35. The Answer in the Sands
A phoenix crowed, perched atop a sturdy branch in a tree with lavender leaves. It was unaware of its present peril until a bolt of green pierced neatly through its chest, causing its stone-dead corpse to drop to the ground.
It had been far from the first phoenix the Huntsman had killed. He knelt over the phoenix body and began to pluck its feathers.
As he had explained before the great phoenix hunt, "The power of the phoenix is that of restoring and extending life. Phoenix tears are known to act as antidotes to otherwise fatal venoms. And it is said that the down of the phoenix, if applied to an intact corpse within a short span of time after death, can even return the dead to life."
"And can it do anything about my hand?" Mozenrath had asked at the time.
"I do not know," the Huntsman admitted. "I am, however, certain that the feathers of a phoenix should protect us from the aura of death that permates Goab."
And so the hunt had begun. The Huntsman already wore a vest of shimmering red-orange feathers. Mozenrath had traded his cape for one made of the fire-colored plumage, and Xayide wore a layer of feathers over her skirt.
"Can you make this one…fabulous?" Yzma asked.
Xayide flicked her hand, and the feathers the Huntsman had plucked swirled upward into a small cyclone, where they spun and spun before binding together. They settled around the back of Yzma's neck, sprouting into a grandiose collar.
"We are ready," the Huntsman announced.
"If we are ready to enter Goab," Xayide pointed out, "that means we shall find it soon enough."
...
Ursula had called Cruella's squad to action, lining up Medusa, McLeach, Clayton, Sykes, Terminus, the Baduns, Snoops, Hoagy, Edgar, and Cruella herself in one of the dungeon halls. "Maleficent has a special mission for all of you," she chuckled.
"And what manner of mission does she deem befitting our little alliance?" Clayton asked.
"You may have been told of one of our more persistent annoyances," Ursula told them. "A little brat named Mozenrath. His power lies in the manipulation of the Black Sands. Simple Earth magic tied to a substance that was already quite magical. And that got us thinking: what if we had Black Sands of our own? What if we had something better?
"There is one world in particular that we all know is dangerous to mess with. They call it Fantastica. One of the oldest worlds there is. Now, I know what you're thinking. 'Wasn't Radiant Garden the first world brought back after everything was swallowed by Darkness?'"
"Nobody was thinkin' that," McLeach corrected. "Nobody knows what all this Darkness talk even means!"
"Fantastica doesn't play by the rules of other worlds," Ursula went on. "It's disappeared, reappeared, disappeared, reappeared, disappeared…you get the picture. That's where you're going. I wouldn't stray off the path of the mission, if I were you. If you do, well, then you've made your own seabed and you're going to have to lie in it."
"What exactly are we doing, in simple terms?" Sykes asked.
"In the world of Fantastica, there is a desert," Ursula explained. "Goab. The Desert of Colors. Exactly what it says on the label. It's full of sand of all colors, and with magical properties, to boot. Your mission is to collect some of every color of sand and bring it back here so I can use it to give our overall magic a bit of a boost."
"SAND?" McLeach repeated. "You want us to pick up a bunch of SAND? I could do that on my own! Except I'm not going to, because the whole thing is stupid! I'm not wasting my talents on – "
Ursula wagged a finger. "Someone wasn't listening! When I said Fantastica was dangerous, I meant it. Goab is guarded by a monster that is said to be unkillable. Now have I got your attention?"
Most nodded silently; only Terminus spoke, with an unsure "…Unkillable?"
"A lion, to be exact," Ursula stated. "Grograman, the Many-Colored Death. It will take a team of trained hunters to subdue him. The biggest hurdle is getting past the death aura he casts over the whole desert. See, the catch of the whole mission is that if you step into the desert at all while Grograman is alive, you die. And even if you somehow managed to survive that initial encounter, which you will, Grograman himself is no slouch."
"So we kill him first," Medusa decided, "then take the sand for ourselves!"
"Magic has this nasty little habit of playing by complicated rules, I'm afraid," Ursula informed her. "You see, without Grograman, Goab doesn't exist at all. No bloodthirsty lion, no magic sand. Sand first, kill lion later. And you're going to have to deal with him eventually. He's not a fan of invaders. Are we clear so far?"
"Crystal," Cruella answered.
"Fortunately, you're going to have a few aces up your sleeves," Ursula explained. "First of all, you're going to be wearing these."
She brought her hands together, clasping them, then spread them apart, a puff of blue smoke erupting from them. Eight pendants, each consisting of a round, clear crystal on a chain, hovered in the air between her palms. "One for Cruella, Medusa, Percival, Clayton, Bill, Horace, Jasper, and…the Doc," Ursula explained.
"B-b-but…" Edgar stammered. "What about – "
"You, Ernie, and Hoagy?" Ursula finished for him. "You're not going. You'll only bungle the whole operation. Your talents are going to be put to better use here. No offense."
Edgar wiped his brow on the back of his sleeve; Snoops and Hoagy felt similar relief that they wouldn't be dispatched to deal with a literal aura of death.
"I'm not wearin' this girly necklace!" McLeach growled.
"Too bad," Ursula told him. "I guess you'll just die upon arrival in Goab, then. These pendants are crystallized phoenix tears. So long as you wear them, the death aura won't affect you, and you can walk through Goab. Lose one, and…well, from our point of view, you were fairly expendable anyway."
"Expendable!" Medusa barked.
"Bring back the sand," Ursula told her, "and you'll prove us wrong on that account."
The chosen eight reached out to take their pendants and settle them around their necks. Clayton, McLeach, and Sykes were not fans of this particular fashion statement, but knew their lives were far more valuable than their objections toward jewelry.
"As for the other ace up your sleeves," Ursula continued, "are you familiar with the Huntsclan?"
No one answered. Then McLeach barked, "None of us know your dang fairy tales, lady!"
"Perhaps we should have found more experienced mercenaries for the job," Ursula huffed. "No matter. The Huntsclan is – WAS – a society of hunters and huntresses devoted to slaying magical creatures. They were native to one particular world, and the vast majority of them were slain by some upstart brat of a dragon. One of them is reported to be alive again, and working with Mozenrath, no less. The point of the story is that they had developed all sorts of weapons designed for the express purpose of killing monsters. And when they died – " Ursula turned and shoved a wide grate cutting off one of the larger prison cells open. "They left all of those weapons up for grabs." She clapped her hands again, and a light spilled from the ceiling, illuminating the contents of the cell.
There were bows, swords, and axes. There were spears, huntstaffs, and guns. There were even a couple vehicles.
"Take your pick," Ursula offered.
Cruella, Medusa, McLeach, Clayton, Sykes, Terminus, Horace, and Jasper descended eagerly upon the armory, their eyes practically sparkling.
"And what about us?" Edgar asked, gesturing to himself, Snoops, and Hoagy. "What are we supposed to be doing?"
"Well, you're a butler, aren't you?" Ursula asked. "I've got lots of very intense magical work to do, and I could use someone to bring me drinks. The three of you are going to be at my beck and call until your superiors return."
"Well," Snoops remarked, "it beats fighting deadly lions." And Hoagy and Edgar couldn't disagree with that.
...
Snatcher and Wuya were put in charge of giving Garfield and Peter the grand tour of the base. They began by locating Neo in one of the communal downstairs kitchens; she was in the process of making herself a sandwich.
"This is Neo," Wuya introduced. "Short for Neopolitan. Our most dangerous assassin. Just take my word for it and don't cross her."
Neo smiled and waved.
"Miss Neopolitan," Snatcher explained, "meet Misters Peter Merkel and Garfield Lynns. They are new additions to our operation."
"THAT'S your most dangerous assassin?" Garfield reiterated, stunned. "She's about half your size, Archie."
