Hyrestia Tales: Into the Darkness Part 2

"Got to me?" asked Frost. "You have the wrong Frost here, sorry."
Raika's eye was full of determination to die for her cause, if it meant taking down Apophis with her.
Agate growled in annoyance.
"Well, then, I ask of something else, gnat. Leave now, or Raika dies."
He held a cutlass to Raika's eye, who tried to get her body away from the tip, yet was too tightly bound and weakened.With a pang of her heart, Frost realized that her friend might not get out of this situation alive.
Long ago, Frost had been a Phantom Rebel, fighting for the cause of taking down Apophis. She'd left the group, even the mostly peaceful Turret branch, because she wanted to live a mostly normal life, alongside other concerns. But no matter what, she still was a Rebel by oath, and couldn't let Raika die unless it were for strategic reasons.
Her brain diverged into two parts, despite Icirrus egging her on to bring Agate a bloody murder. One part continued the conversation, while another leafed through various combat situations.
"Why leave?" she asked. "We're right here, where we can be killed by the tip of your sword."
"Its a CUTLASS!" hissed Agate. Apparently, he cared more about teaching the enemy about the wonders of various steel weapons than the mission, because he lowered his cutlass.
One for the Heroes, zero for the Phantoms.
Suddenly, Frost remembered something,and energy flowed through her veins.
Something that could save Raika and defeat Agate.
She still thought that things were going too smoothly, yet somehow anticipated that after Agate, something horrible would happen.
But whatever the cost for bringing down Agate was, it couldn't be that bad, thought Frost.
She would regret those words only hours later.

Behind her back, Frost concentrated her powers into an orb above the nape of her neck. She let go of her worries, and let all of her elation flow into the orb. She thought of vast meadows and glaciers, trickling waterfalls, the cool ocean lapping at her fur, and the sounds of the forest.
She glanced at Snowyclaw to continue the conversation, and her oldest friend seemed to understand.
"Agate, I love weapons too!" squealed Snowy, despite being an active peace activist. Apparently, Agate didn't appreciate anybody who wasn't devoted to whacking the enemy with death toys, and didn't do his research, because he startde to chatter about weapons.
"So, I love using statues as missiles of doom..." started Agate.
While the Twolegs fidgeted uncomfortably, Frost looked at Tempest, who also understood Frost's gesture from battle experience. She crept over to Raika, taking advantage of blind spots and her scent that closely resembled a phantoms, and looked for a way to unfasten the chains.
Keldeo, also clever, joined in Snowy and Agate's debate about the usefulness of khopeshes, jutting in words about various horseshoe uses and other weapons.
Frost smirked. Everything was going perfectly. While Apophis was wily, his servants? Not so much.
Pink seemed to be in pain, but Frost knew that it was best to just leave Pink be. That was the best she could do for a cyborg in a constant sickness.
Vicky was dejectedly standing around, but she noticed Pink and went to her side, stimulating the wolf with electric shocks. Pink said something about the death of a comrade of hers, but Vicky ignored Pink and kept on generating static.
As the hum of the orb grew louder, fear crept into Frost's bones. What if Agate noticed her or Tempest? All it took was one glance to break away from his stimulating conversation about the weapons of the day to send her plans into utter chaos.
Yet, nothing that wasn't planned happened.
The mirage of a feather surrounded Frost, transparent yet glittering. Frost felt a little bad that nobody was paying attention to her, not even Amanda and Ignacio, since they were listening intently to Agate's lecture about Norse axes.
Then the other side of her felt guilty for feeling bad.
Suddenly, the orb threatened to fizz out, but Frost flowed some thoughts of flower scents to stimulate its power.
Frost had no idea where she'd learned the enchantment, but there was no time to get lost in la-la land.
She looked at Agate, and let the orb loose.
Wisely, Keldeo and Snowyclaw chatted about the relevance of bazooka trajectory until -
"Hey! What's that over there?" squealed Snowy. It wasn't hard for her, apparently, to sound surprised, since she WAS surprised.
Agate turned.
"What's what?"
SMACK!
The comical sound sprung into the air just as Frost saw Agate get smacked by the orb, which seemed very pissed about nothing in particular. It would've fizzed out and done nothing, except Frost flowed the positive power of Icirrus into it. She imagined a flow of liquid icefire into the orb, and the white part of the rainbow orb came to life. A wave of rainbow exuberance spread from the orb, hitting Agate with a thudding sonic boom that deafened Frost.
Her clear aura fizzed out, and so did the orb. At the same moment, Tempest was helping Raika off of the board, who when she said could float, fell face-first onto the cobblestone.
WHOOOOOM!
Just as the ceiling caved in behind them, Frost and her comrades leapt into the doorway, with Agate screaming in terror, yet acceptance, as he was flattened behind them.

Pink awoke to find both Savior and Ledra leaning over her.
"Aren't both of you on leave?" she asked.
She could've done a million cheesier things, but instead, Pink said the practical thing. Despite her gift of prophecy, it wasn't powerful enough to get around the interruptions in time, so her foresight was blurry right now.
"Pink, I'm sorry about what I'm going to have to do." said Savior.
Pink tensed, then realized Savior was apologizing in advance, not about to hurt her.
Since when did Savior have the prophecies and Pink be advised, not vice versa?
Two blue rings on Ledra's forelegs glowed, and laser blades not unlike Mecha Snowyclaw's glowed.
The sad expression on her face said volumes more than Savior's cryptic words.
When Pink glanced at where Savior had been, she realized that Savior was gone.
A warm feeling spread through Pink's veins, and she realized that blood and data was pumping through again, as if Savior's vanishing spurred nature's course to resume inside her body.
Weird, and a bit scary.
"Please forgive us, Pink... but you'll meet Moon herself in time." sighed Ledra. "You'll see."
Suddenly, Pink felt herself flailing as if she were having a seizure.
Not good.
Ledra started to fade.
"It's time..."
An explosion of white blinded Pink.

Frost awoke to Ledra mugging her.
Well, not really, but Ledra was lying right smack-dab on top of her, which almost spurred a scream from Frost's maw.
Then she remembered she was a leader figure.
No leader in her right mind would scream.
Not even in delight.
"Ledra!" she cried.
Ledra was in a normal wolf form, no longer Arctic, and blue rings were taut around her foreleg ankles. Her red and white fur was as elegant as ever, and her top hat was in Frost's eyes.
"Sorry." muttered Ledra.
Frost felt a weird wave of electricity spread through the area, and she froze.
"Vicky? You okay?" she asked.
Vicky nodded. Why Frost could tell? Follow the rumbling stones.
"Yeah. I don't know who spread the EMP field."
Frost realized something was wrong. Why would Pink send out an EMP field when there were no electronics nearby? She wasn't that dumb.
"Is everyone okay?" asked Frost.
"Yea," said everyone, even the voice of Savior (whew), but Pink wasn't accounted for.
"Are you okay, Pink?"
Stones moved as Jamaasians tensed and got up, bracing for an attack.
But why?
Then, as Ledra removed herself from Frost and Frost got up, her joy for Savior and Ledra returning faded into the void of space.
Pink was in a attacking position, her mouth slathering with saliva and claws extended.

Snowyclaw had woken up in a state dubbed "aaaah!" by Yours Truly.
First, she'd felt two cool glass rings on her foreleg ankles filled with electric blue liquid, and when she flicked them, laser blades that cut stone (sweet) protruded from the sides of them.
She'd been piled on top of Savior, whose steel-fiber fur wasn't comfortable to lie on, and the moist passageway had no light in it except for the dim glow of her rings, and Ledra's identical ones.
Then, she'd noticed Pink.
"Pink?" she whimpered. "Are you okay?"
"RAAAAAAAAAH!" screeched Pink. Her eyes were still beautiful, yet a ravenous glint was in them.
That scared Snowyclaw more than any threat by Apophis could ever do.
While Vicky rushed Ignacio and Amanda away into an alcove to protect them from any threat Pink posed, Frost tensed.
Snowy, since she wasn't liking how things were going right now, called on the powers of Electro Chronos. The crackling electricity pulsed from her, and her costume was donned - then she unsheathed her laser blades and tensed for attack.
And when it came, at first Snowy thought that Frost were turning on her (gosh, her comrade was terrifying in her Power Out form), because the claws that raked her were unnaturally skilled, reaching for her neck.
Then, as blood trickled through her fur, Snowy saw the drooling maw of Pink upon her, reaching for a bite of Snowy-blood..
Retaliating, Snowy slashed her laser blades at Pink, who howled in pain. She prayed to Mother Sky to forgive her. Snowy pushed Pink over to Frost, who slashed at Pink.
"What has gotten into you?" asked Frost.
Just before she could get beaten up further, though, Pink was smart enough to lunge for Savior - the almost-sole healer in the group.
Just as Pink seemed to notice Evada, who had followed the convoy in near silence, Savior slashed at Pink's muzzle.
"Pink! Snap out of it!"
"Mrruuuuu-wuuuuu!" she snarled. Her pelt began to glow.
Only Frost seemed to recognize the threat in Pink. Raika had vanished off somewhere, although she was certainly not dead, and nobody else knew Pink very well.
"Guys, we have to defeat her! Pink is transforming - in her next form, she'll be invincible!"
Savior hesitated to hurt her more.
"She can't take more pummeling, Frost. She isn't battle-worn like most of us are."
Ignacio stepped out from the alcove, his face stern.
"I don't like it either, but we'll have to... you know."
Snowy felt her heart sinking. Like Frost, she'd been overconfident, and now, she was feeling like she was falling towards the ground from la-la land.
Somehow, Pink had gained so much power that she no longer needed to limit exposure to the Jamaasian Heroes, which even the veterans had failed to notice as a suspicious thing - even after she'd fallen deeply ill. Legend Pink hadn't appeared in a long time, as could be said for Basic Pink, but both formes were different now that her genetic makeup was altered - right?
But before anyone could react, Pink grew in size - up, up, up...
She roared in savagery as her power altered space so that she, at about 20 feet tall, could barely fit in the tunnel, which before, had been 8 feet tall, not counting how much debree was piled around. Hieroglyphs of power orbited around her, and her darkened fur was singed with - Snowy didn't want to know.
"Holy creeping crud." she whimpered. "Is that Legend Pink?"

Tempest's life already sucked before Legend Pink, so she wasn't too happy when a giant Pink invaded her life and turned a shindig of terror and sadness into crudpalooza.
First - oh joy! - Legend Pink sent her flying into a wall, which didn't really support her thoughts that she was being useless so far with any joy, like "Hey! Remember that time where you fended off the ice golem?". It was more like "Hey! Remember when you freaked out and farted on the face of the ice golem?".
Not really helpful.
Then - oh yay! - Evada felt so pitied on somebody clearly more powerful than she was to the extent of not trying to help her, but rather, extending a dimensional warp so that Tempest could watch the rest.
As if she wanted to.
Now - I'm so enamored to be in a crater! - Tempest was watching Legend Pink roar like Icirrus Frost had done not so long ago, and beat the shit out of her comrades while she was drooling in a crater in the wall, sucking her claw.
If she could attack herself, Tempest would've done it in that sucktastic moment.
She watched Snowy slash at Legend Pink with laser blades, but instead, a jet spray of poison nearly grazed one of Snowy's lavender antlers. Frost was firing ice balls at Legend Pink in increasing size, yet they seemed to just go "piff" on her pelt as if they were plastic balls, not deadly packs of sharp ice.
Evada was warping around Legend Pink, yet kept on getting zapped at before she could attack.
And Pink wasn't even breaking out a sweat.
Tempest realized in that moment that beneath the sophisticated demeanor of most Jamaasians, there was a feral side that Zios and Mira had barely been able to keep under control, even during the Golden Age of Jamaa. With just some tweaking, the Phantoms were able to take advantage of that using Dark Shell magic to make minions worse than any artificial creation.
They were simply exposing the true nature of animals.
Power Out, Legend Pink, Dark Shells... all formes of stripping away sophistication to harness the power of the true nature of animals.
Yet, when Tempest saw what happened next, her heart stopped, and blood covered the cobblestones.
She was yanked back to her body, shrieking.

Snowy couldn't believe what happened.
She was screaming, although she couldn't tell whose voice was with hers.
Blood was around her world.

Frost didn't remember the killing blow, the rasping breath.
Yet, as she lowered her claws, blood seeped into her fur.
But it wasn't hers.

Evada had been in the shadows, neglected for much of the journey.
But she was the closest to the disaster.
So it was upon her to run to the help of the bloodied body.

Ignacio played bloody games.
But he'd never seen so much blood in one place,
Nausea overtook him, and it was all he could do not to vomit on top of the blood.

Amanda nearly fainted from the sight of the red liquid.
She hated blood.
She hated Pink right now.

Why for her?!
Why?!
Ledra wept over the bloodied body.

Pink suddenly had blood on her claws, and she was in normal form, looking at the body of her former comrade.

Elvis was distraught.
Not even Keldeo's soothing hoof could soothe him.
Nothing could, in that moment.

To be continued...