Mage Emergence

by Christopher George

  He survived the initial blast, but the impact had knocked him off his path and sent him flying off course. His shield had protected him from the blast, but it didn’t protect him from what came next. I sent out a Mana Nova thread that easily sliced through his shield and ended the poor man’s life. As his body landed in two pieces beside me, I corrected myself – poor boy’s life. My enemy looked like only about seventeen or eighteen. If he had been a member of Victor’s new order of mages, then he had paid the full price for his membership.

  I launched back into the air and took a contemptuous swipe at the soldiers on the ground, sending several cannons barrelling into the soldiers below as they were telekinetically torn apart. I could hear the shouts and screams from the soldiers below as their own ordinance was turned against them.

  I pondered my next move. This was too easy, not what I had expected at all. Had I truly expended Victor’s resources? Was this really the best defence he could muster after all this time? I didn’t think so. I watched with satisfaction as May easily dispatched her foe, crushing him and sending him falling into the Yarra River.

  A mounted machine-gun on the top of Flinders Street Station opened up and sent a stream of bullets flying at me and with a flick of my wrist I tore the machine-gun from its place and sent it tumbling down into the street below. It seemed like a sacrilege that they should be standing on that exact spot. I had once stood on that rooftop when I first sought out Renee to teach me the magic - I had set off an awareness blast that had rocketed through the city. It seemed like so long ago now, it seemed like a lifetime. I took my time and removed every solder from that rooftop.

  I could see the third and last remaining mage lurking within the boundaries of the city proper as he contemplated how to repel us. Even from here I could see the worry on his face; he had been told they would be able to defeat us, he had been told that the soldiers below would distract us enough so his friends could dispatch us. He had been told he was special and that the training Victor had given him would allow him to overcome us. He had been lied to; he had been nothing more than a distraction. No, it was worse than that. He and his friends had been a trap. There was no other reason for this.

  I immediately pulled back and shouted as May swooped in to finish him off. I don’t know if she heard me or not, but she tore the poor mage from the building he had been standing on and shredded through his shield in seconds. She landed on the rooftop next to him and it was obvious that he was completely outclassed. This fight could only end in one way and I wasn’t surprised when our opponent fell to the ground. Then the trap closed.

  * * * * * *

  Time seemed to slow down as May rose from the rooftop in triumph. Two dozen or so Mana Nova threads were unexpectedly launched from the tops of the buildings surrounding her. I gasped in surprise as dozens of Mana signatures surged into life as the threads took flight. How the hell had he hidden so many mages? Where had he even found them all? Had he covered the whole city in an illusion to hide them? Then I realised, it all made sense. They weren’t mages. They were drones. That was why I hadn’t noticed them earlier - they had been inactive. It was similar to what he had done in Poland. Victor was using drones to send his own powers out into the city, except he was doing it on a far greater scale. He had created an army of drones to destroy us. I gulped as the realisation overtook me; with that amount of firepower he could very well achieve my death long before I had the opportunity to get close enough to return fire.

  May saw her danger as quickly as I did and launched into the air in an attempt to escape it. I watched in futility as two or three dozen threads took off after her. The building she had been standing upon was shredded as a dozen threads gouged out a large chunk of rooftop as they sought to finish her. Three, four, then a dozen more lines of Mana Nova threads chased her down. It was almost beautiful to behold as the deadly lines wove their way through the cityscape seeking their enemy. I would have appreciated their beauty a lot more if they didn’t spell instant death to anything that touched them.

  I sprang into action and immediately turned several of the drones into a fine red mist as I leapt into the fray, but it was too late. There were simply too many threads and it wasn’t possible to keep track of them all. I quickly lost sight of May as she used the buildings to provide cover, but she was out of options and they’d inevitably block her in. Her only recourse would be to propel herself upwards with the force of a tornado, and once that happened her remaining cover would be gone. I wouldn’t have wanted to make that decision, but I saw with despair that she had to make that exact choice. She launched upwards to the sky like a rocket and I watched in impotence as a dozen or more threads followed her up. It was like they were caught in the wake of her passing, but they were in fact gaining on her. Every second closing the gap between them, and to make matters worse, May was slowing down.

  I’d taken out about a dozen of the drones, but the number of threads chasing May didn’t seem to decrease any. I watched with satisfaction as the thread they were controlling fizzled and faded, but there were still too many, and unfortunately, as the number of threads decreased the control that the others seemed to gain increased. At first the Mana Nova threads had appeared clunky and uncoordinated, often causing as much damage to their surroundings as their intended target, but as their numbers dwindled they were becoming more controlled and more accurate.

  Each of the drones was being controlled by Victor himself, and as the vessel was destroyed he would be able to allocate his attention towards a lesser number of threads. It was an impressive display of might. Victor had once told me that true power doesn’t come from sheer strength, but from control. He was wrong: it came from the application of both. He had proved that point today.

