Count Bleck paced the length of the office in an agitated manner.

"Nastasia, this is not good. I have checked the scrying glass and the alignments of the nodes. Ever since the ritual of the Marriage That Should Not Be was disrupted by that green-clad fool, my plans are in disarray!"

"What do you mean by that Master?" Nastasia said with a note of concern.

"That fool stamped on the Chaos Heart and changed the path of what is to happen. The chances of us successfully using Castle Bleck as the seed to a new world dwindles with every extra day he holds out and does not comply with his destiny, as it is laid out in the Dark Prognosticus."

"But Dimentio is with him now Master. Do you want me to send for him and ask why he hasn't done his job yet? He said he would have him ready by the end of the day and that was two days ago!" Nastasia exclaimed.

Nastasia made a gesture and Dimentio appeared.

"Like the smile of a raven at the outbreak of war I come bringing news O Master!"

Dimentio's voice held the cheerful ring of a grin. It was more the tone of voice as he wore the mask whenever he was outside of his private chamber.

"What do you have to say for yourself Dimentio?"Count Bleck said, his irritation mounting.

"We have a new minion. I managed to persuade the Man in Green to become our Man in Green. He agreed to take the seed! I told you that my private prison always changes minds. His was just a bit more intractable. Strange, he is not an obvious warrior but he held out for longest-".

"Enough Dimentio! My patience is failing! I needed to you ensure that he is alive and unharmed and will be ready to fight for us as soon as possible!" Count Bleck sighed, feeling like he was having to explain this to a child.

"But you also said that you cursed the foolish oaf and his clumsy attempt to save the Princess? You wanted him to pay for his trangression? Even though his actions confirmed that he was the one named in the Dark Prognosticus as the Protector of the Chaos Heart." Dimentio said in a tone of hurt innocence.

"Don't think I don't know you well enough to tell that you are stalling us! Take us to him now!" Count Bleck spoke through gritted teeth, struggling to keep his anger in check.

Dimentio, Nastasia and Count Bleck each gestured and with a CRACK disappeared from the office and into Dimentio's prison. They re-appeared in the cell, where the walls appeared to be hewn from the solid rock and it was dark, unlit apart from a faint luminescence that came from the air itself. Nastasia gasped, her hand flying up to her mouth as Count Bleck's expression hardened. He walked forward, and kneeled beside the man in green. His knee landed in a small puddle of blood.

The young man lay unconscious, face down on the rough floor the ropes that had bound him still wrapped around wrists and ankles. Blood soaked the sleeves of his shirt up to the elbows and had seeped through the thick twill of his trousers in places. He was breathing fitfully, and occasionally an involuntary grunt came from him. A rank smell of fear-sweat mixed with that coming from the toilet hole in the corner. Instinctively, Count Bleck reached for a hand and the Man in Green's sleeve fell back to reveal spiral shaped wounds seemingly open to the bone. Nastasia gasped again.

Count Bleck' s face paled with rage. "Dimentio, explain this?"

"Was torturing him really necessary?" Nastasia said, her voice wavering.

Count Bleck grabbed Dimentio by his poncho and hissed "Never do anything without my consent EVER AGAIN!"

"As you wish my lord" Dimentio said coolly.

"Dimentio! You got us into this mess, you can get us out of this but I will deal with you later! Nastasia and I must discuss what to do next. BEGONE!"

"As you wish my lord." Dimentio bowed and disappeared.

"He is in no fit state to fight now." Count Bleck said in a softer tone of voice. "I will need all of your medical expertise to get him ready for the role that fate has assigned him."

"How long do we have?" Asked Nastasia. "You were about to tell me before we summoned Dimentio?"

"We have maybe two weeks, three at the very most. If the Marriage ritual had not been disrupted I could control the growth of the Void. But now it is growing exponentially and if Castle Bleck collapses into the void, everything is doomed!"

"But look at him! Those wounds are serious! Even with the best care I could give him it will be a week before he could even feed himself!"Nastasia said despairingly.

Then her face froze. She remembered the device in the Infirmiry that Dimentio had bought on one of his trans-dimensional shopping trips. He said it was for O'Chunks, in case he kept on getting beaten up. She had never liked having it around and had wilfully tried to forget it was there. It somewhat resembled a coffin, but one which was around 2.5 meters long and 1 meter high and deep. It was supposed to speed up healing by immersing the patient in some sort of fluid. She remembered reading the instructions but it never sat right with her. Now it didn't look like there was a choice.

"I will see what I can do Master." She looked Count Bleck in the eye. "But I will need O'Chunks here now. I cannot carry him myself, I am afraid I will injure him still further."

"Very good Nastasia, I know I can count on you". Replied Count Bleck. Dimentio on the other hand - There was something about that jester that made his fists itch.

"Are you sure you want to do this lassie?" O'Chunks said to Nastasia as they stood in the bathroom in the Infirmary.

They had worked together in carrying Luigi to the Infirmary, cutting off his bloody clothes except where they had stuck to the wounds. O'Chunks had re-set his broken noise and dislocated shoulder. The resetting did not elicit more than a flinch from the man, as he was still deeply unconscious. Of course, prior to that she had administered a muscle relaxant, so that if he was to awaken he could not move and damage himself further. Afterwards, they placed him in a bath with antiseptic fluid to clean his wounds, before dressing him and putting him to bed.

"There is no other way. He cannot go into that chamber until he regains consciousness." Nastasia said. "The risk of axphexia - choking on vomit is very high if you put an unconscious patient in there!"

"Right you are lassie, Oh, and eh, I am still writing that essay -"

"Don't worry about that O'Chunks - I need to be seen to be keeping order, especially in front of Mimi. And Dimentio" Nastasia said with a wan smile.

"Aye, right you are. So that is why you're giving this a go?" O'Chunks pointed to the bucket in the bath, which was filled with a fluid which at first glance looked like water, but was actually something called perfluorocarbon, as written on the canisters. You were supposed to be able to breath when immersed in it. Only one way to find out. Nastasia took a deep breath.

"O'Chunks I am ready"

She knelt either side of the bucket and immersed her head. O'Chunks gently put firmly put his hands on the back of head and neck. She breathed out but this meant she had to breath the fluid in. She held her breath and the pressure on the back of her neck increased as she instinctively tried to lift her head out of the bucket. Eventually the urge to breathe in could not be resisted, her limbs flailing as she started to suck this slimy, chilly fluid down, coughing and gagging. Then, the coughing ceased and she found she was still breathing. It felt cold and strangely itchy, it felt slimy in her nose and throat. She gave O'Chunks a thumbs-up, her head fully submerge.

"It works O'Chunks." Her voice oddly deep.

He let go and she lifted her head out of the bucket, gagging and coughing as she coughed and spat out the fluid. O'Chunks handed her a towel and she rubbed her face with it. He looked uncharacteristically pale and shaken.

"Nassy, are you allright? I didn't hurt you?" O'Chunks said."No, you did fine, that's why I needed you." Nastasia said. But try as she might she could not fight the rising ball of dread in her chest.

"Oh O'Chunks!" She covered her face with her hands, her neatly-cut nails digging into the flesh of her cheeks. " I-I really felt I was going to drown! I have had enough of this!" She said, her voice beginning to hiccup with sobs. "I thought that the torture was over when we got him from that awful cell, but it has only just begun!"

O'Chunks said nothing, but held Nastasia as she wept. Count Bleck, he thought, you had better make this work or they'll be hell to pay!