Killing Olympia

The splitting headache was what woke me up, because it felt like I'd just taken a rusted nail through the skull. What the hell? I groaned. I tried to open my eyes. Blindingly bright light made me wince. I tasted metal. Something dry was on my tongue and crusted around my mouth. My head weighed about a million pounds as I got my chin off my chest and looked around. I was in the living room, the tv turned off and a faint orange afternoon light spilling in through the windows. Then I got a cigarette flicked at me. I flinched, then looked at where it had just come from.

Luckily for me, I was still wearing my costume, but I couldn't move a single muscle—lucky Irina.

She sat on the edge of the coffee table in front of me, an empty beer can worth of cigarettes beside her as she painted her toenails a deep shade of red. She stink of it made my saliva bitter. Not that how her polish smelt was my biggest problem right now. All I could move was my neck and my face. Not my hands. Not my legs. Not my lips.

Panic. Straight-cut panic flared up inside of me. But I swallowed it, tucked it deep inside me. You've been through worse, superhero. I clenched my jaw and moved my tongue around my mouth, feeling blood on my teeth. No mushy gums. No cuts. She hadn't smashed me in the jaw at least. My head still ached. I could barely even focus on her without my vision going fuzzy a second later. The headphones hanging around her neck played some rock song from way back when—something superhuman, judging by the notes being hit and the speed of the riffs, too.

"Like the song?" she asked. I didn't nod. I stared at her from the armchair. "Old Gold. Heard of them?"

If I could spit at her, I would have already. But I guess being diplomatic meant not doing that.

Or sending her through the drywall and giving her a headache as bad as the one she'd given me. The last thing I remembered was skulking into the house, finding her watching over… Right. My eyes flicked to the side as the sound of harsh coughing erupted down the hallway, muffled by a bedroom door. Wasteland is actually in here. Either Cleopatra and the head of the Olympiad were lying to me, or they were just sprouting off what their hopes and dreams actually were. I trusted Kayanna. Kingcaid not so much. He still had to prove himself, and according to him, Wasteland isn't in New Olympus, let alone vomiting so heavily you could smell the stink of it in the warm air.

The house reeked, and you didn't need my nose for that.

Irina stopped painting her nails, then looked up at me through her bangs. "What's the matter?" I didn't move. I stared at her so long that she tensed her jaw. "Yeah, thought as much. You're lucky I didn't kill you."

The sound of coughing got louder. She thumbed up the volume.

"You should have died," she said, going back to her toenails. "But your blood's weird. It's gross. Almost like it doesn't want to listen to me, but only partially. Kinda like a brat of a bitch who doesn't listen to warnings."

Gotta get this conversation back on your side, Ry. And fast. I hated captivity. Fucking hated it.

I'd been thrown in dark rooms before for days. I'd felt what it was like to have people powerful enough to raze entire cities lord over you. Hopeless. Plain and simple. They could stomp down on your chest and you'd have to sit there and take it unless you wanted them to crush your skull next. Your body broke first. Whatever else came next was entirely up to you. Either way, she was protecting Wasteland. Who fucking cares how old the guy was? He'd killed superheroes. Too many to count. Some not even just on the battlefield, but also through his powers alone. Supers don't get sick easily. Something about our immune system shrugging off illnesses, so when one of us does get sick, it could probably put a Normal in a coma or easily into the hospital for barely even a common cold.

Wasteland used to have S-Grade worthy superheroes so withered and cancer-riddled they would rather get themselves killed than struggle through any kind of treatment. And now here he was, withering away quietly into a soft, silent death. Ha. As if he deserved it. I didn't want Lower Olympus to look at me like I was some goddess.

But what I could very much do was decide who I didn't want living here anymore.

And for some fucking reason, my old man's generation just kept crawling back.

A flicker of golden electricity sparked between my rigid fingers. It singed the stained green fabric. But she didn't notice. Too small. Too quick. I felt a tingle in my fingertips, something weirdly painful at first, and then soft.

Almost as if warmth was finally spreading back through my body. Slowly. But there.

"That's my problem with you Capes," she muttered, running the brush along her toenail. Second, maybe even third coat. Don't know how long I'd been out. Where the hell's Limelight? "You think everything is yours. I mean, I told you to go away, and what the hell did you do? You broke down my front door and attacked me, man!"

I blinked slowly. Another quiet crackle of electricity between my fingers. Not enough. Need a little more punch. It wouldn't go where I wanted it. It was violent, almost seemed to have a mind of its own sometimes. It used to spring up on me at the worst possible times during high school. It had a worse tendency to get very violent, very quickly. I could either spend my time slowly getting the feeling back through my body, but what happens next?

She just hits me with another bout of blood-in-my-brain and knocks me out cold?

I could always throw a million volts worth of power at her and see how she likes her unwanted nap, too.

I just needed to figure out a way to control it—to direct it without having to move so much that I ended up getting her attention by accident.

All I needed was one finger, one chance, and we'd be through with this.

