Reborn as a Ghost Rider

The next day, Johnny lounged comfortably in his office. He was in high spirits. He smiled as he admired the spotless cleanliness, the faint smell of bleach the only reminder of the blood, teeth, and two groaning bodies that had occupied the room yesterday. Where his deputy had dumped them near a hospital was no longer his concern.

"Having subordinates isn't so bad," he thought, eyeing the cleaning supplies his team had used all evening.

Finding positives was good, but he needed to be realistic. The urge to punish was growing stronger every day. It first appeared in grade school, a maddening swarm of hellish bees demanding to sting every scumbag nearby. Back then, one fight with bullies could sate it for a year. Now, a single act of vengeance barely lasted a week. The curse was closing in. Any day now, he'd become the Ghost Rider. And then school bullies wouldn't be enough to quench his thirst.

A knock at the door broke his grim thoughts.

"Come in," Johnny said, donning his usual icy mask.

To his surprise, Tim walked into the disciplinary committee's office. Johnny had been certain that after seeing his barely breathing cousins and scrubbing their blood off the walls, Tim would avoid this place like the plague.

"Did you need something?" Johnny asked indifferently.

"Mr. Blaze, thank you," Tim said, bowing. "After your… uh… talk, my cousins promised never to bother me or my mom again."

Johnny simply nodded, returning to his thoughts, but Tim didn't leave. His eyes were filled with tiresome gratitude.

"You literally saved my life," Tim continued, his voice brimming with enthusiasm. "I want to be useful. Sign me up for the disciplinary committee. I know I'm not strong, but I'm ready to improve! Enroll me in the boxing club!"

Johnny barely resisted rolling his eyes.

"I just wanted to unleash my darkness," he thought. "Why does everyone think I fight for them?"

---

The Cross of Vengeance rested on the neck of its rightful heir.

A week had passed since the conversation with… what were their names again? In any case, their time of reckoning had passed, and a new sacrifice was required for the flames of vengeance. Johnny sat in his office, bored out of his mind. The fire in his chest burned with unbearable intensity, but no opportunities for retribution had arisen all week. He felt like a caged beast.

The only thing distracting him was Roxy. She sat across from him with a biology textbook, chattering cheerfully about how she would pass her dreaded test and then become a famous actress. Johnny found himself willing to listen to anything to drown out the burning inside.

A month ago, spending time with loved ones helped him maintain his humanity, but now the fire in his heart screamed for action—terrible, brutal actions against the guilty.

"If this keeps up, I'll start attacking people indiscriminately, like a rabid dog," Johnny thought with a wry smile, though it carried no joy.

Roxy, mistaking his smile as a response to her joke, beamed with happiness. She had no idea what turmoil was raging inside Johnny, and he had no intention of explaining it.

The office door opened, and Tim walked in, sporting a black eye and a nervous expression. Johnny looked up, focusing on the signs of violence. In that moment, a spark of life lit within him. He immediately closed the textbook and stood, giving his full attention to his subordinate.

"Where are you going?" Roxy asked, irritated, glaring at Tim for ruining the moment. "We're not done yet!"

"The students' safety is more important than your biology grade," Johnny replied as politely as he could, motioning for Tim to sit. "I'm responsible for every student in this school."

Roxy flushed, mumbling, "Sorry, I didn't mean to be selfish… I'll come over this weekend, and we can finish studying, okay?"

Before leaving, she stood on her toes and kissed Johnny on the cheek. He didn't flinch, his mind consumed with the effort to restrain the fire of vengeance a little longer.

She pulled back and smiled, but his face remained emotionless.

Tim watched the scene in awe. Once Roxy left, he said, "Leader, what you do… " His face twisted as though he might cry. "You put the problems of a subordinate above spending time with your girl. I don't deserve your respect!"

Johnny remained silent. He didn't consider himself a good boss, let alone a good person. He never saved kittens from trees—he just beat up the people who threw them there. Tim didn't understand that Johnny was driven not by care but by something much darker—a black passion for punishment.

"Talk," Johnny ordered curtly, sitting back at his desk.

Tim nodded and began. "It's my cousins…"

"They now get out of the hospital?" Johnny asked, mildly surprised. He'd hit them hard enough that they should have been bedridden for six more months.

"They can't even clench their fists," Tim said quickly, shaking his head. "It's their father—my uncle. He got out of prison yesterday. When he found out what happened, he lost it. When I got home, he barged in, hit me, and told me to tell you… " Tim hesitated before blurting out, "He said you'd better meet him after school today, or he'll burn down the school."

