Chapter IV27.VIII.2022
Tayne felt comptetely empty, forceless. After seeing all the bloodshed unfold in mere seconds, her mind couldn't catch up, digest and accept what happened and got… turned off, kind of. She sat on the floor amidst the shards and fluff from all the torn pillows, desperately trying to stay conscious and stare away from both the pile of beheaded bodies and the burnt remains.
"Tayne…" – Caithe spoke after what felt like minutes of silence. After getting no response, she moved closer, softly patting Tayne on the head.
"Sis, no need to. Really," – Tayne shook her head. – "Sorry."
"Sorry for what? If anybody should apologize, it's me…"
"And if anybody should be supportive, that's me. But i'm just…"
Caithe put her hand on Tayne's shoulder, and Tayne stopped her sentence. It was so weird how between the two of them Caithe, the younger one, was always the wiser one, the stronger one, a supportive figure. A person who Tayne looked up to despite being taller by a head's height. And even though Tayne had always been trying to catch up, take the guiding role in anything where it's up for grabbing, right now she was very glad for Caithe being around - as she was at all times, caring for her, consoling her and providing moral support when Tayne needed it.
"Do you think Naia can handle them?…" – Tayne asked. – "You know all enemy powers, right?…"
"Better than I do mom's," – said Caithe. – "The bulk of the crew should not be a threat, but there's around a dozen witches-technicians and the two ship owners. Mom would've probably got them all dry in the Starscape, but we're in the Dreamscape…"
Tayne heard these terms before… but after what just happened her mind was in such a jumble she couldn't recall from where. "The what?"
"The Metacosmos, I thought you know humans call it that?"
"Sorry…"
"Nevermind."
"So that dreamscape thing… Witchcraft takes power from it, right?" – Tayne remembered something.
"Sure does, but it also affects it stronger. And with the Watchdog and the Garbage Collector being high witches - they can massively shape raw Metacosmos, rewriting matter, physics laws, everything at will… Though these two are nothing at it compared to, say, the High Emperor."
Caithe took a moment to ponder.
"I would've told mom to stay away from the owners… but then again, have you ever seen them do this?" – Caithe waved towards the pile of soldier corpses, being surprisingly indifferent to their presence – "or go red like that? I think… I hope mom got them all in the bag."
"And will we be able to return from this… place? After…"
"Sure, the ship should be pretty easy to pilot, at least i imagined it to be. I'll show mom around. You just sit there with a cup of chakra and guide it through your imagination while technicians are doing the hard work… wait."
There could be no technicians left on board after Naia's rampage, realised Caithe.
But even before she could reach for the scrollphone, it started ringing by itself in advance. With hands slightly shaking, Caithe on second attempt extracted the scroll from a pocket, and when she finally unrolled it, Naia jumped out of the screen like a plug from a gaseous wine bottle.
"Caithe, quickly," – she said. – "There's a huge robot with four arms that breaks my blades like glass."
"The Watchdog… You can't hit him at all?"
Naia emitted a short puffing sound. "No. Can't even rip from inside, my bots disappear inside him. Any chance he got weaknesses?"
"He does!" – exclaimed Caithe. – "He's all electrical and mechanical on the inside, just fill him in with water! Or sand, or…"
"Nice," - said Naia sarcastically, "and where am i supposed to find these?"
"The ship has water pipes in the walls, it's how he got defeated in my own plot, when the technicians rioted! Just use your magic to break open the pipes and…"
And then the Watchdog appeared, breaking open the double pentagrammed door.
Six-legged and four-armed, the size of a car, with a dragon tail, a canine-looking head and four ears sticking out in all directions, the Watchdog was a mechanical bronze-coated beast, screeching with every movement. He had to duck down to exit the door even after ripping and throwing out the stuck part of it with one swoop of a paw. His three gigantic eyes, more resembling of car headlights, ominously glowed dark red. And his legs, ending with massive paws suited for a lion, were covered in blood up to the knees.
"You son of a witch…" – he roared in mechanical voice. Supposedly, to Naia.
"Caithe, your scroll, now," – commanded Naia. – "I have a plan."
And immediately the whole room was set into motion. The table, beanbags, chairs, glass shards all got picked up by Naia's powers and thrown towards the beast. The glass dome, or rather the remainder of it that was still in place, bended over and broke in a heap of long shards, all trying to penetrate Watchdog's joints, enter the mouth, swarm the eyes. The Watchdog reacted by transmuting it all to metal, that stuck to his body and got absorbed…
But that was just a distraction to save Naia some time.
Naia took Caithe's scroll, unrolled it and bit into the glowing screen, while simultaneously arising up in the air. The screen instantly got bright red, with dots of light constantly exiting the scroll binder and spreading across Naia's body — until Naia started to glow like a hundred lightbulbs, and the screen disappeared. Naia sucked up all the power that was in the battery, throwing the discharged scroll down – with Tayne catching it.
So when the Watchdog was finally done defeating the last of beanbags and looked up, he saw Naia, flickering with light too bright to look on, flying in midair waving hands — and for some reason they now also had four – in a jittery pattern, as if they pushed aroung a heavy object. And behind them, from what previously was an opening to the outside void…
"You're a high witch?" – he exclaimed, with terror and disbelief breaking right through the emotionless mechanical voice.
