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The Fate of The Lich King - Perfect World Epilogues
Written by me, with editing and additions done by 
Sam Gwosdz
Inquisitor is © to me
Miracle is © to Sam Gwosdz
All other characters mentioned are © to their respective owners. The Perfect World is a story series set in an alternate universe of Colmaton written by
Wil Goldwing and the start can be found here: http://www.furaffinity.net/view/24422940/
Fourteen Months after the Apex War...Colmaton
Erin Flaherty’s fingers traced over the names of resistance fighters, engraved in a white marble wall. The lists of names she knew by heart, but her sense of touch conveyed the confirmation that the names were there. The raccoon sighed deeply: too many lives had been lost bringing Jonas Faraday down. Too many had made the ultimate sacrifice. Her friends, her family... the Ringtailed Wonder had lost almost everything. And it was only at the edge of defeat that Christopher Jones aka The Star had pulled it out and in a blinding light gave the United States and the world a new lease on freedom and liberty.
Even though she couldn’t physically see past the sunglasses that covered her blind eyes, she could feel them hurting, throbbing, and the tears welling behind the glasses, to stream down her cheeks. Her throat felt tight as she heard so many others sobbing silently, offering prayers, and hugging loved ones. Her legs quivered as even after a year the peace didn’t seem real. Every other night she’d wake up screaming from dreams that put her back in that hellscape. Cold sweats and a racing heartbeat became the norm even as she put on the best brave face she could.
And yet there was still hope. Tonight there was going to be a reunion of sorts, and in many ways a rebirth. She had the costume, her real costume, tucked neatly into a handbag that she had draped over one shoulder so she could manage it with her cane. Her time for grieving was coming to an end and she started to turn to leave when she bumped into something...someone solid.
“Excuse me…” she muttered, and started to step past the man, she sensed and started to walk past him. Then it hit her, the scent...the smoke...cigar smoke, and something else, older, earthy, like fresh tilled soil. The heavy growl, and soft chuckle scent a chill up her spine as she whirled around. “Kingman!” she gasped out, and blushed as several visitors paying their respects quietly turned to her and she dropped her voice, “...but you’re…”
She felt the ice cold hand on her shoulder and knew it the moment he touched her that this wasn’t a miracle she’d hoped for, but the voice and soft words came to her in a whisper only she could hear.
“I...still am...let’s talk...the sunlight isn’t kind to me.”
He then turned from the wall and walked towards a nearby tree, to anyone looking, the tan and white furred mountain lion looked as normal as could be, dressed in a brown trenchcoat to protect from the cold early spring air the attire wasn’t too out of place, nor was the wide brimmed hat, pulled down to hide most of his features, especially an eye patch and one piercing teal eye.
Standing under the shade of a sycamore tree, away from the crowd, and followed by Erin, the two could converse now without being a distraction. “What happened? I heard Atlanta was burned to the ground during the final moments as was several other pockets of Apex facilities in the South when the end came…” she remarked and the cat sighed again, it was heavy noise, and just the motion of shrugging shoulders, Erin’s heart sake when she didn’t even feel a breath from the corpse’s lungs.
“Your attack...or should I say...her... attack drew a lot of pressure off my horde… I made the most of it and launched a full scale assault of my own. There’s not a single surviving mortal lifeform that worked for that bastard in my domain.” The man formerly known as Inquisitor, and now known in the news as the Lich King bragged and referenced her commander Erica Decker. ‘At least that part of him hadn’t died’, Erin thought quietly to herself.
“But yes...I set balefire to those places and salted the earth over the ruins your glowing friend left me…after his...spectacular attack. I’d like to believe what I did... it was for the best… which is why I’m here now.”
“What do you mean? And this is the most...talkative you’ve been since...the attempt you made on Faraday’s life.” Erin asked, as the cat’s fingers reached up and touched a perfectly green leaf, instantly turning it brown, then black, then to ash.
“My powers are growing Erin, between bouts of madness and clarity I’m seeing what is in effect my end road. The horde is in hiding while the resistance rebuilds the country, and more numbers are being clandestinely added to it. Every fallen Apex with a corpse inside it, every fallen resistance fighter… as my powers grow, they are reanimated and added to the army… and I can’t stop it, it’s happening as easy to me, as you breathing. The evil inside me is taking control bit by bit.”
“What’s that have to do with coming here?” She asked, growing fearful of a new threat, her old friend, going mad with power, hordes of the dead, backed with Apex units thought destroyed, and even worse. She’d seen reports of him being destroyed time and time again by Faraday’s weapons, only to return as the corpse he resembled the day he died. It vexed Faraday and those directed to oppose the undead cat, and everyday the Lich King had been taking territory, now...with everyone so weary of conflict…and so many believing that without Faraday, the Lich King had no purpose to attack, she shivered until he spoke, sensing her unease.
“I came here to find you. I need you to finish me off for good Erin… my lichdom prevents me from harming myself. And, I’ve uh... used a tremendous amount of my power just to keep sane, to keep the hunger for power in check, and it’s not going to last.” He remarked.
“Me? What can I do, that Faraday’s ungodly weapons and machines couldn’t?” She started to sob again as her friend was returning to her, only to ask of her the impossible. “And if your power really is doing that...maybe someone could help, there’s got...someone, anyone that could save you…” she stammered. Her voice then lowered to a whisper.
