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Chapter 16
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“Who’s Al Bowlly?” Cordax whispered to me.
“This would be better alone,” Ghid snapped his fingers while he began to turn away, but then looked back in surprise. “Oh. Ohhh, oh right. I suppose that makes sense.”
He walked across the room, his regal cape flowing behind him, while Diero glanced at me before standing upright, clearly thinking of a plan of some kind. I stooped down and began scraping my finger across the carpet in illegible fashion. Cordax felt about his neck, which seemed to indicate that he had perceived Ghid, in spite of his high collar, did not actually have one, his head floating in position. It turned back as he obtained a glass from a shelf that, much like the rest of the room, screamed art deco.
“Cider, anyone?”
Pakari tapped his fingers against his leg. “Um, sir, what was that snap abou-”
“I placed suggestion devices inside your brains along with the entire police force so you would be more willing to enforce my rule when I came to power and stop dissidents in a divided democracy from protesting the rule of a monarch, which work in proximity to me.” Ghid responded, pouring apple cider in several glasses and somehow carrying them all back over. “Your resurrection at the factory seems to have ignored their placement entirely. Is it still there, or was it completely discarded? Well, it’s a moot point,” He continued towards the other end of the room while Pakari stood speechless with his hand raised in protest, trying to come to terms with the information dumped upon him. “I hope you don’t mind it being cold, hot cider irritates me.”
I looked to see if anyone was going to approach, and seeing as no one felt like moving, I pressed forwards while Diero bit the carpet, roared, and stepped into the elevator for a moment. No one seemed too distracted by the sound of breaking glass as I approached Ghid’s blazing fireplace, which two armchairs were angled in front of. He sat down in one of them, placing the majority of the glasses on a table in between, and looked back towards the door.
“Winger.” The command was simple, and after some hesitation Winger obliged, approaching the seat and only entering it after repeated gesturing from Ghid to do so. The rest of the party crowded around behind, for ease of listening, or to get the drop on Ghid, or just because they didn’t want to leave Winger alone.
“I’ve thought about how lonely it must have been for you to hide in this wicked world all alone.” Ghid pushed one of the two remaining glasses in his hands towards Winger, who did not accept it. “So I decided you wouldn’t have to be.”
“You could have come visiting.” Winger protested awkwardly.
There was a pause. “I wanted to, but being Volume-”
“No it didn’t.” Winger cut him off, standing up and looking into the fire. “How many years have you been holed up here, with such impressive technologies at your reach, unable to send a message or slip away, even if just for a moment? Dad, you run the whole city, did you not stop and think for a moment that perhaps you- just a terrible, horrible person? Huh?”
There was no response. “It’s not like you were pulled away by anything tangible, you just hide up here and comment every couple of months on stuff. I bet you haven’t even left this precious room of yours since- and you kill people! You killed people in front of me!”
“That was a robot-”
“Oh, and that excuses everyone who died in front of you when you could have done something?” Winger turned from the fire, the blazing embers now nestled in his eyes. “You literally ate a guy in front of me!”
“I never claimed I was a saint, son-”
“Darn right.” Winger tossed the glass into the blaze. “We all came here to defeat you or whatever these idiot’s plan is, and short of killing you I don’t care what happens to you. Gosh, you were here this whole time! The WHOLE time I could’ve just-”
He turned away, his hands tensed with anger. “So now what? Are you going to fight us? Hurt more people? Heck, eat more garbage out of a dumpster? Because I don’t-”
I looked at Ghid as he lunged across the room, gripping his son by the back of the neck. My eyes were cold, but in my mind was a growing anger. I had tried to extend one more act of kindness - set myself up for abandoning my entire plan in favor of my son knowing the truth. But now… There was no going back now.
“That’s right, son.” Ghid’s head crept around Winger’s shoulder as his son tensed. “You don’t get to participate in your dad’s business. Be a good little boy and keep to yourself for a while.”
Winger was shoved towards the opposite wall, and Diero growled into a roar, leaping at Ghid and starting in flabbergasted amazement as the fist he sent towards Ghid was caught and held at bay. “There are some advantages to being mechanical,” Ghid mused, gripping Diero by the throat and letting the cape fall to the ground as he bent the cowboy over backwards. “But I must say my favorite benefit is being able to deal with you.”
Ghid looked back at the party. “Well, come on. I won’t wait all day, after all.” Slinging Diero behind him, he stalked menacingly forwards, prompting Pakari to draw two knives and rush towards his side while Bird picked up one of the chair and approached from the opposite end. Ghid gripped both of Pakari’s hands as he attempted to shank him and used him as leverage to kick towards Bird, who blocked the attack with the chair. The points of his feet stabbed through the chair and nearly into Bird’s functioning eye.
Kicking the chair away, Ghid’s heels were caught in Bird’s impressive grip, and the giant was used as leverage to sling Pakari over himself and into Bird’s face. Quickly standing, Ghid’s head spun to avoid Diero, who had climbed out of the cabinet he had been thrown into, trying to grab his cranium. He ducked down and slammed his shoulder into the deadsperado’s stomach, buckling him before flipping him forward and onto the Bird-Pakari pile.
“C’mon, Racie, Cordax, let’s make this interesting.” He rose to full height and flexed his hands. Racie screamed and doubled back into the corner while Cordax gripped my sleeve to pull me aside, but I swiped at his hand.
“Don’t tell me you’re afraid now, not when it all matters.” I hissed at him, but Cordax went into the other corner all the same. Ghid rubbed his smooth chin as the pile started recovering. “Dear me, a choice! Shorty, shorty, or not-so-shorty. Now which do I pick…”
Gripping the underside of Diero’s jaw as he approached, he used him as a skull boxing glove to clock Wild, who had just begun to stand. Pakari dove and gripped around his waist, picking him up and trying to suplex him, but Ghid dug his pointed feet into the ceiling and instead suplexed Pakari into the top of the room, smashing a hole in it with the officer’s head.
“I always wanted a chandelier.” Ghid mused as he walked across the ceiling, stabbing holes in it repeatedly to keep from falling. “However, I doubt many of your friends would agree on your position.” Pakari’s hands slammed into the ceiling in a vain attempt to free himself. “Now, shall we get this on? My feet are getting tired.”
Cordax emerged from the corner, holding a book in one hand and the knife in the other. I jumped a good four feet when I saw it, and Ghid fell off the ceiling, quickly righting himself with a scared glow in his sockets. “The- You shouldn’t be looking through people’s stuff, Cordax. It’s impolite.”
“Sorry,” Cordax turned to put it back, and then stopped. “The heck am I doing? You’re Ghid. I don’t need tghlk”
“You don’t need to read that.” Ghid, who had vaulted the length of the room and was now pinning Cordax’s throat against the wall, threw the book towards the elevator, shattering the glass and sending it plummeting towards the city below.
…Until Diero made a mad dash for the book and caught it, falling out of the tower and down towards the city below. “NO!” Ghid cried, rushing to the elevator and watching him fall. I found I too had rushed halfway across the room, but quickly I shoved my hands in my pockets and feigned unamusement.
“That was my deadsperado, Ghid.” I grumbled. “Forget your stupid book and worry about what we’re going to do to you for that.”
“But Tott!” Cordax wailed, running up just in time for me to slam my finger over his mouth. “Shush. Now we have two options here. I and my crew can throw you off this tower and watch your mechanical organs splatter all over the ground, or you can surrender the city of music and get the heck out.”
“I care only about my son.” Ghid straightened his collar. “You will try what you desire, but in the end-”
Ghid suddenly recoiled, clutching his stomach in pain. I followed suit, entering the fetal position as I collapsed onto my side. Bird, who had ripped a large portion of the ceiling out to free Pakari, looked between Ghid and myself as I tried to stand and collapsed again. “What’s happening here? Are you two twins or something?”
“It’s-” I tried to respond, but cried out in pain and retracted even further. Ghid had stood and tried to walk forward, but collapsed onto his hands and knees. “It’s no good. It’s no use. I can’t push him away. I can’t hold him back any more. It’s all coming to an end.”
Winger had slowly moved towards Ghid and stood, unsure of what to do or whether or not to care. Ghid tried to look at him, but was brought to the floor by another attack, which caused his eyes to flicker. I screamed for a very brief moment, thoroughly startled, and began sliding back towards the wall. Cordax looked at me in the utmost confusion as I did so, but I suddenly gripped the knife and ripped it from his fingers.
“No. NO!” I threw the knife from myself, but Ghid caught it and plunged it violently into his chest. Winger threw his arms around Ghid to keep him from falling again, and Ghid, fighting against his own body, tore the air with his fingertips. “I can’t-!” I cried, clutching as much of my entire body at once as I could. “He’s coming through!”
The air next to the tower ripped itself in a violent fashion, a bright light shining through the seams as from the incision floated a massive clipper ship.
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