by Steven Novak
Before the General could drive his sword into King Walcott’s skull, the Tycarian’s uninjured leg shot out from its shell. A dagger was gripped tightly between his long, flat toes. Using what was left of his energy, he drove the dagger into General Gragor’s chest. The blade sliced through thick ribs, puncturing the lungs. General Gragor’s body stiffened as he attempted to pull himself off the blade. King Walcott wrapped his arms around the Ochan General’s shoulders, pulling him deeper onto the blade. King Walcott grabbed the back of General Gragor’s head and pulled him closer. He defiantly whispered through gritted teeth, “It’s quite amazing…the kinds of things…we Tycarians are capable of storing…inside our shells…isn’t it?”
A small grin slowly crept across General Gragor’s face as the two combatants shared a moment of mutual dislike, sprinkled with pangs of admiration. This was indeed a warrior’s moment; a moment that comes only once in a lifetime, a moment that will be remembered in the next world.
The crowd of Ochan soldiers had been more than content to watch the fight until their commander had been struck by the Tycarian’s fatal blow. Rushing to his aid, the horde of soldiers ran toward their enemy as a thunderous boom tore through the air. An enormous explosion created a massive cloud of smoke and debris at the opposite side of the fortress. Caught in the heavy winds of the rainy night, it spread across the courtyard like a great dark blanket swallowing up things both living and dead.
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CHAPTER 54
FORGED IN FIRE
*
“TOMMY, NO!” Staci screamed as loudly as her already worn and sore throat could muster.
Across the room, Prince Valkea had thrown Tommy Jarvis a good ten feet into the air. Tommy hit the corner of an enormous table, cracking the side of his head. He was unconscious when he collapsed on the cold stone floor.
Pleebo had seen Tommy brutally tossed about and had noticed the faraway look in his eyes when his head had smashed into the thick slab of wood. The normally level-headed Pleebo felt his anger rise. Pleebo’s entire life had been spent drudging through the reality of a world built atop corpses. He had been a child when the war started. Try as might to rise above it and be more like his father, an unrelenting voice in the back of his mind told him that was impossible.
The finely woven fabric of our life was often stained with the blood of the past.
Life’s experiences had stained Pleebo so deeply that no force born of God or flesh could ever hope to wash him clean. He could continue and ignore this fact or he could embrace the lessons learned through tragedy. Strength could be found in the most painful situations, if one was simply willing to look.
Pleebo moved with incredible speed as his long, lanky body rushed across the room, tackling the Prince to the floor with stunning force. As he sat on Prince Valkea’s chest, Pleebo’s thin arms swung so quickly that they became a blur. Blow after blow connected with Prince Valkea’s face, shoulders and arms. Prince Valkea flailed wildly beneath his skinny, unrelenting assailant. The number of punches reached well into the double digits as the skin on Pleebo’s knuckles peeled. The bones in his knuckles shattered; each punch he delivered sent a jolt of fiery, hot pain through his arms, into his shoulders and through his chest. Despite the continuous blows, Prince Valkea managed to turn on his stomach, pushing himself to his knees, shoving the manic, screaming Fillagrou off him. Before Pleebo could get back on his feet, the Prince grabbed a nearby chair, breaking it over his opponent.
“YOU DARE STRIKE ME, FILTHY SWINE!” Prince Valkea wildly screamed as he continued to hit Pleebo’s squirming body with the remaining shards of shattered wood. “WHERE DO YOU GET THE RIGHT!? I’LL TEAR YOU LIMB FROM LIMB FOR THIS! I’LL OPEN YOU UP AND DECORATE THE FOREST WITH YOUR INSIDES FOR ALL TO SEE!”
The Prince tossed aside the chair, kicking Pleebo’s motionless body. The fresh welts on the Ochan’s face were pounding against his skull, blood freely flowing from no less than five open wounds. Prince Valkea had been driven to the brink of insanity. A disgusting froth formed on the side of his mouth as he mercilessly beat the unmoving creature lying on the floor.
While Pleebo kept Prince Valkea occupied, Staci and Nicky hurried to Tommy’s side. A small trickle of blood seeped from a wound above the boy’s left eye where his head had struck the table.
