Moone turned back to the front of the vault, and discovered one of the large reptile-like alien beings stooped there, where the shapeshifter had been, the NOC list clutched in its beefy green claws.
The shapeshifter hadn't been a shapeshifter at all, not the kind that Moone had thought. It could alter its own aura, its own body and soul- and so the soul that Moone had seen, ancient and noble and wise, was itself a fabrication. It wasn't a slip of its true form at all, but the sleight of another false form, to get Moone to trust it; [it hadn't been the same kind of shapeshifter that had revealed itself to Moone, but shapeshifted to appear that way.] It was a shapeshiftershifter, of some kind. Whatever the alien presence was that Moone had felt MacBeth connected to. Maybe the self-same one, even, though when he'd felt it through MacBeth's network the one he'd felt had been somewhere far outside the Pentagram, and he'd run into the impostor Cloud just a few [hours] later while still inside the Pentagram.
[the creature is somehow namedropped as being Xemf. it's a big twist for the audience but not so much for the characters so figure out a way to balance that. And also, have someone know Xemf's name for some reason. maybe something to do with tooth fairy magic, fortunes of money and everything. Xemf's fortune is to be Xemf- have that as a point in the unique way the shapeshifter seemed to interact with the money magic, astrological standard representing fortune, Xemf's fortune is to be Xemf, in a way you wouldn't realize until second readthrough.]
The shapeshifter, the creature Xemf, would have already been gone if not for the cold iron nanoparticles gradually settling through the air, which even now clung to its skin and reverted it to its true form. With the antimagic down, it would have slipped away without anyone noticing; the system was still technically down, but the components of the system were still spread all around, leaving it trapped. There was no magical escape. And so instead of conjuring up a portal for itself, it just took the exit. Of which there was only one, and [between which and the creature stood the entire team].
The creature lunged, overtaking the entire lower level floor in one swoop and landing on the far side, right in front of where Lovecraft, Unwin, and the Pontifex were standing. It had leaped right over Moone's head from where he'd been standing on the black-tiled pressure-sensitive floor, and Moone wasted no time darting up the slope to the creature, attempting to throw it off balance by going for a low center of mass. The creature whirled, and locked metaphorical horns with Moone instead.
Xemf may have had a size advantage, and the advantage of sheer brute strength, but it was left entirely without its magics, which included the fully enhanced aura bestowed by the Pontifex. Moone knew it, knew that trusting the shapeshifter with such power was unwise, or at least suspected, but hindsight had 20/20 vision-- and it didn't matter now, either, with the cold iron-caused dampening of its aura.
It was shut it down here, or have a much much more difficult time of shutting it down later.
Xemf struck back, Moone anticipating the blow and dodging with ease. His boon had been restored, then. He had all the tools he needed in order to come out the victor. And he knew the first order of business.
[he gets Gef to reinstate the security system, fighting above the pressure sensitive floor, but Kissifer comes back into play and Xemf levitates over the floor, fighting, the walls beginning to bleed, Kissifer's strength combining with that of Xemf's- use some exorcism plan B now, establish holy water earlier or something, maybe fountain of youth related somehow. There's that trap activated from the pressure sensitive floor, possibly trapping Kissifer instead for some reason. Xemf and Moone now fight on level, upper area of vault, in front of vault doors, perhaps teammates also trying to assist.]
Xemf realized that it was losing. And that its back wasn't quite up against the wall yet.
With savage ferocity, the creature Xemf kicked Unwin to the side, into the side wall of the bottleneck outside of the inner vault. Unwin's ribcage snapped, and he fell with the squishy burbling groan of a man whose lungs were crushed, his top half rotating a horrible 90 degrees as his body collapsed to the ground.
Lovecraft was there beyond Unwin, and she watched her compatriot fall, eyes wide. She guarded the exit with the last of her life, attempting a spell but failing in it. Xemf made one swipe with its claws, and tore her chest open in massive jagged gashes, Lovecraft falling with a surprised-sounding whine, wounded but alive.
