Meanwhile, across the city from the endless gang warfare, the Bowen Estate was like a cathedral of wealth in the middle of a Gated Community.
All the lawns were perfectly manicured by various servants, soft golden lights lined the long, winding driveway, and at the head of that driveway was a three-story mansion that was a marvel of modern architecture.
Inside the house, in one of the bedrooms, Tandy was sitting cross-legged on her plush bed, the lights in her room was off, and the only illuminating light was the soft-glow pulsing from her fingertips.
She had spent the entire day at home, testing her powers due to her curiosity. Little orbs of shimmering light floated between her palms, spiraling slowly like tiny stars.
She guided them with subtle gestures, thumb flexes, flicks of the wrist, controlled breaths.
Every time she summoned her Light and manipulated it, she felt something else whisper at the edges of her senses.
A pull. She didn't understand it science of it, but she knew who the pull was going towards, it was Tyrone, and that left her to constantly think about him, they were connected in ways neither of them could explain.
Now, she was thinking of Tyrone once more which caused her concentration to waver, one of the orbs immediately bursting into a spray of light.
"Damn it," she muttered under her breath, shaking out her hand and dissipating the remaining orbs.
~BUZZ~BUZZ!~
On her bed, her tablet vibrated with a news alert, and she quickly picked it up, reading the alert.
'BREAKING NEWS: Mass Casualties Across Three City Blocks — Authorities Believe Attacks Are Linked'
The headline alone made Tandy curious, and she opened the tablet and tapped the notification, which brought her into the article.
Grainy photos filled the screen, police tape, fire trucks, and a video of a reporter standing next to a smokey building as police officers investigated and body bags were carried out was playing.
The reporter began speaking, "Multiple gang strongholds were hit not long ago in a seemingly coordinated attack. No witnesses were left, with witnesses saying they only saw a shadow slipping in and out. Members of Black Serpents, Los Huensos and Iron Dogs were massacred, including the leaders, who've been wanted criminals for years,"
Tandy's breath caught as she heard that, especially the part about a shadow slipping in and out of the various buildings, which made her more curious.
She still hadn't forgotten how Tyrone looked and acted towards gang members when they had ran into them on their trip, so she already had a suspicion.
She immediately continued playing the video, the reporter speaking, "Victims were dismembered and crushed, with the bodies of some criminals seemingly disappeared, despite blood samples proving their presence. This leads police to believe the killer may have a fixation on keeping the bodies of their victims as trophies, but more investigation is needed,"
The tablet slipped from her fingers and hit the bed with a soft thud. Her lips parted, whispering a name she barely spoke aloud.
"…Tyrone."
She muttered. All she needed to hear were the bodies of some of them disappearing to know he did it using his mysterious cloak abilities.
As she was thinking that, the air in her room suddenly felt colder.
"What is this?"
The lights in her room flickered multiple times, and then every lamp, bulb and LED Strip snuffed out, swallowing the room in darkness and causing Tandy to freeze up.
Her Light flared instinctively in her palm, soft and blue-white to illuminate her immediate surroundings, and that's when she heard it.
A cracking, warping ripple, like reality folding in on itself. Her curtains fluttered inward despite the windows being closed.
Tandy stumbled back, light trembling in her grip.
"T-Tyrone?"
The shadows in front of her condensed and formed a figure that materialized like a nightmare pulling itself out of an endless void.
Tyrone appeared in her bedroom, but he wasn't the boy she had seen and been with only a day ago.
He was in his Cloak form, the massive cloak of eternal darkness seemed alive as it wrapped around the boy, writhing, snapping and leaking tendrils of living darkness across the floor of Tandy's bedroom like ink in water.
Tyrone's face flickered between human and hollow. Some moments, Tandy saw the face of the boy she had gone through so much in a short time with, but other times, his face vanished, and all she could see was a pit of darkness where his face would be, only with two white eyes that seemed empty looking at her.
And dripping from his form was blood. Not his blood, but still blood.
