Downtown, Meritas City. October 19th, 2014, 00:30

  A single solitary van cruised down the roads of Downtown Meritas City, jet-black on the outside with two emergency lights on top, a single logo emblazoned on either side: a large blue shield over a banner that read “Superhuman Response Team”. It had one single destination: the Cage, Meritas’ holding facility for super-criminals and supervillains alike.

  The Superhuman Response Team - S.R.T. for short - were a specialised police force designed to deal with superhumans for those who lacked superpowers, particularly when official heroes could not be present. Each division of the S.R.T. was rigorously trained to recognise different types of superhumans, how to properly restrain them, and to contain threats safely.

  In the front sat two people: the driver, a heavyset man dressed in the black and blue uniform of the Superhuman Response Team; and a superhero by the name of Impact, a lean and athletic man with dyed white hair, dressed in a mint-green and white costume with a series of tassels in the design of a cape flowing from his shoulders.

  This wasn’t the first trip they had made today, and this was fairly routine for the driver.

  For its prisoners, less so.

  In the back of the van sat four occupants: the first two were S.R.T. guards, dressed in thick black and blue armour with visored helmets, batons and pistols on their waists.

  The third was Razor, a tall, dashing man with messy black hair and green eyes. Normally dressed in a fine Victorian-style suit and coat, now he was dressed in a dark orange prison jumpsuit, his hands bound and sealed in metal restraints.

  The fourth and final one was Twist. She was Razor’s opposite: short - a touch under five feet tall - with a flaming red mane of hair and dark blue eyes. Like Razor, she would normally be dressed in the same style of suit and coat, but was now bound in a tight orange and white strait-jacket, one that kept her arms and legs completely still.

  Much to the guards and Twist’s chagrin, Razor was singing. Badly.

  “I thought I heard the Old Man say: 'Leave her, Johnny, leave her~”

  Twist knew Razor loved the sound of his own voice - which was good, because he did all the talking for the both of them and then some - but unfortunately singing was not his forte. It was off-key, off-tempo, and sounded like someone deaf trying to use a cat as a brass instrument.

  Twist was repeatedly banging her head back onto the wall of the van, trying to ignore Razor; it didn’t work, the metal walls turning the van into a literal echo chamber. She couldn’t deal with this for the entire ride.

  She went to kick Razor, to try to get him to shut up, before she felt a tightening around her leg. The strait-jacket’s fibres suddenly constricted like a vice, pulling her leg back with a thunk as it smacked into the wall of the van. Twist gritted her teeth, hissing in pain. She’d gotten so frustrated by the singing that she’d briefly forgotten the whole point of this strait-jacket: if she tried to move too much or too fast, it would tighten and snap her body back into place.

  She exhaled as she felt the strait-jacket loosened, glaring up at Razor.

  “Oi, come on now!” Razor shouted, turning to the guard next to him, “The little lady has to sign, you know! And you bind her hands? Proper ableist, that is!”

  Twist glared at him. She resented being called ‘little lady’, but she didn’t have much of a choice; she was tiny.

  The two guards shifted slightly, looking a bit guilty. Wasn’t their fault, to be completely fair.

  Being unable to sign was a pain though. Twist couldn’t speak, but she’d learned to sign from a young age and was almost overly-expressive in her face to make up for it. But this strait-jacket completely covered her hands and locked them in place, meaning being able to communicate was near-impossible.

  “You ok?” Razor mouthed, subtly enough that Twist almost didn’t notice.

  No I’m not ok, you asshole! Twist thought, shaking her head once forcefully to get her point across, I can’t fucking move!

  Thankfully, Razor had known Twist long enough that he was able to put together what she was trying to say.

  “You got a crick in your neck?” He mouthed, grinning slightly.

  When he wasn’t being an asshole, anyway.

  Twist just gave him a flat, murderous stare, like she was trying to kill him with her mind.

  “Don’t worry,” Razor mouthed, winking, “We’ll get out of this one.”

