Wretched Joy 36 (Patreon)

Commissioned by southmonk

Wretched Joy

Chapter 36

-VB-

Jack knew that something was wrong. 

He’s been feeling it for months. 

It’s why he had been pushing his team away from the East Coast and deeper into the Appalachian foothills. 

“Uncle Jack!” 

“Yes, poppy?”

“Did you know that the Appalachians used to be as tall as the Himalayas?” 

He blinked and looked at her. “Really?”

“Yup! It’s been so stable that it just eroded down to what it is today.”

He thought about it. It was ironic. Mountains that were once rivals to the Himalayas cut down to what it was now? It was ironic. Now, he may not be the most well read villain out there, but he remembered that the Himalayas formed from the Indian subcontinent smashing into the Eurasian continent. 

“Well, poppy, that sounds like people to me!” 

“It does?”

He nodded. “Look at the people all around us.”

They did. 

The small town that they had visited lay dead at their feet. Or in the Siberian’s mouth. Or on Bonesaw’s impromptu medical table. 

“They were content with their lives. They didn’t struggle. All they did was follow a routine while the world changed around them. And then we came!” he proclaimed with the energy of a preacher. “None of them rose up to the challenge. Barely a few tried to run!” he chuckled. “And that’s what will happen to us if we let ourselves settle down. We’ll become stagnant. Dumb. Weak. Which is exactly why we have to keep moving around. We have to sharpen our skills and instincts, and we can’t do that if we just stay in one city. We’ll know every trick and trade of it.”

“Sounds about right,” Crawler grunted from where he laid on top of a dozen dead bodies. 

Jack nodded as the other members of the Nine agreed with him. “So we’ll keep moving. It’s to keep ourselves sharp and prepared for anything-.”

He tilted his head to the side… just as a loud bang echoed in the town square they were in and popped his tinkertech reinforced eardrums. Something wheezed by his cheek. In the next moment, he felt his face tearing from whatever had just passed by.

“Fuck!” he hissed as he rolled to the side. 

When he looked to see the damage, he saw Burnscar. Or rather, what remained of her after her entire chest had been obliterated. 

Then there was another bang. 

Too quick. Too fast! 

But he dodged it again.

Unlike before, this attack came after killing another one of his minions and splattering him with all of their innards.

And his eyes widened when he realized it was Bonesaw’s insides he got splashed by. 

The same insides that had her dead man’s switch contingency. 

He didn’t even feel what struck him in the left shoulder before the pain set in. 

It crescendoed and then peaked. 

The world was pain and the pain was him. 

Jack gurgled as he died, destroyed by his own protegee’s trap, but he didn’t die before he saw something absurd. 

He forced his froth-filled mouth to grin.

Because the entire world was going dark.

-VB-

One month.

I spent that entire month doing one thing: shoving every single power I gained each day into the Chained Nightmare Sickles. With almost seventy “points” stored in it, it was my most enchanted weapon so far, and it gave me the result I was looking for. 

Full control over its nightmare inducing ability was a given. 

No.

I managed to push the Chained Nightmare Sickles into touching something more sublime.

Domains. 

As corny as it might sound, my Chained Nightmare Sickles now possessed domains of their own. They were gods in the form of weapons, and I was their master. 

And their master wanted the site of Slaughterhouse Nine’s demise contained and shunted. 

As I stood up, the black physical-yet-not-quite barrier fully enclosed the entire town and the surrounding forest with a loud crash. And not too long after, the barrier flaked away into decaying particles. 

When the last bits of the barrier disappeared, all that was left of this once-sleepy town was a chasm that went down to the bedrocks. 

CRASH! 

I looked to my left and saw something white barreling toward me. 

The Siberian.

I clicked my tongue in distaste. “He survived?” I grunted irritably as the Siberian broke tree after tree in her charge toward me. Her eyes and lips showed rage. Hurt. 

Good. 

Both she and Manton deserved to suffer as their victims suffered. 

I tossed the tinkertech gun to the side and met her attacks with my sickles. 

And the moment her claws touched my sickles, she went slack. Her mind - whether it was a twisted human mind or that of the shard - dunked into nightmares of her own making.

I didn’t even bother to pop the projection. Instead, I teleported toward where she came from. 

And then I found it.

A white van.

I flew down from the canopies and slammed down into the front of the van. My feet crumpled the van’s hood and I glared at the man in its driver’s seat. 

Manton.

Looking worse than he did in the last public sighting of him but definitely him. He looked up at me in fear. 

Siberian did not reappear next to him.

Good. The Nightmares were keeping her busy.

I raised my sickles to kill him -.

And a single pistol shot rang out in the woods.

I didn’t even bother to look. 

My target was Manton. 

He died first. 

“Stop!” a woman shouted from the side. 

I didn’t care. 

My sickles shredded the aluminum roof and glass window. 

Its tips poked at his skin…

And then he fell.

Not fell to the side or forward but fell down as a crinkling rainbow-rimmed portal opened up underneath him. 

I sat there, frozen, as my prey got away. 

I slowly turned to look at the shooter and found none other than the fedora lady staring at me with a gun pointed my way. 

Contessa. 

“The Eye’s bitch is here,” I sneered. “And you now get in my way? You weren’t satisfied with the thrashing I gave Alexandria so you came back for me?”

“Manton is needed for the final battle,” she countered. “I can’t have you killing him.”

“I can also start killing every single person connected to you. I can invade Birdcage and end all of your weapons,” I snapped at her. “Is that what you want? Do you want to piss me off so much by appearing in my line of sight?”

She hesitated. 

“You have no idea what Scion can do. We don’t, either. We can’t afford to lose what little chance we have with those parahumans.”

I stared at her and lowered my arms. 

I was … so very close to saying “fuck it” and jumping at her. 

Actually, why didn’t I do that? 

“All but Sting is useless as far as direct weapons go,” I began.

And teleported. 

Contessa whirled around and kicked. 

Not to hurt but to push.

My eyes widened. 

Her push kick didn’t stop my sickles from nicking her, though.

She screamed in terror as she fell backward, and the Door opened up underneath her. She fell through and closed…

Just as another door opened up behind me. I looked and saw that it led to a desolate wasteland. 

Cauldron was trying to contain me. 

Stupid motherfuckers. Literally stupid. I was a fucking teleporter! 

So I teleported back to Earth Bet before the Door closed in front of me.

“You get one chance to stop, Cauldron!” I roared from wherever I landed. It was the same forest as before, if the chasm far away to my left was any indication. “After that, it’s war!” 

Silence. 

No more Doors opening. 

I took a deep breath in and let it out. 

Whatever. 

I got my video evidence I needed for both Slaughterhouse Nine’s death and Cauldron’s existence. 

I reached up to my chest vest and -.

I froze. 

I looked down. 

The camera.

It’s been shot.

I froze as I remembered.

Contessa should know better than to shoot me because she should know it wouldn’t do anything to me, but she shot anyway. 

She hadn’t been aiming for me or to distract me.

Her Path must have told her what I had planned. 

And removed the evidence. 

“MOTHERFUCKERS!”