Saturday Super Stories - The Event 1

"I have pulled from The Knowledge tales from the Event that ravaged two universes.  I start at the beginning and will tell the important parts, and while there are many stories to be told, this will be quick."  Chief Archivist of the Catalogers.

The Event - The Family Part 1 (Escape from Dimension X)

<The Omega Sanction>

"WE HAVE INCOMING!!!" One of the techs screamed at Alpha just as the roof caved in with a gigantic explosion. Fire and shrapnel ripped through the main computer room, sparks shot from the various devices stored in and around the main hub, smoke began to billow and swirl around.

Alpha stood as the last pieces settled on the ground, he surveyed the area and found his entire technical staff dead, 90% of the machines inoperable and a large ship punched through with its engines winding down. Across the bow, the paint badly damaged: HelixONE.

Alpha sighed and strode to the hatch of the ship. He reached out and grasped it by the hinges and wrenched as hard as he could, the metal quickly cooled, then cracked and shattered under the pure PSI of his grasp.

"I know that you are in there. Please exit the ship quickly." He called into the opening, his voiced echoing back at him.

"I'm coming, and I'm all alone! I'm coming out." A massive pile of rocks shifted into position in front of the door, started to climb out, then collapsed. "But I think something went wrong." It mumbled.

"No shit," One of the wounded not quite dead technical staff whispered.

"Grab that...whatever the hell it is and bring it to the Gamma Labs. Send in two teams to search the rest of the ship." Alpha walked away before his anger destroyed the creature and before he could get some answers.

<Inside HelixONE>

Richard Reader watched from one of the still working monitors. Robert Garvey had saved them for a few minutes at least. "I don't know what to do." His wife, Sadie, hissed at his side. "I can't stop glowing." He shot a harsh look over his shoulder at her.

"Be quiet. I'm thinking," He whispered.

"Don't do that, this is affecting all of us," she retorted. "You aren't alone here."

"Yes, DEAR," He replied. "But unless you have a plan in that glowing bosom of yours I suggest you be quiet." Her mouth opened and closed but she remained silent.

The entire ship shuddered as the zone next to it exploded in a million shards of icy death, flying into the corridors and wrecking havoc. 

"I think perhaps, things outside have gotten worse," Reader spoke, "We need to move now, before something even worse happens." He grabbed his wife's glowing hand and motioned for the super-heated Jordana to follow them. He led them up the length of the ship and towards the landing gear compartments.

Outside the gear's hatch in an adjacent hallway, two of the Omega Sanction employee's were working on cutting into the ship from below, and were taken completely by surprise when the outside of the hull exploded outward in super-heated metal. Their deaths were instantaneous.

Reader dropped out and then helped Jordana and Sadie down in turn. She gasped at the melting, burning corpses, and then began to cry. Reader's eyes narrowed. "We don't have time for this, we need to find Robert and escape from wherever we have landed, without 'starting shit' as Black put it."

"I think we're too late for that," Sadie responded.

He smirked, "You may be right, dear." He began to move.

<The Omega Sanction>

Black Sapphire walked from the hole she had created down from the surface along side of the crashed ships impact point.  Freezing the soil down on an angle and boosting her strength to its maximum before punching and shattering a hole down into the underground complex.

“ALPHA!!” She screamed out.

She strode through the debris of the earth, metal and ship as she searched for her opponent.  She heard a chuckle from the ground near her feet and she looked down and saw a computer tech buried under the rubble, a pool of blood slowly spreading out from him.  “What’s so funny jackass?”  She asked as she knelt beside him.

“You, you’re here…cough…to die, just as the shit starts to hit the fan…cough…heh, Alpha is going to kill you, we know everything there is to know about you,” his eyes slid shut and he breathed his last breath.

“Not everything retard, I hardly ever use all of my powers.”  Sapphire stood back up and stepped over the corpse and continued to make her way through the hallways leading out of the central computer zone, she noted as she exited that the walls were painted like a hospital with colored arrows leading to different parts of the complex.  She noticed some blood on the floor heading towards the Gamma Labs and Central Offices; she started down the hallway in that direction.

<Deeper in the Omega Sanction>

"I have no idea what is going on but we need to find Robert and exit as soon as we can."  Richard hissed.

"These tubes..." Sadie pointed as an explosion shook them violently in their housings. "There are people inside of them." From behind the glass a woman in the nearest tube stared at them, her cheek crossed in a scar. "I think she's awake."

"It doesn't matter. Let's move." Reader pulled at her and they continued deeper.

<The Epsilon Center>

Sapphire walked into the Central Office and found a maze of cubicles and a large empty room.  Large flat screen televisions were scattered around the room, several had the rainbow of a dead signal, but one showed a group of technicians fighting a pile of rocks and Alpha talking to them as they struggled.  She snarled and stepped back out and began to run down the hallway towards the Gamma Lab.

<The Gamma Lab>

Sapphire kicked the sliding doors of the Gamma Labs inwards in an explosion of glass and metal shards.  She snarled at the technicians frozen in shock at her entrance and they began to back away from her.  Alpha smiled at her.

“Welcome child,” he spoke loudly and his voice carried.

“Asshole it’s time I took you down for all the crap you have put me through,” her knuckles popped as she leapt at him.  He responded with a single fist, the shockwave rocked the floor.

<The Surface>

Agents stood around the massive wounds in the Earth, their weapons at the ready, just as Reader and his people breached the surface nearby.  The Agents pivoted on the new opponents.

Reader stared back at them.  "We Come in Peace?" He spoke quickly.

Agents Frost and Powerhouse moved to the front of the group.  “We’re with the DSA and you will submit to containment until the scene is secure and we have had time to question you thoroughly about what has happened.”  Reader nodded.  Several Agents moved up with handcuffs, two of which were bulky and when placed on Jordana and Sadie shut their abilities off. 

“Interesting,” Reader mumbled.  The Agents led them to a van and placed them in the back and closed them inside and moved back to secure the scene as the sounds of battle began to waft up through the holes and the ground began to vibrate from the conflict that raged beneath the surface.

