Hjorimir
Adventurer
[size=+1]Paradigm Shift: Vol. 1, Issue 1, Part 1[/size]
Southwest United States, Mojave Desert
Zariel Greystoke raced down the highway on a sleek, black crotch-rocket motorcycle, his long dark leather coat snapping in the cool night air behind him.
Five long months on the case and I finally get a lead. Maybe I’m biting off more than I can chew…but that has never stopped me before. All these reports of some military strike teams taking people out of their homes (yet conveniently there have been no leads on any of the missing person cases headed up by the FBI).
Zariel turned off of the highway to a somewhat discreet service road apparently going nowhere.
But, according to those delivery drivers some kind of facility was built out here. Maybe it is nothing.
Wheeling his head to the sky, Zariel caught glimpse of a man flying high overhead.
Then again…
Stashing his bike behind a group of rocks, Zariel sat down, cross-legged, in the sand. After taking a brief moment to focus his will he evoked the spell releasing his life essence from its sheath of flesh and blood to send it hurtling into the astral. His essence raced through the night sky to the flying man.
The man was powerfully built and wearing a tight-fitting indigo suit with a large, gray ‘V’ which rode from his shoulders down to his waistline. His mask was full-faced but allowed his hair to flow freely.
Isn’t that Venture? What is he doing here?
Venture dropped to a slow hover and looked down below him into the dark shadows of a rocky mountain at the desert edge.
I can’t see anything from here, but obviously Venture can. Zariel made a quick mental note.
Venture descended towards an area of the mountainside and appeared to be studying the terrain. After a few minutes of visual investigation lead nowhere, he made the decision to land and search a bit closer. He released himself from flight only to fall straight though the rock. “Aaaaa!” Landing with a resounding THUD some forty feet below.
A hologram, Venture determined.
Quickly he sprang to his feet and made his way behind the cover provided by a row of black hummers parked nearby. There he scanned the area spotting four high-security hangers, a series of three helipads with some kind of military helicopters, off-road vehicles, and a communications tower; all of it being disturbing familiar to him.
Venture clenched his fists, his corded muscles surging. Please, let her be here.
Zariel had seen enough. He raced back to his flesh-body and rejoined his soul. Standing up he started to focus his Psyche on the facility ahead.
Three soldiers emerged from the central security hanger. Garbed in dark fatigues, Kevlar vests, comp-linked helmets and state-of-the-art machine guns and started to search the compound.
Oh @#$&! Venture quietly floated deeper behind the vehicles narrowly avoiding detection. After a brief survey, the three men reentered the building.
Looking around further Venture discovered an airway shaft sealed off by a heavy metal grate. He smirked as he considered it and then proceeded to roll it back like a tortilla.
RRAAAAANK!
He quickly floated down into the shaft, guided by the soft glow of service lights, and started his search.
Zariel, with the image of the facility’s front lot clearly in his head, wrapped his coat tightly around himself and stepped ever so delicately into the Nightlands.
Ignoring the confronting darkness and emotions that haunted the realm, he slid over distance almost instantly and reemerged into the Material. It didn’t take him long to locate the now open airway. With a sigh, he let himself drop to the bottom, coming to a crouch as he landed. A lesser man’s knee would have shattered with such an impact.
A brief wave of motion, far ahead, caught Zariel’s attention. Sneaking his way forward he came upon Venture who had stopped down a side airway and was looking into the bluish-sheen of a force field barring his advance.
“How are you planning to get past that?” Zariel said, announcing his presence in a high-British accent.
Quickly Venture whirled upon Zariel, “Who are you? Never mind, there is no time for that and you’re obviously not a guard.”
“Quite right, sir. As a matter of fact I am here looking for victims of the recent kidnapping epidemic that seems to have found its way through California.” Zariel proclaimed.
Venture eased, “Well looks like we’re working together for now.”
“Very well, take my hand.” Zariel extended his open hand to Venture.
Hesitantly, Venture took Zariel’s hand.
