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Night of Revelation – Part 3(/3)

When I say LittleBadWolf is always open for a commission, I mean it. They’re one of the most dependable artists I know, so I was happy to go to them for this final chapter of Night of Revelation.

Our heroes, having dealt with their respective villains, are ready to meet up and get out. This was about the point where I remember this was supposed to be a scouting mission and not the final fight, so I had to add some lines pointing that out.

Though this is not the end of “The Case of the Titan Syndicate”. We still have loose ends left to tie up.

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Twenty years of helping the poor in Oplentis, and a decade of life in the criminal underworld to provide for the downtrodden, ruined in a single night by a hot-headed young tigerkin and a scrawny detective who’s never suffered a day in his life. It was unconscionable. It was unfair.

It was more than Volpes could take.

“What do you plan to do with me, Detective?”

Drinking in the venom his adversary hurled with his words, Enigma merely took a deep breath. In and out. Then, he looked his opponent in the eye, helpless as he was due to the control the wolfkin had over his body.

“You’re coming with me… to the rehabilitation center back in Magistrum City. You and the older Azurium both, once my apprentice is finished with him.”

Hearing that, the titan allowed himself to hope again.

“You won’t turn me or my men into Oplentis’s guard?”

For his part, the detective shrugged. “Even were I so inclined, I couldn’t haul you in without exposing myself as a Magistrum detective working in a hostile city. The nobility that runs this place would sooner see me in shackles than listen to a word I have to say. It’s why the Magistrum can’t take direct action around here. We’re completely shut out save for any informants that manage to escape.”

“Who do you think enabled their escape, detective? No one else with the resources for it has the will to carry it out.” Trapped in stasis, arms and legs refusing to obey him, his words were all he had left to defend himself.

“I’m aware of the boon you’ve been to the people here. They speak highly of you, but upon further scrutiny, they also speak of your… shall we say ‘methods’.”

“Hmph. Go on, since you already know so much.”

“Your potion has other effects on its user than the obvious physical change, doesn’t it? The escapees I interviewed mentioned that you had an almost supernatural sway over your flock, as if they hung on your every word.” To underscore the point, Enigma snapped his fingers, conjuring an illusion of Volpes practically being worshiped by humans and other beastkin of similar builds to his own.

“That’s not… I don’t…” Even to the untrained eye, Volpes’s facade had fractured even further, his voice trembling where his body could not.

“Don’t what? Keep them under your control. Please. A man of my talents can see through a lie that transparent. Their minds are clearly tampered with. I noticed it when I put the guards outside this room to sleep.” With a wave of the psiconicist’s hand, the illusion was dismissed as quickly as it was conjured.

“This isn’t an ego trip for me, you fool! Imagine what would happen if my titans were infiltrated by the nobility. If they got their hands on our power, without a way to reel them in!”

“I never said it was. But there’s more to it than that, is there not?” Stepping forward, unafraid of his captured target, the mind mage looked directly into Volpes’s eyes, watching as the titan averted his gaze.

“No. There isn’t.”

Ignoring the denial, Enigma continued. “It is quite ironic. You’ve sculpted yourself and the people who work for you in a powerful fighting force. You are one of strongest, if not the strongest, people on the plane. And yet, the reason for that strength is that fear rules you so completely that you feel you can’t afford to be anything but the toughest around, completely in control. You can’t afford to let anyone threaten your position, not after everything you’ve gone through. There was only room for Volpes.”

Knowing the foxkin couldn’t move, Enigma looked away as he finished that sentence, turning his back to him. His quarry could only look down, at a loss for the words to defend himself. He knew the detective spoke true.

“I…”

“It’s a shame, really. You’re a brilliant alchemist. A once-in-a-lifetime talent. You could bring so much good to Crossroads, but instead you’re brainwashing people with false promises.”

“Stop… please.”

“Fine. There will be time enough to wallow in self-pity when you’re back at the Magistrum. I feel for you, Volpes, but enough is enough. You’ve gone too far, and you need someone to step in before you make things worse for yourself.”

“Do what you want, detective. It’s not as if I can stop you.”

As Enigma turned back to face Volpes once more, their eyes met. The titan expected the fiery gaze of scorn and disdain on the younger wolfkin’s features, but that was not what graced him. No. Rather, it was a pitiful scowl. A mixture of disappointment and resignation.

“No… No, you can’t.”

To the crime lord of the slums, thinking back on the little orphan foxkin boy from decades ago, it stung more than the alternative ever could. With Enigma commanding his body, the two of them snuck out of the compound, reuniting with the Azuriums in an alley behind the building they scouted the warehouse from.

Looking at the soot that covered Azurium where electric burn marks should be, and the snarling features of his apprentice, Enigma could take an educated guess at what happened.

“So much for this being a simple scouting mission, but at least we succeeded in our overall objective. What do you have to say for yourself, Edmund?”

Almost as if responding to a different question entirely, his apprentice gave him a glare with the intensity of a thousand suns. “Found the deadbeat, teach.”

He couldn’t help but look briefly at his own captive, and as they made eye contact it was clear that Volpes realized he may be in more trouble than he thought.

“Do you… want to talk about it, Ed?”

Without missing a beat, the young man made his displeasure clear with terseness alone.

“No.”

Taking a deep breath, the teacher resigned himself to his pupil’s answer. “Let’s go home, then.”

“Sure, teach. There’s nothing else fer me here anyway. This place ain’t home no more, if it ever was.”