two lives of Donna Troy
These are inspired by John Byrne's torments of Donna Troy, in his Wonder Woman run. There were to be more, but I sort of abandoned it after these two. One is really short, & one is surprisingly long.
~ ~ ~
Donna Hinks was destined, it appeared, to live a long & happy life. She had one truly traumatic experience at the age of six, when she was forcibly kidnapped while walking home from school one day. In a couple of days, she would be found, unharmed if a bit shaken, & returned to her parents.
Well, that just wouldn't do. The magic said that young Donna's life's lowest emotional ebb was that first night in the house of her kidnappers, alone in a locked room where everything smelled strange
So that night, just before Donna started to finally slip into sleep, the Dark Angel appeared to her. “Hello, little princess!” She cupped the little girl's chin & let the memories of all of Donna's previous lives stream into her six-year-old brain. The Angel smiled inside as she imagined she actually heard something pop in there. To be an innocent six-year-old & see all the pain of hundreds of lives cut short by the whim of a malevolent god, surely that was dizzying beyond belief.
Rewardingly, Donna indeed vomited on the Dark Angel's legs. The Angel smiled, outside this time, a big toothy one. “Time to start again, little one. Can't waste any more time on happiness here.”
Her father would never get to find her, she would never feel the relief of going home, she was gone, rewound in time to start her next life, only to lose that existence again when the spell said she was at her lowest point...
~
...Donna came home one night to hear, through the exterior walls, sounds of sex in her bedroom. Every hair on her body stood up as she fumbled with the key, as she entered the house, as she walked through the hallway. That was Richie's voice. And who was the woman?
Bile rising in her throat, knees trembling, she came to the door, pushed it open, & flicked on the light. Her husband was in bed with some blonde. Oh no. It was Bette Kaye. Wrapped around her husband, the pair of them thrashing & moaning, then blinking in the light, looking to the door.
“You sick bastard!” she screamed. “What the holy hell...” & here her voice & her knees both gave out; she trailed off into a slow croaking sob, as she crumpled to the floor.
Richie veritably threw Bette off him, & the blonde fell awkwardly to the floor. “Donna!” He sat up in bed, looking at her (sweat & tears mingling on his face, not that Donna could tell that between her one tears & trembling).
Donna shook, trying to get up, not sure whether to find something to throw at them or just to run out, but somehow stayed where she was. The croak was a “Whyyyyy” now.
“Bette, go home.” Richie said in a voice like phlegm & sandpaper.
Bette managed to stand, yelped. “What for you threw me? I twisted my leg!”
“Bette, go.”
As Bette tried to get out the door, Donna lunged at her, & a knife hand reached kidney-or would have, had Donna had any strength or control to connect. Bette fell, & Donna was on top of her, the two clawing at each other, Donna drawing the most blood, Bette alternately trying to defend herself & striking at Donna's head-until Richie remembered how to walk & strode over to pick Donna up off the other woman. Donna kicked like a cat being given a bath.
“I'm sorry,” Richie said.
Donna just sobbed incoherently.
Bette stood up, naked & now streaked in multiple shades of red (depending on how deeply any given swipe had scratched her) & ran unevenly out of the house.
Richie was still holding onto Donna around the waist. He was standing up straight now; she stayed curled up in front of him, facing away.
“If I put you down will you claw my eyes out?”
Donna nodded, & heard him sigh.
“OK, we'll do like this, then. I'm so sorry, hon. But I just connect with Bette, you know? We share the whole acrobat thing, & with you not even wanting to wear the tights, I just-” he gulped, “-I want to be with someone who is my partner all the way, performing, touring, the works. I'm sorry.” With this he set her down on her feet. She could feel him flinch a little, as if to steel himself for whatever she would do to him.
She breathed out. She breathed in. Then she whirled & struck upward, breaking his nose with the heel of her hand. He fell back against the wall. As he raised a hand to feel the damage done, she felt a grand shudder spasm through her whole body. Then, finding herself with no voice to speak, she turned & walked out the door.
This was so stupid. So what if he cheated on her? She could take that. She'd been through worse when she miscarried two years before. This was not the worse thing that had happened to her, no ma'am. She would survive, she would be OK, she would...need somewhere to sleep if she wasn't going back inside.
