The Rise Of Evil Chapter 15
By Citadel
Janus floated down the long hallway with the scowl of a million men who've wronged him. He was followed by a comical and bulky robot that had a difficult time keeping up with his quick pace.
"Please, Sir Janus, slow down so that I may keep up with you. You never know what's around the next corner, you may need my assistance in battles."
"Look robot, I don't need help. I never have, and I never will. I've survived all my life without even a family; I don't think a little thing like impending Armageddon will stop me." Robo just quickened his pace, but didn't like the carelessness that Janus was taking. The hallway got a bit brighter as they walked down it. It turned three or four times and then straightened out. It seemed impossibly long, and had a menacing demeanor. The bricks lined the walls perfectly, not a scratch on any of them. Robo analyzed a few of the bricks and found them to be older than a few billion years. His carbon dating techniques couldn't figure out how old they were.
The long hall finally ended and they were now in a very tall room that stretched hundreds of feet into the air. Robo couldn't sense where it stopped; if it did at all. On a huge altar a winged gargoyle clutched a blue crystal in two hands. In front of the gargoyle stood the unmistakable Dalton. To his left was a tall winged beast. They both looked at Janus and Robo without a word.
Janus's face flushed a deep crimson in anger. The mere sight of Dalton made his blood boil. He heaved and grunted for a few moments.
"Janus, please think this through. Our objective isn't Dalton but--"
"Quiet 'bot!" Janus snapped. "You go after the crystal if you want, but I'm takin' out my revenge on Dalton."
"Janus," Robo protested. "Please listen. We need to obtain the blue crystal. Please." Robo's pleading with Janus was no good. Janus took a few steps toward Dalton.
"Well, Prophet, welcome back. Are we to pick up where we left off?"
"This time there will be no escape."
"I wholeheartedly agree." A large sword slowly materialized in his hand. "Once again, en guard." Janus smirked and gathered his shadow energies around him. His eyes glew a bright purple and his muscles twitched. Janus outstretched his two arms and made fists with his hands. He brought the two fists together with frightening speed. When the two fists collided, en eruption of shadow energies poured out of his body in every direction. Janus became consumed by a shield of magical energy. He floated into the air over Dalton and shot a beam of purple energy towards him. Dalton easily jumped out of the way into the path of Robo. "Whoops!" Dalton put a shield around himself just before a laser beam burnt his head off. "Kerados!" called Dalton. The winged beast responded with a low gurgling grunt. "Kill the robot." The beast nodded and jumped for Robo.
"No, no, you won't have me that easily!" Robo mocked as he dove out of the way. He charged his blaster up and shot the beast square in the head. Its head recoiled a bit in surprise. It seemed totally perplexed that it had actually gotten hit. It shook its head and its eyes glew red.
"Howooo!" It howled into the air. Kerados saw the next shot and put up his hand to block it. The laser simply absorbed itself into the thing's hand. The red hand started to glow yellow and then was surrounded by a bright sphere of light. The Kerados threw the ball of light a Robo. Robo feinted to the right and rolled on the ground away from the explosion. The resulted shockwaves from the blast threw Robo back into the air. He re-landed with a clank. Robo used a cure beam on himself and jumped back to his feet.
Janus ran his real hand's fingers through his blue hair. He and Dalton were circling around like cats ready to pounce. Both were waiting on the other to have a momentary lapse in concentration. With a sudden spring, Janus dove at Dalton's feet and rolled to a stop. He jumped up and shot two purple beams of shadow into Dalton, knocking him into the ground. Dalton sprang into the air and hovered a good ten feet over the ground. Dalton started concentrating his magic into a ball in front of him. Lines of magic, seemingly from nowhere, fed into a bright white sphere in front of Dalton. He released the sphere and it shot at a blinding rate at Janus. Janus had no time to move, so he hoped his shadow barrier would work. The sphere was almost like a comet as it rocketed at the wizard. Janus fortified his barrier just as it hit. Bright, white light permeated the room; the explosion knocked Janus off his feet and shattered his barrier.
"Meteor!" Dalton cried. Janus clutched his head as he felt the black wind howl. It was like a billion knives being stabbed into his brain and ears. He fell to his knees and resisted the urge to scream in pain. He looked where Dalton once stood and now there was a vortex of infinite space.
