Disclaimer: I don't own Elfen Lied. Everything in the Elfen Lied universe belongs to Lynn Okamoto. However, Samael and all of the characters appearing in this original tome belong to yours truly. If you want to borrow Samael, then you must ask for permission and let me review the story before you post it.
Summary: Elfen Lied has ended with Lucy's death. But the story lives on so long as the Diclonius Virus spreads. This is the story of Michael Mordare, the first Diclonius born in America. And more importantly, this is the story of the first male Diclonius born outside of captivity. This is the story of Michael's decent into madness, and the beginning of Samael.
Warnings: This is rated T for bad language, drug referencing, intense dark themes, and gruesome murders.
Author's Notes: I have come to discover that even after eleven chapters into the story some people can't get the main character's name right. So here's the rundown.
Michael Mordare: Main character's name. Bing bang boom, that's it. Remember it!
Samael: The Angel of Massacre, basically Michael's new name for himself. Samael is also the proper name for the Grim Reaper, which is where Michael came up with the name.
Samuel Redrum: A pseudonym that Michael made up on the spot. Redrum is murder spelled backwards, a la Stephen King's Shining.
Stop calling Michael "Samuel"! It's either Michael or Samael! It's my biggest pet peeve so far! I just get all "Grrr!!" every time I read "Samuel ish sho awethum!!1!" on the reviews. Sorry the Author's Notes took up so much space, but I really, really hate it.
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Angel of Massacre
Chapter Eleven: The Night
My eyes opened and I was on my feet in an instant. At first, I didn't know what had waked me up so abruptly. The fine hairs on the back of my neck were standing on end. The Darkness was so deep that I couldn't see anything in front of my face. Then I noticed a small sliver of cold blue light off to the side. I made my way to the light. I pressed my palm flat against the cracked window and saw street light reflecting off the white brick walls on the building opposite to Hotel Carter. There was a narrow alleyway between Hotel Carter and the building. I couldn't see the street lamps unless I hung my head out the window, but their cold light was evidence that it was nighttime. Near absolute silence hung in the air. It was occasionally punctured by a passing vehicle. I turned around, walked in the middle of the room, and waved my hand in the air. I encountered the small chain that controlled the light bulb. I pulled the chain and was briefly blinded by harsh white light. A blurry human shape stood in front of the door. I blinked furiously and found the Boy in the Theater standing nearly nose to nose with me.
"Have I mentioned that I hate when you do that?" I said groggily.
"It's time."
This caught my attention. He didn't sound like anything except dead serious.
"I assume you aren't talking about the time to wake up."
"Tonight you will kill a human."
My blood ran cold. How many humans have I killed already? Hasn't every human I killed so far been out of self defense? I dropped my head and sighed deeply.
"You will no longer hold onto your pathetic shreds of humanity. You will embrace your diclonius instincts and kill."
"So all I have to do to get rid of you is walk down a street and kill a random pedestrian? That sounds easy enough."
"No. You are going to kill a small group of human relatives, better known as a family."
I felt like the pit of my stomach had fallen away and my heart had dropped with it. So this was his game, make me inflict the same suffering that I had endured. I felt sick to the bottom of my heart. The Boy began shouting in his strange raspy, throaty voice. At first I was worried that he would wake up the entire complex, but then I remembered that only I heard his manic voice.
"The reluctance you feel is exactly what you must discard. Why should you be restricted by the laws that humans erected? You are post-human! You are diclonius! You are a law unto yourself! You decide who lives and who dies! Humans are just over glorified apes. You are a motherfuckin' dinosaur!"
The word "dinosaur" was left ringing in my ear. How could that be if he was just a figment of my imagination? Was I just imagining the echo? I remembered the unexplained "sleepwalking" incident on Saturday. Could it be…?
I glared my suspicions at the Boy in the Theater. He merely smirked back as though he were reading my thoughts. Was that possible? I think he exists in my mind, so perhaps he really is hearing my thoughts. I was really starting to hate this apparition. He always appears at random and doesn't have anything nice to say.
"What if I say no?" I asked. "What will you do if I just go back to sleep and ignore you?"
"Sleep will evade you endlessly until you accomplish your mission."
"How am I supposed to leave this place? The front doors are locked at night and only Robert has the key. The guy is really paranoid about-"
"Find a way!"
