“I’m pretty sure it’s too late for me. I’ve only completed two cycles of magical pairing, you see. And he’s coming. Darduk The Devourer. I can’t see him, but I can feel him. And this time he has a lot more than ghost drones with him. I’m sorry, guys, but this isn’t victory. It’s the calm before the storm.”
“Okay,” Fleek said, “I’m just going to say it. I can’t look at her anymore. You guys are seeing this, right? Ari needs a doctor now. Wait. You said you made a wish or something through the ring?”
“Sort of. Yes,” Ari answered.
“Why didn’t you wish for your eye back?” he asked. Then he shouted for a medic. Or a doctor. “Any doctor,” he yelled, echoing into the courtyard.
“I don’t want my eye back, Fleek.” Ari was shouting now, too, and tears unseen were streaming down her face. “This is it, can’t you see? I wanted to have a life here with you guys. Doing stupid things, and fighting with you, and negotiating and solving mysteries.” Her voice broke, and she paused for a moment. “Most of all, I wanted to save everybody. Sorry, guys.”
Ari had barely gotten the words out when a portal appeared and oversized Vikings poured through it. Then another portal appeared and another. Ghost drones were coming back through.
21
Soda crossed two tentacles on her chest, gingerly avoiding the injured one. “Lame. How many of those stupid drones do you people have, anyway?”
Darduk strode over to them, looking at Ari. “Thank goodness. Finally, I’ll get to feast on the Staar. And then I’ll never be hungry again. The casino was a nice touch, right, men?”
The other goth Vikings laughed.
Darduk let the laughter die down, then his expression turned serious. “Now find it. Find it and bring it to me. The rest of the treasure is yours.”
The exhausted Overlord Alliance group just stood there as ghost drones swarmed in and surrounded them for what seemed like the thirtieth time today.
“I don’t know about you guys, but I’m up for one more fight,” Kirian said, stepping between Ari and Darduk.
The Vikings behind him grew restless though. A group of them splintered off. One of them had some sort of a handheld tracking device that beeped at them as they walked.
Ari watched as the odd group of Vikings made their way across the grass and to the hole in the ground that Froggy’s robot missile had made. She realized with a jolt they were looking for the orb.
“Clever,” she said to the ring in her mind.
“Hey, Devourer,” Ari said. “What are those guys looking for?”
“Nothing,” he replied. “Just a technicality.”
“It’s gone,” one of the Vikings at the hole said. He brought the empty box over to Darduk.
A creeping fear crawled across Darduk’s face. That’s when Ari knew none of this had been about her. Not really. It had all been an elaborate and illegal attempt at sneaky, murderous, intergalactic theft. It made her angry.
Darduk closed his eyes. The moment his eyelids shut, she knew he knew she had a magic ring. It was hard to understand. But in that moment, she knew magic recognized magic.
Ari closed her inner eyes too, and for the first time, the two of them beheld each other differently. She could see that Darduk’s living, breathing being was shut out. It was being held captive by the magic. It wasn’t really Darduk that needed her to survive; it was the ring. Ray had mentioned that it was a symbiotic relationship, but the ring had taken over, and now it was in peril. Then Darduk’s ring being turned its attention to the glowing orb in her pocket. It must have been powerful because in this realm it was glowing like a meteor in her pocket.
Darduk opened his eyes and pointed at Ari. “She has the orb!” The other Vikings rushed at her.
“Get the orb, but don’t kill her yet, not before I get to eat her!” he screamed.
“Look, Darduk,” Ari said, backing up. “I saw the real you. I know that you’re not in control. Try to fight the ring.”
“You’ve got it all wrong, Lady.” One of the Vikings smiled at her. “Darduk isn’t the Viking. The Viking died a long time ago. Darduk is the ring.”
Ari and friends prepared for their last battle. The Vikings surrounded them, and the ghost drones streamed back in through new portals. Again, they filled the square. And again, they were even faster than before. She wished more than anything she had had more time to pair once more with her own ring, to complete the last cycle.