Tyrone swayed unsteadily, the DarkForce wrestling with his emotional instability that she wondered if it was controlling him rather than he controlling it. It seemed as if something was ripping him apart.
"T… Tandy…" His voice was distorted, layered with that abyssal echo. His form glitched like a bad signal, patches of his skin turning transparent or dissolving into swirling black.
Tandy was extremely shocked, yet she didn't scream or run away terrified. Maybe it was because they were connected on a deeper, magical level, but Tandy immediately understood what Tyrone was going through.
He was losing control, starved of Light-Force energy he needed to feed the endless darkness of the DarkForce and maintain control of himself and his powers.
In other words, he needed her!
"Tyrone," she whispered, stepping toward him slowly, hands trembling. "What happened to you?"
He opened his mouth to speak but choked on shadows. His knees buckled.
Tandy dashed forward and caught him, not physically ( he weighed nearly nothing in this state ) but by grabbing onto the edge of his cloak, grounding him with her touch.
The moment her fingers brushed him, his entire body lurched toward her like a drowning man reaching air.
Tyrone let out a broken, guttural gasp as her Light bled into him on instinct, a soft, warm glow sinking into the darkness.
His shadows recoiled, and then surged desperately towards her. Tandy wasn't scared, knowing what she needed to do and didn't pull back, instead letting her light flow.
Shimmering threads of white unfurled from her body into his, weaving into the unstable DarkForce like stitching torn fabric. The trembling of Tyrone's body and Cloak stopped.
The air grew warmer, and the instability of Tyrone's silhouette began to solidify, his heart-beat steadying under her hand.
His emotions, full of anger, rage, vengeance and depression, began to finally calm down, allowing him to return to his normal frame of mind over time.
Tyrone sagged forward, forehead resting weakly on her shoulder, breath hot and ragged. The blood on him soaked her shirt and Tandy swallowed hard as she saw him beginning to calm down the more light she poured into him.
"…Tyrone," she whispered again, voice cracking this time, "What did you do?"
He didn't answer, but it was a question she knew the answer to.
From the news, the blood, the grief and rage radiating off of him and his current actions. The way she instinctually knew what to do to help him even while never focusing on feeding him with her light before was all the answers he needed.
He had killed them.
All of them. The gangs. The corrupt cops.
While Tyrone hadn't told her the full story of his life, she was a clever enough girl to fill in the blanks based on what he did, and the photo of what seemed to be his father and brother she had found.
And now, with all of that done, he had came here for her
Her Light dimmed slightly. Unlike Tyrone, Tandy had learned quickly she needed to expel excess LightForce energy or else she'd start shining brighter and brighter.
Tandy didn't know what would happen if she hit the brightest level from not expelling her energy, but she didn't want to find out.
However, this interaction also made her learn that feeding and soothing Tyrone was the perfect way for her to use this excess energy in a safe manner.
As she was thinking of all of this, Tyrone finally spoke.
"Tandy…" he whispered, voice small, broken, so unlike the monster who had stalked the city tonight, "I… I couldn't stop."
She closed her eyes, and held him tighter.
"It's okay. I've got you," she murmured, her voice steady even though her heart pounded with fear and devastation. "I'm here. I'm right here."
The room warmed slowly as her Light stabilized him from the inside out.
The shadows retreated, the monstrous shape faded, and Tyrone Johnson, just Tyrone, collapsed against her, exhausted, trembling, alive.
Still dangerous and drenched in the blood of the gang members, but alive and back in control because of her.
Still drenched in blood.
But alive because of her.
Tandy brushed his hair back gently, her throat tight.
This was her other half.
The one her Light belonged to.
And tonight, it was clearer than ever:
Without her, he would die.
Without him, she would become something else entirely.
Together… they were something terrifying and beautiful.
****
Thanks everyone for reading. I wanted to show how they needed each-other's powers for their own gain pretty early on, so I hope you enjoyed the way I did it.