Fallout (Tales of the Other Universe Book 2)

by J. G. Taschereau

  “So you’ve finally learned to fly,” the Creator said, holding his staff out at Adam.

  “I’ve learned more than that,” said Adam. He surged through the air at the Creator, who stood ready to intercept him. Just before the two collided, the Creator’s feet dipped as he found himself beginning to fall. The unexpected sensation caused him to panic and lose focus, and Adam took advantage by swinging down with his sword at him. The Creator only barely managed to block him with his staff but was hurtled downward by the force of the swing. As he fell, he watched Adam swing his sword again as a gust of wind cut through the air at the speed of sound and collided with the Creator.

  Dee stood in awe from her vantage point as she watched how quickly the tables had turned. The slicing wind had appeared to seriously rattle the Creator. He shot back upwards, keeping his distance from Adam while the two stared each other down. It was clear that the fight was not going to be one sided, but no matter what happened, there would be terrible consequences for the Other Universe.

  “Quite a show, isn’t it?”

  The unexpected sound of a new voice in the room startled Dee, and she spun around to see who else was there. Another man appeared in the door and stepped into the room, keeping his eyes on Adam and the Creator through the window. Dee had never seen this man before, but something about him was unsettling to her. As he got closer, she saw that he was cupping a round, white object in his left hand. Further inspection revealed it to be a human skull.

  “Ms. Diatyallah Gatti,” Mr. White said. “We meet at last. I must say, even after enduring the hardships of the wilderness and the unforgiving desert sun, you are still quite a vision of beauty.”

  Every fiber of her being screamed at Dee to beware this newcomer. She looked towards her bag, just a few feet away, which contained her only practical defense. Dee began to inch towards it, but Mr. White noticed and laughed.

  “Come now, Ms. Gatti, don’t insult me,” he said. “Do you think I’m so unprepared that I would let you take the time to get your wand and cast some deleterious spell on me? I think we both know I would stop you faster than you could say ‘eximo’, so relax. Those two are going to be at it for a while, so let’s chat, you and I.”

  Dee stood still and kept her composure, but she remained tense and alert. “You seem to know a bit about me, but I can’t say the same for you.”

  He placed his hand on his chest. “I’m so sorry, I’ve forgotten my manners. Please, call me Leonardo. I’m a humanitarian and a businessman, and I’ve had my eye on you for some time now.”

  “What is it that you want from Greg? Why are you doing all of this to him?”

  Mr. White chuckled. “Greg? Is that what you call him? You’re as cute as Daniel with his ‘Iilil-ja’. If you mean Adam Evans, as I’m sure you do, I don’t want anything from him. I just want him to understand that his wicked actions have led to the suffering of many people and see that he receives just punishment for his crimes.”

  “What about all the people who’ve suffered in the last few months because of what you’ve done?”

  “More victims caught in the crossfire, and I truly pity them, but their suffering falls on Adam Evans. Had he never existed, their lives wouldn’t have been ruined. I’m certain you would be happier as well.”

  “You’re absolutely wrong, about all of that!” Dee proclaimed. “And trying to shift the terrible things you’ve done onto him is just despicable. What could he have done to make you think your actions against him are justified?”

  “I’m afraid that’s simply an answer that’s on a need to know basis,” Mr. White replied. “And you, my dear, don’t need to know. Don’t take me to be the stereotypical villain who drones on about his inspirations and the finesses of his grand scheme while the hero has time to find a way to stop him. No, Ms. Gatti, the truth is that I’m the hero of this story. Adam Evans is the villain, and he’s about to get what he deserves.”

  Behind her, Dee heard the loud crackling bursts of sound that came each time the two dueling deities landed a hit on each other. She was tempted to turn, but she didn’t want to drop her guard around the enemy standing in front of her. He revealed a beguiling smile while holding the skull up to the fading light and looking into its vacant eyes.

