“I’d be hard pressed to find an actual first name that sounds more patronizing to address someone by than Missy.” I work with someone named Missy. It’s just another name.
Oh yeah, there’s nothing wrong with the name itself. It’s just that it’s a normal name that happens to sound exactly like a term of address that Vista probably wouldn’t appreciate to be called if it wasn’t her name.
This ain’t the first time the Beebs has been mentioned in the story
Oh yeah, now that you mention it, didn’t Taylor’s narration mention him at some point early on?
Blog search doesn’t find it, but it does tend to be especially unreliable with the early parts of the story for some reason.
“Can I just say? This scene would be kinda uncomfortable in any sort of video format, even with respectful camera angles.” Another liveblogger straight up skipped reading/commenting on that section.
Skipping is not something I’d do, especially while liveblogging, but I can absolutely see why someone might decide to under these conditions.
Grammer issue no.2: “Child’s toy” refers to the toy being for a child, not Parian being a child.
Ah, fair enough!
They’re back, bichesss!
This was a pretty good chapter. Shadow Stalker is even worse than I thought. She’s straight up a serial murderer, even while in the Wards.
The Undersiders, on the other hand, are great and I am very pleased to see them again. And we’ve got a mysterious new one, named Imp… I’m looking forward to getting to know her.
We’re definitely not in for a Chariot chapter now. At this point, we’re almost certainly either continuing with Shadow Stalker or moving to Taylor or Imp as the POV character, possibly getting into Interlude territory now that we’ve gone through all the Wards.
I don’t know exactly what the Undersiders plan to do with their new captive, but I’m pretty sure it’s not going to be pleasant for one miss Sophia Hess.
See you next time!
Being tased didn’t hurt as much as she’d expected. It was like being doused in ice water, her entire body seizing, straining, and refusing to cooperate, the pain almost secondary. What hurt most was the way she involuntarily clenched of her jaw. The strength with which her teeth pressed together made her worry she might crack a tooth.
Ow.
It only lasted a moment, but her body wasn’t any more cooperative after the current subsided. She lay there, huffing small breaths, every limb unresponsive. A deep, furious rage grew inside her chest, but she was impotent to do anything to release it.
Yeah, no catharsis for you this time.
A pair of hands seized her, sat her up. Her arm dangled limp to her side.
Grue spoke from behind her. “Skitter, lift her legs. Regent, support her midsection. Imp? Give me a hand with her upper body, take the other shoulder. We lift on three, alright?”
“Right,” someone said.
Imp, huh. Nice name, kinda simple but gets the point through. Her power might be something sort of mischievious?
“One, two, three!”
Time to go!
“Well,” she spoke, her tone sarcastic, “How wonderfully fucking nice for you, that you guys patched things up. You even have a new member, congratulations. I guess everything’s back to normal for you freaks.”
I’m not sure about that, though, if Taylor’s decision from 8.8 is any indication.
“No…” Skitter spoke, and the bugs around her chirped, buzzed and droned to match the pitch and tone of her words. The villain hadn’t done that when the Undersiders attacked the fundraiser, she remembered. Her voice was quiet, which only made it more eerie. The girl held out her hand, and Regent passed his scepter to her.
Oh damn, that’s a really cool effect. Seems Taylor has picked up some more tricks from Grue since last time.
“…Things are different now,” Skitter finished.
Skitter drove the scepter into Shadow Stalker’s body.
It’s Skitter’s turn to get some catharsis.
It was everything Shadow Stalker could do to stay solid as she felt the tines of the crowned stick biting through the fabric of her costume and into her stomach. She resisted the instincts that two and a half years of exercising her powers had lent her, because she knew what came next. It’ll be worse if I’m in my shadow state, maybe lethal.
Oh right, the scepter is a taser!
Rounding out the group were Tattletale, Regent and Skitter. Tattletale smiled, her hands clasped behind her back, while Regent twirled his scepter in his fingers. Skitter stood between the two of them.
😀
It’s so good to see the gang all together again.
The bug girl bent, then crouched until she was almost at eye level with Shadow Stalker.
A laugh escaped Shadow Stalker’s lips, building until she couldn’t balance her upper body on her weakened arm.
Shush, stop ruining Skitter’s moment.
She bent so one shoulder hit the ground, rolled onto her back, arms at her sides. She looked up at Skitter, “All that drama, all that fucking nonsense about allegiances, betraying your team, was it a trick, some joke?”
Well… no, but there is such a thing as forgiveness. You should try it sometime.
Skitter shook her head slowly.
Shadow Stalker tried to rise, but the growling of one of the dogs intensified. It was the only one that wasn’t pulling on its chain – the largest and most monstrous of the four, with one empty eye socket.
Good to see you too, Angelica 🙂
Between the threat of the dog and the lack of strength in the arm that Regent wasn’t fucking up, Shadow Stalker gave up and let herself slump down.
Game over.
Grue stood to her left, arms folded, almost indistinguishable from the darkness behind him. After her first humiliating loss to him, she’d made it a mission to drive him out of this city. He’d stubbornly refused.
He’s not a guy that gives in to pressure easily.
So that’s why you hate him so much. He beat you, so you try to kill him or drive him out…
A girl Shadow Stalker didn’t recognize stood just behind him, wearing a black scarf and a pale gray mask with pointed horns arching over the top of her head.
Oooh, interesting. Did we get a new Undersider while I wasn’t looking?
The eyes of the mask had lenses that were black from corner to corner, stylized to look fierce, more animal than human.
I like this design.
Her opponents were revealed as the shadows passed, arranged in a rough ring around her. Hellhound and her dogs took up half the clearing, in front of Shadow Stalker.
That’s Bitch to you, pal.
She held a metal ring in each hand, with two chains extending out from each ring. The chains, in turn, were connected to harnesses around the heads and snouts of the ‘dogs’, each animal only a little smaller than a refrigerator.
Four dogs, then? Nice. I feel like they, besides Angelica, might be some of the dogs we met before, in 7.2 and 7.3. I should probably reread those sometime soon.
They were monstrous, with scaly, horned exteriors and exposed muscle. Not as big or ugly as they could get, Shadow Stalker knew. The smallest one was barking incessantly. Three of the four were pulling on the chains, hungry to get at Shadow Stalker, clearly intent on tearing her apart.
The fourth one being Angelica, who’s had more training than the rest. I wonder if she still pulls on the leash on walkies.
Hellhound’s sharp pulls on the chains contracted the bindings around their snouts, which made them stop before they could get too close.
In other words, you really shouldn’t try to take out Bitch right now.
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