Chapter 8: Banishment
The body of Hojo's mutated form entered Bone Village, but an old man appeared to be waiting for him. His blank eyes stared at nothing as the horror entered the village.
He began reciting a strange chant and waving a lantern at the body of Hojo. Suddenly, Hojo was ripped from his possession of Aurum and returned back to his physical body. Banishing Sephiroth back to his with one fell ancient chant.
Hojo's body twisted and fell to the ground, the mad scientist growled and screamed, snarling at the old man, "YOU! WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO ME!"
The blind old man approached Hojo, "I've freed your body of a captive spirit with ancient magic." The old man in tan pants and a red shirt hobbled back into the town mumbling something to himself about ungrateful fools.
Enraged with the sudden change of plans and being expelled from his body and returned to this painful existence he lunged forth at the old man and thrust his tentacle arms out at the man. Piercing through the back in the center of the spinal cord and out through the chest Hojo lifted the man into the air and threw the dying man into a tree with it.
The old man's face was bashed In like the rest of his body as Hojo whipped it around like a rag doll, smashing it into tree after tree, swinging the lifeless body around like a child with a toy in a fit of rage. At last the body broke in two and fell to the ground in a pile of mangled flesh and bone.
Hojo entered the town and several archeologists gasped in horror as he entered the site. A beautiful thirty year old archeologist named Ella spotted Hojo first, and screamed as she dropped her shovel and ran inside the tent.
"John! Sam! Mark! Something is attacking the village!"
Two old man emerged from the tent. One wearing thick coke-bottle glasses, his wild hair was untamed and flew everywhere without a single care in the world. His clothes were torn and dirty. The typical tan clothes of an archeologist in Gaia. Though he looked like he was in his late thirties he had the sort of aura that made him seem like a child. He sported a cigar in his mouth and a large cannon in his hand. The second man was in his sixties and held up a pickaxe threateningly. A white beard covered his face, but aside from his feeble body stood a seasoned soldier who still knew how to fight after all these years.
John yelled first, "What the hell are you? Get away from here!"
Sam moved closer and raised his pickaxe high into the air, "Git! Else you'll get a thrashing - HOJO!"
The horror stopped and craned its neck impossibly to the right, breaking its own neck and then continuing to rotate it further and futher until it cracked again, with a single snap thrusting it back into place. The two old men gasped in horror upon this sight and began to move back to the tent slowly.
"Pardon me. I need your bodies for my work. It will only hurt for a moment."
Hojo's arm twisted and detached from his stomach and fell to the ground. It diffused into two writhing snake-like horrors, black ooze shooting from their bodies. Twisting, writhing and squirming they began to develop teeth and became voracious horrors.
Before the two men knew what happened the snake-like creatures pounced on them, flying through the air and opening their mouths widely. They engulfed the heads of their two victims down to the neck and sunk their teeth in and let gravity take over as they snapped the neck of their victims and tore the head off the body. Crimson streams of blood shot from their necks into the mouths of the horrors as they gorged themselves on the blood of their victims.
After feasting themselves on ample amounts of blood they turned to Hojo hungrily and leaped into the air, but their creator simply thrust his arms into the two deviant creatures and spewed black poison onto them. They melted and were absorbed as nutrients back into his body.
Hojo returned to his human form and laughed as he grasped his ruined lab coat with one hand and tore it to shreds, casting it onto the ground below. Walking up to the body of Sam he took the old man's coat and wrapped it around his chest. The blood soaked collar and back still dripped with the lifeblood of its previous master. Hojo moved forward towards the tent, at last able to pass himself off for a human. The change was absolutely incredible. His flesh was its old white pale familiarity. His hair was back to being its wonderful black nature. His eyes returned to normal, giving him less then wonderful vision at close proximities.
Hojo proceeded forward into the tent where the beautiful woman had run. Inside, quivering with fear behind a wooden crate lay the form of a woman. Hojo looked upon her form and noticed something familiar about her, "Lucrecia? Is that you?"
Hojo's voice became soft, it was no longer the voice of a hungry beast driven to the brink of insanity, "Lucrecia? Lucrecia!?" The woman emerged, beginning to cry, holding a knife to her neck, backed into a corner. Her brown hair and soft face reminded Hojo of his wife.
Her face was stricken with fear, tears flowed freely and all life in her face had left her, raising the sharp blade closer to her neck.
Hojo reached out and grabbed her arm, forcing it down to her side before she could cut herself. The blade dipped low and barely cut her neck as Hojo ripped it away by force. Tearing the blade from her supple hand he looked at the dagger and crushed it to pieces in his hands. The slivers of the knife fell to the ground with not so much as a single sound. Flabbergasted she started to whine, her face stricken with horror at the sight of this man.
Hojo reached closer and kissed her on the lips, Ella tried to push away, but her body became weak and she fell to the ground. The poison on even Hojo's lips was lethal, but from a mere kiss it acted as a tranquilizer. As she fell into his arms a victorious Hojo mused, "Let's go to see our son, honey. Hee hee hee. He's waiting for us."
He picked her up in his unnaturally powerful arms and slung her limp body over his shoulder and walked with her, as if she was no more then a piece of cloth draped over his shoulders. Hojo left the tent and lumbered out into the daylight. The sun shone bright overhead, making Hojo turn his head away from the intense light.
Hojo started to leave Bone Village as a familiar face called out to him, "Where you going, yo?" Hojo kept walking, ignoring the obvious annoyance behind him, not even giving so much as a single glace to Reno.
Behind him the red-haired joker himself waved a short baton in his hands. Smacking it idly into his left hand, the soft tapping of the baton like a drum.
"Yo!"
"…"
"Hey, look at me you deranged mutant freak. Get over the fact you a failed piece of shit and give Daddy Reno a hug, yo!"
Hojo stopped in his tracks, anger boiling in him. He was about to erupt in sheer anger, but he could not let himself endanger his beautiful long-lost wife. Living in a world of delusion and madness, Hojo continued walking away at a steady pace, down the hill and away from Bone Village.
Reno growled and ran at Hojo, his baton ready to deliver punishment into Hojo's face. As he got cose Hojo pivoted, whipping his right arm out and slamming into Reno. The body of Reno was flung through the air and twisted before slamming into a tree, cracking and shaking the tree entirely. The force shook Reno up, but he landed on his feet, his cat-like reflexes in combat had been fully reawakened.
Hojo darted from between the trees, moving swiftly and clearly above the ground, whiping his body around from tree trunk to tree trunk at break-neck pace. He growled like a feral creature as he came for Reno, his mouth agape, baring his teeth at Reno.
Reno gasped and ducked, watching Hojo fly overhead, but something dripped onto his black jacket, instantly burning like fire. Reno's eyes widened and he quickly shook his arms violently as he ripped off his jacket and shirt, flailing wildly to get them off.
Reno turned to look around anticipating Hojo's attack, ready and poised for combat he was ready with his baton. Sound returned to the trees, rustling, chirping of birds. Hojo had seemingly disappeared, but Reno stood ready, knowing the old man was a tricky foe to deal with. All brains no brawn before, but now he was a perfect killing machine. Hojo's experiments have gone too far and he was a bigger threat then ever before.
Reno waited and waited, and still no attack. At last he gave up and pulled out his phone, "This is Reno, we got a problem."