Super Genetics
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B2 - Chapter 39: Hoverboard Gambit
🕑 Added 2024-12-05 18:00:07 +0000 UTC[A/N]: Hope you're enjoying! Slight retcon/addition in Chapter 38: the ghoul clan is called Fleshripper, but I forgot to include that. Small detail but figured I'd update you all so you're not confused when I reference the name in this chapter. Updated Chapter 38 accordingly.
Next chapter Tuesday, enjoy!
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Terry’s world froze, the emotions of the realization that Ben had named him Lightbringer nearly overwhelming him. His chest clenched at the thought and he forced himself to turn from Ben to find anything else to look at.
He turned his eyes to Obsidian Blade, and found the leader’s gaze locked onto him.
“You have named him?” Obsidian Blade asked, never taking his eyes off of Terry.
The weight of that stare seemed to pin him in place, but he felt a sense of pride that wouldn’t let him bend or turn away.
I have a ghoulish name…
He had never expected or needed to be named by the ghouls of Wichita; he was prince to them, though he would have preferred Terry.
But now he understood the importance not only of earning a name, but being given one. His thoughts flashed back to when he had first named Crunch. He hadn’t been adept enough to read the ghoul’s emotions or reactions, but in hindsight, the ghoul had possessed an obvious pride with his name. One that belayed the mundane nature of the word crunch.
A sense of silliness washed over him as he realized that pre-teen Terry had named all his closest friends with innocuous names. Crunch, Bloodstain, Burgundy…
And yet, they had never balked or indicated anything but pride with their given names. Perhaps it wasn’t the content of the name that mattered, but the relationship between the giver and receiver.
He shook himself from the emotions, giving Ben one thankful look before shaping his own aura.
In his mind, he held the image that he’d seen before—Ben standing at the center of a raging blizzard. All around him, icy death whirled, but never touched the man. Not only was he safe from the danger—he was the danger. Terry latched onto that idea, forming it into the aura as best he could.
It wasn’t exactly as he recalled from the one time Ben had given it, but he knew intuitively that he had still done the name justice.
He presented Ben to the elders with his ghoul moniker, Lord of Ice.
When he was done, he released his aura, waiting for the ghouls to react or for Ben to speak. He felt his uncle looking at him and glanced up to meet his gaze. There was an appraising look there and Terry lifted his eyebrows subtly in question.
Before he could parse Ben’s expression, Obsidian Blade spoke.
“Powerful given names.” He looked past them to Al’Ruzan and Mara-Lin-Jaid. “The oversized spawnling seems on the verge of violence. While I would never begrudge an excited youth a release, I imagine you would like to tend to your injured spawnling?”
Ben nodded, confirming the gesture with an aura shape.
“If you can spare the Blood.”
Terry’s head whipped up in surprise, then he schooled his expression as best he could. He hadn’t expected Ben to be so bold after the two groups had nearly come to blows. But it seemed Ben—and in some small way, Terry—had passed some sort of challenge.
The Fleshripper Clan had welcomed them into their fold—for now, at least.
***
Py Dar clutched the shield of bone with her four hands, imbuing her aura into the framework they had invented. At her side, Chippy floated on a smaller stretch of bone that Juan Carlos had strangely referred to as a hoverboard.
She didn’t understand the reference, but was nonetheless pleased with the result. Chippy had helped her craft the device by utilizing the aura framework they had isolated from Terry’s Skill. With a constant stream of the little Savant’s aura, he was now able to float on the hoverboard, even directing it by triggering certain sections of the framework.
With her hands freed up now from carrying Chippy, she was able to work as the group performed a fighting retreat.
Juan’s fire arced past her face, singing one of her olfactory antenna ends, causing her to cry out in surprise.
[Py Dar]: Juan Carlos! That was one of my primary antennas you nearly burned off!
[Juan Carlos]: Sorry!
Another fireball flashed past her face, just a handspan further out than the previous one.
How is an Artificer suppose to work under these conditions! she complained.
Her third donor would have told her that genius can only be fully realized with a sword held above the creatant’s neck.
