Violet Starlight/Frost Had It Right
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
"Honey, I know you're angry. But look at it from her point of view...I deserve this. I screwed over people. Our daughter did the right thing and she needs you to be by her," Prudence Bardoux heard her husband say. They can't see eachother at the moment, not with where her daughter put him. But he is allowed telephone calls, and they make use of it.
"I tried," she cried out, "I've tried to be by her! She will barely say two words to me. She's always out, in that armor of hers, playing hero. This would never have hap--" She's cut off, they had this conversation constantly, even before Angie disappeared for several months.
"Yes. I know," Eric said testily, "But our Violet is a hero. Not playing at one. And you know this, my Virtue."
Prudence smiled, her husband rarely pulled out that nickname, so it always had the same effect. "Look. I'm just worried. You're stuck in that...that...that place and our daughter..." She sighs, taking a deep breath, "The Coldwells called earlier and said that Angie took an injury. They said she avoided going to any of the Hero Hospitals Crey offers. She's...She's going to get herself killed, Eric."
"Prue, I can't do anything here. She won't even talk to me now. You'll have to talk to her yourself. Please, Prue. If you're that worried...show her."
Angie lied in her bed, unable to stay asleep. She has barely slept, only about 3-4 hours a day, since she got home. So much to do.
Not for the first time did she wish that the Portal Corps of her dimension didn't blow itself to kingdom come. Or even that DJ Zero's club didn't collapse in on itself. Someone else who knew about dimensions could help her. Even to get a message out...To even have a conversation with one of her friends now seems like a luxury outside of her reach.
She's tried searching out Nemesis, briefly. Before she chided herself for her selfishness. No one had heard from Nemesis since the '40s. No troops at all. If he's still around, she'd need more luck than she has to find him. Let alone any files he has on dimension hopping...
But no, she has a mission instead. Crey. No one knows what Crey's up to it seems. And based on her few raids on Crey properties, it seems they are just as nefarious here at home as they were in that other dimension. But far more secret...and so many people trust them. Important people, like the Phalanx.
And to make matters worse, she knows security spotted her this time. Angie knows how bad she is at stealth, but the equipment she was able to get from Freedom Corps helped quite a bit. Until it was breached by just some guard, and he happened to hit her in the face with his stun gun. It didn't bring her down, no, but she now has been spotted. It'll only be a matter of time.
Just as she's thinking of what to do, trying to figure out how to circumvent Crey from having her arrested, there's a sharp rap at her bedroom door, quickly followed by her mother saying, "Angie, honey. Please, it's time to come out and talk."
Angie sighed, filled with internal dread. She's been avoiding her mother since she got home, knowing the questions that are sure to come.
"Please, Angie."
Angie wanted to fly out the window, but she wasn't in her armor. She desperately wanted that way out, but she got out of bed and went to the door, opening it. Looking out of it, seeing the look flash across her mother's face. The same look that always flashes there since Angie came back, that brief second where her mother remembers that her daughter looks 3 years younger than she should. Angie looks away with her eyes downcast, ashamed despite it not being her fault.
"Angie, please...Can you finally tell me whats going on?"
And there it is. The question Angie knew would eventually come. She let go of her door, letting it open fully as she walked to her bed and sat down, looking over to her mother, "I...was somewhere else. Dunno how, or anythin' like that, but...I was there. I...It had prollems, lotsa prollems...but it had wonderful people. People who dun seem ta exist here."
Her mother smiled a soft sympathetic smile, before crossing the room and kneeling in front of her. "Honey, you had friends here too, before you left."
"I know! But they weren't as wonderful as Jen, or Lori or...Harley. I mean, like, I ended up there, an' I meet Harley an' she -gives- me her apartment ta live in cause I had no where else ta go. I mean, yeah, she was like livin' in her fiance's apartment at the time so had no use fer it, but like, it was still awesome of her an' she didn't have ta do that."
Her mother continued the same smile, before looking down a moment, "Honey, I...I understand you miss them. But you're home. Your father--" She pauses at that, then takes a deep breath and soldiers on, "and I are here."
"I know! And I missed you guys totally. I Kept trying to find a way home...I just thought...Maybe if I found a way...I could keep going. That I wouldn't be trapped there...or here."
Now Prudence knows how she should have continued this conversation, but she can't go down that road. The wider path is before her and she takes it. "Angie, why'd you arrest your father?"
Angie takes a while to respond, she wants to be smart-assed, but she knows what her mother means. "Where I was...That dimension. He was a psychic, an' a supervillain. The stuff daddy has admitted ta doing here? He did there, but he was caught. I ... Fer a long time I didn't think that Daddy was like that....but then I started developin' psychic powers...an' obviously I mean...I got it from him. So, uhm, I started ta wonder...why would he have hid them from me...An' what else he may've hid...An' ...All he hadta do was say he didn't do it. I mean he's Daddy...I woulda believed him...but he did. An' that makes him a criminal, Mom."
Prudence stands up quickly, "He's also your Father."
"An' I'm 19! I love him, lots. But...look, he went quietly, didn't he? I mean...he knows hes gotta pay. So he'll pay...I mean...look, he's been like a wonderful charitible person, right? I'm sure that'll help an' all with his sentence...Just...It hadta happen. It has ta be made right."
"Right?!" Prudence's blood pressure begins to rise, the Irish temper beginning to flare. But she suppresses it, heading towards the door. "Honey...I think...You need to talk to someone. I don't mean, like therapy. But a superhuman counselor or something...Crey offers services, you know. The Coldwell's offered to even get us a discount."
Angie's eyes widen, "No! Not Crey! Mommy, seriously, not Crey!"
"Than what, Angelica?! I'm trying, I'm trying so hard to understand here. But what can I do? This is so beyond me, and you know it! All I want you to do is calm down and live a normal life. Be normal, reconnect with your friends here, instead of wishing for your friends there. Find your life here, with us, instead of wishing for your life there." Then, frustrated, she turns to face her daughter again, only to see an empty bed.
It was cold. Rhode Island, on December 24th, isn't known for being warm. Add to that that Angie was only in a light t-short and shorts, just to sleep in, and now here she was flying above the city in almost freezing weather dressed like that. Not the smartest move, but she felt like she had to get away. Luckily she had options.
She flew down to the nearest Freedom Corps booth, using the influence the arrest of her father (not to mention the data she told the Corps about other dimensions and the fact travelling between them was possible) gave her. She was considered a hero by them, living through adversity and rising above what most people can do.
And so, easily, she got a new set of clothes. They didn't look great. Red and white sweats, Corps logos all over them. But free is free, and they were warm.
Angie knew her mother was right on a lot of things. But she can't easily just drop her feelings towards her friends. And, just as a cathartic move, she found herself getting four christmas cards and writing inside them. She knew her friends would never see them, but she felt she had to do it anyway.
When she was done she put them in their envelopes and stared at them, trying to figure out what she wanted to do with them. When suddenly her hands flared with the green radiation she has flowing through her being, and the cards vanish from her hands. She's not known to swear, not really. But a passerby at that moment would have heard her utter one in bewilderment.
Under a tree, in the atrium of the All Star Teen Sentinels base. Four Christmas cards appear. One addressed to Jen Cunningham, One to Lori Mayham, One to Genie, and one to Harley.
