Fists are being thrown at a bag, his punches begin to. The bag has black marks all over it, surprisingly holding up well. He steps to the right to land a hit, then to the left to land another. The beads of sweat on his body evaporate before they can roll off of it. The more punches he throws, the brighter his scars get. The red glow crackles like wild flames, and his strikes begin to leave streaks of crimson. With one final strike, he burst through the bag. The hole was twice the size of his fist, and the sand that was once in that bag, melts into a glassy paste.
He sighs, shaking his head in disappointment, “This one barely lasted a week. They gotta make these things more durable.” The indoor gym sent out a couple of drones to help clean up the busted bag, and a new one dropped down from the ceiling, perks of having a rich superhero roommate. He checks his phone for the time, the cracked screen reads two in the morning. Ryan thinks that he should continue training or go to sleep; the latter sounds good right now.
While walking out of the gym, the fighter had to be very careful not to leave any burn marks on anything. He treads through the hallway until he reaches the door to his room. He takes a deep breath to calm down so his hand doesn’t melt the doorknob by accident. After a few breathing exercises, his body was cool enough to avoid any damage.
He enters his room and immediately plops himself on the bed. he felt so tired after that session. Losing his heart, smashing through a bridge, a bunch of shit that burned out his energy. All he wants to do is take a good night sleep and be ready when Kat finds out where that fucker with the mask is hiding. His eyelids grew heavy and he began to doze off to Wonderland. His body remains warm.
~~~
The wind howls through the black trees, each step crunches the snow beneath him. His eyes look up at the sky, blood red. He presses forward. Ryan has been here before. Footprints on the snow led him to a cabin, a cabin made out of dark oak and covered with black soot. The air smelled like smoke, but no fire was being burned. The closer he got to the cabin, his insides twisted and turned.
“Here again?”
He takes a break, the overwhelming feeling of dread is too much for him, he looks up at the sky once more, and the deep red is now a shadow purple. Humming could be heard from inside the cabin, he immediately knew who it was. He breaks into a sprint towards the door and swings it open with all of his might.
She wasn’t there, the inside of the cabin was mostly empty. Just a bar with glass full of this murky red liquid is there.
A sweet tender voice talks to him, “Go ahead Mijo, drink it.” It only took a few steps to reach the bar, the liquid had a faint mist floating on top of it. He grabs the glass and stares at it. The glass is raised up in the air and he begins to chug. The liquid pierces through his throat, making it hard to swallow. It was hot, too hot. It burns, its burns so much. Ryan begins to cough, the wood around him ignites into a black flame. Everything falls apart, the purple sky goes black. The trees around are on fire and all he can hear is.
“It was all your fault,” the voice of his mother said
He can’t breathe, he can’t see, he can’t move, he can’t do anything. He felt weak, worthless. He watches the world around him fall apart and he can’t do anything about it. Even after all this time, after all the training. He still felt weak. Flames engulf his vision and then he blinks.
The color of his eyes turn purple and the crosses in his pupils sharpen. The splitting image of his old man.
The once black sky is now his ceiling, and he gets up with a cold sweat. It happened again, the nightmare. He frantically looked for his phone and saw that it was only three in the morning. New record, he finally got an hour in, how painful. He gets out of bed and goes near his bedroom window. He types a code, and the window opens automatically. The cool breeze of the city hits him, and he stares at the giant hyperscapers.
He is not going back to sleep.
~~~
Rock music began to play from a desk, which was quite messy. Covered with Polaroid pictures, sheets of paper with art on them, and a digital camera. She lifts herself from her bed and lets out a big yawn. Just like her desk, her hair is very messy, sticking up in random places. The tired, pale woman gets out of her bed and stretches her arms, then her body. Her legs slowly make their way towards the desk and grab the source of the music. Her cute little “emo” phone, the nickname given by Ryan. She hits the button that turns the alarm off, and her eyes blink rapidly so she can wake up faster.
Her morning routine has begun; she begins by doing all of her business in the bathroom, her sleepy eyes locked in contact with her reflection on the mirror. She washes her face with many skin care products, but while rinsing, she realizes that the water coming out of the faucet has completely frozen, and blackish blue ice spreads around the sink. Thankfully, she was able to dry the water off of her face before that froze, also. It’s weird to have superpowers; the feeling of cold is gone. She doesn’t feel warm either; it’s strange. The black ice melts, and Kat continues on with her routine, brushing her teeth, her hair, then finally putting on some makeup. Always gotta have those iconic black lips of hers.
