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“Martel!”The muffled metallic crunch trailed after the one who shouted. Their approach tore up tender earth, set pebbles from ‘Salvations broken base to skittering. They looked up, revive broken at the frantic man’s approach.He seemed mad, this man who raced no one and thus won nothing. He wore black as al benighted things, the only breaks in the color were the steel tips of his boots, the red of his vest, the frayed tan cape scarcely clinging to his neck, and the silver helm atop his head. The last he unfastened, throwing it aside, then he was back to his mad dash,Shoving past heros and saviors he slowed, head whipping back and forth, desperately looking for what wasn’t there.As for what was, the illusion… the delusion of Grandeur faded. The edges of towering boughs blurred then simply weren’t. A mirage dissipating in fast forward. In greatness’ sake simple potential remained. A sapling, one root jutted out just so to avail some jagged rock, sprig growth swayed and shivered under the barest of breezes.Pacing the tree’s base, the interloper was vaguely aware of the others (unnamed, faceless, just as h preferred them) were pulling back. Raising a mutter about him, and them, and him being with the,. Uncaring he raked his gloved hands through his blue locks still looking. Though the motions of his search were tamer about the edges.“She-here-I heard… where here was?) The words were slurred together, squeezed past a throat gone so tight the whimper at the end was unavoidable. Slowing jsust a bit more he finally found stillness, though his hands refused to quit his hair and he was trying (and failing) to sooth himself via an impromptu combing.The tangles, all helm and sweat born, were hardly cooperating.With something like sanity the interloper (wasn’t heal always, the role didn’t surprise him, didn’t surprise them, well not too much, there were a few bugged out eyes and averted gazed) turned to regard the lot. Names and faces were now seen, acknowledged, though it was a grudging gifting. For his regard though, the bulk, he pinned it on the brightest of the lot.In return these heroes bristled, recalling perhaps belatedly how he’d betrayed one and all, how he could would, should, destroy them all if need be.Still, their realization and his acknowledgement of them as people didn’t make him go away, or start, of gap, or fall all over himself apologizing. It had been war, though the children, these children wouldn’t have called it such, and he held few regrets. Amongst the crush pity was predominant, for sanities sake he did not comment upon it. He’d not be the instigator of a war upon such fresh born soil, the day was too young.So he sought, and found and the last of his anxiety was quit. Lowering his hands, letting them fall stupidly at his sides, they made a macabre study. Black, flaking and frayed. The darkest patches were jagged with hints of fluid staining the edges with gloss.As so many who indulged in desperation had done before him, he did, turning upon the brightest of the lot, entreaty written upon every line and every inflection of his raw worn voice.“Where is my wife?”Amongst this crush of heros (the best, the wisest, the outcaste and canny) his gaze did not wander. He had the one he sought, the substitution and as such gave her all of his regard, openly. What stir this caused, he cared not.“The Tree has a spirit” The girl child murmured, her blonde hair made gold and bright by the new days dawn. The child seemed ethereal; more spirit than mortal, and it was a fitting analogy considering… everything. Her blue eyes peeked out from a face both small and demure, face fitted form, though the soot and splashes of red about her white uniform did dispel the image about the edges. “She said... She was many, the fallen, a guardian.”To that revelation bitterness slid up his throat, the resulting exhalation was both jagged and wet. He swallowed, tasting iron, and grit, and the lot was hotter than Triet on a summer noon. Closing his eyes, he willed the burn behind his lids to abate, and only when it did did he indulge in sight.“So,-” since snark was expected as was flippancy he flashed a bit of tooth, let them dub it smile if they must. “-For all of our efforts the salvation of this unified world rests upon the collective consciousness of a pack of children who died doing nothing? That is a comfort.”“It’s not just Martel, we’re here and-“From beyond his narrowed regard one of them spoke. The child’s mate since no other could turn her head just so. Aurions’ boy, he recalled. Once upon a time the boy’d been vital. Now… well now the child had proven himself quite expandable with his crass monologue.“I know my wife.”The whispered counter went unheard. The lot raised their voice, mistimed choir, all exposing assurance and promise that was so hollow how could they not see. So familiar, so damned familiar, he closed his eyes because the burning was back, and the bitter would not come out a choked thing.It came out a roar.“This is not Martel, she is not my wife! You, all of you, will stop calling it that!”The flinched, perhaps then recalling tales of fallen heroes, and mad men born plans meant to ward off death. Silly, stupid children. Did they really, how could they, so soon, forget such? The villain of this day’s blood was scarcely drying on some patch upon heaven’s back. To the silence that he followed he closed his eyes. Replaying a meeting of no emotional import from long ago, he timed his breathing with every other constantan of that long ago conversation. And since it was an odd day in the Span he flicked eyes open, remembering to blink every twenty whatever’s. Right now, grass would do, there were plentitudes of that, so he timed blinks to count.Because if he didn’t, he wouldn’t, and the situation was too precarious. Any little friction could ignite matters.“Will you silence a world?” So spoke the light, not his, but a world’s, the worlds’.For that he flashed the child a smile.It was a justified query all in all and the blue haired… well what he was didn’t matter anymore, didn’t it? With a sigh Yuan clasped his hands, fingers finding familiar purchase he twisted his wedding ring around and around.“No… The worlds… the world has had enough of that already.”Her gratitude was a smile, and to her warmth and regard… his own lost some of its falsity.“Thank you…”“Oh spare me any sappy sentiment.” The blue haired half elf, half man, no half man… To his own mental wandering he grimaced. He was no man, quite literally, for no could be as he was… the agent of Yggdrasil, the defiler and denier, looked up from his grief with a satire of a grin on his lips.He looked up into a face that was both shocked and horrified, and to that he turned hands fisted in a motion of summoning.A mere second later and it was merely a fist, one that was raised, then dropped.Cruelest of cruelties, she looked the same.This thing, his wife, there were no… well one physical difference. The leaves, but she’d twined those in her hair often enough. As had he. Both had favored the brightest spring hued leaves, delighting in the contrast between those and her hair once long ago. They eyes, spring green, the shape of the face, her hands so long and graceful, each limb aligned and moving as he remembered.And for such as him, there were no falsities in recollection.Damned, thus he was, and looking upon the fair being before him stared upon the yet another facet of his damnation.Not Martel.To that pre-known revelation he should have been moved, should have cried, or rejoiced, or something…All he could do was stare, his wits deserted him as she approached, her green tinted robes rustling as hers ankles, the faint whisper of her scent was Martel’s for only Martel could smell of greenery and woman all which said but one word.“Beloved.” And he was upon his knees, not caring how or for the stones at them or the tree or the audience. None of them mattered, nothing did. “Oh my beloved… Mer Derris Deliahna, mer amnaie, my heart…” He was babbling, undone, even before she spoke one word.“Yuan.” She even had... the voice, her voice. He closed his eyes and efforts failed him, the tears seeped out despite his damnedest.“You’re not…” Because whenever he could be happy, whenever that happiness was hinged upon a delusion he spoke the truth. Another facet, one that caused her.. it… to smile. She nodded, accepting, so damned calm, even as her sun warmed fingers extended, tracing the paths of his tears. Not wiping them away as she would have, the differences were compiling, blessing and damning turn by turn. Still he lifted his head up, to best regard her. “How.. how do you?”“Memories, Yuan Vor’esse,” One of the crush, the living, took in a breath. The voice was familiar. But in that moment even familiarity was irrelevant. “I house memories and souls and… you aren’t unknown amongst them. Amongst one of the lot you are quite… familiar.”“Who-“ Then wits that had been dissolving under the rush of everything somehow coagulated. The crash of realization and recollection stole his breathe and his green eyes went wide. Horror and shock, how like Sylvarant’s Chosen he must look as both their expressions were now mirror images. “Rene! Merciful Goddess, no!”Her nod, that calm quiet acknowledgement of his worst nightmare, that was the last straw. He surged to his feet, snapping up the woman’s shoulders in a grip that could break stone and he shook. Shook her until those celestial teeth rattle and the sap of the world tree surly was stinging in the hollows of pseudo veins and… And there were hands pulling him back, ripping them apart before he could get a good grip about the things throat. Never mind she was spirit and salvation and everything they’d all suffered for, that the hands holding him were saviors from every walk of life, from every place in this twisted time.