The Other Warehouse (JaK)

In an abandoned warehouse, far from the rest and protected from the gangs by a few rough-looking, genetically enhanced hired guards, was a madman's laboratory. Few knew of its existence, and nobody knew what he did in there. The guards kept quiet, even about the body that had been carried in a few days before. It had been the body of a young, pale-skinned woman, with pitch-black hair and two bullet holes in her chest.

***

Shadow’s eyelids flickered, opening slowly then shutting tight again against the bright light that was shining on her. Something was definitely wrong. This wasn’t her room. She opened her eyes again, staring in confusion around her. She was in a small laboratory, so brightly lit it hurt. She tried to use her powers, to slice through the chains that bound her, and found she couldn’t. There were no shadows in the room. What had happened? The last thing she remembered… She frowned as it all came rushing back. She had been in the forest, about to leave, when the two women had ambushed her. Then the men with guns… She had been killed. She should be dead. What was going on?

‘Finally awake, I see.’

Shadow’s eyes whipped around to the voice, finding a slim, harmless-looking man in a lab coat. More memories, memories of fear and captivity and hatred, stung her as she recognised the figure.

‘Y-You…’

‘Me.’ He said calmly. ‘That jail you put me in was quite insulting. Not even maximum security! They assumed that since I wasn’t a metahuman, I wasn’t worth guarding properly. Well, I definitely taught them a lesson.’

‘But I’m dead.’

He smiled maliciously. ‘Not any more, my dear.’

‘How… Why…’

‘Now, now. Just be grateful.’

‘Grateful? To you?! I’d rather stay dead!’

He chuckled. ‘Feisty as always. But I would stay quiet, if I were you, or I’ll have to show you some of the toys I’ve been working on.’ He flicked a switch, cruelty glittering in his bottomless eyes. The lights in the room intensified, almost burning Shadow as she screwed her eyes shut. It didn’t help. It was like being dipped in a furnace for the darkness user; she was a creature of the shadows, and the light was so strong it seared her. She could feel her strength sapping away, but she refused to scream. The man’s chuckle turned into a full-blown laugh, heading towards villain-type hysteria. He turned the lights down slightly, and Shadow slumped where she was chained to the wall, panting. His laugh continued, though, a madman revelling in his power over the girl.

‘That’s just for starters! So do what I say, girl, or you’ll get more pain. And we can’t have you dying yet, can we?’ He grinned evilly. ‘Now, listen. I didn’t just bring you back to life, I upgraded you. You’re my prize weapon, after all. I lost you once, but this time, your mind will be mine.’

Shadow wasn’t going to yell something clichéd, like, ‘Never!’, or ‘When hell freezes over!’ She wasn’t one of those superheroes. She just fixed the man with her steady, hate-filled glare, and hoped he would let something useful slip.

‘So, upgrades.’ He was going into professor mode now, his tone turning clipped and professional. ‘You have greater control over darkness now; you may be able to create small shields and projectiles. We’ll test that. And, of course, the biggest upgrades are your new clothes.’

Shadow glanced down at this, seeing that she was clad in a pair of jeans, a hoodie and boots. They were all pitch-black, and had a strange quality about them.

‘Those are made from your own power. They can change their basic appearance. Go on, imagine yourself in something else. They will change as you will them to.’

The girl tried doubtfully, and was surprised when the clothes changed in a wisp of shadow. Now she was wearing a strapless dress. She wrinkled her nose, wondering where that had come from. She was not a girly person. She changed them back, preferring the jeans and hoodie over anything remotely stylish.

When she glanced back up, the professor was looking at one of the monitors behind him. She gasped as she saw what was on it; her mother, chained and unconscious in a cell. Her mother, who she hadn’t seen in nearly ten years. The same mother who had run away from her problems and abandoned an eight-year-old girl to an abusive stepfather. Shadow didn’t know how to feel; happy, angry, relieved? But the truth was, she felt hate. Hate at the woman who had condemned her to the horrible life she’d had. She never wanted to be a superhero. She just wanted to be normal. But that wish was gone now, nothing more than a desperate dream that could never some true.

The professor noticed what she was staring at and smiled. ‘Ah, yes. I thought she’d be an interesting hostage to have. You’re probably wondering why I need one; the truth is, even if I tortured you, you’d probably just die again instead of being a good little servant and letting me implant my mind-control chip in you. So, I decided that I’d torture your mother instead.’

Shadow spat on the ground, as close to the man as she could reach. ‘Do it, then. Kill her. She deserves it for what she did.’

