Snowflake in a Desert
Chapter 09 [https://www.rellawings.com/superluminal/chapternum/chaphead_9.jpg]
Mistral bit her lip almost hard enough to draw blood. The pain was a needed distraction to prevent the release of a distressed whimper.
“You haven’t entertained me nearly as long as expected, Luv.” Black Angel gloated, beaming down at her toy. She smirked while running a finger across her own lips in a titillating manner.
“It’s been fun, but we both know that playing the same game long enough can get stale. I could do with a change in scenery, don’t you think? Get the juices flowing again! Now that I’ve mastered the use of your little Beasties, perhaps—” she mused aloud. “Aha! To Vancouver! Excellent, Howeesha. I love how you think. We’ll throw in Seattle for the fun of it! Those cities already love their rainy seasons… I wonder how they’ll feel about negative eighty degree temperatures.” Black Angel started laughing at her own sick joke so hard that a few small tears formed in the corners of her eyes.
“Oh, my… I haven’t been moved to tears in at least a decade or so—”
She looked at Mistral, still bound in a set of homemade spelled stocks. The sight drew a thoughtful purr from her throat, tempted to linger, but a more delicious idea occurred to her, causing her to lick her lips playfully.
I’ll take her with me. What would be more amusing than letting the world see the condition she’s in? Ahahahaha! My precious little slave!
There was a loud hissing like a howling tempest-like noise coming from deep inside Black Angel at that thought.
Nooooooo!!! Mistress Angel—
If you take her along with us, she’ll find a way to… Howeesha said.
Shhhhhhh! Rosshossho’s ice-cold voice was like the depths of winter. Don’t ruin the fun for the rest of us. I, for one, would like to see the ‘favoured daughter’ humbled even more. If she witnessed her ‘own powers’ being used to destroy a city—
Speak for yourself, fool! This voice was like a clap of rumbling thunder.
You favor the ‘daughter’? Traitor! Howeesha screeched.
Black Angel soundly struck her own head. “SHUT THE HELL UP, YOU BUMBLING STOOGES!”
As fun as it was to play with the Earth’s elements as she pleased, having these three idiots prattling on and at each other’s throats was a rather mind-numbing experience, to say the least. She only tolerated them because they were sometimes useful——sometimes.
Y-yes, Mistress... The three whimpered together, sounding like a cowed storm. Just as they always should, thought Black Angel.
The black-winged supervillain stroked her temples with two fingers as she once again looked at Mistral. Yes. Why not? It was a fine idea… To see her broken and with no hope of recovery. She smirked to herself; her gaze on Mistral became hungry. “A—”
No… Mistress… Came another hissing noise deep within her.
Her anger ignited anew, and she tore into the Beasts with a vengeance. Which of you idiots had the temerity to speak and interrupt my speech?! One more word and I’ll plunge you all into the deepest of abysses!
scenebreak [https://www.rellawings.com/superluminal/scenebreak/wingsbreak.png]
Seeing Black Angel clearly struggling with the three new voices in her head, Mistral started chuckling softly. The continuous in-fighting was the only thing she’d found the slightest solace in lately. If she didn’t have that small bit of humor, reality would catch up. The gritty reality where she was still weeping from the last lash that Black Angel had squarely placed between her shoulder blades.
Had it been hours, days, weeks? Time had lost all meaning in this pitch-black void.
The ‘games’ Black Angel had been playing with Mistral could more accurately be described as coming straight out of an S&M bondage video from one of the seedier websites. Black Angel had robbed her of as much as she could.
Black Angel took her freedom to move. Took her sense of sight. Took her power. And had ultimately taken her right to say no from her.
But all this wasn’t purely a bid to break her body. No, that wasn’t that at all.
While there was still plenty of pain, Black Angel actually mixed in some things that fell on the other end of the spectrum as well. Her tormentor could easily finish her whenever it pleased her. But what would please her more, what she wanted more, was working towards breaking Mistral’s will and spirit.
