Spinel reported to Avalon two days later, in the alleyway where the senshi’s body lay still breathing. If he thought about it, his hands still ached from feeling Avalon slam pure Chaos through the conduit of his body, from the way it pounded into the girl’s starseed. He had seen the starseed resist, seen it begin to corrupt, before it shattered to pieces. The body had lain unchanged as Avalon fed Chaos into the girl’s soul, as the starseed became a youma of many fractured pieces, a beautiful star that shattered apart with edges that cut like broken glass. Standing there, over the girl’s body, he thought of what she might have been like before. There was a poignancy, a sense of timelessness, to the girl laying on her back in the dust and the trash. Her chest moved, a steady rise-and-fall, but she was as dead as--as--

Soon her body would shut down, failing for whatever reason bodies failed. Dehydration. Lack of drive. And someday someone, anyone, would find the corpse. “She’s going to get bruises,” he realized, with a mounting sense of panic. “She’s going to--she’s going to get sores--”

“She’s gonna swell up like a balloon,” Avalon snorted, and he fell quiet, guilt and nausea churning in his stomach. Even when he’d served the Negaverse loyally, he’d never had to confront the reality of his actions. This girl, this little senshi, she was too much. Too much. “Once she dies, anyway.” The senshi’s lips had chapped from dehydration, her eyelids were ever-so-faintly blue. Avalon crouched and lifted one limp arm, rolled it to expose the bruises. Spinel thought, is this my lesson, because there was sure to be one. The portmanteau before him, lifeless still-breathing corpse and hollow shell of a Knight of Earth, raised every hair on the back of his neck, made it hard for him to breathe for fear.

Avalon got to her feet. “Did you think that this was the end of it,” she asked, and he--he honestly thought it had been. Surely the repetition of punishment was enough. He had watched another girl die, another dark-haired girl, but at least this one had gotten to fight for her life, had gotten to try-- “I guess you did, but, no.”

She shook her head, beckoned for him to follow her. The pair, two tall figures in dark green and black, traversed the rooftops as though searching for something--Spinel didn’t know what, but he had an increasingly awful feeling. Not Raleigh, he thought, not Mother, not Tallulah. If they were who she was searching for, he’d sooner die himself than hurt them, he’d rather cut his own throat on her sword. When she stopped them and he could sense a super-level Order senshi, he could have cried from relief. As it was, his knees didn’t feel reliable, and he couldn’t imagine doing--whatever Avalon wanted him to do to this new girl.

“See that little b***h down there,” asked Avalon. Spinel nodded, not trusting himself to speak, but evidently Avalon didn’t need him to talk. “Bring me her starseed, and maybe I won’t kill your girlfriend.”

And something like ice fell into his stomach, his fingers going numb and cold. Tallulah? Of course she knew about Tallulah. They’d had dinner together, her and her roommate and Paul and Tallulah, and he’d known that Avalon took an instinctive dislike to Tallulah, but he hadn’t known-- he hadn’t dreamed-- and that was the problem, wasn’t it, he’d let himself drift too far, he hadn’t seen this new breed of Negaverser coming before they were already there. “If you don’t get going, I will make you long for the vengeance of Tanzanite,” said Avalon.

Spinel obeyed. He dropped from the roof into the alley. She didn’t notice, too focused on something else--a boy across the way, maybe? He couldn’t let himself care. Spinel hooked an arm around the senshi’s neck and squeezed tight. She struggled, but he was empowered by Chaos and she was empowered by something else, something lesser, something, something purer, and she didn’t have any training, and soon she fell limp against him, and he.

He thought--

“I’m waiting, and I know exactly where Tallulah is, Paul,” said Avalon from the rooftop, and he pressed his hand against the senshi’s chest, so gentle he might have been dipping his hand into water. He lifted the starseed out, and it sparkled with a gentle green-gold light. Turning, he held the starseed out to Avalon; he didn’t know when she’d appeared behind him, it could have been teleportation or something more sinister, but--there she was. “How lovely,” she said, taking the starseed; “it matches your old friend in the other alleyway.”

What was he supposed to say to that? Spinel was still trying to process whether he was even supposed to talk when Avalon tackled him to the ground. If they were in civilian form, he was sure he could have thrown her off him--but even with his martial arts training, even with all the tai chi he knew, she was stronger than he was, her knees were pinning his arms, and one hand was knotted in his hair, keeping him down. He blanked--he couldn’t think of anything to say--and if she was going to kill him, then there was nothing he could do anyway--she was a General--she could do what she liked--

“You’re going to eat it,” she said, “you’re going to feel what it is to be here, with the Negaverse, that rush of power. Don’t you remember it? The first time you powered up. Come on, Spinel.” He shook his head mutely, and she pressed the starseed to his lips, the pressure an insistent command. “You are nothing without the Negaverse. We know you as none other. Give in to the surging of the tide. Chaos made you strong, and proud, and beautiful. Let me help you. Let me take you.”

He shook his head, and eventually she pinched his nose shut, and he had to breathe--

he had to breathe--

The starseed broke with a crunch, and the euphoria that washed over him almost made him puke. Only Avalon's hand over his mouth prevented it. She stayed there until he stopped shuddering, and then rolled off him, stood, dusted off her coat. "We're not done, dear heart," she said, and he heard mockery in her voice, mockery and disdain. He stared up at the clear-blue sky and tried to remember why he had ever wanted to stay--why he'd ever craved this power.

Spinel took a deep, convulsive breath.

"One more punishment and then you're done," said Avalon. "Provided you don't screw up again, of course." She hefted the senshi's body up over her shoulder, and looked at him like she might look at something on the bottom of her shoe-- "We'll meet up near Apollo's on 84th, after sunset," she said. "I'm sure you'll be able to find me. But if you don't show up... I will make you." And with those words, she vanished.

Spinel stayed where he was for a very long time.