I woke up to a surprising lack of pain.

That isn't to say I felt no pain, but rather that the sensations I was experiencing existed well below what I should have felt as a result of... dying basically.

Although I suppose I might be hurting less because my soul was leaving my body. That was definitely a weird feeling. It was strange - when people who had nearly died in ambulances talked about near death experiences, it was always tunnels and lights and the loud silence and all that eldritch nonsense.

What I was getting was way different than that. The stars above were still as vivid and in focus as they had been while I was alive, and I could feel distinctly each individual bit of gravel beneath me. I was itchy all over too, the slow creeping coolness of my soul flowing over me doing nothing to reduce the sensation of a wound repairing itself as it flowed over me.

Was dying supposed to be this uncomfortable?

Wait. Was I actually not dead? I had been laying on my back for who knows how long, thinking I was about to exit stage left. The thing was, that was mostly because when I put some effort into it I could actually feel my soul. I had no idea how and couldn't even begin to describe all the theological implications of even definitively having one, but it was definitely there.

And it was healing me.

'Holy shit I have powers!' I shrieked internally. I had to tell Neptune! No wait, I wasn't talking to Neptune anymore. Shit. Veteran and Hood! Yes! I was a Cape! I could help fight Oni Lee and-

"Fuck!" I screeched, springing upwards with surprising force and sending myself sprawling two meters forward and into the wall on the opposite end of the alleyway. I almost sent myself careening in the other direction when I got both hands on the wall to lever myself up, freezing in place when the sheer stupidity of what I was doing occurred to me. I was basically flailing around like a loony tunes character dammit!

'Okay.' I told myself, struggling to maintain a state of mind as close to calm as I could manage.

'Okay so... I have super strength. So... a Brute.' I continued internally, trying not to get my hopes up. I couldn't think of a lot of Brutes who could come back from a state of being I would loosely describe as 'exploded' as quick as I apparently had. That had to be worth something. Experimentally, I began to slow push against the wall I was on, the slight push apparently more than enough to lever me onto my feet. I couldn't really feel a way to 'turn off' my newfound strength, and I could already feel a headache coming along at the idea of finding ways to limit myself in gym class or even just normal daily life.

I was going to have to be careful with that.

'Powers later, team mates now!' I mentally yelled at myself as the faint haze of confusion finally fell away from me and I became fully cognizant of my situation. Taking a deep breath, I spent a second getting myself oriented, making sure I wasn't going to send myself flying into another wall.

Unfortunately, that single second was more than enough time to survey my surroundings, an action that left me nearly dizzy with nausea. There were bits of gore everywhere. Between when I had blacked out and now, the alleyway looked like it had undergone a small war, with huge holes blasted into the nearby buildings that opened the area up significantly and left hunks of brickwork strewn about the place. Hood's scythe was embedded in a nearby wall not too far away from where I had woken up, and I had to thank whatever luck I had left in this lifetime that I'd managed to avoid being ripped in half by the damn thing. At the center of it all was a single huge scorch mark that I took to be the site of the explosion that had finished the fight. A scorched pair of legs and boots were melted to the ground at the epicenter of the obvious detonation, and I nearly blacked out again at the sight.

The place looked like a cross between a slaughterhouse and a war zone, so much so that it was amazing how lacking in bloodstains I apparently was.

Every time I tried to turn away and move on from that observation, it would jump back out at me again. No matter which direction I whipped my head in there were bits of human being languishing in the cool night air. I continued in that fashion for another precious series of moments before I had to close my eyes and count to ten, reopening them to look for Hood and Veteran. I could figure out how or why Oni Lee had managed to blow himself up later. Or at least I hope Oni Lee blew himself up. It would really suck if he was just waiting in the shadows, watching for an opportunity to explode the obvious Brute on the scene.

Settling in to my self appointed task, I oriented myself on the rear of the area. The two girls I had been with lay in that direction, much further away from Oni Lee's... corpse... than I would have expected. Hood was laying across Veteran not to differently from how the blond had protected her from the original explosion that took her out. I would have appreciated the irony of that fact if the pair didn't look basically exactly as messed up as I had been just a bit earlier. Hood was breathing at least, if only shallowly, but Veteran...

Veteran wasn't.

Quickly shuffling forward, I knelt gently down next to the pair, trying desperately to remember my first aid training, even as the part of my mind that maintained rationality pointed out that they didn't teach high school students how to treat victims of explosions. There was literally nothing I could do for either of them.

