Chakra Heroes Alliance Chapter 1

Here we go, there’s an actual section for this so yet another way to exorcise myself. This follows the storyline of Chakra BoT, with my own special twist of course…

Chakra Heroes Alliance Chapter 1; New Players

  “Orca!” a voice cut through the blackness of the cave. “Are you there?” A yellow, feline shape stalked out of the sulphuric mist. His red eyes looked around as though he were in a panic. Cheetah, a member of the Chakra Heroes, searched for his best friend. “Hey, Orca!” he had been searching for Orca for the last five minutes after discovering that a member of a mysterious group called the Zodiac Demons dropped her down here. He hoped she wasn’t… No, he mustn’t think that. “This is Cheetah, answer me!” a small cough caught his attention. Cheetah whirled around and saw Orca, she was pretty beaten up. Cheetah approached her slowly, fearing the worst. His fear was dispelled when Orca spoke, “Ch… Cheetah…” Cheetah felt his heart lurch and placed a paw on Orca’s cheek, unaware that his other paw was on top of a vent. “Are you okay?” He asked, his filled with concern. “Please tell me you are!” Orca twitched and her eyes slowly opened. The wolf couldn’t hear Cheetah’s words, however her sight was unimpeded, and it was dominated by the vibrating vent.

  “Step away from there!” she shrieked, shoving Cheetah away. Suddenly a pillar of fire struck the spot where Cheetah was, and where Orca is now.

  “No!” screamed Cheetah in anguish, his cry reverberating throughout the cave, attracting the attention of the other Heroes.

  And not just them. Several hundred meters away in the darker areas of the cave a pair of crimson eyes snapped up, they were unnatural unto themselves because they were dilated to such a degree that the red barely showed. Her body was lithe and curved, indicating she was female. A pair of long canines sprouted from her mouth. Her fur was a dark crimson red with a slightly lighter shade on her chest and underbelly, the fur was spattered with blood from a recent kill that she hadn’t bothered to clean off, and on her left shoulder was a bright red symbol of a wolf’s skull with a pair of bat-like wings sprouting from it, however they had no flesh to speak of, only bone with a few strands of sinew holding the bones together. Her tail became still, on the top it was a dark red like her back, on the lower part it was a lighter shade with a few streaks of bright crimson marring the otherwise perfect line between the two. Although despite all of these genetic deviances the she-wolf was extremely beautiful.

  Her name was Morothi, the bearer of the Sanguinus; the Chakra of blood. She glared over where the voice had come from. ‘I wonder who it could be… I wonder how the others will react.’ she thought. She unfolded her wings and a shimmering red aura resembling wing membranes materialized into few and she took off. The wolf’s speed was unparalleled, as was her other physical aspects and senses. She clung onto the ceiling and looked down with curiosity at a group of wolves, she shifted her focus to her sense of hearing, being only able to enhance one sense at a time was something that infuriated Morothi no end. “Uh-huh. Visitors.” She muttered. As the wolves left, leaving a black and white wolf with a cheetah with a rather good hairstyle, she shifted to her vision.

  “Very good hairstyle…” she muttered now that she had a ‘close up’ view. When the other wolves were out of earshot she dropped stealthily from the roof and landed lightly on her paws. She faintly heard the cheetah talking to the she-wolf.

  “You gonna be okay, Orca?” he was evidently worried, perhaps they were in a relationship? This… Orca glared at the yellow feline.

  “I’m fine Cheetah, you should’ve gone with the others, besides they need you more than me.” or maybe not. Cheetah shook his head and moved close to Orca, he stroked her fur and, Morothi noted with amusement, Orca seemed extremely discomforted by it. “Cheetah, get off.” She hissed.

  “No, I won’t let anyone hurt you, I won’t let you out of my sight.” Morothi nearly sighed; she had someone like that… once, before… she didn’t want to think about it, otherwise she will break down and cry again. Orca was lucky, and she was rejecting Cheetah point blank, Morothi was going to do something about this.

  “Hello.” Cheetah jerked up and hissed at Mororthi as she stepped from the shadows, he was momentarily stunned by her appearance before a cold mask of determination masked his face, he was very intent to defend Orca to the death. Morothi smiled cruelly. “I’m not here for trouble,” Morothi knew that she could paralyze Cheetah with her Predator’s Gaze, a glare that could frighten all but the most steel-willed of beings. She didn’t though. “I’m actually interested in your situation, who’s Kozel?” Cheetah glanced at Orca. “Answer my question.” Morothi allowed some of her Gaze to emerge and Cheetah was momentarily spellbound before he answered, “Kozel is part of a group called the Zodiac Demons, they’re our enemies at the moment.”

  “Interesting…” Morothi mumbled.

