"A...Fallen One?" Glenn repeated, his eyes widening. Doyle was a Fallen One? So that's how Fallen Ones were supposed to be?
'...You might die. If he truly is who he says he is, you have no chance of winning. Even I am unable to measure his strength. This psycho was probably playing with you two...' Diamanes slowly said with the most serious tone Glenn had ever heard him take. The young man's fingers crisped as his eyes shot all around the room, trying to find a way to defeat this creature. The silver ball floating in the air and the mechanical bronze rings spinning increasingly faster around it, the dome of bronze plates, a pile of bones, the dozen or so experiment vats...
Doyle was still curtsying, his body twitching and quivering as his muscles bulged, exploding into masses of flesh that fell on the ground with disgusting squishing noises, before growing back as if nothing had happened... Blood kept flowing down on Doyle's white coat, tainting it entirely red as tendrils of his skin began to cover his clothes, mixing with them to create a meat-like vest around him. Doyle's smile grew as he read the distress in his prey's eyes, before coughing out blood profusely. He knelt on one knee, spitting in his hand a rotten lung. Doyle's nose creased as he cut into his own, monstrous chest with his scalpel, pulling the sides of the wound apart to push the lung back in, ignoring everything on its way, be it the bones or the cascading blood.
"My goodness, do you realize how late it is? You kids should all head to sleep, alright?" Doyle smiled gently–well, as gently as a monstrous mixture of flesh could look–before straightening himself up. He glanced at Maron's with hesitation, tapping a finger splitting in two on his progressively rotting chin.
"...Shall I take one last bite? For the road..." A clanging sound caught his attention and he looked away from his half-eaten meal. His head turned but his body refused to follow. His neck winced before crackling as the head rotated at one-hundred-eighty degrees, as would a night owl. Doyle Malory's eyebrows creased as he tried to figure out what Glenn and Sahro were doing.
Glenn was pushing both of his hands on Sahro's back, the Black Heir ready for the fastest sprint of his life. Sparks of electricity shot out from his body and connected with the bronze plates, sending shocking currents through the entire room. Each arc that flew out of Sahro's body crackled violently, before traveling to the bronze spinning rings, powering them and increasing their speed. Doyle's head leaned to the side curiously, watching with wild eyes that struggled to stay in their sockets. One even imploded on itself in a white, creamy liquid, before growing back and imploding again in a certainly unhealthy cycle.
"My friends, what could you possibly be trying to do?" He grinned, disappearing into thin air, before reappearing crouching next to Sahro.
"Hey, hey, do you mind explaining to me? I'm very curious about how doing whatever this is will help you," He whispered into the Black Heir's ear, his teeth falling and sliding off his lips. Doyle then looked at Glenn with a puzzled face, awaiting an answer, before sighing despitefully.
"Come on, you guys should trust me," He placed his finger on his mouth, smiling madly, "...I know how to keep a secret!"
Glenn clenched his teeth and nudged Sahro forward, giving him the go. Time seemed to stop for a second as Sahro's figure blurred out of reality, replaced by a blinding blue light, electrical arcs shooting uncontrollably around his area of departure, shocking Glenn and making him fall to his knees, struggling to resist the electrical shock. Doyle looked at his fingers curiously, playing with the arcs of energy dancing through them like an advanced light show, before flickering his fingers and dispersing the electricity away.
His monstrous face darkened and any pretense of a smile he previously kept up disappeared, replaced by boredom. Doyle Malory yawned, his rotten breath visible with an opaque purple cloud.
"Okay, that was fun, now I need to go back to work guys, so let's just put a stop to this farce. You've amused me a lot, so I'll kill you before I dine on y'all. Maybe," Doyle clasped his hands together, the bloody flesh constantly intertwining and ripping in a macabre spectacle. He glanced at Glenn, expecting the fear, disgust, or hate he would usually get after this kind of grandiloquent show, but only found one emotion, one he hadn't seen in a long while, one that burned his eyes like the most powerful holy light.
