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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:21:55 GMT -5
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:22:27 GMT -5
Titans: The Resistance [/i] Issue #15: "Cult of Blood"[/b] Pt. 5 Written by: Jay McIntyre Cover by: Jina B. Edited by: Brian Burchette[/center] |
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:22:51 GMT -5
"....a man, tall and thin, and ghastly pale... I crept behind It, and gave It my knife; but the knife went through It, empty as the air."
- Bram Stoker
“Now you know what we are, now you know what you are. You'll never grow old, Michael, and you'll never die. But you must feed!”
--Excerpt from The Lost Boys, a film written by Janice Fischer, James Jeremias and Jeffrey Boam
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:23:20 GMT -5
Rose danced and whirled with her blades. She needed to use a stake for the final blow, of course, but to fight the enemy, her swords were best. She sliced and diced with grace and ease.
But they were more graceful, and more importantly, faster. Vampire claws sparked off her body armor. A resounding kick knocked the wind out of her and planted her on the cold, hard ground.
The vampire sneered at her and opened his mouth wide to bite....and then his expression became almost comical as Dorothy staked him from behind. He collapsed, paralyzed, and Ravager cut his head off.
Dorothy gave her a hand up.
“Thanks,” Rose said.
“Don’t mention it.”
They grinned at each other and rejoined the battle.
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:23:49 GMT -5
Sarin stared disbelievingly at Green Lantern. “Such power!”
Green Lantern smiled unpleasantly. “You think that was impressive, try this...” he grabbed Sarin with his emerald energy...and threw him all the way outside.
Into the sunlight.
Sarin screamed in agony and tried to crawl back into the darkness, but the sun burned him to ash before he could make it. Sarin was a vampire of middling power, which mean he survived the burning just long enough for it to be a short season in hell before his final death.
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:24:31 GMT -5
Robin and Jason fought side by side with Joshua, one of Jason’s hunters.
Jason knew, intellectually, that Robin would do what was necessary to take down the vampires. But he was still surprised to see Robin wield a stake with such enthusiasm.
No....he realized as he looked more carefully. Calm detachment, focus and intellect.
A real shame he refused to do it for a living.
He put it aside, as he staked his own enemy. Resentment would accomplish nothing. Leave emotion behind, which had always been his problem.
Joshua staked the last of the first group of vampires, but there was no time for celebration or reflection, as various steam-powered machines and hypnotized humans were the next challenge they faced.
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:25:12 GMT -5
Dagon had fought his “own kind” sparingly, and now took on one of the steam punk creations with real enthusiasm, tearing it apart as it advanced.
It was hard to describe, but Terra knew them well; having read of them in the history of her people. She could have taken them out all by herself, but as usual the problem was, since they were inside, she didn’t want to bring the house down on herself or her friends.
So she selectively hurled rocks at the machines, and took down the humans more selectively, bashing one or two in the head. Terra was reluctant to kill them; they were neither vampires nor Markovian soldiers; merely humans brainwashed into being the slaves of the enemy.
Argent had no reluctance; she decapitated several with flashes of silver power. Terra pursed her lips and wanted to argue; but she knew what the girl had been through. And besides which, Ravager would kill just as readily. Probably Anarky, too. And who was she to complain, steeped in blood as she was?
She sighed.
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:25:56 GMT -5
Slowly they began to push the enemy back.....but then more conditioned humans came in hurling crystal balls. Supergirl used her heat vision on one of the balls. It did not melt....it burst, sending a wave of energy and shards of glass. The human who had been preparing to throw it went down, their body sizzling and shivering with purple and silver waves of power.
“Arcane energies,” Supergirl breathed. She had already learned it was one of the few things that could hurt her on this planet. So instead she blew a huge lungful of breath at them, knocking them back.
Anarky waited until her cold gust was finished, and lunged in on his own account, wielding his cattle prod with great accuracy. His style was like that of Robin in many ways, more than either of them would like to admit.
He took down the last of the conditioned humans, and desperately lunged to catch the crystal ball before it could hit the floor and break. He blew a sigh of relief and held it up gingerly.
“A pity we don’t have a magical specialist to tell us about these things,” he murmured thoughtfully, looking at it.
“Perhaps you should put it down,” Terra suggested.
“Hmmm? Oh, sure.” Carefully Anarky put it on the rocky floor.
“We seem to have survived,” Joshua mused.
“So why does it only feel like the first round?” Dorothy wondered.
“Because you have a brain,” Anarky said matter-of-factly.
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:26:48 GMT -5
The Cult leader built his constructs out of the blood pool. He knew the others had failed. In his own way, he mourned the loss of Sarin and the other vampires. But they would be avenged. This would only be a delay of the Cult’s eventual dominion over the world.
