A Space Oddity

by J. J. Pavlov

  "Then why do you care what happens to your treasure?" Somebody looking forward to dying wouldn't care about worldly belonging.

  She looks up at me with a scowl but doesn't say a word.

  "In either case, I intend to die of old age, in the arms of my loved ones." The moment I say this, I realize that my race may be longer-lived than any of said loved ones. I never thought about this before, but that gives me pause, which doesn't go unnoticed by my opposite.

  "You fool." The Golden Queen declares, and I can't deny it. Before thinking about whether or not I'll outlive my beloved girls, I need to first live to meet them again.

  "Help me find a way back." I demand of Aurelia, but she only tilts her head in irritation.

  "How did this happen?" Despite her nihilism, she still cares enough to learn what course of actions landed me in this situation - and dragged her into it with me.

  "That no longer matters." It's not that I'm embarrassed about my loss - even though it wasn't really one - but that I think it won't contribute to finding a solution to this problem.

  "If you had not discarded my weapons, I could have helped you." She doesn't follow up on getting an answer to her earlier question and instead accuses me with a reproachful glare while crossing her arms. Despite standing before me completely naked, she doesn't seem embarrassed at all and even manages to appear dignified.

  So that's a queen, huh? Maou-mama could learn a thing or two from her.

  "How would you have done that?" I'm quite interested to hear her answer to that, but she manages to look down on me as if I'm a lowly servant asking her to do work in my stead. That's impressive, considering she's shorter than me.

  "That no longer matters." Aurelia simply states while sitting down on her hair, which bends into the shape of a chair. That response was a direct throwback to my own just moments ago. She's unexpectedly stubborn. Also, I realize that my hunch about her incredibly long hair was right - she can control it with her will.

  "Alright, I'll tell you my story, and you tell me yours." Sighing, I form a platform out of tentacles and sit opposite her. She looks down at me with her nose held high as if silently gauging my worth. Then she nods with no hint of reluctance.

  I can't tell whether she's childish or calculated.

  Thus, I proceed to recount my battle against the academy, up to the point when Mithra appeared and betrayed me. Aurelia listens without even blinking, and at one point, I wonder whether she simply fell asleep with her eyes open or turned back into a statue.

  "Tell me more." She suddenly says after several seconds of silence, startling me as I was staring at her beautiful long eyelashes.

  "There is no more. That was how we ended up here." I reply, slight irritation finding its way into my voice. But she shakes her head, causing the chair made from her hair to wobble underneath her. Shifting her one leg over the other, she changes her position.

  "Why were you there, in my prison?" Aurelia asks, and I blink at her for a moment. She appears to be referring to the labyrinth that led to Kiamedras and then her. But she should know that all I wanted was to reach the transportation circle in the room behind the armory that she turned into her throne hall. Before I can open my mouth to speak, she continues. "Tell me about yourself, child of the stars."

  I'm dumbfounded. Is that a hint of curiosity I spot in her gaze? But as if that demand was meant as an order, she closes her eyes and leans back in anticipation of me following that order. If I weren't so fascinated by her audacity, I'd bring her down from her high horse right now.

  "Again." There's something else I feel is more important to comment on, though.

  "Hm?" She makes, not opening her eyes as if to say that she's wholly uninterested about anything other than hearing me tell my tale.

  "What do you mean when you call me a child of the stars?" Sitting cross-legged, I lean forward and ask for clarification.

  "It is simply what you are." She replies with a wave of her hand as if it's a dull topic to her.

  "Then I'll add a condition: You'll have to tell me all you know about that too." Of course, I don't give up so easily, and she opens her eyes to peer at me with a slightly irritated expression. I suppress the urge to flare up and tell her that she's still at my mercy, but that will only make her more defiant, so I swallow my words.

  Thus, I start at the very beginning of my life in this world. It hasn't been that long, and I'm going to leave out all the details about things that shouldn't find their way outside the bedroom - or library balconies.

