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Description
With the brother’s transformation came a revolution of Nocturne that Shade simple stood back from and watched in a mixture of awe and sick horror. They completed their work reworking the city but went even further than they had originally planned. All plant life was removed from view and replaced by defensive machinery, pipes and thick cables ran everywhere connecting to new defensive shields and the construction of massive cannons were being erected.
Zarchary overlooked this project with glee, his apparent knowledge of mechanics, robotics and machines increased ten fold. Factories began to be built for the mass production of fighting Gizoids, the beginnings of a massive army to be created.
Shade said nothing to Ix of her utter distaste of this for she knew already that Ix cared nothing for such concerns. What he cared about was having a massive military power at the Nocturnus’ command.
But the far more disturbing things were happening with Finitevus. He remained in his lab working with Dimitri, the pair of them talked long into most nights arguing back and forth over some papers they had on the table. Shade had glanced once at the diagrams sketches there but they made no sense to her. What disturbed her about it was the fast that gradually Finitevus was inducing a change in Dimitri.
Before the two of them had been quite close, almost to the point where Shade had been tempted to ask Dimitri if he wishes to share quarters with her but now he grew remote and distant. There always seem to be a distant, haunted look in his eyes and whenever he spoke there was always an under current of trepidation.
“Dimitri, what is it?” Shade had asked once, finally unable to take the silence of his company any more. He looked up at her, blinking. “What does Finitevus want you to do?”
He was silent again for perhaps a minute before he looked away.
“You would not understand.” He said quietly.
“Try me.” Shade insisted sternly.
At this a frown creased his face.
“You would not understand.” He repeated and then stood up. “But just know it is something I have to do, for all Nocturne.” He would say no more and left her alone. He never spoke to her again after that and spent all his time working with Finitevus enclosed in the lab.
Left alone, Shade stood still and watched the city she had grown up in and the people she had once known change into a warped parody.
Perhaps she had never really avoided seeing Argus’ face and she had been driven insane and all this was happening inside her disturbed imagination. Or maybe it was this place, this Twilight Cage as it was being called, that was changing everything? Did it affect the people trapped inside?
“I know it was you.” A voice from behind her stated without warning. Shade turned to stare in surprise at an older male echidna, common blood red with long arching white eyebrows that mirrors Ix’s own style.
“Me?” She asked, confused although something told her she should recognise this one.
“Yes.” He said; his tone neither accusatory nor slighting but rather a cold, calm detachment as if stating fact. “You where the one who helped Ix organise the raid for the Chaos Emerald’s Pax created aren’t you?”
It was then that she knew him. Nestor, chief librarian… now out of a job as many of the books and tomes of knowledge that had made Nocturne famous had been burned to provide fuel for the many forges Zarchary was using to remake the city.
Shade looked at him and suddenly shame crept into her soul.
“Yes.” She admitted. “I did.”
Nestor sighed and shook his head, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder.
“You were merely following orders.” He told her. “I do not blame you for the failure of Pax’s design, and neither does his ghost.”
“Ghost? Then… he is dead?”
When Nestor nodded Shade felt a gut wrenching twist of guilt and shame anew.
“Much has been lost.” Nestor said. “And you are not to blame. We are all at fault. The Echidna’s… the Djinn… neither of us could simply put aside our greed and ambition to see the bigger picture. Pax, Samad… those two had foresight and too few of us wanted to listen.”
With a frown he looked around at the pale luminosity of the Cage.
“erhaps we deserve to be stuck in here.” He mused.
“And our descendants? Our children’s children? Do they deserve to be trapped, never knowing the feel of the sun, or the cool rain? That all they should know is this…” She spread her hands. “… this darkness?”
Nestor pursed his lips.
“No.” He said eventually. “It is not.” Then he grinned rather impishly. “But, if you listen to Zarchary, we won’t be here for much longer. I’m sure he has some plan of affecting our escape… but the question for me isn’t; whether or not he can do it… its what we’ll do when we get back.”
Three days later, Ix summoned all Echidna’s and Gizoids to the central square in the middle of the city. Something was to be presented to the people, some grand innovation but there was no hint as to what exactly it was to be.
When Shade arrived in the square she saw that set up in the centre and surrounded by the crowd was a large cylindrical device with a glass chamber about ground height built into its base. There was some shape within this glass but it was far to indistinct behind the glass to make out what.
Hundreds of wires and cables lanced out the top of the metallic pillar, connecting it to nearly every building around; it looked as if this one machine was wired into all of Nocturne.
Up near the front of the machine stood Ix, watching with detachment and argument between Zarchary and Finitevus. The two brothers were going over the strange device, checking over it for whatever last minute errors they could find and talking rapidly with each other but Shade could not near them over the noise of the crowd.
