-Global Resonance-
Previous experience is a lifesaver, especially when failure the next time would result in catastrophe. Marceline kept this in mind as she stayed well above the ground, staring down unwillingly at her opponent. Fifth Arc hadn't changed her expression for the entire time the two girls had been in a deadlock, neither able to strike the other. Thanks to the human's abilities, it was difficult for either fighter to even attempt an approach.
Marcy was busy thinking of a weakness she could use against the Arc; preferably one that wouldn't cause the vampire to permanently put her down. She thought about the results of their first engagement. An up-front fight accomplished nothing, only getting her beaten into submission. Even if she had a way of fighting from a distance, the speed of whatever she fired the human's way would always be slower than her ability to dodge it.
Fifth Arc's hearing would prevent any way of sneaking up on her, removing invisibility as well. She could always shapeshift into a monster to try smacking the Arc, but again, the lack of maneuverability would be more cumbersome than advantageous. Groaning from frustration, Marcy frantically shook her head.
Why can't I be more resilient like Finn, then I could just go down there and outlast the kid in a fistfight.
Thinking of the young hero wasn't exactly helpful either. If anything, it made her feel worse. She gazed out over the horizon of the grasslands, wondering where he was now.
"Dang it, weenie, you've beaten the Lich's mind control, why didn't you beat this loser's?"
However, upon thinking it over for a minute, analyzing all the details that Jake had recounted of their battle against the necromancer all that time ago, Marceline nearly gasped as she realized the answer was right in front of her.
Back then, you had that crush on Bonnie. That sweater, your feelings, they protected you.
She looked back at the darkened border between earth and the heavens, her face set in a saddened frown.
But now, you had no warmth. To think, if you hadn't let go of Flame Princess, you could've used that passion to ward off Elodeus' corruption.
Absentmindedly, the vampire began playing a solemn tune on her ax bass, trying to move past the depressing thoughts she'd just picked apart to understand. A gentle song drifted into the air, filling the blacked atmosphere with an odd sense of emotion and serenity. As the music continued, Marceline's train of thought shifted. Her strums became harder, her sounds more vigorous. The girl's face was contorted more towards anger than sadness.
"That stupid wizard. I'll guillotine him the second I have the chance!"
The music fully teetered towards a hard note, now a full-on hardrock solo. In the middle of her emotional expulsion, Marcy noticed a different sound mixed into the noise. She glanced down to the ground, where she saw Fifth Arc practically grinding her teeth together as she covered her ears and squeezed her eyes shut. Marceline was actually a bit offended.
"Aw come on, it's a perfectly good-"
She stopped, staring at the human with a look of realization. Fifth Arc recovered from the music and shook her head, reoriented.
Her hearing. It's too sensitive.
She held up her hand, then strung down on her bass to produce the loudest sound she could muster. Fifth Arc actually cried out as she covered her ears again. Marceline briefly contemplated, then divebombed the human, striking another hard note. The Arc was unable to hear her approach, resulting in her getting slugged in the chin by her vampire opponent.
Fifth skidded over the ground, knocked out of orientation further by the blow. Marcy flew at her, struming her bass yet again. This time however, the human girl opened her eyes, and set them directly on the closing vampire. With one lightning fast movement, Marcy was slammed into the ground by a strong ax kick from her foe's heel.
Grunting from the pain, Marceline quickly shifted to her large monstrous form, merely for the sake of having a less ragdoll-like body for Fifth Arc to continue pounding while she was dazed on the ground. Unfortunately, the transformation did, as she feared, reduce her ability to move greatly. On the upside, she couldn't get a good hit on the vampire, rushing to various points along the black, tentacled mass, searching for a place to strike.
Marceline took the opportunity and tried swatting the Arc, but naturally, they were once again at a standstill. She wasn't fast enough to make contact, and the human couldn't fight back either. Sighing and seeing they'd made no progress, Marcy returned to her humanoid form and quickly jetted back into the sky.
Fifth Arc stopped her running and glared up at the vampire, who was rather confused as to what had transpired earlier.
"I don't get it, how did you know I was coming the second time?"
The human pointed to Marcy's bass.
"Sound waves, just like light waves, get compressed or strung out when they move towards or away from you. I might not be able to hear for beans while you're playing that thing, but I can still distinguish a change in tune."
Marceline groaned.
"Jeez, girl. I'm not Bonnie, please don't get all technical on me."
Fifth Arc growled.
"Are you gonna fight or talk?"
Sighing, the vampire brandished her ax bass and eyed her target. She knew it would still be difficult to approach the human, no matter what strategy was used to deafen the girl. On the flip-side, she couldn't keep on taking her sweet time. The other Arcs had to be stopped, and the longer she was stuck fighting Fifth, the worse off her friends would be against the remaining humans.
Marcy took a deep breath, planning her move. She couldn't rely on speed or power. So, that only left one thing, and it was one of her 'best' qualities of all. Trickery.
