Chapter 2 – The Mask of Anarchy
2015
"Shouldn't we start with…? I don't know… hand to hand combat?" Luz asked her while she finished loading the air gun with pellets. They were both at the back of a warehouse surrounded by trash and the sound of machines from said place.
"I heard you could handle yourself pretty well against two grown men and there are just a few out there who know how to actually fight but, almost every criminal carries a gun. You were lucky the ones you fought weren't carrying one, and you might not be so lucky next time, so…" She shot the girl in the leg before she could even react, making her scream in pain.
"What the hell, Eda!?" The girl looked at her with an angry frown and she couldn't help but think about how much she reminded her of Camilia.
"Do you think people in the streets are going to wait for you to be ready? Besides, this pellets don't really hurt… too much… so, stop being dramatic and stop me from shooting you again." She pointed the gun at the Latina who started running towards her in a straight line. A pellet came out as soon as she pulled the trigger, hitting the girl right in the chest and making her flinch in pain, a moment she took advantage of and shot her again in the head, making her scream in pain.
"Can you stop shooting me!?" The girl yelled, anger on her voice.
"Sure I can. Would a criminal stop?" She shot her again in the chest and then lowered the gun. "I don't think so." Luz growled with frustration and she walked to get closer to her. "This is lesson number one in which I show you how much of a fool you are for wanting to be a hero without magic."
"Inspiring words coming from the Owl Lady herself." The girl's pout made her chuckle and she put a hand on her head, patting it lightly.
"Then you know they come from someone who knows the job." She lifted the gun and pointed it at the girl again. "Now: are you going to stop here or do you actually want to learn how to kick ass?"
2021
The window opened with a loud thud as she pushed it to enter her apartment. She was in too much pain to care and she also needed to treat her wounds quickly and see how bad they were.
She couldn't help but growl as her movement made her pain even more intense. Dizziness overtook her for a second and she accidentally hit herself on the couch when she was on her way to turn on the lights.
Biting her lip lightly, she stopped another growl from coming out as she started to take her costume off while walking towards the kitchen to get her first aid kit.
Just when she had gotten completely naked to see how injured she was, there was a knock at the door, startling her and making her heart beat faster than ever, especially when the person on the other side said she was a cop.
Taking a deep breath to calm herself, she walked towards the door while thinking about what to say about her nakedness and sweat. She had never been really good at lying, but thankfully, that situation was pretty easy to handle.
The hardest part was to keep a straight face while she spoke to the police woman. Her leg hurt like hell and she also felt some pain on her side every time she spoke.
Luckily, her new cop neighbor seemed to believe everything she said and left, so she went back to the task at hand.
After taking the first aid kit again, she sat at the couch and took out everything in the little bag, putting it beside her and taking a small cushion to bite it, knowing that her pain was about to get worse once she started cleaning the wound.
Breathing quickly, she started cleaning around the wound on her leg with a gauze and some alcohol, biting the cushion as hard as she could to avoid screaming.
Once it was cleaned up, she could see that it was a pretty big wound. She even thought about calling her mom to help her, but she decided not to. This was the life she had chosen. She had to do this by herself.
Luz screamed into the cushion as she started stitching her wound. She had made a mistake that night and she had almost been shot. Luckily (sort of) the bullet just scratched her, but it hurt like hell and it was quite a big scratch, so she decided that a few stitches wouldn't hurt (figuratively, because literally, it really did hurt like hell).
She was thankful that her encounter with her new cop neighbor gave her a boost of adrenaline to help with the pain, but it still hurt.
After a few minutes of the most horrible pain she had experienced, she was finally done and tossed everything she had used to the floor in order to lay on the couch and rest. Even if she felt cold because of her nakedness, she didn't have the energy to move right now.
"You can't just jump into action like you're fucking Superman. You're not bulletproof so, you have to assess the situation before you act." Eda's words played on her mind when she closed her eyes, understanding now how important that lesson had been. Even after five years of training, she still had a lot to learn. The woman had been right when she told her that, but she couldn't wait anymore. Five years had been enough to keep her on edge. The only reason she waited that long was because of the ritual Eda performed, but she was eager to start saving people. Problem was, she had to start thinking about her safety too if she really wanted to help others. She couldn't get home all banged up every day.
"Detective Amity. Thank you for coming. I'm sorry I had to call you in just when I had promised you a few days off but, we had a situation and we need all hands on deck right now." Captain Clawthorne spoke as she sat on her chair, signaling for her to do the same in the one in front of her desk.
"There's no problem, Captain. How can I be of assistance?" She responded with a stern tone, the one she always used when talking to a superior officer.
