by Dan O'Brien
* * * * *
Delgado’s cloak tore from his back as two curved legs landed upon the ground. They lifted the rest of his body high into the air. His head twisted and two vents grew from the sides of his face, a yellow stream erupting from them. Delgado’s form was that of a demon of Nevar, though much larger than even the craven figure of Reftein. Mela took a step back and fell across a remnant of the citadel wall. Wei moved quickly in front of her, his crimson sword blazing.
“Foolish mortals, these events have been in motion for ages. You think you can just change the tides of time.” Delgado’s voice mirrored the rolling thunder.
Wei powered up his suit and the thrusters caused him to hover in the air, just above Mela. She followed suit, her blue aura bringing her level with Wei because Hocher and Edge had failed to relieve her of her armor chip at apprehension – having only sedated her so that she could not communicate with it.
Mela screamed and charged forward, her azure aura reaching out toward the demon. The blue darkened and enveloped it. Delgado writhed back from the attack and attempted to squirm away, but to no avail. Mela raced forward and struck the beast with the ’talon, catching the demon across the back, carving a line down his spine.
“Damned mortal, how dare you strike a god,” roared the demon with a mixture of surprise and anguish.
“Gods don’t bleed,” Mela returned with fury, a series of strikes aimed completely at dicing the enemy to pieces. The attacks were too wild and fueled by anger.
Delgado deflected most of them with his grand claws, the energy dissipating into the surrounding air. Mela rose to eye level with the demon and continued to barrage Delgado with everything she had. In her haste and anger she slipped, and Delgado smashed her into the ground with one of his enormous arms, breaking the ’talon.
“It seems that your luck has run out, girl.” Delgado leaned in to finish her off, forgetting that Wei stood there waiting for his moment to spring. One of the gigantic claws slammed down upon Mela, trapping her to the ground. He raised his other to obliterate the human before him and smash her into nothingness.
Wei swung his sword level with his upper body and sliced the claws from the hand pinning Mela. Delgado reeled and turned to Wei, his eyes frantic, even primal.
“Meddling humans, when will you learn that you face only extinction now?” Delgado screeched and the claws on his damaged hand reemerged, this time more metallic in color. The new claw swung forward and Wei pulled Mela from the path of the attack. Wei turned and wielded his sword again. He thrust it in a defensive stance, trying to buy the two of them some time.
* * * * *
Rider pulsed forward trying to read what was going on. The wind whipped against his face, battering him like an attacker from within. Rider slowed quickly and came to a stop.
Xzin’s purple vapor trail burst from the trees below and raced toward him. Rider brought his arms up to deflect, but nothing struck him from below. Xzin used Rider’s own trick to gain the upper hand, smashing his shoulder into Rider’s lower back and sending Rider crashing into the wall of Xzin’s own mansion.
The hole smoked from Rider’s impact.
Dust created a smoke screen for Xzin to enter unseen. Cautiously, Xzin pushed his energy field forward trying to detect where in the rubble lay his enemy. Rider charged forward and attempted to kick Xzin viciously in the side.
Xzin spun out of the way and caught Rider’s leg. From the sidewall, Rider saw Xzin speeding toward him, his purple aura binding to all that surrounded them. Rider felt his face and knew he had multiple contusions all over from the initial blow. Just as Rider looked up from his hands, he saw Xzin had disappeared from view.
He felt the knee explode against his back, causing him to plummet through the floor. As Rider hit, he saw Xzin’s grinning face above him, all the wounds Rider had inflicted were healed. Xzin’s face looked as if he had never been struck.
“Your power is insignificant next to the power granted by Chaos.” Xzin grabbed Rider by the leg and lifted him into the air. Xzin’s greater height was quite evident as Rider hung there. Xzin’s leg moved with incredible speed and kicked Rider across his left flank and sent him crashing farther into the crumbled palace.