Johnny listened calmly, his face betraying no emotion. He simply asked, "Address?"

Tim shook his head vehemently. "Leader, you can't give in to threats! I don't deserve your protection! Let's call the police…"

"You have to take responsibility for your actions," said the policeman's son firmly. "I created this problem. I'll solve it myself."

"I'm ashamed," Tim's voice quivered. "I only cause trouble…"

"Tim, you're no longer just a student at my school. You're part of my committee," Johnny said decisively, his eyes cold as ice. "I don't care how many times I have to step in for you. But this account will be settled today, once and for all."

His voice was so firm that Tim didn't dare argue. He wanted to express his gratitude, but Johnny ordered him to go home and not worry. Tim left, and Johnny remained in the office, a grim smile forming on his face. A house full of thugs who wanted to kill him—there was no better way to unleash his darker side.

---

When school ended, Johnny changed out of his uniform into jeans, heavy boots, and his father's old biker jacket. The jacket was worn, smelling of oil and smoke, and felt like a part of him—a symbol of readiness for battle.

The fire inside him burned hotter. He walked down the street like a soldier, his thoughts roaring so loudly they nearly drowned everything else out:

"Today, I won't just deal with a problem. Today, I'll end it. Threats to the school are a new line I won't let them cross. There won't be a fight today. There will be a war."

He arrived at the address Tim had given him: a rundown house with peeling paint and broken shutters. Johnny circled the property, assessing the territory.

In the backyard was a chained dog. The guard dog growled, but Johnny swiftly grabbed its neck and subdued it without killing it.

"Animals don't deserve punishment," he thought. "Even if they serve scum."

Peeking through a window, Johnny saw a typical drug den. A blaring TV, the stench of weed, someone snoring loudly in the corner. A man sat by the front door with a pistol ready.

Johnny scoffed to himself.

"Amateurs. They really think I'll come through the front door?"

Johnny took three homemade grenades out of his bag. They were gas bombs that he made himself using a recipe from a book about Nazi weapons. The chemistry inside was so concentrated that one grenade was enough to permanently blind a person. He threw three at once.

The grenades burst with muffled thuds, filling the room with dense, suffocating gas. The gangsters screamed:

"My eyes! They're melting!"

"Someone brought a damn bazooka!"

Their cries turned to choking and sobbing as they slowly died.

Johnny climbed through a window wearing a gas mask, gripping an iron police baton. He moved with precision, incapacitating his enemies mercilessly. One swing shattered a kneecap; another disarmed a hand. Each strike was deliberate, as if taken from a textbook on anatomy.

Grabbing one thug by the hair, Johnny coldly asked, "Where's your boss?"

"In the kitchen! The kitchen!" the man croaked, writhing in pain. "I didn't sign up for this! They said we'd just kill up a stupid schoolkid!"

Johnny silenced him with a blow to the teeth and moved on. In the kitchen, he found Tim's uncle blindly groping for a weapon. Johnny stomped on his fingers.

"You… you're Blaze, right?" the man rasped. "My school had a disciplinary committee too, but you're nothing like a leader. What you did to my boys… you're a monster."

Johnny leaned in close, his voice icy.

"You're right. I don't just patrol hallways or ask kids not to run. I hit, I punish, I exact vengeance. First, your sons. Now, you."

"And what then? You won't kill me. I'll be back, kid. I'll burn your school and your damn committee of punisher's!"

Johnny's grim smile widened.

"You're right again. Time to change the rules. Beatings are for schoolkids. Scum like you don't deserve a second chance. You're going to hell, and I'll be your guide."

At the same moment, the Cross of Vengeance flashed on his chest. The heat became unbearable, and the air in the room vibrated. The Spirit of Vengeance has finally found its long-awaited freedom. A huge fiery skull pierced the roof of the house. At first there was a fever. Unbearable, as if the earth itself had begun to melt. Then the explosion was not just thunder, but a roar that mixed the pain and rage of all the offended. The sky above the house split, and from this rift a fiery tornado in the form of a demon fell to the ground and possessed Johnny. 

He fell and shrank to a small black spot, and when the flames died down, Johnny stood where he was, but now his eyes were burning with fire, and his skin was gone, revealing a charred skull. He became a Ghost Rider.

"What… what is this?" Tim's uncle stammered, squinting. "Why's it so damn hot?"

The Rider lifted him by the throat effortlessly, his voice like thunder.

"Get used to it. It's always hot in hell."

---

Writer notes:

Thank you for reading this arc to the end! Your attention and support mean the world to me.

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