AN: Hello, my dear friends. Here we are, at the big two zero! This fiction has come so far since the halcyon days of 2013. It's in no small part to all the insane amounts of love and input y'all have given me, fueling my fickle creative energy to reach further and further. So here's to us, and to Finn Grows Up. And fear not, more is yet to come. Cheers!
Chapter 20: Born for Chains
Finn staggered back, saving his neck by a hair's breadth. He laughed once, a flustered, giddy sound that his implacable foe didn't seem to appreciate. She let out another digitized howl, cleaving wildly at him as he sprang away. "Stop it! Stop running!" she demanded. Finn couldn't help but titter on. Whoever was under that jumble of dark metal was fast, and mondo strong. Every clang of her goliath great sword against Everstroke sent shocks running up Finn's arm, and keeping out of the long sweep of that four foot blade had the last human working every last evasive technique he knew. She came to him with a vicious diagonal cut, which he ducked left. She swept horizontally low, and Finn jumped, twisting in the air to bring his legs out of the line of the strike. With a bark of laughter Finn finished the twist, landing on his feet and swinging Everstroke in through the gap. The unbluntable saber gouged into one of her scaled abdominal plates, the molecularly reenforced blade easily parting the more conventional metal. The backswing came through at mid level, and again Finn dropped low under it, swinging Everstroke for her knees, forcing his foe's guard low. He continued to threaten low, and Augment realozed his ploy at the last moment when his longer blade came down hard on the back of her left forearm. The plate failed immediately, splitting in two parts that tumbled away. She felt the blade bite into her arm, carving into her muscle, and the arm fell limp and useless. Augment's injectors stoked her frustration, and her howling only increased.
"Thoros, are you seeing this?" Finn asked incredulously.
"Indeed, Lord Finn. She bears Worldcleaver, the Ruling Blade of the British Isles. It is a Scottish Highland claymore, based around an inertial multiplier; objects struck by the weapon experience an impact eight times that of Worldcleaver's weight at a given velocity."
Finn tutted once. "So it's heavier hitting me than it is for her swinging it," he said, and Thoros affirmed.
"Thats not all my lord," the construct continued.
"Huh?" Thoros would've continued, but Augment's howling drowned out his speaker as she rushed in with a crushing downward swing that tore into the steel floor. Finn's grin started to grit slightly; despite the huge chunk of muscle hanging off her arm, this strange female pressed on one-handed with only increasing fury. Finn put Everstroke between him and Worldcleaver, and he gasped at the impact. Everstroke held, but Finn's arm buckled with the strain, and the boy hero had to dance away on his foot work to avoid being cut in two. He raised Dragonfang and fired, staggering her back with his first shot before his target began batting the pulses away with her huge sword. Finn ground his teeth and slid the weapon into it's highest setting. The blast burst open when she struck it, and the roiling blue explosion carried her into the side of a stack of crates. "What is it?" He asked, watching her intently as she picked herself up.
"I cannot be sure with only the instruments within your watch," Thoros continued. "However it would appear your enemy's body is composed very similarly to yours. At the very least she shares your carbide skeleton, nerve conductivity, muscle fibre density, and adrenal responses. To boot, her armor system is equipped for combat drug support; she feels no pain, and her rates of fatigue and recovery are much more efficient. Exercise utmost caution."
Her eight camera eyes were back, focused hard on him. "Your machine is so helpful," she said. "Your Thoros knows too much. My Orithix is so dumb, so stubborn." Augment's gaze settled lower. "He should belong to Augment. Give him to me!"
The last of Finn's grin went away, replaced by angry rebuke. "Over my cold corpse," he said. "You steamed this fleet up alongside my home, and you took a swing at all my friends, and now you want Thoros? You want the Ruling Blades, you want the Silver Tower?" Finn set Dragonfang to medium and let lose. Augment evaded in a zigzagging pattern, until she closed, crossing Worldcleaver with Everstroke. "I've waited my whole life for this birthright, searched high and low for something, anything in this world that was of my kind, and you're not taking it from me!"
