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Chapter Eight: A Song of Fire and More Fire, Part Two

A burning station by the sun, sitting their orbiting quietly. Yet all inside was not quiet, an orbiting prison. Holding the worst specimens known to the star system or those who threatened the government. But the orbit was failing, the station was falling into sun slowly but surely. And in the third cart something was darkening.

"I can feel it; someone is... they're calling out to me." Basil yelled as suddenly his necklace and the gems on his clamp followed by his own eyes started to glow. Matthew backed up as he realized that something was happening. Basil started to approach him putting his hands out fire flew from his hand, not some energy trick fire but actual burning fire. It blew down and hit the metal of the room, not catching.

"Run away my... King! You will not stop the destruction of this station from the sun, you will come with me and together we will burn." Basil bellowed as his voice deepened. A dark glow rose up from the floor around him and blocked the rays of light from the sun behind. Matthew ran backwards as Basil took chase, fire casually coming out of the shark's hand.

Matthew backed up and found he was trapped by Basil. He couldn't find the pad for the door and he didn't think that it would help. Suddenly the entire station shook, Basil looked confused and then the two sections behind them were ripped off. Matthew looked in shook as Basil was sucked back and through the door way.

Matthew grabbed the edge of the wall and held on. Automatically it seemed the airlock's reactivated and the door at the end closed. Matthew fell to the ground as stabilization came back to him. Matthew stood up and watched as Basil was dragged out into space with no effort.

Matthew stood up and ran over to the window. Basil's eyes returned to normal and he saw the shark reach out for help, but Matthew knew that in this situation there was none he could give. Matthew closed his eyes and saw Basil's eyes flash between red and green and with that he saw the shark disappear behind the carriage.

"Basil!" Matthew yelled out as he tried to call out to the shark, If Basil was going to survive the cold, thin vacuums of space he would have to do it on his own. And as Matthew looked out into the thin abyss he wasn't sure that Basil would be able to do it.

"Who the hell are you?" Basil argued with something burned in his head. Pesto and Cilantro were gone, he couldn't hear them. For the whole time he was on the spaceship his head burned, his body burned, his soul burned. It felt like something was working its way into his head like a parasite. As he was evacuated out of the space station, he realized that it was of course the piece of metal on his fusion necklace.

"Why who else would it be, but yourself." A second Basil appeared against the darkness of space. It floated around free from the constraints of gravity, magnetism and seemed to be able to swim in space like it was his own personal swimming pool. Basil face's soured as he saw who he was dealing with himself.

"You might feel a bit slow, using half of your brain to process myself and render my body in spaces takes up a lot of memory as the crazy kids are saying these days." The Dark Basil confided as he approached himself, both of them coming closer. Basil looked nervous as his clone, reached behind him and pulled him in. The second Basil started to kiss him and embrace and squeeze tightlypond.

"But it's okay, it's good to be this realistic." The cloned Basil chirped as it pushed itself away from the original, obviously unclenched by physics. Basil felt his heart skip a beat as he realized that Matthew wasn't with him and still in the space station but that was good he couldn't see what had happened and also probably couldn't breathe.

"Oh great; now I've just made myself into a field day for any psychologists. And if your me, then why are you so different, a bit more flamboyant, a bit more different and a hundred times more into myself than I let on." The original Basil pondered as he tried to ignore the invisible kiss that had just happened. It felt strange, he felt a bit more isolated.

"It's been like this since you got here and had that clamp placed on your neck, like I said I split you up in the worst way possible, if Pesto and Cilantro can't talk to each other than you are nothing but a lone shell. And then there is me, like I said I needed to be rendered so I take some of Pesto and Cilantro's brains and you take what is left." The cloned Basil laughed as he reached out and pulled the fusion sword off his back.

"What, do I get all the recessive memories and you get all the dominant one; are you supposed to take me down?" Basil mockingly asked as he realized that Pesto would probably sue him for stealing his character. The cloned Basil laughed a bit as he looked behind Basil, somehow able to see behind the shark despite being a part of him.