"...Why do you look so hopeful, huh?" Doyle spat to the side, disappearing and reappearing in front of the young man, grabbing him by the throat and lifting him into the air. Glenn looked down, struggling to pull on the ungodly grip, when a loud clanging noise suddenly echoed through the room. Glenn grinned wickedly and glanced up at something in Doyle's back. The creature threw his prey away, turning around with wrathful anger.
"What–?" Blue lightning was traveling all across the room without a stop, covering every bronze plate in electrical arcs that somehow found themselves redirected toward the machinery in the center. The bronze mechanical rings spun even faster, electricity crackling as their dormant powers were awakened ages after their last use. A loud creaking noise echoed once again as the bronze plates making up the room they were in opened, letting them discover that beyond the bronze walls was hidden an even larger room filled with red, bright gems of different sizes, some as tiny as fingernails and other practically as big as the ones the golems bore on their head.
Blumar was amassed from one corner of the room to another, beyond massive conveyor belts and mechanical arms which were all at a standstill, dust covering them like the ancient artifacts they were. Doyle took a step back with wide eyes, his jaw hanging down in shock. The few strips of rotten meat that still held his mouth together snapped one after the other as Doyle's jaw literally fell on the ground. A long black tongue hung out, blood and saliva dripping from it.
Glenn pushed himself from the ground, shaking off the last electrical tremors as he watched Sahro continuing to shoot through the room. The walls and ground of the newly opened room were also made out of bronze plates, gathering the energy Sahro shot through them. Glenn was sure this wasn't how electricity was supposed to be gathered, but if it worked, he certainly wasn't going to complain. He couldn't even begin to guess the reason the ones who built this place made it entirely out of bronze, but it certainly was working to their advantage right now. Maybe.
'I have no idea of what's going on, but I'm sure glad that' it's something that isn't me dying!' The young man thought as he shook his head and regained his composure. He rushed past the stunned Doyle to Maron, before sensing the merchant's pulse. Maron was missing an eye, an arm, some organs, and one leg. His skin was white, almost blue, and his leftover eye was opened and rolled back in its socket.
'I'm pretty sure he's dead already but I need to make sure so I don't have a guilty con–BA-DUMP.'
Glenn jumped back, cold sweat covering his back.
Somehow, even will all of his missing parts, Maron was still alive!
"...Damn, he's even more of a cockroach than me!" Glenn whispered, before covering his hand in Nitrogen and pressing it against the wounds, sealing them with the cold. He couldn't completely freeze them since the magic would be dispersed away by the Blumar's disturbance, but it was the best he could do. He ripped off a few of the remains that served as clothes for the poor merchant and tied them as makeshift tourniquets to stop the hemorrhages on the ripped-off limbs.
He turned back, frowning when seeing Doyle. The monster was still standing there, his eyes turned exploring the new room with awe...
Wait. Glenn squinted, unable to believe his eyes. Trembling lips, fluttering eyes, rapid and uncontrolled breathing... Doyle took another step back, raising his hand in front of him.
If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.
"...N–No...No!" He panted as his eyes shot all around as if searching for an exit. Sahro suddenly lost his footing and crashed on the ground, his lightning dying with his fall, but it seemed like the power he had charged the structure with had been enough. Doyle Malory's eyes suddenly widened with hope when he saw the exit nearby, and he disappeared into thin air. A loud clanging noise rang through the structure which shook heavily, making mountains of dust fall on Glenn and Sahro's head. The two looked at the exit, straining their eyes when they saw Doyle stuck into the closed door, his left arm blocked into it.
The creature roared in pain as it tried to open the door the best it could, but the bronze gate pressed and finally closed with a loud snap, cleanly cutting off Doyle's monstrous arm. The demon fell on his back, blood pooling all around him. Glenn hesitantly took a step forward, before the structure shook once again and made him almost lose his footing.
"An earthquake!" He yelled at Sahro before pointing toward the silver ball and the experiment vats under it.
Doyle struggled to his feet, glancing upward desperately.
"No! No! I don't–I don't want to go back! NO!" Doyle Malory roared before coughing a gargling noise, industrial lights illuminating the room with blinding power. Glenn squinted his eyes, before glancing at Maron, or rather what was left of him. He looked at one of the vats, biting on his lower lip. Sahro gasped for air, still exhausted from his mad run, amazement residing in his eyes.
