And the next bit!
Thanks Tyc and Bhar! So sorry about the last two chapters - but stupid Transformers refused to get out of my head. I still think transformers more appropriate than Cybermen... Hope you like this chapter better - will try to get next chapter up soon.
PK- thanks for note - you're right, Episode 33 and 34 would prolly end up one chapter in my rewrite. Yeah, I did wonder f I was being a little overly ambitious with this one, since it start as an experiment, it 'failed' and I only spent 10 days to think it over and then decide to make it a 5 part epic. Yeah, it could be better , but every story could always be better - lol. Pls understand, every other story posted had been gathering in my dusty closet for years. Well - except Liz's Partheois, and even that one I spliced with an existing story of mine. Yeah, story 4 is galactic-political-mystery - if I can get it right. But let me finish story 3 first, huh?
To Come Home on an Alien Land
By Jolly
Episode 35
Destiny: Godson to The Old Man
The whiteness stretched for miles in all directions. Icy cold winds skirted the face of the cliffs and raced across the isolated plains. It came to a halt at a spot where three young men stood facing each other and glaring at each other, oblivious to the biting cold.
"I will not under any circumstances agree to you taking that risk, Banz," Frank asserted.
"I agree with Frank; I will not sacrifice the life of one brother for another," Joe said.
"You want Frank to live; that's what you have to do, Joe. You know that!" Banz said. "And I disagree with you. I am taking a risk for my brother's life. I am in no way sacrificing myself for him."
"Joe, we're almost out of time. You have to let me go, little brother," Frank reminded his brother. "You did promise you won't let me turn..."
Banz cut in before Frank could finish or Joe could respond, "At this point, Frank is dead man walking – agree?" He did not bother to wait for either of his brothers to respond but forged ahead with his point with his eyes on Joe. "Soon the last of the glyphs will fail. We'll have to kill him and the Legion will look for a new host if we cannot disperse it. That new host would be either me or you, Joe. There's no one else out here on the South Pole."
"That's why you should leave, Banz," Joe said. "After Frank's dead, the Legion will come for me. And I'll do what needs to be done. There's no need for you to take that risk."
"Are you telling me that after Frank 'dies', you will fight off the legion, sent those souls to rest, and then bring Frank back to life using the Ark all on your own?" Banz countered. "You know that you'll have less than 5 minutes to bring Frank back – or you risk brain damage. And you know that putting all those thousands of souls to rest will take hours. You need me here, little brother."
"What's the point of trying to save me, just to have you getting possessed in my place, Banz?" Frank asked reasonably.
"Do you really believe that Joe will kill you under any circumstances?" Banz asked Frank.
Frank looked into Banz's eyes and forced himself to confront that question with brutal honestly. He lowered his eyes when he knew the answer to that question. Banz would stay for Joe's protection.
Then, all the arguments and reasoning ceased to matter as the last of the glyphs dissolved and Frank could feel the demons within him rising. He barely had time to shout out a warning to his brothers before his vision was obliterated by a bloody red haze.
Meanwhile, on board a flight headed for Bayport Airport, Phil Cohen sat on the aisle seat watching his girlfriend of almost two years staring out of the window into the clear blue sky beyond. It wasn't difficult to guess what she might be thinking about.
Joe. For Van, it's always about Joe, Phil mused.
He recalled when Joe went missing almost four years back. He remembered Frank's desperate search, and Vanessa's unwillingness to move on for years. But he'd persisted and she finally came around. They started going out together, and she started being happy again. And now Joe's back. Or was he?
Frank on the other hand withdrew into himself after months of fruitless search. Without either of the Hardy brothers to hold the group together, all of them slowly scattered after graduating from Bayport High. The only other time they all gathered together again was during the funeral for the entire family organized by Aunt Gertrude. He still remembered the cloak of sadness on everyone of the gang on that day as they reminisced the old times and acknowledged the tragedy that befell the Hardy household.
And then to see the brothers alive and well in Mission City under the most unexpected circumstances – battling gigantic living robots. Rather than feeling terrified or worried, Phil actually found himself rather intrigued by the entire incident. That was natural, given his propensity towards cutting edge technology and his interest in Artificial Intelligence. Sadly, the damage cause by those NBE (Non Biological Entities, as the bureaucracy called them) were so extensive, the government made the decision to drop all the remains of the decepticons into the Laurentian Abyss, the deepest part of the ocean on Earth. Only governments and secret bureaucracies would do something as stupid as that: kept secret something that threatened not only national but global security, then when the world finds out about it, dump the only thing they could reverse-engineer to defend themselves into a place so hostile, not even their own best technology could retrieve it.
And only the Hardys can get into that kind of a trouble, Phil could not help but mutter under his breath.
Vanessa must have heard him, for she turned to eye him curiously.
"Do you really think Frank and Joe will turn up at our old haunt as they said?" Phil finally asked just to fill in the silence.
