Adventures of John: Ravages of War

Chapter 2: The Magical Realms

"No," he whispered, pointing the gun at my head again. "This is all your fault. Now you need to pay."

Well that's just great, I thought to myself. I go and get myself into the middle of a war between the two greatest forces in the universe, and what is it that kills me? Not a god, not a demon, not even a faerie. Nope. I get killed by an ex-soldier who has gone Looney Toons. That will be a fantastic way to end my career as a multiverse-traveling magical hero.

Just then I felt something at the edge of my senses, the slightest tingle of magical power. Looking out of the corner of my eye, I saw a small tear opening in the barriers between the realms. It was small, and usually I would close it with barely a thought. Now however, it could quite possibly be my only chance of survival. Instead of working against the two forces tearing apart our world, for just a moment I concentrated and worked with them, ripping that hole wide open.

I didn't stop there though. With the tear gaping wide it was now suddenly visible and Calhoun was too shocked to shoot me as he stared into the glowing rift in the world. I snapped my restraints with magically-assisted strength and twisted my wrists, sending the tear towards us, sending both of us into the magical realms before shutting the door behind us.

"Impossible," Calhoun muttered as he stared at our surroundings. Monstrous mushrooms grew around us, while the waist-high grass surrounding us appeared to be comprised of hair. The ground was an odd shade of greenish-brown and squished slightly as you stepped on it. "What did you do?!" he cried, turning the gun on me again.

"I'm afraid it is too late for that," I laughed, sending the pistol flying away with a wave of my hand. "You should have killed me while you had the chance," I told him, with a snap of my fingers launching a nearby rock at him which sent him crashing into one of the mushrooms. "You're in my world now, and I think it's about time we found out what is so special about that head of yours." I walked forward slowly, chains appearing from nowhere to restrain him.

I know I didn't need to do that to discover what it was that allowed him to remember, but I have to admit I enjoyed it. He had just kidnapped me and almost shot me, so I think I was justified in scaring him a bit. It's not like I killed him or anything. Anyways, I was reaching down to put my fingers on his forehead so I could search his mind when the ground suddenly lurched and I was tossed aside. Gravity seemed to have changed direction and I found myself clinging to a mushroom, desperately trying not to fall into whatever bottomless abyss awaited me.

Once I collected my thoughts I was able to use my magic to float away from the mushroom, only to find that Calhoun was somehow out of the chains I had placed him in, sitting on a nearby mushroom. He had somehow found that gun again and was pointing it at me. "This ends now!" he exclaimed.

Of course, I could easily have survived something as simple as a bullet with the aid of my magic. However, I was getting really sick of this guy. So before he could pull the trigger I blasted him with electricity and the gun fell into the vastness below. I watched in shock as he shrugged off the blast, which should have knocked him out cold. I conjured a giant punching glove and shot it at him, only for it to shatter, barely making him slip.

How is this possible? I asked myself. I tried to throw him off the mushroom with some telekinetic magic, only for him to look as if he were fighting off a troublesome wind. My magical attacks seemed to barely be affecting him. The ground lurched again and gravity switched direction, and suddenly the bottomless abyss was the sky and vise versa. I flew above the chaos while he managed to grab hold of another mushroom, saving himself.

I thought about what had just happened. Calhoun had somehow shrugged off my magical attacks like they were nothing, yet when I had launched that rock at him it had affected him just as well as it should have. Beyond this, he had somehow remembered both the Unlidary invasion and World War Magic. Then, in a moment of inspiration that made me realize just how obvious the answer was, I knew. Somehow, some way, Sergeant Calhoun was resistant to magic. Just as this realization hit me, I sensed danger and turned to see Calhoun pull the trigger of the gun.

Time seemed to slow as the bullet made its way towards me. A thousand different possible outcomes went through my head. A thousand different futures, and I saw one of them that solved all of these problems. All of the ones related to Calhoun, anyway. There were other solutions that would have been infinitely nobler and more heroic. Unfortunately, those didn't have a certain chance of success. There was too much danger, too much chance of something going wrong. So, I chose the easy way. I saw the bullet coming for me and I turned it around, directing it exactly where I wanted it to go.

Calhoun's grip loosened and he fell, a hole in his forehead. He dropped, and soon enough he vanished from sight. He was one of the most unique people in the universe. One of the only ones able to remember the events that had never happened, and not because of any magical trickery. No, he remembered because when time was magically altered he was barely effected. A man who, given the right circumstances, could have stood up to gods and demons with nothing more than a gun in his hand. And I killed him because I was afraid. I was afraid he was too dangerous, afraid that his insanity was too uncontrollable, afraid of the unknown.

I try my best to be a hero. I try to follow the example of the multiverse's greatest heroes. I try, whenever possible, to follow the example set by Jesus Christ. But on that Friday the Thirteenth, I proved that heroes are just as flawed as everyone else. I proved that I am no savior. I am just a man trying to save a universe determined to rip itself apart. I am a man who, out of fear, killed a soldier who, given the chance, could have been one of the universe's greatest heroes. He could have also been the world's most dangerous psychopath, but now we will never know.

Of course, at the time I didn't realize the full extent of what I had done. I had shocked myself, and before I could think about what had happened I was grabbed and lifted up by something so massive I could barely comprehend it. I was soon face-to-face with the largest creature I had ever seen. Its nose alone filled the majority of my vision. I realized then that I had not been standing on ground, and that had not been grass. Those mushrooms likely were actually mushrooms, because I had been standing on this creature's foot and the shifting gravity had been this monstrous being's footsteps.

"WHO ARE YOU?"