Chapter 54: Ch 53: The Lemurian Star Hijack XIII
"You are right, Veritas," Gwen said.
Her voice was incredibly low. It completely lacked the bouncy, quippy energy she always carried into a fight. It was entirely devoid of the emotions she usually wore in her mask.
For the first time in all of their encounters, Gwen had referred to him by his name.
"Killing even those two terrorists wasn’t necessary," Gwen continued, her voice trembling slightly as a wave of suppressed emotion finally flooded her throat. "There was time... we could have handled the situation better. We could have restrained them."
Beneath her mask, her lips quivered.
During her S.H.I.E.L.D. enrollment briefing, Maria Hill had painted a picture of a grand protective shield. S.H.I.E.L.D. was the organization that had brought together the Avengers—the legendary heroes who had saved New York over a year ago.
Hill had also assured her that the agency understood and deeply respected Spider-Woman’s strict no-kill rule and would never force her on a mission like that, but she quoted that if the situation becomes unavoidable, hard and irreversible decisions must be taken.
This, however, was not an unavoidable situation.
And looking at today’s rescue plan, it had seemed so obvious to Gwen that the response team was going to avoid unnecessary bloodshed.
All of the commandos, including herself, had earpieces broadcasting real-time audio from inside the hostage chamber that Veritas himself was broadcasting to the whole of America.
When Veritas started his countdown for Luna Graham’s execution, Captain America had given the order to act. Sure, Gwen understood that snipers were stationed to handle a worst-case scenario, but she, Rumlow, and Rollins were just outside the door.
There had been more than enough time to breach the room and save the hostages without putting bullets in people’s heads. She’d done it before. She was more than fast enough. She knew she was and there was no way S.H.I.E.L.D. wasn’t aware of that fact.
But still... the snipers had fired anyway.
Trained snipers of S.H.I.E.L.D. wouldn’t fire out of confusion... it was predetermined strategical decision - one she had been kept out of.
Even if they doubted her abilities, there was no reason to hide it from her. They didn’t tell her because they knew she’d not go along with it.
A harsh, heavy realization settled in her chest.
It was now clear to her why they killed the two terrorists they could... and it might not even be for efficiency’s sake, it was just for their ego. Veritas and some mercenaries had hijacked their covert ship, what’s more Veritas was showing it the whole of America. By sending her and Captain America here, and killing the terrorists... S.H.I.E.L.D. was saving face.
Gwen let out a shaky sigh, her white lenses dropping to look at the floor. She had been naive. S.H.I.E.L.D. might have assembled Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, but the agency itself didn’t exactly operate on the heroic ideology she had assumed they did.
Her breathing grew heavy. Veritas’s words had perfectly struck the exact nerve she’d been trying to suppress since the moment she saw the bodies.
Veritas let out a quiet, mocking snort.
"Well," he snorted, completely ruining the tense silence. "I deeply regret thinking you were something extraordinary. I really do. I thought your strength, Spider-Woman, came from your unwavering, stubborn heroic resolve. But you’re just another hypocrite... Without that resolve... you’re just mundane. And you’re weak."
He waved his free hand dismissively. "You honestly do not interest me any longer."
Something about what he just said... hit Gwen’s heart far harder than his earlier accusatory words. A murky, twisted feeling she had never experienced before crawled up into her chest.
Gwen slowly raised her face.
Even through the mask, Veritas could see the shift. A dark shadow of absolute seriousness had settled over her - the exact same terrifying body language he had seen during their first encounter at the Daily Bugle when he had brought up her father.
Luke noticed the shift in her demeanor, but he kept talking.
"So, here is the updated itinerary," he announced, casually raising the humming red beam of pure heat toward her face. "I will end you where you stand, Spider-Woman."
"Then, I’ll simply take back the hostages you all worked so hard to rescue. I’ll eliminate all the S.H.I.E.L.D. commandos, and we’ll start a new game. Except this time, there won’t be any fun rules. No riddles. Just a straight-up massacre. One hostage dead for every minute S.H.I.E.L.D. keeps me waiting. See? Your friends at S.H.I.E.L.D. are already rubbing off on me."
Before Gwen could even process the dark humor, Veritas pulled his heat-saber back.
With a deafening BOOM from his back, he launched himself forward. The explosive momentum closed the distance in a fraction of a second.
His left hand shot out like a viper, grabbing Gwen tightly by the throat.
The sheer force of his charge carried them both across the room until - CRASH! - he slammed her brutally against the steel bulkhead behind her.
Gwen gritted her teeth at the heavy impact, but she stayed completely, terrifyingly silent. The tight, choking grip his left hand had on her neck didn’t even manage to squeeze a muffled grunt out of her. She just stared at him through her white lenses, watching with dead calm as he swung the red saber directly at her neck with his other hand.
She moved her head just a fraction of an inch.
Then, her right hand shot up like a blur. She had caught his right forearm in an iron-tight grip, stopping the deadly, roaring blade mere inches from severing her neck.
Veritas pushed with all his might, his arm trembling violently against her hand as he struggled to bring the blade closer. Gwen could feel the blistering heat radiating off the saber, but her grip didn’t budge a single millimeter. Her spider strength was far stronger than his.
