The Butcher- After the Abyss
Mar 27, 2013 3:58:37 GMT -6
Post by Bardiel on Mar 27, 2013 3:58:37 GMT -6
Gore painted the floor and walls in masterful strokes of crimson. Corpses decorated the mall, their tangle of limbs twisted at broken angles as if they had been thrown into the blender of a great tornado. Bodies hung limp half through display windows and collected heavily at the ends of still running escalators, giving the pools of deceased humanity rhythmic ripples of movement.
The Butcher rose from a crater in the floor, letting the soup like remains of a child plop from its immaculate hands. It throws back a head of cerulean hair, the electric sapphire curls in stark contrast with the rich arterial fluid that poured like rain over the shopping complex and filled the air with the sharp tang of copper.
There was no room for pity in the lithe, sickle sharp form of the Hunter as she circled her target from the building’s second story, a flickering shadow of thorn studded leather and effortless, bestial grace. The restless stirrings of a berserker’s rage threatened to pull the Hunter under, a rampaging fire that ignited the glowing coals of her eyes. She was too late to prevent the massacre. The shame of this failure curdled an intense hatred for the one, the Butcher, who had murdered the humans and not shown a shred of dignity for their weakness, or their age.
Even with the tantalizing sent of blood thick in the air, the reek of the Butcher was assaulting. An aura of sodden ash and black tar boiled up from where it basked in what it had wrought, wrapped in the form a young woman that was all too familiar.
At the last moment the Butcher turns, its eyes widening in surprise, just in time to greet the great mace of the Hunter’s wickedly spiked forearm as she fell upon it from above. The Butchers face crumples under the impact, deforming to accommodate the comet of the Hunter’s blow. For a moment the two remain suspended in time as the Butcher, impossibly, attempts to stand its ground, fighting against the force of the strike.
There’s the sudden hiss of air as its face breaks open, and the mirage of the young woman, the Butcher, is flung across the room and with an explosion of debris is sent crashing through a wall.
The Hunter couches low to the ground, patient and poised to strike. Her whole body is a weapon, a finely tuned instrument designed to deliver death. And as she waited for the dust to settle, claws stretching hungrily, it ached to play its song.
The Butcher rises drunkenly from a bed of pulverised ceramic and plaster, struggling to find its footing. Even as the Hunter flies forward, the fractures of its face, its true face, have begun to close and smooth over. Sparks fly as Hunter makes her pass, the spurs extruding from her body that should have torn Butcher to ribbons screeching in anguish as they failed to cut into the creatures hardened flesh.
She bounces off the wall, avoiding the sluggish strikes of the Butcher and brings her hips around to deliver a kick with the blade and weight of an axe behind it. The blow connects solidly with a hard crack, the sound of fracturing ribs. Butcher sways like a tree at the verge of collapse, the Hunter’s leg still buried in its side. Black foam bubbles out from Butcher’s mouth, spilling over from its lips in a choking expression of amazement.
But before Hunter can deliver the finishing blow, the Butcher has a hold of her calf. With a heave it lifts her up into the sky and in a great arch slams her body into the tiles of the mall, the impact splintering the earth and the ligaments of her thigh. Cement digs into the Hunter’s skull, but she refuses the welcoming folds of unconsciousness. As trembling fingers reach for her throat she pushes herself up on her hands, the leg Butcher held rotating wetly in its socket, and the blade of her free foot bites at the monster’s eyes. It releases its hold on the Hunter and staggers away, clutching at its face.
Hunter rolls onto all fours, relocating her leg as she does so. With whispered words spoken in a secret language, a flame licks over her, sending the cells of the Hunter’s body into a burning frenzy of activity as they knitted themselves together alive with the voracious hunger of fire.
The Butcher looks up through a bloody veil of tears and unfolds its massive wings. With a powerful stroke it launches itself at Hunter, but she’s already in the air, bringing down the hammers of her arms scattering dirty feathers into the air. Hunter howls in victory, cinders blossoming from her maw as she straddles Butcher, crashing her mace arms into it again and again, her eyes burning like twin suns.
Against the hails of blows that were destroying its body the Butcher shakily raises an arm. Lost in the frenzy of her battle lust Hunter fails to notice until the feebly approaching hand enters her mouth.