With a burst of speed, Marceline charged down towards Fifth Arc, who braced herself for a strike. The girl apparently thought she could easily repel whatever her opponent was planning, and so neglected to try dashing away. Regrettably for her, this gave Marcy the upper hand.
With a split-second snap of her fingers, two pairs of bony hands suddenly burst through the ground, grabbing onto Fifth Arc's ankles. The girl was understandably frightened, quickly using her speed to shake the undead limbs off of her. Realizing her focus had been disrupted, the Arc quickly swung her head back to where Marceline was last seen.
Well, she definitely wasn't there now.
The human frantically scanned her surroundings, also listening carefully to detect a potentially invisible foe. However, there was no sound aside from the dying wind. Panicking, Fifth Arc zoomed away, heading to a portion of the grasslands several miles from where she'd been standing in mere seconds.
She took a moment to think, trying to remember anything useful from the profile she'd read on the vampire. Nothing came up. Frustrated, she began to dash back towards the spot of their encounter. Only one thing stopped her; a sudden, and very painful, prick on her skin. She cried out from the pain, losing her footing as she'd already begun running.
The momentum gathered by the girl caused her to impact the ground, scraping along it for a good several feet. She groaned from the hurt then slowly got back to her feet. Another bite kept her on her knees, however. Grunting, Fifth Arc began patting herself all over, trying to figure out what was going on.
It was a minute later that she briefly felt a furry object crawl over her jacket. Freaking out, she immediately threw herself to the ground and starting rolling around, as if on fire. It took a moment, but she heard a definite yelp and something being momentarily squashed underneath her. The Arc growled.
"You! Get off of me!"
Marceline's bat form clung to the human's hood, trying her best to endure the painful effects of being steamrolled. Eventually, she managed to bite the Arc a few more times, outlasting the girl as she quickly got back to her feet, enraged and woozy from all the injuries.
"That's it, you pest!"
She ran off, carving across Ooo's expanse at speeds that Marceline could only dream of. It took all the vampire's strength to hang on to the girl's jacket. The human ran faster and faster, eventually turning the land into nothing but a blur. Marcy only managed to look down, seeing that the green and brown of ground had been replaced by the deep blue of water.
Jeez, she's already over the ocean!
Fifth Arc continued the run, attempting to throw the vampire off through the extreme speeds she was attaining. A second later, a boom sounded, signalling that they'd broken the sound barrier. Marcy's entire body felt like it was being compressed, unable to keep up with the air pressure being slammed into her.
Regardless, she knew better than to give up. The Arc was now moving fast enough that only the shifts between land and sea were visible. Even that soon started to blend together. New land formed beneath them, informing Marcy that they were on a different continent. This was a dangerous position, since letting go now would not only be very painful, but also put her at an impossibly attainable distance to get back home.
Fifth Arc didn't seem to figure this out yet, since she could've easily stopped and allowed the staggering inertia to shoot the vampire off of her back. She just kept on running, faster every second. Marceline soon noticed the oceans and land were alternating every few moments, startling her at the speed they had achieved. She wasn't the best at math and such, but guessed that they were now circling the planet every few seconds.
Out of nowhere, the surroundings brightened, blinding Marcy long enough for the world to change. When she next opened her eyes, the environment was bewildering. The sights were no longer blurred, per say, but appeared to be a strange tunnel, through which Fifth Arc seemed to be running at normal human speed.
"What...happened?" the vampire asked in shock.
Her human opponent, unfortunately, looked worried.
"I...I ran so fast...we ended up in a sub-realm of speed."
The bizarre tunnel-like area indeed looked nothing of this world, with random flashes of light streaking by as if they were flying past hundreds of stars. Aside from that, Fifth Arc looked rather panicked.
"Get us out of here!" Marceline begged.
The human shook her head.
"I can't! If I stop suddenly, both of us will be torn apart by the friction."
Marcy groaned.
"Then take it slow!"
The Arc shook her head again.
"I can't! I'm...I'm too scared to focus!"
Marceline had forgotten she was dealing with someone quite young. Fifth Arc looked around twelve or thirteen; certainly not an age that was prepared to deal with a life or death situation. Worried for their survival, she began to come up with a plan. First things first, she used some logic to figure out her maneuverability in the realm. She let go of Fifth Arc, surprisingly not flying off into unknown wastes.
Like I thought. I'm moving at the same speed, so I can't leave until she slows down.
Marcy looked over at the Arc. Even under Elodeus' control, fear was dominant on her face. It was a sad sight, watching a young girl panic and begin to form tears in her eyes. Suddenly, Marceline saw herself, a thousand years back, alone, in a world that was in chaos. She returned to her humanoid form, frowning at the human.
There had to be a way to stop them, a way to gradually reduce their speed so that neither would be ripped to pieces. Absentmindedly, she reached for her bass, which instantly gave her an idea. The vampire took out her instrument and held it in front of her, struming gently.
