Considering The Apocalypse As A Thing Unwanted

[Professor Charles]

Fast asleep I was when he came back. None too gently he shook me awake, at the shoulder, whispering quickly. “Char - Charon!”

“Hmm?” I awoke, brows rising before my eyes opened. Blinking hazily I came to, and found his face to be two inches from mine, with blue eyes blazing. Immediately taken aback I jolted, and succeeded in smacking my head off the back of the seat. Pain exploded across the back of my skull and I scowled deeply, even more annoyed when I could not lift a hand to nurse my head.

“You damn idiot,” I moaned, “Whyyyyy would you do that?”

A sigh came from the lips as he moved back, raising himself away from me as he uncurled from his crouched position over me. As my head continued to throb I mumbled more for a while, huffing and cursing him and his stupidity. Because it was foolish, waking up someone and shocking them so, when they had no movement to be able to react properly. Especially when you were the one who had bound them to the damn chair in the first place.

“I have your power,” he said after a while, after that brief moment of guilt had passed. “Well, some of it.”

“Great,” I rolled my eyes, lifting my free-er hand and reaching for the last of the water. “Some.”

“And I will give it to you in return for your oath of fealty.”

There it was. Another attempt at dragging me into his eternal servitude, his posse of companions, or ‘court’ as he liked to say, who seemed to always thin out in number after large events, such as a divine war. So far I had resisted his charming schemes, using first the fact I served the Old Gods, and then the excuse of serving the King of Death. Now, I was quite free, but a thing I had strived for for so long, and I was not about to let him take that from me.

“You don’t get it,” I replied, finally able to champion over the pain. Blinking solidly I cleared my vision and focused on him, as he stood there, arms over his chest. “I don’t care about my power. Certainly, I won’t take it so that you can use me here and there. I like being free, and having a life here, Morningstar. Keep me bound for another millenia, I don’t care, but I am not getting into one of your schemes.”

A great disappointment entered into his stature. Drawing himself upright, he glared daggers at me. “I would give you authority over much. You will be a general in my court, a captain at my-”

“I am not one of your weak-willed minions, Morningstar,” I interrupted him, “I saw you burped from Khaos as I was, I know you. You lose, more than you win, you always have, always will do. You want to use me as an artillery battery, fine. Give me back what power you manage to get, come to me, say once a week, and I'll do some menial task for you, like opening a hard to open box. But I am not following you into war.”

“An apocalypse is coming,” Morningstar whispered, his voice haunting as he leant towards me, “Similar to the Great Calamity. The prophets of hell are running riot with it, the oracles here are shaking in their sleep. It could mean the end for us all.”

Now that was nerving. The Great Calamity had been the final destructive force that had led to the end of the Old Gods. Then, the Thaynes had risen in power, and after that other pantheons rose up. It had been the single, most powerful experience that any of us had lived through, that had spawned a wealth of magic into the mortal planes as well as new forms of life. Our kind had lived, only to find new masters and new purposes - I had been with the King of Death, who had leeched off the Calamity and its slaughtering powers, Morningstar had thrived with a small court in the heavens. The idea of yet another apocalypse that had the power of the Great Calamity was not something to simply dismiss. After all, it had been the only one, single time where a lone event had altered all of the fates of Althanas.

“Well that is not good,” I mumbled, meaning it sincerely.

“No, it is not. But this is my chance, brother. Our chance, After the current gods have fallen we can finally establish ourselves, be the gods of a new order, a new race!”

“Fuck that,” I replied, now beginning to tug at my bonds. “We need to stop the thing from happening. Get me out of this chair, Morningstar, give me back the power that is rightfully mine, and I will go stop it.”

Morningstar blinked at me, dumbfounded. “You want to stop … a super massive, natural disaster … by yourself?”

“Yes, if I have to,” I snarled, tugging at my wrist. It would not budge, and so I held it to to him, at the end of its short chain. “Now, get me out.”

“No fucking way,” he murmured, eyeing me carefully. “You … that determination. I want it,” his eyes shone as he grinned. Slowly he unfolded his arms and leant over me, desire eeking from every pore. “You are coming with me.”