Unfathomable Power, Book 2, Chapter 54 (Patreon)

I got turned around several times as the prison was a maze of human misery as well as being almost pitch black and I no longer had the blood stick pointing the way. I eventually found the way out by using my nose, heading in the direction that smelled the best. The method was effective but made me dry-heave every few minutes, especially when I took a wrong turn amongst the cages.

Once I was out of the prison and into the much cleaner air of the domain proper, I could finally think clearly. The first thought to present itself: How the hell had I gotten here? I should have paid more attention to my surroundings when following the stick. Hell, even if I had, someone had hit me with a mind-whammy in the middle of a fight. I had no idea how I had ended up in this area of the domain.

I came into a room I recognized by all the blood and bodies lying around. I felt a wave of twitchy weakness roll through my body and nearly stumbled. Along with the weakness, my heart began to race, making me feel my pulse in my neck.

I slowed down and leaned against a wall, trying to calm my racing heart. I was breathing heavily even if I didn’t feel the strain of my exertions. I lifted one of my hands, not sure if it was one of the new ones or an original. It was shaking.

I’ve been through a lot in my life, but that… transformation, for lack of a better word, was the most horrible thing I have ever experienced. I had been able to put it out of my mind with the danger of the ritual right next to me, but now that there was some distance—

I felt the urge to vomit and suppressed it, breathing hissing gasps through my teeth. I gripped my brother tight to my chest—I needed to get my shit together. I can have a meltdown when he is safe. I nodded to myself. Just got to hold it together a little longer, I thought grimly.

Taking another shuddering breath, I shoved away from the wall and resumed my run through this fucked up cave system.

  ***

I found the main room that was surrounded by balconies and made the pleasant discovery that even with two of my arms occupied by my brother, climbing up to the top floor was easy. My claws found purchase in the stone, and when I couldn’t find an easy handhold, my many tentacles took up the slack.

I soon found myself in the mess hall where I had first utilized my new fire whip. The place stank to high heaven from all the bodies but wasn’t close to how bad the prison had been… which was terrifying. I hope the cavalry was on the way to help those people.

The thought brought me up short and I slowed to a stop. I probably don’t want to exit the domain looking like a monster.

I had been avoiding this moment, focusing on my brother and everything else. I was afraid that, even with my expanded control over my body, I wouldn’t be able to undo the changes. Saving my brother takes priority, of course. If I thought I could walk out of here without the risk of the Elysium guys shooting at me as soon as they saw me, I’d likely do it. But I needed everyone as calm as possible so Conner wouldn’t get caught in the crossfire.

So I moved into the next room, which had fewer bodies. They had apparently been forced to fall back here at some point. I moved to the back of the room, by the entrance to the cramped tunnel that served as the entrance to the domain. I took a seat, got Conner as comfortable as I could make him, and closed my eyes in meditation.

The first to go was my tentacles, which wasn’t surprising. I was always able to dismiss them. It was a trick, though. They weren’t gone, just… not here. I felt that there was a way to actually dismiss them and not just hide them, but the ritual was still churning in the distance and I moved on.

Next was returning my body to its original height, which was easy until the last few inches. For some reason, I just couldn’t get back to my original height—not because I physically couldn’t, but because the feedback I was getting was telling me that my natural height was where I am now. I could force it, make myself go down to my usual six foot and change… but that would—if what I’m feeling is to be believed—not be natural. Did the transformation make me taller?

Whatever. It was only two or three inches… which was a lot, I guess, but I didn’t want to force myself to shrink. My initial attempt showed that it'd be painful, and I was kind of done with pain for a while.

Removing my extra set of arms took significant effort. I couldn’t just shunt them into wherever my tentacles go. I had to undo the process I had done in my rage, which was a problem as I hadn’t been paying attention at the time. I had just done it. I bumbled around my head and body for several minutes, fully aware of the ritual in the distance rising in pitch in my magical senses like a reactor about to explode.

It took some doing, but I finally got the trick of removing the extra set of arms. I took careful notes, as the extra arms had come in handy (hurr hurr) and I might need them again.

