(A/N: Happy pride! I have more to say, but I'm saving it for next chapter. Enjoy :3)
"They call you Lady Luck
But there is room for doubt
At times, you've had a very unlady-like way of running out"
—"Luck Be a Lady" from Guys and Dolls by Frank Loesser
"Max," Ithos grunted. Everyone else around them had turned to stone, and now, it was crawling up his partner. It passed over Max as if to mock him, forcing him to see all his friends petrify, powerless to save them. "Don't—," his voice turned hollow as the stone started taking over his lungs, "—give… up." Max watched in horrified silence, but Ithos kept his eyes resolute. "I said… we'd save the world." As the stone reached his shoulder, Ithos jerked it towards Max with a grinding crack to grab his paw.
The crack in his shoulder from the movement took Max's attention until Ithos squeezed his paw in the same instant it petrified. He looked back to see tears dripping down eyes teeming with inner strength. "We…," the stone crept up his throat and over his mouth before he could finish, yet somehow the rest echoed out of his hollow stone, "will."
Tears fell down Max's face, but he felt the same resolution his partner gave him. For a moment, it felt like perhaps the stone had spared him, but then he felt his paws go numb. Even then, he didn't flinch. He grabbed his friend's shoulder for more strength. A burning in his chest didn't abate even when the stone crawled over it. It went up his arms to his paws, locking him in place, but couldn't move up further than his neck.
Even petrified, he saw the fighting spirit in Ithos's eyes that had inspired him to push this far, and he called on that spirit to turn his head and look at Nuzleaf. All the rage faded into complete resolution, certainty of fate as he fought the God of Death sucking out his life force. Nuzleaf flinched.
"Mark my words," Max said with ease. Nuzleaf took a step back, and the victory in his eyes cracked. "This was the biggest mistake you could've made." The fire in his heart blazed with the heat of a star, but hot fires are doomed to fade fast. "You just lost." The stone finally started crawling up his neck. "Everything." The stone took over, but as the darkness took his sight, he saw the traitor's leaves quivering.
Past and present ran in tandem in Max's mind; he could barely tell which was which. He stared into Ithos's eyes in desperate search for that fighting spirit that had consumed both of them in their darkest moment. The charmander had always held an unquenchable optimism that subsumed Max's despair in his worst moments. "Please," he begged, reaching a paw out to 'Ithos'.
"What?" the charmander scoffed. "Do you really think you're getting another chance? After everything you've done?" It sought to cut at Max, but all its words fell on deaf ears as Max searched its eyes for a soul he knew better than his own. Eyes he'd stared into hundreds, thousands of times.
"Please," he begged again, even more desperate as his search failed to find even the slightest glimmer of truth. "Please be real." There, in a fraction of an instant, he saw the slightest hint of frustration. Anger he'd seen before, but not in his partner. A pool of tears welled up in his eyes as his mouth pulled back in rage.
"Wow," the charmander spat. "That desperate to avoid facing the truth, huh?"
Max had to hold back a growl. "Nothing has ever been further from truth than you are," he hissed. All at once, the room filled his mind. Every speck of dust, every pebble, every crack stood clear in his vision. Even the charmander that, now that he let his awareness loose, he could see as empty.
It started to pull its paw back to ready another blow, but Max had already dashed to the left to rush for it with his cheeks spewing sparks. It couldn't stop him before Max wrapped an arm around its neck with one paw embedding itself in its stomach. His weight wasn't enough to knock it over on its own, which is why he knocked its left ankle into a rock barely high enough.
Max almost thought he heard it snap, but that could've been a prelude to the bolt of lightning he called to crash into both of them. He channeled as much of the charge into the charmander as he could while the rest crashed through his system and reinvigorated him.
The lightning strike had yet to dissipate when he leapt up to smash the charmander into a wall with an iron tail. It slammed into the wall hard enough to shake the cave, though Max couldn't tell if he'd feel that without his awareness running at full strength. "I'll give it to you," Max growled; the charmander's limp body fell to the ground. "Even the fucking devil that tried to destroy the world wasn't as incorrigible as your sorry excuse for a blackened soul." Eleos was rubbing off on him.
Orange scales started to fade into red. They stuttered there between it and pink as it fought to reassert itself before losing the rest of their strength and disappearing into a round cloud of purple. It went limp, billowing out into smoke that coalesced into his real form; a gengar.
"Of. Fucking. Course." Max grumbled. He pulled his paw into a fist with enough force to dig his claws into his pawpads. "I already didn't like you." Jake laid slack and still. Max started walking closer, though something didn't feel quite right. "Now, though?" He stopped a few paces short of the gengar. "I might have to fucking kill you." He felt Jake twitch the slightest bit. "You can stop faking, by the way."
