2.0 - Edited by: Rellawing, AlliterativeArts - 11/19/2020

 

Passing through the portal in her family’s living room, Leona experienced a strange chill running through her body. When she stepped through, she found herself in a large wood and earth room. It had a rustic and Native American tribal ambiance, creating a place that was wonderfully homey, warm and felt safe.

 

The lodge had a simple square open-floor plan about fifty feet wide which had a small fire burning away cheerfully in the center from a dug and well-packed fire-pit. Looking around to take in all of her surroundings, Leona saw it was similar to the gazebo they were in when Mistral had plumbed her mind and soul. 

 

“This is my Spiritual Sanctum,” Mistral said, “I don’t often have visitors, but I wanted to share this with you.” She looked into Aurora’s eyes. “You have a great burden, but I have seen your strength and I believe in it.” 

 

She let go of Aurora’s hand and spun in place. In that moment, her costume changed to a puffy vest over a long sweater and leggings with boots. Her platinum-blonde hair changed to a solidly black tone, more in line with her American-Native features.

 

“This is my true form. My civilian outfit, one might say,” she said with a smile, brushing her dark hair back over her shoulder. “I felt it was only fair to share this with you since I barged into your home. You can call me Denise, but my full name is Denise Hastings,” she introduced herself formally and yet warmly. “I trust that you won’t tell anyone my identity, right?”

 

“Right!” Aurora smiled happily, flattered. “I’m so honored, Mistral… Denise!” She looked at her hero with awe and pleasure just over the experienced hero having shared so much of herself with this rookie.

 

“I’m so happy you take me so seriously, Mistral. I was so worried. I thought I couldn’t let anyone know that my own true form is very young. I thought no one would see me as legitimate if they knew. I only dared to dream of being seen as a peer. I knew I had so much further to go, and I’m so happy to have come this far!” She smiled brightly as she clapped her hands together. Her wings fluttered slightly, expressing her happiness.

 

Denise moved to sit on the packed dirt floor and then hesitated. “I’m used to sitting on the ground,” she said, “but if you’d rather relax for a moment, we can go to my apartment instead. Don’t worry too much about your age. There are a few in this field who would worry about that, but I can see your strength and I think your youth and enthusiasm can help us overall. Superhero-wise, I mean.” She waved her hands with a little laugh. “If I was Dragonmage, that might have been an ominous joke about draining you for your lifeforce, not that he’d ever do anything like that. Anyway, just don’t make it a habit of telling just anyone you’re so young,” she said in a conspiratorial tone, winking.

 

Aurora nodded with a chuckle. “He sure would.  I’ve followed everyone in the Society of Sentinels, but none as much as you.”

 

Mistral nodded with a smile. “What you’ve read about us is just the tip of the proverbial ‘iceberg’.” She chuckled and moved on, “I’ll change back when I feel up for a flight, but, for the moment, I’ll tell you something that should be obvious to you. We’re indeed in Canada, but even though we’ve come around one thousand miles or so from your home, we still have a bit of a trip ahead of us when we’re ready. Part of what I have in mind is taking you to the Society of Sentinels’ headquarters to help you get set up there, if that’s alright. You don’t have to join if you don’t want to, but I’d like to at least get you a communicator with them so you have a secure way of talking with people. But before all that, I want to introduce you to Anygmah, the Spirit of Secrets.” Aurora looked at her blankly, never having heard of a superhero under that name. Mistra smiled and laughed softly. “Secrets, I said. Anyway, I assume you want to keep your identity secret, right?”

 

“That’s right.” Aurora said thoughtfully but beamed at Denise while adding, “... at least as much as possible… I do trust you, Mistral, and a lot of the SoS are trustworthy, but even so, I still worry about my cred with everyone.” Aurora knelt down by Mistra gracefully and hesitantly took her hands. “But, I’d love to join the Sentinels and truly become one of your peers. It’s a dream come true. I’ve always dreamed of being a paragon of justice and truth like you and Vanguard.” 

