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They came at me out of the darkness, jet-black, teeth an ivory white, glistening in the moonlight. If they were not here to kill, I would have perhaps admired their beauty. But they had come to me to stain their pearl-white teeth red with blood. My blood. I had betrayed these majestic creatures, and now they were out for revenge. I turned and ran, trying to think of something I could do to stop them, Nightstalkers are incredibly fast and powerful, there was no way I could escape. I would not be able to fight them off, and escape was not possible, I had to find something to trade for my life.
I heard a noise behind me, like a female laugh, and, for a moment, wondered what it was. Nightstalkers are, or at least they look, sound, and act like, humans. During the day. The darkness draws out their true form. I heard the laugh again, they were toying with me. An odd noise, like sharp metal scratching against wet concrete, ahead of me. The claws, retractable like a cat’s, had just been revealed. They had surrounded me; there was nothing left for me to do. They finally got me, killed by my own creations.
Then I saw it. Dirty and splattered with mud. Still, it shone, a faint but distinct, luminous glow. The magical Black Crystal, with which I powered the machine that gave life to them, and changed them from their frail human form. The Black Crystal held dark powers, and they drew their strength from it. But I could not trade it; they would take it from me after killing me, anyway. I snatched it up from the ground, and plunged it deep into my chest, this way they would not have the thrill of the kill.
They cried out, in rage. But buried in their anger was something else. Fear. The dark gem that empowered them was also feared by them. And it had claimed my life; they could not have me now. Strange, though, it did not hurt, it felt as if I was flying, or floating at least. The Crystal’s enchantment ran through my blood, and gave me new power. I could feel my body changing as the power grew; adapting the new enhancements this curious gemstone had given me. I was becoming one of them, and yet, at the same time, different. More powerful, more advanced. I had absorbed the power of the Black Crystal, and changed it. I was larger than any of them now, and greater. Faster, stronger, more agile than before. My senses were alive for the first time in my life.
I had been reborn.
“How is this possible? The crystal was not meant to affect anyone else. The only one that can now be changed is meant to be chosen by the Crystal itself. This impudent fool, who was using it to control us, was using the Gemstone to kill himself, how can it be that he is the one to rule over us, as our only superior? Our creators were to die, that is what it told us, was it not? And yet the one who gave us new life, our second creator, was chosen by the Stone to rule us?”
I wondered where this voice was coming from, then realized the truth about what I had become. The Gemstone had transformed me into a Nightstalker. Or rather, according to this beast leading the attack, I was being formed from the dormant Nightstalker DNA I had implanted into myself becoming active and the Gem they worship and fear. I had bonded with the Stone, and changed it. It changed me, and the Nightstalker DNA inside of me. At last the powers of the Nightstalker were mine. But more advanced. I was a creature of the night once again.
As these thoughts went through my head, I became aware of the beasts, talking to each other, murmuring. Confused as to what they should do. “Silence!” The command came naturally; the Gem was working through me now. “Enough! I am sure you are all wondering what has happened. I know for a fact that you” I directed my finger – claw – towards the one I heard first, “are, I have absorbed your Stone, and it has chosen me to rule over you. But first…”
“Wait just one minute. What makes you think you have the power, or wisdom, to rule us?” The first spoke out again, interrupting me. I sliced his chest open with one swift movement. He fell to the ground, writhing in pain. “Is there anyone else who wishes to question me?” I looked around and saw fear in their eyes. They would not stand against me again. “Very good. Then I shall continue. If we are to rule over the human race, we are going to need more of us. Higher numbers. So, because of this, every new Nightstalker who joins us will grant you all new power. And those who do not assist in increasing our numbers will pay with their life.” With a wave of my hand, the one who stood against me was healed. He rose up, unsure but ready to fight. “Tell me, what is your name, young warrior?”
“My name?” he sounded surprised at my question, “My name is Raziel. I am the leader of these beings.” “Raziel. Interesting name. And you lead these people? In that case, how would you like to be in command of my army? I will put you in charge of training them, and commanding them in the war against the human race. But first, we must take out the Lycan race. With that victory we will have more command over the night. I want you to lead them. You are a great and deadly warrior. Do you accept?”