Jake pulled a ragged breath in and sighed. "Fine," he hissed. Max pulled his tail forward at the ready, and by the time he had it in front of him, Jake was a foot away from him, pulling his own face into a grotesque disfigurement while wailing out a howling screech.
"Pika!" Max barked and flinched behind his tail. He lost sight of Jake for less than a second, and when he looked back, the ghost was gone. "Oh no you don't." When he took a step for the nearest tunnel to the next room, his paw brushed into his badge. A way out, but Max only snarled more. "Thanks." He bent over and tossed the badge into his bag while tuning into his awareness. Now that the disguises had failed, he could easily track Jake moving through the dungeon. "But I'm not leaving yet."
Thanks to being a ghost, Jake could take a direct path to each room, but he wasn't taking a direct path to the exit. If he hurried, Max could get there before him. He spun around and shot to the tunnel behind him, which was mercifully wide enough not to impede his run. His wounds sure tried to slow him down, but anger and adrenaline made quick work of the searing pain.
Only a few rooms stood between him and the exit, but Jake was already only a room away from it. Max redoubled his effort and tried to run faster than he could, but he didn't have a chance at outpacing the ghost. By the time he made it to the room, Jake was already through the threshold.
A distant, cackling laughter echoed to him, but Max couldn't tell if he was imagining that. Regardless, he ran through the distortion without hesitation and didn't even stop to quell his instincts on the other side. It was better to instead focus on how much more clearly he could feel his surroundings, now. He felt Jake in the next room on his left, so he turned to run for it.
There wasn't a tunnel to go through, though. He could feel the room close by, but his closest route was to go around. "Goddammit," he growled. At least he could still speak. His only chance remained cutting the gengar off at the pass, so he felt the dungeon's layout. Seven rooms, two triplets of rooms running parallel to each other before the last one branched off to the right.
Jake was on the left side. Max ran for the tunnel to the next room, feeling for the next tunnel before he'd left the first, and feeling for the third before he entered the second. The path was mostly just straight lines, but he felt a few patches of ground less stable than others and tried to avoid them. With a decent path in his mind, he tried to feel for any items, berries, whatever nearby that might help him.
Before he noticed it, his right hindpaw kicked a berry up towards his face that his forepaw barely managed to catch in time. Blue, rubbery—"Oran?!" he sputtered in disbelief. Shaking his head, he downed it in utter awe at the change in his luck. It wasn't the juiciest, but it'd get the job done.
He burst into the last room in his path well ahead of Jake. His awareness gave him a general idea of Jake's location, enough that he could tell he'd gotten to the room before Jake, but it was hard to feel where in the walls between rooms he was. If Max wasn't careful, Jake could go right around this room and into the last. That was not going to happen, so he took the last tunnel into the room with the distortion to the next floor and waited, ready and alert.
Waiting, he had to wait. Listen. Jake was just two rooms away. He stopped in the room to look around, then went for the wall between that room and the next. One room away, he did the same. Look around, go for the wall. The last time, he seemed to take a direct path to the next room, but Max stayed in the middle of the room to be safe, charging his cheeks.
That turned out to be pointless, since Jake did indeed come right through from the same part of the wall he'd entered. Max loosed the charge he'd prepared the instant he saw purple, but only grazed Jake's right hand when he dodged left. The shock still hit, though, and had Jake clutching the hand.
For once, Jake didn't have that stupid smile splitting him open. Instead, he had his brow furrowed in anger. "You're a persistent pest, aren't you," he grumbled.
Max didn't waste time answering and closed in to smack an iron tail into him. When he got close enough, Jake reached behind himself and pulled out Cori's limp body and held it up to block. Max's eyes shot open in surprise, and he stopped his momentum right before he made eye contact. Jake dropped them and ran for the next floor, and Max dove to catch Cori, but the totodile fell right through him and sputtered into dust when it hit the floor.
Another fake; Max wanted to slap himself. He turned around to see Jake holding up a middle finger with his tongue out as he went to the next floor. Before he phased all the way through, Max caught a glimpse of the badge on his chest. If he had his badge, why was he running?
Without time to think, though, Max ran after him and got his answer sooner than later. His mind lurched, and the cacophony of instincts in his head started overpowering his own thoughts. "Pika chu," he swore. This wasn't a chase—it was a trap. Last time, Jake had managed to entertain him and that nidoran boy with a playful little flame. Even if his instincts considered him a threat again, Jake could manipulate him in that base state with ease.
"Figured it out?" Jake cackled from across the room. Max glared up at him, which made the ghost laugh even harder. "Oh, I think he did! I think he did!"
"PIKA!" Max shouted, launching a thunderbolt that Jake effortlessly bobbed away from.
