Shadowhunter in the Apocalypse

Reed's head swam as his body dangled from thick webbing, cocooned in sticky silk that clung even through his hunter armor. He felt sick which was weird because he never got sick, like ever.

His stomach clenched again violently, as he tried to think, he could feel his connection to shadow come back steadily but it was blurry, like there was something muting it.

He tried to shake the sweat falling from his face, his face was still covered by the his suit but this was his own body heat causing him discomfort, he would kill right now for an ice cold botte of water.

He surveyed his surroundings, trying to ignore the annoying triggering clicks that came the multitude of spirit spiders….or where they even regular spiders? He really didn't know….wait a minute he could always ask Jasmine!

Reed tried his comms now that he was back in reality…in theory it should work. His voice came out a hoarse whisper.

"Jasmine…, do you copy?"

No response

"Do you copy Jasmine" he whispered again, praying for a response, he was slowly getting weaker and more sick he felt like he would….

Suddenly he heaved and bitter liquid forced itself past his lips, and into his mask.

Oh fuck No.

He immediately canceled out his suit and he was back in normal clothes, he was just as vulnerable as before but now he felt even more so.

His vomit dropped into the sea of spiders, it was suspiciously loud considering it was simply liquid, he cursed as he felt thousands of eyes lock on him.

The whole ceiling seemed to shift as thousands of tiny, skittering legs moved at once. Reed didn't need enhanced senses to know what was happening.

He knew it was time to fight but he took his time berating himself for his piss poor performance in this mission.

Spider venom, something so simple, something so small yet it was what put him in this situation.

Nothing in the forest was harmless. He knew that. And he still ignored it.

He'd brushed it off in the forest, every sharp sting, every annoying tickle as he swiped at webs, every time he smacked a spider on his suit. He'd laughed about it to Jasmine, even demanded she upgrade his armor to be airtight.

He thought he was just irritated. Now? He wanted to punch himself in the face.

He coughed hard, chest burning, more acid bubbling up his throat. When the vomit hit the floor, the skittering above grew louder, closer. The sound was maddening, a thousand tiny claws scratching, closing in from all sides.

Now Jasmine was also nowhere to be found, either something was jamming her sensors, or…

His gut twisted, not from the venom this time but from something else. He forced his eyes shut. She has to be okay. She has to.

A weak laugh escaped him, bitter and sharp. Yeah. Great job, Reed. Some S-Class hunter you are. You can handle wolves, bats, frogs the size of cars… but you get taken out by spiders the size of your thumb. Fantastic.

Okay that's enough sulking, they were almost reaching his face and he had atleast gotten the will power to push through and play with a bit of Shadow magic.

The skittering drew closer.

Reeds' lips opened to a vengeful grin.

"Alright, let's go for round two fuckers"

Reed had been connected to stopping Five demonic invasions, out of those five times he had four major contribution, and for each of those major contributions.

Were rewards.

The shadows responded.

The first reward he had gotten admittedly made him a tiny bit lazy, Shadow gun was a pure offensive technique, after he had received it he had found no use crossing swords when he could just take a silent deadly shot, though it wasn't out of the ordinary to find some type of problems that couldn't be shot down.

The second reward was shadow sensing, it could tell apart shadows attached to living things from nonliving things, great for sensing threats and if one had a high enough affinity they could even tell apart shadow signature….of course they had to know the person quiet well before this, even before one got the technique.

The third reward was shadow sight, he didn't use this much because it caused permanent damage to the user, it was connecting to the soul of another being through shadows, Reed didn't know how else to explain it but it was a very difficult and vulnerable technique he rarely employed.

For a moment, the cave seemed to dim. Then the shadows surged, flooding toward him in a tide of black, they sunk into the weird web and coated his body.

They coiled around his limbs, wrapping him tight. Reed smiled as it covered his face, the darkness hardened, clamping over his clothes to form a new, more ancient armor.

And for his most prized technique. One of his most dangerous, the thing that had helped him survive actual demons.

Shadow Knight.

The first gift of the Originals to him.

A surge of energy shot through him making him release a little moan as his sickness was shoved away. Strength, speed, defense, the shadow knight form gave everything, if only you were willing to collect.

A sword of pure shadow extended from his right hand, he didn't summon it deliberately. It was just there, an extension of his will. His left arm flexed, and black shields fanned out like layered plates. His legs kicked once, and the webbing split apart like paper.

