48. The Villain
THE VILLAIN
“You’re…” Beautiful? Terrifying? Powerful? Fucking incredible? No, none of that was good enough. So what did I go for?
“Holy shit.” Good one.
Violet’s flames flickered out, eyes back to her usual blue, and she smiled. A real fucking grin. Not the half ones she’d been giving me. Fuck me, I’d do anything to make sure it stayed in place. Literally anything.
“Pick your jaw up off the floor, Blondie. I’m not done yet.”
I hadn’t even realized the expression on my face. I snapped my mouth shut. “Sorry, I just… Fuck baby, you’re incredible.”
Her soft chuckle was music to my fucking ears. “I’m just getting warmed up.”
She strode by me with a playful glint in her eyes and her head held high, pausing for a brief second to squeeze my hand before she crouched in front of Traitor Bitch—who was trying to get to her feet, still gasping for air.
Violet hummed, eyes trailing over her old friend slowly, disgust growing on her face.
“Amber, Amber, Amber.” She shook her head. “You did all this because you wanted Shit Fucker’s attention, and I’m the pathetic one? Look in the fucking mirror, you crazy bitch.”
Dr. Traitor laughed—tried to at least, she went into a coughing fit instead.
“I didn’t want shit from him. I did it because I hate you.
Your perfect fucking life, your two loving parents, happy and smiley Violet.
Always fucking perfect. It was always you should be more like Violet.
I’m a fucking doctor and still my parents looked at you as an example. ”
Fuck, my wife nailed the maniacal laughter. The perfect pitch, the perfect length of time, like she was born for this.
“That’s even worse. Awe, poor little Amber, Mummy and Daddy didn’t love you and you thought that was my fault?
” She scoffed. “It couldn’t possibly because you’re unlovable.
Because you acted like a spoiled and entitled bitch every waking moment of your life.
Because you always wanted more than what you were given.
God, look at yourself: so weak. You can’t even get up off the ground. ”
Violet paused, tilting her head. Her sadistic grin grew with each second her ex-friend spent trying to get up.
It almost seemed like there was an invisible weight that was pinning her to the stone.
I snuck a glance at the witch, wondering if she was behind it, but she wasn’t looking at Bitch Face.
No, her eyes were glued on Violet, watching my wife with growing curiosity.
“What’s the matter, Friend? Nothing to say? Hm?”
Violet watched her friend open and close her mouth three times before that evil laugh came back. Fuck me. This was not the time or the place to be horny. You need to calm the fuck down, I said to myself several times before my dick remembered we were in fucking danger.
“You know, I should really thank you. I’d been trying to trigger my powers for months, but it was you. Seeing you tossed into the room, realizing my best friend was a traitorous bitch—that was all it took to light my fire. But that’s not all. Do you want to see what else I can do?”
Fuck yeah, I did. Holy shit, evil Violet was the hottest thing I’d ever laid eyes on. Give me all you got, baby.
“Seeing as you can’t talk, I suppose you don’t have a choice.”
Violet’s eyes sparkled as Amber’s face started turning red. Her mouth kept opening and closing like she was trying to gulp down air but there was none. Her body started convulsing as she clawed at Violet. Her eyes were pleading for air but my wife just watched.
“It’s not fun, is it? Struggling to breathe? You know, it’s worse with water. There’s always this little piece of you wondering if all the water is out of your lungs. Dry drowning is a real problem. But you weren’t thinking about that when you watched them hold me down yesterday, were you?”
Bitch’s eyes filled with relief for a second as she gasped in air. It was short lived, quickly returning to terror when water started pouring out of her mouth. She choked and sputtered and clawed at her throat to breathe, but Violet was unrelenting.
“Do you think your parents will miss you when you’re dead? Maybe, but they love me like a daughter. They would probably be happy if I took your place. Finally a daughter they can be proud of.”
Jesus fucking Christ. My wife was fucking evil.
I was the luckiest man in the world.
“After all, I think it’s only fair, considering you helped Fuck Face kill my parents. Isn’t that right?”
The doctor shook her head furiously, panic in her eyes. Violet’s head tilted and the water vanished.