  How?! Twist thought, giving him a wide-eyed, baffled look of frustration. I can’t move, and you can’t touch anything!

  “We’ll get lucky.” He mouthed, leaning back, “That, or she’ll get us out of here somehow.”

  Twist winced, her blood running cold. Not her, please.

  “It’ll be fine.” Twist mouthed, leaning back and grinning.

  Twist leaned back, looking out of the window and into the night time of Meritas City, trying to relax. Downtown at night was always bright, the lights from the buildings and tram rails always kept the streets lit even this late at night.

  Wait, what is that?

  Twist swore that for a split-second she could see something on top of the underpass they were driving towards: a person’s silhouette. Like someone about to jump off.

  Instinctively, she tried to move forward to get a closer look. Too fast. Again, the strait-jacket clamped around her like a full-body vice, causing her body to lock up. She hit the floor with a thud, hissing in pain, the strait-jacket not letting up.

  “Shit, Twist!” Razor yelped, looking down at her. One of the guards shot to his feet, pulling Twist up with a grunt. She was trying to look outside the window, but they’d already turned into the road; she couldn’t see whatever - or whoever - that was anymore.

  “The hell’s going on back there?” The driver’s voice shouted from the front as the underpass approached.

  Twist tried not to wriggle, not to trigger the strait-jacket for a third time. The guard practically dropped her back into her seat with a sharp “Stay down!” as Razor shouted back at him.

  As the van drove forward, into the mouth of the underpass-

  THUNK!

  Something slammed into the windshield. The driver cursed as the van suddenly lurched, before bumping as it ran over something with a series of loud crunches and cracks. The van swerved, screeching to a halt, almost sending Razor and Twist flying out of their seats.

  “What in the fuck was that?!” The guard next to Razor barked at the driver.

  “I think- I think it might have been a jumper?” The driver responded, clearly stunned.

  “I’ll go take a look.” The guard said, moving to open the door. “Keep those two in line.” He said to the other guard, who nodded in response. With that, he pushed something on the front of his armour, causing the back door of the van to open with a click, before he stepped out, the door closing behind him.

  Immediately, Twist turned - slowly this time - to look out of the window behind her. They’d stopped right in the middle of the underpass, swerved so that the view from the window gave them a pretty much perfect look at the road behind them.

  There, under one of the underpass’s lights about fifteen feet away from the van and lying in a pool of blood, was a body. Twist couldn’t see much, but what she could see looked mangled; one leg clearly broken and bent the wrong way, the chest collapsed inward like a kicked-in door, even the head looked like it had turned too far one way like a doll’s head being twisted.

  “Shit.” The remaining guard gasped, having come up next to Twist to look outside. She turned to look up at Razor, who had sidled up next to her on the other side. He didn’t look confused or worried; he looked like he knew something.

  She turned back. The first guard was approaching the mangled body cautiously, slowly, baton in one hand. But as he approached the body, his posture changed; he lowered his hand and put his hand to his ear.

  His voice crackled through the radio on the guard next to Twist, sounding grave. “Yeah, looks like a jumper. She must’ve got caught under the wheels. Jesus, body’s mangled. We need to get an ambulance-”

  Something moved.

  Twist’s eyes widened as she saw the body’s broken leg suddenly whip around, reorienting itself; the chest rippling as the large dent undid itself.

  Then, like something out of a horror movie, the woman’s body sprung forward, launching towards the guard. He swung his baton directly into her, but she barely flinched before plunging something into his neck, hard. The guard stepped back, one hand covering his neck, before dropping to one knee.

  “Fuck!” The guard next to Twist shouted. “Impact!”

  The passenger-side door at the front of the van shot open as Impact stepped out, rushing into view of the window.

  “Hands up, now!” he shouted, pointing an outstretched hand at this body - no, this woman.

