Chapter 46 – Chaos and The Reaper

Shara took a step back and swept her empty hand across in front of herself, palm out, a shimmering wall of pink following behind a second before a pair of monsters ran face-first into it. Almost comically, they flattened somewhat as they hit, then rebounded and landed on their backs on the ground.

“When did you learn to do that?” Lance asked, earthen spikes lifting into the air on either side of her and then driving straight down into the prone monsters.

“Just now? Something to do with all the chaos energy from those clocks,” Shara said, the pink wall already gone, and she spun around to launch her chain fist into another monster. Straight out the fist snapped, like a lunging snake, to catch the monster square in the chest. The small whomp stole the creature’s forward momentum, and its legs jerked forward before it dropped to the ground.

Dispelling the chain, the fist appeared back at her side as she spun her wrist to build a charge, then she quick-stepped up invisible stairs to leap into the air. Both hands went to the hilt of her weapon, and she brought it up and over like a sledgehammer on the prone monster.

WHOMP – she’d never get tired of that sound – and the broken creature lay in the middle of a new crater.

“How are we doing?” she asked, spinning and hurling the fist to intercept a creature running towards the group of sorcerers.

“Holding our own,” Lance said, more earthen spears rapid-firing into the air to pincushion the area around the dam across the river. “Your friend evened the odds, and he’s holding most of them on the far side.”

Shara smacked one more monster then spared a glance above her. The air was full of Tel’s small portals, like the one he’d pulled his pack out of, and out of each one poked a gun’s barrel. Pink and blue energy fell from the sky like hail, pelting the far side of the river in a constant stream of destruction that tore through the main force of the creatures.

On her side of the river, floating spheres spat similar energy bolts while metal hounds ripped into the creatures with energy-coated teeth and claws. Between the mechanical weapons and the sorcerers, they were doing more than holding their own. They were actually winning.

“We can do this,” Shara said. “As long as Tel can keep this up,” she said and turned back towards her friend. Except, it wasn’t him her eyes locked on. No, it was the rush of people charging out of the woods and towards his back and the town, a pack of black and white in the front.

“Tailcoats!” Shara shouted and pointed. “Tailcoats behind us.”

“What? Where?” Lance asked, then seemed to spot what Shara was pointing at.

“Can you hit them from here?” Shara asked, looking from the charging Tailcoats to Tel and the town. They’d evacuated almost everybody by then, but what if the Tailcoats got down into the portal room? Or circled around and hit the sorcerers from behind? Or was Tel their main target? That would make the most sense given the display he was putting on.

Damnit, why did they have to show up now?

“If I let up on the river,” Lance said, more spears launching off between each word, “the others will be completely overrun. You need to do something to slow the Tailcoats down until we can get into a better position or warn your friend, though I don’t know if he’ll be able to split his attention anymore than I can.”

“Me?” Shara asked, but immediately saw Lance was right. The other sorcerers were too far away to do anything, and Lance was doing everything she could to thin the numbers making it across the river.

Tel, likewise, was focused on the battle in front of him, completely unaware of the danger running through the tall grass behind. Still, even with the Tailcoats’ speed, it would take them a few minutes to get to him.

A quick glance at the battle on the river showed things in the sorcerers’ favour, but it wasn’t over yet. There were still too many monsters and not enough of the ‘good guys’. Was it hopeless? If only they had more…

Shara’s head jerked back and forth between the two forces pincering her group in the middle.

“Huh, that just might work,” Shara whispered, then looked at her friend standing on the hill, the sky lighting up around him like a meteor shower. “Sorry,” she said, though he’d never be able to hear her, then ran in the opposite direction towards the river.

“Hey! Where are you going?” Lance shouted after her.

“To talk to Neela!” Shara said. “Buy us some time!”

“What do you think I’ve been doing?” Lance replied tersely.

“Yeah, yeah, you’ve been wonderful. Keep up the good work,” Shara deadpanned, pushing chaos energy down under her feet as she ran. It’d all started when she’d noticed with weaker chaos energy her footing had become soft, like running through mud. Now though, with an almost surplus of power, she was finding all kinds of things she could do with what seemed like a simple magic.

The brief wall was one example, though it only lasted a heartbeat. The real strength of her magic was always in movement, and she climbed into the air while changing the consistency of the energy she ran on. Instead of the simple ‘hard’ air she’d used before, she made it like a springboard, so each step launched her forward.

Her speed doubled, no, tripled, as she raced just above what little tall grass was still left standing and devoured the distance to the river. The sound was nearly deafening as she got closer, even Born’s roars barely audible over the cacophony from Tel’s artillery that continued to churn the river and tear apart the ground on the other side.

