An Asnean Odyssey: Bastien

Twenty-Two

Liet

“Check it out!” Liet shouted as he picked up a rock and tossed it into the air. He thrust his hand out and the rock stopped and hovered in front of him for a few seconds before falling to the ground. “I’ve been practicing!”

-We’ve been practicing- Skye scowled at Liet. -I made some adjustments and Liet learned how to use them.-

“That’s pretty cool,” Gage replied.

-You’re damn right it’s cool.- Skye scribbled as she pulled up Liet’s sleeve. -He can use external blood supplies now so he doesn’t bleed himself dry, as well as being able to affect time for people and objects other than himself.-

“I’d need a lot of blood to affect something other than myself for a long time, though.”

“That’s unfortunate. I guess you can’t just freeze Balthazar in time.”

“I’d be stuck there with him.”

“I hadn’t thought of that,” Gage rubbed his chin.

“You think we’re going the right way?” Liet asked. The group could see a small town on the outskirts of a lake in the distance.

“I’d recognize that glow anywhere,” Gage replied as he nodded towards a figure heading in their direction.

“Bastien!” Gage called out. He kept walking towards the group. Once he was about twenty feet away, he stopped. “Balthazar is looking for you. I think he intends to do you harm.”

“I’m aware. That’s why I’m heading for Asnea. He can’t kill me. No one can.”

“See, nothing to worry about,” Liet joked.

“Where did you get that?”

“Get what?” Liet asked.

“Not you!” Bastien screamed. “The girl! That pendant...”

-It was my mother’s. She gave it to me when I was born.-

“I see...” Bastien’s eyes welled up with tears as he slammed Ludvig into the earth, embedding the sheathe in the ground, then removed him from his prison. “If I kill you, maybe then I won’t hurt so much.”

“That’s stupid, you don’t even know us!” Liet shouted.

“Well, he knows me...”

“I wasn’t talking about you, Gage. Can’t you talk some sense into him?!”

“He never really did listen to me...”

“Skye, just run. I’ll stop him for as long as I can.”

-I don’t want to leave you.-

“Gage, take her away from here.”

“Man, why’d you have to be like that. Now one of you is going to be mad at me...”

“I don’t care!”

-If you take me away, I’ll take Serena away from you.-

“That’s not funny, ay?” Gage frowned. “Sorry Liet. She’s got stronger threats.”

“I guess you’ll have to fight with me, then.”

Bastien crouched down and stuck his gnarled fingers into the ground. After a few moments, he plunged his arm into the dirt up to his shoulder. Pillars of stone shot up from beneath the trio, launching them into the air before shattering. Liet stopped himself and Skye until Gage could get close enough to drag them softly back to the earth. By then, Bastien was below them. Ludvig tore through the air as Bastien tossed him at Skye, missing by a hair. As soon as Ludvig had sped past Skye, Bastien summoned him back into his hand and threw again. Liet responded by slowing Ludvig enough for him to grab the ebon blade. The second he touched the hilt he felt a searing pain course through his hand as his skin began to peel and crack revealing a bright purple light, causing him to drop the massive blade. Bastien walked over to Liet, who was clutching his blackened hand and writhing in pain on the ground. He bent down and picked up Ludvig, then grabbed Liet’s throat with his synthetic arm and lifted him into the air, preparing to plunge Ludvig into his gut.

Liet flexed his arm and the world froze around him. He tried his best to pry himself free of Bastien’s death grip, but he was simply too weak. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a small red sphere in the air headed towards Bastien. He positioned himself with his legs wrapped around Bastien’s arm, just out of Ludvig’s path, then flexed his arm again.

Ludvig thrust forward, cutting through the bottom of Liet’s shirt. Immediately afterwards, the stone impacted Bastien just below his right armpit. A small explosion sent the two flying in opposite directions. Liet flew backwards into a tree, knocking the wind out of him. He tried to stand but the world was spinning around him and he was having trouble focusing on Bastien.

Splayed out on a rock, stained black with his blood, Bastien arose. The explosion had torn a hole in the side of his chest cavity that extended from his shoulder blade to his left nipple, covering the majority of his torso. Viscous black blood dripped down his body like syrup. The beating of his heart was visible through his rotten, cracked ribs, as were his lungs, which expanded every time he drew a breath. The bottom right portion of his face had been seared off, revealing his teeth and fangs, as well as his jawbone.

