Serenity Sides: Silver's Stars (Part 2) (Patreon)

Hey folks, hope the world is treating you right out there!

I'm my same old boring self, working away on writing projects, as if I know how to do anything else. Caught a cold at the start of the month which has made it a bit rough, but there are waaay worse things to catch out there, so I'll not complain!

Instead, what I shall do is post up the second half of Silver's Stars (you can find the first half Here) and let you see the exciting conclusion! It's the Serenity Stars against SilverQuick, the drone making silver slime - who will win?!

Hopefully, the audience. Enjoy! And I'll see you next week.

“I don’t like this.” Serenity Nightmare Star was trailing at the back of the group, casting her gaze around suspiciously. The normally familiar and friendly central plaza of Mercury Bay felt different tonight. Maybe it was the darkness, maybe it was the lack of crowds, or maybe it was because she knew a Desire was somewhere nearby – but there was a sense of threat in the air. So many shadows to hide in…

Alas, her teammate and best friend Serenity Twin Star didn’t seem to be picking up on the mood. “You never like anything though,” the dark-skinned woman snorted, her arms folded behind her head as she led the team up the steps towards the museum. “It’s kind of your thing, Nighty.”

The redhead rolled her eyes, trying not to smirk. “Okay, maybe that’s true, but I don’t like this especially.” Her gaze focused as she looked up towards their destination. “Any Desire that wants to attack us here is either an idiot, or genuinely dangerous – and idiots can get lucky.”

“We’ll have to be cautious – but aren’t we always?” The third member of their group, the guiding light of the team, and Nightmare’s other best friend, Serenity North Star, was climbing briskly beside her, looking as calm as you please. “Don’t stress yourself out before anything goes wrong.”

“I’m pretty sure something’s already gone wrong if a Desire is camping out in our museum,” the redhead sighed.

It was a fair point. The Serenity Stars Museum wasn’t exactly a place any of the trio liked to visit. It was embarrassing to see your past laid out in front of you like that! Their long list of victories, and their occasional struggles, a lot of which weren’t the team’s fondest memories. None of them could deny that the city had been kind in honouring them like this, but it was just… not a spot they wanted to tour all that often. So getting dragged here on the job kind of sucked.

All three Serenities were in uniform, their white outfits marked by coloured highlights – purple for Nightmare, red for Twin, and light blue for North. They were here on business. The Desire alert had been called five minutes ago, and after setting up the seal and checking to make sure no one had been injured in the evacuation, it was time for their work to truly begin.

The front door of the Stars Museum had been left open, the lights inside flickering. Each Serenity stepped over the threshold carefully, looking around with sharp and well-trained eyes. No sign of anything suspicious, save for the complete lack of people. The air was still and silent in the entrance hall. There was no movement – not at the welcome desk, nor at the doors leading deeper in, or the stairs up. All quiet.

“Ugh.” North brushed her long black hair back over her shoulder, groaning. “Remember girls, try to keep the battle to the first and second floors – or the fourth if you have to. The further we stay away from the third, the better.”

Twin blinked, dropping her arms to look back at her. “Huh? Why, what’s on third?”

“Their tribute to our first battle,” Nightmare answered for her teammate. “And if anything happens to damage the Terri memorial, Christina’s going to use it as an excuse to sue us again.”

More blinking. “Who?”

North and Night shared an exasperated glance, all too familiar with their friend’s behaviour. “Christina Moran.” That was North.

“The lady who’s been hounding us for literally a decade after we sealed her former wife?” That was Night. “She tries to sue us like three times a year.”

“Oooh, her.” The dusky-skinned Serenity nodded, a memory reignited. “Right, yeah, I don’t pay that any attention. It’s just kind of sad.”

“No disagreement there,” North groused. “It’s very sad. It’s also a pain in the ass that I have to keep an eye on because someone has to.”

“And we both appreciate your sacrifice!” Nightmare reached over to pat her friend’s shoulder, before looking around the museum and focusing up. “Now, what do we know about the Desire?”

And like that, they were all down to business, their casual attitude vanishing in an instant. The Stars were old pros at this, the protectors of Mercury Bay for ten years straight. They knew how to do their job, and to do it well.

