Kain: This one's a doozy!
Wolf: The twists, the turns, the –
Kain: loop-de-loops!
Wolf: …Where's Jacy?
Kain: I'm not his babysitter…
Wolf: He's too old for a babysitter.
Kain: Whatever, on with the chapter!
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the copyrighted things I use, I do however own my OCs and this story.
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Chapter 2: A Vendetta is Declared
Jacy slashed through the nearest zombie with Fury, causing an arc of crimson energy to fly from the blade and collide with several of the zombies. The zombies hit by the arc were immediately burnt to crisps before the arc dissipated. Aingeru and Rosangela watched in shock as this happened while Sarah merely hid her head in Rosangela's shoulder.
Jacy then slashed another zombie with Serenity and an arc of light-blue energy flew from the blade and froze every zombie in its path. When the ice blue arc had faded, almost every zombie was either frozen or charred to nothing. Jacy kicked the one nearest to him and it shattered, sending shards of ice flying at other frozen zombies and the ones left standing. After a moment, every zombie was on the ground, the undead life gone from their bodies.
Jacy turned back to face Aingeru and Rosangela before he began to walk towards them. As he walked towards them, his eyes faded back to their normal dark green and his swords disappeared in flashes of dark red and pale blue. When he reached them, he looked the same as he did before he attacked the now-destroyed zombie horde. As soon as he reached them, however, Aingeru picked him up by his neck, catching him off-guard.
"What the hell are you doing?" Jacy demanded. Aingeru didn't answered as Rosangela let go of her rifle, allowing it to hang loosely by the strap over her shoulder, before placing her now-free hand on his forehead and closed her eyes. After a few moments she opened her eyes and nodded at Aingeru before he dropped Jacy, causing him to stumble for a moment before he found his balance.
"Sorry," Aingeru apologized, "had to be sure you were still you."
"Of course I'm still me, who the hell else would I be?" Jacy said angrily, rubbing his neck.
"You…changed," Rosangela explained, "Your eyes turned different colors and you said you were three different people. We wanted to make sure that nothing was controlling you."
"Oh that," Jacy said, understanding, "Ever since I was born I've had two voices in my head, either giving me advice, trying to influence my choices, or just plain annoying me. However, it wasn't until recently that I learned that they're more than voices, they're the voices of the past Creation Ones. Every now and then they lend me their strength to fight or defend myself."
"So they're ghosties like Trevor?" Sarah asked, pulling her head out from Rosangela's shoulder and looking at Jacy with her big blue eyes.
Jacy smiled and said, "Not exactly, but they're similar. Unlike Trevor, they can't go into other people or take a semi-physical form."
"Oh," Sarah said, smiling as well as she turned to look at Rosangela and said, "Can we go back to the new home now Mommy?"
Rosangela smiled and responded, "Of course, sweetie."
Sarah held onto her mother tightly as Rosangela flapped her wings a few times before taking flight. Aingeru grabbed the MG4 Jacy had thrown to the ground and handed it back to him. Jacy took it and slung the strap over his shoulder before he and Aingeru began to follow Rosangela on foot.
"You don't have to walk with me just because I can't fly, you know," Jacy pointed out.
"I know but Kera told me that once you got back that you aren't allowed to go anywhere outside the safe houses by yourself," Aingeru explained.
"Merikh captured her, didn't he?" Jacy asked softly, his pace slowing slightly as he looked at the ground.
"I'm afraid so, my friend," he responded reluctantly, "After she pushed you through the portal, we were surrounded by those damn undead. She fought well and managed to hold them off so we could escape, but she herself was captured in the process."
Jacy stopped walking and, without looking up, said, "I'm going after him and getting them out of there."
Aingeru spun around immediately and said, "That's suicide! He's gotten a lot stronger since you defeated him last time, the only reason you're still alive is because he sees you as a player in his sick little game and right now you're the biggest challenge for him. If you go to try and rescue everyone, you'll be playing right into his hands."
