Epilogue: Play With Fire And Get Burned

"So what do you want to do?" Lucy Lane said.

"You have options," Zatanna said.

"And we support you whatever choice you want to make," Supergirl added.

Lois Lane stared down at the pregnancy test in the center of the table. Two blue lines glared up at her. Not that there was anyway to tell, looking at her...but she had been feeling off, lately. Tired. Run down. Hungry, but unable to eat. Stupidly horny. A part of her had thought it was just the break-up with Blaze, but then she had missed her monthly guest, and...

The Daily Planet's greatest reporter chewed her inner lip.

"Would it be ridiculous to say I want pickles and ice cream?"

".maerc eci dna selkcip nommuS" Zatanna said, as she spread her hands...and there was a slight *pop* of air as a jar of pickles and a carton of French vanilla appeared on the table. Lucy Lane stood up to fetch the bowl and spoon; Supergirl reached over to open the pickles.

Lois glowered as she reached out, grabbed a pickle, and started to suck on it.

"You're only a few weeks along," Lucy said. "I mean, you can just take a pill. A lot of women miscarry in the first trimester. There's no guarantee it would even last."

"Actually, if it's a demonic pregnancy...the odds of it coming to term are good. Unless, you know, measures are taken," Zatanna said. "And there are some other considerations in that case. They might inherit some of Blaze's nature."

"Am I even pregnant?" Lois said, chewing on a bite of pickle as she started to scoop ice cream into a bowl. "I mean it could be ovarian cancer or something, right?"

Zatanna and Lucy looked at Supergirl. The blonde stared back...and then blushed as she got the hint. The Kryptonian turned to Lois. "Do you want me to take a look?"

Lois paused, swallowed, and then stuck the half-eaten pickle into the half-filled bowl. She pushed herself away from the table and lifted her shirt.

"Please," the reporter said.

The blonde focused her eyes on the flat stomach—and Lois realized how silly she felt. Supergirl didn't need her to lift her shirt using X-ray vision. The Kryptonian made a sharp intake of breath.

"You're...definitely pregnant," the blonde said. "Very pregnant."

Lois blinked and let her shirt fall. "What does that mean?"

"There's...multiple embryos," Supergirl said. "I counted four."

The reporter sagged a little in her chair. Almost mechanically, her hand reached for the spoon. The three women watched as with nearly-robotic motions, Lois Lane pushed spoonfuls of pickle and ice cream into her face. They all chewed over their private thoughts, none wanting to be the first to speak. Not until Lois set her spoon down in the empty bowl.

"I could perform a magical abortion," Zatanna said, quietly. "Or maybe put it on hold, give you more time to think."

"Clark would still marry you," Supergirl added. "You know he loves you. He always has. He'd love the babies as his own."

Lucy Lane stared into her sister's eyes. She hated to see her older sister like this. But she had to say what was on her mind.

"You aren't still pining for that demonic dick, are you?" Lucy said. "She lied to you. She's evil. You're not going to change her. This isn't some ex-con with a heart of gold beneath a rough exterior. You need to cut her out of your life."

Lois wasn't aware she was crying until the warm tears ran down her face.

"She was my life," Lois whispered, and covered her face into her hands. Lucy got up to hug her sister...and Zatanna and Supergirl shared a glance over the table.

In Hell, a palace rises like a golden ziggurat, the unnaturally angular sides echoing the ancient structures of Sumer and Akkad. On the topmost tier stood a throne carved from obsidian, the smoky black glass reflecting the thousand terrible sights from across the infernal realm. Sunk low in the great chair, the lean, lithe crimson figure seemed almost swallowed up, her pure white eyes smouldering from within.

"She is a mortal cow," her brother Satanus said. He stalked back and forth with long strides, eyes burning from within his helmet. "Forget her. She was nothing more than a momentary conquest in a life eternal!"

"Are thou not free?
It was she that did the leaving!
The writing is plain to see,
Thou must stop believing!"

Etrigan brooded like a gargoyle, the yellow skin of his face stretched in an inscrutable mask. As Blaze's former lover, he no doubt had his own plans for the scarlet succubus' bed.

Mary Marvel coughed. She had drawn her white cape close around her crimson uniform. The infernal wind whipped her dark hair this way and that, and she kept her distance from the others who had come to Blaze in her brooding.