Grabbing Tommy’s arms, Staci attempted to pull him off the floor. “Come on, Tommy! We have to get out of here!”
Nicky wedged himself underneath his brother’s shoulder, doing his best to help him stand.
When Tommy had hit the table, everything went black. The cold, unending darkness had swallowed him whole and had dragged him further into nothingness. Slowly packets of sound accompanied by flashes of warmly colored lights popped into the nothingness like the implosion of stars at the other end of the galaxy. The wobbly darkness faded into something else. Gravity swept in and weighed down his body, filling him once again with the familiar heaviness of existence. Unrecognizable shapes stretched and blurred across the soft curve of his iris, patiently coming into focus, growing sharp and frightening in their clarity.
His head sat flimsily atop his wobbly neck. Tommy’s gaze drifted wearily to Staci. “TOMMY! PLEASE! We have to go!” She screamed, tugging at his limp body.
Sweet Staci – all those years after his mother’s death – all the times she had tried to befriend him, to help him. He should have never treated her the way he did. She had not deserved any of it.
Tommy spotted his little brother wedged underneath his arm, grimacing through his strained little boy muscles. There had been times over the last few days – more times than Tommy had cared to admit – that he doubted he would ever see Nicky again. He could not go on without his brother. Any world without Nicky, quite simply, would not be a world worth living in.
Tommy was standing again, the floor planted firmly underneath his feet. He slowly reclaimed control of his legs. He noticed Pleebo lying on the floor, his dirty tunic ripped and bloodied. His pale, nearly transparent back was covered with endless bruises and cuts. Standing above him, Prince Valkea was relentlessly kicking his lifeless body. “TOMMY! MOVE! COME ON!” Staci yelled, tugging her friend toward the shattered hull of the doorway.
With a sudden burst of strength Tommy managed to wiggle free from her grasp.
He could not leave without Pleebo.
“No, we can’t go yet.” Tommy emphatically said. “We can’t just leave him here.”
As he moved away from his brother and Staci, Tommy urgently told them, “Run Find someplace to hide and stay there.”
“What are you talking about? We’re not leaving without you!” Staci replied, somewhat frustrated
“You have to go! I’ll find you when this is over, I promise.”
Staci and Nicky stared back at the boy with frightened, unbelieving eyes. Staci’s jaw trembled. A waterfall of tears drenched the side of her face, sweat pooled on the tip of her nose.
Tommy glared at them though a pair of shiny-wet, soulful steel-blue eyes, “I can’t just leave him here to die…I can’t. You have to go though…go now. Hide, and I’ll find you…I promise.”
There was no time to listen to another argument. Tommy determinedly turned toward Prince Valkea and Pleebo. Behind him he heard Staci’s screaming protests. Her voice slowly became softer. It faded into the background and floated away like a bottle tossed into a great vast ocean. Everything around him that was not Staci’s voice became crisper and in focus. With every step, Tommy regained control over his muscles, his determination solidified with each breath. He had made the right choice – he had to help Pleebo. The situation before him was strangely familiar. Powers or not, young Tommy Jarvis had faced this before and could face it again.
In fact, one could go so far as if to say that it brought with it a notion of commonplace.
As Tommy Jarvis was well aware, commonplace could not hurt you.
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CHAPTER 55
SAME B
UT DIFFERENT
*
Breathing heavily, his muscles straining, Prince Valkea had momentarily halted his assault on the comatose Pleebo. He also noticed that that Tommy Jarvis was heading toward him. While his rage might have subsided, the Prince still retained a repugnant air of cockiness.
Assuredly, Prince Valkea turned to the boy. “Are you still here?” He growled through heavy breaths. He chuckled as he grabbed the ornately decorated fabric hanging from his belt and used it to wipe Pleebo’s splattered blood from his armor.
“I must admit, child…while reminding this Fillagrou scum of his place in the world…I had nearly forgotten all about you. I’m rather pleased that you decided not to leave without saying goodbye. It would have been such a shame to be robbed of the opportunity to properly send you on your way.”