“Let the others go,” Ari said. “It’s me you want. And besides, this will be a very hollow victory for you since I’m not ready.”
Kirian again stepped in between danger and Ari. “It’s all right, we had a good run. Ari, it was great knowing you, Staar-girl. Soda, if you can, you should teleport out of here.”
“Not a chance,” Soda replied.
Demon Yoda materialized next to Ari. He looked around, noticed that the group was surrounded. He backed up.
“Nice of you to show up,” Ari said.
“Ari, how many magic pairing cycles have you completed?” Ray asked.
“Two,” Ari said.
Demon Yoda just shook his head. “Two pairings with a class five magical ring, all in a two-hour window. It’s extraordinary, but it’s not enough.”
“Don’t blame yourself,” Ari said. Then she thought about it. “You really could, though. I mean, you were a sucky teacher on a very tight timeline who kept disappearing. So, you failed me, but at least you can say you didn’t give it your all. You might as well just poof away. Or did you come back one last time to watch us die? I can’t believe I sold my soul to you.”
“That’s not our deal at all, Ari. Look, this isn’t that hard. It’s a simple favor. You belong to a damned Mafia-style-crime-organization called Regal. How can you not understand the you-owe-me-a-favor dynamic?”
Ari and friends had backed up into the ghost drones. Now they were out of real estate besides being out of time.
Demon Yoda held up both of his hands. He glanced back at Ari. “You’re right. I am sorry,” he said. Then he turned back to face the horde of Vikings. He pushed his hands forward quickly, and an invisible wave seemed to knock them all backward.
“What are you doing?” Ari asked.
“Acting on instinct,” Yoda said. “They didn’t see that coming, did they?” He chuckled. “You taught me that. Sort of like a kick in the balls. I really don’t get to have a lot of fun where I’m from.”
“How many more times can you do that?” Ari asked him.
“Probably only once more,” Demon Yoda answered. “I have a final piece of advice for you.”
“I’ll bite,” Ari said. She had little choice. “Lay it on me.”
“Believe, Ari. Trust the ring,” Demon Yoda said.
“You told me that two cycles isn’t enough,” Ari answered.
Demon Yoda shook his head. “You’re not normal. And life isn’t always about rules. Sometimes, especially in the case of the extraordinary, you are only held back by the limitations in your mind.”
“He’s as bad and as useless as Ray,” Soda chimed in.
Ari thought about what Demon Yoda said. “Fleek!” she yelled. “Are you here?”
“I’m here, Spectra,” he answered.
Spectra, her Staar name. She had forgotten all about it. Ari felt a surge of energy at the sound of her name. The ring reacted to it too. It whispered the name Spectra to her. Something rippled through her soul. She and the ring. Maybe it was fate. The mural said she was supposed to be here. And the ring was made for a Staar. Her ring would not want to lose its host any more than Darduk. Or Darduk’s ring, or whatever. The only thing that had gone right so far was that the images from the mural hadn’t come true.
That’s when an earthquake struck the square, knocking Ari and her friends off of their feet. Ari got back up. There was another earthquake, then more of them closer together. Ari got a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. The ghost drones were leaving. That can’t be a good sign, she thought.
She was afraid to turn around, but she did anyway.
That’s when she saw them. The giant, awful monsters that had been in the mural. This apocalypse was turning out to be the stuff of ancient nightmares. Ari turned to Darduk and crew to see if they would run away like the ghost drones. They didn’t. They stood there and chuckled, like they had seen this horror movie before.
Ari took a few steps back. “Ok, Fleek. When I give the signal, I need you to let rip with the fractals. Everything you’ve got, ok?”
“You got it,” he answered.
“Here we go again,” Soda said.
“What now?” Ari asked.
“You’re glowing,” Soda replied.
“Again?” Ari asked. She looked down at herself, but she didn’t see glowing, not with her ring vision.
The Vikings rushed them again. Again, Demon Yoda repelled them. Then he sang a weird little ditty, like he was drunk, and passed out. At least Ari hoped he was just passed out.
