Chapter 20: Inner Demons
Perspective: Amanda/The Ender
Amanda wanted to play it cool, but she was hyped. She actually kissed him, he wasn't repulsed, and also there was the whole thing about capturing the Dog. Satisfying their mission made her happy too, she guessed.
Warnado, however, was over the moon about every aspect. He danced around the bound form of the Dog.
"Herobrine? Never heard of him!" he cackled. It was the first time Amanda had heard him mention his destiny with anything less than mournfulness.
Fristad leaned against a tree, smiling shyly but enthusiastically. He'd had his big moment of exuberance and now he was pulling back. He seemed afraid of overstaying his welcome and Amanda appreciated it. She was getting closer to forgiving him for becoming the Dreamweaver, but things like that don't erase themselves in one go. That being said, taking on the Dog with nothing but a stick and his fists to save her life was pretty chill of him.
She deliberated and was on the verge of calling out something encouraging when it happened.
A grey-scaled enderman appeared behind Warnado and struck him in the head with a half-broken shield. He went flying and landed in a heap. The same enderman, blood pouring from its shoulder, teleported toward him and kicked him in the gut. The shimmering weapons Warnado tried to summon dissipated with every blow.
Amanda levelled her crossbow. It was a blunt shot, but it would have to do. She could reload once Warnado was free. Just as she was about to fire her shot a clawed hand yanked it up from behind. The bolt struck the branch of a tree and cracked it. It fell and hung limply. Then, another hand reached around her neck, pressing claws to her throat. She was forced to her knees, disarmed and under threat of death.
Fristad, with no weapon to hand, raised his fists and looked wild-eyed at the two endermen. His gaze came to rest on Amanda's neck and the talons about it. He raised his hands and began to slowly advance.
"Look, just let the kids go. I'll do anything you want."
"Get the Dog out of here, Fristad!" Amanda yelled. "Get the others!"
She fumbled lightly around her waist for her shiv. She would fight with that if necessary.
"Amanda," he warned. "I'm not doing that." To the endermen: "No one else has to die. I would gladly offer myself as a prisoner in their place."
That was when the immense shape of Glibby the Ape emerged from behind the tree. He grabbed Fristad and slammed him against the trunk. His gargantuan fist connected with the shepherd's skull with a sickening crunch. When it came away, Fristad's face was coated with blood, and his mouth hung half-open as though he were half asleep.
"How noble," Glibby grunted. "You'll do."
He threw Fristad to the ground face-first, then flipped him over.
Amanda couldn't lower her head enough to see Fristad's face. He must have been dozing off, because Glibby spat: "No, no! Don't you dare. You will stay awake for this, for every second of it, or the children die."
He bared his teeth in disgust, then twisted Fristad's arm until there was a crack. The shepherd shrieked and clasped the broken limb.
"Every second," the Ape hissed.
"Yes," Fristad groaned. His voice sprouted from him like a vine without support, collapsing as soon as it rose.
The Ape grinned and stooped down to straddle him, and Amanda took a moment to weigh her options. No one had appeared to take the Dog. This was all there was. Warnado was still getting beaten by the other enderman. She didn't stand a chance against someone as huge as Glibby - getting Warnado back in the fight was their only option. Her fingers found the circular hand of the shiv. She just needed the doofus behind her to loosen his grip.
Glibby was in position, one smothering hand across Fristad's mouth, the other free.
"I want you to know, Fristad," he confided in a low, raspy whisper, "that your death means precisely nothing. None of this means anything to me. I'm doing a job and trying to have fun while doing it."
He moved the second hand in to clasp his nose shut. He was going to smother him. Amanda waited for her moment. Warnado could get him off Fristad. He couldn't be that hurt, right? She heard his groans and doubt crept in.
Fristad began to thrash, to try and rise up to the surface for air.
"I've had a bad day. A terrible day. You're just a way of blowing off steam."
The Ape pressed down, forcing Fristad's head into the ground, and pressing harder and harder. Fristad's fists flailed impotently against Glibby's muscular arms.
She felt the creature's claws loosen as it cackled in anticipation. She set aside doubt and took her opportunity. She plunged the shiv into her captor's gut. Its arms fell away, and she immediately ran at Warnado's tormentor. One well-placed thrust would buy him enough time to get a spell going.
The talons plunged into her hip, and she felt them sink deep. The breath ran out of her and she collapsed. The enderman she had shanked wiped its talons off in the grass, clasping its wound with the other.
Glibby barely even noticed.
"Make her watch, Shaghran," he murmured, enraptured with his own task.
