1/14/16: "Hands of Fate: After the loss of a teammate and the Dark Lord, the team struggles to find a point in their mission... Until everything goes wrong."
He was dead. There was no rescue, there was no afterlife. No bliss. Ophorum was dead, same with the Dark Lord. I had a bad feeling about encountering the dead dictator's supporters, but we had to move on. After all, the entrance to our chamber was sealed and we only had a connector into the depths of the caves.
"This is pointless," I said after half an hour of walking, "one of our most valuable allies is dead. We killed the leader of the inhabitants to our escape path, meaning we have to avoid his thousands of workers or be brutally murdered."
"No," one of the Cobalts spoke, "our destiny -- regardless of who is and isn't alive lays within this cave. More of us will fall before we reach the end, but the hourglass is still a problem"
After a little bit more walking we reached a door with a heavy padlock on it.
"Step aside," Brandon walked forward. He took a butter knife out of pocket, stolen from the fake paradise. He repeatedly dug it in the bottom slot until there was a loud click. He pulled the unusable lock off, and threw the door open.
Once opened, we filed inside where there was a letter. It was addressed to me.
"Dear Amy,
I have a lot of time in my hands, no misspelling, and saw you did something.
You searched Brandon Gold online, and turned up a result of a missing child's case from 40 years ago?
I abducted him, 40 years ago. I kept him prisoner in a single dimension existence until he was old enough, and then set him up to trade sketchy items with you and your friend.
Funny huh?
You found him and knew the truth.
That's pretty wacky.
Sincerely,
Your best bud - Savior Lord!"
--
I know the Dark Lord was evil, but there was still something haunting about reading a letter from a dead person. But that also raised the question, who stole Liam after we were distracted by Ophorum's death?
My train of thought was interrupted by two purple knights running into the room. They looked like the Cobalts.
"The Magenta Informants of Fate?" Treff asked, "The Dark Lord tried to recreate the Cobalts, but never succeeded. At least -- no one in the continuum said he did."
After that, the Magentas revealed that they had a revolver and a machete each. They both beheaded a the cobalts, swiftly, leaving only one. The one that couldn't talk. There was no time to react, and suddenly we were standing in... Space?
I couldn't see anyone, but I could feel their presence. Suddenly, both Cobalts drifted in, bodies intact. They were slumped over, lacking their usual stiffness. On first glance, it looked as though a white being drifted forward, but as I focused harder - I understood that he was time itself. Comprised of every number sequence ever possible. All numbers changed to zero.
"My children," his voice was louder than anything I'd ever heard, "it is with great sorrow that you are both killed on the same day -- by clones of your perfection. Welcome to time."
"Father," one of the Cobalts spoke, breaking the spell of only telling the future, "are we truly finally free?"
He came out of his armor. I saw he wasn't a being, no, he was made of a blue aura. He hugged his father and meshed into more numbers.
"We're home," The other Cobalt grinned. He too left his armor and embraced his creator. Once everything was merged, Time turned to face the presence of the living Cobalt.
"And you," Time said, "I can't lift your curse until you perish. You must perish by any means other than yourself. I'm afraid that in your current lifetime, you will never talk - so to break the strands of my repetitive creation process, I will mark you as a unique individual."
Time made an X shape with his fingers over the Cobalt's helmet -- making a white X.
---
Consciousness came back. We were still in the room, save for the two bodies of the fallen Cobalts. It was surreal to imagine that two magical beings such as them could be quickly killed so brutally. But there was beauty in their father saving them in their twisted afterlife. Before we could fight the Magentas, they took out their revolvers and shot themselves, fatally. They died and stayed their instead of another ceremony. Then I remembered. "You must perish by any means other than yourself", they weren't built to be honorable figureheads of time, they were built to be copycat murderers to rile up fear.
We stayed wordless and progressed further. Eventually came to a wooden door. As opposed to light filtering from out of the cracks, pure midnight blackness poked out. The silence was broken by a member I didn't expect.
"Get some sleep," The Grand Elder communicated, "tomorrow begins the big finale to our little journey. What the cobalts only told me to keep it safe was that not all of us were the chosen ones. Amy Caulfield, myself, the silent Cobalt, Treff, and Brandon Gold were the only chosen ones. They brought the others for support. It was a cheap tactic, but they didn't want to tell us that some of us would have to die. Fate has gone to incredible depths to ensure that only the prophetic members made it to the final chamber."
And we all slept. For hours. We woke up where we were, no gauge on time.
---
We stepped inside the dark room. The darkness funneled in from the outside. Fresh air was heaven in itself. None of us noticed at first. But there it was.
"The Hourglass!" I shouted. Several monsters stood guard. When they saw us they left through exits carved deep into sandstone specifically conformed for their bodies.
When all was at the brightest, even in the darkness -- our world fell apart.
I saw the feet first, shiny purple feet. Then legs, leading up into a torso. The Dark Lord descended from the sky and landed 5 yards in front of us.
"Impossible!" I yelled, "You died!"
"I did nothing of the sort," he laughed, "if you mean making one of my slaves shapeshift to look like the witch's father to convince him to kill himself, yeah I did that. But that man wasn't me."
"What?" My mind was blown.
"I told you myself that I couldn't physically appear in this world, and yet you let your must valued member die over it? That's funny." He laughed. His body was fizzling in and out from reality.
"And why did you bring Brandon from the past just to torment us?" I asked.
"For banter! Your fanbase, the king and gecko thing, must've felt quite the twist. I'm a showman of course." He laughed.
"Well that doesn't matter, because you're an illusion!" I called him out.
"I was. Our conversation started, and you could've stopped it before it began. But now it didn't, and you didn't notice that the hourglass was completed." He giggled, embracing his insanity.
"Monster!" I screamed.
"In the flesh." He grinned.
I wish I could've said he was bluffing, but the giant hourglass stood in all of its glory in the twilight. Then it started... Shrinking?
"What?" I questioned it. He didn't respond.
Finally, he pulled a stick out and placed it on the middle of the now smaller, but still very large hourglass. It fused into a hammer-like weapon.
"Savior Lord," He shouted, "god of time!"
--
Stay tuned for the dramatic finale continuation, next time on...
Finale [3/5]: Suit of Space vs. Suit of Time
Originally Posted by Dion
