You quickly recreate the barrier while Nightmare is distracted by his broken guitar. This time, you pour even more of your power into it. Your fingers are getting numb, but you ignore the feeling. You just need to keep him in place a little bit longer.
"Again?" You're trying this shit again?" Nightmare says with a grin on his face. "Like it went to well last time" But instead of trying to break it like last time, he looks up, and gets a glint in his eye. Or maybe that's a literal spark.
He starts... chanting. You can't understand what he's saying, but something about it chills you to the bone. It's like someone who doesn't speak English was asked to sound out what they think it sounds like. You occasionally get to what you think may be a word you understand, but it slips away as soon as you think you understand something.
"Nightmare, you have three seconds to stop or I'm lighting you up" You say as you summon a fireball. Part of you doesn't want to fire it. Burning someone alive right in front of you. But the other part of you wants to come home tonight.
Behind you, sparks erupt from Texas Ted. A power surge causes part of his face to burst open in a burst of sparks, revealing the metal endoskeleton inside.
He lifts his foot to stomp on you. You don't know if Nightmare is planning on waiting for you to drop the barrier so he can make a break for it, or if he even cares of he gets squished. You're about to make a run for it while trying to drag the barrier with you when Starhammer flies towards the behemoth and takes its other leg out from under it. Whether it's old joints or something wrong with the spell Nightmare used to animate it, Texas Ted can't bring his hands in front of him to break his fall. He crashes to the ground, with a sickening crunching of plastic and metal.
Texas Ted swings at Starhammer, trying to swat the Hero like a fly, and this time, he connects. The hero is sent flying past you and Nightmare, over your heads, and smashing right into a large F-150. The cab and doors shatter under his weight. Texas Ted climbs to his feet, raising a fist to punch you.
As he brings his fist down, you cast Reflect out of reflex. The fist hits the octagonal barrier, and a bright light bursts from it. You can feel the air displace as you feel like you're getting hit by a truck again. But this time, it isn't you that gets hurt. Texas Ted's fist is shredded apart by the force of his own punch. Sparks fly and you cover your head to protect yourself out.
And that is when a truck hits Ted in the face, knocking his head off and sending it crashing to the ground. The truck, however, keeps going, crashing onto the roof of a building where the Tradeshow was taking place. A place where people sold everything from the latest kitchen device to hot tubs. At least the truck was smashed and not the building. Nightmare looks at the fallen juggernaut with a furious look.
"You no-name piece of shit!" He cries. He tries to turn into lightning again to smash against your barrier. But this time, he doesn't succeed. His body dematerializes, as if he was on an old TV with bad reception, and his body turns into lightning, but he can't transform all the way, leaving him in a humanoid form when he slams into the body not with the force if a lightning bolt, but if a... well, a mid 50's rocker. He shifts back in disbelief that 1. he wasn't able to transform and 2. that your barrier is still up, no worse for wear.
"NO!" He screams. "IT WASN'T SUPPOSED TO BE END LIKE THIS! NOT YET! NOT TO SOME FU-" His words were cut off as part of his jaw turns black and falls to the ground. It shatters when it hits. Nightmare lets out one final scream. Filled with anger. And fear.
Even more pieces of him start of fall apart. Legs, arms, torso, it all collapses, until he finally falls apart entirely. His body turns to ash, leaving behind the clothes he was wearing, his boots still standing up on their own.
You stare at the pile of ash that used to be Mr. Nightmare. The air smells like ozone as you drop the barrier. Part of you is worried that he's going to come back to life like a movie slasher. But he never does. The ash pile is inert. Even the magical energy that you were sensing is gone.
"Well... it looks like I'll need to cancel the containment cell." Starhammer says. He floats towards you. He looks messed up. Cut up costume. Glass in his hair. But he's doing his best not to let it show. "I think we can file this under unintentional suicide."
As you look at the ash pile, you think.
[] You're just glad that you aren't dead.
[] What the fuck was that?
[] You want to try to get an autograph from Starhammer. Gwen would love it.
[] You wonder what could have driven Nightmare to do this.
[] Grab part of Mr. Nightmare's broken guitar as a souvenir.
[] You wonder if you could get a bacon-wrapped turkey leg while you're here.
[] Write in.
