Chapter 160

“Why not!? What have you idiots been doing there!?” a haggard female voice barked into the phone as she turned to pace toward the door, her other arm hugged tightly to her midsection to keep her loose garments in check. “How long does it take to figure out who the rest of them are? I told you: in, and out! No fucking around!”

”We’re doing our best, Madam Chrysalis,” a voice replied over the phone. “As I said, we had no problem locating FS1, but none of the other masked figures have shown themselves for weeks. We can track who she interacts with all we want, but until they show themselves in the suits, we won’t know who is one of them and who isn’t. It’s almost like they know they’re being watched.”

Chrysalis gritted her jagged teeth. “Then start breaking into their homes. Find the suits! Poison their food! Find out who is immortal and who isn’t!”

”Madam... that is extremely risky. You KNOW what’ll happen they catch us here.”

Chrysalis stopped and let out an exasperated sigh, letting her eyes drift up to the sky.

He was right. She had been warned directly by one of the immortals a year earlier to stay away—and for months now, she’d been disobeying that order.

A gust of wind whipped by, blowing a lock of stringy green hair across her eyes. Using a long, painted fake nail attached to the tip of a bony, black finger, Chrysalis swept the strands from her face. Her hair was long, but thin and limp, much of it frazzled with disobedient strays like the trunk of a tree wrapped in vines.

Sections of bare scalp showed between the roots at the top of the sixty year old woman’s head, especially along the lines where she’d parted it with her brush earlier that morning. She looked down at the back of her hand as she lowered it; her pitch black skin was riddled with scars and open sores, the unfortunate result of a lifetime of being plagued by weeping eczema.

Although rich and powerful beyond the need to be a part of society —living high above it instead— Chrysalis nonetheless lived a difficult personal life due to her physical appearance, and thus, rarely ventured out into public. Instead, she opted to spend as much of her time as possible here in her safe-house on the Caribbean island of Saint Lucia, where the humidity helped her live a more comfortable existence.

Dryer climates had a way of exacerbating her skin condition, which included travel on climate-controlled flights—not that that had been a problem for many years since she was able to afford her own private jets, on which she could simply maintain the cabin air quality she desired.

During the past year, however, she had spent more time here than usual. Not because of her health, but to stay hidden, as deemed necessary for her safety while her agents searched for the immortals.

She stood in the center of the large stone patio at the rear of her house —the entirety of which was made of glass, allowing her to see everything inside; every lamp, every piece of furntiure, the big stone fireplace— holding the phone to her ear as she contemplated the challenges her men were facing. She ran her tongue along the inside of her lip, reaching down to hold the red kimono she was wearing from blowing around when another gust of wind rushed past.

”Madam?”

The voice jolted Chrysalis from her thoughts, and after staring with a pair of dull, green eyes, she turned and pace toward the short stone wall at the far edge of the patio. “Yes… I’m aware of the risks,” she replied, stopping to rest her free hand on the ledge as she looked down over the cliff at the ocean far below, the endless roar of its waves crashing against the massive rocks littered along the bottom.

“You have your orders.” Her eyes rose, looking out across the ocean to gaze at the blazing orange that flooded the horizon, lit by the last bit of sun as it sunk beneath the surface. Having seen this majestic sight enough times to become indifferent to it, Chrysalis turned on her heel to march toward the rear door, ready to head inside as the breeze had grown a tad chilly for her liking.

“Just be careful,” she said, her shoes clacking along the stone as she stepped. “Find out what you can, and do it quickly. And if you need more resources, don’t hesitate to contact me or Sombra. Undertstood?”

After sigh from the other end, her agent gave his reply. “Understood, Madam. We’ll do our best.”

“Good,” she said, stopping next to the glass panel door. “Make sure you do. Let us know the moment you find something.”

”Of course. Enjoy your evening, Madam.”

With that, Chrysalis lowered the phone and tapped the screen with her thumb, ending the call. She stared at the blank screen for a moment, sighing. Then she shook her head and reached out to grab the door handle, but stopped suddenly when she heard a scuffing noise on the stone behind her.

She turned quickly to see what it was, and was met by a black fist rushing straight toward her. It collided with her mouth like a cab-over truck, making her head snap back hard enough to break the glass in her door, leaving a spider web in place of the clear pane that was there seconds earlier.

Stunned and disoriented, Chrysalis dropped her phone as she slid down the door, landing on the cold, hard stone with her backside. The taste of blood quickly filled her mouth, her lip smarting horrendously after being split open against her teeth. Grimacing, she swirled her tongue around to gauge the flavour, trying to assess the damage when she found something hard and sharp rolling against the inside of her lip.

She cupped her hand and brought it to her mouth to spit, catching a pool of bubbly saliva and blood in her palm. It wasn’t long before she realised what the hard things were: two of her teeth had been knocked out. Staring at the jagged, rotten little tabs in her hand, she stuck her other index finger in her mouth to feel around, and she quickly found a window in the bottom row, front and center.

Swallowing, she looked up at her attacker.

It was a tall, young woman, dressed all in black with a red and yellow sun depicted on the outer flanks of her thighs. Her outfit hugged her figure, its wide collar flapping in the whistling wind in concert with her long red and yellow hair. She stared down at the old woman with a pair of sharp, turquoise eyes, shining brilliantly through a dark mask.