"Irina?" Wasteland moaned from down the hallway.

She paused, then stared at me as she answered. "I'm here. Do you need something to drink?"

"I need—" Another eruption of coughing, followed by dry retching. More of that and he'd me puking up his pure body mass, or whatever more he had left to vomit, anyway. Irina flinched. I narrowed my eyes. She scoffed and flipped me off. "I just need… It's cold here. I need the windows…closed…just a little. I think I can get up—"

Irina stood, knocking over the polish. It spilled down the table and onto the filthy carpet. She cursed, then said, "No, don't move. I'll be right there." She pointed at me. "If you move, I'll turn your brain into pink sludge."

I stared at her until she swore at me again then jogged down the hallway. I heard the door open, then close gently behind her. I could hear what they were talking about, hear every shuffle, every silent little murmur about how he shouldn't be moving around so much on his own. He said something that made her quietly laugh, but it sounded as real as the sympathy I had for him. I tried to tense my fingers. I tried to get them to move. But it felt like my entire body was encased in concrete right up to my neck. Move, dammit. Sweat dribbled down my spine, wetting my neck and stinging my eyes. C'mon, Rylee. I heard Irina get closer to the door now. I gritted my teeth and tried—

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My index finger twitched.

Ha!

The door opened, closed, and I stilled again, listening to the sound of her feet padding against the floor until she was sitting in front of me again. She stared at the carpet, then cupped her face into her hands, not moving.

Irina stayed like that for almost five minutes, massaging her face, her back and shoulders tense.

Orange light colored the house in dull shades, throwing our shadows against the wall. I couldn't keep using my electricity. It had a certain smell, especially in a place so muggy and humid as this one. The street outside was silent. The weak glass in the windows rattled as a breeze made the moth-eaten curtains dance. She wasn't looking, so I very gently, very minutely, pressed my index finger against the fabric, just enough to make sure of it.

I angled my finger toward her, then waited.

Because now she was quietly sobbing. The kind that broke free from clenched teeth. I swallowed, then watched as she swiped the polish off the table and stood up. She quietly cursed and slammed her fist against the wall. It gave. She cursed even louder, throwing a mug off the table, which careened through the air and smashed into the sole picture frame sitting beside the tv set. She froze. We both watched the frame fall and quietly shatter.

"No," she whispered, then rushed toward it. She dropped to her knees. Glass fell from the frame as she picked it up. "Nononononono," she moaned. It wasn't just the frame. The picture was flimsy, old and yellow.

Well, it used to be—now it was all those things, and split down the middle.

I couldn't see who was in that picture, and couldn't really care.

"What the fuck are you staring at?" she spat, head swiveling to stare at me. I said nothing. Only blinked slowly. She was to my left, inches out of my finger's sights. I needed her closer. "You did this! It's all your fault!"

She was on me in barely a second, her knee between my legs and her fingers digging into my cheeks as she grabbed my face. She reeked of cigs and long days in a cramped little townhouse in the part of Lower Olympus that still didn't have any water. Irina's eyes flared. Her lips twisted into a faint snarl. I looked up at her as her fingernails sunk deeper into my skin. She was so close I could hear the thrum of her blood rushing through every part of her.

I could almost smell the venomous, spiteful anger bleeding from her lips as she said, "I hate you."

I don't even know you, but hell, join the cue.

"You're just so fucking lucky, aren't you?" she said, nails bending against my skin. Her other hand was gripping onto the armchair's backrest, making hell out of the weak fabric. "Waltzed in here with your fancy suit and your goddamned superpowers like you had the right. Why? Because Zeus was your daddy? That's the reason, huh?"

Something thick lodged into my throat. I didn't bother swallowing past it.

I let another crackle of electricity run through each one of my fingers. Softness rushed through them.

I made my hand twitch. Just a little. Just enough. I had to—

She put her mouth on mine. I froze.

Her lips, dry, hard, cracked, pressed against my lips. Her tongue ran along my teeth, brushed against mine and found the roof of my tongue to slather against. She grabbed my face. Chewed on my lower lips.

Then her eyes flew open, and stared into mine.

Irina pulled away, saliva hanging between our mouths.

I wanted to vomit.

She blinked, then ran her arm across her lips.

A whine settled into my ears. A very loud, very painful whine.

Her saliva settled into my mouth. Foul. Intrusive.

Irina breathed through her mouth, still so close her eyes were all I could see.

Breaths came out from my nose. Fast. Hot. My chest heaved. I tensed my jaw. A tooth gave as I clenched my jaw. Panic and rage smashed together inside my body.

Maybe her concentration slipped when she swallowed. Maybe sheer willpower did it.

