Diablo Etwatia was normally quite patient. He knew how to bide his time, how to plan ahead, to ensure maximum success. However, this time was a rarity...he felt in insatiable lust to find her...the one called Railgun...to find her...and mutilate her with all his wrath. Never before had he felt such an intense lust to cause pain.
Calm yourself...Diablo thought. Now is not the time to let your instincts grab hold.
Diablo was sitting within a dark dungeon-like dining hall. He sat at the far end of a long table covered in a red tapestry. Around the table, hidden by the shaddows, only partially visible in the torch light were the current top 10 members of Hydra Head.
On his right sat Noiress Blackout, her skull adorned red fidora glinting in the flaming light. The chair on his left remained empty as the current 1 ranked member was standing in the shadows. Somewhere near the middle of the table, a chair sat empty as well, as the ranked 7 member still had not arrived. Though Diablo doubted with that the creature was even capable of sitting with it's anatomy.
Noiress smiled. "My...you sure are tense today...is ol' Zeref standing in the back making you nervous?"
"Don't patronize me." said Diablo. "I have no fear of death magic...I am death."
"Explains why Ghost Slumberer respects you so much." said Noiress. "Anyways...when is Mr. Important going to show up?"
"Yeah!" said the wild golden haired Aurumnus Rager who sat on Noiress's right. "Me and Argentumius are getting really impatient here!"
Argentumius, a man with long neat silver hair, a handsome face, red iris's and a white samurai robe looked at Aurumnus with his eirie calm. "I do not feel such a thing as impatience. Such is the nature of silver...to flow and allow the shining patience to guide one's way..."
"Yeesh.." muttered Aurumnus. "I can't believe you're the 5th ranked guy...and a Silver Dragon Slayer to boot...you lack motivation."
"Wait..." said Diablo. "He's here..."
The large wooden door in the room opened with an eirie creak. Out of the dark pitch blackness beyond the door came the sound of clicking and dragging and skuttling....as if a deathly creature of the night was approaching with calculating treachery.
"Eeww.." Noiress muttered. "As always, it's entrance is as creepy as it's appearence."
As the skuttling noise continued. A tall hooded figure in a black robe that obscured all his features walked through. It was Black Whisper, leader of Hydra Head.
"My appologies loyal brethren....but I have arrived late.....though I have brought somebody along that will ensure my lateness is well worth the wait."
Black Whisper stepped asside as the skuttling got larger. Then a long arm creeped out of the darkness. a long fleshy blood spindly arm with a bone blade instead of normal hands or fingers. Another blade leg peaked out as the 12 legged thing skuttled out. It's twisted red and flesh head moved out of it's humanoid, yet twisted and spiny body. It had multiple green eyes all over it's fleshy head and The Hydra Head symbol was imprinted on the area where a mouth would be if it had one.
Several people at the table made retching noises...as if disgusted by the creature's appearence. The creature stood up on two muscular skinless human-like legs with three toed claws. "Massster....they aren't pleased to see me..."
"Do not worry yourself Plague." said Black Whisper. "They are just a little surprised...you haven't fought along side us for so long..."
Plague...the 7th ranked member of Hydra Head. Diablo could see the plan that Black Whisper was weaving now. He must have had to calculate for quite a while if Black Whisper was to use this plan.
"Now all of you might be wondering why I brought Plague of all our members to this meeting..." said Black Whisper. "it's quite a simple reason though....You all remember..his rather unique power."
All the other Hydra Head members started muttering among themselves, fear could be sensed growing in the room.
"The Plague of Darkness..." said Diablo. "To infect an area with dark magic so vile, that it bends to the will of it's master, and it put's all living beings within an never ending sleep of darkness....the most powerful of all forbidden sleep and poision magic. It is the very spell that covers the neighboring planet to my dead homeworld...where countless other sentient species lie in an eternal sleep...kept forever alive by caster.....Plague's creator...Asgawrath..."
"Asgawrath!?" said Noiress. "The greatest darkness that ever first crossed the beginning of existance itself!? Creator of Dravis!? But I heard that planet Reswel was only recently put under that spell."