Once they defeated the hunters that were. And he was determined that they would do so, now more than ever.
The surviving vampires, the ones that hadn’t either gone with Sarin or gone to aid him, slowly and wearily came to the edges of the blood pool; none of them had the gift of easy rising that the leader had....and that Sarin had no longer. It had been the sounds of combat that had woken them, but once roused, they answered their master’s summons.
Eight left. The leader surveyed them. Eight, not counting himself. None of the strongest or most powerful. None of those most wise. The enemy had already killed those.
For the first time, the Cult leader felt more than unease, he felt genuine fear.
They might actually lose here.
They might actually die.
No. He could not accept it, and more he would not allow it. The Cult would triumph. It must. The world must be made safe for his kind, and they must take command as was their right and power.
“Believe me when I tell you,” he said to them, not taking his eyes from the blood constructs, “When I say we have a difficult time ahead of us. But if we focus on destroying the humans, we will triumph.”
“We always believe you, master,” one of the vampires said. The highest ranking of the survivors, almost 300 years old, and the only female left in the entire cult.
The leader paused in his blood sculpting to look at her thoughtfully. He smiled briefly, showing fangs, then said, “While it would please me no end to destroy all the interlopers, we may have to turn several of them to replenish our numbers. And if the converts are unwilling, then their agony will be a fitting revenge. And some are always willing, are they not?”
The vampires chuckled; they knew all too well that some hunters were always happy to be turned after the fact. More than once people had got into the hunting “business” out of a sense of envy.
“That said,” he went on, “Do not expose yourself to final death in your efforts to convert a few. Slay as many as you must, then turn the survivors. The very fact that they have advanced this far is alarming. The hunters must have found help of some sort. Be ready for anything.”
“And what of the Dhampir?” the vampiress asked.
He nodded sadly. “I had originally intended for him to be the first of our new vanguard. I had thought that the deaths of the hunters would be a sufficient lesson for him. But the death of so many of our kind, if he did not fall during that battle.....he must die for that. Another will replace him as our daylight walker.”
He finished his blood constructs, fearsome things in their own right. He turned to his followers once more. “Remember, we are the shadow of mankind and grow with them. Our time is now to darken the world. Chant our name. Let our enemies hear it as they come; let them know that they face.....the Cult of Blood. Cult of Blood. Cult of Blood! CULT OF BLOOD[/i]!”
The others took up the chant, louder and louder until the cavern shook with it. “CULT OF BLOOD! CULT OF BLOOD! CULT OF BLOOD! CULT OF BLOOD!”[/i]
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:27:34 GMT -5
The Titans and the hunters could hear the shouting of the vampires as they worked their way through the caverns. None of them had been killed or even seriously hurt yet, which was a minor miracle.
Of course, it was no accident; the presence of the Titans had prevented the casualties of the hunters. But none of them was invulnerable, not even Supergirl; and some of them were ordinary flesh and blood types themselves; Robin, Anarky, Ravager. Green Lantern could shield himself with his ring; but he could still be harmed, as could Argent.
Dagon skittered along ahead of them, listening. “They did this the other night when they first brought me here. They want us to know they’re ready for us. That they know we’re coming.”
“Thanks genius, we’d never have figured that one out for ourselves,” Anarky said.
Jason stared at him. “Dude, seriously, stop taking words out of my mouth.”
Anarky laughed.
Everybody was staring at them, even Jason’s fellow hunters.
“Um, right, could we stick to the task at hand?” Dorothy asked mildly.
“Right you are,” Robin agreed. “This is it.”
“Lantern, if you can shield the others from getting bit, do so,” Jason advised. “I’d hate for them to turn anyone against us.”
Eric opened his mouth to make a smart remark; then found he couldn’t. Jason was right, and he should have thought of that during the last fight himself. “Okay,” he finally said. “Normally my will can block most things, but the further spread out I am the harder it gets, and also fighting myself will weaken those protections still further.”
Jason nodded. “Do what you can.”
“This is it,” Terra breathed.
“Would you do the honors?” Jason asked Dagon.
The Dhampir closed his eyes and charged through.
The others followed him.
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:28:21 GMT -5
The vampires broke off their chanting.
“So you have arrived.....and brought more help than I thought,” the Cult leader intoned, eyeing the Titans. “So be it.”
The vampires charged without further discussion. The Titans and hunters rose to meet them.
All but Terra; she remained focused on the cult leader himself. He had made creatures out of the vast blood pool he stood over; giant snapping dragon-like things, huge brutes, floating swords, and some strange grid-like thing she couldn’t immediately identify.
