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 Posted: Tue Jun 14, 2011 7:16 pm
Maximos All color drained from Maximos' face in an instant, which considering how pale he was naturally was quite a feat. " What?" His book shut with a slam and was sent flying to the far corner of the room. Maximos' eyes were deathly serious. He leaned forward over the bed grabbing Tomorrow by the shoulders, a sort of terrible desperation in his eyes and wracking his face. " What did you just say? Listen, listen to me!" He shook the larger man as best he could and very nearly shouted at him. " Did he say my name! Did he say my NAME!?" Well, that freaked John out, the one armed giant only staring at his disturbed brother for a split second before speaking. "No Max, he said 'children'. ' i'll see them soon - give this message to my children, i'll see them soon.'"His hand suddenly snaked out to clap around Maximos' head, leaning his forehead into his brothers so they were looking square in the eyes. "What. Does. That. Mean? Is Hono'o in danger? Are you in trouble?"He'd never seen Max upset like that before...he wanted nice, direct answers.
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Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2011 3:28 am
"NO!" Maximos shouted back at Tomorrow, immediately followed by a flash of confusion on his face and then. "Yes! I mean yes! How could you even ask that?!"
Maximos' hands flew up from Tomorrow's shoulders to the side of the larger man's face and then he proceeded to shake said face. There was no sense of violence, or attack just the same almost desperate rush of emotion from before. The shake was accompanied with the shout.
"Work! Damn you!" Maximos proclaimed at Tomorrow's brain. This was made more evident by Maximos knocking his head into Tomorrow's. This was not a street brawler headbutt to the nose but literally a crashing of foreheads which left Maximos looking very much like he regretted the action right after taking it. "I need you to think! I know its hard, remembering dreams is like catching smoke with your hands but you need to remember. Did he use my name ever. At all!"
"The empty passage, nothing gate, door to nothingness. It cant...it cant!" Max was talking fast, very fast, and after a list of seemingly ominous titles he jumped to listing off several complex magical terminologies with almost as my syllables as letters and which all sounded like one gigantic blur. He slipped one hand from Tomorrow and bashed the base of it into the side of his skull. "Think you stupid shadow, how, how?! Just a word...just a name."
His eyes snapped quickly back to Tomorrow. "DID HE USE IT!?"
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Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2011 3:55 am
John was utterly flabbergasted at Maximos' reaction - he'd never seen his brother this riled before, and quite frankly, it scared the s**t out of him. The shadow master was babbling incessecently, shaking his head around and smashing their foreheads together, which Max would most likely regret more then John would - surprisingly, he felt a lot better, and if he had two seconds to take his bearings, he'd see that his wounds were healed...
...But now wasn't the time for that sort of thing. He hand reached up to grab Maximos by the chin, his fingers digging into his brother's flesh as his voice took on a commanding tone, something that Maximos might never had heard from John before - the distinct sound of thunder coming from somewhere in the distance, even in the room they were in which was most likely buried deep within Shadow Island. "MAXIMOS! You will take a breath and calm the <********> down!"
He took a second to let his words sink in, his grip like a vice and most likely a little painful. John's eyes actually seemed to spark, the blue iris full of lightening as he spoke in a more measured, normal tone. "Now....listen to the words that come out of my mouth.....he never. Said. Your. Name. Ever. Alright?! Now tell me again - are you in danger? Is Hono'o in danger?!" He sounded quite agitated when he said Hono'o's name - it was of grave importance that Max tell him yes or no on this one, and clearly this time...
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Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2011 4:39 am
Max stopped, cold, as if his entire body had just suffered the most fast acting case of rigor mortis in all of time. He looked Tomorrow dead in the eyes. He didnt blink. He didnt move. And yet it was almost entirely clear to see from the way his eyes darted ever so slightly left and right that he wasnt actually looking at Tomorrow or being very still at all.
And when Tomorrow finished, Maximos whispered. "Oh right."
And then gasped a rather large breath, and let it out in a single rush. "I forgot I need to do that now, dont I?"
"Listen, Johnathan, this is very important." Maximos said in a calm, and almost completely steady tone. Like a man talking over tea and breakfast about the events in the newspaper. Max took another breath, this one casual and measured. "Why Johnathan. Why?"