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  She turned to face Impact, standing under the underpass’s light, letting Twist see her more clearly. She looked like something out of a nightmare; lean and limp, head cocked to one side, a bloodstained knife in her right hand catching the light. Long and stringy straw-blonde hair poked out of the hood of a ragged grey sweater, over tattered tights that were caked with dirt and dried blood and dotted with holes. Twist could just about make out the details on her face: a pair of bright blue eyes, and a series of criss-crossing scars, giving it this disjointed, patchwork appearance.

  Oh fuck. Twist thought, starting to sweat, recognition setting in. It’s her. It’s Patch.

  Patch rushed forward, getting three steps closer to Impact as he made the motion of throwing a punch. The air between them rippled, then Patch’s right shoulder exploded into a burst of wet crimson, blood splattering onto the road behind her as what was left of her right arm landed onto the ground with a meaty thud.

  Her body jolted back from the impact and she staggered back a step. Then, she straightened with an almost casual roll of her neck, despite the fact that she was missing an arm and a good chunk of her chest. Twist could make out a manic, toothy grin on her face as she stepped forward again, despite the empty hole where her shoulder used to be.

  Impact stepped back in surprise, looking shaken as Patch advanced on him like nothing was wrong.

  The empty space where the shoulder had been churned and twisted, rapidly growing like a sped-up timelapse; bone grew from the exposed muscle like white spikes before rapidly knitting together, muscle tissue grew across the new bone like moss on stone, stretching and bubbling and sealing as veins laced across it. Finally, skin slithered over the freshly-regrown meat, knitting itself together neatly as her fingernails bloomed at the end.

  It had taken maybe two seconds for the arm to regrow from the stump of the shoulder. She rolled it once, then twice, like she was testing that it worked.

  Twist cringed, trying her best not to vomit. It was hardly the first time she’d seen Patch do this, but she’d never gotten used to it.

  Patch darted to the side, her new right hand grabbing what remained of her old one - the knife still firmly clenched in its fist - and swinging it like a club at Impact.

  He barely ducked out of the way, trying to dance around her, but she immediately spun on her heel and swung again. Twist could hear her laughing, oddly high-pitched and girly like a kid in a candy store.

  Impact threw his arm out again, the air rippling as a small hole punched itself through Patch’s stomach. Blood burst out of it like a popped balloon, but Patch barely even broke stride, the hole filling up as folds of flesh and skin slid together to seal it shut within a second.

  “What the fuck?!” Impact shouted, visibly panicked as Patch closed in on him, swinging her arm-club again. He threw his arm out to the side, the air rippling again; not hitting Patch this time, but the arm-club, which came apart into two pieces, the clenched hand tearing off and hitting the ground with a thunk. Unlike Patch, the mangled arm-club didn’t regenerate.

  Patch just looked down at it for a second, before running forward, picking up the knife in one swift motion. Impact backed away, screaming as Patch followed, the two of them disappearing out of the view of the window.

  Twist could still hear them though.

  “No, stop, stop!” She heard Impact yell, before another sound of popping flesh rang out.

  The next thing Twist heard was a faint, metallic sound and a gasp of air as metal met flesh. Then another, and another.

  “Fuck!” The driver shouted from the front of the cab, as he tried to start the van again. Through sheer bad luck, the engine refused to start, grinding and gasping as the driver turned the key again and again.

  “Who the fuck is that?!” The other guard, still glaring out the window before turning to Twist and Razor, yelled, “She must be here for you two! Who is she?!”

  CLANG!

  Something slammed into the doors to the back of the van.

  “I’ll tell you one thing,” Razor said, smirking, “She’s not nearly as nice as we are. Crazy too. Proper mental.”

  CLANG!

  The doors groaned as something was trying to pull them open.

  CLANG!

  “There’s no way she’ll get in.” The guard responded, “Those doors are designed to tank hits from people with super-strength! There’s no way she’ll-”

  Click!

  The door slowly opened outward, revealing Patch standing right by the open door, a wide toothy grin on her patchwork face and a little item - the same one the guards had on their chest to open the door - in her hand.

