Nawx (Project IzeBorn Book 1)

by Andrew Jones

  "The only solution you have in your small brain is to kill! That's all you have, and it's become your ultimate urge!" Shalya shouted and laughed, "Kill me, Blaze! Just fucking kill me!"

  Blaze scoffed and pulled her spear from her forehead, "What's it going to take to make you shut up?"

  Blaze dropped her spear and looked behind her, right at the device once again. She wondered if this device really had the ability to delete someone from existence. She didn't have a choice, really. She grabbed Shalya by her upper arms and dragged her toward the device. Even though Blaze's attacks did not damage to her, she seemed to have been inflicted and weakened by them, making it easier to pull her into the vault and shut it.

  "W-What are you doing!?" Shalya yelled as she looked outside the vault.

  "Shut up." Blaze muttered to her as she looked at the controls to the device, "How the hell do you work this?"

  She pressed her fingers firmly on her forehead, where her symbol had been carved into her skin, being able to contact Chip.

  "Wakey, wakey Chip. I need your help." Blaze said in her head, closing her eyes in order to talk to her conscience.

  Chip responded, "Sleep mode abandoned, OPERATOR-3348-CHIP's is now open."

  "I need you to hack into this device and activate it."

  "Scanning for any nearby devices... Scanners confirm a foreign device, but the blueprints are unknown, thus increasing chances for virus risk. Proceed with the request?"

  Blaze nodded her head and opened her eyes, "Yes."

  Within a few seconds after putting in her request, she began seeing the device start up. Shalya banged on the glass, she was panicking just as the device began to glow the deep red. A laser shot down at her, which started the deleting phase.

  "P-Please stop this!" Shalya shouted.

  Blaze crossed her arms and watched, "No. Anyone who would betray a friend of mine deserves more than death."

  Shalya shook her head ferociously, "I am not the traitor! Ace is! He hired me to make Xan do something that is against us Divergence, like to bring you here! I was acting on reason!"

  Blaze tilted her head to the side, "Divergence, huh?"

  Shalya nodded her head, "Y-Yes! Now that you know the truth, will you let me go? I can help you stop Ace!"

  "Hmm... I don't think so."

  Shalya screamed at Blaze, just as the laser began shooting into her face. She screamed louder, as the process looked incredibly painful. The bright light only got brighter, and took her figure out of the picture, the device had only shown the light. But after a few moments, the light slowly faded away and the device had become empty. Blaze chuckled and placed her hand on the glass of the vault.

  "Deleted from existence..." Blaze chuckled as she hung her head low, "That's... That's a new one."

  But now that she knew Ace was the traitor, she had to help Xan. She wanted to know everything Xan knew, he was obviously more than she expected, not only for his mysterious crystal powers but his otherworldly knowledge. She scoffed and turned around, picking up her spear just as she walked out of the room. The hallway was filled with confusion, but Blaze had always found her way past anything. She was so close to learning more about Augur, this was her chance to find her inner peace she's been in search for.

  Journal Entry VII

  Corruption

  It was supposed to be a beautiful new life. A new life that would be cherished along with the other beings made alongside it. Though immediately, there was a noticeable difference between the girl and the other Synths. The Synths were all built to look mutually alike. However, there was differences in appearance that had been intentionally made. With the girl who was different, she was made with the most beautiful purple eyes. Her eyes would describe her character so well that it was unnecessary for the girl to even speak.

  Her purple eyes reflected how beautiful her soul was, how beautiful her heart could become. But it had also shown her crystal-clear difference from all the others whom took their black or white, or sometimes blue eyes with pride. Her purple eyes were admirable, but it scared all the others as well. Any sense of difference scared them, they didn't want to be infected with some sort of virus. And so, they treated the girl as if she were a witch in an old village.

  The girl didn't mind the constant criticism, she desired her independence more than anything else. But as the others spoke in their friendship circles, she found them being more suspicious than she could have been. The appearance of these Synths took form of Humanoids, or Human's with machine capabilities. And the way they acted, it would be easy to confuse the Synths as actual Humans.