He dropped, landed on one knee and rose.

The spiders swarmed him, desperate to get him to his former state, for whatever conniving instincts they were following.

"You guys wouldn't happen to know the location of a pretty red head or an attractive dark skin, would you?"

They didn't seem to be in the mood for questions, he hoped the people hanging there weren't dead, but he just didn't see how they wouldn't die of starvation.

He blurred.

The sword cut the first wave in half before they even reached him. Shadow arcs blasted outward, cleaving through clusters of spiders, painting the ground in twitching limbs. Reed spun low, blade dragging across the stone to split a line through the horde.

His body moved with unnatural speed that rivaled vampires, he was stronger, sharper, faster than any supernatural he had encountered, and that was saying a lot about this technique.

He was probably the only hunter apart from the originals that could use this form without much disadvantages, for others, they gradually would lose what made them Shadowhunters in the first place.

The venom still burned in his blood, but the ShadowKnight form muted it, dulled the weakness, pushed strength into his veins.

A spider the size of a dog leapt from the ceiling. Reed ducked, shadow coiling around his wrist like a whip as he caught a stable hold.

He yanked himself sideways across the cave, sliding on the slick floor before cutting upward.

The spider split clean down the middle.

More leapt at him, the smell alone from them would have made him dizzy if he was still in his original form but not this time. Reed's blade became mist, dissolving into his arm. He slammed his palm forward, releasing a blast of compressed shadow. The explosion shredded the group mid-air, spraying the walls with black ichor.

They kept coming.

Reed welcomed it, he would kill each and everyone of them if it meant rescuing or avenging those people up there.

He swung upward, blade reforming to cleave through three at once. He spun, shadows lashing from his shoulders to spear another pair. His shield arm rose, catching a swarm as they dropped from above, then detonated in a pulse that shook the cave.

Minutes blurred into what felt like hours.

Reed was an unquenchable machine in this form, so he only felt pity for these things, they had chosen the wrong enemy today….yesterday…he didn't even know how long he had been fucking unconscious, yet he didn't feel hungry.

It sparked some hope in him that maybe the webs kept their victims in a frozen state? Maybe those people were just alive and all he had to do was wake them up.

He was moving too fast to think consciously about every strike, his body fought, his instincts reacted, his shadows flowed where he willed without command.

But his mind never stopped.

Jasmine better be okay. He really hoped his assistant wouldn't follow him into this forest or at least called for backup. She was a cool-headed girl, but people could react in any way when someone close to them was in trouble.

Also, what the hell was that dream, I also called a girl Dream….what the hell was that? Why did it feel so real? Did the venom do this to me? Was it a vision? But then why did it feel so real?

He realized now that the thing that woke him up was Raven's ring, so he knew some sort of mind magic was at play but he just didn't know what.

He decapitated another rather large spider, they seemed to be pretty rare in the multitude, but he was seeing the damage he was doing, this fight would be over soon, it felt like hours had passed since he woke up.

It felt like a memory, but then he was definitely sure he had never left earth or met such a woman in my life!

The swarm thinned gradually. Piles of twitching bodies covered the ground. The ceiling still crawled with more, but the flow slowed.

Reed exhaled, and clenched his fist, then unleashed another shadow blast.

He would just ask Raven when he got home, his head told him he didn't know that girl or that realm but his heart registered it as home, he felt for that girl almost exactly how he felt about Raven!

He looked up at the ceiling, at the thousands still waiting. He raised his sword.

"Don't waste my time, let's get this shit over with."

The cave shook as the next wave descended.

***

Soon a black faceless knight stood in the middle of piles of twitching insect corpses, ignoring the stench that had filled the cave.

Reed dissolved the shadow blade back until only the armor remained.

"Guess that's all of you," Reed muttered, voice hoarse.

He looked up.

The ceiling was still a nightmare. Dozens of people wrapped in the same thick, sticky webbing he'd been trapped in. Some hung upside down, others stuck flat to the stone, all bound tight.

Reed's stomach twisted.

How many were dead out of starvation? How many were just stuck inside a dream?

He forced himself to focus. "Ava," he whispered under his breath. "You better be up there somewhere. You too, Jasmine."

The idea of Jasmine hanging there because she came to save his butt was an unpleasant image he didn't even want to think about.

It was going to take forever to cut each one loose. And he had no clue what kind of state they'd be in when he did.

Reed let out a long, tired sigh and went to work