InsaneJournal

Adam hadn’t minded, so much, the months he’d been here without the Sword of Power, but when he and Teela had found it in Castle Grayskull, he’d been happier than he could express. It had felt, a little, like a part of him was missing, and even though Teela had told him that they got the sword back from Skeletor, every day that he didn’t have it felt like yet another day that Skeletor and Evil-Lyn did.

That, and he felt a lot better about fighting these creepy fu creatures as He-Man than as Adam too.

“By the power of Grayskull!” he called as a group of them started to come close. The clouds above them rolled and darkend, a bolt lightning struck him. For a moment, there was a beam of technicoloured light, and when it dissipated, He-Man stood where Adam once had, overly muscled and wearing a fur loincloth.

It felt good. He was always more Adam than he was He-Man, but that didn’t mean that he wasn’t He-Man too.

He turned to Solaire, grinning. “So, shall we do the Monster Mash?”

“THAT IS JUST SO, SO COOL.”

Solaire had been surrounded by impressive people most of his life, and he’d lived a long, long while. From holy warriors to clerics who cast magic straight from the power of the Sun, the people who inhabited Anor Lando and the surrounding areas could fight with the sort of ferocity that only an undead curse could inspire. Still, it never got old. Solaire was always ready to admire a neat weapon, and by golly, that Sword of Power? Was really effing neat.

Unfortunately, Adam’s song reference largely went over Solaire’s medieval head, and the golden-haired paladin turned back to him in cheery confusion: “...you want to-- mash them? But… we could just stab them; I mean, you’re wielding the sword and everything…!”

Adam hadn’t transformed in front of very many people; he’d held the secret of He-Man close these last six years, though now that Skeletor and everyone on Eternia knew, he didn’t see any point of keeping the secret anymore. He’d definitely never transformed into anyone that was so enthused about it, and it made him grin.

“It is pretty cool, isn’t it?” He-Man agreed. He’d missed his sword, and he wasn’t above calling it what it was.

He grimaced a little, an image of actually mashing the monsters shoving its way into his mind. “Yeah, stabbing them is probably less messy, let’s go with that,” he agreed.

He might normally have felt bad about stabbing someone in the head. Normally, he liked to try to reason with someone before he skipped to the butt-kicking, but it had been obvious from day one that these creatures didn’t have any reason to appeal to, and so he didn’t have any problem running the Sword of Power through the head of one of the creatures that charged toward them. It was a lot easier than it had been during the rest of the week.

Solaire, on the other hand, was an old hat at cheerfully killing things that needed killing without asking too many questions. Oh sure, he vastly preferred not killing things, but really, in his estimation a lot of things were better off dead than alive anyhow, particularly if they came from the woods and had horrible fangs and creepy undead-ish faces, etc.

He pulled out his sword - a straightsword, fashioned in one of Astora’s better smitheries - and hoisted his shield up. “Let me know if you need a miracle!” he said, focusing on a monster that had sneaked around the side of a great tree. “A-- healing spell! That’s what they’re called around here, yeah? Healing spell. I’m not grand but I can do a little in a pinch!” Given how muscle-y and huge and intimidating Adam was now, Solaire doubted he’d need it, but better to offer it up front, he figured.

“You can do healing spells too?” He-Man asked, cleaving one of the creatures from skull to wherever its naval would have been, if it had actually been born from anything instead of just arising from whatever demon dimension it must’ve crawled out of. He didn’t want to think too hard about the origins of the creeps. “That’s pretty cool.” He booted the un-undead creature away, and stepped toward the next, swinging his sword. “It seems like everyone can do healing magic but me.”

Maybe not everyone, but Teela and Adora both had the ability, and given the fact that their power came from the same place as his did, he thought that was a little unfair. Just a little.

“A little. I trained years ago to learn miracles, but I’m not grand at it.” Solaire punctuated the statement by lifting his shield to guard himself against a charging monster; it hit his shield and rattled against it. “I’ve just got the basics, I’m afraid. And-- well. This!”

He tossed a lightning bolt toward the stunned creature; it hit it with a satisfying sizzle. Alas, it didn’t kill the monster outright - you really did have to remove their head for that, but nonetheless, it slowed it down considerably. “Think that swords do better with this lot,” Solaire observed a little sadly, and gamely raised his sword once more. “Does your sword make you all-- huge? Does it bring it out of you? Or would it do that to anyone who wielded the sword?”

He didn’t ask it sneakily. Solaire was just curious. He’d seen all sorts of weapons with wild effects but never anything like that.

