Industrial Strength Magic

Chapter 90: Game Over, Man

Chapter 90: Game Over, Man

The wind was whipping by Perry as he cruised above the forest. He spotted a glint of light out of the corner of his eye, and when he focused on it, he saw a skeleton holding a sword.

There! Perry angled himself and his trajectory towards the creature, cutting through the air at deadly speeds.

The skeleton didn’t even know what hit him.

HP: 0

Coughing, Perry dragged himself out of the trench his body had cut into the forest and glanced down. In the center of the pile of shattered bones was a plain longsword, with little imperfections in the steel that indicated it had been made by hand.

The one decoration in the center was a series of foreign words. They weren’t in any language Perry was familiar with, but somehow he could read them anyway.

Temper yourself with the greatest discipline.

Perry’s eyes widened as he picked up the blade. There was more to that quote, Perry knew.

How do I know that? it reminded him of his mom. Yeah, that’s a quote from one of mom’s philosophy books.

Perry’s brows furrowed as he attempted to remember the rest of the quote.

‘Temper yourself with the greatest discipline. Everything that lies beyond our fingertips is the turbulent dream of a being greater than us. We can do nothing when faced with the storm but master ourselves as a captain masters his ship.

Everything is an illusion, save for the decisions you make.’

As if he was emerging from a chrysalis, Paradox the Superhero burst free from Paradox, Son of the captain of the guard.

Perry wobbled in place for a moment as nearly two months of insanity caught up with him and was assimilated into the whole.

He remembered everything. The King-of-the-hill to the death, The zombie attack, followed by the Halloween special. The teen drama, The stupid sit-com, the game shows, both slap-stick and romantic. Even helping Natalie make the sword.

Perry glanced up at Solaris, caught in a bubble of divine power, unable to resist it as it carried him across the sky as a surrogate sun. Solaris was in full light-mode because he needed neither food nor sleep in that form, and was immune to mind-control while made of light. He sat there with his arms crossed, waiting for Gerome to make a mistake.

An impasse.

Can this thing actually stop me from getting erased again? Perry thought, his heart hammering in his chest as he realized the scale at which this outsider had been toying with them.

Every clever plan Perry and the other supers had up until this point had ended with Gerome rolling his eyes, snapping his fingers, and moving onto the next stage of his amusement.

And every time, Perry realized with horror, he had been a little more changed. This most recent Perry had been nearly an entirely different person. The sheer violation of his personhood was staggering.

Although it was pretty cool that he knew how to ride a horse and swordfight properly now. Superhero Perry hadn’t known how to do those things. Still, he was pissed, because Gerome was obviously spiraling out of control, like a child with cheat codes.

Maybe instead of a clever plan I just need more violence, Perry thought, his grip tightening on the hilt as the frantic drumbeat of nearly a dozen horses approached.

Without giving Perry time to recover or plan, or hide the sword until he could figure out how to best use it, Gerome arrived, followed by a posse of no less than eight people on horses.

The ones from the tavern, Perry realized. Reviewing the memory, Perry assumed they were not extensions of Gerome’s will, but peers Gerome had invited over for the deity version of ‘game night’.

The other five were intriguing. Perry saw Barrel of Monkeys, Jetset, Plagius, Sancho and Bikini Gunslinger, all riding along with the inhuman monsters.

Are they working with them? Is there some kind of mind-control at play here? Aside from the obvious. Maybe there was a way Perry could get them to switch sides.

“Hello again, Gerome.” Perry said as the horses formed a half-circle around him. “I want you off my planet.”

“Oh come on,” Gerome said, gesturing in front of him. “How many times do I gotta re-wire this kid!?”

“I’m Paradox,” Paradox said, mostly to piss him off.

“That doesn’t even…” Gerome said, exasperated. “You know what?”

Gerome raised his fingers and snapped, and Perry had to force himself not to flinch. He felt some foreign energy wash through him and get sucked into the sword.

Perry didn’t know how he knew, but he could feel the sword grow stronger, as if it had just feasted on Gerome’s power and was hungry for more. It started to glow.

“Oh. Clever girl,” Gerome murmured as Perry dug his feet into the soft earth, charging forward.

Perry leapt five feet in the air and brought the blade down with an aim to cleave the man in half.

