Lash: Home By Seven

"Bye, Marcy! Bye, Felicia!"

Olevia waved to the pair only partially as her arms were loaded down with shopping bags containing purchases from several stores. Today had been a great day, she thought. She passed her Calculus exam with a C and to celebrate Olevia and her two best friends from Grace Memorial decided that they were all going to buy a new a new pair of shoes to celebrate. One pair however became about six tops, three skirts, four pairs of shorts, a bottle of perfume and two additional pairs of shoes. That passing grade was really important, though, so Olevia mused that she deserved all the extras.

In order to showcase how good her day was, Olevia, still struggling with her bags, attempted to pull out her phone to take a selfie. Awkwardly positioning it while handling the plethora of merchandise, she lifted the phone upwards to get the best shot she could. Wow, she thought as the image came up, I look REALLY cute today, and she wasn't saying it to boost her self-confidence... It was totally true. As the image clicked the phone went to it's home screen. It was a picture of Olevia and Miss Pussycakes, her cat, when they went snowboarding last February. That wasn't the important thing, however. It was that above the photo was the time: 6: 43pm. There were fifteen texts from her friend Kim, who was supposed to be her ride home. The texts, starting at 5:30pm and continuing until 6:30pm, went from stating she was in the parking lot to pick her up to eventually forget it and Olevia could find her own way home. How rude.

"Poop!" Olevia said out loud, utterly frustrated. An old man behind her suddenly looked around for possible dog droppings on the ground as she made her statement. It was going to take thirty minutes to get home at the very least. Her parents were hosting karaoke night at their house for the extended family and Olevia had been warned at great length to NOT miss any more family nights. It was always at seven o'clock sharp. ALWAYS. She had to get home fast before she found herself yelled at, grounded or worse: have her credit card cut off.

Olevia found some trees nearby across the street. This would have to do, she thought, hastily plopping her bags upon the grass. She looked up to the skies and shouted "LONGWANG!" as her body was bathed in green flame. As it subsided she was clad in a metallic green top and skirt, black leggings, white heeled boots, a domino mask with flowing white/ silver hair. And, not that you would think it possible, but she looked even hotter now. Nabbing her collection of mall purchases she took to the skies, flying off and leaving wisps of green behind her in a trail.

Lash was now sky bound, watching the city below her and realizing the crappy traffic this time of day would have made her trip even slower. It was funny how she used to be scared of flying. For her first few months as Lash, Olevia wouldn't even go higher than a three story building due to a fear of heights. She had conquered that at least head on. It was interesting how much Olevia had changed in the year and a half after getting her powers. Sure, she wasn't GREAT at using them, but she was better... kind of. Progress was important and they sure as heck didn't build Rome in a day (or whatever city that was). Mastering her powers was like that time she attempted to lose ten pounds to fit in that Stella McCartney dress, it was merely a work in progress. It would happen.

Suddenly Olevia's head started to pound. Danger was below, her magical sense told her. It was a great ability to have and super helpful as a costumed hero. At least until the time your parents need you home in less than fifteen minutes. Still, it was part of 'the job' and she would feel guilty if she didn't help. That and guilt made her eat and she didn't want that. She dived down from her altitude to check out what the problem was.

The source of danger was a large, bizarre creature of some sort terrorizing a construction site just outside of Millennium's downtown area. It was about sixteen feet tall, humanoid and composed of various metals seemingly welded together. It had truck headlights for eyes and sharp metal for teeth that resembled long kitchen knives. It was kinda cool but kinda creepy all at the same time. She saw it chasing several people in the street, flinging cars in it's path. Screams went out all over the block as it went on it's rampage. Someone was going to get hurt if Lash didn't step on it.

Pushing herself, she throttled down like a rocket and slammed into the thing. She felt it's weight as her own body collided within it, leaving an impressive crater in the middle of an intersection. It was still moving, though, and struck her with it's balled up fists. She reeled back before she has time to assess what was going on and slammed into the wall of a nearby credit union. It didn't hurt as much as it probably looked, though.

"Okay, TOTALLY uncalled for," Lash said as she removed herself from the teen sized indentation in the wall caused by her. She put aside her shopping bags. "Let's just trade names, shake on it to like calm down and call it a day, okay?"

The creature's mouth open and a truck horn went off from inside his body. For something that couldn't emote well she could see it was pissed off. He charged at her like a bull as the noise continued to emanate, blasting her through the already unsteady wall and through it. And two other buildings walls after that. She ended up finding herself on the other side of the block, the metallic monster beating at her viciously.

Lash screamed shrilly, putting up her arms defensively as he wailed upon her. It was a good thirty seconds before the jade heroine realized that she was so durable she could barely feel his blows. In fact it was like being in a pillow fight. After the realization set in, Lash pulled her fist back and smacked him with all she had. The thing shattered in millions of pieces as her titanic strength met with his form. Kinda gross actually but hey. If he was organic it could have been much, much messier.

Lash heard the applause erupt as she defeated her enemy. She turned around, flashed a brilliant smile and flipped her hair like she was ready for her close-up. People swarmed about her and wanted her autograph, some wanted to take pictures. The excitement of the fight flush upon her, she acquiesced and began to soak in the adulation, even as the MCPD arrived on scene to contain and secure the area. Ever the noble heroine she made sure anyone who wanted to thank her had the chance.

That was, of course, until she heard an officer nearby commenting that he needed to be leaving as his shift ended at eight 'clock. EIGHT O'CLOCK??? Lash had completely blanked out on needing to be home. Heck, she forgot she had shopping bags a block away! As she went to where the encounter started she quickly realized the bags were no longer there and that someone (not her) would be looking super sexy in the clothes she bought earlier, now stolen. She grimaced and without missing a beat flew off to home.

It was dark when she arrived at the Alvarez residence. She quickly changed into her normal form and even before she could reach her front door could hear her aunt Maria singing (shrieking, really) to 'I Will Survive' on the karaoke machine. Olevia sheepishly opened the door, only for the first thing to catch her eye was her mother's cross glare sitting in a recliner. She got up to confront her daughter as Maria continued her vocal assassination of the disco classic. Olevia attempted to flee up the stairs, unsuccessfully.

"Olevia!" Her mother, Renata, said in a scolding tone. "Where have you been? Seven o'clock! Seven o'clock is always karaoke time! We asked you to be on time just for once!"

"But I...I..." Olevia started in protest, then realized: what WAS she going to tell them? That she was a super hero? That she just stopped some sort of weird monster from hurting people? That she used their credit card for four hundred dollars of purchases which were stolen and she didn't even report it?

"Go up to your room and think about what you've done," her mother said sternly. "Your Aunt Maria wanted to sing 'You Oughtta Know' by Alanis Morrisette JUST for you and you MISSED it! We can talk about this tomorrow. And in the meantime NO online shopping."

Olevia looked down, defeated. She turned around and proceeded to go up to her room. And today had started so great, too. Even though she could beat the toughest bad guys this town had to offer, only one person had the power to actually stop Lash: her own mother.