Chapter 3.
What Happens When it all Starts Over?
"If you look closely at a camera's lens, you'll see the reflection of a godly champion. That godly champion- is YOU! You can be the Greek mythological character of security kiosks!"
-Writ 103 of Surveillance.
There was a ladder of power position that was below the understanding of mortals- it symbolized how adept you, and your underlings- were at what you did.
In a hegemony that disregarded morals, life, preservation, emotions, and care for the individual- lords that ruled over pockets of influence sprung up like wildfire, under the jurisdiction of a greater leadership above all of them.
Assets to a lord ranged from living servants, items, cults, and even dedicated legions- all the way to simplicities, such as nothing at all.
Lords warred with each other in the underground campaigns across the globe that had been waged for centuries. They formed alliances. They formed conflicts between each other. They formed grudges. Brotherhoods. Respects. Rages. Disputes. Agreements.
In the many generations before man, it was commonplace for their kind to butcher each other over the smallest infraction.
But now, in the new age, the dawn of what would be a reclaimed physical reality- they had mostly been dwindled over the endless infighting, lack of desire to continue the fight, and of course- the occasional hunters.
Hunters, were- in the modern day -the biggest problem they could come across.
Hunters were unique people that had been blessed with some unnatural skill, or some unnatural determination.
Hunters were the reason some very influential lords had been felled, much as their kin and fellows would never admit before death to themselves.
For as long as humanity and the darker beings had lived in the same period of time, Hunters had been born.
Luckily though, for their kind, there hadn't been a hunter in around two hundred years, prosperity intertwined with their plans and their assets, and lords were gaining power more than waning.
For a brief time it seemed... fleeting, the resistance of man.
-Then, another hunter was created. Someone who refused to accept.
Now, several freelancers had been destroyed- a lord had been destroyed -and the underground 'Community' if possible to coin as such,-was disturbed by the success this mere mortal struck their ranks with.
Word and knowledge spread quickly here.
And one of the first lords to hear of the new incursion, was Allas'Tee'Vinthrukrem.
-Or, since formalities were quite extended...
Flintlock.
Flintlock had heard the tales of the persistent little rodent that was running around killing all of them in stealthy hit-and-runs. The member of his kind that had been destroyed by the human had obviously set off one of those unique nerves, now there was ANOTHER hero dedicating his life to their extermination.
...Perfect. Really perfect.
He had to give it to the mortal, he had bravery on his side.
Where the prior slain in this corner of the world had intellect and strength, numbers and speed, Flintlock had brute force, better numbers, and all those prior mentioned attributes combined, with a side of some modest appreciation for overconfidence.
The mistake the lord before him had made was underestimating his prey- and many of Flintlock's peers thought that his own handicap, was of an opposite dilemma- because Flintlock made it seem like he over-estimated his enemies.
Flintlock hadn't much authority beforehand his newest ranking... But if there was one thing his kin could not pry from his reputation, it was that he knew how to kill.
"-Why'd we have to hole up in some dump like this?"
"Oh, my apologies, I'll be sure to rent out a hotel next time."
"That would be... Pleasurable."
"Mm. And so would the destruction by our Master when we exposed our identity to the apes."
"Bah... It'd be worth it..."
"Please be quiet... I'm trying to focus on the important things. You know? The things that mean the better for OUR skins?"
Turning on four padded heels, Flintlock crossed two bulky arms made of layered steel, plastics, wrapping cables- over rounded slabs of metal that made his bulky torso.
Suspended by a ball-jointed plat of wires, gears, and a tri-fold of pistons on both flanks- four legs sprouted from smaller sphere-joint connections, spread out in a arachnid oriented stance to support his upper half.
Flintlock's long, reptilian head of mechanical build was augmented with machinery parts that had become 'Grown' into his forehead, and down the base of his serpentine neck over the course of time he'd been material again.
His former address had been to a humanoid figure of gravely stone- three roughly-shaped, uneven chunks of rock making a torso and hips- copper pipes twisted together in the tens to form thighs sprouted from the bottom chin of the rock-waist.
The pipes dug into two cones of rock that made the being's ankles and feet- a head that looked like a warped section of coned metal was driven through with two uneven gashes with red eyes in their blackest centers.
Jagged shoulders made from hundreds of stacked, twisted-together strips, plates, and planes of metals formed large cylindrical expunging points for two thin arms of melded copper pipes towards elbow joints of meshed, dull-red industrial valves.
Finally, in a branch from that- two fists assembled from stacked rocks formed the three-fingered body parts made of cracked, gray earth of the thing's fists, one covered with vehicular hub-caps over each knuckle.
