Beginning of the End
by Gary Jones
The tunnels were tight and claustrophobic, the small amount of light being given off by the torches the Moloids carried barely allowed their three visitors to see more than two feet in front of them.
Carried at the front of the group, on the shoulders of a group of Moloids, was the hero from another dimension know as Mimic.
He had used his uncanny abilities to take on the form and powers of anyone he has touched to change into the Mole Man, the ruler of the underground kingdoms of Earth.
From the mental link he now shared with the Moloids, Mimic could see what had become of the underground kingdoms since the vampires had taken over.
The greatest loss the vampires felt was the loss of the wild hunt, they missed their prey's smell of fear as they chased them, and they longed for the look of fear in a person's eye before they sank their fangs into their victim's throat.
With human now farmed as cattle, the underground races were the only choice left. The fact that this new prey was located underground away from the harmful rays of the sun meant that entire days could be spent hunting and killing.
Stalker hated being in the restrictive space of the underground tunnels, the enclosed space made his enhanced agility and speed next to useless.
Steve Rogers could only look on with wonder at the creatures that carried him high on their shoulders. It had been a little over a month since he had been selected to become the United States first Super-Soldier. The drugs, surgery and the radio-active vita-rays had all served to transform him into Captain America.
Some of the larger creatures that Mimic had summoned were pulling down the tunnels behind them to prevent anyone from following, but even through the tons of rubble they pulled down, the cries of blood hungry vampires could be heard as they tore futility at the tons of Earth separating them from their prey.
The dim light and restrictive space of the tunnels made it hard to mark the passage of time; hours seemed to pass until at the end of another length of tunnels a bright light could be seen.
The opened up into a massive cavern that could easily have housed a city block. The light came from above, formed by a mass of glowing stones, it was unknown if these light giving stones where natural formations or had been artificially made.
Mimic, in the form of the Mole Man could feel his control over the underground creatures being disrupted and a few moments after he had felt the first effects the link had completely vanished.
The silent convoy kept moving toward the centre of the cavern, where Captain America, Stalker and especially Mimic were shocked to discover the real Mole Man, sitting on a throne of worn rocks.
"Welcome to my home," the Mole Man coughed as he rose to his feet, most of his weight being taken by his cane. He looked tried and old, and several bite marks could be made out upon his body "but is it as friend or foe."
Selene kneeled in front of the Vampire Lord and his Queen, if her heart was still capable of beating it would now be pounding so hard as to burst from her chest.
"Tell me again what you just said," the Vampire Lord asked, his face obstructed by the shadows in the barely lit throne room.
"The new meat we brought in facilitated an escape amongst a small group of captives," Selene said, omitting the fact that the security systems had alerted her to the escape attempt but she had chosen to let them escape so she could have the fun of capturing them again.
"Yes, I thought that was what you said," the Vampire Lord gestured with his hands to the several powerfully built vampiric bodyguards who stood motionless at either side of the doors to the throne room.
"Take her to the sub-level, I hear the Lowlifes have worn out another of their toys, Selene here will be a more than adequate replacement."
Selene's beautiful but pale face was fixed with horror as the guards seized her by the shoulders and hauled her to her feet.
The Lowlifes, as they were known, were those vampires that had… gone wrong, something had happened during their transformation into a member of the undead and they had been left as little more than mindless zombies.
Despite their lack of intelligence, the Lowlifes were incredibly strong and had an absolute loyalty to the Vampire Lord; they could be used as shock-troops if an ambitious Master Vampire ever tried to take the ruling position.
They also had a voracious sexual appetite and if someone displeased the Vampire Lord, male or female, they were given to the Lowlifes to do with as they pleased.
Selene was dragged kicking and screaming from the Throne Room, her cries a mixture of pleading and threats.
"Now she was a rather useful tool, it will be a shame to lose her services," the Vampire Queen leaned forward on her seat, her face coming from the shadow, her long blonde hair hanging off her shoulder.
"I've warned you about getting too attached to the help before now, haven't I Darla," the Vampire Lord rose from his seat, he was clothed entirely in black and wore a long black leather coat, his black hair was cut short.
"Now Angelus, you know mistakes can happen," Darla stood and wrapped her arms around her immortal lover "you do remember what that Slayer nearly did to you in Istanbul, don't you?"
"I try to forget that incident," Angelus half grinned as he remember when he though he had defeated the Slayer, only for her to stab him with a stake as he drank from her. The stake had missed his heart by only a fraction of an inch.
"So you won't send Selene to the Lowlifes then my love," Darla asked before playfully biting the neck of Angelus.
"Oh! She's still going," he replied "but maybe just for a couple of weeks," he grinned before passionately kissing his immortal love.
"Come on you buggers let me back in, it's getting a little toasty out here," Spike pounded on a steel security door on the East side of the mall.
Spike had refused to divulge the exact location of the blood farm where the captured Stalker had been taken. Fixit had been ready to pull Spike's head from his shoulders but Phoenix had managed to convince him that they could gather no information from a pile of dust. It had been Sue, who had mentioned that at the moment the sun was high in the sky, in a few minutes it would pass over and begin its decent into the East.
"Tell us what we want to know or you burn," Fixit grinned through the security grill "personally I'm hoping you don't."
