Part Two, Chapter Twenty Two: Gay and Evil

"Beatrice!" Charlie gasped. "You're not serious, right?"

Beatrice tried not to pay her too much attention, but it was hard when she looked like such a kicked puppy.

Her mother appeared just like that, as if she had said some kind of magic spell. She laid her hand on Beatrice's shoulder, but Beatrice stopped her before she could teleport away.

"Wait!"

Her mother sighed and let go fo her shoulder.

"Yes?"

"I need you to apologize to TJ first." She said.

Her mother gave her an exasperated look.

"For what?"

"You knew that he was being experimented on, and you didn't even go save him. You baited me into it."

"Of course I didn't try to save your brother." Her mother scoffed. "I mean, look at him, he's pathetic."

She pointed over to where he stood, and Lin took a step closer to him.

"Mom!" Beatrice gasped.

"What? You know it's true." Her mother rolled her eyes. "He's a doormat. If you stabbed him he would apologize for getting blood on the carpet. Now, don't get me wrong, you've got your faults too— I've seen your devastating lack of social skills— but at least you're angry and useful."

"What the fuck." Beatrice snapped. She wanted to yell about how she was going to snap her neck if she kept talking to TJ like that, but instead she tried to control her anger like Lin had taught her.

"Don't be dramatic, Beatrice. I wasn't going to let them kill him. I would have stopped them before it got that far." She said, as if it were some sort of consolation.

"Geez. Maybe my dad isn't so bad." Charlie said under her breath.

Beatrice crossed her arms and stared expectantly up at her mother.

"I don't care about any of that. Are you going to apologize to him or not?"

Her mother scoffed and rolled her eyes.

"Fine." She turned to TJ, who most certainly did not seem to appreciate the attention. "I'm sorry I didn't save you."

TJ crossed his arms.

"Okay? Apology not accepted?"

Her mother gestured towards him in an exaggerated sort of way.

"See? He doesn't even care. What was even the point of that, Beatrice?"

Beatrice smiled.

"It was just for me." She said, "Now, are we going to take over the city, or what?"

There was no verbal response from her mother. Instead, she grabbed her by the arm and quickly teleported her away from her friends. Beatrice found herself in what looked like a basement. There wasn't really anything in there except a couple of small, blinking devices and a laptop.

"So what's the plan?" Beatrice said. "Besides just 'taking over the city', I mean."

"Well, I really like to wing my plans." Her mother said. "If you don't know what you're going to do ahead of time, then neither do your enemies."

That did technically make sense.

"I see."

"But the long and short of it is, I went to let all of the prisoners out of the Super Prison. From there I'm going to try and get the Council of Evil back together."

"What if they won't agree to join?" Beatrice said. "There could be a lot of in-fighting, and that'll just make it easier for the authorities to take us down."

"That's where Charlie comes in." Her mother excitedly explained. "Hopefully, she will be able to sway them to our side."

"Charlie isn't going to want to do that, mom." Beatrice said.

"I'm sure you can convince her." Her mother said dismissively. "She's your girlfriend, after all. She knew what she was getting into when you kidnapped her."

Beatrice sighed.

"What is it?" Her mother asked.

"I mean, it's a good plan— it's just—" She sighed again and crossed her arms over chest and looked at the ground.

"What?"

"Nothing." She said, "It— it's stupid."

"Come on, Beatrice, just spit it out. We don't have time to go back and forth all night with your moods." Her mother said.

"You've never apologized to me before." She said.

"Apologized?" She scoffed. "Apologized for what?"

Beatrice turned her back and looked away again.

"If I have to tell you then I guess it's pointless."

There was a brief but tense silence.

"Okay, fine. I'm sorry for kidnapping your girlfriend." She said.

Beatrice raised an eyebrow.

"And?"

Her mother let out a dramatic groan.

"Oh my god, what else is there?"

"Oh, I don't know. Treating me like shit my whole life? Locking me in my room for weeks at a time? Trying to kill me?" Beatrice said.

"I don't know what you're talking about." Her mother said.

"Like I said. I was being stupid."

Beatrice crossed her arms and looked away, back to the computer screen. She tried her best to seem like she was studying something closely.

There was another few minutes of tense silence, broken up by the sound of her mother typing.

"Okay, fine. I'm sorry." Her mother said. "Are you happy now?"

"Almost—"

Beatrice opened her arms. Her mother gave her a look of disgust in response.

"Come on Beatrice. I'm not going to hug you. That's gross."

In response, Beatrice kept her arms open expectantly and said nothing. Her mother let out a sighed and very reluctantly came over to hug her.

After a while, her mother pulled back, and Beatrice was surprised to see that she looked almost… happy. She wasn't expecting that.

"So, do you forgive me?" She asked quietly.

"Do I forgive you?"

Her mother nodded.

"Fuck no." Beatrice laughed. "Forgiveness is a scam made up by assholes so they can trick you into letting them hurt you again."

"Wha—"

"Also, we're about to have a fist fight, so square the fuck up."

"A fist fight?"

Beatrice responded to her bewilderment by throwing a punch at her. Her fist met her cheek, and sent her stumbling backwards a couple of steps.

She threw out her hand towards Beatrice, a snarl on her face, but nothing happened. Her eyes widened and she tried again.

"Wha—"

"You're bot the only one who can emotionally manipulate someone, you know." Beatrice said. She tossed one of the power blockers in the air and caught it in the palm of her hand. "And I learned from the best."

