“MY BABY BOY!” Kaidan screamed inside of him, moving his knife, time after time, trying to cut Anton’s throat.
The bridges moved in a whirlpool as the water drained down.
“MY BABY BOY!” He screamed again, Anton dancing out of his way at every turn.
“MY BABY BOY!” Rage was the only thing left. Rage was everything he had now. No wife, no Elysium, no friends…. No son.
“WHY?” He screamed, at Anton, the rain falling over them. It was the first time Kaidan felt something akin to rain falling upon him, and it was the worst feeling he had ever felt.
As usual, Anton didn’t respond.
“Nothing you do makes a lick of sense. You’re just insane!”
That seemed to strike Anton a little. But not enough to get an answer out of him.
The bridge smashed against a wall of bioluminescent plants, the lake’s water was too shallow now, and the plants became walls surrounding the two.
Anton took the strange pole he carried at his back. He pressed against it and something akin to a round disc slid off from the inside of the pole. The object looked like some kind of old antenna. He stabbed it into the ground and turned it on. The pole had multiple Rings surrounding it, and as the top, circular disc began to rotate, the Rings initiated their vibrational motion. The magenta dust, illuminated by the cyan light of the plants, began to shift into different colors.
“What is this?” shouted Uroa from atop a bunch of plants. Kaidan didn’t notice, but they were close to the slope where he’d left him with the weapon.
“My people, they are….”
“Part of nature’s cycle, I’m afraid,” said Anton. “Cultures come and go, especially if they are not strong enough to survive. You proved to not be smart enough.”
Anton dodged, he wasn’t even looking but he dodged Kaidan's slash against his throat. He knew he would, so Kaidan raised his feet, kicked him out of the way, and turned towards the rod on the floor. I’ll stop whatever you’re trying to do.
He prepared the knife to cut it down. Anton noticed his plan, he picked two objects out of his belt. One was the vial Shinzu simulated an explosion earlier at the Tower, the other was the round object he used underwater to control the snake from inside the cloth. The outer section of the orb was made of Rings surrounding one another, with different sizes from the center to the poles
The snake…
It came crashing down the walls of plants and surrounded the rod. Kaidan stopped on his track. Uroa jumped into the hole the two were trapped in with the snake and ran towards Anton. He noticed Uroa coming and so he moved his fingers, the color of some dust in the air began to shift towards green…
A second wave hit, and the island shook once again. Anton lost his composure as some small amounts of water flooded in the section where they were, dropping the vial and the round object. Uroa kicked the orb away, towards Kaidan. The snake wasn’t attacking him, instead, it couldn’t take its gaze out of the rolling orb that curved away from Kaidan due to the uneven structure of the soil and the water.
Kaidan made a bet. He threw the knife towards the orb, the water was carrying it, making it hard to hit…. But he made it. The knife cracked the object, the dust inside of it began to pop out, and the Rings that made it stopped vibrating.
“What did you do? That thing now is out of control.” Anton was angered. And scared.
The snake moved and attacked Anton, he dodged, but the animal was relentless. It seemed to be driven by madness, a desire to kill him. Anton took the seed’s pouch off his belt and the creature for a second stopped, the head recoiling back.
Like the Flower in the boat, Kaidan thought surprised. It was never after Anton, it was after that.
“Such a shame,” said Anton, throwing the seeds away. The snake grabbed it in midair, but couldn’t swallow it, instead, it snapped around one of its teeth. Anton seemed relieved and surprised at the same time. He opened a communicator identical to the one Kaidan used to communicate with Elysium-3 on his right wrist.
Weapons from Elysium-2 he said, Kaidan recalled.
“Shinzu,” Anton called, “send me the bow…” he hesitated, looking at Kaidan and the snake, rattling around, trying to remove the seeds from its teeth. Anton then followed, “Bring Liam too.”
--
Lina screamed, screamed once more, and cried as she watched the workshop being swallowed by the waves, two kids, a boy, and a girl, Uiumi and Tukal, two bodies who surged up from underneath one of the broken walls and followed down the stream of pure destruction. She cried their names in a song of pain and desperation.
“Lina, look at me,” said Ayane, trying to avert her gaze from the horror, “You need to breathe, the baby can’t come now, I can’t deliver it -”
The piece of the dining hall they stood atop, now a single island amidst the current underneath, shook, trembled, creaked…
“Uiumi” Lina cried, “Tukal…” she continued, tightening her grip around Ayane’s hands.
The Exocore was moving around the stream, fighting against the current. It looked like a giant man with a hunchback, made of metal and missing its right arm. Lina said something in her language, but as usual, Ayane didn’t understand.
“Look, you have to be strong. For Uroa and the baby. And all the kids. Look at them, at the arm.”
