Scarlet-11.

Chapter 11

I don’t really remember much from the point of where I started bawling my eyes out. Little hazy patches mixed in with other hazy red lit patches in my mind. I know that I was in Sentinels arms and crying like a woman that had just lost her mind or part of her soul but inside of myself.

I’m Darcy, curled into a ball in this place that’s like some kind of salt flats but I’m on flagstones and there’s this structure just behind me of this temple? It’s so strange because I looks like a medieval era constructed geodesic dome and that’s mixed with a lot of middle eastern designs.

Like a sort of stained glass mosque.

Then Gran’s there….she’s holding me and the others are there too…the other Scarlet Angels are there and they’re stepping in and kneeling and rubbing my back or a shoulder and almost everyone of them are crying along with me, for me.

“Gran?”

“Hello Darcy Sweetie.” I hug and cry a bit more at that because the way that she said that it’s just like I’ve always been her Darcy. Dead or not Gran’s still Gran and being amazing like that’s still a super power of hers.

“You’re dead…”

“Yeah I suppose I am.”

“You suppose?”

“Well for each of us Angels part of our life force, of us binds itself to the bracelet.”

“So not all of you went to heaven?” (Sniffle.)

“Yes honey but I went to heaven but Scarlet me stays here.”

“But…”

“It’s fine honey, just like in life souls are adaptable.”

“But You’re okay?”

“Okay? I’m proud as heck of you of course I’m okay!”

(Sniffle?)…………………

“But I killed a man?”

“Darcy if he’d been any kind of man he’d had never joined such a movement in the first place much less them attack children.”

“But…”

She takes my face in her hands. “You’re a super, that makes you and our families targets. That could’ve been or might someday come to them coming at our family in the same way.”

“No…No…I won’t let them.”

“Exactly my sweet girl you’d give your last breath and do whatever you could to do to stop them right?”

I nod. “Yes.” (Sniffle.)

“And are the families of those children and those children any less innocent or deserving than our family?”

“No Gran…”

“Good girl, that’s exactly why I chose you.”

I cry a bit more but it’s different here, I can feel her sinking into me like the way she used to make tea but I’m the hot water. It’s Gran but it’s Scarlet and there’s a bond here now beyond the grandchild and grandparent. We both chose, we’ve both done “The Job” even though I’m just starting, we’ve both killed to defend those that need defending. It hurts, it sucks but it’s not easy, it should never be easy.

“No Honey it’s never easy, it’s one of the reasons why we are able to cry baby. We need the tears to wash the blood away.”

“Gran?”

“Yes honey?”

“Is the other you happy?”

“Yes honey I’m with my loved ones.”

“Are you happy?”

“Yes, I’m home here, with my family here. We’re related to half of these women here Darcy, they’re our family too and even the other bearers of the Matrix.”

“Matrix? Like the Movie or the Transformers thing?”

“Not quite honey, a long time ago there was a war where the light faced the darkness in a big way. There was a goddess called Myriad and she was a champion of light a goddess of love and of justice and even a goddess of war. But she had been gravely wounded by an enemy and was dying and in that time the gods and goddesses she stood with abided by her wishes and took the last parts of her life force and created The Myriad-Matrix as a weapon of good. It was bestowed as she wished on one of the members of her followers with the most light and the most heart. That turned out to be the son of one of the goddesses priestesses and her energy filled him and her essence offered him a choice. It’s that energy that shifts and changes us She can’t work without a willing heart and we all become part of each other.”

“Part of each other?”

She gestures around. “All of this Darcy, all of us here ate connected and we’re all a part of you now.”

“Oh…”

“Yes, oh…and it’s for these times, the hard times and the deep trials honey…you’re not alone you’ll always have us. You’ll always have me.”

“Always?”

“Yes always.”

We hug and hold each other until the place faded out as I fell asleep.

………………………………..................Okay I’m not sure how long it’s been but I’m asleep on this really comfy huge couch and I smell food. Everything growls I swear and not just my stomach. I get up and rub at my eyes. I sort of stumble around sleepy, I feel a mess. I’m still shifted in my powered up Scarlett state.

I look around and it’s really big in here. Condo like big three or four floors and very chic, how chic well the staircase looks like it’s crystal set in place by anti gravity tech. That alone would be a couple of million. It’s very open air in here too but not sparse it’s not ever really intimidating. As nice as the place is there’s movie poster on the walls instead of the high end art. I see lots of models everywhere and even vintage toys.

There’s and office nook in this raised dais library’s corner and at a glance there’s serious computer stuff in there but I see a mess too.

I’m oddly reassured by that.

