The Shadow of All Worlds
Chapter 21
“Well, we are here…sort of.” Asantra said gazing into the distance. She and her companions, superheroes made up of humans and animals who called themselves Heroes United, had just arrived on the outskirts of Ebulon. They could see Ebulon in the short distance. “Should we continue onward?” The young protector sorceress was eager to find her enemy, Sampson, before he could do too much damage especially since it was her fault he was here in the first place.
The leader of Heroes United, Black Cat, gazed back at her. Worry was clearly showing in the cat’s green eyes. She knew continuing to Ebulon was the only thing to do as Ebulon was their only ally in this world, they had answered Yadi’s call twice now. But since their last visit much had changed within herself.
“What?” Asantra asked.
“It’s just…we don’t have a plan.” Black Cat answered hesitantly.
“What is it really?” a black terrier mix in a blue and yellow costume asked suspiciously. Star Power knew not having a plan wasn’t enough to make Black Cat this hesitant. His costume was a doggy hoodie with a big yellow star to cover the big white one on his head which gave him his name. Attached to the hoodie was a long blue cape with a yellow trim.
Black Cat ignored the question. Instead she flew up above the other heroes, her blue cape trailing behind her. The cape was attached to the neck of the green pet shirt the short haired black cat was wearing. On the chest of the shirt was Black Cat’s symbol- the bold black letters of BC inside a blue diamond with a cat scratch running through diagonally from right to left. “Before we continue our journey into this world there are a few things we should go over.”
The heroes immediately stood at attention. All of them knew that what Black Cat was about to say would help prepare them for the fight they would inevitably be in.
“We know that my old enemy, Atacir Rata, is here along with Sampson. Atacir has the biggest and most powerful dragon in existence under his control.” Black Cat then went on to explain about Golden Flame’s abilities and the bridal controlling her. “While Golden Flame is under the control of Atacir Rata, she is one of the good guys and if freed from the bridal she will return to our side. I believe in the upcoming battle freeing Golden Flame from the magical bridal should be our top priority.”
“So if we break the harness, we free Golden Flame and defeat Atacir?” a human girl wearing a blue and silver wolf hoodie costume asked. The costume consisted of a blue hoodie shirt with a wolf head and nose that left Wonder Wolf’s own head and nose completely covered. The wolf ears and muzzle were silver. The lower half of the costume consisted of blue pants with a blue tail attached. The tip of the tail was silver. Wonder Wolf also wore silver boots and silver gloves.
“In theory,” Black Cat answered Wonder Wolf.
“Sounds easy enough,” another human girl said. She was wearing a costume made up of a black shirt, black pants, purple boots, a purple utility belt, and a long haired black wig with a black mask attached.
“It might sound easy, Spy Girl, but it won’t be,” Black Cat warned. “The bridal is rumored to be indestructible.”
“Then how do we break it?” Spy Girl asked.
“I don’t know,” Black Cat admitted. “Hopefully even if we can’t break it we can get it off Golden Flame somehow.”
“If we do get the bridal and free Golden Flame she will be free and so will the dragons influenced by her, but we don’t know the nature of the dragons.” Wonder Wolf worried.
“It doesn’t matter, Golden Flame will use her powers to keep them tame if needed,” Black Cat said.
“What if even after the bridal is no longer on her, Golden Flame remains under Atacir’s control?” a large brown haired human girl asked.
“There’s also a possible problem that we may not be able to get the bridal off by any means.” Wonder Wolf said.
“Then in either of those situations we will have a big problem on our hands and paws.”
“Hopefully, things go as planned but if they don’t we will worry about it then.”
“Remember last time we were here and fought the orcs? We had no plan then yet we still found a way to win.” Black Cat said attempting to encourage the team.
“We also did a very bad job at acting like a team. I was one of the worst at this.” Spy Girl remembered.
“And that’s why we practiced being a team afterwards. We learned a lot and are a much better team now because of it.” Black Cat said.
“So do you think we can win?” Spy Girl asked.
“I think we have a chance as long as we are as prepared as possible and fight the best we can.”
“Speaking about being prepared, what are we planning to do about Sampson? He stole magic from the Mortal Realm before escaping to this world,” Wonder Wolf said.
“Maybe he doesn’t know how to use them yet,” a horse wearing a blue and silver costume suggested.
“Wonder Horse, it’s impossible not to know how to use a wizard wand. The magic’s already in them. All you have to do is know what you want to happen and it usually does.” Asantra sighed then brightened, “At least I have fought and won against him before.”
“You were still a witch then,” Wonder Wolf reminded her.
“That’s true,” Asantra admitted. “But I have become advanced in the use of sorcery since then.”
“Which is still the weakest of the three main types of magic.” Wonder Wolf answered worriedly. “Besides wizardry Sampson will also have low level sorcery at his command.”
“Still, even advanced sorcery against a combination of low level wizardry and sorcery should be easy to defeat.” Asantra said.
“Don’t get too confident,” Black Cat warned her. “We don’t exactly know all of what is going on here. Things are rarely as easy as they appear.”
“Even so, I’m not worried about fighting him.” Asantra said, “Though I am worried about all the potential damage he could do in this world and might have already done.”
