Sleep is the greatest gift afforded to the mortal race, it is a divine blessing that allows us to recharge our bodies and clear our minds from any built up stress suffered during the day. Christian Ambrosius Medraut Ddraig was unfortunately not enjoying this gift through no fault of his own, or maybe it was the fault of something in his head.

He wished that there had been any other way for him to transport himself rather using a Bee. The giant box shaped flying vessels were great at moving a large amount of people fast, but their chairs were absolutely horrendous for sleep.

Chris's neck felt cramped from how uncomfortable the seat he was resting on was, no matter how many times he tried to sit differently, it was all the same. The tough wool and nilon just refused to let him sleep properly and then there were the nightmares, every time he fell into the realm of dreams he was mentally assaulted by the same vision over and over again without change.

He was always standing in frozen tundra that extended for miles without end. He knew that it was simply a dream, and yet whenever he mentally returned to this place, it felt so real that he could feel the cold wind beating against his skin and the rough snow freezing over his toes.

He took in a deep breath and immediately regretted it as the cold air was like an icical being driven down his throat and he violently coughed.

"Note to self, never do that again." he thought as he looked around and noticed that the area around him looked like something either been detonated or crashed into the thick ice and stone which composed the ground by how large and deep the crater that was a few feet away from him was.

Against his will an invisible force possessed his legs and slowly dragged him towards the crater with each step feeling like a thousand cold needles were being driven into his flesh.

Inside the crater appeared to be a piece of obsidian the size of a full grown man.

Something about it though unsettled Chris to his bone, perhaps it was the dark inky shade that almost looked like a black mark in existence itself. Matters were not helped by the whispers emanating from it, and though Chris knew that shouldn't be possible, he recognised the voice and he could understand each word uttered.

"We... I... feel me all... but more must be collected... rejoin... reconstituted... reborn in night... must add more..." it whispered to itself continuously.

And with each passing second the words became louder and faster and Chris just wanted to grab his ears and shut out the sound but his arms were no longer in his control.

He tried thrashing, he tried screaming some more and he tried to divert his eyes but that accomplished nothing as the reigns of his own body had been ripped away from him, making him an alien in his own flesh.

It was a terrifying experience, and then the earth under him rumbled and Chris felt a presence behind him like eyes digging into his back but not looking at him as strange as that sounds. At this point he was always yanked out of his dreams and back to his sore neck in the Bee, looking out the window to the many mountains and forests of the Iron Province below.

His eye's opened to the interior of the massive vessel, with Knights and Asikari as far as he could see. The Asikari looked the same in their somewhat uniform gold, red and blue armour, though the Knights were different in a way, they each bore golden insignia of a golden sword in a star.

Avalon in the past had always fought Night Terrors at the rare occasions in the past, they had faced different civilizations in other realities. This had meant that the Knights core had never needed to make their armour uniform like the Asikari. After all, who would mistake a Knight for a half rotten Dullahan or a creature of literal shadow like a Shadecan.

This had always granted them the right to build their armour in unique and sometimes over the top ways. Chris had seen some knightly armour that looked like it belonged in a fashion show, rather than a battlefield.

With the Lunar Empire now their enemy, there needed to be a way for Knights of Avalon to be identified and just trying to overturn thousands of years of tradition at once would have resulted in rebellion by most of the Knights of Avalon.

So the crown had to settle for a golden insignia of a sword driven through a star to identify one as a Knight, just as the Asikari had a goldenrod dragon. Of course there were a few other things like some standardisation which modifications to armor were essential and what was considered going too far in customisation.

He reached for his right shoulder where one of his insignia lay and that was when he realised that there was something heavy resting upon his shoulder, he turned to his left and saw it to be Pyrrha who like him had fallen asleep and she was using his left shoulder as a pillow.

The elf had not woken up from his movements and a small sliver of silver rolled out of her mouth, down her chin and upon his breastplate.

Looking at Pyrrha's soft features as she lay with a mind elsewhere, Chris could not stop his mind from thinking out. "By all the accursed Ancient Ones and Mizihimo, she is beautiful."

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Chris felt a spark of frustration light up in his heart as he tried to think of a proper stance on his old childhood friend, turned childhood bully and now new teammate and saviour. A month ago, before the Nexus of Narratives, it had been easy to express his stance on her, he absolutely hated her guts.

But now he felt a warm flattering of something in his chest whenever he thought about her and it wasn't from some irritation caused her spear which Nimue had driven through his chest.

He wanted to shake her off of his shoulder, but he could not bring himself to do so and thus he only raised his hand to his mouth and softly closed it it shut to stop her drooling.

He turned his attention to others around and he could see that Thor had fallen into a deep sleep, though he would occasionally toss and turn like Chris had been doing earlier. Hamanymu had an easier time in sleeping on the tough chairs as he had a pair of headsets resting on his ears and whatever music they blasted into his brain probably helped in his rest.

The only member of his team awake was Ursa Tudor. The green and purple Knight in question had been reading some book which Chris was sure had been gifted to her by her close "friend" William Redret from the Runith Institute. Though she would occasionally flip through some pages to a picture which he was sure showed both her and William.

"She is definitely in love, the poor thing. " he thought in pity as he watched her continue to circle around the idea of confessing to William. After she had asked them all the tried and tested asking for advice for a friend, they all knew.

Ursa then noticed him looking at her and a sly grin grew on he face. She gave him a thumbs up and he was quite sure why she did that.