Saturday Super Stories - Stand Alone 11

She is alone floating in a kinetic void of dimensional space, saved by chaos and chance.

Stand Alone 11 - Echoes across the Face

The first sound she heard was music, the music of the spheres.

The second sound was her screaming.

The last sound was her crying.

She floated in the endless expanse of the void, fluid below her and a white gray sky above.  She hovered in between them cruising at several dozen miles an hour, the force of the concussion carrying her across the dimension where her powers had pulled her to protect her from death.

Sapphire pulled her eyes open, forcing them to view her surroundings, the sky wasn’t just endless white and gray overtones it was filled with other earths and planets.  She looked at her body and saw the burns and blood, the damage the explosion had caused her before she ended up in this place.  She didn’t feel the pain internally but she knew deep within her soul that she should probably be dead right now.

Whatever it was that had saved her must be linked to her abilities, the power source that was similar to the Star Force but not actually alike at all, a source that bordered on the cosmic.

So she floated in this kinetic ether, she neither slowed nor sped up, just maintaining the speed in which she had entered.

It gave her time to think and to plot.

Whoever had done this to her was tied into her search for the Protégé that came before her, that much she was sure.  The 5 had popped onto the screens after she had viewed the last class of students at the Raven Institute before the Event had shut down the school.  That narrowed the search down to a handful of people.  The voice that had announced the ‘One’ was male and Walters had recognized it, but also seemed confused since she had the feeling that the Protégé had died in the past at some point.

So Protégé had either faked his death or was left for dead and now he was back for revenge, which apparently began with her and ended with the destruction of the cave and Walters.

He hadn’t counted on whatever happened to her then, an unknown ability being triggered by the explosive force that had slammed into her.  So she had surprise on her side and no way as to how she was going to take advantage of it, stuck in this musical floating hell.

She closed her eyes again and meditated on calming her center and focusing her energies inwards as Dune had taught her as a child.  Her mind began to drift backwards and brought with it memories that she had attempted to push aside.

TBC in the EVENT

Saturday Super Stories - Skulduggery 110 Part 4

"Malefactor, Reprobate, Charlatan, Neerdowell, or Gentlemen Thief, names associated with villainy.  I pull from the universe tales of Larceny and Legerdemain focusing on the evil that fills the world."  The Nameless.

His eyes snapped open as he was brought out of his meditative reverie, the alarms that sounded indicated someone had been looking into his file, and the first phase of his plan was being initiated.  He smiled and stood from his yoga-like position unfurling his limbs like a flower blooming.

“Time for vengeance old man, and time for your new protégé to meet the old Protégé,” Zero cackled long and loud in his lair.

Saturday Super Stories – Skulduggery 110 Part 4

Sapphire closed the files and frowned.  She began to stand and turn away from the monitors when the entire bank of monitors light up.  They remained blank for a moment and then began to fill with small red dots; they continued to fill until the whole of the monitor wall made a large red number 5.

“What the hell?”  The 5 lasted for a few seconds and then shut off.  Sapphire frowned.  On the other side of the monitors Zero watched the new side-kick with confusion, it was a woman and she was actually very pretty, but the Dark Avenger had never had a penchant for the fairer sex when it came to crime fighting partners.  He watched her walk off wondering if she would mention the odd occurrence that had just happened to her mentor and found that he was pleased when she just exited.

He punched a few keys and started a download of all of the Dark Avengers files and located the online web storage for the journals that ‘Black Sapphire’ kept.  This game was going to be easy.  He started to laugh again.

Sometime later…

Mercedes sat at the bar quietly waiting for her date to arrive. The waiter set down another beer and grabbed the empty from the countertop. The bell dinged above the door as someone entered. She glanced at the mirror over the bar and saw Nicolette Chalm walk in. She was dressed like a normal person, as off-duty as someone in her position ever got. Mercedes swiveled in the stool and grabbed the glass from the bar and stood. She motioned to a booth, and met her halfway.

Nicolette sat as the waiter arrived with two menus and a glass of water. Mercedes thanked him and sat down, picking up a menu after she set the beer on a coaster. She opened it up to the entrees and found a large green "4" colored in crayon across the face. She sighed and waved the waiter back over and ordered an appetizer.

Zero watched quietly from another booth as the two women ate and drank and talked about this day.  He smiled inwardly as he had texted both women to come to this bar and bribed the waiter to deliver the menu with the next warning inside.  Manipulating this one was easy since he had insights into her own memories and experiences.

He waved the waiter over and paid his check, slipping a tainted bill into the tip that would slowly seep into the skin and poison the waiter in a few hours, long after he and the women had left the bar.  He watched the two interact and took notes for awhile before he left after one last beer.

Down the road…

Sapphire wiped the tears from her eyes and blinked at the wall of the alley before her, amongst the graffiti was a huge yellow number three; it caught the light of a nearby doorway’s overhead lamp just right.  She stood and walked to the lamp and pulled the bulb from its socket and looked it over.  “I think it’s a black light?”  She mumbled to herself.  “Why would someone use a black light to light an alley?”

Zero stood watching from overhead, perched on the edge of one of the rooftops near the intersection of alleyways.  Getting Sapphire to this point had taken a lot of effort.  First he had to find the man she was hunting for her, Damien Lockhart had abandoned the identity many years ago and went by equally disturbing nom de plume now Daemon Ravenswood, which when he had discovered it wondered if he had any ties to the Raven Institute which had sat next to the Ravenwood.  It was on odd last name.

Next he had to barricade and block alleys and intentionally lead the two people to where he had wanted them and was surprised when Daemon just vanished into the shadows and escaped after his talk with Sapphire.  But the next clue had been delivered and he was satisfied.

Adamantly failed…

The phone rang and rang before Zero finally heard a muffled “Hello?” as Sapphire finally responded to his summons.  He triggered the voice synthesizer and spoke.

“Where the hell have you been?”  ‘Walters’ voice came through the speaker.

“I’m working on something.”  She muttered in return.

“Are you still working that Scion thing?”  Zero retorted, even he knew that purging any of the celestial power of the God Seed was a fruitless endeavor.

