Sell you a Bridge chapter 218 (Patreon)

April 16th 2016 Doomhollow Hall 10:00 PM EDT

I  met Morana at the training room excited to test myself. I supposed she  got her anticipation of sparring from me. While I wasn't always a  fighter, months of constant Outer Body Training daily had drilled a love  of combat into me. The fresh thrill of discovering a new power, the joy  of matching blades with an equal opponent, the stronger I got the more I  grew to love fighting. Morana seemed to have inherited that love,  judging by the bouncy way she entered the training room.

I  had to smile at her enthusiasm. "You're a sweet kid, willing to humor  your old man even though I was barely able to touch you last time." I  knew she'd treated our last sparring session as more a fun workout than a  serious fight, and it was sweet how she was willing to do it again  despite not getting much out of it. As we both limbered up for the fight  I finally decided to ask her something I'd been wondering about. "So,  how long are you planning to do the whole 'robot daughter doesn't  understand' schtick when you want to avoid being called on something."

She  gave me a wry smile. "You noticed that huh? it works better when you  aren't around. Your aura sight makes it a tough sell even if you didn't  know I wasn't like that from our sparring sessions." She shrugged. "It's  just convenient to be underestimated, not to mention it gets me out of  trouble when I say or do something someone else doesn't like. Why? Do  you want me to stop?"

The casual  ease with which she admitted her deception made me smile. She really  was my kid. "Nah. Do what you need to do, just don't think it'll work on  me or your mothers. So, you seemed to connect pretty well with Cassie.  It's nice to see you making a friend." I walked to the center of the  training room, taking a position off to one side while she took the  other, standing directly across from me in preparation for our fight.

The  bright smile this time was warmer, but tinged with wry amusement. "Yes  dad, my playdate went very well thank you." She paused. "Seriously  though, thank you. It's...weird. Being a new person. I have these  emotions for our friends and family but they come from you all, and they  don't know me well enough to feel the same for me. It's nice to make a  friend of my own. To form a bond with someone I didn't inherit from you  and the moms. It makes me feel...real. Like I actually exist."

I  crossed the space between us to pull her into a hug. "You are real. You  might be new, but you're still a person, still you. We don't see you as  some knock off of anyone else. We're still getting to know you, but you  are important all on your own." My heart ached as I remembered my  cousin. Poor Kit, who always felt like second best. Her father, my  father, hell even I had sidelined her. I wouldn't let my kid feel like  that. I wasn't going to be the next Falcone to join the bad dads club,  even if I hadn't been expecting it.

Morana  squeezed me tightly. "Thanks dad. I know that. I do. mom has been  showering me with affection, and mama too, albeit more subtly." I could  tell without needing to ask that Zee was mom and Dreamer was mama. Aside  from the labels just fitting them pretty well that description was  pretty on the nose. Zee hadn't done anything subtle in her life. Her  loud personality was one of the things that drew me to her. She was just  nonstop fun unless things got bad. She could do serious when she had to  but she was always able to lighten my mood.

Stepping  back I bounced on my toes a bit. "Now, what's say you throw some hands  with your old man. I have a feeling this fight will be more of a  challenge than our last sparring session. I summoned Tartarus to my hand  as she called Oblivion, but more than that I reached out with my will  and triggered my torc. The black metal washed over me, a liquid suiting  of gleaming dark plate that coated every inch of my body, conforming to  me like a second skin. Before I knew it I was standing there like a  perfectly sculpted black statue, no features or defining characteristics  except my muscles.

That  got an impressed whistle from my daughter. "Wow. Swanky new suit. It's  not going to be enough to take me o-" Her eyes widened and she hurled  herself backwards as I blurred across the room, my fist speeding through  the space her head had just occupied. She narrowed her eyes as she  caught herself, twisting midair to land gracefully on her toes. "Ok.  That wasn't bad. You're certainly faster now. How about stronger?" She  hurled herself forward, blurring just as fast as I did, smashing  Oblivion down at my skull.

The  torc amplified absolutely everything about me. It was like having my  body and mind both turned up to eleven. With my advanced dexterity I  normally didn't notice the triple reflexes anymore, I was either faster  or slower and reflex rarely played a part, but in the armor to think was  to move, and that tripled reaction time essentially made me three times  as fast. I blurred sideways, lashing out at her hands where she held  the keyblade.

Unfortunately  for me she had the same ability to call the thing I did. She just let  go and dodged, reconjuring it once she was clear. Her eyes were blazing  with excitement. "See! Now THIS is a sparring match." She sounded almost  giddy with anticipation at the fight to come, and I could understand  why. It was no wonder Morana had crushed Circe so badly, she was pretty  obviously holding back during out initial fight.