I started in surprise at his razor-sharp tone. The barely suppressed excitement sharpened his words like a whetstone would hone a sword's edge.
"I don't want excuses, I want blood! I've waited long enough to watch you take your revenge on humanity! Or did you not love your family enough to take vengeance?"
I curled my fingers into a tight fist. My upper lips curled into an animalistic snarl. How did he always know the exact words that would anger me? Finally I scooped up the backpack and threw it onto my shoulders. The weight of my retribution struck my back. The pain was welcomed. I purposely left my brunette wig behind. I was going to show my true colors tonight.
"By the way, how long have I been asleep?"
"Six and a half hours, it's around eight-thirty o' clock."
How long has it been since my family died? I know that it was in the late-evening when my parents were killed. Then there was that long night where I killed those soldiers. I emerged from the forest on Friday, at twelve o' clock in the morning. Then I explored Toledo until around nine-thirty in the morning, when I came across Hotel Carter and then fell asleep. I slept until Sunday, then found some stuff, and now its Sunday still at 8:30-ish. If I ignore everything else and focus on the time that my new life started until now, it would be around sixty-eight and a half hours. I have been Samael for sixty-eight and one half hours. I guess that's enough time for preparation, it's time to get killing.
I pressed both palms of my hands against the cracked glass window and forced it to slide up the entire way. There wasn't a screen window so I just put my hands on the window sill and hoisted my weight into the window. A cold breeze, funneled through the alleyway, cut across my face and reddened my cheeks. I looked to the sides and found absolutely no handholds. I did see the street lamppost that was casting the yellow light. I looked across the alleyway and saw that the opposite wall was about two and a half meters away. Two people standing shoulder to shoulder would have only a little difficulty. I looked down and saw that the ground looked miles away. I pulled myself back into the room and fought a spell of dizziness. I shook my red capped head and stuck my head outside again. A vector slid itself out of my back and I threw it across the alley. It struck the white wall and I held it against the wall. Then I threw three more vectors against that wall and snaked five more vectors out the window to grip the window sill. Finally I sat my rear on the dusty window sill, letting my feet hang into open air. I shoved off.
I guess my idea worked similarly to how a person can scale a narrow hallway by using their arms and legs to hold them up. I also know that the vectors can hold my weight because they did so when I vaulted a chain-link fence. So it should be entirely possible to descend in this manner. I can't think of a single reason why this shouldn't work
But all that reasoning didn't stop me from dropping straight down.
For one terrifying second, I plummeted towards the ground. Then there was a sudden stop. My heart pounded in my ears. I looked up and saw the spectral arms pulled taunt, suspending my body above the ground. I let two vectors drop off the wall and adhere to the wall again, but beneath my body. I thought that they were doing a pretty good job at holding my body up, so I let more arms lower and slowly began to climb down the alleyway. From a third person view, it would look like an eleven legged giant spider crawling down a wall. I worked up a rhythm at moving my vectors. Finally my feet touched the ground. I looked around to see if anyone had watched my decent. The streets were barren except for a distant figure lurching on the other side of the street. The night was mine.
I pulled the hood of my jacket over my horns and began to walk to the nearest bus stop. I wanted this indecent deed to happen outside the city. It had to happen somewhere that couldn't be traced back to me. Random killings were hardest for the police to track, so I had to focus on keeping off a pattern. A lively beat began to work its way into my step and my mind. Without a conscience thought I started to snap my mutilated fingers in rhythm to the music in my head. The music was tantalizingly familiar.
I located the bus stop on Monroe Street and boarded a TARTA bus, paying a small fare along the way. There were even less people on than the last time I had ridden a bus. There was an acidic stench that seemed universal among late-night bus. I settled in a leather seat free from neighbors and the bus started to roll down Monroe Street. I suppressed the childhood urge to stand up and hold onto the hand-hold rings hanging from the ceiling. Damn those things were tempting!
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"Sir, he's on the move." said a technician. He was staring at a blinking red light on a flat-screen monitor. The screen was filled with a satellite map of downtown Toledo. He zoomed in so he could see the street name.
"Subject D-1 has just stepped onto Monroe Street."