“Not much,” North answered, flicking her hand and pulling her communicator out to scroll through the reports she’d received through the Serenity Alert App. “The eyewitness accounts said shapeshifter, so, she could look like pretty much anything in here. Doesn’t look like she took any civilians, no one’s been reported missing – but, still, be careful.”

“Of course.” Night nodded, giving the entrance hall a second scan. A shapeshifter warranted extra diligence. “Remember, girls, if anyone sees a Desire they don’t remember defeating posing as one of the displays, let everyone know. Actually, no, not you, Twin. You don’t remember Desires you defeated last week.”

“Hey!”

“Prove me wrong.” The redhead looked around, trying to get a sense of where the Desire was hiding. Nothing. That itching she always felt under her fingernails when a Desire was near was completely absent. “So, how do you want to handle this one, ladies? Split up three ways to cover more ground?”

There was a moment of silence, before all three Serenities burst out laughing. “Yeah, sure, let’s go and feed ourselves to the monster one by one like a bunch of rookies,” the dusky skinned North snorted, wiping at her eyes. “Total victory.”

“Dibs on seeing a suspicious shadow and going off to investigate alone without telling anyone” North Star had a bright grin on her face. “I’ve always wanted to be the first idiot to get taken out in a horror movie”

“Oh, I love that for you. Let’s make your dream come true!” Night put a supportive hand on her friend’s shoulder, her expression one of complete (insincere) encouragement – before it morphed into mock disappointment. “Oh, wait, darn. Sorry girls, I forgot to leave my brain at home today. Guess we’ll have to do this properly.”

“Awww…” The other Stars whined in complete sync, before there was another round of laughter.

“Okay, come on.” North started across the entrance hall, heading towards the first exhibit room. “Enough fun, let’s do this professionally. Sweep each floor, and keep each other in sight at all times. Understood?”

“Yes ma’am!” Her teammates gave her mock salutes, before hurrying after her. Soon, the entrance hall was silent once again.

Silent, save for a distant dripping sound…

-

“Hey, remember this one?”

“What, the dinosaur lady? I remember she ate you.”

“No, that was Twin. I was the one who got stomped into the stree- Oh my god they have my imprint from the road in here.”

As expected, searching a museum full of monster memorabilia for a shapeshifting monster? Was hard. It was really hard. They had to inspect everything to make sure the Desire hadn’t hidden herself in one of the exhibits. Inevitably, they’d ended up reminiscing as they worked.

“PalaeonPredator was a Desire who believed that the expansion of Mercury Bay threatened to destroy the historic record of the surrounding areas, and tried to ‘restore’ the city to a primitive state… Oh yeah, that takes me back. The city was so pretty as a jungle…”

“It was a nightmare of a commute though.” Night shook her head, stepping back from the display as Twin read its placard aloud. “I’m just glad you could seal her from her stomach.”

The dark-skinned Serenity shuddered. “Ugh, don’t remind me.” She shimmered, and then suddenly there were two of her standing next to one another. “It took both of me to pull that off!”

“Yeah, you’re pretty lucky with your powers,” the redhead said with a shrug as she moved to follow North to the next exhibit. “As long as you put both of your heads together, you’ll be able to generate at least one functioning braincell.”

“Hey!”

Night just blew her friend a kiss as she stepped over to the next exhibit, confident in the two Twins being able to keep an eye on one another. She found her other teammate examining a wrecked vending machine, its front torn off from the inside. “What’cha looking at over here.”

“The results of CanCanAnn’s rampage.”

The redhead frowned. “CanCan…? I don’t remember fighting a dance-based Desire, at least not in Mercury…”

But the shortest Star shook her head. “No, she was the soft drink Desire. Remember? She fired them around the city like grenades.”

“Ooooh. Right, her.” Night winced as it all came flooding back to her. “Didn’t she turn me into strawberry soda?”

“I don’t know what flavour you were, I didn’t drink you.” North poked at the torn-up machinery for a moment, before backing up, seemingly satisfied. “Twin might’ve though.”

“No I didn’t!”

“She was super sweet!”

The pair paused as two completely different responses were yelled across the room. “… You know what? I don’t actually want to know. What else is in here?”