  It was kind of beautiful seeing the threads swirling into a tight column as they pursued May further into the night sky. They twisted along an axis as they gained speed towards their diminutive target. I struggled to get to her in time, but I didn’t see May’s last moments. I couldn’t see her through the mass of Mana threads that brought about her doom, but I could hear them. A large explosion took her life as the threads collapsed into a sphere of Mana-powered pyrotechnics that trapped her inside. The resulting conflagration of power tore across the Melbourne skyline, indicating that May was gone.

  The light of the explosion flared out in all directions, and for a few seconds it was if a new star had been born. The explosion’s light illuminating the twilight sky made it seem like midday. May wouldn’t have suffered; she would have been destroyed almost instantly. There was no way her shield would have even slowed their passage as they converged upon her. She would have been disintegrated in seconds as the Mana Nova consumed her flesh. It would have been painless. I could only hope for the same when my turn came.

  I didn’t have much time to mourn the loss of my companion, as the threads turned upon me in fury as the drones selected their new target. I wondered briefly why Victor hadn’t send threads after me initially and had instead relentlessly pursued May. Had he chosen to deal with us one at a time? Was he unable to divide his attention any further? It made a strange sense, but something wasn’t right. I had made more than a nuisance of myself in dispatching a dozen or so of his vessels while his focus had been on May. He should have easily been able to use some of his power to at least slow me down.

  Then I realised why he hadn’t been able to do that; although there were numerous threads they were being centrally controlled by Victor. He had split his mind into several dozen undead vessels, but he was still only one person acting in concert. It was like when we learn to form a shield thread; instinctively we try to focus on each individual threads. But that’s impossible - we simply can’t focus on that many separate elements. Instead, we form a pattern of threads and in the act of the pattern the field is formed. Victor wasn’t controlling each vessel individually, he was controlling them as one would a mindless automation: each operating from a single set of instructions. That changed things immensely; i
t meant that each thread couldn’t make its own decisions in my pursuit, but followed the same set of orders as each other. Understanding how Victor had done this didn’t lessen the impressiveness of the act, though it did perhaps give me a glimpse as to how I might survive this.

  I had just destroyed another vessel when I saw a wave of threads tearing through the street, consuming everything in their path. With a grim smile, I threw myself into the air and my Mana threads tore gouges into the skyscraper walls surrounding me as I made good my escape. If I sought to escape in the same way May had, my fate would be the same. But I couldn’t think of a better solution. It was difficult to think with two dozen threads actively chasing after me.

  I glanced behind me as the surging multitude of threads pursued me down the street. I somehow needed to follow them back to their source, but I knew that should I attempt to turn and change direction, my speed would fail and they would take me. I needed to go faster, but I’d pretty much already used most of my strength to keep me going at this speed. It was a simply matter of physics - I wasn’t as fast the Mana threads. They weren’t as good at manoeuvring as I was though, and I used that to my advantage. If I avoided travelling in straight lines, they couldn’t attain their full speed. I used the city like a playground, playing the world’s most dangerous game of hide and go seek, but I knew it would end in the same way as it had for May. It was inevitable. There were simply too many.

  I rounded a corner, my magic tearing chunks off a corner of the building and sending them tumbling down into the city below. A dozen or more threads rounded the corner, impacting the sides of the buildings and letting their power burn through glass, concrete and stone.

  I pulled myself round into a tight arc, throwing myself into the next block as the threads pursued me. I tore through the city with a dozen or more threads in close pursuit and rounded the corner without attempting to slow down. My thread tore loose from its connection as the stone wall I had latched on to collapsed into rubble. I careened down the street sideways and would have hit the ground had I not pulled myself into a around, literally throwing myself into the next block and gaining control again, only seconds before the pursing threads would have had me. I tore through the ruined city like a tornado being chased by a hurricane that was powered by a volcanic blast, but it still wasn’t enough. In an attempt to elude my prey, I even strengthened my shield and threw myself directly through the centre of a building, tearing through the office block as if it were made of paper and emerging on the other side unharmed. This trick bought me nothing more than a few minutes, but it did reveal two more drones standing on the building tops on the other side. Small lines of power arched from their outstretched hands as they added their power to the Mana Nova threads trailing behind me. My earlier guess had proved correct: had they the power of independent thought, they could have easily altered the angle of their threads and finished me. Instead they made no attempt to change the direction of their attack. I only had a few seconds of sight before I was off, but that was enough. They were unshielded drones. Victor hadn’t worried about protecting them. I sent two volleys of flame in their direction as I passed by, narrowly ducking under their Mana Nova threads, and that was enough. I watched with satisfaction as several of the threads pursuing me fizzled and failed.