Well, she could always sleep in the van tonight. But that would mean sleeping in the garage. The van wasn't going anywhere tonight with the engine all taken apart. Vic had said he'd replace the alternator but she knew he hadn't yet. And if she went back to sleep in the garage, she'd be too close to Richie, & she might wake up in the middle of the night & murder him.
She turned & started walking toward the bus stop. She half expected a naked Bette to be sitting on the bench, but apparently not. Oh, well. Less mayhem this way. She sat on the bench, her arms crossed in front of her, & idly wondered where Bette had gotten to, being naked & all, as a sort of distraction from thinking about what Bette had been getting up to with her husband & for how long.
Oh god. How long?
Eventually the bus pulled up, & she got in. It was brightly lit, a stout woman was driving, & three passengers sat in the middle. They looked to Donna like scared mice, whom she could brain with a swift strike of her hand. But that was probably just her mental state. Well, & their response to the general bloody disarray of her appearance.
She sat down in a seat a little way past the front row, thinking of sleeping there.
One passenger was a young man. “Er, do you need help?”
So one mouse was getting bold. She looked at him, like, she imagined, a bird of prey swiveling its head menacingly.
“If you need a place to stay,”-what the hell? Was the mouse propositioning her?-“there's a shelter downtown.” Ah, a charitable mouse. Probably a church mouse.
She settled into her seat, fully intending to spend the whole night there. The driver ended that quick.
“Where are you getting off?” Damn fat lady.
“Hey, mouse, where's that shelter?”
“Uh? Down on 18th Avenue, you have to take a different bus. I can show you.”
“OK. That's where I'm going.”
The driver waggled her eyebrows in a sort of expression of disgust & drove on.
Donna sat, feeling the pain of the last two years of her life throb inside her like a ride over a rough highway into a desert of the soul. Were the city streets really this rough, or was it just her heart pounding? She felt the echo of her lost child, & now the sheer dull ache of a lost marriage, a conviction that she would never return to Richie setting like concrete, turning to stone.
When they got to the stop to switch buses, gentleman mouse left the bus with her. The driver looked worried, like this crazy woman with the wild hair & the blood drying on her skin might harm the naïve lad.
They stood at the bus stop. Mouse opened his mouth, closed it again. They waited a bit longer. Finally, he said, “I'm Chris.”
Donna just grunted. She had too many holes in her right now to make friends.
The boy waited quietly, looking worried. Was he more worried that she would get hurt, or that she would hurt someone? She said, “I'm not going to hurt you.”
“OK,” he said.
The other bus arrived. Mouse waited for her to get up, then followed her in. “18th Avenue,” he said.
This bus stank.
When they got to the shelter, Mouse got out with her. “Um, here it is, are you going to be OK?”
She looked at him. He was a little goofy looking, but tall & probably stronger than she'd realized. Not actually a mouse. She swallowed, noticed now how much her throat hurt. “Yeah.”
“Um, well, I'll wait here. For a little while, in case you can't stay here.” What was he thinking? Was he just mortally nice? “We can find something else, you know, if this just...” he trailed off. He was not really sure what to do with her, was he? That's why he'd taken her here.
She went inside. The place stunk in an entirely more acidic way than the second bus. A woman's stern voice came from a window with a counter. “Name?”
“Donna Gracen. No,” she was not using Richie's name, ever again. “Donna Stacey.”
“Showers are closed, you'll have to sleep like that. OK?”
She filled out some form, was led to a bed in the dark & sat on it. Suddenly it hit her, to be sleeping in a strange & smelly place, surrounded by possibly insane strangers. And all this unexpected just this afternoon. She lay there, not yet daring to go to sleep, so her waking mind had to keep reliving all the horror of the day, then try to find foreshadowing in Richie's behavior of the last two years, & her dead baby started pulling at her too, & all the fear of this strange place. As she became so tired that her head started dreaming no matter if she kept her eyes open, the world twisted, & somehow became even darker.
“Smile, princess, this is the only night you stay here.” said an entirely too cheerful-
-Dark Angel. Oh no.
