I Am Rage {Superhero, Action, Tragedy}

The last of a blaring echo quaking ramshackle construction. Sheet metal rippling against concrete. Sand shifting against steel. Bodies hushed to nothing as the world closed down to naught but this colosseum. This church of blood and strife defied. This unholy altar to which a daemon was called to. Broken open, swarmed and crashed before the deed could be fulfilled. Parishioners curtailed and brought low. The ritual interrupted before its greatest extent could be reached. Yet there stood upon it, there ripped from nightmare and worst case scenarios.

There stood the full lord of hell these apostates hoped to one day see rise, with their attempt at reincarnation throttled in his clawed hand.

Metal chaffed, purpled flesh twisted into his likeness bulging out, the power that coiled through this mockery highlighted as discord harmonized by sheer willpower. This fool clinging to sanity off of a promise of salvation. Of righteous sacrifice that would shepherd all to his ideals. He was strong, that was clear. But he was being swallowed deeper by the second, as the greed underpinning ran wild through all the pieces he'd cleansed. Not enough to never see the light of day again, but...

'Can't just leave him down there now can I?'

A spark, a threaded connection, a jolt out to pop that locked in hell. Fairer harmonization made just ever so slightly more viable. Consciousness freed up from under all that this Averous had been, but still bearing its leftover psychosis. Nothing so drastic, can't just casually rip free even this disparate tangle. And why would he go and spoil the fun. Better to split that darkness open so this zealot could see and feel for himself.

That his god was displeased with his blasphemy.

But the suffocating aura of his mere being here wasn't enough to freeze the rest of the world solid. Duties rising higher and finding the only clearance they could ever ask for. Those stopped occultists still needing to be dragged out, desperate captors hauling them out of this battlefield as the worst was yet to come obviously. None stopping them as none could match this courage. Heroes all for knowing when it was finally time to get the hell out of the line of fire and protect people.

As that half plated abomination they called 'his return' was dropped to the sand. Thumping the atmosphere with that stolen weight and a new found lease on life. As those squirreling away were shocked to stun, and this newfound penitent clambered back all the way to the broken stage. With those oh-so-holy features contorted in fear.

With Seth looming over unmoved from his actions.

As action mounted behind, as heroes forced through the need to clear the floor. Get more and more cultists out of this clearly ready to blow arena. Hauling them by hand and power through broken portcullis and the hole burned into the wall. Past those still stuck colored flamers, past those who wanted to stay and fight, past those who were now trapped by their own courage. By their own sense of righteousness. The whole fire family in the same rocked boat. Stanced halfway between renewed assault and terror so deep that not even an ember of their will would survive.

All but Tasha, all but their matriarch, all but the cobalt balefire that knew no such extinguishing! Allowed no such fear to overflow what burned in her heart! As she rose from the sand and glass from over her daughter's shoulder, injury and malaise just prelude and kindling. As step by glistering step cracked her back into that burned trench. With all this useless weight needing gone.

"Get this armor off of me and evacuate. I want all of you out of here!"

A snapping of quaking despair, a call to action and sparing from duty far more demanding and utterly better than anything else right now! They needed to do something, and then get the hell out of the way!

Because she was going to burn this pretender to death!

Because…

Because that can't be him.

Because that was no god of his!

That priest, that high cleric, that speaker of his word and caller of his power. This Saint Saladar. He had seen, he had felt his true might. Knew its grandeur and weight for himself. He had seen its light, its terrible power to unmake and make again! Bore its rueful demise in awe of its inspiring splendor. And so knew of the false things that dared to try and copy him! Who paid for that blasphemy! He had felt them in the armor, heard their voices in the echoes of his power. He knew they were lie in raw form. Pretenders, greedy malcontents who only sought what could be taken. They were things to be overcome and proven stronger then. And he would not be fooled again by their ultimate corruptor! Because-

"You… are not Him!!!"

The tension of existence unfurled seemed to have such a… different effect than Seth thought. As step by backward step, he let the zealot have his creation back. As he took the center stage from none who would dare still occupy it. As behind he heard the clank and rip of disengaging plating. And before him he heard more utter bullshit.

"I... I have seen lies like you. False things like you! Homunculi by that doctor who thinks himself immortal! Heresies he tries to claim progeny!! Thieves who taint his greatness!!!"

His staff rattled wood and air alike, beat this small place with fury so thinly buried.

'What the fuck happened while I was dead?'