“Yes, I am still working on that Scion thing.  I’m going to cure him and try and regain a little of my past if that’s okay with you.”  She responded.

“It’s not.  I need you back on the job.  There’s something big brewing in the city and I need as many eyes on the ground to try and get ahead of this thing.”  ‘Walters’ growled back at her, her lifestyle of wandering the Earth had slowed his plans immensely and he was growing irritated that it was taking so long.  She was supposed to be some kind of detective.

“I’ll be there as soon I get done with this, I have to go to Sham’bala next and I don’t have a choice.”  She paused for moment before continuing, “My next lead showed up on my doorstep last night and it’s in Sham’bala on the full moon in two days time.”

Zero was shocked for a moment, his informants had seen the man called Wynn Hunter enter the building but had failed to mention he had stayed the night, a flicker of rage crossed his features and his knuckles cracked as he ground his fists together.  He took a deep breath before responding, “I expect you back here by week’s end or you’re fired.”

“Deal,” she responded.  Zero disengaged the call and screamed.

Several days later…

Zero stood alone on a rooftop and waited for Sapphire to stumble upon the next number.  He smiled to himself as he thought over the plan and looked up as the plane from Europe flew overhead just as a massive power outage revealed the number two in the remaining lights of the city below.

His earpiece chirped as his informant on the plane signaled him.  “Sir she wasn’t on the plane as you expected.”  The brief burst fed through the speaker and gave him the readied message.

“Well shit, just where the hell is she?”  He snarled at himself, how could he had have failed in his manipulations.  She had confirmed her flight and reservation and her tickets had been used how had she gotten past his man on board?

Almost two weeks after the missed flight…

Sapphire finished her story of the last few weeks and waited for Walters to comment.  He stood up from the chair and his cane clicked on the stone floor.  He paused and glanced back over his shoulder at her.  “So you did all of that and accomplished nothing in the end.”

“I found out I can’t save Alex and stopped a god from destroying all of reality, so I would say I accomplished enough to keep me from getting fired.”  Sapphire retorted.

“Who said anything about getting fired?”  He replied.

“You did on the phone last week when you called to bitch at me for not watching the city.”

“I never called you…” He was interrupted as reverb from all of the speakers in the Avenging Cave turned on at once and a voice spoke a single word.

“ONE,” Walters turned to her and started to run as the first explosions shook the foundations and they were quickly followed by secondary and tertiary ones, Sapphire screamed as the flames overtook Walters and the concussion ripped into her.

Walters slid to the ground as the flames washed over him, the batteries in his personal force shield whined as they were put to the test, he pushed a button in his cane and some of the equipment was jettisoned to safety.  He watched Sapphire slam backwards as the multiple concussion waves hit her over and over and saw the air ripple and saw her vanish and he could swear he heard music.  He came to a rest and triggered the escape hatch and fell into the wide stream that fed one of the hydro electric generators.

He grabbed onto the wave runner that waited for him and muttered to himself, “My Protégé died years ago, how I just heard his voice?  Unless…”

YEAR ZERO coming this November, barring any unforeseen circumstance that is…

TBC in Stand Alone 11

Saturday Super Stories - Stand Alone 10

“My life is a series of events, one thing after another, each of these things eventually culminating into some kind of life changing event that then alters my destiny from that point forward.  I was born in another universe and because of that I was in line for an Event that ripped our universe to the ground and forced us to go to war with a parallel universe that was invading us.”

“In truth we went to war with them because they accidentally invaded us and we retaliated in the only way we knew how, and at the same time an unseen hand was moving us forward to their own end for some unknown reason.”

“I watched as my universe was sealed away from me and lost my parents and family forever because the way back was gone.  This left me in the care of one of world’s greatest heroes and his training brought me against my greatest enemy, Zero.”

“Zero in turn forced me to locate a new source of knowledge so that I might continue my education and find a way to cure my…father, the man like my father.  I know it’s impossible, but we’re super heroes and that’s what we do every day.  So I will use the Knowledge and weed out the answers I need until I figure out a solution to the problem I have given myself.”  Sapphire looked at Zoe who nodded at her.  “I have to ask it the right questions, everyone has a boss, and that led me to Andreas Darkk, whom I stood over in Carcass his prison.  I saw the birth of Genesis, the Coming Darkness, the thing which is coming next and that which I am now preparing myself for.”  She rubbed the bridge of her nose and sighed. “What are the right questions?  What can I ask to start and knit together the last threads to see the whole tapestry.”

Stand Alone 10 - The Little Things 1

“Who was Doctor Kirby?”

“Presenting Doctor Alexander Kellan Kirby noted physicist and quantum engineer.”  The crowd roared in approval as the Doctor came up on to the stage.  He waved his hands for calm and the group quietly rapidly.

“Good morning every one, I feel like a rock star.”  The crowd laughed at the joke.  “Today I am going to go over several of my recent discoveries relating to the evolution of stars.  We think that these celestial bodies are just lights in the sky that twinkle and eventually fade away, but I believe that they are so much more.”  He pointed at the white screen behind him and slides began to follow what he was saying changing from star type to star type across a common stars life cycle.  “What I am saying is…what if the stars themselves are alive and they follow an evolutionary life cycle from birth to death?”  Several people in the crowd gasped and in the silence someone muttered blasphemy.

“I am working with several government and businesses to attempt to draw some of the energy down from the stars and get long range readings; we are currently building several laboratories across the world to attempt to better understand my theories and possibly harness the energy to remove ourselves from a dependent resource like oil.  I would like you all to meet my main financier Rex Ruthless!!”  A young man barely into his twenties stepped onto the stage and joined Dr. Kirby at the podium.  He waved at the crowd.

“Hello everyone,” he spoke quietly but his voice carried, “I believe in Dr. Kirby’s theories and have put forth considerable resources towards this venture.  We already have several ARC, advanced research collectives, in multiple countries across the planet and construction has begun on the equipment that will draw some of the energy down to the Earth.  I have personally hired two doctors that have specialized in this field to oversee that project, and we should have results in a few years.”

“Who is Oswald Johnson?”

