II. The Intricacies of Air
The wall is an invisible thing, and stronger for it. The locals have built waist-high stone fences around it, , but it's really a pulsing of energy that shields Shin Makoko's boarders. In fact, even the rolling hills past the wall are an illusion – a nice projection, for the sake of everyone's sanity – to conceal the non-dimensional void beyond.
To breech a wall is quite a difficult thing. Dimension-hopping, in itself, is a strenuous task. Further, the energy needed is compounded greatly by the wall held up mainly by Gwendal's formidable mental strength.
Wolfram isn't sure what to be prepared for at the breech, but his blood is already warming with the expectancy of a rough fight. But very little could have prepared him for the sight of an inter-dimensional hole.
The tear is wide, gaping, and the air around it is frenetic with displacement. Wolfram's eyes are drawn to it, despite the sting to his mind. It is, at once, dark and black but filled with more colors than he thinks he's ever seen. He thinks it sounds loud, but the pulsing that it emanates blurs the line between sound and raw energy.
As soon as Von Dunn lands them, he takes a second to be awed. Memories of harsh words from his oldest brother breaks through his surprise, however, and soon he begins to evaluate the rest of the situation.
Von Dunn is at his side, panting heavily. The soldier is really only good at jumping, and only good for one medium-distance jump at that. His eyes are glazed over and nearly unseeing into the depths of the hole.
The area around the hole is decimated. The ground is scorched black, stone walls blasted to debris, a few standing houses burning and ruined. Wolfram estimates the worst of the damage stretching out to a quarter mile radius around the tear.
The center of it all – probably 20 feet away – is where Wolfram expects to find his trespasser. From his vantage, he sees nothing.
"I'm going closer." A brazen hand on his shoulder stops him.
"Sir – ."
"You may remain or follow."
Wolfram moves slowly towards the center of damage, carefully picking his way around debris. The enormous noise of the environment has him on edge, worried he will at any moment be attacked.
He spots a dark head lying amidst blacked rubble.
He turns to Von Dunn, who has followed him, and holds a hand up.
"Stay."
His advance is even more cautious now. He appraises the intruder with every tiny step forward: Male, dark haired, perhaps a little taller than he, and (from what he can tell face down) not very old. Seemingly passed out cold right next to a turbulent inter-dimensional wall breech.
"Hello?" Wolfram says, which he realizes afterwards is not very commander-like.
The man twitches.
"Hey!" Wolfram says a little louder, and takes a step closer. The figure jolts onto his side, and with startling speed, sits up onto his knees.
Oh no…Wolfram thinks, because there are a few worrisome traits he picks up on right away. For one, the stranger is most definitely human, or at least part human, and a human breaking through their walls would most likely instigate a nasty war. But more importantly, right now, are the boy's glowing eyes. The unnatural light ringing his irises is something Wolfram has only seen once, but recognizes instantly.
"Get back!" Wolfram shrieks, and then looks over his shoulder to see if Von Dunn is. "GO!" The other soldier nods and takes off.
He tries to contact Sulleymann through a mental link, but as suspected, the breech is cancelling out any other waves in the area. He realizes, with a pang of despair, that the effects of his powers will be greatly reduced here.
Not that he can allow this to matter, of course, because it is his people's honor that is in question here.
"Hey!" He yells again, and this time the glowing eyes fix on him. "Why the hell did you come here, human, and why do you think you have the right to wield MAOH?
The human-MAOH puppet blinks slowly, and finally speaks in a reverberating voice.
"Did you do this?" He asks, moving one hand to sweep around.
"Do what?" Wolfram seethes.
"Destroy these homes. Did you do this?" The voice becomes even lower.
"What? No! You did that, you scumbag human -."
Wolfram is cut off by a wave of energy that crashes into his chest. He is thrown backwards, hard, and the wind is knocked from his lungs. He weezes as he chokes down a breath, and sees the MAOH user standing.
"Do not lie to me. I will have justice here."
Wolfram gets to his feet as soon as they will allow. Clearly, the MOAH user is not in a mood to cooperate. His only option, then, is either to try and contain him or to stall him until the rest of his squad gets here to also try and contain him.
"Look, you didn't think blasting a hole in the wall was going to be pleasant for the people near it, did you?"
"SILENCE!" The human roars, and flings a hand up with a loud snap. Wolfram tries to shield himself from the powerful magic blast, but it easily shatters his wall and drives straight into his mind, immediately overwhelming him. He can feel blood trickling out of the corners of his eyes and nose. Not a good sign at all.
Through the spinning nausea, he attempts a counter attack. He can't beat MAOH, human user or not, but maybe he can build a wall around it long enough for back-up to arrive –
His power is heat. More specifically, he is sensitive to temperature – he can feel it, change it, move it, absorb it – an interesting power, often destructive – but sometimes less than helpful. His best solution now, he thinks, it to try and heat the air close to the intruder to at least halt him.
The task would not be impossible during normal circumstances, but now it seems a little more difficult. The energy from the breech makes the air changeable, the infrared moving through it so hard to locate and control. Further, his power is nearly decimated from the previous mental attack, so much so that years of mental shields have been blasted away and his grip on reality is growing shaky with every breath.
The MAOH user has turned away from him now, surveying his surroundings. Wolfram reaches out mentally, trying to find the familiar in the churning air. He feels it faintly, waves that resonate with him, and he pumps them as full of energy as he can. Slowly, as their frequency rises, the air (he can feel it) begins to heat…
The MAOH notices immediately. With a dignified huff, he raises a hand again – but this time he calls forth a dragon. If Wolfram weren't more panicked, he would be feeling annoyed right now. It was just his luck that the human MAOH user was competent, but to have a grasp of elemental magic? He was so, earnestly fucked.
Despite the dragon being composed entirely of water (from the humidity? Wolfram guesses) it still stings as it coils around him and lifts him high into the air. From the ground, looking ever haughty, the MAOH says, "You do not deserve to be on my land."
The coils tighten, but Wolfram is hardly paying attention. The MAOH has left him an opening, however slim, and he intends to take it.
In the distraction of his…capture (ughh, Wolfram thinks) he's able to feel around all the energy surrounding the MAOH. With one mighty, final display of strength, he charges the air with fiery waves of heat. The effect is instantaneous – the water dragon dissolves immediately and Wolfram plummets to the ground.
Even as he lands hard on his back (something broke oh god he heard it he can feel it) he doesn't let his assault stop. He can barely hear the MAOH shrieking in frustration from inside his prison of heat. The effort to listen is becoming unbearable as he depletes whatever mental and magic reserves he had left. The overdraw becomes apparent as blood slides down his chin and drips from his ears.
He can't keep it up for much longer. He thinks he might have another minute or two left before he's burned it all up. He would fade away and this trespasser would be free to rampage on his merry, insane way.
Just as the edges of his consciousness go black, he hears a voice in the distance. "Wolfram!" Wolfram? Oh right, that's his name. And the voice is very familiar.
"Wolfram!" He hears again, this time a little closer. Ah, was that Little Big Brother? It sounds like him – wait, it's been at least thirty years since he's called Weller that…
"Wolfram!" He hears, one final time, much closer but muffled through his exhaustion. He feels big hands softly touch his cheeks. It has to be Little Big Brother. If Weller's here, Weller's forces are here, and that means the situation gets to be under their control now.
Wolfram retracts his powers and allows himself to slide into the rather attractive arms of unconsciousness.