Zakki lifted an arm and the cosmic halo of his energy formed a glowing shield in front of him as the creature went lunging through the air. He braced himself for it to smash into the shield and was ready to roll aside as soon as the shield was dropped. He was already anticipating his next move. The creature was huge and clearly fast but Zakki knew he was faster. He also knew there was a syringe gun lurking in one of his pockets that he could jab into a vein at the right moment to give his Titan friend a little fiery surprise if necessary. The Titan hit his shield hard and sent him staggering backwards but it was enough to break the thing's speed.
Zakki leapt and rolled to the side. The slender youth came up on his feet and with a shout of anger let three orbs of energy spew forward into its open mouth.
Sliding and sneaking from street to street, Victor Vendetta, in his hospital attire of green coloured pants and shirt, advanced towards the direction of... nowhere!
“Dum dum...” the enigmatic businessman chirped happily to himself as he moved stealthily along the wall. He stopped for a breather at the corner.
And then, there was a mammoth bellow that rung loud and awfully, ripping apart the night air. Victor ducked flat to the wall, struck with mortal apprehension. It took him a few seconds to calm himself. He hopped nimbly out of the wall and took a quick look to his sides, making exceptionally sure he wasn’t in the company of others – company in the form of the ghostly shadows that had been haunting him for recent years past.
No, there was no way he wanted that. No way at all. The sensation was similar, for sure – the same dusty, clogged and peppery air which stung his throat with every breath and instigated a fear in Victor with every lingering second.
Another blistering growl whipped down his left. Startled, the raven-haired man began to run. It didn’t matter where he ran, in which direction, and to where. He just wanted to get away. And he kept running, and running. A line of street lamps that stained the dark roads ahead with orange beams lit Victor’s path.
Beads of fearful perspiration began to develop on his forehead as Victor sped down the street, looking at his rear anxiously at times. There was nothing behind him.
He stopped at a lamp post finally, exhausted from all the running. He slumped, his knees and hands on the chilly concrete floor. Victor idly watched his sweat trickle generously onto the ground. He was physically and mentally jaded.
But he heard something. A human voice, shouting something he couldn’t make out exactly. It was a distance away. Victor got up hastily and craftily crept behind a car. Down the bleak street, he could see two dark figures that slipped in and out of perceptible visibility with the help of street lamps.
After a short moment of careful observation, Victor could remark that one of the figures was a human. It had long limbs and a slender body. The other figure however, was much larger than the other and it moved on all fours. They moved very nimbly and seemed to be engaging each other in combat.
The green cloud had engulfed him and all his brain could think of was don’t breath. His face and body were relentlessly attacked, but with claws fully extended he was fighting back much like one of those geeky high school slap fest where two whips are flailing at each other in such a pathetic display you just walk by. However unlike such an event, blood was being exposed and pieces of limb were crashing to the ground.
In a brief moment between attacks, Darius leaped backwards. His lungs had begun to burn from holding his breath for so long. He was breathing heavily and seemed to be going nowhere fast. The tag team of titans was proving to be too much for him alone. On top of it, none of the third of resource he had pulled for himself had followed him. He knew no one would have done so with as little time as he had spent with the corporation.
Flaring his thanatoresonance, he felt as if the claws had gotten sharper. Taking a deep breath, Darius charged into the haze hellbent to carve his name into the pair.
As if her body moved to the harmony of hymns, Syren walked onwards. Radiant locks swayed and glistened with every step. Porcelain skin glimmered in the sunlight. Pleased to see this momentous occasion mount to such an extraordinary climax, the hollow empress smiled warmly as she watched the children frolic and play. “Go on, feed. Enjoy yourselves.”
Until, of course, she heard the painful squeals of her children in pain. Hurling herself around, the tails of her dress circled as rampant and feverish as she, her eyes flared red. An unnatural screech forged from her lips, and the high-pitched shriek shattered windows by the thousands, aiming the frequency of the shrills toward the human wielding knives. In her fury, the once-beauteous face distorted to sport the countenance of a fiend manifested from hell.
And just as quickly, the perversions melted away and the image of perfection returned. Tilting her head to the side, an entrancing gentleness in her gaze, Syren called, “Please… don’t hurt the children.”
