[Rise of the Champion] Chapter 38.5

*** SPOILERS. DO NOT READ UNLESS YOU ARE FINISHED RISE OF THE CHAMPION. ***

Rise of the Champion

Bonus Chapter [Chapter 38.5]

(reminder) Alec transported everyone away from Asclepius'

basement, accidently leaving Tyler and Sean behind.

Tyler

No.

No no no no.

That… That did not just happen.

No. Zoe… Zoe did not just leave me here. Not on purpose. 

Muscles-galore? Yeah. Oh, absolutely he left us here. 

Not Zoe, though. No… She wouldn’t have–

“Ty,” Sean growled from where he stood next to me, both of us with our hands outstretched,  our fingers only hairs from attempting to grab onto Sex-On-Wheels before he poofed away. My fingers… my fingers had just grazed an outer-thread of his shirt when the whole lot of them disappeared. 

Zoe and Nemesis, the two littles – Annabelle and James, and Alec. 

Fuck. 

Zoe was gone, Zoe was safe. 

She didn’t mean to leave me here. 

“Ty,” Sean warned again, pressing closer to me as my body froze into a trance. I hadn’t felt my muscles lock up to leave my mind to stray since…

It had been a long time.

But Zoe didn’t leave me. No… No, Zoe didn’t abandon me. 

She wouldn’t.

“Come on, bud,” Sean coaxed, his voice low and grim, "wherever you’ve gone, Ty, come back. Come back, bud. They’re coming for us and I need you, pal.”

They’re coming for us.

I nodded to myself several times, the motion capable of drawing consciousness back into my body as I lifted my eyes. Except as I did, I realized that Sean had not been talking about Zoe – no, he had been talking about the bodies surrounding us. Each of them glaring at us with enough hatred to power a fucking electric-airplane, if such a thing existed. 

There was moron and moronette, the two slender and hauntingly gorgeous gods who had tried to gut us not so long ago – Apollo and Artemis, Zoe had explained. Then behind them was that raggedy old man who looked one powerful shit away from crumbling into dust, Uh-sklee-something. I knew to steer clear of that particular decrepit gaze. Next to him was an equally as vile looking creature that, if I didn’t know any better, was his offspring. 

Which left only one more predator in that room, Sex-On-Wheels-Two, whose mouth was gaped open, his hand stretched towards where Alec had departed. Gamble-knees, I think Zoe said his name was. Only as our fingers dared to touch did the two of us lock eyes and finally stumble away. 

Blinking, I quickly realized what Sean was talking about. They were all staring at us, boring into our very souls with brows so thoroughly pressed together I was sure they thought their facial features were a vise. 

My temporary lapse away from reality sent a shudder through my body as I found myself within my own head again. Or at least the part of my head that was tolerable. The part of my mind that was safe.

Pulling the corners of my lips to either of my ears, I straightened my spine and threw both hands up. “Quite a pickle we’ve found ourselves in, I must admit.”

Golden-boy, whose face I clearly remembered after Zoe had carved a hole into their mansion-of-doom, cocked his head at me. 

Sean moved closer to me, his shoulder brushing against mine and sending a flow of warmth across my entire being that allowed me to steel my spine further. My hands were shaking, though, so I tossed them deep into my pockets and curled an even crueler smile across my face.

“Now, I don’t appreciate the way you’re eyeing me up like the most fried of chickens,” I said as I flicked my gaze to his twin, who was indeed trailing her eyes along me. “Unless you change your gaze to something more peeling-my-clothes-from-my-body instead of peeling-my-flesh-from-my-bones.”

“Ty,” Sean snarled. “Wind it in, won’t you?”

I would’ve if I could’ve.

But I couldn’t, so I didn’t.

Beefed-up god-boy across from me hung his head and slowly retreated backwards, until the backs of his knees found his chair and he slumped down. I was fairly sure he was on our side up until about five minutes ago, and I hadn’t completely come to understand why the fuck he was still here with us. 

“Seize them,” Apollo growled as he palmed a sword absentmindedly at his side.

Terror ran through me, worsened when I felt Sean bristle at my side.

“Back the fuck up,” Sean hissed as he grabbed onto my arm and lifted his other out towards them, as if his measly fingers could do anything to the situation we had gotten ourselves into. 

