xXx
Sym brushed his hands against each other as the last of the ninja's blood drained into the Nether Pool at the end of the underspace. "Come on, little one," he said to the dead ninja, "summon your master. Beast! I call upon you!" Then Sym, a fairly patient creature when the situation demanded it, squatted by the pool and waited under the burning sky. His thick tail very slowly lashed in anticipation.
After a time that could have been seconds or weeks but was more likely hours, there was a stirring in the dark face of the lake; this was more than a lake, it was a portal that opened to deeper realms than underspace, a portal best left locked.
A shadow shifted on the other side, and Sym thought he could almost make out forms. "Are you this ninja's master?" he asked.
I AM THE BEAST rumbled a reply that might have knocked Sym down had the creature been in the same dimension.
"Sym hears that the ninja are trying to get you up on Prime with them to destroy the world," Sym said casually, puffing on his cigar.
I WILL DESTROY THEIR WORLD the voice vibrated the stone, vibrated the air, I WILL CAST IT INTO DARKNESS AND DEVOUR ITS LIGHT
"Sym can get you up to Prime," Sym said, "Sym doesn't care what you do to Prime as long as you leave Sym ruler of underspace. You must destroy the Swordbearer."
THIS PALE SHADOW IS NOTHING came the chest rattling expression of the Beast. THE SWORDBEARER IS NOTHING ALL WILL BE CAST INTO FLAME AND DARKNESS AND BITTER COLD
"Sounds to Sym," the demon said, grinning and chomping the butt of his cigar, "like we have a deal."
xXx
"From here the city looks so peaceful and beautiful," Valeria murmured to herself from where she perched on a skyscraper downtown. She sighed. Safe enough up here. Her mind wandered over the mortals she knew. "How do you do it?" she breathed. No place they could run. Strange could always escape, if he had to; Illyana had her underspace limbo, Valeria could fly. But what about Doug? The secretaries and executives and other staff of the building upon which she sat? The cab drivers, tooling around in their tiny yellow dots down below? When danger threatened, how did they stand it?
"Life is so random," she said distantly, her eyes roving the city, her incredibly sharp sight slipping through windows and seeing those who knew they were unobserved; picking out facial expressions on pedestrians on the streets over a hundred stories below. "At any moment," she murmured, snapping her fingers. A car swerves out of its path. Drug dealers get in a gunfight. Cancer. She shook her head and sighed. Ninja. You never can tell.
She looked down at her own hands. "Am I ready to shed blood?" she whispered to herself. "Am I ready to kill those that pursue me? Or do I risk the lives of everyone around me by letting them live?" She bowed her head. "Are their lives worth sparing? Are they beyond reform, now that they have chosen their path?"
The answer haunted her. She looked past it, kept looking.
"Oh, Strange," she murmured. "You picked the wrong time to leave the dimension. I need you for this." She shook her head, envisioned the saturnine wisdom of the sorcerer's face. She listened to his voice, to see what he would do. In her imagination, he was silent. Would Strange kill them?
"Maybe you could come up with another way," she murmured, "but I'm not you and I'm fresh out of ideas." She took a deep breath, and hardened herself.
"They follow the path of death," she said to herself. She nodded curtly. "If the choice is between giving death and receiving it, I choose to give it to them. I have little choice."
Something inside her quivered at the ramifications of her choice. She gazed up into the afternoon sun.
"Forgive me," she whispered.
xXx
Arrhythmic thudding drumbeats roused him from his swoon. The bald man blinked once before his heavy eyelids slid down, too heavy to lift. The room was viscous with shadow, slithering dark. He tried to focus his thoughts, but he was immersed in cloying incense that scattered his thoughts, twisted his reason. He felt tiny threads of pain shoot through him, unpredictable, startling. His mind felt tender; thinking was pain. The drumbeats throbbing around him were impossible to fathom, there was no rhythm to grasp. His pulse stirred in an off kilter pattern. He struggled to move and barely twitched.
This is the veil of life, the veil of pain, came a voice from his past.
"Jonin!" he gasped.
We meet again, Charles Xavier, the silent speech of the voice said. You have come into my power.
