Reality's Plaything 5: The Infinity Annihilator

by Will Greenway

  “Ah,” Gaea said. “Our part is almost done.” In a few more instants, the threads being spun out of his body ceased entirely. “There.” The goddess rose from her seat. “Now we can see how things are progressing.”

  “That’s it?” Daena asked, looking back.

  “Indeed,” the All-mother assured her.

  “Wizard,” Daena popped up out of her chair, obviously eager to be away from it.

  Corim stood up and looked around with a furrowed brow.

  Bannor rose and put an arm around Sarai. His wife-to-be immediately oriented in the direction of her mother. Together the two of them walked over to the scrying circle that Damay was providing with energy.

  The elder Kel’varan sat with legs folded her body leaned back and balanced against her palms. Heat images flickered around the ascendant’s skin, multicolored sparks and moats of magic orbiting her limbs. Even with all the power pouring out of her, she seemed to be barely even exerting herself. If anything, from the expression on her face, it felt good.

  They stopped briefly to look into the mirror that Janai was staring into. The second princess was a study in concentration. Images flickered by almost too fast to perceive, but Bannor noticed that she seemed to be making choices, accepting one path and discarding another. For her to make anything out at the speed at which the images moved she must be telepathically linked with the scrying crystal.

  Daena came over and put her hands on Janai’s shoulders. The dark-haired elf lady acknowledged the gesture by rubbing her cheek against Daena’s knuckles. “It feels like we’re getting close,” she said in a whisper.

  They walked a little further around the circle to where King T’Evagduran stood at the Queen’s shoulder as she too guided the search of her mirror.

  Jhaan’s gaze met Bannor’s. The elder elf shook his head. “I like not the feel of where this is going,” he said in a soft voice.

  “What do you mean?”

  “This is a creature of power—of magick power—actively attempting to thwart their attempts to pinpoint its location.”

  “Magic?” Sarai said. “I thought this was a Kriar!”

  “Aye,” the King said. “As did I. I saw the grim looks when Bannor produced that device.” He pointed to the collar floating above Loric’s krillglobe. His gaze tracked to Senalloy who sat in the chair next to Aarlen. “Sen had the scent of it before we even started.”

  Bannor tried to imagine what could possibly put that grim expression on the Baronian lady’s face. The woman was fearless. She looked death square in the eye without flinching.

  “Damn this character is slippery,” Aarlen muttered. “Sen, Sind, Drue, we need to box him in.”

  “Working,” Senalloy responded.

  “Got it,” Sindra answered.

  “I keep getting nothing but cold trails,” Kalindinai muttered.

  “He’s leaving false images,” Janai said. “I don’t know how… but he’s doing it…”

  “Daughter,” Gaea said in a calming voice, coming up on Bannor’s left. “Perhaps a bit of assistance.”

  Kalindinai looked up from her mirror, amber eyes wide. She nodded.

  Gaea stepped by the chair arm and laced her fingers with Kalindinai’s. “Leave us stop playing at his game and stab straight into the heart of matters.”

  Kalindinai sucked a breath as the power of the all-mother rushed through her body making her skin shine with a greenish light. The flickering images on the mirror blurred into a crimson froth. Then a flare of blue light made them wince back.

  “Ah,” Gaea mused. “That’s done it. He didn’t like that. Aarlen, Senalloy, I believe we have an active trace.”

  “Coming!” Aarlen said, making a sweeping gesture with her hand.

  “Right behind her!” Senalloy said.

  “Son Loric,” Gaea said. “We have a good lead.”

  “I heard!” Loric called back. “We’re tuning to it!”

  “Son Corim,” Gaea said. “Call your brothers and sisters, you need to be prepared to jump in just a few moments.”

  “Huh?”

  “Your portal will be right there,” Gaea pointed to the krillglobe. The crystalline skin of device had begun to skimmer like the surface of water, a rainbow of colors licking over the surface in patterns. “If you do not jump immediately to the location and lock down the area, your perpetrator will escape.”

  “Spit!” The man grabbed the shaladen band on his arm and began yelling for other members of the Shael Dal.

