Chapter 2 – Dark Tidings
"That's all of the infected tissue I could sense inside of him, General. He should wake up within the hour. What about the girl?"
A raspy, breathy voice was the first thing Aiden heard after becoming conscious.
"Good. His organs and blood levels have returned to normal, correct?" was the voice of a very familiar war general.
"His healing worked even faster than you had informed me it would."
"Aiden has grown even more powerful since I last saw him, it seems."
"Now that he's been tended to, what about the girl? I can sense no wounds, inside or out, anywhere on her."
"I honestly don't know. Maybe she's sleep deprived from the time she was with Aiden?"
"Lux…" Aiden said, barely more than a whisper, but clearly enough to attract another person's attention.
"Seems our sleeping beauty here has woken up already. Isn't that right, Aiden? Or were you simply dreaming?"
Testing his current strength, Aiden tentatively propped one eye halfway open, then the other. Standing over him were three figures: Losfar; a man in a dark over coat who additionally sported a sleek respirator covering the vast portion of his face; and a lanky man with cropped, sandy hair, piercing green eyes, and a black tuxedo over his slim figure. The suddenly bright light, however, caused Aiden to blink his eyes rapidly. Losfar let out a deep sigh of relief, while the other two continued to simply stare at him.
"Uh, Losfar?" the one Aiden identified as Sypher asked.
"What is it?"
"Were his irises red before?"
Losfar suddenly straightened, looking intensely into Aiden's eyes.
"I, actually, can answer that one," Aiden said, not enjoying the critical way in which both Losfar and Sypher looked at him, "the answer is no. I've always had green eyes. And I don't quite appreciate the joke that you're-!"
Rivel quickly cut him off with a wave of his hand.
"Sypher, I already know what this is."
"And I know too! This, however, should be impossible, seeing as how you drew the afflicted blood out of him!"
"It was a mutated strain, apparently. My apologies for not noticing as I drew it out, but there's nothing more we can do."
"What exactly are you two talking about?!" Losfar demanded impatiently.
"And the topic of discussion happens to be me, which I'm very interested in!" Aiden declared, rising to his feet.
Rivel rasped what sounded like a sigh through his respirator before facing Aiden.
"Apparently, the Hemo-Virus I drew out of you was a duo strain, and unfortunately…well…" his voice trailed off condescendingly.
"Oh just tell him! You appear to have inherited the traits of a vampire."
"Wait what?!" Aiden sputtered.
"WHAT?!" the General yelled.
"Now General, there's an explanation…" Sypher began.
"If you would give me time to analyze him, I could find out what exact traits he's inherited…" Rivel continued.
"Sounds great, all of you, but we've got an enemy creature headed this way," Exavier finished.
All of them quickly looked behind Aiden, where Exavier had appeared out of nowhere. The Marksman himself looked much worse for wear: his exo-suit was battered and smoking in places, his helmet was missing, and his usually pristine sniper rifle had dirt and a strange black substance splattered all over its carapace. Not to mention the unconscious Caitlyn he cradled in his arms.
"Exavier! What happened?" Losfar asked, hurriedly drawing his great sword and peering around the warehouse interior cautiously.
"That creature…it's like nothing I've ever encountered before. The thing took five of my high caliber rounds to what I figured was its head, and didn't flinch once! Luckily, my incendiary shells slowed it down enough that I was able to warp us here. My suit's power has degraded to less than 5%, though, so I need someone to take Cait and let me get this thing off."
"Drones! Gently take this lady to the recovery chamber and see that she is properly healed and rested," Sypher commanded, seemingly to no one. However, in no time at all, seven moderately sized spider-like drones crawled down the nearby crates and allowed Exavier to drape Caitlyn's body across them.
"Exavier, go get out of that suit. We'll need you out here when that thing arrives," Losfar commanded.