Back in her room, she is deciding on what outfit she wants to wear today. Does she want to go all black? Be lazy? Try something new? She went lazy, so a hoodie and some sweatpants will suffice. After dressing up, she sits on her bed and summons a shard of her black ice. The blue undertone is what catches her attention. why is it blue? Many usually chalk it up to personality but nothing about her screams blue. Purple would’ve looked nice anyway. What was she gonna do today? The tired wolf thinks and thinks and thinks, and she has completely forgotten what she was going to do today. If it was important, then she would’ve remembered. Her boyfriend immediately plagues her mind, and she has the sudden urge to be annoying, so with her phone, she gives him a call.
“Hello?” A tired, dark voice comes from the other line
Kat shouts, “Good morning, dork, how was sleep?”
Ryan responds, “You know I don’t sleep.”
“Because maybe one day you do get some, I want to make sure that I’m the first to know,” Kat leans on her desk with the phone held to her ear.
“Oh did you figure out who you are supposed to contact to fight that fucker?” Ryan asked. Oh shit, that was what she was supposed to do for today, the memories begin to flood her mind.
She answers him, “No, not yet, stop getting so antsy for a fight. It makes you sound like a jackass.”
Ryan sounded offended, “You were the one who suggested the idea?!”
“Oh yeah I did, you still sound like a jackass tho,” she laughs after saying that, annoying her before just so he can yelp like a cute dog will always be amusing to her.
She continues on, “Anyway, I’ll give them a call, I’ll keep you updated, okay?”
Still frustrated, he tries to keep his composure, “Yeah sure, talk to ya a bit, love ya.”
“Love ya too!” She says out of excitement and the phone conversation finishes. She scrolls through her text messages to find the one conversation that she blocked. Once entering the text conversation, she sees that her mother has sent her a phone number with a name attached to it.
“Cotton, what an interesting name for a hero,” she thinks out loud and saves the number to her phone. Kat makes sure to block her mother’s number again so she doesn’t have to deal with her phone calls. Her first thought is to send the dude a text but after punching in their number. She sends a cute text explaining her situation and what she wants but one problem, she hits the send button and it doesn’t send. She hits it again and once more, it doesn’t send. Then she remembers, Kat forgot to recharge her text messages. No wonder Ryan didn’t react to any of her cute selfies. She groans out loud and she heads over to give this number a call.
~~~
Time has passed, it is currently the afternoon and the mall is full of life today. Pedestrians walking around, shopping for new clothes or anything that is trendy. A person with blue and pink hair is sitting near a table, drinking some soda. They looked very friendly and bubbly. They checked their smartphone to see what was going on in their social media profile. Right behind them was a man with well kept crimson hair, his eye patch glistening and he looked pissed.
He begins to argue, “So why am I here again? You know my time is precious, Cotton!”
Cotton! stops sipping from their straw to answer, “We are here to meet our leader’s daughter. She said that she needed some help with something so as heroes. We are going to help her.”
“Ah the fox’s brat, I always wanted to meet her. Let’s see why Fox always brags about this brat of hers,” he leans forward, resting his arms on the table.
Cotton! scolds their friend, “Making comments like that can lead to karma, Malekith. No hero should be this rude.”
This frustrates the rockstar, “You’re no saint either, weren’t you checking if any of your posts got hate comments so you can report them? People do have the right to critique.”
“Commenting hate and giving out criticism are two different things, but you wouldn’t know cause everyone hates you,” the snarky remark from Cotton! causes Malekith’s eye to twitch.
“You littl—“ Before Malekith can finish his insult, the star of the show has arrived.
Kat sits in front of Cotton! and Malektih, “Am I interrupting something?”
Cotton! smiles at her, “No, you are fine. It seems like you made it right on time.”
Kat speaks, she doesn’t want to waste anymore time, “Let’s get straight to the point, me and m—“
“Oh wow, I didn’t expect the fox’s brat to be so beautiful. It almost makes me want to feel kind towards the old hag,” Malekith’s voice was ear grating towards Kat but she kept her cool
She asked him a cold question while crossing her arms, “And you are?”
The question stung Malekith a bit but he introduced himself with a smirk on his face, “Malekith, hit rockstar and the master of the dark wind. It is a pleasure to meet you…” he was waiting for her to say her name
“Kat, now that you got that pompous attitude out of the way, let us get back to the main point on finding this bastard. I assume you have the information that I need?” She ignores the jackass and turns her attention to Cotton!
Cotton! places a small blue device on the table and passes it to Kat. she picks up the device to see that it is a map of the Midnight Zone. There is a little blip roaming around an abandoned warehouse that used to store retail items.
Cotton! takes another sip from their soda, then speaks, “My drones found him lurking around in that warehouse, it seems like when the heroes sweep for infected. They forgot to ping this guy for removal.”