“...you can’t make me kill you.”
He smiled, and shook his head. With his own whisper he replied. “You can’t kill what’s already dead Erin, and the only way to save me…” He reached into the coat pocket and took her right hand in both of his. She shuddered as she could feel the skeletal claw under the leather glove of his left hand, and the cold fur of his right. And pressed into her palm was a small box. “Is with this…”
She felt the box in her hands, it was only about the size of a deck of playing cards, with a tiny lock, and intricate key, only half an inch long, and what she could only assume were dark, arcane engravings...and hinges so it could be opened. “Wh...what do I do with this?” She asked as her hands shook as he retreated his own hands from hers. She had a few extra light grey hairs on the back of her hands and he wasn’t about to tell her, his control of his necromancy was being so badly taxed that even now, his touch was corrupting.
“That’s my phylactery Erin, that’s what Faraday wanted so badly to find and never knew it. He could have nuked Atlanta and if that survived...I would have too. And that’s how you save me...I want you to destroy it. Destroy it, and you destroy this monster in front of you and so many more about to be unleashed on this new peaceful world.”
Erin shook, but she put the box into her bag. “I just don’t know if… if I can… I mean… there’s got to be another way, I’ve lost my mom, my uncle, my best friends, my husband, and...and here you are when I never thought I’d see you again and…*sniff* why are you making me do this?” she sobbed until he let out a low groan.
“I wish I could cry like that again. You don’t know how badly I want to cry with you… but… I need this… I don’t want to be like this forever… I want to be free of this undeath.” He pleaded in a whisper.
“Then what about Erica? Or someone else… they could des….des...do it.” She sniffled and found him offering her a handkerchief. She took it and cleaned her tears. It smelled sweet like his cigars before they were burned. “No one else, Erica might try to study it, or she’d just crush it without any thought and be done… no… I want someone I trust, Erin. And I want a friend to do this. Just... keep it for now… think on it… but one way or another destroy it at dawn tomorrow.
She shuddered as he started to turn and walk away. “Okay...I...I’ll do it Kingman…” She sighed deeply and tried to get ahold of her trembling body and was surprised when he wheeled around. “Oh...I almost forgot… while I’m out with the living one last time, I’d really like to get some ice cream. My treat.”
“What?” she laughed as she continued to wipe her tears. “I’m dead...not like I can get an ice cream headache…and I’ve had twenty bucks in my wallet ever since I died... besides… I have something else to give you.”
An hour and half away at a small ice cream shop outside Colmaton...
The mountain lion and raccoon sat at the grey metal table, enjoying each other’s company like old friends and eating their sundaes. The face she knew to be Kingman’s seemed so off as he ate, of course she knew his powers had probably fashioned a disguise so he could move about in the day among normal people. But it felt like she was conversing with a shell, instead of the hero that was always leaping into a fight with a smart-ass remark. Sensing her examination he smiled and then watched her for a moment with his remaining eye. “You know… another reason… I want you to do it… I can’t taste any of this… who wants to live forever in a world where you can’t taste chocolate sauce, cherries and vanilla ice cream.” he whispered in disappointment, though the mountain lion’s smirk was plain as day.
Erin laughed at that: only this cat would make light of mortality and base it on something like ice cream, especially with everything that had happened to them all. “Then why you’d want to come here?” She smiled and then realized the shop was quiet, the people inside had simply disappeared and the mountain lion smirked again.
“I did say I had something else to give you.”
The bell on the door rang, and that was Erin Flaherty's first cue people were coming in. She felt warmth, and sounds dancing around the figures, framing each one as the door’s corner would hit the bell again. The sound of a gasp caught in her throat as the noise let her ‘see’ their features. Each time the door swing, once, twice, three times, five times in total. There was a soft tone of a vixen, who patted Erin on the shoulder, unlike Kingman’s hand, her’s was warm, her’s felt...alive. “Hey Erin, what’s up? Crazy meeting you here right?”
Erin shuddered for a moment and then found she was crying again “Cindy...is it really you?”
“Who else would it be silly?” Cindy Laroque, a blonde-haired red vixen, giggled and the other figures came close, their scent, their presence. “And no hello for us Erin?” the middle raccoon male smiled and held his arms out and found himself instantly embraced by the still sobbing, yet smiling Erin. “Uncle Randy! Mom!” She cried as she was embraced by her family. “Room for one more in this hug?” Cindy asked and was grabbed by the shoulder and tugged hard into the embrace by Erin's father figure.
“I’ve missed all of you so much.” Erin cried happily.
“I guess that’s understandable.” Cindy giggled and then Erin realized her vision, she wasn’t sensing her family, her tracing their outlines, she was seeing them. The eye colors, the light coming in from outside, the blue and white checkered floor of the shop. And those smiling faces, of her lost loved ones.
“Is this really real?” she asked and looked over to a healthy looking Kingman, smoking a cigar. “As real as ever, though it took a lot of pull from above...and a few favors.”
“Hey who said you can smoke here?” asked Gloria Flaherty, and they all laughed as Inquisitor rushed to put the cigar out. “Jeez...you people.” He’d laugh and stand up. “I’ll be outside…” he smirked and stepped out of the ice cream shop and out into the sunlight, leaving Erin alone with her loved ones.