Neo gave Garfield a playful wink.
"First of all, you're not allowed to call me that," Snatcher grunted. "Second, don't judge Miss Neopolitan by appearances…in more ways than one. Her 'superpower,' as you'd put it, is being able to change the looks of things."
Neo slowly shifted her appearance from the top down, taking on her old favorite guise of an emerald-eyed woman with two black ponytails, clad in all black.
"Well, that looks handy," Peter commented.
Neo's face then twisted into a frown. She stormed right up to Snatcher, looking up at him; despite the stark height difference between the two in Snatcher's favor, Neo's emerald gaze was unnerving. Snatcher knew exactly what she was angry at him about. "I tried to stop him!" he argued. "He just went barreling into danger of his own accord!"
"Technically, I flew him up to the ship," Garfield broke in before immediately realizing why that was a mistake.
Neo slowly turned to glare at Garfield. She pointed two fingers at her eyes, then jabbed them back at Garfield.
"But it WAS his idea," Garfield said hurriedly.
"Mr. Vexen is patching him up in the laboratory," Snatcher explained. "He'll be right as rain soon enough."
Neo rolled her eyes.
"I'm even less happy about this than you are!" Snatcher emphasized.
Neo turned on a heel and went back to fixing her sandwich.
"Let's move on, shall we?" Wuya suggested.
As she, Snatcher, Peter, and Garfield left the kitchen, Peter remarked, "With a name like 'Neopolitan,' she must be quite the fan of ice cream."
Wuya hurriedly made a slicing motion across her neck with a pointed stare in Peter's direction.
"Ice cream," Snatcher muttered. "Never cared for it. No particular reason why."
Wuya fell back to the rear of the group, then grabbed Garfield and Peter by the shoulders, drawing them close enough together that she could hiss in their ears, "We don't bring up ice cream here. And we especially don't eat it. I'll explain later."
The next stop was the spacious room that Ravess had designated her practice studio due to its superior acoustics; the group came upon her in the midst of her playing a particularly fierce piece on her violin. All knew better than to interrupt her in the midst of the piece, so they waited as Ravess, with her back to them, played out the final notes. Once the piece was finished, Peter began to clap furiously, startling Ravess.
"Who are THEY?" she barked as she spun round.
"New recruits," Wuya explained. "This is Ravess, our resident archer and musician. Ravess, this is Garfield, our new arsonist, and Peter, our…"
"Master thief and unparalleled contortionist," Peter filled in.
"Charmed," Ravess said haughtily.
"You and Vexen must make quite a pair," Peter commented, realizing where he'd heard that greeting before.
"Really?" Ravess squeaked, suddenly blushing. "You think? I mean, of course, in the logical way. We make logical partners. Battle partners, that is."
"Suuuuuure," Garfield told her. "I gotcha. Like me and Peter are battle partners."
"Exactly!" Ravess said with a nod.
"They're dating," Wuya clarified.
"I take that 'exactly' back!" Ravess said hurriedly, beet red.
"I've never seen you get so worked up before," Wuya remarked. "Whatever's going on between you and Vexen is new – "
"THERE IS NOTHING GOING ON BETWEEN VEXEN AND ME!" Ravess practically shrieked. "Now, if you could please leave me alone, I am in the midst of a very important practice session."
"Question," Garfield brought up. "Do you actually think playing the violin is more important to practice than marksmanship?"
"I can land an arrow at any distance, no matter the circumstances, and I know it," Ravess replied. "This piece, however, is one I only recently learned, and I'm still refining it."
"Would you happen to know where we might be able to locate your brother?" Snatcher asked.
"My brother?" Ravess' grin turned positively diabolical. "Why, I've no idea. I haven't seen him in a while. I'm sure he'll turn up eventually."
"You're not missing much by not meeting Snipe right away anyway," Wuya explained.
As the quartet left Ravess to her practice, Snatcher remarked, "I've obviously missed a lot. There's most definitely something going on between her and Vexen. Care to give me the details?"
"You know as much as I do," Wuya said with a shrug.
The next stop was the trashed reading room. "What happened here?" Garfield asked.
"Snipe was an idiot," Wuya replied, not caring to mention that she was responsible for a large part of the damage.
Irmaplotz was absorbed in a rather large book, tucked away on a plush chair in the corner, behind the downed bookshelf. She looked up and said, "Hey. You the new guys?"
"Yeah," Garfield replied.
"Peter Merkel," Peter introduced, "and my ever-faithful and talented companion, Garfield Lynns. Who might you be?"
"Princess Irmaplotz," Irmaplotz replied.
"Did…your mom hate you or something?" Garfield asked.
"Sometimes I wonder," Irmaplotz sighed. "Well, welcome to the team."
"That book any good?" Peter inquired.
"Terrible," Irmaplotz said, but her smile widened as her eyes returned to the page.
"One last stop," Wuya announced, turning to walk down the hall. "Now, if you'll follow me, you can – "
"All be free?" Peter finished, keeping pace with her as Garfield and Snatcher fell into step. "Free, you can all be free…"
He broke into song, and Garfield joined him, "As a bird on a big T.V. if you dream, if you dream, if you dream…MY DREAM!" Then the pair collapsed into laughter.
"What's going on, then?" Snatcher asked, very confused.
"It's this stupid, STUPID meme Peter loves," Garfield explained. "So there's this weird kids' show that no one knows anything about. It just kinda plays on one of the fringe channels, and it has all these weird songs. And people took this one song and started putting videos on the Internet of it with weird stuff done to it. Like speeding it up or making it switch to other songs."
"I have NO idea what you've just said," Snatcher admitted.
"I'll explain it later," Wuya told him. "Too much time around Jack Spicer gave me quite the experience with…" She gritted her teeth hard. "MEMES."
They arrived at the pair of levers that marked the entry to the laboratory. "Pull it," Wuya commanded.
Peter reached out and touched one of the levers, but Wuya and Snatcher quickly yelled "NOT THAT ONE!" in synchrony.
"Also…" Wuya steered Garfield closer to the levers, gripping him by the shoulders. "You should probably stand here."
Peter and Garfield traded expressions of confusion before Peter reached out and pulled the correct lever.
They were flipped around the wall and into the cart of the coaster behind it. "What the – " Garfield blurted as the safety bar clicked into place.
Then the coaster took off, careening down the sliding track. At some point, Garfield surrendered to the ridiculousness of it all and just threw his hands up in the air and whooped. Peter did the same not long after.
The cart halted, dumping them both into the laboratory. They found themselves unable to do anything but laugh for a solid two minutes.
"Best base EVER!" Garfield managed in between guffaws.
A second cart came to halt behind the first, spilling Snatcher and Wuya onto the same floor. "I take it you like the coaster," Wuya said coyly. "It was mostly my work, but Yzma's idea."
"Yzma?" Peter repeated. "Interesting name. Is she who we're here to meet?"
"We're unsure if she's even still here," Snatcher answered. "She, Lord Mozenrath, and the Huntsman left for an enigmatic quest of their own shortly before we departed for Gotham."
"Yzma, Mozenrath, Huntsman," Garfield counted off. "Guess that finishes spelling WHAM ARMY. It's Yzma with a 'Y,' right?"
"Correct," Snatcher confirmed.
"That name makes a lot more sense now," Garfield admitted. "So, who do we meet here?"
"It isn't so much 'meet' as 'reunite with,'" Snatcher clarified, beginning a trek deeper into the laboratory. Intrigued, Garfield and Peter followed, with Wuya bringing up the rear.
They found Roman sitting on an examination table, shirtless (much to Snatcher's delight), with Vexen looking over him and raising and lowering the previously broken arm. "I'm fine, Iceman," Roman sighed. "I didn't think you cared this much, anyway."