“How many innocents contributed their blood to that pool?” she asked softly.
The leader only smiled and gestured, and the blood constructs came screaming at her.
She smiled in turn, a hard furious smile, and ripped up rocks that flew to meet the blood things. They splashed harmlessly against the rocks and dissipated....except the unidentifiable lattice thing.
This wrapped itself around her and was beginning to choke her, threatening to try to pour down her mouth....until Green Lantern’s energy was there, disrupting it.
He caught her and she gasped, drawing breath safely as Lantern’s energies pushed the blood away.
As the leader stood staring in disbelief, Terra gestured again; ripping holes in the bottom of the pool. She channeled the holes, digging them deeper, until the blood could drain away.
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:30:29 GMT -5
Jason staked one vampire and ducked another, which met the Anarky’s sparking cattle prod. Electricity could not kill the vampire, but it could harm it just fine.
Robin pole-vaulted in and staked it from behind.
There was no time for congratulations or comparing notes; they turned to face new enemies.
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:31:21 GMT -5
Supergirl blasted a vampire with her heat vision. It was down but not dead, writhing in pain on the floor. She picked it up and broke its back, then staked it.
While she had no compassion for these creatures, she did find their deaths rather horrible. She would have to study the remains, and see what could be learned of their strange not-quite-dead condition. Hadn’t the Kryptonians had revenants of a sort, once upon a time in their ancient history? Rumors and legends? She was not sure.
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:33:29 GMT -5
Dorothy, Joshua and Grant were taking on a vampire each. Grant staked his relatively easily, but Dorothy was almost evenly matched against her foe, and Joshua was losing.
Grant raced to aid Joshua, as Dorothy ducked and dived and tried desperately to avoid the superior reflexes and strength of the vampire. So far the others had proven lucky. But this was not her day, or so it seemed.
The vampire batted away her stake almost contemptuously, hissing laughter at her with bared fangs. So she pulled her personal favorite weapon out of her overstuffed backpack.....
“A baseball bat?” the vampire asked incredulously.
She swung it hard and fast, knocking him down. He got up quickly, but not so quickly as to prevent her from throwing a UV pack in his face, which ignited on contact.
He screamed in agony and rolled around on the floor of the cavern.
She picked up her stake and rammed it home.
“I love my aluminum baseball bat,” she said simply.
Grant tried to help Joshua but was kicked off like an offending dog. Jason, Robin, Argent and Anarky were all rushing in to save the day, but they were too late....too late.
The vampire ripped Joshua in half.
Jason shrieked in rage and just started punching him, but the vampire slashed his chest and Jason fell away in agony.
Anarky hit the vampire high and Robin hit him low. He went down, but grabbed Anarky in a headlock and kicked Robin away.
Dorothy came in and bashed him with her baseball bat, and he let go of Anarky.
Grant finally recovered enough to stake him.
“One more good soldier lost,” Grant said sadly.
Dorothy shed a quiet tear and Jason made outraged noises, sitting up and shaking with fury, staring at what was left of Joshua.
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:34:20 GMT -5
Ravager was squared off against a long, lean thin vampire who grinned unpleasantly at her. She slashed at his fangs but he ducked back, and then lunged in with his spooky speed.
Realizing she couldn’t match his quickness she simply let him knock her blades away and pounce on her. She went with his momentum, and kicked out as they landed, sending him flying.
To his credit, he turned in midair and landed cat-footed, and came for her again.....but this gave her time to draw a gun and shoot him in the face.
He was stunned and in pain but he slowly got up. She grabbed one of her katanas and chopped his head off.
With him not being staked, his head could still have been reattached to his body, but he would need help for that. While the torso was laying there helpless, Ravager pulled a stake and finished him.
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:35:41 GMT -5
Dagon was up against the female vampire.
“You threw everything away,” she hissed.
He responded by punching her in the throat. She gagged; then lashed out with her claws, scratching his face.
He hissed in pain then blocked her next strike, grabbed her arm, and broke it over his knee.
She howled in agony but was healing fast; he dared not let her have time to recover. He struck her two, three, four times.
She lashed out with a foot and he stumbled back. She leapt for him with her good arm out, claws extended. He grabbed her arm and spun her into the cave wall.
Before she could get up, he slammed a stake home.
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:36:41 GMT -5
Terra and Green Lantern looked around and saw that, just like that, the battle was over. Several of the vampires would have to be decapitated, but their side had clearly won.
She looked at the leader. “You thought your blood control abilities were so amazing,” she said, almost mocking. “Apparently not.”
He stared at her in disbelief and rage for a long moment, then seemed to master himself. “Ah, but you misunderstand,” he said. “The blood does not have to be pooled in the open air to use.”
