That's him... thought Kevin.
His blood was starting to boil.
Finally I found him...
His thoughts were losing their rationality.
Because of him...
Looking at his face forced him to face his own helplessness.
Because of him Ben almost died!
He stared into Albedo's red eyes. His white hair. His ironic smile.
Sorry, Gwen...
Kevin stepped forward and grabbed Albedo's blouse with one hand. With the other he punched the villain in the face.
"You!" shouted Sir William "Stop right now!"
He did not listen, not even to his own reason. He prepared to throw a second punch.
"What an ungrateful person," Albedo contained his anger in a wry smile. From a crack in his lip ran a trickle of blood.
Kevin stopped his arm in the air and said:
"What did you say!?"
"I called you ungrateful! I expected a 'thank you' but was met with punches."
"And why should I thank you, huh, you bastard! For not beating you up before? Don't be for that!" And punched again.
"If it wasn't for me, you'd still be stuck in that damn maze!"
"For you!" Kevin laughed ironically, "I can't believe it!" One more punch.
Albedo turned his face away, made two circular movements with his jaw, and spat blood onto the stone floor of the crypt. His gaze stared at the red bloodstain on the floor, then said:
"I already knew you weren't the smartest of goofs, but it seems your lack of intellect must stand out among all of the species, it's not possible...."
"What did you say?" Kevin prepared his arm for another punch when Albedo interrupted him.
"'Faced,' you inept man! The answer was in the damn story! If you didn't activate the traps in the rooms you wouldn't be able to advance!" Albedo pointed at the knights "This herd of fools values the 'courage' of throwing themselves into a suicidal situation more than dealing rationally with something!"
Kevin lowered his arm a little and stared at the ground, trying to remember the poem. He couldn't remember any "faced". He could only remember George saying that the traps were dangerous and could kill them.
"But what am I saying?" Albedo said, a mixed smile of irony and frustration drawn on his face, "It's logical that you wouldn't be able to understand this."
"You activated the rooms." said Kevin softly.
"That's what I said."
The teenager remembered all the suffering he had been through. Storm, rain of lasers, a fire-breathing metallic snake... The wounds on his body were still throbbing.
"And then?" said Albedo "Where's the thank you?"
Kevin hit him again. This time he dented the cartilage of his nose and let a trickle of blood flow from the villain's nostril. He raises his arm for the next punch and-
An arrow passes between the space of their faces, disappearing into the darkness of the previous chamber and echoing with the sound of an explosion. The two turn their gaze toward the knights and find Sir William lowering a technological bow and handing it to one of the knights at his side. He then says in his thick, impassive voice:
"I hope you have not forgotten where you are at this moment..."
Actually, I did... thought Kevin.
"Let him go," said Sir.
Albedo pushed Kevin away and let himself out of the youth's hand. He then brings the back of his hand to his nose and wipes away the blood that was flowing.
The soldier-knights stood ready, with the sights of their weapons focused on the invaders. Next to Sir William, three other knights stood out with their grandiosity, stateliness and arrogant posture. 97% chance they were Sirs.
"Name?" said Sir William to Kevin.
"Kevin Levin."
"I've heard about you. A mestizo, if I'm not mistaken."
Kevin didn't answer.
"And you must be Albedo."
"That's correct."
"Well, both of you have been present in our facilities for the last few hours, knowing our precepts and rules, so you already know what happens to scum like you."
"Indeed." Albedo raised a finger for attention "Before we proceed with the planned activities, which I believe will be quite amusing, I have no doubt about that; I have one question: How did you discover my disguise?"
"Your kindness" replied the knight.
Kevin intruded into the conversation:
"Excuse me?" he said indignantly.
"We already suspected that the alien Albedo would attempt to invade our facility based on his movements over the past few days. We only focused on identifying the member of our Order who was behaving out of the ordinary, in case there was an attempt of disguise."
"Yes, I thought so," Albedo said, "but I didn't understand the 'kindness' part."
"It had been over twelve hours and none of the new recruits had asked to leave the training."