And the truly sad thing was that the villain had gotten exactly what she wanted. Mistral saw what had happened within herself.
She saw the reality of it. But reality just hadn’t caught up yet.
“They’re a handful, aren’t they?”
Black Angel didn’t respond, still focused inwardly, seemingly deeply engaged in some conversation.
She’s distracted… Great Manitou, I beg of you. P-please—now——deliver me—!
Mistral saw this one last hope of deliverance, now that Black Angel was so distracted she wasn’t even bothering to punish her for speaking disrespectfully, and prayed like she never had before.
—————
Your desperation is unseemingly, Favoured Daughter. We have had this discussion before. I cannot help you if you won’t help yourself, the Great Manitou spoke.
Mistral took a heavy breath, and more tears fell from her eyes.
‘I won’t help myself’!? Mother, I’ve been humiliated in too many ways to count—and she—she proposes to do more unspeakable things to me…! I—can’t hold out any longer—
—————
She has violated your corporeal body, Daughter. She has trod upon your pride. Leave these things behind. You can’t do what needs be done unless you rise beyond yourself. Pray to me no further. Your deliverance depends solely on yourself alone... But I will offer you this truth: there’s yet a glimmer of hope.
Though she managed to show no external signs of it, Mistral’s mind cried out in protest. The window was closing, Black Angel looked as though she was regaining focus.
Please… Mother… I beg of you!
———————
There is a glimmer of hope. A speck of it hidden in a world of darkness. Consider well my words, my Daughter.
And with that, the Great Manitou’s presence left Mistral alone.
More tears leaked from the corners of Mistral’s eyes as her shoulders shook under the weight of what had just happened. She wanted to hunch herself into as small a space as possible, but Black Angel had also taken her ability to even move an iota.
scenebreak [https://www.rellawings.com/superluminal/scenebreak/wingsbreak.png]
When Black Angel’s eyes cleared, she let out a wry sigh.
“Very well. It’s true that once freed from the spelled bindings that hold her, she may prove less pliant, I suppose. Perhaps she has a bit of a backbone left in her.” Her lingering gaze on Mistral loudly expressed profound disappointment. “I should at least pay respect to the formidable child she once was.”
Without another word, Black Angel turned her back on her ex-rival, the ravaged wreckage of what was left of the great Weather Witch Mistral. Now nothing more than a simple toy with few uses left to discover.
She left the room where she imprisoned Mistral, turned off all the lights, plunging her captive into the same pure and deep darkness they’d shared.
However, unbeknownst to the dark one, as she left the lonely shadow-cloaked cavern, a pair of yellow eyes watched. These eyes narrowed as the villain swooped northward and away from the parcel of New Mexico desert down near the border that Black Angel made her sanctum.
Now was the time to move.
scenebreak [https://www.rellawings.com/superluminal/scenebreak/wingsbreak.png]
With Black Angel now gone, all the tiredness caught up with Mistral and she sank into a deep unconsciousness.
Mistral’s sleep was fitful. She could not stop crying even during what little sleep she could get since her capture.
This time, though, her sleeping mind found itself trapped in a whirlpool of utter darkness that was composed of her weather powers combined with the dark energies of her nemesis, or so she thought. The elements she was normally so familiar with turned to truly evil ends.
Or perhaps this was Black Angel’s latest threat spiraled around her, haunting.
The Beasts acted like villains, but in truth they were nothing more than the caprice of nature itself. They didn’t always destroy and kill, only when the mood struck them or circumstances perfectly aligned.
But there was something truly unnatural about the darkness ingrained in Black Angel that had now seeped into her. It swallowed, absorbed, usurped—devoured. She was certain by now that these shadowy powers of the villain’s weren’t born of this universe.
Perhaps they sprang from Hell itself, and yet… Mistral had fought emissaries of that particular nightmare dimension in several of her past adventures. Demons existed—as did much older creatures, and those that had no determinable age since time didn’t work the same way on them.