Xavier struggled to gather his thoughts, to bring his formidable mental power to bear, to find and shut down the Jonin while he still had a shred of power left. But he could not focus, could not push past the peculiar torture to bring his thoughts to coherence. He gasped wetly, thrilling with poisonous adrenaline and unable to act.
You come from one place, move through life, go to another place. But here all is confusion. There is no past. There is no future. You must deal with the now. And in the now the only relief you will find is in capturing her—flash, an image of Valeria, he suddenly knew her name; an image of the one he had been waiting to meet—her who you touched, you must bring her to us.
"I will not!" gasped Xavier as the pain shifted and raced in circles around the bones of his left hand.
Laughter surrounded him like dry leaves in an autumn wind. He began to struggle to open his eyes.
You will, Charles Xavier. But please. Let us speak silently.
He managed to force one eye open, and he saw that he was naked on a slab, with a dozen long needles in his chi meridians, sigils painted on his flesh, half lost in the haze that curled and drifted around him from the glowing points of incense. Silver threads were tied to the head of each needle, like marionette strings, and they swooped through the darkness to a shadowed man's hand.
"I will not submit," Xavier gritted out.
The Jonin's smile could be felt. This is the veil of life, the veil of pain, he whispered without speaking.
Xavier's head thudded back on the stone slab as he fought with all his might; he had so little left to fight with…
xXx
The demon snarled and snapped at Sym as he put his back into it and pushed it into the lake. It's hind leg slapped down in the water, and its snarl abruptly shifted to a mewling yelp. Sym gave it one last shove, and the demon lost its footing on the slick shore and flailed out into the lake. It howled, desperate and alarmed, and Sym stood looking at the lake, pleased with himself.
The demon's howling abruptly shifted to a scream as something moved in the lake. The demon was yanked deep enough so only it's screaming face was above the surface. It choked, jaws working, eyes desperate.
UNTIL I REGAIN MY FORM THIS WILL DO the demon's face whispered, rocking the foundation of the lake. The demon crawled out, pitch black as though painted with oil.
The Swordbearer cleared the ridge. "Sym!" she shouted. "What are you doing to my demon?" She planted her fists on her hips and glared at the tall dark demon, her thin tail lashing.
"Sym likes your new tail, it's fetching," he grinned.
"Answer the question or burn, demon," she growled.
He gestured at the tarry black demon hunched at his side. "Sym was doing what you asked," he said. "You know if you teleport demons out of underspace, they die, right?" he said. He clamped his cigar in his teeth. "Sym bonded this demon to underspace. You can take this demon with you to fight in Prime and he will be able to fight even away from underspace." Sym grinned, very proud of himself. "No one else but you can do that, Swordbearer."
"Oh," she said, hesitating for a moment. "Oh, good," she said, brightening. "Very good," she beamed, upon reflecting. Then her expression darkened again. "It doesn't feel like it's bonded to my realm."
Sym shrugged. "Had to use old demon magic trick. Had to coat it with portalwaters. It has to cure into new hide for the demon. Until then it will feel a little strange."
Swordbearer looked at the ground beneath the demon's feet. The ground was cracking, shriveling. "Seems a bit more… powerful, too," she said.
"Of course," Sym said with a grin. "Sym juiced it up a little for you, since this one is not expendable. Worth any ten other underspace demons."
Swordbearer smiled, her mind working the possibilitites. "Thanks, Sym. Next time I'm in a battle I'll have to try this fella out!"
"Good," Sym said with a grin. She turned to go, and he narrowed his eyes.
You do that.
xXx
The chanting started. Ninja in the darkness, in a circle around some kind of platform, chanting ancient and mysterious words over and over. Xavier trembled, not sure if he was sweating or not. Exquisitely sharp specific pain wandered under his sternum, down ribs and up again, and the cloying incense was the only air he could remember. He struggled, his muscles twitching, whimpering slightly.
The Jonin broke the pattern he had endlessly repeated in the months that Xavier had been here, the years. But there was no past. There was no future. There was only now. And the only way to find relief—
Xavier struggled to raise his defenses, the meditations and barriers he had meticulously erected over the years. But his breathing was not his own to control, the flow of blood and concentration in his body and brain was disrupted, and he could not properly—he could not properly do anything. He lay gasping, desperate, piteously flinging his will against the inexorable command of the Jonin.
