Lillian Skinner dropped down hard on the picnic table. She rolled off but managed to regain her footing
“Hold the circle!” she yelled as she bolted back in
“Got it!” Dana Mclean replied holding her crystal in place with both hands.
On the other side of Dana stood Meagan Galloway and Naomi O’Neill Both were concentrating as hard as Dana to maintain the circle. The demon in the circle took another swipe at the girls again but this time his attack was blocked by the energy ring surrounding him. Lillian arrived back just in time and held her crystal back into the energy.
“Ready?” she yelled out to the others
The others nodded. All four of them began to chant in unison their Sumerian phrases affecting a small device placed in the center of the circle. The large demon howled at them and doubled his efforts to break free but it was no good. A moment later the runes inscribed on the device shot out a blinding gold beam of light. The girls looked away shielding their eyes but continued to chant. Just then there was an explosion and all four were throw backwards onto the ground.
Megan sat up painfully and straightened her glasses. The demon was gone and the small device lay inside a small ring of smoldering grass. Quickly she got to her feet and walked over to the device.
“I think we got him.” Megan said poking the device experimentally with a stick
“Thank Christ!” Naomi exclaimed pulling herself up from the ground, “Can we get some crash mats or something the next time we have to do this?”
Lillian and Dana walked over to where Megan was trying to lift the extremely hot device.
“They’re getting more blatant,” Dana said
“It was only a matter of time till they came back out of the woodwork,” Lillian replied, “Wolfram and Hart blowing up only slowed them down.”
“Yeah, you’re right, let’s get this thing uploaded and go home.”
With the aid of a towel Megan lifted the small hexagonal device and placed it on the picnic table. From her backpack she pulled out a laptop and a cell phone. While the laptop connected to the internet Megan pulled out a standard USB cable and connects one end to the computer and the other to the device. She starts to type furiously. A moment later an upload progress meter appears on the screen and the device slowly becomes dimmer and dimmer.
“How many do you think we caught this month?” Naomi asked
“Gotta be at least twelve,” Dana replied, “I’m getting worried Lil the server’s almost full and the new hard drive wont arrive till next week.”
Lillian folded her arms and sighed.
“We’ll work something out we always do,” Lillian replied, “Besides it’s the demons fault they messed with Techno-Pagans.”
~ Apartment, Phoenix Arizona – two hours later ~
Brett Carpenter sat at his computer smugly. Surrounding him were all the signs of an advance user disguarded CD and DVD ROMs, empty cans of heavily caffeinated cola and reams and reams of print outs that lay on his floor in Brett’s version of a filing system. He typed in the last line of the code and waited for the system to compile. Brett leaned back on his chair with his hand behind his head and watched the progress meter. In a few moments he was going to unleash is creation on an unexpecting world. He thought of himself as an artist and this was his Mona Lisa. A few minutes later the screen flashed up that it was completed. Brett smiled to himself and attached his beast to an email which he sent to a random address.
And that’s how it started. The virus Brett wrote hit the internet like a plague. Servers started dropping left and right. By midnight half the internet was completely incapacitated while the other half was barely functional. Brett thought he had just completed his master piece he didn’t know how wrong he was.
~ The server storage of the Techno-Pagan coven – Midnight ~
The machines hummed silently to themselves as they continued their task of acting as a virtual prison. Suddenly a server, standing alone near the phone line, blinked up that it received an email. A moment later it displayed a critical error message and shut down. At first the room was silent then the computer slowly began to shake. Sparks shot out of various gaps until finally it exploded in a combination of fire and magic. The room was suddenly filled with twelve menacing looking demons. The tallest and the most vicious of them all were called Thi'Ne. He looked around the room slowly, snarling like a dog.
“Finally we have been released from our prison,” Thi'Ne said in a deep booming voice.
He walked around the large room and run his hand over the systems.
“We must see out the one who has done this so that the others can be released.”
~ Public park, Phoenix, Arizona – the next day ~
“There’s a hero in this city,” Jarrod Taylor said in an official voice, “A female willing to risk her own life to save others. That special lady goes by the name of . . .”
Jarrod bent down, making sure the camera man kept up with him, with a broad smile on his face he started to pat a small white dog that was standing next to him.
“ . . . Fifi. About two hours ago Mrs. Wendy Cooper decided to take a mid morning swim in this beautiful lake she suddenly disaster struck. Feeling a cramp in her right leg the poor woman began to descend rapidly under the waves. This story takes a happy turn when Fifi sensing her master was in danger bravely dove in and dragged her to the shore. I don’t know about you but I hope that this special pooch is around when I need rescuing. I’m Jarrod Taylor for WNHK News.”