"Aw, what's the matter?" Jake chided. Max was so deadset on glaring at him that he didn't notice the meowth coming at him from the side until it finished Jake's thought for him. "Cat got your tongue?" Max jumped back and launched a pitifully uncharged shock at the air where the meowth used to stand, sending Jake into another laughing fit. "Hah! Never gets old, does it?"
Max ran to slam him with an iron tail. Jake dodged back and lobbed a shadow ball directly into his face, knocking Max nearly all the way back to his start. The blow dazed him, and he obviously needed to reorient himself for a moment, yet his paws were already running back for another attack. He barely managed to stop himself at the sight of Jake reeling back to throw a punch, and then a portal apparated right in the fist's path and the punch slammed into the back of Max's head.
His eyes couldn't consolidate their stereoscopic perspective, forcing Max to see both angles at once. He tried to push himself back up. For a moment, it felt a lot easier than he'd expected, but then his paws left the ground, and he felt a hand holding him by the scruff of his neck.
"You're a lot more manageable like this, y'know," Jake mocked. Max tried to swing his hindpaw forward and kick, but Jake didn't even need to bother moving for the hit to miss. "See?" since Max hated the gengar's face, seeing two of them at once doubled his displeasure. "Come on, c'mon! You're not done yet, are you?" Max tried to bark back and got a blue something shoved into his mouth for the attempt.
Whatever it was lodged into his throat, then Jake tossed him aside like a used rag. Hitting the ground dislodged the blockage and let him spit it into his paw. An oran berry. Max stared at it for a moment, then eyed Jake with suspicion, who threw his hands up in innocent surrender.
"What can I say?" Jake said, innocence so exaggerated that Max couldn't reasonably see it as a genuine attempt at deception. "I believe in your potential, oh Hero of Harmony." The epithet jabbed Max's ears like a thorn. He took a small, test bite of the berry just in case and rolled it around in his mouth. It was an oran. Looking between it and Jake, he grew even more confused.
Max started trying to ask what this was about, but stopped the instant he heard pikaspeak. For once, Jake seemed to grant him mercy by not insulting him about it. Scarfing down the rest of the oran, he brought his paw to his bracelet and focused on his breathing (while keeping a close eye on Jake). Jake seemed happy to let him, too. Focusing on his thoughts, with help from the healing, helped Max ground himself just enough to speak again.
"What are you doing?" Max asked.
"So far?" Jake said. "Kicking your ass." Max rolled his eyes. "Though you've certainly been kicking mine a bit, too. Don't fret." Jake's hellish, annoying smile spread his mouth yet again. "It'll be reflected in your grade."
"Grade?" Max grumbled, then shook his head. Stupid joke, obviously. He didn't need to bother with it. "Whatever. Why me?"
"Oh, you already know, don't you?" Jake said. "C'mon, you're a clever, little rat." Sparks bounced off Max's cheeks on instinct. "Well, I guess your screws are a bit loose now, aren't they?" Max felt a growl rumbling in his throat and wasn't too inclined to hold it back. Jake threw his hands out in dramatic acquiescence. "Fine, fine, I'll spell it out for you. You found out more than you needed to know, so now you've got two options."
Jake held up a theatrical one finger and said, "Earn the right to know." He looked down with a sinister glare and drew out a second finger. "Or stop knowing what you shouldn't."
Only one forbidden bit of knowledge came to mind. "The extra floor?" Max asked.
"Bingo!" Jake cheered, starting to clap and apparated ten or so more sets of hands to join in applause. The last of the healing finally took hold and let Max push himself up onto his paws. He already knew Jake didn't want him to know about it, that it was some kind of secret, but a hitman? "You're pretty lucky, y'know."
"What?" Max asked.
"Dungeons don't really open up like that," Jake said. "Though, they do seem to have a tendency to reveal themselves to certain people." Jake gave an utterly indecipherable wink and shrugged. "Alas, I've already spoken too much. I can't dare say another word." Max had to resist the urge to reignite his concussion by slamming his head unconscious, and then Jake pointed to his left. "She can say as much as she wants, though."
Max followed the finger to see 'Neb' standing less than a foot away. "Pika!" he screamed, leaping back. Before he could feel embarrassed for having slipped again, he heard Jake's laughter growing further and further away. Max didn't immediately go after him, though, instead taking a second to look back at the 'Neb' impersonator.
Could illusions be that strong? He knew it was a move, but he assumed they were more limited than this. "How the hell is he doing this?" he wondered aloud.
