Chapter 66: Burning Plains, Pt 9
You immediately leap into action and use your Telekinesis to stop the flow of superheated air back into the Ifrit. Or try to, anyway. Though you're straining with all your might, the best you can do is just slightly slow the particles down.
Help me out here! you yell through the Network. Please?!
I don't even know how you're doing that! Noir replies. But I'll try…
You sense her reach out, mimicking the way your own energy flows. And by doing that, she's able to also figure out how to manipulate particles to some degree, which helps slow the Ifrit's gathering flames. Thankfully, your absolute panic and need to survive helps her hone her newfound skill despite not having the hours of practice you have.
Still, it's a tough match - the both of you groan and strain and grit your teeth in an effort to stop the fiery creature.
It's still far stronger than the both of you combined - its very essence is built on its own Telekinetic abilities, and it is incomprehensibly more experienced than you. From what you can tell, it understands the very foundations of what the power is, and can use it as easily as you use your own body. It's practically a subconscious effort on its part.
You're certain that the Ifrit is equally as powerful as the Sweeper, at least in terms of Telekinetic abilities. Perhaps even more so.
Thankfully, because of how much damage you did to the Ifrit earlier with that blast, you're able to hold it at bay. Or just barely. It too is straining to pull itself together, though it is winning ever so slowly. Worse, all of you are aware of this fact, that it's only a matter of time before it can gather enough of itself to fight back with ease.
Your head throbs with pain as your energies sweep through you, as your psionic powers flare out with desperation. You sense slices of heat and fire shivering invisibly in the air, as the Ifrit struggles against you. As you and Noir wrestle against it for control of the atmosphere. As all three of you fight for your very lives.
Alternating waves of hot and cold air splash you across your face as you all vie for control.
You and Noir attempt to slow the air down and keep it cool, while it attempts to lighten it and speed it up. You even detect a hint of methane in the air, as though a spark is about to occur. But you're able to keep just enough control of the air around you to prevent such violent reactions.
After a second, you chide yourself on your foolishness thus far. You've already noted that the Ifrit isn't just activating powers and using them - no, it's layering them as part of itself, so that they better work in conjunction with each other.
It simply isn't just pulling itself together with its Telekinesis. That would be too simple an act. No, a quick Scan reveals that it's using all of its Disciplines to pull itself together. The Ifrit has activated its Temperance to reform itself, its ESP to come quicker to full consciousness, its Surge to speed the process metaphysically, its Telekinesis to speed the process physically.
The creature is even using its Third Eye and Foresight to determine which power to temporarily boost, and when.
Least importantly, it's using its Telepathy simply to scream out into the psionic void. It reminds you of screaming to let out frustrations, or of a kiai shout in martial arts. Somehow, by emitting Telepathic noise like this, it's able to better focus its other powers. Sharpen them, even. Almost like it is acting like a rocket's backblast.
More importantly, it's using a third power in Control - one which you have no idea what it does, not exactly. But you try to remember the way it's channeling its energies because once you're done with this thing, you need to learn it.
Regardless, on realizing that it's utilizing every bit of its powers in synchronicity with itself, then you must do the same as well. It's the only way you could possibly beat it.
In fact, you're sure you could beat the thing. Though it seems incredibly powerful with all three Disciplines, it doesn't seem to know that the powers have an inverse. If it did, it would have certainly used one by now, or at least would have attempted to overcome your Cloak.
Since you've got almost half a tank of gas left, you'd better use it wisely.
Hey, I'm gonna try something, alright? you tell Noir. Can you pick up Telekinesis by yourself for a bit?
What? No! I only just now figured out how to control all this air! No way can I take all of that on by myself! she replies frenziedly.
Just for a second. Maybe two. I'll rejoin you once I'm set.
Fine, fine! Don't blame me if I slip and we get roasted!
You grin as you activate your Foresight and step into a sliver of the future. As you've done before, you increase your Temperance and accelerate your senses for a flash of a moment. As a result, you hang in the moment between, stretching out time to an eternity inside of your Temporal Acceleration.
