“You have made up your mind. I suppose that conviction makes you who you are,” she reached up to cusp his cheeks with both her hands, “very well then. Thank you for letting me see the world, and so many of my children, one last time.
Do what you must.”
Her hands fell from his face, and she returned to lay upon the bed of lilies within a patch of crystal sawgrass surrounded by a silver ocean.
What little life she had left has been spent: those were certainly her last words and these would certainly be her last breaths. She would soon be dead no matter what. There was nothing that could be done. This was inevitable. There was no point in contemplating what could have been done before or how things could have turned out differently.
Tejieue could only make the best of the situation; to do that, there was only one option.
He came to her bedside. Looking down upon her, his weightless body of light became heavy as lead. Every inch he raised his hand was another anchor that chained down his arm. But no matter how difficult the challenge, he would always persevere. All those burdens were unshackled when his hand finally fell upon her mediastinum. All that remained was to tighten his grip.
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Holding Tyler’s lifeless and scarred body in her arms broke Hannah’s heart. The only image she ever had of him was animated and full of life; she had never even seen him sleep. Now he was limp, passed by beyond her sight. She has lost loved ones before but it got no easier each time. Now especially was a day she never imagined would come.
She had so much she wanted to ask him; so much she wanted to tell him. She wondered what happened, when it happened, and what she could have done. There was so much about him that she did not know before, and recently she learned that what she did not know was more than she ever fathomed.
A part of her had hoped that everything could go back to the way it was, but even she understood that was impossible. What would she tell Aaliyah? What would she tell Mr. and Mrs. Deimos?
She told the other knights to report what they found and laid the body on the island. Aaliyah was still in trouble; responsibility left no time to mourn. The knights would secure the area while GalvanGal returned to the docks.
She prepared to bolt when she felt an acid grip on her heart. Each finger burnt as it squeezed and made her drop to her knees in pain. She collapsed and gasped for air when her heart was crushed. The knights hopped out of their boats to hurry to her side. They each felt some mild heartburn, but nothing to her extent. Whether they admit it or not, GalvanGal was the best asset they had in this war.
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Aaliyah collapsed on the floor of the mobile center, clutching her heart. With her also fell the bubble that separated Streaker and Srenika from the rest of the battlefield. They fell to their knees in pain from the acid that was poured into their chests. The gargoyles plummeed from the sky and convulsed on the ground as the magic that bound them seemed to unravel.
The undisciplined gangsters were daunted by the loss of their best advantage and that relent in the suppression enabled the soldiers to shoot the gargoyles while they had the chance. This kind of fight was far beyond the scope of the gang violence they were used to. They were suddenly ordered by their captain to fight the military alongside monsters when most action they had seen before were small arms shootouts.
If they retreated now, they would need to make sure someone picked up the mutant brat they came with. Those nearby the brothers considered if taking another mutant would be enough to bargain for their lives.
The return fire of the soldiers forced the gangster to scramble for what cover that nature could provide. Whatever their options were, they had to focus on the stakes at hand. It would only take a handful to break and flee for the whole of them to rout.
Just as some considered it, the fog that strangled the Everglades began to blow away and obscured the line of sight for both sides. Streaker seized the opportunity to escape back to the dock. All that Srenika saw was a blur that faded into a cloud.
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GalvanGal was still in agony, but the pain finally began to subside. So too did the impenetrable fog begin to clear to reveal the beauty it had concealed.
For all the blood that was shed and struggle that was had among humans, nature began to flourish. Before their eyes, the red quill-leafs bloomed pink among the bald cypress trees. The canopy above and shrubbery around them were enthused with vigor and verdancy. A cool breeze that carried sweet scents supplanted all fatigue while the gentle warmth of the sun revitalized blood flow.
The fauna, that were chased off by the chaos of battle, had returned. Schools of sailfin mollies swam out from the buttressed tree trunks and root projections of the cypress to fill the waters around the island. Spadefoot toads and alligators capsized the boats. Vivid swarms of blue dashers and roseate skimmers harried the knights in buzzing cacophony.