Just as Exavier activated the release for his suit, however, an unearthly and piercing howl filled the warehouse. Instantly, Aiden felt his scythe materialize in his hands. After that, they heard nothing. Tension was thick in the air as all eyes scanned every bit of visible space. As he was looking towards the large dropship that he assumed brought him here, Aiden caught the faintest hint of movement out the corner of his left eye. Whipping his head around, he was met with the stench of decay and a mass of darkness that growled menacingly at him.
"Uh…hi, doggy," Aiden choked out.
Losfar and Exavier, turning to face him, audibly gasped. There was no time to react, however, when the "doggy" leapt into Aiden, pushing him into a large stack of crates and onto the floor beyond. Aiden landed roughly on his back, sliding back another five feet across the ground.
"God damn…" he grunted, propping himself up on his elbows.
Immediately, he noticed two things: one, the pile of crates that the monster had knocked over created an effective barrier from the others, and two, said monster looked as though it was prepared to pounce on him again. Aiden quickly scrambled to his feet, summoning a mass of crimson energy in his left hand and lowering the scythe into a defensive stance. The beast simply snarled and leapt at him again. Aiden acted quickly, sending tendrils of energy at the beast and timing a slash to meet its trajectory.
The slash did absolutely nothing save for passing straight through the beast, but the tendrils blasted it back into the crates that Aiden had previously been slammed through. Unfortunately, the beast knocked both Losfar and Rivel, who had been muscling crates out of the way, onto their backs. Aiden grimaced, quickly shoving the rest of the boxes aside and stepping back into the area where he had awoken. The beast, much to his surprise, was lying perfectly still on the concrete floor. Both Rivel and Losfar groaned, causing Aiden to look towards them. He sensed that both men had suffered hits to the head from the flying crates. However, it wasn't their injuries that most worried him at the moment; it was the creature's inactivity.
He cautiously approached it's still figure, summoning another mass of energy in his palm. Even so, he pondered why his strike had simply passed through the creature's body. Before he had time to continue the thought, the creature sprang into action, quickly entrapping him within its icy grasp and dispelling the energy in his palm. Aiden struggled, pushing against the creature with most of his strength, but to no avail. The creature simply had too much mass, presumably only when it desired to. There was no time to think, however, as the gaping maw of darkness opened to reveal…even more darkness. Rancid air that stank of death and decay was blasted full-force into Aiden's face, causing him to blink and shake his head.
"Get off!" he shouted, channeling his energy into arcs of red lightning that leapt from his fingertips and into the beast's flanks.
It let out another frightening howl before quickly leaping off and away from Aiden. Scrambling to his feet, Aiden opted to use his energy in the stead of his scythe, summoning tendrils of crimson to surround him. The beast snarled, and a long standoff began. The two circled each other like boxers, each instinctively knowing that the other would get a perfect attack of opportunity on their aggressor should an attempt at an attack be made. Aiden, while confident in his ability to hit the creature, was clueless as to if the creature had any more tricks. If so, one wrong move might cost him a limb and cause him to suffer a lot of pain. Loss of limbs wasn't necessarily fatal to Aiden, but every hit he took was a blow on his psyche, and the pain was worse for him than for other people. Not only was he losing the limb, but his powers immediately began the process of creating a new one, which only made the pain that much worse.
Just as Aiden was ready to end the stalemate with a blast of lightning that he was certain would strike the creature in its head area, something shimmered in the air next to him, causing the creature to stop and tense.
"DEMACIAAA!" was all Aiden heard before a gargantuan blast of light slammed into the creature, almost instantly vaporizing it.
The amount of light from the blast caused Aiden to shut his eyes tightly. After a few seconds, he tentatively opened one eye to find that (much to his relief) he could still see. He breathed a sigh of relief before turning around to greet Lux. However, when he turned fully around, his eyes widened as he rushed forward, dropping his scythe. Lux was standing shakily on her feet and looked as though she was very ill.
"H-hi Aiden…" Lux mumbled weakly before collapsing.
Luckily, Aiden made it to her before she fell completely, sliding to catch her now limp form.
"What happened to you?" he asked, cradling her head in his lap.