“SILENCE!” Ix bellowed when finally it seemed like they were ready to begin. The crowd went utterly quiet instantly, all eyes forward.
It was then Finitevus who stepped forward.
“Today, you will see the ultimate expression of the ideals to which we must now galvanise ourselves to.” He declared. “We must cast aside all outdated notions of compassion or pity. These weaknesses will ensure our destruction in this place. Today, you will see in my machine the Chaos Siphon the birth of the ultimate warrior, a personified vision of ruthless order.”
Then he stepped aside.
“Ascend to your destiny!”
Someone walked up the short flight of stairs to the device and Shade had to strain over the shoulders of a who people to see who it was. Then she gasped.
It was Dimitri.
He was wearing the undergarment that was worn underneath the regular Nightshade armour, a tight fitting black padded suit that covered everything except the head.
“Dimitri!” Shade choked out hoarsely as without a moment’s hesitation he stepped into the machine through a glass door that Finitevus locked shut behind him.
“Brother, let us begin!” He declared. Grinning insanely, Zarchary nodded and began operating the side controls of the machine. There was a pulsing noise and loud groaning as the device activated, lights around its top turning out and sparks of power beginning to travel down the connecting cables.
Shade shoved her way through the crowd, bowling people over where necessary until she emerged at the front of the mob.
What she saw then made her wished than she hadn’t for now she had to watch up close as the transformation occurred.
Dimitri stood within the machine, arms outspread in welcome. Swirling around him were visible winds of light like a miniature hurricane. It looked as if energy, drawn from all over the city, was being fed directly into him through his open mouth and eyes.
Shade just stared, eyes wide in awe at the sight. It was as if they could see the power flowing through him, his veins standing out through his skin and glowing bright blue. His eyes were now completely white but not from any sudden blindness.
Around him, swirling in the winds, were pieces of customized Nightshade armour, each piece a styled work of ingenious art probably by Finitevus himself, gold instead of black.
Suddenly the gauntlets of the armour, as if drawn to him like a magnet, flew onto his hands.
There was a soft shunting noise once they connected and then expanded, sliding up and over his shoulders to form a seamless protection over his expanding muscles.
The cuirass was next, twirling until he connected to Dimitri’s chest, it slid over his body with clockwork movements and connected to form one piece with the gauntlets.
Following that the greaves and the boots, each piece fitting together like a jigsaw puzzle and solidifying the hold the armour itself had on him.
The armour was mostly golden, the light from the siphon gleaming brightly over the fine details carved into it. It was blue up the arms and down the sides of the legs to the boots, these being the seamless fittings. A loin clothe at the length to his knees was in front giving him a regal look.
The helmet Dimitri snatched out of the air, and then personally placed it down over his own head as if relishing the completion of some new identity. This helmet did not connect to the rest of the armour but it really did not need to, with two long sidepieces down the side of the head that ran from the chest to the top. A large red jewel stood out on the forehead where it rolled back over the top of the skull and then stopped to let the now longer dreadlocks to flow out the back.
With sharp detonations, lights blew off Finitevus’ Chaos siphon as if the device had been purpose built only to survive this one attempt and Zarchary acted quickly to shut it down before the machine would blow up completely.
The glass door swung open and Dimtri emerged, sparks trailing off him like a charge of static.
“D…Dimitri?” Shade asked in a quavering voice.
“I am more than just …Dimitri now.” The Echidna said, flexing himself as if testing his muscles, raising his arms to look at his hands. Bolts of lightning sparked between his fingers. Even his voice sounded different.
“Yes yes of course you are!” Finitevus declared with a spreading grin over his face, zeal in his face that made him look psychotic. “You are one with chaos now! You have tapped into the energy that binds the universe together! Your power may now be limitless!!”
The Doctor turned to look back at Ix, whose expression was one of thoughtful contemplation.
“Dimitri is now the ultimate Echidna warrior! With him spear heading our armies we can conquer this cage and the denizens within, harness them and galvanise them to our cause.”
Shade looked around at him sharply and in that moment, seeing the evil gleam in his eye she knew that the Finitevus she had known was gone forever. That explosion in the reactor had changed far more than just his fur colour. It was as if this new personality was a photo opposite of what he had been before.
Hearing this Ix managed a slight smile.
Dimitri advanced, his footsteps cracking the ground where he placed himself, bolts of energy lancing off from his being and carving scars in the ground.
“I am now the ultimate Procurator.” He declared but he did not bow. “Dimitri is no more.” He raised a fist and clenched it tight, lighting sparking between his fingers illuminating the entire square. “Now I am your weapon... your one man army. I am ENERJAK!”