"Wouldn't you like to know?" the espeon asked, making him jump back again. 'Neb' snickered in Jake's infuriating cadence. "Sometimes, people just have special abilities." Great, more pointless non-answers. Max moved to leave, but then 'Neb' went on to say, "You, for example." That got him to stop, but he raised an ear instead of turning around. "Y'know, dungeon sickness isn't all that bad."
Max turned back; the espeon was dissipating. He wanted to question it, but there was no mistaking what he heard: pokéspeak. A gengar's. But that would mean Jake…
Jake! Max slapped himself for getting distracted and ran for the next floor. He reached out to feel the Dungeon, but didn't feel any hint of Jake on that floor. That made him at least one floor deeper. "I'm in control," Max panted and started to run. "I'm in control."
Despite the mantra, he could still hear his instincts more clearly than his own thoughts. If he didn't get control back from them, he had no chance against Jake. They made it impossible to think a single thought through, and he'd even gotten to the point where they acted on their own. The former, in fact, had him struggling to come up with what to do. He could probably wrest back more control if he took a minute to stop and breathe, but then he'd lose any chance of catching Jake on the next floor.
The more he tried to think it through, the more he mistook instincts for his own thoughts. He'd already started using his awareness to get around, too, and with it, he felt the dungeon's pulse. It didn't have nearly the power it had that night, a light rumble that he could only feel thanks to knowing what to feel for, but he felt it nonetheless.
His time was up. Max met with the distortion to the next floor before he saw it and tumbled from the seventh to the eighth. "Dammit!" he barked, rage smoldering as he felt his legs fly out from under him. Rage at Jake for torturing him, for fighting him, trapping him; rage at himself for falling this deep into instinct, letting Jake take advantage of his grief, and worst of all, letting himself forget so much that he could actually believe that worthless mockery was his old friend. A sob ached in the back of his throat as tears overcame his vision. "Ithos."
The memories that returned had already begun to fade again—if he couldn't hold on, he'd lose what little he'd gotten back. He tried to squeeze his fists tight enough to hold on, but they were already so distant. Each wave of sorrow washed them further. Rising tides washed over uncovered memories like sand. Without trying, he already felt the rest of the floor was empty. He didn't have a chance. His paw relaxed for him as he felt himself slip away.
When it released, he felt the waves of sorrow fade. Detachment always came to save him from feeling when he blacked out, yet this felt different. He didn't stop feeling the sorrow. Instead, he started feeling less of it. He looked down at his paw and saw the distance from it had vanished.
Hope you can forgive me for the delay.
Max jumped at the voice."Eleos?!" It had gotten so natural after so long, yet the sudden return to the back of his mind was still jarring after weeks of having his head to himself. He wasted no time clawing his control back now that he didn't have overwhelming pain holding him down. "Where the hell did y'all go?" Still couldn't speak, but he kept working on it.
Well, after you kissed me and left, another you took your place.
His cheeks flushed. Right. Great. That's the last thing they'd done together.
I understand how this might be somewhat embarrassing, but this seems like an incredibly poor time to get flustered.
"Thanks," Max growled. As long as he ignored the memory, he didn't have to deal with it. "Another me?" That sounded familiar.
Yes, and a poor imitation at that. At least, I thought so, though it did fool Neb and Cori.
Max could feel it harrumph in its recount. Feeling it emote in his subconscious was a bit nostalgic, he had to admit.
I tried to contain my anger at the insulting performance.
A strange warmth made it feel like that was meant to be a compliment.
Based on Neb and Cori's reactions, however, it seems either I failed in that regard, or they assumed the absurd speaking style I adopted was for the purpose of mocking you.
"Absurd—pika!" Max cheered at finally getting his speech back, but that cheer collapsed in on itself when he immediately slipped back in excitement. Eleos very obviously chuckled in the back of his head, but at least it tried to hold back. Max took another breath and tried again. "You talked strange?" Eleos hummed in agreement. "Why?"
I presumed the impostor might try to fool you, and so I sought to sabotage the attempt.
"Ooh," Max said. It all clicked into place. No wonder the fake Eleos was so obviously not the real deal. Although, a twinge of frustration crept up before Eleos sucked it away. "You knew I was still here! What took you so long?!" Eleos either gave the yell a moment out of respect, or so it could eliminate the residual rage before giving an answer.
I am sorry for that. I had thought at first that you must have been ahead of us, but when you weren't on the last floor, I realized my error.
Max's tail popped out in surprise. Dungeons don't let you go back. "You—"
Max, we have a pressing matter to attend to. I can help, but your instincts will ultimately overwhelm you given enough time.
"Right," Max said with a nod. He started deeper into the dungeon, but a sense of warm comfort welled up in his chest. "Thank you." The specter roiled in the back of his mind.
We are fated to save each other, it seems.
