Grimmfall: Eclipse

I do not own Grimmfall, Gargoyles, OK K.O, Powerpuff Girls or any other franchises with characters or ideas that appear in this story.

A new threat emerges, heralded by Goliath's former love. As Point Prep's own Foxtail goes on the hunt, Sebben brings Melissa Hunter into the field to stop events from spiralling into chaos.

Xxx

Chapter Two: Imminent Reunions

Pierpont Programming Facility

Earlier that day

Another shot of the plasma pistol, another robot with a hole blasted through it.

"You know, I never did stop to appreciate some of the things humans have done." Daemon holstered the weapon at his hip and patted it with one hand. "Like how they make their newer weapons so…what's the word? Ah yes: user-friendly."

Behind the main office's desk, another shorter gargoyle wearing a pair of mechanized goggles leaned over the computer there, scanning the contents of the screen. "The reason for intuitive weapon designs stem from how deeply interconnected humans are with other species, particularly Mobians and faunus, when it comes to matters of defence." He stated, his speech patterns akin to someone hyped up on coffee. "Only logical to make weapons simple to master and easy to physically manipulate for all of them if at all possible."

"If you two are done," Demona stepped over the wreckage of the freshly wrecked security mech, "I'd like an update on our objective."

"Download finished. And since I had some spare time, I went ahead and downloaded a software spike. Might only last a few days before it's found, but until then if P.O.I.N.T even sneezes in our direction we'll know it." The spectacled gargoyle announced, pulling a portable drive out of the computer terminal. "Also, enemy reinforcements impending. Recommend exfiltration."

Tactics were not Pik's forte, but common sense was common sense.

Demona tapped her radio. "All teams, regroup on my position." She pulled out a piece of chalk and nodded to Daemon, who did the same and set about helping her draw the rune of translocation on the office floor.

Within minutes the Grim Clan was gathered in the office. Less than three minutes later that same room was hit with flash-bang grenades and smoke canisters before heavily armed humans augmented by more security mechs stormed in and found it all empty without any trace of the intruders…except for an explosive charge which levelled that entire section of the facility.

Xxx

Hsi Wu

Several hours later

"Children of Vorador, inheritors of the new world!" Daemon held a tankard up in a toast to the cargo bay turned feasting hall full of Gargoyles. "To another flawless victory over the lesser races!"

Tankards clashed together, spilling foaming contents on floor and table before the Grim Clan indulged themselves. The only ones not to be found partaking in the celebration were Demona and Pik, both of whom were in the privacy of the cargo container he had made into his laboratory.

"This 'Project Titanomachy' was authorized in its earliest stage by the same administration which attempted to implement the Huntsman Draft." Pik explained, his goggle covered eyes scanning the lines of data as he decrypted the files which he'd stolen that very same day. "It seems that after that spectacular failure and the Silver Age of Huntsmen began there were a lot of wounded egos. Politicians who lost influence, captains of industry who lost contracts, wealthy lobbyists who didn't get what they wanted…you know: morons."

"And those same 'morons' worked towards a new means of shackling their best defenders." Demona smirked. "How deliciously ironic that this would be the key to our victory."

"I can see how it would certainly improve our chances." Pik nodded. "The Huntsmen represent the other races' most common and capable means of opposing our goals. And if what I'm reading here is right, Titanomachy was meant to level the playing field in case of a 'Fallen Angel' scenario. It's described as the outbreak of conflict between the United States Government or World Security Council against…Huntsmen anywhere and everywhere. They were particularly fixated on Phil Ken Sebben as a likely hostile entity in that possibility."

He passed over a series of documents labelled with red X shaped marks. "The project itself has actually taken on multiple forms since then, as one proposal after another proved ineffective or unrealistic. For the last decade the American government focused more on encouraging Hunter enrolment to its armed forces or intelligence branches. But it appears that the most recent variation was approved for testing and succeeded before the leading member of the research team scrapped it."

"Scrapped a working anti-Hunter weapon?" Demona asked.

"So it would seem. There's nothing here to indicate why, but the project wasn't just approved for further development: it was simulate to be the best chance of subduing a Huntsman insurrection." Pik turned his chair to look up at Demona. "I think we have our edge agains the mortal races now."

"No." Demona shook her head. "Titanomachy on its own is only one component of the plan that our dark father has planned. As the humans are so fond of saying: Rome was not built in a day. Our new kingdom will not be so easily built upon a single pillar."

Pik's goggles exaggerated the surprised expression he wore. "You mean he has told you his entire plan already?"

Before Demona could answer a window popped up on one of the secondary monitors which Pik had set up alongside the larger central one. It flashed green and was accompanied by a whistling noise before Pik quickly reached out and tapped one finger against it.