Sean and I had gotten ourselves into a lot of situations. And, together, we had always gotten ourselves out of them. Something about this, though, seemed different. Something about it seemed… total. Surmized. Complete. As if some fucker was sat in some high place and had just signed my name across a thick-black line – like some fucker actually cared enough about little-ole-shitty Tyler to do such a thing.

“Why?” the little rat-looking thing with two wooden-snakes curled around her neck scoffed. “Run them through and be done with it. We didn’t come for two straggly humans.”

“Hey,” I scoffed, placing my shaking hand across my heart. “My mama taught me never to insult women, but push your luck with me a little more and I’ll find myself straying.”

My mama never taught me anything but one thing - my most valuable lesson. But they didn’t need to know that. No one did.

“The fuck is wrong with him,” Apollo continued to eye me warily as if I could suddenly turn into the shadow that haunted Zoe’s every step, Alec-Oh-Mighty. I couldn’t help but find myself wishing he was as obsessed with me as he was with her at this very moment. I’d kiss him, tongue and everything, if he stood in front of me the way he stood in front of her.

“No, no – Apollo is right,” the wrinkled-bastard croaked. “Bring me them. At best they’ll lure her back, at worst, I’ll get a practice run. Two, actually.”

Nothing was as ugly as uh-sklee-whatever letting his face twist into a villain-grin. Surprising, too, because he had all of his teeth.

But I had allowed my attention to snag on one particular thing.

Lure her back.

Sean must have heard and understood, too, because all of the fear he had been oozing across the room snapped back twice as fast, drawing his body into a line even straighter than my own. His hands flexed over and over at his side as his jaw ticked, a sight I was far too familiar with from our many escapades. Except we were used to back-alley fist-fights with low-life losers, not an all out brawl with however many fucking gods were staring at us now.

Apollo lunged for Sean, forgetting his sword behind as he deemed us not worthy of the shoulderache.

“No!” I howled, leaping between the two of them just as he managed to restrain Sean’s arms. Other bodies were moving towards me, but I clawed at Apollo with my eyes red-rimmed and my mouth frothing. “Leave him be! Let him go!”

My own words rattled around my brain, threatening to wake the sleeping monsters that lived there. I swore one of them peeped open a red eye just as someone grabbed onto my shoulders, hauling me backwards and away from Sean.

“Let him fucking go!” 

Sean gave up. I saw it in him before his shoulders sagged and his chin hung. There was something in those puppy-dog brown eyes of his, something apologetic and too terribly sad to be his. I wanted to claw my way out of the grabbing hands around me just to slap that look off of his face. Instead, I found myself matching it as rage continued to bulldoze its way through my body.

“Touch a fuckin’ hair on his head and I swear to every god–”

“What?” Apollo chuckled, a darkness to his eyes as he held Sean firmly against him. “What will you swear? And to which gods, boyo? Because I hear all of your prayers and I can promise you no one will help you.”

No one will help you.

The cobwebs of my mind were fluttering as a window found itself blown in, the shards of glass splintering across every memory and waking every demon within.

Tears prickled my eyes as I furiously blinked them away. 

“It’s okay, Ty,” Sean pleaded, eyes as soft and sorrowful as ever. “I’m here with you, Ty.”

Ty. Ty. Ty. Ty.

Tyler. 

Henderson.

My name was Tyler Henderson.

My whole body was convulsing against the darkness that so quickly wanted to sweep me away.

“Ty,” Sean reminded me again, drawing my focus to him as I dared to let a tear slip. “I’m here with you.”

Not alone. Not alone. Not alone.

***

I wasn’t proud of it, but my whole body locked down as they began to move us. 

I said nothing, did nothing, thought nothing as they set us down on gurneys. Opening my eyes, opening my mouth, opening my thoughts would do nothing but kill me quicker than anything that they planned on doing would.

Silence lurked around us at last, the only noise to be heard being the faint beeping of two machines, the sound not synced in any way, daring to tempt my heartbeat into matching the quick, off-beat pace.

The lights flicked off next.

Not alone. Not alone.

Ty. Tyler. Ty. Henderson. I am Tyler Henderson.

My whole body strained against that small truth, my teeth gritted where I barely held back a horribly deep groan.

“Ty?” 

That was Sean’s voice, small and weak from somewhere at my side. 

“Fuck,” he groaned, his breathing shaky. “I’m mighty scared, bud.”

I flinched as a tear trickled down my cheek, unable to wipe it away as my hands remained firmly at my side from the binding that was wrapped thoroughly across my body.

