Chapter 14

MESSAGE 1 - SENDER: ANONYMOUS

I have information. There’s going to be an opportunity soon.

MESSAGE 2 - SENDER: ZEUS

I am delighted that you feel you can contact me again.

MESSAGE 3 - SENDER: ANONYMOUS

I thought about what you said. It’s true, you kept your word the last time. You failed to remove Homer, but you didn't hurt Ardia. At least not significantly. When I think about what happened I can see that you clearly went out of your way to keep her alive. When I consider that then I feel that I probably can trust you. At least with a second chance.

MESSAGE 4 - SENDER: ZEUS

Very good and very true. You’re bringing something of value to me and I can offer a service of value for you. It is not in my best interest to be disloyal to you. I understand the risk that you are taking in reaching out to me. Now, tell me what you know.

MESSAGE 5 - SENDER: ANONYMOUS

I don’t have all the details yet. I know that they are aware of some activity of the Darkley Corporation in the Mediterranean. There’s a platform in the sea, I think it’s somewhere near Greece. They’re planning an expedition to investigate what’s going on out there.

MESSAGE 6 - SENDER: ZEUS

Darkley? What could have drawn their interest to Darkley?

MESSAGE 7 - SENDER: ANONYMOUS

Razmik is very smart. He sees connections where anyone else would just see shadows. He’s used his connections and his insight to link Darkley to you somehow.

MESSAGE 8 - SENDER: ZEUS

Incredible. I mean that, truly. Monstrous government agencies have probed Darkley in attempts to explain certain suspicious events over the decades. I cannot believe that this one little man could pierce the shroud. Tell me, when are they going to be there? How are they going to get there?

MESSAGE 9 - SENDER: ANONYMOUS

I don’t know yet. The talking has just begun so it may take some time before a plan is completely in place. I just wanted to warn you, to put you on alert. As soon as I know more then so will you.

MESSAGE 10 - SENDER: ZEUS

Excellent. You did the right thing. I will prepare a response to this.

Chapter 15

An entry from the diary of Damien Slayer,

Washington State. I really thought I’d seen the last of this place. I was born here. My earliest and happiest memories are all of this place. Simple but beautiful pleasures. Childhood games, playing with my parents in the forests, glories on the football field. Penny.

When I think about it, I guess the worst memories of my life are here as well. The events of Penny’s death. Somehow becoming one of the most reviled men in America. Then my failure of a return when I let Prowler get to Avril, when I had every possible opportunity to stop it.

I didn’t think I’d ever be able to come back here. I was right really, if it hadn’t been for Razmik the risk of coming back here would have been too great. But now I’m here, well dressed and well disguised, with the best fake documentation money can buy. I even have a helicopter waiting on standby to extract me if the shit hits the fan. That’s one thing that law enforcement could never expect, the vagrant killer Damien Slayer escaping on an unmarked private chopper.

I don’t think it will come to that.

I have a priest to talk to. He’s a member of the Secret Order of St. Jean Chastel, but he has grown disillusioned with his church. He was peripherally involved during the debacle with Prowler here the second time, in the first years of this new millennium. He saw what the order did, how they used women as bait and allowed them to be destroyed by the monster. We met on internet forums and the relationship has solidified over the last year. Having Razmik’s home as a base has allowed me to have regular access to very discreet and secure internet connections and the result has been a distinct acceleration in my developing of contacts and resources.

The priest has information for me but he’s unwilling to share it online. He is afraid that the Order may be watching, that the nature of the intelligence would allow them to identify him if they are watching. I hope it is going to be worth the risk. I have a feeling that it will be.

When I arrived here I also attempted to make contact with someone else. Sheriff Bill.

Bill was directly involved in the events of the second appearance of Prowler. He knew me before I ever came to be considered one of the most heinous killers in the history of the USA. Bill hounded me when I came back here the first time. A simple man but a ferocious one. Smart and loyal, true to his calling.

