Controls Echidna

I reached out, again, this time to Noelle. Like Eidolon, she, too, struggled against me, then folded like a house of cards. It should have ended there, it should have been easy from that point on, but even though Noelle herself caved under my will, something rose inside of her and resisted more, resisted my control. It was alien and powerful and had millennia of weight behind it, pushing back against my will. It was like some elder god reaching out of the sea for the brave ship that tried to tame it.

The fragment of the beast that had granted Noelle her powers, I realized. Her passenger.

My mind burned as I reached deeper into the wells of my power, drawing further from my own will, but I ignored it and took hold of that fragment, what portion of it was within this world that I could touch, and commanded it to bow to me.

Kneel.

[FIGHT​]

Were I merely human or nothing more than another cape, it would have disobeyed. It would have ignored me as I would an ant, and it would easily have shrugged off any paltry attempt at control I might attempt. Even Khepri at the height of her power would have been utterly unable to take direct control of a passenger.

But I was a Heroic Spirit, now. My power had been amplified at the moment of ascension. And I had to —

Stop fighting.

— save my friends. Even forcing Echidna’s passenger to obey was not beyond me, now.

Beneath my iron will, it was crushed and brought to heel.

[FIGHT​]

The encroaching madness inched further, inexorable, like sharp nails being driven slowly into my brain. I locked away the sections that it took, barricading as much of myself as I could behind walls of iron willpower and towers of razor focus. It would not hold, not for long, but I only needed it to last until everything was finished.


“Guh… Ha… Ha…”

Sweat poured down my head from the effort. Come on, Taylor. Can’t give up, now.

I reached again for Noelle and her passenger, and now, lashed to my will, I commanded them with all the weight of my authority.

Let everyone go.

There was no resistance, now, only obedience.

Stop. Fight.

[FIGHT​]

Noelle’s lower half bulged and expanded, and one of the monstrous heads dropped its jaw to disgorge more of the bile and first one body, then another, then another, until at last, there was a blonde girl and a girl with mousy brown hair. Lisa and Pan… Lisa and Amy flopped bonelessly to the ground, hacking as they spat up whatever of the sickly fluid had managed to get into their mouths and stomachs.