  “Did you ever think it would be possible to kill a god, Ms. Gatti?” he asked. “I suppose you wouldn’t have thought it so, at least not until you saw Adam Evans slay his other half in Kyoto. That must have been quite a surprise to you. It was a surprise to me as well. Care to guess why?”

  “You expected Greg to lose to his anger?”

  “No,” said Mr. White. “I had expected that the two would kill each other. The anger-form had the advantage of raw power that granted him a physical edge over Adam Evans, while the latter had a calmer head about him and would have been able to counter as the anger-form eventually lost control of himself. Still, they were in essence balanced such that neither was to survive, thus eliminating my problems in one beautiful double homicide. The addition of the Magid powers into the mix was admittedly unexpected, but in the end didn’t alter the outcome in either direction. So why then did Adam Evans win out, even just barely?”

  He turned his attention away from the skull back to Dee, waiting for her to answer. She remained silent, staring back with quiet repugnance.

  “It was because of you, Ms. Gatti, you and the Creator and the rest of those meddlers. I arranged everything to achieve the outcome I wanted: creating a fake terror plot, dangling the anger-form in front of Adam Evans like a turkey leg, and letting that lunatic disobey his orders and go after his gentler half so that they would destroy each other. And they would have, if not for your intervention. Somehow, your group being there gave him the extra push that allowed him to snatch his victory. He lived because I made an assumption I still cannot believe was incorrect: that there were people who cared enough about his wicked life to risk their own lives to save him.”

  “It serves you right,” Dee finally said. “You talk about him like he’s some kind of demon bent on destroying the world. Well he’s not. He may have made some mistakes in the past, and innocent people have gotten hurt because of him, but he at least accepts his mistakes and has been working to do all he can to make up for them.”

  “All sinners attempt to make penance as death creeps closer,” said Mr. White. “It doesn’t make up for what he’s done. Would you be so willing to forgive the Creator of this fine universe for all that he’s done to you, even if he made amends?”

  Dee glared, but Mr. White had made his point.

  “So you and I are on the same page now,” Mr. White went on. “Good, so let me continue. I apologize for rambling on like this, I know I’m contradicting myself about not going on about my plans, but I assure you I’m getting to a very important point and I’m almost there. You see, I realized that as long as Adam Evans had people who cared about him still around, people who would come to his aide, I would fail to destroy him. So I set out to eliminate those people, or better yet, turn them against him. Daniel and the Khazaki were no challenge to gain control of, but there were others who I realized I would need to eliminate completely. The Baggins was the first, and the bounty hunter as well. One by one I removed those people in the Other Universe who had stood by him. Adam Evans lost all the people he cared for as he was driven deeper into the despair he deserves. And so we reach the finale, where he finds himself with but one hope left to cling to.”

  He lowered his hand and held the skull forward so that its gaping eyes stared at Dee as Mr. White’s terrifying point became clear. “That hope, my dear Ms. Gatti, is you.”

  A bolt of lightning shot from the clouds and struck the Creator’s staff, nearly hitting the deity himself. He recovered from the blast in time to block the swing of Adam’s sword from above him. He pushed the blade away and propelled himself towards Adam, extending his hand out to shoot a beam of charged particles into Adam’s chest. Adam bent backwards to narrowly avoid the surge of energy and in t
he same movement kicked the Creator’s chin. The upward momentum separated the two as they continued their clash high above the desert floor, and there still seemed to be no clear advantage for either side. Adam had come into his powers and used them to his full advantage. The Creator, with his near unlimited power, was finding it difficult to keep up with his other half.

  Creating a pocket dimension to seal them in would do little to help the Creator, and it was contrary to what he was hoping to accomplish. He knew that Mr. White was somewhere close by, watching to make sure the Creator followed his wishes by killing Adam. Hiding the battle would only raise suspicions, and the Creator couldn’t risk that. He would have to continue to fight Adam head on, but even with his divine power it would not be possible to just blink Adam out of existence. Adam was a Legend, and a powerful one at that, and that meant the Creator would need to put everything he had into the fight in order to win, let alone to keep himself alive.

