The Adjudicator's Institute for Heroics

Dawn smiled weakly. "That... Thanks, Evan. You might've saved my life back there," she said. She noticed how he slumped and tried to pat his shoulder, only for a splouch of yellow to stain her hands. It dripped from her fingers onto the floor. Then she chuckled and the elevator opened into the Adjudicator's office. "It was cool, whatever it was. Just a bit messy, but who I am to talk?"

Winifred's furrowed brow lifted and her stare softened. "Any toy?" she repeated, looking off to the side. In an instant, she and her teddy bear ran off to the children's section.
After a minute or so, she returned with a stuffed cat that must've gone through years of wear and tear. It had a missing eye and several missing limbs. Both of the ears had been torn off by younger hands.. Winnie shoved it into Avery. "That's Pickles. Fix him, and maybe I'll think about it," she said, shyly. Winifred rubbed the fur of her bear between her fingers, unwilling to even look at the poor kitty.

Avery paused. She hadn't exactly been expecting to be handed something so worn-out and tired. Pickles looked ancient, and exhausted. Its one intact eye almost seemed to widen in fear as she cradled it in her large hands.
Dear God, she thought, holding up the little stuffed cat. What happened to you?
"I...think I can fix him," Avery turned back to Winifred. "But he might not be exactly the same as before. Is that okay with you?"

Winifred didn't respond. She just held her teddy tighter, and it did the same in return. Instead, she simply yelled: "Fix him!" and stormed off.

Eventually, after a long waiting period, Astrid screamed. "Evan!" they jumped as they saw the condition he was. "Holy crap, what happened back there!? You look like an acid trip!" They grabbed Evan by the shoulders, only to get dripping colors all over them. She tripped wipping it on her dress, but that just stained her baby pink dress deep cyan and green.

Evan grinned. "Color bomb."


Sage watched the little girl stomp away.
"Well, uh, she left," she muttered. "Is that what you were hoping to achieve?"
"...Yes," Avery decided after a moment, still staring at Pickles.
"You know you don't have to fix that thing, right?" Sage pointed to the broken stuffed animal.
"Yeah...well, I'll do it anyways. It's in desperate need of repair. And what if she comes back?"
Sage shrugged. "Good point."
Avery took her handful of Daya, winding it around the little cat like glowing purple bandages. Then she began to sculpt it, eyes narrowed in concentration as she re-shaped Pickles' limbs, re-grew his fur, and replaced his missing eye. When she was done, the once-broken stuffed animal looked brand new.
"There!" she grinned, holding it up triumphantly. "Fixed!"

Astrid couldn't help but squeal. "Color bomb! I knew it! God, your powers are awesome. I told you! You might wanna clean up a bit before we see the others, but color bomb!" Astrid jumped in place, before suddenly stopping. "You guys did get enough evidence, right?"

Sadly, Dawn nodded. "We got... something." Once again, her chest felt heavy as she skimmed her fingers over the camera. Did she really want people to see her mother as the bad guy? What was she talking about!? Of course! Her mother was evil. Those words made her sick to her stomach. Why was she so conflicted all of a sudden? Why did she still care for her reputation? Well... Anyone who watched the video would see her being mistreated. Did she want to be pitied and talked about like that? She never wanted to be seen as the victim... Dawn handed the camera back to Evan before she could do anything. She didn't trust her hands anymore, especially after she sliced her own hair off. "Let's get this online before anyone stops us."

The cat sprung up with new life, as if it were just a plain old cat, although his proportions were a bit more exageratted. It purred in Avery's hand, climbing up her arm before jumping onto the desk. It shook it's new limbs around, testing the endurance of it. Although a simple plush, it never looked happier to finally be bouncing around and crawling like a normal cat would. Once off the computer, it trouted to the spot Winifred was hiding, rubbing it's head against her shoulder.
There were tears welling up in her eyes as she took her stuffie into her arms, the teddy bear standing beside. Winnie made eye contact with Avery for a brief moment. In that moment, she slightly smiled, before nodding and running back to the children's shelves.

"I think we're in the clear," Avery murmured as Winnie disappeared between the bookshelves. Sage nodded.
"I think I've found all the information I can. Now we just wait for Evan and Dawn to come back."
"Yeah..." Avery sucked in a nervous breath, eyes fixed on the entry to the library. She didn't like the thought of Dawn or her brother going into the Adjudicator's lair...what if something happened to them? What if it already did happen, and they were lying on a table somewhere, having the life drained out of them?
Avery shivered, trying to push these thoughts away. The image of Dawn's pale face, slowly getting all the vibrance and personality taken away was more than she could handle.