“We can’t stay long, kiddo, but we’re so happy to see you again.” Randy remarked, getting Erin to turn to him and frown for a moment. “What do you mean? You just got here; I have so much to tell you.”
“We know, honey, but this place isn’t for you just quite yet. We love you so much and we are so proud of you. All that you’ve done. As yourself and as Miracle,” Gloria said quietly, and wiped a very real tear away from her own cheek. “We’ll always be looking out for you.”
Erin shook visibly; she couldn’t believe what she was hearing as her mother broke the embrace along with her uncle. “Hey, don’t get here too quick though, the waiting lines are worse than Disneyland.” Randy joked, getting another giggle from Erin as he wiped a tear from her eye.
“Goodbye, Erin, my little Miracle… we’ll be waiting for you.”
“Goodbye mom...goodbye Uncle Randy.” she shook again, realizing she was finally saying her last goodbyes the way she wanted to. Cindy sighed and turned to Erin. “I gotta go too, but hey, anytime you want to talk...I’ll be listening Erin.” “Thanks, Cindy… good-bye…” The vixen started to go, but then turned around.
“Oh, and I’ve got a message for you from Janet: keep kicking tail and she’s looking forward to seeing you again.”
Erin laughed at that. She knew Janet was happy and whole now with that message.
“Good bye, Cindy, and tell Janet that I will.”
The three turned and seemed to vanish, like a mirage, leaving the other two visitors to stare at her.
She hadn't recognized the remaining raccoon at first when he had walked in, but she knew his name: Derek Flaherty. But to Erin, she called him another more important name. “Daddy.” She then looked over at a man that brought another wide smile to her face. Looking at her and leaning on his cane, the opossum simply smiled back. “You’re still as beautiful as the last time I saw you.” he remarked softly and then stood up straight, and hugged her tightly. He then went to kiss her, just as she did and…
*Bonk*
The two grunted in discomfort and couldn’t help but giggle. Erin then embraced her husband in a way she’d only dreamed about in her rare pleasant dreams. The kiss was perfect, her hands found his back strong, his hands found her body… and there was a deep cough from her father, getting both to break their kiss and blush.
“Oops, sorry…” Erin replied to her father and he patted her on the head, and ruffled her hair up. “Nah it’s alright, I guess that’s to be expected… My, you’ve grown. I wish I could have been there kiddo, I really would have given anything.” He smiled and she nodded.
“I know, mom… she really missed you and…” He interrupted. “I know hun, but that’s old news, I just want to tell you everyone is happy here, and I don’t want you feeling guilty about any of this. You’ve always done your very best for those around you and there’s nothing you could have done differently that’d change where we all are now.”
“But I…” She tried to speak and found her husband’s hands holding hers. “No buts, Erin.” he spoke so clearly and confidently. “Anything that could of been done, could have very well meant us being together here, but then the people down there… they still need their Miracle. They need you, my love. And don’t worry: Elvira and I will be here. And when the time comes, we can get cozy on the couch, and be together forever.”
Erin nodded, the words sinking in and watched as her father turned for the door. “Daddy…” she called out and he turned. “Hey...did I tell you, you are the greatest daughter a father could ever have?” he asked as he faded away. It left her there, feeling the warmth of her husband, feeling his heartbeat through his palms, and felt his kiss again on her lips. “And you’re the best wife a husband could ask for.” He kissed her again and then a chill went over her body.
“Goodbye Erin…” the voice sounded so far away, she felt the need to shout. “Goodbye Gary! I love you! Gary!” she called out again and found her vision fading back to black, plunging her into darkness. “I love you…” she sobbed again. As she regained her bearings, she sensed the mountain lion still sitting at the table in front of her, eating an ice cream sundae he couldn’t taste or feel.
“Welcome back…” he murred and lightly tapped the table, sending vibrations through it that gave her the knowledge that her super senses were back in full. “Where were we?” She spoke in a hushed whisper, though his answer was one she expected. “At the gateway to the big house...I took your soul there, so for the last few minutes it’s looked like you were really having an intense staring contest with that bowl of melting ice cream.” He smirked.. “You wouldn’t believe the powers I have now… but… c’est la vie.”
He then got up slowly and with a grunt, as if there was some old ache he could still feel in his joints. “I gotta go… this excursion was draining and I need to meditate and focus to keep control, but… it was good seeing you again Erin.” Kingman smiled and put his hands in his pockets and turned to walk out of the small ice cream shop.
“It was good to see you too,” Erin whispered.
The next morning
Erin was still dressed in her new attire: a green synthweave uniform looked so much like her old one, but the addition of the gun holsters added a certain level of lethal potential she’d gained over years and years of fighting. She held her staff in one hand, and in the other held the phylactery that Kingman had given her. She felt almost compelled to open it and with little effort, the box opened up. As soon as it did, it began to play music: somehow the Lich King had made his phylactery into a music box. The tune was off but she recognized it enough: the song ‘Dust in the Wind’ by Kansas plinked mechanically on a little metal wheel. Inside as well was a folded up picture. She couldn’t tell what it was of, but knowing it to be part of the device she put the box on the floor and looked outside her window.
