by Terra Snover
It didn’t take me long to get to the pit. I pulled the lever to bring up the cage from the deep, dark chasm. Inside the cage, curled up in a ball was Oracle. Her cold glowing eye moved to look at me. “They are coming, aren't they?”
“You knew this would happen?”
“When you said they were awake I guessed they may.” She slithered up out of her ball, the mass of tentacles gripping the bars.
“How can we stop them?”
“You don’t.” Her voice was even and empty. “They are too powerful for you and yours.”
“I refuse to accept that.”
“Then you are a fool.” She moved ever slightly closer to the edge of the cage.
“There must be something that can be done.”
“Well, there is one thing.” She moved closer still. “If you kill the leader, the second strongest of their rank will take over.”
“And how will that help?” I put my hands on my hips and gave her an annoyed look.
“Well, if I’m there among them I’ll be the next strongest, and I will be able to take control.”
“Yeah, given your history with trying to kill me, I don’t take much comfort in that.” I almost laughed at the thought of her actually helping me.
“I will kill you eventually, but if you help me take my place at the head of the First Ones, I give you my word it will not be this day.” She was stiller than I had ever seen her, the only movement was the cage rocking back and forth ever so slightly.
“I don’t know if your word is worth anything.”
“Look at it this way; if that army gets here, you and yours are all dead, but if you help me help you there is a chance that I’m telling the truth and you live another day.”
“Damn it.” I spat and looked to the ground. “Nothing but shit choices.”
“That’s what it is to be alive.”
“Fine, to hell with it, you have a deal.” I reached for another lever, and as I pulled it a bridge extended from the side of the pit to the hanging cage. I pulled the third and final lever and the cage door opened.
Oracle dashed out of the cage as soon as the door opened. She rushed over to me, towering over me, her tentacle stretched as far as they could go. She stared at me and I could tell she was contemplating trying to kill me here and now. We were both standing our ground, not moving a bit. “So, shall we then?” I motioned to the exit.
“I guess so,” she said after a long moment. And the two of us walked out of the dungeons.
Chapter 21
The Stand
You could hear every thump as the crab took a giant step, moving closer and closer. Amber stood on my side, frowning. “I don’t know about this, Var.”
“Look, if this works it won't matter how much we lose tonight. We will be free.”
“I know, but free people can still fight.”
“They have been fighting for a long time now, they will be as done with all this as we are. We’ll be fine.” I reached over and grabbed her hand and gave it a squeeze.
“If you say so.” She had an uneasy look on her face, but she tried to smile anyway. I knew she was right, but I had to hope for the best. This plan was our only option, we had spent the entire night strategizing and this was the only one we could think of that had even a slightest chance of working.
I turned away from her to look at the horizon and the rising sun. In the morning light, I could see the massive metal crab that had just a few days before almost ended me. And it was coming to my doorstep. “Everything is ready.” Gelm approached us, coming up the steps of the outer walls.
“Yeah, I can feel them.” I squeezed the seeing stone in the hand that wasn’t holding Amber’s. I frowned and I looked back at Void City behind me. The dark city in stark contrast to the morning light. We had worked so hard to make this, and there was a good chance that by this day's end it would all be gone. My eyes moved to the castle. That was the only thing that really mattered; the clockwork machine that would power the attack on the System Hivemind. As long as it stood, we could end everything. I took a deep breath and let out a sigh. “Gelm, and everyone is safe in your realm?”
“They are all safe. The Red Empire will continue no matter what happens this day.” I frowned even more as he spoke. Did he expect this to end badly? There was something else that was making me feel uneasy, I couldn't put my finger on why, but something was off. “Good to know…” I turned back to the crab in the distance who was getting ever closer. It would get here any minute now, every stride covered a massive amount of space. “Well, I’m on.” I shuddered. I really didn’t want to do the next step, but it had to be done. I let go of Amber’s hand and spread my wings.
