Like an ancient monolith, Terminus stood over the forest, piercing red eyes tracking the light of Roxie’s sports car amongst the trees. Below, the trio raced to come up with a plan, all while assailed by the ever determined Knights of Unending End.

Autumn veered to one side, slamming into a golf cart full of knights and forcing it into a tree, taking it out with a twisting crunch of metal and bone.

“What’s the plan?! The Apocalypse Trigger’s been met-”

“It has not been met!” Autumn cut Serra off, “Terminus must escape the forest first!”

“Then let’s kill it first!” Serra swung her arm to take out a motorcyclist, their bike tumbling off behind them, “take us round the front!”

“Much easier to say than achieve!”

Roxie’s car ripped through the forest, veering around towards Terminus’ back. The beast tracked them through the trees until they passed its rear legs where, all too soon, they lost its attention. The walking disaster began, slowly, to move forward, each step sending quakes through the earth.

A hail of bullets from Serra’s revolvers bounced off its hide, ineffective. Terminus continued to move forward, the weather growing steadily worse.

Roxie took a deep breath, reaching out to her natural fairy magic; an ancestry with a deep connection to nature, and nature here was abundant. The clouds overhead rumbled more, louder, the thunder matched Roxie’s rhythm, a beat to her music.

Lightning split the sky in a flash of pure white, piercing the air and crashing into Terminus’ back; the beast staggered, roaring in pain. Electricity arced across Roxie’s guitar strings, racing through her fingers and up to her elbows, the fairy dropped back, slamming her shoulder into the corner of her amp.

“Fuck! Ow!” she clutched her shoulder, rolling awkwardly into the footwell.

Terminus recovered slowly, swaying side-to-side, smoldering cracks across the entirety of its broad back. Autumn swerved right, towards its tail.

Arrows from the Knights of Unending End whistled by, clattering off the car and Autumn’s plating. Two of them sunk into Serra’s arm, to little effect, but one caught Autumn in the neck.

Finding a gap between the metal plating, it made a horrible grinding noise as Autumn’s body began to shudder and shake, it was all the automaton could do to keep the car straight. Terminus’ tail swung downwards as they raced under it, with no way to swerve.

Serra was out of her seat in a flash, drawing her katanas. Power surged through the blades as she swept them overhead, slicing clean through the monster’s tail. It fell to the ground with a thud, crushing the Knights who couldn’t swerve in time. With reduced numbers, the Knights kept up the chase.

“Not goin’ anywhere now!” Serra grinned, wiping blood from her eyes.

“Not until it kills us,” Roxie grabbed Autumn’s headrest and pulled herself to her knees in the footwell, tugging the arrows out of Autumn’s neck and shoulder. Their mobility was still reduced, but with the obstructions free they were able to drift the car to Terminus’ left side, “let’s piss it off more!”

“Perhaps if-”

“Watch it!” Autumn had taken their eyes off the road for a second and Terminus unleashed a breath of black smoke and bile in their path. Serra grabbed the wheel and yanked it to the right, steering between the monster’s legs.

The Knights’ vehicles may have matched them in speed, but their handling left much to be desired, and the zealots careened into the ruinous breath.

Rusted vehicles and rotted bodies rolled pathetically out the other side, the withering of a hundred years had snuffed their lives out in an instant. The King slammed his foot into his subordinate’s wrist, their buggy swerving wildly to the left.

Another Knight’s vehicle collided with their rear end, sending them spinning out into the trees, safe on the other side of the Primordial Reckoning’s breath. Their companion vehicles were not so lucky.

Beneath Terminus, Autumn took back control of the vehicle, veering left towards its head. One massive foot lifted into the air, mud and rain-soaked stone crumbling off it, and came back down above their heads.

Autumn released the wheel, leaving Serra to dive for it, and raised both arms overhead, forming a chronomantic sigil. Magic swept out across the leg and spread to the rest of the beast, slowing it in time to a near halt.

The car sped along under its slowly encroaching foot, the light of safety just ahead. Autumn rattled and shook, desperately holding on to the magic they had summoned, while Roxie wrapped her arms around their shoulders from behind the seat, humming a panicked tune to help maintain their strength.

With a triumphant roar of the engine, the car raced out of harm’s way, but the edge of the foot clipped Serra’s horns as they went, slamming her forehead into the windshield. She lost control of the car and it spun out in the mud.

Rattled around, Autumn nearly flew out of the vehicle, releasing control of their magic to grab a more secure position as the car slid to a halt. Terminus’ foot slammed down, the quake sending Autumn tumbling over the hood and onto the ground, profuse smoke billowing from beneath their metal plate skin, “Serra! Now’s our chance!” their voice was compressed and distorted as chronomantic energies racked their body.

Serra shook her head clear, clambering onto the hood. With a wide stance, she inhaled deeply, the slit-like vents in her side expanding to draw in more air. Her chest swelled slightly, a glowing pink energy rising from the tip of her tail, through her spikes and along her spine, through her chest and up into her throat. Smoke leaked from the corners of her mouth, the energy filled her eyes, and she unleashed from her maw a beam of pure, concentrated, fiery power.

It impacted Terminus’ chest and began to carve its way inside, red hot cracks spreading across the beast’s skin, starting to crumble away. With a pained roar, the energy split huge tears across Terminus’ body and ripped out of its already fractured back, stretching into the clouds.

The Primordial Reckoning staggered and swayed, the rain died out and the thunder stopped, clouds clearing to let sunlight once again break through, shining onto the trio through the bloody hole they had carved. Terminus dipped to one side and collapsed, a deafening boom echoing through the forest as it hit the ground in a cloud of splintered wood and splattered mud.

Serra blinked in the light, smoke billowing from her mouth and nostrils. With a heavy sigh, she fell back onto her butt, seated on the hood. Her tail flicked out happily, slapping the windshield, “still alive, Autumn?”

“Ask me again in five minutes.” Autumn’s speech sped up and slowed down at random, shaking and twitching painfully.

“Ow…” Roxie blew gently on her scorched fingers, “apocalypse averted, mission complete.”

“I’m not-”

“Blasphemers!”

The shout shook the weary group from rest. The King, stood proud upon a battered buggy, a handful of surviving Knights at his side, raced towards them.

“Infidels! Cowards! Bastards!” he screamed, “cut them down! Kill them! No mercy! Fight to the death!”