Summoned: An Accidental Adventure –
Chapter 03
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~Nicholas~
Wandering off to the side Nick rolled his, well her, eyes at Felix and Malachai’s antics. Seeing everyone in their all together was rather disconcerting. Bodies not-withstanding of course. She was also working on coming to grips with her new body. Definitely taller. At least six and a half feet if not more if her guess at the others heights were anything to go for. The longer legs and arms were actually tripping her up more than her shifted center of gravity and new… ahem… jiggly bits. It didn’t help that her new flesh was so sensitive. It also wasn’t very helpful that though she hadn’t even seen her reflection she knew her new form had to be quite a looker from her friends reactions.

“Could be worse. I could be a warrior slave to some interdimensional tentacle monster.”

“Who know we no slave now?” Malachai returned from where she was battling with getting Felix unhooked.

“Point.” Nick shuddered a little as she leaned forward to look at the Old Man she had tripped over on her way to Malachai when the smaller woman had gained consciousness.

She overbalanced and had to reach out both hands to catch herself on a table. With a curse muttered under her breath she lowered herself to a kneeling position next to the body.

“Ha! Least I no top heavy since I woman too.” Came the breathy whispered reply.

“Yeah, at least Nicky doesn’t sound like a phone sex operator.” Felix shot at the smallest of their group. His grumbled tone spoke volumes of his annoyance of getting disconnected from the bed so forcefully by Malachai.

Both women glared at him.

“Really Felix? ‘Nicky?’ You couldn’t come up with something less trope?”

Felix glanced over to where the tall woman was bending over. “You’re not exactly a Nicholas anymore are youuuueeeeEEOOOUCH!!!”

Malachai had a pair of slim cables that had been snaked under his skin, the leads still dripping a sort of sickly purple liquid. “You are insensitive twat.”

“That really hurt you know.”

She glared delightedly at him. “Good.”

“Why don’t you girls have scars or blood from these?” He paused as the ‘girls’ in question glared at him again. “Sorry, Guys, I meant Guys…. not Girls.”

“See Nick. He teachable.”

“I’m not really sure about that.” Nick said with a quiet laugh. “Though, as the blood? I know how much it hurt to remove, but it was like my skin sealed up immediately. Sort of like a certain varmint named mutant you are fond of?" She was looking down at her forearm where she had pulled out two longish rubbery surgical tubes. There were no marks there, though blood had come out when they had been removed.

“Sounds reasonable enough. Hey! Hands off, let me get that one!” Felix batted Malachai’s hands away from another wire.

Nick chuckled under her breath again and left the two to removing the stuff that she was sure must’ve been some form of life support equipment for their new bodies. She was studiously avoiding what it all meant for now. First she felt it more important to discover more of the strange room she found herself in. The man on the floor wasn’t much to look at compared to the rest of them. Just a bundle of rags and cloaks next to an odd staff that looked like it belonged on the set of Mad Max. His body looked like a fried half mummified piece of human jerky that until only recently clung to the last vestiges of life.

Throughout the body and clothes Nick could see various gadgets or devices just as eclectic and odd as the equipment in the room. Some of the gearworks still ticked away and there were digital displays flickering on and off as well.

She leaned closer and cursed as her breasts swung beneath her. The sensation was very different and one she was not ready for. “Damned body, what am I going to even use as clothes? A Tent?”

Done being sardonic with herself Nick poked at the crumpled form. She flipped a piece of cloth cloak to the side curiously. Underneath and apparently embedded into the right side of his chest was a half circle gadget that seemed to be a hybrid of exposed clockworks and smartphone interface. The gears were busily clacking away even though they seemed to be poorly adjusted and warped out of frame. The two inch by three inch kidney bean shaped screen flickered a blue and black color on and off. However after about four of the sixteen revolutions of the visual clock she saw it would go black and seemingly start again. Lines of text similar to the clock yet different flowed haltingly until the reset then started over.

‘Some sort of reboot sequence?’

There was a piece of jagged metal jammed into the flesh beside the device at an angle that Nick thought would possibly intersect inside the gear housing. She removed the part that really didn’t look like it was part of this specific hodge-podge. As soon as the nearly seven inch long metal shard was removed the clockworks pulled themselves back together. No longer did they click and clack, now they whirled up to a speed and moved to a metronome perfection. This time the display did not reset itself at the end of the fourth cycle of the clock.