It seemed to buzz happily, and Max smiled back. He needed to not think about it, but the idea of their fates intertwining tempted him greatly. "So," he said, moving to change topics. "What's the plan, then?" From what he felt passively, this floor was expansive, even with the most direct route, so they had plenty of time to talk, think… or not think about certain topics Max felt very inclined to consider.
I would kill for you.
Max stopped in his tracks. He'd definitely considered murder after all this, but someone else suggesting it made it feel a bit too real. Even if it still felt tempting.
Please ask me to kill for you.
"No," Max said. The burst of disappointment and frustration made him chuckle. "This is personal." After that despicable use of his partner's… partner…. A shard of glass embedded itself into his heart. Even Eleos siphoning away the pain left Max reeling. "H-his name." A paw went to his scarf. The warmth it gave off when it glowed, he'd never forget.
Not the time. Max closed his eyes and swallowed his shrinking pain, then started walking again. "If anyone's gonna kill him," he mumbled, releasing his scarf to clench his fist. "It's me." Jake's cries of pain in their fight came to him as inspiration and built the redirected rage higher. As Eleos siphoned it away, though, Max still felt it clearly. Stronger, even, and it felt so nice to build. He glanced down at his paw and saw an iridescent miasma of purple and black phasing into it.
"Whoah—Eleos?!" Max shouted. Without him tending to it, the rage fell away in a moment and brought the growing darkness with it.
Ah, best that you avoid doing that.
Max narrowed his eyes at the air. "Avoid what exactly?" he grumbled, though he could already tell Eleos had no intention of answering. With a deep breath, he carefully let go of his rage and felt it slip out of his paws and into Eleos.
I thought you might want to fight Jake yourself, but I will not let him best you.
For a moment, Max balked at the insinuation he'd need help, though Eleos's tone didn't quite feel protective. It had a hint of that, but a twinge after sang more of a challenge than a promise.
So, it's up to you, in the end.
Max smirked at that. Despite the turn, he could still feel the protective overtone it started from. "I guess it's good to know I've got a basically guaranteed win, then," he said. Room after room, the tunnels between them remained significantly wider than they'd been on previous floors, as if the mountain was opening itself up. "I'm glad you've got my back." Even if he'd prefer a bit more trust, he understood Eleos couldn't help itself when it came to its more protective tendencies.
If ever you fall, my entire existence has been a farce.
Somehow, Max resisted the temptation to stop in his tracks, but the surprise definitely slowed him down. He glanced up at the air to vent the slight unease Eleos's influence left behind.
Was that not romantic? My apologies.
"Pi—pikachu?" Max blubbered, sparks bouncing down his cheeks. Romantic? Why was it trying to be romantic—did it want to—it liked him? Max shook his head and cleared his throat. "I-it's whatever." He brought his paw up to the wall and felt it run along the stone. The mix of smooth with patches of jagged and rough felt just soothing enough to keep his mind off the obvious concern.
Light in the cavern grew ever so slightly brighter as he entered the next tunnel and grew subtly and slowly enough that he only noticed once the air shifted from stale to fresh. "Oh, we're here," he mumbled.
He walked to the end of the tunnel and saw the dungeon's last distortion bending light beyond recognition as it tried to pass into the mountain. Like the surface of a gem, he could only see windows of the world on the other side cut and scattered across the surface with no single refraction having any relation to its neighbor. He'd seen distortions before, but not with this level of clarity. Was this one special? Or did his awareness only just now let him see it?
Ready?
The sudden question made Max jump a little. "Yeah, sure," he mumbled, immediately getting a buzz of doubt from Eleos. He shrugged. "Not a lot else I can do to prepare at this point." His eyes drifted along the ground, nerves tugging his attention to less than ideal scenarios. Jake had literal centuries of experience, after all.
At least, he hinted as much. Didn't he?
Not to mention that ability of his. At least Max knew about it, though, making it pretty useless (if he can keep his instincts at bay, that is). Jake hinted to Max having one of his own, but even if that was true and not a misdirection, how was he supposed to figure it out then and there? "Do you know anything about special abilities?" he asked. Worth a shot, at least.
Such as Jake's? Not exactly, though it's foolish under any circumstance to discount invention and ingenuity. Many moves, as you'd call them now, were reformations of existing techniques of the time in new contexts. Consider how you use iron tail, for example.
Max appreciated the input, but couldn't help zoning out towards the end. "Right, got it," he mumbled. An interesting insight, but it didn't exactly give him the edge he wanted.
Good to know you value my input. That's important in any relationship. You wouldn't believe the deepest sorrows I absorbed in my youth from love built on flimsy care for the other's thoughts.
The utter depths of sarcasm dripping from its words nearly made Max drown. "All right, sorry," Max chuckled. After a moment, Eleos chuckled along. "That's the only kinda special ability you know about?"
