Call Me… Doc Ock – Arc One: Origin

Chapter 29: Down Below

Somehow, over the screaming, the raging storm of pure hate above, and even the sound of what sounds like monsters growling in the background, I can hear my own damned heartbeat. Which is really strange considering that for all intents and purposes, I should be a disembodied spirit. I've been running for a few minutes so far and that's all I could hear.

"Then again, I'm up against the absolute worst of the worst here… It's a miracle I can even still move…"

Literally everything was on the line here. And it's on me to lock this thing back in its metaphysical cage somehow. "Wish I had had more time to prepare… and the entire marvel roster as back-up…. Maybe some heroes from other franchises as well…" Like Dragon Ball, Pokémon, Tenchi, Kirby and maybe even-

A sudden rumbling interrupts my thoughts, and I have to take a moment to keep my balance. Something like an explosion sounds off and suddenly in the sky I can see more pillars of green flames shoot up into the sky and converge at a point ahead to form a growing ball of green fire.

"Dammit! Don't stop, move!" I got back to running. As I get closer, the familiar sound of that poor bastard screaming gets louder and louder. Just as I'm about to reach the open area where Remy/Logos-Below-All is probably waiting; I stop and look around. There were a lot of buildings overlooking the place. Rather than go out into the open, I go into one of the buildings and climb up to one of the upper floors. When I get up to the topmost floor that I can reach, I head to a room that has a vantage point and sneak up to one of the windows.

Lifting my head as far up as I dare, I can spot them: The monster behind all of this and the spirit of that young mage. The former is facing the glowing green portal, and the latter is still stuck on that slab, screaming his head off.

I can barely hear it, but Remy/Logos-Below-All is chanting something with their hands raised. Up above, the green fire is slowly descending onto the poor bastard on the slab… at which point it turns red and flows into the green portal.

My brow furrows as I take in the scene. I don't know the specifics, but so far it seems like the monster is using the young mage in some way. How I don't know. I couldn't even begin to understand all of this. What I do know is that I have to find some way to stop whatever its-

"SO, yOU HAvE cOMe tO THIs PlacE…"

All thoughts stop at the sound of that voice. The monster's head begins to turn, and I duck down immediately, to avoid being spotted.

"I cAN sENse THAt accurSED LighT… YoU ArE HERE sOMEWhere…"

Ever so slowly I lift my head up and see the monster's head turning around as it sweeps over the buildings in the immediate vicinity. As it turns its gaze in my direction, I duck back down and clamp my hands over my mouth to stop and sudden sounds. 'Holy FUCK! That is terrifying!'

What do I do?! What do I do?! WHAT DO I DO-

"NO maTTERr… tHE BarrieR wILL brEAk soON… anD THEn… evERYTHing… wIll BE DesTROYeD…"

I lifted up my head and spotted the monster holding a hand out to its side. A circle of runes forms before it and from the side comes… I feel my shoulders sag in disbelief as what looks like a pack of hulkified wolves, four in all, walk out into this realm.

"Go, FINd hIM, BREAk Him, BRInG Him, HerE…"

The monstrous beasts begin to sniff the area and head in my direction.

'…oh… COME THE FUCK ON!'

I back away from the window and quickly made my way down. 'Of course he calls up a pack of hulkified wolves! Because I wasn't having enough problems before! Seriously, that is bullshit! What in the world am I supposed to do about that?! Probably strong enough to tear into Banner at his angriest too!'

'Come on, Isaac, think! Think!'

I headed into another building and quickly climbed my way to the top. Heading into a room for a second, I grab whatever debris is available and block the entrance. Taking a few seconds to calm my nerves, I close my eyes and go over… everything.