The Pontifex struggled to his feet, and lunged at the creature, placing a shaking hand against the small of its dappled yellow back, and attempting to psychically pull. The same thing stunting its power and keeping it from using its magic, however, was the same thing that kept the Pontifex from withdrawing his aura back into himself.
Xemf swatted the man back to the floor, turned down on all fours, and sniffed at him. The creature may have been bestial, but there was cold frightening intelligence in its eyes as it examined the grounded and panting Pontifex. Xemf turned around, pivoting on all fours, and disappeared out through the vault doors.
It was over. At least one of their comrades was down, the second in poor shape. And they'd failed to shut down Xemf.
[they examine Lovecraft; she won't make it. Process this fact. Quiet, slow beat, after the intense action.]
Lovecraft's eyes clouded over, and a keening wail emanated from the walls, where Gef had been in wait. Something rustled like leaves, and Gef [appeared,] jerking around in agony of loss over Lovecraft. "Vanished!" Gef keened.
There was a clattering all around, Gef rattling through the room and walls, flying around in a mad frenzy. Vanished, vanished, vanished, vanished, Gef's voice hung in the air, as his physical form shuddered and clanged from one corner of the room to another with impossible speed. Vanished! Vanished! Vanished! getting softer and softer, subdued and distant somehow. Gef's voice faded, and his form faded, and the clangs too faded and grew still.
Thus passed Gef as well.
There was a haunting, booming silence.
"Do you know the difference between a ghost and a poltergeist?" the Pontifex's voice rang out softly, from where he stood behind Moone. "The true distinction between them. It's not that poltergeists are more mischievous or anything. The simple difference is that ghosts haunt places. And poltergeists, poltergeists haunt people."
Moone was confused, at first. But something deep and powerful about Gef's nature clicked in his mind.
Gef had, in his first incarnation, been [hauntingly attached] to Jim Irving... but thinking on it now, Moone realized that it had been Jim's daughter, Voirrey, whom Gef truly loved; most people associated the legend of the Dalby Spook more to Voirrey than they did Jim, but it was Jim's death that had released Gef the first time. Abandoned my love. Forsaken from my love. It must have been agony, to be so close and so far.
This time around, Gef had been haunting the right person. The one. The one Gef loved, and the one who loved Gef right on back, fiercely, intensely. Bliss.
But bliss that couldn't last. Vanished, vanished, vanished.
Moone collapsed to his knees, knelt over Lovecraft's body, cradling it close in his arms, and wept for the love that had been whole then broken apart, his entire body spasming as he gasped for shaky breath in between sobs.
And Moone couldn't help but blame himself, at least partially. This was his fault. Not deliberately, but without his stratagem of releasing the cold iron into the air, the creature Xemf, the false Mushroom Cloud, would just have ported away without doing harm to anyone or ever revealing its true identity.
Moone had used his boon to save his own neck, but it had led, whether directly or indirectly, to more deaths on the part of others. And not for the first time. Cloud, now Lovecraft and Gef. There was only one other member of his original team left.
And that member was a traitor.
Moone looked up with red eyes from the cradled form of Lovecraft's twisted body, and vowed revenge with all the power of the [fortunes] that flowed from this room. MacBeth would pay. Xemf would pay. Somehow.
But even as he made the oath, Moone knew that vengeance wasn't truly possible. MacBeth would have been back in the present by now. And...
And it was Unwin's magic that had put them here in Babel in the first place. Unwin's ritual. Without him here to end that ritual, with Unwin dead, they wouldn't be able to simply pop back into the present. Which meant that while the creature Xemf made off with the NOC list, possessing the ability to tear down every domestic agent and destabilize the entire domestic supernatural intelligence and military complexes... Moone and the Pontifex were stuck back here in Babel.
Permanently.
THE END
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OF PART SIX
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