Right after what happened to Avril, I contacted him. He understood then, I think. Law enforcement continued to blame me for what happened to Avril and the other women but Bill had put it together by then. We spoke and I planted the seeds then that we might be able to use or help each other again someday. In the years since I haven’t been able to reach him. It was too great a risk. I felt that he had figured out the truth of what had been happening in the woods, but I was hardly going to risk exposing myself to law enforcement.

I arrived in Washington last night. When I arrived I risked making some phone calls using the special cellphone that Razmik gave me. Bill is no longer a cop. He’s no longer anywhere to be found. This worries me somehow. I wanted to speak to him because I am painfully aware that Prowler is very overdue to strike again. He’s come here twice, he’s had some of his best successes here. Bill was the man I was hoping who could confirm or deny the possibility that the attacks have begun again. Now he has completely vanished.

This prompted me to do a little more research, to make a few more calls. What I found out disturbs me even further. Avril is no longer in the asylum. She escaped more than a year ago and disappeared.

Chapter 16

Hyperion walked toward the mountain.

As he progressed across the island certain facts began to become much clearer to him.

The island was very large. It was hard to surmise exactly how large it was, but it was quite vast. It was mostly covered in dense jungle. On the fringes were mostly sandy beaches with some stretches of cliffs that rose far above the sea. The jungle was adamant that this was its island, pushing out towards the shore with a nearly obstinate determination. Towards the centre of the island rose a single monstrous cone of rock. This mountain was almost certainly the volcano that had given rise to the entire island. Now, millenia after it had roared up from the sea floor in a storm of fire, ash and smoke, the volcano was nothing more than a tower of black stone.

The mountain was Zeus’s personal lair. He even called it Mount Olympus although Hyperion understood it had a different name on official charts.

The physical composition of the island aside, Hyperion could observe other elements that defined life on the island. Firstly, the population of hybrids here was far greater than he had imagined. The dozens he had originally envisioned had quickly been replaced with hundreds in his mind. As he crossed towards the mountain, moving first through beach, then jungle, and now ascending the slope, he counted more and more of his peers. Hundreds may not capture the reality here. Hyperion now judged that there could even be some few thousand hybrids on the island.

And still that was not all. He had observed how the males had taken the right to mate with a female (her interest and consent being completely superfluous). He had begun to envision this society as being two tiered, the bottom tier being composed of female breeders and the top tier consisting of the males that used them. Even that was shifting further as he cast his eyes around.

Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

‘What have I gotten myself into?’ Hyperion breathed to himself as he walked.

At the fringes of the island, where he had chosen to pass most of his time to this point, he had mostly observed homes that were little more than jungle shacks. There had been loosely assembled walls with palm leaf roofs. The closer he got to the centre of island, the more he realized that there were further tiers to society here. The houses became more elaborate. Not every hybrid wanted to exist so close to nature it seemed. Those dwelling near the mountain, near Zeus, lived in structures that ranged from elaborate huts all the way to prefabricated structures that must have been brought here by ship.

The ground beneath his feet changed from the dark, loamy vegetation strewn ground of the jungle to a loose crumbling rock as he began his ascent.

The climb was a steep one. There were many times when he had to leap and climb up sheer faces. For a creature like Hyperion it was nearly effortless. For a human, even an experienced mountain climber, it would have been a challenging route.

Up above, he could see Hercules waiting. Hercules’s monstrous, almost square, shape stood on the edge of an outcrop. The massive hybrid was watching Hyperion as he approached. Hyperion knew that behind Hercules, where the outcrop met the face of the mountain, would be the entrance to Mount Olympus.

Hyperion found himself not that eager to join Hercules, so he paused. He took a moment to cast his eyes about and absorb the view that his elevation provided. From this height he could see the jungle like a green ocean stretching out to the band of sand that lay like a demarcation line between the green and the next, so much more infinite, ocean of blue. It was truly beautiful here. It had the appearance of paradise. The appearance.

Hyperion also marvelled at how completely invisible all of the homes were, even from this height. Cleverly disguised, the island seemed completely uninhabited.

Then Hercules’s voice, so loud and powerful that it felt like something elemental, ‘Come, Brother! Time isn’t with us. You can sightsee later.’