"There are times when master Asgawrath stirs in his dark endless slumber." said Plague. "As an elder god of darkness...even he must stir in his sleep...and sense the chaos Dravis, my brother in creation, is causing. When that happens....sometimes some of his more vile creations could be set loose from his deep dark ancient mind...like I was 5 years ago... My brother still runs along the surface of Reswel, watching...feeding."
"Plague shall serve as our final means to ensure that Fiore is no longer a threat in the our plans..." said Black Whisper. "Hades has already made preparations with Azuma. The plan will run on schedule....the moment to seal off the The Rainbow Gateway soon approaches.
"That gate existists beyond reality itself." said Noiress. "You can't destroy it...nor can you close it...these two worlds are connected permaneantly."
"Maybe so.." said Black Whisper. "But just because the door is still there, doesn't mean you can't find ways of preventing those from entering...or escaping. With Fiore locked down from that other world....they will be vulnerable, espers only make up a small percentage of their world while here, the mages number in thousands upon thousands. Cut off their supply of power and they will starve before Dravis. And in the mean time...this world will be consumed by Plague."
"My powers only encompass several kilometers though.." hissed Plague. "How do you intend for me to consume this entire world?"
"As I said before.." said Black Whisper. "Hades and Azuma are fixing that. In the meantime...I have more immediate concerns....the Railgun, there have been too many mistakes where she is concerned. Many of them have been my own...it's time that mistake ended."
"Our top assasins Slither, Plasmoid, and Ghost Slumberer are currently taking care of that." said Noiress. "They will also obliterate the company with her...as well as any hopes of them reaching this location."
"The time has long passed since merely leaving it to a few would be successful." said Black Whisper. "Me, Hades, and even our most powerful member Diablo have all failed to defeat her. It is time we pulled out all our resources to destroy this girl of prophecy. Diablo! Noiress"
"Yes master Black Whisper..."
"I am giving you two a full reign." said Black Whisper. "You are free to hunt down the Railgun and destroy whoever get's in your way.....And as for you Zeref..."
Black Whisper nodded at the dark mage who still stood in the shadows at the back of the room. "You are to continue guarding the Gate of Entry....should she make it through...grant her no mercy...remember....Hydra Head is your master now.....you are to obey..."
"I cannot go against the rules of your magic." whispered Zeref. "I shall do as you say."13
"Good..." said Black Whisper. "So..shall we begin Plague."
Plague blinked his multiple eyes in apparent pleasure. "My lord....it would be an honor."
Campsite for Squad 1 of the Fairy Tail division.
Laxus peered through the wilderness again...The massive gray canyons and gorges that spread out before him seemed to outline the difficulty of what he was about to do. He sniffed the air...hmm...he couldn't even smell anything strange...so why did he have such a bad feeling in his gut?
"See anything?" Laxus asked to Mirajane who was standing next to him, wearing a form fitting black suit instead of her usual dress. (Like Mira would wear a dress to war.)
"No...everything seems fine....but I can't help but feel that something is up.." said Mira.
"Me too." said Laxus. "But logically...I can't find any reason for it."
Suddenly, Kuroko Shirai appeared right next to Mira, having been teleporting all over the canyon. Today she was wearing a blue denim jacket and gray shorts. "I've looked all over...there's not a living thing in sight, unless you count some birds, a few jackals, and one very dumb looking vulcan."
"Wait..." said Laxus. "That's it....it's too good....there should be at least 3 Wyrms ever 18 miles. Yet..."
"We haven't met any for the past 25 miles." said Kuroko. "What's going on?"
Suddenly a flock of birds flew past the group in a panic, followed by an entire group of deer, and other animals, even the vulcan. The terrified group of living beings ran off in a panic from the area.
"Wow...it's like they sense something is wrong too." murmured Mira.
"And it's throwing them into a panic." said Laxus. "It's probably why there aren't any Wyrms. They may be servants of Dravis, but they have an instinctual sense for survival too."
"It's as if they're running from a plague of some sort." said Kuroko. "Should we get the everyone to take another route?"
Laxus shook his head. "If we do that, there's no way we will be able to meet up with the other squads on time. And I bet it's the same whatever direction we go. We have no choice...we have to go through..."
