Howdy all!
Finally, finally, I'm out of school and going whole hog. This
hopefully means that I'll be able to settle back into a 'one
issue every two weeks' schedule again. Fingers crossed,
and thanks for your patience.
This issue's a bit of a doozie, so brace yourselves.
As always, thanks to Ken Schmidt, Rory Bryant,
and Kelly Pekrul, who saw fit to kick some
feedback my way.
Enjoy!
=========================================================================
DERELICT Press Presents
The thirty-first issue of
/~~\/~~\ {] /~~\ (^^^ || ***** /~~\
/ /\/\ \ [) ~\__ (^^ || ,' ~\__
/__/ \__\ (} \__/ ( || ', \__/
" Secrets "
Crows: Part 6 of 7
A psuedo-Acraphobe title
._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._.'COVER`._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._._.
Nei stands center cover, one arm hanging at her side, the other fanned
in front of her face. The backdrop is unrelenting jungle, full of green
shadows and dead vegetation. The look in her eyes is torn between sorrow
and anger.
)()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()
Because my mouth
Is wide with laughter
And my throat
Is deep with song
You do not think
I suffer after
I have held my pain
So long?
Because my mouth
Is wide with laughter
You do not hear
My inner cry?
Because my feet
Are gay with dancing
You do not know
I die
- Langston Hughes, "Minstrel Man"
Brittany tossed her empty soda can to Nei, who caught it with a
flourish. Several cracking and tearing noises followed, as Nei tried to
shape the metal cylinder into something resembling a cute aluminum bunny.
The resulting creation was set gently at Savannah's feet.
Brittany hopped out of the co-pilot chair, leaving the flying of
the flight.thingee to Paytan. She crouched just behind the bunny, nudging
it over the floor until it tapped Savannah's shoe. Savannah lifted her
head.
"See? Mr.Floppy likes you," said Brittany. Savannah looked from
her to Nei and back again, the two of them grinning madly at her, and
smiled.
"Guys, enough with the rabbit, okay?" She gently picked up the
malformed metal sculpture, and set it beside her. "I'm okay, really."
"What're you going to do?" asked Nei.
"I don't know. Talk to Bryan, I guess. Agh," she buried her face
in her knees again.
"But he's a nice guy, isn't he? Even though he's a villain?" Nei
leaned forward earnestly. "Just because he's on another side doesn't mean
you have to hate him."
"I don't _hate_ him, I just -- "
"You can still work it out, maybe he's got his own reasons,"
interrupted Nei. Savannah didn't reply, and Nei's face fell.
"Hey guys?" Paytan leaned back in the pilot's chair. "We're
almost to the secret base. Do you think we should set down in the city
first, or just go straight there?"
Brittany looked out the window. "Are they used to superheroes
here?"
Paytan thought for a moment. "Straight to the base it is."
Brittany looked at Savannah, who still hadn't looked up, to Nei,
who was staring at her hands. Brit resettled herself into a cross-legged
position, and picked up Mr.Floppy, trying to bend one of his ears into
the right shape. Nei jerked suddenly, and Brit looked up curiously, but
the other girl had closed her eyes and didn't move again. After a minute
or so Brit went back to the rabbit. She wished she'd taken Binky with
her. But he did have a tendency to get airsick, and she hadn't wanted to
subject him to a long flight.
"Okay, we're at the coordinates. There's a little building --
I'll try to set us down on the roof," said Paytan.
Nei stood and walked out of the cockpit without a word. Brittany
watched her go, then looked at Paytan with a raised eyebrow. Paytan
shrugged.
"I don't know, but if I go to go talk to her I'll just screw her
up. Anyway, I'm landing." Brittany stuck her tongue out, and hopped to
her feet. Savannah was still lost in thought, tracing one finger over a
seam in the floor. Brit shrugged, and headed back into the passenger
compartment.
She found Nei way in the back, leaning forward until her nose
almost pressed into the glass of the window. She approached slowly, and
waited for a moment, but Nei didn't move. Finally Brit reached out and
put a hand on her shoulder.
"Hey."
Nei jerked away and spun to face her, face twisted into a snarl.
"Get away from me! Don't touch me, you stupid thing!" Her eyes were wet
with tears.
Brittany's jaw dropped, and she took a step back. Nei paused for
one last, angry moment, then threw herself into the aisle and ran into
the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind her.