"I don't care," Jacy said, looking up, "All those people he has captured are there because he wants me to come to him, it's my fault he took them. I'm going to get them back, whether I come back with them or not."
"If you think that I'm letting you go alone you're a fool," Aingeru said, watching Jacy closely, "However, we have to get back to the other Survivors and inform them of your return and plan; I doubt any of them will let you go alone, either."
Jacy nodded his head in understanding before he created a portal next to him. He stuck his hand inside and pulled out what looked like a snowboard before it closed. It was a mixture of white and light green with the same mark he had on his shoulder on the bottom of it. He sat it on the ground and strapped his feet to it before, much to Aingeru's surprise, the board began to hover off the ground.
"How did you learn to make that?" Aingeru questioned.
"My powers are only limited by my imagination, among a few other things," Jacy said, smirking, "Now c'mon, we have to catch up with Rosangela and Sarah!"
Jacy took off fast and Aingeru quickly took flight so he wouldn't lose him.
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Blane let out a groan as he regained consciousness. He lifted his hand to rub the bump he now had on his head from where he'd been hit and knocked unconscious. As he did, he opened his eyes and found that he was no longer in the destroyed city; instead he was in a cage in some dark place.
"Where the hell am I?" He wondered aloud, not expecting the answer he received.
"An arena to fight as entertainment," someone said from behind him. He spun around to find he wasn't alone in the cage. On the other side of the cave was, what looked to be, a fifteen or sixteen year old boy with messy red hair and blue eyes. His clothes were ripped and torn in places, revealing scars and fresh wounds underneath.
"And you are?" Blane asked, his eyes narrowing.
"A veteran gladiator," the boy said, "name's Aaron."
"A veteran gladiator? You're just a kid!" Blane exclaimed, pulling his hand away from his head.
"I don't know where you've been for the last five years, gramps, but no one's a kid anymore," Aaron said sharply, "Especially not in this hellhole."
"How long have you been in this place?" Blane asked, leaning back against the bars of the cage as he watched Aaron closely.
"Since I was eleven," he said, looking up, "a year after the first attack by Merikh and his army of zombies. They killed my parents, were about to kill me too, when I took two of them down with my bare hands. Two grown men with guns taken down by an unarmed eleven year old boy, to this day I still don't know how I managed it."
"Humanity is a lot different here than from where I come from," Blane sighed, "Capturing others and forcing them to fight as entertainment, it's savagery."
"Where you come from?" Aaron echoed, looking back at Blane in confusion, "What the hell does that mean?"
"I'm from another realm, got a mate and a hatchling there," Blane said, "I'm here because a friend of mine needs my help."
"Mate? Hatchling?" Aaron asked, confused further before he noticed Blane's slightly pointed ear and his eyes widened it surprise, "You're a dragon!"
"Half-dragon, actually," he corrected, "My mother was a dragoness and my father a human. Have you never seen a dragon before?"
"Well, no," Aaron admitted, "Frankly, I thought they were just stories, though I heard that The Survivors have quite a few of them on their side."
"I don't know, Jacy never told me anything about them, let alone that he led them," Blane said, causing Aaron to gasp in surprise.
"You know Jacy? The Jacy who leads the Survivors and supposedly has the power to create anything?" he asked, shocked.
"The very same," Blane said, amused by the boy's reaction, "He's the friend who needs my help. His girlfriend and several others have been captured by Merikh and he needs my help to rescue them."
"Wow…" Aaron said, "Do you think he'll come and try to get you out of here?"
"He won't have to," Blane said, grinning, "I'm busting out."
"Are you mad?" Aaron demanded, "No one escapes this place!"
"Exactly, no one escapes this place," he said, standing turning to look at the bars of the cage they were in, "I'm busting everyone else out with me. You in?"
"If there's a chance to escape this hellhole and join the Survivors, you can count me in," Aaron said, standing up with a determined look on his face.
