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Silent Jury
Issue #10
by Tom Zjaba
Chapter 14
Rise of the Fallen One
In Justin Rage's office, Deacon is talking with a dozen of
his most trusted men. "Justin has taken off with his tail between his legs. This
is our opportunity to seize control of the empire." He looks at the men to gauge
their reactions. So far they are enthusiastic. "Men, we don't have long. The
enemy is coming fast. We need to grab as much cash, weapons and any other items
of value and get out of this building." This worries the men. Who are these
enemy and why are they running from them? And what could be so bad to scare off
Justin Rage. He is not afraid of anything or so they thought. One of the men
speaks up "Who is coming that is so bad it scared of Mr. Rage?" Deacon turns to
the man who is speaking and says "The Fallen One is coming. He is a demon from
another dimension." The men all look at each other. They have seen and heard
some far fetched things but a demon from another dimension. This is too much for
them to accept. Another man speaks up "I think we should stay and fight. There
is enough firepower in this building to beat anyone, even a demon from another
dimension." Deacon did not expect this. He figured they would blindly follow
him. They always did in the past. But what he did not take into account was they
followed him for fear of Justin Rage. It was not him they followed so much as
Justin Rage. But now that he is out of the equation, the men are thinking for
themselves and as Deacon is finding out, they are not coming up with good ideas.
While Deacon had plans for his own army, he decides it is best to let these guys
find out the folly of their actions. So he turns and says "Men, head to the
basement and get all the weapons you can find." The men all cheer and head
towards the elevator. Once they get aboard and head down, Deacon heads over to a
filing cabinet and moves it aside. Behind it is a safe built into the wall. He
knows the combination from watching Justin Rage do it. He used Justin's own
cameras to spy on him and get the combination. He slowly turns the locks until
he hears the final one open. He then pulls the handle and opens the safe. Inside
are the most precious belongings, ones that he was surprised were left behind.
These include Justin's black book of personal information on everyone of
importance in North Harbor. Also is a key ring with keys to various safety
deposit boxes and lockers around the city. The last thing is a stack of DVDs
that are in a case and marked "Important." He grabs all of them and smiles. He
just received the keys to the kingdom and now is headed out to reap his rewards.
In an instant, the team appears in front of the Rage
Building. The people around, are shocked by the sudden appearance of the group.
As the citizens of North Harbor have realized, when super powered beings appear,
it is time to disappear. Things get destroyed and people get hurt or even
killed. With the sight of the Silent Jury, the people on the street start
running away. At first this unnerves Robert. They are the good guys, the crowd
should be cheering them, not running away. But as he thinks about their earlier
battle with The One, he can understand the people's fear. But he has little time
to worry about the crowds as they see the enemy coming fast. Headed down the
boulevard, flying in the air is The Fallen One and his group. This is the first
that Robert and the girls have seen them in person. It is one thing to see him
on a monitor. There he almost looks like a creature from a horror movie. But
seeing him here in the flesh, Robert can really see how impressive he is. The
giant bat wings are flapping as he flies through the air. Next to him is Doctor
Warlock. Following behind them are five men and one woman that they have never
seen before. They are all dressed in garish outfits and carrying different
weapons. Robert does not like these odds. There are five people in his group,
seven if you count both of Daniel's familiars. He had hoped that when they
finally faced the Fallen One, it would be only him. If he is as formidable as
Daniel says he is, then they will have their hands full with him alone. But to
have seven other people helping him only makes this seem more like a massacre.
And not knowing who these other six people are in extremely worrisome. As The
Fallen One sees the Silent Jury, he flies down and lands a few feet from them.
The rest of his group follows suit and lands behind him. "Daniel, so this is
where you have been hiding." he says in a mocking voice. Daniel looks at him and
says "I never hid from you. I was brought here against my will." The Fallen One
laughs and replies "Only one as weak as you could be captured by these pathetic
creatures." Daniel laughs back as he responds "Are they the same pathetic
creatures that shredded your wings and forced you into hiding?" This angers The
Fallen One and he screams out "Do not mock me, guardian. Your power is not of
this world and you do not have the other guardians to protect you. Now step
aside as my battle is not with you." Daniel takes a step towards The Fallen One
and says "I will not step aside. I am here to stop you from harming anyone
else." The Fallen One turns to his team and says "I do not have time to waste
with such worthless foes. Men, it is time for you to earn your new powers.
Attack!" He then waves his hand and the six unknown adversaries charge at the
Silent Jury. The Fallen One and Doctor Warlock fly upwards and towards the Rage
Building.