  I didn’t have time to congratulate myself though; there were still at least a dozen more pursuing me. I tore past the burning bodies of the drones as I worked my way deeper into the city. Perhaps I could use that trick of throwing myself through the building again to buy myself more time. If I could figure out where the drones were standing, I could find a better position from which to strike at them, but that would mean leaving the safety of the city. The knowledge of where my enemy was a luxury I couldn’t afford.

  I barely recognised most the city as I flew through it; a building or street triggered my memory and gave me a brief idea of where I was, but the ruined city was so different than the one I had known as a child. I saw faces briefly as I passed across the streets - there were still people here, but they had wisely decided to stay out of this. They looked like they had their own problems, with the soldiers from the river pulling back into the city in pursuit of me. The original occupants of the city were rioting and turning on the soldiers.

  The distraction of the battle below had almost proved my undoing, as the threads arched out from a city corner and blocked my escape. If I continued in that same direction, I’d barrel straight into a mess of three or four threads. In desperation I glanced around the city, seeking an escape, but there was none. Like May, I vaguely contemplated going up, but then I realised where I was. Up wasn’t the only option I had. I braced myself as I looped a thread around a street lamp and curled into a tight spin. I barrelled straight down and into a flight of stairs positioned in a nearby footpath.

  The stairs led into the underground shopping district of Melbourne Central. Had I not been shielded, my descent through the stairwell would have killed me - I didn’t exactly descend gracefully. I fell down the flight of stairs like a rag doll, emerging battered and bruised but intact on the other side. It was pitch black, but I could see a dim light ahead.

  Unfortunately my lighting problems resolved itself as several Mana Nova threads sailed down the stairwell after me, casting an eldritch glow across the walls and abandoned storefronts of the centre. With a new source of light I was now able to recognise where I was. Launching into the air again, I tore through the small corridor into the shopping centre main lobby and glanced up at the cone-shaped ceiling. I watched with dismay as threads smashed through the windows as they sought me out. I launched down into the levels below, hearing the familiar sizzle of the threads behind me. They sounded so very close now, and there were just too many obstructions in the complex for me to get my speed up. It wasn’t a problem for the threads as they would simply tear through any obstruction without a loss of momentum, but every time I bounced off a cart or shop sign I slowed down.

  With a small grin, I sent a disrupt pulse arching down the corridor. I made the pulse wide enough to encompass the whole corridor and there was nowhere for the threads to go. I watched with glee as the disrupt thread did its work and the Mana Nova thread immediately failed and fizzled to nothing. This caused an unexpected problem as they had been the only source of light in this cramped corridor. I emerged only seconds later into a side street and out into the city again. New threads were on me in moments and I pushed deeper into the city to elude my eventual death. Disrupting the threads had been a neat trick, but until I could deal with the drones, they would simply create new threads.

  Most of the city was an unrecognisable mess, but the familiar sight of Flinders Street Station meant I was running out of city, and that meant danger. I tore across Flinders Street, passing so low across the ground that dust and garbage was picked up in my passing and thrown down the street, only to be consumed by the Mana powered death that followed me. I raced down Elizabeth Street and passed the apartment block that had once been my father’s home. I didn’t have time to meander in memory, but the sight of it as it was now tore through my heart. I didn’t have any time to experience my melancholy, though, as a string of threads had emerged from ahead. I immediately ripped a chunk of marble from a building that had probably stood unmolested for over two hundred years. I pulled myself into a tight arc and threw myself down a side street to emerge in what I thought was a refuge on the other side. I was wrong.

  In horror I glanced around and realised that the details of this place were etched in my mind. A tremor rippled through my body and for a second I thought that the Mana sustaining my shield was going to fail. It took everything I had to gain control of myself. I had been here before - I had almost died here.

  I was standing in the very same place where Victor had brought the building down upon me. It had to be here. I had known that this place was here, of course. I watched in dismay as the threads arced around both corners of the building as they sought me out. There was no escape. I could
maybe punch my way through the building, but that would take too long. I watched as the threads arced out as they prepared to finally hone in on their end target. It wasn’t possible to see any kind of emotion in the Mana thread, but they looked almost triumphant as they arced towards me.

  I took a deep breath as I accepted my fate. I would die here for a second time. At least this time it would be quick. I would be consumed in a single burst of light and there would be nothing.

  Like last time, my thoughts were on those who I had failed: my sister, my father, my lover and my son. Like last time, I apologised for letting them down and failing to protect them. I thought it would be over quickly, but I was wrong. The threads came to embrace me and it seemed like I had all the time in the world.

  No! This was not going to be the last time. A strange sense of calm overcame me and I knew in seconds what I needed to do. I had been foolish. I had played the game the way Victor had wanted it to be played, but I was a mage and I had options other than running.

  I teleported mere seconds before the threads took out the building. The impact of so many threads at the mid-level of the building tore out the remaining supports and sent the building collapsing in on itself as the floors below could no longer support the weight of the ones above.