“Well, shit,” Gage was dumbfounded. “You’re the Demon of the Aether, aren’t you? You destroyed Asnea all those years ago. We need to run!”

“You’re not allowed to live,” Bastien hissed through his damage lips.

“Who are you to decide who lives and who dies?!”

“I’m just giving you what I want so dearly, what I would do anything for...What I can’t have...” Bastien began to approach Gage and Skye. “Why won’t you accept my gift?!”

The pair turned to flee, to which Bastien responded by hurling a ball of frost at Skye. Gage threw himself in front of the ball of ice, which hit him in the chest. His body was surrounded by a thin layer of frozen water, restricting his movement, but otherwise leaving him unharmed.

“You only delay the inevitable,” Bastien called Ludvig to his side and hurled him at Skye.

Though his vision was blurred, he could clearly see Skye as she dropped to the ground, a pillar of darkness erupting from her gut. Liet scrambled to activate the manipulator, but Bastien tapped the ground with his finger, causing stone to erupt and encase Liet’s arms before he could. His arms still restricted, he rose to his feet and stumbled towards Skye’s body. Bastien launched a gust of wind at Liet, knocking him over, as he bent down and lifted Skye into his arms. He pulled Ludvig from her back, causing her bright pink blood to spill onto the forest floor. Dipping a finger in her wound, he raised it to his mouth and sampled her ichor with his blackened tongue.

“So sweet,” Bastien whispered softly in her ear. “I often wondered what she’d taste like...”

Skye’s eyes drifted towards Liet as Bastien cocked her head to the side and sank his teeth into her neck, draining her essence. Liet could see Skye mouthing something as blood and tears streamed down her face. Bastien’s flesh began to writhe and twist as it pulled itself together, closing his wounds and returning his skin to its pale, cracked luster. Once Bastien had finished feeding, he remained crouched over Skye’s corpse for a moment.

“Why...?” Bastien sobbed quietly. “Why do I still feel this way?! This was supposed to make me feel better!”

Bastien threw Skye’s corpse aside and picked up Ludvig, then approached Gage. He picked up Gage by the collar of his jacket and dragged him in front of Liet, then thrust Ludvig through his back, spraying his blood all over Liet.

“If I have to feel this pain,” Bastien cried out, his voice shaking and his face dripping with sadness. He smashed his skull against Liet’s, knocking him unconscious. “Then I’ll share it with you! Hate me, Liet! Seek me out and kill me!”

When Liet awoke, Bastien was gone. Gage was caked in blood, but somehow still conscious. Liet scrambled through both of their pockets, looking for anything he could find to stop the bleeding.

“It’s no use,” Gage choked as he spoke. Somehow, he managed to crack a bloody smile. “I deserve this anyway.”

“No one deserves to die,” Liet’s voice was calm, his face expressionless.

“It’s our birthright. Don’t feel bad, alright?”

“I don’t want you guys to leave me...” Liet’s voice began to crack. “I almost lost her once...”

“It’s too late for us. All you can do now is live your life. We live on through your memories,” Gage’s hand trembled as he reached into his pocket and produced a small silver spoon. He placed it in Liet’s palm, then lifted his eye patch. His eye was pure white, with a small black outline around the iris and a deep circular slash around the middle. “You’ll have to do it for me, my hand’s not steady enough. This is my gift.”

“W-what?”

“My eye. Take my eye.”

“I can’t,” Liet stared at the spoon in his hand.

“This is a treasure you’ll not want to turn away, boy,” Gage coughed as his eye began to dull. “Just make sure you get the right one...”

“Gage?” Liet shook his body gently. “Gage?!”

