It will be surprising to a lot of you, but my mom actually reads what I write and enjoys it immensely.
When I asked her what she wanted for Mothers Day, she asked me to continue this (when I was already doing it so I made sure this is what she wanted).
She said yes, so I put on the afterburners and finished up this chapter for you guys (but mostly her to be honest. Priorities, you know.)
Happy Mother's Day!
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Jessica really couldn't believe her luck.
She
really really couldn't. She had thought that today was going to be like any other, and now she was heading to what was no doubt another crazy cult and she was going there with Greg Fucking Veder.
She had no idea if her luck was pretty good, or especially bad today.
Today had started exactly as she had planned. Wake up, breakfast, morning coffee, get ready for the day and finally experiment with her power. That had been her schedule for the past two weeks and, even after all that time, there was still so much to find out.
Jessica knew that wasn't normal.
After researching her power, the way that it would
observe what she directed it at and then tell her the results, she knew that she was definitely a Thinker, and probably one of the most powerful at that. Days of searching Parahumans Online, a site she had little interest in before her trigger, for any descriptions of how Thinkers used their abilities and liberal use of her power while reading any posts where Thinkers talked about their abilities gave her enough information to make a very important conclusion.
Thinker powers were either vague or had terrible drawbacks to them, neither of which seemed to describe Jessica's power. From Gallant, the local ward who could see emotions but only as colours, to Accord, the Bostonian villain who could make a plan to accomplish anything thst he thought of but he had crippling OCD in return. Jessica's power didn't act like that. It actually told her things, in terms that she could understand. It made suggestions and gave her conclusions based on what she was doing at the time. At first it terrified her when she really thought about it. Her powers actually
talked to her and she had been worried that it wasn't her powers at all, but instead being mastered by some sort of analytical Cape. But as the days went one, she just realised that her powers were just that good. Too good compared to almost everyone else's power. It felt like her power was the cheat version of every thinker's hard-won abilities. Other thinkers seemed to need to work alongside her abilities, her powers worked with her. She didn't even have a need to go out and use her powers for fighting like every other Parahuman seemed too. Instead, in return for the power to
Observe anything she wanted, she had one urge to fulfil.
Investigate what happened at Winslow. All of it.
It had freaked her out when her power had come out and told her exactly what it wanted her to do, what it was subconsciously urging her to do. However, she couldn't deny that, even without powers, she would want to know that too.
In this case, the difference between her with and without powers was merely the abilities to get answers.
And what answers they were!
It hadn't taken her and her power long to definitively prove out that the Demons, as Greg Veder of all people had named them, weren't some sort of parahuman creation like the news had claimed. The evidence for that, lay in the energy that they used.
Using her power, It had been all too easy to get back into the ruins of Winslow and find pieces of the Demons that had been killed that day. When the body was in enough pieces, it was inevitable that an overworked forensic team would miss quite a few of them. She guessed she should probably thank Greg for dismembering so many Demons, as morose as that sounds.
From those assorted, gruesome pieces, she had found the secret that laid with in each demon. It was a type of energy, that much was certain but it barely registered on any attempt to actually record it. It was as though the energy was on a different type of reality from her own…
…
Which kind of made sense considering the giant portal thing she had almost been fed to.
She had been a little grateful when her power had informed her that it was preventing her from feeling trauma from that little episode. She had seen some of her old friends after Winslow and she
never wanted to become a nervous wreck like they were.
After finding out the Demon Energy was from a different dimension entirely, it hadn't taken much to build a detector to find any more of that energy.
That is what had led her to the cults.
The thought of them brought a shiver down her spine. She shouldn't have been surprised to find that a city as violent as Brockton Bay had even more violently insane people but when she had first stumbled onto her first cult of the day, she could do nothing but stare, feeling like her shaking legs were going to collapse out from underneath her, as people in deceptively normal clothes sacrificed crying men, women and even a few that looked barely into their teens.
It was a cold comfort to know that her power couldn't stop her from feeling everything.
After she managed to keep her legs still for a moment, she did the only thing a reasonable person could do when faced with an arcane mass killing.
Call the PRT.
Within two minutes, armoured PRT vans had arrived and black armoured troops had raided the entire cult, arrested them and freed the, now extremely relieved captives. Her power told her from her hiding place that they were part of a new division of PRT troops dedicated to preventing another Event like Winslow, considering everyone still thought the Demons were the minions of some new villain.
So, she obliged them, and called them for the next six cults she had found.
And then at her most recent incident of 'teenager rats out murderous psychos to cops', she found Greg Veder of all people, looking like he had just waded through a slaughter house in a red and black jacket with a shirt depicting some Aleph anime and bloodspattered jeans and running shoes, staring almost obliviously as the PRT arrested the latest Cult leader that had found. The fact that her power told her that none of that same blood was his didn't help much.