  “L-look, I don’t want any trouble.” Morothi shook her head and allowed her Gaze to fade away. “And I didn’t mean to scare you. In fact, I’d like to help. It’s been a while since I meet someone who hasn’t tried to kill me for… what they’ve heard of me.” Cheetah relaxed and took a few steps towards Morothi with a look of pity as the crimson wolf looked away. “No, don’t pity me, I don’t deserve it.” Morothi wiped away her tears and walked over to the prone Orca. “Let’s see what I can do for you.” Orca winced as Morothi placed a paw on her burn marks. “I see… I know what to do, this won’t hurt a bit.” She sliced a cut into Orca’s flank.

  “Ouch…” said Orca.

  “See? I lied.” Morothi sliced a line in her paw pad and allowed a drop of her blood to enter the cut. The crimson liquid seeped into Orca’s cut and it closed instantly, the burns faded away before her dumbstruck eyes. Orca could barely breathe, instead she said, “Wow…” Cheetah tapped Morothi’s shoulder. “So who are yo—“

  “Morothi!” a cracked voice that sounded like a blocked drain spoke from the darkness as the foulest and most repulsive wolf stalked out of the sulphurous mist. He was covered in boils, infected gashes and rashes, his mossy green fur had fallen off in places revealing withered folds of corrupted flesh. The wolf’s face was strangely unaffected by this corruption, serving only to make it more foul. A small mouth mask could be seen dangling from some ropes around his neck, hissing out a green gas which Cheetah could smell from ten feet away. The wolf was frail and his ribs could be seen. However despite all of these horrible things the wolf had a crack of a smile that could be seen on the corners of his mouth. “Morothi, Lucia and Keiros have been fighting again, but Ferrus has broken it up and—oh, who do we have here?” for the wolf had just noticed Cheetah and Orca staring in absolute horror at his rotten form. He angled his body slowly, his atrophic muscles straining with effort, but still he didn’t seem discomforted, he sniffed from his mask. “I am Kugath, a pleasure to meet your company.” Orca could see that his paw prints left a hissing acidic matter wherever he trod, and made a mental note never to stand behind him when walking single file.

  “Are the others coming?” Morothi asked the corpse of a wolf who nodded slowly. Three more wolves stalked from the gloom, one was a steel grey colour with half of his face and his left covered with metal, with a glowing red orb positioned where his eye should be. Most of his body, including his left flank, most of his chest and his left foreleg was metal. He had an odd cylinder shaped device on his left shoulder and a wrist bracer on his right foreleg. His mechanical limb whirred and clanked with each step it took. The wolf, despite his half metal face, could be considered handsome. The she-wolves behind him walked with grace, they were fairly similar in terms of size and shape; one could say they were twins, the one on the left was an alabaster white colour, and the other was a light blue. The white wolf moved with grace and barely made a sound as she walked, she was the most beautiful wolf ever, with pink eyes and a small lilac wedged between her ear and head. She smiled at Cheetah who blushed furiously, then stared intently at Orca.

  “Hmm, interesting. You’re lucky.” She said to Cheetah before grinning at Kugath, who laughed. “Ever the matchmaker aren’t you, Lucia?” Lucia laughed, her voice was soft and enticing, like the feel of silk. The other she-wolf rolled her face as she didn’t seem to have any eyes, suddenly, one eye opened on her forehead, it was bright yellow and had a cat-like slit down the middle. The eye itself seemed to glow with power and Orca couldn’t help but stare.

  “Forgive my sister, she likes lust to go around, it’s just the way she is.” Her voice was the opposite of her sister’s; it was harsh and brittle, but somehow held power. Lucia giggled as the wolf, assumingly Keiros, closed that eye and walked over to Morothi. “Morothi, who are these intruders? I sense something wrong about them.” Morothi shook her head and nodded to Orca and Cheetah.

  “No,” she said after a pause. “I don’t think these are the wolves who revel in chaos, but they mentioned a group known as the Zodiac Demons. Kugath chuckled, “You shouldn’t be so paranoid.” He gargled. Keiros rolled her… face.

  “You shouldn’t be so jovial to everyone you meet, Kugath.” A slight smile, creased Cheetah’s face as he remembered Orca and him having a similar argument not twelve hours ago. He could tell by Orca’s solitary laugh, which was barely noticeable, that Orca was thinking the same thing. Lucia walked over to Ferrus and propped her head on his massive shoulder with a purr. Morothi cleared her throat and immediately everyone stared at her, how she could take being looked at by these individuals Orca wasn’t sure.