“Var!” Amber let out a quick shout. I turned to look at her and she grabbed the back of my neck and pulled me in for a kiss. Her lips burned against mine, her glowing red hair brushed against my cheek. I was surprised for a moment, but the shock soon moved into enjoyment. I moved my hand around to her lower back and pulled her even closer to me. I felt embers move between our mouths as she slightly opened hers. This was far different from Hell’a. Where with her it felt like a struggle of power and dominance, but with Amber it felt, well, like we became one. All our feelings, bodies and minds swirling into something else. A fusion of being and a feeling of safety.
I have no idea how long we kissed, but it wasn’t long enough. I could have stayed in that embrace forever. But eventually, Amber pulled back and whispered, “Be safe.”
I placed my hand on her cheek. “You too.” Simple words, but the meaning was understood by us both, because we will be together after. My eye caught Gelm staring at us. Once we made eye contact he looked away and to the sky. “Wow, nice clouds today, I’m so entranced by them I didn’t notice anything around me for the last several minutes.” I rolled my eyes and turned to the ever approaching crab. I spread my wings and took off towards the beast.
I landed on a large pillar-like stone that would be about eye level with the First One crab and pointed my finger in the air. I cast a Titan Bolt above me. The loud flash and crack of the bolt moved across the landscape. As expected, the crab turned to face me. I cast the spell so I could be heard from great distances. “First One, this is not your realm! Return to whence you came.”
“Unacceptable, we have come to reclaim that which you have stolen from us!” its voice boomed back.
“I give you this chance only once, leave now and you will not be harmed!”
“Negative,” it said in a simple matter-of-fact tone that could destroy one's eardrums.
“Don’t say I didn’t warn you!” I then removed my voice amplifying spell and spoke in a hushed voice. “You are on.”
“Yes, my Queen,” Leon spoke from the shadow of the stone. And thousands of Fairies burst out from behind the rock in a cloud of tiny bodies. They darted across the surface of the ground, giving Leon the cover he needed to not be seen in the morning light. I then pointed my finger at the great beast and cast a flurry of fireballs. I knew they wouldn't do anything, but I needed the crab’s attention on me.
It seemed as if his attention was indeed on me as it opened its maw and there was a glowing light gathering power inside it. “That can’t be good…” I muttered to myself. I took off back into the air. I knew what was going to happen, I have seen anime. That was the clear sign of a super laser. I was right, the rock where I stood only moments before was just gone in a flash of light; along with a huge chunk of the landscape. The beam tracked me into the air. I could feel the extreme heat that I knew would probably take me out behind me. I felt my tail sizzle a bit as the beam finished. “Why do both my enemies get super laser things and I don’t?!” I exclaimed. “First Pronoia, now this thing!” I moved in closer, I had to, I almost didn’t avoid that hit and I could feel its power. If it hit me I would be dead… Again. “Surge Claw, Shadow Swarm!” I cast the spells on me as I landed right on top of the thing. I ripped at the metal surface, making a hole about a meter wide. That's when the masked, r
obotic figures came bouncing across the surface of the crab. “Aw shit!” I took off again as they darted under me, shooting projectiles at me. I made an effort to try and dodge all of them, barely. I dropped back onto the back of the crab, right in the middle of a cluster of the masked First Ones. “Algid Soul!” The gale came cascading out of me and froze them in place. Well, some of them anyway, there were still a lot coming at me. I kicked one of the frozen ones as hard as I could, knocking over a good amount of the approaching First Ones in that direction. I moved my claw to the ground and ran, dragging across the metal, my Surge cCaw cutting a swath out of the beast. “Come on, come on!” I kept glancing back to Void City. A First One pounced on me as I was distracted. My barrier managed to take care of that, the machine person bouncing off of me. “Firestorm!” I spun around, unleashing the balls at random First Ones. Not killing them or even doing a ton of damage, but there was enough knock back to keep them off me for a bit. “Come on!” I risked another glance to Void City, hoping. I watched as one of my barriers shattered as one of the First Ones slammed me with a huge, like two meter long by half a meter wide, sword. “COME ON!” I then cast my Unholy Lance, followed by a Titan Bolt in extremely quick succession. Another barrier shattered as numerous blows hit me.
