F-Rank Frank: Chapter 80 Awakening (Part III)

Chapter 80

Awakening (Part III)

Never underestimate the lengths a broken mind will go to, in order to take back what they consider theirs.

She was crazy. Her mind was fractured. Just being this close to her, to Constance let Frank realize how much this forced separation had on her psyche. This insight was also a deeper look into just how fragile the mind of the night walkers were.

That was the thing, each seemed to have a give and take. Power at a cost.

Frank had already given up a lot of his own consciousness to make the bond with the beast. Now that the bond was made, and their body seemed powerless to resist this new infusion of dark blood, it became clear that Frank’s mind would shatter.

“Don’t worry, I will protect you,” the voice of his spirit animal spoke out. Offering soothing words to his mind.

In that moment, Frank felt the years of past memories flash through his mind. Memories where similar stories existed in the past. Stories where fused edge walkers took more power, only to be broken by the weight of their choices.

“You can’t do this, you will make him an abomination if you continue,” Prentip’s wise voice called out. Even without the ability to move or look around, Frank knew that this rebuke was towards Constance.

“You dare doubt my bonded?” Constance hissed back, her voice showing that even now she was one step away from having a fractured mind herself.

From their unbreakable bond, Frank could feel her emotions flittering back and forth. He could feel the way she teetered on the balance. How she wanted Frank to break, so that she could be the one to save him. A Hero complex.

In her mind, Constance wanted to be the one to save Frank when his own mind was at the brink of destruction, just as he had done for her. To her, there was no difference between this event and the one from which Frank had originally saved her.

The only problem was that, Frank knew that this was not the case. He knew that the variables were different. Frank already had a consciousness with him. One who was still forming, and in a very fragile state, but nonetheless integral to his survival.

Frank knew this, and yet his own body still refused to fight, to come back under his control.

“Calm down, fighting the process will only worsen your overall effect. You need to let the energy flow over you.” The spirit that took a chance with him declared.

Even in his mind, the spirit seemed to be of the shadows, melding into the dark recesses of his mind.

Frank didn’t know if it was his current spiritual state, the fact that his body no longer blocked certain impulses from being directly translated by his mind, or if it was something about being in a deep spiritual state, which he now found himself, but the result was one where Frank could read minds. Well not fully, and not every mind.

In fact, right now he could just loosely read two minds, if he was being completely honest with himself. Those were the minds of Constance, and the mind of his spiritual guide, the creature who took a chance on Frank and offered a portion of its overall power to Frank.

From these two connections, Frank could read the baseline thoughts, or more accurately the impulses of those around him. He could feel the selfless act that his bonded spirit would offer, how if everything became too much for Frank, then his spirit would take on the full burden.

In his mind he saw the past examples of this very act, ones where bonded spirits took on the mental strain of power. Power that would kill or cripple most beings. The result of this sacrifice by the spirit animal was that it would forever break the shard of essence that the spirit creature would bestow upon the corrupted individual. Resulting in the forming of an abomination, where the full extent of power would go to the residual essence of the spirit animal.

To be an abomination was death to an edge walker, for it meant that all of the excess power would be held and stored by the animal form. An animal that would forever be corrupted by too much power for such a small portion of essence to control.

The reason such an act was death was due to the way this forever forced the edge walker to be human. Worse, any shifting would unleash the monster and its fully contained power. Like a coiled spring given a chance to finally release its tension, this act would cause the abomination to go feral, for at that point not even the spirit could contain the pent-up energy. Forcing the abomination to strike out at anything and everything that came its way.

Yet, despite this, despite knowing that by taking on all of the energy, the spirit animal would forever curse its own existence to that of being little more than a mindless monster constantly being pushed to extremes by the painful existence of trying to restrain power, the spirit still readily accepted this fate.

“Don’t worry, I accepted this possible fate, when I chose you as my companion,” The beast within Frank’s mind commented. It seemed that in this state the beast too could easily read Frank’s mind as well. This was needed, in time the transfer of thoughts and ideas would become quicker and seamless. Then the ultimate stage would be for their thoughts to be as one, no longer independent thoughts that get bandied about between consciousness to consciousness, but one clear coherent exchange, rebuttal, and perfection of thoughts. At least, that was what was supposed to happen.

Now it seemed that this exchange, this partnership of having a second consciousness to draw instincts from would be gone. Sacrificing itself the moment it became tangible to save Frank. Realizing this fate, that it was not what he wanted, Frank protested.

“No,” Frank cried out. Yet, his thoughts and actions were too little, too late. Frank was finally mentally aware enough of his body’s processes to be able to feel the faint tickling sensation of cold liquid dirt being brushed and spread out on his forehead.