Kuroko nodded. "I wonder how Sissy is doing right now.."
"I'm sure she's fine....we all know she's tough." said Laxus. "To be honest, I'd be more worried if I was the enemy and ran into her."
"Y-yeah...you're right.." said Kuroko nervously.
"Listen." said Laxus. "I'll scout on ahead...just to be sure. You two tell everyone to get ready to move out."
A little later, Laxus was walking alone through the steep gray gorge. After walking for a bit, Laxus kneeled near to the ground and put a finger on some strange rotting looking goo that was on a tree root that was poking out of the cracked stone.
"Strange..." said Laxus. "there's a root here...but there's no tree near enough for that root to grow all the way here....not with how young all the trees are around here."
Laxus stood up and observed the strange black rotting goo that was covering the root. It looked diseased....more diseased then anything he had ever seen in his life...in fact, he could feel a low magic energy coming from it...as if it was somehow alive.
"This isn't good..." muttered Laxus. "This isn't good at all."
"No it isn't...not for you that is....though for the flowing silver...it is quite beautiful."
Laxus grinned and turned his head to look at Argentumius. "So...you're rather skilled at hiding your magic power....that explains it.."
"The flowing shining silver, must once in a while cover it's beautiful gleam, so as to take one's enemy by surprise." said Argentumius. "Now tell me...where is she?"
"By she, I'll assume you mean Mikoto?" said Laxus.
"Indeed, the Railgun is whom I refer to...after all, I have two associates who wish to have some words with her....one of which is right here..."
As if out of the shadows themselves, Noiress emerged, she already had her black sword in her right hand as she waved her left hand and chanted. "Swords of the Seven Heads. Grimald, Ragnarok, Destero, Malef, Ryghoul, Golem, Serpentia..."
Seven swords, each of a different color, red, green, gold silver, orange, blue, and yellow. six shadowy arms came out of Noiress's shoulders and grabbed a sword as her left hand grabbed the last sword. "Don't bother with the formalities Argentumius....he won't give up any information....Laxus Dreyar I believe...I was hoping that I would get to fight Erza Scarlet..."
"How could you not know where Railgun is..?" said Laxus. "From what communications told us...two of your members have already attacked her. Don't you have a decent means of communication?"
"Yes..." said Noiress rolling her eyes. "But Argentumius always insists on finding an excuse to take down what he believes to be unseen great threats...apparently he believes you're one of them."
"So.." said Laxus grinning again. "I assume you're going to try and eliminate me..."
"Try...?" said Argentumius. "No, Mr. Dreyar....we WILL eliminate you..."
Laxus began to crackle with yellow electricity, a dark angry look in his eyes. "Well then...it's time you learned which is the true guild to fear.....faries may look pretty at first....but mess with one...and you'll get a whole lot more then wings...."
Far away on the edge of the gorge. Mira perked up as she felt a tremendous vibration of magical power and a yellow lightning bolt flashed in the sky...
Information on Plague:
Plague is the only member of Hydra Head besides Diablo whose origin is completely extraterrestrial. Asgawrath, the elder god of darkness, was his unwitting creator.
As Asgawrath sometimes stirs in his sleep, the result is fluxuations in death magic and necrotic energy. The result of this is usually the creation of horrid mutations with strange and unnatural powers. While none of these beings were as powerful as Diablo's race, some of them can be powerful enough to rival Wizard Saints. These creations are known as Wrath Demons.
Wrath Demons like Plague are usually horrifying in appearence, being half alive and half dead. Their powers and the effectiveness of their powers vary with each Wrath Demon. However, every Wrath Demon has the ability to spread a deadly viral shadow which puts those in vicinity in a deep sleep for as long as the shadow is active.
Plague also has an unusual amount of agiility, being able to sneak around dark caves and rough terrain with relative ease. His bone blades secrete an acid that, though it's not extremely corrosive, can cause extreme pain due to it's ability to connect directly to a victim's nerves. Plague is also mainly nocturnal...prefering to lurk around in darkness rather then go out in broad daylight.
(Part of Plague's design was based off the Slasher Necromorphs from Dead Space.)