Infinity Legends

Chapter 24: The Shadows

Serry’s clone swung a pair of icy daggers at her throat, missing narrowly.

The evil Potathunder nimbly ran up DM3’s legs and dove at the good bard.

Gurm was launched across the room by a dark-matter shot aimed at her guts by her dark self.

Takol’s Doppelganger rushed to meet his match before Takol could even fire. The two reptiles were soon locked in an intense brawl of punches, kicks, claws and tail swings, both trying to seize the rifle for just long enough to shoot the other.

“Gurm!” Lord yelled, swinging his lute at his maddened self. “Get your crystal! Quick!”

Gurm scrambled to her feet and ran for the obelisk, now undefended, but was thrown back by another ranged attack of her copy.

Seeing the occurrence, Potathunder ran for the evil Gurm, delivering a lute blow to her ribs. The evil wizard spun on her heels, her fist enveloped in dark-matter and ready to disintegrate Lord’s face. The bard rolled back, then dodged a kick by his own shadow and returned to his feet already playing a tune.

“Can’t touch this!” the bard sung. “Da-ra-ra-ra-tatara-tara!”

Both his shadow and Gurm’s exchanged a confused look, then proceeded to pursue the bard. Behind them, Gurm ran unimpeded to the obelisk.

***

Kramen blinked, confused in his fallen position. In the darkness, it was hard to tell friend from foe. Not far from him, two Takols were locked in a flurry of melee blows, wrestling for the rifle. Whoever came out on top would have the advantage for the whole battle.

He had to help.

Pushing himself up, Kramen ran for the reptiles, screaming and swinging his fists.

But before any of his blows connected, a thick crocodile tail hit him square in the chest, launching him into the air. He did not even know which Takol had delivered the blow!

Kramen returned to the ground meters away, his momentum making him roll until he collided against one of the deactivated pylons. Grunting as he felt every joint in his body c***k back in place, Kramen spat out a small bloody puddle.

Then, by the shadow of the pylon, he saw a figure. A shy little black creature, no bigger than a melon, hiding behind ten short tentacles and shivering in fear.

“What the…” Kramen muttered, and saw the alien octopus retreat a bit further into the shadow. “Hey, little guy, don’t be af…”

As Kramen reached for the thing, it leaped towards him, tentacles wrapping around his face and neck, suckers sticking to his skin as the little pest spilled dark ink everywhere and nibbled at his nose.

“Ahhh! Face hugger! Face hugger!” Kramen screamed as he ran blindly through the room, trying but failing to rip the thing away.

***

“Giddy up, robohorse!” Lord yelled as he hopped onto DM3’s back, the evil bard and mage still on his track.

With black-matter missiles zooming by, the robot took off running in zig-zag through the rows of pylons, always keeping the bard protected behind its body. Potathunder kept singing a provocative song that would ensure focus on them, and not Gurm, but he stopped upon seeing the Takol duel.

“DM! That way!” the bard used his lute to point at the reptiles. “Let’s see how good a polo player I am!”

As DM3 ran past the two Takols, Potathunder swung his lute at dark Takol’s temple. The monster was barely injured, but flinched for long enough for the real Takol to take a step back, aim and open fire.

“Woooo!” Potathunder cheered as the evil reptile vanished in a purple cloud, but then dropped from his ride as a ball of dark-matter exploded against his face.

“No!” Takol yelled, quickly gunning down the evil Gurm, the source of the attack that had hit Potathunder. As the evil bard turned around to avenge its ally, Takol was already on top of him, swinging the butt of his rifle to crush the shadow’s skull.

Having dealt with the doppelgangers, Takol ran for the real Potathunder, whose face was being entirely consumed by dark-matter.

“He’s dying!” Takol cried out. “Help!”