Or... there shouldn't be, but the minute my mind turned towards helping them a deluge of information sprung forward. As a result of long hours trolling PHO, I knew that most Capes had a sort of default knowledge of how their powers worked. You didn't just wake up one day with powers you had no idea how to control or work with. There was an instinctive grasp of how they were intended to behave, if not necessarily the most effective way of using them. And right now my power was telling me that there was something I could do.

My... soul... was a manifestation of potential energy. I think anyway. By unlocking it or... no synchronizing with it properly, I could use that potential energy. I could condense it down into an almost physical form, using it to nourish my body, to enhance my physique, to protect and to attack. But that energy itself wasn't my power. From what I could gather, unlocking my uh, energy, was a function of my power - but it was the understanding and manipulation of this energy on an instinctual level that my power provided me. In a sense, I wasn't a Brute but a Thinker.

Completely unbidden, I lurched forward, slapping a palm across the motionless form of Veteran, senselessly groping around for her energy, her potential. The second I tried it snapped into focus. A vast well of power laying just out of reach. There was a tenuous strand of... something... connecting it to her, one that grew narrower and less able to move power the longer I watched. Without even really considering the side effects of doing so I thrust my own power forward, using my hand on the girls head as a bridge. With lightning speed my own power flowed outward, reinforcing that narrow tether and forcing it wider and wider.

The blondes physical form began to glow as I worked, a bright yellow shimmer spreading across her that would have been beautiful if it didn't highlight how wounded she obviously was. Wounds, I realized, that weren't healing. Shit. Why the hell wasn't she getting better? I unlocked her soul or whatever, so she should start breathing any minute now right?!

Staring in confusion at what was quickly becoming a corpse, it dawned on me that healing using this power might be a skill and not just... automatic. I'd already come to the conclusion that my Thinker power gave me mastery over it, but that didn't mean an unconscious person who had never used it before would be able to use it to heal themselves.

"Shit fuck shit!" I cursed, before plunging onward. Hood could wait, she was at least breathing. Veteran on the other hand... the brain can only survive for four minutes or so without oxygen. I'd learned that from an Earth Aleph movie, but I really hoped it was accurate. I might save the girl only to get back someone brain dead.

But I still had to try something.

With as much skill as I could manage - which wasn't much - I dipped into my own reserves of energy, feeling the steadily decreasing pool of power there begin to rapidly diminish as I plied it towards healing Veteran.

Or well, I say 'healing' but I honestly had no idea how this was supposed to work. I wasn't Panacea so I had no idea what my power was actually doing, instead I was just sort of pressing it forward with the intent to heal and praying. I was so focused on the futile task that I actually started backward slightly when Veteran shuddered once and then took in a single haggard breath.

"Yes!" I cheered, only to be forced to scramble backward when the wild eyed girl lunged forward, swinging a fist into me, mere inches in front of my face. Before she had even finished the movement she began to cough and hack, spitting up great globs of blackish red goo that I suspected was probably the blood she had been choking on.

"Wuh- I- New Guy? Ruby!" Veteran coughed out in a daze, gazing around her for a second before her eyes fell on her team mate and her pupils shrunk down to pinpricks.

"Rubes? Hey come on, wake up, what am I gonna tell Dad if - I never meant..." She babbled in a panicky way, rolling over onto her knees and shaking the smaller girl slightly. I made a mental note in the back of my head that either Veteran didn't have the improved strength the energy gave me, or the strength was another active ability that my power had simplified for me.

I pointedly did not make a mental note of what Veteran was calling Hood.

"I got it." I rasped hoarsely, releasing a breath I didn't realize I was holding and standing up. Veteran sent me a terrified but hopeful glance as I spoke, and I quickly shuffled over to the last member of the group to examine her. Glancing at Veteran for permission, I slowly extended a hand to place a finger against the side of the smaller girls neck, my senses ranging out to examine her energy pool. It was smaller than Veterans, but the connection to it she possessed was much more stable. If I had to hazard a guess, the connection I was sensing was probably an indicator of how close to death someone was. I mean, if what I was working with was basically 'soul power' then it made sense that a dead or dying person would have a weaker connection to it. Your soul leaves your body after you die after all. I probably would have made that observation earlier, especially backed by my instinctive understanding of this stuff, but I had been significantly more panicked about Veteran than I was about Hood. The smaller girl was pretty hurt - she was pretty torn up by the explosion that had taken Oni Lee - but she apparently had avoided anything immediately lethal.

I was just about to widen her soul connection as I had done with Veteran when a thought occurred to me. Did I have to do that to heal someone, or could I conduct my own power through her for healing without her own soul as a bridge?

