An elite martial pupil used a mantra to summon up a hedge of hungry roses. Striking out at those who survived her attack with a whip of thorns.

A young warrior-priest called for strength from his gods and swung a sword of silver and gold flames, cutting his way through the metal horde.

A virile, horse-kin warrior strode through the surviving masses. Leading his men as he cleared a path for them with impacts of force and thunder. . Using his spear and fist full of lightning to take care of any creatures that managed to survive his initial assault.

Finally there was the Thespian. The man in the gray and purple opera mask. He danced amongst the demons. Using his magic hands to flip, flick, throw and smash his way clear to the end of the floor. His trusty crew of associates and company men, dealing with whatever remained.

In the end every last steel-supplicant and modified demonbeast was disposed of and defeated and the raid was able to come to its penultimate conclusion with a surprising amount of its people still alive. A feat that would raise the statuses of all who were present.

*****

It was ‘that’ sort of feeling. One of those moments where one got the sense that things were going a little too well. Bringing on a certain uneasiness. Where that sense that too many things were turning up in your favor, resulted in a paranoid watchfulness.  

A certainty that whether it was an exhaustion of one’s store of good fortune, or the set up for some bad cosmic set up, something bad was coming next. So you couldn’t really enjoy it, because you were too busy spending all your time waiting for the other shoe to drop.

*****

After splitting up to conquer the prism as a whole, the assorted contractor factions found themselves together again. Reassembling at a single massive door.

A door that was meant to be raised, slid up into the wall. Built like obscenely ostentatious freight elevator, given all the dressings and ornamentation of a door you’d find in front of a throne room.

The Bone Tree Company and the Thousand Ghosts stood at the back of the crowd, waiting for Supervisor Arold and the rest of the up-and-ups to figure out what the raid’s next move was. Preparing for their final push.

Frowning behind his nine-eyed mask, Billy gnawed on his bottom lip. Finally making his mind to be firm and clear, about the feelings that had been building up the entire time, their party had been climbing up this tower.

“I think...I think we should probably bow out while we’re still ahead, guys.” said Billy.

“Huh? Billy, we’ve already made it all the way here, what are you talking about?” said Edna.

“Did ever have one of those dreams? One of the ones where you’re locked in a room and there’s something on the other side of the door. Knocking, banging, trying to get inside...It’s that kind of feeling.” said Billy

Edna looked up at him, her expression still light, though her face had gone stiff and her complexion paler.  He didn’t know it, but he’d struck a nerve, unfortunately it was the wrong nerve.

“Billy...I think….I know you’ve saying that you’re not really getting a good vibe about this place but come on its tomb, a ruin. We’re surrounded by metal zombies. It’s natural. Plus we’re almost done. Just hold on.” said Edna.

Billy sighed, he’d been hinting, constantly suggesting that they pull back, for all of the three weeks that they’d been there. His suggestions becoming slightly firmer with each passing day and even he wasn’t exactly sure why he felt so uncomfortable with this place. It was his own fault really, he’d been too indecisive.

He should have tried to talk them out of this the moment he came to the prism and felt the aura of the place. Tasting it, feeling it. It felt like him.The air filled with deathly susurrations.

The darkness thick and velvety and very alive, very aware. It felt dark, and gray, and off, like an endless continuation of that feeling that someone was stepping over ones grave.

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Like walking through a nightmare after all the monsters had been put away and only the gloomy, discomfort was left. It wasn’t a feeling that he’d expected to feel again. It was a nostalgic feeling, both comfortable and uncomfortable.

And the girls had seemed eager to keep pushing forwards so when they ignored his words he just went along with it. Accepting that he’d been outvoted. His judgement no doubt affected by the fact that this place was the richest source of miasma he’d been able to find since he’d come back to this world.

Thicker and richer, than he’d find if he were to suddenly lose his mind and slaughter every living thing on Monde. An entire universe of death and darkness and quiet. Less like air and more like soup. A nutritious soup that Billy pulled into himself. Expanding the world that lay within his shadow.

His shades using it to give themselves proper forms, new forms. The humanoid souls becoming humanoid shades, the jongleurs and Nyts. The draconic souls becoming serpentine, slitherers. The beastial souls becoming the motley, multilimbed, skitterers and fuzzies.

With those souls that weren’t really anything in particular or didn’t really possess a preference, choosing to become, the amorphous, squid-like, squiglies.