“Hey guys, check this out.” She said as she stood up to look over at them. The scene she turned to made her laugh. Felix was fighting Malachai off as she was attempting to remove the last few, and the most uncomfortable of the attachments. “Or maybe I should tell you both to get a room.”

The two looked over at her comically. A sort of twin blink blink action going on. This made Nick laugh again. She was sure that Felix was blushing but with his strange star filled skin she could not tell. At least with his violet eyes and shoulder length white hair she could tell that he was indeed looking at her. Malachai however seemed shameless as she took some of her frustration of her situation out on the most socially dense person of their group.

“No need room. He need tuber out of pecker so he able help with others.”

“It is a cathartic tube and I am perfectly able to remove it myself.” Felix countered in a huff.

“Then do. Or I do.”

“I will when you, uh… well…”

“What. When I? What?”

Yeah Felix was definitely blushing this time. “Could you look away please?”

Nick snorted at the same time that Malachai lunched forward and finally got his towel away from him.

“You no have nothing I never see before.” She looked down at her own body then continued in a purposefully sultry whisper. “I however may have parts you no see yet.”

“HA! Malachai’s got you there,” Nick heard something from the floor beside her. “Huh?”

The desiccated body was moving, her eyes widened in fear as it snaked a hand out to grasp her around her ankle. It said something that sounded both panicked and confused though the guttural clicking language was something she had never heard before. Nicholas watched as the room and her friends began to fade from view.

“NOOOOOOO!!!!”

She attempted to escape the vicelike grip and run to Felix and Malachai who were looking at her with the same panicked terror in their eyes as everything disappeared once again.

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~The Old Man~
- Reboot Initiated
- Reboot Initiated
- Reboot Initiated

He was not sure how many times the system had attempted to restart. He was conscious within the damaged shell of his body. Unable to act, or even sense the world around him, the Old Man had watched far to many aborted cycles to rest easy. The only thing he could think of that would prevent his core control and regenerative artifice from working would be if something of similar or stronger materials had jammed into it. Otherwise he would either be dead or his system would have absorbed it for parts.

- Reboot Initiated
- Reboot Initiated
- Reboot Initiated

Of the most likely events to have initiated this debilitation upon him the simplest was an explosion of one of the Summoning Artifices which indicated a failure on his part. That was bad enough as it was. The summoning back of the Soul Matrices was a one time chance. A gamble. The energies got geometrically harder to harness back into alignment with the molecular vibrations of their body vessels as time progressed.

Because of the vibrational aspect of the body vessel to its original ‘Soul’ it had to be done right the first time to call it back. If the Science, Aether, and Artifice was not exactly on track it could potentially lead to ‘Bad Things’ happening. Do it wrong and the Void could enter instead. Which is how the very first Demon Lords had gained access to the world.

- Reboot Initiated
- Reboot Initiated
- Reboot Initiated

Now if only he could sense anything other than darkness. His entire existence was the attempted initiation of his personal Artifice CyberNeuro systems reboot sequence. The techno-organic components of his body would slowly rebuild his damaged body, even if they had to replace what few regular organics remained. However a functional body would be useless without the Artifice Interface required to link his consciousness to reality.

- Reboot Initiated
- Reboot Initiated
- Reboot Initiated

The other consideration that truly scared him was that his safehold was compromised and either the Void had claimed the Champions he was trying to save. That one or more of the Fell Demon Lords had breached his safehold.

- Reboot Initiated…. Systems Restoration Diagnostics
- Combat Systems Damaged
- Technical Interface Compromised
- Mobility Impairment Detected
- Molecular Phase Nominal
- Systems Interface Nominal

The list continued onwards with various status listings available. Some time had passed but his Artifice could not calculate it as of yet. His actual vision began to reach through the terminal interface overlay. He began to regain control of a body that felt drained and more than partially crippled.

He opened his eyes to what he most feared. If his Soul Rejoining Summons had been successful then the equipment would have kept the Champions in a comatose state until he could have brought them awake one by one properly. It would have kept them under nearly indefinitely. Instead he saw that something wearing the body of one of the Champions, that of Battles Mistress, had gotten up and was squatting over him. Two others, Xyr and Esenz, were arguing over something in a Language that sounded halting and mumbled. As if their words were spoken with gruel and mash in their mouths.

“No…” he whispered.