Lina’s eyes trail there, burning in deep red. A giant machine piece fell from the sky on the city street. Debris of all sizes and shapes continued to rain from the sky. And then they stopped. Ayane looked at the water sprout, it had fallen, and a second wave was coming.
“DYLAN!” she screamed, letting go of Lina's hands and standing up. She pointed at the ocean, the gigantic thing coming as a gaping mouth ready to swallow all in its wake.
Dylan noticed the object coming, Ok, I have to move faster… and… what? He kept asking himself.
The Exocore’s right leg stopped moving. He couldn’t get a response. Hanging on one of the pipes connected to the driver’s seat, he put his body out of the robot, just in time to see the cables from the leg floating free from the joints section. Cut by a piece of sharp metal carried by the water.
Well, they are about 5 meters away and the arm is 4 meters long so if I… but Lina… NO, no time to think. He sat back in the driver’s seat and waved at the kids to leave the arm and rush towards him. At the same time, he moved the arm to be as close as possible.
“STAY BY THE EDGE AS CLOSE TO THE ARM AS POSSIBLE!” he screamed.
Ayane looked at Lina, she was frozen in place. “Uiumi… Tukal” she kept on crying.
Lina held Ayane’s hands, once again, gripping it as tight as she could. “How can you not be scared?” Lina asked.
“I’m scared, what are you talking about?” Ayane responded, trying to get the woman to stand up.
“The snake… and this…” Lina said, breathless.
Ayane held Lina in her arms with the strongest grip she could and pulled the woman up, standing at the edge closest to the arm. Her heart began to race, was he expecting her to jump? She would never do that, the distance and the –
The second wave hit. The building shook once again and the structure, the single pillar holding the dining hall's last surviving piece began to spin on its axis. And then, it leaned, towards the direction the two women were, their weight directing it close to the arm.
The structure crumbled over the arm, but Dylan was fast, he expected it, closing the giant’s robot hand around the leaning pillar, holding it in place, and creating a sturdy platform for the woman to move into the arm’s safety section.
Lina moved slowly, staring at the water’s edge. A sudden burst of light came from the Tower’s direction, Lina’s heart stopped, Uroa was there after all. Ayane approached her. “How is the baby going?”
“I don’t know… I’m so worried…”
Ayane held Lina’s hands once again, this time though, her grip wasn’t strong, instead it was delicate. “Take some deep breaths, and just listen to me ok? pay attention to my voice,” she said softly, “I’ll tell you a story, one about why, despite how scared I am, I won’t let it control me, and it won’t control you too.”
----
The dust surrounding the now-fallen Tower shifted abnormally around a multitude of colors. The effect was somehow odd to Kaidan, as odd as the shifting creature wailing and flailing around, tortured by the satchel of seeds attached to its teeth, splashing water from the shallow puddle left by the second wave, the place where once a lake used to be, stood too high for the impact of it to be truly felt if it wasn’t for the opening on the natural wall made by the vegetation created by the beast.
The unpredictability of the body slams, the back and forth, and the swirls of the snake required Kaidan’s and Anton’s utmost attention, each was way too random to be properly evaded as the creature wasn’t aiming to hit either of them.
Anton… Kaidan thought with a killing desire. Observing the man fighting to avoid each slam.
Anton… the desire grew stronger, with malice.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
Anton, I… and then, all dust shifted into a bright blue, each particle of Pleor shining ever stronger towards a light indigo shade.
The snake stopped moving. The creatures’ eyes went frozen as if hypnotized by the song of a flute no one else could hear. Kaidan glanced at Anton. The man seemed… surprised? Happy? Dumb folded? The grimace on his face couldn’t tell the full picture.
The rod began to emit a noise, a pulsating hum coming from its round top disc. The air now began to tremble, and Kaidan felt weird inside, his guts felt out of place, his arm and head wanted to explode, and then he noticed, that the places around his body where the dust gathered across the years were vibrating on the same shade of blue as the air surrounding them. His legs went numb, and he fell on his knees.
Sean… Dena I, the names crossed his mind in sadness. And suddenly, the hum of the rod vanished, replaced by the engine of a speeding car. Kaidan couldn’t stand up, he felt sick, but he could see his surroundings, he could hear the vibration in the air stopping as Uroa drove his car around, pieces of the rod smashed underneath it, coming in through the opening on the vegetation’s wall left behind by the snake’s entrance.
He used a piece of vegetation as a slope and the car launched into the air, towards the snake’s head. The creature, now out of the trance, tried to swallow the whole thing but the car was too big to fit on its mouth, getting stuck between its teeth. The beast lifted its head in an attempt to make the car fall in through its mouth.
Uroa opened the door and tried to reach the seed's satchel, but they were too far. He stepped out of the car, keeping a foot in and one arm holding the belt section, avoiding falling into the gaping throat open under him. He reached for it. His arms getting cut by the immense number of teeth the monster had. Was this really a snake? His fingers grabbed the satchel and he carefully pulled it without allowing the strings to be cut by the sharp teeth.