"Sweet fancy Moses!" Janus exclaimed. He'd never seen anything so large. Suddenly he saw a huge armada of white spheres moving at him. "What are those?" Before he could figure it out, a huge meteor flew out of the portal and whooshed by Janus. "Oh jeez!" He screamed. He put up a green physical and magical barrier. The next meteor flew directly into Janus's barrier and shattered his shield instantly. "Gotta move," he told himself. He dodged another meteor and rolled on the ground. As soon as he got up, however, he was hit by a meteor and knocked off his feet. It was large enough to actually carry him. He looked at the room fly by in slow motion as he sailed through the air. He hit the opposite wall and felt several ribs shatter, and his head hit the back wall so hard he thought he'd been bludgeoned with a hammer. The meteors disappeared and the vortex closed.
"Shadow Flare!" Dalton screamed. The entire room lost its color for a moment. Janus and Dalton only saw black images against the white background. Janus pulled himself off the ground and looked at the queer scenery. Just as he was about to say something about it, a swarm of black spots materialized out of midair and hurtled toward him. Janus covered his head with his arms but to no avail. The first one to hit sent an extreme shock of pain up his arm. His right side felt like lightning was flowing through it. A few more hit, and then more. They tore at Janus's body, hit armor, and his robotics. The last of the spots fizzled and the room returned to normal. Janus laid on the ground a lifeless ragdoll. His body was bruised and bloody. A large cut on his head oozed blood.
Robo witnessed this with great surprise. He was shocked at the new powers Dalton had developed. Even Lavos couldn't ever have wielded magics that strong. But Dalton threw them around as if they were nothing. Robo was interrupted in his thoughts by the Kerados tossing him into the wall. Robo climbed to his feet and ran toward Janus. Fireballs licked his feet as he made his way over to the fallen wizard.
"Janus! Janus wake up!" he called. A fireball hit Robo on the shoulder and blew something up. The blast threw Robo from his feet into the air. He sailed right over Janus and toward Dalton. Robo looked at his shoulder and saw his blaster was blown off. He looked back at Dalton and formed a quick plan. Robo hit the ground and skidded a few inches. He anticipated Dalton's magic and rolled to the left, casting a cure beam on himself on the way. Robo jumped to his feet and opened his main chest cavity. The power orb in the center glew brightly for a moment and charged up Robo's energy.
"Meteo!" Dalton called. Dalton's hands went into the air and red clouds suddenly appeared overhead. Robo's orb finished charging and he loosed a flurry of lightning all around the room. The electricity hit Dalton in the chest and threw him back to the wall, with a bolt of lightning implanted in him all the way. He hit the wall and stayed suspended there for a moment, spasming under the intense power of the electricity. Spit gurgled out of his mouth and dribbled down his shirt. The Kerados was hit by a bolt momentarily, but pulled a shield around itself to fend off the magic.
The red Meteo clouds flashed brightly and then sent down the first meteor into Robo. It hit his chest, right above his power source, and made a huge dent. The next hit his open chest plate, denting it in such a way so that it couldn't close back. The third destroyed Robo's right eye lens.
A few meteors hit the Kerados and ripped open its flesh. The second wave hit the Kerados in the head six times and broke his cranium. The fracture injured its brain, making it fall the ground with seizures. It howled a few times and then died.
A third wave of meteors hit Robo multiple times and destroyed his other arm and knocked him off his feet. One meteor hit too close to him and blew up, knocking him into the air and nearer to Janus. The clouds disappeared abruptly and the Meteo stopped. Dalton was groggy from Robo's lightning blast and had a difficult time getting up. He tried to stand, but fell on his face.
