Santi lay there inside Tim for some time more, struggling angrily the whole time, delighting in how Tim kept giving reactions of discomfort and pain.  She wanted him to<span style="font-style: italic">hurt</span>.  Maybe he could decide to stop rebuilding her and just digest her again if she didn't stop struggling like this, but no way was she going to let him do whatever he felt like doing without resisting.  She had been ready to fight to the death.  The bastard hadn't even let her have that much respect, keeping her conscious instead of letting her die.<br/><br/>Santi wasn't sure how long it took, but after a while she knew her body was intact again.  Inside his gut she could feel her fingers and toes again now as she continued to kick and claw at the slimy, seemingly impenetrable stomach walls.  She could hear his groans again, really hear them... and though it had still been too much time for her tastes, she had a feeling it hadn't taken the half an hour he had said it would, and by a long shot.  Maybe she<span style="font-style: italic">had</span>been able to heal a little...<br/><br/>She couldn't hear his thoughts anymore, and she didn't think he could hear hers either.  She was whole again.  She didn't dare open her eyes --- for fear of his stomach's acids --- but between bouts of struggling she felt her face and the rest of her body for flaws.  She couldn't tell if she was herself again or if she looked like the lying bastard she was still inside of...<br/><br/>The slimy walls around her compressed suddenly.  She grimaced, but as the flesh pressed close to her own she realized what the movements were.  She snorted and let him do what he should never have needed to do: bring her back up.<br/><br/>She slid out like she was diving, her hands held over her head.  She felt herself slide out of him, the sensation again all too pleasurable as her naked body squeezed through his flesh, but she didn't give voice to that feeling.  She was still angry at him and she wouldn't give him the satisfaction of letting him know she had enjoyed even<span style="font-style: italic">one instant</span>of that ordeal.  She felt her hands land on something that rustled, then her face and her breasts, and from that point on she resumed struggling as hard as she could.  Though her body from her waist down was still inside Tim's, she kicked and squirmed, and a momentary glance back revealed a satisfying grimace on Tim's upper face as his head jerked back and forth from her struggle.  Her hips came free, then her thighs; she popped out of him at last, his mouth returning to its regular cute shape immediately, only to have both her feet slam against his nose and jaw as soon as they were free.<br/><br/>"Santi."  Sam was there, dropping a sheet over her, but with a muttered<span style="font-style: italic">don't bother</span>she shook it off and came to her knees, then her feet.  Her body obeyed without hesitation, wet and slimy but her muscles seeming fine, and she looked at herself in the nearest mirror.  To her relief the image looking back at her was entirely her own... her eyes, her hair, her shape, all exactly as they had been.  Either Tim had done something different this time so she didn't look like him, or her own healing had played a role in keeping her from looking like him.  Either way, she was relieved... but still enraged.<br/><br/>She turned to face Tim.  She didn't care that she was nude.  Now, right<span style="font-style: italic">now,</span>before she had a chance to calm down, was when she had to say what she had to... to do what she had to.  Before Tim could replicate another helper, and while Sam was still around and wary.<br/><br/>"San..." Tim started, but her name died in his throat as he saw her expression.  He swallowed, looking over the edge of the bed.  He knew he was about to pay for the betrayal.  He knew it.  She wasn't sure what she could really do to him --- he was stronger than she was --- but damn him, she was going to<span style="font-style: italic">try </span>to<span style="font-style: italic">royally fuck him up.</span><br/><br/>"I'm not gonna hold you back. Just try not to kill him. His healing isn't nearly as advanced as yours." Sam was standing next to her, and before she could even tear her eyes away from Tim their long-haired protector had tossed two somethings onto the bed in front of her.  She looked down, frowning.  It looked like a gun... but a gun designed for shooting those little foam balls.  No, there was a canister of gelatinous pepper extract inside.  She'd seen police use one of those on some of her friends once... just for kicks.  The other was a set of brass knuckles cast from, well, real brass.  They were small enough that even her fists could use them.<br/><br/>"Sam!" Tim yelped, wide-eyed, still somehow looking cute even then, damn him.  She wanted to wipe that cuteness off his face... or beat it off, perhaps.<br/><br/>"Ah, who knows, maybe she can beat some sanity into you." Sam turned and walked away, and started fixing coffee on a heat crystal plate. "Oh, Tim, remember, you scream, they might come."<br/><br/>Santi turned a look his way, and smirked, grateful, glad she wasn't the only one who thought this was necessary.  Tim was like a child, and he needed to be disciplined.  And it seemed as though "big sister" was going to be the one administering the... spanking, so to speak.<br/><br/>She took both the objects into her hands.  "Thank you, Sam," she said, trying to keep her tone light.  Her hands were shaking though.  "But I hate to say it, but I don't think my healing's better than his.  I tried to heal myself.  I couldn't.  I couldn't do... a<span style="font-style: italic">thing</span>."  Her body gave a shudder.  She usually enjoyed being helpless, and something of that remained even now, but right now all that mattered was justice for the betrayal.<br/><br/>"Tim."  She rolled her shoulders.  She couldn't believe how much she was looking forward to this... how comfortable the knuckles and pepper gun felt in her hands at this moment.  "You betrayed me.  I trusted you.  You broke your word.  Now I will never trust you for anything ever again."  She was having a hard time keeping her tone calm.  She was shaking, shaking so bad.  "Before I was a little curious.  If you'd earned my trust properly I probably would have eventually let you swallow me.  Willingly.  You've lost that.  Forever."  She held up the pepper gun, and his wide eyes locked on it.  "You take your punishment now.  You take it like you're something like a man.  Otherwise Sam will have to shoot me to keep me from running back to that hospital, cutting off Shari's head, and bringing it back here to drop it on your lap."<br/><br/>She gave Sam a quick glare, defying him to tell her otherwise.  She meant it, to some extent.  If Tim fought back, shy and quiet as she'd been until today she would try to keep her word.  Killing Shari wouldn't be difficult for her anymore.  She had shot men who never saw the bullets coming.  Men she didn't know.  Murdering a woman who had tried to (sort of) murder her wouldn't take much coaxing.<br/><br/>She didn't give Sam time to reply, though.  One finger of her left hand flexed.  The pepper gun jerked in her hand, and unloaded a blast straight into Tim's face.  Then, no sooner had his hands flown up to his face than she had thrown herself forward and her right arm started to move.  The first punches slammed into his chest with satisfying thuds, then the next ones went lower and dug into his belly... the belly that had been the source of all this rage she now had.  She fired another pepper shot into that belly, and when his hands shot to the burning sensation that caused, her other fist went for his face, punching and punching, trying to wipe the cuteness from his expression forevermore.<br/><br/>Santi wasn't usually violent.  But betrayal, dishonesty, and putting "family" in mortal danger... these were things she could not forgive.  He had spoken into her mind, tried to turn her into himself.  Maybe he had seen her memories of her friends back in the ghetto.  If he had, her family was in danger.  She couldn't let him ever devour them as he had her.<br/><br/>She found herself on top of him, nudity be damned, pummeling him with punches and kicks and shots of pepper, her own eyes and skin burning from the stuff and the tears but nowhere near as much as his was.<br/><br/>Something about this just felt way too good.  If Sam didn't intervene soon she wasn't sure she would be able to stop... and she didn't think she would mind if she didn't.