"Why the fleeb are you touching my FACE?!" And with that, Max jerked his head free in way that was almost assuredly more than a little bit painful. And yet, the Shadow pressed on, all calmness shattered like a boulder through glass. "Dont ever think thats okay! We're like brothers! I know its been a while since I've had proper time with Lucind but no, no!"
Then the lights turned on, Maximos had his mouth open as if about to go on a tirade when he suddenly stopped, closed his mouth and quickly opened it again jabbing an accusing finger at the large Aesir. "No, no, no that's not what you asked. How could you even ask that! Werent you paying attention at all?!"
"Listen, really really listen! Nocturne is sealed away. His sister died to put him away. It was done for a reason! Everyone forgot, thats what the Door does. It puts you away, outside of existence and erases you from forever. That's why he can touch dreams, because dreams exist outside of this! But someone, some block headed idiot found the book and opened the Door just a sliver. Enough. Enough for all that you've seen to spill through. A sliver! If he gets out, if he comes to see us, you just imagine what havoc a god that old, that bitter can do. Here. Anywhere!"
His eyes snapped back to Tomorrow full of emotion, undefined, raw mixed emotion. "To play with all realities like a never-waking dream! Does that sound like danger to you?!"
Empowered steps brought Maximos closer to the bed again, passion, fury, life in his mismatched eyes. "Oh. Oh oh oh, that's just the start. We took the Door, we bastardized it. We put the criminals in there that the Reapers cannot handle. Those that threatened all the worlds so deeply that their death would not be enough, so they had to be forgotten. Does that little monster sound like the kind of person to shut the fleebing door behind himself?!"
His hands reached out to grab Tomorrow's shoulders again. "DOES HE?!"
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Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2011 5:31 am
This was beginning to hurt John's head. Which, this day and age, wasn't very hard to do, granted - but he hadn't started spurting blood out of his nose yet, so hopefully he'd be able to keep it together long enough to get a clear idea on what the ******** was going on.
So now he didn't just grab Maximos' face. He reached out and gave him a good slap.
A nice, open palm, loud slap, right on the cheek.
He didn't slap his head off his shoulders.
He didn't dislocate his jaw.
He didn't even rattle the man's teeth. But maybe he would give him the shock that he needed to snap out of it.
"Sorry, but you're getting hysterical, and you need to calm down..." John said in measured tones. "Like I said, he didn't say your name....he said mine and Hono'o's a bunch of times....he seemed quite pleasent on some occasions...if not a total b*****d on others...now let me get this straight. The god you worship - the god Hono'o worships - might have access to this world and this frightens you?"
He grit his teeth a little. Fright was too frail a word for how Maximos was acting - absolutely terrified might be the phrase, though. More words equal more impact. "I need my arm - lets go shut this door you keep speaking of nice and tight and put a lock on it so nothing can get in or out anymore..." He muttered, throwing off the sheets on the bed to push himself to his feet, rising to his full height to tower over Max. "...I need my arm and my boots. Damn this floor is cold..."
Nocturne had said not to get between him and Hono'o....but John could play his own tricks as well. Technically, this wasn't getting in the way of their current relationship - dreams are up to Nocturne to do as he saw fit, apparently. But making sure he stayed locked away - as the Balance God Liara intended....that wasn't overstepping his mark.
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Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2011 1:55 pm
"I dont understand how this is possible! Time convergence, matter lines, deadlocks, arcane, divine, extra dimensional pockets, reality negation, and a word lock! A word lock its not possible for that little b--" And then he was slapped. It didnt really hurt, but it was loud enough to make an audible slap and cause Maximos to stop entirely and blink at Tomorrow suddenly lost.
"Did you just hit me?" Blink, blink. "This isnt really the time for a match Tomm."
As Tomorrow continued Maximos looked at him like he had just grown a third eye, or suddenly died his hair black, or maybe started speaking in jibberish. Most of all he looked confused. He silently lipped the word, 'frightened', but didnt actually say anything until John was done and standing a full one or two feet over the Shadow. "What, what are you talking about Johnathan?"
"I'm not scared. I'm ecstatic!" And then he balled his fist tight and shook it menacingly in the space between them. "And furious!"
He swung, in the same sort of way a man might swing at a wall or a punching bag. But this was Tomorrow's chest, which might as well have been either of the above. The blow lacked any real force, just a display, and after he hit he'd scrunch his fist around a patch of the cloth of Tomorrow's shirt and shook it. "He beat me to it! That clever little b*****d found a way out of the oldest, greatest, and most powerful lock in all of existence!"