Quickly, Zariel’s long black coat reached out and enveloped him in cold darkness. Venture felt himself stretch to impossible distance and his Psyche reeled with shadowy figments that clawed at his soul. Then, as quickly as it started, it was over. He briefly shook his head, as everything he saw seemed to bob up and down. He prepared to strike the Englishman. But then he noticed he was now beyond the force field in the same airway.
“How?”
Zariel smiled. “We had better hurry.”
The pair made their way further into the complex airway system. Vents looked down upon various rooms that were unoccupied. But one room caught Zariel’s attention.
“I see dead people. Lots of dead people.” Zariel sighed.
Venture floated back to him and looked down, “A collection of experiments gone wrong.”
“Experiments! What the hell are you talking about?!?”
“Failed experiments involving gene-splicing in an effort to introduce an x-gene in order to induce mutation.” Venture explained.
“How do you know about these things?” Zariel demanded.
“There is no time for that now. Let’s continue our search for the living, please.” With that Venture continued his search.
After a few minutes of searching Venture and Zariel found themselves looking down on a particularly large sub-basement. Through the bars Zariel spied a large tube filled with some kind of blue jelly. Hazily inside he could make out the form of a man.
“What is this place?” he inquired.
“A Splicing Nexus. There will be multiple subjects below. It is a kind of laboratory for Operation: Genesis.”
“Operation: Genesis?” Zariel pried.
“Later, we need to help these people now.”
Venture slid his fingers through the bars and gave a short, quick jerk.
POP!
Tossing the bars aside, Venture and Zariel dropped down into the room. There were four subject-tubes in all. The first they had spotted was labeled “BRAWL.”
“Brawl is a DNA sequence they are toying with.” Venture explained.
Zariel nodded grimly. A woman had been labeled “SHEATH,” another man “BINARY,” and the last tube, totally enclosed, read as “BLAZE.”
“They know we’re here!” Venture exclaimed, standing in front of a computer terminal.
WHOMP! WHOMP!
Two heavy blows and Venture shattered the tube that held the BRAWL subject. He pulled a long breathing tube out of the man’s throat and deposited him on the ground to sit for the moment. Brawl's eyes dizzily opened, “Are we on set? Where the hell is my agent?”
The subjects of SHEATH and BINARY remained unconscious as they were pulled from their respective tubes by Venture. Zariel, finding a carelessly written password under a keyboard, unlocked the last subject-tube labeled as BLAZE. An explosion of light burst from the tube momentarily blinding everybody. Then, as quickly as it emerged, it dimmed as a man fell out of the tube to the ground.
Then the doors to the room exploded sending shockwaves throughout.
BOOOOOOM!
“GO! GO! GO! GO!” men were shouting. Laser sights cut through the smoke and fire seeking their targets.
Zariel picked up Sheath and made his way over to Binary shielding the both of them from the commandos as Brawl rolled for cover behind a large mainframe in the center of the room.
Automatic gunfire riddled Zariel’s back as he lay Sheath down. “Arrrrrrgh!” Damn that hurts!
Venture’s flight was too fast for the commandos to track and he was on them in a flash. Gunfire ripped back and forth in tight quarters but no bullet found its mark.
With his hands clung to the side of his head, Brawl yelled, “Where the hell is my agent!” Get a hold of yourself, David! Is this really a movie set? Where am I? What is going on? Man, am I ripped! Neat, chicks dig ripped guys! Why are people shooting at me?!?
Spreading the tails of his coat upon Sheath and Binary, Zariel slipped into the Nightlands once more; the three of them faded into shadow.
WHOMP! Venture sent one of the attackers flying across the room where he proceeded to slam violently against a wall and then, after a moment’s pause, fall unconscious to the floor.
Machinegun fire tore through the room, the mainframe Brawl hid behind flared and sparked under the assault. Okay, now I’m getting mad!
Brawl stood up and hurled a nearby computer chair at the gunmen missing completely. Upon impact with the wall, however, the chair exploded in to small chucks of metal and plastic. Wow!