  Then, her eyes lit up.

  “Razy! Twisty!” She squeaked, jumping in place like a kid.

  BANG!

  A gunshot burst in the back of the van, loud enough to make Twist’s ears ring. The guard next to her had whipped out his pistol and fired directly at Patch, nailing her in the chest, screaming as he shot her.

  BANG!

  He fired again, hitting her in the left arm.

  BANG-BANG-BANG!

  Again in the stomach.

  BANG!

  Again in the face.

  Each bullet tore into her, causing her body to lurch.

  Click!

  Out of bullets.

  Fuck it. Twist thought.

  She lurched, slamming into the guard’s side; the strait-jacket snapped around her again, but she’d moved quick enough to knock him off-balance before she fell to the floor. Then she turned, craning her neck up to look at Patch.

  “Ghh… y’got my faysh… y’meanie” Patch gurgled. One of the bullets had ripped through her cheek and shattered some of her teeth, leaving the inside of her mouth exposed. Not that it’d last; Twist could already see the skin and muscle zipping itself back together, new teeth growing from her jaw. The other bullet holes had already sealed themselves up good as new.

  Without missing a beat, Patch jammed her knife directly into the guard’s hand, hard enough that it pierced right through his glove. He screamed, loud and guttural.

  “So like…these two~” Patch chirped at him, squatting down and pointing at Razor and Twist as her face fully healed. “How can we like, get these jacket thingies off?”

  In complete contrast to everything else about her, Patch’s voice was high-pitched and sugary-sweet, and slightly nasally. She sounded less like some unhinged lunatic and more like some airheaded valley girl.

  “Go to hell!” The guard shouted through gritted teeth.

  “Nah,” Patch shrugged, immediately stabbing him through the neck, “They like, didn’t let me stay. Totally rude, right?”

  Twist just watched as the guard gurgled, sinking to the floor as blood poured from his neck. She didn’t know whether to be impressed or horrified. She looked up at Patch, who was looking at the guard’s dying body in the same way a child might look at a dying insect.

  Twist bristled as she stared up at her, feeling her stomach churn. Razor liked her well enough, because he thought she was useful; she was, but she didn’t share Twist and Razor’s code regarding murder. They’d maim and hurt people, sure, but they didn’t like killing people if they could help it. Patch was different, she was twisted; she seemed to relish in the bloodshed.

  Twist slowly pulled herself up, the strait-jacket loosening around her as she moved. Patch’s eyes darted to her, making Twist instinctively freeze, before a childlike, happy smile beamed across Patch’s face.

  “Hi guys!” Patch beamed, smiling wide.

  “Evenin’ Patch.” Razor said, before his eyes drifted downward, “You’ve got a tit hanging out.”

  All three of them looked down at Patch’s chest. Sure enough, one of her breasts was exposed, practically at eye level with Twist. In the chaos of the fight, she hadn’t even realised that half of her sweater had gotten blown apart.

  “Don’t look!” Patch let out a panicked whine, before pulling what was left of her sweater around to cover herself up a bit more.

  “Patch,” Razor sighed, rolling his eyes, “I’ve literally seen your lungs and guts sprayed across god-knows how many walls and floors.”

  She ignored him, looking embarrassed. Her sweater - well, what was left of it - was now on backwards, covering her up slightly better.

  Twist nudged Razor, before gesturing down to herself - well, as best as she could with her limbs restrained.

  Razor nodded, turning to Patch. “Patch, love. Can you stick your knife in my mouth?”

  Patch tilted her head, quizzical. “I mean…sure?” She reached out, pointing her knife blade-first towards his mouth.

  Razor rolled his eyes and groaned. “Other way.”

  “Oh!” Patch realised, giggling before flipping it around.

  Razor bit down on the hilt, words muffled. “Hobfully thith shood work.”