“Too many things,” the light blue Serenity sighed, leading Night over to the next display. “Like NewsNeeds. Remember her?”

“I remember that edition of the paper,” her teammate nodded, making her look back and go pale.

“Oh man, they recreated that?” she whined, staring at one of the papers on the wall – this one with a large picture of her, Serenity North Star on the front page. It wasn’t a flattering photo – actually, it looked rather like a glass prison that said Serenity was trying to break out of! The headline next to it read ‘Serenity Gets To Learn How It Feels To Be Sealed!’, which- well, she kind of hoped was wrong, because that had been pretty unpleasant, and she didn’t really wish that on the Desires she fought.

“Yeah,” Twin walked over, giving her friend a consoling pat on the shoulder. “I guess someone sent them a copy they’d made, huh?”

“Looks like.” The dusky skinned Serenity groaned. “Of all the things to put in here…”

Nightmare gave her a nudge. “Hey, it could be worse. I bet Twin’s got way worse things in here, y’know.”

“Hey!”

“You don’t know that!”

North blinked.

Nightmare blinked.

That was funny. Both of Twin’s voices had come from the direction of the dinosaur display. But Twin could only duplicate herself one – becoming twins was very much her limit. It was in the name. So…

No, there was no ‘So…’. By the time that thought would have occurred, both Serenities were in action, swinging around to confront the imposter who had joined them. Unfortunately, it was already far, far too late.

“Ack!” The consoling hand on North’s shoulder suddenly became an inhumanly strong grip, yanking the Serenity off her feet and into the Twin Star duplicate. Except, the duplicate was suddenly a lot less solid than her hand implied, and the false Serenity’s form splashed out in a splattering of silver metal droplets as North crashed into her, swiftly vanishing beneath the silver substance, despite the figure’s slim frame.

The imposter dropped her disguise as she dodged backwards around Nightmare’s desperate blast attack, her body shimmering as it melted into a humanoid shape with a surprising amount of hands – and then melted further into a flat silver puddle, which shot away across the floor and vanished through a vent cover.

“Come back here!” The redheaded Serenity tried to charge after them, but by the time she’d ripped the vent cover off the wall, there was no sign of the Desire, nor her captive, in the maze of twisted pipes beyond.

It was too late. The silver figure was gone – and their teammate was gone with her.

-

Serenity North struggled against her bindings. She was wrapped up tight in silver below the waist, like the small chamber she found herself in had been filled with quick setting metal. Her arms had been forcefully dragged beneath the tide, clamped by silver hands, so she couldn’t use them to try and pull herself free – she was just stuck in place.

The chamber itself was tiny and dark, with no light and only just enough room for her upper body to wiggle a bit. She could breathe, and she could see, barely, but that was it.

All of which was fine with her, because she knew what was coming next. A Desire didn’t catch a Serenity just to chain them up, but hopefully the others were keeping her distracted long enough to let her-

“Serenity.”

- escape. Damnit. Wait.

North Star’s eyes narrowed. She knew that voice.

“Christina.”

“Wrong” The Desire sang all around her. “Wrong wrong wrong. You’ve been calling me by the wrong name for years! I’m SilverQuick Ohhh, it feels so good to finally correct you…”

Years…? The metamorphosis didn’t take that long. But if Christina Maran had been a Desire before today, she would have known it. The woman must have been holding herself back from changing for maybe a decade. Ugh. Yeah, North Star could absolutely believe that.

“So you’ve finally revealed your true self, huh?”

“Yes! And now I’ll finally get my revenge!” The silver sea around her swirled, clinging hungrily to her skin. “At long last, I can show the world what you Serenities really are!”

She was done for. North was all too aware of that fact. Restrained like this, she couldn’t fight, she couldn’t draw her weapon, and she couldn’t hope to summon a Serenity Seal. She was doomed. Her best bet, the most logical choice here, was to stall. Keep the Desire talking, give her friends as much time as she could to catch up and save her.

… But try as she might, after all these years there was no way she could play nice with this woman. “Seriously? It wasn’t enough to keep throwing lawsuits at us, you had to destroy your own life over it? You’re a Desire now! There’s no cure, no way back!”

