The Bitter Taste Of Vengeance

[CHICAGO - 31 July 2009 - 10:50 Pm]

In Lola's bedroom, Felicia is seen unmasked and duck taped to a chair. Her shoulder-length platinum blonde hair is caked in blood from her head injury, her left eye is swollen shut and the bleeding from her broken nose has stopped.

"A fucking kid!? Are you telling me I got made a fool of by a fucking kid?" Bone asks in indignant disbelief staring at Felicia's youthful features. "Am I some kind of joke? Look at my face..." He grabs her roughly by the hair and yanks her head to look up at him. "...Do I look like the sort of man you want to fuck with?" he growls glaring at her.

He stares at her blank expression with tears running down her face for a moment and sighs letting go of her head and watches as she turns her head toward Lola's dead body. "Kids these days man no respect I tell you,"

"Let me tell you a little story...My mom and dad were scum. I was raised by an aunt who was worse than them," He pauses for a moment. "I mostly grew up in a group home. You know much about group homes? They suck. You're packed in there with all kinds. You get beat or worse,"

"But I could handle that. What really gnawed at me is that my stuff got stolen all the time," He huffs angrily. "I didn't have a damn thing to call my own. So, when I made my way up through this world, got some folding money in my pocket, I began to acquire nice things," He crouches in front of Felicia and looks at her. "Jewelry. Art. Rare coins. I like these things. They make me feel more cultured than I truly am. I know it's petty, but it made me happy," He smiles with a helpless shrug.

"Then you come along--" He glares at her, his face contorting in rage. "--And steal all of my nice crap!" he yells in her face. There is a beat of silence then he sighs, stands up, and looks at Lola. "Your friend--Your fence...Before we beat her to death and put one in her head, she was kind enough to explain the code to her bookkeeping," He walks over to Lola's body and picks up the black notebook that's covered in her blood from her body, and grimaces slightly at the blood on it.

"Now, I have to go all around this city, and more than that--To find your 'Customers' and get my nice crap back," He says annoyed, and stuffs the notebook in his suit pocket. "Why couldn't you have been like Red Hood, and I wouldn't have cared much nearly as much...That's business. This..." He sighs disappointed. "...Group Home,"

"Work her over 'till she croaks...Lose both the bodies." He orders as he grabs his coat and walks out of the room leaving Felicia with his three goons. "She's quiet. I don't like them quiet," One of them says looking at her blank expression and eyes devoid of emotion still streaming with tears. "She'll start making some noise soon," Another one sneers.

Felicia stares at Lola's lifeless face as her blank expression slowly morphs into a dark hate-filled glare. She feels a tiny jolt at the back of her neck that she would have missed if her entire body didn't suddenly kick into overdrive right after that jolt. "Seems my 'rotten' luck is back," She chuckles mirthlessly. "Shut up cunt," The first goon says and punches her hard across the face sending her falling to the ground in her chair.

"C'mon, hotpants. Got nothing else to say?" The second goon asks smirking down at her. "You're all gonna be dead in the next three seconds," She says coldly and breaks free from the chair rolling backward to her feet. She grabs the third goon's gun while they are left stunned and shoots him in the head. She dodges out of the way of a wild punch from the first goon and shoots him in the stomach, pushes him into the second goon unloads the rest of the clip into the two killing them both.

"Told you," She says tossing the gun to the side. She walks over to Lola's dead body and strokes her cheek, "I'll be back in a bit ok," She stands and opens Lola's closet taking out the bat she keeps in there for self-defense.

[Later at the Moffat Building]

Bone is sitting on a couch in a private room on the top floor of the Moffat Building, getting a private lap dance from two strippers. He smirks as one of the strippers grinds her ass on him and gives her ass a small smack causing her to yelp and smile coyly at him over her shoulder. He leans back enjoying the show and taking a drink from his glass of wine.

CRACK-CRACK ACKACK

Bone startles as the skylight is shot to pieces as Felicia falls through right behind and takes him, hostage. She shoots his one bodyguard in the head before he can react. The two strippers scream in fear running out of the private room without a glance back. "Let's talk 'Bone'," She purrs venomously and starts dragging him towards the roof exit of the building.

