Lightning without Thunder
ONC entry for 2024.
Prompt 49: Being a superhero is just too boring. Let's be a villain!
15-years-old Marissa Everstar makes a Faustian bargain to receive superpowers, in the hope they will make her famous. But when being a superhero turns out to mainly involve boring work that does not get her the immediate popularity she craves, she shifts gears and becomes a villain.
Trigger warning: contains descriptions of physical and emotional abuse, blood and gore.
Excerpt from chapter 2:
I carefully begin pouring the white powder onto the floor, drawing a large pentagram. I spend a lot of time on the intricate details, making sure everything is perfect. The summoning circle quite small, but it will have to do.
I clap my hands twice and hear a soul-crushing scream that appears to pierce my body to its core. Hearing the sound fills my stomach with butterflies and gives me a fuzzy feeling. I haven't heard a single sound in almost a year.
Following the scream, a shadowy figure emerges. He appears deep black, littered with stars, as if a human-like shape has been carved out of the universe, but also strangely transparent, as if made of glass.
His long arms end in clawed fingers, and his ears and horns are goat-like in appearance. On his back are two bat-like wings. He speaks in a deep voice-the only one I've heard in a long time.
"Mortal, why have you awoken me from my slumber?"
