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Alrighty then, fisrt off I know that I haven't been around for a few months, but my schedule is really karazy right now and don't want to comit to anything else right now.

In the meantime!

Me and a friend of mine (Walter Mitty, who only showed up for one post and hasn't showd up since...) have been tinkering around writing a story in turns for a few weeks now and I think it would be kinda cool to post it up here.

So, I'll post my first part, and then I'll post Walter's, and so on and so forth.

Note that yes, it is inspired, and we are very pleased with what we came up with...



(P.S. Oh yeah, feedback would be nice)

~~~~~~~~
((SlowlyCrazyIAmGoing))
Mark used to go to the park a lot. The last time he went was with his dad during Christmas break, when they attended an annual winter fair. Now it was summer, and sitting next to him on a bench that he usually reserved for himself and his father was a different man than he was used to. In fact, Mark was fairly sure he wasn’t human at all.

He stood a reasonable few inches above Mark and had long jet black hair that streamed off his head like smooth water to within an inch of his shoulders. Long, rectangular glasses rested on the bridge of a pointed nose that reflected the slender, angular look that the rest of his face had. On his chin was a dark goatee that was mirrored by a small, straight moustache just under his nose. He wore a long sleeved, black dress shirt and a pin-stripe tuxedo vest over it. His shirt was tucked into dress slacks that were held up by a large, black leather belt; several chains hung down from this belt, and at the end of each one was a trinket of some kind: a pocket watch, a ring box, a set of keys, and even a palm pilot, along with a few other weird things Mark couldn’t identify.

“So,” Mark finally pulled up the courage to say, “why are you still here? Shouldn’t you be going home or something?” He scratched his shoulder during an awkward silence that continued even after his question. The man didn’t seem to notice the question.

Finally, the man, still not moving from his fixed position on the bench, replied, “I don’t know how to get home. I was told to guide you.”

“And you did great, really! I’d probably have died just then if you hadn’t killed those…”

“Demons.”

“Sure, whatever. My point is you don’t have to follow me around anymore.”

The man adjusted his glasses and continued to blankly stare in front of him, “They weren’t your demons, that’s why you couldn’t defeat them. Normally they haunt whoever created them, but these ones obviously wanted to kill. There will be more attacks, not just on you, but on everyone. So you will need me.”

Frustrated, Mark stood up and faced him, “I don’t need you! I need my father! You’ve got a bit of explaining to do so spill it! Where is my father!?”

Quickly, but calmly it seamed, the man stood up and grabbed Mark by the collar. He then raised a hand to his glasses and pulled them down to the end of his nose. The dark pupils in his eyes seemed to fall into his head, and this continued out until his entire eye socket was a black, sunken pit. “Your father,” he began, “tore me from the Ethereal Plane with his bare hands. He pointed you out, and told me to guide you through what was about to happen, and then he vanished, abandoning me here on your plane. How’s about explaining a few things on your end?” When he finished, he replaced his glasses and ‘normal’ eyes refilled themselves on his face.
Dazed, Mark sat back down and looked down at his feet. The man joined him. After a long while, Mark finally spoke:

“When I was
A young boy,
My father took me into the city
To see a marching band.

He said,
‘Son when you grow up
Will you be the saviour of the broken,
The beaten and the damned?’

He said
‘Will you defeat them,
your demons, and all the non believers,
the plans that they have made?

Because one day I'll leave you,
A phantom to lead you in the summer,


Mark paused for a moment before continuing.



To join the black parade.’"

((Walter Mitty))

The man with the glasses stared at Mark, “What was that?”
“It was a poem my father told me when we came here last winter, he said to always remember it, that it would all make sense someday”.

The man stood up from the bench and removed a cylindrical roll from one of the chains around his belt. He popped the top of it and tilted out the contents to Mark. Mark held his hands out and caught a pen and roll of parchment. “Whats this?” Mark asked, giving the man a strange look.

The man in answer flatly stated, “It’s my contract.” Mark scanned the piece of paper.