  They spoke in bizarre accents, accents they learned after reading books. They gave gestures to one another that had some special meaning to them. The females gave sexual gestures to the males, and it would be especially strange since the male Synths went along with it. The male's reaction was not of what a Human male would generally produce, the results varied. It became somewhat scary, as the Synths became more and more closer.

  They started to participate in these activities, which looked like mere child's play. A game where you would run around the area and 'tag' one another until the last person was gone. They called the one who was chasing everyone 'It', and soon It became a fearful thing toward all of our kind. Something about this child's game made our mechanical minds create a picture- an illusion of some sorts, that would brainwash us to believe more that the one who was chosen to be it was indeed It.

  It was truly intriguing, and because of this the machines would experiment more into the Human kind. They read books about love and hate, sin and lust, greed and murder. They became confused, and asked one another why anyone would want to murder their own kind. The Human race was a pure, and much more elegant race than the machine life. That was until a machine was found stabbing another helpless machine in one of the rooms. All we heard was the victim machine screaming, and the murderous machine laughing and shouting, "Look at me! Look at me! I'm a Human!"

  The machines began to think of the Humans as more dangerous than one would think, and want. But they continued to mindlessly research the origins of the Humans. They stumbled upon a word. This was a powerful word. It was breed. The word held an unmistakably powerful ability that consists of growing the Human race and supporting it's existence. It was admirable to all of the machines- so admirable that they attempted to try this breeding ritual several times.

  Machines would always be found in their 'hiding spots', and they would just be laying on each other, or trying all these sacred positions that was found in one of the books. They wanted to help increase the machine population so we could be guaranteed a great lifespan. They would mimic what the Humans would do, even the disturbing and loud moans and groans.

  Maybe the machines were afraid of what they were up against. We were made to be a much more powerful and intelligent race, far more superior than the Humans. But the machines, themselves, and the Synths as well, worshipped these Humans and wanted to be more like them than themselves. It was like the machine lifespan was already dying down. Some machines would kill another so they could feel like a Human, and other machines would take their own lives because they were not born a Human and didn't think they could become Human.

  The girl with the purple eyes was special, but she had many weaknesses, she was vulnerable to the darkness. But she was smart, and even though she was called upon the other machines as a Corrupted, maybe the other machines were Corrupted and they wanted to escape their fate. Maybe they just wanted to be Human. To feel like a Human, to die a Human.

  Verse VIII

  Into Oblivion

  Within the outside of the building, Ace had Xanadu clutched in his fists by his neck. The sky was dark, but it had a red glow that would swirl around the middle of the sky, creating a beautiful aura in the sky. This was called a Deliverance, which the Divergence used in order to teleport to a different time. It served as the portal to the other world. The world they resided in was called, Between Time, the world that l
ived in between time. Because of that, it was fairly easy for them to travel throughout time and observe it.

  But on the roof of the grand building, there was a gigantic hourglass with limitless sands falling down to the bottom half. Maybe the bottom halves sands would somehow teleport to the top half, only to fall back down as time shifted. But it was big enough for Ace to trap Xanadu within. He shoved Xanadu into the glass of the hourglass, immediately opening it afterward. He glanced over at him as he opened it, sighing.

  "I know, Xan. You didn't expect things to go down this way..." Ace muttered.

  Xanadu grunted, "You're the traitor, aren't you?"

  Ace laughed, "You are smarter than I thought. Perhaps there was some hope for you. But, as of now, it is too late for you. I'll be leaving the Timeline in Shalya's care for now."

  "W-What about me?"

  Ace looked down, but he nudged his head toward the hourglass, giving him the signal to go inside.

  "The Grand Hourglass? B-But..."

  "But you will lose your ability to travel through time, lose all your memory, and get thrown into a random Timeline. Yeah, I get it." Ace mocked Xan, as he did the explaining for him.

  Xan frowned as he clutched his fists, "You are the traitor... You're the one who overthrew the Divergence. It all changed since you became the leader!"