Thankfully, it was soon after that Astrid burst through the library doors, Evan and Dawn in tow. All three looked like a mess. "We did it!" she shouted, before the librarian shushed her. She whispered an apology, before running up to Sage at the computer. "We did it!" they repeated, quieter this time.

Dawn picked her finger tips, which had been dyed a deep red. For a moment, she thought about how she cut her mother's finger. She never hurt her mother before, even on accident. What happened to them, anyways? They looked freakishly unhinged.
She couldn't think on it for long as she raised her eyes and met with Avery's. Nervously, she messed with her hair. What was left of it, anyways. She chuckled shyly. How do you explain that and whatever happened to Evan? "Um... surprise? Do you, uh, like the new look?" At least she tried to play it off, despite how miserable she looked over her lost length.

"Your hair..." Avery rushed forward to greet the both of them, inspecting Evan's strange new patterning and Dawn's frayed edges. "What...happened to you two?"
"They were going to take Dawn's powers away," Evan explained, trying to rub away some of his odd coloring, but he only managed to smear it a bit. "So I, uh, flashbanged them. Then the Adjudicator grabbed Dawn's hair, so she had to cut it off. But we got the evidence!"
He held up the Christmas-colored camera.

Astrid sprung up to grab the camera. "Color bomb! I knew it could work! Man, it must've looked so cool. You gotta invite me next time you use it. I wanna look like a rainbow!" they eventually bounced their way to Sage, handing them the camera. "So, how do we upload this thing? Better hurry before someone finds us. We are, uh, noticeable, to say the least."

Dawn smiled slightly, thinking back to their previous in the library. "It was pretty impressive what he did back there. I could see it through closed eyes," she said, rubbing her neck. It was especially cold, seeing how there wasn't much left to coat her shoulders. "But we made it out alive. That's all I care about! Even if it feels like I could sleep forever right now, I'm glad everyone's safe."

Avery reached into her canister and pulled out a USB cord.
"Here, use this," she handed the cord to Sage. "It'll allow you to upload the video file."
"Thanks," Sage plugged the camera into the computer, then began scrolling through folders as she looked for the correct one. While she was doing that, Avery wrapped her arm around Dawn.
"Are you sure you're okay?" she asked softly. "You look pretty shaken up."

While Astrid was watching everything that happened on the technical side, Dawn glanced up at Avery. She smiled and leaned into her on instinct. Avery's warmth was unforgetable. "No. I don't think so," she admitted. It was hard to pull her eyes off the floor. "But I'll be okay. I hope, anyways."
Eventually, she was able to look up at Avery, though eye-contact was brief. "It's just that... I saw someone down there, and she kinda looked like you. A-And I'm a little scared that one day it will be you. Or any of us, for that matter." Dawn's eyes had been dried out after the flashbang downstairs, so no more tears would well for the time being. "I don't know how protect you if that happens," she whispered.

"Don't worry," Avery rubbed Dawn's arm, watching as Sage uploaded the video to the computer. "We'll get this online, and then everything that we've had to go through over the past few months will be over. No more power-stealing, no more hiding, no more being trapped under the Adjudicator's thumb. We'll finally be free!"

"Really?" Dawn found it truly hard to believe. "How?" she asked, leaning even closer. "I mean... How many people will even believe the video? What if no one does? And, I mean, will one video really be enough to tear all this down? What if she takes down the video before anyone sees it?" Much of Dawn's optiminism had been drained at this point, especially after everything her mother did. After a long sigh, she closed her eyed and relished in Avery's hold. Maybe she needed to worry less, or maybe more. Everything felt a bit fuzzy at that point.

"Maybe it will, maybe it won't," Avery replied. "I certainly hope this will all work out...but if it doesn't, we still have each other, right?"
"Cliche," Evan called from the computer. Avery shot him a look.
"You've never been one for optimism," she pointed out.
"True," Evan shrugged. "But you can't be disappointed if you're already expecting the worst."

Astrid snickered with Evan's comment, though she wasn't sure if they should be worried about the ladt one. "Yeah, Evan's right. Now, Evan, I dunno if that's a good mentality-" she pat his shoulder before turning to Avery and Dawn, "-but you guys are, like, sickeningly sweet. I'm getting cavities over here!"

Dawn tried not to become flustered, but that was sort of impossible when their entire friendgroup was joking about their... relationship(?), if there was one. "Are we really like that?" she whispered to Avery, using her hand to cover a part of her red face. "I know you said painfully obvious before but, um, is it really really painfully obvious or are they joking?"