After making a second chapter to "Her Heart Plucked" about five years later (that delay though), and given the note it ended on, I thought it'd be fitting to make a sequel-prequel story for it that focuses on the next tier of the Rivera-Aves totem pole.
As far as Voltura/Carmelita's age:
In canon she's 36 (the ET wiki gave that number, which seems about right given how relatively young [and fine] she looks). I just assumed that the show's set in 2007 (when the show aired), so 2007 - 36 = 1971. Carmelita is 17 in this (in actual ET canon, who knows how old she was when this happened) short story, so add 17 to 1971 and you get 1988. Math. Oh, and April 26th is Alien Day, a sacred holiday to me. I needed a day and month and I chose that.
You guys really gotta leave some reviews on this and its prequel story. I'm not asking for money here, just feedback.
...
Though both the Riveras and Aves got a good laugh at Voltura, known to a few as Carmelita Aves, blasting the oh-so-insufferable Dr. Eugene Butterman out of his chair during a make-up counseling session to try and end hostilities between the two warring families, Carmelita still felt light in the knees and sick in the stomach after the whole thing ended. Flying home by way of jetpacks rather than walking or driving probably didn't help at all in terms of reducing her sickness, but as the Aves women said as sort of a family joke, "When life gives you wings, fly".
"You were so brave, Mami", her daughter Zoe finally said, looking up and smiling at her mother. "It meant a lot to me."
"Thank you, mija", Carmelita weakly replied, attempting to smile as best she could. "It felt good to stick it to that doctor."
Her daughter giggled. It warmed Carmelita's heart to hear her daughter's laughter, but given how cold she felt at her core, any warmth was welcome.
The truth of the matter was that Carmelita was afraid. As much as she hated to admit it, she wanted Rodolfo back and knew damn well that he broke up with her, not the other way around; as surprisingly well as things went, Carmelita feared that giving into her devilish impulses by shooting the therapist could very well have jeopardized the whole meeting. Sure, they all laughed at it - why exactly the two Rivera men laughed at something so evil was unknown to her, but the quartet still laughed at it nonetheless. Rodolfo even said he'd call her, which made her heart skip a beat or two, but now she feared that by the time she got back to her family's hideout, her former boyfriend would have had a serious change of heart and thought that by zapping Butterman, she showed no signs of reforming. At this stage in her life, bitterness and hatred had consumed her, and changing to more noble ways wasn't as easy as flicking a light switch for her.
...
Miracle City High
Tuesday, April 26th, 1988
...
"Rodolfo, what do you think of this cheerleading outfit?" a 17-year-old self-conscious Carmelita Aves asked her high school sweetheart as she suited up in her cheerleading outfit for the very first time. "Does this make my butt look big?"
"Mi querido, you look wonderful", Rodolfo suavely replied. "I wasn't even looking at your butt.". He paused for a moment. "Was I supposed to?"
Carmelita snickered and gave her boyfriend a light slap on the face. "My, my", she lovingly remarked, clicking her tongue, "Did you get into another fight? There's only one thing that can heal such a wound."
And with that, Carmelita swung in and gave Rodolfo a long kiss on the cheek she'd slapped him on. Rodolfo sighed in relief.
"Come on, Aves", the rather uptight queen bee leader of the cheerleading squad, Isabel Garcia, barked, stomping her foot and raising her whistle as a threat. "Quit mooching off of Rivera and join the rest of the team."
"Whatever you say", Carmelita sighed, giving Rodolfo one final kiss and a wave before dashing off to join the rest of the squad.
...
Not five minutes after Carmelita and Rodolfo had parted ways, and the former had run off, having been reduced to tears by a series of hateful acts against her that were headed by Isabel.
"Carmelita!" Rodolfo exclaimed as he saw his bawling girlfriend rush over to him; "What happened?"
"Those vile wenches!" Carmelita cried. "They opened up on me with a great many terrible insults."
"Like what?" Rodolfo asked as he embraced his teary-eyed girlfriend and calmly stroked her hair.