The final bit was the one I was most worried about: my skin. I had never been able to undo the changes previously and was relying on the new perspective and knowledge given to me by my newly confronted and unlocked memories. I started with my head, my rationale being that the team had already seen my black hands. I just needed to get a portion of my skin back to normal.

It took a lot of fumbling, but when I figured out the trick it was easy. The problem was, that I ran into the same problem as I did when I had tried to return to my original height. My body was telling me that my new skin was my natural skin, and changing it back to its original color would be akin to making it blue or green.

I felt my hands begin to shake as they held Conner. I quashed the rising panic, or disassociation, or body dysmorphia, or whatever it was that I was currently experiencing. My skin wasn’t my fucking skin anymore.

I realized I was hyperventilating and quickly hammered down my panic with an iron-clad will. This was—not fine, of course, but I had been prepared. I’ve been saying since the start that nothing mattered except getting Conner safe. I squeezed my brother to my chest, reaffirming his presence. It was almost over.

So what if my skin was void-colored and I looked like a character in a video game that was missing the texture model? My brother is what mattered. Armed with that rationale, I made the changes to my skin. I wish I had a mirror to make sure I got the tone right, but what I could see of my chest was close enough—well, the parts that weren’t covered in blood, anyway. I kept the skin on my arms and legs black but toned down the “depths of space” aspect of it and made sure it could reflect light. Jesus, what a day.

I stood and made the awkward journey through the cave that led to the stairs out of the domain. It was doubly awkward, having to hunch over while carrying my brother. I found myself missing the stabilizing utility of my tentacles.

A bright thought popped into my head as the stairs appeared ahead. With what I knew now, I knew that my condition wasn’t communicable. It wasn’t even really physical, outside of its effects on my body. I’ll verify it, of course, but as soon as all this is over…

I allowed myself a brief daydream of spending time with Ida as I rushed up the stairs. I gave myself a good minute of something to look forward to before I set aside the happy thoughts and focused on the present.

The trip up the stairs was far faster with my improved physicality and my disregard for caution. Light appeared in the distance and I began taking the steps three or four at a time. As I got closer to the light, the steps became more uniform, which helped me pick up speed.

When I was about two dozen yards away, I slowed down. I didn’t want to burst out of a hole in the ground where Elysium knew demons and cultists were preparing a super weapon.

“Friendly incoming!” I shouted up the stairs. “Medic needed!”

“Identify yourself!” An unfamiliar voice yelled back.

“Colm Avery! I was with Albright’s group,” I replied, slowing my ascent but not stopping.

I came out of the trap doors to find a very changed warehouse. The area around the stairs had been cleared of containers, and I found myself at the center of many guns—a couple that looked like anti-armor—held by men and women with hard expressions.

“Go no further,” said the guy closest with an Australian accent. He was a big dude, black, with long dreadlocks tied in a tail. He was wearing armor similar to Greg's, his gun of similar size but not belt-fed.

“Please, get Albright over here,” I pleaded. “My brother needs medical attention.” I lifted the still form in my arms for emphasis.

The man opened his mouth but was interrupted as Albright rounded the corner. “Jesus Christ, Colm,” he said once he got a look at me.

Oh yeah. I forgot I was mostly naked and covered in blood. “You can keep pointing guns at me,” I said, turning to Albright. “But Conner needs help. Where’s Beats?”

“Sleeping,” Albright said. “She nearly killed herself keeping us patched up. I’m sending for Calhoun.”

I frowned in confusion before remembering the second medic of the squad who had stayed behind with my friends. “Are my friends okay?”

Albright nodded. “They’re awake and being a pain in the ass,” he said, and it was only then I sensed how tired he was. I realized he had been awake for the entire trip into the domain, and likely long before, and hadn’t had the benefit of a transformation to rejuvenate him.

“Were you able to stop the ritual?” Albright asked, interrupting my thoughts.