"I don't care about you in particular," Vexen confirmed. "I care about doing a thorough job for my own sake, I care about NOT having you storm back into this laboratory with any complaints about my medical work, and I respect certain members of this organization who wish to see you healthy. I will decide whether or not you are 'fine.'" He stepped back, giving Roman one more glance. "…You're fine."
"He's FINE?" Garfield reiterated as Roman slid off the table. "He had BROKEN BONES. That was an HOUR ago. What did you DO?"
"My job," Vexen answered dryly. "I see you are from a world that is primitive in the ways of magic. It always is amusing to see how easily impressed such people are with such mundane procedures."
"So I take it you're doing the grand tour," Roman stated.
"Last stop," Wuya confirmed. "Unless Yzma, Mozenrath, and the Huntsman are back."
"Those three have been gone a suspiciously long time," Vexen realized. "I suppose this would be cause for concern."
"I'll check on them," Wuya resigned.
"How are you going to do that?" Vexen asked. "You don't even know where they are!"
"No, but I have all the tools I need to figure it out," Wuya replied, sauntering into Yzma's side of the laboratory. "If anyone needs me, that's what I'll be doing. You don't think Yzma will mind – no, she probably won't." She plucked implements from cabinets, setting them out on the table. "Snatcher, you can finish showing them to their rooms, can't you?"
"Certainly," Snatcher replied, "though I can't shake the feeling we've forgotten to introduce someone."
Wuya shook her head. "We looked for everyone. We didn't forget anything."
"If you insist," Snatcher said with a shrug. "Gentlemen, the exit is this way."
Roman debated putting on a shirt, but he rather wanted to show off so long as his significant other was in the vicinity. "We should get you guys some scrolls," he decided as he took Wuya's place in the touring party. "That way, you can keep in touch, AND I can text you guys unwanted memes."
"Who said memes were unwanted?" Peter replied with a wink.
Snatcher didn't even bother pointing out, yet again, that he still had no idea what a "meme" was.
A small blur zoomed around the corner as the touring party passed one of Vexen's worktables. As this blur got close to Garfield, Garfield gave a scream and leaped onto the table, knocking over several beakers and flasks in a rain of glass that Vexen would be none too happy to clean up later. "WHAT THE HECK IS THAT?" he yelled at what he perceived to be an unholy abomination.
"Mozenrath?" Xerxes asked, looking over Garfield and Peter. "…Not Mozenrath."
"Xerxes!" Snatcher realized. "KNEW we were forgetting someone! Gentlemen…this is Xerxes. Sort of a team mascot, if you will."
"New people!" Xerxes observed, flying and bending in a vertical circle.
"I can do that too, you know," Peter told him. "Just not in the air." He bent over backward, rolling into a wheel for a few feet before straightening back up into a standing position.
Xerxes chuckled. "Xerxes like you!"
"Garfield doesn't like you," Garfield muttered, still of the mind that Xerxes was nothing short of creepy.
The eel was left behind, and Garfield and Peter were shown out of the laboratory and to their quarters. "You'll be staying here," Snatcher introduced.
"Seriously?" Garfield stepped into the network of rooms. "I was expecting a bedroom or two. This is like our own apartment."
"This entire ship was its own kingdom once," Roman informed him. "Everybody gets digs. Figured you two would wanna share."
"You figured right," Garfield confirmed.
"We'll let you two get settled in," Snatcher told them. "Give you what I'm sure is some much-needed privacy…if you catch my meaning."
"Yeah, about that…" Garfield very nearly corrected Snatcher's implication before realizing it was none of Snatcher's business. "What time is it, anyway?"
"We don't really have 'days' or 'nights' around here," Roman said as he withdrew his scroll from a pants pocket, "so we all collectively kind of just decided on a time to start synchronizing our scrolls. And right now, on WHAM ARMY time, it would be…" He glanced at the screen. "Eleven p.m. Night's still young."
"Night owls as we are," Peter told him, "it may be a night to actually turn in early. We've had quite the day."
"Agreed," Garfield said with a nod.
"Suit yourself," Roman said as he turned to leave the apartment. "Don't you kids have TOO much fun, now."
"We'll reconnect tomorrow," Snatcher vowed as he also took his leave, shutting the door behind him.
The kitchen in the apartment was not as large as the communal facility where Neo had been spotted, but it still contained many of the essentials. Garfield cracked open the refrigerator and read the label on one of many bottles that stood in a neat line in the back of the upper shelf: "'Yorka juice.' Do I wanna know what a yorka is? Don't answer that; I'm too thirsty to care." He removed the bottle, slammed the refrigerator door shut, procured a pair of glasses from a cabinet, plopped them on the counter, and split the bottle's contents evenly between both glasses before taking a long swig. After Peter watched Garfield down his portion of juice without gagging, he took a deep draught from his own glass; the yorka juice was incredibly sweet, and if Peter had to equate it to the taste of a fruit to his own world, the closest he could get was mango tinged with blueberry.
The pair put their glasses down on the counter at the same time. "So this is our life now," Garfield sighed, looking directly into Peter's eyes. He couldn't help but smile.
"Our rather hasty and unceremonious retreat from the new Joker aside," Peter replied, his usual wide grin in place, "things seem to be looking up. We've certainly found ourselves among an eccentric crowd."
"Do we run with any other kind?"
They clinked the lips of their glasses against each other. Garfield lifted his arm to take another drink; Peter quickly and lithely wrapped his arm through the crook of Garfield's elbow before doing the same so that they both drank with arms linked.
...
"WE'RE BACK!" Sora cried as he ran through the doors of the Radiant Garden castle with his large entourage in tow.
Aerith and Leon had been on their way down the stairs; Aerith broke into a run the rest of the way when she saw that the group had returned. "Welcome back!" she said joyfully as she spread her arms; she and Sora exchanged a brief hug.
"Should I find the usual people?" Leon asked.
"Yeah," Sora told him. "Let's get everybody into the library. We have a lot to talk about!"
The adventurers and the Committee were arranged, and the adventuring party took turns telling their tale. The Committee listened in interest.
"We may not have found Even," Kairi said, "but if the hourglass is right, he's probably still alive."
Lea let out a sigh of relief.
"And that's why we're thinking of putting our own hourglass in THIS castle," Sadira concluded. "Which is NICE!"
"Having a way to scry for answers to our questions is a good idea," Leon said with a nod. "You're welcome to stay for as long as you need to in order to complete it."
"I can stay? HERE?" Sadira gaped.
"We let you stay over at the palace all the time," Aladdin teased.
"Yeah, but that's in our homeworld," Sadira reminded him. "I've never seen anything like THIS before!"
"I wonder if the Moogles will help us forge the glass and build the receptacle for the crystal," Aerith volunteered.
"I KNOW Merlin can help out with some of the magic part of it," Yuffie egged on.
"Oh, all right, all right!" Merlin huffed. "If you so insist!" Yet it was rather obvious he was eager to help.
"Merlin!" Sora realized. "We need your help with more than just that! We were hoping you would know what the things we saw in the hourglass in Agrabah mean."
"Remind me again of your first vision," Merlin commanded. "The one you saw when asking about Mozenrath."
"There were six eggs," Jasmine explained. "Each was a different color. When they hatched, a dragon came out of each one, followed by a baby that looked human but had wings sprouting from its head."
"Why, that one's obvious!" Merlin realized. "My dear girl, you were shown the Eliatropes! More specifically, their leaders, the Twelve."
"What's an…Eliatrope?" Sora asked.