BRRRRRRRAT! The soldiers continued their fire. Aaak, they’re still shooting! Brawl fell back into cover.
Bullets ripped into Venture that he promptly ignored.
CRUNCH! A double-handed hammer strike broke both shoulders of another soldier sending him to the ground in a heap.
Then Blaze came awake. With a flare of light he lifted himself from the ground. Freedom!
WHOOSH! His body surrounded in a nimbus of light, Blaze flew from the room up the airway.
Zariel laid Sheath and Binary next to his bike. Now to get the others out of there! Whirling his coat about himself he slid back into the shadows.
“We are not hurting this guy! Switch to AP!” shouted one of the commandos.
AP? Armor-Piercing! Forget that! “Time to go!” Venture swooped to Brawl and carried him up the airway as the men exchanged clips.
Venture dropped Brawl and proceeded to thunder upon the force field. No need for subtlety anymore!
THOOOOM! THOOOOM! The assault was more than the circuitry could endure and with a shower of energy the force field crumbled before Venture.
Then Zariel slid back into the room. For a moment he considered the situation. I am alone!
A terrible crossfire ensued as they all opened fire on him.
BRATATATATATAT!
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARG!” Zariel fell to his knees under the barrage. BLOODY HELL! Slowly, he stood back up.
“Ummmm, Sir? He is still moving!” one of the commandos squeaked pitifully.
“Gas him!” came the response.
Gas? I don’t think so! With a flurry he spun into the darkness of his coat and was gone to appear up in the airway near the others. “I think it is time to go.”
Venture nodded in agreement, grabbed up Brawl and Zariel and flew out of there with Blaze on his tail. Zariel directed them back to his bike where Binary and Sheath lay unconscious.
“I can’t carry them on my bike,” Zariel explained.
Blaze turned to venture, “Can you carry the bike?”
Venture nodded in affirmation.
“Great, I will get the others.” Blaze floated up and his body flared with light which enveloped Zariel and Brawl as well as the unconscious forms of Binary and Sheath who all started to fly along with him.
“Amazing!” Venture declared.
Like a shot through the night, the group of them fled the scene.
Southwest United States, Mojave Desert
Zariel Greystoke raced down the highway on a sleek, black crotch-rocket motorcycle, his long dark leather coat snapping in the cool night air behind him.
Five long months on the case and I finally get a lead. Maybe I’m biting off more than I can chew…but that has never stopped me before. All these reports of some military strike teams taking people out of their homes (yet conveniently there have been no leads on any of the missing person cases headed up by the FBI).
Zariel turned off of the highway to a somewhat discreet service road apparently going nowhere.
But, according to those delivery drivers some kind of facility was built out here. Maybe it is nothing.
Wheeling his head to the sky, Zariel caught glimpse of a man flying high overhead.
Then again…
Stashing his bike behind a group of rocks, Zariel sat down, cross-legged, in the sand. After taking a brief moment to focus his will he evoked the spell releasing his life essence from its sheath of flesh and blood to send it hurtling into the astral. His essence raced through the night sky to the flying man.
The man was powerfully built and wearing a tight-fitting indigo suit with a large, gray ‘V’ which rode from his shoulders down to his waistline. His mask was full-faced but allowed his hair to flow freely.
Isn’t that Venture? What is he doing here?
Venture dropped to a slow hover and looked down below him into the dark shadows of a rocky mountain at the desert edge.
I can’t see anything from here, but obviously Venture can. Zariel made a quick mental note.
Venture descended towards an area of the mountainside and appeared to be studying the terrain. After a few minutes of visual investigation lead nowhere, he made the decision to land and search a bit closer. He released himself from flight only to fall straight though the rock. “Aaaaa!” Landing with a resounding THUD some forty feet below.
A hologram, Venture determined.
Quickly he sprang to his feet and made his way behind the cover provided by a row of black hummers parked nearby. There he scanned the area spotting four high-security hangers, a series of three helipads with some kind of military helicopters, off-road vehicles, and a communications tower; all of it being disturbing familiar to him.