A heavy-duty shield manifested between the two of them. Perry buried Resistance a finger-length into the steel before wrenching it back out with a metallic shriek, tumbling to the ground in an awkward landing, desperately scrambling to avoid the stamping of the startled horses.

“The lich has sent his son to kill us with the sword!” Gerome said, pointing at Perry.

“All right! Finally some actual combat!” The empty armor said, climbing off his horse.

Perry slashed the horse tack, causing the saddle to slip, sending the armor tumbling to the ground.

“Ack!”

Perry jumped overtop the armor.

“Wai-“

With a grunt, Perry slashed the armor open from head to crotch in a spray of sparks, revealing the nothingness inside. Resistance hummed with stolen power.

“Get off him!” A woman wearing designer robes shouted, launching a living serpent of flame at Perry.

No HP. God, I hope this works.

Perry held the sword out, flat side against the fire, causing the serpent to bounce off.

The skin of his knuckles and forearms burst into pain.

Perry rolled away, using the armor’s horse as a barrier as he watched the flicker of light leave the helmet’s eyes.

One down.

A glitter of light out of the corner of Perry’s eye cause him to lean back as a handful of thrown daggers whizzed past his face. Perry lunged forward in a counter attack at the cloaked figure.

The sword pierced the cloaked figure, emerging out the back…completely clean.

Crap, Perry whipped the sword out of the living swarm’s body, drawing it sideways. The swarm of tentacles simply split around the blade and reformed before the creature launched a vicious flurry of blows on Perry’s face and torso.

Perry stumbled backwards and spotted Gerome looming over him with a two-handed grip on his longsword.

Perry leaned into his backward stumble and curled into a ball, rolling between the dark-haired man’s legs.

“Come back here, you little-“ Gerome said, spinning around, blade missing Perry by a hair’s breadth.

BANG!

Heather slammed into Gerome’s body like a diving hawk, forming herself into a blade and lopping off the paladin’s head.

Gerome’s body staggered there for a moment before slumping to the ground, spurting blood into the loamy earth.

“You alright?” Heather asked, panting as she glanced back at him.

“Yeah, but-“

“Hey, G, I finished rolling a new character,” An incredibly handsome man said from the side of the trail, where he reclined against a nearby tree. “I’m gonna give skin another shot. You guys let me know when you’re done with this encounter. I’m gonna be a bard this time. Fits my playstyle better.”

Perry frowned, glancing at the dead suit of armor, then back to the man showing off his eight pack while stumming a harp.

A flash of realization struck him like a bolt of lightning, and Perry lunged forward, grabbing Heather and yanking her backwards.

A bright blade whiffed inches away from her neck.

Gerome was standing again, right above his own dead body, scowling at them.

“I can at least get rid of-“ Gerome said, raising his hand.

Perry grabbed Heather’s hand and slapped it around the blade, so they were both holding it.

Click. Gerome snapped his fingers, the wave of energy funneling into Resistance.

The blade glowed harder.

“Oh, come on!”The god of chaos, madness and the sudden horrifying realization that you have stepped on a wasp nest in October stomped his feet like a child.

“Oh my god, I haven’t taken a shower in four days!” Heather shouted as her memories and personality flooded back. “And there’s no shampoo!”

“Hi,” Perry said over Heather’s shoulder. They were sandwiched together by the need to maintain their grip on the hilt. “Welcome back.”

“Let’s murder this bitch,” Heather said, her eyes narrowed to slits.

“I don’t think that’s going to work,” Perry said with a shrug before turning his attention to Gerome.

“Look, you leave, or we’re just going to keep cutting your head off.”

Gerome’s expression darkened, along with the sky.

“You think you can give me ultimatums?” He asked, scowling.

Perry’s stomach dropped as the land around them peeled up, surrounding them in a sphere of forest. Perry looked straight up and saw himself, looking back down at him.

“I am a GOD. The land you stand on, the air you breath exists because I make it so.”

Suddenly Perry couldn’t breathe, his eyes bulging in the sudden vacuum. A moment later it vanished, allowing him to draw a ragged breath.

“You can’t beat me. It’s a pointless exercise. I exist in more dimensions than you. Compared to you, I am infinite. You are clinging to that pathetic sword when there’s an unlimited number of ways I could end your limited existence despite it!”

“Compared to him, you’re a spider in a terrarium,” the woman said, stepping forward. She gave Barrel of monkeys a meaningful wink outside Gerome’s field of view.