The lock slid shut with an audible click.
-=ð=- -=ð=-
He'd left Kismet back at the LNHHQ and grabbed the fastest
flight.thingee the Legion had to offer, flown like a madman out of the
city and south, the engines blasting at full power. It was a minor
miracle that he didn't smash into something or throw the wrong switch and
send the machine spiraling to the ground.
But he didn't, and now Bryan was well on his way to the Amazon,
doing his best to pilot with one hand while he held the manual in the
other, trying to read the section on 'Landing'. A dot flickered on the
screen of the tracking computer, marking the location of Savannah's
flight.thingee. Hopefully she'd give him a chance to talk, especially
since he'd gotten the goods on Lord Corvine as promised. He wanted to see
her smile so badly he could taste it.
The landing went as well as could be expected, tearing up a huge
swath of vegetation and nearly ripping one of the flight.thingee's wings
off. But he was on the ground, at Lord Corvine's base, and he'd lived
through it, which was all that mattered. He estimated he'd managed to
pull up about half an hour after Savannah had landed. He headed for the
front of the secret base, the jungle silent around him. Hopefully not too
much had happened since then.
Once inside things began to get a little strange. He had noticed
the shattered satellite dishes outside, but inside there wasn't any sign
of habitation. Nothing moved in the hallways, or made any noise, as if
the place had never been used.
Finally he arrived at a set of stairs, leading down. He shrugged,
and took them. After a few minutes it became clear that the base was a
little bit deeper than he'd thought. The silence started get to him,
turning corner after corner to find nothing there. The lights looked to
be running on half power as well, throwing everything into shadow. Bases
were usually filled with all manner of paraphernalia, not to mention
henchmen. What was going on here?
Three floors beneath ground level he entered a room and almost
ran over Weirdness Girl. They both jumped back, she with one of her
stuffed fish in hand, he looking for something to charge up so that it
would explode. When she realized it was him she let the fish fall to her
side and motioned him closer.
"Hey," she whispered.
"Hey. Where is everybody?" At least he knew they were here. He'd
been beginning to think he was alone in the building.
"After nothing jumped us on the first two floors we split up to
cover more ground. There's just a lot more basement than we thought there
was to cover. Do you have a jellybean?"
He gave her a funny look. "Why?"
"I ran out a while ago. You wanna go find Savannah? She's angry
at you, you know."
"This should cheer her up. I've got the dirt on Lord Corvine."
"Really?" The room around them looked to have been a command
center, once. Now, from what he could see in the half-light, it was just
a wreckage of clutter and computer pieces.
"Yeah, it looks like he's actually tied up in Reality, and
they're both neck-deep in some kind of cult thing that I haven't found a
name for yet. There's this big spider motif going on, and some funky
rituals -- "
Brittany's hand clenched iron-hard around his wrist. "What?" she
asked, her voice gone to the ghost of a whisper.
The lights came up all at once, bathing the room in brilliance.
Standing in what was once a pool of shadows, Lord Corvine smiled and
bowed. "At last, Lady Avatar, we meet. I only got a glimpse of you when
you boarded my helicopter." He stopped smiling. "If a certain someone had
followed orders, we could have become better acquainted then."
When Bryan was ten he had gone on a camping trip with his father
and a storm had turned the sky an ominous grey, broken open and poured
over the woods in unrelenting sheets. They had thrown everything in the
jeep and driven fast for town, in the middle of that wild thunder and wet
darkness. A deer had darted in front of the truck's headlights. There
had been a single frozen second of terror, then nothing but the horrible
crash and wet crunch.
Brittany looked like that deer, a second before the jeep hit.
"No," she said.
"Actually, yes. Good of you to show up," said Lord Corvine.
Bryan stooped to grab a shard of computer board off the floor and
stepped forward. He didn't know what was going on, but Corvine was tied
up with the folks who had killed Jenna. That was all that mattered.
"You're part of the Reality?"
Corvine looked toward him, nonplussed. "And who are you?"
"Explosion Boy. I want to know who's in charge."
"Well," said Corvine," management's just changed actually, within
the last few months. You'll have to talk to the new kid, if you live to
see him."
"If I live to -- whatever, Enrique."
Lord Corvine's face went cherry red. "HOW DO YOU KNOW MY NAME!?"