“My Lord, it would be an honor to fight alongside you, and command your armies. I hope to serve you well.” He feared me now. I liked the power. Fear is the best insurance money – or in this case power – can buy. “Then command them now, make sure they know you are above them. Raziel, if you lead them to victory against the Lycans, I will make you my second. Ruling all in my absence, with power over all but me. Now go!”
An explosion in the distance, blinding light. A small grenade – flash-bang – somewhere nearby. The distant sound was a distraction. They ran, the bright light forcing them back into their human forms. I was angry at how weak they were as humans. That would have to change. I realized where the grenade came from, a group of humans running towards me. I knew where my army had gone, back to the lab to get the weapons I made for them. I forced the human mercenaries away with a single blast, it seemed the Gemstone had given me the power my army got from the guns; I could control shadows and fire them from my body. I charged at the humans and sliced through their bodies with deadly accuracy. They dropped instantly, and I tore into their skulls.
As my would-be assassins lay dying around me, I felt an odd rush, a joyous feeling. I knew then why the Nightstalkers enjoyed killing so much. The rush of adrenaline, and the powerful feeling that came with it, was incredible. I heard a soft whimper ahead of me, and growled deeply. The person ran from their hiding place, scared, and tried to get away. I caught her almost instantly, and forced her to the ground. My speed was greater, even, than the Nightstalkers I had created to be perfect. "Who are you?" No answer, just a whimper again. "Who are you?" again, the same question, more demanding now. I pinned her down and forced my razor-sharp claws into her stomach. Finally she answered.
"I'm surprised you don't recognize me. My name is Alice, I'm your daughter."
I hesitated, then forced my claws deeper into her soft belly. "Liar!" I had no family, the Nightstalkers killed my parents, under my orders, and I was an only child. The only person I ever loved was dead, died years ago. It was in the rage of her death that I created the machine powered by the Crystal – I was going to chip a piece off and put it in the ring I had for her – the machine was made out of pure anger, the creatures, although perfect, were revenge on the world for taking her from me. My child, my unborn child, died with her, in her womb. This girl before me could not be that child, that child is dead. "Who are you? Tell me the truth!" I was angry now. "You cannot be my child. I have no daughter!"
"You don't remember do you? The first night you were with my mother. You fell in love with her instantly, and spent the night with her. She was gone when you awoke, and the next time you saw her was a year later. I was given to another family, and they were to tell me the truth when they thought I was ready to know it. I found out three months ago, and I've been after you since they told me. Didn't you wonder where she was? Or why she was so different when she came back? Or why she would suddenly break down when the conversation she was having turned to children? You never cared about her; all you ever care about were your silly little experiments. You're pathetic!"
She hated me. As if it was all my fault. I sliced deeply into her face, and threw her down the alley. "How dare you? The only 'experiment' I showed more interest in than her was the Black Crystal. And that was for a reason. I loved her greatly. Just because your family told you the truth, doesn't mean you know anything about me! Now join me or die!"
Join you? I'd rather have my stomach ripped out and fed to me!" She was weakening; the cuts and scratches did a lot of damage. I healed her, reluctant to let this feeble girl die until I had my fun. "I would rather die then join you, but I won't be the one to die tonight. I don't like either of those options, I choose to fight." She drew two large metal instruments from holsters at her waist, one gold the other silver, and swung them above her head. "Like 'em? Made 'em myself. They'll be the last things you see before you die." She put them away, and drew her handguns. "Them, and these, of course." She fired off a few rounds, in an arc, knowing I would not be able to avoid them. They struck, one in each shoulder, and another in my chest. I collapsed to the ground. "The bullets dissolve upon contact with the blood, and get to the blood much quicker and more painfully thanks to the acid coating. They are filled with the poison on the Brazilian Wandering Spider, fatal to all.