"Good," he said before reeling his fist back, lighting it ablaze with white fire, and hitting the bars straight on. The bars either melted or were knocked free of the cage, allowing Blane and Aaron to step out of the cage freely.
"Feels good to get out of that thing," Aaron said, stretching.
"We're not out of the woods, yet," Blane said, lighting his other fist on fire as well just as several guards came in.
"And here I thought that we'd just walk out of here without a problem," Aaron chuckled before he got into a fighting stance as well.
"Nah, that'd make things easy," Blane laughed as well, "and I like a challenge."
The guards started shooting with their rifles but the two of them jumped out of the way quickly. Blane launched a blast of fire from one his hands at one of the guards and lit his clothes on fire. The man began to panic and dropped his gun in an attempt to stop-drop-and-roll faster. This left only two armed guards and Blane and Aaron rushed at them. They, too, began to panic and fired wildly. Blane quickly launched another blast of fire, this one much larger, and it melted the bullets before they could reach them and melted the guards' guns as well. The now unarmed guards quickly grabbed their singed, but otherwise unharmed, comrade and fled.
"They'll be back with more," Aaron said as he and Blane stood in the now-empty doorway.
"Then we have to act fast," Blane said, "How many other 'gladiators' are there?"
"About twenty," Aaron informed him, "they should be in cages in different rooms up and down this corridor, but not all of them are cut out for the world outside this compound."
Blane knelt down and grabbed the keys that the guard he'd set on fire had dropped when he'd scramble to put himself out and handed them to Aaron and said, "Release everyone, no one is going to be left here."
Aaron nodded in understanding as he took the keys and the guard's abandoned rifle before taking off to start releasing people. Blane, however, walked out into the corridor and stood in the middle of it. He put out one of his hands and reached underneath his tunic for the small locket he wore underneath. He opened it and inside it were two pictures, one on each half of the locket. One was a picture of him, Talea, and Dex, all of them smiling happily. It'd been taken the day after the party by Jacy, after Talea had given Blane the empty locket. On the other side was a picture of him, Jacy, and Kera. All of them had made goofy-looking faces during the picture and it made Blane chuckle as he looked at it. This one had been taken not long after he'd come here the first time with them for his training.
Blane heard boot steps, a lot of them, coming towards him and put the locket back underneath his tunic and lit both of his entire arms on fire. He stood with arms loose at his sides as he waited for the guards to appear in his sight.
"I will come home…" Blane said softly to himself, "and never leave again when I do."
Blane felt a small tugging at the back of his mind but ignored it as the guards came into view. Blane clenched his fists hard, his nails growing into claws and cutting into his palm. His wings grew and ripped through the back of his tunic, effectively ruining it. He felt his horns grow from the sides of his head and the familiar itching feeling as his scales formed. He felt another appendage grow from his rear and rip through the back of his pants. His tail waved back and forth slowly as he watched the guards slow as they saw him standing in the corridor.
"What the hell is that thing?" one them whispered, Blane being able to hear it due to his enhanced hearing.
"Some kind of freak…" one of them whispered back.
"I'm no freak," Blane's voice boomed, startling the guards, "I am Blane, son of Rurik the human noble and Silena the graceful dragoness. I'm half-dragon, half-human, and both parts of my heritage burn with anger with the atrocities you've done. You…will…DIE!"
Blane roared and loosed a torrent of white flames from his open mouth and sent them at the guards. However, they never reached the guards as the same dark-cloaked man that had captured Blane appeared and absorbed the fire into his cloak. Blane ceased his wave of flame and scrutinized his new foe.
"Who are you, cloaked one?" Blane demanded, "And why do you interfere?"
"I am simply known as Shadow Man," the man said, his voice deep and dark, "I run this place and I will not allow you to release my gladiators nor char my employees to crisps."
"If you run this damn place then you are my enemy and that is not a good thing to be," Blane warned, his eyes narrowing and his pupils becoming slits.
