Magi Legend

by Andrew Dobell

  Mary looked at it, then back to the portal, and then back to Ignacio. “Does it work?”

  “We’ve not yet sent it through,” Ignacio answered. “Would you like me to?”

  “Do it,” Mary said. Assunta felt like protesting. She would have liked to have had a little more time to test it, but she also knew that complaining would only serve to annoy Mary and not stop it from happening, so she kept quiet.

  A short time later, Ignacio and Cesar had the camera hooked up to a monitor with both a long cable taped into place and a wireless connection as backup. They had no idea what would happen when they sent Rover through the portal, but they hoped they would get a picture of the other side. They could also use the cable to pull the car back through once they were done.

  With everything set up, Cesar gave Ignacio the thumbs up, and he placed the car on the edge of the platform, right at the base of the energy globe while being careful not to touch it himself.

  Ignacio then backed up slightly and pushed the stick on the controller forward.

  The moment Rover passed through the outer shell of the globe, the picture on the monitor fizzed and went to static for a second before an image of trees and bushes appeared on the screen.

  “Is that a forest?” Mary asked.

  “It appears so, Inquisitor,” Cesar said, peering at the screen before him.

  Ignacio had the remote next to him and played with the controls but to no avail. Rover appeared dead. Or, at least, the radio signal didn’t pass through the portal.

  “Put the aerial through,” Cesar said.

  Ignacio looked at the metal extendable aerial and moved closer to the globe. Inserting the aerial into the energy ball, he tried the controls again. This time, the car moved.

  Ignacio watched the screen and worked the controls, but even at the full extent of the wire’s length, all they got were images of a forest. After a minute or two, the sight of movement a short distance away caught everyone’s attention, making them look closer at the screen. A woman in modern clothes, with bright long red hair, was seen for only a few fleeting seconds.

  “Amanda,” Mary whispered.

  “Are you sure?” Assunta asked.

  “I’d bet my life on it,” Mary stated.

  Ignacio tried moving the car around some more but to no avail. Nothing further could be seen, which meant only one thing, Assunta thought.

  “We need to send someone through,” Mary said, voicing what Assunta was thinking.

  “We’re not set up for that here,” Assunta said, referencing their lack of proper tactical gear and other tools for such a trip.

  “I completely agree with you, and I want to handpick the team to do this, as well. We have the key, right? If we take it, then no one else can get in here, correct?”

  “I believe so, yes,” Assunta said.

  “We’re leaving then, I want to plan this carefully. Gather your things and get back to the seaplane. We’ll be back and ready to explore the world on the other side of that portal soon enough. Time is on our side, I think,” Mary quipped.

  “Is it not wise to leave someone here, to watch the place?”

  “Your call. While leaving a guard might give us some eyes on the island, it also shows our hand. Especially, if any Witches pass by who can read his mind. It’s a risk either way, so that’s up to you, Assunta. And, if anything goes wrong, I’ll hold you accountable.”

  “Very well, Inquisitor,” Assunta replied.

  - The Ocean.

  Echo opened her eyes as she cancelled the Mental Link she’d been concentrating on and found herself back in the darkened room on the boat that was taking them back to their island.

  She had only just recently woken up from whatever kind of coma she’d fallen into after the nuclear blast late last year, to find that her father had been horribly disfigured by that same event. He’d been taking care of her to the best of his ability ever since.

  His huge, disfigured body held a tremendous amount of power, and suddenly, for the first time, Echo actually felt a little afraid of him.

  “So…?” his voice rumbled from across the room, where he sat in shadow.

  “Well, it seems that the Syndicate has been taken over by a Magus who calls herself Angel. I think we both know who that is,” she said with a grim smile. “So, when you’re ready, we’ll Port over there.”

  Evicted

  The Syndicate Island

  Angel sat at the large desk in the largest office on the Syndicate Island. This was the seldom-used office of Mr Black. Usually, he lived aboard an almost constantly airborne converted jumbo jet that was refuelled in the air to negate the need for landing. Only technical issues would bring the jet to the ground, and then, usually only to the private airstrip on the island.