"I-I…the voices…" came the faint reply.
"It's alright. I'll clear the voices from your head, just sit tight."
Aiden closed his eyes and concentrated. Indeed, he could sense that Lux's mind had a darkness lying over it. Something, or more accurately someone, was exerting a psychic power in an attempt to…what? Destroy her mind? Corrupt it? Aiden didn't care. Without hesitation, he exerted his own psychic power and entered her mind.
Opening his eyes, Aiden found himself surrounded by a dark mass.
"So this is what's attacking Lux," Aiden said, his voice merely a whisper in the cloud of darkness.
A deep groan echoed throughout the large space. Aiden placed his shadowy hands over his ears. He always found entering another person's mind to be a very odd experience. This time, something malevolent was there with him. Mustering a little extra strength, Aiden created a ball of blue fire in his palm. The darkness around him writhed and massed around the flame, seeking to extinguish it. Summoning even more power, Aiden increased the intensity of the flame until it was almost a roaring bonfire emanating from his palm.
Just as Aiden was preparing to unleash the flame and expunge the darkness, a voice whispered throughout the darkness.
"So," Aiden was able to faintly hear, "this is the hero. Greetings, little, insignificant worm."
"Greetings, oh dark and scary faceless voice. How's your day going so far?"
Aiden had found, and proved several times in the past, that the best way to throw off an opponent, especially a mage, was to be extremely blunt and act stupid. They got cocky, quickly made mistakes, and left themselves completely unguarded.
"I'd say fairly well. Two birds with one stone, as they say."
It was then that an oppressing force bore itself onto Aiden's mind, causing him to abandon Lux's to defend his own.
"Interesting…perhaps this will prove more challenging than previously expected."
Aiden was barely able to retain the scream that suddenly rose in his throat. The pain was more intense than any other he had experienced before. His hands flew to his head in a weak and reflex attempt to block out the pain. Ba-dump. Aiden's heartbeat roared in his ears, and a shudder ran down his spine. Ba-dump. Anger like no other felt by man suddenly bubbled to the surface, making his hands clench even tighter. It was as though all of the pain and emotion he had felt in the past had somehow morphed into pure, white anger.
The feeling continued to rise, bringing Aiden to his knees.
"Hmm? What's this?" the voice suddenly spoke.
Aiden's hands erupted in crimson flames. The only problem was: Aiden had never wanted them to.
"Impossible! How is it that you resist my power?!"
"Get…out…of…my…head!" Aiden hissed. The amount of pain and anger was causing him to slowly lose hold of himself.
"Give up, child! There is no one alive who can resist me!" the voice had practically started shouting.
"I said GET OUT!" Aiden yelled, finally giving in to his power.
Aiden had sworn from its first usage that he would never let his power control him. Sure, the temptation was always there. What person with his power wouldn't have it? He had only ever done it once; when he first discovered the power, and that was by complete accident. The life he had taken by unleashing it fully was one that Aiden found he could never forgive himself for. Other times, he'd had a solid reason to do it, end another person's life. This was just…different for him.
This time, he let go for quite a few reasons. His mind and therefore his judgment was fogged due to pain, he suddenly had a tremendous amount of anger built up inside of him, and his day just generally wasn't going so well. Crimson energy leaped out of his body, surrounding him in a swirling torrent of power. Aiden rose to his feet slowly, hands leaving his head.
"Perhaps I was mistaken. Perhaps…" the voice was more curious that malicious now.
"Leave now!" Aiden commanded in a voice quite unlike his own; it was deeper and even sounded more powerful.
Almost all at once the dark presence dissipated, and with it went the anger and pain. Aiden's power dissipated as well, leaving him kneeling on the floor. His legs felt like jelly, his arms like thin wire. He doubted that any part of himself was capable of functioning besides his organs. At the edges of his vision, Aiden could faintly see that the floor around him was blackened. It was the last thing he saw before a familiar darkness clouded his vision. He almost welcomed it. Almost.