Venture clenched his fists, his corded muscles surging. Please, let her be here.
Zariel had seen enough. He raced back to his flesh-body and rejoined his soul. Standing up he started to focus his Psyche on the facility ahead.
Three soldiers emerged from the central security hanger. Garbed in dark fatigues, Kevlar vests, comp-linked helmets and state-of-the-art machine guns and started to search the compound.
Oh @#$&! Venture quietly floated deeper behind the vehicles narrowly avoiding detection. After a brief survey, the three men reentered the building.
Looking around further Venture discovered an airway shaft sealed off by a heavy metal grate. He smirked as he considered it and then proceeded to roll it back like a tortilla.
RRAAAAANK!
He quickly floated down into the shaft, guided by the soft glow of service lights, and started his search.
Zariel, with the image of the facility’s front lot clearly in his head, wrapped his coat tightly around himself and stepped ever so delicately into the Nightlands.
Ignoring the confronting darkness and emotions that haunted the realm, he slid over distance almost instantly and reemerged into the Material. It didn’t take him long to locate the now open airway. With a sigh, he let himself drop to the bottom, coming to a crouch as he landed. A lesser man’s knee would have shattered with such an impact.
A brief wave of motion, far ahead, caught Zariel’s attention. Sneaking his way forward he came upon Venture who had stopped down a side airway and was looking into the bluish-sheen of a force field barring his advance.
“How are you planning to get past that?” Zariel said, announcing his presence in a high-British accent.
Quickly Venture whirled upon Zariel, “Who are you? Never mind, there is no time for that and you’re obviously not a guard.”
“Quite right, sir. As a matter of fact I am here looking for victims of the recent kidnapping epidemic that seems to have found its way through California.” Zariel proclaimed.
Venture eased, “Well looks like we’re working together for now.”
“Very well, take my hand.” Zariel extended his open hand to Venture.
Hesitantly, Venture took Zariel’s hand.
Quickly, Zariel’s long black coat reached out and enveloped him in cold darkness. Venture felt himself stretch to impossible distance and his Psyche reeled with shadowy figments that clawed at his soul. Then, as quickly as it started, it was over. He briefly shook his head, as everything he saw seemed to bob up and down. He prepared to strike the Englishman. But then he noticed he was now beyond the force field in the same airway.
“How?”
Zariel smiled. “We had better hurry.”
The pair made their way further into the complex airway system. Vents looked down upon various rooms that were unoccupied. But one room caught Zariel’s attention.
“I see dead people. Lots of dead people.” Zariel sighed.
Venture floated back to him and looked down, “A collection of experiments gone wrong.”
“Experiments! What the hell are you talking about?!?”
“Failed experiments involving gene-splicing in an effort to introduce an x-gene in order to induce mutation.” Venture explained.
“How do you know about these things?” Zariel demanded.
“There is no time for that now. Let’s continue our search for the living, please.” With that Venture continued his search.
After a few minutes of searching Venture and Zariel found themselves looking down on a particularly large sub-basement. Through the bars Zariel spied a large tube filled with some kind of blue jelly. Hazily inside he could make out the form of a man.
“What is this place?” he inquired.
“A Splicing Nexus. There will be multiple subjects below. It is a kind of laboratory for Operation: Genesis.”
“Operation: Genesis?” Zariel pried.
“Later, we need to help these people now.”
Venture slid his fingers through the bars and gave a short, quick jerk.
POP!
Tossing the bars aside, Venture and Zariel dropped down into the room. There were four subject-tubes in all. The first they had spotted was labeled “BRAWL.”
“Brawl is a DNA sequence they are toying with.” Venture explained.
Zariel nodded grimly. A woman had been labeled “SHEATH,” another man “BINARY,” and the last tube, totally enclosed, read as “BLAZE.”
“They know we’re here!” Venture exclaimed, standing in front of a computer terminal.
WHOMP! WHOMP!
Two heavy blows and Venture shattered the tube that held the BRAWL subject. He pulled a long breathing tube out of the man’s throat and deposited him on the ground to sit for the moment. Brawl's eyes dizzily opened, “Are we on set? Where the hell is my agent?”
