Chapter 3
Dedra Hall watched the snowfall profusely out of her living room window with the hope that her precious daughter would make it home before noon. The first thing she did that very morning was to check her daughter's room for any sign of the poor child, but nothing. She placed her hand on her perfectly made bed with the tiger embroidered picture on it, and felt a burst of fear rush through her body. She looked at Jessica's sketch art of butterflies that she had in frames on the wall above her neatly made bed, and wondered where her daughter could be. Nothing had changed in the room from the previous night. She spent hours pacing the living room floor until she fell asleep on the couch for a few hours. Frustrated, she made several failed attempts to call her daughter's cellphone, but it went straight to voice mail. At first, she thought her daughter deliberately turned off her cellphone, but she quickly squelched that idea in her mind. When she walked past the brown coffee table that she laid in front of the leather couch, she stubbed her toe on the corner. "Dammit!" Now it was one of the coldest mornings of the year, and the snow had covered her car completely, and came up midway on the living room window. Picking up the cellphone off the table, she held it with an aggressively tight grip in the hopes that her daughter would call, but she hadn't received one call or text the entire night. Jessica had been missing for nearly eighteen hours, and she couldn't locate her using a tracking device on her phone. Dedra didn't hesitate to put a tracking device on her daughter's phone because Gotham had too many odious characters in its mist. Children went missing all the time, and some of the people at the hospital where she worked as a nurse talked about an elite group of men that kept a community of sex slaves hidden beneath the city. The residents of Gotham had seen small children used in a salacious manner, but turned the other way because it was customary not to get involved. Nobody wanted to take responsibility for the children who lived in the sewers of Gotham. The surface dwellers made a lucrative game of preying on the subsurface dwellers, and nobody cared. Nearly eighty thousand kids lived under the city at any given time, and more ended up homeless every day. Nearly every spacious room in the sewers that stretched across Gotham had shanty towns, and Dedra made sure her daughter never associated with those people. She didn't live in a large house, but it had all the amenities she needed: stove, central heat and air, computer, refrigerator, running water, and so on. Like most of the homes in Gotham, she had two personal computers that set in the far corner of the living room and one in Jessica's bedroom, but did the majority of her communications through a mobile, black tablet computer that she had attached to her waist. In most homes in Gotham, a family had more tablet computers than individuals to use them because new books were sold on a replete tablet PC. One of the amenities of the house was a red button next to the front door with the word "Deicer" above it. She pushed the red button, and the snow slowly melted in the front yard. It took only a few hours for the snow to turn into water, and give her the freedom she needed to go to work. The thought of her daughter being sold into sex slavery crossed her mind, but it wasn't her worse thought. She feared something might have activated her dormant meta-human powers. The fear of her clandestine powers surfacing without warning scared her immensely. She thought of her daughter's hidden powers as meta-human instead of what Jessica really was in the scheme of powerful beings throughout the universe. Jessica was a direct descendant of a race of gods that existed in an alternative universe on her father's side. Her human DNA made the process of transforming into a Titan, an ugly endeavor because of the cocooning process. It took an outside force to initiate her cocooning phase; and then after that, she would grow in strength and other abilities. She'd see the world differently as she grew in strength and power too. Unfortunately, the path of good and evil wasn't clear. Her father—Derrick Hall—possessed a magical glove called "The Glove of Darkness" that gave him the ability to walk between universes, influence people's will, and essentially kill enemies. After he went through the pain of the cocooning process, "The Glove of Darkness" called to him like a sea nymph in the night. No matter how much a person of his race tried to block the call of the glove, it overwhelmed their every desire. Unfortunately, he gave up fighting crime, returned "The Glove of Darkness" to his people, and took refuge in the Celestial Kingdom—the only place that minimized his desire for the glove. He had a horrendous battle in the Gray Universe against their Superman. That Superman was evil and petty; and when Derrick confronted