"You do not scare me, half-dragon," Shadow Man sneered, "My powers do not just counteract yours, they also overpower them!"
Shadow Man launched a ball of darkness at Blane before he could do anything but try to block it with his wings. Blane felt the force of the attack collide with his wings and could feel the muscles in his wings struggling to hold the attack at bay. Blane ignited his wings with white fire, renewing his strength, but it still wasn't enough for him to push it away. He gritted his teeth as he felt the ball begin to push him backwards.
"Heh, I'll admit it, you're pretty strong," Blane said, smirking as he continued to struggle with Shadow Man's attack, "but I wonder how you're faring with attempting to keep such a powerful attack so powerful."
"I don't know what you're talking about," Shadow Man said, but Blane could hear the slight strain in his voice.
"You're not fooling anyone, Shadow Man," Blane chuckled as he was pushed back a few more inches, "I can hear the strain in your voice; it's draining you to keep this up. You're just a human with a small amount of Dark Magic, and though you make it strong, you do not know how to keep it from draining you drastically."
Just as he finished, Blane felt the power in the dark ball weaken enough and he reflected it back at Shadow Man. He was unable to dodge and the attack struck him directly in the chest and sent him flying backwards. The guards had fled by this time and there was nothing between him and stone wall behind him to cushion the blow. He struck the wall with enough force to crack it as well as his skull and spine. Shadow Man fell to the ground, dead, blood pooling under his lifeless form.
Blane walked over to him and pulled off his cloak to reveal a man who looked to be in about his mid-thirties. His clothes were all dark and in his right arm he limply held a dark leather book with a sigil in what appeared to be blood on the cover. Blane wrapped the cloak around himself, hiding his wings from view as he tucked them in, before he picked up the book. As he touched it he heard dark voices whispering hints of lost knowledge, power, and sinister plans. He ignored them and lit the book ablaze and listened as the voices shrieked in pain as the book burned before they fell silent. He let the remains of the burning book fall to the ground and noticed something in Shadow Man's other hand. He pried his fingers off of it and picked it up. It was a slip of paper with words in a language unknown to him. Knowing it could prove to be a clue, he stuck it in one of the pockets of his pants before turning away from the Shadow Man's dead corpse.
"So much suffering," Blane whispered, "but I'll help Jacy stop it by killing Merikh. But first, I have to get these people to the Survivors and safety."
He began to walk in the direction of where Aaron had gone when he heard something from behind him. He spun around, a sword of white flames forming in his hand, and saw that Shadow Man's head had moved and was now looking at him.
"You may have killed me, but there are others who will avenge me," he rasped, his voice low and almost incoherent, "Death's Embrace will find you and enshroud you in death and darkness."
"You can tell your damn friends that if they come after me then they'll meet the same fate as you," Blane frowned, the blazing sword in his hand pulsing as if it were a heartbeat.
"Oh, it is not you who they will go after," Shadow Man said, a sinister grin stretching his lips, "they will go after those closest to you."
"If they go after my family I swear I will annihilate all of them," Blane said threateningly, the burning sword in his hand growing larger in size and heat, "there won't even be any ashes to scatter."
"If you think they will be as easily beaten as I, you are sorely mistaken," Shadow Man said, "They will not go down easy and even then they will not go without killing many in the process. Good luck saving your family, half-breed."
Shadow Man slumped over, whatever life he had left leaving him and rendering him dead once more. Blane was still for a moment before he roared in fury and threw his sword at Shadow Man's lifeless body. The sword struck the body and, in a great flash of heat, light, and fire, incinerated the body and a good chunk of the wall.
"Stay safe, everyone…" Blane whispered, looking at the ground, "Please…"
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Kain: So, Blane wasn't captured by Merikh?
Wolf: Looks like it.
Kain: And he's got an entirely different evil organization after him and his family, that's gotta suck.
Wolf: Big time, but where the hell is Jacy?
Meanwhile…
Jacy: How the hell did I get on this desert island?