Purpose

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GlytchMeister
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

Moments later, Brandi made a triumphant exclamation and poked at the holographic map of the library. The Library's instantaneous transport system immediately scanned the trio and 'vorped' them to the destination Brandi had selected.
The sensation was completely different from the wormhole teleportation the three were used to. Whereas the 'poit' was instant and sensationless, 'vorping' caused a sensory overload that generally registered as tingling, ringing ears, and tasting metal.
"Woah," Monica shifted her weight back and forth between her feet to get the pins and needles feeling out. "Why didn't you just poit us?"
"This was more accurate..." Brandi reached out and grabbed a book exactly in front of her at eye level. "See? Just what we needed." It was plainly ancient, but not nearly as old as it should have been. Monica guessed someone might have tried to swat a fly with it at some point.
"What's that?" Tepoz poited onto Brandi's shoulder to get a better view.
"Notes written by a Jaguar Girl who got Alzheimer's. She didn't have the ability to reset her age, but she did have a vastly increased lifespan." Brandi flipped through the pages, which were mostly filled with dates, names, illustrations, and other details of the random day-to-day life of an ancient Jaguar Girl. Then Brandi found a section that was absolutely packed edge-to-edge with complex instructions. "Well, here are the guided meditations and physical incantations."
"Physical incantations?" Monica furrowed her brow. "What, do I have to dance or something?"
Brandi tilted her head side to side. "Ehhh... Not quite," Brandi led them to a reading table nearby and sat down, leaning close to the book. "It's more like... Yoga? Or tai chi? It's a set of movements and actions designed to help your mind get into the right state to initiate a Deathwalk."
"Well, it's no real use to you." Monica sat, smirking as Brandi slid the book to her, and began to read. Occasionally she would close her eyes to imagine a complex motion. On her third time doing this, Tepoz gasped.
"What?" Monica asked, irritated. Her concentration had been shattered.
"You went all... Foggy." Tepoz gaped at Monica. "I could through your thinner parts."
"You've read that same set of instructions several times." Brandi stood from the table. "Time to clear some room for you to start the motions. You've ready gotten close to the proper state."
Monica nodded and stood, and the three of them pushed and poited tables and chairs out of the way.
Once she had enough space, Monica began to go through the forms. She was unsteady at first and had to break the pattern to consult the book several times. However, after a few minutes and with Brandi helping by reading the forms aloud from the book, Monica soon entered the hazy state as before.
Then she took a deep, slow breath in... and, with a "HRAUGH!", a small burst of astral fire obscured her briefly as she shifted into her Jaguar Girl state.
The effect was very strange. Normally, Monica had an extreme presence as the Jaguar Girl, but her Deathwalk made it seem like she was barely there at all.
Glassy-eyed, she held out her hands, beckoning Brandi and Tepoz closer. "Hold on," Monica's voice sounded both amplified and very far away.
Brandi grabbed her hand and Tepoz poited into her outstretched palm, sat cross-legged, and grabbed her ring and middle fingers like reigns.
The moment they made contact, Monica solidified while the world around them went blurry and grey. Tepoz and Brandi stared about.
"The book said 'the first step is always a doozy. Let's see what that's supposed to mean." Monica lifted one foot off the ground and planted it in front of her.
But her foot did not reach the library floor. It reached a soft, dark, black ground.
Brandi experienced the unique feeling of traveling an infinite distance in a single step. The dizzying sensation almost brought her to her knees.
Tepoz didn't fare so well. He completely fell off of Monica's hand, landing with a small puff of ash and dust.
"Wuhuuuaaaargh... Somebody make the world stop spinning, please..." His feeble voice was muffled, as he lay facedown in the dirt, occasionally twitching.
"Where are we?" Brandi said once she recovered.
Monica looked around, her face reflecting the displeasure she felt toward their new location. "Xibalba. The Greeks called it Tatarus. The Abrahamic Theologies know it as Hell. I hope we don't spend too much time here."
"Why?"
Tepoz, moving suspiciously slowly, pushed himself out of the ashen dirt. "Because a lot of people here have a serous beef with you, Bud, and Jin." He poited to Monica's shoulder as the ash began to stir. "We need to move."
Brandi snarled and her eyes lit up as a spindly hand made of the ash wrapped its fingers around her ankle. Her kick powdered it again, but it soon reformed.
Tepoz grabbed a lock of Monica's hair and spoke into her ear with an uncharacteristically hard voice. "Now."
There was an unmistakable undercurrent of fear in his tone.
Monica growled, grabbed Brandi by her forearm, and surged forward.
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
Starts to glitch in my clutch!
I'm too much!
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lake_wrangler
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Re: Purpose

Post by lake_wrangler »

Beautiful, interesting, captivating, believable...

(Let's just hope this doesn't all comes falling apart the first time Paul has Monica use some of the more esoteric powers of the Jaguar Girl...)
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GlytchMeister
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

The ashes of Lanthis rise howling
Grabbing, splitting, gripping, and biting
Burned by fury of three women's scorn
We stir our madness and are reborn


The ghastly, hollow, discordant roar continued to rant from the scorched remains of the maddened, evil souls the Chimera had obliterated so abruptly. Above flew clouds of wrathful anger, pelting the harried trio with small chunks of burned bodies. Below them, clawing out of the dirt, were hands and feet, grasping at the surface with greedy, blackened bones as they struggled to assemble themselves into the forms that now surrounded the visitors, shuffling and sprinting with horrific gaits and limps in constant pursuit of one of the three women who made them as they were: burnt so completely their very souls were destroyed. Only by sheer force of will, fueled by the madness from both their lives and the insanity caused by their obliterated soul ash mixing, losing their individuality, were they able to coalesce and find their way to this forsaken corner of the Underworld.

Our great creation did betray us
Flaming tooth, claw, and hate cremate us
Melting the rock and bending the earth
Without mercy did she drive us forth


The damned choir grew ever louder. The sound rattled Monica's teeth and pounded on her head. Brandi was sobbing even as she ran. Tepoz had lost all traces of his usual good humor. His face was completely still, fixed in an expression of stern determination.

A large knot of burned shades of madness fell upon them from the right. They instantly enveloped Brandi and began to pummel, claw, and bite her, largely ignoring Monica.
"I'm sorry! I wasn't in control! You made me into that monster!" Brandi wailed from within the writhing mass of blackened shades. Monica dove in, snarling and flaming, and slowly dragged Brandi out of the pile. Brandi was covered in soot, which coalesced into fingers and teeth and fell off as Brandi moved.
"There!" Tepoz pointed at the crest of a hill. An obsidian archway stood atop it, and a ruddy light shined from within.
Monica nodded and lunged forward, keeping a tight hold on Brandi.
The traumatized golem was now simply following along, her eyes dull and her movements clumsy. Tepoz poited to her shoulder and began to speak quickly into her ear.
Soon, new life entered her and she regained strength, and Tepoz continued his stream of words, working to reassure her and keep her from falling into dangerous levels of emotions.
Monica forged onward, pushing through the seemingly endless army of insanity. She couldn't poit directly to the portal, the ashen throng would likely be caught in the teleport, and she didn't want to risk bringing them straight to the portal. So she pushed forward, using her free hand and astral fire to throw the vindictive abominations out of the way.

Through Void we drifted, pain unceasing
Through Styx we swam, out hate undying
We found our way to lay patiently
In waiting for you to visit me


It was nearly an hour before they reached the portal. Monica roughly threw Brandi into the archway, and she disappeared. All traces of soot still clinging to her were unable to follow, and the animated black dust rebounded off the surface of the portal and fell to the ground.
The ghastly legion howled and cursed as their target escaped them, and promptly fell apart, returning to the ground like dust settling.