I shook my head. “No,” I said with a defeated sigh. “I slowed it down, but it was getting ready to fire off when I left. Then again… it kind of felt like that for a while. I don’t actually know what the ritual will feel like once it’s complete.” I threw a worried glance over my shoulder, down the stairs. “Speaking of—can I not be here?”

Albright gestured at the squad around me and they lowered their guns. Albright waved me forward and led me through the warehouse, two of the squad falling out and following us. As we walked, Albright kept throwing glances at me.

“Are you taller?” He asked.

The warehouse was well-lit now. Hastily written spells were on every surface, shedding light in a cool, blue-white glow. People in vaguely military uniforms were helping the prisoners leave, bringing in gurneys, and doing emergency first-aid. I noticed they all had a crow emblem over their heart.

“A little,” I admitted. “It was a real shit-show down there, man.”

We exited the warehouse into early twilight. I had been expecting an emergency medical area to be set up right outside, but that was not the case. Prisoners were being loaded into buses and vans. The people who weren’t able to sit on their own were loaded into the latter, where they were able to lie down. The people in the worst condition were moved into the rare ambulance.

“What—“ I started, not being able to articulate my question.

“With the ritual continuing,” Albright explained as we started to walk down the long drive to the road. “We are evacuating as many people as we can.”

I nodded slowly. I frowned as I saw the personnel moving in and out of the warehouse. No one had been moving into the domain. The people I saw weren’t combat personnel.

“What about the prisoners in the domain?” I asked slowly, fearing I knew the answer.

I hadn’t noticed until now, but Albright’s shoulders were rigid with tension. He avoided looking at me. “We’re doing what we can.”

I glared at his back. I turned and looked at the two guards who were following us—following me. I looked past them at the warehouse.

“You aren’t going in for them,” I concluded, not bothering to hide my disdain.

Albright’s shoulders fell. “We’re doing what we can.”

“There’s hundreds, maybe thousands of people in there, Albright!”

His head snapped to me. “I know!” He nearly shouted. “I could feel every single one of them! But fighting an avatar in a collapsing domain would just get my men killed, along with the prisoners. Maybe if Jager were here, would could organize a rescue, but he is currently fighting another avatar in Brazil.”

He inhaled deeply, wrestling his emotions under control. “You helped us find this place early,” he gestured to the right, where I finally noticed a team of people drawing big designs into the dirt with one of those little carts they used to draw baseball diamonds. “Because of you, we can make preparations and maybe have a chance of containing this without Jager’s assistance.”

Whatever response I was about to give was interrupted by a bus barreling down the drive. It slowed just enough for the doors to open for the heavily tanned medic to hop out. As soon as his feet hit the pavement, the engine gunned and it shot down the drive to the warehouse.

“Bring him to the side of the road,” Calhoun instructed and I complied. I placed my brother on the ground, wishing I had something softer to lay him on. I stayed crouched next to him but scooched back when the man waved me away for space. The guards kept a respectful (and tactical) distance.

The leathery medic placed his hands on either side of Conner’s head. “Malnourished, lesions, lacerations…” He muttered, moving his hands from Conner’s head to other parts of his body.

“This kid should be dead,” Calhoun said. “But he isn’t, and now that he’s under my care, he won’t.” This last he said while meeting my eyes. I nodded shakily as the medic got to work.

He produced a silver flask and began to pour a thick, clear substance out, plopping big drops onto Conner’s forehead, the base of his neck, his sternum, his stomach, and one on each side of his hips. He put the flask aside and began to spread the goop with his fingers. “IV,” he demanded.

Albright held out his hand and suddenly a saline bag was in it. Calhoun took it and handed it to me while unspooling the tube from it. “Hold it up,” he said.

I lifted the bag to the height of my shoulder while Calhoun attacked the crook of Conner’s elbow with an alcohol wipe, going through four of them before he was satisfied it was clean. I looked away when he was inserting the needle. (Look, I can confront demons, guns, and horrors of the unknown—but needles squick me out. I’m always afraid I’m going to move wrong and snap them off.)

