(Atrium Carceri – Great Old One)
There was in the accursed lands of Enmaria a vast, white lake hidden by a chain of bluish mountains, whose summits sparkled with a myriad of tiny white lights, encrusted with gems only few selected mortals know of. The lake reflected their visage upon its glasslike surface, tranquil and unwilling to move, even to the harshest of winds. It was told that, in an age when the most advanced species barely rose from the primordial mud that shaped them, the lake's shores were host to a great city of legends, home to a race said to be closest to the Creator. After their fall, the blue sands had done a poor job of preserving the remains, now only a speck of what it used to be. Peopled with beings that would be considered alien to modern mortalkind, the magical essence of that civilization was scattered across the realm, forming shapes akin to trees with spirals for flowers. That same essence was denser in some places between the mountains of old, crystalizing into even bigger spirals, held still by stonelike pylons impossibly tall and thin for the weight they carried.
On those same shores did Braylon wake up after his battle with Handsome Jack and his encounter with a figure that claimed to be his own blood. His prolonged groan betrayed a sense of tiredness, confusion gripping his memory as he tried to stand on his feet. He couldn't help but gasp at his own form, displeasing to look at. It was scrawny and bare of features, most notably his pathetic excuse for muscles, covered in spots of blue sand glued to his wounds. Even his lifeblood, his PDA, was not where it was supposed to be. His breaths became rapid and distorted. He knew that something was supposed to attached to his arm, even as the word used to describe it eluded his knowledge. His speech and mannerisms regressed to that of a ten-year-old.
Crying from the sense of loss, the boy gazed at his reflection on the lake with the amazement of a child. Unsteady steps brought him closer, so that he could land on his knees and touch the surface with his fingers. A tiny ripple obfuscated his reflection, itself already distorted by the bright lights that were the raging fires of Hell behind the entrancing landscape. Though their luminosity could easily compete with the fury of one thousand hypergiants, thus stripping the heavens of any meaningful detail, they gave none of the heat such a fire would ordinarily generate, leaving Braylon with a bad case of low temperatures.
The desire to explore the ruins on the other side of the lake gave the Vault Hunter a new reason to meander around the strange land, and its even stranger lake, that his weakened feet lumbered their master all around the body of water. He was transfixed with the dazzling lights of the mountains and the unnatural stillness of the lake, like a child that just got its first real experience of the world. Deeper within, he felt that there were far more pressing matters to worry about, such as the mysterious encounter with members of his immediate family, evidently cursed and corrupted by Hell for whatever reason, or the fact that, no matter how beautiful, the lands of Enmaria lacked any form of life.
Halfway on his journey stood one of the trees with spiral-pattern flowers near an idol shaped from grayish rock, imbued with otherworldly energies in the form of thin green lines spread over its surface. Up close, the tree itself was more akin to a rocky formation than a member of the race whose form it took. Each of the flowers had an unique mesmerizing whisper that came from its petals in a total absence of harmony, yet together providing a song that no mortal ears ever heard and hearts never felt.
There was a crack in the bark of the structure, home to vine-like growths that were in a shade of crimson unbecoming of such an ambient. Braylon's childlike approach, lacking the mental faculty to know any better, triggered a reaction in the offending organism, stretching the hole until it became wide enough for an eyeball the size of a dinner plate to crawl through. It was feral in nature, demonic even, staring obsessively at the screaming figure. When his vocalized fear died down, a raspy, snarky voice his subconscious seemed to recognize, yet he himself seemed clueless about, yammered in his ears.
"I find it vexing that you are still in one piece, you ill-bred boy. You just can't stop provoking me, can you?"
For better or worse, the Vault Hunter didn't understand the deeper meaning behind the poisonous words, though his id screamed at him to get the hell away from that eye. He did so, stumbling backwards, unwilling to leave the talking eyeball out of his sight.
"Oh my, whatever will I do?!" the eyeball's iris dashed madly as it mocked in a high-pitched voice, "He made a hole in my army of expendable minions. He killed a hundred of them. What am I going to do? Oh wait, I know. How about I make a thousand more?"
"Don't you get it, you mentally-challenged ape? My pool of expendables keeps getting bigger by the minute and there is nothing anybody can do to stop it. Soon I will find a way to breed actual, living demons, identical in every aspect, just like all these failures I am surrounded with. And what will you do then, hm? Will you keep hopping and shooting and punching? Look at you! You can hardly walk. I ought to..."
