Chapter 47: Bedlam (Patreon)

Chapter 47: Bedlam

“Fly my pretties!” Klarion cackled. “Fly!” The mammoths smashed forward, tusks scything the air. The Witch Boy’s black lightning crackled over their bodies. Fate slipped through the gap. A barrier of translucent gold formed around him as the beasts smashed together. The sudden shift in pressure shot my body forward like a cork from a bottle, slamming shield first into Klarion.

The Witch Boy laughed, cartwheeling away. Before Fate could follow a hind leg took him in the chest. I gasped, wind driven out of my spiritual lungs as my body slammed into the wall. Fate rose back into the air unruffled. A wave of force did nothing but push the massive elephants back a half step as beams of gold and red arced through the air.

Another spear of pain lanced through my shoulder. Fate was an easy target, with the mammoths monopolizing he ground. And I was the one hurting from every hit he let through. 

“Do you like my new pets?” Klarion called. “Aren’t they so cute?”

A row of Ankhs formed in the air, sending crimson fire wide. It looked like a massive wall; I could feel the insane amount of mana sustaining it.

“Your abominations of magic and science are of no consequence,” Fate said. With a flick of his wrist, the wall of gold washed downward, each ankh growing larger with each second until they filled the room. I felt my eyes dilate as the rush of new information hit.

The spell itself, on the other hand, smashed into the rune scarred mammoths and shattered like so much glass.

“The lady does protest too much!” Klarion called back. “Here, see? They even do tricks!” He flicked the reins, an arc of electricity racing up to the thing’s collar. With a trumpeting bellow, it leapt into the air. 

“One!” Klarion shouted.

I cursed as Fate streaked to the side, ten tons of surging muscle crushed past us. I felt putrid wind and ozone wash over my senses.

“And Two!”

Fate didn’t dodge the second.

Instead, he caught the charge on a glowing dome, but no amount of mystic force could hold back the sheer weight of the beast. We were hurled backwards in the air, golden shield cracking and breaking. Hitting the wall hard enough to dent.

I screamed as Klarion’s runes made contact with my skin.

I smelled my own burning flesh.

Golden energy exploded out of my skin. This, finally, had enough force to throw the mammoth backwards. It hit the ground with an earth shaking crash. Cracks spread out across the floor, matching the ones on the wall behind Fate.

From the corners of my eyes, I could see that Fate’s golden raiment had been blackened by Klarion’s magic. As I watched, scraps of light fell from the cloak, evaporating in the air. Within seconds the damage had vanished.

The sight did not increase my confidence. Nor did Klarion’s smile on the ground below.

“Not a bad job, old man!” the Witch Boy shouted as his mammoths rallied around him again. They looked no worse for the wear from the fall. “But how long can you keep it up, huh?”

Fate floated in the air, arms crossed imperiously. “Your tricks will do you no good, Witch Boy,” Fate said.

Klarion hummed. “Aww, is someone jealous of my new toys?” he said. “You should be, you know. I only had to sacrifice a ten people for each!”

I felt something cold in my chest at his casual admission. “For each Mammoth?” I asked. Fate didn’t repeat my question, but Klarion elaborated regardless.

“Oh, I see what you’re thinking there!” he said. “A measly ten mortals per monster? That’s small potatoes.” He cackled, mammoth’s pawing at the ground angrily. “No, I mean ten people for each rune!” 

I stiffened, and I could even feel Fate’s revulsion roiling in the Plane of Order. Klarion cackled. “Did that—did that one tweak your nose, Fatey?” he asked. “Does it burn? Oh wait, It already did! The soul, the most important part of Hell Fire.”

Suddenly, the lack of personal in the labs took on a much more sinister cast. A cold part of me said that they’d chosen their fate, working with Klarion, but… how many even knew what they were getting into? I bit my lip, struggling with the tumult of emotions. My power nudged me, but this body… it wasn’t real. It was simply an echo. As I realized the horror Klarion had committed here, a horror I maybe could have prevented had I donned the helm immediately, my control over that echo began to slip.

Fate on the other hand, said nothing. Klarion’s words didn’t even give him a second’s pause. Instead he renewed his assault in the midst of Klarion’s echoing laughter.

Once again, the mammoths played perfect defense, soaking up Fate’s spells while Klarion launched fire and claws out from behind their protection.

“Do you still balk at what must be done?” Fate asked me. I bowed my head. “Do you still think to occlude our connection for your illogical pride, in the face of this foe?”

I glanced over, to where the representation of my power sat, still offering me the ability to take control of my body. In the outside world, Klarion and Fate traded spell fire. It looked almost even, but I felt each blow my body suffered. The pain was clarifying, but even still…

“I told you,” I said. “I’m not the one blocking the joining.” I could no more cut off my power than I could excise my own magic.

“I tire of your reticence.”

I held back a growl. “Then use my magic!” I shouted. “Klarion has a hard counter for Order Magic, so stop pretending that you don’t have a whole other type on—”

“Be silent.” Fate said, and I found myself voiceless. “Your kind upsets the balance of the material plane with your very existence.”

I nearly flinched at the cool anger in his voice.

“You rend magic from the worlds you set foot upon. Each of these spells places a stone on the scales of order, and threatens to bring them crashing down.”

“What?”