------

Yes more comic references. Enjoy, I'm off on vacation

Description
With the brother’s transformation came a revolution of Nocturne that Shade simple stood back from and watched in a mixture of awe and sick horror. They completed their work reworking the city but went even further than they had originally planned. All plant life was removed from view and replaced by defensive machinery, pipes and thick cables ran everywhere connecting to new defensive shields and the construction of massive cannons were being erected.
Zarchary overlooked this project with glee, his apparent knowledge of mechanics, robotics and machines increased ten fold. Factories began to be built for the mass production of fighting Gizoids, the beginnings of a massive army to be created.
Shade said nothing to Ix of her utter distaste of this for she knew already that Ix cared nothing for such concerns. What he cared about was having a massive military power at the Nocturnus’ command.
But the far more disturbing things were happening with Finitevus. He remained in his lab working with Dimitri, the pair of them talked long into most nights arguing back and forth over some papers they had on the table. Shade had glanced once at the diagrams sketches there but they made no sense to her. What disturbed her about it was the fast that gradually Finitevus was inducing a change in Dimitri.
Before the two of them had been quite close, almost to the point where Shade had been tempted to ask Dimitri if he wishes to share quarters with her but now he grew remote and distant. There always seem to be a distant, haunted look in his eyes and whenever he spoke there was always an under current of trepidation.
“Dimitri, what is it?” Shade had asked once, finally unable to take the silence of his company any more. He looked up at her, blinking. “What does Finitevus want you to do?”
He was silent again for perhaps a minute before he looked away.
“You would not understand.” He said quietly.
“Try me.” Shade insisted sternly.
At this a frown creased his face.
“You would not understand.” He repeated and then stood up. “But just know it is something I have to do, for all Nocturne.” He would say no more and left her alone. He never spoke to her again after that and spent all his time working with Finitevus enclosed in the lab.
Left alone, Shade stood still and watched the city she had grown up in and the people she had once known change into a warped parody.
Perhaps she had never really avoided seeing Argus’ face and she had been driven insane and all this was happening inside her disturbed imagination. Or maybe it was this place, this Twilight Cage as it was being called, that was changing everything? Did it affect the people trapped inside?
“I know it was you.” A voice from behind her stated without warning. Shade turned to stare in surprise at an older male echidna, common blood red with long arching white eyebrows that mirrors Ix’s own style.
“Me?” She asked, confused although something told her she should recognise this one.
“Yes.” He said; his tone neither accusatory nor slighting but rather a cold, calm detachment as if stating fact. “You where the one who helped Ix organise the raid for the Chaos Emerald’s Pax created aren’t you?”
It was then that she knew him. Nestor, chief librarian… now out of a job as many of the books and tomes of knowledge that had made Nocturne famous had been burned to provide fuel for the many forges Zarchary was using to remake the city.
Shade looked at him and suddenly shame crept into her soul.
“Yes.” She admitted. “I did.”
Nestor sighed and shook his head, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder.
“You were merely following orders.” He told her. “I do not blame you for the failure of Pax’s design, and neither does his ghost.”
“Ghost? Then… he is dead?”
When Nestor nodded Shade felt a gut wrenching twist of guilt and shame anew.
“Much has been lost.” Nestor said. “And you are not to blame. We are all at fault. The Echidna’s… the Djinn… neither of us could simply put aside our greed and ambition to see the bigger picture. Pax, Samad… those two had foresight and too few of us wanted to listen.”
With a frown he looked around at the pale luminosity of the Cage.
“erhaps we deserve to be stuck in here.” He mused.
“And our descendants? Our children’s children? Do they deserve to be trapped, never knowing the feel of the sun, or the cool rain? That all they should know is this…” She spread her hands. “… this darkness?”
Nestor pursed his lips.
“No.” He said eventually. “It is not.” Then he grinned rather impishly. “But, if you listen to Zarchary, we won’t be here for much longer. I’m sure he has some plan of affecting our escape… but the question for me isn’t; whether or not he can do it… its what we’ll do when we get back.”
Three days later, Ix summoned all Echidna’s and Gizoids to the central square in the middle of the city. Something was to be presented to the people, some grand innovation but there was no hint as to what exactly it was to be.
When Shade arrived in the square she saw that set up in the centre and surrounded by the crowd was a large cylindrical device with a glass chamber about ground height built into its base. There was some shape within this glass but it was far to indistinct behind the glass to make out what.
Hundreds of wires and cables lanced out the top of the metallic pillar, connecting it to nearly every building around; it looked as if this one machine was wired into all of Nocturne.
Up near the front of the machine stood Ix, watching with detachment and argument between Zarchary and Finitevus. The two brothers were going over the strange device, checking over it for whatever last minute errors they could find and talking rapidly with each other but Shade could not near them over the noise of the crowd.