All the while, the sun seemed to only get brighter. Hannah, still on the ground, had to shield her eyes from the blinding light. Something came to block the sunlight from reaching her.
The dead rose and the sun now crowned a corpse in radiance. The sight of it took her breath away. Her mind was awash with so many thoughts none could make it out of her mouth.
Another sight cleared those thoughts. From the clouds crystallized dozens of golden icicles the size of pillars. They lurched down and GalvanGal bolted up to meet them, regardless of the aid left in her chest. Amethyst lances struck each icicle—and only managed to scratch them as the lances were crushed into sparks. GalvanGal was staked in her abs by one of the icicles in her moment of shock.
She pushed out the shallow puncture and swung it to bat away as many others as she could. She tossed the icicle to the side to race for the ones that were still falling to punt them away. Those she punted, as well as those she had batted, all stopped in mid-air. They all re-angled toward her and all together lurched to crash upon her in a shattering that sent shards raining across the Everglades
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Tejieue, the Immortal Gator, coughed up gold vapor as he choked on the ice in his throat. He couldn’t see anything—no, he was seeing everything, across the electromagnetic spectrum and beyond. Feeling, hearing, tasting, smelling, and a plethora of senses beyond that. Everything, from this world and the next, was in his hands.
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There was nothing beyond his grasp—no, there was one last thing missing. A celestial light that cut through the cosmos of senses. A holy light. With it, finally, perfection. He just had to have it. But the task at hand demanded his attention.
The knights had begun to fire their cryoguns at him but a barrier of heat melted every blast before they could reach him. In his chest, his heart sweltered to burst. The cryoguns were caved in on themselves and spilled nitrogen slush onto the knights. At the same time, his own bones creaked. He looked past the stunned knights onto the immortals that were strewn about the place. He opened up rippling portals to scoop up his warriors and felt himself become unbalanced.
Using any one magic saw a backlash against him. He was never meant to use magic, let alone all of it. With a limitless arsenal, the effect could circumvented with a little creativity. Thankfully, a proper test was about to arrive like a lightning strike.
GalvanGal bolted to the Earth with a thunderous punch—and was caught with one hand. His elbow was pushed all the way back and he called up roots to wrap around his lower body to stabilize him, though the island itself cracked from the strain. She finally decided to put her back into it.
He pumped up his blood and muscles to get the strength to push back. A sudden jet of fire boosted his arm forward, and a spike of bone that speared out from his wrist slashed open her cheek.
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She hovered back at what she saw. She could hardly believe it, but that cut was undoubtedly real. Same with the gnash in her gut, as those icicles must have been his doing as well. Whatever happened here had given him access to magic without limit.
It took most people a lifetime to understand their own affinity, but the man she had admired for so long had the knowledge and talent to learn anything quickly. The best chance to stop him was right now as he would only grow exponentially.
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As predictable as she was, it was reassuring to be able to look into the future for what she would do frame by frame, even if it set his macula ablaze. If she did strike him, he had various new means of durability as safeguards. His own strength could finally be effective rather than relying upon obtuse theatrics and long-shot plans to deal any damage.
His whole life he had fought against privileged beings, human or otherwise, who relished in invulnerability and overwhelming power. He dragged them down to tear them apart in the mud. Now, on a mountain of their corpses, he understood just how appealing that privilege was, but arrogance was the downfall of many. He knew better than anyone that even an ant should not be underestimated.
The knights had pulled out their shock pikes from the capsized boats and encircled his position. They skewered his torse from every angle with a stream of lightning to his head from GalvanGal capping off the attack. He stood there paralyzed by the voltage that coursed through his body. At least, that should have been what happened.
He had actually turned his skin into rubber that insulated him from electricity. He let them get their hopes up and waste their energy before he discharged the energy back at them. GalvanGal was pushed back and the knights were thrown off the island into the water.
They may not have been able to damage him, but the backlash of using so much magic was already taking its toll. He had mostly hoped to do some more tests, partially to have some more fun, but it seemed that he would soon reach his limit as a born-again. He would have to train his body at a later time. Right now, he had to finish up here and, as always, clean up the messes of his subordinates.
