Chapter 3: Call to Arms

Bzzz. Bzzz. Bzzz. Bzzz. Bzzz.

What the hell is that?

Ral's eyes flickered open as the persistent buzzing bore its way into his subconscious. He was immediately met with a harsh ray of sunlight from the now-empty window frame of the Azorius bell tower. He squinted and held a hand up to shield his eyes, just long enough for them to adjust to the morning sun.

Morning? Does that mean…

Ral's pulse quickened, his grogginess subsiding as a rush of adrenaline bolted through his body. He jumped off the wooden floor and looked before him to the source of the consistent buzzing.

"The Beacon's on…" His voice trailed off in wonder as he looked at the impressive machine chugging along, a large multicolored beam of pure energy firing continually from its top. "I did it. We did it!"

We…

Ral turned, his eyes quickly darting around the cramped bell tower room for his allies. He saw Kaya, laying prone on her back. He saw Lavinia face down on the floor, her cloak now covered in soot. He saw Hekara, face down in a pool of her own blood.

"I'm sorry," he whispered to Hekara's corpse. He didn't know why he did it. The two had never gotten along, and not just because she was Rakdos and he Izzet. She just never seemed to take any of this seriously, no matter how much he had tried to convince her.

Maybe if she'd listen, she'd still be alive.

This did little to assuage his guilt, but his mind was soon stirred by the soft murmuring of Kaya regaining consciousness.

He walked over as she propped herself up on her elbows, scrunching her face at the sun's rays. Hearing the approaching footsteps, she reflexively reached for the daggers on her belt, but her hands froze midair when she saw Ral's face.

"Did… did we do it?" she managed to stammer out through her mental fugue. "Did we win?"

Ral opened his mouth to answer, then realized he didn't know how to. He listened to the buzzing of the operational Beacon, but his eyes fell once more on Hekara's body and the crimson halo splayed around her head.

Kaya's eyes followed his, then widened as the memories of last night flooded back. "Oh gods. Ral, I'm sorry, I tried to warn her, but…"

"It's ok," Ral cut her off, his voice hard and shear as a tempered blade. "It couldn't be helped. We all knew that this was the risk of teaming up against Bolas. We should be grateful only one of us died."

What am I saying? While Ral's words conveyed a cold detachment, his insides were twisted in sadness. None of us should've died. He wanted to cry, but knew he could not, not now. There'll be plenty of time to mourn when that damned dragon is dead.

"So, the Beacon's up and running?" Kaya asked as she got to her feet. She stumbled slightly, putting a hand to her head until she found her footing.

"Yeah, it's working all right. If Niv's design is correct, which it being wrong would be a first, Ravnica should be seeing a massive influx of planeswalkers soon. The Beacon's signal should be reaching all over the multiverse, finding active sparks and pulling them to Ravnica like a giant magnet."

More like a chameleon's tongue latching on to a dragonfly, he thought, but he quickly shook away this morbidity. He was dubious upon seeing Niv-Mizzet's backup plan, but he knew he should believe in it. He needed to believe in it. Otherwise, the dragon, and Hekara, and soon countless others, would have died in vain.

"If an army of planeswalkers can't stop Nicol Bolas, then I don't know what will."

"If that's true, why didn't he just smash the damned thing when we were all knocked out?" asked Kaya.

Ral flashed a half-smile. "Niv's design made sure it was indestructible once turned on. No failsafes, no weak points, no backdoors. I couldn't stop it even if I tried. At this point, it'll keep running until it runs out of juice, and with the amount of galvanizing I did, that won't be for a damn long time."

"Finally, some good news. So, when should the planeswalkers start getting here?"

"They should have already started arriving. The Beacon'll pull them here, but when they arrive and where they land is completely random. Niv loved his inventions to have just a hint of unpredictability."

"So…" Kaya began, then paused. Ral could see the words get caught in her throat, but he couldn't guess what she was trying to say. Eventually, she pushed the words out. "Does that mean Vraska will be back?"

Ral felt his heart sink slightly at her mention. "Probably," he shrugged.

"Do you think she'll fight on our side? I mean, she's still technically the queen of the Golgari. I can't imagine she'll want to see her guild destroyed."