Chrysalis, paralyzed with shock and terror, watched helplessly as the woman bent down, her amber-toned cleavage nearly pouring from the suit’s deep V-neck as she gripped the front of the kimono and hauled the frail woman to her feet, slamming her back against the door.

The pair locked eyes, Chrysalis’s bloody mouth hanging open as that masked face came within millimeters of hers.

“You know who I am?” the woman asked. “Do you recognise my voice?”

Chrysalis’ eyes widened. Of course she recognised the voice; it was a voice that filled her with terror every time she thought of it, ever since that phone conversation all those months ago. It was a voice she hoped she’d never be unfortunate enough to hear in person.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” the masked woman said. “I’m guessing that also means you know why I’m here.”

Chrysalis’s jaw began to tremble. “I… I-I—“

“You remember what I said to you?” the woman cut in. “About leaving us alone? About staying out of Canterlot?” She paused to cock her head. “Seems like a pretty easy thing to do—or at least I thought it was.”

The old woman shook her head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I never sent anyone—“

“You’re lying.”

Chrysalis stared for a moment, unsure of what to say next. Then she swallowed and pursed her lips, jaw clenched as she creased her brow at the woman. “How did you find me here?”

“We found your boys… sneaking around our town. Not smart.” The masked woman licked her bottom lip. “Let’s just say I was able to ask them a few questions about where I could find you. And that guy you were just talking to on the phone? Don’t think for a second that he was acting of his own accord—people tend to be pretty obedient when they’ve been hung upside-down between two fifteen-story buildings.”

Trembling, Chrysalis balled her hands into fists to keep them steady. The pair stood quietly, staring at one another as the wind whipped by, the sound of the ocean roaring down below.

With a quick inhale, the masked woman brought her fingers to her mouth and bit down on the fingertips of her glove so she could pull her hand free. “A’yway,” she said, her words marred by the material between her teeth, “go’a do a lil diggin.”

She closed her eyes and placed her bare hand on the older woman’s temple.

Chrysalis tensed up. Her eyes darted around, unsure of what to make of this. “What… what are you doing?”

No answer.

Chrysalis’ breathing intensified, and she tried to pull away; it was to no avail, however, as she was trapped against the the door. “Why are you touching me like this? Let me go!”

Finally, the masked red-head opened those aqua-coloured eyes of hers. She cocked her head to one side, watching her adversary with a newfound inquisitiveness. She swirled her tongue around the inside of her cheek, making it poke outwards. “Hm. JFK, huh?”

Chrysalis’ brows furrowed. “W— ... what about him?”

“Dealey Plaza. That was you guys. You made an example out of him; a message… to say to others: ‘don’t mess with us, or we’ll mess with you.”

The old woman’s breathing stopped. “How do you know that?”

The red-head smiled. “I know whatever I want.”

Chrysalis stared back, speechless.

After a short pause, the masked woman glanced out over the ocean and then back at the old woman. “Alright, let’s get this over with,” she said as she turned to head for the edge of the patio, dragging Chrysalis along by the collar. “Come on. This won’t take long.”

“Get what over with? What are you taking about!?” Chrysalis cried, skidding and stumbling along, helpless to do anything but follow her much stronger opponent.

The masked woman dragged her to the edge and, without a word, grabbed her collar with both hands and hurled her over the stone wall. An ear-piercing shriek echoed off the surrounding cliff faces as the frail old woman fell hundreds of feet to her doom, hands in front of her face to shield herself as the jagged rocks and foaming water rushed toward her.

Then there was only the sound of the water.

“Hm.” Looking over her shoulder, the masked woman spied her victim’s phone lying near the shattered door. She stepped over to pick it up, entering the password she’d just pillaged from Chrysalis’ mind to unlock it.

After scrolling through the contact list, she stopped when a particular name caught her eye. A little smirk tugged on the corner of her mouth as she made her way back to the edge, reaching out with the phone to snap a photo of the broken body sprawled across the rocks, surrounded by a faint shade of crimson that tinted the frothing water.

Turning away once again, she leaned on the stone wall with her backside, holding the phone against her bust as she tapped away at the screen.

Chuckling to herself, she slipped the phone into the pouch on her belt and put her fingers to her earpiece. “Agent Shadow? Knight Mare here; I am in need of a pickup. Same coordinates.”

”Roger that,” a female voice replied. ”I should be there in approximately three minutes.”

“Copy that.”

Knight Mare folded her hands across her lap and drew a deep breath, staring mindlessly into the old woman’s house as the last bit of daylight gradually faded away. Beyond the layers of glass, she could see the lights of the city that stretched across the valley below, which the house overlooked.

After rubbing her chin for a moment, she reached to her side to produce her own phone. She unlocked it and pulled up a map of her location, frustrated that the name of this particular town was escaping her. Once she found it, she cocked her head and paused for a moment.

“Hm. Soufrière,” she muttered to herself. The name seemed vaguely familiar to her, but she couldn’t quite place it—someone she knew from another life, perhaps.

Sighing, she put her phone away and reached back to lean on the wall with her hands, waiting patiently for her ride.

Then, somewhere off in the distance, just above the sound of the wind, a dog barked.