That's when I saw it, a burning pillar of fire reaching into the sky like an erupting volcano. “Finally!” I shot off the beast like a rocket, welcoming the open air once again. But then I remembered the super laser. Or more to the point, it reminded me. I could see the wall of Void City light up with the extremely bright glow. I drew my wings close to me and I let gravity take me. The laser barely missed me but the ambient heat coming from the blast took down my last barrier. I hit the ground and tumbled a bit but managed to get back into the air with some acrobatics. I was shocked when I realized there was only minimal damage to the wall and buildings from the blast. It would seem Gelm’s protection spells helped quite a bit.
I saw the glow of the beam once again. Right as I was making it over the wall. I once again let gravity take me over the edge of the wall as the beam ripped into it. Cutting down it like a hot knife through butter. I guess his spells could only do so much. But the wall did one thing: it kept me alive. I slammed into the side of a house, ending up in their kitchen covered from head to toe in flour. “That went well…” I looked up to see that the beam had set the building on fire. I stood up and reached into my pocket and squeezed the Seeing Stone. Thank the gods, Amber was okay. She was now moving deeper into the city. Time to do the same.
I kicked out the door of the house and moved onto the street. Again, I was shocked how well the buildings were doing. “Damn, Gelm, I owe you a drink once this is done.” I ran down the streets, not daring to take to the sky again. The crab took a few more shots at the wall, just turning it into dust. “Jackass,” I muttered as I entered the doors of the dark temple in the city center. I ran up the steps of the belltower. I breached back into the day sky where I found Drac and Tilln waiting for me. Drac glanced over at me and in a dry voice said, “Took you long enough.”
“Bite me, I had to move by ground.”
“I always move by ground and you don’t see me ever being late.”
“Can you two banter later, we have things to do.” Tilln ruffled her brow at us as she pointed her finger at the mechanical crab who was now setting a leg past the broken wall. Drac and I both nodded and put a hand into the air and opened massive portals in the sky. And the remainder of our airships poured out of them. Each one flying at full speed towards the crab. All unloading their cannonballs as they flew at the thing. The most insane part of all of this was you could hear the shouting players making the most noisy ruckus over the cannons.
The crab jerked itself to face the airships and shot a blast at them, taking one or two out in a single hit. But that was okay; the point wasn’t to keep these ships up and operational, but to ram the damn thing! The first airship slammed into it with a horrible sound of metal scraping into metal. The crab slid into a nearby building as the airship continued to push into it. I counted to thirty and watched the players on the deck jump off of the crashed airship onto the top of the crab. Once I hit thirty, I pointed my finger at the back of the airship where hundreds of Alchemist Fires were strapped to the back. “Firestorm!” The balls shot out of my finger and blew up the airship like a giant pipe bomb. I took out a good number of players but they knew they had only thirty seconds to get off the ship. And anyway, if they died they would just come back to the temple below in a few minutes and become part of the ground force. “Well, I’ll leave this to you, Mother. Have fun!” Drac shouted as he and Tilln made their way down the stairs.
“Don’t die!” I called back to him as another airship slammed into the crab. Again, I counted to thirty and then ignited the bombs strapped to the ship, and another thirty for the next, then the next. I had no idea how much damage we were doing to the thing, but it had to be enough, right? The crab turned and took another shot at the remaining airships, taking out six this time. That gave it an opening to then turn to the belltower where I was standing. “Nope!” I jumped out of the building as the tower exploded above me.
Right before I hit the ground, I gave a few flaps, slowing my descent. I then had to dart and weave as bits of the belltower came cascading down on top of me. A particularly big chunk was about to hit me when Ral tackled me out of the way. We just missed being crushed. “Ral, this isn’t where you are supposed to be.” I frowned at her.