“Who are you really Oz?”  Rex Ruthless sat on the edge of his bed and stared at the young man before him.  “I have had some of my people look into you, since you are my roommate, and one cannot be too careful you understand.”

Oswald nodded, “That is a good question Rex.”  He turned and sat at his desk.

“Well?”

“Well what?”

“Who are you?!”  Rex’s voice raised a few decibels.

“I am the son of Kaliope and Jaswell Johnson.  My IQ is 37 points higher than yours.  I come from no money and a middle class background and have had to achieve all of my college funding through scholarships and holding three jobs during high school.  I also gamble occasionally and raised money that way as I am able to count cards quite easily.  Dr. Kirby put in a good word with the school board and found me placement here.  Other than that I am just a young man looking to make his mark on this world, and your roommate for now.”

Rex ground his teeth, “I knew all of that already but I think you are hiding something.”  Oswald turned in his chair and looked Rex right in the eye.

“Everything I told you was true,” he stared intently at Rex.  “The things I have left out about who I am are none of your concern and therefore none of your business.  So DROP it.”  The single word echoed slightly.  Rex looked away first and immediately felt ashamed, but he nodded.

‘You won’t be my roommate for long.’ Rex thought to himself as he stood and walked out of the dorm room calmly.  Oswald sighed as the door clicked shut and then smiled. 

‘Everything about that story was true Rex,” he thought to himself, ‘Except I’m not actually Oswald Johnson, I replaced him months ago.’ He started to laugh to himself.

Darwin Dexter the Baron of the Side-realms, and King of the Anathema went back to his homework, after all the Star Force wasn't just going to come to him without some work.

“Why was SuperDude in Nevada when Shrulk made its first appearance?”

‘I will guide you where you are needed most, when the greatest dangers arise on this world.’  Dawnbringer voiced its thoughts directly into his mind.  SuperDude banked left as a feeling began to pull him in that direction.

“So you are like a danger magnet?”  Superdude asked the entity that dwelled within him.

‘In a way, I go to the danger, I do not bring the danger to me,’ it responded.  SuperDude nodded.

‘I feel something towards the West Coast of this country, continue on this path and we may be able to prevent many deaths.’  SuperDude nodded again and pushed himself faster.

“How did Doctor Kirby die?”

“Why are you doing this?”  Kirby screamed over the wind howling through the alleys created by the skyscrapers of Megalopolis.

“Because I tire of your repeated failures, I have invested too much time and money on you and your protégés, perhaps your suicide will spur them onto greater achievements.”  He shoved and the good doctor fell down from the penthouse of Ruthless Unlimited.

TBC in Skullduggery 110 Part 1

Saturday Super Stories - Mythology 109 Part 4

My name is Mercedes Whitman and I'm a hero on a foreign world. I am the daughter of two heroes, and was trapped on this Earth during an Event that sealed the way back home forever. They call me Black Sapphire when I’m out patrolling, and these are my Blogs.

Sapphire’s eyes snapped open and she gasped for breath.  She looked around wildly and her hands lashed out to try and grab anything solid just to prove to herself that she had awoken in the real world.

Her fingers dug deep into the stone of a side table and it cracked under the pressure of her strength, bits crumbled to the ground and rested quietly.  Then the screaming started from somewhere outside and she forced herself to stand.  Her legs held her wait and she pulled herself out of the room, bumping into the tables, chairs and walls and eventually the door.

A man in a top hat appeared in front of her.  She blinked at him and kept walking avoiding his gaze.  “You know what you must do Mercedes Whitman, save the Hunter, the Woman in White must not break free of this prison.”

“Shut up, you aren’t real, I’m sick and you’re a hallucination.”  She fell to her knee’s and continued moving toward the screaming.

“I am the Black King and it is my job to watch the Woman in White and keep her contained within the Hollow City which itself is the Black Room and her prison.”  His image flickered and he was in front of her again and this time his chest was glowing slightly illuminating his rib cage.  “I was once a man named George and my friend Clarissa asked me to watch over the void reborn, and I agreed because I am very powerful, if I wanted, even in this place I could rip the Earth apart with little effort.”

“I guess its good you’re a hero then.”  Sapphire paused and vomited all over the cobblestones.

“I never said I was a hero.”

Mythology 109 - Part 4 “…of all Trades”

The Woman in White carved Wynn’s chest slowly and she watched as the tattoo’s reflected his future and they always ended with him dead, and this pleased her.  The skin was flayed and she watched the muscle twist and turn as Wynn struggled against his bonds.

She began to laugh and watched as the Orrery twisted into a new position overhead.  Her freedom was at hand.

*******

Mercedes turned to look at the Black King.  “Then stop her.”

“Not my place, she is your responsibility.  Mine is making sure she does not leave this place, and she will not leave for it is her duty to choose a vessel to carry her special plague into the universe, and that door is quickly approaching us.”

Sapphire wretched one more time and forced herself to stand straight up.  “Okay chuckles I can save the universe once more with feeling.”  She clenched her hands at her side and steeled herself as another wave of temporal chaos pulled at her soul.  She took a breath and released and walked towards the continued screaming and broke into a run as it started to break off and start again.

She slide around the corner and to a stop as she saw the cities center for the first time and the fountain that Wynn was tied to, blood poured from the gaping wound in his chest, the flesh had been pulled back, the muscle lay loose around the edge and the woman in white had begun to crack the ribs open and tear them loose, casually dropping them to the ground at her feet.

Sapphire growled and ran, her speed augmented with her abilities and she leapt instantly releasing the speed and pumping up her muscles and strength to deliver a blow that tore through the shoulder of the woman and smashed it like porcelain.  She screamed and spun away as the force drove her from Wynn’s side.  The knife clattered across the cobbles away from them.

“You whore!!”  The Woman screamed at Sapphire.

“Been called once,” she smirked, “But I really need to ask what your deal is.  You seem to be leaking all over the place.”

