EXPLANATION: ROSE'S LAST NAME.
Rose's current last name is the same as her family's, Ramirez, but in the original timeline (pre-Aztec Skulls) her surname was Underwood. Which is why the coded email she received in Chapter 14 The Candle named her as Underwood. It was a careful reference that someone who knows the real truth about everything that's gone on in their lives so far left for Rose, although she didn't notice at the time.
REMEMBER to read spells in reverse.
Enjoy.
Haley and Susan Long collapsed feet in front of the American Dragon.
"Mom! Haley!"
Thalia was already up and tried to blast the chains off the wall.
"Damn it... it must be laced with unicorn blood. It repels magical properties." Thalia muttered.
"Explains why I feel so faint." Jake admitted.
"We don't have time to waste." Rose said, slashing through the chains like they were made of butter and freeing Jake from his binds.
"Rose!" Jake yelled, running to her and hugging her. "You're okay."
"Mom... Haley." Jake remembered running over to them and trying to help them up. "You look drained."
"I'm fine..." Haley tried to stand up and passed out.
"Haley!" Jake caught her before she fell. "Spud give me a hand!"
Spud took Haley while Jake helped his mom into the giant jet Spud crash-landed into the complex.
"Honestly, i don't even know if this thing is gonna work. We might need to find a different way out of here." Spud confessed.
"Make it work, Spud." Jake said, going to get his grandfather, who had just been freed by Rose.
Spud nodded and went to his computer in the cockpit to check the status of the jet.
Rose helped Lao Shi to his feet as Jake got to them.
"Gramps, are you okay?"
"I wil be fine... ow..." He groaned, falling over.
"He's drained, he needs help. Thalia?"
But Thalia was still recuperating, herself.
"Laeh." Jake muttered, running his hands over a small space between him and his grandfather. "Laeh ruoy sdnuow."
Gramps passed out.
"He'll be fine, let's get him on the jet and get out of here." Rose said.
Jake nodded, "Right behind you."
Jake waited until everyone was on board before he went up the ramp himself.
Then he stopped.
"I'm tired of running... it has to be now."
Jake turned around and yelled,
"Dragon up!"
He blasted through the door with a fireball and flew as fast as he could, cutting around corners with his long flexible body, and using his dragon super strength to subdue any guards.
He grabbed one last guard and chucked him into the wall, blasting the door in front of him off the hinges with another burst of fire.
He flew in and reverted to his human form.
"HELEN!" He shouted, waking up the sleeping leader of the Night Warriors.
"How did you...? Guards!"
No one came in.
Jake cracked his knuckles.
"I can handle you by myself." She said, pulling some sort of firearm out from under her pillow.
"Mrasid." Jake muttered, waving his hand from the gun to the fireplace. The gun flew out of Helen's hand and into the raging fire. "Nuts!" He shouted, pointing forward and completely immobilizing Helen Grace Ramirez. "It doesn't have to be this way Helen. Don't serve Darkness, she's gonna destroy everything."
Jake felt a cold shiver down his spine right before he flew across the room and crashed into a portrait of Corporal Mace.
He cracked the ground and already he began to mutter, "Laeh... laeh."
"Haha." Darkness cackled, "Did you really think it would be this easy? Lay waste the guards, kill the Corporal, and lull me back into sleep? You're a bigger fool than I thought."
Jake grunted as he tried to get up.
"I'm gonna stop you." He told her.
"It is certainly possible," Darkness conceded, "But, you cannot halt me forever Jake Long. You can petrify me, stun me as you did my Corporal, or put me back to sleep... but you cannot kill me. I do not die. Every success you have is meaningless, because I am immortal. Older than the gods, Titans, and Primordials. I am the essence of evil, chaos, and power. I am eternal. You could defeat a hundred times in your lifetime and it will accomplish nothing."
"So let me guess, you want me to just make it easier on you... and let you win?"
"That would be as effective as prolonging the suffering of your race. For I promise you, fight me now... and I will make certain that humanity suffers far worse than when Pandora opened the jar. I will unleash devastation on your people for far longer than I intend too now. Surrender, and I will destroy the human race quickly... and without pain."
"Or... I could fight you until I figure out how to destroy you forever."
"If you discover how to destroy me, let me know. It will surely work on my counterpart."
"Yb ym rewop!" Jake shouted, unleashing the strongest spell he knew.
"You'll have to do better than that." Darkness chided, wading through the spell's energy like water.
"Ylf." Jake muttered, taking to the air in his human form. He dived to the right, "Retaw! Eci! Rednuht!"
A storm began to swirl, darkening the room.
"Dniw!" Jake shouted, waving his arms around so the wind would pick up.
The water and ice was covering Darkness, faster than she could destroy it. The thunder pounded in the sky.
"Ekirts!" Jake screamed, bringing both his arms down.
Lightning blasted the ceiling to smithereens and electrocuted Darkness with an amplified effect, leaving a singed smell in the room.
"Dnib! Dnib! Nuts. Nuts!" Chains began to bind Darkness, before she could even react. "Pmots."
Darkness was stomped on by an invisible foot three times... then four.
Jake put his hands together, separated by an imaginary tennis ball.
"Hsurc." Jake commanded, crushing his hands together with deliberate force.
Darkness's form contorted, crunching until it was the size of a beach ball.
"Nrub."
Darkness caught fire, screaming.
Jake was running out of energy fast... he had never, in all of his training, tried to use so much magic at the same time.
"Yb ym rewop!" Jake shouted, releasing his final attack.
The explosion created a tremor that could be felt across the globe. Even in the sky, Spud's jet shook from the force.