--------------
The wolf sputtered and spat as searing, green pain shred through his mouth. With a broken whimper, the canine fell backwards and slid across the ground, ripping streets and tar up along with the momentum of his body.
Grumbling, he pushed himself forward. Now this… was a surprise. The fragile boy had quite a bit of fight in him. A delightful revelation -- all the more succulent he would be.
Onyx eyes lifted upward, teeth snarling as globs of saliva hung from its mouth. Planting both paws and drilling his cold stare into the youth, Blackfur suddenly threw his head backward and pierced a deafening howl into the skies. The earth shook, the streets quivered, even the trees and lampposts succumbed and crashed to the ground in a series of tumultuous thuds.
“You’re mine!” And again, the beast lunged forward. This time, he flung his body over the dark-haired boy. His feet barely landed against a nearby wall before he sprung again, aiming to fill his jaws with the sweet flesh from the back of his prey’s neck.
-------------
Before he could carve anything, the metal pipe swung sideways, bursting forward to smash the skull of the relentless businessman.
A sound in the mist attracted Kumakichi's attention. When he faced in that direction, the glint of reflected light caught his eye. Figuring it was as good a target as any, the teenager launched one of his orbs at the glimmer. With any luck, the sphere would hit an enemy.
[50/512]
ooc
The glint is the pipe. Whether the sphere arrives in time to be useful or not is someone else's call.
The hellish cry unleashed by the once beautiful maiden broke Daniel’s concentration for only a fraction of a second. In that time, a horrible wave of pain and jolt of nausea consumed his body. The horrible noise forced the agent to lose his balance and topple over mid-slash. The beast in question used his sudden slip up to deliver a vicious slash with its horrible claws.
Daniel winced as the talons grazed his flesh, but a moment later his body phased through the avian creature. With a quick jab, he pierced the back of the creature’s feathered head as his body regained its substantiality. The hordes continued to enclose on his position, and a quick upward leap carried him out of the masses and into a patch of clear ground. He landed heavily, wincing at his newly acquired wounds.
He flung the first throwing knife at a bat-like creature that tried to capture him with its claws by swooping downwards. It met a grisly end when the modified projectile tore through its chest and ended its life.
"Here I go,” thought the agent as he pulled out a syringe gun filled with bright red liquid. He jabbed it into his left arm and leased the concoction into his system. A moment later, he activated the clear patch located on his bicep; the cortaboost patch. He could already feel the cocktail coursing through his body and without warning fired a jet of searing flame from his left palm. It incinerated an incoming line of Titans, and the others backed down, weary of a fiery death.
A crack traveled up the mist beaded windshield of Meiko's two thousand nine Nissan Skyline, until it had completely divided the glass with a thin sharp line. If she had parked a few blocks down and instead of in this parking garage, she would probably have a car with out windows right now instead of a crack that she could live with at the moment.
Taking a long drag of her cigarette before tossing it on the ground, she opened the vehicle's door and sat behind the driver's seat. Meiko turned the key and started the engine then proceeded to slowly pull out of her parking space and into the damp air outside. Normally the bass would be rattling the frame of the GT-R, but right now she figured it was best to keep the volume down and her ears open for any further sound.
She wasn't really in a hurry to locate the hollow but it would look bad on her part if she didn't at least show some interest in the situation. [173]
She stepped on the wings of two dark and grisly bat-like hollows. But to the boy...
Perceive euphoria.
It would appear as if she rode on the wings of a flock of doves -- a distant angel, soaring through the heavens. Tranquility, majesty, glory, and jubilation. All were the sensations of brilliance and joy she shared with the boy.
What she stole, however, was his true perception and the acuity to realize the speed and depth of her claws as they made their way to plunge into his abdomen.
[90/737]
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(Zenny, you can decide on what to do with Neko’s... balls. xP)
Whether it was the blast of the orb that had hit the pipe, or if it was the pipe itself did not matter as much as the fact that Darius had by sheer fortune been knocked out of the infected green air. His ear was ringing, and he could feel the trickles of blood that slowly flowed from his crown and ear. The migraine induced was by far one of the worst things he had ever felt as far as could recall.
Something had to be done, he was no closer to using his power on the pair and from the little experience he had with these claws time was beginning to run out. On the plus side he did take note of a familiar thantoresonance, which meant it was more of a fair fight than it had been seconds ago.