Deacon looks out the window and sees the two teams prepare
for battle. He knows that he cannot go out the front door now and wonders how he
is going to escape. He decides to head to the basement and see if Justin Rage
has a hidden tunnel. As he heads down the elevator, he wonders if he should have
left with Justin. As much as he was tired of being second in command, it is
better to be #2 and alive. The elevator reaches the bottom and he hears some
strange noises. It sounds like gunfire and yelling. He hesitates to leave the
safety of the elevator. But he has to get out of this building before it is
destroyed. He opens the doors and sees his henchmen battling. They are shooting
at each other from across the room. "These weapons belong to us, we saw them
first." one of the guys shouts as he shoots some kind of experimental gun at the
other guys. There is a small explosion as the beam from the gun hits some crates
they are hiding behind. The men run as their barrier is disintegrated. So far
none of the guys notice Deacon who just stepped out of the elevator. He looks
around and decides it is best to get back in the elevator and take his chances.
He steps back in and sends the elevator back up to the penthouse at the top of
the building.
As the Fallen One and Doctor Warlock head upwards, Daniel
takes off after them. The rest of the Silent Jury heads to battle these new
foes. A large man with a ridiculously large sledgehammer charges towards Robert.
The man appears to be in his early thirties and has tanned skin with long black
hair. He is wearing a hard helmet and looks to be very built. The hammer which
is almost as long as he is, glows blue. "Time to bring down the hammer, so says
the Foreman!" The man swings the massive hammer at Robert, who moves aside and
easily dodges the clumsily swung weapon. The hammer hits the concrete and
smashes through it, sending pieces of concrete flying in all directions. A small
piece bounces off Robert's armor. "Is that your best shot?" Robert says as he
activates his repel shield and sends The Foreman flying across the street. He
hits a parked car across the street and smashes into it, denting it in so far
that the side door is now where the driver would be.
Connie flies over and confronts a tall Hispanic woman. She
has long black hair that is in a pony tail and is wearing what looks like a
musketeer. She has on a white blouse with big puffy sleeves and gold buttons.
Her black pants are tight and taper down to bell bottoms. She wears a large
black hat with a red feather sticking in it. She carries a long rapier sword
that glows with the same blue hue as the Foreman's sledgehammer. She swings the
sword to make a big "D" with the trail of energy coming from the sword. "The D
stands for the Duelist, it also stands for death as you will soon experience."
With this she takes a wild swing at Connie who quickly puts up a shield that
easily stops the blow. The Duelist then takes another swing, only to find the
same shield halting her. Frustrated, she stops for a second to ponder her next
move. This is the opening Connie needs and she shoots a blast at her. Not
expecting it, she takes the full brunt of it, knocking her down. She then
struggles to a sitting position and looks at Connie who has her hands facing
her, ready to blast. Instead of attacking her head on, she takes her sword and
sticks it in the ground. As the sword enters the concrete, it begins to glow
brighter than before. This distracts Connie who is wondering what is going on.
Before she can figure it out, a blast of blue energy shoots up from the ground
below her and sends her flying. She does not go far as the Rage Building is
behind her and it stops her flight with a hard thud. The Duelist then stands up
and pulls her sword from the concrete and smiles.
A behemoth of a man heads towards The One. He stands a good
ten feet tall and is as thick as a redwood tree. He carries a giant club which
also glows blue. He is dressed in a plaid shirt and blue jeans and has a long
blonde hair and a flowing beard. Each of his steps shakes the ground as he walks
across the street. "Move aside metal man, you cannot stand up to the might of
the Myth." He then swings his massive club which hits The One right on the top
of his head. The blow is hard and loud as the sound of the impact reverberates
through the city. But it does little to faze The One who easily shrugs it off.
The Myth is surprised by what little impact it had. The One then walks up to the
brute and punches him with a big steel fist. While he hits with great force, it
also does little to affect the Myth. He also shrugs off the hit and laughs. "I
see we are evenly matched. Time to change that." After he says that, he lifts
his club and points it up towards the sky. His whole body starts to shake as he
begins to grow. Within seconds, he doubles in size to over twenty feet tall. The
club also seems to grow with him. The One is watching in shock at the whole
thing. He has never seen a man who can will himself to grow larger. Once The
Myth is done growing, he looks at The One and says "Goodbye little man." He then
swings his enormous club and hits The One with a force that even he cannot halt.
