Nawx (Project IzeBorn Book 1)

by Andrew Jones

  "You don't have to thank me." He answered.

  "Yes, yes I do. You basically saved me."

  "I couldn't just leave you there."

  Nova's hands formed a fist, as her eyes looked up at him.

  "Why? It would've been an easy way to dispose of me." She asked, her voice sounded more aggressive than what Atreyu had heard.

  He turned away from her, looking at the sunset that was setting behind some mountains that were consumed by the sands.

  He sighed, "Because, I didn't want to listen to Drakkar. Or that asshole, Densetsu."

  Nova tilted her head to the side.

  "I never wanted to listen to their orders. I wanted to walk out of there and never say that I saw you. You struck me as... Interesting." Atreyu explained.

  Nova looked down at her hands, the vision of view she had slowly become darker as dusk was arriving. She took a deep breath and stepped forward next to him. She leaned into his side and wrapped her arm around his neck in a joking matter.

  "Come on, I think Blaze's hideout is around here. It has to be." She said as she smiled at him and walked forward.

  He smiled as she did. He liked her smile, it helped him feel calm, and he had sensed some warmth in his chest. Deep, deep inside, like where his heart resided. He never felt this way before, not even around Amaya. Her smile, from what ancient documents described, was the definition of 'pretty' to him. Even though he didn't entirely know what it meant, he thought it was close enough.

  Nova and Atreyu separated to cover more ground. The area was too large, as they both had discovered the large, locked gates that were the guideway to the Ancient Deserts. There were multiple huts and cabins around, most of them looked to be in ruins from maybe an invasion. This settlement, from what it looks like, was pretty old. Nova even found a camera with some old pictures in a drawer within one of the huts. The picture was in black and white. It had a family. It looked like there was a son, a daughter, and a dog. The dog looked strange though; There was something in its mouth, and it was behind the smiling son and daughter. All she could spot was an arm high in the air behind the smiling child, the arm was in front of the dog as well. Nova sighed and put the belongings back in the drawer.

  "Hey, Nova!"

  Atreyu's voice was heard outside. She quickly rushed outside in the anticipation of what he had found. But she stopped as she saw two shadowy figures in front of her. The two were holding hands, and they had the faint appearance of the children in that photo. The daughter spoke of something, but she had no voice. The son grinned. Nova heard a growl in the distance, and she began to panic when she realized it was in the direction of Atreyu's voice.

  "Not all is what you suspect, Nova." The son spoke from his grinning lips.

  Nova turned back to them as she was prepared to rush the other direction.

  "What is the point of going on, when all you know is hopeless?" The daughter spoke, gaining her voice.

  But the girl's voice was a combination of two voices. One was a normal little girl's voice, and the other was more demonic. It was definitely low, and it provided a wave that would create pain in Nova's ears. Nova held her hands over her ears, as her body began to visibly shake from the pain she was creating.

  "Why don't you just kill Atreyu? It's not like he's not planning to kill you. Why would he let someone like you live? With that, he could regain his trust from Drakkar." The son spoke.

  With that instance, the two children's eyes turned red, and their eyes began to bleed.

  "It-... It hurts!" The daughter screamed out as she let go of the son's hand.

  "Worthless!" The son yelled as he grabbed a knife or a dagger.

  He used the sharp object to stab the daughter in the stomach, letting her fall onto the ground. The daughter fell, whining from the pain as she looked up at her brother with pain. But he could only sit beside her and stab the sharp object into her more and more.

  And they then disappeared, and Nova fell on her knees as she screamed. The sight of two siblings murdering was unbearable to her. She held her hands over her face as she could feel the tears that were materializing from her eyes, but as she looked at the palms of her hands, she saw red liquid, blood.

  She shouted, "Stop fucking with me!"

  "A-All right...!" A strange voice was heard in front of her.

  She jumped back and hit her back against the hut she had previously walked out of, hitting her head as well. She rubbed the back of her head, shutting her eyes and whining.

  "Are you all right?" The voice appeared again, forming a question.

  Nova grumbled, opening her eyes and seeing nothing. She looked both left and right, seeing no one and sighed.

  "Hey!" The voice shouted. "I'm down here!"