The monologue was interrupted by a sudden booming noise, accompanied by the whitening of the skies. A whirlpool stretched the fabric of reality above and beyond the lands of Enmaria. So distant, yet so close, hundreds of shiny droplets trickled slowly into the unknown, beyond the great mountains and beyond the walls of hellfire. The entity behind the eye laughed jovially.
"Well, that happened. Amazing how life can be so unpredictable, even to someone like me. I'll go now, to meet our guests. Away with you and die already."
Distorted scratching signalled the retreat of the flesh into the depths of the tree, sealing the crack behind itself. Braylon was left observing the falling lights. His lips formed a thin smile as he sat on the beach, staring at the phenomenon. He liked those tiny dots for a reason he himself didn't know, though he got bored quickly and resumed his journey to the ruins.
Though withered to almost-nothingness, it was easy for the mind to imagine the grandiosity of the city that lost its name. Towers that stretched to the heavens loomed over the bustling streets hidden behind a thick, impenetrable wall, guarded by the best warriors its citizens had to offer. Ancient temples kindled flames near the entrances as the graying priests performed their daily rituals dictated by the local religions. Breathtaking gardens filled with innumerable species of flowers surrounded the gray monoliths, statues dedicated to the heroes of old, many of whom served their kind with priceless acts of courage that would never be repaid enough.
This and much more conjured the imagination of the teenager, who stood on a minuscule dune in the middle of some ruins whose purpose he couldn't fathom. Not that he cared, for he was too invested in his fantasies to ever bother reevaluating those projections. The winds passed through every inch of the decaying remains, wheezing as if they blew into flutes. Braylon went on to check the ruins some more, searching for mysteries that were lurking in the darkness, only to find nothing but dust. Angered, he stormed off to a staircase connected to a decrepit building of unfathomable purpose.
In its insides, he found an intricate, ornate door floating a few, imperceptible inches above the floor and connected to no wall. Its mere existence drew attention, being the only preserved object amidst a silent graveyard. Compelled to unlock its secrets, the young Vault Hunter stepped closer, grabbing the bronze doorknob with his bony fingers.
(Doom 64 – The Glitch Rot)
In a place forgotten by God grew a warped forest of immeasurable proportions, seeking to lay claim on the dry red rock underneath the sickly-green carpet of grass. No light produced by Hell could illuminate that mockery of nature, save for lumps of glowing gold stone that, in a twisted sense of irony, formed naturally on the kilometer-high ceiling or in the forest itself.
Nothing was safe in its bosom. The stench of sulphur and death was strong enough to make any olfactory senses go numb, no matter how developed, making them useless for spotting oddities. Heat typical to Hell was slightly abated in exchange for humidity that bordered on paranormal, so that the skin would be wet enough to relatively obfuscate the feeling of any surface touched by fingers, and the breathing become difficult enough to develop asthma on long-term periods. Even the ears were prone to deception and distraction. Sounds like the snapping of a twig, the deep howl of a creature hidden miles away into the forest, the scratching and tearing of something akin to a fabric, served to hid potential predators as well as prey by playing at just the right times, amplified enough to be heard at the distance of five stadiums or more.
"Mommy… please help…"
That was the new destination in which Braylon had been thrown by his own will, thanks to the door that was lost to the mystical woods of Hell's take on nature. Clinging to his shoulders as a primitive form of protection, Braylon's eyes scoured the terrain that had him in its claws, jumping at any sudden noise that his ears picked up. The moisture helped shaving off some of the filth that stubbornly clung to his body, but that helped little to soothe the painful breathing or the constant urge to gag and vomit. He refused to approach the trees, for the presence of pulsating, aetherial green veins unnerved him, as did the bright blue vines, the ever-present stranglers of forests around Creation, that grew towards the ceiling rather than where they were supposed to. The slimy, vibrating feeling under his feet was more than enough. Not that he knew the names of those tiny, hair-like thingies, just like he failed to acknowledge the vibrantly-colored mushrooms that would pop up the moment his eyes moved away from their homes.
He would, on his trek to nowhere, find a crater around a small hill covered in daffodil-like growths, filled with a viscous purple fluid. Skeletons and metallic remains were either partially submerged in the boiling liquid or sank on the shores, claimed by the local flora. A black, elongated object caught his attention, near the mutilated body of an Enderman and a soldier in an all-green uniform. His eyes widened slightly when he recognized its shape; a shotgun, one of those weapons his father kept at home. He even learned how to use one thanks to him.
Holding the shotgun proved to be a challenge for his decrepit hands, slippery just like the object. Its weight was even more of a problem, for he was not used to carry around something so heavy. He never needed to. Father used to do all the work.