"Oh trust me where'd be the fun in that, no I can't interact with anything but I can give you advice or I could annoy you or maybe I can try to reveal your insecurities, force a little character development, or slow down your relationship with Matthew." The second shark said as it held the sword in its hand and slid it back and forth, feeling the sharpness of the blade.

"Now the sun is pulling based on the station, magnetism, definitively magnetism so what do you have the sun can pull and what can you do to use it to your advantage?" The second Basil said as he squeezed tight on the grip of the sword and the original shark realized that his Fusion Sword was holding him back.

Grabbing it off his back, he was pulled back to what he realized what was happening. He plunged his sword down and penetrated the hull of the station, perhaps luckily it seemed that he only broke through a protective layer. Heat least knew that the prisoners inside wouldn't die, he didn't want any needless death any more.

Basil was attached to the station and stopped, the way it looked the sun was slowly pulling them in maybe they would have anytime from a day or ninety minutes until the sun decided to engulf them in its burning corona. On the other hand being in what would harsh radiation and horrible sun burns rivaling the ones he got on Terraona Alpha it was probably not going to be good to stay out in the vacuum of space for too much longer.

"Well done, now then back to me; let me tell you about that necklace. It places your little rock in a state of quantum flux, it allows me think of me like Trojan virus to walk into your mind and hijack one of your minds, but here's why Grand Asher Yu wanted that on you." The second Basil still said as he floated above the carriage of the abandoned section of the station.

"Now then you are like a computer, ours brains are already good at processing multiple lines of information they're like computers with multiple processing cores. Now you and your fusion are like an exponential function, you increase your power by multiplying not adding. But now with me with half control of your brain and your mind well let's say the odds are not in your favor today." The second Basil said as he laughed and knew that he was going to be pushing the shark as far as possible today.

"Ok, your being really annoying so, please don't stay around; don't move to go, don't collect two hundred, and leave me the hell alone!" Basil said as he looked around for an entrance into the spaceship. He banged against it and tried to find where he wanted to go but where he wanted to fo and where he was going to go seemed to be a different thing today.

"Oh, I'm sorry maybe you want my help." The second Basil said as he disappeared into thin air and the clamp instead started to glow again. Basil reached down to his necklace and tried to push it off knowing how much trouble it was going to get him in. He didn't have time to deal with this imposter shark, he needed to save Matthew and get back to the space ship.

"Oh trust me, it will be fun." The first and second Basil's voices overlapped as they both fought for control of one body. And then the original Basil knew that his fight was over for a few minutes as he felt his body go as limp as a biscuit. Fire entered his eye sight and he felt the fear and horror that he felt before enter his body.

Basil felt himself float backwards; grabbing his sword and placing it back on his back as he went to the back of the line. And then he felt pain, he charged forward and somehow passed through two layers of metal passing by a person and landing back where he started. And then Basil felt control again.

"All those tricks, they're easy." First Basil groaned as the clone version of him appeared again next to him. "See if Pesto payed more attention in his training classes then he would have learned that he can use this necklace to phase through matter as well as turn most of his energy into real fire. That might have come in use during the caves."

"Oh, god you have my memories as well." Basil said as he realized that all the prisoners were looking at him, he realized that while second Basil could talk to him in his mind, he had to speak out loud in order to communicate backwards. He might have been viewed a bit crazy by more than a few of the people.

"Ok, maybe calm down. Now then the second piece of advice you'll receive today, had you been using your fusion necklace to listen to over the airway commutations you would have learned that behind you was a very important prisoner, a VIP if you will." The clone Basil said as he floated backwards and showed the real Basil the pad controlling the door.