“Who needs a way back from perfection?” A head emerged from the silver wall in front of her, a smooth, round oval lacking any kind of face. A silver mouth orbited around it like a tiny moon, lips moving as the Desire’s voice echoed through the chamber. “Of course a Serenity could never understand…”

North’s eyes narrowed. “I understand plenty. I understand you’ve twisted yourself into a monster out of a misplaced sense of revenge – and I understand you did it all for a Desire who doesn’t even remember who you are!”

“Wrong!” The chamber roared, the mouth snarling. “She spared me that day! She was still my wife!”

But North had heard it all before. She knew the desperate lies people told themselves to avoid the truth, and she no longer had the patience to humour them. “She didn’t spare you – she lost interest in you. Once she became a Desire, you stopped mattering to her. You’ve heard the testimony from her cor-Mmph!”

A silver hand slapped itself over her mouth as the chamber raged. “Liar! Lies! The Foundation made it all up in order to protect you! But it can’t protect you now.” The silver grew tighter, squeezing around her as liquid fingers slid up the sides of her head. “Now I get to see all of your vile little secrets, Serenity…”

The dark-haired heroine took a breath and gritted her teeth. She could feel cold metal seeping into her ears. “I hope you choke on-Ghnk!”

Her head jolted to the side as her eyes rolled up, showing her whites, teeth clacking together. The cold feeling had slithered in through the sides of her head and gathered in the centre, sending a shock of cold through her entire body. All of her muscles stiffened, and then all relaxed all at once. Her arms went limp, her head drooped, her jaw slacked.

And it wasn’t because she wasn’t trying to move, either. Inside her head, the Serenity was fiercely struggling, trying to get her body to so much as twitch. It did no good – she was trapped inside her own mind. A mind that was starting to get rather fuzzy around the edges. Cold, slipper silver was starting to seep in…

Where- Where was she? What was this? Why couldn’t she move? She knew there was a reason, a bad, bad reason, she knew she had to try to escape, but every time she grasped for a memory to tell her why, or a plan to get her out, it would slide out of her reach, sucked out of her head…

It was like- It was like there was a straw in her mind, s-suck-sucking-

Sluuuurp~

“Mmn, North Star, has anyone ever told you that your thoughts are delicious?”

“I… Why… Buh…?” The soft words slipped from slack, drool slicked lips, but only because SilverQuick let them.

“So that’s how Nightmare Star’s powers work, is it? And Twin’s got a weakness that big? Oh, you spoil me~”

“Nn… Nuh…” Panic welled up inside the Serenity’s emptying brain, but even that was quickly sucked away, leaving her feeling lost and dull. Something bad was happening, she knew, but she-

Ssssuck!

- She… She… What… What was she just…?

“Relax, little Serenity. Almost done now. Just relax and go blank like the good girl you are~”

Oh… Okay… That sounded nice…

North’s lips twitched, the faintest traces of an empty smile making themselves known, just in time for the very last of her thoughts – her core memories, her deepest, most tightly held emotions, her very identity itself – was drained out of her ears and vanished. A quiet moan echoed from her lips, the last sound she’d ever make, as she finally went still, her eyes swirling as they turned silver. Her skin turned grey as her Serenity uniform disintegrated, leaving nothing but a naked, drooling drone in the Desire’s grip.

“There we go.” SilverQuick’s voice was excited, positively giddy – the rush of achieving her revenge over one of the three targets she was obsessed over more than enough to justify her years of waiting. “Nice and empty. And don’t worry. Your friends will be joining you soon~”

The drone didn’t answer. Nor did it react as another hand reached out of the silver sea to pat its grey, drooling head. And it didn’t resist as said hand grabbed hold, pulling it under for good…

-

“Where is she?!?” Nightmare was roaring through the building, marching so fast that the Twins could barely keep up. The Serenity of fear and darkness was always an unsettling presence, but the shadows really seemed to come alive around her when she was angry. Right now, they were roiling. The redhead was furious, both out of worry for her teammate, and rage at the Desire, and she was happy to let the whole world know it.

“She’s in here somewhere…”

“… Both of them.” The Twins were calmer, but still clearly on edge. “The Seal’s still up, she can’t escape.”

