ic Caught Somewhere in Time (Solo)

[RobRX]

June 4th 2014, Freedom City Sewers

 

Sewers are generally considered unpleasant, unnapealing places. It's just a fact. They smell, they are dirty and they are dark. However, to some these dark unnapealing places can constitute a refuge form the outside world. In this case, they are the refuge against the rays of the sun for time-travelling vampire, Bloodline.

 

Having cut himself off the outside world. A world he simply didn't and couldn't understand. No matter how better this world seemed, no matter how much it seemed like everything he had fought for, he couldn't bring himself to become part of it. Now that his timeline was less and less a reality, he was the only part of it that still existed.

 

Finding a place to sit down, Bloodline rummaged through a pouch on his belt, taking out a syringe. Briefly, he paused, examining it even if it was completely familliar to him. He needed the serum contained within that syringe, or else his vampiric nature would re-assert itself and he would hunger for blood. "Last shot." he said out loud, to himself and perhaps the rats scurrying around him. "Damn it..." then said the man, tossing his blaster in frustration. The large weapon made a racket, which scared the rats, as it impacted the wall. Reluctantly, he then injected the serum into his body. As always, it was an unpleasant experience and he had to hold back a few screams of pain.

 

Alone in a dark sewer, his mind wandered back to a future that perhaps no longer existed...

[RobRX]

August 2, 2060, Californian Wastelands

 

The modified, ramshackle all-terrain vehicle came to a halt and two figures stepped off it. Bloodline and his partner knew exactly how to proceed from there. Weapon in hand, Bloodline scouted the site, making sure they were indeed alone and not about to run into an ambush. Once the way was clear, he headed back to the vehicle, where his partner Hardwire, a technopath, was busy unloading gear from their transport.

 

"Good news and bad news." said Bloodline to the technopath, in his usual tone. "Bad news is, they were here and trashed the comm tower. Good news is they've been gone for hours." These communication towers were essential to the resistance. Losing a single one was problematic. "Well, just how badly wrecked are we talking about?" asked Hardwire.

 

"Hey you're the guy who talk to machine, go ask the comm tower!" replied Bloodline. Of course, it was just typical banter between the two. Once next to the comm tower, the two of them could more easily see the damage. The thing had been tossed to the ground and key components had been ripped straight out. "So what do you think?" asked Bloodline to his comrade. "Heh! I think we need to make these things a lot more sturdy!"

 

After a short examination, his mood soured. "Well, looks like this one's busted for now. We'll have to get back to base because I don't have everything on hand to fix it." Already, Hardwire was picking up and packing up his tools. "I hate when that happens..."

Edited August 3, 2014 by RobRX

[RobRX]

Driving back to their resistance hideout, Bloodline once again had a chance to 'admire' the beautifully hideous scenery of the world he lived in. Nothing but grey and green haze, a cloudy sky and twisted, burned ruins. Once people had lived here, now there was nothing but ashes. Many things had been burned during the long nights, when the feral vampires overran the earth. While limited in intellect, it hadn't taken them long to figure out fire could spread and that fire was dangerous. Or perhaps, even then, the intelligent vampires had directed them. No one was certain.

 

The ATV pulled a sharp turn and went inside the arch, made from welded debris. This makeshift tunnel led to a door. Bloodline dismounted the vehicle and knocked on the door, with a code only resistance members knew. After a brief moment, the door opened with the sound of screeching metal.

 

The inside of the resistance hideout consisted of dark tunnels, where people lived cramped lives. Kept safe by some of the remaining supers, both some of the old guard and new ones as well as vampires who had been 'treated', the people of the resistance fought tooth and nail to free those inside the vampire camps. "Anton." said one of the resistance fighter to Bloodline. "There's a transmission waiting for you."

Edited August 3, 2014 by RobRX

[RobRX]

"Hey there, old friend. Long time no see." said Bloodline as the transmission came in. His old friend, going by the codename of Cathedral. Absolutely no powers whatsoever but still considered one of the best vampire hunter ever. "We're going to make this quick. As it happens, we've recently found that they're moving more captives into L.A. I know you are in the area, pack your gear; we're grabbing you on the way."

 

"Heh, you're not beating around the bush aren't you?" he replied. "So tell me the rest of the story, will you?" While everyone knew Bloodline wouldn't say no, at least he'd want to know what kind of mess he's going to put himself into. Simple precaution, after all.

 

"Several trucks were spotted, each carrying a lot of people and headed for Los Angeles. These convoys have been going for a while. My guess is that they're getting hungry. Well, thirsty really. If we hit those trucks in the badlands..." Bloodline cut him off, already having guessed the rest. "They won't have any backup and we'll be able to slip away with as many people as we can. Not bad"

 

"Allright then, we'll pick you up and head north again and prep an ambush on those bloodsuckers!" He then pause, suddenly reminded of what the person he was talking to was. "Well, you know. No hard feelings, right?"

