I Am Rage {Superhero, Action, Tragedy}

It has come. The day has come.

This was to be merely the opening act before all was readied, but such hopes can always be dashed. So they were... by his spark at last revealed no less.

Maybe we were just too slow. Maybe we had failed and this was his push for us to finally do what was necessary. What we couldn't do in totality.

One last test. And what a mighty one it has become.

But it is still coming to fruition. The rabble outside used as was needed. The trials undertaken enough to show they were not worthy yet...

Not like you.

Not like me.

But that was unneeded. You are. You are called to show your strength. To bear the unbearable and prove that nothing can sway you from his light. Be it man or demon, you are his champion in purging it from his birthright.

So let us show them what his power was always meant to do.

The rattling of metal and chain and pressing trash over struggling muscle. Groans of pain and shame at being defeated in their own home. At being captured and detained by who they thought unworthy, as their hopes and struggles proved for naught. As both claimants and followers. As heralds and as will manifest. As little more than ignorant assholes who saw a chance at power and climbed for it over everyone else's backs! As damned zealots swept into a fervor over a god that died the moment it lived! As fanatics more than deserving of the punishment being brought down! All these and more made low! So that maybe, once all was said and done, some proper introspection could curtail them from such brazen bullshit!

But all of that was someone else's problem. Someone else's debt to repay. The sands beneath Seth's feet were stained in blood he never asked for. This arena built in the name of one dead and buried for all they ever could know. For something that was very much not him. Their prayers answered by another, their relics marked stolen and tainted before they ever knew. And the cries, for his salvation to come down, fell on very deaf ears. Not just because he refused, but because he had heard something more concerning.

Tasha brought her children to this raid!?

"We've got you! Here!"

Another all over and over-armored form ran to this more-than commander's side, swinging a shoulder under and helping her to her feet. The same faint whirring of servo assistance adding torque to her aid. Or was it resistance as well? Seth couldn't tell anymore, but it didn't really matter. As another one, the one who flared green fire at him before and got slammed into the back wall for it, ran in beside and added themselves without a second thought.

"We're helping! Don't even try to pull rank!"

"hurrgg. Pessimistic and insubordinate? Now you really- hu… are asking for it Nie."

The still dusted and dented man just took the prospects with hardly hidden smirk and a stance that just read it was worth it. Because he wasn't going to be the only one punished. As even more forms left the brawl turned predominantly into cordwood.

"Family's gotta stick together. Through the good-"

"The bad!"

"And the worse beyond!"

A pack of three leaping over rowed bodies and melding in with the first on the right. Another on the left being followed by one from the stands. All charging into line-a-breast with their leader, with little more than slight differences between them all. Some short some tall. Age range out of order yet gender hard to not see in disparity toward girls. Just drawing questions and confusion as they all stanced damn near identical. Though chief among those question was always going to be-

"How many children do you have!?!"

Seth's incredulence only adding to the ire, the fire, the literal fire as all fucking seven of them ignited their hands with each their own colored flame! The verdant green and magenta from before being added by red and yellow and pink and indigo and…

'No! Not chartreuse! Not again!!'

But again it was, a menagerie of hues wavering light and dark in their own gradient roars. And without doubt, bearing all the same screaming damnation as their mother's. All locked on him. All wanting the same defining thing. To burn him alive for being where he was! For doing what he had done! For being what they believed him to be! And for the worst sin of all!

Hurting their mother!

So all came and forced him behold the rainbow of their fury! As no jet wash nor glassing halo!

Just pure rainbow fire tsunami!

Streams of death hued off normal, caustic, and outright toxic surging. Like a plastic factory fire was jealous of napalm! Three gouts tore the battlefield equilateral, narrowed it down to but a single row between green, red, and magenta. Swallowing up the rallied charge and covering like no Hothead barrage ever could. Because there was heat enough to yank at his soul, and rage enough to know just where the rest were converging!