“Then where?” Night snapped, eyes flashing red. “We’ve searched the building! We’ve scanned the vents, we’ve checked the pipes, there’s nowhere in here for her to hide – not with North with her! So where’s she gone?!”

“There’s only one place we haven’t checked, Night.”

“She’s gotta be there.”

The redhead turned to look at them, brow furrowed in angry confusion – but after a moment, the cogs in her head began to turn. Right, they’d avoided one exhibit… which meant that it was probably the perfect hiding place. Damnit.

“Fine,” she grumbled, turning towards the stairs. “Let’s check the third floor.”

The third floor was where the more respectful displays were, for the Desires who had been identified, linked with their former identities as humans. That alone would make it an unpleasant place for any Serenity to visit - they never forgot that the creatures they fought had once been people, and that their new existence was a tragedy, but having it rubbed in their faces was a lot.

It was worse for the Stars, though, because the third floor contained the memorial to TerriTerritory, the first Desire they’d ever fought, and the source of a major pain in the ass for their team. Terri’s former wife had never forgiven them for defeating her…

… So of course that was where the Desire was hiding. Both Serenities (all three of them) felt it as they entered the third-floor gallery. There were those itchy fingernails…

“Okay.” Nightmare took charge, one arm out to block Twin from passing her, holding them both at the top of the stairwell. “Let’s do this carefully. The Desire clearly knows a lot about us in order for her to fake being you, even for a second. This place is going to be a trap. We need to be ready.”

“Oh come on-”

“-We’re always ready!”

“If that was true, North would still be with us.”

Both Twins winced. There wasn’t much arguing with that.

Night nodded. “I’m going to go in, and draw the Desire out. You follow up with the Seal, okay? The faster we do this, the faster we get her back.”

The closer Twin nodded, her face firm, committed to the plan. The second Twin, however…

“Hey,” the redhead glared, “pay attention.”

“Sorry, got distracted,” the Twin at the back muttered, rubbing the top of her head. “When we’re done here, we should let someone know they need to have a plumber check this place out…”

Her double elbowed her. “Focus.”

“I’m focused, I’m focused!”

“Yeah, sure, whatever.” Nightmare sighed, shaking her head. “Just… get ready, okay? You see your chance to strike, you take it.”

“Yes ma’am!” This time the Twins were in perfect sync, saluting before jumping up into the rafters, disappearing from sight. Despite having twice as much to hide, Twin Star had always been the stealthiest member of the team.

Which left Nightmare to face her fears alone. That was fine though. Fears were things she inflicted on other people. Including this Desire, soon enough.

The Terri room was quiet as she stepped inside, but she knew it was here. She could feel its presence, lurking nearby. She didn’t know this memorial well enough to spot a shapeshifter hiding, but she didn’t need to. She knew what would make the monster jump.

“Man,” the Serenity said, striding through the room and glancing towards the photo of Olivia Meran on the far wall. “I know I don’t visit often, but I have to say, I can see why you went Desire after meeting your loser of an ex-wife. I-”

“HOW DARE YOU!” Silver spikes lanced out from the suspiciously slick looking ceiling, slamming into the ground where Nightmare had just been standing, before she jumped away at the last second. “You little wretch!”

“I knew it,” the Serenity snarled, jumping back out of reach. “I knew it had to be you, Christina! You’re the only one this obsessed with us!”

“Wrong!” The Desire giggled as she melted down from the ceiling, a long droplet that formed into a mass of silver hands clasped together in the rough shape of a woman. “But then, your friend got it wrong too, before I corrected her into one of my pretty little drones. I’m SilverQuick. And this won’t take long~”

Perfect. There she was, out in the open. Now Night just had to keep her distracted for Twin to get a proper shot on her. Easy.

“What, trying to scare me with what you did to North?” The redhead snorted, circling around the room. “You got lucky, and you don’t have anywhere to hide this time. Endless March!”

She threw out her hands, leading with an attack. Darkness swirled around her before rolling forwards, an unstoppable, crushing force.

SilverQuick didn’t react, simply allowing the blast to slide over her and dissipate harmlessly. Uh oh.

“Ah, and now you’re trying to scare me, Nightmare? But I know your secret…” The silver creature’s floating mouth grinned as she slid up closer to the Serenity, looming over her. “Your powers are all illusions. Fake. I’ve nothing to worry about from you. Especially since I know that you’re actually standing over there.”