And in this long and drawn out slice of time, you activate a number of powers - each one with the intention of carving away at the Ifrit one bit at a time, from every possible angle and dimension.
First, you barrage its Telepathic ravings with slivers of Interrupts. Though they are simple 'stops', they're enough to pierce through the noise and jar its very thoughts. Even just the first few Interrupts cause parts of its psyche to shudder and shake, down to its psionic roots and foundations.
Doing so loosens the grip it has on its other powers, allowing you to further erode its very being.
Because you can't combat its powers of Cognition with their antithetic versions - you simply don't know what they are - you instead pour in extra power into your Devour. You use these to practically surround the Ifrit, covering it from every angle against its own incoming particles. At the same time, you channel as much Telekinetic energy as you can spare into Noir to give her as much of an edge as possible.
When you step out of your Temporal Acceleration, everything seems to hit the Ifrit at once, and it becomes very momentarily stunned. It's especially affected by your Interrupts, which pierce into its mind with unrelenting energy. Though the bombardment does little to actually damage the Ifrit, it does something even better.
The Telepathic backblast becomes irregular and dissonant, which causes the Ifrit's other powers to stutter and waver significantly. You can feel the energies in them twist and turn in ways they shouldn't, causing their patterns to go awry.
At this point you open up with everything you've got into your Devour, completely negating the Ifrit's numerous inwards Surges. By stopping it from drawing on its psyche further, you're able to cause a spectacular chain reaction, where one stumble and slip leads the Ifrit further down the proverbial hole.
Your Devours combined with Noir's Telekinetic resistance easily halts the Ifrit's attempt to rebuild itself, though you can sense its sheer anger and frustration and deep desire to survive lash outward in powerful waves.
Finally, you intertwine your Foresight and some of your Telepathy to find slivers of the future that reveal the Ifrit's demise. You then project those slivers and weave them into the Ifrit's own Foresight in an attempt to completely demoralize its will to win. As in the past, you fling countless copies of a falsified future at its energies and fool it into believing that its future is bleak and pointless.
Though it hardly gives up on seeing your Omen in full force all around it, or by the barrage you're assailing on its psyche, or Noir's constant ripping and tearing of its physical form. It struggles as hard as it can against the both of you with everything it has, to the point where all three of you strain greatly to maintain control of the situation.
Despite the pulsing pain in your head, all your powers weave through the Ifrit's dramatically waning energies, and rip it apart from its metaphysical core with one concerted, violent pull. You and Noir then shred it completely, even despite its agonizing and vengeful wail.
But once you separate its physical and psionic parts far enough from each other, the whole thing simply… ebbs away. There's no violent thrashing, no dramatic explosion, no rising from the dead. The Ifrit simply ceases to exist beyond a waning psionic echo. Its life force and energies peter out into nothingness in parallel.
Once its presence is completely gone, you note that the temperature around you is significantly cooler. It's certainly still oppressive considering it's daytime, but certainly nothing like before. Or perhaps, certainly more similar to the temperature back East.
You look outwards, past the charred farmland around you and watch as the flames in the middle distance seem to lower and weaken. Many flicker and fade, even as you try to recover from all that effort. It takes a few minutes, but they eventually die out completely. Maybe one or two small fires are out there, trying desperately to stay lit, but that's about all that's out there.
There's still a constant warping haze in the air due to the sheer heat wafting up through the air, but it's no longer as agitated as before.
You sigh deeply as you let go almost all of your held energies and power everything down to a minimum.
You can't help but think about the Ifrit itself as you recover, specifically where it has come from - it hardly seems like many of the other alien creatures that have appeared. It's certainly nothing like the Crags or other animals you've come across.
Then again, what would you know? If alien beings are invading the earth, who knows what they could do or what they're composed of. You can't help but think about the origin of all these alien creatures, but you can do little more than theorize.
