by marat
Chapter Six
Lynn walked as
quickly as her clothing allowed along the dark street, away from the brilliant
lights along the McLeod-Slaughter driveway. The wet street shone in the lights
and the cool air eased her exertions. When she got to the blue van that now sat
alone along the curb, she quickly slid into the driver’s seat. The van started
as soon as she turned the key and she pulled out heading for the new
Mitropoulos City Centre and City Hall. Flicking on the lights, she fought the
confusion that seized her mind. Right now, she had to beat Crimson Flare to
Police Headquarters. She would eventually have to do something about Maria
Blakeman.
Red streaks had
begun colouring the sky in the east as she drove downtown. ‘Red sky at night,
sailor’s delight; red sky at dawning, sailor take warning,’ she thought. After
last night’s terrific storm, what did the new day have in store?
She drove
rapidly down the Theodore Franklin Parkway, gazing at the site where she had
first encountered Crimson Flare, tied to the roadway barrier after her
encounter with Ape and Nancy. Once that site was behind her, she determinedly
punched the accelerator.
She had to get
to the City Hall before Crimson.
Exiting a little
too fast for her van’s good, she crushed the break, screeching the tires,
fishtailing the rear of her vehicle. When she got it again under control, she
turned from New Street onto Wall Street toward the City Centre.
The four-storey
building that was the Mitropoulos City Hall was well lit and fairly glowed in
the damp pre-dawn. Everyone knew the details of the layout of the building. The
Police Department was on the top two floors, with the most secured areas on the
top floor. She parked the van on the street less than twenty meters from the
entrance. Pushing the door open, she slammed it shut behind her and rushed
toward the marble façade.
‘Oh, shit,’ she
thought, as two police officers came around the corner and into view. She
slowed to a walk.
As they
approached one another, she saw the eyes of one of Mitropoulos’ ‘finest’ widen
and almost seem to glow as he took in the spandex-clad body of the blonde
athlete. But it was the other who challenged her.
‘What are you
doing here, miss?’ he asked roughly.
‘I’ve… come to
lodge a complaint,’ she said. ‘Do I see the desk sergeant?’
‘If you’ve been
rousted by the police, it won’t do any good. You know the mayor is trying to
clean up downtown,’ the ogling officer remarked.
‘No, actually
it’s about someone else who’s in trouble.’
‘See Sergeant
Anderson. Take the elevator to the third floor and then straight ahead,’ the
first officer said.
‘Thank you.’
As she walked
away from the policemen, she heard a gruff mumbled conversation behind her,
followed by suppressed laughter between the two officers. She felt a chill run
down her spine and she was intensely conscious of her dress clinging to her
hips as she turned toward the entrance to the lobby.
Once in the
elevator, she punched the button marked ‘Roof’ and settled back in the corner directly
beneath the surveillance camera. It was only a matter of seconds, though it
seemed interminable, before the doors opened onto the roof of City Hall.
As she stepped
out into the night air, Lynn said to herself, ‘She’ll be coming soon.’
*****
Crimson Flare
had routinely used her great strength and speed to make her way toward the
Mitropoulos City Hall. She had strength that allowed her to race high-powered
automobiles and to leap from rooftop to rooftop across the city; but this time
the effects of the drugs on her system gave her less control over her body than
she normally enjoyed. As she moved rapidly from the mansion toward downtown, a
moment of pain caused her to wilt under its intensity and delay, just a moment,
in her progress. In the downtown area, as she leapt across the roofs toward her
goal, her judgment might be affected, and her leaps might be just short enough
to require her to grab at a ledge and pull herself up.
Eventually,
however, she saw the well-lit City Centre a few blocks in front of her. She
knew that when she had secured the bags her master required, he would relieve
her pain. He would remove the torments that gripped and overpowered her.
At that moment
her body was convulsed by a violent spasm that seemed to twist her internal
organs. Standing only two rooftops away from City Hall, she moaned and dropped
to her knees. ‘Oh, god,’ she thought, as she leaned forward, doubling over.
‘Just a few moments more.’
This wish was
not granted immediately, as her insides seemed to be ripped asunder. She moaned
again, louder this time.
Then it was
gone. Only the residue of the pain remained with her.
She stood and
leapt the final couple of streets and landed safely on the City Hall roof.
She walked
purposefully toward the stairwell. She had traversed this stretch of concrete
many times previously. She had often visited Police Headquarters to provide
information or to coordinate and cooperate with the authorities on any number
of cases. As she did so now, she did not remember what she had recently learned
about the attitude of the Department itself. All she knew was that her master
required her to remove some materials from the high security areas on the top
floor. If she did so, he would reward her.
‘Karen.’
She stopped.