Noah Brimstrome power walked over to the technician's post and leaned over his shoulder. His midnight blue eyes stared hungrily at the red light. He felt a great sense of relief wash over him. Noah had been afraid that Michael wouldn't leave the shady hotel before the batteries of the Jericho NETBAT Tactical helmet died. They couldn't stage a strike while he was in the city. That would be far too dangerous in case the police became involved. Now Subject D-1 was finally moving after two days of silence. They didn't know why Subject D-1 waited so long to start moving. "His diclonius instincts must be raving mad, having gone so long without killing anyone!" thought Noah. Of course it was possible that Michael had already committed murder and had just left the helmet behind. But Noah had paid special attention to the Toledo news and there was no reported mysterious murder. Then the light began to blink faster and started to move quickly towards the top of the screen. The technician made panicked motions to zoom out before the red light escaped from sight.
"He's moving up Monroe Street pretty fast. Maybe he's grabbed a taxi or something?"
Noah brushed the question away and said "Keep me posted on every turn and every stop he makes. Give me an update every minute on my pager." The technician nodded and glued his eyes on the screen. Noah spun away and strode over to a telephone. He grabbed the phone and barked complicated orders into it. He was gathering a strike team as fast as possible. Tonight, Noah was in his element. The night belonged to him.
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I watched out the window as buildings rolled by as though someone had put the entire city on a track. The buildings became more widely spaced and trees started to increase steadily. The bus stopped at Collingwood Boulevard. A man with tired eyes exited the bus. Then it dropped some more people off North Detroit Avenue, and kept going. How far was this thing going to go? We were passing a darkened street lined with shadowy trees when I decided that I wanted off. The next stop was Upton Avenue, and I was the only one who stepped off the bus.
The cold night air overwhelmed my flimsy jacket. It felt like I had plunged into ice water. I pulled the jacket closer around my frail body and began to walk back towards that intriguing darkened street lined with shadowy trees. I was strolling on the left-hand sidewalk. The street stretched for an eternity into the Darkness of the night. The blackness was periodically punctured by street lamps. Again and again my shadow danced in front of me every time I passed under the harsh bulbs. There was a closed bank on the opposite side of the street, the right-hand side. Finally I turned into the mysteriously exciting street. I looked up and barely made out North Cove Boulevard. The shadows concealed my body as effectively as an invisibility cloak. I didn't feel afraid to pull back the hood and reveal my horns. I began to stroll through the valley of the shadow of death. Many houses were still lit, but even more were dark inside. It was a Sunday night, so the smart students went to bed early. The night was still mine.
The only sounds I could hear were my own footfalls. The silence was slightly unnerving so I let my vectors out. They slid over the concrete sidewalk with a raspy noise. I wondered if anyone would notice a few stones and leaves suddenly moving without a breeze. The Darkness grew deeper and deeper, as though my soul had turned inside-out. I felt oddly at peace in this cold atmosphere surrounded by black trees and dark houses.
Finally I stopped and turned into Glen Street. The trees were dense and the houses were very far apart. It was almost as though nobody had bothered to clear the area of forestry before building houses. The trees seemed to absorb every sound. I couldn't even hear cars as I walked down a winding street. A white single-story house stood out in the darkness. I could see lights on inside the house. There were so many trees and no street lamps. This was the place where I would lose my humanity. My heart felt heavy as I considered the sin I was to commit. Perhaps the Boy was right; maybe I needed to do this to embrace my diclonius nature. Perhaps the Boy was wrong, maybe killing wasn't part of this "initiation" and I was going to kill a family for no reason. But I would give their deaths a reason. They would die so I could become a full diclonius.
I don't know how long I stood in front of the house between three ebony trees. Their tall shadows concealed my presence. I would have to walk in the light but briefly, paint the inside of the house red, then retreat to the embrace of the Darkness. I sucked in a cold breath and exhaled a moist cloud. The last step I took for preparation was to uncap the black hatred I had sealed in my heart. Hatred and rage threatened to pull me into nothingness. I lifted my hands to the sky and let the hatred sweep me away. I curled my fingers into a fist and let it drop to my side. Eleven wraithlike hands appeared around my body and poised for the kill. A sinister smile split my face apart maliciously.
