Kayla leaves her room, noticeably limping on her hurt ankle, wearing nothing but her green striped pajama set as she strolls into the kitchen. The apartment that was reimbursed for them during their stay in New York City was generous. The couches were leather, had wall-to-wall carpeting, the kitchen area had stainless steel accessories from the refrigerator and the cooktops to the dishwashers and the cookware that came with it. The place was a bit too sterile and creepy for Kayla’s taste.

I still feel like I’m in Patrick Bateman’s apartment from American Psycho, Kayla thought as she cooked breakfast for herself. It would damn her if she would prepare a big lunch for Ryoko and her fuck buddies who were staying on the other side of the apartment. She could hear Ryoko and a few others grunting and moaning in the separate bedroom, despite the rooms in being soundproof.

And I just lost my appetite, Kayla declared as she grabbed a carton of yogurt from the fridge. She sits down at the table with her smartphone in hand. Enjoying her yogurt, Natalia and Ayeka finally came back from jail. Natalia walked into the apartment with her head down and a bit timid as Ayeka meets up with Kayla in the kitchen area.

“Well, what do we have here? So how was jail, Natty?” Kayla teased, stirring into her carton of yogurt.

Always on the defensive with her rival, Natalia fired back. “I don’t need this shit from you!”

“IS THAT NATALIA?!” A high-pitched female voice hollered in the other room.

Unfortunately for Natalia, she recognizes the voice as this sends shivers down her spine. It was none other than the Angel of Death, Adrian Eichner.

Too much delight, Kayla answered first. “Yes, Mistress.”

“TELL HER THAT I’M IN HER ROOM!” Adrian hollered.

“Okay!” Kayla responded as she took her attention towards the woman who was responsible for breaking her ankle in three places, “Natalia, the boss is in your room, waiting for you.” Kayla smiled as Natalia didn’t even bother looking at Kayla while she gingerly walked to her own bedroom.

As she was walking down the hallway and pretty much towards her impending doom, she knew she was solely responsible for the auditorium being destroyed, and for Ryoko and Kayla getting injured. It was her sloppiness and her lack of foresight that caused such destruction.

As she arrived at her bedroom, her long black and brown-haired mentor staring back with her almond brown eyes, sitting in one of the chairs, wearing her casual black sweater and black pants with stiletto heeled boots underneath her long black overcoat.

Even though she was smiling devilishly, it also made Natalia more nervous as Adrian appeared to be in a good mood. But it didn’t matter. What was going on inside her head, only Adrian knew and no one else?

Oscar Wilde once wrote, "Death Must be so beautiful. To lie in the soft brown earth, with the grasses waving above one's head and listen to silence. To have no yesterday and no tomorrow. To forget time, to forget life, to be at peace."

Too bad Oscar Wilde met no one like a real nightmare named The Angel of Death, Adrian Eichner. Someone who is indeed emotionally dead inside takes pleasure in bringing death to others. She does not forgive and does not forget. To the Angel of Death, no one escapes death, and no one escapes her.

Natalia was courteous enough to close the door behind her and addressed her superior. “Y-you want to s-s-see me, Mistress?”

Adrian smirked at her student’s nervousness. “Please, I would like for you to have a seat.”

Cautiously, Natalia approached Adrian and the empty chair in front of her, she immediately sat down and pleaded for mercy, “I am very sorry, Mistress…”

Adrian uncrossed her legs and rose out of her chair and approached the frightened Natalia. Adrian had a knack for punishing her subordinates in cruel and heinous ways.

Natalia’s wolf ears perked up, and her red eyes grew large as she sees her abusive mentor approach her, “M-Mistress, I--”

“Don’t speak…” Adrian hushes as she cups her pupil’s chin to see the noticeable bandage on her cheek. Gently, she takes off the bandage as Natalia winces from the pain. Her being a registered nurse, Adrian gives her own medical evaluation on the cut. “It doesn’t look that bad, but they did a very horrible job patching you up.”

“It stings a bit, but I’ll be fine…” Natalia playing it off.

However, her mentor knows better than that, “I know it hurts. Just embrace the pain, remember?”

Those words emanated as Natalia’s wolf ears lowered. “Yes, Mistress. I remember.”

Natalia was like an open book when it came to her emotions. Her physical tells and how she raised her voice was always poetic as a sign of what she would do next. While people just wrote her off as a hot-blooded wolf girl who respects nobody, Adrian knows more about her psychological growth and background more than anyone. Including the grandmaster.

Adrian stroked her cheek gently to calm her down. “Natalia, I’m not angry at you. In fact, that was on me for bringing you back into the field after a five-year hiatus.” Natalia’s wolf ears shot up in utter shock as Adrian continued. “It also appears that the sentinels from the nexus had already beaten us to it. By the looks of things, you already ran into one of them. They use specialized weapons to counteract our own nether energy. Once again, that rests on me as your superior and handler to make sure you are briefed on the situations.” Natalia explained as she pulled a small container of blue gel from her coat pocket. She opened it up and scooped out a dollop of gel with her two fingers.