Monica doubled over and retched. She remained there, standing in front of the portal, as the final echoes of the horrifying song faded. Finally, she stood up straight, took a few deep breaths to calm her racing heart, and went through the portal.
Last edited by GlytchMeister on Tue Jul 28, 2015 9:05 pm, edited 1 time in total.
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
Starts to glitch in my clutch!
I'm too much!
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GlytchMeister
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

The other side wasn't much better.
Monica instantly knew where she was. "The Hot House..." She muttered to herself. Turning around, she read an inscription on the dark portal she had just come through. The arch was covered in markings, each one in a different language. One was written Maya. It named the realm within as "The Bat House." Other inscriptions gave the place different names, most of which alluded to the insane nature of those interred inside.
Monica turned away, pushing the Ashes of Lanthis out of her mind. Brandi was on her hands and knees, trembling. Tepoz stood in front of her, muttering and crooning softly to her. A small puddle of boiling tears was collecting below Brandi's down-turned face. Her clothes were smoking. Tepoz's outfit was also beginning to smoke.
Monica made a move to approach, but Tepoz thrust a hand out, signaling her to stay away. He continued to speak softly to Brandi. Eventually, she stopped trembling, and Tepoz beckoned toward Monica.
She moved slowly and knelt by Brandi's side, and put a gentle hand on the Golem's back. Eventually, Brandi straightened, sniffing, and took a few deep breaths. She looked at Monica with bloodshot eyes, and Monica felt an upwelling of pity in her heart and tears in her eyes. The two simultaneously hugged, and they sat there, comforting each other as best as they could, for several minutes.
Finally, they broke the embrace and stood. Brandi's left tank top strap fell apart, charred by the intense heat. Her bra, however, didn't seem affected. Brandi looked down and smiled. "Lydia sure knows her stuff," she sniffed. "It's made of spider silk. Very hard to damage."
Monica laughed a bit, relieved that Brandi's mind was still sound. "Yeah, I told you she could work wonders." She looked around and saw several familiar sights, including Sisyphus and his boulder on his hill. It was the highest point in the area. "Over there. I bet we'll be able to see where to go or at least someone to ask from that hill."
Tepoz nodded. "Maybe the guy with the rock could help."
The three of them poited next to Sisyphus and Brandi, without asking, immediately began to hold the rock up for him, granting the tortured soul his first reprieve in thousands of years.
"No tricks, got it?" Monica spoke sternly to the dead king.
"Of course not," Sisyphus replied in an oily voice. "Don't you think I've learned my lesson by now?" Monica had the distinct impression Sisyphus would be an excellent used car salesman.
"No. But if you try to screw us, Brandi here will get you so turned around you won't know which way to roll this boulder."
"All I really have to do is blind you and destroy your inner ears. Shouldn't be too hard, really." Brandi looked at the boulder and adjusted her grip. "I can also make this thing bigger and denser. You wouldn't want that, now would you?"
Sisyphus slumped, his face going pale. "Fine." His voice turned bitter. "What do you want?"
"We need directions to the Hole, and preferably someone to help us get there without constantly getting attacked."
Sisyphus stroked his chin for a moment, thinking. "The best option would be one of the bosses. Hades is probably your best bet. Last time I saw him he was flying back to his castle. You'll want to head downhill. You'll eventually start seeing gems and stuff poking out of the ground. See the sparkly area way out there?" He turned and pointed past Brandi. "That's where it starts."
"Thanks." Brandi suddenly let to of the boulder and let it crash down on Sisyphus. It bowled him over, and kept rolling until it reached the bottom.
"Yeah, sure. Whatever." Sisyphus stood and went after his boulder.
The trio set off again, now at a much faster pace. The damned souls here did not bother them, preoccupied as they were with their various tortures.
The heat was intolerable. Even Brandi and Tepoz were irritated by it. Monica kept cycling through rebirth and death every few seconds. It wasn't all fire and lava, either. The smoke was thick and laced with various toxins, and the air was heavy and sticky with humidity. Sweat didn't evaporate. It clung to Monica, matting her fur and getting in her eyes and nose. The oily smoke mixed with her sweat to make a disgusting black mud that weighed her down.
Heat haze rose from every surface, and ghostly mirages puddled all around them, blurring the line between the ground and the eternally black sky.
Finally, they reached the gem plains. The heat was all the more intense here. Molten rock flowed like water. Twisting vortices of fire writhed high into the sky. Razor sharp crystals and bladed shards were the only solid objects to stand on. Tepoz's size suited him well, as he could find purchase on surfaces far too small for Brandi or Monica. He went on ahead, carefully scampering and teleporting, until he found a large enough crystal for the girls to stand on, then teleported them to his side.
The Blade House... Monica thought sluggishly.
They continued in this fashion for what seemed like an eternity. Monica died and was reborn several more times, in quicker succession than before.
Finally, Tepoz found a yawning, circular pit rimmed by granite. The three of them stared down into the abyss, apprehensive.
"Do you think Sisyphus..." Monica panted.
"No..." Brandi wiped her brow. Even she was feeling the heat. "And I don't think this is the Hole they sent John to."
"Only one way to find out," Tepoz leaned against Monica's calf, rubbing gunk from his eye. "Jump."
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
Starts to glitch in my clutch!
I'm too much!
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GlytchMeister
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

For some reason, Monica was feeling fear. She was afraid of jumping.
She knew she was made of sterner stuff than your average human. In all likelihood, she wouldn't even roll her ankle upon landing. And even of she did splat, she'd just light on fire and resurrect herself.
No big deal.
So why am I so afraid to jump?
She glanced at Brandi. Her face was also fearful.
Then she smelled it.
It was just a whiff. But it was distinct. And, most unusually, it was familiar.
It was the smell of meat going bad in the freezer. She never really smelled it as a human, but after her transformation, she smelled a bag of ground beef in her freezer going bad. It took her quite some time to finally find the stupid thing.
Down there is the Cold House. And if Dante had any real experience, this is where Satan would be. And I'd bet my britches if he really did have real knowledge, he saw Kronos down there.
Brandi took a deep breath. "I... Don't like it. I don't know why."
Tepoz nodded. "I'm definitely getting a bad vibe, too."
"We don't have much choice. If we're going to find someone to get us to the Hole, we need to keep moving." Monica stepped forward, planting her left foot of the brink. "If nothing else, we can cause enough trouble and make enough noise to get someone's attention." With a growl, she pushed herself to jump, despite many primal parts of her brain screaming at her to run away very fast.
She chose to dive feet first. She crossed her legs, locking her ankles together to keep the wind from whipping her legs into a painful surprise split, and held her arms out to keep herself upright.
Brandi followed behind, diving head first. Tepoz clung to her hair, eyes squinched shut against the wind.
Their plummet took them deep into the pit. The farther they fell, the colder it became. Soon, the muck that clung to Monica's fur froze, giving her an almost reptilian appearance. Brandi's scales flaked away, lacking fur to anchor it to her skin.
Monica looked up, past Brandi, and noticed how dim the fires above them seemed to be. They must have been traveling extremely fast to have covered so much distance, far faster than a human's terminal velocity.
Brandi's eye lights turned on as she too began to smell what Monica had caught wind of at the rim. To Monica, the odor was strong enough to make her eyes water. She looked down and her own eyes lit up, just in time to see a rapidly approaching ground.
BOOM
...
BOOM
Their impact excavated a small crater around each of them, and clods of frozen dirt and ash rained down on them for several seconds.
Monica screamed in agony and Brandi rushed to her. "What?! What happen- oh, gods..." Brandi went pale at the sight.
Nearly every bone below Monica's belly button had shattered, and hundreds of shards were poking out from her crushed legs and hips. Her feet looked like meatloaves with crushed gravel mixed in. "Ok, hold on, M..." Brandi bent over and grasped her friend's head, one hand on her chin, the other just behind the crown of her skull.
With a sudden pull and twist, Monica's neck snapped. A moment later, flame enveloped her body and she was restored. "Jeezus friggin' Christ, that hurt..." Monica groaned and picked herself up off the ground. "We fell way faster than we should have."
"Do you smell that?" Brandi stood and looked around.
Monica nodded. "I could smell it up at the top. Apparently I get a bit of a jaguar nose when I turn. It's frozen, rotting meat."
"Gross. I wonder what it was."
Tepoz pointed to a hulking structure in the distance. "I think it's that."
Monica squinted, trying to understand what she was seeing. The object was immense and oddly shaped for a building. There was a misshapen lump on top, two bulky flying buttresses on the sides...
"That's not a castle." Monica gasped, apalled. "That's a body."

