I crawled out of the ruined Humvee through the door facing up, John doing the same, face red with exertion. The vehicle was on its side, blocking off the alleyway, though I could still hear the yell of cannibals from the other side. Fortunately, I could also hear gunfire, so the rest of the militia should be able to stop us from getting rushed before we get our bearings.

I tried to reach in to pull Goro out, but I found that my left arm was all wobbly and unresponsive, so I used my right instead. Goro grasped it and pulled hard enough to damn near rip the other one out of its socket too. He emerged from the humvee no worse for wear, oversized machinegun and ammo belt in tow.

Goro looked at my arm and gave me a look of mild concern. “You alright?”

”No,” I groaned. “What am I going to do without my second-favorite drinking arm?”

Goro just rolled his eyes, and we both turned to John, who had his upper torso sticking back in the humvee. “Bradley!” he cried, his stoic voice finally cracking, revealing heartfelt concern.

I gave Goro a look, and he understood. I yanked John off the side of the humvee with my free hand, while Goro casually flipped the vehicle back on its wheels. I stuck my head in the driver's door, and immediately saw the problem.

Bradley was still alive. He had a rather..bemused look on his face. One of acceptance, maybe of relief. The dent on the side has crushed him into his chair, his arm and shoulder almost squished flat. The metal was all that was keeping all of the blood on the inside.

”Damn...” he murmured, almost delirious. “It doesn’t even hurt...who woulda thought?”

John blew past me, ignoring my noodle arm, and grabbed onto Bradley for dear life, yanking on him as best as he could. “Come on kid, we can get you out of there!”

He turned back, yelling at Goro. “Come on, Superman! Peel this shit off him!”

Goro looked inside, then shook his head. “He’ll die immediately if I do.”

John looked aggrieved, but he wasn’t so far gone that he didn’t know that...he just didn’t want to accept it.

Bradley used his free arm to reach for John. “Come on, sir...these kinds of dramatics are just embarrassing us both. This isn’t exactly a new thing, is it? I’m not the first to die in the desert, and I won’t be the last.”

He took a few, shaky breaths, as if checking to make sure his lungs still worked. The yelling from outside got louder, the gunshots closer. A few began to clink off the armor, still doing its job even if dented beyond repair.

”I can safely say that this is better than a bullet to the head... I’ve got time to reflect, and I’d appreciate it if you didn’t ruin it with your sniveling.”

John just shook his head wearily. “This has gone on long enough. We’re in a whole new world...magic and aliens exist...and still we die in the dirt. I don’t think I can accept it, kid.”

The gunshots were becoming more and more pressing, though John just didn’t seem to care. I gave Goro a look that said ‘do you mind?’, gesturing towards the direction of the gunfire, and he complied, hefting his machinegun as he lept right over the humvee, sword still strapped to him.

Bradley shook his head. “That’s life. It’s shit, and there is nothing we can do about it.”

John looked to his shaking hands and whispered. “Is that right?”

And there it was. The moment I was hoping for. The reason I stuck around to watch this pathetic pity party. His teensy weensy little wisp of a core flared. Just a bit, just a notion, an instinct... an idea.

But it was enough for me.

I placed my hand on his back. “Wrong. You can still save him, you know. You have the power to change things.”

Bradley gave me a look of genuine confusion, while John froze, feeling my hand on his back like a freezing brand. “...How?” he asked.

I let my power flow, focusing only on the process, ignoring the gunfire and death all around me, trusting that Goro would keep us safe. It was a familiar process, especially with all the practice over the last month. I instigated, infused, and invigorated, giving his core the push it needed to become what it had to.

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”Feel it,” I said. “Feel what you want, who you are, and impose your will. I’ll take care of the rest.”

Bradley laughed weakly. “That’s some gay-ass juju shit.”

John ignored him, and closed his eyes, grabbing onto Bradley’s un-crushed shoulder. He focused inwards, and felt with senses he never knew he had. His core spiraled, hungrily gathering energy from his surroundings, himself, and me.

And then, he opened his eyes, and reached for Bradley's crushed limb. He grasped it firmly.

Bradley screamed like a banshee as John ripped the arm and shoulder free, allowing blood to spew like a river as his pulverized paste of a limb came loose. I’m honestly not sure what was keeping it attached to his body. Muscle, perhaps? It didn’t matter.

What did matter was the energy coming from John. It flowed into Bradley like a gentle stream of water, nourishing and loving, and slowly the kid stopped screaming, disbelief contorting his expression.