In the outside world, Fate twisted my body around a flurry of crimson orbs, focusing on defense for a moment. “I have seen your memories,” the embodiment of order continued. “The records of this ‘Remedi’ and her experiments. Does it not seem strange to you that, in the middle of her research the multiverse itself shifted, as if teetering on the brink of collapse?” Images flashed across my eyes, skies torn asunder, worlds colliding as planar walls collapsed, time twisting back on itself. Things, I sensed, that were once possible but now no longer. “The Walkers of Planes doomed all worlds to oblivion with their chaotic selfishness.” Fate said “How this doom was averted I do not know, but even now, I feel the wounds your kind carves into creation.”

I swallowed at that. At once, I remembered how I forced connections with the land on the Kabane’s plane. The agony, which I’d thought was wholly internal, took on a more sinister cast now. Was I the one in pain, or was it the newly claimed energy roiling torturously in my chest.

“You begin to see,” Fate said.

But even then, I knew there were more Planeswalkers running around. “I haven’t seen any danger of the entirety of everything teetering on the brink of collapse this time around,” I said. I felt like I was drowning. Did Fate need to tell me this now? “You’re fighting a Lord of Chaos here. Isn’t…a lesser evil the better choice?”

“A drop of chaos is no less objectionable, for being a single drop,” came Fate’s reply.

Something twisted in my breast at his words. Objectionable was I? The edges of my vision turned red, and I felt my objectionable mana swirling inside me. The Plane of Order recoiled from my rage.

But then Klarion spoke. “When did you get so boring, Fatey?” he asked, massive elephants stepping to the side. “Don’t you want to play with my pets? I got them just for you, you know!”

“Your taunts are simplistic in the extreme,” Fate said. “Vanish.”

Fate raised my arms, and the stagnant wind in the room began to swirl. I felt the spell dig deep. The rage inside me sparked out as Fate called every drop of potential my body held.

A storm roared into being, screaming where it brushed against the foul runes that lined the walls. Arcs of white mana built up overhead, like nascent bolts of lightning. Klarion covered his eyes, and even his pets stumbled back from the display of power.

Then Klarion laughed, and I felt a something cold form a pit in my stomach.

“Now, now!” he said. “Let’s not be too hasty there!”

“Your pleas will not stay Fate’s hand.”

“Oh, really? But what if I wasn’t talking about mine?” Klarion said. “Hey, Brain in a jar, bring out the party favors?”

Another door, this one disguised as a wall, opened. Beyond it, I caught a glimpse of a robot. It looked like an upsized R2 unit, except for the human brain floating in a domed compartment set at the top. But that caught my attention only for a heartbeat.

As the brain in a jar rolled back out of sight, someone else rolled forward.

I recognized the simple brown suit and white shirt at once, but even still I gasped as Kent rolled into view, strapped to a metal platform. It held him down like a surgical table, bands of steel wrapped around his neck and twice for each limb.

He’d been used harshly. Even though his clothes were untouched, I could see scars on his face and neck. One eye was swollen shut, and his hair was plastered to his forehead. His good eye was shut. And I couldn’t tell if he was breathing.

I threw myself forward, only to crash into the ground. My real body didn’t move. “Help him!” I shouted. “God dammit! Fucking help him!”

Fate said nothing. I gasped, trying to get my emotions back under control, but they spiraled out of my grip. I shook my head frantically.

My power seemed so far away.

“What about his pleas, hmmmm?” Klarion asked. I swore explosively, straining, mana pulsing through me, as I tried to make Fate move.

“Fucking answer me, Fate!” I screamed.

Klarion waved his hand, and Kent’s body jerked. Electricity raced up and down his form. My heart leapt into my throat.

Then he coughed, eyes opening. Despite his horrible condition, he grasped the situation in an instant.

“Ah, sorry that you have to see me like this, Taylor,” he said. He gave a small smile. I sank to my knees. I could barely breathe. “Though, I remember you saying that you didn’t want the helmet.”

“Kent…” I whispered.

Klarion grinned. “Does that change your mind?” he said. “Huh? Huh? C’mon, you know you want to give up!”

Fate turned to look at his nemesis, then back at his erstwhile host. Kent’s smile didn’t change. “Sorry about this, old friend,” my mentor said. 

“Hey! Shut up, you old fossil!” Klarion said. He slashed his hand, and Kent jerked again. 

“Fate!” I shouted.

“It is unfortunate,” Fate said at last. Klarion’s lightning cut out. The storm began shrinking. And my head snapped up, eyes widening.

“The hell are you—”

“What does he now know?” Fate continued. My breath came faster as the storm continued to shrink—no, to compress.

Kent laughed. It was a pitiful, rasping sound. “Nothing much,” he said. “I’m a bit of a tough nut to crack, after all.” He coughed, eyes closing.

“No!” I shouted. “No, Kent! Fate, don’t—don’t do this!” Something pricked at the back of my mind.

“I suppose I brought this on myself,” Kent said.

My power. My power was still here…

“Should have been more happy with my retirement, but then, it was never in my nature to go quietly into the night.”

“Indeed,” Fate said. The storm began to roil, like a bomb waiting to explode. Wanting to explode.

But my body wasn’t here. I turned my attention back to the outside world…

“Hey, hey, HEY HEY HEY!” Klarion shouted. “What do you old fogies think you’re doing?”

Kent smiled. “Don’t mourn me,”

My body was out there.

The storm swelled.

Klarion howled. 

Then my fist collided with his face, wreathed in every drop of mana Fate had gathered.

The ground shattered beneath my feet.

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I'm back ladies and gentlemen. Sorry for the wait, end of the semester killed me a little, and thank you once again for your continued support!