She stopped then, in shock, realising what she had just said. She couldn’t let her mother die. She was an awful person, but still an innocent life. And she had answers that Shadow – no, that Suraya needed. Who her father had been, why her mother had left… Suraya needed to know who her family was.

The man laughed again. ‘Bluff all you like, my dear. I’ll win in the end.’ He walked over to a blank wall and flicked another switch, this one opening a hidden doorway and showing where Shadow’s mother was. He pulled out a gun, holding it to the woman’s temple. ‘Well? Still want her dead?’

‘Wait!’ Shadow cried, admitting defeat. Or so it seemed. She slumped in her chains again, sagging as far as she could to the ground, and lowered her eyes in shame. She had never been good at acting, but the man seemed to buy it, laughing again.

‘What you would give to be out of those chains… But you can’t use your powers, can you?’

She so wanted to glare at him, rage at him, force him to let her go, but she kept her act of defeat going. The man drew closer, putting the gun under her chin and forcing her head up.

‘Don’t be getting any ideas, now. The woman will live if you do exactly as I say.’

Shadow’s act was over now; she couldn’t hold back the pure, unbridled hate that was blazing in her eyes. The professor stepped back, a little less confident, and she took her chance, swinging her legs upward and kicking the gun. It flew upward and shattered a light, giving Shadow just what she needed. A tiny sliver of darkness. She cut through her handcuffs and broke the rest of the fluorescent lights, plunging the whole lab into darkness.

‘No!’ The man screamed, scrambling for his gun. He picked it up, took aim, and pulled the trigger.

Shadow could have stopped the bullet. She could have taken it herself, knocked it aside with her powers, done something, but she just watched in a sort of fascinated detachment as it streaked towards her mother. By the time she snapped out of it, it was too late. The bullet had connected. Her mother was… dead.

Part of her cheered. The woman had deserved it. But the rest of her was screaming, asking why she hadn’t stopped the bullet. And Shadow had no answer. All she knew was that the hatred that had been inside her so long was flowing out. Hatred for her mother, her selfishness and stupid decisions. Hatred for her stepfather, the drunk and violent horror who had made most of her life hell. Hatred for the professor, who had stolen the only chance she’d ever have at a normal life, and ruined the chance she’d had at a peaceful death. Hatred at the world for the cards she’d been dealt. All the hate she’d kept bottled up for so long burst out, in tendrils of shadow, destroying everything it could reach.

A falling chunk of ceiling shot down, missing the professor by centimetres. He was scrambling around, trying desperately to get out of the collapsing building, but he had no such luck. A girder fell towards him. He tried to dive out of the way, but he met Shadow’s darkness-covered fist, sending him flying back into a wall. He fell forward, right into the path of the girder. She watched as it crushed him, that bloodthirsty vicious part of her rejoicing again at his death. That was what really brought Shadow back to her senses; that fact that she was happy at killing someone. Happy. She was meant to be a hero. But she wasn’t, had never really been. She had just let two lives go in the last hour; two lives that had shaped her own, for better or worse. All her hate was gone now. She was just a pathetic bundle of fear and weakness.

The laboratory was still collapsing around her. Shadow thought how easy it would be to just let one of those chunks of rock and metal squash her. Everybody thought she was dead anyway; who would want some outcast murderer around? She’d be better off dead. And maybe, just maybe, she would see her mother again. That was the one hope Shadow clung onto as she watched a huge piece of debris fall towards her.

Shadow barely noticed Spider-Girl zipping towards her until she was pulled across the room, tumbling to a stop. The teen's frantic voice barely cut through her daze of pain, but it was enough to compel her to extend her wings and get herself out of the collapsing warehouse. Shadow dodged the falling debris on autopilot, still too shocked and confused to think about what was going on. Once she was safe, the full reality of what had just happened came crashing down on her.

Her mother. The professor. Both dead. The only hopes she had of ever returning to a normal life, gone, just like that. Shadow hadn't thought about it, but there were always those tiny rays of light in the back of her mind, half-baked plans of somehow reversing her powers, becoming normal again, finding her mother and clearing the air with her... It was all lost now. The pain of losing something she'd never really had hurt nonetheless; and with it came the realization that Shadow had killed someone. With her own hands, she had ended a life, and she might as well have killed her own mother too. The scene replayed again in her mind, the bullet flashing by while Shadow just stood and watched. The professor slamming back into the wall, falling in front of the girder...

Enough.

She had killed them.

No.

Both of them, dead. Gone.

Stop it!

'I-I killed them.'