This creature, was Flintlock's right-hand, if you will.
The muscle, his name was Shrap.
With humor lacing his gravel-laden voice, his ally remarked.
"-You think killing ONE simian will get eyes in our direction?" Shrap mocked the very idea of it. "I can't believe you're tracking the little shit down."
"What other idea have you got, aye? Last I checked, SOMEONE- was forced to use a sidewalk as their only alternative for physical reformation... Know him? He's an moronic ass with a bad jest about him."
"If you weren't one of us, I'd have destroyed you. Just a fact."
"Here's another- I AM, one of us- and so any possibility otherwise was thrown away the second I was created. Same goes for you. 'Apple doesn't far from the tree'- we're all made to uneasily coexist... Why add attitude to it?"
"This is why the others hate you..."
"I shake their pill-bottles I know- I know."
"So our agenda has revolved around angering our brethren, finding out where a single ape has run off to... And now...?"
"How to catch that ape in a corner and terminate it. Of course."
"Mm. So, why not walk up to it and KILL it?"
"-He's been mutated."
"The freaking cherubs can DO that?"
"Suddenly got more complicated, right? Tends to happen when you examine things. You should try it."
"That doesn't sound right."
"It's not supposed too."
Flintlock glared over the sulking, rusted frame of a broken, dented, scuffed and ratty car that was lain out next to an entire stack of its kind that towered several feet in the air.
A dull dark gray/blue sky contrasted with the last flittering tendrils of pink above several walls and mounds of vehicles, automobile parts, and a few sheds and garages they were all piled around.
Evening was closing for night, and Flintlock now was gaining the freedom to begin trekking towards his goal- a living being he hoped to kill, and rectify the loss of the overlord he had slain.
Flintlock wasn't certain that any of the other bands or mobs would even blink an eye at the death of this new stir-up in the underground aside from their usual gawking to his misadventures in the name of none but himself.
-But in that respect, Flint' didn't give a flying hell what his kin were concerned with. He HADN'T, for centuries.
"How much further? I'm getting bored." Shrap complained. "I haven't killed anything in years."
"You'll get your shot. Don't worry my finely-stony ally, we'll be covered in ape blood soon."
"How stereotypical..." The stone being groaned. "-How long 'till that promise goes down the drain?"
Flintlock looked back at him, stepping away from the car.
"It WON'T."
"If the others failed, what makes us different?"
"Mortals cannot best us for long."
"You know, the boy' you're trying to vindicate? He's bested us a long time."
"Can't last forever."
"Says you."
"Says history."
"-That's written by the losers, and READ to the losers..."
"Let me ask you- what's with the sudden plunge on your view of us?"
"It's not US I'm concerned with." Shrap shrugged with a crackling of stone. "You remember good that 'Fred'- I think he called himself that -let his ego oversee his logic."
"The others have been locked in personal vendettas for too long."
"Then what are YOU doing right now?"
"A vendetta for a GREATER vendetta overall."
"That sounds mildly poetic... And a double-standard at the same time."
"It's ingenious, and it's unusual- both of which combine best."
"Or CONTRAST worst..."
"You're naive. We'll corner him, we'll kill him. I'll gather more of us to my arm, we'll expand." Flintlock waved an arm in the air. "BOOM. An army. I'm confident. When has my confidence failed me? ONLY me?"
"-You added that last part, so now I have nothin'."
"Exactly."
"Exactly?"
"EXACTLY." Flintlock grinned, suction-cupped feet starting to crawl insect-like past Shrap's stand. "Can we stop pussy-footing and move already? Now I'M chafing."
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"-Sir, we understand that this is intrusive, but we are required by law to-"
"Look, I get that, I really do, it's your job- but, sir, my wife is really, REALLY not feeling comfortable with this... 'Advanced Screening Process' if we could just-?"
"Sir, if you want to catch your flight, I'm afraid you and her must abide by safety regulations."
"Oh for Christ's sake..."
American and western airports in general were already hell enough to get Foxy through prying security- but this, was just a bit ridiculous.
Though, granted, with all the psychos running around nowadays, Phillip couldn't say he necessarily blamed the Austrian staff here for their caution about a woman wrapped up in so much clothing you couldn't even see her.
However, having people see Foxy as FOXY, did not compute with their success and continued lives. Thus, Phil was forced to improvise.
"-How about this? We all forget this happened, you scan her, we get on the plane, deal?"