And he shook the shirt violently. "And he did it before me!"
At which point he stopped, blinked a few times, and let go of the other man's shirt straightening it out with his hand. "Oh, sorry, I'll have Walter press that. Also, I cant give you your arm back. Its gone. Long story."
"Spiders." And then he just sort of coughed.
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Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2011 4:07 pm
John rubbed his eyes again and sat back down on the bed heavily. He gave up. Max was being incoherent one minute, then speaking gibberish the next - how could the idea of a being putting the whole world under one big dream, possibly unleashing things Reavers couldn't kill in the process, be a good thing.
But he took a deep breath. This was just...one of those moments. He needed to give Maximos more faith. Surely his brother wouldn't release something so evil into this world. Nocturne wasn't so bad...when he wasn't being a pretentious d**k.
"Good for him then, I suppose. I'll bet you have a lot of things to talk about when he..." He started to say dryly, throughly too confused to care anymore - if this was a bad thing, hey'd deal with it then, until then it wasn't his place to judge before having the facts laid out for him - before Maximos said something just as crazy.
John lowered his hand to his lap and stared at Max. "Max...please tell me how spiders could have taken an 80 pound mechanical arm from Shadow <********> Island?!
Obviously, this upset him somewhat. They're better be pretty big ******** spiders...
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Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2011 5:51 pm
"No, no, no." Max said, waving his hand dismissively. "Its terrible really, all those things I said were completely true. Horrible danger. Nightmares. Shadows. We really need to get all that sorted."
Max just watched Tomorrow stare at him John lowered his hand to his lap and stared at Max. Somehow, all urgency had drained out of the Shadow. "Max...please tell me how spiders could have taken an 80 pound mechanical arm from Shadow <********> Island?!"
"Oh right." Well Maximos had to think on that, he tapped his chin with his finger and let his eyes wander up and to the right. "Well Tomm, they were great big spiders. Enormous. And we actually found them inside the -- "
He just stopped, shook his head and let out a long sigh. "Alright truth be told I threw it off the island. Have you actually seen that thing? Its disgusting really."
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Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2011 8:16 pm
((Editted for depth)) John looked at Maximos with incredulity. He was lost for words. Then he found them, and used them to great effect. No matter where Walter was on the Island, he would most certainly hear, very faintly, John's cry through the bedrock and the magical chambers concealed within. "WHAT?!" The sudden burst of noise in such close proximity would've most likely made Maximos' ears ring, and if he was wearing his hat it would've been blown across the room. John stood and pushed past his brother, pacing the room like a caged animal, clenching and unclenching his fist, his eyes sparking as static leapt off his body. "I can't believe you did that! Again! Wasn't once enough? Do you want the other one as well?! Maybe you could add it to your collection of my body parts!! I don't care how disgusting you thought it was Max, it was my damn arm!!Ooo he was pissed. He was emitting enough charge to make Max's hair stand on end from across the room, he was so pissed. He finally stopped pacing and stood at the other end of the room with his hand on his hip, jaw clenched, nostrils flaring, eyes wild as he looked down at the pale man, as if his gaze would burn straight through him....and if he got pissed off enough, it might just! He found some measured tone, however, and spoke with barely concealed fury. "I now have no left arm. What are you going to do about that?"s**t, Max dropped his arm 30,000 feet. It was definately destroyed now. No amount of John's tinkering or spare parts would repair it being shattered on some mountaintop....if that was even where they were anymore. Knowing John's luck, they were probably somewhere over the Durem sea - which means not only is it completely destroyed, but totally unsalvagable!
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Posted: Thu Jun 16, 2011 3:27 am
Max let out a frustrated sort of grumbling sound and then a long drawn out sigh. It wasnt the sonic boom that really annoyed him, it was the fact that afterwards his ears were left ringing and yet he could still here Tomorrow complain about his arm. A few minutes of deafness must have been too much to ask for.
"Do about that?" Max repeated, trying his best to pat his hair back down but to no avail. He spoke, but in almost sad and guilty tone, like a boy caught red handed in the cookie jar. "Oh yes Tomm, its your limbs I want. Just look at your arms! There so big and muscley, I just could help myself, I was absolutely drawn to it. Would you? Could you please? Just toss me the other one?"
