Chapter Fifteen: On the Wings of Rage

I waited for a moment, wondering if that would actually work. Sounds began to come from the enclosure, first growling, then yowling, then…purring? I ran over and looked over the edge of the wall to see two tigers laying on their backs, Fang kneeling between them rubbing their bellies. “Who’s a pretty kitty? You are, yes you are.” He then looked up at me and smiled. “That was quite the little moment there. But you didn’t really think that would work, did you?” He then stood up and leaned over, clutching his stomach like he was in pain. Maybe the tigers really had gotten to him. I quickly realized this wasn’t the case, as two large black bat-like wings tore through the back of his jacket. In a single move, he was out of the enclosure and in the air above me. He closed his wings and dove at me, claws outstretched in front of him. I jumped to the side avoiding him, watching as he opened his wings at the last minute and pulling up to avoid hitting the ground. He turned and dove again, laughing wildly. “Gyahahaha! Now this is fun!” I dodged back and forth as he dove left and right, trying to impale me from the air. “Why am I not surprised that this is your idea of fun?”

As he dove again, I planted my feet and readied a fist.  I wasn’t running this time. As he came down towards me I sent my fist straight into his claws, where it was split down the middle all the way down the arm, cutting it into two tendrils which then wrapped around Fang’s ankles pulling him back down to earth. I retracted my tendrils dragging Fang towards me and slammed a fist into his face, sending him reeling backwards. He rubbed his nose and looked at me, folding his wings behind him. “You’re getting better at this squishy. Looks like I need to step it up another notch.” He doubled over in pain again and sprouted a thick tail ending in a scorpions stinger. “Maybe my claws can’t hurt you, but let’s see how you deal with my lovely smoothie of animal toxins! Gyahahaha!” He spun around, using the tail like a club and slamming it into my side. It knocked me into the wall just before the drop into the lions enclosure, and I raised a shield hoping not to be hit into the hungry mouths below. He lunged his stinger at me and without thinking I melted down to a puddle and ran between his feet, reforming behind him. As he turned to meet me, I slammed a rock hard fist across his face, knocking him into the lion’s den. He recovered quickly, using his wings to get back out before the lions could even inspect what had had fallen into their home.   

He swooped down on me, swinging his stinger beneath him like a hornet. I melted down again to avoid it, then sent a tendril out, wrapping it around the base of his tail and slammed him into the ground again. This time I didn’t let go, instead lifting him up and slamming him back into the ground again and again. I wanted to make sure he wouldn’t get up again, not this time. I threw him into the air and coiled myself, quickly releasing and shooting up after him. Once I was even with him, I wrapped a tendril around each of his limbs and his wings and tail, and aimed us at the ground. “I know I can survive this fall Fang. Can you?” He just laughed madly, staring at the ground as it rose to meet us. As we slammed back into the ground, the earth beneath us cracked and I could feel the impact reverberating back through our bodies. Admittedly, it hurt me a lot too, but I knew I could survive it. I let go of his limbs and stood up, drawing my tendrils back into me and resuming my usual form. I was sure that had killed him as I stood over his body, lying there limp.

Until it started laughing. “Gyehe…Gyehehehe…GYAHAHAHA!”  He slowly pulled himself off the ground, standing up and cracking his neck. He cracked his knuckles and smiled at me, not a scratch on him except for his clothes which were now tattered and torn. “Now THAT was fun! I didn’t know you had it in you squishy. You’re quite the scrapper. But I wonder what your little human would think if she saw the monster I see right now.” His words struck a nerve, as they often do, and I snapped. Countless fists sprouted from my back and I began pummeling him repeatedly, creating a blinding cloud of punches. “Shut up! What do you know? You’re the monster, not me! I'm fighting for her, for a good cause! But what are you fighting for? Besides some stupid hunt!” Suddenly I felt a tug at one of my fists as Fang got ahold of it. He pulled hard and spun around, sending me flying into the nearby wall. “You really wanna know what I'm fighting for? Nothing. Not a damn thing. You know why? Cause it doesn’t matter anymore squishy! I'm a monster. I don’t belong anywhere. Just like you. But I don’t lie to myself, thinking I can fit in just by changing my shape, or the way I act. I know what I am. I’m a hunter. That’s what they made me for. So that’s what I'm gunna be.” He walked over, with a newfound rage in his step, grabbing me by my mask and slamming me into the wall again. “You wanna know my story Max? Cause I’ll tell ya. I’d be happy to!” I just stood there, silent as his hand gripped the holes in my mask.

“You didn’t call me squishy that time. You called me Max..” He sighed and let me go, turning and walking away. He then turned and looked back at me, and when he did I could swear it was someone else’s face looking at me. Maybe this was the face of the real Fang? “You know why I went crazy Max? Its cause I stopped having anything to live for. I stopped caring. Even before they made me a monster, my life was hell. I was orphaned in the streets. And it wasn’t some orphan annie story. I was alone, no one raised me but myself. I became a criminal to survive, and when the Facility approached me they gave me a choice. Be their guinea pig, or get the chair. Some choice right?” I pulled myself off the wall and stood tall. It seemed like he had no more intrest in fighting, just like my fight with Pain. First Pain, now Fang. I was starting to realize maybe there was more to the story of the Facility then I understood. He noticed I was standing and quickly lunged forward again, slamming me back into the wall. “I ain’t done yet, so don’t you go anywhere! You wanted to know, so you damn well better sit there and listen!” And with that he made it quite clear this was nothing like what happened with Pain. This wasn’t something he had been bottling up or hiding; this was something he knew all too well. So I stopped moving, and just listened. “You know what I did as soon as I left that facility? I found out where my parents were, and went to their house. And I killed them. Right there, in their own living room. I slaughtered them without a second thought. Without ever even asking why they left me. It was then I lost my mind. I now had nothing left, no family, no friends, no home. I was nothing more than a hunter, a predator who’s only joy in life came from the challenge of a hunt. So THAT’S why I fight. Since its so damn important.” He threw me into the wall across the way and sat down.

I peeled myself off the wall and began to walk towards him. As I did he began to growl and I stopped in my tracks. He stood and looked me in the eye. “This proves it. You really are immortal. Good, maybe that means you can kill Zeke. I may be insane, but Zeke is the real madman. I’m sure he’s waiting for you in the facility. If you really want all this to end, find him and kill him.” He doubled over, and his tail retracted back inside him and he began to walk away. I called after him before he got too far, “Wait! That’s it? You’re just going to leave now?” He turned and smiled his cheshire grin, and finally looked like the Fang I knew again. “Don’t worry squishy, you’ll see me again soon. We gotta do what we gotta do, right? Good luck fighting general poofypants, you’ll need it. GYAHAHAHA!!!” And with that, he spread his wings wide and leapt into the air, flying off into the horizon.

After he left, I went back and got Lee-Ann and filled her in on what had happened. She was just as surprised and dumbfounded as I was. “So, he just flew away? After all that? Are all of these guys like that? Man you have some weird friends.” She smiled at me and we both laughed. “If that’s what you want to call them, then I suppose you might be right. But now comes the real challenge. I have to go back and face Zeke. It’s his fault all this happened. I have to set things right.” Her smile dropped and she looked concerned. I wrapped my arms around her and she did the same. “Don’t worry Lee-Ann. We’ve come this far. We can handle it. Its time to finally end all this madness.”