“How? Nobody knew?” Elise took a step back.
“The secret's out; let’s just say I am starting a collection of my own!”
“It won’t work on me: I’m human.” Terra levitated from the floor and began to rise toward Orthos.
“Same here.” Brendan rose from the floor to join his former mentor.
“Stop where you are! I admit I depended on Carol to do her part and separate you from that human body, Terra. But I see I must ask you to do it yourself since she obviously didn't survive the attempt.”
Terra laughed a nervous laugh. “I won’t commit suicide to help you!” She continued to rise toward Orthos.
“Don’t do it, Terra. You can’t give in to him!” Liam shouted.
“Don’t get any closer!” Orthos began to unscrew the lid to the jar. “I’m afraid I will have to destroy Liam if you do.” He grinned exposing his sharpened teeth.
“And all of these thousands of your own followers with him?” Terra gestured toward the orb.
“Let him, I’m not afraid!” Liam yelled.
Elise began approaching the orb quietly, but Terra noticed her movement and waved for Elise to back away.
“It is unfortunate, but they volunteered. I am sure I can build a new one later if I feel the need.”
Brendan stopped in midair, halfway up the side of the orb. His brow creased for a moment before his eyes widened. He glanced up. Orthos was focused on Terra. He gestured for Liam to come to the wall of the orb where he had stopped and was now descending. Brendan held his finger over his lips, warning Liam to stay quiet. “This may hurt, try to stay quiet and then get out of here!” Brendan whispered. He made a fist, then plunged it through the orb in one of the thinner points. The orb rushed toward his exposed arm, scratching and clawing at his forearm. “Take my hand,” Brendan ordered through clenched teeth.
Liam obeyed without question. His eyes stayed focused on Terra as Brendan attempted to pull Liam’s entire entity through his arm and into his rightful body, stepping out of the body as he executed the change. As soon as Brendan was free of Liam’s body its ability to levitate ended, and Liam was left dangling by his forearm a foot above the floor. Liam let out an involuntary groan as the orb chewed his arm, it shook his body as he tried to pull away.
“What’s this?” Orthos screeched as he turned to investigate.
“That formula won’t affect him now! It’s just between you and me. Let’s settle this!” Terra charged up the orb crashing into Orthos. As they collided, she caught a glimpse of the Mason jar slipping through the cracks of the mesh orb. “Get back!” she yelled to Brendan and Elise. She was unable to see if they were safe. Orthos sunk his claws into her flesh as he drove her into the orb. Terra was pinned to thrashing souls beneath her. The anger and pain from the evil crowd raged through her. Terra fought to pull her arm from the orb and slapped her hand against his face. Her fingers were bloody from the orb, left red streaks in stark contrast with the ghoulish complexion of her attacker. She struggled to reach into his thoughts and memories. The misery of the orb was nothing compared with the darkness that emitted from Orthos. He had no shred of compassion or empathy.
"You cannot destroy him with his ties to humanity. He has none." The voice of the One startled Terra, but that spark of light within her mind pushed back the darkness that had threatened to swallow her.
Help me! Terra thought to the One. I cannot do this alone. Admitting that she needed and wanted help brought a wave of peace that further eroded Ortho's evil, letting more of the Tweens’ energy flow through her thoughts.
“What’s happening to her?” Liam asked. He stood in the doorway. Elise and Brendan held him back by both arms as he struggled to reach Terra. “She’s glowing!”
“I don’t know,” Elise said. “Should we go to her?”
Stand clear, wait until it is time the voice of the one demanded in the thoughts of both guides.
“How can we?” Brendan took a step toward his mentor with a look of anguish.
“How can we what?” demanded Liam. He held his bloodied arm with his other hand as he attempted to run toward Terra. It took Brendan and Elise to hold him back.
“This is her fight; we have to stay out of it,” Elise whispered.
“So you came here just to watch her be destroyed? What kind of sick people are you?”
Before Elise could answer, the sound of broken glass clattering onto the concrete floor announced the release of Azalea’s formula. The smallest splash from the jar triggered the Orb to begin to lose its structural integrity. The perfect globe rippled, and the sides began to shrivel like rotten fruit.
Terra opened her eyes as the brackish energy that supported her trembled beneath her. “No more, there's nothing to save within you!” she spoke between clenched teeth.
Orthos wheezed as he laughed. “You still thought you could save me?”
“No, I'm here to destroy you!” As her gaze met his, the white light surrounding her focused to beams locking with the blackened eyes of the Originator. Terra could feel the energy of the Tweens coursing through her. She tried to open her mind to it and allow it to flow through her and into Orthos.
Orthos gasped as the new surge of immortal energy hit him. Terra could feel the darkness seeping from him trying to encapsulate her.
The orb beneath them sunk toward the floor, dissolving with an angry hiss as the darkness melted away. A pool of formula and broken glass lay barely visible in the swirling darkness.
Chapter 49
As Terra struggled against Orthos, the orb became a blackened cloud, obscuring the two immortal beings.
"Enough of this." Liam twisted free of the two shocked guides and ran into the billowing darkness.
