Duel of the Gemini

Destiny

“What is it?” It was Liliana who’d spoken. No one moved, or took their eyes off the swirling vortex.
“It’s him,” Sorin replied, “he’s coming. It’s…”
“Bolas!” Eldranis finished.
The vortex was nearly complete, a great rift breaking the space between the planes. Mana pour from the opening and crashed into the artificial wasteland. The Planeswalkers had to resist the shockwaves to stay on their feet and shouted over the noise.
“We have to go!” he yelled.
“We can’t teleport!” she call back. “With that thing open, we’ll be pulled in!”
“Then we have to fight!” he yelled again.
“Look around you!” Eldranis cut in. “Look at where are! We can’t fight him!”
Sorin looked back at the massive portal. “We don’t have a choice!” Reaching down, he grabbed the golden sword which lay at his feet and stood ready, facing the vortex. From the corner of his eye, he could see Liliana facing the sky as well. Her hair was flying wildly in the rush of the crashing mana, and the runes on her body were glowing brightly once again.
The last great mana surge exploded out of the portal, shaking the suspended landmass. The storm that had raged in the fabricated atmosphere had been quelled, absorbed by the vortex, and a tense silence descended in its wake. The rift was open now, a great gap of light in the perfect darkness. The three Planeswalkers stood fast, waiting, unspeaking.
A tremendous roar filled the empty space, shaking the ground they stood on and causing their breath to catch in their throats. From the light, Nicol Bolas descended into the darkness: the greatest evil in the universe had arrived.
The dragon-god roared again. Free of the vortex, his size was overwhelming, growing larger by the moment as his great wings unfurled and his head raised on a long, thin neck. His malignant face was angular and pointed at every opportunity and complimented by rows of razor sharp teeth. From his temple rose two curved horns, between which a large jewel hung suspended in mana. Armour plates were mounted across his body and down his long, thin arms, serving a purely ornamental function.
No words. This creature had lived for countless millennia, seen the rise and fall of more worlds than Sorin would ever hear of, controlled magic that could rewrite the laws of time itself: he had no need for words. His empty eyes, dark pits in the sea of scorn that was his existence, took in the scene below him: the lost device, the unconscious servants. All at once the place he had created lost all purpose for him. There was only one response he knew for that eventuality.
They felt it at once, a tightening in their chests as their breath caught and they struggled to find the next.
“He’s going to destroy this place!” Liliana screamed. “He’ll kill us without ever attacking!”
Sorin never had the chance to respond. Their desperation was at breaking point, and Liliana Vess was the product of a life lived by facing conflict head-on. She screamed again and the runes on her skin glowed brighter than ever, covering her face and back. From her back, the outline of a pair of demon’s wings appearing like a phantom. Black mana was rushing around her feet in a whirlwind, gathering around her arms. Eldranis yelled for her to wait, but she was beyond listening. With a final yell she pushed outwards and sent a spear of concentrated magic skyward, towards the great dragon.
The attack never reached his plated armour, instead crashing uselessly against a barrier that existed purely as a product of the intense mana the dragon surrounded himself with at all times. Liliana felt the force of the deflected impact reverberate back to her, knocking her to the ground. Sorin and Eldranis were at her side in moments, calling her name. She barely responded, but was conscious.
“We have to do something,” Eldranis said. “We won’t last much longer.”
“There’s only one thing we can do,” replied Sorin, “Only one thing is strong enough. We can do it if we work together.” Eldranis watched him for a moment without speaking, then looked back up at the great dragon, still guarded by his immense mana shield.
“Ok,” he said finally. “Let’s do it.” Together they took to their feet. “This had better work,” he added, with a resigned tone.
“It will,” chided Sorin. Something in him knew that even a creature as powerful as Nicol Bolas was capable of fear. It was fear, not hate or revenge, that had created this place, fear of magic the dragon couldn’t control. Together they could summon the one thing Bolas was truly afraid of.
The two Planeswalkers reached out into the artificial world, a world in which White mana should never had existed. Blue, Red and Black were the only colours they could feel, delivered from the soul of Bolas himself. Wind swept around their feet as they let the Black mana surge through them, using their own bodies as conduits, converting the magic into the White mana they needed. They closed their eyes and felt out with their minds, synchronising their efforts and letting their magics complement each other’s. Brilliant spheres burned in the darkness, glowing brightly around them, pushing unknown limits, bringing a new mana to the dark wasteland. Slowly, the spheres combined to create a giant shield.
If Bolas noticed their efforts, he made no sign of it. Sorin felt his body approaching its limit: he still wasn’t used to commanding two colours, even less so when only one was available from the land around him. A bolt of panic ran through him as his sphere began to weaken. His focus was shattered further by the great dragon’s thunderous roar
The dragon-Planeswalker Nicol Bolas had grown furious with their efforts to bring White mana to his world. The jewel hanging between his horns glowed brightly, releasing a Red mana bolt towards them. It hit the shield with enough force to sunder mountains to pieces. The Planeswalkers held their ground, maintaining the magic that protected not only their own lives, but that of Liliana.
“We can’t take another shot like that!” Sorin yelled.
“I know! Do it now!” Eldranis called back.