Seth's feet slammed wide of stance, overdrive ramping as numbers became unmanageable for keeping inline. Just as that chartreuse reminder swung his over bright green and yellow hellspawn right at his head. The wielder on the short side easily dodged, twined with the pink on pure stature alone. But not in ferocity as she leapt right through their backwash! Forcing Seth's spine to contort him away before a cheek burn became a jaw fire. And before an indigo fist could shoot its own shot. As his feet desperately scathed narrow to his chin was spared but a slight toasting.

Gritted teeth, bone deep sunburns, and some horrid hesitation at beating up the adult children of someone he saved just kept compounding all together. Catching that overdrive in clunky memories. Making him waste moments as the older half broke through their flames dissipating. Into fretting regret with a deep green wreathed shin! A full arm guard took it and felt that regret truer than he should, felt threading nearly scream in overwriting energetics. In washing over fire not just simply burning his skin. Not just wanting his soul as kindling! The heat roiling through his very being! Like his suit was overloading with him still inside! The copper globules threatening to melt into his unprepared skin! This wasn't heat, this was the memory of it. This was what their fire was, punishment with the worst your mind could conjure. The worst heat, the worst burn. And that meant-

'Don't you dare send me back to-'

But bake he went, as magenta haloed off the left side of his face. As cooper jet and military grade explosives scoured his sanity. So yellow could bring the sun from the other side. And make this a best hits of the fourth degree!!

Sending him back and forth between cauterizing exfoliation and stellar sunbath, as they both took turns smacking him in the side of the head. His guard evaporating, overdrive catastrophically failing. The only saving grace his refusal to burn physically. Adding frustration to familial wrath and tow to the back-around that the pink one was ripping through. As she refused to be avoided this time.

Hot pink in more than one sense tore down as his flanks let a new star shine. Let her break his knee cap and beat the ever living shit out of him. Armor resistance reversed and adding, and sending his body back to the upper atmosphere he'd been was dragged to. Flurrying over him, striking sternum to septum and then some. Knocking his footing loose by pounding down his knees every time he tried to stay. Kidney-shoting to lurch him down to her level. Caving in a lung as he sputtered for breath. And flashing him back to one dark day after another, by socking him right over the edge!

Vision rough and blackening, angle losing degree by the wrenching moment.

The memory, the feeling of burning for what he'd done.

The just punishment for sins committed.

The cauterizing, hollowing out of being damned for it all.

Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.

For the deaths he caused.

For the pain he brought.

For the suffering he created.

For…

For what he already died for! For what he already paid for! For-

'FUCK YOU!!!'

For refusing to just let sins be piled on again! For his own pain and suffering to be ignored wholesale! For all he'd tried and done that was right to be ignored and thought wrong! And for that footing to shoot back under him and his angle fight to torrential overwrought! And bring the weight down on someone else's head!

Namely this pink brat's!!

Mid swing the world found no speed by Seth's, as he rammed back to stature and excess degree! To head butt right into that reflection of someone done with remembering all their pain! And shatter that damnable modernity keeping his opponents to themselves!

Liquid splattered, black and fine grain and telling of what he'd been fighting. Some kind of non-Newtonian bullshit just masking as rubber! Formed into shape and pressurized to all hell. Too hard to keep fighting outright, judging from the blood sizzling in the meteoric ejecta of impact. But it proved one thing just fine. They were all in over their heads!

The fucking sun and off color HEAT tried to corral him, send him back so the rest of the siblings could bury him in guilt. But the mountains rang hollow with what there was to ply! As he twisted up, sprang to the air, span in liberation from what was not anymore! And split kicked the both of them to the ground!

Not enough force to splatter, but enough throw them out and away. So the rest could bear the nonplussed gravity of the one pushed one step back too many.

That green, juxtaposition between verdance and burning plastic, tried to avenge and take magenta's place. Charging in as Seth's feet laid claim to the sheen glass beneath them. But only succeeded in bring himself into range. As his fist swung below that glower upturned, with counter following parallel to sock it to 'em!

