Baron Knight

by Jason Krate

  The Baron Knight Returns: Chapter 8

  * * *

  Chapter 8: The Ruins of Moraes Manor

  * * *

  St. Charles cathedral, Brightmoon City: October 8th, 2063: 4:50 PM

  At this time, Rachel was busy gathering supplies needed for her and Kaitlin's journey to a new city…preferably one that did not have electricity.

  Baron Knight stood alone by the statue, waiting for Rachel to get her supplies ready so he could send her and her daughter away.

  He would be glad to be rid of them.

  He didn't care about them, and he didn't want to.

  All he cared about was finishing his mission of revenge against the Sadistic Five and leave this damn world for good.

  That was when he felt a tug at his coat.

  He looked down to see it was Kaitlin.

  "Thank you for looking after my mother, and bringing her to me" Kaitlin Addison said politely.

  Baron Knight stared at her for a while, and then looked away "I wish I could say I was looking after her kid…"

  "What do you mean?" Kaitlin Addison asked confused.

  "Your mother is just a distraction I didn't need to deal with; when both you and her are on your merry way…you will both undoubtedly forget I existed in a short time. No matter the good deeds, human beings always forget them and the people they received them from" Baron Knight said bitterly, "Which is very well a good thing…because I don't plan to be long for this world. It doesn't deserve good deeds or good people, it never did."

  Kaitlin was confused.

  How could a man who had calmed her in her time of fear, re-united her with her mother, who had agreed to help them escape the city…could suddenly be so cold.

  "I don't understand, I thought you were a…" Kaitlin began.

  "A what?" Baron Knight scoffed, "A hero? Don't make strangers you hardly know into heroes little girl. Heroes don't exist anymore in this world, and I am certainly not one of them…not anymore."

  "You lost someone didn't you…someone you cared about" Kaitlin Addison said in realization.

  "How did you…?" Baron Knight's surprise faded away into stubborn refusal to dwell on the subject "it's none of your business."

  "You did." Kaitlin Addison said, growing sad "I know…because I have seen that look before…on my mom. She lost people she cared about too…I lost my father and mother when I was a toddler. But you know something Mr. Metahuman …we both taught one another a way to help each other get through the hurt. Maybe it can help you as well."

  Before Baron Knight could stop her, Kaitlin opened up and wrapped her arms around his waist.

  Hugging him tightly, like the child in that birthday card Minra had given his mother on her last mother's day…of a young boy giving his mom a hug and kiss.

  How he wished he was still able to do that…or at least had been able to have let his mom know one last time that he loved her.

  He never got a chance to tell his mother that things would be all right, or kiss her goodbye before the great massacre.

  The only time he got to hug her afterward, was to hug her goodbye before he buried her corpse with her placed beside his father… alongside everyone else he cared and loved.

  He snapped out of his moment of mournful reflect, and grew stern with Kaitlin.

  "Let go…I don't like little children and I certainly don't like hugs" Baron Knight lied.

  "Then why are you putting a hand on my head" she asked impishly.

  Minra didn't even realize his hand was on her head in an affectionate manner until Kaitlin Addison pointed it out.

  He shook off his bewilderment and returned to his grumpy cynical old self.

  "To push you away…" Baron Knight growled, but to his surprise…found he couldn't bring himself to do that to Kaitlin Addison.

  Her spirit and kind nature and also her curiosity…It reminded him of Kilari when she was that age.

  Kilari.

  Baron Knight could feel a tear roll down his masked cheek as his mind wandered off, thinking about his daughter.

  He quickly ignored it and the sad feelings when he heard Rachel's voice sound off from behind him.

  "Come on Kaitlin, say goodbye to Mr. Baron Knight…" she said, calling to her daughter who was still hugging the knight of the night, "We have to get going, we can make ten miles before dark if we are lucky."

  "For the kids sake…" Baron Knight said to Rachel Addison, "I hope you find a new home…"

  "We will" Rachel Addison assured him.

  "…and for your sake, find a new profession. If the clients who don't take 'no' for an answer don't get you, the sexually transmitted diseases that still exist will. If you get sick and die, what will happen to her?" Baron Knight said with concern.

  "I don't need your concern…" Rachel Addison looked away stubbornly, "I will do what I have to in order to support my daughter. Even things I hate. But…I will take your advice. For her sake…I hope I can find other lines of…work…that don't involve men/women and their libidos."

  Baron Knight then stretched out his hand, and opened up a shadow portal behind where Rachel stood.

