Wretched Joy 9

Wretched Joy

Chapter 9

-VB-

Ethan, in his costume as Assault, shuddered as he walked out of the growing nightmare zone. 

Today, he encountered Everyday Joe’s fear territory and understood rather deeply just how unsettling it was. 

“Hold on!” he shouted at Jamie as he tried to pull her up from the edge of the rooftop. 

Why was he so powerless?! Where was his power?! 

Jamie sobbed as she hung limply. She was powerless, too. 

Where was everyone else?! 

“Someone help!” he shouted. 

No one. All he heard were screams, gunshots, and flares of light in the distance. 

His fingers were slipping…!

“Jamie, Jamie, you have to- You have to climb, Jamie!” 

“I can’t…!” 

“Jamie, ple-”

And their hands slipped.

He gritted his teeth. 

If that was the level of “illusions” everyone in the fear territory hallucinated, then he understood viscerally well why people affected by those dreams began to leave Everyday Joe’s territory. A place with those nightly nightmares was not worth staying, no matter what other advantage they might have there. 

Worse, the reports coming into the Protectorate and PRT showed that the nightmares changed all of the time to cause the most intense emotional response. 

He took a deep breath in and let it out slowly. 

But there was a good news. Like he heard in the meeting before, less and less people started getting the nightmares. The civilian bystanders were being spared, and Assault knew that it was intentional on Joe’s part.

Which meant that the intensification of the nightmares inflicted upon the gangsters, criminal capes, and the heroes was also intentional. 

This also meant that within the Fear Field, as some have come to call it, regular police were more effective than heroes at fighting crime. 

It’s really hard to punch someone when hallucinations blinded them, after all.

Everyday Joe was still at large, and criminals were starting to feel really creeped out and cornered. 

Hell, no one’s heard about Kaiser or Lung showing up in public for anything anymore. 

-VB-

I took a deep breath in and let it out slowly. 

I hefted my baseball over my right shoulder and tightened the grip on the sickle in my left hand. 

“So,” I drawled out as I stared at the almost a hundred or so people gathered inside the warehouse, half of whom wore blatant E88 gang signs and colors. “Who’s first?”

I tracked this group of racists down by following one of them. My red hoodie gained a new function, which allowed me to go invisible when I pulled the hoodie up. However, that invisibility would break if I came within a foot of anything not on me and weighed more than ten pounds. For some reason.

Whatever the current restrictions were, it was enough for me to go and hunt the gangs down like now. 

“F-Fuck, it’s him!” someone shouted as they drew guns and bats and -.

I raised the sickle up. “Shatter, Kyoka Suigetsu.” And “rung” it in the air. The sickle gonged like it was a giant bell, and a slow ripple rang out across the warehouse. It covered the entire open warehouse faster than anyone could run, even if it was slow for a parahuman effect. 

As soon as the first ripples hit the gangsters, they started screaming. Some immediately dropped to their knees and hands as nightmares played out in front of their eyes. 

I walked toward them and started looking over all of the gangsters to see if there was anyone special among them. You know, the powerful, the rich, and the like. I wanted to start displaying hidden associates up in public for everyone to see. 

Then I stopped. 

“Well then… I guess that’s why this gathering’s so big, huh?” I drawled as I walked over to where one gangster was rolling on the ground and crouched down in front of him. “Eh, Hookwolf?” He was fully in his “wolf” form, but it was unstable and constantly switching between multiple forms even as he tried to keep himself to the wolf form.

Not that it mattered.

I raised my sickle.

And struck.

The blade of the sickle sliced through the metals easily and then … struck the floor.

“Huh,” I muttered.

But Hookwolf? He was awake now. The attack had shaken him free of the nightmares, if only for now. Instead of backing away, he attacked.

And then got crushed when I brought my bat down and hammered him from the top.

The concrete ground around us cracked and splintered like a spider web centering on him. 

Weakly, he tried to get up.

Casually, I struck him down.

He realized he couldn’t fight me, so he tried to run… but I struck him down with my bat again, and this time, I followed it up with a sickle slice. 

I missed again, but I didn’t stop. I kept slicing and punting. Slice. Punt. Punt. Punt. Slice. Slice. Slice. 

Pinned and losing mass ever faster, Hookwolf got desperate.

He finally gave up on his wolf form and changed into a snake. And jumped away. 

“Oh no, you don’t,” I growled as I jumped after him. I swung and managed to get his midbody, and he spun in the air before crashing into the warehouse’s brick wall. With how dense he was, he crashed right through the wall and landed squarely in the alley. 

I jumped through the hole and struck with my sickle again.

This time, I got him.

I sliced through something fleshy. Something denser than the metal shell around him.

And he stopped moving.

I slowly stood back up as his metallic form reverted to his human form.

Yeah, he’s definitely dead.

With a flick of the sickle, my blade sliced his head clean off of his shoulder.

Then I turned invisible, grabbed the head by the hair, and walked off, leaving a trail of blood behind me. 

People screamed a lot when I dropped the head in front of Medhall later that day.

It was a good day. One less scum on Earth.