Hyperion sighed and turned back to the ascent. He climbed towards Hercules, towards Zeus, all the while wondering if he had made a mistake.

Chapter 17

Ukraine, sometime in the early 1960s…

The small child, with skin as dark as coal and clothes as ragged as the alleys he ran through, darted frantically through the narrow streets of the southern city in Ukraine. His feet pounded against the cobblestones of the alleyway, creating a steady rhythm that echoed off the crumbling buildings around him. The air was thick with the scent of smoke from distant factories, mixing with the sound of distant church bells chiming in the evening air.

As he ran, the child could hear the shouts of the gang of men behind him, their voices filled with malice and murder intent. Their heavy footsteps echoed loudly behind him, pushing him to run faster, his heart pounding in his chest. The dimly lit street lamps flickered overhead, casting eerie shadows on the walls around him as he raced through the labyrinth of alleys.

The child's coal-like skin gleamed in the dim light, reflecting the shadows around him as he weaved through the maze of alleyways, his breath ragged and his heart pounding in fear. The men behind him grew closer, their shouts growing louder and more menacing with each passing moment.

The city was strange and alien to him, the tall smokestacks of the factories in the distance, the distant sound of a train whistle echoing through the night, the faded murals on the walls depicting scenes of a time long past. The city was alive with history and secrets, a place where danger lurked around every corner and not everyone was who they seemed to be.

But despite the darkness of the alleyways and the danger that pursued him, the child ran on, his jagged skin glistening in the faint light, determined to escape the clutches of the men chasing him, and find safety in the shadows of the city. There was nothing they could to him here, nothing that could be worse here, than in the place he had left.

The child's heart pounded in his chest as he dashed through the winding alleys, his coal-black skin glistening with sweat in the dim light. His ragged clothes fluttered behind him as he pushed himself to run faster, his feet pounding against the cobblestone streets. Panic welled up inside him as he realized he had reached a dead end, the looming walls of the alley closing in around him like a trap.

Turning quickly, like a cornered rat, the child faced the gang of men approaching slowly, their menacing figures casting long shadows on the crumbling walls. They brandished an assortment of improvised melee weapons - pipes, chains, and broken bottles - glinting in the faint light of the street lamps. The child's chest heaved with fear as he backed up against the cold stone wall, eyes wide with terror as he searched desperately for an escape route.

The men closed in on him, their faces twisted with malice and cruelty, their heavy footsteps echoing loudly in the enclosed space. The child could feel the cold sweat trickling down his forehead as he braced himself for what was to come. His coal-black skin seemed to absorb the darkness around him, blending seamlessly with the shadows as he tried to make himself smaller, less noticeable in the face of the impending violence.

As the men drew closer, their weapons glinting dangerously in the low light, the child's mind raced with thoughts of survival. He knew he was outnumbered and outmatched, but he refused to go down without a fight. With a deep breath, he steeled himself for the inevitable confrontation, his eyes darting between the menacing figures as he prepared to defend himself against the onslaught of violence that was about to descend upon him.

One of the men stepped forward, raising a hand to stop the others.

"Stay back," he commanded, his voice cold and cruel. "I want the pleasure of dispatching this demon creature myself."

The child had heard this sentiment many times since he had crept into the city days ago, seeking food, his bizarre appearance both an asset and a curse. His skin, like armor, was alien and horrifying to man - a trait that he could now only hope would save him.

The man approached the boy confidently, an improvised club in hand, while the others stood back, shouting taunts and encouragement.

"Come on, Pyotr, smash that demon good!" one yelled, a cruel grin spreading across his face.

With a heavy grunt, the man swung the club at the child, but the boy dodged, his coal-black skin glistening in the dim light. The wooden club whistled through the air as the man swung again and again, his fury rising with each passing moment.

The boy evaded the blows with increasing difficulty, his movements becoming more and more frantic, as the heavy-handed man grew even wilder. The taunts and encouragement of the others grew as well, as they jeered at their prey, blocking the way to any potential escape.