  With a bit of Magic, Angel had easily gained entry into his office after taking control of the island. She’d also soon broken through the security on his computer so that she could access his files.

  These past few days, Angel had focused on only one thing; hunting through Mr Black’s files to find out as much as she could about his operation. She was under no delusion that there would be others interested the Syndicate, so she had ordered her coven to gather everything they could so that if they needed to leave in a hurry, this wouldn’t be a wasted trip.

  Some might call her paranoid, but Angel saw it as prudent.

  She wanted to know who Mr Black controlled and why. She hunted for the people who owed him favours and the people he had information on for bribery purposes.

  When the alarm went off, warning her of an intruder on the island, she didn’t feel at all surprised. With a calmness that came from decades of life as a Nomad, she opened up the security camera feeds and quickly found that they were under a two-pronged attack. She could see Echo Black, Mr Black’s daughter, walking in, not even trying to hide. She looked confident, striding purposefully with her fists clenched.

  Meanwhile, another camera showed something huge and monstrous striding over the grass towards the compound. Dressed in a thrown-together outfit of black that looked ripped and hastily stitched together from maybe ten different garments, the giant was eight or nine feet tall with layers of muscle beneath a tough, deformed hide of pale, hairless, death-like skin.

  Angel glanced at Echo again. She looked the same as she had when she’d last seen her, just a bit rougher around the edges, and then she looked back at the huge deformed man.

  Was that, Mr Black?

  She tried to get a closer look but struggled to see much at all on the security feed. That’s when the first of the telepathic messages from her coven started to come through, making sure she had seen the alert and asking what she wanted to do.

  Angel glanced at the screens again, at the two people walking through the island’s landscape towards the complex they were in. It was just too much of a coincidence that Echo and this other thing was here at the same time. So, she made the assumption that this was Mr Black and his daughter making a bid to take back the island and his organisation.

  The way they were approaching the complex from basically opposite ends also spoke volumes about how much they knew about the current situation. You wouldn’t do that if you thought nothing had changed. Angel had to assume that Mr Black knew she was here, and knew she’d taken control of the Syndicate.

  She didn’t see the point in getting her coven killed trying to keep hold of the place, but she didn’t want to just run away either.

  “Okay, Michael, take Cherub, Uriel, and Azrael and see what you can do with the girl. Don’t get yourselves killed over this, but if you can scare her off or even kill her, then do it. Gabrielle, Uziel, you’re with me. We’ll take on the big guy. I’ll meet you out front ASAP,” she said and called on her Magic to split her mind and Multitask. She set all but one of her minds to building up her Aegis and the store of Essentia she held within her. With her remaining mind, she Ported from the office to the front of the building.

  Moments later, Gabrielle and Uz
iel appeared next to her.

  Concentrating, Angel sent her senses out to where the cameras had picked up the creature’s approach and easily found the huge man walking towards them. He was still a long way off, though.

  She gifted this information and view to her two coven mates through their Mental Link.

  “Let’s go and meet our guest, shall we?” she said and Ported all of them so they appeared a few meters ahead of the striding creature.

  The thing stopped in its tracks upon seeing them.

  “Angel. Thought you could have my empire all to yourself, did you?” the thing said. She actually kind of recognised the voice. It sounded much deeper with a more gravelly tone to it than before, but it was undoubtedly Mr Black’s voice.

  “So, it is you,” Angel answered, confirming her suspicions that this ugly thing was, in fact, Mr Black. “You could really do with some skin treatment, I think,” she quipped.

  “Leave,” he said, ignoring her joke.

  “Not just yet. We’re not done here,” she said, pulling as much Magical energy as she could to her and then casting it out at Mr Black with as much force and power as she could muster. Angel had seen Mr Black’s Aegis when she had first appeared before him. She could see it had some serious power behind it, and as her Magic hit him like a speeding freight train before cascading around his Aegis, it started to become clear just how powerful it was.

