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Join Date: Jan 2008
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Found a way to power my laptop and wanted to post the story I wrote while in transition.
Shadow Hawk returns to Saint Katherine’s Bay battered, bruised, and very confused at what happened in Sun City. The Ghost seemed to channel his dead father’s spirit so that he could speak with him one last time. And all John got from his father was a warning and a shadowy glimpse of his killer’s face. Not enough to make an ID though.
Someone set him up. The thug that told him about the ghost wasn’t smart enough to have been behind the deception. Someone else was behind the lie. Someone was spreading the rumor of the ghost in order to send him on that wild goose chase. But, for what purpose? *
*(for more on Shadow Hawk’s run in with the ghost see Deadlaw vs Shadow Hawk: Deadly Lies)
No time to worry about that now. He had to find out if Jessica was okay. He had trusted Alicia to find her when he left town and then the ghost blocked his communicator so he couldn’t get in touch with them. For some reason his communicator still wasn’t working. He would have to get it repaired. As he arrived home he saw Alicia’s car parked outside next to Jess’.**
**(see last issue to find out what happened to Jessica Dark aka Talon)
“Girls I’m home” he says as he opens the door.
Jessica hurtles the couch in an effort to meet her brother at the door. She throws her arms around him in a tight bear hug grateful that he made it back safe. Alicia just stares at him with a look that says “you should have called” and “that was a very stupid thing to do, going alone.” John smiles at her glad to know she was concerned.
“Alright sis, I can’t breathe. Let me go” John begged and then grunted as Alicia tackled him with another hug.
“So what happened?” Alicia asked.
John spent an hour explaining his run in with Deadlaw while carefully leaving out the parts about talking to his dead father. He didn’t want to upset his sister with the details of that little encounter. He ended the tale by saying the ghost wasn’t the murderer and someone fabricated the rumor to get him out of town.
“Do you know if Mike’s home?” John asked Alicia about her brother.
“I can find out” she replied picking up her cell phone “why do you need him?”
“My communicator’s busted. And my suit took a beating, I want him to run a diagnostic and make sure everything else still works like it should.”
As Alicia went outside to get a better reception on her phone John began interrogating Jess about her encounter with the so called Kinetics. The super powered street gang seemed to be a new addition to the city. This got him to wandering if they were part of the reason he was sent out of the city. Maybe they were doing something that someone else didn’t want him to get in the way of?
“There were just too many of them for me and Alicia to take on alone. They made off with something in a crate. I never got a look at it though” Jess said apologetically.
John tried to comfort her with a smile and then went into his room and collapsed on his bed. He was a sleep almost instantly.
He woke up with Alicia standing over his bed with a look of concern on her face. John slowly sat up and looked around the room. His suit was draped over a chair and looked like it had just been picked up from the drycleaners. In another chair his sister Jess was sleeping next to his bed.
“What’s going on?”
“You’ve been asleep for days. We were worried about you” Alicia said. Then pointing at the suit she mentioned “Mike fixed the communicator and cleaned up the suit. He said something about upgrades wouldn’t give me any of the details.”
Jessica’s eyes opened and she yawned. Then she looked over to see her brother awake. A smile crossed her face as she stood up.
“Bout time big brother, I’ll go make some coffee.”
Elsewhere in the city…
“Here’s the package boss” Melanie Neidich aka Bombshell says as Quake and Voltage carry in the crate and sit it on the office floor.
“Is this truly it?” the boss asks delighted “Quake would you do the honors?”
Chris Ajax the man known as Quake changes his hand into a stone crowbar and begins to force the lid off the box. A blast of energy erupted from the box knocking the stone covered villain off his feet. Then the crate splintered into a million tiny pieces that flew off in several directions. Firefox erupted into flame burning up the wood pieces before they could do any harm to the others.
Left in the place where the crate had been was a black book pulsating with dark energy. The boss, Franklin Harrier leaned over and picked it up gently. Then he let out a hideous laugh that caused the Kinetics to shiver.
“I finally have it in my possession! With this I will be invincible!”
“What is it?” Voltage asked curiously.
“It is the Grimoire of the Void, Key to the Underworld, Opener of Portals. This book is known by many names. It was created by druids conscripted by the church to find a way to banish demons and other undesirables back in the 11th century. But they made a mistake in its design, a fatal flaw that cost the druids their lives. The portal remained open leaving a way for them to crossover into our world. This left the druids vulnerable to demonic attacks which ended their lives. After a few centuries the book fell into the hands of a powerful Russian, one Grigori Rasputin. Since then its whereabouts have remained a mystery until now!”
The gang looked a little uncertain about what was to happen next and Bombshell asserted her authority as leader “we would like our payment now. We have to get back to our own turf before the cops think they’re in charge again.”
“Of course, of course” the mob boss waved a hand toward an associate of his.
The large, balding man brought over a metal briefcase and set it on a small table. Bombshell opened the case and stared at the stacks of hundreds that lined its insides. The rest of the gang peered over her shoulder and each one of them grinned.
“Voltage, get this back to H.Q.” Bombshell ordered tossing him the briefcase “the rest of us will catch up.”
Voltage nodded his head and teleported the briefcase and himself out. The others each left by their own route as well and headed back to Wayward City, their home turf.
Three days later outside of Moscow…
Franklin Harrier stands out in the snow holding the Grimoire of the Void open in his hands. He begins to chant in a strange tongue. The white snow begins to swirl around as energy arcs toward the sky causing it to grow dark. Then a portal opens and a man steps through. The man scratches his beard as he steps through and laughs to himself.
