Stronger Together chapter 116

I was making a habit of getting knocked unconscious, and I was  starting to get really annoyed. Though it was night and I had  voluntarily gone to sleep so I wasn't sure it counted. The first thing I  noticed when I woke up was that I was back in bed. The sun was  streaming in through the window. Raven,Barb,Cinder,Yang, and Kara were  all at various points around the room. They were all awake and looking  tired, Raven was reading a book, Barb was writing notes, Yang and Kara  were playing a board game and Cinder was sitting in a lotus position  meditating.

When  I sat up they all looked over at me, before any of them could open  their mouths though I held up a hand for silence and just...felt. The  hand was my right, and I noticed that all that spare power was gone. My  arm had been sucked dry to fuel my recovery. Once again I was damn lucky  to have the thing or I would be dead. Despite having just gone to sleep  after nearly exploding I felt somehow different. I wanted to say good  but that wasn't even enough to cover it. I felt...more.

In fact the word feel didn't even seem like enough, like that word  belonged to the old me. I was just attuned to the world around me in a  completely different way. Like I'd gone from watching my life in ten  eighty P to watching it in four K but not just visually. My muscles were  structured differently, and they seemed to be reinforced in a new way.  My mind was clearer than it had been even after my tune up, though the  difference wasn't as shocking. My bones were heavier, and I wasn't sure  how I even knew that because it was so infinitesimal that it shouldn't  even be possible to tell. But I could, I could feel the veins of  godsteel running through them, knitting them together stronger.

In  fact I could feel strands of godsteel in my muscles too. Now that I  knew how to sense it. That was what was reinforcing them, but it wasn't  stable. the godsteel running through me was all in that malleable active  state it was in before it stabilized into it's final form, and it  wasn't fading. The metal was still alive somehow, the network traced  back to my arm, still connected, still somehow biological while the  magic stayed alive in the material. I only had thin strands of the stuff  in me but it made me so much stronger. I stood and there was no lag  time behind decision and motion, my execution of the thought was  flawless and instant.

The  strands were woven through my spine and brain too. I could think  faster. Not how the tune up had allowed but on a biological level. The  godsteel formed a living network through me making me better. I felt my  literal soul anchored to my body in a way other people would never see  and I knew the energy in that godsteel network was my Aura. That it was  acting like a battery, and indicator, and a network of magical veins all  at once. I knew I was stronger, had more Aura than I ever had, and the  godsteel would hold more and build faster than my body ever would.

That  said my time of discovery was over. Kara was looking at me, and I could  see the glazed look she got on her face when she was using her X-ray  vision. I was damn lucky she had even been home, unless she heard me  screaming from the sears tower and ran back. If we lost the vampires I  would feel like shit, but I didn't think they were going anywhere. Her  face wrinkled in distress, but before she could say a word I spoke.  "Yes, that's godsteel. No, it's not metal. It's still alive kind of. It  doesn't seem like it's stabilizing and being active and malleable lets  it act as biological material."

Raven's  eyes were wide with fear "You have metal in your body? That's...Cameron  what the hell happened? You were outside training and then I felt this  massive wave of power. The wards have a function to keep them from  spilling power out so no one would have noticed but when I got to the  back yard you were screaming, your skin was cracking and light was  pouring out." Now that she mentioned it my skin was knit together  subdermally with godsteel. On the one hand I felt like I was sturdier  now, on the other hand I realized this wasn't supposed to happen.

My  body had been about to shatter from the pressure of whatever the hell  I'd accidentally done by mixing the power sources of three worlds. The  godsteel weave inside me was powerful and amazing, and it was also the  only reason I wasn't dead. I looked deep into Raven's violet eyes.  "I...made a mistake. I was training, doing my klurkor exercises and I  tried to use that time to work on using my strength and speed aspects.  Whatever method my semblance uses to do what it does, it connected my  soulfire, my aura, and the purification aspects of klurkor into some  kind of feedback loop. Something new and unique that I definitely will  not touch again until I'm much stronger."

Kara  looked genuinely angry "Yeah no shit! Your body is stitched together  with a weird network of living metal. You look like you almost exploded.  If that godsteel wasn't part of you now and somehow living I'd say it  looks like a mad scientist used metal threads to sew together a person  out of pieces of corpse. But the thread is alive and part of you, your  body is healed...somehow. It's creepy and scary and I think we should  stop messing with klurkor. It's not what I thought it was. It's  dangerous, one of us might get killed."

I  smiled gently and was suddenly across the room holding her hand. My  eyes widened as I looked down. This new network of godsteel made using  aspects instantaneous and so easy I'd done it without noticing. I'd  channeled lightning through the weave without noticing and I'd had full  access to the aspect instantly with barely any power used. It was like  instead of an active consistent draw on my soul I was enchanting the  network itself. I stopped and focused into myself, searching for  answers.

