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Silent Jury
Chapter Nine After they make small talk, the group heads back upstairs. Damian the gargoyle carries Daniel up the stairs. At the top, Daniel is put into a chair to rest. Damian stands next to him as if to protect him. Once Daniel is confident that he is safe, he points his hand towards Damian and mumbles some words. A beam of light emerges from his hand and envelops Damian. In a few seconds, he shrinks into a small figurine and Daniel picks him up and places him in his pocket. "You should be more at ease now. I know how intimidating he can be." Robert is the first to speak up. "What were you doing frozen here?" he says with a puzzled look on his face. Daniel speaks "Dr. Warlock summoned me from another plane. He had some device that could peer into other planes and somehow found me. He was a sorcerer much like myself, only he was much more of a novice. His magic was not organic, meaning it did not come from him but from enchanted items and books." Daniel moves in the chair to make himself comfortable and continues "While his magic was not organic, some of his magical items were quite powerful and very ancient. He used one such item to pull me here and immobilize me. He tried to make me his servant but my will and magic was to great for him to force me to do his bidding. So he froze me in the chamber you saw until he could find a stronger magic. And there I stayed until you came and released me." After the story, they all asked him different questions. Vanessa was the next to ask a question "What is your home like?" Daniel smiled at her and said "While I have not been out of this cavern, I am guessing our worlds are similar. My world is one of magic and nature. We lived in harmony with the earth and draw power from it. I was one of the many guardians that protected it." Vanessa then responded "You may not be so happy here. We are not so in harmony with our planet." Daniel gets a sad look on his face. Connie is next to ask a question "Now that you are free, are you going to return to your world?" Daniel puts his head down and says "I do not have the magical powers to do that. I have natural powers that come from the world. I do not have the power to travel to other planes." "That is so sad." Vanessa says as her and Connie go over and try to cheer him up. After they both give him a hug, Charlie is the next to speak up "What is Damian?" Suddenly Daniel's face lights up. He reaches in his pocket and pulls out two figurines. One is Damian and the other looks like a larger rock monster. "These are my familiars, so to speak. They are enchanted statues that can be summoned in a moment's notice. Every mage has at least one familiar. The longer you are one, the more likely you will get more familiars." He then looks at them and says "So what happened to Dr. Warlock and who are you?" Gadget speaks up first "Many years ago, we were battling Dr. Warlock and his cult. When it looked like everything was doomed, he had his followers all poison themselves along with him. But that was nearly twenty years ago." Daniel has a puzzled look on his face as he says "I have been frozen for that long." His mood suddenly changes. "I wonder what has become of my world?" He says as he lowers his head. Connie speaks up "It's only twenty years, it should still be there." Daniel raises his head and says "There is a delicate balance of good and evil on my world. Without me there, that balance has been shifted. Who knows what may have happened." He then lowers his head and fights to hold back the tears. The girls come over to comfort him and with some urging, he has a long cry. The next day, Daniel wakes up and feels better. As he gets out of bed, he can move freely once again. He put a cure spell on himself the night before and it has done wonders. As he rises from bed, he looks around and smiles. While he barely knows these people, he can sense they are trustworthy people. His magic gives him the ability to see a person's aura and it is easy to tell if they are good or bad by the color of their aura. Good people have an almost yellow glow around them. Bad people have a dark red glow. While it is invisible to the average person, a mage can easily see it. And unlike your appearance or what you say, the aura is never wrong. None of the people that found him glows red. They all have a yellow or near yellow glow. Vanessa and Charlie have the least yellow glow, but it is still in the range of good. Gadget has the brightest glow with Robert and Connie very close. It is so much different than Dr. Warlock who glowed a blood red. Never had Daniel ever seen someone who was so purely evil. While his henchmen were various shades of red, none were close to his color. As Daniel makes his way to the main room, he is greeted by the gang. He quickly realizes that he is the last one awake. Realizing that he needed the sleep, they let him sleep in. There was no pressing matters, so they let him rest. As he walks in the room, Connie looks over and says "You look to be much healthier today." He smiles at her and responds "Yes, I feel allot better. A good night's sleep and a healing spell and I feel like a new man." That last statement is enough to catch Charlie's attention. While he is a man of science, he heard of the power of magic. He asks Daniel "Where does your magic come from and how did you learn it?" Daniel laughs as he replies "I forget that magic is a lost art on this world. Magic is something that all people on my world are born with. Most never bother to harness it as it is hard work, but a select group of us train daily." While this technically answers Charlie's question, it only creates a greater hunger for knowledge. He must know more of this magic and continues with his inquiries "So how many spells do you know and how often can you