No, Black Angel wasn’t drawing on something demonic. It was something else. Something equally primordial. Something like a paradox that held the villain herself captive.
Mistral’s mind might have known she was asleep, but a bolt of fear and anxiety still shot through her after she felt something touch her ‘outside.’
Would her enemy return before she woke?
When her tormentor did return, what new desire would her body be used to sate?
Mistral somehow had to escape, but there wasn’t any hope of that now. She’d tried before. The spell on her restraints that Black Angel had laid on them was keyed in a way that she couldn’t exactly discern. Most likely, the spell had been tied to her captor’s life force in some fashion.
Had she truly been brought so low? Was she losing her mind? She wasn’t even able to escape her torment when alone. But that was understandable, wasn’t it? Wouldn’t anyone have lost their mind if they were in her place?
She just somehow had to escape.
It felt impossible to face who she’d been made to become. Perhaps it would simply be best to stay here in her sleep if waking meant looking into the cruel eyes of her captor. Those demeaning eyes that stripped her bare with a glance.
Perhaps if she prayed to Great Manitou to take her life, would her god have mercy on her? Even if letting go wasn’t painless, it had to be less so than what she was already going through.
With these thoughts washed over her, danced around her, swirled through her, Mistral sank into the darkness.
Deeper.
And deeper.
Her mind sought the deepest meditation she could manage, not for the sake of finding balance, but to find the bottom. To find the end.
In time, she plunged so deep inside herself that any sense she had of the outside world was faint. And still Mistral continued to sink deeper into the darkness within her mind, into the eye of the cyclone made of pure malevolence.
Deeper, deeper—deeper.
Mistral sank until she felt she couldn’t fall any further. It wasn’t the bottom she reached, but she was filled with a sense of something that paralyzed and stopped her from diving further.
scenebreak [https://www.rellawings.com/superluminal/scenebreak/wingsbreak.png]
After what must have been an eternity suspended alone in the darkness, Mistral felt a hand slap her face.
She cringed, suppressing a desire to scream from inside her self-impressed prison. If she let out a scream, Black Angel would just beat her again. Forcing herself to remain silent, she slumped in her slumber, giving up. She truly didn’t want to live.
The hand slapped Mistral again.
There was a rumbling noise. Mistral closed her mind and ears to push away the last vestiges of her sense of the outside world. That had to be Black Angel showing off her command over Korakorkomaq, the power over lightning and thunder.
The rumbling continued, and more firmly, she was slapped. Mistral refused to acknowledge her captor. Perhaps she’d been wrong before. She had something that had yet to be taken: her renewed recalcitrance.
scenebreak [https://www.rellawings.com/superluminal/scenebreak/wingsbreak.png]
After the Mistral’s capture, Garou had sought the aid of the Society of Sentinels, the spirits of nature and every other ally he could think of to cast the net as widely as possible. Through sheer stubborn determination and tireless searching for his partner, the wolf-man eventually caught onto her scent.
Strangely, the vile stench of darkness was detectable from what turned out to be practically a whole U.S. state away. Black Angel’s usual tricks for staying hidden must have been disrupted by something unknown to Garou stealing her focus.
He counted this as a small blessing, but only when he was feeling sardonic. Regardless, whatever it was had allowed him to track the villain to what seemed to be her home base.
The dark one had apparently found herself a perfect hideout in the southernmost tip of New Mexico, jutting into Mexico, with barely anything or anyone living nearby occupying the nearby natural cavern system must have been a natural decision.
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Garou thought the choice of location strange at first until he discovered how deeply the passages went and found how light itself was denied access in many of the auxiliary caverns that Garou investigated that surrounded hers.
True to its nature, a snake will always go to ground in the deepest, darkest hole it can find, he thought.
After seeing Black Angel depart from her base, Garou moved in, knowing it was time to explore the chambers while she was away.
