Ww - the coming storm

Steven was instantly knocked unconcious by the blow,and collapsed to the floor.


~~~


Pierre heard something behind him,and turned around,and saw nothing. Whatever it was,it was gone now.


~~~


Borghen,who heard the knocking,came to the door,and opened the door. He saw it was a man,and said, "I recieved no word that there would be guests today. Are you a personal friend of Hope?"
 
:: it had been several minutes after the engagement between hope's forces and the battlemages, for every 15 soldiers that were killed, the battlemages lost one of their own ::


:: Marco and faith stod, far from the battle, Marco was covered in wounds, his left arm was broken and he was bleeding :


Marco: "that.. all you got?"


:: little did faith know, he was dancing in Marco's palm, and Marco was about to set the trap ::
 
Leslie looked up at the building that claimed it was there to help magic people. Walking across the grounds, she faintly smiled to the gaurds, who had seen her around a few times, always near Marco when she had actually believed him. Believing her to just be wandering about, they let her be. Moving around the bases of the outside, small bits of sand getting dropped off here and there, she sighed.


Heading inside the building would be to risky, but it needed to be done. Layer the first floor, and the third, the rest should follow suit... Going in, Leslie jumped a bit, acting much like her old self without really meaning too. Every step she took, grains of sand fell to the ground till. After 15 minutes, she exited the building. Walking off the grounds and sitting on the curb across the street, Leslie waited.


Five minutes later, the warning she had left in the girls bathroom was found, as teh school started being evacuated, or at least, the students where, the personel where all wands out trying to find out were this so called bomb was. Taking a deep breath, Leslie called out to the sand in a soft whisper of a voice. "Destroy."


All at once, the sand she had placed shoot up into large pillars of it, destroying the building, and killing or badly injuring the personel left inside. By the time the attack was done, the sand had become nothing more than a few grains here and there soon to be picked up by the wind, where the school itself was gone, with no hope of being rebuilt.


Standing up, Leslie pulled up the hood to her jacket and started walking back towards Hope's, a dark grin on her face.
 
:: a hand grasped Leslie's neck ::


Artemis: "well well well"


:: he squeezed her nexk, easily blocking her throut ::


Artemis: "you little murderer..."


:: he squeezed a bit more, until a loud "snap" was heard, after this he dragged her body into the ruins of the school ::
 
Letting out a choking noise, Leslie clawed at the hand before it pressed down and she went limp.
 
:: back in the ruins, Artemis threw her down, he drove a piece of metal into her thigh-bone, and fixed her neck, he made sure that she could feel all the pain possible ::


Artemis: "and to think that i was willing to welcome you..."


:: he pulled out a scalpel ::


Artemis: "well, seeing how you work for that maniac, hope... you're gonna tell me everything you know"


:: the door that lead to the teleportation room, or the "gas chamber" as leslie thought opened, 3 mages came out, as well as many students ::


Mage: "is this the terrorist?"


Artemis: "yes"
 
Leslie clenched her teeth tightly, narrowing her eyes. "Nightrise scum." She spat at Artemis, shooting her hand out towards him, a polearm appearing in it and being thrown towards him.
 
Artemis: "nightrise?"


:: he smacked her across the face ::


Artemis: "you dare call me nightrise!? I'M THE ONE WHO BOUGHT DOWN NIGHTRISE!!"


:: he showed her a scar on his arm ::


Artemis: "i got this in the battle against nightrise forces in the "battle of asguard" and you dare try and call me one of them!?"


:: he stamped on her chest, cracking 2 ribs and snapping 1 ::


Artemis: "and what's worse... you bombed a building without making sure they were you're target! if you wanted to bomb nightrise, you should have gone to south africa, that's the only place they can still opperate in!"
 
Leslie didn't even make a sound at the abuse. She wasn't going to give him that satisfaction. Looking him in the eyes, she didn't believe a word he said to her, after what she had seen, and what she knew along with what Hope had told her, she wasn't ever going to believe it. Should could feel it though, something shifty about inside her.
 
:: Artemis stopped the beating ::


Artemis: "thats enough... i can see Hope's lies have burned themselves into your mind..."