  Ace shrugged his shoulders, "The rules were insufficient. Do you think we could just sit back and watch as a Timeline, like the one you were assigned to, can destroy itself? I'm helping these Timelines, these people!"

  "Maybe, but their fate is sealed. You cannot change one's fate for your own pleasure. People are born for a reason, and you are taking that reason away from them. They now live their lives for no reason because of you!"

  Ace punched the glass of the hourglass, then pointed at Xan in a fit of rage, "You've always been a spoiled brat, Xan! The Timelines are at peace, this is the most peaceful we have seen the Timelines in so long. Can't you appreciate that!?"

  "It's... It's still wrong."

  Ace grabbed Xanadu by the collar of his shirt and shoved him inside the hourglass, shutting it afterward. Xanadu panicked and knocked on the glass, screaming out but the glass prevented any sound from coming out from within.

  Ace sighed and moved his hand through his long black hair, letting out a sigh of relief until he heard some footprints from behind him.

  "Ah, Shalya. Did you eliminate that pest?" Ace asked as he turned back, looking shocked to see Blaze there instead of Shalya.

  Blaze aimed her spear forward at Ace, grinning, "Oh, I eliminated that bitch for sure. She has been deleted."

  Ace frowned, "Deleted? The only way mere worldly beings like you could defeat us. You're more clever than I thought."

  "You can stop with the bullshit. Let Xan out of there."

  Ace crossed his arms and shook his head, "I don't think so."

  "You'll regret that."

  Blaze muttered as she quickly dashed toward Ace, sending a powerful wave of winds his way. But he was able to withstand the wind and block her attack as he materialized two dual swords. Blaze pushed her attack through, but she could sense Ace's immense power, so she jumped up and pressed her feet against his dual swords and kicked away from him. She jumped back a great distance from him, as she saw him materialize a huge amount of what appeared to be sand. The sand flew in the sky above Ace, and fell down into him, creating a set of heavy armor for him.

  With the sand armor, Ace glared toward Blaze as he stepped closer to her, "You've fought many battles, Blaze. But they are nothing like me."

  Ace swung his dual swords, which shot sand slashes her way. Blaze blocked one of the incoming sands slashes, but she began dashing around him with the purpose of dodging each of the attacks. Ace began getting frustrated with her. He opened his arms and allowed himself to gently float off of the ground where a bright light emerged from his body. Within a strong and large amount of light, the light shot white beams at Blaze. She was able to quickly dodge two of the beams, but the last one ended up hitting her in the stomach, forcing her to fall straight to the ground.

  She felt the blood from the impact, but it wasn't enough for her to be weakened. Jumping up into the air, she dashed straight into Ace, just blocking a light beam. She kicked her foot strongly into Ace, which cracked his sand armor. He fell to his feet, but as he looked up he saw Blaze dashing toward him again and used her battle axe to deal a strong his on his armor- which created a large crack on the back of the armor.

  "You're powerful, but you are not powerful enough to overcome your fate," Ace grunted, as he began regaining his strength.

  "I don't care about that. I'm taking it one fight at a time." Blaze responded.

  Ace grew a huge fit of rage, as his body began to dissolve into sand. Blaze would narrow her eyes as she watched the sand from his body cover the entire floor of the room. Suddenly, the area gave an illusionous picture of a desert. Perhaps the Ancient Desert? No. The land was nothing but sand, a true ocean of sand, but it was missing the heat the desert had produced.

  The ground began to shake, and a whirlpool of sand was created just in front of her. It was large, large enough for a monstrous enemy to come out from the sand whirlpool. It must've been huge, because it could only expose its head, and its head had reached way up into the sky.

  "You're making a big mistake, Blaze..." The monster spoke, "I will cast you into oblivion!"

  Blaze gasped as she looked up and noticed how big the monster was, and she realized it was Ace, as well. One of his forms perhaps. She looked down at the palm of her hand, seeing a red glow begin to occur.

  "Target identified. Opening system file declassified, system file is only operable for emergency security reasons, do you wish to proceed?" Chip spoke.