“Yes, Mistress. But I--”

“You did not cause that explosion, they did,” Adrian interrupted as she gently applied the cooling gel on Natalia’s cut on her face. “Let’s just say, she had done her work very well on schooling that one. Such a shame, she could’ve been a lot of things… Still, this is not your fault. So, don’t expect any kind of repercussions for me at least.”

It was a massive weight off Natalia’s mind and shoulders knowing that Adrian admitted that she was the one who made a mistake. Although it was scarce for her to do so, this was a complete blessing. Whether if it was her mentor’s self-admittance ever being wrong or the medicine kicking in from the gel, it felt that Natalia was at ease with herself.

“Yes, Mistress…” Natalia said.

After the application, Adrian closed the small container of gel and handed it to Natalia as she started to wipe off her fingers with her own handkerchief she pulls out of her coat pocket.

Adrian even strolled around the bedroom and looked out the window, “Well, the city has never changed no matter how many times I come back here. The city stinks of rotten flesh and excrement…” Adrian reflected on the days of her youth which made her chuckle a bit. “But enough cock stroking for one morning, I’m surprised you held your own with a Crucis Sentinel after such an ‘extended vacation.’ They would have send you upstate, but I called in a small favor and swept it under the rug. So, we can go home.”

Although she was happy that she dodged a jail sentence and pending court dates, Natalia was a bit amazed by Adrian and how she was able to make charges like this go away.

“B-but I punched out a nurse… and a couple of security guards at the hospital,” Natalia reflected.

Adrian turned around and faced Natalia, “They even said you’re screaming in Spanish. Any particular reason why?” She asked.

The accusation genuinely confused Natalia, “I don’t know… It’s all gibberish to me. I mean, I understand it…”

Adrian defiantly shrugged her shoulders, “I expect you to learn some Spanish since you were raised in Spain.” Adrian went back to her chair and sat down with Natalia again, “What about your nightmares?”

“I have nightmares every day…” Natalia admitted, looking away in embarrassment.

“I’m sorry to hear that. But don’t worry. We will fix that soon enough.” Adrian assured. “I guess you are wondering why I’m bringing up your nightmares and what you did in the hospital. You were sleepwalking when this all happened.” Adrian concluded.

“So that’s why they put me in jail…” Natalia sadly reflected.

“You have got to take better care of yourself, Natalia. You, going on screaming fits in different languages and sleepwalking are dangerous. You can get yourself seriously injured or even worse,” Adrian lectured, but it was nothing new to Natalia since this has been happening ever since she was a teenager.

“I guess that’s why you’re here. To check up on us?” Natalia guesses.

“They found him, Natalia,” Adrian vaguely reported.

Curious, Natalia wondered, “Found who--?”

“Do not play dumb with me,” Adrian bellowed as her loving demeanor faded away. “You know who? After all, you did promise him you would hunt him down and kill him years ago.”

This sudden change in her mentor genuinely scared Natalia, “I… I don’t know…”

“Some of his body parts were found floating in the Centla Swamps in Mexico. He was declared missing around January of this year. The local authorities could not identify the body since it was poorly decayed, but I already knew it was him. It looks like most of the alligators and crustaceans had a field day of eating that poor nephalem’s dead body. There was literally almost nothing left of that guy that we saved in Brazil years ago,” Natalia reported in detail. It seemed she was even a bit depressed that her favorite sex partner was murdered in such a brutal fashion.

Nephalems are derived from the daemon species. Most nephalems are human in appearance yet inherit the principal powers of their daemonic ancestors. Elemental control, teleportation, telekinesis, and telepathy are standard, as are enhancements of regular human abilities, such as strength, sight and hearing.

Rightfully so, Natalia felt otherwise, “Yeah, that poor nephalem…” Even sounding a bit relieved that the sex slave turned serial rapist they reluctantly saved in Brazil is now dead.

“Yeah, I heard he was raising a baby…” Adrian added.

“R-really?!” Natalia bellowed. “Since when did he father a child?!”

“Relax, it’s not who you think. I made sure of that, didn’t I? Besides, I couldn’t afford to have any of you knocked up anyway, nor I didn’t want you to be.” Adrian jovially admitted. “Right now, they are saying it was just an accident. The medical examiner’s think that he was electrocuted before he went into the swamp water since there was water in his lungs. However, there are some red flags. His genitals were cut off. When they opened him up, they found the contents of his genitals inside of his own stomach.”

