Renegade Reborn

Part 12

Ren reappeared in the Black Forest in Germany. Twilight was falling, and the wood lived up to its name. Pockets of shadow pooled in between the branches and trunks, and Ren's summoned darkness blended with the natural one.

The Black Forest was a breeding ground for demons, especially blood-drinking upyr, basis for the legendary vampires. But Ren was at the top of the food chain, and the demons he sensed currently closing in on him? They were not the hunters. They were now the hunted.

Ren's attire turned all black, the undershirt and jeans fitting to his form and his sunglasses disappearing. His eyes burned red and his pupils became slits, a side-effect of perfect infrared night vision. Slender, short blades appeared from the shadows, and he held them tight against his forearms. Prepared for the chase, Ren took off, silent as a ghost and invisible in the darkness, not to mention easily exceeding hundreds of miles an hour.

The upyr gave a short owl's cry, the signal for no activity, as he closed in on the scent's origin. A moment after he finished, a tanned arm from behind clamped around his mouth and a sword blade exploded through his heart. The upyr's eyes widened and he swayed as the arm released its hold. A second short sword decapitated him as he opened his pulverized jaw to shout. The upyr crumbled soundlessly to dust without his comrades knowing a single thing. Ren dispersed the dust with a short puff, and it flew away on the wind. He had left a cloud of pheromones in the clearing, but he was now in his natural scentless state.

Rather ironically, the thrill of the chase helped clear his head. And right now, as he leaped from tree to tree in pursuit of his next victim, his mind was crystalline in its clarity. He suddenly dropped down on the pair of oblivious upyr with swords pointed downwards. The weapons severed the demons' spinal cords and then ripped out to remove their heads- the only sure way to kill the upyr. Ren flashed away, once again on the prowl for victims. Thirty seconds later, Ren had slaughtered every upyr in a nearby semicircle. Finished for now with the hunt, he teleported back to the clearing to await the rest of the merry band. Ren leaned against a sturdy old oak, his feet crossed. He dismissed his blades and instead conjured an already-open bottle of rum- Captain Morgan's Black Spiced, to be exact. He raised the bottle to his lips and settled in to wait. Not even a minute later, a semicircle of upyr demons closed in, filling the trees in front of him. They seemed quite satisfied with finding a supposedly drunk human out in the middle of a forest. All but one, that is. He studied Ren with narrowed eyes which then widened with realization. That one's the oldest, Ren thought with absolute certainty. He alone knows what I am. The demon backed away, his hands up in a gesture of surrender. I want no part in this, he mouthed to Ren. Spare me. Ren let his senses loose on the upyr, the 'penitent' one in particular. In the blink of an eye, he knew every deed it had ever done. Surprisingly, the upyr's good deeds far outweighed his evil ones. Ren nodded in acquiescence, allowing the demon to turn and take to his heels. The rest of the upyr seemed surprised that the rest of them- the demons meant to be behind Ren- hadn't shown, but they closed in anyway.

We entered the clearing stealthily, my brethren and I. The human, tall as he was, was sucking down the last drops in a rum bottle. His eyes were slitted, and he was quite obviously drunk. Quite suddenly, he stood straight and bellowed theatrically, " Why is the rum always gone?" before hurling the empty alcohol bottle into the forest. To my shock, the glass slammed into the face of the upyr next to me and sent him flying backwards, looking unconscious. I turned back to the human and- Satan preserve me! His eyes were burning crimson, and the pupils were black slits. My first thought- That is no human. My second- He can see us! But what happened next was even worse. The being doubled in size- he must have been over thirteen feet tall and near a thousand pounds. His skin turned ashen grey as six blindingly white wings blotted out all traces of starlight, and muscles rippled along his form as his clothing morphed into simple black leather pants and boots. A massive black scythe filled his hands. A cracked bone mask covered his face, and pure white orbs blazed in the eyeholes. The change had taken barely a second or two. He glared down at us, all frozen in terror, entirely devoid of pity of mercy. "Time to atone, upyr," came a gravelly voice from behind that mask, and then the fearsome scythe rose.