Detective Anderson slowly eases the safety off his sidearm and moves around the corner. Ahead of him is a strange and eerie light, just far enough away that he cannot make out what lies within the ominous sight. Still, Anderson is no fool, so he takes the utmost care to move as silent as a ghost knowing that if he has any shot at all, it will be but a single one.
With his free hand, he reaches down to his short-range radio. A minute ago, he tried using it only to find that the mystic forces swirling about the warehouse rendered it inert. But the thought of it crackling to life at an inopportune time is a grim one, so Anderson flicks it to mute anyway.
With each step, Anderson’s breath gets shorter and his gut gets a little tighter. Fear crawls up his spine and whispers terrible things in his ears. But Anderson does not stop moving, not even for a second, as he glides forth toward the arcane light shining from the half-open door in front of him.
Just as he reaches the edge of the door, leaning carefully to see just a sliver of the room within, he hears a voice chanting in some unknown and unintelligible tongue.
Detective Anderson remains cautious, leaning slowly but steadily, ignoring the conversation. His body moves just barely far enough to see the speaker. A coldly attractive man wearing a precise looking suit stands confidently. He removed his jacket, tossing the expensive piece carelessly on the back of a nearby metal chair leaving him in just the buttoned shirt and vest covering it. Unconcerned by whatever might be happening in front of him, he rolls up the sleeves to his forearms in a series of decisive motions as Anderson watches carefully. All the while words that grate and cut at Anderson’s ears continue to fall from his mouth.
Anderson leans slightly further, revealing the rest of the room. Around the man are a series of runes carved into the ground run red with blood. They form a series of circles with two clear focal points. One of those centers contains the man. Anderson can see the edge of the other, where the end of a table sits. Leaning a little further, Anderson sees the table in full.
A moment later, he pulls back, his blood run cold. On the table was the pale, lifeless body of his daughter’s friend, Bella.
“Bella,” he hisses in anger, struggling with himself but still remaining silent enough that the noise does not reach even his own ears.
Steeling himself, Anderson checks his weapon. Then, in a quick motion, he whips around the corner and begins squeezing the trigger rapidly unloading his sidearm!
In the corner of his eye, he spots a green-skinned girl where Bella was with claw-like fingers leaping from the table toward the man.
“Stop,” says Athow in a bored voice.
As he does, the bullets stop moving and fall to the ground. At the same time, Belladonna stops dead in her attack.
“Down.”
Belladonna’s palms crash to the table as her whole body collapses. For a few seconds she fights the spell, her superhuman strength straining against the invisible weight until her elbows snap outward and her body pitches forward slamming into the surface of the table. In the other room, Anderson glares helplessly at the celling, unable to lift his arms or move off his back.
“Now who are you?” Athow asks, contemplating them both.
He begins speaking some arcane word but another gunshot rings out!
Dropping to a knee, Athow grunts as a splash of blood leaks from his mouth. Glancing down at the rapidly expanding tide of red, he tries to speak only to gasp as more blood comes out instead. Slowly turning toward the other end of the vast room, he sees a nervous looking guard walking into the light.
Holding his gun ready, but down, the guard asks nervously, “Did-did ah git em?” He looks over to his new partner still lying on the ground and grimly raises his weapon again. “Guess not,” he says as he takes aim and puts a round into Athow’s head, right between the eyes.
The body falls to the floor, dead. The guard shoots again, watching for any signs of life. Slowly he circles the expanding pool of blood until he gets to the door and nudges Anderson with his foot.
“Buddy,” he says, “you okay?”
His eyes never waver from Athow’s body. Getting no response, he asks again, “Hey, come’on bud, you ‘kay? You a’right? C’mon partner, talk to me!”
On the ground, Anderson remains inert.
“Hey, Anderson! C’mon! Tell me you okay!”
A note of panic fills his voice as he continues to plead for a response.
“Anderson! Buddy! Jesus, you dead?” He glances away from Athow’s corpse. “Y-you dead? Are, are you dead?” Sweat on his brow and tears in his eyes, he raises his gun unsteadily toward the body and murmurs, “You kill’d ‘im! Jesus an’ tha girl, you-”
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“And soon you will join them.”
Whirling around, the guard begins firing the in the direction of the voice only to find his bullets hitting the same wall as Anderson’s!
Cocking his head to the side, Athow walks toward the guard. With a flick of his finger, the man’s pistol flies off to the corner of the room with a clatter. Another flick and the guard joins Anderson on the ground. As his head hits the floor, he grunts softly and falls unconscious.
“A little too much force,” he muses, looking at the two frozen men. Seeing Anderson’s baleful gaze from the ground he chuckles and admonishes him, “It’s been a while since I had so much power. You can’t blame me for taking some time to reacquaint myself with the finer measures of control.”
Seeing Anderson’s eyes remain unwavering, Athow waves his hand in dismissal. As he does, Anderson’s head lifts and then cracks against the concrete floor, leaving him in the same state as his partner.
Then, Athow turns to Belladonna. As he walks across the room toward her, it becomes apparent she is still fighting her invisible bonds with everything she has.
“It is futile,” Athow remarks after watching her for a few moments. “To struggle, that is. The Binding From Beyond does not weigh down your body. It grabs hold of your soul.”