The impact of the club knocks him off his feet and sends him flying through The
Rage Building. He flies through one wall after another as nothing seems to stop
his flight. He is then literally sent through the building, crashing out the
other side, where he hits a bus and knocks it over. This finally stops his
movement as he is imbedded into the side of the bus. He struggles to get to his
feet. The blow does knock him for a loop. As he rises, he shakes his head and
turns to look at the bus. He sees people in the bus struggling to get out. He
walks over and lifts the bus up and puts it back on all four wheels. He then
rips the door off the bus and the people hold back and wait. They are fearful of
him and do not want to come out. Not knowing what to do, he just walks back
towards the battle. After he has disappeared into the hole in the building that
he made, the passengers start to slowly come out. One by one they emerge from
the damaged bus and stop to look at the huge dent in the side of the bus. They
all look around and luckily no one was seriously injured. A few people have cuts
or bruises, but they all walk away from the accident.
Vanessa is going after a man who is dressed as a Mime. He is
wearing gloves that have that familiar blue glow and his face is painted white
with red lips and black paint around his eyes.. He is wearing a traditional
beret and a striped shirt. She lands in front of him and says "Let me guess, you
are the Mad Mime?" He smiles and shakes his head no. He then draws a box in
front of him and smiles at her. "OK clown, let's get this over with." she says
as she flies towards him. As she gets within a few feet of him, she hits what
seems like an invisible wall with a loud and painful thud. This knocks her to
the ground. As she lays there, the mime draws a baseball bat, which appears in
the blue glow. He takes the baseball bat and starts hitting her with it. The
blows are easily absorbed by her armor but it still rattles her. She still has
not completely recovered from hitting the wall. She rolls over to avoid any more
blows with the baseball bat. But the Abstract Artist, as he is known as,
continues to hit her with the glowing bat. She gets hit again as she tries to
get away. As the Abstract Artist comes for another swing, she turns on her
shields and the blow is easily stopped. She keeps the shields on as she rises to
her feet with the Abstract Artist continuing to pound on her shield. She smiles
and says "My turn." She then drops the shields and blasts the mime, knocking him
over. She laughs and says "Get up you clown." Instead of getting up, he draws a
circle on the ground and jumps into it. Vanessa is shocked and goes over to see
where he disappeared to. Little does she know that a circle appears behind her
and he jumps out. He then draws a lasso and starts to swing it. She turns around
just as the lasso flies over her. Before she knows what hit her, she is tied up.
But before she can break free, she is hit with a large beam of energy that
knocks her over. As she hits the ground, she struggles with consciousness. She
looks up with her heavy eyes and sees a man in a miner's helmet. He is looking
at her and then another beam of energy comes out of his helmet and knocks her
out.
Before Robert can go finish off The Foreman, a crazed looking
man jumps in front of him. He looks like an ordinary man with no special powers.
"Leave him alone or you will deal with me." the man says. He has a head of wild
brown hair that is long and messed up. He is ill shaven and has an insane look
in his eye. He is wearing a blue glowing necklace. "Move aside or I will hurt
you." Robert says as he takes a step towards him. "You may be able to beat one
man, but can you defeat the power of the Mob?" With this, the man turns into
fifty men. They all look like the original and are look insane. They all then
scream in unison "The Mob Rules!" With that, the wave of men pours over Robert.
He is overwhelmed by the sheer mass of men and falls back under the weight of
the mob. As he struggles under the pile, he screams "Langston, repulser rays
now!" With that, the repulser rays are turned and the mob is pushed back. He
struggles to keep them off as they keep coming back. But they finally stop their
assault for a second. The Mob then look at him and yell in unison "The Mob
Rules!" Once again, the number of men doubles into an army of a hundred crazed
men. And like before, they swarm at Robert. This time he decides to use the
freeze ray that was just installed in his armor. He touches the button and
shoots out a stream of ice that envelops the men. The first wave of the mob is
quickly trapped in ice to their waists. This slows them down for a moment. But
instead of stopping them, then once again yell out "The Mob Rules!" and once
again their numbers double. And the men who were stuck in ice are freed as two
men now occupy the space that was once filled by one man. This forces the ice to
break and frees the trapped mob members. Realizing this is a losing effort,
Robert takes to the air, hoping these guys cannot fly. As he looks down, he sees
the Mob is now heading towards the other team members. "Langston, any ideas how
to defeat the Mob?" There is a moment of silence as a beam from the armor scans
over the wave of men. It then stops on a single man. "This is the main man,
knock him out and the rest will go away." Robert then sends a stream of ice down
on his target and within seconds, he freezes him into a block of ice. Once he
blacks outs, the rest of the mob disappears. All that is left is a single frozen
man. Robert breathes a sigh of relief and says "Thanks Langston!" Langston
merely replies "Only doing my job, sir."
