Published at 12th of August 2022 9:14 pm

Book 2: Chapter 63: Revelation

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The parking lot was a biblical scene, Goliath towering over David. Radiance from on high illuminated the scene, an APD chopper with a large spotlight pointed at the center of the parking lot. It painted a misleading picture. Gregoir, in appearance alone, out massed Cannibal four or five times. The blonde officer was an easy six and a half feet tall, with arms like watermelons, a barrel chest, and legs like oak trees. His clothes hung in loose tatters, as if a pack of lions had used him as a scratching post, and his skin was covered in dry blood. He stood tall and straight-backed, and his fierce horseshoe mustache somehow glittered in the light.

Cannibal stood across from him. The villain was tall, but extremely emaciated, and adopted a hunched posture even when standing still. His arms were long, hanging so low as to brush his ankles, and his leg were slightly bent. His feet were bare, and Dan only now noticed toenails that were every bit as hooked as the villain’s fingers. The man’s shirt was completely gone, courtesy of Dan and friction. The man’s pants were hanging by a belt and a prayer, and Dan hoped they’d make it through the rest of the fight. Cannibal’s chest was painted crimson red and caked in filth. Between Gregoir’s blood, and the many times he’d been cast into the dirt, the man looked like a starving, homeless vagrant. He was also by far the more dangerous of the two.

It was a tense moment, broken up by the screaming commands of the APD chopper. Orders to stand down, to stand back, to lie down and surrender; rapid-fire orders were bellowed by loudspeaker and both combatants ignored them all. Gregoir by necessity, and Cannibal by choice. They had eyes only for each other, Gregoir’s face hard and stern, and Cannibal’s just shy of euphoric. The villain twitched first, his patience snapping like a frayed rubber band, and he leapt forward with a snarl.

The helicopter answered with the booming roar of gunfire, a stream of heavy rounds emerged from the nose of the gunship, intercepting Cannibal halfway to Gregoir. Tracers whizzed off the villain’s thick skin and scattered in every direction. Cannibal didn’t even slow down, crashing into Gregoir with all the force of a speeding train and taking the larger man off his feet. They rolled across the ground, a blur of limbs and blood, before Gregoir’s massive foot planted itself on the villains chest and heaved him skyward.

Talons bit deep and flesh tore; Cannibal was launched into the air trailing skin and blood. The gunship tracked his path, bullets impacting with nearly no effect, but the force driving the villain away from Gregoir. Cannibal landed in a crouch, one hand interposed between himself and the chopper, and the other tearing out a chunk of concrete.

The stream of bullets paused as the pilot realized what was coming. It spun sideways, exposing its wide profile, and the door slid open. Another officer, dressed in the armor of a SPEAR Team member, leaned out of the gunship and cast his arm forward, right as Cannibal’s hand blurred. The chunk of concrete snapped through the air and broke against a crackling golden shield, suspended across the chopper. The shield rippled upon impact, shrank into a similar sized ball, then launched itself back at Cannibal. The villain cackled, shattering the counter attack with a contemptuous backhand.

Gregoir closed the distance while his enemy was distracted, and caught Cannibal in a vicious clothesline. His meaty bicep carried the villain three full strides before slamming him down. The concrete shattered beneath the pair as Cannibal was driven through the foundations. Gregoir stomped his foe into the ground, pushing him deeper, then dashed backwards.

The gunship hovered above, angled down, and unleashed a storm of angry red fire into the pit. Dan watched the concrete melt, shattering into powder as trapped liquid violently evaporated. A rope dropped out of the helicopter, pooling on the ground, and a pair of SPEAR members slid down it to the concrete below. One of them held his hand out, projecting the same golden shield that had first protected the chopper. It followed the pair down, rippling from the intense heat billowing out of aircraft’s front end.