That’s interesting. Perry didn’t know what to do with the information that those two had some kind of agreement. All he could do was stay the course.

“Then you better kill all of us, because as long as any of us are still alive we’re gonna keep slipping the collar. Maybe because you’re not as powerful as you say.

“Fine.” Gerome said, raising his hand.

Perry could feel something coalescing outside of his perception, like someone had surrounded and smothered his Attunement. He felt the distinct loss of a connection he’d never realized he had.

He was about to die.

“Hey G, quick question.” The handsome bard – formerly living armor – said, raising his hand.

“Eh?” Gerome asked.

“Are you gonna follow the rules?”

“What?”

“I mean, if you wanna kill an NPC, you gotta use your character’s powers to do it, right? Not just erase them.”

“Yes, it hardly seems to be in keeping with the spirit of the game,” Jocelyn said with a barely restrained smile.

“That is true,” The tentacle swarm monk said, nodding.

Barrel of Monkeys and the rest of his crew were edging closer to Jocelyn, their hands hovering near their weapons. But they weren’t watching Perry. They were watching Gerome.

Interesting.

“What do you guys know!?” “You have any idea how much trouble this Paradox kid has caused me before I invited you to join me!? I’m doing us a favor.”

“I dunno, sounds like somebody’s chicken.” Barrel of Monkeys said around a cigar.

Gerome raised a brow and clicked his fingers.

“On second thought, you should totally erase them,” Barrel of Monkeys said. “I don’t like ‘em that much anyway.”

The rest of BoM’s crew watched their leader with horrified expressions.

Jocelyn shook her head with a frown.

“Oh, come on, dude,” the muscley bard said, shaking his head. “That’s in poor taste. Play the game the way it’s supposed to be played. Kill them with three dimensional attacks.”

“Ugh! Fine!” Gerome snapped his fingers, and the bubble of isolated spacetime popped, leaving them in the center of a normal forest again.

Then things started getting weird.

SHIT!

Perry and Heather broke apart to dodge a pair of massive tree trunks flying together with the intent of crushing them. The sword went with Perry.

Click.Gerome clicked his fingers.

“You killed my mother!” Heather shouted, rebounding towards Perry, her limbs forming blades.

I could really go for some power armor right now.

Perry lunged inside Heather’s reach, sustaining a shallow cut on his scalp to slam the hilt into Heather’s face.

“Oh,” Heather said, her face wrapped around the hilt. “Sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Perry said. “Launch me?”

“Gotcha,” Heather said, folding around behind him and violently expanding like an airbag, launching him towards Gerome.

Perry felt something tug on his feet.

Roots that had wrapped around his feet in an instant of stillness caused him to tumble violently through the air towards Gerome, rather than the collected attack he’d planned.

Gerome held up a shield, even thicker than before, and over an arm’s length away from himself.

Perry slammed up against it shoulder first, causing a burst of pain to spread through his torso. He embedded the sword into the shield and used it as leverage to swing around it.

Resistance pulled out of the shield with a shriek, and Perry whipped it around towards gerome’s face in a feint before swinging low for a shallow slash against the god’s tassets.

Resistance cut through the armor like butter and drew a line along the god’s thigh.

“OW!” The battle screeched to a halt as Gerome hobbled backwards, giving Perry an accusatory glare. “Why would you do that!? That really hurts!”

Perry paused, cocking his head.

“And…cutting your head off…didn’t?”

“No!”

“Huh.” Perry shrugged and went back to the stabbing, raising the humming blade for another rush.

“NO!”

Instantly, a layer of solid steel encased Perry from head to toe, with a small hole for his face, immobilizing him completely.

Oh. Crap.

Perry glanced down at the humming Resistance and noticed about a foot of his right hand was uncovered by steel.

Does the sword have an aura that resists his control? and if so, can I make it bigger?

“You think it’s okay to just hurt people!?” Gerome demanded.

“You know you’re literally trying to kill me,” Perry retorted, his breathing shallow as his ribs butted up against the constraints of the inch-thick metal coffin.

“YOU’RE NOT PEOPLE!” Gerome shouted, his face red as his hands glowed, sealing the wound on his thigh. “You’re just a stupid ape weaving your stupid little spiral on a doomed planet weaving its own stupid little spiral as your sun flies off into the darkness, as short and insignificant as a spark from a hammer.”