She knew dawn was coming even if she couldn’t see it.
The Lich King listened to the sounds of crickets as he stood at an overlook at the Sierra National Forest; it’d be the best view of a sunrise he’d get. The flesh mask he’d worn to move about the sheep and cattle below had long sloshed off his face, and his dark necromancy was radiating in waves of green fire so powerful that the nearby trees and grass turned to blackened, rotting mush. The kind soul that had spent most of the day before with his friend was now gone as the Lich fumed.
“Erica Decker...you stole Faraday from me!” He hissed as the skeletal half of his face glowed with balefire. “I will raze this country to the ground because of you.. He was MY Kill!” he roared and the ground quaked from the dark magic: birds in the sky died as they felt his dark voice pass through them.
“Damn you! Damn all living things on this planet!” he cried out as green fog slipped from his rotten maw, the gas killing everything that breathed it in. The madness of lichdom had finally taken a toll as the undead stored in hiding places across the United States heard the master’s call and began to stir. Dead eyes began to glow with green fire as they raised out of sewers, graveyards, and ruins. Much to the sudden panic of those nearby.
Erin felt the warmth on her cheeks; she also felt hands holding her staff, she could feel her family and loved ones around her, lifting her staff. Encouraging her. Helping her. It was time to finish this. She screamed and brought the staff down on the box, breaking it. She hit it again, and again, months of pain, years of fear and anger poured into her staff and into the box, breaking the little metal wheel, ending the music, the wood itself turning to splinters. She kept hitting the little box until she could no longer feel the warm hands around her, and till she could feel in her heart the deed was done. Her heart felt very heavy and she sighed deeply.
“Goodbye Kingman.”
As the sun rose, and light touched the Lich King, he clutched his chest and doubled over as his body began to crack open with green flames, turning on his own body.. His remaining eye widened in surprise “No...what have you done!?” he roared. “Erin! What have you done to your lord and master, you foolish wretch?!” the undead monster swung his hammer felling an oak tree in one blow, and then screamed in unholy pain as fur began to burn away, skin cracked and blew away, turning to dust on the wind. Soon only his long black hair remained attached to a skeletal creature with burning green eyes, dripping fangs of pure ectoplasm. The organs inside the body began to run through the bone like black liquid to the ground. All but the burning heart of Tezcatlipoca in the cage of bones that was his ribs remained. But even then that too started to fail. Bones cracked, breaking into powder and the lich fell to his knees collapsing further still. And with a final howl of anguish and pain from the Lich King’s skull he vanished and was scattered to the winds. Only the heart remained, waiting for new host.
All over the country, people screamed in terror as they saw the undead horde return moving to overrun the only remaining resistance fighters and fursons in law enforcement. This was the same horde that had thrown itself against Apex units over and over again in the South, and as handgun rounds hit zombies and animated skeletons the horde advanced undeterred until they stepped out into the growing light of the sun and their master’s call was heard again. It was a new call, one of pain and true, final death.
The animating forces left the undead in a wave moving towards the east and corpses fell to the ground, the fire in their eyes died, each one of upon thousands and thousands more of the army of the dead began to burn away with sudden combustions of balefire, reducing the horde to mountains of black lifeless ash. Leaving many shocked and terrified, as the horde vanished once again.
No one but Erin would ever know how much restraint Kingman had put into keeping this from happening sooner when no one would have been able to stop him. The Lich King was a result of his pain and anger, his inability to let go, his own self perceived shame for letting his friends and loved ones die and move on from losing so much he cared for. But such a road to power required a commitment to evil forces. He’d put himself on the path in case he had failed to assassinate Jonas Faraday. It had been a contingency plan that in truth the Inquisitor fully expected to happen.
Fourteen months after Faraday was killed by his own tower and falling creations, Kingman had kept shackled the beast of his own creation, that had ran wild in it’s war with Jonas Faraday. The supernatural evil he created out of his own body to annihilate Jonas Faraday and everyone he touched could never truly be appeased or pacified. And as Kingman’s reigns had finally slipped, Erin was there to stop the second apocalypse from ever happening. No one would know Erin brought to a halt to the threat. The dead burning away would be a mystery that would never be solved.
She breathed a sigh of relief and swept the box up, and dumped it into the fireplace, and lit it, to destroy any chance of it being rebuilt. The photo inside was one of two young cougars, Kingman Highborn, Terry Brown Jr., a bear and vixen, Brandy Bellue and Marigold Stevens, and in the center a raccoon girl they’d come to be great friends with. Erin Flaherty. As the photo burned away, the last thread of the phylactery’s power was broken, and those souls would be at peace.
Kingman looked around, he was back in the ice cream shop, and was sitting at the table eyeing the door, while twiddling his tan fur colored thumbs. He’d never remembered having tan fur naturally, his dark ash, almost black fur was all he’d known. Still, he was...whole, and warm, and somehow he knew his back was no longer hideously scarred, nor did he bare any scar or wound. He felt great, but just one thing was missing.
“Are you just going to sit there and let your sundae melt sugar?” the voice had he turning in his seat to see a smiling bovine with green hair. Her smile big and wide. “Pamela.” he smiled and his eyes watered, his voice shaking as he tried to think what he could say, what apology he could give for letting her go so long ago, what he could...and then there was the laughter of a child. And he had found his piece of heaven.
