Of Heroes And Villains: The Ties That Bind By Minikisa An assassin. A fallen hero. An unlikely meeting. The road to redemption is long and hard and filled with explosives.

As long as Caroline could remember, she had always had a ferocious streak. After her first kidnapping, to the dismay of her parents, she had cherished and nurtured it, turning it into the very viciousness that would one day attract the attention of an even more vicious mercenary.

And then her ferocity had become her lifeline. She had clung to it, feeding it anger and hatred until it allowed her to deliver brutal vengeance.

Caroline liked to think that, had she known what she knew now, she would have made different choices and cultivated kinder traits. But the past was in the past, and for better or for worse, now she was a warrior.

But ferocity alone did not win battles.

Radiance was small and delicate, always had been. She had to work hard to overcome the limitations of her body. Her grip on her staff tightened as she twirled it, dropping into a defensive stance, the steel gleaming as it turned toward the Executioner.

It was an enormous weapon, almost as long as Radiance was tall. The long hilt flowed into wickedly sharp blades at both ends, creating a double-sided hybrid of sword and spear.

It gave her the reach she lacked.

“Executioner,” she greeted him, almost casually.

The assassin cocked his head, and while she could not see his face beneath the mask, she could tell that he was scrutinizing her appearance. She’d torn her gown, the slit in the red silk now running up to her waist to allow for the full range of leg movements. She’d swapped the strappy heels for heavy combat boots. She had never shown him her face before, but her weapon was likely a give-away nonetheless.

“Radiance.” His voice was cold and detached as always, and yet… the pregnant pause hinted at surprise. He held his infamous sword loosely at his side, and had not yet assumed a combat stance. Her brows furrowed in confusion.

She knew Executioner. When he went in for a kill, he did not stop to have a chat. So if he was here to hunt her down, he should have attempted to impale her several times already at this point.

“Are we having an Order corporate meeting? I must have missed the memo.”

“Our operation is none of your concern.” Executioner turned to leave. “Though in the interest of professional courtesy, I would advise you to teleport away. Pestilence is about.”

So she was not their target after all.

For a brief moment, Caroline relaxed.

And then realization hit her.

Caroline was no longer part of the Order.

She did not have to sit back and watch them kill their target. She could stop them. She should stop them.

In fact, she did not think she’d be able to face either Stephen or Ian again if she used her new gift of free will to save her own skin, again, at the expense of someone else’s.

“Who’s the target?” she asked, voice silky, lowering her staff.

“Our operation is not your concern, Radiance,” he repeated, his tone dropping to such freezing temperatures that the polar caps might grow jealous.

Executioner was being evasive. There was no reason not to tell her.

Which meant he thought she would not approve of the answer.

So she took a stab in the dark, because only one target made sense. “Ian.”

Executioner tensed.

Radiance hissed. “He is marked!”

“He,” Executioner’s voice held a mocking lilt, emphasizing the word. “…does not exist any longer. I am hunting for a different name.”

Oh god.

A hero.

Her brother was a hero. With a codename. And she had pointed Executioner right at him. “That is dishonorable,” she bit out. “The Order will not stand for it.”

“We do not trade in honor, Radiance. Considering what you did to your mentor, you should understand that.”

Silence.

“You’re right. I have never cared for honor.”

She appeared in a whirl of blinding light behind him, bringing her blade down on his back.

Steel met steel.

“Goodbye, Radiance.”


***


Impossible.

Mark stared wide-eyed at the man striding toward them, eyes burning with a golden blaze and jaw set in determination the way it always was when they were about to face down a villain.

Impossible, he thought again, the word repeating over and over because this made no sense.

Psy was in the hospital.

And if he wasn’t, he wouldn’t be glaring at the villainess; he’d be groveling at her feet. Because Stephen was gone and in his place was Cinder Snow’s twisted slave.

At that thought, golden eyes briefly met his.

Finally, the weight of what he was seeing sank in, and Tex grasped the obvious conclusion.

It was impossible. The psychic had broken into his mind and was using the image of his best friend to torment him.


***


Psy could feel the rush of emotions pouring from Mark – maintaining a shield around him meant he had to establish a mental connection – but he ignored them in favor of concentrating on the assassin.

Or rather, he tried to.

He couldn’t help but notice there was no anger or loathing like he’d expected.

But there was no warmth either.