Despite the total lack of illumination except for his flashlight, with his powerful nose and innate night-vision, it didn’t take too long to track down his compatriot within.
Garou shined his flashlight on Mistral, wincing as he beheld the violated form of his partner and muttered, “She sure did a number on you!” Garou snarled, desiring the taste of Black Angel’s blood at that moment overflowing from his teeth more than ever.
“Mistral! Shake yourself out of this!” He barked as he drew back a paw-hand to strike Mistral gently across her face. “Wake up!”
His partner was oblivious to the world, sunken into some deep coma within herself. He was no expert in these matters, but Mistral couldn’t be roused by anything Garou did to wake her and, despite repeated failure, he tried again and again.
“Damn it!” He roared as his stubby fingers tore at the crude mechanism holding Mistral in such a demeaning pose that disgusted him. “What the hell is this thing made of?!” His thews strained as he used every bit of power his muscles could produce to rend the blasted thing apart.
It wouldn’t budge. He raked it with his claws furiously, howling, but no marks were left to further mar the mystical stocks that bound Mistral, despite their already crude and ruddy black surface.
“Damn it, Damn it, Damn it! MISTRAL!” He was seeing red with how furiously he struggled to break her free. When he finished exhausting all his energy, he panted and glared at Mistral.
“Your pride! Your DAMNED PRIDE! THAT STUPID MOTE OF GOODNESS THAT YOU THOUGHT EXISTED! YOU’VE ENDURED ALL THIS FOR NOTHING! IF ONLY YOU’D JUST FUCKING LISTENED TO ME! YOU, STUPID! ——Idiot—!!!” Garou’s feral face was filled with anger and remorse. Tears soaked the fur on his cheeks.
“DAMN IT!” He howled loud enough that he thought it might chill the blood of the nearest town’s occupants.
scenebreak [https://www.rellawings.com/superluminal/scenebreak/wingsbreak.png]
Whatever had halted her descent must have stopped as Mistral felt herself slip into the void again.
Regardless, she was beyond caring at this point. The only option she felt she had was to lose herself in herself. A meditation so deep that even Black Angel couldn’t reach her. The villain could do as she wished with her body, but her mind would be safe.
If Great Manitou would not answer her prayers, she would take her life in her own hands.
But here in this meditative state, Mistral had also distanced herself from her ego. The thick swirling tar pit around her actually became a sort of mirror, a place for her to reflect on her thoughts more clearly.
You can’t do what needs be done unless you rise beyond yourself. Pray to me no further. Your deliverance depends solely on yourself alone... But I will offer you this truth: there’s yet a glimmer of hope.
Mistral replayed Great Manitou’s last messages one by one, softly playing them in her mind.
Your DAMNED PRIDE!
Blinking, so to speak, Mistral was taken aback. Great Manitou hadn’t said that—
She has violated your corporeal body, Daughter. She has trod upon your pride. Leave these things behind.
No, her god had said that in the end.
Leave these things behind.
“But who are we without pride?” Mistral asked herself philosophically. “Who am I without my sense of self? Why is it a problem to have some damned self-confidence? WHY?!”
THAT STUPID MOTE OF GOO—THAT YOU THOU——STED! YOU’VE ENDU—IS FOR NOTHIN——YOU’D JUST FUCKING LISTENE——STUPID!
—————
“‘Stupid’... That’s more something Garou would say than Mother.” Mistral softly laughed. “Now I torture myself with the voice of my oldest friend. He can’t find me wherever she’s squirreled me away. It’s impossible to hope for after it’s been so long.”
THAT STUPID MOTE OF GOODNESS THAT YOU THOUGHT EXISTED!
Leave these things behind.
There’s yet a glimmer of hope.
Mistral took a deep breath and sobbed. Where was this hope supposed to be found? Where was the hope for her deliverance?
She desperately reached deeply within herself, fumbling for something—ANYTHING! —For some nonexistent hope.