'Okay, so let's think this through Isaac… let's… go over everything.' I take a few moments to calm down and breathe. 'The ritual to break the way open for the One-Below-All requires a vessel, for it to act, that would be me (or Remy) and an anchor… the mage on that slab…'

Looking out the window of the room I was currently in, I look up to the red sky. I can see one of the streams of green fire streaking across the air. 'That fire… Remy/Logos/OBA was directing it at the mage on the slab.' Leaning out of the window a bit I look to where the flames converge into a ball, then back the other way from where the flame is coming from. 'Where is that flame coming from?' Maybe I should go and head that-

The sound of growling breaks my thought process. Padded footsteps get a little too close for comfort and I hastily look around for an exit. Looking towards the window I notice a building across from the one I'm in. I can see a set of windows directly in front of me and decide to go that way. Climbing over the windowsill, I positioned myself with my tentacles and kicked off from the outer wall. Air rushes by me as I make my way over the gap. As soon as I get close, I use two of my tentacles to grab a window ledge and quickly climb through the opening.

And just in time; back in the room in the building across there's a blast of green fire and I quickly duck down. Even from here, I can hear the wolves growling, and hot damn does that sound wrong! I do my best to not make a sound as I crawl my way out of the room and find another spot to hide in to think.

'Those flames have to be coming from somewhere so-'

The sound of padded feet grabs my attention again.

'Fuck it! Let's go!'

I check out the window to see if any of those gamma-wolves are watching. When I don't spot any, I quickly climb out the window and head up to the roof. From there, I trace the nearest path of flame to its source.

It doesn't take long for me to find the source.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG!"

…which is also coming from the spirit of some (probably) half-dead corpse. But where that first poor sucker is nailed to a slab, this one is trapped in a sphere on an altar. I look around the area this guy (I think) is located, and the clearing is much smaller than the one from before. I take a moment to listen for the sound of gamma wolves. When I don't hear any, I quickly climb down and approach the trapped spirit.

It's hard to tell, but I think… I think that this guy might be a changing one. The lower jaw juts out into three sharp looking protrusions indicates and his arms curve in way that demonstrates that he doesn't have a regular bone structure. Maybe-

I slap my hands to my face. 'Focus!' I look the contraption over from a distance. Within the sphere the tortured soul is screaming from what looks like electrical shocks. Under the sphere is what appears to be an altar/table. At the foot of the altar, I can see a tablet. I squint a bit and see some patterns on it. Surrounding the structure on the ground, there is a circle of script I don't recognize. I want to get closer to it, but something tells me that the glowing circle of symbols around it would really ruin my day. With that I focus my attention on the tablet. More of that unrecognizable script.

"What is that? It looks like hieroglyphs, but I can't be certain." These symbols had to mean something important, I needed to figure it out and fast! I-

A weird sensation shot up my spine, and suddenly, I got this strange sense of vertigo and-

Abeje bit back a yelp as she jumped away from an axe swing from one of the numerous undead marching towards the group. She hastily conjured up a ball of fire and threw it at her assailant's face. She glanced over at Fabre and Henri. The two of them, despite their initial reluctance, were giving a good accounting of themselves.

She then turned her attention to the mages. Watching the two (Sol and Sarah, was it?) work was… awe-inspiring. Golden whips and blades lashed out, severing limbs and heads of the undead horde with such precision. Shields and hammer crushed any foe that survived the blades. And finally magic bolts that exploded upon contact with any foe unfortunate enough to be in the projectile's path.

Then there was the mage overlooking the ve- the boy. Despite the effort he was putting into maintaining the boy's astral form, he still managed to take out quite a few of the undead that came within range with a combination of levitating blades and orbiting shields. Anything that got past his defenses was quickly put down by the machine that the boy had built.

Then of course, there was the boy himself. During their run to this point, he had shown a great deal of proficiency with the spells he knew and had not been worn out despite the frequent use of them. He had definitely shown much more potential than she had at his age.