…a gigantic tsunami wave the whole height of the now-gone dome appeared, which had flown through Naia and around the kids, but hit the Watchdog like a heavy truck, submerging him, throwing him back to the starship and whirling around him in tact to Naia's motions, spinning and slamming him repeatedly into the starship wall. The witch screamed, groaned, screeched and gurgled so loud that kids had to block their ears – but eventually it stopped. Unable to safely transmute liquid which already got in his belly and unable to function with salty sea water hitting agaist the microchips, he switched off. Only for Naia to slash their hand through the air, chopping off the monstrous head, whose eyes were still flickering red, and instantly throwing it into the void – revealing the inside to be filled with cogs and sparkling rainbow-colored wires.
Water, returning to normal physics, instantly spilled out from the flat, now borderless platform, disappearing into the black abyss.
"I'm done," – Naia snapped out, returning to the ground. They lost almost all the glow and looked even dimmer and thinner than usual. – "I'm freaking done with this. Tayne, please give me your…"
And they disappeared. Only the motherdrone, a tiny metal sphere containing their mind, fell down, splashing in a puddle of water.
"Out of battery." – Tayne reached to the drone.
"Oh. Can you charge them from your scroll?"
"I'll try," – Tayne inserted the drone in a hole at the end of her scroll binder. – "Device found… device installed. Chute!"
"What happened?" – wondered Caithe.
"Seems to be a long process. Damn, what kind of trickery mom used to suck yours so fast?"
"They are apparently a high witch and you are surprised about that?"
"Caithe, witches aren't real…" – Tayne choked, — "I mean… it's all just complicated metaphysics and science and stuff…"
"Or as i like to call it in my book, witchcraft," – smiled Caithe. – "So, how long will they recharge for? We have one more witch to defeat…"
"We who?"
That smirky voice, speaking in Archon with a clear Rubean accent, belonged to one who could only be the Garbage Collector. A wrinkly old person in a dark brown cloak and a top-hat, with a fabulous gray moustache, who looked hilariously tiny compared to the Watchdog, only around a meter and a half high. The Collector had just floated out of the ship, levitating three meters above the ground.
"And they are…" – Tayne started.
"It's «he». And yes."
"Another robot?"
"A human," – Caithe pointed a finger at him. – "Looking for me, huh?"
"The Creatress herself…" – the Collector whispered menacingly. – "All the chaos you've caused, all the lives you have taken…"
"You really wrote that thing all edgy and ellipsis-y like that?" – Tayne backed away, desperately trying to activate something on the scroll. Caithe did the same, even though nothing really remained on the flat metal disk to hide behind.
"Damned stupid coders!" – Tayne's scroll suddenly exclaimed in Naia's voice. – "They've put a memory error checking protocol in here, why can't I skip it, whyyyy! Kids, can you hold up for just six sec…"
And then the scroll binder broke in half right in Tayne's hands. The Garbage Collector started to giggle in his screechy disgusting voice.
"What was that, a talking toy?" – he mumbled, still giggling. – "Or maybe," – and his voice instantly turned serious, – "that was a witch who slaughtered two hundred men on my ship? I saw everything. Don't you expect to not get revenge…"
The scroll pieces slid out of Tayne's hands like soap and immediately began disassembling, crumbling into dust. Tayne could've sworn she heard a short, heavily silenced, but recognisable scream. And then the Garbage Collector began to descend, slowly approaching Caithe.
"If you even remotely dare to touch my sister," – Tayne blocked his way and pulled out the only weapon she had — her fists, – "i swear, i'll find you across the whole Metacosmos and…"
"And cut," – interrupted the Garbage Collector. – "You're not even a witch, hon, you're a minor annoyance. I think i might sell you as an exotic slave given your origin, but…"
Tayne screamed with rage and dashed at the floating old man, yet got raised into the air herself halfway. Effortlessly swinging limbs in attempt to escape the pulling force, she got pulled right to the witch and frozen in the air, with a fist raised to punch him in the face — stopped last second by a force suppressing all movement.
"Minor annoyance…" – he poked her nose lightly with his rough knobby old-man finger, – "yet such a young and capable body… No, i won't sell you, such a remarkable piece of garbage should belong to my collection… How'd you like getting brainwashed?"
Tayne stared at the Collector with fury. This bloody damned thing crushed her mother to dust (could they be restored from some backup even? Tayne knew nothing about hologram transfer), was accountable for reducing her mom's friend to dust, and now wants her sister to serve for some dumbass emperor?!
"You've got some emotions, ma'girl," – the Collector continued to mumble, – "that's fine, living things tend to have these, but how about a little less, potentially, maybe…"
He tried to cast a little mind controlling. Just a little. Not his best field of witchcraft, not the worst. He was not expecting to hit a barrier, and one so tough he physically felt hit on the head. And at the same time, unsuspecting Tayne channelled all the push force she could into her raised fist. And finally broke through.
An old man screamed - and his scream was so loud and disgustingly high, that it probably would've shattered the glass dome if there was left any. Tayne unbended two fingers from the fist last second, striking the witch in the eyes — and thanks to her long nails, the effect was pretty painful.
"MY EYEEEEES!!! I'M BLIIIIIIND!!! HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO RUN THE SHIIIP!!!" – this was the last thing Tayne heard before a powerful shockwave hit her, propelling her through the air at a ridiculous speed and tossing her over the ledge, into the misty abyss. The scream echoed quieter and quieter in the distance until ceasing completely. But by that time Tayne already fell unconscious.
There is no air in raw Metacosmos.
End of Act 0