Of course, she knew she was mistaken to start with. No one who had violated her so much, no one like her could have even a mote of goodness inside her!
Floating in the whirlpool of darkness, right in the eye of this storm of inky darkness, she looked into the deepest abyss that she’d cast herself into.
“Where is this? Is this darkness swirling around me—Is it mine, or hers? I thought it was my own despair—some darkness that’s roosted inside me; consuming, and yet—somehow… Wait—! She wouldn’t show me this.”
And there it lay.
Just as she dismissed and rejected the possibility, she beheld a twinkling light, like a star seen from a distance, that was almost too far to see with the naked eye. As she gazed into it, it grew in brilliance, twinkling, perhaps calling out to her.
Was this the ray of hope that Great Manitou had spoken of?
Feeling as though she once again couldn’t dive any deeper without tearing herself apart, Mistral forced herself closer. The moment she’d been able to see the glimmering, she’d come as far as she was able without actively trying to get wherever she was now. All she’d done was floating, sinking deeply into this mire.
Swimming through the morass of corruption, she considered what it meant and used all her being to reach the pin-prick of illumination. She struggled, fought and tried so hard because if she couldn’t reach it now, nothing else would matter.
As she plunged deeper and closer to it, the star grew. The twinkling white light gradually turned red and increased in size. As she drew close enough to be on top of it, that weak pinpoint of light exploded to the size of a red giant star. Now everywhere she saw appeared to be a straight wall up and down, left and right with no indication of any curvature amid the dim light it shed. And it was indeed a wall she was facing—of some sort.
Mistral thrust forward, desperately mustering her essence to fashion it like a spear to pry at the wall, scrabbling to find the merest hint of an opening.
It took everything she had to push herself through the smallest cranny she could create and, after she’d finished, she free-floated.
She was truly wrung out, but now was near to her goal, one way or another. However, before she could finally get to whatever it was, she passed out.
————
But then hands grabbed Mistral, flooding her with energy. The sudden jolt shocked the heroine out of her torpor and she found she floated in a deeper level of all this darkness.
Mistral screamed. It was a trap! There was no relief here for her! She thrashed and almost sunk even further.
“Nooooooooooooooo!” She’d been revived against her will, returned to her existence as a mere toy.
“I’m so sorry… I’ve hurt you so much, Mistral—in unspeakable ways. I can’t take any of it back—no matter what I do—there’s simply no way.”
As if out of nowhere, a soft voice sobbed with Mistral.
“At least I could keep myself from finishing it.”
Mistral gaped, not seeing anything, not feeling anything except the surrounding arms. She was otherwise totally numb.
“I’m sorry—for everything I’ve done to everyone in your world… But I must ask you a favor. Take some of my strength with you. Seize the Beasts again, take them back—and then please strike me down. I can’t hold out any longer.”
Mistral gasped as realization dawned on her. “You’re the glimmer of hope!”
"So to speak. But there truly is none. I’ve been lost in all this void for too long. I too was violated in unspeakable ways, but my journey took a different form; one that I can’t speak of now. The time we have to act is short. I will say this, my dark side needs to despoil—steal the innocence of others as ours was seized. It’s a cycle of destruction that can’t be ended, but she is not the source. These feelings of despair and hopelessness are not wholly your own. They are born of the darkness we now find ourselves steeped in.
Therefore, I ask you to break your solemn vow and kill me. We’re no common villain like any other you’ve fought. When I am gone, there will be nothing left to keep this disease from spreading out into your world.”
scenebreak [https://www.rellawings.com/superluminal/scenebreak/wingsbreak.png]
Garou blinked in surprise when Mistral stirred from her deep slumber. Since he’d already used up all the energy left in his flashlight, her reaction was heard more than seen.
He gaped as his howling turned from notes of despair to those of exultant joy, and he awkwardly embraced her.
