Two girls sit next to one another, silent. Intense expressions move across their face, matching the tension in their figures. Slowly turning, one of the girls makes eye contact with the other out of the corner of her eye. Nodding at her, she signals her companion, who slowly shimmies closer.
Once the two come close enough to whisper to one another, the first girl subtly says, “Before anything happens. In case anything happens to me. I need you to know something.”
“What?” her new friend asks.
“Beadritch is still better. You can’t deny it makes more sense than Eleacon.”
Sputtering, Marsha hisses back at Susan, “Are you kidding me?”
Dead serious, Susan replies, “No. See, it just makes more sense is all. Beadritch uses more letters from each person while Eleacon is almost entirely Beacon’s name. It’s unfair and more than a little sexist to subordinate the woman like that.”
“I should have expected this,” replies Marsha, sighing.
“Expected what?” Susan shoots back.
In a clipped whisper, Marsha answers, “You’re a faux feminist, that’s what. Everyone knows that by giving Eldritch the all-important first letter it emphasizes her importance and primacy in the relationship. Only a fool would think otherwise.”
“A fool!” Susan starts to say before quieting and continuing with, “Well let me just point out that Beadritch invokes the name Beatrice, which according to Dante’s Divine Comedy is the name of the perfect woman. So who’s the anti-feminist fool now?”
Irritated, Marsha cuts back, “You already had the chance to make your point and we all voted. Just because you don’t like what the group decided doesn’t mean we should change the official name.”
“Official?” Susan snaps in reply, “the vote was almost tied!”
“But Eleacon won!”
“Hey!” snaps Vicious from the other end of the room by the door, “Shut up.”
Glaring at one another, the two girls stop talking. A moment later the mercenary motions for them to stand and shuffle over to the back of the room where the rest of the captives sit. Once they arrive, he binds their feet in a few quick motions using metal wires. Placing a lone finger along his lips, he motions for the pair to be silent. Then he turns and moves back to the front of the room where Dr. Doubt stands, rocking back and forth as he mumbles inaudibly to himself.
Glancing at the doctor, Vicious says, “The room is secure, metal panes on all entrance points and hostages moved out of the main area. We’ll have space to fight now.”
Nodding without facing the mercenary, Dr. Doubt says, “Good, good, very good.”
Sparing him a look of naked contempt that his mask obscures, Vicious pauses before continuing, “I’m going to place traps in the hallways. Guard the prisoners. Don’t kill anyone.”
In the back, Marsha and Susan hold hands, temporarily setting aside differences as Dr. Doubt walks toward them. As he waves his gun in their direction, Vicious hurls a dagger at him. The hilt smacks Dr. Doubt on the hand, causing him to flinch and drop the gun. Whirling towards his partner the doctor seems angry, but before he has the chance to say anything Vicious speaks in a dangerous voice. “Don’t kill,” he says in a voice that warns the mad doctor of the consequences of disobedience.
Before the doctor can admonish him, Vicious steps out of the door and into the hallway. Alone with the girls, the doctor turns back and says, “Now we’re all alone! It’s time to continue your education.”
Quailing, Marsha and Susan hug as best they can with the bindings obstructing their hands. Huddling close to the other girls in the group, they collectively and silently begin to pray. Dr. Doubt leans over to retrieve his fallen pistol. As his fingers curl around the handle, the door explodes inwards, throwing Vicious back into the room!
On the other side of the front of the room, the opposite door bursts open as a whirling torrent of metal flows through. From the door, that Vicious flew through, in walks a girl dressed in all white. A nimbus of glowing energy swirls around her as she twists her fingers into various shapes and murmurs a low cant that seems to reverberate throughout the room with power.
Dr. Doubt moves quickly, bringing his gun around to face the captives and shouting, “Surrender Source or I’ll excise your servants!”
But even as he speaks, a shimmering wall of light forms between him and the captives. A moment later, he begins to fire, causing Susan, Marsha, and the rest of the hostages to scream in fear. Seeing the barrier of light reflect the bullets, they begin to cheer and shout out praise for Eldritch. Heedless of the barrier, Dr. Doubt continues to shoot until his weapon is out of ammo. Ducking to reload, he is out of the fight for a few precious seconds.
Vicious, however, takes no time recovering from the blast that left him lying on his back near the podium. With a swift motion, he leaps to his feet and throws spikes at Eldritch. Before they can connect, a torrent of liquefied metal erects itself in between the two and neatly captures his projectiles. But as if he knew this would happen, Vicious has already dove sideways behind the podium and has a gun trained on Eldritch. By sidestepping the metal wall, he has a new line of sight on his victim. Without hesitating, he begins squeezing the trigger.
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Seeing the muzzle flashes, Susan and Marsha scream. When the golden barrier of light shatters a second later, they pitch of their scream intensifies. When they wriggle into position to see the front of the room clearly, it becomes apparent that their fears were premature. Eldritch has a skin-deep layer of golden light shielding her that shatters under the impact of the bullets. But it lasted long enough to give Ginger Snap time to make her way across the room.
Taking the form of a giant metal wolf, she pounces on the mercenary, who rolls and smashes her figure with a roundhouse kick. From his legs, the dangling spikes seem poised to do significant damage to the form Ginger took. Instead, however, they sink into the pliable metal and catch. Cursing, Vicious slices the fabric of his pants leg with a hastily created razor and jerks his leg out. Once free, he dives behind the teacher’s desk.