 

Despite her assertions, Aurora couldn’t keep from blushing as she thought about Sarah while holding Mistral’s hands and the difficulties she was facing with Sarah’s predicament. She wasn’t getting either justice or truth with that mess, not nearly as much as she wanted. Could she tell Mistral about her case and seriously expect more action? She didn’t think so. It was too early to ask for favors, when Mistral was already doing the fledgeling angel a great service as a friend and peer.

 

“Um, well,” Leona said after a moment of introspection, “Introductions might be a bit late at this point, but... My civilian name is Leona Ramses. I don’t plan to tell anyone I’m Aurora except for my closest friends.” Even though she was tempted to do so, it wasn’t time to tell Sarah her secret yet. She was under the control of the camp. The less she knew the better for now. “I’m a young t-transgender girl. My mom and sister are really my aunt and cousin who adopted me and loved me… more than my father ever did. My real form is…” Aurora stopped, chewing her lip. “...as you saw. But this power, it makes me the girl I’ve always wanted to be. That is a small selfish reason for wanting to continue being Aurora. Secrecy and selfishness aren’t exactly ‘paragon of truth and justice’ material, I know.” Aurora fidgeted, expecting Mistral, her hero to condemn her.

 

Denise smiled and took Aurora’s hands and squeezed them. “It’s brave of you to admit that,” she said. “Thank you for trusting me.” She let go of one of her hands and lifted Aurora’s chin to look into her eyes with warm compassion. “You continue to prove your bravery. May I call you Leona?”

 

“Yes!!!” Aurora exclaimed happily. 

 

She looked into Mistral’s eyes. “I’d like that very much, Mistral… Denise.” Despite relaxing a bit as she looked at Mistral’s civilian form, she was still overflowing with a giddy joy. “I’d change back too, but I know you saw me, and at least this way I’m decent. I can change my clothes to look like anything I want.” Aurora grinned and shifted her clothes into a white dress skirt with strappy shoulders and a white bow on the chest. The skirt was ruffled, had ribbons across it and reached down just past crotch-level. Her hair to a lively lustrous blonde. 

 

Aurora was showing off for her new mentor, clearly looking for a little praise. “I don’t know if I can change much else besides things that touch my skin. I think I can do makeup and things like that too with work and an eye for detail.”

 

“Well done!” Mistral nodded and smiled with a little clap. “I’m sure with practice you could stretch that skill further. For now though, you should stay in regular costume, unless that outfit’s more relaxing for you,” she said. “As I’ve said, our next stop will be the Spirit of Secrets and there’s not going to be anyplace I plan to take you tonight that will need anything other than your usual.”

 

The Native American woman continued, “While I recharge, let me tell you a little bit about Black Angel and our history, okay?”

 

Aurora nodded, shifting her clothes back to her costume. She settled in more comfortably and replied, “Actually I do kind of default to this form now, even though it’s still new to me. It takes concentration to hold the other forms.” She looked into Mistral’s eyes and waited, sitting cross-legged. “Please tell me more about what you wanted to say.”

 

Denise smiled. “Okay, so you know most science fiction shows aliens as technologically advanced races who travel in ships and use highly advanced and weird science, right? However, the alien race known as the Empyrean are mystically advanced.” She raised a finger. “They explore and travel space through the use of their magic, one way or another. Their bodies have become so ingrained with their magic that they can now passively absorb the mystic energies of stars and have learned to use those energies to varying degrees,” she explained.

 

“Now, I can’t tell you a lot about the biology or science behind it all, but the layman’s version is this; their wings - they all have feathered wings - collect and absorb starlight. They absorb the most from the nearest star, the Sun in our case, but also pick up everything else that hits them down to cosmic background radiation. Each feather is adapted to contain a certain amount of power so an Empyreans power is literally plain to see. Empyreans who get old enough either get really large wings or multiples of wings. Now, they use this energy to live, so they don’t have to eat, drink, or breathe technically but they can do those things for the pleasure of it.”