A voice spoke behind them, evoking sensations of dread, exhilaration, revulsion, and attraction all at once. "It's my father."
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
Starts to glitch in my clutch!
I'm too much!
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GlytchMeister
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

Monica and Brandi whipped around to face the source of the voice. Monica even went so far as to conjure some flames in her clawed hands.
Tepoz, however, turned slowly, his posture relaxed and relief evident on his face. "Pleasure to see you. You must be Hades. Or is it Pluto?"
The god of the underworld shrugged. He wore a finely tailored suit. It would have inspired envy in James Bond. Around him was a whirling cloud of souls, bound in servitude to their King for eternity as penance for enslaving their peers in life. His skin was white, his eyes were black, and all of his teeth were pointed. "Either name is acceptable." Hades stared at each of them in turn, first into their eyes until they broke and looked away, then looking them up and down.
He started at Tepoz, who held the God's gaze for a long moment. "Tepoztecal the proto-Golem. Mayahuel's little blue experiment. You and Dionysus would get along excellently, I think."
He moved on to Brandi. She looked away almost immediately. "Brandi Oduya. The Lioness. The Deal Maker. The Defender."
Finally, he turned his gaze to Monica. They locked eyes for a full two minutes. The corners of Hades' lips twitched with a hint of a smile as their wills clashed. Eventually, Monica conceded, but she had made her point.
"Monica Villareal. The Sub-Titan, Jaguar Girl, Pheonix-blooded, Glyph-reading, Demon shepherd. Patron to the Chimeric Golems. Savior of the Timekeeper's Daughter. The Fifth Light." Hades spread his arms. "Welcome to my kingdom. To what do I owe the pleasure for your visit?"
Monica took the lead. "We are here as instructors for John Smith. I understand he is currently contained in the Hole?"
Hades nodded. "Just in time, too. His abilities were building so fast had we waited any longer, he would have destroyed the entrance to the Hole as he went through. As it is, he severely weakened it. The inertial stabilization engine is destabilized, the time rate has been decelerated to the point of almost matching our realities, and the folds in space within almost flattened out completely."
"How?!?" Tepoz poited onto Monica's head to get closer to eye level with the King of the Dead.
"He absorbed enough Dark Matter and Dark Energy from the six singularities to throw everything out of balance. I've sent the Furies and Thanatos out to fetch some neutron stars to make repairs. Fortunately for you three, the portal is useable."
"Is there another way to get there besides going through..." Brandi shuddered.
"Ah... You were brought here by Monica? Yes, she would arrive in that area. I apologize." Hades shook his head sorrowfully. "Those... Abominations are beyond me. I cannot help nor dispose of them. There are ways to get here, however. I will show you a portal to my abode you may use. Come." He brushed past them and made for the frozen, wasting corpse of his father.
The trio followed apprehensively, staring at the misshapen head, watching carefully for any sign of movement.
As they approached, the stench of the rotting Titan grew to be overpowering. "How do you cope with this gawd-awful stink?" Monica coughed.
"Out of necessity. Besides, if he didn't stink, it would be a supremely bad sign." Hades lunged forward, his flight sustained by the souls he commanded. The trio poited after him to keep up.
As they approached, torches and braziers glowing with blue flame winked and flamed into existence, bathing the immense corpse in cold light.
Kronos, Hades's castle, was about the most terrifying thing Monica had ever laid eyes on.
The flesh had been mummified by the bone-chilling temperatures and the dry air. The skin was taut and leathery where it was intact. The face was mangled, and a large chunk of the Titan's head had been blasted apart. The arms were torn away at the shoulders, exposing the white, round ball of the shoulder. They remained connected to the torso by solid, clear, blue ice. The ribcage and sternum had been ripped from his chest and torso, leaving a gaping, red cavern yawning overhead. The ribs formed watchtowers, webbed by frozen flesh making walls as hard as iron. Black granite and steel anchored and reinforced the whole thing. The entire structure was about the most impregnable fortress Monica could imagine, guarded even from the air by the slumped, empty chest cavity.
"Where are his organs?" Brandi whispered, more to herself than anything.
Hades chuckled, and the sound echoed onto itself, sending shivers down everyone's spines that had nothing to do with the temperature. "They are sealed in canoptic jars custom forged by Hephaestus from the strongest materials he could get those callused hands on. Brute force cannot open them. Not even Bia could dent them. The puzzle locks involve six-dimensional shapes that utilize displacements in time, space, and even warpings of the very mathematics of several planes of reality. They are quite literally impossible."
"Woah..." Brandi stared at Hades with newfound respect. Monica was too busy trying to comprehend how a lock could involve bent math and six dimensions.
"He's still alive, of course. He's just so damaged and so cold he can't do anything about it."
"He's still alive?!?" Monica gasped, staring into the eyes of the Titan of Time.
"Oh, yes. Kronos is quite impossible to kill. Even if we did, who knows what effects his death would have on the flow of Time."
Monica stopped cold. The eyes were looking at her.
"He's... He's looking at me..."
Hades was unfazed. "He does that. Usually he just glares at me, but new people catch his attention every once in a while. Don't worry. Even if he did, somehow, let slip the various layers of defense I've placed around his body and organs, and even if he managed to somehow summon the chunk of his brain from the Hole, we still have those." Hades pointed up at the walls of the pit. Monica could just barely make out long, thin objects lining them.
"The Chains." Tepoz said aloud, awestruck.
"The moment any movement is detected beyond his eyes, they will descend upon him, binding him tighter than any other force."
"Why aren't they in place now?" Brandi asked, an eyebrow raised.
Hades snorted. "The chains harness the four fundamental forces of the universe. The power they require drains the entire Underworld. I suppose the closest approximation you can understand would be something like a brown-out of every power grid on the planet."
"So... Powering the Chains is a pain in the ass, is what your saying."
Hades reached the porticullis, which were Kronos' two front teeth, and opened them with a lazy wave of his hand. "In essence, yes."
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
Starts to glitch in my clutch!
I'm too much!
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GlytchMeister
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

Beyond the gate, the interior of the castle was a mixture of red and gold. Kronos's flesh was a dark red, but the blood vessels and the blood that had spilled out and frozen was gold. The ground was covered in the frozen ichor. Immense Persian rugs were thrown haphazardly around, breaking the bright monotony of the hard, cold ground. A diminutive black Cerebus lifted it's heads to consider the three new visitors, licked it's chops lazily, and went back to snoozing.
"That's not... the Cerebus, is it?" Tepoz stared at the small beast. "It's no bigger than a Great Dane!"
Hades shook his head. "Of course not, Tepoztecal. That's a toy breed. She's actually a bit of a runt, really. Couldn't find any use for her, so she gets to live here. She's cute, though, so I don't mind. And she's an excellent foot warmer."
Monica struggled to see how the immense three-headed dog they were talking about could possibly be a cute runt. The beast's teeth were as big as her thumbs.
They made their way toward Kronos' spine. A sweeping spiral staircase made of onyx, jet, obsidian, silver, and platinum wound around the vertebrae. The Titan's spinal cord was severed between every single bone to make way for landings for each revolution of the staircase.
Brandi was clearly impressed. "Almost every aspect of the architecture does at least one thing to make Kronos' return more difficult."
"Two, actually." Hades started up the stairs. "This staircase both severs the spinal cord over and over as well as immobilizes the vertebrae. If he tries to move his spine, his bones will break before the stairs do. Not that he could, what with him being paralyzed."
They ascended five floors before taking a landing. This floor was carved from a single massive slab of obsidian. The surface had been meticulously detailed with a continuous pattern of wood grain. The trio took a moment to admire the craftsmanship before catching up with Hades, who led them to the left edge of the platform. Hanging from an ornate "T" shaped stand fluttered a very familiar tapestry. It was woven with the same technique as the one Katherine had found, and even the image was very similar.
"No way." Tepoz shook his head, baffled. "That was destroyed years ago!"
Hades' lips twitched again with a slight smile. "Not this pair. Close inspection will reveal this tapestry operates on a different frequency than the one you are familiar with. I've also had to make some adjustments, so it would continue to function through the Void.
"Where's the other one?" Brandi asked, leaning close to the tapestry for a better look.
"It's in a very cooperative Swiss Bank. The vault this one is in is located in their hollowed mountain. The price is astronomical, but I get what I pay for." Hades walked a short distance away, his hands clasped imperiously behind his back. "This will be your mode of transport between the Land of the Living and the here, unless you happen to enjoy being attacked by hordes of maddened, cremated abominations. To each their own. Now, I shall take you to Charon. I don't have time to be your soccer mom forever. When you come through the tapestry, you will be able to teleport to his dock, and he will arrive shortly to take you to the Hole. Come nearer, so I don't have to reach."

