NOVEL NEXT Interlude - Recruitment III Pt. 2
These Capes misunderstood my appeal to reason. I didn't parlay because I was afraid of any of them, but because I am a distinguished gentleman, not a savage. But if they don't want to deal with Mister Black, I'll show them the Monster from the Black. My multitude of eyes sees the exact moment they all realize this isn't going the way they thought it would. If the Valkyrie is the only one who can fly, then they'll all fall to the muck soon enough.
From within the tar, fifteen octopus arms as thick and long as redwood tree trunks spring up. Three for each of the Capes. The titanic tentacles start flailing, slamming the asphalt ocean with a thumping sound as I try to squish the Capes. The Amazon catches one of the limbs, stopping it in its tracks. The remaining two capitalize on the opportunity, grasping for her stationary body. The Archer is quite athletic, parkouring across the sea of tar by jumping off the top of half-submerged sedans and swinging from streetlights. He hooms his legs around a pole, and starts firing arrows toward the Amazon's location. Without the energy, your attacks cannot do anything against me.
The Amazon drops the tentacle she's holding, grabs one of the projectiles, and turns it gold with her ability. She spears it right at her feet, annihilating the sludge in the area surrounding her. The fact that her ability doesn't affect her is quite frustrating. The bowman fires two more arrows toward her. She leaps up and catches the arrows out of the air. They glow golden with her ability, and she throws them at the base of my limbs, severing them into stumps.
"Hell yeah, Muck Monster. You ain't getting rid of me that easily. We aren't slouches," she yelled triumphantly.
The taunting isn't necessary, and they're beginning to grate on my patience. I have been nothing but amicable to these people. Name-calling? Really? Completely uncalled for. If they want to be nasty, I'll show them nasty. Her celebration doesn't last long as more of my limbs sprout up, and one smashes her from behind. It sends her flying head over heels into an SUV. Before she can recover, I grab her ankles and drag her down into the muck. I feel her struggling as she is pulled deeper into my depths. Once she's fully submerged, it's over. I'm not made of water, and it isn't an animal holding you down. I am suffocating, sticky, and heavy. I am a pit that you will never escape.
"Enough. Leave my team alone," the last member of their party said.
He's floating high above the battle I'm having against the rest of his team and wearing a full-body green hyperweave suit, with only the arms being silver. His hooded cape is green on the inside and silver on the outside, with a rectangular visor on his face. My multitude of eyes have been tracking all of them, so I saw him above me, but it's only now that I'm truly noticing him. The Cape flies down toward the fight, moving so quickly that it looks like he's teleporting. He stops just an inch above my body and swipes his hand down in a chopping motion. A thin white line burns in the air where his chop was. Gathering tar, I create a fist the size of a car and swing it at the Cape. My hand hits the line and gets sliced through before combusting. The two halves are incinerated in a flash. It hurts. It hurts a lot. What the hell is that white line made of?
Elsewhere, I'm locked in a heated battle with the valkyrie. Four arms chase after her, and she's staying just out of reach of them. Her flight isn't as fast as the man's, but she's very agile. The hands morph into spikes, swinging at her like wrecking balls. She ducks down, flying into a little mart. I follow her with my mace arms, crashing through the building and collapsing it behind her. Unfortunate. Jagged black spears with hardened tips explode out of the sludge, putting her skills to the test. A test that she passes with flying colors as she swerves out of the way of every one. No matter the angle or amount, she rolls and weaves effortlessly around them.
The speedster keeps avoiding every attack I throw at him. He's running circles around me, and across me, hitting the tar with the bottom of his foot hard and fast enough not to get stuck. I launch a barrage of sludge spikes that just barely miss him, embedding in brick walls and steel frames. These Capes are putting up a good enough resistance to me that I'm wondering if I might be in trouble. Even the archer is posted up at the top of the tallest building nearby. My body encompasses several blocks, but despite the overwhelming amount of mass I have, I'm losing on four fronts. The Amazon bit off more than she could chew, but the other flyer is using that odd white fire power to burn a hole through me straight to her.