"Oh wait, you cant." Faced with a growing thunderstorm, one should not normally goad the storm, or feed it. If anyone expected otherwise out of Max, they were a fool. And about them any amount of guilt in his tone absolutely vanished replaced with one of utter frustration. " -- Oh, put it back in the deck!"
"I'll have you know I made a damned nifty hammer out of that arm! What am I going to do about it? What am I going to do about it?!" For a moment, it really seemed like Maximos was getting angry. But then he laughed and said, "I'm going to help make you a new one, remember? We talked about this outside in the garden before lunch. Infact we said we'd go take a look at things in the lab after lunch. Oh and look!"
He whipped out his pocket watch, and said. "Isnt that amazing? Its after lunch. Way after, Mr. Sleepyhead, I dare say we're late."
The Shadow ventured a finger up to poke Tomorrow in the forehead. "I swear, I should be making you a new one of those too. Come on then, lab's across the hall."
And casually as ever, Max turned to exit the bedroom.
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Posted: Thu Jun 16, 2011 3:36 am
Holy crap he knew how to take the wind out of a viking's sails. As usual they squabbled, and as usual Maximos knew just what to say to blow Tomorrow right off his feet
"Wha...did..." John babbled, blinking hard in surprise as Maximos poked him before turning and walking out of the room. "Did you just say hammer?"
He quickly followed after his brother, amost slamming his head into the doorframe as he did, ducking under it to chase after Maximos. "We discussed Max - its not like we can just grow me a new one. I have this ******** plate embedded in my chest now. Yes the stupid damn thing broke down all the time and got rusty, but it was serviceable..." He was babbling again, and he couldn't help but ask again, a little desperately. "W-what do you mean, a hammer?"
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Posted: Fri Jun 17, 2011 2:11 am
The hallway was much the same as the hallways, plural, that Tomorrow had taken to get to the gymnasium earlier. He followed behind Max, and the Shadow simply continued walking. He didnt even really break pace to call back over his shoulder a very resolute.
"No." And then he continued walking. John hadnt even asked a yes or no question! It almost seemed like Maximos wasnt listening until John said.
"We discussed Max - its not like we can just grow me a new one. I have this ******** plate embedded in my chest now. Yes the stupid damn thing broke down all the time and got rusty, but it was serviceable..." And almost immediately replied with. "Yes we can! Any hospital on Gaia can. You just dont want to. Why did you get a fleebing plate put in your chest then?! We'll rip the damn thing out! Also, no!"
Again, Max kept pace without missing a beat or turning around, at the opposite end of the hall, which strangely seemed to have no other entrances but the bedroom they had just left, were a large set of black double doors. They looked a bit like blast doors.
"W-what do you mean, a hammer?" And came to a dead stop about three feet from the doors, he spun around on his heels and jabbed a finger straight at Tomorrow and very sternly said. "No! I've said it three times now."
"That's final! If you want a noct damned nifty hammer then you get your own off a thunder god arm and I'll see what we can do! You cannot have mine!" And then, not wanting to hear another word on the topic Max spun back around and flung open one of the large doors and signaled for Johnathan to enter, yet another pitch black room. "Now get in, we have alot of work to do."
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Posted: Fri Jun 17, 2011 2:37 am
John knew medicine had advanced to the poiint where limbs could be grown back....at the time, however, he had not had access to such technology....in fact, he didn't even know where he'd gotten the arm installed! Of course he had poured over every inch of the thing, but all he'd found was a strange insignia stamped on the inside of the sholder plate, and even then, he hadn't been able to find anything out about it afterwards...
...To him, it was his arm. It was what....he deserved.
But...that was over now. Max had thrown his arm away....he had no choice now. He didn't want to live his life as a cripple...he had to take what Max was offering. Knowing his brother's penchance for magical items, perhaps he might even give him something that was better then his own arm was...
He blinked as Max laid down the law, right in his face even, halting his forward progress. It didn't stop him from pressing the subject. "Dammit Maximos, its my arm, its a part of me! Which you stole, i might add, right from my body!"
Odin's spear, it was like they were haggling over a lost wallet. Or that Maximos had eaten the last packet of chips from the cupboard.
He blinked as Maximos threw open the doors to reveal yet another yawning chasmous void...yet, for some reason, John did not feel the same fear he felt the first time Max had presented him with such a portal. There was a twinge of fear, granted - but it wasn't as crippling or debeilitating as it had been the first time. Maybe....he was finally beginning to relax around his brother. Maybe meeting Nocturne had eased his Nyctophobia a little, seeing as he now knew the face behind the shadows. In any case, he only hesitated momentarily, like a person hesitated when they smell something bad, before forging ahead after his brother.