Once outside she throws him to the ground dangerously close to the edge of the roof. "Okay, I get it. Point made! I got way too emotional," Bone says sitting up and warily watching Felicia as she tosses the guns off the roof.

"But let me make this right. You whacking me doesn't get you anything but a whole lot more trouble!" He says trying to reason with her. She looks at him impassively and takes off the duffel bag on her shoulder.

"I can get you cash--right now. There's no reason for this to get--" He pleads as Felicia opens the duffel bag, pulling out a silver metal bat with the words 'Good Night' written on the side.

"--Out of hand...Aw hell," He says in despair realizing that he's not getting through to her. She swings the bat hitting him across the face, blood and flakes from his skin splashing on the ground. "You think I give a fuck about your group homes?!" She asks in a low dark emotionless tone. She hits him on the kneecaps shattering them. "You think I give a fuck about what scum like you went through?!" She raises her voice, her anger and hatred seeping through.

"You were right!" SWING "If I was more like Red!" SWING "If I wasn't so vindictive none of this would have happened!" SWING "But I'm not!" SWING "And that's my fault she's dead," She stops her beating and looks down at the mess Bone has become. "You hurt Red because he was messing up your business and you were only returning the favor, on some level I understood that,"

"But Lola...You killed her over things!" She shouts and hits him across his battered face. "MEANLESS!" SWING "STUPID!" SWING "THINGS!" SWING SWING SWING. She stops breathing heavily with tears streaming down her face. "And now--" She glares at his disfigured face. "--I'm gonna take something too," She says lowly and kicks him off the roof to his death.

She stares at his body as it falls and smashes into a car setting off the alarms. She lowers her head tightening her hand around the bat so hard her knuckles start cracking. "five out of ten. Horrible form but perfect execution," Red Hood's modulated voice says from behind her.

"You put a tracker on me," She states glancing back at him. "I put a tracker on everyone... Besides you weren't really subtle," He shrugs from behind her and rubs her arms soothingly. "...Yeah," She says softly, turns around, and hugs him tightly dropping her bat. He rubs her back in comfort as she cries and shudders from her sobs hugging him tighter.

After a few minutes of crying, she pulls back and looks up at him with a sad smile, "I'm fine now,". He looks at her intently for a moment and leans his hood against her forehead and says softly, "I'm not really good at these things but know that I'm always here for you...Ok," She can't see his face because of his hood but knows he is giving her one of his sincere and genuine smiles which are only reserved for her.

"I know," She gives him a soft smile. "I have to go," She says stepping back and toward the ledge. "Wait," He says and tosses her something. She catches it and sees it's a holographic disguise chip. "Don't lose my tech again," He says in mock anger wagging a finger at her. "I won't," She says and puts it behind her ear. The device activates turning her platinum hair, black, and her green eyes, blue with a few other adjustments to her facial features.

"I'll see ya later Red," She waves goodbye jumping off the roof and swinging away with her grappling hook. He waves watching as she disappears into the night. As he watches her swing off he catches a flicker of yellow light disappear from the building across from him. "God I hope it's not what I think it is," He sighs tiredly.

[Lola's Apartment]

Lola has some stuff on her computer, but I can get Oracle to handle that. Really, though, she just did everything old school. She wrote it all down. Black Cat throws a bunch of books, folders, and notepads in the fireplace burning them. I try to tell myself that it's so she won't be found out and remembered as a criminal.

But who am I kidding? I'm just here to save my own ass. When they find her and rule it a homicide, they'll take this place apart. I need to remove everything that could tie me to her. She takes photos of her and Lola out of their frames and throws them in the fire as well.

No one can find any piece of me here. I can't be a part of her life.

She looks at one photo of her and Lola taken at a Zoo. Her lips quiver and she starts tearing up again. She throws the photo in the fire sobbing, "I...I am so sorry Lola,". She stands up and looks around her making sure she hadn't missed anything. She walks into Lola's bedroom and looks at her dead body one more time before jumping out the window just as the cops barge through the front door missing her entirely.