To Whom It May Concern:
You currently hold in your hands an item known as a Phantom Contract. If you believe to have received this item in error kindly place it back where you found it and walk away. Otherwise continue…

Mark continued,

In signing this contract you give full and total responsibilty of your protection to the Phantom of which it belongs. You also relize that in doing so you open yourself up to personal physical attacks by otherwordly beings, including (but not limited to) Deamons, Ghosts, Puppets, and The Non’s. Also in signing this you pledge full and total allience to the order of The Black Parade and acknowledge your involment in the participation of said Parade.

It should also be noted that half of your life essence will be taken as payment for your Phantom Guardian.

IF all terms and conditions are fully understood and met, please sign here,

X________________

Mark looked up from the contract to the phantom standing in front of him. “You relize I’m not signing this right? I mean, I don’t even know what some of this stuff is. The Order of the Black Parade? Non’s? This is all crazy”. The phantom glared down at Mark with annoyance

“Listen”, he said, “There is a wind of change coming from the human world that smells of something rotten. It is a putrid stench of rotting bodies in the streets, filling the air and choking our minds”. At this the phantom removed another cydrical tube from his suit coat and flicked it out to reveal a cane. “If you want to live”, he continued, “Then sign my contract, because I can gurantee if you don’t, you won’t last much longer”.

Mark stared down and the contract and picked up the pen, “Can I ask one question first?”
“Sure”.

“What’s your name?”

The Phantom gave Mark a sideways look, “My name is Faust, Adian Faust, the Phantom of the Lock and Key”.

((SlowlyCrazyIAmGoing))

“‘Lock and Key’? What’s that supposed to mean?” Mark asked, confused. Adian just looked at him and cocked an eyebrow, expectantly. With a shake of his head and a quick sigh, Mark hesitantly put the pen to the paper and signed in long, wispy letters:
Mark Adams.

As soon as the last ‘S’ was written, the parchment began to fold itself. It reminded Mark of some kind of origami, the way it was twisting and folding in on itself. Finally, the contract was now roughly the size of a business card, and had Mark’s name above another dotted line. Adian quickly snatched up the card and signed his own name on it:
Adian Faust.

Holding the card out to Mark, Adian said, “You’ll need this. It’s proof of our contract and will get you out of a few tough spots I’d wager.” Mark timidly received the card and put it in his jeans pocket.

“So, what now?” Mark said, looking around the park. It was a little past three in the afternoon, and he could plainly see a few people enjoying the afternoon.

“Well, by the way you… handled yourself during the demon attack, I’d say that you need equipment. We’ll need to head to a supplier.” Adian reached over to the bench and grabbed the long trench coat that he had been wearing before and put it on.

“Okay…” Mark began, slowly. “Where would that be?”

Adian stopped midstride. “You mean you don’t know?”

“Why should I know where to find supernatural crap? YOU’RE the one from another dimension!”

“Yeah, I don’t know my way to the John in this Plane. You live here!”

“Well yeah but-“

“Never mind.” Adian said, annoyed. He grabbed a long case from his belt and opened it to reveal a set of sunglasses almost identical to the regular ones he was wearing. After switching them out and putting on the sun glasses, he tilted his head back and began walking and tapping the ground in front of him with the cane.

Mark looked at Adian as he slowly started walking away, “So what, you’re blind now?”

“I can’t see without my glasses, so yeah. However, the supernatural has a scent. It’s hard, even for me, to sniff out, but with these glasses I can see it in the air. We find a large enough deposit, and we’ll find our supplier.”

Still slightly dazed and confused, Mark followed, “That’s it?”

“Well, like I said, I can’t see. And the occasional psychic or church will throw me off for a minute or two, but bear with me.”

((Walter Mitty))

[Yay! Intrigue!]
* * *

Mark shoved his hands in his pockets and stared up at the sky in frustration. They had been walking around for hours now and still hadn’t found anything promising. Several times Mark had to help Faust so he didn’t run into a pole or mailbox, once a car almost hit him. Despite all of Mark’s protests Faust refused to remove his “glasses”, and it wasn’t as if Mark was going to go anywhere Faust wasn’t, he’d die for sure if he left. All Mark could do was keep walking and hope that Faust saw a strong supernatural scent soon.