  Nova spotted a green teddy bear jumping up and down and waving at her. She frowned, as she couldn't believe she had seen a talking teddy bear. But it's not like she hadn't seen anything unusual lately, she just took it as an illusion once again.

  "Whoever is playing with me, I'll tear you apart!" She shouted as she grabbed one of her dual blades and held it against the teddy bear's neck quickly, pinning him to the wall.

  "Whoa!" The teddy bear screams, as he quickly waved his paws around with haste. "I'm no threat! I come in peace!"

  Nova tilted her head as she felt the teddy bear's presence as she held him against a wall of another hut across the other one. She sighed and released him from her grasp, taking a step back from him. But she continued to hold her blade in her hand just in case.

  "I'm not stupid." She responds.

  "I don't know how to respond to that..." The teddy bear sounded confused.

  "The illusions, or-... Whatever is trying to mess with me!"

  "Illusions? ... You must be talking about the desert's hallucination effect. It's normal to see strange things when you're in this type of climate. The hallucinations- or illusions just depend on your mood, personality, or mind's condition." The teddy bear explains.

  Nova crossed her arms, "I see. Who are you again?"

  The teddy bear gasped from her question. He quickly reached into his pocket and pulled out his black top hat. Placing it on his head and doing a unique manner gesture of men's introduction.

  "I am Kryptonite." He said.

  "You pulled a hat from your pocket..." Nova muttered.

  "Yes, and...?"

  "That's not normal."

  "I KNOW THAT'S NOT NORMAL," Kryptonite shouted in pure frustration, his green fur momentarily changed to a red color. "... A name in return would be appreciated." He scoffed."

  "Nova." She laughed softly at his reaction as she covered her smile behind her hand. "So, what are you doing around here?"

  Kryptonite put his hat back in his pocket, pulling out his orange headband afterward and wrapped it around his neck in a stylish matter.

  "I should ask you that question. Why? Because I live here and you do not." Kryptonite answers, crossing his paws.

  "Would... You know who Blaze is?" Nova asked, tilting her head.

  Kryptonite's button eyes grow as if his eyes were widened. He didn't believe that someone had mentioned Blaze's name. Barely anyone he'd meet around the land knew who she was. He rubbed his paw against his chin softly, watching and observing Nova.

  "I may. I may not. Why do you ask?" He asked.

  "Amaya mentioned her, to me."

  Kryptonite's voice squeaked, "Amaya?"

  Nova scoffed and rubbed the bridge of her nose, looking frustrated from the nonstop questions. She eventually crossed her arms and looked down at the fluffy bear.

  "Now, listen here. You're gonna give me some answers instead of questions. Explain yourself!" She shouted in pure anger.

  "Ugh. M'lady is not going to be impressed with me." Kryptonite grumbled. "Why don't we talk in one of these huts?"

  "Preferably Blaze's hut. She owes Tilda some material." Atreyu interrupts the conversation as he stepped next to Nova.

  "Another one of you? Ugh, follow me."

 
; Kryptonite guided Nova and Atreyu to Blaze's hut. It was way on the outskirts of the seas of huts, it was actually inside the Ancient Desert territory, as they had to crouch to pass a hidden entry of the gateway into the deserts. The hut was not so different from the others, but on the top of the doorway, there was a flower. It looked to have died and begun its process of rotting.

  Kryptonite jumped up a few times to nudge the door handle to allow entry. Nova lent her hand over and pulled up the handle for him, while Kryptonite pushed the door open. It was dark inside before Kryptonite pulled out a lantern from his pocket and lit it. It was messy inside the hut. There were documents everywhere on the floor, documents hung on the wall and the ceiling. Nova looked around as Atreyu and Kryptonite settled in. She peered at a table which housed some photos and a fat looking folder. She picked up the photo and looked at it.

  It was black and white, like the original. But there was a girl in it only. She looked to of been in the mid-20s, with long hair that flowed onto her shoulders beautifully. Her arms, however, showed no skin. They showed robotic arms. The room looked different and odd as well, it looked like a room Nova had seen in the factory, but more of a mint condition. She was sitting on the floor and looking at the camera. Her face showed no emotion, her bangs covered one side of her face. And even though this was a photo of which was taken at an unknown time, and knew not of its purpose, Nova could feel some despair and suffer just looking into her exposing eye.

