"Bottoms up!" Julian cheerfully declared, pouring a long, glass bottle with a Spanish label on it into everybody's glass. The air in the restaurant was loud and obnoxious, but he'd be damned if it wasn't life-giving too.
Alice gave her glass a shifty look. "I've been preconditioned not to trust anything from you."
"Has Julian ever wronged us?" Dart downed his drink without so much as a second thought.
"Peer pressure is a fickle and cruel thing." She followed suit after her meister, sipping it empty in a gradual process.
"Peer pressure drives me to drink!" Cassiel slammed her fist on the oval-shaped table, chugging hers heartily.
"I feel that." Nicolette sloshed the entire drink in one gulp.
"E-Enough!" Cole scrambled to seize the glasses on the table, but by then, they were all empty.
Victoria reclined in her chair, throwing a hard glare at an all-too-eager Julian. "These've better be non-alcoholic, Leone!" She wasn't against night shenanigans, but none of them could risk a hangover before an assassination attempt. And that wasn't even bringing into question if the drinks were poisoned or not...
"Sure, sure, totally!" He filled up another glass amongst the company of Dart and Joaquin, both taking turns slapping him on the back as he chugged.
And just as she resigned herself the party atmosphere, a reminder of her own circumstances drags her down. "Victoria." The voice feels right beside her ear, sending icy ripples down her back. "I'm close. Get outside and follow my directions from there."
"Y-Yeah." Victoria got up abruptly, two fingers pressed against her left ear. When gazes turned to her, she faked a smile, walking off with a wave. "I'll see you guys later. Don't do anything too stupid while I'm out!" Like that, she was gone, leaving the students confused at her intentions.
"Wait, hold on." Joaquin narrowed his eyes, suspicious. "This is sparkling grape juice, guys." A collective groan ruptured through the table, all eyes on a red-faced Julian.
"Once you've passed the water tower, turn left. Keep going, and you'll find where I am. It's entirely vacant, I've made sure of it. Where are you right now?"
Victoria was walking along the outskirts of town where no one dared to venture at night, where the glitz and glamor of downtown gave way to the unadvertised areas. Cracked streets, chipping sidewalks, and ivy that seeped through the cracks in buildings ravenously. And silence. Droning, omnipresent, silence. Talking to Medusa almost seemed preferable, whatever scheme she had in store.
"Almost there. Left at the water tower, ya said?" She scrunched her nose at the rusty tin container protruding to the dark skies like a sore thumb.
"Exactly. The building should be coming into view. It's two stories high, no windows, no roof, converge with me on the second—"
"Hey, hey, one direction at a time. I see the building. Keep your fucking voice down 'case we attract attention."
"So there's brains behind that wall of meat. I leave the rest in your...capable hands."
Victoria rolled her eyes so long as Medusa couldn't see it, following the sidewalk down yet another dingy street. Buildings were growing sparse, traded for empty lots of dry dirt as she inched closer to desert territory. "Oi, I think I'm here." She said.
"Grghhh..." Something growled from behind, getting an instinctive reaction from Victoria as she put her fists up. Its gnashing teeth glinted in the moonlight, yellowed eyes glaring upward at her hatefully.
"Have we been compromised?" Medusa's voice turned shrill over the line in a rare instance of panic, speaking in a harsh whisper. Victoria shook her head dismissively, correcting the outburst.
"Just a coyote or something. You know any witches like that?"
"Only one or two. They're too cowardly to ever show their faces outside the Witch Realm, however. I wouldn't worry."
With that, the transmission ended as Victoria found herself at the building's steps. Maybe 'building' was stretching it. Half-finished framework for a building felt more apt to describe it; there was a sturdy foundation, but it looked anything but finished. For starters, the 'door' where she entered was merely a rectangular hole at the front. No windows either. Her footsteps drudged up ripples amongst the dust-laden floor, and she could have sworn she saw tiny footsteps scurrying by her shoes. In the top-right corner of the room, a patch of white light flooded in from the staircase; two floors and a staircase, just as Medusa had said. Victoria banged against the wall as she arrived on the second floor, announcing her presence.