  The light of day around the Creator began to creep away as he found a cloud of darkness circling around him. In seconds he was enclosed in an inky blackness like a moonless night, unable to see anything around him. Adam used his disorientation to make a move by flying forward and thrusting his sword into the dark cloud. He felt it pass through, missing his target, as a tremendous burst within the darkness pulsed out and flung Adam across the sky and down towards the ground. He managed to catch himself with the wind, turning his attention back up as the Creator reappeared out of the dissipating cloud. He pointed his staff towards Adam.

  “You’ll have to do more than cut off my sight if you want to destroy me, Iilil,” the Creator said.

  Adam shot himself back up, preparing to engage the Creator with his sword alone. A swirl of light gathered at the tip of the Creator’s staff, culminating in a fierce glow that shook as if it begged to be set loose. As Adam approached, it was, burning through the sky with enough speed to break the sound barrier. Adam swung his sword straight downward onto the immense force. An earsplitting sound rippled through the air, echoing out for miles around. The result, to the Creator’s surprise, was Adam somehow combining his own powers with the swing of the sword to cut through the Creator’s attack and propel himself forward. Adam’s sword nicked the tip of the Creator’s staff. The Creator deflected it in time to avoid being skewered, but Adam had already closed in on him. Adam spun around to deliver a close range cut when he found himself falling from the sky, just as the Creator had as the fight began.

  The Creator was beginning to catch on to Adam’s tricks, and his manipulation of the elements was no different from what he did, just in a different way. Adam had caused the Creator to stop floating by changing the air pressure beneath him, and the Creator had just done the same to Adam. So long as the Creator could discern how Adam was manipulating the elements around him, he could find a way to counter them by undoing the effect or turning it to his advantage. In this way, the Creator had found a way to come out ahead of his other half. Now it was just a matter of putting an end to the fight.

  He flew downwards, where Adam had corrected the air pressure and stabilized himself. The Creator repeated his previous attack, but this time Adam dodged it entirely, allowing the wind to carry him back upwards to swing downward with his sword. Once again the Creator took advantage and forced the air beneath him to drive Adam upwards. Unlike before, Adam was ready for this. He made a manipulation of his own to the air around the Creator, drawing it all inward like a vacuum and crushing him into a stiff configuration. The Creator saw what Adam had done and broke free, but in doing so he had allowed Adam to carry on with his downward strike. The blow was glancing, as the Creator managed to move at the last moment, but he was still struck in the face. Adam’s blade sliced down across the Creator’s cheek, making a parallel cut to the scar that The Baggins had left on him almost a year earlier.

  The injury stunned the Creator, leaving him open to further attack. Adam was inches away, locking eyes with his counterpart. His hands gripped his sword, ready to deliver a killing blow to the Creator and put an end to all the madness he and Dee had been forced to endure. Without any hesitation he raised his sword high, intent on performing the technique he had learned from Andrei Moscov, one that had never failed to kill one of his mortal victims and would be sure to slay even the Creator Most High. In front of him, the Creator’s eyes flashed with a painful sadness as Adam started to swing down.

  Before he could execute the rapid movement, the Creator lurched forward. His staff forced Adam’s sword upwards as his free hand shot out and grabbed firm hold of Adam’s chest. Adam’s eyes widened as the Creator gripped against his skin. In that moment, the battle faded away from him. His thoughts turned to Dee, a time when they had stood under the stars and watched fireworks, when they had celebrated her birthday in Magid Palace, her alluring dance with the fire in Erebia Village, and her confession of love that he shared with her. He saw her smiling face as it faded away in his mind, and he heard the solemn words that Sean Walker had whispered to him as he fell dying, the motto the two had adopted and often told each other and their fellow soldiers: “Remember that you will die.”

