#connor does a write

Artwork by @aradchnid

Face of contusions

Jackie pulled his grappling gun from his belt, aiming it at a faraway building. He jumped off the ledge of the building he was standing on, pulling the trigger on his gun. A rope shot out, hooking onto the metal fire escape. He swung over the streets below, landing on the steps of one of the escape landings, going up a few flights. He stopped at a particular window, the curtains pulled tightly over the pane. He slid it open, quietly slipping into the apartment. He started walking around the apartment, digging through cupboards, looking for a first aid kit.

The hero felt something cold touch the back of his head, along with a click.

“Stand up slowly,” said a voice behind him, “hands up, don't try anything.”

Jackie obeyed, raising his hands above his head, standing up. The object, presumably a gun, was removed from the back of his head.

“Turn around.”

He did, slowly, not wanting to make the other believe he would attack. He wasn’t surprised to see that there was, in fact, a gun in the person’s hands, nor was he surprised that the gun was still pointed at him.

“Who are you? Why are you here? How did you even get in??” the man asked quickly, not lowering the gun at all. If anything, he raised it more.

Jackie opened his mouth to speak, his hand flying to cover his mouth as he coughed wildly, nearly falling to the floor.

“Look, I can explain this all… But please,” he started coughing again, “Please, let me have a first aid kit, I’m hurt. Badly.”

The man reluctantly lowered his gun, slipping it into his holster with a sigh. He motioned for the hero to follow him, walking down a hallway. Jackie slowly followed him, having to steady himself on the wall, careful to not get any blood on it. He finally caught up to the other, who was standing in front of a door, waiting for the hero.

“There’s a kit in the cabinet, hurry up. I want answers.” he said sternly, opening the door and stepping to the side. He leaned against the wall, crossing his arms, eyeing the red clad man.

Jackie nodded in response, stumbling into the room. He closed the door behind himself, walking to the sink and opening the medicine cabinet. He digs through the cabinet, pushing past medicines to get to the kit. He hopped up onto the bathroom counter, pulling out the kit and shutting the cabinet. He pops open the kit, placing it down next to himself.

- - - -

Jackie walked out of the bathroom, his suit hood pulled down, but his mask remained on his face.

“Okay, look, Chase-” he started.

“How do you know my name!?” The other- Chase- interrupted, taking out his gun again, scared.

‘Shit…’

The hero sighed and reached up to his face, pulling off his mask, his bright green hair returning back to its natural brown. He looked at Chase worriedly, hoping that he would recognize him.

Chase gasped, his eyes going wide as he dropped the gun. He took a few steps forward, gently grabbing Jackie’s arm.

“J-Jackie?” he stuttered out, shocked, “I…. Y-You... You’re a superhero!? Why didn’t you tell me!?”

“Chase--” he was interrupted again.

“No! Jackie you should’ve told me! You shouldn’t be out there doing what you think is best! You can’t just… You can’t risk your life like this! I was so fucking worried after you disappeared, I didn’t know where you went- Hell, I didn’t even know if you were alive!!” he shouted, his voice beginning to break. Tears welled up in Chase’s eyes, but he didn’t care. He grabbed Jackie’s other arm, shaking him slightly.

“Jackie, you left. You left all of us without e-even saying anything! You didn’t even tell me goodbye! I thought you hated me- h-hated us…”

Tears started to fall from Chase’s eyes, his sobs echoing through the corridor. Jackie slowly wraps his arms around the father, trying to console him.

“Chase… I’m so sorry… I didn’t mean to do that… I just… I didn’t want to bother you… You were always so busy with Stacy and Sammy… I didn’t think you even cared.”

“Well I did.. Still do… I always wil--”  Chase gets interrupted as he yelped, the hero lifting the father off the ground.

“J-JACKIE..! PUT ME DOWN!!” he shouted, struggling, trying to get out of the other’s arms. Jackie just hummed, starting to walk back to the living room. He ignored his wounds, caring more about comforting his friend than making sure he was okay. He plopped down on the couch with Chase, lying the smaller man on top of him. He slowly ran a hand through the other’s hair, holding him close.

