She-Hulk: Gamma Glamour by Jade Gretz

https://www.deviantart.com/jadegretzai/art/She-Hulk-Gamma-Glamour-1302197809#image-1

She-Hulk: Gamma Glamour ANIMATION

Marrowglass

By the time Jennifer Walters reached the funeral home, the city had already decided to lie about the dead.

The wake was being held in a chapel that smelled of lilies, varnish, and old rain. The coffin sat beneath a chandelier dimmed to a respectful bruise. Two dozen mourners in black leaned over their programs and whispered into gloves. No one cried. The silence had the polished quality of something paid for.

Jennifer stood at the back in a charcoal suit, glasses on, hair pinned with deliberate care. She had come as a lawyer, which meant her face wore reason, and as She-Hulk, which meant her body held back a storm with the courtesy of a locked jaw. She had been following the city’s crime syndicates for three months, and each time she tugged at one thread, another would glide away in the dark with a smile.

At the front of the chapel, the corpse of Tomas Vale had a silver coin placed on each eyelid.

Jennifer frowned. She knew that coin.

A voice at her elbow said, “You recognize the family jewelry?”

She turned. It was the Black Cat, all lacquered mischief and midnight confidence, a black veil hung from a hat that ought to have looked ridiculous and somehow did not. She smiled as if funerals were invitations and crimes were refreshments.

“I recognize a ritual,” Jennifer said. “I do not recognize why you invited yourself.”

“Because,” Felicia Hardy replied, “when a city starts burying its secrets with silver, somebody stylish has to notice.”

Before Jennifer could answer, a broad shadow slid from behind a marble pillar. Luke Cage’s expression was carved from patience and streetlight. Beside him, Daredevil stood still as a held breath, head tilted slightly, listening to the room like it might confess. Jessica Jones arrived last, leather jacket open, expression suggesting she had already met every bad idea in town and disliked them equally.

Jennifer exhaled once. “So this is a team.”

Luke gave a small shrug. “You got a better word?”

“Interference,” Jessica said.

Daredevil’s face tightened. “Someone in this room is lying hard enough to taste.”

Felicia’s grin sharpened. “That narrows it down to everyone with expensive shoes.”

A mournful note sounded from the chapel organ. No organist sat there. The keys moved by themselves, one slow chord at a time, as if the building were remembering music rather than playing it.

The widow at the front began to sob.

Then she stopped.

Her mouth stayed open, but no sound came out. Her eyes rolled white. She gripped the coffin as if trying to hold herself in place. Jennifer was moving before anyone else understood. She crossed the aisle in three strides, but the widow had already sagged to her knees, fingers scraping the wood.

“Back,” Jennifer said.

Too late. From beneath the woman’s veil, a thin black tendril rose like a wet ribbon and disappeared into the coffin’s keyhole.

Luke lunged. Daredevil ripped the lid open. The corpse of Tomas Vale had not decayed in the expected way. The chest cavity was packed with pale flowers, each petal veined with something that pulsed darkly, like blood learning a new language. The silver coins on his eyes had melted into his skin.

Jessica swore softly. “That is disgusting on at least four levels.”

Felicia leaned over the coffin and murmured, “And yet, weirdly floral.”

The widow let out a single keening cry and collapsed. Jennifer caught her before her skull struck the floor.

Then the chapel doors slammed shut.

Every candle in the room extinguished at once.

Darkness dropped over them with the weight of a lid.

From the back pews came the sound of wet, synchronized breathing.

Jennifer changed first. Her skin flushed emerald; her frame expanded, bones and muscle rewriting themselves with a sound like a page torn too slowly. The suit burst and remade itself around power. She-Hulk rose in the dark, her eyes bright with rage and alarm.

“Stay behind me,” she said.

Jessica laughed once, humorless. “That’s a lovely thing to hear in a locked room full of nightmare traffic.”

A voice answered from the darkness, smooth as oiled silk. “You are all behind schedule.”

Lanterns flared. Their light revealed no men in the pews, only mannequins dressed as mourners, heads turned toward the coffin. Each had a real human mouth stitched into its face, the lips
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