“And we’re clear” the segment producer said
Jarrod Taylor got back up onto his feet and dusted off the mud from his pants. Still smiling he handed back the microphone to the camera man and started to walk over to a near by picnic bench where his personal assistant, Penny Whitfield, sat. Penny was consulting a large diary while playing with one of the long plats she put her hair in. when Jarrod Taylor sat down opposite her Penny looked up and smiled. Jarrod smiled in return but it seemed more forced.
“Hey Pen can you do me a favor?” he asked
“Sure, what?” Penny replied
“Can you stab me in the eye with your pen?” He replied sarcastically, “because that’s gotta be less painful then what I just had to go through.”
Penny rolled her eyes and smirked at the reported.
“Come on Jarrod that dog is, like, so cute.”
Jarrod gave the red head a strange look.
“Yeah, great, that’s going to get me respect.”
“Why are you so uptight about your job?”
“Doing the lighter side of the news is not where I saw myself at this point in my career.” Jarrod replied
“But that dog was a hero.” Penny replied pointing at the small poodle jumping up excitedly on her owner
Jarrod watched the scene and shook his head.
“Are you trying to make me ill?” Jarrod replied, “Firstly that dog is about two feet tall, secondly Mrs. Cooper looks like she’s about two hundered pounds and thirdly, this lake, it’s like five feet deep. What I think happed is tubby fell over then had to crawl back to the shore while her annoying little rat kept barking and leaping around her.”
Penny sighed. She knew where this conversation was going to lead to.
“Ten years Penny. Ten years I’ve been a journalist,” Jarrod explained, “I won awards you know. One piece I wrote for the Washington Post one me a Pulitzer. I was supposed to be anchor not Bill. Just because I ran over the bosses foot . . . Four, maybe five times suddenly I’m a dangerous lunatic who can’t be seen fronting a news show.”
“I know. Life’s not fair.” Penny replied absent mindedly not really paying attention to his rant
“One day I’m going to be sitting in the big chair then everybody will be sorry.” Jarrod continued
He looked over and noticed that Penny was writing down notes in the diary. Jarrod frowned
“Are you listening to me?”
Penny looked up and smiled at him.
“Nope.” she replied
Jarrod smirked then went back to his dog staring. Penny had been working for Jarrod for about a year now. He was incredibly bitter about his position but there was childishness about him that she liked and she appreciated him more then her previous employer the Pizza shop owner with the busy hands. Penny found out quickly that the vigilante lifestyle costs a lot of money and soon the funds her father had given her dried up quickly. With no source of income to replenish them penny had no other option she had no choice but to look for work.
When the crew finished packing up their equipment Jarrod motioned that they should head back. Penny collected her thing and was about to move when she noticed something she didn’t see when she sat down. A few meters away from the bench was a round burn mark in the grass a few inches wide and perfectly circular. Penny looked at it curiously. She bent down and studied it closely.
Something wasn’t right about it. The burnt patch had the distinct smell of sulphur and had a strange energized feeling when she ran her hand over the spot. Penny was scrutinizing further when Hope landed on the table. She began to chirp loudly catching the champion’s attention. Penny looked at hope curiously
“What is it?” Penny asked “What happened?”
. . . at around Midnight last night a crippling computer virus going by the name of ‘Luthor’ was released onto the internet crippling at least half of the online services . . .
“I don’t get it,” The Wanderer said as they watched the news in the mansion, “Hope never gets worked up about things like this.”
“She keeps warning me that something was released because of this thing.” Penny replied
“Did she say what it was?”
“I don’t know,” Penny replied, “she said demons but wasn’t to clear on the details. I, like, don’t see how this ties in with the internet virus.”
“If there’s one thing I learnt about that Night-Hawk ,” The Wanderer replied, “she comes through with the goods. I’m sure well find out in time.”
Lillian started to filter through the mess left by the explosion. Nearby Dana was checking the other systems while Megan checked the damaged system.
“What the hell happened?” Lillian asked, “Galloway?”
“Best guess,” Megan replied leaning back from the smoking computer case, “something crashed the server digitally then the demons stored inside crashed it literally.”
Dana walked back to the pair.
“The others are fine,” she said seriously, “looks like the only one affected was the online one.”
“I thought you said you checked the system before we left.”
“I did,” Megan replied annoyed, “Something must have punched through the firewall while we were on our way back.”