"Janus," Robo called. His voice was wavering and his power levels were dropping dangerously fast. "Janus!" Robo called a little louder. "You must get up! Hurry!" He got no response. He scanned Janus and found he was knocked out. "Come on, Janus, Dalton will kill us if you don't wake!" With his last ounces of strength, Robo pulled himself a little closer to Janus. He pushed his bulky body onto his back and sat up. His power orb was flickering, the energy leaving his body. "Cure beam!" Robo cried. A green light came from Robo's orb and hit Janus. It scanned Janus's hurt parts and repaired all of them. Robo did another diagnostic check on himself. He was running at only ten per cent energy. He collapsed onto his back. His power source was damaged. Robo judged that it had a crack and he was losing all his power. His memory banks started to wither. His functions stopped operating. Slowly Robo died, he felt each separate operating system shut down inside himself. If he'd had tear ducts he would've cried at having to feel his body shut down. After a few more seconds, his memory totally collapsed and his power source went dark. His body sparked a few times, and then it was still.
Janus opened his eyes at about the same time Robo had died. He was scared for a moment, he wasn't sure where he was. Then, with a sudden realization, he pulled himself to a sitting position and saw Dalton using his huge sword as a cane to try to walk. Janus noticed Robo on his right, for some reason his chest cavity was ajar. He crawled over to him and examined him.
"Robo? You there?" He received no answer. He closed his eyes and bit his lower lip. Janus's hair fell around his face like a shroud of grief. "You were always faithful to us, Robo. Semper Fi." Janus said the last words in the old mystic language, a language Janus had learned in his times in six hundred. They meant 'always faithful.' Janus picked himself up and turned to glare at Dalton, who stood gazing at the dead Kerados.
"Well, Janus, it seems your robot friend has certainly done a number on my Kerados."
"You!" Janus seethed. A renewed anger boiled inside of him. His cheeks were completely crimson with his boiling fury. "You killed Robo!" he screamed.
"The way I heard you talking to him I thought you two weren't even friends." Janus suddenly remembered how poorly he'd treated Robo on their way to Dalton. He then reminisced for a moment on how horribly he'd treated every close person in his life. Even Schala. He'd loved her more than life itself, but still, he had treated her like dirt at times. The veil of depression and anti-emotion swept back over Janus like a quilt in winter, covering him with its somber mood. The dark mage ran his fingers through his hair, pushing back, behind his ears. He curled his lip back and gave a horrible scowl.
"You are dead man, you will pay for all your crimes you have committed."
Dalton pulled his sword in front of himself. It trembled in the battered hands of Dalton. He could barely hold it in front of himself, let alone use it in battle. "Janus, I just want to remind you before I kill you. Your sister Schala was always horrible in the sack, she never could just give in like all the other women at the palace."
"DALTON!" Janus screamed in a fit of rage. He floated into the air and cast a shield of shadow around himself. The shield became an orb of shadow fire that protected him from any magics outside. Dalton tried to break the barrier, but hadn't seen anything quite like it before.
"What the hell is he doing?" Dalton quietly murmured to himself. He looked up at the ball of shadow saw a thin line of black fire shoot out of it and hit him straight in the chest. "Ugh!" he grunted.
Inside the shadow sphere Janus was beyond any sort of anger he had ever before experienced. His shadow powers were no longer even under his control, he was solely acting on some instinct inside of himself. Much like the time in the prehistoric age when he used some huge shadow attack on Dalton that put a crater in the ground.
Dalton couldn't shake off the thin stream of shadow, his hands only passed through it and he couldn't even figure out what it was. It was starting to make him uneasy. With a deafening explosion the orb of shadow blew apart and Dalton saw Janus's ominous figure holding the other end of the shadow string. He had an insidious smile on his face. His hair was being pushed back by an unseen wind. Dalton knew what that wind was, though. That wind was a shadow magi's best friend. It foretold amazing events. It was the black wind. Until now, he'd never seen it in the real world. He only had been told that people could feel it, never actually touch it.
"Dalton," Janus announced with a godlike voice, "nobody talks 'bout my sister." Janus's eyes flashed black and the hand hold the string shot out a huge fire along the string. Dalton ran from Janus, but the string still stayed attached to his chest.
"God help me!" he frantically screamed. The fire wormed its way along the string, quickly eating up the distance between itself and Dalton. Dalton screamed and raved at the fire that was snaking its way ever closer to its target. It hit Dalton with the force of a speeding bullet, knocking him clear off his feet. He it the ground with a thud and felt an intense burning on his chest. Dalton looked down and saw his whole torso being smothered in black flames. He didn't even have a chance to scream his shrill scream once more as the flames engulfed his face and ended his life.
.