When I looked back, Calhoun had placed both his hands on Conner’s chest. A golden glow like a Sunday afternoon emanated from his hands, soaking into the stuff he had spread on my brother. After several minutes, the glow began to seep into Conner, and I watched in awe as his wounds began to close and color returned to his pallid cheeks.

With a grunt, Calhoun removed his hand, but the glow remained on Conner. Calhoun gestured something at Albright, and the blonde man produced a stretcher.

“Let’s get him to the field hospital,” Calhoun said. Together, we gently lifted Conner on the stretcher. Albright moved to take one side of the stretcher, but I stopped him by handing him the IV. He took it from me, and though he tried to hide it, I saw his relief. He must be dog-tired.

I took the back end of the stretcher. Calhoun grunted as we lifted my brother, and I silently marveled that I barely felt the weight. Conner had lost a lot of weight in his captivity, but he was still over six feet tall and had been athletic. I should feel some strain from lifting him.

We began to walk towards the road. “How long were we in there?” I asked.

“About forty-five minutes for myself and the squad,” Albright replied. “You were in there for a little over two hours.”

My eyebrows shot up. I glanced behind at the warehouse, at all the vehicles. Impressive organization in such a short time. How the hell had they gotten so many people here? Did they teleport all of them?

We exited the warehouse property. I frowned as I realized Alice’s Prius was nowhere to be seen. The field hospital was across the highway, which I felt was dangerous until I noticed there was no traffic except for the arrival of buses, vans, and ambulances. Someone had removed the divider of the highway to allow traffic to move unhindered from the field hospital to the warehouse drive.

Calhoun didn’t stop, taking us across the highway and into the cluster of pavilions that housed so many ill and injured people. People in various states of dress, from office wear to nurse uniforms, were moving amongst the patients and rendering aid.

Calhoun found an empty cot, but instead of setting the stretcher down beside it, just put it down on the cot itself. Once it settled, Albright handed me the IV and touched the stretcher, which vanished. He then produced a pole to hang the IV.

“Thank you,” I said to them both, fighting back tears as the realization that Conner was finally safe hit me like a rock slide. “I mean it.”

Calhoun smiled and did some final checks on Conner. Albright opened his mouth but was interrupted.

“Colm!”

I turned and found Ida running at me, who stopped short when she got a good look at me, her eyes widening in horror.

“I’m fine,” I said quickly. “None of it’s mine.” Which might not be true, as I had been injured earlier. But she didn’t need to know that.

Suddenly her caution evaporated and she leapt at me. I caught her as she wrapped her legs around my hips, heedless of the blood, and kissed me with such passion I was afraid my lips would ignite. I was thankful that my face was much cleaner than the rest of me.

She suddenly paused, leaving me breathless, as she looked at me and then at the ground. She frowned. “Are you taller?”

“A bit,” I admitted, trying not to glance at Albright. “I went through some shit.”

“When their squad came out without you, nearly dead, I was so worried,” she said, squeezing me with a full-body hug. “I thought—” she left the rest unsaid.

“I’m fi—I’m alive,” I corrected. “I’ll—I’ll need to process everything. It—“ my voice hitched.

“It was bad in there,” I said quietly.

Ida pressed her forehead against mine. “Well, you’re back. And your brother?”

I leaned back and gestured at the man in the cot I was standing beside. Ida suddenly realized where she was and slipped off me with a slightly embarrassed expression, wincing at the blood on her clothes, but she shoved aside her concern to study my brother. “You found him!”

I nodded. “He’s in bad shape, but I think he’s going to recover?” I turned to Calhoun.

The weathered medic nodded. “He’ll be weak for weeks, maybe months, but his main problems are muscle atrophy and malnutrition. The spell I worked on him is one of the gentler ones and will put the least strain on his natural resources, but it’ll still be there. The upside is that it’ll continue to work on him for the next two to three days, stabilizing him and reducing his recovery.”

“Thank you,” I said again. “Thank you so much.”

Calhoun gave me a tired smile, that broke when he glanced at Albright. “I got to get back to work,” he said abruptly, walking away.

I glanced at Albright, then behind me. More guards had shown up. I sighed.