The form of the network  wasn't an accident. It was a bridge between the physical and soul, it  had been able to form because of my semblance that connected the two,  the network WAS my semblance in a way. It was weird and confusing and  the metallic weave existed in both physical and spiritual terms at the  same time, but it was still godsteel. I could imbue it with  enchantments, with my aspects, and it would amplify the power and hold  it. Not forever because it wasn't stable but until I dispersed it. It  basically made my aspects passive.

I  saw the girls staring at me and I blinked, my mind focusing. That  realization had taken much less time than I thought, they were still  reacting to the instantaneous movement. Even Kara looked surprised.  "Cameron, what the hell was that? That was so fast the human eye  couldn't track it. I was able to follow you of course but you've never  moved that quickly before." Her voice was worried, which was fair,  becoming less human was scary in a way, even though it was also amazing.  I had to understanding of what the girls were feeling, they couldn't  understand what this was like and they would be afraid.

I  closed my eyes and exhaled. "The godsteel in my body holds my aspects  now when I use them. A bit of power and I can tap into them, it  amplifies the power I put in to new higher levels and keeps it there  until I dismiss it. I don't have to worry about draining myself dry from  aspects, though it's still possible with normal spells or my shield."  Having another though I manifested an Aura around myself, imbuing it  with a spell. It was the same as always. Fair enough, couldn't expect  everything to get an upgrade.

Raven  looked alarmed but intrigued "The weave inside you is acting as a sort  of spiritual nervous system. That's fascinating." The other girls all  glared at her, except Cinder who looked just as intrigued. She held up  her hands "It clearly isn't a bad thing, not that we shouldn't try to  learn more, but freaking out over the changes when they could very well  be good seems like it would just put stress on Cameron." The others  frowned but seemed like they agreed, forcing themselves to relax  outwardly.

I  was doing a mental checklist. Of my four types of magic aspects,  shields, and spells had always been most dangerous. My aura could be  imbued with magic, but it was passively limited to protect my soul. The  other three, the aspects from my semblance, the shield I could layer  spells into like my aura, and just regular magic spell casting all  tapped directly into my soul with no safety mechanism. I could drain  myself dry and keep over a soulless husk if I wasn't careful. Now my  aspects were safe like my aura, and stronger for it.

Barb  snapped me out of another fugue by speaking up. "You're right Rae.  We've all been through a ton of changes since we got here, this is just  one more, albeit a strange one." She turned to look at me . "I'm not a  magic nerd like Raven and Harry, or even Cinder." That got a scowl from  the maiden but Barb continued, blithely ignoring her annoyance " So I  don't get the specifics, but if Raven isn't freaking out, considering  how much I know she loves you, I can see what happens here. " She looked  at me seriously "Is Kara right though? Is klurkor that dangerous?"

I  shook my head. "Not to you guys. Not even to me if I never do that  again. My semblance is weird I think. It's part soulfire magic part  remnant aura. Not sure why, but it formed a connection between the  klurkor and my soul directly. I could sense that something was wrong as  it happened. That connection was similar to the one I suspect divine  blood forms, but I don't have divine blood, or any of the protection it  would give. The combination supercharged even that. I would and should  have died if not for my arm."

I  looked Kara in the eye then. "But no. No one else will be in danger  doing klurkor. It's still a good thing and will help us all get  stronger. Even I can do it still as long as I don't use my aspects  during it." I didn't share that I planned to try again once my body was  strong enough to handle that new power. The weave should ease some of  the strain from...whatever the feedback loop was. I decided to call it  an art of ascension. Into what I had no idea. The others would become  angels when the soulfire purified them but what I was doing felt  different. Like I would be something else entirely.

Regardless  I wouldn't try it again anytime soon. Normal klurkor training for me  for now, though I still needed to learn how my aspects worked with my  new upgrade and train with it, an exciting prospect. For now though I  checked the clock and smiled at the others. "Well now that you know I  won't so that again I think it's time to get ready. I was out for a  while and we're due at Mac's again for our meeting with the Summer  Knight and Lady."

Their  eyes widened as they flicked to the clock themselves and everyone  scrambled to get out of the room and get ready. Apparently they were all  coming with me, which sounded like fun. I peeled out of my clothes and  somehow managed to get to the shower first, climbing in to clean up  before our meeting. I'd been through so much change over the last few  days alone. It was a lot to process, but I was excited to see where it  went. I felt special now, for real, I was becoming something new,  something that could stand with the girls, stay by their side. I  couldn't wait to see what that was.