"Name the first Storm Hawk that comes to your mind."
"Aerrow", he said without hesitation.
His response painted a smirk on her pale face. The slight upward crease of her lips hid behind her shadowy veil, yet her sparkling eyes betrayed efforts to conceal her true sentiments.
Almost automatically, the Dark Ace cocked his head to the side and curiously peered at his Master. There she stood like a skeletal mannequin, with a dark cloak draped over her bony structure. Her fingers peeked from her gloves and curled around the keys of the machine behind her as she leaned casually against the cold, metal surface. To an untrained eye, she looked the same, but the Dark Ace knew otherwise. Yes, there was something nagging him inexplicably…
"Is he the only one you think about?" Master Cyclonis asked.
The Dark Ace did not trust the word that dangled on the tip of his tongue. He would not lie to her face, yet he knew the truth would have consequences. He let out a small grumble and waited for the topic to pass.
As principle, Master Cyclonis never let go easily.
"Ah, silence. But should I read your lips or your mind, Dark Ace?" she chuckled darkly.
"You should read neither, Master. You have witnessed the hostility between Aerrow and I. Seeing is believing. I only know hate for that Storm Hawk. And the rest of them for that matter," the Dark Ace immediately responded.
Another chuckle escaped the young empress's throat. "No, Dark Ace, I did not intend anything inappropriate. Nevertheless, your initial focus is on the wrong Storm Hawk. You should concentrate on another."
His dark eyebrows furrowed in confusion. "Another Storm Hawk? Aerrow is the right one, Master. He is the heart of the squadron, and to squeeze the life out of him means the destruction of them all".
Yet these words sounded as if to convince himself of his own cause. It was the same path he took when the Dark Ace himself was a member of that squadron, decapitating the very leader of the old Storm Hawks to be the stepping stone to where he was presently.
Master Cyclonis hovered closer to her loyal servant. Her purple gaze met his conflicted crimson one, her eyes squinting to read his expressive face. She placed a petite finger on his chest plate, on the heart of their insignia.
On the heart of the Dark Ace.
"I believe you are wrong. Like you said, seeing is believing and I have seen. I have seen the heart of the Storm Hawks. Crushing her is the only solution".
"Her?" he hissed, "As in that Piper? But she's… she's…"
"She is the strongest, the most skilled, the most talented…"
"She's a girl."
That carefully placed finger turned into a palm as Master Cyclonis, with all her accumulated crystal power, pushed the Dark Ace into the dark ebony doors on the opposite side of the room. His back collided with the wood with a resounding boom, and pain resonated like an echo through his limbs and bones, the purple crystal energy still rippling through his sinews. He bit his lip from the injury, but kept his head down, hoping that Master Cyclonis would not see his agony.
"What do you mean 'She's a girl'?" Cyclonis hissed as her footsteps echoed closer to him. "Can't a girl be powerful too?". Her hand glowed a deathly purple as she prepared another crystal blast. "Tell me!"
"Master, I beg for forgiveness. Those words… You are the most powerful there is, and no one can match your power," the Dark Ace mumbled in his awkward position. He rearranged himself and bent his knee for her, bowing solemnly. "I am always your loyal servant, Master Cyclonis".
A brief smirk flitted across her pale lips. The purple glow dimmed and she bent down, tickling his ear with her dark, whispery words. "You swore an oath to me, do you remember Dark Ace? Remember when you were chosen as my champion? You will be my servant forever."
She roughly cupped his chin and pulled his head up to meet her gaze. A storm danced in his eyes and it was clear this taunting had become a mere passing of unpleasant weather to him. His small admirations toward her prowess and his prose about his utmost loyalty and undivided dedication to her were always sung to the same tune. Their exchanges had become a performance of master and servant, both tugged by the strings of an invisible puppeteer to dance this way and that.
Master Cyclonis was no slave to fate, and so she decided to rewrite the script herself.
"You will do a task."
"Yes, whatever it may be, it shall succeed".
"You must succeed."
"For you, Master, I will".
They both exhaled, and their breaths meshed between them.
Unfurling her hood into a pointed mane to reveal a pale, haggard face of a young girl, she blinked slowly at her first commander. She dug her nails into his chin, making sure his and her gaze never wavered.
"Bring me Piper."
oooo
In the rickety chair, the bonds embraced her unlike the caring arms of whom she loved, as the fibres dug into her flesh and mercilessly gnawed away the skin. Pink began to lacerate her arms as she twisted, with small grunts escaping her mouth at every movement. Her struggling was painful, yet sitting still hurt her more. She was a Storm Hawk, and she would always fight.
He smirked. Her mindset was stubborn and foolish. Much expected from one of those brats.
"Let me go!" Piper yelled, the sweat glistening from her furrowed brow. She twisted and cried again in vain. "Let me go!"