"Who doesn't?"
"HOW!?"
Bryan held up his hand, forefinger a hairswidth from his thumb.
"You had a tiny little information leak."
"I kill you -- "
Bryan clenched his hand a little more tightly around the chunk of
computer board, which was by now glowing very faintly. He hurled it at
Lord Corvine's feet, and the explosion flared bright enough to blind.
Even before the light died away, he could hear Lord Corvine's
frustrated scream. For a second Bryan thought he'd hit him, then his
vision cleared and he saw the real cause. Brittany was gone, and the door
to the room hung wide open. He hadn't even heard her move.
Corvine was already at one of the few remaining computer banks, a
small microphone in his hand.
"Activate Plan B. Activate Plan B!" he screamed, and Bryan could
hear his voice echo down the corridors.
-=ð=- -=ð=-
"Activate Plan B. Activate Plan B!" shouted the speakers, Lord
Corvine's voice booming through the hallway.
"I guess he screwed up Plan A," muttered Paytan.
"Do we know what Plan B is?" asked Savannah.
"Did we know what Plan A was?"
Paytan's question went unanswered, as Savannah turned to watch
the corridor behind them. Generally commands like 'Activate Plan B' were
followed immediately by an attack of some sort. The continued quietness
of the corridor was beginning to get unsettling.
"Paytan?" whispered Nei. Paytan was busy peering around the
corner, looking for some kind of movement. Nei had seemed strange since
they'd landed, uncertain and hesitant. Paytan hoped it wasn't because of
the talk she'd given her.
"What?"
"Did you ever go cliff-diving? Like in Hawaii?"
Paytan gave her a weird look. "Yeah, that would be right after I
finished that macrame class with Sharon Stone."
Nei frowned, and glanced away. "No, I mean, did you ever have a
chance to do something really scary, and not do it? Like if you're
standing on top of the cliff, you know, and everyone's waiting for you to
jump, but suddenly you realize how far down the water is, and how bright
and kind things are up where you are -- "
"Scared?" asked Paytan softly.
Nei kept her gaze down. "Yeah."
"It's okay. It's not so bad when you're in the air. Just close
your eyes, and jump."
Nei closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the wall.
She let out a deep breath, until her whole body relaxed. "Thank you," she
said.
Then she had Savannah's throat in one hand, had dragged the other
net.heroine around and in front of her before Paytan could even move. She
held up her other hand and five thin needles sprang from her finger tips.
Paytan froze.
"I'm sorry, but there's enough poison in each of these to kill
Savannah a hundred times over." Nei's eyes were full of tears. The hand
she had around Savannah's throat was shaking, and Savannah had closed her
eyes and begun to breathe harshly through her mouth.
"Plan B, I take it?" hissed Paytan.
Nei nodded unhappily.
-=ð=- -=ð=-
Brittany ran up the metal stairs, heading for the roof and the
flight.thingee. Each time her foot hit a step the whole stairwell
reverberated. She jumped to the top of the next landing, and slowed for
just an instant.
Then the stairs rang out like a machine-gun rattle, faster than
even an Olympic sprinter could move. Lord Corvine's voice blasted out
through the speaker system, louder even than the noise she was making.
"Brittany. By now we have your friend hostage. Wherever you are,
stop."
She kept running.
"I repeat, Brittany. We have your friend -- urk."
There was thump, and a crackle over the system.
Bryan's voice came on. "Run Brit, I don't know what's going on
here --"
-=ð=- -=ð=-
"-- but just GET OUT!"
Bryan's voice boomed into the hallway around them, and Nei's hand
jerked. Savannah caught her breath for a moment, and squeezed her eyes
shut a little tighter.
Paytan held out both her hands, palms open. "Don't. Don't, okay?
We'll do whatever you want us to."
"They sent the signal as we were landing. I didn't want to. You
have to believe me, I didn't _want_ to!" said Nei, glancing down the
hallway and back again wildly. "Where's Brittany?"
"Nei, I don't know that. I'm not psychic -- "
"WHERE WOULD SHE GO!?"
"The flight.thingee, maybe."
"You first."
-=ð=- -=ð=-
They burst out of the door in a tight cluster, Paytan first, with
Nei just behind her, Savannah still held tightly round the throat.
