The old order changes

[Malice]

East River- Bishop's safe house

Delilah and Alexia would be safe from Haleigh now. If nothing else, at least there was that.

:: Oh how sad. How NAIVE to think that he had the power to keep them, OR HIMSELF safe.::

:: He braved the elements, for the short time that he was exposed to them, and made his way inside his safe house, and removed his shirt, he began to dry off.::

:: A sound caught his hearing. It was faint, but it was distinct at the same time. He recognized it, as only a father could, the vocalizations of an baby girl. HIS daughter.::

:: And as he looked around, his senses began to fail him, as he saw himself somewhere he KNEW he couldn't be, but never the less, there he was, ARKLAY MANSION, when it was in it's full glory and operation. The storm that Ravena created was still raging outside.::

:: But despite the storm, and unusual sounds that could be heard around him, ALEXIA'S little voice rang out like a beacon.::

FIND her, Bishop. FIND HER before the MONSTERS get her....

:: The voice of the white queen haunts him, his MIND, like the winds of the storm outside, and she guides him with her telepathy down to the lower reaches of the mansion. ::

:: Everything around him warps, distorts and SWIRLS, and he is NOW in the underground lab, where the sounds of sadness, torture, and FEAR can be heard. Lights flicker...doors open and shut...chains rattle...the sound of surgical steel instruments cutting flesh and bone...and more...all heard by him.::

Time is running OUT, Bishop. Alexia is NEXT.

:: And soon, he is confronted with the HORRIBLE reality, (one that Malice is telepathically COERCING him to believe ). In the main laboratory, he beholds Delilah Trelevan, floating in a stasis tube. She's been mutated, but his heart, his SOUL recognizes her...and Malice broadcasts her screams, her cries...and her PAIN into him as he looks upon his true love, the mother of his child.::

She belongs to US now.

:: Malice taunts::

:: Further in...he finds a group of doctors, all of whom have tattered, bloody lab coats and enshrouded faces. They are observing Dr. Kelly Shaw , who is lecturing, and conducting an experiment on the live test subject, ALEXIA!::

:: Bishop's approach is HALTED by the suddent appearance of the White Queen, a woman whom he's heard of, but never actually ENCOUNTERED. ::

You MADE it, Bishop! JUST IN TIME!

Dr. Shaw: And now, in order for us to determine how the test subject will react to direct exposure to the G Virus, I will now inject the most recent sample. But FIRST...

:: Bishop sees her weilding a large, sharp surgical knife::

Dr. Shaw: A genetic sample must be taken, so that we can subject her to the same cloning and mutation process that her mother has been exposed to. If my calculations are correct, we should get QUITE A BIT OF USE from this one!

WE are the monsters, Bishop.

:: And just as Kelly is about to BRUTALLY CUT into Alexia, her screams, and crash of thunder startle Bishop, and he is jarred back to actual reality, with a POWERFUL slap across the face by a diamond hand, that sends him crashing to the floor.::

GREETINGS!

:: Malice says in a mocking tone, as she stands over him, holding the holoempathic crystal necklace that was gifted him by Ororo!::

I am Malice, The White Queen, I am the the source of ALL distress and heartache that has haunted and encompassed Delilah and the Six, and NOW? It's YOUR turn.

:: She turns and walks away from him, as he gets to his feet::

Don't bother reaching for a weapon, flatscan. You'll find them all quite useless against me. You are quite alone, and QUITE HELPLESS. With my telepathy, I'll know your moves before your body can respond to your brain, and I'll deal with you accordingly.

:: Turning back to face him, dangling the holoempathic necklace in her hand::

Now then.

:: She looks upon him, registering all the thoughts, the emotions, the INSTINCTIVE feelings that are rising up within him.::

You assaulted my daughter earlier.

You raised your hand to a member of my White Court, and ultimately to the Hellfire Club.

That simply will not do.

