Chapter 7

By Carycomic

NORTHWESTERN FRANCE (590 A.D.)

"Let me out of here!" came the barely audible shout from the interior of the glassy-looking sphere being held by the djinn known as 'Rouge'. The young man standing to her right looked at her and asked if this was really necessary.

She grimly nodded. "Yes, Sir Adol. I fear so. Klarion was willing to drown his fellow islanders of Ys just to help this one..."

She used her chin to disdainfully point at Teekl, the feline Mamodo, before continuing.

"...gain enough power to overthrow her people's rightful ruler. Four hundred years early! For that, they must be punished."

Whereupon, she brought back her right arm like she was pulling on an imaginary bowstring. She then shot that right arm forward; catapulting the transparent sphere (and its proportionately shrunken occupants) skyward. Like a falling star in reverse! Only for the sphere to completely disappear, seconds later.

GOTHAM CITY, NEW JERSEY, USA

(1,400 YEARS LATER)

The whip now known as 'Vampire Killer' had been created by Sherry Belmont's ancestor- -11th century alchemist Leon Belmont- -to avenge the vampirizing of his fiancé, Sara. Toward that end, he had used the fabled philosopher's stone to turn knotted rawhide, drenched in holy water, into one long, thin strand of silver -similar to an over-grown guitar string- but, easier to braid than his beloved's own hair. After that, the whip had been successfully wielded by every single one of Leon's descendants right up until the advent of the Second World War. Subsequently disappearing for nearly twenty years. Only to briefly reappear, in the hands of Dr. Fate, who used to quell a vampiric uprising in the Hungarian province of Barovia!*

Now, however, it was back in the hands of a Belmont. Right where it belonged! And Sherry did not hesitate in the slightest to begin cracking it across the lower jaws of the Chiropterans who tried to attack her en masse. And, judging by their pain-filled vocal responses, the whip was having just as much effect on them as it did more traditional vampires. As for her Mamodo partner, Brago, he took advantage of the chaos stemming from the 'sewage gas' explosion to finish breaking the already-splintered windows of a hardware store and a sporting goods store, just across the street from the Gotham Ritz-Carlton. Whereupon he emerged from the second with a baseball bat... and from the first with a firewood-chopping axe.

"Ready or not, you bloodsuckers, here I come!"

At Which he became a veritable whirlwind of activity. Clubbing and stunning with his right hand; then, cleaving and decapitating with his left. All to protect Sherry from those Chiropterans who were too close-range for effective use of the whip.

Meanwhile, over at Madison Round Garden, Kuno Kodachi had just finished mummy-wrapping her redheaded 'rival' (in the adhesive streamer of her rhythmic gymnastics ribbon stick) when the first of 'Matches' Malone's pipe bombs went off. Needless to say, she was dazed by the ensuing shock wave for at least a minute or two. By the time she had reoriented herself, however, she found both herself and her captive surrounded by Chiropterans!

And, for once, she found herself paralyzed with fright.

"Sayonara, my beloved Ranma," she whispered.

As if her prayer were being answered, one large group of Chiropterans suddenly flew in all directions as something long and black plowed into them from behind. Almost like a non-explosive torpedo! Except that this 'torpedo' had four wheels and a tinted-glass cockpit. The right-hand side of the latter sliding open, while a deep commanding voice from within the left-hand side shouted (in fluent Japanese): "Kurumaninoru!"

The Black Rose Gymnast needed no further urging. Throwing her redheaded 'rival' over her right shoulder (as effortlessly as with a sack of laundry), Kuno charged forward; sprang into the air, somersaulted once; and, then, landed in the so-called 'shotgun seat' of this strange-yet-miraculous vehicle. It was only when it got going again that she recognized the driver of it... and gasped.

"Battoman!"

Meanwhile, Drake, Takamine, and Zatch Bell finally made it down to street level. Their blazers bulging with the number of panic-stricken fellow hotel guests they had been forced to have Zatch Bell shrink in order to transport them! Unfortunately, the relative place of safety they had been looking forward to reaching, in order to enact reversal of the shrinkage, had vanished.

