To Cesar848: I'm partial to "Dumbass-holes," personally!
To Lyger 0: Wrong transformation phrase :D
To Butterfly: Glad you got your power back!
To StarDaPanda225: Still a few chapters left before we get to that point…
To yellow 14: Felix and the Ripper definitely have a "date with destiny" coming up!
Bri slowly trudged out of her Electrical and Electronic Engineering class into the grey afternoon on Thursday, her hands in her pockets, hugging her new Ladybug sweatshirt close for comfort. She hadn't wanted to go to class today, either – all she had wanted to do for the last week was to sleep – sleep and pretend that she had never even heard of the Stripper Ripper. She had tried to call her mother the day before to talk to her about… about Friday. She had woken up Wednesday morning in a cold sweat, the Ripper's stench burning in her throat, terrified that he would be standing over her–that he had somehow found her and was in her bedroom, ready to finish the job. Her finger had been hovering over her mother's contact information on the screen of her newly-repaired bracelet when she had paused.
If she told her mother, her mother would of course tell her father. And Bri had no illusions about what her father would do if he found out what had happened to her. And for as much as she wanted her father to have Mecha-Man stomp the Ripper's face into jelly, his last visit had almost ended in half of London exploding. If that happened again now, and as a result of her actions, whatever meagre catharsis the Ripper's demise might bring would be more than outweighed by the guilt of indirectly causing even more damage to the city.
Although Bri was starting to change her mind, if the previous night was any portent of the future.
Even if she hadn't heard that anguished shriek through the phone, it had been loud enough and close enough for her to hear it from her bedroom. Despite being on the phone, the Hound had hardly said another word to her after that. When the call had disconnected abruptly, she had nearly panicked – not from fear for him but because of what she could already envision that his sudden silence meant. She had tried calling the Hound back, but he hadn't answered. It had been morning before she found out what had happened from the e-news. Another Ripper attack, another woman gutted, raped, and murdered. She had finally called Amelie, who had confirmed what she already suspected: the Hound had arrived too late to save the victim and missed capturing the Ripper by mere moments. All because of that goddamn Dark Acolyte.
All because she was too weak and scared to go out and help him.
Despite the clusters of people she could see walking around the campus, huddling in small groups beside benches and trees – some of whom she even recognized from shared classes – Bri felt utterly alone. The sky over her head rumbled – an impending thunderstorm to match the storm clouds raging in her mind. She looked up into the sky and watched the cloud formations swirl around in the wind. A couple drops fell on her face, and she pulled up the sweatshirt's hood, pulling it tight for warmth. That could have been her, dying alone in an alley because no one came to help her in time. Dying because help had been waylaid.
A flash of colour from the far side of the campus caught her eye. A man in dark purple robes with sandy blond hair strode purposely down the sidewalk, a long, thin walking staff in his hand, apparently cutting across the college. Bri was about to turn away – King's College attracted all sorts of strange people – but stopped to take a closer look. She had only seen a handful of the pictures of Dark Acolytes taken by the Heroes of Paris, but something about the way this man carried himself set off alarm bells in her head. Suspicious, she jogged across the campus to follow him.
The man led her east along the Strand a couple of blocks, setting a brisk pace as he walked. Bri narrowed her eyes: while she wasn't close enough to make it out, he appeared to be speaking to himself, gesturing subtly with one hand. Surreptitiously she raised her left arm, aimed carefully, and shot a tiny bug that snagged in the back of his robe. She extracted a wireless earbud from her bracelet to listen in.
"Why would the miraculous abuser be so interested in this area of the city?" the man muttered to himself. "Why would he claim to be helping people, despite using a miraculous?"
Bri's eyes widened. This was the man who had attacked the Hound – the Vicar. This was the reason he couldn't save the victim last night! The Dark Acolyte turned up Chancery Lane with Bri only a block behind him, racing to reach the corner and keep him in sight. She looked furtively around at the small number of people on the streets, none of whom paid her any attention. It was close to dinnertime. The clouds cut off the sunset, giving the appearance of being later in the day than it really was. All the same, she didn't want to be out past nightfall…
But if she allowed this Dark Acolyte to get away, what might happen the next time the Hound tried to stop the Ripper? What if he ambushed the Hound while he was just out on patrol? And anyways, if the Ripper stuck to pattern, she was safe for tonight.
The Dark Acolyte turned into the archway by the library, and Bri hustled to catch up, her steps loud to her ears on the cobblestones. She raced after him but pulled up short when she peeked around the corner to find him standing under the covered archway, watching her.
"I know you are there," he announced, eyeing her warily. "Why are you following me?"
Bri pressed her back against the brick wall along Chancery, trying to still her racing heart. The clouds above turned darker. "Are you the Vicar, the one who keeps attacking miraculous users?"
He gave an amused hum and raised an eyebrow. "If you are asking that question, you must already know the answer."
Bri flicked her wrists and caught the controls for both her bracelets holding them inside her sleeves. Hands clenched into white-knuckled fists around the controls, she stepped around the corner, eyes narrowed at him in a challenge. "Why don't you try your luck with me?"