Right as Phillip said this to the screening translation manager- all but to himself -there was a noticeable pulsation of white-ish air by his wrist, the atmosphere in the room thickened, and all three of the guards, including the translator, had foggy looks on their faces.
The manager was a portly fellow, and Phil was afraid the poor guy would topple over with the burst of mental skewing he had hit them all with.
Essentially, Phillip did feel bad for these tactics he was forced to employ- because all these guys were trying to do was their jobs to keep flights safe.
-But like pointed prior, if anyone, anyone, especially someone with authority- saw Foxy as what she was, the results would not be good in the slightest, and Phillip's newly discovered powers would not fix that dramatic of an event.
So it was good that his developing skills were perfect for little stuff like this.
A quick shake of the men's minds, and they were in business.
"-Friggin' assholes..." Foxy muttered behind him, hugging the coats over herself tighter. "-You used that hokus-pokus stuff on 'em, right?"
"Yep." Phil grinned. "-So, sir, are we screened and clear for flight boarding?"
"-Y-You... A-Are... YES, sir. Yes sir, you are clear... Please... Proceed that way-"
Phillip and Foxy were already halfway out of the room towards the receding line for their plane.
Phil handed the man behind the ticket desk their passes, waited for him to check and scan them- took them back with a grin, and grabbed Foxy's waist to start tugging her along like he usually did.
The animatronic laughed at him under the hood, and quieted when she noticed people looking awkwardly at her for brief intervals.
Luckily, a bunch of the people on this plane were business people- so they had seen the freakiest of the freakiest, and the strangest of the strangest -thus someone with a lot of clothes on was the last thing on their shit-list.
She had to duck a little more than Phil when they walked down the aisle of the plane's center fuselage cabin.
Phillip let her slide in the seat by the window, and he sat after her.
A few more people were filing in and taking their seats.
This was actually a usual routine of theirs by now- Foxy had flown on a few of these things by this point.
Still though, she gazed outside the viewport window with wide eyes at the span of the plane's wing, the expansive tarmac and runway system. Faintly over the horizon of the airport- the city of Vienna and its centered skyscrapers seemed to say farewell a last time.
Foxy had had few locations that she had felt so inspired by- and Vienna, Austria in general was one of them.
Disappointed as she was for her limited exposure to it all, she had seen things and been places that would not have been possible a while ago, so she wasn't complaining at all.
They'd had to basically live in the rental van they had garnered from the dealer- it was why whenever they rented vehicles for a trip, they were always bulky passenger cars, vans, or SUVs- they provided a decent enough ride and cover for their short stays.
Phillip had never kept them in a trip for more than a week- he meticulously would plan out the locations, travel routes, means of reaching other means- and there were backups for all that if any one failed.
On the trip to England, Phillip hadn't slept for two nights going over it all.
Sometimes his passion for stopping these things came off as more an obsession. Despite all the positives that she reviewed earlier- Phil's temper acted up more when they were on hunts -he was more to the point, and if she strayed or took too long, he started to try and guide her physically.
Like any two people in such a lock, she supposed- there were things that annoyed her, as much as flattered her.
What was she gonna' do? Men.
"How long until the plane takes off?" She asked excitedly in a hushed mutter. "I can't wait, honestly."
"I think in a few minutes- they'll go over all that safety stuff again, remember?"
"Uh-huh."
"-Then we should be good."
"Alright."
"You like it when the planes take off?"
"I think it's amazing."
"What flight is this now, do you think, Fox'?"
"I don't know," She shrugged. "Maybe the eighth? Ninth?"
"Maybe."
"Yeah."
On that note- they waited (Foxy, quite impatiently)- for the man to finish demonstrating the usage of all the safety equipment and the buttons around the chairs. As he spoke, a microphone played translations in a God-awful number of languages before English.
Phillip was smiling at the end, because she was practically ready to leap from her seat- her leg was bouncing before her, and she was leaning back into the chair with her gaze locked on the window glass beside her.
The plane started to shift, people quieted down, the runway started passing by the window's view.
Phillip watched his friend's intrigue to the mechanical capabilities of human technology that had been introduced to her.
He remembered the first time they had boarded a plane- that Foxy would not speak the entire time before the thing started to take off.
That had been a trip to Brazil- she came off that excursion a little shaken.
The stress of going on a plane for the first time, for her first hunting trip with Phillip, almost made her keel over.
When the plane took off, she nearly crushed his hand with her paw, and she didn't move until they were flying twenty minutes.
He called her a 'Statue' a few times, and she got angry with him and threw a bag of chips at his head.
-Now though, a year later, and plane rides were actually quite the exciting thing for her.