"They called me such things as 'thick'; 'chunky'; 'un-FIT to be on the squad'; that I'd break their spines if I were on top of the pyramid at the big game on Friday..."
"Querido, to me you're none of those terrible things", Rodolfo gently replied. "You never have been, you aren't, and you never will be. It's their egos. They're jealous of you."
"Y'think so?" Carmelita asked.
"I know so", Rodolfo insisted. "I wear the Bronze Boots of Truth, after all", he chuckled, tapping his heels together like Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz just to make a point and lighten the mood, which made his misty-eyed girlfriend snicker and playfully slap his shoulder.
The ground began shaking slightly, and Rodolfo and Carmelita turned to see the Aves family's personal mechanized ostrich-themed walker, which her mother used in lieu of an actual car. Her mother beeped the horn, which equated to a loud squawking rather than a deep honk, and so Carmelita dashed off to head home with her mother, waving her boyfriend goodbye.
"Such a sweet girl", Rodolfo sighed, thinking of how much Carmelita warmed his heart.
...
"Mija, you don't look so good", Mami Aves remarked upon noticing how bloodshot Carmelita's eyes had become after crying her tear ducts dry. "What happen?"
"Those putrid cheerleaders", Carmelita hissed. "They insulted me left and right. Calling me fat. Calling me worthless."
"'Fat'?!" Mami Aves scoffed, laughing in her "gobbling" fashion. "You are the skinniest girl I've ever laid my good eye on. To infierno with those girls. You ask me, you deserve vendetta against them."
"What do you have in mind, Mami?"
"No mercy, mi querido", Mami Aves snickered. "No mercy."
...
The next day, Carmelita showed up to school with a devious grin on her face, one that her boyfriend most certainly noticed. "Carmelita, are you feeling better today?" Rodolfo asked in a loving but suspicious tone that Carmelita didn't seem to pick up on.
"I'm on cloud nine, Rodolfo", Carmelita chuckled. "I couldn't be in a better mood today."
"Good to hear, mi amour", Rodolfo replied. "I'm afraid I won't be able to attend your cheerleading practice today; I have to leave for a dental appointment at noon. Hopefully those girls will dial it back a notch and give you a chance."
"Don't worry", said Carmelita, "It'll all go fine. Juuuuuuust fine."
...
"Aves?" Isabel scoffed upon seeing the new blood of the squad enter the girls' locker room; "I thought we ran your saggy ass out of here?"
"Well well, Isabel", Carmelita chortled as she walked up to the girl she secretly wanted to dismember, wrapping her arm around her new sworn enemy and dropping something into her open purse without Isabel or the other girls being any the wiser; "I think we may have gotten off on the wrong foot. If you give me a chance, I'm sure we can bond over our mutual passion for-"
"Out", Isabel ordered, glaring at Carmelita, who merely shrugged, patted Isabel on the shoulder, and walked outside.
Carmelita merely hung around outside of the locker room, counting down the seconds on a timer built into her watch.
5... 4... 3... 2... 1...
A horrified shriek that matched the sound of Isabel's voice erupted at the same time as a series of loud snaps, booms, cracks and bangs, and several more shrieks burst out of the other cheerleaders as well. Carmelita fell to the ground laughing with tears in her eyes - she'd dropped a pack of small firecrackers into her enemy's purse, and was counting down the time until the REAL fireworks - the terrified screams of the other girls - began.
The coach overheard the cacaphony and dashed in to investigate. Before Carmelita could make herself scarce, Isabel marched out of the locker room with the coach and the rest of the squad, pointing to Carmelita and shouting "IT WAS HER!"
Busted.
"Aves dropped a lit firecracker in my purse!"
A series of variations of "She totally did it" followed from the rest of the girls.
"Aves!" the coach shouted, "Report to the detention room immediately."