  “So, you’ll help us?” she said. Suddenly the wolves froze and Orca was worried that she had struck a cord, a bad one. Keiros snorted, breaking the awkward silence, “Why should we? The moment you hero types lay eyes on us, it’ll be ‘destroy the beasts and the hideous creatures!’ We’ve seen it all before, only two weeks ago one of us was killed by a bunch of travellers, lead by someone called Red. And how did she die, oh that’s right, a stone right in the temple, such a noble way to die. But we killed off nearly half of his group in retaliation.” Cheetah got up as Keiros advanced towards them, but Morothi got between the two.

  “Keiros is right, we don’t owe anyone anything. We’re just going to get kicked out because of our appearance.”

  “No, you got it wrong!” Cheetah blurted out. Morothi paused, before nodding, seeing his chance, Cheetah continued, “The Chakra Heroes defend everybody from people like Red, he’s a coward who attacks the weak, but when he’s outnumbered or faced with a mighty foe, he runs. The Zodiac Demons are much worse, their leader, Jackal intends to rule everything in sight, it won’t matter what you look like, he’ll enslave or kill you either way. In a way… your situation is similar to mine when I joined.” Seeing that he had not swayed the wolves he sighed. “Let’s go Orca, they don’t want us here.”

  Suddenly as Cheetah turned to leave, he felt a paw grab his shoulder, Morothi had cleared five feet in an instant.

  “Speak,” she said. “Justify yourself, if you can.” Cheetah nodded, knowing that he had Morothi’s attention.

  “I joined because I had nothing to lose and everything to gain, my sister was dead, my brother had deserted the group which I’m a part of now, things are precarious and more dangerous than ever but they’re the best days of my life! If you help, you have my sworn promise that you won’t be treated like freaks.”

  “We can take being insulted by an enemy, but by your own friends, no. You think you can stem the opinion of others?” this was Ferrus speaking once more, he glared at Cheetah but he maintained his stare down with Morothi, even when she started using her Gaze. “Our leader, C.Y, she has three eyes, we’re not puritans, we have our mutations; Motyl has insect wings, Kuma is as big as a bear, and look at me.” He brandished his tail in front of Morothi’s face. “I look like a cat, for crying out loud, I even have their habits of preening myself! None of us let our disabilities get to us, we show our hearts by our actions, and judge others by theirs, if you help us, you can have a purpose worth living for.” Morothi looked at the others, they looked back. The Damned made their decision.

00000000

  Led didn’t like this, they have been travelling for nearly an hour and so far nothing had happened. It was too easy, Helio also felt the same way, as Did Kuma and C.Y. Motyl was slightly obsessed about the flowers at this point and on more than one occasion she had to be told to stay focussed.

  “Anything?” he asked C.Y as they left the tree line and stopped by a rocky ledge that seemed o be the end of the forest. The three-eyed wolf looked around and shook her head in defeat, with a sigh she turned to Led, “Nothing, something’s blocking me. What could possibly switch my powers of just like that?”

  “Well, me for a start.” The Heroes jumped as Jackal appeared on a ledge next to them with the same sadistically triumphant grin on his face and glittering red eyes. “You are so foolish, falling for that.” The Zodiac Demons appeared out of the trees and soon, the Chakra Heroes were surrounded.

  “I never thought I’d want to see Cheetah.” Helio grumbled. Kuma chuckled, “Yes, his flirtatious attitude and his lack of common sense is just what we need.” Kuma meant to lighten the mood but was completely unsuccessful. C.Y suddenly felt something; a collection of presences moving towards them, coming in fast.

  “Led,” she whispered so that the Demons didn’t hear. “Something’s coming, something… I don’t know how to describe it.” Led shook his head with a sigh.

  “We’ll just have to concentrate on fighting our way out.” Jackal suddenly dragged the sword up to his side.

  “I have the Destiny Sword and, technically, I don’t need to eliminate you, but that would be an occupational hazard so why not kill two birds with one stone and just finish you here?” The Demons chuckled and advanced before a familiar voice sounded behind them,

  “I think not.” The Demons turned in surprise as Cheetah and Orca appeared from the trees. Ryu looked at the Heroes then at the two newcomers. He let out a bark of laughter. “Is that all there is? The great relief force of the Chakra Heroes, two of your precious troops, bravo!” he clapped mockingly until he heard Cheetah laughing a mocking representation of Jackal’s chilling laughter. The Heroes’ jaws dropped as they saw that it wasn’t Cheetah laughing, but Orca!

  “Do you honestly think that we came alone?” Orca’s laughter turned hysterical and several five more wolves stalked from the undergrowth, a red female leading them. The Heroes were fascinated and horrified by the appearance of the newcomers. One was half made of metal, one was skeletally thin and covered in disease, one lacked eyes and the leader had a pair of skeletal bat wings with no wing membranes to speak of on her back. The female glared with soul piercing eyes at Ryu.

  “We are the Damned, I am Morothi, and this is Kugath, Keiros, Lucia and Ferrus. We have come for you.”