"Maybe you’re right about me making a bad call," Gwen whispered. Her voice was icy, shaking with a terrifying intensity.
"But you’re wrong about me... I do regret the loss of lives today... and..."
She tightened her grip on his forearm, the reinforced fabric of his suit groaning under the pressure.
"...I’m not weak... neither is my resolve."
Without giving him a single moment to process her words, Gwen brought her free hand up and chopped down on his saber-holding arm with brutal, full-powered superhuman force. She was not holding anything back now.
CRACK!!
This clown... this incredibly dramatic, hyper-lethal jester had occupied her mind from the very first encounter. For two whole months, whether out of deep frustration, anger, or misplaced sympathy, he had lived in her head completely rent-free.
He had claimed he wanted to help her. He had claimed he wanted to show her the truth of the world, and show the world her efforts and sacrifices.
Because of these things... Gwen had genuinely believed that he saw some part of himself in her.
She had thought that this man simply had flawed logic and a broken mind. That his worldview was twisted and broken due to the tragic, horrifying childhood that created him.
She had actually pitied him.
She didn’t feel that way about her other foes. Unlike the other thugs, gangsters, and super-villains she fought - who were usually driven by simple greed or mindless destruction - Veritas was different.
He was alone, and he just needed to see the other warm side of humanity. The one she fought to protect.
She had thought he could be saved.
She had cared so much about trying to save him, and in return, he just went on like...
...you no longer interest me anymore...
No, that wasn’t the reason... She was angry because he wanted to kill the hostages mindlessly.
CRACK!!
The sickening sound of snapping bone echoed loudly across the silent room. She had just cleanly snapped his forearm in half.
"Urgh!"
Veritas’s eyes widened instantly behind his mask. A wave of white-hot agony flared up his arm. This was the first time Luke had ever broken a bone in either of his lives, and he quickly realized the movies did not do the experience justice. It was a solid -10 out of 10. He would not recommend it.
Due to his quirk mastery reaching 100% his skin and bones have become extremely durable, but under a focused, full-powered chop from a spider-hero who could stop moving trains and hold buildings and falling bridges together the bone of his arm snapped.
’Fuck! When the heck is her cannon event! Why does she stop holding back so easily!!!!!!!!’
Under the sheer weight of the pain, his concentration shattered. The fiery red saber flickered and vanished into thin air.
Gwen didn’t waste the opening. With blinding spider-speed, she drove three heavy, bone-rattling, rapid punches straight into his masked face.
Bam! Bam! Bam!
Then, grabbing his shoulders, she brought both her knees up and slammed her feet squarely into his chest.
Veritas was launched backward like a ragdoll. But even while flying through the air in immense pain, the jester managed to keep some of his flair.
With a quick, controlled explosive blast from his intact left hand, he killed his backward momentum. He hit the deck and skidded backward, finally coming to a stop in a crouch on one knee.
He looked down at his right arm. It was hanging at a completely unnatural, soggy angle. He instinctively clutched it with his good hand, gritting his teeth behind the mask as if holding it together would somehow relieve the blinding pain.
But Gwen wasn’t about to give him a breather.
She leaped high into the air, perfectly angling her body to deliver a crushing dropkick straight down onto his head.
But while she was still mid-air, her Spider-Sense suddenly screamed at her.
Down below, Veritas’s crouching body began to glow like a live grenade.
BOOM!
Luke’s entire crouching body erupted in a massive, omnidirectional explosion. Thankfully for her, it wasn’t of the size that he had created in the sky a few moments ago.
The blistering heat washed over Gwen’s already-battered suit, burning her skin on the exposed patches, and the sheer concussive force sent her sailing backward towards the steel wall.
Reacting on pure instinct, Gwen shot a web string to a nearby steel pillar. She swung in a tight arc and landed flawlessly on top of a shipping crate, crouching low in her predatory spider-pose.
She watched from her perch as Veritas slowly stood up amidst the drifting ash and smoke. Silver moonlight streamed in from the jagged hole in the ceiling, illuminating his form.
His chest heaved with heavy, ragged breaths.
Then, Gwen noticed something strange.
A thick, warm trail of blood leaked from beneath the chin of his mask. It fell toward the steel floor, but as the crimson drops touched the floor... they hissed and instantly evaporated into thin air.
Gwen tilted her head, her white lenses narrowing.
She hadn’t had the time to really process it during their fight on the bridge, but a foggy part of her memory suddenly clicked into place. His blood had evaporated back then, too.
And then, things got even weirder.
With a loud, sharp swishhh, thick white steam began to aggressively hiss from Veritas’s broken arm, as well as from beneath the edges of his mask.
Gwen watched in stunned silence as his right arm violently twisted. The bones popped and snapped back into their proper alignment, the muscles and tissue reforming in a matter of seconds.
The vapor around his face cleared, and Veritas slowly looked up at her. The painted, manic smile on his jester mask seemed to stretch so wide it might just tear the mask apart.
========================
Thanks for reading!
Support me on Pat reon!
pa t reon.com/c/Marveller
Comments