:: he placed his hand on her head, sending the equivilent of 2.7 terrabites per second of information straight from Artemis's brain, the facts that he was showing her all disproved all of Hope's lies, but it all really came down to her choosing wether or not to even look at the facts ::


Artemis: "accept the truth or not, the fact remains that you killed a lot of people in this attack... some of the casualties were under 5 years old"


:: he pointed to a row of bodies, most were small children, a cvouple were even babies, and all were being pulled from the wrekage and being covered with torn white cloths ::
 
Leslie looked at him then over at the row. "Stupid people not to remove children when there was a bomb threat in that building..." Though she wasn't going to express it, it hurt a lot knowing that children, even after taking precations to get people like them out of the building, got killed. Still, keeping a blank face, she looked back at Artemis before shrugging. While her mind was processing what had just enetered her head, she grew quiet before leaning her head forward and sighing.
 
Vent sighed, picking up Steven's limp body, then Alec's then Joseph's. He carried all three into the hospital. Using Steven's emergency record from last time, when his lung was punctured (among other horrific and nearly fatal injuries) Vent managed to get all three immediate treatment. He saw each of them go off to separate rooms in the emergency section, and sighed, sitting down in the lobby and falling asleep.


~


Hope sighed.


'Borghen, keep whatever moron is at the door busy.' He sent, warping out of the house.


~


As Artemis tried to interrogate Leslie, a dome of light appeared around her. Sincerity Astrumregis appeared inside the dome.


"Big man, you stop hurting friends!" She yelled defiantly, going to work at healing Leslie's various injuries, as an untraceable warp-hole started to form beneath them.


Between Artemis and the other two, appeared Hope himself.


But Hope wasn't looking like Hope.


His platinum hair flowed in the breeze, but now his skin matched. He worse simple black pants, no shirt. In the middle of his chest, sat the Soulstone. Markings of light blue, the same glowing colour that now completely dominated his eyes, flowed from the Soulstone and covered his body.


"..... Hello, Artemis. It's been a long time." Hope said in revertebrating voice, like there was more than one of him talking.


~


Faith grinned.


"No, it isn't, Highland! But for you, I'll do better!" He spat, actually enjoying this fight.


"Titanos!" He yelled, his hand growing to gigantic proportions, picking up Marco around the torso. Faith's feet turned giant for a second as well, as he lept up into the air, taking Marco with him.


"You do realize, I was never aware those forces were in this area, right? I was sent to guard this mountain alone! I don't even think those forces are Hope's! We could both be getting played, Marco!" Faith screamed as they flew higher, onto the top of the mountain, where nobody was around. Faith set Marco down ten feet away, as his hand returned to normal, and he took a fighting stance.
 
Leslie blinked a few times at the little girl, before figuring out pretty easily who it was. Smiling faintly at her, she stayed silent. But, as Hope appeared, she narrowed her eyes. "Hope...." She muttered. "Leave him be." She understood, despite the fact that others might call this a cruel kind of toucher to figure out why someone did something, that it was a necessary repercussion. She also understood exactly what kept stirring restlessly inside, and she didn't want him or his sister around when it fully opened itself.
 
Hope turned to Leslie, his glowing eyes fixed on her for a second.


"..... Fine." He said, no revertebrations, his voice normal. Hope turned back to Artemis, and waved. An assine grin spread across Hope's face as he disappeared along with Leslie and Sincerity.


Back at the mansion, where the three materialized from the untraceable portal, Hope sighed. He looked normal, except for the Soulstone in his chest, and the markings just surrounding it. His skin and eyes were normal, and the extra markings were gone.


"..... What possesed you to destroy the Academy?" Hope asked, as Sincerity went about healing the major injury to Leslie's thigh.
 
Looking at the ceiling, she shrugged. "Because..." Leslie sighed. "Because I was stupid..." Sitting up and flinching a bit, she gently placed a hand on Sincerity's shoulder, "Sweetie, you don't have to do that. It's just a scratch, really. But thank you." Looking ack at Hope, she raised an eyebrow. "Why did you lie?"
 
Sincerity pouted, and skinned off to her room.


