Inside Naecken's fortress, a small chamber toward the top of the artificial mountain...
A giant window made of perfectly clear ice dominate soon to be battleground, where the thousands of T5 droids are beginning to morph into flying machines.
Looking trough the window are two figures, deeply immersed in conversation that both of them would have preferred to avoid.
"Look, Saros..."
"Don't call me Saros, Merlin. Call me with my true name, the one that for millennia the slaves your ancestors have used with fear and respect. I am En-Ki, the Lord of the Earth."
"I call you loser, Saros. I have destroyed your organization, the Hoods, and your adversaries, the Capes, succeeding where my father has failed for 40.000 years..."
"Ah, Merlin, how stupid you are. You really believe that what your father was trying to do was destroying us? He merely wanted to keep a balance between Hoods and Capes. He never even thought hat destroying us would have been a smart thing to do for our... your... planet. But what do you know about it? You that have never looked at the sky, always tampering with the affair of the multiple Earths, to think that humans are not alone in the Universe... you will see, now, that the science of the Hoods and the magic of the Capes have been thrown away... you'll see how Earth have lost his shield... how fangs and claws from the deep of space will come to clutch this planet..."
"Pffhhh! Look down there, Saros. Look at those men and women... they are the future. You, your Hoods, the Capes, my father... are the past. Them, is what the Earth needs... an army of gifted peoples, under my command. Why do you think I am simply not nuking this whole place? I want those metahumans win their war. Feel proud. Create confidence in their qualities. They will join my Strikeforce, and the Strikeforce will be invincible."
"And then your iron fist finally will bring order to Earth, eh, Merlin? How fool you are. You never learned that the power is in complexity, never in simplicity. You are just creating a single target big as an elephant... destroyed it, nothing will stand for the planet..."
"Saros, open your eyes. I am the winner, here."
"No, Merlin, you aren't, even if you will win this battle. Oh, how can you be so blind? I am creating the right defense for this planet. Selling it to the forces of the underworld, at last we'll keep the planet protected from any outside interference. My pact with Naecken is that in exchange for our help, he will restore the worship for the Annunaki. But what he doesn't know, is that when we'll be Gods again, we'll thrown him and his acolytes down in the pit again."
"And what, Saros, should prevent him to destroy you and your people after he has gained the power?"
"You don't know about him, eh, Jack Merlin? You think Naecken is a demon... but Lord Kwaizel is just one of the five beings composing him. He is not just a true demon... his goal is much more complex than basic domination over the world... that's why he needs us... he doesn't understand the thinness of politics... and he doesn't want to create wasteland over the planet... he wants to be a conqueror and a ruler... he doesn't want to reign over a mudball."
"And that will not happen, I will assure you, Saros. What he's doing? Trying to open the gates of Hell? I heard what happened when he arrived on Earth..."
"How?"
"It happens that looking for metahumans, Saros, my organization stumbled over a peculiar Voodoo cultist... Kalunga, she's called... that was with Naecken at the time the transdimensional being with the Vanguardians, the one called Mxy... tricked Naecken cutting him from the Underworld realm. I guess he is what is trying to do... opening back the gates... and let his armies loose on the planet. And your involvement in this... obviously... is to concentrate your traces of godhood powers into giving him the strength to do that..."
"Very acute, Merlin... what you don't know is that we are just inches from the success. Naecken right now is about to open the gate... that's why we are letting the T5 robots to swarm... they will keep the army of the various countries... and your stupid metahuman batallion... occupied... while demons will invade the world. You still think you will be the winner today, Merlin?"
"Loser I called you, and will call you again, Saros. There are Gods on our side, too. Don't think those gates are open, until you'll see demons around. And I don't see any, nowhere. Hear me, Saros, I consider you and your experience very precious for my goals. Leave this place, ally with me, I will grant you a big role in upcoming events. For you and your eleven companions."
"No, Merlin. You have cheated myself before. I never repeat the same mistake."
"Ok, then, Saros. Don't tell me I have not advised you. Farewell!"
And with that, the hologram of Merlin vanished, leaving En-ki alone.
