Wednesday, February 15, 2017

Apocalypse How? - Demons - Brimstone

Hello Everyone, Morbidly Deceased Here...
So, it's been a long time since I've made a blog post, and while i could currently talk about The Walking Dead Mid-Season Premiere, instead, I'll do a retrospective when the season ends. So in the intermediary, let's talk Demons, or more particularly, an idea I had for a demon apocalypse that I came up with about 2 years ago now....

The World:
100 years ago, Demons invaded Earth in search of land and living space, as there was no longer enough room in Hell. From the depths of Hell rose seven Demonic Lords, each of them laid claim upon a part of the world. One took North America, another South America, one Africa, another the South Pacific, two fight for Asia as the one who would claim Antarctica realized that there is nothing there to rule. The final one, the one that was meant to claim Europe, made an error. Each Demonic Lord can create Hell-gates from Hell to the real world, however, their main Hell-gate can only function while they are in it on the Hell side, these were their first portals before they finally saw Earth. They were blind guesses based on the largest land masses. The 7th’s error was to open his central Hell-gate under water in the Atlantic, off the coast of Ireland. Though the other lords were able to seal off that section of Hell to prevent Hell itself from being flooded, and the Demon’s natural weakness to water killing them all, the water is evaporating and the ocean is draining. After 100 years however, the war in Asia has lain waste to the entire continent, and a new war between the American Demonic Lords has started. The North is losing, every day the Demons far up in the northern reaches of the continent are being sent south through Hell-gates, making former Northern America and Canada one of the few places Humanity can survive relatively unharmed. 

In the mist of this stands New Minneapolis, The Lonely Twin. St.  Paul was destroyed before the Demonic hordes could be routed. From its rumble a wall was built, and its workers were to act as guards. Soon another wall was built, and again the workers were designated to be guards. This happened for more times, with each wall being taller, stronger, more defensible, and closer to the city than the last. Eventually the guards of the 1st through 4th walls abandoned their posts, no one noticed at first, and no one cared when they did, there was no point to the outer walls anymore, though some would disagree. Each group of wall guards created their own camps around the city, but now, after pillaging all the rest, Camp Hell-water remains, and has been moving further out ever since they lost the last of their supplies. Now they hunt down and devour Demons, its the only way they can survive, Here at Camp Hell-water, or more over, after its fall, does our story begin.

The Story: 
      Oliver, the protagonist, will explain how Camp Hell-water fell to Demons, and how he, Drew, and Alexia were the only ones to find each other, and that they aren’t sure if others survived. Then it will snap back to the present to reveal that Oliver was telling this story to the group of 50 or so men, women, and children from a city called Brimstone. It is protected from Demonic invasions via the creation of a giant moat around them, but the water since turned black with ash, and they had nearly run out of food. One of the members, Michelle, will talk of Brimstone itself and the path the citizens took to try to find a better place, and all the way up to when they meet the group from Camp Hell-water. That night a swarm of Hell-bats attack. In the frenzy, with only Oliver, Drew, Alexia knowing how to deal with them, they are only able to save four from Brimstone as the rest try to run or hide. With Brimstone being a lost cause, and finding survivors from that night too dangerous, the group heads back north to the one place that, if they can get in, might be the last safe haven in this world, New Minneapolis.
Oliver leads them to back Camp Hell-water where there are still some hidden reserves of food and water, along with the chief’s armory still intact, all of which were too risky to go for, as failing to clear it all out in time would just mean the Demons would find it. The fact that nothing had been taken meant that if there had been survivors, none of them had been related to Oliver Jenson, as he was the son of the Chief, and only the Chief’s relatives knew of the cache. The group stays the night, and starts heading north again. Soon they run out of food, and the Camp Hell-water survivors show Michelle Henley, Bianca Hernandez, Howard Maelstrom, and Rachel Adams (the survivors of Brimstone), how to hunt Demons, though its more of a demonstration than an actual lesson. A few days later, they all finally make it to just outside the first wall of New Minneapolis, Alexia tells them they can easily climb the first 4 walls, they were abandoned long ago for they weren’t required anymore for the defense of the city. The 4th wall was the last one that was built with stone, the rest are metal and guarded. Though climbing up the walls is treacherous at times, they make it through to within two days to the suburbs between the 4th and 5th. They decide that since no protectors off the 5th and 6th wall knew off it’s inner workings, their best option to to search for food in suburbs while looking for a weak point. The next day, they find a Hell-gate, but it’s abandoned oddly enough, with no discernible way in or out. Inside, its filled with brimstone, a Hellish metal that is always hot to the touch, and though as malleable as iron in Hell, it is indestructible on Earth, it is used to anchor Hell-gates to Earth. The fact that there’s no defense around it nor any destruction beyond it means that no one has been here in quite some time. They trek on, searching the walls, trying to find a path. Finally, a party of New Minneapolis scavengers looking for what they can outside the city. The group is spotted and captured. They’re led into the New Minneapolis, and put into the city prison, which is surprisingly empty. They are stripped of supplies, armor, and weaponry, then interrogated, Alexia is the only one to stay calm, while Drew is the only one able to escape. His interrogator is found a flaming mess, and Drew is gone. The group is jailed, each in separate cells, but all close by.