“Its late, and you need to sleep. So, I’m going to hold you captive to make you sleep, and you cannot stop me.”

Jackie jumped from building to building, his phone clutched tightly in his hand. Chase had texted him, it was a short message, just two words.

"Come over."

Just like that. Typing like that was unusual for Chase. If he was using punctuation, it meant that it was important. It meant that he needed to get there, now

Jackie hopped onto the fire escape, climbing up a couple flights. He pushed open the window, stumbling into Chase’s apartment.

“Brody?” he called out as he stood up, looking around the room. Things had been thrown, the table flipped over. A broken bottle of whiskey lay on the floor, the alcohol pooling out of the cracked middle. There seemed to be blood droplets on and around the bottle.

“C-Chase..?” the hero called out again. He walked past the couch.

The pillows were torn to shreds, and there was

more

blood.

Jackie was starting to get worried.

He walked down to the hall, carefully looking.

Claw marks littered the walls.

There was

still

more

blood.

CRASH

Something fell in the bedroom.

“Chase..? Is that you..?” he asked reluctantly, slowly walking to the bedroom door. He stopped in front of the door, eyes widen as he notices that the door was completely ajar. Chase was sat on the edge of his bed, his gun in hand. He was looking down at it, unmoving.

“C-CHASE!” he shouted, running over to the father. He grabbed the gun out of Chase’s hands, tossing it behind himself. He cupped Chase’s face in his hands, tilting his head up to look at the hero.

“Chase-” he started, only being abruptly stopped as he looked at Chase’s face.

There was blood running down his cheeks.

It wouldn’t stop coming.

His eyes were pitch black, only the faintest bit of white being seen in them.

“Brody is no longer here…” said an unsettling voice coming through Chase’s mouth. That wasn’t Chase’s voice, that wasn’t Chase….

‘What happened here? Why was Chase like this? Was Chase going to be okay? Who had done th-’

Jackie’s thoughts were cut short as he was knocked down to the ground by Chase. He snarled wildly at Jackie, his teeth razor sharp. Chase’s neck leaked blood onto Jackie’s suit, his eyes dripping nonstop blood onto his face.

“I’m sorry, but, Master needs you.” said Chase’s voice, but it wasn’t right. Something was off, something was completely wrong with how his best friend sounded. He sounded distorted, like he wasn’t talking from his own body. Like he wasn’t even in his body.

“What the fuck did you do to Chase?” he growled, trying to get “Chase” off of himself. He couldn’t though, whatever this thing that was pretending to be Chase, was far much stronger than him.

“I just fixed him…” the voice responded. It sounded awfully familiar.

Jackie opened his mouth to speak, his mouth being shut by some unseen force. The imposter’s grip on Jackie tightened as he started glitching. Jackie glitched with him, pain shooting through his body as they teleported away.

Chase pushed open her bedroom door, snapping on the light. He carefully placed her in her bed, putting her stuffed panda into her arms. He smiled, pushing her hair out of her face, kissing her blood stained forehead. He turned, heading for the door.

A small girl walked through the crowded halls, her shoulders hunched, arms close to her body; making her seem smaller. She ignored everyone around her, just trying to push through to her class.

She was, of course, the first one to get to class. The teacher was still writing the days assignment on the board, and didn’t even hear the girl come in. She just sighs, setting her bag down and placing her head on the desk.

--

When her head rose again, the morning bell had just rung, and the majority of the class was present. The teacher began explaining the assignment, and when she was done, students started getting up and pairing up with their friends.

Friends.

What a funny concept.

She hadn’t made a single friend since she started going to this school. No one wanted to be friends with someone who has dark magic anyway.

So she just sat there at her desk, staring blankly, no partner to work with. After a few moments, the teacher finally noticed her sitting there, and saw another student doing the same exact thing, sighing.

“Ms. Korkanova, Mr. Kichisaburo, since neither of you have partners, you will be working together.”

