Lars didn't know the geography that well, as he'd only seen a few maps of the continent in his life, but he knew he was out of Tubarai. He had a good sense for how far away Andal and Jeva were, though he could no longer tell where Trots was. He was pushing himself to his limit as he ran, fueled by desperation to reach them before Trots did.
The withdrawals from lack of wine had already begun. He had the desperation, at least, but there was still a strong feeling of emptiness. Running felt unnatural even, because the feeling of his feet on the ground was so weak without a hallucinogen to modify it that he could barely notice it. There was a nagging temptation to be apathetic about things other than his own experiences, to not care about Andal and Jeva, or anything that wasn't Haverdash wine. He couldn't help but think of all those bottles left unattended from the Haverdash he killed at the castle.
Though, ultimately, he did care. He reminded himself that Andal is more important than intense feelings. He wouldn't call what he felt toward Andal an intense feeling of the like that the Haverdash felt, though he felt very strongly about Andal. It was more like there was a bond, where he wanted what was best for Andal. He didn't want it because of the satisfaction or emotions it provided, but as an end to itself. Andal was his best friend, after all.
Lohant had been right, and he should have realized that at the time. Haverdash wine was a prison, which he'd been trapped in for years. Imagine having thought it was a sign of strength when his skin turned gray. Before the Haverdash came along, the only thing with gray skin was a dead man. Though, that’s fitting; to be a Haverdash was a lot like being dead. Not being stimulated by the world around you, not even noticing it, isn’t a corpse that way? They need wine to be alive, not to live in a higher state than humanity.
Lars focused in on the feeling of the air speeding past him, the texture of the ground beneath him, the sound of the trees and wild animals, and the smells of the wilderness. “Now, I make a choice, to be alive the way all natural things in the world are, and to be totally unlike the Haverdash. If they took my awareness of the little, pleasant things in life from me, then I will have it back by way of conscious choice. Even as I run to save Andal, I will not miss the little things I pass by. I will appreciate them, and love them, the way a human can be in awe of the world. A way that a Haverdash never can be.”
The scenery around him changed, and he found himself in his hometown by the sea. He was sitting with three kids: Andal, Vera, and Tia. He remembered this day, they'd just been talking with Weird Wallace the merchant. He'd told them a fantastic story about Calestine, who'd killed a dragon to save his home. Andal asked, "Let's say a dragon attacked us, do you think anyone in town could fight it off?"
"I would!" Lars instantly piped, getting caught up in his memory of the moment.
“Of course you would, Lars,” Vera mocked, “Obviously nobody could fight a dragon.”
“What about my dad?” Andal asked.
Tia told him, “Your dad is cool, but it’s a dragon, Andal.”
“What if Calestine trained someone to fight dragons,” Andal added, “could someone then?”
Lars got up on his knees, “I would! I would be the best student there is!”
Vera gestured at his whole body, “Lars, you’re a kid! I bet you would be a great student, and he’d probably love the effort you give everything, but you’re so short!”
Tia laughed, “Yea, Lars. You would take twice as long to climb the mountain as Calestine. By then the dragon wouldn’t even be there!”
“I’d just have to learn how to climb too. Let me ask you a question, if a dragon attacked this town, do any of you think I wouldn’t do anything I could to stop it?”
Andal smirked, “No, you definitely would.”
“Thank you. So I’m telling you, I’d figure it out! If I had to try harder than the adults, that’s just what I’d have to do. I wouldn’t let anything threaten our home.”
Tia gave his arm a little hug, “Thanks Lars.”
The vision faded, and Lars realized he’d been smiling. It was a pleasant memory, though ultimately tragic in light of what was to come. A dragon had attacked the village, the Haverdash, and Lars didn’t stop them at all. If he could go back in time then he would have done things differently, though he couldn’t imagine what. He dwelt on that as he ran, trying to think of what he should have done, but it came down to the fact that he couldn’t have done anything else against the Haverdash wine. He liked to believe in himself, but as he recalled his first taste of Haverdash wine he knew it was a miracle that he was alive.
Nothing could have been done at the time, that could be the simple truth of the matter. Anything done to fight the dragon would have to be done now. The best way to kill a dragon would be the way Calestine did it, to cut off its head. “I’m coming, Trots. You won’t lay a finger on Andal, or his friend Jeva. If anyone is the head, it’s you. When I kill you I’ll have done what I needed to all those years ago to protect my home, and when you’re gone I’ll bring back my home in all of its beauty.”