Serry ducked behind a manufactured block of ice as her twisted twin fired a volley of sharp ice projectiles at her. As the last icicle met her cover, Serry poked her head out to blast the enemy with a frost blizzard. A white cloud spawned from her hands, but the hostile Serry simply smirked as the cold only created little ice membranes on her sickly skin.

Evil Serry raised her hands ready for another icicle attack, but was interrupted by Gurm’s staff colliding to her side.

As she turned to punish the other mage, the real Serry leaped from cover, removed one of the icy daggers stuck to the block of ice and tossed it to Gurm, who nimbly grabbed the weapon and stabbed it to evil Serry’s chest.

“Nice job…” Serry said as her evil self vanished.

“He’s dying!” Takol echoed from afar. “Help!”

“Have you got your crystal?” Serry asked, urgency downing on her voice.

“I have!” Gurm showed Serry a small stone removed from the obelisk. “But I can only heal if it’s stuck to the staff!”

“We have to hurry…” Serry pulled Gurm toward Takol and Lord. “I can freeze staff and diamond together, but I’ll need some kind of liquid to bind them…”

“Face hugger! Take it off!” Kramen came running, stumbling on every other pylon as a strange creature covered his eyes not only with its tentacles, but with a very thick natural ink.

Serry looked at Gurm.

Gurm looked at Serry.

“That’ll do,” Serry said.

Gurm ran to Kramen and swung her bare staff at the octopus on his face. The thing tried to slap her with a tentacle, but she struck again. Flapping its tentacles wildly, the little monster partially released Kramen and redirected its pitch-black squirts at Gurm’s staff.

Having the wooden rod covered in ink, Gurm retreated, leaving Kramen to his struggle against the face hugger. The mage placed the dark-matter crystal onto the dirty staff, the ink bubbling with the contact. Serry came running and wrapped her hands around the crystal, a wave of cold solidifying the ink that covered both diamond and staff.

The black rock, now attached to the weapon, gave out a purple glow.

“It worked!” Gurm smiled beneath her hood, then ran for Potathunder, pushing Takol aside. “Give room!”

Lord’s face was nearly entirely covered in dark-matter, only an eye still untouched by the material’s corroding effects. If he was not dead already, he looked like it, and soon would be unless Gurm acted fast. As she outstretched the staff to the bard,  Lord’s body was surrounded by a purple aura similar to the one around the diamond.

The burn on his face regressed, the disfigured features of the bard returned it their natural charm and, in the blink of an eye, there was no more unstable dark-matter eating his face.

“I…” Lord ran his hands through his face in disbelief. “You saved me!”

“I did!” Gurm smiled and bounced in excitement.

“Hey, Gurm,” Takol called out. “He was hit at least forty seconds ago…”

The hooded mage stared intently at Takol, then at the bard. Forty seconds was way above her personal best time regression. She was getting more powerful as both mage and healer! And her new staff looked way cooler than the old one, with a more intricate handle and a layer of mysterious frozen ink around the crystal on top.

And speaking of the mysterious ink…

“Help!” Kramen was still stumbling between pylons like a pinball, the alien still glued to his face. As he screamed, Lord, Gurm, Takol, Serry and even DM3 watched with a mixture of curiosity and amusement.

“What is that thing, even?” Serry asked.

“You have confronted your counterparts,” DM3 spoke in his deep synthetic voice. “That thing… would be mine.”

With a hiss, a portion of DM3-C4’s upper torso slid open to reveal a small compartment covered in cushions, buttons, levers and screens. On top of the cushions, an octopus exactly like the one hugging Kramen, but green, waved a friendly tentacle at them.

“Okay, that’s a twist!” Lord raised a finger. “Now, Mr. Octopus, are you supposed to be dangerous?”

The robot’s carapace slid shut again, concealing the small creature controlling it.

“Negative. Organic form is harmless without technological supplementation.”

“Well, then, I guess Kramen’s got this,” Potathunder shrugged and sat down to watch the poor Spawn-Master struggle, covered in ink. “Anyone’s got some popcorn?”