Jim handed the phone to Brian when they pulled up to the emergency room entrance. While Ken had been talking to EMS, Jim had been reporting everything to the Watch command. They were going to double the size of the teams tonight. Two of the homes now had workshops hard at work building makeshift Japanese Sasumata. Someone had described them as spears which are meant to allow you to stop a charging enemy and hold them on the ground. Each weapon team was going to have two gunners and two people with sasumata in case they were charged by Zombies. It concerned everyone that there were only three weapon teams per shift.
The house was also sending another car with two armed Watch members and Jared. Losing Jim's Partner (turned out his name was Richard) really hurt the group’s defenses. Losing Jim too would be a nightmare.
Manuel had driven up in the middle of the Jim's call. He was crying, terrified and guilty at running away. When he'd heard that most people were ok and what had happened, he just started crying incoherently. It had taken 2 people to bring him inside to calm down.
Everyone seemed confused about how to act. On one hand Manuel had endangered them by running away. They knew they'd never count on him again, but they also felt bad for his fear and guilt. Ken felt proud that everyone seemed to choose pity and sorrow for him rather than anger or accusations.
Brian and Angelina helped Jim stand up to walk into the Hospital. As soon as the doors opened a Nurse exclaimed and pointed out a wheelchair for him to use. When Jim tried to go sit down in a normal chair instead Ken watched her yellow and green aura reach out and wash over him. Without a second though he turned around and went to sit in the wheelchair.
After he'd faced the agony of sitting, Jim's face showed confusion alongside his obvious pain.
Ken told him. “The nurse has magick. I don't know if she did it on purpose or not, but I watched her change your mind with magick.”
“Ugh,” was all he could reply before a concerned nurse and doctor headed over.
“What happened here?” The doctor asked.
“I was stabbed.” Jim replied. “It's a gut wound and you can smell bile.”
“Jesus.” The Doctor replied. “This is the 11th gut wound today. There is a line 4 long for the surgical rooms. Admit him. Get him on a Vancomycin and Rifampin drip as soon as possible. Prep him for surgery. I'll get the scrips written up with 10/300 Vicodin too. The blood doesn't look too bad from here, but lets get that wound checked and packed as fast as possible.”
The doctor hurried away to his other tasks as the nurse brought Jim and Brian through the giant automatic door which led deeper into the hospital.
Ken waited out in the Emergency Room entrance. They probably would have let him in, but he wanted to be here to guide Jared. While he was waiting he felt for his “mana bladder.” It felt mostly empty still, but like he could do a couple things.
Ken decided to use the time to do a grounding and centering exercise. He sat down, closed his eyes and reached that quiet meditation place he'd practiced over the years. Feeling the energy around him he reached down. Down into the earth. It was odd though. Before he could reach down and feel more and more energy the lower he went. Now it seemed the opposite. The lower he went the less energy he felt. It was almost like the earth had been a huge battery which had held the last wisps of mana from before, and it hadn't had time to recharge yet.
Curious Ken envisioned the roots he was used to, but then something unexpected happened. Power that was now in the air all around him treated him like a mountain lake would use a drainpipe into a valley below.
More mana than he could comprehend flowed down his connection to the deep. The weight of the flow knocked him to his knees. He could actually see it like a whirlpool in his mind's eye. In fact he could see everything. Each person's aura, their energy, their thoughts, their feelings, their pasts, their futures.... It was all Ken could do to hold on to himself as the flow of mana eroded through his core-self.
After what seemed like ages, the depths he touched seemed to drink their fill and the incredible flow eased. His vision cleared and he came back to himself.
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Ken was looking at the world through an odd bubble as if he were in an aquarium and they were on the outside.
They.
They were staring at him. Shock and fear in their eyes. Shattered glass and some sort of fiber like styrofoam still swirled around the floor at his feet.
He looked up. Roof tiles and lights had all been shattered by the whirlpool. Odd burn marks scarred the remaining tiles.
Raising his eyes to the people surrounding him Ken saw the horror and fear in their faces. Whatever had happened, these people were now looking at a monster. Ken couldn't handle that. He spread his hands and declared to them: “This isn't a big deal. We'll be ok.”
