Rogan's Monsters 2: Below, page 21
I gritted my teeth and cursed under my breath, and wondered what I needed to do to ensure Ecco’s survival.
That I was lost was, in my mind, a foregone conclusion by then, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t take the snake woman’s attention at a vital moment.
If only I’d had time to meditate, then perhaps it would have been different. If I’d been able to find balance, and to open myself to the energies of the heavens, then I would have been able to fight.
But the world wasn’t filled with “if only’s.” If it had been, then the Wraiths and Goblins would never have attacked, and I would have lived out my life in a much younger world. Perhaps I would have got married, raised a few kids, and taught them how to fish.
But none of that mattered. The only thing left for me was this fight, and I would do everything in my power to keep Ecco alive.
As I set myself for that last attack, I resented Ecco’s sister for draining me of my chi. I found myself wondering if I could somehow take it all back, weakening her as she had done me.
But once again, that was no more than wishful thinking. And wishful thinking didn’t win fights.
“Fuck it,” I said, and set myself to go for her throat.
Except… at the last moment, I didn’t.
51
Perhaps I didn’t have time to meditate, but there was one potential option remaining.
When Gamma had removed the binding, we had joined our respective chi into something more. For just a moment, we were more than just Rogan Ward and Lady Gamma. We were a being of power, a merging of two different people. If I could do that with Gamma, then perhaps, even with the small amount of chi I still retained, I could do that with Ecco as well.
I just needed to buy a moment of time.
I launched myself at Ecco’s sister one more time, just as I had planned to do before. But instead of going for an impossible kill, selling my life for one last effort, I did what I had been doing until now. I darted in, spinning like a top, stepping away from the snake woman’s best attack options, carving a gash in her flesh and then darting away.
“Ecco!” I bellowed. “Make a wall!”
I had no idea if she had the energy left or the focus to spare. But it was our only hope, and to my surprise, she managed it.
For just a moment, a wall of solid rock appeared between us and her sister. I knew without having to be told that it wasn’t strong enough to keep her at bay for long, but that wasn’t the purpose.
All I needed was a moment of time.
As soon as the wall appeared, I turned to Ecco and made my way to her as fast as I could. The fox woman was drained to the point of exhaustion. She still stood, still held the cave ceiling in place, but she was shaking with the effort, the sweat dripping off her as it was dripping off me.
Nor had she escaped the battle unscathed. Somehow, some of her sister’s attacks had got through.
There was blood seeping through Ecco’s diaphanous clothing, mixing with the dust on her skin.
“I don’t know how long…” Ecco began, and then I was by her side, holding her against me.
“Don’t talk. Just listen. We need to join our power together. Your chi and mine. Do it quickly, and we might have a chance.”
The fox woman spared me a glance, her confusion plain. But I didn’t explain any more, instead choosing to show her.
I reached out with my chi as I had done with Gamma. Ecco sensed it, and, in a moment of sudden enlightenment, I could see she understood.
As Ecco’s sister shattered the wall with the strength of her tail and a cry of rage, Ecco reached toward me with her dwindling chi.
Ecco’s sister slithered toward us with an expression of triumph on her face.
She either failed to sense what we were trying to do, or she failed to understand it. Either way, she reared up as high as she could in the cave, looking at us as if she had won.
“It is over,” she gloated. “But fear not. I’ll make this quick.”
She could have brought the whole cave system down. She could have used her rock-spear technique, and turned Ecco and me into pin cushions. But instead, she chose to use the strength of her tail, whipping it toward us in a powerful blow that I didn’t think either of us would withstand.
Once again, I was facing certain death. But I’d faced it before and emerged on the other side. I wasn’t afraid.
In fact, I was hopeful.
At the last possible instant, I felt Ecco’s waning chi move with mine, and just as had happened with Gamma, a miracle happened.
Time stopped.
I felt us become so much more than either of us had been. We swelled like a gigantic balloon, our power joining together and becoming beyond mighty. And unlike with Gamma, whose chi seemed to be in some way antagonistic with mind, Ecco’s was not.
We were in alignment along so many dimensions. It was like my chi and hers were the same. Nearly identical, with only a few differences that were mostly minor.
I wanted to consider the ramifications of this, to figure out what it might mean, if anything at all.
But there was work to be done. No longer was I moments from death. No longer was Ecco so exhausted she was barely able to stand. Somehow, even though her chi and mine had been nearly exhausted, by coming together, we were powerful again. We stood in the cavern, magnificent, a god and goddess full of strength and ready to act.
