Blood Obsidian

Issue 6

There was no way that block of concrete should move like it did. It disobeyed the laws of physics, flying toward her without Blockchain even swinging the chain. It caught her again in the chest, but it didn't hurt anywhere near as bad as before. Her hand pressed against her body to find the suit had changed again, a padded front piece, more red than black protected a more vulnerable spot. Thankful for that, but filled with questions, Caitlyn tried to gain herself some space.

Away to both ends of the street, she could see flashing red and blue lights. The police cordoning off the area, leaving the fight to her. That was procedure in these days of supers crawling out of every piece of woodwork. A super-villain was the preserve of superheroes. Normal cops were simply not equipped to stop them.

She looked up, hoping that some other super would drop from the sky, Principle, or Minerva, or Trooper Jane. Someone, anyone better able to deal with this enormous man that acted like he was having nothing but a child's tantrum. Even as she evaded more of Blockchain's strikes, she found herself looking around. There were no banks here. No jewellery stores. No armoured car filled with money. Nothing. Only a street devastated by Blockchain for no reason.

"Hey, Blockhead, what's this all about anyway?" She caught the chain as it swept over her head and became dragged along with it spinning in the air as Blockchain tried to shake her off. "What do you get out of this? Fame? Notoriety? What do you hope to achieve here?"

"Ah hoped Black Staff would come, is all." For a second, Blockchain's voice quivered. "He cain't be dead. He cain't."

"Wait a second. Are you ... are you crying?" At the apex of the chain's swing, she let go, using the momentum to fly across the space to land on Blockchain's shoulders, wrapping a leg around his throat and squeezing. "Are you ... upset that he's dead?"

Blockchain roared in defiance, reaching up with one hand to grasp at Caitlyn, swinging the chain with the other. She swatted the one hand away and then bent backward, almost double, to avoid the chain and concrete block as it tore through the air above Blockchain's head. She locked her other leg over the one around his throat and squeezed even harder and his hand began to scrabble at her.

"He wuz a good super. Always treated me wit respect." The ground shuddered as Blockchain fell to one knee, fighting for breath, but he still talked. "Only super as ever talked to me like I ain't as dumb as I am. Treated ... me ... right."

The chain fell from his hand and, of a sudden, he began to transform. Without the magic of the block and chain, Blockchain became smaller and smaller until he looked only a few inches taller than Caitlyn herself. Then she heard his sobs. Unwrapping her legs from his much smaller neck, she jumped in front of the man, kicking the chain far away from his reach, and crouched before him.

"You really cared about him, huh? I'm sorry. If it helps, he died saving a bunch of kids." She felt uncomfortable, watching a grown man, a super-villain, cry at the loss of his enemy. Only another weird thing to happen to her this day. "Listen, what's your name?"

"Daryl. Daryl Darnell. My friends call me Daryl." Blockchain, Daryl, sat on the ground amidst the destruction he had caused, rubbing his neck. "Black Staff always called me Chain, 'cos he said it sounded like 'Shane'. You know, that old Western movie. Ah liked that. Died savin' kids, huh? That's about right."

"Daryl, I know you're upset, but you know you've hurt people, right?" He dipped his head, nodding and Caitlyn couldn't help but feel sorry for him. "You have so much power, you know? You could use that power to do good, like Black Staff. You know, I've seen people online that earned thousands just by playing hackey sack on video? Thousands. Imagine what you could get just by swinging that chain."

Monetising his abilities. Professor Halstrom had said that was what she would do. His twisted reasoning why he should have whatever it was that now resided within her. It couldn't hurt Daryl to try it, though she couldn't see herself making videos for cash. That sounded a little dirty. She looked away, up the street, to see Aunt Mary haranguing an EMT trying to look at her head. She looked fine. Fearsome.

Knowing Aunt Mary was okay, Caitlyn sat down, crossing her legs, and laid a comforting hand on Daryl's shoulder. She had never expected a super-villain to care about the heroes that opposed them. She had always thought every super-villain was nothing but pure evil, only interested in stealing money or dominating the world. Daryl was just an ordinary man that had found a magical chain and concrete block. How many others were only being villains because they didn't know what else to do.

After a while, the police finally realised that the fight was over, coming along to place Daryl in cuffs. What they were going to do with his chain and concrete block, she didn't know, but she hoped that, once he had paid his debt to society, that he could turn his life around. Be something better. Unlike her. If nothing else, this fight had proven she was no hero. She needed to get rid of this thing inside her before it killed her.

-+-

Elsewhere.

There were several empty chairs around the table, a spotlight casting its light upon the surface from high above, keeping the faces and figures of the people that were sat there in shadow. A gavel struck the wooden sounding block three times and then rattled as the hand that held it placed it aside. That same hand reached for a remote control and pressed a button with the thumb.

A huge, ultra-high definition screen lit up, but that definition was a waste considering the grainy, flickering, low-definition images that played upon its surface. Taken from a traffic camera, or a security camera of a home or a business, it showed two figures in the near distance, both sat on the ground amidst a scene of destruction. Cars overturned, road shattered. The two figures looked like they were talking.

"It would seem that this girl now has the Black Element that once belonged to Black Staff, along with the Red Element that Doctor Blood had taken for his own. This could prove either very dangerous to our ongoing efforts, or pivotal in bringing these efforts to fruition." The thumb clicked the pause button, showing one of the figures laying a hand on the other's shoulder. "We don't know which side she's on. This? This was in response to her Aunt being injured. The first incident due to an attack by a Professor Halstrom, who appears to also have minute fragments of the Black Element in his blood, causing him to mutate."

"One way or another, she's dangerous. Look at that destruction, and at that school." Another figure leaned forward, only clasped hands breaking into the light. "We need to find out which side she's really on. She needs testing and, if she doesn't come to our cause, she must be stopped. Permanently."

A series of murmurs rippled around the table until one figure leaned forward, into the light. Silvery, metal claws glinted in the light and the visage the figure presented would strike fear into the very hardest of hearts, hero or villain. The glowing red eyes showed no emotion over the gaping mouth, filled with long fangs. A mask, but still terrifying.

"I will test her." The figure scraped those metal claws against the surface of the table, leaving gouges beside older, similar ones. "And this 'Blood Obsidian' will know Fear!"