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After EVO, he was stuck in a kind of limbo- not necessarily unpleasant, but still not nice. Xelqua was falling in the void for more days than he could remember, thinking that every moment spent would be his last.
A strange purple light shone from the left of him; and he twisted his body with unnatural flexibility to see it better, not really protesting when it drew him in with an otherworldly power.
It was far too late when he realized what had happened -that they were watchers, that this is what admins had all been warned about. He tried escaping the cosmic wind, but the more he struggled the more it drew him in.
Eventually, he found himself in the center of the whirlwind, unable to move without great strength. Centrifugal force, he recalled, from a science lesson a long time ago. A raspy voice from all around him spoke.
‘Admin of EVO. We have you under our possession. Become one of us, or all of your friends will fall. My name is N, I cannot shed blood upon any thing, alive or undead. That is my flaw.’ The watcher -N- appeared in front of Xelqua, but he couldn’t see his expression under the poker face that they (he?) wore.
N was huge, at least ten times bigger than the average human. He opened his palm, and then closed it again, bringing up a mist shield. The purple vapor swirled and swirled until the image of Taurtis appeared, unconscious and bound.
Xelqua squirmed under the picture, not knowing what to think.
‘Is this-is this real? A dream? Why do you have my boyfriend?’
‘For a mere mortal, you do ask a lot of questions. Join us, and all your questions shall be answered. For now, just know that if you do not agree, he will die. We will give you a chance for every person who remains alive.’
‘Are they all… there? Even Zee? Netty? Martyn?’
‘As far as I know, the one you call Zee is dead, as is Tomohawk. My subordinates were too casual and overestimated their strength. Netty is also gone, but not to my doings. She fell in the void from the dragon fight and could not respawn when the server was destroyed.’
Grian felt an overwhelming pang of sadness, Zee in all his chaoticness couldn’t be suddenly gone. Martyn would be crushed to hear that his girlfriend was dead- if he was still alive, that is. And Tom as well? That meant…
‘Timmy, Martyn, Taurtis, Pearl, BigB, Salem, and Mini are still alive.’
‘And you. You forget how lucky you are to have survived the void, to have such good resistance. Oh, I remember now that Mini died in the teleportation process, whilst the rest of you just passed out. I was worried for a moment that perhaps all of you had died, but my skills are not that bad.’
Mini was gone too? And so would Taurtis, if this is all real and not a nightmare. It felt like a nightmare. But Xelqua knew it wasn’t, knew that it was real. Too real.
N clenched his fist again, and the mist brought out Taurtis, who took one look at Xelqua and made a beeline for him, but was promptly restrained by some glowing purple ropes.
‘What are you doing to him?’ Xelqua demanded. ‘Why is he tied up like that?’
‘You can see the ropes.’ N sounded surprised, like he didn’t expect this. ‘You are perfect. Not many mortals are born with the Sight before turning.
‘The Sight?’ Grian tried his best to ignore Taurtis straining against the ropes.
‘Watcher magic. You can see past the void and our masking magic. But enough questions from you. It’s time for one from me. Will you become a Watcher?’
‘No!’
‘He dies. You kill him.’ N handed him a sword. ‘In the void, everything is perma-die. The void is our domain.’
‘I can’t kill him!’ Xelqua noticed how Taurtis looked very afraid, and was crying a little. He was also crying, as the hot thing that slid down his cheek proved to be.
‘Then I will make you.’
And everything went black.
He woke up to N’s face, leaning over him. ‘So powerful, yet so fragile to a little magic. That will have to be trained in.’
Xelqua tried to speak, but a little cosmic wind brushed pass his mouth and kept it shut. He stood up without wanting to, yet couldn’t sit back down.
‘At leaded you’re conscious now. I’ve taken control of your body in a simple spell. You will kill him now.’
Xelqua stepped forwards against his will, and this time noticed ropes around his body neck and mouth, bending him forwards in position to stab the now frozen Taurtis, who with seemingly great effort opened his mouth.
‘Xelqua! Xel-‘
The ropes unleashed from both their bodies, letting Taurtis fall freely to the floor, and Xelqua fall next to him, overwhelmed by guilt and horror.
He let out a cry of anguish, of regret, of all the lives lost and taken, of Zee, Mini, Tom, and now his dearest boyfriend who will never say his name again.
N smiled. ‘You feel this horror? The regret? You are weak. You must embrace the pain, be stronger than it. I will help you by killing Salem.’
‘No! Not- not Salem.’
‘You no longer have a choice.’
The ropes rematerialized from the mist that surrounded Xelqua, and once again he stepped forwards, but this time directly onto the dead body of Taurtis. The crunch made him want to throw up, but his oesophagus remained steady.
Salem came through the vapor this time, and also started towards Xelqua, but couldn’t move at all.
Xelqua lunged at her in a bloodthirsty rush, a sadistic loss of judgement- or control of. Her eyes screamed, but physically made no sound as she, too, slumped down to the ground.
It was too much. His heart was pounding, head hurting. A ringing in his ears grew louder and louder, stopped the moment they brought out Timmy.
N spoke. ‘Will you join us? Or let another one die?’
Xelqua shook his head.
‘Is that a no to the joining, or the killing?’
Xelqua took a deep breath. Jimmy was only sixteen. He would- he would sacrifice everything to let him live til a hundred.
