by Max Jager
Alerius stomped over to Aurela. "What do you mean 'no ship'? We can't get to Wrath Burn without a ship!"
Aurela glided her hand gently on his face. "Don't worry. We can."
Alerius's face showed his confusion. He didn't even bother to hide it. His eyes went from side-to-side wondering how they were going to get to Wrath Burn without a ship.
Rock, Aurela, and Alerius were about to head out of the door when Braxus stopped them. "Well, I don't care how you guys are going outside but I'm taking the easy route."
Suddenly, Braxus fade from sight! He plain out disappeared! Then, in the wall close to the door inside the guard room, Alerius and Rock saw these ripples wave out. Like ripples in a pond.
Alerius blinked his eyes several times wondering what had just happened! Aurela just arrogantly said, "He went through the wall. Show off."
Alerius just looked at her dumbfounded. "What?"
Aurela looked at him with this pale, expressionless face. "He went through the wall. He can move through solid objects and can be invisible for a short period of time."
"Wait a minute! If he can do that, then how did those chains in his cell hold him?"
Aurela still had that strong, indifferent look on her face. "The material may have been man-made but the technology was okren."
"Meaning?"
"Meaning that if he had escaped from the chains and gone through the door; the diamond sensors would have picked it up."
"Why didn't anything go off when we went inside?"
"The diamonds are light sensitive. As long as there was light in the room, the system was not active. That's why it was so dark in there, dear. Darkness keeps the diamond system active."
"Well the system was still active when those two hounds went in to unlock him, wasn't it?"
"No dear, they turned it off for that short period of time, then when they exited, they would have switched it back on if we were not in there. It's the routine they follow around here."
"I think I get it." Alerius was still confused.
He was losing more and more of a grip on the situation. He couldn't stand it either. He felt like a small little kid in a church full of adults during congregation. All these people were talking and doing things that made absolutely no sense to him. Little did he realize it was going to get a lot worse for him.
Aurela, Rock, and Alerius all went out of the guard room and out of the castle. They found Braxus waiting for them near the castle. He was about twenty feet off to the side. The three went over to him.
Braxus looked at them with amusement. "So you decided to take the hard way out." He just rolled his eyes.
Rock again inquired about a spaceship. Aurela again told him they didn't need one, "Do we Braxus."
"You do what you want, whore! I'm taking the shortcut."
Braxus suddenly began to act strangely. He put his arms out and closed his eyes. His hands were wide spread and this strange red glow was emanating from his hands. Then, a strong wind picked up and began to blow furiously. The only one who wasn't really effected by it was Aurela. Both Rock and Alerius were struggling to keep their footing.
Then, in front of Braxus, it seemed that the whole land began to swirl and contort. As if he was turning the land and sky upside down! It was as if he was ripping the planet apart but that was just a small illusion to what was really going on.
What was really going on was that a portal was opening! Braxus was opening a portal to another world! It swirled right into existence making the swirling world and illusion disappear. This red storming portal opened up like an umbrella bigger then Braxus. It was about ten feet high and about the same in width. It was swirling like a red cloud in a vortex. Blue lighting covered all of it and was storming all around it.
Braxus looked back at the three saying, "You better be quick."
He suddenly jumped through it and was out of sight! Alerius and Rock were in utter bewilderment but Aurela just stood looking at the portal with a solemn look on her face. Alerius was about to run right through it when Aurela stopped him. He tried to get at least close but Aurela was holding him back.
"What are you doing Aurela, its going to close!"
Aurela's look did not dissipate nor did she look at Alerius, "I know."
"We've got to go through."
"Trust me."
Alerius looked at her absolutely confused. Suddenly, Braxus's voice came through the portal. "I can't keep it open for very much longer!"
Aurela still held Alerius back. The portal suddenly began to close. It started to get smaller seeming to swirl into itself. Alerius again fought against Aurela but it was no use. She was far too powerful. He wondered what she had in mind but then just as that entered his head; the gusts of wind stopped and the portal was gone!
He threw his hands up into the air and looked at Aurela with disgust. "Great! Now what are we going to do?"
She smiled at him. She walked over to the castle and seemed to be staring at the structure. She raised her hand up and held her middle finger and thumb together. Rock and Alerius were just standing back watching her do all this.
Aurela then snapped her fingers and a powerful force knocked Alerius and Rock to the ground. It was such a great force of power that it felt like they had been driven over by two Mac-trucks! When they regained their composure and stood up they saw an amazing sight!
The castle was gone! Instead was this huge, blue, spiraling vortex! It was just like Braxus's only this one was blue and had covered the entire castle! It was gigantic! It looked like a giant, fallen, blue tornado with lighting in it!
Aurela looked back at Alerius. "You coming dear?"
Alerius and Rock were both frozen with shock. Braxus had to actually concentrate and focus his energy. All Aurela had to do was snap her fingers! Such a huge force had been created by such a little effort of energy from her!