The End.
Sam GwosdzInquisitor is © to me
Miracle is © to
Sam Gwosdz All other characters mentioned are © to their respective owners. The Perfect World is a story series set in an alternate universe of Colmaton written by
Wil Goldwing and the start can be found here: http://www.furaffinity.net/view/24422940/Fourteen Months after the Apex War...Colmaton
Erin Flaherty’s fingers traced over the names of resistance fighters, engraved in a white marble wall. The lists of names she knew by heart, but her sense of touch conveyed the confirmation that the names were there. The raccoon sighed deeply: too many lives had been lost bringing Jonas Faraday down. Too many had made the ultimate sacrifice. Her friends, her family... the Ringtailed Wonder had lost almost everything. And it was only at the edge of defeat that Christopher Jones aka The Star had pulled it out and in a blinding light gave the United States and the world a new lease on freedom and liberty.
Even though she couldn’t physically see past the sunglasses that covered her blind eyes, she could feel them hurting, throbbing, and the tears welling behind the glasses, to stream down her cheeks. Her throat felt tight as she heard so many others sobbing silently, offering prayers, and hugging loved ones. Her legs quivered as even after a year the peace didn’t seem real. Every other night she’d wake up screaming from dreams that put her back in that hellscape. Cold sweats and a racing heartbeat became the norm even as she put on the best brave face she could.
And yet there was still hope. Tonight there was going to be a reunion of sorts, and in many ways a rebirth. She had the costume, her real costume, tucked neatly into a handbag that she had draped over one shoulder so she could manage it with her cane. Her time for grieving was coming to an end and she started to turn to leave when she bumped into something...someone solid.
“Excuse me…” she muttered, and started to step past the man, she sensed and started to walk past him. Then it hit her, the scent...the smoke...cigar smoke, and something else, older, earthy, like fresh tilled soil. The heavy growl, and soft chuckle scent a chill up her spine as she whirled around. “Kingman!” she gasped out, and blushed as several visitors paying their respects quietly turned to her and she dropped her voice, “...but you’re…”
She felt the ice cold hand on her shoulder and knew it the moment he touched her that this wasn’t a miracle she’d hoped for, but the voice and soft words came to her in a whisper only she could hear.
“I...still am...let’s talk...the sunlight isn’t kind to me.”
He then turned from the wall and walked towards a nearby tree, to anyone looking, the tan and white furred mountain lion looked as normal as could be, dressed in a brown trenchcoat to protect from the cold early spring air the attire wasn’t too out of place, nor was the wide brimmed hat, pulled down to hide most of his features, especially an eye patch and one piercing teal eye.
Standing under the shade of a sycamore tree, away from the crowd, and followed by Erin, the two could converse now without being a distraction. “What happened? I heard Atlanta was burned to the ground during the final moments as was several other pockets of Apex facilities in the South when the end came…” she remarked and the cat sighed again, it was heavy noise, and just the motion of shrugging shoulders, Erin’s heart sake when she didn’t even feel a breath from the corpse’s lungs.
“Your attack...or should I say...her... attack drew a lot of pressure off my horde… I made the most of it and launched a full scale assault of my own. There’s not a single surviving mortal lifeform that worked for that bastard in my domain.” The man formerly known as Inquisitor, and now known in the news as the Lich King bragged and referenced her commander Erica Decker. ‘At least that part of him hadn’t died’, Erin thought quietly to herself.
“But yes...I set balefire to those places and salted the earth over the ruins your glowing friend left me…after his...spectacular attack. I’d like to believe what I did... it was for the best… which is why I’m here now.”
“What do you mean? And this is the most...talkative you’ve been since...the attempt you made on Faraday’s life.” Erin asked, as the cat’s fingers reached up and touched a perfectly green leaf, instantly turning it brown, then black, then to ash.
“My powers are growing Erin, between bouts of madness and clarity I’m seeing what is in effect my end road. The horde is in hiding while the resistance rebuilds the country, and more numbers are being clandestinely added to it. Every fallen Apex with a corpse inside it, every fallen resistance fighter… as my powers grow, they are reanimated and added to the army… and I can’t stop it, it’s happening as easy to me, as you breathing. The evil inside me is taking control bit by bit.”
“What’s that have to do with coming here?” She asked, growing fearful of a new threat, her old friend, going mad with power, hordes of the dead, backed with Apex units thought destroyed, and even worse. She’d seen reports of him being destroyed time and time again by Faraday’s weapons, only to return as the corpse he resembled the day he died. It vexed Faraday and those directed to oppose the undead cat, and everyday the Lich King had been taking territory, now...with everyone so weary of conflict…and so many believing that without Faraday, the Lich King had no purpose to attack, she shivered until he spoke, sensing her unease.
“I came here to find you. I need you to finish me off for good Erin… my lichdom prevents me from harming myself. And, I’ve uh... used a tremendous amount of my power just to keep sane, to keep the hunger for power in check, and it’s not going to last.” He remarked.
“Me? What can I do, that Faraday’s ungodly weapons and machines couldn’t?” She started to sob again as her friend was returning to her, only to ask of her the impossible. “And if your power really is doing that...maybe someone could help, there’s got...someone, anyone that could save you…” she stammered. Her voice then lowered to a whisper.
