Reign

Part 1

Here we go! Please enjoy and I hope you enjoy this novelette as much as I did!

Flash photography sucks. Like really sucks.

Being surrounded by dozens of reporters was something, I realized, that no one could ever prepare you for. The bombardment of their questions as you walked through a crime scene only added to the flashing lights from their cameras, colorful dots dancing across your vision while they stood directly in front of you in your face. I had seen scenes like this on TV, police officers walking around to keep everyone out, reporters looking over their shoulders trying to get to the truth of the situation, and the criminal investigators searching for clues amongst the scene. But what they really don't prepare you for, is the one thing you think you would never have to see, even as a superhero.

The cold dead eyes of a victim.

Or in this case, multiple victims.

A dozen chairs lined the center of the abandoned warehouse where everyone stood, each one with a single person sitting within them, their empty fear filled eyes staring back at us. Their faces contorted into ones of complete terror, their empty screams perpetually frozen for the rest of eternity. The lights from the emergency vehicles surrounding the building illuminated their pale lifeless faces as they flashed in the distance.

"They must have been so afraid" A voice said from beside me, the softness of it snapping me out of my trance.

I looked next to me, taking in the sight of Seraphina, her feathered wings pressed deeply into her back as she stared at the horrors before her, Blonde hair enveloping her heartshaped face. Her ocean blue eyes looked at the victims with empathy, her thin lips turned down in a frown that was a rare sight to see. She too, like most of us in the area, was a virgin to the type of atrocities we had been warned about before that moment. I'm glad I wasn't the only one that felt saddened by what we were witnessing.

"I don't think that matters anymore Sera" I stated, the weight of the morbidity in my words bothering me more than it should have.

Seraphina pointed her frown towards me, those blue eyes piercing into me with a heavy sense of judgment at my words, a sight that felt very familiar. I looked away from her in that moment, my eyes glancing over at the victims, their faces etching themselves into my memory as I felt her eyes dig into the side of my face.

"Man, even with stiffs, your ability to say the wrong thing at the wrong time is still a problem" A cold clipped voice boomed from behind us, "Reign, I think it would be better for you to look for evidence instead of giving us any unnecessary input."

Without looking behind me, I knew the voice of Torrent anywhere, the distaste in his voice rubbed me like nails on a chalkboard. His words felt like they always did, so filled with hatred and rage that my skin seemed to heat up from the feeling of them coming my way. Unfortunately, I've had to deal with it for the last year.

"I don't know Torrent, being happy-go-lucky in this moment seems to be kind of inappropriate" I replied, my eyes refusing to look at him in order to evade his current malice.

"See? There you go again with the unnecessary input. I think you're more tolerable when that pretty mouth of yours stays shut" He spat, the frown evident in his voice as he got closer to the crime scene.

Thunder started to rumble in the distance, the atmospheric pressure rising in the building while I examined the victim in front of me, Torrent's words still branding themselves into my skin. Sera's eyes flicked towards me, her wings twitched at the sudden change, the same judgment from before refilling that blue stare of hers. In a flash I felt a wave of hot breath brushing against my face, the feeling of another body almost against my own as I stared at a woman's petrified face.