Anyway, the trip continued until they were over the port city of Genveden, or little Geneva as its high concentration of earth born humans had began calling. Chris counted the seconds until he felt the reverberation run though the soles of his feet as a sign that they had finally landed.

Everyone felt it too because they instantly scrambled out of whatever sweet dreams they had been lost too. As soon as Pyrrha got up, she looked startled at her position and she grew red in embarrassment.

The group didn't dwell on this as they grabbed their duffle bags and walked out of the Bee to Genvedens port, where many other Bees landed to a hive of activity, all under the shadow of one of the largest battleships Chris had everseen.

Plastered upon the side of this giant of engineering was the word VIPER in bright green.

XXXXXXX

Walking through the docks, Chris could see people working nonstop to either load the Battleship or some who just seemed to be going around their merry way to their own shipping and transport vessels.

Chris doubted that those me and women were pleased to have their timetables thrown out of wak with this monster of a battleship loading in their port.

"How do you think they have taken it?" Ursa asked in a low almost meek voice though Chris wasn't sure exactly what she meant.

"Taken what?".

" To have their homes, lives and their planet torn from them. To have everything that they once thought about existence shattered in such a way that could leave them question just what their place in this world is." she spoke whilst looking at the dock workers and fishermen who were predominantly humans from earth.

" Ursa, are you okay?" Hamanymu asked her.

"I am fine, it's just..." She stopped talking as her face became grimmer. "...All these people, I very rarely think about them. About what they lost to the Darkness, about what kind of world they now find themselves in. Here I am, feeling joy about being here on Avalon while some poor soul would have been better off if it never happened... I just mean that i feel like an awful person."

"Your not." he responded. " A bad thing happened and we had no way of stopping or preparing for it. We can grieve for what we lost but we have to look forward. Like you once told me, we have to roll with the punches."

"That's was too deep coming from you." Ursa chuckled as she cleaned her eyes from the tears built up from her thought's.

"Hey, I have my moments."

Chris watched as the the people who two years ago had existed upon a world were all of this was just fantasy went on with lives as if little had changed. He wondered how many here had lost direct family and cataclysm and how they got along.

He wondered how many dock workers and fishermen were once experts in high paying jobs like scientists and even lawyers who had failed to transition into their Avalonian counterpart. After the survivors of earth who had agreed to come with them, the state had acted to the best of its ability to give them a source of economic security.

Chris thought about that sixty percent of survivors who had chosen to go with the alder, that race of cosmic swimming dragons. He wondered if the earth people with might have been better off they had stayed with those.

He stopped himself at this train of thoughts, it was all too easy to fall to despier and Chris was not in the mood for that. He returned his attention to the Viper and he remembered the speech that his mother had delivered to the whole of Avalon in the capital.

"My dear brothers and sisters, it has been one month since our nation was drawn into a war beyond our borders by the aggressive and imperialistic Lunar Empire.... We have seen some successes in these first few weeks as well as some failures... This has reminded us the importance of allies, a concept that we have neglected for far too long. We have had contact with the Sun empire as well as multiple other states to the east and as such, we shall be sending one of our newest QA-23 battleships, captained by crown princess Ishtar to solidify our friendship against our aggressor to the north..."

Every Knight and Asikari here were amongst the chosen. Though he didn't know which was worse, being amongst those first battleships to engage with Lunar Empire forces at sea and at Serpents way. Or to be on a battleship that would no doubt receive greater attention at the Lunar Empires hands.

"Argentum Ddraig," came an excited voice and turning Chris found himself face to face with an old friend.

Stand before him was none other than Munale Livingstone. The Fae had a nice three piece suite on, though his suite which mattered more was being lifted by a crane for the Vipers deck. Chris wished that he had able to see the mech suit in action, but unfortunately he was too busy getting beaten near to death by an Elder Night Terror.

"Munale Livingstone." Chris said in joy as he clupsed hands with the Fae who he had not seen in a long time. "It has been so long."

"Indeed, the last we met, you were an Aris Knight, now you are already a legend and a Argentum. Oh how things change in this world." the mech pilot said with a grin. "Some has really moved up in the world."

"I am just a third class Argentum, I haven't become an Imperator yet."

"Well, give it time, with how much you are moving up in the world, we will be following your orders already," Munale responded with a hearty laugh.

"You do have to follow my orders, Aris Livingstone," Chris said with a smirk and the Fae's grin grew wider and he playfully bowed.

"Forgive my impudence, oh commanding officer. I won't last in a court-martialing."

A slow clapping eminated around them and the two of them turned to face with an old face that he had never missed. Theseus Troezen.

"Troezen," he groaned out.

"Ddraig." Theseus scowled. "Growing a large head aren't we."

"Is that anyway to talk to your commanding officer Troezen." Munale interjected with a grin.

"He is not..."

"Yes he is brother, now let's go already." the Fae's sister, Meghanada Troezen stated in exasperation as she walked past them. "We need to settle in our cabin."

Theseus tried to say something, but he paused and thought better of it. He then looked at Chris in utter disgust and Chris felt a sharp anger within him. He was tempted to reach out and grab ahold of the blue skinned bastard and tear him apart for dearing to....to....

"What am I thinking." he thought in suprise as his scar stung in a dull pain.

He placed his hand on his chest and as he passed his heart, he almost felt two heartbeats a

nd yet he could not bring himself to ask anyone about it. He could only look at the Viper and wonder what adventure awaited him.