"Liam, don't." Elise lunged to stop him a second too late. Liam disappeared from sight. Elise moved to follow him.
"Stay back!" The voice of the One reverberated through the industrial chamber.
Elise, with Brendan on her heels, stopped in mid-air.
"We have to help them!" Brendan called out.
"More than you, when it is time. Wait."
Carol, supported by Liliana came slowly out of the side room. "He went in there, after Terra didn't he," Carol's voice was soft. The hate-filled malice now replaced by a mother's grief.
Elise did not say a word, she turned to answer, but no words would come.
"He did, you don't have to tell me, I can feel it. A mother knows when her child is in danger." She looked through the darkness, hoping to catch a glimpse of her mortal child.
"I'm so sorry, Carol," Liliana said.
"No, I understand now. There are things set in motion here that none of us can change, they are meant for this." Her voice ended with a strangled sob.
The hissing and churning of the black mass that had once been the orb intensified. The tortured cries of the souls who had given themselves to become part of the evil monument were joined by a low hissing growl as the formula dissolved one layer at a time.
~~~~~~~~
Terra's bloodied fingers gripped Orthos by his face. The blinding light from her eyes connected with his eyes, empty as the darkest void. Neither would concede, and neither could overpower the other.
The shrieking of the orb surrounded them as thickly as its brackish darkness but somewhere in the unholy dim Terra heard another sound.
"Terra, Terra, where are you?" Liam called out to her.
She felt the connection with Liam reaching out to her like a tangible thing. In desperation, she allowed her consciousness to entwine itself in the connection, pulling it to her to comfort herself against the barrage of foul, evil impressions, worse than the darkest descriptions of biblical Hell. And in her desperation, surrounded by the power of the ONE, the link she had always felt to Liam's thoughts expanded to allow him to share her thoughts and feelings as well. The link between the two became as strong as a tangible thing, and though her body and mind still struggled against her attacker, a new sensation of total wholeness overc
ame her as Liam approached her through the swarm of evil.
Terra could not see Liam when he found her pinned beneath the monster who had hunted them both. Her eyes were fixed on her attacker, but she could feel his presence, hear his thoughts.
Enough! Terra and Liam thought as one.
Liam launched himself bodily onto Ortho's back. Catching him around the throat he wrenched the moldering think backward. As he did Orthos reached behind him, plunging his blade-like claws into Liam's side. In an instant, Terra could feel both Liam's surprise, his pain and the warm gush of his blood flowing onto her as he continued to fight her attacker.
"No!" Terra screamed. But she could no more change what had already been done than she could change Orthos. She rose to take on the beast with a new surge of vitality, her blood mingling with Liam's as she clawed Orthos away from him.
As the freely given blood mingled, Liam's sacrifice, the purpose he had always been made to fulfill was complete. The anger and fear that had consumed them both a moment before were replaced by peace as they finally accepted the role that was always meant for them. The peace at that moment was a strange contrast to the violent beast they still sought to overcome.
The building began to tremble. The little light in the room dimmed, then darkened. The darkness spread out through the local area, throughout the state, expanding until it engulfed the entire continent. Liam slumped against Orthos, his lifeblood ebbing, covering both Orthos and Terra, and as the gleaned from the sun ebbed from the earth, immortal energy flowed through Terra, becoming a beacon of light, brighter than anything ever before witnessed by human eyes. The roof blew off the room. The blackness swirled around them, but she held on, to Orthos by the throat with all of her physical strength, and to Liam's consciousness with all of her immortal mind.
As the energy coursed through her, her fingers began to lose their grip on the thing that had sought her for her entire human life, as he slipped from her grasp, a wave of panic ripped through her.
~~~~~~~~
The sudden glare of pure immortal energy flattened the remaining fragments of the orb, revealing Terra in her horror and her glory to the three guides and Carol, who stood aside in wonder.
"That looks like a signal to me." Brendan pointed to the beam extending into the night sky.
"Yes, but what does it mean?" Elise asked.
"It means Terra and Brendan are in trouble." Carol tried to wiggle past the three guides toward her son.
Liliana shuddered. "No, do you feel that? My charges, I can connect to their thoughts again, all of them.
"Yes! But how? They're everywhere, and some of them, well they are beyond our help," said Brendan.
"No, I mean the motion, can you feel them coming?" Elise said. She clutched her head as the distorted thoughts and feelings of charges she had long since lost coursed through her mind with renewed vitality. "I think they're coming here!"
"Yes, but it's all of them – all the ones we thought lost to the scourge " Brendan flinched and shook his head as tortured thoughts wracked through his mind.
"If they are coming here, then we need to get ready to fend them off," Liliana said.
"I think you're right, but how?" Elise said.
"Isn't it obvious, we fight the evil with a united front? We will stop them together," said Carol, ready to defend her child.
"We'll try, but we really could use some help!" Elise said.
Chapter 50
"How many more can there be?" Christopher asked.
"Too many, it took us almost forty-eight hours to sort out the stadium mess. All those people separated from the bodies, and so many were just destroyed." Amity grabbed another scourge from under a porch to dispatch it while she spoke.