While the knights were still recovering, Tejieue pointed one finger into the sky. Above that finger formed an emerald flare that began to rapidly fire blazing bolts. As expected, GalvanGal raced to intercept the bolts with her lightning and her body in exactly the pattern he wanted her to.
Once she was positioned where he wanted her, he snapped his fingers to stop time. In that frozen second, the weight of the past, present, and future of the universe crashed upon him. Of course, such powerful, all-encompassing magic would have that effect, but he had to try it. He should ask Kenny how to handle it someday.
He walked across the water to where Hippo was fixed. This Hippo had the habit of naming her techniques because she would forget what she could do.
Amethyst Promenade – unleash all power in one direction; Amethyst Marley – unleash all power in all directions; Electric Waltz – turn into energy to bolt to a different position; Sparking Shimmy – a magnetic field that protects her, allows flight, and can be spread to other things; Electroreception – detect electric pulses; Amethyst concert – the sparks of energy that surround her in the aftermath; Circuit Tango – transfer energy.
It seemed fairly silly, but with limitless combinations, and equally endless backlash to track, it may be a useful memory trick. With all the time in the world, he might as well try it out.
He lined up the tips of his fingers with her liver. He closed his fist one inch away from her. His whole arm shook as black lightning coursed through his veins, spilling out in onyx sparks.
His fist tapped the upper right of her abdominal cavity and his arm fell back to his side. A snap of his fingers unthawed the world into a flash of darkness that snuffed all light.
An Onyx Zaouli lanced her liver and cleaved into the forest behind it. Deafening silence lulled the Everglades as GalvanGal was blown through trees and stone and the water split open as she passed above it. Lightning prances from the passing zaouli had rent the marsh with steaming whirlpools, crumpled masses of tree trunks and roots, and scorched moss and sawgrass. The air in the clearing was now a crackling dirge of onyx sparks. As the deathly lull subsided, the stampede and flutter of fleeing animals rose to take its place.
Tejieue thought that his heart would be destroyed by the backlash—that he may have gotten carried away. Instead, he felt both tired and unencumbered, like a weight had finally been lifted from his shoulder. But he still had responsibilities to take care of. To let his body recover, he would have to chase after the fastball special he sent the old-fashioned way.
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The gangsters used the fog as an opportunity to escape just as Kenny did. The gargoyles were still down to. There was no word from Auntie Chen, and the chest pain did not help either. It was almost certain that Todd would have to retreat too, but to what end? Without Chen’s portals, they would be cleaned up by oncoming reinforcements. To save this operation would require a miracle to happen.
Darkness flashed like an involuntary blink and the sense of sound was wrenched from Todd’s ears. What he saw was a lance of crackling darkness blow away the fog and smash through the building, hurtling debris onto those fleeing on that side. Through the dust, among the debris was none other than GalvanGal, beaten and bloody. The sight of it gave pause to everyone on the battlefield. What could have possibly done that?
While the soldiers were distracted, the gargoyles rose again, including those they thought they killed. Now, no matter the number or caliber of bullets fired, even as their organs were pulped, wings tattered, and limbs severed, the gargoyles would not fall. The macabre show drove the gangsters to scatter across the woods.
“Did you see Kenny?” asked Uncle, shirtless, wet, and covered in algae.
“Yes. He didn’t want anything to do with me,” said Srenika.
“There’s nothing left for us here then. Let’s go.”
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The rime that covered WhiteOut shook and dripped until it sloughed off as slush from a combination of vibrations and increased body temperature. A moment of hesitation and she would have been as helplessly frozen as her targets. The only other one free was Letiche but she had no strength left. The gun she brought was fractured by the expansion of ice inside it, so she would just have to use a shard to slit their throats.
A hand reached into the back of her skull and this clone was melted into sludge with no way to reform. The rhodonite meadow saw the petals of every flower carried into the sky over the city. Pink snowflakes rained all around as Chen coughed up sleet.
“So… it worked,” she strained.
“Was there any doubt.” Tejieue picked up Letiche while Todd warmed up Lanying.
“Of course not. Next comes the inevitable.”