"What the Hel are you going to do with a hammer anyways, its entirely against your style. You'll pull a back muscle just trying to lift it..."
...Unless he made some kind of ballpeen hammer out of it. Something small, something Maximos-esque, although that still didn't answer the question of how he could do such a thing with John's superdense bones - but that didn't stop the Aesir's mind from wandering. He would've rearranged the metacarpels and phalanges and made some kind of skull-shaped hilt with a...
Frigga's sceptre, now he was just being stupid. John didn't know if he could handle the thought. His own brother had sliced his arm off then weaponised it. Who does that?
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Posted: Fri Jun 17, 2011 9:58 pm
It was like that feeling before someone sneezes, their face contorts in an ugly fashion, their mouth opens...and then sometimes nothing happens. Maximos' eyes slanted, his lips pressed into a thin line. In every way it appeared as if the Shadow was about to shout and then explode with some sort of angry or violent retort.
And then it was gone. All of his anger vanished, all at once. Max smiled and nodded, and said. "Your right John, you should have this."
Maximos held out his hand, and the magic began. The Shadow already had tattoos covering the majority of his body. With his hand upturned and gloveless Tomorrow would be able to see the black curls and lines tracing up Maximos' palm and around a few of his fingers. They were, true to his word, exactly like the magic lines Nocturne had shown him in his dream. And if they were in any way difficult to see, such difficulty would be removed with a dark plum light began to fill and pour from the tattoos. Black swirled from the corners and edges of the room pooling in Maximos' hand, swimming and gathering into a smokey mass several feet long and fat.
There was a crackle, then the sound of thunder...and there it was. The hammer was four and a half feet long from pommel to tip, and it weights approximately 250lbs, with a mallet style head made of single section of pillar capped on either side with a large black steel plate and reinforced through its core. It didnt seem so at first, but the haft and joint of the hammer was infact a full set of dull gray arm bones and a skeletal hand which gripped the pillar hammer head. Leather wraps covered key hand grips, and lunaic engravings had been etched into the bone.
"This is Moljinir." Maximos said as he held out the arm turned weapon, in one hand without any real visible strain. A thin crackle of bright blue electricity raced over its surface. "Take it."
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Posted: Fri Jun 17, 2011 11:31 pm
John blinked as Maximos turned, looking like he was about to let fly some sort of barrage of words, telling John to not be selfish, to find his own arm...
...Before that vapid smile came over his face, the anger seemingly disappearing, and John couldn't help but think of earlier in the day, when he'd asked Maximos to truely show himself - was he keeping something back from John now? Or did he have one of those moments when he just decided to give in, allow John a small victory in a sea of failures that was their arguementative conversations.
He looked down at Max seemed to just will the hammer into existance, his eyes wide as he looked down at the weapon. He had never expected his own bones to look like that...somehow he figured they would be bigger. There was definately power within the weapon, John could sense it even without seeing the static flaring over the thick bone.
Slowly, and with great care, he reached out with his remaining hand and laid it upon the haft, letting out a shuddering breath as he felt the texture of the bone and the divots of the glyphs and runes carved into it's surface. But it was only when his fingers curled around the haft and lifted the hammer from Maximos' grip that John felt....
....Something. A completeness, perhaps, that he had been missing since Max had taken the arm, all those years ago. Like a circuit being put inot a breaker, he felt whole once more. But...not just that.
Something was building now. Something...internal. He could feel it rising in his heart and mind as he looked down at the weapon, yet he couldn't put his finger on the exact cause of the feeling...it was like a babbling brook, and his thunderclouds had hung heavy over it for years....and as soon as he took up the hammer, the thunderclouds had finally begun to release it's burgining water, filling the brook slowly, causing the water to rush and flow harder....
"...'Moljinir'?" John repeated with a small grin, getting the joke as he hefted the weapon in his hand, lost in the sight of it. It should feel strange, holding his extended bone arms like they were the hilt of a weapon, his own fingers curling into the stone at the end, but....it wasn't. "...How durable is it? Does it have any other properties besides being a hammer?" He asked, noting the static as it curled over the haft again. The hammer had weight to it, but it was like holding a thick branch to John - 250 lbs was nothing...
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