“It’s going to be okay,” I lied, my jaw close to popping from the pressure I placed against it. “I’ve got you, Seanie-boy.”

“And I’ve got you, Ty,” he promised.

When a darkness unknown to me and the demons prowling within my mind rippled across me, I at last closed my eyes and allowed my mind, body, and soul to be filled with his promise.

I’ve got you.

You’re not alone, Tyler Henderson.

And I tried with all of my might to believe it.

Part 2

“Up to no good as per usual, dude?”

To say I woke up would be a lie. Something else was happening that drew my eyes open, leaving me in a sinking void that was endless blackness. The colour was so dominating as it stretched from left to right, up and down. I would have believed I was dead, or close to it, if it wasn’t for the strange sensation across my body.

It wasn’t a sensation, no, it was water. Water was everywhere, as if this strange world of nothingness had two inches of water across the surface. And there I was, sat in it, my pants drenched and my knuckles freezing from the frigid temperature.

Frowning, I went to push myself to my knees when I caught a glimpse of something next to me.

Me.

My reflection in this strange pool that I sat within. Two dark, green eyes peering at me, a clustered fucking mess of blond atop my head, but me. Except he didn’t tilt his head when I tilted my head, he didn’t narrow his eyes when I narrowed my eyes. Instead, he simply stared at me, unblinking, with a to-the-wind smile on his face that I had thoroughly mastered.

“Can you hear me, buddy?”

Swallowing, I looked around me for that voice. That voice that had convinced me I was dead when I awoke, because no living soul had that voice anymore. Only one, who was very dead, very gone. 

All around me was that yawning emptiness, that alluring space of possibility and absence. 

“Ignoring me won’t make me go away, Ty.”

“This is hell, right?” I finally asked, rubbing at one of my eyes before running a trembling hand through my hair. “Heaven and hell and all that shit that came before these fucking gods? I’m in hell, right?”

I deserved to be in hell.

His chuckle boomed across the abyss, disturbing the quiet water I sat on and sending another tremor along my spine. “Not hell, my friend. Welcome to the edge.”

“The edge of what? And who the fuck are you?”

“You know who I am,” he said, his voice suggestive of that humourless, cruel smile that I remembered so vividly. “And the edge of it all, Tyler. But don’t worry, I’m here to help you over the edge. I know it sounds daunting, bud, but it’s not, I promise. I’ll guide you right through it.”

“The… the edge?” I groaned, palming my stinging headache. “How can there be something beyond an edge? I’m no genius, pal, but I think an edge suggests an end.”

“Edge, end. Call it what makes you feel better, Ty.”

“Stop,” I groaned. “Whatever trickery this is… Just stop. Don’t… Don’t use his voice, please.”

“It’s really me,” he pushed, sending a breeze of something across my body that forced me into a never-ending shiver.

“Yeah?” I snorted. “Tell me, Noah, what was my gamertag–”

“PureSexAppeal25,” he spat out. 

It did nothing to appease the shiver taking my entire body hostage. Everything within me was screaming to give in to the horrible cold, to surrender my body and my mind along with it just to be freed from such a terrible sensation.

“Well anyone could’ve guessed that,” I hissed, clenching my jaw to keep my teeth from shattering.

“You’re fighting it, Ty,” Noah continued. “Stop fighting it – let it take you. Let go.”

“I don’t want to go. I want to stay – I need to find Sean. I need to find Sean and I need to get back to Zoe.”

Noah said nothing at the mention of his sister. 

“You remember Zoe, don’t you?”

“Sure,” he offered. “Sure I do, Ty. But that’s not important right now. I need you to stop fighting pal, or it’s going to get a whole lot worse. Let’s move, now.”

The ground abandoned me.

Abandoned. 

She’s coming for you, Ty – you’re not alone.

I was endlessly falling, my arms flailing out on either side of me as I plummeted towards a nonexistent ground, the water drying from my body and leaving me with that sickly-shiver that was rattling my bones.

“What the fuck is this, Noah!”

Just as I finished my roar, the ground found me once more, allowing me to hover just above a dry surface that my toes eventually touched down on. It was still endless around me, black in all directions with the only light coming from a faint reflection against the ground.

“Don’t make me push you, Tyler. I need you to decide this for yourself.”

“I’m not leaving them,” I snarled back. “Never.”

A sigh reverberated around my skull just before the temperature dropped further.