"Okay, now I'm impressed," Albedo said, looking at Kevin. "I really dedicated myself to making the recruits' lives a living hell..."
Kevin held back from attacking the villain.
"Our squire is famous for his methods of selecting the strongest."
"Selection methods?" Kevin's memories about all the bullying he had suffered or witnessed at the hands of the Squire-Albedo kept coming back, like a clear case of post-traumatic stress.
"His record, if I'm not mistaken..." The Knight Leader looked at his fellow Sir next door and waved his hand as if he needed help remembering a piece of information.
"Three minutes and forty-seven seconds," replied his colleague.
"Yes, three minutes and forty-seven seconds! After that the boy ran away in tears without even setting foot inside the wall," Sir William smiled at the memory.
Kevin wanted to understand why a group of people would praise the disgusting attitude of a subordinate. But it didn't take much to realize that he was dealing with a group famous for the most despicable actions possible and precepts just as repugnant.
"Well, if there are no more doubts, let's move on to the execution."
A sharp noise was heard from all the guns drawn. The shooting would start at the first signal.
"Should I keep my hands up?" said Albedo, already putting his arms up.
Kevin looked at Albedo suspiciously. What is he planning?
"Feel free to do whatever you think best," Sir said.
"Well, if that's the way it is." Albedo crossed his arms over his head and pressed the core of his Omnitrix.
Oh, shit!
Kevin ran toward a pillar to protect himself from the hail of gunfire that followed. He squeezed behind the stone column as much as he could, but each laser shot ripped off bits and pieces of his protection.
With difficulty, the teenager looked out of the corner of his eye to where Albedo had previously stood. He saw only a humanoid silhouette being completely pierced like a Swiss cheese. Red spots appeared on the walls, floor and ceiling with each new shot. Kevin even thought of feeling sorry, but the feeling of revenge spoke louder.
Well done...
Sir William raised his hand and the firing ceased. The smell of burning filled the air. Slowly, the smoke from the debris torn from walls and pilasters began to settle. Only a violent red stain remained on the dungeon floor of what had once been the Galvanian.
"Don't be a coward, mestizo," Sir William said, "Come face your fate with an open heart, like your friend."
He was definitely not my friend...
Kevin breathed heavily. He tried to find a way out of there, but the possible options were few. Even the impossible options had an unlikely chance of success...
He heard again the high-pitched sound of weapons being activated. Carefully he looked around the corner of the pillar to his left and saw the soldiers with their guns in their sights, but they're not aiming at me?
"That's right, Osmosian, now it's your turn," a high-pitched voice echoed from within the dark antechamber. "Maybe against you they'll have a little more luck..."
Kevin turned toward Albedo's tombstain. He noticed that slowly the 'blood' spread over the ground and the walls began to recede into a single point. The shapeless liquid was gathering like a bright red lake. Literally.
The bastard had survived!
From the darkness of the antechamber, a small floating drone entered the vault room and hovered above the liquid. The antigravity generator then began to rise and bring the liquefied matter with it, until it formed a faceless, gelatinous-looking humanoid silhouette.
Having everyone's attention turned to himself, the polymorpho then continued to speak:
"Should I wait my turn again once you guys are done with the Osmosian brat, or is there no such thing as a queue?"
I, the narrator, if I were Kevin or Albedo, would sell tickets so people could enjoy the look on Sir William's face when he realized that he was not only fooled, but also underestimated. All this in front of the vast majority of his subordinates and his fellow Sirs. It was too much humiliation per square meter. It would certainly make a lot of money. Finally, the chief knight ordered:
"Finish those bastards off!!!"
The battery of shots were again fired at Albedo and Kevin. The teenager rested his hand on the ground beneath him and began to coat himself with rock. The villain, on the other hand, advanced toward the soldiers, dodging the shots with his disarticulated, formless body.
He can't take Chaotic! thought Kevin.
The boy ran through the left side of the vault room, his arms crossed in front of his face to shield his eyes from the shots. As soon as he got close enough to a soldier, he invested a blow with his shoulder, throwing him sideways.