Shadow's voice was fractured and full of pain, the girl herself sitting broken on the ground. All her sarcasm and fighting spirit had disappeared. She had just wanted to end it, before the reality hit her. But even that had been taken away from her.

After a long pause from Shadow she seemed to finally recognize what Liz was saying or maybe not, in any case she did take to the skies and flew out of the warehouse before it all came tumbling down. As she did so Spider-Girl also needed to get out of there, her own Spider-Senses seeming to be on auto-alert as any piece of falling debris came towards her. Making a run of the exits, many of the blocked by piles of ruble, Liz ducked dodged and rolled as she made her way towards one of the only ones she saw not blocked off. On the way she had to lunge forward and roll to avoid a large piece of falling debris and then jumped over another blocking her path having no time to go around. Leaping side ways to avoid another object, and then jumping up onto and hopscotching across 3 other pieces while they were still falling in mid air before she dived out of the only exit and out onto the ground below. No sooner had she done so did the entire place come crumbling down on itself. Afterwards Spider-Girl went and checked on the goons she had wrangled up earlier. As to be expected they escaped her webbing and were now loose in the city.

(Mind)
"Just great, eh whatever, it's not like I wont be seeing them again."

Besides, Liz had more important things to worry about. Shadow although safe and in the clear still seemed rather out of it and kept muttering that she had killed them?

"Hey, you're ok now. Alright, whatever happened back there it's all over with you're fine and whatever you did....I'm sure you had to do it in self-defense."

Words of comfort, the only thing she could think of at this time. Spidey didn't even know what was going on really and didn't expect to get many answers out of Shadow in this state so she chose to just console her as best she could.

Again, Lizandra's words seemed to bring Shadow out of her daze and back to reality. Self-defense? She should have been saving them. The teen collected herself. She was still hurting, but she hid it away, even managing to summon an ironic grin at the hero's words. Wallowing in her own self-pity would get her nowhere.

'Self-defense. Wouldn't that be nice. I watched as he shot my mother, and then I lost control and killed him for revenge. He was helpless. They both were.'

Her words were bitter and harsh, hurting Shadow all the more as she said them. She didn't care. She deserved it. She waited for the blow to fall, waited for Spider-Girl to pronounce she was just another criminal and take her away.

Spider-Girl stood there quietly for a while realizing fully what she had just done. Then after taking off her goggles in her right hand and placing her left palm on Shadow's shoulder Liz would speak.

"It happens...It happens to all of us."

Lizandra began to weep as she spoke a bit, somewhat sharing Suraya's pain, but at the same time remembering her own from that fateful night. Although she tried to hide her tears not wanting to take away from Shadow's self-pity. This was about her afterall, not Spider-Girl.

"A couple days ago, there was a hitman trying to take out a target and he made a move...I couldn't stop him in time..And...Well..................Were human. We might not look like it fully, we might have a little different DNA or gifted abilites, but overall were all human beings somewhat. And as so we make mistakes, we lose control of situations, and we have to make close calls. Sometimes decisions that will haunt us for the rest of our lives. But, the question is do we let that stop us from continuing on. From doing what we still know, deep down, is right and give up the fight agsint those who are trying to make this world worse off than it already is. I say NO, I say that there is no perfect way to do what we do. There's no manual for how to be a savior, but we do the best we can and if we fail in the end...We can keep on going and recognize that in a perfect world...We wouldn't even be needed."

Lizandra spoke more so to herself thn to Shadow, trying to believe her own words. She did...But of course at the same time the sting of what she had done would burden her for the rest of her days. As would what Shadow had done she was sure.

Shadow looked up at Spider-Girl, shocked. Maybe it was naive of her, but she'd thought that no other hero could have done what she had. And, somehow, hearing she wasn't the only one was comforting.

'...T-Thanks.'

She looked down again, embarrassed as she realized there were tears welling up in her eyes. Shadow hadn't cried for a long time. She let the tears fall, tired of hiding them. The girl gave herself over for a while, crying out all the pain and hate and anger she could until her tears dried up.
Shadow stood up, a little shakily, and wiped the last of her tears away. There was a new light in her eyes, and new grief, too. But she wouldn’t let the past shake her. She had put it all behind her once and she could do it again. And this time, she vowed, I won’t look back.

As Shadow began to weep, Liz continued to try and dry her tears and then as the girl thanked her and vowed to keep on with the right path Spider-Girl placed a hand upon her shoulder and smiled.

"Good...So um, mind if I ask why when I got here there were guys guarding the place that could take a good roundhouse from Chuck Norris? And where have you been for the last few months?!"

