Try to remember
Chapter 5: Beneath Gotham.
Disclaimer: I do not own South Park, Young Justice, or any works in/related to H.P Lovecraft's Cthulhu mythos.
Mild warning: We're starting to really earn that M rating people.
—?M?—
With the lights cut, Mysterion needed to move fast if he wanted any hope of keeping track of the robed buyers. Scurrying across the metal rafter beams, he made his way down to one of the catwalks and then slipped, unnoticed, out of a nearby window.
Once outside, he found himself on a sloped, corrugated iron roof. As he slid himself down to the edge, Mysterion could hear spasmodic bursts of gunfire from back inside the warehouse, as well as several shouts of fear and pain. Ignoring these, the hooded vigilante fixed his eyes on the buyer's getaway vehicle; an unremarkable white van, which the chosen captives were now hurriedly being piled into.
With the captives squirrelled away, the buyers swiftly got into their vehicle. As Mysterion heard the engine start up, he darted across the roof, sprinting into a leap out over the parking yard, aiming to land on the van's roof. He made the jump, and landed with a 'clunk' as the van revved into action, taking off out of the yard just as another bout of gunfire erupted from the warehouse.
The stern faced hero hunkered down on the van, keeping his centre of gravity as low as he could, so as to not to be sent tumbling off as the vehicle sped away.
Where he was and as focused as he was, Mysterion didn't notice when a small, black projectile flew out of the night and hit the van's rear bumper. The device adhered to the metal and clung on, becoming another unknown passenger on board.
Every street seemed to take the van into darker and darker parts of Gotham, until one last turn took them into an impenetrably dark, dead end alleyway. The headlights on the van remained switched off, and the vehicle came to a stop… A second passed with nothing but the engine purring, before there was the sound of shifting stone and sliding bricks, and a dimly lit opening grew out of nowhere in the wall which had until just now impeded their progress.
The unmarked vehicle continued on into the revealed tunnel, and as it passed into the confined space, Mysterion was forced to change position. He grabbed onto the edge of the van, above the rear doors, and dangled off the edge as the stony ceiling passed over them.
From there the path carried them down below the city, further down than the subway, further even than most of the sewers. It continued on for a while, and as Mysterion was beginning to finally notice the pain his prolonged awkward position was bringing, the truck slowed to a halt.
Hearing the drivers-side door open, Mysterion dropped to the floor and slipped under the van to hide himself, what with there no longer being space on the roof.
Bare feet padded around, and Mysterion could see the robes of the figure dusting across the floor, as they walked round to open the rear doors. The figure reached the doors and threw them open. No words were spoken, but the sniffling captives stepped down from their holding area and stood around nervously.
When the robed individual moved off again, returning to the front of the truck. The captives followed dutifully, and they all headed out of the passageway through a heavy stone door. The other two buyers went as well, and soon Mysterion was left alone, lying on the damp floor beneath the transit.
Rolling out from the small space, Mysterion got to his feet and hurried around to the front of the van. Opening the door he took a quick look inside for anything useful that might've been left behind. He found nothing major, but one thing tweaked his curiosity and worry. The steering wheel visibly glistened with some sort of substance. It was mustard yellow, and clung to the wheel where the driver must've been gripping it.
Mysterion grimaced at the sight of the foreign ooze. Whatever it was and whatever it's source, it did not bode well. His mind was already racing through potential suspects, even from just seeing the colour of their robes. But there was no cult he could remember whose robes would be teal and beige… The cultists all covering robes, and now the presence of this substance only made him worry more.
Hesitating no further, Mysterion swept around to the stone door, slowly pushing it open and hoping the cultists and their captives had moved on.
The room beyond was something of an underground planetarium, with a domed roof, and depressed floor, resulting in the whole of the space being roughly spherical. It was modestly lit by flickering fires held in brackets set upon the wall at regular intervals. Then at the lowest point of the room, directly in the centre, was a large pool of grey water. Completely opaque, with thick algae resting on it's still surface. Measuring at about ten feet in circumference, the whole of the pool was surrounded by engraved runes that had been chiseled into the stone floor.
On the opposite side of the room was a small raised area, flat, unlike the rest of the room. On this small platform was another door, which explained where the cultists and their captives had gone.
