Oasis could only remember a few times that they’d seen The Vampire Queen and Richard in the same place. One memorable time was an autumn day around ‘24 or ‘25, where Katarina had turned part of Queen Street West in front of the old city hall into black-coloured quicksand. And not the real kind, but the one you see in movies, that can pull in a person in mere seconds. Dozens of people had already gotten sucked in with an awful wet SLORP — they’d probably ended up in the subway tunnel that ran under the street, confused and covered in muck.

Fortunately for SwordBright, there was some sort of construction going on around the facade of the skyscraper across the street. The walkway had been covered by scaffolding for weeks, so they’d scrambled to climb up it as soon as the Vampire Queen had started to transfigure the pavement below. They had no idea if their magic immunity would prevent them from sinking through, and to be honest they had no intention of finding out. Now they were parkouring their way across the structure, trying to figure out a way to jump across the street to the courtyard where the Queen was grandstanding. 

She’d sent figures made out of shadow to pursue them, and they were slashing and hacking at them with Ginette as best as they could. Overhead, they could hear a news helicopter whirring, no doubt trying to get the best angle at which to view the whole thing.   One of the shadow figure made a grab at them and they had to duck and roll, sliding to a stop at the edge of a plank. There was netting all around the scaffolding to prevent workers from plummeting down, and they used their momentum to grab the shadow figure by the arm and judo-throw them right into it. They weren’t corporeal, despite SwordBright’s ability to grab onto them, so they passed right through and sloshed onto the pavement/sands below. Two more shadow figure materialized on each side of them, forcing them to swing Ginette in a tight arc around their body.

Oasis considered themself pretty good at sword fighting. They’d gone to a bunch of classes, and placed in a couple of tournaments before Richard had made them stop. They didn’t understand what the problem was. The only thing they’d needed to do to protect their identity was to pretend to be a SwordBright fan, and break down crying while telling the other students that SB was the first non-binary superhero that they’d seen and that they wanted to study the blade to emulate them. It had worked like a charm, and even gave them an excuse to wear their own merch. But Richard had insisted that they stop going, and had even offered to hire them a private tutor to practice with. 

The Vampire Queen, for her part, hadn’t been impressed by their skills. She’d bitched at them for years about their lack of “flair” until they’d gotten the hint and taken a stage sword fighting class. Now they could do some very impressive flynning, even if it hurt their pride to do it. They had to admit that the useless flailing and slashing did look pretty cool on camera, even if it was doing absolutely nothing to help them win fights. 

Today, however, they had to be smart about how they moved their sword in the cramped space. They ran Ginette through both shadows, her white blade flashing and piercing dramatically through the dissipating gloom. The figures burst into smoke and more of them reappeared further back, like really frustrating intangible hydras. 

SwordBright flicked a glance around the street, still trying to figure out a way to the Vampire Queen. She was raising more and more shadow minions and sending them inside the building, no doubt to terrorize the staff there. Further up Queen Street, there was a pedestrian bridge that linked buildings on both side; they thought that their scaffolding could get them there. But to run all the way there would take them away from the fight, and then they’d have to floor-is-lava their way back across the front of the Cadillac Fairview Tower, and they would still be separated from the old city hall by James street, that ran perpendicularly from Queen Street. That was too complicated a plan. The only good way across would be to jump, or to fly, or….

They looked up. There were electric cables linking both sides of the street. The area was eerily quiet, now that all of the ground surfaces had been turned into quicksand for at least three or four blocks. Their thoughts slowed to a halt, the wiring of the helicopter blades and Katarina’s villain monologue fading in the background. SwordBright took a deep breath, then ran up to the edge of the scaffolding, climbed the security fence, and launched themself into the air. With one hand, they grabbed an electric cable, and with the other, they swung Ginette as hard as they could. 

Time to figure out if she could cut through a power line.

Ever dependable, the magical blade sliced through the rubber and copper and lord knew that else like it was butter. The snapped line swung across the street in an arc, taking SwordBright with it, and sent them flying towards the large stone Cenotaph that stood in the middle of the old city hall courtyard. They clipped the monument with their shoulder and ricocheted into the stairs of the building. They rolled down the stone steps and barely managed to catch themselves before they reached the quicksand that was lapping at the bottom of them.