This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.
“Yo, this is great, thank you for your help. I’ll report back what happens to him once we are done,” after giving Cotton! her thanks, she begins to stand up
But
Malekith asks, “So what are you going to do with this information? We can’t just let some civilian handle some 'personal’ business, that is quite illegal after all.”
Kat stops from moving to answer him, “Me and my boyfriend are going to stop him from terrorizing innocent lives, we are doing you a favor, dumbass.”
“Already with the insults? Seems like that the fox’s brat can’t handle a bit of disagreement. Rather spoiled huh,” Malekith knows what he is doing, if she can not handle this argument. How can she fight a monster like that without collateral damages? Anger is what causes problems.
“Hey, you got an issue with my girlfriend?” A dark claw grips onto Malekith’s shoulder and forces him to turn around. The aqua green eye stares at dark lenses
Malekith remarks at Ryan, “So you’re the brat’s fuck toy, I expected more but all I see is a pathetic display of power.”
Ryan angrily glares at the rockstar, “If you keep running your mouth then kiss that crooked jaw goodbye.”
Cotton! tries to get in between them, “Hey calm down, you two are causing a scene already, stop.” Cotton’s! words were true, people begin to gather up at their little table, watching both Ryan and Malekith glare at each other.
“Come on, hotshot. Swing as hard as you can, I dare you.” Malekith taunts Ryan and he simply smiles then
A punch was thrown.
But instead of impact, Ryan trips forward. It was almost like he tried to hit air. In front of him is only teal colored smoke, and the smoke travels through him. His body becomes cold and stiff then forearms lock around his neck. Malekith continues to smile, he squeezes harder, and Ryan coughs and wheezes.
“Too slow, hotshot. If you’re gonna hit someone, at least be sure that they can’t dodge it,” Malekith taunts the choking fighter. The rockstar was too busy laughing, mocking the fighter. After an eyeblink, Malekith’s tone changes. he was struck in the nose but something hard. A headbutt causes him to let go immediately and to cover his nose.
This angers the rockstar, “You asshole! That’s it, you want to fight! Let’s fight!”
Ryan takes off his sunglasses and puts them in a pocket within his jacket. “Keep running your mouth, watch what happens.”
But before any more damage can be done, a giant bear poofs into existence. They put both Ryan and Malekith into a headlock, stopping the fight. The bear smashes their head together, knocking them out cold.
Cotton! speaks, “Alright, everyone, the show is over. You can go back to your normal lives.” The group of people took photos and videos of the two idiots lying on the floor them they make their way back to shopping.
“Ms. Kathrine, please keep your boyfriend in check. I don’t need him to cause any more trouble,” Cotton! requests.
The comment annoyed Kat, so she spoke what was on her mind, “My boyfriend was only doing what he needed to do when someone insults me, how about keep your coworker in check. Badmouthing people ain’t hero-like.”
Cotton! looks down at the sleeping rockstar and admits defeat, “You are right, that is our fault. He did approach you with insults. I will take the blame and scold him when he wakes up.”
Kat smiles, pleased at the results, “Make sure to hit him in the head for me also. Anyways, I got what I came for, so our talk is done and we shall never meet again, okay? Okay.” Cotton! was going to say something else, but couldn’t, Kat had already left the table to help her boyfriend up on his feet. The two slowly make their way through the crowd, disappearing out of sight.
Malekith snores out loud, and that is when Cotton! sighs once more. Why are they the only normal one within this team?
~~~
Ryan wakes up with dull pain on his head, he felt so delirious.
“And this is why napping sucks ass” —He rubs his head while looking around— “The midnight zone, when the hell did I get here?”
Kat is scouting the abandoned warehouse but she still gives Ryan an answer, “I dragged your ass here after you got knocked out by a huge teddy bear, for being an undefeated fighter, you tend to lose a lot.”
This pisses off Ryan, “You can be a bitch at times, you know that?”
“And you can be a whiny ass baby, anyways come here, I think I found our dude,” Kat motions Ryan to come scout right next to her. He shambles onto his feet and crouches right by her. Ryan squints his eyes to see the same white crystal from the previous night but these are a bit smaller than the ones in the crazy cave.
The fighter asks, “Are you sure he is in there?”
“Positive, hotshot. Now go in there and whoops that fuckers ass,” Kat says to hype Ryan up but it does the complete opposite.
“That’s it? Jump in and fight? Ain’t there a plan? Some protocol that we gotta follow?” He keeps asking questions after questions.
Kat shuts him up by saying, “Nope, go in there and fight him. Cotton! and that fuckface is gonna handle the rest once you are done.”