If it wasn’t for the monsters’ absurd durability, the fight would’ve already been over. But, so much closer now, Shara could see the things taking multiple hits without even slowing down. This fight wouldn’t be over before the Tailcoats got to Tel. Which meant she needed to find…

“Neela!” Shara shouted, spotting the woman stuttering between monsters, her blades and afterimages cutting deep into anything around her.

“Shara? You were supposed to be covering Lance,” Neela said, slowing just long enough to survey the fight.

“She’s fine, but we’ve got a bigger problem. The Tailcoats are here, and there are a lot of them,” Shara said as Neela scowled at the bad news. “Don’t worry though. I have a plan.”

*

Anad backpedaled as his blade flashed in front of him, each parry barely coming in time to deflect the deadly scythe. His cane-sheath had a dozen notches taken out of it from where it had met the Reaper’s weapon, while he had a long cut across his chest, another on his shoulder, and one down his right thigh where his suit’s protection had proved inadequate. And where he’d been too slow.

The Reaper, meanwhile, had a manic grin spread across its silver-geared face, like it was thoroughly enjoying the one-sided exchange.

Not that he could really blame it. It was basically just playing with him.

Twice Anad had managed to land a solid hit against the machine, and twice it had… rewound… back to where it had been a few seconds before, the damage completely gone like it had never happened. The only evidence it had even been there was its footprints in the charred earth.

I’m a goner if I can’t figure out how it’s doing that.

Anad’s eyes went briefly to the right side of the Reaper as his blade pushed the scythe out wide, and he darted in the other direction to put some room between them.

Something hurt it badly enough that it couldn’t repair itself. No arm, and its definitely favoring that right leg. What did that?

“That won’t work,” the Reaper said in its hollow, echoing voice, its scythe appearing perfectly to block Anad’s counter-attack lunge. “Neither will that,” it added, ducking as Anad whipped his cane around for the side of its head. “Come on. You can do better than that.”

Better than that? How? He was already pulling so hard on the Trance it was like he had Regulars pounding sledgehammers on his head with every heartbeat. Not to mention the Reaper could seemingly see what he was going to do before he did it.

Hrm. See? Maybe there is one thing I can try…

Anad feinted in with a low slash to the Reaper’s left side, forcing it to put weight on its good leg, which it easily parried, then he pushed the energy of his Trance into his blade. His sword flared silver, tendrils of the energy wafting off like thick smoke, and he quickly double-stepped back while sweeping his weapon up in front of him.

He didn’t aim to strike anything with the wide motions, but where his blade passed, a silver shimmer like a mirror hung in the air, obscuring him from the Reaper’s view. Up and down, left and right, he painted the air with the echo of energy from his Trance as he retreated and moved to the Reaper’s right. The hanging screen wouldn’t last long, not in ‘normal time’, but with how fast he and the Reaper were both moving, it would almost linger for an eternity to each of them as they fought between seconds.

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Anad fell into a sword-style akin to dancing as he spun and pivoted around the Reaper, the ribbon of light growing with every motion, but not just between them. No, he made sure to wind it around himself as well, creating a maze of light.

Another step to the Reaper’s right, and finally the thing made its move.

“Interesting tactic, but…” it started, then cut off abruptly as Anad hurled his cane through the hanging silver at the sound of its voice.

A telltale clang signalled it had parried the attack, but Anad was already dashing back to his right, hidden by the mirror-like ribbon. Not even a heartbeat later, the scythe cut through the screen of silver back where Anad had been at the same time his now-empty hand closed around the hilt of Mediator Hulo’s forgotten sword. Digging his right heel into the charred ground, Anad abruptly pulled up short, and twisted hard at the waist to snap both weapons back towards where the Reaper was standing.

Leading slightly with Hulo’s uninfused sword at shoulder height, the blade parted the hanging screen and raced for the Reaper’s throat. Inhumanely fast, the scythe came up to catch the weapon, and the Reaper started to grin, confident it had caught Anad’s blade, before it noticed the second sword, the infused one, hiding in the blind spot behind the first.

The scythe, such a dangerous and unpredictable shape compared to anything Anad had fought before, suddenly worked against the Reaper. Caught on Anad’s sword, the machine couldn’t disengage its weapon to block the second sword racing for it, and its weight was already on its good leg as Anad’s blade struck its side.

SCHIIIIING, Anad carved through the Reaper’s waist, the hanging mirror-like ribbon reflecting the surprise on its face as it looked down, and Anad caught a flare of pink from its right eye before it vanished.