"You've arrived." The first Victoria saw of Medusa's shadowy figure was her bare feet, stepping out of the shadows and into the white moon's glow on the dirty floor. She smiled, an expression that didn't mesh well with that hellish right eye of hers.
"Yeah. What do you want? I've got students that I should be watching right now." There was a standoffish edge to Victoria's tone, infectious enough to irk even a woman as composed as Medusa. She stepped close, seizing Victoria's wrist in a sudden movement.
"Your students? Brandt, do I need to remind you of your ongoing dilemma?" The vein Medusa touched began to writhe and turn purple, the snakes festering inside. Growing queasy, Victoria ditched the attitude, but not before jerking away from her grasp. "Now then. I'll be clear in my orders; I need blood. Lots of it."
"Blood?" Victoria recoiled, her eyebrows twitching. "Did getting revived turn you into a vampire too?!" It would make too much sense; Victoria had only ever seen her at night or indoors, she could turn into an animal, and now this. Where are the fangs? She wondered.
"...No." Medusa blinked slowly, just the slightest bit baffled. "It's a base for a project of mine. After some number-crunching, I figure I'll need four liters worth. I don't care how you obtain it, so long as its not dried up."
How am I supposed to get that much blood? She wondered, a question that went unasked the moment the two heard footsteps coming from the bottom floor. A cold hand seized around Victoria's throat, a sharpened nail scratching at her neck.
"...I could've sworn you said you came alone, Victoria." Medusa whispered maliciously, stepping backwards to the room's shadows with the larger woman in her grip.
Victoria turned her head back, glaring aside. "I didn't rat you out! Shut up and we might avoid detection." She went tight-lipped, watching the person come into view at the top of the stairs. They moved with confidence, taking long, deliberate strides that couldn't be anything but a knowing intruder's.
A pair of animalistic yellow eyes gleamed right at Victoria and Medusa, contrasting against his otherwise human figure—somewhat muscular, tall, and sporting a 'punk' getup of a mohawk and a leather jacket. "Well well well well well well." He stepped into the light, seemingly unafraid as evidenced by the smug, toothy grin on his face. He was youthful, Victoria's age, but cockier, if such a thing was even possible.
No doubt about it. That guy's Toxicity. Victoria deduced, squinting at his chest; he was wearing a flower necklace. Perhaps superstition, but in Fleurah, coincidence was slim.
The man's chin pointed upward, sniffing the air twice. "I knew it. Victoria Brandt, and someone else." His smirk dropped. "SHOW YOURSELVES!" With thunderous force and sudden rage, he slammed his fist against the wall to his right, tearing through the solid brick so easily it may as have been a plank.
Her options exhausted, Victoria came out of hiding, exchanging unwelcome looks with the intruder. Medusa followed, tersely stepping into the open with her arms folded.
Half-looking, the man snorted. "And who's that supposed to be?" His condescending air reared its ugly head to Medusa, eyeing her features up and down. "Hold up." Something flickered in his eyes, taking a step closer as if to verify what he was seeing was truth. Then he froze—his legs beginning to hobble mid-stride. The way he trembled was characteristic of a rat crossing paths with a python in the underbrush. "Medusa...Gorgon." It was the terror that made one's blood run dry. She's the one! She's the one who revived Asura! There isn't nothing but bloodlust in that soul, I know it! Thoughts raced and wandered, all concentrated on the horrid woman standing coolly beside Victoria.
"What's—what's the DWMA doing with the likes of Medusa Gorgon?" He asked, getting dead silence in return. "Why is she alive?! She should be dead like the maniac deserves! Just because you're a witch doesn't mean Toxicity's gonna excuse the atrocities that you..."
"Victoria," Medusa made firm eye contact with her. "Kill the witness."
"What?!"
"Do it. Or he won't be the only one 'gone missing' on a lively Friday night." Her fingers tightened and loosened, traces of anxiety beginning to manifest, and it showed in her actions. A bead of sweat trickled down Victoria's forehead, raising her guard without objection.
"Kill me?" The man's nose furled into a jeering expression. "Just try it! AZALEA, AWAKEN!" Like a magnificent star, his flower necklace burst, glowing a bright red while each individual petal grew thrice its size, becoming a wreath around his neck.
