UNTITLED: Book One

DAY 137.75

This time is weaker,

This time is slower,

The past said to every future without it

Aiye leaves Solara’s side to stand over The Dawn Hero, his Mother, Anaye. He watches her light fade as her crimson pool engulfs his feet. She reaches out to him with a weak but sincere smile, the light in her eyes nearly gone. Then, her hand drops before his hand can reach it, followed by her fist-sized, dark power core falling from her hand. The dense and heavy glass-like orb hits the ground. It rolls through the crimson pool to Aiye’s foot.

—

The hangar is falling apart as the last of the city’s civilians file in to The Broker’s final transport ship. Now, it’s just Tozi, a barely-walking Junaid, The Broker and several New Wave remaining—including the pilot who has some healing deep cuts and bruises.

They all watch the last transport as it manages to just barely take off before part of the ceiling, at the mouth of the hangar, collapses behind it, blocking most of their exit—leaving only a small gap for them to escape through.

“Doable.” The pilot simply mutters to herself as she looks at the blocked exit.

“That’s everyone! Time for us to get out of here too!” Tozi spins towards the New Wave pilot, “You’re up! We gotta move!”

Just then, The Broker’s final transport is blown away by enemy battleships camping right outside of the hangar exit. The explosion violently rattles the hangar as the shields hold, and Tozi panics internally. With all the shit that was going on inside the city, we completely forgot again that there’s an entire war going on outside!

After a moment of silence and hesitation, they all rush to cram themselves into their small transport ship, like sardines, while the hangar begins its final stages of collapse. The shockwave of the exploding transport contributing to the further destabilization of the hangar’s structure.

“We’re gonna have to space jump!” The pilot shouts back. “It’s going to completely destroy this hangar and probably mess up any chance of the city not falling apart too, but it’s us, or the city!”

“Easy choice! Why haven’t we left??” Tozi asks rushing up to the front of the ship.

“Two things—three! Our current weight is about one person too much, so I was tryna figure out how I’m suppose to tell someone to stay behind… and basically die? I also realized that we left the big three behind to fight that Dark State Hero—or each other, knowing them, anddd we have no clue as to where the Protector is-”

Tozi interrupts her with a quick glare.

“What? I don’t-? -Warden?” She rolls her eyes, “Ugh. WARDEN. Okay, my bad. Yeah, so all of that,” the pilot finishes.

Tozi looks back to notice that The Broker is no longer in the ship. She and Junaid make eye contact and he manages a nod to confirm her suspicions. She decides it’s not her business. If he thinks this will serve as some sort of penance, then more power to him. She could care less. She just wants to get out of here at this point.

“…Don’t worry about any of that and punch it.” Tozi responds now with calm conviction.

“..Yeah?”

“…Yes. Let’s get the fuck out of here.”

“…all right,” the pilot says quietly as she hesitantly powers up the space jump engines, then turning around to everyone else, she shouts, “Strap in!”

The ship is located at the far back of the hangar. Its engines explode on, blowing away a chunk of the hangar wall behind it. The wall is a dense metal made up of the same, stronger-than-steel, element as Isi-Iyi. The destruction first comes in the form of the shockwave, but as the engines continue to power up for their space jump, the shockwave becomes a more focused beam of constant force, tunneling through the wall and the shooting their transport forward. It sends them snapping back into their seats.

The falling debris, starting from the mouth, has created a sort of obstacle course for them, requiring the pilot to maneuver by rolling side-to-side at extremely high speeds in just a brief couple seconds. Fortunately for them, the space jump can be initiated separately, so even if the engines reach full power, they aren’t suddenly forced into a space jump. This gives the pilot a chance to pull off a nearly impossible sequence of maneuvers, where one mistake would’ve resulted in their obliteration, yet she couldn’t have executed their escape any more perfectly, with as much poise, as she does. She never loses focus as her hands fly across the controls at incredible speeds.

They accelerate out of the hangar just as it collapses, right towards the waiting enemy battleships. But, the very moment they escape the hangar, right as the battleships lock-on and are about to fire, the pilot engages the jump drive and they zip deep into space. The force from the jump is strong enough to make one of the battleships rock slightly after their ship zips past it.

