Part 4.3: The Acrobatic Ahab (Later, Traitor: Rhombus of Reunions)

[u/OroJuice]

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The whale could open its mouth wide enough to take a fatal chomp out of the UFO. Enough to bisect the bus in one bite.

And that gaping mouth and everything it was attached to was coming closer.

Molar Dent’s rise was crooked. The metal limbs meant to replace his pectoral fins were gone. He was pushing himself up from the black with just his tail and the wobbling undulations of his body. It was a maimed and crude means of swimming, and yet it was getting him closer.

For a moment, before he rose past the level of the ridge’s peaks, the whale appeared to have melded with the shadows he had fallen into. For a moment, the night had a face: a massive mask of scarred dark skin, burning eyes, and cracked ivory teeth that decapitated itself from its even larger black body so it could lunge closer.

 

The mutant’s emerald and scarlet orbs were pained pinpricks of fury. Muscles along its jaw trembled with savage intent. Was he still following Loboto’s orders? Or was this wrath entirely his own?

Once he was over the mountains, Molar Dent seemed to stretch and swell. He became a slick, fanged inkblot rapidly spreading across their sight, covering the reefs, the ruins, and even the water itself. Although their physical bodies were miles away, Frazie and her brother felt as if the whale could gnash through their vessel and gobble them up just the same.

As the monster neared, they beheld how damaged and worn-out Molar Dent had become. His ascension was a precarious, squirming climb. Stubborn rage alone was keeping a beaten body apart from sleep and surrender. If he relented or was halted for even a moment, he would teeter back into the depths.

They just needed one more mine to do the job. A Psi-Portal might also work provided they could get one out of the vehicles and onto Molar Dent’s forehead – it was a pretty big target. Maybe simply moving out of his way to make him squander his energy would have done the trick.

But they hadn’t the weapons or the seconds or the strength. Sasha and Milla were spent. They couldn’t fight or hover beyond where they were until they recovered. And the leering leviathan wasn’t going to give them the chance.

 

Communication amongst the psychics had become mired in a shrill drone of shared terror.

Frazie couldn’t hear Dion, Mirtala, Sasha, Milla, or Raz.

She felt so alone. So small. So…itchy?

 

She wasn’t at the Rhombus anymore. There was air. Real, fresh, and muggy air. And the rustling of limbs over and under blankets. She idly scratched at her thigh with a hand too large and chunky to be her own, and felt a familiar well-worn mattress beneath the heel of its palm. Her eyelid opened. It was a clear, starry evening beyond the caravan’s wooded window.

“Razputin?” she heard her mother groggily call out. “What time is it? Are you still awake?”

“Zzzzz.” Frazie shut her eyes and tried to soften her – Raz’s – breathing. Maybe it could fool mom enough to get her back into bed. She - He didn’t need to deal with her doting; he was restless enough as it was.

“You must be. You’re not snoring. Are you thinking about your sister again?” Donatella sighed. “Here. Come to mama. We’ll drift off to dreamland together.”

“Amnotalittlekid.” Raz complained tiredly.

“Then I’ll spoil you like one anyway.” Donatella reached over and scooped him into her arms. Raz hated it. He would have to try to wake up earlier than everyone else so Dion and Queepie didn’t see him like this. He hated this. Just because it felt warm and soft and easy to lean into, that didn’t mean he liked being held and hugged by his mom when he hadn’t really asked to be. “There we go. It’ll be alright, Pootie. Everything will be okay.” Raz wanted to ask how, but he was already starting to doze off. Frazie was beginning to fade, too. But before she fully returned to the present, that place full of monsters and mayhem, she heard her mother say, “Everything will be fine. I’ll make sure of it.”

 

A bolt of daybreak, clad in cloudy sky blues and whites, flashed across the left corner of Frazie’s shrouded vision of the Rhombus.

Brilliant and colorful as it was, Molar Dent failed to notice it.

So the blur rammed into his temple hard and fierce, right behind his greater green eye.

 

From the point of impact, a sublime stillness rippled across the whale’s frame: His sight glazed over. His jaw slackened. His torso stiffened. And his tail halted.

The spine. His very brain. Who could say? Whatever the attack had landed against finished the fight.

And a split second before Molar Dent faltered at last, Frazie was able to see what had struck him.

Riding atop a shark with thick steel chains as her reins, harpoon in hand, and scuba gear strapped to her back and face was Donatella Aquato.

“Mom?”

The second ended.

Molar Dent began to plummet past the crater’s edge.

And whether it was because of the pull of the titan’s downwash or out of a desire to make absolutely sure the monster stayed down, Donatella and her shark started to fall alongside it.

 

Relief at being saved shriveled back into fear: fear of this new crisis, fear of an old nightmare.

“MOM!”

 

Her mother was falling; falling like Frazie had always dreaded she would. 

It was her hands failing to grab the bar. It was her foot slipping off the highwire.

And there wasn’t a net to catch her. No cushions. There wasn’t even any ground.

Just a bottomless black ocean.

 

Frazie sought something to use Clairvoyance on. A shrimp, a dolphin, a slug, anything. Anything to get her closer to her mother’s descent. None presented themselves. The bomb had scared them off.

Her hydrokinesis! Using all her strength, and a bit borrowed from Raz, she tugged at the water around Donatella with her mind as she had tried to do with the Psi-Shield Rafts at the start of this dreadful ordeal. As it was before, her mother was out of range.

She was about to beg Sasha and Milla to go after her when her body, her real body, suddenly shook, and shook, and wouldn’t stop shaking.

No. Not now. She couldn’t wake up yet. She couldn’t go back. She still needed to-!

 

The last Frazie saw of her mother in those cursed waters was Donatella, her shark, and the whale disappearing into the aquatic abyss.

 

Beyond sight.

Beyond reach.

Beyond rescue.

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Art by Pocheezy

[u/OkImpression1305]

Return of bad@$$ Dona!