Knights Apocalyptica

Chapter 263: A Special Kind Of Couple

Colin slammed his fist into Alexandria’s face with a wet thunk; the weight sent her stumbling back. She reeled, nearly falling over her own feet, but by some miracle, kept herself upright.

Erec winced at the chorus of gasping, but there was no help for it. That was the natural reaction when the groom punched the bride point-blank. And no amount of alcohol in the world would smooth over and make people forget what they had just seen.

Alexandria gave a series of rapid blinks, a hand going to the welling spot on her jaw.

“You can punch like that?” she asked.

“There is much you do not know about me, and even more you are unlikely to ever know,” Colin replied.

She grinned. "Well, you fucked up. Should've thrown a spell to start off with. I'm not about to lose a fist fight to a mage."

Colin began to reply, but the words never came out as three copies of Alexandria rushed forward. One was a bull rush right at Colin with a cocked-back fist. The second copy split off to the left, running across the top of a truck and coming down at him from above with a kick. The last copy went to the right, taking a wide sprint that ended in a vicious roundhouse.

Of course, Colin reacted the best he could. A small backstep. He braced himself, but defending against three attacks at once was impossible.

The roundhouse slipped through his guard, and the copies of Alexandria vanished, merging into the singular version of her as her right foot slid past Colin's block and snapped straight into his torso.

He grunted, flying through the air, his back crashing into a car and denting the door. Alexandria finished her spinning kick and stamped her foot down with a force that sent up a plume of dust. She stared at her soon-to-be spouse.Then, she stalked up to the collapsed man the way a cat would a mouse.

"Really? One hit?" she asked.

Colin didn't move, head hanging as she crouched down to get a better look.

"I thought he'd have more fight in him." Enide appeared next to Erec, handing over a beer. He broke his fixation on the fight and scanned both her and the crowd. It'd swelled. The surrounding music softened as people turned it down to get a better view of what was happening; people were jumping onto cars to get nice spots for the show. "I've seen him do more on the road. Is she just that strong? I mean, I knew she was feisty, but what was that?"

"He's not done. I'm not sure what he's up to." Erec returned his attention to the fight, taking a sip of the beer. It had a nice citrus hint. Not much had changed from his brief glance.

Alexandria was still crouched next to Colin, only now, she cupped his chin. Making him look her in the eyes. His eyes were now blazing a deep golden light, and she frowned at him. “Just what are you doing…?”

Glyphs spawned in rapid succession around them; several at the same time, each filling with a crackling purple energy. Alexandria gasped and dropped Colin; she split into several different bodies, each of which tried to put distance between her and Colin. Systematically, each copy was pierced by a bolt of lightning as the glyphs activated, eliminating all versions of her until a single one remained; the copy where she was still in front of Colin, eyes wide and hand outstretched.

Colin grabbed her wrist, yanking her off balance and sending the woman tumbling toward him.

At the same time, he pushed off with his other leg. A knee went straight into her gut.

Alexandria wheezed and spilled onto the dirt ground, curling up and clutching her insides.

“My spells are used how I choose to use them. That is the point of magic…. But with you, dearest, you deserve a more personal touch.” Colin declared.

Alexandria stopped squirming and spoke in a pained tone, “Wait—you aren’t actually going to hit me with a spell?”

“Don’t be foolish. I hit you with several spells; I forced you to stay put. Measured force is the mark of a true Knight. Give it up now, I do not wish to hurt you," Colin said, with genuine concern in his voice. She tried to get to her feet, but Colin shoved his boot on her back, pressing her down onto the ground.

Do we end it? This does not look good.

Before he could move, there was an eruption of dust, sand, and a tornado of limbs that forced his attention back on the two of them. Alexandria had exploded into a tornado of versions of herself. Each of them was trying to propel herself out from underneath her betrothed.

Colin reacted instantly with a veritable army of glyphs appearing in the air. His fingers waved like a skilled conductor for an orchestra, and with each snap of a glyph came the crack of a lightning strike, smashing into each copy of Alexandria as she tried to escape, all the while pushing her down further with his boot. Stripping her of every clean escape attempt she made. He kept her there, just like he said, right underneath his foot.

Alexandria screamed in frustration, and her copies doubled, going from three at a time to five. From five to ten. From ten to twenty. Reality itself began to distort around them, the air wavering as whatever manipulation her Talent wielded took its toll on the immediate area, punctuated by snaps of lightning searing into the ground as he cut off all the possible realities Alexandria formed to escape.

He was an inescapable force of magic; his will enforced by lightning.

“We’ve done this already. Come on. Cease this fighting… I... I don’t want to hurt you, but this gets us nowhere. We can stop fighting now. I do see you as a fellow Knight, and more than just my bride-to-be, you know that.” Colin said, with a yell to be heard over the crackle of lightning, yet it still had a soft quality to it.

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Alexandria responded with a screamed insult, pushing back against the inevitable mage on her back.

And then the next bolt of lightning snapped into a version of Alexandria who forced her way out. Only this time, the copy didn't vanish. She screamed in sheer pain, all the versions of her snapping together into the damaged copy. Her back arched as she writhed on the ground.

Colin froze. The rest of the glyphs fizzled out with sparks; his eyes went wide.

"W-what—? Alexandria!" he exclaimed.

Then, he dropped to his knees next to her, a hand reaching out to help.

“Got you, you little fucker,” she yelled, grabbing his wrist and pulling the same trick he had earlier. With a single yank, she brought him to her; her forehead smashed into his with a loud bang. Colin fell back, but she didn’t let go, launching herself onto him and straddling him as he fell to the ground.