  "Kryptonite." She spoke up as she kept her eyes on the photo. "Who is the woman in this photo?"

  Kryptonite and Atreyu had been sitting on the floor, with the lantern just in the middle of them. Kryptonite was sitting on a pile of paper, which he had modified to fill his comfortability. He glanced over at Nova.

  "That's Blaze." He replied.

  Nova looked back at Kryptonite, then back at the picture. There was a few shooting pains within Nova's head, but not enough to really effect her. She didn't even notice that her eye twitched from the pain.

  "So... Blaze is a..." Nova began to mutter.

  "A Machina. That picture is of when she was being created. From what I hear, she's the first machine to have been created." Kryptonite explains.

  Atreyu frowns, he leaned his arms back as he got in more relaxing position.

  "The first machine to be created? But the Machina have been around for hundreds of years." Atreyu exclaimed, watching Kryptonite.

  Kryptonite nodded.

  Nova set the picture down on the file, just like how it was before she had picked it up. She turned back toward the two and sat in between them, looking down into the little flame that grew within the little lantern.

  "So, how did you meet her?" She asked.

  "From Drenawx." He answered, looking deep into the flame as if he was preparing to tell a long story of the past.

  Verse VIII

  Remnants of the Past

  The room became silent as the teddy bear looked into the flames of the little lantern he had pulled from his pocket. The flame deepened into a darker color, as Nova and Atreyu also stared into the flames. One pitch of the flame jumped from the bottomless pit, and changed into a dark blue flame, giving influence to the flames below it. Kryptonite used the flames to determine his current mood. As the flames had given into its new appearance, Kryptonite's mood had given into some kind of change.

  He kept his button eyes at the flames, placing his little paws on his lap. But he suddenly looked up at Nova.

  "You said you heard of Drenawx, right?" He asked.

  Nova and Atreyu looked at each other before either of them would respond to his strange question. But Nova turned back to Kryptonite and nodded her head.

  "Yes. We have a few times."

  "Did you hear that he is the creator of the Machina?"

  Atreyu positioned himself upward more as if he became more interested in the current conversation.

  "Drenawx? So he must be bad?" Atreyu asked.

  Kryptonite shook his head.

  "Did... Did you know him, Kryptonite?" Nova asked, sensing some concern for him.

  Kryptonite nodded his head.

  All of a sudden, a desert appeared. As it was before, the air was burning within the sands reflection of the sun. It was like the heated breeze that would blow by was the silent screams of the air as it burned away. The teddy bear crawled on the sands, his body was damaged severely. The right side of his body had gone missing, his cotton balls that would make up his insides had been pouring out of him as he traveled. He closed his button eyes, and stopped his movement, as time had finally set course what he was trying to achieve. His survival, which time was slowly taking away day by day, year by year.

  After a horrific battle that set the course the disaster of the world, Kryptonite separated from his newfound friends in secrecy. He wanted to explore the world and find a new place to call home, in order to bring peace to his people. It took a long time for him to explore the whole world because as events passed that would eventually bring us to this very event, the world changed for unknown reasons. It was changing and managing the chaos and corruption the Gods had sensed in the world. He felt unsafe, he didn't have any support, no one he could fall back on. It was scary just stopping for a little rest in those deserts. When his eyes closed, he couldn't open them up again. He was afraid they'd be closed forever.

  But the voice of a man awoke him. It was similar to a man he once knew. He was a crazy one, stupider of a companion than he had anticipated, but he managed. A light shined down in the heart as his memories of that man awoke him. But the image his eyes presented him as they opened was not of who he was expecting.

  It was Drenawx. He looked like a normal person, a little too normal for Kryptonite's comfort, because of the rumors he had been hearing about him. But he only gave Kryptonite a smile, looking happy to have helped him open his eyes. Kryptonite felt different though. He felt a weird sensation on the right side of his body he had never felt before. Like the feeling of emptiness and numbness entwined with strength and utmost power. He had a paw, and a leg, something he had not seen on that side of his body for what it seemed like hundreds of events ago.

