The warrior woman raised the broken broadsword
high above her head and with a cry that echoed through Louis Forest
and into Founders Falls below, plunged the mighty sword deep into
the Beast’s thigh. As though knowing this would be the last strike
it would ever make, the blade sank in to the hilt. Temptations pulled
the weapon free, mucus green blood flowing from the wound.
The Beast
screamed in pain and shock, frantically scanning the earth below for
it’s attacker. It saw the stained blade in Temptations hand and struck
at her with lightning quickness. "You Insignificant flea!" the Beast
bellowed. His huge fist pounded the mud next to the warrior, sending
her stumbling back. In spite of it’s enormous size the thing was swift
and before Temptations could spin out of the way, the demon’s left
hand slapped her flat to the ground like it was swatting a fly. It’s
right hand quickly scooped her up, holding her by her leg. "Filthy
animal," the Beast hissed and raised her high over it’s head. "Die!"
And then slammed her into the muddy ground.
Temptations was driven
into the earth, hitting so hard the snap of her bones could be heard
over the battle. The Beast raised her up again and smashed her down
once more then tossed the broken body aside. Temptations sailed through
the sky, tumbling, and hit the concrete of the force field wall. She
landed at it’s base and lay still, her body twisted grotesquely, her
neck bent at an unnatural angle.
"TEMPT!" Tropic cried, his hand holding
his forehead in shock. He could see from her still form that the mighty
warrior was dead. But he could spare no time to mourn. Above the fighting
WillowWind flew, rushing to check on Temptations. She spun and twisted
her way through the fray but as the Beast raised it’s hand to strike
at her teammates below, it slapped Willow with the back of it’s hand.
The impact sent her rocketing straight up and then down in a large
arc.
"WILLOW!" Tropic screamed and watched as she hit the ground not
twenty yards away from him. He ran toward her saying, whispering,
over and over "oh no, oh no, oh no." The fiery hero slid to his knees
at her side and lifted her into his arms. He breathed a sigh of relief
then. Her heart beat strong and her breathing was steady.
WillowWind’s
face was covered with blood and he took his cape and wiped it from
her face, trying to see how badly she was injured. Tropic sighed again.
Willow had a deep cut that started above her right eyebrow, circling
the eye and then down her cheek. It looked, for all intents and purposes,
like a big question mark.
Tropic laid her back on the soft green grass
and turned to the battle once more, his mind spinning. "This isn’t
working," he thought. "We’re missing something." Tugging on his lower
lip he remembered the passage in the Tablet of Traume. Incite the
fire, old and gather. Released shall it be and the Beast shall be
slain. Incite the fire, old and gather. Released shall it be. Tropic
shook his head. What does it mean? What? Incite the fire, old and
gather. Released shall it be. Incite the fire, old and gather. Released.
Incite the fire, old and gather. Fire, old and gather.
Suddenly, Tropic’s
eyes sprang open. "It can’t…," he whispered. And then the fire blaster
remembered the words Azuira had said to Willow: "Tell him he will
know what to do when the time comes." "Oh, no," Tropic thought, "no,
no, no…" A look of fear covered his face.
But then he looked at the
battlefield, saw the bodies of his slain friends, saw the rest of
the team engaged in what he now knew was a hopeless cause. Hopeless
unless he…
Tropic nodded to himself, the look of fear changing to
one of grim resignation. He kneeled at WillowWind’s side once more.
His face melted into a look of such sadness that it would make the
bitterest heart crack. He cupped her face gently with his rough hot
hand. Tropic smiled a sad little smile and said softly, "I wish I
could see how it turns out."
The red-skinned hero picked up the unconscious
heroine and ran down the hill to where Scrap and TuxedoGin still stood,
crying out as he ran, "Call them back! I know what to do!"
Scrap and
Tux looked questioningly at each other then back to Tropic as he rushed
to them. He laid WillowWind carefully on the soft grass and urgently
spoke to his teammates. "We were wrong!" he exclaimed. "The Tablet…I
know what needs to be done!"
Nikon, Aeroxon and Serridus joined the
group, taking a brief rest to regain some of their endurance. Nikon
asked quickly, "What is it, Tropic?"
The blaster gestured wildly with
his hands. "It’s not the Beast we need to incite. We read it wrong!"