“I guess you have some questions for me,” I said.

“I’m going to need you to submit to a mental probe,” Albright said. Now that I wasn’t solely focused on my brother, I could see the tension in Albright wasn’t due to him being tired. He was geared for a fight.

I went to put my thumbs through my belt loops, which is when what remained of my pants ripped and fell apart. They fell to the ground in a wet “plat.” I sighed and placed my hands on my hips. “Blow me.”

Albright bristled, and I continued. “I said we’d talk after my brother was safe, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to let you root around in my head like the bargain bin at Walmart. And I think you know my character well enough at this point that I’m not some sinister villain who’s doing dastardly deeds behind everyone’s back.” At least, not to people who don’t deserve it.

I felt Ida slowly move to the side. If you didn’t know her, you might think she was creating space between us to separate herself from the argument. But I did know her, and I knew how good she was in a fight. She was clearing the lines of fire as best she could. Which wasn’t much, as there were people all around us.

“Don’t make this difficult, Mr. Avery,” Albright said in what I assumed was his cop voice. “There are many things about you that don’t add up, and it would greatly benefit you to aid me in doing so.”

“Am I being arrested?” I asked.

“Not yet,” Albright said. “But I will if I have to.”

I nodded slowly. I lifted a hand and pointed outside the pavilion. “Why don’t we continue this conversation over there, away from all these injured and ill people.”

“I can’t let you do that,” he said, unsubtly shifting closer to my brother.

I regarded him silently for several seconds. “You don’t want to do that,” I said, quietly.

“We have rules for a reason, Mr. Avery,” Albright said. “And even if you have aided us, we must all be made accountable—“

“That’s not what I’m talking about, and you know it,” I interrupted.

Albright stared me down. Luckily, the confrontation was cut short by someone screaming Albright’s name. We both turned as Kristy ran up.

“The ritual’s complete,” she gasped, clearly having run herself ragged.

Albright looked like he aged several years over the next few seconds. He gave me a look that could melt steel before sighing. He shook his head and walked away, beginning to bark orders at the guards. Kristy gave me an up-and-down look, giving Ida an approving nod before turning and chasing after Albright.

I let out a breath I’d been holding, a sudden wave of adrenaline with no outlet making my hands shake. Ida came over and took one in both of hers. “Are you okay?” She asked.

“No,” I said. I opened my mouth to say more but nothing came. I shook my head violently. “Where’s Alice?”

“She went with her brother to see if they could get her car working,” she said. “Tony said he knows a few tricks to make cars run when they shouldn’t, though he wasn’t sure if it’d work on a hybrid. I’ll call her.”

Ida pulled out her phone and began dialing.

“Is it working?” She said after a minute. “Great. That’s good. Yes. Colm wants to speak to you.”

I heard Alice’s excited and slightly angry shouting as Ida winced and handed me the phone. I guess Alice wanted her to lead with that.

“Hi,” I said to interrupt her shouting. “I’m fine and I got Conner out, but we need to get the fuck out of Dodge. Elysium is going to fight the Doorman’s little brother.”

“Yeah sure—wait what? What the fuck?” Alice said, and I could practically see her do a double-take.

“I’ll explain once we’re in person, but bring the car up to the highway where they set up the pavilions,” I instructed.

“I—yeah, okay. Glad you’re safe. Talk to you soon.”

“Back at you,” I said and handed Ida her phone back. “Grab his IV,” I told her, indicating my brother.

“He’s as big as you,” she said, moving to the other end of the cot. “I don’t know if I can hold the IV and help… oh.”

She stopped as she watched me lift my brother—cot and all—into the air without much effort. Luckily it was a steel frame and didn’t flex much as I lifted it. Ida hurried to unhook the IV bag from the pole and held it above Conner’s chest as I began walking toward the highway.

Alice was waiting for us when we got to the highway. She had changed shirts, but I could see evidence of her wound in the bloodstains at the top of her pants. Tony climbed out of the passenger seat. Unlike his sister, he was still wearing the same clothing, and his front was thoroughly stained with blood.