—

Aiye’s face is blank while holding Anaye’s power core. Solara suddenly gets a chill down her spine. Her fighting instinct rarely wrong, she knows something is different about him. She tries to break the tension by belittling The Warden.

“You should’ve just died quietly in a fucking ditch! Falling off the city was your last chance to escape Old Man.”

“ENOUGH. CHILD! You are my daughter and that is the ONLY reason why I have not yet ended you, but make no mistake, I can accomplish my goals with you dead OR alive!” The Warden erupts, leaking blood from the corner of his mouth and nose.

This stuns Solara for a brief moment to see him finally unraveling like this as his empire collapses all around him. But she gathers herself again.

“Let’s make this quick.” Clenching her fist with resolve, she shouts at the top of her lungs, “FUCK. HIM. UP!”

The Warden battle tested in his near-century of living, lunges at Aiye in an attempt to get him before he can get his bearings back and figure out what to do with that core, but it wasn’t Aiye she was shouting at.

The moment he takes first step forward when lunging towards Aiye, Thema appears behind him in a violet, thunderous flash and swings her sword at his neck. At the same time, The Warden sends one of his blades at the Hero’s power core in Aiye’s hand. Aiye moves the core out of the way and catches the grip of the blade, but the blade continues crashing into him with such force, that it ends up moving him upwards and out of the room, blowing through the ceiling.

Warden’s other blade automatically flies into his hand as he blocks Thema’s attack just in time, protecting himself from anything fatal. The impact bats him into the wall on the other end of the room, crushing it like it’s an aluminum can. It makes him spit up blood. He’s still a regular human after all.

Despite the pain, The Warden is about to jump back up, but suddenly he starts to convulse and roll around on the ground while roaring in pain, holding his head.

“Death- agh!” He exclaims holding his head in pain. It’s as if something internally is attacking him, “… CAN’T HAVE ME!” He roars through his gritted teeth as he gets back up, but he’s given no time to rest.

Thema flashes in front of him and slams her sword down at him, but he’s able to teleport out of the way in a violet flash of his own. Thema’s attack ends up causing large chunks of metal and rock to erupt out of the ground as it explodes under the pressure of her attack. She hasn’t healed much, but she’s determined that she’s putting all she’s got into this fight and not letting up.

She looks towards where The Warden reappears, instinctively knowing the general space in which he’d pop again—thanks to her own weapon.

The Warden reappears, huffing and puffing, looking sickly. Thema begins to feel the same aura she felt when facing Sollar back at that mountain plateau—that pitch black. Just pure darkness. Then right on cue, the dark violet-colored energy that his blades normally emit gradually change into a deeper and darker color. It takes a few second until it turns completely black.

The energy physically starts to shroud around his body covering his all black uniform: his skin-tight battle skin top, his baggy pants that are tapered skin-tight at the ankles, and his long cape-like, robe-coat. Now it’s looking like he’s wearing some flickering black fire armor? She can’t really tell.

Solara observes that it looks like a similar darkness as when the Hero used when her full power.aHer sinister change after absorbing so much power at once.

Thema skids to a halt, hesitating to attack again as she’s reminded of when Sollar entered his final, desperate fight mode. When he gave his mind and body entirely over to the power of the weapon—to the someone, or something in the somewhere. Whatever this thing really is, she thinks as she looks down at her own weapon and then back up towards The Warden.

The point is, she’s not trying rush in and lose her life or a limb being caught off guard by whatever comes next. But, he still looks like he has control over himself? No. No that’s just for now.

While she hesitates, continuing to internally debate, Solara zooms past her. Thema could’ve sworn she saw her smiling too. Solara speeds across the floor towards The Warden who responds by getting into the same battle stance that all the New Wave use—the one he taught them. He launches his blade at her like it’s an extension of all his punches and kicks, but she easily dodges each attack.

She’s out for blood. She smells blood. Unsure if he’s a bit off because of his wound or the weapon, or both—it doesn’t matter. He’s going to die today!