"Eliatropes are a mysterious people with the ability to create portals at will," Merlin explained. "An ancient war with a hostile army caused them to flee from world to world. They were ruled by the Twelve: six Eliatropes and their dragon siblings. The Eliatrope leaders hatched from dragon eggs, you see, and each has a twin. The Twelve are immortal in a way. Each time they die, they reincarnate and hatch from their eggs, called 'dofus,' once more, with their memories erased. I believe I know the exact world upon which the Eliatropes make their home to this day: the World of Twelve. I can give you directions to reach it by Gummi later."
"And how do you know all this?" Stork asked.
"I've been around quite longer than you suspect," Merlin answered, "and I've traveled across nearly all of time, to boot. Except the frustrating thing about time is there keeps being more of it made, and that means more of it to explore, and it begins to be a chore."
"WAIT A MINUTE!" Papyrus realized. "IF YOU CAN TRAVEL THROUGH ALL OF TIME, THAT MEANS - !"
"That means you know the answers to all of our questions already!" Ruby gasped.
"Not necessarily," Merlin told her. "In my trips to the future, it seems to be different each time. I have seen a hundred possible futures, and in none of them did I encounter you having traveled to the World of Twelve or building a scrying hourglass in Radiant Garden. Believe me, I've tried to go forward and figure out what some of our more persistent enemies have been planning and what the outcome will be, but it turns out the flow of time is far more complicated than that, and sometimes, even I can't make heads or tails of what just happened! One great big mess, is what it is!"
"Is there anything that ain't a great big fuckin' mess to you?" Cid groaned.
"Well, the library at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, off the top of my head," Merlin answered. "The rest of the school and its surrounding world are an absolute tangle, but the library seems well-kept no matter what." He cleared his throat. "And what was the second vision? The one that apparently told the location of Even?"
"It was a world full of tunnels and crystals," Kairi replied. "The people working in the tunnels were…hard to describe. They were gray."
"Hmm, I do think I know what you might be describing!" Merlin realized. "There is a rather large world composed of an absolute myriad of planets. It is, unfortunately, referred to as Galra Space nowadays, as it is currently mostly under the control of an army of warlords by that name. It is there that you will find the celestial body known as the Balmera. Not a planet, mind you, but a planet-sized living creature that produces crystals as secretions! Its people harvest the crystals and give back energy in return. Though the last I saw of it, it was a prime target for the Galra to capture and harvest the crystal energy."
"Do you think the Balmera would let us have one of its crystals to power the hourglass?" Kairi asked.
"If you paid it back in kind," Merlin replied. "And, of course, if you spoke of the matter with its people. The crystals belong to them first and foremost! You will need not only coordinates to find Galra Space but also to navigate within it. It seems a wizard's work is never done."
"If the Balmera doesn't have a crystal that works," Stork reminded Kairi, "there's a small chance Atmos may have something that fits what you're looking for. Maybe. Small chance."
"Atmos…" Merlin hung his head, shaking it slightly. "I am afraid that when I journeyed to that world to return Huginnmuninn to his true shape, I came across a rather distressing sight. Much of the Atmosia side had been attacked by some sort of warship, leaving most of the Terras in states of destruction and disarray."
Stork flinched as though he'd been hit by a large and heavy object. "You…saw…what?"
"Most of the reports were that of the Cyclonian warship regaining power and carving a path of destruction before leaving the world entirely," Merlin said somberly. "I was able to trace the destruction to Terra Atmosia, where the all-important Aurora Stone's shards had been taken."
"Don't tell me," Stork said through gritted teeth. "Maleficent."
"Not by description," Merlin corrected. "The Atmosian guards claimed the shards were stolen by a younger man with raven hair, brandishing some sort of magical gauntlet."
"MOZENRATH!" Sora, Ruby, Papyrus, Stork, and Jasmine cried as one.
Ruby turned to look at Stork. "Do you wanna go back to Atmos? Try and fix things?"
"I'm afraid the damage is far greater than you can fix," Merlin announced.
"I…don't even know if I could handle seeing it," Stork admitted. He clenched his fists. "If Mozenrath is the reason everything's ruined…then I'm going after him."
"It may give you hope to know that I did meet with a young man on Atmos who seemed determined to right the wrongs that had occurred," Merlin recounted. "We met in a Wasteland, and he was piloting a skimmer to who knows where. I've no idea what he thought he could do, but he seemed to have faith he could make some sort of change. He had a most intriguing name. Aerrow, I believe it w – "
"AERROW?" Stork practically screamed. "You found Aerrow? He's ALIVE?"
"Maybe all the Storm Hawks really did survive!" Ruby chirped.
"I wonder if he'll find Finn or Piper," Sora commented.
"DOESN'T THAT JUST LEAVE TWO?" Papyrus asked.
"Junko and Radarr," Stork said with a nod. "I'm not gonna get my hopes up. What matters NOW is that we track down Mozenrath in this World of Twelve and…" He knew Papyrus wouldn't want to punish Mozenrath with death. Perhaps it wasn't the best way to go about things after all. "…make him give back the shards."
"So who's all on board for the Mozenrath-chasing team?" Sora asked. "Because I think that's my team. Me, Stork…"
"Gotta bring me along," Ruby told him.
"ME TOO!" Papyrus insisted.
"So the usual team, then!" Sora laughed. "What about you, Riku?"
"I…don't know," Riku admitted. "There are so many other places that need help. Atmos. Remnant. I feel like they're all calling for me."
"Me too," Nick and Xander said as one.
"Above everything else, I think we have to keep an eye out for Maleficent," Riku went on.
"Same here," Aladdin agreed.
"I think chasing Mozenrath is just as important," Jasmine broke in.
"I'd love to go with you, Sora," Riku said at last, "and I'd love it if you could stay with me. But I think we're after different things. Not to mention Kairi's probably going to Galra Space. Even if we don't have our Keyblades, this makes three teams, each with a Keybearer, and that's probably safer."
"I guess that makes sense," Sora relented. "I'll miss you."
"I'll miss you too."
They stepped toward each other, clasping their right hands in each other tightly. Then they closed the distance, using that touch to pull each other closer for a kiss.
"AAAAAWWWW!" everyone else in the room cooed.
"Like we didn't all see this coming!" Nora followed up.
As Sora and Riku parted, Sora said cheerfully, "It won't really be like we're that far apart. After all, we always have each other, don't we?" He tapped his chest, where his heart was. "Right here!"
Riku folded his hand over the same place on his own body. "Where we can keep each other safe."
"Are…we splitting up too?" Aladdin asked Jasmine. "To different teams, I mean."
"I can't just stand back and ignore Mozenrath," Jasmine stated. "Even with Maleficent and Jafar out there. You remember what Mozenrath did to us. He tried to dominate the whole Seven Deserts. If he knows about other worlds, that can't mean anything good."
"I agree," Aladdin said with a nod. "But Jafar is even more powerful."
"Then maybe we do need to split up," Jasmine realized. "Both of these threats need our attention."
"They might be just about as important as each other," Aladdin conceded. "But it'll be okay. It's like Sora and Riku said. I'll be keeping you with me right in my heart."
"And you'll be in mine," Jasmine replied.
They, too, had to share a kiss, drawing out another "AAAAWWWW!" from observers.
When they parted, Jasmine turned to Sora. "Looks like I'm joining your team."
"And I'm with you," Aladdin told Riku.
"So…are you going to Galra Space?" Madison asked Kairi.
"I have to," Kairi confirmed. "That's where Even is. I have to save him. And I can finish the hourglass while I'm there."
"Then that's where I'm going," Madison decided. "Blue buddies, remember?"
"BLUE BUDDIES!" Genie broke in, wrapping Madison and Kairi each in an arm and squeezing them in a tight but not uncomfortable hug. "Let's set a course for Galra Space!" As he let go, he transformed into the shape of a man wearing a yellow shirt that would have been recognized by many as a Starfleet uniform. "The final frontier!"
