The Shadow of the Magi

by Billy Spencer

  Abigail popped her head outside to see what was taking Lucuris and Jessica so long. “Hey anytime now guys. How about you two can make out later but right now we got stuff to talk about,” Abigail said as she grabbed Jessica's hand and dragged her inside.

  “Everyone this is Abigail my sister, and my girlfriend Jessica. Jess and Abigail, this is Hast, Alexander, Sonya, Bailey, and Mazikeen.” Lucuris said out loud standing in the middle of the room introducing everyone to each other.

  “So, Nick, how are we going to get him back?” Abigail said out loud standing and looking around the room seeing that no one had any idea.

  “Well the master will use him to do his bidding, what that is even I do not know. My time in that place was only but a fog, and most of the time he kept important information to himself,” Mazikeen said out loud grabbing a cover from the couch and wrapping herself in it.

  “My brother does like to keep his secrets, always leaving me wondering,” Hast said replying to Mazikeen and keeping his focus on the book he was reading.

  “Wait a minute, you are related to the master, and you worked for him?” Jessica said out loud looking at Hast and back at Mazikeen in shocked and in disbelief.

  Lucuris placed his hands-on Jessica's waist and looked her in the eyes. “It is a long story, but they are helping us. I know it sounds crazy, but they want to stop the master from gaining power and coming into our world,” Lucuris said out loud keeping his focus on Jessica letting her know that she can trust them.

  “Nick is someone I never thought would fall to darkness. Every time we were out no matter what it felt like he was leading us. Before Lucuris, and before this mess with the demons and the looming darkness, Nick was the one we depended on,” Jessica said softly as she sat down on the floor and stared into the ceiling.

  “I remember him being afraid to date at first. He would say things like what if I found someone better and what if he couldn’t give me what I deserved. I always laughed it off and thought to myself there was no one in the world that could handle me but him,” Abigail said softly lowering her head trying to hold her tears back.

  Lucuris could see how much they were hurting. He did not know Nick as long as they did, but he still had a connection with him. “Nick thinks we all left him. When he was captured no one looked for him, but you never knew he left. I think and I believe we can bring Nick back from the darkness, but it won’t be easy.” Lucuris said out loud looking at everyone that was in the room.

  “Whatever you need Lucuris we are with you,” Alexander said out loud nodding at Lucuris.

  “Your friend is family Lucuris and well that means everything. He needs you all more than ever because feeling alone and just resentful, that is a hard thing to shake off,” Sonya said out loud turning her head and looking at Hast.

  “I wonder why the master even needs Nick. I mean what can Nick give him that his creatures cannot,” Lucuris said out loud looking at Hast who was still flipping through a book.

  “The more one knows, the more it stays. Stories, legends, and rumors linger for years. The help of people, like you, like kids, like elderly. People keep the master in mind all the time, but at times even he tends to fade. It is then he tries to get people talking about him again, and for that he needs someone, a believer to help him out. Your fallen angel of light is his disciple,” Hast said out loud, letting out a small chuckle.

  “What is he going to use Nick for Hast?” Abigail said looking at Hast with fire in her eyes. The fire that she knew she would unleash on if she ever got a chance to fight the master. Using Nick as a puppet to control and to do his bidding, trapping the man she loved in a mental cage of darkness and fog.

  Hast leaned forward looking at Lucuris and Abigail, and then leaned back into the chair smiling behind his mask. “Your friend use to believe, he use to pray every morning and every night. He never went to a building to pray, but he had faith and he held that faith I would think for a long time. But now Nick has no faith, none at all, but he still believes in something. He believes in the master and will prove that the master is right and aid him no matter what. My brother has no bounds when it comes to the living you see. He will use Nick to gather people Lucuris. Gather the children like the piper, and to lead the adults into the darkness that were already on the edge of despair,” Hast said out loud, letting out a small sight.

  “What else would happen with the kids and adults. Whenever Nick leads them to the master then what happens?” Lucuris said out loud wondering why a being of immense power would need children and adults.

  “He feeds on them, skin and bones. Drinks their blood and destroys the rest of their bodies. Although he lets a couple of them go usually, to spread the word of his horrors, and a lot of times those people are tormented by the thought that the master would return and get them, and sometimes they cannot take it and would end their own lives,” Hast said out loud looking around and seeing the look he was all too familiar with the look of horror.

  “No, we can’t let him do that, why would the master do that to children and adults,” Bailey said yelling at Hast, angry with the thought of children being eaten by some beast like a wild creature.

  “To make sure people remember, to make sure they fear us. We are the old gods and he is the most powerful one,” Hast said out loud.

  “To make sure people remember. To see the fear in their eyes and to have their families be torn apart,” Sonya said as she went up to Hast and placed one of her daggers on his neck.

  “You can blame me all you want for what happened to your family Sonya, but it will never bring them back. You want to make someone pay, you make the master pay,” Hast said out loud placing his finger on the blade of her dagger and pushing it slowly away from his neck.

