by A A Warren
She was standing a few yards away from him. Her back was to him, and she was looking out over the endless, desolate terrain.
“Another vision?” he asked.
The wind whipped through her long, blue hair, and she brushed it back from her face as she turned to look at him. She nodded. “Yes. There are things I didn’t show you before. Things too painful for me to face.”
“Like the fact that Sartarus was your husband?” he snarled. “Zobo insisted Prince Lucian has a spy in his ranks.”
She stared at him with a blank expression on her face. She blinked. “Do you believe I am the traitor?”
Talon glared at her a moment, then sighed. “No. I know you are not. But you should have told us.”
She stepped closer to him. Reaching out, she touched the side of his face. “You’re right. Please, join me now. There’s not much time… soon, I will be too far away and our bond may be severed. Let me show you the truth while I still can.”
He nodded. His eye pulsed with a crimson glow. The air rippled around them. Once again, the visions took hold, and he felt himself plunging down the glowing blue tunnels of her eyes.
With a sudden blur, they emerged in another vision, stepping out into a cloudy, smoky landscape. Talon saw more ruins in the distance. Plumes of smoke drifted up from crumbling towers and piles of rubble, tinting the sun’s rays overheard, and painting the sky in streaks of crimson and orange.
“Where are we now?” Talon asked, shielding his eyes from the glare overhead.
Salena knelt down and lifted a handful of rocky soil. She stared at the trails of ash and sand as they flowed between her fingers.
“Lyko was right about one thing. Since the fall of the Star Cross Throne, this galaxy has been beset with one war after another. Even General Kyr’s current border conflicts are insignificant compared to the destruction unleashed in the first Great War. My home world was not the only planet that suffered devastation.”
Talon squinted at a crumbling building in the distance. Its shattered dome reflected the light from the burning skies above. A torn, charred banner drifted in the breeze. He narrowed his eyes, as the symbol on the flag fluttered into view.
“The Tygon Family crest. This is Tal Adar, the capital world of the Dominion.”
“Yes.” She stood up and put her hand on his shoulder. “This is Lyko’s homeward. He was a Dominion general then. Lyko arranged for myself and thousand of refugees to escape here, after our world was destroyed. He was good man, once.”
“Is that why you brought me here?” Talon grunted. “To show me Sartarus’ past?”
“No,” she said. “Not Sartarus. This is my past. Look.”
She tugged at his shoulder. He turned around.
Behind them, a low plain stretched off toward the falling horizon of night. Shadowy hills rose in the distance. Tiny dots of light cast a soft glow over the ground. The sea of light flowed into the hills like a second sky full of stars, mirroring those that would soon shine above.
“What is this?” Talon asked.
She took his hand. “Walk with me.”
They stepped out into the field of lights. As they moved closer, he realized the glowing dots were tiny crystals, mounted to metal pikes stuck in the ground. Other men and women walked alongside them, like shadows in the dim light of the falling suns. Talon heard distant cries in the darkness. Sobs echoed through the still air of dusk. Every so often, the other figures would stop, and pause before one of the crystal-topped spires. They waved their hands over the glowing light. A hologram flickered to life, glowing in the partial darkness. Images of men, women… children. The figures knelt, and placed tiny bundles on the ground beneath the glowing images. Food, flowers, shiny trinkets…
“Death offerings,” Talon said, his voice low and quiet. “This is a graveyard.”
“In the last days of the war the enemy struck here, in the capital. A last-ditch attack. It failed. But it snuffed out millions of lives.”
Something about her voice seemed strange, indistinct… like a distant echo in a vast room. Talon glanced over at her… her body seemed to shimmer and glow. She was translucent, like a holo-projection, and he could see the brightest pinpoints of light through her ghostly form.
“Salena…”
She smiled at the note of concern in his voice. “Do not fear, my warrior. This is only a vision, a memory. Nothing can harm either of us here. It is merely the distance growing between us. As I said, our time is short. But we don't have much farther to go.”
