[19th August 2010]
[Entrance to the Tower of Fate, Salem]
Magic flared suddenly all within the car park around me as suddenly whatever veil the enemy was using was dropped, and they began their attack. For the moment defence was the only option, to my side Zatara was turning and shouting out his backward talk to raise a shield barrier. While on my other Constantine chanted out some brief words and flung a yellow-gold coloured crystal into the asphalt before with such force as to shatter in at the moment of impact. Even as the golden shield shimmered into existence I joined him in pouring power into support the barrier as the barrage of chaos energy and eldritch lightning slammed into it, and Zatara's shield, as a tsunami of power.
'Blessed be magical items and preparation' flashed through my mind as the shield held, just about, in the face of the sudden magical assault. Behind my teammates were reacting, mostly with startled surprise as nearest to me I saw Artemis drawing an arrow from her quiver and Aqualad doing his 'form magic weapon from water and tattoos' thing in one smooth, clean, motion.
My own immediate response was to cast a shield spell as I looked up and tried to make a quick study of the attackers as the mustered for another assault. They'd got Kent Nelson wedged in the middle of them, a collar of some sort around his neck to control from the looks of it, with a man in a silk shirt and holding a wand standing guard. Abracadabra Kid Flash shouted helpfully, and my studying of anyone public in terms of magic had him marked down as a fake. Though a fake with enough schizo-tech evidently to be able to mimic the abilities of a true mage.
"That's bleedin' Felix Faust attackin' us!" John hissed at myself and the others. Though more Zatara and me than the others I expect as the others didn't likely have knowledge of the ancient, evil, and dangerously powerful sorcerer who was now hovering in the air clad in his ugly blue robes and cap-thing. Purple coloured energy flowed around him in intricate patterns forming either a shield or the next coming attack as he waved his arms lazily through empty night air. It was all rather impressive and would be more worrying if not for the last figure amongst our enemies.
"Fuck him, that's a misbegotten Elemental Lord across the gods be damned car-park from us!" I snapped back to both of them with some urgency as my eyes of True Seeing indicated the mass of energy swirling and roiling around where the shape of teenage human boy stood.
I'd seen such before, on another plane and in another life, and this thing reeked of the Elemental Realm of Chaos so strongly that my mind was idly wondering why the very ground wasn't catching fire where it stood. I'd expected possible creatures of Evil and/or Chaos considering the nature of the retired Doctor Fate, but no way was this the kind of threat level I was expecting us to encounter. My hand reached into my magic murder bag and drew out my black and silver staff as Zatara decided to illuminate me on our enemy as we both braced the shields against another assault.
"Indeed you are correct young man, we need to be wary here everyone! That is Klarion the Witch Boy, a Lord of Chaos over there! Be on your guard!"
Wait...what?
...that was Klarion the Witch Boy? He was a Lord of Chaos in this plane of the multi-verse?
That was just bloody unfair, that or I'd completely misread the little fecker's character sheet all those decades ago, or screwed up the memory recall spell at some point. Because my mind had got him pegged as a powerful magician who'd made a pact with Chaos...rather than a full blown primordial from the realm of undivided chaos. That was just soooo much better to find out in the middle of a battle.
Shit. Shit. Shit. That was not good, not good at all. My body just wasn't up to fully developed magically potential to go one on one with a bloody primordial of chaos, even with both Constantine and Zatara in support with magic, and majority of me Team present like now. What's worse our heavy hitters like Superboy for strength, and Kid Flash for speed, would be vulnerable to something neither seemed to truly see as real, let alone a danger to them. And if I could forge weapons capable of theoretically injuring, or killing, a Kyrptonian then I'm sure a power like the one before us could do the exact same...
My eyes widened in horror as I felt something dangerous occurring, turning my head and frantically shouting out "M'GANN! NO! STAY OUT OF THEIR MINDS!"
No. I was too late...
My hovering green skinned teammate suddenly brought her hands to the sides of her head and screamed...
"Naughty-naughty! Silly green girls shouldn't be snooping where they don't belong!" the voice of the child disguised abomination laughed out cheerfully as M'gann fell the short distance from where she had been hovering to sprawl on the ground whimpering in pain and clutching at her head. Superboy and Kid Flash raced over to her prone form as Artemis let loose an arrow to fly at the Primordial. To no success as it literally caught flame, burning to ash, even before it reached the black suited thing in the guise of a human boy as he chuckled cheerfully with another burst of chaos flame into out hastily erected shields. I froze a second, caught between rushing to the injured girl and focusing on the attackers.
"Is she okay?"
Superboy and Kid Flash were shouting angrily, at each other, at the enemy, at the sky as M'gann curled herself into a foetal position and continued to whimper. I could try heal her now but that meant leaving the line and taking away from other things. Aqualad at least was more calm "She is in pain but physically unharmed for now!"
I took a breath "Okay, form up. Kid Flash stand guard on her and..."
'NO!' flashed through my mind as Superboy roared in anger, shot a glare filled with rage towards the Chaos Lord, braced his legs back in a way I knew "Superboy! Hold position!"
"RARRRGH!" was the response to that as those powerful Kyrptonian leg muscles braced back, stained and then he was soaring forward through the air as they propelled him above us as if he was flying. Beside me both Constantine let out almost simultaneous swears along with myself as my teammate's battlecry filled the air as he flew over our heads. My hand snapped forward in the direction of the enemy, flicking out a small glass rod into hand as I did so, then reaching inwards and unleashing the spell that first came to my mind to support my teammate's ill-advised attack.
