Day Zero
Page 20
Somehow I was . . . untouched.
The Fury (XI)
Spite, She Who Harrows
“Blood will tell. Blood will run. But the tears of the damned always taste sweet.”
A.k.a.: Justice
Powers: Acid spitting and flight. Superhuman senses, strength, and healing. Infrared vision. Her fireproof wings can blend into surroundings, camouflaging her.
Special Skills: Concealment.
Weapons: Razor-sharp claws that tip her wings and a scourging whip.
Tableau: A blindfolded, winged demoness, holding a steel-studded whip in her upraised right hand and weighing scales in her lowered left hand.
Icon: Navy-blue scales.
Unique Arcana Characteristics: Her eyes are yellow instead of white, with green keyhole pupils. She has long retractable claws and batlike wings. Prior to striking an enemy, her wings will vibrate, the sharp claws tapping each other to make a rattling sound.
Before Flash: Daughter of Egyptian museum curators, in the States for a long-term exhibit.
Suburb of Chicago, Illinois
Day 0
Look at the lights! The newscasters had talked about these right before the channels all cut out.
Lines of purples and pinks and greens rolled like waves in the night sky. So beautiful I could cry.
I heard others on my street oohing and aahing. Most were American hipsters; all of them behaved as if I didn’t exist. Nothing new.
My parents did as well.
But tonight I didn’t ridicule my neighbors as usual—because I actually had something in common with them.
We were all basking in these lights.
No one had told me I might see the aurora borealis this time of year. I could stare at it forever. I adjusted my thick glasses and wondered if my parents were watching from their ritzy uptown patron party.
As usual, I was babysitting my little sister, Febe. I thought of her solemn brown eyes, plump cheeks, and eight-year-old lisp, and considered heading back to our rented house to get her. She was in the basement playing video games, would never see the sky on her own.
She was the only one in the world I loved, the only one who didn’t view my usual expression as sneering or vindictive. She had never called me the nickname that somehow followed me from country to country: Spiteful.
I exhaled. Still staring over my shoulder, I headed toward the house. But when I had to walk under a tree, I couldn’t bring myself to lose my view of the lights—
Pain flared, shooting across my upper back. What was that?
Ignore it! All I wanted to do was look at the sky. . . . Another jolt ripped through me. My legs gave way, my knees hitting the sidewalk.
I managed to cry, “H-help me!” to my closest neighbors, but they were captivated by the lights.
My skin felt as if it was being stabbed, but from the inside. It was . . . it was ripping open!
I heard wet sounds, like something being born. A wave of nausea swept through me, and I vomited black liquid all over the pavement. Cloth was tearing somewhere nearby—and then these bloody, gooey black things flapped in front of me. I shrieked, scrambling away from them.
They followed me! I’d never outrun them; I cowered down—and they stopped. Then quivered when I timidly started to rise. Because they were . . . attached to my body? Ah God, they’d sprung out of my back!
My lips parted with shock. The things unfolding around me were . . . “W-wings.” They were huge and shaped like a bat’s, just like the ones that had haunted my dreams ever since I could remember.
But the lights in the sky . . . must look at them!
Those wings opened wide, blocking the view above, the only thing I wanted to see. Just as I realized I was losing my mind, the wings enfolded me tightly.
Like a shroud.
I wanted out! These stupid things were keeping me from the lights! I raked my nails against the velvety surface to get free; more pain shot through me. Were my nails getting sharper? The grayish flesh on the underside of these wings was as sensitive as my fingertips.
I punched them, wrestling against them. After struggling for what must have been an eternity, I accepted that I couldn’t escape.
The appeal of the lights had lessened, anyway. Now I was overwhelmed with the need to get to Febe. What if she went upstairs and realized she was all alone?
I mentally willed my new appendages to retract. . . . Nothing. I was trapped, a caterpillar in her cocoon.
And like a caterpillar, I began changing.
Molting.
Even in the enclosed darkness, I could somehow see—in fact, my glasses no longer helped my vision, actually obscured it. So I crushed them in my palm. Seeing with perfect clarity for the first time, I watched my nails grow into long sharp claws and my skin thicken into scales.
I wasn’t as shocked by these changes as I would’ve expected.
My mind turned to a memory from eight years ago, when I’d been Febe’s age. I’d watched a teenage boy from my neighborhood stroll hand in hand into the forest with a girl—though he’d already been in a relationship with another one.
I’d followed the couple, hiding in a tree. When they’d started having sex, I’d thought of his betrayed girlfriend and imagined the pain his unfaithfulness would bring her.
Bile had risen in my throat. I’d wanted so badly to punish him that I’d gnashed my teeth and my body had begun to shake. I’d fallen, dislocating my shoulder.
They’d called me Spiteful (as usual) and left me there.
Getting to a doctor had taken forever. The pain in my shoulder had faded after a while, replaced by a dull feeling of wrongness.
Now, as I witnessed my body evolving, I realized my new form was rightness. Something wrong had finally clicked into place.
