Doctor Almost rubbed at his sore head as he joined the growing group of new comers. It had been a few weeks since he had bumped into another set of Tights aside from Crimson Maiden, and he was not sure he recognized them.
"Thanks for the assist." He said with a smile as he offered a thankful hand to the nearest hero who had just saved him from one of the thugs. "The name's Almost. Doctor Almost." He said in a horrible fake British accent. "And you are..."
* * *
Angelica Ofilia Donnelly watched the spectacle draw to a close on her cell's TV, and glowered as the group of heroes finished apprehending the pitiful brutes of the Bad Luck Gang who were now utterly powerless under the multitude of abilities these heroes possessed as a group. The news chopper had a pretty good view of the casino's parking lot, and Angelica found herself smirking when she saw one of the heroes returning what appeared to be a large ruby gem encrusted pendant to one of the other heroes.
Angelica recognized the pendant immediately. It was hers. And the woman who had it now must be the same woman who had taken it from her, Madam Crimson, though this hero's appearance now greatly differed from what she recalled from her skirmish five years before. The news cut away from the scene and returned to the anchor man and woman who were blabbering about something to do with "new heroes saving the day" or some such, but Angelica tuned it out. She knew where her amulet was, and more over, she knew she could get it back. She did not need the blasted thing, it was merely a trinket compared to her other artifacts that Madam Crimson had not taken upon Angelica's capture several years before, but it was a pretty trinket, and she liked the thing rather endearingly.
"Guard!" Angelica said loudly at the enchanted duraglass wall separating her from freedom. She had tried every spell and incantation she could think of to try and escape over the years, but none had been able to work. The enchantments nullified her magic almost entirely, and she could do little more than write useless runes in the air.
"What is it, Dark?" Officer Leroy asked from the other side. It had long since become standard procedure a long time before her imprisonment to keep all class five supers under constant guard even despite the impenetrable cells, mostly because of the escape of one Johnny Nuclear about twenty years ago that resulted in the destruction of half of Lake County when several capes had tried and failed to capture him. Since then, constant guards were standard practice.
"I want to speak with my lawyer." Angelica said simply.
"Sure thing, Miss Dark, I'll be sure to have him down here first thing in the morning... Now, it's late, do you mind going to sleep now, or do I have to read you a bed time story?" He added sarcastically.
"That depends..." She said pressing a thoughtful finger to her lips. "Is it a story of true love?" She put as much sensuality into her words as she could stomach. Leroy visibly blushed, but made his face hard.
"Don't make me come in there." He insisted pulling his billy club free. If he came in, he could beat her senseless and the enchantments would leave her mostly defenseless, but she could still use her physical attributes to her advantage...
"Oh, does the big bad police guard man want to give wittle 'ol me a spanking?" She continued taunting the guard.
"That's it." Leroy glowered as he leaned towards the radio at his shoulder and spoke into it. "Open up C-17, our guest needs a little discipline."
"Jeeze, Leroy, that's the third time this week..." A voice piped in over the static. It sounded like Officer Stanely. "You need some back up?"
"Nah, I got this." Leroy said with an evil smirk. "I'll let you know when I'm finished."
"Roger that. Try not to break her too bad this time, will you? Doc's been working overtime enough as it is without her in intensive care all the time."
"She can heal just fine with her magic voodoo crap." Leroy said. A moment passed, and the duraglass wall slid open, and Leroy stepped inside. "Come here Miss Dark, I ain't gonna hurt ya too bad."
Angelica smirked and deftly drew a series of symbols in the air that flashed and fizzled, then she put a hand on her hip and smiled knowingly at Leroy.
"Your magic can't do nothin' in here, lady, ain't you given up yet?" Leroy said dismissively as he gestured with his billy club.
"Really? Then what's that behind you?" She asked, pointing.
"I ain't fallin' for that, Dark... What, ya think I'm stupid?" He smirked, but he obviously seemed more angry.
"Oh, okay then. I thought I would just warn you about the dracolich I summoned behind you... But I see you don't mind being eaten, so never mind..." She causally began picking at her finger nails and blowing on them.
