Matchlight crouched there above Enmei's prone body, sword held in both hands, the back of the blade pressed into shoulder by the force of the Custodian's strike.
Between the two blades, the air had broken – not to another world, but to a blinding starry light. Glass hovered and swirled around Matchlight's sword, attracted to it inexplicably.
The Custodian screeched in surprise and broke contact instantly, retreating back across the grass.
"HERETICS, YOU DEFILE A BLADE OF THE ARCHWARDEN'S FORGE."
Matchlight stood, flipping the sword in his palm. "You two, get through the portal. If we calculated the trajectory right, you'll be safe once you're inside. Do not wait for me. Distance yourself from the rift's entrance as far as it takes. A contact named Aspentas will find you there."
Enmei stumbled upward, dizziness almost forcing him down again. Katsumi appeared under his arm, nodded earnestly. Together they stepped through the portal, into darkness.
And in all hope, to safety.
*****
Matchlight surveyed the Custodian from his position in front of the portal. The creature was twenty, maybe thirty meters away. It had backed up fast, understandably wary of the blade in Matchlight's right hand.
"Custodian. In the name of the Archwarden, I challenge you to in single combat."
"HOW PUTRID FOR THE HOLY ARCHWARDEN TO BE INVOKED UPON THE LIPS OF A HERETIC. BUT NO MATTER. YOU SHALL TASTE JUDGMENT JUST THE SAME. I RESPECT YOUR REQUEST. JUST KNOW THAT WHEN YOU DIE, THE TRESPASSERS WILL BE THE NEXT TO FALL."
"Somehow I doubt that," Matchlight said, relaxing his defensive stance and unstrapping the armored vest from his body, casting it aside so his black, skin tight nanoweave exosuit lay exposed beneath. As far as Matchlight knew from his few encounters with them, the Custodians were an honorable sort. He doubted the mechanoid would attack until the duel had officially begun.
"Custodian, grant me a minute to prepare, if you will."
The mechanical beast paused, probably evaluating its ethical code.
"SO BE IT, HERETIC. I SHALL GRANT YOU THIRTY SECONDS, AND THEN OUR BATTLE SHALL BEGIN."
Matchlight's hand darted to his earpiece, pressing the comm function. "This is Matchlight. Tradewind, do you read?"
The cool thrum of interdimensional static. Then a voice.
"I hear you, Matchlight. What's our situation?"
"Everyone's dead. In a second I will be too. But Badger got off the breach to Aspentas's domain just in time. The packages are secure."
More static, then, "Good work, sir. One step closer to fulfilling the Prophet's dream."
Matchlight smiled. "Aye. Stay in the absolution ward for a while longer, make sure you're not being tracked. Then you can make your way home."
"Prophet bless you. Hope it isn't too painful."
"Prophet bless you. Matchlight out."
Matchlight cast the earpiece away. "Now then. Come at me, you abomination."
The Custodian shrieked a battle cry, its body blurring as it lunged across the field – to the left, carving an arc around Matchlight's position.
He didn't move, tracking the path of the beast with his eyes. It would be a difficult fight, but with the Amorphic steel sword in his grip, it was a possible one.
The sword was more valuable than his life was, but no matter what Matchlight needed to kill the Custodian, or at least maim it. Even if it meant losing the sword they had promised Neptune for the next stage of the operation.
Their fireteam had opened a rift straight to Aspentas's domain right under its watchful gaze. If the Custodian lived, it would report the domain's location, and Aspentas and the two mortals would be hunted down. It would be a worse outcome than the two packages being killed outright. Without Aspentas's help, they wouldn't be able to try again.
Matchlight had to end it here.
Without warning, the Custodian flung itself inward at Matchlight, redirecting its momentum in an impossible feat of physical prowess. Matchlight almost didn't catch the movement in time. The Custodian's unnatural speed wasn't anything new, but Matchlight wasn't used to his own body's slow processing rate.
The Custodian twisted over Matchlight's head, swinging its giant spear below itself. Matchlight sidestepped too late, the blade slicing by his head and severing his left arm below the elbow. He came up with the sword just in time to deflect the next strike as it came rushing down.
The Custodian landed several meters away, a second before Matchlight's severed arm fell beside it.
Shit. This body is too human, damnit, Matchlight thought, we should have asked the Prophet for more expensive bodies. Then the mission wouldn't have been compromised like this.