“Who has awakened me?” the stranger asks.
“I need your help Grigori. I know this book used to belong to you. And other than the druids who created it you are the only one who can decipher it in its entirety.”
“That is true of course” the man named Grigori replied “but I still don’t know who it is that summoned me from the grave.”
“It is I Franklin Harrier of the United States of America. I want to raise an army of demons and need someone who can control them once they are here.”
“Grigori Rasputin is nobody’s lackey” the large Russian said as he let loose some dark energy from his hand knocking the mob boss off his feet.
Then he summoned some more energy and telekinetically picked up the Grimoire and brought it into his own hands “this book is mine. Do not touch it ever again!”
With those words the sorcerer Rasputin disappeared into thin air leaving Franklin Harrier out in the cold night without the army he so desired. Grumbling the mob boss got to his feet and went back to his car.
Angry the mob boss ordered his driver to return to the airport so they could in turn go back to America “what a waste of time” he complained as he downed a bottle of scotch.
Back in Saint Katherine’s Bay…
After watching the news and monitoring the police bands John found out that several major crimes happened in his absence, none of which seemed at all related. The one involving the Kinetics seemed to be the most organized however there was also a robbery at the local blood bank and some large animal trashed Town Centre Park.
“What would anyone want with thirty pints of blood?” John asked himself more than anyone else.
“Its kind a weird huh big brother?” Jess replies “makes me think those Hollywood vampire movies.”
“There’s no such thing as vampires” Alicia cuts in as she takes a seat on the couch while sipping hot cocoa.
“Maybe not” John says in return “but what happened in the park reminds me of monster movies. You think this has anything to do with the fact that next week is All Hallows Eve?”
“Halloween, are you serious? Do you think this is some sort of prank made by some kids?”
“Not at all Alicia, but the realm of the supernatural is supposed to be stronger around this time of year.”
“So who do we go after first Dracula or the Wolfman?” Jess asks with a look of seriousness on her face.
“You two are not serious are you?” Alicia asks incredulously.
“Not exactly those particular creatures but something similar” John answers “there is something out there that drinks blood and something else with a feral instinct and a thirst for destruction “why don’t you and Jess go check out Town Centre Park while I drop in on the blood bank?”
“No you two are on your own this time” Alicia says “I’m supposed to meet Mike tonight. We have some family stuff we need to take care of.”
“You sure?” John asks “we could use your help.”
“No I really can’t. I’ll explain everything to you later but not without Mike’s approval.”
“Okay Alicia, have it your way” John consents “I can’t force you. But I will miss you.”
“You two be careful out there” Alicia says patting John on the back “I’ll have the communicator on me if you do run into trouble.”
With that she leaves the house and speeds off down the street. John goes to his room and dons his suit while Jessica does the same in her room. Once suited up Shadow Hawk and Talon each swing off in different directions. Talon arrives at the Park fairly quickly and is sickened by the unnecessary amount of damage done.
Park benches were split in half, a swing set was completely dismantled, and a large pine tree was even knocked over. Talon activated her lenses and looked around in thermal vision detecting a few small animals like squirrels and chipmunks. Then something large looms into view and she switches to telescopic mode in order to zoom in on it.
A large orange feline with black stripes lets out a feral roar sending the small critters running for cover. Its razor sharp claws slice through several lampposts in mere seconds as Talon watches in horror. She draws her sword from its sheath and prepares herself for the confrontation.
Elsewhere in the heart of the city…
Shadow Hawk finds nothing at the blood bank that might lead him to the burglar. Activating the new sensors in his suit he’s able to detect every fingerprint in the building and cross-reference them with the police, FBI, and CIA databanks. And yet he still comes up empty handed. Realizing this to be a lost cause he wraps up his investigation just before his communicator goes off.
“What’s going on Talon?”
“I found something in the park.”
“What did you find?”
“A giant cat” Jess replies just as the creature lunges at her “hurry up and get over here!”
With that the communication ended. John fires his grappler and swings out of a window and towards Town Centre Park. It took him all of five minutes to cover the distance and he lands on a high tree branch. Here he surveys the park looking for his sister and the creature.
Then he sees the two of them fighting. His sister wields her ninjato snake sword like an expert warrior though at the moment she is settled in a defensive stance. The large cat, which resembles a humanoid female tiger, swipes out with her claws which glance off the steel blade of the sword. She roars in fury as her strikes are continuously blocked.
John decides to intervene and fires off a bird shaped shuriken with deadly accuracy from his gauntlet. With lightning fast reflexes the Tigress leaps forward catching the shuriken in her teeth. Then taking the shuriken in her paw she flings it back in his direction. The bird shaped device slices through the branch he was resting on causing him to fall crashing through the lower branches of the tree.
The Tigress charges off in his direction with all the speed of a jungle cat. As he rubs his head, Shadow Hawk tries to steady himself for the impact. Extending his wrist blades he takes his own defensive stance. The cat crashes into him with tremendous strength throwing him off balance. The two of them tumble through some underbrush and down an embankment toward the rushing stream below.
Talon rushes after them changing her sword into a chain whip as she does so. Right before the two combatants crash into the water she lashes out with her whip causing the end to wrap around her brother’s leg stopping his decent. The Tigress however continues her fall and disappears into the rushing water.
“I appreciate the assist” Shadow Hawk says over the communicator as he lies panting on the ground.
“Looks like you’re still not a hundred percent brother” Talon replies “maybe you should rest for a few more days.”
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Welcome back. Glad to see you had time to write.
