Dark Legacy
Chapter Sixteen


        Lina stared. Somewhere in the back of her head, a small voice began ranting about the impossibility of it all, and then she forcibly reminded herself that when dealing with the remnants of Rezo’s magic, almost anything was possible.
        She was looking at the prime example of it: one very irritated, very human Zelgadis.
        She watched the human look at chimera look at human look at her. Raising both hands, she turned so that she could see them both. “Hey, don’t look at me like that. I only killed the dragon.”
        The human smirked. “I’m perfectly aware of that, Lina.”
        Amelia looked back and forth, finally venturing nervously: “Mister… Zelgadis?”
        Both human and chimera turned to look at her, though only the human offered a verbal reply. “Yes, Amelia?”
        It proved entirely too much for Amelia, and the princess promptly burst into tears. “I don’t know which you is you!”
        The human sighed, and the chimera deflated slightly. Sylphiel figured it out at once. “They’re both Zelgadis, Amelia! One is just an extension of the other…”
        Gourry scratched his head. “I don’t get it. If that’s Zelgadis… who is this?” He pointed to the chimera, who joined the human in staring disbelievingly at him.
        Lina reached for something to smack Gourry with, grabbing the first thing that came near her hand, and scored the hit. Only then did she look at what she had used.
        It was a brown shoe with no special traits, only slightly scuffed. Her expression shifted from irritation to disbelief as it dawned on her that she’d grabbed it from above her… she turned and looked upwards to see a very startled Xellos… minus a shoe. Amelia’s muffled tears turned into muffled laughter as those looking at the Mazoku noticed his sock. It was black, with yellow dots of what looked like smiley faces on it. Lina smiled dangerously, drifting up towards Xellos, shoe in hand. “Xellos…” She started to snicker, “your socks… have smiley faces on them…”
        Xellos snatched his shoe back from Lina, hastily putting it back on his foot. “So what if they do, Lina? I happen to like them. I walk around flattening happiness wherever I go.”
        It took the group several minutes to recover while the smiling Mazoku enjoyed his joke.

        “So Zel…” Lina started as she chewed on some waybread at their hastily-made camp. “What do you think? Is one of you a copy?”
        The human looked at the chimera. The chimera looked at the human. Lina decided that it was entirely too spooky.
        The human shook his head. “I don’t know. The other copies that we encountered… To be honest, we didn’t really study any of them. And the copy of Rezo was perfectly capable of functioning without a controlling element, unlike…” For lack of a better reference, he simply looked at the chimera, who looked back at him.
        Eris frowned, leaning forwards as Lina sipped from her waterskin. “Are you controlling him, Zelgadis?”
        The human nodded. “To an extent, yes. It’s disorienting, but I can see from both… viewpoints. I can’t make him talk… but I can influence what he does.”
        Eris pursed her lips. “You aren’t going to like this, but switch back, if you can. Just for a moment. I need to see if you can control the human from the chimera.”
        For a moment, it looked as if the human would object, but with a resigned sigh, he closed his eyes. Lina noticed that the chimera’s eyes closed at the same time as well.
        Quite suddenly, the human fell backwards, hitting his head on the rock that he was sitting in front of, and the chimera opened his eyes, looked over with irritation, and remarked quite clearly: “That’s going to hurt, you realize.”
        Lina reflexively looked at the human who looked for all the world like he was asleep. “It’s nothing that a healing spell won’t fix…” She reached out with the spell in her hand, casting it, then shivering.
        “What’s wrong, Lina?” Sylphiel asked.
        Lina shook her head. “I felt the magic heal… but there was no sense of awareness.”
        Eris looked to the chimera. “Can you wake him?”
        The chimera stared at the human for a time, and then shook his head. “No. This body has the advantage of demon and golem. That,” he said, indicating the human body, “does not.”
        Eris nodded. “You can switch back if you want. I don’t think this is a simple case of copy.”
        The chimera blinked, and the human sat up with a grunt and looked at Eris. “What do you think this is then?” The human asked.
        Eris frowned. “That is disconcerting, Zelgadis. I think probably Rezo lied to you, and somehow Astrally translated you into the form he created with the demon and the golem. I’m going to have to think about this some more, and find the library and read some of his studies again. But why don’t we rest for the night, and start looking again in the morning?”
        Lina nodded. “Yeah, Zel. In that body, you’re human. You may not be aware of how tired you really are.”
        Everyone got their bedrolls out, and as watches were split out, Zelgadis noted that he wasn’t included. But before he could gather enough energy to remark upon it, he was fast asleep.