The Fury (XI)
Spite, She Who Harrows
“Blood will tell. Blood will run. But the tears of the damned always taste sweet.”
A.k.a.: Justice
Powers: Acid spitting and flight. Superhuman senses, strength, and healing. Infrared vision. Her fireproof wings can blend into surroundings, camouflaging her.
Special Skills: Concealment.
Weapons: Razor-sharp claws that tip her wings and a scourging whip.
Tableau: A blindfolded, winged demoness, holding a steel-studded whip in her upraised right hand and weighing scales in her lowered left hand.
Icon: Navy-blue scales.
Unique Arcana Characteristics: Her eyes are yellow instead of white, with green keyhole pupils. She has long retractable claws and batlike wings. Prior to striking an enemy, her wings will vibrate, the sharp claws tapping each other to make a rattling sound.
Before Flash: Daughter of Egyptian museum curators, in the States for a long-term exhibit.
Suburb of Chicago, Illinois
Day 0
Look at the lights! The newscasters had talked about these right before the channels all cut out.
Lines of purples and pinks and greens rolled like waves in the night sky. So beautiful I could cry.
I heard others on my street oohing and aahing. Most were American hipsters; all of them behaved as if I didn’t exist. Nothing new.
My parents did as well.
But tonight I didn’t ridicule my neighbors as usual—because I actually had something in common with them.
We were all basking in these lights.
No one had told me I might see the aurora borealis this time of year. I could stare at it forever. I adjusted my thick glasses and wondered if my parents were watching from their ritzy uptown patron party.
As usual, I was babysitting my little sister, Febe. I thought of her solemn brown eyes, plump cheeks, and eight-year-old lisp, and considered heading back to our rented house to get her. She was in the basement playing video games, would never see the sky on her own.
She was the only one in the world I loved, the only one who didn’t view my usual expression as sneering or vindictive. She had never called me the nickname that somehow followed me from country to country: Spiteful.
I exhaled. Still staring over my shoulder, I headed toward the house. But when I had to walk under a tree, I couldn’t bring myself to lose my view of the lights—
Pain flared, shooting across my upper back. What was that?
Ignore it! All I wanted to do was look at the sky. . . . Another jolt ripped through me. My legs gave way, my knees hitting the sidewalk.
I managed to cry, “H-help me!” to my closest neighbors, but they were captivated by the lights.
My skin felt as if it was being stabbed, but from the inside. It was . . . it was ripping open!
I heard wet sounds, like something being born. A wave of nausea swept through me, and I vomited black liquid all over the pavement. Cloth was tearing somewhere nearby—and then these bloody, gooey black things flapped in front of me. I shrieked, scrambling away from them.
They followed me! I’d never outrun them; I cowered down—and they stopped. Then quivered when I timidly started to rise. Because they were . . . attached to my body? Ah God, they’d sprung out of my back!
My lips parted with shock. The things unfolding around me were . . . “W-wings.” They were huge and shaped like a bat’s, just like the ones that had haunted my dreams ever since I could remember.
But the lights in the sky . . . must look at them!
Those wings opened wide, blocking the view above, the only thing I wanted to see. Just as I realized I was losing my mind, the wings enfolded me tightly.
Like a shroud.
I wanted out! These stupid things were keeping me from the lights! I raked my nails against the velvety surface to get free; more pain shot through me. Were my nails getting sharper? The grayish flesh on the underside of these wings was as sensitive as my fingertips.
I punched them, wrestling against them. After struggling for what must have been an eternity, I accepted that I couldn’t escape.
The appeal of the lights had lessened, anyway. Now I was overwhelmed with the need to get to Febe. What if she went upstairs and realized she was all alone?
I mentally willed my new appendages to retract. . . . Nothing. I was trapped, a caterpillar in her cocoon.
And like a caterpillar, I began changing.
Molting.
Even in the enclosed darkness, I could somehow see—in fact, my glasses no longer helped my vision, actually obscured it. So I crushed them in my palm. Seeing with perfect clarity for the first time, I watched my nails grow into long sharp claws and my skin thicken into scales.
I wasn’t as shocked by these changes as I would’ve expected.
My mind turned to a memory from eight years ago, when I’d been Febe’s age. I’d watched a teenage boy from my neighborhood stroll hand in hand into the forest with a girl—though he’d already been in a relationship with another one.
I’d followed the couple, hiding in a tree. When they’d started having sex, I’d thought of his betrayed girlfriend and imagined the pain his unfaithfulness would bring her.
Bile had risen in my throat. I’d wanted so badly to punish him that I’d gnashed my teeth and my body had begun to shake. I’d fallen, dislocating my shoulder.
They’d called me Spiteful (as usual) and left me there.
Getting to a doctor had taken forever. The pain in my shoulder had faded after a while, replaced by a dull feeling of wrongness.
Now, as I witnessed my body evolving, I realized my new form was rightness. Something wrong had finally clicked into place.
