Cords of black energy stretched the joints in her arms, shoulders, legs, knees, and ankles to near breaking as they held her far above the battle. Lion-O/Lea (still unsure of what name was truly hers) looked down in horror that the tendrils about her throat choked off. Tears slid down her cheeks at the sight of the woman (Cheetara, she loves you...) fighting for her life as similarly bound copies of herself attacked her with knives and clumsy thrusts. Cheetara parried each blow, her body twisting and turning frantically to move her between assaults.
"She is brave," Alluro whispered into her ear, "but I wonder how long she can keep this up?"
"Let me go, you bastard!"
"No. I like your mind right where it is. Beneath my heel." Lion-O's gaze was then locked forcibly on Cheetara's increasingly desperate struggles.
Dodge. Evade. Strike. Backflip. Cheetara began to gasp from the effort of dodging the Lion-O clones which kept trying to turn her into a shish-ke-bab. Muscles she did not possess in this plane burned from the effort of keeping ahead of each thrust of knife. Their efforts were clumsy, yet numerous, and the sheer amount of assaults to her person made up for the lack of skill.
I can't keep this up, she thought as she desperately felt for Lion-O's mind. I'm playing right into Alluro's hands. A stinging pain streaked her side where a knife found slight purchase, yet she resisted the urge to slap a palm to it. Blood trickled down her right side from the shallow cut as she parried blows from two puppets to dodge away from a third near her back.
Puppets, she thought, that's all these are! A plan formed, quick and desperate, but it was her only chance.
"Oh, look at her go!" Alluro cried in delight, far above the battle. "Not gonna lie, this is giving me SUCH wood right now!" He tightened the coils about the female Lion-O's throat just enough to render speech impossible. "Look at her. Fighting so desperately for you. Not killing any of them for fear of killing you, even though I could summon ten for each she takes down! Ah, love." Alluro cast a cruel look at the bound Lion-O, revelling in her pain. "It truly does make fools of us all." Far below, Cheetara dashed in a circle that left several of the Lion-O images flat. She stood amidst the recovering bodies, panting in exhaustion as one rose up behind her. Lion-O fought for all she was worth, her scream a strangled croak as the copy of herself rose, readied the dagger, and struck.
Her heart froze in mid-beat as the blade exited Cheetara's chest just below her sternum. Cheetara siezed as if in the grip of an electric shock just before the crimson-stained blade retracted through her chest.
"And that, as they say, is that," Alluro's smug voice sang in her ear. Horror and fury warred for control as Cheetara fell to the ground. Lion-O could not tear her eyes away from the ocean of blood pooling beneath the chest of the woman she loved. Memories rushed back, repelling the lies she had begun to believe. Cheetara's body faded into ether, lost in the nether spaces of thought.
"DAMN YOU!" she cried at the top of her lungs, fury waging war with despair.
"Oh, come now, you don't even know who she was," Alluro said with a smug smirk on his face. "You don't know ANYTHING for sure anymore! But, I will fix that. Oh, yes."
She felt his invasive presence once more, hammering at the flimsy walls she had erected.
"Please, such a feeble defense," Alluro purred. "Just give in, already! You KNOW you can't... win?" The tide against her thought faded as the Lunattak cast his eyes about. "What in the..."
"It was a good try," Cheetara's voice said from the nothingness. "Miserable failure, but a nice try."
"What is this shit...?"
"Did you think you were the ONLY one who knew how to wage a war of the mind?" her voice demanded, its thundering boom filled with equal parts mocking and scorn. Lion-O looked up and her jaw dropped open in astonishment. Alluro followed her gaze as Cheetara, fifty feet tall and glowing a brilliant gold, strode into view.
"Oh, fuck me..." Alluro choked as her leg raised.
"On the battlefield of the mind," she began, "MINE IS SUPERIOR!" Lion-O felt as if she were growing ever more detached as the giant woman's foot (her name is... her name... is...) struck the floor with tremendous force directly atop Alluro (Allu Ro?). The shockwave from the impact hammered into her with savage force, blowing her back across the nothingness to land sliding on her bare back. The fog cleared slightly, the burning in her chest faint despite the fading whirl of her thoughts. Lion-O was no longer acutely aware of herself submerging, drowning in the blank white which seeped into her slowly.
