Assunta offered her hand to Mary as she got closer to her. ‘High Inquisitor Damask, it’s a pleasure to have you here, thank you for coming.’
Mary briefly shook Assunta’s hand in greeting. ‘Your insistence about not talking about this remotely is what has brought me here, against my better judgement. The conclave will not be happy with me disappearing like this, so this had better be good Assunta.’
Assunta had lowered her gaze as Mary had spoken, feeling somewhat chastised by her comments, which she supposed would be justified. Assunta knew that the Conclave took a dim view of Mary’s personal vendetta against Amanda.
But she also felt certain that once Mary saw what was here and what it could potentially do, she would understand why she had insisted that Mary come to see this herself.
‘I understand Inquisitor, but I beg your indulgence on this. I think you will not be disappointed.’
‘We shall see. Well, let’s get on with it shall we?’ Mary asked.
‘Of course, follow me,’ Assunta said and led Mary and her entourage up the beach towards the dense green foliage in the center of the island. There was now an open and clean path through the bushes to a widened clearing before the metal door set into the rock face, which Assunta reached with Mary in tow.
‘This is what we found on the first day here, this doorway set into the rock.’
‘I hope there is more to see than just a door,’ Mary said.
‘As you can see, there appears to be no handle on the door, and only this keyhole up here,’ she said, ignoring Mary’s comment. ‘Later that same day I happened across this item on the beach out there,’ she said, holding the metallic key aloft in her hand. She then placed the key into the lock and opened the door. As it opened, she could see the look of curiosity on Mary’s face and the reaction she had to the intense wave of Temporal energy that washed over her from the inside of the device.
Assunta smiled to herself, she knew she had Mary’s interest now.
‘What… is it…?’ Mary asked.
‘I have my theories Inquisitor, please, follow me inside, I have more to show you,’ she said, and stepped into the device which proceeded to light up as she entered.
Assunta waited as everyone filed inside and they all had a good look around the room.
‘Are we sure this is not powered by Witch Magic?’ Mary said.
‘I don’t know how we can be certain of that, but the energy in here does seem to be quite pure, and without the typical feel that the Witches give their Magic.’
‘Aaah yes, I see,’ Mary said as she looked about her. Assunta could feel the divine power from their Lord and Savior flowing through her mentor as she used his Grace to look upon the energy that fuelled this device.
‘But what does it do?’ said an Italian looking man stood next to Mary. This was Augusto, another of Mary’s Knights and Assunta’s peer.
‘With your permission Inquisitor,’ Assunta asked.
Mary nodded, clearly fascinated.
‘Please, stand back,’ she said, and inserted the key into the control panel, and turned it. The now familiar hum started up all around them and the button on the panel next to the key started to glow. ‘I would shield your eyes, this tends to be quite bright,’ she said and pressed the button.
The bright white flare of light flashed above the central platform and then grew into a huge globe of light and dark blue energy, like a mini azure sun hovering before them. The temporal energy that flooded out from this effect always stunned Assunta, and she could see the effect it had on those in the group that had been graced with the ability to use their God’s power.
After a short time, the group settled and gazed up at the globe without shielding their eyes, with only pure wonder and awe on their faces.
‘Our best guess? This is some kind of Time Travel device, and that is the portal,’ she said, pointing to the globe. But, we need to send something or someone through, to test it.’
‘Time Travel?’ Mary said cautiously.
‘That’s right. We’re not sure where to or when, but we think this is a portal into the past. We’re also unsure how this links to Amanda, but given the fight she had here recently and the new rumours about her, we’re fairly sure of a link, we just need to know what it is.’
‘Request whatever you need, I want to know what’s on the other side of that Portal.’ Mary said.
‘We have a… thing, we jury rigged up that’s about ready to go. We’re just going through some final tests now.’
‘What thing?’
‘We’re calling it our “Rover”,’ she said and gestured to the door where Ignacio stood with an all-terrain remote control car with a camera duct taped to the top of it.
Mary looked at it, then back to the Portal, and then back to Ignacio. ‘Does it work?’
‘Yes is the short answer. I could send it through now,’ Ignacio said.
‘Then do it,’ Mary said. Assunta felt like protesting as she would have liked to have had a little more time to test it, but she also knew that protesting this would only serve to annoy Mary and not stop this from happening, so she kept quiet.
A short time later, Ignacio and Cesar had the camera hooked up to a monitor with both a long cable, taped into place and a wireless connection as a backup. They had no idea what would happen when they sent the car through the Portal, but they hoped they would get a picture of the other side though. They could also use the wire to pull the car back through once they were done.
With everything set up, Cesar gave Ignacio the thumbs up and he placed the car on the edge of the platform, right at the base of the energy globe while being careful not to touch it himself.
Ignacio then backed up slightly and pushed the stick on the controller forward.
The moment the car passed through the outer shell of the globe, the picture on the monitor fizzed and went to static for a second before an image of trees and bushes appeared on the screen.
‘Is that a forest?’ Mary asked.
‘It appears so Inquisitor,’ Cesar said, peering at the screen before him.