Then, she had an idea and, before she could think her plan through, the scariest person she knew was now walking side by side with her as they went to the next place with Demon Energy. Her original plan had simply been to get Greg, the guy who had saved her before and pretty much single handedly killing the lunatics at Winslow, to do it again. Thankfully, from the barely noticeable bulge under his jacket, he had brought a shotgun.
Unfortunately, this threw up her anxiety by another five points at least.
She knew Greg from before the whole Demon thing. He had been a nerd with almost no social skills that used to be the collective chew toy of both the popular kids and the football team. Jessica was had been in the year after Greg, and she had seen him gain the reputation of "that weird nerdy freshman kid".
To past Jessica, Greg had merely been a reference that the girls around her used when trying to prove that the bullies that they wanted to date were 'manly' enough for them. She just couldn't reconcile the images of
that Greg with the blond teen that had ripped apart almost a hundred demons that day.
Was this what it was like to see a Carrie? One day, someone just Triggers, gets super powers and goes on to cause death and destruction on a ludicrous scale? No longer was Greg the boy that would keep to his small circle of friends and would have normally been too nervous to talk to her, if the way he spoke to that Herbert girl was any indication. No, now he was walking next to her on the side walk, filled with a sort of inner confidence that her power had helpfully attributed to apathy. It was almost like he didn't notice that she was a girl anymore.
Just like it was easy to forget that, upon some reflection, the boy next to her had a larger body count than some serial killers.
"So…" Greg began next to her, staring intently at the beeping Energy sensor in her hand as though trying to see all of it at once, "What is that?"
Her logical part of her brain instantly called her stupid when she heard that question and her breath immediately hitched. All of Jessica's anxiety about being next to an adolescent killing machine and the nervousness about her power came to the forefront of her mind, overpowering that small logical voice inside of her head with incoherent sounds of panic. She hadn't told anyone about her power. Her parents were distant enough from her that they barely noticed what she was doing in the basement, little alone whether she was okay after the Incident or not. What could she say to him? The thing in her hand was hardly something you could buy at a surplus store…
Thankfully, her experience in the cutthroat nature of high school politics allowed her to instinctively disguise her internal panic with a thoughtful expression, as though she was pondering what to say. Unfortunately, you couldn't ponder like that forever.
Energy Detector was built using publicly available scientific principles. Apathetic mannerisms have persisted in Greg's question with minor variation. Limited information should satisfy Greg's curiosity. Jessica's power cut through her mental panic
Could that even work? She thought back.
The device in your hand does not have the traits commonly associated with 'Tinkertech'. It has proven many times in human history that the fabrication of an inflated intelligence to the point of incomprehension is an efficient one.
Yeah, until they start to ask reasonable questions at least. She shot back.
Data indicates that such occurrences are rare.
"It's a…" Jessica began, completely trusting her power, despite her personal doubts. "…Detector for the energy the Demons use."
She felt her anxiety spike as she waited for a response. Was he going to suddenly become violent at the mention of Demons? Did he suspect her about having powers?
It seemed like forever until Greg nodded at her answer.
"I guess that makes sense." Greg continued. "Demons normally come from Hell and somehow eat souls or things like that. It makes sense that they would have Demon magic-"
"Magic?" Jessica interrupted, her power's voice echoing her own. "What are you talking about?"
Greg raised an eyebrow.
"It's always some sort of magic. You know, like in DmC? D&D? Quake?" Greg's expression got more and more frustrated at her confused expression.
Was I supposed to understand any of that?
Unclear.
Greg sighed as he seemed to be deep in thought.
"Diablo?" He tried again. "Doom? Almost any supernatural game?"
Diablo? Wait… Was he…?
"Are these video games you are talking about?"
Greg looked relieved as he gave her a nod.
"Greg. I don't think these 'Demons' work like they do in video games." Jessica's tone remaining incredulous. She
had played video games before, especially when she was younger, but nothing like whatever Greg had been referring to.
She didn't really like fantasy games.
"Come on. Of course, they do!" Greg insisted. "Summoning rituals, Cultists, Fireballs. There is no way that it isn't because of some sort of magic."
Jessica frowned, the part of her that had made her a reasonably popular girl was telling her that arguing with him wasn't going to get her anywhere.
But…
"All of that doesn't need magic to do." She retorted, her dislike of fantasy fiction brewing under the surface. "Cults happen all the time from people having weird ideas. Even that Fallen group is some sort of Endbringer cult of all things. And, a fireball doesn't need magic to be made either. Plenty of parahumans can do it, even Lung does it occasionaly."
"And Capes are no way essentially magic nonsense?" Greg replied with an incredulous look.
"Okay. Bad example." She admitted. "But there is still ways to do it without resorting to saying some stupid words and waving your hands."
Greg gave her an odd look.
Greg's expression indicates suspicion and incredulity. Likely your bias against fantasy settings has been on display and has reduced your relationship value.
"Magic isn't as stupid at that." Greg gave out a huff. "Most magic systems require intense study, or being part of some ancient bloodline, or having a genetic defect or something."