“Indeed, it's all looking up from here. One night in this dump, & you go on, & become a stronger person. Or you would, but of course we can't have that. Time to start again...”
~ ~ ~
Donna Hinks was destined, it appeared, to live a long & happy life. She had one truly traumatic experience at the age of six, when she was forcibly kidnapped while walking home from school one day. In a couple of days, she would be found, unharmed if a bit shaken, & returned to her parents.
Well, that just wouldn't do. The magic said that young Donna's life's lowest emotional ebb was that first night in the house of her kidnappers, alone in a locked room where everything smelled strange
So that night, just before Donna started to finally slip into sleep, the Dark Angel appeared to her. “Hello, little princess!” She cupped the little girl's chin & let the memories of all of Donna's previous lives stream into her six-year-old brain. The Angel smiled inside as she imagined she actually heard something pop in there. To be an innocent six-year-old & see all the pain of hundreds of lives cut short by the whim of a malevolent god, surely that was dizzying beyond belief.
Rewardingly, Donna indeed vomited on the Dark Angel's legs. The Angel smiled, outside this time, a big toothy one. “Time to start again, little one. Can't waste any more time on happiness here.”
Her father would never get to find her, she would never feel the relief of going home, she was gone, rewound in time to start her next life, only to lose that existence again when the spell said she was at her lowest point...
~
...Donna came home one night to hear, through the exterior walls, sounds of sex in her bedroom. Every hair on her body stood up as she fumbled with the key, as she entered the house, as she walked through the hallway. That was Richie's voice. And who was the woman?
Bile rising in her throat, knees trembling, she came to the door, pushed it open, & flicked on the light. Her husband was in bed with some blonde. Oh no. It was Bette Kaye. Wrapped around her husband, the pair of them thrashing & moaning, then blinking in the light, looking to the door.
“You sick bastard!” she screamed. “What the holy hell...” & here her voice & her knees both gave out; she trailed off into a slow croaking sob, as she crumpled to the floor.
Richie veritably threw Bette off him, & the blonde fell awkwardly to the floor. “Donna!” He sat up in bed, looking at her (sweat & tears mingling on his face, not that Donna could tell that between her one tears & trembling).
Donna shook, trying to get up, not sure whether to find something to throw at them or just to run out, but somehow stayed where she was. The croak was a “Whyyyyy” now.
“Bette, go home.” Richie said in a voice like phlegm & sandpaper.
Bette managed to stand, yelped. “What for you threw me? I twisted my leg!”
“Bette, go.”
As Bette tried to get out the door, Donna lunged at her, & a knife hand reached kidney-or would have, had Donna had any strength or control to connect. Bette fell, & Donna was on top of her, the two clawing at each other, Donna drawing the most blood, Bette alternately trying to defend herself & striking at Donna's head-until Richie remembered how to walk & strode over to pick Donna up off the other woman. Donna kicked like a cat being given a bath.
“I'm sorry,” Richie said.
Donna just sobbed incoherently.
Bette stood up, naked & now streaked in multiple shades of red (depending on how deeply any given swipe had scratched her) & ran unevenly out of the house.
Richie was still holding onto Donna around the waist. He was standing up straight now; she stayed curled up in front of him, facing away.
“If I put you down will you claw my eyes out?”
Donna nodded, & heard him sigh.
“OK, we'll do like this, then. I'm so sorry, hon. But I just connect with Bette, you know? We share the whole acrobat thing, & with you not even wanting to wear the tights, I just-” he gulped, “-I want to be with someone who is my partner all the way, performing, touring, the works. I'm sorry.” With this he set her down on her feet. She could feel him flinch a little, as if to steel himself for whatever she would do to him.
She breathed out. She breathed in. Then she whirled & struck upward, breaking his nose with the heel of her hand. He fell back against the wall. As he raised a hand to feel the damage done, she felt a grand shudder spasm through her whole body. Then, finding herself with no voice to speak, she turned & walked out the door.
This was so stupid. So what if he cheated on her? She could take that. She'd been through worse when she miscarried two years before. This was not the worse thing that had happened to her, no ma'am. She would survive, she would be OK, she would...need somewhere to sleep if she wasn't going back inside.