Suddenly, the energy surrounding him fluctuates. After that, following each blade attack are black lightning bolts, ripping towards her and around her, tearing through the ground and ceiling. His aim is terrible so he’s attacking in volume, but this doesn’t stop Solara as she continues coming at him, even through the bolts themselves.

The dark lightning bolts, even when barely grazing her skin, burn small bits of her skin off in a peeling motion, right off of the side of her cheek, neck and and any part of her arms that get grazed. She remains smiling, thoroughly enjoying this—his end, as she winds up for a full power punch with the arm that The Hero dislocated, the one she just recently popped back into place.

All the bones throughout her arm are shattered from the force of the impact that her fist makes against Warden’s unbreakable shield, but it still sends him flying back again. Her attack leaves her arm dangling and useless. She’s stunned by the pain for only just a moment and The Warden uses that moment to attack again, charging her and sending his blade to pierce through her, right through her stomach and flying out from the back side of her body. He calls it back to finish the, but Solara doesn’t stop there. He got too close, again. She’s got him once more.

Solara’s dangling arm brushes up ever-so-slightly against the Warden’s coat, after his attack. Got him again! Her smile then transforms into a devious, predatory grin as immediately capitalizes on the opportunity by smacking the palm of her good arm into his temple, stunning him, while simultaneously tripping him at his ankles, all in one fluid motion.

The Warden’s body flips horizontally in the air with his head getting forced towards the ground with a deadly force, threatening to slam and smash against the floor as long as Solara maintains physical contact. His body comes to a halt just as his head looks as though it will splatter against the ground. He stopped just a breath away, his body floating horizontally and parallel to the floor. Solara even drops to a knee to force it down but she can’t make his body move any further with the energy and blade protecting him.

Still hovering over the floor, he rolls from one side to the other to face her, as if the air itself was a solid surface he was rolling on. Then, facing Solara, he swipes his blade at her exposed achilles tendon but stops his attack short because he is interrupted mid-way by the sight of Thema’s sword ripping through the ground, carving a path towards his face in an upward swinging motion.

Solara is also startled. She jumps out the way and the dark energy shrouding Warden’s body lifts him upright to dodge Thema’s attack. Thema isn’t worrying about either of them, whether it’s because she expects Solara to dodge or she doesn’t care. Either way, Solara loves it. She pivots towards the Warden with her predatory smile across, back in battle stance.

He motions to attack, but this time dark energy shoots up from random spots in the ground like geysers, creating massive columns around him, and the rest of the room. They explode upwards, out of the ground and through the ceiling. Both Thema and Solara jump around to barely dodge them. Then the geysers suddenly break down by bursting into homing laser beams that all seek out Thema.

The lasers shoot towards her, reflected in the lenses of her sunglasses, and the light reveals her eyes widening at the sheer speed of the attack. She only has enough time to stab the sword into the ground to brace herself. An explosion follows as she blocks the first barrage and then she’s on the move. His attacks combined with her constant teleporting to dodge, both generate more shrill, screaming voices—screeching metal noises.

The noise increases while they battle with continuous teleporting. Solara watches them closely. Waiting to strike, her eyes rapidly dart around with them to follow the action, unfazed by her wrecked arm.

Piercing shrieks. The Warden and Thema appear upside-down, clashing mid-air directly above Solara. Solar still waits. Piercing shrieks. Now they’re defying gravity, yet again, standing up sideways on the wall on the opposite end of the room.

Thema is swinging with two hands, like it’s a bat, releasing an energy attack of her own. At the same time, The Warden’s dark energy erupts out of the ground and flows over her, engulfing her like a large, crashing wave. The attacks explode upon impact.

Piercing shrieks. They’re now behind Solara, but again she doesn’t react to it. Instead she stands stone-still while Thema is rolling out of the way of The Warden’s free-flowing, seemingly-sentient energy attacks. Thema is clumsily swatting some of the attacks away with her sword while trying to stand up again. Solara just cocks her head in their direction and waits—not yet.

Piercing shrieks. Warden blocking Thema’s sword with both his hands on his single blade, unable to stop her from slowly pressing the blade of her sword into his body with her superior strength—even with his energy exoskeleton as support. Piercing shrieks. Warden hitting the ground, falling right next to Solara finally makes her move by quickly pivoting into stomp aimed at his head.