Gage offered no response. Liet closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He steadied his hand and placed the spoon against Gage’s lower right eyelid. Liet could feel the metal scraping against the bone in his eye socket as he quickly thrust the head of the spoon into his skull. There was no blood and the eye popped out without much effort, almost like it wanted to leave its host. He left the slimy orb resting on top of the empty socket as he steadied the spoon in front of his own eye. The same scraping echoed through his head, tickling his brain as he plunged the spoon underneath his eyeball. Blood spurt forth, coating the end of the spoon and bubbling over into his other eye. He flipped the spoon up, popping out his eyeball, which fell and dangled on his cheek. Liet cried out in agony as he tried to sever the optical nerve with the soiled spoon. The instrument was too blunt to cut the fleshy cord, so Liet dropped the spoon and gripped the sphere with his hands, crushing it and causing vitreous to squeeze through his fingers, then pulled as hard as he could, tearing the nerve from his skull. He could see waves of blood spurt forth with every heartbeat out of his remaining eye as he felt himself become dizzy. He struggled to grab Gage’s eye, barely managing to raise it to his face. Once it came within a few inches of his eye socket, small tentacles sprouted from the gooey ball and latched onto his face, one of which dug into his skull through the open socket. He could feel something twisting around in his brain as his consciousness slipped away.

Bastien

- “Why are you allowed to die, but I’m not?! I don’t want to live without you...I can’t...”

Asnea was quiet when Bastien returned. The people in the streets whispered among each other and disappeared into the closest building when they saw him. He headed straight for the castle. No one dared to oppose him. Balthazar was waiting just inside the courtyard.

“Bastien, my old friend,” Balthazar extended his arms to embrace Bastien with a glowing smile on his face.

“Why did you want to see me, Duke?”

“Not even a hug?”

“I want to kill you. I need to.”

“But you can’t!”

“And you can’t kill me. So why did you want to see me?”

“I wanted to thank you.”

“For what?”

“I realized something when I awoke. Do you know what that was?” Balthazar had begun to stroll casually towards the castle with Bastien at his side, who offered no response. “It was never about you!”

“What?”

“The whole time I thought you were their champion. But it was me! I killed Leinhardt, I killed Randgris, and now it’s me who rules Asnea! You were just a pawn to help me remember my true calling,” Balthazar turned to face Bastien as he pushed open the doors to the castle. “Blood.”

“You killed Leinhardt...? You killed...” Bastien paused for a moment. “Her?”

“Of course! It was so easy, too. Of course, I didn’t fight either of them, oh, no. Confronting Leinhardt would have been a terrible decision. So, I poisoned him!” Balthazar cackled as the pair entered the throne room. Balthazar bent down just in front of the throne and pointed to a slight discoloration on the carpet. “This is him. I wonder which one is you...”

Bastien offered no response while his eyes locked onto a large splotch on the carpet. “What about the other one?”

“She was disappointing,” Balthazar sat upon the throne and yawned casually as he crossed his legs. “She was shackled up in the tower, waiting for her prince to come save her. He never did, in the end. I splayed her entrails out in front of her. I wore your face when I did it, too. She was really difficult to kill. Her wounds kept healing every time I pulled something out!”

Bastien used all of the strength he could muster to keep himself from bawling. “You used my face...?”

“Pre-damnation,” Balthazar twirled his finger in the air, gesturing towards Bastien’s face. “Not this mess. You split me in two, Bastien. Do you even know the pain you caused me? It was all I could do to return the favor.”

“You don’t know anything about pain! I lost everything!”

“I know it hurts a hell of a lot more the second time.”

“Is this what hatred feels like?” Bastien asked through his fangs. “This overwhelming desire to tear you apart?”

“That’s a little stale, don’t you think? You need to expand your horizons, try something new!” Balthazar rose from his seat and approached Bastien. “And with this blessing, this gift of undeath that has been bestowed upon us, the possibilities are endless!”

Bastien gritted his teeth. “Fight me.”

“Oh! I was hoping you’d say that!” Balthazar practically jumped from his seat as he reached behind the throne and grabbed Sverker. “I see you have Ludvig. I hope you don’t mind if I use Sverker.”

“I don’t care,” Bastien replied as he began to draw Ludvig.

“Hold on,” Balthazar walked behind the throne and fiddled with a panel on the back of the chair. “I want to show you something first.”