His tall figure swooped down next to the struggling girl, his back bent and head aligned with her shoulder. He placed his hands behind his back as he signed, waiting for Master Cyclonis to appear and take responsibility of this tedious prisoner.
Piper stopped struggling when she felt his hot breath tickling her skin. Her heart thumped as he dug into her personal bubble, but she frowned to hide her discomfort. She did not want her hot tears to fall down her cheeks and streak her face with a shimmering vulnerability. But with the harsh stinging as the binds tightened around her body and a depraved criminal of a man leering at her shoulder, Piper could not help it.
"Keep crying child. Your pathetic screams aren't going to bring your friends here," the Dark Ace whispered, his voice delicately balancing on threatening and alluring. "Stop wasting your effort, darling."
"They will come! I know they will!" Piper exclaimed with the most naive determination she could that it made the Dark Ace smirk.
"Oh will they now?" he questioned as he straightened his back and walked forward. "Let's time how long it will take."
"My friends will come soon enough!" Piper shouted at the Cyclonian with the same determination. "That's what friends are for!"
"She's definitely the most boring hostage I've ever had," the Dark Ace thought. "Should have kidnapped Aerrow instead."
"Let me go, or else!" Piper's voice whinged this time, her cries rebounding off the walls of the enclosed cell.
Something in Dark Ace's mind clicked, and started something in his core. Turning swiftly around, he slammed his hands on the armrests of the chair, his face dangerously close to Piper's. She quickly recoiled into her seat, her amber eyes widening at his intimacy.
"Or else what?" the Dark Ace hissed. "Are you going to threaten my life whilst tied down to that chair?" You are pathetic."
"No. But I am going to do this."
Piper's leg darted out and kicked him squarely in the groin.
The Dark Ace roared as his bent over, arms wrapped around his lower region as he tried to recover from the pain. A smile flickered onto Piper's face as she felt some victory surge through her body. Playing the 'annoying mistress in distress' clearly fooled him. But before she could enjoy it, he turned around with sword drawn and pointed to her chest.
"You are nothing but vermin I will happily eradicate," the Dark Ace spat as he raised his sword to slam it down in attempt to slice the Storm Hawk in two.
And yet the Dark Ace cleanly cut through the chair, freeing Piper. At the last second, she had leaned to the side, where the blade hit the toppling blade instead. Rolling to the side, she grabbed the broken wooden legs of the chair and threw them at the Cyclonian with precision, aiming for the head. The Dark Ace swiftly parried the projectile in quick succession, before rushing towards the Storm Hawk with his flaming sword. Sensing the immediate closure of space between them, Piper whipped the rope away from her body and into her hands, swinging the roughly knotted end at his face. He ducked and severed the length with his blade, and swung his blade at her torso. She jumped back, the sizzling crystal energy millimetres away from her chest, and twisted to the side to loop the rope around his wrist. Tugging roughly, she pulled her prey towards her as the rope dug into the Cyclonian glove. Yet she forgot that he could wield the dual-handed sword like one of Aerrow's blades. With this miscalculation, he countered and pulled her towards him, the momentum hurtling the Storm Hawk into the Dark Ace's weapon. Twisting her body in desperation away from the sword, the crystal badly scalped her arm as the rest of her body collided into the Cyclonian's chest.
The sword clattered away from the Dark Ace's grasp as Piper's legs pinned his arms to his side. Her hands were clenched in tight fists as she prepared to pummel the snarking face beneath her, ignoring the gushing of blood from her injured arm.
"Well, this is an interesting position," the Dark Ace observed in an unexpected playful way. He did have a female straddling him and, unexpected to himself, was enjoying the view.
"Excuse me?" Piper spat, loosening her fists and letting her arms fall to the side. "Oh."
"You can do me a favour and move yourself lower," he mused again, internally laughing as the girl's expression changed from anger to pure disgust and shock.
Piper immediately shot up and removed herself from the Dark Ace's reclining body, holding tightly the arm that bled profusely. "You pervert."
"And you're a hormonal teenager," he responded coolly, propping himself up with his elbows. "I take what I can get."
"You are just as depraved as I thought you would be. Even more so," Piper spat back, as she dislodged the Firebolt crystal with a kick at the Dark Ace's discarded sword.
"Oh, aren't you just sweet. You think of me," the Dark Ace snickered.
"That's not what I meant!"
"But what you exactly intended."
She glared at him, and he returned her gaze knowingly.
"Shut up and take me to your medics. I'm bleeding."
"And why should I listen to you? I would like to see you bleed dry."
Piper smiled to herself. Despite the stinging in her arm and the crimson stickiness that soaked through her uniform, she felt powerful with her words.
"No, you wouldn't. And I know exactly why."
oooo
From the shadows, Master Cyclonis watched the events unfold. This was perfect.
A sudden pang of agony cut through her stomach, yet she held her posture like any empress would.
She would not show weakness.
A/N: Yep, this is undergoing a rewrite.