Prologue: Summoned for a Prize
Nighttime had fallen over Domino again. A full moon was shining brightly over the city, giving the darkened skyscrapers a mystical glow which made it appear to be the perfect place for a little magic and mystery to occur.
And at that moment, actually, a young woman standing at the top of one of those buildings was planning on using some magic for her own purposes.
The woman's name was Meg. She had flowing hair which was the color of amber, deep sapphire eyes, and ruby red lips. At the moment, she was wearing a flowing emerald green dress, an onyx cloak, and onyx high heels to match. Necklaces and bracelets of diamonds, rubies, emeralds, sapphires, and many other gems adorned her wrists and neck.
In front of Meg, a chalk drawing had been made on the roof of a snake which had curled up into a circle and put its tail into its mouth. Surrounding the snake drawing was another circle of lit candles.
"Perfect," Meg grinned. "Everything is set."
She pulled a dog-eared piece of paper out of her cloak. Meg read the paper for a few minutes, then nodded and returned it to the cloak. She rose her hands up and looked into the starry sky. She chanted in a deep, melodramatic voice:
I call upon the creature formerly of golden hair,
Cursed for making out in a temple, she did dare,
Now a femme fatale with locks of snakes and turner to stone
You shall do my bidding, for now you're a creature of my own!
The snake drawing started to glow with a bright, white light. The light shot up and formed a tall dome which spun around in its place. The flames of the candles flared out towards the dome and turned from orange to an eerie green.
Meg hurriedly pulled out a pair of dark sunglasses and put them on. "Wouldn't wanna get turned to stone by my own servant, now would I?"
The dome stopped spinning. Slowly, the candles' flames returned to their normal size and color, and the light retreated back into the ground, revealing that a woman now stood in the center of the snake drawing. While her skin was a pretty pale cream and she wore a vivacious red evening gown, her beauty was ruined by the fact that she had long, green snakes with sharp fangs coming out of where her hair should have been.
The woman kneeled down before Meg and hissed out, "How may I serve you, mistress?"
Meg sighed. "Well, my dear Medusa…" She walked around the woman and picked up one of the candles from the circle. She blew out the flame and closed her eyes. The candle glowed with a strange light for a second, then transformed into a candle made of pure gold. "I've grown tired of simply using my power to transform so many rocks and such into so many beautiful jewels for me." She delicately touched one of her diamond necklaces. "I'm ready to claim some other, much more valuable prizes for myself, but unfortunately… my power is limited to transforming inanimate objects."
She turned back to Medusa, who had gotten up and now faced her new master. "That, my dear, is where you come in. I need you to turn a couple of humans into inanimate objects with that stone-transforming power of yours. You can do that easily, can't you?"
Medusa bowed. "Absolutely, mistress. Did you have any particular humans in mind?"
Meg grinned evilly. "I've been watching these teens with certain, shall we say, gifts for the past couple of days. I believe they'll make absolutely wonderful trophies for a jewel lover such as me…"