Author Note: There we go… starting to pump out longer chapters, but I think we need some tasty fillers.
Mmmmhmmmm… FILLER… not yet, need to make a certain alien go away first!
Episode Ten: Unlikely Team-ups
Standing underneath a now super-sized alien, the trio of fighters was now at a loss for their next move. Not taking a rest, Pyron picked up his three thousand sized foot to end the frustration without delay. Snapping back to reality, Joe grabbed the two female Darkstalkers and vanished from the shadow of the lowering foot. Smashing into the ground, another half mile was left flattened by the pressure of Pyron's stomp. Roaring loudly, Joe was missing from view as Felicia and Hsien-Ko came to.
"Nya… ouchie…" Groaning softly, the tip of Felicia's tail had gotten singed from the attack. Cleaning off the charred fur, the weapon specialist shook debris from her hat. Looking around, it seemed Joe was blown further away than they were.
Pyron was actively looking for them, scanning the area for signs of movement from survivors. "Tch, will you just let me use the Dragon Technique now?" Popping off her sister's head, Mei-Lin appeared and shook in disapproval. "It is not time to throw away our chance to help mom…"
Sensing energy being released, Pyron noticed the two Darkstalkers. There you are! Shocked, the two prepared to attack… but was interrupted by the sight of Pyron being turned into a one hundred foot glowing popsicle. The white ice spirit belonging to Donovan vanished as the dhampir arrived to the battle. "I thought I sensed a new Dark One… but it's just the cat." Noticing a collapsed wall, he sliced the brick surface open with his flame spirit. Revealing Joe, the freed human coughed heavily from the dust. "Where's that strength I sensed from you boy?"
"I assume it'd kill you to say hi once in a while?" Joe countered as Pyron exploded through his icy seal. Showering the scene in a mid-summer snow, the air sparkled before the flakes melted away quickly. Fool! You think I would fall to such a cheap trick?
A howl echoed through the ruins of the area as a flaming dragon crashed into the unsuspecting Pyron's head. Dropping the creature to the ground, Jon Talbain appeared and snarled at the sight of not one… but two Dark Hunters. "And to think I trusted you human!" Saying the same line at almost the exact time, the werewolf and dhampir were about to unleash hell on each other. Stepping between the two, Joe prevented another conflict.
"Hey, cut it out! We got enough problems to…" Flinching, the human grabbed the right side of his rib cage. While transporting Felicia and Hsien-Ko, he couldn't move fast enough and was thrown into a wall. The wall came down and ended up pushing a thin metal shard right into him. Blood dripped from his hand, as Joe found himself wounded badly.
Scoffing, Jon had seen what the human had done up to this point. Not looking to get involved at the start, the wolf was looking to take advantage and take revenge on Pyron for not pushing him past his limits to remove the curse. "You've fought my darker half… I'll help this time, but if you don't alert me to the next time it shows… I will kill you myself." Staring at the wolf-creature, Donovan put away his sword. "I shall keep that request and not hunt until this thing is put down."
Forcing out a smile, Joe was in serious pain. He pushed his body beyond the breaking point and the medicine he took wasn't working anymore. Feeling someone catch him from hitting the ground, he noticed Felicia's tail holding him up before putting an arm under his shoulders. "Thanks Felicia…" Noticing Pyron back on his feet, the Raging Chaos attack was still inside the giant alien's stomach.
"Hey…" Stopping the unusual team, Joe pointed up at the black and white area. "Aim for that, if you can break through his barrier… it'll go off."
Taking off to fight the glowing giant, Joe groaned out in pain as the werewolf and dhampir team headed out. Holding onto her wounded friend, Felicia was worried about the chaotic human's health. Sitting on the ground, Joe was forced to endure Hsien-Ko's treatment to halt the blood coming from his ribs. "Geez, you are too reckless…" Applying another swab of ointment on the open wound, Joe's eyes went wide as he screamed in pain from the burning. Felicia and Mei-Lin were holding the stubborn human down as the blue hunter sighed. "… you baby."
Meanwhile, the fight with Pyron was going as poorly as Joe's healing factor. Rushing up to the creature's head, Jon pummeled several hard strikes before being blown back. Catching hold of Pyron's left arm on the way down to the ground, the wolf was able to dash away from being crushed in between two large hands. Using the distraction, Donovan called out his lighting spirit to strike. Throwing a sparking fist at the alien, the spirit unleashed a wave of thunder bolts. Crashing into Pyron's barrier, the swirling attack inside the towering enemy was unchanged.