A small distortion opened in front of Bastien. Duke smiled and stepped through the portal. Bastien quickly followed. The sensation he felt was something similar to waking up from a dream. The pair were standing on a metal platform suspended above an endless expanse of machinery. The sound of metal grinding on metal echoed through the air. All around the platform were glass tubes filled with people who seemed to be sleeping. They had countless tubes channeling plasma from their bodies.

“Isn’t it magnificent?!” Duke cried out with his arms outstretched. Behind him was an enormous reservoir of blood.

“What is this...?”

“This is the shell of the moon, the mechanical sun, Shefira!” Duke began to explain. “It’s quite spectacular, isn’t it? Leinhardt had already started building it when I began to ‘guide’ him. He was planning to use wood or coal or something to power it. I simply suggested they steer their research towards blood as a clean, renewable energy source and voila! My very own planet sized blood factory.”

“Why are you showing me this?”

“I want you to feed, Bastien. Feed until you burst. I want to fight you at your full potential. I saw half your body get blown away and you walked it off like it was nothing. That should have put you into a coma, but you were unfazed.”

“How did you see that?”

“I followed Liet, obviously,” Balthazar wore a sly smirk. “I had to make sure you were coming to see me, after all.”

“I don’t need your charity,” Bastien spat as Ludvig ignited with black flames.

“Then surely, you will lose,” Balthazar held Sverker just above his head with the point facing Bastien. “And then you’ll be mine. And believe me, I will not be gentle.”

“You will free me from this curse, Duke,” Bastien stated as he lunged at Balthazar, who leapt into the air, flipping over Bastien.

“In what way is this a curse, Bastien?” Balthazar thrust Sverker at Bastien. Ludvig dove over Bastien’s shoulder to block Sverker, causing an arc of black lightning to jump off and strike the catwalk when they touched. “I can have anything I want!”

Bastien spun around, slashing Balthazar’s throat with his blackened claw. Crimson blood coated Bastien as it sprayed from Balthazar’s neck. “I just want to stop the pain.”

Balthazar placed his hand around his throat. A bright flash filled the room. Balthazar’s wound had been replaced with a large burn that was quickly shrinking. “Then you came to the wrong place. All I know is pain!”

Balthazar began to swing fanatically at Bastien, who easily blocked his blows. Every time Ludvig and Sverker connected, black lightning jumped from the blades. Eventually, Bastien saw an opening and thrust Ludvig through Balthazar’s left shoulder. He winced in pain as Ludvig tore a chunk of flesh from his arm causing Sverker to fall to the floor of the catwalk. Balthazar extended his right arm, launching a small blizzard from his palm at Bastien, knocking him back. While Bastien was recovering, Balthazar smashed open one of the containers and ripped the person from their shell. He tore into their throat like a ravenous dog, spilling blood all over himself as he feasted. The wound on his arm rapidly pulled together as Balthazar cast the drained body into the grinding gears below. “Look around you Bastien! I can do this until time winds down and nothing but dust remains, but I wonder. How long will you last?”

“I don’t think you can feed without a head,” Bastien shouted back as he swung Ludvig in a wide arc. The black flames crawled forth from the ebon blade through the air, approaching Balthazar, who dispersed them with a ball of frost. Bastien rushed forward and thrust his gnarled arm into Balthazar’s gut. His arm began to glow bright purple, eventually gathering in Balthazar’s stomach.

“Learn some new moves, mongrel,” Balthazar cried out as he plunged his fingers into Bastien’s eyes, pulling them from his sockets. Blood spurted out of the empty holes as Balthazar crushed the soft, fleshy balls in his hand. Bastien removed his hand from Balthazar’s gut as the energy from his fist discharged into the air, knocking him to the ground as he clutched his face and cried out in pain. Balthazar approached Bastien, who was writhing on the floor of the catwalk, then thrust both of his hands into Bastien’s stomach. Bastien’s gut began to glow bright orange as his intestines started to liquefy inside of his body. “See, I learned one. From you, actually. I just changed it a bit.”

Bastien tried to speak but his words came out as cries of agony. He couldn’t tell if blood or tears were pouring down his face as all of his feelings began to fade away into nothingness.

“Get used to this, boy,” Balthazar spoke softly in Bastien’s ear. “Because this is all you’ll ever know.”