"A-AHHHHH!" Bones snapped from within, his spinal structure lengthening beyond human limits. Hair growths began to accelerate rapidly from his head to his toes, covering him in thick layers, while claws sprouted from ordinary nails. His nose puffed out, becoming a pointed snout. And through his pained grin, Victoria saw his canines arch, getting longer, sharper.
Medusa tilted her head to the side, resting her cheek on her palm. "A walking wolfman. Never thought I'd be acquainted with one twice."
Upon completing his transformation, Azalea's user looked down on Victoria, only two-thirds of his height now. "Scared, Brandt? Azalea's power can perfectly replicate the body part of any mammal on the planet. The pinnacle of natural selection, in one package. I could tear out your throat with a bear's claw and lunge at that scum Medusa with a lion's jaws. Doesn't that terrify you?" He leaned in close enough for her to catch a whiff of his rancid breath, catlike eyes wide and eager. "Well, I'm not really a fan of a hunt without a struggle, so I'll be courteous here. I'll let you take the first move. Can't promise I won't block or dodge though." He monologued further, opening up so as to give Victoria a free shot. There was visible annoyance in her body language, not budging an inch.
"What? Come on! Don't think you're tough enough for the big, bad w—" One second, he was in Victoria's face, the next, he was on the receiving end of a surprise hook, knocked flat against the floor with a whimper.
"Do you even know what 'natural selection' means?" Victoria cracked her knuckles and rocked her head; it'd been so long since her last good fight. "'Courteous' my ass. Do you think the foxes would let the rabbit bite first? You're exactly the kind that wouldn't survive a second in real savage nature!"
Azalea clutched the cheek where he was struck, dismayed to see that a canine tooth fallen out amongst the blood. "S-Shut up...!" He growled, sparking another transformation. His arms bulked up, trading in bear claws for gorilla fists. "I'LL BASH YOUR HEAD IN!" He turned his attention to Medusa, clearing the distance between them in one pounce.
"Hm." Medusa jumped, casually using Azalea's head as a stepping stone to get behind, letting him rush clean through the building's second story wall and into the air. Gravity's cruel majesty did the rest, his body crashing on the hood of a junked car, flattening it. "Victoria, you're handling it from here.. I'll spare you sparing you one Vector; use it wisely." Her Soul Protect shattered for an instant, materializing a twisting, arrow-shaped tattoo around Victoria's left arm. She nodded, jumping down to deal with Azalea.
/
I was an idiot to let Victoria get the first move. Just play defensive and when she gets worn down...I'll kill her. His thoughts refocused as he shook the glass shards from his back, limping towards the street. A flicker of light appeared in the corner of his eye—Victoria's Soul Wavelength. "That e-eager for a beating, huh?" She had already closed in, standing on the sidewalk opposite from him. Her forearms burned with steady flames, neither one brighter than the other.
"I'll strike you down myself, two-faced whore!" He morphed a rhino's horn at the top of his head, mindlessly sprinting forward. Victoria stomped, beckoning for his attack. With the ivory spike in his way, he couldn't see where he was going, but whatever it was going to hit would be utterly ravaged.
"SOUL FORCE!" A searing blow clocked him in the side of his jaw, staggering him. It hurt like hell, but she'd taken the bait, hook, line, and sinker. "Sorry you had to get involved." Victoria swung downward with her other fist onto his exposed forehead, but as she did, he blocked—with an arm lined with porcupine spines. "Damn!" By the time she saw, she'd already punctured her forearm deep. Acting on panic, she yanked her wrist away, bringing about spurts of blood.
"Is this how far your experience goes, Victoria?!" By the time she got a grip on her senses, his next attack was already coming. A roundhouse kick was going straight for her head, morphing into a horse's leg midway through. The merciless blow clubbed her in the neck—sloppy, but powerful, throwing her against a streetlamp just from the force. "I've turned DWMA's best into a sandbag! This feels great!" His arms became that of an orangutan's, stretching far enough to choke Victoria at a distance where her punches couldn't hope to reach. Her eyes began to bulge, and she pounded against his grip for all her worth, but in the end, the assault was just as effective a lunging dog tied to a stake, that is to say, not at all.
