Daniel "Danny" Ketch (vengeancespirit) wrote in wariscoming, @ 2010-01-17 22:15:00 |
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Entry tags: | andrea rojas, danny ketch |
Who: Ghost Rider and Open!
What: Vengeance rides again! …Okay, I just wanted to type that. He’s patrolling.
Where: Rooftops. Yes, the rooftops. He rides up there.
When: Evening/late night
Rating: Probably PG-13.
Status: Incomplete
Danny was angry. He’d been angry, on some level, since he read about those stupid comics, but he wasn’t one for temper tantrums. Usually, he just buried things he didn’t know how to handle. So the anger got buried, because he didn’t know how to deal with it and didn’t really have time to deal with it right now. Unfortunately, things like that don’t tend to stay buried, and like a zombie the anger had been slowly rising to the surface to devour his forced calm. It didn’t help that suppressing the Ghost Rider was causing terrible dreams of a scorched landscape, Blackout murdering everyone he cared about, and a flaming skeleton trying to convince him to let it out.
Everyone has a breaking point. Everyone. And Danny had just reached his. It was part of the reason he’d overreacted to the drama earlier. Tonight was one of his nights off from the club, and he’d tried to get to bed early to avoid feeling compelled to go out. That just led to more dreams, dreams of the past and of the supposed future. He woke up angry, practically snarling, and this time he couldn’t calm himself down. Why was he fighting this thing so hard? It wouldn’t matter. He’d always be the Ghost Rider, and if he did manage to get rid of it things would just get worse. Like it or not, he was cursed and would be cursed until some villain took the direct route and blew his brains out in human form before he could transform. That was all he really had to look forward to in life. He would never be a bike mechanic, he would never be anything other than the Ghost Rider. He would never be able to settle down and have a family, because he refused to put someone else in danger by letting them get close to him. If Blackout proved anything, it was that these psychopaths wouldn’t hesitate to use people he cared about to get to him, and no targets would be better than a girlfriend, wife, or kids.
He was pissed that his bio-mom had made a deal with Mephisto to make sure her precious first son would never manifest this. Sure, Blaze had his own problems, but those were all his own doing. He could sympathize with the guy’s desire to save his father, even if Danny wouldn’t have gone as far as making a deal with the devil. But he couldn’t help resenting Johnny anyway, because at least he could get rid of that demon that was possessing him and lead a normal life. Danny never could shake this Spirit of Vengeance, and if he did he’d just become a worthless, easily manipulated addict. He knew that much was true because he knew, as much as he hated the Ghost Rider right now, that he also needed it. He needed it to level some payback Blackout’s way, he needed it to feel in control, and if he lost it now…
Whatever. Point was, he couldn’t get rid of it. Couldn’t ever be normal, and would probably have to spend the rest of his life as a lonely wretch on a bike fighting crime and who knows what else. The only thing he had to look forward to was a violent, bloody death. So maybe the anger had finally done its job. Fine, Danny decided. If that’s how it’s going to be, then why fight it? Why bother? If this was who he had to be, then he would do it right. He wasn’t going to be at war with a thing he couldn’t ever get rid of. Storming into the bathroom, he practically tore the lid off the little tube of toothpaste he’d been using and squeezed some out onto his finger. A few angry swipes and he’d scrawled two words onto the mirror, two words that he knew the Rider – Kale, he remembered the Wikipedia entry calling him – would see when he returned.
YOU WIN
Then he practically bolted from the room, hopped angrily onto his bike, and tore off into the night, not bothering to put anything on to hide his face. Why fight the inevitable? Death was coming for him like it had come for his sister and his friends, what did it matter of some thug the Rider stopped saw him transform? It wasn’t like he lived with anybody, so if the thugs came looking for him, he was all they would find.
It didn’t take him long to find a mugging. It was amazing, what you could find when you were actually looking for trouble. It was going down in an alley, of course. Danny took a risky turn on the bike, managing to keep himself balanced because hey, he was a pretty skilled biker, and rode into the alley, stopping just in the entrance. The dark night and the shadows of the alley masked the details of his face pretty well, though that hadn’t been his intent. The sound drew the attention of both the mugger and his intended victim, and as the mugger turned his body to look at the newcomer, Danny spotted the knife.
It wasn’t hard to see the gas cap light up in the dark of night and the heavy shadow of the alley. Danny didn’t waste time. He slapped the gas cap and, in a flash of bright white light and the sound of spontaneous flame, the Ghost Rider took his place. As always his body being consumed with hellflame hurt for that instant of transformation, and then Danny felt himself slipping back as the Rider’s – Kale’s – persona took over. The mugger’s eyes widened and he let go of the woman he was mugging. He took off out the other end of the alley, and the Rider revved his Hellcycle and gave chase, blowing right past the shocked woman. The Rider pulled out onto the sidewalk and picked up speed, gaining on the panicked, fleeing mugger. One gloved hand whipped out, and the chain around his torso detached at his mental command, one end flying into his hand and the other whipping high in the air. With a flick of his wrist, the Rider sent the chain out and lasso’d the mugger by one leg, and with a simple yank on the chain the mugger was hauled into the air upside down, the chain writhing back closer to the Rider. The Rider hauled his Hellcycle to a stop as the mugger dangled in the air from the chain. “P-P-Please don’t hurt me! Please!”
The Rider grabbed the man by his hair and yanked his head back. “You beg for the mercy you would not show your victims?” The Rider’s voice sounded like ground gravel put through an electronic voice modulator, with a strange, unearthly echo effect on top of it all. “Look into my eyes and feel the agony of your victims!” He forced the man’s head closer to his, tightening his grip on the mugger’s hair to force him to look into his cold, empty sockets.
And nothing happened.
If the Rider had eyebrows, he would have furrowed them in puzzlement. Why was his Penance Stare not working? It was the best way to show those that could still be redeemed the error of their ways. Nothing forced redemption more than hellfire scorching your soul and being forced to feel all the pain you’d ever caused anyone. If the Penance Stare was somehow being impeded by something in this world, it would mean the Rider would have to depend on the much less efficient way of doing this: Fear.
The Rider snarled, staring right at the mugger. “This is your only warning. Cease your wicked ways, or when you next see me you will know my wrath.” Letting go of the man’s hair, he threw a huge haymaker right at the mugger’s head, knocking him out easily. Tossing him to the sidewalk, the Rider commanded the chain to wrap back around his torso, attaching it at the same shoulder spike as always. He hoped the mugger would take his warning seriously, because the punishment was also a serious one. The Rider wasted no time in turning into another alley, riding straight up the wall, and taking his flaming Hellcycle to the rooftops. He would draw less attention riding the rooftops, which was important, since his work this night was just beginning…