Chapter 16
Gabriel's parents found him sobbing in the Hospital room where his last two friends died. They helped him up and walked him to their car and from there to their home. The whole time Gabriel sobbed, it was all he could think of to do. Eventually they made it to his room and Gabriel cried into his Mom's shoulder as she held him on his bed like a little child. They're all dead now. Why did this have to happen? Those two thoughts repeated over and over in his mind along with images of watching Lacy and Stacy die in front of him while he couldn't do anything to save him. He, Gabriel Fenton, one of the most powerful beings on Earth, could not save his friends from Death. He could fly faster than sound, he could lift up small buildings over his head, he could freeze a lake in a second, power a whole city; he could do it all. But he could not save the ones he cared about.
Eventually his sobs stopped and his Mom left him. She thought he had cried himself to sleep. But he was all too conscious. He focused on the voices downstairs and heard his parents talking to someone. "I've got it Mr. Fenton, I found out everything about those Purifier turds. Now all you folks gotta do is find them and put them down hard," Gabriel heard. He recognized the voice as a man named Steven Iglesias. Steven was a fat nerd, 6' tall and 4' wide who was still a pretty nice guy, massive anime fan. He had helped his Dad develop his cyber security systems, and improved on them after the Purifiers hacked his old system and stole the designs for the Halfa Suit months ago. "But what are we going to do about the girls, and the twins? We can't take them, they'll be in too much danger," Uncle Jack said, he knew they were talking about Anna, Greta, and Selma, as well as himself and Michael.
"Oh come on!" Greta moaned. "NO! Greta, this is their main fortress, there'll be God knows how many of them there, we can't keep you safe and protect ourselves too!" Uncle Roger told his second youngest child. "He's right, you, Selma, and Anna can't come," Grandpa Danny told Greta. "I can stay here and watch them," Steven suggested, "I watch my brother and sisters' kids all the time." After a minute Gabriel heard Aunt Chloe say, "Thank you. Girls, you need to listen to Mr. Iglesias while we're gone." "Okay," Gabriel heard Selma say, "Okay," he heard Greta say next with much less enthusiasm. Images of his friends flashed through Gabriel's mind and he realized, I'm going to go too. I won't stand by while everyone else fights! He got up and walked downstairs to see his Dad about to go up, to tell him they were leaving no doubt. "Gabriel," Jerry started then his son interrupted, "I'm going with you."
The tone he used made his Father blink in surprise. "Gabriel, you can't, you're-" "I'm going Dad," Gabriel insisted as his eyes glowed green. "I can't let you go, you're not ready for this, you just watched your friends die, I'm not going to put you in the middle of a warzone after that," Jerry sternly told him. "I'm not asking for your permission," Gabriel said, then went Ghost and before anyone could stop him he focused his ectoplasmic energy into his fast twitch muscles and in a white blur grabbed Steven's laptop and sent the information on it to his phone. "Gabriel stop!" his cousin JJ yelled then Gabriel turned invisible and phased through his house and flew away.
As soon as he was sure he wasn't found Gabriel looked on his phone and saw the address, the base was the head office of Advance Human Conglomerate, he recognized the name, it had owned Futech Labs, a genetic engineering company that had made a formula that made humans into ghost-like creatures, JJ, June, and Cooper had shut it down last year. They had been cleared of any complicity in it, but his family had had their doubts. I guess this explains a lot. Gabriel then typed the address into the GPS app on his phone and flew for the home base in New York City. As he flew faster than sound his mind was aflame with thoughts of revenge and how he would do it. His ghostly aura surrounded him and turned red as his rage grew and finally he found himself in front of the building.
