Sell you a Bridge chapter 165 (Patreon)

February 12th 2011 The OZ 11:00 PM EDT

Getting  DG and the others away from the longcoats was a snap with help from  Dreamer and my own abilities. We bypassed the queens soldiers and  waited, watching them fly off once they realized DG wasn't around  anymore. Glitch, a man who had apparently had his damn brain removed by  dark magic and was somehow still talking, mostly stayed quiet as we  walked, but DG was a big cheery ray of sunshine now that she'd met  people from back home. It was sweet to see how the older girl had  latched onto Zatanna and my girlfriend didn't seem to mind the  attention.

I could see in her  aura that DG had been scared and feeling alone in this strange world,  and the presence of other people from Earth was a touchstone for the  girl. As we walked though, DG suddenly stopped. When she did we all came  to a halt with her, and the lack of motion was enough to hear something  in the distance. A scream. Again. I had to fight the urge roll my eyes  at this dramatic ass place that couldn't seem to leave us the hell  alone. I turned to Wally who nodded again, once more vanishing into a  blur of sparks.

DG  and Glitch yelped and stared at the where the redhead had been as  Artemis turned to glare at me. "Can you please stop using my boyfriend  as the canary for your coal mine? You can make clones remember?" I  opened my mouth to respond, then stopped. She snorted at me. "You forgot  didn't you? The great and powerful Random, can't even remember his own  powers."

I  glared right back. "Hey! I have a lot of them ok? Besides clones take  power and they aren't as fast. Wally is still the best call for  scouting. Nothing here will be fast enough to hurt him, don't worry."  Speak of the devil, our redheaded teammate was back within minutes. I  exhaled slightly as he showed up, having actually considered what I'd  say to Artemis if he got hurt. "Hey, what did you find?"

Wally's  face looked ill. "I...it's hard to explain. Follow me." He turned  without a word and headed off into the woods. I shared an uncertain look  with Artemis and followed. The redhead seemed shaken by whatever he had  found, and that wasn't good. Jokes aside Wally was a fairly season  hero, and he knew what he was doing. For him to react like this to  something he found meant it must be pretty bad. He led us to the edge of  a large open meadow and pointed out to where a group of people stood.

Specifically,  the same longcoats we'd ridden with earlier. They had a man between  them, beating him, and as we watched they dragged a woman and a kid out  of the house and started hitting them. I was used to some serious shit.  I'd killed people, slain demons, fought bug monsters. I'd been through  hell, literally. But watching those mean beat that woman and her kid in  front of the man who I was sure was her husband, I felt sick. Artemis  drew her bow to fire at them, but Wally put a hand on her arm, looking  sad.

I had no  idea why he would stop her, and I was about to demand an answer when  there was a ripple in the air and then...it was the beginning again. The  men were dragging the captive out again to beat him. I turned to Wally.  He swallowed hard. "It's a projection. I tried running in to help and I  went right through them. There's some weird device thing in that post  over there. High level tech. I came to find you in case there was some  kind of magic defense on it somewhere.

Artemis  looked at her boyfriend staring at the images being projected onto the  air and reached up to hug him tightly. He closed his eyes, and I  understood. Where we were from things got bad, but it was the kind of  bad you fight. Watching a family get tortured to death in front of one  of the parents was...that was a level of fucked up I was not emotionally  equipped to deal with. I pulled Dreamer and Zee against me as we all  walked forward slowly, relief flooding us when we disrupted the  illusion.

We  stopped near the post and stared down at the object. I wasn't sure what  it was, and Wally, our resident science nerd, didn't seem to know  either. Surprisingly it was spaced out Glitch who answered the unspoken  question. "TDESPHTL." We all turned to shoot him a questioning glance.  "Tri Dimensional Energy Storage Projected Holographic Time Loop. Nifty  little thing." He blinked a bit at that. "Not sure how I knew that.  Although." He paused. "I think I might have invented it."

Wally  stepped up next to him, examining the device. "That's some advanced  tech, man. If you invented that you were a straight up genius before  you...uh, brain got stolen. I've seen legitimate alien technology that  couldn't operate at this level of complexity." He pulled it from the  wooden post. "This is just amazing. Though I do wonder why the hell it  was out here being projected like this without anyone to watch it."

As  he said that we all started glancing around, wondering what we were  missing. Luckily I had aura sight, so I was able to notice the captive  man in the iron coffin rig off to one side. I blinked at him tapping Zee  on the arm and pointing her toward the device. It didn't look like  tech, aside from a slight steampunk flavor to it, so I was betting  magic. I let Zee go over and do her whole magic sensing thing, though I  followed close behind just in case.