The trio drew within arm's length of Hades, and his whirling shroud of slave souls enveloped them as well. They flew faster, blurring into a single, opaque wall. Then Hades drew an ornate black helm from seemingly nowhere and put it on. He vanished in an instant, then the souls dissipated to reveal a bleached-white dock of bones extending from a black shore into an even blacker river. Hades was gone.
Far downstream, a green light appeared and began to bob toward the dock.
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
Starts to glitch in my clutch!
I'm too much!
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GlytchMeister
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

"Isn't there a nice part of the Underworld?" Tepoz whined upon seeing Charon's skeletal ferry.
"I hear Necropolis isn't too bad." Brandi smirked.
Tepoz grumbled, shaking his head.
"If you're looking for Paradise, you're on the wrong side of the tracks." Charon's voice slithered and clacked through the thick, stale air. "You are in the realm of the dead. Paradise is the realm of the afterliving." He motioned for them to come aboard as the spinal gangplank thunked down onto the dock. "Hurry, before the others return and begin the repairs. I doubt you want to let John sit in the hole for millennia."
The trio filed on board and the ferry lurched as the hundreds of legs began to paddle at the water, obeying Charon's wordless command.
"How do we get into the Hole?" Brandi asked, leaning against a rail.
"How else? You fall in. The Styx will take us close enough for you to see the edge from the deck." Charon chewed on a fingerbone thoughtfully. "I believe the singularities are still stable enough to make sure you don't go in wrong. I doubt even you could survive that, Golem." Charon's voice became rather sharp at the end of his answer.
Brandi looked away at the last word, staring into the Styx. Tepoz poited and sat on the rail next to her right hand, facing her, and placed his tiny hand on hers.
"Hey, watch your jaw, boatman." Monica raised her chin at the towering captain. Tepoz chesting up to Phix would have been a similar sight.
Charon, however, bowed his head. "My apologies. My job is to ferry souls across the Styx. What the Chimera did had... An effect... on us all down here. I lost quite a lot of pay, Hades was very upset... And then the Abominations polluted the Styx. But you are not the Chimera. Nor should I treat you as such."
Brandi nodded mutely, focusing more on Tepoz than anything.
Charon steered the ferry through a set of rapids, passing an immense crustacean claw as he did. The unexpected smell of cooked lobster lingered in the air.
"I hope somebody does something about that." Charon muttered. "Wouldn't want some industrious soul making a raft out of that."
"What happened?" Monica gaped at the remnants of the aircraft-carrier-sized claw, which was slowly sinking into the silt
"Some dumb Karkinos didn't like how fast I was going and tried to eat us. John cooked it from the inside out. Pretty neat trick. Smelled good, too."
They sailed in silence for the rest of the trip. Charon only spoke when they got to the bend in the Styx that was closest to the edge of The Hole. "Keep going that direction," Charon pointed with one hand, "and you'll eventually see the edge. Just fall in, the gravity will do the rest of the work."
The three poited ashore as Charon passed, waving a bony arm. "Good luck with him!" His voice slid through the air as he faded into the distance.
They turned and began to walk.
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
Starts to glitch in my clutch!
I'm too much!
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

The three visitors trudged through the bleak realm. They didn't dare poit, for fear of overshooting the brink and falling into the emptiness.
Every step served to make them less motivated to take another step.
The monotony was the worst. The ground was black. The sky... Or whatever was actually above them... Was black. The light from Monica and Brandi's eyes barely illuminated themselves.
The darkness was... Thicker than the kind on earth. Monica remembered finding Tina's Dia de Los Muertos doll; her eye lights were as bright as a pair of big maglights.
Now, they weren't even as bright as matchflames.
A seeming eternity later, the three finally found the edge. They go onto their hands and knees and crawled up to the edge. Tepoz hung back, ready to poit the girls to his side should they slip.
Brandi peered over the edge first, and felt a twinge of fear.
Below her, twelve titanic cosmological anomalies struggled against each other's power, dancing around another singularity that dwarfed their combined intensity. The smaller black and white holes seemed to be at once playing and dancing... And fighting and devouring one another in a multi-directional ouroboros.
"We have to just... fall into that?" Monica whispered. Her fur was standing on end. Not that it did much, most of her fur was very short.
Brandi studied the movements of the objects, squinting and furrowing her brow.
Her finger began to trace a series of incomprehensible symbols and complex graphs into the black dirt under her, and she mouthed even more calculations as she worked the arithmetic through her mind.
Then, she stood and began to tap her foot to some unheard beat. Monica looked between her tapping foot and the mess below them, trying, unsuccessfully, to understand.
Once Brandi got the beat down, she spoke. "I'm timing for when to jump. If we get it right, we can get through without being subjected to too much pain."
"And if we get it wrong?" Monica stood apprehensively, spreading her arms out for balance.
"You'll wish you weren't immortal. Even I will feel that kind of stress." There was a deadly serious set to Brandi's face.
Tepoz was visibly frightened by Brandi's last statement. "You'll feel it? I don't want to find out how I'll fare in that!"
Monica scooped Tepoz up with a single hand and held him at eye level. "Can you think of anybody better for this job?"
Tepoz looked her dead in the eye. "...yes."
Monica rolled her eyes and turned to Brandi. "Can I throw him in yet?"
Brandi shook her head. "We need to go in all at once. Here, my hair is easier to hold onto." She took Tepoz and deposited him unceremoniously into her curly hair. "Hold on tight."
Tepoz wrapped a few locks around each hand and wrist, securing him in place. He nodded curtly, indicating he was ready.
Monica nodded at Brandi, who was still tapping her foot. She began to snap her fingers to keep the beat as she walked forward, placing her toes right on the edge. "Ten, nine, eight, seven," she started a countdown, and Monica got the hint.
On your mark.
Monica mimicked Brandi, putting her toes on the brink, even snapping to keep the beat.
"Three, two, one, NOW!"
They jumped, rocketing outward from the cliff. The force of their leap cracked rocks beneath their feet.
Then, a brief moment of weightlessness, followed by a gut-wrenching drop as gravity began to pull them inexorably toward The Hole.
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
Starts to glitch in my clutch!
I'm too much!
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

The fall was actually quite pleasant. It felt like a massage that was happening to their entire bodies, inside and out, all at once. Monica worked out several knots she doubted the best masseuse on earth could have gotten to. Her back popped in places it had never popped before, causing her to cry out in a strange mixture of pain, relief, and pleasure.
Brandi's expression indicated she was feeling about the same thing; her eyes were closed and she was smiling in a pleasant, almost meditative way.
Tepoz was screaming like a little baby. He must have been poiting air into his lungs to keep his scream going for that long.
They plummeted faster and faster as the air became thinner. Brandi tilted into a dive and motioned Monica closer.
Monica obeyed, getting as close as she could. Brandi reached out and pulled Monica into a tight hug. Then Monica began to feel tiny, almost imperceptible changes in their speed and direction.
She's correcting our cou- "OOMPH!"
Gravitational waves rocked through them, bending her bones to the point of breaking. The girls craned her necks to behold six neutron stars being towed in from an immense portal opened far in the distance.
The singularities all simultaneously twitched in response to the gargantuan disturbance. Even the huge one below was nudged slightly.
Brandi began a series of poits, each one carrying the trio hundreds of lightyears as she struggled to maintain a safe course. A bad entry would hurt Brandi, but Monica could be ripped apart several times. Tepoz probably wouldn't survive.
I have to get us in before they start swinging those things into position!
She jumped them around the tortured spacetime, avoiding the immense gravitational conflicts as best as she could. Tepoz stopped screaming. Brandi caught him just before his grip failed.
Monica's bones and muscles were frequently tested to the limit. She began to scream as pain wracked her body.
Brandi spun them around to get a clear view of what was happening with the neutron stars.
Shit.
They were already being put into position.
Brandi screwed up her face against a jolt of pain as a particularly strong spacetime stress rocketed up her leg, and she poited them to safety just before it reached Tepoz's limp form.
"I'm taking a shortcut!" Brandi roared. Monica nodded weakly.
Brandi glared at the large central singularity, sucked in a breath, and made the single longest-distance poit she had ever done, dwarfing the distance between earth and the Library.
It almost took a noticeable amount of time to complete.
They emerged from the wormhole and were momentarily blinded by the photosphere, just before they were plunged into absolute darkness.
They floated, Brandi holding them both close and tight. Her eye lights barely illuminated them. Tepoz had turned into a statue. His locked face was contorted with fear.
Monica groaned. "Kill me, please."
Brandi shuddered and obeyed, snapping Monica's neck once again.
Astral fire lit the area for a brief moment before Monica finished regenerated. Not that it did anything. There was nothing for the light to bounce off of.
"That actually felt kinda nice at the beginning. What happened?" Monica mumbled, rubbing her neck.
"The neutron stars arrived. Threw off my calculation. I had to guess our distance from the event horizon. If I hadn't gotten it right, I could have messed up the link between that monster black hole and... Well... Here."
"But we got in, right? Tepoz, how're ya doin?" Monica coughed, a grim smile on her face.
"He's a statue now." Brandi explained. "Must've reverted to that to stay alive."
"Give him here. I got this." Monica took Tepoz, looked at his back, and read aloud. "He will bring it, you will drink it."
FSHZAK!
"Owwwwie... How long was I out?" Tepoz grumbled.
"About three million years. You need your hearing checked. Bud and I've been screaming at you every year." Brandi smirked.
"WHAT?" Tepoz flailed around as Brandi let him go. "Hey, uh... Woah... Wha... Where..."
"Earth got obliterated. We've been stuck like this for a while now." Monica giggled.
"Monica? How are you... You're messing with me, aren't you? You oversized shitheads!" Tepoz shook a tiny fist at them. "We made it to The Hole, didn't we? Please tell me we made it."
Monica and Brandi stopped laughing long enough to confirm they made it. "At least, we think so." Brandi added, coughing.
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
Starts to glitch in my clutch!
I'm too much!
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