The vision was of a spring day, and so that version of his home manifested around him. Everything around Lars became spring, even the songs of birds suddenly filled the air. Lars noticed something was off about his arms, and stopped running. He looked over his arms, not sure what he was missing. Then it struck him, his arms were a pinkish tan. They weren’t gray! He wasn’t a Haverdash anymore, he was alive! He was a human, and he was alive!
He started running again, filled with joy and excitement. He felt the pounding of his feet on the earth and the rushing of the wind through his hair, and he loved it. He ran faster still, blowing the leaves off the branches in his trail and throwing up dirt with every turn of his feet. His smile returned, and widened. He hadn’t felt this way since before the Haverdash arrived, and he’d only dreamed of moving with this kind of freedom. He leapt in the air and soared for almost a minute, crashing down and continuing to run without losing a stride.
He saw Andal and Jeva’s presence drawing near, but then Trots’s presence finally came into view. He was almost upon him. Lars slowed down and stopped running, wanting to be cautious for the fight he was about to start. His aura of spring had been making trees around him, but then he passed that tree line. He saw Trots and rubbed his hands together, nervous but determined to wipe him away.
Trots looked confused at first, but then gasped, “Lars?”
Lars spread his hands wide, “I’m here, Trots!”
Trots was aghast, “What has happened to you? You look… human!”
“I do! I really do. And I am! I’m no longer a Haverdash, Trots, and I’m here to fight for humanity! I’m here to kill you!”
Lars’s smile faded, confused at what he saw. Trots’s eyes had welled up, then that water became tears. “No, Lars, it cannot be.”
Lars stood silently, having never imagined that Trots could cry.
“Moxey is dead, but you remain as his greatest work! You are his prodigy, Lars! Everything he stood for remains in you!” He pointed at the Dalmation, “His killers are hiding in those caves, and instead of letting me kill them, you want to oppose me? You should help me! For Moxey, who did everything for you, execute his murderers yourself!”
Now Lars’s expression was grim. “I have no part in Moxey anymore. If I could have, I would like to have killed him when we first met. I was confused for years because of him, and now that he’s dead I can only say thank goodness. As for his murderers, well, I’m glad to hear it was them who killed Moxey. Those are my friends, and you will not lay a finger on either of them.”
Trots pushed his hands into his hair, “Lars, you’re making a terrible mistake! You’re giving up such a glorious way of living, with strong experiences, and with such promise for greater things to come! You-”
“No, Trots! You can stop talking, you aren’t going to convince me. I’ve made a choice, and that choice is final. Not even Moxey could persuade me now. Rather than talking you should think of defending yourself, but if you don’t then that’s fine by me.”
Lars drew his sword and rushed forward. He thought he would catch Trots unprepared, but Trots drew his sword unhesitantly and parried Lars’s blow. Neither one of them was ever officially trained with a sword; they’d never needed it before. Instead of using their skill, they each used terrific power. They drew back their swords to strike again, their blades clashing and making a shockwave behind them that tore up layers of the earth.
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Lars perceived Haverdash spawning behind him by seeing the massless particles wrap around them. He turned to cut it, but Trots’s sword was swinging down. Lars parried, then Trots grabbed his wrist and bound up with him. A Haverdash was going to shoot him in the back, but then a human spawned and cut off his head. Trots looked behind Lars in surprise, spawning a horde of Haverdash quickly.
Lars shoved Trots back, spawning humans that were faster and stronger than normal to match the Haverdash, “You’re not the only one who knows this game, Trots!”
“Bold words for someone who recently stopped playing!”
Roots came out of the ground and tore Lars’s army apart. Lars responded quickly, shouting and making Trots’s Haverdash dissolve.
The soundwaves did not affect Trots though, stopping when they reached his aura of light. Trots bound his sword with Lars’s, then struck his chest with his palm. Dark waters rushed through the point of contact, filling Lars’s chest. Trots lifted off the ground and hovered out of reach. “It’s over, Lars. If you are indeed not Haverdash anymore, that will kill you. I suggest you weep, as humans are prone to do in the end.”