Well, she could always sleep in the van tonight. But that would mean sleeping in the garage. The van wasn't going anywhere tonight with the engine all taken apart. Vic had said he'd replace the alternator but she knew he hadn't yet. And if she went back to sleep in the garage, she'd be too close to Richie, & she might wake up in the middle of the night & murder him.
She turned & started walking toward the bus stop. She half expected a naked Bette to be sitting on the bench, but apparently not. Oh, well. Less mayhem this way. She sat on the bench, her arms crossed in front of her, & idly wondered where Bette had gotten to, being naked & all, as a sort of distraction from thinking about what Bette had been getting up to with her husband & for how long.
Oh god. How long?
Eventually the bus pulled up, & she got in. It was brightly lit, a stout woman was driving, & three passengers sat in the middle. They looked to Donna like scared mice, whom she could brain with a swift strike of her hand. But that was probably just her mental state. Well, & their response to the general bloody disarray of her appearance.
She sat down in a seat a little way past the front row, thinking of sleeping there.
One passenger was a young man. “Er, do you need help?”
So one mouse was getting bold. She looked at him, like, she imagined, a bird of prey swiveling its head menacingly.
“If you need a place to stay,”-what the hell? Was the mouse propositioning her?-“there's a shelter downtown.” Ah, a charitable mouse. Probably a church mouse.
She settled into her seat, fully intending to spend the whole night there. The driver ended that quick.
“Where are you getting off?” Damn fat lady.
“Hey, mouse, where's that shelter?”
“Uh? Down on 18th Avenue, you have to take a different bus. I can show you.”
“OK. That's where I'm going.”
The driver waggled her eyebrows in a sort of expression of disgust & drove on.
Donna sat, feeling the pain of the last two years of her life throb inside her like a ride over a rough highway into a desert of the soul. Were the city streets really this rough, or was it just her heart pounding? She felt the echo of her lost child, & now the sheer dull ache of a lost marriage, a conviction that she would never return to Richie setting like concrete, turning to stone.
When they got to the stop to switch buses, gentleman mouse left the bus with her. The driver looked worried, like this crazy woman with the wild hair & the blood drying on her skin might harm the naïve lad.
They stood at the bus stop. Mouse opened his mouth, closed it again. They waited a bit longer. Finally, he said, “I'm Chris.”
Donna just grunted. She had too many holes in her right now to make friends.
The boy waited quietly, looking worried. Was he more worried that she would get hurt, or that she would hurt someone? She said, “I'm not going to hurt you.”
“OK,” he said.
The other bus arrived. Mouse waited for her to get up, then followed her in. “18th Avenue,” he said.
This bus stank.
When they got to the shelter, Mouse got out with her. “Um, here it is, are you going to be OK?”
She looked at him. He was a little goofy looking, but tall & probably stronger than she'd realized. Not actually a mouse. She swallowed, noticed now how much her throat hurt. “Yeah.”
“Um, well, I'll wait here. For a little while, in case you can't stay here.” What was he thinking? Was he just mortally nice? “We can find something else, you know, if this just...” he trailed off. He was not really sure what to do with her, was he? That's why he'd taken her here.
She went inside. The place stunk in an entirely more acidic way than the second bus. A woman's stern voice came from a window with a counter. “Name?”
“Donna Gracen. No,” she was not using Richie's name, ever again. “Donna Stacey.”
“Showers are closed, you'll have to sleep like that. OK?”
She filled out some form, was led to a bed in the dark & sat on it. Suddenly it hit her, to be sleeping in a strange & smelly place, surrounded by possibly insane strangers. And all this unexpected just this afternoon. She lay there, not yet daring to go to sleep, so her waking mind had to keep reliving all the horror of the day, then try to find foreshadowing in Richie's behavior of the last two years, & her dead baby started pulling at her too, & all the fear of this strange place. As she became so tired that her head started dreaming no matter if she kept her eyes open, the world twisted, & somehow became even darker.
“Smile, princess, this is the only night you stay here.” said an entirely too cheerful-
-Dark Angel. Oh no.
“Indeed, it's all looking up from here. One night in this dump, & you go on, & become a stronger person. Or you would, but of course we can't have that. Time to start again...”