There was a good reason why Adrian went into such detail about the nephalem’s gruesome murder. She wanted to see whether Natalia was involved or not. Natalia’s facial expressions were stone cold. She didn’t even tilt her head or look away from Adrian. All she did was emotionlessly respond, “That’s a terrible way to go…”

A sudden smile crept up on Adrian’s face as this was the tell that she was looking for from Natalia, “It really is…”

Natalia took a deep breath and decided to take her mind off that horrifying situation. She started to examine the small container of gel, “So, will this heal my face?”

“Of course, it will… Just apply that cream on your wound, and it will heal up in the next twenty-four hours. This stuff is so good, you won’t even have a scar. I know you need some privacy so… I would like for you to get cleaned up, get dressed and burn your clothing,” Adrian instructed.

“Yes, Mistress,” wasting no time, Natalia rose from her chair and went straight to her private bathroom.

“Always finish what you start, Natalia.” Adrian belted out as this stopped Natalia in her tracks. “That’s all I ask of you. All of you… By the way, what did you do in the past five years? Did you go to Cabo San Lucas like you always wanted?”

Natalia turned her head to see Adrian as she answered, “It was hot and humid… Nothing special about it…”

As Natalia walked into her private bathroom, locking the door behind, Adrian sat there reflecting her thoughts. Without a doubt in her mind, Natalia hunted down the man out of revenge for he’d done to his teammates and what his twin brother did to her.

Natalia must have found him, tortured him, brutalized him, electrocuted him, cut off his genitals, made him forcibly consume them and watched him die by dumping him in the swamp full of predatorial creatures.

It’s not like Adrian was angry that Natalia may have killed him. In fact, she was happy that might have. That whole entire experience in Brazil was to bring out the absolute killer in Natalia ten years ago and in the same instance give her a sense of emotional conditioning that she greatly needed.

It has been an uphill battle for her to be a ruthless operative that they needed her to be, but with the cruel teachings of the Angel of Death, that pipedream will become a stark reality for those who will oppose them in the future.

Later that night, Britney was at her home outside of the University. She couldn’t sleep for two days. All Britney could think is the face of her husband and how he turned himself into a monster. She felt so uneasy. She knew she had to do something but failed to do so. There was a lot of blood on her hands just like her husband’s. There was a knock on her door which alarmed her.

She immediately went to the door and peeped out the window. It was a familiar face with a new visitor. Britney opened the door cautiously. In plain view, it was Alpha Crucis carrying someone wrapped in a blanket and a small little girl next to her.

“Mrs. Larson?” the little girl spoke.

“Yes, that’s me?” Britney identified. “You must be the Aethereal Queen.”

The Aethereal Queen nodded as Britney opened the door swiftly and the two went in. Alpha Crucis carried Donovan to the living room and laid him down on the couch.

“Is Donovan okay?” Britney asked with tears in her eyes.

Alpha Crucis confirmed this by revealing his bruised human face, “It’s 100% out of the system. No trace of the isotopes in his blood either. We even stabilized his dormant lycanthropy. He’s going to be fine.”

“Physically, yes…” Britney waivers.

“But the scars are going to remain. My team that you encountered a couple of days ago, we handle situations like these consistently,” the Aethereal Queen explains. “Mrs. Larson, you and Donovan cannot stay here anymore. You have to leave the University, perhaps the country if need be.”

Britney was confused, “You mean the FBI will come after us?”

The Aethereal Queen shook her head in disagreement, “They are far worse organizations out there that would love to take the both of you for further study. Under our protection, we will make sure that your husband gets the rehabilitation that he needs.”

“What about the other victims?” Britney asked in a low voice.

“You let us handle it. Nobody is in the ‘right’ in this situation. Not even you…” Alpha Crucis fired back.

“Not even…” Britney tried to make it all makes sense out loud, but it was meaningless. She couldn’t stay. Both of them can’t stay here. The gravity of the situation was understandable, “we will leave.”

“Take care of yourselves, Mrs. Larson.” The Aethereal Queen said as both her and Alpha Crucis left the house.

Walking down the street to their car, the Aethereal Queen couldn’t help lecturing this out loud, “waking up from one nightmare to another, their lucidity never changes.”

Alpha Crucis remained silent as she doesn’t have much to say, hiding her own sadness.

However, the Aethereal Queen has been around her ever since Selena was a child and she knows what she is feeling all too well, “I thought you hated those two.”

Alpha Crucis shrugged her shoulders, “I don’t know. I mean, two days ago I ran into the perfect couple. Only to find out Donovan is just like me. Broken home, had to bury his own siblings and nobody cared about him or what he was going through.”

“In the end, not everybody goes around killing people after going through with that. He decided to be a monster,” the Aethereal Queen rebuttals.

Which only lead Alpha Crucis to have more feelings of dread, “I could have easily been that monster…”

Hearing this, the Aethereal Queen wrapped her arm around hers, comforting her friend and subordinate. Another mission was successful. For now, many others can rest easy. But not for long…