"Keep it up, Victoria! You're racking up the costs for my band-aids later, that's for sure!" Azalea laughed, watching the redhead turn blue the tighter he applied his grip. "Oh, the people's faces when their all-star girl gets exposed as a radical heretic! Wouldn't that dampen up the funeral?" Oh, that got a reaction; her brows twitched upward and her eyes went wide—despair was settling in. "And you know who's gonna find out first?" He shook her neck neck around, grabbing her attention from fading consciousness.
Azalea licked the upper row of his teeth. "Your students..."
Something primal in Victoria sparked, all at once. Her bloodshot pupils dilated, and her flailing picked up again after going limp. "N-NNGH!" She slammed the back of her head against the streetlamp, grunting choked breaths. Again, again, she battered herself, to Azalea's continued bewilderment. She stomped one leg forward, seething through her shaking lips.
Victoria's persistent was beginning to wound Azalea's pride, clawing her neck in frustration. "Touched a nerve, huh? Why don't you make my job easier so I can—" It was exactly then that she seized Azalea's wrists, and forced them apart. With her release, she belted out a feral scream before rushing at her aggressor, Soul Wavfelength alight all around her body. "P-Psycho bitch!" He caught her blazing fist just before it could bash his brains in, managing to steady it just a few inches away from his nose. It's like holding firewood! Resisting her was a battle in-and-of-itself, his palms blackening from contact.
"ORYA!" She landed a kick to his gut, knocking the wind out of him. Then, like smiting lightning, an elbow to the head banished him to the hard concrete sidewalk in one swift judgement, Victoria standing over his collapsed figure pitilessly. "Listen good, shapeshifting freak. Nobody is gonna know about what happened here tonight, understand?" Azalea peeked up, supporting himself with a shaky neck as he looked around helplessly for any trace of her. And just when he thought himself safe, Victoria stomped down, hard. "And nobody's gonna tell my students about the grimy business I'm getting dragged into, understand?"
How did I...end up like this? Azalea's blood was seeping into the cracks of the sidewalk, his head held down by her foot. She's gonna KILL me...! Her stare hardened, not a trace of mercy in her wild eyes. Was he nothing more than the common Kishin sport to her?
"Don't struggle." She ordered. With one holding Azalea's head in place, she raised her other foot, torched with her soul's essence.
"A-AHHHH!" With his last instincts of self-preservation, he morphed into a black mouse, scurrying away with his newfound size (or lack thereof.)
"Hey, we aren't done here!" Victoria gave chase, struggling to track his tiny form in-between the flickering streetlights. "Just try hiding now..." She set her fists alight as makeshift torches while she ran. His path took a sharp divergence, swerving off the street and squeezing through the gaps of a high chainlink fence. Victoria sighed, creased a palm over her face, and got climbing.
She dropped onto the ground from the fence's top, woosh-ing up a dirt cloud on impact. The surrounding area was what looked to be a construction site for a forever-unfinished skyscraper, with towering girders providing the framework aside mounds of gravel. Could be anywhere... He's trying to bait me out. A nagging, self-deprecating feeling invaded her thoughts, coming to the realization that she'd walked into a trap all too late.
"She won't even know what hit her!" Azalea flapped to the highest possible point on the building using a pair of outstretched bat wings, fixating on her position with feline pupils. "UP HERE, VICTORIIIIIIIIAAA!" His legs bent, preparing to jump.
"Huh?" She squinted upward, and a grimace crossed her lips. "...Are you fucking serious right now?!" A shadow formed above her, growing bigger, and bigger...
"A WHALE?!"
Two-hundred tons and one-hundred feet of blubber and fins were falling from the sky, primed to flatten every living thing in his radius. "I'm gonna wipe scum like you off of the face of the Earth!" Azalea shouted, his voice booming. Victoria forced a gulp down her throat, trying to calm down while certain doom approached.