Just like that, the Reaper’s metallic body was replaced by a pink outline, and the machine itself stepped out of the woods back onto the charred ground.

“Well, well, that certainly was better,” the Reaper said, very not cut in two like it should’ve been. “You’ve made killing time very entertaining.”

Anad flipped Mediator Hulo’s sword into a reverse grip, like he’d hold his cane-sheath, and brought both weapons up into defensive positions. “You keep mentioning killing time. What’s that about?” he asked. If the talkative machine wanted to give him a chance to catch his breath, that was fine with him.

“Hrm? Well, I guess I can tell you,” the Reaper said conspiratorially. “Your childhood friend has a somewhat annoying magic. Locked me away for years, and after everything I did for him too…” it said, raising the silver above its eye like somebody would raise an eyebrow.

“Tel?” Anad asked. “What did you do for Tel?”

“Oh, you know. The usual. Saved his life. Committed some casual murder together, starting with that orphanage you two grew up in. And that was just the beginning. We had a good run, me and him, though I guess I did most of the heavy lifting and he just tagged along. Then he got all ‘oh no, you have to stop killing people’ whiney with me,” the Reaper said. “Such a pity.”

Anad blinked at the Reaper’s words, his body suddenly frozen. “The orphanage?” he said. He hadn’t been back since the Mediators had taken him away, but the Reaper had to be lying.

“Yes, all dead. Slit their little throats and burned the building to the ground. Good times,” the Reaper said. “Fun as it was, that’s not really important. What matters now is that he’s spending all his energy helping those other useless sorcerers. And,” the Reaper cocked his head to the side like he was listening to something. “He’s just about used up all that power. Time for me to go pay him back for keeping me locked up like that. If you’ll excuse me.”

“Wait!” Anad said, stepping forward… but the Reaper was already gone.

Gone to kill Tel.

*

Tel dropped down to one knee, the raging energy scouring his body from the inside out taking its toll more and more with every tick of the massive clocks. His weapons fired non-stop at the monsters across the river, their automated systems needing little from him other than the constant stream of power he offered. At this point, he was barely more than a battery. One that had been practically drained. Still, he had to hold out a bit longer. Had to push aside the pain and fatigue. This was part of his penance.

“Just a little more,” he told himself, lifting his head to take stock of the battle by the river, but instead found himself staring at a familiar silver skull.

“Huh, I was honestly hoping for a bit more of a look of surprise. Maybe… fear? Instead, all I see is a weak, tired, coward,” the Reaper said, its voice sounding more hollow now that it wasn’t rattling around inside Tel’s skull. “Do you want to beg or something first?” it asked as it lifted its scythe up.

“I was beginning to wonder when you’d betray me,” Tel said, breathing heavily like he’d run a marathon. “Took you long enough.”

“You expected it and still let me out? Shows how much you needed me,” the Reaper said, then purposely looked to its left. “Maybe more than you realized.”

Tel followed the Reaper’s gaze and found the line of Tailcoats and Regulars rushing in his direction. Already some of them broke off to head towards the town, but most of them were angling straight for him.

“Just like Fork Valley, isn’t it?” the Reaper asked. “And before you ask, don’t worry. I plan on killing all of them too. For old time’s sake.”

“No,” Tel said, looking up to meet the gear-like pupils of the Reaper’s eyes. “No more killing from you. That ends today.”

“Oh, you think you can stop me? Like this?” the Reaper asked, but then scowled as its left eye glowed a fierce pink.

If Tel hadn’t been watching for it, he might have missed it, and it was the only warning he had before the Reaper lashed out with its scythe. The silver blade arced around for his neck to separate his head from his body, but stopped a fraction of an inch away from his skin as Tel gave a mental push.

Grimacing against the Reaper’s natural strength, Tel forced his magic to hold its body in place while he pulled on the energy of that left eye, a streamer like pink smoke leaking out. With another mental tug, Tel connected that smoky energy to the two large clocks on either side of him, and pushed himself to his feet as the second-hands halted, time pausing all across the field.

“There, now we have a minute without you trying to kill me,” Tel said, taking an involuntary step back from the scythe that had come dangerously close to ending him. That really had been too close, but now he just needed to finish what he started before the Reaper broke free.

“How?” the Reaper rasped out, even though Tel had its jaw locked in place.