“I didn’t. I swear to god, I didn’t help him. I didn’t even know,” Amber gasped out between gulps of air. “I’d never hurt them.”
“No? You just wanted to hurt me?”
“I wanted something you didn’t have! For once in my life I wanted something you didn’t have.
Power—not literally but the kind I could get from Chris’ influence.
He wanted you broken, serving him, and I thought I could finally have something you didn’t.
I swear to god I didn’t know about your parents.
I never would have gone along with that. ”
“I believe you,” Violet said softly, brushing the hair from her old friend’s face so tenderly that I might have believed there was love behind it. “But I don’t care.”
My wife stood, took two steps back to stand at my side, and slipped her fingers through mine.
A second later a piece of the mountain—the size of a small boulder—broke off of the ceiling and landed on Amber’s leg.
The crunch of bone and Amber’s screaming filled the room.
Another piece fell on her hand, then another on her other leg, then another on her lower back.
Scream after scream, boulder after boulder, Violet stood stone cold until Amber fell limp on the floor. Crumpled and crushed.
She took a second to admire her work before she looked at me and smiled. No, it’s still not the time or the place. Fucking chill, stupid dick.
“So, how did I do? Do you think my villain speech was okay? Or did it need some work?”
I placed my free hand on her cheek and ran my thumb over her skin.
I hadn’t noticed before, but all her bruises had vanished.
Same with all her cuts and that fucking brand.
I nearly burst into tears right there. She could heal herself; she wouldn’t have to live the rest of her life wearing the marks they tried to scar her with.
“It was perfect. You are incredible and I’m so fucking proud of you.”
Her eyes fluttered closed as her smile grew and she turned her head to kiss my palm. “I love you.”
“I love you.”
I leaned forward to kiss her forehead. When I pulled back, she had a mischievous sparkle in her eyes.
“You look like you’re in pain.”
“Me? What?”
Her eyes travelled down my suit. Shit, busted. This suit had fucking everything on display.
“Look, I’m sorry. I really, really am, but oh my fuck. Evil Violet is the hottest shit ever and I can’t help it.”
She popped onto her tiptoes and pressed her lips to my ear. “What do you say about getting out of here so I can show my husband exactly how much I missed him?”
“Fuck yes. Hell fucking yes.”
She chuckled softly, stepping back.
“Are you going to be okay? Getting out on your own?” she asked turning to her left.
Shit. I completely forgot about the witch.
“Yes, thank you for coming for me.”
The witch stood for the first time and walked over to us. Her hand wrapped around Violet’s wrist and she leaned in. I wasn’t more than a few inches away but when the witch’s mouth moved, I couldn’t hear what she was saying.
Violet met her eye, nodding once. “Good luck. I hope freedom is everything you wished for.”
“I believe it will be.” Then the witch vanished.
“What was that about?”
“Nothing, just saying thanks. There’s one more thing I have to do. Are you okay for a few more minutes?”
“I’ll be okay for a few more hours as long as you keep me at your side. What are we doing?”
Violet grinned. “We’re going to take this mountain down on top of their whole operation.”
I had no idea why she waited for me to break out of here when she clearly didn’t need me. In fact, I felt like I was slowing her down. I was at her heels as she navigated the halls like she owned the place, killing guards with nothing more than a blink or wave of her hands.
“Did you really just learn what your powers were?”
Violet nodded, checking around a corner before she waved me forward.
“I felt them brewing the whole time. A couple weeks ago these people…they messed up my back pretty bad with a whip—nearly took the skin clean off. The doctor said I may never get it all back. I was lying on my stomach, Niko was trying to keep my mind off of everything and was chattering away when he stopped dead. He told me the skin was knitting itself back together. I had to stop it, obviously. I couldn’t let them know I could heal.
I was worried that was the only thing I could do, which I wouldn’t complain about but it wouldn’t exactly be useful for making an escape. ”
At the end of the next hall, she paused again, giving me a chance to digest everything she just said.
I only saw a fraction of the scars they’d tried to leave her with.
It was fucking miracle she’d gotten her voice back so fast, let alone her smile and her laugh.
