Kallaway here.
The fight had already begun by the time we arrived. We parked the bus a distance away from the action and filed out.
Kraken, the White Comet, and the AMU were firing at each other. But there was another group there that I wasn't expecting. And they had a moose with them.
"Seems like Trias has joined the party," Daniel said. "This might make teleporting a bit tricky for me..."
"How will this effect the plan?" Tony asked.
"Not at all," Daniel said. "Our targets remain the same. Bring down the White Comet and Kraken, and provide support for the AMU and Trias."
"What if Trias and the AMU come to blows?" I asked.
"Cross our fingers and hope that doesn't happen," Daniel replied. "If it does, either stay out of it or break it up."
"What's our first move?" I asked.
"First," Daniel said, aiming his finger gun at the sky, "We let 'em know we're here."
And with that, he fired a lightning bolt directly into the sky.
That got a lot of peoples attention, but more than a few were too preoccupied with the fight to notice. Those that did notice were either confused by our ragtag little group, or showed signs of terrified recognition at a few of our members.
"Let's go!" Daniel said, teleporting directly up to a Kraken agent, who was conveniently far away from the moose, and freezing his skull solid.
We charged in after that, joining the conflict. A lot happened. I can't recall all of it, and I'm couldn't see much of what the others were doing, but we made it out of it okay by the end of that first struggle. The White Comet forces seemed to bail at some point, but Kraken decided to be all stubborn and shit, and stuck around until we brought them all down. The fighting drew to a close after that, as we all pulled ourselves together from all the chaos.
"Is that it?" I asked.
"Not by a long shot," the Biker said. "Those weren't all of Kraken's forces. They're bound to pop up again at some point."
"So, battle's won, but war... not yet," I said. "Perfect..."
There wasn't much time to rest after that. Not long after, I sensed a powerful eldritch energy approaching. Soon after, a flock of birds emerged from the forest. The air around them was crackling with energy.
"The Convocation?" I asked.
"Yep," Tony confirmed.
The birds were joined by two more Fears, a woman made of wood, moving like a puppet on strings, and a large black dog. Didn't take too many braincells to realize who they were.
Not long after, someone emerged from within the AMU's forces. An old man. And as he moved, I slowly became aware that he had an eldritch aura of his own, which was gradually growing, as if he'd been keeping it suppressed this entire time, and was finally drawing it out.
He exchanged some words with some of the AMU members, before removing his dark glasses, revealing his disturbing lack of eyes, confirming his identity. The Blind Man. A Fear.
All of the AMU's Martyrs kneeled before him. All but one. My cousin, Professor Ben Malkator, stood a distance away, looking distracted.
The Blind Man gestured for the Martyr's to rise, saying something else to them, before turning to the other Fears. The Black Dog grew to a larger size, snarling. Then two more Fears showed up. A young boy, who seemed to freeze everything around him, confronted the Black Dog. I noticed Jane, who was a short distance away bandaging Kimiko's arm, visibly flinched when he appeared.
And then that cunt Valravn showed up and started attacking the Wooden Girl. Daniel growled angrily, but managed to restrain himself from going after her. Then Ben appeared at my shoulder.
"So, obviously, things are about to go to shit," he said. "But, I need to borrow David and Damien. We're needed elsewhere."
Daniel nodded.
"I can handle myself without them for a while," he said. "Don't take too long."
"No promises," Ben said.
He turned to face the Biker.
"Damien," he said.
"Benjamin," the Biker replied.
he tension between them was palpable...
"I hear Daniel brought Sylvia back," Ben said.
"Yeah," the Biker said. "And no, I'm not anywhere near forgiving you."
"Understandable," Ben replied.
"But...," the Biker said, averting his gaze, which was admittedly kind of pointless, as he was still wearing a blindfold. "I'm not tempted to kill you where you stand. So, that's something."
"Good to hear," Ben said. "And... I am sorry..."
"Shut up," the Biker said. "Now, where we headed?"
Give me a minute," Ben said, taking both of our shoulders. "You're gonna love tis.
And then, the world around us began to slowly fade away, as a new location began to fade into reality to replace it.
"A little slow, yes, but energy efficient and completely painless," Ben said. "I call it 'Fading'. Suck it, Prius."
He released our shoulders after we finished fading into the new location, somewhere at the edge of the city.
"And the best part?" Ben added. "The moose can't do jack shit to stop it."
"Neat," I said. "Won't be too useful in battle, though."
"I can use the God's Way if I absolutely have to," Ben said. "But Fading's better if there's enough time for it."
"So, what's the deal?" I asked.
"Yeah," the Biker asked. "Why are you taking us away from all the real action?"
"Oh, don't worry," Ben said. "There'll be plenty of action. You see, while the others are dealing with the forest itself, we'll be dealing with Dawson."
"The shadow punk?" the Biker asked. "Alright."
"What about Tyler?" I asked.
Ben shook his head.
"I can't foresee everything," he said. "But I believe Tyler will be going off on his own."
Exactly what I was afraid of...
"As for who Dawson does have with him," Ben said. "He's got two human followers, as well as at least one Dying Man shard. And... a Mana user..."
"That's the same weird magic power you use, right?" I asked.
"That's right," Ben said. "We need to be on guard."
He stretched out a hand, and a Japanese short sword appeared in it. The sheath seemed to have been sliced in two at some point, and glued back together.
"Let's get this show on the road," Ben said.