I stepped out from the trees and swaggered up the driveway. The white house had only one story and there was a vast window facing the street. I could make out a vague human shape walking around in front of the window. The shape was silhouetted by unmistakable flickering colors cast by a large television. I didn't see another person, but there probably was another human living there. A bachelor rarely kept such expensive palaces. I walked around a maroon sedan and stepped onto the porch. I lifted my fist and without hesitation rapped my knuckles against the doorframe. A couple seconds passed and the door swung inward to reveal a man in his mid-forties with dark black hair, short beard stubble, and a scruffy moustache. He looked at me with dark eyes for a second and spoke hesitantly.
"Can I help you?"
I smirked and pulled the hood of the jacket back. His eyes lifted off my face and onto my white horns.
"I sincerely doubt it."
Four vectors punched through his chest and abdomen and exited out his back, entrails in hand. The man looked surprised, and then fell limp. I held him up with my power and carried him into the house.
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"Target spotted." said a lone soldier. He was kneeling inside a clove of three trees. Their tall shadows compounded with his obsidian armor concealed him perfectly. He whistled quietly as he watched Subject D-1 impale a guy. The diclonius disappeared from view as he walked into the household.
"This is Private First Class Langston Sparks, calling in a successful target lock-on. The bastard just killed a fool and he's entered the house. Please tell me that you guys are on your way!"
The NETBAT helmet was silent for a second before an answer came through. "Yeah, we're heading down Jackson Road as we speak. ETA is seven minutes."
Private Sparks cursed in his microphone and then said "Man, I don't think that whoever's left in that place is gonna last another thirty seconds!"
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I walked into the room with a large flat-screen HD television and wide window. The TV was the only source of light. An episode of a show I don't know about was playing. The television was muted; the show's characters were smiling with perfect white teeth and bodies that looked fit for modeling. They looked like silent, living mannequins. The corpse of the poor bloke was dragging along the ground behind me. Blood was pouring out of the holes in his body and staining the carpet red. I looked around deliberately. A doublewide couch was pressed against the wall opposite the TV. There were two plates of lasagna on two folding tables in front of the couch. It smelled astonishingly good. I stepped in front of the HD TV and wafted the aroma in my nose. A feminine voice called out from a room behind me.
"Steve, who was it at the door…?"
I could hear her voice trailing off as she came closer. Must have found the organs and blood I had torn out of Steve's body. A middle-aged woman stepped into the room, the cold light from the television carving dark shadows in her haggard face. She stared unbelieving at Steve's body and then at me. She didn't seem to know that she was standing in her husband's own blood-path. Her small mouth hung open and her eyes were starting to tear up. Finally she dropped to her knees and began to scream loudly. I quickly grabbed her by the throat and pinned her to the wall with a single vector. Her scream was cut off. Her eyes went wild, trying to figure out what was happening and what was holding her throat. Watching her suffer was unbearable, so I took two vectors and with a scissor-cutting action I decapitated the widow. Her head spun traced bloody arcs in the air before landing on the ground with a soft thud. The feminine body collapsed to the ground and was still.
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"Oh shit! I mean, sir, the son of a bitch just killed the last remaining person in the house. We don't have six more minutes! He got his kill, so he's gonna scram! What should I do?"
Private Sparks sounded frantic to his own ears. He couldn't really see well what had happened, but he could make out a human shape losing its head. The diclonius wasn't going to stick around! They only had this one chance before the stolen helmet's batteries died and they lost him. Finally a stern voice spoke through the built-in headset.
"Private, you need to calm down! Just watch him for now and tell us when he leaves. We'll be there in six minutes! Don't do anything rash!"
Langston burrowed his brow in thought, and then replied. "No can do sir, as soon as Subject D-1 leaves that house he'll be able to escape easily. There are woods all around. I'm gonna engage the target and keep him pinned down for as long as it takes for you guys to get here!"
He cut off the furious protests by switching off the headset. Then he reached around his back and pulled out an M-32 40MM six shot grenade launcher. "This baby can easily demolish that house. It even has foregrip!" thought Langston. He planted a quick kiss on the grenade launcher before he started loading 40MM grenades into it. The night was gonna get a little crazy.
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End Chapter Eleven: The Night
Things are going to get messy! The night is young and innocent blood has been spilt. Will Michael survive the trap laid out before him? Or will he become captured and brought straight to Noah himself? Stay tuned because the shit's about to hit the fan!
Next is Chapter Twelve: The Night Explodes!
