Hank didn’t dwell any further on the gossip about his boss and steered the conversation back to scientific matters.
“Dr. Ziegler, might I ask you something—back in Poland, Magda and Nina… were their wounds fatal?”
Angela turned to glance at Hank and gave him the answer he was hoping for, plainly and directly.
“Of course.
They were fatal wounds.
I never intended to hide it.
There simply hadn’t been an opening for me to say so before now.”
Hank’s interest was piqued at once, and he asked, curious, “I’ve heard the Professor say your ‘healing’ ability stems from ‘nanobiology.’ Which would mean others could master this power too, wouldn’t it?
Including… pulling someone back from death?”
Angela didn’t answer right away.
She thought of that biotic rifle.
In the game Overwatch, Ana relied on that healing-type sniper rifle to mend her teammates and subdue her enemies, along with her biotic grenade—the one players simply called the “heal nade,” because once you lobbed it, every ally caught in its radius was healed while every enemy was locked out of healing entirely.
Both of those weapons now sat shamelessly out in the open in the system shop.
In other words, she could buy them.
And perhaps she could even hand them off for someone else to use.
The same might even go for the Caduceus Staff she used most often.
Even so, even within the game, only a single hero possessed the Resurrect skill—and that hero was “Angela Ziegler.”
“I’d say that healing others is something that could be done, given the right instruments and the right technique.
But snatching a person back from Death itself—that may well be my own particular specialty.
That’s my ability.
It isn’t entirely the work of ‘technology.'”
That was “Angela Ziegler’s” power.
Hearing Angela openly admit that she possessed the power of resurrection, Hank couldn’t help drawing in a sharp breath.
“Dr. Ziegler, you… how long have you had this ability?”
“How long?
No, not nearly as long as you’re imagining.” Angela tallied the time up with ease.
“Only four years.
And in those four years, I’ve used this power far fewer times than you’d think.”
Because she had never dared gamble that her teammates were like her—able to walk back out of the “respawn room” once their health hit zero and pick the mission right back up.
She could save a teammate once, twice; but she could never guarantee that the “next time” would succeed. Find the original chapter at g.com.
So she trained all the harder, fought all the more desperately, and watched over her teammates all the more carefully.
“Mercy’s” rank as an agent hadn’t been some special favor handed to her on account of her being a doctor.
Her marksmanship was a match for any of her teammates, ranked among the very best in the whole organization.
Infiltration, ambush, close combat, tracking, countertracking—every skill an outstanding agent needed, she’d mastered well.
“Four years…” Hank repeated the figure, something stirring in his chest.
“As a rule, a mutant’s powers awaken in adolescence—though that isn’t without its exceptions.”
Angela smiled.
“Dr. McCoy, there’s no need to be so delicate about it. I know what you’re trying to say. The awakening of a power usually takes some trigger. In my case, I watched a teammate die right in front of me—”
In the pursuit of a breakthrough in nanobiological healing, Overwatch—short on the data it needed—had carried out human trials.
The participants were, of course, no clueless innocents, but Overwatch members who’d volunteered themselves as test subjects.
—Overwatch’s own leader, Gabriel Reyes.
Reyes had died there before her eyes, his life-signs guttering out one by one.
“And then I came into that power, and I brought him back.”
But from that day on, Reyes became “Reaper.” The trials had wrought irreversible damage on his body; his cells died and regenerated at one and the same rate, leaving him locked ever after in some uncanny state, somewhere between human and inhuman.
She didn’t want to call it fate—but reality was simply what it was.
“I understand, deeply, that none of this comes without a cost. Every person who is brought back has a price to pay for it.” Angela gave Hank a wink.
“So if you’re worried I might abuse the power, you can set your mind at ease.
I think a price tag of five million US dollars is more than enough to make most people turn and walk away.”
Hank said, a little awkwardly, “The Professor asked me just now to remind you—he fears there could be trouble once word of your ability gets out.
And there’s the matter of the genetic test results.
He’s already mentioned them to Logan, and Logan very much wants to meet you.
He’s waiting for you at the infirmary right now.”
Angela couldn’t help glancing back over her shoulder; sure enough, there was no one else behind her.
“Why didn’t Charles just tell me himself?”
If he could send word to McCoy by telepathy, why not contact her in person?
Hank gave a soft cough and explained, “The Professor says that, out of respect for your privacy as a lady, he won’t use telepathy to reach you without your consent first.” Here he started to laugh.
“Jean’s already passed your conversation along to him, and he asks you to rest assured that he absolutely won’t intrude on your date.”
That made Angela laugh outright.
“Well, these telepaths really do… abuse their powers rather a lot, don’t they?”
Faster than a phone call, and free of charge to boot.
Hank waved goodbye and set off toward the lab, while Angela carried on toward the infirmary at the end of the road.
A powerfully built, fierce-looking middle-aged man stood at the infirmary door, his short hair standing up in stiff spikes, lending him a keen, knife-edged air.
He carried no weapon at all, simply stood there—and yet the sheer pressure rolling off him already far outstripped a fully armed Cyclops.
This was a man who had walked off the battlefield alive.
Angela knew it at a single glance.
Gunsmoke had tempered his bones, and blood had forged his spirit.
Only countless deaths could forge a mind like that, forever poised for combat; only countless victories could leave a man so utterly at ease, so used to battle that he’d come to relish it.
What a familiar presence.
Like Reyes.
Like Morrison.
Like Reinhardt.
Like Ana Amari.
Like McCree.
Like herself.
No introduction was needed.
A name surfaced in her mind all on its own.
“Logan—Wolverine.”
The man’s brow lifted a fraction, and the taut corner of his mouth eased, tugging upward, until that cold, cutting edge melted away and gave over to a relaxed smile.
“Mercy.
Angela Ziegler.
I’ve been waiting a good while for you.”
“My apologies.” Angela stepped forward and held out a hand to the man.
“I cut the mission as short as I could.”
“Ah, I didn’t mean it as a complaint.” Logan’s brow drew together slightly as he came forward and clasped her hand, a light grip and then a release.
“I didn’t expect the lot of you back this quickly. I figured Magneto would never budge an inch. I know better than most how stubborn the man is.”