“I blurred the future your left eye can see,” Tel said while focusing his energy on one last portal between him and the Reaper. Holding the monstrosity in place was already taking more energy than he’d expected, so the portal only crawled open. “Yes, I know about your left eye, that it can see the future, and about your right eye that can take you a short time into the past. On top of your other weapons, those eyes make you terrifying. And, don’t bother trying to rewind yourself right now, I’ve blocked that function.

“What, did you think I’d really spent the last six years hiding away for nothing? Didn’t you ever wonder why I joined the Clocksmiths to begin with? I knew I couldn’t keep you trapped forever. That I’d need a way to actually kill you. I found enough in the enclaves to piece together what I’d seen watching you kill for almost ten years. I know your kind destroyed most of the records of your creation, but the Clocksmiths were good at finding forbidden knowledge. Still, I wasn’t sure if you’d be able to rewind the damage I did to you before I put you in my head.

“I have to say, I’m relieved that wasn’t the case,” Tel said as the gears between them, in front of the Reaper’s head, spiraled open to reveal another portal. “I’d been trying to find the pieces in the enclaves to rebuild something like your eye, to test my theories, but nothing was advanced enough. I was almost out of options. Until today.

“Letting you out to fight the monsters and the Tailcoats gave me the readings I needed to confirm my theory,” he pointed at the giant clocks and their measurement devices, “and then it was just waiting for your predictable betrayal.

“Yes, I looked weak because I was saving the energy I needed to do this. Oh, and your arrogance wouldn’t let you see anything but the weak coward you thought I was,” Tel explained, a gun barrel pushing out of the portal to line up directly with the Reaper’s right eye.

Tel sighed. “Looks like you’ve been a bad influence on me, making me monologue like this. Or, maybe I just wanted you to know how you lost. Either way, it’s over now,” Tel said, pointing at the barrel of the gun. “Eighth Generation disassembler.”

Without another word, he’d already said too many, Tel gave a gentle mental push on the gun. A thin beam of soft blue shot out from the weapon and passed through the Reaper’s eye and head without doing any apparent damage. That was, until the components suddenly broke apart in a rush of silver sand that flowed out of the Reaper’s head to leave a perfectly cylindrical hole through its skull.

Pink flickered in the left eye… once, twice… and then went dark.

The Reaper’s body fell to the ground at the same time Tel did, completely drained, the second-hands of the giant clocks ticking back to life as the time-freeze faded.

On his hands and knees, Tel struggled to keep his machines running, but already they were beginning to flicker and fade. The larger APPs, the biggest drain on his magic at the moment, wobbled in the air, their blasts growing more infrequent with each passing second, and one even dropped out of the sky to hit the ground with a dull thud.

“Can’t leave… these… lying around,” Tel mumbled out loud to try and keep himself awake, then retracted the energy he was using to animate the APPs and put it towards stuffing them back in his dimensional space. The spheres vanished with little more than a pop, each dropping into a newly formed portal that opened beneath it, and their weight settled comfortably back inside Tel’s head.

Without the Reaper bound behind the door he’d erected in his mind, and the memories it forced him to relive, the dimensional space was almost peaceful. Gone were the constant whispers and reminders of the things he’d been part of. Those actions and his own regrets wouldn’t fade so easily, but at least the vengeful machine wouldn’t be able to weaponize them anymore.

With his thoughts on the Reaper, Tel turned his attention to the still body splayed out in front of him. A few quick probes with his magic confirmed all the machine’s systems were offline, and that the Reaper was well and truly dead. Still, like the APPs, he couldn’t leave it lying around for others to find, and completely destroying it would take far more power than he had at the moment.

Gritting his teeth and only hesitating for a moment, Tel opened another portal beneath the Reaper’s corpse and likewise dropped it into his dimensional space. As soon as it thudded in his mind, Tel braced for the Voice to come back, to poke and prod at old wounds, but nothing came out from behind the door, and he let out the breath he was holding.

Even though the APPs and Reaper were no longer draining his energy, Tel could still feel his limit quickly closing in, and he dropped to a sitting position. He could probably keep the weapons in the sky firing for a few more minutes, but the hounds would need to return to where they came from. A small wave of his hand and portals opened up beside the mechanical dogs. They each fired off a few parting shots, to give the sorcerers warning they were leaving, then bound through the portals to settle inside Tel’s mind.

Er… wait. Where were the sorcerers?

Tel scanned along the bank of the river, but all he saw were monsters getting pelted by his weapons. More monsters than he could possibly hold off by himself, especially now.

Where had…?

A hand dropped onto Tel’s shoulder, and he looked up to find Neela standing above him.

“Hold on to your lunch,” was all she said before his senses exploded out in a thousand different directions, and all his portals closed with a sound like fireworks.