"Although…" Greg rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "That last one I mentioned was actually from that Aleph game, Dragon Age and it doesn't really count because Demons there are actually sentient pieces of emotion and not…"
All Jessica could do was stare as Greg fell into several long rants and explanations about why Dragon Age's magic system somehow did and didn't count as actual magic. She had honestly expected some sort of catty remark or snide insult when her power had told her that she had offended Greg, not him falling into a vocal debate with him playing both sides of the argument. Was this how it felt to talk to a nerd?
Previous observation and conclusion seems… incorrect.
You could say that again…
Previous obser-
Please don't.
It didn't take long for Greg to seemingly run out of steam, eventually just walking alongside Jessica with a thoughtful expression on his face. Now if only she could keep quiet long enough for-
"Magic is still dumb though," Jessica blurted out. "The idea that you could break the law of physics with a few words and handwaving is too unbelievable."
Goddammit Brain…
Greg sighed.
"You really don't like fantasy…" It was a statement. "What do you prefer then?"
"Sci-fi." Jessica proudly stated, her brain's latent anxiety unable to catch up with her mouth. "I grew up on Starcraft and Star Trek as a kid."
While the small socially conditioned part of Jessica was being mortified, Greg rolled his eyes.
"So you prefer an organism that can flick his fingers and change reality, just because, but can't stand dudes who study really hard to do the same thing."
"Hey," Jessica humphed. "I never said I like Q's ability to just destroy all reason or logic. I like him because he is funny. Besides, other Sci-fi doesn't have magic."
"Oh yes, because the Psionic powers the Overmind had to literally resurrect Cerebrates, through the POWER OF THE MIND, is clearly following the law of Energy Conservation."
And so the discussion continued as they walked to where the detector was pointing them, Jessica finding it easier and easier to ignore that voice in her head trying to remind her that it would be smart to be scared of a guy like Greg.
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Christian Mortimer stared at the place where his coffee table used to be.
Instead of the mahogany and glass table, the table where his Dad used to rest his feet from the seat of a nearby couch and the table that he had kissed his wife on, there rested a scene from a horror film.
In the centre of the living room lay a glowing symbol that vaguely looked like a pentagram. That in itself wasn't the horrific part.
No, the horrific part was the fact the dozens of people who had been killed ontop of it.
As Christian watched the cloaked men and women around him chant as they dragged another crying victim to the center of the symbol, he thought back to how it had all gone wrong.
It had all begun in a hospital, on the day that his father had been almost eviscerated by a gang of ABB.
The family had fallen on hard times, trying to pay for the expensive surgeries and doctors that had made sure that his dad had kept on living. A mere month from that accident, his mother had been killed working as a Sales representative in a building that one of Purity of the E88's beams had collapsed. It had turned out that it was an accident as well, having been a missed shot against Glory Girl of that New Wave hero group.
They had apologised, but that was a cold comfort to the Mortimer family who had lost the most caring mother that they could have ever wished for.
Immediately, the patriarch of the family had fallen into a deep depression and, four months later, Christian's father had commited suicide by ganger, purposely attacking a group of E88 thugs in the night leaving Christian and his sister as the last members of their family in the bay.
That was three years ago. Three years of sadness and trying to ger by on what income a teenager/young adult could get to support a sixteen year old girl.
That had been his life until three weeks ago. He had been so busy he had failed to notice his sister join the Merchant's as a drug pusher to try and help with the salary issues. The first that he had heard of it was when he had been called as her emergency contact, just as she was dying from an infection from a crossbow bolt that had been shot through her shoulder.
Christian had been shattered, his family was gone, chewed up by the shittness of the Bay and leaving him with no friends, no family, no one to care if he joined them.
He had almost done so, until he had met Jack Wells.
The Charismatic man had asked him why he was willing to throw away his life when the Bay was so close to salvation? Why would he do such a thing if he could see his family again?
Like that, he had him. The idea that he could make everything right, that everything could go back to just having a happy family… It made him think that he would do anything to get them back.
Until today that is.
He had a bad feeling when a truck had pulled up to his front lawn that morning and a young teen, introducing himself as Alex, had gotten out of the truck and opened the back with a few familiar members of the Cult.
He had been shocked into speechlessnsess when they had started pulling at least a dozen bound and gagged people from the back of the truck.
It was all he could do but watch as the sudden visitors in his home had overturned his lounge, drew some odd symbols with knives in the floor and walls and then begun killing their captives on top of them, somehow getting them to glow a sickly red.
This wasn't what he wanted. Jack had gave him the job of a recruiter, pitching the idea of the cult to people and helping them see the truth that Jack had shown him. But no matter what his very soul was screaming at him about the sheer wrongness of the ritual slaughter, he couldn't bring himself to stop it.
Jack was right. Everyone in Earth Bet was already damned, no matter who you were. With more and more parahumans running around, heroes and villians, the innocent people in the middle were going to die or get corrupted by whatever made the parahumans in the first place, his family being the prime example for Christian.