Tommy stopped ten feet away. His heartbeat had settled into a heavy, dogged thump. The space between beats had been a mathematical constant as precise as the ticking of a clock. Powerless for the time being, the tips of his fingers had ticked instead with a different sort of feeling, something more familiar – something more natural. It was a strength that had been born of a childhood spent wading neck-deep in waters children were not meant to wade. Tommy did not need the abilities of the Elders to foretell what was about to happen. He knew precisely. He knew because, in one form or another, it had happened to him many, many times before.
Darkness wore many masks, but when removed, the face underneath was generally the same. It was the remake of a movie that had not been very interesting the first time around - identical story, different actors. Even with slight tonal changes, or minuscule alterations in the performers’ inflection, the basics – the script – had remained constant.
His knuckles cracked like snapping twigs as he pulled them into fists.
Prince Valkea noticed the gesture and smiled sarcastically. “How stupid of you, boy…how utterly childish. You’ve given into flights of fancy…into youthful, misinformed ideas of heroism. The real world doesn’t work like you think it does. In the real world stupid little children meet grizzly, painful ends when they attempt to tackle situations they aren’t fully prepared to handle.” His smile slowly faded. The stone-serious Prince lifted his hands, motioning for Tommy to advance. “Come, then, if you must. I will be more than happy to teach you the lessons all children should learn.”
Without plan, hesitation, or thought, Tommy barreled forward at full speed. His fists rose in anger. His movements were wild, untamed and sloppy. With ease Prince Valkea sidestepped the charging boy, grabbing his shirt in the process. Using Tommy’s own momentum, he threw the boy face first into the wall behind him. Tommy’s nose hit the stone, sending a sharp, stiff shooting pain throughout his face and into his ringing ears while the cut on his forehead opened again.
“Ignore the pain, you can take it.” Tommy reminded himself.
Tommy charged at Prince Valkea and hit the Ochan in the stomach. Prince Valkea shrugged off the punches, barely feeling them. Prince Valkea shoved Tommy away, hitting him in the chest. The blow sent a shockwave of jagged, painful thunderbolts throughout Tommy’s body. With his feet kicked out from underneath him, his body tumbled against the wall, landing him on his rear with his shoulders hunched over. His lungs seemed to have been punctured, weighty and useless. A heavy cough rattled against his sore ribs, violently shooting from his mouth like a handful of sharp gravel. When Tommy attempted to stand, a thousand needles poked him in the chest. He did not doubt that something had been broken, fractured or possibly both.
“Ignore the pain. This is nothing you haven’t felt before.”
Prince Valkea snatched a handful of the boy’s hair. At an achingly slow pace, he pulled Tommy across the room, the boy’s legs kicking wildly, his body thrashing from side to side. Prince Valkea tossed Tommy across the floor; spinning like a top, he crashed viciously into a set of chairs.
Prince Valkea smiled when he threw a handful of Tommy’s hair onto the floor but the delicate strands caught a soft breeze and floated in the air. “Such pathetic creatures you are…every last one of you so very, very fragile,” he remarked. “I will never understand why my father chose to strand me here…to force me to live among the likes of you and the rest of these mongrels. What a pointless position…useless…better left for the likes of General Gragor or one of similar breeding.”
With Tommy lying motionless on the floor, Prince Valkea glanced at Nicky and Staci. Both children were seated in the center of the room, terrified by the unconscionable viciousness of what they had just seen.
Prince Valkea appeared ethereal, his mind wandering back to his youth and back to thoughts of his father. “ He must be testing me…testing me to see if I’m worthy of the throne…as if my youth alone weren’t test enough. No doubt he assumes I’ll fail…he always has. In the back of his mind he most likely hopes for it,” he whispered, obviously talking to no one but himself. “I’ll have your kingdom one day, you old fool…I’ll have your kingdom and I’ll have your head.”
Despite the fact that every inch of his body was throbbing and sore, Tommy Jarvis slowly pushed the heavy chairs off him. Disgusting, grayish-blue bruises were cropping up on his arms. While he could not see them, he could feel even more welts sprouting beneath his pants. The top of his head felt as if it had been set on fire. The cut above his eye flowed freely, a stream of warm blood cascading down his face.
“Ignore the pain. He can’t hurt you.”
Placing one hand on the ground to steady himself, he managed to kneel.
“This is nothing. He can’t hurt you”.