"You okay, Fox'?" He asked.
"Yeah." She nodded quickly.
When gravity started to shift them in that strange downwards-pull of initiating takeoff- Foxy felt an excitement run through her system that could only be caused by experiencing a adventurous wonder never granted before.
She still got that amazing rush of energy, even though the first flight had long passed into the early year.
It was just so fascinating being propelled through the air- slow or not -by a large metal craft.
She never really got over it.
"-Hey, Phillip?" She asked lightly at the receding pull on their forms. "Here's a question,"
"What's that? You're still okay?"
"-Oh heck, Phil, if something's wrong I'll say so! Quit worrying." She said lowly, bumping him with her elbow.
"Sorry, sorry..." He held a hand up. "I'm paranoid."
"No, you're a good guy," She reminded him. "-So who would win in a race, you think? This plane or a Ju-88?"
"Ha!" He laughed at the World War 2 comparison. "You're funny."
"Yeah." She grinned. "So which you think?"
"I think if the jet was flying at maximum speed, with no passengers, I think the jet would win."
"What about a De Havilland Mosquito?"
"The Mosquito was fast... But still, the jet would win."
"-Too bad... That one was made of wood, right?"
"A lot of it was, yes."
"Okay."
The droning of the engines filled the cabin, a microphone announcement came through from the driver's cockpit telling of stabilized flight- and small chatter buzzed up from some of the passengers.
Phillip reached over and held her paw through the glove covering it.
"So, what do you want to do on our 'Vacation', Fox'?" He smiled.
"I don't know. I think just relaxing would be nice, yes?"
"I agree. I'm sure Mangle will be ecstatic."
"What does she... Like... DO, while we're gone?"
"Besides ravaging all my iced tea in the garage and the fridge? Uhm... Watches T.V. I think she got into my old movies..."
"Is that bad or good?" She asked. "The last thing we need is her to get ideas..."
"It's fine. I think she's learned the borders of her behavior, to a degree."
"If you say so..."
"-Hey, the weirdy hasn't broken anything in a long time! I'm proud of her."
"Except the tea reserves for the tri-state area. Speaking of, where has all that been GOING?"
"What do you mean? She chugs it."
"I know... But... You know Mangle has a... Strange internal system, compared to me, right?"
"Well... Yeah, you don't have to eat."
"Neither does she." Foxy rolled her eyes flatly.
"Are you asking where she's taking a leak?"
"You're not letting her use the bathrooms are you?"
"...Oh my God."
There was a moment of purveying silence, and Phillip started to hunch over in realization.
"Oh my God. I'm now afraid."
"Fool."
"-Don't gimme none of that! I didn't even consider that! Oh jeez', it's gonna be a horror show at home!"
"Hope you have a good mop."
"-And a HAZMAT suit! And radiation scrubbers..."
"AND a Will."
"You're not helping."
"Tee-hee."
-0-0-0-0-0-
When it was all said and done, 'Jobs' as he coined them- never slipped from either of their memories to the point where they could recollect nothing.
It was a few months ago- not too long, not too soon in the past -that they had stepped off a passenger bus on the outskirts of the town of Thetford, in East Anglia, in the United Kingdom.
He had been overjoyed at the sight of all the old buildings, the lush, forested landscapes and the red-double-deck buses that drove down the streets of London itself. He had been ecstatic to be in a place of such vibrant history.
To boot, Britain was filled to the brim with relics and locations directly tied to the Second World War- so he and her, both drooled over the possibilities for sightseeing, for information, for simply experiencing it all...
But they both put all of that aside.
They both disregarded their wants, and put forth a 'Priority' of sorts.
This priority, was deemed the closest thing they could achieve to better the world.
The town of Thetford was their landing and staging point- at the height of the afternoon, Phillip Linn and Foxy began to walk through the thinnest outskirts to the north of the urban developments- they were quiet, and collected, the entire way.
Both dueled with the alien feeling of being in this foreign land for all the WRONG reasons, as the mainstream person would point out -they both were like moving statues, because they knew exactly what to do, and when.
By this point, a few of these 'Hits' had been undertaken. Foxy undid one of her gloves- struggling with the layered coats about her body -pressed into barely-visible bolts that sided on both curves of her wrist.
Her own paw popped off like an extension of say a vacuum cleaner, or a gun's additive customization.
She stuffed it in her clothes, pulled out a metallic curve of metal, and screwed it into the palm's place on her arm.
Paved roads became thinner, trees taller, soon in the outskirts was a major port overlooking the waters of the Atlantic Ocean- and the two were far from that great city in the woodlands, combing the terrain.