"Hey, now," Vida broke in. "I've gotta look after my little sister. Count me in."
"And me," Jaune added. "Because…well…I want to."
"Can I come?" Chip asked. "After, you know, those errands we talked about."
"I think all of us have errands we have to take care of before we can leave, anyway," Kairi said with a smile. "Anybody else for Galra Space?"
Cadance stepped forward. "I, too, want to rescue Even. I know we've never met, but he seems so important to you."
Carpet tapped Genie on the shoulder. "You want to come along too?" Genie asked. "You and me, just like old times!" He smacked Carpet's tassel in what passed for a high-five.
"Carpet is mostly blue," Madison realized. "He can be a blue buddy too!"
"Luna?" Cadance asked.
Luna shook her head. "As a princess of the night, I feel I must attend to where the Darkness is strongest. And that means following Riku."
"Riku hasn't steered us wrong yet," Nora added, and Ren nodded. "We're stickin' with him."
"Nick?" Riku asked. "Xander? You two seemed to agree with what I thought I should do."
"And we're with you!" Xander confirmed.
"Sure are," Nick added.
"Yuffie?" Cid asked. "You gonna run off on some adventure with 'em again?"
"I think I'm adventured out for a bit," Yuffie admitted. "Besides, I'm the glue that holds this Committee together!"
"I thought that was me," Lea joked.
"I think that's everyone," Sora realized. "All right, everybody! Let's go! To the World of Twelve!"
"To Galra Space," Kairi added.
"To a place I don't know yet," Riku contributed, "but somewhere we can make a difference."
...
Garfield dreamed of the entire warship exploding.
He awoke breathing shallowly. His transformation into the monstrous Phosphorus and back had left him with a few souvenirs, one of which was heavily intrusive thoughts about destruction. During the daytime, he had gotten better at dealing with them, but at night, they ruled his mind whenever they chose to enter.
It always proceeded the same way. He would first have the vision, the dream, the thought of causing the utter annihilation of his surroundings. Then he would briefly enjoy it, an unbidden reaction. Then he would realize that he'd been happy, yet again, at the thought of whatever good he had going for him going up in flames. His mood would quickly gel into fear and disgust. As much as Gotham had irked him, there were things in it he cared about; things he knew should be protected, not destroyed. And here on the WHAM ARMY battleship, there were even more. Peter was the apex of it all; Garfield had vowed never to try and harm him the way he had almost done when he was Phosphorus, and realizing he'd had a fantasy of an event that would culminate in Peter's demise made him shiver with revulsion.
First he took stock of his location. He had woken up in a soft bed with a set of spindly limbs wrapped tightly around him. He thought back to Snatcher's early assumption that what he and Peter would get up to behind closed doors would be sexual. What he hadn't thought it any of his business to mention – and obviously Peter had agreed, as he hadn't said anything either – was that Peter was completely asexual, having actually had his genitalia removed so as to not have to concern himself with it when bending into impossible positions. Garfield had no qualms with this. After all, when he had become Phosphorus, he had learned that he was willing to give up his ability to even touch another human being in exchange for power, though he was determined not to go to those lengths again. He was also perfectly capable of fulfilling his carnal desires by his own hand, so to speak. He and Peter did prefer, all the same, to sleep in the same bed, at least half-clothed if not fully so. That particular night, due to the abruptness of their move to new quarters, Garfield was stripped down to the thin underclothes he had worn beneath his battle suit while Peter had settled into bed in almost full costume as Ragdoll. The arrangement benefitted Peter greatly in terms of temperature; another leftover aspect of Phosphorus was that Garfield's body temperature was ever so slightly higher, and he radiated a small amount of comfortable heat even in cool environments. Peter was a chronic cuddler, preferring to wrap both arms and legs around Garfield in a tangle that, often times, only he knew how to undo, effectively trapping Garfield in place until Peter woke up.
And Peter was a heavy sleeper.
This was far from the first night Garfield had awoken needing to clear his mind from unpleasant dreams, yet the task of getting Peter to let go of him never seemed any easier than in past nights. Garfield first tried to squirm out of Peter's grip without untangling him, but Peter's grip was vise-tight. He then tried to undo the knot that Peter had made out of his arms, but with little success.
"Well, I hope you're comfortable," Garfield huffed. "Peter. Wake up and let me go."
He was met with a wordless mutter of half-formed syllables.
"Will you just wake up?"
"Nnnnnnnnn…no."
"I need to…" Garfield didn't want to admit that the dream had happened to him again. "Use the can, okay? Let go."
With a half-awake and very dissatisfied grumble, Peter loosened his grip enough for Garfield to leave him behind in the bed. "Was that so hard?" Garfield whispered as he left the bedroom.
The apartment didn't have a fireplace. His previous Gotham safehouse, Peter's personal apartment, had a fireplace, and that was the key to defeating past instances of the dream. However, it did have a stove with four burners that looked relatively old-fashioned. Garfield figured they would work.
He vaguely recalled where the reading room was where he'd met Irmaplotz, and he found his way there with some trial and error. To his surprise, Irmaplotz was still there, now sprawled out on the floor with what Garfield was sure was a different book splayed in front of her. "Uh…hey," he greeted.
"Hey," Irmaplotz replied without looking up.
"So…" Garfield asked awkwardly, "you read a lot of the books in here?"
"Yup."
"Found any really bad ones?"
"Oh, you want bad books?" This got Irmaplotz to look up from her tome, scrambling to her feet. "I'll show you some bad books." She plucked one from one of the still-standing shelves. "This here is your typical romance story between a teenage girl and a supernatural creature. Purple prose, forced dialogue, limited characterization, and dysfunctional concepts of 'love.'" She took down another one. "This poet gives Ped Xing a run for his money." Another. "A history of the world this ship came from, and it's boring, boring, boring." Another. "Grammatical errors." Another. "I'm pretty sure this one was badly written on purpose by somebody who wanted to try and get the worst book possible published as a joke. Happens more often than you'd think." Another. "Author tries to put his point across by just having as many bad things as he can think of happen to his main character with no payoff and a one-dimensional theme. The last chapter of the book is just his political philosophy, and then it ends with no clear resolution." Another. "This would be well-written horror if every single twist wasn't predictable." She reached for yet another –
"I'm good," Garfield told her. "That should do."
Irmaplotz transferred the stack of books into Garfield's hands. "If you need more, just ask."
"Oh, I will."
Garfield had almost made it out the door before he heard Irmaplotz say "Let me know what you think. Oh, and just put them on that table when you're done. I don't know which one I want to re-read first, but I want to get back to all of them eventually."
Garfield stopped. He then turned back around with a sigh, dumping all the books on the aforementioned table. "Let me rephrase. Which books around here will no one miss?"
Irmaplotz raised an eyebrow. "What were you going to do to my books?"
"You don't wanna know."
Irmaplotz was only able to produce one book. "It's the dictionary," she explained as she handed it over to Garfield. "Nobody here will miss the dictionary. Everyone here either doesn't need it or will refuse to use it."
"Guess I owe you one for this. You ever need something burned with no evidence of who did it left behind, just call me up."
"Duly noted."
"Also, why do you like terrible books?"
"Why do you like setting things on fire?"
"Point taken."
Garfield returned to his quarters with the dictionary, trying to be fairly quiet despite the knowledge that Peter was likely to sleep through the apocalypse. He turned on one of the burners of the stove, unaware that it was powered by a small red crystal rather than gasoline. He was delighted to see small flames ring the burner, and he set the dictionary down, watching the fire work its way through the thick book, curling and blackening the pages, disintegrating the cover to ash.
"Using the bathroom, hm?"
Garfield was startled into turning around to see Peter leaning against the door frame. "You're awake," he said, kicking himself for stating the obvious.