Flames burn a large hole into the side of the Rage Building.
The intense heat melts through the glass and steel walls that protect the
offices of Justin Rage. Once a large sized hole is made, The Fallen One and
Doctor Warlock enter the building. As they walk in the empty offices, they look
for the man who betrayed them. They are here to show him the error of his ways.
The Fallen One turns to Doctor Warlock and asks "Is the one we seek here?"
Doctor Warlock closes his eyes and mumbles a phrase. A large glowing eye appears
over his head and slowly turns to the left and then the right. Once it is
finished looking around, the eye disappears. Then Doctor Warlock opens his eyes
and answers "No, he has left. But his second in command remains." The Fallen One
looks around and then answers "Where is the one that remains? We will exact our
revenge on him." Doctor Warlock points downward and says "He is on the ground
floor, in the lobby." The Fallen One then aims his hands at the floor and shoots
a blast of fire that engulfs the floor and burns a hole. But the flames do not
stop there. Floor by floor, they burn their way through until they reach the
bottom floor. There the flames stop as if they had a mind of their own. It takes
a few seconds for the flames to die down and reveal a wide hole in the floor.
The Fallen One looks down the hole and then flies down through the freshly
burned hole until he reaches his destination. Doctor Warlock prepares to follow
him down when is attacked by a volley of magical arrows. The shower of magically
glowing arrows hits and stuns him as he was not expecting the attack and did not
have time to counter it. He is knocked over and finds his arms pinned to the
ground by the magical arrows. He looks up at his attacker and sees Daniel
floating towards him. "Fool, you cannot stop us." he says to Daniel. He then
mumbles a spell and a glow comes over his body and dislodges the arrows that had
him pinned down and sends them flying in every direction. Being freed, he leaps
to his feet as Daniel throws his familiar statue of Damien at him and it
instantly turns into the large gargoyle. As Damien transforms, he is already in
flight and heads right at Doctor Warlock. The speed of the gargoyle is too much
and he is upon Doctor Warlock before he can throw a spell. The two lock into
mortal combat as Daniel heads down the hole after The Fallen One. This is a
battle he has waited for. He fears the power of The Fallen One but has wanted to
take him down for a long time. As he reaches the bottom, he sees the demon
moving towards a cowering Deacon. "Tell me where your boss went and I may end
your life quickly." he says as he walks towards Deacon, who is hiding behind the
main desk in the lobby. Before he has a chance to answer, Daniel screams "Leave
the human alone and challenge me." The Fallen One turns his head to see Daniel
and laughs "You dare challenge me? You do not have the other wizards to protect
you." Daniel readies his hands and says "I do not need them." The Fallen One
laughs out loud "All four wizards could not defeat me, what chance do you alone
have?" Daniel then raises his hands and sends out a blast of white light which
engulfs The Fallen One. For a moment he is completely covered in the white light
and he appears to be in pain. The white light does hurts him, but it does little
to stop him. He shakes off the effects and replies "Your holy light has little
effect on me in this world. Let's see how strong your defenses are." He then
sends a blast of fire at Daniel who quickly gets up a shield to block the flood
of flames. The flames do burn the furniture and other items in the building as
they go around Daniel's shield. Deacon tries to move away as the flames are
burning the building and heading towards him. Just as Daniel prepares to attack,
he gets a message from Gadget. "Daniel, come back to HQ, we are ready." Daniel
replies "It has to wait, I am in the middle of a battle." There is a pause and
then Gadget says "It cannot wait. Come now." With the distraction, The Fallen
One flies over and plows into him, knocking him into a lobby desk where Deacon
was hiding only minutes ago. The two of them slam into it, smashing the wood
desk into splinters and setting it on fire. As Daniel is pinned to the ground by
the sheer weight of The Fallen One, he raises his hand and prepare to stick his
claws into Daniel's neck. Before he can inflict more harm to Daniel, he feels
something grab him by his wings and pulls him off with great force. Before he
can find out his attacker, he is tossed across the room and smashed into a wall,
smashing through it. Daniel looks up and there is The Fury who offers him a
hand. He helps him up and he says "Go to HQ, I will take care of him." Daniel
looks at him and says "Who are you and how do you know?" He looks at him and
says "No time for explanations, just go!" He then flies towards the hole where
the Fallen One just flew through. Daniel, against his better judgment, teleports
back to headquarters.
Silent Jury © 2006 Tom Zjaba
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