"Mallory?" the Haunting Nightmare grunted.

"That's her name." Zen hummed calmly.

"Rare name around these parts. Irish, I think?" Boneyard threw in.

"Only Mallory I've ever heard of is that dumb bitch from the Enlightened who got murked in this area." the boss chuckled.

Rude.

I was going to try to derail the discussion with a quip and swerve when Zen made my worst nightmare a grim reality.

"Interesting you say that boss, because that is her right here."

There was a long pause.

A torturously long pause.

A gap in conversation that allowed my thoughts to race 10 miles a minute.

What should I do?

What could I do?

Should I attempt to flee?

Fight?

Try to salvage the situation?

How did Zen read my mind?

I felt nothing at all!

Is he someone from my past who knows about my cape-switch?

Is he a mage?

Are his powers so far beyond mine that my defenses didn't even register?

"Are you serious?" the grotesque team leader finally asked, freeing me from the neverending mobious strip my mind-highway had twisted itself into. "The Master Controller is...."

"Satori. Yes." Zen confirmed.

"No shit. We have a dead girl walking here. Maybe you fit in better with the Freaks than we all thought."

He hung his misformed arm around my shoulder, but not for comradery or comfort. His, long, sharp claws slowly closed around my neck, tight enough to make it hurt when I swallowed.

"Our friend Zen here has helped the team expose and...get rid of a spy in our midst somewhat recently. And another promising potential recruit turned out to be a narc too. Both for some organization named after a group of comic book bad guys, isn't that crazy?" he breathed into my ear.

"i-insane..." I nodded quickly.

"Now, I didn't suspect you at all, personally. You killed so many innocent people after all. But hearing you're really a White Cape...., or used to be, at least...it raises some suspicions." he continued.

"Understandable." I placated nervously.

Boneyard had removed her skeletal pointer finger from its fleshy prison and pressed its sharpened tip into my chest area.

"I would be very disappointed if we had to debone you, MC. Zen.....what should we do with her?"

Once again there was a long silence, though my thoughts were mostly focused at this point.

Eventually, Zen smirked.

"You can let her go. She can be trusted. We have nothing to fear from her. Isn't that right, Mal?"

My racing heart began to gradually calm down, especially when the claws were lifted from my neck and the bone from my chest.

What was happening? I thought I was a goner for sure. This made no sense at all to me.

I felt a hard slap on the back and the boss started laughing.

"Never doubted you, girl." he said and Boneyard nodded. "What luck! I'm sure we can use this. We have to be able to, only a complete moron would let a chance like that slip away. Not really sure how we're gonna spin this to our advantage, but I'll work on it. First though."

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He sat down and gestured for me to do the same.

"Tell me everything. Not your whole life story or whatever, but how you ended up here. On the right side of the caped coin. We should have done this at the food stalls, this is the perfect opportunity for some popcorn."

"Of course...." Zen butted in. "I can relay the information for you if you don't feel comfortable doing so yourself."

I looked between the three villains in the room and sighed, sitting down.

There is no world in which letting Zen do this is in any way more beneficial than me trying to do it myself.

"Alright. I mean, what can I do? You're going to find out sooner or later."

I told them most of everything.

I began with a short summary of my time with the Enlightened. Established the relationships. Then the Gas Quarter job. How Ray betrayed me. My kidnapping by the Society.

I skipped over most of my time in the Powerbreaker's lair. Just mentioned that it wasn't....very pleasant. No one of them pushed the issue.

After that came my stint as a Beginner villain. Meeting and working with Jess, though I kept her identity safe. I'm sure Zen could've spilled the beans on that too, but he just....hovered there, eyes closed, saying nothing.

I took a few.....creative liberties. I needed them to believe having me around was a boon, so in my retelling, everything I did to increase my reputation was either planned from the start or deliberately executed when the opportunity came up.

I left out the first world...or timeline...still not quite sure how that worked....when we got to the Petite Group. Souto would have only complicated matters unnecessarily. And of course, I did not mention W.R.A.I.T.H..

I was hoping beyond hope that this would satisfy him. That Zen would keep his trap shut.

And my prayers were heard.

"So, the golden boy and the slithery bitch were bad apples, eh?" the boss chuckled.

"Figures. It's always the capes at the top who abuse their power the most." Boneyard murmured.

The Haunting Nightmare laughed.

"Hey, if my Power wasn't this grotesquely unappealing from a marketing standpoint I would've probably taken the same path. Don't get me wrong, doing whatever the hell I want and fighting the system is great and all, but doing whatever the hell I want and being protected by the system is the real pinnacle of self-service. It's just a good deal."

My stomach turned a bit, but I didn't let it affect me.

"Did you guys know what was going on back then? When I was taken?" I asked.

The boss shook his head.

"Othello was still in charge back then. Did a lot of things his way, and our tent has to live with the consequences to this day. I don't know the details, but he let the SoP take over the old factory in exchange for a generous amount of monthly cash. Basically covered our lair fees fully with every payment. Raked in tons of profits during that time." He shrugged. "But we kept apart. No interactions between the teams, that was one of the rules. He might have known what was up, but if he did, he never told any of us."