Sorin lead them off, the same words he’d learned less than 24 hours earlier. “Teldias!” he yelled.
“Vardrina!” came Eldranis’ reply.
“Ajani!”
The great dragon roared again, and the jewel glowed blindingly bright. In the depths of infinite abyss below, something roared back.
The ground shook violently. It took all of Sorin’s will to stay on his feet while maintaining the shield. To his left, something landed. Looking across, he saw a giant hand, made of the same White light as the lion-kin from the Orzhov vault, clutching the edge of the suspended wasteland. Another thunderous crash, this time from his right. Beyond where Eldranis stood, another hand had landed, still made of the same light. Great arms disappeared into the black reaches of the abyss. The ground continued to shake and Sorin felt something powerful feeding of the mana from his body. Struggling, he continued to convert the Black mana Bolas had brought into the Void Realms into White, feeling it draining from his body as fast as he could produce it. Something roared again. It wasn’t the dragon, it was the creature climbing up behind them.
Sorin turned in time to see the head of the enormous lion-kin rising out of the darkness, infinitely larger than when he had first met him inside the vault. No longer holding the artificial land, his body disappearing out of sight, the lion-kin seeming to stand on the empty space of the Void itself. Spirit of the White Original, Ajani the Eternal, who had sacrificed himself to become the ultimate force for good, had arrived.
All of Bolas’ attention was on Ajani now. The jewel burned fiercely as the dragon’s maw opened, and from his mouth erupted fire enough to engulf a world. It passed high above the Planeswalkers, heading instead for the form of the giant lion-kin. The flames crashed with devastating force, covering the Spirit in fire and smoke. Sorin felt the rush of mana drain from his body as Ajani  pushed through the wall of flames unharmed with a deafening bellow.
Like Sorin, Eldranis was struggling to stand, one foot reaching out in front of him for stability. They had to finish it, they realised. They’d come too far to fail now. They had succeeded in summoning the avatar of the White Original in a place where White mana didn’t exist. All that was left was to strike back at the dragon himself. The thought crashed against the reality in Sorin’s mind. His mana was failing, and he could feel Eldranis slipping away too. With a sick twisting in his heart he knew they wouldn’t have the strength to finish the attack.
Liliana was on her feet behind the pair. Across her body, the runes were glowing brighter and more numerous than ever before. Sorin tried to look at her, but her eyes were an explosion of light, unblinking, focused on the enormous dragon. Reaching up, she put a hand on Sorin, the other on Eldranis. They felt it instantly: the incredible surge of mana feeding directly into their souls. No longer focused on collecting it, Sorin channelled all his energy into converting the Black mana Liliana was providing him into White. He looked up in time the blinding white light erupt from the spaces between the great lion-kin’s his hands. The Spirit of Ajani had summoned a gigantic twin-bladed staff.
The hanging landmass was crumbling now, falling away under the combined forces of Bolas’ and Ajani. Great pieces were falling away from the edges. One way or another this battle would be over soon. The three of them yelled in unison as their collective wills channelled into the Spirit. The lion-kin had the bladed-staff high above its head, and brought the weapon down in a devastating swing into the roaring dragon. Just as had happened with Liliana’s attack, the weapon first hit the layers of mana surrounding the ancient Planeswalker. For a moment the blade seemed stuck in place, so near its target and at the same time so far away. Then, with a terrible crash, the mana barrier gave way and the weapon succeeded in rending the dragon in an arc across his chest.
The dragon roared in pain as White mana exploded from the wound, burning the great dragon like no fire ever could. The Spirit of Ajani held the weapon straight out in front of him, and drove the blade forward like a spear. Another crash and the weapon hit a second magical barrier, then passed through and struck the dragon in his armour plating. With an ear-shattering scream the great dragon began to retreat through the vortex. 
“He’s getting away!” Sorin shouted.
“Let him go,” replied Eldranis. “He’s defeated for now, that’s enough.”
In moments, the dragon-god was gone, the vortex crashing shut in spectacular waves behind him. The lion-kin released the bladed-weapon first, letting it vaporise. Then, wordlessly, showing no signs of victory or defeat, the Spirit allowed itself to fade away.
Sorin felt the immense relief as the great drain on his mana expired. Next to him he could hear Eldranis breathing a similar sigh of gratitude and watched as Liliana’s eyes returned to normal. She blinked like a person waking suddenly from a dream. Her legs gave slightly and Sorin stepped across to catch her under his arm, supporting her while she found her balance. The runes across her body had faded again, except for a partial ring which ran along the right side of the base of her neck, near the shoulder. She hissed a curse in Zenkaril as she felt the burning runes, still warm as though they’d been branded on: a permanent reminder of her bargains.
Eldranis was the first to speak. “This place isn’t going to last much longer,” he said, casting nervous glances at the pieces that were quickly falling into the oblivion abyss. “We should get out of here.” The others nodded quickly in agreement. They took a moment to drag the still-unconscious bodies of Balaren and Tezzeret closer, determined to find bargaining value in the life of an Original and a considerably powerful hybrid. Grateful of the fact that it was easier to leave the Void Realms than to enter them, the three remaining Planeswalkers held out their hands and opened a series of shimmering portals.