The  cast a few scanning spells over it, her brow doing that cute furrowing  thing it did when she was focused, before finally turning back to look  at me with tears in her eyes. "It's...a stasis spell. It keeps the  occupant alive and aware, forcing him to remain completely still without  even blinking. They made him watch this, over and over again. He's been  here for...oh gods Morgan it's been years. He's just been watching this  on repeat without end for years. I think he might be the man from the  illusion. They forced him to watch the worst moment of his life on a  loop."

I  couldn't imagine a worse fate than that. Whoever had done this to him  was a fucking monster and a sadistic genius, because this was some next  level hellish torment. I'd literally seen less imaginative torture  methods in the actual HELL I'd been in. We snapped off the rusted bolt's  helping the man as he stumbled free, unable to stand. Apparently the  stasis spell didn't keep him in perfect health, or maybe it just kept  him in the same condition and he had been starving and limp when he went  into the thing.

Wally  and I carried him over to a nearby stump and sat him down, backing off  to give him time to catch his breath. It took him a while. Almost an  hour actually, but we didn't rush him. I passed him some clippers from  my spatial ring and he shaved his head and face, clipping his hair short  and his face smooth before handing it back to me with a stony nod of  thanks. The guy had some serious gravitas, which I supposed was fair  given the hell he had been through. He saw me staring and cleared his  throat, his mouth dry after so long.

I  handed him a bottle of water I had in my spatial ring and he took a  long deep swallow before coughing a bit from drinking too fast. He  handed it back. "Much obliged kid. Thanks for the help. Name's Wyatt  Cain. What do I call you?" His voice was rough and hard, even after the  drink, and I wasn't sure how much of that was from the time in the box  and how much of it was just him. Regardless I could tell without even  looking at his aura that this was a man with whom wise people did not  fuck.

I  debated just saying Random, but we were just passing through here to get  home and honestly I felt like if anyone had earned the right to an  honest answer it was someone like this. I stuck out my hand to shake.  "Morgan O'Malley, nice to meet you Wyatt." I debated saying something  about being sorry for his loss, but that felt way too personal for a  stranger to say after seeing what we had. I just squeezed his hand and  then let go. "So, Wyatt, which direction are you going? We don't know  our way around here and we'd love to tag along."

He  raised an eyebrow. "I'm headed for the brick route, but no offense kid,  as much as I appreciate the help and as much as you all look like  you're capable of taking care of yourselves, you're still kids. I don't  need you slowing me down or getting hurt. I appreciate the assist, but  you're better off just turning aroun-" I cut him off by raising an open  palm to one side and sending a burst of ectoplasmic energy into a tree  about fifty feet away. The tree exploded. Then caught fire. Then fell  over.

I  smiled at him calmly. "No offense Wyatt, but I'd say we have to be more  worried about you. Now our new friend DG over there needs to find her  parents, and we have some very pointed questions for this Azkedelia lady  about whatever the hell a travel storm is. Seems to me like that puts  us all on the road to Central City." My smile widened into something  slightly mocking. "So, big man. How about you take us to the brick route  and show us how to get to the city and WE can watch our for YOU."

For  the first time since we'd met him Wyatt Cain smiled slightly. Not much,  just a small twitch of the lips. He looked over at the tree again.  "Well now. I suppose I might take you up on that. Might be I could use  some protection." His face flattened again. "If I'm showing you the way  though you need to listen and listen good. I don't know what kind of  crazy abilities you have kid, but the places we're going are dangerous  even to the strong if you aren't careful."

His  voice brooked no argument, but honestly I wasn't inclined to offer one.  The guy was a local and he knew the ins and outs of this place better  than I ever could. I'd have dismissed him when we first got here, but  after hearing from Zee what kind of dark magic existed around here I was  much more willing to take threats around these parts seriously. I  nodded sharply, making sure he knew that I understood the severity of  what we were doing. I expected the others to argue but they all followed  my lead, which was nice.

Wyatt  lead us off to one side of the clearing and towards a different spot in  the woods. "This next part is going to be tense. Stick close and don't  wander off, the creatures where we're going are dangerous." We traveled  for about two hours through the woods, and as we advanced the trees got  thinner and sicker until all that was left were dead wood and bare earth  between it. Wyatt stopped, staring into the dead section of the forest  but not entering. He took a deep breath before turning to us. "Don't  move too far away and keep your eyes and ears peeled. Noses too, the  runners don't like water. Do that and I can try to make sure we all  survive." On that ominous note he turned around and headed into the  woods. "Welcome to the fields of the Papay."