He found four shells near the corpse he tried to avoid staring at. Slowly loading them into the shotgun, the Vault Hunter proceeded to leave behind the crater in search for another landmark.
A curious bunch of extraordinary characters sat at a table near the edge of cliff which pointed at a sea of lava. Those chatting individuals resembled anthropomorphic animals; a blue snake, a red pig, a yellow canary. Each wore attires with vibrant colors and confusing patterns, akin to men who lost their sanity. A humanoid with a white tea pot for a head poured a dark fluid from itself. Unlike them, it carried itself professionally, with an uniform of a soldier dating back to the 18th century Earth.
The snake coiled its tail around the cup and drank all of its contents. With a satisfied sigh, it continued a conversation with a distinct contralto.
"It is interesting indeed, how fragile minds can comprehend chaos that surrounds them. One would think that after being witness to powers beyond understanding, the mind would shatter itself."
"Bollocks!" squealed the pig after digging into a plate full of cake, "Every mind breaks after that! You just have to search for the cracks…"
"And what do we have here?"
Only the bird seemed to care enough for Braylon and his presence. Sitting in between the two guests, the third entity hid its beak behind its hands, digits intertwined, its beady black eyes focusing on the newcomer. It was the only one who refused to drink from its cup.
"Looks like a guest to me…" said the snake.
"More like… more like a drifter to me." growled the pig, "Can't you see he is confused?"
"And what would you know about drifters? It's not like you can see anything beyond that plate of yours."
"I'm sorry, was I talking to you?"
"You mouth worded a comment on my-"
"Voices! Those were voices, alright! Voices of the uninvited. Be quiet for once and you will hear them too."
The bird interrupted their conversation when it spoke again, still maintaining the monotonous, emotionless tone: "Why are you here? I don't remember invinitng someone like you to our tea party."
"I'm... lost..."
Braylon whispered the words, unsure what to say. He looked at the other two. Their attitudes didn't change. He yelped when the entity interrupted him without a warning.
"We are all lost here. Nobody who entered into this forest ever had a purpose in their life. Are you like that? Or are you a vagabond without a home?"
"What's a vagabond?"
The snake rolled its eyes: "He talks like a child. Wonderful."
"We are all children to some extent." The bird replied without moving its eyes away. "All we do is wait of the tender embrace of those who gave us life, even though we know that will never happen."
"Oh my, please don't do that. He might think he is insane."
"He is just talking to a snake, a bird and a pig, all of whom sit at a table and have a tea party!" the pig exploded, "I would think myself mad too!"
"Eugh. At least swallow your food before talking."
Loud rustling interrupted the trance-like play as something shambled out from the warped mass of local flora. A twitching humanoid with arms as long as branches rushed at the screaming Vault Hunter, its legs twisting as if broken or malformed. Braylon jumped, moving the shotgun with his shaky hands. He pulled the trigger when the creature was less than five meters away. The recoil threw him on the ground as the blast ripped through the target's skull.
"One of the uninvited, I see." the snake waved to the teapot-head with its tail, "Though suffering, it wanted to savor the taste of a soul. Truly an act of love."
"You call that love?" the pig interjected, "Only madness could deprive someone of their right to live. Madness, I tell you!"
"I disagree. That was love in its purest form. How can you be so blind?"
"Madness."
"Love."
"Madness." It accentuated through its teeth.
"Love." The snake hissed back. "Madness is a form of love."
"Love is a form of madness."
"Only one's love can create life and give it a meaning."
"But only one's madness can cast that life into a pit of despair and strip it of its meaning."
"Who are we to judge what is love and what madness?"
The bird gave the final word to their argument, raising its hands and head at the crimson ceiling. Braylon looked at it with confusion and fear, glancing sometimes at the shotgun that rested near his right leg.
"One's love was what brought forth the existence of everything. The other's madness tried to ruin everything. Even our guest might be both mad and madly in love. What possible answer could explain one's willingness to throw themselves into a sea of pure chaos?"
"Or maybe all of this never actually happened and it's just a product of his brain." the pig returned to its revolting feeding frenzy.
"After all; "The mind of the subject will desperately struggle to create memories where none exist."… heh, cute." the snake shook its head, chuckling to itself.
"That might also be a possibility." the bird continued, still stuck in the same pose, "We do not know how fragile minds work and how easy they are to manipulate. Who, and what, dares to consider itself trustworthy enough?"
"He does… apparently."
The other two entities turned their heads to the pig, who signaled its meaning to Braylon with a nod.
