Mary’s bad day

Mary Marvel streaked across the sky in a blur of red and white, answering the panicked cries echoing through the city square. The villain calling himself Gravitus—a towering figure wrapped in rippling distortions of warped gravity—had already torn chunks of pavement into the air like drifting islands. Mary hit him with everything she had, lightning crackling across her fists, but each strike seemed to fold harmlessly into the gravitational fields swirling around him. With a flick of his hand, Gravitus sent her crashing to the ground hard enough to rattle windows, leaving her dazed as civilians scrambled for cover behind overturned kiosks and shattered stone. When Gravitus lifted several fleeing bystanders into the air like puppets on invisible strings, Mary pushed herself up despite the pain, her heart pounding harder than any impact he’d dealt.