Dr Douglas absently wondered what dying would feel like. It seemed that she would soon find out. 

But just as the fire from the bomb spread outwards, engulfing her, the dark haired youth that had made to walk off earlier threw himself on top of her, taking the majority of the blast. All she could feel was an intense heat and the sharp pain of tiny fragments embedding themselves into her exposed left leg as the explosion finally relented. When all the orange flames had disappeared, Dr Douglas found herself staring something from a zombie horror film; the flesh had been burnt off her saviour's torso, exposing something white beneath his flesh which Dr Douglas soon recognised as his ribs. However, he - like the strange machine man - had healed within seconds, the flesh closing up before her eyes. Douglas rubbed her eyes, her brain struggling to compute everything that was occurring tonight, as the man stood up, leaving her lying on the concrete, shaking. 

She watched as the man ran back at the other 'machine' (what else could he be?), who was also fighting the girl in monk robes and then found herself gaping at the silver clad mutant that had landed on a car near her earlier, who seemed to have now joined the party. If not for the pain raging away in her left leg, she would have be sure she was dreaming. She crawled out the way, back up to a nearby wall and focused on keeping her breathing even. She kept her eyes away from her calf, which was oozing a sickening scarlet, and instead on the battle happening before her. 

She caught sight of the frayed telegraph wire, lying by her ankles. She grasped it and felt her heartbeat increase rapidly, as electricity began to flow into her body. She had never done this before, intentionally and it was like someone had directly inject a litre of pure adrenaline into her bloodstream. Her skin began to glow - ever so faintly - and she marvelled at this transformation, forgetting about her reservations on using her ability. She felt strong, a need to move. Her leg - the pain now considerably easier to deal with - still looked as though it had been mauled by a bear, but she felt less tired.

However, she soon became aware of the mutant rally, which surely could not have missed the explosion. They would soon surely descend upon them all to see what was going on. She began to panic, pulling the glow back into her mind and easing back on electricity absorbance, dropping the wire. After a minute, or so, she had managed to retract the glow back only to her eyes. She got to her feet, wobbling in her low heels and tried to stumble out of the alley, preparing herself in case the mutant with the electric heart tried to attack her again. She wasn't sure she could drain him a second time. 

And then a question occurred to her foggy, muddled brain; why was this mutant (for he couldn't be anything else) fighting against his fellow X-Gene carriers?