  Through the flares and pyrotechnic display of her Magic hitting his Shield, she could see the smile on his face growing. He would not be an easy opponent to beat.

  ~A little help?~ Angel sent out through her Mental Link to her coven mates. A moment later, they joined her in blasting him with more Essentia in a combined effort to take down his Aegis. Beyond her Magical attack, Angel could make out something glowing green on Mr Black’s chest. It seemed to be fuelling his Shield, and as the power of their attack grew, so did the energy that poured out of the thing on his chest.

  And then it hit her what it was. This was the Green Orb that she’d helped recover from the ice at the South Pole. Somehow it had fused into Mr Black’s chest and seemed to be protecting him.

  Doubt grew inside her, and she wondered if this was a fight she could win. As her fear grew, she began to take a few steps back from Mr Black.

  “Our Magic is doing nothing, Angel, he’s too powerful. I can’t see us ever getting through his Shield,” Gabrielle stated.

  “I agree,” Angel replied, and indicated that they should cancel their castings. As one, following her lead, they all broke off their attacks.

  “Finally realised what you’re up against, have you?” Mr Black said, a sneer on his lips.

  Angel merely frowned. She didn’t like the idea that she could be beaten by this man, but she also didn’t want to end up in a losing fight and risk the destruction of her coven. There would be other opportunities to deal with him.

  “Let’s see how you do against me,” said a raspy feminine voice to Angel’s right. Looking over, she watched as a huge cloaked figure stepped out of the bushes. Its flowing robes covered a body that looked to be nearly twelve feet tall and seemed to ooze from the nearby undergrowth.

  Mr Black turned to the new arrival, apparently forgetting that Angel was even there. The attack from this new challenger was swift. With a sudden Kinetic Ram, the newcomer’s Magic slammed Mr Black into the ground. She followed it up with a rapid series of attacks that hammered him into the earth and made his Aegis fizz and pop as it tried to hold off the onslaught of Magic. As Angel watched, huge boulders hauled themselves out of the ground and threw themselves at him while nearby trees were uprooted to do the same. Debris and smoke rose from the growing crater that Mr Black found himself pummelled into.

  From thin air, without a cloud in the sky, bolts of lightning started to lance down at Mr Black’s barely visible form, followed by balls of fire and lava that caused more smoke and dust to rise into the air.

  This strange new Magus strode into the maelstrom of Magical attacks while Angel and her coven mates looked on in awe at the power she brought to bear.

  Angel didn’t know who she was. Its voice suggested a female creature, but from the sheer strength, power, and number of attacks that were hitting Mr Black, she guessed this was an Arch Magus of fearsome ability.

  Angel backed off further but continued to watch the fight. “I don’t know about you, but I’m feeling quite out of my depth here,” Angel said.

  “Agreed,” Gabrielle said.

  “Damn right,” Uziel said.

  ~Michael, how’s it going over there?~ Angel sent through to her other coven mates who were trying to repel Echo.

  ~She’s proving to be problematic. She’s fast and powerful and holding her own,~ Michael answered.

  ~We’re way out of our depth on this end, and we have a new player on the island who I would guess is an Arch Magus.~

  Suddenly, from the clouds of dust and smoke, a hand shot out and caught the cloaked Magus by the neck. Mr Black stepped out from the storm of Magical attacks, holding the figure aloft before slamming it against the nearest tree. The creature’s hood fell off with the impact, revealing a long, angular, almost alien face that sported a small pair of horns on top of its head. The thing looked barely human, let alone male or female or anything else.

  The creature’s own Aegis crackled and hissed as it tried to resist and get out of Mr Black’s iron-like grip.

  “Who are you?” Mr Black bellowed.

  “You don’t know?” the thing said, amused by the question.

  “Don’t play games with me,” Mr Black said.