“Soon a most exquisite pain will engulf your entire body. Your limbs will be paralyzed, your lungs cease to draw breath, eventually your heart will stop beating. Very painful, but it will provide amusement for a while." She laughed. "But that would be too easy." Once again she drew the handcrafted metal tools, "These will be what kill you." She raised the tools above her head, perfectly positioned to behead me, and brought them thundering down onto my neck.
I woke a few hours later, in a hospital. I had reverted back to my human form. She had not killed me. A doctor walked in, and seemed surprised to see me awake. "You've been tossing and turning, completely restless, since we found you. Your laboratory exploded, and we found you lying outside it. A curious poison coursing through your blood, but we cured it before it advanced too far. The holes in your chest have healed up very quickly; I'm amazed you're still alive, considering the depth. Not entirely sure what made them, looks like you'd been shot, but no bullet was found. Curious though, you stopped moving when that child came to visit you. She came in, put that card down, and left. Very odd behavior. What did she say her name was, again? Oh, yes, Alice..."
I was no longer listening; the card that had been placed on my bedside table had just caught my eye. I tore open the envelope, and pulled out the card inside. It read 'you are not my father by birth, mother was seeing someone else. I couldn't kill you. Meet with me tonight, and I will explain everything. I'll see you at your lab.' The doctor was still talking; he would not let me leave tonight. "...Because of this, you will have to stay here for a few nights. You have very unusual DNA, a sample needs to be tested, and I don't think we have encountered it before. And we will need to run some blood tests, the poison had been in your bloodstream for at least four hours, long enough to kill any human, even if they had been provided with twice the recommended dosage of the antidote. Your blood may be the key to a stronger, quicker antidote, so we will need to..." He stopped talking so suddenly that I started to panic. Everyone knew about the black creatures, which the humans called 'Death-Beasts', having immaculate healing power, and increased strength and speed. It took a moment, but I noticed a strange, sticky liquid dripping from his chest. Then, I saw the shining metal blade, jutting out of his body, wet with blood.
“Ah, we meet again ‘Doctor’. Do you remember, that night fifteen years ago? You were the one who fixed me, imbuing me with this weapon and curse. This robotic arm destroyed my life; you laid this curse on me, with full knowledge of the destruction it would cause! So I made special note to train myself, and my body, to utilize this tool. I trained for many years and now I return to claim my revenge! Mindless slaughter is all I seek now, and this hospital has felt my wrath! I am a god of war, ready to destroy any fool that gets in my way!” I recognized that voice, from long ago. Training I followed too. This man, whatever his name was, was head pupil at the ninja training facility I used to work at!
I dove out of the bed as the sharp blade was drawn, slowly, from the doctor, and I ducked behind the bed just in time to avoid the gleamingShurikens Shurikens Shurikens Shurikens Shurikens Shurikens Shurikens Shurikens Shurikens Shurikensshurikens whistling past my head, lodging deep into the wall. “Ah, you again. Let’s have some fun, shall we?” Out of pure instinct I charged at the ninja, dressed in black as traditional ninjas were, and forced him down with a tremendous amount of force. “Holy shit! How’d you do that?” He got up, staggering, and charged at me, swinging the bloodstained katana down towards my skull.
I transformed. I wasn’t even aware that the Nightstalkers could transform in this place, with all the spells that had been cast to protect it. But I was more than just a Nightstalker now. I had advanced beyond the limitations of their feeble spells, and grown beyond the limitations of the simple beasts I first created. I made then what they are now, it is only right that I should be their God.
Even as I changed I realized I didn’t know all my powers, I may have even been able to destroy this ninja with a simple thought and have him implode. I didn’t fully understand my power, but one thing was clear. The transformation scared him. He dropped the blade and fell to his knees in fear as the being he once knew transformed into the most feared creature in the world. And yet he didn’t seem surprised when I refused to attack him.
