When Peter Met Jinx

Arsenal flew up, heading for the surface from the underground chamber.

A cloud of sparks intercepted him. Jinx materialized in front of him, and grappled him in mid-air. They fell.

Arsenal had the presence of mind to throw his hand-held computer through an insubstantial spot on the ceiling as Jinx's hands reached to crush his windpipe.

In the instant before impact, Jinx dematerialized again, leaving Arsenal behind in a cloud of sparks. As Arsenal slowly stood up, the shipping container beside him was lifted up and slammed into the container on the other side, momentarily pinning him between them for a brief, painful second before he could become intangible.

He emerged, ghost-like, from the side of the container Jinx was using to crush him. Before she could react, he stuck her with a shock wave bolt, which sent her skittering across the floor. In the moment of respite, he gestured, and the lights went out.

Concentrating again, he lifted his right arm, and a ghostly beam of grayish light played through the pitch black hall. He swept the beam of X-Rays in a broad arc, stopping suddenly when a shower of sparks and an anomalous air current made it clear to him that Jinx had teleported again.

He flew towards the disturbance, continuing his barrage of ionizing radiation. He soon found himself in another section of the underground chamber, filled with tanks of hydrocarbon solvent surrounding an assembly bay brightly lit by lamps on stands.

Behind the last row of shipping containers, Jinx pulled out a war spork, a dagger-like piece of plastic tipped with two vicious spikes that extended forwards from a razor-sharp round head. It glowed with a dim, reddish aura. She readied herself for a fraction of a second as Arsenal approached her position, then disappeared in a shower of sparks.

She re-materialized directly in front of him, thrust her arm forward, driving the left spike of the war spork into Arsenal's throat. Red lightning cascaded over Arsenal's body. With a sudden jerk, she tore open his throat, and he fell, covered in red sparks that traced out the paths of his nervous system.

She stood and watched him bleed as the sparks died down. His eyes rolled into his head as the pool of blood became larger. She turned around and walked away slowly, returning the war spork to its scabbard.

A noise from behind startled her. She spun around, and saw Arsenal, the front of his uniform drenched in blood from his mangled throat, struggling to his feet. He seemed to be having problems standing up straight.

Jinx muttered a mundane and vulgar curse beneath her breath, and leapt forwards. Her shoulder rammed into his blood-stained chest, knocking both of them to the ground.

Arsenal, pinned beneath Jinx, struggled to move. She grabbed his jaw, forcing him to look into her eyes. "You're not what I call living, really. You should have stayed down."

Her mouth opened as Arsenal's half-focused eyes made contact with her gaze. A glowing blue mist rose from Arsenal's body, and Jinx breathed it in. As the last of the blue mist disappeared into her mouth, she rolled off him and clutched her belly. "It burns! It burns!"

She lay, rolled up into a ball of pain, until her mind regained control of her body.

She approached one of the barrels of solvent, punched a hole in the top with her bare hand, and picked it up, carrying it to where Arsenal's lifeless body lay. She poured the volatile, colorless liquid over him, retrieved a lighter from a pocket in her blood-stained jacket, and set his corpse on fire.

She disappeared in a shower of sparks as the flames grew higher, reappearing in what appeared to be a small, dark recording studio.

She sat down on her comfortable chair, in front of a desk filled with mixing boards and a single, cloudy orb that began to glow as her mind focused upon it. One of the monitors sprang to life, showing Arsenal walking, disoriented, though gray mists, dressed in a dark business suit, unbloodied and whole.

She pressed a few buttons on the console, and an orange light lit up behind her -- she was recording.

In the gray psychic wasteland, Arsenal looked up as a gargantuan, demonic image of Jinx, with eyes of flame, confronted him. He stood his ground.

"Where am I? What is this place?"

A distorted voice boomed through the mists.

"THIS IS THE AFTERLIFE -- AND YOU'RE IN HELL!"

The ground disappeared beneath Arsenal's feet, and he fell, screaming, into the darkness.

Outside the hidden base, a small computer beeped as it coupled with the short-range maintenance network of the power sub-station. A script ran, and the computer tried to find a relay to send its message.

To no avail.