"Azalea and Korin should have known" Troy grumbled as he dragged a smaller scourge down the street towards the small team of guides.
"They couldn't have known. I think the intention was good." Constance shook her head sadly.
"For Korin, I know she wanted to help, but that old lady knew what she was doing," Troy said. The scourge he had been wrangling attempted to claw him, he punched it to vent his frustration. "We didn't want this. I mean it was about protecting ourselves, not causing that kind of carnage.
"The news is calling the body count an act of terrorism," said Amity. "Will they send Korin back to jail?"
"I wouldn't doubt it," Troy said.
"Whoa, did you feel that?" Christopher asked.
"Feel what? Troy asked."
Constance doubled over holding her head. "Oh, that's bad, where did that come from?"
"What? What is happening?" Troy demanded. His eyes scanned for signs of another impending attack.
“The charges, all of them all at once. They’re screaming,” Amity groaned.
"What the heck?" Troy braced his feet as the scourge he had been trying to wrangle was lifted straight into the air like a balloon. He yanked the thing back down to eye level. He did not have long to leer at the thing that had almost slipped through his fingers: the sky dimmed and went pitch black.
"Look!" Amity shouted, pointing upward.
"What is that light?" Christopher asked. He strained his eyes to see the strange light that grew brighter by the moment.
"That light isn’t from this world!" Halle said.
"Hey, what's going on?" Troy's feet were lifted from the ground as he was dragged bodily toward the giant beam of light. He let go of the Scourge as the thing was propelled through the darkness in the same direction.
Christopher grabbed Troy by the arm as he drifted by picking up speed, pushing him back to the ground. "Look at them all, it is pulling all disembodied entities toward it!"
"The time has come. The guides must join Terra." The voice of the One reverberated through the thoughts of the five guides.
"How, where?" Amity asked.
George put his hands on his head, trying to block the flood of thoughts and emotions from his rediscovered charges. "Whatever that is, all the charges are being dragged there, like it or not."
"Follow your charges, it is your purpose." The voice of the One demanded action.
"What is going on?" Troy demanded as he scrambled to right himself.
"We have to go! The One is calling us to action," Christopher said.
"What about the others?" Amity asked.
"They will hear the call, just like we did," Constance said.
"Calling, what are you talking about?" Troy asked.
"Sorry about this. I really am, we will tag along for the ride, but it looks like we're all taking a trip," Christopher said as he let Troy drift off the ground.
"It is time to go!" Constance said. She levitated forward.
"I think we should keep Troy between us, just in case," Amity said to Christopher.
"Agreed," Christopher nodded. A moment later, the five guides were moving with a velocity faster than the speed of sound as all of them hurtled toward the glowing beam of light.
"Wait, what about my troops?" Troy shouted.
"I think they'll be joining us," Amity called back.
The five immortals went toward the beam of light. Halle grabbed onto Christopher for guidance, as she tried to catch a glimpse of her portal at top speed. She had lost track of Terra after she left the stadium, so instead, she focused on Liam, who had always been easier to track. As Halle looked down at the portal in her arms, she could only see a glaring white light. "I have a location for Liam, maybe, but I really can't tell what is happening to him. Everything is in a glare."
"Well, where is he?" Amity asked.
"From what I can tell, I think he is there!" Halle pointed at the beacon of light.
"So we can assume that Terra is once again at the source of the trouble." Christopher looked up at the light in amazement.
"I can't imagine she would be anywhere else." Halle levitated slowly toward the beacon of light.
Chapter 51
"What's happening to them?" Carol asked. The frantic edge to her voice was un
deniable.
The remnants of the orb were now cleared, allowing Brendan, Elise, and Liliana a clear view of Liam and Terra. But they were no closer to understanding what they were seeing. Terra and Liam were now part of the root of an enormous vortex of immortal energy that spun at unimaginable speeds starting a few feet above the floor and extending into the night sky as far as they could see.
"I think that is out of our hands." Brendan's pain was etched on his face.
"Then what is it that we are waiting around for?" Carol asked. "Somebody has to do something.
"Look!" Elise pointed to the sky. "The sky is filling with the disembodied!"
As the four watched in awe, the sky above the scourge headquarters gradually filled with torrents of mortal souls. They were entrapped in a vortex that rose, miles wide around the beacon of light.
Elise furrowed her brow as she watched the sky. "I don't understand. I thought we were here to fend them off but they are all just stuck up there." She had to shout over the din of the trapped.
A rumble much louder than thunder silenced the trapped souls in one blast. The vortex shook slightly as an explosion-filled with sparks rocked the area where Terra and Liam had been at the focal point of the vortex.
"No!" Carol sank to her knees as a sob of despair wracked through her. The guides strained to see Terra and Liam struggling against Orthos in the light, but instead saw only a ball of light hovering over an enormous crater where the floor and the formula once had been.
"They're gone, they are really gone." Brendan hung his head.
"Now, you must join together to mend what has been broken." The voice of the One reverberated through the minds of the guides. In that instant, they knew that they must take over where Terra left off. Brendan, Elise, and Liliana joined hands and walked toward the pinnacle of light.
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