Within seconds I was fully transformed, now he stood no chance. He grabbed the blade and bought it violently down onto my shoulder, regardless of the knowledge that it wouldn’t work, and for a moment a searing pain ran through my arm. When I looked, I saw the blade had gone halfway into my arm and gotten stuck, my shoulder healing automatically around it. His attack had worked, but not quite the way he wanted. I pulled the katana out of my arm and aimed it at him as he fell back to his knees.
“Who are you, fiend? Why did you kill this doctor?” I needed information before I carried out the rest of my plan. At first he answered slowly, resisting my questioning, but eventually I broke him down to give it up and answer normally, providing me with enough information about this man before me to know he was following the samurai teachings very strictly. As it was, his robotic arm was a large violation of the laws his sensei taught him, and so he was using everything he had learned to take on all those who mocked him for it, mocked him for only having one arm, and all those involved in the arrangement and attachment of his ‘false limb’. He had taken out hundreds of people, this last doctor and I were all that were left of his malformed past, and he’d come to take us both out, for good. He didn’t expect my offer at the end of the interrogation. I asked him to join the Nightstalkers.
We left the hospital very suddenly after that, as a nurse walked into the room to find out what all the noise was about. I grabbed him and leapt out of the window, in human form, landing five floors down on the ground. Even I was shocked at how much my human body could stand now, but both me and Ninja, for that was the man’s new name and what he demanded we called him, were fine. We fled back to my old laboratory, which now lay in ruins, to wait for Alice to show her face again. We talked as we waited, and I found an odd liking of this strange samurai in front of me. As it got dark, I informed him of the necessary procedures to turn him into one of my newly formed army. As I finished explaining, I hit him with a blast of pure energy, forcing him against the back wall of what was once the machine with which I made them to begin with.
He fell to the floor, lifeless. The other Nightstalkers ran into the laboratory at full speed in human form, 40mph, to see what the energy blast was about. As they were beings created by that same pure energy, they could sense when and where it was used again. As they rushed in, they separated, splitting down the middle of the large group. Just in time, as a spray of bullets penetrated the ground where they were standing moments before. Alas, one of the creatures was caught in the spray and torn to shreds by the bullets. Alice walked into the dimly light room form the shadows of the corners and examined the person who was hit, only to find he wasn’t a Nightstalker at all, but a secret agent who had overheard a conversation between two of the beasts and followed them back to the lab, blending into the crowd in an attempt to remain hidden. Before she even had a chance to speak, I hit her with the same blast of energy Ninja had fallen by, and she flew into the other open pod of the ruined machine, and fell to the floor also, as the demonic creatures yelled with glee as two more people were prepared for transformation.
The beasts swarmed around the two limp bodies, as the procedure was prepared. They all knew this procedure well. They all knew they would get to mutilate the bodies, and drain the bodies of blood and organs before I would get to work. They all knew, because it is what happened to them. The newcomers finally got to prove their skills in an amazing display, without any harm coming to themselves or their opponent. And the veteran Nightstalkers got another chance to put the newcomers in their place by revealing their somewhat superior talents. And I had a chance to test the limits of my vastly superior powers, and to find out if my powers actually had a limit. It was time for some fun.
But, as we gathered around Alice, she sprung up and struck out at the nearest of the beasts, a young girl who went by the name of Susan. The metallic blades sliced deep into her chest, until they came to rest in the center of her upper body. She looked at me and my eyes met hers for a split second before she pulled the blades down, full force, out of her body, slicing her clean in half. Almost. The clean cut stopped around where her heart once was, and swerved off the right. The others looked on in astonishment as the smaller section of her body slid out and fell to the floor. Another clean swipe and the poor girl was gone. Mutilated and decapitated.
“Anyone else want to try their luck?” She cried out into the night as she swung at her next victim. This time, the intended target pulled away just in time, but the old man behind the target was not so lucky. The curved ends of the blades dug deep into his shoulders, and as he tried to pull away they tore through the flesh in his upper arms. He fell to the ground writhing in pain as she stood over him with a gun drawn, aimed delicately at his skull. Everyone in the room looked away and shuddered when the trigger was pulled, the old man, who’s name ironically was Tom, was well known, and everyone liked him. But he was a gentle man, and was to become the head of my training faculty to assist with the young newcomers, so he didn’t have to fight. Alas, that dream was ended as the bullet forced its way into Tom’s brain. Someone would be needed to continue his dream, and aid the new additions to the Nightstalker forces. But first, I had to take care of this unruly child.