"Doesn't look like a scratch....." She grumbled, hugging Hope of the way by.


"Night big bro! Night lady!" She yelled from the bottom of the stair, before bounding up them.


Hope rolled his eyes, and watched Sincerity go up the stairs. With that, he turned back to Leslie.


He raised an eyebrow of his own, and grinned.


".... Lie about what, exactly?"
 
Standing up, Leslie folded her arms across her chest. "About what they were?About what your really trying to do. That your not the good guy after all...." There was no joking in her voice nor any shy stuttering adoration that she had previously held with him. Only calmness and a slight amount of anger.
 
Hope's grin faded.


"They're my enemies. Doesn't matter what they are. They're all the same to me. And good is only a matter of opinion. Evil is the same. To me, I do what has to be done. And if that means passing myself off as evil or good, or whatever, then so be it." Hope explained, no sign of his formal air, or the rare informal tone. This was just Hope.


He sat down, in opposition of Leslie's standing.


"..... And stupidity or not, you chose to attack them. And I'm willing to bet, you liked it. Power feels good, doesn't it?" He asked, a small grin on his face.
 
"No it doesn't." Leslie stated. "It's disgusting." There was a hint in the way she talked, liked she had cut herself off from saying something cruel towards Hope. She knew better than that though. "Do you really think enslaving the world is a good thing?" She shook her head and stared off the side, the restless shifty grew some more.
 
Hope sighed.


"Power without control feels disgusting." He spat, a bit insulted, but shaking his head, sighing.


He stood back up, picking up an ornament, holding it in his hand gently.


"..... And exactly who says I'm trying to enslave the world? True, believing everything I say wouldn't be smart, but you'd have to be an even bigger fool to swallow the crap Artemis feeds his students and himself." He said, acid in his voice. He looked generally displeased, almost hurt.
 
"It's not so much of a who...more so a thing." Leslie stated, not looking at him for fear of breaking down and feeling horrid for upsetting him. Hearing herself be called a fool in an offhanded sort of way stung. A lot more than it should have. Looking out the window, she frowned, she didn't even realize the changes happened to her. Her hair was gradually becoming a lot darker, she was growing in height and becoming something more along the lines of what a man would picture a female demon of lust to look like.
 
Hope sighed.


He noted, however, the expected changes were occurring to Leslie's body, as expected.


He almost smiled.


"Well," He started, his formal etiquette sparking up, "There's two courses of action from here." He explained, snapping his fingers, a shirt appearing on him.


He paused.


"...... One. You can leave. I've noted enough from this experiment, and in that department your help is no longer required. You're free to go and do whatever your heart desires." He explained.


"Or two. You can listen to my true intentions, and make an informed decision." He finished, crossing his arms, eyes closed, waiting.
 
:: Marco glared at faith ::


Marco: "maybe so... but still..."


:: he got up, focusing all his magic to his left hand and his legs ::


Marco: "sorry but... you should have been more careful"


:: Marco shrugged, his wounds remained open but he didn't even seem to mind ::


Marco: "there is one move that makes all blood-mages feared by all"


:: he flickered behind Faith ::


Marco: "blood magic, curse 99.. wound transfer"


:: he tapped Faith, instantly Marco's wounds were all fixed, and Faith's body opened up all over, spurting blood everywhere ::


____________________________________________________________


:: Artemis frowned at Hope ::


Artemis: "you are insane... you actually attempted to become a god with the soulstone, didn't you?"


:: he took a step back ::


Artemis: "fine... take you're pawn... but if she comes here again, i won't bother to interogate her, i'll burn her insides right out of her"


:: a portal opened behind him ::


Artemis: "everyone, retreat... we can't beat him"
 
Stuck for a moment, Valentina eyed the halls and decided to wait her stay out in the area designated for such. The way there was somewhat confusing, as she came in the wrong entrance but she eventually made it there. Although there were a couple people in the lobby, she seemed to be drawn towards the one sleeping in one of the chairs. Making her way over, she sat across from him and pulled down her hood, dusting herself off afterwards.


From the two feet distance, she stared him down, not really looking; she was preoccupied with thoughts…spacing out.
 
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