"It seems I may have one last job to do, whelp." Gibil drifted closer to John, cloaked in flames and wreathed in power. He appeared far younger than before.
"That little tantrum cost me several thousand millennia. I've been trying to get rid of energy, and now you come along and pump me full of it." He grabbed John by his throat. "What?"
The boy's flesh was no hotter than a normal human. Gibil cursed and oathed in several ancient languages. The Hole had reacted to the idiot, and it drained him to within an inch of his life.
The boy was changing quickly. A normal human temperature caused him to act like he's been in the cold ocean for too long. He power was growing fast... But so too were his weaknesses.
The grumpy god set his jaw and shut his eyes tight, placing one hand on John's heart and the other on John's brow.
Gibil inhaled quickly, then slowly and deliberately exhaled, pushing his own heat into John.
The familiar chill and the aches and pains of old age returned to Gibil's body.
As John's body warmed up again, Gibil frowned. If there were others coming, he'd have to make the youngster presentable.
Gibil concentrated, and The Hole obeyed, weaving a cloak from the darkness and wrapping John's nude form in it.

Then, the darkness shuddered. Gibil listened hard, and he heard a faint sound... Of young women laughing?
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
Starts to glitch in my clutch!
I'm too much!
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

Brandi and Monica fell silent as a shudder went through the reality surrounding them.
"What was that?" Tepoz looked around, his eyes wide.
Brandi frowned. "Must be caused by the singularities being repaired." She peered into the darkness. "Hello? John, can you hear me?"
"Down here! Or perhaps up, it's all relative. Ach, sod it... This way!" An incredibly old and tired-sounding voice gave the reply.
The three exchanged worried glances. How long has he been waiting?
Tepoz poited them in front of the old man. Another figure, cloaked in black, floated aimlessly nearby.
"Um... Are you John?" Monica spoke nervously.
"What? Me? Pfha! No, I'm Gibil. John's the dummy floating over there."
Brandi tried to turn in the weightless environment with little success.
Gibil scowled and rolled his eyes. "You can will some ground into existence. Honestly, at this rate, I'm going to have to ask someone to start printing travel pamphlets."
"Oh, it's one of those! I got it!" Tepoz concentrated for a moment and a large, smooth platform with railings, blocky chairs, and a slab on which John was gently deposited weaved into existence.
Gibil raised an eyebrow. "Had some practice, hmm?"
Tepoz shrugged, though a hint of a grin belied his satisfaction at one-upping the old god.
The four walked to John, who appeared to be simply asleep.
"Where'd he get the cloak?" Monica looked at Gibil.
He scowled and scoffed. "This hothead decided to throw a tantrum at me because I want to die. He seems to think I have unfinished business."
"Well, there was that thing wi-" Tepoz said in a far to innocent-sounding voice.
"Oh, shut her yap. I took care of that several millennia ago." Gibil snapped. "Anyway, he went and tripped one of the Hole's mechanisms and got himself drained. I managed to get him warmed up, but it'll take more than a bit of fire to get him back on his feet.
A disconcertingly evil grin spread across Tepoz's face. "How about a drink?"
Brandi looked sharply at the tiny golem. "What do you mean?"
"I mean... Give him a shot of something so hot and so horrendous it could wake the dead." Tepoz gave Gibil a sidelong look. "Got any good ideas?"
Gibil shook his head, frowning. "Nothing modern or very strong. Though... Let's see what you can come up with, and we'll see if inspiration strikes me."
Tepoz laughed. "Ok..." He began to list ingredients, counting with his fingers. "Everclear that has goldenseal pickling in it. Everclear thas has Korean ginseng pickling in it. Bacardi 151 that has bitter orange peel pickling in it. Spirytus that has Angelicus pickling in it. 99 Cherries that has ginger root pickling in it. 99 Bananas that has horehound pickling in it. And a bit of Ouzo since we're being mean."
Brandi gasped at the recipe. "What are you trying to do, embalm him and cremate him from the inside out?"
"Naah, that wouldn't do it. But... Add some pure chemical ethanol that has peppers pickling in it."
Tepoz rubbed his hands together all too gleefully. "Ghost peppers?"
This time, Monica blanched. "Jeezus!"
Tepoz giggled. "Ghost peppers it is!"
A large Teflon container appeared with a *ploonk!* the liquid inside was on fire, and the container appeared to be smoking.
Tepoz poited five shot glasses onto one of the blocky chairs and gently poured the flaming, boiling liquid into each glass.
"Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Gibil's Scorn." And with that, Tepoz downed the shot.
He immediately regretted his decision immensely. He doubled over, coughing and spluttering, before he managed to wheeze "If you don't want to try it, I won't judge! Kahk!"
Gibil drank his without issue. "Tasty. Those ghost peppers really add to the flavor."
Brandi looked between Tepoz and Gibil. I'll probably be fine. Tepoz isn't as durable as I am, anyway. She steeled herself and gulped her shot.
"Hork! Blahargh! Ugh, yiiiaa-hack-kack!" She regretted her decision almost as much as Tepoz.
Monica watched and prudently poured her shot back into the Teflon container, smiling delicately. "I'll pass. That looks like a really unpleasant way for me to die again."
Tepoz recovered enough to look at Gibil. "You think that will do?"
Gibil nodded. "Oh, certainly. Just don't get it down his lungs. That might still kill him."
Tepoz smiled and snapped his fingers. The liquid in the Teflon container disappeared. "Whoops. Wrong cup. Shoulda looked at what I was doing."
"You did not just poit a flagon of hellfire into that poor kid's stomach." Monica glared at Tepoz.

"...maybe?"
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
Starts to glitch in my clutch!
I'm too much!
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Re: Purpose

Post by jwhouk »

"Burn, baby, burn..."
"Character is what you are in the dark." - D.L. Moody
"You should never run from the voices in your head. That's how you give them power." - Jin
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

John awoke mid-shout, covered in hot sweat. His clothes were completely soaked through.

But not because of a nightmare.

It was because he currently had the worst case of heartburn he could possibly imagine.
He clutched at his chest and gut, groaning and writhing as the burning intensified. "RRRAAAAGH!!!" John screamed and arched his back before curling into a fetal position.
Calm down. Yelling won't accomplish anything. John thought to himself. Open your eyes. Assess the situation.
John growled deep in his throat and snapped his eyes open, pushing the pain out of his mind.
He saw three new individuals. One was a tall, busty African-American woman with medium-length curly hair, wearing a beat-up and filthy tank top missing a strap over a mysteriously undamaged bra. The second was a bald smurf with a goatee and surprisingly well-fitting clothes. The third was a short, nude Jaquar-type catgirl... Or something... With science-experiment-sized breasts.
The smurf was obviously the least dangerous. He couldn't tell if the jaguar-girl or the black woman with the ratty tank top was the most dangerous. Both women had teeth made for taking down deer-sized prey.