"Mierda", Carmelita huffed as she strolled down to the detention room - her very first detention in all her years of school. It wasn't retribution from her mother that she worried about - her mother would likely buy her cupcakes or take her out for dinner or something if she found out her goodie-two-shoes daughter had committed her first act of evil, however small it was - it was Rodolfo catching wind of this and either casting some harsh judgment down on her or potentially even dumping her.
...
The day after the incident, and the day before the big Friday game, the cheerleaders were oh-too-eager to get some payback on Carmelita, which she was somewhat afraid of. If she'd had the foresight to see that by taking it up a step from harsh words by putting an explosive in the bullies' ringleaders purse, thus setting the scale for a form of similar or greater retaliation, then perhaps Carmelita would've just kept it at verbal harassment. Plus, there were 8 of them in the uncharacteristically small squad, and 1 of her; plus they were backed by the coach and the coach was backed by the school. Rodolfo was the only real ally she had but at the same time knew that he would potentially side with the bullies due to his sense of righteousness and nobility.
It was a tacit statement that Carmelita was off the team, so she didn't even bother walking into the locker room on her way to her first class. However, the trap was set for her outside of the usual battlefield.
It was the classic bucket-of-water-on-top-of-door gimmick, but in place of water it was blood. From what creature the blood came from was unknown, but it was highly irrelevant - it was blood, and it was all over her. Carmelita screamed in horror, trying to shake and wipe as much of it off as she could, as the sound of the cheerleading squad laughing maniacally began to open up. Her scream had been heard by all, and now she was being mocked and laughed at by the other students in the halls - hell, even the teachers were laughing.
Carmelita ran off crying, not even noticing Rodolfo, who had a look of grief on his face. It burdened him not knowing who was responsible for this, and thus he couldn't figure out what to do.
Carmelita's target was the hose outside by the girl's locker room. The structure had been vacated, since the squad was lurking in the classroom at the time of the ambush, so she didn't have to worry about a second trap being laid inside the locker room despite not having to go inside. Carmelita turned the hose on, but no water came out. Instead, she heard a deep gurgling noise, and before she could even reach for the handle, the water blasted from the hose, hitting her like getting struck in the face by a baseball bat, and knocking her on her rear as the hose sprayed around wildly. Now a mix of drenched in blood and soaking wet, Carmelita's only instinct was to flee, and so her second target was to just hide behind the bleachers and cry her pain away.
Life refused to dial it back for her, and even as she sat on the bleachers, crying her eyes out, she heard a deathly squawking. Looking up, she saw a flock of vultures hovering above her. Was that all she amounted to? Just being a human strip-tease to a bunch of carrion eating buzzards?
Carmelita's heart began to beat heavily, and eventually cooled down. She went from crying with her head in her arms to just casually standing up, stretching, and walking home, with her vulture entourage flying overhead.
...
Rodolfo was worried. He hadn't seen Carmelita at all throughout the school day, and after school let out, he called but received no response. He then ran across town to her "house", but nobody answered when he knocked. When he heard his father calling him for supper, he couldn't linger outside his girlfriend's home any longer, and with great regret, he was forced to abandon her and head home.
...
It was Friday, the night of the big football game between the Miracle City High Marauders and the Calavera Chupacabras, which Rodolfo would otherwise been ecstatic for, but after seeing his girlfriend being reduced to tears and running off while drenched in blood, and not being able to get a hold of her, his mood had been shot dead, and so instead of attending an event that he paid for, he chose to stay home alone in his room.
"Mijo, what is matter?" his Papi, Jorge Rivera asked with something close to sincerity as he opened his son's bedroom door and took a seat next to his mopey son.
"Papi, it's Carmelita", Rodolfo sighed. "Yesterday, I saw her run out of the school, crying and dripping with blood-"
"You sure it wasn't that time of-"
"Papi!" Rodolfo exclaimed.
Jorge knew when to back down, though his intentions fell somewhere between trying to joke around to cheer up his son and just trying to joke around at a golden opportunity to crack an inappropriate joke, something that he almost seemed to make a career out of.