A small part of him was okay with the killings from that point of view. It was better to die for a good purpose rather than slaughtered thoughtlessly by one of those caped monsters.
So all he could do was stand there as the final sacrifice, a young homeless woman crying into the rag stuffed into her mouth, was about to be stabbed by that kid Alex, who was raising his knife while saying words that Christian had no hope of getting his mouth to even repeat, little alone understand.
The young woman let out a muffled screen has Alex, whose knife had been raised high above the kneeling captive, began to bring it down.
And then he immediately froze, as a large bang sounded from the house's back door.
"What was that?!" Another cultist asked, newbie looking around nervously as the eyes on his teenaged face threatened to pop out of his skull.
Alex's eyes immediately widened.
"Oh fuck…" Alex breathed out, his horrified blood splattered face confusing Christian. Suddenly, Alex bent down, made some quick adjustments to the symbol below him with his knife and sprinted towards the corridor leading to the front door.
"What the hell are you doing!?" One of the old members of the cult yelled after the retreating teen, his wrinkeled face sporting a confused but angry frown.
Alex didn't reply, only turning around briefly and gesturing to the confused captive before continuing his sprint out the front door.
Suddenly, with a cry of pain, the young woman's neck exploded, throwing what looked like boiling blood all around her as the circle took on a bright red glow, almost blinding compared to what it had looked like earlier.
Then, as the captive's corpse hit the glowing circle and disintegrated, the kitchen door, just towards the back of the lounge opposite from the front of the house, slammed open. Christian was shocked to see that the person standing in the door was only a young, blonde teenage boy, a red and black jacket framing a shirt with some sort of cartoon on it along with blood-spattered jeans and running shoes.
The look of fury on the boy's face in the light of the glowing symbols had such an intensity that it shocked the half a dozen cultists in the living room.
"Wha-" That was all the kid's closest to the doorway managed to say before the intruder raised his shotgun to the head and fired. With a massive boom, the adolescent cultist's blood joined that of the sacrifices' on his clothes as the shotgun reduced his head to mush. The gruesome death managed to get blood on his killer's face, the blood emphasising the eyes as it reflected the sinister light of the sacrificial circle as though they were glowing themselves.
By the time the dead kid's body was falling to the ground, his dirty 9mm pistol flying from his pocket at the sheer force, the rest of the Lord's Faithfull managed to get their wits about them.
Unfortunately, even that was far too late.
Christian watched as the blond killer ran towards another one of the cultists, a twenty-two-year-old former dockworker named Johnny in bloodsplattered overalls, his fist reared back for a punch. Christian expected the killer to act like anyone would, stop and carefully aim the fist for maximum effect.
He didn't.
The boy's speed was shocking, his fist colliding with Johnny's face before he could react to the sudden charge. The sound of splintering bone and snapping tendon ran through the air as Johnny's face snapped back from the sheer force of the fist, his neck snapping back further than it could go and blood exploading from the man's shattered jaw.
Fear filled Christian as the blond killer didn't slow down, charging to the cultist behind Johnny, A middle-aged former E88 member who Christian had recruited last week, and launching his fist at the man's midsection. With the sound of rending flesh and broken ribs, the killer's fist burrowed into the man's chest with the force of the punch.
What the fuck? Was the summary of the fear filled thoughts that ran through Christian's mind.
How the hell did he do this? Was this kid a parahuman?
With a jolt of realisation, he realised that the boy who had just killed three people nearly effortlessly had to be a parahuman. Punches couldn't snap necks or eviscerate people after all.
So as the parahuman set about pulling his fist from the dying man's ribcage, Christian felt a rage overcome him. In front of him was the one of the things that had caused all his misery, one of the creatures that his cult was dedicated to destroying. Looking around, he could see the two remaining cultists felt the same way, if their faces were any indication.
With a snarl, Christian felt his fear bleed away as he reached into his pocket and drew the revolver that he had tucked away there that morning. It used to belong to his father before he died and it was one of the keepsakes that Christian had kept with him to remind himself of why he was doing this.
It was only fitting that he would take revenge with his father's prized possession and, as the beast's fist finally came free of his victim's chest, Christian aimed and fired.
The gun's aim was true and a bullet slammed into the beast's shoulder, releasing a spray of blood out of the newly made whole in its jacket as the arm holding the gun spasmed from the wound. It's blazing eyes turned towards him, pure fury written on the deceptively human face. With a furious yell, the other two cultists charged the beast, wielding their sacrificial knives with furious grips as Christian was about to fire again.
Unfortunately, it wasn't meant to be.
Quicker than Christian could see, the beast raised its shotgun in his direction and fired it one handed.
It was all Christian could do to scream as he felt the pellets rip through his torso, dropping the revolver from his nerveless hand. As he collapsed against the wall behind him, it felt as though everything was in slow motion.