"Lightning Bolt!" I snapped out in the tongue of another world, the glass shattering into nothingness in my hand as a powerful blueish-white bolt of electricity surged from my outstretched hand at the Primordial my teammate was aiming for. Joined from my left by a fireball, then another, as John had the exact same thoughts as myself; save his were aimed at the now flying blue robed wizard currently shooting purple lightning of his own at us. Another arrow flew over my shoulder. Unfortunately our efforts were to no avail as John's fireballs were easily absorbed by intricately shimming shields around Faust, and mine and Artemis's efforts were dodged as the Elemental teleported blinked out of existence like a black hole for a moment...
...before reappearing a moment later, a few metres to the side of where he'd stood, as my blast of lighting slammed into that exact spot of asphalt. Superboy was descending helpless now through the air towards where 'Klarion the Witch-Boy' had been standing, and as I and the others had feared that pretend child's hand flashed up and power roared out upwards him in a lance of pure chaos flame. Then slammed into my soaring teammate with such force to break the forward momentum of his fall, to fling him back and down with such might that he slammed into the 'brickwork' of the Tower of Fate behind us.
"Gentlemen, one of you please shield me and the others a moment!" a snapped command came from my side as I felt power soar up from Mr. Zatara as I felt the anger in his tone. Dammit a few seconds, a minute at most, into this fight and we already on the defensive with M'gann and maybe Superboy down for the count. John signalled the affirmative to the request with unusual seriousness as he suggested a course of action to me "Got ya Giovanni. John mate, I suggest ye work on a ward against chaos like we trained together. Looks like we're in a bit of sticky wicket as the ponces say"
My agreement was drowned out as the power around Zatara soared like a dam bursting as he seemed to illuminate with magic to my eyes, rising a few inches off the ground as he called power to himself in that backwards talk and motioned at the startled looking Lord of Chaos. Magic flooded the air as white tinged balls of fire and energy formed before the chanting wizard, a disk of silver metal materialising under his feet even as the air filled with these spheres. Then bars of mystical energy lashed out from them in a rather impressive light show as I turned to my teammates and prayed I didn't get blasted in the back in the next few seconds if the shield failed.
"Get Superboy back in here. I'm going to cast a warding circle about ten foot wide! Hurry now!" I ordered them as I let my illusion drop and brought a silvery metal scroll case out of my magic murder bag. I didn't wait for answers as I turned back, focusing on the spells needed to achieve my goal; and the enemy before us currently getting bombarded by bolts of order aligned mystical energy while John tried to hold off Faust's continued attacks.
"Contingency Activate; Ritual Circles of Protection" I commanded pouring power into the silver case held in my free and slammed my staff into the ground. It was a cheaters way of using ritual magic in combat as an old necromancer had once thought me, wasteful of magic too as well as requiring an hour or mores' preparation time for a normally ten minute ritual well before the activation...
...but right now, in situations such as this, it was a lifesaver as the time consuming to make case and scroll vaporised into silver and white dust that swirled upon the night air at my command. Within moments it was spreading out around us, into a large circular shape as they hovered in the air as I chanted and guided the spell with my magic. I raised my staff back up, and the motes of tiny silver and white froze in the air in their intricate patterns...before I slammed my staff down into the asphalt...
"Circle of Protection against Chaos! Circle of Protection against Evil!" I commanded as the staff stuck into asphalt and the dust upon the air glowed brightly, flashed, and then appeared as faintly glowing lines etched themselves magically beneath our feet. I grunted softly at the effort and falling to one knee hand on staff; hating being in this weakened state but for a moment. Then savoured the sweet taste of Law and Good that seemed to now permeate the very air around us...and also served to help shield us somewhat from the overflowing chaos energy tainting the area. Okay I had an anchor to at least try fight this battle with, even if we were still getting our asses kicked as Zatara's efforts were defeated by a burst of angry red chaos flame that he just barely defelected.
"What is..." he started to say as I cut him off, pushing myself back to stand and leaving my staff embedded into the now gleaming lines and sigils of the glowing silver now crisscrossing the asphalt "Circle of Protection, barrier of good auld Law an' Order this one, but we need a shield. John need your help with this if you please!"
"On it mate, on it" he shouted back drawing another gem from inside his coat, beginning a chant that caused it to glow strongly as he placed it to hover above my staff with gleaming light as a shield ignited over the magical in a half sphere of soft gold colour as the original barrier collapsed under Faust's and the Chaos Lord's combined assault. This new barrier though was stronger, much stronger in fact than those hastily thrown up magical barricades and the red flames and purple lightning were thrown off in flashing rainbows of power. Something far less happy Primordial had noticed, along with the fact that said magical defence was right now directly in front of the entrance to the Tower of Fate along with us. Time was on our side after all if we could hold out and call for...
"Faust! Here I grant you some little power to help me punish these little helpers of Nabu! Seems Kenny boy here has a little apprentice playing with Order..." not-a-child laughed out dancing out of the way of a fireball thrown by Constantine. Then gave a rather uncanny valley smile towards us all that gleamed in the darkness "...don't you know Order went out of style in the twentieth century! Why Chaos is much more fun don't you know? And has far more friends too you big meanies!"
'And that's not good, no not at all' I snarled silently, though I now saw M'gann was pushing herself up to stand as Aqualad helped a clearly injured Superboy over to her. We had a brief moment to get a respite and now I saw we might now even get that as Faust began chanting loudly and dozens of elaborate sigils and runes erupted in the dark night sky above us. Okay someone was serious about getting inside this tower I noted with growing concern was that a dozen shadowy shapes had emerged from the purple coloured gateways, and took flight above us with roaring battle cries...
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