Lynn stepped out
from the shadows. She saw before her her closest friend. In the crisp early
morning air, Crimson Flare looked like the heroine that so many knew her to be.
Behind her long red streaks of dawn cut across a blue sky, giving an
atmospheric appearance whose colours could be likened to the stripes on the
flag that the heroine so often invoked in her public statements. The
high-intensity lights surrounding the City Centre reflected off the sequins of
her costume, so that as she moved the glittering effect emphasised the
exquisite curves of her feminine form. Her feminine form was clearly outlined
by the brilliantly lit background, a singularity of line this time not broken
by her black belt, which usually so clearly defined her round hips. That belt
had been left behind at the mansion. The highly polished leather of her boots,
mask, and cowl glimmered in that light, and it was not possible to see the
ripped portions of that cowl through which her matted dark brown hair
protruded.
Crimson Flare
turned to face Lynn. ‘Who are you and what do you want?’
‘Don’t you know
who I am?’ Lynn asked as she stepped slowly toward the Champion of Mitropoulos.
‘Don’t you know
who I am?’ Crimson retorted, and adopted a defensive posture.
Lynn continued
to walk slowly, determinedly, toward the masked figure. ‘Yes, you’re Karen
Perry. You’re my friend.’
‘I’m Crimson
Flare, and I’m on a mission to fulfill the orders of my master. No one may
question me or challenge my right….’ Her words were cut off when she felt
another violent twisting of her insides.
She cried out
softly, pitifully, and dropped to her knees before she rolled onto her hip. She
sat on the roof quietly sobbing.
Lynn raced to
her side. Her own voice cracked as she reached her. ‘Karen, oh, Karen, what do
you want me to do?’
As Lynn placed
her arms around the helpless avenger, she caressed her face and embraced her
around her shoulders, drawing the girl to her.
‘Lynn?’ There
was pain in her voice.
‘Yes, it’s me,
Karen.’ Lynn felt tears welling up in her eyes.
‘Help me,
please… help… me.’ There was a soft expulsion of air, as a crushing force
seemed to grip Crimson Flare’s body. She briefly sobbed out something that
sounded like Lynn’s name, and then the pain disappeared from her face as she
slipped into peaceful unconsciousness.
‘I have to get
you home.’
Lynn feared
taking the senseless heroine down in the elevator, where the police or even the
custodian might be encountered. She knew the stairwell ended at a fire exit,
but she also knew that she had, luckily, parked her van only a short distance
from that door. Slipping off her heels, the athletic blonde hefted the
unconscious Champion of Women onto her shoulders in a fireman’s carry and
entered the stairwell.
Five flights!
she thought as she look into the chasm.
Well, nobody
said this would be easy.
All went well
until she reached the last landing before the ground level exit. As she stood,
nearly totally exhausted, looking down the final flight of stairs, above her
she heard the heavy door crash open and someone raced into the shaft. Lynn held
her breath for a moment, until she realised that the intruder was going up the
stairs, from the third to the fourth floor. When she heard a door slam a second
time above her, she again made her way down the final flight of stairs.
Standing on the cement floor, she gently placed her burden on the steps,
resting Crimson’s weight against the wall.
She tried to
picture what it looked like outside: the location of the door on the wall,
whether it was on Wall Street itself or an alleyway that led to the street, how
great the distance to be covered to her van. Would there be any pedestrians?
Once she opened the door, the fire alarm would sound and she would have to move
quickly. The only thing she was absolutely sure of was that her van was to the
right once she exited the building.
She breathed
deeply, trying to get her complaining lungs to accept one more exertion. She
felt her heart hammering inside her chest. Only now did she realise how
profusely she was sweating and how painful her breathing had become. As she
stood, her legs seemed to give out under her, and Lynn had to grab to handrail
to steady herself. Multicoloured spots appeared before her eyes and her head
spun.
Come on, girl!
It’s barely twenty yards! You’ve already done five flights of stairs!
But her body
resisted any more.
By an act of
sheer will, Lynn took up her friend one last time in that same fireman’s carry
and leaned against the door.
Fuck it! I’ve
got to do this.
She took three
deep draughts of air, holding the last one before easing it out, and crushed
the bar opening the door.
Immediately
behind her she heard the raucous alarm. And as soon as she stepped into the
street, she saw her van, barely twenty yards away.
Fear energized
her, and she ran as fast as she could. Pulling open the sliding rear door, she
unceremoniously dumped her costumed friend onto the tattered flooring. Slamming
the door behind her, she then stepped to the driver’s door and climbed into the
vehicle.
Her van started
as she turned the key. She pulled away from the curb as the first denizens of
City Hall wandered groggily onto the street. No one seemed to notice the Ford
as it sped past the plaza in front of City Hall.
Later, they
would find her discarded shoes on the rooftop, but no one would connect them
with the false alarm.