The Butcher’s mussels bunch together with an abrupt spasm, its fingers piercing through the soft flesh under the Hunter’s throat as it grabbed hold of her jaw bone. With a grinding twist the Butcher tears her mandible away in its iron like grip. The Hunter gurgles through a torrent of boiling blood, her rough tongue dangling from the newly torn cavity bellow her face. Bringing its fist back the Butcher sends Hunter flying with a crunching blow to the side of the head, the lower jaw in hand shattering under the impact.
With an inhumane scream the Butcher rises from the floor before collapsing under the weight of its injuries. Dark wings slapped at the ground as it fought to stand, sometimes limping and sometimes crawling forward. One of its arms hung uselessly by its side, the shoulder an unrecognisable mess of shredded meat and mangled sinew. Craters and large scaring trenches pocketed its body, connected by webs of fractures in its stony skin that hissed with the sound of pressurised air. Pieces of the Butcher fell away before it collapsed through the window of a cook and kitchenware store in a knot of twisted wings and crooked feathers.
The Hunter approaches, breathing a heavy red mist that coiled ominously around her head. The inferno of her gaze beholds the Butcher as it writhes amongst the shards of glass and blood of its victims, helpless to defend itself. Drained of emotion the Hunter combusts the air around her fingers into white hot lances of flame and with the flick of her wrists severs the Butchers head from its shoulders.
Only her hands are no longer attached to her wrists. They’re soaring above her head. As she watches they begin to dismember themselves, the digits of her fingers dividing, her palms neatly dissolving into even bloody chunks.
The Butcher was holding a knife. As she watched it began to corrode before her eyes, thick flaking rust spreading from the Butcher’s hands, covering the blade in a cocoon of ruin. From deep within the knife’s heart molten slag began to bleed outward, as the Butcher finally drew his weapon.
From high above the Watcher turned away, it had seen enough. It had been foolish of Hunter to engage, but then she had not known the truth. It was strange; Watcher would almost miss the demon. But of course she had to know the Armistice would not break. While he wore the Crucifix it was impossible to tell what side of the line Bardiel had fallen, and although Heaven could not condone his methods (at least not in the open), if the Host benefited from his actions they wouldn’t interfere. The story was already running rampant through the human world, fuelled by the Butcher’s handiwork and mankind’s own capacity for paranoia and fear. Soon the Queen would be flushed out into the open.
The Butcher rose from a crater in the floor, letting the soup like remains of a child plop from its immaculate hands. It throws back a head of cerulean hair, the electric sapphire curls in stark contrast with the rich arterial fluid that poured like rain over the shopping complex and filled the air with the sharp tang of copper.
There was no room for pity in the lithe, sickle sharp form of the Hunter as she circled her target from the building’s second story, a flickering shadow of thorn studded leather and effortless, bestial grace. The restless stirrings of a berserker’s rage threatened to pull the Hunter under, a rampaging fire that ignited the glowing coals of her eyes. She was too late to prevent the massacre. The shame of this failure curdled an intense hatred for the one, the Butcher, who had murdered the humans and not shown a shred of dignity for their weakness, or their age.
Even with the tantalizing sent of blood thick in the air, the reek of the Butcher was assaulting. An aura of sodden ash and black tar boiled up from where it basked in what it had wrought, wrapped in the form a young woman that was all too familiar.
At the last moment the Butcher turns, its eyes widening in surprise, just in time to greet the great mace of the Hunter’s wickedly spiked forearm as she fell upon it from above. The Butchers face crumples under the impact, deforming to accommodate the comet of the Hunter’s blow. For a moment the two remain suspended in time as the Butcher, impossibly, attempts to stand its ground, fighting against the force of the strike.
There’s the sudden hiss of air as its face breaks open, and the mirage of the young woman, the Butcher, is flung across the room and with an explosion of debris is sent crashing through a wall.
The Hunter couches low to the ground, patient and poised to strike. Her whole body is a weapon, a finely tuned instrument designed to deliver death. And as she waited for the dust to settle, claws stretching hungrily, it ached to play its song.
The Butcher rises drunkenly from a bed of pulverised ceramic and plaster, struggling to find its footing. Even as the Hunter flies forward, the fractures of its face, its true face, have begun to close and smooth over. Sparks fly as Hunter makes her pass, the spurs extruding from her body that should have torn Butcher to ribbons screeching in anguish as they failed to cut into the creatures hardened flesh.