Well, it is my best explanation for Jake's, at least what I have seen of it. There's also your awareness, of course, that—
"My—" Max slapped himself in the face hard enough to see stars. "Pikachu," he growled, shaking his head. How? How did he not think of that already? It wasn't as flashy as Jake's (what did he call it?) Mad World, but it definitely wasn't a standard move, either. If he'd really heard Jake speak feral, too, maybe Dungeon Sickness did more than even Neb knew about.
Oh, was I helpful just now?
Max didn't remember ever 'hearing' Eleos so excited and hopeful, and it brought enough joy to pull the worst of the frustration away. "You were," Max said. "Thanks." Max could swear he heard Eleos sing. "Okay, well, I guess that's my ticket?" Adjusting the strap on his bag, he looked to the distortion, ready to head out, but struggled to convince his paws to move.
This day, so long already, was exhausting. Even now, he could hear the hum of his instincts frighteningly clearly. Going deeper (distortion-wise, if not elevation), he had no idea how well he'd handle it on its own, so using his awareness might throw him over the edge. Already, Jake had used Max's instincts against him, but he hadn't really lost the battle before that, either. Max felt a chill go up his spine as, for the first time in a while, he really didn't know how the fight would go—or what would happen if he lost.
I am here.
New air went into his lungs. "Right," Max gasped. "Thanks." No matter what, he would be fine. He had Eleos. Win or lose, he had Eleos, and Eleos had him. The shiver down his back turned to a blossoming warmth in his chest. After this, what could he and Eleos do toge—
Er, as excited as I am, as well. Now is perhaps not the time.
"Right," Max sputtered, sparks spewing off his cheeks. Sharing a head with his prospective partner maybe wasn't the best case scenario. Yet, as he steeled himself and went up to the distortion, he smiled. Eleos was excited, too.
"Luck let a gentleman see
How nice a dame you can be"
"Arceus, finally," Jake groaned. Max looked around to find him lounging under the sun on top of his own bag on the other side of the peak. "Started to think you ran off." Jake rolled back and forth as if trying to get up, then sunk beneath the ground and floated back up, standing. More on the outskirts, he moved closer to the center where the ground wasn't so jagged and unsteady.
Max gave very little heed to him at all. Besides the attention necessary to know if he was rushing in to attack, he ignored Jake completely to instead focus on his mind. The last distortion had instincts chirping at him at every moment, every thought. He brought his paw to feel his bracelet and center his thoughts. They were loud, constant, but they weren't fighting against him for control. As long as he kept his cool, he didn't have to worry.
"Oh, still can't talk?" Jake snickered. "Are you even still in there?" Max opened his eyes a crack to glare, making Jake raise an impressed brow. "Well, aren't you a resilient one?"
"Let's cut to the chase," Max barked. He brought one hindpaw back, held both forepaws close to his chest, and flagged his tail to the sky to feel and accumulate charges in the air. His opponent wasn't wearing a bag, so he tossed his own behind him.
Jake's smile grew impossibly wider, and he laughed his infuriating laugh even more. "Oh! You talk?" He partially mirrored Max's stance, but held his hands out instead of in to start spinning shadow balls in each. "Sure you don't wanna keep your badge on you? Wouldn't want the mouse to get trapped, would we?" He laughed at his own joke; Max didn't react at all. "Well, I guess I would."
Silence remained Max's response, so Jake rolled his eyes. "What? Never heard of banter?" he asked.
It wasn't impossible to tune Jake out, but it did give Max a lot of trouble since the ghost was so goddamn annoying. Eleos, too, despite seeming to understand it needed to leave the two of them to it, was bursting at the seams to resist its own input. Letting it murder Jake started growing more and more tempting by the second.
Max took a breath. He focused his eyes on Jake and let the rest of his vision clarify. His awareness branched out in his vision, letting him watch the shadow balls with as much clarity as he had watching Jake's expression. Every little movement imprinted itself on his vision to the point that he could practically see afterimages. Just a flinch, just a twitch, and he'd know when an attack was coming before Jake launched it.
A flinch of Jake's pinky, Max leapt to the side, a shadow ball hitting where he stood a whole second later, and he ducked under the next as he rushed forward. Jake's eyes only barely widened in surprise. Max hopped up to reel his tail back as if ready to strike with it, but Jake already started moving to dodge. With a booming shock, Max launched himself a hair back and lightning coursed through Jake.
The grunt of pain Jake muffled out played like music to Max's ears, but he didn't get any time to celebrate. His paws barely hit the ground before he had to jump back, Jake reeling back for a punch. Despite the dodge, Jake still threw the punch with a self-assured smirk.