“...you can’t make me kill you.”
He smiled, and shook his head. With his own whisper he replied. “You can’t kill what’s already dead Erin, and the only way to save me…” He reached into the coat pocket and took her right hand in both of his. She shuddered as she could feel the skeletal claw under the leather glove of his left hand, and the cold fur of his right. And pressed into her palm was a small box. “Is with this…”
She felt the box in her hands, it was only about the size of a deck of playing cards, with a tiny lock, and intricate key, only half an inch long, and what she could only assume were dark, arcane engravings...and hinges so it could be opened. “Wh...what do I do with this?” She asked as her hands shook as he retreated his own hands from hers. She had a few extra light grey hairs on the back of her hands and he wasn’t about to tell her, his control of his necromancy was being so badly taxed that even now, his touch was corrupting.
“That’s my phylactery Erin, that’s what Faraday wanted so badly to find and never knew it. He could have nuked Atlanta and if that survived...I would have too. And that’s how you save me...I want you to destroy it. Destroy it, and you destroy this monster in front of you and so many more about to be unleashed on this new peaceful world.”
Erin shook, but she put the box into her bag. “I just don’t know if… if I can… I mean… there’s got to be another way, I’ve lost my mom, my uncle, my best friends, my husband, and...and here you are when I never thought I’d see you again and…*sniff* why are you making me do this?” she sobbed until he let out a low groan.
“I wish I could cry like that again. You don’t know how badly I want to cry with you… but… I need this… I don’t want to be like this forever… I want to be free of this undeath.” He pleaded in a whisper.
“Then what about Erica? Or someone else… they could des….des...do it.” She sniffled and found him offering her a handkerchief. She took it and cleaned her tears. It smelled sweet like his cigars before they were burned. “No one else, Erica might try to study it, or she’d just crush it without any thought and be done… no… I want someone I trust, Erin. And I want a friend to do this. Just... keep it for now… think on it… but one way or another destroy it at dawn tomorrow.
She shuddered as he started to turn and walk away. “Okay...I...I’ll do it Kingman…” She sighed deeply and tried to get ahold of her trembling body and was surprised when he wheeled around. “Oh...I almost forgot… while I’m out with the living one last time, I’d really like to get some ice cream. My treat.”
“What?” she laughed as she continued to wipe her tears. “I’m dead...not like I can get an ice cream headache…and I’ve had twenty bucks in my wallet ever since I died... besides… I have something else to give you.”
An hour and half away at a small ice cream shop outside Colmaton...
The mountain lion and raccoon sat at the grey metal table, enjoying each other’s company like old friends and eating their sundaes. The face she knew to be Kingman’s seemed so off as he ate, of course she knew his powers had probably fashioned a disguise so he could move about in the day among normal people. But it felt like she was conversing with a shell, instead of the hero that was always leaping into a fight with a smart-ass remark. Sensing her examination he smiled and then watched her for a moment with his remaining eye. “You know… another reason… I want you to do it… I can’t taste any of this… who wants to live forever in a world where you can’t taste chocolate sauce, cherries and vanilla ice cream.” he whispered in disappointment, though the mountain lion’s smirk was plain as day.
Erin laughed at that: only this cat would make light of mortality and base it on something like ice cream, especially with everything that had happened to them all. “Then why you’d want to come here?” She smiled and then realized the shop was quiet, the people inside had simply disappeared and the mountain lion smirked again.
“I did say I had something else to give you.”
The bell on the door rang, and that was Erin Flaherty's first cue people were coming in. She felt warmth, and sounds dancing around the figures, framing each one as the door’s corner would hit the bell again. The sound of a gasp caught in her throat as the noise let her ‘see’ their features. Each time the door swing, once, twice, three times, five times in total. There was a soft tone of a vixen, who patted Erin on the shoulder, unlike Kingman’s hand, her’s was warm, her’s felt...alive. “Hey Erin, what’s up? Crazy meeting you here right?”
Erin shuddered for a moment and then found she was crying again “Cindy...is it really you?”
“Who else would it be silly?” Cindy Laroque, a blonde-haired red vixen, giggled and the other figures came close, their scent, their presence. “And no hello for us Erin?” the middle raccoon male smiled and held his arms out and found himself instantly embraced by the still sobbing, yet smiling Erin. “Uncle Randy! Mom!” She cried as she was embraced by her family. “Room for one more in this hug?” Cindy asked and was grabbed by the shoulder and tugged hard into the embrace by Erin's father figure.
“I’ve missed all of you so much.” Erin cried happily.
“I guess that’s understandable.” Cindy giggled and then Erin realized her vision, she wasn’t sensing her family, her tracing their outlines, she was seeing them. The eye colors, the light coming in from outside, the blue and white checkered floor of the shop. And those smiling faces, of her lost loved ones.
“Is this really real?” she asked and looked over to a healthy looking Kingman, smoking a cigar. “As real as ever, though it took a lot of pull from above...and a few favors.”
“Hey who said you can smoke here?” asked Gloria Flaherty, and they all laughed as Inquisitor rushed to put the cigar out. “Jeez...you people.” He’d laugh and stand up. “I’ll be outside…” he smirked and stepped out of the ice cream shop and out into the sunlight, leaving Erin alone with her loved ones.