Fortunately, they all appeared to have worried expressions on their faces.
John then noticed Gibil and nodded at him thankfully. Two beautiful women (and a smurf's evil twin) were staring at him when he woke up. It would have been... Awkward had Gibil not made a cloak for him.

Gibil rolled his eyes. "He didn't put poison in you, you know. It's just a little alcohol. You should burn it off easy enough."
"The... Rrrrg... smurf did this?" John immediately decided the little blue bastard was far more dangerous than the two women. "What the hell-ass kind of booze was that? Flouroantimonic acid-laced moonshine???"
The diminutive man flinched. "Ok, one? I'm NOT a smurf. I am Tepoztecal."
"Tep-hnnng! Tep-os-ti-what?"
"Tep. Oz. Tec. Al. Tepoztecal." The not-a-smurf was not amused.
"We call him Tepoz for short. He's the Aztec god of alcohol." The jaguar-girl said. "Do you need him to take that stuff out?"
An image of Tepoz booze-bending his stomach contents out through his throat flashed through John's mind. "Nope. I'll just deal with it. Gibil, you said I should be able to -kaaahk!- burn this off?"
"Well, yeah. You are a fire creature. You oughta be able to deal with a little alcohol better than this!"
John glared at Gibil. "I've never had more than a sip of alcohol in my life."
The black woman's eyes went wide. "Oh, crud. That's gotta be a shock to your system."
John took a few deep breaths, trying to calm down.
"Serves him right for throwing that tantr-OOOF!"
A blast of fire erupted from John's hand, blowing the old god backward and off the pavilion.
John stood and groaned. The alcohol was seeping into his bloodstream. He needed to burn it off fast.
"Excuse me, ladies and... Tepoz." John closed his eyes for a moment before summoning the fire back up. He spread his arms, pointing his palms outward. Two jets of fire, no larger than an average flamethrower, issued from both hands for a few seconds.
John's vision went blurry for a moment before clearing up again as his fire burnt away the alcohol.
"See? I told you you could handle it." Gibil grunted as he climbed over the rail and back onto the pavilion.
John ignored him and looked at Tepoz. "Explain yourself." He spoke with a deep, threatening voice. "I don't take kindly to having alcohol dumped into my body while I'm unconscious."
Tepoz met John's gaze unflinchingly. "It was to wake you up again. The Hole drained you. Gibil said you were in trouble. It worked, didn't it?"
John narrowed his eyes. "Fine. But next time, take it slow."
"And watch what your doing!" The black woman nudged Tepoz with a foot.
John looked at the jaguar-girl and the black woman for a moment, made a snap decision, and extended his right hand toward the jaguar-girl, keeping it slightly upturned. "Well, might as well introduce myself properly. I'm John Smith. I apparently eat Dark Energy and make fire. Or something."
"Monica Villareal. I'm here to help instruct you on how to control your power." Monica shook John's hand slightly firmly, but she didn't twist his hand to put hers on top. John made note of the apparent lack of confidence. "I'm a Jaguar Girl, Demon Shepherd, Realm-walker, and I have Pheonix blood."
"I have no idea what most of that means, but I'm curious to find out." John replied before turning to the black woman, extending his hand in the same manner.
She shook his hand with a powerful grip, and her hand was placed solidly on top of his. She knew she had power. "Brandi Oduya, Director of the Men In Black. I'm a Golem, and the Lion of the Chimera."
John bowed his head slightly in response to her air of command. "Pleased to meet you, Madam Director. Thank you for taking the time to see me." He glanced at Monica, who appeared a little put out. "...Thank you both." He added.
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
Starts to glitch in my clutch!
I'm too much!
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

"It's not like they're losing time on you. Outside time is barely moving compared to in here." Gibil scowled.
"But they are spending their own time and energy on me." John retorted.
"Oh, don't mind me, I volunteered for this!" Tepoz rolled his eyes and glared at John.
"You can shut up any time, now," John growled viciously. "If I was normal, your antics could have killed me." He closed his eyes for a moment, temporarily extinguishing the flames from his eyes, and took a few deep breaths. "I feel like I've been dosed with accelerants."
Monica and Brandi exchanged glances as Gibil nodded, understanding written across his face. "You're pumped full of energy... More than any human ever has to deal with. You've yet to learn how to manage it."
"I thought I did, when I had to learn how to control my ADHD." John shook his head, looking down.
Brandi stepped forward and put a hand on John's shoulder. "Good, you already have those tools. The ADHD might just have been this power all along."
John was acutely aware of Director Oduya's hand on him. "I... Always did have a high body temperature. I used to be able to get out of school easy because I was always running a fever."
Brandi looked at Gibil, who nodded again. "Sounds about right. And since you used to be able to control it, I'm betting you still can with a little practice and discipline."
John scratched his chin. "Why did I suddenly lose control?" Director Oduya's hand slipped away as John began to pace back and forth.
"I think you've been holding back the heat inadvertently by learning to manage your ADHD. But I guess that can only contain so much energy before it starts to leak out..." Monica's voice took on a dark tone. "Or before the containment fails catastrophically."
"If that's the case, the same techniques I've been using won't be enough." John turned and faced Gibil. "They aren't now... And I'm only going to get worse."
"You don't have many options, John," Tepoz piped up. "Either you learn to control this extra energy, or you learn a safe way to expend it."
"Energy cannot be created nor destroyed. I know." John heaved a sigh.
"There are more intense ways of managing energy from a mental and emotional standpoint," Tepoz stepped into John's downward gaze. "I know a few things that might help with that."
"Do they involve booze?" John grumbled, glaring down at the little man.
"...I know two things that fit you."
"Which are...?"
Tepoz smiled. "Meditation and, in more extreme situations, Mushin no shin."
"Wait a sec, Tepoz. Care to fill us in?" Monica interrupted, her head tilted slightly to the side.
"Mushin is a martial arts and zen thing, it means 'The Mind Without Mind'." John looked up, speaking confidently. "When a master enters this state of no-mindedness, their actions are not dictated by their thoughts, but rather by intuitive, trained, natural reactions. No emotions, no thoughts... One's mind becomes open to everything. Think of it as a higher form of muscle-memory." Everyone looked sharply toward John, who shrugged. "I'm into martial arts and I meditate a little already. I guess I just need to get serious about achieving true Mushin now."
"Excellent, you already have some idea of what to try for." Tepoz grinned. "Brandi, you and I will take care of the martial arts and the Mushin. M, would you mind checking if he has demons?"
Monica nodded and closed her eyes, concentrating. John widened his stance, worried. "If I have demons? What, like if I need an exorciii..." John's vision went completely white. He closed his eyes, but that did nothing to block the painful brightness. "Great, now I'm blind! Just WONDERFUL!"
"Hey, calm down, alright!" Monica's voice spoke from behind. "You aren't blind. I'm just in your head. You're in here with me."
John whirled around and saw Monica... And a massive crowd of other beings. "And you brought an army with you. Thanks. My last bastion of sanity has been violated and invaded. My head, my mind, is the only thing I could always retreat to and feel safe. Apparently not any more."
"I can't do anything you don't want me to. You're still safe." One of the beings stepped up and whispered into her ear, and she bit her lip nervously.
"You don't seem so sure about that." John growled. He felt his skin getting hot.
"That's not what I'm..." Monica paused and shook her head. "You don't have any demons... And I think you're scaring mine."
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
Starts to glitch in my clutch!
I'm too much!
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