"I–gasp–I honestly didn't think it would work, gasp!" Sahro chuckled with awe.
"Listen, if you have time to sing my genius, instead come and help me open one of these vats!" Glenn hissed through his teeth, the structure shaking down once more, the quake throwing them on all fours. Sahro hurriedly nodded and rushed toward the smallest one, a human-sized vat. The others were all increasingly bigger, the last one as big as the Three-Eyed Blumar Golem. Glenn didn't linger on it and quickly examined the stainless vat. There were a few valve wheels on the side of the vat, each probably controlling some very important function.
"[...SYSTEM REBOOTING...CRITICAL POWER LEVELS...INITIALIZING EMERGENCY POWER SUPPLY...]
A robotic voice talked through the room loudly as the bronze plates began to rearrange themselves again. Glenn stepped to the side as the plate he was standing on suddenly slid elsewhere.
"Shit!" Glenn cursed the gods and grabbed one of the handles randomly, turning it open. Sahro looked at him doing so, before mimicking his actions as best he could with a single arm, turning another valve. The handles creaked, not from rustiness. No, it was creaking because whatever it controlled was unbearably heavy. The young men's muscles bulged as they clenched their teeth and used all of their strength to turn the vats. The dark liquid inside the stainless vat was suddenly aspirated away, letting them see a red crystal surrounded by a vaguely human-shaped Blumar structure.
Glenn pulled on the handle of the vat's door, only for it to remain entirely stuck. He glanced at the biggest valve he didn't dare to touch yet, before mentally swearing at whoever built this godforsaken place. He glanced at Sahro, who sighed tiredly. The two grabbed the valve's handle, forcing it to twist open.
In the meanwhile, Doyle was still desperately trying to open the sole exit door to the facility, punching with his leftover arm the bronze gate, denting it inward, but failing to make a hole inside. He roared madly before headbutting the metal gate to the blood, his brains and flesh soon covering it.
"NEVER!!!! NO!!!!" He cried tears of blood as he scratched his cheeks open, opening the flesh and letting out of it a thick yellow pus. One of the mechanical arms standing still suddenly shot out dexterously, grabbing the creature's waist. Doyle punched the machine away, bending it and breaking as much of it as he possibly could, before another mechanical arm shot, grabbing him by the chest. Before he even had time to fight back, another mechanical arm seized him by the head, and another pierced through one of his legs, until a flurry of mechanical arms pierced and grabbed him violently.
Doyle's body began to fade away in a black cloud, but a spear entirely made out of Blumar swiftly shot out from under one of the bronze plates, skewering him in place and sealing his powers even further. His appearance continued to destabilize, becoming a grotesque mixture of bones, flesh, and despair. 'It', because it couldn't even be called Doyle anymore, was grunting painfully as his body was pulled apart, stretched like a piece of gum before being transported and forced onto one of the conveyor belts.
"[...ENERGY SOURCE FOUND...PROCESSING WITH PROTOCOL N°277...SYSTEM ANALYSIS... 'SOURCE SPECIMEN' RECOGNIZED...OPERATION 'PUT THE GENIE BACK INTO THE BOTTLE' RESUMED]"
The robotic voice shouted emotionlessly again, as Glenn and Sahro finally managed to open the last valve. A cloud of steam shot out of the vat as its door slowly slide open. The vat's door slowly slid open, a cloud of steam shooting out of it and blinding the two's sight. Glenn dispersed it with a light wave of Mana, squinting at the human-ish replicate, pulling it out with all but delicate hands.
"I don't know what these vats are for, but I don't see many other options to save Maron!" Glenn yelled over the constant mechanical noise and painful cries that filled the room. Somehow, the situation had turned advantage, and Doyle was getting packed up by the machines filling the room. The silver ball above them hummed violently, pulsing with occasional energy waves. Glenn clenched his teeth and turned around, reaching with his hand for the operation table there, when he realized the table was gone.
