Heralds: The Pursuit of Darkness

Russell shook his head violently.

"Oh no no no, my dear. Just...thinking out loud."

"Okay, anyway. Lets get going then, time might wait but I doubt the monsters will." With that and before anyone could argue Julia immediately began striding back towards downtown London.

I've been wondering what I'm capable of with this new power. Its time to find out.

Terry shook his head and decided to follow Julia out there, walking with a brisk pace. He knew she probably distrusted him over the Destroyer thing, and she was right to. It could escape at any time, and what would occur next, not even his Icon knew, except it'd be very, very bad.

With so many of these Forms...heh, if you need it, just let me out. I can handle them easily. Just know if your precious innocents die because of your own reluctance to use me, you have no one to blame but yourself.

Shut...up...just. Shut. Up. Terry thought, as he winced while walking.

David followed after Julia, casting one last worried glance towards Terry before turning away.

Odd, he thought, Out of all these people, I seem to be the one with the least mental problems.

Even before they Heralds arrived at the heart of the destruction, the effects were hard to miss. Sounds made in the likeness of all out war could be heard, and civilians sprinting for their lives in the opposite direction assured them that they were headed exactly where they needed to go. The crashes, gunfire, and screams of terror became gradually louder as they came closer, and eventually they could see, just down the street from them, the bulk of the forces.

The damage was just as extensive as could be expected from an invasion by an entity of pure malevolence- as they looked on, one of the larger ooze forms deliberately hoisted a car over the bulk of its mass and hurled it towards a store, and the dead creatures beat against glass windows like a rioting mob- Apparently, their enemy's hate extended not just to humans, but to anything they created.

Anger filled Marina as her golden armor manifested. The amount of malice displayed here set every fiber of her being ablaze. Not mere disregard for life, but intentional destruction of it-!

"Hate will pay for this... I swear it," she growled as Clarent formed in her hand.

Terry immediately set his aura around him, eyes glowing fiercely, his anger evident. He did try to keep himself under control, and ignore the urge to act violently and without any fetters. He knew where these urges came from.

The Destroyer was absolutely ecstatic, So much death...so much destruction...yes, deliver justice to Hate's minions, release it all. Relish in violence and deliver a thousand-fold worse.

Terry flew forward, and immediately formed a massive sphere of hot, golden fire before launching it right at the head of one of the larger Ooze Forms.

The scene before Dr. Mansart was by all means serious, but for some reason a smile curled his lips. Staring at a group of "zombies" trying to raid a convenience store, the Doctor's smile turned into a chuckle. As one of the pseudo-humans stumbed up to him Russell merely stepped out of its way and watched the creature fall to the ground. At this, Mansart's chuckle burst into full-out laughter.

"What in bloody Hell is this?" he cried. "Has Hate the Last Trumpet?!"

With a bit more joy than was called for, the Doctor unsheathed Durendaal and decapitated the fallen failure of a person. He turned away before he could see that it was ooze—not blood—that pooled around the corpse.

As the Mad Doctor struck at the raiding monsters, he gleefully sang an age-old aria:

''Behold, I tell you a mystery; we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet.

The trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on in corruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.''

edited 13th Sep '13 5:51:44 PM by TheodoreHastings

Terry did not overhear Mansart's words, though, somehow, The Destroyer did;

I might have changed my mind about the old man. Heh, he has some good tastes, I suppose.

He kept slinging giant golden blasts at the large ooze-forms, trying to bring them down before they could do any more damage.

Julia smiled. "Oh this is gonna be fun." she said to no one in paticular. But where to start

Then she noticed a small group of zombies shuffling in her general direction. The bounty hunter started thickening the bones in her hand a tad and growing spikes from her arms. When she charged Julia had a makeshift bone cestus on both hands.

Julia struck not with any real fighting style or training. Any watching may have noticed moves resembling boxing combos but mostly the style was just smashing an opponent in the face until they stayed down.

Julia looked around at her dissolving enemies. "Not much of a fight." That was when an ooze form blindsided her, knocking the Herald into a wall which left her dazed as the monster approached.

James seemed to have gone mostly unnoticed among the chaos until now. A couple of zombies had spotted him, and were approaching in that shambolic parody of walking that seemed so ubiquitous among the recently deceased. He let out a small sigh, looked longingly at his mini-crossbow, and blurred. As his personal timeframe sped up a hundredfold the world around him slowed to a crawl. He walked between the two zombies and, with a smile that would have been disturbing had anyone else been able to witness it, drove his foot into the rightmost creature's shin. Can't fight without legs, pain or no. He allowed time to resume normal passage, and turned around just in time to meet the other monster's fist coming the other way. He fell like-well, like a man who'd just been punched in the face by a zombie. Quick thinking. Good job, monster. He looked up, blood streaming from his nose, at the hellish beast bearing down on him... And smiled.

Anyone who was on the sideline and happened to be glancing in the right direction would have noticed a figure approaching down a road, running towards the battle. Some may have noticed a few ooze-zombies approaching the teen and probably heard the sonic scream that he attacked them with. What would probably catch the attention of the rest was when he took the violin off his back, took out his bow and started playing.

The violin music started out quietly but soon became louder, audible even over the noise of battle. The boy started to rise up into the air as he played the music before suddenly increasing the music's speed. As he did so, he focused on a group of ooze-zombies and released a burst of destructive force. A wide grin spread across Nico Valdez's face as he started letting off blast after blast, targeting the monsters which were further away from buildings or other heralds.

Terry immediately sprung into action when he saw that an Ooze-Form had struck Julia. Moving incredibly quickly, he flew right at the creature and fired off a massive pillar of solar fire at the head, the blast aiming downward.

I am needed. I cannot let my friends die here. I cannot let Hate win, not here and not ever.

Employing more of his power than he previously knew he possessed and flew right through the zombie grinning down at James in a speed blitz, his punch outright seeming to contain enough force to send most of the top half of the creature flying in many different directions, ooze-imbued internal organs and a shattered spinal column splattering out on the ground.

It seemed these creatures' blood was simply more ooze mixed with a frothing, boiling red liquid, and it was now splattered haphazardly, some even ending up on James.

Terry breathed in and out, trying to regain control. He...He had saved them. He had saved James and Julia. Just...calm down. Calm down, Terry, don't let your anger get the better of you.

He winced suddenly, Very well done, boy. I couldn't have done it better myself.

Unfortunately for him, the wince was all the distraction required as one of the Ooze forms suddenly reached out, an arm seeming to sculpt into a human-like hand and grabbing around Terry, suddenly leaving him inside a dark place. He immediately started struggling to get free, but it seemed a greater power had intervened and the Ooze Form was holding itself together against the Herald of Light struggling inside its palm.

Time blurred once again, and James sprang to his feet. Blood was streaming from his nose, but he was running on adrenaline by now anyway. He brought his elbow into the creature's face, sending it recoiling from the shock, allowing time to resume for a split second, sweeping its legs from under it. He put one foot on the creature's chest, and bent down. Time resumed. "Can you speak, monster?" he snarled. It hissed, and spat, and said absolutely nothing. "Fair enough." He stood up, and kicked the monster once in the face.

edited 10th Oct '13 11:43:00 AM by ObsidianFeathers