Some attack… and to think I thought this world was a challenge! Charging another one of his Soul Smashers, the sphere was huge coming out of Pyron's left hand. Not wasting time, the alien let the attack go. Falling towards the new fighters, the sphere was massive as it vaporized anything it touched.
Appearing in front of the two-man team, Demitri threw aside his torn up cloak and growled in anger. Ignoring the hunter, the king of vampires took Pyron's attack head on. "DEMON BLAST!" Letting a shower of energy bats go, Demitri's continuous counter-attack began to weaken the incoming sphere. Growling from having to give out a lot of power, the vampire king hissed.
"Any time succubus!" Hovering over the men, Morrigan was enjoying the sight of seeing Demitri struggle. "Ok ok…" With a set of heavily scratched up wings, the head of Aensland House let a charged Soul Fist out of her right hand. Traveling through Demitri's attack, the Soul Fist absorbed some of the vampire's attack and broke through. WHAT? Not expecting four former enemies to all team up at once, Pyron prepared to block the counter-projectile. Nice try, but I'm…
A howl rang in Pyron's head as Jon flew right at the exposed alien's face. Morrigan threw the werewolf up at the giant enemy per request. Using a chain of several Beast Rushes, the werewolf got into position quickly. Bouncing between Pyron's arms, Jon broke the guard and threw a hard vertical kick to start the combo. Opening a gash in the alien's stomach, the spinning projectile made its mark by turning the gash into an open crater. The energy from Joe's attack could be felt again now that the Raging Chaos was exposed.
"Amazing…" Morrigan was in disbelief and snapped out of her awe in time to avoid Donovan's sword. Hurling the uniquely shaped weapon quickly, Donovan was acting on part of Joe's plan. Groaning in pain, Pyron was finding it difficult to absorb several attacks at one time. The sun was starting to rise and the first few ray of light shined on the flying sword. Noticing the glimmering object, Donovan was riding the weapon to guide it to hit the swirling target.
Donovan changed into his deity form and readied to kick Joe's absorbed attack. Forcing the open wound to close at his will, Pyron caught the transformed hunter by his right leg. Smirking, the alien caught the sword, hidden inside the spirit, before it could pierce the absorbed attack. Not this time Hunter! Slamming an arm through the large spirit's extended leg; the spirit was dispersed as the sword was left sticking out of Pyron's gut.
Panting heavily, the four Darkstalkers were drained… the four person attack had taken a lot of energy out of them. So weak… VANISH! Glowing brightly, Pyron let another burst of energy go. Throwing the four night warriors aside, Morrigan bounced off the ground as her bats vanished from taking too much damage, Demitri tried grabbing the ground and was thrown through a collapsing building, and Donovan smashed a hole in the earth as Jon bounced off the shell of a destroyed car.
Standing over the scene, Pyron had shrunk down to a quarter of his giant form. Without any more power reserves, the alien had to condense his form to summon another attack. Not seeing any of the 'sub-creatures' moving this time, Pyron laughed. Finally! I can now destroy this world!
"Not on my watch!" Looking out at the area, Pyron didn't see anyone until it was too late. From the area of the sun, a single silhouette suddenly became two. With a head of silver hair, Joe cracked a hard roundhouse kick to Pyron's face. Backing off, the human was standing under the twenty-five foot alien groaning and holding onto his ribs. Stupid human, you had a shot to stop me and failed!
"Did I really?"
What are you talking about?
Jumping off Joe's shoulders, Felicia threw herself at Pyron. Realizing the tactic, Pyron threw a punch and missed as the feline fighter spun around his arm with her claws. Letting go, Felicia released the rest of her EX Force and Delta-Kicked Donovan's sword deep into the energy being. Cutting into the Raging Chaos, the seal around Joe's attack was broken and allowed the attack to continue as planned.
!
The chaotic energy unleashed inside Pyron exploded outwards. Unable to control the chain reaction inside his body, the alien was left stunned as it began to consume him. Impossible… this is not possible! I AM PYRON! Left with a gaping hole in him, Pyron collapsed in on himself. Pulled into a wormhole caused by the twisting energies, a light consumed the area as the explosive reaction continued on.
