The Matthias Chronicles

Vol. 2 Story 3: "Welcome to Fight Club..."

By Wraith

      Blink, Penance, and Magik, the three young mutants who just stepped through a portal connecting this dimension with the realm of Limbo, laid on the ground in front of Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters unconscious. Their assailant, Eddie Brock/Venom, stood with his foot on the chest of Sean Cassidy. Sean’s throat (and in turn his mutated larynx) was constricted Venom’s unique brand of organic spider webbing, and his mouth was covered with the same.

      “We may not be on the X-Men’s list of baddies, but we do our research Mr. Cassidy. So you will forgive us for not allowing you to use your dreaded sonic powers against us.”

      Venom looked around for the boy. The reason he was attacking a small group of innocents, the young man who had bonded with one of the symbiotes.

      “C’mon! Come out come out wherever you are!”

      Abruptly, a powerful blast of electricity hit Venom square in the spine. The huge creature screeched in pain as he turned to face is attacker. Chris Storm stood with his fists in front of his body, still giving off smoke.

      “Mutant Security. We heard there was a break-in,” The humor was lost on Venom who lunged at the young mutant.

      Angelo emerged from the bushes and extended a length of skin from the back of his hand, wrapped Venom in mid-air and dropped him to the earth. Hard.

      “Do you fools know what you’re doing?!? That symbiote is dangerous!”

      Angelo and Chris looked at each other in confusion and spoke in unison:

      “Symbi-huh?”

      Venom flexed his massive biceps and ripped the skin that Angelo was using to bind him. In response the young mutant screamed in immense pain as his torn skin began to bleed profusely.

      “We have no time for this! Venom turned towards the doors that lead to the school and continued to search for young Paul Jordan and the symbiote who bonded to him.

      Chris ran over to his fallen comrade and knelt to pick up the ripped pieces of his skin. “Ange, Ange! Talk to me bro! C’mon please be O.K.!” Chris’ pleas were not answered as Angelo had passed out from a combination of pain and blood loss. Chris ran over to Cassidy and helped his headmaster remove the webbing from his mouth and throat.

      “Cassidy, Angelo is down, Penance and those two girls are knocked out and Paul is missing.”

      “Aye lad. Now who else is in the school? Is Emma back from the Professor’s yet.”

      “Yeah, but she had a visitor and locked herself in her ‘isolation chamber’ soon after he left. And Munroe headed back to the Westchester campus as soon as you called saying you were on your way.”

      Cassidy sized up the situation. “Well Chris, aside from me the only people on campus who are capable of waging an attack on that beastie are ye students correct?”

      “Correct.”

      “And of those students, four have not yet had any formal offensive or defensive training with their abilities, correct?”

      “Correct.”

      “Well lad, if’n yure a praying man, I suggest ye start now.”

      ************

      Jamal knelt at the foot-tall table in the Li’s dining room enjoying the dinner served by Aoi, the matriarch. As Jamal ate his rice and vegetables with a pair of red chopsticks, Aoi noticed a wooden bracelet on his right wrist.

      “Jamal, you still wear the prayer bracelet that Mika made for you?”

      Jamal chewed and swallowed his food before responding. “Of course! I wear it all the time, even when I sleep.”

      Aoi was surprised, “Jamal, your Japanese is so good! I was afraid you would have forgotten most of it!”

      “I needed a few refreshers before I came back, but on the ride from the airport, Mika only spoke to me in Japanese so I got reacquainted quickly.”

      Aoi smiled at the act of enjoying a meal with her surrogate son for the first time in almost four years. Mika walked in from the kitchen holding a tray with a bottle of pills, a small pot of tea, and a bowl of miso soup.

      “Mika, you look like you could use some help with that.”

      “Jamal, I’m fine, trust me,” Mika smiled at the chivalrous offer. “However, I am going to take this to my father, he’s out in the garden meditating. He has been since I left to pick you up earlier. You know you’re more than welcome to join me.”

      Mika and Jamal walked across the property to the small shrine located in the middle of the farmland estate. Inside of the minute, open-air temple the Li family patriarch, Akira, knelt in front of a bundle of lit incense. Akira’s head was bald, due to the chemotherapy, and he was quoting Taoist verses. He didn’t need to look up, he simply felt an energy enter the temple and he immediately knew who it was.