Gabriel typed in a number on his phone and put it to his ear. "Hello?" Abby answered. "Abs, its Gabriel; Lacy and Stacy are dead now. I couldn't stop it," he said, his tears evaporating on his cheeks. "Why did this have to happen," Abby replied, he could hear her struggling not to cry. "I'm going to make them pay for this, for all our friends and everyone else they hurt. I just wanted you to know that I love you Abs," Gabriel told her. "Wait-" she tried to say, but Gabriel hung up. He then checked his phone and saw that the base was underground and turned intangible, still glowing red as he went to the basement of the building. The bloodthirsty young halfa then raised his fists and pounded on the floor with all his supernatural might, shattering the floor and revealing the room below it. He saw about two dozen people gawking at him, all of them with the Purifier's symbol of a human hand crushing a ghost on the chests of their grey uniforms. "I'm going to make you all pay," Gabriel said as he floated down like a wrathful demon come to claim the damned.
"SECURITY!" a woman screamed and a dozen Purifier's in their reverse engineered Halfa Suits ran in. They fired their lasers at Gabriel who ignored the blasts, his inhuman aura protected him. He wanted to feel them suffer at his hands, and they would. One black armored terrorist at last ran forward to punch Gabriel. The vengeful halfa punched his fist, and a mad joy leapt in his heart when his attacker screamed in pain and Gabriel kicked him back hard enough to leave a dent in his armor and knock two more Purifiers down. Gabriel ran at the others and grabbed the first one he saw by his arms and swung him around like a bat, battering away at the unfortunate man's fellows with all his might. "He's on a rampage! We need backup!" Gabriel heard someone say as he threw the Purifier he had used as a bat away, this one didn't get up, and neither did the other eleven.
Three dozen people in black armor then swarmed in. Gabriel summoned up all the power in his Cold Core and focused it into a massive snowball in his hands. "This'll get cold, but Hell should warm you all up in no time!" he roared and threw the snowball at the attackers, freezing all of them in a massive ball of ice. He then summoned electricity and sent electricity from his fingers to the unarmored people in the room; stunning them all before they could call for more backup. Gabriel approached a blonde woman and picked her up by her shirt, "Where is your leader?" he asked. The woman just looked at him in wide eyed fear and Gabriel then made his other hand intangible and placed it over her chest, "Talk or I'll tear your lungs out!" "Please! I don't know anything!" the woman screamed. Gabriel tossed her aside and grabbed a fat man with brown hair that was struggling to get up. "Tell me where your boss is or I'll rip your guts out!" Gabriel yelled and this time put his intangible hand inside the man.
"OH GOD OH GOD! SHE'S AT THE LOWEST LEVEL I SWEAR! SPARE ME!" "Does she have anything that can stop me from reaching her?" Gabriel asked; his voice promising pain. "NO NO! NOTHING LIKE THAT! BUT SHE HAS HUNDREDS OF SOLDIERS BETWEEN HERE AND THERE!" "GABRIEL!" Gabriel looked up and saw his family floating down, his Aunt April and Grandma Sam in their ghost fighting suits and everyone else in Ghost Form. "My God, what have you done?" his Dad asked as he looked around the room. "What I had to," Gabriel said as he dropped the fat man who immediately ran. Grandpa Danny went to the frozen people and phased them out of the ice; all of them were shivering and suffering from the beginnings of frostbite, but alive.
"Gabriel, you're going too far," his Mom said. Just then a voice from a hidden sound system resounded around the room. "I always knew halfas were nothing more than vicious monsters," the female voice said. "YOU KILLED MY FRIENDS! YOU AND YOUR PEOPLE!" Gabriel yelled back. "To stop monsters such as you, I would do it ten times over again. You halfas aren't human; you're more powerful than any human can ever naturally be. If I don't stop you now, you will spread like locusts, and drive humanity extinct! But now that you're all here, I can destroy you all at once!" the voice yelled and the floor beneath Gabriel moved. He flew up; his Grandpa grabbed everyone else by creating a dozen copies and got them out of harm's way. Gabriel watched as hundreds of black armored people started to fly up from below. "THIS WON'T STOP ME!" "DON'T!" Grandpa Danny screamed as Gabriel filled his lungs with air and unleashed a red Ghostly Wail at the rising armors.
