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Peeking into the Emperor's mind was a spur-of-the-moment thing. Gus was ready to see some horrible things - possibly things that he could never unsee. But if it gave them a chance to win the fight then he is going to do his best.
He was right.
You can never unsee these things.
Belos stands over a kneeling Golden Guard, - "What a shame, you were so promising."
The man is a traitor, a disgrace. Someone who thought he could stand between him and his sacred mission.
He raises his staff and blood-red sparks fly. Gus doesn't know what this is, or what spell it was supposed to be. All he knows is that the energy hits the man in the chest and he lets out this ear-splitting scream that's loud enough to wake the dead.
The next moment he is on the ground. He isn't moving.
Belos and a strange shadow are talking at length. They are in the portal room and Belos is contemplating the machine. Hunter runs in, battered and dirty, but with a triumphant look on his face.
A key is hanging from his grip.
The Emperor all but snatches it from him and sends him away as if he doesn't even want to look at his face. - "He disobeyed me! I told him to stay and he disobeyed!"
Rage bubbles up like water in a boiling pot. The curse threatens to wash over him. For a minute he thinks he will let it - teach the boy a lesson he should have learned a long time ago.
He sends the boy away with harsh words. Hunter all but flees.
"You make those things just to destroy them," the shadow accused with glee from the wall. "Admit it!"
There is a lab, it's small and cramped and is covered from floor to ceiling with creepy things - like jars, animal remains, and scary-looking tools. There is only a dim light from a lamp on the table. It's dark and it's difficult to make anything out.
What Gus could see clearly was the table.
There is a book in front of him. The title 'Grimwalker' was written in big bold letters, but all Gus could see were the illustrated magenta eyes staring back at him from the page.
Belos turns and faces a patch of disturbed ground before him. - "Almost time."
Gus hesitates, but the memory moves like waves rushing in with the tide.
Time must have passed because now a hand is reaching out of the ground. Belos grabs it and pulls. He pulls and there is a man under there, and he is gasping, and coughing. He lets the man fall to the ground and lets him collect himself - he shakes, either from the cold or with fear. Belos hoists him up without any regard and makes him sit in a chair.
He is tired and annoyed and wants to do nothing more than to sleep but he can't, not until he is done here.
There are tests to be conducted. He has to check his eyes and his ears and the inside of his mouth as well as down his throat. Has to listen to the beating of his heart that's way too fast but slowly evens out. - "I can't afford to mess this up. This one has to be perfect."
The man looks up. Gus had seen this man before.
Only he is a boy.
Blue eyes are reflected from a curved dagger.
Blood drips from the blade in a steady pattern.
A man is lying on the ground. He has blond hair. Brown eyes staring at the sky. A grotesque gash on his chest - "You left me no choice!"
It happens over and over again.
Those hands mold the ingredients together. Raise them from the ground. Clean them, teach them, punish them. And in the end lays them to rest in a pile of bones somewhere dark, and forbidden. - "Why do you turn away from me? Even now."
The bones grow. The masks scatter. Those empty eye sockets stare at him with contempt.
The ghosts rise.
Hunter is a small child. He wears a dark uniform that fits him oddly. He adjusts it, then again, then another time until he is told to stop fidgeting.
"The Titan has big plans for you, Hunter," Belos says getting down on a knee to look the boy in the eyes. "This is what you meant to be. It's a big responsibility."
"I won't disappoint you, uncle!"
"We will see," he smiles, and it sounds like a light-hearted joke. - "We always do, in the end."
"I can do it. I will prove it to you!" the boy is full of pride. He stood tall, as tall as it was possible.
His uncle hands him a white mask, that of the scouts.
Hunter is standing before him, fully clad in uniform but missing the mask - he looks so much closer to the boy Gus knows now. They are somewhere strange, someplace filled with roots and trees and what appear to be paintings on the wall.
Belos flicks Hunter's hair out of his face only for it to fall back into place.
The boy's face is haunted and Gus could only stare.
"It's a shame. Out of all the Grimwalkers, you look the most like him."
"What?"
The earth almost swallows him, Luz is there - somehow she is there- and tries to save him, but Hunter is gone. - "I thought this one would last longer."
He returns as if he is waking from a nightmare. The spell-light slowly fades from his eyes, but the illusions - the memories - are still sharp in his mind.
No time, he has to move.
Hunter's there. He looks at him - his eyes are the same as countless others - as the drawings on the pages. His face is the same as a traitor's, as countless skeletons, as a brother long dead - familiar in a strange backward kind of way.
Gus wants to forget. He wants his friend without the memories - the long shadow of a man who couldn't let go. Without the feeling of bitter betrayal. Feelings that are not his own!
But there is no time. They have a fight to win.