*****
The van pulled
up next to the apartment building that housed the operations centre for Karen
and Lynn. It was still too early for much foot traffic in a residential
neighbourhood, so Lynn climbed into the rear of the van and looked down at the
still-unconscious avenger. She would have to carry her inside.
Fortunately, the
elevator would get them upstairs.
She didn’t care
whether the two prisoners saw Crimson Flare carried into the apartment. They
would be dealt with. They were in part responsible for Crimson’s condition.
*****
In a short
while, Crimson Flare had been deposited on the bed in her room, the van had
been moved from the illegal parking spot to the nearby parking lot, and Lynn
had collapsed into the cushioned chair in front of her computer.
She fingered the
heroine’s baton as she considered the fates of her prisoners, one of whom had
stared with undisguised fury at her as she carried the inert form on the
Champion of Women through the living room.
They would have
to wait. Karen had to be tended to first.
*****
Lynn stretched
Crimson Flare’s form out on the bed, and then gently turned her onto her
stomach. Undoing the zipper from the back of her neck, she slowly opened her
glittering skintight uniform exposing her flawless flesh and petite form. A
reason for Crimson Flare’s first successes was her small stature: she took on
criminals who were easily many times her size and dealt with them with ease, in
no small part because they often underestimated the tiny heroine. Ape had been
her first opponent whose strength nearly matched the Champion’s, and Nancy’s
intelligence had provided a warning for the brute about the heroine’s strength.
The girl’s skin
glistened with perspiration as the easily identifiable uniform was pulled from
her. When Lynn released Karen’s arms from her costume and then rolled her onto
her back, the lithe blonde athlete noticed how clammy Crimson’s flesh was under
the form-fitting bodysuit. Pulling the costume down, revealing her small but
magnificent feminine figure, Lynn again noticed how her soaked skin shone in
the light of the bedroom. She gingerly spread the unconscious Maid of
Mitropoulos’ legs slightly, allowing her to remove the famed sequined attire.
Once again, Lynn noticed Crimson’s most commented-upon attribute: Her legs, now
shining bare, were glorious to behold. The thighs were perfectly round with
hard muscle beneath the utterly flawless skin. The calves, covered by the
brilliant leather of her black boots, still showed their musculature any time
she moved, for the trademark footwear looked to be veritably painted on. The
straight line up the front of each leg from ankle to hip bespoke her physical
fitness and provided the focus of many a criminal’s admiration. Around her
waist, the band of her tights still cinched tightly. The tattered synthetic
material left nothing to the imagination and the now faint bruising at her sex
told the story of what had happened in the ballroom.
Lynn took the
elastic in her hands and ripped the colourless material away with seeming ease.
The perfect isosceles of her dark brown pubic hair indicated what had emerged
as one of the heroine’s vulnerabilities. In addition to the bruising, Lynn
noticed the pale grey crust that lay at her entrance. The course of what had
been a rivulet was still visible on the inside of her left thigh.
Having noted the
stains and fading purple contusions around her vagina, Lynn next looked at
Crimson Flare’s face and, as she expected, she saw similar encrustations around
her mouth and mask. She rose from the bed and in a matter of a few steps she
reached the bathroom. A moment later, she returned carrying a bowl of warm
water and some washcloths and towels. Patiently, gently, she removed the detritus
from the Champion of Women.
She returned the
basin and cloths to the bathroom. When she stepped back into the bedchamber,
she stopped and stared, struck by the naked figure that rested on the bed.
Crimson Flare’s physical form had long been praised by friend and foe alike.
Those who admired her gloried in her attributes: the strength hidden by her
small and delicate frame, the mystery of her mask and the implied virtue
created by the costume that Karen and Stacy had contrived, her grand and
glorious physicality, and, certainly not least, her success in bringing down
Mitropoulos’ gang leaders. Those who sought to impugn the vigilante condemned
her overt sexuality and put a great deal of stock in unconfirmed reports from
some surviving gang members about the sexual attacks which the heroine had
undergone and, apparently, both survived and relished.
Crimson Flare’s
tanned body lay supine and unmoving on the bright yellow sheets. Her mask,
cowl, gloves and boots were still in place; her crimson-sequined costume lay,
casually tossed, next to her.
Lynn sat herself
next to the masked Maiden’s head, and then reached down and pulled off her
mask. Dropping it on a pillow at the head of the bed, the lissome blonde
stretched out next to her friend. Lynn gently caressed Karen’s cheek and jaw
with her left hand, moving her hand along the outline of Karen’s lovely face,
barely touching the surface of the flesh.
‘What do you
want me to do?’
Lynn embraced
her friend, wrapping both her arms around the naked shoulders of the
unconscious avenger, pressing her own chest against her friend’s torso. The
spandex dress that Lynn still wore allowed for a high sensitivity, as Lynn’s
own petite breasts embraced the perfect hemisphere of Karen’s right breast.