Brittany was in the middle of hauling open the flight.thingee's door, but
she stopped dead when she saw them. She was so pale she looked like a
ghost.
"If you just give yourself up, everything will be so much
easier," said Nei. Even Paytan could hear her voice shake, on the verge
of tears.
"The prophecy. There was a promise," said Brit.
"_Was_. Draen's boss-guy now, and he's decided the old promises
don't apply anymore. You've met Draen, haven't you? All those years
ago." Brittany grew even whiter, if that was possible.
"I thought you were our friend."
Nei paused. "Paytan's my friend. Savannah is my friend. I hate
only Brittany Marcelyn _Reeves_." She looked down at the ground. "If
you'd just stayed where you were supposed to I wouldn't have to be doing
this."
"You don't have to do this at all."
"I owe them my life."
Paytan watched the exchange, the emotions that flitted across
Brit's face. Then Nei shifted and sunlight flashed off the
finger-needles. A memory burst up from the depths of Paytan's mind. The
first time she and Brittany had met.
Hell. The altar with Savannah chained to it, the dagger blade
driving toward her forehead while Dirmarw did nothing, NOTHING! Hands
closing around her wrists, as Paytan looked up and into Brittany Reeves'
eyes for the first time ever.
"I'm sorry," Brit had said, then something had pricked into the
flesh of Paytan's wrist and the world had faded to black...
"You," said Paytan, and both Nei and Brit turned toward her. Her
stomach felt like it had dropped three thousand feet in the last two
seconds. "You did this to me the first time we met."
Brit blanched, and looked away.
"No," said Nei. "We would have sensed it. We track any usage of
the system, and - "
"We were in Hell," whispered Brit.
"You killed me somehow, and brought me back, and that's why the
demons couldn't sense me that time, or control me. You used your powers."
Nei smothered a laugh, but it still leaked out of her mouth in
fragments. "What powers, Brit? What did you use?"
"You _are_ the Avatar," said Paytan.
Brittany flinched. "She used to be," said Nei. "Before her family
screwed up."
"I still am," said Brit.
"In name only," Nei turned to Paytan. "You ever wonder why you
never saw her use her powers? Because she _can't_. Not without triggering
thousands of feedback systems."
"Brittany, what is she talking about?"
Brittany looked at the ground, her eyes hooded. "You know how
Binky's a cosmic power, right?" She looked up. "You know how there's more
than one?"
"You're telling me Kid Kirby -- "
Brittany shook her head. "He's major," she whispered, "We're
minor. There were five minor cosmic powers once, at least, ones with
Avatars."
Nei tightened her grip on Savannah. "And now there are only two,"
she said, "Binky and Skaine."
Paytan turned on her, seething. "So that whole wanting to be a
hero bit was just a lie, huh, Nei?"
"I'm still a hero."
Paytan spat. "You're nothing. Heroes don't do this. Not even
_worms_ do this."
Nei looked up, and the tears were back. "Look at her! She lied
too!"
"Not as much as you did," snarled Paytan, and Nei winced back.
Then the guilt on her face flashed back into anger again.
"Oh really, watch this!" The skin on the palm of her hand irised
open, and Nei swung her arm out, pointed straight at Brittany. Then she
fired, a bolt of light bursting straight into Brittany's stomach.
Savannah and Paytan both screamed, and an aura of wild neon green
flared to life all around Paytan. Brittany was hurled backward, her back
slamming so hard into the side of the flight.thingee that she dented it.
She clutched her stomach and began to slide to the ground.
"Stop faking it," spat Nei. "They'll know soon enough anyway."
And Brittany stopped sliding.
She had one foot down on the ground to brace herself, looking up
uncertainly. There wasn't any blood. She wasn't even hurt. "Sorry," she
whispered. "Habit."
-=ð=- -=ð=-
Allen finally tracked Kismet down in front of the LNHHQ, lying on
her back in the grass. He spared a glance for her wings, which seemed to
have grown much larger since he last saw her. Her skin had taken on a
decidedly golden hue, and he could see her ribcage clearly through her
skin. She looked like she was starving.
"Are you okay?" he asked. She raised herself up on one elbow.
"I am fine, Allen, thank you for asking. How are you?"
He decided not to pursue it any further. "Look, have you seen -- "
"Guys!" shouted Kyoko, emerging from the front of the building
with a cellphone in her hand. She rushed across the grass to them. "He
says it's an emergency!"