I would never not be in awe of this woman and her strength.
“So I forced the healing to stop. Luckily for me, the doctor was a fucking idiot.” Violet rolled her eyes. “She thought she was the reason my back healed up so fast. Can you believe that?”
“What a stupid bitch.”
“Right! Anyway, for a couple weeks that was all I felt. Then last week, one of the guards tried to…um—”
“Which guard?”
“I don’t know, they all look the same to me.
Although that particular guard is now missing a finger, so he shouldn’t be hard to point out if he’s still here.
Which he’s probably not because Fuck Head made it very clear I was his and no one was allowed to touch me.
” She gagged. “He didn’t,” she added quickly as though she saw the question on my face.
“He wanted me willing. He didn’t touch me—at least not like that. ”
I didn’t know what to say. I was relieved she hadn’t been violated to that degree sure, but she still went through hell. And I wanted to kill him—slowly, brutally, over days. But that was Violet’s kill, no chance I was taking that away from her.
“Anyway, I bit off that one guard’s finger and spit it back in his face. You would have died—the look on his face as his finger landed at his feet…” She trailed off laughing. “As his partner was dragging him out of the room, I felt it. The spark, my fire.
“I started practicing on the torches when I was alone in the tor—my usual room. I’d fan the flames a little. Nothing super noticeable, because I knew they were watching when I was in there.”
She stopped to peek around the next corner.
“A few days after that I accidentally put out one of the torches in the hall when they were walking me back to my cell. That was when I realized I could control the air too. So I tried for water and earth too. I was a huge Avatar: The Last Airbender fan as a kid, so I got a little giddy when I got two out of four, not going to lie.”
She smiled, continuing our walk.
“So you started on earth right away, considering you’re surrounded by it?”
She nodded. “I took little chunks out of the walls then put them back like they never left. But no matter how much I tried, I couldn’t get water.
Until yesterday, when Amber showed up. She decided it would be fun to watch me get waterboarded.
I felt the water respond to me, like it didn’t want to drown me. I actually had to force it to.”
“You… You waterboarded yourself?”
“Yeah, I couldn’t let them know yet. I was planning to build up my strength this week and see about breaking out once I’d gotten control of my powers. But then you found me and I thought, that’s perfect, we can do it together.”
“You… You did all that to Amber with no practice? Scared off twenty guards with no practice? Jesus Christ, Violet. You know, I think that makes you the most powerful out of all of us.”
She grinned over her shoulder at me. “Am I? I guess the two of us will be an unstoppable team then. Think of all the good—or evil we could do. I guess it depends on which side you’re looking at it from.”
“You want to team up?”
“Hell yeah, I do! Are you kidding?”
I grabbed her hand and spun her into my chest. “God, I fucking love you. How did I get so lucky?”
“You pinned me to a wall in an alley and you never got rid of me.”
“More like, I never let you go.”
She smiled, popping up on her toes to kiss me. My arms tightened around her as her lips parted. Never let me go.
Not even if you tried to kill me.
“What the fuck?”
Violet barely pulled away from me to glance at the open doorway at the end of the hall. In front of it stood Officer Fuck Shit, surrounded by fifteen guards. She shot them a wicked grin.
“Hello boys, so nice to see you all while we’re on even footing, don’t you think?”
“How—”
She tsked, taking a step toward the door. “Oh gosh! How rude of me! Officer O’Neill, have you met my husband?”
“He’s not— But you’re supposed—”
“Oh, shut the fuck up would you? I told you a hundred times I’ll never be yours. Get over it.” She shrugged. “Or don’t, you won’t live long enough for it to matter.”
“Sound the alarm!”
“Yes, good idea,” Violet said. “It’ll be so much easier if all of you are in one place for this next part.”
Dickhead scoffed. “Oh yeah? And what part is that?”
“The part where I kill you all.”
She smiled, raising her hands out in front of her chest. Four guards near the back caught on fire, four on my left started choking, five on the right were coughing up water, and the two directly behind Shit Fucker Face stared at my wife in horror as the whole mountain began to shake.