In an instant, my blades turned into my favorite weapon—the oversized sword I had found myself in possession of when I had woken in this new and dangerous world. With a contemptuous flick, I sliced a chunk of the snake woman’s tail clean off, sending it flying, unable to hurt us. It was a sudden, frighteningly fast move that she hadn’t expected, and even as the pain hit her and she began to wail, it was Ecco’s turn.
Ecco reached out her hand and closed her fist in a gesture that had only one meaning. The walls and ceiling around her sister collapsed on the monster, burying her in tons of rubble.
We stood in place, waiting for the dust to clear, and when it had, we could see that the snake woman still lived.
Even though I knew it would break the connection, that this awesome unity of powers would be lost, there was little choice. I stepped away from Ecco’s side, whirled my blade, crossed the short distance to the snake woman, and lopped off her head.
All of my exhaustion came crashing back. The unlimited power I had possessed while my chi had merged with Ecco had gone. In fact, it was worse, as if that very merging had used almost all that remained. I collapsed to my knees, the head of Ecco’s sister staring at me through eyes that were starting to dim, and I saw that Ecco had collapsed in the same way.
I was puffing and panting, my heart beating loud, and my robe soaked with sweat. But it was done.
Ecco’s sister was dead.
Even better, the grinding and grating of the cave system, almost ever present for the last couple of days, had suddenly faded into nothing.
We had done it.
Except…
“It isn’t finished,” Ecco said.
She was on her hands and knees, much as I was, but had raised her head.
I knew she was right. The snake woman might be dead, but there was still the seed. But I’d had a thought about that, and knew what to do.
“The seed isn’t likely to regenerate that bitch any time soon, is it?” I asked.
If it was, then I would have little choice. But I was hoping Ecco would give me the answer I sought.
She closed her eyes and thought for a moment. “No. Killing her has weakened it. It will take time. A couple of days, perhaps. Maybe less. But for the moment, we are safe.”
Safe from Ecco’s sister, safe from the walls collapsing around us, and safe from the different monsters that had been coming our way.
“Good. Can you take us back to where we left the others?” I asked.
To my surprise, Ecco uttered a laugh.
“I could. But I have nothing left. I cannot open the cave wall.”
Despite everything, I found myself laughing as well. I knew we could try to merge our chi once again, but I feared we would lack the power to keep ourselves breathing once we separated.
But there was another way.
“I will meditate,” I said. “Restore my own chi. Then, if you would like, we can work on yours as well.”
52
If I felt guilty about taking the time to enjoy myself with Ecco while the others were no doubt anxious about what had happened to us, then at least I knew it was necessary. In any case, we didn’t linger. I found my balance and opened myself to the energy of heaven, taking in as much as I could as quickly as possible. Then I shared what I had with Ecco, and we were on our way.
Ecco was as good as her word. She found the others where we had left them, sealed in. Unable to travel further and unwilling to go back, they had waited and hoped that Ecco or I–or both of us–would return.
As briefly as I could, I let them know what had happened. “The malignant part of the cavern manifested itself,” I said. “Ecco’s sister. There was a battle. Ecco and I managed to kill her. We’ve found the seed, but the job isn’t done.”
“Well, what are we waiting for?” said Camille in her usual blunt manner.
We all followed Ecco, and very soon found ourselves in the unusual glowing chamber with the egg-shaped seed in the middle. The evidence of the battle was all around, if anyone cared to look. But none of that mattered anymore.
The only thing that mattered was the seed.
“Well?” Ash said. “Let us destroy it, and we will be done with this place.”
“It isn’t that simple,” I said. I flicked a glance at Ecco, and saw that she had reverted to a sadder, quieter version of herself. Yet she didn’t contradict Ash’s words, instead just staying quiet and letting me do the talking.
“If we destroy the seed, we lose Ecco as well.”
None of the women had considered this ramification. They each displayed varying degrees of surprise or shock, and Zera held her hand to her mouth.
“We can’t!” she said.
Gamma looked at me. “You have thought of another option, haven’t you?” she said, her voice full of confidence.
I nodded. “I think so. See the crack in the surface? Ecco, how long have you existed in this cavern system?”
“I don’t know,” she said. She frowned, trying to puzzle it out. “I know that time is measured in years, and inside the caves, it is much the same. But I think… maybe two, three centuries? A little more? I’m not sure.”
At this pronouncement, the others expressed more astonishment. But I wasn’t done. “How about your sister?” I asked.
Ecco nodded. “She is the same.”
I turned to the others. “I believe the seed is older. It has been here since the Merging began, and is part of the reason it happened at all. Which means it has been here for more than six hundred years.”