“Anyway…I’m gonna stab you in the face now.” He said, straightening as a wicked looking dagger manifested in his hand.

Perry’s heart shot into his throat as Gerome raised the blade above his head, the point one-dimensionsal from Perry’s point of view.

With the sheer adrenaline and fear of death rattling around in his brain, Perry was tempted to beg for his life but…the sheer indignity of having his mind toyed with hardened his resolve.

Now if only I could think of something clever and go out like a boss, Perry thought, struggling against the thick steel, too panicked to think of anything but escape.

If I could modify it…no time.

Gerome brought the dagger down towards Perry’s face with a grunt of effort….then burst into pieces as a high pitched whine filled the air.

“Damn!” The muscley bard said, eyebrows raised.

“What’s going on?” Perry said, trying to move his head but completely unable to catch what had happened.

“Perry, are you okay!?” Perry saw Natalie walk a primitive mechsuit into his field of view. It was little more than a chair with magical robot legs and a series of wands making a gatling gun. Anne was piggybacking on the chair, her toes hooked in the back of the seat, hands clutching the high back.

“Get away, he’s still alive!” Perry shouted, twisting his wrist to tap himself with Resistance.

Perry closed his eyes and focused on the Tinker Twitch.

Tap. Perry tapped a line into his torso.

Layers of rust sprung up and flaked away from the steel encasing him, but it wasn’t quite enough.

Tap.

Lines appeared in the rust, where joints began to form around his shoulders, knees, elbows, waist and neck.

C’mon…

Tap.

“What do you mean he’s still alive!?” Natalie shouted, an instant before a jagged bolt composed entirely of steel whipped out of nothing and flung itself straight at her face.

“EEK!” Natalie squeaked and ducked the projectile with a surprising amount of dexterity from her makeshift mechsuit.

Anne’s eyes widened in surprise a moment before the jagged steel caught her in the chest, propelling her violently off of Natalie’s mech and pinning her to a tree.

“ANNE!” Nat shrieked, glancing over her shoulder. A heartbeat later, her mechsuit vanished out from under her. Nat flailed in the air a moment, eyes wide before Heather caught her.

“Anne!” Nat shouted, climbing out of Heathers grip before the two of them ran to their injured friend.

DAMNIT! Perry thought, speeding up his Great Escape.

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.

“You just don’t seem to get it,” Gerome said, shaking his head as he stepped daintily over his own ruined corpse. “You literally can’t ‘beat’ me.”

“Destroying this form? Does nothing. Even that’s not much more than a bug bite.” he said, pointing at Resistance with his thumb. “Barely even qualifies as an artifact of unimaginable power.”

“I’ll kill you!” Nat shouted, rounding on him and whipping a snake out of her shirt. She yelped and dropped the creature to the ground.

“Not what you were looking for?” Gerome asked with a smug smirk.

“Now, if you don’t wanna end up like your friend, just relax for a moment and let me prune that belligerent streak out of your minds. I think I figured out where I went wrong.”

“I mean, I’m still gonna kill you,” Gerome said, glancing at Perry.

His eyes widened a fraction when he spotted Perry charging toward him, the metal restraint transformed into jointed armor.

“But-“

Perry caught Gerome in the gut, and hoisted him up on the sword, Vlad the Impaler style.

The god’s eyes went wide and he let out a wordless gasp of pain. Resistance thrummed and flared with light. Perry’s makeshift armor was wiped away, replaced with the power-armor he’d entered the sphere in.

In the center of the forest, directly underneath Perry’s feet was a small circle of familiar Franklin concrete.

Eight foot radius. Was it a burst or is it a constant aura?

Perry shifted his stance to the side a couple inches, but the circle on the ground didn’t move. Burst, then.

“That hurts!” another copy of Gerome said, stepping up behind Perry and smacking him aside, flinging him violently into a tree.

Ugh. Perry needed superior firepower. The Mcguffin they’d poured themselves into was doing what they needed it to do, but only for one person at a time, and it was pissing off Gerome more than it was tangibly harming him.

A raw plan formed in the back of Perry’s mind. It was missing everything except for the end-goal: He’d have to make the rest up as he went.

Assuming he doesn’t kill me outright.