And he got it.
The car began to break, the creature's raw power trying to break it. Uroa lost his balance, falling back towards the driver’s seat. The car began to free fall and stopped midway into the creature’s mouth. From Kaidan’s perspective, Uroa and the car had been swallowed whole. And he wanted to scream, was there no end to this nightmare? But he couldn’t scream, he was feeling too ill for that.
“KAIDAN! WHERE ARE YOU!?” Uroa screamed.
The sound of the car getting smashed intensified.
“FAST MAN, WHERE ARE YOU,?A NOISE, SOMETHING!”
Kaidan wanted to scream but he had no strength. He opened his mouth, but all that came out was a gasp.
He needs me, I–I need to–at least him!”
“AAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHhhhhh” he shouted, the sound of his scream eclipsed the noise of the metal being compressed under the teeth’s pressure.
The satchel with the seeds flew from inside the snake’s open mouth towards Kaidan’s general direction, the creator’s gaze tracking its every movement as it landed in the water puddle and vanished from sight.
It was then that Kaidan finally noticed a faint light coming from the mouth, changing from a deep blue to a bloodied red.
“Make sure you complete it,” Uroa slowly said, the car crashing inside the beast.
The engine compartment was fully open, the dust filter was leaking and inside, the vial Anton dropped earlier was active, changing the colors of the accumulated Pleor inside the filter’s steel container he had just changed this morning, but the island was too dense with dust. The amount inside was enough to make it blow.
The sixth ring interlocked.
“Your mission, ok? So, my son and my people won’t be forgotten–So we–”
Kaidan wanted to scream, to beg him to turn the thing off and jump off the monster’s jaw, but he knew Uroa couldn’t jump that high, no one could.
“Show that men, I–we aren’t idiots.”
As Uroa said his words, the red faint light became more visible, and soon, the seventh ring interlocked.
The beast's head exploded on a cacophony of colors, but its red blood splashed all around. Or was it Uroa’s? Shrapnel of the car’s metal flung in every direction. Kaidan was hit by multiple pieces, cutting him on multiple sections, but none were of great injury.
What was left of the snake’s body fell, revealing a red figure covered in fresh blood. Except for the area around his eyes, Anton’s eyes were as driven as he had ever been.
“Well, it seems like your friend just finished my job,” he said in arrogance, although he had some difficulty pronouncing some words. “Stupid, asking you to carry on while he would explode the seeds, killing your mission. Ironic, I think.”
Kaidan quickly noticed that Uroa’s actions were carefully calculated. When he screamed, he never mentioned he had the seeds, only asked for Kaidan’s location. Anton never noticed them flying out, landing inside the water puddle, now mixed with the creature’s blood.
He was anything but stupid. He might’ve gambled the fact Anton wouldn’t see the seeds being thrown away, but it was a plan, nonetheless. One that worked, Kaidan told himself, but how could he still stand and speak so easily? After all the air vibration?
And then, Anton fell on his knees, the penancing posture lost in a single second.
“I…” Kaidan tried to say something, but the words were not coming. He tried to walk, but he couldn’t move…
… so, he crawled. He crawled towards the knives and fell next to the orb once used to hypnotize the beast.
“…kill…you…” he continued, as he crawled over the mossy floor mixed in water and blood, smelling like iron, just like a cut on the lips you notice due to how close it is to your nose.
Someone walked in. A tall man in perfect posture, his hands to the back, his hair tied in a long-braided ponytail, undulating like a wave, even though the wind could hardly reach the enclosure they were in. Behind him followed a small boy, carrying a boy, carrying a crossbow between his arms, the object was as tall as him and trailed on the rasped, dirty, and wet floor, painting it in red.
“It seems our hunt is over”, Shinzu said calmly, as if nothing had happened, as he approached Anton, “but the test was at least, somewhat successful, and the Tower fell.”
He extended his hand to Anton and helped the man to stand. Anton’s legs shook, so Shinzu gave him his shoulder, even though the immaculate green robe he was wearing became stained with speckles of red and blue.
“I am–” Anton began, but Shinzu quickly reacted.
“Hush man, you need to rest now. or the next Seven Towers will–so you’re still alive?” Shinzu pondered, finally noticing Kaidan crawling on the floor toward the weapon.
“Liam, kill him” Shinzu ordered the little boy to act.
The kid had no expression, looked dead inside, and still, he shook his head against the order.
“Do it” he said again. “Or else, I will.”
The boy looked at Kaidan and prepared the bow.
“There is no point…” began Anton with pauses at every word, “that man is already dead. His mission won’t intervene with ours… the seeds are… no more.”
“So, you can speak quite well after the indigo shift,” Shinzu exclaimed, in a tone suited to a person talking to themselves.
