Chapter Text
I had never fought back against the bullies. Not after I learned that my resistance was futile more than a year ago. The best I could hope for was to avoid, escape, survive.
Now I realized that that had been futile as well. They had never made me suffer this much before, I had never even imagined it was possible, not in my worst nightmares.
Locked in a steel cage, smothered by rotting bloody waste, insects crawling under my clothes and buzzing in my ears...I felt my white hot glow of outrage coming back.
I'll make them suffer too!
I felt something shift within me and I stepped outside myself. I looked down at myself from a higher plane of existence. Detached, examining the girl trapped in the locker with a clinical eye. My pain, discomfort, stress, it all dropped away in an instant. They were that girl's problems, not mine.
And that was when I saw Them.
The other people with me in this higher plane. If they could be called people. They were ghostly shadows, standing behind the girl in a neat, orderly line. Two girls, a boy, an elderly couple, an older man.
The ghosts were only faintly recognizable as human shapes. Or perhaps they were too human.
Their bodies and faces were smoothed over, as if they were made of clay, or dolls made from a common mold. Anonymous artificial people, no features to reveal their identities.
But inside...their skin was glistening and transparent, revealing the muscle and bone and organs and brain underneath.
It was an almost painfully vivid hyperawareness, far more than simple sight. I shouldn't have been able to see the skin at the same time as the muscle and bone underneath, but they were all clear as day. I could tell that the young ghosts were in good physical shape, while the elderly ghosts had arthritic bones, weak liver and kidneys, and the elderly woman had a small cancer growing in her left breast.
I shifted my attention between the girl and the ghosts. What was the point of all this?
The girl in the locker gasped for breath, choking on the smell of blood and rot. I felt a distant echo of the sensation, a hint of discomfort.
Then the sensations shifted, sliding from the girl in the locker onto the ghostly girl hovering behind her.
The girl in the locker relaxed a fraction, and the ghostly girl behind her recoiled in disgust. The ghost gasped, half-choked, then blew all the air out of her lungs, as if she was futilely trying to banish the smell.
I became aware of more of the locker girl's injuries. Minor bruises on her nose and cheeks where she'd been pressed into the waste face-first. Cuts on her arms and legs where she'd been scraped against the metal frame as she was jammed inside. More brusies on her head and limbs from her wild thrashing in the enclosed space. A papercut on her index finger and a scrape on the back of her hand she'd acquired the previous night while making an art project. The slight ache in her head and lassitude in her limbs from not getting a full night's sleep.
One by one, the wounds slid from the locker girl onto the girl-ghost hovering behind her. The ghost staggered and ran its hands over its body, taking stock of its wounds in disbelief.
The locker girl was completely healed now. She had no need to panic anymore, no need to escape outside herself. The girl was fine, she was fine, she was perfectly fine, she was...she was...I was...
I came back to myself with a shock.
I was still trapped in the locker, but now I was fine. Better than fine. I don't think I'd ever felt so good before in my life. A sense of...peace. Perfect security, perfect tranquility. Nothing could harm me. Nothing could touch me.
I wanted to be like this forever.
I turned my head, as much as I could in the cramped space, and looked at the ghostly girl hovering behind me. I could see her clear as day through the locker door, doubled over and hacking at the pungent smell invading her lungs, kneeling like a vassal before her Queen.
The other five ghosts stood in a neat and orderly line behind her. Dutiful guardians, patiently waiting their turn. I focused on two of them, the elderly couple, and after a moment they shuffled to the back of the line, the man in the back stepping forward to take their place.
I smiled at the ghost girl behind me. "Thank you. It's been a long time since I had friends to back me up."
The ghost didn't reply, but she seemed to have a faint awareness that I was there. She glanced up at me and there was a glimmer in her eyes that was almost familiar.
I smiled wider. "That's right. You and me. We're going to get out of here."
The first thing to do was get room to maneuver. I pushed at the waste around me, trying to compact it onto the sides of the locker. I felt the waste as vividly as ever, but the unpleasant parts of the sensation, the sliminess and the smell and the infectious bacteria...they never even touched me. They slid smoothly onto the ghost girl without me having to will it. The ghost shivered and began rubbing at her skin, at the dried blood and fluids that had suddenly appeared caked-on to her arms.
