Told ya it wouldn't take too long for me to get this next chapter up and running. My apologies to anyone who was either offended or sickened by the previous chapter, but soon you'll see why I put it in. Here's chapter 3 sorry that its not the gore filled chapter that I promised, that'll be chappie 4, but as I wrote this I felt like I should write what I have cause it'll help set the scene for what is to come later on. Enjoy.
Chapter 3: There is no Place Like Home
Scourge ducked and dived through the tight and winding streets determined to evade his pursuers. Diving behind a small collection of metallic rubbish bins the green hedgehog remained motionless, oxygen was something that no-one, not even he, could do without but he remained extremely cautious when drawing breath so as not to attract the attention of those who had chased him for nearly a whole hour. Quietly, in his cramped hideaway, he seethed with untamed rage, he would clench his hand into a tight fist and then would unleash the hate against the surrounding environment. Smacking his fists repeatedly against the brickwork that formed the surrounding walls, Scourge clenched his teeth and curled his cracked lips over so as to expose the yellow canines to the wide world. Trickles of saliva either fell straight to the muddy ground or splashed against his leather jacket as he repeatedly pounded the walls. The pain he now felt course through both of his arms was not enough to cease his relentless attacks, even the sight of his own blood beginning to mingle with that of his first victim of the day and thus further stain his white gloves did not stop him. Who knows what caused him to act the way he did for the duration of his vengeful counterattack against the world, some would say that its nothing more than an insane lunatic becoming even more psychotic. However, it is more likely the fact that he hated knowing that he let his latest victim live to escape his grasp. He would not realize until it was too late, that fate had decided that that heinous crime would bring about his own downfall.
"Stupid little bitch, how dare do that to me. If I see her again I'll gut her like a fish, yes that's it, I'll make her bleed oceans of blood before letting her die". Lost in his own deluded fantasies of horrific vengeance, the green beast failed to notice that he was actually becoming aroused at the thoughts of making the little pink hedgehog suffer more pain than she had previously experienced.
Eventually, after approximately ten minutes of continuous assault, Scourged ceased his attack. Numbness took hold of his arms but was quickly replaced by sharp pain burning into his flesh as he tried to flex the muscles in all his fingers, with his eyes widened he stared at a dirty patch of ground along the alleyway in the not too far off distance. Even though his eyes faced in that direction Scourge saw nothing, the only sights that covered his hate fueled and bloodshot eyes were visions of death, mutilation and blood. The victims were not of any specific individual, they were merely of random people. More innocent victims who unwittingly gave him ever more amounts of joy at being seen to die slowly and painfully. Slowly they faded from view until all that remained was the patch of dirt in the darkness of the real world, in which he existed. Scourge now paid the matter no more attention, he had allowed his anger to reach boiling point but now it had simmered and cooled to nothing, the green hedgehog slowly removed the glove from his left hand and then the one from his right. He looked over them with unnatural attention, they were after all his chief tool and weapons although it was the weapon he concealed in between his legs that would backfire fatally on him. Both hands were covered in cuts and congealed blood, it hurt him to contract and then relax the muscles within each hand but the pain seemed to excite him, lapping at the still trickling blood from a few of the cuts as a dog would lap at a pool of water, Scourge tasted his own mortality.
His own blood served as a constant reminder that he was nothing more than an ordinary life form, no matter how much he had hoped to be something more than he was… it would come to nothing. Sooner or later he would die and he knew it, all that mattered was whether it was by someone else getting a lucky hit through his defenses, disease, or old age. He held his fists up to the cloudy sky and shook them violently as if blaming the heavens for granting the Rose girl a second chance at life, everyone was his enemy, everyone had it in for him and everyone deserved to die… very slowly. Gritting his teeth so as to expose his canines, Scourge took to his heels. Diving over bins and piles of trash left on the ground of the alleyway, the green hedgehog kept running. Deeper and deeper into the alleyways and side streets he ventured until he came to a place all too familiar to him… the ganglands.
'The Ganglands' was not the proper name for the area of Mobotropolis that Scourge now found himself in, its real title had been forgotten long ago but the area had become synonymous with street kids, prostitutes, drug dealer and addicts and general scum like himself. Although he would never for one moment consider himself as fitting into that category. It had always been a rundown area of the city where high crime levels and high unemployment reigned supreme, families who lived there could not or merely would not look after their offspring… of which, as was quite often the case, there were many. Children of all ages ran through the grimy and disheveled streets looking for anything to entertain themselves with or to simply find something to eat or drink. Most of the residents who used to reside there packed up and moved out when they realised that the area was going downhill fast and would destroy everything within it, including them, if they didn't jump ship fast, and so the place was left to its fate. As the old residents moved out the new tenants, the street kids, moved in. It was hard to imagine that the neighborhood could become any more of a wreck than it already was… but it did. Kids find a way to accomplish anything they set their minds too… even destruction.
Since families could not or took no interest in raising their children they were simply left to fend for themselves, even children from outside of the area were driven there by a family member or friend and just abandoned on the streets, thus earning the truthful but unattractive title of 'The Dumping Ground'. The streets were covered in layers of grime and mud, the walls of the many building along the streets were cracked and almost ready to collapse, and everywhere you turned one could see starvation, disease and sadness. The Mobian government treated the place as if it didn't exist at all, since it first started going down hill no financial assistance was given nor was any encouragement made for people to live there and make the place more presentable. Everything and everyone existing there had simply been abandoned and left to rot. Here, in this hell hole of a home town, there was only one law that ruled the streets… you fight or you perish, it was as simple as that. Street youths of all species were split into two groups, one group was reserved for those kids who proved themselves in a fight, if you proved your worth you were given respect, admiration and even a sizeable portion of sustenance. However, if you were unlucky enough to be found wanting in a fight you got put into category two, children who found themselves here were left to fend for themselves or most likely murdered so as to help preserve the small food supply for those who truly deserved it. All in all… it was a dog eat dog world, but it was what one green hedgehog called his playground.