The ground and everywhere around them shook as Gabriel unleashed his most powerful technique. All the armors exploded and Gabriel felt nothing but vicious satisfaction. "I'm coming for you!" he yelled down as he flew to the bottom of the tunnel. Suddenly he saw a light coming and raised an ecto-energy shield. A massive laser blast erupted from below and Gabriel could feel his shield beginning to collapse. Gabriel yelled as loud as he could as the laser broke through his shield and the energy engulfed him and sent him flying up. The laser blast sent him soaring and crashing through the building above and finally he hit open air. With a massive effort of will he managed to force himself to slip out of the energy ray and found himself hovering high over the city.
Everything in his body hurt. My God, what was that!? Gabriel could feel his power slipping from him and he focused with all his willpower to stay in his Ghost Form. He slowly floated back down; he had been blasted up higher than the clouds! After a slow and painful eternity he saw the remains of the building and realized, "What have I done?" There was devastation all around, unleashed from that laser that would not have fired if not for him rushing in. He then flew lower and saw that his family was battling a twenty foot tall black Halfa Suit! Gabriel watched as his Aunts and Uncles, Cousins and Grandparents all flew around the giant armor blasting away with ghost and ice rays and electricity courtesy of his Mom. Nothing worked as the suit seemed to absorb all the power and then blast small lasers from all over its body, forcing his family on the defensive. Gabriel flew down and joined the melee, blasting his own ghost rays, with similar results.
He dodged several white lasers that came his way and flew over to his Cousins June and Eve who were dodging and blasting together. "This isn't working!" Gabriel yelled. "What else can we do?" June asked him. As if in response they heard a massive GONG sound and saw that Uncle Jack had formed an ectoplasmic hammer and hit the giant armor, destroying one of its cannons. "Blunt force it is!" Eve said and June formed a hammer herself. Gabriel focused his energy to shield himself and charged at the armor's left leg. He pounded through it, severing it. "The kids are following your lead Jack! And it's working!" Marie yelled as everyone else followed Gabriel, June, Eve and Jack's lead. Those that couldn't form weapons shielded the ones that could, namely Uncle Jack, JJ, June, and Cooper while Marie made copies and flew around the armor's head to distract it.
Suddenly a massive field of energy burst out from the armor, knocking everyone back. "THIS ISN'T OVER!" the voice from before yelled from the armor, then suddenly the now reduced suit, with only the torso, head, and right arm remaining, blasted black lasers at the stunned halfas. Gabriel was hit and suddenly his Ghost Form shut off! He watched as he started to fall along with everyone else in his family when a black blur grabbed him and everyone else. "Grandpa?" Gabriel said in confusion as he watched copies of his Grandpa Danny catch the rest of their family. "I dodged just in time," Grandpa Danny told him, then flew them all down. Grandpa Danny looked at each of them as soon as they were on solid ground and said, "I can handle it from here." "Be careful Danny," Grandma Sam told him. "This will be over soon," he assured her.
Gabriel watched as a white ghostly aura surrounded his Grandfather and Danny flew up at the armor. The ruined suit blasted away and Danny dodged all of them. "This is over!" Danny yelled as he crashed through the suit and it exploded behind him. "Whoa," Cousin Ivan said and watched as Grandpa Danny floated down, holding a short white woman with black hair and one blue eye and one green eye by her collar. "Rachel Cristoff," Jerry said when he saw her. "It's over you psycho," Grandpa Danny said. Cristoff only growled at him and spat in his face, "Go ahead, kill me, we all know that's what you really want! You halfas only did this to flaunt your superiority!" Everyone turned to Gabriel, who said, "I've already killed a lot of people." "No, you didn't," Grandma Sam told him, "They were robots; that was all she had left, Gabriel, it's over."
Gabriel looked up at the sky and once again thought about Kory, Mike, Lisa, Lucas, Lacy, and Stacy. He summoned up his power and went Ghost one more time. He walked up to Cristoff and said, "I won't give you the satisfaction of being right. You're not worth it." Then he walked over to arriving EMT's, and passed out.