The Woman grabbed her shoulder and the white energy pouring from the wound slowed to a stop and the shoulder regenerated before Sapphires eyes.  “He is the vessel to spread my divine word, he is perfect and you brought him to me in your pathetic quest to save your false father.  You cannot purge the darkness of the seed within him.  He is Death, and his goal is to claim the universe just as mine is its obliteration.”

“I would call you mad but everyone has a purpose, just like mine is to beat your ass and leave you stuck here and make sure the mystic society back on earth knows to never come here again.  You lose bitch.”  The Orrery overhead clicked into place and the energies of the Hollow City coalesced into another portal.  In a second Sapphire was slamming back into the woman and send her hurtling through the walls and across the city away from them. 

Sapphire smiled.  “It’s always nice to be able to hit something with full force and not have to worry about it dying.”  She pulled a blade from her pack and sliced the leather straps holding Wynn to the fountain, already his wounds were healing, the bones re-growing as the muscle shifted back into place and the flesh knitted the hole closed.  “Come on chief lets go home.”  She picked him up and started to leap into the portal.

His eyes snapped open and he pulled away from her as she passed into the event horizon of the mystic opening that pulled her back into reality, she managed a glimpse back before she was gone.  Wynn was sad and reaching into the healing hole as he fell back to the cobblestones and ripping his heart from the open wound which was glowing white, Sapphire could hear the Woman roaring in anger.  Wynn managed to mouth the word Sacrifice before she was gone and the heart exploded.

She slammed into the ground of Sham’bala and the Proctors were waiting, each had a different look of sadness on their face.  “Victory always comes at a huge price young one.”  Thaddeus said as he helped her to her feet.

“You won this day and lost an ally but the universe lives on.”  Kimalia spoke from his side.

“He lives on in you now,” Annelletta whispered, “but not literally.  Go home now, you’ve earned it.”

********

She finished her story of the last few weeks and waited for Walters to comment.  He stood up from the chair and his cane clicked on the stone floor.  He paused and glanced back over his shoulder at her.  “So you did all of that and accomplished nothing in the end.”

“I found out I can’t save Alex and stopped a god from destroying all of reality, so I would say I accomplished enough to keep me from getting fired.”  Sapphire retorted.

“Who said anything about getting fired?”  He replied.

“You did on the phone last week when you called to bitch at me for not watching the city.”

“I never called you…” He was interrupted as reverb from all of the speakers in the Avenging Cave turned on at once and a voice spoke a single word.

“ONE,” Walters turned to her and started to run as the first explosions shook the foundations and were quickly followed by secondary and tertiary Sapphire screamed as the flames overtook Walters and the concussion ripped into her.

YEAR ZERO coming this November, barring any unforeseen circumstance that is…

TBC in Stand Alone 10

Saturday Super Stories - Mythology 109 Part 2

This tale was timed to be placed with a strip that has been cut until Chapter 3, so remember this tale in the future!!

My name is Mercedes Whitman and I'm a hero on a foreign world. I am the daughter of two heroes, and was trapped on this Earth during an Event that sealed the way back home forever. They call me Black Sapphire when I’m out patrolling, and these are my Blogs.

“When am I?”  Black Sapphire asked herself in the void that was her unconscious mind.  Her waking mind had been jumping back and forth between the present and her past training with Mr. Walters the former Dark Avenger when she had collapsed in the Hollow City, the third of the trinities holy places.

Sapphires eyes snapped open and she found herself staring at the wizened aged face of a filthy woman who smiled down at her.  “What?”  She explained before passing out once again.  Wynn sighed and took another sip from the tea he had be given to assist with the anxiety he had been feeling since they had arrived here as had been prophesied by his mystic tattoo’s.

“You were saying?”  Wynn prodded at his host.

“She is suffering from post traumatic temporal dysplasia, her body and mind are fighting one another and attempting to come to grips with the reality she now finds herself in.  She comes from another world as do you, together you are bound to one another as you rush towards your destiny.”

Wynn sighed again and took another sip.  “But we aren't from the same universe and why aren't I suffering from this affliction?”

“You are far more in tune with the universe than she is,” she rested a hand on Sapphire’s breast and it began to glow softly.  “She comes of fire and ice, a raging battle between two vastly different personality types and underneath those emotions lay endless movement, her bane and true source of power.  She is restless and seeks to cure a man than cannot be cured for the person he once was no longer exists and she troubles her as her mind and soul grow to understand the futility of her quest.”

Wynn set the glass down and looked up at the glass ceiling that filled the entirety of the shacks roof taking in the Orrery that filled the air above them in the center of the Hollow City.  He exhaled a breath he hadn't realized he had been holding in.  “That thing up there is a representation of this universe?”

She nodded.  “The two primes sit at the center of all, and the shadows and echoes of the other universes rotate around them, the walls grow thin in places and events and things bleed through.  Our world should not be, and Those Who Came Before should have left this universe dead as had been intended by the Man in White and his Black Room.”  Wynn’s head whipped around.

“You’re talking about the void, why is…how the conversation switched to…” Wynn’s eyes drooped and he fell into the table and knocked the tea over as he slammed into it and then the ground.

“Outworlders are always the same,” she muttered to herself as she straightened and began to change into her true self, “Always taking for granted that which always comes with a price never realizing the price is their soul.”  She leaned over and ripped open Wynn’s shirt and saw the prophecy written beneath, he lay on a table beneath multiple earths and his heart had been ripped from his chest by a woman in white in a black room.  She smiled at the truth written on his skin.

Mythology 109 - Part 2 “Legendary Journeys”

He slammed his flagon down on the table top and foam sloshed over the side and he wept.  “I had armies once, vast warriors and champions and OH MY BERSERKERS!!”  He wailed.

“You do realize I have no idea what you’re going on about right?”  She spoke slowly to the drunken Hrolf.

“There was a battle many years ago, we had been celebrating the deaths of the last of the dragon wings and then they showed up, those three!!”  He clenched a fist and thrust it upwards and lightning crackled outside as his mind drifted back to the battle.

*******

King Hrolf Kraki wielded Skofnung and twirled it around his palm and wrist and he walked towards the three invaders that had summoned him and his warriors.  A light rain had begun and the sky grew darker as his mood soured, the celebration had been stopped because of this interference.

