Chibiyu: So you all want to know if Joe's ok, right?

Nick: She killed him twice…was it only two times? You are off your game.

Chibiyu: Sorry, I was too busy killing you.

Nick: …don't remind me.

()()()()()()()()()()())()()()()

"Longer than any of you bastards." She would have said more, if not for the unconscious scream plowing through her well concealed mind. "While you fools debate on the status of my son," she spoke quickly, already heading towards the door of the replacement council hall, "My other son needs help. Unlike you, he is doing something useful."

Sandy Lucas left the room, waiting for the doors to swing closed before breaking off into a dead run.

()()()()()()()()()()())()()()()

The heaviness of the air as it pushes against her wings, drawing her closer to the earth, entangling her in a hold stronger than gravity – she don't like it. Though no smoke covers the falling sun, the world beneath is darker. There used to only be the faint twitter of birds or the occasional insult to those considered evil or useless. But now, now there was more – the tinkling of glass as crime mounted as the muffled cries of those unwilling to mourn in the public eye and the shivers of fear cascading down everyone's spine. Twenty-four hours have yet to pass and yet the streets have changed.

The girl landed, heavier than she would have normally done, on the brick windowsill. Her gaze pierced through the gaped curtains, watching the Hero called Nurse stand, blood staining her fingertips. She saw the middle Lucas's pale face as he pulled himself up, forcing a smile to his crowding family and nodding in thanks to Nurse. The Villain eyed the parents, throat constricting as her eyes narrowed, but it must be done. So she tapped on the glass relentlessly, only stopping when Kevin opened the window.

"I told you this would happen, didn't I?" the girl accused, not even taking a moment to exchange pleasantries. "I told you he wasn't safe. You all should have known the other message behind that. They will go after you just as they went after Nick before this fiasco. Get to you, use you as bait, and control Nick, control the Four."

"Paragon,"

"No, Kevin," she cut across, holding up her hand. "I have to agree with Tac – it's quite sad how a Normal is the brains of the operation. He understood that and he even told you that Villains use people as bait. Are you really that thick?"

"Thick?" Sandy Lucas turned to the Villain, towering over her. "First the council degrades my son and now you waltz in here and put down the only ones willing to find him."

"I'm only telling the truth," Paragon hissed, nose to nose with the mother. "You don't think I know that no one but us is looking for my friend? I know that – Nick probably knows that. In fact, I know he does. The Four is evil, so therefore the wearer is evil. Ha, stupid Hero views," Paragon near ranted, stepping back and throwing her hands in the air. "I should have snatched that pendant when I had the chance. It wouldn't like that, oh, it would hate that, but Nick would be ok. Everything would be ok!"

"Bring Henry here, Para."

The girl stopped her frantic steps at Joe's kind command. "What?"

"You're scared for his safety now that everything is going to the dogs."

Paragon blinked once, scowling. "Nick isn't the only one with brains, I see."

"And you're not the only one with a Normal sibling," Kevin replied, catching on quickly.

"He won't be safe here – not with Heroes."

Sandy looked to her husband, understanding coating her face. "Paragon, we are good at protecting people. Nick is alive is he not?"

Paragon snorted once, throwing in an eye roll for good measure.

"I am glad you see the humor in this," Sandy muttered, voice cold. Paragon instantly quieted, throwing a cruel glare towards the brothers.

But the silence didn't last long as Paragon snorted lightly, turning away. "Everything is going to change. All because a freaking necklace let a Normal carry it."

"Why would it do that? Let him carry it?" Tom final chimed in, looking to the Villain with accusation in his eyes.

"If you think I turned your son into some sort of Villain, then think again."

"I don't know what to think," Tom nearly sneered at the teen. "All I know is that Nicholas never acted the way he does now before you came into his life."

At this Paragon laughed. "I've been in his life for eight years." Everyone's jaws dropped at this bit of news. "Yeah, didn't know that, did ya?" she smirked, putting her hands on her hips. "And I will give every ounce of my power to promise you that Nick isn't a Villain – he is a guy who wants to change the world. I'd put money on that being the reason the pendant chose him to carry it. He probably intrigues it."

"It's an object," Nurse whispered, unable to even meet the eyes of the fierce girl. "How can it be intrigued?"

Paragon snorted, turning her back to the group and mounting the window ledge. "Clearly you need to read up on your history." With that, she was gone; leaping from the window and a slight thud alerting them of her landing.

"She's right," Kevin told them, turning his gaze to the oldest one in the room. "We heard it speak. And Nick said something about four souls in that one being."

"It has its own thoughts," Joe inserted, "Intentions, and wants."

"Then what does it want with Nick?" Tom asked, turning his head when Frankie finally climbed up the stairs, looking at Joe with wide eyes. There was a moment of silence as the youngest Lucas latched onto Joe's leg.

"We don't know."

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()

"Filth," the insult was sneered into his face as the hand released his neck.

"Sticks and stones," Nick calmly replied, not bothered to take a step back. He eyed the mask with utter distaste, his gaze lingering on the ruby hanging from its new master's neck. "I have known that I was a delivery boy. Why else would it let me carry it?" the Normal mused, flicking the pendant lightly. The Villain jerked back, hand closed around the depthless snake. "But even it didn't see this coming."

"Or perhaps it did," Necrophere cut across, "Perhaps it led you here for its own purposes."

Nick rolled his eyes, shoving his hands in his pockets. "And it's using you for its own purposes as well. At least I knew when I was being its puppet. You're clueless."

"Am I?"

"What, clueless or a puppet?" Nick taunted further, watching the tenseness of the Villain's cloaked shoulders grow. "Yeah, I'd say you're both."

Nick ducked as a metal-clad hand soared, meeting the air where his face had previously been. The teen tatted his tongue, shaking his head. "One wrong move and I end you."

"Ha!" Necrophere shouted out, "You cannot even stop plants from murdering little kids."

A scowl darkened the Normal's face. "No, but I will stop you."

"And how will you do that? By using it to kill me? I laugh at the thought."

Nick eyed the Villains huddling around them, waiting to restrain him if he did act as he so desperately wanted to. But he turned his gaze back to the silver face, no emotion crossing his features. "I was not put on this planet to be used," the Normal stated, "I will not be used by you, or by the thing of so called purity hanging from my neck."

"You hold the power to stop this right here and now. That purity is made by Heroes, for this exact purpose. What bad could come from it?"

Nick snorted, shaking his head. "Any power corrupts, as I am sure every Villain knows. As every Hero is too ignorant to admit that they too are corrupted by their own self. I won't be like that," he commented, voice flat. "That won't be me."

His hand wrapped around the white chain and yanked. The dove, captured in flight, fell. One Villain jerked forward, hand coming out to catch the fragile necklace – the one power that can be held as leverage for an indefinite period of time, and their one weakness.

As soon as the crystal touched his skin, the Villain shrieked. All watched as the dove clanged to the floor, a pile of ashes falling in a perfect 'U' around it.

The shocked silence stretched on, only broken when Necrophere's hand clenched in the Normal's curls, yanking him to face his cruel eyes.

"You just ended your life."

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()

Chibiyu: Took my forever to get the willpower to write again. Of course I come back to this story .' Until Next Update!

Written on 2/26/12