“Let me go! Let me down.” Because he had been hauled up. Someone with sense knew that putting him down would be the same as setting death on its feet and helping it along. “Let her go, now!”“She’s dead Yuan,” so death, her death, bellowed into one of his pointed ears. “Aska’s grace man, stand down! Halt, of I’ll slash your damned fool throat!”“Release me Derris fa Sith or I swear I’ll…”What? What could he do? Without underlings and plans, while not weak he was never... could never be Kratos’ equal in combat. The fight drained out of him, he went limp, and once set to his feet nearly collapsed. Only the memory of how to stand was enough to keep him up. That and the stubborn pride to apply those memories to the here and now.“Done now?” So spoke death, Kratos Aurion’s smile was a perfect match to his expression, strained and dark. It took everything Yuan had not to punch the man’s face in.“For the moment,” Yuan snarled, swiping a hand over his face and pointedly ignoring the muck that had coagulated there. “But I want answers. Why, why is she with you…” He waved a hand at the spirit, tree creature, lips curling into a sneer. “She died outside the ritual… the crystal was a fluke, she wasn’t Chosen! ”“Some choices are forced.” The spirit murmured, showing nary a bruise to mark his attack. But there was weariness, a cringed whip-dog air that made her assailant smile and brought forth the image of every child Cruxis had ever killed. It was curious to see, just for a moment, such a tortured multitude. “And she… they all will only reside for a while. Once… once the time is right they will be released to be reborn again.”Then the thing had the audacity to lift her head and glower at him.“What you did was wrong.”Green met green, but for one pair of eyes there was a glint of lightning about the iris’.“Not my first mistake, little girl.” Adjusting his capes clasp he growled. “And it won’t be my last.”To his audacity, she snorted but spared him from another comment. “Why?” He rasped, hands fisting, ignoring the weary looking mass about him, the hands sliding over weapons. “You could release them they aren’t part of the Tree, you violate your domain...”“I.” Her expression turned haughty, perhaps she drew upon some long ago noblewoman for it. “Am a new born being. There is much for me to learn. It’s a short cut for a foisted off task that none of the others would take.” Her lips curled into the bitterest of smiles. “They don’t trust humanity.”“You do.”A multitude looked back at him, and he looked back, seeking who knew what. He didn’t. Not then or even when he indulged the odd moment of remembrance a centuries hence.“The potential is there. It’s as I was meant to be, trusting, hopeful, but such suffering that I inherited, I… I don’t know... not yet.”“I want my daughter back.” Yuan breathed. “Humanity and trusting be hanged. I. Want. Her. Back.”“When I have learned from her what I was meant to, I will.”The promise was given as had the touch and all other gestures preceding it. Dully, distance being predominant.He thought of the automation, and honestly, he worried a bit. Not for her, but those lives she impacted. All lives, she was mana itself now, thus all were hung in those apathetic fingers.“You will tell me.” Yuan rasped. “When she is to be freed so… so I might look after her as I had before.” It should have been a demand, but it came out a plea. A strangled, tortured exhalation sans bitterness.Perhaps.” And with that she was gone, a swirl of green and the tree… sapling… shivered. Then she was gone though not it. Not the Tree, never that.From the back, the crush, the misplaced heroes and pseudo villains he spoke. Aurion’s boy. Part awe, part shock colored the bumpkin’s words.Still the expected “What… who was Rene, I mean are you alright I mean uhm… well Damn this isn’t coming out right at all...““Quit while you’re ahead Irving.” Yuan groused. “Just… be silent.”And wonder of wonders, the boy was.The whipered “But.. I'd like to know…” Not from him, the boy, but the Chosen. To that Yuan grimaced and faced Colette denial on his lips.Until he made the mistake of meeting those wide, watery blue eyes.There was little resistance to such a pathos inducing regard. And for him, to her (who’d held Martel’s very soul against her own, shielding her from Mithos’ madness, from madness itself) he found resistance a petty thing indeed.
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A Promise of SortsChapter 2
They made a curious collection, noble, president, exile, angel, like a chlid’s game of duck-duck save there were not water fowl to be named, rather the lot wore titles of finery and shame. Still it was a curious thought, perhaps brought by the fore when his Renegade met them at the bases’ door. This wasn’t Sylvarant’s sand logged abode, or even Tethe’alla’s ice sheathed magic monstrosity where he’d made his “final stand” against Aurion’s boy and their lot.Rather it was a hole in the wall of a mountain a handful of mile away from a tree of no little import. The lot was steel plated (an idea snatched from the dwarves), with a few wards here and there to align the structure with Shadows essence (wards were ever the elves specialty, not that any of their pristine hides would have dared commune with the keeper of the Abyss). And though simple was quite elegant. He made a mental note to find who’d pushed for those innovations and reward them.If they were alive that was.The area was, per pressure and presence of the runes, a rather gloomy affair. Shade thickened to near blinding levels and since there were no unnatural lights the shade was in abundance. The aura of gloom and doom was helped along by the occasional man sized boulder, and the fact that the sun was descending and the door faced wrong way about to get that fleeting light.A private patch of twilight, it did a lot to hide the runes set in yellow quartz, the lot obscured further by the fact the pathway up to said door was a rock garden. They stepped upon some, scattering the more fickle rocks and not even guessing to the nature of the more “ornamental” of the lot... While the mortals… the non-augmented humans… felt nothing (save the sharp edges of stone and the crick of gravel under boot) Derris fa Sith winced.Surely the man was feeling those invisible bands of pressure upon his back. Flight, here, would not be an option. Gnome, or rather his assistant manipulating Gnome for her benefit, had made sure of that.“Halt.” So spoke the dark, or rather a person cloaked in it. Yuan felt a pointed ear twitch, his left, all accidental giving a tell as to where the person was if Kratos’ thinning eyes and oh-so-slight turn in that direction indicated. “Password.”“Of course Mes. Kystin,” Yuan offered underling a grin, making a point to fix his gaze on exactly where she was. An easy feat, considering her balanced mana (with a slight slant towards wind, just a breath mind) made her all but glow when compared to the sheer blackness of Shadow’s overabundance. She would be expecting such little bits of omnipotence after all. “Obligar Obsidian ja’derri’il.”“And how was hell, sir?” Queried the dark.“Amusing, and I even brought tourists from the other side.”At his side, about and behind, they heroes and would be saviors of the world looked at him in confusion…. Well the younger ones did. The adults, more expecting and experienced, knew an insult when they heard it.“Dad…” Aurion’s boy whined, oh yes he’d feel the wards too. Newly changed and all that. Well too bad. “I don’t feel too good…”When the Chosen, Sylvarants hope and ex-vessel of his wife made a similar complaint Yuan decided that his quota for torturing the others via suspense was up. For at least an hour or two. He’d reconsider his stance after they were fed and watered.“Commander, lights please.”He was obeyed, with a promptness that might have startled those about him with no military experience. The lot pulled out small sphere from pockets, stirred the lot with a quick shake and the agitated algae birthed a grudging light born of irritation. Of an aquatic and dodgy sort of system, but it’d do.As for the one with any military experience, any commentary he might have about Yuan’s Renegades were surly taken away by the little fact that there were five men, two women, in various locations about stone and walkway (the closest a mere five feet away) and all seven of the lot had cross bows with black onyx tips pointed at him.At the noise of protest, from Aurion’s boy, no surprise there, Yuan elaborated on the obvious.“You’ve no friends here Mr. Aurion. You’ve many many enemies.”“I’d of never guessed.” Brown eyes flicked to the blue haired half elf… or rather the creature who’d once been as such. “Does this… distinction… extend to my host?”“I’ve yet to decide, commander?”Between pasty hues and looming shadows the Commander, a girl child of perhaps fifteen, seemed horribly small. Considering who she stood against, who she’d be made to fight at his order if he decided to press said fight…She nodded at him. Expecting recognition though they’d never traded names. He recognized her of course, her features told her tale more than the bands on her wrist or the symbols stitched upon her shoulder. He’d recognize the slant of her eyes and that pointed chin from her mother… the thatch of black hair all riled and mussed was the only allusion to her father. Not even a helmet could hold down those spikes, or rather they could be pinned but they flared like squashed bird wings about her ears and neck wherever the helmet granted leeway.