‘I… I will join.’
N clapped. ‘Very well! I will seat you in a dream meeting, where I will announce you to the rest of Them. The turning process will start when you and me are alone.
Xelqua felt sick, but could do nothing but watch as N lulled him to sleep and brought out his subconscious.
He was in a purple room with a round table, seated on a chair of purple velvet gilded with gold. About ten other people sat around him, each dressed in elaborate purple robes as he remained in a tunic stained with blood.
N stood up, and everybody snapped to, clearly referring to him as the leader. ‘Today I have brought with me a mortal, but not for much longer. His name now is Xelqua. I propose it be Q. His flaw shall be that once told a secret, can never reveal nor forget it.’
Everyone simultaneously nodded apart from Xelqua, who was still confused at the turn of events. Just now he had been transported to the void to kill his friends… what was happening?
No way this was real. Had to be sketchy dream magic. But the wind, the voices, they all felt too real to be a dream. He was interrupted of his thoughts from N speaking again.
‘Anyone with questions, ask now.’
A small person (god?) at the back stood up, and asked,
‘Q. Are you the admin of your server that’s been destroyed?’
Snickers all around, and Xelqua -or should that be Q now?- felt his face burning, ropes tightening around his face like a muzzle. Guilt still pooled in his stomach because of not preventing this situation from happening in the first place, but what’s done is done.
He tried to respond, to defend himself, but he couldn’t make a single sound louder than a hum.
More laughter. Apparently the sight of him trying to open his mouth was greatly amusing. Xelqua wanted to cry, it was so many eyes watching him, kill him now! This time N flicked a finger towards the Watcher who had spoken, who immediately sat back down with a sharp cry.
‘Anyone who disobeys me… I can cast a sharp pain over their body for as long as I want. Watchers, I will see to him adequately in due time, but in the meanwhile I do not want any of you to touch him, understand?’
They nodded again, scarily in sync, other than the small guy, who was still writing in pain.
The meeting continued in a language that Xelqua didn’t understand, and so instead he silently cried for all the lives taken today, by the hands sworn to protect them.
Eventually, he felt N’s hand in his shoulder, and somewhat sleepily, stood up, not caring where they were going. He walked through much purple mist, until eventually ended up in a cold room with blood-splattered floors.
‘Don’t worry, you won’t become part of the floor,’ said N, somewhat kindly. ‘I can’t spill blood.’
Xelqua stood in the centre of the room, not sure whether he should sit down or move. Suddenly, cold hands grabbed his face, hands that weren’t his or N’s.
N laughed. ‘I love this, every time. All the pain you feel will be by me, yet the actual turning should be relatively painless, other than growing the wings. The hands and eyes are of the omnipresent Watchers that have chosen you to Watch:’
Eyes surrounded Xelqua, and N hummed appreciatively. ‘It’s been a long time since we’ve had a newcomer with so many ancients assigned to them. I can tell already that you will be an interesting one.’
Xelqua didn’t want any of this. It was too much, too many eyes, so many hands on him, all of them Watching.
Gasps and shakes racked his body, yet he still couldn’t move his feet, chained to the ground without space to cry.
He could tell when it started.
First was the shivering. Uncontrollable shivering that came with bursts of pain, sharp shots of agony that pierced his body and made him scream.
Then his back ripped apart, no blood but an intense, all-encompassing torture that burned, burned so hard and yet nothing could be done about it.
Dark purple feathers sprayed out against his face, colliding with the existing set of green-yellow wings the suffering had subconsciously brought out. N paused in his maniacal laughter as the green wings snapped under the pressure, bringing a fresh wave of blinding pain to Xelqua.
‘Why do you have a separate set of wings? I suppose these cannot be removed? Why did you not warn us beforehand?’
Xelqua couldn’t formulate a thought, let alone a sentence, so all he could do in response was a grunt against his tear-soaked chest.
‘Useless. I’ll have to get a lower to rip them off for me. It would be tricky against the ribcage, your bone structure is completely off, I mean… it’ll be fine, just hurt like absolutely hell.’
The next few hours were just torture, and there was no way to even pretend it wasn’t. A short figure in a purple cloak without a face came in the room, prodding Xelqua with a cattle prod and laughing at the screams.
They eventually got around to his wings, and took great pleasure in pulling out each feather individually, breaking all the bones and completely shattering his rib cages
It was a never-ending cycle of misery that he couldn’t escape, couldn’t disassociate from and every time he started drifting N would bring him back with a snap of the fingers.
It took so long that by the end he didn’t know what or who he was, or how he was still alive.
They left him there, alone in a pool of his own blood, N’s final words to him being ‘You’re a watcher now. Figure it out.’
It took every ounce of willpower to slowly check if any part of his body was still working. The answer was no, but he couldn’t help it.
Healing magic was complicated and even as an Admin, he still struggled. Oh god. He was the admin, the protector, the reason why they all died-
Stop it, Xelqua mentally chastised himself.. Pitying himself wasn’t going to do any good. If he could just… focus all his energy into one place… and…
A small blossom of warmth arose at the base of his wings, relieving a little pain. Xelqua closed his eyes, vision blurring from the effort.
The darkness made him realize how much he needed to sleep… all he wanted to do was rest now. He wasn’t sure if he would get wake up again, but that was fine. He didn’t want to anyways.