Cheetara knew her boast was hollow, panting as she willed herself to what she perceived was her normal height and dashing to Lion-O. The other woman lay on her back, taking deep gulps of air and staring out with a growing look of vacancy in her eyes.
"Lion-O!" she snapped, grasping the other woman by the shoulders and yanking her roughly upward. "LION-O!" Sitting there in her arms, limp and without will, Lion-O merely stared ahead. Ice gripped Cheetara's heart as she felt Lion-O's mind slowly fade. "No, no, DAMNIT LISTEN TO ME!" she shrieked, grasping Lion-O's jaw and forcing their eyes to meet. "This is YOUR mind!" she shouted, increasingly desperate. "Alluro only has what control you give him!"
"Yeah, just keep telling yourself that." Cheetara looked over her shoulder as the ruined spot swirled and reformed into Alluro, his smug expression still firmly in place. "I am impressed, by the way. Attack of the Fifty-Foot Cheetara. Priceless!" He stepped forward languidly, clearly in no hurry. "Don't bother trying to reach her. The doubts I placed in her mind are like computer viruses," Alluro explained. "Always expanding. Hell, I give her about five minutes before she becomes an empty vessel. Ripe for re-molding." Cheetara was unable to dodge the black tendril which rapidly snaked up her arms and legs, hoisting her into the air. Their grip was harder than steel, colder than ice. "It's only a matter of time," he began, "before I leave her an empty vessel. Killing you will only speed that along." Cheetara could offer no resistance as the onyx tendrils snaked about her limbs and hoisted her upright.
"He only has what power you give him," she said as her limbs were painfully constricted, her ribs crushed to near breaking. "REMEMBER THAT!" She reached out with her heart on saying those words.
"Keep talking," Alluro said. "Talk all you want. Her mind is MINE! What little resistance is there is... is..." Alluro let his focus fall away from Cheetara. "Oh, shit..."
The words struck deep within her, reverberating in crystal clear waves through her mind, her soul, casting light were shadows had formed. Memories began to return, her will rallying forth and gaining strength. She felt something, bright and hot, deep in herself stir to life and fill her with vigor and strength. Alluro's choking grip on her mind lessened by degrees, his iron bondage losing strength. She could feel his mounting desperation as he doubled his efforts, and found another source of strength, of love and life, and a name burned in her mind like the sun. Cheetara.
Lion-O opened her eyes and cast a disdainful look at the dark tendrils that bound her. With an effort of will, she cast them aside, shattering them into jagged shards that faded to smoke. She glanced up, and the tendrils trying to crush Cheetara fell to the same fate. The Cheetah landed easily, looking back at her with gratitude and love.
"I knew you'd do it," she said, ver voice choked with relief. "I love you."
"Oh, for the love of SHIT!" Alluro cried. "Do you really think you can fight me off? Neither of you has the power to match me!"
"Not alone," Lion-O said.
"But together, blah, blah, blah." He inreased his efforts further, straining her newly-regained control. "You even think you have home-field advantage. Guess, what? I damn near BROKE you! You think I can't do it again?!"
"You will NOT!"
"Yeah. Sure. Keep telling yourself that," Alluro snarled. She felt Cheetara step behind her, the other woman's arms sliding about her shoulders, her chin in Lion-O's cascade of hair and, most of all, Cheetara's heart joining hers in the struggle against Alluro. She thrust her hands outward as Cheetara's power, her love, her light, flowed inside.
Yet, it wasn't enough. The cold, malevolent power backing Alluro increased its pressure, a wall of darkness pressing against a now-visible shimmering golden barrier. Through their gestalt, he felt Cheetara weakening alongside her, their reserves of strength failing fast.
(Don't give up,) Cheetara thought.
(I won't. Never.) Lion-O focused on the image, seeing it as clearly as if it were in her hand, the Sword of Omens appearing in her right a moment later.
"Oh, that's just too cute," Alluro mocked. "A memory of your sword." Lion-O ignored him, feeling Cheetara's memories streaking through herself, understanding on a level neither could achieve alone. And smiled.