“Orders sir?”“Commander Lis for the First regiment, Tethe’alla division, please warn the kitchen we’ve mouths to feed. And accommodations for the night for most of this lot. Derris fa Sith will of course not be staying, so you may put your bows back, ladies and gentlemen.”That raised a grumble and a few glares, but bows were put back.“Back to your posts, the lot of you.” Lis barked, over riding arguments from this lot. And as they moved about, all but seeming unarmed, a curious thing happened. Perhaps it was the lgith, or them as they gathered their lights and held it close. But some of the effects of those featureless steel masks were pushed back. The lot seemed poorly fit for their armor, weapons once merely deadly were now seen as over sized for most, held awkwardly by the rest.“They’re…” The silver haired half elf scholar gaped realization belated and awful all at once.“Children.” Yuan finished. “Yes, the offspring of those who fell in the tower during our two pronged attack last month. This was a training ground for the offspring of commanders and the like. It’s also the closest friendly terrain for myself.”“Their parents…” The woman persisted, never mind how some of those not so fast in retreating winced at wounds revealed.Mercifully Yuan waited until all were gone, until it was just him and this lot and a door that was open and ringed round by runes meant to discomfort any being of light.His skin itched, his wounds burned, he’d of been thirsty and hungry if such were allowed.As it was, he wasn’t.“None have reported back, and rank is, in an emergency, inherited. I’ve need to speak to the commander, to make sure that accommodations are being met for them, you’ll just have to suffer what they offer you and your own. If you’ll excuse me story time is going to have to wait.”His steel boots clicked across stone, flicking bits of fickle rock that held no meaning, and left the lot to follow or not.Their murmured conversations, as decisions were met and resolve to stay or go, (Derris fa Sith wasn’t the only one who left for Altessa’s, that dwarf’s home was reasonably near for those with flight, and considering this lot had stolen his Riehards it went without saying they could fly once beyond the runes) were made without him hearing. Or meaning to hear. The bulk of it. At door he indulged a gesture and was through. The pressure against his skin eased and he could breathe.Being of light wasn’t the prerogative of fallen heros of wars so distant most didn’t recall the name anymore. There were the two children (Chosen and Aurion’s), and himself to consider. Not that he’d confess distress from a working his subordinates had wrought but it was nice to be away from the more blatant defenses of this pseudo base.Thinking of subordinates he looked and in a far corner, where chamber blended into hall, and there she was. Fussing with bit of misplaced hair that was trying to take an eye and upsetting her helm all at once. He smiled, some things never changed.“I think we can skip the helmet, Commander.” When she moved to salute him, helm askew and hair still threatening that eye Yuan chuckled. “And formality. I think we can lynch that today, being the first day of a new world.”“Yes Lord Yuan.” She didn’t salute then, but stuck to titles and a wry grin that was more scared and bravo than joy.“Show me around a bit, Commander. Let’s avoid Derris fa Siths spawn and the obligatory troop of fools he’s gathered for a bit shall we?”The answering smile was more sincere than anything he’d seen from her before. Pulling off helm, she tucked it under her arm and lead.And in an inverse of station, he followed. Listened and heard and listening and hearing both her and other things. Other conversations, some he’d participated in, others he had not.XXThe rooms were all universal, his and there’s though he’d never divulge that. Earthen walls and a cot for sleeping, a table for personal affects and nothing else unless one asked. Likely they didn’t. Honestly he didn’t care if they did or didn’t. He’d bandied about his underlings, slipping into the mess hall, a nook furthest from what little light and day this place had claim to. He found one of the children about his size wearing clothes far too big and appropriated a spare uniform from the boy’s laundry and had changed.That’d been after his tour of the base and he’d had copies of all the data that made such a base run before him with the Commander’s blessing. It was simple really, a child with basic economic knowledge could calculate how long food would last, and water supplies were scrawled in the blanks by a hand that was distinctly childish indicating that one of the more math savvy children had been doing just that.The fact these children had been on ration for two weeks and only had enough for perhaps a week an half more was startling. Yes, the world was in turmoil, but he took care of his own.In normal situations this would be intolerable. He’d obsessively taken care of his own, playing a conservative campaign verses Kratos son’s reckless willy-nilly tearing apart the fabric of divided worlds or Mithos’ insane driven wrenches, where with the aid of the Eternal the mad man child had forced worlds and minds to his kind of thinking with a flick of a legendary blade.Still this wasn’t a normal situation. When a boy had slain an angel normal had died along with the divine messenger.Which meant he should have been taking twice as much care, because hadn’t he promised to do just that. To be better than any of the Cardinals and Cruxis and others combined.It was jarring to see the tangible proof before him that he’d been neglecting his duties once more.She’d of killed him.And though a morbid comfort there was something soothing in that thought. A sense of I know something you don’t, flavored with I know how they think, how they thought, and you never will. And if he were directing that sentiment at the bearer, at the Chosen of a mythos now as ruined as its tower… well he was allowed some juvenile lapses.Encroaching senility would serve as good an excuse as any other.Flipping a page he considered technological resources. Though good for battling Seraph, earth and dark mana were very poor conductors for transmitting information, particularly voice over distance. Still some of the dated tech could be taken apart and he was comfortable enough with a magi-tech lab to put something together that would pass muster and get the right frequency.And if he weren’t he could fly for three days to the nearest base and force march those soldiers here for a pick up.They’d have to abandon this base, Kratos had seen, and what he’d seen he’d likely destroy. Habits of four thousand years were not shaken off overnight.Tapping his foot he considered nothing at all, pointedly not thinking on his negligence and how Rene and Martel would have killed him for it. They’d of done it simultaneously too, no dithering about lines and turns and who got to do what.Smiling, because it was funny, really it was, you just had to know them both well enough before the joke caught on. Yuan leaned his head back against nothing at all. He let the chair handle most his weight and indulged in something as close to sleep as he got.A close eyed sprawl, artfully boneless, and artificially tranquil. Breathing slowed, steady, he resided in a middle ground between alert and calm, a meditation in form but not substance because his mind was ever rattling about and nothing would still his reflexes if something truly set them off.If he could dream, he’d choose his dreams to be a nightmare. Of green eyes familiar, hers and not but hers all the same. Because that would be fitting. An aversion and compliment to the woman ghost who was yet was not his Martel.She’d take her name, her voice, her eyes…Smile fading, relaxation fallen, he stiffened, cradling the new, unwelcome thought with careless regard of its spines. Memories, all that was left were memories now, the ghost had the rest. Memories of who she was and had been, and though the tree-spirit surly thought she had his child and his wife’s essences in her hands she hadn’t a thing.Because memories were a one sided thing, especially memories that were not lived, merely vicariously savored. She’d always be a step removed from what she held… and she’d merrily hold what she had hostage over him, possibly, probably.Eyes sliding open, he considered the air above his desk with all due seriousness, then pulled open packets and pages, considering a generator and stones used to power it, if Yashin’s theory of conflicting elements were being used as a power source in this base there’d be a thin lining of white quartz within the shadow generator. He could pull the guts out of one of those, compromising the security minimally if he took one of the spares, and perhaps using the runic symbol of distance with an altered holy song spell could…Flipping the page of his report he consulted pockets and finding nothing just snapped off a corner of his desk with one hand. Once sure of his grip he set edge of the wooden bit aflame with a spark of electricity and with a quiet huff snuffed out the budding flames.While not quite a pen it was the wee hours of the morning. He’d not bother any with his needs when he could make do on his own.Sketching one rune he considered angles and calculated force and frequency to pitch in his head, only scrawling down answers when he got to them.Half aware of the here and now, mostly focused on the past, he groused at Yashin and his bloody systems when he found that the