“What a trick the world played on us…” Anton continued, despite having difficulties talking, there was an air of contemplation in his voice. “… to have the man who needs the Towers meet the man who would destroy them, on an island, in the middle of nowhere… destiny seemed to be on my side… your mission was gone before it began.”
Kaidan wanted to scream at him, he wanted to grab the knife and cut the man’s throat.
“I thought we were past conversations such as this,” said Shinzu in reprimand, “there is no such a thing as destiny, you’re seeing patterns where there were none.”
Anton glanced at Liam for a quick second and then stared back at Kaidan, their eyes locked in.
“I–I’m sorry about your kid, '' Anton told Kaidan, slowly, almost regretfully.
“How…” began Kaidan. “How can you say this?” He forced himself to say, with the rest of his energy. “After all…”
“ don’t get you –
Kaidan’s senses began to fade away, his vision slowly fading to black. A giant silhouette of an Exocore came flying down from the sky, sparking pure light blue dust from sections on its back, but he could make very little of its shape. The light blue reduces it all to an angelic being, descending from the skies, shapeless, yet perfect.
The three figures who once he could see so clearly began to move towards the object that had just arrived.
Then Anton said, his voice mournful. As the boy took the rod from the floor….
“I don’t do this because I want to. I did it because I needed to…the world needs it. I’m truly sorry for your loss.”
And the world faded to black as Kaidan’s face met with the cold and wet floor.
----
From the boat, Unalu could only see what remained of the orphanage. The wave carried him and his trusted companion on travels far inland, docking the ship atop a hill.
He’d heard the explosion, and the only thing he could think about was the conversation he had with his best friend earlier. He couldn’t believe Uroa was right, and they would try something at the Tower.
Mali, he thought, with despair in his heart. He hoped the girl would be alright. He desired more than anything to jump in the water and swim to the bakery and fishery store. To see if she was alright, and to tell her what he always wanted to say, just like Uroa always asked of him. But to jump in the water would just endanger him, it would be better to wait, after all, he was very good at waiting for things to happen, for the right time to come.
He clasped the necklace around his neck, made of a brown husk of wood similar to the totems surrounding the lake, with three pearls-like small black beads surrounding a simple black string. A name was carved on it, “Nesai”. The piece of wood was rough, as if was forcibly removed from the tree it came from and never cared for, all the splinters still in. And still, he held strong to it.
He closed his eyes, the Moon shining above him, its light passing through spaces left by the electrical storm surrounding the sky above, while in the distance, where once a water spout came to unleash destruction, only remained a pillar of dust, falling as it’s colors transition from bright red to its neutral, invisible state, surrounding a debris’ field of what once was a submerged city. And there, he made a promise.
Once the water settles down, he will never wait again.
----
Scorching, heating, burning… The Sun once again made Ayane despise the daytime. but right now, she didn’t care. All she cared about was to find her friend, amidst the place where once a lake stood.
From atop the slope, she managed to see where he was, not by locating his body, but by the trail of blood and destruction caused by the car’s explosion.
She ran down the slope, this time dressed in her uniform, not in her usual dress, leaving behind Unalu, who had guided her there, but the boy quickly followed her.
She found Kaidan awake, sitting by the natural wall of what once was a reef underwater, his hand clasping to a satchel. He had burns from the Sun, cuts, and dirt all over him.
“Kay!” she shouted running towards him, “you’re–”
“I need a boat, we need to go search for survivors,” each word came slowly and painfully.
Unalu walked in, noticing the snake’s body and pieces of Uroa’s jeep all over the place.
“My friend, where is he?”
Kaidan didn’t know how to answer.
The way back from the Tower was silent. At the orphanage, or what remained of it, Kaidan went to the room where he spent the night he arrived, finding it to be in a section of the place still intact. He grabbed the book from atop the corner, the one Sean had given him, and quickly went out of the place, towards the ocean.
He passed by Lina, and she extended his hands toward him, but he ignored her, he didn’t know what to tell her. Unalu watched as he passed by and approached her.
Kaidan just heard her cries fading away as he moved further in the distance.
“Kay!” Ayane shouted as he arrived at the beach. “You need to rest, I need to treat your wounds, they might get infected!”
But he didn’t listen.
“Sean, here, your book is here, come travel with me please, just tell me… just answer me…”
A giant piece of metal washed against his legs, it was three times his size.
“Baby boy, please, call for me…” Kaidan said faintly, to himself.
“Kay, please, don’t do this to me, you have to listen. If you don’t treat yourself–”
Kaidan clasped his book and punched the metallic shard in front of him, falling to his knees on the water.
“They killed him, my little boy… and he was so scared, he was…”
He couldn’t control the tears anymore. He remembered Sean’s wishes, his words…
I think heroes do not cry, but parents do.