Tradewind had been the only one with a body able to work Amorphic Magicks, and he was back safe with the Flesh Artisan. The Prophet had probably thought the cost wasn't worth the slim possibility that they would be found.
But they had been found, and now they paid the price for it. Matchlight stared at the stump of his left arm as it spurted blood onto the grass.
He doubted the Custodian would allow him to tie a tourniquet in the middle of their duel, which gave him only a couple minutes before he passed out from blood loss.
At least the body's neurons had been tuned to only feel 20 percent of the pain he should be feeling now. The wound still throbbed like all hell, but it was bearable.
The Custodian laughed hideously, leveled his spear once more. Matchlight supposed his only choice was to predict the Custodian's attacks before they had even begun. Staying reactionary meant death. It wouldn't be easy, and he wouldn't have another chance. But possible?
Matchlight had faced stronger foes and won.
A brief coiling of the creature's bionic limbs. The spear plunged toward Matchlight's neck, but he had correctly intuited the trajectory of the strike.
The blade cut barely a centimeter into his flesh, then flew past with a stream of blood. Matchlight ducked forward, fingering a button on the hilt of his sword and striking upward through the Custodian's wrist.
Glass fragments spiraled into the air – the creature didn't even have time to scream before Matchlight was beside it, under its arm, dragging the sword along its chitinous armor and cutting into its abdomen. Another plume of glass and stark red blood – the creature was part biological after all.
A blood curdling cry of anger, and the Custodian lurched backward, too fast to pursue.
Matchlight did anyways, sprinting toward it as it fled. He saw now that it was bleeding from other wounds – it's armor had cracked in places, exposing patches of bloody, gray flesh beneath.
So the penetrator rounds they'd unloaded into it did have some effect.
It had lost its spear as well, left on the grass with its shattered hand.
It darted around the dimensional rift. Matchlight pursued.
A trap. The Custodian surged out from behind the shattered section of air, its remaining clawed hand burying itself in Matchlight's shoulder.
It lifted him off the ground, incredibly strong for its thin form. Matchlight almost lost his grip on the sword as the creature flung him into the ground.
He rolled over into a hail of the Custodian's wild strikes, the beast stabbing downward with its fingers straight like a dagger. The first strike hit the ground, the second crushed through Matchlight's ribcage, the third through his stomach, blood and entrails flying as the hand poised for another dive.
When it did, Matchlight shattered it with the Amorphic sword. Glass stung his face, the effects of contact with it nearly making him lose consciousness.
But the Custodian was maimed, nigh insane, and screaming at him in some esoteric language. It reeled backwards, then dove down at him headfirst, catching the blade of Matchlight's sword between its teeth.
Idiot.
Matchlight fingered the button on the hilt once more, the blade thrummed with energy, and the Custodian's teeth shattered as it bit down, Glass spewing into its face.
It reeled back again, and Matchlight was lifted upward with the sword, finding footing on the creature's chest and shoulder as it teetered backwards.
He ripped the sword from its teeth, Glass sparkling into the air, and flipped the blade in his hand, driving it downward, through the Custodians open mouth and down into its throat.
The creature's neck and chest exploded outward in a shockwave of Glass. Then it was falling backwards, down into the dimensional rift.
Into Aspentas's domain.
*****
Enmei shuffled into the darkness, Katsumi supporting him until his dizziness faded, overcome by the adrenaline pumping through his veins. From then on they wandered side by side, watching the darkness around them warily.
And there was only darkness – a strange, luminescent darkness. Enmei could barely see the ground at their feet. The Custodian's voice still bellowed from the entrance. They moved further in.
A crisp snap of fingers. Light. Enmei shielded his eyes as the darkness retreated around them, replaced by a bright and endless expanse. A blue sun shone reflected in the flat, glassy expanse on which they stood, alone amidst a twilight sky strangely absent of stars. Enmei turned slowly, eyes adjusting. The horizon encircled them completely, only discernible as a sharp blue line. He heard Katsumi gasp. It was utterly surreal.
Enmei completed his rotation, and was surprised to find a figure standing before them now. He and Katsumi backed up instinctively.
"Do not be afraid, mortals. You will not be harmed within this space."
"You're the one Matchlight was talking about?" Enmei said. "Aspentas?"