As soon as the pair touched down the fire ceased, and the shield quickly capped the superheated hole in the parking lot. The rope line leading to the chopper was retracted, its length zipping upwards, but a hand tore free of the concrete and latched onto its length. Cannibal ripped himself out of the ground, a full twenty feet from where he’d been pounded into it, one hand wrapped around the thick rope while the other dug into the ground. The officers shouted in alarm, one managing to unload his rifle in Cannibal’s face, but the villain disregarded it utterly. He yanked hard on the line, and chopper spun from the force. The rope snapped before the gunship could be brought down, but it spun low across the parking lot, while the pilot fought to regain control.

Cannibal casually swatted at the closest officer. The golden shield interposed itself between the two, and his claws raked against it. Cannibal twisted, planting a foot against the vertical pane, and launched himself across the parking lot towards the gunship. The shield shattered like glass, his foot impacting the officer’s torso with the strength of a cannonball, and Cannibal blitzed across the parking lot to leap up at the floundering aircraft. The pilot saw him coming, and managed to angle the tail rotor to intercept him. The blades caught Cannibal in the chest and exploded, knocking him downward at the cost of the chopper’s control. It spun, wildly out of control, as the pilot fought to crash it somewhere safe.

There were lights coming from the distant highway, flashing colors that danced against the horizon like red and blue fireflies. Dozens of police cars tore down the feeder road, towards the escalating fight. More lights lay beyond them, the bright white and yellow headlights of witnesses. Civilians were parked up on the overpass, the brave and the stupid watching the battle from what they assumed was a safe distance. In any other circumstance, spare officers would pull aside and drive them away.

There were no spare officers.

Gregoir bellowed in rage as he caught up to the villain. He seized Cannibal by the waist, his massive hand almost fully enveloping the emaciated villain, and slammed him repeatedly against the ground. There was a flash of dirty skin and sharp talons, and Gregoir’s left arm came free at the shoulder. Cannibal dropped to the ground, twisting like a cat, and lunged forward.

Gregoir did not even break stride. He seized his own arm before it could touch the ground, and swung it like a long iron. The limb was far meatier than any golf club, and the impact swatted Cannibal across the parking lot. The villain’s flailing descent ended against a massive pine tree, and the force of his flight uprooted the tall evergreen. Gregoir shifted his grip on his amputated arm, shoved it back into place, and strode forward grimly. He let go between steps, and his left arm flexed as it reattached itself.

Police cars began to pour across the long driveway leading to the motel. Cannibal took note, standing upright and seizing the downed pine. He lifted it with one hand, fingers biting deep into its trunk, and hurled it like a javelin at the lead vehicle, nearly a hundred yards away. The cruiser peeled out of the way, but the tree took its cohort through the windshield. The driver died instantly, and the tree continued forward, tumbling wildly across the path, before landing sideways and blocking a huge chunk of the entrance.

Cannibal turned to meet Gregoir, a smile on his face. He laughed giddily as he called out, “This might take a while!”

The villain’s back was to an empty field, a massive plot that would eventually go under construction. No cops other than Gregoir were in range of the man, and Gregoir was still striding across the parking lot. The highway was in the other direction, as were all the people.

Dan saw his chance, and he took it.

The anvil he’d stolen was moving as fast as the refrigerator before it, faster even, and out massed it by several times. Dan was frightened to go further; he didn’t know enough about physics to guess at what would happen if he let the thing accelerate for too long. He’d heard of kinetic weapons, rods from god, but knew virtually nothing about them. How fast was too fast? Dan didn’t know. But he wasn’t going to let that uncertainty stop him from trying to kill the monster in front of him.

He needed to be quick. The chopper was down, illumination was low. They were fighting beneath the moon and the gentle glow of distant headlights. Dan could be nothing more than a mirage, an eyeblink, but he had to act now. He appeared slightly above Cannibal the moment the man finished speaking. The anvil erupted from Dan’s veil, angled towards the ground, and Dan was gone in the very next instant. His Navigator pulled him to safety, obeying his will with speeds that Dan’s mind could not comprehend.