She was dragged to her feet and teleported over. Fristad was pale. His eyes were wide, fearful and agonised tears streaming out. His arm was mangled.
"Look at that," Glibby cooed, "That is a fine quantity of life in this one. He's guarding it pretty jealously, isn't he?"
Amanda tried to look away but the enderman forced her head back. She wished her eyes would fill with tears as they might obscure her view. Glibby's hands reshuffled. She heard yelling.
"Now, watch what the turning of a little valve does to the selfish."
His hands slid in opposite directions. A crack. The Ape drew away. Fristad was looking right at her. His tears began to dry up, and he wheezed fruitlessly. Amanda could only gape. Fristad could only gape. He lifted his head as far as he could, which wasn't very far at all. Blood dripping from the torn, slumped corner of his mouth. His jaw hung loose, shattered under the force. He moaned something, then fell back, dead.
Glibby gave him a probing punch to the ribs. The body spasmed. Nothing more. He chuckled.
"Well, that's him gone. I think I'm going to kill you next, girl," concluded Glibby with a smile.
Then, everything happened at once. Steve materialised in a puff of ender-pearl smoke. Astro was soaring up the mountainside, carrying Tyron by the armpits. Shadow not far behind.
"FRISTAD!" he yelled with a swing of Excalibur.
Glibby fell back with a yell and the enderman let go of Amanda to drive off Steve. There was a deep gash on the Ape's forearm.
"Warnado!" she called out.
There was a burst of purple fire from Warnado's direction. The enderman that had been pummeling him staggered back, scales melting and smoke rising. A huge, horned shape arose, composed of that purple fire. At the centre of its chest, an obscured form about the size of a child hung in motionless suspension.
The horned flame reached down and tore the enderman in half, further scorching it as it did so.
Kay emerged from a portal, saw the beast, and rolled away into another just as it struck the ground where he had stood.
Glibby cried out in fury. He leaned down to Amanda and growled at her:
"Tell the demon-child I've changed my mind, he's next."
He went, picked up the Dog with his good arm and called out to his remaining bodyguard. The horned beast began to charge at him, and the Ape glared it down. As it pounced, the enderman broke free from Steve and materialised at its master's side. Amanda blinked. They were gone. The horned beast's fists slammed into the ground and left great, scorching indents in the earth. The beast reared back and roared, before charging at the nearest target: Astro and Tyron, who had just touched down and were immediately forced to dodge away.
As they rolled between the creature's blows, Shadow touched down and squinted at the creature for a moment. Then, she looked down at Amanda and placed a hand over her wound. The teenager felt the pain subside a little and placed an arm around Shadow's shoulder as she lifted her.
Shadow's right arm shot forward, a bolt of lightning erupted from it, striking the beast in the head, the thunder was deafening. Its fiery body seemed to grow thinner, as if thrown off-balance metaphysically. Another bolt, aimed at its feet this time. Shadow's entire arm looked scorched, the electricity seemingly affecting her too.
The flames thinned out enough for Amanda to make out Warnado's body beneath them, still motionless. The spell normally obfuscating his face was gone, his eyes were pinched shut, face contorted in a vile mix of emotions.
"Amanda, I'll need you to help me with this." Shadow said with more calm than seemed appropriate for the situation.
What did she want? Amanda didn't know what to do.
She said with panic in her voice: "But I don't know magic or demons!"
Shadow had started walking towards the horned creature, dragging Amanda with her, shooting more lightning in regular intervals. Her arm was gradually becoming less and less recognizable as such.
When they arrived near Warnado the flames had gone back enough to be unable to lift his body, leaving him lying on the ground, but Amanda could still feel intense heat radiating off of him. His obfuscation charm was still down, and his horns were visible.
Shadow said: "I need you to come close to Warnado with me, hold his hand or whatever you think is best. What I'm about to do won't work without something he strongly associates with positive emotions and you're about as strong as it gets here."
There were also unspoken words there, Amanda would get burned in the process, but she didn't even have to consider for a moment. She looked at Shadow and nodded. They were close enough now that the heat became scorching.
With a quick movement Shadow separated from Amanda and positioned herself behind Warnado, lifting his head up and placing her still-functional left hand on top of it. Amanda was not a second behind, grabbing both of Warnado's hands, gritting her teeth as the heat pierced her skin.
Amanda's gaze jumped between Shadow's face and that of Warnado, torn between looking for assurance and offering comfort. A pulse of energy seemed to ripple through Shadow, tearing open gashes all over her, revealing nothing but blackness. Her mouth moved slightly, as if she was speaking in a dream with the motions not quite making it out. Amanda clenched her hands tightly, the heat was getting worse, she wanted to scream.
