The Phantom's Power

'Don't tell me you want me to join your clubhouse?'

'I wouldn't call it that but, how did you know?'

'It's becoming a habit of so many Supremes nowadays.'

'And?…what's your answer?'

'You almost blew out my eardrums with that kettle boiling thingy.'

'Oh, sorry about that. Phantoms can create not only visual illusions but auditory ones too.'

'I don't care about what you can or cannot do. I'll give you the same answer I gave the others; Hell no! I'm not so base as to join a serial killer fraternity.'

'You don't understand, Brendan. We need all hands on deck if we're to execute the Dawn, especially a Supreme as promising as yourself.'

'What is the Dawn?' Brendan asked him.

'The Supreme revolt, and we've already begun to rally the others to join our cause.'

'Jack, you cannot be serious. When did you lose your humanity? You were human first before you became anything else. All of a sudden you think you're different and superior just because a witch mixed some herbs and weeds and had you drink them?'

'It does not matter how I came to be what I am, Brendan. What matters is that I am. Don't see the plant for the seed.'

'And the seed you came from was human, Jack.'

Jack chuckled as he shook his head. Brendan could tell from his wavering foul expression that he had finally run out of patience. Jack said, 'You know what? The Finch's mention of your importance made me forget about mine. You may be a Versatile but that's not enough to make me cower in fear.'

'I don't want or even need to get you scared, Jack,' Brendan said his eyes looking around the house. 'Just tell me where Sparrow is.'

'You'll have to make me talk.'

'That can be arranged.' He swung a punch at him but it just went through his face like it was smoke. Brendan's expression turned into shock.

Jack laughed then said, 'Surprised? Well, I thought you might be. Besides illusions, teleportation and all other bizarre and mystical powers, I can manipulate matter and gravity more than you can ever imagine. That's right, Brendan- I'm a Demon Phantom!' He took a few steps back. His body was turning foggy, as if it was sublimating. 'Watch and learn, Versatile!' He began to swirl like a violent miniature tornado with his hands stretched outwards.

One of his fists caught Brendan heavily in the eye and sent him flying out of the warehouse and smashing on the ground back first, stirring a cloud of dust on impact.

'So…pray tell; how did you plan on defeating something intangible?'

Brendan got up, his tuxedo covered in dust, 'I am a Versatile! I have much more power than you!' He was wiping sand from his eye.

'If you were as powerful as you claim, you would have shut me up, or maybe you just haven't had your vision yet?'

'I don't need an ounce more power to defeat you!' He charged at him with his heightened speed but Mr. Price teleported to one of the trusses at the center of the ceiling.

'You dejected fool. I'm not going to waste my time fighting someone who can't fight back. Come back when you can.'

Despair and rage flowed through Brendan. He ran up the walls of the warehouse with his heightened speed again to try and tackle him but he was welcomed with a heavy punch which sent him flying through the air again and landing a few feet farther from the previous spot. He staggered to his feet and saw Jack now standing by the entrance.

'Don't waste both of our time. As much as I would love to stay here and make a fool out of our city's hero, I've got much more important things to do.'

He dusted himself up, 'What important things does a ghost have to do other than haunt houses?'

He sneered, 'Mock all you want, boy, and deny us just as much but you can't change this city's fate. You can't change the world's fate. You're not that powerful. I did enjoy our little sparring session, though, but I'm afraid I have to leave you. I have to help the Finch in organizing the Dawn.'

'Why don't you stay and finish what you started?'

'You already are finished. A new era is rising; the era of Supremes. We shall wipe out the entire human race because we are the next stage of evolution. For many years we have been hunted and studied. We're turning the tables now; the hunter has become the hunted!'

'Is that why you kidnapped Sparrow?' he asked him.

'It's something like that but…I just wanted your attention.'

'And you accomplished that. So what are you going to do with him?'

'That's none of your business, but just so you don't get worried; I did not kill him…at least not yet.' Mr. Price then vanished into thin air, right before Brendan's eyes.

Strongest of all Races? Did the book lie? How could one even beat something literally untouchable? These were the questions going through Brendan's mind as he took off his dirty tuxedo. He kept replaying the scene over and over again in his mind, of how he had swung a punch at Mr. Price but the blows just went through his transparent body.

Brendan had called Todd and told him he was not leaving with him. He grabbed his mask from under his bed and looked at it, pondering. If most of the Supremes were planning a revolt could he as much as delay it? Could he battle the full force and fury of the Finch, Jack Price, Black Ice and the Flicker? He was just one sixteen year old boy, and they were the Finch, and her latest creations. And the bizarre powers that Jack had? How does one stop something like that?

In anger, he threw the mask back under the bed. He knew one thing for certain; the Finch knew the answers to all these questions. She knew what each and every one of her creations was capable of. Their potential and their limits. But how was it that the Finch knew so much when she had probably spent most of her life in the bushes?

He lay down on the bed his face directed towards the wall. Was this all just a terrible nightmare?

'This is all just a dream…It's just a dream,' he murmured to himself in comfort. 'There is no such thing as magic.'