She smashed a fist into the side of his head, and then another into the other side.

It was all Colin could do to try to protect his face as she began an onslaught. But the tide had shifted. More versions of her arms appeared; the relentless assault was too much for the mage to concentrate and form another glyph. She made full use of her Talent and seized every opening. Fist after fist landed, each of them finding their way to an unguarded spot to deal maximal damage; with all of the fists flying, all of the versions of her searching for an opening, it was impossible to block at all.

Erec’s jaw dropped, and a flush of both horror and appreciation went through him as his friend’s future wife pummeled him into the ground. She was strong. But damn, did this not look bad.

“Such a fucking legend, aren’t you, my little Colly Wolly? Hah!” Alexandria cried with triumph; she eased her blows, taking a look at him.

Colin twitched underneath her, not able to focus. She leaned in, putting a hand on his neck; a bit of blood ran from her lip, and she licked it. Then she grinned and pushed closer, her face mere inches from his.

“How does it feel to be bested, Nitidus?”

Colin’s eyes focused.

And then… it was hard to see. But Erec swore he saw him smirk.

“You’ve yet to best me, wench.”

In response, Alexandria pulled away and brought a fist back; twenty copies of it formed, each approaching his face at a different angle. She’d find the best one, the one with the most impact, and that would be the hit to end the fight.

Not a single one landed.

She was flung back by a shockwave of electricity; it cracked into the nearby cars, making them spark as their engines kicked out. Alexandria flew through the air and hit the ground, once more convulsing from muscle contractions several feet away.

Glyphs formed around Colin. But these were different. They only appeared for half a second. Nearly too fast to see, and with the typical purple came flecks of gold in the lines; electricity ran out from him in branches, his body levitated from the ground, a spiral of arcing lightning snapped into the sand, and his golden eyes gazed down on Alexandria.

The crowd rushed for cover, save for the brave few.

Amongst them, Erec stood firm. His heart raced.

It was no longer just Colin who was tilting his head at Alexandria, considering her. Kay. His brother-in-arms. Erec felt it, the tell-tale tugging at the silver fire inside of him as it reacted to the other Knight reaching his mantle.

For a second, his mind vanished away; he saw the round table clearly. He saw Kay, sitting in his chair, his golden eyes gleaming like the suns themselves, and then he was back, watching the fight, watching the arrival of Kay. The chains on the mantle loosened.

Alexandria stopped twitching and leaped to her feet. She stumbled in doing so, muscles still dealing with the rampant charge running through her. She stared up at Colin.

“You—what is this?”

“This is me. All of me.” Colin’s voice rang out, and in it came the full weight of a Knight with a seat at the Round Table.

Colin vanished.

Then, before the eyes could register what happened, he was upon Alexandria. A wave of elecricity snapping forward, washing away every version of her that tried to dodge, escape, or even attack him. Save for the copy that stayed.

Faster than the eye could blink, he’d won the fight. But he didn’t hit her with a spell. He contented himself to staring at her, his golden eyes gazing deeply into hers.

“Do you still wish to fight me?” he asked, the sound of the question barely perceptible. Had it not been for Erec’s high Virtues, he was sure he wouldn’t have caught it.

Alexandria shivered beneath the weight of that gaze.

“Do I scare you?” Colin asked, a note of sadness in his voice.

At this, she stopped shaking. The woman stared him right back in the eyes: "You have never scared me, Colin. Not since the day we were first betrothed, and I found out what a little brat I’d be marrying. Not when you insulted me and avoided me. Not when you did the million other annoying little stuck-up noble brat things you do to keep people away to protect yourself. You don’t scare me.”

“Then what am I to you? Why? Why go through all this for me?” Colin asked, the lightning around him fading. The gold in his eyes dimmed.

"Because, you stupid little idiot, I love you. I love the way you are when you let the shell drop. From the way you care about your friends, to the responsibility you always try to take on, even when another person might just walk away. I love how much you care, because deep down, even when you try to lie about it, you do the same for me," Alexandria said. She hesitated and then reached out, running her fingers along his cheek. Sparks formed between her and him, making her wince, yet she did not relent.

The gold left Colin’s eyes, and a snap of electricity crashed from him into the ground, forming a ring of glass around the two of them as it burned away the sand.

Alexandria paused, her hand on his cheek, taking in Colin staring at her, tears forming in the corners of his eyes.

And then, she gave a vicious grin. “Got you again, dumbass.”

She shoved him onto the ground and forced her way on top, slamming a fist into the sand right next to his head, and giving a wicked smile at him from above.

"I win," she declared, and then, before he could argue, she shut him up with a kiss. Pinning him beneath her.

Enide whistled. The partygoers who had been running for cover leapt out and began to cheer and egg them on.

It… Erec winced again, for perhaps the fifth time in the fight, as the cheering only escalated the public display of affection. The kissing turned into a full-blown makeout session, which was quickly going nowhere good. Erec found Olivia in the crowd; her face was turning an embarrassed shade of red, and catching her eye was enough for her to leap into action—she grabbed Garin and the two of them rushed towards the future married couple on the ground to break them up before things got even more heated.

Erec looked into the sky at the moon far above, taking in a quick breath.

Well, that had been the bachelor party. Goddess willing, the wedding would go far better.

When he looked back down, he saw that Alexandria was trying to fight off Olivia; she was not yet done with her future husband.

No matter how the wedding went, it would not be denied that the two were in love. Enide grabbed him by the elbow. "Let's help out too, yeah?"

“Yeah.”

Two days, and they’d have the wedding; and it would be all they could do to keep it from becoming another political blunder.