The magick responded. What would have been more power than his whole bladder could hold before blasted from him in a wave hitting everyone in its wake. Everyone in the room relaxed. In that single moment, all fear was washed away and was replaced with utter confidence that this wasn't a big deal.
“That was pretty sweet man.” Someone in the room announced playfully.
That had happened from his stray thoughts? Ken worried. What if I think about fire or...
The magick responded again. A tiny flame forming in the middle of the mana-aquarium surrounding Ken. Desperately Ken controlled his mind and willed: End Fire.
The magick responded and the fire went out.
For a horrifying moment Ken wouldn't allow himself to think about anything. The only thought he allowed himself was: I have to go somewhere safe, where I won't hurt anyone...
The magick responded
...and suddenly he was home. In his old room, in an empty house.
Except it wasn't empty.
It was filled with party goers. They'd torn his posters down. His DVD and Music collection were intentionally broken and the half disks lay on the ground.
Three women and two men were putting on a show worthy of a hardcore video on his bed. Half a dozen men and women in various stages of undress were watching their lurid acts. The smell of sex, alcohol and smoke filled the room: Tobacco, Pot, Meth and something else he couldn't identify.
Three people were at his TV playing a HALO game. His desktop computers were both gone. Half his other games had been tossed carelessly in a pile. Beloved pictures of friends and family had been defaced. Someone had even entertained themselves by throwing all of his miniatures at the concrete wall.
A red fury filled Ken's vision. Images of agony, burning, tearing and torture raced through his rage filled mind. I'm gonna fucking kill everyone who came in here to do this!
And again... the magick responded.
A giant wave burst out of the globe of Mana. Everyone in the room screamed in terror and pain as Ken's darkest fantasies were immediately visited upon them.
The people nearest him called out in agony as their bodies were yanked and contorted into knots and other unnatural positions. Bones shattered with horrible cracks; bone shards punctured skin as people's limbs and backs were twisted around like a child playing with playdough dolls.
One of the video gamers was picked up by the magick and slowly bent backwards until, with the sounds of bones breaking and his tormented cries, his back broke and his head was shoved up his ass. Another video gamer wailed as he bloated larger and larger until he simply popped, exploding over the room. The final video gamer was slowly pulled into himself screaming as bone by bone, muscle by muscle, he was sucked into a singularity in his navel.
Flaming creatures of earth, shadow and bone appeared out of sudden bursts of fire and inserted their sharp and oversized bodies into the orgy. The human participants' cries quickly transitioned to full blown panic as these monsters from nightmares opened return portals mid-orgy and slowly drew everyone into a world of flaming darkness.
Dreadful shrieks and howls came from upstairs as other personal hellscapes were visited upon people up there. Clearly the party hadn't simply been down here.
Ken stood in shocked horror unable to think, unable to move. He pissed himself and fell to his knees to the blood soaked carpet. It took a couple minutes for the sounds of death to end as everyone in the house was finally granted the bliss of freedom from their agonies. It took a couple more for Ken's brain to start working again.
His first movement was to vomit. He was shaking so badly that he couldn't even hold himself up anymore. He fell to his side, holding himself in a fetal position coated in vomit, blood and other unholy fluids.
How could he?
…
How could he have?
…
How could he have done?
…
That?
…
Desperately Ken willed to the Magick: Take it back! Undo it! Make them alive again!
The magick responded. It leapt forth seeking for a way to make his will manifest, but the magick quickly returned.
This, it couldn't accomplish.
Emergency sirens wailed in the distance as emergency vehicles raced to the scene of a terror darker than any of the other crazy stuff the occupants had encountered today. Ken broke down in tears. Sanity disappeared as he fled deep inside, into fantasies of worlds where he couldn't hurt anyone: worlds where he wasn't a bad man and lived with peace, and warmth, and had absolutely no responsibility for anything at all.
His remaining magickal energy drained away harmlessly as his body rocked itself in a subconscious effort to comfort his shattered heart and broken sense of self.