Sloan tightened her fist. Like a thing of paper, the gem inside her grasp cracked.

The Terminatrix's eye went wide. Her hands and body hung half-raised, and then dropped into the snow.

Her costume, the sleek black bodysuit, disappeared. The mask, fallen some ways away, disappeared also. Instead, ragged scraps of patchwork cloth flapped in the wind against the Terminatrix's body.

Sloan opened her fist. Black dust trickled out and spiraled into the storm.

Some black specks remained in her palm. Had she... had she expected to crush it completely? Did she have that much power? When she tried to break Omaha's gem in Williston, she had failed... But her own gem was much more powerful now. She was much more powerful now.

(Chapter 25)