Disappointment tried to weigh down in the reverb, his grand return to the world of the living seen as… What, some fucking mad science experiment? Was that what he was seeing in the armor? Some poor idiot being used like a lab rat. It… sure seemed like it.

'And I went and burned that memory away.'

"You will not defile his form any longer! You will pay for daring to touch his relics!! You will suffer for tricking us again with lies!!! Because you are nothing but a pretender!!!"

Separate heavy, sandy thunks bracketed his claims. The world seemingly thawed from its stupor by justifications from a mad man. Tasha preparing for a worst case scenario a little too forcefully. That personal side to this conflict agitated all over again. Was everyone tricked so easily by whoever this doctor was? Whatever he'd done? Or… had he just walked into the funeral wearing the deadman's clothes.

"Get everyone clear of the floor and call the red line!! I'll keep this bastard busy."

'Fucking hell... No wonder I don't care for making things right.'

"You will pay for your blasphemies!! You will all pay!! Because our god is dead!! But he will live again!!!"

That staff slammed down, cracked wood liable to burst into flames! As tendrils shattered out in bright shining discharge! His own power over electricity forcing the point, grabbing at the sky as if wanting to bring it all down. Yet down it arced! Curving as if drawn, as if finding the path of least resistance and greatest want of its fury!

Racking over that abomination stuck horrified with his life choices!

Power raced over, crackling through flesh and scale caught half of a half. Lit his nervous cacophony for all to see. For so few left to see him writhe as the power they worshiped was fed to snarling overflow. So the beast caught in the lurch could be brought back up to roaring snuff!

Roaring fury in stereo. The flames of soulful damnation turning torrent like the wings of a demon. The deep azure of swallowing condemnation, to the blistering cyan of its gradient hell. Tasha's full might wrought to bear. No resistance nor restraint allowed anymore, this was what was deserved for her own memories defiled.

Defiled across time and across divinity, swirling about with slaughter in their eyes locked upon him. Locked upon Seth with nothing but death on the warrant and justice allowed. Allowed no respite and no place on this wared over space. Marred and bloodied and blackened to glass.

Because he just could not help but be the iconoclast.

"Let the earth quake with his fury!!! Let the sky fall upon all our heads!!! So that this charlatan will burn in the divine rage he so ignites!!!"

Armored claws screeching metal through its sand, weight upon weight making way in overcharged coil. Eyes alight in desaturating green ilk, glaring down the only course allowed for this sacrilege. But each step was another falsity, another crime in the blind and made righteous without care. Made counter and scorching by heavy boots and spreading inferno. By every step in defiance of this over seen insult. This wrought indignity to a memory burning brighter than any alien star could ever outshine. As the fear of power fell to the scrap heap of 'what's right'. So that all this ramshackle world would feel its crash.

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

"Rake it to pieces!!! Burn them to ash!!! And make this world know that the truth has come!! THAT DEATH IS ALL IT DESERVES!!!"

The air, the arena, the sand, and the metal! All rang and broke and were caught in the crossfire! In the screaming slicing pillar of a revivified god! In the molten mangle of exploding self-sacrifice! And in the frozen moment of all hell breaking loose! As that word echoed, again and again! Through crushing steps and roaring wrath! Through barreling bodies who knew nothing but anger! Through the being of the one whose altar they claimed! And through colliding schisms and collapsing time!

So it could be rebounded together in the beat of his soul.

Melding together with the rage of his fire.

Into a grin malicious across his toothy face.

Because they gone and made him mad!

Shooting down below the cresting wave of caustic hellfire and slamming the misshapen talons right out from under that charging abomination! With all grace of a derailing freight train! Air slicing and armor buckling and true bulk pirouetting to crush that worthless excuse for a laceroid! With a talon on its neck to springboard up, and meet the demon more fitting that had charged through the gap. So she could receive the back of his foot for the trouble.

No more armor rebound, no impact restrained, but a full flight impeded by the flare of her hand and that blue flame halo of her refusal to be struck out. Screaming back in with fist still wreathed in its jet fire! Booming against scaly guard as Seth's twists died in the sand. The feeling of white phosphorous shine bucked him into the raving maw whipping back upright. Into the backhand eating that imparted inertia whole! That stricken guard whirled about before that armored visage could tumble away, trailing smoke and memories and wrapping around that upper jaw like it was an unruly crocodile. Wrenching it up and ducking behind, before the hellfire geyser that was trying to combo him loosed in the follow through!

