The white puffs of snow floated across the blanket that their brothers and sisters created during the day. The sheet spread itself thick amongst the gravestones and mausoleums, creating a two-foot pile of snow as far as the eye could see. Even the trees that outlined the forest around the cemetery looked like one big storm cloud.
The chill of the night only grew stronger as the wind began to pick up and throw about the loose powder that coated the ground. Dark robes began flapping in the wind, and a man's hood came loose. For a moment, as the wind stopped, he draped the dark fabric back over his head. His vision shifted towards the smaller mausoleum in the middle of the graveyard.
He made no footsteps as he drew closer to the crypt. His robes dragged slightly along the powder, but his feet hovered just inches above the blanket of snow. He simply glided to the first step of the metallic building knowing exactly what his next moves were to be. He looked up at the bright light-rings fixated to each corner of the roof of the building. In an instant, the man blinked and suddenly the light-rings began to power down.
As soon as they were dim, he looked along the front entrance and gazed into the camera set in place by a madman. The small lens captured most of the area in front of the building, which meant it had to go. Soon the camera shorted itself out and the red light associated with active recording programs ceased.
With these problems out of the way, the man began to type away on the information terminal posted on the mausoleum's doorway. The holo-glass panel was not equipped for the hacking procedures he used so he was able to quickly gain access to the inside of the crypt. Before he entered, he rewrote a line of coding in the panel's access system.
After he tapped for the last time on the glass, he heard a sound from within the crypt. The grinding of metal and stone rang out and echoed into the forest. The man sighed heavily, then swiftly rushed into the crypt. He saw the coffin first, standing upright at the end of the small room. Directly below it, was a set of stairs that led down to a narrow hallway. When he reached the door where the hallway ended, he put his hand on the frame where a small thumb scanner stuck out. A tone rang as he pressed the button, and the door slid into the ground.
"Welcome, Siphon." There was an elderly voice calling from inside. Siphon nearly fell to his knees. "My son, I only wish this moment could last forever. Time does not readily choose our side, and in this regard, it is our sworn enemy."
The room was small, cramped. The large table took nearly half the space, and the two chairs set askew did not help. Siphon moved to the unoccupied chair and faced the ghost of his mother. His eyes filled up with tears that fought for the small space along his eyelids. Some were thrown overboard, falling from his cheek to the floor. He dared not help it, for this was the first time in so long that he had felt something other than anger or regret. He held onto the relief that now washed over him.
Even just seeing the ethereal shadow of his mother was enough. Covered in pale white robes and old age, Glourine Zeo was still a beautiful sight to behold. The silver strands of hair on her head were finely braided and bunched in a tight bun, yet loose strands hung about her bangs, draping over her face. The everlasting smile she wore was all Siphon needed to see. It was hard to focus on her words, but he could not stop staring at her smile.
"They will call you the Unender, my son." Her voice was as soft as the snow outside and just as bright. "The one who can stop the end. I'm afraid that I cannot be so blunt with my answers from this side of the grave. There are laws even after death, I'm afraid. In fact, this very meeting breaks many of the most important laws but it will not give me away quicker than the breaking of others."
"Mother..." Siphon held out his hand on the table. He stretched until his mother began to reach out for him. Their hands could never touch. Her fingertips dipped into his palm, passing through the glass of the table.
"Just remember what I must tell you." She removed her hand from his. "There are curfews set in all of the cities of the world, no doubt your terrible guardian has told you nothing of what's going on in the world."
"He's gone..." Siphon blinked and looked down at the table before him. He deemed the glass was not ordinary when he noticed the familiar shimmer of Hologlass screens. "I... Had to stop him. The things he made me do... They were all just training methods. He turned me into a monster." Siphon removed his hood and shook his head. His black hair had bright bits of silver rivers flowing through it. "I don't know what he did."
Glourine cried out when she saw his face. Nearly every inch of his face was coated in a thick black ink that had been drawn to match the most sacred of geometrical patterns. They twisted and gyrated to create a beautiful design meant to symbolize the purest of protections.
Glourine looked away and continued to speak.
"The curfews, Siphon. Do not enter a city after dark. Do not walk the streets of a city after dark. There are those who uphold this curfew... Led by Zable, the man who calls himself the Arch-Ender. He wants what his father wanted, and more."
"What is it?" Siphon could barely speak through his tears. He couldn't gather the strength to speak again. He longed to hear what his mother wanted him to do. He longed for her to simply reveal where her killer was.
The table began to glow with a blue light. A globe of the world floated in the middle of the room. Siphon watched as the view of the globe grew closer and closer until it began to zoom in on a specific region. Soon he saw the graveyard he was in, but the view zoomed out further this time just as quickly.