Lars made his massless particles shift apart for an instant, and the dark waters fell out of him to poison the earth. “Like you were weeping a minute ago?” He leaped at Trots, hanging in the air and swinging his sword with a cut that was much larger than the blade itself.
A root rose up to slap Lars out of the air, so he redirected his sword to destroy it. Trots flew forward in that moment and kicked Lars in the side, sending him crashing into the ground. He gave no time for Lars to recover, sending roots to pierce and entrap him, all with fountains of dark water flying out when the roots broke the earth.
Lars froze the massless particles around him, jumping onto the roots that were going to entrap him, then running over frozen particles in the air. A sheet of leaves was floating down from above him, which clearly was going to have some dangerous effect, but he could reach Trots first. He swung, and Trots parried, but then he let go of his sword to grab Trots’s wrist. He punched with his left, which Trots caught, but then moved his sword by controlling its particles to stab Trots in the chest.
Trots wrenched his hand away, but Lars caught the blade of his sword. Since the handle was free, he punched Lars in the face with it. That gave him space to let go of Lars’s other hand and grab Lars’s sword. He pulled, intending to overpower the unarmed Lars, but he couldn’t remove the sword from his chest. Actually, it was all he could do to stop the blade from slicing down from Lars controlling it.
The leaves had fallen to where they were, so Lars drew in breath to blow them away. Then, he lost control of his sword. A burst of light came out of the great tree, much like the aura of light around Trots, protecting everything in it from Lars’s control. The leaves were not blown away, and even the frozen particles Lars had been standing on became gaseous again. He started to fall, but then the roots that were frozen below him struck him in the back and sent him flying upward. Trots took both swords and gashed Lars’s side as he flew by, then Lars collided with the falling leaves.
Each leaf felt like an explosion on contact, but no energy came out of them, nor was his body damaged. The explosions felt internal, destroying his spirit and his energy. He felt weak, and worthless. Each leaf that hit him vaporized his desire to win, and his desire to live. Trots came up behind him and gashed him in the back, taking chunks out of his spine.
Lars reacted slowly, but this was not the first time he’d felt this empty. The leaves were recreating the feeling of going without Haverdash wine. Forcing his mind into submission, he grabbed control of his sword again and turned it upward in Trots’s hand. As he’d been flying forward, the sword stuck him in the chin and buried itself several inches deep before Trots stopped his momentum. Lars then shoved his sword away, pushing Trots away with it to give himself some distance. He hit the ground, Trots’s leaves still falling and swirling around him. Lars focused on the smell of the grass beneath him, and his mind returned to the idea of spring. Massless particles in the leaves turned on their heads, and rather than being weapons of trots, they became healing for Lars. The effects were reversed, energizing and motivating Lars, but also healing his physical wounds.
Trots took Lars’s sword in both hands, recognizing that he couldn’t use it, and snapped it in two. Lars watched as he tossed the two halves away, then pulled them to him and fused them again. He waved the sword at Trots and smiled, “Good try, at least.”
Trots resheathed his sword, “Keep your sword then. In the end you fight alone, but I have great glory on my side. I have tried to fight you with many tools, but I recognize now that you can counter anything I would throw at you. I will win this fight by pressing my advantage, which is not trickery or abundance of tools, but by power.”
“Whatever you do in power I will match with determination!”
Trots wasn’t looking at Lars, but at the great tree in the distance behind him, “No. You will not.”
Lars felt a great tremor. He felt like he should turn around and see what had happened, but he already knew. The tree was no longer in the distance, but here in their midst. It shone with an aura like that of the Glorious Haverdash, but that aura extended for miles. The tree provided shade under its leaves, but the shade and the light did not clash with each other, existing side by side. Trots had not moved, simply watching the tree. Then, the shade became darker than the darkest night, and that darkness became the dark waters that came from the tree. Lars was forced to the ground by the weight of the waters, which seeped into his mouth, nose, and ears, providing great pressure and seeping through his skin wherever it touched.
He tried to separate his particles to let the dark waters fall through, as he had done before, but when he reformed the dark waters filled him again almost instantly. He tried to move, difficult enough from the weight of the waters, but roots wrapped around his legs and crawled up his torso. The tree, the symbol of Haverdash to Trots, had a level of power he could not possibly deal with. Though, he seemed to remember something countering the tree before.
