"It was a bloody night. The moon hangs low under a starless sky, as the fabric of all that we know splinter amidst the eyes of a challenger." Running his fingers through a pool of crimson blood, Jasper brought the blood to his lips. "What creatures lurk under this bloodless sky? How many souls are lost whilst the hungry feed?" Opening his pale lips, Jasper slowly moved his finger to his waiting tongue. "How many sanctums fall into the void when the wrong things rise into the light."
Before Jasper could put his fingers into his mouth, his partner stepped forward.
Slapping the back of his partner's head, Keen grimaced. "Would you stop talking like that, it's creeping me out." Raising his eyes, Keen's expression grew dark. "And I'm creeped out enough right now."
A dozen corpses hung above the courtyard; not one single wound could be seen on their bodies, yet blood dripped from their clothes. Each body floated in different ways; one was upside down, one softly spun, and another held their arms up to the pale disk hanging in the sky. The only similarity: Each body held a soft expression, their eyes closed as if they were sleeping
Feeling his pocket buzz, Keen reached into it, pulling out his communicator. "Huh, they got comms back online pretty quick." Squinting at the screen, Keen read the displayed name. "Central." Pressing his earpiece, Keen opened his communicator to the open channel.
A female voice spoke on the other end of the call. "This is Central, who is this."
"This is Keen of Team Three, I'm with Jasper of Team Three."
The woman's voice paused for a moment, "Keen?"
"I'm new. So what's the situation?"
"The sector you're in has undergone a complete communications blackout, the only reason we've been able to reach you is due to you being on the outside of the blackout. Have you found any signs of the Aberration?"
"No sign of the Aberration, but we've found about a dozen more dead… What's the count up to now?"
The female voice was silent for a moment before answering, "That would make the count five-hundred and sixteen. The Aberration is being identified as a Grade-Four; all teams are authorised to terminate the Aberration on sight."
"Confirmed Central. So this blackout, are any other teams on its perimeter?"
"Not that we know of. Furthermore, readings show that there is a spike in-" The voice was cut off by static.
Frowning, Keen looked at his phone. It displayed a lack of signal. "A spike in? A spike in what?" Pocketing his communicator, Keen glanced at Jasper. "Did you catch what she was trying to say at the end there?"
Without saying a word, Jasper pointed at the corpses. "I am believing that it will have something to do with that."
Following his finger, Keen's eyes widened for a moment before narrowing. "The hell."
The corpses were no longer floating aimlessly; now, each of them hung in the air, facing the two. Their irises were obscured due to how bloodshot their eyes were, causing their pupils to look like pinpricks of black in a sea of blood. Suddenly, the bodies dropped from the air, collapsing to the floor with sickening thuds.
The second after the bodies struck the ground, they immediately picked themselves up, beginning to move in Keen and Jasper's direction.
Not moving, Keen groaned as he rubbed his face. "Maybe it's a good thing we're on the same team. Could you deal with those, Jasper? I really don't want to have to get near them."
Silently obliging, Jasper pulled a thin, slender knife from his belt. Holding it to his palm, Jasper cut a small line across his palm. Blood immediately began to drip from the wound, slamming his hand into the puddle of blood closest to him. Jasper froze, turning towards Keen, a glum frown on his lips.
"Keen, I believe this Aberration has powers based on hemomancy."
"Haemomancy? Do you mean it has blood manipulation? What makes you say that?"
"I'm unable to bend the blood on the ground to my will."
Turning back to look at the bodies, they slowly picked up speed as they moved towards the two. Keen's hand tightened around the hilt of his sword. "That's just grand."
Drawing his sword, Keen side-stepped the first body, bringing his sword up; the blade cleanly sliced through its neck. The second and third bodies were dispatched in the same manner. As Keen moved to decapitate the fourth body, its hand shot up to catch the blade. The blade cut through the body's fingers. Having lost its momentum, the blade became lodged in the fourth body's neck.
Reacting fast, Keen brought his leg up, kicking the body square in the chest knocking it backwards.
As the body fell backwards, two more stepped forward. Gripping his sword, Keen called to his partner. "Jasper! Your help would be greatly appreciated!" After a moment of no response, Keen quickly turned his head to look behind him.