Tropic looked each of them in the eye. "It’s not ‘Incite the fire,
old and gather. Released shall it be.’ It’s gather and release the
old fire!" The heroes looked at each other with raised eyebrows and
furrowed brows, not understanding.
Tropic looked at them in frustration.
"Don’t you see?" He pounded his chest with his open hand. "It’s me!
I’m the old fire!" He looked down to the Beast and the battle that
still raged around it. "I have to gather all my power…everything and
release it all in one huge…" Tropic sighed heavily and looked at his
friends. "They knew, all those centuries ago when they carved it,
they knew I’d be here," he said, his voice barely a whisper. "I’m
the old fire."
General Scrap clutched Tropic’s arm. "No! Trop, it’s
suicide! You can’t…"
"DON’T YOU THINK I KNOW THAT!" Tropic shouted.
He waved his arm at the fighting. "But we’re getting slaughtered!
And we’re not talking about the city anymore! It’s the whole planet
now!" He shook his head sadly. "Call everyone back. I’ll go in and…"
"Well, I’m going with you," a voice said calmly.
Tropic spun on his
heels and saw the healer, Cadecus, standing there grimly. The red-skinned
hero shook his head slowly from side to side. "No, Cad, this is…I’m
not going to…I won’t be…No, you can’t. You have two little gir…"
"And
I want to make sure they get tomorrow," Cadecus said. He sighed, "Look,
you’re going to need some time to pull all your power together. That
thing’s not just gonna be standing there." The healer nodded his head.
"I can keep you going…heal you long enough for you to…"
Tropic smiled
crookedly and silently gripped the man by the shoulder, his emotions
not allowing him to speak when another voice chimed in. "Count me
in," it said with a snort.
Tropic looked over his shoulder. "Johnny?"
he asked warily.
Johnny Cognito raised his hand slightly as if to
ward off the question. "Yeah, yeah I know. Cad there can heal ya,
but I can slow that monster down, lock it up, for a while at least.
You need time." He looked at Cadecus. "Cad can give ya time to live.
I can give ya time to kill."
Tropic frowned. "Johnny, you know that
we’re not com…"
"Yeah," the controller said, then he shrugged his
shoulders, "but I always wanted a high school named after me." Cognito
just stood there with a smirk on his face.
Tropic nodded and looked
at Cadecus and Johnny Cognito. "All right." He stared down at the
battlefield once more and watched for a moment as Top Ten continuously
assaulted the Beast. He turned to Nikon and the others. "We’re going
over there," he pointed to a small hill about 50 yards to the left.
"When we see that everyone is out we’ll go in and end this," he said
with conviction. The fiery hero spared a glance at WillowWind, still
laying unconscious near them. "Nobody stops us, ok? And stay low…I’ve
never tried to pull so much…," he grinned sheepishly, "it’s going
to be a rather large explosion, I think."
General Scrap stepped forward
frowning, "Are you sure? This is…" He saw the look on Tropic’s face
then nodded. The teammates all looked at each other in farewell and
silently Cadecus, Johnny Cognito and Tropic turned and ran to the
little hill. Scrap sighed and whispered, "Goodbye." Then he, TuxedoGin,
Nikon and the others began calling the retreat.
The three men got
to the small hill and watched as the heroes of Top Ten fell back,
away from the Beast, and started to gather near Scrap, Aeroxon and
the rest. Tropic nodded and outlined his plan. "When the last of us
has retreated we go in." He turned to the controller. "Johnny, stay
at the limits of your power and lock that thing down. Cadecus, tuck
in behind me and…well, just heal the hell out of me," he smiled at
the healer.
"Literally," Cad grinned.
The three watched as their friends
gathered at the hill. Valya was helping WillowWind to her feet, holding
the blaster tightly in her arms. Scrap, Elendil, Ryuuhoshi, Kunai,
Miyaka, Deep Phreeze and Buttercup, all the heroes who had been there
from the beginning, looked down at the three sadly. Tropic waited,
watching Ebola, Novak and L33t rush away. Padre Ares was the last,
the controller trying to hold the Beast as the others escaped. Finally
he too was at the hill with the rest of Top Ten.
Tropic looked at
his two friends. "Gentlemen," he said solemnly, "it has been my honor."
He and Cadecus shook hands and hugged briefly. He turned and did the
same with Johnny, but watching from the hill, TuxedoGin saw that Tropic
whispered something in Cognito’s ear.
Then, silently, the three rushed
toward the Beast.