Allen took the phone, while Kismet looked on with interest.
"Hello?"
Bryan was on the other end. "Guys! Get down here, I think there's
something really wrong and we need -- urk."
There was a thud, then Lord Corvine's voice was on the line.
"Meddling boy. I wouldn't come down here if I were you. All you'll find
are corpses."
Click.
Kismet and Allen looked at each other for a split second. Then
they sprinted for the flight.thingee bay.
-=ð=- -=ð=-
Savannah stood awkwardly leaning against Nei, the girl's
finger-needles still pressed lightly into her neck, hating herself. She
should have paid closer attention to Nei. If she had talked to her at
least, really focused on her for just a moment --
But she hadn't noticed Brittany. All this time and she hadn't
noticed Brittany.
"Why didn't you tell us?" whispered Paytan.
Brittany pushed herself up from the side of the flight.thingee,
wrapping her trenchcoat around herself to cover the torn spandex. "It
happened a long time ago."
"She was _supposed_ to be ours. But her family interrupted things
before they were finished. She's got the souped up body, and the power
Skaine keeps running through it prevents her from using her own. She's
been ours for years," said Nei. "I'm just putting things right."
"Oh _shut_ _up_!" said Paytan. "Brittany?"
"We made a deal," said Brittany, "when everything calmed down.
Our families promised to leave each other alone for at least a
generation." Brittany glanced toward the flight.thingee, and
Savannah felt Nei's grip tighten around her neck.
"Oh no, you don't. Take a step toward the flight.thingee and
Savannah gets it," said Nei. But her voice was shaking, and Savannah
could feel the girl's whole body shudder.
"I thought I was your friend?" whispered Savannah. She felt Nei
wince.
Nei turned to Paytan, dragging Savannah around in a half circle.
"Don't you see? This all happened long ago! I'm just a pawn. They saved
me when I was in the hospital, when I couldn't walk, they remade me, like
they did to Brittany. I owe them! Brittany belongs to them anyway, they
just didn't get a chance to finish what they started!"
Paytan looked at her dead on. "Nei, this is a betrayal if there
ever was one. Don't do this."
"I _know_ this is a mistake! I have to!" cried Nei.
Brittany took a step forward, and Savannah felt Nei's arms tense.
"This isn't your fight," said Brit, and held out her hands. "This isn't
even _my_ fight. Somebody who's been dead for centuries started it, and
now every couple of generations someone in my family or someone in
Skaine's begins the whole thing again."
"Well, it'll be over now," said Nei.
Paytan just looked at Brittany, confusion and hurt etching their
way across her features. Brittany met her eyes for a moment then glanced
away again.
"The office of Avatar to a minor cosmic power is passed down
through a family line. My mother was Avatar before me," said Brit.
"Destroy a bloodline, and the power dies away," said Nei. "It was
easy in the old days, but now? The bloodlines have gotten so thin anyway,
second cousins and aunts three times removed, you can't destroy them,
they've gotten too spread out."
"You don't have to destroy anything," said Brit. "We weren't a
threat."
"The only thing left is to control the Avatar, to make them your
own without killing them. So we made Brittany."
"You didn't _make_ me," said Brittany, though her voice cracked
halfway through. "They turned me into a cyborg, and they would have
mindwiped me if my family hadn't come for me."
"Draen said a lot of people died because of that."
"And how many of them did Draen kill himself?" asked Brit.
"Let's just finish it, okay? Just give up, let me take you in,
and the whole thing'll stop!" cried Nei, and dragged Savannah another
step forward.
Savannah let herself be dragged, and for a second her fear and
confusion solidified into an irrational, wild anger at Bryan. If they
hadn't been researching the Reality so much, if she'd had just a single
chance to talk to Nei, to really _look_ at her, she would have picked up
the cyborg traits, easy as pie. But she hadn't had the time, and she
hadn't really talked to Nei, and now she was nothing but a hostage.
She glanced at Paytan, who was still glowing with power. Paytan
was full of anger, seething with hair-trigger power, but as long Nei had
Savannah nothing could be done. Savannah closed her eyes for a second.
She was more use to the enemy than to her friends.
There had to be something she could do. She had destroyed a
Demonlord, even if it had thrown her into a coma. Nei was no demon, just
another human. She opened her eyes again, but the only thing she could
see was Nei's right hand, still held straight out and aiming at Brittany.