"After the amount of voltage I shot at her, I doubt she'll make herself known any time soon. Unless she's sitting by Bolas' side right now…"

"Ral, you can't be too hard on her. We both know what that dragon can do once he's in your head."

"And yet here we are. Still seeing over our guilds, still fighting Bolas, still not murdering anybody."

Kaya eyes fell, not sure how to respond. Ral saw this and wanted to apologize, but his resolve against Vraksa, and his pride, kept him silent.

A few seconds passed, with neither Kaya nor Ral knowing quite what to say. Fortunately for them, it was another voice by the window that cut the tension.

"So," Lavinia said slowly as she rose to her feet. "I take it that incessant buzzing means the Beacon is operational?"

"Yeah," Ral responded, running a hand through his silver-streaked hair. "We managed to turn it on just before…"

His voice trailed off. The air once again grew thick with tension as Ral's eyes broke from Lavinia's and moved across the floor until he saw the faint outline of red in his periphery.

Lavinia's eyes followed his. She looked up and down the still body of their former ally, then returned her gaze to Ral.

"It's unfortunate," she said, voice even as it had ever been.

Kaya reached out to her. "Lavinia, I'm sorry. I know you didn't…"

"Stop," she commanded. "I don't blame myself for this. I'm not a child. I know that Hekara's blood is on Bolas' hands, not mine."

Kaya nodded. "Just another name on the list of people to avenge by stopping that dragon."

"A list that's already far too long. With that machine, though, we have a chance to cut it short. Especially when the Living Guildpact finally shows himself. Hopefully he'll actually do something and not just sit and hide until Bolas is done."

Ral felt the venom behind her words, a feeling he certainly shared. "I don't like him any more than you, but with Niv gone and the guilds so divided, we do need him."

"Hmm, I'll be surprised if he even remembers how to use his powers," she huffed.

"We can remind him. Finding that pompous ass should be top priority. Bolas has perpetrated so many crimes, but we finally have something on him under Ravnican law. He killed a guild master, so all we need is for the Living Guildpact to command his arrest, and the Guildpact's magic should take care of it."

"That's a small comfort," Kaya spoke up. "Hopefully he'll get here soon, and hopefully he's not hard to find."

Ral sighed. "We can only ho-"

His words were cut short as a massive flash of light erupted between the three of them. Ral nearly doubled over in surprise. Then he saw the silhouette of a hooded figure appear in the middle of the glow

Could it be…

The light subsided, and Ral, Kaya, and Lavinia watched as a young boy collapsed to the ground before them, coughing violently and gasping for air. Kaya quickly rushed to the boy's side and helped him to his feet, easily supporting his weight.

Huh, not exactly what I was expecting… Ral thought.

The boy kept coughing for a few seconds, but as it subsided, he looked around the small room. His eyes darted to Ral, then to Lavinia, then to the buzzing Beacon, and finally to Kaya beside him.

"Wh-wh-where am I?" he sputtered, his eyes wobbling frantically. "Who are you people?"

Ral sized the boy up. He looked to be in his late teens, with sun-tanned skin and dark-brown hair cut close to the sides of his head. His clothes reminded Ral of the robes the Orzhov priests wore, except his was drab brown and weather-worn instead of immaculate white and gold. The strangest thing, however, was that the boy was covered in sand. Light beige specks seemed to fall from every surface, accumulating in small piles by his feet.

"My name is Ral," he began, holding in hands up in a gesture for the child to calm down. "Ral Zarek. The woman propping you up is Kaya. We're both planeswalkers too. And this is Lavinia. She's not a 'walker, but she's a former lawmage and a hell of a combatant. You're on Ravnica, in a bell tower of the Azorius Senate. Sorry, I didn't think the jump would be that disorienting for a planeswalker to endure."

The boy's demeanor grew more frightened. "Ravnica? Azorius? Planeswalker? What are you talking about? And why are you all dressed li-like that? Does your city not worry about the diamond storms?"

Now it was Ral's turn to join the confusion. He looked to Kaya, but she could only shrug, clearly just as ignorant to the boy's meaning as he was.