“You will not live long enough to regret that Titan.”
The thing with fighting is that the longer you do it, the harder it is to win; for while you are learning about your opponent, he is also learning about you. Darius was by no means a fighter, he was a persuader and he needed to persuade these titans to die. Knowing that there was another person it felt fighting with him on the other side of the titan, Darius had to get to him to form a plan.
Extending his claws again, and this time through his shoes too, Darius used the extra traction to give his speed a boost. He wasn’t aiming for either titan, but the gap that was between them. He was ready unlike the last time. That goul would not get a second homerun off his head.
The ravening Titan barely missed tearing a hole in Zakki's neck as he hit the ground hard. He threw himself flat to avoid having his head taken off by this creature and quickly made a scramble to his feet in time to face it again. The tremble it had sent through the ground had made the slim young man's heart pound even harder and now it came for him again.
The boy's syringe full of Pyrozac C was just within reach in his outer coat pocket and with one hand he raised his shield of energy and in the other he palmed the syringe, flicked the cap off and jabbed it into his arm. As soon as the contents were flowing through his bloodstream the massive black Titan was on him again.
The pale waif of a youth made a roll onto his back and the hungry creature slid off of the energy barrier. Now it was facing him with cold hunger in its eyes and Zakki grinned at it.
"I always did love a good barbecue!"
He pointed his finger and a long streamer of flame began lashing at the shadowy beast with crackling intensity. Zakki was watching and waiting to see what would happen.
"Lima!” shouted Ciro, as both the summon’s eyes and his glowed a bright crimson. The body of the phantom warped, as a perfect replica of Ciro appeared in its face. The being looked through the fog, transmitting what it saw back to his master’s eyes.
With a flick of his wrist, the Assistant Director commanded the creature to run alongside Darius. Ciro lowered its speed slightly, commanding it to run right behind the agent. "Darius!” shouted the summon, transmitting the researcher’s voice, "What’s the plan now?” The two silver daggers reappeared in his hands, as he cautiously began to spin them.
The sudden euphoria that came across his body was a strange paradox to the pain and stress that he was feeling just a moment earlier. He watched as the truly beautiful maiden soared through the air on a flock of doves that looked like a pure-white cloud. His eyes widened as she came closer. Yes, he wanted to be near her. He needed to be near her. But why? She was his enemy just moments ago. But now she was beautiful and serene.
His mind flashed. At first it seemed like an illusion; the blonde beauty was a vicious beast one moment, but her perfection returned just a second later. His eyes felt slow, like they couldn’t keep up with what they were seeing. Everything was moving in slow motion, and the claws of the angelic being were coming closer. Claws? Why did such a beautiful woman have claws? The agent tried to react. He tried to make his body move, but he suddenly felt sluggish. They were getting close, but how close were they? After all, they seemed very far away. No. He needed to phase through her attack, but even his energy flow seemed to have slowed down significantly.
Move, damn you… Move…
The searing pain of the claws rending his flesh was almost enough for him to cry out. Instead, the usually stoic agent bit the inside of his mouth hard enough to draw blood. The claw scraped over the length of his shoulder; his body had moved just enough to avoid having his heart torn out. As the sudden flash of pain overwhelmed him, he was jolted into reality. Still, everything looked like he was seeing them through a veil. The harpy that he had thought was a beautiful creature stood, mounting a pair of grisly creatures with wings.
His left shoulder pained him a lot, but he forced his arm upwards. The jet of flame erupted from his palm once more; aiming to incinerate the creature he had slashed him.
The battle fiercely raged on between the two mysterious shadows. Windows were violently shattered and roads shockingly cleaved open. It was almost like an earthquake. It was amazing.
A scared but curious Victor inched closer to the tussle, sneaking from vehicle to vehicle with tip-toed haste and stealth. He eventually slipped behind a shabby white van and stuck half a head out. From his vantage, he had a front-row seat of the fight, but it was dangerously close to it as well. Victor was well aware of the risk, but he didn’t come this far to miss out.
“I need to know more...” he thought to himself. “What’re these shadows?”