Taking advantage of the emptiness of the room, while still worrying about it's lack of hiding places, Mysterion moved down by the edge of the filthy pond. Stopping at the side, he didn't go near the water, instead gazing intently at the runes and sigils engraved on the floor surrounding it, committing to memory the strange shapes, only a few of which he vaguely recognised.
Not wanting to risk any tampering, since meddling with rituals in any way could have unforeseen consequences, Mysterion moved on to the only other door in the space.
He had reached the door, when a voice from behind stopped him dead in his tracks. An inhuman voice that gargled and burbled it's words, if you can call the sounds it made words.
"Ya, Gla'aki, fhtagn ng-lw'nafh. Grah'n hupadagh R'lyeh, kadishtu Gla'aki lw'nafh."
It was quiet, yet in the utter silence of the subterranean space it could be heard very clearly.
"llll sha ftaathun ut ghha'a xuia'ft ah
llll ftats aftu'a sha shugg.
sa'agat hrii anatt ftaftugh xuia' raas
lughst ghuftft thuna ng-anft'atha garaas."
Kenny turned to face the speaker, but was presented with nothing other than the empty spherical room. The only clue being given that someone or something was making these sounds, was the opaque surface of the grey water rippling subtly.
"Sghu, ftx sghu, ftx sghu, ftx sghu,
sha una ghhu ratf afuna ut xuia."
To almost any ear on earth, human or otherwise, it would've sounded complete gibberish. However, this was a language that Mysterion found eerily familiar. It's guttural nonsense stirring up a churning feeling inside his stomach, the otherworldly syllables, almost palpable in the air.
"Ch'tiankan tsa't ng-anthuans 'aiaftst,
shas ghuftft 'anu'a xuia' ftaghu ehye."
Mysterion picked up on an inconsistent rhythm to the words, though no sane, earthly poet could produce something so utterly odd as the metre of this babble. Yet it vomited forth from the previously still pond, and grew ever louder.
"Uias ur wahl ng-uias ur suna,
ut ghha'a xuia'ft fta tans ghhan lftanast aftugn.
sha ftia'ka' llll sha gasa ha taat,
xuia' lats, xuia' l'atans, ng-syha'h."
As the pool began to bubble more fiercely, almost boiling from some unseen heat, Mysterion's anxiety was building. The speech coming from beneath the waters was now so loud as to most certainly draw attention.
"Su ah untha nu'a un shas thutnuth thu'a"
As if cued by his thoughts, the door he had been about to breach, flew open with a crash. Into the room streamed the three robed cultists, who stopped short when seeing Mysterion stood but a metre before them, and almost fell to their knees upon turning their gazes to the boiling water.
"xuia'ft n'gha n'gha n'gha tna nu'a!"
The caterwauling had by now grown to a crescendo, though any meaning the words might've been trying to impart was lost on Kenny's ears, despite how familiar the language seemed.
"Grah'gof'n ghun's naas hut ang!"
Then, adding to the pot of mayhem that was about to overflow, the other entrance to the room exploded inwards, bringing with it a cloud of dust and smoke. Through which stepped a dark, imposing figure.
"Ftias ru'a suna ha'ftft ftua aftft hut uh'e!"
The three parties looked between each other. Three cultists, enrobed utterly, their expressions and body language unreadable.
The Batman himself, equally as unreadable as the robed three, though infinitely more menacing, given that he was not trembling in the wake of the phrases that had come out of the water.
Then caught between them was Mysterion, crouched low and ready for action. But behind his stern facade was a bristling sense of panic and worry. He was sorely outnumbered on one side, and though he hoped he and the Bat would not come to blows, he was soundly outmatched on the other.
"Ya, Gla'aki, fhtagn ng-lw'nafh. Grah'n hupadagh R'lyeh, kadishtu Gla'aki lw'nafh…"
With the quiet that followed, to call the atmosphere electric would've been an injustice. It was the calm before a storm, and as the waters settled back down, it was only a matter of moments before someone made the first move.
With a cry, one of the cultists rushed forwards, anger coming from him in a sound not dissimilar to that of an screaming child. It's target was Mysterion, and although he was ready for the attack, the young vigilante was not ready for the power that came with this wild bullrush.
He narrowly ducked to the side as the flailing arms came down on him, but even though he subsequently sank a heavy right hook into the cultists abdomen, he was met with little to no reaction.