Spidey was confused about so much. All she really knew is that she had aided in getting Shadow out of a tough scrape and something serious was or had definitely been going down here.

Shadow frowned as Spider-Girl described the guards outside the warehouse, opening her mouth to respond.

'Well, they were probably genetically enha- wait a minute, did you say months?!'

Shadow was shocked to find how long she had been out of action. She paced for a minute, muttering to herself, finally figuring out what must have happened. She had been killed by Velocity and Aphrodite, that much she knew, and she must have been somehow revived by the professor. But it had obviously taken him a long time to get his hands on what had been her dead body and the technology to do whatever he did. She stopped, straightening things out in her mind, then realized Liz was more confused than before.

'Sorry. Let me start from the beginning.' Shadow began to speak again. 'The last thing I remember, before waking up in the warehouse, is being attacked by a couple of villains. I was in the forest outside Jump City. Anyway, I'm pretty sure they killed me.'

She paused, looking at Spider-Girl to make sure she was keeping up.

'All I remember after that is waking up in there,' - Shadow gestured to the remains of the warehouse - 'and being told that I was alive again. And then... Well, you know the rest.'

Shadow didn't want to go through the events that had just transpired. Once was plenty for her.

'The guards were probably genetically enhanced, like I said before. The guy obviously had some decent technology, bringing me back from the dead and all.'

Her last words had some of the sarcasm of old, showing that Shadow was at least getting back to normal.

Spider-Girl watched as Shadow flipped out after receiving news that she had been dead for a while and then explained the situation to her.

(Mind)
"Wow, I cant begin to comprehend how she feels. Sure my father was killed by indigenous people, oddly enough, because they thought he was seeking the powers I now posses. But to have been murdered in cold blood then be given life again by the same man that took the life of your mother. She's gotta be dealing with a roller coaster of emotions right now. I don't even know if I'd be able to keep it together."

"Oh wow, well erm, I would say 'Welcome Back', but considering the circumstances it's really nothing to happy about. At least no one will have to worry about that guy doing anything like that ever again and I'm sure his hired help will resurface soon enough, but what about the villains you said that cornered you? Do you remember if anyone attempted to come to your aid or could they still be out there because if they are we should go after them...Or, at least I will. I can udnerstand if payback's not the first thing on your mind right now all things considering.

Liz knew Shadow was no pushover in a fight and if she had been slain then the ones responsible couldn't be allowed to roam free for too long. Spider-Girl would hunt them down, no matter how long it took. Killing civilians is one thing, they won't fight back for the most part, but hunting down the ones who protect them took a whole other level of powerful evil.

Shadow knew nothing more about the villains who had murdered her; she'd racked her brains already, trying to find any tiny scrap of memory that might help. Her frown and hunched shoulders showed her displeasure at saying so.

'I don't know. But I do know it's a bad idea to go after them alone. We should go to Jump City and tell the Titans about this, form a team to go after them. If we just blindly rush in, it won't end well.'

Shadow was sure of her words, but there was another motive in going back to Jump. She had left people she would like to call friends behind, and the girl had no idea what had been happening in the time she had been gone. She needed to make sure the Titans were okay. And at the thought of them, Shadow realized there was another team that she needed to see.

'Anyway, I need to get some things, and see some people. If we're done here, then...'

Shadow winced at the mention of Sage. She definitely didn't want to go running to him, but it was somewhat a relief that he wasn't dead. That would have made the others sad; though she couldn't fathom why. The girl simply nodded in agreement to Spider-Girl's last statement, her thoughts busy with what to say when she saw the Titans. She wasn't sure who they were going to, but she was hoping it would be Titans Central. The shadow user remembered Jay and Zack had been a part of that particular team, and they were probably her two closest friends in Jump City.

Friends. It felt nice to think the word. Shadow had never really had any close friends, not until she'd met Jump's metahuman population, anyway. She recalled meeting Zack at the abandoned tower so long ago, finding Jay in a random alley while fighting a horde of aliens, Simca pulling her into a lake and then inviting her to join the Slivers. They were simple things - at least, for a metahuman living in Jump City - but they meant a lot. And Shadow had nearly lost them. She couldn't help but feel in a little grateful, in some twisted way.

"Ok, so I'll see you there. Well meet up at Titans Central."

Noticing Shadow was no longer saying anything other than her expression at the mention of Sage, which made Liz guess that she did know of him and felt around the same way about the guy as she did. Spider-Girl would give a quick wave to the winged Sliver and then shot her grappling hook about a half mile or so before zipping away. Heading back home so she could pack her things, it looked like ol' Web-head was heading back to Jump City.