Issue 9: The Lone Prayer
This is Terran Alliance News Network: Reports of strange lights over Ireland have residents paging in as many magical demis as they can muster. Sir Avalon is on the scene with Dr. Zanzibar. We go live in 3, 2, 1….—Breaking News Alert
I have never felt a melding of faith akin to this!—O’rioh
Nyx knew exactly what she had. All of our enemies viewed each other as expendable. It’s why they lost in the end. Alice was singing to a different tune from me but it was no less vital. Because of her: They had a way to remove the bindings done on Hidan’s people. A way to rescue that embryo from Nyx. –Sleeping in Starlight, a memoir of the 23rd century (vol 2)
Ireland (Ruins of Tir’ma)
The Dreaming
January 9th, 2116
Paxton thrust his silver lance forward. A pale set of teeth snapping at the metal as it pierced the side of the White Owl. The former enlisted man shouted, “Bring the Pain, Father!” Miles Brookes raised his cross on high. Its glow rippling across the creature’s flesh. The smoke rising as it keened. There was no sign of Morgana. Distant booms indicated the Pinkertons had found their mark. One of her Living Stone nests.
A pillar of fire followed.
The Dreaming sang with the song of the Weave with each nest nuked.
*****
I headbutted one White Owl.
Its ink-black eyes exploding from its skull. Another attempted to lock its fangs in my neck. Each of them deformed in some way. Based on what species it had been ripped from. Most of these were humanoid. One even had snakes snapping at the air. Red venom spraying from scaled jaws. Doc was glued to my back. Firing away with her energy abilities. Forming a Gatling gun. Its golden light causing the Living Stone mixed in with the Owls to recoil. By this point, we moved around the battlefield as one.
I was thankful for her keen eye.
Green lazer fire danced overhead. The Puzzler had found another nest.
*****
Mordred flinched as a ripple formed over his head. Morgana shifted into his hotel room. Hands curled around her ashen staff. A purple jewel pulsating on its tip. A murderous expression on her shriveled face. She could use magic to make herself appear unnaturally beautiful but seeing the scorched white flames that manifested before the portal shut let him know she had just escaped a warzone. He bowed.
Mockery could wait.
She pulled him in close. Her breath was sickly sweet.
“Boy, the Keepers lead the Host to my doorstep!”
He froze. Nephilim.
“How many?”
Her eyes flared wide, “A dozen in all.”
Mordred whistled. Yet his sword hungered.
A voracious glint smoldered in his gaze as he leaned in. “What’s in it for me?”
*****
A gargantuan black wolf snarled.
Pacing about a black tree.
Yellow rose petals floating around it. A woman was standing by the lowest branch. Her face set. Kneeling in the soft earth. Hands clasped in prayer. I pulled Doc into my arms and phased through the Dreaming encircling the two figures. As I got closer Lorain shouted, “THORNS!” I crouched. The vines snapping at my back as I absorbed the assault. I motioned to Micheal Brookes and his team. They jumped over me. Dragging Paxton and Father Brookes behind them. I lashed out with my dark matter sight. Buring the vines that attempted to engulf them.
Black, in his Tiger form, sprang over me as the vines closed in. Doc’s energy shield encasing us both. My brother called out,>>Get ready! Mordred is almost here. I can feel the warped song of his sword. <<
Souls.
Their voices scraping across my skin. White recoiled within me.
Unity’s universe powered that thing.
Doc choked back a yelp as a White Owl bit down on my right forearm. Leaving black scrawl behind. It smoked on my uniform. I inhaled and sent forth a burst of arctic wind. Ice flowing over the repugnant face.It howled. Pawing at the ground. Doc pulled away from my embrace and launched a snap kick. The creature thudded against the thorn wall. The ice shattering on impact. Vines snapped and hissed. Pulling it apart.
*****
Miles Dennis Brookes held his cross and bible aloft. Avoiding the massive limbs of the tree via Benediction. He wasn’t nearly as powerful as his mother. His foul blood would provide something else to this battle. Confusion. Another figure barred his path. A woman rode by the soul of one most foul. He held his cross before him. Quoting, “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”
She smirked. Raising the black and red blade over her head. “God doesn’t hear the prayers of the unclean.” A shadow fell across them both as a black tiger barreled into Mordred. Its 3 golden eyes locked onto its foe. It shouted, “NOW!”