A red blip began to blink, indicating their current location. Siphon saw the forest that outlined the cemetery, and the city of Malor at the end of the road. The view roamed around the rest of the continent of Onside
"Gloom, the planet we call home, is so close to its end. My son, not even your darkest of enemies could undertake what you must. All I ask is that you save these people from themselves."
The map stretched far across Onside, and in view now was the Old Stable. The military base was in ruins from battles waged years ago. Shadowy figures darted in and out of the blackness. From this view, Siphon saw red eyes flash from shadow to shadow. In the distance, behind two halves of a destroyed tank, Siphon swore he saw a man simply standing in the open before the view cut away.
The holo-glass table soared across Gloom at immeasurable speeds now and it reminded Siphon of himself. He had run away from his step-parents after destroying half of their village. He was so young then, and only wanted to protect those he loved from the Unstable. His 11-year-old body had a difficult time adjusting to his power so when he screamed at his enemies there were no words, only bright lights, and beams of energy that scattered throughout the forested village. When the dust settled, Siphon saw what he had done. He used the last of his power to lift his body off the ground and fly as far as he could.
Now it seemed as if the glass table had read his mind. The view slowed down until a vast desert area was revealed. This was where he had run to, all those years ago. The desolate land was known as Scarside. Siphon was not ready for what the holo-glass showed him next.
At first, he thought the table would reveal the brilliant city of glass, Centerrim. He had learned to block out the feelings he got whenever that name came up, but instead what was shown was an old mansion that looked ready to collapse from neglect. The feelings that this location brought up were worse, and when the view zoomed over to the front doors Siphon felt his stomach drop.
The doors swung open furiously as a tall man dressed in laboratory coats strode quickly down the front steps. Another tall figure rushed after him. Siphon could barely read lips, but the men seemed to be screaming at each other. The scientist looked vaguely familiar, while the other man Siphon knew all too well.
Siphon's late tutor, Mazer Xion Brezzo, quickly followed the scientist while yelling at him for a mile before they finally arrived at a gas-port. The man in lab coats would only yell back every now and then until they both reached his skycar. At that moment, the glass table began to raise its volume level. Siphon envisioned himself being there for this conversation. He floated away in his mind until the hot desert heat made his face sweat, and he was standing in the middle of the two figures.
"You'll wish one day, Zable, that I had not chosen sides with your father." Brezzo held fast to the man's car door. He did not want to leave without making his point, even though he had been attempting to do so for the entire walk there.
"I wish that already, you old crow. If you think for one second that I'm just going to sit here and watch my father's work go down the drain, you couldn't be more wrong." Zable looked up at the beefy man before him. His bulging muscles and rugged face did not place fear in Zable's heart, only anger. "God damn you, Brezzo. I know you have that fucking kid with you. I know exactly what you think you're going to do with him. And above all things, Brezzo, we both know what it will mean when I leave here without him."
"Oh please, you're still young." Brezzo raised his voice. He wiped the sweat from his brow, but another thin layer was already starting to collect. The heat from the desert never bothered him much now that he had been exiled for over a decade, but on this day he felt as if his blood would boil. "If you really know what your father was trying to accomplish, you'd denounce your own family name. This is-"
Zable slammed the door in Mazer's face.
"Oh you little shit, this is war then!" Brezzo pounded his fists on the car's window until the glass began to splinter. It lifted off the ground and zipped ten feet into the air. It sped up and was soon off in the distant horizon. Brezzo was on his knees, still driving his fists into the air. "I'm telling you it's war! Damn him... Where's my pupil?!"
The man frantically searched himself for his comm. device. He swiped across its main screen and contacted Siphon.
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"Search for me in Centerrim." He collected himself whilst speaking to his only pupil. On the tiny screen, Siphon saw himself only younger and more ignorant. His vision began to fade from this scene, and he was okay with that. He already knew what happened next. Brezzo needed something that would take Zable by surprise. A brutal way to show that terrible scientist's son that he truly meant to put an end to what his father started.
Siphon came to under the low light of the small room. The holo-table had disappeared... Along with his mother's projection. He dragged himself up from the floor, holding his right palm towards the frame of the door. He blinked and the door shot off its hinges with such speed that it clanged against the far stairs at the end of the hallway.
"Soon it'll be done..." Siphon was sluggish, disoriented even, and muttering nonsense to himself. He had never used his powers to observe past moments in time before... That much energy must have drained him to the point of passing out. "... And we won't have to wait..." He struggled with his footing on the mausoleum steps. He slipped but simply floated in mid-air, facing the ground as if he were in a wind tunnel. "... for the end no more..."
There was a set of tracks along the path to the mausoleum, leading out to the cemetery gates. Siphon noticed the familiar tread of military boots in the snow. He held out his palm to the sky, releasing a prism of light. The light glowed quite dim, giving off a light blue aura that matched the light poles fixated to the mausoleum. He then saw the creature.