"And you had the dream again."
"Yeah," Garfield admitted. "About this place, this time. Blowing it all up." He switched the burner off; he didn't want to risk losing the book while he wasn't watching.
"Creative solution," Peter commented. Usually, in his safehouse, he let Garfield make use of the fireplace to burn a book. Once he'd discovered what Garfield needed in order to clear his mind – which was, in clear terms, to watch something small burn, to watch the fire he so loved consume something inconsequential – he had acquired, through means both legal and illegal, the romance novels of the worst repute he could dig up, largely of the pornographic genre: novels he would never read and never miss. Whenever Garfield awoke from the dream, he could simply pluck one out of Peter's bad book stash and throw it on the fire.
"Look," Garfield sighed, "we both know this is something really good. I don't wanna screw it up. I don't even wanna think about screwing it up." And I don't want to think about hurting you, he didn't add.
"I know," Peter said in understanding. He took a few strides across the kitchen until he stood near Garfield; he gently grasped Garfield's shoulders and turned him back around to face the stove. Keeping one hand pressed lightly on Garfield's left shoulder, he slid his right hand to surround Garfield's, guiding his fingers back to the burner switch. Garfield fired the burner back up, and in silence, the pair watched the dictionary turn to ash.
...
Goab, the Desert of Colors, was aptly named. Its sands stretched out in striations of every hue, a swath of plum adjacent to hot pink, citrine near lime, sky blue with blood red. Its dunes rose and fell in rainbows, creating high hills and low valleys.
Crossing onto these variegated sands, Mozenrath, the Huntsman, Yzma, and Xayide all felt a chill pass over them. It was a reminder of the aura that they should not have been able to survive, but that the phoenix feathers kept them safe from.
"How are we to find a single grain of sand in all of this?" Xayide asked.
"I've been thinking about that," Yzma replied. "The best I could come up with begins with us acquiring an enormous feather duster – "
"No," the Huntsman said sternly.
"I wanted to hear her out," Mozenrath stated.
"No," the Huntsman corrected. "You didn't."
"I have a question that may or may not be related," Mozenrath then said. "What's this?"
He held out an open palm upon which rested the Amulet of Avalor. The gem's violet depths pulsed with a faint glow of light blue.
"The Amulet of Avalor," the Huntsman explained. "A trinket that belongs to an accomplice."
"That's what brought us here, isn't it?" Yzma realized. "That botched locator spell caused it to lead us right here. That spell was SUPPOSED to lead us to an element of concentrated Entropy – "
She halted herself. Realization sank in.
"It's been pointing us here all along, hasn't it?" Yzma said rather sheepishly. She thought to add that they would have found the grain of sand much, much earlier if someone hadn't decided to try and take the throne of the entire world, but that seemed somehow inappropriate, given the current circumstance.
"It just started getting warmer," Mozenrath announced.
"Perhaps it will lead us to what we seek," Xayide suggested.
Mozenrath dangled the amulet from its chain, holding it at arm's length. "Where do you want us to go, you little trinket?" He slowly swung his arm in an arc, noting the exact position at which the blue glowed just a little brighter. "That's better."
As Mozenrath, Xayide, Yzma, and the Huntsman ventured into Goab from one end, a pair of small off-roaders and a disc-shaped skimmer careened over the sands from the opposite direction. Cruella de Vil was at the wheel of one car, with Terminus in the passenger seat and the Badun brothers sitting folded up in the back. The other car was driven by McLeach, with Clayton occupying the passenger seat and Sykes taking up the back. Medusa piloted the skimmer. All involved were more nervous than they cared to admit, given who was driving each vehicle, as it was general knowledge that a crash between all three vehicles was only a mistake away. Cruella had already nearly overturned her own car on a steep dune, McLeach had almost flipped his riding downhill, and Medusa had endured near misses with the rooftops of both cars and the explosive missiles strapped to them.
They stopped at the edge of a high dune where the striations of color were particularly thin, offering a variety to collect. Cruella slammed her brakes so hard, Terminus was flung rather jarringly against the dashboard. McLeach's car spun a 180 as he halted. Medusa all but crashed.
"Everyone to a different color!" Cruella barked. "Now, now, now! Who knows how long we'll have before that lion comes after us!"
"We have nothing to fear from the lion," Clayton tried to reassure her.
"Yeah!" McLeach insisted, readying a Huntsclan standard-issue crossbow that released green beams of energy. "I'll give it a mouthful of this!"
"Or we could kill it with a man's weapon," Clayton argued as he hoisted a cannon above his shoulder.
"It's not the lion she's worried about," Sykes reminded them. "It's the fact that once we kill the lion, our time in the desert is up, and Maleficent will want us to pay up."
The eight split up, each finding a different color and filling a small pouch full of it. They all stood almost simultaneously upon finishing. "Everyone's done?" Cruella confirmed. "Back in the cars, all of you! We'll find another spot – "
"SHHHHHH-sh-sh-sh-sh-shhhhhhh!" Medusa hushed. "Do you hear that?"
"Hear?" Terminus repeated. "I don't hear anyth – "
"Because you are TALKING!" Medusa hissed.
A silence fell, and the squad of eight could hear voices from the other side of the dune:
"We're definitely getting closer."
"We still have to find a single grain of sand, you know. Even if the Amulet leads us to the general area, it's going to be buried."
"Then we'll make you dig for it."
"ME? Why ME? You're the one who actually LIVES in a desert! If you could remember it, this would feel just like home to you!"
Cruella and her companions crept up to the peak of the dune to see Mozenrath, the Huntsman, Yzma, and Xayide some distance away, trekking toward a goal Cruella couldn't discern. She slowly covered her mouth with a hand, knowing that if she laughed, she would give away her position. Yet she so desperately wanted to laugh. She had come for the sand, and, if all went well, was about to leave with Mozenrath in her possession, alive or dead; either would satisfy Maleficent.
"What are you looking at?" Sykes grumbled.
"One of Maleficent's most wanted," Cruella replied, her grin wide.
The Amulet gave a sharp tug at Mozenrath's hand, suddenly wishing to fly forward of its own accord. The second time it tried such a thing, it succeeded, with Mozenrath losing grip completely. The Amulet surged forth until it planted itself in the sand without warning, glowing brightly blue against a backdrop of deep green. Mozenrath, the Huntsman, Yzma, and Xayide ran after it, dropping to their knees where it landed.
They all saw it at the same time. One single speck of the sand that had covered half the gem was not green at all. To the untrained eye, it at first appeared white.
"We must pick it up without losing it," the Huntsman stated.
"I'll make it easier." Xayide's hand passed over the grain, and it enlarged to the size and shape of a rough pebble. It was now clear that the grain was not, in fact, white. White was a color, and the grain lacked all color whatsoever.
"Pure entropy," Mozenrath said as he gathered what was now a stone into his hand.
"Well?" Yzma huffed. "We found the grain of sand. The Empress said we'd find a way home after this." She stood up to get a look at her surroundings. "But all I see is – "
Her eyes widened. Her lips pursed. "Oh…no," she muttered.
Xayide, the Huntsman, and Mozenrath turned to see a missile soaring directly for them.
Xayide snapped her fingers, and the missile exploded in the air before it could reach its target; the shockwave caused all four to stumble. Both off-roaders barreled down the dune, with the skimmer floating above, and while the Huntsman didn't recognize any of the vehicles' occupants, he was well aware all were hostile. "PREPARE FOR BATTLE!" he commanded.
Yzma drew her atlatl. Xayide raised both arms to stretch out, prepared to cast heavy magic. Mozenrath, not quite sure what he could do to contribute, simply shuffled to the back of the group awkwardly.