"V."
Fifth Arc's attention was drawn, gazing with holding fear at the vampire.
"Please, listen."
She strummed a few more notes, setting the mood and closing her eyes, letting the emotion take over.
Alone, in a world, that's been turned upside down
Here I stand, crying, with a desperate frown
No one to love, no one hug, no one's warm hand to hold
I was alone...
I was alone...
Little girl on my own
Fifth Arc's frightened expression was slowly dying down.
You were fooled
I was ruled
By the despair growing in my soul
Turned my heart black as coal
If only I could, I would reach back and save you from this fate
Of lies and hate
You were alone...
You were alone...
Little girl on your own
The realm's streaking objects were decreasing their speeds, now appearing as elongated lines. Fifth Arc wasn't even blinking as she stared with wetting eyes at Marceline.
A dear friend lost, a family gone
We suffer our endless torment, one frozen in time, and the other a pawn
But if the earth has taught me one thing true
It's that 'hopes dwells in each, and every...one of you'
Harmonic strums were calming the surroundings, nearly grinding the sub-realm to a halt. Marcy opened her eyes, now smiling gently at Fifth Arc, who was letting the tears run down her cheeks. The vampire floated closer and brushed them away.
We were alone...
We were alone...
Little girls without a home
Fifth Arc's pace finally met its end. She tripped, whereupon Marceline quickly caught her in her arms as the reality they were trapped in shattered. As Ooo came back into focus, Marcy braced herself, allowing her body to take the pain as she was throw to the ground, sliding along it until their momentum was finally halted. The vampire groaned momentarily, then looked down at the girl curled up on her chest.
The human was sobbing quietly, eyes tightly shut and shivering from the emotional release Marceline's song had caused. The raven-haired girl gently stroked the girl's hair, smoothly shushing her in a compassionate way of calming her.
"It's alright, V."
The red light from the Arc's shirt suddenly faded away, reverting to its yellow normality. Marcy helped herself and Fifth sit up, now knelt on the ground, with the vampires arms around her. The human let her tears fall to the grass, where they soaked into the soil hidden underneath.
"Marceline...you..."
She managed to hold her head up high enough to look the lady in her eyes.
"You lived it too."
The pale-skinned girl nodded.
"Yes. All the fine and heartbreaking details."
She wiped away the last of the tears on the human's face.
"I just wish...that you could've had a better person to offer you hope, like I did."
Fifth Arc let her eyelids fall closed, sniffling one last time.
"Me too. In fact..."
She found the strength to place her own arms around the vampire.
"I wish it would've been you."
Marceline returned the embrace, giving the girl what support she could. The other Arcs had been her family, even after the loss of her own. Thinking about what little she had now, it made the human feel less whole to the vampire.
Literally.
Marcy flung her eyes open and gazed upon the girl's form. Her lower body had already begun fading away.
"V! What's happening to you!"
The human slowly opened her own sight and looked upon her legs and abdomen.
"I guess...I failed him, and this is my punishment."
Marcy looked devastated, as she watched dispersing particles fly off into the wind, each one taking away a piece of Fifth Arc's existence.
"No! This can't be!" Marcy shouted, holding the girl's shoulders tightly.
The human looked back up at her, somehow forcing through a smile. Her hand reached out, grasping Marceline's weakly.
"I may have not had a long run. But at the very least, I'm glad it's ending when I'm not alone."
She noticed the tears now coming out of the immortal's eyes. She tried wiping them away, but her hand was already too intangible to do so.
"Marceline, thank you."
She threw herself into the vampire once more, which she received back in the form of a tight embrace.
"Thank you for showing me I'm not alone, no matter who comes by..."
Marcy felt the disappearance of what she held in her arms. The limbs grasped nothing but air, causing her to fall forward onto her hands and knees. Head raised, the girl gazed up into the dark sky, seeing the final remains of Fifth Arc drift into the heavens.
"V..."
Marcy stood up, shakily, picking up her ax bass in the process. She watched, unmoving, until she could no longer make out the soft shimmer of the human's departing essence. The vampire stood there for a few moments, just staring off into the sky. Eventually though, her hand holding the bass tightened, nearly cracking the instrument's neck.
"She was just a kid..."
Marceline turned around, staring, with a glare, out into the distance. She could barely make out the sight of an abnormal light source on the horizon, where their enemy was up to no good. What the wizard could possibly do to worsen the situation she didn't know. But she also didn't care.
"And you did that to her."
She held up her bass, pointing its blades toward the far-off light.
"Mark my words, Elodeus. I'm taking a page out of Finn's book. When we come for you, your evil will fall, and I'll make sure it's slow and painful..."
A/N: Sweet, on schedule with this one.
TheMentalAdventurer: At least the finale looks exciting.
DJ Rodriguez: Those are very kind words. Thanks.
Fiery Crusader: It's good to be optimistic. Keep on doing so.
I am The7: Well, I guess I kinda answered that.