A swirling orb of ash preludes the arrival of a new party of five. One is an unnatural-looking, very tall woman with outrageous proportions and elongated limbs who moves like a panther. Her tan skin contrasts with the short white hair she has. Her left arm splits in half, except for the hand, which has a black steel barrel attached to the end of it. The hand flips completely, so the gun barrel is projecting a foot out past the wrist. The fingers unfold, revealing wired jacks that attach to the woman's upper arm. The right half of her face changes, extending forward with two additional eyes appearing: one smaller and one much larger. Her extremely long legs split into four and then eight insectoid limbs with pointed ends.
The second is a large bare-chested man wearing a tiny white mask over his eyes that does little to hide his identity. Wearing blue wrestling trunks held up by a gold belt, a bright red cape, and blue gloves and boots. He starts posing immediately, clapping his hands in excitement. Then he throws out some punches and kicks at nothing, grinning like a small child. Next to him is a teenager dressed in nothing but different shades of black, with more chains, buckles, and spikes than you'd think possible. She's doing her best to look uninterested and annoyed, flipping her bright blue hair repeatedly.
The final two people are a grungy man with haunted eyes, surrounded by four ghostly white wolves, and a person wearing simple white cloth clothes, and their head is encased in a bronze helmet that's sealed. There are eye and mouth holes, but other than that, it seems unremovable. The grungy man is wearing a faded and worn leather jacket, a wife-beater, and deep maroon tight jeans. Every part of his body I can see is emaciated and tattooed, and his hair is greasy. The other is his complete opposite: clean and pure. The front of his shirt has a black cross on it, and the back has two ovals side-by-side. Who are these people and where did they come from?
"Would you like some assistance, Mr. Black?" The teen asked, looking directly at one of my eyes.
My mouth forms on a puddle of tar that's near them.
"Who are you people and what are you doing here?" I asked.
If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.
"Sorry, I was rude, sir. I'm Umbra, and Mom said you might need some help dealing with the Capes," Umbra, the teen, answered. "That's Doll, Hero, Jackal, and Apostle."
"Your mother sent all of you here to this place?"
"Yes. What the girl says is true. You aren't doing well; allow us to even the odds," Doll advised.
"I'm not the type to turn down some assistance from well-meaning people. I'll gladly accept your offer, and we can talk more when we're done," I responded nicely.
The android woman, Doll, moves immediately. She jumps off the building they're standing on, her legs digging into the walls to hold her in place. Aiming her gun arm, she fires a laser that looks more like a blast of raw energy than anything else. Her shot is true and accurate, hitting the archer as he dodges another one of my attacks. A perfectly circle is deleted from his chest, leaving a smoking hole the diameter of a beach ball behind. The valkyrie screams in sorrow as the archer's lifeless body falls off the ledge he was standing on, sinking into the sludge. She immediately switches target, firing at the mourning female Cape. The flying Cape avoids the shot, but I'm able to grab her out of the sky and throw her down. The Traveller runs up the side of the building at the remaining members of the group, avoiding a swipe from Doll. He runs straight for Umbra, but Hero steps in front of her, moving much faster than his bulk would lead me to believe possible. Hero grabs him by the front of his costume, lifting him up and then slamming him into the roof.
"LEAVE MY SISTER ALONE, VILLAIN!" Hero screamed.
"Thanks, Hero," Umbra said, smiling through her put-on frown.
"I would never let a villain hurt my family. Mother would be sad, and I don't want her to be sad," he replied.
The speedster tries to pry Hero's fingers off him, but isn't making any progress. Even smashing his fists against the giant's arm does nothing. Vibrating within the grasp doesn't help him either. All it succeeds in doing is irritating Hero, who slams him into the roof again. Cracks spread from the impact, and the others move away from him. Hero smashes the captured man off the ground again, and the others crowd around Umbra as ash swirls around her, forming an orb. Apostle, Jackal, and Umbra appear on a different nearby building as Hero's face transforms into a furious snarl. He's screaming about evil and villains as he bashes the speedster into the roof hard enough to shatter it. He lets go of him, stepping back a few feet and then jumping thirty feet into the air, landing on the unconscious, injured man. The roof can't take any more, and it fully collapses, dropping both of them into the lower floor, which collapses as well. The process repeats until Hero has ridden the other man's body through eight floors to the ground floor.
