The Conspiracy of Hearts and Daggers
Chapter Four
In wide eyed disbelief, General Harken in the seat of his cannon blaster was about to open fire on the Skelcons that surrounded his army. Upon seeing his wizard captured by the instigator inhabiting Snake Mountain he had every reason to do so. There was no Tataran to advise him otherwise, so be damned, a retaliatory response was the answer.
However, the deathly still Skelcons were not attacking. Harken grit his teeth in frustration...on if he should start firing on them or not...until he saw something happening down below.
In the spot where the mystic portal opened up to invite Damon to meet with Skeletor...it appeared as if that same energy was manifesting again. Harken took his binoculars out to get a better at what was happening down below.
Harkan grinned when he spotted with his binoculars the portal that original opened to take his wizard from him again start to open!
A voice came in on the open channel of Harkens communicator, "General...are you seeing what I am?"
"Quiet Kronis!", Harken ordered as he watched the portal struggling to open itself up again.
"What are your orders?", Kronis asked through the communicator.
The tanks where patterned two at a time in an echelon formation. The tank at the front was being operated by Kronis who seeing what happened to Damon originally was concerned at what might come out of the portal next.
What was happening down below was that the portal that originally closed was being forced open once more!
General Harken saw with his binoculars the portal finally thrust open by somebody! Damon fought his way through the portal once he had it open! There were several of those creatures' tentacles attached to Damons's waste trying to pull him back in! Whether or not the tentacles belonged to the other wizard or were body parts belonging to him remained to be seen. It delighted Harken when he watches Damon disintegrate the tentacles with his hands!
Harken rallies his wizard, "Yes, break free of that wretched creature!"
Then in one motion, Damon spins around to blast the porta closed, creatures and all!
Damon stands ready for the gate to open again, ready to blast it away!
Nothing happens...the portal is no more.
To make sure his wizard is not attacked again, the General calls for his Goblin soldiers to run down and escort Damon back to him. The lead soldier yells out," Hurry, wizard we have you covered!"
Damon not sensing any danger stands defiant in the open valley!
In an effort to protect the wizard he was sworn to by his general, the lead soldier starts to go over to him when without turning around, Damon commands, "Tell your General that I am preparing to battle with Skeletor!"
As the lead soldier backs away, Damon defiantly stands facing Snake Mountain!
The threat of Skeletors soldiers remain in play but they do not sway. There is no blast from up high, no menacing creature unleashed...no external threat.
Finally, Damon yells out to his invisible enemy, "Prepare yourself for my wrath!"
Many of the goblin soldiers back away from Damon as he blasts with his magick a circle in the ground around him. One concentric circle to the laymen eye for the wizard it is a mystic barrier. The Damon sits inside of it with his legs folded between themselves.
As Damon goes deep in thought, many of the Goblin soldiers become petrified with fear of what will happen. General Harken orders them to stand their ground!
Though he has not witnessed this event, the Goblin General knows what it is that Damon is preparing to do. For the Harkens wizard prepares to do battle with Skeletor on another plane of existence. They will do battle where no one in the valley below Snake Mountain will ever bare witness.
The place where Damon now travels outward to as he leaves his physical form is called the astral plane.
Where Skeletor already waits for him in his astral projection of himself.
The environment is eerily the same, the valley, with both armies un attendance even though they cannot see the combatants.
Out of the valley Damon walks towards his skull faced adversary. At the midway point Skeletor waves his left clawed blue hand to cause the ground beneath Damons's feet to give way! Suddenly, Damon falls into the sink hole!
Despite the illusory nature of the battle the effects are real to both combatants as if in a dream.
A fault line begins to crack on the surface of the ground, it begins at the sink hole where it continues towards Skeletor!
Skeletor erects a tombstone like rock that explodes from the ground in front of the cracking fault line!
The defensive measure by Skeletor blocks the fault lines initial path! However, the fault line splits into two to go around Skeletor's tombed barrier!
Instead of conjuring up something else, Skeletor leaps out of the way as both fault lines crash into each other! An explosion is created which nearly incinerates Skeletor who as he rolls away finds the very ground sticking to his body!
"Show yourself, fool!", Skeletor yells at his adversary, trying to call him out as he himself struggles to get free of what appeared to be the ground wrapped up around his body! At first the rock was wrapped around Skeletor's body like a dirt rug. Then as Skeletor struggled on the ground after his roll, first on his stomach then as he turned over onto his back the rug around him stiffened to become unto bandages like a stray jacket!
A taunting laugh could be heard from Damon, while Skeletor lay on his backside with both his arms pinned to his sides facing downward. The rams head staff for which Skeletor often used was still in his clutches with its head facing down towards his free moving legs. Though with his arms restrained, Skeletor could not stand up!
Damon slowly approached Skeletor in his supine position.
