Unwilling Eldritch Horror of Fortune

Xalla, Bob, and I stayed just outside of the threshold as we prepared ourselves to save the Restus in case something went wrong. Well, perhaps save wasn’t the right word for things, since our goal was to have them all killed, so we were all geared up to… kill them? Well, either way, the three of us were prepared for any traps that this Margret person prepared.

We watched patiently as the files and files of Restus rushed headlong into the narrow corridor; it would have been difficult for me to watch all of it happening if I was still in Human form since the bodies of the Aspirants blocked a normal line of sight, but that was not a problem with a Xollon’s unique way of viewing the world.

The three of us quickly squeezed through the opening once the last of the Restus was in, and just as we expected, there was a surprise waiting for us there, although it wasn’t quite what I surmised.

“Hey, Bob,” I said, tapping the chubby man’s shoulders, “Now I’m not an expert on tech, but uh, is that what I think it is?”

I pointed a feeler toward one of the large mechanisms that was in charge of regulating the interior’s filtration and temperature systems. There was only a small monitor that kind of looked like one of those Human Jukeboxes, but I knew that the bulk of the machine ran into the walls.

Unless heavy modifications were made, the thing should have wires and pipes running throughout the complex, just hidden out of sight. This system was so old that it was practically obsolete even when I first worked as an Arbiter, almost 60 cycles back, so I was familiar with the thing’s general function.

“Oh,” Big Bob answered, “Well, at least we know what the proxy admin’s planning now. How bad’s the explosion going to be again according to the lawsuits again?”

Xalla frowned, “What are you two talking about?”

“That antique machine,” I said, gesturing to the now smoking terminal, “was discontinued for a very good reason. I think Bob knows more about the situation than I; want to explain?”

“That’s the model 12-”

“In simple terms, I mean,” I added quickly, giving him an admonishing stare.

Bob blushed, “Right, sorry. I mean this particular machine’s been recalled because it had a tendency to explode quite spectacularly if it was ever operating outside its normal parameters. Mind you, it did have to be quite a bit outside of those parameters, but I won’t get into specifics.”

Good, it seemed like Bob’s actually learning to keep all that technical info to himself for once. I guess there is hope for the man. I gave him a silent nod of approval.

Xalla pointed at the now screeching and smoking terminal, “Which, I can assume, it is doing now?”

“Correct,” Bob nodded, “And uh, we might want to step back a bit and hold on to any loose valuables, since they’re using antimatter to power its generators. I hope your suit’s also heat and impact-proof, Xalla.”

“Is it going to be that bad?”

The explosion answered Xalla’s question for her.

Big Bob had already erected a small barrier to shield us from the worst of the resulting explosion, but even that couldn’t block all the various shrapnel and vaporized Restus pieces off of us. Thanks to my enhanced Xollon senses, I was even able to see in excruciating detail just what had happened.

The build-up of pressure inside the various pipes and wires reached its limit, which caused the power cell of the machine to explode. Since the machine needed multiple cells to power all of its operations here, the first explosion caused a chain reaction that propagated through the entire facility, leading to the absolute devastation that we experienced.

“Oh…” Xalla muttered as she stepped out of Big Bob’s protective bubble and surveyed the now obliterated facility.

The three of us were fine, albeit a bit more grimy, but I couldn’t say the same about any of the other living creatures that used to be here. There was no sign that the Restus even existed since every single one of them was atomized. And this was precisely the reason why no one in their right mind ever used unstable matter as an energy source going forward.

I extended my senses and saw that almost the entire eastern wing of Site 1100 went up in flames, taking a good chunk of its staff and equipment with it. Even part of the central headquarters was damaged, although its reinforced defenses blocked off the worst of the explosion.

Big Bob, Xalla, and I stood around for a while, unsure on how to proceed now that there wasn’t much of a facility left when the battered and damaged blast doors - the only ones still intact - slid open. A woman wearing a stubby-looking Restus suit came out the doors along with a half dozen other security members but stopped in her tracks when she saw the three of us.

We just stared at each other, no group quite sure what to do.

“Um, hello?” I said, breaking the ice.

That got their attention, but instead of a welcome, the one in charge - whom I can only assume was Margret - barked a few orders to her men and attacked us.

“Our plans are leaked,” she muttered, “Leave none of the Overseer’s goons alive.”

Her team expertly spread out around the ruins and started to bombard our position with advanced weapon fire. I saw beams of highly concentrated radiation directed at Bob’s position, while a localized black hole threatened to swallow my own position. My friends and I had to quickly retreat back.

“Wait, we’re not with him!” Xalla started to say, but her only response was more retaliation.

Margret frowned when she saw that her minions were doing nothing productive, and she decided to take things into her own hands. She swiped a massive talon into the air, tearing apart this dimension, and summoned a huge squirming mass of sludge, maybe 20 or 30 feet tall and just as round. In the middle of its mucous-like form was a mouth that frothed acidic bile. It reached out with an appendage and tried to drag Xalla into its maw.

The Xollon just frowned and swatted it aside with a feeler, hurling half of its mass back toward the person who summoned the monster. The entire creature vanished right before it could impact with a really angry Margret.

“Hey, we’re not here to fight,” I said, louder this time, “How about we talk things out first?”

More silence greeted us - well, silent mouths at least because the bombardment didn’t cease.

