Hello mates, I'm back with yet another installment of the lives of Hellboy and Cat. Sorry it has taken so long to get this one out to ya… Hope you like it.

Disclaimer: yada yada yada. Blah blah blah. Yaknowwhatimean.?!

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As the heated hues of the day slowly changed from blue to a deep red, we knew it was time to head out. Red and I had prepped the small team of special agents who would be going with us. The general idea was that they would stay out of the way until we told them to do other wise. Lucky for us, they actually followed orders, unlike Red and myself.

The air was actually colder outside today, clocking in at a crisp 80 degrees rather than a scorching 110. I don't know if it was a good sign or not, but in retrospect I guess it didn't really matter did it? Red was checking the Samaritan for any possible flaws and making sure he had enough ammo distributed about his person to take on an army of undead, or general monsters. I had my glocs, massive amounts of ammunition and enough blades that I fairly bristled and I almost felt safe.

The small team also had the general catch all ammunition , it seems that they had stayed up most of the night making it. I had to give them credit or maybe an A for effort.

Red grinned and whispered to me, "They sure are good little boy scouts."

Of course we would have to see how they held up under the pressure of the next few hours and then they might receive official high marks (or not if things went to hell)

Red lit his customary cigar that stayed in his jacket for such occasions and I spun my stilettos out of their wrist sheaths in a showy fashion.

" All right boys, its time to dance." Red grinned and led us out.

At the park we dispersed thinly as to not draw overly much attention to our selves. Red took prime position under a tree to watch the little girls that weren't, play. I sat on a bench sprawled out without a care in the world, while the guys tried really hard to blend in with the small groups of adults who were busily ignoring their kids. The little girls looked up at me for a fleeting second and flashed me a smile full of sharp teeth. I tried not to shudder, but like it or not, they scared me. I didn't care what they look like, gods, minor or not shouldn't be taken lightly. I went back to scanning the crowd and then it happened…

Maybe it was just a change in the breeze or my mind playing tricks on me, but I immediately went in to hunt mode. There was something near the not girls but the harder I tried to see it, the less substantial it became. As if my vision was sliding off a slick surface like oil repelling water. The girls gave up what ever game they were playing to follow something only they could see and Red was already two steps ahead of me. We made an odd sort of shambling parade lurching and stopping and following but not too closely as to alert or alarm the creatures we snuck after. I could tell Red wanted to move in and destroy something, but to give his due, he had near perfect restraint. So follow we did in to the heat drenched evening. The girls seemed unperturbed about being off in the psudo desert with monsters and I wondered how they knew to act around these things with out giving themselves away. Granted the girls were much better actresses than I would ever be.

The pace was slowing and the creatures became much more visible. Abe had been right, the vaguely man shaped creatures covered in a fine layer of feathers and disturbingly inelegant eyes. There were many of them, creeping out from hiding spots in the brush. Some where far behind us I knew that our special team was straining at the proverbial leash to shoot something, but damn, they were better trained than us. And yet we waited to see what would happen next. And it wasn't what we expected. The creatures circled the girls, touching them, examining them, yet not hurting them at all. Sort of like inspecting the merchandise before offering it up for sale at a higher price. (probably not the best analogy at the moment, but apt.)

I was so busy looking at the chupacabra's that I didn't notice the women until she was walking among the creatures. Stroking them absently as she walked past, they cringed just a bit as they fawned for her attention. The not girls were putting on a note worthy performance of being scared children. The women stroked their faces and said something to them. The girls held her hands and followed her. The women was beautiful in an ethereal sort of way, with long black hair and pail skin. We followed, Hellboy and I; the rest of the team fell back for a while to let us work. I glanced at Red and saw the single minded force that was driving him onward. I don't think we actually had a plan for what would happen next, but then one of the creatures caught our sent and the need for a plan was eliminated. We froze in the momentary second when a tick of the clock lasts a life time. Red had his guns out and I realized with a start so did I. We were efficiently surrounded but surprisingly I wasn't worried, I think I was smiling and It wasn't pretty.

The women drifted over to us, the little girls in tow. Her power was thick and hot as jungle rain and it threw me off a bit. But that was fine since she was paying no attention to me at all and was strictly looking at Red.

" What are you doing here demon? Have you come to mock me as well?" her hands caressed the not girls heads. " you and your little pet, have come for my children."

The women was crying, but something was wrong with her tears. She was crying tears of blood, it ran in stark trails down her soft white skin to stain the dress she wore. It seemed like she had run out of real tears long ago and her body had traded tears of salt water for something more substantial. I was fascinated by those tears like a bird is fascinated by a snake.

I leveled my gun at her. " Poor weeping mother, where are your children?" I asked in a soft voice that was not quite my own.

She turned those bloody tear kissed eyes to me as if I was a creature who had done something interesting and unexpected. " My children are lost, do you not hear them crying?" she asked me.

And the funny thing was, I did. Accept they weren't crying; they were screaming in my head. The Chupacabra's rushed us and we opened fire. The special forces team came out to play as soon as Reds first shot had been fired. I was busy screaming along with the voices in my head. I shot with every breath I exhaled and screamed because I couldn't not. The women was gone and so were the girls.

Red wasn't worried about the twins, they could take care of themselves, but he was damn worried about Cat who was having major issues and was currently huddled on the ground, clutching her head, rocking back and forth. The scary part was that she had dropped her gun, and that just didn't happen. He reached down to touch her, big mistake.

Cat screamed; "GET AWAY, GET AWAY, GET AWAYYYYY!!!!" Red pulled back sharply, shaken, for in the second he had touched Cat, he could hear the children screaming in terror and death. Such violent emotions really made him want to hurt something. But there wasn't much left to hurt. Red lifted his gun to shoot one of the Chupacabra's that was still alive after a fashion. But he was reluctant to pull the trigger as he saw the sad intelligence in the creatures eyes.

"Don't kill it!" Cat screeched and scrambled on hands and knees to kneel beside the creature who had begun to keen as she moved closer.

" Poor monster," she said stroking its feathers. "You want to stop the screaming too." Red and the others watched as the creature reached up a weak hand to touch her and trembled as it quietly died under her gaze.

Red put away his gone and just stared for a moment, "Cat?"

She didn't even look up as she moved toward the next creature who was yet still alive. It tried to crawl toward her, but death was weighing down its shadow too much to allow for much movement. Cat touched it and it shuddered.

" It doesn't want to die, it didn't want the small things to die." Cat stood up abruptly, the special team still had its guns trained on the still breathing creature.

Cat looked at them, " its already dieing, so kill it."

Cat raised her eyes to meet Reds and she cringed a bit. Red didn't like that at all, He wanted to make that look in her eyes go away. Something wrong was going on here and they needed to figure out what it was fast. Oh yeah and find the women who cried blood tears.

I looked at the poor dead creatures and felt nothing but sadness for them. They couldn't help but obey the women in white. Her power filled them, made them burn with her needs, wants, desired. With out her power driving them, they were just the creatures they were supposed to be. And I cant begrudge them their own being. Yet they had all had to die because of her. That beautiful cold women, she had sent them all to die. In that moment I I knew with cold calculation that the women would die by my hand and I would feel nothing but satisfaction with her death. I knelt by the dead creatures and stroked the soft unbloodied feathers of its cheek. The death of these shy creatures was such a damn waste. I could feel a sob choking me, burning behind my eyes, ready to break through my ribs if I didn't give in to it. But I refused, I swallowed down the sob along with my anger and I felt tired and empty for all my trouble. Serves me right I guess. I shouldn't see the monsters as anything else, but the problem was; after these monsters; now I did…..