The leaky-warm blood splashed onto the floor, staining the fortress stone red.
“He can’t hurt you. Nothing can hurt you.”
Tommy took a deep breath and forced himself to stand.
In a breathy, rebellious tone he calmly said, “Ya, sure…you hate your dad…your life has sucked…so has everyone’s…why don’t you do us all a favor, and shut up about it.”
The sound of the boy’s voice brought Prince Valkea back to his immediate surroundings. He looked at the boy, uttering surprised. Though barely able to pick himself up, this creature – this child – stood defiantly before him, mocking him. Suddenly the young Prince felt naked and exposed. An unquestionably heavy, painful weight had settled deep in the pit of his stomach as if he had swallowed a mouthful of rocks. With a single sentence, this weak, powerless little child had managed to toss asunder his veneer of confidence like garbage catching the breeze. Images of his father, warnings of prophecies and visions of failure had unceremoniously invaded his brain, quickly spreading across his body, devouring him from the inside out. With the single blink of an eye, his vision had turned from crystal clear to red.
This thing, this boy, this monster – must die.
Blinded by uncontrollable rage, Prince Valkea charged at Tommy, wrapping his large hands around the boy’s neck. His fingers dug into soft flesh, rapidly transforming the child’s skin to a frightening shade of purple. Lifting Tommy into the air, Prince Valkea’s sharp teeth ground together and sweat poured from his face as he squeezed with all his might.
Seeing Tommy in such peril forced Staci to find the courage that she needed to help her friend. Without hesitation, she charged at the Prince, slamming herself into his back as he choked the life out of Tommy. Prince Valkea shoved her away; the force from the blow knocked her to the ground, causing her to somersault across the floor
With his face soaked by salty tears, Nicky Jarvis cupped his hands tightly over his ears, shaking uncontrollably. While the Prince held Tommy in his vice-like grip, a strange sensation overcame Nicky. Less than fifteen feet away his brother was dying – being murdered right before his eyes. So many years Tommy had had suffered for him. Not once had he done anything. A steady, terrible hum was building inside Nicky’s head. The maddening noise pressed against the interior of his skull, threatening to crack it open. Try as he might to make it stop, he was failing. The awful sound was
not coming from outside; covering his ears did absolutely nothing. His body shook violently while a thick, crystal sheen of sweat covered him from head to toe. The boy wearily lifted his jittery, pulsing head and gazed at his brother. Tommy’s face had turned a ghoulish purple-blue, his eyes were wide open. His legs had stopped kicking; his body was limp as it dangled above the floor. With a blank, very sad, yet vaguely forgiving look on his face, Tommy glanced at his little brother while his life was being taken away.
Tommy’s lips softly mouthed the words, “Its okay.”
The simple phrase instantly bore its way into Nicky’s soul. The pressure inside the skull of the youngest Jarvis brother reached a fevered pitch. To contain it any longer would be pointless. The time had come for release.
For the first time in years, quiet little Nicky Jarvis - the boy who had lost his voice for so many years – opened his mouth. He spoke one single word. It was a word spoken so very loud that it was heard by all the worlds in all the universes.
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CHAPTER 56
COLD, WHITE GOODBYES
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It had been less than a week since young Tommy Jarvis’ mother passed away. The days since had been spent mostly alone in his bedroom. Walking through the house seemed strange with his mother gone, uncomfortable and wrong. Each day folded unnoticed into the next. At night, instead of sleeping, Tommy found himself staring blankly at the bedroom ceiling. When the sun disappeared, the world quieted down. It had never been completely silent, just quieter, and slower, like stepping from a noisy street into a library. The hushed atmosphere made it easier for Tommy to clear his mind and think about things other than his mother.
On the morning of her funeral, Chris Jarvis said very little to either of his boys. Gruffly instructing Tommy to get dressed, he seemed more than a bit annoyed with the fact that he still had to remind his children of such basic things. They were old enough and should have known better. The drive to the mortuary had been much the same. Father and sons stared blankly out the windows, their minds wandering, the luminescence created by the sunlight reflecting off the fallen snow straining their eyes. The world outside had been cold – cold, white, and achingly beautiful, reminiscent of her skin.