  He moved them, hearing something odd like they were mechanical. He looked up at Drenawx.

  "I'm glad you're doing all right." Drenawx smiled.

  But then Drenawx turned away and walked out of the room. Kryptonite followed him into a room of which looked like a lab. There were a bunch of vaults lined up next to each other like a hallway. Each of the vaults contained a person, but Drenawx had looked down at Kryptonite and mentioned that they are no human, but something far more intelligent. Something he thought would bring a true fight to those darn Dragoona, who he believed would come out of hiding and destroy the rest of Humanity to claim the land like it says in myths.

  He called these new beings the Machina. Technically more advanced types of humanoids in every category possible by far charts. But he mentioned that they do in fact have many flaws, including the inability to handle certain emotions when they come into contact with them. Then he created Blaze.

  Kryptonite observed the rest of the vaults, noticing one lonesome one behind closed doors and having see-through mirrors to gain visible access to the vault and the room. Drenawx that one was reserved for his first creation, but he did speak anything of it at all. Instead, he took Kryptonite back to the Machina known as BLAZE-0X119, codenamed Blaze for easier reference.

  "... Amaya mentioned that she was dangerous. And that she looked like me." Nova interrupted, raising her hand up to gain Kryptonite's attention.

  Kryptonite glanced up at her and tilted his head to get a better view of her.

  "Hmm, maybe a little. Blaze was beautiful. She had deep purple eyes, long silver hair, a gentle and somewhat innocent voice. She's what I'd say is an angel descendant." Kryptonite admits as his button eyes turn into the shape of hearts.

  Nova frowns and glares at Kryptonite, "We get it, get back to the story.

  Kryptonite's f
ace grew red as he cleared his throat in an attempt to speak again.

  BLAZE-0X119 was the first of the Machina, and from what Drenawx has mentioned under his breath, he considers her a huge malfunction. Yes, she was designed with the incapability to feel any sort of emotion, but she found a way to feel it. She had the newfound knowledge and will to seek out what she was unable to access. She floated in her vault, with her eyes closed, but as Kryptonite stared at her, he couldn't help but notice that a little tear had been materialized from her closed eyes, and made a watery trail down her cheek. Kryptonite wondered if this was possible, for Machina to even produce tears.

  Drenawx explained that he wanted to create the Machina not only to help fight off the Dragoona but to be completely unable to become effected with the unknown virus. The virus that was spread throughout Kryptonite's past that brought genocide to his people.

  But that wasn't the case, as every Machina within that hall of vaults were contaminated with the virus. At that moment, Kryptonite gave the virus a name, Ruse.

  Each of the Machina within the room ended up cutting their way through the glass of the vault. Their eyes showed pure evil and darkness, the color of crimson red. They attacked each other until they found out that Drenawx and Kryptonite were in the other room watching them from some see through the glass. They were terrified, but Drenawx took this golden opportunity to get some research in on what was known as Ruse. How did it affect the machine's behavior, their beliefs, their personalities? Drenawx completely forgot about his plans of the past and focused on his new obsession which was the virus.

  Kryptonite could tell that Drenawx wanted to make a name for himself more than help the world. He failed to grasp the fact and reasoning of creating machines, and why they'd help the human race defeat something that has been unseen since the beginning of time.

  The machine labeled as BLAZE-0X119 opened her eyes to the mass chaos that was occurring in the room she was in. With no hesitation, she punched her way through the glass. But from what Drenawx and Kryptonite could see, the machine's eyes still shined the purple color brighter than ever. She materialized a spear in her hand within the air and rushed toward some of the machines in combat and slashed them. She spun the spear in her hands, stabbed the ground to create a purple wave that dealt damage to all the machines and spun around the spear, with speed that landing multiple kicks to the machines before pulling out the spear from the floor and slashing the air as she was well over them, dealing a strong and massive slash that cut inside the machine's mainframes. All the machines fell to the ground, each of them exploded as they all were conducted with their malfunctioned parts, sending shock waves through them all. She dropped to the ground and listened as all the machines exploded, looking back into the mirror where Drenawx and Kryptonite stood.