After three days, Oliver decides to tell the rest of the group the stories his grandfather had told him, stories in turn he had been told by his father. Oliver tells them of the Myth Of the Hunters, the people who now rule New Minneapolis. They are immortal, granted powers from special weapons gifted to them from those long dead. The Hunters saved the world several times over a century ago. They stopped madmen bent on world domination, those who were willing to raise Dinosaurs from the dead to accomplish this goal. The Hunters were the last of those willing to fight for an ancient order, in a secret war that millennia ago was known to all. It was lost to history as their ancestors had won, but the enemy was never defeating. Their last victory however, was only a few years before the Demonic Invasion. When the world called them, screaming out to be saved, instead, they defended only the Twin Cities, and after the battle was won, they used St. Paul’s ruins to build the walls. Then they promptly disappeared into the highest floors of the city center, never to be heard from again. Most think they are dead, but those who know the truth know that they have gone mad. 
That next night, the group finds their cells open, and the guards gone. Cautiously, they leave, they wonder who let them out. It’s Poulier, one of The Hunters. She’s been watching them since they were brought in. She leads the group upstairs and gives them clothes to wear, along with a map of the city, and circles the place where she’ll meet them. Before they can say a word, she leaves. Oliver gives Michelle the map and says “You’re probably better with these than i am.” They work their way through the city and try to avoid attention, they end up in the middle of a crowd that’s gathered in front of an older man. 
The man starts to speak and he says that “Thanks to the criminals who tried to sneak into the city, workers have discovered a Hell-gate full of brimstone, and we plan to use it to build one last wall, a 7th wall made of brimstone, the only indestructible material on Earth. We need workers though, all those who can help should, and this time, you will not be abandoned.” Some people from the crowd leave in pursuit of his new offer for a job. After his speech is finished, another man takes the stage. Michelle and Alexia decide to stay and listen, this place no longer sounded like it was safe, they needed to know what else was going wrong. Michelle hands Oliver the map and says, “I know where we’re going I’ll meet you there.” The second man steps on stage. He shouts down to the crowd that the Hunters have abandoned them, something they should’ve realized that a long time ago. Their reclusiveness lead the protectors to be abandon outside city walls, to let murders run rampant, and let disease plague certain parts of the city. “Well, no more!” “We built these walls while they hide up in their tower, we need to take this city back!” Everyone in the crowd agrees, and the crowd follows the man from the stage toward the Hunter’s tower. There’s no more speakers after that, just a roaring crowd heading toward the tower in the center of New Minneapolis. They find that they were sent to an abandoned section of town, a city sector that was plagued, until everything there just died. The people died in weeks, the animals died in months, and the mosquitoes carrying the disease died in a year, Poulier is now living in one of the abandoned buildings of this abandoned sectors. There are hundreds of sectors, each wall off from each other in order to contain disease, invaders, or rioters. When Michelle and Alexia reach the apartment complex, they find that the rest of their group, including Drew, is already there. Poulier talks about what she can remember of the descent of the Hunters, and how seeing Oliver’s face, the same face of a man long dead, the face of a madman that The Hunters once fought. It snapped her out of her paranoia, and mistrust, and depression. She started truly thinking again, and she had gone to desperate measures to get rid of her weapon, to rid herself of the immortality that had only caused her to turn her back on others. She killed one of the citizens of New Minneapolis, an innocent, she was no longer deemed worry by the weapon, and it disappeared.