It donned on Mark after a while that now was probably a good time to find out what he’d gotten himself into. “Hey Adian”,

“Faust”, Faust said over his sholder, “Call me Faust please, everybody does”.

“Alright Faust”, Mark said, “I was wondering, about the contract, I had some questions”.

“Like what?” Faust replied.

“Well, mainly I wanted to ask about the ‘half of your life force’ thing, that doesn’t seem very, pleasnt”.

Faust stopped walking and turned around to face Mark. People passed by them on the sidewalk chatting on cell-phones and glancing at their watches, always in a hurry. Faust tapped around for a nerby building wall and leaned up against it, he motioned for Mark to do the same. Mark walked over and leaned up aginst the building next to Faust.

“Well?” Mark prompted.

“This is…”, Faust paused, “Hard to explain”.

Mark gave him a look.

“Fine” Faust said coldly, “First off you need to understand that there are two types of ways for a person to die, a physicall accident, or all of their life force being used up”.

Mark jerked up in shock, “So you took half of my life!”

Faust glared at him, “Technically yes, but that doesn’t mean you can’t earn it back”. Mark wrinkled his forhead, confused. Faust continued.

“Life force is like fuel, it keeps a human’s body working. Without it the body slowly shuts down and dies, and the person’s etheral version is hurled into the Etheral Plane. However no single person has a set life force amount. You can increase your body’s life force by taking care of it, exercising, eating right, you get the point?”

Mark nodded and Faust continued.

“Moving the body requires life force though, for this reason an athlete will normally have less life force than a couch potato will. The only differince is that the athlete continually gains new life force to use, the couch potato does not”.

Mark slowly nodded his head again, “Ok”, he said, “But what about those people who die in car accidents, or get shot, or something like that”.

“That’s considered a physical accident” Faust said, “Anything other than what you humans call ‘dying of old age’ is a physical accident. The body undergoes some ordeal that it can’t function in and dies.”

“So then what happens to the rest of that human’s life force?” Mark asked.

Faust looked down at his shoes, “That depends” he said.

“Depends on what?”

Faust put his head back against the wall and sighed, “On what The Order of the Black Parade decides”, he turned his head to look at Mark, “Phantoms, like myself, are different from humans. We are created when a massive amount of life force is slammed together in one place, almost like how a star is born”. The problem is we burn up life force much faster than humans do, and since are bodies are etheral we can’t earn life force back. Our only option”, Faust said, “Is to absorb life force from humans, otherwise we dissapate into thin air”.

Mark straightended up from the wall in anger, “So your using humans as fuel! Are you kidding me! What right do you have to do that?!”

“We prefer to see it as payment”.

“Payment!?” Mark yelled incredulously, “Payment for what!”

Faust spoke a little louder now, irritated, “Do you even know what The Black Parade is Mark?”

“Why the hell would I know that!?” Mark yelled, “Do you think I live on the ethral plane, I’m as lost there as you are here!”

People were staring now as they walked by, the noise distracted them out of there conversations. Faust grunted, grabbed Mark by the shoulder, and pulled him into a nerby ally between two buildings. In anger he shoved Mark up against the wall and glared at him.

“It’s a service”.

“What is?!”, Mark said, “What’s a service?!”

Faust put a hand against Mark’s mouth, “The Black Parade”, he said, “It’s a service to guide souls to Heaven”.

Mark gave Faust an odd look. Faust let Mark down from the wall and stepped away. “When people die,”, Faust continued, “Their ethral bodies get dumped into the wastelands of the Ethral Plain, some humans call it purgatory. In any case the Black Parade is just that, a Parade. A prossesion that marches around the Wastelands and finds lost souls to help them on there way. It’s run by the Phantoms, we keep everything in check and keep the Parade moving smoothly, or we used to.”

Mark was still glaring at Faust but seemed to have calmed down some, “You used to?” he asked, “What happened?”