pressures he’d estimated were proven to break his rune at one particular curve that was vital for coherence. Thus Yuan was forced to scratch out a page of his efforts and rip another part of the table off to make another make shift pencil.Never mind he was crabbing at someone who wasn’t there, the lonely did that from time to time, no the telling part was one fact.Yashin had been dead over two thousand years.Lost in the mire of equation Yuan wasn’t aware of that. He carried on and ignored the telling silences as he worked by raising his voice, waving his hand to better articulate some point that seemed important. He only came to his senses when no matter how he worked his pen he left no mark upon the page. Looking up from his effort he intended to tell someone off about the qualities of his writing tool the world came back to him.Scent, char and the grit under his tingling fingers woke him fully form his waking dream.Before him, perched on a stool, the illusions of clutter blurring his feet and the floor about him was a man. Pointed ears proudly bared, white hair pulled back to make the baring obvious. The man’s black uniform that might have been the inspiration for Yuan’s. More a slip and shad than shadow himself, save Luna’d blessed him with pallor even if she stole his wits. He was more ghost than the tree-ghost herself, and as if in response to that thought the phantom of Yuan’s memory smiled wryly.One blink later and he was gone.Yuan stared transfixed at was and wasn’t for a long time. Equations almost done really, he could afford the indulgence. So he lingered, focused upon nothing that had been something until, sometime later, there came a knock upon his door.Some sib of the Commanders, pressed into a servant’s duty, she wanted to know if he was going to eat in the Mess or if he’d rather eat alone.Twiddling charred wood in his hand Yuan pushed aside papers and pages and stood. The girl, clearly pre adolescence and far too young to actually be serving… He idly wondered if she’d been visiting her family before the call and the tower. Shaking his head to banish such concerns he accidentally inspired a torrent of fearful babble.To that he spoke, shaking off the last of his mental cobwebs with a soundless growl. “I know the way. I’ll show myself in in a minute. I understand we’ve… guests.” Parasites, intruders, interlopers who’d sap resources that these children didn’t dare use on themselves much less… One deep breath later and he continued. “Who remains?”“Umm… well the humans… the blonde one, and the boy with Lis’ hair ‘cept it’s brown, and a silver haired half elf woman and her little boy, sir.”A curious choice and if he cared it could have meant a lot. He could sift name from importance and dissect what he knew of their bonds to tell him…But he didn’t.Obligation to the girl child, the Chosen of a world that now wasn’t –because there weren’t not two worlds, not when all was one once more- would be met and he’d be done with them. A glance at the paper, and the ghost it had so glibly inspired –because Yashin was back, in his own way, not a phantom but lying within lines and figures upon the page, even the erroneous ones- was a reminder he needed but didn’t want.His attention had been wandering.He’d not make the mistakes of his past.He’d pick up the pieces of his organization, of his life, and Martel phantom be damned he’d see his daughter freed. If she’d not come back to be his, at least she’d be free before world’s end.“If they’re sleeping, wake them, if they complain I’ll sort it out. Oh and Private Chals,” Because what could you call a child, one in her sisters altered uniform that still didn’t fit thought the stitches had been grotesquely altered to make it stay in place? “-you’ll want to get the coldest water possible, the brown haired boy sleeps like a rock.”“Yes sir.”She saluted, wrong hand, wrong way, still he nodded like she’d gotten it right, and she left a little bit less shaken then when she’d entered.It was something.If only if hadn’t felt too much like how this whole mess had begun. Taking in refugees from shattered worlds, with broken innocence streaming off of them like blood trails. And need, he’d never had, but they did. Needing too much, having too little. He’d faced those decisions before and they’d been hellish the first time about, repetition did not make this easier.Rattling decisions and runic formula in his head he paced down halls he remembered commissioning two centuries ago. Luckily none of the rooms had been shuffled about too much and he found the Mess without having to ask for help.Unfortunately for him his luck died then, as the room was all but empty of his own people and only the golden haired child and her bratty boyfriend were up and about. Both were eating, though they ate much less than most would expect someone their age to be actually consuming.“…you get used to it.” The blonde murmured, her red shirted paramour was looking crest fallen about something. “I know it’s a lot less but…”“I… I just remember being more hungry in the morning and then I see the food and I’m suddenly not and no one said anything about not being able to eat anymore…”“No one expected you to sprout wings either, boy. Welcome to Cruxis, we’d throw a party with cake but I figure you won’t want any so it’s canceled.” Yuan drawled, because though these weren’t familiar or friendly faces who knew all the protocols in talking to him it was something.The girl child gave him a little huffy look, told him to be nice, but did scoot a bit so that the bench they were perched upon had some room for him to take a spot on it he wanted to join them.He took the offer mainly to hear Aurion’s boy channel his inner bird and squawk at him.“Good morning Mister Yuan... Or is it Mer Yuan?” The girl wondered.To that reasonable question Yuan shrugged. “I don’t know anymore. Since this is nominally Tethe’alla Mer. Vor’esse works.” Then seeing the boy wasn’t going to eat his meal of syrup drenched flat cakes Yuan snapped up the plate and pulling a knife from his boot cut off all the chewed up parts.The boy to his credit managed a deeper sort of squawk of outrage.“So, is it story time yet?” The brunette snarked, recalling Yuan’s evasion from last night and likely thinking himself cunning for throwing it back into the Seraph’s face.Unruffled Yuan sliced his purloined meal into a proper Seraph sized serving. Three medium sized bites were quite generous after a fortnight’s fast.“After breakfast,” Yuan promised, “I’ll be happy to tell the Chosen what she wishes to know about whatever memories she saw. You, on the other hand, are not invited to story time for your record of atrocious behavior.”“My behavior!” The boy really was taking his wing thing too far, at this rate he’d sprout beak and talons and subside on the occasional handful of seed. “I just saved the world here!”“And you almost broke it, twice.”The look pinned on him was unbelieving, Yuan though was busy with his first bite and the boy had something of manners, letting the older Seraph have his first third without complaint. When that mouth opened, Yuan’s had his bite and a half mouthful of milk as well.“Flanoir.”The boy opened his mouth wider, clearly meaning to yell something.“Triet.”The following snap as it shut was almost musical.“Hima.”“Alright already…” The boy huffed, flushing.“Altessa’s.”“Hey, you’re the one who brought an army of assassins...”“They were meant to contain your father.”“Yggdrail’s the one who brought all those angels. I blame him for everything that went wrong that time.”After some thought, and an interlude where Yuan shifted a bit so the Chosen’s fork could slip on his plate and take off one of the soggier bits of Lloyd’s breakfast, Yuan sighed and rubbed off the syrup that’d accidentally gotten on his sleeve.“Perhaps… you’re right.” Recalling the battle, Yuan smirked, the look of terror when Kratos had snapped and gone after Mithos with his bare hands had been golden. Still, recalling the lives lost… recalling the one who should have been there… who would of if not for...Little wonder his smile died.“The sea side ranch.”Silence. For a long moment none breathed, not the child, or Aurion’s boy, or any of the few Renegades who’d been there and eating and listening with a shocked wonder as their leader and the outsider had bantered. Finally the quiet was punctured by a pained hiss, one of his own, perhaps recalling the pain of a loved one’s death.This was how jocularity died.Yuan stood, deciding to indulge in a drink he took the cup with him. Or meant to. A hand, hers but not, stilled him. Smearing sticky remnants of sweet abandoned and nearly spilling his milk on them both. Not the best way to get his attention, his skin tingled where her fingers applied pressure, whether it was enough to hurt or meant to hurt he couldn’t tell.It was going to be one of those days.“Yes Chosen?”“When won’t you be busy doing Renegade stuff Mr. Y- Vor’esse?”“Do you sleep?”To that non-sequetor she blinked, but was truthful despite the surprise. “Yes, a little, do you?”“I’m a few centuries between naps.” Green stared down at blue, she did not flinch. He did not blink, did not have too and though she might (out of habit or necessity) it did nothing to lessen the impact of her regard. “Just drift by when normal people are sleeping, I’ll likely be working on something nonsensical during those hours and thus can make time for whatever is on your mind.”To that promise, that really wasn’t much of one, she let him go and he left cup still in hand.Warm or cold, he couldn’t tell. So he sipped on stuff that might as well have been water and quit company to go back to work.