This still doesn’t ease Ryan’s worry, “What about my fire? Won't it spread to the other buildings?”
“Ryan! Go fight, go all out. Show him what happens when you fuck with the champ,” her words of encouragement finally kicks in, he stands up from the edge and stretches a bit. His heart ignites, and a smile stretches across his face, and with one jump. He blasts towards the warehouse, leaving dark fire behind.
Some of the fire begins to burn Kat’s coat, “Hey! What the fuck!” She immediately drowns the flames with her ice, but she couldn’t help but laugh.
~~~
He is no ordinary hero, society rejects him and his goals. The gift that god bestows upon him to cure that disgusting plague called villainy. These crystals shall save everyone, they shall save him. The monster rubs his hand against one of the larger crystals within the warehouse, grazing at its beauty. The sound of glass shattering interrupts him and his thinking. The faceless man turns to see an interesting individual.
His head turns upside down and says, “Haven’t I killed you before?”
The intruder chuckles, “No, you ripped my heart out and left it to rot in your little cave, but I'm back now.”
“So why are you here again, villain? To receive justice from a true hero?” His voice changes pitch, from low to high.
Ryan cracks his knuckles, “Quite hypocritical talking about justice, now shut up and put them up. I want my rematch.” He takes his coat off in one swift motion, landing right next to the exit of the building.
The monster is amused by this man, “If you wish to be brought down by justice, so be it. Our final round shall begin!”
The monster lunges at Ryan, swiping at him with his massive arm. He ducks under the attack effortlessly and lands a heavy blow at the monster’s ribs, knocking him off of balance and another blow lands at his chest. Each strike is fueled not by revenge, not justice but for the love of the game. He can not fall here, he can not let this villain win. Crystals burst out of his gruesome limbs, they darted towards Ryan. Chains erupt from a black glyph that formed on the ground, flames burn the crystals into a crisp. The annoying fire came to haunt him but it won't be enough to stop him. The monster blitzes around the room, shooting crystals all around the fighter but each burst gets burned by the dark flames. Out of desperation, he lunges at Ryan’s back, hoping he can land one attack.
A black shoots out to block the attack, the creature’s claw in contact with the black metal. Then within the chain links, human eyes appear to stare at the monster. This distracts him and out of the blue, a black gauntlet is slammed across his face. A dark red streak is cut in the air. The impact launches the monster back to crash onto his back.
He lies there and he screeches, “Where has this power come from? How did you hide this from me?”
Ryan’s laughter pierces through the monster’s ears, “Why do you ask? Scared? Afraid that the villain is going to win. Sorry to tell ya but this story ends with you gone.”
This little fucker, how dare he, how dare he, how dare he, I am the HERO!
On all fours, the monster rushes at Ryan with unbelievable speed. With no time to react, he suffers from being clawed across the chest. One of the monster’s limbs breaks and shifts, so he unpredictably attacks Ryan, clawing at his face. Feral attacks from left to right to up to down, the barrage never ends.
Flames burst from the ground, engulfing both Ryan and the monster. This causes the monster to leap back to put out the dark fire on his skin. Ryan steps out of the black fire, his wounds healed completely, and something appears to cover his head. A helmet, the black metal eats the light from the flam,e and only darkness shrouds his face
A dark voice echoes within the warehouse, gargles of static fill the room, “Now now, no need to act all feral. The fight only just got started. Conserve that strength of yours. You are really going to need it.” The black flames rage in the background, consuming whatever they come in contact with. The crystal nest was destroyed once more, and the monster can not have another failure. It screeches in rage, charging at Ryan blindly. No pain is going to stop him, no damage, nothing. He shall be the hero of this story. The fire eats away at his skin; no matter how many crystals he forms for armor, the fire just burns them away. He is nothing but just muscle and bone, the faceless monster reaches to attack Ryan once more, but his fingers begin to burn away. A single punch knocks him down to the ground, his left arm is gone, burned away. He stares up at the man who defeated him, and all he sees is darkness. His flames provide no light; there is no hope here, no justice, just darkness.
~~~
Kat watches from afar, black flames creep out from the opening of the warehouse.
“Yeesh, I see why he held back. Hopefully, he has it under control,” she says.
Another voice appears right next to her, “And if he doesn’t?” This scares Kat, and she flings some blue ice at the sudden man.
He manages to dodge it and yell, “What the hell?! What’s with people trying to attack me today?”
Once Kat realizes who he is, she says in disgust, “Ugh, it's you. Why are you here, Malekith?”