  At the mention of the Graebern in Rathgolim, Aurelia perks up but doesn't comment. When I tell her how I corrupted Hestia, she only sniffs as if she already knew. Throughout, she never once shows genuine surprise, and when I conclude with the part where I learned about Kamii's disappearance after arriving in Kongenssoevn, she leans back on her chair once again. I already told the rest earlier.

  "As expected, you are ignorant of your origins." It doesn't look like she intends to make any remarks about my story and immediately jumps into the explanation I demanded of her earlier. She shifts her position into a more comfortable one once again and seems to prepare herself for a long speech. "But I do not know more than that you came from the stars. The place humans once thought the gods resided in."

  "Wha...?" I'm taken aback by her admittance that she got me hooked on nothing. She only knows I'm alien to this world, but made it sound as if she understood everything about me. It would have explained why she didn't go mad from seeing my true appearance. Then again, Thorvald and some other professors weren't as affected as regular people either, so it may depend on a person's strength of will.

  "My story begins with-" Aurelia lifts a hand to perform a sweeping gesture as if signaling that this will be a long one.

  "Wait, something came up." I interrupt her before she can even finish her opening sentence. Her surprised blinking and subsequent peeved expression cause my heart to skip a beat. She looks equal parts childish and charming. "I'll be right back."

  With these words, I melt my avatar into the platform and return my consciousness to the exterior. I've been watching space with my actual set of eyes, just in case something happens. It's a bizarre feeling to see from two different perspectives, but I'll take this as an opportunity to train for a situation in which I need to look both forward and backward.

  In either case, something entered my view, so I had to focus my mind on one side to see what it was. When I look around, a chill runs down my spine, and my thoughts blank out. For a moment, I search for a logical explanation, but no matter how I think about it, nothing comes close to satisfying.

  I'm flying backward through a field of undeniably artificial debris. Scattered pieces of aluminum and plastic, broken solar panels, bolts and microchips, and entire modules of destroyed satellites pass me by. Their lack of momentum implies that they've achieved a stable orbit.

  A pathway has opened around me, and nothing floats in my way, so my assumption that Mithra's gravity magic is still affecting me was correct. At one point, I thought about expelling all the air inside me to propel myself back toward Mundia, just like a space shuttle maneuvers according to all the movies I've seen. But if I had done it, I wouldn't be able to talk to Aurelia now, and

  nothing would have changed about my situation.

  I'm not moving as quickly as I thought I did, but the amount of wreckage is overwhelming.

  How did nobody down there ever notice this? Or maybe they did but never considered it important?

  Though the more pressing question is: What does this mean?!

  "I know." Aurelia replies when I return to the inside of our little me-shaped spaceship and inform her of the wreckages. She doesn't show a hint of surprise upon hearing these world-shattering news. Mundia doesn't have technology on the level that allows them to launch rockets into space, so why is she so relaxed?

  "What do you mean, you know? How?" I can't keep my composure and point at her in an accusing tone, but she only shrugs. For some re
ason, I seem to have forgotten that we tried to kill each other only two days ago and am talking to her as I would to a traveling companion. Well, if we don't get back, she's going to be my last one.

  "All in due time." Leaning her head back to peer down at me as a queen would a nosy subject, she regards me with a clearly displeased look. "Though you shall never know if you interrupt me again."

  "Sorry." My mouth is faster than my mind, and I apologize with a slight bow before realizing what I just did. A smirk graces Aurelia's lips, though I don't know if it's from amusement or a feeling of superiority over the person that beat her.

  "You are quite droll." She remarks, looking at me with an unexpectedly warm gaze. However, I spy a hint of melancholy and loneliness in it. It disappears when she blinks and adjusts her position to begin with her story.

  Chapter 84 - Soul Of Gold

  In ancient days, the now mighty Empire of Terminus had not yet existed, and Northern Enorath had been fragmented into many small nations and city-states. In that time, Kael, the Lord of the Sky, had appeared before the woman who would become the founding mother of the city of Terminus. Out of their short liaison, she became pregnant with his child.

