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Post by David on Mar 13, 2007 20:33:14 GMT -5
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Post by David on Mar 13, 2007 20:33:49 GMT -5
DC2 Challenge
Week 1: “The Strange Case of Dr. Kirk Langstrom and the Holy Grayle”
Written by David Charlton
Cover by Craig Cermak
Edited by David Charlton |
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Post by David on Mar 13, 2007 20:34:37 GMT -5
The stars were not right.
He sat on the edge of the monastery’s wall and gazed up at the Milky Way, his breath misting before him. A deep malevolence seemed to pour down from the scintillating pinpricks of light, as if something very old, and something very bad was watching and waiting…
He thought he had left that all behind; he thought he had at last found peace. It had been many years since he had woken up from the dream, that awful, vivid dream of a post-apocalyptic future, where a Great Disaster had befallen the world, and he was an ‘atomic knight’, a lone voice of sanity and justice. That future was tragic and bleak, and he had wanted so bad to believe it would never exist--- but there was the armor, decades more technologically-advanced than anything in the world today…and his absolute certainty that the future he had come from was being born in the here and now.
If only he could remember what had brought it about…!
“Gardner Grayle,” A soft voice came from behind him. A monk inclined his head respectfully, and beckoned to him. “The Goddess will hear you know.”
Grayle slid down from the ledge and followed the monk inside the monastery of Nanda Parbat.
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Post by David on Mar 13, 2007 20:36:05 GMT -5
The door to the lab slammed open, and Dr. Kirk Langstrom stumbled inside, his fingers clawing at his collar.
It was past midnight, and his Gotham University rooms were empty and dark, only moonlight from the single window slashing across the floor to illumine the room. But he didn’t need much light: he was in the throes of his transformation, and his heightened senses took him where he needed to go.
He ransacked his desk, no care for the papers and folders that went flying every which way. He had made the discovery almost by accident, stumbled upon it in the journal of a 19th century British explorer Francine had purchased for him on eBay as a birthday present.
The Victorian’s had had such a penchant for the dramatic that he had paid it no mind when he first read of the thing’s discovery in darkest Africa… What rubbish! How could an inanimate object possess ‘unspeakable evil’ or know ‘great hunger’? After all, it looked so beautiful in the sketch the explorer had made of it…
Then it dawned on him. The twin of it was sitting in an envelope in his desk, sent to him many years ago by a colleague as a keepsake.
Langstrom doubled up in pain, feeling his muscles expand and his incisors extend, contorting his mouth into a rictus of fury. The Bat was almost upon him, but he had to find this thing. The journal had warned that it possessed a kind of sentience, that it would devour all light and goodness, extinguishing hope.
And if Kirk Langstrom needed anything in his life, it was hope.
He grasped the old yellowing envelope, and spilled its contents out into his convulsing hand. The small, perfectly shaped black diamond seemed not to reflect light, but absorb it.
His hirsute, brutish chest heaving, his sense swiftly abandoning him in the rush--- the visceral need for blood and violence--- Man Bat stood in the rays of the moonlight streaming through the window, and howled.
Glass sprayed as he burst from the lab and soared into the sky, the black diamond clutched tightly in his clawed fist.
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Post by David on Mar 14, 2007 17:49:55 GMT -5
The Avatar of the Goddess waited in the Sanctum, inhaling deeply of the incense that swirled thickly in the air.
Grayle thought she couldn’t have been more than a teen-ager, but it was hard to tell: the Avatar wore an ornate mask, decorated with the visage of Rama Kushna. He entered slowly, her eyes following him as he knelt in respect on the prayer mat.
“Gardner Grayle, you are a man out of time.” Came her otherworldly voice, muffled by the mouthless mask.
The smell of the incense was redolent and made his head light. He wondered how he should take that comment: was time running out for him, or was he displaced in this era? Perhaps it meant both?
“The Great Disaster looms.” She raised her arms and her eyes rolled up into her head, so that all he could see through the slits of the mask was white. “One day soon will come the last morning on Earth, and malice alone will rule the hearts of men…”
Grayle stared up at her--- the smoke from the thurifers clouded his vision, but it looked like the Avatar had four arms, all of them waving hypnotically before him.
“What… What can I do…?”
“The Challenge must be met.” The voice of the Avatar had grown richer, and thrummed in the very rocks of the Sanctum. “The history of tomorrow is writ in blood and savagery. The Atomic Knight must take up arms again!”
The words of the goddess rang in his ears. Gardner Grayle stood, swaying unsteadily, his vision swimming before him in colors he’d never imagined existed.
“Where do I start?” He heard his own voice, as if from a great distance. He struggled to steady himself, and it seemed like hours had passed before he had his answer.
“Seek out Command D.” Spake Rama Kushna. “And know this, Gardner Grayle: ere the Last Day dawns, you must meet the Dragon at the World’s End…”
At that moment, Grayle realized he was in his armor. He had no idea how it had happened, nor did he seem to care.