"You bitch—"

Beatrice cut her off by punching her again, this time square in the nose. Stunned, her mother took a step back as a trail of blood trickled from her nostile.

"Are you just going to stand there and let me kick your ass?" Beatrice taunted her. "Or are you going to fight back?"

This time her mother responded by swinging wildly at her, an attack that Beatrice easily deflected by grabbing her arm, and hooking her ankle with her foot. They fell to the ground, and her mother grabbed desperately at her throat with her hands, but Beatrice was able to keep her away.

Beatrice grabbed a handful of her hair, and was able to slip from underneath her, and take her back. From there she wrapped her legs around her, and began to choke her with her arm.

Her mother's nails dug into her arm, and she kicked her legs in a desperate attempt to break free. In response she pulled her arm tighter.

She heard footsteps running down stairs, and then hitting the concrete and stopping a few feet away from her. Looking back, she could see it was Charlie, TJ, and Lin.

It looked like Lin had been able to bust the door down after all.

"B!" Charlie shouted.

At the sound of her voice, her grip on her mother's neck momentarily slipped.

"Beatrice please. Don't kill me." She gasped. "Please."

Beatrice regained her grip and tightened the choke again so that she could no longer speak.

"B…" Charlie said softly. She took a couple of steps towards her. "You don't want to kill her. You're not that kind of person."

She pulled the choke tighter.

"She never felt bad when she hurt me." She said. Tears started to form in her eyes. "She never stopped when I begged her. Why should I?"

"Don't let her take up the space in your head that should be filled with things you love."

Charlie held out her hand.

Beatrice felt her bottom lip quivering, and reluctantly let go of her mother. The older woman fell to the ground, gasping for breath and coughing.

Beatrice fell back and put her face in her hands. Through the gaps in her fingers , she watched as Lin went over and restrained her mother.

"We should probably call the police." Lin said. "And Alice will probably want to know about this too—"

He kept talking, but his voice sounded like it was miles away. Her focus had shifted— away from him and away from Charlie, who was coming over to try and comfort her. Instead she looked at the laptop.

The red light was blinking. It was ready to stream.

She walked over and picked it up.

"Hello, New Atlanta." She said awkwardly into the camera. "This is Shadow Witch, and I know it's really weird for me to have to tell all of you this like this, but I'm done being a hero.

I'm sorry, this city just has a lot of problems— like that thing last month with the radioactive waste— and it's too much. Especially considering no one here has ever really done anything to help me.

Plus, I actually have a lot of my own problems I need to work out.

Let me see if I have anything else to say….

Oh yeah— this is for the company I work for— I'm stealing all of the equipment you gave me, so don't even bother trying to come back for it. My manager is kind of a dick anyway.

Alright. Bye."

She clicked the button to end the stream and shut the laptop.

Her attention was then turned to Charlie, who stared at her with an open mouth.

"Charlie, would you do me the honor of running away from the authorities with me?" She asked.

To her surprise, Charlie's eyes lit up.

"Of course. We've done it before, haven't we?"

"For good this time?" Beatrice said.

"Why not?"

"You want to be stuck with me forever?"

Charlie leaned over and grabbed her hand.

"Of course I do."

Lin cleared his throat, and elbowed TJ in the side. TJ stumbled into action, and walked over to her.

"B, I think you're making an impulsive decision here." He said.

"Charlie and I have been together for over a year now." She said, "I think that's long enough to defect from the US government together."

"B…"

"TJ, I'm an adult now, and I can make my own stupid decisions." She said.

"B, I just want what's best for you—"

"I know, and I want what's best for you too." She said, "You've always taken care of me, and you've always put yourself in danger for me. There's nothing I could really do to ever repay you for that. I want you to go out and live whatever kind of life you want. You deserve at least that much."

"But we just got to start seeing each other again." He said. "You're all grown up now and there's so much we still need to catch up on."

"We'll still see each other." She held out her pinky finger and smiled. "I promise."

He hooked his finger around hers.

"Okay. I'm going to hold you to it."

"Of course." She turned to Charlie. "Come on. I'm going to grab my hoverboard. Let's go."

Beatrice enjoyed the sting of the wind against her face as she flew through the air. She enjoyed the feeling of Charlie's arms wrapped tight around her waist. She was just… enjoying herself for once.

It was a good feeling.

She felt free.

"You know, maybe it's a good thing if I leave the city." Charlie said, clearly jittering with anxiety. "Everyone here hates me, and I don't want to accidentally make them like me against my will— if I am a mutant."

Beatrice frowned, though she knew Charlie couldn't see. She reached down to her waist and squeezed her fingers.

"I don't want to so that to you either, though." Charlie added. "What if the only reason you love me is because of some kind of power I have?"

Beatrice slowed the hoverboard down until it was drifting— the closest it could come to a full stop. She pulled her helmet off, and shook her hair out, then turned to face Charlie with a frown.

"Charlie, I want you to know that I have never, not even for one second, doubted my feelings for you." She said. "Maybe that's stupid or me, but you are one of the few things that actually makes me happy, and I don't want to lose that. I mean, I hate most things, but I love you."

Charlie blinked her, her eyes glassy.

"I… I love you too."

Beatrice leaned forward and kissed her, hundreds of feet above the tallest building in New Atlanta, a city she was finally leaving.

As they parted, she looked at Charlie and smiled.

"Come on. Let's go figure out what we're going to do for the rest of our lives."