“SILENCE!” Ix bellowed when finally it seemed like they were ready to begin. The crowd went utterly quiet instantly, all eyes forward.
It was then Finitevus who stepped forward.
“Today, you will see the ultimate expression of the ideals to which we must now galvanise ourselves to.” He declared. “We must cast aside all outdated notions of compassion or pity. These weaknesses will ensure our destruction in this place. Today, you will see in my machine the Chaos Siphon the birth of the ultimate warrior, a personified vision of ruthless order.”
Then he stepped aside.
“Ascend to your destiny!”
Someone walked up the short flight of stairs to the device and Shade had to strain over the shoulders of a who people to see who it was. Then she gasped.
It was Dimitri.
He was wearing the undergarment that was worn underneath the regular Nightshade armour, a tight fitting black padded suit that covered everything except the head.
“Dimitri!” Shade choked out hoarsely as without a moment’s hesitation he stepped into the machine through a glass door that Finitevus locked shut behind him.
“Brother, let us begin!” He declared. Grinning insanely, Zarchary nodded and began operating the side controls of the machine. There was a pulsing noise and loud groaning as the device activated, lights around its top turning out and sparks of power beginning to travel down the connecting cables.
Shade shoved her way through the crowd, bowling people over where necessary until she emerged at the front of the mob.
What she saw then made her wished than she hadn’t for now she had to watch up close as the transformation occurred.
Dimitri stood within the machine, arms outspread in welcome. Swirling around him were visible winds of light like a miniature hurricane. It looked as if energy, drawn from all over the city, was being fed directly into him through his open mouth and eyes.
Shade just stared, eyes wide in awe at the sight. It was as if they could see the power flowing through him, his veins standing out through his skin and glowing bright blue. His eyes were now completely white but not from any sudden blindness.
Around him, swirling in the winds, were pieces of customized Nightshade armour, each piece a styled work of ingenious art probably by Finitevus himself, gold instead of black.
Suddenly the gauntlets of the armour, as if drawn to him like a magnet, flew onto his hands.
There was a soft shunting noise once they connected and then expanded, sliding up and over his shoulders to form a seamless protection over his expanding muscles.
The cuirass was next, twirling until he connected to Dimitri’s chest, it slid over his body with clockwork movements and connected to form one piece with the gauntlets.
Following that the greaves and the boots, each piece fitting together like a jigsaw puzzle and solidifying the hold the armour itself had on him.
The armour was mostly golden, the light from the siphon gleaming brightly over the fine details carved into it. It was blue up the arms and down the sides of the legs to the boots, these being the seamless fittings. A loin clothe at the length to his knees was in front giving him a regal look.
The helmet Dimitri snatched out of the air, and then personally placed it down over his own head as if relishing the completion of some new identity. This helmet did not connect to the rest of the armour but it really did not need to, with two long sidepieces down the side of the head that ran from the chest to the top. A large red jewel stood out on the forehead where it rolled back over the top of the skull and then stopped to let the now longer dreadlocks to flow out the back.
With sharp detonations, lights blew off Finitevus’ Chaos siphon as if the device had been purpose built only to survive this one attempt and Zarchary acted quickly to shut it down before the machine would blow up completely.
The glass door swung open and Dimtri emerged, sparks trailing off him like a charge of static.
“D…Dimitri?” Shade asked in a quavering voice.
“I am more than just …Dimitri now.” The Echidna said, flexing himself as if testing his muscles, raising his arms to look at his hands. Bolts of lightning sparked between his fingers. Even his voice sounded different.
“Yes yes of course you are!” Finitevus declared with a spreading grin over his face, zeal in his face that made him look psychotic. “You are one with chaos now! You have tapped into the energy that binds the universe together! Your power may now be limitless!!”
The Doctor turned to look back at Ix, whose expression was one of thoughtful contemplation.
“Dimitri is now the ultimate Echidna warrior! With him spear heading our armies we can conquer this cage and the denizens within, harness them and galvanise them to our cause.”
Shade looked around at him sharply and in that moment, seeing the evil gleam in his eye she knew that the Finitevus she had known was gone forever. That explosion in the reactor had changed far more than just his fur colour. It was as if this new personality was a photo opposite of what he had been before.
Hearing this Ix managed a slight smile.
Dimitri advanced, his footsteps cracking the ground where he placed himself, bolts of energy lancing off from his being and carving scars in the ground.
“I am now the ultimate Procurator.” He declared but he did not bow. “Dimitri is no more.” He raised a fist and clenched it tight, lighting sparking between his fingers illuminating the entire square. “Now I am your weapon... your one man army. I am ENERJAK!”
------

Yes more comic references. Enjoy, I'm off on vacation