The two brothers and their new friend had disappeared soon after promising to meet up at Prito's Pizzaria in a couple of days' time to explain what they could. He winced at the memory of Captain Lennox raging over their disappearance. But there was nothing he and Van could say; they could not tell what they do not know. The problem with having the Hardys as friends – they're always keeping secrets. That was why their group of close chums was small and tight. Not many people could stand their close friends keeping that many secrets from them. But Phil, and the rest of the gang, was the few that didn't mind. In part because all of them had their own share of secrets, and they guard each other's right to privacy fiercely.
"Yes," she replied without hesitation, and without looking at him. "If Joe said he will, he will."
Phil sighed. It was clear to him that Van's still not over Joe.
"Phil?"
"Yes Van?"
"Did you remember seeing Joe wearing a ring?" Van asked in a soft voice, her eyes still glued to the sky outside.
Phil stared sympathetically at the back of his girlfriend's head and answered: "Yes. I also saw Frank wearing one."
"Oh," came the response in a small voice.
Phil knew without doubt that Van was crying. He should be jealous, but he was not. He loved her, and would always put her happiness above his own. Furthermore, this Joe was not the same Joe that went missing at seventeen. The same applies to Frank. The sooner Van accepted that, the better for her. And knowing that Joe was no longer available also helps. He was a patient person by nature, and he would wait as long as it takes to win her heart.
Terror filled Joe's heart as he watched the multiple wounds on Frank's body starting to close. Any single one those stabs should have been fatal, especially the two that went straight through the heart. Both he and Banz made sure of that, and both of them were proficient warriors. Or killers, Joe admitted. Warriors, fighters, soldiers… they're all words infused with delusional sense of pride and honor to mask the real hard truth that some would feel difficult to accept.
Yet, the Legion still refused to disengage from Frank, and his brother was still struggling with inhuman strength to break his and Banz's hold.
Why wasn't the Legion disengaging? What was he missing here? Joe asked those questions with ever increasing desperation as the minutes trickled away like the sands in the top half of an hour glass.
Frank broke free of his and Banz's hold and Joe had to focus on physically restraining his brother again. He sidestepped a blow, caught his brother's arm in a death-grip, twisted his brother's arm back and together with Banz's help, forced the body back onto the icy ground with the arms trapped beneath the body. He avoided his brother's eyes; he did not want to see the burning hatred from there directed at him. That was not his brother, but it was still his brother's eyes.
Good thing The Old Man insisted Frank be kept from advanced hand to hand combat classes for the time being, Banz thought as he barely avoided another side swipe as Frank managed to slip his arm from his hold yet again. Using a little known Kalosian hold, he managed to restrain the elder Hardy again.
"Joe, whatever it is you have to do, you better figure it out fast! Because Frank here has over 5000 brains in there helping him do all the analysis and there're only two of us here…" Banz grunted.
Trust Banz to come up with something Frankish… Think, Joe, think! You can do it! Joe psyched himself. What am I missing? Father said the Legion will fight desperately for the host's life and body… Omph!
Joe doubled over in pain from a well-placed kick from Frank. Banz swiftly stepped in to block a potentially fatal attack from Frank's clawed hands, and then sent his brother flying into an icy outcrop with a psychic shove. He winced as he watched Frank's back crashed into that rocky ice and then slide down onto the cold hard ground.
"Better him than us at this point in time, Joe!" Banz shot back at him. Any idea at all yet?! He added telepathically.
A paradox… Father said but implied the Legion will only leave a body if it believes the body is damaged beyond repair… but the Ark needs an undamaged and intact body in order to gift a second life…
Banz could hear the despair skirting the edges of his soul brother's voice. He turned Joe's words over and over in his mind as he eyed Joe working desperately to gently bring Frank down yet again. His mind flashed back to all the incidents that happened in the last three years. The Old Man had said that Joe's prowess at its peak would by far exceed his own. Yet as he watched Joe wriggled his way out of one after another tight spot, he never could sense that level of potential. Perhaps the entire issue was the lack of need and motivation, and here for the first time, he saw what could be that motivation, that impetus to push Joe…
He moved.
A flying tackled forcefully separated the battling brothers. Another back flip sent Frank back onto that icy outcrop for the second time. His mind cleared, he knew all his next moves down to the very last micro-second and millimeter. There would be no room for error on his side, and he had faith Joe would do everything that would be required of him. He finally understood the true purpose of the Rites of Ascension.
He caught Joe's eyes for a fraction of a second and smiled confidently.
"I only do what I am about to do, because I have absolute confidence that you can… we'll all be dependent on you from now…"
With that, Banz generated a level 10 storm sphere and sent it careening into Frank. He remembered all that happened just over two weeks back. He could hear Joe screaming at him in the background, which he ignored. He focused on what was to come. He had to. He could sense Joe running towards Frank – just as he expected. A pre-planned psychic shove sent Joe to the ground far away from himself and Frank. A dark aura started to appear around Frank and collated into a boiling dark mass just above Frank's inert but broken body. He opened up his mind and let his own power flare strong and bright and the darkness came for him, just as he wanted…