      “Jamal! I was wondering when you would get here!” Akira smiled and stood up to greet his former student.

      Jamal quickly knelt before his former teacher. “It has been so long since I last saw you teacher. I am saddened to hear of your illness...”

      Akira smiled at the young man’s formalities. “Jamal, stand up. I do not wish to be seen as your teacher. My time left on this planet is limited, I have accepted this. I am glad that you have returned to Kanazawa in my final days.”

      “Don’t be ridiculous sir! Wild horses could not have kept me away from here!”

      Another voice emanated from behind Jamal, “I would hope not. I have waited far too long for this pleasure.”

      Jamal turned to face the speaker, and recognized him immediately. “Tetsuo. I was wondering when you’d show up.”

      “Enough of your mindless banter! I trust you came prepared to fight for your life?”

      Akira stepped between the two. “That is enough Tetsuo! I will not have blood shed in the sacred shrine,” As the two young men backed off from one another, Akira continued. “I do not approve of this nonsense between you, however, if you and Jamal wish to have at each other, you will do so at the proper place and time!”

      Tetsuo turned his back on Jamal. As he walked away, he spoke, “Tonight at sundown, in the dojo on the east side of the estate. Do not run away again!”

 ************

As Chris Storm and Sean Cassidy sized up their odds of not only success, but survival, Venom continued stalking towards the entrance of the school’s main building. It was unusual, normally Venom could sense symbiotes in the area, but this one was invisible to them. Perhaps the fact that it had bonded with a mutant had affected Venom’s sense of it. Before the onyx-skinned symbiote could wonder much more, he was blindsided by a blast of pure psionic energy.

      “You’re trespassing gruesome, so how about you back off, slow and easy, and forget about trying to escalate this any further,” Synch stood at the head of a standard “diamond” military formation (with Chamber and Husk on the left and right flanks and M in the rear).

      While Synch spoke to distract Venom, Chamber charged up his psionic energy furnace for another blast. Meanwhile Alicia used her ability to manipulate her physical surroundings to burrow underground and try to rescue her fallen schoolmates and Blink and Magik; while Zoë used her ability to command the natural world to do the same.

      “You youngsters seem to have alot of fight in you; but we have neither the time nor the patience to amuse you by explaining our presence here! Suffice to say if you stand in our way, you will become Venom fodder!”

      A sonic scream ripped through the afternoon air and was directed at the huge white spider design on Venom’s back. The target rippled like a calm pond disturbed by a rock and jumped off of Brock’s back. The creature screamed in pain as one of the only forces on Earth that could harm it, landed a direct hit.

      “ARRGH! You are attacking the WRONG target!!” Venom doubled over in pain as Banshee’s scream continued its assault. Instinctively, Venom hurled a ball of its alien skin at the Irish mutant’s head, enveloping it in a black, organic skin.

      While Venom was down, M charged through the diamond-shaped ranks with her right fist extended and landed an atomic-charged right hook to the weakened creature’s jaw. Slowly, the symbiote began to shake off the effects of Banshee’s sonic attack. However, no sooner had Venom stood up to attack M, when Synch used his “synch-aura” to mimic Banshee’s sonic scream and continue his assault against him.

M held Venom while Chamber trained his psionic blast on the weakened Venom in conjunction with Synch’s sonic blast and Shockwave’s electrical output. While the others attacked, Husk ran over by the entrance in order to help Alicia and Zoë bring the wounded into the school for medical treatment.

Banshee struggled to get the symbiote skin off of him. The living-skin fought with him to stay attached to his face. The warm, squirming substance that covered his entire head, suddenly became cold and still. As the sunlight filtered into his vision in chunks, Banshee knew what had occurred. Melissa used her cryokinesis to freeze the substance, make it solid (and brittle) and ripped it off. This was the first time Banshee had ever seen Melissa use her mutant power, he was surprised at her presence of mind to use her abilities in such a way.

“I owe ye lass,” Banshee observed the battle taking place and noticed quite a few of his young charges were missing. “Where are the others? Penance, Skin…”

“my sister and zoë took them inside to sara, she’s in the medlab preparing to receive the wounded,” Melissa’s voice was almost drowned out by the furor of battle behind them.

“I’m guessing Frost is still in her damned ‘isolation chamber’. Ach, we could use all the help we can get.”