:: She shakes her hand, and wags her finger in a scolding measure::

You thought that eliminating her would keep Delilah and Alexia safe?

:: She walks over to a nearby shelf, and finds a picture of Delilah, picking up for a moment, she studies it. Then, she lets it fall to the floor, and STEPS on it with her high heel, breaking the glass, and the frame itself. She then destroys the picture with her high heel, ruining the integrity of the image.::

Pictures...the MIND makes pictures too. I believe you know them as MEMORIES?

:: Bishop tries to move, but Malice has telepathically seized his mind, and FORCED him to his knees. She now circles him slowly::

Some memories are so precious, aren't they?

Perhaps the most precious ones of all, are the ones a parent has...of their child.

:: She now holds the crystal of the necklace in her hand, and a humming sound is heard, as a shimmering image of Alexia can be seen. The little baby, yawning as she stirs in her sleep.::

You desperately hope to see her again. You hope for the day that you and Delilah can be together, with Alexia in your arms.

That is what drives you more than ANYTHING else, and you'd give...DO anything for that to happen, isn't that right?

The memory of your baby, holding her the first time....seeing her off in Harbinger's arms....they provide solace as you wander through the valley of damnation.

How SAD it would be....if you LOST ALL MEMORY of HER.

:: And with that, Malice uses her psi powers to REMOVE any memory of Alexia::

:: She holds the holoempathic necklace down, letting the crystal dangle right in front of Bishop's face::

She's GONE now, Bishop.

The most beautiful and precious thing you held in your black heart is GONE.

:: and with that, she throws the crystal on the floor and SLAMS her high heel down on it, SHATTERING the crystal, and Alexia's CRY can be heard fading away in the air::

Who will you call? Alison? DELILAH? What will you tell them? How will you explain that you've FAILED again, that you've LOST her AGAIN.

You'd rather DIE, than be in a world that was unsafe for her. NOW you can LIVE in this world, without ANY knowledge or memory of her, and when you finally DO see her? nothing she can say to you will convince you. Ohhh how DREADFUL that will be...for you to look upon that child as if she were INSANE.

:: Malice LAUGHS at Bishop as she GRINDS the crystal under her high heel::

THIS is the price that you pay for attacking my daughter, you pathetic HUMAN.

NO ONE defies my will and goes UNPUNISHED.

:: she turns, walking away, it appears she'll LEAVE him there, like this...but then she turns back, and with a wave of her hand, Bishop is struck with a great pain that defies physical explanation. She RESTORES the physical, psionic and emotional connections, giving him BACK his memory and recollection of Alexis, as WELL as the awareness of what Malice had just done to him. The shattered crystal? It was still laying on the table, as it had all along. THAT detail of her destroying it was just another part of her telepathic illusion!::

There are OTHER ways to destroy someone besides physical death, Maxim Sheremetyev.

:: She reminds him, as her sapphire blue eyes glow and she smiles wickedly::

I just showed you ONE of them.

:: Ravena's portal opens::

Delilah is not safe. ALEXIA is not safe. Even though she is beyond a world away? I can make it so she's an ORPHAN, in MORE than one way.

YOU are not safe, Bishop.

You thought SCION was a bitch?

You'll learn that her MOTHER is something MUCH WORSE.

:: and with that, Malice unleashes a PSI SHOCK, that sends Bishop SLAMMING into the wall, and his head feels like it will EXPLODE::

Goodbye now, Sweet dreams...

:: Her image, and what she'd done, would haunt him for the rest of the night.::

:: Thunder from the storm crashes, and lightning strikes, and She passes through the portal, to a waiting Ravena, who had witnessed it all via his scrying pool::

It will be a while before he can even THINK clearly, much less vex Scion or anyone else in the Inner Circle again.

:: She says coldly, but with a satisfied glint in her sapphire blue eyes::

 

[Bishop]

East River Safe House

Bishop toweled himself off, standing in his kitchen. His ears perked up, though, and he paused, as he heard a noise behind him. He dropped the towel on the table, and turned. It sounded just like...