use them?" Daniel walks over and grabs an empty glass that is sitting there. "Think of my body as this glass. When I had a full night's rest, my magic level is full, like this cup." He then does a spell to fill the cup with water. "As I do spells, the level goes down." He then pours out some of the liquid that gravitates in the air. "When it is empty, I cannot do anymore spells." The glass is now empty and he makes the water vanish. "Spells use varying amounts of magic, depending on their complexity. My body knows when it is getting low as I feel the magic leaving my body." He then looks at Charlie who is soaking this all up like a sponge. "Also, the more I use my magic abilities, the more spells I can cast. Like a muscle, it grows bigger with use." Before Charlie can ask anymore questions, Gadget interrupts them. "I think we are being called into a trap." Everyone rushes over to the view screens to see what Gadget is looking at. As predicted, there are four men hijacking a brinks truck and they are wearing very identical armor to theirs. The biggest difference is their armor is all black and looks more menacing with spikes on the shoulders and arms. They look like rejects from a heavy metal concert more than criminals. "Think they are luring us to a trap or are they trying to figure out what safeguards you have?" Robert asks. Without looking up from the monitor, Gadget answers "Justin Rage wants to see how his armor will hold up against ours. And he wants to see if we have a trick to counter it." Vanessa moves closer to her father and asks "We do have a trick to counter it, don't we?" Gadget looks up from the screen and smiles. Without saying anything, everyone feels more at ease. With that, the three of them rush over to put on their suits. Back at Justin Rage's building, he heads to the basement. In the secret level that is only accessible from his private elevator, he enters the labs where all his weapons are made. As he makes his way through the maze of machinery, he comes across The Deacon who is with the scientists. Inside a giant glass chamber is The One. He is pounding on the glass, trying to get loose. The glass is sound proof, so they do not hear his pleas. As Justin Rage walks into view, they all stop and turn around to greet him. As much as they all fear him, they know he pays their wages and deserves their respect. "Are you ready to start?" he says as he walks over to the glass chamber. The One looks down at him and screams something. "I could use a chamber like this down at City Hall." They all laugh at his joke. They always do. The scientists rush over and say "Are you sure you want to go through with this? It is very dangerous." Justin keeps looking at the chamber and says "We owe our good friend here a reward. So let's give it to him. Turn on the sound in the chamber, I want to hear this." One of the scientists turns on the internal microphone and he hears The One screaming "You lied to me. Let me out of here." Justin just smiles at the mammoth man and says "You are about to get your reward. You do want your reward, don't you?" The One smashes both of his gigantic fists against the glass and screams "I want to be free. That is all I want." Justin smiles at him and answers "You will be very shortly." He then motions for the scientists to begin. They hit a few buttons and turn a few dials and soon an overhead chamber opens up and out pours what looks like metallic rice. As the stuff falls in the cage, it comes to life. It soon envelops The One and he screams out in pain as he falls to his knees. The giant of a man curls up in a fetal position as the tiny creatures crawl all over his. His screams can be heard throughout the basement. Justin just laughs. He then turns to the scientists and asks "So will these nanobytes kill him or will he be transformed?" One of them steps forward and sheepishly looks at him as he answers "It is untested on humans, so we can only speculate. But if all goes as planned, he should emerge stronger than ever." Justin keeps looking at the man as he is devoured by these miniscule creatures. "I guess will have to wait and see what happens." The other scientist steps in and says "You do realize they are changing his whole physical structure. He will not be human anymore." Justin turns to him and asks "What will he be then?" The nervous scientist responds "Something much more than human. A monster, if you will." Justin smiles and responds "That is exactly what I want." As the three of them go for their armor, they realize it is different. While it looks almost the same, it is not exactly the same. "Did you change our armor again?" Robert says as he looks at his armor sitting there. Gadget smiles and says "You will find a few minor changes. The first difference is he notices how much quicker the armor goes on. It almost goes on by itself. It only takes a few minutes to suit up. A big difference from the cumbersome armor he first flew in. As he puts on the helmet, he hears the familiar voice of Langston. "Welcome back Robert" he says as he turns on all the systems. "Langston, what is new?" Robert asks. "The armor features a repel field." Before Langston can finish with the new features, Robert asks "What is a repel field?" Langston then answers "It works like a force field. IT will repel anything in its field or anything that will hit the field." Robert smiles as he says "Very nice." As they get dressed and ready to go, Daniel comes over and says "Let me go along." Gadget steps up and says "I don't think that would be a good idea. You have no idea what you are getting yourself into." Daniel responds quickly "If they really have replicated your armor, then you may be in more trouble than you think. I can guarantee they have nothing to counter my magic and that may be the difference." Everyone but Gadget agrees with him. Knowing