Kevin saw in the center of the room the sealed square receptacle. Around him a row of soldiers surrounded the object. In front of him, a Sir with a technological bow was firing arrows in Albedo's direction. The damned walking catarrh was having trouble moving forward, but that didn't stop him from being able to dodge all the blows and projectiles coming his way.
Suddenly Kevin felt a heavy iron ball crash into his ribs ― the sound of breaking bones reached his ears ― and he was thrown to the other end of the room and crashed against a pillar. The air in his lungs escaped on impact. Partially conscious, the boy realized that his shirt and part of his skin were scorched. A bruise had already begun to form in the region of his lower ribs.
The brute in armor approached Kevin accompanied by two other soldiers. In his hand was a weapon that was a mixture of Camelot and Star Wars: a stylized medieval mace, but instead of thorns, electric beams emanated from the smooth surface of the iron ball.
"Hello, trash! Remember me?"
Kevin's blurred vision slowly normalized, allowing him to identify the owner of the voice and the damn iron ball.
"Hey there, old man... I met your son. Nice people. Totally different from his father. We even became friends!"
Sir Gustav looked at Kevin with disgust. The mere idea that his son could become friends with such a repulsive being made the knight sick with hatred. He held the mace in both hands and raised it over his head to deliver the final blow.
A scream of pain echoed through the hall, making Sir Gustav stop the blow in mid-air.
Kevin couldn't see the source of the scream, but he could see the worried expression on the face of the knight in front of him.
"Arrest him," said Sir Gustav. "I want the pleasure of finishing him off myself." And he took quick steps towards the source of the scream.
The teenager felt pain from head to toe. He didn't even have the strength to react to the soldiers who lifted him up like a doll and put handcuffs on his hands. He was thrown back against the wall of the room and kept under surveillance by three soldiers in a semicircle.
At last some rest... Thought Kevin.
Now let's change our point of view a little. We will do a "Meanwhile" to better contextualize the reasons that led to the cry earlier.
Let's go back to the instant when Kevin came out from behind the pillar and advanced against the soldiers.
* * *
Meanwhile, Albedo was trying to reach the receptacle of the Chaotic, but the siege around him was intensifying more and more. Although he was at the moment a practically indestructible single-celled organism, he needed to have a minimum of organic matter to be able to hold the desired device in his hands in order to escape. So, losing pieces along the way was not a good strategy, and all that remained was to dodge as much as possible.
But this was wasting too much time, and time was not something he had to waste like this...
He stopped dodging.
A sword cut across his head from 'one ear to the other' making a piece of goo fly and hit the armor arm of a soldier. Laser shots hurled pieces of his "abdomen" at the soldiers behind him. An arrow hit the center of his chest and remained there. A faint audible noise preceded the impact wave that splattered the polymorpho's body against a crowd in attendance.
Victory! thought the soldiers.
Suddenly, small gelatinous streams began to form between the various pieces of polymorpho scattered in the room. The soldiers tried to get loose, but the more they interacted against the goo, the more it trapped them. Suddenly, all the beams tensioned with each other, forcing the pieces to clump together and bringing with them all the victims of the sticky trap to a single point.
About twenty bodies crashed into each other with such violence that few were able to maintain even the slightest bit of consciousness from the impact. That is, if they didn't pass out immediately afterwards.
From above the cluster of bodies, the antigravity generator flies over and gathers the remains of polymorpho into a single organism. Then, floating a few inches off the ground, Albedo's shapeless body attacked the other soldiers on its way to the Chaotic.
Punches were thrown in a thousand directions. A henchman was grabbed and spun around in mid-air three times before being thrown at his comrades. Two electric arrows came toward the polymorpho, but ended up hitting a soldier who was used as a shield. In a second moment, with his legs spinning like a propeller in the air, Albedo advanced kicking five soldiers and the Knight Archer.