  "You won't make it far on foot, not with the distance between here and the next town before it gets dark. That portal will take you to a mansion I am…familiar with. It's ruined and broken…but it can still provide you shelter. Plus it's the safest place in outer Brightmoon area. No drone patrols."

  "The old Moraes Mansion…?" Rachel Addison asked in recognition, she then looked at Baron Knight with narrow eyes of suspicion.

  Why would he choose a location like that, when there could be better places to send the two of them outside the city?

  Also, why did he say he was 'familiar' with it?

  No one had lived there for years.

  She decided that she didn't really want to know, nor did she care…she just wanted to get herself and Kaitlin to safety.

  She stopped before she and Kaitlin could enter, and turned to look at Baron Knight.

  "Thank you, for everything you've done Baron Knight. You saved my life, more than once…and you helped my little girl with her…gift. I am grateful, and I also know I can never repay you for enough for that kindness." she said to Baron Knight, "Good luck with…whatever it was you were doing before you…before you saved me from Bone Breaker. Maybe there are still heroes in the world. Or at least one Hero left in the world anyway. "

  "I didn't…" Minra began to say that he didn't intend on rescuing her from Bone Breaker, or the Drone attack for that matter.

  But something about the way she said it, and the genuine grateful look in her eyes made him change his words.

  "Your welcome…and good luck" Baron Knight said to the prostitute and her adoptive daughter.

  His mask, hiding the first smile he had ever made in years towards someone who hadn't been Kilari.

  Before Rachel Addison and Kaitlin Addison could step through the Shadow Portal, the ground beneath them suddenly violently shook as a shockwave occurring from an explosion somewhere in the area outside the church rocked through the floor of the congregation hall.

  The shockwave ended up sending everyone in the church falling to the ground on their faces or on their knees.

  Well…everyone who wasn't a Metahuman with shadow powers that is.

  Baron Knight quickly recovered, and looked in the direction the shockwave had come from.

  That was when the front doors to the cathedral burst open, and a crowd of terrified Brightmoon City citizens ran inside, no doubt seeking sanctuary from something…but from what?

  Baron Knight's Dark Sense suddenly started to work…and then he saw exactly what these people were running for shelter here in the church to get away from.

  "Damn it, my Dark Sense must be on the fritz…I'm too close to the deadline to have my power work." Baron Knight said in horrified realization.

  "What deadline?"

  Before Baron Knight could answer, he quickly realized he was running out of time.


  He quickly used his powers to open up a shadow portal to the only safe location in Brightmoon city.

  "Get through the damn portal if you want to live!" Baron Knight shouted to the terrified masses.

  When the masses showed they were to terrified to believe that the swirling vortex wasn't going to lead them to their doom, Baron Knight in frustration concentrated what little control he had left before he reached his deadline.

  The shadow portal lurched forward from where it had been standing and swallowed Baron Knight, Rachel, Kaitlin, the priest and all the refugees who had fled here to hide from the horde of killers that had now laid siege to the Church.

  They all vanished in flashes of light as the shadow portal passed over them, before the portal reached the end of the group where it closed in a flash of light and a large plume of purple smoke.

  And not a moment too soon as the doors to the church were bust wide open, and in emerged a death squad of marauders lead by a rabid Mourne.

  Mourne had once been the "collector" of the taxes in this section of the city, and only Father Morris had dared to speak up against them.

  Saying to Mourne that God would punish them for their horrific acts and misdeeds against the people of the city, which they would all have answer to him for at the gates of St. Peter one day.

  Mourne had remembered that, and had come to the conclusion that this pain in the ass Priest in this useless building in his section of Brightmoon City had something to do with the creature that had murdered his lover Silencer.

  He hadn't heard about Mastermind II's discovery on the true identity of the intruder, and had left before the messenger that the arch-villain had sent out to call in the remaining members of the Sadistic Five could get to him to inform him of this.

  Having come to this conclusion on his own despite his low intelligence and come to enact bloody vengeance on the churchman he blamed for Silencer's death.

  "You sent that demon after us holy man, that's why you and everyone in this church are going to die!" Mourne snarled.

  Then when he saw that no one was in the church, he turned to look at his followers.

  "FIND HIM, and burn this pathetic place to the ground!"

  * * *

  Mansion Ruins Front Grounds, Palisade Forest: October 8th, 2063: 5:00 PM

  All the people that had taken refuge in the church, Father Morris, Baron Knight, Rachel and Kaitlin Addison appeared out from a shadow portal.

  The second they saw Baron Knight, they ran off in fear.

