<div class="floatleft">(https://i.pinimg.com/originals/39/41/f2/3941f28838206b15e3c5e57c8cc8fb36.jpg)</div><strong>Name</strong>Caitlin McInnis<br/><strong>Alias</strong>Midnight Angel<br/>Tagging: Anyone watching<br/><hr/><br/><br/>The fan base could never truly be ignored.  She had done her best to shrug off the pressure of millions watching, to ignore the letters of hope and hatred that came to her.  For a time she had even sworn off reading letters from her personal email server.  Even she had to admit the battle was a futile one.  Ever since she was a child the audience had been there.  Watching her first adult tooth, viewing the fights with her mother from the comfort of their home and partaking in some small way in each capture of a bully or wannabe street thug.  Of course, for a twelve-year-old the ordeal had been fun.  Fun, of course, until Fate had come calling and place its hand firmly on her backside.   Lights lit up the stage where she stood and memories flashed back into her mind.  The lights of the passenger jet rushing onward, lights of cameras hiding the faces of screaming men and women and the darkness when he had plucked the lights from her eyes.<br/><br/>Dampeners went into effect to hide the glare so that she could see.  Bile was pushed down in her throat and the figure now known as Midnight Angel lifted a single fist upward.  A sign of persistence and strength she was told.  The gesture was hollow but she would not let them see that part.  Instead she then swept her fist downward, opening her hand and her body lifting off the platform.  As if on cue her half-cap fluttered behind her.  Black leather seemed to lighten by the strip of pure, soft blue that flowed at length behind her.  If there was one thing she had learned working on television, it was the importance of dramatic effect.  Caitlyn didn’t have to do anything to fly.  Flying simply required she be awake and was easier than walking for her.  Especially since the surgeries that nagging thought wormed from her mind.  Eyes flashed red as she focused on the task at hand.  Already the computer inside her mind was flickering through visual spectrums and running threat assessment algorithms.<br/><br/>Caitlyn recalled the story given to her about a child at a local hospital.  Paralyzed from some disease she could not pronounce the little girl had gushed about finding strength in Midnight Angel.  There was warmth there, sincerity.  If a child could suffer so much and still talk with such enthusiasm about her heros, could find strength in some ridiculous television show then Caitlyn had no excuses not to perform.  Resolved set on her face and she thrust her body forward as the clock began to tick away the seconds.<br/><br/>Odds were that the course would largely be aerial.  Those thoughts were meet with comfort as a series of hoops and blocks seemed to float upward from the ground below.  A smile broke over her features as she began to move through the obstacles, displaying her prowess at her favored ability of flight.  She swept through the course easily, twisting and turning to make the movements appear difficult while her solutions were graceful.  Dives and rotations executed with the skill many might remember from her childhood.  The movements were effortless.  Blonde hair and blue cloak flowing around her while she conducted the aerial ballet.  Of course, the designers of this cruel instrument were not so kind.  Her cloak came too close to a block, a seemingly innocent brush as she came too close to one obstacle.  There was a flash of red before the sky lit up in a blaze.<br/><br/>Audio and visual dampeners kept her aware of the situation even as the explosive impact rocked her body.  She could taste the force in her mouth if that were actually possible.  A lapse of thought made her falter from the sky and she could almost hear the collective gasp as she fell downward.  An arm struck another block and then another.  A cascade of explosions came across like fireworks while she fell downward to the waters below.  Thoughts raced through her mind of how she could be so stupid, so arrogant.  Then those thoughts turned to her own hubris the night she was attacked.  Panic started to rise in her chest and she turned in the air.  Below her the water rushed upward while above the fire of the Heavens continued to stretch.  She had to turn this around, make this something for others to speak about.  She did not even look to the clock.  Instead she swept downward across the water’s surface, one finger dancing over the surface so that the mirror finish rippled.  An orange flow dominated the water as she flew between the two.  Then she was out and she could feel the freedom from her panic.<br/><br/>The water broke then as a wall lifted before her.  Calculations were performed in her mind to tell her that an impact was inevitable.  Numbers crunched to tell her what instinct already screamed in her mind.  There would be no graceful execution here but instead a display of her strength.  That metallic arm rose upward, hidden behind the sheath of leather.  Yet the perspective would see the blackened flesh of metallic sinew that flashed beneath the surface.  That hand struck the surface, power of her body and the force of her flight landing in a singular point of impact.  With a shudder and crash the wall gave way to another.  A roar of defiance left her lips as she smashed through one and then another.  Blocks of some material peppering her face and catching in her blonde strands.<br/><br/>There was pain but not so great as to what she had already endured.  One wall fell after the other.  Once more a comfort lapsed into her mind until she struck a wall and her fist simply passed through the surface.  Before her mind and the computer could register, she was already sliding through the surface.  Black gel coated her body.  Electricity flashed through, crackled over the surface of the gel and in turn over her body.  Then she truly did come to a crashing halt on the next platform.  That ooze became stickier as she struggled against the tightening confines of it.  Blue streaks darkened and became red when coming into contact with the platform’s surface.<br/><br/>Bracing her legs, she fought to stand.  The red pulsed and grow darker.  Knees buckled and even the reinforced frame that held her body together could not resist.  Ooze drenched her chest and tightened on her throat.  Like a hand to choke away her air, a gloved hand with cold fingers that sought to take away even her freedom to breathe.  She saw his face again.  Those laughing, condescending eyes.  There was no lust there, no search for fulfillment or even twisted love as he had proclaimed to her.  Caitlyn saw only that she was prey and he the predator.  That feeling of being helpless wracked her body and she sobbed.  One knee touched the platform as she fought for air, fought to push back the panic and fear.  Above her the clock continued to tick while she seemed to give up.<br/><br/>She wanted to curl into a ball.  Really that would have been the best thing.  Curl into a ball, admit her own failure and return home.  Even if they took her arm, took her new body and her mind she could still fly.  Maybe just fly off into the clouds one night.  Then who would that little girl have to look up to.  Such a sudden thought interrupted her brush with despair.  A metallic fist curled at her side, then her flesh one did the same.  Biceps flexed with her might and then the other muscles of her body found their spirit.  Thighs flexed and she pushed upward from the platform.  Then her mind joined the fray as she commanded herself to rise and pull against the ooze.  Red lightening echoed outward from her in a radiant display while she took flight.  The gel still clung to her like a rubber band dragging at her.  Warnings flashed in her vision as her robotic arm drifted downward.<br/><br/>Her handler had said not to use the blaster if she could avoid the eventuality.  He had been arrogant too, thinking this test would not push her to that point.  Vent opened along her arm, pressure stored and then released as she commanded a bolt of light to leave her.  Red light flashed orange as that bolt seared through the concoction that tried to keep her earth-bound.  Then another left her and then the arm unleashed a true fury.  Somewhere below her she could see the cloaked figure of her tormentor laughing while she laid waste to the platform.  Her handler had said the arm would scare her fan-base, frighten people with the lethality of her new power.  Let them be afraid them, let him be afraid of what she had become.  What he had made her.<br/><br/>Midnight Angel screamed in fury, agony and triumph as she soared upward.  Almost she had forgotten the clock and the finish line.  Red eyes glowed from above the obstacle course before suddenly dashing forward and across the arbitrary point of exit.  Above her the buzzer sounded only seconds afterward.<br/>Fuck them for what they had done to her and fuck him for making her submit to this test.<br/>