"Then we should put that statement to a test. Please, travel through that door over there."
Braylon followed the bird's finger to a door that materialized near the teacup-headed being, ever still and quiet like a statue. It was the exact same replica of the one he had found in the ruins. Wishing to escape the forest's grasp, he ran through with no clear plan in mind, leaving behind both his weapon and the tea party.
"How quick he was to relieve himself of his burden." Sighed the yellow canary.
"I envy him. At least he has a home to go to."
"True, my dear red-skinned friend. Although one has to wonder, after he discovers the truth, will he still wish to have a home?"
(Lustmord – Subspace)
Upon finding his body in the soft embrace of a mattress, the first thing that the Vault Hunter did was to throw himself off its gentle surface and onto the wooden floor, for he discovered, soon after his awakening, the presence of a corpse whose head had been blown all over the pillow that held it. Wearing a silk night gown, thus betraying its sex, the body held a yellow pistol gently on its chest, with the barrel pointing at the missing head. He came to a conclusion that someone, or something, had put him near that corpse while he was unconscious, for unknown reasons. Panicking, he would examine the bedroom for any trace of irregularities that could shed a light on his situation.
It did not take long for him to find one; three massive drills invading the room through the ceiling, each covered in blood that leaked from their holes. Frantically trying to piece together the sight with his memories of the previous place, Braylon inadvertently gazed upon his reflection on a mirror connected to a mahogany dresser of large proportions. He found out that his body was as normal as that of an average, uninteresting boy of his age, except naked and still lacking the PDA. Among a storm of emotions he felt, shame was not one of them.
The only natural response fit for the situation was to touch his body, if for nothing else then to at least check the state of his sanity. A chill crept over him as he remembered being a skin-wearing skeleton only moments before, or what he perceived to be a short period in the past, only to now look unmistakably healthy in comparison. No trace of the wounds that were inflicted on him. All the dirt and blood and other manners of filth were gone as well.
Biting his lip, he approached the doorknob of the only door present in the room. It didn't budge. He tried again.
"I'm locked in?" he thought as he looked back at the corpse, "What is even this place about? Where am I?"
Braylon walked towards the bed. He gave one last look at the corpse before taking away the gun; a seemingly generic pistol with no signature of the producer whatsoever. The fingers he touched were warm as if they were alive, though there was no heartbeat present when he checked the pulse. When he was about to inspect the magazine for bullets, the door he previously tried to open clicked loudly, scaring Braylon into looking in that direction.
With the gun held firmly in his hands, the Vault Hunter tiptoed towards the door. Twisting the doorknob, he gently pushed open the creaking object, enough to peek into the world outside. To his surprise, he did found something that couldn't wait to get its hands around his throat. That something, however, was radically different to anything he had seen up to then.
The entity took the form of a poker card with legs, arms and a skull for a head. The body appeared to be incredibly thin, though he couldn't understand whether it wore garments resembling a card or it was actually one. It stood at the end of the hallway, spasming and growling, seemingly unaware of being watched. Braylon held his breath, aimed and fired at the entity's head. A loud crack was followed by the entity's head knocked backwards, who fell with a muffled thud.
Once the thing was dead, the hallway was utterly devoid of life. It was hard to see, even with all the candles that were hanging from the walls. There was a distinct lack of decoration, thus hiding any details that might reveal too much about the place. Five more doors were stationed in the hallway, with four of them locked and only one, to the left of the corpse, slightly opened.
It was another bedroom, only smaller and less extravagant. A simple bed and an even simpler table made up all the present furniture. Unlike the one he woke up in, this one had a window, even if the only thing that could be seen was pure darkness. A lit candle sat on the table, near a piece of paper whose surface was defiled with near-perfect handwriting.
"18th of August, 1858." he read the contents, "once again did my revolutionary ideas face misplaced contempt and fear from those with lesser intelligence. My precious Titan is still resting at the bottom of lake Iri, all thanks to that cursed savage-loving monkey and his Mexican lackey! But alas, I found new hope. With the help of colonel Kraizer I will be able to build a weapon that this primitive world has never seen before. With it, I shall finally have the recognition I sought for so long. My archnemesis and his red savages can all go to hell."
"Hmm, sounds like the writings of a loony…" he had found a bronze key in a drawer. Taking the key, he walked down the hallway in search for the appropriate keyhole, which led to a cellar that revealed its secrets only to those who dared to step into its damp, flooded rooms filled with wooden barrels.
