The Traveler

Thunder cracked, echoing down the streets, and through the buildings
as the rain created a constant, continuous tapping on the rooftops. The
only other sound in the streets of the old, run down city, was the
tapping of boots on stone. It was sometime around mid-night, and
everyone in town was sleeping except for one; a lonely traveler just
passing through in the middle of the night.

He was wearing a black robe, with a dark blue hood over his head.
There was a gold band across his forehead with a ruby engraved in the
center in the shape of an eye, to match the blood red of his battle
vest under his coat. The handle of a sword hung out the front of his
coat, with a black scabbard out the back. The red eye on the pommel of
his sword continuously scanned the area for anything out of
place.

As the traveler approached a seemingly abandoned inn, he noticed the
eye on his sword had found something; fixed on a target. He thought
nothing of it, and pushed on the door.

The loud squeaking of the old, rusty hinges filled the room inside
with what seemed like the only noise the room had experienced in ages.
He couldn't see anything in the room, but quick glimpses when the
lightning struck. From what he could tell, the room was empty. He could
hear the water leaking into the building, and dripping on the floor.
The man searched around the room with the light from outside for a
lamp, or candle. He finally notices a small, almost completely melted
candle on a table, on the far side of the room.

As he walked through the room, the sound of his steal boots on the
wood echoed through the room, up the stairs, and all through the
building.

He reached the table and felt around for a chair to sit on. As his
hand fished for the chair, his mind, and the eye on his sword, focused
on the candle on the table.

He had spent most of his life living in an Elwin city, learning to
master his own mind. He had just recently left the city because he had
been sent away to look for, and kill the only living human who knew the
location of the temple. He, of coarse, was the only human the Elwins
could trust to keep the knowledge to himself, at least until he was in
his deathbed.

The wick of the candle burst into flame, just barely giving enough
light for most of the room. He finally found the chair, and started to
sit, but stopped and looked down at the chair. He used his power to
compress air above the chair, pressing it down. The chair cracked, and
fell into pieces under the pressure.

He looked around the room for a good chair that at least looked like
it could support his weight, and found a bench not far from the table
he was standing next to. He used his power to pull the bench next to
him, and sat down, looking around the room.

The room he was in was obviously the pub of the inn, with a bar at one
end of the room. He noticed a small cup on the bar, and a canister next
to it. The canister was half full of about one month old tea. The
canister lifted off of the counter, and poured into the cup. The cup
jumped from the counter and landed in the man's hand.

The man sat, drinking the old, stale tea, watching the light from the
flame on the candle dance along the walls, and chairs and tables.

The eye on his sword finally found, and locked onto what it had been
looking for all this time. There were four of them, and they were all
armed. They had come in through one of the windows up stairs. They were
all around him now, but he couldn't see them. The small candle didn't
give enough light to show him what he wanted to see, and still, even
the lightning didn't reveal them.

A gust of wind broke the hinges on the door, sending it rolling down
the street. The wind from out side blew into the inn, sending cups and
pans off their hooks, and clanking on the wooden floor. Some of the
chairs, and even the tables were moved, making a high pitch rumble of
wood sliding against wood.

The wind blew out the candle in the middle of the man's table,
extinguishing all light from the room, except for the flashes of
lightning.

Apocalypse could now see the four men standing around him. They were
all in black, with swords strapped to their backs. All Apocalypse could
see of the men was their eyes, which was the only bare part of skin on
them.

Lightning flashed again. Swords appeared in their hands.

Apocalypse sighs, takes another sip of tea, and places the cup on the
table.

"When will you guys ever learn? You know, you could just leave. You
know, run away?"

The four men stood motionless and said nothing.

"No? Alright then," Apocalypse said, pushed the bench from under the
table. "Don't say I didn't warn you. Just wait till we get out side, I
don't want to make a mess."

He stood, and began walking toward the door. His boots on the wooden
floor tapped loudly. Every one of the men followed him out of the
doorway, and out on to the street.

He stood in the middle of the street as the rain pored down onto his
coat, running down, and dripping on the stone. The men all surrounded
him again; their steps on the stone making no sound. Lightning flashes
again, showing the scenery again.

"No one's leaving?" Apocalypse asked, staring at the ground in front
of him, keeping his head in the hood of his coat.

No one moved.

"Alright, here we go again?"

Apocalypse grips his sword with his right hand. The stone beneath his
feet cracks and buckles. What was left of the glass of the inn
shattered inward. The water around his feet flew out away from him in a
circle, covering the other men.

He pulled his sword free from its scabbard, throwing the pieces of
stone from under him outward. The glass that had been shattered on the
inn flew back out in the street. Instead of the sound of ringing metal,
a deep rumble came from the blade of the sword as Apocalypse pulled it
free.

The eye slammed shut, and threw energy into his body.

Time seemed to stop as Apocalypse lives up to his name.

He thickened the air behind him and threw it at the man standing
behind him, slicing him in two from the groin to the forehead. He
throws the sword in the throat of the man standing in front of him. The
two at the side jump at him at once. He uses thickened air to take
their swords from their hands in mid-air, bringing them to the backs of
their heads, and slamming the blade into the lower skull. The front of
the blades erupted out of the both of the men's mouths. The force of
the hand guards on the swords hitting the back of their heads forced
them into each other where the front of each other's blade slid into
the others face. The two were linked together in mid-air by each
other's swords. He then used his magic to rip both of them in half,
sending a huge spray of blood into the air around them, used his power
to spin his sword in the man's throat, ripping his head off, sending
another eruption of blood into the air, and summoning the blade back to
his hand.

Everything happened in the blink of an eye.
All the bodies, and parts of bodies, hit the wet stone floor at the
same time, seeming to call upon a flash of lightning.

Apocalypse sheathed his blade, and fell to his knees as the eye
absorbed the energy back from the man. He had used too much of it that
time, and some of his own. The eye sucked all of the energy it had
given, and more.

The cold, wet stone street came up to his face as the world evaporated
into darkness.