Sympathy For The Devil
The woman's eyes shot open. She sat up and looked around the chamber. White blocks of stone with thin black veins made up the walls. The ceiling glowed like daylight. A heavy, metal door stood in the wall. She was lying in a small, utilitarian bed. A woman in leather body armor with a long braid of chestnut hair sat across from her bed. Twister and I watched from an enchanted mirror outside the room. We'd captured Malice in our fight against Fractal back at the lab break in. Now she was our only lead on finding Fractal or the other missing artifacts. She pushed her dyed red hair out of her face and turned to face Freya.
"You need not fear. You're safe now," Freya said in a warm voice.
The woman's eyes went wide and her hands darted up to the pale skin of her neck, nervously feeling for fabric that wasn't there. "Where's the collar?" She asked tersely.
"It's gone. You need not fear Fractal controlling you any longer," Freya answered.
"Well get it back!" She shouted, still clasping her neck.
"I fear we cannot. Fractal escaped with it. But you are safe from him now. This is the Sanctum."
"But you're not safe from me. You shouldn't be in here without the collar."
"Listen Malice, worry not for my safety. I volunteered to wait here with you because of my toughness."
"Don't call me Malice," she snapped. "That's her name, the devil. I'm Allison. And you don't understand. I can't control her. You need to get out of here." Allison grabbed the white sheets of her bed and huddled behind them, like she was trying to build a wall.
"Listen Allison, you are among some of the earth's mightiest heroes. Whatever your destructive impulses, we can check them,"
"No you can't. No you can't. You don't understand. No one understands," Allison whimpered. She started rocking back and forth on the bed.
"Allison, we're here for you," Freya said reaching out a hand to the young woman.
The girl exploded from behind the sheets, her skin a deep crimson and her arms, muscular. Her clawed hand reached out for Freya's throat. Allison grabbed her neck and slammed her up against the wall. "Just leave me alone," she growled.
Freya kipped up against the wall and kicked both of her legs into Allison's chest. The redhead skidded backwards and landed on the bed. "I told you, I'm no fragile maiden."
The crimson flushed from Allison's cheeks and she shrunk back down. "It doesn't matter. I'm not talking to you. Don't come back without the collar." She buried her head under the sheets.
After a few minutes of awkward silence, Freya left the room. She met up with us in the hallway. "Well that didn't go as I'd hoped."
"She'll come around. We can just give her a little time," Twister added optimistically.
"I'm not sure she will. Not unless we do something," I said. "I can still feel the aura of sadness radiating out from her."
"Well what can we do Sam? She didn't exactly want to talk. I doubt we could get the collar back without finding Fractal again, and we can't find Fractal without her help,"Twister said.
I couldn't help but feel bad for her. I knew what it felt like to have trouble controlling yourself to put it mildly. "I do have one idea. Give me a a bit." I ran off down the hallway back to my own room. Maybe it was a dumb idea, but I couldn't get it out of my head.
I turned out of the tall, narrow corridor and into the central nave of the Sanctum. Sometimes I still couldn't believe I lived here Now.
Tree like, white columns lined the walls of the knave. Stained glass windows, depicting abstract patterns cast a kaleidoscope of colors across the ground. Of course the windows just looked out into a void of light. Still not sure how that was possible, but I tried not to think about it. I passed a series of pointed archways, one led to the hall of mirrors, another the library, a third the the entrance to the void beyond time. I still hadn't been to that chamber and hoped I never would. Then I finally reached the corridor that housed the living quarters.
My room wasn't much bigger than the chamber she was locked in. But it was bright and clean and safe. It was still a massive upgrade from my old apartment or a padded room in a laboratory. My easel and desk took up most of the room. My twin bed was shoved up against one wall. I grabbed a pad of water color paper, ripping a sheet free and placing it on the easel. I squeezed some paints from their bottles and began mixing them with water.
The painting started with her hair, a vibrant pop of red in the center of the page. A slight flutter of my wrist gave the color a gentle wave to match her hair. Then I turned my attention to tracing her silhouette. I used the narrow edge of my brush to outline her figure. Next I moved to the room. I kept a delicate touch on the dark shadows. You didn't need to use much dark color with watercolors. Rather than a pure black, I painted the shadows with dark purples and greens. I teased the shadows out into bright colors and then into the white of the page. When I finished and stepped back, the whole scene had a surreal quality, like waking up from a bad dream. The shadows all dissolved into bright colors before fading to white. The fading touch of the watercolor also lightened the scene from her memory, giving it a more ephemeral air. I hoped it would be enough.
As soon as it dried I took it off the easel and headed back to Allison's room. Twister and Freya agreed to wait outside in case things got ugly. I took my painting and went in. Allison had been sitting on her bed with her legs curled up, facing the wall. She turned towards me with a raised eyebrow. "Oh it's you. The boy with the death wish. That was crazy, what you did back there. I could have murdered you," she said.
"You didn't though," I responded cheerfully.
"Yeah you got lucky. I can't control it, which is why you shouldn't be in here right now."
I sat on the bed next to her, still holding the painting against my chest. "I don't think it was luck. You stopped on your own. Because I showed you this," I said turning the painting around.
Allison snatched it out of my hands and hunched over it. She gently ran her hand over the dimpled paper. "How did you get this?" She asked, incredulous.
"I painted it," I said, trying to hide my pride. My psychic powers caused me to see images from the minds of strangers. I had been painting scenes like this for years. I made my living selling those paintings. But this is the first time I got to show one of them to the person it came from. It felt nice.