He blinked before looking at Sahro confusedly, the Black Heir blinking back with his arms opened in incomprehension. Glenn searched through the room, seeing two bronze plates carrying Maron's operation table sliding away, bringing the merchant to one of the gigantic conveyor belts. Glenn swore and sprinted forward, jumping over the sliding bronze plates or the hissing steam pipes. Sahro tried to follow him, but his legs gave up under him.
"Fuck!" He swore and forced himself up, unbuckling his sword and using it as a cane. He watched helplessly as Glenn chased Maron away when his eyes accidentally caught a small piece of rectangle leather next to one of the vats. His eyebrows creased.
"...What might that be?"
Glenn clenched his teeth and jumped forward, grabbing the edge of the operation table, the bronze plates under him suddenly accelerating and dragging him with them. The young man grabbed Maron's collar and tried to pull him off the operation table, but his restraints were doing their jobs much too excellently.
"Rahhh!" Glenn yelled in frustration as he pulled himself up the operation table, before ripping the restraints off one by one. Maron's body slipped away, his head passing a hair's breadth away from exploding on the ground. The young man pulled the merchant on his shoulder, before jumping off the operating table. He watched in horror as one of the mechanical arms suddenly grabbed the table, ripping it apart and throwing it on one of the conveyor belts.
"Shit, shit, shit!" Glenn ran with all his might, avoiding everything on his way. He passed Sahro and threw Maron into the vat, before hurriedly grabbing the valve and closing it open. Sahro woke up from his stupor, sticking a dark-brown leather piece in his belt, before coming to help him. The door slid closed and Maron's body suddenly straightened inside the vat. Glenn drew a deep breath, sweat covering his eyebrows, before nodding at Sahro and grabbing the smaller valve handle he opened earlier. The Black Heir did the same and began pulling with whatever strength he had left.
After a painful, draining minute, they close, or open all the valves, and the vat is filled with the dark liquid it previously contained.
Doyle screamed painfully, his head shooting to the sides with panic as the creature desperately tried to find a way out. He looked at Glenn and Sahro under him with bulging, bloodshot eyes that stuck out of the flesh ball he had become.
"YOU!! IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT!! I WAS SO CLOSE!!! MY FREEDOM!!!" He painfully roared, the conveyor belt pushing him toward the silver ball which spun at incredible, gravity-defying speeds. The rings all aligned, before locking together with a loud mechanical noise. The silver ball opened like a flower in Spring and chains shot out of it, pulling Doyle in.
"I CURSE YOU GLENNNNN–!!!!"
Clang!
The silver sphere snapped shut, killing the sound of anything that resided in it. Glenn and Sahro looked at each other, the sight sending a terrible chill down their spines. A bright, blue light suddenly descended from the ceiling attached to a bronze mechanical arm, staring at them like a gigantic, otherworldly eye.
"[OPERATION SUCCESSFUL...STARTING DIAGNOSTIC...ENERGY PRODUCTION OPERATIONAL...CONTROL GEMS PRODUCTION RESUMED...ERROR, RECIPIENT N°GS MISSING...]"
Glenn drew a deep breath as he stared back at the gigantic blue light, his mind blown away.
If there was one thing he wasn't expecting in this god-forsaken world, it certainly was a fucking talking machine.
"[...EMERGENCY PROTOCOL INITIATED...ERROR, HUMAN PRESENCE FOUND INSIDE TESTING VAT N°1...CALCULATING...PROBABILITIES OF SURVIVAL: 0%. INITIATING 'PROJECT GUNDAM']"
"[...UNAUTHORIZED HUMAN PRESENCE FOUND INSIDE THE DOME...EXPULSION PROTOCOL INITIATED...]"
Glenn squinted. Expulsion protocol...?
Suddenly, the bronze plates in the ceiling split open, revealing a dark bronze metal pipe. A powerful suction pulled them in the air, sending them shooting through the pipe. The two young men screamed in terror as they flew at extreme speed, unable to control their flight.
A second later, Glenn and Sahro were indeed expulsed away.
Into the starry night sky.
Above the fucking, not-so-Still Peak.
'Shit.'