To Keen's surprise, the bodies he had decapitated had not stayed down, they had gotten back up despite lacking a head. Jasper wielded a crimson axe, moving with incredible speed as he quickly dispatched the bodies within a matter of moments. Turning his gaze to Keen, Jasper held his axe above his head.
The head of the axe morphed, flowing like a liquid turning into the head of a spear.
Keen's eyes widened as Jasper hurled the spear directly at him. But as the spear was about to skewer Keen through the chest, it split apart. Now two slightly smaller spears slammed into the two bodies that were about to pounce on Keen.
Hearing the bodies hit the ground, Keen turned his eyes, widening further as the spears sticking out of the bodies began to twist, their forms turning from staffs into blades that whipped around, slicing apart all of the moving bodies until they were no more recognisable than chunks of meat.
Jasper idly stepped past Keen, the blades moving to his open palms, joining together and then sinking into the open wound on his right palm.
'That's that's the power of an Aberrant. He cut through these bodies as if they were paper.'
Jasper's eyes narrowed looking at the remnants of the sliced-up bodies. With a sigh, Jasper ran his blood-covered fingers through his bone-white hair. "The herald of these creatures of blood is by no means a Grade-Four."
Sheathing his sword, Keen followed Jasper's gaze. Keen couldn't help but frown as he looked at the bodies they had been forced to dispatch.
'These, these were people before that thing did something to them…'
"But… Control said the Aberration was a Grade-Four. If they are wrong, what could it be then?" Keen's tone was tinged with fear.
Jasper looked up at the moon; it hung directly above them like a pupil-less eye, watching, waiting, judging.
"Control may have at one point been correct, but this Aberration is no small thing. We are nowhere near to it, yet it puppeteers these bodies with no string. They move despite pain, despite injury; even a headless fool knows when to die. A Grade-Four it is not, but a Grade-Three it may be."
"A- A Grade-Three?" Keen racked his brain to remember the Aberration classifications designated by the Department of Aberration Control. "If a Grade-Four is an Aberration that can kill hundreds of people with ease, then Grade-Three…" Keen's face grew pale. "A Grade-Three can destroy an entire sector of the city."
Jasper looked at Keen out of the corner of his eye. "Control will have detected the heightened strength of this Aberration. Reinforcements they will send. But now, further into the lion's den we must go, group up with the rest of our friends. Captain will have a plan."
"Further in?! Jasper, are you mad? This Aberration managed to kill over five hundred people, and that's when we thought it was a Grade-Four, with it being able to control the dead. Who knows how many people it's killed at this point? We should stay here, or better yet, retreat and wait for reinforcements."
Jasper tilted his head. "We do not retreat." Despite how Jasper usually spoke, as he answered Keen his words were short, blunt and to the point. He spoke almost as if he didn't understand what Keen had just said.
"But-" Keen gestured to what they were standing over. "Aren't you scared, man? This thing – a Grade-Three – we're just human, we have no way of stopping this thing."
Nodding his head, Jasper slightly smiled as Keen finished. "I do understand what you are speaking. To think, it has only been a few weeks since you joined Team Three, and now you are being sent to eliminate a Grade-Three Aberration. Fear is natural; fear is normal. Hold onto your fear, it keeps you alive."
"This isn't about fear, Jasper. It's just about not wanting to die."
Stepping closer to Keen, Jasper reached a hand up to touch his shoulder – but remembering how his hands were covered in blood, he withdrew it. "Keen, do you know what we are called?"
"What we are called? We're ARC Operatives."
"Officially, yes, but what is another name people call us by? If ARC Operatives is our official name, then what is our unofficial name? What do the people call us?"
It took Keen a moment to understand the question he was being asked. "The people…" It was a name Keen had heard a lot during his youth, sometimes with mocking disdain, sometimes with snide arrogance, but when an Abberant was on the loose, it was always a name cried out in desperate need. "Wardens, the people call us Wardens."
"Yes," Jasper nodded with a smile. "They call us Wardens. Because if we are not there to hold the line, then who will be the one to strike against these unearthly creatures?"