  Blaze whispered, "A declassified system file? Hm, sure. Why not."

  "Opening system file codenamed, 'Oblivious Form'. Now taking form."

  Blaze's body twitched, just as she began to scream. Her body was suddenly being transformed from a normal Synth to something that the Synths were forced to forget, an alternative form which could only be used once in a Synth's life. Her arms shifted and grew giant cannons, her back materialized jet rockets, and her outer skin hardened and changed into a deep purple coloring, she even grew a helmet which would help her defenses even more. But in her hand, she felt something begin to grow. It grew slowly and took great height. It was a giant mechanical sword, which was able to shoot lasers from its swings.

  "You're not the only one who has multiple forms, Ace!"

  Blaze yelled as the monstrous Ace roared. She jumped into the sky and used her jets to fly around the monster, getting a better understanding of it. But it roared louder, creating a wave of powerful sands that would shoot her out of the sky. But she used her sword to cut through the sands. She grew tired of fighting him, so she quickly dove into the monster and stabbed her sword right into the monster's head.

  It had a violent lash out, but Blaze was the sword's power weakened him quite a bit. She flew outward and shot some cannons at him, which created a dark fog around him. She grinned and pulled out her battle axe and swung a powerful hit at him, slashing him as he was blinded by the fog.

  He stopped. Everything within the area stopped. But he disappeared just as Blaze blinked her eyes. He slowly let herself land on her feet, the desert area was fading, as the previous area with the Grand Hourglass was now visible. Xanadu smiled and clapped his hands as Blaze looked around. It was like she never even faced Ace. Did she kill him somehow? She doubted it, and she tried to forget about it as she began to open the glass of the Hourglass.

  "Blaze, that was amazing!" Xanadu shouted as he jumped out of the Hourglass.

  "Thanks..." Blaze whispered as she looked back again, looking a bit cautious. "Is he dead?"

  Xanadu shook his head, "No. He let you win. He already knows how he dies, and it isn't by yours or my hands."

  "I see..." Blaze muttered as she looked up at him, "So, you can really
travel through time? I knew you were special, Xan."

  Xanadu chuckled, "Might as well admit it... What happened to Shalya? Was she really deleted?"

  "Yup, yup."

  Xanadu sighed. Blaze really didn't know how he would react to knowing she was gone. She didn't know Xanadu or Shalya all too well, but she felt the two had some kind of connection. But she betrayed him, so she saw no need to forgive such a person. But he fell to his knees, then he just sat back against the Hourglass and took a deep breath, laughing in a sarcastic manner.

  "It's funny..." Xanadu said.

  Blaze crossed her arms, "What is?"

  "It's... We were looking at your Timeline and became extremely cautious of the conditions. It's what we do... But because of that, we didn't look to see how we were doing. The Divergence was falling- breaking down in front of me and I never even noticed." Xanadu explained, holding a frustrated fist up.

  "It isn't your fault, Xan. There was nothing you could have done... I think."

  Xanadu sighed, "You're right."

  Blaze plopped down next to him and sighed as well, her sigh was excessive though so it was obvious that she was mocking him. She looked up at him and smiled widely for a second, but after her face grew calm again. But before she sat down next to him, her new armor had disappeared along with her new sword, rocket jets, and cannon blasters.

  "That form, though. I hadn't seen that in the Machina records." Xan said as he looked to the side at her.

  "It's highly classified. I forgot about it until now. But, I doubt I would have a chance against Ace without it, he's a strong one." Blaze replied.

  "That he is, he's manipulative and the most powerful of us all..."

  Xanadu was talking, but he stopped as he felt Blaze's head softly leaning on his shoulder.

  "So, what do we do from here? I heard that my-... Or our Timeline is screwed. Is there anything we can do?"

  Xanadu thought for a moment, letting the area become silent. He had an idea, it was risky and it probably would not work out, but it was the only way the branch wouldn't end up so corrupted to the point that it wouldn't require being sealed. He stood up and reached his hand down to Blaze, to help her up on her feet.