More critically perhaps, it makes sense to you that Ifrit itself was causing all the fires out here. Its attempts to 'free' itself must have been raising the outside temperature to such a degree that all these fires have spread, resulting in all this damage.
Since its very existence was enough to melt corrugated steel, it would no doubt have caused even more damage had it gone free. Plenty of lives would have been lost to it, simply due to it traveling.
It seems to you that it was almost drawing on the energy of the sun itself, as though it was acting as a kind of beacon. A bit like shining rays through a magnifying glass. But instead of directing it, it's drawn into a point instead.
You also wonder how that's even remotely possible, how something so small could affect something so large and so far…
Just as you sigh that it's dead and you no longer have to worry about it, it occurs to you that it can't possibly be the only one. There must be more of these out there in the world, right? Terrible things never come singularly. After all, life is a diaspora filled with infinite pathways, each of them terminating in endless blessings and horrors alike.
You make a few notes and sketches in your Journal to try to collect all of your thoughts about the Ifrit. But you end up with too many other questions which seem to pluck at your curiosity with ease.
"We'd better get out of here fast," you say after you finish up your entry.
What, you don't think we killed that thing? That Ifrit, you called it? Noir replies. She licks her paw as though to mend some hurt in it.
"Oh we beat that thing, I'm certain. Problem is other things."
You Scan outward in every direction, for as far as you can reach. Almost all of what you can sense is dead - the fire damage is vast and beyond your full sight. Though you certainly don't sense any more Ifritii, it doesn't mean they aren't out there.
"For one thing, that Ifrit might have friends or family," you reply. "They're not gonna like one of their own getting offed. If there aren't, there's going to be some rather curious things headed in our direction. Probably dangerous, hungry things. Best we avoid meeting any of them and get the hell outta here."
~~~
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Chapter 67: Desolate Oasis, Pt 1
The sounds of numerous crowds of people fill your ears as you sit patiently inside of a busy and bustling medical tent. You once again find yourself in the stadium next to Kaja, both being tended to by military medics. But unlike the first time when you were filled with worry and dejectedness, now you're much more eager to be here.
Most of you want to observe the incoming Crag attack in greater detail, to see if you could perhaps sway them to your side in this fight. In that way, you could potentially turn the tides against the Shadow Sweeper.
If you could manage to do that in the dream, then you might have a chance at doing that in reality, too. Well, should the opportunity ever present itself anyway.
Kaja looks at you with mild concern, even as a grin widens on your face. Your heart and mind are both filled with joy, which leaves your partner completely and utterly dumbfounded.
"I know it's nice to be protected by the military and all, but I don't think that's cause for celebration," she says to you, her voice somewhat hushed. "The world's still fucked from where I'm sitting."
"Oh, them?" you reply, perhaps a little more loudly than you would normally. "I'm not happy 'coz of them. They're useless."
You get a few glares from the people around you, clearly angered or upset by your words. Especially from the medics tending to the many other civilians in the tent. The tension is palpable in the air, though most of it was here long before you arrived.
You suppose the end of the world has something to do with their somber moods. Though you note their mood feels heavier than the first time - even the thoughts of the numerous other Telepaths in the stadium feel more muted than usual.
A part of you can't help but wonder why that feels different to you.
"Okay, sorry, not useless," you correct yourself shortly after. "I meant more like… helpless. Yeah, that sounds about right."
Your correction does little to ease the animosity rising up towards you, but you pay little mind to that. This is a dream after all, and these people aren't actually real. These are all projections within your own mind and nothing actually exists here except your near-unflinching memory of the past.
And so you turn back towards Kaja to continue your conversation, completely ignoring the people grumbling all around you.
"Look, no offense, but all that's going to happen to them is get killed by the Sweeper," you explain. But the puzzlement on Kaja's face remains.
"What, that shadow creature thing?" she says. "You're saying it's coming back? But we drove it off earlier… And I even took its weapon thing."
"Oh, definitely. We probably could have killed it back then, which we've been doing for the past couple of times or so. But now I kinda wanna try something different."