"Dracolich...?" Leroy paled visible and began to turn. As soon as he did, Angelica grabbed the TV off the table and slammed it over the guard's head with a loud glass shattering crash. He dropped like a sack of potatoes.
"Idiot..." Angelica smirked as she grabbed the guard and flipped him over to remove his radio. Then stepping into the hall, and freeing herself from her cell's enchantments, she cast a spell to alter her voice and frowned as she spoke. "All done, she's settled down now, go ahead and close 'er up." She said in Leroy's voice. A second later Stanely said something that she did not pay attention to, and the duraglass wall slid back into place.
She dropped the radio then began casting a teleport spell. She was not one hundred percent sure where she was going, so there was a chance she might end up partially in a wall, but it was better than staying put, and she could heal herself relatively easily, so long as her head was not stuck in something solid... She pointed herself somewhere near where she had seen the heroes on the TV and finished casting and escaped from Cook County Jail.
When she appeared in the middle of the group of heroes a moment later, she suddenly wished she had chosen somewhere else...
"Madam Crimson, we meet again..." She said simply ignoring the questions coming from everyone else around them, and only focusing on the woman who held her pendant.
"Who?" One man asked.
"I think you have me confused with someone else..." Madam said slowly.
"No, I'm sure it's you." Angelica said simply. "What, you don't recognize your old nemesis?"
"Who are you?" Another hero asked.
"Looks like she's wearing prison orange..." Another added.
Angelica frowned, realizing in her haste to escape, she had forgotten to change her clothes.
"Perhaps this will refresh your memory?" She waved her hand, and her orange jump suit was quickly replaced with a long flowing black robe and high collar, with an intricate metal ornament on her back, and her hair was restored to twin ornate buns.
"That chick from Final Fantasy 8?" One hero asked. "That sorcorer chick? What's her name?"
Angelica groaned, lashed out with a spell silencing the other heroes and binding their bodies to where the stood. "No further interruptions!" She said angrily. "Now... I have waited a long time for this, Madam Crimson... Do you really not remember me?"
"My name is Crimson Maiden..." The woman said with a frown. "And I see that you are very powerful with magic, but I don't have the faintest clue who you are..."
"I see... Well, then perhaps you are related to the woman I seek... Regardless, I am the deliverer of darkness. The assistant to the devil. Right hand to the Dark God, and His angel of Death. You will tremble before me, and know that my name is Darkheart Angel!" She finished with a flourish of simple lightning spells that punctuated her speech.
She frowned when she heard one man burst out laughing, and she glanced with confusion at him. She had cast her spell on him, the same as the others, but he was still able to speak? His body at least still seemed bound, but it was troubling. Perhaps she was getting rusty from years of not using her magic...
"Darkheart Angel? Really? That's what you call yourself? Bwa ha ha ha!" The man continued in his fit of laughter.
"Will you be silent!" Angelica cast her silence spell on the man again, but it still seemed to have no effect. "What sorcery is this...?"
"Almost, shut up, she's the real deal! You want her to kill you where you stand? Shut up!"
"Sorry, it's just so ridiculous!" He continued giggling uncontrollably.
Hitting her last nerve, Angelica created a pocket vortex around the man's head that created a bubble around him and sucked out all the oxygen. The man promptly stopped laughing and began rasping and coughing trying in vain to breath. "Now then, for my pendant..." Angelica gestured simply, and her pendant, which was still in "Crimson Maiden's" hand snapped out of her grasp and flew into Angelica's hand.
"That was my mother's!" She objected, trying to cast a spell to retrieve it, to which Angelica effortlessly countered it.
"Ah, so I see." Angelica smirked. "That makes you Madam Crimson's daughter... I'll have you know, that this is my pendant actually, she merely took it from me when she arrested me five years ago. Anyways, I'll be seeing you around." she added as she walked closer and ran a hand over the soft features of the woman's face. "Now, to catch up on five years of mayhem, chaos, murder, and senseless destruction, so if you will excuse me..." She countered another pitiful spell of Crimson's as she began casting her teleportation spell, and smiled devilishly as she teleported away.
* * *
Doctor Almost gasped as what ever was preventing him from breathing in air suddenly vanished, and he inhaled a large much needed breath.
"What..." He coughed between heavy breaths. "Who the hell was that?"