METALCHEMY - quantum witch © 2008
see chapter 1 for warnings, rating, and summary
3 : RUBEDO
Offdensen dreamed, lying quite still and calm in his bed.
He stood on a blackened plain, watching the five metal giants… lumbering, shuffling, weaving, striding, flying… toward one another along a pentagram pattern. Copper, lead, gold, tin, silver. When they reached each other, there was a blinding flash of power that could be called nothing less than alchemical. And when the light receded, he saw the giants fused together at the hands, a pure energy pulsing constantly amongst them, fluctuating between whitest white and blackest blackness and blood-flame red . Music pounded from their forms, shaking the world.
And the world bowed before them, basking in the terrifying, hypnotic, dark glow. The common masses screamed in worship. The guardians stood masked and well-armed. And both groups declared their willingness to sacrifice themselves without hesitation upon the altar of their new gods.
Offdensen looked around the edges of the plain, where shadows moved, red eyes watching the five giants, not bowing down but instead plotting how to use them to their own ends. Or how to bring about their end. The world would suffer no matter what happened, he knew this. It had a small chance of surviving under the rule of the metal kings, whereas the shadows wouldn't be so merciful.
He had a great decision to make. Stay with the giants, or leave them to the clutches of the shadows.
In the middle of those shadows was a slithering circle, an ouroboros of mercury, liquid and deadly.
He looked back to the giants. He knew them well after nearly a year, knew they were flawed and damaged, ignorant, self-centered, and in some ways even naïve. But it wasn't entirely malicious, and it had begun to change. Now there was a strange innocence and new life and purpose inside the band, and it was… bizarrely sacred.
No, he would stay here. His choice had become clear and sharp.
He looked at his own body now, and saw he too had become a giant. An iron dragon, who would protect with fierceness and destroy those seeking to tear down the metal gods soon to rule the world…
Offdensen awoke with a heavy sigh, remembering every bit of the dream. He sat up, picked up the bedside phone and dialed a very private number.
"Yes, it's Charles Offdensen… You can tell Mr. Selecia that the… prophecy is true. They have found the fifth one. They have arisen, and I intend to keep their path clear to the end. Tell him that I am no longer the Tribunal's spy, I have defected. I belong to Dethklok now."
He replaced the phone, then lay back down, secure in the knowledge that he had found his own destiny. He was metal too, far more than the band would ever know.
- The eternal symbol of the ouroboros, as well as deadly untouchable mercury is Selatcia, of course. It is another metal used in alchemy.
- Offdensen is iron which is another achemical metal, and the dragon is often used at its symbol.
- Hm. Betcha didn't see that coming. But one has to wonder how he seemed to know as much as he did about what was going to happen.
Also, the spelling of "Offdensen" and "Selecia" are according to Brendon Small and not the fandom. He is quoted as saying he doesn't know how the spelling of "Selatcia" got started, but it's wrong.