The Vikings were screaming now. Ari had heard Darduk’s thoughts. The ring needed to absorb all of Ari’s energy to survive, but the Vikings needed the orb. Or else. And they would do whatever it took to get it. It was not anger or theft that was driving them; it was fear.
Without Demon Yoda to stop them, the Vikings broke through. Kirian fought like a mad woman, but it didn’t matter, she was hopelessly outnumbered.
The assorted terrifying monsters that vaguely reminded her of Pokémon, thundered into the surrounding square.
“Leave her alive!” Darduk yelled as he sprang to the head of the pack. His head engorged again.
One of his own men cut off his head on his way past. “We’re through with you, old man. You’re not calling the shots anymore.”
Darduk’s head rolled onto the ground. It continued to roar in anger.
The Viking in front knocked Kirian out of the way and grabbed Ari. “I will ask you to give it to me one time, then I will rip you to pieces and get it anyway,” he said, lifting her high in the air.
“Now, Fleek,” Ari yelled.
“Wrong answer,” the Viking holding Ari said. He nodded and the guy next to him plunged a sword through Ari’s chest.
22
Ari felt the cold steel go through the front of her. Judging by the size of the sword and the size of herself, it was probably sticking out of her back. She felt the world go all wobbly and dark. The last thing she saw before the Viking let go of her so she could hit the ground was Fleek’s gorgeous fractal spring to life. Then everything went dark.
“Spectra,” the ring spoke to her in the darkness. It used her name. Ari knew in that moment that the ring had accepted her. Something changed.
Ari opened her eyes and gasped. Her real eyes. All she could see was blood soaked, R-rated bandanna. She removed it and looked around with her actual physical eyes. Both of them.
That sent the Vikings scrambling since they thought they were going through the pockets of a corpse. She felt the pocket where she had put the orb. It was still there. Whew. The Vikings hadn’t gotten to it yet.
“There!” one of the Vikings said, pointing to her pocket, which was glowing white. “The treasure’s there, get it.”
Ari stood up and cracked her neck. “I don’t think so.” She felt power surging through her body. She looked down at her chest. Making that power surge through her new, uninjured body. “Thank you, ring.” In a moment of unbridled gratitude, she kissed the ring. She finally got it. “So, this is what it’s like to finally believe and trust in something outside of yourself.” She hadn’t realized she had mumbled that last part out loud until she heard Soda’s voice.
“Hey, Ari, how about a little less philosophizing and a little more magic fighting? Don’t you have a crap ton of pixie sticks to eat? You look great, by the way. If the ring can fix a missing eyeball and a sword through the chest, I think you’ll be just fine.”
The earthquakes continued, and more monsters roared to life. They were at least fifteen feet tall, dark colored, and scaly. Also, some of them were breathing fire. Ari watched Fleek walk right through the center of two of the monsters, barely avoiding being stepped on. A breath of fire lit up in his direction. He leaped aside. The lick of fire missed him and burned up one of the Vikings, who shrieked in agony.
Darduk had gotten his head back onto his body. The head and body fused back together. Then he snarled at Ari, “Let’s try this again.”
Ari knew Darduk was coming for her. But the monsters were closing in on her friends, and the ghost drones were trickling back in. She blinked at Darduk, trying to figure out what to do. That’s when the ring spoke to her, “Do it, Spectra!”
As soon as the ring spoke to her, she knew what to do. In a move that visibly surprised Darduk, she sprinted toward him instead of away.
He held his ground though, pulling out his giant axe and waiting for her.
Ari stopped short of touching him. She swung in his general direction with the fist that had the ring on it.
Darduk, giant axe and all, was knocked backward across the courtyard and into a building.
That was incredible, Ari thought. She ran forward to meet the other Vikings. She swung at them the same way. She never made contact though. She didn’t have to. The Vikings went flying backward through the air, into the ghost drones and monsters.
Ari pointed her hand at Fleek’s Fractal, which had risen into the air. She concentrated on her friends, one by one, until it healed them. They looked at her like she was a ghost herself, but she didn’t care.