The work was slow, but robbed of its disgusting features it was almost pleasant. Halfway through a fat fly landed in my ear and buzzed angrily, but it didn't trouble me. The ghost slapped at her ear.
I laughed. Nothing could touch me.
After a few minutes of work, I had more space. My arms were at my sides, and now I slid my hands up to the level of my shoulders.
The movement dislodged a bloody piece of waste from the roof of the locker that fell and landed in my mouth. I gagged, purely by reflex, but it wasn't necessary. The moment the waste entered my mouth it simply vanished.
I blinked. What?
The ghost startled and brought her hands to her throat. She hacked and spit out a ghostly chunk of waste onto the floor, where it promptly dissolved into insubstantial ether.
I laughed harder this time. Nothing could touch me. Any matter that offended me was simply annihilated.
It only took me a minute to clear the rest of the space around my head and arms. I had room to maneuver at last.
The next thing to do was to get then locker open. I couldn't unlock it from the inside, but the lock was a flimsy one, holding the door closed with a single rod of metal at a single point at half-height on the locker. If I could break the rod of metal, or bend the metal door of the locker around it, I could force the door open.
I pulled back my elbow and banged at the lock at full force. No effect on the lock. No effect on me, either. The faint throb of pain slid onto the ghost.
That gave me an idea. I could break my body's limits. Hit harder, now that I had a friend to back me up and accept the damage.
I drew back my elbow and slammed as hard as I could. Then harder. Then harder. Then harder.
After a few minutes of punishment, I realized that my progress was too slow. I felt much stronger than before. I bet I could shatter the lock without a problem if I had the space to get a running start and give it a flying kick. But trapped as I was, I simply didn't have the leverage and angle of attack to do do the job. I was doing more damage to my body than to the lock. The metal rod had bent but not broken.
The ghost was clutching its elbow, laying on its back, stricken. The bone of her elbow had shattered from the repeated blows, and the skin and muscle on half her arm was shot through with rips and tears.
The damage was so severe it had spread to the ghost behind her in the line. The second girl ghost was cradling her own elbow, her flesh badly bruised and a hairline fracture in the bone.
I realized that the damage I received wasn't being mirrored by the ghosts, not exactly. If I damaged a particular patch of muscle and that exact area was already damaged on the nearest ghost, the damage would transfer to a nearby area instead. There were limits, though. After the first ghost's elbow and all of the nearby flesh and bone had been destroyed beyond any functionality, new damage was transferred to the next ghost in line.
...which meant I could run out of guardians, if I wasn't careful. Then I would be vulnerable. I would lose this peace and I could be hurt again and-
No!
No. Never. I had to get out of here. I had to make my guardians count.
"Don't worry guys." I said. I put an upbeat tone in my voice. "I won't let your help go to waste. We can do this!"
The ghosts watched me without a word. But I could tell they appreciated the thought.
I formed a new plan. I wouldn't break the lock's metal rod. Instead, I would hammer at the top part of the locker, bend the flimsy metal outward until there was enough space to reach through with my hand and enter the lock's combination.
The first step was to turn around. There wasn't quite enough room, but that was okay. I twisted my body to its limits, until a glowing hot thread of pain was flowing through me to the ghost. Then I braced myself with my arms and legs and forced myself to twist further.
It shouldn't have been physically possible to break my body like that, but I was stronger now. I felt a crack as a bone in one of my legs snapped, then another crack as my hip gave way. I didn't feel any pain, that was shifted to the ghost, but I willed my body to accept the broken bones for a second so that I could twist unnaturally to turn in the cramped space. The instant I finished turning my broken bones were shifted as well. I snapped back into perfect health.
I blinked. Forcing myself to accept the damage had been disorienting. I had been floating outside my body again. As if my soul refused to reside in a damaged body for even an instant.
I heard distant shouts from outside the locker. I listened for a minute, hoping someone had heard my banging and was bringing help at last, but they weren't talking about me. Something about getting a nurse, or an ambulance.
I couldn't let myself get distracted. The next part was the important one. I didn't have enough space to wind up for a punch, not at the height where the metal of the locker door was weakest, but I had another option.
I rested my forehead against the metal door of the locker. I took a deep breath, drew my head back as far as I could in the meager space, then slammed it forward.