  Chapter 20

  Nick teleported back to where the master was. Within the shadows he could feel the cold air against his skin, he could feel the weight of everything land on his shoulders. He looked around and saw the walls covered in human arms and legs and the different doors were made out of human torsos and heads that were torn apart. “What am I going to do about Lucuris,” Nick said to himself in a small whisper as he sat down on the floor staring into the ceiling looking into the open mouths of people that were tortured and killed by the master.

  “You will kill them all,” A loud deep and snarly voice said from the shadows.

  “You don’t understand it is not that easy. I don’t know how,” Nick said out loud looking within the darkness waiting for something to emerge.

  “As the master, you do as what I say no matter what Nick,” The master said out loud walking out of the shadows covered in a rob reaching out their boney fingers that looked like claws and wrapped them around Nicks neck.

  Nick tried to struggle out of the master’s grasp but could not he was not strong enough he could barely gasp words out of his mouth. “I never done it before. I never killed anyone,” Nick said out loud gasping for air

  “After all the demons you killed you do not think you killed anyone. Was it because you saw demons just like you do bugs, because they did not have names or could not talk to you, you saw them beneath you?” The master said out loud snarling at Nick and then tossing him to the floor moving towards one of the doors that were covered in human torsos.

  “it’s not the same these were my friends,” Nick said out loud while on his hands and knees panting trying to breathe.

  The master went towards Nick with horrific fury and kicked him on the side of his body knocking him back down. “And those demons were part of my kind. You think just because they were demons that they deserved to die. They eat for survival, they kill for protection, and what do you and your kind do. You kill because you can, pathetic,” The master said out loud turning around and looking at the floor with their face still hidden away. Their voice trembled with anger and sadness from what he felt was an unfair world. That the current world did not deserve the old gods, that the people didn’t deserve to live. He felt that humans of any kind
deserved to be erased because they spent so much time hurting others that their world and history got more corrupted over the decades.

  “Lucuris doesn’t deserve to die, just take his powers and let them live,” Nick said out loud looking at the master with tears running down his face.

  “I will have to show you Nick, you are not truly completed. Your friends left you here to rot, they forgot about you. The one upstairs who you put all your faith in left you alone in the darkness, but me I am here and you will listen to me,” The master said out loud grabbing Nicks head opening his mouth and placing a black worm inside of him.

  “What did you do to me, what did you do to me,” Nick said out loud as he got up and started to charge the master but before he could do anything he stopped dead in his tracks and started to shake uncontrollably.

  “You will see the light Nick; you will do as I say in time and you will remember who is the one that pulls the strings. You will grab the children, the adults, and your friends and they will be mine. You see these walls, these doors, and the ceiling, they will drip red again. The blood of the small, the blood of the old, and the blood of your friends will be mine. I will taste their skin and I tear it off their bones and chew with delight. I will make you watch and all you will do is wonder within yourself just how hopeless everything is.The world is going to change and I will be the one to reset it and make it right again,” The master said out loud rubbing Nicks head.

  “The pain is unbearable, what did you do to me. It is like someone is pulling at my skull and trying to rip it from my head. I can hear voices telling me to kill, to harm. I can see the deaths in front of my eyes, my friends, my loved ones, everyone I have ever cared about dying a slow death,” Nick said out loud laying on the floor twisting and turning his body looking at the faces on the ceiling as they looked at him in horror.

  “You will become darkness; you will become what your friends fear. A darken soul that has been drowned in the abyss of the blackness within your world. You will be their judgement,you will become death itself once you murder your friends,” The master said out loud starring at Nick and let out a small chuckle thinking of the chaos and destruction that his new creation would bring into the world.

  “Lucuris left me, they all left me. I tried to show them mercy and I showed up to try and show them the way, but they shunned me. They did not want me or to allow me with them. People want to look at me and to try to find the answers, but I only have one answer for them, for all of them and that is the master. I will go back to that city where Lucuris is in and I will take all the children and adults that I can find and send them back to the master. They deserve it all, to be punished and to be used for something truly greater. I will show Lucuris the way the world needs to be. I will make sure that they all get shown the truth,” Nick said out loud as he got up and dropped both of his handguns and walked through the doors as the master followed behind him.

  Nick gave up his humanity to the master and became possessed with darkness. The darkness showed him what it wanted to, the lies, and the hunger of evil grew within him. He lost who he was, because no man, no woman, no being could deny the master of what they wanted. No One could say no to them, no matter how pure, how full of life they were. The weapons that Nick held close to him now shrouded in complete darkness and his transformation into death was almost complete. He felt that he had nothing and no one to live for, all he could feel was the pain and the hunger he felt to cause harm to others. His old life to him was almost completely dead, and nothing else mattered to him than to fix what humankind had messed up so many times and for so long.The world had to be rewritten and to start new, for Nick would be the left hand to play his part and destroy humankind as the master suckle on their lifeless corpse’s

  Chapter 21

  The city itself was quiet at night, all that could be heard were the screams of the people being cornered. “Take them, the little girl, and the older woman my breast. Don’t you dare try to get any taste in, they are all for the master,” Nick said out loud kneeling down and beckoning a small little boy over to come closer to him.