  Atop a hill, in an abandoned tower, she gave birth to the boy that became the first in a line of kings and later emperors. Within his lifetime, he would build the Kingdom of Terminus, which spanned nearly a third of the Enorath continent. It reached from the west coast all the way to the mightly Ortus Mountains that formed a natural barrier against the barbarians in the east. It occupied the fertile plains overlooked by the eternally snow-capped Dragon Mountains that separated it from the Fatas Triarchy in the north. And the southern borders reached the pharaonic dynasties of Ammenhotep in the desert lands.

  Several centuries and many generations later, the influential cities of Mineva, Phobio, and Deima in the south of the kingdom declared independence during a period of internal decay in Terminus. Other remote colonies followed suit, resulting in a fragmentation of the massive kingdom holdings.

  The capital, Vertex Mundia - the top of the world - was beginning to lose the prestige that earned it its name. Queen Salvia II announced a campaign to retake the lost colonies, first targeting the most influential ones in the south. Mineva would be the first to feel the fall of the hammer, but its allies Phobio and Deima supported them from the rear. It created two opposing forces of nearly equal strength.

  The second winter of the war, as the bloody conflict entered a stalemate, the queen gave birth to a daughter. Omens of greatness but also signs of ruin loomed over her. She was quiet at birth, sleeping soundly as if seeing her mother in her last moments was of no concern to her. When they pried open her tightly-closed palm, they discovered a gold nugget. For that, she was named Aurelia rather than the inauspicious name that her mother's death would have earned her otherwise.

  With the queen's untimely death, and the only heir but a newborn child, the nation was left in the hands of a regent from the Fatas Triarchy. It had been a long-standing tradition as Aurelia's was not the first such case. Under the mindful guidance of Regent Elpis Moirael, the kingdom made peace with the city-states and focused on domestic issues that arose from the loss of the previous leader.

  In these peaceful times, Aurelia grew up loved by those without and feared by those within the palace. Her outward personality was bright, but she was moody and had a gift that instilled terror in those who wronged her. After all, she could do from the moment she was born what generations of alchemists had failed to achieve; with a touch, she could turn anything into gold.

  Though one would think it a curse, she had absolute control over it. She generally contented herself with setting examples on lifeless things rather than petrify servants she disliked. In some fits of rage, she did turn several living humans into statues, though. They were placed in her garden to enrich the landscape and stand as a warning for others to never try her patience.

  Without parents, she was only ever surrounded by subservient people and never taught her moral limits. Even Elpis Moirael, the Fata regent, could not hold her in check. She performed more and more outrageous feats in hopes of finding somebody that would not treat her with cold distance or fearful submission.

  One day, she ran away from the palace and left the city of Vertex Mundia by herself. If nobody came to force her back, she thought she might as well embark on a journey. Just the previous spring, a crew of daredevil explorers wanted to circumnavigate the world. For that purpose, they sailed around Yagrath, the Sealed Continent - a land humans were forbidden from entering under the law of Kael, as it contained the sanctum of the gods. One moon out on sea away from Yagrath, they had come upon a landmass.

  The sailors traveled along the shore and came upon a wooden fishing boat, leading them to believe that they had circumnavigated the world and reached the other side of the kingdom. Thus, they called out to the two fishermen.

  They were greeted with curious waving and words spoken in an unknown Imperian accent. But when the kingdom sailors saw the blue faces of the two men, they steered their ship away in a panic. At the time, the humans thought it was the result of an infectious disease and escaped as quickly as they could.

  Later, the humans would learn that these beings were naturally born the way they looked. Soon after, the Fatas Triarchy declared them demons and an affront against the gods. That had been the first encounter between humans and demons.

  Aurelia thought of traveling to this new world filled with mysterious monsters, Ceogath, as it was called - the continent of the unknown. Maybe it would be a good place to start making a name for herself. It would allow her to proudly stand among the gods, where a person of her caliber unquestionably belonged.