Washing over unprotected flesh in a flash frying burst. Barely cut off in spite of the animosity. At the bigger fish refusing to be cooked, let alone allowing her to stand idle. Claws exchanging places, sizzling burns whipped back before they could take a reflexive bite, the bow of the amalgamate's spine used and abused and spun as counter. So the tail whipping behind Seth could toss aside the next volley. Spin Tasha wide, send an already recoiled arm out into his reach. And leave the both of them reeling so he could reel them both in. And send them rebounding off to the ring of their thick skulls!

Bone and armor clang, personal space made all the larger. Both bodies tumbled to the sand in their own warring concussions. Deferring the ceasefire to clawed at ruts and raging back in. Because neither were ready to capitulate their need to rip Seth asunder!

Heavy weight, teeth, and the principle of it all took precedent. So Seth took to slithering about into its stride to crunch an uppercut into his claimed avatar! The shoulder pressing in just showing off in turn. The arm wrapping around for leverage foisting it to anvil. So the hammer Tasha was bringing down could reshape its spine! Armor and bone crackle, bare knuckle Ohming the brunt. Air awash in fire and rebound, but all that weight was left to fall. Because its support left and slunk off lower, right out from behind and under. Grabbing its tail far more grotesque and ripping down.

Winced amalgamate bounced off sand, was flattened by the real weight it tried to mimic. As a talon stamped it flat and Seth charged that hammer trying to reacquire him. Backboarding off, through the heat of the past, with fist on intercept for the missile already launching back toward him. Flames shooting from her elbow to her wrist, making the point that this was a losing exchange. That she'd plow right through him. But inertia was a simple fact of life. And Seth gone and loosed himself of his stake.

Scaly fist, barely given tension, took that screaming missile to swirl seesaw! Freed talons whipping counterweight with her egregious momentum. All to whirl him around like a scarecrow dummy, and slam a foot across Tasha's back. With more than enough of everything she put in!

Send her spiraling back over with less than that but more than enough. More sand to eat than bruises to suffer. Because Seth's talon still had more deserving meat to mince.

Those glaring eyes finding more green to shine, scrambling to lunge as that momentum died just shy. Yet he locked in spring before that maw could crunch. So his knee could do the crunching as it dislocated that jaw! Send the beast off target, so Seth could scathe alongside and grab hold of its flailing limbs. And start back up the merry-go-round-to-hell!

Straight to the hell trying to reenter the fight. Letting go of this half and a half ton of half-assed divinity! So it could bowel her down! Slam into her gut first! Throw the lot of them back to that so very tired wall! And roll them about till it all came to a groaning stop at its blackened borehole.

So they could both think about what it meant to rage at Rage.

But damage remained a superficial factor, the obviously resistant being pushed off of the one less expected to bounce back at her age. But bounce was too light a word, crash fitting more aptly. Armored bulk rendered ignoble cacophony of plate on sandy floor, snapping at the proximity and the unwanted contact. But losing its pride to the soup of indignity, and the disregarding glare locked on who should be receiving that edge.

The one still stood while they wrestled with gravity. The one in full stature while they writhed on the ground. The one commonalty between the two of them, target and despoiler needing to be toppled. Careful movements tried to fight bodily want to tear up and back in to the fray. Hunch and flexibility spelling all the intent and a bit of the disparity. But her stamina, his regeneration, both marred the grander need to end this. So letting them cool was off the table.

And so very 'un-Rage' of him.

So Seth's spine straightened haughty, noble demeanor flashing up from a thousand lessons from just as many humbled Garkah. Tail upturned just so and forced to the line of his profile. Turning side on to his opponents with but one claw presented to challenge. Grin upon his teeth and gleam upon his eye, as that claw gave the universal signal none could misjudge.

Of bring it on.

Effect immediate, azure and green flaring brighter in the shine of one unworthy to call themselves superior! Ripping up off that undignified floor and taking back the stance of those so very lost in the taunt. Flames wreathed around emptied bodysuit allowing. Arcs buzzed in armor snarling to purpose. Infectious want to murder him so thorough in its spread. So roiling to their own personal fires! Their engines of action and emotion throttling up to full power between gritted teeth and knuckle! All so he could beat them down and show them…

That he was the only one justified here.

Twin torturing of sand to glass and glass to molten flame. Grinding down into the metal beneath and caving it in too! Marking the line crossed! Hollowing the ground defiled! And making way for the challenge given that shall be regretted eternal!