"Oh, apologies Lady Demona, that software spike in P.O.I.N.T's systems picked up on something." Pik spun his chair back around to focus on the new discovery.

"What is it?" Demona leaned over the back of his chair. "Have they found our trail?"

"No, it seems that a recent report had a combination of words which I programmed the Spike to what for." Pik peered at the contents. "It seems that P.O.I.N.T has the exact opposite of our trail. They have instead pursued your former clan in Empire City…and taken them captive to an off shore containment facility near Empire City for interrogation and internment."

Demona felt her head leap against her ribs. "The entire clan? Even Angela?"

"So it would appear." Pik nodded. "But this report seems suspect in my eyes, Lady Demona. Foxtail, as arrogant as she is, would at least have practiced basic precautions. Instead she's made no secret of who the prisoners are and where they have gone. And she's placed them so close to where we only recently operated. Combined with the fact that your alienation from your former clan would be well known to her, I think that this may be bait specifically intended for you."

His words made sense. Demona had not been entirely ignorant of the evolution of warfare as waged by the other races. The days when vast armies were the sole means by which any great change took place were gone, replaced by the more elaborate and deceptive methods of spies and saboteurs. She had already been a master at the game of shadows when the other races were still struggling to secure the New World, so keeping up with changes to it had been of little difficulty. This plan reeked of desperation by Foxtail- and she was the only leader of P.O.I.N.T who would be so brazen; what she could not control she preferred to cage or kill, and in this case the Manhattan Clan would be too valuable for the third option and too wilful for the first.

Bait, it was then.

But that didn't change her mind.

"Daemon!" Demona called out, and her lieutenant was quick to reach the lab container.

"Yes, Lady Demona!"

"Muster the clan." Demona commanded. "We are deploying."

"Lord Vorador has already given command?" Daemon asked in surprise.

"No. But we deploy all the same." Demona stepped past him, Pik hurrying to catch up.

"But, my lady, you know-"

"Yes, I do." Demona cut him off. "I know that Foxtail is as arrogant as she is deluded. I know the kind of mercy that my daughter can expect from her, the same 'mercy' that many hatchlings were given in bygone ages. I know she believes that she can close a trap around us by using Angela against me. And I know that she is expecting us."

She smirked as her eyes emanated a red glow. "And I know that she likes to think herself a master at this game. That will be her undoing. Now muster the clan. We are getting my daughter away from Foxtail…and from her father."

Xxx

Offshore Mobile Facility 9, Gilded Heart

Three miles offshore from Empire City

The Quantum Array was a miracle of physics and engineering, one of few significant advancements made without the use of Dust or Aura. Instead it relied on bare bone science that was not anchored by planetary boundaries or limited resources. It had taken decades to refine and many failures, particularly by General Specific and his laundry list of half assed black projects, but his failures had made excellent teachers for P.O.I.N.T to pick up the slack.

It made moving personnel and supplies between bases a matter of stepping through a doorway. No need for secret convoys or hidden underground roads, no opportunity for interception between facilities. Without the exact frequency on which each individual array operated it would be impossible to access, and the odds of randomly guessing it was less than one in a trillion…at least according to the egg heads who'd explained it in layman's terms to the lone operator sitting at the control panel before the Golded Heart's array.

Boring, but lucrative. That was what being the equivalent of a bouncer could be defined as in his experience. While passage to and from the facility was not traffic-heavy the few times anyone came or went every week were always important. And with Foxtail herself on site he had to make an effort to appear busy while he focused on the latest in a long line of sudoku pages that formed a growing mound of crumpled paper beneath his desk. If anyone were to show up he would have a folder full of paperwork finished well in advance to maintain his façade of diligence.

Was it the standard expected of him? No. But he consoled himself with the assurance that he still completed his work anyways, and unless someone had found a way to be that one in a trillion he had no reason to fear an intruder walking through the array.

Blip.

His pencil stopped short of finishing another column. "Hm?" He closed the folder over his sudoku book and glanced at the console, focusing on the area devoted to a screen which would register incoming portals.

It was blank.

"Hm…" Slowly opening the folder back up, he began to double check his work- both the actual work and his hobby to make sure he hadn't made any mistakes on either.

Blip.

He quickly shot his gaze back towards the screen from before.

Nothing.

Now annoyed, he leaned forward in his seat and glared at the computer as if silently daring it to make another noise.

Instead, following half a minute of silence, he was made to jump in his seat by a burst of static from the radio hanging from his vest. "Control to Vanguard Actual, come in. Over."

Scrambling for the radio, he cleared his throat and pressed the talk button. "Vanguard Actual here, Control, go ahead. Over."

"Vanguard Actual, we just registered activity on the Queen's Arc. Verify. Over."