The subjects of SHEATH and BINARY remained unconscious as they were pulled from their respective tubes by Venture. Zariel, finding a carelessly written password under a keyboard, unlocked the last subject-tube labeled as BLAZE. An explosion of light burst from the tube momentarily blinding everybody. Then, as quickly as it emerged, it dimmed as a man fell out of the tube to the ground.
Then the doors to the room exploded sending shockwaves throughout.
BOOOOOOM!
“GO! GO! GO! GO!” men were shouting. Laser sights cut through the smoke and fire seeking their targets.
Zariel picked up Sheath and made his way over to Binary shielding the both of them from the commandos as Brawl rolled for cover behind a large mainframe in the center of the room.
Automatic gunfire riddled Zariel’s back as he lay Sheath down. “Arrrrrrgh!” Damn that hurts!
Venture’s flight was too fast for the commandos to track and he was on them in a flash. Gunfire ripped back and forth in tight quarters but no bullet found its mark.
With his hands clung to the side of his head, Brawl yelled, “Where the hell is my agent!” Get a hold of yourself, David! Is this really a movie set? Where am I? What is going on? Man, am I ripped! Neat, chicks dig ripped guys! Why are people shooting at me?!?
Spreading the tails of his coat upon Sheath and Binary, Zariel slipped into the Nightlands once more; the three of them faded into shadow.
WHOMP! Venture sent one of the attackers flying across the room where he proceeded to slam violently against a wall and then, after a moment’s pause, fall unconscious to the floor.
Machinegun fire tore through the room, the mainframe Brawl hid behind flared and sparked under the assault. Okay, now I’m getting mad!
Brawl stood up and hurled a nearby computer chair at the gunmen missing completely. Upon impact with the wall, however, the chair exploded in to small chucks of metal and plastic. Wow!
BRRRRRRRAT! The soldiers continued their fire. Aaak, they’re still shooting! Brawl fell back into cover.
Bullets ripped into Venture that he promptly ignored.
CRUNCH! A double-handed hammer strike broke both shoulders of another soldier sending him to the ground in a heap.
Then Blaze came awake. With a flare of light he lifted himself from the ground. Freedom!
WHOOSH! His body surrounded in a nimbus of light, Blaze flew from the room up the airway.
Zariel laid Sheath and Binary next to his bike. Now to get the others out of there! Whirling his coat about himself he slid back into the shadows.
“We are not hurting this guy! Switch to AP!” shouted one of the commandos.
AP? Armor-Piercing! Forget that! “Time to go!” Venture swooped to Brawl and carried him up the airway as the men exchanged clips.
Venture dropped Brawl and proceeded to thunder upon the force field. No need for subtlety anymore!
THOOOOM! THOOOOM! The assault was more than the circuitry could endure and with a shower of energy the force field crumbled before Venture.
Then Zariel slid back into the room. For a moment he considered the situation. I am alone!
A terrible crossfire ensued as they all opened fire on him.
BRATATATATATAT!
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARG!” Zariel fell to his knees under the barrage. BLOODY HELL! Slowly, he stood back up.
“Ummmm, Sir? He is still moving!” one of the commandos squeaked pitifully.
“Gas him!” came the response.
Gas? I don’t think so! With a flurry he spun into the darkness of his coat and was gone to appear up in the airway near the others. “I think it is time to go.”
Venture nodded in agreement, grabbed up Brawl and Zariel and flew out of there with Blaze on his tail. Zariel directed them back to his bike where Binary and Sheath lay unconscious.
“I can’t carry them on my bike,” Zariel explained.
Blaze turned to venture, “Can you carry the bike?”
Venture nodded in affirmation.
“Great, I will get the others.” Blaze floated up and his body flared with light which enveloped Zariel and Brawl as well as the unconscious forms of Binary and Sheath who all started to fly along with him.
“Amazing!” Venture declared.
Like a shot through the night, the group of them fled the scene.
Last edited:
