UNTITLED: Book One

EPILOGUE

This hurt I protect

I hurt to protect

It hurts to protect

Coughing. More blood. Whatever. It gets wiped away on their pants. Keep moving. They tell themselves as they wade through bodies until stopping at the base of a large, hill-like pile of bodies. Humanoid creatures with dark yellow, leathery skin and brown spots dotted all around their bodies. Some with tails, some without. All of them with four sharp fingers that grip blades sharper and stronger than steal.

The Broker stops at the bottom of the hill and looks up at the figure sitting atop it, their back towards him, and their long braid snaking down the hill-like pile. They are staring in the direction of this planet’s two suns, setting just over the horizon.

“I believe I have finally figured out their machinery, completely this time. Only took me these past five days of little food and sleep I suppose, but once I came into possession of these translator modules, the rest was easy. Warden really prepared for this. I am glad I got all the information that I did before that place fell…” No response, so he continues. “Well, after we finally get that arm of yours properly healed this time, we can commandeer a ship and get out of here once and for all. I am eager to go and explore as many of the other locations on that map from The Eye as possible. While I still can. Besides, I believe we have long overstayed our welcome.” He says towards the silhouette.

No reply again. She has been sitting there, in the same spot she was transported to by the gateway. No food, and little sleep. Just the occasional water-like sustenance that Broker is occasionally able to bring her when she is not currently fighting. Otherwise, she just sits there, waiting for him to come back to her. Come for her. Thankfully, it seems like this planet’s species almost religiously do not attack non-hostiles like himself.

“You might wanna focus on yourself,” Solara finally responds, in a low, blunt tone. Soulless. “You ain’t gonna last much longer.”

“Hence, the ‘while I still can’ part. But I’ll be around long enough. Besides, although intensified by that gateway, this was already in the works, as you know by now. My end, was destined.” The Broker says while casually looking around at the wasteland that has formed here due to Solara’s battles.

He throws something up to her that she catches without turning to him. Her senses are even stronger on this planet, and maybe with the constant fighting she’s endured since arriving—the atmosphere too. Even he feels a bit stronger and faster here, lighter. He had knew the answer already since he had already gathered the data on this planet in their brief time here.

“It is a translator. I think they use it for all the species they have encountered in all of their history. There is quite a lot of languages on there. A lot. From what I gather, they had a very long history. One that did not foresee your arrival, Solara.”

“Our arrival, Old Broker. You’re here too, after all. Here to play your part in what’s to come.”

Those last words, those exact. Last words. They trigger a flashback for The Broker, to a time when The Warden said the exact same thing to him while they stood on Isi-Iyi, right in front of the War Cry. His mind returns back to the present and he looks up at her.

“…Case and point, Young Solara,” Her mutters to himself before he turns around, but then he suddenly stops and calmly turns back towards her. “I remember the last time we were in this position. A beginning like this… You were standing atop something like you are now. I asked you to join me in taking down your Father, told you that you needed me. The beginning of the end for me when I opted to use that pulse staff as I did. But the beginning of something special nonetheless… *clear throat* Despite… how I am now, I want to ensure the survival of my people for years to come. I am sure you do as well and I think you still need me. I regret nothing, and I will regret nothing. You should—”

The ground starts to rumble. They are coming back again, already! Their final wave, most likely—from what he has gathered about their military. This is sad. They have been in peacetime for too long to be prepared for this person. This unnatural disaster that has descended upon them. The Warden truly planned galactic—no, universal conquest. He shakes his head.

Solara stands up and turns towards him and the army behind him, charging towards them. “Good to hear, because now you’re gonna help me.” She’s no longer a silhouette. The two suns have nearly set. She jumps down, landing softly on his side. Looking strong. Standing there with her unparalleled strength. Then, she says as she calmly walks towards the charging army:

{

“We used to think it was better to be prisoners of war than of the Warden. Sad that we were prisoners of more, then. But to me, they’re all the same thing. So I just wanna be free. I beat the Warden, now I’ll beat War—then, I’ll need War to be me. So when they say ‘the price’, they wage me. It’s my release. I’m no soldier, I am more. I’m no prisoner, I am War.”

}

—

Aiye remains brooding in the sky, standing on thin air while looking down at the collective cleanup efforts of the New Wave, Old Guard, and even the Naturals—the regular civilians. Working together like some big happy family I guess, he thinks to himself. He remains high enough in the sky to be out of sight—for the Naturals at least, but surely some of the Old Guard and New Wave can spot him if they look close enough. Squint their eyes, or something. They’d know he’s there, watching. Seems to be all they’ll allow him and Thema to do lately. They don’t want his or Thema’s super weapons to do all the work, they said, banishing them to governing and mostly just policing duties across the planet.

After all, the attack wasn’t just here where the city in the sky once was, it was across the entire planet. The main forces were simply focused here. There’s unrest all across the globe now. People are starving. They’re panicking, fighting. All that.

There’s no life in the ocean to fish out, there’s little-to-no livestock to be raised—especially after the attack. The land that didn’t heal from the first Dark War, and now this second one, it’s all trashed. They’re going to need a solution, soon. And time.

Aiye grits his teeth, his anger boiling. His mind always going back to that day. Two hours. That’s how long it took to finish the war. Just two hours after he went back out there. He didn’t get the mothership because it was just too big. It’s as if Earth brought part of their planet with them in that thing. But it didn’t matter because they were crippled now and it only took TWO hours. All she had to do…it wasn’t a long wait. His blades begin to burn increasingly larger dark flames—in sync with his growing rage. Just then, a large, violet lightning bolt strikes down in front of him with a thunderous boom.

“I think you’ve been standing here for a literal day now… you still at this?” Thema questions, ignoring the flaming blades. She probably sensed them and came up here to check on him.

“I could ask you the same…” he begins, until he looks at her, feeling her glare through her opaque shades. “…but I guess I won’t.”

“Wise.” Thema replies bluntly.

Thema walks up next to him, on thin air, staring out at the horizon—the rising sun. As usual, she’s wearing all black: a thin long, robe-coat down to her ankles with no buttons or zipper with large and long sleeves; her skin tight, short-sleeve top that’s tucked into her baggy pants that taper at her ankles; her silk black hair still long as ever.

Both her coat, and her hair flowing in the wind at this altitude. Her coat like a cape or flag, and her hair just streaming behind her with the flow of the wind. Aiye looks at her blackened hands, poking out of her large draping sleeves, as rough and as tough as stone.

He had asked the doctors to fix that, but they told him that there was nothing too fix. That her skin had genuinely become that rough. The change wasn’t some simple damage to her hands, it was a change to her skin on a cellular level. They were healthy otherwise. Just more… durable. Plus it seemed as though Thema was enjoying the changes. Sticking her hand directly in fire or freezing snow—and other places one normally couldn’t withstand. Challenging Old Guard, New Wave, and Naturals alike. Betting rations, then being forced to return them. Unlike him, they loved her and looked up to her, like she was genuinely family and a leader. But, he could see her hesitate to give her heart over to that. Ever since…

A few minutes pass before Aiye speaks up again, “How is it going though?”

“Do you see them back here with me?? What the fuck do you think Aiye?” Thema snaps, raising her voice but not shouting.

“All right. Sorry. I only mean, any progress? You’ve been at it for a few months now… This is me, offering to help now.”

Thema snorts with nothing but cynicism, doubting the sincerity of his offer because she knows what he’s after. She looks up with a sigh, then a release as the light of the Sun starts to stretch further across the ocean below them. She hesitates for a moment, as if she’s having an internal argument.

She finally speaks up again, albeit reluctantly, forcing herself to show empathy on the matter, “How about you?… Any luck?”

Aiye shakes his head, “Nope. I didn’t see the coordinates, or anything like that. The Eye won’t let me access them without The Warden’s or her blood. There are so many planets on that list. More than I ever dreamed of. But now he’s at the bottom of the ocean somewhere and she’s… No. No success, but-”

“No. Aiye.” Thema firmly cuts him off. They’ve had this discussion a thousand times already in the past several weeks. He already knows what she’ll say by now, and that he’s wrong for asking. There’s no way she’s going to partake in helping him bring her back here. Not when everyone is trying to heal. Not after what she’s done.

She begins walking away, still on the sky itself. Then her self control from earlier finally breaks as she suddenly whirls around to face Aiye, eye-to-eye, “Actually, I do know where Tozi and Junaid are—all of them for that matter. I just found out before coming back here. I found out a lot of things in this week alone. Horrible things. About what’s being done to our people, about the colonies… and recently about myself.”

Now Thema’s sword starts to release the dark aura too as she get angrier. It’s not flaming like Aiye’s did when he was getting angry. Instead it’s more of a blackish red color that’s spilling out of it.

Her arm is down by her side, her crunching into a fist, then opening with her fingers spread out, then crunching into a fist again. It repeats this again and again, pretty fast, as she tries to contain herself. Her tone gets low and darker. “I’ve been trying to hold it back, but there aren’t enough words to describe my current level of anger right now. I feel… bloodthirsty? Yeah… yeah. That… Bloodthirsty. Bloodthirsty, because I do know the where and I now know the what and…,” she leans in closer to his ear, her tone growing more bitter and dark, “…what I’m going to do about it. So if you want me to help you find her Aiye, you’re gonna help me first.”

The thunderous drum strikes once…but not for the final time