“It’s not just bad vibes Ed...I’m scared. Feel my hand…” he said. Taking her hand in his, letting her feel his trembling.

Letting her feel how he shook. This was another thing that he’d never expected to feel here. Fear. But this wasn’t just fear, this was piss yourself terror. Primal. This was the kind of fear, that drove lesser men mad and set beasts to frenzy. What manner of thing could make an immortal man feel a fear like that?

Whatever it was Billy didn’t want to meet it. Whatever it was he knew his friends wouldn’t be able to handle it. He knew ‘he’ might not be able to protect them.They needed to get out of here.

“.....”

Edna said nothing, she stared up at his face, as if she were trying to look past the mask and meet his eye. Her false smile falling, her expression empty and tense. He didn’t know it but he’d said the wrong thing again.

Long after her body had been restored and long before she could manage the strength required to regain her words she’d needed to regain her ability to leave the confines of her room. It was hard going and she only barely managed it, but when she did, it came with a certain understanding and a certain fear.

Edna at her base, at her core was a creature of caution. Between the three of them, while Elena had always been the brave one and she had always been the sensible one, with Billy playing the part of the scaredy cat, she’d always been just as scared as Billy was.  

Perhaps maybe even more so, because she was older and therefore knew just a little bit more about what was out there to be afraid of. Always listening to her morbid father talking about the bad luck his business friends ran into while traversing the roads and the wastes.

She used to use Billy’s fear as an excuse. Using her baby cousin as a reasonable excuse for why they should do ‘whatever’ Elena was planning, when the scariness overcame the fun. Then ‘that’ had to happen.

Everyone died and a few of the killers found her and the ‘other thing’ happened and for a while there was no fun, there was no anything, there was only fear. Fear and bad dreams and the small room that became her prison for the longest time.

Eventually with enough time, she managed to talk herself out of being her own warden. She managed to talk herself out of the room, but it came with a quiet caveat, a quiet fear, a quiet realization of how very easy it would be for her to talk herself back into a room.

And so she  made a promise to herself. Whether wise or not, or sensible or not, she made a promise to herself. A promise to let reason, logic, sensibility, whim, mood and much anything else, ‘but’ fear be the thing that made her decisions for her. No matter what, even if she was afraid, she wouldn’t let it be a thing that bound her.  

She had far too many fears and things that she was afraid of, to allow them to be the thing that controlled her decisions.

This was her determination, a truth that lay at the core of her being and it was for this reason alone that she wouldn’t give in to her friend’s words. So instead she just squeezed his hand, unsure what to say or how to explain, why she now almost kind of ‘had’ to see what was past that door. Curiosity and slightly perverse, stubborn voice in her head egging her on.

Billy couldn’t know of what was going on in her head because his friends were amongst the small number of people that he refused to read. What he could see was that she was hesitating and now wasn’t the time for hesitation.

“Yo...Thespian Gray, we need to talk. I don’t think we can go through with this.” said Billy. Walking over to his current employer.

The sudden elevation of his usually barely-above-a-whisper voice shocked Jermaine and his advisors in the Thousand Ghosts out of whatever discussion they’d been about to have.

“Huh?...What’d you mean, man? We might be nearly there, but the game’s not done yet.” said Jermaine.

Billy shook his head.

“Nh...That’s true enough, but I think, that the Bone Tree Company doesn’t need to see what lies past that door. Since you’ve been good to us and seem a fairly decent sort, I’d advise you to do the same. Turn back...Just like the voice keeps asking...Nothing good happens if we keep going forward…” said Billy.

Another slipped into Billy’s squeezing tight. He turned and saw Elena beside him. Her mask lifted up like a visor. Her gaze soft and watchful, and concerned.

“Hon...maybe just hold on for a little bit longer. We have the phone-bands, we can get out here if the worst comes to worst.” said Elena.

“Nh…”

Billy wanted to argue, for whatever reason, every instinct both the vestigial and the learned, was telling him that they had to go. But her words were sensible so with a sigh and with some difficulty he made himself nod.

“So you guys staying or what?” said Jermaine.

“Not for nothing, but you’ve done a damn good job, kids. It’d be a shame for you to leave this party before it was time to get a share of the goodies.”

Billy didn’t much care about getting ‘goodies’. He just wanted him and his to get out of here alive. Still he kept mum because saying more would neither look nor do any good. Now it was time to return to plan B.

“Yeah...I think we’re good.” said Edna.

With Elena nodding alongside her.