Another pulse went through Shadow, rendering her so torn that it was difficult to recognize either of her appearances. Whoever she had been talking to seemed to be sufficiently intimidated, the heat from Warnado's body died down and his face relaxed. A few moments later Amanda was only staring into obscurity as Warnado's obfuscation spell returned.
Shadow let Warnado go. Her body was a charred marionette, barely standing.
"Shadow…" said Amanda as if it explained everything.
"I know, one second," she winced.
Shadow stepped backwards and her ice-mage disguise crumbled away in chunks of almost-flesh like a cracked vase, pristine black tissue gradually replacing it. All that was left was the black-skinned, white-haired mage Amanda was more accustomed to.
The others were milling about. Fire up on the ridge, surveying the scene with cool, unmoved eyes. Tyron patted down the fledgling flames on his fur with the help of Urist. Kay was marshalling Rose and Voidblade into establishing a perimeter.
"Shadow," Astro called out.
Jennifer, Steve and Astro were in a group. Destiny was a little apart from them, covering her mouth and looking out over the promontory. Jennifer had her arm around Steve, who wept into her shoulder. Astro was on his knees, passing his glowing hands up and down the body of Fristad. Amanda limped after the mage, knowing what was about to be said.
"Is there anything that can be done?" Astro asked with gravity, face iron-clad against all emotion.
"Too much brain damage from loss of oxygen and the hits he sustained, not to mention the snapped neck. The only magic that'll do anything would be necromancy. He's dead."
"You, for once, you could try and sound upset," said Jennifer coldly, holding Steve closer.
Amanda looked out over the cliff. She saw the blue cage with Silver in it and salvaged the small comfort that they had won. Bodies carpeted the ground around him.
Destiny was on her knees to her left. Fire had a hand on her shoulder.
"I know it might not feel it," Kay murmured as he crouched over the still-unconscious Warnado. "But we are victorious. Fristad will be commemorated. He is our first martyr."
As Amanda had thought, it was small comfort. The only sound was the wind, and the occasional rustle of armour as they walked.
The Ender signaled to her men to hold. There were reports of a disturbance in Research's main workshop. Freak approached them, translucent and grinning, clasping his pale, talon-like fingers together.
"You are going to love this!" he sniggered.
The Ender furrowed her eyebrows.
"Mercury!" roared Glibby the Ape. "I need gauntlets!"
"Calm, now, Glibby, there's no need for-"
There was a crashing sound. The second voice was that of Marinus Bul. The Ender beckoned to her soldiers to move in.
"I care not for calm! Calm can have his day when my Grey Ones are avenged. When I have gone back there and choked the life from the demon, from Brine and from Fire, then you have my permission to talk of calm!"
The Ender's urge to suppress a smirk at Glibby's evident but undefined misfortune receded on hearing news of Fire's involvement. Aside from the strange little mage's brief mention of her "brother", the Ender hadn't heard anything that could possibly be linked to the alchemist who had helped her and the dimensional cartographers and then left.
Distracting thoughts intruded upon her mind at the prospect of seeing him again, but she repelled them. The outlaws had the alchemist on their side, and he had angered Glibby. These were only facts. Intelligence. She rounded the corner and entered the room. Freak made himself visible beside her.
Glibby was pounding away on a door at the back of the room which had Dr Mercury's name on it. True to his word, his gauntlets were missing, his hands bleeding from hairline cuts. His right forearm was cut open and bleeding as well.
Only one Grey One accompanied him - the one who had taken the name Shaghran in his entrapment at the hands of Kay - and this one clasped his hands to a wound on his stomach. Silver, Shaghran and the other one. Those were the three who had started the defections from her ranks. She was not at all sad to hear at least one of them needed avenging. She hoped it was Silver, by far the most insubordinate even before they got stuck outside Nexus.
Bul was holding up the unconscious body of Bartholomew, the dog-faced officer who had accompanied Glibby out to face the Jackals. The attorney's jaw was on the floor and he just seemed glad not to be the object of the Ape's ire.
"Mercury, come out now!" Glibby cried again. "I swear, do not make an enemy-"
"-Hello, Glibby," The Ender interrupted with some degree of smugness. "Mind explaining what's going on?"
Glibby lowered his head and cackled.
"Of course, you're here to gloat."
"Nonsense, your loss is the loss of the Tower," the Ender condescended. "Tell myself and Mr. Bul what has happened."
Glibby paused a moment. The Ender could practically hear the whir of gears in his head as he concocted his excuse.