him about his cruel behavior, a fight ensued. Once Derrick used the glove to make Superman feel all his sins, it empowered the Man of Steel. He grew stronger from all the pain that he caused his world, and went on a killing spree that took out entire nations on the Gray Earth. Angered, Derrick returned to the Gray Universe in order to remove the evilness from power, and he did. Unfortunately, the battle nearly destroyed Derrick's will to live, and the glove tried to force him to become the new ruler on the Gray Earth. When Derrick resisted the glove's power, it forced him into a lamenting phase that caused him to travel to the Celestial Kingdom for rest. It didn't take him long to realize that the Celestial Kingdom was his only solace against the will of the glove. She wanted to keep her daughter from knowing her heritage because possession of "The Glove of Darkness" came with its own set of problems. When her husband possessed the glove, she never knew if he controlled the glove or if the glove somehow controlled him. The glove came with its on set of moral values that didn't necessarily mesh with society's values. The glove had the ability to carry out its own brand of justice that sometimes included complete annihilation of the target. The glove frightened Dedra because with one touch, a few words, and the glove could make an individual face all their demons. It was enough to tear the strongest of beings apart. The cocooning process would take close to a week; and then after that, she'd be almost impervious to most outside forces. But at the same time, she'd feel a longing for "The Glove of Darkness" because the desire to have it was an innate calling. She'd feel incomplete without the glove—almost a feeling of madness. Regardless of her situation, her birthright would eventually happen, and she'd be an uncontrollable force of nature. Dedra looked out the window at the falling snow, and wondered if she did the right thing about keeping her daughter in the dark about her heritage. It was her prerogative to keep her sweet daughter out of the crazy world of superpowers. She wanted to warn her about the cocooning, but didn't know how to tell her. It was highly probable to initiate the cocooning using certain medicines, but she chose not to do it. In any case, she didn't fear Jessica's birthright; she feared "The Glove of Darkness." Dedra went into her attic, rummaged through hundreds of Derrick's journals, and found the one about cocooning that she needed in order to find out where her daughter might be. When Derrick podded, he went into a secure location in his school's boiler room that had somewhat of a steamy atmosphere. Unfortunately, Gotham had tons of buildings with steamy boiler rooms, and her search would seem endless, especially in the deep, unending snow. Even though she deiced her yard and the city of Gotham did an admirable job at clearing the main streets, the neighborhood streets more often than not were impassable. The bus would have dropped her off about a mile away near Fifth Street, and the majority of the buildings in that area were vacant. However, the sewers beneath Fifth Street would most likely have the dampness and warmth needed for the cocooning, she thought. Frustrated, she did a lackluster job at cleaning the snow off her car, but cleared enough of the thick, white stuff to see out the driver's window. The deicer melted most of the snow in her yard, and gave her the ability to at least drive the car into the middle of the street where other cars had trudged out a path. The machines piled tons of snow on the side of roads, and Fifth Street was completely cleared of the snow and ice. She didn't hesitate to climb into the dark sewer, and quickly walked towards the lump of biological mass attached to the wall. She placed her hands on the cocoon, and could feel the life form on the inside of it. It was the first time that she had seen an actual cocoon, but knew what to expect because her husband drew a picture of it in his journal. "I should have warned you of this," she said with a whisper. "Your life will forever be changed, baby." She sat beside the pod, pulled out her tablet computer, and took a picture of the cocoon. At first, she felt a bit of relief knowing that her daughter was safe; but at the same time, she felt distraught knowing the pain she'd endure trying to control her powers. She'd need a lot of patience, a bit of grace, and as much eloquence as possible to control the pain of being a descendant of gods. The structure of the pod looked more like a gigantic pea pod except it was dark brown. According to Derrick's notes, the pod would be tan when the rebirth happened. Derrick wrote that the occupant of the pod wouldn't be oblivious to the outside world, and it was important to be careful not to speak ill of it. It would take approximately four more days for Jessica's rebirth, and she'd need plenty of food upon her arrival.