They walked another few meters, and stopped before a pair of the glowing spires, placed only a couple feet apart. Two flower wreaths, their blossoms dried and withered, lay before them on the dusty ground. She stopped. She reached out as if to touch the crystals, as the other figures were doing. But she paused halfway. Her slim, lavender fingers hung suspended in midair, as if frozen.
“This… This is where it all began for me. Or perhaps where it all ended.”
“You lost someone,” Talon said. It was not a question.
Salena choked back a sob, and gave him a quick, tiny nod. “We lost everything.”
She took a deep breath. Then she reached forward the rest of the way, moving her fingers over the crystals, so close she almost touched their glowing surfaces. Two figures flickered to life, hovering in the air before them.
Talon saw a boy and a girl. Their skin was a shade lighter than Salena’s, and their eyes did not glow as hers did. They were laughing, smiling. The girl raised her hand, as if waving. The boy threw his arms around the girl in an awkward embrace. He kissed her cheek. Then the action repeated… the glowing figures were a loop, playing out the same tender motions over and over, for infinity.
Talon shook his head. “Your children. And the father… Sartarus?”
She nodded. “He thought we would be safe here. That the capital’s defenses would protect us. When the bombs fell… it took fourteen days. Fourteen days to find the bodies. All that time, not knowing if they were trapped, hurt… or something worse.”
Talon kicked at the dirt, and stared at the dried, shriveled wreaths. He didn't know what to say, or how to comfort her. A lifetime of battle and bloodshed in the arena had not prepared him for this.
“I… I’m sorry, Salena,” he stammered. “They were lucky to have you.”
“Perhaps,” she said, her voice a hoarse whisper. “Over the years, I’ve grown to accept it. To cherish their memory. But I remember the pain, the anger. I was lost. Grief consumed me, and I refused to let go.”
She waved her fingers back over the crystals. The holograms flickered and vanished. The shimmering blue light surrounded them once again.
“Come. There is more I must show you.”
Talon blinked. The scenery had changed. Hovering glow spheres flickered overhead, replacing the burning sunset and darkened fields. He and Salena stood hidden behind a row of tall ivory columns. The pillars ran along the walls of the circular room, and cast long shadows across the floor of the domed temple.
He glanced to his left. A series of life-like statues lined the walls behind the columns. He tensed, remembering the living monoliths that had attacked them in the jungle temple. But these figures remained frozen and lifeless, as the drifting lights above shifted over their carved faces.
Whispered chanting filled the air… a womanly voice called from beyond the barrier of shadows. Her words seemed to echo and repeat, slithering through the void like the razor-tipped tongue of a serpent.
The language was ancient, and the sound of it was unnerving. It grated on Talon’s ears, filling his chest with a cold, clammy welling of dread. He reached for the hilt of his axe, but it was not there… glancing down at his harness, he realized he had no weapons of any kind.
“That voice,” he whispered. “Who is it?”
Salena glanced out from behind the columns, her eyes glowing faintly in the darkness. She blinked and bit her lip. A sad smile crossed her lips.
“See for yourself,�
�� she said.
She stepped out from behind the column. Her sandals clicked across the stone tiles of the floor. Talon grit his teeth and followed her. They stepped into the shadows, moving closer to the chanting voice. Ahead of them, the hazy light from the glow spheres revealed a slim, petite figure, kneeling before a pool of water. Talon saw dark blue highlights in the woman’s long, inky hair. As she continued chanting, she raised her arms, and glowing mystic symbols swirled around her fingers, reflecting in the rippling water of the pool.
Talon sucked in a breath.
“That woman… it’s you!”
“I told you my people naturally wield dark energy,” she said, her eyes locked on the kneeling figure before them. “But it wasn’t enough. I pushed myself further. I inhaled the dust of the fire orchid, I sipped the blood of the ancient seers… I tried everything. I did anything I could to increase my power.”
