It's Time...To Rise. (Fright Night Prologue)

Tonight was a drag, a literal freaking drag. Ethan hated it when he got this little urges to wander around the town, it was like when he first encountered Jinx, simply on the off hand chance that he was just succumbing to his wanderlust. But that was a good thing for Ethan having made a friend in someone, this however, was not a good thing. It always meant trouble in one way or another when he felt so antsy that he refused himself a cigarette.

The streets were getting quiet, a bit too quiet for his liking but that at least meant there would be no cops or people to pester him tonight as he walked along, his mind full of thoughts, his head racing with ideas. It was all so strange though, even this late in the night there were usually kids roaming the streets with their parents going from door to door one last time for treats and frights before calling it a night. But that's when he heard it, the inhuman shouts of monsters. Like fingernails on a chalkboard, the voices caused Ethan to look up, a look of interest glimmering in his eyes. Could those voices so foul, be the reason that the streets are bare? It was a good enough reason for Ethan to actually check it out.

Skipping through an alleyway, Ethan leaped up and over dumpsters, a parked half-ton pick up truck and various cargo boxes, being loaded into that very same truck. What he found, was worthy of a circus freak show; horrific, monstrous and inhuman beasts of flesh and muscle and sinew, being led by impish little demons. But that wasn't the big attraction here, no. The big spectacle here, was the whip wielding monkey faced critter driving them forward.

That alone, made Ethan slink back into the alleyway and latch onto a fire escape nearby. As he shimmied his way up the ladder and onto the rusty metal steps, he crawled his way up to the roof to get a better look at these things, they were ugly, inhuman and obvious out to cause the city harm. But what happened to the police? What happened to the pedestrians? And most importantly, what the hell happened to the heroes?

This was beginning to look like more trouble than it was worth. Ethan was caught up in it again, how he hated getting caught up in trouble like this. This was for heroes, not ex gangsters with super powers. But if it did come down to it, Ethan would, with a begrudging attitude, play the hero for one day. Tch, the circus is in town and I don't got a ticket. Let's hope I don't have to crash the festivities.


Ethan thought with a sigh. Tonight was going to be a really hectic night it would seem. Lots of property destruction, lots of damage and hopefully some heroes to show up so he wouldn't have to fight, at least he hoped he wouldn't have to fight. He didn't need to become a known person, he liked being an unknown that just smoked all day, walked around, maybe did the occasional odd job and beat up someone that annoyed him. He didn't like the idea of being....heroic. That title alone was worth it's weight in trouble, "Let's hope I don't get to fight the freak-show menagerie. I Rather like being a relative unknown around here," he mumbled to himself as he kept his head low, eyes trained on the approaching masses of hideous flesh, backed by what he could only assume to be their lieutenant.

Sanakan was watching the fight proceed back and forth between the defenders and attackers; tug-o-war could be one way to describe this fight, between the titans and the hollowmans minions. She was busy in her sanctuary away from sanctuaries, her command and control center, coordinating her droids to distract or if possible, annihilate the various monstrosities when possible, to ease the burden on those outside. Hearing Zack chime in, Sanakan openly responded towards him and the others. "This is Sanakan in C&C, my drones are busy keeping a majority of the enemy on the western side of the tower occupied. They can't hold out forever and need immediate assistance. I would be appreciative if you would help them."

Between coordinating her drones for an offensive, managing the channels between her teammates and devising various ideas and theories on how to best defeat these creatures, Sanakan's hands were full, until they broke through the inner defenses, that is . Her drones were dispensing with lances of fire; solid-state industrial lasers, designed to cut steel re-purposed and scaled down for her 'children'. While they didn't have the same power as a normal factory sized laser, they were still good for harassing and occasionally, igniting the creatures and turning them into shrieking balls of fire. Outside of this auxiliary purpose, they were better used for scouting or light repairs around the tower.

