All sentient life is connected. The appendages may be different, we may eat different things, and live in different universes, but at the end of the day, we’re all one big family.
It’s time to explore the branches of the multiversal family tree, and today, we present:
Ahdis’s Greatest Hits
– 6 – Some Unholy War
Before Pultine left the Fonlands with the Vodun, she stood with Tracia before Ahdis in a clearing of jungle near the aziza mound. They both stared at Ahdis, who had extended her white armor from her entire body and then shattered it into a flash of white splinters and shards that stopped at a distance around her, suspended in space until she recalled it.
“Are you ready to let it go?” Tracia asked gently as Ahdis concentrated with her eyes open. In order to expel the very substantial assets that she had collected over the years, not only did she have to dismantle her white shield, she had to coax them out of the interior space where she kept them.
“Get this over with immediately!” Pultine said angrily, though her anger came from a place of true concern.
“You are not helping,” Tracia said. “If it could happen quickly, I imagine that she would already be doing it quickly. This needs to be done with care and we need to be ready when they come.”
Pultine lifted a hand and cast a portal that appeared near Ahdis.
“I am ready,” Pultine said and then she dismissed the portal as quickly as it had been summoned.
“They are coming,” Ahdis said as she flapped her large wings to levitate from the ground. Tracia and Pultine did the same and they readied themselves, Pultine had summoned the portal and Tracia gathered her glittering magic at her hands.
Ahdis was overcome, her body went tense, limbs splayed to their extremes. Bubbles of hazy white began to emerge from her torso and Ahdis yelled in excruciating pain as they passed one by one out of her body. As the bubbles floated away from her, they began to grow in size and the things they contained became more apparent. Tracia directed her magic to usher the gray bubbles into Pultine’s portal. And before any of them became too large, Ahdis ceased her screams of agony and the bubbles stopped emerging and were all swept through the portal. Ahdis’s white shield began to reassemble from the shards and fragments. When it was repaired, she followed Pultine and Tracia through the portal after the bubbles that had popped to free the Fonlanders of immense power that had been contained.
The mmoatia landed on the rocky surface of an uninhabited planetoid in the space of the Disc of Jo. The Razur Wurm was large, coiled around many formations of rocks and it screeched loudly over the terrain. The group of Poisons that emerged were stalking the area where the mmoatia landed; they were a diverse group of eight who secreted poisons to stun, paralyze, or kill. The mmoatia dealt with them first, Tracia and Pultine attacking the Poisons and Ahdis the Razur Wurm. These were the most likely of the freed assets to respond with aggression and after the battle raged and was won by the mmoatia, the more sensible of Ahdis’s former assets emerged.
“Did you free us just for the sport of battle?” Platymeris, the lethal assassin said as he approached the mmoatia.
“I freed you because it was a mistake to imprison you in the first place,” Ahdis said. “I intend to leave you all here to fend for yourself. I have no delusions that any of you are interested in not being a detriment to your surroundings, but I don’t intend to kill any of you unless you make me. If any of you return to the Disc of Agê while a Supreme Mmoatia still exists, you will be killed. If the Luminaries contact me and tell me of any of you causing trouble, you will be killed. This is your warning. This is your chance to make a new life, do with it what you will. This planet is yours to do with what you will.”
“Is the Supreme feeling guilty?” Platymeris asked. His anger was apparent, but he wasn’t interested in fighting, he knew that he couldn’t best the Supremes. “Or did you take on more than you could stomach?”
“I have freed you, Platymeris,” Ahdis continued. “You would be wise to speak to the other powers here and organize to keep from killing one another.”
“After you angered the Poisons with that epic battle?” Platymeris laughed. “You may as well kill me now.”
“That is mercy,” Ahdis said. “You didn’t show mercy when you came to the Deep.”
Ahdis cast a binding spell on the planetoid that would keep all of the new inhabitants there, and then she followed the other mmoatia through a portal back to the jungle.
“You are unburdened,” Shini said as he welcomed Ahdis to the room in the Aziza mound that the two shared. The room was mostly empty and they cast magic when they needed furniture of any kind. Shini had been meditating with the Green, studying the magic to become more proficient with it. Since his return from Kútmómɛ, Shini had been hesitant to use Death Magic. He is happy to never use it again, but he doesn’t want to compromise his power, especially in light of the reality that the Death Witches had been returned with him.
“I am,” Ahdis said and the two embraced for a long time. “Everything that I was holding that I shouldn’t have been holding is gone. Pultine and Tracia were with me.”
“I could have been with you,” Shini said, head rested on her shoulder.
“I know you would have, but I needed a show of force to deter them from making their way back to the Deep. It worked out, and I get to hug you now.”
“Why does it seem like you are savoring this before you are forced to leave me alone again?” Shini asked skeptically. He kissed her cheek and then held her at arms length to look into her eyes.
“I’m sorry,” Ahdis said. “You know what is coming, it is truly a nightmare and all of the Fonlands will unite against it. Even the Death Witches. Tracia and I are going back to the Mire of Teal to continue our acquaintance with them.”
“I will go with you,” Shini offered and Ahdis could see the anger in his face that he was trying to hide.
“There’s no need to put yourself through that,” Ahdis said. “You should continue your study of the Green. I hear Ariel has become very knowledgeable.”
“We meet regularly,” Shini said with a nod. “The Death Witches should be killed. They are not a good thing for the Fonlands. But I guess if their power can be helpful for what’s ahead, then we don’t have much of a choice. It is crazy that we face something so horrible that the Death Witches are on the side of the good guys.”
“The coming conflict will be unlike anything the multiversal structure has ever seen. It won’t be clean, it won’t be neat. We will be forced to sully ourselves to save tomorrow. And I would do anything for a future with you.”
Shini wiped tears from his eyes and he fell to his knees and wrapped his arms around Ahdis’s waist. She cradled his head at her midsection.
“I just wish that I knew it would all work out,” Shini said between sobs. “I just want it all to be over.”
“We will survive. I promise you, Shini, we will survive.”
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