"You may wish you hadn't made that offer, girl," the Vicar observed. Quick as lightning, he whipped a wad of chi-putty from his sleeve and flung it at her. It glommed onto her sweatshirt, sticking to a black spot near her collarbone. The Vicar smirked. "All too easy."
Bri arched an eyebrow and glanced down at the chi-putty stain dispassionately. "Was that supposed to do something?" she asked sardonically before pressing a button and whipping her arm around as quick as lightning. The barrel deployed from her right bracelet as she brought it to bear, sending a beam of energy straight at the Vicar's head.
The Vicar stared at her in wide-eyed shock. He dove to the ground and scrambled backward around the corner and out from under the archway and into the deserted courtyard beyond as Bri peppered the ground around him with energy blasts. She advanced on him, eyes aflame, aiming her bracelet at the corner around which he had fled. She slowly, carefully slid around the corner, watching for the Vicar's attack. "Not so tough now, are you?" she taunted.
The Vicar charged around the corner, quarterstaff raised, swinging for her head. "Any friend of a miraculous abuser is my enemy!" Bri dropped her foot back, retracted her energy weapon, and raised her arms in an X shape to catch the strike on both bracelets, redirecting it to the side and away from herself. The Vicar stumbled. Bri dropped into a crouch, leaned forward, and punched him in the gut. He let out a surprised grunt and imbalanced, falling onto his back foot. The end of his staff dropped to the ground, and he slid it forward, catching it behind her knee and pulling her foot off the ground. She stumbled backward and hit the cobblestones on her butt with a grunt. "There is no mercy for those who threaten the balance of the universe!"
Bri glared up at him. "That's okay; I wasn't going to offer you any mercy, either!" She shifted her position to bring her legs under herself and surged forward, arms outstretched, lunging straight into his gut. Eyes widening in surprise, the Vicar brought his quarterstaff to bear, but too late. She caught him in a flying tackle and knocked him backward, landing astride his chest, the quarterstaff pinned between them. With a scream she punched him in the chest, eliciting a gasp. Again and again she drove her fists into his chest. "You think you're helping people!?" she demanded, slapping him across the face. "You're only hurting them!" Another punch. "My friend was trying to save someone last night, and You. Stopped. Him!" Again and again she punched him with each word. "Another woman dead, because of you!" She brought her fists together over her head and slammed them down into his chest.
The Vicar spat a mouthful of blood onto the cobblestones beside him and glared up at her. "You think you can blame me for the actions of the miraculous abuser?" He exhaled through his nose and simultaneously drove his fist into her gut. Bri gasped in shock at the force of it – so much it pushed her off of him into the air. As she came down, he followed up the punch with a kick to the stomach that sent her flying backward across the courtyard. He kipped to his feet and loomed over her, his staff clenched tightly in one hand. With a gasp Bri pushed herself up on one elbow, glaring up at him. The Vicar advanced, eyes wild with anger. "I am not the one using magic which imbalances the universe!"
"I'm not, either!" she snapped. He raised his staff, twirled it once over his head, and swung in a downward chop. Bri raised her arm and got off a quick shot, hitting the quarterstaff in the middle and bisecting it cleanly. The broken half fell into her other hand and she swung at his legs. He jumped back away from her, and she shot her grappling hook, looping it around one of his legs. His eyes widened and she jerked him to the ground. She hit the new button on her control, sending an electric pulse down the grapple wire. The Vicar convulsed, a stifled yelp of pain escaping his throat. She released the button and rose to her feet, aiming the energy pistol on her other bracelet at his head, her finger on the triggers of both bracelets. He fell back to the ground, gasping for breath. "Now leave my friend alone!"
He stared up at her in shock, mouth agape, and kicked his leg out, knocking the grappling hook away from his ankle. Bri hit the taser trigger again, but too late. The moment he was free the Vicar rolled backward to his feet, narrowly avoiding the energy pulse that shattered a cobblestone beneath his hand, and ran off without looking back. Bri shifted her other bracelet to the grappling hook and shot, narrowly missing his waist as he fled. He raced across the cobbled sidewalk past the library, Bri in hot pursuit. Reaching Fetter Lane, he dove around the corner of the building. When Bri reached the street, he had disappeared.
Bri groaned in frustration as her grappling hooks retracted automatically. She'd let him get away! She almost didn't hear her bracelet ringing with an incoming call. With a sigh she hit the button. "Hello?"
"Hey, girl!" Anne called cheerily. "I was just finishing up at the library archives – leaving onto Chancery right now. You wouldn't believe what I found out today! I was looking up the history of the college property before the founding of London."
Bri relaxed on hearing her flatmate's voice. "So how much more of this research are you planning to do?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.
"I mean, I can't just stop now," she replied with a carefree laugh. "The next book might have exactly what I'm looking for and contradict everything I've found already!"
"It sounds like an addiction," Bri observed in some amusement.
"You have no idea." Anne hummed in confusion. Her voice became softer as if she had taken the phone away from her mouth. "Hang on, can I help you? I–" Her voice cut off with a startled gasp.
"Anne?" Bri stared down at her bracelet. It remained silent. "Anne!?"
Heaving breathing on the other end of the line. A voice she would never forget whispered, "You will do nicely for the sacrifice."
"Anne!"