I nodded. "Alright. Thanks for the answer."

He got up and I followed suit.

"No sweat, hero. Lots of things to think about here. But now that I know I can trust you, we have to do something. It'll make your stay here much, much easier. Follow me."

Boneyard and I followed behind him as he left, but Zen stayed floating inside the small chamber. Good. Being around him can only cause trouble.

We made our way through another series of rooms, all in various sizes and for various purposes. This pocket dimension really was huge. It must cost them a small fortune to rent.

When we arrived at our destination we were standing at the entrance to a very peculiar room. Unique. Instead of a tent flap leading to the next section, there was a large, circular hole, leading into a sort of cave of fabric. Webs hung from all sides of the cave-ish walls.

I was pretty sure I knew where we were.

"Ariadne! Come out! We have someone to introduce you to!" the boss yelled.

I could hear shuffling from inside the cave, a series of clicks coming ever closer.

A mild, sour smell crept into my mask, through the filters even. It got more intense over time but.....I actually kinda liked it.

No, "liked" was a bit of an underreaction. I adored it. I...loved it! I needed it! Needed more!

Yes, it wasn't good smelling in the traditional sense, but it set all of my nerve ends on fire.

"Coming." a pretty, angelic, wonderful voice sang from the depths of the hollow, which I was sure must lead into heaven itself.

Then she emerged.

The perfect being.

Eight strong, large legs carried her forward on the body of a gigantic spider, her bottom half more of a chariot built to support the majestic top. From that lower body, like a beautiful flower in a diseased patch of earth, grew the most beautiful, heavenly, unblemished, amazing upper body ever put on this planet. If a god existed he must've begun to rest for he had surely created his masterpiece.

Her glistening body was perfection to behold. A cute little navel, a form-fitting ribcage, and bare breasts criminally covered by her luscious locks of black hair. She must've been the only creature on earth on whom greasy hair added to her beauty instead of subtracting from it.

Her eight benevolent, kind, caring eyes locked onto me, and her smile revealed a row of sharp, thin fangs that accentuated the rest of her face magnificently.

"Oh, is that one for me?" she cooed both maternally and with the raw eroticism of a goddess. I was truly in awe.

"No, Ari. She's our newest team member. Do your thing." the monster screeched gratingly. I could barely even look at it. Not when this divine being stood in front of me as a direct comparison.

"Awwww." she pouted and I felt visceral hatred grow in me for the...the THING which disappointed my goddess, my mistress, my angel. I would kill him. I had to. This couldn't go unpunished.

"Take your mask off, Sweetling." my owner said, for she was in possession of my heart.

"Of course! At once!" I cried, tears running down my face due to joy, luck, euphoria, disbelief that a being as perfect as her would deign to interact with me at all.

I basically tore my wretched mask off and threw it on the ground.

"I did it! I did it, my queen!" I sobbed.

"Such a good girl." she whispered and bent down, her surprisingly strong arms wrapping around my mid-section and pulling me up. My heart nearly exploded at the praise, her wonderful scent enveloping me this close to her unparalleled body.

She opened her mouth, showing her fangs, and I wordlessly offered my neck. I was ready to die, as long as it was by her hand. This was a good death. The best. I hoped I would be reborn as a bacterium on her flawless skin, for that is surely what religions spoke of when they described paradise.

The pain of her teeth in my neck was euphoric, a symphony of joy...and...

All at once the rank stench hit me. My stomach lurched. Blood was trickling from my neck but the pain was non-existent.

I turned my head back and looked at the grotesque abomination holding me in her arms.

Her eight black eyes stared at me, blood running down her chin from her razor-sharp, needle-like, red-stained fangs. Her hair....her whole body, really, was caked in a thick layer of grease and sweat.

The thing kissed my forehead and set me back down. As soon as she let go I collapsed to the ground and scrambled backward. On the back of her spider body lay a woman, her belly swollen, her body fully wrapped in web. She was unconscious, or napping, but a big smile was resting on her still face.

"I have things to do, Sweetling. We'll talk later." the Half-spider woman said, blew me a kiss, and retreated into her den.

I was panting heavily, disgust warring with my need not to leave my DNA behind with these people. I lunged for my mask and put it on. If I was going to puke, I'd take it with me, no matter how gross it was going to be. But luckily, my belly quickly calmed down.

"Yeah. That's just what's got to happen if someone is going to spend any amount of time here. Good news though, now that youre inoculated, her pheromones wont ever bother you again. Most of us had to go through that." the boss murmured. "But she is exceptionally useful."

He helped me up, but I was still not in the right state of mind to speak.

"Well then. It'll be official official when we have your welcome dinner with the rest of the team....and official official official when you make your debut under our name, but....allow me, the boss, to officially say, Mallory...."

He put his hand on my shoulder. His human hand, this time.

"Welcome to the family."

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