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I
Paul's thoughts drifted to the day his Lieutenant was killed, the man assigned to train him.
The last moment of the man's life is what played in his mind. That was the first time he had seen someone die, and, though he had seen many others after, none had that "see you later" look in their eyes.
Those eyes.
Purity's thoughts went to her last moment on regular earth, before the amulet absorbed her like water to a sponge. She saw the eyes of her father just before he died, and she remembered how unafraid and reassured she felt.
Unafraid and reassured.
II
"Enough dancing already. Fight!"
"Yea! Fight!"
The elders were getting restless. The food was gone and they were lusting for blood. Not one cared who won, only that he did so by inflicting as much pain as possible, with flesh ripped from bone being the top thrill.
It was an elite group, warriors who had never battled anything worse than heartburn from overeating. Some had gained their position because of politics, some as a reward for brown nosing above and beyond the call of duty, and at least one as a result of an elder who fell down and hit his head on a rock and was subsequently eaten alive by his peers.
But, not one had ever endured a battle. Ever.
Sed lapped up the blood of his opponent from his forearm. Mortivian felt a wave of disgust, not at the sight of such a horrific beast enjoying his snack or great pleasure he witnessed while he did so; Sed had surprised him.
Sed now had his blood melding with his own and such an advantage was nearly impossible to overcome, especially in battle. The blood of Mortivian would now work to help Sed defeat him, by providing nourishment and information about him that his opponent would never had known otherwise, simply because he was first to consume the other.
An almost unsurmountable obstacle, to be sure. A straight on attack would give Sed even more of an advantage should it go against him. There was only one way to change the flow of battle.
Creetoo Humdin Aktar, whispered Mortivian, then shouted, CREETOO HUMDIN AKTAR!
Sed was stunned by a burst of energy long enough for Mortivian to lunge forward and bite a chunk from his right arm. The elders roared with delight at this blatant maneuver, both dishonorable and corrupt. Mortivian had developed this attack for later on in the battle, when Sed would have been weakened by his superior fighting skills. Even so, he was still confident in his superiority.
His time had come.
Sed stumbled backwards a step or two, reeling from that surge, and assessing his injury.
Lepyer took it upon himself to bring the warriors their first weapon, Sed's favorite- the War Hammer. He was especially fond of the 18 inch spike on the head- sharp and lethal. Both weapons were absolutely clean, all flesh and blood removed by an underling the same way a child would "clean" the bowl used to make icing for a cake.
Each hammer was as long as the average man is tall, weighed around 140 pounds, most of that on the end, and was wielded with ease by both warriors.
The two ran at each other at full speed. Sed swung hard, burying the spike deep into Mortivian's chest. Mortivian swung as well, but his weapon came apart, the head flying into the crowd of dignitaries, striking Elder Crone in the center of his forehead. His body was consumed by the crowd in a blood lust feeding frenzy, leaving only a meatless skeleton. The bones were pulled apart and scattered by the crowd, some slurping marrow like it was a melting ice cream cone.
Mortivian knew he had been tricked, his weapon sabotaged, set to fail at the worst possible moment. He would make Lepyer pay, whether it was his fault or not. He had no way of knowing for sure that it was the actions of the supposed lackey that threatened his victory.
But, it is hard to exact revenge with a large metal spike invading your chest, piercing your still beating heart.
Sed began to circle his dying friend at a slow pace, both enjoying his pain and saddened that the fight ended so soon. When convinced that the fight was truly over, Sed turned to the milling crowd, stunned by the speed of his victory, and brought them to their feet by raising his bloodied arms.
The crowd, and Sed, were stunned once again when the handle of Mortivian's weapon flew through the air with enough force to slip through his body. It had enough speed left to impale itself into the chest of Elder Frish. The old guy fought off his hungry companions for a minute or two, but was soon wriggling amongst the acidic and functioning channels of their overused digestive tracts.
Sed fell, landing face down in a sludge of elder refuse, too horrific for any sewer. He didn't move for a good while, only throwing a twitch here and there, studied intently by Mortivian.
The two beasts rose a little at a time, standing up mostly by sheer will. Lepyer did not wait for a signal. He walked over to the stash and brought each fighter a weapon, more like a weapon system, something that resembled a Super Blaster water gun with three tanks and a dull green light on each side.
Lepyer handed the weapon to Mortivian, then one to Sed. He had not taken two steps away when Mortivian stopped him, screeching.
"Stop!" His breathing was labored and purposeful. Give me the weapon you gave to HIM!"
The memory of the catastrophic failure of his last weapon had not left him, in spite of his own heart trying to pump out his life's blood. The suit, designed to prevent such an incident, was beginning to fail him as well. Even with this, he had enough blood-- and hatred – circulating to keep the fight going. He needed to win soon, or there would not be enough time, or strength, to save himself; his friends would only devour him.
Lepyer did as instructed, switching the weapons. Now it was Sed who did not trust them.
"No such thing!," he said. "Take them back, we will fight as in the old time!"
There it was. In the old time warriors used only the strength of their clawed hands to fight, snacking on the chunks taken from their foes. The fighting would last much longer now, and the crowd was very pleased.
Lepyer knew this was a possibility, but had hoped it would not happen. Now that it had he realized that it could not have gone any other way. Now he needed the fight to last as long as it possibly could, for the fighters to greatly weaken each other. Now; he would have to kill the winner himself. It was the only way to end their reign of terror against humanity.
III
Paul could not believe how close his son was; or how far. But, they had to get out of there. It was just a matter of time before they would be trampled by the wickedly stupid and rowdy crowd, which milled about like a mob looking for a reason to burn and loot.
He looked up at his son. Anyone else would see a magnificent eagle, perched high above the forest floor, watching the goings on in his domain. But he could see the intensity the bird used to watch the event playing out below, the eyes jumping from the fight to the horizon, then back to the fight.
Then he saw that the branch the eagle was on ran straight into the wall that separated the two worlds. On their side a tree stood that, if the two trees were in the same dimension, would be a mere six feet from each other. A branch strong enough to hold a truck ran into the one that Scapularium was on.
A mothers love is never diminished or distorted, regardless of how much time passes since she last touches her baby, or even looks upon him with the eyes in her head, not just the ones in her heart. And, when Paul turned to Purity to ask her if she felt she could make the climb, he found she was 12 feet in the air and climbing fast.
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