Now  though, I could take her toe to toe and she was ready to let loose. She  lashed out at me with a series of moves I recognized as my own. Bits  and pieces of the warlord, Myrina, and Blood's style, mixed together  with various small time enemies and a not small amount of hardcore  training in Outer Body against myself. I'd polished and perfected the  style over months in my own head, putting it all on the line in  scenarios where I never tired and no mistakes could affect me, with  perfect memory against endless waves of enemies.

Morana  had the technical understanding of my style, but she didn't have the  experience. It had been less obvious the first time because she could  compensate with an overwhelming advantage on power and speed, and the  holes hadn't shown, but she just wasn't as smooth as I was, wasn't as  practiced. She didn't use the Hole bloodline or the darkness, I didn't  call the Soulless, neither of us wanted this to end. This was combat on a  level we couldn't get from nearly anyone else, and it was amazing.

I'd  fought people stronger than me, fought people faster, hell I'd fought  equals, and even myself. But this was my first time fighting someone so  evenly matched against me without it actually being me. Morana had  access to my skills, but her mind and choices were different. You give  two chefs the same ingredients and no directions, and there's no  guarantee they'll make the same dish. Morana had all my ingredients, but  she was cooking up her own way of using them, and it was forcing me to  genuinely push myself.

As  I pushed on I also realized why this armor was so amazing for me. It  put a massive amount of strain on the body to use it, but with my insane  vitality I was able to handle the stress. As we fought it became clear  that Morana wasn't my match without using her magic, but then again she  wasn't built for pure physical combat. Breaking out pattern of pure  assault I stepped back through the shadows, feeling myself slide through  the corridor effortlessly in the armor, like I was greased up and  slipping through a waterslide.

The  corridors had been better for long rang than mid combat capabilities  before, but with this new speed I could use them much more effectively  mid fight. Once I came out I funneled power through my keyblade and  rained down a series of Abyssal Alloy spikes across the room at Morana.  Seeming to pick up the change in tempo she immediately flicked her  fingers and a series of black tendrils leapt from her shadows to pick  them all from the air, a second flick sent them hurtling back at me.

I  opened a series of Holes, my bloodline responding just as quickly and  effortlessly in this armor as everything else, costing pittance in the  way of points and being infinitely easier to control. A series of  layered Holes had half the spikes emerging aimed right at the others,  destroying each other midair in an explosive surge of demonically  detonated charged ectoplasm. The Abyssal Alloy spikes were basically  explosive metal spears and I saw Morana begin to eye me more warily.

I  opened another Hole beneath my feet, and curled into a ball as I  slipped into it, opening a corresponding and much bigger Hole over  Morana's head. She sensed it, but couldn't get out of the way in time,  so as my massive curled up armored form came through she bellowed and  let loose a dark infused Ghostly Wail right at me. it wasn't the same.  She used the void to fuel it instead of ectoplasm, but the mechanism  worked just as well if not better with concentrated nothingness.

My  armor tanked the blast but it stopped me dead long enough for her to  shadow port out. I slipped through another Hole, returning to my normal  size as she held up her hands in surrender. "I give! You win dad. Damn.  That armor is no joke. It channels all your abilities even better than  the keyblade does, and with a hell of a lot more versatility. Can you  use demonic strength augmentation on that stuff?"

I  let the armor recede, having to brace myself as it came down so I  didn't stumble. Damn, even my vitality couldn't take the edge off that  kind of consumption. "Yeah, but even with the armor eating some of the  cost that would be expensive to keep up for more than a few seconds.  That's a last resort kind of ability, and not one I would use during a  sparring match. That's more something for if I was massively outmatched  and needed to beat someone to death."

My  demonically enhanced armor would put me on a level similar to a fucking  kryptonian, for a few seconds at least. It absolutely wasn't to be  fucked around with. It made me almost look forward to the fight with  those fucking scarabs though. In this armor I wouldn't need anything but  my keyblade and skills to put the bastards down. Even if there were a  hundred of them.

I  tried to trigger the stuff again and winced as my head throbbed. I  wavered slightly on my feet. "It's far from perfect though. Apparently  it leverages the power against a ton of my vitality over a longer  period. Basically taking out a loan for combat. Tough stuff, but I have  to be sparing with it until I can build up my vitality some more."  Regardless though, it would be plenty to see me through this crisis.

I  turned to my daughter. "Anyway, we should do this more often. I need to  get some practice in with this stuff before I take it into real  battle." I didn't, not with Outer Body, but it was nice spending time  with Morana, and the fighting was a blast. "Now, how about you help your  old man back to his room. I feel like I got hit by a truck."Despite the  headache though, I was happy. I'd definitely had worse days.