  “Please let me and my sister and daddy, and mommy leave. I’m scared,” The little boy said out loud still in his pajamas and shaking from fear.

  “You see these people behind me kid. You see these lines of people in this city going through the portals right now. These people will be used for something greater. You don’t want to live life like this. I bet your mommy and daddy beat you. I bet your dad fucks around and abuses your mother. Many people do it and you know how fucking sick that is, how evil people can be. People use kids like you as slaves, or worse and all I want to do is set you free,” Nick said out loud grabbing the little boy with one hand tightly ,pulling him closer and aiming his hand out to the woman and male that were on their knees begging him to not harm their son.

  “We don’t know you, don’t hurt them please. Please don’t kill my parents,” The little boy screamed and whaled as he began to cry hysterically.

  “I’m not going to kill them my boy, oh no that is something for the master. You see he is going to put you all under a trance to give yourself to him willingly, and then as they see his true form, they will have fear as if death was staring them in their face. But before they can even scream the master will tear them all to shreds and eat them as the others watch on in horror,” Nick said out loud as he leaned closer to the boy whispering into the boy’s innocent ears.

  The demons came and grabbed the little boy and his parents and put them in the line with the other people in the city. The little boy screaming and crying at Nick begging him to let them go, begging for his life.

  “Little one, little one, your time has come. You will not feel pain hopefully, but it has to be done. The world must be set right again,” Nick said out loud looking at his darken handguns and wondering why the almighty never came to help him in his time of need.

  The lines were long, and many people were going through the portals to be claimed by the master. The demons stood guard close to the humans to make sure they did not try and run away. Many of them had fear in their eyes while others had sadness. They were being moved like they were cattle and there was nothing that they could do. “This will truly be an awakening,” Nick said out loud aiming both of his handguns to the sky looking up staring into the moon in wonder.

  A dark beam of chaos suddenly shot from out of nowhere and struck nick dead on, knocking him down to the floor. “What the hell, who did that?” Nick said out loud getting back to his feet and calling to the demons to come to his aid.

  “You want to destroy this world Nick, we cannot allow you,” Lucuris said out loud holding his staff out with Jessica and Abigail next to him with Odin and Zee by their sides.

  “We can’t let you harm these people Nick, have you fallen so far that you would destroy the lives of innocent people,” Jessica said out loud holding her sword out with both hands getting into an attack position.

  “Snap out of this Nick before it is too late to turn back, please,” Abigail said with sadness in her face pleading with the man she loved to stop his madness.

  “You don’t understand it is too late, it is over Abigail. I loved you so much, but you didn’t even know I was missing. Do you know how much that hurt that even the one I loved didn’t even come to help me.It’s too late and I can never come back, I won’t it’s too painful,” Nick said out loud as he dashed towards Lucuris and the rest aiming his hand guns at them.

  “Lucuris you take care of Nick, me and Jessica will handle the demons and get people to safety,” Abigail said out loud.

  Lucuris dashed towards Nick with his staff aimed at him, he began shooting sparks of purple electricity trying to hit Nick. Trying to slow him down but he felt he couldn’t, it felt that he was just speeding up. “Nick you have to stop all of this, he is using you, using your despair into a weapon. Don’t you see what he is making you do, what he is making you into?” Lucuris said out loud dashing around trying to dodge Nicks
attacks.

  “What I see Lucuris is you all fucking it all up. Don’t you know sometimes you have to sacrifice for the good of all. Aren’t you tired of the dumb ass wars, the violence, the harm that is done to us every day. It won’t change Lucuris it never will, there will always be another fucking enemy, another damn monster to take down,” Nick said out loud shooting at Lucuris trying to hit him with all his might. He could feel his blood boil and the anger consume him. The darkness was growing inside of him and he could feel it fill his body and spike inside of him making him feel more pain than he ever felt before, but he loved it, he loved to feel like he was being hurt, being punished.

  “Dark Magic Attack,” Lucuris said out loud yelling at the top of his lungs as a giant ball of chaos energy shot from his crystal and darted towards Nick.

  The chaos energy engulfed Nick in his entirely. His screams filled the sky as if the world itself was dying.

  Abigail heard him scream and ran back towards Nick with Zee by her side, dodging demon attacks as they tried to stop her, but Odin and Jessica held them off giving her the chance to see what happened to Nick.

  Her eyes widen as she heard his screams coming from the chaos energy. “Lucuris what happened, what did you do to Nick?” Abigail said trying to look for Nick within the chaos energy.

  “I don’t know if he just let the attack hit him, it feels like he did it on purpose,” Lucuris said out loud getting into a defensive stance preparing for Nick to fly out and try to attack him.

  “Darkness is what you all see as evil. Something you put a label on because you do not understand. It must be fucking funny to think you all are the good guys. All we want, all the master ever wanted was a world that would just obey. A world that was peaceful but stayed in line. The world will start all over, and so will we,” Nick said out loud walking out slowly from the ball of chaos energy holding both of his hand guns to his hips laughing manically thinking about how much of a joke the whole world was with everything that has happened.