It was a normal night in the city, or, however normal a night in the city could be after an apocalypse. The streets were quiet, with the occasional critter scurrying around. There was also the business man walking down the street with a briefcase. If anyone was awake to see this they wouldn’t have been concerned, most citizens would rather sneek home in the safety of darkness.
They would have been concerned however, when he turned and walked down into an alleyway.
The man took a deep breath, “I’m here,” he told the alleyway.
There was a rustle and a couple tin cans were knocked around as whatever he had disturbed the slumber of turn to look at him. Then there was the low mechanical voice that belonged to the creature.
“You’re late.”
“One of the values blew,” he said, “it wasn’t my fault.” The man froze as a thin, metallic arm with a clawed hand slunk out of the shadows and reared back like a snake.
“You’re still late.”
The man felt something cold and metallic on his face, and before he could realize that it was the thing's hand he found himself flying face first down the alleyway.
Completely ignoring the man it just threw away like a piece of trash, the arm crept over to the briefcase he was carrying and picked it up.
“It’s time.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Lucas, come get some breakfast.”
“I can’t mom,” Lucas said while running down the stairs, “I’m going to be late.”
“Your friends can wait a few minutes,” she told him, “I even made your favourite, honey pancakes.”
“Thanks, but I'm not really hungry.” he said trying to walk out the door. Instead his mother grabbed him by the shoulder and turned him around for a hug.
“Stay safe, you don't know when one of the gangs might make a move.”
“I’ll be fine mom, this is Phantom X’s territory.”
“That doesn’t make it any better, does it Harold?”
Lucas' father, still knee deep in a pile of paperwork, barely looked away as he responded with, “Listen to your mother.”
“Yes dad.” Lucas said, “thank you for your input.”
“Lucas, your fathers very busy,” scolded his mom, “at least he responded.”
“I know mom, I didn’t mean that to be sarcastic.”
“Just stay safe.”
“Don’t worry, I will” With that Lucas walked out the door and rode away on his bike.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Lucas rode through the trash filled streets of the nearly abandoned city he called home. The actual name of the city had been long forgotten along with everyone else that now lived in this mix between a city and a rubble pile.
He passed multiple people walking in the streets as most cars had been abandoned when the gas stations closed, leaving them without a fuel source.
A pair of men wearing tattered police uniforms waved at Lucas as he rode by. They weren’t actual police officers as the chances of them making even a dent in the crime rates were next to nothing. The most likely scenario was that they were simple hoping the uniforms were bulletproof.
Life wasn't a lot different during the ‘apocalypse’, of course there was the fact that most of the schools and bigger companies were closed for good, and all the governments were gone or no longer intact. Alright life was a lot different during the ‘apocalypse’, but aside from that everything was still the same old life that it used to be.
Lucas didn’t actually know what life was like before the ‘apocalypse’ as he had been born twenty years after it had started but he assumed it was similar in most ways.
He had ridden to a point where the roads and buildings got a lot more worn down and destroyed as he was now entering the section that contained all the abandoned warehouses.
He rode up to and stopped at one that despite looking exactly the same as the rest was the one he knew to be the right one. He walked up to a small door that had been very badly cut into the pre-existing wall and knocked on it. He heard footsteps and then there was a voice.
“What’s the password?”
“Since when is there a password?”
The door creaked open and Lucas caught sight of his friend Johnathan standing there looking disappointed.
He sighed, “there isn’t, I was hoping you could give me one.”
“Like I suggested, No.”
Lucas looked past Johnathan and saw his other friend Simon sitting on the couch they had dragged in for the lounge they had made. He walked in and sat down on the beanbag chair he had found in a library the previous week.
“No?”
“For a password.” Simon said.
“Why?”
“Well if someone was asked for a password the last thing they would think of saying is no.”
“Fair enough.”
“Alright,” Jonathan said, “we all agree that from now on the password is no?”
Lucas looked at him and nodded, “sure.”
“Alright then, can we continue?”
“Fight for Fantasy or Solar Servants?”
“You know I prefer sci-fi over fantasy, and honestly Fight for Fantasy’s storyline doesn’t make sense.”