"Scaring your demons? First you're title makes them out to be sheep, then you make them sound like parasites, and now they sound like your pets." John ignited his hands, spreading them into claw-like positions. "I'm very sorry I frightened you army of freaky demon beings, would you please get them out of here and then teach me how to keep you and your ilk from aver getting back in?"
Monica and her army promptly vanished from sight, and John's vision went black again. He opened his eyes to see the others standing right where they were, looking toward Monica, expecting her report.
"He doesn't have demons... And he freaked mine out."
Tepoz's eyes went wide, and Brandi turned sharply to look John up and down, her brow furrowed. "But you aren't a sphinx... Even if you were, you're male."
"Do demons like getting burned?" John scowled.
"Not especially," Monica replied, smiling a little. "But your fire is normal, outside of how its created. It's not astral or anything."
"It's not like that... He isn't hospitable for them." Gibil took the floor. "Demons are parasitic little shits. Parasites sometimes can't handle certain kinds of beings. I don't know what John is, but he isn't human... Or any other kind of living sentient being I've heard of before." The ancient god stepped close to John. "Just what are you, boy?"
"Well, I kinda thought I was human... You know, what with having a human body, complete with a belly button." John leaned back, away from the old god's wrinkly face.
"I don't think so..." Gibil poked John's arm with a hot finger, sizzling through the cloak. The heat lit up the skin around where his finger touched, revealing the swirling, tattoo-like patterns that had shown up previously. "You were a salamander."
"Um. No, I'm pretty sure I wasn't. Mom never mentioned a tadpole phase." John stepped back, frowning.
"No, you dolt! Not the amphibian! You are... Or were... A being made from heat and fire! But something happened... Now you can burn Dark Energy. Salamanders don't do that."
"Sooo... What do Salamanders do?" John raised an eyebrow, still trying to shake the image of a slimy amphibian on fire.
Brandi shrugged. "Nothing, usually. They're made from heat and fire coalescing into a being. Most don't even show any powers. They just live through life and then... Dissipate. They aren't even recorded in the Akashik Records." Brandi put her hands on her hips. "More have been showing up lately what with the global temperature rising, and more of them have... Well, you can hardly call them 'powers.' They don't get burnt, they run a bit of a fever all the time... A few have a knack for getting a fire going when the fuel is wet or crappy. The biggest case I ever saw was a group of them who could dry wet sheets by meditating."
"But you can consume Dark Energy. You aren't just made of fire, you can make it. You might never even burn out." Gibil's face split with an unwholesome grin. "You won't die until you run out of Dark Energy."
"Or until I'm shot." John smirked. "Or stabbed, or frozen, or any number of other ways of being killed."
"You don't know that," Tepoz argued. "Nobody does. You're a Salamander... with a nearly infinite source of fuel. You might be invulnerable as well as immortal."
Brandi smiled reassuringly. "It's not as bad as this old geezer makes it out to be."
"You said they aren't recorded?" Monica suddenly looked up at Brandi.
"Yeah... Why?"
"That's why he doesn't have Demons, and why he frightened mine! He doesn't have a soul for them to latch on to!" Monica smiled briefly before spotting John's thoroughly unamused expression.
"'Soulless' doesn't exactly seem like a compliment. Last time I checked, that's something people tend to call psychopaths and zombies." John crossed his arms, tapping his foot.
"Nah, it's not that big a deal. We know a zombie... Well, a brain-dead human with no soul who's currently being operated by an abandoned covey of Demons." Tepoz smirked.
"Really? Wow, that must have been a hell of a day." Gibil raised his bushy eyebrows in amazement.
"It was. And most of it was very unpleasant." Monica replied coolly.
"The point is, not having a soul like a human isn't a bad thing. Tina is a really nice girl. Hmm... I wonder if she could predict your order..." Brandi petered off.
"Alright, fine. So I don't have a soul, I'm made of fire, I am fueled by Dark Energy, and I need to achieve Mushin to avoid blowing up the Earth." John counted on his fingers. "Anything I missed?"
"Well, you might not need to achieve Mushin, you might just need to up your meditation game. But that about sums it up, I think." Tepoz nodded.
"You've all forgotten something extremely important." Gibil said in a low voice, glowering at the four youngsters. "John here is capable of converting useless and nearly limitless Dark Energy into fire and heat. Take a moment and think about who would do anything to get their hands on power like that?"
Brandi's face went pale.
Gibil's ensuing smile was entirely without humor. "I know one guy who has a chunk of his brain locked up in here somewhere, or his kids, who I honestly wouldn't entrust the power of an electric eel to, let alone John... And then there's the slimy bastard in R'lyeh. Then there's Angra Mainyu, Whiro, the hungry snake Apep, and that new kid Lucifer and his little gang. And those are the ones we know are bad apples. Most of the ones we think are good... Well... Power corrupts. Hades might seem all fair and everything, but if he learned he was in possession of something like John? Let's just say the old family feuds were never completely resolved."
Everyone stared at Gibil in stunned silence.
"How wonderfully observant of you, Gibil." Hade's voice spoke calmly from all directions before resolving to a single source behind the ancient god as the King of the Underworld stepped out of nothing, holding his helm.
Gibil spun around, deepening his stance. "Hades, I'm not going to destroy the status quo by handing John over for you to use as a some infinite power source."
"Nor do I want you to." Hades regarded Gibil without expression. "Stand down."
"...no."
"I'm not going to start a war, Gibil. I'm hoping to nip one in the bud."
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Re: Purpose

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"Ever since you and yours," Hades nodded toward Monica and Brandi, "destroyed the Calendar Machine, the status quo between the powers has shifted. It went in a direction it hasn't gone since before the onslaught of the Chimera. Bia, Charon, and several others seem to believe that there will be five winged beings, prophesied to set the powers right, and their blood will run with Bia's ichor."
Monica was paying very close attention to Hades at this point. She could think of several winged beings related to Bia off the top of her head, and Tina mentioned this before.
Hades paid her no mind, and dismissed the concept with a lazy wave of his hand. "The Oracle is rather fond of saying things that can encompass so many different actual events, it is nigh impossible to figure out what she means. It's possible she can only speak that way because every outcome is true, given the correct parallel universe. Nonetheless, I put no stock in prophesies like that. I put my faith in things I can trust: power. Money. Ownership. Debt. And, of course, the inexorable flow of time, bringing with it the unstoppable creep of death... Thanatos is the most reliable of my cohorts."
"What's your point, Hades?" Gibil snapped, his bony hands balled up into angular fists, smoking and smoldering.
"My point, Gibil, is that John here can and will cause another shift in the Status quo. And I want to make sure he makes it go in the right direction."
"Who decides which way is the right direction?" John stepped out from behind Gibil. "Manipulating the future is something I'm not confident you are qualified for, deathgod." With every word, a small jet of flame escaped John's mouth. "In fact, I don't think anybody is, not like this. You want to keep your infrastructure working smoothly without traffic jams? Fine. That sounds like as good a goal as any." Gibil turned and narrowed his eyes at John, shaking his head slightly in warning. John ignored him and continued. "Go ahead and help me get myself right. But after that, I say we do whatever we think is best for the world, and we deal with the consequences when they come. Trying to manipulate one thing into happening is just as likely to force the opposite to come to pass. It ain't called 'Chaos Theory' for nothing, pops."
Hades glowered at John, a dangerous, seething fury building within him. "Do not underestimate me, mortal. I am the eldest of Kronos's sons, and I know far more about that which you speak of than any of your kind could ever even hope to claim to know."
"Oh? Do you? Tell me this, then... What happens when you kill your dad?" John snarled.
"Nobody knows what will happen should he-" Hades blustered before being interrupted by John.
"That's right. That means you don't know everything. And it takes true omnipotence and omniscience to be able to successfully manipulate the future... Because the future is infinitely unpredictable. You have to know everything about every single minuscule possibility to truly know how to avoid all but one of them. It's not about making one thing happen, it's about forcing all other possibilities to not happen. Can you look me in the eye, Hades, and tell me you can pull that off?" John stepped up to Hades, willing himself onto higher ground so he stood eye to eye with the god, and brought his face within a centimeter of the infuriated deity's, glaring at him until Hades dropped his gaze. Flames roiled bright in John's eyes and wrapped themselves around his body, spreading out from his shoulder blades in great, sweeping, flickering wings of heat haze and fire. Electricity arced between John's fingers and limbs and over his skin.
"...no. I am not all powerful and all knowing." The god slumped, defeated.
"Then shut the hell up. Let these people train me, give me the areas I need to keep me from endangering anybody, give the dead a black to exist in peace, and keep your damned daddy frozen. That is your job. Go do it."
Hades backed away, slipped on his helm, and vanished without another word.

