Fabi: Say It Twice and Disappear: The Nightmare

DANGER: IN THIS NIGHTMARE, EVERYONE GOES VEGETARIAN AND GLUTEN-FREE. THIS IS HAPPENING IN FABI’S HEAD AND DOES NOT AFFECT YOU OR YOUR SUBPLOT IN THE SLIGHTEST. YOU CAN STILL EAT WHATEVER YOU LIKE.

"Fabi, help!" Mara's voice echoed, high and squeaky across the grand hall of Mevolent's castle, now a war zone.

Fabi's froze in terror. The enemy army was on all sides, blocking every exit. It had been a trap, an astonishingly well-planned one. Fabi suspected Serpine. Mevolent was in the center of it all, calmly setting the Irish Elders on fire. Ravel screamed and tried to retaliate, but he couldn’t. “Fabienne, help!” Madame Mist screamed, her mouth oozing spiders as she looked at Fabi, a plea in her eyes. Fabi’s first thought was ‘uurgh, spiders,’ soon followed by a wave of guilt as she watched the three of them die.

Effie stubbornly charged with one of those metal suits glassblowers or the Mythbusters wear, but Mevolent simply waved his hand and the air pressed her back against a pillar. The pillar. The same cold, marble pillar Fabi had been leaning against when she'd gotten into this mess.

"Fabi! Use the Force!" Eff screamed as the sword slit her throat open and she died again. The sword...it was the same sword Fabi had lost, just after she'd been leaning against the pillar. Oh, gosh, she'd been so stupid back then...!

Mevolent let Effie's corpse fall to the floor and turned around. "Give in and your friends will live, Fabienne. The ones that are left, anyway. Give me the orb."

Fabi looked down at her hands and saw she was holding a Focusing Orb [from Glitch]. She couldn't, wouldn't give it to him; her friends would die anyway if she did.

Ember came from behind, with a syringe, but Mevolent was too fast, whirling around and skewering her with a sword, Fabi's sword. Fabi’s fault.

"Fabi!" Mara shrieked again, her scream abruptly cut off. Fabi turned to her left in time to see Baron Vengeous turn her friend’s body inside out. A fragment of skull and hair landed on Fabi’s shoe and she looked away from it, her face contorting into rage, sadness, helplessness…

"Give in, or they'll all meet the same fate," Mevolent said, his voice drowning out the screams, the clash of metal on metal. All that metal, and Fabi was doing nothing to use it, unable to make herself move. That was okay…ish. If she didn’t move, she wouldn’t be giving up, but she wouldn’t be saving any of them…

"Ready...go!" Death Rose's voice drowned out the fighting for a minute and the four of them charged. Death directly in front of Mevolent, Star and Raeza to his left and Aretha Tesla from behind.

Star summoned a puddle of ink, making Baron Vengeous slip and fall to the ground, but he was up in a flash, joining his master and sending shadows after Star, shadows she barely managed to dodge. Raeza was not so lucky, though, and she screamed as the darkness sliced into her, disintegrating into flesh-colored dust.

Vengeous howled with rage and started after Star, the two of them disappearing into the fray. Fabi couldn’t see what was happening, but she heard the disgusting squelching sound, and the look on the Baron’s face when he returned told it all. Another of Fabi’s allies wouldn’t be coming out of this alive.

Death glared, but missed, evaporating three sorcerers and five Hollow Men before Serpine came from behind and forced her to look at the ground. The foundation of the castle shook. For a moment Serpine looked almost gentle, as if remembering Death as a little girl. Suddenly, though, his face hardened and he went from holding her head down to pointing with his red right hand. A pillar and uncountable mages and Hollow Men crumbled as she flailed around before falling lifeless to the ground.

Aretha circled Mevolent, and he turned to watch her, his back to Fabi. That was her moment, strike, strike him down already, but she couldn't and the laughter and the echoes in her head, never back down but fail anyway. Aretha kicked Mevolent in the jaw and he snarled, sending a wave of air into Ari and knocking her to the ground.

Mevolent darted around in one quick motion, snatched the orb before Fabi could so much as think.

“Fabi! How could…? You~” The anger in Aretha’s eyes hurt Fabi far deeper than the sword that penetrated her from behind, she could ignore that, it felt almost…good. Good that it was letting the life out of her, releasing her. Don’t give in, won’t give in, don’t give in, she thought to herself over and over until she could find the strength to pull out the blade. It was a good blade, if (more than) a little bloody already.

Mevolent whispered something into the glowing ball and smashed it against Ari’s head. Her body began to glow with an eerie blue light.

“Assault on a Sanctuary official!” Zafira Kerias and a few others Fabi recognized from the American Sanctuary ran into the battle. The Grand Mage summoned a wave of shadows, but Mevolent only laughed. He simply held up the orb and the shadows fizzled out. Kerias tried to summon more, but nothing happened.

Fabi stepped closer with the sword, not going to mess things up this time, not going to let any more of her friends die, but Mevolent didn't care, he only spoke two words.

“Virelai, stop.”

Virelai…Fabi had never heard the word before, and yet it felt so familiar… she froze.

Oh, =_|||=_-|||->

The Grand Mage charged again, and Mevolent flexed his fingers. The air held Kerias in place, and Mevolent gestured to Fabi to strike the killing blow. She didn’t have a choice, he had her TRUE NAME. She stepped forward, shutting her eyes so she wouldn’t have to see the way Zaf was looking at her, as if she’d betrayed them all. It was as much as she deserved.

Fabi's eyes flew open, and Star, Ember and Liberty jumped back in shock. Liberty glared, Ember pulled out a syringe and Star gasped. "Fabi?  What happened?"

"I-I don't know." 

(Side note: Virelai is a replacement for Fabi's true name, not her actual name. It'd be the same as mine, y'see, and I can't let you know that.)

If anyone featured in this nightmare really wants the figment of FabiTC's imagination that resembles their character to be edited out of the chapter, let me know either in a comment or via email and I'll change it. Sorry for any inconvenience/upsetness.

My temporary absence from Blogland includes the MC, I'm afraid. I'll be gone until Saturday, maybe popping in for a little bit if I stay up late, but I'm a bit low on energy for that, so...see you on Star Wars Day! [hugs all] Basically, don't be offended if I don't comment on your chapters, I'm sure they're awesome, but I really can't be here, apologies again.

~Fabi