“I do not know who you are, or why you have come to this place, but you have entered the kingdom of King Kraki and we are the defenders of this realm.”  The lead male thrust out a finger and lightning crackled behind him, illuminating the trio.  His words were lost in the crack of thunder.  The man next to him laughed and rested his hands on his hips, and a young woman seemed to float slightly behind the pair.

“I did not hear a word you said,” King Hrolf said.  The man once again thrust a finger out and screamed as a second bolt leapt from the heavens and interrupted his speech.  The King sighed and his warriors rushed forward, followed by his champions and the berserkers brought up the rear.  He urged his horse forward and bellowed commands and watched over the course of several hours as his people were slaughtered by the trio that would not die.

*******

Hrolf finished the tale and Amazona patted him on the back and paused in her consoling.  “Wait…three immortals?”

TBC in Mythology 109 Part 3

Saturday Super Stories - Mythology 109 Part 1

My name is Mercedes Whitman and I'm a hero on a foreign world. I am the daughter of two heroes, and was trapped on this Earth during an Event that sealed the way back home forever. They call me Black Sapphire when I’m out patrolling, and these are my Blogs.

Sapphire and Wynn tumbled through the abyss of time and space and fell for a long time, she was sure she was screaming but no sound escaped her lips.  But before she could register the change she was out and slamming into the ground from a great height and Wynn followed her by landing on her ass.

“Sorry,” he mumbled as he pulled himself free.  She pushed up from the ground and brushed herself as she began to take in her surroundings.  They were in a vast cavern surrounded by short buildings, none higher than two stories, and none of them had any windows.  Wynn pointed above them and there were more on the walls and ceiling.  Sapphire frowned and attempted to get the scope of this city and found her mind couldn't comprehend it, so she narrowed her field of vision to what was directly in front of her.

“There has to be someone here that has answers.”  She pointed to a random road and began walking.

* * * * *

Walters knelt down until her upside down face was equal to his.  “So you were telling me about this place?”  Sapphire shook her head a moment confused.

“How did I get here?”  She asked.

“That’s always a good question.”  The line holding her dropped a few inches closer to the vast of chemicals brewing underneath her.  “Now continue with your story.”

* * * * *

Sapphire stumbled one step and she grabbed a wall for support, it was warm to the touch.  “Are you okay?”  Wynn asked from behind her.  She shook her head, and took a few deep breathes before pushing back off of the wall.

“Something is messing with my head,” she looked around to make sure she was still within the odd city.  “I thought I was somewhere else for a minute.  Let’s go it must be side effects of the trip to get here or something.”  Together they moved through the empty streets looking for some kind of life or clue as to where they had ended up.  There answers came in the form of a small building with smoke pluming from its chimney.

“Well there

* * * * *

we go, finally… what?”  Walters landed a solid punch on the bridge of her nose and knocked her down.

“Pay attention kid or this training isn't going to help you any.”  He whipped his leg around and she managed to block it at the last second and he continued to spin and landed a foot into her midsection, she grunted and he headbutted her completely to the floor.

She shook her head, “Something

* * * * *

isn't right here…balls…”  Wynn looked back at her a look of concern of his face.  “It’s getting worse.”  Sapphire collapsed in a heap on the road, Wynn rushed to her side as the door to the shack opened and the occupant exited.

“Welcome to the Hollow City Wynn Hunter, please pick up Mercedes and bring her along.  We have much to discuss.”

Mythology 109 - Part 1 “Odyssey”

“I travel from place to place fighting evil where I can find it.  But in truth I am searching for my family, we have been displaced all around the world over the years.”  Damien Lockheart spoke to the tape recorder sitting in front of him.  He looked the young journalist in the eye as he spoke.   She smiled at him and nodded for him to continue.  “I didn't start out in life as much, and had no aspirations to be anything greater than the lush I had become over the long years of hanging out with my degenerate friends.  I had hit ‘rock bottom’ as they say and it took the loss of a dear friend of my brothers and then my brother for me to wake up and try and get my life back together.  But in truth the disease was always there just waiting to wake up again and it took me being buried alive to finally break free of its curse and on that day I was reborn and Damien Lockheart occult detective walked into the world.”  He smiled inwardly as his personal joke.  He wasn't lying to the reporter, just skewing the facts into something she could print.

“So you are a recovering alcoholic and a master of occult knowledge who works with the police and local government bodies to try and gain leads on the whereabouts of your brother, mother and your brothers’ best friend?”  She prodded.

He nodded back at her.  “That is the truth of it.”

“So how did I come about this?”  She reached under the desk and pulled out a journal, his journal that had been lost several years ago in the wastes of Africa.

“I lost it a long time ago when I was in Africa dealing with a zombie outbreak, not disease zombies mind you, but the good old fashioned demons infesting the bodies of the recently deceased zombies, much harder to kill, and some of the fresher ones can run, devilishly a pain in the ass in you don’t mind my French.”

She rolled her eyes.  “My cousins and I were in the region at the same time as you and managed to seal away the Black Idol of Calabash'zt, the source of the demonic incursion.  We had actually been wondering who had cleared most of the infestation before we managed to seal it.  I found the journal in some ruins that were filled with bodies.”

“Ah the siege zone, I was held up there for almost two whole days.  That’s the problem with zombies day or night they just don’t stop trying to kill you.”  Damien took a sip of the tea she had bought him, and then ate a handful of the fries next to the last few bites of an overcooked burger.  “So you’re the younger cousin of Barnabus Alexander?”  She nodded.

“Jasmine Bethany Caulders, the information and research member of the Adventurers of the Undiscovered.  Barnabus leads us into such strange and wonderful places, just last year we found an Amazonian colony hidden in the depths of…wait I shouldn't tell you that.  Wonderful woman, deadly fighters, strange gods though, Barnabus has taken to worshiping a rabbit or hare god now.  Happy that he found religion, but weird-ed out slightly by the amount of brown hares he has bought for around the house.”  Damien shook his head.

