The earthquake continued, growing in intensity. Books tumbled from shelves; the lamp crashed to the floor. Vases and busts cracked and shattered as the vibrations bounced them from their perches.
Xarxos managed to get to his hooves as he slid along the shaking wooden floor. He grabbed Trog, who moaned and rolled his head back and forth and then scooped up Mark, who was crouched under the desk, pulling them both under his arms. Rusty grabbed Rok and Tanaka and they stumbled for the door.
They made it out to the balcony which overlooked the beach and stared. The mountain range which separated LA from the rest of California was splitting along a huge fault line. Buildings in downtown were swaying back and forth. Beach goers were screaming and pointing as a fault line in the ocean opened up and the sea began to drain, tumbling down into the depths below.
Rusty gaped, all heads staring in different directions. “It’s like the lower half of California is just splitting away.”
“The sea too.” Rok pointed at the coastline, “Looks like some new mountains are forming out in the sea, keeping the water contained like a gigantic bowl.”
“I don’t think those are mountains?” Mark swallowed and stared. “They’re too consistent in shape to be rock formations. More like teeth or…the edge of a shell.” His eyes were distant and his face was unnaturally pale, even for an elf.
“A shell?” Rusty chuckled. “Do you know how big that turtle would have to be to have a shell hundreds of miles long?”
“Big, r-really b-big,” Mark clutched his head and collapsed. “Xarxos, I-I don’t feel so good.”
Xarxos eyes narrowed. “Get away from Mark. Now!” He backed away, cradling Trog in his arms.
Mark’s elven features blunted, his eyebrows thickening and nose becoming more triangular as he gasped. His eyes bulged, huge and dark, and his teeth sharpened into thick fangs jutting up from his jaw like an orc. His face shoved forward into a muzzle, giving him a distinctly leonine appearance.
“I…I remember now,” Mark gasped, feline tongue licking his darkening lips. “Years and years of memories.” He grasped at his head as centuries of knowledge overwhelmed him, almost causing him to pass out. “I feel so old…Ancient…” He whispered and stared, unseeing. His ears widened and curled.
Xarxos and the others backed up as Mark tottered forward onto stumpy, clawed feet, hands becoming wide paws. His skin had turned an odd grey-green, like stone, hair curling in a great curly mane. A thick tail wound its way out of his pants, tufted with strangely fibrous fur.
Mark’s body began to crack and shift, growing larger and larger to tower over them. Rusty and Xarxos leapt from the balcony as it gave way under the weight of the ever-growing reptilian lion-man. They rolled safely onto the grass below, but Mark landed on his butt, spine cracking and forcing him onto all fours.
His frame shuddered, growing ever massive.
“I…I…have to go.” Mark’s voice nearly blasted Xarxos’ eardrums. “I…errr…aaaarrrrrrggg!”
Mark’s booming voice shifted into strange, animalistic growls. He crawled to the cliff’s edge, ground shaking from his steps, and then flung himself into the ocean. Xarxos watched as he shifted from swimming to crawling, out to the edge of the shell, and then dove deep off the ridge into the swirling abyss below.
“What’s happening?” Rusty asked as he helped the Cyclops to his feet.
“The real Reality Audit.” Rok swallowed. “Don’t worry, you’ll forget it soon.”
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Mark was having a difficult time thinking. Or rather, trying to decide on what to think about first. It was so easy to lose himself in the memories. They spanned a million years, after all, and he appeared to have eidetic memory.
The ocean was calling to him. Home. He needed the peace of the flowing waters. He dove deep, deep under the Pacific. He continued to grow, his lungs increasing in size and capacity and suddenly something heavy was pressing down on him.
He pushed against the seabed with his four stumpy legs. He heaved, body growing, the enormous shell attaching itself to him and he could feel them. All the millions of lives that were living on his shell. They itched and scratched and it didn’t bother him. His nerves were deadening to them, becoming desensitized, though he could feel a subway carve itself into his shell and he stretched and flexed his back.
Los Angeles rocked above him, Skyscrapers rising, buildings shifting in the sway of the Lion Turtle’s back. They were built of steel and glass and wood and shell and they rose higher and higher, Los Angeles becoming Myth City and growing its own atmosphere.
