Chapter 2: The Skin–Ripper
Later that night…
Red Steel was running across the top of the buildings in New York City, trying to avoid being noticed on the streets below. After he heard the reports about an alien ripping off the skins of innocent bystanders (which was a gruesome thought indeed), he decided to find the alien himself and take him down before it harms anymore people. As he was jumping from building to building, Red Steel felt an exhilaration that he had never felt before. Being an X-Man in the past, he had always trained his body to control his unimaginable strength in his steel form. Red Steel rarely jumped across buildings before since his steel form was excessively heavy, but over time, he had learn how to move a bit more quickly in his steel form so that he could escape from his enemies or take them down much quicker. At the moment, Red Steel felt as free as a bird leaping from one building to the next, as he felt that he could do anything that he puts his mind to; an activity that he rarely offered to himself ever since the decimation of the mutants first started.
Once Red Steel landed on a small building, he heard a commotion down below and he immediately leapt from the building to the ground. Once Red Steel reached his destination in a few strides, the sight he saw ahead of him had terrified and angered him all at once. He saw an alien grab a young woman by her neck and while the young woman was screaming in terror, the alien then punctured the back of the woman's neck with its sharp claws. Then, the alien proceeded to tear along the woman's skin with its sharp claws until it reached the woman's bottom half and then it ripped her skin off while dropping the bloodied form of the young woman on the ground. The alien was just about to hang the skin on another flagpole nearby a building when it suddenly heard a booming voice from across the streets.
"You have made a grave mistake, Tovarisch! You have taken the life of an innocent person and I will not tolerate that!"
Red Steel then ran at the alien and punched it three feet across the street and into a building, which crumbled at the alien's impact. Red Steel than looked down at the bloodied body of the woman and said to himself, "This is truly utter madness! How could anyone do this to an innocent bystander?" Suddenly, Red Steel heard the sound of debris, from the building that the alien had crashed into, being thrown around. There standing among the crumbled building stood the alien unscathed.
"What? How are you still standing?" said Red Steel surprised.
"Easy, you bumbling Earth life form! I cannot be hurt no matter what moves you can put on me!" said the alien.
Red Steel was taken aback as the alien spoke, but then he regains himself and spoke, "Who are you? Why have you come here?"
"So many questions, so little time to answer to a puny life form. Very well, since you seem so insistent on knowing who I am, I will tell you. I am known as the Skin-Ripper, the only alien around the galaxy who has the ability to rip the skins off of any opponent that I come across," said the Skin-Ripper with pride.
"So you are an alien who can rip people's skins off. What is the pleasure in doing this horrible deed?" said Red Steel with disgust.
"I live to see the terror in my victims' eyes! And hanging their skins on whatever flagpole I can find is like my own personal display of my trophies! Trophies that I intend to get more of for my collection! It might take a little more time to skin you alive, but it would be worth it!"
The Skin-Ripper then leapt at Red Steel and tackled him to the ground. Red Steel tried to push the malicious alien off of him, but the alien held on tight and started scratching at his steel body. Even though Red Steel can barely feel the pain of his steel skin being scratched at, he knew that if he doesn't do something quickly, the alien will scratch at him until there is nothing left of his body. Red Steel then raised his legs to reach the alien's stomach and then with a mighty grunt, pushed his legs against the alien's stomach and sent it flying up into the sky. Once the alien came back down again, Red Steel then grabs the alien and threw it down into the ground.
"Have enough yet?" asked Red Steel through gritted teeth.
Even though the alien's head was a few inches into the ground, it responded, "I am not even finished yet!"
The Skin-Ripper than lifted itself from the ground and kicked Red Steel up his chin and then made a 180 – degree turn in the air and kicked Red Steel in the stomach, throwing him three feet across the street. Red Steel then crashed into a building and looked dazedly at the alien who was approaching him.
"Give it up, weakling! You cannot possibly think that you defeat me with your puny-"
Suddenly, a gunshot sounded out in the streets and the Skin-Ripper yelped in pain. A bullet had busted through the alien's stomach and dark purple blood started shooting out of its body. Once his head started to clear up, Red Steel saw a man standing on a building not too far off and immediately recognized him.
"Hey, slime and ugly! Why don't you pick on someone your own size?" yelled the man at the alien.
The Skin-Ripper then looked behind itself and saw Jerome Brown jump down from the building and onto the ground with two smoking pistols at his sides.
"Well, it seems that I have another interloper to deal with!" the Skin-Ripper said through gritted teeth. Then, the alien stood up quickly and the bullet wound in its stomach started to heal up. After the wound was completely healed, the alien then started running towards Jerome, who had his pistols at ready. Suddenly, the alien was tackled down by Red Steel once again and as Red Steel held the alien on the ground, the alien screamed, "You again? Don't you ever give up?!"
The alien then raised itself from the ground and pushed at Red Steel until Jerome ran up and started shooting at the alien again, this time hitting it in the leg. The alien screamed again, but healed itself once more and started running for Jerome.
"This isn't working! There's got to be a way to kill this thing!" yelled Jerome.
Red Steel thought for a moment and then said, "If this alien cannot be killed from the outside, then it could be killed from the inside!"
Red Steel then ran quickly towards the alien, who was about to rip Jerome's skin off, and grabbed the alien by the neck. He then proceeded to lift the alien over his head and ended up snapping the alien's back on his knee. The alien then screamed and fell to the ground, limping as it slowly felt the sharp pain in its back.
"Nice work!" complimented Jerome.
"Thank you, my friend!" said Red Steel grinning.
"You're welcome! You're pretty handy with the fighting moves." Jerome then leaned close to Red Steel and whispered, "Colossus."
Red Steel looked at Jerome in shock and said, "How did you know?" Then he looked embarrassed and whispered back, "Oh, the steel body gave it away, did it not?"
"Yeah, pretty much. But, I will admit that this is really clever and don't worry, I won't tell anyone about this." Jerome whispered back.
"Thank you," said Red Steel
The Skin – Ripper was moving slowly on the ground and then whispered, "Fools! You are both fools! You may have defeated me, but you cannot defeat our master!"
Red Steel and Jerome than looked at the alien in shock and Red Steel said, "Master? What master?"
The alien laughed quietly and said, "Our master has great plans for your pathetic planet. Plans that could easily destroy every life form on this waste of a planet. Our mole has done a brilliant job in making our master's plans succeed!"
Red Steel then grabbed the alien from the ground and started shaking it as he said, "You have a mole on this planet?! Who is this mole?!"
The alien laughed for one last time and then died in Red Steel's hands. Red Steel then dropped the alien on the ground and said to himself, "I thought that it was bizarre that aliens have suddenly invaded this planet. But, who is this mole and what do they want with this planet?"
Jerome shrugged his shoulders and said, "I don't know, but whatever it is, it's pretty bad. We got to figure this out before it's too late."
Suddenly, Jerome's beeper started beeping once more and he looked at Red Steel and said, "Oh, I got to go. I got something important to do, but it was great fighting alongside you, now that we took down this alien threat. Goodbye!"
Jerome then ran off down the streets and Red Steel just stared after Jerome and said with suspicion laced in his voice, "Yes, although I will be seeing you much sooner than you think."