She wondered if her third donor had ever had a swarm of bloodsucking sanguine hounding him while he worked—at a run!
The group’s attempt to penetrate through the liminal layer leading to the fourth of seven layers had failed. Sanguine forces had blocked the path with boulders that stretched ten ghouls high, impeding their passage the entire way down.
Despite that, they’d managed to fight their way through, only to find the narrow passage leading to the fourth layer had been completely collapsed. Crimson Spear had signaled a retreat and passed aura images that had given the non-natives the sense of an alternate route.
The ghoul elder had been very particular in his hand gestures, pointing to Chippy’s hoverboard, before offering another bone shield that a ghoul had been using.
It only took Py a moment to understand that the elder wanted her to create another, larger version, of the hoverboard.
As they fought their way back up the liminal layer, she fought her aura—and rising panic—to rearrange the aura of the shield into the necessary framework.
Sanguine fliers continuously harassed the group, darting from the inky black with nothing but the rush of wind to signal them. Juan managed to throw balls of fire every minute or so to illuminate the attackers, but she could sense his aura draining faster than it recovered.
But the sanguine were ultimately no match for the powerful ghouls—not in the scant numbers that they were currently attacking. It seemed that by closing off access to the lower layers, they’d effectively cut off their own reinforcements.
As a result, they came in small bursts of three or four, rather than the hundreds of the previous layers.
When the group reached the top of the liminal layer, the ghoul leader pointed to Juan, then out toward the yawning chasm stretching before them. Juan nodded and sent a fireball arcing through the dark.
Py felt her atennas twitch as she finally understood the plan.
Across a hundred feet of open space, a rock column jutted up into the air. Faintly past that, she saw another column stretching in the distance.
More sanguine attacks swept down upon them, the ghoul spears launching with a burst of aura to strike them from the air.
The ghoul leader turned to her, then indicated the shield of bone in her hands.
Pressure settled on her shoulders, her antennas twitching and her limbs vibrating uncontrollably. She pushed away those physical sensations, focusing utterly on manipulating the aura of the bone shield to create a moving platform—one they could use to reach the distant stone columns.
The words of her third donor rattled unwanted in her head once more—genius can only be fully realized with a sword held above the creatant’s neck.
She had never liked her third donor.
***
Despite the sense of urgency infecting his limbs—not only for their mission, but for the sake of Mara-Lin-Jaid—the Fleshsplitter Clan would not be hurried. They encircled the group, Al’Ruzan carrying the injured Seer as Ben and Terry walked side-by-side.
The currents of the surrounding ghouls’ auras were unsettled, an obvious disagreement passing between them. They managed to keep the specifics shielded from their group, but he couldn’t help but catch glimpses of the silent argument.
Outsiders in our home, was one impression.
But initiated in our ways, given a holy name!
By Surface dwellers! What weight is there in that?
A turbulent wave of aura passed among the ghouls at that, giving Terry the impression that most did not agree with the last sentiment. Despite their status as second-class citizens among the ghouls of this layer, there was still a sanctity among the name-giving of the Surface ghouls.
The silent conversation settled as Obsidian Blade led them toward what Terry could only describe as a temple. Crimson Spear’s clan had crafted an impressive entrance to their Evolution Chamber given the circumstances and considering the time they had lived there.
But the display before them now beggared the Bloodsplatter Clan’s best efforts.
Two dozen sandstone columns stretched up to the top of the cavern, flanking the entrance to the Fleshripper Clan’s Evolution Chamber. Each column was intricately carved with geometric shapes that he realized must be some sort of language. They were small, almost hieroglyphic in nature, trailing up the columns in a swirling pattern that made it difficult for his human eyes to follow.
Past the columns were massive ivory doors that appeared to be carved from the bones of some behemoth. At first glance, the images on the door’s surface seemed to be nonsensical. But as they moved closer, he realized that the images carved into the bone were just so small as to be unreadable from a distance.
Even close up, the tops of the doors were too far to get a good glimpse at the story seemingly told by the carvings. But at the bottom of doors, he was able to examine the images a bit closer.