One of those card-like beings was hidden behind a barrel. It lashed out at Braylon, who shot it dead with the few remaining bullets. He passed by the corpse and walked into a room. One of the bricks stuck out from a wall near a small table and a lantern. He pulled it out and peeked through the hole. There was a stairway on the other side, brightly lit and dry. Faint whispers echoed from the depths.
In a room adjacent, he had found a pickaxe which he used to destroy the wall. Once he went through the hole, his nose picked up the smell of freshly-baked bread. Holding the pickaxe in front of himself, Braylon descended to a tiny room with a wooden slab for a door. A skeleton was crucified on its surface, with another piece of paper stuck inside its rib cage. The smell came from beyond that door, so sharp it made his eyes all teary.
He approached the skeleton, staring at its sunken head as he picked up the paper. He drowned the need to gag and unrolled it.
"1st of November, 1858. I am fearing for my safety. The "Spirit with the Hatchet" had returned to Darkwood. The colonel kept saying that we would be safe, but I know that brute better than anyone. I know that we will fail should he get his disgusting hands on my weapon and that there is nothing we can do about that. The mere thought makes me furious. In all my hatred, I almost forgot the true intent of these notes. I recently made, without colonel's nose in the matter, a fascinating discovery I named „teleportation". Energy can be transported from one point to another without the need for physical transportation. Theoretically, I could move matter from my laboratory to any place I wish, provided I have adequate equipment. Should my experiments prove fruitful, living tissue could also be transported, just like energy! There would be no need for horses anymore. This research must be kept hidden at all costs, lest my archnemesis or the colonel misuse and destroy them. Speaking of Krainzer, I can see him eyeing me with suspicion. Does he know something?"
"I don't understand. What does this have to do with anything? What's the point?"
Were he more attentive to details, he would have been wary of the skull that stared back at him. Instead, he pointed an accusatory finger at it, shouting thus: "Stop fucking with me, damn you! You won't get in my head! I won't allow it!"
The pickaxe flew at the skeleton, smashing it together with the door. A thick cloud of dust sprouted from the remains as Braylon charged through, spitting out over a dozen curses through the maddening haze.
(Dead Melodies – The Amaranthine Expansion)
Gingerbread houses, more ornate than a handcrafted doily, were tightly squeezed around wide polished roads of red and white candy. Trees shaped from liquorice with green jelly leaves and road signs made of cookie dough carried their message with precise meaning to the Vault Hunter who was yet again impressed and terrified at the same time. He would have rather wished for a more gruesome, more hateful scenery instead of something that could as well be plagiarized from a fable narrated from parents to their children.
Braylon didn't know how to approach the problem that was served to him. Such a ridiculous change made him even more paranoid; checking the windows of each house to make sure he wasn't spied on. A bad feeling came over him, telling him to turn around, for there was someone else present. And there was. A boy that looked like him, only younger.
A boy that was him.
The impersonator's face was hidden under the unkempt mass of hair, yet the smirk on their face betrayed them far worse than their pose, stuck between laid-back and preparing for an attack.
"Do you remember," they began, "when father brought home that bag of Bladeflower seeds?"
Blood drained from his face at the mentioning of the flowers endemic to his planet.
"I stopped playing with my dirty teddy bear and ran to the door so that I could be the first one to meet him. I would go "daddy, daddy, what's in that bag" and he would mess up my hair with that big smile on his face."
He gulped, his grimace softened.
"Mom would welcome him as she always did. They whispered something, and then she laughed. The other two came after me, so I stuck my tongue out to them."
Braylon's eyes turned left: "My little brother would puff his cheeks in that cute way of his. Sister just pulled my ear." His hand touched the left cheek. Although it was an entertaining memory, none of them laughed.
"Father scolded her for being her," they continued as if he never spoke, "He would then gather all three of us at the table and spill all of the seeds from the bag."
"And we went "oooh"…"
"Do you remember what he said?"
"These are Bladeflower seeds. Throw them in sand or between rocks, they will grow either way, until they become a beautiful flower with razor-sharp petals. You need to be like these seeds if you want to be beautiful like your mother."
"Or strong like your father, she would add."
"Yeah… she would."
A minute of silence passed before the impersonator picked up the conversation.
"Did you understand the meaning of those words?"
"No. I was thinking how could I ever be like a flower."
"You weren't as sharp as your sister."
"No. No I wasn't."
The impersonator reappeared behind Braylon, saying: "But they didn't survive. You did. Their lives were lost even if they were better than you."
Braylon ran. He ran across the street and into a house, locking the confectionary door behind himself. His forehead touched the door.