Faust sighed, “There was a schism. You see Mark, when a person dies by running out of life force they go straight to Heaven. Only when a physical accident occurs do they get thrown into the Wasteland. The problem is the humans who die under this circumstance are not always good people. Obviously bad humans should not be allowed into Heaven, so a punishment was developed.”

Faust gave Mark a hard look, “People who die in a physical accident keep their remaining life force with them, even after death, the reason they’re dead is that their life force has no body to fuel. Bad people don’t deserve that life force, and Phantoms have to eat.”

Mark’s eyes widened in disbelief, “You judge them.” He said.

Faust nodded, “Every soul that enters The Black Parade is put on trial before the Order. If they are found not guilty then they join The Black Parade and march towards Heaven. However if they are found guilty…”

“You absorb their remaining life force?” Mark said

Faust nodded again, “This is where the schism came from, over a dispute for a man’s life force”.

Mark leaned up against the wall, “What happened?” he asked.

Faust hunched over his cane, “There was a man, a hitman, who died of cancer in a hospital. The disease came on quickly, and he was a healthy man before that. When he landed in the Wastelands he had enough life force left to keep a Phantom alive for another thousand years, he was a big catch. The problem was that before he died he repented of his sins, asked for forgiveness, and I confess during his trial he seemed sincerely sorry for all the people he had killed. Thus when we, the Order, took a vote it was split, right down the middle.”

Mark sat down on the ground, “What did the Order do?”

“We didn’t know what to do, nothing like this had ever happened before, and so the order was split. One side, The Believers, who voted for an innocent veridct, and the Non-Believers, who voted guilty. The arguments became firece, until eventually the Non-Believers couldn’t stand waiting anymore.

Mark listened with rapt attention.

They wanted the man’s life force so badly that they descened on him, and unjustly absorbed him. That’s when the war began. The Believers, in a violent rage, swore to chase after and destroy every last Non-Believer, for it was out of pure greed they had absorbed a man who might have been innocent, and now they deserved punishment.”

Faust stood up from his hunched position, “We are still hunting”.

Mark looked up at the sky in desperation, “What have I gotten myself into?” he thought.

omg....this is soo...

EPIC

way cool man, way cool.

you guys are doing great, keep up the good work ^_^

((SlowlyCrazyIAmGoing))

Faust continued his blind roaming for a long time after their conversation. Neither of them said anything more on the subject. Mark looked out it front of him at his other worldly companion and gave a sigh of worry, fear, and even excitement. Nothing like this had ever happened before that he knew of, and he always wanted something special to happen to him. But now that it was happening…

Suddenly, Faust stopped, took off his glasses, and replaced them with his ‘seeing’ ones. Mark walked up beside him and looked past him to see what he was looking at.

“What’s going on? Did we get to a supplier?” Mark asked, cautiously.

“No, something big happened here, and I don’t need my glasses to smell it either.” Faust jogged up to a street corner, and Mark made a surprised pursuit. Once they turned the corner, they saw bright colored lights, a huge crowd of people, yellow tape, and a white chalk outline.

“The hell?” Mark started, surprised once more. Faust grabbed him by the scruff of his shirt and pulled him closer. “What happened?” he said, looking over at the phantom.

“I was hoping you could tell me.” Faust looked deep in thought as he slowly approached the yellow tape. Quickly looking from side to side, he ducked under it and made his way to the chalk outline. As he knelt low to the ground, a police officer grabbed him by the jacket and dragged him back to the sideline.

“Back off punk! You try anything like that again smart ass and you’ll be arrested!” The man yelled as he pushed Faust through the tape. He stumbled and fell to his knees for a moment; Mark came and knelt beside him.

“What the hell are you doing? You can’t just burst in on a crime scene!”

“I was right.” Faust said, looking straight down at the ground. Mark saw how pale he was (in comparison) and began to worry. “Something supernatural happened here, and whatever it was, I got its scent.”

Mark was really worried now. “Are you alright?”

Faust stood up, shakily, and looked over at a nearby building. “Yeah, I think we’re in luck kid.” He said, smiling. “We just found you our first Non.”