  "Your welcome" Baron Knight said cynically, and then he winced in pain "Aww…not again."

  Before Rachel and Kaitlin's eyes, Baron Knight dropped to the ground where he stood.

  Almost as if he had dropped dead.

  They walked over to the collapsed metahuman Vigilante and Rachel placed her fingers against the exposed area of the Baron Knights neck.

  She noticed that his skin was very wrinkly and rough.

  So her suspicions of him being an old man were correct.

  "He's still breathing…" She said to her daughter when she saw she was looking at the collapsed Baron Knight worriedly, "he's sleeping I think."

  "Why did he collapse like that?" Kaitlin asked confused, "Was he just that tired."

  "I don't know honey…" Rachel said unsure.

  That was when it started to rain.

  Rachel was glad that Baron Knight's theory about Kaitlin's powers had been correct, she hated to think what would have happened if she still had access to her electric abilities since it was now raining.

  She might have accidentally electrocuted herself (unless she was immune), and Rachel and Baron Knight.

  Rachel looked towards the ruins of the old Moraes Mansion, the only shelter within walking short distance.

  "Let's go Kaitlin" Rachel Addison said to her daughter.

  "But mom, we can't leave him here like this." Kaitlin said in protest.

  "We're not" she assured her daughter.

  * * *

  Minra was perplexed.

  He blinked his eyes sleepily and confused as if waking up from a long dream.

  He found himself back in his bedroom back in the family mansion, as it had once been.

  For a moment he thought he was hallucinating, then he felt the warm lips of a female touch his grizzled old lips.

  His wife Raven Ducard appeared before his eyes, smiling at him.

  Suddenly another female's lips kissed his.

  This woman pulled back to reveal her face to him.

  Gwen!

  His first wife, the reformed supervillainess who had gone by the codename "Spectress"…he hadn't seen her face in a while.

  She had been a very special woman in his life, on the same level as Raven had been.

  She hadn't been a supervillainess by choice, having been confined to the life as a villain for hire by way of the symbiotic body suit she had been trapped in that she was desperate to get free from.

  Somewhere during their battles, a grudging respect grew into infatuation.

  He eventually found a way to free her, and down the line…he married her.

  She bore him his first child, his eldest son Max.

  It was a happy marriage…till Dark Shadow killed her.

  It had taken a lot for him to get over the guilt, the remorse and make peace with her memory to eventually marry Raven Ducard as per her dying wish for him to not grow old and alone with someone special in his life and his bed.

  That was when he felt another female's lips kiss him, this time on his grizzled cheek.

  He froze and almost felt like crying tears of joy upon seeing the Goth makeup painted face of his second daughter, Angel.

  His third child born from Raven Ducard, a child he had once lost along with her twin brother Johnny…but had been found again along with her brother later during both their teenage years.

  The last time he had seen her she had told him that she was expecting, and Shadow, the heroic clone of the villain Shadow Naemon… was the father.

  Any happiness he had in his heart upon knowing he was going to be a grandfather was eventually destroyed by THANATOS along with his daughter.

  To see her again…there was so much he wanted to tell her.

  Before he could attempt to speak, he felt another female kiss him on the cheek.

  This time, it was someone in the group of important women in his life that he had lost very recently.

  Kilari.

  Usually these were silent phantoms of his heart he only saw in his dreams and nightmares.

  This time however…the phantoms of his heart spoke, Kilari's of all phantoms to be exact actually spoke to him.

  "I love you daddy…and I'm so proud of you."

  * * *

  Minra awoke from his dream, and cursed himself for once again falling for the dreams and hopes buried deep down in his cynical heart.

  He missed his family, so much.

  If he didn't have a mission to accomplish, he'd have found a way to kill himself by now to end his miserable lonely existence that the Sadistic Five and the Deathborne Siblings had sentenced him to by their actions.

  But since he had a mission that was only two numbers of a quintet done, he couldn't sit here resting on…where the hell was he?

  He found he was lying on the soft ground inside a ruined building out in the open somewhere.

  It was raining outside, if his old ears weren't deceiving him.

  He looked around to get his bearings.

  This burned out room, it looked familiar.

  Getting off of the floor, Minra exited the room and walked around trying to understand why this place looked familiar.

  He then walked into a grand hall, and he froze in disbelief at what he saw.

  In the hall, Rachel and Kaitlin were looking at a grand portrait that was by the look of things had nearly been ruined by fire and exposure to the elements over time…but not enough that one couldn't make out what it was portraying.

  They were c
ompletely oblivious to Baron Knight's prescience behind them.