Abeje bit her lip at the thought. For most of her life she had always been ridiculed by others, either for being a woman, for not being a 'pretty woman,' her poor background or her lack of magical potential. Her father was the worst of her tormentors. He would often berate her for the tiniest slights, real or fake, and yelled at her for her difficulty in conjuring, despite being part of the line of Clan Logos that had developed an affinity for magic. Even when she had shown talent in making several of the brews that their clan had catalogued over the centuries, such as the potion for healing the Astral Form, it did not matter. As far as he was concerned, her ineptitude with direct magic spells had made her an embarrassment to him and his lineage.

Between her father's abuse and the taunts of other children over her difficulties with magic, she had developed a major jealous streak for the mages of their group who had less difficulty with magic than she. Pascale in particular had been a target of said jealousy. She had shown an affinity for reading the past as early as a child. She had also been betrothed to Antione, who many other girls had fancied. As far as others were concerned, Pascale had had a bright future within the clan.

Then Pascale had fled and had a child with a colonizer. It had been quite the shock among them and Antione, in particular, had been angry… violently angry. Only the threat of Clan Akkaba and the presence of Masters of the Mystic Arts had kept him from going after Pascale. Everyone had been prepared to write the runaway off.

Then Remy had gone to visit her and had come running back with news about her son's status as a viable vessel for their 'patron.' The entire clan had gone into frenzy with that news and had immediately began preparations for the ritual to use the boy as a vessel. It had been touch and go at first, especially when the boy had managed to somehow purge the binding potion that she had helped to concoct from himself with those 'nano machines,' as he had called them. With the assault by Clan Akkaba and those witch hunters, it had seemed like all their efforts would be for naught.

Until finally, somehow, their patron had managed to take control of the boy. Their patron's presence had certainly been frightening to be sure, but their sense of jubilation and triumph had dampened their fear somewhat.

'Then it had impaled Antione and crushed his head,' Abeje thought with a rueful smile.

The immediate slaughter of Clan Logos had been swift and brutal, and Abeje, Fabre and Henri had only survived because they had the luck to fall through a hole in ground.

Now here the three are, all but forced to fight against something worse than the devil, or any devil really. Abeje shuddered as she recalled being under the gaze of the possessed Remy. There had been so much evil in the eyes of that… thing. How could their ancestors not have seen how twisted that monster was?! Where they that desperate to-

"Isaac?!"

Abeje's gaze snapped to the mage keeping the boy's astral form materialized. To everyone's confusion, the tentacles on his back suddenly began to move despite the boy still being in an unconscious state.

"Vincent," the female shouted. "What's wrong with Isaac?!"

"I don't know," Vincent shouted back as he went after the boy who suddenly began to move along the walls, his tentacles bludgeoning or blasting anything that got in his way. The mage, Vincent tried to reach him, but the tentacles on his back rebuffed any attempts to get close.

"Shit," Vincent cursed after a particularly nasty swipe. He turned to the automaton. "H2H! What's going on with Isaac?!"

The machine's eyes flashed as it followed in their wake. "SCANNING… SCAN COMPLETE: UNIT HAS DETECTED A SECONDARY BRAIN PATTERN FROM CREATOR."

Vincent's eyes widened. "Wait! Is it the same as before at the abandoned hospital?!"

The machine's eyes flashed again. "NEGATIVE. CREATOR'S BRAINWAVES INDICATES PATTERNS EXPECTED OF UNCONSCIOUSNESS, NOT POSSESSION. SECONDARY BRAINWAVE APPEARS TO BE WORKING IN CONJUCTION WITH CREATOR'S PRIMARY BRAINWAVES."

"A second brain?!" The other male mage shouted as he continued to strike down more undead with spells. "Vincent what's going on?!"

As the man in question fired of a barrage of spell blades at a pack of undead, his face went into a frown. A moment later, he blinked and looked back up at the machine. "H2H! Where are these brainwaves coming from?"

"SECONDARY BRAINWAVES APPEAR TO BE COMING FROM A POINT ALONG CREATOR'S SPINAL COLUMN."