“Your annoying mom wanted me to be here. Something about keeping you safe and blah blah blah boring hero shit but I’m here to make sure that awful boyfriend of yours doesn’t burn down the midnight zone,” he said annoyed.
Kat simply tells him, “There is nothing to worry about, I’m pretty sure that Ryan is going to keep a cool head and not explode the warehou—“ The roof of the abandoned building gets blown into the sky with a giant white grotesque crystal.
Kat and Malekith look up at the massive crystallized structure, and he comments about her, “Yeah, totally under control.” She looks annoyed, not saying anything. Black flames engulf the structure and instantly turn the giant crystal into dust.
This puts a smile on Kat’s face, “Told ya, under control.” Before Mal can say anything, she jumps off the building to see the aftermath of the battle. She lands on her feet, but the sudden pain from the drop causes her body to jolt a little, and then she runs towards the warehouse. The rockstar is right behind her, climbing down the building smoothly. His body morphs into a cloud of teal green smoke, he floats along the small breeze that he created and catches up to Kat easily. Malekith manages to pass through Kat and his body goes back to being physical once more. He tries to open the door that leads into the warehouse but the handle is molten hot, and he receives endless counts of burns on his hand. Yelping while jumping back away from the door.
“FUCK! Shit, Ow, what the fuck,” he keeps cursing out loud then he realizes that Kat is going for the handle also.
He yells out while throwing his burned hand forward, “Watch out! The door is hot!”
“Huh what?” She says while grabbing the handle, she felt nothing. Malekith is a bit annoyed that she is immune but he lets out a sigh of relief. The wolf opens the door.
A rush of heat hits Malekith when the door is opened, his eyes forced to squint. The heat is so immense that it feels like Malekith is staring at hell itself. Small black flames cover bits and pieces of the warehouse and Ryan is standing over the monster. He seems to have little to no damage on him while the beast underneath him has lost an arm and leg. The monster is still breathing.
Ryan turns his head to see who has entered the warehouse, the darkness from his helmet glares at the two, “You two took a while to get here, missed out the boring match.”
Malekith asks, “Boring? You turned the whole warehouse into an oven.”
He chuckles, “I did huh? Anyways.” The burning knight crouches down and places his dark claw on the monster’s chest and black flames swallow their body. Instead of burning, the flames eat away the crystal until the monster becomes its previous self. A normal man, lying there without an arm and a leg. Both Kat and Malekith stand there in awe. Ryan stands up and walks towards the exit.
He walks past Malekith, “Consider this a preview if you ever insult my girl again.” Ryan grabs his coat from the ground. He puts it on effortlessly, his hand resting within his pockets.
“Kat, let’s go before the pigs come,” he says while exiting the building.
Before Kat leaves, she stares at the black inferno. She knew her boyfriend was strong, but this is a whole new level. If he went all out on that day, she and that family wouldn’t have stood a chance against the flames. Now the question remains: Does he constantly hold back? Once her thoughts are finished, she follows Ryan. This leaves Malekith on his own. Green winds put out the rest of the black flames, and the dark heat has disappeared, right on time, too. The warehouse gets swarmed with an abundance of runners and drones, each robot scanning the environment to find any clues of what happened within this area. They weren’t alone; a man wearing tactical armor entered the warehouse, and his boots sounded heavy.
A robotic voice gurgles among the warehouse walls, “H.I.T Member, Malekith, didn’t expect a little shit like yourself to be able to take down a special infected all by yourself. Great work, hero.” Malekith turns to see a white skull, face to face with the second-ranked hero of the city, the metallic arsenal, America’s favorite soldier, Man O War. The mere presence of the hero causes Malekith to stay quiet.
He speaks once more, the gurgles pierce through the rockstar’s ears, “A little shy? Shell-shocked? Doesn’t matter, scram. I’ll handle it from here.”
Malekith musters up the courage to say, “What are you doing here? Usually, it's just the clean-up crew.”
“A H.I.T member questioning me? Last time that happened, their family went missing, do you want your family to go missing too, Malekith?” He threatens him, and with that, Malekith stays quiet and walks away from the area.
He chuckles, “Dumb kids believing everything.” The soldier makes his way to the infected, then he crouches down to get a good look at the damage that was caused. Burn marks, he doesn’t bother to remember what Malekith’s abilities were, and he doesn’t care.
Malekith, now as green smoke, is watching from a broken window. He stares at Man O War and the man. What is he going to do with him? And his question gets immediately answered. Man O War pulls out a specially made pistol from his belt and shoots him. Killing it with no hesitation, after watching this, Malekith had to leave. He rushes out of there. Why did he kill him? He was cured; he had seen it with his very own eyes.