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Defiance: Birth of the Renegades
chapter 3
Once upon a time
Pieces upon fabric, crudely carved, their flawed bases and jagged decorations were a naturalists fantasy. Breaks held soils and the barest of floral compounds from two worlds, worlds that w’ren't anymore. The comparison between what was and wasn’t must have been invaluable to someone.But not him. He picked up his allotted amount, and perhaps it was something like spite that caused him to rotate them. Making tops of bottoms, and setting horizontal vertical by setting them long way about.“You’re a contrary man.”To that comment he looked up, from setting up his play and she did not falter in her set up save to smile and set her pieces just right the right ways about.There were no rules, none were needed. They’d done this enough that perhaps it gave her a sense of comfort. She’d need such. As for him the pressure of playing intelligently would set a wall between him and his past.The details of the room were lost to dark. The walls were dark, the shadows depe, the only light was a odd water globe that the girl child before him rolled about in her chakram calloused hands. The cot was a relic to humanity, and as such had been adapted to modern world with some alterations. He’d wrenched it from the wall and purloined books on plumbing maintenance served as its legs, giving it just enough height that a foot might slide under it if kept flat and still. A reasonable thing, considering that both were prone to sprawling and shifting about for varieties sake.Never comfort.They rarely indulged such.The illusion of table was aided by a sheathe of colored fabric, laundry layered upon laundry, shirts folded sideways, arms pinned to bulk, it made a suitable strip when set against the white of pillows pinned to wood. Papers were ever in attendance, his side, furthest corner. By his left hand were a pile of thin wood slivers, the longest of them pitted with holes where nails had been pried out with restless fingertips that could garner no splinters.As for her she had a cup of water, a tell of old mortality not forgotten and perhaps she’s even remember to indulge it. Maybe…“What do you remember?”He’d asked, picking his time with care. She was done but not restless or bored. The delicacies of his timing beyond those parameters… he wasn’t sure.Not that he cared, what he cared about was her response.Because he’d say nothing if she said nothing. This was too vast… to massive and tender and awful and wonderful and… everything to him. Should she not treat it with reverence, as he would, than they would have their game and evasions and the nothing ever after.Because this memory, this recollection was everything.He was a ghost of a man, a being of power strung about recollection of sensation and an eternal looped recollection of morals gone wrong. Hot loss seared him, scorched numb skin and brought forth limits. Those parameters were marked by the dull realization that this was his skin being pulled from flesh, and flesh could surly be scoured from bone by this force most called divine.As for heavens light, it lay in the hands of a mad man-child centuries gone yet still hellishly alive. Save it’s been a week, and the boy had been dead a week.That should have summoned something, loss perhaps, even a recalling of loss long ago, an echo of what should have been felt often served him in emotions steed. He’d known the child for centuries, as he’s known Aurion, both had been his brothers in all but blood.But the revelation of what was against this moment was nothing, a “ah so this is how it is” and nothing.Stones ticked against board, save the board was soft and its base softer. They sank, rather than stood. The golden haired child had to steady her first move with a finger least it tumble a few places farther than the rules would allow. So not board then, the base was not the source of sound. A move, his, poorly considered, gave him his answer. The soft burst of percussion was nail against stone, made more than it should have ever been by augmented ears.Mystery solved he nodded, indicating her turn.“I remember me, who I am.” Pieces were considered, his and hers. Then, only because any other move would mean having to let go of that which clearly wanted to roll about, she moved her rebellious stone two hops.It settled into a groove and was still without its steadying touch.“You remember you?”“Who I am, even as I know who she was... is.. Martel. The real one, not the spirit tree.”He considered words and angles, and applied both against the character of the child before him. For she was still a child. Aurions boy’s boasts to the contrary, world saved or at least freed to seek its own damnation under its own terms, it did not change facts. Nineteen years, innocent raised, gentle still.See how she petted lopsided rebellious stone, as if it were a puppy needing soothing.Silly then, silly still, atrocities and miracles and atrocious miracles inflicted and surmounted, she was ever the same.And ever different.“If you could elaborate…” He murmured, and though his tone were entreaty, and his form still, hands flat against leg, save for the one that lurked over the bored, over his side eager to snap up whatever opportunity she cast his way… That subdued, absent malice, was exacerbated by the slant of his gaze, the speed of it as it shifted from the point above her head. All of it was minute, and all of it was telling.Save those who knew how to read such signs were dead and gone, or as good as dead.“It’s like that.”He stiffened, because she was looking at him, eyes wide in wonder, the “ah ha” of revelation set in the blue of her eyes and their wideness, the little “o” her mouth made.Revelation found but not disclosed.That… irritated him, a little. His hands crooked, an d her regard was on those hands even before he was aware he was indulging habit centuries old. Both watched purple starlets flick abound his nails, before h recalled himself and flattened the digits, banishing the mana with something less than thought.“It’s like that.”Repetition wasn’t really helping him understand her. Still, about the edges, something flickered.“When… you’ve been with someone, you know them. You know what they do and why they do it. People… they do things before they say things. It’s like that. They have habits and signs and odd thinkings that aren’t yours but become yours because you’ve been with them forever and it sticks, making them part of you even as you become part of them.”He nodded, familiar with the phenomenon in abstract and personally because it’d once been him, rubbing off and being rubbed wrong way until them and him had been impossible to be extracted and they’d become companions and done things and other people had made it into something it wasn’t.Legend had followed shortly after, twin to delusion, legend had made them into vessels of hope then loss had come along.Then nightmare. Theirs had been vast and awful it’d been enough to drag whole worlds into a fell dreaming.“So, you know me? I’d offer you my congratulations but they’d be utterly insincere.”“Stop that!” The girl snapped, and if her next move was a bit snappish, well it both redundant and expected. What was curious was a matter of hands; he studied them lips pressing into a thin line. “You aren’t a burden and-!”“And you aren’t left handed, Martel was though.”The piece fell, making ripple and a minor ruin after impact as both their pieces were jarred about.Not that that mattered, he recalled the lay out, couldn’t forget it if he tried.“I’m me.” The girl child whimpered, shivered, even as he reached out and caught the hand she’d pulled back, stilling flight before it could be realized. “I’m me, I’m Colette Brunel and…”“And you’re her. With all her little seeings, because you are with me and she watched me as I watched her. With eyes and heart and soul.”Her hands, this child’s hands that weren’t hers… they curled over his own, surly feeling the bite of his wedding ring. He’d scoured worlds for it, in poorly masked desperation, and he’d dropped masks when he’d spied it in a boy’s hands.He’d begged, on hands and knees. Groveled. And she’d heard and saw desperation from him, not even Mithos had been so graced. And before that moment, her words had been skewed in innocence had rasped against a loss freshly realized thus smarting and raw, she’d made an idle comment about four leaf clovers...Never knowing.He could have hated her then.And in this moment he forgave her, of innocence and errors made because of it.Yuan smile, with teeth and warmth that caught his eyes. “It’s slightly paraphrased but…”Her gaze dropped to his hand, that was further muffled under her hand. The ring bit and burned without the blessings of Efreet to prompt such changes. She knew the inscription, surly.And where Martel would have held tighter, never mind the pain because it was him… Colette let go, confusion writ upon her every line.“You are Colette, with the memories of a woman long dead. Not pictures and thoughts turned monologes and scenes of a play resting behind your eyes… You are not an invisible spy about her shoulder in her Kharlan days. You simply know.”She nodded, confirming his words.“But you want to know more.”Her blush and nod really said it all, they needed no more words.“You’re a fool.”Girlish hands worried at stones, smoothing wrinkles an crevices, fixing what destruction the drop had rendered, and though the pieces weren’t exactly right, a quick glance and memory helped him deduce that, Yuan stilled his tongue. Things were more in his favor as they stood now.Still if she were a fool perhaps he was one to. He set up her pieces right, then set his wrong but close enough to right that there’d be no confusion as to how he was to play.Lopsided and at odd angles, still the play would be straight forward enough, the lines of the board weren’t compromised, rather the pieces bore on the slightest of skews.She moved, he did, the give and take went by two rounds, neither really caring where they landed with only a vague sense of progress being met to guild them.Finally: “What do you want to know?”Because she’d earned it, and something of warmth from him. For ghosts born and bared and endured even now.Her response was not surprising, and the laugh it summoned was more pain than joy.“Everything.”“Everything, every meal, every tale, every lie, every truth… What will I have left little girl, if I were to give you everything.”“You won’t have lost anything.” Her move wasn’t pointed, and she minded a ridge a wrinkle missed under tending motions. Or perhaps born from meddling. Regardless of origin, she smiled as others had smiled. As others confronting silly friends about trivialities and expecting to share a laugh. Because this truth of hers was just that simple, and didn’t he know this already?“I’m a consummate liar. I’ve lied to the king of heaven and hell and walked out with a boon to boot.”She giggled, audacious little thing, and to that he smiled.“I’ve got a trick up my sleeve.”“Just one?”“It’s a good one.”“One of the best.” He agreed, never doubting her, or Martel, never for a moment. And, to his silence she recalled and sipped lukewarm water, not quite able to gulp anymore. “Well then, let me tell you a tale, not as grand as one saving the world twice over… but it’s still a goodly one if I’m allowed a brag.”“You’d brag even if you weren’t allowed to.” Martel shot back.Because it was Martel, his Martel and not some pasty spirit that aspired to his beloved’s perfection. Eyes flickered from blue to green and back again and since he didn’t blink he saw the transformation where pigment met motion and blurred from one hue to the other.“You know me too well.”“You’re stalling!”“Yes, because… Colette?” Green had come and fled, so the girl he addressed by name. “Are you alright?”Because there were tears in her eyes, and you asked that question when there were tears. He remembered that, recalled it deeper than fact and almost had moved to steady her without thinking.She fell against him and he held her, and stones skipped and mixed what was with what is because the floors were earthen, stone, but stone could be sand and dirty despite being kept clean.“I’m sorry I…”He pulled her close, muffling what words must follow. Because he recalled reports and conversations spied upon and dissections of personality by psychologists who’d spent days pouring over footage. He knew her, even if he didn’t, he knew her by proxy and that knowledge was enough to know that she’d apologize for what couldn’t be. And thinking it was bad enough…Hearing her say those words, that she wasn’t that she couldn’t be… the temptation an offer, even one made in misplaced guilt would kill him.So he didn’t let her speak. He spoke instead. Spoke loud and harsh and babbled. It’d been millennia since he babbled.