The sun was slowly moving into the East and the shadow the building cast was shrinking as it did so. Spike could only watch as the edge of the shadow crawled closer, threatening to bathe him in the burning, literally in his case, light of day.
"Ok! You win you buggers," Spike pressed himself against the door, desperately hugging the last piece of shadow "they take all the new supers to a place called the Baxter Building on Manhattan."
The three dimension tossed heroes looked at each other, the name known to each of them but Sue had once called the building her home.
"Thanks for that," Fixit said grinning through the door's small security grill, before he turned and began to walk away back into the innards of the Mall.
"Joe," Sue said sternly as she barred the grey man's path "you said you'd let him back inside if he told you where Stalker was likely to be."
"Yeah, I did, didn't I," Fixit said as he looked down at the petite blonde woman. She had a fire in her eyes that reminded him of his fellow Avenger Carol Barton, the woman called Hawkeye.
"You sure I can't just leave him out there," Fixit said with disappointment in his voice.
"JOE."
"Ok. Ok. A guy ain't allowed to have any fun around here," Fixit took one huge stride back toward the door and opened it, wrenching it from its hinges as he did so.
"About bloody time," Spike ran inside, patting out the few small flames that had began to burn his clothes "another minute and you would have been sweeping me up with a dustpan and brush."
"That can still be arranged if you're messin' with us," Fixit said to the English born vampire as he pulled him up to eye level by the front of his dark red t-shirt "and just to make sure you ain't, guess whose leading us there."
"Well that is a &$ing horrible smell," Stalker complained as he and the others had been led by the Mole Man into a smaller side chamber. Mimic had now returned to his real male form.
Captain America stood over the source of the foul stench and even though he was nearly gagging, he could not tear himself away from what he saw.
The body was badly decomposed and had obviously spent a great deal of time in the waters, such was its state but it was the outfit that clothes the body that kept Steve Rogers gaze fixed to it, underneath the tattered brown overalls a more colourful cloth could be made out, it was a more militaristic version of the Captain America costume that he had been given.
"The few creatures that remain to me that are capable of travelling through the water dragged the body in here a few days ago," the Mole Man leant on his cane, his age weighing on him far more than it should "he was found in the remains of an iceberg, he would never have even realised he was drowning but at least he was spared the terror that the world has become."
The Mole Man turned and began to walk out of the chamber "the vampires will soon come again to feed; I would advise that you find somewhere to hide."
"So are you going to take the costume?" Mimic asked the silent Cap.
"Who gives a rats arse about some costume, I'm going to find a hole to hide in before I become a life time donor to the blood bank," Stalker said as he began to follow the Mole Man out of the chamber, he stopped when he heard the blood hungry cries of a group of vampires, he could just make them out across the other side of the cavern where they were feeding on a terrified group of Moloids.
"Not the costume but I think I can find a use for this," Cap knelt down and carefully unfastened the front of the overalls and pulled out a round shield, with a white star at its centre surrounded by blue, with two red stripes and a white one between them.
The shields aged leather straps creaked as Cap positioned the shield on his right forearm. Even though he had never carried anything like it before, it immediately felt to Cap that he had carried it all his life.
"I'm not just going to hide in a hole while innocent creatures are terrorised," Cap walked to the side chambers entrance and looked back at Mimic and Stalker "I don't expect either of you to come but I would appreciate the back up."
"You don't even have to ask Cap," Mimic said as he stepped forward "and I even have the perfect body to give these vamps a roasting." Mimic activated his powers and changed his form into that of Johnny Storm, the man on his world who was known as the Human Torch.
"You guys are $£&ing nuts going out there," Stalker shouted at the two men.
"No-one expects you to go," Cap replied to Stalker as he moved past the entrance "only you have to live with your conscience."
The Moloids screamed silently as the pack of five vampires moved among them, feeding and rendering flesh at will.
"You're a fat one aren't you," Dominic Petros held the Moloid up to face level by the poor creatures throat, it wriggled fruitlessly in the vampiric mutants grasp, its poor memory recalling vividly what had happened to so many of its fellow Moloids.
"Just hurry up and eat the thing will you," another member of the feeding party cried out as she tossed a drained Moloid aside "I swear Avalanche if we didn't need your power to get us into these places, there is no way you would be allowed to come along."
"Why don't you shut your mouth," Avalanche said back with a sneer before sinking his fangs into the neck of the Moloid he was holding, the creature struggled for only a moment before going deathly still, resigned as it was to its fate.
Avalanche didn't even have time to scream as he was consumed by a massive column of fire.
"Damn I didn't mean to burn up the Moloid as well," Mimic said as he watched the vampire and its prey burn to dust "I should have trained more in using Storm's powers."
"You probably did the thing a favour," Cap replied as he wrestled with the female vampire that Avalanche had been talking to, eventually managing to throw her to the ground, and using his newly acquired shield to remove her head.
The taking off life repulsed Captain America but he knew that in war sometimes there was no other choice.
"That wasn't a very nice thing to do now was it?" the vampire talking was dressed in a smart dark blue business suit and had a neatly trimmed grey beard, he wiped a small amount of blood from the corner of his mouth with a monogrammed handkerchief "but how rude of me not to introduce myself."
The vampire folded his handkerchief neatly before putting it back in the right-hand breast pocket of his jacket "my name is Deacon Frost."
Next Issue