//------------------------------// // Metarex Conspiracy // Story: Worlds Apart: The Chosen of the Prognosticus // by GMBlackjack //------------------------------// “You remember?” Twilight gasped at Tippi. “Tell us everyth—” Dark Oak dropped from the ceiling, landing in the hall just in front of them. “I do not need to hear your pointless memory.” Tippi fluttered back in shock. “What in—were you waiting for us?” “I was waiting for the proper moment. I would find your memories dull, boring, and meaningless. It would be of a woman who no longer exists.” “I exist!” Tippi shouted. “My name was Timpani!” “Was,” Dark Oak said, clenching his fists. “Even you recognize that you are not her. He recognizes that he is not Blumiere, either. You cannot hope to change his mind.” “We’ll see about that when we get to him! I have a few choice words…” Dark Oak held out one of his hands. “He has suspected your identity since you encountered him in Equis. He has done nothing to stop this assault.” Tippi fluttered closer to him. “We have the Resistance’s reports. He changed. He stopped caring.” “He never cared in the first place.” The Castle floors rumbled under their feet. “Do you know what that trembling means, Tippi?” “I…” “You’ve known what his true goal is for quite some time, even before you regained those memories of another life. I’ve seen it. But you never told them?” Comso frowned. “Tippi, what’s he talking about?” Tippi fluttered away from Dark Oak. “I… it was just a theory and… how do you know?” “We’ll get to that momentarily.” Dark Oak leaned in to Twilight. “Perhaps you can guess what the Count’s actual goal is.” Twilight took a step back. “...It’s not to make all worlds new in his image.” “Precisely. He is under no illusion that he has the ability to create perfect worlds, he does not even believe such things can exist. This Void is final.” He spread his arms to the sky. “The worlds will end and then there will be nothingness!” “How… How could he!?” Twilight shouted. “I understand trying to fix things with drastic measures, but… but leaving there with nothing? How?” “I… Oh no… why… Blumiere…” Tippi sounded like she was crying, even though her Pixl form didn’t support tears. “I have a better question,” Cosmo said, pointing the Staff of Holding at Dark Oak. “How can you support this!?” “You still do not know what the final goal of the Metarex is, little traitor.” “W-what?” Cosmo stammered. “We sought absolute peace. Before our plans were interrupted by the Void and all dimensional interaction was ended, we were to use the light between worlds to end all animal life in the universe and replace it with a single, beautiful, eternal forest. There would have been nothing else, no change, peace for eternity.” “That’s not peace!” Cosmo sputtered. “That’s just a lack of people!” “Peace does not exist so long as people exist,” Dark Oak said. “Even us, though we are plants, have intelligence. I would gladly have become the tree in that forest of eternal, serene peace. But the Count has proven that even that is not possible, for the trees will compete for resources, and the world itself would eventually end to be replaced by something complex once more. The only peace that exists… is nothingness.” “Wait…” Toph pointed at Cosmo and Dark Oak. “You’re both plants?” “Yes, that metal is just armor,” Cosmo said. “We hail from the same homeworld… but we are not the same people. His hunted mine down to extinction, leaving only me. We… were an insult to their ideas that… I never really understood why until now.” Dark Oak pointed a finger at her. “You still do not fully understand. Ask yourself this, why do you live? Why you, out of all the seedrians?” Cosmo clenched her fists. “I got away.” “Wrong. We let you think you got away. In reality, we captured you and put an information recorder within your brain matter. It was originally intended for you to be the spy for Sonic and his crew, but then you became much, much more useful when it turned out you were the Light Prognosticus’ chosen.” “W-what?” Cosmo shook her head rapidly. “No, that’s not possible.” “You are the reason we knew where to find you,” Dark Oak said. “You are the reason Narcissus knew to go to the Thon Iridescence. You are the reason Mr. L and Lulu were able to go directly to the Hag’s cave in Narnia. You were the reason we were able to get to Lumash’s Pure Heart and trap you there for an entire month.” He leaned in. “You’re a traitor to your friends, Cosmo.” “I…” Cosmo took a step back. “How…” “She’s no traitor,” Twilight spat. “You’re just evil.” “See it as you wish,” Dark Oak said. “The information I’ve gathered on the seven of you through her is more than enough to counteract any combat strategy you may have—unless you wish to waste the energy of the Pure Hearts on me. Which I very much hope you do.” “Eat this.” Twilight’s eyes went white as she activated the Element of Magic, tapping into the connection she had with her friends, unleashing the rainbow through Tippi and right into Dark Oak. He held up his hand and caught the energy directly, dissipating it across the edge of his armor. “H-how!?” Twilight stammered. “I built the latest version of my chassis to resist the Chaos Emeralds,” Dark Oak said. “After observing your ‘Elements’ in action, it was a simple matter of recalibrating it to resist their very similar energy. And just in case you want to figure out something with your unpredictable Magic of Friendship…” He backhanded Tippi, flattening her against the wall, knocking her out of the fight entirely. “You’re one down.” Cosmo fired her phaser and swung the Light Prognosticus. Both hit, and both were utterly useless. Dark Oak kicked her to the side like a doll, using his arm to sweep Caspian in the middle of his attempt at a shield bash. They were pawns to him. “Three down.” Twilight, Data, Toph, and Vivian attacked as one unit. Data threw his phaser, set to overload, but Dark Oak shot it out of the sky before it got close enough to harm him. At the same time, he lifted a foot and kicked Vivian in the face, keeping her from dragging him into the void. He allowed Toph’s first boulder and Twilight’s first magic bolt to hit him, but after that, he moved with such agility predicting where Toph’s rocks were going to come from based on her movements and using a tiny energy shield around his left hand to deflect Twilight’s attacks. Toph and Data jumped in, attempting to use their power to pry apart his armor. Data’s android body proved to not be strong enough to overcome the refined synthetic metal, but Toph was able to pry a small opening at the foot. But this was exactly that Dark Oak had wanted. He pushed his arms back, intending to knock both of them silly. Data managed to dodge the attack, but Toph was knocked to the ground so hard she stopped moving. Data jumped back to Twilight. “We lack the necessary skills to defeat him.” Twilight winced. “I… I’m thinking, give me some time.” “I do not believe I can.” “I can!” To the shock of everyone present, a Void portal appeared behind Dark Oak, depositing none other than Gilgamesh himself into the fray, twirling a halberd around. “How are you using the Void without the Chaos Curse!?” Dark Oak demanded. Gilgamesh ignored him. “Look at you. Reveling in your victory. You’re only winning because you’ve studied their behaviors and habits like a creepily obsessive boyfriend. You know their arsenal. You don’t know mine.” He pointed his halberd at Dark Oak. “So let’s do this, toaster!” Dark Oak grabbed the head of the halberd and broke it off, punching forward with his other fist. Gilgamesh tried to catch it with his two left hands, but physical muscles were next to nothing against Dark Oak’s pure, refined mechanism. Gilgamesh had to jump back, pulling out four swords and slicing at the machine. Three of the blades broke, but one glowing amber blade embedded itself in the metal chassis. Seeing this, Dark Oak twisted his arm to the side, forcing the amber blade out of Gilgamesh’s hands so he could use it. “Hey! No fair!” Gilgamesh said. “That’s mine!” “All’s fair in love and war,” Dark Oak growled, driving the amber blade forward. “So I guess this means you like me? Flattering, but also kind of disgusting.” He pulled out a set of enchanted machine guns and filled Dark Oak with lead. Naturally, his armor was more than impervious to the assault. “You’re a little tough, I’ll give you that.” “You are a nuisance,” Dark Oak said. He jumped forward, grabbing Gilgamesh by the legs and throwing him into a wall. Gilgamesh pushed off with three of his arms, using the fourth to grab a grenade and throwing it at Dark Oak. The Metarex caught the grenade and let it explode in his hands, surrounding him with smoke but otherwise leaving him unharmed. “That’s just ridiculous.” Gilgamesh pulled out a spear that glowed with blue light and stabbed forward. Dark Oak chopped it in half before it even arrived. While Gilgamesh was pulling out yet another weapon, Dark Oak plunged the amber blade into the warrior’s chest with a shocking burst of speed. “You are nothing,” Dark Oak breathed, leaving the sword in Gilgamesh and pushing the warrior over. “Just an insect.” Gilgamesh fell back into a Void portal, vanishing. “That was your last hope,” Dark Oak said, turning back to Data and Twilight. “It has failed you.” “You’re only winning because you’ve planned for us,” Twilight said, narrowing her eyes. “However, just because I only use a small number of spells usually, it doesn’t mean I don’t know more.” “They all follow similar patterns.” “They do. Unless I specifically try to copy another spell style.” She grinned, remembering back to the times they’d fought Lulu. “Quick.” Suddenly time froze, and she was given the opportunity to cast two spells at once. “Thundara.” Then she repeated the incantation of befuddlement, as a result hitting Dark Oak in the face with a thunderbolt and a headache at the same time. “Meteor,” she continued, driving a molten rock onto Dark Oak’s faceplate. “I know her tricks as well!” “I bet you don’t know this one.” She smirked. “Cura! Cura, Cura, Cura!” Her magic went out and restored health to all her downed allies. “A lot faster than my usual magic, I must say,” Twilight chuckled. “I should have taken you out first,” Dark Oak breathed. He charged her. Swallowing a lump in her throat, Twilight turned her horn a disgusting, dark green color. “...Bio.” A swift ripple of green magic enveloped Dark Oak. It would have done absolutely nothing had Toph not opened up a hole in his metal casing earlier. The spell found its way to his interior—to the plant-based creature within. The spell began to rot away at his inner legs, and without a magic shield of his own, he couldn’t stop it. He tripped over his rotting leg, falling to the ground with a thud. “It… matters not…” Dark Oak said, trembling as he was torn apart on the cellular level. “The army… has blocked your little hallway. You cannot get to the Count, now.” “That matters a lot,” Twilight said, a tear rolling down her cheek. “I’ve killed you, in cold blood. I… I could stop it now, you’re weak enough, but… I’m not going to.” She swallowed. “Rarity… said something about there being no evil people in this Castle. That’s not true. You… have no heart to change. You d-deserve this.” “You sound uncertain…” “I’m not uncertain. Just…” She bit back tears. “I had hoped there weren’t any actually evil people anywhere. That it was all dark magic or misguided ideals or… or something that could be fixed. Could be helped.” “Naive…” Dark Oak laughed. “All people are evil. There are no good people. Those who seem the best… they are the ones who live the biggest… lie…” He crumbled to the ground, nothing more than an empty husk of metal. “You just… wow.” Toph put her hands on her hips, nodding in approval. “I didn’t think you had it in you.” “I…” Twilight wiped her face. “I know there’s been death on this journey before, but it was always… more out there. This was personal. I did this. I didn’t have to—I… I thought it was good.” “No arguments here,” Toph said, shaking her head. “He was a threat and showed no signs of changing,” Data added. Caspian nodded. “We must be strong. There are terrible things that must be done for the sake of what is good and just.” Twilight turned to Cosmo. “...What about you?” “He… he turned me into a monster,” Cosmo said, shuddering. “I… I’m happy and so angry that I’m happy.” She rushed Twilight into a hug and started bawling on her shoulder. Twilight did much the same. Tippi fluttered forward. “He’s… he’s gone now. He can’t hurt us any more than he already has.” The castle rumbled. “We should keep moving.” “How?” Toph asked. “You heard him, the army’s still up ahead.” “I can try… sneaking around, looking for another path,” Vivian suggested. “I c—” “Ah ha ha ha ha ha ha! No.” Before they could figure out where the mysterious laugh was coming from, all seven of them were taken up in a warp of spacetime, vanishing from the hallway. Back in Flipside, every light on Eggman’s console flashed red. “Oh dear…” He grimaced. “I just lost their signals.”