At the other end of the room, Dr. Doubt finishes reloading and turns to face Eldritch screaming, “Kill the Source, kill the disease!” Firing as he moves, he begins to run towards her.
Eldritch begins to layer on her shields, preventing the bullets from landing. But the force of Vicious’ brand of gun is high enough that each one shatters her shield, leaving her barely enough time to create another. Even layering her shields fast as she can, Eldritch barely has time to create enough to stop the first salvo of bullets. Then, Dr. Doubt takes another step closer.
An instant later, Hailey feels the impact of a bullet across her shoulder and in her leg. Spinning from the blows, she falls to the ground, looking around in horror as her suit begins to dissipate. Stammering, she says, “Wh-what?” before scrambling backwards and applying pressure to her damaged shoulder and scrambling backwards on her damaged leg.
Across the room, Ginger leaps towards the desk, trying to pin down Vicious. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Eldritch go down. Committed to her jump, she has half a second to make a decision. If she twists in midair, she could crash into the desk and have a chance of stopping Dr. Doubt from shooting the helpless girl. Or, she could continue to apply pressure to Vicious. He has not had the chance to regroup since the start of the fight, and if the she gives him time, he will be the more dangerous of the two.
But heroinism is not for the indecisive, dear reader! Nor is it for the selfish, and although Ginny has made many a selfish choice, in this instant she makes the correct one. So it is without an instant of hesitation that Ginger twists, diverting her trajectory and slamming into the teacher’s desk. The sound of fingers snapping reverberates throughout the room as Ginny reshaping herself as she falls. When she collides with the desk, her form sprouts a second set of hind legs and bursts into a fast turnabout.
Seconds pass like hours as Ginger closes the impossibly wide gap between her and Dr. Doubt. As she begins to fly forward, she stops abruptly. Reeling from the sudden bout of whiplash, Ginny glances backwards. When she does, she spots a loop of cable around her ankle with Vicious on the other end. Reeling her in like a fish, the mercenary pulls out a blade in one hand and begins to looping the cable around his arm.
Snapping her fingers desperately, Ginger wants to scream in frustration as the mechanical voice informs her that she cannot shift forms so soon. Looking back to the fallen figure of Eldritch laying near the door, Ginger desperately casts her hand forward and hurls a wave of metal to the space between Dr. Doubt and her fallen friend.
Her actions are not a moment too soon, for just as she erects the barrier Dr. Doubt begins shooting again. His bullets sink into the metal barrier as Vicious plunges his blade into the metal form of Ginger. Silently, Ginger thanks her lucky stars that his strike did not hit her flesh underneath, instead simply passing through the metal. Then she attempts to assimilate the weapon into her suit.
As she does, the AI of the suit says, “Error! Miss Napp, the blade utilized by Vicious appears to be made of a previously unknown metal, we cannot assimilate it!”
Lying on the floor, Eldritch whispers yet another incantation, cursing herself as it fails once more. The cackling laughter of Dr. Doubt fills her head as she desperately tries another invocation. Failing, she whispers, “Bel? Please, please help. Bel please I’m sorry, but I need you.”
The silence she receives in reply to her entreaties is deafening. Crushing down on her damaged figure is the knowledge that her mentor intends to leave her to die at the hands of this lunatic. Casting her eyes about she searches for anything that can save her. Seeing Dr. Doubt’s fingers curl around the edge of the metal barrier Ginger created, she panics.
“Bel! Why won’t you answer!” begs Hailey.
“Delusions!” cries out Dr. Doubt as he walks around the barrier, “delusions and madness!”
Hysterical, Hailey says, “Please! I know you’re disappointed in me but please Bel.” Quieter, almost resigned, she adds, “I’m sorry. Retribution against Malefic is important to you, and you’re important to me. What matters to you should matter to me and I should have tried to find a compromise. I just don’t want to die with you hating me. Oh God, please Bel!”
Across the room, Vicious twists his blade, sinking it deeper into Ginger’s metal form. Even as he does, the sound of fingers snapping reverberates once again almost simultaneous with the suit saying in Ginger’s ear, “Transformation available!”
Even as she tries to reshape her form away from the blade, Vicious throws a mess of his cables around her form, capturing her in the ropes. Drawing them tight, he says in a bored voice, “Not quite Mistress Metallurgy, are we?”
Shocked by the reference to her mother, Ginger hesitates for a split second. In that time, Vicious smashes the butt of his blade across her face, knocking her to the ground. Then, to the downed girl, he says, “You’re not my contract. Stay down or I’ll kill you.”
With Ginger at his feet, Vicious’ attention turns to events near the doorway. Cursing, he starts to move, whipping a dagger out of a hidden pocket in his suit and preparing to hurl it at Dr. Doubt while shouting, “She’s my contract you deluded loon!”
Staring down the end of Dr. Doubt’s barrel, Eldritch Maiden screws her eyes shut, still mumbling entreaties to her silent companion. Desperate to survive her functional arm casts about for anything to place between her and the bullet she knows is coming.
Across the room, Vicious is about to release his dagger when the sound of a gunshot slices through the room. As it reverberates, the screams of Marsha, Susan, and the rest of the fan club are the only other noise in the classroom.
Has Eldritch fallen? If so, what fate lies in store for Ginger and the other captives? Find out next week, dear reader… “In the Space of Two Gunshots!”