“Well, sorry for saving your life.” She stood and offered me her hand. I took it and stood. She continued, “And Gelm’s got this next bit handled.” There was a crash as another airship slammed into the crab then about forty seconds later exploded. “I guess Thaz’s people don’t mind going down with the ship.” I watched in amazement.
“Insane Lamorea,” Ral added. “Come on, we need to get to the next point.” I gave a nod and we ran off as the final airship exploded behind us.
The streets were beginning to fill with players pouring out of the temples as they respawned. Ral and I rounded a corner and found ourselves face to face with about fifty masked First Ones. I slid to a stop and grabbed Ral and pulled her back as another huge sword wielding First One took a swing at her. She pulled out her weapon and she managed to cut a projectile out of the air that was headed right for my head. I pulled us both into, of all places, an item shop. About five of the masked First Ones followed us into the shop, the rest dealing with the onslaught of players that were now swarming them.
Two of the First Ones jumped into the rafters, quickly readying their handgonne. “I’ll take those two, you get these three,” I shouted at Ral as I flew into the rafters. There were two blasts from the handgonne. I avoided one but the other went right into my left thigh, tearing out a large chunk of flesh. I just ignored the pain and grabbed the face of one of the two. I gave a quick look around and realized that this was almost the exact layout of the item shop I knew far too well. Giving me the home field advantage. I tossed the First One behind the counter in the back room. I gave the other a roundhouse kick, knocking him to the ground. I jumped over the counter and darted through the shelves, my mind racing to use my knowledge of the shop. I went past the Max Heal potions and wished I could use them, I could really use a healthboost about now. But alas, only players could use- Wait, a second, I had a player tag now. Would this work? I snatched one of the potions and chugged it. Wouldn't you know it, my health jumped up a bit. I shouted and jumped in victory, and immediately got shot in the face. “Son of a bitch!” I shouted as I took cover behind a shelf. I felt my face, and the large chunk of iron had gone through my cheek and was now lodged in my neck. I knew how to deal with pain, but this hurt with a capital H. Luckily for me, I had a way to deal with this that I didn’t before. I wrapped my arm around the shelf, my hand knowing without even thinking about where to go. The one upside of being stuck in the same place for fifteen years is knowing the place like the back of your hand. I snagged a flask of restora
tion potion and then a healing potion. There was another bang as several of the potions around my hand exploded. I yanked back and chugged both the potions at the same time. I felt the restoration potion do its thing and push out the iron and rebuild my broken bone and flesh, where the health potion brought back a chunk of my health.
“Okay, how can I use this?” I asked myself as my mind raced at the possibilities. It came to me in a flash; I could make this work. I darted out from behind the shelf as another shot blasted, the bullet narrowly avoiding me. I ran down a row of the shelving and grabbed an amulet, tossing it around my neck. I then rolled behind another shelf as another shot sounded and blasted a hole in the heavy wood of the shelf. For this to work, I couldn't get hit so I had to be a true master of dodging. Amulet, check; now I need to get to the third shelving unit, top shelf. I rounded the corner and jumped to the one of the First Ones as it was reloading, this time grabbing its leg and again tossing it behind the counter. Then darted behind the counter as the other fired at me. “Ral, get out of here!” I shouted and ran down the third shelving unit. I glanced behind me to see Ral jumping out of the window into the chaotic street. Good, she listened to me. I made it to the end of the row and grabbed the item that lay on the top shelf. A few of the First Ones rounded, entered the row and aimed their weapons at me. “You know what section of the shop this is? The explosives.” I smiled and activated the bomb in my hand. “Kaboom.” I dropped the bomb and braced for what was coming. The item shop exploded in a brilliant fireball with enough concussive force to send me shooting out of the rafters, through the wall and into the shop across the street. I lay strewn on top of a pile of bows. I watched the amulet around my neck turn to dust, just like it should. That little amulet was a handy little tool used to stop people from getting the drop on you, and would stop any attack from hitting you and make you invincible for a few seconds after it took the hit for you. It was a one time use item and you could only equip one a day, but it did its job.