The blonde girl
felt her nipples tingle as the contact continued. She pressed her face to that
of her friend, finally giving her a small kiss on the cheekbone. Sweat still
gleamed on the unmoving form of the Maid of Mitropoulos, and Lynn noticed a
small rivulet seeking escape from under the tattered cowl. She reached up and
gently pulled off the formfitting leather helmet. Karen’s short locks were
matted crosswise with occasional spikes darting this way and that over the
perspiring landscape. The action revived the Champion, who, still disoriented,
seemed to seek protection from her friend, her green eyes fearful.
Lynn pulled
Karen’s head to her chest and cooed soothing sounds, trying to relax her
friend. She ran her hands up and down the bare back of her friend, her
fingernails lightly touching the smooth, sweat-soaked flesh.
Karen’s
breathing was rapid and irregular. But something in her told her that she was,
at least for the moment, safe from the terrors that had stalked her earlier
this night. It took much of her remaining strength as she turned her face
toward her friend. Her dry tongue swept across dry lips, providing no relief to
the poor girl.
Lynn reached to
the nightstand next to the bed and plucked up the bottle of water that usually
sat there. With one hand she undid the light blue cap, and then tilted the
container, splashing some of the refreshing liquid into and around Karen
parched mouth. The brunette turned toward the source and found the revitalising
fluid, allowing it to pour into her.
Finally, her
thirst assuaged, Karen turned to her friend. Her green eyes opened and she
seemed to try to smile. ‘Wh- where… are we?’ The fear in her eyes was presently
diminished.
‘We’re safe,
Karen. We’re home.’
Just then
another spasm seized the hapless girl. She drew her knees up to her torso and
twisted her body to try to relieve the pain that seemed to spring from deep
inside her. When it had passed, those green eyes opened again, pain this time
evident in their stare. ‘Make it… stop, please… Lynn.’
‘Where is it
coming from?’
‘There,’ she
whispered, indicating her belly. Lynn could see that her abdominal muscles had
tightened across her stomach. Through gentle coaxing, the petite blonde athlete
convinced Karen to lower her legs. With one hand she gently stroked the smooth
skin of the heroine’s lower torso.
‘What does it
feel like?’ Lynn asked.
‘Like…’ Karen
sighed. ‘Like… something empty… what was there has been torn out. It… it
burns.’ Tears welled up in Karen’s eyes.
After all of the
effort to end Karen’s dependence to drugs and vulnerability to Chan’s
concoction, after all that Professor Brayfield had tried to do, Crimson Flare
had been battered back into this weakness again. Lynn thought, what do we have
to do to free her? Confused and angry, she pushed herself up and stared down at
her friend.
‘What do you
need, Karen?’ she asked.
‘I need…
someone… to… fuck me.’
Stunned, Lynn
looked at her friend. How could she say that? What does it mean? Does she mean
that sex could replace her body’s need for drugs? What if she were wrong? It
had always been the assumption that the problem was the drugs, that the desire
for sex could be a substitute for that craving. But what if Chan’s goal had
been to eliminate Crimson Flare as a threat to gang activity not by making her
dependent on drugs, but on sex. Didn’t he move in with her right after her
initial rapes? Didn’t he try to force sex on her, even after Stacy’s funeral?
Maybe he was more motivated by personal desire than by gang;and concerns.
The silence from
her partner caused Karen to open her eyes. Sweat rolled down her forehead and
she weakly tossed her head to try to keep it out of her eyes. Lynn reached out
her hand and tenderly brushed the droplets aside. She was showing signs of
withdrawal. When Karen convulsed again, Lynn leapt to the floor and began
pacing. She looked at the dresser, where they kept some of their ‘toys’. But
Karen’s physical reaction continued to escalate, sweat pouring from her body,
the muscles clearly quivering, her extremities shaking.
Lynn turned
toward the living room.
*****
The athletic
blonde girl walked slowly through the door from the bedroom, glaring at the two
prisoners who were still tied there. One man’s face was a mass of blood. He
appeared to still be unconscious. The other, who had watched with something
approaching fury as Lynn had carried the unmoving form of Crimson Flare to the
bedroom, now watched her closely, fear mixed with the anger just behind his
eyes.
From behind her
back she pulled Crimson Flare’s baton and jabbed at the young man. He shouted
in surprise and pain. The anger in his eyes was gone; the fear remained. Then
she untied the prisoner. She used the baton as a prod to direct the man toward
the bedroom.
‘And if thou
gaze into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee,’ she said softly to
herself.
End of Chapter
Six
Comments, questions, suggestions welcome:
contact the author at marat1793@comcast.net