 

“Now for the bad news: they discovered a source of dark power called the Oubliette Nebula, at least I’m told that’s how it translates. No one really knows its true nature, but my own personal theory is that it’s a fragment of some kind of an Old One. Whatever it is, it has corrupted a significant portion of the Empyrean race. Their Acolytes have enslaved their own people and are slowly attempting to sacrifice all their species to the Nebula.”

 

“Black Angel came to Earth to conquer it and use its energies for the Oubliette Nebula. She’d fought a number of heroes here on Earth but in the end seemed to clash with me the most. Garou and I tricked her into turning her own devices on herself. It didn’t kill her, but you see… it pissed her off. How I managed to trick her is complicated, but we had a full-on conflict above the Rockies. It got a bit touch-and-go there, but I tricked her again by offering what she wanted. Her remains still had her presence in them as you know, and it appears that what you merged with was some small portion of her that somehow escaped detection.”

 

Mistral held Aurora’s hand and squeezed it. “And that’s the history of Black Angel in a nutshell,” she said. Aurora tilted her head, sensing there was more to it, but it was more than enough for now. Mistral finished by saying, “I hope that helps to answer some questions you might have had about the nature of your powers. You seem to have become a mystic Human-Empyrean hybrid in this form.”

 

“How weird…” Aurora tilted her head. “So if her race, more of her race shows up…. I’ll probably be a target, huh?” She thought over that. “A hybrid? Maybe that means better? Can I do like they do and breathe in space? I tried breathing underwater, but I think I still needed air… it was easier when I used my shields to collect some air before I went under… I was able to fly for a really long time underwater after that. I don’t know what that says about how space travel would go.”

 

“Well, I don’t really have the capability to test you in that category,” Mistral said smiling, “But I don’t think you’ll need to worry too much about other Empyreans coming here for now. If one is detected, however, we’ll let you know.” She winked.

 

“Okay, I’m just about ready to go… If you want to spend some time later testing, we’ll talk to the Society about that, but for now, I’m going to bring us to Anygmah, okay?” she asked while getting up and offered a hand to Aurora.

 

Aurora nodded. “I’ve never heard of anyone named Anygmah… is he a hero? Also, I never heard you needed to recharge your energies. I’m honored that you’d trust me with that tidbit too.”

 

“Well,” she said after they were both up, “second question first. Teleporting to my sanctum from any old place is actually pretty tiring. I have a few laces linked to this one, but as far as secure places go, this is one of the best ones. No way to spy on me in here without serious magic behind it, and no way to sneak in or out without my knowing about it either.”

 

She smiled and just as quickly she shifted her form, her hair went platinum-blonde again as her clothes wavered and her costume reappeared. “As far as Anygmah goes, it’s basically the entire point that you wouldn’t know anything about him. He IS the spirit of secrets after all, not a hero. He’s one of the cornerstones of secret identities in this information age.”

 

Mistral started gathering some things from pouches and gourds on the walls and started throwing them into the fire in the middle. “Anygmah was once targeted by a mystic organization called ‘the Yellow Grasp’ and was rescued by superheroes. Since then, he has pledged to guard their secrets above all others. There’s other things that go into secret IDs, but he guards them from mystic prying. His influence even extends into the world of the ‘mundane’ somewhat.”

 

A portal appeared over the fire. “Anygmah doesn’t like visitors, but makes an exception for superheroes. Usually.” She winked mischievously. “Ready?”

 

Aurora grinned and nodded, standing straight. “I am…” She took a last wistful look around. “You have such an amazing place here… I hope that one day I’ll be able to have such an amazing place of my very own like this.” She smiled heartfully.

 

“Well, you’re welcome to come back,” Mistral said, beckoning for her young charge to follow her through.