Launching, tearing, back blast obliterating! Jets of hellfire and ionic discharge! Rippling and ripping air to concave get the hell out of the way! Charging back in unison want and need and unholy desire to see this pretender laid low! Laid steamrolled and slaughtered for all he represented! For the ground he sullied, for the memory he stained! And for-

For that true blue gleam to blue shift in kind! Ripped its own way right into their faces! Highlighted all that they had thought righteous alone! Their fires only feeding the inferno of that who they thought wrong!!

So he could show them what was right all along!

Overdrive, overpower, overloaded with spite at the lot of it all! Fist of scales and thread wrought being flaring that inner firestorm of utter underestimation! Armor cratered, flesh rippled, hardened constitutions and stubborn stolen power both made moot! Nerves flashing, some semblance of mercy allowed in the flash of his ire! But none seen fit to go unpunished for this height!

The half and half plate cracked into teeth and sparking spray. The unarmored unbeknowing made to spiral in the new azure streak. Seth's form a blur of violence and keepsake, impacts rebounding from off the both of them to strike at the other.

Shoulders twisted and found new limits to be struck to, elbows found ribs and spines to crack, knees splintered and yet rewound in turn. Power flowing and refusing to make permanent Seth's own want to make them know his pain!

Flashing between them, tail whipping as his fist slammed that false visage down. Tasha sent aside so Seth could show his devote the reward he'd earned! As he tore around him with talons raking inertia about, claws latching to that metal tail unworthy. Scraping that fleshy bulk along for another ride, with no time to see the sky before crashing back to Earth in a strike of friction fired ejecta!

Flames and wrath haloing their imparted momentum back round, balefire retrorockets fighting to not be left at the wayside. But sidelines they received as Seth twisted and blurred malicious, catching his avatar before he could fight back upright. Claws digging in, wringing neck and tail and invalidating all that weight misaligned. Discordant, unworthy, fallen, and needing to be cracked open! Upon the pure anvil that was his god! On the knee snapping his spine in surest half!

Spittle and blood a glisten in the light of flaring his choice to make them know! Before the other leg sent the trash to fly back whence it came. Tumbling in metal cacophony and catching ground by the head, before slamming into the wall aside the self-made saint so thoroughly lost of faith. So that the more immediate and deserving could receive all that she wanted for her own self-righteousness.

A guard accepting, defied what may. Damning fist raising the hell of his choosing as it crashed its flames over him. Charring scales, cooking his soul, but failing to crack the shell that was never there. Because this was him through and through! This was his form, a rock in a sea of energetic extremity! Of flames fit for the underworld! Of inertia driven rebounds fighting to break him down!

Tasha a swirling maelstrom of unrepentant wrath. Her leg sweeping round, never touching ground but by the burst of her jets. Striking another guard, rock solid against the weather and sea and spite at thee.

Halos burned air to soot, shot her back with ever chip at his will. As time and again, each was found wanting upon flesh sacrificed to the heat of fires long past and overcome. A knee tried for his sternum and only found forearm. Both fist in hammer down, parried off a skull too damn thick to even accept her scorn anymore! To accept any of this condemnation as anything but time's revenge! He'd missed too much to just let it judge him some hollow fake!

The sweep of jet fire that was her rebuttal found nothing but already chocked air. As her other leg found his shoulder slamming it off kilter. Her barely stable world flipping on its axis, spun her around to face that which she could only see as false. As he finally marked the extent by which he would rebuke her assertion. With a fist straight to gut!

And a spread of power unmistakable!

Through one who should always have known who he was!

Sending her flying as flames were snuffed by sheer wind force. Sending her careening off the glass of a place so very much done with existing. Burying her in a rut of blackened melt and stripped metal. And giving her a taste of her own medicine as temporary threads made heavy all that she was. Highlighted all that kept her in the fight. The nanomachines acting the part but paling in comparison to the true being electric defiance. And getting overwritten and destroyed so this could just fucking move on already!

So she could feel for herself, that moment of revival again. And know the truth that rose above this farce of a religion.

Know in straining pain and teaching agony what stood alone upon this broken battlefield. What had brought low the defenders of a memory that was split in two and fed upon as carrion. That stared down methodical on only one. Stared with eyes ringed in dimming glow still being kept in check. But allowing only one to see. One who would truly remember them for herself. To see for herself that the passage of time plays so many for fools.

That the one who saved her, who gave back her life and her power, who twisted before her from hero to villain, and who fell by none but his own hand. Was there again to shove her out of that too bright a light. To dim her fire before it burned her again. To let her go on seeing the world better than she no doubt had already.

And maybe…

Show off a little too much.

Because that's just who he was.