Bang!
The metal of the locker was visibly bent. I was definitely a lot stronger now. If I had room to wind up I could probably punch straight through the metal.
I would have to make my blows count, though. The ghost girl was already prostrate on the floor. Her forehead was bleeding and there was a faint microfracture in her skull. Again, harder this time.
Bang!
Again.
Bang!
Again.
Bang!
It took fifteen or twenty blows before the door was bent far enough that I could start to work with my hands. It was just in time. The first ghost's face was a wreck, the front of her skull caved in and the tissue damage radiating deep into her brain. The damage had begun to transfer to the second ghost, who was kneeling and cradling her head in her hands, nursing a fractured skull and bruised eyes and cheeks.
I awkwardly reached around the bent-out top of the locker door and got a hand on the lock outside. I tried to enter the lock combination, but after a few seconds of futile attempts I had a better idea. With the new space I had available, I hit the top of the locker door with a flurry of punches, then when it had bent down enough, hammer blows with my elbows. After a few more strikes, the top of the locker bent far enough that it simply snapped clean off.
I crawled out of the locker and fell onto the floor of the hallway. The jagged edge of the metal ran across my stomach but it didn't matter. It couldn't touch me.
Free at last.
I felt strangely at peace. I should have been filled with rage, revenge against the bullies, racing to the principal's office to get them expelled for the shit they'd put me through.
But somehow I felt...satisfied. As though my exertions had given them a kind of absolution.
The hallways were oddly empty. There were shouts coming from the far end of the school, in what I realized was the direction of the nurse's office. I guessed I should go there too. I knew I was physically fine, perfectly fine, but the nurse should probably give me a look for formality's sake.
As I walked through the empty hallways the ghosts followed me. They weren't moving under their own power so much as being moved by an outside force. The ghost girl directly behind me was hovering an inch above the ground, laid out on her back, drawing her breath in labored gasps that were growing fainter every second. And she was fading, turning insubstantial, as if she was about to disappear.
"Thanks, ghost guardian girl." I said. "You saved my life back there. I don't know what you are, but you were protecting me with your own life and I, I can't thank you enough. If this is the end for you, I'll...I'll never forget you."
I turned the corner to the nurse's office, and was greeted by a swarm of activity. There were three teachers and staff members at the door in agitated conversation. Two took off running in the direction of the principal's office, leaving one behind in front of the door. It was my Contemporary Topics teacher.
"Mister Gladly." I said. "I need to see the nurse-"
"No!" he shouted. "No. Uh. Sorry, Taylor. You can't go in there. Unless it's a real emergency. You should leave."
I blinked. What was his deal? "I, uh, some girls locked me in my locker and I had to force my way out. I'm pretty banged up."
He looked at me with fear in his eyes. But not fear of me. He barely acknowledged me.
"I'm sorry but you can't come in. You have to leave right now."
"But I-"
"Leave! Listen to me Taylor for God's sake it's for your own safety! It's dangerous here. There's a-"
The PA system came on, and Principal Blackwell's voice echoed over the speakers.
"Teachers, students. This is an emergency. For your safety, stay in your classrooms and lock the doors and windows. The PRT is on the way to apprehend an unknown parahuman who attacked two students. I repeat, stay inside your classrooms. The PRT is on the way. We will keep you informed-"
I don't know what made me press on. A dozen strange things about my situation snapping into place. Ghosts following me, parahumans, accepting my pain, students attacked, held in the nurse's office-
I pushed past Mister Gladly into the nurse's office and saw it all in the space of a second.
Emma Barnes, laid out on a bed and groaning, a hand clutching her bloody face She was staring wide-eyed at the bed next to her.
Sophia Hess, or what had been her. Covered in blood and bandages, one arm shattered, more blood at her hip and leg, her face a ruin. Trying to breathe and failing. Her body was flickering, changing between flesh and insubstantial shadows so fast it was barely perceptible.
Sophia's chest rattled. She went still.
The ghost girl behind me faded out and disappeared.
A new ghost bloomed into existence and took a place in the line. A middle aged man, of a very familiar height and weight.
I looked at Sophia and Emma.
I looked at Mister Gladly.
I..I...
I ran.