"Let's take a look." Basil whispered to himself as he turned around and decided to take a bit of a looksee at the pad. The pad seemed to be fried and just touching a button released a bit of an electrical signal throughout the pad. The door was raised into the ceiling, folding upwards as the wall of what looked to be a very hard material was pulled up.

"Oh god, someone came to save me; a hybrid warrior!" The wolf inside seemed to be young, very young in fact maybe about as old as Pesto or Cilantro. "Now, then we need to get out of here the resistance awaits, by the way my name's Mike."

And with that Basil smiled.

...

Matthew looked in disbelieve at what had happened Basil had just been sucked out the window at full force without so much as a little warning. Still it could have been worse, Basil could at least breath in space and there appeared to be two carts behind them that he could catch a lift on, so all wasn't lost so far.

"Hey, hey, you you're the king." One prisoner said catching his eye. Matthew turned, out of all his time on the planet Terraona Alpha no one had really recognized him as King of Terra Nova without being told by Basil or a platoon of Primetroopers. Matthew walked over to his forcefield cell, he seemed different than the other prisoners, he was tiny and didn't seem dangerous.

"Hey I'm a part of the resistance, my brother was the leader and if you let us escape from here well then we can take you and provide you with enough troopers to create a massive invading force." The prisoner said as Matthew stared at him. Basil was right; of course Basil was right Basil always seemed to be right in the end.

"Ok say I let you go, why won't you attack me when your free; well actually I guess there might be one test." Matthew put his hand up and it glowed pink as normal. "If you're loyal you'll glow as well and be healed of all injuries as well; consider this the one step loyalty test."

"King don't ever say that again or I will have to smack that smirk off your face in the most loyal of ways." The prisoner said as he grabbed the bars on the outsider of his cage and leaned around waiting for Matthew to do his magic voodoo. Of course Matthew wasn't the only one with voodoo on the station, just the most pronounced. And as Matthew raised his hand it was seen that the prisoner did too glow.

"Well that feels amazing, I've never felt so strong or healed before; this is amazing, also your King that might be all the information you need I believe." The wolf said as he got down on one knee and pledged his loyalty as well. Matthew looked over and saw a control pad, he wondered if he would have to answer a question to get through that door as well.

"Well then my humble servant, I grant you your well-deserved freedom consider this a gift from the royal family, do not abuse it." Matthew said as he clicked the door and the forcefield raised, he was surprised it was quite easy to get through the forcefield he didn't even have to answer a question or jump through hoops, he hated hoop jumping. "Now then, what is your name solider?"

"Wallace, now then I can say that my brother is on this station and maybe you might my other brother; or his remains and possibly his head." Wallace said as he stood up and looked right into Matthew's eyes and seemed to be using them as if they were the windows into his soul. Matthew tilted his head and broke eye contact bringing Wallace back.

"Wait do you mean, I think I may have meet your brother, the colosseum in the Acropolis City." Matthew said as he remembered parts of the details before fully remembering why Wallace's brother was in the colosseum. "Oh, I'm so sorry I didn't mean to, your brother was a brave man facing Asher."

"Oh, its okay he died for the cause and it only brought us further to meeting you the real and true king and it comforts me to know that he at least had the honor of facing the president, I figured that's why we were sent here we have the support powers and he has the real powers." Wallace said laughing a bit as he looked forward at the gate and saw that it was locked a bit.

"Well the door, we need to answer trivia questions in order to pass through so I wouldn't be able to guess that you might be better at trivia than I was?" Matthew said as he and the wolf walked up to the gate and took a look at the seeming blue screen of death that it was giving them. Matthew placed his hand on the scanner and it loaded up the trivia question for them.

"How many years ago was the bastard king born?" The blue screened as Matthew made a condescending look at Wallace, as if he knew the worst question of all would have showed up. Matthew groaned wondering that if in his three months of adventuring with Basil if he did age a year.

"Sixteen years ago." Matthew said and the door screen turned green and it opened. The station shook around them and Matthew quickly realized the same was going to happen. Matthew grabbed Wallace and pushed himself and the wolf through the door. The station shook and as they passed through the air lock the station was once again ripped apart.

Wallace started to nervously breath as he looked at the horror of the sun ripping apart the station and pulling it into the sun. Matthew looked, he hoped Basil might have had found some way to get back and he at least figured he was leaving a massive trail of bread crumbs for him to follow.

"Oh, the horror look at that so many prisoners being lost, I can only hope that we'll be able to save them. I only hope that my brother is in the station ahead of us, he might be able to reset the system and save the station. Maybe your friend will be able to find him and find his own way.

"I can hope so as well, the air lock seemed to close but it seems that the air locks on the other the sections are closing as well, so there is hope that others will be found so don't give up hope. Hope got me through the entirely of my desert walking and it can get your brother through his ordeal too." Matthew said as they walked forward. In the section he was in, it seemed that the prisoners were being stored in cages of pure steel, he couldn't see, feel, or smell them; not that he would want to do any of the five senses to them.

"Your right, maybe our hope can reach over distance and encourage people, all the same but secretly, I can feel Basil and my brother they're together and they're coming to us. Grand Asher Yu is floating in a pod nearby and my super power is that I can sense other superheroes your king." Wallace said as he got Matthew to smile massively, knowing that Basil was still alive and he was coming to save them. "Also, I can feel something a few hundred miles out, but I can tell feels strange."

...

"You're not going to save him." Second Basil said as he floated along, trying to get the original's attention. Mike and Basil walked calming along as they passed through the first gate. Basil looked for a second as the station shook but he figured that they were safe as the airlock closed again.

"You and Matthew you're not going to work, out both of you will fall apart and you'll only be a legend told by parents of misbehaving children and eventually even that will end, but had you remained a hybridtrooper think of all the acclaim and fame you might have received." The second Basil said as he finally felt that he hit a nerve and he was going to pinch it like hell.

"Think about how you could have stayed, all the money you could have had, all the fights, and maybe with some training you might have been able to earn you position as top dog back even." Second Basil said as he tried to get his counterpart to enter some sort of flashback but it seemed that Basil was resisting.

"Oh shame I'll have to do it myself." Basil fell to the floor as a flash back was induced on him.

...

Basil marched forward; all marching behind him was the massive army of Terraona Prime. Some of the soldiers were behind by a mile; they probably wouldn't see the action that be on display today. That would be a shame for them. Standing next to him was Ingram, both of them had their wings spread and where ready to fly over that wall and into the Capital City without regret.

"Terra Nova, open you gates!" Ingram said as he commanded a platoon of troopers forward. The battering platoon moved forward, running towards the door with their battering ram and then forcefully knocking it open. The two doors swung open and a flow of Primetroopers into the town started.

Basil and Ingram walked in, as they looked at the chaos being undertaken in such a beautiful town. Basil smiled and took a look at the nicely built houses. Putting his hand up, he walked out of the marching crowd of Primetroopers and fired a ball of energy at the house. It caught into a glorious red flame as the shark walked forward.

Basil looked around people were running all around and Ingram was doing a fine job setting the other houses on fire and bringing out the traitorous citizens of Terra Nova. And then Basil realized his watch was beeping, it was time for the last hybrid trooper to join in for this attack. A massive purple plume of energy shot across the planet and arrived in Terra Nova in half a second.

The dragon plump curled around the city setting whatever wasn't on fire to the nice shade of red. Basil smiled and covered his eyes as the fire charred itself into his eyes. Backing up Basil looked for more places to cause chaos, he was told not to touch the walls and only the houses inside.

Looking around he walked forward, a tiny child was walking around alone through the chaos. As Basil walked towards it the child seemingly sensed his infamy and tried to walk away, but the shark easily shifted forward and caught the kid, grabbing him by the collar of his shirt and nearly choking the kid. Basil held the kid up off the ground as with his other hand he established communication.