He twisted his hands, and all the humans screamed and collapsed.
“It is called the Cult of Blood, you fools!” he screamed at them as they writhed and twisted. “I can boil your blood away or still your hearts! Mine is the power!”
Dagon, with his partially transformed blood, was not fully affected, and while in pain, could jump to the attack. Almost contemptuously, the leader batted him away, into the cavern wall. “I will deal with you later, fool.”
Then, suddenly, a pair of hands grabbed him and flew with him out of the cavern.
He stared in disbelief, and twisted his hands more, but nothing happened. “You cannot be immune to my blood powers!”
“I don’t have human blood,” Supergirl said simply.
“An alien....” the leader realized his danger, but before he could shift to mist, Supergirl blasted him with heat vision, disrupting his concentration.
She flew with him out into the sunlight.
He screamed, and thrashed, and fought....and burned.
And very, very slowly, he disintegrated into a pile of ash.
She flew back inside; while no Markovian troopers had seen, ordinary citizens certainly had, and she’d best get the others to safety before word got back to the authorities.
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:40:28 GMT -5
Supergirl had decapitated all the remaining vampires, and with Dagon’s help, had gotten the others out, into the deeper networks of caverns.
None of the others had died, though Grant seemed to have been partially handicapped, at least for the time being. He could barely walk. The others were all right after a period of rest.
Jason stared at Dagon.
“You’re not blaming him?” Terra asked.
“This might be one of those times of conflict between us you were worried about.” Robin said.
Jason didn’t answer at first. Then he went over to Dagon.
“You!”
Dagon looked up.
“Me,” he said expressionlessly.
“You’re not happy being what you are.”
“No,” Dagon agreed.
“You know what you’re going to do?”
Dagon looked blankly puzzled. “I can’t see the future, or at least I haven’t yet.”
Jason smiled, but there was no humor in it. “I know what you’re going to do.”
“Yes?”
“You’re going to help us find other vampire covens and exterminate them.”
Dagon nodded. “I don’t think there are any other cults quite like this one was.”
“Probably not, but you’re going to help us anyway.”
Dagon nodded. “As best I can.”
Jason crossed his arms. “I lost one hunter to the Cult, and another is on injured reserve. You will learn our ways and assist our team.”
Dagon nodded again.
Jason frowned, clearly expecting an argument. Finding none, he turned to Dorothy. “You’ll teach him what he needs to know.”
“Of course,” she nodded.
“He expected me to argue,” Dagon said thoughtfully.
“He thinks you’ll strike out on your own and become a vampire like they were,” Dorothy said. “And also he’s angry about the loss of Joshua. We’ll need you to tell us about what you are and what it meant to the Cult.”
Dagon nodded. “I will help the best I can.”
Dorothy smiled. “I know you will.”
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:41:34 GMT -5
“Thank you for your help.” Jason said, if a touch stiffly, to the Titans. “Without you, we couldn’t have stopped the Cult and their plans. With your help, we may have very well saved the world from vampire dominion.”
“You’re welcome,” Terra said softly.
“Which is all the more reason why you need to understand that this is where your skills are needed; not against mere human opponents! Markovian rule, while terrible, is a far lesser thing!”
“Which is why I’m going to give you a communicator,” said Robin. “If things get too hot, call us. But I want a promise from you in return.”
“And what’s that?”
“If we get in a huge fight with Markovians, you in turn will help us.”
Jason thought long and hard.
Then he nodded.
They shook hands.
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:42:19 GMT -5
Zhukov arrived in the caverns six hours after the Titans had left.
There was nothing to find, of course, but piles of ash.
He had brief notions of covering it up, but he knew there were spies in the British dominion government that would report if he didn’t.
He could only hope that the Empress wouldn’t execute him on the spot. In his defense, they had probably gotten here around the same time he did, if not earlier. And whatever they had fought; was not part of the Empire. In fact, they might have indirectly sustained the security of the Empire by dealing with this....whatever it was.
“Gather all the evidence you can,” he sighed to his troopers. “I will make a full report to the Empress.”
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:42:46 GMT -5
Dagon followed Dorothy into the labyrinth of tunnels the hunters used.
He would have to feed on animals to survive, drinking their blood so he would not turn fully. But he would do it, to help end the existence of the hated creatures that had made him.
The Titans had already left. He admired their bright eyes, their powers, and their hopes. He hoped they would meet again.
But for now, he followed Dorothy into the night.
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Post by starlord on Mar 18, 2008 21:43:45 GMT -5
END[/b]
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Post by Admin on Mar 19, 2008 2:24:52 GMT -5
If you wish to comment on this issue, please CLICK HERE to visit the letters page. |
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