  And as the two warring gods were locked together in the air, Dee began to back away from Mr. White as he continued with his vague threat.

  “It’s quite simple, Ms. Gatti,” he told her. “In order for there to be despair, there must first be hope. So I’ve allowed Adam Evans to experience such fleeting hope as people like you have been allowed to give him, until the appropriate time came to take it away. That’s the only way for him to understand absolute despair. Because of you, Adam Evans will kill Daniel, because if he does not, then you will suffer through his loss. This I know will come to pass. Of course, this creates a problem for me. I’ve been using Daniel up there as a means of carrying out my revenge, and while I do want him to suffer for his own misdeed in creating Adam Evans in the first place, my true mission is to destroy Evans himself. But only a Legend can kill a Legend, so what’s a boy to do when the god he controls is wiped out?”

  Mr. White reached into his suit jacket with his free hand and pulled out a pistol, aiming it towards Dee. “There is another way to kill a Legend. As I’m sure you’ve learned, a Legend can choose to let his scars remain unhealed, and this applies to all wounds as well. So what do you suppose would happen when Adam Evans returned from his duel to find his one and only hope lying dead on the floor? Why, it’d be enough to drive a man mad! If the deaths of the Khazaki were not enough to make him want to die, then losing you should do the trick. When that happens, he will gladly accept death, whether by his own sword or with my gun. Sadly, Ms. Gatti, this means the end of your life.”

  Dee’s heart raced as she racked her brain for options. She was powerless to stop him without her wand, especially with a gun in his hand. There was nowhere for her to run. She was trapped.

  He cocked the hammer. “Please don’t take this personally. With your sacrifice, you bring about an age of peace and joy for all the worlds. Goodbye.”

  Dee shut her eyes, her body flinching in preparation for the impending shot. A resounding blast followed by the loudest sound she had ever heard shook the room and she screamed, expecting the bullet to pierce her. Instead she found that she had endured no physical pain, and upon opening her eyes she saw Mr. White staring wide eyed out the window. Dee turned and saw what had captivated him. High in the sky was the remnants of a tremendous explosion, still burning with churning fire. It was this blast that had created a shockwave that shook Rosa Wist and prevented her from being shot. The initial awe caused from the explosion soon shifted to horror as she realized what had happened.

  That was when she saw him. The fire dissipated and in the clear air Dee saw the Creator floating. Beneath him was Adam, now quite still, falling through the sky with his sword tumbling in pieces beside him. Unlike before, he was not using the wind to catch himself. He built up speed until he was falling at terminal velocity and Dee watched as his body kept falling until it collided with the
desert below with enough force to shoot a cloud of sand high into the air. The sand settled and there was no movement down below. From where she stood, Adam was no longer visible and there was no sign of further struggle.

  Dee’s heart felt like it had stopped and shriveled up. She waited for it to keep beating, just as she waited for Adam to get back up and keep fighting. Her heart was beating, but she failed to recognize that. She gasped for breath and felt fresh tears coming as a sadness she had never known came over her. Behind her, Mr. White lowered his gun and continued looking out the window with joyful bewilderment. Then he began to laugh, a crazed cackle that echoed through the open room.

  “Well I’ll be damned,” he said after settling down. “I was wrong after all. To be honest, I thought he had more in him than that. I was wrong, but this end worked just as well. I suppose it’s better this way, anyhow. I’m glad not to have to spill the blood of a beautiful woman.”

  Dee felt numb all over. She wanted to scream, but she couldn’t even do that. All she could do was stare out at the crater where Adam had landed, hoping that he would just stand back up and keep going. It was a hope that would not be realized. As she felt a despair of her own creeping over her, Mr. White began to approach her. It was his intention to dispel her suffering and make her see that Adam’s death was a victory for all that was good in the world, and that she could only be happier now that she didn’t have to live in a world she shared with him. He never spoke these words to her. Before he got any closer, the Creator materialized between them with a stern expression and his staff in hand.