"Hey boss we've got a little child down here, what should I do with the little squirt?" Basil asked as he contacted Grand Asher Drake through his head set. For a few seconds the headset was rerouted through a few different communication routes trying to find its way to the Grand Asher. And then the head set made a slight beeping sound.

"A child you say, well we don't want any survivors." Grand Asher Drake said presumably from his newly built satellite in orbit. Basil looked down at the child and his face soured, he placed the kid down on the ground but now seemingly petrified with fear the child did not move.

"What do you mean by no survivors?" Basil said as he put his hand on his ears and activated the transmission line again. Basil looked down at the child; he felt something in his hear. He didn't want to kill the child, he rather have it perish in the fire or live to tell the story as a warning to all.

"You know, kill it, we're leaving no one." Grand Asher Drake sounded as uncomfortable as he was with it and quickly disconnected the connection. Something inside Basil told him that was wrong, he was killing an innocent child not a traitorous citizen of Terra Nova. He put his hand up and formed a ball of energy, he felt his mind bend and his stomach churn.

"No this is wrong." Basil said, the Primetroopers seemed to stop fighting which would mean that President Asher would be coming soon, maybe he could just say that Asher was about to call him and he decided it wouldn't be worth the time to do. Basil took a sigh of relief as he felt his morals come back into check and placing his arm down he reabsorbed the energy.

And then the child was blasted away a green blast of energy hit the child and he was knocked away and into the wall. Basil's mind screen as two as something snapped in him, something was inherently wrong and as Ingram approached him he looked at the dragon komodo.

"If you can't follow the plan, then you need to reevaluate being replaced on royal guards you know Asher would be way happier with him on the team." Past Ingram said as he looked up and pointed at the purple flames caused by the latest hybridtrooper. Maybe in the past he cared about his strength but now the world seemed horrible and sad.

...

Basil's mind fractured, he made a resolve to do better he wasn't going to stay under an empire that killed kids. He returned to the spaceship and as soon as Asher left to return to Terraona Prime, he started his penance. Walking forward from the pod, he waved bye as President Asher and his pod flew away from the docking port and back towards the warp gate.

"So then, how long do I have until you desire to leave this place and take the king with you?" Ingram nonchalantly asked Basil as they walked away from the docking port and towards their quarters on the ringed ship. Basil realized that Ingram had been poking through his mind, searching through for maybe gossip or something to do.

"Of course you know, well you don't seem that torn about it. I give it about five hours, break out the King, do something to the Grand Asher and get my penance." Basil said as he practically blurted out his own plans to Ingram, the only other person on the entire base who could even have a chance of stopping him.

"Ok, will schedule my sleeping around it. Grand Asher Drake will probably be pissed about that, so I'll probably be sent down. Also you're not going to come after me for what I did." Ingram said as he cringed a bit wondering if his hybridtrooper friend would turn on him for killing the child.

"No you're a smaller problem, and I know what you're going to do. You were doing as Grand Asher Drake was doing and he was doing what President Asher told him to do. He and USC are the problem here and today, I firmly, I firmly intend to stop Asher's rule and whether or not you follow him or me is your choice." Basil said as they walked into the thin hallway and arrived the high crew quarters. Both of them parted and Basil walked into his room.

"So what exactly are you intending on doing?" Second Basil asked as he broke into Basil's mind and took over the flash back. "Oh don't worry, I was here too, and now you'll feel that you're back in control of your body, now come you must pack with a little more for your little journey."

"Of course not even my flashbacks are safe from you, and I'll tell you I was having a fine conversation with Ingram back there. Now the way it's going to go, well the way it always went. I'll blast out of my room and go through the base killing the few Primetroopers and taking Matthew away from here." Basil said as he recounted the events that saved Matthew in the beginning.

"And why are you doing that, couldn't the Primetroopers be as innocent as you in the long run?" The second Basil said as he jumped off the bed and started to float.