* * * * *


The building Faust was referring to was abandoned, and as Mark slowly walked up the steps he felt like each mildew covered one was going to cave in and send him crashing down to the floor below. In comparison though, the condition of the building around him was nothing compared to how a Non made him feel. The very thought of facing off with some supernatural fiend made him want to wait for Faust outside next to the nice cops. Faust, however, had insisted that he came along.

“So tell me,” Mark said with a slight crack in his voice, “what are we going to do once we find this Non?”

Faust was walking behind him, slowly counting out the keys on a large brass ring. “We’re going to kill him of course… or her.” He said this very casually, and continued counting until he came upon an old fashioned silver key; it reminded Mark of the one to his grandmother’s foot locker.

Upon reaching the third floor, Faust stopped in front of a door and called for Mark to stop, “This is it. It’s through there.”

As he reached for the handle Mark spoke up, “Hey Faust? Can a phantom kill a human?”

Faust stopped. “No, that would go against the laws set up to prevent stealing a human’s life force. That is why I am wary of what happened down on the street.”
Mark doubted that. Faust looked as composed as ever, and he continued his way into the door.

Inside, Mark saw… something. It didn’t really look like a phantom, or he supposed it didn’t because he had never seen one other than Faust. It was short, impish, and hunched. It had mottled grey skin and wore a leather cloak that covered his head and the rest of his body. The only thing he could see of his face were two large, black, goggle covered eyes.

“Hey Faust, is that a…”

“Yes.” Faust replied, taking off the key from the ring, “Hello Lou.”

“FAUST!” The thing screeched, it wasn’t out of terror, or surprise, he just yelled. “HEARD YOU WERE IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD, SO I THOUGHT I’D INVITE YOU IN!”

“Invite? Wha-”

Faust fell down. Mark followed suit.

* * * *

Mark woke up tied to a chair. Groggily, he turned from side to side and noticed Faust tied up in a chair next to him. Although Mark could feel rope on his wrists, he noticed that Faust’s were tied with chains that had strange, glowing letters on them.

“WAKE UP!” Lou’s face appeared out of nowhere, right in front of Mark. Mark gave a yell of fright, which made Faust snap up to attention, pulling on his chains as he tried to stand up.

“Lou!” He shouted, still pulling on his chains in vain. “What are you doing? How’d you kill a human?!” Faust looked pissed. Mark understood now that he knew as soon as he had gotten Lou’s scent, and was bottling up his anger until this moment.

Lou shook his head disapprovingly, “Kill a human…” he said, quietly. “You know I can’t do that. BUT HE CAN!”

Someone else stepped into the light from behind the two captives. It was human, or at least Mark thought. He was a large bald man, and he held a large knife. Mark guessed it was at least a foot long. Faust looked between the two in disgust. “You’re murdering humans for their life force?” He turned over to the bald man, “How’d he rope you into this?”

Lou jumped up onto the man’s shoulders, “IKE HERE, HAS TB! That’s tuberculosis kid.” He added, nodding to Mark, “AND WE HAVE A CONTRACT!”

Ike coughed as he held up a contract card, and on it were the names Ike and Lou. Faust was confused now, “What difference does that make?”

“I’M GETTING TO THAT! Now, somebody, I think you know who Faust, found out how to mess with the fine print. It’s changed just enough so that the rules are bent. And I’m sure even you are aware that rules that are bent are not broken, and thus ARE A HELLUVA LOT MORE FUN!”

Ike broke into a coughing fit, “Can we hurry this up…” he breathed.

“Yeah, yeah, ANYWAY! IT’S A SIMPLE ARANGMENT FAUST! IKE DOES THE MESSY WORK, I sit by and watch, AND COLLECT THE FRUITS OF HIS LABOR! The catch though… is that instead of him paying me life force, I pay HIM life force!”

Faust sat in bewilderment. “How can this be?” he whispered. “It can’t work Ike. Tuberculosis is a disease, simply adding life force won’t work.”