I knew I was right. I knew it, deep in my bones. “See the crack on the top? I don’t know how it happened, but I’m guessing that it was maybe two, three centuries when it did. Maybe more.”
Ecco nodded as if an agreement.
“I think the seed was never meant to produce Ecco and her sister. I think, when the seed became damaged, Ecco and her sister came into being. But they were never meant to be. Not as they are. I think there was only supposed to be one.”
The others were beginning to understand, but Gamma went even further. She figured out where I was going.
“So, now what do you intend to do?” she asked.
I smiled at her. “Do you still have any of your healing potion left?”
She nodded.
“Do you think it will heal the seed?”
It was Gamma’s turn to smile. “We can try,” she said.
Ecco’s eyes had grown wide with confusion, hope, and a little fear. But when she spoke, her words were filled with doubt.
“Will it work?” she asked. She tilted her head to the side. “If it does, will I still be… me?”
I didn’t know the answer. “There is only one way to find out,” I said.
She still seemed uncertain. “What if my sister is the stronger one?” she asked.
It was Ash who answered that question. “Then we will do what we must,” she said. Then she softened. “But isn’t it worth a try?”
Ash was a pragmatist. She knew what the stakes were. This was the only chance we had to keep Ecco alive. If we didn’t try it, we would have to destroy the seed as originally planned.
Ecco still seemed uncertain, but nodded.
“You said yourself that the essence that manifested as your sister was weaker now, because we killed that manifestation,” I said slowly. “Were you wrong?”
The ethereal woman shook her head and offered me a smile. “I wasn’t wrong.”
“Then now is the best time, is it not?”
“It is.”
It didn’t take long. There were no preparations to make. Gamma simply found her healing potion, and let a few drips fall onto the crack in the seed.
At first, nothing happened. Then Ecco’s expression turned into one of surprise and pain.
“Oh,” she said. “That hurts.” Then, before anyone could so much as tell her it would be okay or comfort her in any way, she faded out of existence.
The rest of us looked at each other.
“She’s gone?” Zera asked.
I didn’t know the answer any more than anyone else. “We should wait,” I said.
We waited. With every passing moment, my uncertainty grew. I knew that if Ecco didn’t return, we would have no choice. We would have to shatter the seed, just to make sure that her sister didn’t regain control.
And yet, none of us knew how long we should wait. Whether we had only minutes, or if we had to wait for days.
All we could do was stay together, and keep an eye on the seed.
After a couple of hours, Ash gestured toward the seed. “Look,” she said. “The crack. It is gone.”
She was right. Yet none of us could say what that might mean.
We waited some more.
And then, not long after, our patience was rewarded. Ecco, or someone very much like her, reappeared in the chamber.
It looked like Ecco. She had the same face. The same look to her. Yet I had been fooled by that once before, and kept my oversized sword at the ready even as I tried to figure out if it was still her.
There certainly was something different about her. She was more present. Less ethereal. And yet, this woman, this Ecco, perhaps, still retained the essential purity that Ecco had displayed.
“Ecco?” I asked.
She tilted her head to one side and smiled at me. “Yes. Mostly. Although I do feel a little different. But I’m still me.”
As she spoke, she brought her hands up in front of her and looked at them curiously, a very Ecco-like gesture.
I wasn’t the only one who breathed a sigh of relief.
“Okay, then,” I said. “Ecco, if you would show us the way, I think we’d very much like to leave this place.”
Ecco smiled. “Me too.”
“Have you ever been outside the caverns?” Zera asked.
Ecco shook her head, and I couldn’t imagine living as long as she had without ever seeing daylight.
“Lead the way, then,” I said.
Ecco turned and led us toward the back of the chamber, and for a moment, the world turned completely dark as the cavern wall opened into the darkest passageway we had yet seen. No bioluminescent plants, no butterflies, nothing but rock and the feeling of being underground.
And then, as the ground rumbled and the familiar sound of grinding filled our ears, I saw something far ahead in the passage.
A shaft of warm, yellow light, high above us.
Daylight.
Ecco took the lead, and we immediately began to climb. It was a tough one, and many times we had to grip onto the rock and pull ourselves up onto ledges and over boulders. Zera had little trouble since the chimney-like opening was wide enough for her to spread her wings. And Camille was an expert climber. But Ash and I had to help Gamma, who was often too short to use the same handholds that we did.
But the light ahead shone like a beacon of hope, buoying our spirits and driving us forward without stopping.
Until finally, panting, dusty, and soaked in sweat, we emerged blinking into the late afternoon sun.
We were free.
~End Book 2~
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Jack Porter, Rogan's Monsters 2: Below