The aged cultist yelled as he came close to the beast, stabbing his knife forward with all his weight. The beast caught the man's arm, stopping it completely as it dropped its shotgun and snapping the man's bone from its grip alone. The knife fell from the limp hand as its owner was then punched in the head with a sickening snap. The beast then grabbed the falling knife out of the air with a bit of a fumble and, faster than Christian could see, stabbed it into the neck of the other cultist, a woman who had been saved from slavery at an ABB brothel just four months prior.
But Christian's attention wasn't on the death of his two acquaintances.
As Christian slowly slid to the floor while the Beast started killing the other cultists, the sacrificial circle brightened and pulsed. Then, in a flash of red light that forced Christian's broken body to shudder, a… Monster appeared.
It was almost humanoid. It looked like an immensely large man with odd feet and only four digits on each hand. Its grey skin covered its extremely large muscles and its face looked like some sort of eyeless skull draped tightly with skin. It was huge and towered everyone there.
Christian watched it notice the beast just as the poor cultist woman started to cough blood though the new hole in her throat, and it Roared.
Almost like a flash, the monster had charged the Beast and punched forward with a flaming fist. The Beast braced itself, hoping to take the punch.
It didn't.
As the Monster hit the Beast's chest, Christian heard the Beast's ribcage collapse as it was lifted off its feet, the force of the punch launching back into the kitchen.
Christian's feeling of grim satisfaction lasted only until the Monster looked towards him and snarled. With a sense of dread, Christian watched as the monster took a few massive steps towards him and raised its foot above his head.
With a choked scream, Christian felt his head be crushed into paste under the monster's clawed foot.
Then he woke up to a burning sky.
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Coughing up blood wasn't an activity I had any experience with,
Then again, neither was getting my ribcage crushed by a demon's fist but I digress.
As I tried to take another breath, I hacked as even more blood left my punctured lungs. The feeling of my ribs poking through my lungs was extremely unpleasant.
Despite my seemingly mortal wounds, my rage hadn't decreased at all since I found the cultists around their sacrificial circle, their latest victim's body disintegrating into the glowing symbol carved into the house's living room floor. With the rage I already felt by just being near demon stuff, it had been the straw to break the camel's back and I felt my rage turn murderous.
I had killed all the cultists in that room, and I don't regret a single thing about that. The circle erupting into a bright light of a Demon teleport made me regret not coming sooner and interrupting the whole thing before it finished.
I regretted it even more when the Hell Knight had crushed my chest in one blow. As I knelt on the floor, hacking up blood on the kitchen floor, I puzzled over just how it did that. Hell Knights had punched me before and none of them had hurt me this badly. Was it because the ones at school were lesser ones and this was a stronger variant? Were they levelled demons and I was beating level tens but this one is a level thirty or something? Or was it something to do with the fact that it was the only demon there?
I am on my hands and knees on the tiled floor of the kitchen, puking my literal guts out. Why isn't it trying to finish me off?
A soft scream and crunch answered that. I really couldn't feel sorry for the unfortunate cultist but I knew that it really sucked to be teamkilled as well. The sound of the cultist dying reminded me that I didn't have time to sit here with a collapsed chest cavity. Thankfully, I could feel my ribs slowly moving out of my lungs and back into what I felt was the proper position for them, I couldn't tell really as feeling ones ribs wasn't really an everyday activity.
I also just noticed that I get very sarcastic when I am in great pain. Good to know such relevant information.
I looked towards the towering demon, eyeing its slow approach from the edge of the living room of the house, enjoying my suffering before it likely was planning to kill me. I mentally cursed. I couldn't fight like this and, despite my paradoxically calm rage, my chest was healing far too slowly for it to finish before the Hell Knight decided to take this seriously.
"Dammit." I breathe out, thankful that my lungs could suddenly inflate as the last bit of my ribs left them but rather put out by the fact that none of my ribs were back to being unbroken. The demon was only a few steps away now and I had nothing else to help me against it, having thoughtlessly dropped my shotgun in the living room earlier.
Not that it would do much, considering I had used both shots in the thing.
I couldn't even ask Jessica for help. When we had arrived to this place, we had actually found ourselves behind the house through sheer circumstance. Having the real life equivalent to regenerating health, I had suggested going in the back door while she waited outside. That meant that, as long as the Demon and I were inside, she couldn't do anything about it. Not that I would want her to, of course. It didn't look like she actually had a gun on her and, knowing just how tough I was to a normal person, I couldn't help but think that she would just get one-shotted by the Hell Knight if she did fight it. Kind of like if a zergling tried to bite a deployed siege tank.
I figured, for someone whose first game was apparently Starcraft, she would appreciate the analogy even if she would yell at me for fighting a demon like this alone. She just felt like that kind of person.
My thoughts paused as a massive shadow fell over me, the Hell Knight's impressive height blocking out the light from the fluorescent bulbs above. I could tell that the Hell Knight was doing its best to smile as it slowly raised its arms in the air, its hands joined together in a combined fist. It thought I was helpless from the pain and false fear on my expression. It was almost right, I was near helpless.
