[endermage]

"Quite cheeky, girl. I'll tell you what. I'm a fair being. If you, young girl, can strike me even once, I'll let you all pass....." she smiled, her teeth showing,"Of course...if I strike you once...you'll be dead."

Valor again tried to stand, but collapsed back into Glory,"Jimmy...don't play this game with her...."

Justice spiraled around Glory and Valor, her eyes looking very frightened. "I don't know what to do....."

"Just one strike, by you little one. Your friends can help of course...well the ones that won't fragment on contact with me... those incarnations can barely hold themselves together."

[252] [222] [17]

[Freezair]

"Fair, huh?" I chuckled darkly. "That means you're playing by the rules! Since when does Chaos play by the rules? That sounds pretty disgraceful if you ask me! Don't you think so, Avani?"

I looked over my shoulder, ready to reap support from my favorite green earth Paragon.

But she was gone.

My face fell.

Sky's eyes were drawn back, too. "Avani!" She looked, much like I did, as if she were at least expecting to see the light of Valor's spell in her. But there was nothing.

Krii spun around, too, to see what we (weren't) looking at. A peep of bewilderment left him. "What the...?"

I felt a tremor beneath my feet.

((Gonna summon Constantine next post, I think. Woohoo!))

[endermage]

"Oh, you are different." Eris smiled, "The old you would never try to cheat. I love it....maybe you won't make as big a mess of it as I thought..." Eris started after her, her eyes starting to glow with the dark light, when several opaque glowing walls blocked Eris's path.

Justice spiraled into view. "Oh no you don't! FLY AVANI!", her spheres swirled around Eris, Justice began chanting something unhearable. It was like what Justice was saying was difficult to understand, but more like she was speaking in silence, her pauses rather than the sounds she made were the language.

"Who taught you to speak to the Unseen Forces? Very very curious...that's some dark magic for an Incarnation of Justice." said Eris, diving at Justice. The claw merely scraped her, but it left a garish hole and cracks, like a hole smashed into a piece of glass on Justice. Justice flew several feet, and collapsed, severely wounded.

"I told you I could smash you...I'm not going to let you summon one of the Unseen  Forces," said Eris, "Now for that green lizard...." she turned to head back down the corridor, but a slumped over Valor and fire brandishing Glory stood in her path. "We are gonna.....hold...you...off till she gets there..." said Valor, eyes flashing.

[253] [223] [18]

[Freezair]

People brewing and bubbling with magic surrounded me. Just like back in the war--oh god, the war--I felt alone. Surrounded by those who outpowered me, I was a deadweight in the midst of a storm. I closed my eyes against the torrent around me. Eris hurling insults at Justice, Krii hurtling fireballs that merged toward Justice's magic. Lights flickered around me. Avani gone. I wanted to vanish.

And then.

And then, a roar.

Chips of stone rained down from the ceiling, and I shielded my eyes. A rumble shook the cave. A green blur darted in front of us, sailing over Eris' head. Avani? I dared to look up, and got grit in my eyes and nostrils for my trouble. Something, bomblike, fell near Eris and exploded in a flashy green storm. Fringes of light, looking like leaves, erupted near her. Was the roar her? No. Even if she had wanted to, Avani was small. There simply wasn't space in her body to make that kind of sound.

Then came the source, unmistakable.

A Paragon the color of stone and moss came out of the darkness, blending in with the cave yet somehow stading out amidst it. Razors of wind came off his beating wings.

His voice shook the world.

"I thought I felt a disturbance..."

[endermage]

"Oh darn." Eris snapped her claw, "Connie is out. No matter. I still feel like watching this unwind will be quite interesting. But this Eternal knows when she's beat. Bai Bai Connie and big green lizard. Have fun trying to stop the catastrophe....." She tossed her head, her body glowed, "Oh and Pseudo Incarnations...next time...you will die." And with that she vanished. Her eyes the last things seen.

Justice was coughing and hacking, her body looked wretched, like she was infected. The cracks were like cracks in a rock, there was no blood or gore pouring from the hole that Eris had left, but it was a void. She looked like Swiss cheese.

Valor was already in a semi-unconscious stupor, and Glory was panicking. "Um...hello big grey guy....my friends are dying...can you like...um help?"

[254] [224] [19]

[Freezair]

I stared off at Eris as she high-tailed it out of there. Eyes swapping back and forth between the two, Justice and Valor lying "bleeding" on the ground, and awash in thought, only one of my several dozen questions managed to make it to my lips:

"...'Connie?'"

The enormous gray Paragon knelt over Justice. Normally, even a Paragon of his massive size would have difficulty kneeling over her--Justice was pretty enormous--but, lying on the ground and wracked by injury, she seemed painfully small and easy to step on. Constantine hummed, and it was like the world getting ready to have an earthquake.

"...They are not so unlike you, young one," the gray Paragon said. At first I thought he was talking to Sky--and for a moment, she reacted like he was--but from the cast of his eyes, it soon became obvious that he meant Avani, behind her. Avani came forward and stood in the shadow of the great beast. "In your past, you were like them. Reach into your memory, and find the skills I taught you that will help you heal them."

A glowing light flickered in Avani's branches. "B-but... It was so long ago...! I don't remember everything like that. I remember you, but... but I think you were calling me."

"It is within you. It is all within you. As if it were a plant beneath your care, nurture it and help it grow."

Avani gulped. "But... I don't know if I can, before..." She glanced at Valor. In that worried flicker in her eyes, I knew all trace of the trance had left her. This was my Avani, the Avani I knew, once again. And yet, she herself knew something I did not understand.

Patting the head of the fallen Justice, Krii stepped forward. "I don't know what exactly is going on here," he said, and he sucked in his chest. "But I do know you, Avani. And I know you never give up! Whatever this... healing spell is, I know you can pull it off! We're behind you, Avani! 100 percent! Woo! Rah rah and sis boom bah and all that!"

Avani smiled. "Thank you, Krii. But..." She sucked in her lip. "Valor."

With a slight swoop of her wings, she leapt towards the spot where the injured Valor sat. "Valor, I know you are very injured. But is there enough strength within you for one more spell? I think, working together with that spell of yours, I can help you all. Is it possible?"