“So if there’s anything else?”  He inquired.  She shook her head back at him and passed the journal back over.  He held up a hand, “Keep it, maybe it will make a great book someday.”  She smiled and tucked the book back into her satchel.

“There was one final thing I wanted to mention though, off the record,” she clicked the recorder off, “Through our travels we've come across several different mentions in various cultures of the Hollow City and an immortal that lives there.  Other than that we have nothing but I felt that information might be of use to you somehow, since in your journal you reference immortality several times as potential leads for your family.”

“The Hollow City eh…”

TBC in Mythology 109 Part 2

Saturday Super Stories - Religion 108 Part 4

My name is Mercedes Whitman and I'm a hero on a foreign world. I am the daughter of two heroes, and was trapped on this Earth during an Event that sealed the way back home forever. They call me Black Sapphire when I’m out patrolling, and these are my Blogs.

Black Sapphire stood up and set down the book she had been reading.  “Jerusalem Walker really wrote down every single thing he ever did.  This is really, really boring.”  She rolled her head back and forth and listened to the sounds of the bones popping.

“That’s really gross you know.”  Wynn’s voice filtered through the stacks.

“Bruce Lee did it, makes it automatically awesome.”

“Yeah not so much, only a couple of hours left before whatever happens, happens.  So they want us to sit through a ritual for luck for whatever journey is going to take us and we need to head down now.”  Wynn finally appeared around one of the bends.

“Okay, let’s get ready.”

Religion 108 - Part 4 “The New Testament”

‘Let there be Light, and there was Light.’

‘But with Light there must be darkness.’

There once was a man from Chicago and he was a regular man with a regular life and lived quite the normal existence.  But one day he fell into the muti-verse and was lost for quite some time.   He shared in the adventures of heroes and villains until he landed in a dark world far in its future.  This place gnawed at his soul and a shadow took root deep inside of him and as they say ‘absolute power corrupts…’.

So in this black place his rose in power and became a Dark God, an echo for the three lights that burned in the heavens, the Light Gods that watched over this world.  A plan began to form and he realized with a growing intensity that he needed to extinguish those lights and when they were gone he could truly rule.

He gathered followers, like minded individuals, and together they formed an army, and they traveled into the past to kill Those Who Came Before.

The Spider watched as one of stars burned out moments after Andreas Darkk and his men left the future and traveled into the past.  Already the future was changing and as soon as it began it stopped.  Twin Stars burned in the heavens and no further changes occurred.  He turned to his pregnant wife and laid a hand on her belly.  “They must have stopped the invasion and sealed away his evil somehow.”  She smiled at him and rested her hand over his.

Behind them the Spider’s Legion roared in approval.

-------

The ritual finished as the moon reached its perfect fullness, and for a moment nothing happened, and then a portal rips open above the fountain that rested at the center of the nine points of the ley lines.

“I am so going to be fired.”  Sapphire grabbed Wynn’s hand and pulled him along as she leapt through into the unknown.  The portal snapped closed and the world was still for a moment before Thaddeus spoke up.

“I suppose that’s my fault.”

-------

Zero stood alone on a rooftop and waited for Sapphire to stumble upon the next number.  He smiled to himself as he thought over the plan and looked up as the plane from Europe flew over head as a massive power outage revealed the number two in the remaining lights.

His earpiece chirped as his informant on the plane signaled him.  “Sir she wasn’t on the plane as you expected.”  The brief burst fed through the speaker and gave him the readied message.

“Well shit, just where the hell is she?”

TBC in Last Legends of a Dying Earth

Saturday Super Stories - Religion 108 Part 3

With this post I am at 50, more than a year has passed since I started the SSS, I started these months before my mother past from this plane and into the next, and the first post went up two days after her untimely passing.  I chug along slowly as ideas trickle in from wherever it is that ideas come from, but there is a plan, a long term goal and a plot.  With todays post, which is a day late because a dog ate my internet, we finally have some answers and a hint at the future.

We burn towards the Event, followed by the Year Zero and culminate in the Coming Darkness, trust me there is a plan, and we will get there together.

My name is Mercedes Whitman and I'm a hero on a foreign world. I am the daughter of two heroes, and was trapped on this Earth during an Event that sealed the way back home forever. They call me Black Sapphire when I’m out patrolling, and these are my Blogs.

With this post I am at 50, more than a year has passed since I started the SSS, I started these months before my mother past from this plane and into the next, and the first post went up two days after her untimely passing.  I chug along slowly as ideas trickle in from wherever it is that ideas come from, but there is a plan, a long term goal and a plot.  With todays post, which is a day late because a dog ate my internet, we finally have some answers and a hint at the future.

We burn towards the Event, followed by the Year Zero and culminate in the Coming Darkness, trust me there is a plan, and we will get there together.

Sapphire sat down hard on a bench in the main temple then sighed loudly.  Wynn was off talking to the Proctors and she was being confined to the temple to ease the transition of a non-magickal entity into their city.

She looked around the temple and looked at the stain glassed windows lining the walls.  There were many more here than there were in Carcass, and all of them were intact.  The largest of them all was of Jerusalem Walker.  He was flanked with Discord at his right hand and Pandemonium at his left.  These reliefs were more detailed that the others and she found herself drawn to Pandemonium and she mind kept returning to the last moments of the event.  She frowned at the reflection and a tear rolled down her cheek.  She turned away to take in the rest of the building and the other windows.

One drew her eye almost immediately and confused her at the same time, a black room with a man made out of white and rays bursting forth from him.  It was labeled The Beginning of The End is The End of the Beginning.

“Destiny,” a voice said behind her.  Sapphire turned and watched a older woman walk across her field of vision and vanish behind one of the shelves of book that filled the temple.

“How do you mean?”  Sapphire asked in response.

“All journeys are the same journey; it is just the road that is different.”  Was the response from another female voice, this one was younger.

“I don’t understand,” Sapphire responded.

“You wouldn’t.  You aren’t one of us.  You do not have the magick within you,” a final male voice spoke from directly behind her.  She turned to face the older man, his hair grayed by age.