Xayide shoved her arms forward, and a tidal wave of sand surged over the three vehicles, burying them and upending both cars. Medusa's skimmer erupted out of the pile of sand; the others all struggled out of their cars and surged forth on foot. McLeach started to fire green bolts from his crossbow; Clayton sent out larger projectiles of energy from the cannon. Horace and Jasper drew back twin longbows, and arrows of lime-colored energy appeared in both before letting loose.
Xayide tried to stop each with a small barrier, but instead of deflecting, the projectiles were only slowed, as though they'd been fired into hot glue. They lost enough momentum that they were easy to dodge, but Xayide still screamed in horror, "WHY IS IT CUTTING THROUGH MY MAGIC?"
The Huntsman visibly flinched. "Those weapons are built to resist most types of magic," he explained. "They belong to the Huntsclan!"
As he said this, Sykes and Terminus descended upon him. Sykes swung a double-bladed axe that blazed with green aura, and Terminus brandished a mace – nowhere near as big as Snipe's, but still threatening – with the same light. The Huntsman parried blows from both, and the three became locked in a close-range duel.
Cruella faced off against Yzma; the former had a shining black purse slung over one shoulder. "What do you WANT from us?" Yzma hissed.
"We want to bring you back to Maleficent so you IDIOTS can stop being underfoot from her every scheme," Cruella replied. She opened the purse, and a small laser mounted on a snakelike neck popped out, locking onto Yzma's heat signature and shooting. Yzma forwent going on the offensive with her weapon, instead cartwheeling out of the way of the blast. The fire kept coming, and Yzma found herself trapped in a series of backflips and cartwheels to save her skin.
Medusa flew her craft above Mozenrath, shooting at him from a dashboard-mounted gun. Mozenrath ran, panicking. "What's the matter?" Medusa taunted. "Aren't you going to use your little gauntlet to try and stop me?"
Mozenrath skidded to a halt, deciding to try and hold his ground with a bluff. "Keep going," he dared, raising his right fist, "and you'll find out just how painful my powers – "
Medusa didn't wait for him to finish the sentence before firing again. Mozenrath dove, faceplanting in the sand to avoid the blast.
"You can't use your magic, can you?" Medusa realized; it was the only reason a sorcerer of the repute she'd been told wouldn't be returning fire at her. "HE CAN'T USE HIS MAGIC!"
The words echoed as a fanfare of joy among Maleficent's mercenaries and a death knell to the Huntsman, Xayide, and Yzma.
Medusa turned the skimmer around, ducking low near the Badun brothers. "Why don't we pull off what we called capture plan alpha?" she asked sweetly.
Jasper and Horace boarded either side of the skimmer, standing on the edges with a wobbly balance as Medusa took it back up into the air. They flew behind Xayide; she knew she couldn't take her attention off holding back Clayton and McLeach's fire. Medusa ducked to let the Baduns equip their arrows; they strung a specially constructed net between the bows in such a way that the next bolts of energy would catch it. They drew back and fired.
Mozenrath wasn't fast enough to outrun this one. The net enveloped him, tangling him up completely so he couldn't move.
"Now SHOOT HIM!" Medusa cried.
The Huntsman, in a panic, spun and kicked his boot into Terminus' chest so hard that the so-called doctor was sent sprawling and rolling across the sand. As he turned back to Sykes, he noticed a sparkle of light at the man's chest; Sykes' pendant had escaped from beneath his shirt. While the eight mercenaries weren't versed enough in the magical protection arts to recognize phoenix feather "fabric" such as was draped over Mozenrath's team, the Huntsman knew a phoenix tear when he saw it. He slid the blade of the huntstaff beneath the chain of the pendant, and Sykes froze anxiously. "I know how you're surviving this desert!" the Huntsman yelled at Medusa. "Fire at Mozenrath and I will sever your strongman's pendant!" They were likely all wearing pendants, he realized, and he could have a potential strategy of simply cutting down each one.
"Kill him!" Cruella yelled at Medusa. "I'll get a new one!" Three more lasers erupted from her purse, all of them tracking Yzma, who was beginning to tire of constant acrobatics.
The Baduns drew their bows. Medusa's grip tightened on the dashboard gun of the skimmer. And Mozenrath might have met his end then and there if it weren't for the lion.
The beast was immense, and the same color as the sand around him at all times; as he leapt from a topaz-blue dune to where Medusa hovered over carnation pink, his coat changed from blue to pink as a reflection. He sank teeth into the skimmer, bringing it down hard into the sand; the Baduns nearly lost their balance.
"You dare steal from ME?" he roared. "Grograman, the Many-Colored Death!"
Clayton and McLeach trained their weapons upon the lion. Medusa and the Baduns were stunned. Cruella was startled into inaction. Terminus was still regaining his balance, trying to determine if the Huntsman had cracked a rib. And Sykes was still held at bay by the Huntsman, who realized if there was any window to escape, it was now. The Huntsman tried to sever the pendant chain as he turned and dashed toward the bound-up Mozenrath, but in his haste, all he managed to do was graze it with the blunt end of the staff. Killing Sykes was nowhere as important as saving Mozenrath, anyhow; he scooped up the young sorcerer and threw him over a shoulder. "RUN!" he yelled; as he took off, Yzma and Xayide were quick to follow.
"AFTER THEM!" Cruella yelled. "AFTER THEM, YOU IDIOTS!"
"But what about the – " Jasper interrupted.
"NOT ALL OF YOU!" Cruella roared as she gave chase after the Huntsman, Yzma, and Xayide. "KILL THE LION! THERE ARE MORE THAN ENOUGH OF YOU FOR THIS JOB, AREN'T THERE?"
Jasper and Horace followed her obediently, as did one other.
Grograman lunged at Sykes, who swung his axe. Grograman did not expect the axe to be able to harm him, and was surprised to feel a sting carve through his chest. "You thieves should not even have survived this desert," he growled through the pain as he pinned Sykes down, batting the axe away.
A sudden sharp pain in his shoulder diverted his attention. McLeach had fired a well-placed shot from his crossbow, and was loading up for another, now trained on Grograman's heart. While Grograman turned his head to face McLeach, Sykes took the axe back in hand, now aiming for Grograman's neck.
The skimmer was downed, but its guns were still in working order. Medusa forced them to point at Grograman's face.
As all three weapons loosed, the last thoughts that crossed Grograman's mind were these: first of all, that he had believed himself invincible, and was now awoken from that illusion ever harshly. How could he not have known that of all the stories to be told, one would eventually be woven that would contain the weapons designed for his demise?
Then his memories of the first friend he ever had, and of the one who returned to him in the first's name: the only two people he had ever enjoyed the company of. He would never enjoy the company of another again.
Terminus smacked the side of Grograman's head with his mace, getting in one final blow.
A pained roar crossed the sky of Goab. Grograman's body dissolved into dark gray sand, which was caught up by the wind and dissipated over the desert, marring the rainbow of its earth.
Not a moment later, the entire desert was swallowed up by a forest that erupted from nowhere, trees reaching for the rapidly turning black-colored, star-studded heavens and flowering vines reaching up through the trunks and branches. The mercenaries were engulfed.
And so were the Huntsman, Yzma, Xayide, and the bound Mozenrath.
"This should give us some cover for a while," the Huntsman grunted, looking about; he couldn't see a sign of any pursuer. "All the same, do not slow down."
They couldn't see Clayton stealthily making his way through the upper branches of the trees above, having taken several of the sphinx-hair nets from the Baduns and attaching them to his cannon. He was used to hunting prey from thick forestation, and if humans were the most exhilarating prey, then sorcerers were on another level altogether: a challenge worthy of only the most courageous and talented men, in Clayton's eyes.
BOOM.
The next net bowled over Xayide, pinning her to the ground. She attempted to sever it with magic, only for her magic to rebound upon her, filling her body with intense physical pain.