My jaw split apart as I roared, then I grabbed her arm and threw her off of me. She smashed through the drywall and slammed against the cabinets in the kitchen, dropping into a heap. Dust settled into the air, lit into a burning orange color. She groaned. I sunk my fingers into the armchair and stood up, ripping old foam out of it. I staggered. Knuckles my mouth. Spat on the floor. I breathed hard. Heavy. Irina groaned and got onto one elbow. We met eyes, then I screamed again, and turned her living room into a storm of broken furniture and trash when I shot toward her. Her eyes widened. She tried to get her arms up to block me. I grabbed her by the throat and went straight through the wall behind her, through the grimy bathroom, and out onto the back lawn, leaving her rolling to a stop.

I landed with a thud onto the dry, brittle grass. Bricks. Broken kids toys. A swing set hanging from a dead tree, and a car on cinder blocks. Limelight was here, too. An afterthought. He was close to the wide open windows of the bedroom, standing on a pile of bricks that leveraged him close enough to maybe squeeze his way inside.

Or something. Or fucking something.

I had my eyes on Irina. Only Irina.

She was bleeding from her forehead. Gashes ran along her arms and legs. I started walking toward her.

She first threw dirt at me. Then rocks. The blood streaming down her face and from a nasty gash along her forearm stopped bleeding, then formed into edged blades that hung in the air, then darted toward me like bullets.

They shattered against my skin as I stopped and stood over her, the sun behind me, her face pale.

"Wait!" she cried. I grabbed her wrists and threw them aside, then got on top of her. She kicked and squirmed, throwing dust into the air. Mascara streamed down her face, mixing with blood. "Get— Get off of—"

I slammed my fist into her jaw. Not hard enough to split her skull open. No.

To shut her up. Just enough to make my knuckles sting. For once.

I swung again. Blood spat from her mouth, covering the faint white fence beside us.

She gagged on saliva and blood, tried to beat at me and grab my hands.

I gritted my teeth and kept going, snapping her head one way and then the next until the weapons of blood she was forming dropped to the ground, pooling crimson around her. Until her legs jerked with every wet crack my fists made against her jaw. Until all I could hear was the soft, meaty crunch of bone and meat and my racing heart.

"You don't ever—" Another swing. Another pouring of blood. "Pur your—" The world was silent. Irina sputtered out blood. "Filthy fucking lips—" Her hand weakly grabbed my wrist. I batted it away. "Anywere on me!"

I raised my fist to the sky. Blood soaked my costume, wetting my sleeve. Sunlight glinted off my knuckles. Her teeth littered the dirt. Her face was swollen. Where it wasn't, it was cut open, gushing blood, red and very meaty. She choked. Her tongue was limp and fat. One of her eyes, bloodshot and swollen, leaked watery, crystalline tears.

I lowered my hand, then spat on her as I stood up. I was panting. My entire body steamed.

Limelight was staring at me from across the lawn, unmoving, dead silent. His face was blank. His eyes said nothing. I looked down at my hands, at the blood dripping off my costume. I swallowed, then looked up at him.

"What?" I asked, the wind stealing the word from my mouth.

Irina choked on blood behind me.

He looked past me for a moment at the girl in the dirt, then looked away. He shut his eyes, breathed out, and slowly nodded. "You are…" He took a moment to finish, and when he finally did, it was a whisper, "Terrifying."

"She deserved it," I said, walking past him and pulling open the back door. "Let's deal with Wasteland."

I didn't hear movement behind me.

I glanced over my shoulder. "Limelight."

No answer. He stared at Irina and her shaking, shivering body.

"Oh my gods," I muttered. "This is the reason I work alone. A little blood and everyone freaks out."

And what was I supposed to do? Stomach that shit?

So, what, I one day kiss Bianca, then give her something this bitch had?

Supervillains and their bullshit is contagious, because that's what Irina is for helping Wasteland.

Kick me. Punch me. Try to kill me. But there was a line. A very rigid line.

And all too quickly, I felt like someone I thought I'd gotten rid of. I banished the thought.

Now wasn't the time.

I shakily breathed out. Fuck it. If he's not cut-out for this, then fine. Whatever.

I turned around, and found an old man standing at the end of the hallway, his bony fingers clutching hard onto the wall, his pale, sunken eyes staring at the blood on my costume, and then the girl had just left for dead, too.

"Irina," he whispered hoarsely, the stink of vomit clinging onto his cracked lips. "What… My daughter."

Daughter?

It came slowly. First the stench of rotting wood catching fire, smoke spilling from the wall he held.

Then the raunchy smell of death pooled out of his mouth as he stared at me, vile and black.

My skin immediately tingled, felt like it was burning. Hot. I flinched and stepped back.

Wasteland, though, staggered forward, burning through the clothes on his body, scorching the wood under his feet, and peeling the wallpaper right off the walls and oh, shit. His skin flaked. Burned. Turned pussy and yellow as boils simmered and his skin slowly sloughed and moved and nearly dripped off his bones. The smell launched itself down my throat. I raised my hands. Violent lashes of electricity leaped toward his body. And died right on impact.

His slag, fleshy mouth moved, moaning words his boil-riddled tongue couldn't pronounce.

Then, before he could get close, a voice from behind me screamed, "Stop! Dad, Jesus! Stop!"