Forgetting her for a moment, The Warden is startled by her attack and proceeds to roll out the way, but Solara counters by lunging past him to cut him off, rolling over his body, and using her good arm to grab his arm and throw him directly at a reappearing Thema.

Most of The Warden’s energy suit moves off of him, rushing forward to block Thema, wrapping around her like a net and slinging her away. Solara uses the opportunity to grab hold of him again. She aims for his ribs that she damaged earlier in The Eye, but he’s still quick enough to pivot, so she manages to only grab hold of his cloak. Piercing shrieks.

They’re out of the room, out of the city in the sky, and on top of one of Core’s battleships that’s currently taking heavy fire from the city’s defenses and some of The Broker’s fleet. The Warden is barraging Solara with punches while screaming with his blackening pupils, using the remainder of the dark energy shroud armor exoskeleton for boosted strength and speed. At the same time, his blade is freely zooming at her, attacking constantly from different angles. He’s like a wounded animal, his attacks are getting increasingly desperate. But there’s a few times where she gets cut or barely dodges the blade in time, still she’s able to handle all of his physical attacks because he’s not nearly as fast or as strong as a New Wave. Especially her, as she performs all this with just her one good arm.

Meanwhile, Thema is skidding down the side of the battleship because teleporting after The Warden’s last attack made her overshoot her intended landing spot. She punches her arm into the ship to stop her momentum. Her blackened, tough-as-stone arm is able to withstand the friction, but she still grimaces from the pain from the force as she slows to a stop—nearly falling off the ship completely.

The moment she comes to a stop she is able to finally focus her mind again. She’s been practicing and with all she’s witnessed from Sollar and now The a warden, she has some idea of the extent of this weapons power. Once focused, she is now able to pull her arm out of the ship by jumping backwards. Then, she literally flies towards Solara and Warden like a bullet while slashing the entire ship in half.

Solara’s eyes widen as she sees the energy slash heading for them while cutting the ship. She ducks Warden’s blade and grabs his coat, catching him. She then yanks him up into the air towards her for an elbow attack aimed for his throat, never letting go of his coat. Piercing shriek. The ship explodes and Thema, still in the air, decides to fly at them instead of teleporting. She breaks the sound barrier as she shoots through enemy ships and past some of their own ships. Her eyes scan the area that her sword has her expecting them to reappear from.

They’re on Isi-Iyi. Thema is rocketing towards the two of them as Solara is lifting the Warden for a one-armed suplex into the groun- piercing shriek! Unable to halt her flying speed fast enough, Thema decides to follow them with her own teleportation, into the raging ocean. Piercing shriek! Solara falls amongst all the dead ships and debris, into the large, violent waves as Thema skids across the waves as if it’s a solid surface for her. She ends up stopping just above where Solara just sank through.

Standing on the rocking and flowing waves, she reaches her hand into the water and grabs the surfacing Solara’s arm just as a wave of black energy hits her. Piercing shrieks!

They’re back in the city again! A soaked Solara rolls across the ground and happens to catch glimpses, mid-roll, of Thema being thrown into a wall by The Warden’s dark energy shroud crashing against her like a high-powered water hose. The force of the attack tunneling into the wall behind and around Thema while starting to crack through parts of her weakening shield.

Solara hops up quickly and rushes behind the preoccupied Warden. They fall to the ground in a struggle, rolling around while Solara tries to choke him out. Piercing shriek!

They’re outside again tumbling mid air, through the raging air battle. The Warden roars as he blows Solara off of him with a shockwave exploding from his body, sending Solara blowing through an enemy fighter ship that happened to be zooming by. While panting, trying to catch his breath, he senses something and looks directly up above himself just in time to see a bloodied Thema floating high above him while gathering a massive amount of violet energy around her sword. The Warden watches, shaking in his fury as veins bulge on the sides of his head and blood starts stream out of his ears, eyes, and nose.