BOOM.
Yzma was sent head over high heels tangled in another net.
BOOM.
The Huntsman sliced right through the net intended for him. Foolish, he thought, to assume Huntsclan technology could not be ripped through with Huntsclan technology.
Knowing he had to take a more direct approach, Clayton leapt from branch to branch down the tree until he had landed upon the ground. "Surrender now," he cajoled with a greasy smile. "It will be far less painful."
The Huntsman tightened his grip both on Mozenrath and on the huntstaff.
"Certainly, you don't think you can take on all four of us by yourself?" Clayton taunted.
Jasper and Horace emerged from the trees, drawing their bows and aiming at the Huntsman. Cruella stepped into view as well, her purse now spilling forth a spinning circular saw blade.
"Put the staff down, my good man," Clayton went on.
"Forget it!" Cruella hissed. "Just kill him already! Kill all of them!"
"I want him to acknowledge that he has lost to the better man," Clayton seethed, his grin disintegrating.
"I DON'T CARE!" Cruella shrieked. "I JUST WANT THEM ALL DEAD!"
It was their arguing that gave salvation just enough time to descend from above. It plummeted from the sky, breaking into the world's atmosphere from interspace shoes-first, and, like a torpedo, planted right next to Yzma on the soil of Perilin, the Night Forest, managing to avoid being impaled by any branches on the way down. And it came in the form of a redheaded woman who took a battle stance.
"So you WERE having fun without me," Wuya remarked.
Clayton pulled the trigger on the cannon, firing not a net this time but pure destructive energy. Wuya pirouetted before slinging a bolt of magic of her own directly at the plasma cannonball; the force of her spell overpowered the might of the cannon and sent the energy of both ricocheting right back at Clayton. Clayton dove to the ground to avoid it; the deadly energy went sailing over him, radiating heat as it went. As he dove, he had flung the cannon up into the air upon instinct; the energy collided with it and obliterated it in a rain of shrapnel.
The Baduns fired both bows in succession; the Huntsman was able to cut down both arrows easily with his staff. Wuya performed a handspring that brought her close enough to the brothers to grip the limbs of both bows in her hands and crush them in a burst of magic.
"Let's get outta here!" Horace sputtered in horror.
"Right!" Jasper went chasing after him as the two got themselves lost in the brush.
"IDIOOOOOOOTS!" Cruella screamed as she rushed Wuya, holding up the purse, which had sprouted all of its lasers once more. They latched onto Wuya, but as they fired, Wuya danced around each shot, getting close enough to Cruella to reach into the purse, snap off the circular saw blade, and hold it up to the fashionista's throat.
The blade was slung straight back instead once Wuya was aware of Clayton rushing her from behind. The teeth bit right into his shoulder, causing him to halt and wince. Wuya backflipped, her feet – normally bare, but now clad in a pair of sparkling purple high heels – catching Cruella upside the chin before coming down the other side and whacking Clayton back. Clayton wrenched the blade from his shoulder, casting it at Mozenrath; the Huntsman deflected it with the huntstaff and it stabbed harmlessly into the soil. Clayton tried to rush Wuya again, swinging both fists right through the pain, but she expertly ducked each blow, returning her own to him with fists and feet.
She then stepped back, bouncing a ball of white-hot magic in each hand, glancing between Cruella and Clayton with a soft smirk. "If I were you," she said, "I'd run now."
To emphasize the point, the Huntsman pointed his staff outward.
Cruella and Clayton didn't need to be told twice. Finally ready to admit defeat in the name of saving their own skins, they turned tail and bolted.
The Huntsman lay Mozenrath down on the ground, cutting through first his net, then Xayide and Yzma's. "I can see I've missed a lot," Wuya stated as she watched.
"You have no idea," Yzma huffed as she stood. "How did you even find us here?"
"With a locator spell," Wuya answered. "I just had to use something that belonged to one of you. Something I could hitch a ride on across the multiverse." She gestured downward.
Yzma spied the shoes. "Are those MY heels?"
"Is there a problem?"
"No," Yzma admitted. "What just happened with those hunters was worth it. Besides, you make them work almost as well as I do."
"It is fortuitous that you have arrived, Wuya," the Huntsman related. "We are trapped on this world, and there seemed to be no way of escape in sight."
Wuya raised a brow. "Can't Mozenrath just take you back in a Corridor?"
"I would," Mozenrath stated, "if I knew how." He looked to the Huntsman nervously. "She's…one of ours, right?" He hadn't let go of the colorless pebble; his grip tightened around it as his nerves prickled from unfamiliarity.
"WHAT happened?" Wuya asked, aware something was terribly amiss.
"We'll fill you in when we get back to base," Yzma replied. "All you need to know right now is that Mozenrath doesn't remember any magic – or anything worth remembering at all – and Xayide is coming with us."
"Xayide," Wuya repeated, turning to look at the newcomer. "Well, hello."
"It is a pleasure," Xayide said with a curtsy. "I suppose I am speaking either to Mad Madam Mim or Wuya."
"If you think I'm Mim, then obviously, they haven't told you much about Mim," Wuya replied. She wasn't going to argue with bringing Xayide into the fold; she trusted Mozenrath, the Huntsman, and Yzma to know what they were doing…even though Mozenrath was currently suspect for not even recognizing who Wuya was. "Welcome to the fold."
The sound of approaching voices signaled that the group didn't have much time until the next wave of mercenaries came; McLeach was shouting rather loudly about what he was going to do to Mozenrath when he got ahold of him, and Terminus was insisting vehemently to Sykes that yes, he did have a hand in killing Grograman and had in fact dealt the final blow; Sykes was convinced Terminus had only lightly bopped the lion on the head when he was already dead.
"We had best leave," Xayide insisted.
"Way ahead of you." Wuya cast a Corridor, and all five slipped through; the portal melted away before any trace could be found.
...
The Corridor opened into the control room of the warship, where Mim, Aghoul, Roman, and Snatcher sat in a circle, holding out their hands with fingers extended.. While sitting on the floor looked to be a natural position for the former three, Snatcher had an air of awkwardness that stemmed from trying to look altogether too formal. "Hmm…let's see," Mim mused. "Never have I ever…died!"
The three men groaned, lowering a finger each.
"My turn?" Aghoul said next. "Never have I ever worn a skirt."
"You're wearing a skirt right now," Roman groaned.
"This is a thobe!" Aghoul huffed, offended. "Learn the difference!"
Wuya cleared her throat rather loudly, and all four looked up to see her, Mozenrath, the Huntsman, Yzma, and Xayide. "You're back!" Mim chirped.
"You won't BELIEVE what we've been through," Yzma groaned.
'Try me," Roman retorted. "In fact, you'll have to beat what WE'VE been through."
"You've brought home a new ally, I see," Snatcher observed.
"This is Xayide," the Huntsman introduced. "She is a part of our army now."
"Was it absolutely necessary to bring home a redhead?" Snatcher groaned.
"You'll like her," Yzma encouraged. "She's got the same ability as you to talk her way out of anything."
"Oh, so now you're trying to make me redundant?" Snatcher grunted.
"I would argue it better that two silver tongues are better than one," Xayide said calmly.
"I suppose that's true…" Snatcher admitted, well aware that Xayide had just used her powers of persuasion on him, and to a degree, they'd worked.
"You've been oddly quiet, Mozenrath," Aghoul stated.
Mozenrath was still trying to take in the environment into which he'd been thrust and the people he was expected to know. He clutched the colorless pebble tighter as a form of comfort. "Remind me again which one's which…?" he muttered.
"Wait, what?" Roman flinched. "Did he just say – "
The Huntsman cut Roman off with a stern nod.
"I am afraid we have somber news to deliver."