Why do you fight me? the Jonin whispered into his mind. Your students, slain. Your Institute, life's work, in shambles. Your power so easily reduced to nothing. All those you crafted so carefully, turning on you. Emptiness and nothingness wait for you in the world you try so desperately to reclaim. But with us, Xavier. With us you will have greatness. You will be able to do what no other has done in the history of humanity. You will help us as we usher in a new age. THAT is to be your greatness, Xavier. The ritual is begun. Bring us—the girl—and all of this suffering will end.
Xavier shuddered, struggling to speak. "I will not submit," Xavier managed, "because you are… evil."
So now you are pure? That is not what I recall from our time together at the Institute, the Jonin smiled in the darkness.
"But I," Xavier gasped, "I would never destroy the world. I won't be part of this."
The Jonin's smile faded. Really.
Xavier struggled to breathe.
The girl will not be killed. She will transcend herself. You must bring her, docile, to the summoning ring and you will receive a swift, painless death.
"No," Xavier huffed, fighting for precious air in the thick fog of incense, his lungs not drawing properly.
We shall see. This is the veil of life, the veil of pain. You come from one place, move through life, go to another place. Here all is confusion. There is no past. There is no future. You must deal with the now. And in the now the only relief you will find…
Xavier tried to scream and failed.
xXx
Lock lay on her back in the trees not far from the pump house. Her eyes were squeezed shut, tears seeping from their edges. Oh, Xavier. How did you get pulled into this?
She felt his pain, his agony, the slow burn of his will consumed in the dark magics of the ninja. His will was fierce and strong, but it could not withstand… what was happening in the concrete building right now.
Again half a dozen rescue plans whirled through her mind, but each and every one of them was pure suicide. Alone she could not save Xavier. None of her allies could get here in time, and even if they did, they could do nothing against what lurked in that building. If she tried to shore up his will, the Jonin would send ninja who would, no question, find and kill her while she was distracted.
One more day, Xavier. Hold out one more day. Silent tears rolled down her face. She knew that it was impossible.
So she lay at the end of the world, desperately trying to think of a plan to prevent its destruction.
xXx
Strange blinked, struggling to rise. Enitharmon put a restraining hand on his forearm. "Rest, wizard. You've been through an ordeal."
Strange felt blood seep in the marrow of his bones, his flesh limp and torn at a cellular level. He gasped to breathe.
you will remember when the time is right echoed a memory—
Standing on the edge of the Oracle, a presence surrounding him, each mote seeming to contain as much energy as his dimension, where mortals cannot go—
Her voice so gentle; you will remember when the time is right—
Darkness, tearing. Strange fought to breathe.
"Did you discover what you were after?" Enitharmon asked as he began the laborious mystical task of unweaving Strange from the pattern that had taken some part of him deep enough for a few words with the Oracle and kept him sane and living.
"I don't know," Strange managed, blood freely flowing from his eyes, nose, mouth, ears. "I don't know what I learned." He managed a cough.
"That's the way of the Oracle," the weaver said with a solemn nod. "Now what will you do?"
"I have been away from Prime too long," Strange managed. "I must leave at once. I sense danger, great danger. The spirits of Earth call to me. I must answer."
"You will die before you escape my realm," the weaver said. "You must stay until you have healed."
"A little sleep, a little food," Strange murmured.
Enitharmon half smiled. "I must get you healthy enough to escape my realm, Strange. I rather like you and would not want to have to pluck your flesh sack out of the fabric should you die."
"Enitharmon," Strange said, fixing the weaver in a bloody gaze, "You're good to me." The wizard passed out.
The weaver sighed, pulled a blanket over the unconscious wizard, and smiled to himself. "You're worth it," he said softly to himself. He cocked his head and listened for a moment, and his expression grew dark. "An evil wind from Prime," he murmured to himself. He shook his head. "Heal up fast, Strange. They have need of you."
He climbed back into his alien loom, and the universe continued to unfold.