“Seems that way,” He-Man agreed. Which was probably for the best; he couldn’t make lightning bolts come out of nowhere and he didn’t want to put his fist anywhere near those teeth. Luckily enough, his sword cleaved through the creatures like a knife through butter, and he unless they attempted to swarm him and Solaire, he thought that they should be fine.

“The sword acts as a conduit, but the Power lives inside me,” He-Man said. “Though I think it also…” he frowned a little thinking, “restrains? The power? Teela comes from a little bit in my future, and she told me that when I tried to transform without the sword, that I just became a being of power and rage.”

He had no memory of the experience, and he didn’t particularly want to test it out. Teela seemed pretty sure that he could have hurt innocent people if he’d had the chance, that he’d killed a manticore that hadn’t been doing anything more than enjoying the sun.

“But given the right circumstances, anyone can use it to harness the power too.”

What those circumstances were, He-Man wasn’t about to go telling anyone, even if they seemed like they were okay. The power was too dangerous to fall into someone else’s hands. His last memory of home was Skeletor getting the power, and it still gave him nightmares sometimes, even though Teela had told him that the’d gotten the sword back from him.

Solaire didn’t press the details, being both content with his own weapons and being fine with staying far, far away from anything that might bring out his inner power and rage. He may have been a cheery, simple sort on paper, but that had been a personality wrought from the kind of trauma people wrote epic poems about. He’d had epic abilities once. He hadn’t been happy.

“I don’t think we need just anyone,” he observed, feinting left and jamming a lightning bolt into the forehead of an attacking monster, stunning it just long enough to lop off its head with his sword. “I think we’ll do just fine with you, to be honest. I know there are quite a few heroes here, but Vallo could always use one more. And trust me, as someone who used to not be particularly keen on restraint, I’ve learned moderation is the way to go.” He ducked a jagged arm that thrust out. “I know I look a hair above your age,” he said with a breathless laugh, “but I’m actually much older than I look. Feel free to mistake me for wise as well.”

“Wow, these guys just keep coming, don’t they?” He-Man asked. Not that he minded too much, except for the fact that he was wondering if they had managed to find a pocket of the things or if there were this many of the creatures swarming the rest of Vallo. “Here.” And then he stepped a couple steps ahead of Solaire and punched the ground. It rippled up, like small wave of dirt extending out in front of him. He doubted he caused much damage to the creatures, but he did manage to cause them to lose their footing, some of them falling down completely, and it made it a lot easier to lop off their heads when they were struggling to stand.

“I’m not convinced it would be a mistake,” He-Man said, shooting him a smile. “It’s a side effect of experience, most of the time.”

“Oh, thank you! That was nice,” Solaire observed as the monsters that had been swarming them lost their footing and collapsed with the force of Adam’s shockwave (he himself had done a swift roll over it to avoid getting caught up in it). Lopping off several heads with one stroke of his Astora-steel, he turned toward the other man, grateful for taking a breather. It was true; he wasn’t as powerful as this He-Man fellow, but that had never been a source of concern for Solaire, who only competed against himself.

“Did you expect there to be so many?” he asked, glancing toward the direction they had come from. “I knew that we were under attack, but I didn’t imagine it to be quite this… focused. Do you think that the town is okay or should we perhaps circle back to check on folk?” Solaire didn’t want to interrupt their patrol, but at the same time…

“I didn’t,” He-Man said, frowning. He followed Solaire’s gaze, and frowned. Anyone who came out to the forest at this point probably knew what they were getting into and could, in theory, take care of themselves. The people back in town were probably less equipped to deal with this sort of threat. On the other hand, anyone who was caught unaware out here would be alone, and anyone back in the city would, presumably, be surrounded by other people.

It wasn't an easy choice. These were probably the kind of choices his father was always telling him he’d have to make someday that Adam always preferred to put off.

“We should keep going,” He-Man said after a moment. “But pay attention to your phone. If we’re needed back at the city, they’ll let us know. In the meantime, we’re the only ones out here.” He flashed Solaire a smile and a wink. “Besides, we can let loose a little more out here. Makes this whole thing a little more fun.”

Solaire considered the response, and nodding, turning back to the heart of the woods. If he had disagreed, he would have put up more of a fight, but Adam-- He-Man -- wasn’t wrong. This was their assignment, and the people that needed to get ahold of them absolutely could, even in this enchanted forest.

“It’s a lot easier with phones,” he said conversationally. “Back home, to send one another messages, we wrote glowing runes into the ground. Lots of opportunity for foolishness. As it is..” He changed his stance, readying his shield gamely. “I’m ready to let loose the dragons of war! Or well. You know.” He shrugged. “A lightning bolt or two.”