Black Cat decided to accept Asantra’s answer since she did know Sampson best.
On their way to Ebulon Black Cat wondered if she should tell them about what she observed on their journey from their own world. If she was wrong she didn’t want to worry them unnecessarily, but if she wasn’t they needed to be prepared. Just as the group arrived in Ebulon she stopped them.
“Why are we stopping?” Chihuahua asked. The little brown Chihuahua was wearing his usual costume made up of a light blue doggy shirt with a rounded off red cape.
“Because we came to this world answering King Yadi’s call he obviously needs us. Besides I have something to warn everyone about.”
“What do you mean?” Chihuahua asked with a small whine. Although he no longer hesitated or ran away from battles he still felt nervous about fighting lots of new enemies.
Once again flying up above the group Black Cat began to speak, “On the way here I noticed some things.” She made sure everyone was paying attention before continuing. “First there were some green hairs on the ground that were obviously shed by Atacir Rata and there were no footprints of either Atacir Rata’s or a dragons.”
“Which means he flew here,” Spy Girl said.
“Right,” Black Cat confirmed. “And all this was expected, however there were footprints…three sets of paw prints and human prints along with some brown and black hairs. I could be wrong but I think Crimson Claw along with the combination clones he made by combining mine and Chihuahua’s DNA, Fang and Scratch, are here and the human…”
“Has to be Sampson,” Spy Girl cut in. “Who else could it be?”
“I’m not so sure they belonged to Sampson.” Black Cat said. “It’s true that Sampson didn’t use magic or Asantra could have tracked the magical energy signature left behind and there should have been footprints from him but the footprints I saw were too small to have been left by Sampson.”
“Then whose were they?” Wonder Wolf a
sked.
“Judging by the size and depth the prints weren’t exactly a kid’s but they weren’t an adult’s either.” Black Cat said.
Trixie didn’t need to hear more. Having taken his ability to become a wolf from him as part of her job as the Ultimate Shifter, she knew who it was. “Ryder.” Trixie was a special shape shifter who had the ability to turn into any living thing. She could take on any form she wanted, whether it be animal, human, real or mythical, it didn’t matter. She could even become a boy if she ever desired to. Due to this she had no true form of her own or felt the need to hide her identity using anything other than her real name. Currently Trixie appeared as a human girl. As the Ultimate Shifter it was her job to keep the balance of nature. Normally this meant keeping animals safe from illegal hunting and poaching, but sometimes it involved taking one of a shape shifter’s abilities. When Ryder misused his wolf abilities to lead an attack against humans she had been forced to remove his ability to become one, leaving Ryder a human with a few wolf like qualities. Most of these would eventually fade, such as his wolf instincts, his ability to sound like a wolf in any way, his fangs and yellow eyes.
“If even Ryder’s here then that means all of our biggest enemies are here,” Wonder Wolf said.
“Not all, as far as we know The Virtual Vampire isn’t here,” Spy Girl thought to herself hoping that this was true. Although he lived in the virtual world he had almost escaped into the real more than once. Spy Girl knew he would succeed one day and her worst enemy would be free.
“I’m sure there isn’t much to worry about with Ryder.” Trixie said, “He is powerless except his sharp teeth, intelligence, his instincts, and maybe his fighting ability which he is sure to have been working on…and actually at this point in time he’s basically still the same as when we last fought him only he can’t become a wolf.”
“I thought his abilities were supposed to fade,” Wonder Wolf said.
“They will in time,” Trixie answered, “And actually it shouldn’t be too much longer before this begins happening to him. For now all we can hope is that it begins before we have to fight him again.”
“At least we have one new trick we can use against him. He might not be able to become a wolf anymore but I can.” Wonder Wolf said with a wolfish grin.
“We will defeat him with his own power.” When Trixie had extracted Ryder’s wolf shifting ability it needed a place to go so she gave it to Wonder Wolf since she had some wolf like powers, which is how she got her name. That and the first Wonder Wolf asked her to take on the name and costume after her first and only adventure as a superhero.
“Wonder Wolf,” Black Cat warned sensing dark thoughts arising in Wonder Wolf’s mind. “You are a hero.” After discovering for herself how close the line between hero and villain really was and how easy it was to switch to the other side, she felt the need to remind Wonder Wolf of this fact.
“I know, I won’t forget.” Wonder Wolf promised though this didn’t stop her from thinking about and even enjoying many of the dark thoughts that jumped into her head about the many ways she could use Ryder’s old power against him. Ryder had a way of bringing out the worst in her. He was the only one who ever brought Wonder Wolf close to killing anyone before.
“Okay everyone,” Black Cat said regaining the attention of the heroes. “Let’s go find out what has been happening around here and learn exactly what we are facing.”
“I hope Atacir hasn’t collected too many dragons,” Wonder Horse said. He knew his ability to fly meant he might have to battle them or provide some kind of distraction.
“I know, that’s probably what worries me most about our current situation,” Wonder Wolf answered. “He could have a whole army of them by now.”
“I guess there’s only one way to find out,” Wonder Horse sighed as he began following the other heroes towards Ebulon.