Chapter 29 Catch-22

Jeb bounced off a white stone palisade and tumbled into the empty street, the wind thoroughly knocked out of him.

His Body was still high enough to survive the fall, but it sure as hell wasn’t comfortable.

Jeb rolled to a halt in the middle of the cobbled street, the stinking muck staining his clothes as he groaned, flopping over onto his back. I think I slipped a disc.

“Oooow,” Jeb groaned, fishing in his vest pocket for his trap notebook and pen.

With trembling hands, Jeb jotted down ‘Parachute trap’.

So this is what rock bottom feels like, Jeb thought, staring up into the sky, which had turned grey and cold.

BOOM! There was the sound of an explosion to Jeb’s left.

Je turned his head to the left, where the stone walls of the city shed ages of dust as they were finally put to the test against the army of the dead. Even leaderless their footsteps shook the very ground.

“Daddy no!”

Jeb turned his head to the right, where he heard the faint snarling of an undead and the grunting struggles of a woman, from the general direction of the church. Their child, not understanding the situation, was trying to talk her dead father out of eating mommy.

Jeb moved to wipe away a clump of what he hoped was mud from his face.

A flash of blue caught his attention.

The scroll was clutched in his right hand, the tendons unnaturally tight, like they’d been struck with rigor mortis. How did I
I just
I thought I threw this thing away. Again. Goddamnit.

Borg’s ugly mug entered Jeb’s view of the sky.

“You alright?” Borg asked.

“I don’t think so,” Jeb said, trying to let go of the scroll and failing miserably.

“Why don’t you just use the scroll to fix everything?”

“How many cautionary tales are there about wishes!?” Jeb demanded, looking up at his rotting companion. “SO MANY! The phrase ‘careful what you wish for’ exists in every human language! What good would it do if I save these people only to turn around and kill them all because my new boss said so!?” Unknowingly, Jeb’s voice had escalated to a full blown shout.

“Her title is ‘The Destroyer, Borg!”

“Sooner or later, the irresistible force wins,” Jeb muttered. “And immortal deities are pretty damn close.”

Smartass entered Jeb’s field of vision from the other side.

BOOM!

The walls of the city shuddered again.

“Remember when I was sad, and you cheered me up?” Smartass asked, her brown eyes filled with concern.  She hesitantly reached out and patted his shoulder. “There, there.”

Actually, I do remember cheering her up. She was a budding little goth and dropped it within a few hours. It amazes me how quickly fairies change, despite being immortal
Waitaminute.

‘Immortality is a word devised by the short lived to describe something they don’t understand. But time is relentless. It doesn’t matter how it happens, sooner or later, the pieces align, and entropy will win out’ – Smartass, facing the inevitable.

Jeb’s eyes widened.

Immortals aren’t irresistible forces. Gods aren’t irresistible forces. Destroyers aren’t either. The only irresistible force is time. Gods used to not exist. They can be created, and they can be changed. Everything can be changed.

Jeb looked up at Borg.

“You look like you just had an idea.”

“Borg, I want you to find me a lawyer.”

“I just passed the bar exam.” Borg said.

BOOM! The ground bucked underneath Jeb and nearly lifted him off the ground.

“When?”

“About a femtosecond after you said you wanted a lawyer,” Borg said, casually flicking something that looked suspiciously like a microchip into the gutter.

Jeb looked down at the blue vellum clutched in a death grip in his hand.

He thought about his Deal.

He thought about all the people out there who needed an end to this, right now. The little girl he’d heard not a minute ago sprung to mind.

He thought about Mab’s smug face
and realized he really didn’t like losing.

“How small can you write?”

“Small enough that wavelengths of light become a factor,” Borg said, a pen and sheet of paper manifesting out of nothing in his hands.

“Excellent.” Jeb leaned forward and poked Borg with the scroll.

Borg raised a brow.

“Just making sure you were still loyal.” Jeb said with a shrug. It never hurts to be paranoid. Besides, he doesn’t have any feelings.

“We’ll start with the broad strokes and work down to the fine details.” Jeb said, pulling out a knife and slicing open his thumb.

When dealing with contracts with evil gods, blood was traditional.

***Emperor Pikaku, Uniter of the Continent, Ruler of Mestikos, Level 328***

“They’ve hidden Iyapiwa among the ten remaining groups,” General Grazoth said, pointing to the ten clusters of intelligent undead on the map. “If the Maiden of Death manages to get the drop on one of our more powerful enforcers or gods forbid, the emperor himself, that could be enough to tilt the scales entirely in their favor.”

Iyapiwa was a damsel known for being an assassin before she was sold by her country to the former emperor in a bid to kill him. It hadn’t worked. This was some hundred and fifteen years ago. The damsel had been very old when she was murdered, but her level had been very high for a damsel, and her experience in battle was the highest among the Damsels.

They could only watch out for how this skillset might have translated in her undeath.

“The best strategy is to form up our strongest forces and cut off small portions of the undead army using superior mobility, taking them apart one piece at a time.”

“While the miasma does their job for them?” Pikaku asked, his neck strained from the stress of the oncoming assault. “There are low level commoners already turning out there. The undead need to be purged before they annihilate the city simply by existing. If they’re still out there by nightfall, thing will get muchworse.”

“With respect, sire, your father’s strategy is still in play, and has leveraged the characteristics of the undead masterfully. If we overcommit and are turned, the death toll will be far higher than a few extra mindless undead. There is no painless way to finish this.”

Pikaku’s eye twitched.

What am I paying you cretins for? He thought, not putting the ungenerous thought to word. Generals were some of the few people he truly had to handle with tact.

Pikaku looked up from the map and glanced over the edge of the wall, where undead were still streaming out of the water, a seemingly limitless river of death.

The river concealed their numbers, protected them from siege weapons and their decomposing flesh poisoned the city
.

Pikaku clenched his beak. There could be a limitless number of reinforcements hiding in the swirling waters. His father knew how to leverage the fear of the unknown


The ten clusters of corpses had grown to small armies, the mindless undead acting as effective armor that would blunt any assault the remaining forces of Mestikos could launch against them.

By the time they reached the center, the attackers would be tired in both Body and Myst, and the intelligent undead would have the advantage.

If they sent the enforcers in ones and twos, in the manner they were accustomed to, there was every change that they could lose one of their powerhouses to a surprise attack, who might then be turned against them.

The general was correct, but that didn’t make Pikaku less upset.

Perhaps
perhaps I can arrange for some assistance from Vex. The sidnio has proven himself willing to bargain.

What we need from our side is a power move that renders father’s tactics meaningless.

Just as Pikaku had that thought, an unease settled over the battlefield like a cloud. As if the light of the gods had been smothered, a warm presence he had known since birth
vanished.

The world went dark, and the clouds parted to reveal that the sun had been consumed by complete blackness, with only a corona of faint light.

Pikaku’s feathers stood on end.

Slowly and reluctantly, the void dripped off the sun, forming a teardrop that descended towards the surface of Pharos on a thread of blackest night.

The teardrop grew to a massive size as it approached, and seemed to be on a direct course to impact Mestikos. Hardened veterans were screaming and looking for a place to hide, while others simply stared, captured by the deadly beauty of the nothingness that was visiting their world.

Pikaku was one of the latter, perfectly aware that there was no place in the city someone couldhide. Not from something like that.

Just as the sky had turned completely black, with the only light being from torches and a thin band of residual light from the horizon, the object stopped.

Thousands of droplets the size of a man fell from the darkness above them, radiating an aura of palpable unease. They were connected to the main mass by a thin thread of black, nearly invisible against the backdrop of limitless darkness.

Each place a droplet fell, an undead was engulfed by the darkness and simply ceased to exist.

Pikaku looked up to the sky, trying to see if there was one meant for him, but his eyes were not up to the task of piercing the void.

And as quickly as it came, the void retracted its limbs and withdrew into the sky, gradually vanishing into the distance as the light of the sun returned.

A full-body shiver brought Pikaku to his knees. Where before there had been an army, stood a silent field.

The sounds of alarm and violence that had drifted to his senses from inside the city had ceased as well.

The world was silent. Holding its breath.

“I think something really bad just happened,” Pikaku whispered.

***Queen Mab***

Aw, the little girl’s tuckered out. Irritating.

The girl didn’t want to turn her back on the human race completely, which was fine. Mab had hundreds of years to mold her into someone who would obey without question. The key was a light touch. And making sure none of the horrible things that were going to happen to Casey could be traced back to Mab.

At least, not until after she signed away everything.

Well, the first thing we’re going to need to do is arrange for her mother’s death at the hands of a ‘Myst-crazed’ human lunatic. Her current boyfriend/bodyguard is a good choice. Her silly little constructs thought to set her up with a reliable human male to enhance the woman’s ‘happiness’ and ‘stability’. Fools.

So how can we drive him insane and causing him to slaughter his girlfriend?

Mab reviewed the background check on the boyfriend while the contemptable child slept.

I’m impressed. Those little homunculi were thorough. Boring, but thorough.

There were no relatives to leverage, his family line was completely free of mental illness
physical too for that matter. Had a baby sister, (dead) that would serve as a binding agent to Casey 3, and was generally a good guy.

Dead sister is fertile grounds. The tragedy that could have bound him to Casey the third could easily be exploited by one of my specialists.

Mab took a quick mental note then turned her attention to the next part of the plan: handling the delivery of the information, and making sure the boyfriend died long before Casey got to ask him any question.

Allowing the girl to seek revenge on a specific person could backfire. Better that she see the killer of her mother in every Myst user in the world
save Mab of course.

An errant breeze flowed in above Mab’s head and gently rang a series of chimes hanging from the ceiling.

Sounds like someone’s at the front door.

Mab created a scrying, a rare honest smile coming to her face as she spotted her grandson standing where the portal to the faewyld had been, looking adorably frustrated and confused.

Such a cutie.

“What can I do for you, Scion?” She asked, resting her chin on her palm in an un-queenly slouch that no one could see.

Jebediah Trapper turned to face her, and something about the way he stood made her skin crawl. He’s too confident. Far too confident. She also detected that suicidal look Jeb got when he was throwing away his life.

“Hello, Grandma.” Jebediah Trapper paused, seeming to weigh the next words carefully.

“I’m here to tell you that if you don’t do exactly what I tell you to do, you will die.”

Mab blinked.

He’s telling the truth. She’d been around for long enough to spot when someone disturbed ambient Impact with a lie. Not to mention Jeb would be showing telltale signs of breaking his Word. And yet there were none.

Mab’s hackles raised unbidden as her long buried animalistic nature stirred in its grave.

What is going on?

Mab turned to her blind manservant, a withered husk of a fae who knew her moods better than she did.

“Giles, will you excuse me? I’ve got to take this.”

***Jebediah Trapper***

“Thanks for inviting me in so quickly,” Jeb said, “It saved me the effort of –“

“Alright, let’s see it,” Mab said, holding out her hand.

“See what?” Jeb asked innocently.

“Whatever you have that makes you think you can threaten ME.”

“It’s nothing too big,” Jeb said, pulling the blue scroll out of his pocket. “It’s just a wish from Kes’thuali The Destroyer.”

“No one gives things away for free. What are the terms?”

“In exchange for these boons, I the undersigned, Jebediah Trapper, agree to become the mortal agent of Kes'thuali, acting in her interest in perpetuity and until the end of time.” Jeb said.

Mab’s eyes widened. “Even you have to know that signing that is a very, very stupid thing to do. Frankly, I don’t think you’re dumb enough to -”

Jeb unrolled the contract and grinned, showing Mab his signature at the bottom of the page, written in blood. Big and bold.

The fairy queen went white as a sheet. “Nevermind,” she said quietly.

“I don’t understand, why aren’t you trying to destroy all of existence right now?”

“Well, because my part of the agreement is held in abeyance until every part of my wish is fulfilled,” Jeb said, unrolling the entire scroll to reveal what appeared to be a blank scroll dyed brownish red by blood.

In reality the script was so small and so dense, the naked eye just registered it as a solid color.

Jeb had a few handy cliff notes on the side pointing out various parts of the arrangement.

“This narrow band here, is what I like to call the ‘Mab’ section,” Jeb said, pointing out a band of script about three inches wide. “You should be proud, you’ve got the second widest section of any being on here.”

“There are several hundred clauses, but the broad strokes are this:

“If you don’t do everythingI tell you, the literal God of Destruction is going to be given express permission to destroy you, the faewyld, and your entire court. And frankly, I don’t think the other gods would bother to interfere. In fact, I KNOW they won’t. They really want you dead, and the wish is very specific. There won’t be any collateral damage. It’s a win-win for me and the gods.”

“If you evertry to manipulate Casey the third again...You die.”

“If you ever try to manipulate me. You die.”

“If I ever state a desire for you to die. You die.”

“And a few hundred other things that I’m just gonna let you figure out on your own,” Jeb said, rolling the scroll back up. “Let’s just say you should be on your best behavior from now on.”

Mab had a shell-shocked, thousand-yard stare.

“What about the corrupted Myst? My people are going to die.”

“That reminds me,” Jeb said. “Say ‘thank you for saving my people’.”

“’Thank you for saving my people,’” Mab gritted through clenched teeth.

Abhorrent – but restrained – power, oozed into their reality, passing through the faewyld like a sonic boom. In the distance, Jeb could make out the anguished screams of fae being purified. The god of destruction had been given permission to burn the corruption away.

“Say ‘I owe you my life and those of my people,” Jeb continued.

Mab’s eyes widened again. They both knew what would happen if a being like her said a thing like that.

“That’s extortion!”

“Extortion has never been against fairy rules,” Jeb said with a shrug. “Like kidnapping children and brainwashing them. Say it now.”

“I owe you my life and those of my people,” Mab said, her expression vaguely reminiscent of a Japanese Oni mask.

“You do,don’t you?” Jeb asked.

Jeb’s entire body began to throb with Impact.

“Now, I’m going to be nice and allow you to partially repay your substantial debt to me for saving your people
.Give humans their Myst back, you. Evil. Witch.”

Mab’s eye twitched. “Fine.”

“Yep. Feels good to help people,” Jeb said, rolling the scroll back up and slipping it into his coat pocket. “You still owe me your life, though. I specifically instructed The Destroyer not to kill you after signing the document, after all. As long as you behave.”

“You remind me of your grandfather,” Mab said, eye twitching violently as her cheeks flushed with pure rage.

“Oh, one more thing,” Jeb said.

“What?”

“Send Casey the third back to her mother immediately.”

“To repay my debt?”

Jeb smirked.

“Because you’ll die if you don’t.”

***Astral Plane****

The gods laughed uproariously.

“It’s notfunny!” Kes'thuali shouted, stomping in place, which spurred them to laugh harder.

“Listen, listen to this,” Erron, God of Masculine Vigor said, catching his breath between giggles, clutching Kes'thuali’s copy of the scroll in his hands. “Jebediah’s end of the bargain will be held in abeyance until Kes'thuali fulfills every clause. Number one, Kes'thuali must destroy the world
at the exact moment the sun goes supernova.”

They broke into laughter.

“Okay, okay, number two, Kes'thuali must become a fully recognized part of the pantheon and obey its rules until the end of time. She will be known as Kes’thuali The Destroyer
of evil. The pantheon in turn can assign Kes’thuali people, places or things to be destroyed, with the exception of those exempt in this contract. Kes’thuali retains the right to refuse to destroy anything or anyone.”

“There’s literally tens of thousands of these!” Erron said, scrolling down the list.

“Check this one out. Kes'thuali must live as a mortal once every hundred years, retaining none of her memories or power, the memories of their lives are retained when Kes'thuali’s mortal shell dies and they return to the divine.

“Oof, that sucks!” another god chimed in.

“I am the DESTROYER OF REALITIES! Give me back my scroll!” Kes'thuali shrieked.

“I think we can consider this your first lesson as an official god of the Pharos Pantheon: Never
ever, give someone a blank wish.” The god of Knowledge said.

“Especially not a fae.” Murkos the Scarred said, nodding.

“You all suck!” Kes'thuali shouted at the top of her lungs before she stormed away, slamming the door on the divine hall with an echoing BOOM.

Once the laughter died down, the mood sobered.

“Should we consider his Quest completed?” Venaxus The Weaveer asked. “He didn’t kill Mab, but the restraints that have been placed on Kes'thuali by her own hand have spared us an even greater amount of power than we would have gained if the fae queen had died.”

“He did not do as he was asked, and it seems he will continue to be disobedient. We should not reward this.” Erron said.

There was a general murmur of agreement.

“Very well, we will withdraw our offer and allow him to die.”

“Hey guys?” Nixus asked, the body made of spiralling galaxies and stardust difficult to read as he stared down into the mortal plane.

“Eh?” Erron grunted.

“Where did the bomb go?”