As I Lay Dying (10): The Counter-Stroke (718 hits)
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Rating: 1.63 on 19 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Axolotl || ltoloxA (View user info) at 2006-10-11 09:55:00 EDT
"We've failed," Amaliel said, marching Adam and Elizabeth out of the windmill from deep sleep. "Tepes and his assistants are dead. Your opponent and his demon killed them."
"Where are we going?" Elizabeth asked as Opaiosaita joined them with Jackie and Jean-Claude, ready for combat.
"It's going to be done now," Opaiosaita said, but instead of her usual cruel high voice, she spoke calmly. "Adam, we're bringing you to the dikes. Elizabeth, come. We're facing the demons."
"Will you be there?" Elizabeth asked Amaliel.
Amaliel paused and said, "I will."
It was nighttime, and the moon was heavy and high over the dikes. A copse of trees lay in a clearing beneath two hills, in a ravine. Amaliel pushed Adam and Elizabeth forward and let them slide down the grass into the ravine.
"We felt their presence escaping the city," Amaliel said, his voice hushed and savage. "Keep forward, swords out."
"I'm ready," Jackie said, arming his pistols. "I'm ready to do it."
They pressed on down the clearing, a huddled group of humans and angles. "What are we going to do?" Adam asked sleepily—they stopped. Amaliel seized Adam by the cuff of his neck and dragged him back—before them stood four tall figures.
"The demons are here," Opaiosaita hissed.
There was a moment of stunned, shocked silence. Adam huddled into Amaliel as he looked out at the four demons. They had dark eyes and their presence coagulated a pit in his stomach; the chief demon was tall and proud, holding a sword in his hands.
"I suppose you are here for Virgil," said the lead demon dryly, fingering his sword. The three other demons drew closer, swords facing outward in a tight pack. Jack and Jean-Claude clicked the safeties off on their guns, but did not act.
Amaliel's eyes flashed and he shrieked, broad silvery wings roaring from his back, a fire inside. Adam moaned as the pure holy light shot through his brain, paralyzing him. Above him, Amaliel flapped his wings and cried, "Into the dark, creatures of the earth! Bring forth the boy, and draw back into the abyss; for our power is greater than yours."
Adam looked to his left, and he looked to his right; Elizabeth was prone on the ground, tears streaming down her face. Jack and Jean-Claude's eyes were rolled back in their heads, and Amaliel's rage was bright and fearful. But Adam looked up, and saw the demon smirk, and laugh even, and his laugh was purer and brighter in the darkness.
"Angel, you have no idea what I know," the demon said. "I'm Sophopyron, the wise flame. And I command the boy, and I'm well aware of the powers and prophecies surrounding him. Am I to imagine that this—this is your boy? Mine's opponent? Calm yourself, angel. There is no need for needless death—see, here's the boy. Present your own."
And the demon Sophopyron drew back, unfolding his wings and bringing forward a scared lad, clutching a sword, looking sick—
And Adam locked eyes with his opponent.
He was younger than he, maybe fifteen years old, and he stood beneath the towering angels with a blood-stained face and clothes. They gazed into each other's eyes, and Adam saw he was a human like him, he wasn't just a name, an unknown evil specter of the devil.
"Adam," Opaiosaita said sadly behind him. "Take out your sword and kill him. Just walk forward and do it."
"Your name is Adam?" the opponent called out, stepping out from the shelter of his demons into the grassy clearing. His voice was haughty and slow, the dried blood on his hair and scar on his neck adding to his ominous demeanor. "I'm Virgil Kasabian, and this is the first I'm hearing about an opponent."
"I didn't know this day would come so soon, Virgil," Sophopyron said, turning his clear glassy eyes down upon his young charge. "But it would come eventually...there is a reason you are here with me, a reason that this Adam boy is here to fight you."
"Demon!" Amaliel roared, vacillating fecklessly next to Adam, unwilling to take action. "Don't say a word!"
"The Lord of the Demons chose a male and a female at their births," Sophopyron said. "Out of trillions of people in billions of worlds, they chose two and marked them with hidden strength, the power to become angelic, and to overthrow the Authority. We waited for them to reach adulthood to use them in the fight...but the authorities of El found them first."
"Demon!"
"They kept you alive together for one reason only," sneered Sophopyron, looking at Adam. "If they killed Elizabeth, you would become suspicious. Did they tell you that you would become as kings over the universes? They lied, Adam. If you win, they know you were the chosen one, and will kill you along with Elizabeth as example to all rebels against Authority. If you lose, you die at the hands of Virgil, and we escape with the boy safely. It comes to this."
Virgil's face broke open in a wide smile, and he raised his sword; he had been through hell and torment, and he would strike down Adam, and the angels would break upon him like water. Adam looked up at Amaliel, and found his face stony and sincere.
"Do it, Adam," Opaiosaita said calmly, her eyes staring blandly into the distance. "Take him." Behind her, Elizabeth held onto Opaiosaita's wings with the attachment of a refugee's child.
"Jackie, Jean-Claude, stand down," Amaliel ordered, and the group moved back, exposing Adam.
"Thamuz, Xaphan, Shakor," Sophopyron commanded lazily, and Virgil stepped out into the clearing, sword arm swinging. "Kill him."
Virgil sliced the short sword through the air, and Adam flung himself to the dewy grass, his feet slipping. The sword hissed past his ears, and Adam swung wildly over his shoulder. He struggled to his feet, his heart pounding and looking above at Virgil.
Virgil bore down, striking through the grass. Adam parried with a counterstroke, and the swords clattered together in a shine of metal. Virgil fell back, shivering from the shock, and for some reason Adam's heart rejoiced. Virgil regained his bearings, and whipped the blade at Adam's stomach; Adam leaped back, unwilling to face him head-to-head.
"Is this the king of worlds?" Sophopyron remarked as Adam dodged blows through the grass. "The lord of Heaven and Earth? Adam, the son of Adam, savior of humanity?"
"No!" Adam cried, leaping up and thrusting his sword afresh, clanging in a vicious parry against Virgil's. Virgil laconically retreated, his feet moving adroitly on the wet grass. Virgil raised his sword arm coolly—Adam never saw it coming. His blade whirred through the air, and caught onto Adam's hand.
Adam screamed, and fell to the grass, drenched in his pain and blood. In his hands he clasped two fingers, his own; in his other was held a sword. Virgil hung back, his dark eyelids parted and clear, hunger and malice evident in the deep pools.
"The savior falls," Sophopyron said mockingly. "Did you believe you were some great hope for the Authority? When you die, Virgil is ours, and with him we will extinguish the Kingdom. Do it, Virgil—now or never, now and forever."
Like a volcano long dormant, Adam crouched in his bloody pool, the drizzle of magma preparing to burst through. Sword in hand, clutched tight, Adam exploded upwards, his hand heavy. The shining blade cut Virgil at the shoulder, and he cried and let himself fall to the ground.
Virgil lay beneath him, merciless under Adam's sword...If he won, he would die, and if he lost, he would die...but it was better to die at the hands of those who had protected—no—Adam hesitated, and began to see as if through a tunnel. Through the hazy audible noise, he heard—
"Adam, don't do it!"
Elizabeth's voice. She pounced from the angels' ranks and grasped him tightly, making him drop his sword. Virgil's shoulder was bleeding profusely, and as Adam reeled back from the tackle, Sophopyron darted forward and lifted Virgil to his feet.
"Don't do it, Adam!"
Sophopyron pulled Virgil upright and bore him in his arms; the demons hissed and screeched, retreating from the field. Adam looked down, and saw that Elizabeth's pure white hands were holding his bloody stumps of fingers, and she was looking at him, tears running down her face.
She knew as well as he did that they were doomed if there was a winner. Elizabeth had saved him, but Adam could barely process it. The pain was overwhelming him, and his eyes strived to stay focused. All he could see were Elizabeth's eyes, and lips, and they drew close and kissed.
Before their lips even met, a swift stroke cut through Elizabeth's neck, a long rope of blood falling across the bridge of Adam's nose. He opened his clouded eyes to see Amaliel's sword passing out of Elizabeth's throat, and Elizabeth falling—
"It was coming eventually," Amaliel's voice intoned through a haze of blood and pain. "She shouldn't have...pointless...they've...escaped—"
Adam grabbed onto Elizabeth's arms and held her limp body, blood on her shoulders, running in a red stream. "Virgil's gone," Amaliel said.