Standing inside of the large arched doorway that loomed over them, The Vampire Queen barked a laugh. She thrust out a hand, and the shadows haunting the entrance of the building came to her, resolving themselves into a long, ebony black spear. She twirled it in her hands and advanced towards them. 

SwordBright picked themselves up and readied their beautiful white blade. The Queen’s makeup was dramatic and perfect as always, purple winged eyeshadow and glossy blood-red lips contrasting with the white powder in which she painted her face. Her raven hair spread behind her in an arc as she swung the spear at them, and SwordBright had to jump back to avoid her hits. They parried and twirled and blocked, knowing full well that they were indulging her by engaging in this dramatic fight. In hand-to-hand, they were better than her, and could likely cut the duel short with one feint and thrust. 

In everything else, The Queen could obliterate them in less than a second.

Her costume today was appropriately dramatic. She was wearing a long black velvet trench coat with a silk red inner lining that shone and flashed around her legs as they fought. The upper part of the coat was figure-hugging with a deep cleavage, and her pants were clad in leather so tight they had no idea how she could move, let alone fight. She also wore a chocker and pointy stilettos, because someone apparently had never left the nineties. 

“What was your purpose here today, Vampire Queen?” They panted in between two parries. They were losing ground on the stairs and needed to distract her before she pushed them backwards into the quicksands. They really didn’t want to be slurped into the subway tunnel today. They’d have to take like, five showers to get rid of the stink of magic asphalt-sand. 

“The same as always, my dear, claiming what’s mine.” she replied with a smirk. Quick as a whip, the Vampire Queen pressed her advantage and pushed them backward with her spear. 

SwordBright had anticipated the move and quickly stepped aside, but she grabbed her weapon with both hands and quickly slammed them back into a railing. They strained against each other, blade and spear inches from their faces, body warmth mingling together as she kept pressing them backwards. They felt the railing dig uncomfortably into their lower back and had to shift their stance to brace themselves. 

“And there is nothing you can do to stop me,” she hissed. 

This close, they could see the flaws in her makeup, the little part near her ear where she had smudged some white into her hair and the way her eyeliner wasn’t quite symmetrical. She was breathing hard, even though they knew that she didn’t need to do that at all. But the thrill of the fight always made her forget herself. Her claws were out, ruining her doubtlessly expensive manicure, and her fangs flashed when she was speaking. She was pushing so hard on the spear that they were starting to bend backward over the railing. Their arms were starting to shake, and their hands were sweating inside of their gloves. A glance at their left confirmed that the quicksand was rising, the bottoms steps already disappearing into the inky, grainy blackness. SwordBright was about to come up with something cool to snap back at her when her eyes narrowed past their helmet for a second, and then she was off of them.

The Vampire Queen pulled back and ducked just as a beam of light swooshed over her head and slammed into the monument behind her. The stone exploded in a million pieces. SwordBright spun around, heart in their throat, to see The Big Leaf flying towards them both - straight at the Vampire Queen. He stopped just shy of slamming into her and hovered over the courtyard, hands on his hips. 

“Surrender, Vampire Queen! You are outmatched here!” he shouted.

The Vampire Queen straightened up from her crouch and rolled her eyes. “Oh, it’s you. Do be careful, would you?” 

She waved a hand, and the damage to the Cenotaph behind her magically repaired itself. The Big Leaf startled. He had clearly not expected that. SwordBright rolled their own eyes and dusted themself off. If only someone — anyone — bothered to read their report about their nemesis, they would know what she was capable of. 

The Queen pushed her long hair back behind her shoulder. “Well, this was fun,” she said, “But I gotta run. Brighty, I’ll see you at the game. Farewell!”

“Hold it —” screamed Richard, zooming towards her once more, but she had already dissipated into shadows. The ground rumbled ominously. “What now?” He growled. 

SwordBright sheathed Ginette and rolled their aching wrists. “Nothing, she’s ran off. Her magic is dissipating,” they said, gesturing at the street where the quicksand was already morphing back into asphalt. The cut power line was sparking dangerously, and at least one delivery van was stuck halfway into the ground. That was probably going to be a pain to extirpate, but it could have been worse. A superhero could have thoughtlessly exploded a historical war monument, for example.

The Big Leaf landed a few feet from them. “Are you alright, son? Do you know what game she was talking about?”

“I have no idea,” they groaned. She probably wouldn’t show up at any game and had just said that to be a dick. Now Richard was going to have them on duty at every single sport event for the next three months at least. Ugh.