As Skeletor lifted his head to see Damon he noticed behind the wizard the tombstone like slab he erected earlier. Despite his restrictions, Skeletor still had his Havok staff and will power!
"Do you now surrender or do have to punish you into submission?", a gloating Damon asked his fallen adversary.
There was a peculiar advantage that Skeletor had in the moment. It was that his face was not a face but a skull without eyes. In this way Skeletor focused on moving the tombstone threw the ground without Damon noticing that he wasn't focused on him in doing so. Yet, Skeletor had to chat about something while he moved the stone slab over to Damon.
"Well, it looks like you passed my test.", Skeletor tells Damon.
"You say that now that I have you beaten.", Damon cooly states.
Skeletor see's the stone slab as he pulls it closer with his power, steadily, silently, until it is in position... to crush his adversary.
"I have been in control up until this point. You are boring me Damon, either get on with it or let me go!", Skeletor says to goad his adversary.
In response, Damon raises both his arms in the air to start generating a powerful blast of some sort at his fallen foe.
The energy whirls in the palms of Damons hands. Damon's face is cast aglow in the red light emanating from his sphere of energy. Then the ground again under Damons' feet!
However, this time Damon does not fall in the hole, he simply levitates over it.
As expected, Damon began to laugh as he felt victory was in his grasp saying," Now skull face, you are going to regret batting your better!"
Skeletor pulled the huge slab towards Damon who reeled back to unleash his energy blast!
Damon was grabbed by a huge granite hand precisely after releasing his energy blast!
Skeletor lifted his legs in the air while aiming his Havok staff at the blast!
The blast was absorbed by the staff, yet the immense power cracked its ram's head!
Skeletor's wrapping was also torn at the bottom to where he could start tearing it apart!
Damon who was being held inside the large granite fist created by Skeletor began to seethe in anger!
Skeletor now on his feet blocked a blast from Damons glowing red eyes! The beam became steady as Damon intensified it onto Skeletor! The beam is summarily redirected into the opened-up sink hole for which become molten hot lava!
Damon shuts off his heated gaze just in time to be smashed into the fiery pit that he helped create! Once Damon is smashed into the fiery hole, it is sealed up as Skeletor turns the granite fist back into a tombstone slab!
Skeletor even goes as far as to carve Damon on the slab with a heated beam of his own, saying," At last your final resting place!"
The gallows humor as well as hubris of Skeletor almost misses the rumbling underneath his decrepit bare feet.
What follows the rumbling is the upheaval of the tombstone as it is flung into the air above Skeletor's head!
A plumage of smoke rises out of the burning pit. Skeletor makes duplicate images of himself all-around the pit in preparation for what will come out.
To Skeletor's astonishment, it is not Damon that emerges from the smoking pit but a literal yellow demon with red fur and horns!
All of Skeletors images open fire on Damon with their Havok staffs!
The overwhelming assault on Damon sends him back underground! Until he reemerges to be once again blasted in the same way! The overwhelming assault has scalded Damons yellow hide as he slumps from the hole.
Damon, no longer a man now lies defeated on the ground as a hulking yellow skinned demonic beast with two curved horns atop his head which is covered in a red mane of fur.
As Skeletor walks in to get a closer look at Damons altered appearance the wizard has the wherewithal to quickly revert himself back to his formal self.
"I give..." Damon begs Skeletor who lords over him with his original one true Havoc staff back in his possession.
Skeletor agreeing with Damon responds," You are right to give in to my power. Now begone, away from here. That is unless you want to witness the mutiny of General Harken firsthand?"
A beaten Damon slowly rises back to his feet only to treat Skeletor's offering with indifference," I have no loyalty to General Harken nor Tataran as I presume it was, he who told you about the many disloyal subjects in Harkens army. I also sense that you see things in kind. You and I are the same, we should be working together not battling each other."
Skeletor pushes back on the offer," So, you say. Now begone before I decide to damage your mind as well as your body."
"Power is not a thing unless you know in how to wield it. I can help direct you forces on Eternia, from the dark hemisphere to the Royal Palace and everywhere in -between. There are many secrets on Eternos which you do not know of let us discover them together." Damon shrewdly offers.
Skeletor is suspicious at Damons reference to the term power as well as secrets, and he probably knows more than he is letting on. Damon could make a useful ally only so long as he was away from Snake Mountain.
"If you leave me something to remember you by then I will think on it." Skeletor coldly offers,"
"I will depart for now, though in my wake I will leave you a keepsake they are called the Bloodwynd stones. As I herald your name to my associates let my Bloodwynd stones grow in my absence. The stones will be located where my real body once lay, on the battlefield. A gateway for which either of us can walk through to reconnect. So, until that time I bid you evil!"
Without hesitation Damon simply bows his head towards Skeletor and raising his hands while his body casts itself into flame! The only thing left in Damon's wake is a smoldering pile of coal-colored stones with red pulsating centers like burning black hearts.