With that done, she turned just in time to see Fleek cornered by three of the monsters. She sprinted across the courtyard. A giant, scaly foot was in the air, poised to come down right on top of him.
Ari slid onto the grass like a baseball player until she was next to Fleek, under the giant foot. Once she got there, though, she figured out the flaw in her plan. She didn’t even have time to rear her fist backward with the ring before the foot was on top of them.
She did the only other thing she could think of, laying there next to a screaming Fleek. She closed her eyes. The world changed again, and she saw things differently. She saw the monsters for what they really were. What she saw was that the ghost drones, and the monsters were products of Darduk’s ring.
She also knew exactly what to do. She held her ring hand up, open at the monster. Then she released her Staar energy at it. It evaporated in a flaming roar.
She forced herself to focus. She got up, eyes still closed and repeated the action, destroying the rest of the monsters. She knew it was a pointless gesture. She knew Darduk would make more of them. But she had to temporarily clear the courtyard so she could get the magic ring out of Darduk. Somehow.
That’s when something hit her from behind. She felt a stabbing, blinding pain. When she looked down at herself, there was an axe protruding from her chest, from the back to the front. Blood was dripping down onto the grass.
Not again. Darduk. She sunk back down onto her knees, worried she would start seriously testing the healing power of the ring. By all rights, she should be dead. Again.
For the next few moments, Ari listened to the roar of the new assorted Pokémon monsters and swirled into and out of consciousness. The single thought she couldn’t chase out of her mind: I can’t win. There are too many monsters, too many Vikings, too many ghost drones. It was an alien invasion with a magic ring against a small, kick-ass band of friends, one of whom also had a magic ring, but it wasn’t fair. It would never be fair.
With a groan of pain, she reached her arms behind her head. She needed the ring’s strength to get the axe out of her body, having little of her own strength left. The axe hit the grass with a bloody thud. Then she turned to face Darduk. By the time she turned around, though, he wasn’t there.
Darduk was across Arcturis Square, directing his Vikings to each grab one of her friends. Then they spread out to opposite corners. He turned to Ari. “That’s right, I’ve figured out your weakness. You like them. And you’ll d
o whatever it takes to save them I’m guessing. Even lose.”
“You mean I’m a real leader, unlike you,” Ari said. “I was there. I saw you kill your own man.”
“He was weak and expendable,” Darduk said. His black cloak whipped dramatically in the breeze and his face was gaunt and white as a ghost.
Ari guessed it had been quite a while since any of him was human.
“What will happen now,” Darduk continued, “is that you’re going to walk right over here and let me eat you. Or I will start killing your friends. You have thirty seconds. Your girl warrior will be the first one to go.” He pointed at the Viking holding Kirian. “And then the Octopus. The point is, every thirty seconds, you’ll lose one of your friends if you don’t surrender.” He paused for a moment. “Twenty seconds.”
“Bullshit,” Fleek yelled. “It hasn’t been ten seconds since you announced the countdown.”
Several loud blows quieted Fleek down.
Ari could hear a flashback of Demon Yoda’s voice. He said she was a sacrifice. He said the only way out of this was to get eaten. She had a moment of clarity. It didn’t matter how hard she fought it; it would always come to this. She could already feel that both she and the ring were in a weakened state due to the massive amounts of magic already used to repair Ari’s wounds and attack all the creatures around her. This was truly it. Out of options, she took a few steps toward Darduk.
“Ten seconds,” Darduk said.
“Ari, no!” Kirian yelled. “Don’t do this!”
Ari looked around the square to confirm what she already knew that it was over. She had no choice. She continued ambling over to the hulking Viking. “Okay,” she said. “Just don’t hurt them.”
“They’re gonna kill us the moment you’re gone anyway, Ari,” Soda said. “There’s no need to get eaten.”
“Don’t do it, Ari!” Fleek yelled. “We can still fight.” For a fraction of a second, a fractal appeared. The Vikings around Fleek kicked him to the ground and rained blows down on him. The fractal disappeared.
Overlord Alliance: Book 2 of the Neon Octopus Ally Series Page 14