I charged at her and forced her frail body hard against the wall of the machine, and did what was required to keep her in place. I twisted one of the metal poles of the machine into a support, pressed tightly against her stomach. She was stuck now, and the machine would hold her in place until I was finished. I could finally get to work on restoring power to the now-ruined mechanism, transforming her before she had another chance to break free and take out more of my people. She would join my army, whether she wanted to or not.
I started moving at incredible speed, making adjustments to the mechanism from what whet was left of all the other ruined devices and trinkets that littered the floor and desks of my laboratory. Within a matter of minutes, the entire machine had been rebuilt, better than before. The two people encased within it were sealed off in separate chambers, which opened out into one large one inside the machine itself where the vast amount of energy inserted into the machine was transferred, to effectively morph the human body, and change the very DNA of the human subject. I released a tremendous amount of power directly into the core of the machine. The power was so great it pulled the two humans into it, and the alteration of their bodies, and indeed their cells, began almost instantly.
Within moments, their human forms were at my control, at my disposal, and there for me to do with what I wished. These weak humans were finally ready for the power I was going to endow upon them. All that was left was to combine the skills of both warriors and let the transformation complete itself. Or would it be better to leave the humans as they are, in theory, as these new creatures, with their own skills, and their own weaknesses. Either that or blend the two weaknesses together, as well as the two strengths leaving one Nightstalker, duplicated. The main problem with all of this was no matter what I chose to do; the creature would still have weakness, the one thing I’ve been trying to eliminate from my marvelous beasts. This operation would leave them as basic hunters, relying on what they knew as people, and what they could do in the past, the new creature I would create would have to take time to learn all the techniques and powers they will have, and without Tom, training them would be a big problem.
I had little time to choose, either way these simple creatures would need a lot of work to become the perfect beasts I desired. But it would be much more… amusing… to leave them as they are, training two separate creatures instead of one, duplicated. Of course, this procedure was simpler, but the training would be more difficult, and take a lot longer to go through with. Without Tom, this could be very dangerous, if we were to be attacked during this time, we would have many inexperienced soldiers to fight with, promising a quick defeat or a quick victory if on their side of the battle. I would have to conduct the training myself, and hope they would be able to focus long enough to complete at least the most basic of training procedures. I hope…
But it seems luck was against us. Though the two new ‘recruits’ were excelling in all their little training programs, they were not ready for the attack the Lycans bought with them during their special little stay with us. They somehow managed to make my people believe they were here for a peace treaty, to end all the little disputes I had created. When, in reality, they were back to steal our training procedures, steal the technology for our machine, and slaughter all our people. We killed as many as we could, but to no avail. They destroyed the laboratory, and Alice and Ninja fled. I ordered Raziel to follow them, protect them from any Lycans waiting on the outside of our little home, and I was left with a group no bigger than 10 Nightstalkers to fight off the small army the Lycans had put together to put an end to our fight, permanently.
Naturally, we were superior, but they had more than ten times our number, and my people were slaughtered quickly. They surrounded us, closed us off from help, and took us down, one by one. In a fair fight we would have won easily. Even if we only had a few more, five or ten more, we would’ve stood a chance against these savage beasts, but the numbers as they were, my people were killed. It ended with me and one other, back to back fighting them off, refusing to be drawn apart. I ordered this ferocious warrior to go, leaving me to handle all the remaining beasts, we had killed ten so far, and I didn’t want this soldier to die. So she fled, to join the others who got to safety. I was alone, against more than a hundred of these vile creatures. Me. Who was once one of them, now to fight against my former brothers. Ironic, isn’t it?