Belladonna’s eyes become bloodshot as she continues to strain. For all her struggle however, she remains immobile.
“You have something to say?” Athow asks. “Keep it to yourself,” he adds contemptuously.
With a flick of his wrist, Athow raises Belladonna into the air and then slams her down on the ground, breaking the table in the process. Seeing her still awake, he repeats the motion a few more times.
Cocking his head to the side, Athow pauses after the fourth hit. “Resilient. Almost interesting enough for me to care, if I didn’t have a few more errands to run before my beloved’s resurrection.”
With a twist of his wrist, Belladonna’s neck contorts and snaps. Finally quelled, she falls to the ground still moving as the magic that fuels her form slowly begins healing her. Fascinated, Athow watches for a minute as the girl’s head inches back to a normal position.
“Extraordinary,” he murmurs. “When I have her again, we will delve the secrets of your resilience girl.” A cruel grin breaks out across his face as he adds, “I will rip them from your skin and then nothing will ever harm my beloved again.”
A soft expression crosses his face as he glances up, his eyes on something only he can see. “We will be eternal and together,” he whispers wistfully. Then, the malice returns to his expression as he looks down at the girl and adds, “But for now, containing you takes priority. If you were awake, I might even apologize. This,” he pauses, pursing his lips and narrowing his eyes, “this will hurt.”
High above the docks, a robotic voice chirps in Ginger’s ear. “Ms. Napp, scanning identified three anomalies. Two of them are moving, too quickly for a full scan. Course projection has them on route to the third. Based on your search parameters, the third anomaly is likely the target.”
“Then the other two are Eldritch and our new friend,” Ginger replies. “Set our flight pattern to arrive at the same time as them. Did your sensors pick up the blood I mentioned?”
“Affirmative, Ms. Napp,” her suit replies.
“Good,” Ginger replies. Then, she adds, “Let’s give them a signal!”
A moment later, a light flashes in the sky above the docks. For a few long seconds, a signal sits illuminated against the clouds in the afternoon sky.
Down on the rooftops, Eldritch lets out a peal of laughter. The man at her side gives her a confused look, clearly struck by the sharp contrast between the seriousness of the mission and her actions.
Sobering up, Eldritch points up to the sky and says, “Look, it’s Ginger she…” she trails off uncertainly as she glances back at the cloth covering the man’s eyes. “Oh,” she says. “I almost forgot you’re blind. Obviously, I mean, ah,” Eldritch stops talking, letting an awkward silence build between them before adding, “like, you know, you’re… obviously… blind and all. So, um, anyway, Ginger just gave us a signal.” Her smiling returning, Eldritch continues, “Well, something like that I guess. She put a giant angry emoji in the sky.”
The man arches his eyebrow but says nothing in reply.
“Right,” Eldritch swallows, “let’s just get going, shall we?”
“Kids these days,” the superhero says with a shake of his head before grabbing onto her arm and leaping to the next building. “Always doing their own thing.”
Then his expression sharpens as his nonchalant aura drains away. “There,” he says, pointing toward the warehouse that Anderson and his new partner vanished within. “He’s in there.” Turning toward Eldritch, he asks, “Are you ready?”
With two voices layered over one another, the first that of a teenage girl and the other that of a grown woman, Eldritch answers, “Yes.”
High above their heads, a falling star streaks toward the warehouse. Ginger is finished waiting!
“Justice…” the man intones solemnly as he reaches up toward the cloth covering his eyes. “Lady Justice is Blind, and yet she sees everything.” In a few practices motions he unknots the cloth around his eyes and pulls it away. “And nothing escapes her judgement,” he finishes as the cloth falls away.
Eldritch sucks in a sharp breath as she watches the cloth fall to the ground. “Blind Justice,” she says in awe and uncertainty.
Turning to face her, he replies, “Hailey Juniper Penze. Steel yourself. This is no petty villain.” He pauses, imposing upon her the gravity of the situation before adding, “You know him, far better than I or anyone else ever will. Use that.”
Without the cloth, Eldritch sees his eye sockets for the first time. Where there should be eyes, Blind Justice has nothing. No prosthetics, no glass eyes, no patch. Where his eye should be is just an empty socket, the bare flesh showing, bleeding, weeping blood, exposed to the air.
“Beacon thinks you’re special,” Blind Justice says. “Be worth that faith. Be worth this fight.”
“It’s time,” is Eldritch’s only reply as she watches as the comet that is Ginger Snap descends toward the warehouse containing Athow—and just as importantly, Bella!
Whispering an incantation, Eldritch answers his challenge as a suit of mystic runes flare on her suit before fading into the weave. “I am,” she says, her eyes flaring with energy and anticipation. “Let’s go save Bella.”
Then, with a blast of magic energy, Eldritch and Blind Justice match Ginger Snap’s pace toward the warehouse. In only a few seconds the trio will arrive together, poised to strike the unsuspecting Athow in his hiding place!
Will this be enough? Is the addition of Blind Justice sufficient to bridge the gap between Athow and Eldritch or will this fight end the same way as the last—with her defeat? Find out next week in… “The Wizard and The Witch!”