As the battle raged, Venom was on the brink of defeat and exhaustion. In a final act of desperation, Eddie Brock violently expelled the Venom symbiote from his body. This act sent his young mutant attackers soaring in all directions; all of them unconscious. Once his symbiote rejoined him Eddie Brock surveyed his handiwork.

“Not bad for a bunch of rugrats. But we digress. WE MUST FIND THE OTHER!”

Before Banshee could get to his feet and help his fallen students, Paul appeared in-between Venom and the weakened headmaster.

“I don’t know what you want with me but here I am.”

Venom licked their lips at the sight of their target, but something was wrong. “Hey, where’s the symbiote we sensed? We don’t want to hurt you kid, we just need to take that lethal symbiote off of you and you’ll be fine.”

With a scream, the red-orange substance that Paul Jordan had suppressed with sheer will for almost a year, ran free over the young mutant’s body.

“We are the symbiote you seek Venom! We mean none any harm, but we will defend ourselves if need be!”

The only other mutants conscious, Banshee and Melissa, stared in amazement as the red-orange symbiote merged with Paul creating a single entity larger than the young man and surging with energy.

Venom simply covered their mouth and yawned, “You done yet? We’ve got bad symbiote to exterminate!”

The Paul-Symbiote looked up at Venom and a shape on its face, almost a smile, appeared. “You leave us no choice but to defend ourselves.” 

************

Jamal tied the belt on his gi tightly so that it wouldn’t become a distraction during his battle. Mika stood inside the small changing room with him as he prepared to fight. The two had long passed the point of modesty during the three years Jamal spent with the Li family in his youth.

“Jamal, you don’t have to do this. Tetsuo is an asshole. He doesn’t even know what this whole ‘blood feud’ thing is about anymore, and I bet you don’t either.”

Jamal turned to look at Mika; he remembered why it was so easy to fall in love with her all those years ago; before he even knew what ‘love’ was. 

“No, I still remember Mika, he didn’t like the way we felt about each other.”

“Feel Jamal, you did mean ‘feel’ didn’t you?”

His mind soared across half of the planet to Salem Center. He thought about Sara and the fact that they promised not to use their special psychic rapport during his trip. Jamal insisted, saying that he didn’t want Sara to worry about him during the fight with Tetsuo. Jamal knew he loved Sara with all of his heart, but...Mika still held his heart and he knew he could never stop feeling this way about her.

“Yeah, sorry I guess I’m just nervous. Of course I mean ‘feel’.”

Mika smiled with love, joy and pride. “I have something for you, Jamal,” Mika retrieved a long object wrapped in a bright, sky-blue cloth.

As Jamal unwrapped it Mika continued, “Actually it’s mostly from my dad, it’s the ‘Wolf Fang’.”

Jamal gazed in awe of the sheathed blade. The blade once owned by the legendary samurai Itto Ogami, and passed down countless generations from fathers to their sons. Akira had always assumed that he would pass it on to Tetsuo, but his birth son had disappointed him constantly. Tetsuo made it a practice to abuse his power and skill; to lord over those smaller and weaker than him in order to impose his will. Akira felt his true heir was Jamal, and set aside the “Wolf Fang” to be given to him.

Jamal took the sheathed sword and placed it in his belt. Physically he was ready but something was missing. Jamal looked into Mika’s eyes and found what he was looking for, confidence. Jamal knew that Tetsuo was immeasurably more skilled than him, but looking at Mika’s face Jamal knew there was no way he could fail. He realized how important love was, especially for someone whose genetic makeup predisposed them to ostrazation. Jamal believed that people were lucky to fall in love and have someone love them just as much. For it to happen to him twice was beyond comprehension.

"What keeps you boy?" Tetsuo called out to Jamal from the main chamber of the dojo. "Do not postpone your fate any longer!"

Jamal looked at Mika again and swallowed. "Well I guess this is it."

"Yeah…I guess it is."

"You gonna wish me luck?"

"You won't need it Jamal."

Mika smiled and leaned in to kiss Jamal hard and passionately on his lips. Before he knew what was happening, Jamal was kissing back. Their mouths opened and their passions rose to a boiling point. In the back of his mind Jamal wondered how he could love two girls this much. While he still wasn't one hundred percent sure he knew what love was, what he felt for both Mika and Sara was the closest to what he though it would be.