He double checked his readouts. "Uh…Control, I saw it too. Was just a kind of…blip on the readings. Not sure what that means. Over."

"Hm…the last shift reported something similar." The Operator at Control, seemingly choosing to default to more casual speech, commented. "Still gotta catalogue these things though, right? Better safe than sorry."

"I'll say." He was able to relax in his seat again, assured against a scolding for any perceived slacking. "What is that supposed to be anyways? Any of the egg heads got an explanation?"

"Nah, but we got two theories floating about. One is that there's some parallel dimension occupied by zombified versions of everyone who are trying to make their way to our world after devouring all the living flesh on their's."

A snort of laughter escaped him. "I wish. Real killer here is the boredom. What's theory B?"

"Well that one is a little more specific. Some of the boys think that someone found a way to lock onto the Quantum Array and is opening a very tiny portal, hence the 'blip', to send and receive sensory data."

"Huh? I thought you need one of those mobile transceivers to link to the Array. And why would they do that if they can just come through?"

"Well, wouldn't you want to know what's on the other side? Like, what if there was a whole lotta firepower waiting to fill you with holes? Or a horde of Grimm? Maybe to check if there's a computer you can link to?" The Operator chuckled. "Or maybe…there's one lazy simpleton with a sudoku addiction."

Suddenly, too quickly for him to react or comment on the very specific assessment, the Quantum Array opened as a golden disc of light. A figure shot out from it and jabbed two fingers between his exposed eyes, causing his body to lock up as he toppled over backwards.

"Sounds like a safe bet to me." Melissa said as Elisa emerged from the portal with her pistol in hand. "Xanatos? We're in. Good job on that virus."

"What else did you expect?" The 'Operator' asked. "Foxtail might have thought she was a step ahead, buying from someone besides my company, but the one she did buy her firewalls from is just a front for me. All I needed was a 'blip' and suddenly I've got complete control of communications now."

"Keep them thinking that things are normal as long as you can." Melissa said, checking the only other exit to the room. "Otherwise, we need to be radio silent."

"Can do. I'll bring the cavalry as soon as I can. Just don't bring me up to Foxtail when you see her."

"Can do." Melissa kicked the door open. "Doubt I'll be in a talking mood anyways."

Xxx

A few decks away from where this occurred, Goliath's eyes shot open. "Angela!" He instinctually tried to rise but found his limbs and body pinned down by sturdy restraints set over him, bolted into a thick metal slate that he was laid down on. Several seconds of snarling and thrashing proved that he would not be escaping unaided.

"I wouldn't bother."

Goliath's eyes shot to the source of the voice. "You…" He growled.

"Me." Foxtail replied flatly, arms crossed.

"Why…?"

"Bait." She answered. "And I think you know who for. Your ex left a bug in our system, a pretty crafty one too. But I have a new employee, a young lady with an amazing talent for computers which went untapped until recently, who sniffed it out. Demona either already knows you're here or she will soon, which makes you and your clan an irresistible target for her."

"That still does not justify you attacking my clan unprovoked!" Goliath snapped. "If your goal is to stop Demona, you could have simply asked for our aid!"

"I'm not a real 'asking' type." Foxtail's eyes narrowed. "And in any case, you and your little clan- along with most Gargoyles out there who lay claim over entire cities and take the law into their own hands, are little more than glorified vigilantes at best…or threats like Demona at worst."

"Such arrogance…and such blind intolerance is what led to Demona becoming what she is." Goliath said.

"I have a psych profile on her that disagrees." Foxtail grabbed a chair and sat in front of him, one leg crossed over the other. "It says that she has an inability to take responsibility for her own actions, instead choosing to blame the consequences for them and sometimes those actions themselves on others- particularly humans while Mobians and Faunus come a close second. The sacking of Castle Wyvern, the razing of Scotland under Macbeth's reign …quite frankly I can't countenance such lack of integrity."

"You are well informed, Foxtail, but still know so little." Goliath rumbled. "From what I have heard of you, integrity is not something that is prized at your school."

"This coming from one who raided multiple government labs on the word of David Xanatos."

"My clan and I were deceived and have long atoned, as has Xanatos. It served a stern lesson in trusting too easily."

"I didn't need to break the law to learn that." Foxtail scoffed.

"Did you need to employ children as your soldiers?" Goliath demanded. "How many 'betrayed' you be refusing to sink to your level?"

Foxtail's expression remains unreadable as she slowly reached up and tapped her communicator. "Begin."

Through the walls, Goliath heard something which sent his blood running cold. A scream. A familiar one that was wrought with agony.

"Angela!" He wrenched against his restraints. "What are you doing to my daughter?!"