  In instants, Megan flashed into being next to him, her wings fluttering and flashing. Tal and Terra were mere heartbeats behind her. The thing that surprised Bannor was that Koass himself along with Garn and Nethra appeared as well. It was obvious they were taking no chances.

  “Nethra,” Gaea said. “You will want to brace the portal, the target will attempt to close it, the moment we create a connection.”

  The red-haired eternal cracked her knuckles. “They can try…”

  The krillglobe sparked and flared, the illumination around it growing brighter. Flashes of red appeared in the column of light radiating from the top of the device.

  “Hit!” Elsbeth yelled thrusting a hand in the air.

  “I have it as well!” Gabriella said waving a hand.

  “Got it!” Senalloy called.

  A humming thrummed in the air near the globe, a white incision beginning to lengthen and take shape.

  “Found him!” Ziedra yelled.

  “Here!” Cassandra called

  “Pinned!” Dorian chimed in.

  As each mage increased the focus of the scrying circle the portal grew more and more tangible.

  “Why isn’t it opening?” Bannor asked.

  Gaea frowned and looked back at the mirror. “Kal, you’re fixed?” She stepped over to Sindra and peered at her mirror.

  “Just got it,” the elder offered looking up.

  “I’m in,” Janai confirmed.

  “Drucilla and I have it bracketed as well,” Aarlen reported. “It’s pinned down like a bug on a cork board.”

  “The damn portal isn’t opening!” Loric growled.

  Bannor stared at the tear in fabric of Eternity that should have opened with all the energy and magic being focused on it. In that glowing line, the fabric of two hugely separated physical spaces were connected. Thousands of magical threads were laced through the gap.

  Bannor’s heart sped up. There was something else, another thread not like the others wound around and through them, choking them off, preventing the magic from completing the spatial circuit.

  It was being held closed.

  “Dammmn,” Bannor let out. “Lady Nethra, is it harder to open or close a gate?”

  “It’s very tough to close an already open gate,” the Eternal answered.

  “Bet it’s not nearly as hard to hold it closed before it opens,” he said.

  “It—” The giant red-haired immortal let out a growl. “That sneaky bastard, he grabbed the flux point while it was still in transition! Damn it!”

  “Can you force it open if I get it back?” Bannor said.

  “You damn bet I can!” the Eternal snarled. She slammed a fist into her palm and stared at the slash of light hanging before her. She held out her hands, fingers outstretched. “Ready!”

  “Here we go!” Bannor thrust his arm forward, and gripped that binding thread and yanked.

  For the first time in his entire time using the Garmtur, a thread stretched. It didn’t break, unravel, or attenuate… its length changed and the windings clamped down even tighter, just like the energy was a woven reed cord.

  All around the circle, Loric and the others let out yells and gripped their skulls. Bannor jerked at the noise, feeling his heart lurch. Damn, he never would have thought that would happen, and it fed back to the coven.

  Whoever this was, they even knew about manipulating the threads of reality. Since he already had a hold of the enemy’s binding he tightened his grip down to a single point an
d pinched down.

  Bannor gritted his teeth, feeling his thumping heart labor as he put more and more force into breaking the constricting energy. Whoever had done this possessed either amazing strength or phenomenal skill because even with his ascendant body he was struggling.

  He glanced down to Sarai who was looking up at him with a concerned expression, violet eyes glowing in her radiant face. He would not let this creature run free to threaten either him, his wife-to-be or their unborn child.

  Drawing a breath, he summoned all his will and smashed down on the resistance.

  With a heave, the binding broke releasing the closed edges of the gate that Loric and the others were striving so hard to open. With a flare of sparks and a booming of air, the portal opened with a crash leaving a yawning circular hole hovering in front of the central dais.

  “I have it!” Nethra yelled. “Go! Go! Go!”

  Koass and Garn were already moving. Chest still aching and head smarting, Bannor stumbled forward behind them. Megan, Tal, and Terra were at his shoulder as he leaped into shiny flickering surface of the gate.

  Bannor felt the kiss of magicks fluttering over him as he crossed the threshold into the new location. He landed with a thud and scrambled to one side to clear space as others came through the gate behind him in crackles of portal energy.