Still in the air, Max couldn't move out of the way when Jake's fist disappeared into a portal. Spinning purple flashed in the periphery of his vision. Max yanked his tail forward to intercept the blow and felt the punch slam into it before both hit his head, sending him flying to the right. The blow dazed him too much to try and land. He almost wished he'd tanked the hit so he could slide on his tail instead of his side, particularly once the smoother floor gave way to uneven stone.
Stray pebbles and stones started building up around him as he slid, giving him a mound to catch him once his momentum died. He kept his eyes closed, certain they'd only see spinning doubles, and focused on his other senses. His ears twitched at a gust right above him, the same inversion of space that appeared before the last hit.
He rolled away and onto all fours. Jake swore as his fist slammed into the mound of pebbles and rocks, and Max brought a forepaw up to hold his head. He peaked an eye open to watch Jake glaring at him, but ultimately not approaching. If he had to rely on his sight, Max would have a lot more trouble reading him from here. As it was, he only needed to worry about how to deliver a blow of his own.
Given the grin still spreading Jake's cheeks, Max figured he hadn't seen the last of those punches. Sure enough, Jake pulled his fist back. Max closed his eyes to listen to his surroundings, his tail up and ready. The wind, it whipped at him from his right (North, based on his charge).
A gust hissed out from his left, so he twisted around his right forepaw and sliced his iron tail right into the punch that came.
"FUCK!" Jake screamed, ripping his hand back to clutch it in his other. Max looked over with a smirk. It probably wasn't good that he was enjoying this as much as he was, but he couldn't bring himself to care all that much. A stream of blood spilled down from Jake's hands. Max glanced at his tail to see how deep it had gone. About three inches.
Jesus.
It struck him as strange that ghosts bled, but he could care when he wasn't fighting for his life at the top of a mountain.
"Nice reflexes," Jake shouted. A quiet, but piercing pitch started filling the air. "Let's see how well you can really dodge." Max squared his stance, trying to visualize a path to Jake, but had to wince as the tone grew louder, like a dog whistle through a string of megaphones. As it got louder, Jake's eyes started to glow. Jake joined into the screeching with a scream of his own and shot a beam of piercing, refracted light so bright it hurt to look at.
Max tried to jump out of the way, but it torched his left shoulder and sent him careening back and to the side. He managed to land, though his paws didn't appreciate the jagged ground he had to land on, and he could feel the ground trembling below him. Shadow balls came from both sides of him while he clutched his shoulder with the opposite paw.
The fur and bones all felt equally overheated as he tried to jump back from the incoming attacks. He dodged the first volley, but the shots that missed had come from opposite diagonals. When he dashed back, they flanked both sides of him while new shots narrowed the angle and shrank the gap around him.
He took another step back on instinct and felt the ground quake. In a flash, he felt the ground below him, an overhang that could barely hold itself up. Dodging had only put him in a worse situation. If he could retaliate, he could force Jake to flinch long enough to leave the overhang, but even if he called lightning, he didn't have the accuracy to make the shot from so far away—especially with shadow balls blocking his vision.
Although, he didn't need to rely exclusively on his sight anymore. He had less and less time, the shadow balls closing in around him. Closing his eyes, he felt the dungeon around him. Jake stood in the same place he had before, a single pool of blood below him, growing while he shot his shadow balls through alternating portals.
A breath. The air tasted of its encroaching darkness, but they were pretty high, too. Max could feel the building charges zipping between the ground, the peak, and the sky with newfound clarity. A circuit. Gusts from the shadow balls' turbulence. He was out of time. He launched a bolt up and over the attack that crashed into the pool of blood in front of Jake.
Before Jake could gloat that it'd missed, the sky crackled. The charge at Jake's feet had grown too strong to stay still and split the air as lightning crashed down to reunite it with the sky. The shadow balls stopped, and Max took a breath.
The air in front of him cleared, letting him see and—more importantly—letting him get back to solid ground. When he took a step forward, a shadow ball flew in front of him, barely missing the skin of his nose. He reeled back and stomped his hindpaw hard enough to make the ground below him shake. It didn't all shake the same, though, and he could feel which parts were more stable below the surface.
Jake was panting on one knee, one hand clutched against his chest, the other holding a shadow ball at the ready. "You're not," he panted, "coming any closer." When the dust cleared enough to make out his expression, Max felt the malice piercing into his soul. All the playfulness had perished.
Max pulled back into a fighting stance. His own charge felt close to empty from that stunt. Enough to stay afloat, but any move more than a shock might leave him out of commission if he didn't give himself time to recover. He might not be in danger anymore, but he still couldn't attack Jake, either. Not directly, and he doubted he could dodge enough shadow balls to collapse the distance.