Alexia.

But as he turned around, suddenly he found himself in another place, a place he remembered all too well. Arklay mansion. It was storming here, too.

"Okay, what the fuck."

He heard the cry again, and his heart began to beat faster. He knew what was in this place. And if she was here...

FIND her, Bishop. FIND HER before the MONSTERS get her....

He had to find her.

He made his way further into the mansion, finding himself in the underground lab, not entirely sure how he had gotten there. There were more noises here, unpleasant ones. But he couldn't find her. Where was she?

Time is running OUT, Bishop. Alexia is NEXT.

He walked through the laboratory, tubes on either side of him, unspeakable horrors contained within. Some had clearly been human once. He got closer to one of the tubes, and saw the creature inside looking back at him. And suddenly he knew. It was Delilah. He gasped, put his hand on the glass of the tube. What had they done to her? He started to pound on the glass, to break it, when he was hit by a rush of pain, as sure as if he had been stabbed in the gut. He doubled over, hearing Delilah screaming, feelincg her pain as if it were happening to him. Worse because he knew it was her that it was happening to.

She belongs to US now.

"She will NEVER belong to you."

He manages to spit out through gritted teeth, before finding himself again mysteriously deeper into the building.

Gruesome caricatures of doctors stood before her, around and operating table. One that held Alexia. Bishop's eyebrows knitted together in anger as he rushed forward, ready to kill them all and save his daughter...

But then a blonde woman in white was blocking his path.

You MADE it, Bishop! JUST IN TIME!

Dr. Shaw: And now, in order for us to determine how the test subject will react to direct exposure to the G Virus, I will now inject the most recent sample. But FIRST...A genetic sample must be taken, so that we can subject her to the same cloning and mutation process that her mother has been exposed to. If my calculations are correct, we should get QUITE A BIT OF USE from this one!

"DON'T YOU TOUCH HER!"

But he was held back somehow, not able to get to her.

WE are the monsters, Bishop.

"I don't give a FUCK who you are, let my daughter go! She's just a child!"

The doctor raised a surgical knife, and Alexia screamed. Bishop fought against what was holding him but could not get any closer...

And then suddenly he felt something hit him in the face, and he was falling to the floor in his safe house.

GREETINGS! I am Malice, The White Queen, I am the the source of ALL distress and heartache that has haunted and encompassed Delilah and the Six, and NOW? It's YOUR turn.

"I'm not sure Delilah would agree with you, there. But okay."

He looked around himself as if to assure him that he was indeed where he should be, rising to hit feet. He reached behind himself into the bag on the table.

Don't bother reaching for a weapon, flatscan. You'll find them all quite useless against me. You are quite alone, and QUITE HELPLESS. With my telepathy, I'll know your moves before your body can respond to your brain, and I'll deal with you accordingly.

He watched her dangling the necklace that he had found on his pillow, the one that allowed him to see Alexia, but made no move towards it. He was still seeing the images from what must be an illusion. This chick was a telepath, like that douchebag Cameron.

"So...you here to fuck me or kill me? Like mother, like daughter and all that? I don't usually do MILF, but what the hell, I've never done mother-daughter before..."

He crossed his arms over his bare chest.

You assaulted my daughter earlier.

"Oh I did more than that to her last week."

He grinned vindictively at her, but he noticed that she hadn't used the words murdered, killed, or executed.

You raised your hand to a member of my White Court, and ultimately to the Hellfire Club.

"See, you're saying that like I give a fuck."

You thought that eliminating her would keep Delilah and Alexia safe?

"It's definitely a start."

This bitch - Malice, whatever - picked up a photograph he had of Delilah and crushed it beneath her her foot. He had had about enough of this bullshit, and moved forward to take his necklace back from the woman, only to find himself being forced to kneel.

Some memories are so precious, aren't they? ... How SAD it would be....if you LOST ALL MEMORY of HER.