When Michelle mentions the potential over throw of the Hunters, Poulier convinces them to come with her to HQ, to snap the Hunters out of whatever their stuck in, to save them, the city could run without them, but they were Poulier’s friends. On the way there, Michelle mentions to Drew the re-enforcing off the wall. Drew tells her “We’ll need to talk about that later, they can’t do that, they’ll destroy this city.” Drew’s worried, but he won’t say why yet. By the time they all reach the HQ, they find hundreds of bodies, killed by auto-sentries, and other automatons that no one thought could still exist. Relics of the past that were more powerful than present. Poutier’s presence allows the group to enter unharmed. This group confronts the hunters, but as soon as Oliver steps into the room, Harrison, the leader of The Hunters, tackles him and puts his dagger to Oliver’s throat. “How are you still alive!” “We killed you Oliver!” Oliver is confused as to how the hunters know his name, that when it hits him, they’re confusing him with his great grandfather, the same man Poulier thought he was. Before Harrison or Oliver can do anything else, Harrison is sprayed with fire. Everyone looks to see Drew standing with his palm out flat, and hand outstretched, he has a pentagram branded into his palm, and from there a small flame lingers. Everyone’s confused, but Harrison’s come to his senses, shell-shocked, but starting to think again. Harrison see’s that the group from Brimstone and Hell-water haven’t given up, and that they might have the skills to defend the city. He offers his weapon to Oliver, but Oliver refuses, it’s of no use to him. But the weapon chooses otherwise, it flies out of Harrison’s hands and embeds itself into Oliver pack, and when Oliver pulls it out, it has inscribed itself with “This is not your choice” Though confused, Oliver tosses the weapon towards Harrison, “I don't need it, nor do I want your fate.” Oliver leaves, and soon, the others follow him one by one.
Poulier decides to stay behind with the rest of the Hunters, she gives them one piece of advice, “Take my place, and don’t come back here, don’t tell anyone you ever saw us. After today, there will be no one in the city who won’t attack someone us, or someone who knows us.” The group returns back home, taking the same route as before, transportation of brimstone bricks into the city has begun. Their assumption about the Hell-gate was right, it was actually blocked off from the rest of hell, perfect for workers to forge Brimstone pieces in Hell, and bring them up the surface, thus not having to deal with the metal’s indestructible properties on Earth until it’s already formed. Drew and Alexia split off from the group and head back to the city square, and Drew almost gets on stage. Alexia stops him, but not before making a scene. The speaker though welcomes him up on stage, “Any citizen’s opinion is worth sharing.” Drew warns the crowd of what will happen if they re-enforce the wall with brimstone. “Demonic Lords use rings of Brimstone to anchor their Hell-gates. Surrounding the city in Brimstone will only lead to a Demonic Lord being able to create a Hell-gate around the entire city, destroying this completely, and keeping the walls intact. We would be creating the strongest Demonic fortress in existence.” People ask why on Earth they should trust Drew. Among the shouts of the crowd, Drew sprays fire into the sky, and the shouting stops. He and Alexia have to book it, the crowd doesn’t trust them nor like what they’re hearing, they’re able to lose them and return to Poulier's house. When they return Drew gives Alexia a book, a journal really, he says that its his father’s research on Hell and its Demons. He says that his father is probably the only person to go to Hell and come back. He believes that if the city finds him, they will try to kill him, so his father’s work must survive if he doesn’t.
Days go by, nothing happens, then suddenly, a large mass of people arrive around New Minneapolis. They are survivors from Brimstone, they speak a portal being owned up from out of nowhere, right under the center of the city, only those along the shores of the moat could escape in time. They fled in all directions, but this group headed north, hoping to find whatever the group before them had. They also speak of something new, something more powerful than even the lumbering Demonic Siegers. They speak of a towering behemoth that can spray fire and that was covered in brimstone armor, a being with massive wings that, despite it’s size, could allow it to fly. Only Drew knows what this means, its a Demonic Lord, and it must be desperate. For a Demonic Lord to leave its Central Hell-gate means that it is either scared or relocating, and a relocating Demonic Lord wouldn’t bother to travel on Earth, and instead go through Hell. The survivors of the Fall of Brimstone also say that they were followed by the Lord for quite sometime, but it was slow moving. With word spreading of a potential Demonic invasion, those who recognize Drew in crowd ask for his help. They now believe him, they believe that the brimstone wall will only doom them. Luckily, a Demonic Lord on the move means it has no central Hell-gate, and can’t produce new Hell-gates for a large distance, nor can it make a portal large enough to even swallow up a section of New Minneapolis.
A demon army will be on their way, the city will need to be ready. Drew discusses an idea with the new war planners. (The Hunters were overthrown, they have no power, but they just simply can’t be killed because no one can get past the auto-sentries.) A Demonic Lord is on it’s way, if they can lead it into the Hell-gate between the 4th and 5th wall, they can kill it with iron weapons, as iron has reverse properties of brimstone, it’s indestructible in Hell. The next morning, the 4th wall is manned for the first time in 60 years, and the 5th and 6th walls have been restocked, geared and ready. All of which are ordered to lead a large demon to that Hell-gate if possible. Special units of the scavengers are placed in the suburbs to lead to Demonic Lords into the Hell-gate. Oliver, now among the scavengers, is also given guns with iron bullets instead of lead. The New Minneapolis Scavengers are also given iron shields and swords in case they have to get up close. When a Demonic Lord is on the move, it’s main portal closes, when it dies, all other portal will collapse, thus, the iron bullets, if they were to kill it close up, they’d be stuck in Hell till they find the other portals. The last of the brimstone is used to create armor, and the 7th wall is built, with brimstone reinforcing the guard stations. For the first time in a century, the smoke in the sky is of human cause rather than Demon conquest, of human forges and smeltery to create weapons both medieval and modern to the time the world fell. Any one who can fight, send messages, or resupply are put on the 4th-7th walls. The stage is set, either the Demonic Lord falls, or New Minneapolis becomes the new North America central Hell-gate, one insurmountable by man and Demons alike.