It seemed as if the carvings were telling a story of the loss of the Lakarot. A font of some liquid that spouted high into the air in one image was now depleted in the next. Stemming from that, the ghouls in the next carving were at war, fighting sanguine, draugrs, and even other ghouls.
The final image seemed to indicate a sort of diaspora, a united front of ghouls spreading to the far ends of the Underworld as their source of life slowly dried up.
He was pulled from his examination by a slight scuffle behind him. Turning, he saw two ghouls approaching Al’Ruzan to take Mara-Lin-Jaid. But the big Duelist growled in response, eliciting a hostile stance from the nearby ghouls.
[Al’Ruzan, third of his name]: Tell them to back off!
[Terry]: Calm down! They’re going to heal her using the same method they used to heal me. It’s a huge show of trust.
That you’re ruining, he didn’t say.
[Al’Ruzan, third of his name]: I will carry her.
“What’s the fool doing?” Ben asked with a scowl.
Terry sighed. “He doesn’t want to leave her. Is it possible for him to carry her in?”
Ben furled his nose, then turned toward Obsidian Blade. The moment he asked the question, Whirling Bone took a hostile step toward Al’Ruzan.
“Tell this spawnling that he sorely tests our generosity!” The raw disgust in the elder’s aura was a physical thing that even Al’Ruzan couldn’t have missed. “Give the weak one over to receive the Mother’s Blessing. Or don’t, and let it die!”
The tension among the group ratcheted higher, Al’Ruzan not understanding the words but reading the intent just fine. He angled his body to encompass as many of the flanking ghouls as possible, preparing for an ambush rather than giving in to the demands.
Terry might have cursed the giant for being a fool, but he understood just how confused and alienated Al’Ruzan was feeling. Not only could he not understand the exchanges that had been happening for the past few minutes, but he also was carrying his dying friend in his arms. Being ordered to give her up to these hostile strangers was a tall ask.
For a moment, he remained silent, wondering if Ben or perhaps Obsidian Blade would interject and override Whirling Bone’s proclamation. But Ben seemed resigned to the ultimatum, simply shaking his head, while Obsidian Blade said nothing to contradict his subordinate.
Taking a risk, Terry stepped forward.
“Would it be acceptable if I carried her into the Chamber? I’ve been inside the Bonesplinter’s Chamber and witnessed the Promise of Return. I even received the Mother’s Blessing after fighting the sanguine in defense of the Bloodsplatter Clan.”
A confusing mix of aura passed among the ghoul elders and he had difficulty determining if it was a positive or negative reaction.
Whirling Bone—who Terry had realized was determined to undermine them at every turn—spoke first.
“See how Lightbringer lies? Perhaps these ones are spies of the exiles, sent to trick us from our store of Blood?”
Just as Whirling Bone projected disgust and disbelief with both his aura and words, Terry likewise pushed his sincerity and honesty through the shape of his aura.
“I defer to the elder’s wisdom on matters of the Children. But in this instance, I tell the truth.”
Before Whirling Bone could respond, Silent Death shaped his aura, pushing it forward in a ghoulish way of taking the floor.
“Tell us of your experience with the Bonesplinter Clan. We had thought them lost to sanguine raids many cycles past.”
He was a bit surprised to realize they were familiar with the Witchatan ghouls. In all his time among them, he had never fully learned the story of their arrival on Earth. There were carvings in the Evolution Chamber door, as well as the Awakening Chamber, that depicted stories—mostly of his grandfather’s journey in the Underworld. But as a child, they had scared him more than anything.
Thinking back, he wracked his brain trying to remember those stories now.
“My grandfather—” The word was different in ghoulish, more akin to the word and shape they used for elder, but he thought it sufficient. “—was summoned to your world as I was, long ago. The details are lost to me, but I know that a pact was formed between him and the Bonesplinter Clan. They returned to my world with him…” He hesitated, wondering if they would be offended by this next part, yet realizing that any deception would not go unnoticed. “They serve him…as vassals.”