When it sounded like Mistral had fully come around, Garou softly explained what had happened through a sore throat, “I see that you’re still with me, partner. I’d been on her trail since the moment she took you. But with the Beasts’ power in her hands, she’d grown too powerful for me to challenge alone. Only now that she’s left could I find a window to rescue you.”
Mistral’s eyes twitched before her eyes opened up wide. Not that it meant much. She moaned again and grit her teeth. She felt his fuzzy hug, but there wasn’t even enough light to see Garou’s glowing eyes in here.
Feeling her energy slowly returning to her, she could barely speak. “I’m sorry. I was such a fool. Not wrong, but still a fool.”
This time, Garou gaped in astonishment. Not that she could see it, but quickly recovered. “Save this kind of fluff for after you’re safe. I’m unable to free you at the moment. But, I vow that I’ll take her life if I can. I will ambush her from the shadows of this hellhole’s absolute darkness—”
“No, not yet, my friend,” Mistral said. “We must first wrest the Beasts from her grip. Leave it to me to finish this.”
“No!” Garou snarled. “If you force me to leave your side again, I’ll turn away from you and never return. Your damned pride always blinds you in the end!” He clenched a fist, on the brink of striking Mistral himself, but hesitated.
“No, this isn’t pride… I have none left.” Mistral said, and her tone expressed clearly how she felt, more so than her words, “But I have a plan. You’re right as usual, Garou. Just be careful—”
scenebreak [https://www.rellawings.com/superluminal/scenebreak/wingsbreak.png]
The process of freezing over Vancouver hadn’t been going on for very long yet. Black Angel reached the city only moments ago and most of that time was spent gloating and preparing to unleash her new powers.
However, before she could fully let loose the hellish storm she’d been brewing, Black Angel felt her very soul tear. Whatever it was, didn’t last long as the tension quickly eased, but something was WRONG.
With a venomous hiss, the villain’s eyes widened when she realized she couldn’t fully sense what was going on.
Mistress! The Beasts hissed in unison. We have heard an unfamiliar voice! It says, ‘Please kill me!’ Hahaha! Their voices spoke in a chorus as they raucously laughed.
Black Angel froze, and she gritted her teeth. “What kind of drivel are you spouting now?!”
‘PLEASE KILL ME!’ ‘PLEASE KILL ME!’ Hahaha! They replied again in unison, unable to stop their laughter.
“That can be arranged, idiots. Even having the use of your powers isn’t worth this annoyance—and yet—” Black Angel scowled, looking back towards her stronghold, far to the southeast.
“An unfamiliar voice, they say. Or perhaps an old one. One that’s not been heard in a while… You three will remain silent. Lest I bind you to some mind-broken puppet. Yes, let them deal with your nonsense. But first, I think I’ll need to cut things short here. Something tells me my dearest Mistral hasn’t fallen as much as I’d hoped..”
The ambient temperatures lowered to the freezing point on a boiling day during summer, but these two cities were just spared a slow and sure death.
Cloaking herself in her darkness aura, Black Angel rocketed south along the coastline, going as fast as possible, using the thermals coming off the ocean to gain greater speed. In no time, she was passing another pair of large and yet truly insignificant cities. As she zoomed over the dirtier of the two, there was a peculiar sensation that reached out for the briefest instant; a disembodied presence.
With a frown, she pressed on. Probably another stupid human playing with mystical toys, but there was something—enticing about that presence.
She cleared the other side of the bay when she felt that same fumbling again for a moment, but then again, nothing.
A powerful aura—perhaps this one could host us, Mistress… Rosshossho suggested.
“Zip it, spiritling,” Black Angel hissed. “—though I was not fully serious before, this presence intrigues me. A delectable flavor that calls to me… Something to keep in mind for later perhaps, but I mustn’t dawdle. It’s time to take a shortcut.”