I follow my nose especially when I smell something bready and hot and I go through an archway into this big modern kitchen and see Ryan Chase there, then I see the Helmet for the Sentinel armor there left out. Okay given there’s no armor here he did that on purpose.

Yeah he knows I’m Darcy, or that Darcy’s Scarlet.

“Hey, you’re awake you okay?”

“Yeah, just I’ve never…”

“It’s okay it was a clean shoot.”

“It wasn’t okay Ryan it’ll never be okay but…but I’d do it again.”

“Good, it’s good it hurts and that you feel this way about it.”

“It’s the only way I can look at it, I’m made this way. Always have been.”

He walk to another counter and passes me these scrubs but they’re red and there’s those cheap emergency panties in a package along with some toiletries and flip flops. “Here I got a care pack slapped together I figured you’d like to do the clean and showered thing before eating.”

“Oh god yes thank you Ryan….uhm sorry should I still be using your hero name or calling you sir or Mr. Chase?”

“No…we’re semi off the clock now so out of my armor I’m always Ryan, even to the people that work for me. It’s just not me otherwise….here.”

He takes a glass and puts it to the drink dispenser built into the fridge and it fills with chocolate milk. I take it gratefully since my energy’s on low and I sort of was feeling that more than hungry low blood sugar headache. I actually guzzle it lady like or not. I pass him back the glass.

“Another?”

“Maybe half.”

I take that with me and he tells me where I should go to use the shower and it’s in one of the guest rooms. The place is pretty new looking and It has that just moved in thing to it that’s sort of rings true since there’s a lot of personal stuff here that doesn’t fit in with the rest of the place. And there’s this part of me that’s…tweaked to him. It’s Sentinel he’s a real basified hero, he saved my life and he kept me safe while I lost it crying and like a knight in shining armor brought me here.

I’m not going to say that I’m not feeling something from him and all of this. And he’s really damned good looking…there’s this feeling there of wanting to know more about him. More than the papers and news and the tabloids. More than the stuff I know as Sentinel.

And that makes me feel a bit guilty about feeling these things while I’m in the shower…I’m seeing Nikki, she deserves better than that from me. Well that get’s me thinking about me and Nikki and I end up hugging myself in the shower having another shaky cry and really, really wishing she was here to hold me.

I’m not having a freak out or a flashback but I’m just hurting…and I just want her.

I get cleaned up and it feels good, it actually feels a whole lot better to wash all of today off and get myself straightened out.

Ryan must have made the scrubs somehow because they’re a good match for my Scarlet look as uncostumed me/her.

I could down shift to Darcy mode but I’m not ready to do that here yet. I come down and there’s voices. Other Ark Angels…Victory, Saber, Daystar, Harrier, Samson…all in Ryan’s kitchen and all out of uniform except for Shroud? He’s that guy from Paradise City with the nasty rep.

It’s like a gathering of heroes that’s just…

It’s like walking into the JLA and their in there civvies except for Batman of course.

Apparently the floor we had are meeting on and the one above and below it got V-Trashed.

“V-trashed?”

“Victory trashed, back in the day she had a habit of racking up some really high levels of collateral damage.” Daystar says handing me a tray.

“Really?” I smile a thank you at him as I take the tray. I can’t help it Chris Daystar is not just hot and built and huge and blonde but he’s just got something that really says decent guy, it’s like he gives off good guy more that super hotty.

Which is good because Saber’s his wife and she’s a martial arts samurai mistress and kind of like the Wolverine of the team with an anger rep like Hawkgirl.

Speaking of her she talks around a mouthful of chili-burger. “Actually there were some insurance companies that had act of meta and then they had Victory insurance.”

I can’t help but to laugh along with the others and it feels good. I’m assuming Shroud found it funny but it was against his beliefs to show it. Yeah okay we get it you’re Batman.

Okay I was expecting a lot of things but Hot dogs, Burgers, Chili and boxed Mac ‘n Cheese wasn’t what I thought of when it came to these people. But given what we were just through…comfort food makes perfect sense.

There’s milk, and shakes and floats. No booze, apparently being a Super hero comes with drug and alcohol problems. So there whole building is a dry zone. That makes sense. I’m also really glad that both Saber and Victory are big eaters for women. I’m starved and I’m not getting flak for it.

And you’d think that we’d not talk shop, not talk about what just happened but we’re into talking about what happened and getting this out and figuring things out.

Apparently there was something there, something I was feeling.

Something pushing the crowd along.

Something Mystical.

I look the same way the others do as Chris Daystar set’s this pearl the size of a large marble on the counter.

I can’t help it. “Guys…there’s something alive in there.” I can feel it….almost see it, and my tummy isn’t liking the feel of the thing.