“It’s hard, to divorce lies from truth, because the whole of it, the beginning and the end, was braced on a mix mash of the two that you couldn’t sift one from the other. It had to be like that. Because the first was. Not mine though, not mine, but Mithos’. He promised us eternal life you see…Endless chances to counter death for her…” His hands, shaking, found her hair, the back of her head. He traced the crown of her skull with a gloved hand, twiddled locks that were a blonde so vibrant gold must be envious. Never puling, never that, he had practice in this, though two hundred hundred years separated him from that time. “He never told us we’d be dead before it ended…”Resting against his breast, surly hearing his heartbeat and felling the stone that was clasped over his heart biting into her skin… she said nothing of this lie, this first of many. Still she squirmed a bit and he loosened. Once sure she wasn’t going to say that, to promise impossible insanities (he’d been swayed once, to saying yes, he’d not endure that temptation again, but as for what he’d do to such a temptress he wasn’t sure. Luckily for her she never spoke of it, and thus they didn’t find out) he let go.To be contrary of a different sort she lingered against him for a bit before squirming back. Impromptu table between them, some righting and reordering of stripes required both busied with fetching stones and board. As they set up again Colette had one complaint.“I... I thought stories stated with “once upon a time”, that’s how they started at home…”To that he grinned, though he didn’t feel like smiling and sobbing was beyond him. Surly she saw the truth to his gesture because she didn’t smile back.“My base, my rules. I tell my stories the way I want to.”To that she had nothing to say, and for her silence he considered nothing and everything, both were painfully swift affairs.“It’d be better if we’d have all died.” To that confession she winced, but most telling she did not dispute. After all, it’s what Martel had wanted when she’d seen some of their truths. “A hundred thousand people have died from this madness Mithos wrought, and for the longest of times I was compliant, lured in by promise after broken promise, the draw of “maybe this time” was the blade that felled many children. And what was death considering with “just a little more time” everything would be perfect and if not that it’d be forgiven, because no one could remember. Not after a hundred years, or a thousand, or a hundred thousand. Such was the nonsense that rang in my ears until I heard nothing else.”He pushed a piece forward, uncaring that she was to go first, that she had in all their failed games thus far. She countered without thinking.“We all changed so much, and I never saw it. Eyes fixed to the past, I no longer could see the present, much less imagine a future that wasn’t spent wrapped up in the past….”He pushed something forward; it might have been one of her pieces considering he had to stretch. If it was she didn’t comment, simply considered a board she wasn’t really seeing. That vacant regard so familiar jarred him to something like humanity. As much as an ex half elf could be jarred to humanity anyway…“So, since it’s necessary for this to be “right” I guess I should say “once upon a time, in a land of light in times in the far past…””“How far past?”“Too far and too late. Such is the past. Regardless of such trifling details and for the sake of being a good host, I’ll say it one last time: Once upon a time…”She laughed, a soft sad sound, but it was better than her being numb. And as he carried on she looked from him to board and moved her next piece with something like interest, even if her attention was somewhat divided.He moved something, and she didn’t call him out on it, so he likely wasn’t cheating by accident.“There was a land of light, and under lights lay there was a span of shadows, where all the space and span between heaven and earth was compiled and cramped. Shadows and slivers swirled on mists of creation, and these mists and their varied walkways served as heavens foundation and braced the world that served to divide. This is where our tale begins. In light’s shadow. There was a wall too. Tall once, but worn down. Because that’s what happens to walls. Because walls deserve that for passively standing up to everything and everyone.“Also… I might have been picking at the wall, on its edges and imperfections, scraping it away bit by bit, working down mortar with nail tips until stone tumbled free…”To her shock, he sighed.“It’d been a slow millennia, and what else was there to do? Twelve failed regenerations one per year from each world had left the closest matches reduced to babes in arms from distant branches upon a near extinct family tree. It was back to the waiting game, and I was bored. So on this wall, for Origin only knows how long, I worry stones larger than two of my fists, pulling one out, seeking its flaws, polishing it down to a pebble, dropping said pebble into the ether, only to do so again, thus I was found by an Angel and sent on journey, not so different from a Regeneration, isn’t it?”Mutely Colette shook her head, having neither heart nor words to disagree.Or perhaps she did not have the right mind. Green and blue spun a slow kaleidoscope about the pupil of her eyes, the effect was both beautiful and worrying.
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Defiance: Birth of the Renegades,Making an Impact Yuan trembled in rage, it was an odd state to be sure, but he recalled rage in that moment his his body acted in accordance to how the memories said it should have worked.Stark counterpoint to his needless emoting Yggdrasil was as always, a study of tranquility. Wings more mist than feather and multitude to boot framed him amd they weren’t even ruffled. They fanned the air lazily spreading the scents of sanctified substances to the incensed. Of wings, they were a curious shade; the color of violet reserved normally for the skies at sun’s dying before true dark came, and they offered a fey illumination to both men. Though highlighted oddly Yggdrasil’s autocratic expression said noting of the insanity that was this moment or their lives. He was still, only indulging movement to partake such little things, as air. As if to prove how above such little things as mortality his eyes were still, the pupils neither contracting nor expanding to response to his own light.In contrast Yuan did more than just the necessary. Going so far as to fidget once fuming was proven more than worthless against that sea of calm. He went so far indulge small vanities like setting a displaced strand of blue hair out of his eyes.It all nearly vulgar when compared to Yggdrasil’s stillness. Still, such had seemed necessary, there was a danger of sensation and to ocular capacity. He’d of said so if asked, but never was, so he simply bore the brunt of Yggdrasil regard wordlessly.Honestly, he’d spoken more than enough already.Speaking of eyes… He met those unreadable storm hued orbs of the angel lord. Dressed in almost skin tight pants and long sleeve shirt Yggdrasil stared at him, unblinking, unmoved. All complaints and concerns to the contrary.What were complaints of might-be mortal affairs to the divine?But, as Yuan had warned before this silence had fallen, they weren’t done, not yet, not now.Running long slender digits through long golden locks, Yggdrasil finally broke from his façade of angelic tranquility. The absent motion was millennia old, and told of a headache, or what might have been one. Pain was something beyond them all, but there mortal lives weren’t that distant that the memory of sensation could not bring up a response.Not yet.The lord of Heaven considered his Second. Said Lord’s lips turned down just the slightest around the edges. It was a frown; few people lived very long after Yggdrasil expressed such sentiment. Yuan ignored the gesture, the implications of it being turned upon him, and blinked through the blinding light that marked his leader as purity incarnate."I gave you a command Yuan."The boy… no man’s, he was a man though how memory clamored that it wasn’t right, that Mithos was a boy, a boy with a perchance for arcane and they’d been on a journey and...Recollections failed when set up against the present. When the present and past were so distant that the bridge between them had rotted and it’s memory was warped beyond safe recall.This wasn’t right. None of it.The man before him (once a child, once his wife’s little brother thus his by proxy, annoying and precocious and gone) was of an unnatural slant. Cast in frigid seeming flesh and eschewing color of all type, they both were rather pale specimens of… whatever they were. Still, of the two Yggdrasil seemed blissfully unaware of their personal winters.Perhaps that was why Yuan indulged, moved and the like. He was trying to keep the ice from locking him in place.An hour later, perhaps later still, did Heaven’s Lord grow weary of Yuan’s little spat of rebellion. His unmoving after an order was said, save for moving that was not sanctified or directed towards complying with a command. For Yggdrasil did finally speak.If there was steel amongst the blonde’s silken tones Yuan didn’t notice, simply glad that the ringing of quiet –too much, quiet upon quiet till the hearing organs must make noise on their own least they anthrope away- was felled."I’ve never asked you to kill. Martel would hardly approve. Yet Kratos has volunteered. As a person who was once human he feels it his penance to take up all the killing when he can. To spare us enlightened few that chore…” Storms boiled amongst the winged man-child’s eyes, nearly engulfing stagnant pupil, still the pin prick of black was a steadying factor and Yuan locked his own blue eyes upon it. This storm would not suck him down so that he’d be deaf to that voice, he’d not mindlessly agree to words he couldn’t comprehend and come to himself with bloodied hands and a prone form at his feet.That’d never happen again.Checking immaculate digits for dirt, thus Yuan was spared the storm, by this perfect thing’s sudden surge of vanity.“As of this day he is escorting the Chosen of Tehte'alla and this task may not wait, thus I cannot ask him, hence why I asked you.""... Kratos has been killing?"Because ignorance had been bliss and its loss was something like pain. He recalled pain, pain of all types, all at once even. Under the force of such a recollection his voice cracked, he flushed at the… well it was more than indulgence… It’d been vulgar and violation, because they weren’t meant to be perfect. Thus Yggdrasil’s response of anger, the thinning of eyes, the deepening of that frown, was utterly justified."When they fail he kills them, an effective practice to cull out the bloodline. Expediency, you taught me that, thus I cherish your teachings and only the closest matches survive."They were meant to be perfect, had been culled and attuned to things beyond mortal ken to achieve such perfection. Still a flaw or two remained, a handover from a process not perfected.Yuan shivered as the images of Kratos' Flamberge shearing through the flesh of half angel half human children danced behind his eyes.Because they were children, one and all, for none older than twenty were allowed to go on the journey to save the world.Such imagery was both gift and torment. A side effect of minds that would never cease yammering, or eyes that could never close and seek slumber. Sleep would be a kind of mercy, a dark mercy that as something of the light he could never indulge.Still... had he been mortal bile would have rose to his lips, as it was his stomach writhed on nothing but air and he felt a sensation like hollowness along his face and hands.Blood receding from those places went to dwell in the heart and other secret homes of his body. It pulled away so that he may be warned, on this bases of levels, not to touch the evil before him. Had he been mortal he would have been cold, shaking. As an angel, unable to feel hot or cold, he simply was empty and wondered why.A man can go crazy being empty for so long, when his sanity echoes on the walls of thought and finds nothing to touch. Kratos had said that to him, was it just a decade ago? But the man had said it and perhaps now he understood that Kratos was right. It was a slow insanity this game of waiting.Old words, his, Mithos', both, it was both their litany against the madness, they came to him, and like everything else they echoed.