"You're too valuable to risk harm to because you're Demona's primary target." Foxtail replied coolly. "But Angela? Her tactical value to me only goes as far as her sentimental value to her parents." She stood up and walked away. "I'll give you a few minutes to think on that."

"Foxtail!" Goliath roared as the door slammed shut behind her. "FOXTAIL!"

Xxx

"I thought we're trying to avoid people." Elisa whispered as she and Melissa crept through the crew quarters.

"We are. This section is almost empty. And that one elevator we need to get down to the prison level will be over this way." Melissa replied. "Just two signatures up ahead…but their auras are different, almost nonexistent. There's something else about them that I can't pick up on."

"Fight?" Elisa asked.

"Likely." Melissa peered around a corner as a sound reached her from down the corridor.

Focusing her aura to amplify her hearing, she deciphered it as…sniffling, crying. Words of whispered comfort from a second source.

And both sounded too young to be soldiers…

"Children." Melissa realized, and stood up as she stepped out from behind cover while Elisa hurried after her.

They came to the door of a rec room which was empty, save for two young girls sitting at one of the tables. One of them, clad in a blue dress with blonde pigtails, was being held by her brunette counterpart in a similar pink dress as she cried.

"She-she's awful…!" The blonde bawled.

"Sh…it's okay, Bubbles."

Melissa and Elisa recognized them both on sight.

"Powerpuff girls?"

The brunette's head snapped up, an expression of imminent hostility forming before it changed to surprise. "You're not…one of her's."

"If by 'her' you mean Fox-" Melissa noticed the blonde flinch at the mere mention of her old schoolmate. "Then no. We're not. And you're supposed to be saving the day over in Townsville…what are you doing here?"

Blossom looked reluctant to answer before her sister clasped her hands over her ears. "Nnnnn! She's playing it again, Blossom!"

"It's not real, Bubbles, just remember that." Blossom quickly assured her. "It's all just a recording, remember?"

"Playing?" Elisa raised one brow.

"Foxtail…mixed together a recording of a girl screaming to make it sound like she's being…" Blossom choked. "Hurt. We think she's doing it to make her family afraid."

"Would this girl happen to be a gargoyle?" Melissa asked, and saw Blossom and Bubbles shrink in on themselves from guilt as they averted their eyes. "Okay…then I take it you're the ones she sent to get Goliath and his clan. That still doesn't answer the question of why you're working for her. You're minors, not soldiers."

"She- she made our dad give us to her." Bubbles sat up, wiping her red rimmed eyes. "I don't like any of this…I don't want to stay. I just want to go home!"

Melissa slowly approached them, prompting Blossom to shift herself between her sister and a clear stranger. But then Melissa knelt down and extracted a tissue packet from her coat pocket, offering it to them. "Here." She said softly, and waited until Bubbles reluctantly accepted it. "Now…what exactly did Foxtail do to make your dad give you to her?"

"She…she said she'd make sure he'd lose us if he didn't enrol us in Point Prep." Blossom explained. "We made…mistakes. A lot of them. She said that's why she did it…to make us 'do better'."

Bubbles blew her nose with one of the offered tissues. "She said he'd go to jail if we didn't. And we- we didn't want him to get in trouble." She curled up into a ball. "But we haven't even talked to him ever since…she keeps making us train or do things like this…I hate all of it. And she won't even let us look for Buttercup!"

Melissa's hands balled into fists as she sat down next to the two. "Buttercup, the third Powerpuff Girl, right? Where is she?"

"Gone." Buttercup looked a little bitter at this. "She just ran off one day and we don't know where she is. Foxtail…keeps telling us to forget about her, that she can't be counted on. That…that we shouldn't even consider her family anymore." Now she looked on the verge of joining her sister in a fresh wave of tears before Melissa reached out and enveloped them both in a hug, causing them to freeze up before they both slowly leaned into her as the stress of many weeks under Foxtail's command finally broke down whatever emotional dams they had left to keep up.

Elisa stayed back, watching with a sympathetic expression as Melissa held the two crying girls.

"There now, shhh…" She gently hushed them. "It's gonna be okay. You hear me? Everything's going to be okay…because I'm gonna go talk with my old friend Fox and have a nice. Friendly. Chat." As she raised her head Elisa could see hear eyes blazing with barely constrained Aura. "Whether she wants to or not."

Xxx

Several miles out from the Gilded Heart, Pik looked up from his handheld computer. "That's the one, Lady Demona!"

"Good." Demona, at the head of a formation of dozens of Grim Clan Gargoyles in full battle armour, smirked as her eyes let out their signature ominous crimson glow. "Tonight we rescue my daughter…but I have no interest in prisoners. Kill the rest. And leave Goliath to me."

Xxx

End of Chapter