Just as she says that, the door opened, and a student with black and red hair stepped in, seeming to not care about being late.

“Mr. Frye! It's so wonderful to see you finally join our class today!"

Jackie pulled his grappling gun from his belt, aiming it at a faraway building. He jumped off the ledge of the building he was standing on, pulling the trigger on his gun. A rope shot out, hooking onto the metal fire escape. He swung over the streets below, landing on the steps of one of the escape landings, going up a few flights. He stopped at a particular window, the curtains pulled tightly over the pane. He slid it open, quietly slipping into the apartment. He started walking around the apartment, digging through cupboards, looking for a first aid kit.

The hero felt something cold touch the back of his head, along with a click.

“Stand up slowly,” said a voice behind him, “hands up, don't try anything.”

Jackie obeyed, raising his hands above his head, standing up. The object, presumably a gun, was removed from the back of his head.

“Turn around.”

He did, slowly, not wanting to make the other believe he would attack. He wasn’t surprised to see that there was, in fact, a gun in the person’s hands, nor was he surprised that the gun was still pointed at him.

A young boy walks into the school building, his bag slung haphazardly over his shoulder. The top two buttons of his shirt were undone, his tie half done, just hanging below the buttons. His hair was slicked back, the black fading into a fiery red at the tips. His chocolate brown eyes seemed to have a flame in them, as golden specks were dancing around like the embers of a large fire.

The school halls were empty, except for a few office aides. He seemed to be late, but he didn't care in the slightest. He just waltzed to his first class, ignoring any student who walked through the halls.

--

"Mr. Frye! It's so wonderful to see you finally join our class today!" The teacher said sarcastically, pushing her glasses up. "If you had bothered to be on time today, you would've been able to pick a group for this semester's major project, but everyone already has a partner. You will be joining Ms. Korkanova and Mr. Kichisaburo, and you will do at least a third of the work."

Journal entry one.

My name is Jayden Acevedo. I have lived on Mars for two Earth years. I know of the risks here, so do all my crew mates… or did all my crew mates. Some of them have died now. We came with about 8 people on our ship, now we are just 3. Mission Control says that they are planning to send more people in the coming year. I don’t know if I, or the remainder of my crew, will survive until then.

I had a point for starting this journal, I really should’ve started it when we were on our way to this planet. Nearly a years journey to get to this shitty planet. We can’t plant things here. No matter how many times we have tried, we have not been able to grow things. Our plants in the bigelow have to get artificial sunlight to stay alive. We cannot use real sunlight, there are no windows in our space that we could set the plants. It has

been so hard to keep them living all this time.

I just want to get off of this awful planet, go back to Earth, go back to my husband. I can’t contact him while I’m here. There is no way to contact anyone besides Mission Control, even then, it’s hard to get anything from them. Every few months at the very least, we get some small message from them.

--------

Chase pressed his back against the wall, breathing heavily. Everything was basked in red. The air was filled with static, it growing louder as the creature grew closer. He could hear its giggles echoing through the house, its calls out for him. It was terrifying.

He knew the creature was close, sounds of static and heavy footsteps were all he could hear.

"Daddy?" Called out a childish voice, it sounded like his daughter. Tears pricked it his eyes, he couldn't dare move, it could be a trick. The creature could've been using her, trying to lure him out.

"Daddy? Daddy where are you? I'm scared!"

Chase let out a few soft sobs, covering his mouth with his hands, trying to not be heard.

Everything went quiet for a moment.

"T̸͕̳̟̈́ḧ̴̨̡͙̤́́e̵̞͈͆̋̐͝r̴̦̙̿͗͠e̶̤̬͒́̚ ̸͙̟̇͐y̶͚͠ò̷͇̗̉̉u̷̙͐̑͋̕ ̴̩́̈́̔ǎ̸̜̙̪̩̈́̕r̵̠̀ȇ̵̙̜͎͚͌̎̐.̶̹̘̀̈́̕͜.̵̡̭͓̂̿̆̕.̷̤̋̕" the creature giggled crazily, stalking over to Chase.