Welp. This is going in the curriculum. She thought, putting her mind out of 'instinct' mode and into 'you can't punch this one, Victoria' mode. What can I still do... What left can I counter this left? She bit her lip, feeling her head grow tight with stress. "D-Damn it all!"
The hectic song and dance of the restaurant halted, just for a moment, when a quake shook the ground, eliciting brief pause from everyone inside. "Um... That didn't sound too good." Georgina took an anxious look through the window for any sign of damage outside—nobody looked hurt, thankfully, just as confused as the people inside.
Nicolette dialed the music back up. "Not our problem." She hooked the nearest person by the elbow and made way to the dance floor.
Azalea's fall and subsequent impact laid waste to the surrounding lot, setting off a dust shockwave that blew all the way over to the next street, and the street after that, and the street after that. He assumed a bipedal form, standing in the wide crater of his own creation. "F-Fuck...I tore up a few ribs with that one. But I got her! Bitch's corpse should be lying around here somewhere... She's tenacious, I'll give her that." It would be a shock to find her body whole—even a few blood splatters would be substantial proof. The only question was 'where?'
The sound of pebbles and dirt shifting around seized his attention behind him. One of the gravel mounds shifted, and from it, arose Victoria Brandt, coughing while she patted off her shoulders. She looked around for a second, before settling on Azalea himself, standing up without so much as a limp.
"You...you survived?" He blinked, clutching his wounded stomach. The gravel mounds were sturdy enough to resist the aftershock...
"Convenient, huh? If it'd been anywhere else I don't think I would've been able to shelter myself like that. Then again, this was the only spot where the drop would've worked to your benefit, isn't that right?" She was walking forward, making idle conversation while Azalea stood in static terror. Ten feet away, she came to a firm halt, her hands burning with her very soul. "Come on! You said you'd wipe me clean off the Earth, didn't you?! Then be the hero, if you aren't all talk!"
Azalea shook away the doubt and roared, his arms adopting a tiger's muscles and claws. He broke into sprint, enthused by the spirit of combat as he leapt at her with one, decisive pounce. Pride surged through his blood—pride for humanity, pride for witchkind, and a pride all his own, all united in a singular desire to protect the world he knew from Medusa Gorgon.
Defying her instincts, Victoria stood and waited as the savage beast came at her, until he took up everything in her vision. Right arm first. It felt as though time had slowed to a crawl when she swung, striking his inner elbow with a straight jab, then doing the same to his left in an instant, crippling any attempt at an attack. "OOORRRYAAAAAAAH!" Flaming blows rained on Azalea, powerless before her breaking onslaught.
That monster woman... I would've brought company if I'd known she was this—! Those were the only coherent reflections formed in Azalea's mind before the final hit connected, pushing his face in with an unpleasant CRACK before his body catapulted off, going straight through the fence and into some alleyway.
/
"Nnnrgh..." Azalea tried to sit up. He really did. But with every twitch, he got a physical reminder of how the battle went. Burn scars and bruises. Burn scars and bruises. Burn scars and bruises and broken bones. "Somebody, P-PLEASE...!" He moaned, muffled by the concrete ground. He groveled. Then he remembered.
Medusa Gorgon.
He laid a palm forward, using it to drag himself an inch further. Voices, lots of them, rang in his ears, on the streets beyond the alley. His eyes widened, spiked with adrenaline. Azalea forced his bloodied legs to crawl of his own willpower, panicked breaths escaping from his lips. Light enveloped his fingers, nearly emerged from the shadows of the alley. "I've gotta tell someone...Somebody has to learn! M-Medusa Gorgon... Medusa Gorgon is...!"
"Vector Arrow!" Something sharp like a knife struck the back of his head, swiftly freezing him to the spot. The object twisted, and Azalea's hope began to break down with each horrid squish, along with his bodily functions. The arrow retracted, pulling Azalea back to the darkness from whence he came.
Victoria panted, and stared at Azalea's dead body. Any traces of animal were gone, replaced by his mangled, human self. His pupils were rolled upwards, forever locked into an agonized expression with an agape jaw. The limbs were curled inward, once-rigid towers battered to brittleness. It was when she knelt down to move his body further away that she saw it; the rich, thick human blood that stained her knuckles, the very same that were honed as enforcers of justice, and the very same that shook hands with Death Scythes. "I-I...did this." She shook her head in denial, but she knew fully well. She'd made herself capable of doing very terrible things, and there was no going back.