Helmet not cracked but made bearer of force majeure, sending them flying as Seth reeled back with the other hand all but hidden. Stopping the indigo burn mid attempt at an already toasted kidney. Her fist burned his palm, but it was the heat of reconstruction and revival! The good overpowering the bad, as he bombed down on her elbow to force her too close. And planted a foot square on her gut to shoot her the hell back!

Because it never ended with these people!

As red made herself known again from the back the map, let loose twin gouts to cut his battlefield to one straight shot. So that gaudy color that burned his eyes more than his soul could leap in for another chance. The kid bearing chartreuse failing on the uptake that he was too much for the lot of them. Still, Seth steeled himself with an arm loaded to swat them away.

As the kid yelled like a sheet metal door, and made himself too easy a target. Getting armbared into that crimson flame wall as he tried to barrel in. As he tried to cover for that pink fury charging in his shadow. Only winning the consolation prize of whiplash and giving Seth the excuse to grind distance into tension. So he could meet that pink flamed girl with all she deserved as she swung away at him!

Her helmet discarded and outmoded by the fire lit behind her eyes. Pink streaks almost melting into her shared brown hair just utterly uncalled for. But accepted as is. Because it was a start, a need, one more uncovered and able to show their all! Show everything they were to him! So he could overshadow it! Show them futility! Show them… horror…?

Fear undue in those alight eyes. Fury drowning to extinguish. Focus on her only target faltering and finding something worse. What the hell could be worse than the one they-

*KRRRRGGaaaaannngggg*

A reverberation through all the ramshackle trash that made this place up. Sheet metal, on the groove made for it, clanging its last in baffled tenor. Bringing silence down upon the groan and the riot and the fury once taking center stage. As far lighter step took back their wooden height. No emotions radiating out but what was stalling to halt before him, yet the air could not deny what took its place. As it buzzed to life from the recesses Seth had thrown his armor down.

As, with thundering echo, out stepped the master. The self-appointed apostle to his falsely claimed divinity. With all the menace befitting one given power beyond power.

"You…!! You who denied and sequestered what was never yours!"

His words no longer held the jaded weight of the one on top. Revitalized and near cackling with static malice.

"You!! Who blaspheme and decry the unalienable truth!!"

Dread came as backwash and forced Seth's back straight. Forced him to feel what he could no longer Paracausally.

"That you can't kill a god!"

As a new foot made landfall upon that wooden stage and cracked it in splay.

"You can't deny it now! You can't oppress us with your lies!! You can't claim authority over what you never controlled!!"

As those horror filled pink eyes doubled and doubled and drove steps where his own displays could never manage. As the other, armored foot crushed the border between darkness and light. Splintered wood and cracked concrete and dared all see.

"Tyra get out of there now!!!"

"Well now it's time…!

"To show you our RAGE!!!"

The world hollowed out, a grim precedent making itself known all over again. Shoving perception out of its way so it could force all to see and feel in pure grinding slowness. What Seth turned his head through, stuck to the ramrod that was his spine. Taking in more reeling horror, more contorting faces, more… More irking ecstasy.

Those detained and defeated rowed on the ground could not help but smile and weep and make him know more than he wanted. As he made it all the way to bear what was only a nightmare half thought possible. But what he should have know. That left eye, that laden orb now seeing it. Reflecting upon its surface was a new death manifesting itself in spite.

A shadow, sun risen high and slicing down, forcing all not in its light to the deepest of darkness. A darkness filled to its brim just beyond that broken stage. The doorway down, the hide away he was prepared to just storm down or wait for his apostate of a saint to return from with true champion in toe. Armor clad and hulking sure, but not... Not...!

Not crawling out of its familiar darkness... with claw pulling it free.

Pulling that visage he'd given them into that light. The armor he'd cleansed, the discord he'd made right. But more and more and so very not right. Failing to account for what his power truly did, as it bowing that champion down. Dragging it feral. Limping it to favor one side not lame. As what had taken his place seeped in, feeding on the power he'd used to bring order, rousing out what should not be possible anymore. But there clawing its way like that day so long ago now...