Finn kicked Augment hard, staggering her back, before leaping into a whirlwind of swordplay, driving back his foe with a sustained assault. Blow after blow rained down on Worldcleaver, keeping Augment's movements short and close; giving her no space or time to build the momentum to deaden his assault with heavy clashes. "Shut up!" She roared at him. "Why do you deserve it? What's your pain? Where are your scars? How can you flaunt your freedom to my face like this? We were born for chains, and you'll feel them too!"
Their rush out of the hangar bay was maddening. Marceline could smash bots all she liked, no matter how many alloy frames she crushed beneath her huge vampiric fists would quiet the scream from the back of her skull, begging for news of Finn's fate. She could feel how much her features had twisted, but her stress couldn't be fought down enough to stop it. "Come on!" Peebs had shouted. "He's right, we can't take the computer core with that thing breathing down our necks! The sooner we hit the computer core, the sooner we can come back and help him!" So Marcie fought like the demon she appeared as, mercilessly smashing her targets and brushing off the pain of their stinging plasma weapons.
Bonnibel had never seen her friend so incensed. Not that Marceline had never been known for temper, but her more bestial form was something that caused her no small amount of grief. Yet Marceline was embracing it, letting her demon blood and vampiric infection alter her human body into a more lethal form. In any other situation behavior this off key would alarm Bubblegum greatly, but in pitched combat there was simply no time to address it; the ruler of the Candy Kingdom would have to settle for the Vampire Queen's increased aggression as a force multiplier, the assault team advancing steadily in the wake of Marcie's rampage with minimal losses. Eventually the computer core entrance stood before them, buffered by a thick knot of robotic soldiers. The team posted on the corner; when Marceline charged ahead to smash the firing line, a pair of formidable triple-barreled cannons deployed from the cieling. Marceline cried out as the hail of plasma pulses and airbursting shells tore into her, though she continuously regenerated these injuries.
"Hold on sistah," Jake growled. "I got ya back!" As FP laid down a spray of fire, the magic hound shrank down as small as he could, before ststretching out a thin arm, down the floor, between clanking feet and then up the wall behind the mechanized security units. Jake began threading himself between the barrels of the rotary cannons. Soon the hail of shredding fragmentation bursts came to an end, and Marceline's charge resumed. The vampiress began pounding away at the thick steel doors in frustration, but these were far to thick and well locked to budge. Marceline gave up with a demonic 'ugh', while Bonnibel set about the entry controls, connecting her control gauntlet to an input port in an attempt to open maintanence access.
"Thoros, are you listening?" Peebs asked.
"I wondered when you'd finally need my services. How can I assist, Princess?" Came the cool reply.
"Slice me through this security door, and get ready to force your way into this baby's computer system."
The doors clanged and clonged, locking mechanisms disengaging before the rectangular doors split in five like trapezoidial teeth, two above into the ceiling and three below into the floor. The team spilled inside, PB rushing ahead down a catwalk running between and around the massive server blocks, to the primary access at the center of the room. The gum girl flashed a smile of relief to the others. "Here goes," she said, jacking in. She watched her eyepiece, and her frown slowly shifted. "What the grod? The command signal cut out?"
"What do you mean, it cut out?!" Marceline growled, far beyond the end of her patience.
"I mean it's gone. The user command interface went silent." Bubblegum started up her holoprojector. "There's just this."
"Well," said the gregarious, yet cantankerous voice. "I see you folks down there finally found your way in for our little powwow. Good to see you could make it." Martin Mertens was a dashing figure. Much like Finn, though his hair darker and his skin pinker. Yet there was a viciousness in his face and a rage in his eyes that was quite un-Finn-like. He sat at a desk, his bearded chin on his fist. "What a delightful little freakshow."
"This asset is out of play," Bubblegum said, reasserting her moxy. "You're gonna have to wait a little while longer before you can get your butt kicked by us again."
"And you should be thankful. Though honestly, if this was enough to take you out youd have literally zero chance... Ah, but anyways. I see my son isn't with you. Augment must have him occupied. Good good, it's bout time they met."
"What sort of vile monster did you sic on him?" Marceline hissed. Martin laughed.
"Himself, of course!"
"Finn is human!" Pheobe shouted.