"You called her house?" he asked.
"I did", Rodolfo sighed. "But I didn't hear-"
And on the note of hearing, Rodolfo and Jorge heard faint screaming and saw flashing green lights near the school. Rodolfo's hero instincts interpreted this as a sign of danger, and his inner hero seized control of his emotions, whipping him back into shape and eager to save the day.
...
Rodolfo, now technically his superhero alter-ego White Pantera, bolted to the school in a white flash, and reached the football field only to see patches of flame on the grass, sizeable chunks of molten steel that had been burned and melted suddenly, and, of course, horrified students running and screaming from a hovering figure wearing a jetpack that gave off green exhaust flames. This unknown villain wore a bird themed costume with long feathers behind the jetpack; fluffy, cuffed wrists that separated arm from hand with green talon-tipped fingers; and a helmet with a translucent green visor and green accents. The villain in question also had twin energy weapons, one on each wrist, and seemed to be searching for something, or somebody.
He or she found their target, which was a mortified cheerleader rendered catatonic out of fear. The winged entity swung in towards their prey, talons raised, and aimed at the helpless cheerleader known as Isabel Garcia, whom the black-and-green villain swooped in towards. Before Pantera could intervene, the villain snatched Isabel and raised her up in the air, swinging their arm and slashing her face with the green talons on their fingertips.
"Unhand that cheerleader, you vile villain!" Pantera demanded.
"Whatever you say!" the vile villain chuckled, flinging the screaming girl down to the ground - she would've broken her neck and spine had Pantera not caught her at the last second. Pantera set her down and leapt up into the air with his boot raised, and kicked the villain straight in the face - though their visor absorbed the impact that would've hit harder than a freight train, the force was enough to knock them to the ground, and the force of that was enough to knock the helmet off...
...Revealing the terrorist as none other than Pantera's sweetheart, Carmelita Aves.
Pantera's heart and mouth dropped upon seeing his unmasked girlfriend, coughing and gagging as she struggled to stand back up.
"C-Carmelita?"
"Carmelita is no more, Pantera", Carmelita snarled, wiping away the blood dripping from her nose. "Now there's only... Voltura."
"Not to me", Pantera sighed, lowering his head but keeping eye contact with her. "To me, you'll always be Carmelita Aves, but if this is the kind of person you truly are..."
"Don't say it", Voltura growled, fighting back tears.
"...Then we're through."
Voltura snapped. She shrieked in rage, firing her jetpack's thrusters at maximum power and raising her fist towards her new enemy, who leapt up with his foot raised once more. Voltura's fist struck Pantera's boot, creating a shockwave that threw both parties, as well as the student and faculty spectators, backwards while also creating a huge dust cloud.
Pantera rose to, but when the dust cleared, his former love was gone, and all he could hear was maniacal laughing echoing in the distance as smoke from her jetpack exhaust vanished and she disappeared over the horizon.
...
Back in the present, Carmelita hadn't spoken a word, even through dinner with her mother and daughter. She had still been reflecting on her origins as the infamous villainess Voltura, the second-in-command of the at-the-time newly formed Flock of Fury, and was wondering how she'd gone from such a disastrous breakup to sitting in an office and being pleasant with her former boyfriend and potentially former adversary. The whole time, she was staring at the telephone, or, the Flock of Fury equivalent, a holographic communication terminal, waiting to see if Rodolfo would actually come through on his promise.
The loud beeping that her daughter described as being as loud as a truck backing up began, and Carmelita began sweating.
"It's your sweetheart", Lady Gobbler remarked, making mocking kissing noises and smooches.
"Shut up!" Carmelita barked as she stared at the terminal.
"Do I really want to do this?" Carmelita asked herself. It was apparent that her mother wasn't too thrilled about it, but she felt a tug from her other family member present, and looking down at little Zoe's smile was enough motivation for her to get up and walk over to the terminal. Carmelita sighed and pressed "talk."
"Hello... Rodolfo."