He remembered, in Hathor, the Haverdash had seen a tree bountiful and strong, but the humans had seen it as dead and decayed. Lars yelled with a muffled voice through the dark waters, “I can counter this tree, Trots, however powerful it is! I am the counter, I am a human!”
The dark waters disappeared, and the sun shown in. The great branches of the tree were gone, and the shade with them. The trunk remained, but it was thin and dry. Lars stood proudly and pointed his sword at Trots.
Trots’s eyes were wide, and he slowly looked from the tree to Lars. “You truly are a human, Lars. No Haverdash could be as detestable as you!”
He ripped his sword from its sheath, rushing forward. Lars tried to remotely control his sword again, but it didn’t lift out of his hand. He almost dropped it, barely recovering his grip in time to parry a heavy blow from Trots.
“You think you are anything, can do anything, without the glory of Haverdash? You turn your back on it, it will turn its back on you!”
Lars backed away as quickly as he could, holding his sword on both ends to defend the weight of Trots’s attacks which he swung like hammer blows. He sidestepped an attack, but tripped over a dead root. When his skin touched the bark, he felt an ominous presence, and realized that he hadn’t deactivated the tree. He’d changed the tree to be like its opposite; instead of being this bastion of hallucinations and visions, it rendered them inert.
He deflected another swing from Trots, then kicked him in the jaw to knock him back. Lars found his footing in time to evade another swing, then lunged forward with a jab. Trots deflected it with his own sword, then caught the dull side of the blade with his offhand in the moment Lars let his balance falter. Lars pulled on his sword, but knowing Trots wouldn’t let go, used it to speed up a side kick that hit Trots in the belly.
Trots almost fell back over the root that he’d chased Lars over, but hit his sword against the root to provide a counterforce that kept him upright. As the blade of the sword bit into the bark, it too went inert. It lost all its dreamlike qualities, and the enchantments that made it work as a blade. It became nothing but a sharpened spine from a long dead creature, floppy and light.
Lars stepped forward to try to leverage his sword into Trots’s leg, but Trots hopped back over the root and let Lars push the sword down to cut the root. Lars tossed the sword at Trots, who knocked it to the side, and dove to tackle him. Trots had one leg lifted to step over the root, and didn’t have the balance to avoid the tackle. They hit the ground, and Lars climbed up Trots to hold him down and get to where he could start pummeling him.
Trots rotated under him and pushed up with his legs and arms, getting up on his elbows and knees. Lars started punching and elbowing at his side and head, but Trots didn’t focus on defending himself. He grabbed Lars by the leg, slid one of his legs out from under him to get leverage, and lifted Lars while pushing with his leg to push him off. He swung his legs around and wrapped them around Lars’s leg as he fell on his side, catching him in a knee bar and unhesitantly snapping the leg.
Lars yelled in pain, but drove himself to sit up and try kicking at Trots. With his other leg dangling on the ground, he couldn’t kick with any decent force. Trots jumped on him and shoved his torso back on the ground. He sat on Lars’s chest and started punching him in the head repeatedly, accurately avoiding Lars’s arms as he tried to shield himself.
Lars held on as long as he could, but only grew weaker as his brain was rocked back and forth in his skull. At the brink of losing consciousness, he thought, “So much for being a ‘living human being’ again, now I’m really gonna die.”
His effect on the tree ended. It grew to be large and strong, with branches reaching to the heavens and shading the countryside. Lars felt the change, and knew he would be able to use his full power again, but Trots’s fist his head again with his full strength returned to him. Lars’s skull shattered and caved. He perceived time slowly. This was his last moment, there was no way he could heal himself here. Even if he did, Trots was right on top of him and could easily cave his skull in again while he was trying to heal. If he wasted too much effort trying to save himself then Trots could finish him off and then go get Andal, so he had to hurt Trots as much as he could, even in death.
He gave a final command to his massless particles, that they would rush into Trots and tear him apart from the inside. His body and clothes disappeared, and Lars was gone. Trots’s aura of light grew dim as Lars’s particles filled him, subdued by an intense feeling of pain from his body becoming a battleground. The pain was so great that Trots could only be aware of it, losing all sense of location and duty. Though, in the back of his mind there was a trace of grief for the deaths of Moxey and Lars.