"Last night the… Owl Lady attacked a group of mobsters on the docks. When we got to the scene, we found thousands of pounds of cocaine, methamphetamine and heroine. Some men were still there too, confirming that the Owl Lady was the one who attacked them. I put your siblings in charge of the investigation and I would like for you to aid them. There's a certain name that raises concern in this investigation." The older woman took a picture from her desk and showed it to her. It was a picture of a wooden box with a white raven painted on its side, a thing she remembered quite well.
"Raventhorn is back." She said, not believing what she was seeing. First, the Owl Lady came back after twenty years and now her biggest and worst enemy was coming back too? It was too weird to be a coincidence.
"We do not know for sure. The theory right now is that we are dealing with a copycat. Someone who wants to use Raventhorn's reputation to control the market again." She nodded, understanding the situation and starting to think about the best way to play things out.
"I should go to the scene immediately then." She stood up but was stopped by the woman in front of her.
"No. I called you here because, while your siblings are still there sorting things out, I want you to start interrogating the perps." She nodded again and turned around to get out of the office.
"Understood. I'll start immediately." She got out and closed the door behind her, starting to walk towards the interrogation room.
She couldn't stop thinking about how big of a coincidence it all was. Twenty years of nothing and all of a sudden, the Owl Lady, The Boiling Isles' biggest "hero", was back from retirement and then, a few days after that, they find a lot of drugs with the Owl Lady's biggest enemy as the prime suspect.
What if the Owl Lady was not really a hero, but someone who had a grudge against Raventhorn? That would explain why she disappeared at the end of 2000, right after Raventhorn disappeared too. Could the Owl Lady be connected to a different crime organization? Maybe she was the head of one of those organizations they could never really stop. That would explain why they keep coming back. Maybe she was the head of the Japanese or the Russians. But then, that made no real sense. There were people that talked about how great the Owl Lady was and how many she had saved.
Yet again, a lot of people used to say that her name and actions only represented anarchy, a thought she didn't share back when she was just a kid, listening to the tales of that hero.
Clearing her thoughts, she entered the interrogation room, ready to talk to whomever was there to get some answers.
"This is gonna take years! Look at all the evidence we have!" Edric spoke dramatically, making her chuckle.
"That's the job. To catch the bad guys and make sure they stay in a cell, we have to do all this boring stuff, bro." Her brother sighed in defeat as he kept writing his report.
She felt a vibration on her jacket, someone was calling her and, given how the phone just vibrated and didn't make a sound, she knew who it was, so she walked away from her brother to answer the call.
"I have something for you." The voice on the other side of the phone said. It was a distorted voice that made it impossible to know if the person talking was a man, a woman or even a demon.
"I'm in the middle of something. Can I meet you later?" She spoke in a whisper, not wanting anyone to hear her.
"I know you're at the docks. I'm here too. Come out of the warehouse and walk to the trash cans where you already finished filing the evidence." The voice said calmly and then the call ended, not giving her even a second to say anything, so she just sighed and walked towards her brother again.
"Who was that?" Edric asked, not taking away his attention from the report he was writing.
"My landlord." She lied quickly, already used to it. "I forgot to give him this month's money and I promised to pay him tonight."
"Ha! And just a week ago you were calling me an idiot for the exact same thing." He stopped for a second what he was doing just to look at her with a silly grin, making her sigh in faked annoyance.
"Whatever. I'm gonna go to the bathroom, alright? Don't fool around. I would like to finish this today so that we can go home when we're supposed to." She turned around to get out of the warehouse, still listening to her brother complaining about how boring that part of the job was.
On her way out, she made sure to ask a couple of uniformed cops where the nearest bathroom was, just to have a solid alibi in case someone asked about her. In just a couple minutes, she was out of the building, walking towards the trash cans and seeing the figure of a girl she knew well standing amongst the trash.
"We need to stop meeting like this." She spoke once she was close enough for the other person to hear her without worrying about someone else doing so.
"Is it because I don't have my costume?" The brunette got closer to her in a couple of steps and then hugged her lightly.
"Honestly? Yes. Spandex does wonders to your figure." Returning the hug, she also planted a kiss on the girl's head. "Although, it is easier to explain why my girlfriend is at a crime scene." Viney chuckled a little and then broke the hug, looking at her.
"That's why I do it but, whatever." The shorter girl handed her a paper bag and she took it, opening it to see a sandwich and a soda can. "There's a napkin there with a location. We captured a guy who got away last night. We interrogated him and he said he shot the owl lady and then ran. The guy's still there, tied to a column."
"He shot her?" Emira looked at her girlfriend in disbelief.
"Exactly. That's why I came right now." The brunette looked around as if to make sure no one was listening to them. "I know that Raventhorn seems to be back but, after hearing what that guy said, I think that this new Owl Lady is a copycat, which could mean that this Raventhorn is a copycat too."
"I mean, it is surprising to hear that the Owl Lady got shot but, it's not that weird, right? She might be a powerful witch, but she's still just a person." She took out the sandwich from the bag and started eating it, making her girlfriend giggle and making her remember how much Viney said she was a bottomless pit of food.
