A failed gambit

“Wha… What ARE you?”

Faster than Susan could react, the cosmically powered demoness slithered around the Invisible Woman, forcing everyone to take a step back as the red skinned creature kept her eyes on her prize and smiled a cruel grin of sharp teeth at the frightened woman. Her talons twitched as the creature brought them close to either side of Susan’s head as If she would harm her at any second, but stayed her hands.

“I’m What You Could Have Been, What We ALL Could Have Been, Had You Followed Your Ambitions!” Malice hissed with a forked tongue, still circling the woman like a cobra sizing up a mouse and ready to strike. “I’ve Finally Become All I Was Meant To Be, I Am A Goddess Of Rage. Malice Personified! And Very Soon With Your Help, So will Every Other Us In The Multi-Verse.”

Turning away and heading towards the dimensional portal at the far end of the lab, Malice made a gesture with her clawed finger over her shoulder for the rest to follow her. Susan gasped as she felt her feet sliding forward against her will, no longer in control of her bearings as she was dragged forward by an invisible ****.

“My Little Iron Clad Pet Has Increased The Hate Monger’s Potency To Encompass The Entire Tri-State Area. When The Portal Is Activated, That Will Translate To EVERY New York In EVERY reality. So, Now That You Are Here, We Can Begin My Master Plan!” Waving her arms outspread to the entire dungeon, Susan and the others were given better lighting to see the entire transmuted lab and the portal device. The entire space stank of cruelty and despair.

The only one in the group capable of walking, Susan Von Doom moved ahead of the group and headed to the controls to activate the device. Letting the portal hum to life, it began showing different dimensions and realities in the lens of its opening. “Can You Imagine It Sisters? Every World. Every Reality. Bathed In Madness and Bloodlust, With US At Its Head In Every World.”

Unfurling her wings and levitating above their heads with her arms outstretched, Malice laughed at the prospect. The Invisible Woman’s presence in proximity to the portal was already having an effect, showing alternate worlds, and focusing on their versions of Susan Storm in them. One world focused on a bearded sailor with a blonde pirate woman hanging off his arm, another of a blond cavewoman sharpening a stone knife while a dinosaur with a harness in its mouth loomed behind her, drinking from a pond. Dozens of other realities flickered from the portal, each one more different than the last, but Susan’s attention was never on it. Instead, all that demanded her attention was the sight of her **** husband hanging overhead like some broken trophy, along with the rest of her friends and loved ones hanging from the ceiling.

“Oh Reed…”

A hiss from above her head diverted her attention back to the terrible demoness who landed in front of her and glared deeply in her eyes, filled with an intense hatred as her gaze bore into the Invisible Woman’s terrified stare.

“DO NOT WASTE YOUR ATTENTION ON THAT QUIVERING SACK OF MEAT!” She snarled, propping herself up by the pinions of her wings and brandishing her talons as if she would claw the woman’s face off in a fit of blind rage, even her red scaly skin crackled with raw cosmic power. “His Life Is Meaningless! ALL There Lives Are Meaningless! In Just A Few Minutes There Won’t Even Be A Reed Richards To Sulk Over!”

Narrowing her yellow slit eyes, Malice looked to the other Susans in front of her, noticing they remained stoic, and rage filled, but there was something missing in their eyes, something that betrayed a hint, a spark that something was different. Looking over to the wendigo, she held the empathy ray at her side with one hand and the former sex **** in her other, her grip tightening the longer Malice loomed over the Invisible Woman threateningly. “By The Way, What Happened To The Third One? The One That Prided Herself A Beauty Compared To The Rest Of Us?”

Realising the attention had fallen on her, the model posing as the vampire she had slain paused only slightly before falling into her role. “I… Fed off her, she was easy too, didn’t put up much of a chase at all.”

“Oh?” Purred Malice, standing to her full height to cross her arms under breasts and fold her wings over her shoulders like a cape. “Do Tell.”

