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:
The Deft Hands of Zacchaeus
– Issue 13 – Wielders of the Black
Zacchaeus never considered himself to be a magic user. Sure, he can do extraordinary things thanks to his connection to the Needy, but he just never thought of what he was doing as the same thing that Issac, the Master of Multiversal Arcana, did when he wielded his power using spells and incantations. Since arriving to the Fonlands and spending considerable time on the Disc of Agê, then in the mysterious realm known as Kútmómɛ where he and Pultine had gone with Maxx to retrieve the Blight Maker that he has been wielding in a solo fight against a Pito who can make things appear out of thin air, like large boulders or other beings who fight until Maxx cuts them down like nothing, Zacchaeus has become much more familiar with wielding magic. His relationship with the mmoatia Coffey has become much more intimate and watching her on the Disc of Agê, protecting others from dangers by flicking her wrists and casting, slinging, or blasting magic has been an education. But it has been more than a hundred years in the Fonlands and it is very natural to him by the time he finds himself in the Talj Junction universe with others from the Fonlands to defend against the encroaching Pito.
“I have never felt one such as you,” the 4Warrior known as Nwa Wa through the communicator that Zacchaeus wears. She is still in the command room of the spaceship where Alia sits as commander while Pultine directly engages the Pito in battle. Nwa Wa had been with Pultine in battle against Pulatus, the Pito version of Pultine, but she retreated to the ship once she’d used to magic to immobilize the head of the Pito, just as Zacchaeus had after he’d engaged a member of the Pito who was a giant red bat. “The energies that you display are familiar but very new to me. Your magic is black like the disc of Lêgba, it can cause metamorphosis, and it has been a pleasure to interact with it so closely. Are you ready to see if our plan to stop these Pito will work?”
“I guess so,” Zacchaeus says nervously and he begins the precise hand movements that Nwa Wa had taught him. He knows hand spells like this, Issac had taught him, but these spells are much more complex. Even if he never considered himself to be a magic user, he is adept enough to use Nwa Wa power and to direct it to the black beacons that the warriors from the Fonlands have curated by surrounding their Pito enemies in black magic. He floats before the ship that Nwa Wa inhabits, but he is a far way from it, closer to the battle front than the ship, but when he begins casting the spell, his dark form is clearly visible to everyone watching because his form expands. Tendrils of the black magic shoot out from his body and they connect to all of the Pito that had engaged the forces from the Fonlands, to the black magic the fores have been covering the Pito with.
“Excellent,” Nwa Wa says and she leaves the command ship, passes easily through the large front window and out into the void, moving her hands and chanting words while a beam of black energy leaves her body to connect her with Zacchaeus. They no longer need to speak to communicate and Zacchaeus is able to see the view through her eyes as clearly as he can see his own. He can feel Nwa Wa working very hard to overpower the psychies of the Pito and he wonders if he can help, but Nwa Wa assures him that he is doing the heaviest lifting already by directly connecting them all.
“This is it,” Zacchaeus hears Nwa Wa say in his mind after a while holding all the tendrils that connect them. “This is all.”
“What do you mean?” Zacchaeus asks.
“We can only stop them. But we can’t hold this forever, even if we can hold it for a very long time. The Pito are not like the wall that is so base and easy to take hold of. The Pito have much more complex thoughts and they don’t have room for anything but their hivemind command.”
Zacchaeus is slightly saddened by the news. Things had been going well for them in Talj, and suddenly, they were just biding time until they went back to the Fonlands. He listens as Nwa Wa explains the reality to Pultine and he watches from a distance as the Supreme mmoatia detonates a large ball of light, then advances into the dark wall to do it over again. He turns to look at Nwa Wa who floats with him in space and the command ship is visible in the distance.
“Do you feel it yet?” Nwa Wa asks. Her face is a pale mask that looks like a real skeleton to Zacchaeus.
“I don’t know,” he says and he looks at his hand that has dark veins of black creeping out from the palms toward the melanin of the back of his hand, then down his wrists and forearms.
“We made a mistake,” Nwa Wa says, “we underestimated the enemy to engage it like we did. Now I fear that every black magic user on our side is now Pito or food.” Black lines begin to creep across Nwa Wa’s mask from the mouth and eventually it looks as though the mask is shattered. “We made a mistake to ever oppose the great mother. I will show the ship, you show the misguided who have helped us to blaspheme the mother.”
Zacchaeus cocks his head as the black veins creep up his neck and to his temples. Then he half bows to Nwa Wa and turns to the battle. He lifts both of his arms in a flourish and black magic blossoms out with his arms like a thick smoke, and when he bends his wrists high over his hand toward the battle, the smoke moves like a giant snake through space. But before it can reach the battle, it is hit by two steady bolts of yellow-white energy that slice through it along its length as the source of the bolts approach Zacchaeus.
“You are Pito now?” Zacchaeus hears.
“Alia,” Zacchaeus says when he recognizes her, “you are not my enemy. We have come to know one another over the course of this mission…”
“There are way too many people here for that and you know it,” Alia interrupts him. “They took you over that quick, that easy? I don’t know you very well, but everybody I talked to said you were a powerhouse, and you just fold to it like that?”
“I am just as surprised as you are, but that should tell you something, Alia. I am a powerhouse. I tamed the Needy, a primordial being of my Earth who was empowered by centuries of the despair of living things, I faced the Omega to save Bludon, I fought and resisted Minyak, the first Pito that I ever encountered. Then we come here and we face that wall that took our collective breath away, we give it our best, we stop the wall, we kill some Pito, and damn it if I didn’t drop my guard and let it get it. Its the black magic, that’s the only reason you didn’t get caught off guard cause you was through that yellow-white like a boss. But Alia, it is over now. Nwa Wa will restart the wall soon and there are more Pito here than you realize. Your forces will not last long and neither will this existence. Your effort here was top notch, Une is impressed and we are all Pito and will lead her glory to the ends of this existence. Don’t resist, Alia. We are teammates, right?”
Alia shakes her head.
“Aww, come one now,” Zacchaues continues, “we don’t need to be fighting each other. Ain’t you tired? I know I am. I been fighting for so long, lord knows how long I been in the Fonlands fighting, and then with the Needy at home before that. I know its the same for you. Its always something cause we got powers or whatever. Once Une is done, we can rest. Won’t be no more fights to fight. Don’t you want that?”
“No, man,” Alia says sadly, shaking her head, “and I know you don’t either. I don’t want to do this,” Alia says as her eyes begin to glow yellow-white, “but it’s better than letting something turn you into a puppet. God bless you, Zacchaeus.” Alia prepares to shoot beams of intense light from her eyes that had been effective against the black snake that had burned to dust behind her. But just as she is about to let go, she feels a strange sensation.
Zacchaeus watches Alia disappear in a light blue distortion in front of him and he cocks his head to the side. When he looks out at the battlefield, he sees other light blue distortions.
“I’m glad they got out,” he says and flies to stand by the new leader of the Pito in the existence known as Talj, the Zombie Warrior General, Nwa Wa.
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