he was outvoted, he reluctantly agreed to let him come along. As the three of them flew out of the cave, they go through a tunnel and end up coming out far away from the mountain. As they fly into the sky, they see Daniel casting a spell and soon he is flying alongside them. It is odd to see a man without armor in their group, but they have a feeling he will be fine without it. They quickly head towards the city, where the robbery is taking place. It takes over ten minutes for them to finally get to the scene of the crime. The brinks truck is gone and the police are there. Robert asks "Langston, do you have any idea where the brinks truck went?" After a few seconds, he answers "A warehouse by the docks. I will send up the coordinates." Robert answers "Langston, lead us there." With that, he takes over the armor and they fly towards the docks. Robert then asks Vanessa "How does Langston know where the brinks truck went?" As he listens, he hears her voice come through "Satellites tracked it." That made perfect sense, why didn't Robert think of that. Now how they got satellites in the sky and are able to use them is another matter. As they near the warehouse, a sense of dread overcomes Robert. He knows they are walking in a trap and wonder if even the repel field will save them. He hopes that Gadget has some more tricks up his sleeve as they may need it. The stop on a building next to the warehouse and Robert has Langston do a scan of the building to make sure they are there. Langston replies "The walls are lined with lead, so I cannot see what is inside the building. But satellite surveillance shows they entered the building and no one has come out." This makes Robert even more nervous. Is this building set up to keep out surveillance because of illegal activity or for another purpose? That purpose being a trap. Against his better judgment, Robert orders the team to stay together and to storm the main door. As much as he wants to use stealth, he expects a trap and feels they have a better chance staying together. As they approach the door, Robert uses his blasters to smash the door down. The large metal door falls with a loud thump. Inside, there are four men in armor who are unloading the money from the brinks truck. They turn and see the Silent Jury and stop what they are doing. Robert yells out as the team enters the building "Give up now and make things easy on yourself." The men look at each other and then one of them shoots a blaster at the group. Instinctively, they fly off in different directions to avoid the energy blast. When the entire group is in the building, a different door comes down and closes in place of the damaged door. This one is much heavier and has a reflective surface. Then the lights in the building all come on and flood the room with light. The previous dimly lit building is now illuminated with light and they now see that the room is also filled with men in armor suits. Instead of the four that were there before, there are now over twenty men. And they all are wearing matching black armor. It was a trap as Robert expected. Before the team can assess the situation, blasters are shooting from all directions. Vanessa manages to escape the blasts but Robert and Connie are hit. Both get knocked down. Daniel easily makes a mental shield to block the blasts. As Robert tries to get up, three of the men fly over and start beating on him. He is unable to get up so he screams for Langston to activate the repel shield. As the shield is activated, the surprised men are thrown across the room. One of them runs into another of the attackers and renders both of them unconscious. Vanessa is hiding behind the brinks truck and trying to blast anyone she can. As she is trying to keep from being hit, one of the men fly under the truck and lift it up. Suddenly she is very exposed and all at once, she is hit with numerous blasts. Within seconds, she is knocked unconscious. Sensing the need for help, Daniel reaches in his pocket and pulls out Damien the gargoyle and Ozmodeus the Golem. He throws both figures down and within seconds, the grow to full size. Daniel yells out "Attack!" and within seconds Damien is ripping an armored foe out of his armor. As this is happening, one of them calls to Justin Rage "Boss, there is some guy who created two monsters." There is a few moments of silence and then he hears "What the hell are you talking about?" The guy responds as he cowers in a corner and watches as the golem smashes one of his friends into the ground. "I have no idea boss, some guy in a weird costume pulled a demon and a giant rock guy out of his pocket and they are destroying our team." Once again there is a few moments of silence and then Justin Rage's voice comes over the headset "I am sending in the big guns, get the men out of there." As this is happening, Robert has returned to his feet and is back in the fight. He sees that Daniel could use some help and flies over and hits one of the attackers in the back. The man is not expecting it and Robert runs him into a wall. Within seconds, he goes limp as Robert has knocked him out. He then turns and yells "Langston, send a volley of missiles at those guys to the left." After he finishes his sentence, four missiles fly out of his armor and go after two men who are flying off. As they turn to see the missiles, they are too late to blast them out of the air and are hit square with one missile and then the other one. Two more men fall to the ground. What's left of the group are now flying to the ceiling and trying to make an escape. As they fly off, Damien goes after them with bloodlust in his eyes. While he has not killed anyone yet, he has managed to seriously wound a few. And his claws have sliced the armor to ribbons. As Robert looks at the carnage left behind, he is glad that Daniel is on his