quipped under her breath, Jackie detecting it only because her senses were blaring.

“You’re using experimental technology on us?!” Jackie shouted in disbelief.

Leslie didn’t say anything immediately at first. He used his free hand to softly rub his worn face, which caused Jackie to back down subtly.

“It’s the ever-changing and invasive practice of siVictim care, I’m afraid. It’s something you have to deal with now.”

Jackie slumped her shoulders. Feeling the weight somehow more unbearable.

She worked up the courage, to look at the backside of her head, where her “re: Birthmark” rested.

A jutted-out piece of siVis structure, that’s constantly there. A sign that you’ve been changed. She glanced over at Maddie’s, which rested on the side of her neck. Then looked over at Aiko, which she knew rested on her shoulder. She never found out River and Tracy’s locations.

“We really fucked up the worse, didn’t we?”

Before she could bow her head downwards, she saw his stern expression fortify. She couldn’t help to keep looking.

“This isn’t a contest. This is your recovery—and that involves you accepting what happened to you. You’re not wholly responsible, but the response—your response to it, is. Don’t meet trauma with more trauma. Not anymore, okay?”

Jackie felt that weight transfer into her throat. Her lips wavered, and her teeth gritted. But she was able to swallow it down.

“Okay.”

Leslie looked at the others, his head swaying left and right in quick succession.

“I want to hear it from everyone—” as he shifted back to his usual state of dick-i-try.

Which forced an uneven chorus of agreement, from a discordant group of people.

Jackie couldn’t help but look down at her arm, softly rubbing her forearm. Still trying in vain to keep in mind, she still has her DNA. She isn’t inhuman. If anything, she’s the next step.

And as she looked at the CAST she’ll be wearing, she still lamented silently at how botched this step was.

***

Walking on the sidewalks of Steppe Ave, with a red weight snug on an arm, definitely singled out the girls as they went down the streets together. Othered them.

Despite half of the buildings around everyone, were destroyed and being consumed.

Jackie stared at the Shiftication process. Living meshes of technology grafted themselves, using its blobs that it calls tendrils to bore into the weakened building. Taking the shape it destroyed soon after.

Men in rectangular hazmat suits scrambled about, picking up the debris with their massive gantlets with engorged “fingers” that spread easily and easy to grapple chunks of buildings.

“Jackson, will you stop zoning out every single time at shit you don’t like?”

She arched her head towards Maddie, squinting in annoyance.

Maddie had a hand in her leather coat pocket, her CAST arm had a sleeve rolled up against it. “Haven’t changed not one bit in what, two weeks or something?”

“Yes, because two weeks makes a world of difference—” Jackie spat back.

“People die in two weeks, my dude—”

Jackie conceded with a sigh.

Maddie was with her at her right, with Tracy and River behind them, and Aiko way at the front. Only the ambiance of the avenue bounced around them, just stewing in it.

“So, what fell out of everyone?” Maddie poked the stressed bear.

“Fucking hell—” Jackie sighed again.

“My leg got kicked out of my leg—but it wasn’t as funny as wrestling made it out to be,” River replied, calmly.

“Brooke, like… Are you one of those weirdos that look at old stuff all the time? Wrestling hasn’t been a thing since we were born—”

“As a history buff, I’m so offended right now,” Jackie side-eyed Maddie, semi-playfully.

Maddie just pointed at her. “See? Weirdos only do that shit, Brooke—"

“Why—w-why… Are we acting like we’re okay…?”

Jackie looked behind her, seeing a meek Tracy grabbing her own hands.

“You heard Homer Simpson,” Maddie looked forward. “We have to cool it a bit.”

“But you know that something…” Tracy shook her head, not in disagreement, but in dread. “Something always happens!”

“More or less, but we don’t have to be involved.”

“You know that we can’t escape things well!”

“Regardless…” Jackie broke up the exchange. “It gives us time to think. Which gives us more time to talk. About what we’re gonna do…”

Another silence filled the air.

“Yeeeeah, the teaming up…?” Maddie sounded strained. “Still on the fence on that. Can like, do we get days off or?”

“That sounds like something that only happens if it gets successful,” River quipped. “There’s no such thing as ‘days off’ or ‘rest’ when you’re getting stuff off the ground—”

“And don’t we have to… Do public displays or something?” Tracy questioned. “Or do we pay for billboards?”

Maddie laughed, “You know people in TV, unless it’s dying right now, get some dude to film us a commercial—”

“Oh god…”

“Listen…” Jackie looked at her CAST. “Doing this team thing, learning to fight against all of this shit and helping others… It’ll give people hope. Unambiguous hope, something we didn’t have for a long while…”

And because the universe had such a cruel sense of humor, they were quickly blasted onto their sides as rock rained in its wake.

Jackie was on the ground, scrambling. She looked at the impact.

And saw a statue, embedded in the ruined wall.