Work Text:
Part 1- Reuniting
The group looked over to the door next to the desk and walked over it. They stood in front of the door looking at it for a moment. Liz took in a long deep breath.
“Right… let's see what this is all about then.”
Liz reached out her hand and turned the door nob before slowly pulling the door open. The room was suddenly filled with the overwhelming sound of hundreds if not thousands of voices all having there own conversations. The group stepped through the door and into the room behind. The room they entered was enormous, large enough to fit several plains with no window, only being lit by several rows of bright lights running along the roof. The room was packed tightly with a sea of people. Behind the sound of the hundreds of voices was the low pitched drones of several exhaust fans keeping air flowing through the space. Liz looked around in amazement at the room.
“Holy crap… this place is enormous,” Liz said in amazement.
“Guess this must be some sort of government facility,” replied Alex.
“Hey you guys,” Tobin said grabbing the pair's attention. “I’m gonna head off and try to find some of my connections in the other guild, maybe I can find out just what's going on here. I'll see you round ok.”
Tobin raised his hand and waved as he turned and walked off into the large crowd leaving Liz, Alex, and Bip alone. Liz looked around the building scanning from person to person. She noticed a large podium at the far end of the room with a single microphone standing in the middle of it. Liz raised up her hand to point towards the podium.
“Come on let’s go try and get closer to the stage so we can see what’s going on.”
“Huh… oh yeah sure,” Alex took a step forward towards the podium before being stopped in his tracks as he felt a slight pulling on his shirt.
He turned around to see a scrawny well-dressed man wearing a pair of thick-rimmed glasses looking back at him with a familiar stare. Alex looked at the man in confusion for a moment.
“Oh umm… hello… do I know you?”
The man continued to stare at Alex without saying a word making Alex grow even more uncomfortable. After a few seconds, the man raised his hand up to his mouth clenching a small inhaler in it. He took in a short puff, instantly jogging Alex’s memory.
“Oh hey I remember you now, Puffs right?”
The man nodded in reply without saying a word leaving Alex unsure of how to respond.
“Well well well if they called you guys here it must be serious,” came a familiar voice from behind Liz.
She turned around to see Calem, Edgar, and Tom smiling back at her.
“Oh hey, you guys… what are all of you doing here?” Liz said.
“The cleaners guild was called here as well you know,” said Edgar.
“And my squad was ordered to come here and help out with keeping order at the meeting,” Tom added.
“Oh… well, it’s good to see you again anyway,” Liz said.
Her eyes glanced down to see a short stump of wood sticking out of his shoe. Calem noticed Liz’s eyes shift down. He raised his leg up and grabbed his foot and balanced on one leg as he pulled his shoe off revealing a wooden foot underneath.
“Pretty cool right. It took a little while to get used to but now I barely even notice,” said Calem.
Liz looked slightly uncomfortable as she stared at the wooden foot. Edgar noticed the uncomfortable expression on her face.
“Come on Calem… put that away, you don’t want to traumatize the poor girl,” Edgar said.
Calem slipped his shoe back on and put his leg back to the ground.
“So anyway…” Liz said as she turned to look at Tom. “You’re a captain, right? then you must have some idea of what’s going on here.”
“Uhh… yeah actually I’m a private now,” Tom replied awkwardly.
Alex waved off Puffs as he walked off into the crowd. He turned around to join the rest of the group. Liz looked on surprised as Tom’s words sunk in.
“Huh, a private. Isn’t that a lower rank than a captain?”
“Yeah, that’s right. After the stunt I pulled back in Niske I was put in front of a military court, guess the army doesn’t take to kindly to being blackmailed. After that, I was bumped down to a private and they are keeping me under a pretty tight watch. Honestly, with how much trouble I was in I’m surprised I didn’t get worse. Unfortunately, privates aren’t really privy to much useful information so can't really help there .”
Tom looked down at his watch before looking back up to the others.
“I should really get back to it, don’t want to get into any more trouble. See you around guys.”
Tom turned around and walked off towards a small group of soldiers.
“We should probably go have a look around too. Don’t get into any trouble you two ok,” Edgar said drawing Liz, Bip, and Alex's attention back to them.
“See you around,” Bip said with a smile.
The groups waved at each other as Calem and Edgar turned around and walked off into the crowd. After a few seconds of waving Alex and Liz dropped their hands and turned to face each other once again.
“It’s a little bit weird seeing so many familiar faces all in one place like this,” Alex said.
“Yeah but it’s nice to see all our friends again,” Liz replied.
“Oh... well I wouldn’t necessarily call us friends but I suppose it's nice to see you too,” came a cold, sarcastic voice from further into the crowd.
Shivers shot down Liz’s spine freezing her solid in place. She turned her head to look into the mess of strangers where the voice had come from. The sea of people seemed to almost part revealing Es standing ominously amongst the crowd. He began to walk forward out of the crowd towards the group, eyeing off Liz with an evil glare. Liz continued to stand motionless in shock. Alex noticed the fearful expressions etched onto Liz face. As Es grew closer Alex stepped out in front of Liz block Es and snapping her out of her shocked state.
“That’s close enough, what are you doing here.”
Es stared off Alex before cracking a sly smile.
“No need to get so defensive, I’m not dumb enough to try anything with all these Mages around. As for what I’m doing here…”
Es reached into his pocket and riffled around in there. After a few seconds he pulled his hand out a small folded up piece of paper and began to unfold it. He held the sheet of paper up to Alex revealing it to be a similar letter to the one Tobin had received.
“I received special notice to come here despite not being in a guild. Guess someone high up must have taken note of my skill and power and decided id be perfect to help out,” Es said with no small hint of arrogance.
Alex felt a tap on his shoulder. He turned his head to see Liz holding her hand out to his shoulder.
“Alex… I'm ok,” She muttered.
Alex stepped out of the way allowing Liz and Es to meet each other gaze.
“That’s all well and good but why would you come here, It doesn’t seem like you to want to help out,” said Liz.
“Oh really? You have such little faith, cant I just want to help out my country?” Es said, his voice laced with a thick coating of sarcasm.
Liz continued to stare down Es with a serious scoul. Es sarcastic smile slowly faded as Liz continued to glare at him.
“Fine, I wanted to have our final showdown but even I’m not brave enough to start a big fight in here with all these solider’s and mages around. But don’t you worry… it's coming very soon, so you best be ready for when it does.”
Es began to sink back into the crowd before being consumed by it completely and disappearing. Liz let out a long deep breath as her body loosened and she let her guard drop. She continued to stare entranced off into the crowd where Es had disappeared.
“Liz!” Bip yelled, snapping Liz out of her trance.”
“Huh… what.”
“You ok?” asked Bip.
“Yeah… I’m fine,” Liz said unconvincingly.
Suddenly a door opened onto the stage, only letting out a quiet creek. Every mage in the room instantly stopped their conversations and shifted there gaze up to the stage. An uncomfortable silence came over the room as everyone waited for something to happen. After a few moments, a man dressed in a military uniform with many colorful badges pinned to his chest strode out onto the stage. The man walked towards the podium in complete silence. He reached the podium and tapped the microphone sending a thumping sound echoing out through the stadium through the speakers around the room. The man leaned in close to the microphone.
“Ok people, times up. So without any further delay, lets begin.”
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TO BE CONTINUED
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Thanks you for reading Chapter 61 of Mage. If you like what you see please consider dropping a Kudos and maybe checking out the rest of my work. Also for any updates or if you just wanna see my cosplay adventure please consider follwing my tumblr here https://www.tumblr.com/blog/50funny and until next time have a good one.