"You aren't making any sense, you know that?"
All you can do is nod in response, which causes a little bit of frustration to rise up out of Kaja. She leans back in her seat a bit, and exhales at length.
"I really don't get you," she says after a moment. "It's like this… thing that's happened to the world, forced it to become this… It's changed you, too."
Your smile flattens slightly on hearing her say that. It's all true, of course. The apocalypse has one hundred percent changed the entire world, yourself included.
You look down at your hands, or rather the hands you held back then. They were soft and fleshy, easy to bruise and slice open with any slight contact, like a ripe fruit. Nowadays, in the real world, they're hard and calloused, toned for the wilderness and the harshness of reality.
Of course your whole body has become like that, hardened against the environment, more resilient to cuts and scrapes, and more tolerant of the extremes. You've become tougher than you ever have before, and that's even without your Temperance to strengthen you.
And not to mention your mind, which has become a mind-boggling arsenal filled with razor-sharp powers. Beyond your psyche's growth, so too has your knowledge of all kinds of things. That alone has honed you severely.
All told however, you can't help but realize just how truly capable you have become.
Though you concede it isn't necessarily the end of the world that's caused you to change so drastically - it's losing Kaja in the first place. Her absence is what makes you, you.
"Same change that's happened in me happened to you, too," you tell Kaja. "Or where'd you think all your crazy mind powers have come from?"
This time it's Kaja's frown that flattens and eases into neutrality.
"I suppose you're right," she says. "And I suppose it's good you've changed. You're more… engaged with everything. Happier even. You don't shy from anything, and you're eager to leap into the thick of things… Before you would've just run or done nothing, and honestly that's impressive to me."
"I've always wanted to be more like that anyway," you reply. "More like you. You might not have known that before… and I kinda wish I did tell you before. I suppose now's gonna have to do."
You sense a part of Kaja crumble inside as you speak, as your words cause her to visibly tremble in her seat. At the same time, you feel her heart swell - the sensation is so palpable that you barely need to use any powers to sense it.
Her cheeks turn rosy for a second, and she looks away in embarrassment.
"Ah, I'm just a scrub trying to do my best," she mutters. Then she looks back at you with eyes slightly misty. "And I'm glad you're doing the same, too. In fact, I'm gonna take back how worried I've been about you changing.
"At first I thought maybe you're turning into some bloodthirsty monster, lashing out at everything even looking at us wrong. But now I get it - you just wanna make sure we make it out of this alive. And you had to seriously change who you are to make that happen. That makes you braver than me, and I can't be upset about that at all, in the slightest.
"Honestly, if this is who you wanna be, then I'm with you from now on. If this is what it takes to make you the best you can be, then fuck it. I'm down to help you be the best you can be. The rest of the world is just gonna have to deal with it."
This time it's your turn for your heart to soften. To hear her say that to you is… everything you didn't know you wanted in life. You feel a warmth spread through you, and instinctively take her hand in yours.
The both of you intertwine your fingers and hold each other tightly, even as you look in each others' eyes.
Before either of you can truly enjoy the moment, a blaring alarm wafts through the air, accompanied by some frenzied screams from frightened civilians all around you.
Both of you stand up decisively, ready to take action.
"Is what you've been saying about to start?" Kaja asks you. "The whole attack thing?"
You nod in response.
"Let's go deal with it," you add a second after.
The two of you then sprint out of the tent, across the field, and into the stadium hallways towards the entrance. As you do, panicked groups of people rush past you in the opposite direction, fearful for their lives. When you get to the entrance, you can sense the tension of the defending soldiers thick in the air around you.
Everything's as it always has been in the dream - soldiers are posted up in their armor. They've got their weapons at the ready and on the lookout for incoming Crags. Beyond them are the large Hesco barriers filled with sand, then the razor wire beyond those.
As always, the T-intersection is littered with dead Crags, and the sharp smell of sulfur along with them.