Micheal Brookes aimed.
The Pinkertons adding to the barrage. Mordred hissed but didn’t retreat.
Black Scrawl absorbed the Laz-rifle projectiles. The Father intoned, “Light guide the faith of men!” Mordred cackled. Absorbing more power from the ground around him.
*****
Bel took note of Mordred’s defenses. He put too much faith in the reserves of Black Scrawl polluting the area around the tree. That Father and the annoying female near the heart of the grove were going to drain them quick if she didn’t act. She sent a compulsion out to Mordred. Tapping into her pheromones.
Bury me into the ground.
She would not die because of false bravado.
No matter what Morgana had promised this fool.
He resisted! She bit her lip. Those three golden eyes locked onto the chipped part of the blade. Narrowing. Diving into that spot she had cultivated to conceal her soul from Mordred. From the Blade. It was dangerous but also defective. Not one of the true Blades of Creation.
She poured more of her demi ability into his bloodstream. Her bloodstream, she noted sardonically.
The Tiger knows! Sink into the earth!
*****
Alice peered through the Veil.
Space flowed past her. Endless stars gleaming in the vast expanse.
The home of the Markav Collective enshrined within the Light.
She raised her voice to the heavens.
“Brothers of a forgotten age. I beseech thee. The Star and Shield guide my hands!”
They bowed. “Freely given. Aim well.”
Waves of golden light flowed from Alice. Lending strength to all the warriors trapped within the web of Morgana’s lies. Her son shouted, “By the grace of God, you are repelled.” Faint popping echoed across the grove. All the White Owls fell dead. Alice collapsed. Lightheaded and nauseous. A cold wet nose nudged her. A gentle weight fell upon her back. A massive paw cradling her tenderly.
The Slumbering One would awaken and cleanse the Weave of Creation.
*****
I dived through the thorns.
The clarion call on the other side pulling me.
A voice as familiar to me as my own father’s.
Doc clung to me. Blasting at any corrupted thing that moved. A brilliant silver tree rose from the salted earth. New grass blooming around it. A woman with an odd eye attatchment screamed. Driving an obsidian blade into the ground. She vanished in an explosion of black smoke. Black padded quickly to a comatose woman. Doc racing alongside. Her healing powers already returning color to the cheeks of her patient. Father Brookes said, “My mother. Alice.”
I ducked down. Pulling the Howling into a hug as he shrunk to corgi size.
“Who’s a good boy?”
He sneezed. Resting a bruised paw on my chest.
“Can you help?”
I rested my palm on the silver trunk. Noticing for the first time it looked like a giant version of the one O’rioh had when I first met him and his brother. I never did get his name. I got the sense he didn’t respond to it much. A voice rose from the heart of the wood. “You are safe here.” Animals materialzed from the golden leaves. King Elias shouted, “Nicely done you Yanks!”
Avalon had been restored in full.
Doc placed Alice on an awaiting medical stretcher. Her face pale.
“I can’t fix this. Her body isn’t broken.”
White reached out. Forming as a tiger. Placing a paw on Alice’s chest.
“Her soul is missing!”
*****
Mordred awoke within a gray room. Metallic walls curving outward. Completely nude.
He tested his bonds. They tightened around his wrists. A iris opened. Two squat beings entered. Drones. Their expressions dull. A voice touched his mind, >>Ahh. So that’s what happened.<<
A Typherian entered.
Her dress indicated House trappings. He aksed, “So what does father want from me?”
The All-Mother answered, “To see what is within that blade of yours.”
He motioned to the drones. They complied. Releasing him. He found his clothing within a small bin. He dressed. Noticing that the All-Mother’s hands always remained near her weapon. Smart and deadly. He grinned, “Want to know what Morgana offered me?”
The taller Typherian raised one manicured eyebrow, “Why not?”
Mordred’s smile grew ugly, “A place at Unity’s side. If I killed that Tree and the All-Father.” The head assassin of House Urraden didn’t rise to the bait. Yet another mercenary for their side. How tiresome. Mordred held up a finger, “Ah! But I didn’t say which All-Father!”
She glowered at him. Noting that a female form didn’t suit such a fellow.
She motioned towards the doorway. “Let’s be off.”
Her husband would hear of this. Their list of actual allies was thin.
Issue 8: Here
Issue 10: Here
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