Rider slid across the floor and smashed into the retaining wall. Xzin was atop him before he could blink, and his strikes came in dangerously quick motions, striking Rider all about his body, beating his bones into nothing. Xzin’s attack receded and Rider slumped to the floor, bloodied and beaten.
Rider’s eyes fluttered and closed.
* * * * *
Wei moved quickly and brought his sword around the left side of the creature, dragging his blade deep into the bulk of its body. Blood poured from the gash, causing Delgado to fall to one knee. His ugly head reared as he looked into the steely gaze of Wei.
“Kill me or not, you can’t ….”
Wei had no time for the ramblings of a demon. He slashed the sword downward, ending the creature’s pathetic existence. Delgado gargled his remaining words and then coughed violently, showering Wei in his life’s blood. Delgado’s frame slumped and fell to the ground; his body lay still as the blood drained from it. Wei rushed to Mela’s side and helped her to steady herself.
“What happened to James?” Mela’s voice quivered as she powered down her energy field, her feet resting firmly on the ground. They both listened for sound in the distance. They no longer heard the crashing of war or the battle cries of the warring.
Wei replaced his sword in its sheath. They walked to the edge of the citadel where the tower had once stood. Wei turned to Mela as if to speak, but at that moment Xzin rose from beneath them. His aura pushed them back, the sheer velocity of the energy field flung them and they looked skyward at the tyrant.
“I see that you defeated my most trusted minion.” Xzin allowed his energy to recede and he flicked his hair back to continue. “It is of no consequence. I was going to kill you anyway.” Xzin’s energy burst forth with such quickness that neither Mela nor Wei had time to react. The energy pulled them toward the sky and suspended them, the purple aura encompassing them and feeding on their energy.
Mela winced at the pain and tried to free herself, but there was no way to escape the scope of the energy. She turned to Wei and saw him writhing in pain as well. It was eating away at them from within, destroying their minds.
“Xzin, you die as well if the merger is complete,” Wei tried to shout, but it came out in a whispered gasp as he tried to breathe against the pain.
“Your pathetic mind games will not work on me. I know what comes now. Chaos has control over my body and there is no end to this evil. It is absolute.” Xzin turned heavenward and dragged the two of them with him, their bodies convulsing under the pain and pressure of the energy storm.
The sky looked blurred.
The stars were absorbing into one another. The canvas of the universe was even darker than night and the stars seemed to fall from the heavens and singe the earth. Even through their agony, Mela and Wei were swept away by the absoluteness of what Xzin had done.
There was no way to realign the stars. Xzin allowed his aura to radiate further. The pain subsided, and he allowed Wei and Mela to fall back to the ruins of the citadel. Xzin met Mela’s tired gaze.
“It has begun. The universe shall never be the same.” Xzin’s obvious glee came forth as he stifled a laugh and turned to the night sky. The stars began to crash into the sun, creating an explosion that mirrored nothing they had ever seen.
“How do you know what comes next for you? Can you not see that you are leading yourself blindly to whatever evil awaits at the other end of the Void?” called Mela weakly into the wind.
“It matters not now. I am imbued with the life force of the mighty Chaos. My power is absolute,” roared Xzin like the tyrant he wished to be.
“The power you possess is borrowed, a clever gift by a cunning deceiver. The wisdom of Xeon should allow you to realize such a thing,” called Wei weakly, desp
erately trying to reason with the maniacal Xzin.
“Your words are useless. The merger cannot be stopped. What I have begun shall end of its own accord. I have placed my loyalties; it is you that goes blindly,” shot back Xzin, his body gravitating toward the void.
Mela and Wei struggled against the energy fields that held them, but they could not free themselves from the immaterial prison that Xzin housed them within.
An emerald flash appeared, smashing into Xzin within seconds, knocking him from his statuesque pose. Rider gathered Wei and Mela under each arm and rocketed forward, away from Xzin. They had merely gotten out of sight of Xzin, far below him in the foliage around the citadel. Xzin watched them flee and then returned back to the stars, his concentration focused elsewhere. Rider collapsed to the ground when Wei and Mela had their footing, Mela eased Rider to his feet. When she looked down into his eyes, she saw the battered face that Xzin had defeated.