“It’s simple really,” Lucas said, which caused Simon to sigh, “we play as a group of knights that are protecting the god Orin’s Sword so that it may be wielded by the goldenborn who will make sure balance can be restored.”
“But why don't we just wield the sword and use it to defeat the evil… things, that want it?”
“Because like I’ve told you, only the goldenborn can wield the sword.”
“So why are worrying about the.. the..”
“The Desorians.” Simon said.
“The Desorians, from getting their hands on the sword if they can't use it.”
“They’re not trying to use it, they’re trying to get it so they can destroy it.
“And yet the blacksmith who made it said it was unbreakable.”
“No, he said ‘in the hands of Orin, the sword is unbreakable.”
“So why don’t they just get Orin to wield it and sprinkle a little bit of godly power over the land and boom, balance restored.”
“They can’t get Orin.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t know why, they just can't get him.”
“Is he stuck, unable to come down to earth, like why can't they get him.”
“I don’t know, it never explains that.”
“Are you two going to keep arguing or can we continue?”
Lucas and Johnathan both looked at each other and then at Simon, “We can continue, we were just discussing which.”
“Well then, if it's hard for you two to decide then we’ll let Bernie pick.”
Simon navigated the screen, clicked on both of the games and then selected shuffle. After a few seconds the screen went black and a logo appeared.
“Yes,” Johnathan said, “thank you Bernie.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Unknown to the inhabitants of the city, today was not only going to be, pretty similar to every other day, but also the start to a new and equally dangerous apocalypse. The only difference between the current apocalypse and the new one would be the authority. Which is to say that after thirty five years there would finally be some sort of government, even though it wouldn’t act like a government.
He turned and looked at the seven gangsters blocking the entrance of the convenience store, “What do you want?”
The middle one, and clearly the most confident of the bunch, stepped forward, “Boss wants to know if you could meet her at Big T’s.”
“And she needs seven of her goons to do that?”
The ‘goon’ was clearly offended while the others could only nod and back away, realizing that it was best to be a bystander in the conflict that was obviously about to take place.
“No, we were the closest patrol, so we all came,” He raised his rifle, “I could have easily done it myself.”
There was an ear deafening gunshot as he fired his gun, and the rifle fell to the ground, shortly followed by the goon. Phantom X sighed and picked up the gun, then tossed it to the gangster that seemed to be in control now.
“Tell her I’ll be able to meet her later today,” He paused as he looked at the goon at his feet, “and tell her that some of her ‘warriors’ need some more discipline.
The second in charge, now the first in charge, nodded and the group quickly scurried away. Thankful that they were gone he continued his shopping, or rather looting, as there was no shop owner. Even if there was he probably would just take it anyways, since the very few people that had money probably would be the last.
Despite the fact that most of the shops had already been looted he was still able to find a decent amount of supplies, including a very rare and probably valuable item that he didn’t know the name of. It was all for nought though, as a member of the Silent Death gang spotted him with his haul and decided to take it from him. Which wasn’t that big of a problem unless they decided to call in some friends, which, of course they did.
“You all know the rules I assume.” He said to the group of fifteen or more gangsters that were starting to fan out around him. The rules, which there were none, went a little something along the lines of, ‘the fight continues until one side can’t or surrenders, or until the items that are being fought over are snatched away while the fighters are distracted’. Though those weren't really rules, it was just something everyone had silently agreed on.
The one that spotted him gave him a slight scowl, as one of the other fifteen moved the bag of goods to a spot where it wouldn’t be damaged, which he took as a yes. They all stood in anticipation, waiting for the first person to fire.
Before the place could erupt in a burst of gunfire the ground shook and about half the city to their right went up in a blinding bright light. Then came the shockwave, sending them all flying a couple dozen feet through the air to crash into the side of a building. Blasting the wind out of several of them and knocking the rest unconscious.
Phantom X stood up to catch his breath, then walked in the direction of the explosion, along with two other gang members that no longer had any interest in fighting him, as the bag of goods seemed to have been destroyed in the shockwave. “So who's going to go check what that was?”
He looked at the gangster that had spoken and shrugged, “Who’s going to tell their boss that half their territory was just blown up.”