  She was a demigod after all.

  "I admit that I was arrogant in my youth." Shrugging with an unapologetic expression, Aurelia interrupts her tale when she sees my frown. That causes me to suppress a chuckle.

  "Was?" I poke fun at her, remembering her words during our fight. Then I proceed to ape her arrogant tone when she still held the upper hand against me in our battle. "You are nothing before me."

  The Golden Queen glares at me with a displeased expression, but at my grin, she averts her gaze with a snobbish sniff. Even though it's such an arrogant gesture, she appears quite cute while doing so.

  "I shall continue." She then steers the topic back to her story, shooting me a glare as if suggesting I shouldn't interrupt her. Even though she was the one who interrupted herself just now.

  I'm intrigued and keep my eyes trained on her face, not letting a single expression escape my attention as she continues to relate her past to me.

  Aurelia traveled across the entire Enorath continent under the watchful eyes of a host of Fatas. They kept circling her like a flock of vultures before Elpis deemed it time to call her back. But to be told that only after she already traveled for three seasons and reached the westernmost tip of the kingdom made her furious.

  She proceeded to commandeer the first sea-going ship she found and had them sail to Ceogath, ignoring any further protests from Elpis. Even at that point, he did not dare hold her back by force - and neither did any of the others that followed her. They should have been aware that she had her unique ability under control, but still doubted her. Their attitude wounded her deeper than any words ever could have.

  The journey took over two moons, during which her retinue steadily swelled to the size of an entire fleet. While Elpis was afraid to hold Aurelia back, he could not let the sole heir to the throne get into any danger. Thus, he sent two dozen warships loaded with the royal guard after her. With more than twenty Fatas gliding through the air above her, it was as if she stood at the tip of an army heading into war against these mysterious demons.

  The young queen, only sixteen winters old at the time of her arrival, was the first human to set foot on Ceogath proper. A small scouting base had been set up on an island off the mainland a few moons prior, but nobody had dared to step into demon territor
y until the fearless Aurelia showed up all the sailors and battle-hardened soldiers.

  Thus, a procession four hundred strong began marching along the shore in search of the fishing village the two fishermen the first explorers had seen must have lived in.

  On the third night, they were attacked. Sleeping in the majestic tent that had been prepared for her as a matter of course, Aurelia was roused by screams and the sound of metal being ripped apart. An animalistic roar wiped all sleepiness from her mind, and she quickly put on her equipment.

  Back then, her control over gold had barely exceeded a degree at which she could levitate a single sword made from pure gold. It was not something she could fight with, so she still wore regular silken clothes or armor made from steel. She understood that despite her affinity to gold, it was both too cumbersome and ineffective for protection.

  Wielding her short sword and round shield, she walked toward the tent right as a beast charged into her from the outside and pushed her back onto the bed. For the first time, she was confronted with the reality of something coming after her life, and she was petrified. However, when she looked up, her fear gave way to curiosity.

  It looked like a human woman half a head taller than the young queen, but she had red skin, shaggy silver hair, and horns growing from her forehead. An animal's hide was draped over her shoulders and tied around her waist, which barely hid her naked form. Sharp teeth lined her parted lips as a hot, animalistic breath escaped them. But when Aurelia looked into her eyes, she instantly knew that this was not a mindless creature.

  For a moment, understanding seemed to blossom between the two, as the young queen raised a hand to touch the bestial woman's cheek. Glancing at the hand once, the demon did not move and regarded the beautiful girl underneath her with unabashed interest. But the royal guard charged in from the tent entrance and startled her, breaking the magical veil that had laid itself over the two.

  The beast drew away, jumped off the bed, and swiped at the soldiers carrying tower shields, her claws ripping through steel as if they were made of silk. Tossing around grown men in full armor as if they were simple straw dolls, she broke through their encirclement and ran outside.