With that, Black Angel opened a singularity in front of her and plunged into it with an explosion of darkness that dissipated it.
scenebreak [https://www.rellawings.com/superluminal/scenebreak/wingsbreak.png]
As she’d set it up, the singularity deposited Black Angel a few short minutes’ flight time away from her secret base. This gave the dark villainess a few moments to reflect.
If the point-to-point spell had a shorter cooldown or wasn’t so staggeringly inefficient once the distances exceeded a few hundred miles, Black Angel would have preferred to use it as her primary form of travel. But, sadly, those restrictions existed and were only stricter under the wretched light of that accursed ball of hot gas sitting smugly in the sky.
It was nothing short of soothing to sit in complete darkness as she made her plans to wreak casual havoc in the world. Light itself seemed to interfere with her thought-processes—very, very slightly—but in the darkness, or most any solar effect thanks to the ores in the surrounding deposits, there was pure and complete clarity.
Even though this world was full of light half the time, there were still deep pools of darkness to spelunk in. In exploring these, perhaps a way to destroy all who stood in her path would present itself. Other members of the Sentinels could prove to be annoying, but nothing like Vanguard. He drove her mad with frustration. Just the very idea of his existence was offensive, so she carefully avoided him for now.
Black Angel barked a laugh. Mistral was one of the most powerful ‘metas’ this pitiful planet offered; aside from her, these so-called awakened humans were barely worth mentioning. The Weather Witch was certainly the most suitable to be her nemesis. WAS!
Vanguard, by comparison, was boring. Not an ounce of magic in him to whet her skills against, not to mention that he was so inconveniently damn fast and strong. Combined with his insufferable do-goodery attitude, and he was practically lab-grown to annoy her.
Arriving at the base, Black Angel burst through the entrance of the cavern that was her lair. Her eyes narrowed as she walked down the corridors to the room that held Mistral.
Nothing seemed amiss so far… Which spoke to something being amiss, as she was never wrong.
Except for the lamps she used when toying with Mistral, she left all light behind her as she finally unsealed the room that imprisoned her former foe.
And there said foe hung just as she should. Again, just as though nothing was amiss.
She looked carefully at Mistral, seeing that she had somehow managed to find some peaceful sleep. How can she even sleep after all we’ve gone through? She mocks me, even now.
Speaking of which, perhaps toying with Mistral some more was in order. Black Angel would have her insights regarding the invasion she’d felt—and perhaps have a bit of fun to relieve some tension.
The black-winged tormentor’s eyes narrowed and licked her lips again. Yes, she would ask about that invasion in a moment, but first, a bit of release would do wonders to start—Together, they could explore whatever delightful ideas struck as they went along.
Stepping gracefully over to Mistral, she tilted Mistral’s head up to wake her with a painful, soul-sucking kiss before beginning the session of grueling punishment she had in mind. She leaned down, her eyes open, and Mistral opened hers, flooded with some kind of light!
When the weather witch opened her eyes, light flooded out, tearing at Black Angel’s essence, holding her in place. She shrieked loudly. “Impossible!” She screamed, holding her hands to her face to cover it. “DAMN IT! What are you doing? HOW?!”
“You borrowed my power—have a taste of your own lost power, bitch!” Mistral hissed as she burst free from the spell-bound stocks that held her.
scenebreak [https://www.rellawings.com/superluminal/scenebreak/wingsbreak.png]
Mistral had felt her the moment Black Angel returned. It was as though the feeble connection that her actions had forged between them had strengthened as the distance between them shrank. Energies within her surged through her body now that the villain was in range.
The power she’d somehow gained from Black Angel had broken the spell on her restraints. The chamber flooded with the light that emanated from her eyes, pinning the villain in place. She couldn’t see Black Angel’s expression through the emanation, barely anything else really, but as she walked towards her silhouette, Mistral suspected that her stunned former tormentor likely beheld her own doom.
Black Angel turned to flee as Mistral shambled across the floor to her. Despite being wobbly from being bound and tortured for so long, and even looking so weak, the villain still fled.