The light went out. Elizabeth's eyes closed, her mouth slightly parted; Adam let her fall onto the slicked grass, and looked at her body. She was dead, and the opponent was gone.
"I'm sorry, Adam," Opaiosaita said calmly. "But you're ours now."
With a wave of crushing sadness, Adam realized that out of trillions of people in the universes, he was entirely alone, and in the captivity of killers. He fell across Elizabeth's body and nuzzled into her bloody shoulder.
AS I LAY DYING
(1) Unto Dust, and story information: http://www.ubersite.com/m/92393
(2) Pillar http://www.ubersite.com/m/92560
(3) The Balances of Justice http://www.ubersite.com/m/92621
(4) Lilies of Sharon http://ubersite.com/m/92934
(5) Messengers http://www.ubersite.com/m/92996
(6) The Demon's Servant http://www.ubersite.com/m/93187
(7) The Front http://www.ubersite.com/m/93836
(8) The Darkness Rising http://www.ubersite.com/m/93883
(9) The Demonificat http://www.ubersite.com/m/93934
User Reviews
Submitted by St_Jimmy (user info) at 2006-12-18 15:27:26 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by JoeyG (user info) at 2006-10-25 14:03:42 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by MyNameIsTim (user info) at 2006-10-16 22:44:59 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I LIKED IT
Submitted by ripple (user info) at 2006-10-16 13:56:14 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
i agree with stagger, but it didnt hit me as hard cause i read these one or two at a time. i like that the angels are evil, too.
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-10-15 11:10:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Alright, prepare for misinformed and wildly inaccurate criticism.
This whole thing is so epic that it loses sight of characters. It's plot after plot after plot. And after awhile, when your characters are just there to do violent and betraying things to each other, you start to stop caring. I mean, your characters could do heartbreakingly depraved things to each other, but the reader is unlikely to mind.
I would suggest that the amount of action needs a serious reduction. If you're writing this for Ubersite specifically, I can see how you want to make each segment exciting and so on. Try writing chapters from changing perspectives, but get into the details of what makes each character tick and what makes their perspective interesting.
A lot of your dialogue advances plot, which is sort of a deathblow, in that people instinctively know when dialoge rings a bit false. Dialogue is possibly the worst way to give exposition. People just don't talk that way.
As it is, it's an entertaining sort of story, but it reads (in parts) like an outline of a plot rather than a complete work. With a bit more reason to care about what happens to the characters it could be really good.
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-10-12 08:00:38 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-10-11 23:15:56 (#)
Ranking: 2
I'm going to to read this series early Saturday afternoon or so.
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Thanks Stagger, that means a lot.
Submitted by ghola (user info) at 2006-10-12 00:30:10 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Chroniclysm (user info) at 2006-10-11 23:59:39 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-10-11 23:15:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I'm going to to read this series early Saturday afternoon or so.
Submitted by Susie_Derkins (user info) at 2006-10-11 15:43:29 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-10-11 15:30:53 (#)
Ranking: 2
As I Lay Dying Part 10 is up.
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I know, Ax. Mine is the third review. Have another +2.
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-10-11 15:29:25 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2006-10-11 15:17:46 (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-10-11 11:09:44 (#)
Ranking: 0
Halfway done.
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what?
By my calculations, you still have 22 more parts to go.
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10 more parts.
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2006-10-11 15:17:46 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-10-11 11:09:44 (#)
Ranking: 0
Halfway done.
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what?
By my calculations, you still have 22 more parts to go.
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-10-11 14:21:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Is there any point anymore?
Submitted by HotWillie (user info) at 2006-10-11 13:16:10 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
No Comment
Submitted by kybernetikum (user info) at 2006-10-11 12:35:04 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
The not so good as the ones before.
Can I do a story placed in your universe (multiverse) Axolotl? An erotic one?
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-10-11 11:09:44 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Halfway done.
Submitted by Susie_Derkins (user info) at 2006-10-11 11:06:17 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Jebus, I didn't see that coming.
Submitted by Mike-Mc (user info) at 2006-10-11 10:21:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Good
Submitted by Axolotl (user info) at 2006-10-11 09:55:18 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
rape?