“We can’t stay long, kiddo, but we’re so happy to see you again.” Randy remarked, getting Erin to turn to him and frown for a moment. “What do you mean? You just got here; I have so much to tell you.”
“We know, honey, but this place isn’t for you just quite yet. We love you so much and we are so proud of you. All that you’ve done. As yourself and as Miracle,” Gloria said quietly, and wiped a very real tear away from her own cheek. “We’ll always be looking out for you.”
Erin shook visibly; she couldn’t believe what she was hearing as her mother broke the embrace along with her uncle. “Hey, don’t get here too quick though, the waiting lines are worse than Disneyland.” Randy joked, getting another giggle from Erin as he wiped a tear from her eye.
“Goodbye, Erin, my little Miracle… we’ll be waiting for you.”
“Goodbye mom...goodbye Uncle Randy.” she shook again, realizing she was finally saying her last goodbyes the way she wanted to. Cindy sighed and turned to Erin. “I gotta go too, but hey, anytime you want to talk...I’ll be listening Erin.” “Thanks, Cindy… good-bye…” The vixen started to go, but then turned around.
“Oh, and I’ve got a message for you from Janet: keep kicking tail and she’s looking forward to seeing you again.”
Erin laughed at that. She knew Janet was happy and whole now with that message.
“Good bye, Cindy, and tell Janet that I will.”
The three turned and seemed to vanish, like a mirage, leaving the other two visitors to stare at her.
She hadn't recognized the remaining raccoon at first when he had walked in, but she knew his name: Derek Flaherty. But to Erin, she called him another more important name. “Daddy.” She then looked over at a man that brought another wide smile to her face. Looking at her and leaning on his cane, the opossum simply smiled back. “You’re still as beautiful as the last time I saw you.” he remarked softly and then stood up straight, and hugged her tightly. He then went to kiss her, just as she did and…
*Bonk*
The two grunted in discomfort and couldn’t help but giggle. Erin then embraced her husband in a way she’d only dreamed about in her rare pleasant dreams. The kiss was perfect, her hands found his back strong, his hands found her body… and there was a deep cough from her father, getting both to break their kiss and blush.
“Oops, sorry…” Erin replied to her father and he patted her on the head, and ruffled her hair up. “Nah it’s alright, I guess that’s to be expected… My, you’ve grown. I wish I could have been there kiddo, I really would have given anything.” He smiled and she nodded.
“I know, mom… she really missed you and…” He interrupted. “I know hun, but that’s old news, I just want to tell you everyone is happy here, and I don’t want you feeling guilty about any of this. You’ve always done your very best for those around you and there’s nothing you could have done differently that’d change where we all are now.”
“But I…” She tried to speak and found her husband’s hands holding hers. “No buts, Erin.” he spoke so clearly and confidently. “Anything that could of been done, could have very well meant us being together here, but then the people down there… they still need their Miracle. They need you, my love. And don’t worry: Elvira and I will be here. And when the time comes, we can get cozy on the couch, and be together forever.”
Erin nodded, the words sinking in and watched as her father turned for the door. “Daddy…” she called out and he turned. “Hey...did I tell you, you are the greatest daughter a father could ever have?” he asked as he faded away. It left her there, feeling the warmth of her husband, feeling his heartbeat through his palms, and felt his kiss again on her lips. “And you’re the best wife a husband could ask for.” He kissed her again and then a chill went over her body.
“Goodbye Erin…” the voice sounded so far away, she felt the need to shout. “Goodbye Gary! I love you! Gary!” she called out again and found her vision fading back to black, plunging her into darkness. “I love you…” she sobbed again. As she regained her bearings, she sensed the mountain lion still sitting at the table in front of her, eating an ice cream sundae he couldn’t taste or feel.
“Welcome back…” he murred and lightly tapped the table, sending vibrations through it that gave her the knowledge that her super senses were back in full. “Where were we?” She spoke in a hushed whisper, though his answer was one she expected. “At the gateway to the big house...I took your soul there, so for the last few minutes it’s looked like you were really having an intense staring contest with that bowl of melting ice cream.” He smirked.. “You wouldn’t believe the powers I have now… but… c’est la vie.”
He then got up slowly and with a grunt, as if there was some old ache he could still feel in his joints. “I gotta go… this excursion was draining and I need to meditate and focus to keep control, but… it was good seeing you again Erin.” Kingman smiled and put his hands in his pockets and turned to walk out of the small ice cream shop.
“It was good to see you too,” Erin whispered.
The next morning
Erin was still dressed in her new attire: a green synthweave uniform looked so much like her old one, but the addition of the gun holsters added a certain level of lethal potential she’d gained over years and years of fighting. She held her staff in one hand, and in the other held the phylactery that Kingman had given her. She felt almost compelled to open it and with little effort, the box opened up. As soon as it did, it began to play music: somehow the Lich King had made his phylactery into a music box. The tune was off but she recognized it enough: the song ‘Dust in the Wind’ by Kansas plinked mechanically on a little metal wheel. Inside as well was a folded up picture. She couldn’t tell what it was of, but knowing it to be part of the device she put the box on the floor and looked outside her window.
She knew dawn was coming even if she couldn’t see it.