"Laughable!" Martin countered. "Finn is an augment! Altered via cybernetics and gene therapy into a killing machine, damn his mother's eyes. He's no more human than any of you! All that the boy is missing is an armor suit to bend him to my command, that's all that separates him from the other freak I sent to him! Same parents, same mods, same being!" Martin found himself spitting, and reigned himself in. "No matter. There are humans left. Untainted. I see them every day. Begging me to restore them to their homes once again. For their sake, your stain will be wiped clean from my Earth."
Klaxons began to blare, filling the ship with their din. "Ohhhh, that doesn't sound good," Flame Princess said.
"Oh, and don't bother Finn about not getting to see his old man. We'll be seeing y'all again real, real soon."
"Stop it, stop it, stop it!" Augment staggered, swinging wildly as this damning boy hacked at her thigh and waist. She whirled back at him, missing with a left to right slice, a diagonal top right to bottom left, before going for the other diagonal. Finn slapped it off course with the flat of Everstroke, but Augment changed angles suddenly, thrusting with Worldcleaver's tip and catching Finn's abdomen. It was just a grazing slice, but Thoros had not lied, the wound was much deeper than it should have been. Yet when she saw that he still stood, she kicked off an even deeper tantrum than before, thrashing her surroundings. "Stop living, damn you!"
Finn growled, and pumped three medium-high Dragonfang shots into her guard. No more play. He struck high with Everstroke, then dropped another pulse on her kneecap. When she swung hard diagonally for his shoulder, he jumped aside it, damaging her right shoulder plate, and then kicking her chest in the same move. She rolled back with it to her feet, but Finn was already upon her, launching a flurry of cuts and thrusts. Augment blocked five before Finn finally predicted her move and had Everstoke meet her last good arm half way, and then again like lightning. Worldcleaver flew high into the air, and with no defenses left in his path, Finn swung Everstroke low and hobbled her. Sheathing his two weapons, the Lord of the Silver Tower reached up and caught the Ruling Blade. Then he moved, swinging Worldcleaver back and then through, connecting with Augment's chest, throat, and face armor, tossing her to the ground. Finn stood still as Augment gathered herself up. What he saw stopped him cold.
It was Augment's face, but it was his face as well. His eyes, his skin, his hair, his face, all of it. She stared back at him, flaberghasted, before pawing weakly at her face and throat. The helmet and injectors were trashed.
"Y-you're me," he muttered in amazement. She returned her gaze to him, face inscrutable but undeniably his.
Then she felt the tingle, the one that had brought her to Orthix in the first place. "No, not now..." she gasped, Finn in her true voice as well. The gasp became a scream, one that lingered after the gold matter-energy conversion spirited augment away; "No!"
They found Finn Up on the outside, feet dangling over the edge, staring out at the sun. Marceline jogged over, pulling him to his feet. She saw the look on his face, but they had no time. "Come on, hero boy," she said softly, helping him into the gunship. As they soared into the distance, the fusion reactor powering the carrier lost containment, launching a fireball into the sky behind them.
The party was wild and it was bumping, held in a cafeteria two layers above the hilt. It was small, just the team, but it was needed and welcome. They were alive, Ooo was safe, there was much to celebrate. Finn was chilling off to the side on a couch, all bandaged up from his fight enjoying a plate of food from the synth, a thick porterhouse beefsteak topped with mushrooms and onions, with side portions of mashed potatoes with sausage gravy and collared greens. Marceline sat with her back to his, sipping red wine. Eventually he sighted Peebs, and caught her attention.
"Come on, take a seat," he said quietly. The three sat together, far enough off from the music and laughter that they could hear each other. Finn looked out the window on stars above. The girls looked at each other, and then back to Finn. "The girl on the carrier," he eventually said. "Augment?" Marcie and Bonnibel shared another apprehensive look, but Finn by now was in harmony with it. "She's me," he stated simply. "How or why is irrelevant. She's me, and he's got her... Chained up some how. Compliant. And I need to set her free."
"We're here," Marceline said. "We'll get it done."
"Tonight is something we needed, but we also need a next move from here. There's things to be done, other Old Earth assets we can bring into play," Peebs added. "And you need to find the rest of the Ruling Blades.
"We'll do it all," Finn said with a serene smile. "Together.