And suddenly, he couldn't remember what his daughter looked like, how old she was, or what her name was.

She's GONE now, Bishop. The most beautiful and precious thing you held in your black heart is GONE.

"You bitch."

Malice smashed the necklace in front of him, the one that let him see her. His fingers touched the pieces, but no image came. The memories were there, just on the cusp of his consciousness, like a dream forgotten upon waking.

Who will you call? Alison? DELILAH? What will you tell them? How will you explain that you've FAILED again, that you've LOST her AGAIN.

He looked up at her coldly. It was easy for her to sound so smug when she could keep him at arm's distance. He'd like to see her face as he choked the life out of her...

"She's safe from you, I know that, and that's all that matters."

You'd rather DIE, than be in a world that was unsafe for her. NOW you can LIVE in this world, without ANY knowledge or memory of her, and when you finally DO see her? nothing she can say to you will convince you. Ohhh how DREADFUL that will be...for you to look upon that child as if she were INSANE.

"Why don't I practice now, with you."

THIS is the price that you pay for attacking my daughter, you pathetic HUMAN. NO ONE defies my will and goes UNPUNISHED.

"You want to kill me, then get on with it. I've already lost everything."

Because of your bitch of a daughter.

Malice turned and started to walk away, leaving him there, fighting to remember, and failing. But then in a rush, the memories flooded back, causing him to stagger at the surge of physical and emotional feeling.

There are OTHER ways to destroy someone besides physical death, Maxim Sheremetyev. I just showed you ONE of them.

He forced himself to stand tall, facing her. Defiant.

Delilah is not safe. ALEXIA is not safe.

"You leave them out of this."

Even though she is beyond a world away? I can make it so she's an ORPHAN, in MORE than one way. YOU are not safe, Bishop. You thought SCION was a bitch? You'll learn that her MOTHER is something MUCH WORSE.

"A cunt?"

She hit him with something then, sending him flying backwards hard into a wall. The pain in his head was massive, his hands going to the sides of his head but giving him no relief.

Goodbye now, Sweet dreams...

And she was gone. The pain subsided, and he was able to finally stand. He stumbled towards the table, where he had left his phone. He dialed Delilah number, and it went right to voicemail.

"Damnit Delilah!"

She had blocked his number.

Now that the cobwebs were clearing, rage was replacing them. That CUNT had threatened Delilah AND Alexia, made him feel both of their losses. He had to make sure Delilah stayed safe.

"No one defies you and goes unpunished, eh bitch? The Six seems to do a pretty damn good job of it, and they're idiots."

He hated the Six, but there was nothing he wanted to see more than that bitch's smug face turned into a toilet brush or whatever it was the Six did with their enemies.

His fingers were dialing another number, as he was pulling a dry t shirt on. The Six would probably not listen to him, not now. But...

"Zizi? I need another favor."

Zizi: "Maxim, honey? Ashley's not here right now..."

"No, I called for you. I need you to use your technical wizardry and put Delilah on your surveillance. I need you to watch her. You can do that, can't you?"

Zizi [startled]: "Um, well, YES, but...Maxim, don't you think you ought to just talk to her?"

"Malice just paid me a visit. She threatened to go after Delilah next. Please, Zizi..."

Zizi: "I'll get right on it."

"Thank you."

Zizi: "Be careful honey."

Maxim ended the call and shoved the phone into his pants pocket, grabbing a pair of Beretta 92s and slipping them into his waistband. He slid into a jacket and headed back out into the storm to find Delilah, clutching Ororo's necklace in his fist.

 

[Lord Ravena]

The thing to watch about Diana was how she attacked someone.

Some fighters went to total war, the attempted annihilation of their quarry, some went to indirect war, the idea of coercion of your quarry to your way of thinking. With Malice, it was difficult to predict how she would work, the only clue would be to know yourself as a target of her well enough to be honest about your weaknesses and how she might exploit them.