Johnny stopped about 50 feet out and put his energy
in the thickest patch of tar he could conjure. The Beast howled in
anger as it’s movement slowed.
Suddenly Tropic leapt in front of it
and grabbed both sides of the monster’s waist, holding on as tightly
as he could. Cadecus was directly behind him, head low, the green
healing aura already flowing from his body.
"What?" the Beast cried
out. When he saw who his attacker was he screamed again. "NOOOO! You
shall not stop me! It is destiny!" and began to rain blows down upon
the blaster. But the strikes moved so slowly Tropic barely felt their
effects.
On the hill overlooking the men, WillowWind finally had regained
her senses. "What happened?" she asked, wondering why everyone was
gathered around her. "Did we beat it? Is it…" She wiped some of the
blood from her face and her gaze fell on the three men below. "Wait…is
that…?" Realization at last took hold and she cried out, "OH MY GOD!!!
TROPIC!! WHAT’S HE DOING!!"
"What has to be done," Buttercup whispered,
tears already streaming down her face.
Valya hugged her friend tightly
and Willow held on to the controller. "Oh no, not yet, not yet," she
gasped between sobs, her face pressed against Val’s chest.
Tropic
had begun to glow, slowly becoming brighter. The Beast tried to shake
the red-skinned man off, to pummel him away with it’s great fists,
but the blaster would not let go.
Cognito kept the Beast down, slowing
it as best he could. But the effort was taking a terrible toll. He
could feel himself tiring rapidly, his endurance waning. He pushed
more and more of himself out, keeping the thing slowed. He sank to
his knees, not strong enough to stand. "Got to keep going," he thought.
"Can’t…let them…down." Johnny felt something wet on his upper lip
and knew his nose had started to bleed. Still he kept sending waves
and waves of energy outward, turning the earth around the beast into
an all consuming tar. But soon, he had nothing left. He sent out the
last of his power thinking, "That’s all…I’m sorry…" then his eyes
rolled back and he fell face first in the grass, unconscious.
With
Johnny gone, the effects of the tar slowly dissipated and the Beast
began to strike Tropic in earnest now. He was glowing brighter and
brighter, the energy growing within him. Behind him, Cadecus sent
out waves of healing power, but with the loss of the tar patch, his
output of power doubled.
The blows fell mercilessly and Cad was expending
his energy quickly. He kept his head low, not looking up. In truth
it had become hard to see. Tropic was glowing so brightly it hurt
his eyes. And it was getting hot. Hotter by the second. Cadecus was
at the limits of his power. He felt so weak he placed his hand on
Tropic’s back, the physical contact acting as a siphon, his health
flowing directly into the blaster.
The healer’s hand began to hiss,
his glove burning away, and the flesh of his hand began to sizzle
and pop. Then, with one final push, he sent all his health, his hope,
into Tropic. Slowly his hand fell away and he slid to the ground near
the blaster’s feet, lifeless, having given Tropic everything.
Tropic
felt the hand slide from his back and knew that Cadecus was dead.
He kept on, pulling more and more energy, heat, power into himself.
The Beast’s fists rained down on him but he barely felt them. The
Beast howled it’s frustration and anger at the sky, the sound of it’s
roars echoing throughout Founders Falls.
On the hill above, Top Ten
waited. They saw Cognito fall but Tropic was shining so brightly only
the most eagle-eyed among them could see Cadecus slump to the earth.
They noticed too that it had gotten much colder and they could see
their breath as if it were a winter’s day. Tropic was pulling all
the heat from around them, from the park, from Founders Falls. And
a wind had started blowing. It swept from behind them flowing down
to the blaster as he drew heat and energy to him.
Tears streamed down
Willow’s face. The light emanating from Tropic was blinding and, astoundingly,
getting brighter. She knew he didn’t have much time left. WillowWind
caught her breath, her head resting still on Valya’s chest, and whispered
to the glowing hero, "You’re breaking my heart."
Tropic was at his
limit but he kept pulling power to him. The Beast screamed and struck
him over and over, it’s great fists battering the hero. He was taking
a terrible beating but ignored it, his blazing fingers sinking deeper
into the monsters flesh.
"Impossible!" the Beast screamed. "You cannot!"
Finally Tropic looked up and stared directly into the Beast’s flaming
green eyes. "GO…TO…HELL!" Tropic screamed.