Life as a supervillain wasn't easy in the optimistically-named Future City, which was exactly why the woman widely-known as The Shimmer was determined never to get too proud of being one. She'd made her friend Ramona promise to give her a swift kick in the head if she ever started making big, bold speeches, or sending self-important letters to the press. That never ended well. 'Supervillain', in her experience, too often meant someone too caught up in their own bullshit to be able to tell when to get the hell out of dodge. That, she could honestly say, wasn't one of her many flaws. She just needed one big score, and she was done for good.
Which was why she never thought of herself as The Shimmer, and only as plain old Trinity. 'Shimmer' wasn't a bad name, as names went. A little sparkles-and-fairy-magic for her liking, but much better than ending up christened as Lady Deathcakes or something by a particularly misguided journalist. Trinity's small-time villain buddies would have never let her hear the end of it. Not that she needed to worry about their opinions for much longer. Trinity was already on her way to that one big score she'd been longing for, making her way through the busy streets of Future City with her head down and a giddy smile on her face. This was it. She was finally going to get rich, and the best part was, she'd be stealing from a corporate asshole in the process. It was going to be great.
It was going to be nothing like the previous dozen or so failed big scores she'd embarked on.
Trinity really believed that. She had to believe it, because she had to get out of this city. Trinity glanced around, taking stock of the neighborhood she was walking through and noticing all the hundreds of shitty ways it had changed. It was called Castron, and it was the place she'd grown up. She'd been born in the local hospital, twenty-three years before. Back then, it had been on the outskirts - poor, yeah, but at a safe distance from the identical, glass-plated, high-rise corporate buildings that dominated the heart of the city. It'd had soul. Now, though, those corporations were just a few blocks away, and inching closer every month.
The rot was already beginning to show. Local stores being bought out. Rents going up. Billboards about new developments plastered everywhere. Gentrification. Trinity hated it.
And unlike some, she wasn't arrogant enough to believe she could stop it. She just wanted enough money to get out and start a nice, comfy life somewhere completely different. Which was why she was currently on her way to steal a whole lot of money from an obscenely wealthy corporate bitch.
Trinity was just minding her own business, walking along the sidewalk, contemplating that happy prospect, when she felt someone grab her arm roughly and peer in to look at her under her hood.
"Hey, aren't you that-"
That was all Trinity needed to hear. She sighed once, heavily, and then put her fingertips to the woman's temple and gave her a taste of her shimmer.
Trinity hated being recognized. At first, even after a couple of high-profile tussles with superheroes, she hadn't needed to worry about it. She figured she looked pretty ordinary. She was a little short, and a little curvier than most people expected. Sure, she had a sidecut and a septum piercing, but hey, she was far from the only dyke in Future City. Apparently, though, after getting arrested half a dozen times, your mugshot got around. Fortunately, she'd done a way better job at keeping the details of her powers under wrap. It's not like it made any sense to go around bragging about them, and putting a big 'WEAKNESS HERE' target on herself.
Most people didn't know that one little touch was all she needed.
It usually took a moment, though, and Trinity enjoyed using it to get a good look at today's lucky, nosy citizen of the day. Frankly, she looked just like almost anybody else. Nice, curly hair. Cute freckles. She was wearing a suit, but it looked a little cheap for her to be a corporate type. Maybe she was on her way to a job interview. Trinity didn't really care. All she cared about was the woman's pretty, green eyes, and the way they looked as they started to change color.
As soon as Trinity's fingertips made contact with the woman's temple, they started to glow a brilliant, warm purple. It wasn't just her skin; it emanated from Trinity's fingers in strange, cloudy streaks, like luminescent fluid spreading through water. Then, the glow started to spread to Trinity's victim, a bolt of it passing under her skin until it reached her eyes, darting for them like an electric current.
And then her green eyes started to turn a rich, bright purple.
It took a few moments for them to change completely. Little purple lights started appearing in her irises, more of them flickering to life as the seconds passed, until purple overwhelmed green. The purple of Trinity's shimmer was bright, but it was also flat and uniform, and before long, the poor woman's eyes were left empty and glassy, devoid of any spark of independent thought, and even the whites of her eyes seemed to reflect an eerie, cloudy glow.
Trinity shivered. It was so hot. It never stopped being hot.
Just as hot was watching her posture slump, and watching a big, dumb, vacant smile spread across her alarmed face. She looked like she didn't have a care in the world - because she didn't. All she was thinking was shimmer.