“What happened? Why did we run from Xzin?”
“He is too powerful. I nearly killed him and he came back as if I never even fought him.” Rider stopped to take a ragged breath. “The merger cannot be reversed. The stars have fallen and the suns imploded. All we can do now is wait for the end.” Rider sagged to the ground and Mela fell with him.
“We cannot just walk away,” pleaded Mela, her eyes filled with tears of pain and sadness.
“Rider speaks the truth. If he could not defeat him, then we would serve no better a chance. The merger is irreversible. We can only smile back into the face of our doom and await our judgment,” responded Wei dryly.
“I will not accept that,” spat Mela angrily.
“It is not your choice. We failed and now we must hope for a better beginning – one where we will stand a chance.”
“What of all the powers you were given on Xeon? Do they mean nothing?” cried Mela incredulously.
“I was more powerful than Xzin until he completed the ritual. The power that he has been granted from the Void is far too grand for me to combat. I tried and he still kept coming,” replied Rider, defeated.
The void that Xzin had opened fluctuated before him in an inverted sphere that continued to reciprocate itself, flowing out completely than imploding upon itself, creating a cornucopia of images and shades. Wei leaned against a nearby tree and looked into the sky as the stars collided. The planets ceased their orbits and their gravities failed. He looked into the night and thought only of the woman who had ever dared to love him.
“The burden is not the Transient’s. It is the burden of all of humanity to change its course to make their lives the way they should. The transient is a guide to the lost souls of time, and without him existence would be no more.”
-Teachings of the Clan of the Branded
The dampness of the night spilled into morning; the ground was littered with needles and leaves from the surrounding forest. Overcast skies plunged all into shadow. The effects of the merger could already be felt. There was a nauseous feeling in the pits of their stomachs and disorientation, the absolute inability to place past events, was upon them.
Her pressed uniform was worn tight against her body, her dark hair curled into a fastidious bun, and her arms swayed in perfect motion alongside her body. Her dark features blended eloquently with the surrounding gloom, her mannerisms attaching her even more to the sour nature of the winds.
The blackened forest around her swayed menacingly in the subtle winds that accompanied the rolling clouds. The once lush fields of green shrubs had been reduced to rows of sullen dirt, indistinguishable mounds of clay and stone. She had walked the better part of several kilometers to reach this location: the graveyard of the heroes of the State.
At one time, it had been a monument to the fallen brethren of justice and peace, and now had to be hidden from view. Her dark eyes stared at the collapsing stars, their destruction marked by the trailing streams of white and yellow and then explosions of blue and red, a veritable fireworks display for the end of time.
Her black boots clicked hollowly as she made her way to the marked headstone at the end of the rows, the gray slab of death marked with the words: Gerald Roberts, hero and vigilant servant of the state, died without the love of a family or the spoils of a hero, he will be missed.
She had not cried for the better part of two decades, her emotions hardened and frozen deep within her soul. The anguish of her lost family had left her without a care for humanity. It had been taken from her. Roberts had been a pillar of the State’s navy, a man who had remained at the side of the government until his death and when the State fell with it came all of the heroes that had fought so hard for its presence, men and women like Roberts.
Admiral Reckson, the unwavering leader and commander of the Baldorian Navy, looked upon the headstone, her dark pupils welling with tears, finding their way down her cheeks and falling to the rain-soaked earth. Her body shook. A small shiver soon consumed her with rising sobs.
She fell to her knees upon the ground and gripped the edges of the headstone. Her tears smeared the dirt and soil that dirtied its edges. She sat, her legs tucked beneath her body, her arms hugging herself tightly. She hated what the State had allowed to happen; yet she knew that heroes had died in the resurrection of something in its place, heroes that desired a more fitting demise than mass execution at the center of Gajying. She closed her eyes and never saw that time had disassembled itself around her.