It was all for Martel, all of this for her, nothing else mattered save her, the world could end, it didn't matter... nothing mattered... except Martel.
Once as a half elf he'd have licked his lips and taken in the bitter taste of tears. Tears of sin, from a surplus of light, he wasn’t sure of their origin, only that they’d be. As it was, as he was, h did not bother. For he could taste nothing."What must I do?"The angel before him smiled a child's smile then laughed. It was in perfect harmony, warm to tenor, the lot musical as a whole. Because Yggdrasil had just won, won out against Yuan’s anger and the screams of fast fading morality. So if Yggdrasil had won why not indulge a bit of gloating? Such slivers of mortality, of skewed morality, were so rare and precious, so much so Yuan forgot his anger.Because this was a blessing and it was the closest things to the old Mithos that he ever saw since they’d snapped up half rotting books on a faith long dead and taken inspiration from those tales of divinity.XXX
Death and death, he was to deal such in Ozette, and when Mithos might have nattered about where the tree choked city was located Yuan’s voiced something too tame to be a protest.
"Mithos I know Tethe'alla, I was born there. Remember?"And because Kratos wasn’t there, Mithos indulged in a bit of half elven truth."The worlds have changed, after all it's been five centuries since you left Derris Kharlan, and humans are so antsy. They build and break, and waste and raze and re-build, all at a whim."Yuan as he glided around trees made titanic by wards so ancient one could not deduce them from roots of earth. Had to agree. Humans were whimsical. Because the Ozettie, now Ozette if he’d read his modern mad by the light of his pink wings, had simply moved from setting homes at the base of their trees and had moved up into them.They wove branches and leaves for floors, and upon the winding distortion that the made of nature they wheeled up convinces like walls and roofs and other misplaced comforts to make the extraordinary ordinary.It was something like letting giving squirrels standards and the tools of industry and seeing what happened. Add into the fact that Tethe’alla’s tree town was flourishing with a surplus of Cruxis wrought mana and the view below and above was dazzling, and while white was a favored color per priestly pressures…He shied about a building that was tinted rot green by the aid of its magi-tech lights and a paint job melding together in the worst way possible.“Humans..”His flight, interspaced with quick looks about and down to consult his map, was born on wings of a child's dream. More feather than Mithos’ mist, and the feathers were angular and sharp. Still there was light, since as he was of Cruxis his wings glowed. If propaganda were to be believed the light he would bring peace upon those who saw him, and all children of both worlds were taught to reverently believe the silliest things about an angel flying about.In actuality he had murder on his mind, made an inverse of that dream made it nightmare. But only if you had access to the contents of his mind. He might be the bearer of joy to those who spied him, but in Martel’s name he would bring horror upon one soul. But it would only be one, and then he would go back to the seed’s chamber and the far too still Martel and his voice would again be one of many, of a multitude, beseeching her to wake up.Or perhaps he’d go back to his wall. He’d gotten it knee high, worn it down to such from five stories height, and it was with something akin to curiosity and anticipation that made him wonder of base and foundation that had tolerated his abuses over the decades.Still wonder’s ghost could not still conscious, and conscious flourished when he was stimulated, swaying leaves changing light, and having to actually see where he was going least he fly into a branch or house had woken it up sad to say.Still it was company, the bruises it bore notwithstanding.So he spoke of it, to her, because she’d always helped him sort his thoughts."What will you say, beloved, when you find I killed a child in your name.” Recollection met speculation and he shivered down to his primaries. “She'd be horrified..." Merciful environment met momentum and he had to stop talking, stop thinking so that he could better kick off one of those annoyingly low branches and spiral higher.Ironic how the poor lived higher up, while the wealthy made do at the bottom and built their homes amongst the roots. In other societies the rich favored the higher perches so they could lord over their properties with more ease. Still, despite the inversion of tradition, in this place and time the rich had more space, less prickly weavings, and it would take them very little time to bolt in case of a fire...For the poor, well, let them burn, that was the unspoken motto of the Ozettians."Two thousand years and you'd think we'd have done something about the damn social class stigmas in the world. If Mithos had even listened to my twist on the propaganda we sent out last century this might not even be a problem..."Grumbling about the stupidity of humans, one of his favorite subjects to discuss with Kratos over a game of Trava, Yuan entertained himself with polishing up a few more mental barbs for their debate after Kratos’ journey. While doing so he decided to consult the map Mithos had provided, fumbling through pouches because he recalled shoveling it somewhere and photographic memory was useless when you considered all his pouches were lumped together and they all looked the same. Thus he went from beyond stimulation. He was thinking on a future, and the past, and guilt unrealized, and guilt known, and he was realizing it and wanting to smash his head to drive it out, and such multitasking while moving wasn’t wise. Angelic mind and augmented senses could only go so far to protect him from his own stupidity.In short, he should have watched where he was flying.Finally, he had the map, unrolled it and looked down at the mess of homes below, had but a moment to split his attention further, to brighten his wings, for there’d surly been a cloud between him and the full moon.He should have been looking up.Because what he thought was empty sky wasn’t, and the crunch of impact, as branch met skull, and didn’t halt him was all his fault. As was the following span of disorientation. He blanked for a moment, then found himself spiraling down, his wings, smarter than the rest of him, had disappeared while he was out and snapped up light in their leaving.Like a stranger, his thoughts visited him as he saw the branch, the size of a normal tree, and noted it was falling besides him.The realization he was falling, as in he should not be doing so came then, as well as a long put off headache. Still come impact, before impact, he’d only one thought.
Ah, that's what happened.
