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Posts: 1674
Join Date: Jan 2008
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The remorse hit him hard. He thought he would be feeling joy now. Something was definitely wrong. The horror at what he had just done threatened to turn his insides into outsides. His stomach churned like a whirlpool. He was glad his mask was off for in the next instant he wretched, spewing forth the contents of his stomach. The smell was overpowering, he fell to his knees.
“My father is disappointed” he whispered to himself “it’s not the way he would have done things” no John Dark Senior would have done his best to take the guy alive.
“I’m sorry father” John Jr. cried out looking up towards the heavens.
Seraphim raised her fiery sword, Chrysaor and readied to deal the killing blow, an armored hand clamped down on her shoulder as the Rook spoke “you said it yourself, that is not the way of a hero. Besides I think Shadow Hawk is in enough agony at the moment. He will have to live with the consequences of his actions for the rest of his life.”
The two British heroes left him there alone in the dark as they made their own ways home. John stayed where he was for a few minutes more and then he decided that it was best if he disposed of the body. It took all his courage to go near the Greek, near Marcus Deimus’ corpse. There was a cavern nearby, so well hidden that even the locals might not know of its existence. Shadow Hawk only found it using the x-ray sensors in his mask.
Here he buried Marcus Deimus beneath a pile of stones. He even said a few words to the departed. It wasn’t much but it would have to do. John then made his way to a nearby train station. Here he made a collect call to Sebastian King.
“It’s done. I need a ride home.”
“You alright, you don’t sound too good?”
“I’ll be fine” John answered “just tell me where to meet the plane.”
“Heathrow Airport” Sebastian replied “your flight leaves in forty minutes.”
“Thanks” was all John could manage before hanging up.
Five hours later, stateside…
A vicious killing takes place just outside a homeless shelter. The homeless man slumps to the ground after the muffled sound of a gunshot. Satellites picked up the scene and alerted the Sentinel supercomputer located in the Citadel.
Sebastian took control of the satellite remotely and kept it on the target. The killer was holding a .44 Magnum revolver, its barrel smoking. As the camera zoomed in the mysterious gunman looked straight up as if he could sense them watching him. Then he gave a grim smile and disappeared into the night.
“What the hell was that?” Talon asked looking over Sebastian’s shoulders.
“Dirty Harry” he replied “did you see how he looked straight into the camera like he knew we were watching?”
“But nobody could have seen the satellite. And he didn’t look a thing like Clint Eastwood.”
“I’ll get the facial recognition software working on an ID. It should have a match by the time John returns.”
Raptor had already left the Citadel before this new threat emerged. She was on her way to CyberTech Industries. It was the dead of night so she should only have to get past a few roving security guards. At least she hoped it would be that easy.
Using her telekinetic ability to levitate herself to the roof was easier said than done. She still needed more practice with this super suit. Alicia banged her leg against a ledge on the way up the side of the building but otherwise made it without incident. She wondered why all the tall skyscrapers in the city had giant vent fans on the roof? It made it pretty easy for airborne thieves to break in.
Shoving against the shaft grate with telekinetic force she managed to bend and twist the metal crumpling it up like a wad of paper. Then she gently set it down beside the ventilation shaft. Peering inside the duct she could hear the whirring of the fan blades spinning down in the darkness below.
She shouted, sending echoing sound waves down the shaft. She heard them hit the fan with shattering force. The way before her now seemed clear. She climbed into the large vent and dropped down the vertical shaft. The drop was longer than she had expected. Falling for what seemed forever was not her idea of fun. Then she managed to look down. Green infrared beams crisscrossed the shaft, no doubt linked to motion sensors which would in turn trigger an alarm.
Wrapping herself in a telekinetic field she began lifting up on herself slowing her decent. Raptor halted a mere 2 ½ inches from the topmost beam. How had the fan blades not broken the beams? Maybe they had and the beams simply reconnected? If that was the case then the guards were probably already alerted to her presence.
“No need to be stealthy anymore” she muttered to herself “might as well make an entrance.”
