Page 2 of Victorious

He was in purgatory. Not in the biblical sense—he didn’t believe in that—but technically trapped. Tethered to a drug that kept him alive, but powerless.

He’d hoped, when he’d first stolen the serum, that it was simply a matter of finding the right dose. That the threshold, once determined, would enable Victor to keep death at bay without giving up his powers. But there seemed to be no nuance. No degrees.

The compound was all or nothing.

The only reprieve, a narrow window of time after the dose wore off and before the dying began. A brief gap during which his abilities came rushing back, heady, electric. But it was a window measured in hours, not days, and Victor had the grim suspicion that it, like the time between his episodes, was shrinking. That it would eventually close.

Until he found an alternative remedy, he was bound to the clock. Counting every hour, every day until—

Somewhere beyond the bar, a dog barked.

Victor looked up, scanning the windows, and saw a large black beast standing on the curb outside.

“Dol?”

It wasn’t. Couldn’t be.

And yet, the dog—Sydney’s shadow, his stray—stared back at Victor, tail wagging in recognition.

He stood too fast, nearly upending what was left of his scotch, but by the time he righted the glass, the dog was gone. The curb, empty.

Victor frowned, running a hand through his hair.

He’d never slept well, his senses too keen, every body around him humming like a plucked string, but these days he was having the opposite problem. Without his power, he felt exposed. Vulnerable. Spent most nights hovering at the edge of consciousness, unwilling or unable to sink fully into sleep.

The lack of rest was clearly catching up with him.

He went to the restroom, was bent over the sink, splashing water on his face when he heard the sound of another man entering, followed by the bolt being thrown. He looked up, expecting trouble.

And saw him.

The mass of him filling the doorway, tattoos protruding from the edges of his shirt. First the dog, now Mitch. Victor wondered, for a moment, if he might be losing his mind. More likely, it was a side effect of the serum, a consequence of constant medication—

But then his cellmate stepped forward, and smirked, and he knew it was neither a hallucination nor the real Mitchell Turner.

It was June.

The shapeshifting mercenary who’d gotten close to Sydney after Serena’s death, positioned herself as a surrogate sister. An EO almost as dangerous as Serena, and—he knew from experience—far harder to kill.

Sure, June had helped Victor once. During an episode. And after.

But that was before.

Before she tried to recruit him on Marcella’s behalf.

Before she kidnapped Syd.

Before she intercepted him at the gala and forced him to stop Marcella instead of going after Eli. She’d cost him that fight, that life, that death, and Victor had promised her that the next time they met, he’d settle the score.

And here she was.

“Hello, June.”

A smile split Mitch’s hardened face. “Aww,” said his mouth, in a voice that was and wasn’t his, inflected with a musical note. “What gave me away?”

“Your little trick may work on strangers,” said Victor, turning from the sink to face her. “But I know my cellmate better than most.”

Mitchell Turner was the kind of man who hated his size, worked hard to make himself seem smaller than he was, whereas June seemed to relish taking up space.