Ignacio had the remote next to him and fiddled with the controls, but to no avail. The car appeared dead. Or at least, the radio signals didn’t pass through the Portal.
‘Put the aerial through,’ Cesar said.
Ignacio looked at the metal extendable aerial and moved closer to the globe, inserting the aerial into the energy ball, and then he tried the controls again. This time, the car moved.
Ignacio watched the screen and worked the controls, but even at the extent of the wire’s length, all they got were images of a forest. After a minute or two of moving the car around and seeing nothing but tress, the sight of movement a short distance away caught everyone’s attention, making them look closer at the screen. Someone, in modern clothes, with bright long red hair and clearly female was seen for only a few fleeting seconds.
‘Amanda,’ Mary whispered.
‘Are you sure?’ Assunta asked.
‘I’d bet my life on it,’ Mary said.
Ignacio tried moving the car around some more, but to no avail, nothing further could be seen. Which meant only one thing, they would need to send someone through the portal itself, Assunta thought.
‘We need to send someone through,’ Mary said, echoing Assunta’s thoughts.
‘We’re not set up for that here,’ Assunta said, referencing their lack of proper tactical gear and other tools for such a trip.
‘I completely agree with you, and I want to hand pick the team to do this as well. We have the key right? If we take it, then no one else can get in here, correct?’
‘I believe so, yes,’ Assunta said.
‘We’re leaving then, I want to plan this carefully. Gather your things and get back to the seaplane, we’ll be back and ready to explore the world on the other side of that Portal soon enough. Time is on our side I think,’ Mary said.
‘Is it not wise to leave someone here, to watch the place?’
; ‘Your call. We have the key, so no one else is getting in here, and while leaving a guard might give us some eyes on the Island, it also shows our hand, especially if any Witches pass by who can read his mind. It’s a risk either way, so that’s up to you Assunta.’
‘Very well Inquisitor,’ Assunta said and wondered what she should do.
- The Ocean.
Echo opened her eyes as she cancelled the Mental link she had been concentrating on and found herself back in the dark room on the boat that was taking them back to their island.
She had only just recently woken up from whatever kind of coma she had fallen into to find that her father had been horribly disfigured by the events on the island late last year, and had been taking care of her to the best of his ability while trying to return to his Island.
His new, huge and yet disfigured body held within him a huge amount of power, and suddenly, for the first time, Echo actually felt a little afraid of her father.
‘So…?’ his voice rumbled from across the room, where he sat in shadow.
‘Well, it seems that the Syndicate has been taken over by a Magus who calls herself Angel, and I think we both know who that is,’ she said, smiling. ‘So, when you’re ready, we’ll Port over there.’
Evicted
The Syndicate Island
Jan 16th
Angel sat at the huge desk in the largest office on the Syndicate Island. This was the seldom used office of Mr Black. Usually, he lived aboard an almost constantly airborne converted Jumbo Jet that was refuelled in the air to negate the need for landing. Only technical issues would bring the jet to the ground, and then usually only to the private airstrip on the Syndicate Island.
With a bit of Magic, Angel had soon broken into this office after taking control of the Island and broken through the security on his computer so that she could access his files.
These past few days, Angel had been doing only one thing, hunting through Mr Blacks files to find out as much as she could about his operation in the time she had.
She wanted to know who he controlled and why. She hunted for the people who owed him favours and the people he had dirty information on that he could use to bribe people with.
She let the rest of her coven deal with the day to day running of the place, preferring to concentrate on the gathering of as much information as she could. She had a feeling that having control over this empire wouldn’t last. She wasn’t sure why she felt this way, but she did and it certainly helped focus her mind on what she wanted to do.
So when the alarm went off, warning her of an intruder onto the island, she didn’t feel at all surprised. With a calmness that came from decades of life as a Nomad, she opened up the security camera feeds and quickly found that they were under a two-pronged attack. She could see Echo Black, Mr Black's daughter, walking in and not even trying to hide herself. She looked confident and with her fists clenched, ready for whatever came her way.
Meanwhile, another camera showed something huge and monstrous striding over the grass towards the compound. Dressed in a thrown together outfit of black that looked ripped and hastily stitched together from maybe ten different garments, this man looked maybe eight or nine foot tall with layers of muscle beneath a tough and deformed hide of pale, hairless, death like skin.
Angel glanced at Echo again, she looked the same as she had when she had last seen her, just a bit rougher around the edges, and then she looked back at the huge deformed man.
Was that, Mr Black?
She tried to get a closer look, but struggled to see much at all on the images generated by the security cameras dotted about the island. That’s when the first of the Telepathic messages from her Coven started to come through, making sure she had seen the alert and asking what she wanted to do.
Angel looked at the screen again and at the two people walking through the island’s landscape towards the complex they were in. It was just too much of a coincidence that Echo and this other… thing, were here at the same time, and given that she knew that Mr Black had been outside the shield that Amanda and her friends had created on the Island when the Nukes went off, everything seemed to fit. So she made the assumption that this was Mr Black and his daughter making a bid to take back control of the island and his organisation.