  The area where they had appeared was nothing strange or alarming. It looked to be a sizable office. A large stylized desk sat at the rear of the room, a framed image of what looked like a star exploding dominating the back wall. A gold-skinned male was leaned back in large chair with the fingers of both hands pressed together and held at his lips. Eyes burning with a silvery light, he stared at them with a furrowed brow.

  As Megan, Tal, Terra and others continued to file in through the rasping shimmering portal, Bannor summoned Xersis and transformed it into axes and braced himself. His gaze flicked around the chamber to the rear to check for other threats.

  Except for the male obviously prepared and waiting for them, the place looked empty of life and magic. He saw no out-of-place threads or distortions that might disguise threats. Innocuous nature scenes in dark frames hung on the walls. The ceiling and wall lights, cabinets, couches, and potted plants were similar to the appointments found in Quasar’s tower. While his eyes saw no threat, there was an icy feel to the room, and a coppery smell that reminded him of death.

  Koass and Garn already had their gleaming weapons out and pointed at the single occupant of the chamber. Bannor felt Megan brush up against him as she moved to stand shoulder to shoulder with her husband. Tal and Terra took up positions near blue-skinned Garn, who stood like a monolithic statue against the opposite wall. A hand touched his shoulder and he realized Sarai was there behind him, glaring at the creature that their magicks divined as the source of all their recent hardships.

  It was a good thing it was a decent sized room because the portal continued to disgorge ascendants, Shael Dal, and elders. Aarlen, Elsbeth, Dominique and the T’Evagdurans came through followed by Wren, Ziedra, Daena, and the Kergathas. Last through were Senalloy, the Felspars, Gaea, and Nethra.

  As the red-haired eternal hit the floor, looming massive and forbidding behind the all-mother, the portal winked out.

  Immortal bodies glowed and the air sizzled with battle magic ready to be unleashed. Enough power to annihilate an entire pantheon of gods thrummed and shivered in the hands of the confrontation force.

  The creature behind the desk stared at the assemblage. If he was afraid, it certainly didn’t show in his demeanor. What most troubled Bannor was the creature’s threads were totally obscured. He could sense their presence but could glean no information from them as to the character or power of the entity.

  He glanced to Koass. The eternal was simply scowling, his glowing white eyes narrowed as he sized up their opponent. Blue-skinned Garn stood poised, hands able to crush mountains opening and closing with nervous tension.

  The gold male sighed. He put his hands down on the desk in front of him, obvious in the way he kept them in clear view of the throng of warriors twitching and ready to attack at the slightest provocation. He leaned back, the lines of his narrow face set in an expression of disdain. The circular red jewel on his forehead flickered with shadows. “So,” the entity said in chilly resonating voice. “You found me. Now what?”

  Garn growled and surged forward a step. He stopped when Koass threw out a hand.

  “You can tell us what you’re about,” Koass said.

  “I have no intention of telling you anything,” the male answered with a shrug.

  “That might not be your intent Chyrith,” Gaea rumbled. “It is however, what you will do.”

  The entity raised an eyebrow, his gaze fixing on Gaea. The creature’s silvery burning eyes narrowed. “Oh?” The sound of his voice rumbled with power that Bannor could suddenly feel vibrating in the walls. “An interesting boast incarnate.” He held out his hand, and in a flare of white sparkles the enemy genemar appeared, the one Bannor had hoped destroyed in the explosion. “Can you back it up without taking half of Eternity with you…?”

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  * * *

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  When I get angry, I scare myself…

  —Bannor Nalthane Starfist,

  Prince Conjugal of Malan

  The power and anger made Bannor dizzy. The scrying circle had led them to the origin of all their recent pain and woe, and the arrogant posturing bastard sat there and laughed at them. He held a genemar in his hand and had the audacity to threaten Gaea with it. Either he was supremely powerful or abysmally stupid.

  Bannor’s heart pounded, the anger so hot his body shook. After all the harm this creature had already done, to even suggest the annihilation of Eternity through Gaea was too much to stomach or countenance for even a breath.

  The Chyrith’s threads were hidden from him but the primal essence of the newly summoned genemar was as clear as black paint on a white-washed wall. He thrust his nola into the heart of the device, became it, knew it—annihilated it.