"Sometimes I used to ask myself," it came from the kitchen, "why did my siblings have red eyes and I didn't?"
He gasped soundlessly, slowly turning to walk towards the voice. He had found a cake-like radio on a table. White noise followed a short buzz, then the voice returned.
"A thought once came in my head. Could it be that I was adopted? No, I looked like my father. The ball of yarn kept unravelling from there. Why did my siblings always spent more time with each other than with me? Why was I the one with the weakest physique? Why was I the one who was more exposed to danger than my siblings? Why did I feel more sadness for my parents than for my siblings? Why, why, why?"
"Shut up. Shut up!"
His fists repeatedly hit the radio until the pastry turned into crumbs.
"And all this time… I tried to avoid the answers to these questions."
The table crashed against the drawers. Utensils made of candy dropped on the wafer floor, denting it or even crashing through.
"I tried to stow them somewhere far away, where they wouldn't bother me. All this time I tried to avoid the little details."
"Shut the fuck up! Shut up!"
"I was the weakest. I was the kid who lived when I should have been dead in a ditch."
The grinding of teeth reverberated in his skull. Voices sang from the walls as he rushed out on the street, half-crazed. A loud thump came from a neighborhood, shaking the earth with each repetition. One of the houses was lifted up and thrown over Braylon's head, blocking the road with sweet detritus.
"Where was justice back in that camp? What good it did killing the bandits when it didn't bring my family back?"
The thumping ceased.. A large, light brown teddy bear walked over the houseless land, turning to face Braylon in silence. Its stumpy hands wriggled as if something were moving under the plain patchwork. Five curved knives ripped their way out from each of the two limbs, with the previously hidden mouth under the conical nose expanding into a grin, then into a full-blown laughter. *
"Hello-ho-ho! Mister Dreadbear is here to help!" it sang in a robotic, androgynous voice, charging at the Vault Hunter. The latter dashed to the nearby house, jumping over the fence and breaking the door. When he was about to reach the small garden on the back, the oversized teddy bear tore through the walls with no effort, crashing the house and laughing maniacally.
Braylon escaped into the other neighborhood, hiding behind a red car and watching the chaos that unfolded.
"If that thing gets me I'm as good as dead." He looked at his left hand. There was no PDA. His ring seemed less shiny than it used to be. "What'll I do now?"
Braylon waited for the monster to turn its back to him before he rushed into another house while trying to be as quiet as possible. Inside he bolted for the nearest door, which led to a basement. A demonic face with red eyes protruded from a wall behind a pile of wafel boxes. He looked at it, at its faint smile and taunting gaze.
"Seven years passed since their deaths. Did I ever take a day off to mourn their deaths?" his younger self sat on one of the boxes, facing him.
The Vault Hunter gulped, taking a step forward.
"Who am I kidding. I don't even know whether they are buried or rotted away in that place."
His legs felt weak.
"Is that why… why they…"
The impersonator dropped their smile.
(Lucas King – Sociopath)
"I once asked my father what was the best day of his life. He touched his forehead then said: "It was the day when I met your mom kiddo". But I saw. For a brief moment, I saw a trace of sadness in those eyes that I didn't understand. Do you remember what he told us later?"
Braylon lowered his eyes. When he raised them again, the figure disappeared. He whispered while touching the demonic face.
"Men change through the roads they walk."
The wall broke down and rebuilt itself into a bridge over an empty void. The chaos upstairs turned louder by the minute as the monster searched for Braylon, who dared to venture into the unknown. When he thought he reached the end of the road, he discovered that an invisible wall hid a curve, as did others ahead. The sweet, serpentine path led to a vast nothingness of a space.
In that nothingness, Braylon discovered a massacre. Men, women and xeno alike were being tortured in ways his mind could never come up with. Their most prominent feature was a golden crown-like object on their heads that never seemed to leave their owners no matter what. His thoughts were strangled by the myriad of voices begging their creator to forgive them for their sins and to save them from the torture, so the wisest thing to do was to stop dwelling upon it at all.
Mindlessly strolling through the carnage, the Vault Hunter seemed to follow a pattern carved from bones and flesh, one that deliberately let him observe the greatest cruelty unknown to Man from all possible angles. Near the end, the blankets of skin and hills of gore switched to iron bars and silent roads looming over an infinite abyss darker than black. Demons caged, chained, and in some cases tortured, were displayed across space like trophies. Among an infinity of forms, there were some that were recognized with various degrees of difficulty, most of them bested by Braylon in battle; Entities like Marmythael, the Moulder of Flesh, or the fearsome Glaciel, the Ice Elemental. They recognized him as well, with more burning hatred than he was able to gather in the deepest stretches of his being.