She focused. There was a seam beneath the flesh of Nei's wrist,
where two of her internal parts came together. Censor Girl moved
haphazardly because one side was metal, the other flesh. She was
unbalanced enough that Savannah would have spotted it even if she hadn't
been looking for it. Nei never moved like that, which meant she was
probably more balanced, each side of her equal parts flesh and metal.
Which meant there should be a similar seam on the other wrist.
"Even if you escape, it doesn't mean anything. There's more of
Skaine's clan already on their way. It's over Brittany," said Nei. "Why
do you think we dragged you all the way down here, so far from your
family? You should have stayed at home."
Just then Lord Corvine rose over the side of the building on a
small hovering platform, and everything happened at once.
"If you hand over the Avatar -- " he began, but Nei had glanced
his way and Savannah reached up, jammed her fingers into the seam and
twisted just so. Nei's hand snapped back, the needles withdrawing into
her fingers.
Savannah was already diving out of the way, until something
slammed into her hip and the whole world seemed to stop. She blacked out
for a second, and when she came to she was tumbling to a stop across the
roof. Nei had kicked her. She didn't think she could stand.
All through the background there was a roar like that of a
waterfall, and Savannah looked up blurrily. Paytan had found a target in
Corvine, and now the small platform hung perilously in the middle of the
air, lit by green flames. Corvine was screaming.
Savannah turned to look for Nei, as one last blast knocked out
the rest of the platform and Corvine dropped out of sight. It was only a
two story drop, so he shouldn't do much more than break a leg. She hoped.
Then she found Nei, and froze.
The other girl must have jumped right after she kicked Savannah,
and landed right next to Brittany. Nei was attacking viciously, throwing
punches almost faster than Savannah could follow. One of them went
astray, and left a fist-sized hole in the side of the flight.thingee.
Brittany was blocking every punch.
It was the most surreal thing Savannah had ever seen, worse even
than the swirl of atoms in a Demonlord's eye. She had focused on
Brittany before, looked her in the eye, and never known. Brittany must
have been a master at hiding it before they'd even met.
Nei and Brittany kept punching, faster and faster, the air making
strange tearing noises as they moved. They were like a video game on fast
forward. Brittany looked like she was about to cry.
"Brittany, get out of the way!" yelled Paytan, power warping the
space around her fists.
"No! You'll hit them both!" shouted Savannah. Then the decision
was taken out of their hands. Nei surged forward, sending she and
Brittany tumbling to the ground, Brittany on the bottom. Nei levered
herself up and raised her fist.
"Just admit you lost!"
But Brittany had kept one of her knees between them both, and
when Nei lifted herself up she managed to plant her foot solidly in Nei's
stomach, and push. She flung Nei ten feet into the air and to the edge of
the roof.
Nei was up in a second, but Brittany was already at her side, and
stream of guttural words was pouring from Paytan's mouth as the glow
around her hands increased. Nei took a step back toward the edge of the
roof.
"If you don't give up, they'll kill Paytan and Savannah. They'll
kill your whole family," she said. Then she met Savannah's eyes for a
single second, mouthed the words 'I'm sorry', and stepped off the roof.
Savannah heard the thud as Nei hit the ground, then the sound of feet
pounding against the ground as she ran off into the brush.
Brittany had already dropped to her knees, cupping her face in
her hands. Paytan let the power around her die away to nothing, and
walked to her friend's side.
"Brittany..."
"She'll be okay. Her body type can take a fall a lot bigger than
that one. She probably didn't even feel it -- "
"Screw Nei," said Paytan, "I want to know if you're okay."
Savannah lifted herself carefully to her feet, and stared off
into the distance. The sun glittered off something on the horizon, and
she paused. Focused. Felt the sick feeling that'd been with her
the whole day solidify. "Guys," she said.
"They're coming."
________________________________________________________________________
Binky, Kismet, Mr.Fossavellus, the Junior Brotherhood of Net.Villains,
Out-of-It Lass, Perdition, Weirdness Girl, copyright Jennifer Whitson,
1995. Censor Girl is Public Domain. Everyone else is someone's.
Next Issue:
Brittany comes face to face with the Avatar of Skaine.
The past catches up with the present, and chaos reigns.
========================================================================