Slowly, almost mesmerizingly, the limb began to put itself back together. Bones crackled and popped as they shifted into the right position, blood flowed back to where it was supposed to be, and flesh came flush with life, shifting back into its original position.

”Holy shit,” murmured Bradley.

John stared at him, surveying his handiwork. “Holy shit,” he echoed.

”Welcome to the magic gang,” I said. “It’s a pretty exclusive club, I hear.”

Bradley's eyes watered as he flexed his newly repaired hand. “I’m not going to die...oh god...”

I suppose the levity was the only way he could stave off the impending doom, as he proceeded to absolutely bawl his eyes out.

”Well, don’t speak too soon,” I said, reminding him of the obvious. “You could still get shot in the head during the gunfight that is happening as we speak. Right now. That we should, perhaps, be participating in.”

John shook his head, climbing out of the Humvee. He was trying his best to hide his shakes of relief and adrenaline. “He‘s all out of fight. Just stay here, Bradley, and keep the doors shut.”

Bradley didn’t even hear him over his own sobs, so John slammed the door closed, and reached for my arm. He attempted to heal me, but his energy bounced off mine, intrinsically incompatible.

He frowned. “Why didn’t that work? Am I doing it wrong?”

”Nah,” I said, reaching for my dislocated arm and cracking it back into place. “I’m just special. Let’s get a move on, magic man.”

He nodded and steeled himself, emotional outburst nowhere to be seen, as he climbed over the top of the Humvee. For a moment, I watched him from behind, marveling in yet another fine specimen of a core.

It was teal, as round and solid as anything could be. He defined compassion, embodied it, but it was not kindness. He loved as much as he hated, shared as well as he stole, killed as easily as he healed. And yet, it was one solid color. These things weren’t incompatible, or even disagreeable. It wasn’t even two sides of the same coin.

It was just a coin.

I retrieved my gaudy-ass desert eagle and hopped over the humvee, ready to join the battle. I then faceplanted on the other side with a painful crunching sound, my prosthetic leg having been caught on the rim.

"Ow..." I whined.

Meanwhile, Goro had just about run out of bullets, having kept the alleyway clear by pure rate of fire. The remaining cannibals were holding back, cowering behind cover, shooting from gaps in the metal buildings, so the gunbattle had reached a bit of a standoff.

Goro tossed the machinegun away, and reached down to offer me a hand, which I accepted, wiping sand off my dress shirt and exposed skin. Which was difficult, as it seemed the sand had found every pore I had.

"Might want to fix your face," said John, who had stopped by the corner of the alleyway, trying to peak out without getting his head blown off.

I reached up to my nose and wrenched it back in what I hope was the right position. "You too."

John ignored me, firing accurate shots from behind cover with his M4. He leaned back as a large-caliber bullet took a chunk out of the scrap metal. "Fuck. They're acting differently. They aren't charging us like madmen anymore. What changed?"

I hummed to myself, focusing on a dying cannibal in the middle of the field, so mortally wounded that nobody had bothered to finish him off. He was rolling around, gurgling screams getting quieter by the moment. My eye strained as I focused not on the energy, but on the body itself.

The anatomy was near identical to humans, save for the incredibly dark skin tone and oddly angular facial structure. The differences were closer to ethnicity than species, though I wouldn't really be able to tell the minute differences anyway.

More importantly, the similarities lead me to believe that the incredible heart rate of almost 300 bpm - despite the lack of blood in his body - bloodshot eyes, and blue lips, might be the answer to that question, assuming that wasn’t universal. I haven’t found a chance to cross-reference it with the cannibals currently cowering behind cover.

”I’m sure we’ll find out,” I said, not bothering to explain my hypothesis. “For now, let's break the stalemate.”

John nodded, stepping back from the line of fire. The endless stream had slowed down a bit, as it seems both sides weren’t too keen on wasting much more ammo. “We’ll head out the back of the alley and circle around to the big building. We’ll flank em’ from there.”

”You’re the expert,” I said. “Let's do this.”

John looked me up and down as he passed me. “How much juice does that shield have?”

I shrugged. “I don‘t know, it’s not like I have easily quantifiable numbers I could refer to and waste incredible amounts of time monologuing about.”

John nodded slowly. “Right. Well, it, uh, better be enough, because we’re about to long-dick this.”

I chambered my desert eagle menacingly, as I had forgotten to do so beforehand. “That’s the only kind of dicking I like.”

Goro sighed wearily.