Finally, their leader managed to land a solid hit, smashing his club into the child's side, with a loud crack. His weapon splintered against the boy's armored skin, staggering him slightly but causing no serious injury. The sight of this feat drew a collective gasp from the gang, disbelief and confusion crossing their faces.

Anger flared in the child's eyes as he snatched the shattered remnants of the weapon from the much larger man. The man, utterly shocked, could only mutter a curse, "Fucking... demon!"

He stared at the impossible display of strength from this demon child.

In a swift, powerful movement, the child swung the improvised weapon back at the man, bringing him to his knees with a gut-wrenching thud. It was an unspoken warning to the others. They had underestimated him, and perhaps, he wasn't as helpless as they had believed.

Despite his momentary triumph, the situation quickly turned dire again. The men, their eyes burning with rage at the sight of their fallen leader, approached en masse, pitchforks and other weapons brandished. Their failure to easily overpower the boy only served to rile them up further. Overwhelmed, the child backed up slowly, an utter sense of hopelessness settling within him.

He could not have known what he would one day become - a creature that would feel no threat from a half-dozen men, or even more - but for now, as a child, he was beyond outmatched. As he backed up against the wall, he stopped, growling and baring his teeth ferally in a last futile gesture of defiance.

Just as the closest man prepared to strike him with the deadly tines of his pitchfork, a sudden burst of automatic gunfire erupted from behind them, the staccato reports sending pigeons scattered about the area into panicked flight.

All the men, confused and alarmed, turned their attention away from the child. The boy followed their gaze to see a group of soldiers standing resolutely, weapons in hand. He didn't recognize that they were Russian soldiers; he knew nothing of the world after living isolated from society for so long.

The gang of men, however, recognized them instantly. They also recognized the insignia and uniform of the high-ranking general - proud and powerful, he stood amidst the soldiers, utterly at ease in the chaotic situation. His loyal retainers flanked him, their weapons ready and a steely resolve in their eyes.

The presence of the soldiers and their general effectively ended the standoff, leaving the gang of men hesitant and uncertain as they considered their options. Blood still pounded in the child's ears, clouding his senses, but he knew that for now, at least, fortune had turned in his favor.

The general raised his hand in a dismissive gesture, his authoritative voice cutting through the tense atmosphere. "Get out of here, you cowards. You have no place here."

The gangsters exchanged furtive glances amongst themselves, keenly aware of the armed soldiers flanking the imposing figure of the general. Their bravado rapidly drained away, and they scattered, melting into the shadows of the alleys and disappearing into the night.

With the gangsters dealt with, the general slowly approached the child, his steps measured and deliberate. The boy, still filled with fear and suspicion, growled softly and waved the club defensively. The general stopped just short of the child's reach, studying him with a keen eye. His eyes were kind, but there was also a cold, eager depth to them that hinted at a calculating mind beneath his compassion.

"Don't be afraid, child," the general said, his voice soft but unwavering. "I promise you, you're safe now."

Though the child continued to growl, it was weaker and tinged with uncertainty as he listened to the man before him. The general, sensing the boy's hesitance, reached into his pocket and pulled out something wrapped in wax paper. The child's nose caught the scent of food, and his stomach growled in response, a testament to the days he had spent living like an alley cat, scavenging for every morsel he could find.

The general carefully unfolded the paper, revealing a sweet pastry. The sight of the food was like a balm to the child's wariness, and he slowly let the club clatter to the ground. He approached the general with an air of caution, his gaze flicking back and forth between the pastry and the man's face.

"I am here to help you," the general said, his voice reassuring. "You don't need to be afraid anymore."

He extended a hand, the offer of both the pastry and his assistance clear in his kindly eyes.

After a moment's hesitation, the child decided to trust the man before him. He reached out with his own stony, coal-black hand and placed it in the general's warm grip, the pastry being transferred to his other hand. Together, they walked away into the evening, hand in hand, the boy taking his first, hesitant steps towards an uncertain future under the guidance and protection of this unknown guardian.