“Perfect,” Lillian replied running her hand stressfully through her golden hair, “so how many got out?”
“That server stored twelve including Thi'Ne,” Dana replied
Lillian looked at Dana in shock.
“Thi'Ne’s free again? It took us five weeks to trap him the first time!”
“Looks like we’re gonna have a busy month,” Megan replied
Lillian dropped her head. This server crash has pushed them back by at least six months but she couldn’t loose her head over it.
“Do we at least know where they’re going?” she asked
Just then Naomi stepped into the rubble. She slapped a paper down on the table directly into Lillian’s eye line. Curiously Lillian read the article.
“This is our guy,” Naomi said, “The FBI identified him early this afternoon.”
“Brett Carpenter,” Lillian read out loud, “also know as ‘The carp’ for his ability to swim through security systems like a fish. He is wanted in a string of computer crimes involving the stock exchanged and numerous financial institutions and is believed to be responsible for the midnight attack which brought the information super highway to a stand still.”
Lillian looked up at the other Techno-Pagans.
“We all thinking the same thing?” she asked
“That Thi'Ne got a ‘get out of jail free’ card now he looking for the guy with the deck?” Megan replied, “oh yeah.”
~ The loft, Phoenix Arizona – that evening ~
The loft was practically empty. The only things that made it look furnished were the old coffee table three beanbags and a giant whiteboard containing scores. Three people were currently using the loft. They were Brett, Shayne and a guy who went by the name Shadow. Brett and Shayne sat casually while Shadow stood by the whiteboard holding a marker.
“Greeting and salutations my friends,” Shadow said in his own special way, “if I’m not mistaken I think it’s time to tally the scores.”
Brett looked smugly over to Shayne who had an extremely annoyed look on his face.
“But first I think some last minute props have to be given to ‘The carp’ for the Lutor virus.” Shadow continued
Shayne looked over to Brett
“Luthor? Give me a break!” he said
Brett shrugged at Shayne
“Yeah,” he replied, “Superman’s arch nemesis? What would you call the uber-virus?”
“I don’t know. How about something cool!” Shayne snapped back
Brett smirked at him
“Bitter much?”
“Okay Ladies,” Shadow replied, “you can pull on each other hair later . . .”
Shadow moved to the white board and started to scribble down some numbers.
“. . . Now, when we last met Shayne was in the lead with is mega hack into McDonalds corporate headquarters and donating most of their profit to the poor, very noble dude.”
“Thank you.” Shayne replied
“But the bad news is that the Luthor takes Brett up to first place.”
“What!”
“I’m sorry, man, but dropping half the internet in one night that’s hard to beat.”
“Oh come on! I though we had a curfew Brett was way past it when he launched Luthor!”
Brett looked casually up to Shadow.
“Do you want to take this one shadow?” he asked
“Nah, you do it, you earned it dude.”
Brett looked back to the extremely agitated Shayne.
“The rule is ‘no attacks can be counted if they are launched twenty four hours before we start the next meeting’.”
“Yeah! We organized to meet at midnight!”
Brett nodded.
“Shadow. What time did we start tonight?”
Shadow folded his arms and leaned against the board.
“I do believe we started at one in the morning because a certain person was late.”
“I was caught in traffic!” Shayne yelled
“Sorry man rules are rules,” Brett replied, “we started at one so Luthor stays in.”
Shayne flopped back down onto the beanbag.
“You guy suck!” he said
Brett smirked victoriously. He stood up.
“And on that mental image I have to jet,” he replied, “same time next month?”
Ignoring Shayne’s protests Brett made his way down the stairs. He was still gloating to himself when he arrived at his car. Brett was about to open the door when he heard a low growling sound coming from the darkness. He stopped and looked behind himself. There was no one around. Cautiously he reached into his pocket and pulled out his keys. The growling started again catching Brett off guard causing him to drop them.
“Okay this is not funny,” Brett called out to the darkness, “What are you, like, five years old?”
The growling became louder and more intense. Slowly Brett reached down and picked up his keys. Before he stood up he looked over to his left and saw it. The hell hound was on all fours. Its twisted demon face snarled angrily at the hacker. Brett freaked and shot back onto his feet. He fumbled with the lock as the hell hound slowly approached him. Sporadically he kept looking over his shoulder as the demon came closer and closer. Giving up on the lock Brett swung around just as the hell hound was right on top of him.
“Nice doggy,” Brett said nervous, “who’s a-a cute boy?”