This is where Scourge had come to after the murder of his parents, and from the moment he had arrived there it became instantly clear to everyone that hell had well and truly come to earth. He may have been young at the time but he soon gained a reputation for brutal savagery and his merciless hatred for anyone, it mattered not if they were male or female or even if they were toddlers… they were all fair game. Gangs of street thugs who had grown up rough and tough in this neighborhood tried to take Scourge down with such unbridled savagery that it almost rivaled his own, if they were smart, as was not often the case, they would attack en masse but usually they would come at him in small clusters of between three and six individuals. But each and every time since the day they first tried, they failed and failed disastrously. Scourge leaned against a brick wall as memories of his arrival in the ganglands filled his mind, it gave him no end of pleasure at seeing such hacked and slashed corpses, dead by his own hand, splash the streets with their own crimson life force only to flow down into the darkness of the cities drains and be lost forever. Pushing himself away from his resting position, the green psychopath headed into the dark and dank world of his home turf.
"There really is no place like home", he muttered quietly to himself as he motioned towards the emptiness of the streets. The wind howled down the seemingly empty streets, bouncing off the broken and disheveled buildings it pierced the ears of many, including the green hedgehog himself, as it moved to and fro through cracks in the walls and broken windows and down the narrow alleyways. It did not strike the hedgehog as suspicious that there was no activity whatsoever in the part of the neighborhood he had entered into, usually he would have expected to have been greeted by the cries and shrieks of fear of those mobians who had been foolish enough not to have seen him approach… but no sound, save for the wind, was heard.
"Well this is certainly fucked up, I would have expected a pleasant welcome home", he said to himself as his eyes darted to and fro across the streets in a seemingly desperate attempt to seek out some form of life.
Shrugging his shoulders, Scourge gave up his search and carried on down the broken and pot-hole covered road. As he continued his trek along the road he felt himself becoming slightly more agitated, since there was no-one around for him to have 'fun' with boredom was setting in fast. Scourge hated the feeling of boredom, but more importantly everyone hated him even more when he was bored, the green hedgehog's insanity was never in any doubt but it had become painfully obvious to those mobians in the past that Scourge was accustomed to bizarre and horrific levels of unheard of barbarity, especially when he had nothing to do that would satisfy his madness.
"MAN, THIS FUCKING SUCKS!", he roared to the heavens in an attempt to let out his frustration
Clenching his fists together, Scourge ran along the road, almost tripping over a pot-hole as he went, until he reached the summit of a small hill on the outskirts of his home ground. Standing on the brow of the small tarmacked hill, Scourge looked out over and towards the horizon. It was truly a spectacular sight, ruined and wracked building lay before him for man miles and the midday sun shone brightly over the surrounding lands. For many the sun was the only source of warmth they had, but for others, like Scourge, the sun was merely mocking them. He viewed the sun as nothing more than an insulting gesture from whatever otherworldly body might have existed out there, not that he held any faith whatsoever in a higher authority save his own, and that it only existed to mock those whose lives had been shattered either by the doings of others or that of their own. Pulling down his newly acquired shades over his eyes the world seemed to have changed to how he would always like it to be… dark and cold, just like himself. Viewing the world through the black lenses brought some sickening comfort to his heart, but he did not wear them for long as something quite startling attracted his gaze.
Staring down towards the bottom of the hill, Scourge looked upon a sight that both shocked and thrilled him. Stretching across the street, a few meters away from the hill where the hedgehog stood, a barricade comprising of all matter of ruined household items had been erected. It seemed as if it had been created with the specific purpose of halting the advance of an army, but little did the green hedgehog at first realize that the construction had been built only for the purpose of stopping one individual… him. Standing poised for a fight both in front and behind the barricade were positioned row upon row of mobians, all dressed in the appropriate attire of the typical rough street mob. From his position atop the hill, Scourge could not tell if the all of the fighters arrayed against him were armed, some did not hide their weapons from view, the bore them aloft to the heavens in an obvious 'bring it on' gesture of defiance. There were indeed many of them at least thirty by his rough estimation but all of them had one thing in common… they were bent on killing him.
Some of the mob looked to be no more than youngsters, probably around seven or eight years of age, but even they joined with their older comrades in the cacophony of shouts and screams that pierced the airways and were directed at their target. The majority of the fighters were clearly male but there was also the casual female mobian who had no doubt concealed a weapon about her person, and had decided to stand shoulder to shoulder with her comrades with the intention of killing the beast that stood not one hundred meters from their position.
A toothy grin slowly formed into a smirk of utter glee on Scourge's face as he cast his eyes over the array of fighters below him, this is what he lived for, mindless and senseless killing and butchery brought him no end of joy… now he would have fun after all. Shuffling his right hand around his pocket, Scourge gingerly fingered his blade. It had tasted blood only once so far this day but soon the time would come whereby it would unleash more crimson upon the surface of the world. The blade, like the hedgehog himself, craved an eternal hunger for blood and death… and it would be satisfied come what may.
"Looks like this day aint gonna be a total loss after all", he whispered calmly to himself. Slowly putting one green trainer in front of the other, the green monster headed calmly down the hill.
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I know I said that this chapter would be full of blood and gore but as wrote this I just wanted to further explain the environment within which Scourge, and most of his victims, exists. 'the ganglands' are important to the story so I had to base this chapter around it. The next chapter will consist of much fighting and a lot of bloodshed, as you probably already figured out, so I hope you'll enjoy that one too. Chow.