Discourtesy of the Chiropterans they found waiting for them just outside the emergency exit.

"Uhm, guys?" muttered Drake. "Please, tell me these are some of your usual playmates."

Takamine looked at Zatch Bell who merely shook his head.

"Oh, great!" Drake resumed. "So, now what do we do?"

Takamine's only response was to place the other jacket full of shrinkees on top of the one Drake was already carrying! Whereupon, the former whipped out his copy of the Mamodo spell book and hurriedly leafed through the pages till he found the spell he was looking for.

"Here goes nothing," he murmured before raising his voice to shout aloud. "Kyu-den!"

Seconds later, Zatch Bell was hurling multiple balls of lightning, from his clenched fists, at the slowly advancing Chiropterans. Setting each one on fire as the high-voltage spheroids passed through their bodies! Whereupon, Takamine closed the book, took back the other blazer, and shouted at his companions to run for it. With Drake and Zatch Bell needing no further urging to do so. Indeed, they did not cease running until they got to a sawhorse blockade being set up by the GCFD four blocks away.

Consequently, that is where Drake and Takamine emptied their blazers before the latter reopened the spell book and shouted, "Sai kakudai!" Following which, the fair-haired Mamodo emitted two streams of electrical energy from his flattened hands. Each one re-enlarging the shrunken crowd of hotel guests to their original heights.

At that same moment, Tony Zucco was gazing at his TV screen, as a news helicopter from the United Broadcasting Company transmitted live-breaking footage of the inferno that erupted all around the Gotham Ritz-Carlton Hotel. And the grimmer the journalist in the co-pilot's seat tried to make it sound to the viewing audience, the wider Zucco's grin became. That is; till he heard a grunt (the kind usually associated with throat-clearing) come from behind him.

Making his grin disappear faster than a re-elected politician's memory.

"Tony, Tony, Tony!" recited Lord Deathman. "I told you not to do anything rash. And, what happens? You do the exact opposite. Are you what criminological profilers would refer to as a chronic counter-punching narcissistic psychopath?"

Zucco slowly got to his feet and faced the yakuza oyabun. Thereby simultaneously noting the retinue of twelve armed genin accompanying his not-entirely-unexpected guest.

"I won't insult you by asking how you got past my security system. I'll just remind you that I'm supposed to be your partner- -not your puppet- -in taking over the Gotham Underworld. But, you see, you're just like my Uncle Arnie. Always under-estimating me! Because I'm a lot smarter than I look."

Lord Deathman chuckled. "I'll admit that I certainly underestimated your ambition! Your cleverness, on the other hand, is debatable (to say the least)."

Zucco's grin returned. "Oh, really! Well, I wonder just how the rest of the Hyakuran would take it if they learned the Skull Clan had recently joined up with Intergang of Metropolis?"

The momentary silence that followed only encouraged Zucco to resume his boasting.

"They probably wouldn't like it any more than the local Chinatown branch of the Lin Kuei Tong... who pride themselves on being autonomous! That's why they lent me the services of two special enforcers from the Black Dragon Sect of their legendary House of Bamboo."

Whereupon, he put two fingers in his mouth and whistled as if for a taxi. Following which, a cold mist suddenly enveloped the entirety of the living room behind Zucco's back. Only to dissipate almost as fast as it had materialized. Revealing two figures (one in green-and-black; the other in blue-and-black) standing behind and to either side of him.

"Yama-sama?" said Zucco with undisguised glee. "Meet Reptile and Subzero."

tbc

*See chapter 1.

ANGLO-JAPANESE GLOSSARY

"Kurumaninoru (Get in the car)!"

"Kyu-den (Ball lightning)!"

"Sai kakudai (Re-enlarge)!"

Hyakuran: my own portmanteau of 'hyaku' (one hundred) and 'kuran' (clans). You see, during the Late Silver Age, the Superman comics used to depict three rival crime syndicates running around Metropolis. Intergang; SKULL; and the 100. For my own storytelling convenience, I've made the latter a euphemistic alias for the Yakuza. Similar to how the NYC Mafia used to prefer calling themselves 'The Five Families'.