It twitched slightly when their gazes were locked. There was a long moment where the creature did nothing but cough up blood and dust. After the second bit of coughing bouts, Siphon flew closer to the thing. Somehow, through a broken jaw, it spoke.
"Unender..." There was a croaking rasp to its voice. The thing's tongue was cracked and crusty besides the bit of blood, yet the thing had learned to speak around these flaws.
"And who dares to offer up such a title?" Siphon's voice boomed along the tombstones. The creature reared back and plopped into the snow. It twitched and rolled upright. The thing was down on one knee, with its head bowed to Siphon.
"This one's name is Barbullis." It spoke a little clearer this time as if the shock of Siphon's voice had awoken some inner focus. He looked back up to the Unender, who watched him warily. "This one travels from Vivistot... You know of it..." Barbullis stood up and scouted the cemetery for a long while. Siphon slowly followed behind him as they conversed.
"Vivistot was where I was raised for a few years." Siphon had already concluded that this Barbullis would be unable to defend himself in a fight against anything. Though he hadn't yet concluded as to why an Unstable on the brink of death would know to find the Unender here. "Was it someone in Vivistot who sent you?" Siphon seemed almost convinced that this thing was lying. Vivistot had been nearly destroyed by Siphon himself so long ago when he could not control his powers.
"No, I was told a long time ago to come here and wait for you..." Barbullis pulled his head down into his hands. "But I had forgotten for so long... Until just now. I am dying... And with our death, comes the truth of our old lives." Siphon had yet to learn about what happens when an Unstable passes away. Though he had heard rumors that their memories of their past lives become increasingly clear the closer they are to death. "Before I was turned by Mable, something came to me in a dream... Little Fatelings of destiny kept calling me in a cemetery I had never seen before. Last night I had the same dream... Only you were here, with a young woman, destroying the henchmen of Zable without a second thought."
Siphon looked the creature up and down with a peculiar gaze. He let the beast continue as he floated peacefully in a circle around it.
"This is your mother's tomb... I remember her more and more every day." Barbullis slouched along the stairs of the tomb. He brushed away some snow, revealing a name and dates... But no epitaph.
Glorine Zeo
2095-2125
"She was my brother's girlfriend at the time, you know?" Barbullis and Siphon sat alone in the nearby forest. The rotted one gathered branches from dead trees, to add to the glimmering fire that burned away. Siphon sat cross-legged just inches above the snowy ground. He learned that this pose offered the most efficient way to meditate... It also worked for devouring military rations, which he did so now. When the crumbs would fall into his lap instead of on the ground, he would be sure to nibble every last piece. Wasting nothing.
"I'm sorry I speak like this," Barbullis coughed into the fire, accidentally spitting up some blood in the process. It sizzled while he slurred some more. "If only I had found you sooner. There's so much to tell you, little Unender."
"If you'd speak as much as you spit we'd be making more progress buddy." Siphon floated behind the rotten one who kept gathering sticks from the low-hanging branches. "Why has Zable put up the curfew? Who do I look out for if I decide to sneak around at night? Let's start with some answers if I'm going to trust you."
Barbullis sighed and began to rub his head. "Zable sets the curfew for a simple reason, fear. Not everyone is afraid of the dark... at least not until they are forbidden from it. His citizens are more compliant if their hearts are filled with fear, rather than love."
"Easy enough, right?" Siphon watched the beast through the fire between them. It flickered and popped as he convinced Barbullis to spill more beans.
"Only as easy as it can be to recall the moments before one has died." Barbullis began to resent the young man before him. He shrugged off these feelings and continued, knowing the Unender needed more guidance than factual information. "They are called Demiphants... The ones who uphold Zable's cruel law. You know their power, for it is the same as yours. Zable has afflicted them with the same Ayawhite ink that has been drawn on you... There is one for every city on Gloom, so say the rumors."
Siphon was wide-eyed at this point, unable to accept that someone else could have the same power as he, let alone more than one someone else. His mind chaotically danced around the thought of having to oppose these so-called Demiphants. He had aggressively used his powers only a few times before, but now his mind raced with ways to dispose of such beings. The low tone of Barbullis' voice barely echoed through the forest, but it was enough to keep Siphon grounded to this reality.
"These people are enslaved Unender... Just as the Unstable were when Mable created us, so are the Marked Men now that Zable has created them." Siphon floated closer to Barbullis, intrigue aloof upon his face. "It sits on your shoulders alone, yet we are all here to help you, child. Or, at least we will be."
"I don't have allies... Friends..." Siphon slowed his speech... Trying not to catch up to the sadness in his words. "Family..." He fell into the snow face first. There was a muffled cry that was stifled. He lifted his body to float again, not a trace of snow on him.