Then the world was caught him in that thing called impactThe branch beat him to the roof, opened a nice sized hole that he fell through. He smashed his stomach against the branch, and weakly rolled off of the damned thing, falling onto a gasping heap in the center of what was some type of communal greeting room. Even with branches scratching his side and belly post failed rise he was aware of the room. What the room was. Disrepair was predominant, dust mired floors, had crept past corners to tint walls and cobwebs were about and around. Under the sounds of his failed breathing he could hear them, tap dancing upon thread and weave, spiders, and there were mites than wood quietly gnawing, the sizzle of failed ward had long gone still and was more a like the memory of a pulse under his sprawled form.Moaning, wishing ears and raw arcane sense would be still, he cried out to hear himself and not everything else. When that didn’t help (vocalization never did) he rolled over, his cape was a tangled mess more shred than substance but the armor he wore under bore no scars. He’d of heard the damage, and winced, for though centuries since he had to fear the sound of steel giving way instinct was still with him. The ghost of panic was still something he feared, but he was spared its company today.There were leaves to keep dust company, he noted, and his room breaking entrance not only had done in his cloak but made a mess of his hair.He missed his comb, and Derris Kharlan, because there the world hummed its silences but at least the humming didn’t hurt this much.A squeak caused him to open eyes he’d scrunched shut. He looked up from failure and failed entrance in a place he wasn’t supposed to be and found a girl child. Or rather, the thing had found him.He could offer no assurances, to the vocalized terror, no reassurances. Trying to move, or speak, was too much at the moment, so he panted and watched the stars flash in his vision. Curious they offered no light. He would have cursed, but cursing took air, air was a precious commodity at the moment and could not be wasted, so spoke his lungs. Their language was labor, thus he labored for breathe, wordless, thoughtless, for a while."Hello?"Closing his eyes Yuan tried to get up, arms spread, fingers clawed stabile floor for purchase and slipped on the slick silk sliver, “cape” it’d once been called. Failed rise number... whatever… he didn’t care. All he cared was that he had managed to fall on his stomach. His belly did not like this, and told him so by aching."Oh Sweet Martel, are you alright?"A child's voice, a very young child's voice by the sound of it. Yuan opened his eyes as small touched him. First his throat, then taking one chill hand in the two of her own, with some intent about his wrist. His wits caught up with him then, and he realized what the child was about.She was checking his pulse, inexpertly, but still…With the help of this inexpert medic he was rolled so he lay on his back. Strong little kid, he endured touch and turning and found himself looked into the cat green eyes of his child savior. She was small, not exactly gaunt but there were some shallowness of the face. All the better for the nights shadows to lurk and fill the budding gauntness.Huh, this kid couldn't be no more than eleven, twelve... Mithos had been that old once..."Who are you, do you have a name?"Yuan winced, he did not like children, hated them with an unholy passion made holy since he was supposedly holy and with these altered ears of his shrillness was made a torment… So, like the mature two thousand year old entity he was Yuan decided to close his eyes to better make this nightmare go away..."Are you the nice person who comes down chimneys and give presents?"Nightmares didn’t talk; much less spout such humorous oddities. So Yuan indulged a small smirk as he croaked out a "No..." and wished things would be left at that."Hmmm are you a burglar?""No."This voice gained strength, no longer pinched, his lungs must be reforming from the morass impact had turned them into.And all he wanted to do was sleep.
Go to sleep, it's all a nightmare; you'll wake up with Martel and be able to tell her all about...
Martel was dead.
Angels do not sleep.
Sighing, telling himself to just face reality already he opened his eyes and swatted the small hand that had lifted up the flap of fabric about his shoulders that had, once upon time, been his cloak."What in the Gods name are you doing?""Lookin' for your wings."Yuan blinked, and the girl laughed at his expression. It was a shrill grating sound that made his teeth clench for it was the antitheses of melodic or restrained."Well you aren't a squirrel, you don't have a tail. You aren't a bird, you don't have a beak. You aren't a burglar cuz you said so. You aren't a Sandy Clause because you don't have reindeer... So that means you're an angel... but you don't have any wings."Observational little beast. Yuan smiled despite himself."I'm... an… in training angel." Yuan grunted, rubbing his stomach. Scraping off whatever greener had been found there and off his pant fronts as well. "My wings come and go."What he didn’t say, since she was really too young to be alone, much less be blessed by his snark, was the following. “They go at their own sadistic will which is why I should have just damn well walked but no I had to practice flying again just to prove that I'm better than Kratos.”He managed not to say the lot, but it was a trial."Oh... well are you lost? I know everywhere in Ozette!"Considering the fall he was a little disoriented, he decided to trust the little urchin to point him in the right direction. After all the Chosen's House was probably a damn monument to the people of this town. And he could give the child some Gald or something to pay for the roof’s repairs or something. If he left her with money her keepers would likely tend to the roof and perhaps feed her as well. It wasn’t a small leak or anything he’d left behind and her state, now that he was coherent enough to comprehend (days, possibly weeks without eating well, so spoke the thinness, the brittle fragility about her limbs and hair) was starting to bother him."Where are your parents?" Yuan decided to fight to his feet, he was given a small hand and he decided that for a child, the helpful girl wasn't all that bad."They died." He blinked at that no-tone, a little alarmed by the utter lack of inflection. "The Shiny Heads took them.""Shin... Ah the Desian's." Yuan coughed, a bit uncomfortable by that steady green gaze. He shifted and she let him go, left him leaning against the branch that’d preceded him. Martel had had eyes like the child’s, shining emerald pools that he felt he could just drown in. Shelving that memory, because thinking of her would make this worse (he’d look back and look in and never wake up) Yuan focused on the present. "Do you know where the Chosen lives?""Yes." She looked nervous now, shifted from foot to foot and danced in place. "Are you here to take me home?"Yuan stared at her for a long moment, not comprehending. He was no student or author of the holy writ. That chore fell upon Mithos who had crafted most of the rituals and stories of the "Martel faith"."The Angels take the Chosen to her home, is that why you're here, to take me home?"Rage boiled in him, anger, this was a child, not a failed Chosen. She’d not even started the journey. Efreet’s fires, she’d no survive a trip across this town much less to the first seal, the first trial the state she was in. This girl was a babe in arms. And she was looking at him with a morass of emotion barely held in check.This he knew of Mithos’ hodgepodge faith: the Angels brought salvation; they initiated the ritual of the Chosen. They brought death and pain to the Chosen but through the trials of the Chosen their world was saved.This pale, starving, girl had been reared to believe that. And thus, all accidental, he was meeting the effect of such a mythos hen applied to a person. No longer was this hypothetical social propaganda not when you were looking down at the person who lived and breathed these fostered beliefs.Yuan stared into those damned familiar eyes, and again, his thoughts were like a strangers, in his head. Unattached.He’d been ordered to take a sizable sample of flesh so that Mithos could study the genetic code and see where the flaws were in this specimen so they might better perfect the breeding program for this branch of the line.She had aunts, nieces, a nephew, she was her mother’s child but that mother was a black sheep and worse for stepping out with the wrong man, because the man who’d been so wrong had been seductive and petty and sported a pair of pointed ears.Clearly the addition of genetic material closer to the parent race of their goal had done nothing to better the Regeneration process. It’s immediate candidate of the forced union (because it had been forced, the man had been altered and repulsed when he’d realized the plants put in his head and… and what happened after Yuan didn’t know. He hadn’t read past the part of adding the genetic material and how that might help speed things along) hadn’t benefited. He’d signed on because when Kratos had proposed the idea of infusing new genetic material because Yuan’d agree to anything that’d make this procedure faster and the waiting had been biting sharp and its fangs pricked deep and…He wondered what the girl child knew of her parents, he wondered who mother and father really were.He did not ask. Simply stood and endured what was and what’d been and felt faintly sick as the results stared back at him with faintly veiled terror."No, I am not."“You’re not? That’s… that’s not how things work… isn’t it?”Even as it repulsed him that Mithos wanted this baby dead the hopelessness of her question… her knowing that eventually someone with wings was going to come around and she’d be as good as dead after… Nausea, not the memory, the real ailment, caused his gut to clench."I am uncertain of my course at the moment." Yuan croaked, not quite believing what he was saying even as he said it.The words in his head were like those in his mouth, strangers, and ill-fitting, and odd tasting, and wrong."Can Angels be confused?""I guess we can." Yuan was rather uncomfortable at being addressed as an Angel. Considered a correction than considered the child who was shivering under his endless unblinking regard. Not worth the trouble of outburst or tears, he decided after a moment.Making a sort of peace with what he didn’t like he amused himself with the alternative.In Derris Kharlan he was known as Lord Yuan, a title the worlds’ hadn’t even bothered to grace him even after his service in the War. His familiar name was only permitted to fall from the lips of Mithos and Kratos, or the affectionate nickname of "annoying pointy eared bastard" if Kratos was in a spectacular bout of bad humor.She was about his height when he was sitting down and stooped, when he stood she would be about up to his waist. Natural, or had the starvation been altering her growth?Shaking his head in wonder of it all, he pulled out that annoying lock of blue hair that always fell into his eyes every chance it got. He stared at the child noting her ragged brown clothes and mentally shook his head. Even Kratos, for all his coldness, could not have killed such a young thing. Not even Mithos. How like Mithos she looked, so small and helpless.There had to be a mistake somewhere in all of this.He'd just have to find that mistake and fix it.