Jamal gently pushed away from Mika. "Well, I gotta go."

Mika slowly opened her eyes, her slightly glazed over orbs focused on Jamal. "We gotta go Jamal. I'm coming in to watch."      

 Tetsuo’s arms were crossed as he waited for Jamal to enter the dojo. Akira and Aoi knelt outside of the dojo’s mat, ready to watch the inevitable.

As Jamal and Mika entered the dojo, Tetsuo unfolded his arms to reveal a remote control of some type.

“Glad you showed up, I thought you’d run, again, and all the money I invested in Genoshan technology would’ve been wasted.”

The word “Genosha” sounded vaguely familiar to Jamal, something from one of his classes back at school. He wished he paid more attention. “Whatever Tetsuo. Are we gonna do this or not?”

Tetsuo couldn’t hold his excitement. He could taste his victory at hand. After three long years, His destiny was ready to be fulfilled. His hands were shaking as he depressed the button on the remote control that activated the mutation-dampening field Tetsuo installed throughout the dojo.

With a loud electric hum, a purple hue surrounded the dojo. Everyone, save for Tetsuo of course, was taken by surprise. Akira stood up from his kneeling position.

“Tetsuo! What is this? What is the meaning?” The sickly patriarch clasped his cane’s handle and he fought to maintain his balance.

Tetsuo smirked as he tossed the remote control to the far end of the dojo, away from Jamal and himself. “You see father Jamal here is a mutant. A genetic mistake, that sullies our home by even breathing our air!”

Akira and Aoi looked at Jamal in disbelief. “Is this true Jamal?”

Jamal looked at his surrogate parents, and then back at Mika. “Yes. Yes I am a mutant. I am a ‘mistake’. But I am also the lost child your family took in so many years ago. Your unconditional love was, and continues to be, the brightest point in my life. I do not feel shame because of what I am, and I can only hope you do not feel any different about me, now that you know what I am,” Jamal turned his head from Tetsuo and looked towards Mika and her parents.

The three looked back at him and smiled warmly. Akira knelt back down and said a single word.

“HAJIME!”

Tetsuo didn’t wait for the final syllable to leave his father’s mouth before he ran towards Jamal with his sword unsheathed. Jamal barely leaped back and deflected the sword swipe with the sheathed “Wolf Fang”.

Jamal quickly rid himself of the blade’s scabbard and proceeded to go on the offensive. The much more skilled Tetsuo easily blocked his rapid slices and stabs. Jamal was also rather rusty, having not used a sword much in almost three years.

Jamal caught glimpses of Tetsuo’s arrogant smile between swings of steel. Jamal knew Tetsuo was better than he was, but something was wrong. He felt weaker than he did when they started, almost as if his life force were being siphoned out of him. The more he tried to defend, the more energy he felt he was missing.

“Having trouble gene-joke? Tetsuo taunted the kneeling Jamal.

Jamal decided he needed to make a desperate move. He had no idea if it would work physically or practically, but he had no choice. With all of his remaining strength, Jamal swung the “Wolf Fang” upwards; aiming for the scabbard Tetsuo wore on his left hip. The “Fang” bit into the hard wooden sheath and sent the pointed bottom end flying across the room.

“OK, the easy part is out of the way,” Jamal thought to himself. “Now luck is the only thing that can help me now.”

Fortunately, Luck was listening.

The twisting, spinning scabbard bottom flew towards the far corner of the room and implanted itself into the previously discarded remote control. The tiny box violently spat out sparks as it began to short out. When the last bit of power had left the remote control, the electric hum and purple hue dissipated.

Tetsuo looked around, surprised at the course of events that had transpired.

Jamal executed a backward break-roll to add distance between himself and Tetsuo. Jamal s  l  o  w  l  y  but surely felt his energy returning to him.

“I’ll assume that you just thought that the force field would nullify my mutation, and not drain me of my energy. Because if you did, well that would mean you’re just running scared,” Jamal was desperately trying to seem much stronger and more confident than he felt. The fact of the matter was, he hadn’t had much of his energy returned to him, and he still knew that Tetsuo was better. His only hope was that Tetsuo would believe that Jamal was stronger than he was. That small inkling of doubt would be the only way that Jamal could win.