The Desire pointed to her side, towards a patch of ground near to the door, ignoring the redhead in front of her, who suddenly flickered and disappeared, like a TV getting shut off. Illusion dispelled, the real Serenity Nightmare was revealed, standing exactly where her opponent was looking. Shit.

The redhead ground her teeth, clenching a fist. “Oh, I wouldn’t say nothing to worry about,” as she prepared to leap at the monster. When illusions didn’t work, empowered punches tended to make up the difference!

But she didn’t move.

Looking down quickly revealed the reason why. The ground under her feet had turned silver, and while she’d been focused on her illusions, SilverQuick had taken the chance to rise up around her ankles and bind her in place. She was firmly anchored down.

Crap.

The Desire’s floating mouth smirked as she closed in on the captured Serenity. More silver hands jumped up out of the ground, latching onto Nightmare’s fists and clamping them down. She was helpless in front of her now.

Oh well. Not quite what she’d hoped for, but this still worked for the plan. She’d lured the Desire out, now Twin just needed to strike! And, uh, hopefully she’d do it quickly, because said Desire was starting to get awfully close…!

“Binary Blast!”

Suddenly, the red Serenity dropped down from overhead in front of her, hands flashing as twin bolts flew from her fingers, slamming into SilverQuick with miniature explosions and driving her backwards. The dark-skinned saviour quickly set herself between the monster and her friend, palms still glowing. “That’s as far as you go!

“What? No!” Hey, Nightmare appreciated the save, but… “You were supposed to Seal her!”

Twin grinned back over her shoulder. “It’s okay! She was a bit out of position, but now other me’s got her for sure!”

H-hey, she was only out of position because the stupid Desire could see through her illusions, and- Never mind, didn’t matter. As long as the Seal was coming, everything was fine. SilverQuick was still reeling from Twin’s first attack, pulling herself back together from where she’d been splashed around the place, so…

…

… so, uh…

…

Nightmare twitched. Twin licked her lips nervously. The wait grew longer and longer…

And the Desire smirked as she finished reforming herself. “Missing someone?”

Both Serenities jolted. No no no…

“Hey! Other me, get your butt down here already!” Twin yelled, preparing another blast attack. But without the other her, she didn’t have much chance of landing a Seal like this – you needed a chance to charge it up, and SilverQuick certainly wasn’t going to give her one…

Fortunately, the other Twin finally showed herself, dropping down from above to landing on the other side of the room. But something was clearly wrong. She set down on unsteady feet, swaying from side to side – and much more worryingly, her black hair was starting to turn grey. “Uh… H-hey, me I… uh… I feel… weird…”

“Me! What-?” The dark skinned Serenity turned to glare at the Desire. “What did you do to her?”

And the Desire giggled, swirling around the room to put her hands on Twin-B’s shoulders. “To her? Oh, I’m afraid I infected her a while back. It’s been a lot of fun, actually, slowly drinking her mind away, seeing how much I could do without her noticing. Turns out, all of it! But then, there wasn’t really very much to consume in the first place…”

“You-!” Twin-A growled, the glow around her hands brightening. Behind her, Nightmare blinked. Was she seriously- Yes, she was charging up a Serenity Seal! And distracting the Desire with talk! That might actually work!

SilverQuick certainly didn’t seem to have noticed, waving a few hands, while keeping two on Twin-B’s shoulders, the double slowly starting to drool as her eyes swirled with silver. “Don’t worry, dear, it’s quite painless. Neither she nor North Star complained. And ohh, North Star had all sorts of interesting facts in her head to enjoy.”

She slid around her captive, stretching her form out to coil around her like a snake, all while watching the other two Serenities smugly. “Facts about how Nightmare’s illusions worked…” She laughed, and laughed harder as Nightmare bristled. “Facts about how much you hated my old self…” Somehow that one made her laugh even harder. “And facts about you, Twin Star!” She stroked her grey Twin’s head fondly. “Like how you can only stay separated from your other self for five minutes – and would you look at that? Time’s up!”

Nightmare’s eyes widened, looking towards her Twin for a denial. If she recombined now then everything that was happening to her other self would affect both of them! She couldn’t have lost track, right?