* * * * *
The people of Earth III gathered and looked toward the strange attractors that reverberated in the night sky. Joseph Grenn leaned close to Mariko Wing and offered the woman a smile. She gently punched him in the shoulder.
“What do you think it means?” Grenn asked no one in particular. Those within the Resistance had gathered to launch one final attack upon the Crimson Hand, but at the meeting place they found their attention diverted. The stars were moving rapidly about the universe. Planets were shifting out of orbit. It was only a matter of time before Earth III would join them, reversing its planetary spin. They stood like a flock of birds watching the sunrise in the morning.
“I don’t know,” replied Wing without inflection. Wing’s face darkened and she hugged her arms to herself. A sudden chill washed over the planet.
Hario Busho was alone in the distance.
“Is this the end?” queried a nervous soldier standing near Grenn and Wing. They both turned and looked at him with sour and indistinguishable glances.
“I don’t know. I truly don’t know,” responded Mariko sadly, her dark eyes searching the night for an answer, for some semblance of a sign.
“If this is the end, what comes next?” Grenn had wished many things of his life and one of those was to settle, to live a life as his ancestors before had done, but war was all this realm knew.
“We begin again,” trailed off Mariko, her arms wrapped around herself, a chill seizing her as she thought of the wayward love that was not with her.
Without warning, gravity shifted and the people of Earth III were flung from the planet. They gasped for air as the oxygen of their home disappeared. The oceans emptied, and the ground imploded. Without oxygen, there were no screams. The planet was gone, drawn into the vortex created by Xzin light years away.
* * * * *
Verdule had once been the apex of the universe, the jewel of the State. As the merger threatened to consume reality, the once lush world dimmed and faded – a shadow of its former self. The ruins of Garefe had long ago ceased to contain humanity. The politics of years past were far gone.
Fael Damon’s body had grown frail from war and starvation. The traders and farmers of his land had long ago fled, leaving Damon to his own devices; relying on the abilities of his ancestors, the basics of hunting and gathering.
His skeletal form lay upon a makeshift cot, covered by a damp brown blanket that revealed his hideous condition. His eyes stared vacantly into the distance; the walls of his once illustrious home had been demolished and torn down, giving him a fabulous vi
ew of the merger. The swirling shades and colliding celestial bodies were entertainment enough for the dying man. He could feel a childish laughter rising from deep within him – innocence revisited within his desecrating mind – and his spindly hand covered the thin, pale lips fixed to his hollow features.
Whoossssssh. Sloooooooooosh. Swiiiish.
The squishing noises startled his lost soul. His panicked eyes roamed the room, his malnourished muscles struggling to raise him to a sitting position. His body shook beneath the strain of holding himself upright. He fell back upon the cot with a shallow sigh and returned his lazy gaze to the collapsing world outside.
“Why are you still here, Fael? You have wasted so many years watching the world pass you by.” She sighed softly and crept out from the shadows into what light remained in the fading skies.
“I could ask you the same question, Erinana of Nemodtia. Why have you come back to this place, to mock an old man as he lay in his own filth?” Damon’s voice had once held such power and integrity, but now it was defeated and distant, the words slurred together and hesitant.
“You know why I came here; for the same reason you stare absently into the horizon every night. We were meant to be something all those years ago. Your inability to rise above your defeat and my pride collided, sending us on different paths. I have come back for you, Fael. I have missed you.” Her eyes pooled with the beginning of tears, and she drew her breath in and shook away the rising emotion.
“You have come too late. There is nothing left,” responded Damon, his feeble limbs bending and then propping his frame upon his stricken elbows.
“There is always time. We are not gone yet,” pleaded Erinana, her footsteps bringing her closer to the defeated form of Damon. She came within plain sight of his drawn features and frail frame and brought her hand to her mouth. Her eyes widened. “My god, what has happened to you? Lifetimes have passed for you since we last met.”