Before, a feat like this would have been impossible. Alerius knew this. It actual sent a chill down his spine of how much Aurela had changed. How much power she had acquired. Not too long ago she could barely lift vehicles with her mind. Now, she could create massive portals to worlds across the span of a galaxy!
Alerius walked up to her with a surprised look on his face. "Why do we need Braxus again?"
She smiled at him and kissed him on the cheek. "Your so sweet." She looked back at her portal. "Come on, I don't think he'll stick around for too long over there."
Alerius looked at her strange. "Over where?"
"Wrath Burn."
Alerius walked up to Aurela's portal and stared at it. He slowly inched his way towards it until, finally, he went through it. He disappeared from sight and Rock never saw him again.
Aurela turned to face Rock. She walked right up to him. "Rock."
He was paying full attention to her.
"I can feel them coming." She was referring to the hellion forces. They were close to invading the city. They were right outside its borders. More and more were coming just outside the city. "Be careful." She then hugged General Rock and Rock returned her grip. She was so grateful for his hospitality towards her and Alerius and she would never forget it.
She waved goodbye and started to head towards the portal. She walked straight through and when she did it closed behind her. It whirled clockwise into itself and disappeared. The castle was visible again and it was almost as if nothing had even happened.
Eva, Rock's wife, was standing just outside the main doors. She had this look of worry on her face. She seemed to be lost. Rock was a little worried about her. He began to walk up to her when this loud explosion rocked the city to its foundations!
Rock looked towards the northern outer rim of the city. A whole war had broken out and several explosions like the one a second ago followed. It was the tanks firing at something.
He ran over to Eva and told her to get inside. She did as she was told. As she hurried inside, at least forty hounds came out armed with rifles. One had a map of the city. That hound rolled it out and him a
nd Rock began to discuss how to defend the city.
Unfortunately, if Alerius and Aurela didn't succeed then all of planet Hogarth would crumble under the crushing weight of the hellion forces. The whole universe, in fact, would be utterly decimated!
Planet Wrath Burn: Stoking The Fires
Alerius watched the whole planet disappear from behind him! He was engulfed by the blue vortex and soon watching this amazing blue portal swirl all around him. It engulfed him and through sections of the swirling blue aura that the vortex was created out of, he could see the passing of stars. He felt like he was standing perfectly still. Like he wasn't even moving but he could tell that he was moving and fast. Probably faster then any ship could ever go. He had no idea if what he was seeing beyond the blue was stars or if it was just some kind of illusion created by the vortex itself.
Suddenly, he saw this light in front of him and it quickly surrounded him. He felt like he was moving now. As if the portal was fading away and was going to leave him in the blackness of space. This white, blinding light surrounded him and he felt this crushing weight of pressure. He closed his eyes and felt his whole body fling forward. He couldn't have stopped if he had wanted to. He suddenly felt like he fell out of the sky and hit a hard rough surface. He tumbled twice and came to a halt on his face.
He opened his eyes and this bright color of red flooded his vision. He felt this hard dirt all over his body as he began to get up. His hands were pinched with slight pain from the craggy surface of this new world.
Alerius stood tall and looked around as that red still plagued him. He was on Wrath Burn! He saw mostly dirt around him that was piled about five foot high around him. He looked around some more and came to a correct conclusion that he was in some sort of trench. He looked down at the ground were he had landed, there was some dirt moved out of place. So, he also concluded that nobody had been down in the trench for a while. At least, the section he was in.
There was also this incredible heat. It felt like a hundred degrees! He immediately started to sweat. He also could smell this horrible stench. It was like when something was burning. Like when you overcook something. Only this was worse. It was ripe in the air and he figured the whole planet had to stink like it. Alerius wasn't too sure what was burning and he figured he didn't want to know.
He could also hear all sorts of noises around him. The most predominate one was this continual blasting. It was so loud that Alerius could feel it rock his eardrums. It reverberated harshly inside his head and seemed to drill into his brain. He could live with it though. After all, he was use to the loud drill of machine guns and the borderline deafening booms of shotguns and grenades.
He knelt down inside the trench and peeked over the short, right mound. He kept his head somewhat down. He only extended it enough to see over the edge. What he saw was nothing short of a postcard moment from Hell itself!
To his immediate left was this huge volcano which was making that loud blasting. It would irrupt every minute or so with a blast of lava. The blasts didn't seem as violent as Earth's volcanoes but it was still an awesome sight. His eyes began to move to the right scanning everything in that direction from the volcano.