 

"You know I've never considered myself one of them."

[RobRX]

June 4th 2014, Freedom City Sewers

 

Snapping out of his thought and out of memory lane, Bloodline was reminded that he was still inside a dark, smelly sewer. That flashback had seemed so vivid, so real, it was almost as if he had been living those moments again. Of course, he wasn't.

 

It dawned on Anton that those events didn't even exist anymore, or at least not in any shape or form he might recognise. His actions had presumably altered the course of history, as it was intended and as it was in his desperate mission. Still, it was a hard thing to swallow, that in a way he had erased his friends from time itself. Of course, he also knew that had Cathedral went back in time and not him, HE would have likely been erased from time. It had been the resistance's plan all along, after all; they knew their future was simply not sustainable in the long run. The vampires were at risk of eventually starving themselves to oblivion should they consume too many lives.

 

"Did I do the right thing?" he asked out loud. "Or did I kill more people than anybody else ever did?"

[RobRX]

August 4, 2060, Californian Wastelands

 

In the wastelands, Bloodline had rejoined with his old team and they had set up a camp, a few miles away from the road. While initially they had all been glad to meet each others again, the wastelands were not a place for celebration and the mood quickly turned dark and sour again. Hidden in their makeshift hideout, dug into the ground and covered in debris, they waited and talked in hushed tones.

 

"So how's everyone else anyway?" asked Bloodline, while counting the number of remaining grenades. The others had remained quiet about the whereabouts of other teammates.

 

"Well, everyone else you don't see here, right now? They're dead." explained Cathedral, turning the mood even bleaker.

 

"Damn." was all Bloodline could say. "What the hell even hapenned?"

 

"They're getting good, that's what. The vamps are getting better at tracking us. They know where our bases are, they know our tactics. Not to mention they're a bit less kill-happy these days now that they got a much more solid leadership."

 

"Let me guess; they take prisoners and turn them?" Figured Bloodline.

 

"Damn right they do. Then they let those poor bastard starves for a week and just when they are about to turn feral, they promise them blood if they will spill the beans. Works almost every time." Cathedral replied, with sorrow, pain and anger in his voice. "They're closing in on us."

[RobRX]

"Well, sh**. I guess it was only a matter of time, wasn't it?" Anton really didn't like the sound of that. He knew a situation like that was coming, in fact, it had been going for quite some time but as the vampire grew more and more organized, they also vastly increased in efficiency.

 

"Things have heated up while you were gone." Explained Raze, the entropy controller, something that was 'in the family' for a while now, according to him. "Freedom City's still a battlefield. Claremont is losing students every day, I heard. Well okay, 'students'. They're soldiers now."

 

"Chicago's in their pocket. Been like that for a while." Cathedral continued where Raze left off. "Look, it's what you'd expect; slave camps. Forced breeding. Limited kill, of course, gotta keep the foodstock alive for now. It hasn't changed that much from back in the days, when you got captured and-"

 

On the same cue, they all went silent and stopped breathing. Well, those that needed to breathe anyway. Bloodline's fingers reached to his mouth as he put them on his lip. He then gestured. They all knew what it meant.

 

Silently, Deadaim, the team's archer, moved toward the exit of their makeshift hideout.

[RobRX]

Scurriying on all four like foul, scuttling beast, were feral vampires trying to find something to feast upon as the sun was setting down. Clearly the creatures had been driven to such desperate attempts that they didn't even seem to care that they were still partially exposed to sunlight, weakening them. Perhaps they were so desperate and crazy that they simply didn't care and couldn't feel pain.

 

They were pale and dressed in the ragged, barely clinging remains of the clothes they had died in. Covered in filth from head to toe and decaying from injuries that hadn't healed due to a lack of feedings, these creatures barely looked human. Shuffling around, the creatures moaned.

 

Bloodline and the others, meanwhile, were on edge as they heard noises around them. There were more vampires nearby and they couldn't see them, which was a bad thing, obviously. With his weapon ready, he waited.

[RobRX]

June 4th 2014, Freedom City

 

Crawling out of the sewers, Bloodline found himself back on the surface during the night. Hopefully nobody would mind the strange, awful-smelling man who reeked of sewage. It was a rather strange city, after all.

 

Later, overlooking the streets from the roof of a building, the vampire kept ruminating in a type of self-examination and introspection one would only expect from the undead. In reality, Anton wasn't normally the brooding type. However, recent events had forced him into a far more brooding state. Closing his eyes, he continued remembering the story that no longer hapenned...

 

The noise and smell of the battle came back to him. The feral vampires leaping at Deadaim. Their rotten stench. A short, brutal, nearly deadly battle that had just hapenned more or less at random. Such was the life in those post-apocalyptic wastelands.

Edited August 6, 2014 by RobRX