And as he thought that, the human-like silhouette rolled to a stop under the street lamp, now whole in colour and entirely visible. He caught sight of it. It was familiar. No, it was very familiar. He knew this man... from the visit at the spirit medium, Victoria. The pale texture of his skin, slick black hair and the lanky form...
“Shihara Zakki...” Victor recollected. It was the quiet and mysterious man that Victor barely considered an acquaintance, although he left quite an impression having been the first to admit to have suffered the same kind of spiritual experience as him.
Victor’s raven eyebrows crumpled in bewilderment, “What the fuck is he doing here?”
He was just about out to the gas cloud and able to speak safely to his ally when an earsplitting screech cracked him full force across the temples or at least it felt that way when he dropped to the ground. Breathing hard, Darius’ lungs had been on fire and now he was certain to be poisoned. However the screech had brought with it some saving grace as the green cloud had been lifted enough form the ground to provide fresh air. Seeing how close he was to the feet of mushroom Titan, Darius could not resist the urge. Jabbing his claws on his right hand as deep as they were physically allowed, Darius took on a death grip with the last few seconds.
His eyes flared wide as he felt the surge of his power reach full force and blast its way into the Titan’s mind. He would take everything it knew and force this Titan to deal with that ghoul.
Strained eyes looked up to Ciro, "Take on the other one, I got this one.”
As he delved through the countless layers of the Titan’s mind, most of which were immense pangs of ravenous hunger and urges to feed, the heavily injured suited man discovered a massive drive to head back towards the Sougi Towers.
[217 / 1,531]
OOC:
Sorry but it seemed important enough that it had to be done. If there are any issues with what happened please tell me and I'll edit it.
Dear Cerberus… I’m so sorry that I haven’t replied for three days. Real life has been a b*tch, but now, I promise I’ll be back on track. Let’s do some hollow ass-kicking (even though I’ll be on the receiving end)!!
The scent of burning flesh and hair filled the Tokyo air. Blackfur stumbled in place as shreds of pain scattered all over his body. Through the black char, blood and interstitial fluid seeped through, and every movement rocketed millions of nerves into painful disarray. Excruciating. Maddening. Wildly enraging.
“You’ll pay for that, boy!” His enemy was no longer a meal, but a victim he would eradicate at all costs. “There’s no turning back now! YOU’RE MINE!” Heaving his chest up and down, ribs pulsating with every breath, Blackfur dipped his nose to the ground. And with a sudden, violent jolt, the wolf’s body convulsed and writhed until a deep red luminance filled his jaws.
“GRAARRRGHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!” He roared as a fiery burst of hot energy drove forward at the skinny boy.
---------
Cold. His hands were so icy that Deathcap felt as if he was being frozen from the inside out. “WHAT are you doing?!” the hollow fiend shrilled. His mind was being pulled apart and played with. Stretched, moved, flicked through like a magazine.
Once he overcame the initial sensations of cold, the inky hollow beast couldn’t help but smile. “You think you’ll find something in there?” Deathcap snickered. Tilting his face forward, the massive head leaned in close to the businessman. So close, the two faces were positioned so that his opponent could appreciate the full odor of dead human flesh on the hollow’s lips.
“Well you’re WRONG!!!” Suddenly distorting and twisting its body, Deathcap pulled one spidery leg over the pair of them and drove it forward, aiming to impale the businessman through his back and into his heart.
-
“So that’s the blind creature who was wildly swinging his knives through the mist." The humanoid ghoul raised an eyebrow at the ridiculous yellow, jubilant outfit the man wore. "He looks like a fool.”
Hiding himself in the shadows, Shackles waited patiently for the man to come within range. The rapid clonk, clonk only seemed to grow increasingly louder with every step. Closer, closer. Louder, louder. Once he was in position, the hollow thrust one skeletal arm into the ground and timed it to emerge in synchrony with the beat of his footsteps.
Calculated successfully, Shackle's white hand latched onto the ankle of his opponent's bright boot. And just as quickly, his ghoulish form appeared on the blonde man's side with his opposite arm swinging the pipe at the back of his skull.
---------
“My face! NO! My face!!” Syren fell backwards as one hand reached over to cover the burnt flesh. Her perfection ruined, her calm shred apart, the enraged hollow pointed a clawed finger at the insolent boy.
