Gabrielle let out a grunt of surprise as she flew through the air by Elara's aura lasso, her body flying high above the ground. "What the—?!"
Elara caught Gabrielle and held her in her arms, the paralyzed Cabal member still struggling against the effects of Iritscen's serum.
"There's no use fighting it, sweetie," Elara cooed in a condescending tone, her voice filled with false sympathy. "The drug Iritscen administered sounds pretty damn strong, it'll keep you paralyzed for a good while.”
Gabrielle struggled weakly in Elara's grip, her frustration and anger simmering beneath the paralysis. "Let go of me," she spat through clenched teeth, her voice strained. "Set me down, damn it!”
Elara smirked, unfazed by Gabrielle's resistance. "Oh honey, you're in no position to give orders," she teased, tightening her grip slightly. "You’ve been a very naughty girl—raiding auctions, stealing from dangerous people...tut tut. Now it’s time for your timeout."
She glanced over at Adeyemi and the others descending on Antiquus’ back. “Perfect timing,” Elara purred. “Adeyemi, sweetie—care to do the honors? Let’s make sure our…strong little hero doesn’t go anywhere.”
Adeyemi nodded solemnly, stepping forward with ancient energy swirling around her hands. Void Magic crackled in the air like stormfront lightning as she pressed her palm against Gabrielle’s chest—not harming her, but sealing something inside.
“There,” Adeyemi whispered. “Her connection to the Gauntlets is severed…for now. They’ll be inert until we decide otherwise.”
Gabrielle let out a guttural growl—one of pure rage—as she felt that familiar pulse of power within her vanish.
“You…you BITCHES!” she snarled weakly into Elara's shoulder.
Elara just laughed—a light, musical sound—and gave Gabrielle’s cheek a patronizing pat.
“Now now,” she said sweetly. “No need to be rude~ You’ll get your things back...eventually.” She winked at Alice, Rachel and Zalgo watching nearby. “Assuming you behave.”
Gabrielle's anger flared further as she felt her power being stripped away. But her current state of paralysis left her utterly powerless to do anything, leaving her at the mercy of her captors.
She could only let out a low grumble as Elara spoke to Gabrielle like she was some unruly child, the condescension in her tone only fueling the anger and humiliation coursing through her.
"You don't know who you're messing with," she grumbled, her voice strained but full of defiance.
Elara just tilted her head, feigning innocence. "Aww, is someone pouty?" she cooed, shifting Gabrielle in her arms like a misbehaving toddler. "You’re not exactly in a position to make threats, sweetie. But hey—I do love a firecracker. Makes the capture more fun."
She glanced over at Alice and Zalgo with a playful smirk. "Think we should toss her in the back of that old sky-cart? Or just let Antiquus carry her like a grumpy sack of potatoes?"
Antiquus snorted from above, wings lazily circling back around. "As long as she doesn’t bite, I’m good," he rumbled.
Gabrielle’s eye twitched—pure murder in her glare.
"You better hope I never get loose," she growled through clenched teeth. "Because when I do… you're all dead.”
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Elara just laughed, giving Gabrielle a little bounce like she was testing the weight of a stubborn grocery bag.
"Oh honey, promises, promises," she teased. "You say that now, but in ten minutes you'll be napping like a good girl thanks to Iritscen’s special cocktail."
She turned and started walking toward the sky-cart parked nearby. "Come on, team! Load up! We've got a grumpy legend-to-be in custody and about five other disasters waiting for us at HQ!"
As they moved out, Adeyemi couldn’t resist adding one last jab with perfect timing:
"Don’t worry, Gabby. We’ll take real good care of your gauntlets~ Maybe Technica will even name their next warship after them."
Gabrielle let out an enraged roar — muffled only slightly by her paralysis — as they carried her off.
The mission was complete.
For now...
…
The sky-cart hummed softly as it glided through the air, wind whispering past its metallic frame. Inside, Gabrielle lay bound in energy cuffs — not struggling now, just glaring, her eyes like smoldering coals in a dead fire.
Elara lounged across from her with one leg kicked up, idly spinning a stolen dagger between her fingers. “Y’know,” she mused, “you’re way less fun now that you’re not yelling threats every three seconds.”
Gabrielle didn’t blink. Just stared. Hard.
“Still got that killer look though,” Elara added with a grin. “Cute.”
Up front, Jax was busy syncing his tech to the Black Snakes’ network via encrypted pulse-wave relay from his mask’s interface.
“Alright… message sent,” he announced. “Told ‘em we got the package and are en route to Extraction Point Delta-9.” He leaned back and stretched. “Should be smooth sailing from—”
BOOM!
A sudden impact rocked the cart — everyone jolted forward as alarms blared red.
“What in seven voids was that?!” Iritscen yelped.
From outside came an echoing voice — deep, distorted… mechanical:
"You took something... that doesn't belong to you."
Everyone turned toward the shattered rear window…
…and saw Cassie hovering outside on twin plasma thrusters built into her boots, gauntlets charged and glowing hot with unstable Void energy.
Her eyes burned crimson beneath her hood.
And behind her?
Dozens of Cabal members — all un-frozen now — riding war-gliders across the storm-choked sky like vengeful ghosts on thunder wings.
Gabrielle smirked weakly.
“Ohhh yeah…”
"...now it gets fun.”
Elara sat up straight, any trace of relaxation gone in an instant. She turned to the shattered window with a growl, fixing Cassie with a frosty glare. But she quickly saw that she wasn't alone, with the other present Cabal members also by her side, with Jax, Liana, Iritscen, and Hikaru all bound by Chelsea's gears.
"Well I’ll be damned," Elara muttered. "The Cabal sure do like their dramatic entrances."
Ciel was already working the controls, pulling up tactical displays and prepping the sky-cart’s defenses.
"How in the hell did they find us so quickly?!" Elara growled, never taking her eyes off of the Cabal members.
"Guess they traced our signal," Adeyemi grumbled from the back. "Damn it, we must have missed a tracking device somewhere.”
Elara snapped her fingers at Charlotte, who was already pulling a tiny brass pocket watch from her dress. "When—we’ve got incoming and fast. Buy us thirty seconds of slowed time or I’m tossing you out the back!"
Charlotte huffed, offended. "A little gratitude would be nice! I did freeze half their crew earlier!" But she flipped the watch open anyway—its gears whirred with golden light as time around the sky-cart thickened like syrup.
Outside, Cassie roared forward—only to slam into the invisible wall of delayed momentum, her plasma blast crawling through air like molasses.
Inside, chaos shifted into controlled urgency.
Meanwhile, Hikaru looked around the sky-cart, their eyes landing on a box of glazed donuts. They then kicked one of their legs to catch Adeyemi's attention, nodding their head in the direction of the donut box. Adeyemi looked to her right to the donuts and got an idea. How couldn't she think of this earlier? She took out a donut and skillfully chucked it at Hikaru's open mouth. A few chews, and Hikaru swallowed the donut. What followed was an allergic reaction, but then something much more sinister…
As the donut hit Hikaru's stomach, they immediately began to gasp and convulse, their body going into shock from the allergic reaction to the gluten.
But instead of a simple allergic reaction, their body started to morph—a sickeningly familiar glow and purple sparks crackled across their skin as Hikaru's body was consumed by Void Magic, their skin turning black with glowing red and blue scar-like marks. Their hair turned white as rice and their scleras turned blood red, now looking like an exotic demonic beast rather than a human.
"Holy..." Ciel whispered from the controls, her eyes wide in horror as she watched Hikaru mutate into the unsettling transformation.