Everyone was silent for a moment before John let out an explosive sigh of relief. "BWAAHHH... Holy shit, that was terrifying..."
Last edited by GlytchMeister on Wed Dec 16, 2015 3:05 am, edited 1 time in total.
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
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I'm too much!
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

Everyone quickly got to work... Just as soon as Gibil had finished laughing uproariously at Hades' embarrassment. Monica and Tepoz worked together on a plan to help John develop greater control over himself through their own techniques, while Brandi and Gibil focused on the martial arts aspect. John alternated between the two pairs between every time they slept... Without a sun or moon, or indeed any astrological cue to wake or sleep, they soon settled for the policy of "go until everybody is too tired to continue." When John wasn't with one pair, they planned the next session.
Brandi, having spent her long life a little bit more productively than Gibil's, knew a multitude of martial arts, both ancient and modern. Gibil, meanwhile, focused more on John's powers, seeking both to develop them into greater intensities, refine his precision and control, and broaden his understanding of physics to include these seeming acts of magic.
John would alternate between Brandi and Gibil, and every other lesson with either of them was a sparring session, during which both Brandi and Gibil would teach John about the true history of the world he was going to return to, the events of the Calendar Machine, and the workings of ParaSociety. Brandi spent several of these sparring-and-geopolitical-paranormal-history-and-current-events sessions focused entirely on the slow progress toward equality between the many species within ParaSociety. Sometimes, a visitor would show up for added insight. They were usually MIB agents of various species, but sometimes they were civilians, like Mr. Meadows, a crocodilian humanoid who ran a paranormal orphanage that worked closely with the MIB. Another was a sort of a sister to Brandi - Acacia Budur, a blonde dance instructor. Those visits were usually fairly pleasant, and always at least a little eye-opening. They usually sat off to the side, chatting with John as he sparred with Brandi or Gibil, but a few were durable enough to go toe-to-toe with him. As John's power grew and developed, so too did his body, often painfully so.
Growth spurts always sucked.
John never did have a chance to look in a mirror, but he slowly became aware of the changes... He was never a slouch when it came to physical fitness, but now? John's musculature was sharp and chiseled, stripped of any remaining traces of baby fat. His skin almost constantly displayed the swirling markings of his salamander nature unless he was trying to hide it. And those growing pains? John started his training somewhere between Monica and Brandi in terms of height... Now he was taller than Brandi.
One "day," as it were, after a particularly bone-bending night of growing, John discovered he had a different opponent for his sparring session...

A sphinx.

She had apparently heard of John's training and of the opponents he had bested in hand-to-hand combat, and sought him out to ensure he knew his place. Brandi's disapproval was evident.
"He doesn't need to be told where is place i-"
The Sphinx backhanded Brandi. Hard. The impact compressed the air between paw and body, heating it to an instantaneous fusion glow before sending Brandi's comparatively light form careening into the void. Monica was there in a flash, all claws and fur and fire, snarling her challenge at the impertinent guest.
"No."
Monica stopped, mid growl. "...what?"
"She wants to fight me." John turned to face the beastial being. "Sphinx! See me!"
The immense creature rounded on him, lowering its body into a ready crouch, tail thrashing, spikes whistling.
"You've just laid a hand on my Sensei. You might as well have spat on her, you primitive, flying cat."
"And what do you intend to do about it, you mewling hairball?"
"I'm going to make you say you're sorry." John squared his shoulders and set his feet shoulder-width apart, centering himself and slowing his breathing. He studied his opponent... The Sphinx was massive, standing at least twenty feet at the shoulder. Her wings were huge, and would be excellent for buffeting him. All four limbs were powerfully constructed, but not so musclebound as to inhibit movement. The body flowed seamlessly from humanoid to feline to avian. He noticed the neck joined the skull at the same angle it does with normal humans, however. In its current posture, the Sphinx couldn't look up. Why would she need to? Sphinxes were apex predators. Nothing hunted them. Everything was below a Sphinx when it took flight.
Keep her on the ground and get over her. That's the play. John smiled and closed his eyes, waiting.
She pounced. Her feathers were not those of an owl; she was not meant for stealth, but rather hunted with overwhelming speed and strength. John heard her wings unfurl before she ever left the ground, and was waiting for her attack. Just as she began her rapid descent toward him, John leapt up and forward, twisting half a rotation and flipping a full rotation,landing directly between the Sphinx's wing joints. He managed to land a single, bone-bruising blow to the base of her skull when his shoulder was suddenly immobilized. All he felt was a sharp pressure. John looked at the source of the sensation and saw a massive tailspike protruding from him. A wordless howl of pain and fury escaped him before something small, dark, and very fast slammed into the Sphinx's side, even as John wrenched the spike from his muscle. He tumbled to the ground as the Sphinx shot off into the darkness. A series of bright flashes, howls of pain, and sharp cracks from impacts and breaking bones echoed through the Hole.
Then, Brandi slowly walked back to their little area, dragging the unconscious, bloody, and broken Sphinx behind her by the tail. One of the spikes had been burnt away.
"Gibil's turn. Learn how to heal yourself." Brandi growled.
John just stood there, dumbstruck.
"GO!"

Gibil was suitably impressed John had managed to land even a single blow on the predator. "I thought you'd come back with a leg bitten off. Well done."
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

And so, training continued. John's sparring took on an aspect of fully analyzing the opponent, so as to avoid future tailspike oversights.

His sessions with Monica and Tepoz were stressful to the extreme as well. Using what was apparently a very clever interpretation of some laws, Monica convinced her demons and their ruling parties that they could ply their trade on John, saying it was helping him train, which was a greater boon indirectly than the damage their words did directly.
And so John weathered onslaughts of negative emotions; vanity, anger, panic, fear... And doubt. His job was to not get too hot or too cold under their attacks. Tepoz and Monica taught him ways of meditating and combating demons, ways to manage and convert his negative emotions into strengths and tools. And whenever John felt in control, Tepoz would shoot him full of alcohol to break down his inhibitions.

Years passed in the Hole. Monica and Brandi left one day, leaving him with Gibil and Tepoz - the two beings who didn't mind long stretches of time.
John soon missed having a somewhat normal being to talk to, something that wasn't an ancient, irritating God of alcohol or an ancient, suicidal God of fire. Years blurred into decades. Then centuries. John grew tired of failing over and over as the expectations were raised higher and higher. Centuries slowly plodded away, adding up into melennia.
Then, Monica and Brandi returned. John wept openly at their return. Finally, someone other than these two bastards to talk to! They made many comments about how much taller he was (he finally stopped growing when he hit seven feet) and how much improvement he had made
Their visit was another few hundred years, but it was far easier to bear. Then they left. John watched, stone-faced, as they left him with the two gods again.
Gibil turned and grinned up at John. "Another couple hundred millennia, then, big guy? Let's ge-BOOOF!"
John looked impassively down his arm, past his fist, and beheld the fading spark of the old fire God as he flew off into the distance. "Shut the fuck up."

Training continued. And continued. And continued. John fought two Sphinx to a standstill simultaneously before he remembered his lessons on their courting behaviors, and let them pin him. He still hadn't achieved mushin. He lost count of the years. He had tried counting days, but his perception of time warped and dragged and faded into a blur as time, and training, passed by. Soon, all he understood about time was that it didn't seem to work the way he thought he remembered. He faintly remembered losing count somewhere around three million days.

Then, Monica returned, alone this time.
John ran to her, hugging her tight before asking the obvious question. "Where's Brandi?"
"John, there's some bad stuff happening topside. Are you good to go?"
John turned to Gibil and Tepoz. Both saw the look on Monica's face, and understood John was needed. "He's... Good enough."
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
Starts to glitch in my clutch!
I'm too much!
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Re: Purpose

Post by GlytchMeister »

Hades reclined in his throne dispassionately, listening to the report on the black and white holes around the entrance to The Hole.
"The neutron stars provided plenty of matter, inertia, and angular momentum to the system to keep the ring singularity stable and the spacetime deformations intact for several more millennia, assuming nothing else tampers with them again."
"And my father's right cerebral cortex?"
"Aside from a slight spike in activity when it sensed shifts in the local flow of time, it remains undisturbed. No related activity was detected in the rest of his brain or body."
"Good... That is always of utmost importance. How goes the young salamander's training?" Hades yawned, feigning boredom.
"He is making progress... Though he will be here for a long time if he keeps at this pace."
"Good... I don't want to wait too long to call in my favor..."
He's mister GlytchMeister, he's mister code
He's mister exploiter, he's mister ones and zeros
They call me GlytchMeister, whatever I touch
Starts to glitch in my clutch!
I'm too much!
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