But that wasn’t what terrified me. It was that as I ran my hands along either of my arms, desperate for some sort of heat to find me, my mind opened.

All of it opened.

Every crammed memory and every burned thought that I had so tightly packed away, that I had mastered leaving behind, surfaced.

“I’m sorry,” Noah whispered from somewhere beyond. “Stop fighting and it will end.”

Hands were reaching for me.

Three pairs of hands.

Not Zoe’s, Sean’s, or even Nemesis’, who I would have welcomed.

No, I knew those hands.

My whole body wanted to freeze but my pattering heart sent beat after beat through my spine and forced my eyes wide. Quickly and without thought I began to step backwards, desperate to get those hands away from me, my breathing choppy and cold.

“No, no, no,” I groaned as they closed in on me, as I felt a finger brush my cheek. “Get away from me!”

I did what I had not done for decades – I dropped to the ground, pulled my knees to my chin, and buried my face in my lap. Wrapping my arms around myself, I rocked back and forth, back and forth.

Zoe will come, I begged.

Zoe will come, you’re not alone.

Zoe will come, you’re not abandoned.

I muffled several sobs as I felt those hands crawling along my body, unwelcome and cruel, as unforgiving as I remembered them being.

“Get off of me!” I howled before burying my face again. “Noah, please. Please, Noah.”

“I am here to help you, Tyler. Let go, my friend, and let the edge take you.”

“W-why,” I muttered, wincing as I felt my lifelong stutter return in a simple blink. “Why-why are you-you doing this to-to me, Noah? You… You k-know what hap-happened.”

“I am here to help you,” he repeated. “But I have to stop you from fighting. You have to give in, Ty.”

Groaning, I finally found the strength to look up from my little cocoon.

The hands were gone.

But then it was the voices. The shouting and the screaming, the threats and the heavy promises.

So quickly I was a little boy again, both of my hands over my ears as I rocked and I rocked and I rocked.

“Noah,” I cried, “Please, Noah – d-don’t make me do this. Don’t make-make me relive it.” The rocking quickened, my spine aching as my whole body fought and fought and fought.

Hold on, Tyler.

Hold on until Zoe gets here.

“Hold-hold fast,” I mumbled to myself as I dropped my brows to my knees again. “Hold fast, Tyler-Tyler Hen-henderson.”

“My sister will not be coming for you,” Noah finally said, his voice harder and not quite his own. “She has left you here, Tyler. Just as the rest have. Just as they always will.”

“No,” I groaned. No.

Not Zoe.

She wouldn’t leave me. She wouldn’t abandon me.

“No,” I said, sterner and promising. “Sh-she’s coming for me.”

“My sister will find herself walking the edge soon enough, Tyler. You can meet her on the other side, pal.”

Hope fluttered across my chest, daring me to peek out from my forearms. “She will?”

“She will,” he promised.

“You’ll guide h-her, too?”

Noah made a strange noise that sent an echo across the edge. “No, I will not. Only you, Ty. Because I won’t abandon you, bud.”

“You already-already did,” I whispered, grimacing as the voices within my head got louder, ridding my mind of all cobwebs. “I’m not going, N-Noah. I don’t-don’t want to – I don’t trust you.”

All at once a memory crashed over me, blurred and choppy as it came back in bunches. A brief glimpse at a bathroom-stall, my head over the rim of it. Then a flash of tight, blond curls and a shit-eating grin as Noah stepped in behind me. Horror that rippled across his face as he saw what I was doing, what I was trying to do. A blink brought about the conversation, the muffled admission to him of my darkest memories, encouraged by my slurred tongue and heavy stomach of vodka.

“You see, Ty?” Noah pushed. “You can trust me, just like you trusted me that day.”

“No,” I groaned once more, the coldness seeping into my bones and fusing with my entire being, the noises getting louder, the hands reaching for me. “I will-will not give in.”

Hold fast, Tyler Henderson.

“You can fight it, Ty. You can fight it for minutes, for hours, for days. But you will give in, in the end. Do you want to know why?”

My shudder had nothing to do with his coaxing and everything to do with the little-Tyler in my head, the screams that ripped from my throat and the tears that endlessly trailed my cheeks.

“The edge can take it all away, Tyler. All of it. Not just box it up and store it, but take it. You’ll be free of it, my friend.”

I lifted my head. “All of it?”

“All of it.”

“But-but… B-but Zoe.”