Psy forced himself to focus on the deadly assassin, where his attention belonged. She was surrounded by a web of dark tendrils, hundreds of them crawling and coiling around the people surrounding her to turn them into puppets whose strings she could pull. A new thread lashed toward Tex, and Psy cut it before it even touched him.

twisted slave

PsyKick’s gaze darted to Tex, who was staring at him with wide eyes. Then they narrowed, a spike of seething fury stabbing at him over the link. Pained, Stephen averted his eyes, and the assassin struck in his moment of weakness.

The force of her assault made him hiss in a sharp breath, his fingers instinctively clutching his forehead as she tore at his walls.

“Such an interesting mind,” she whispered and it echoed. His mindscape trembled with each word, the fault lines in his mind cracking ominously. And then her voice changed, her childlike glee giving way to huskiness. Each word was clipped and impatient, giving orders she expected him to follow.

“Lower your walls.”

It was the voice of his nightmares.

“Remember your Purpose, PsyKick.”

No, no, no, he had no purpose, it was gone, Mistress had taken it from him. He jerkily shook his head, taking a step backward.

Twisted slave, whispered another voice, deep and drawling and familiar and he knew, knew that she was the one saying that, but Tex had thought it, too, because it was true, that was what he’d become.

“And slaves are meant to serve,” she crooned to him, almost lovingly, and that struck him as wrong because she never crooned. Her voice, so similar to Constance’s, was always so flat and cold, with none of the affection her sister carried.

“No.” His defiance came out sounding small and uncertain.

Another step backward.

Black ooze was seeping in through his walls.

And then radiant silver light burned it away as starlight spilled through the breach in his walls, something vast and bright and loving brushing his mind in comfort. Clarity returned, a wave of golden light expanding outward from his core, crashing against his walls to strengthen them.

“No,” he repeated, glowing eyes narrowing. “Enough.”

His hand slashed in an arc, hacking away the ethereal threads fanning out around her. The assassin reared back, shock and pain twisting her flawless features as half her puppets were cut from her. The heroine who’d been restraining Tex hit the ground, her eyes rolling back in her head at the shock of having the mental connection ripped away, and all around them people started fainting.

PsyKick’s hand came down again, targeting the next cluster of vile tendrils, and she shrieked, a high-pitched inhuman sound, followed by a barrage of psychic blasts bombarding his shields.

His walls had never fallen.

Not to Cinder Snow.

Not in the hospital.

And not today.

Psy smiled, triumphant, and unraveled the few strings she had left.

The assassin hissed, and suddenly there was a dagger in her hand, which had previously been strapped to her thigh and concealed by her long gown. Psy jerked back in surprise as she darted forward, charging him while still maintaining her assault on his walls. He couldn’t stop concentrating on his shields for even one second to be able to utilize his highly complex telekinesis or she would break them. He tensed to dodge but while he had gained at least a little proficiency in hand-to-hand combat over the years, he doubted this body, weakened by its long imprisonment, would move like he remembered it.

An explosion tore apart her path toward him, and she barely dodged to the side in time. The assault on Psy’s mind eased as she sank to her knees, cradling her burned shoulder.

Tex, freed from the chokehold of the mind controlled heroine, was still aiming one hand at the assassin, palm crackling with red lightning. But his gaze was not on her.

“Psy.”

Stephen reluctantly met his gaze, not certain what he’d find there.

Mark was staring at him with wide, hopeful eyes, radiating a confused mix of longing and fear.

“Is that you?”

Psy wasn’t really sure how to answer that.

He wasn’t the person Mark was thinking of, and never would be again. He was the person who had chosen the words which hurt the most, and then used them on all his friends, lashing out again and again. His core was restored, but it didn’t undo three years of servitude and pain.

He was someone new.

So he smiled helplessly and shrugged. Tentatively, praying that Mark would not mind the intrusion, he bypassed his walls over their temporary link and projected a series of images and impressions and his sense of self, flawed as it was; the things he could never hope to put into words.

Mark blinked slowly.

And then that chain, that horribly torn chain started stirring. It coiled and writhed – and then wrapped itself around Stephen, whole and strong and glowing, seamlessly mending the tear as if it never had been broken at all.

“Welcome back,” his best friend said hoarsely.

Stephen closed his eyes, swallowing the lump in his throat.

The shields around Tex shook under the impact of a renewed assault, but Psy swatted it aside like it was nothing. The golden aura surrounding his body blazed brighter, solidifying into flickering flames. When he opened his eyes, they were solid gold.

“Care to take down an assassin of the Order with me, Tex?”

His lips slowly curved into a cocky grin. “I thought you’d never ask.”