Everything you see is just about the same, except for one thing - you don't see a swarm of Crags headed in your direction. Besides the numerous corpses that trail down the street in front of you, there's nothing. Not even the sweeper.
You're immediately beset with alarm at the sight in front of you, or rather the lack thereof.
"The hells are you two doing here?" shouts the officer in charge. "Get back or you're gonna killed!"
"We're here to help!" Kaja replies. "We heard the alarm, so we came here."
"And what the hell are you two gonna do that we can't?"
Kaja's face flattens, then with a gesture she plucks the semi translucent blade sticking out of the asphalt in the intersection. Then with a few more gestures, she flips it around in the air, then places it defensively in front of the entrance.
All without looking at it.
"Okay, well, dunno what that's gonna do, but…" says the officer after clearing his throat. "At least post up over here so you're not in my team's way."
As the two of you walk towards his position, you can't help but remain utterly stunned at the lack of activity outside. Using your Temperance, you focus your vision to look as far down the street as possible, all the way to the other end of it.
And it's practically empty all the way down - not a living soul in sight.
"So, uh, what's the emergency?" you ask. "I don't see a single Crag out there, much less a stampede."
"Crags? Stampede? No," the officer replies. He points up into the sky above, beyond the city's skyline. "Look at that thing! Have you seen anything like that?"
You turn your vision skyward, toward where he's pointing and note that there's a pair of barely visible but massive disembodied 'eyes' peering down on the city. Both glow an ominous deep red, the light of which just barely pierces through the thick, dark clouds above your heads.
It's then that you realize that the overwhelming change in the atmosphere isn't because of the people around you - it's that thing looking down on everything. This oppressiveness in the air is a result of this Being's psyche, and understanding that causes a shiver to run through you, accompanied by a single heavy heartbeat.
You watch as the massive eyes seem to scour the surface, as they look for… something. You don't know what, nor do you have any guesses.
And then you feel it in the air - it's thick and suffocating and wholly disheartening. Whatever it is channels a vast amount of psionic energy and weaves it into something resembling a Scan. But it's so potent and so complex and so beyond your knowledge that you just barely recognize it as a Scan in the first place.
The very realization frightens you deeply, enough to cause your blood to stop pumping for a moment.
Then all of you are pushed back by the force of those energies sweeping into you, through you, past you. Some of the soldiers tumble down to the ground as a result, leaving you in awe. There's so much energy being channeled that it's enough to disrupt all of you physically.
Of course, you're able to raise a defense quickly enough to protect both you and Kaja, and do your best to Cloak your presence from the Scan. But it hardly matters what you do - the Being's power is far beyond yours, and most of it passes through your Cloak unabated.
You feel the energies push through you regardless, at which point those massive eyes flick in your direction. They brighten in the sky and seem to enlarge, even as your perception of the world shrinks. It seems the Being sees you and Kaja, and you can feel even more complex versions of Scan sweep through you.
It's more than that - you sense the energies of Foresight attached to its Scan, as though it's attempting to see your futures, or potential futures.
Then the Being is beset by surprise, then fear, then rage. Its eyes narrow as it channels a vast amount of Telekinetic energy, causing you to seize up in fear. The very size of the blast it's forming is half as large as the city itself, which you sense coming down onto all of you, right down on your heads.
It presses down on you psionically as it falls, causing your heart to race.
You immediately push up and out with as much of your own Telekinetic energy as you can muster, screaming into the sky in defiance. Even Kaja joins you out of alarm and fear and desperation. But it hardly matters how much energy you use or how powerful either of you are - nothing you do makes the slightest difference.
The ground shakes madly and buildings around you crumble even before the pure Telekinetic blast hits them. Even the stadium itself cracks and breaks all around you, as though you're at the epicenter of one powerful earthquake.
It's a second later that the Telekinetic blast strikes, utterly flattening everything underneath it. The attack is quick and it's absolute. Your vision and your senses wink out as the world around you is pressed into nothingness.
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