“Zoe doesn’t understand, Ty,” he mumbled, his voice so soft and so inviting, just as it had been in that memory, convincing me to tell him all of it. “She won’t ever be able to understand what haunts you. But… But my sister will understand why you chose to come. She will understand why you wanted it all to go away.”

I shook my head several times, allowing the tears to flow endlessly. “She-she will think-think me w-weak, Noah. S-so very weak-weak.”

“Never,” he purred. “How could anyone, after what you have been through?”

His words were like the warmest of hugs, the brightest of sunrises, the softest of strokes. Like love and hope and sanctuary all in one. 

“She doesn’t know,” I whispered, damning myself with the admission.

“Then you’ll tell her. Come, Tyler. Let go. Let it all go, you’re going to feel so much better.”

I uncurled my body, slowly lifting to my feet. “She’ll be coming, too?”

“Yes,” he promised, the darkness around us somehow thickening, my lungs tightening. “She’s coming and she’s going to be proud of you, Ty.”

Proud of me.

I blinked several times, my head cocked to the side, a mop of blond swinging in my vision. “It’ll all be gone?”

“All gone,” he hummed. “Not a single memory of it. You won’t feel a thing after this, Tyler. I can promise you that.”

My shoulders rolled forward as I stared down at the ground, my eyes flicking between either of my destroyed sneakers. “All gone.”

“Sean is waiting for you, pal. Come on.”

Head lifting slowly, I felt a tear tickle the inside of my eyes again. This time I did sniffle and wipe it away. “Seanie is going too?”

“Where one of you goes, the other often follows,” Noah chuckled, repeating something he had said on more than one occasion. Often when he was begging us for a ride and we would defer him to the other. 

“Will-will you be there too, bud?”

“Sure, pal,” Noah said. “I never left you.”

Swallowing, I nodded my head and squared my shoulders. “What do I do?”

“Just breathe, Ty. Let it all go, give over to the edge.”

“Be brave, Ty,” I whispered to myself, closing my eyes and feeling a warmth return to my flooded bones. Everything started to lift, one piece at a time. A thousand faces flitted behind my eyelids, a thousand different smiles and a thousand different frowns. But then it was my friends, my odd little family, who stayed a little while longer.

It was a pair of bright eyes and overly ginger hair as a drummer-to-be tipped his head back and laughed, the sight like nothing I had ever seen before just as he went to pick out a new rhythm to bash against my dashboard. Then it was a quiet and composed Charlie, often staying as far as she possibly could from me but occasionally being caught stealing glances at the side of my face. 

Then came those blond ringlets, so tightly wound, bouncing up and down on Noah’s head as he thundered after Sean and I on a late night, begging for us to drive him around town and involve him in our antics. For Sean, it was fear of repercussions from his sister that made him leave him behind. For me, it was the horror of seeing Noah turn into me that made me slam my car door in his face.

Nemesis’ face stuck around a little longer. That hair so black and promising as it hugged her body, flowing along her curves and accentuating what already drove me wild. But that chaos to her, that twinkle of mischief that sang so loud and dared my own chaos to sing along with her. It was an allure and a trap and I wanted to drown in it, in eyes so purple and a wicked smirk smothered in red lipstick.

Then my Seanie-boy, wildness in his eyes and the widest and truest of smiles as we cruised our way from one trouble to the next. The lightness in his face as he managed to simply quiet everything about me, truly helping me to lock away the terrors. And then there were the flashes, the days where it got so bad that I couldn’t breathe, that I fought every second to survive – he was there with his hand on my back or his arm around my shoulders, letting me ride out the waves while I groaned and fought. 

And…

Zoe.

She was illuminated. A ring of white-light surrounded her, my snowy-Zoe, as she watched me curiously. She wasn’t like the others, the brief flashes at a thousand memories, the offered smiles and the reminder of what I was leaving behind as I gave in. No, Zoe was different – Zoe was stronger and her brows were furrowed, her mouth opening to try and say something to me.

Her hand reached towards me and I cocked my head, my body starting to chill again.

“No,” she muttered, her voice coming from deep under water, muffled and strained. “No, Tyler Henderson – you hold fast, Tyler.”

I stared at her.

“Don’t you dare,” she cried, trying to step towards me. “I’m coming for you, Ty – don’t you dare.”

I let the smallest and most sincere smile grace my face. “I know you are, Zoe.”

I let it all be taken from me.

I slipped away, mercifully and peacefully.