{Merlin interface active} A cold, feminine voice sounded from his earpiece, and across the inside of his visor, a digital display showed him a virtual 3D model of Nanda Parbat, and that his suit’s power levels were at maximum.
“Standby, Merlin.” Grayle subvocalized. He faced the Avatar of Rama Kushna, who seemed to fill the whole chamber now, and knelt at her feet. “Lady, I vow to expend every ounce of breath holding back the darkness. Wherever evil or injustice reigns, you will find there also the Atomic Knight!”
“GO!” Intoned Rama Kushna. “THE BLESSINGS OF HEAVEN UPON YOU!”
He stood and went from the Sanctum.
“Merlin, anti-grav pads, on!”
Like a crusader from a bygone era, the Atomic Knight strode across the courtyard until the anti-gravity pads in the soles of his metallic boots glowed to life, and he drifted into the dark sky, much to the amazement of the watching monks.
“Fusion thrusters, one third power.”
Angling his body in mid air, and with one last salute below to those he had lived with for the last several weeks, his thrusters fired, and the Atomic Knight shot across the sky like the arrow of Apollo…
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Post by David on Mar 14, 2007 17:51:46 GMT -5
Kyle “Ace” Morgan sat at the monitor screen with a cup of coffee, and scanned the news across the world. It felt good to be back at Challengers Mountain. His retirement from the Air Force had left him with little to do these days, so when Prof. Haley had disappeared last year, Ace had spared little time assembling his old friends Matt “Red” Ryan and Leslie “Rocky” Davis to find him and bring him home. Their reunion had led them out of retirement, and now they met as a club of like-minded friends, to investigate the paranormal and unexplainable, once again, challenging the unknown.
While it was indeed Ace’s turn at monitor duty, he knew the others were in residence, as well. Of them all, only he had married, the rest remaining confirmed bachelors, and devoted to their own hobbies and interests: Prof had his studies and environmental crusades, Red his daredevil exploits (he was just back from climbing K2!), and Rocky had his quest for perfect physical health, not to mention a newly discovered talent at watercolor painting. And that was just fine with Ace, because he had June. As interesting as his days were with the Challs, he was always happiest coming home to his beautiful, fiery, brilliant, infuriating June--- not to mention the daughter she had given him, so much like her mother, that she could only be named June as well! In fact, his daughter was as an aviatrix that put even him to shame, and would sometimes even accompany the Challengers on their investigations.
He was just thinking that it had been months since he had seen Hal, and that he should call and invite him to dinner one of these days, when a perimeter alarm went off. Ace glanced at Camera 52, and saw the bespectacled man in the white lab coat pounding wildly on the massive steel doors to the Mountain complex. The speakers at the entrance picked up his frantic screams: “Haley! Open up, damn it! Haley, I need you! I need help!”
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Post by David on Mar 14, 2007 17:55:37 GMT -5
The Challengers raced towards the hanger entrance, the klaxon alarms sounding and the red alert lights whirling.
“Who the heck is he, Prof?” Rocky asked in his calm, steady bass, even as the huge doors separated, letting into the cavernous chamber the sunlight and the rabidly raving figure of a man.
But Prof only frowned, squinting ahead at the familiar figure.
“Who ever he is, he needs to calm down!” Said Red warningly, one hand on the pistol holstered at his hip, and both eyes on the man rushing towards them.
“Steady, Red.” Ace cautioned. “The Prof can handle himself.”
Then the man in the white lab coat and horn-rimmed glasses was upon them, out of breath, and a look of profound unease on his face. Prof. Haley took the gasping intruder by the shoulders, studying his face intently.
“Martin? Martin Stein?” His frown grew deeper, furrowing his already creased brow.
“Who?” Ace asked, even as the stranger struggled to regain his composure.
“My old college roommate, and university colleague.” Prof explained. “But it’s been years since---.”
“Walter!” Dr. Martin Stein finally gasped out. “I need your help! I need someone I can trust… Someone who won’t think I’m crazy…!”
“What?” Prof implored his old friend. “What is it, Martin? Tell me---.”
Suddenly, Stein let out a blood-curdling scream, and would have fallen over had not Prof held him up. As it was, he doubled over in pain, gritting his teeth, and muttered, almost imperceptibly: “No, Ronald, I implore you, no---.”
The Challengers exchanged astonished glances.
When Martin Stein lifted his head, his eyes were blazing like miniature supernovas.
Prof reared back in shock, letting go of Stein as if he were too hot to handle.
“Beware the Shadowstorm!” Stein gritted between clenched teeth, and in a voice that rumbled like a thundercloud. “Beware the Shadowstorm…!”
And then, before their eyes, his form was suddenly reduced to a scintillating coruscation of visible super-atomic matrices, almost too bright for them to see--- and in the next instant, he was gone!
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Post by David on Mar 14, 2007 17:56:20 GMT -5
To be continued!
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Post by mockingbird on Jul 28, 2011 13:02:13 GMT -5
To let us know what you think of this issue, please visit the letters page here!
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