As they worked on removing more of the obviously failed support systems he took a cursory look around the room. Something must have drained the power nodes from his equipment as almost nothing seemed active. Those nodes would have kept his room secure for generations. However as he was still alive they must not yet have realized where they were or who they inhabited. That of course would change once they had a chance to familiarize themselves with their new corporeal bodies.

“Void Take you Back! From Whence you came I will Send you Again!”

He reached out a ravaged hand and grabbed the ankle of the Fell One inhabiting Angelica Pentel. Though his flesh was regaining structure and capability it was still too far gone for a fight against one of the Champions let alone three. Perhaps if he leveled the field a little he could take her out before the creature discovered to use Pentel’s Wings. He would have to be fast. His aged and degraded systems took longer to regenerate than any of the Champions of the Created Systems. He should know after all, the Old Man had been one of the people who had helped enhance and uplift the Generals. He was but a minor hailstorm to their Glacial Strength. But a hailstorm hitting at the right angle and point can shatter even the mightiest stone.

As the three turned towards him a lever popped up out of the side of his Artifice control interface. He felt it link to his rooms remaining emergency shunts. ‘Still running thank the Brightness for that.’ Even reduced the nodal points should have enough remaining within to do the job. The Old Man hated to do this, but he felt he was out of options. He mentally entered the command lines to cause the hidden bunker to purge itself and all of its contents randomly along the lines of power of the planet. Hopefully the Fell will be killed off by whatever forces they land into as they reappear. If not, then at least everything would be scattered to the winds and unable to be used to awaken more Demon Lords.

That way he could take out his oldest friend and adopted daughter himself.

The feeling of slamming the control lever in his back home was like shattering of two hearts. Both that of his Sanctum and that of his family given what must be his final task.

Everything faded as the shunt activated. All except for the Void Filled Shell of Angelica and himself. All was replaced by a grassy hill with a line of trees off in the distance. The purple hedge grass was beautiful this time of year. Perhaps if more than just his body survived he would take time to recuperate here.

First though, he struggled up using his staff which he had miraculously managed to keep ahold of. While he did that she jumped back several body lengths and covered up her reproductive area and chest. The move really confused him. It was no combat stance that he had ever seen and defied conception. There was no benefit to it, not for Battles Mistress nor for a Void Demon in possession of her body. Even if the Demon had access to her memories and abilities.

Her Castine features turned furious as she began to rapid fire words in that bizarre tongue she had used earlier.

He gave as a thought command in the particular way required to engage his built in systems. The Old Man felt some of the living gears start to click along a different path and a rush as a hind mounted neural chipset pulled the data from the subether as well as the molecular resonances around him.

Something was truly off.

She took a step towards him. Feet unsteady, obviously still unsure of her own body. After a particularly pithy sounding diatribe she rolled her eyes at him and flung her arms out in a universal sign of exasperation. She grabbed at her hair with both hands briefly before stomping towards him again. He backed up quickly as she did so. After a few times of this she stopped and her voice tonals seemed to change to pleading. There were tears in the corners of her eyes as she gesticulated in a foreign manner.

Finally his Artifice chimed its conclusion.

[Analysis Odd] showed in his vision overlay.

“Relay Artifice.”

[Battles Mistress is not Present.]

“I got that Artifice. Explain.”

[Enhanced Champion created present with analogous Spirit Matrice located within apropos physical boundaries]

[Error Received]

[Registered Enhanced Champion Created in current physical proximity of Non-Registered Spirit Matrice. Incomparable Datum]

[Analysis Odd]

Angelica who was not Angelica stood those several paces in front of him still. No longer attempting to communicate in any way. Just standing there tapping her foot with her arms crossed across her chest. There was no way that something from beyond was playing her body like a puppet. Also there should be no way that she was standing here in front of him with a Spirit Matrice that was not Angelica’s.

In the few hundred cycles of his wandering this war wracked planet he had never encountered any empty vessel receiving a Spirit Matrice from another sourse. Only the Fell from the Void could enter a vessel that was emptied of its originating Spirit.

He would know. He was a Summoner. One of the very few able to affect the molecular resonances of the Aethers of the Universe.

“You are not who you should be.”

She only continued to glare at him and tap her foot.

“Who are you?” His question was rhetorical only as he knew she could not understand him.

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End Chapter 03

Notes - More chapters are available on my Patreon! Please pop on over and at least comment.
I'm still dedicated to a chapter posted online every week or two, and at least one a week on my Patreon.

I'm also working on a couple other books at the same time. Hopefully I can get them online soon too!

TTFN All.