A/N: Well, here goes. I hope this goes over better than Pages of Nightmare. Personally, this is the kind of thing I'm good at, action, combat, and main characters that don't always coexist, unlike most merry cliche fictions. I don't have much to say about this right now, besides enjoy to the best of your ability. I'll have improved my revision and editing a hell of a lot more since my first story. As this is more modern, a lot more people may be able to grasp the concept of this story. And now, without further ado, enter the Tainted.

Revised, It was pointed out to me that the comparisons to comics were invalid, and after some thought I agreed. Nothing huge, just making it more realistic and maybe preventing a verbal attack from enraged Marvel fans. Fixed up some errors and typos as well. Enjoy.

TAINTED

The Story Of Darkhurst

Prologue

So things have to be picture perfect for me, because my uncle is the mayor of this hick ass town. I shouldn't really say that, Darkhurst isn't that small. It's got a decent 10,000 people, and a well rounded economy. That does not change the fact that it's a shitty, sleazy burg, and a perfect home to some of the miscreant individuals within it.

Anyways, I'm straying off topic. I don't see how. A story like this you just don't forget. It sure as hell isn't something you just send to your nearest newspaper, though. My story would look like more of a story sent to a horror magazine in hopes of winning a cash prize. In short, completely unbelievable. (I know, I actually tried. They told me to go see a psychologist, not a publisher.)

There I go again, getting fired up over stuff that's not important. I'll make a long story short. My name is Brian Darkhurst. I was seventeen when this particular wad of shit hit the fan. I'm twenty-four now, and I remember it like yesterday. I certainly remember them all well. Blaine, Ryan, Joel... Celine. I remember the stuff I don't want to remember too. Gashnik, Tepes, Absorphan. Thinking back, this is like a really fucked up movie.

Except in movies, the good guys always win, and nobody actually gets hurt. The bad guys are always these random psycho's off the street, and almost never a familiar face. And nobody in the movies was ever Tainted. At least, not to my knowledge. We knew it wasn't confined to Darkhurst. None of the heroes in movies ever really had the blood of innocents on their hands.

We did. Every mistake I made, every time Desacross would emit his so called 'judgement'. Every time Skathed satisfied his animal thirst. Every bloody corpse carved to peices by Gashnik. Every person killed at a word from Viktor Tepes... We aren't perfect. No matter what happened to us, no matter how mighty we became, we're still somewhat human. We have regrets, but of course, for everything we regret there's something we don't regret at all.

We did something. We saved a town from drowning in it's own stagnant lifeblood. We saved it from the BloodWrath, Viktor Tepes, and it's own twisted denizens. Sometimes we saved it from each other. But the point is, no matter what kind of hell we marched through, we came back out, closer than ever. Sure we had scars, but you know what they say; What doesn't kill you makes you stronger.

There's always exceptions to that. What about my uncle? Harry Darkhurst? He survived this, but he's certainly not stronger. Tepes, to Desacross' dismay, is alive, corroding in a padded cell, his mind gone, and hopefully Drakuzula as well. The point is, no matter how miraculous we may think heroes are, nobody's perfect.

Heroes can die. Our Lady Peace points this out nicely with one of the greatest songs of all time, "Superman's Dead." Lo and behold, Christopher Reeve, God rest his soul, is now six feet under. My parents are in perpetual rest in the windswept hills of Darkhurst Cemetery. For what? So more can die for the unwitting discovery of a madman?

Maybe, just maybe, some good came of this. I don't know. I'm alive, I have a family. You could say thats good. I'll let you decide. I guess it's time for me to stop whining to you about this and spit it out already. Let me tell you now, don't expect a sugar-coated story of heroes and villains. Don't expect a classic ending where we all go home happy. Blood, sweat, tears, and more blood went into this. It is, without a doubt. Tainted.

-Stewey