"There is a way you might earn her back," Mary said, measuring each word.

Blaze raised her head. There was no hope in those eyes, only a dull glow, as if the fires of hell itself had burnt down to a smolder.

"Speak," Blaze said.

"If you renounce hell and all its powers, all ties and bonds...a true emancipation incantation...then you would be human. Complete with a human soul. Fully transubstantiated. Able to seek your redemption in the mortal world," the Lady Shazam said. "The wisdom of Minerva has revealed this incantation to me."

"Foolishness!" Satanus said. "Give up your power? Need I not remind you sister, we have enemies that would crush us at the first sign of weakness?"

Etrigan scratched his chin. When he spoke, the words were without jest.

"Mortal life I've tasted, this you know,
So I have reason to be concerned,
Your lover may yet reject you, a dire blow,
Play with fire, and you will get burned."

Blaze's fingers dug into the arms of her throne.

"But there's a chance," the demon said, her eyes focused on Mary Marvel. "All I have to do is give up everything, and place my heart in Lois Lane's hands, and hope she takes me back? And if she says no..."

"Then you're stuck as a human. Permanently. Until **** takes you," the heroine said. "As it takes all of us 'mere mortals.'"

"Sister, cease this foolishness!" Satanus growled. "Would you really abandon all we've built together for some mortal cunt? A whiff of quim? I could summon a hundred damned souls in her exact image, to suck your cock every day for the rest of eternity!"

Blaze lifted her head and looked at her brother.

"Yet it wouldn't be her."

The demon slid off the phone and hovered on the air. Her fingers rubbed itchy palms. A step brought her to grab Mary Marvel's shoulder...and then the two of them were gone, moving through shadows, to someplace where neither Etrigan or Satanus could hear.

"Tell me the incantation," Blaze said. Her scarlet lips quivered as she **** herself to add. "Please."

Two lonely hearts. Broken. Hurting. Which the moth and which the flame? Not all stories have a happy ending. How seldom it works out! Yet we all keep trying, like fools.

There was a knock at the door to Lois Lane's apartment. The reporter had her face buried in her sister's shoulder. Zatanna rose to answer it...voices wafted from the hall...and then the magician returned, her mouth a tight line.

"Lois...there's someone at the door to see you," Zatanna's voice was a warning, and Supergirl stood, but one gloved hand waved, and the Maid of Might sat back down. "If you want to see her."

The Daily Planet's most pregnant reporter sniffed and rose. She wiped her eyes and mumbled something about putting the ice cream away before it melted...and then looked to the figure standing in the door.

She was no shorter than when Lois Lane had last seen her. Yet there was something gone from Angelica Blaze. A haughtiness, a confidence, an aura of invincibility. The dickgirl stood there, naked save for the borrowed white cape of Mary Marvel wrapped around her body, not quite long enough to hide the swinging tip of her dick.

"Hello, sweetmeat," Blaze said, trying on a smile...and then it faltered and her eyes grew wide as she saw the tired eyes. "You've been crying. Are you hurt? Are you..."

Lois Lane crashed into her lover and buried her face between the breasts that popped out from the white cloak. The other women blushed and looked away...except for Zatanna who appeared thoughtful.

"She's not a demon any more, is she?" The magician asked Mary Marvel.

"Totally human. Powerless. Also penniless and without any ID," the Lady Shazam said. The brunette looked over at the table and furrowed her brow. "Pickles and ice cream?"

"Lois is preggers," Zatanna whispered. "Really pregnant. Quadruplets."

"Oh!" Mary Marvel said...and watched as Lois herded the naked dickgirl into the bedroom, leaving the white cape on the floor. Mary sighed and picked it up. Glad that the mystic lightning also did drycleaning.

"It's all so romantic," Supergirl said, with a happy sniff and wiping a tear from her eye. "I mean, Clark will be sad, but he'll get over it, and..."

The other three women stared at the blonde.

"What?" Supergirl said. "I mean, they're back together again, Blaze is human, it'll all work out, right?"

Lucy Lane sighed and opened a cabinet to remove her sister's bottle of emergency tequila.

"It's not that simple," the younger Lane said, as she unscrewed the top. She took a hefty swig. "It's never that simple. But they have a shot."

Zatanna reached for the bottle, and took her own swig. The magician's face screwed up and she coughed.

"The same shot any couple has."