Tetsuo regained his composure and scoffed at Jamal’s accusation. “Me? Afraid of you? If that were not the ultimate insult, I would laugh,” Tetsuo charged at Jamal with his sword out in front of him.

Jamal smiled for the first time since beginning the fight. He saw Tetsuo rushing towards him and knew that he had his opening. Jamal waited until Tetsuo’s blade was mere inches from his chest before making his move. Summoning all of his remaining speed and strength, he sidestepped the thrust and countered with one of his own; slicing upward from below Tetsuo’s blade.

When Jamal saw his opponent’s sword fly into the air, he thought the battle was over, however it wasn’t until he saw Tetsuo’s disembodied hand on the floor between them that he knew just how final the battle had been.      

  ************

      Venom/Eddie Brock was in trouble; the self-styled “Lethal Protector” bit off more than they could chew. The battle began simply enough, two titans hammering each other with brute strength. With the added ability of “web-shooting”, Venom thought they had the upper hand. However that was before the boy’s mutation kicked in.

      Paul’s symbiote glowed brightly until the red-orange skin looked like living fire. Fire and sonics were the only thing that could cause harm to Venom, and Paul and his symbiote were a walking flame.

      Every punch the Paul-Symbiote landed scorched a piece of alien skin off of Venom’s body until only a bruised and battered Eddie Brock laid unconscious, surrounded by wounded chunks of jet-black alien skin. With Venom no longer a threat, the Paul-Symbiote relaxed and the symbiote slowly drained back into Paul’s pores leaving the young mutant on the estate of Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters breathing heavily and looking at his handiwork.

      “D-did I do this?” Paul asked no one in particular as he dropped to his knees.

      Melissa slowly walked over to Paul and placed her arms around his shoulders to comfort him. “paul, you did what was necessary in order to protect the school and yourself. you did what you had to do.”

      Paul looked around at the carnage he and Venom had caused. “But, I’m not a fighter! I don’t use violence. I’m a thinker, I fight with my mind! I-I don’t know what happened to me back there.”

      Melissa helped Paul up to his feet and walked him over to where Banshee was sitting, still shaking off the effects of Venom’s initial attack. “paul, don’t worry. No one blames you for what you did,” Melissa helped her headmaster up off of the ground as well before she continued.

      “actually, i think it was brave, what you did back there.”

      Paul’s eyes widened beneath his glasses and he smiled ever so slightly.

      Hours later, as the school’s infirmary was filled to capacity and Venom was temporarily incarcerated at the Xavier Institute for Higher Learning, Sean Cassidy was finishing his vidphone call to Charles Xavier.

      “Sean, I have alerted a contact of mine in New York. He will retrieve Venom from the Danger Room and handle him personally.”

      “Aye? Stop me if’n I’m wrong Charles, but I dinnae think yure ‘contact’ is exactly of the law-abiding variety.”

      “No Sean, not as such. However he and Venom have a bit of a past and I’m sure that he will straighten him out.”

      “Tis a shame Charles. From what ye ‘ave told me that misguided soul only wanted to do what he thought was best. Trying to prevent any other horrors such as himself from populating the planet.”

      “Yes truly a shame Sean, such a raw sense of justice twisted beyond recognition by an insane mind. What might have been if only he maintained his sanity.”

      As the two men ended their call the door to Sean’s office opened and Emma stepped in.

      “My God Sean,” Emma cheerfully exclaimed while yawning, “I positively love that isolation chamber! I can simply lay back and relax while the annoyances of the day melt away. Did you know that Shinobi Shaw stopped by today and questioned his daughters’ safety? I mean honestly, the insolence! Between him grilling me and Penance’s disappearance...” Emma stopped herself mid-thought and changed the subject. “But enough of my rambling, did I miss anything?”

      Sean held back a chuckle as he got up from his desk to leave. “Penny, Illyana Rasputan, and Blink all appear out of thin air on our door step and ye ask ‘did I miss anything’. The school comes under an all-out attack and ye ask ‘did I miss anything’. Half of our student body is currently in the infirmary recovering from injuries sustained in said battle and ye ask ‘did I miss anything’, Sean switched off the light to his office and walked Emma to the Ready Room to recount the days events to her. “Tell me lass, did ye go up to Mrs. Lincoln at Ford Theater and say ‘How was the show? Did I miss anything?’”