But not for long and I wasn't scared of it, all I needed to do was to time it right.
I was only
Angry.
As it brought its fists down at a blinding speed, I pushed off with both my arms, my enhanced anger strength more than enough to throw me clear from the demons attack and further into the cramped kitchen, neatly between the kitchen sink, filled with all manner of dirty dishes, and the large fridge opposite it. I landed on my back, watching as the Knight's fists sunk into the tiled floor, spreading a spiderweb of cracks around the area of impact.
It turned to look at me, rage clear in the tightening of its jaw and low rumbling growl from its throat. As the last pain from my chest faded along with a click of refusing ribs, I gave the Demon a bloodthirsty smile.
And then I let go.
As though by Instinct, I smacked my fists on the floor with my fists, the force of the impact obeying Newton's third law and coming back into me, lifting me up high enough for me to stand.
Any other time, I would have been gushing about how cool that move was, and how I needed to keep practicing it to Anime levels of polish. Now, I could only feel my need to
Kill this thing.
To Rip it apart with my bare HANDS!
I launched myself at the Demon, my speed just being enough to shatter its notions of me being pathetic as I striked my fist against its jaw. It staggered upright, recovering from my attack quickly and launching a quick fist of its own towards my torso.
Instead of being an idiot and trying to tank a bodybuilding demon, I dodged to the side fast enough to miss it entirely. Then I punched it in the chest.
Again. And Again. And Again.
My fists were faster than they ever had been as I metted out my rage-filled combo. A couple of punches and a dodge of quick retaliatory strike was an easy routine to fit into. Each of my punches shifted the Hell Knight slightly, meaning that its inevitable punch or kick was a lot easier to dodge. However, despite my strength, I was doing little to it. But it was a little damage over a long time vs no damage at all and odds like that won boss fights.
Plus, I don't think it is called cheesing if you do it in real life.
Unfortunately, the Hell Knight was not a video game character. I felt myself lose my balance as the Hell Knight used its forearm to block my latest punch and pushed back against it, forcing my fist away from me and forcing myself to stumble.
Then, I felt my neck erupt in pain as the Knight's right hand closed around it in a steel like grip and lifted me bodily from the floor. It raised its left hand into a fist, glowing with energy, likely going to try and cave my skull in with a massive strike to my face.
I didn't let that happen.
Almost as soon as my feet left the ground, my fists started lashing out, landing blow after blow on the demon's head. I saw its head snap back slightly after each punch, spewing demon blood from its jaw slightly denting the skull and adding more bruises and cuts that now littered the demon's body.
With a roar of pain and rage, it threw me to the opposite side of the room and I let out a grunt of pain as my back struck a kitchen counter, splintering the wood as I crashed trough the cupboard doors on the bottom part.
I could feel a mild pain down my spine but it wasn't crippling so I quickly scrambled to my feet again, ending up right next to the fridge. The Demon charged so I did the most sensible thing possible and slammed the fridge door in its face.
It broke immediately, not built to withstand a charging Hell Knight or a near super human teen using it as a bludgeon, but it got the job done as the Demon yelled in pain after colliding with the steel door, reeling back and clutching its head.
I didn't stop. Wielding the broken door in my hands, I raised it and brought it down on the demon again and again with a yell of rage, the sound of bones cracking as it impacted the demon's blocking forearms, even as I drove it to the ground. Then I almost lost my balance when the demon grabbed the door, tugging it out of my grip and ripping it in two with a snarl.
I recovered instantly and reached over to the other side, towards the sink. The Hell Knight growled as I started launching dirty plates and glasses at it, the flying ceramic and glass doing nothing to it. That was fine, I was looking for something else. Just as my hand closed around the handle of a dirty steak knife, I had to quickly move away from the Knight's falling fist as it tried to decapitate me. I watched as the Demon's fist barely missed my head and collided with the sink, crumpling the metal around it's impact and destroying the remaining plates and glasses in that sink.
Having found what I was looking for, I didn't care and simply turned around and stabbed the bloody steak knife into the Hell Knight's chest. The meat was tough, but my strike had enough force to overcome it and a spurt of demon blood was released as the knife sunk into its shoulder.
It yelled in pain and it took a step back, glaring me all the way.
I tried to pull my knife back, it didn't move. I tried again and it only moved slightly.
My eyes widened as I realised that it was stuck there, and I was just standing there trying to pull it out.
In a fight that relied on me trying to dodge every attack, it was suicide.
Then the left part of my face exploded in pain as I went flying from a quick backhand by the Hell Knight.
Right into the kitchen window.
Comparably, the pain of breaking through the reinforced glass that most people in Brockton Bay had in their windows was significantly less that what felt to be a dislocated jaw and a nearly cracked left temple.
Landing on the grass in the back yard of the house felt like a pillow compared to those two.
As I lay there, I felt…sleepy but thankfully I was still very
angry and my desire to
KILL that
PATHETIC SLAVE WARRIOR was enough to keep me awake.
