"You're SURE this will work?" Rythian asked nervously, examining the complex mechanism in front of him for the umpteenth time.
"Yes!" Duncan replied, slightly patronizing. "For Christ's sake Rythian, you, Sjin and I have all checked it over a hundred times, the simulations check out and, if you'll stop worrying so there's less adrenalin in your blood, the machine'll be able to reverse the destruction of the end, which should destroy the pest problem."
"That 'pest problem' as you so innocently put it destroyed the end and turned it's inhabitants into monsters." Scowled Rythian. Then, to himself, with any luck, I'll see you again soon, mother.
"Where's Sjin?" Duncan frowned suddenly. "I thought he was going to be here?"
"Maybe something came up?" Rythian doubted the words as soon as they were out of his mouth. The village was too quiet for Sjin to have become distracted, even if he'd run into Zoe during one of her... mushroom whispering moments. The two friends glanced at each other, hesitantly. "Maybe I should go look for him?"
"No, no. Nooo. That's really not a good idea. If you stop pouring your magic into the machine, it could backfire." Duncan sighed heavily. "I'll have to go and look for him. Everything should be okay if you just stay still." He leapt into the air, and for a moment Rythian wondered if the technomage was using his jetpack or flying ring. Then he heard them. The distant, hated gurgles of the transformed citizens of the end, twisted beyond recognition by her.
She couldn't know, could not have found out now, when he was so close to getting his mother back... but the tell-tale purple sparks were starting to appear at the corners of his vision, and it took all of Rythian's will to keep his arms outstretched over the machine that was now useless, all because Sjin hadn't shown up... a sudden explosion made the enderborn jump in alarm- the proximity was worryingly close- but he knew that the endermen didn't use such things. It was probably just someone testing a new weapon.
Then he started to smell the smoke, and his purple eyes widened in shock. Duncan's roof was ablaze, and the two scientists were hovering in the air above it- for a moment he was convinced that the endermen must've ignited Duncan's roof to lure the two friends away from the machine that he, Rythian, was now struggling to power... and then came the unwanted remembrance that the endermen feared fire more than any other being, because they could not quench the flames in water... and then the two friends were duelling like demons, science and magic thrown against each other randomly, mining laser, ring of fire, the momentary flash of red matter grinding against nano-sabre... he saw Zoe's beloved mushroom ignite, and began to hear the agonised yells of his friends, trapped inside their burning houses, and he couldn't understand what had happened, why, now, Duncan and Sjin had chosen to hurl their powers at each other in a combined fit of madness.
The screams of his friends became too much to bear. The enderborn gave one, last, agonised look at the machine that would've saved his race, and suddenly wondered, in a fit of inexplicable fury, why Duncan hadn't designed it better, why Sjin hadn't found a way to power it without he, Rythian, having to hold out his hands like a zombie, why he couldn't save both his people and his friends...
He took off as fast as he could, racing towards Zoe's burning 'shroom...
The flow of magic to the machine was abruptly cut off...
He thought he caught a momentary gleam of purple, deep in Sjin's vacant eyes as he sped past...
And suddenly he was falling uncontrollably, an explosion the likes of which he'd never known, which his predictable, unchaotic magic could never have created detonating all around him...
But, even as he fell into the burning crater below him, he didn't feel angry...
One simple question burned through his mind, even as his magic backfired, because of Sjin and Duncan and their stupid, unreliable machine...
A question that, a year later, in the new world, face to face with the scientist again, a red and blue forcefield keeping him from strangling the blond bastard, Rythian asked.
"Do you realise that what you did in the old world is actually something that requires retribution, and justice?"
"Retribution?" The scientist replied, a chaotic gleam of madness barely visible in his goggled eyes. "Can't I just say 'sorry!'"