Residue from the fire extinguisher coated the ruined monitor arch above their heads, the coating melted and still sparking in places. Pumyra shoved it away with a snarl, now reduced to a handscanner that lacked the capacity to analyze brain waves and neural firing patterns. Lion-O and Cheetara still lay side-by-side, unmoving yet coated in a slick sheen of sweat. She glanced down at the scanner.
"Heart rates are through the roof!" she cried. "Respiration is erratic! Pulse... I don't even want to say it!" Lion-O's right arm rose from her side, palm up and fingers outstretched as a surge of energy, invisible and silent yet tangible all the same, pushed them back from her bed. A small portion the bedchamber's far wall exploded outward, a streak of silver resolving into the Sword of Omens settling neatly into her palm. Lion-O's fingers curled about the blade, which grew to battle length with a mighty growl from the Eye which resonated with each ThunderCat in the room.
"She's calling us," Tygra said.
"How do we get in?" Panthro asked. "Stand in a circle and hold hands?"
"At this point, why not?" WilyKit replied. They stood around Lion-O's bed, each ThunderCat clasping hands with the other and a wave of power washed through them from the Eye, unlike any they had ever felt before.
The Sword grew hot in her hand, and she felt them from the outside reaching in, filling her with power and fire. The failing barrier flared a brilliant white before exploding outward, banishing the darkness and leaving Alluro exposed.
"Seems Mumm-Ra ducked out on you," she snarled as Cheetara stepped beside her. The power of her friends, of her love, roared in her veins and flames licked at the Sword's blade. Cheetara looked down at her own hand in surprise to find an identical Sword of Omens in her grip. "You hurt me," Lion-O said in a low voice. "You twisted my thoughts. You bent me to your will and tried to break me." With each word, she and Cheetara took another step forward. "But, you didn't come NEAR the core of me. Of who I am and what I believe."
"You... you can't DO THIS!" Alluro screamed.
"Know what? You never would have, either," Lion-O went on. "Sure, you might have mind-screwed me, but you would NEVER have gotten to that part of me. Not with all the ones I love with me. They showed me that light, and I will never lose sight of it again." With that, she charged forward, the blazing fires of the Sword glowing white-hot, Cheetara keeping pace and her own blade following suit. Their steps quickened to a run, closing in on Alluro with Swords raised high, and their voices cried out in unison. "Thunder! Thunder! THUNDER!"
The encircled ThunderCats heard the cry and echoed it with the two trapped in the spaces of the mind. "THUNDERCATS!"
"HO!" Lion-O and Cheetara screamed as one, their blades passing through Alluro in a manner that would make a hot knife through butter envious. The ended their charge on one knee, their blades dipped at opposite angles as Alluro flew apart with a scream of torment. His presence vanished moments later.
Alluro, suspended above the cauldron, screamed in agony just before the entire stone base exploded in a shower of stone fragments that hammered Mumm-Ra off his feet. His back slammed into the closed lid of his sarcophagus, nearly blacking him out. He opened his ember-like eyes a moment later, surverying the damage.
The cauldron was destroyed, utterly useless. The puddle ran between lines of mortar in the stone floor of the Tomb Chamber, tinged with red. He looked about, finding Alluro in a rather sorry, to mean dead, state. A long fragment of the orb from his Psych Club lay embedded in his right eye, dripping blood that had splashed against it. Even if that had not killed the Lunattak, the unnatural angle of his neck would also have done the job. Alluro had landed agains the upper facade of his sarcophagus chamber, if the massive bloodstain were any indicator.
"Ma-Mutt," he said, weak from the effort of the night's magic. The hound appeared at once. "Deal with that," Mumm-Ra said before shuffling toward his sanctuary. "And when you are done, do your business in the sands outside." Mumm-Ra trudged toward the sarcophagus, weary as the sound of Ma-Mutt rapidly masticating the remains of Alluro filled the air. It had been a good plan, and once again the Eye of Thundera had ruined it. "She will come to me, now," he said, knowing that this would be the result. "I will let her rest. Recover. Best to break an enemy when they are at the peak of their strength. As I must be, as well." The stone lid closed, blocking out the sounds of Ma-Mutt enjoying fresh meat.