"Holy shit! Are you okay!?" I heard Jessica in the distance, but I ignored it. I had to focus on
Killing now.
As I struggled to my knees, I felt the side of my head. I gasped as pain erupted when my hand touched my temple but less than just a second ago. I had read somewhere that you fell unconscious if someone hit you there hard enough.
That meant that I'd be off balance for a while at least.
As I stumbled to my feet, a slight feeling of nausea breaking through the constant
rage I felt and I knew that I was unfortunately correct.
I turned my head groggily as the house's back door was broken down by a single kick from the irate Hell Knight.
I prepared myself as the Hell Knight stalked directly towards me at a brisk pace. The fight had certainly taken its toll on it as I could see all the cuts, bruises and knife sticking out of its shoulder. It wasn't enough, this wasn't going to end until I
KILLED it. I stayed where I was, trying to clear my head.
Zeeeeeeiiiii. Bing
What is that? My mind absently thought. It sounded like something being charged.
Fiitch
My eyes widened as I saw a bright flash of light lance from somewhere behind me and strike the Hell Knight in the chest, staggering it. When the light cleared from my vision, I saw a sizeable hole in the Demon's torso, as though something had punched right through it.
My head spun around and I saw Jessica, her backpack had been lain on the ground, open and some sort of thing that looked like a jury rigged space rifle was in her hands.
Honestly, it looked more like a wireframe than anything else. It looked like a piece of metal customised to be some sort of stock. Coils exposed to the open air surrounded where the barrel for the rifle was supposed to go while on the end closest to her was some sort of cube box that looked like it came from sort of those brand new miniature radios that they were selling at the Boardwalk. It also looked like the sides of the radio had been stripped away and the whole thing was connected to the coils on the barrel. As Jessica placed a sharpened piece of metal in the middle of the barrel, past the coils, I could barely spot a flickering red light in that box.
As soon as the sharpened spike had been placed, she aimed at the Hell Knight again, her face a mixture of determination and being scared shitless I think while her gun made the same odd charging noise.
The whole process had only taken a second and a half and the Knight barely had enough time to roar in defiance when she fired again, imbedding another spike into the demon's chest with a flash of light. This time, the Hell Knight doubled over in pain, its breathing laboured, trying to recover from the shots.
It was at that moment that gun sparked and started fizzing out.
I cursed, I couldn't rely on this thankful Deus Ex Machina to finish it off.
But that was fine,
I wanted to kill it anyway.
With a yell of anger, I ran up to the demon and grabbed the knife in it's shoulder.
I braced my foot against the demon and used it to pull out the knife, the bloodied instrument coming free with a pained grunt from the Knight. Then I grabbed its lower jaw with my offhand, pulling it as open as I could.
Then I stabbed the knife through the roof in its mouth.
It stood there for a second, its blood leaking down my arm from its fatal wound, and then it collapsed lifelessly.
In an instant, my rage disappeared, and I too collapsed, almost as lifelessly.
I don't know how long I lay there, exhausted and staring off into the darkening sky above me, next to the dead Hell Knight.
Eventually I saw Jessica stand above me.
"You Idiot!" She yelled at me, concern clear on her face. "Why didn't you say that there was a Grey Demon there?"
"Didn't know." I simply answered, too tired for longer responses. "Found Cultists at first. Knight came later."
"What happened to the cultists?"
"Dead." I don't know why, but I saw her wince at my answer.
"Then why didn't you lead the grey out here so we could work together?"
"Didn't know that you had some sort of Super crossbow."
She remained silent at that, and I took the opportunity to close my eyes.
=====================================
Eventually, Jessica and I had to eventually talk about the cleanup of this whole mess.
Because apparently, even if they were cultists who were actually trying to bring about Hell on Earth, again, I had technically committed mass murder. I was significantly less worried about that than Jessica was, especially after she saw the bodies.
It was definite proof that I was still pretty weird, even compared to survivors of kidnapping, Demon attacks and attempted sacrifice. Although, Jessica seemed to get powers from Winslow, so I guess she shouldn't be really used as a comparison.
Capes are always a bit weird after all.
For awhile, it seemed inevitable that the PRT, who Jessica insisted on calling, were going to notice the immense carnage and determine that someone had come in and killed them all as they summoned 'a dangerous Tinker-made creature last seen in the Winslow attack'.
That was, until I rememberd the Demon indulging in teamkilling that injured cultist. After Jessica confirmed that all their deaths could be interpreted as a fight between the Demon and some unfortunate misses on the part of shotgun wielding cultists, I dragged the Demon back into the house and dumped it into the kitchen and arranged it in such a way that indicated that it had died there.
My plan had even accounted for the fact that a normal person could't really use a fridge door as a weapon through making it look like the Demon did it.
All I had to do was desecrate a cultist corpse with one of the pieces of the door, which I didn't really find to distasteful oddly enough but kept it quick for Jessica's sake, and drop it as though it had been thrown away in frustration. Hopefully, the PRT would think that a Brute Parahuman had helped fight the Hell Knight, which I cemented by forcefully dislocating the dead demon's jaw, and was eventually killed whereupon the survivors bailed, which the broken back door suggested.