"His spine… wait!" Vincent's attention focused on the tentacles as they moved. "Not his spine… his tentacles!"

Well… this felt weird… I was… here, yet somehow, it felt like I was back there and… wait! There's something on the wall… no behind it.

The tentacles stopped moving at a specific point in front of the wall. Vincent was about to make a second attempt, when suddenly one of them pounded on the wall.

"Isaac?!"

Behind me, I could faintly hear the sound of growling.

"Come on, come on…"

Vincent could only watch as the tentacle continued to pound the wall. "Isaac, what are doing?"

The mage got his answer when suddenly the wall began to crumble and much to his surprise he found a small room behind the wall. Leaning in he found a slab with a skeleton pinned to it with a large spike in its chest.

"What in the worl- WOAH" He stumbled as one of the tentacles shoved him out of the way. As Isaac's unconscious form approached, a circle of green flame erupted around it.
"ISAAC!" Vincent rushed forward and made to shield him, when one of the tentacles grabbed him by the arm.

"ISAAC! WHAT ARE YOU- huh?" Confusion flooded Vincent as the tentacle flooded him with that same familiar warmth before holding his arm out towards the flame.

Looking back and forth between Isaac and the flame, Vincent seemed uncertain for a bit before his eyes went resolute. "I'm not sure what you need me to do, but you clearly need help with whatever is going on in there." Lifting up his other arm, Vincent regarded the flame for a moment before he went through several gestures. "If you need me to get rid of this flame, then how about some water." A circle of magic formed in front of Vincent. With a thought, he conjured a stream of water. The stream shot towards the green flame, putting it out immediately. With the flame taken care of, the tentacles began to move again, pulling Vincent to the slab with the skeleton on it.

Vincent regarded the skeleton carefully. His training as a cop and mage, told him that whoever this person had been, they had suffered before they died. There were signs of bruising and lacerations here and there. What really caught his attention was the chin that ended in a prong-like shape and the spike in the chest. In the latter case, he could see ancient script carved into it. He didn't know what it did, but the tentacles insistent tugging of his arm to it told him all he needed to know.

"Alright, Isaac, let's do this." His hands went through a few gestures and a floating script appeared before Vincent. "This spike looks like it's meant to bind this skeleton in some way. So, let's use a spell of unbinding to break it." The words floating before him circled around the script for a bit before smashing into it. A sound like glass breaking went off and the patterns on the spike fizzled out, before the spike itself went up in white flames.

Vincent turned his attention to Isaac. "Is that enough, Isaac?"

Just as I was getting ready to circle around in an attempt to throw the gamma-wolves off for a bit, the circle around the altar suddenly vanished.

"YES!" I quickly rushed forward and without thinking, flooded as much of that warmth into my fist and rammed it into the sphere containing the ghost of the changing one. The sphere immediately cracked into pieces. The spirit within stopped screaming and fell to the ground. I quickly went over and kneeled next to him.

It was definitely a guy. The poor bastard looked as though he had been tortured for days, he was such a state. Seriously, what the fuck did these assholes do to-

A hand grabbed my wrist, halting my thoughts. My eyes snapped to the face only to be met with a pair of eyes that had a swirling pattern. Faint tears began to form at the edges of the changing one's eyes. A voice, barely audible, whispered in the back of my mind.

'Thank… you…" The spirit then faded away.

Immediately after, the flame coming from the sphere went out, and was quickly followed by a sudden rumbling.

Just as I managed to regain my balance-

"YOU LITTLE BASTARD! WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!" I could feel Remy/Logos/OBA's spike of rage form here. The sound of growling was replaced by barking. More than that, I could feel the presence of Remy/Logos/OBA approaching and fast.

Quickly heading into one of the buildings, I made my way up and over. "Okay that's one down, three to go…" I don't know how that worked, but I was not going to look a gift horse in the mouth. I needed to get going, it was high time I sent this thing back to where it came from!