With another yell, the cultist moved faster than Mysterion had expected, clumsily latching onto his upper arm and bringing him around with considerable might. What ensued was Mysterion being lifted clean off the ground as easily as if he were a feather, and held before the cultist. Where he was suspended, Kenny should've been able to see his attackers face, but even this close the hood his opponent wore still hid their visage in a most definitely mystic darkness.
"Hlirgh!" Was what the attacker screamed in his face, as they swiftly drew something from within their robes. Before he could react, Mysterion saw metal glint in the torchlight, and then felt pain blossom around his stomach region.
Unable to contain the bark of pain or the expletive that slipped from his mouth, Mysterion cried out in anguished rage. "Motherfucker!" Looking down he saw a ornamentally hilted dagger sticking out of him, with blood accompanying it as the red liquid eked out of the wound, soaking his costume.
The cultist withdrew their hand, and held his body up, facing towards the pool. But the mistake was already made; the robed assailant had left the dagger in him, which Mysterion quickly removed with only a light flinch, overcoming the initial spark of agony with ease.
"Ya uln Gla'aki-" The cultist's rapturous chant was cut off, as Mysterion drove the ritual knife into the arm holding him. Stabbing it through the wrist and twisting as he did so, Mysterion was rewarded with the cultist letting out a hiss of pain, before throwing him like a rag doll across the room.
Landing with an ungraceful thud, Mysterion rolled with his momentum and brought himself back to his feet. Casting a quick glance around him, he spotted Batman combating the other two robed figures at once. Even though the Dark Knight conducted himself with more precision and skill than Mysterion, he didn't seem to be having any more luck than the younger crusader.
Turning his attention back to his own foe, Mysterion saw them unsheathe the bloody blade from their wrist, and charge back at him, knife raised.
There was a short distance between them, so Mysterion had ample time to perform one practiced movement. He slipped the chain of firecrackers from his belt in one hand, grabbing his lighter with the other. Flicking the lighter, he brought flame and firework together, proceeding to throw them at his adversary's hidden face.
The fuse that he had already shortened, ignited quickly, the timing of the detonation coinciding perfectly with the proximity to their target's head. Then they did what firecrackers do; exploded in bright light, smoke and noise, snapping and cracking about the cultists head and sending them reeling backwards.
Mysterion turned the fight to his advantage then, sweeping in and past his enemy, grabbing hold of and pulling down their hood as he placed himself behind them.
What he saw beneath the shroud was a bald, scabbed cranium, coloured a mouldy yellow and glistening with a slimy mucus. With this action, the humanoid thing turned it's head to face him, and what greeted Mysterion was a portrait of hideously shrunken features. Shrivelled beady eyes sat in sunken sockets, with no visible nose and only a misshapen, yawning mouth gaping at him.
In his horrified surprise, Mysterion lost his train of thought, which in the middle of a fight, was a very bad thing indeed. The ghoulish creature had dropped the knife, but grappled onto him with both of its slick hands. Then it proceeded to drag him towards the pool at the rooms centre.
He was now struggling to get out of the humanoids grasp, smashing his fists against it's slimy skin, when his hand caught hold of something odd beneath it's robes. What felt like a metal peg was sticking out of it's lower back by about an inch, and as Mysterion tugged it in the melee, whatever it was came loose.
The peg gave a little, pulling further out of the corpse-like creature's body. With this, the monster seethed in pain and let go of the young vigilante. Not letting the opportunity slip, Kenny immediately pressed his advantage, twisting around and sprinting at the retreating creature.
Though it tried to shrink away from him, covering up the bolt in it's side, Mysterion would not let it recover. He regained his composure and slid a kick to it's shin whilst planting a fist in it's gut, knocking the creature off balance. Then as it flailed for control, he weaved in and grabbed hold of the metallic peg with both hands and yanked.
A good section of the robe tore apart, and the barb came away with some resistance. The patch of clothing that had been torn off revealed the monstrosity's disgusting body, also allowing Kenny to see what it was he had removed.
The barb had taken with it a great deal more than one would guess, the end of this silvery looking peg spreading out into gnarled red roots, that pulsated and twitched in a way that made Kenny's nerves shiver. It had not completely separated from the ghoulish torso however, as stringy tendons and wet vein-like strands still anchored themselves somewhere within the once-humans blackened insides.