The valkyrie is inside my body, and I can feel the ooze going up her nose and into her mouth. The toxic fumes make her gag, but she can't puke as more tar is forced down her throat. The powerful Cape, who saved the Amazon, tries to do the same, but Doll is holding him at bay with shots. The blasts don't seem to be hurting him, but they're blowing him backward every time he gets hit by one. The Traveller and the archer are dead, with the valkyrie soon to follow. The sound of wolves howling fills the air, melancholic ones, as the ghostly hounds bound forward, jumping off the rooftop toward the remaining two Capes. The Amazon picks up a couple of broken pieces of road using her power on them before she whips them at the wolves.
The spectral animals' forms seem to flicker as the empowered rocks pass through them harmlessly, exploding behind them. They leap across the street, avoiding the tar below them as the female giantess tries to hit them with her stones. The man with the white fire is preoccupied with trying to get away from Doll's sniping. He isn't like me, with hundreds of points of view to observe the battle. He's so focused on trying to get to the valkyrie, he doesn't even know he's lost two other members already. Hundreds of black hands emerge from behind the Amazon, rising up and then descending as a wave. All of the hands grab her, and once they're stuck on, she isn't able to move or get out. The wolves descend on her, ripping and tearing at her flesh as I hold her in place. She screams out in agony, alerting her leader, who gets distracted long enough for Doll to hit him again. He drops out of the sky, falling toward the mire below. Falling into my domain.
"I SAID ENOUGH OF THIS!" He roared in rage.
He claws at the area around him, tearing white lines through reality. The hounds don't dare approach, and Doll's laser can't get through it. All of the muck around him is destroyed, and he flies up toward Umbra, Apostle, and Jackal. He soars at them, form blinking as he moves faster than before. His arms are out and leaving behind long white fire streaks as he flies. He's gone mad with grief. The bronze helmeted Cowl steps to the edge of the rooftop, pointing both of his hands at the incoming man with finger guns. A blue glow appears at the tips of both fingers, growing brighter as the Cape approaches until Apostle fires when he's within fifteen feet of him. An ice age springs to life in an instant, flash-freezing everything within a cone in front of Apostle for several blocks. Every part of my body within the zone is frozen solid, and layers of frost cover the buildings, streets, and every item between. That includes the Cape, whose frozen form falls out of the sky, hitting the ground. He doesn't shatter on impact, but the ice encasing him shows no signs of breaking or thawing.
Monsters, all of them. Monsters like me. Whoever this group is, they are strong. Whoever this Mother character is must be pretty impressive to gather all of these people together. The spectral wolves are back with Jackal and barking angrily at Apostle. I begin drawing all the tar and the accessible bodies back to where I created my mouth to talk to the others. All of it is absorbed back into my pocket except for enough to create a humanoid form to talk to my saviors.
"I've told you before, you can't just ice out willy nilly. You could've hurt my wolves, and then I'd never hear the end of it," Jackal chastised Apostle.
"If they died, then they were not fit to live in the world He desires. Only the strong survive, you know that. If they are weak enough to be killed by that, then they weren't worthy of living. It is as He has decreed: only those who have strength can make demands, the weak exist to be tested and culled," Apostle responded coldly.
"I know, but I have more than proven my worth to Him and to Mother. And the specters are an extension of my will and guilt, meaning they have been tested and passed. All I am asking for is a bit of courtesy from one Child of the Empty Circle to another. We're family, and Mother wants us to get along," Jackal countered.
"Fine," Apostle said, turning away from him.
Doll crawls back up along with Hero, and then everyone is accounted for.
"You have my sincere thanks for the help you provided. You are all quite a formidable force. Your Mother must be proud," I said warmly.
Umbra, Hero, and Jackal practically beam at my compliment. I can't see Apostle's face, and Doll's is unexpressive currently, but I think they appreciate it as well.
"Now that we have helped you, would you be interested in meeting Mother? She was very interested in meeting you," Umbra asked.
I don't think I have much of a choice in the matter. And it would be so very rude to decline their invitation now.
"I'd love to; where are we going to meet her?" I asked curiously.
"It's a secret. But you'll be safe, Mother only kills heretics and nonbelievers. And once you see what we've accomplished because of His guidance, you too will believe," Umbra answered.