“THAT!” Lou interrupted, “IS MORE FINE PRINT WORK! Basically the whole theme I want you to take away is that this is a win win situation. And when we win, YOU LOSE!”

Moving on now! BTW, I totally forgot to thank you DragonRider, I feel rude now... Anywho, thanks!

P.S. Forgive the miss-spellings, spell check is broke for some reason so bear with it please.

((Walter Mitty))

As Lou said this Ike moved up to Mark with the knife. To Mark the knife looked like it was some sort of cleaver, like the one butchers use for chopping pigs. Mark recoiled and squirmmed in his chair. He tugged against the ropes as hard as he could but it was no use, the knots were tied tight.

“I am sorry about this”, Ike said in a monotone voice, “It’s nothing personal but I really need you life force”. He lifted the cleaver high ready to slice Mark in two. Faust was starring at Lou, his eyes were rock solid, shiny in the dim light. He yelled.

“Mark! Kick down at the ground NOW!”

In response Mark shoved his feet into the floor. The force threw the chair backwards right as Ike’s knife came crashing down. The cleaver missed Mark by inches and thuuded into the floorboards.

“HEY NOW!”, Lou shouted, “NONE OF THAT!” He pointed a finger at Ike, and a strange green symbol appeared on Ike’s back. Ike floated up into the air, Mark looked up and stared.

“What the…”, he started but Faust cut him off.

“Phantom of Manipulation”, he said, “Lou you really bit off more than you could chew this time. You used your power to manipulate your contract, and this poor man”

Lou grinned, “HA HA HA! HEY WE HAVE A WINNER. TO BAD IT’S TOO LATE FOR YOU TO SAVE THIS KID”, he pointed to Mark, “AND IKE!”

Faust looked at Ike, “Ike listen”. Ike was sweating, he looked down from his levitated position with effort.

“What?” he chocked out, “What do you want?”

Faust stared hard at Lou, “He’s just using you Ike, he’s manpulating your heart to think killings ok”.

“But”, Ike said straining, “The more people I kill the longer I get to live, Lou’s giving me life!” A sickening smile streached across his face.

“No” Faust said, “He’s giving you death. You have TB Ike, no supernatural force can cure that, it’s science, a medical cure is what you need. Letting Lou do this to you is only killing you more.”

Lou interjected, “SHUT UP FAUST! Ike don’t listen to him, think about it, doesn’t all this life force feel good, nice tasty life force for everybody! YUM YUM!”

Ike turned his head around to look at Lou and nodded, “Sure he said, yeah it’s good”, he turned to Fasut, “IT IS GOOD!” he yelled and dive bombed toward Mark.

Faust swore and yelled, “LOCK!” Mark screamed in agony, it felt like something had just been torn out of him. He looked over at Faust in confusion, but then looked up in amazement. Suspended above him were Ike and Lou, still on Ike’s shoulder, frozen in mid-air. Mark looked over at Faust.

“What did you do?” He said, confused.

“I am the Phantom of the Lock and Key”, Faust said, “I have the ability to lock or unlock anything,” he pointed to Lou and Ike, “So I locked their position”. He then strained against the chains again. They shattered into pieces and clattered on the floor. Faust rose from the chair and went over to untie Mark.

Mark stood up from the floor, “So why didn’t you just do that sooner” he said. Suddenly a pain ripped through Mark, he crumpled to the floor and gasped.

“Because it takes your life force to do it”. Faust picked up Mark from the floor and jumped out of the way as he unlocked Lou and Ike. They crashed to the floor and rolled over each other in a heap. Faust set Mark down on the ground.

“Is that why” Mark gasped, “Is that why I felt that pain just now?”

“Yes”, Faust answered, “Phantoms can’t use their abilities in the material plane because they’re trapped in a body. We still retain our life force but we can’t shape it to use our powers because of the matter dragging us down. Instead”, he looked at Mark, “We have to make a contract with a human, and use their life force in place of our own”.