  In a thunderous crash of pounding energy, the icon of ultimate destruction folded in upon itself and imploded into nothingness. The force of the impact smashed the golden creature against the wall.

  Rage drove Bannor forward in a flash, stepping across space in zero time to bring a whistling fist into the Chyrith’s midriff. He felt metal hard bone creak and flesh split under the force of the strike.

  The enemy let out a gasp, its steely composure finally broken. The enemy lashed back with a punch meant to shatter Bannor’s face.

  He brushed aside the attack feeling the heat burn his cheek.

  “Threaten my family?” Bannor roared, slamming home another blow that smashed his opponent back against the wall. The Chyrith tried to counter, its body slipping through time to disembowel him, but the towering fury had driven Bannor so far into the Garmtur that anything was possible. He turned inside the swing, spinning an elbow into the entity’s face hammering its head against the bulkhead. “Threaten my wife? My mothers?” He pummeled away with all his strength, white blood spraying up from each impact. “I—don’t—think—so!” Face misshapen and body torn, the Chyrith dropped to its knees. Bannor gripped the entity’s hair and drew back a fist. Mercy for this wight? Not likely…

  “Bannor—ENOUGH!” Gaea boomed.

  The sound of Gaea’s voice shocked him out of his scorching blood-lust. He let go of the creature, allowing it to slide down the wall leaving a pasty white streak on the wall.

  “Gods and goddesses, Bannor,” Wren breathed, hands pressed to her face.

  “Damn,” Tal muttered.

  Bannor looked around. He was covered in the creature’s white blood. The substance was crusted and dried on his clothing—what little of it remained. His shirt and leggings had been reduced to charred tatters. The desk the creature had been sitting behind was nothing but a smoldering hillock of slag. His fists still glowed and crackled with nola power
. His body ached. He had sensed the creature’s defenses and simply plowed through them. He had been so angry he hadn’t felt the pain of the near misses or even sensed the danger.

  “Garn, detain that creature,” Koass said.

  The blue-skinned eternal thumped forward and jerked the battered Chyrith to its feet. Slapping dark shackles on the creature’s arms.

  “My One?” Sarai said, staring at him with wide, violet eyes. There was fear in her eyes. In fact, she wasn’t the only one, even the elders looked alarmed.

  “I—” He coughed. A spasm wracked through his body. “Urgh…” He staggered and eternal Koass stepped forward to steady him. “I think—I think I got a little carried away.”

  “I’ll say,” Wren murmured. “He was all over you, I thought sure…” Her voice trailed off.

  A flash of silver at the back of the group made Bannor focus. Tall Senalloy stood where the gate had opened, shaking her head. “This is bad.” Her voice, usually so steady, actually cracked, “one of the masters… here. We are so frelled…”

  “Leave us go,” Koass said. “We…”

  Bannor heard the energy cell of a heavy blaster rifle being clacked into position. “You are trespassing,” a cold male voice growled. “Stand down. Councilor Gharad is a Kriar citizen and you are in the sovereign demesnes of Fabrista Homeworld.”

  Everyone turned to see Eclipse and Quasar at the entry with weapons leveled. The two Kriar were fully armored, obviously prepared for war. Behind them were numerous other figures all equally prepared to fight. Bannor only saw glimmers of the Kriar tarkath’s glowing blue eyes through the visor of his helmet.

  Koass gritted his teeth. “This is no more your councilor than I am!”

  Eclipse worried his feet into the deck keeping his weapon leveled on the group. “That might be true. Such determinations can be made at a proper Kriar inquest. At such time, extradition can be discussed. Stand down. I will not ask again.”

  Nethra let out a growl. “You want to take us on Eclipse? All of us? I don’t like your chances.”

  “Koass,” Quasar said in her icy voice. “I strongly urge you to reconsider. You take that councilor out of here, and you are giving the Daergons exactly what they want—another war with the Protectorate. To the citizens of Fabrista Homeworld, the Baronians are someone else’s problem. Eternals they remember, raiding inside our borders… we expect a little more courtesy from our neighbors.”