A bolt of lightning descended from the ominous clouds forming around them, the concussive blast staggering Perry as it made contact with his armor and etched it shoulder to knee.

“Are you sure I can’t just make it so he never existed?” Gerome asked, glancing back at his crew.

“Nah man, gotta play it as it lies,” ‘Clank’ said.

“He’s got power armor now,” Gerome whined.

“So? Give yourself super-powers or something.” ‘Clank’ said, waving a dismissive hand.

“Are we still playing D&D?” the cloaked tentacle swarm asked.

“Or…!” Gerome’s expression brightened. “I was saving this for another story arc, but let’s see how the lich’s son fares against his worst enemy!”

Click.

“Huh?“

Perry’s armor began to dissolve as Chemestro stepped out of the woods, expression murderous.

“Oh, COME ON!” Perry shouted, charging forward. Chemestro was a way better fighter than Gerome, and he couldn’t afford to give him an inch.

Unfortunately, Chemestro took the inch, floating backward out of Perry’s range while expertly manipulating the environment to gain the upper hand, darting in for a punch every time Perry was off-balance before backing off and resuming the gradual disintegration of the Mk.4.

“Hey!” Perry said, raising his hand to stop the onslaught. “You know you’re being mind-controlled right now, right?”

“Obviously,” Chemestro said, knocking his defense aside and catching Perry with haymaker. “But it’s also an excellent opportunity to kick your ass.”

“Sociopathic Jerk.” Perry muttered, launching a front kick and several noob hunters, which flew right through their target.

“Spoiled Trust Fund Baby.” Chemestro retorted, catching planting a vicious kick to the side of his face.

Crack!

Was that my face, or my armor!?

“Chemestro, stop it!” Nat shouted, her voice breaking a bit.

“He killed my father!” Chemestro shouted, flinging Heather’s tackle aside before she could do any damage to him.

“You’re so full of shit!” Perry shouted.

“Maybe so, but there will be less animosity afterwards if they think I didn’t enjoy this.” Chemestro said, giving him a wink before launching himself forward and catching Perry in a headlock.

Perry blasted the jets on his boots, sending them both tumbling high into the air. Out of earshot.

“So, who’s the controller and what’s the plan?” Chemestro asked, punctuating his question with a punch to the face before wrenching Perry’s arm into a lock.

“Gerome. The dark skinned one in the paladin armor.” Perry said, trying to punch Chemestro off him.

Chemestro’s eye twitched.

“What?”

“Oh, Gerome just raised me my entire life and made me into the person I am today. Now how do we kill him?”

“Sociopath.”

“Brief me on his abilities, or be excluded from the plan. Permanently.” Chemestro said, tightening his grip.

“He’s unkillable. Literally a fourth dimensional being that calls himself a god. Luckily it seems pretty easy to mess with his head, and his friends are keeping him from just wiping us out of existence.”

“Our options are fight him to a stalemate until he gives up and goes home, or…”

“Or?”

“I don’t know, we’ve killed him like three times already!”

“Any ideas?” he asked.

Perry glanced down at the tableue below them, scanning the gawking onlookers, the three Gerome corpses, and Anne’s corpse, pinned to the tree.

“One idea.”

***Reginald***

This is ridiculous. With a wave of Gerome’s hand, a powerful sorcerer had appeared and begun beating on the skilled young man like he was an amateur.

They were currently flying through the air, engaged in a brutal slugfest, some fifty feet above the ground.

“You’re gonna wanna stand right here,” Jocelyn said, grabbing Reginald’s shoulders and shifting him about six inches to the right.

“Huh?”

“Just stay right there.” Jocelyn said with a smile.

“Hey Joss, you just jumped ahead and back for a moment. What’s up?” Mars asked.

“I’m just…nudging things a bit while G is distracted.”

“Is that okay? I mean, he’s the dungeon master,” Mars asked, tapping his tentacles together.

“There’s more to playing D&D than doing whatever you’re told,” ‘Clank’ said, nudging Jocelyn with his elbow. “Sometimes the dungeon master needs a taste of his own medicine.”

“Oh. Really?” Mars asked.

“This one does, anyway,” Jocelyn said.

“What’s-“

“Don’t move.” Jocelyn said, putting her hand on Reggie’s shoulder.

BOOM!

Three figures stepped out of shimmering mirages: A young woman, an old one, and a giant skeleton.