Figuring it couldn't hurt to try it out, I once more dipped into my own power. It was getting dangerously low at this point, but as far as I could tell running out wouldn't be immediately lethal or anything so I would worry about that later. This time, instead of my patient glowing, I did, or rather, because Hood wasn't glowing like Veteran had, I actually had the opportunity to notice that I too was glowing. On the one hand, that was pretty cool, and my healing was definitely having an effect soothing, the girls breathing and quickly knitting her wound shut. On the other hand, if I was going to literally glow every time I used it, then I definitely couldn't try to use it in my civilian life. It would probably be very noticeable.

Dragging myself from my thoughts, I nearly fainted when I finished healing Hood and leaned away, my energy more or less completely used up. I was going to have to come up with a better way to refer to it though. If I went around exclaiming about my inner power all the time I was going to sound like a weirdo who watched too many cartoons.

Soul Power? Nah, better stay away from that one. The Endbringers might have drastically reduced the power of organized religion but that didn't mean the church didn't still exist. Best not to get caught saying I can muck about with souls in that case. Aura? Yeah that could work. It would also obscure exactly how complex my power actually was. If I boiled it down enough then my powers looked like 'glowy regenerator' from the outside. Maybe if-

"Mm-Yang? It's too early, let me go back to sleep..." Hood grumbled as she came awake and Veteran - nope still not remembering any names - scooped her up into a big hug.

"Rubes! Oh my god! You are never coming out with me ever again!" She cried, clinging to the smaller girl like she never intended to let go. I wondered if they were maybe just a tad bit closer than 'friends' given the way the blond was reacting. Actually, that would explain a lot.

I wasn't disappointed by that realization I swear.

"Ehem." I faux coughed to draw the girls attention. It didn't work at first so I frowned and did it again.

"EHEM!" I said aloud, finally getting the pair to turn towards me.

"What!?" Yang hissed at me, obviously displeased by my interruption.

"I'm pretty sure we just killed Oni Lee so uh... we should probably run?" I pointed out. I promised myself I could curl up into a ball and cry about this when I got home. I might have superpowers now but that didn't mean I was all that intent on getting eaten alive by Lung. That thought made me pause.

Oh my god Lung. He was going to freak out when he found out his top lieutenant was dead - however the hell that happened. No wait, freak out later. Run away now. That said...

"Actually, Hood, how the hell did Oni Lee die?" I asked, gesturing for the two girls to follow me as I rose and started to exit the alleyway.

"I dunno actually. I was just swinging wildly at him for a while and then it looked like he finally had me - then something happened and we both sort of just blacked out for a second. I think he might have forgotten to teleport and blown himself up." Hood said pensively as she extricated herself from Veteran's grip and stepped over to me, wincing slightly as she did so.

"Serves him right." Veteran growled, glaring at the spot in the alley where the man had obviously died. She said that, but even at a glance I could tell that she was visibly perturbed by what she was seeing. So much so that I was beginning to wonder why I wasn't freaking out. I mean, I was definitely going to be having nightmares about this but it felt like if I wanted to I could dam the whole thing up and just not think about it. Adrenaline maybe?

"Do you have a power that could do that?" I asked curiously, looking back over my shoulder at the two while I waited for a reply.

"Not... really..." Hood said hesitantly, trailing off and looking ahead of me to the mouth of the alley. I blinked, following her gaze back around to look in front of me.

Only to find myself face to face with what I could only really describe as a giant demonic creature made of coiled flesh and teeth. It's maw was mere inches from my nose, and dripped with saliva, like it was painfully, desperately hungry. I could feel myself go temporarily cross eyed at the sight, and heard the clicking whir of machinery as Hood's scythe thing shifted forms behind me, clearly having been pulled out of the wall as we passed it.

"Wha-" I got out, intending to ask 'What the fuck' but not getting all that much further before the hell beast shifted away from me to reveal a group of people standing to either side of it.

Along with two more demon things.

"Hi! Name's Tattletale. Short, sweet, rolls off the tongue." One of them said chipperly stepping forward and thrusting a hand out. I'd have found the quote cute coming from the extremely pretty blond (Okay so I might have a type), if it weren't for one simple fact - if she'd heard me say that she'd also probably heard me say my actual god damn name. A name I had spoken aloud when I wasn't even a freaking cape, because I didn't really think it would matter.

I stared blankly at her for a second, secondary parts of my brain taking in the skin tight purple bodysuit she was wearing and filing the image away for later. The second I thought as such she quirked a brow at me and rolled her eyes, her expression shifting to a piercing gaze that felt like I was being completely deconstructed in her minds eye.

Then she smiled at me, and there was absolutely nothing comforting about it.

Fuck.