She bounces off the wall, avoiding the sluggish strikes of the Butcher and brings her hips around to deliver a kick with the blade and weight of an axe behind it. The blow connects solidly with a hard crack, the sound of fracturing ribs. Butcher sways like a tree at the verge of collapse, the Hunter’s leg still buried in its side. Black foam bubbles out from Butcher’s mouth, spilling over from its lips in a choking expression of amazement.
But before Hunter can deliver the finishing blow, the Butcher has a hold of her calf. With a heave it lifts her up into the sky and in a great arch slams her body into the tiles of the mall, the impact splintering the earth and the ligaments of her thigh. Cement digs into the Hunter’s skull, but she refuses the welcoming folds of unconsciousness. As trembling fingers reach for her throat she pushes herself up on her hands, the leg Butcher held rotating wetly in its socket, and the blade of her free foot bites at the monster’s eyes. It releases its hold on the Hunter and staggers away, clutching at its face.
Hunter rolls onto all fours, relocating her leg as she does so. With whispered words spoken in a secret language, a flame licks over her, sending the cells of the Hunter’s body into a burning frenzy of activity as they knitted themselves together alive with the voracious hunger of fire.
The Butcher looks up through a bloody veil of tears and unfolds its massive wings. With a powerful stroke it launches itself at Hunter, but she’s already in the air, bringing down the hammers of her arms scattering dirty feathers into the air. Hunter howls in victory, cinders blossoming from her maw as she straddles Butcher, crashing her mace arms into it again and again, her eyes burning like twin suns.
Against the hails of blows that were destroying its body the Butcher shakily raises an arm. Lost in the frenzy of her battle lust Hunter fails to notice until the feebly approaching hand enters her mouth.
The Butcher’s mussels bunch together with an abrupt spasm, its fingers piercing through the soft flesh under the Hunter’s throat as it grabbed hold of her jaw bone. With a grinding twist the Butcher tears her mandible away in its iron like grip. The Hunter gurgles through a torrent of boiling blood, her rough tongue dangling from the newly torn cavity bellow her face. Bringing its fist back the Butcher sends Hunter flying with a crunching blow to the side of the head, the lower jaw in hand shattering under the impact.
With an inhumane scream the Butcher rises from the floor before collapsing under the weight of its injuries. Dark wings slapped at the ground as it fought to stand, sometimes limping and sometimes crawling forward. One of its arms hung uselessly by its side, the shoulder an unrecognisable mess of shredded meat and mangled sinew. Craters and large scaring trenches pocketed its body, connected by webs of fractures in its stony skin that hissed with the sound of pressurised air. Pieces of the Butcher fell away before it collapsed through the window of a cook and kitchenware store in a knot of twisted wings and crooked feathers.
The Hunter approaches, breathing a heavy red mist that coiled ominously around her head. The inferno of her gaze beholds the Butcher as it writhes amongst the shards of glass and blood of its victims, helpless to defend itself. Drained of emotion the Hunter combusts the air around her fingers into white hot lances of flame and with the flick of her wrists severs the Butchers head from its shoulders.
Only her hands are no longer attached to her wrists. They’re soaring above her head. As she watches they begin to dismember themselves, the digits of her fingers dividing, her palms neatly dissolving into even bloody chunks.
The Butcher was holding a knife. As she watched it began to corrode before her eyes, thick flaking rust spreading from the Butcher’s hands, covering the blade in a cocoon of ruin. From deep within the knife’s heart molten slag began to bleed outward, as the Butcher finally drew his weapon.
*
From high above the Watcher turned away, it had seen enough. It had been foolish of Hunter to engage, but then she had not known the truth. It was strange; Watcher would almost miss the demon. But of course she had to know the Armistice would not break. While he wore the Crucifix it was impossible to tell what side of the line Bardiel had fallen, and although Heaven could not condone his methods (at least not in the open), if the Host benefited from his actions they wouldn’t interfere. The story was already running rampant through the human world, fuelled by the Butcher’s handiwork and mankind’s own capacity for paranoia and fear. Soon the Queen would be flushed out into the open.