A shiver ran down his spine at the sudden application of the odd substance. Yet, he mentally braced himself for what was to come next. However nothing he did could have prepared himself for the level of energy that seemed to seep into his skin from the brush.

White hot pain.

A pain so intense and piercing struck Frank’s skull and all but threatened to shatter his blood and bone. In his mind, he realized how this was wrong, how this was not how the Dark Queen’s blood was to be applied. That this was a corrupted form of the process and conversion ritual. Even Constance knew this.

Constance knew this, and she still did it wrong, but why?

It only took a second for his mind to reach out to Constance’s for him to first feel the fractured webbing of thought that coursed through the monster’s mind. And she was a monster, there was no doubt about this assessment now, for her mind was bent and fractured beyond all repair. Worse, she knew that by doing this, Frank’s mind would also shatter, that this was what she wanted for Frank would be more broken than her. This way, she could provide for Frank in a way she felt was beyond her reach currently.

“Why?” Frank cried out, his mental anguish reaching out and seeming to pierce through Constance’s mind. For a moment the fractured thoughts and broken fragments aligned themselves to one structure that was nearly perfect. In that one moment of alignment, Frank felt Constance’s mind come to life. He felt her reasoning return, and then found a frightened Constance staring at him. Tears evident in her eyes. As their consciousnesses seemed to align, Frank saw the complete look of sadness and remorse that filled Constance’s psyche.

“Why?” Frank found himself asking her again.

Crying headshake. Constance could only break eye contact at the question as tears filled her angelic features. Then as if realizing that something was wrong, Frank felt it, a dark ominous presence that once again connected to Constance’s mind. This mental presence was powerful, and unyielding, worst of all, Frank had felt this presence before. Although the last time he had felt her presence, Frank had been able to resist.

This time, he felt how helpless Constance was from this corruption. How the Dark Queen herself had taken over the mind of Constance and now shattered that mind, until Constance was nothing more than a near mindless drone. Seeing this, Frank knew that he too would suffer the same fate, if he fully consumed the corrupted blood that was now seeping into his body.

Fear gripped him, as he saw his own future breaking before him. He saw the inevitability that awaited him, even if his body survived this second conversion process, his mind would shatter. Then just as his thoughts became their darkest, a voice of hope called out to him.

“Don’t worry, I’ll handle this,” the spirit spoke.

However, the voice was too little, too late. All the spirit would do was help prolong the danger that Frank was in, staving off his execution for a short period of time. For taking the blood and essence of the Dark Queen was to take on eternity. Meaning, it didn’t matter if he fell today, tomorrow, or a hundred years from now, he would fall, and when he did, the Dark Queen would be there to snatch his shattered mind and make him little more than the broken puppet that Constance currently was.

It was a bleak fate.

For a moment, he wondered why me?

This whole thing was a lot for one person, at least that’s what Frank thought at first. Then as if a last act of defiance from the momentarily aware Constance, or an act of sheer coincidence, Frank understood the attraction. He understood why the Dark Queen herself would provide excess power to Constance to let her fly, and break the essence of the peace accords, while still maintaining the wording.

In that one momentary exchange of thoughts and ideas, Frank saw it, the reason for the interest. It was so simple, and Frank felt stupid for not recognizing its value earlier. The reason for the infatuation was the fact that Frank had something no one else had. Something that even the Dark Queen with all her millennia of experience could not fathom.

Frank had the ability to cultivate Earth Energy. Better still, he could manipulate both positive and negative polarities of the energy, something that had apparently been lost to time. Realizing this, Frank suddenly realized one thing, the odd paste that was being applied to his forehead, it was composed primarily of earth and earth particles.

Just as he was coming to this understanding, the spirit creature strode forward in an ultimate act of self-sacrifice, where it would offer up its own consciousness to save Frank’s. Seeing the act, Frank knew that he had chosen his form of companion well, such loyalty was beyond admirable. Still, Frank couldn’t let his companion sacrifice himself, not like this, especially not, when he now had a plan.

“Take a step back, I’ve got this,” Frank called out to his companion as he mentally strode forward to take on the foreign energy. Energy that was even now seeping directly into his body, and trying to saturate his consciousness with too much energy at one time.

Smiling to himself, Frank realized one fatal flaw in the Dark Queen’s thinking, namely the fact that he had dealt with far more energy than was contained in this dollop of ancient blood and clay.

“Let’s do this…” Frank said, as he expanded his mind and let his body take control of what would happen next.