Like in a pilgrimage of a devout man of faith, Braylon admired these relics that spoke of an ancient and forgotten history. But none of them struck him as hard as the crucifixtion of a demon whose legs were stolen and whose every bit of existent flesh was stripped away from the skull. The silver patterns on red skin and the killing intent were recognized by his soul as elements that belonged to the Warmaster of Hell, whom he defeated during the lecture in Remnant's Forever Fall, now under pessimistic scrutiny.
"And so your struggles brought you back to me. Who bought your freedom now?"
The failure in communication hung in the air as an awkward silence, with the Vault Hunter directing his half-conscious eyes at the pair of blood leaking cavities.
"What a nice ring you got there. It used to be brighter, I am sure. But times change in unexpected ways and things that used to rule now do not."
"Times… change?"
"He made you see the tragedy, did he not? It would be unnerving if he didn't. It is his way of torturing those around him."
Images of the shower of lights rushed back into his mind, but found no words which he could use to describe it.
"I see it in your eyes. Those lights… how beautiful they were, falling like that. You probably never saw them or heard their names. It might be for the better, I think. It will be easier to slay them in battle that way." Being aware of Braylon's visible confusion, the demon added: "Their lights will serve a new master. Those who refuse will meet their end like the saint souls you were forced to observe."
"He won't save them!" Screeched an eyeless Pain Elemental with dark blue skin. "They are beyond hope now!"
Ignoring the interruption, the Warmaster continued in its bass monotone. "My current circumstances were realized due to your meddling. And yet I am willing to give you one of those offers you are certainly familiar with, all for the downfall of our common enemy. In return for your deliberate cooperation, I will reward you with what little power is left within me. Insurmountable battles will become a breeze for you to shed blood in my name. Will you be willing to forge an alliance with me, mortal?"
A dumbfounded chuckle came from Braylon, one that pushed the demon's claws into their palms. "You must be joking. After all the shit I went through, do you really think I would give up my freedom for something that would curse me even more?"
"I hope you understand your predicament. Your freedom lost its meaning the moment you allowed your desires to overwhelm your rational judgement. The struggle with a certain outcome has become a war with a delicate balance, all because of an unexpected incident. How many such incidents are needed for the "Dark Lord" to win, I wonder. Are you really willing to let him have such an opportunity? What do you think will become of Creation once he and his dogs rule over it?"
"…You surely have a lot of hatred for your brother. And how do I know that you won't betray me?"
The demon seemed to concentrate on something before answering.
"As hard as it might be for you to understand, we do not think as one. Each of us has our own aspirations and fears, just like you, mortal. What is hidden behind those misshapen, carnal creatures were once visages of utmost purity and holiness, before one of our own condemned us all. Not all will agree with me, but they don't have to. All it takes is to look at them to prove that I am right. They still believe in his empty promises, now more than ever. If I were to take his life, I could show them their delusions."
"This is exactly why I refuse any offer you can come up with. How can anybody trust someone who is willing to scheme against their own blood?"
"You dare! You dare to be so self-righteous, you whose hands were drowned in blood of thousands!"
"I don't claim to be a saint! But I also won't bow to someone worse than me, no matter what. I deserved worse than this. Still, I won't give in until I bring these four souls back to their world. Of this, I'm sure."
Deafening silence spread across the cursed dungeon; a vacuum where the entire world stood still. It was as if the Warmaster got a slap on the face, leaving each demon to mock the puny mortal in silence or to fall back into their primal thoughts.
"I was not wrong about you, mortal. It must be pleasant to act like a hero who seeks to redeem themselves for the sins that have put a stain on their souls. How many I have met in my life that have spoken like this. And when you confront one of them, any of them, when you point out their flawed reasoning, when you put their pathetic nature in front of them, they begin to repeat the same spiel over and over. It is either friendship or love or hope or faith. But as it often happens, their ideals will not grant them the strength they need, and so they fail. They break. Their spirit breaks. And then they die. Do you think you are different from them?"
His feet were tickled by slight tremors in the ground.
"Do you honestly think you will exceed your limitations by faith alone? He couldn't save his own son from death and you believe He has the right to say what is justice? Pathetic! Only the strongest get a say in the matter! Because that is the meaning of justice; the interest of the strong."
A piece of reality between Braylon and the Warmaster cracked as if it were hit by a sledgehammer. A faint cackle squeezed through the increasingly unstable floating lines until it was surpassed by repeated banging. When reality was weakened enough, a stuffed hand with razor-sharp claws broke through.
