Black Owl and Butterfly | +18

Chapter One

It was supposed to be a simple job. Bad men with bad intentions broke into a store; she (Hannah Bosley, Black Owl) was supposed to swoop in, sock one or both of them in the jaw, tie them up, and leave them for the cops to find. Simple, right? That's how it was supposed to go. She'd trained to take the Black Owl mantle since she was a kid. She just didn't expect the first night of it to end with her being shot down in the street before she could even deliver a single brick-breaking punch to the ribs of a neerdowell. She was lying in the alley just beside Willis's Grocery Store on Earle and West Street, clutching the wound in her belly as she began to bleed out, her eyes cast up to the sky right as the clouds parted from the moon. The blood loss had caused a harsh electric buzz to start up in her ears. At least she could die looking at something beautiful.

A shape eclipsed the moon, acting as the new woman's halo as she looked down on her. The angel's skin was as dark as the night, but Hannah could make out the broad shape of her features, save for her eyes. Her eyes were solid white like two spheres of polished marble, but they had lines on them like those of some insect.

"This is a pretty bad way to go out," said the angel, her voice dripped like honey falling from a spoon. She had teeth like a cat.

"Please call me an ambulance," said Hannah.

"I'm afraid there'd be no point," said the angel. "You'd bleed out by the time they got here."

"Do you have a car? I can do anything right now, really. Just please save me," pleaded Hannah.

"I can do something to save you," said the angel. "But I need your consent. I want to hear you say, 'Please save me, Butterfly.'"

Hannah wasn't sure why this stranger wanted her to say those exact words; it felt rather strange and controlling, but at the same time, weirdly liberating: "Please save me, Butterfly."

Butterfly moved so fast that it took a moment for Hannah's brain to register what was happening. In a flash she was above her; then she was on her, cold lips pressed against her neck. Then the pain started; it was as if two ice-cold needles had been thrust into her neck. The buzzing became worse, and she felt something sting. The woman, Butterfly, had thrust two of her fingers into the open wound in her belly. It was all so horrible, and yet at the same time, she'd never felt such ecstasy as something flooded her mind. It was like when she broke her leg as a kid, and the hospital had her on morphine. Just a flood of intense pleasure that made all of her muscles relax, and she found herself leaning closer to Butterfly's mouth. But that was short-lived as Butterfly pulled away, her lips dripping with blood. Hannah found herself licking her lips as she looked up at her.

"What?" was all Hannah could manage to get out before she saw it happen; she watched Butterfly's tongue loll out of her mouth, slowly circling her lips as she lapped away the blood.

Then, without any sort of warning, she bit off the tip of her tongue and leaned in, forcing the bleeding oral muscle into her mouth. Butterfly's blood was cold and bitter at the start. Gradually, though, it took on a sweeter taste as it flooded Hannah's mouth, spilling over her own tongue and down her throat. Hannah drank greedily of Butterfly's blood.

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Hannah woke up in her apartment. It was a little studio that she rented in Yorktown's Yankeeville project. She always figured that it would be a good proving ground for her skills as a budding superhero. She felt ready to write everything off as a very hot dream until she felt her neck. It was sore. Shooting up, she made her way to the bathroom to look at the mirror, only to find nothing looking back at her. In place of where a reflection should have been, there was a dull grey haze. Fog in the broad outline of a person.

"What the hell?" Hannah asked herself, out loud, like a freak.

She hooked her fingers around the hem of her Black Owl costume's shirt, lifting to find where the wound would be from getting shot. She looked down. It was there, right at her abdomen, just barely missing her ribcage. It should still have been a deep wound, but it looked as though it had been allowed to scab over the course of months.

She repeated her earlier statement and sat down, trying to work out what happened. It was then that light started to pour in from the rising sun. When the rays of light fell on her, her skin started to blister and burn like being caught by some supervillain's laser weapon. She rushed over and forced her curtains shut, ending the full body burning. 

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Thanks for making it to the end of this first chapter. Right here is the little interstitial where I explain some things. Black Owl is a character who exists. There are two of them in comics and they're both in the public domain and are thus free for anybody to use. I chose to just use the name because I found both of the original men boring. 

Butterfly is also a public domain superhero, but with some modifications she's becomes something different. I will update you on her deal as the story progresses. 

If you liked this story, be sure to leave a comment so I know that my efforts mean something.