Just a few meters before reaching the Chaotic's receptacle, the gelatinous mass of the polymorpho crashed against the surface of a medieval shield that appeared at the last moment. The knight carrying the shield emitted a guttural shout of rage, and then activated his internal defense mechanisms.
From the surface of the shield, a powerful shockwave hurled all the gelatinous matter and its antigravity generator to the beginning of the vault room, restarting Albedo's entire course.
Sir William jumps up and grabs the floating drone in the air. He then says:
"You mean it's that device that allows you to move forward that way.... I want to see what you will be able to do without your little toy."
The machine rattles, trying futilely to free itself from the knight's hands. Sir William walks victoriously through his men until he meets the Knight of the Shield who was coming towards him.
"Sir Edward, I must congratulate you! Your strategy worked perfectly well!"
"Thank you, My Lord," said the Knight of the Shield in a thick voice that resembled a roar. - And now, what do we do with this?
"You don't really think you won with just that, do you?" said the high-pitched voice of the polymorpho from inside the drone.
The knights then realize that on the ground beneath their feet, the red goo has collected its fragments. Sir William pulls a dagger from his back and prepares to pierce the drone when his chin is struck by a jelly-like hand coming from the ground. He is thrown, falling backwards to the ground.
Sir Edward positions himself with his shield in front of his body. Albedo, in turn, circles around the knight's body and clings to various parts of his armor.
"Don't even think about it, brute," Albedo says, his head protruding in front of the knight's face. "I notice that you are quite protected inside this metal carcass. I think you could withstand even a tank shot if you had to..."
A bead of sweat ran down the knight's face. There was anger in his eyes, but his body trembled with fear of what might come next.
"But it's a good thing you're not facing a tank right now, isn't it?" Albedo throws the knight's shield to one side of the room. "And if you are not facing anything that requires all this protection..." He begins to separate the components of the armor and throws pieces of it to all sides "... this all becomes unnecessary. Don't you agree?"
The knight tries to bring his hand to the polymorpho's head when he feels a stabbing pain go through his arm. The gelatinous matter that surrounded parts of his body changed its nature and became corrosive, opening a long wound in his skin.
Sir Edward lets out a pained scream that echoes throughout the vault room.
And with that, we conclude "Meanwhile..."
Let us return to Kevin.
* * *
The boy awakes with the second scream of pain.
What was that! Thought Kevin. What's going on! How long have I been out!
Five minutes and thirty seven seconds, just to clarify.
Kevin tried to move, but only then did he realize that he was handcuffed. The three soldiers around him didn't seem interested in him, but in the confusion in the middle of the room. He heard one of the soldiers say to his colleague:
"Let's go help!"
"Are you crazy? How are we going to beat something like that?"
"Fine, then, keep an eye on the kid there. Henry, are you coming?"
"Let's go."
Two of the soldiers head toward the confusion. The remaining one was not really worried about Kevin, so much so that at no once did he turn around to see if the boy was still alive or not.
Kevin touched the ground and absorbed enough rock to cover his body. He forced the handcuffs, trying to break them. He couldn't do it at first, probably because he was weakened. After two more attempts, he managed to get rid of the shackles. He stood up next to the soldier guarding him and asked:
"What's going on over there?"
"It seems that the alien trash has taken one of the Sirs hostage. I don't know how he did it..."
The soldier looks at Kevin's face and takes a few seconds to recognize it:
"Wait a minute! You're supposed to be-"
A stone punch to the pit of the stomach was more than enough to silence the soldier who fell bent over the ground. Kevin kept his attention focused for a few seconds on the confusion.
Albedo coated part of a Knight's torso and arms like a parasite. Seeking to reach the Chaotic, he forced his hostage toward the receptacle. One acid burn at a time. Should anyone try to attack him in any way, he would simply slide down the Knight's body and use his body as a shield.
"Come on, Eduardo!" shouted Albedo "I don't have all day!"
A new acid burn formed on the knight's back, causing him to groan gutturally and, with great resistance, to take a step towards the receptacle.