“Y-yes, she and the other little mice tried to scurry off to this world’s higher authorities, they even had a flying ship in the air… Imagine that.”

“You Don’t Say? Did You Leave Anyone Alive?”

“In that flying tugboat? I only left enough alive to tell the tale of my little **** spree.” The woman nervously laughed, still haunted by the experience. “After all, if everyone’s dead, who’s going to tell the tale of how I slew an entire army for shits and giggles?”

“Just Like At The Bar We Went To That Night, You Left At Least One Alive To Tell The Tale… Right?” Malice hissed with a smirk, eyeing the vampire woman.

Tilting her shoulder and giving the terrifying woman a coy smirk, the pale woman chuckled. “It’s my thing.”

“Of Course It Is.”

With a hand gesture, the rest of the Susans cried out as they were all hoisted up into the air by invisible forces that held them up and splayed their arms and legs out. Realising their ruse had failed, the lot struggled against their bonds while others cried out in fright. Twirling her fingers, Malice plucked the empathy ray out of the wendigo woman’s hand and had it float over her outstretched talon. Looking up at the terrified actress as she wept and struggled up in the air, Malice could only smile darkly up at the powerless doppelganger.

“You Make For A Good Liar My Sister, But A Poor Vampire, Her Thirst Was Insatiable. No Survivors At All…” Bending a finger in a come-hither gesture, the weeping actress found herself being pulled down closer to see her face to face. “Perhaps After This I Can Make You Like Her…”

“LEAVE HER ALONE!”

“Witch!”

“DON’T LAY A FUCKING FINGER ON HER!”

“You wish to inflict harm?! Do so on me Daemon!!!”

Looking up at the Canoness, Malice’s smile threatened to split her face. Slithering towards the armored woman with her long serpentine tail, she flapped her wings and looked down at the furious Sister of Battle while sitting on a coil of her tail like it was a stool. Crossing her arms and resting her chin in the pal of her clawed hand.

“And You? You Would Willingly Work Alongside These Freaks and Demons Yourself? And Here I Thought You Were Disgusted By Their Existence. That You Touted ‘Burn the Daemon’ When The REAL Vampire Sister Was Scooping out Your Mind To Make You More Pliant.”

“The only daemon I see here is you!” Spitting Malice in the face, Susanna scowled back at the creature laughing back at her. With another gesture with her claw, she allowed the empathy ray to levitate towards Susan Von Doom, who stood by the controls of the portal and where the hate monger was hooked up and thrummed with life, ready to broadcast.

“They planned to trick you, use the empathy ray to blindside you while they saved your prisoners.” Explained Susan Von Doom, inspecting the empathy ray in her hands as Malice wiped the spit from her cheek.

“And They Failed… Miserably… REJOICE My Sisters, In Just A Few Minutes, This world, EVERY World Will Drown In Bloodshed, And ALL Will Become Malice!” Levitating off the ground and spreading her wings again, she watched the portal device flicker across hundreds of universes at once in front of her, just waiting for her influence to ooze itself in and drive each Susan mad with rage. “Activate The Device My Pawn, I Want To See It Happen! I Want To See Billions Drive Themselves To **** In My Name!”

Looking to her friends and family, the Invisible Woman slumped in her invisible shackles. She was defeated, her gambit had failed. They were doomed, ALL of them. Looking over to her **** husband one last time, she broke down and began to cry.

“Awww… Don’t Shed Tears Here Sister. It’s A Waste Of Good Suffering.”

Hearing the whine of the device, Malice glimpsed over to the hatemonger one last time, only to find it on the floor detached from its power source, and in its place was the empathy ray. Turning to look over her shoulder and encase her face in her iron mask, the two villains stared off as Susan Von Doom rested her hand over the activation button.

“What? Why Would You Betray me?!”

“Doom serves only Doom!” Dropping her hand over the button, the device came to life.