"Sorry kid, but I don't know what you mean. Why don't you start by telling us your name and the last thing you remember?"

"Um, my name's Teyo. Teyo Verada of Gobakhan. I'm an acolyte of the Order of the Shieldmage. The last thing I remember is coming back from a mission in Oasis. I was at the back of the caravan when a particularly rough diamond storm hit. I remember trying to shield the backmost packbeast, but failing. I remember Abbot Barrez yelling at me to watch my step. Then I remember accidentally stepping into a sinkhole. I sank. I couldn't see, couldn't hear, couldn't breathe. Then I felt something…" He paused, seemingly try to find the exact right words. "I don't know, like, it felt like energy surging through my body. Like my soul leaked into my veins. And the last thing I remember is a big blast of light covering me, and then I was here."

As he finished talking, Teyo's eyes suddenly grew wide. He looked at Ral with a look of pure terror. "Wait, am I dead? I-is this the afterlife?"

Kaya smiled to Ral and let out a slight chuckle. "'fraid not, kid. This is the land of the living, at least for the time being."

Teyo looked relieved, but that lasted for a fraction of a second before panicked confusion settled back in. "So, I'm in the city of Ravnica?"

"Yup," said Ral, "grandest city in the multiverse."

"So, how far away am I from Oasis now? I appreciate you all saving me from the sinkhole, but I need to get back to my monastery. The abbot will have my head if I'm lost too long!"

Ral sighed and shook his head. Just my luck. Out of every planeswalker in the multiverse, we're stuck with some kid whose spark literally just activated.

"Look Teyo, I hate to break this to you, but you are nowhere near Oasis. You're on a completely different plane of existence. You said you were some kind of monk, right?"

"Huh? Oh, yeah…" Ral saw Teyo's pupils dilate and watched as a thin layer of sweat began to collect along his brow. "Actually, I'm a true monk yet. I'm still in training."

"Well, regardless of what you were, now you're a planeswalker. That near-death experience you just had must've unlocked your spark, just in time for you to be pulled to our happy little universe."

"I… I don't…" Teyo mumbled, unsure how to process all of this new information. It was clear that he wasn't fully comprehending the situation. He looked like he wanted to ask Ral more questions, but he didn't know what to ask.

Sorry kid, I know it's a lot, but we have more urgent business to get to.

"Ral, Kaya, you should come see this." The two looked to Lavinia, who was standing by the empty window overlooking the horizon.

"You good to stand, Teyo?" Kaya asked. He nodded nervously, then let go of Kaya's shoulders. He stood up and brushed his hands across his tunic, a new pile of sand falling from its wrinkles.

Teyo followed Ral and Kaya as they walked to the open window, but he instantly paused when he saw Hekara's body still sitting in the corona of blood. He watched, horrified, as Kaya and Ral neatly stepped around it, as if it were just another shard of broken glass to be avoided. He swallowed hard, forced his eyes off the too-still body, and made his way to the window.

Teyo froze as he looked out of the window, his eyes bulging with fear. "What's with all of these buildings? All of these people? And why is there only one sun in the sky?"

His eyes darted this way and that, soaking in the looming spires and cobblestone streets of Ravnica. He waited for an answer, but Ral, Kaya, and Lavinia had their attention drawn to something else. An enormous building shadowed the far corner of the Tenth District plaza, black as midnight and taller than any structure the city had ever known. It clashed horribly with the Ravnican architecture, but Ral instinctively knew that was probably the purpose, a citadel to represent that the old Ravnica would soon be under siege.

"I don't remember that being there last night," Kaya remarked.

"I guess we know where Bolas is hiding out," Lavinia stated flatly. "And I guess that means he has his peons with him. Bolas is powerful, but his magic doesn't build things like that." Her eyes dropped, scanning the ground below. "It looks like planeswalkers are beginning to appear. Hopefully the Living Guildpact will be here soon."

Teyo looked back at the three adults, his voice cracking with stress. "Um, can someone please explain what all of this is?"

Ral heaved a deep, almost mournful sigh. "This is Ravnica, kid. Welcome to the war front."