Nimmie Zinschmidt trekked out of the forest surrounding Mission looking much the same as she had walking into it. It was a common sight to see contract Huntsman and Huntresses returning from the forest severely banged up at the beginning and end of each and every working day, so the first time the girl had emerged from the forest without so much as a scratch or a bruise, it had called attention to her. She was seen as weird by some, shifty and suspicious for her conspicuous cleanliness. The children loved her and thought she must be some sort of superhero or ultra-Huntress, but she’d had a harder time convincing most of the locals old enough to drink that she wasn’t some sort of ghost or a spy, or worse, a coward or a liar. Clearly, one coming in and out of that forest doing Huntress work could ever remain untouched for that long. She had to be either making it up, or she was up to something else out there...
None of those things were true, obviously. Well, maybe they were a little. But eventually Nimmie had won over the townspeople, who now begrudgingly allowed her presence in their village without complaint. Best of all, she’d managed it without ever having to explain her secret. Which was good, because the truth was-
“Oof!”
She got hurt a lot.
An alpha Ursa’s powerful spiked forearm slammed into Nimmie’s chest like a tree-trunk swung by the hands of an angry giant, knocking her breath out of her and her feet from out under her. She flew, though not as far as she looked like she should have, and skidded to a stop against the soft dirt of the forest floor. She blinked, dazed. The alpha seemed like it had turned into ten smaller Ursa. That wasn’t good.
Nimmie shook her head, blinked, then looked again. Oh, nevermind. The alpha had just called in the rest of its pack. Well... darn. That really wasn’t good. She staggered to her feet.
“Ten against one, huh?” she said, gripping her axe. “Well now I just feel insulted.”
Thumbing the trigger on Chopfyt’s handle, she activated the weapon’s rocket-boosters and swung hard, releasing the lock on the head of the axe. The gruesome blade shot out ahead of her in arc, tethered to the handle by a thin-string of carbon fibre wire as it collided with the pack of Grimm one at a time, knocking them into each other like dominos. The pack was blown away by the momentum and mass of Chopfyt’s rocket-assisted flail attack, scattered the nine smaller Ursa across the clearing. Even the alpha stumbled.
Nimmie didn’t bother waiting for Chopfyt’s head to retract. Instead, she clicked her heels together and shot into the air, her sneakers ejecting their own bright blue plumes of fire. Rocket-powered axe? Cool. Rocket-powered sneakers? Come on, what kid didn’t want a pair?
The two met at the height of her jump, Chopfyt reuniting with her and locking into place in its handle. She gripped onto it tightly, and began to lean into her fall with all her weight. The alpha Ursa received it, catching Chopfyt by the handle in a crossguard. Nimmie struggled with it.
“Why,” she grunted, “won’t you die?!”
The Ursa lunged unexpectedly, clamping its enormous jaws down on her arm. It didn’t find the purchase it was looking for. The arm, it was too stiff. Too rigid. And it bent beneath the Grimm’s fangs instead of yielding fresh blood. The red-headed Huntress cursed.
“Oh that’s how you want it, huh? Well then fine! You can just take the bloody arm!”
She thumbed the rocket-boosters one more time, igniting a bright plume behind her that pushed the axe-head closer to the alpha. It roared, shaking its head vigorously as it tried to rip off her arm. Nimmie screamed. Something broke, and there was a sound like squealing metal in a car crash.
“That’s enough! Just... fricking... diiie!”
The rockets flared even brighter, and the Grimm lost all ability to resist. The axe fell as inevitably as a shooting star, freeing the Grimm’s head from its body, and Nimmie’s arm from her shoulder. It clung to Chopfyt’s handle like a boody trophy, the axe embedded in the ground a fitting headstone for a Grimm. Except it wasn’t a normal arm. There was no blood gushing out of it. Only oil and a clear lubricant fluid that dripped from various tubes surrounding a complex array of wires and motors. This arm didn’t belong to anyone human.
It belonged to Nimmie Zinschmidt, Remnant’s first (as far as she knew), gynoid Huntress.
Nimmie collapsed to the ground, more tired than she’d been in a long while. She gasped, trying to get her breath back, then looked at her arm.
“Aw dammit...”
Nimmie hid her injury the way many Huntsmen and Huntresses did. That is to say, not well. The arm had been hastily shoved in her backpack, and the gushing, sparking stump was covered by a loose-fitting poncho she’d been given as a gift by one of the townsmen she’d helped save. Even though no one could actually see the disturbing mechanical mutilation of her left arm, she felt everyone staring at her regardless. She’d had a reputation in this town for being the only Huntress to return from the forest unhurt every time. Now she’d broken her pattern. It was as good of an excuse as any for people to be suspicious. Even, she noted with some chagrin, the children.
Clinging tightly to the parka with her good arm, Nimmie gave everyone a quick nod which did absolutely nothing to make her look less suspicious and hurried to Mission’s local smithy, Core’s Hammer. They had parts there, and machine shops. Little private rooms you could rent out to do your own repairs. Her arm was a fairly simple piece of tech... she thought. She could be wrong. Anyway, she could fix it. If she could just have some time alone, she could use her good arm to, I dunno, solder it back on.
And who’s gonna hold it in place while you do? she thought. Actually, no. Don’t think about it. Just fix it. Before anyone sees.
Greeting the owner with a brusque grunt, she made her excuses and headed into the back, clinging even tighter to her stump in the hopes that nobody would see it or ask questions. Nimmie made haste, and threw open the door to the first room she saw. But...
“O-Oh, I’m sorry!” she stammered when she saw the bulging back muscles hunched over a pair of heavy gauntlets with a welding torch. “I didn’t realize...”
Nimmie blinked as she recognized the swole girl, almost taken aback.
“Tori?”
