#WritingWonders 6.24 — Antagonist POV: What do you think about the MC? Ms. George and the...

[Sorry. Better late than never. 😇 Brand, the POV here, is the primary antagonist in the SF story I am writing now, so I thought, why not get a feel for his thoughts, since they never show in a 1st person story? Most of the WW prompts I've answered take place half a year after this incident.]

Long bronze-red hair tumbled wetly down. The devil-girl looked at me from over my shoulder with expectant green eyes. She was perched on my back. Were I an average human, she'd be the size of a toddler compared to me.

"It's really okay?" she asked, brightly.

I lay with my face turned to my right, cheek on my arm, but managed a nod. "Yeah. Sure."

She grinned like a child. She might have faintly squealed in glee, but I was sure that was my imagination. She crawled to my hips and began massaging my shoulder. The steamy alcove dripped with water. Vines grew over rocks and water cascaded down as dappled green light flicked and darted with shadows. It looked like a jungle hot spring, but was in a gravity bubble. Her kneading fingers felt strong, but she was a worker of miracles so I knew her strength came from more than muscle.

She'd invented a new revelation on the spot for the job—doubtless. Then again, I wasn't a "devil-girl" as she called herself. Who knew what she really knew, or invented.

Was it really okay? Was I really okay with this? Beyond her cheeky insistence on physical contact?

I needed her to help me save my world from her world. Lives depended on it. I'd spent twelve decades balancing intuition against careful decision. You didn't grow to my size or win my position without breaking egos, and breaking heads.

Yet.

Not half an hour ago...

I'd been walking with my hand on her shoulder. My weight could drill her into the ground. Conversationally, she'd been pointing through a window at our newly arrived companions. In doing so, she'd turned me around twice, managing to stretch me out—and she over balanced me.

She ducked, moving explosively. When I reached, she rolled forcing me to hop as she came around, bouncing to her feet, and bounding out of reach.

I did not miss her darting, evaluating eyes.

My body still in motion, she came up in a three-point stance as I reached reflexively (not smartly) her direction. A blue-green misty gravity shield bloomed between us, crackling and spitting sparks, smelling of ozone and humming. She anchored her miraculous wonder into the gravity-glass floor; I piled into it, like a sack of meat. The shield grated against the floor as I pushed it and her back, but not far. She'd properly gauged my aged lack of flexibility and had tricked me into twisting to reach. Inertia slid me shoulder first onto the floor with thump.

Considering how little I'd pushed her back, I judged she could easily levitate my weight with what force she'd deigned to demonstrate.

I understood I was lucky to be alive.

Her eye movements—and how her predator eyes watched me grind to a stop—told me she could have swept my legs with gravity differentials coming down, meaning I'd have thrown myself into a wall face first. She would have had had plenty of time for an axe-strike to my groin. As I'd have keeled over uncontrollably, I would have exposed my belly.

(I'd been sold on her when I'd learned she could perform the Impossible Revelation; she had a limiter around her neck, but the device only prevented her from appearing in bank vaults and such places.)

Falling on my back, even with her average human weight, she could have finished by stomping my wing joints. I'd have balled up in pain, or passed out cold.

She could have slayed me.

I might have rolled over on her, though. My pride insisted that much, anyway.

Capable. I had purchased her services last year from the mobster who'd claimed she owned her. Her sharp tool. I knew the devil-girl was capable.

Pricey, but capable.

The mobster had died, and I knew for a fact that I was the first dragon the devil-girl had ever met.

We had a common enemy, though, so she'd consented to remain my prisoner, for the time being.

Intuition told me to kill her, while she acted like a little girl, playing at massaging her big guy doll. Catch her off guard, intuition demanded. Crush her against the rock wall. Turn her into a red splash.

But—

She. Could. Work. Miracles. A world, my world, depended on her doing so.

I said, "A little to the right."

My worker of miracles, my sharp tool with a blade for a hilt, said, "Yes, boss!" and giggled as her feet dug in and she shifted over.

[Author retains copyright(c) 2023 by R.S.]

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