She shrieked and turned to escape, but at that moment, a pair of powerful arms wrapped around Black Angel in a crushing embrace. She cried out when she felt pain sharp as the teeth that sunk into her neck.
With a gasp, she reached up and hammered on Garou’s head as she thrashed. “YOUR FUCKING DOG!? YOU DARE SNAP AT YOUR BETTERS! I WILL KILL YOU!”
As suddenly as the bite came, a wave of fatigue and weakness washed over Black Angel. She crumpled to the floor in a heap, with Garou still locked onto her. Mistral, meanwhile, knelt down next to the two even as Black Angel continued to struggle.
“No—not today—there’s something you have that I need and I cannot hold on to this light for too much longer. The exchange should pay you back in spades for what you’ve done to me though, so prepare yourself!”
In a spiritual sense, Mistral reached down deep into Black Angel, just the way she had and wrenched the Beasts from her. They kicked and screamed the same ways her enemy was. Mistral’s eyes went cold and merciless as she wrung them free from their dark sanctuary and pulled them inexorably back to where they belonged.
Once she had drawn the Three into their old bindings, she returned Black Angel’s forgotten light to her, a light that seared her to her soul; an inescapable inferno of light.
It did not take long for the transfer to complete, but the task left Mistral exhausted like she’d never been before. Slumping over, the world shrank around her as she allowed her consciousness to drift away.
She had no energy left to even stay awake, much less to do anything else. She would need to recover for a few moments before she could do what she now possessed the strength and self-assuredness to do.
Once she was able, she would keep her solemn promise.
scenebreak [https://www.rellawings.com/superluminal/scenebreak/wingsbreak.png]
While Mistral slept to recover, Garou stood wearily above Black Angel. Blinded by the darkness, the wolf-man didn’t witness the moment the villain regained consciousness.
Her body tremored as it tried to fight off the flood of the wolf-man’s trademark paralyzing venom. Said paralyzing agent was a part of his saliva, which was why he always sunk his teeth into his prey, not because of any animalistic ferocity.
Black Angel suppressed the writhing of her muscles, remaining still as possible since Garou would sense any movement regardless of his ability to see.
Carefully, she peeked at Mistral’s slumped form and then at Garou’s shaggy outline. Something was wrong. Black Angel normally needed no light to see here. In fact, the dose of light that Mistral had unleashed on her had somehow damaged her shadow-sense.
Despite being unable to see a thing in her lair, the dark one’s foolish toy had remained to get a wink of sleep. Garou’s thinking she was in hand was very much a mistaken assumption as well.
These twos’ continual naivety would again work in her favor, representing the villain’s narrow chance of escape.
To still not fully have her guard up against me... Could it be that she loves me? Does she feel such sentimentality towards our home?
Black Angel mirthlessly and inwardly chuckled. That light had disrupted her soul and power such that she knew it would be necessary to take time to recover. Having had her system flooded with such brightness left her body seared from head to toes.
Yet, she still had enough in her to pull a last trick they couldn’t counter, thanks to Garou’s overuse of his venom. Her spasms had nothing to do with his ability since she’d already started building up a slight resistance to it.
No, she would not go to prison this time. They would surely lock her in some room specially made to contain her, a cell filled with a highly annoying ambient light that disrupted her thinking and powers would be obvious even to these simpletons. She played her last card by crooning to the surrounding darkness.
Unseen by either of the two heroes, the shadows thickened around Black Angel, whipping around her prone form, orbiting her. Moments later, a singularity opened that would swallow up Black Angel, taking her elsewhere in a wink while leaving a special little after-effect behind.
In the spell’s aftermath, the force of a void-fueled implosion viciously slammed Garou into the floor where Black Angel previously lay. Mistral was also pulled across the floor, but was already out cold.
This battle of light versus darkness came to a close, with the two heroes unconscious in a heap.
scenebreak [https://www.rellawings.com/superluminal/scenebreak/wingsbreak.png]