Howard, Drew and Alexia position themselves at the 7th wall. Oliver, Bianca, Rachel, and Michelle are on the 4th wall. Bianca and Drew share shortwave radio. More days go by, people become restless, maybe they were wrong, maybe they lucked out. Then, something unexpected happens, Hell-gates open up in between the walls, every single one of them. Demonic Siegers pour out and pound at the walls, bullets and water in rained down on them, burning them and puncturing their thick skin. Before long, Hell-bats fly out as well, and head towards the top defenses of the walls. Anyone their now focuses their fire upward, the Siegers, no longer stalled, return to breaking the walls at their base, but then Demonic Scavengers pour over them an kill each one of them. The Demons want the walls intact, even if it means having to kill their own. From above the ash clouds, a Demonic Lord descends, it sprays fire at the walls, roasting anyone inside those regions, leaving a huge chink in the walls defense, and remains suspended in the air, its red hulking mass in stark contrast to the permanently twilit sky. The battle on the ground isn’t much better. Guards are overwhelmed as Demonic Scavengers, though being weaker, are of overwhelming odds, and keep pouring out of the Hell-gates. Scavengers now unheeded by the walls defenses, still focused on the Hell-bats, break into the inner defenses of the walls, but are held back by city guards. Meanwhile near the 4th wall, Bianca contacts Drew, the Demonic Lord is nearing the portal, but they need to bring it down. Drew orders the guards to shoot at the demon’s wings, while Oliver gets in position at the edge of the portal. It had to be the abandoned one, Demons were still pouring out of the rest. Michelle lead Rachel and Bianca to that portal, where they meet Oliver and the New Minneapolis Scavengers, and switch out regular ammo for the iron bullets, not a second after, the Demonic Lord crashes to the ground, right at the edge of the portal, and falls backwards into it, knocking the group back with the impact the force of the impact. They get back up starting and start firing at it, the bullets becoming invincible when they pass into Hell. But it’s not working, the Lord isn’t making a screech and it’s still moving, city guards finally show up, and start putting regular rounds into it, it’s not hurting it either, but it is keeping it down in the Hell-gate. Bullets in general just can’t pierce it’s skin. Bianca radio’s Drew, “It’s not working.” Alexia flips through Drew’s book, the defenders had regained the wall, it’s calm there, and the defenders will lead a charge soon. Alexia pulls out a map, a map of Hell, she hands Howard the book. Drew asks what she’s doing. “Bullets won’t work, you heard them, someone’s going to have to kill it up close, they’ll be lost without this, i need to get down there.” Drew nods. 
Alexia find her way to the bottom of the 7th wall, and runs as fast as she can. It’s been an hour, and even with replacements, the Demonic Lords suppressors are running out of ammo, and Oliver has his sword out standing at the edge of the Hell-gate. He’s going to kill the Demonic Lord himself, Alexia gives him the map and says, “Try and head to South America, that way you can make it back.” Oliver thanks her, the drops into the Hell-gate, landing on a the scaffolding that the defenders had set up while they were mining brimstone. He starts making his way around the around the scaffolding wherever he can, trying to descend safely, but it’s partially broken, and the defenders have run out of ammo, the Demonic Lord has gotten back up, and it’s looking right at Oliver. It quickly starts trying to set him on fire, but his shield holds back the flames, in Hell iron is always cold, and impossible to heat up. The Lord breaks the scaffolds underneath Oliver, but falls over in the process. Oliver lands on the back of the demon’s neck. He plunges his sword in-between  its armor and it screeches in pain, and snaps backward. Oliver keeps his grip on the sword and it budges slightly, fiery liquid spurts out of the demon’s neck and the sword loosens. Oliver yanks out the sword and stabs again, and again more and more liquid rushes out, the Demonic Lord stopped moving after the first time, but now, it finally falls over, face first. Oliver knows it’s dead, the Hell-gate above his head has closed, revealing the cavern ceiling. There’s an army of scavengers below him now, the section of Hell is no longer sealed off, their Lord is slumped against the side of the cave. Oliver’s still on their Demonic Lord’s back, they want to kill him, and they’ll have to reach him first. That’s how it ends, with no idea as to the fate of any of the characters.

Aren't I Great....
Anyways, thank you if you made it this far, if you just skipped to the end, I don't blame you.