team. Up until now, Daniel has let his familiars fight for him. But now he decides to take matters in his own hands. As the men near the top of the building, Daniel shoots a blast from his fingers of what looks like pure ice. Within seconds, the men are encased in ice and fall to the ground. When they hit the ground, the ice shatters and the men hit hard. They lay their motionless. Ozmodeus the golem is finishing off the last few men. While he is slower than the rest, one hit from him and they are done. Within minutes the danger is over. Robert heads over to tend to Vanessa and Connie. He reaches Vanessa first and has Langston scan her vitals. She is fine outside of some minor bruises. But it will be a bit before she is awake. She took quite a blow to the head and may have suffered a concussion. As he heads over to Connie, she is slowly getting up. He once again scans her vitals and finds her also in good shape. The new armor really does a good job of absorbing the blows. He helps Connie to her feet. "What happened?" she asks as she looks around and sees all the knocked out men. Then she sees the golem as he lumbers over. "What is that?" she asks with a sound of fear in her voice. "That is Daniel's other familiar, Ozmodeus the golem." She does not know what to say. Daniel comes over and Damien is right behind him. "Good thing I was here." he says as Robert nods in agreement. Without him, they would have been slaughtered. Before they have a chance to get out of there, the main door opens up. As it opens, the sunlight pours into the room and temporarily blinds the group. They squint to see what is next and the silhouette of a man floating in the air. He is just floating there staring at them. Then without any warning, he screams out "You smashed my Legos!" He flies into the room and with his mind, he throws Robert, Vanessa and Connie against the far wall. Each one hits with a force that they have not experienced before and were caught by surprise. They are also all knocked out. As the man comes into the room and sees Daniel there with Damien and Ozmodeus standing in front of him, he screams again "Why won't you leave my legos alone?" Daniel throws up a shield in the nick of time to block the psychic blast he sends at them. They are protected by the shield, but the brinks truck is thrown across the room as is any loose furniture. The truck is embedded into the far wall about five feet in the air. Daniel knows he must plan his next move carefully as this man is way beyond the power of their previous foes. He is also very unstable. He concentrates for a second and aims at the ground. A beam of light shoots into the ground and right underneath Psyclone, a blast of pure earth flies up and smashes him into the ceiling. While he is stunned, he was able to conjure a mental shield to block most of the damage. When the magic shield went down, Damien and Ozmodeus took off to battle Psyclone. Damien is upon him within a second and before he can stop him. His razor sharp claws tear into Psyclone's chest and makes him send out a scream so loud, it can be heard throughout the whole city. But as Damien quickly finds out, when you make Psyclone hurt, you pay. Along with that horrible scream is a psychic wave that shoots out and devastates everything in its path. First hit is Damien and he is thrown back in its force. Luckily his magic based body can withstand the blow. As the wave is shooting down towards the rest of them, Daniel flies as fast as possible towards the other three and conjures up the most powerful magic shield he can create. Within a second of creating it, the psyclone as it is called and how he got his name, rolls over them. The shield is taking the brunt of the attack, but is taxing Daniel's mind. Within seconds, it is gone and so is the building. They are buried in a pile of rubble and all Daniel hears is Psyclone as he screams "Leave my legos alone." He then flies off. As things get quiet, Daniel tries to expand the force shield and use it to move the rubble. But he soon finds himself too worn out to move the debris that has them pinned. He instead forces himself to maintain the shield that is now slowly closing on him as the pressure of the rubble is straining his powers. He knows if he loses the spell, they will all be crushed. While the others may or may not be able to withstand it in their armor, he will surely die. After a few minutes of quiet, he hears the rocks and metal of the pile moving. Slowly, he feels the weight of the rubble lessen. Then he sees Damien and Ozmodeus moving the rubble aside. While both look injured, with scrapes and cracks in their rock bodies, they are both still intact and are now working to free their master. Slowly, they clear the rubble aside and Daniel can finally end the spell. He then lays down and closes his eyes. His head hurts from the strain and he needs to rest for a few minutes. After a minute of resting, he hears sirens. While not sure what they are, he has an idea that they are not good. He slowly stands up and recalls his familiars back into his pocket. Both creatures shrink and go back into his pocket. He then looks at his teammates who are still unconscious and thinks. As he stands in the rubble, he sees people slowly coming around. They are running around like crazy reaching at paper that is falling from the sky. What he does not know is the money from the brinks truck was blown into the air and is now flying around the city. Hundreds of thousands of dollars are now flying around and it is attracting a crowd of people. He figures it is time to leave and he pulls the teammates together into a small area and performs a teleport spell. Within seconds, they all disappear from the destroyed building and end up back in the headquarters. Silent Jury © 2006 Tom Zjaba |
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