Around the hostage, the other Sirs and soldiers were positioning themselves in search of some gap to attack, but "attack" meant being able to wound their colleague or superior to death.
Kevin looked around him. With all attention focused on Albedo, his path was partially clear to his objective. He cautiously advanced, hiding behind the pillars. He was one pillar away from the protective enclosure of the receptacle when he once again heard the knight's scream of suffering.
A wound was blistering all over the victim's right arm. He would probably no longer be able to use that limb. Kevin felt himself inside the labyrinth again. He looked around him for clues as to what he could do. He found the answer stuck in a wall.
Albedo delighted in all the confusion. The struggle of a few moments only wasted his energy and was to no avail. These worms were not going to give up so easily, and if they can cheat using technology, so can he. But, honestly, the screams of the brute were getting on his nerves...
He observed the expressions of the soldiers around him. He loved to be hated. He looked at the knights in front of him and their looks of fury made his heart race with excitement. Well, maybe it was his heart, he couldn't quite tell if he had one in that form.
Albedo kept an eye out for any movement. Any attempt to strike at him was followed by a cowardly slip and a "Are you sure you want to do this? What if you hurt your friend here, huh? He's your superior, huh?"
Suddenly a new scream is heard in the hall. But it was not one of pain. It was the roar of one who advances in an attack. Albedo smiled and turned in the direction of the sound. He watched the soldiers confusedly move away, forming a corridor for an individual running with a familiar medieval shield. "He won't have the courage to attack his superior," Albedo thought.
Then Albedo sees a determined look from behind the object, followed by a wry smile from an Osmosian.
Damn! Thought Albedo.
The polymorpho even tried to disengage from his hostage puppet, but as soon as the surface of the shield touched the knight's body, a shockwave spread over the spot. Like the first time, chunks of gelatinous matter spread across the site, staining mainly the surface of Chaotic's vault. The Knight was thrown and fell unconscious (but alive) into the arms of his companions.
Kevin was impressed by the result. He didn't know that the shield was capable of all that. He thought he would just give it a push and that would be it. Well, it worked at least...
Albedo's antigravity generator hit the surface of the vault, ricocheted and fell close to Kevin's feet. The boy didn't blink and jumped up to grab the object still on the ground. He knew well how the polymorpho worked.
The soldiers gathered around Kevin with their sights on his head. It was thanks to him that his superior was saved, so the least that is expected of gratitude is that there is at least one superior command to carry out the execution. Outsourcing the blame, some would say.
Kevin felt the drone swing in his arms. Holding the object tightly, his gaze ignored all the soldiers and knights around him and focused on the receptacle in the background. He watched the red goo of Albedo slowly invade the cracks in the vault.
Without the generator you're just a walking slime, you won't be able to hold the Chaotic... - thought Kevin.
Then the drone stopped moving. For a few moments a silence fell over the vault room. The knights were performing first aid on their tortured comrade. The soldiers were awaiting commands. Kevin could hear the accelerated sounds of his own heart.
Suddenly, the antigravity generator in his hands began to liquefy. The transparent liquid began to slide towards the Chaotic vault and penetrate through the cracks.
Something is wrong...
An explosion ripples through the room, hurling fragments of the receptacle in various directions. The few present who managed to react to the event sought to cover their eyes from the massive steel debris.
On the surface where the box once stood, a semi-transparent humanoid creature resembling a glass puppet stood. There was no device floating above its head, but three small spheres that rotated with each other inside the creature's thorax.
A thick voice sounded from the creature, saying:
"Where is it!?"
The soldiers looked at each other without understanding. Kevin didn't know what to say to the creature either.
Where is what? Thought Kevin, Who is this guy? And where is Chaotic?
The humanoid figure pointed at Sir William and asked again:
"The Entropy Regulator, where is it!?"
Sir William's answer was a wry smile, the kind we offer when we know we've won a dispute, or when our plans have reached their final objective, although they have suffered some unforeseen events on the way.
Then everything made sense to Kevin: there was nothing in the safe.
It was all a bluff!