  He leaned down, poking the knife into Twist’s strait-jacket, right in the centre of the chest. Twist froze, trying desperately not to move as the blade slid through the fibres, cutting through it like a hot knife through butter. Immediately, she felt that constant tension lessen, and flexed her hands again; it felt good to be able to move properly. She still let it hang over her shoulders, as she wasn’t wearing much more than basic underwear underneath.

  Razor spat out the knife, Patch catching it a second later. “Brilliant.”

  Immediately, the three heard the faint sounds of sirens. Twist slowly turned her head to the front of the cab.

  Somehow, the driver hadn’t run away yet. In fact, it looked as if he had been desperately trying to not be noticed.

  “Oi, driver!” Razor shouted, turning around. He flinched as Razor shouted to him, slowly turning around. Patch gave him a wave, which made him look even more tense.

  “You called for backup, didn’t you~?” Patch asked, sickeningly sweet.

  The driver just nodded in response.

  She took a step forward, knife raised, before Razor put up a hand casually to stop her. She lowered her knife, pouting and looking disappointed.

  “We need to go before the boys in blue rock up.” Razor sighed, “Twist, you feel good to give us a lift?”

  Twist looked between him and Patch, then looked outside.

  “In the middle of an underpass.” She quickly signed, “Need open air.”

  Patch giggled behind her, stretching hard enough that Twist could hear bones pop.

  The three rushed out from the back of the van, and onto the road. The moment her feet hit the asphalt, Twist started spinning, arms outstretched and feet perfectly poised like a ballet dancer. Each rotation felt like energy building up in her body like a spring, winding up and bubbling beneath her skin.

  As they got out from the underpass, she grabbed onto both Patch and Twist, then leapt into the air, spinning like a top and rocketing upwards. The force she’d built up spun around her, sending the three of them flying into the sky; she could hear Patch giggling like a kid on a rollercoaster, while Razor was quiet in her other arm.

  As they got level with the roof of a building, Twist slowed, the momentum fading from her spin. She tried her best to aim for the rooftop, twisting her arms and legs like flaps on a plane’s wing to guide her descent. After a moment, the three landed on the rooftop with a thud, tumbling.

  They pulled themselves up quickly, Twist making an effort to stay a few steps away from Patch. She placed a hand on the restraints around Razor’s arms and rotated them; the metal groaned loudly, before it buckled and snapped, dropping to the ground with a thunk and freeing his hands.

  “Cheers, love.” Razor said, smiling at Twist as he flexed his hands. Twist smiled up at him, giving a quick thumbs-up.

  Almost immediately, Twist felt something suddenly wrap around her, as Patch grabbed her and Razor into a hug.

  “Oh I missed you guys!” She squealed.

  She was gripping them both like a vice. Twist felt like her ribs were being crushed. That, and the smell of blood and filth from Patch was overpowering, causing Twist to gag.

  “Patch, we- loosen your grip a smidge!” Razor gasped.

  “Oh, sorry.” Patch responded, loosening her grip slightly. Twist gasped, feeling Razor pat Patch on the back.

  Eventually, Patch let go and pulled away, still smiling like a kid seeing her two best friends in the world. It would have looked sweet, if it wasn’t for everything else about her.

  “So, like…” Patch purred, turning to look at Razor, “Who put you two in the slammer anyway?”

  Twist looked up at Razor, suddenly nervous.

  “Couple o’ new girls” Razor said, brushing himself off.

  “Oh wow!,” Patch chimed, leaning in and getting closer to Razor, “You’ve gotta tell me about ‘em!”

  Twist immediately held her face with one hand. Why did Razor have to say that? He knew how Patch could get.

  “…Why?” He asked, his eyes narrowing.

  “Well…” Patch said, drawing out the word and rocking back and forth on the balls of her feet, “If they put my besties in jail, I kinda wanna meet them! Maybe give them a little payback. Y’know, girl-to-girl.”

  Twist let this sink in, and immediately felt a sinking sense of dread wash over her. Was Patch really going to try and go after two kids?