‘He killed the other reaper,’ said Garovel. ‘You’d better get up, Hector. Karkash may be gone, but this fight isn’t over yet.’
Hector stood. ‘What do you mean?’
But Garovel didn’t have to answer. Through the settling dust, Hector saw the other man appear. It was Stoker, and yet, perhaps not so.
Stoker was on his feet again and fully regenerated, but his shoulders were slumped forward, his arms hanging limp in front of him. His mouth was half-open, his eyes half-drawn, and his head twitched from moment to moment, looking one direction, then another, as if searching for something.
Hector edged in front of Garovel. ‘What the fuck is wrong with him?’
‘This is what happens when the reaper dies while the servant still lives. His body works just fine, but his consciousness is broken.’
‘Agh...’
‘Be extremely careful. It will die on its own within the next hour, but if we just let it go, then it will seek out people to kill.’
‘But... why? If he’s mindless, then why would he...?’
‘It’s only driven by a sense of self-preservation now. Its soul is destroyed, so it will try to take someone else’s in order to repair it. Which won’t work. But that won’t stop it from trying.’
‘Isn’t there, uh... I mean, there’s no way to help him?’
‘No. Listen to me, Hector. It’s not even “him” anymore. That thing is a monster now. And if you don’t destroy its brain, it’s going to go over to that town and slaughter dozens of people.’
Hector gave a painful frown as he watched the man. ‘But he’s just... standing there... I can’t just kill him.’
‘Then watch it closely, and you’ll see.’
Stoker’s breathing was increasingly erratic. His body flexed, small chunks converting into hydrogen gas and leaving bloody gashes behind, which soon regenerated. He looked toward the town, then toward Hector and Garovel.
‘Oh right,’ said Garovel. ‘We’re a lot closer to it than the town is, aren’t we? It’ll want to kill us first.’
Hector’s brow lowered. ‘Exactly how dangerous is this thing?’
A dark serial novel. Set in a modern fantasy world called Eleg. Mature language. Updates every night at midnight PST by ~400 words.
Don't you just hate it when your ally suddenly becomes a mindless psychotic monster?
ReplyDeleteMeh. You kinda get used to it. XD
ReplyDeleteWell, I guess this might explain why Karkash just up and left right after killing Nize.
ReplyDeleteSorta. Will be fully addressed later.
ReplyDeleteMaybe Stoker just needs a hug or something. It'll be fine, I'm sure.
ReplyDeleteMissing quotation mark at the end:
ReplyDelete‘Be extremely careful. It will die on its own within the next hour, but if we just let it go, then it will seek out people to kill.
I liked Stoker. Giving his backstory in his dying moments was really kind of cruel.
Got it, thank you.
ReplyDeleteHaha, well. His backstory had multiple reasons for being there, and believe it or not, cruelty wasn't chief among them.
I suppose Hector could just drop a huge iron boulder on Stoker, like he tried to do to Karkash. It didn't work on K, because he's a magnetism guy--S, who works with hydrogen, shouldn't be able to do anything about it, especially if he's no longer intelligent. As he noted earlier in the battle, working with hydrogen is a tool for a thinking man--which he isn't, anymore.
ReplyDeleteYes, I have no trouble believing that. You were introducing Dozer in person after all and show some of the inner workings of Abolish. Though I find it strange that they just recruit random homeless children. Reapers should be pretty rare compared to potential servants, so I kind of expected them to select their servants more carefully.
ReplyDeleteCertainly wasn't the conventional method of recruitment, yes. They do have other, more standard means, but the kids were given rather special treatment, having struck Dozer's fancy 'n all.
ReplyDeleteTragic end. Was really liking his character
ReplyDeleteTotally. Sometimes it ruins my whole afternoon. Or morning. Not evening, though. Dinnertime is way too enjoyable.
ReplyDelete