"Jesus Christ!"
"Not quite."
The second hand squeezed through, tearing the hole to even greater sizes, until the beast in the form of a teddy bear could crawl into the small part of Hell where its target escaped to.
"Yo-ho-ho! Every activity is funnier with Mister Dreadbear! Why would you leave at all?"
Braylon slipped while taking a step back, falling down and still managing to scoot away from the approaching murderous entity.
"Which will break first, I wonder? Your body or your faith?"
As it prepared for a life-threatening swing, the ring on Braylon's finger released a shower of golden light that blinded the creature and restored Braylon's vitality to its former glory, along with reuniting him with the PDA. In that small time window he felt like the light was weaker than it used to be when he used the ring for slaying demons. The murderous teddy bear swung the arm it used to cover its face, only succeeding in swatting empty air. He made some distance between them.
He materialized the Devastator and fired a rocket at the gigantic head. It shook as if slapped, although there was no visible sign of damage. A layer of faint white aura flashed in and out of reality for less than a second. He gasped.
"It has a Shield?!"
"Mwehehe! That tickled!"
After dodging the swipe from above, the only way where he could go was through the hole, thus returning to the land of gingerbread houses. The teddy bear received three more rockets as it poked its head through. None of them passed through, although the third burned some of the patchwork. He switched to Minishark. The shower of lead penetrated the Shield after the creature was halfway closer to Braylon, at which point he had to retreat. The damage done by the Minishark was greater than Devastator's, as many bullets perforated the soft belly. Instead of the usual cotton or wool, this toy leaked blood. If it felt pain, it didn't show any.
Braylon strafed into a house and broke his way through the second floor. He threw himself on the ground as it approached the house and tore the entire floor away with a swing. When it sniffed the ruins, he activated the Holo Ripper and cleaved a sizeable chunk of muzzle. Pressurized blood exploded in small arcs and rivers as the thing let out a soul chilling scream. Shields were weak against melee attacks.
He jumped on the monster's head and kept hacking and mutilating. After tearing through an ear, he shoved the holographic tool into the back of the head, spreading gore all over the street. He ducked under the arm and jumped, bringing down the Holo Ripper all the way to the rear. Something wet and warm splashed the Vault Hunter as the giant puppet dropped on the house. It was as fluffy as wool, though it had the appearance of flesh.
A storm of curses sang from the direction of the hole in reality, promising torture and death. At the same time the sugary world began to crumble and rot. Entire districts began smelling of rot and sulphur. Fires broke out over the horizon, soon to be followed in neighborhoods close to Braylon, who ran towards the hole; the only safe haven. As he got closer, the voices on the other side turned distant and tonned down. Once he jumped through, the gaping wound sew itself shut, breaking the only connection with the chaos that he left behind.
There was the dark void once again, but nothing was present, save for a small pentagram carved on the „floor" and glowing with red light. Closing his eyes, he stepped on it. His vision melted into a red fog as the world collapsed upon itself.
Not dead yet. Too busy for that.
An this is the bonus chapter. The point was to offer a breather from all the fighting by focusing more on some of the lore. The encounter in the last part was a cruel reminder of the reality that awaits our protagonist.
And so we have finally reached the last section of the arc. All Hell is loose here. No rules, no exceptions. Fight till the very end.
Season two of the fic concludes with this arc. Really excited to see it end and begin the third season. More info on that will be written in the final chapter of the season.
Next chapter: Fields of Gehenna
PDA Biopedia:
*Entry #172: Death Puppet Dreadbear Dynamo
Type: Construct
Faction: Legions of Hell
Description: "In the days that followed the exile of the rebels, one of the masterminds, his name lost in time, took control of a planet, enslaved its population and built an industrial complex that spanned over an entire continent, which he named "Kingdom of Wonders". It was from there that some of the most vile things ever saw the light of day, all of them in the form of toys, which earned him the title "Toymaker", soon to be the name he accepted fondly. Before being banished to Hell, some of the brothers decided to drag the Toymaker with them as well, so they orchestrated the downfall of the Kingdom of Wonders. It was far more complicated than they expected, as the Kingdom of Wonders was also an impenetrable fortress. The conflict destroyed the whole planet and killed its populace, but the Toymaker was brought to Hell, chained and thrown in a nameless pit, once again forgotten by all. This must have been one of the few remaining contraptions left alive. Even I doubt that they would go so far as to rescue the Toymaker."