But her Twin was just blinking. “Oh. Oops.”

Bamf!

And like that, both Twins (plural) were gone, a pair of puffs of smoke in their places. And in between the two points now stood another Twin (singular). A combination of the pair – which meant half of her hair was black, and the other half was silver. Her skin on her left side was warm hazel, while the other was dull grey. Even her eyes were mismatched – one normal, the other an empty spiral. But the difference didn’t last for long.

The silver leached out, spreading through her hair, as her skin lost all colour, seeping into nothingness. She gasped once, stammering out something that might have been a word – but the strength of her tongue deserted her, and it all came out as a garbled groan, before falling completely silent.

Twin Star went slack, drooling, empty eyed – before sinking into the silver floor without a trace.

“Two down…” SilverQuick giggled, sounding like a burbling spring. “One to go! Let’s finish this with a splash, shall we Nightmare?”

And then she was growing. The Desire rose up, silver flowing, roaring around her, flooding into the room from above and below. It all formed into a shining tidal wave, growing higher and higher around the last Serenity, threatening to crash down at any moment.

“W-Wait!” Nightmare yelled out, reaching desperately for one last chance, one little distraction. “You’ll destroy your wife’s memorial!”

And for a moment, the Desire paused, her awareness casting around. At the photos, the tributes, the words of kindness, many of which she herself had paid for in a past life. The reason for her obsession, the cause of her vengeance.

“Oh yeah. Who was that again?”

Unfortunately, she cared just as much about her old life as Terri had.

“God damnit,” Nightmare muttered, knowing there was nothing left to try. “I hate you so much.”

Then the wave of silver crashed down, and snuffed out her identity beneath its inescapable weight.

-

Months later…

“Though the Stars haven’t been seen in some time, we still honour their work protecting this city. It’s thanks to them that Mercury Bay is the place that it is.”

A small crowd of people followed the tour guide into the room, looking around and taking pictures. The Serenity Stars Museum had enjoyed a big spike in popularity after the team vanished, though that had mostly settled down by now. Still, plenty of visitors still passed through, week after week.

This was generally the most popular room of the tour – the Star Memorial room. In it, there were arrays of flowers, tributes to the city’s heroes, dedicated plaques, framed newspaper articles, videos of the Stars at their peak… And, of course, in the middle of it all, on a plinth in the centre of the room, sealed behind thick glass, was a set of statues depicting the Stars themselves. Nightmare on the left, her fists raised. Twin on the right, making a V gesture. And North in the middle, hands proud on her hips.

Most of the photos taken in here were of them.

“And though we don’t know where they’ve gone, we here at the Museum like to believe that they’re still here, somewhere, watching over us all…” The tour guide smiled, resuming the tour and leading the group on to the next exhibit. “Now, just over here, we have a gallery dedicated to the city’s new defenders, the Serenity Riders…”

Once upon a time, the guide’s name had been Jennifer Felt, but that identity had been scooped out of her long ago. Now she was just the tour guide, mindlessly reciting the facts left in her head, her body on endless loop – with just a little makeup to make sure no one noticed her pale skin.

Behind them, the Star Memorial was left empty. There wasn’t much to interact with in there after all. The main exhibit, the statues in the middle, were firmly behind glass, and distant enough that you couldn’t make out much detail.

Some guests might have noticed that their outfits didn’t look quite right – cheaper and skimpier than the ones the Stars wore in the pictures. Some might have mentioned, on odd occasion, how glassy their expressions they looked, how they had no visible pupils, like their eyes were pure silver. Or some might have even pointed out that sometimes the statues seemed to be breathing, or even drooling…

But not this time. Which was good, because whenever anyone noticed something like that, silver tendrils always reached down from the roof, and ate the memories of every guest present, until such details were all cleaned away.

Observant people like that had been growing rarer anyway. The public eye had long moved on from the old heroes now. Soon, this display would be boarded up, left to gather dust as more current figures became the focus of the museum – and the Stars were left forgotten once and for all.

A delicious fate for the one who’d engineered it all. One that she’d enjoy for years and years and years. Oh yes, this display was going to be here for a very, very long time…~