She may have been on her own, but she had met many people in Citadel City. They often wondered about the mysterious girl who touched their lives and made them better.
The Gypsy, Alfonzo Beznik, missed having the unnamed guest to share his love of transformation. He missed having someone to play with who seemed to understand.
Officer Mahoney couldn't sleep on the night desk anymore. He worried he would miss a call from the phantom voice on the radio.
Her instructor, Isamu Katana, remembered young Pandora every free moment he spent with his children instead of working.
Her institutionalized mother had a strange moment of clarity when a new nurse came in and brushed her long wild hair just like her daughter used to do so many years ago.
The Anvil was curious who else Little Lila, the Terror of Murdock’s Gym, had clobbered with her amazing fighting skills. He told the story of how she fought a ring full of men, to everyone who listened. The tale grew taller with each retelling.
Professor Leo Langley wondered if he would ever see Witness X again. Since the trial, the world outside didn't seem so scary to him anymore.
The fans of Raven missed their powerful mistress and longed for her return.
And every time Carson the President of the Citadel bank violated a new receptionist in his office, he thought of Jewel.
It had been a long day at the bank for Carson. He was headed home via taxi. Work became incredibly stressful and he needed distractions. The Board of Directors watched his every move. His lawyers fended off appeals and struggled to close the Schadenfreude case for good.
The Paragon building reconstruction project was facing delay after delay due to equipment sabotage executed by its former tenants. If it were up to Carson, he would wipe out that entire section of town if he could, and turn it into something he could tolerate looking at.
The cab turned into the brick driveway of his city mansion.
He thought, “The tenants were taking more extreme measures. They didn’t know who they were dealing with. Something needed to be done about them. Another example needed to be made. Another one of them needed to die to keep the project on schedule. At this point I would do whatever it took to put an end to their interference. The damned niggers and wops and Jews were all getting in my way. They were like mosquitoes that needed to be swatted. The building was already gone. They lost. What were they still fighting for? To get the press on their side, I guess? The whole economic mess was the perfect setting for stories about little guys throwing stones and defeating those of wealth. They were just fantasies that never came true, not in the long run. We, the elite, always won!”
“I needed the Paragon job done so I could get the final payment, the big payment. Maybe that would get the board members off my back.”
“Maybe it was time for another agitator to disappear. I had no problem killing another one.”
He was home. He paid the driver and exited the cab.
Carson entered the double doors of his palatial manor. He sang out his traditional greeting to his family. "Your king has returned from the crusades.”
He noticed a stack of mail on the foyer table and leafed through it. He waited for his family's response, but it never came. At first he was disturbed by the silence, then he smiled as he remembered it was his birthday. He returned the mail and peeked around the corner. He expected to find his children waiting to ambush him with a surprise party, but there was no one.
“They must have hidden better this year. They were cleverer. Well, two could play at that game.” He thought.
He removed his shoes as quietly as possible, and then tiptoed into the spacious living room, still no one. Then he spied a toe, peeking out from behind a lavish sofa. He nodded knowingly and crept to the seat. When he was near enough he leapt into the air and pounced like a tiger and landed with a resounding, "Ah ha!"
It wasn't what he thought. One of his servants appeared to be dead. The smile dropped from Carson’s face. Panic stricken he called out for his wife. "Annabelle?"
There was no response.
He advanced to a liquor cabinet where he retrieved a sawed off shotgun from its hiding place. His mouth dried out and he crept through the room. Through the hallway he could see his youngest son seated at the dining room table. His neck was bent back and he stared motionless at the ceiling, like a dead thing. A dreadful pang stuck his gut, but he maintained his silence.
He continued and discovered the rest of his family at the table. His wife, sister, two sons, and two daughters were positioned similarly around a birthday cake. They all looked dead.
Emotions welled up inside him like he'd never felt. He never imagined he would experience this kind of loss. He never imagined he would outlive his children. Who could do such a thing? What type of monster was loose in the Citadel? Worse yet, was it still inside his home?
He leapt into the room with shotgun poised to kill.
Betty saw the muzzle first and surprised Carson by kicking the gun away from her. He fired simultaneously and blasted out a window. Betty disarmed him quickly and discarded the spent weapon.
Something haunted his house, but it wasn’t what he expected. Betty turned to confront Carson. He imagined a much larger, more threatening invader, not a little girl in a strange looking chauffeur's uniform with hood and goggles to hide her features.
He wanted to fight her.
Betty welcomed the opportunity to unleash more chaos into his home.
He began to swing at her wildly. Betty blocked each blow as it approached her. He was a lot slower than she remembered and she let out a haughty laugh. Her mockery infuriated Carson and he screamed like a madman.
"You killed them all, you devil woman!"
He grabbed and heaved a vase at her. She dodged it. It shattered against the wall. He grabbed up a chair to smash her, but she was too nimble. She tumbled out of the way as the chair broke on the floor. Then she delivered a sidekick that tossed Carson out of the room and into the wide hallway.
He hit the wooden floor hard. He laid dazed and saw stars, as Betty stalked toward him.
“Who are you?” He asked.
She said. “I'm the embodiment of all the working people of the Citadel. I represent the ones who can’t defend themselves against you!"
“What did I ever do to you?” He asked.
“You know exactly what you do. You deal in misery. You ruin lives. You do anything for money, no matter who your actions hurt, no matter who your actions kill! You might escape the courts but you'll never escape me.”
Tears shivered into Carson’s eyes. “You killed my family!”
She replied, “I would be more worried about your fate, if I was you.”
"I don’t even know you!" He snapped.
She said with an evil smile. “Think of me as Jewel’s avenging ghost.”
His eyes looked like saucers. He scrambled backwards on his hands and feet.
Betty stalked after him.
“What do you want?” He bellowed.
“I want you to pay for your crimes.” She said.
“I’ll pay you whatever you want, in cash!” He nervously barked.
“I don’t want your money. I want your blood.” She said.
Fueled by panic he lashed out at her again. Betty blocked his scrambled attack and sent him crashing back through the bars of the stair railing.
She said. “It’s not safe to have someone like you in our society. So I’m removing you from it."