Chapter 2: The Aftermath
The drive back to Vought Tower was a blur of wet asphalt and silent recrimination. Annie scrubbed at her hands with a sanitizing wipe until the skin felt raw, but the phantom sensation lingered—not of touch, but of that pull, a gravitational distortion centered on the passenger seat.
Stormfront hadn’t said a word. She just stared out the window, her profile carved from marble. Only the occasional, almost imperceptible twitch in her jaw muscle betrayed the storm beneath the surface. The car smelled of her ozone, rain, and that faint, expensive shampoo. Annie cracked her window, needing the dirty city air to dilute it.
Their phones buzzed in unison. A summons. A debriefing. Of course.
---
The Vought Tower underground garage was a tomb of cold concrete and echoing emptiness. Annie’s heels clicked a steady, nervous rhythm against the sealed floor, the sound bouncing off the pillars that rose like dark, thick trees. Somewhere, water dripped. A flickering neon sign painted the scene in stuttering strokes of sickly green.
Stormfront walked three paces ahead, her stride long and purposeful, as if trying to physically outdistance what had happened. The backs of her hands were scuffed, knuckles raw from pounding steel. Annie found herself staring at the minor wounds, wondering if they’d already healed, feeling a stupid, unwelcome twinge of concern. She immediately shoved it down, locking it away with the other contaminated memories.
“He got away,” Stormfront said suddenly, her voice flat, not looking back. It wasn’t an admission. It was an accusation.
“Your method of ‘subduing’ him involved bringing the building down,” Annie replied, her own tone carefully neutral. “He used the chaos.”
Stormfront stopped. Turned. In the uneven light, her pale eyes were just chips of glacial ice. “My method was a response to his corruption. A cleansing fire. You just stood there. Glowing.”
The air between them thickened. It wasn’t the artificial, perfumed lust from the warehouse. This was different. Sharper. A live wire of mutual animosity, now dangerously intertwined with a shared, shameful secret. Annie could still feel the echo of that addictive pull, a low-grade hum in her blood, making her anger feel unstable, volatile.
“I was containing the situation,” Annie said, holding her gaze.
“You were weak.” Stormfront took a step closer. The garage felt like it was shrinking. “It makes me wonder. About your loyalties. Your… constitution.”
Annie’s heart hammered against her ribs. Was this just generic bullying, or did she know something? “My constitution handled his power. Yours made you rage out on inanimate objects.”
A cold, humorless smile touched Stormfront’s lips. “Touché, little girl.” She looked Annie up and down, a slow, deliberate inspection that felt violating. “Remember the debrief. Stick to the script. He was elusive. We engaged. The structure was compromised. He fled. No specifics.”
“I know how a debrief works.”
“Do you?” Stormfront leaned in, just slightly. Her voice dropped to a whisper that somehow carried more threat than a shout. It was intimate. “If you speak of what happened, of that feeling, I will make your death look like an accident. A tragic training mishap. A faulty power grid. And I will enjoy it. The cleanup. The press conference where I mourn the poor, fragile Starlight.”
Annie’s breath caught. The threat was real, professional, ice-cold. But the proximity was a problem. That damnable, lingering trace of Cupid’s power twisted inside her, mixing fear with a sudden, shocking, and utterly unwelcome thought: She’s so close. Why didn’t she just kiss me to shut me up?
The thought hit her like a physical blow. Nausea, immediate and acidic, rose in her throat. Her hands trembled. She hoped the bad light hid it.
Stormfront’s eyes flickered, as if she’d caught a glimpse of the internal chaos. The smile widened, turning cruel with understanding. She’d seen the revulsion, yes, but perhaps she’d also seen the horrible, fractional second of something else that preceded it.
She straightened up, the moment broken. “Elevator’s here.”
---
The debrief was a sterile, brightly-lit farce. They sat in padded chairs across a polished table from two Vought suits. Annie recited the lines. Stormfront, now the picture of composed professionalism, expanded on them with eloquent efficiency. She spoke of tactical challenges, of Cupid’s cowardice, of structural instability. She was convincing. She was a leader. Annie felt like a puppet with fraying strings.
The suits nodded, took notes. No hard questions. Just a failure to be logged. They were more concerned with optics, with drafting a statement about how The Seven were "actively monitoring the situation."
As they were dismissed, one of the suits, a woman with a tight smile, added, “We’ll need you two to coordinate on the follow-up. Increased public appearances. A united front. Show the city we’re not rattled. Maybe a joint patrol tonight. The blogosphere is already buzzing with ‘tension’ rumors.”
Stormfront’s smile was all polished teeth. “Of course. We’re a team.”
Annie felt the words like a weight in her stomach.
---
Back in the garage, walking towards their separate vehicles, the silence returned. It was heavier now, loaded with the future, with forced proximity, with the knowledge that the lie had to be maintained indefinitely.
Stormfront stopped by her car, a sleek, black thing that looked like a weapon. She didn’t get in. She just looked at Annie across the hood.
“The patrol,” she said. “Nine PM. The Financial District. Don’t be late. And wear something the cameras like. We’re selling a story.”
Annie just nodded, fumbling for her keys.
Stormfront opened her door. Before sliding in, she paused. “That feeling,” she said, her voice casual, as if discussing the weather. “It’s fading. Like a bad smell. Remember that. Whatever weakness it triggered in you… it’s just chemical residue. It means nothing.”
She got in. The engine purred to life, a low, powerful growl, and she drove off without another look, the tires squealing softly on the concrete.
Annie stood alone in the flickering green light. She replayed the words. It’s fading. Was it? The intense, compulsive pull had lessened, true. But in its place was something more insidious, more tangled. A hyper-awareness. A knowledge of the shape of Stormfront’s mouth when she made a threat. The specific scent of ozone that clung to her.
She walked to her own car, a modest sedan Vought provided. As she unlocked it, her phone lit up. A text from an unlisted number. Butcher.
Heard it went tits up. Warehouse district chatter says lots of noise, big damage, no package. You clean?
She stared at the screen. Clean? She felt permanently stained. She typed back, her fingers cold.
Clean. Complicated. Cupid’s power… it was a problem. Stormfront is suspicious.
The reply was almost instantaneous.
Of course she is. She’s a fucking Nazi. They’re paranoid by design. Stay the course. Get closer. Find her pressure point.
Annie slid into the driver’s seat, closing the door on the garage’s damp silence. Get closer. The last thing on earth she wanted. The only thing, now, she had to do.
She started the car, the mundane sound alien in the aftermath of everything. As she pulled out, her headlights swept across the empty space where Stormfront’s car had been. For a second, she imagined she could still see the afterimage of her there, a cut-out shape against the gray.
The attraction was fading, maybe. The mission was just beginning. And Annie wasn’t sure which was more dangerous.