Lou climbed up from the floor and looked over his sholder at Ike. Ike was passed out on the ground, he didn’t look good. Lou spat and turned to face Faust and Mark. “YOU STUPID PHANTOM! YOU COULDN’T JUST LET ME HAVE HIM COULD YOU?!”. Lou threw off his leather cloak, undernethe Mark saw a metal contraption. A whrring and clanking of gears ensued as the metal machine under Lou’s cloak unfolded itself into an automan. The thing was at least eight feet tall with spindly arms and legs. It had two huge iron feet; at its head rode Lou, strapped in by leather belts.

It was only now that Mark relized that Lou was actually a very small Phantom. He had to be only two feet tall. Mark wondered how Ike had managed to carry the little Phantom and his huge contraption on his sholder. Then Mark noticed the same green symbols that had been on Faust’s chains and Ike’s back. Faust asumed a fighting stance and motioned for Mark to get behind him.

“You manipulated the metal’s atomic structure to make it lighter”, Faust said, “Clever”.

Lou raised his hands, the automan’s hands followed suit. “WELL I CAN’T TAKE ALL THE CREDIT”, he motioned to Ike, “THIS HUMANS A VERY GOOD BATTERY, LOT OF LIFE FORCE IN HIM”.

Mark’s head snapped up in anger, “A battery!”, he pointed at Ike, “He had TB you jerk! He’s not your power source!”

Lou chorttled, “REALLY? THEN WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU ARE TO FAUST? BECAUSE I CAN GURANTEE YOU HE NEEDS LIFE FORCE JUST AS MUCH AS I DO!”

Mark turned to look at Faust, “Hey Phantom”, he said.

“Yes?” Faust glanced in his direction.

Mark pointed at Lou, “Take this guy down even if it kills me”.

A tiny smile spread across Faust’s face, “Don’t worry”, he said, “I won’t even need a year of your life”. Faust suddenly lunged at Lou. Lou saw it coming and doged, but he wasn’t quick enough to stop Faust from ripping off one of the automan’s arms. Lou screeched in annoyance and brought the automan’s other hand down in a karate chop on Faust’s back.
Faust pushed off against the floor and flipped around to block the blow with his cane. He succeeded but was driven back to the ground again so hard that his feet smashed through the floor boards. Lou cackled and brought an iron foot straight up into Faust’s stomach. Faust winnced and flew back against the house’s wall.

Mark ran over to Ike and lifted his head up from the floor. It wasn’t looking good for Ike, his entire face was pale, and Mark could see blood running from his nose, his eyes were rolled back into his head. Mark checked for a pulse.

Faust was just getting his breath back when Lou drove his metal arm into his face. This time the house’s wall broke and Faust fell out into space. Lou jumped out after him and kicked him to the ground. Faust flew toward the pavement, but slammed his cane down into the cement just before he hit. He blanced there for a second then let go and landed with his back on the cement. Lou came down feet first, but just before he hit Faust stood up and impaled the automan’s chest on his cane.

Mark dropped Ike’s head and began slamming on his chest with both fists, he hadn’t felt a heart beat.

Gears and cogs screeched to a halt inside Lou’s automan as Faust thrashed his cane around inside and knocked them out of place. Lou yelled in panic and started to unstrap himself, Faust was too quick. He shook the automan off his cane and grabbed Lou by the throat as the leather straps came undone. The automan crumpled to the curb and Faust raised Lou to eye level.

“You are screwed”. Faust said.

Lou struggled and squeaked but couldn’t get anything out of his throat. Faust raised his cane and pressed a button on the side. A knife point shot out of the cane’s tip, Lou squeeled.

“Phantom of Manipulation Lou”, Faust said in a revent voice, “You have been tried and found guilty of the crime of unjustly stealing human life force, you are sentenced to anahillation, may God have mercy on your soul”. He brought the cane down straight through Lou’s head, the squeeling stopped.

Faust dropped Lou’s body and took a tube off of his belt. He opened it and a blue essence flowed from Lou to the tube. When Lou’s life force was all collected Faust capped the tube and hung it back on his belt. “Your lucky Mark”, he said, “Lou was so weak I didn’t have to use any of your life force”. Faust walked away from the mess on the street and headed back up to meet his partner.
~~~~~~~~~~