“Oh my God,” Alice said as she laid eyes on me. Her eyes widened when she saw me carrying my brother. “Is that him? Of course, that’s him—look at that chin.”

I glanced down. Oh yeah. We had the same chin.

“Help me get him in the back,” I said.

They helped me get him into the back. The car was too small to lay him down in the back seat, so he carefully sat him down with Ida next to him holding up the IV. I stood and turned to Alice, who ended up next to me.

“Take him back to LA,” I said. “He has a slow healing spell on him that should heal him through the drive, but he needs medical attention and care.”

“Why the fuck are you talking like you aren’t coming?” Alice demanded.

I sighed. “Because something similar to the Doorman is being born under that warehouse, and the guy strong enough to take him down is currently fighting another one in Brazil. This is like when the Doorman got loose on the island. If it isn’t stopped here and gains power, it’ll have access to the entire universe. No one will be safe.”

“You barely escaped the Doorman!” Alice pleaded. “What makes you think you can fight this thing?”

“First thing; I don’t know if I can. I just know I have to try,” I said with a sad smile. “Second; I got a bit of a power boost while I was gone.”

I found a rock with my magic and pulled it into my hand. I squeezed it. I was planning on gradually increasing the pressure of the squeeze until it shattered, but it shattered far sooner than I expected. Alice, Tony, and Ida’s (she was leaning out of the car by now) eyebrows rose in surprise.

“Oh, in case I die,” I said, looking Alice in the eye. “I need you to call Trix so she doesn’t take my soul.”

Alice had started to comment on my increased strength, her words caught in her throat at the mention of her great times whatever grandma. “What?!”

“I owed her a favor for saving me last time, and I told her I’d guilt trip you into calling her if she agreed to deal with me,” I said, unable to layer the humor into the words that I’d been intending. “I wouldn’t call it a good deal but it was… potent.”

Alice studied my face. “What happened down there?”

I tried to smile reassuringly but it didn’t happen. “A lot. Give her a call, please.”

Alice gave a slow nod. “Sure.”

Ida grabbed Tony through the broken window and made him take the IV before crawling through the car to where I was. “You can’t leave us again,” she said, pissed.

“Someone’s got to stop this thing,” I said. “I’ve seen what Elysium can bring to bear, and it’s a lot, but… not enough. Unless they have an ace up their sleeve and I’m worried about nothing.” I turned and looked at the warehouse, barely visible in the fading light and my nearsightedness. Struck by a sudden thought, I adjusted my vision using my newly clarified ability to modify my body, watching the warehouse suddenly come into focus. Oddly, that little breakthrough just reaffirmed my decision. I looked down at Ida.

“I’ve been kind of building myself up for a fight like this for the past decade, Ida,” I said. “Sure, I can go with you guys and probably keep us all safe… but what about everyone else? Do I want to do that, knowing I could have stopped what’s about to happen?”

“You don’t know they’ll need your help,” Ida argued, but she knew it was a weak one.

“If they don’t, then I’ll skip out and get myself out of Dodge. I’ll find a payphone and you can come drag my ass away,” I said as I put a hand on her shoulder. “But I need you guys and Conner out of here.”

She nodded and looked like she was going to go in for another hug until she realized I was still covered in blood. She looked like she was about to go “the hell with it” but was interrupted as Alice, Tony and my head snapped toward the warehouse.

A ton of magic had just started to gather.

“It’s starting,” I said, chivying Ida into the car. “Go, go, go! Get out of here and get safe.”

Tony gave me a nod before getting back into the car. Alice slammed her door closed and glared at me through the broken driver's side window. “Goddamnit, you’re—you’re like, my only friend. Don’t fucking die.”

“Don’t plan on it,” I said. I slapped the roof of the car. “Now go!”

I expected the engine to rev, but the little car just glided silently onto the highway. Oh, right. Hybrid.

I inhaled deeply through my nose and let it out.

As I strode back toward the warehouse and the growing activity in the desert surrounding it, I wished I wasn’t walking toward my likely death without fucking pants.