The symbols swirling around the kneeling figure shifted and warped. They burned with even greater intensity, as the color shifted from a pale blue to crimson. The kneeling woman looked up… her eyes were wide, and shimmering with the same blood-red fire. Her lips parted in a triumphant smile.
Above the water, a vortex of energy swirled through the air. As it spun faster and faster it formed a cone of ruby-red beams. Talon squinted… he saw shapes, movement, within the crimson void.
“Those beams… like on the train,” he hissed.
Salena nodded. “I sought to pierce the veil of death itself. But instead, I found something else.”
Two tiny figures emerged from the glowing prism of energy. The stepped forward with outstretched arms, their footsteps causing tiny splashes in the dark waters of the pool. Their youthful faces beamed, and their eyes glowed with intense blue light.
“Alain… Savisa. By the gods, seeing them again, even now…” Salena clutched Talon’s shoulder, and he felt her nails dig into his flesh. Her body slumped against him, and for a moment he thought she might faint to the floor. He wrapped an arm around her waist, supporting her weight. She steadied herself, and took a tentative step forward. Talon squinted, as he saw something else emerging from the shimmering of light. Glistening tendrils of slithering, pink flesh flopped into the water, and snaked towards the prostate woman.
He watched as she stood up, and reached out her arms to the glowing children. The tendrils snaked around their feet, cutting a trail through the rippling black water. They drew nearer to the woman, but she appeared oblivious, staring only at the frolicking children splashing towards her.
“She doesn’t see…” Talon hissed. “Those tentacles, moving towards her… towards you!”
“Daizon,” Salena said in a cold, quiet voice. “My dark energy breached the walls of its prison. I was exposed to its deception. It was more than a simple illusion, or trick… Daizon feeds on your heart’s desires. Reality itself is warped within its presence. All I could see were my children, inches from my grasp. They felt so real. Even now, I remember the sound of their laughter that night, the touch of their hair against my skin.”
Salena choked back another sob, as the woman before them grabbed the ghostly children, and embraced them. From the corner of his eye, Talon saw a single tear flow down her cheek.
Before them, the tentacles surfaced from the water and curled through the air, hovering centimeters from the woman’s lavender flesh. They circled around her, darting just above her skin, not quite touching. One dipped lower, and the razor-tipped barb at the end caressed her hair with the gentle touch of a lover.
The woman’s eyes shot open. She turned to face the tentacle swaying beside her. Talon saw her features contort into a mask of horror. She screamed out, holding the children tighter to her breast. The tentacle reared back like a cobra, and a bubbling hiss arose from the pool.
The woman screamed out a single phrase in her ancient chanting tongue. The crimson portal shrank to a pinpoint of light, and shot beneath the surface of the pool. The closing walls of energy severed the tentacle, and it struck the floor with a wet slap. The woman’s eyes returned to normal. The room was once again dim. She looked at her open arms… they were empty.
The children had vanished.
She collapsed on the floor, sobbing. A guttural wail of pain rose from her shaking body.
“You saw through the creature’s deception,” Talon said.
“It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. Even then, knowing the creature had manipulated my mind, my very soul… I still longed to speak the words again. To re-open the portal. To see them one last time.”
“But you were strong, you resisted.”
She glanced to their right. “Barely. But it matters not. The damage was already done…”
Talon followed her gaze. Another figure had entered the chamber. A man, wearing a black cloak over the crimson armor of the Tygon Dominion. He hid behind a column as they did, watching the horrific display. In the dim light of a hovering sphere, Talon could only see half the man’s face… the rest was cloaked in shadow.
Whoever he was, he was young and handsome. Long, brown hair framed a chiseled jaw and tan skin. His mouth gaped as he watched the monstrous severed tentacle writhe and thrash on the floor. He grabbed his pulse pistol, as his eyes opened wide with horror.
His eyes…
Talon watched as the man leant further around the column. The shadow fell away, and he could see the man’s eyes clearly. They were a brilliant sapphire blue. Their twitching stare drank in the image of the sobbing woman with maniacal fascination.