Margret frowned as she realized that her first creature didn’t manage to do much of anything, and I saw her tense up in concentration as a visible force built up within the woman. Her Restus guise exploded and her true form peeled out of the shattered disguise. Out came a crone of a being, she was skeletal thin and stood at least 12 feet tall even when she was hunched over. What appeared to be blackened bark-like growths spiraled up her withered feet and entwined inside of her body. Her limbs were gangly with strange plant-like growths sprouting across their form, while her entire face was an ashen mass of tumors and fungal growths. Creepy looking, to say the least.

A short while later, a guttural snarl of noise exited her mouth, the sheer volume of it shook the very earth around us. A huge formation expanded from the ground and I could feel something massive tunneling its way toward our location.

The ground erupted as a multisegmented monstrosity of a creature burst out and tried to swallow us all. It was massive in size, probably the size of a midrise condo, and while the dust and debris covered most of its features, it was impossible to miss its rows and rows of razor-sharp legs and the bony needle-sharp spikes that layered every inch of its body.

There was no avoiding this thing, at least not on this plane of existence, so instead I opted to dip out of here in a nearby shadow, letting the soothing dusk engulf my physical form. I had to phase back in a short while later, for not even the impressive Xollon’s Secondary Form could withstand the horrid conditions of the abyss for too long. They’d have to go full-on Prime for that.

Once I was back in this reality again, I saw the giant millipede creature burn under a rain of white-hot fire, courtesy of Big Bob. The chubby god had floated high up into the sky as a ray of searing light ate away chunks of the massive beast. Xalla, having no way of flying without transforming further, had latched onto Big Bob’s arm, and it was a comical sight to see if not for the awful destruction being unleashed on the poor saps that were earthbound.

Yet despite how much punishment Big Bob was dishing out, the segmented creature was still struggling and fighting back. It was spitting enormous gobbets of putrid smelling slime toward the floating pair even as the rest of it burned under the light. At the rate that it was melting, it’d be a while before it died.

I snuck up to his flank and sped up the process. Now it was much too large for me to just chuck it straight into the Abyss, what with my currently limited ability, but that doesn’t mean that I couldn’t do a lot of damage. I forced one of my feelers into its side and allowed my limb to slither inside the beast’s cavities. I doubt it would even feel that part, but what it couldn’t miss was the little bits of liquid Darkness I was secreting inside its body.

It tried to dislodge me by rolling around, but the Xollon body was so sturdy that I didn’t even need to dodge. If it thought that pure physical force could do anything to me then it was sorely mistaken. It continued to thrash and roll around while I clung on to it like a leech.

The creature rumbled in pain as the puddles of pure void ate through its body, sending away huge chunks of its form into the Abyss. I thrust another feeler into its side, and another and another until I looked like a strange dark spur stuck to the millipede’s side. With the combined efforts of Big Bob’s rain of fire and my liquefaction of the creature’s insides, the worm-thing finally stopped its thrashing and died.

After the carnage cleared, the only ones left standing were Margret, Xalla, Bob, and I. It seems that her minions were caught up in the crossfire and did not survive the encounter. In fact, the facility wouldn’t have survived that encounter either if it hadn’t already been destroyed by the earlier explosion.

Margret looked like she was about to attack again but was quickly stopped by a rather disgruntled-looking Xalla.

“Enough,” she shouted, “You’ve made a mess of things already. We already said that we were not here to fight.”

The other Head of Security paused what she was doing and finally took the time to look at the three of us. Her body language screamed of hesitation and distrust, but at least she wasn’t outright attacking us now.

“It seems like the Overseer’s managed to hire Primal Gods and Xollons to his side,” she spat, “What a waste of resources. Well, go on with it, gloat and get the execution out of the way, I don’t have all day.”

Does this woman not understand what we were saying? I even tried to shift her perception or emotions, but whatever type of creature she was made my efforts mute. I guess I can’t rely on the Shards to do much when I was faced with Central’s elites.

“For the last time,” I sighed, “We are not here to fight you!”

“Yes, I know,” she cursed, “You are here not to fight, but to execute us, enough with your useless semantics, cursed spawn of the Overseer. You will not learn a thing from me; do your worst.”

“Oh for the love of everything,” I exclaimed, “will you just listen to us?”

A cold glare and a grunt were the only indications that she heard me.

“As I was saying,” I repeated, “We are not with the Overseer. In fact, that piece of shit slimeball is the last person I would ever willingly help out.”

“You say that but the Xollon woman has one of our uniforms on while the other one’s been in commercials advertising his products with Central’s endorsements and money,” she spat, “You think I’m that stupid? So I will say it again: go fuck yourselves. You will get nothing useful out of me.”

Well, that was the first time I heard about Big Bob being in commercials, and I couldn’t for the life of me picture how that would look like. I glanced at the man with a raised eyebrow, who just shrugged in response.

“Money’s money,” he said, “And Central used to pay really well.”

I sighed. Well, this just made things substantially harder.

“Look, we can say the same about you,” I said, hoping that some kind of reasoning would work on the woman before resorting to the unpleasant alternative, “You got the same uniform as Xalla’s got, and you’re on the Overseer’s payroll as well. What’s to say our situation’s not the same as yours?”

The woman thought about it for a while before slowly nodding. At least she was willing to listen, that was a start.

“Look, we both know that the Overseer’s a sack of shit and that he’s running Central into the dirt,” I continued, “So how about I explain our side of things before you make your decision?”

Another pensive moment followed by another nod. Good, we were getting somewhere.

I smiled, “Alright, so here’s what’s going on.”

 

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