“I’m also from another universe if you wanted to take your comment a step farther.  I am almost unique, but there are others from my world trapped in the universe.”  Sapphire met his eye and held it, it was almost as if she was talking to Walters, without the uncomfortable darkness hidden behind the eyes, the stain of his soul bleeding through.

The man nodded.  “I am Thaddeus, Master of Arms and this is my wife Kimalia the Judge, and our daughter Annelletta the High Priestess.  We are the Proctors of Sham’bala the Mystic City and you are welcome here until the prophecy has come to pass.”  Sapphire nodded.

“Can I ask another favor?”  She asked.  He nodded at her.

“Do you mind if I read through some of these texts?”  He moved his head to the side and it was his wife who responded.

“Yes,” and then the three of them were gone.  Sapphire shook her head and grabbed one of the first books that called to her and opened and began to read.

Religion 108 - Part 3 “The Book of Revelations”

‘And lo there came of a beginning’

‘They were of the count of three, a Trinity’

‘One Angelic, Heavenly, and Good’

‘One Dark, Hellish, and Evil’

‘The Last was of a strange sort, Neutral’

‘These Three became one in Voice and Power’

‘And From the White Sprang Forth the Universe’

‘Built upon the Ashes of the Stars Twin and the Prime’

The Ballad of Jerusalem Walker

“We made a mistake coming here.  We should have started with a clean slate.  This dead world…it should have stayed that way.”

“We three were of more power than the universe we were born in was capable of handling safely.  So we decided to leave that place and a find a universe that we call our own, or change into one that we could thrive in.”

“It took much time but we soon found ourselves in universe claimed by the void, wiped clean and perfect for our purposes.  We felt the remnants of the world before, the ashes of a world much like our own, but it had been touched by the Primes.”

“In our arrogance we decided to start here and rebuild this Twinstar and make it our own, add things we liked from our pasts and forge a new future.  Each of us sacrificed a portion of our raw strength and a new universal constant was born.”

“Let there be light, and there was light.”

“We realized that our lives were finite, and decided to craft the first being, the guardian of this universe, our watchdog.  More of our strength was lost and the first being was awakened.  We quickly realized our mistake and the first being uttered one sound, a scream and the power inside of it was warped inward and it exploded and imploded at the same time, ripping a tear in the face of space/time, one that echoed into the past and far into the future.”

“The Kaleidoscope Cascade was born; the tear in which we had come into this universe was something we had created after we had arrived.  But as the past had caught up with the present we were able to see the echoes surrounding the tear, echoes of other universes.”

“We contemplated reversing the Cascade but soon realized that the power needed would weaken us before we had even begun, or kill one of us should we require the sacrifice so the Cascade remained.”

“The thought of one guardian was discarded and we decided that more power taken from each of us could be crafted into an army of watchers, so we purged the emotions that we felt would impair our future tasks and the entities were formed into the ether.”

“This was also a mistake, the War of Sorrows ripped at the heart of the universe and lasted many long eons, and when it was finished the universe was a darker place.  We had failed again.  So we retreated to our home worlds echo and tried one final time to guide the universes hand.  Few of the entities lived and several were wounded beyond the capacity to live long, so we took love and hate and crafted them into the soul of Earth.  So the cities were born, I founded Sham’bala and lived there to guide humanity as a wise mystic, Pandemonium took the opposite side and the city that would become Carcass was unearthed, and in between them Discord watched from the Hollow, the final prison.”

“This worked for a time.”

The Lament of Discord

“When we crafted this world we pulled upon our own personal memories and added them to the mix that was already here.  In my past I was in love with a man and I lost him to a great monster that destroyed world after world.  In the end I had to slay my love and this broke me.”

“But Scott soon found me and told me his plan to start anew, somewhere else, some place that we could make ours, and if I wanted I could bring my love back.  He would not be the same man I had fallen for, only an echo.”

“I agreed.”

“So when we started anew the man I loved was reborn, crafted into a position that would suit him.  He would watch the universe and document all that he saw and commit that Knowledge for any who wanted to gaze upon its splendor.”

“I could not see that I brought that same darkness with me when we began and that same evil claimed my love again, and tainted him and his new master further tainted the Knowledge he had gathered.  I was the only one in the universe that knew his true name and I would take that with me in the end, but the evil that was A’gon would be left in the world as a corruption, but just as he fell in my universe so too would he fall in this one, I only regret that I will not be there to witness it.”

Some time ago…

Spectacular watched as the Cataloger purged his name from the Knowledge, the corruption taking any trace of his identity and that of the prior scions and any future scions as well.  It was a brilliant plan, but he was smarter.  He wound back time to learn the name of this traitor and smiled with a cock of the eyebrow at symmetry of it all.

“Who names their child after Jason’s boat?”

The Torment of Pandemonium

“I had one job where we came from; I was the one who stopped the Man in White and sealed the Black Room, I failed in this task.  His avatar was unleashed at our universe was lost.  Scott and Clarissa do not know that I failed in my only job.”

“Always I am in turmoil, my emotions ruling my abilities and my focus.  It was during one of these episodes that the Void was unleashed and the universe was lost, once unleashed the void cannot be stopped.  Though I believe that the void has a counter, something or someone that can halt its progression, but I have never located or managed to confirm this theory.”

“Thus I have failed, the void inched its way across reality consuming everything in its path and it was then that I decided that the three of us needed to leave and start anew.  We three aberrations shifted through a crack in the universe and fled as the void consumed searching for a universe to begin anew, finally settling on a universe scoured clean by a void avatar in the past.”

“Mercedes?”  Scott inquired.  I turned to take him in, my shame hidden from my face even though it tore at my soul.  “Is this a place to start?”  I nodded at him.

“If we are to be the caretakers of this new universe perhaps we should rename ourselves?”  I asked Clarissa and Scott.  They nodded, for they knew that true names held power.  It was in that moment that Scott became the Jerusalem Walker, Clarissa became Discord, and Mercedes Whitman became Pandemonium.

EPILOGUE

At the very center of the universe sits a room, and in that room sits a man in white surrounded by the black, just waiting for the perfect moment to announce itself.

TBC in Religion 108 Part 4