His own breath felt heavy, as well, if not quite as heavy as Jake's, and his shoulder still seared from the blow. If he shook his head too fast, he could still feel the dizzying punches. Running wasn't a good idea. He needed another way to get over there.
The ground beneath him shook again, and the same veins of stability ran beneath him. A thought struck Max, and he had to smile. "What did you say about my own ability?" he shouted back. He had the perfect song, too, if he could just remember the name. "Well, I might have the perfect thing."
The ground echoed beneath him as he spread his arms wide and took a step back.
What are you doing.
Jake's glare split halfway into concern. Max kept stepping back, the ground shaking with each one. The name, the name, what was the name? "Max, wait," Jake shouted. His shadow ball swirled into nothing as he reached his good hand forward. "Don't just jump off—I'm not gonna actually kill you!"
Max barely heard him. With every step, he lost time to remember. "Your Mad World was something else," he said. He could mostly remember the tune, the lyrics slowly coming to match up. One last step back sent the furthest edge crumbling behind him. "But it never stood a chance against mine." He hurriedly hummed the tune to get to the chorus.
It was probably a waste of time, and it was definitely stupid, but he deserved at least something fun to end this day with. He finally made it to the chorus, and, just in time, the name came to him. "Fall to mine!" he declared. "Be a Lady!"
He was in too much of a rush to realize he'd only said part of the song's name. In the move to take his final step back, he realized his mistake and stumbled as his confidence collapsed with the overhang beneath him.
"Stop!" Jake shouted and started flying to catch him, but the ground shattered beneath Max before he had a chance to stop it. Max plummeted down and brought the entirety of the overhang he'd traversed with him as he fell. An avalanche of stone boomed as it fell and slammed into the mountain beneath. Jake flinched back at the sound. He'd made it to the edge seconds too late. Taking a breath to steel himself, he looked over the edge to see the catastrophe.
A pile of stones had crashed onto an outcropping below and, he had to assume, right on top of Max. He looked on with utter horror and brought his good hand to his head as the full extent of what he'd done hit him.
At the very bottom of his vision, a vine swung around fossilized branches, when suddenly its tension snapped back in on itself. It swung out from the cliff side and back up to the edge right where Jake stood. He started to look up and an iron tail smacked him in the face.
Max balanced on his tail on top of the ghost, letting the momentum of the blow shove him across the ground as if he was surfing. As they lost momentum, he turned sideways and leaned back to increase the friction by dragging as much of Jake across the ground as he could at once. Right before they ground to a halt, he jumped up and brought his tail crashing down back on Jake.
Before Jake could even flinch, Max sent a bolt of electricity into him. Jake twitched and seized, but he couldn't move more than his eyes in any significant way.
Max smiled and dropped an elbow on top of the scumbag. "Well, well, well," he hummed, admiring the sight of his claws. "Looks like I passed that test of yours, didn't I?" He stood up on his toes to really dig his elbow into Jake.
"Y-you'RE," Jake stammered through the paralysis, "iNSanE!"
Max tilted his head to the sky and tapped a paw to his chin. "Am I?" he wondered aloud. "It's possible, though we should get a second opinion." An eerie confidence filled his gaze as he looked back down. "You know, I made a really interesting friend in my travels. I wonder if you've ever seen it before." Jake stared at him in utter bewilderment. "Well, if you haven't, I'm sure you'll recognize it.
An endless darkness swirled between them as Eleos dug itself out of Max's brain and before Jake who stared on in abject horror. "D-Dark—y-you—you let it live?!" he stammered. The paralysis had almost worn off, but now fear finished the job as electricity dissipated.
Neither Eleos or Max made a sound. Eleos grew right in front of Jake's gaze (appearing to engulf Max when it wasn't even as big as the mouse's head in this form). Jake tried to shake his head, but found his body unresponsive. When he looked down, grey had crawled all the way from his hands to his legs, and was now making its way up his body. He could do nothing as his ghostly form turned to stone.
The stone ate all the way up to the last remaining purple, but struggled at the very tips of his spikes. "This used to be easier," Eleos grumbled.
Max gingerly flopped down to the ground. For all his confidence, he was panting from exhaustion. The acting towards the end took a lot more energy than he had, too. "How ya feeling?" he asked. The last of the stone overtook Jake, and Eleos turned to face Max. "Want to throw the world into the sun?"
Eleos hummed for a moment in thought. "No more than always," it answered.
With a chuckle, Max let himself rest. He put up a token resistance when his eyes started to droop closed, but resigned himself with the knowledge Eleos could use the badges, too. With a sigh, he put his fate in its paws. Or, well.
Whatever that ball of rehabilitated evil had at its disposal.