She had already lost three of them, their power cells exploding from the abuse of taking too many hits, their binary screams entering her head and causing her no small amount of anguish. While it didn't show on her face, Sanakan was furious and was now guiding them with a caring hand to harass and distract, to occupy them instead of their reckless attack that, while effective, was costing her too many children.

::Initiating defensive counter measure protocol alpha and beta......Data transfer complete....Drones are now operating on a hit and run, hide and seek set of parameters.::

"Thank you for informing me Otis, if you could keep me informed of their progress and notify me if any more fall, I don't want to lose another. Also, please inform me when Raven and the others of the inner defense team arrive so I can let them in. "

::.....affirmative, Kaitlyn. You will be informed of their arrival, which should be sooner, rather than later. ::

With a slight nod to an invisible voice that floated in her head, and in her computers, Sanakan went back to work, a sigh escaping her lips. What kind of monster is this hollowman?

In the meantime, Ben was in trouble and much like a steady hand with a scalpel, began to concentrate some heavy firepower in his general vicinity. Not to hit him mind you, but to shake things up a bit for those, vampires.

"Don't worry Ben, I've got you covered. But please, keep your head down if you could be so kind, these shots do not discriminate between persons."

When the surge of white magic flowed through Scope, he was stunned for a moment. With his head cocked up and eyes bugging out, he felt a lot of pain pulse through his head with the magic. This was the first time that he had ever felt any sort of magic and it seemed that his body just really didn't like it. After a minute passed, all of the tension left him and he dropped to his knees. With a couple coughs and a face wet with sweat, Scope rose back to his feet, somehow feeling stronger than before. With his razor sharp discs at hand, he waited nervously for the ghouls to break through the walls.

Suddenly, a blood curdling shriek rang through the tower, or perhaps it was just in his head. Nevertheless, in a moment, a battalion of ghouls sped through the walls of the Main Ops room and encircled the Titans. "I'll try to separate them!" Scope yelled as he sprinted towards the door and straight at four of the ghosts. He chucked four discs straight at their centers, three were sliced down the side as they returned to Scope's hands but one ghoul avoided it. Scope skidded out of the room and into the hallway, hoping the ghouls would follow.

He heard moaning behind him, indicating that Will's spell did work. He didn't know the Tower too well yet so he just ended up at his own room. When he pressed the code to open the electronic sliding door, the lights in the hallway went out and also what seemed to be most of the Tower! Scope decided to manually push the door open so as to make sure he wouldn't be surrounded. Once in his room, everything seemed colder...almost at a hypo-thermal level. All that was lighting the room now was the outside moon. He let out a deep breath and widened his eyes as he could see it spread throughout the room.

Feeling the hairs on the back of his head stand on end, he felt like he was being watched. Hearing chuckling behind him, he spun around, expecting to see one of the ghouls but only finding his dartboard. The laughing came again but louder! He spun towards the open door but again nothing. Deciding that his plan must have not worked, he was about to run back to the Main Ops room when he noticed the air being drawn behind him as if something was collecting it together. Scope turned slowly to see the four ghouls seemingly squish together to form something far worse. It grew larger and larger until it formed into something slightly familiar...

"D-DAD!?"



The specter that was now floating in front of him obviously wasn't exactly how Scope remembered him, but, the similarity in the face and hair was uncanny! It was like his dad but older, skeletal and with long claws...but...it was still his dad!

Letting his guard down, Scope walked towards his father with his hand out, almost expecting to feel the warm glow off his face like he remembered when he was a child. The phantom hung motionless as Scope approached, trembling. "Dad?..." the young Titan repeated again, still reaching for the ghoul's face. "Richard Arimitage!" Scope now yelled, angry. With that, the ghost's head quickly bolted towards his apparent son, his face seemingly consumed with rage. In one swift motion, the ghost's claw swiped Scope's face with impossible force. The Titan fell to the ground with his hand covering the right side of his face, clutching it in agony.

Scope looked up in awe as what seemed to be the ghost of his father was cackling at his son's pain. "But...no...." Scope choked out...