"I hope Jakey's all right." Trixie stated once the tremor was gone.
"Me too." Susan Long agreed, thinking of her son and being glad that he was not alone.
Jake got up slowly and tried to focus.
"What the...?"
Darkness was standing upright, unfazed by the attacks he'd made on her.
"Amusing... but pointless. Fighting me with anger, only makes me stronger." Darkness chided, flicking her wrist and sending Jake crashing through three walls.
Jake switched to his dragon form and unleashed a barrage of fire that instantly charcoaled Darkness's surroundings, but did not affect the deity.
She lunged out and grabbed him by the throat, squeezing tight.
"It is over... now your entire race will pay." Darkness told him, "But now you die... alone."
"He's not alone bitch!" Rose shouted, blasting Darkness with her Huntsclan weapon and sending the deity crashing backwards into a no-longer stunned Helen Ramirez.
"Rose..." Jake gasped, falling to the ground in his human form. "What are you doing here?"
"We're sticking together whether you like it or not." Rose challenged him, "Don't try and pull that lone hero crap."
"I'm glad you're here." Jake muttered.
"So am I, sister dear." Helen said, getting up and staring down her twin. "You're just in time to witness the end of all life."
"Don't do this Helen... it doesn't have to be this way." Jake pleaded.
"Helen?" Rose asked, "Why are you doing this?" She'd been dying to ask ever since her sister and master had attacked her in Lao Shi's shop all that time ago.
"Control... this world needs cleansing of man. Mankind is finished..."
"But you're human... you'll be destroyed too." Rose pointed out.
"A mere formality..." She dismissed, "My lordess will reincarnate me into something greater than human."
"Like what?" Jake asked.
"A goddess."
Damn... what a deal. Betray the human race and make it extinct.. become an all-powerful god. Who could choose?
"Don't do this Helen..." Rose implored.
"Eid!" Corporal Mace screamed.
"Pots!" Jake cried, stopping the dark spell with a shield charm of his own.
"Yrc!"
"Pilf!" Jake took off into a run towards Mace, who was busy stopping her own rebounding curse, and shouted, "Pu!" He dived into the air and spiraled over Helen.
Rose fired at her sister, forcing her to take on both at one time.
"Erif." Jake waved his hand, creating a circle of flames to surround Rose's sister.
"Pots!" Mace shouted, blocking Rose's volley of energy beams from her scepter.
Jake clapped his hands together in one decent bang and shouted, "Tsalb!"
Mace spun around and was blasted backwards with tremendous force. She cracked her head on the wall and began to bleed.
Rose ran to Jake and aimed her staff at Darkness, who still hadn't moved.
"That's a nice weapon." Jake complimented.
"Night Warriors and Huntsclan did not get along. That's actually most of the reason why the Huntsclan hated magical beings."
"We'll see if your weapon is strong enough to defeat me." Darkness cackled, getting up slowly, her spine cracking as she rose.
"Gross." Rose said, blasting her again.
Darkness crashed into the wall behind her and snarled, "You will die!"
A wave of Darkness forced Jake and Rose to duck.
"Dragon up!" Jake said, taking off from the laying position and breathing fire around Darkness and closing the circle.
Rose set the blaster mode on repeat and fired without mercy.
"AHHHHHHH!" Darkness's screams pierced the air, with a wave of terror washing over everyone in a thousand mile radius.
Jake reverted to human and focused his energy on himself.
"Tilps." He muttered, splitting himself into three.
His two copies and the original held hands and screamed, "YB EHT REWOP FO EERHT! YB YM REWOP!"
A powerful wave of energy pounded Darkness into a cocoon of energy.
Jake's doppelgangers dissolved and Rose's staff ran out of energy.
Jake's original form's knees buckled and he fell to the ground, using his arms to steady himself he stared at the black cocoon of energy swirling at the center of what looked like the site from a meteorite.
Rose went over to her sister and held her head in her knees, trying to stop the bleeding with her ripped pants. She tore it off completely and pressed it firmly.
"You're going to be okay." She told Helen.
"But you're not." Helen shouted, lunging for Rose's throat and pinning her down.
"Hel...en..."
"One more step and she's done for." Helen challenged Jake, who'd run over to help, raising a glowing black fist.
"Helen... don't..." Jake pleaded.
"You took away my future... now I'll take everything from you." She muttered, raising her fist.
"Dnib." Jake whispered, but nothing happened. He was completely taxed out of power. "Nuts." Nothing. "Wait!"
Helen hesitated.
"Kill me... spare her. It was my spell that destroyed Darkness." Jake told her, "I don't even have the strength to fight."
Corporal Mace seemed to consider this.
"Or... I kill you both." Mace blasted Jake with her glowing fist and tightened her grip on Rose's throat... her sister's throat. "Not now..." Helen muttered, picturing the bright blue light in front of her for the first time in many days.
"Please do not do this Helen... if you do, you will never not regret it." It pleaded.
"it's too late."
"It never is." It implored, "You can be a better person, be one who is kind and compassionate. That is your sister your trying to kill... the boy you tried to kill... he is simply doing what he must to protect his fellow people. Why kill him for following his duty?"
"I did kill him... maybe you didn't notice. His eyes stare without seeing."
The mirage shook its head disapprovingly.
"There is a better path."
"Go away... and never come back."
The mirage dissipated.
Helen was on top of Rose.
Corporal Mace had her by the throat.
But which one was the real her?
I hope you enjoyed the chapter. Next one will be in a couple weeks or so... Review, favorite, follow... whatever it is you do. :) Nothing perks me up more than getting notifications on my stories. Have a great day.