The demon screamed at him. Brett joined in with the screaming and ducked just in time before the hell hound struck. The demons smashed the window in the car then stumbled back with its paw bleeding. Brett found his moment and jumped into his car through the window. Turning on the ignition he slammed the car into reverse just as the hell hound recovered. The demon charged at the car. Brett shifted it into gear moments before the hell hound struck.
Brett screamed down the road. He looked in his rearview mirror to see the hell hound running after him. To his horror the demon was keeping up with the speed of his car. This was impossible what the hell was that thing? He thought. Brett arrived at a set of traffic lights and that when the demon made its move. Leaping at full strength the demon flew through the air and landed on Brett’s bonnet. He screamed loudly as the demon used its immense claws to scratch through his windscreen.
The hell hound was about to make its final lunge when suddenly it was struck in the shoulder by an arrow. The demon howled and stumbled off the car. On a rooftop nearby Nighthawk drew her second arrow and loaded it into her bow. Taking careful aim she fired again. This arrow struck the hell hounds left thigh dropping it to the ground. This didn’t phase the demon for long. He climbed back onto his feat and managed to work his way back onto the bonnet. Packing away her bow Nighthawk took a couple of steps forward and dropped down from the roof.
Brett fought off the hell hound as much as he could but it wasn’t much use. Suddenly the demon flew back after Nighthawk leaped at it and connected with a flying kick to the head. She rolled of the bonnet and readied herself for a fight. Brett watched stunned as this woman wearing leather and a long jacket with some kind of bird on the back came out of nowhere and started to fight the monster. The hell hound got back onto his but Nighthawk was ready. From the small sheath strapped to her right leg she pulled out her collapsible sword. Pressing the release she flicked it out extending the blade.
The hell hound charged her but Nighthawk ducked under the first attack then blocked the second with her sword. She kicked the demon in the stomach the spun around catching the hell hound in the face with her blade. It screamed swing out with one of its paws striking Nighthawk on the hand. The champion momentarily lost concentration giving the hell hound enough time to leap on top of her. Nighthawk struggled against the beast laying in the occasional punch across the face. When all seemed lost a bird flew out of the sky and started to swoop the large demon. Nighthawk used this moment to regain control
Using her full slayer strength she pushed the demon off her then flipped back onto her feet. Nighthawk punched the demon across the jaw then, keeping up the momentum struck it in the side of the face with her elbow. As the demon slowly lost its footing Nighthawk kicked up her sword from the ground into her hand. Dodging the last two swipes she plunged it deep into the hell hounds heart. It screamed loudly then collapsed onto ground. Slowly Brett climbed out of his car and walked towards the masked woman.
“That was . . . I mean . . . “he attempted
Nighthawk looked over to the shaken man just at the small bird landed on her shoulder.
“It’s okay it’s dead.” she said seriously
Brett looked at Nighthawk in terrified confusion. She knew that he was in no condition to make a rational decision so she pre-empted.
“We should get here, it’s not safe,” she continued, “There could be more of them.”
“What do you mean more?” Brett asked shaken, “More monsters? And who are you anyway?”
“No time, get in the car.”
Not in the mood to argue the both of them walked back to Brett’s car. Just then a huge spear came out of nowhere and pierced straight through the vehicle. Fuel started to leak then there was a spark from the electrics. Nighthawk threw Brett to the ground as the car exploded into a huge fireball. Slowly the pair looked up to see Thi'Ne walking slowly towards them. The eight foot tall, muscle bound demon, snarled softly at them. Nighthawk readied her sword. Thi'Ne looked at her curiously
“My interest is not with you Slayer, “he said in a commanding tone
“Do I even have to ask who you want?” Nighthawk replied
The demon pointed at Brett.
“All I want is my freer and you can leave in peace.”
Nighthawk looked at Brett curiously. Every time she has heard the phrase ‘freer’ it never ends well.
|
|
|
|
Rave
Barbie Girl (Becca)
biscuit07
Filmtheory (Jim)
Malice (Jess)
MebbtheScribe (MichaelB)
Reset (Allie)
Shay (Marrisa)
somnambulist29 (Shea)
Stephanie Loss
Wendyness (Wendy)
Questions?Contact Us
|
|
All stories on this site have been archived with the authors' consent. Do not copy these stories for your own uses without the express consent of the author themselves. Buffy the Vampire Slayer TM and Angel TM are © UPN, WB, Fox and its related entities. All photos on the site are © UPN, Fox, Warner Bros, and/or their respective owners. No profits are being made by use of these images.
Powered with the assitance of eFiction.
|
|
|