“Sartarus!” Talon bellowed. He lunged toward the armored man, his fingers outstretched in a strangling grip.
Before he could reach the man in the crimson armor, the swirling blue light engulfed him once again. He roared in fury, as he felt himself tumbling down into the infinite glowing spiral.
His stomach lurched as he dropped into another reality.
Images coalesced before him, as the glowing light receded from his vision. He was peering though a curved panel of glass. In the distance, he saw the jagged rock walls of a dark cave.
“Salena!” He spun his head, turned his gaze left and right… he was alone, trapped in a slim metal tube. His blood boiled, and perspiration dotted his face. The rage he had felt in Bakala returned. The cavern was shaking, vibrating. Rocks fell from the dark shadows overhead, and pelted the tiny window.
“You are not alone, Talon.” He heard the echoing whisper of her voice inside his head, as if she were part of a dream. “I am here, but the distance between us is vast. Soon, our bond will be severed. You can no longer see me, but we can share one last vision.”
“Where am I?” he shouted.
“This is your past, Talon. Fragments of your lost memories. You shared them with me before, when we first met.”
“Enough of this sorcery! You heard Ikari… I am not the one you seek! Release me from this delusion!”
“I am not the one who has brought us here. I shared the pain of my memories with you… now you are doing the same for me.”
“Salena, I swear I—” Before he could finish his words, a woman came into view, leaning over the window of the tube. She was dressed in a white robe sand silver armor, and her green eyes were damp with tears. Her fingers touched the glass, as another wave of vibrations shook the chamber. Her lips formed frantic words, but Talon could not make them out through the thick glass.
“I did not see this before,” Salena said. “Your mind locked this memory away, like a puzzle box.”
“I do not know… I don’t remember…”
“You must remember, Talon, otherwise, I could not be here now. She is calling to you. What is she saying?”
The woman looked up. She yanked her hand away, as a larger chunk of rock crashed against the viewing panel of the life pod.
“Mother,” Talon whispered. And in that instant, a flood of memories rushed though his mind, drowning his rage and anger. The years of training, the endless preparation. Destiny's heavy burden, weighing down upo
n his young soul.
The woman turned back, and once again pressed her splayed fingers against the clear panel. Talon reached up, and touched the panel as well, matching the position of her fingers.”
“She is my mother,” he said, his voice a hoarse whisper. “She and my father trained me, prepared me. I, and others like me. We were sealed in life pods, protected from the final battle. Hidden away, so we could rise again should Daizon ever return.”
The woman kept speaking, her mouth forming silent words as the cavern shook and rattled behind her.
“She’s calling to you, Talon. What is she saying?”
Suddenly, a tremendous fragment of rock slammed into the life pod, smashing the woman to the ground. Talon's fists battered the panel, but there was nothing he could do. It refused to break, no matter how hard he pounded against it. The woman’s hand reached up, and smeared a trail of blood across the window. Then her pale fingers fell out of view, as an avalanche of rocks fell down from above.
The pod was buried beneath the falling debris. The light outside slowly faded from the window, replaced with the crushing black depths of darkness.
“What is she saying Talon? Jut listen…”
He heard her voice, calling out to him from behind the curtain of shadows.
He heard, and understood.
“My name,” he said. He grit his teeth, and closed his eyes. “My mother is calling my name.”
What is your name? Can you hear me, Talon? Listen to her. What is your name? Just listen…
He opened his eyes.
“Ikari!” he shouted. “Do you hear me, Guardian? Do you know my thoughts? I see my past now. Look into my mind’s eye, and you will know my name. And know this as well… I am the last Claw of R’Kur!”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Talon stood engulfed in white light. The darkness, the feeling of helpless rage, was but a lingering memory, like a dream half-remembered upon awakening. A woman moved towards him, slowly emerging from the wall of light. Her image grew clearer, until she stood before him, solid flesh and blood.