The first thing he saw was this rock tube that lead right into the volcano itself and seemed to be connected to the very trench he was in! Then, he saw a whole host of enemy forces. deneks, baragons, and a lot of volcanis. They seemed to be preparing for something. Alerius suspected they were more infantry to be deployed to Hogarth. Then he saw a large ship to their right. It was packed full of troggles. Those huge eyeball, red laser-beam shooting monsters. Alerius hadn't seen those things since Reign. To the right of that was a whole army of baragons. They were being assembled for some kind of deployment. It seemed that the whole of Wrath Burn was being set up for a large scale invasion! Alerius wasn't sure though if it was going to be just to planet Hogarth or if it was a wide spread attack. One thing was for sure, whatever the case, The failure of Flaming on Hogarth and the transformation of Aurela had sent the hellion forces into a full-scale, blitzkrieg, counter-offensive! Alerius assumed this was happening at all the hellion main planets. Not just there on Wrath Burn.
Alerius soon felt this light presence on his shoulder. His first instinct was to turn around and shove the shotgun at whatever this thing was. As he still felt this presence snake its way across his shoulder and across his neck. It soothed him. He couldn't explain it but he knew whatever this thing was, it was no danger to him at all.
He slowly turned around and saw Aurela's face. He was glad to see her. He tried to hide it but he couldn't. He grabbed her by her waist and said, "You're here!"
He had this huge smile on his face and he felt relieved that she was there. He was nervous and a little scarred but that wasn't the reason. He was just happy to see her again. He loved her so much and he was happy that she had made it through the portal safely. He figured it was pretty dumb to feel that way since it was her own portal. He couldn't help it though.
Aurela saw the love in his eyes and caressed his face. "Of course I'm here. You'll never be alone again, Firius. I love you too much." She eased into kiss him on the lips but Alerius's old feelings suddenly kicked in. He turned away from her and said in a very monotone, "We need to find Braxus."
Aurela half expected that reaction from him. She was just hoping for something different from him. She looked off down the trench a little bit to the right. "He's here. He's got a 30 second head start on us. He's down that way." Pointing down the direction she was looking in.
Alerius passed by her and was in a crouched position. The trench provided little cover even with Alerius crouched down about as low as he could go without going prone or sacrificing to much movement. Aurela was right behind him and she was just calmly walking in his direction. Alerius really wasn't paying attention.
He felt death creeping up on him. He had been close to death before but this was ridiculous! He didn't know whether it was the loud explosions from the volcano or the stench that infested his nostrils. Maybe it was just the planet itself. It was so dark and so void of life. On all planets he had been on there was flora and fauna of all kinds. Here though, there was nothing but this red, cracked dirt. It was similar to Traxus but on Traxus there was some indigenous life and the air on that planet was filled with molecules. The air on Wrath Burn was stale and didn't even have a smell except for that pungent burning smell. Alerius thought if there was anything that could be qualified as a dead planet, a zombified entity among the living; this red, cracked, fiery planet was it. This was as close to Hell as anyone could possibly get without being dead!
Soon, the two caught up with Braxus. He was extremely surprised to see them. He figured that they wouldn't be able to get there that fast without going through his own portal. He wondered how they did get there and Aurela answered. "One of our own."
That just made Braxus even more nervous and uneasy about Aurela. He was, indeed, afraid of her. Her mentioning of her own portal did not ease his tension about her either. It only amplified it. It just made him even more scarred of her.
The three continued down the long trench. Each one moving a certain way. Alerius was, of course, keeping his head down. Aurela just walked through the trench without a shred of fear. Braxus was crouched as well but in his own way. He couldn't necessarily crouch like Alerius. He had his whole torso at an angle downward and he stepped very lightly.
The three made it to the rock tunnel that began in the trench and went right into the volcano. All of them snuck past the amassing forces above the trench as they prepared for some kind of mass invasion. Either to Hogarth, maybe to Reign, maybe even a surprise attack on Whitmore, or an all-out universal assault!
As they entered the tunnel, the heat began to really get to Alerius. Aurela and Braxus were fine. Alerius couldn't figure out why but they seemed to not even be feeling the effects of the hot temperature inside the magma mountain. It had to be literality 150 degrees! He felt his stomach start to turn inside out and
he began to get a headache. He knew that a normal human wouldn't be able to take this kind of heat at all. Alerius was quite a bit tougher then a human but even this extreme heat was too much for him. The worse part was the deeper they went into the volcano, the hotter it got. Alerius was handling it as best as he could. Soon, it was up to about 200 as they entered one of the first rock chambers of the volcano.
Planet Wrath Burn: Chamber 1
This rock chamber was the lowest level. It was like the floor of the volcano. Braxus started to give a brief history on the chamber and the volcano itself. "Ah, Tendril's Tomb. A lot of mass assaults on the galaxies have been staged right here."
Alerius was breathing heavily. He was trying to keep his consciousness. "Where are we?"
"We're right where we're suppose to be. Kano Mountain. This is where The Flaming Meteorite is hiding. Only he's on the fourth floor. We're on the first right now."