Several weeks later…
The world was just coming out of shock of nearly being destroyed by an unknown force. Several of the world's government demanded answers as a huge section and population of New York was just gone with no apparent reason. No radioactivity was located in the area and terror groups from around the world were not taking responsibility. Watching TV from the basement of their camp, Jeff was taking a break from helping rebuild the damaged Phobos to watch the idiot news casters blame each other for the events of the past few weeks.
Remembering the aftermath of Pyron's defeat by the Darkstalkers, the area was still smoldering as the technology loving human pulled out of town. Finding the road back home was easier than arriving into the city, the big rig truck was absorbed by Phobos after its cargo was unloaded. Consuming all of the otherwise stolen truck, the golden machine was using the material to help rebuild its body. The only thing left was to make sure the fine tuning was completed and after piloting the brave machine, Jeff was starting to understand how Huitzil machinery worked.
"Hmm?" Hearing the door click open to his underground repair shop, Cecil was worried about his metal friend. Smiling, Jeff pointed at a semi-active Phobos. Master Cecil is safe… main program is still in effect. Shutting down again, the robot still needed to be worked on. "Don't worry; I'll have him up and about in a day or so. You haven't seen my brother around have you?" Shaking his head, the little human was more concerned about his mechanical friend.
At the family camp, the local cat women were busy trying to find Felicia. After her surprising victory against Pyron, Pico got ripped out by Grace for not listening and sneaking off to the fight. Unable to locate the feline savior, Lucy fumed at the idea Felicia had snuck off again. "I bet she's with that damn human again… that's the fourth time this week alone!"
"Leave them alone." Grace spoke up. Being the eldest of the group made it easy for her to settle down the others. "You know they deserve a little time off, so just relax… not like they are doing anything wrong."
"That's what you think!" Lucy countered, still more than against the idea of having her friend being so close to a human of all creatures.
However, Lucy was far from being right about the two going off alone. Sitting under a full tree on a hill away from any kind of civilization, Joe and Felicia were sleeping a sunny Thursday afternoon away. In the lap of the slumbering human, Felicia… in her full cat form flicked her ears a little before curling up against Joe's warm left leg. The scene was perfect… unless you were in a little known dimension in the Darkstalker World.
Standing in the pulsing area, Dami was watching several thousand souls being pulled into a strangely shaped jar. As the glowing spheres were sucked into the container, the black haired clone looked back to notice someone coming up through the floor. "Ah, there you are Jedah." Phasing up through his own dimensional floor, a revived "savior" smirked at the collection of souls being gathered. "Looks like your little plan is going well… but remember our deal. I broke the seal on your dimension and promised to give you the strongest souls."
"Yes…" Stretching out his blade-like wings, Jedah Dohma… the self-proclaimed messiah of the Dark Ones was indeed alive. Morrigan indeed shredded Jedah into scrap with a combo of Soul Blade and Darkness Cannon. But, because of the confidant noble's ability to conform his liquid body to any form… the pure essence of his being was not damaged. I thank you for the few strong souls that you did provide… but it is not enough." Smirking, Dami waved off Jedah's complaint and complied. "I'll go hunt down a few more for you then."
Vanishing from the dimension, the evil clone of a victorious Joe had made a pact with the devil itself. Looking down at the floor, Jedah summoned a small table that held a chess board. The board was populated with small figurines of all of those who fought against him. The figures belonging to Anakaris, Bulleta, Bishamon, Lilith, Lord Raptor, Rikuo, Sasquatch, Q-Bee and Victor were all colored black. In contrast… Demitri, Felicia, Hsien-Ko, Jon Talbain, and Morrigan's figures were all colored white.
"Heh, I wonder how these pawns will handle their new roles?" Laughing heavily with his plan, a pair of eyes moved back into the shadows from the scheming Jedah as figures used to represent Dami and Joe were standing behind their respective sides. Modeled in white, Joe stood behind his unofficial team and Dami modeled in black behind the larger team.
End of Episode 10
Trailer for the next episode:
Time makes people forget events that seem too unbearable to deal with… in this case, the media is unable to let go of tragic events. While trying to find information with what happened to NYC, the secret of a life-time is about to be unleashed.
Joe: What do you mean interview?
Jeff: Yep, turns out that someone has footage of Felicia destroying Pyron.
Felicia: YAY! I get to be a superstar in several worlds~
Joe: Fame isn't all it's cracked up to be Felicia.
Next time… Episode Eleven: 24/7 Insanity
Author Note: Did I bring the Pyron Arc to an end too quickly? Otherwise, R+R!