  “You freed me from the ice, you woke me up when you took that,” the thing said as it nodded down at the Green Orb embedded in Mr Black’s chest.

  “Did I?” Mr Black replied.

  Angel watched and listened closely, desperate to know what was going on.

  “I am Lilith, and I want it back.”

  “You want it back? Take it,” Mr Black said, before punching Lilith across the face with a force that made Angel wince. “Go on, take it,” he said again, before hitting Lilith a second time. “If you can!”

  Then he threw a third punch, and a fourth, and more. Punching quicker and harder each time. The Essentia in each of his strikes smashed against Lilith’s Aegis, cracking it, overwhelming the Shield, and allowing the force of the hits to break through and hurt her.

  Then, with a sudden flare of Magic, Lilith disappeared from beneath Mr Black’s attacks. Mr Black roared, and swung left and right, looking around him for the aggressor.

  Having seen enough, Angel knew the time to leave had come and sent out the call for the team to Port away.

  Her two coven mates next to her called on their Magic and Ported, leaving Angel standing before her former employer.

  “It was fun while it lasted,” Angel said, causing Mr Black to turn and fix Angel with a piercing stare. “But I have new horizons to explore. Maybe we’ll meet again sometime,” she said before calling on her own Magic and Porting away.

  ***

  Back in Milan, Angel walked out of the meeting room, her coven mates leaving to go about their business. After getting back from the island, they’d convened here to discuss their mission and what they had gained. Each had been filling numerous hard drives and memory sticks with as much data from Mr Black’s servers as they could, and now they would pass the data on to their most trusted Initiated tech guys, who would go through it with a fine-toothed comb and present it back to Angel in a more accessible format for her coven to use.

  It had been a more dramatic end to their mission than they had planned, but watching Lilith fight had been incredibly impressive. You don’t often get to see an Arch Magus let loose and anyone live through it.

  Mr Black was another matter. He’d survived the nuclear blast on the atoll and apparently come through it not only alive but also stronger. With the Green Orb now embedded in his chest, he was able to fend off an Arch Magus.

  Things had certainly taken a
turn for the strange, it seemed.

  She wondered what Mr Black would be planning now that he was back in control of his organisation. It would be much more difficult to keep track of him now, not least because he knew who she was and would be on guard for such things.

  But Angel had several other endeavours underway.

  She walked through the modern minimalist corridors of her coven’s private residence at the top of the tower her company owned, and stepped into her private office, glad to have some time to herself.

  Closing the door behind her, the sudden rush of Essentia and the speed of the attack against her left her no time to defend herself. Within a split second, she found herself pinned by the neck against the wall by the dark figure of Lilith.

  “Hello… Lilith…ack,” she coughed as Lilith’s hand slowly crushed her throat.

  Deep within the shadows of Lilith’s large hood, her eyes had a red glow to them and bored down deep into Angel’s soul. Going by the sheer power she had unleashed upon Mr Black earlier, she knew that if Lilith wanted to kill her, she’d already be dead. She had also clearly bypassed the Aegis on this building undetected, meaning she was not only powerful but also highly skilled.

  But Lilith said nothing. She held Angel for a moment more before suddenly letting go and dropping her.

  The strength in Angel’s legs failed her, and she fell to the floor in a heap, coughing as she fought to get her breath back.

  After a moment, as her breathing steadied itself, she looked up at the dark figure, its cloak billowing as if a breeze blew through the room.

  “What can I do for you?” Angel asked.

  “You can tell me everything you know about Mr Black,” Lilith said, her voice deep and powerful.

  “Everything? That’s an awful lot to go through,” Angel said.

  “The main thing I want is a weakness. Something I can use against him. And I do hope you know of such a thing, for your sake,” Lilith threatened.

  Her life meant nothing to this Arch Magus, she knew that, which meant Angel could only really cooperate and hope for the best. As for a weakness, that was a tough one. Angel knew about as much as Lilith did about the new form that Mr Black had taken, and there seemed to be little if any weakness at all.