Phillip and Foxy had no specific idea of where exactly their quarry was.
So they trekked the entirety of two neighborhoods, a few farms, and by the time they had an inkling of the target's home- they were exhausted from the travel.
Matted in sweat, Phil stopped them mid-stride on a dirt path between rows of thickets.
"It's maybe a mile from here." He said.
They camped on the side of the road for a few hours- a farmer drove by in a pickup truck, asked them if they were having car trouble or such, and was waved away by Phillip as he told some ludicrous lie.
The two walked again after Phillip caught his breath- they passed through a small village, where a drunken man stepped out of a tavern, and followed them down a road with beckoning to Foxy's layered clothing.
Foxy ignored him, and Phillip told him to leave.
Of course, not in his right mind- the drunk walked over and grabbed at Foxy's back.
Phillip reared his fist and clocked the man right in the temple with one of the fiercest side-winds she had ever seen from him.
The man collapsed, Phillip dragged him over to a stoop and propped him up on it, and they both traveled once more. Foxy pecked him on the cheek, and he didn't respond with any kind of confirmation to her appreciation.
The forest consumed around them for the last time this trip. For a good while, the forests of this section of East Anglia provided nothing short of hooting owls, and a single coyote's cry.
Then, an abomination- a hound of shadow and titanium white eyes- the Old Shuck -burst out to meet them.
It swatted Foxy away like an insect, it tackled Phillip and opened its several rows of daggered teeth over his head.
The beast was unbelievably imposing.
On all fours it stood nearly six feet tall- its back arched high over its ragged ears and neck-base, black fur that wavered in the air like liquid onyx fire cascaded all down its paws and body.
"I've never had prey COME to me before..." It whispered to him. "-I LIKE you..."
Foxy jumped on its back- Phillip kicked away. The fight lasted a half hour. She wounded it, and it fled deeper into the woods.
So they chased it.
-And they found it.
This time, Phil got the first jump- they surprised it in a hill-dip, leaping over a mound of brush to descend on it below.
"Humans have NEVER bested me!" The Shuck screamed. "You aren't one of them!"
It gazed at Foxy at last, having been stabbed, sliced, blunted, and beaten to a bloody mess on the grassy ground.
"-Abomination..." It spat. "-You can't destroy us legion."
"I'm betting on it."
Foxy edged back in shock when Phillip ran up and started stepping on the hound's head with the heel of his boot- bringing down his foot in stamping arcs repeatedly.
THMP
THMP
THMP
-He paused, changed legs.
THMP THMP THMP
THMP
Foxy listened to the pattern of impacts until the hound stopped moving, and the legend of the Black Shuck was put to rest. Literally, and permanently.
"Phillip..." She muttered. "-That was..."
He looked at her with an angry glint in his eye, blankly.
She relented, opened her mouth to speak again, and only got out-
"I don't know what that was."
Phillip just shrugged.
-Much less to say, they never talked about East Anglia a lot. In fact a month later, one time she thought about it profusely on a chilly Wednesday morning, and she started to cry.
Phillip was over to her immediately, and started rubbing his hands down her back.
"What's wrong?" He asked urgently. "What happened?"
"-Y-You bludgeoned that thing..." She said. "-And I don't know w-why I'm just getting that out now!"
Foxy never heard it from him, or from the body language of their daily lives, and yet she had the unspoken knowledge that he never forgave himself for eliciting that reaction from her.
At night, he would apologize to her again, and again, and it would find a way into his speech for a third or sometimes fourth instance.
"Foxy, I'm sorry I made you upset."
"-You didn't DO anything... I've, just, you know... I've seen that kind of violence when it was directed at the wrong people. It's not you."
"It was brash." He drawled. "It was barbaric, and it was beneath me. You don't deserve to be exposed to those things."
"The past is the past, yes?"
"Maybe. But when you don't heed the past, it repeats itself..."
"Well... YEAH. B-But that's not a concern here, Phillip."
"I'm concerned with MYSELF Fox'." He said. "I'm fixated on a dangerous thing."
"Well that's why you have me." She smiled, sifting through blankets to kneed her paws into his bare shoulder. "You're doing a heroic thing."
"But what are heroics, if I hurt those I care about?" Phillip frowned, slumping forwards to place his chin in upwards-angled palms.
Foxy flexed her fingers, sighed, and scooted over to lean her chest on him.
"That tends to happen when two people hold hands and jump." She spoke with her chin on his neck.
Phil raised a brow, and shook his head in some measure of agreement.
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