Façade distorting to take on the gruesome visage of a hellish banshee, Syren screeched violently – the frequency of her cry was so shrill and painful that eardrums all around ruptured as blood seeped from the orifices of their skull.
“Children!” Syren shrieked. “Kill him! Eat him alive! Make him pay for what he did to Mother!”
Upon her orders, dozens of hollows of all shapes and sizes turned their attention on the boy. In a series of low and hungry growls, they all lunged forward in a monstrous wave, ready to shred apart the human who dared to burn their empress.
There wasn't enough time to lift his shield of energy so Zakki threw himself flat on the ground as the wall of flame roiled over his back. The heat was excruciating and it took the air from his lungs as it went whooshing over him. He felt the exquisite agony of burning skin but his leather jacket took the brunt of the heat. There were a few extremely painful patches that would blister and scar but there wasn't time to think about that now. He made a quick roll onto his feet and the pain sent lances through him but he bit the inside of his cheek to force the pain away.
He was facing the charred, bleeding Titan with murder in it's eyes and his own eyes were full of cold anger at this attack. He raised one hand and his body became transparent again. The eerie glow of his power spun around his outstretched hand and went erupting forward towards the ugly creature. His other hand let loose a stream of fire as he accessed the energy of the drug which was coursing through his veins. The energy darts hit the Titan first followed by the flame. The ghostly youth's keen eyes were watching as the being was struck hard by the two forms of attack.
"That's what you get for burning me, you fucking thing!"
Blackfur couldn’t handle much more. His mask was shattered. His teeth and jaws were black and burnt. Half of his fur was charred away, and puddles of his own blood filled the cracks of the streets. Every movement, every breath was like an overwhelming inferno that sent his body into a blaze of shattering torture. His cero had drained him, forcing the ambitious wolf to reach the brim of his limit.
There wasn’t much left…
Just…
“I’m going to bite your head off, skinny boy!!”
With an extraordinary roar, the hollow wolf hurled its body at the Cerberus agent in a final attempt to snap his jaws over his face and slash the human’s chest to shreds.
[133/1,431]
Go ahead and give the final blow, moonilicious <3
There comes a moment when one must realize that the current plan is failing and a change is needed. For Darius this moment came just a little too late. He should have taken a clue that what he had expected and to some degree hoped for, simply did not exist within this particular Titan. Now within seconds of his life being terminated prematurely, Darius pulled a complete one-eighty in the mental war zone.
Nearly screaming on all of the levels of the titan’s mind he had perused though, one extremely heated idea exploded from Darius’ mind at the idea of being killed. It rocket down his arm and blasted at the mind as if the very notion had been fired from a howitzer at point blank range. The suggestion was by all means a single word command in a desperate bid to take control of the titan. So forceful was and driven the notion was that Darius even without realizing it yelled the command as well.
Seeing that an agent had already engaged the evil toadstool, Kumakichi turned his attention toward its friend. When the titan struck at Ciro's puppet, Kumakichi made his move. He pulled the orb launched previously back to himself, while generating another metal sphere. Now armed with three of his globes, the teenager rushed towards the masked beast. He sent two spheres hurtling toward the creature, once again holding one back.
If his aim was true, the titan was in for a serious headache.
“You want me to… stop?” The lithe hollow snickered in utmost delight. "Thought you could... control me?" More and more thrill ripped up from the manic hollow's lips. “Silly businessman. Try as you might, but you DON’T HAVE that power!!!”
Laughing hysteria into the sky, Deathcap plunged and drove his sharp, twisted leg straight into the human’s heart. Impaling all the way through his chest, the hollow cackled and continued to curl the organ around his black, bloody limbs, widening and deepening the gap catalyzed by the man’s own stupidity.
-
Just as the pipe came around, a heavy metal sphere whirred through the air and knocked Shackles off his feet. The ghoul fell backwards, abdomen sore from the massive weight. He heard several bones crack as a sneer slashed across his lips. Grunting as he pushed himself up, a spire of anger drove though him.
These humans… Always preventing me from using the full force of this pipe.
Thoroughly irritated, Shackles raised one slow eye to the intern in the background. “Two can play this game, boy.” Lifting his left hand and aiming it at the attacker, a rift formed in his palm followed by searing hot, red energy that emerged and burst ferociously in the direction of the naïve interrupter.
