“I’m sure you have,” she frowned. Her hood and scarf were down, so I could see her face, much as I had during the bank robbery. She had dark circles under her eyes that looked painted on. She spoke, sighing the words, “I need your permission to touch you.”
“What?”
That might not be the best way to phrase it.
But yeah, it makes a lot of sense that Panacea would be required to ask consent, especially considering she can run her power in reverse, so to speak, and make matters worse if she wants to.
That said, Panacea doesn’t necessarily need touch to affect someone… although it seems her power is vastly weakened if she doesn’t. I guess that’s why she complained about Taylor’s outfit covering everything back in Agitation – if she had been able to touch Taylor’s skin for just a moment, she might’ve been able to do so much worse than give Taylor a headache.
“Liability reasons. Someone overheard you say you’ve got a broken back. There could be other complications, and that takes people, time, equipment and money that the people in charge of this hospital are reluctant to spare at a time like this.
Yeah, that’s all fair.
You could refuse to let me touch you, make the hospital give you the X-rays and MRI, get months or years of treatment paid for by the Preservation Act, all under oppressive confidentiality agreements that could cost the hospital millions. It’s an option, but the treatment wouldn’t be as fast, good or effective as it would if I used my power. You’d be shooting yourself in the foot for the sake of being stubborn.”
Taylor has literally no rational reason to decline this. I mean, she’s butted heads with Panacea before, and Panacea could do some nasty stuff to her, but if Panacea really wanted to be that spiteful here, she might as well do it without asking permission. She’d get in trouble either way unless she kept it subtle.
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