He reappeared on the roof of the motel, and immediately regretted not waiting. The noise was almost indescribable. A sharp, resounding crack accompanied by a blast of air that took Dan clear off his feet and sent his ears ringing. Every piece of glass within half a mile shattered, and the oncoming police cars all skidded to a halt. The ground quaked, and a plume of dirt, concrete, and debris rocketed skyward. The earth behind Cannibal cratered in the shape of a horseshoe, then crumbled like an avalanche. Dust filled the air, and everyone stopped moving.

Dan shakily climbed to his feet nursing his poor eardrums. He gazed in shock, pride and more than a little horror, at the devastation he’d caused. There was a very long pause, as officers began to pour out of their vehicles and secure the parking lot. Dan glanced towards where he’d seen the motel guests evacuating, a distant point in the complete opposite direction of the fighting. They grouped parallel to the freeway, huddled together like frightened herbivores, too far to see much of anything. An officer noticed them, and moved to shoo them further away.

Something shifted in the swirling dust beyond the parking lot. Gregoir shouted an alert, and APD officers fanned out across the lot, taking cover as if it would somehow help them. Dan saw no more SPEAR members; they were all dressed in the standard blue-black uniform of patrol.

The dust cloud drifted in the direction of Dan’s attack, away from the motel and its inhabitants. The wind carried it further, clearing away the thick visual noise. The open lot was a brown crater, filled with mulched earth and rock. There was a clear trench leading from where Cannibal had once stood, towards the center of the crater. Some clever officer brought a handheld spotlight, and shined it at the impact zone. Dan saw movement on the edges, and his heart sank.

Cannibal strode out of the dust, nude as the day he was born and caked in dust. His body was covered in dirt, hiding his pale skin and thin frame. Gunfire erupted the moment he stepped into view, bullets tearing at the earth caked onto his body. Great clods of dirt fell to the ground, and bits of stone fell from his hair as he completely disregarded the assault. A hand came up to his chest, wiping at it. The grit scrubbed away, revealing a small welt, no larger than Dan’s thumbnail.

Cannibal poked at the welt, and chuckled to himself. He held up his hands, seeming to surrender. The gunfire came to a stop.

“I think,” Cannibal said, his hoarse voice carrying across the parking lot, “that my job here is done.”

He turned to the freeway, to the distant mass of rubbernecking civilians, and pointedly waved.

“I’ll be going, now.”

Gregoir strode forward, his face a mask of pure rage. “You’ll be going nowhere, vile creature!”

There was a crackle like lightning, followed by a purple flash of light. The officers opened fire on Cannibal out of reflex alone, but the bullets collided with a dull blur. Three men appeared beside Cannibal where none had stood before. One dressed in bright spandex, patterned like the American flag. He held his hand out, fingers splayed towards the shooting officers. Bullets halted against a flat plane of force, vibrating furiously. Kinetic energy bled away, traveling through the flat pane like ripples in a pond. They continued to build, swirling and trembling, until the gunfire stopped completely.

The second man was clothed in a pinstriped shirt, purple on white, and black pants with suspenders. A huge cape billowed out from behind him that settled moments after landing. He stood in the back, lingering almost out of sight, his face concealed by a deep hood.

The final man stepped forward, past his companions, and Gregoir’s advance stuttered to a stop.

“Impossible,” Gregoir stated in what was, for him, an astonished whisper.

The man wore a tweed brown suit and matching tie, with polished black shoes and a black fedora. On his face was a silver Venetian mask that he managed to make look regal. Dan recognized this man from every history book he’d ever read. A man respected, admired, even by his enemies. A man whose moral character was beyond reproach. Dan recognized him, but the man, much like Cannibal, was supposed to be long dead.

The Champion of Chicago stood beside a mass murdering serial killer, and stared out at the assembled officers with an expression of profound disappointment.

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