"Indeed," the mechanoid replied, its faceless, matt black head bowing in acknowledgement. "I am Aspentas of the Prophet Mortifal's Apocrypha. I am pleased to make your acquaintance, and thankful that you have arrived here safely. You may remove your respirators if you wish. There will be no further need for them here."
Enmei and Katsumi did as suggested. He studied Aspentas. Undoubtedly a mechanoid, similar to the Flesh Artisan in size, clothed in a similar red rubbery attire that Enmei thought reminiscent of a trenchcoat. The mechanoid's hands were clasped formally behind his back, but its legs and arms and face were all of the same black metallic finish. Enmei thought that it . . . he, she? It spoke with male voice, but . . . whatever it was, the robot creature looked almost regal.
"I am indeed male, mortal Enmei. Though such categorizations mean little to me anymore."
Huh?
"Yes. In this space, I have access to your minds as well as your bodies."
I won't bother asking how that works.
"It works because–"
"Um . . . Aspentas?" Katsumi asked tentatively, "Mortifal's Apocrypha? What is that exactly?"
"The Apocrypha is us – the organization that commissioned your creation. I take it you haven't been told anything as of yet?"
"No," Katsumi said, "there really hasn't been time."
A magnificent crash, and the shattered, bleeding corpse of the Custodian fell between the three of them. Enmei hardly even reacted. Not more of this, please. I just want to lie down. And anyways, how did the portal get so close? Physical distortion?
"I brought the portal closer, mortal," Aspentas said.
Huh? Oh right, the mind reading.
"Matchlight. Welcome."
Matchlight walked off the Custodian's corpse, bent down and drew the sword out of the thing's throat. Small shards of glass were pulled along as the blade moved. Matchlight pressed a button on the hilt of the weapon, and the shining Glass dissipated, reforming seamlessly with the air around it.
It was only then that Enmei noticed the soldier was bleeding. Bad. Left arm gone at the elbow, blood pouring down his neck, his chest and stomach a ruined landscape of crushed bone and exposed intestines. It shouldn't have been possible for someone in that condition to remain standing.
Enmei keeled over and vomited on the glassy ground. Second time so far.
Aspentas was saying something. Enmei got up, trying not to look at Matchlight's appalling form.
" . . . commend your work with that Custodian, Matchlight. Even with an Amorphic blade, not many could have accomplished such a feat. I will have the Prophet hear your name."
"Many thanks, Aspentas. But . . . this body is ruined. I'm struggling to stay conscious. Here's the sword – make sure it gets to Neptune. May . . ." Matchlight's breathing was heavy and wet with blood. ". . . May I be relieved now?"
"Of course, Matchlight. Prophet bless you," Aspentas said, making a brief gesture with his right hand.
Matchlight's neck snapped, and his body dropped next to the Custodian's.
"You . . . you just killed him," Enmei said, incredulous.
"I spared him the pain of existence in that body. But yes, in a way I did. Do not fret, mortal, he'll be fine. Now if you will, I will begin explaining everything, including why you are here, your fractured memory, Enmei, and what the Apocrypha has planned for you both."
Katsumi's eyes widened eagerly. How is she not . . . Enmei sighed. "Aspentas, I apologize," he said, "but I doubt I would understand anything you're about to say right now. I just watched several people massacred by the most horrific creature I've probably ever seen, though I don't know because I don't know what's real in my head, and there's an actual bleeding corpse lying next to us."
"No there isn't," Aspentas said. Enmei looked. Matchlight was gone. Not only that, but the Custodian's body and the portal had both vanished as well.
Too much. I can't deal with this.
Enmei let out a crazed laugh. "I think I'm . . . in shock or something."
"Your body has been engineered such that you are not physically capable of entering a state of clinical shock."
"Aspentas, I'm fucking tired! Can we rest for a moment?"
Katsumi shot him a concerned look, then nodded in agreement. "I think it would be best to save the explanation for later."
Aspentas made a chittering sound Enmei surmised to be of robotic consternation. He looked at Enmei – or made the best approximation of 'looking,' which was difficult without a face – surveying the wet blood on his cheek and uniform. Not ten minutes had gone by since the Custodian first ambushed them. "Very well. Goodnight."
Aspentas snapped his fingers, and everything went dark.