"A person, yes. Powerful witch? I don't think so. We avoid bullets with magic. At most, we get some scratches if we're not careful enough, but we don't get shot." She swallowed, thinking about everything the shorter girl had told her.
"Okay so, knowing this, that means we have the Owl Lady's blood on this crime scene and we can also skip a few steps of the investigation since we were already starting to look into her old file." Viney nodded with a smile.
"Exactly. You just have to find an excuse to go to that location…" The brunette signaled the paper bag on her hands. "And then you will be able to tie everything I said so that you can find either Raventhorn's copycat or the Owl Lady's faster. Maybe you even get lucky and the blood you find leads you directly to her." In an impulse, she hugged her girlfriend tightly, making her groan.
"I love you so much right now!" Loosening her grip on the girl, she lowered her head and gave her a tiny kiss on the lips. "But I've got to go. I have a ton of work I need to finish if we want to hang out later tonight. I mean, if you're able…"
"Sure thing. I can spare a couple hours for my cute bonehead." They kissed again, a longer kiss this time.
"Right now I love you so much that I don't even care about what you just said." A giggle came out of both of them before they finally separated and started walking in opposite directions.
2015
"Okay kid. Lesson number one in hand to hand combat: Try to finish the fight in one blow." Luz and Eda were standing at the back of the warehouse where they trained almost every day, both of them wearing loose clothes to move around easily.
"So, aim for the head?" The older woman got in front of her and took a fighting position, which she imitated quickly.
"Try that." As soon as the white haired woman finished speaking, she threw a punch towards her face, but it was quickly blocked by the woman who, in a swift movement, kicked her in the shinbone, making her scream in pain as she fell to the floor.
"Jesus fuck, Eda!" She yelled still on the floor, breathing deeply as if trying to not be affected by the pain.
"Hey! Don't say things I would or your mom will get mad at me again." The witch offered her hand to help her get up and she took it, groaning in pain as soon as she put her weight on her leg again. "Now, what did you learn from that?"
"That you are a mean woman who enjoys bullying people." Eda laughed out loud at her comment and made no effort to correct her.
"Fair. But that's not what I meant." Luz got silent for a second, thinking about what the right answer could be until she came up with something.
"I should aim for the legs first, then?" She took a deep breath after speaking, feeling the pain fading slowly.
"Not exactly." The older woman got closer to her and took her by the arms, putting a leg between hers. "The first thing is: you need to stand up properly before you start throwing punches. Otherwise, any puny kick like the one I threw is going to end with you on the floor, ready to be kicked to dead by a criminal." She moved her legs guided by Eda's movements. "The second one: If you aim for someone's face, they will react quickly. You're not fighting blind people. If they can see what's coming, they're not going to wait for you to hit them before they react. Real life is not like a TV show, girl." Once the witch thought she had left her in a good position, she took a step back and also took a fighting stand again. "Lastly: You're not boxing. If you only look at my fists, you will never see a kick coming." Luz looked at Eda's legs and saw a kick coming her way, making her take a couple steps back to avoid it, but before she could do anything else, she felt a punch connecting in her belly, making her fall to her knees without air, feeling like she was about to throw up.
"Are you… serious?" The Latina complained while still on the floor, trying to take back the air that had gone out of her lungs.
"Jesus, kid. You have the reflexes of a dead cat." The white haired woman's laugh echoed through her ears while she still felt dizzy on the floor. "I think we will have to postpone this lesson." At those words, she stood up again, acting as if she was okay even though she still felt like throwing up.
"It's okay. I'm fine." Swallowing hard, she stood again ready to fight.
"No, you're not. And when I said we will postpone this lesson is because I will have to train your reflexes first. I'm not stopping your training so, go ahead and throw up in the dumpster before we start that. You're looking paler than me." The older woman sat at one of the boxes near a trash bag while she ran towards the dumpster and vomited her breakfast out, strangely motivated to keep going.
Hey! I'm back with chapter 2!
First of all: There was a brief mention of a ritual which will be explained later as the story progresses so, don't get mad at me just for mentioning it and then not telling you what it is, hahahah.
Another thing: I guess you all know already who Raventhorn is going to be (It took me a while to pick a name I thought was fitting, but it's still pretty obvious) and I promise you, we will get more backstory on her in the future.
Lastly: As you can see, I'm not focusing much on anyone's feelings when we're on their POV's and that's because this story is just starting, we will get there eventually.
I posted a drawing I made for this chapter in my twitter, in case you wanna go see it. You can find me at gloomy_autumn and, if you like what you see, you can follow me (I'm one of those who follows back, don't worry, hahahaha).
And well, that's it for this week. I intent to upload a chapter a week (like I always intent to) but, I might fail so, that's just a heads up in case you don't see me next thursday, hahahaha.
Thank you for reading!