He felt the shock from Silent Death and many of the surrounding ghouls, but from Whirling Bone, he felt only anger and denial.
“You claim that an Outsider rules over the Bonesplinter Clan!” Whirling Bone took a threatening step forward and Ben angled himself in front of Terry, staring the ghoul down. Their eyes met in open challenge.
“It does sound possible,” Silent Death said. “They did disappear without even a trace of their bodies or their wealth of Blood.”
Terry nodded, latching onto that single idea.
“I’ve seen it—their cache of the Mother’s Blood is vast, stretching further than I can even see.”
A ripple of shock ranged among the ghouls, but was cutoff instantly by a pulse from Obsidian Blade.
“You’ve interacted with them then? What was their leader’s name?”
He felt his stomach drop at the question. As a child, he’d never even known they had ghoulish names, let alone how to sense them. By the time he’d figured it out, he had only been introduced to a single individual of the Clan.
“I was uninitiated—” He used the word Silent Death had used earlier, not quite sure if it was accurate. “—so was too ignorant to learn his name.” He felt Whirling Bone’s smug arrogance through his aura. “But I did meet a lich who instructed me on the purpose of the Promise of Return. His name was Hoping Tree.” Terry pushed the images forward with the word, eliciting a surprised sound from somewhere behind him.
He looked to see the group of liches turning their hooded gazes toward each other, the ripple of shock in their aura ranging out plain to read.
Obsidian Blade sent his aura forward in response. “Speak.”
One of the liches inclined its hooded head, stepping forward.
“This one is known to us. Before the Bonesplinter Clan’s disappearance, this lich was a colleague of ours.”
Terry felt his heart lift at those words, turning to see how Obsidian Blade would react. The ghouls rarely, if ever, let their thoughts show on their faces. But he could feel the ghoul leader’s aura react, shaping into a form that Terry read as acceptance.
“This could be information passed by those exiles on the Surface!” Whirling Bone turned toward his fellow elders, his aura boiling with disbelief. “A ploy to sneak them into our good—”
Silent Death’s aura shot forward, interrupting the elder.
“Can you not read his aura, if not his words? There is no hint of deception or calculation in this Outsider’s aura.” Silent Death turned to face Whirling Bone. “One would think you had some specific reason to implicate these Outsiders—”
“Do not challenge me,” Whirling Bone hissed. His hand reached back for his spear.
Obsidian Blade sent a pulse of aura out, disrupting Terry’s senses for a moment, causing his head to swim and his eyes to fuzz. When he recovered, Whirling Bone and Silent Death had bowed their postures—along with the two dozen other members of the Fleshripper Clan.
“You shame me,” Obsidian Blade said quietly. “You shame our Clan. Both of you leave my senses. Fight it out if you must, but do not return until I deem it appropriate.”
The two dismissed elders left with a bow and it was impossible to miss the eagerness for violence in Whirling Bone’s gaze. For his part, Silent Death clearly strode toward the fight, though not with his brother’s excitement.
[Al’Ruzan, third of his name]: By all the gods! What is happening, Terry!
[Terry]: They’re gonna heal her, but I think it has to be me that carries her in.
He studied Al’Ruzan’s expression at that, and though he wasn’t as difficult to read as the ghouls, his alien features did make Terry wonder if that was anger or jealousy on the Duelist’s face.
After a moment, he nodded, passing Mara-Lin-Jaid over to Terry’s arms.
[Al’Ruzan, third of his name]: Protect her with your life, Terry.
Despite his previous inability to read Al’Ruzan’s expression, the unsaid threat of those words was clear as day in the set of his eyes.
Protect her with your life, or yours is forfeit, was the message Terry understood.
He nodded acknowledgment, then turned toward Obsidian Blade.
“Please,” he said urgently. “She needs the Blood.”
Obsidian Blade ranged his senses over her, feeling her aura, before turning toward the Evolution Chamber doors. Four ghouls rushed forward to peel the giant ivory doors back.
“Follow me.”
Then Obsidian Blade strode through the entry and into the dark of the Chamber.