The Lion Turtle, who could vaguely remember being called Mark, but only for perhaps twenty-seven of its millions of years, grew ever massive, a true Kaiju. The press of its shell became less and less ponderous and its great leonine head broke the surface of the ocean, heavy nostrils snorting a spray of water as it exhaled, water infused with its magic, becoming a myst that would surround the island, altering all those who came into contact with it.
The Lion Turtle was a bridge from the Fae World to the Mundane. Every two hundred years it would move, lumbering across an ever-changing landscape, turning dreams into reality by its mere presence.
It settled back into the newly created Gulf again, returning to its slumber, dimly aware of the activities of the ones who lived on its shell. Bridges reconnected to the mainland. Tourists flew in and reality shifted and altered…as it always had whenever one visited Myth City—where Legends were made.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=--=-=-=-==-
Rusty brushed himself off, breathing in the lovely air. “The Lion Turtle must be in a good mood today! Haven’t seen myst like this in a hundred years or so!”
Rok stared at the back of the Lion Turtle’s head, barely visible in the distance. “Yeah. I hope that’s what it means.”
Trog groaned as a sharp pain struck him in the chest. He convulsed in Xarxos’ arms as the Minotaur stared down at his husband.
Rusty’s ear swiveled and his heads turned to stare at Trog. “He’s having a heart attack, Xarxos.”
Trog had gone a purple-red color in his face. Sweat was pouring off him and he was barely breathing. Xarxos panicked.
“You said he’d be fine!” Xarxos snapped at Tanaka.
The Tanuki looked down in shock. “He was supposed to be like this, but in perfect health! The magic…”
“Reality Auditor.” Xarxos grit his teeth. “Has to be.”
“But the Paradox is almost certainly negligible!” Tanaka protested.
“His Auditor is Loki!” Rok hissed.
“Ah. Trickster.” Tanaka frowned. “Yes, he’s certainly done that. Still, I’m not sure why he’d be stressed out.”
“You don’t…” Xarxos rolled his eyes. “Three Audits! Four, if we count him, Tanaka!”
“By the Gods….” Tanaka’s eyes widened. “But if we do anything to him now…”
Xarxos cried and held Trog in his arms.
Tanaka bit his lip and pulled out a long, red feather that had a colorful eye like one of a peacock’s feathers.
“We use this.” Tanaka said.
Xarxos blinked away tears. “What is that?”
“Phoenix feather. Stab him in the heart and use Legendary Anthroform: Phoenix. I will work my magic as well.” Tanaka thrust the feather in Xarxos’ hands.
“Everyone shut your ears!” Xarxos growled as he carefully set the dying bugbear on the ground.
Rusty, Rok, and Tanaka did as commanded. Tanaka reached down and stuffed cotton in Trog’s ears. He glanced up at Xarxos and nodded. It was time.
Xarxos stared down at Trog, whose face was going waxy yellow, breathing slowing. His heart broke, watching his love slip away, all because of him. He grit his teeth and stabbed the quill into Trog’s heart while keeping a hand on the book.
“Legendary Anthroshift: Phoenix!’ Xarxos whispered and pointed, hoping against hope that it would work.
Tanaka stuck a leaf on Trog’s head and intoned something in Japanese.
Trog’s features began to shift, mouth pushing out into a sharp beak, brightly colored feathers appearing along his arms and across his head. The Tanuki finished his intonation and clapped his hands twice. Trog gasped raggedly, then his eyes opened wide, hand moving to the clutch feather in his chest.
“Back!” Tanaka tackled Xarxos away just before Trog exploded in a pillar of flames.
Xarxos stared down at the resultant ash. A small, very ugly baby anthropomorphic bird wriggled helplessly in the greasy charcoal of his former lover.
“Is he...?” Xarxos asked.
“Maybe.” Tanaka nodded. “He might still be there. I can accelerate his growth. Twenty-Six, you said?”
Xarxos nodded.
“It will be done, Master.” The Tanuki scooped up the baby bird, brushing some ashes off of it, and scooted away to find a blanket.
“You look weirded out, man.” Rusty said. “Something wrong?”
Xarxos stared at Rok and Rusty.
“No.” He said finally. “Everything’s just fine.”