"And you did well, Victoria." Medusa's cold voice pierced her eardrums, shaking at the sound of it. "I didn't intend for it..." Her tone trailed with intrigue, drawing her long index finger through the sanguine puddle. "But there's enough blood to be salvaged for the base. I just need to make sure it isn't exposed for so long and..."
Victoria snapped. Without even thinking, she shot around and decked Medusa while she was close, knocking her against the alley wall. "What the hell is wrong with you?! 'It', like he's already some variable! Did your empathy die in the same ditch you were born in?"
Medusa was still recoiling from the hit, using the wall as support while she wiped her face. She made a point to glare at Victoria as a reminder of who was in charge. "My empathy for this world died when it decided it would rather stagnate in fragile peace than risk advancement towards something grand on this insignificant hunk of space-rock." Her mismatched eyes widened, grinning a joyless grin. "This is my retribution, Victoria; petty and magnificent. Witness it."
With that, Medusa's snake tattoo sparked to life and seized Azalea in its jaws, eyeing Victoria closely as its master turned heel and walked away. How far am I gonna have to go to satisfy your revenge plot, Medusa? She stared at Medusa's fading silhouette for a long while, watching. There was nothing to make of her, nothing but an evil, incomprehensible woman.
"Leonard Sax is dead." The announcement was flat and swift, reducing an already-quiet room to silence while a man's fingers drummed on a round table. "I used Lobelia to scan the surrounding area. Azalea wilted away once it couldn't feed off his soul anymore."
The older man in the room deflated, his lips quivering beneath his hood. "He was undeserving...of such a fate. Just a young man..." He coughed and wheezed, prompting the woman at his side to steady him.
"Out with such talk. You strike fear into the sage's heart. Jane, Adan, and Cecília are only hospitalized right now. How can you prove that Leonard suffered such a fate when they still breathe life?" She hissed, before turning to reassure the old man. "There is no substantial proof, my sire. We've no reason to believe him until he can show us."
A glint shone in the man's thin glasses. "Isadora, do I have to trouble myself further?" He snapped his fingers. "Lobelia, return." Within a minute, pitter-patter footsteps could be heard scaling the spiraling stairs leading to their meeting room. Three little imps busted into the room, each the size of a palm, carrying something large over their heads. They jumped from chair-to-table, placing down the object in the light. It was a flower necklace, drenched in blood—unmistakably Azalea.
"Hah...!" The woman gasped, stepping over to clutch the dead petals in her hands. "He said he was off to kill Victoria Brandt..." So it was confirmed: the DWMA was out for blood now. But that was alright—Toxicity was braced for this much, much longer.
"They draw close to our position... Shall we stay and confront them tomorrow?" The old man held the Book of Eibon like his life depended on it. If it was back in that infernal sorcerer's clutches, Toxicity's entire operation would be in vain.
The woman rose at his suggestion, wisps of smoke trailing from her hand. "Perhaps we should... I could try to take out as many as I can with Gloriosa Superba, sire."
The other man, however, was not so eager. "No need. I've contacted a mercenary who's going to escort the book further to the capital. If you'd be willing to entrust it to outsiders, that is."
"Heresy!" The woman slammed her palms on the table.
"N-Now now." The sage put his hands up, willing to hear the idea out. "We are in dire straits. We may cast aside some of our pride, but the importance of our cause dwarfs that tenfold." He made eye contact with the young man. "When is he expected?"
"Tomorrow morning. I don't expect him to run into any trouble on his way, but if he does..." The tempo of his finger-drumming picked up. "He's efficient."
The conversation lost momentum, leaving Toxicity's thinning numbers to wait, and wonder in anticipation.
AN: Here we are again with a Victoria chapter. Hope the drama wasn't too ham-fisted, but as you've come to expect, criticism's welcome. Exploring more and more of Toxicity is plain fun. Scratch that—worldbuilding in general is just fun.