The way they were approaching the complex from basically opposite ends also spoke volumes about how much they knew about the current situation on the island. You wouldn’t do that if you thought nothing had changed. Angel had to assume that Mr Black knew she was here, and knew she had taken control of the Syndicate.
She didn’t see the point in getting her Coven killed trying to keep hold of the place, but she didn’t want to just run away either.
‘Okay, Michael, take Cherub, Uriel and Azrael and see what you can do with the girl. Don’t get yourselves killed over this, but if you can scare her off or even kill her, then do it. Gabrielle and Uziel, you’re with me, we’ll take on the big guy, I’ll meet you out front now,’ she said, and called on her Magic to split her mind and Multitask. She set all but one of her minds to building up her Aegis and the store of Essentia she held within her, while with her remaining mind she Ported from the office to the front of the building she had walked into only a few days before.
Moments later, Gabrielle and Uziel also appeared next to her.
Concentrating, Angel sent her senses out to where the Camera’s had picked up the creatures approach and easily found the huge man walking towards them. He was still a good way off though.
She gifted this information and view to her two Coven mates through their Mental Link.
‘Let’s go and meet our guest shall we?’ she said, and Ported all of them so they appeared a few meters ahead of the striding creature.
The thing stopped in its tracks as it saw the three Magi appear before it.
‘Angel, thought you could have my empire all to yourself did you?’ the thing said. She actually kind of regocnised the voice. It sounded much deeper with a gravelly tone to it than before, but it was certainly the voice of Mr Black.
‘So it is you,’ Angel answered, realising that this deformed thing was in fact Mr Black. ‘You could really do with some skin treatment I think,’ she quipped.
‘Leave,’ he said, ignoring her joke.
‘Not just yet, we’re not done here,’ she said, and pulled as much Magical energy as she could to her and cast it out at Mr Black with as much force and power as she could muster. Angel had seen Mr Black’s Aegis when she had first appeared before him, and could see it had some serious power behind it, and as her Magic hit him like a speeding freight train and cascaded around his Aegis like water over a rock, it started to become clear just how powerful that Aegis was.
Through the flares and pyrotechnic display of her Magic hitting his shield, she could see the smile growing on his face, and knew this wouldn’t be an easy opponent to beat.
‘A little help,’ Angel sent out through her mental link to her Coven Mates, and a moment later they joined her in blasting him with more Essentia trying to take down that Aegis of his. Beyond her Magic that flowed around and past his shield, Angel could make out something glowing green on his chest that seemed to be fuelling the shield that resisted her Magic, and as the power of their attack grew, so did the energy that poured out of the thing on his chest.
And then it hit her what it was. This was the Green Orb that she had helped recover from the ice at the South Pole, and somehow it had fused into Mr Blacks chest and seemed to be protecting him.
A doubt inside of her suggested that this was not a fight she could win grew as she realised the truth, causing her to take a few steps back from Mr Black.
‘Our Magic is doing nothing Angel, he’s too powerful, I can’t see us ever getting through that shield,’ Gabrielle said.
‘I agree,’ Angel said, and indicated that they should cancel their castings. As one, following her lead, they all broke off their attacks.
‘Finally realised what you are up against
have you?’ Mr Black said, a sneer on his lips.
Angel merely frowned. She did not like the idea that she would be beaten by this man, but she also didn’t want to end up in a losing fight and risk the destruction of her Coven. There would be other opportunities, other times to deal with this man.
‘Let’s see how you do against me,’ said a voice to Angel’s right. Looking in the direction of the voice, she noticed the movement of a shadow in the nearby copse of trees and watched as a huge cloaked figure stepped out. Its flowing robes covered a body that looked to be nearly twelve foot tall and seemed to melt from the nearby undergrowth.
Mr Black turned to the new arrival, and upon seeing her, apparently forgot that Angel was even there. The attack from this new challenger was swift. With a quick kinetic attack their Magic slammed Mr Black into the ground, and followed it up with a quick succession of attacks that hammered him into the ground and made his Aegis fizz and pop as it tried to hold off the Magic. As she watched, huge boulders hauled themselves out of the ground and threw themselves at him while nearby trees were uprooted to do the same as debris and smoke rose from the growing crater that Mr Black found himself pummelled into.
From thin air, even without a cloud in the sky, bolts of lightning started to lance down at the barely visible form of Mr Black, followed by balls of fire and lava that caused more smoke and dust to rise into the air.
The robed figure of this strange new Magus walked forward into this maelstrom of Magical attacks while Angel and her Coven mates looked on in awe at the power it could bring to bear.
Angel didn’t know who she was, only its voice suggesting a female creature, but from the sheer strength, power and number of attacks that were hitting Mr Black, she guessed this was an Arch Magus of fearsome ability.
Angel backed off further with her Coven but continued to watch the fight. ‘I don’t know about you, but I’m feeling quite out of my depth here,’ Angel said.
‘Agreed,’ Gabrielle said.
Infinities' Edge (The Magi Saga Book 4) Page 16