With all that done, all I had was a hastily arranged crimescene, my empty shotgun, nauseus girl outside waiting for me to leave and way more blood on me than I used to have.
Meaning I was absolutely drenched in it and I shouldn't be here when the PRT arrived.
So, after leaving the PRT an anonymous tip, Jessica and I left for the bus stop, Hoping, to take the late bus home while Jessica was silently accusing my plan of being bad.
Honestly, I didn't really see the badness. With my blood-splattered red and black jacket I looked like a very active E88 member and Jessica looked like some sort of bystander or even a nervous girlfriend dragged along to illegal things. This normally would have been a problem but as the suburbs were E88 territory, it was a common occurrence from what I had seen. I don't know why I got banned from PHO for pointing that out though.
When we eventually reached the bus stop, I sat down on the completely deserted bench with a sigh.
It had been a long day.
"Thank you." Jessica suddenly spoke up, having been completely silent on the way there. "I couldn't have done this without you and…" she paused.
"No worries." I cut her off. "I came here to do this anyway. If anything, you saved my life today."
Jessica's eyes widened.
"NoNoNo." She quickly denied. "I barely helped. My railgun broke after the second shot. If I had been there alone, I would have died today" Jessica said somberly, her gaze now firmly on the floor with what I saw as a pout on her face.
I nodded. I figured it had to be some sort of railgun. I didn't know how they worked but the one in Quake kind of made the same sounds and the same lightshow.
"Maybe." I replied. "But if you hadn't shot at it, it would have ripped me apart from my head injury. If I had fought it alone, I definitely would have died."
And what a sobering thought that was. I wasn't a proud or even really confident person but I had underestimated that Hell Knight. I had thought that It was like the others I had faced, an annoynce but manageable.
My crushed ribcage told me how dumb I was. I needed to take them more seriously. In gaming terms, Winslow was my tutorial level and I couldn't rely on badass conservation to win.
I needed training.
I sighed. It was going to be a lot of work but if it was going to save my life it would be worth it. I needed to be able to shoot properly, I needed to be able to fight with my fists better because apparently I
really liked doing that. I wasn't going to be a whiny shonen protagonist and lose a fight before I started training. No, I was going the RPG route, where a trash mob was way too hard to take down so now its time to power level.
I broke off my thoughts to look at Jessica as she sat next to me. Could she help me get better? We just met but I enjoyed talking to her earlier even if she had some sort of grudge against magic systems.
Seriously, How does someone play Starcraft but not know Diablo though…
I started to say something but stopped as soon as I saw that she had that far away look on her face. I quickly figured out the entire world ceased to exist for her when she did that, even had to drag her back on the sidewalk during our earlier walk.
"Sorry, Am I interrupting something?"
I looked up at whoever was speaking, seeing a familiar beard and ratty clothes standing infront of the bench I was sitting at.
"Hey," I replied, mildly suspicious. "You are that guy from earlier. I thought you lived a few blocks away."
The homeless man smiled.
"No, I was just passing through really. Checking on how things were going and all that. I'm far more interested about you though." He said, eyeing my bloody clothes.
"Yeah, I guess you could say that."
He tutted.
"No need to be modest, Greg. I'm sure that crashing Alex's little party will get that stupid little imp to actually step up now that he has a proper host. Although, I don't particularly blame you though. The warehouse was supposed to be your welcoming present but some fuckers can't read a book properly."
"Wha-" I didn't have a chance for my shocked mind to reply as a large blade of red energy suddenly erupted from above the man's wrist and stabbed it into my stomach area.
I gasped in pain, the burning of my insides preventing me from screaming while Jessica did what I wanted to do, the sudden violence startling her from her trance.
"Getting a suspicious address from a PHO post? I was surprised when you actually took the bait, never believing that the person ruining my plans, years in the making, were ruined by a fucking fifteen year old." The man's voice became deeper, more sinister and… digital as he spoke.
With no effort at all, the man raised his arm blade, raising me into the air as I felt my ribcage start to scorch from the blades touch.
Then the man changed… As though he was some sort of corrupted image, he dissolved into thousands of fading corrupted pixels.
As they faded away, it revealed something that could only come from the depths of hell. It was armour, with the blackest scorched steel I had ever seen, created in such a way that it almost looked organic. The arm holding me aloft was now armoured in a spiked, black gauntlet with some sort of energy projector that generated the blade.
The man in the Hellsuit stared at me, bright red-orange lenses staring into my own eyes.
"My name is Micheal. You have fucked up this world's salvation from crystal worms. Prepare to go to Hell you fuck." He said. A quiet rage filling every word.
============================================
AN: Hey, did you guys know that this story has a TV TROPES PAGE!
I recently found out, and it made my day.
Also, I hope you enjoyed the chapter!