"No, they're just prices I have to pay for my vision of the land, a planet with Matthew in charge of what is happening." Basil said as he justified his plan.

"And couldn't that child be a price, maybe they needed him to die. You seemed quite excited to kill Primetroopers, so what makes a child different from the Primetroopers, who could be as innocent?"

"It's different, a child wouldn't know what they're doing wrong, and the Primetroopers do." Basil countered.

"So what, couldn't the Primetroopers blindly follow, do what they were ordered because they think they're working for something." Second Basil said as he argued.

"So what, now you've proven my massive moral debate wrong what else would you like?" Basil said as he gained a face of anger and tried to ignore what his cloned half was saying.

"Now the real question is you already know that, and really in the end which side of you is more bothered by that fact?" The second Basil said bringing them to the end of their questions.

...

"Oh the maker, are you ok?" Mike asked as he pulled Basil up from the floor and suddenly the shark looked relieved. Basil took a breath of air and he seemed at peace with himself, the clamp on his necklace glowed blue and it fell to pieces and landed on the ground. Basil put his feet on the clamp and crushed it to pieces.

"I feel better, now then we need to catch up with Matthew and save this station this could be just the turning point that we need." Basil said as he walked to the end of the section and saw the section in front of him. Mike raised his hand and it seemed to glow the same blue as the screen.

"So then, what is your superpower?" Basil asked as he grinned at Mike, Basil figured it out in his own head as he realized that Mike could interface with all the technology on the base, which was why they put in the strange lined case. Mike's eyes glowed as he seemingly caused a reboot on the system, the lights and the screen going dark.

...

"Well then, into the next pod I can only assume." Wallace said as he felt his brother and Basil start to move. Matthew approached the next screen and bent down to look at it, getting some whistles and claps from what looked to be the fully filled section of prisoners. He stood back up and Wallace could only smile as he gave a stern look to all of the prisoners.

"Well then, one last question what is the name of the star?" Matthew asked as he did wondered what he would answer. It obviously wanted its real name, a scientific name, not the way they called it motherstar or the sun, but instead its real name, and Matthew didn't know the answer to that question.

Matthew took a breath and wondered if he knew the answer to that question, it was interesting he tried to think back but he did know if his planet ever got the knowledge of the star's true name.

...

"Well that is Arcturus, the hound of death. And that is the star Helios, one of the closest to us and who knows maybe it has life." King Piecewise the XXV said to his prince as they looked up to the sky and he traced out the constellations in the sky. This was the time of peace, before the thousand year war escalated and before everything went to hell.

"Of course, so far we only know of one star that really has life. Tau Ceti our star, and hold her close because everything that her light touches is fed by here. Tau Ceti our mother stars gives us so much energy and we don't even thank her, so one day you might need to thank her back."

...

"Tau Ceti." Matthew said as he remembered that tiny piece of information from his childhood. He smiled as the door opened and they walked to what was seemingly the bridge. He walked out to the glass enclosed air dock and looked out into space seeing where the fleeting space ship of Grand Asher Yu was. Matthew waved and he could have only heard the screens of him stuck in his ship and failed.

"Now then where is Basil and Mike?" Wallace asked, the entire computer screen was blue for a second before it turned black. The ship suddenly shook and Matthew heard a tiny interlocking sound in the background as they rocked back and forth in space. Suddenly the screens rebooted and the normal interface returned.

The airlocks of the spaceship opened as the entire station was connected as one whole piece and on the side of the ship reaction control systems blasted and pushed them away from the sun. The shark and the pepper wolf walked through the station. Matthew was relieved all the agents of Terraona Prime were off the station and they had control of it. It would only be a few more seconds until they were out of the dangerous sun.

"We're back." Basil said as he walked into the bridge and looked out into the abyss of space. He and Matthew fist bumped as they reunited and on that day was the beginning of something more powerful then they could imagine.