Stalked a laceroid of patchwork hell.

Out of darkness holding over shaded form tensing loose.

'Don't!'

Out of darkness shining over scales greyed yet freshly hewn.

'Don't you dare!'

Into light reflecting and burning out between and beneath.

'Don't! You dare! Open those-'

"RRRRRAAAAAGGGGGGHHHHH!!!!"

Like his first! Like his father ripped from tortures memory! This mismatched thing of revived nightmares roared and tore free of that hell! Burning its eyes a new caustic green!!

Tearing stage to ribbons with claws only half armored! With talons uncaring and teeth uncut! Carving forward as all abound were made weak by sheer knowing! Flinching in full body cowardice, reflex and training conflicting to back peddling hesitation! As this thing rammed down to the sand, clawed for the one left in its sights! Because even Seth was driven to step out of its way! And leave the pink fire brat to heed her mother's words and-

"RUN!!!!"

Sand fishtailed beneath boot and talon alike. Metal screeched as it was sparked with clawing degeneracy. No light, consciousness, just death and want for all it brings. As the form bulked by cancerous being barreled down the arena after its almost tiny prey. Splayed to a sprint to slice all before it like its progenitors before.

And meeting the progeny of those who put them all down!

Metal scrap and cacophonous bangs collided as the girl dove for her life. That Cross Off and the yet named flashbanger acting before the brat was made mince. Slowing the monstrosity by sheer force of weight and overpressure and making it angrier! A slab of solid sheet metal and trash whipped to shrapnel before it could bind its hide. The concussive spectacle just ignored with rippling charge and maw overpowering! Overfilling with flames shooting with pink defiance, as the girl rounded from the ground to make her flight more than fear. But only served to halo its drive to rend her in twain!

Yet still it was proved in purpose and action!

Green fire, brighter than that avarice, filling a claw as big as his chest. Yellow flames burning to extremes to stop the other in its path. Siblings charging to the defense of their younger to stop a claw each. With jets firing to their maximums to stop the whole thing there! So their mother could blast between and wrangle that maw in denying, lurching stop!

Servos screamed, metal and solid fluid nonsense straining under the weight. That pink girl watching, forced by weight of reality to the ground. Contorted by new fear only holding in the flash of realization that she was being saved this time.

As the one truly frozen was made to watch his hopes wither in his own hubris.

As fires scorched, tried to burn what was still exposed. Holding no fear for what laid beneath that twisted mundane shell. What… what wasn't there! No resonance sang with the reverb of defeated momentum. No rending of matter by metaphysical corruption. An actual laceroid in all but its full, so just a locked in moron that chose this existence! So maybe one that could be undone! One that could be scoured! And one that could be burned-

"TOGETHER!!!"

In the bonfire of those that defied its emergence! That rainbow of colors mismatched and roaring in concert! The stragglers and the one left on the ground fighting forward to fill the gaps with fire!!

Blow this thing off its footing, off talons it dared to stake! Off muscle false and wrath dared thought rage! Forcing it up by force of familial fury. Awash in color and charring denial. So all seven of them could wind up to send it back whence it came! Turn jets to flamethrowers, turn fury to physical, and launch this mangled thing back across the arena in dazzling riposte!

Send it flying back in lazy arc trailing technicolor smoke, to fall upon that broken thrice stage. Caving in the wood and burning it residual. Flinching that aged priest in the shower and spark. Yet stay him staunch as master of this cult. As wood crackled and was clawed before it could ever settle. And this nightmare scenario could prove its longevity. As that almost baked laceroid tore free of concussion and splinter. And snarl its claim on this warred over sand in sizzling refusal to die.

As the only one frozen in fear unique, watched his plans falter.

Yet evolve in the light of this now third alien star.

Proving the chaos of what time had made way for.

And proving what he had to do to see his name right.