"Silver failed me," Glibby decided as he turned, tone regaining its theatrical emotiveness. "They had already disrupted us. Landslide, falling trees and a bombardment of arrows. Nearly half of us were dead or wounded, the mages all slain, most of your men succumbing to their wounds - like the weaklings they are."
The Ender raised her hand to stay her soldiers as they began to growl and hiss at this denigration of their fallen comrades.
"General Mandy then captured dear Bartholomew - thrust him through a rift and out of our sight. I deduced he couldn't be too far off and sent Shaghran out to find him. With our leadership and our numbers already decimated I called on Silver to stay with me, to help hold the line, but he went out to confront General Mandy. His lust for vengeance was too great. Your abandoning of him broke him, truly. The ruin and demise of good soldiers are you!
"Suffice to say, he went out to face the General and was beaten. As you, Ender, can testify, he truly is a masterful warrior, and Silver, who was your equal in every way, was just as inadequate an opponent. He was incinerated in front of all the men. After that, our soldiers began to panic - our ranks were broken by Fire and the men started to panic. Your so-called elites were the first to flee and the first to die for it!"
Glibby's pace began to staccato and rapid-fire on the laps sentence and he smashed another set of test-tubes.
The Ender was unfazed by the verbal assault.
"I was only just able to rescue Bartholomew before they descended upon us in full force. At which point my Lointain was slain by the demon-child." He clasped his brow in a false sadness that barely concealed impetuous anger.
"Well, well, well," Freak entered, walking around the Ender with hands clasped behind his back. "The Ape swings from lie to lie as his namesake swings from tree to tree."
Glibby wrenched a pipe from a table and hurled it at the phantom. He quickly became intangible, and it passed through him. The Ape snarled and pounded on the door three more times.
"Mercur- mods damn you!" He turned to Bul, who had just laid Bartholomew aside. "Get out there - get me armour - get me gauntlets! Magical, technological, enchanted, mundane, I do not care. And potions for our wounds! If you don't return with them, you had best return carrying your own severed head!"
He grabbed Bul by the shoulder and shunted him off down the corridor. The Ender, Freak, and their guards parted ways.
"Pacify him," Bul hissed as he went through.
The Ender moved her hand to the pommel of her sword as they closed ranks.
"Pacify me?!" Glibby roared again. "I risked my life to save Bartholomew, Bul! Were it not for Silver, and the cowards the Ender supplied me with I would be victorious! Fristad of Veridale is dead! Steven Brine, I bested. Destiny, slayer of the Sovereign, I bested. The Children of the Prophecy, some pernicious assassin, the wizard Astro - all these I bested! And dead they would be now had you given me the troops to make good on these combats. I was outgunned and outnumbered by the time of these duels, but I fought on. Even after that cowardly trickster Fire carved away my gauntlets, I fought on! And I shall yet fight on, and I shall yet present those I have named as corpses before the Entity if you just get me some mods-damned gauntlets!"
He threw one last punch back at Mercury's door. The entire metal structure, door and frame, quivered like a string from the impact. The Ender's smirk intensified. Seeing him tantrum like this was deeply satisfying. He deserved it for poaching her men. She prayed to the ancestors he would get violent with her so she could put an end to him.
"And where is this Entity I am supposed to serve?" Glibby raved, flailing his good arm emphatically. "Currently it is busy patrolling villages, muttering to itself like a senile old man. Am I now to lead you? I shall if I must. Oh, what has the Silhouette foisted upon me? I shall tell you: an army of cowards led by a-"
A white glove clasped his arm, at the end of a bronze-armoured limb. Behind Glibby stood the Entity, unmoving and as unfazed as a statue. Dr Mercury stood to the Entity's side, eyes bloodshot and surrounded by deep purple rings from nights without sleep. Even her robotic arms seemed to droop from exhaustion.
The Ender received the treasure of seeing the blood drain from Glibby's face in real time, as he desperately attempted to course correct.
"By-by a noble, mighty ruler, who I am wrong to doubt in such a manner," Glibby seethed, falling to his knees and bowing his head to hide his venom. "I apologise my lord, the heat of battle and the pain of loss are still on me. I was not thinking clearly."
The Entity lowered its gaze.
"Then you are not-fit to... return to the field," it concluded. "Go, contact your Silhouette. Tell him-I-demand more crystals-more quickly. As per the duties you… have had-foisted upon you."
It shunted him forward and he limped out of the room contemptuously. The Ender was ecstatic. She and Freak shared a satisfied look, and then they turned to their master.
"We have accelerated the plan. It is time I told you what shape-our victory shall take."
The Ender's heart stopped. She tried to exchange a look with Freak, but he couldn't take his eyes off the Entity. His gaze was ablaze with a terrifying ambition.