Case in point, this bubble of hairy flesh before Lord Ravena now. He reveled in his ability to vex an opponent greater than himself through elocution. If one could be talked to death, this secular "bishop" would be someone to be concerned about.

But at this time, he was cowering before Malice, unable to do anything but suffer in any of the ways she chose to have him do so. She threatened his love and his child, and made him feel their deaths YET STILL LIVE. It was impressive in how terrible it was. She proved again that she had the stomach to remake the world into what they wanted. She showed him again why he was in the Hellfire Club at all. She was sensual in her power, the domination of this NOTHING arousing him in its total domination.

And then it was over, and she left the fool in a panic as she returned to him.

:: Thunder from the storm crashes, and lightning strikes, and She passes through the portal, to a waiting Ravena, who had witnessed it all via his scrying pool::

It will be a while before he can even THINK clearly, much less vex Scion or anyone else in the Inner Circle again.

:: She says coldly, but with a satisfied glint in her sapphire blue eyes::

Lord Ravena smiled widely.

To the victor goes the spoils. And I plan to spoil you tonight, Diana.

The King embraced his queen, lifting her effortlessly and carrying her to the bed. It was the most incredibly luxurious thing she had ever laid upon! The next few hours tested the limits of the frame of that bed, which was carved from a single trunk of a baobab tree along with the accompanying furniture that made up the ranch-home sized bedroom.

 

[Bishop]

The Parthenon

As he made his way uptown, Oracle had informed Bishop that the last time a security camera had caught Delilah on tape was earlier in the evening, entering her suite at the Parthenon, so that was where he headed. He was turning over Malice's visit in his head, unable to get the horrifying visions of Delilah and Alexia out of his mind. And then there was the question, Had Haleigh survived? He supposed anything was possible, though he had left her as she did him, drowning in her own blood. He guessed it was only fair, an eye for an eye...but then he laughed internally: they were no way NEAR even.

Arriving at the Parthenon, he considered not even bothering going in the front door, since there was a good chance Delilah or Cameron had barred him from the place, but he gave it a shot and was able to make it to the elevator and up to her floor unmolested. He knocked on the door, and kept knocking, cursing himself that he hadn't thought to steal a keycard. He could do that if he had to, though. Finally he heard her shuffle to the other side of the door.

"Come on Delilah, open up."

He banged on the door with his hand again, and the door opened a crack. She did not look happy to see him.

Delilah: "You shouldn't be here."

"I need to talk to you. And you blocked my number?"

He said incredulously, and made as if to move inside, but she stood her ground.

Delilah: "We have nothing to talk about. And you wouldn't stop calling me."

"Malice came to see me. She attacked me, and threatened you, Delilah. You and Alexia."

Delilah opened the door then, but still made no move to let him inside. She crossed her arms over her chest, scoffing.

Delilah: "Why would Malice concern herself with you? Plus, if Diana had attacked you, you wouldn't be standing here right now."

She peered at him suspiciously. He contemplated telling her about Haleigh, but stopped himself. It wouldn't win him any points with Delilah. Especially if, as he suspected, she had not in actuality died.

Delilah: "What is this? Some ploy to get me to take you back? Just because I was gullible enough to after your girlfriend almost killed you, doesn't mean it will again. I learned my lesson. Go cry to her."

He let out a noise of frustration.

"Lilah, listen to me, you need to be careful-"

Delilah: "That is NOT my name."

"Stop being so stubborn about this-"

Delilah: "Don't come here again."

And she slammed the door shut.

He stared at it, clenching his fists, his frustration boiling over. He banged on the door again.

"You have to listen to me, Delilah!"

But she didn't open it again. That WOMAN. How could she think he would make this up? WHY would he do that? For fuck's SAKE.

"And WE WEREN'T TOGETHER!"

He yelled through the door. That didn't make her open the door, either. And he turned and stormed back towards the elevator in a fury. Now he had to find a place to watch the building. In a storm.

Fuck.