“Stay away from my son!” The young sorceress said.

As one they raised their hands and unleashed a multi-colored hail of powerful magics directly on the olive-skinned god.

The magic flowed around and through Gerome, as if it was never meant to hurt him in the first place. He peered up at the three figures in the sky.

“No, no no!” He said. “Now even the bosses are off-script! Back to your lairs!”

Click.

The three mages vanished.

A moment later, Paradox the Guard-captain’s son was flung down to the ground by one of the newcomer’s kicks, embedding his armored body a few feet into the ground.

Ooh, that looks painful.

Reggie caught movement off to the side.

The young maid’s corpse which had been pinned to the side of a tree began to…slough off.

A young man’s body emerged from the corpse like it was a chrysalis, gasping and wide-eyed as he fell to his knees, just outside of Gerome’s field of view.

The blood-soaked young man stared at his hands for a moment, his brows furrowing as he scanned the surroundings, his gaze landing on Gerome, who was ambling up to Paradox.

This is getting really weird.

The sword had fallen out of the Paradox’s grip and was half-embedded in the ground some six feet away from him.

“Finally let go of that damned sword,” Gerome said as he loomed over Paradox, who was struggling to pull himself out of the earth he was embedded in. “I could just reset you, but I think we’d all be better off without a Paradox. Goodbye, ape.”

“NO!” Heather flung herself forward, smashing through a stone wall that manifested between them.

A head-sized chunk of sharp stone whizzed past Reggie’s left ear. Reggie glanced over at Jocelyn, who gave him a thumbs up that sent ice down his spine. Did I just almost die?

Heather charged forward, her arm turning into a blade.

Click.

The spice heiress stopped in her tracks, glancing down at Paradox with a spiteful expression. “Are you going to kill him already or do I have to do it myself?” she asked.

“On it,” Gerome said, lifting his hand. in the sky a star began to move, growing larger and larger.

“A planet-killing meteor strike is a three-dimensional attack.” Gerome justified himself, glancing at his group.

“Sure, buddy,” ‘Clank’ said, giving him a thumb’s up. Jocelyn just smiled quietly.

Suddenly a new voice cut through the scene.

“Gerome!”

“Eh?” Gerome glanced over his shoulder, frowning as he spotted a blood-soaked, naked young man.

“I challenge you to a dance battle!” he shouted.

BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM.

Impossibly loud music began to play as the naked young man began to bust out some rather impressive dance moves.

The approaching star above them flickered out as Gerome slowly began to dance, frowning as he did so.

“What is the meaning of this, why is-“ Gerome started.

“Bend your knees and get ready to catch,” Jocelyn whispered in Reggie’s ear.

Paradox lunged out of the hole in the ground and dashed for the sword.

Get back here, you-“ Gerome shouted, trying to reach for Paradox but unable to stop dancing.

Heather tried to pin Paradox, but the young man ejected out of his armor, leaving the young woman wrapped around an empty shell.

Chemestro moved to stop him, but Natalie drop-kicked the young man in his chiseled abs, bouncing off the wall of muscle, but slowing him just barely enough for his grab to miss Perry’s leg.

Paradox snatched up the sword and flung it forward.

At Reggie.

“ACK!” Reggie flinched as a bolt of adrenaline went through his body, slowing everything down and allowing him to realize he needed to catch the sword by the hilt of get cut in half.

He reached out and closed his hand, experiencing a sudden yank on his wrist as the sword came to a halt inches from disembowling him.

“Whaa..”

Reginald the Fantasy Mercenary sloughed away, and Barrel of Monkeys emerged, a shudder running from scalp to toe.

Well, it’s nice to be back, Barrel of Monkeys thought, pulling a cigar out of his pocket and biting down on it. But I’m not exactly a swordfighter.

As if listening to his thoughts, the thrumming, glowing sword shifted in his grip and became something he was more familiar with: A tommy gun.

Gerome was busy doing the funky-chicken dance, watching Barrel of Monkeys with wide eyes as Reggie pulled out the barrel drum and checked it.

It had ammo. Excellent.

Click.

Gerome danced harder, but was otherwise unable to act as Barrel of Monkeys slammed the drum magazine back in place, retracted the bolt, then lit his cigar and tilted his fedora at a rakish angle, waiting for Breaker’s ability to end.

“FIND SOME COVER!” Paradox shouted.