"Unender... My brother, I remember." Barbullis barely let the words fall out of his mouth. "The man who raised you as a child. Murphy... He would not have you fight alone. Not while he still lives.” This instantly brought Siphon upright.
“He lives?” Siphon almost yelled out the question. “But where? How? He would have come for me if he was still alive. He would have rescued me just like he did when I was born. How could he have just let Brezzo torment me like that?”
“How could you let him do that to you? Siphon...” Barbullis had crept closer to the Unender, laying a decrepit hand on his shoulder. Before the creature could finish his sentence, the hand had burst into a brown mist that spewed across Siphon's face. Barbullis fell back into the snow, grasping for the Unender who now shot up into the sky, dodging red beams of light.
A few trees had caught fire when the light-beams blasted the flaming wood where Siphon had previously sat before. The Unender did not fly above the treeline, he knew better than to give his position away that easily. He hid just below, sifting silently through the limbs and branches until he sat atop a small, stubby bricklebranch. He closed his eyes until his lids began to glow. When he opened them, a sea of blue waves engulfed his vision. Back and forth, in light and dark shades on each end of the spectrum, the waves gave him spirit sight.
His vision sailed along his surroundings until he spotted the red pulse, darkened by its aggressive aura. This was the form his enemy's spirit took... A signed red dot amongst the indigo-laden reality. When Siphon blinked, the dark forest returned to sight. The physical plane remained unchanged, that is until a few, more powerful, beams of light began to pock large holes in the rooted dirt.
Siphon was silent even still, yet his pace was quicker than before. Soon he was behind a hooded figure who had risen above the treeline. The dark cloak almost mimicked Siphon's own garb. He watched as the figure simply extended his arms towards the forest and then let out a small cry as the energy released itself in the direction he pointed. Siphon began to do the same, only he held out his palm before him.
From the center of his hand, a pyramid began to protrude from his skin, rising upwards, enlarging itself as every second passed. Soon the pyramid took on a diamond shape, and it began to glow immensely. The figure began to turn around, but Siphon sent the diamond towards the man's body. In a few brief seconds, Siphon was already back below the treeline as the explosion rang out... And after a few long minutes, Siphon realized he was searching for the remains of an enemy that no longer existed.
Upon returning to what was left of the campsite, Siphon uncovered the top half of Barbullis' body. It twitched and crawled towards the boy in desperation. Barbullis tried to lay the same hand on the boy that had disintegrated earlier.
“Leave this place.” The creature's mouth split at each side, but it still spoke. “Keep going through the forest, maybe they'll find you... Maybe you'll find them.” Barbullis scratched at several spots on his torso, tearing open his fringed clothing. He held out a blinker device for the boy to take. “This will show you the way, I think.” Barbullis retched and retched, but there was no more blood to cough up.
“I will find a way to help you.” Siphon closed his fingers around the small metallic blinker. He then held the creature's hand just as tight.
“Whatever way you find, I hope you help the world on it. Leave me now, I can crawl the rest of the way. No need to carry me on your back like some old master in exile.” And with that Barbullis turned himself around with his one half-good hand and began through the forest. When Siphon tried to interact with him, there was no response. He simply crawled on, his gaze fixed heavily on whatever was beyond the forest. It grasped the entirety of his attention.
Siphon gave up and retreated in the opposite direction. He concluded that the man's mind was much further gone than his own. Muddled with shock, twisted by the Unstable virus that now fueled what was left of him. Siphon wondered how much of what the creature said was true.
Clearly, there was someone who had roughly the same abilities as Siphon. The person he had just killed... He flew but made so much noise that Siphon only had to surf for a few moments in the spirit realm to find him. His energy was largely unformed or even untrained, and he handled such energy recklessly. Compared to Siphon, he was no threat, which was why Siphon took him out with ease. He thought not of questioning the man... Perhaps because he acted on emotion. If Barbullis was, in fact, his uncle-in-law, Siphon enacted on revenge, without thought.
The last time his actions followed this suit, he destroyed half a village... Half his loved ones. Last time, he might as well have destroyed half of his heart. He couldn't allow the other half to be in such danger. Not after he fought so hard against Brezzo, to restore his apathy to a minimum, and his compassion to full blast.
Letting these thoughts give him strength, he pressed on through the darkened woods. Ahead was the same village he destroyed. He knew he had to return there, despite how cryptic Barbullis was. The Unstable who trudged onward without the Unender's help must have meant for him to find the village in the forest. And soon enough, when Siphon followed a small path that forked into two paths, he spotted the old signpost.
One path, straightforward, was labeled “Vivistot.” While the other, pointing East was labeled “Nexius Suites.”
Siphon followed the straight path, deeper into the woods, where the moonlight could not help brighten his destiny.