With the barb dislodged, what was visible of the body started to sizzle and smoke, letting out a smell like rotting fruit. Then with a shriek and a whine, the walking corpse collapsed, crumpling to the floor like a sack of mud, falling silent and limp.
"A barb, look for a barb!" He yelled across to Batman, who was trying all he could to subdue two of these inhumanly strong creatures. But whatever the Bat tried seemed to have no effect. During his own tussle, Mysterion had seen the Dark Knight fire an electrified cable at one of them. But the ensuing voltage had no visible effect. Neither did the ties the Bat was currently using to try and bind them; cords that were pulled apart with relative ease.
Batman gave no indication that he had heard the junior crusader, but that had no effect on Mysterion's decision to run around the pool and assist. Discarding the still twitching root as he ran, Mysterion came up behind one of the distracted assailants.
Grasping at their torso, Mysterion searched for a similar metallic protrusion. As the cultist's attention began to turn to the teenage vigilante who was, to all appearances, briskly feeling them up, Kenny found what he was looking for.
Pressing a foot against this creature's spine for extra leverage, he pulled. The root came loose easily, tearing out the back of the robe and sending gore and filth flying free from the humanoid's gaping wound. The veiny roots twisted in the air, as the body itself spasmed and dropped to the ground like a puppet whose strings had been cut.
For all his demeanour and presence, the Dark Knight seemed to be at a loss for a moment, though he didn't necessarily show it in an ordinary way. Standing there, wrestling with the one remaining cultist, the white slits of his cowl narrowed and directed towards the fallen cultists, and the teenager who had put them down.
With Batman's attention focused elsewhere, the remaining cultist took the initiative, delivering a forceful kick to the Dark Knights midriff. The energy behind the blow lifted the caped crusader up off of the ground and sent him flying a few metres back. Then it lunged at Mysterion, dutifully attacking the vigilante who had found their apparently lethal weakness.
Feeling the cramp from his stab wound, and not trusting himself to be able to overcome this ghouls inhuman strength with his hand to hand skills alone, Mysterion went for one of his last resorts.
As such, Batman was given a perfect view of Mysterion drawing a gun from his belt, cleanly taking aim in a New York minute, and firing a single, killing shot.
As the gunshot sang out, the Dark Knight could only raise a hand and move to shout out to the younger crime fighter in hopes of causing him to think twice. But the teenager's arm had rocked back with the recoil before Batman could even speak. And the bullet disappeared into the cultists shrouded hood before he could move, so there was nothing he could do to stop the teenage vigilante gunning down his opponent.
The result was not quite what Batman expected. Instead of falling to the ground a dead man, the cultist merely shuddered back violently, taking the power of the gunshot to its skull with immense resilience, but remaining very much alive despite the lethal hit. Then Gotham's defender took note of the other two fallen cult members, their smoking wounds, mutated faces, and the red roots that lay near their bodies.
Mysterion sprang into action once more, drawing on the opening his shot had given him. He smashed into the last remaining cultist, quickly seizing hold of the barb that stuck out of their back and withdrawing it.
The same sickly separation occurred, and the twisted human fell to the floor, a cavernous hole now opened where their spine should've been.
Tossing the malign root to the side, Mysterion spat out a thick globule of blood onto the ground. What followed was a very muted stillness, with the only audible noises being Mysterion's heavy breathing, and a low sizzling sound being emitted from the three abnormal corpses.
Mysterion turned to regard the Dark Knight, only to find the towering and terrifying figure of The Batman, looming over him.
He kept a stern look on his face as he stared up at the almost mythical hero, but inside his head two words ran on repeat.
'Oh shit.'
—?M?—
A/N: I am an awful person, for reasons many and varied, but number one and two on the list right now are… 1) This chapter's ending. I just had to cut it off there though, because as long as it's taken me to finally buckle down and find time to finish this chapter, it's been taking me even longer to figure out, just what the fuck these two are gonna say to each other! But good news is I've got a lot of ideas for that written down already so next chapter shouldn't take too long.
And 2) Well I touched on it there, it's taken a while to get this chapter out. I said to myself when I started this story, I said "I'm not gonna lose track of my updates this time. I will update it as much as I can." And I tried, I did, but a lot of stuff got in the way.
Anyway, I've rambled on for long enough, all that remains is to say, thanks for reading, hope you liked it, and thanks to the people who've followed, favourited and reviewed so far! You guys are great!