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 3

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.

“Where am I?”  Wynn asked as the drugged tea wore off.

“Still inside the Hollow City darling,” the woman in white responded.  You are about to become the most important creature in the whole universe, it really is too bad that the Cascade was sealed so long ago or the sickness could spread into the multi-verse.”

“You’re crazy!”  Wynn managed to raise his voice as he began to take notice of the area he was being held captive in.  She smiled at him.

“I prefer to think of myself as uniquely enlightened.  The Hollow City isn’t reality its actuality, nestled inside the astral plane in the cleft created by the hollows of Love and Hate, and as they burn with the power of Sham’bala and Carcass I rest here, in the Hollow City waiting, biding my time until the host arrives and unlocks the Black Room.”  She turned to watch his eyes with her head cocked to the side, the look was unnerving.  “Everything you see in the Hollow City was once the city of Pompeii; I almost gained me freedom that day, but only managed to supplant an echo of the city on the face of the Black Room.”

“But you are alone here.”  She tsked at him and then pointed right at his heart. Wynn’s eyes widened slightly and she smiled in response.  “Fuck we walked right into this.”

“You are the perfect host for this universe you are immortal and will be able to contain the void.”

“I’m not an immortal but my father was it didn’t pass on to me.  I just age well, I might look like I am in my twenties, but I’m only 33.”  Her head straightened and she frowned.

“You are the host, this I know, but not the perfect host.”  She turned and the topic of discussion completely switched, “They were always focused on the numbers you see, three proctors, two brothers, and one king to watch over their prisons, the homes of the worst of the worst of all villainy.”  The woman in white spoke to Wynn quietly as the orrery spun overhead.

“There were four people watching the Dark City.”  He mumbled in return.

She smiled at him, “Only two that mattered, the oldest brothers, the other two were incidental, and only managed to hold back the dark for so long.  Already he stirs.”  Wynn frowned at her.  “Oh it’s not an immediate problem, he ate one of his two guardians and unless the other dies it will take him centuries to gain enough power to break free.”  She drew a long blade carved of the stone of the Hollow City and ran it lightly over his chest.  “Whereas I will be gaining my freedom eminently by tearing your heart from the chest cavity and eating it in front of you as the orrery predicts the next conjunction of dimensions and my window to slip free of my shackles and bring about the white once again.  I did try so very, very hard before to wipe this universe clean.”

Wynn laughed, “Didn’t take though…”

“BECAUSE THEY INTERFERED WITH THE GRAND DESIGN!”  She screamed as she plunged the blade into his chest and began to carve.

Mythology 109 - Part 3 “The Warrior Princess”

“My mother Penthesilea was an immortal warrior queen from another world, exiled to the Earth many eons ago by noble blood.  She had made the best of this new world and this new life, but the field of battle was something that she loved with all her heart and without that rush of fist against flesh or blade against blade she was lost in the wilderness of life.”  Amazona spoke to Hrolf after he finished his tale.

“So she raised her daughter to be the greatest warrior princess ever to walk the face of the Earth.  Penthesilea was disheartened by what was coming; she could feel that the Queen was coming for her, a gloom that overtook her normally cheerful personality.”

“It was within a day when the Queen arrived and the visit was late at night, Penthesilea did not go without a fight however and the struggle was brief and ended quietly, a small puncture wound in her abdomen was the only clue to her true fate,” Amazona sighed, “They say the curse took her and in a way it was a curse one that I will never fully understand.”

“Her daughter Daphne grew up and led her people to the best of her ability, they raided the lands of Earth without compare, until she met her king.  Their romance did not last long but ended splendidly,” she smiled at him then and took his hand in hers.  “Then came the Culling, the three immortals came and decimated my people leaving only a handful alive, those born on Earth and therefore low bloods, on her mothers homeworld the low bloods were charged with mining the mineral of the immortals, but on Earth there was no such task to be handled and so they were left alone.”

“I have heard only rumors of one of the killers in the America’s but every lead have come up short, some day I will find them and drive them into the ground.”

TBC in Mythology 109 Part 4

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