The Lich King listened to the sounds of crickets as he stood at an overlook at the Sierra National Forest; it’d be the best view of a sunrise he’d get. The flesh mask he’d worn to move about the sheep and cattle below had long sloshed off his face, and his dark necromancy was radiating in waves of green fire so powerful that the nearby trees and grass turned to blackened, rotting mush. The kind soul that had spent most of the day before with his friend was now gone as the Lich fumed.
“Erica Decker...you stole Faraday from me!” He hissed as the skeletal half of his face glowed with balefire. “I will raze this country to the ground because of you.. He was MY Kill!” he roared and the ground quaked from the dark magic: birds in the sky died as they felt his dark voice pass through them.
“Damn you! Damn all living things on this planet!” he cried out as green fog slipped from his rotten maw, the gas killing everything that breathed it in. The madness of lichdom had finally taken a toll as the undead stored in hiding places across the United States heard the master’s call and began to stir. Dead eyes began to glow with green fire as they raised out of sewers, graveyards, and ruins. Much to the sudden panic of those nearby.
Erin felt the warmth on her cheeks; she also felt hands holding her staff, she could feel her family and loved ones around her, lifting her staff. Encouraging her. Helping her. It was time to finish this. She screamed and brought the staff down on the box, breaking it. She hit it again, and again, months of pain, years of fear and anger poured into her staff and into the box, breaking the little metal wheel, ending the music, the wood itself turning to splinters. She kept hitting the little box until she could no longer feel the warm hands around her, and till she could feel in her heart the deed was done. Her heart felt very heavy and she sighed deeply.
“Goodbye Kingman.”
As the sun rose, and light touched the Lich King, he clutched his chest and doubled over as his body began to crack open with green flames, turning on his own body.. His remaining eye widened in surprise “No...what have you done!?” he roared. “Erin! What have you done to your lord and master, you foolish wretch?!” the undead monster swung his hammer felling an oak tree in one blow, and then screamed in unholy pain as fur began to burn away, skin cracked and blew away, turning to dust on the wind. Soon only his long black hair remained attached to a skeletal creature with burning green eyes, dripping fangs of pure ectoplasm. The organs inside the body began to run through the bone like black liquid to the ground. All but the burning heart of Tezcatlipoca in the cage of bones that was his ribs remained. But even then that too started to fail. Bones cracked, breaking into powder and the lich fell to his knees collapsing further still. And with a final howl of anguish and pain from the Lich King’s skull he vanished and was scattered to the winds. Only the heart remained, waiting for new host.
All over the country, people screamed in terror as they saw the undead horde return moving to overrun the only remaining resistance fighters and fursons in law enforcement. This was the same horde that had thrown itself against Apex units over and over again in the South, and as handgun rounds hit zombies and animated skeletons the horde advanced undeterred until they stepped out into the growing light of the sun and their master’s call was heard again. It was a new call, one of pain and true, final death.
The animating forces left the undead in a wave moving towards the east and corpses fell to the ground, the fire in their eyes died, each one of upon thousands and thousands more of the army of the dead began to burn away with sudden combustions of balefire, reducing the horde to mountains of black lifeless ash. Leaving many shocked and terrified, as the horde vanished once again.
No one but Erin would ever know how much restraint Kingman had put into keeping this from happening sooner when no one would have been able to stop him. The Lich King was a result of his pain and anger, his inability to let go, his own self perceived shame for letting his friends and loved ones die and move on from losing so much he cared for. But such a road to power required a commitment to evil forces. He’d put himself on the path in case he had failed to assassinate Jonas Faraday. It had been a contingency plan that in truth the Inquisitor fully expected to happen.
Fourteen months after Faraday was killed by his own tower and falling creations, Kingman had kept shackled the beast of his own creation, that had ran wild in it’s war with Jonas Faraday. The supernatural evil he created out of his own body to annihilate Jonas Faraday and everyone he touched could never truly be appeased or pacified. And as Kingman’s reigns had finally slipped, Erin was there to stop the second apocalypse from ever happening. No one would know Erin brought to a halt to the threat. The dead burning away would be a mystery that would never be solved.
She breathed a sigh of relief and swept the box up, and dumped it into the fireplace, and lit it, to destroy any chance of it being rebuilt. The photo inside was one of two young cougars, Kingman Highborn, Terry Brown Jr., a bear and vixen, Brandy Bellue and Marigold Stevens, and in the center a raccoon girl they’d come to be great friends with. Erin Flaherty. As the photo burned away, the last thread of the phylactery’s power was broken, and those souls would be at peace.
Kingman looked around, he was back in the ice cream shop, and was sitting at the table eyeing the door, while twiddling his tan fur colored thumbs. He’d never remembered having tan fur naturally, his dark ash, almost black fur was all he’d known. Still, he was...whole, and warm, and somehow he knew his back was no longer hideously scarred, nor did he bare any scar or wound. He felt great, but just one thing was missing.
“Are you just going to sit there and let your sundae melt sugar?” the voice had he turning in his seat to see a smiling bovine with green hair. Her smile big and wide. “Pamela.” he smiled and his eyes watered, his voice shaking as he tried to think what he could say, what apology he could give for letting her go so long ago, what he could...and then there was the laughter of a child. And he had found his piece of heaven.
The End.
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