She opened her mouth and let out a sonic resonance strong enough to rip right through the walls of the shaft. Then she jumped through the hole still surrounded by her telekinetic field. She used this to take on the appearance of flight as she entered a large round antechamber. Robotic drones like the ones that attacked her company were now staring up at her.
They opened fire with various types of weaponry, from machine guns to flamethrowers. A couple even tossed up grenades unaware it seems that gravity would just pull them down again. The detonations that followed knocked the drones off their feet.
“Well that was easy” Raptor smiled to herself as she blew a hole in the door behind them.
She now found herself in a room containing one long oval table with leather high backed chairs circling it “this must be the conference room where the board of directors meet” she surmised.
The room was deserted at this time of night. The only other thing here was a large flat screen against one wall which was probably used to show PowerPoint presentations and to engage in video teleconferencing with other branches. She surveyed the room quickly looking for anything that might give her a clue as to where the research department was located.
She heard the soft click of a gun cocking as the barrel was pushed into the back of her head “don’t turn around” the voice on the other end said “what do you think you are doing here?”
“I was just leaving” Raptor replied as she inched a step away from the newcomer.
“Don’t even think about it” the other voice said jamming the gun into the back of her head harder this time “move again and I pull the trigger.”
“Well this awkward. Where do we go from here?”
“You are going to remove your mask and tell me what you want, then I will kill you.”
“I don’t like that plan” Raptor commented “how about you let me go and I won’t hurt you?”
“Take a good look at what side of the trigger you’re on before you think about negotiating.”
Raptor swung her arms up to where they were straight out and parallel to the floor. In the same instant she sent forth a telekinetic wave that swept out from her in every direction. The blast hit the guard causing him to drop the gun he was holding as his body slammed into the wall.
She turned on him then, coming face to face with an African American man sporting a goatee and thick dark glasses. He was already on his feet again and he was clinching his fists, ready for a fight. She didn’t given him the chance to take a swing for she let forth another sonic blast wave. The screeching noise caused him to clamp his hands over his ears before it built up enough power to knock him back, this time through the wall.
The security guard got up more slowly this time. His eyes were cold and calculating his chances. He figured he had more experience even if he couldn’t match her power. He picked up a chair and smashed it against the floor breaking the seat and legs off of it. Then he jumped toward the left wall. His feet connected and he sprang off of it diving straight at her. Then he swung the back of the chair against her head.
It happened so fast Raptor didn’t have time to respond. She felt the wood splinter as it hit home. Her ears started ringing as she fell sideways, crumpling to the floor. She had a splitting headache. It became hard to concentrate. The large black man stood over her now with a smile on his face and a cell phone to his ear. She couldn’t quite make out what he was saying before she passed out.
Back at the Citadel…
“Big brother you’re back” Jess let out an excited shout as she jumped up from the chair and threw her arms around him.
“I missed you too sis” John said patting her back gently then he turned to Sebastian “anything interesting happen while I’ve been gone?”
“Not much” he replied “other than the homeless killer that showed up six hours ago now.”
“Really nothing else the entire time I was gone?” John said pulling out a newspaper he had hidden in his suitcase.
The front page showed the picture of a man wearing a cybernetic version of the Shadow Hawk suit mixing it up with some robots alongside Talon and Raptor. This was accompanied by the headline “New Heroes in Town? Or Did Resident Vigilante Get an Upgrade?”
“I can explain that” Sebastian said uneasily “you see the Sojourn Corporation was attacked by the cyborgs again.”
“Raptor needed our help” Jessica put in.
“I thought you were done Jess?”
“So did I” came her reply.
“Where is Raptor now?”
“Infiltrating CyberTech Industries, we think that is who the cybernetics are working for” Sebastian said.
“And neither one of you went with her?”
“She said it was too personal, that she could handle herself.”
John couldn’t argue with that. He felt the same way going after the Greek. Okay so let her have her moment. Hopefully she’d make the right choices where he could not. But he couldn’t just sit around and dwell on what had happened in Britain. He needed to be doing something. Then he remembered something else Sebastian had said.
“Tell me more about this homeless killer.”
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Duo attack. Lolz