“Not me, and I definitely don’t want to be around when she finds out.” He replied, then started walking towards the area that now mostly consisted of a crater. Followed shortly after by Phantom X, mainly because he was more curious than worried about what damage it might have caused.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“What was that?” Lucas looked to Johnathan, “No idea, but it didn’t sound good.” They got up and ran over to look out the window, only to see nothing different. Then Simon pointed to one of the few skyscrapers left.
“The flag’s gone.”
Johnathan squinted his eyes and looked at the building he was referring to.
“Not just the flag,” he said, “the entire building is gone.”
“Did someone manage to build some kind of nuke, or did the rest of the world just forget one here.”
“I don’t know, but hopefully that was the only one they had.”
Lucas sprinted, the door flung open and he sped away on his bike. Simon ran out after him, followed by Johnathan.
“Lucas!” He called, “where are you going?!”
Jonathan stopped running as he figured it out, “That's where his parents work.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Phantom X arrived at the edge of the crater, followed shortly by a couple of Silent Death members. He scanned the crater and came to the conclusion that it was roughly 400-500 meters in diameter.
“Well,” he said, “looks like Silent Death lost about a quarter of its territory.”
“Lost? It's still there, just in the form of a crater.”
Phantom X raised his eyebrows and pointed to a flag that was sticking out of the charred ground.
The goon sighed, “Great, of course it was them, why wouldn’t it have been them, other than the fact this is the first time they’ve been seen in seven years.”
“Calm down, there wasn’t much there before it was blown to kingdom come, just a couple worn down apartment buildings and the pizza place.” One of the other goons replied.
“Yeah, yeah yeah, you're just trying to make it seem like you don't care about our loss of territory.”
“It was just a few blocks of rubble basically, nothing to really be worried about.”
“That may be true, but I doubt boss will be happy knowing that The Night Stalkers have returned.”
“Maybe she’ll decide to go to war against them, that might cheer her up, even if just a little.”
The first goon turned toward Phantom X, “If she does decide to go to war, you mind if a few of us hide in your territory, I’m really not that confident in our numbers, or anything to with them for that matter.”
“Sure,” He said, “but you’ll have to find your own food.”
“That’s fine, I’d rather go hungry for a few weeks than end up spendin’ my time with Grim.”
With that, they walked off, leaving Phantom X alone to look at the crater. It was big, that was for sure, it had managed to take out about eight full blocks plus a few large chunks of the surrounding buildings, but everything just outside of the radius had only been hit with a small shockwave. Whatever had exploded certainly wasn’t anything that had existed before, or not something that anyone knew existed.
This was bad. Not only had the Night Stalkers returned, but they had somehow gotten their hands on new - and very dangerous - weaponry.
Then of course, there was what would happen once they fully came out into the open. Most likely, a lot of the other gangs would try forming alliances, with either the Night Stalkers in order to survive, or with each other, to hopefully get rid of them.
Neither of them seemed a good idea.
There was a specific reason why everyone was scared of them, and it was also the reason why their name was what it was.
About twelve years ago, well, the relationship between all the gangs was pretty similar to what they were today. Then the Night Stalkers showed up. Now, back then they weren’t called that, they called themselves The Wild Ones but changed it because they prefered what everyone else was calling them, the Night Stalkers.
The reason why everyone called them that is pretty self explanatory, they stalked the night. But they did it so well, no one felt safe going out at night. It used to be that nighttime was the time when you could get to where you wanted without having to worry that someone would find you.
The Night Stalkers completely changed that. People started disappearing, there were strange and sometimes disturbing sightings, and, sooner or later, everyone started to realize that the Night Stalkers were behind it. Hence, the name.
A couple gangs tried to team up with them, surprisingly they agreed to it, and then something happened and both gangs that teamed up with them were found completely wiped out. Without a single Night Stalker casualty.
That shut everyone up, for a good four years.
Then they disappeared, and it wasn’t lost on people how similar their disappearance was to the Illuminati’s. It took a couple years for people to relax and have everything go back to normal, but some of them still worry till this day.
And now, Phantom X was one of them.
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