Thema makes her move the moment the energy completely absorbs into her sword. She rockets down towards him and he roars while lifting his two hands above, struggling as if he’s lifting a very heavy object above his head. What follows are humongous geysers of dark energy shooting at her like mountains erupting out of the ocean below. They shoot past him, all around him, and go towards Thema as they erase anything and everything else in their path.

Both of their powerful attacks collide and an explosion follows that engulfs all ships in the vicinity.

Between The Hero’s overuse of her armor’s power and this single clash between Thema and The Warden, the advantage Earth had due to the overwhelming number of ships they brought to this fight, is now gone.

Piercing shrieks.

They’re on Isi-Iyi once again. Having abandoned their weapons momentarily after expending too much energy on on their last attacks, they resort to physical combat—hands locked together while they push against one another. But again, New Wave strength prevails and Thema grabs his arms and slams him like a rag doll onto the ground. First on one side of her, then up into the air, and back down on the other side. His dark energy armor absorbing most of it upon first impact, then another piercing shriek the moment his body impacts the ground the second time.

The noise coming from his blade is now much louder and even more disturbing. It’s similar now to how the sword sounded like a million screams when Sollar was using it.

A smile threatens to cut across Thema’s face. He must be weakening a lot. He’s breaking!

The sword comes zooming back into Thema’s outstretched hand, and she nearly teleports after him until she see spots Solara’s body falling in the distance. Her body is almost about to slam against the wave at a high velocity, so Thema grunts and teleports with her own piercing shriek—hers also worsening, though not as bad as The Warden. She catches Solara just in time and then immediately teleports to where The Warden jumped to.

Back in the city as they skid into a tumble across the ground from the momentum of their fall. The force sends them slamming in a wall. Or the floor? Thema realizes that the city is tilted because it’s falling out of the sky!

She sees The Warden, coughing, still struggling to stand and she teleports into him, tackling him to the ground. They roll back on the ground and a desperate Thema, sensing his end is near, tries multiple times to simply just slam the sword’s pommel into him. She crawls after him, desperately slamming the sword down at him while he continues to dodge-roll across the floor.

He gets up to one knee and stares as his blade powers up for an attack. His energy armor suit exoskeleton is absorbed into his blade—prepping for his own large attack. Thema suddenly stops in her tracks, then piercing shriek, another violet flash and lightning bolts slams down to teleport her out of the way. The Warden braces himself and looks around the room confused as he’s unable see where she went but still sense her nearby…because she faked it!

Thema faked him out by teleporting herself only slightly to her left. She lunges out towards him through the smoke that the bolt created, sliding under his sloppy blade strike while she ends up just behind him. She grabs him and throws him. He tries to teleport, but his wounds and head stop him when they send a sharp pain throughout his body. Still flying through the air from Thema tossing him, he ends up right in front of a waiting Solara who uses his momentum against him, clotheslining him which shatters his sunglasses. This makes his body somersault mid-air and Solara quickly catches his leg while his body flips, then she hurls him across the room.

The Warden’s blade flies out of his hand and he tries to call it back but it doesn’t return. He can’t actually even see where it fell to because he’s flipping so fast.

I’m too weak to control it now? Panic hits right before he hits the ground, tumbling across it like a rag doll before he is able to get stop his momentum with the help of his remain exoskeleton energy armor. He tries to jump, but just as he’s barely getting off the ground, Thema appears underneath him in a slide swings upward at him.

What’s left of his energy shroud armor flows completely off of him to shield him as he’s too physically weak now to defend himself. The force of Thema’s attack just sends him flying up toward what might be the ceiling, or the wall, or the floor. Hard to tell mid-fight in a city falling out of the sky, but he’s flying nonetheless…right into a floating Aiye? Who the Warden notices is holding on to the other blade!

The blade in one hand and his Mother’s power core in the other; while the second blade that got away from The Warden, orbits around his torso.

The Warden just grins with a defeated chuckle-scoff. Ah, so that’s why I saw…then Death it is. He thinks to himself as Aiye punches down with a mixed dark black and violet energy that is a combination of the powers from both the core and the blade.

A shockwave erupts from Aiye’s punch and blows away all of the remaining dark, shrouding armor covering The Warden like it’s a candle being blown out.

The thunderous drum strikes once…