Edge of Chaos

by Des Pensable

  Obphiscon looked and then quickly said.

  ‘I’m extremely sorry for invading your privacy, My Lord. How may I help you?’

  ‘I came here to find out what happened to the dragons.’ replied Qin a little curious as to why the orb had so quickly changed its attitude.

  ‘They are alive in a manner but they are trapped by some powerful magical effect.’

  ‘How long have they been here?’ asked Qin quite surprised.

  ‘For 155 Astarian years or 342 Crystalhaven years.’ said the orb.

  ’Ever since they were captured by a very powerful Newman and placed here to serve his will.’

  ‘Have you tried to wake them?’.

  ‘Of course! Over the years I have tried everything that I could think of.’

  ‘What about that pyramid in the centre of the room what does that do?’ asked Qin.

  ‘What pyramid?’ asked the orb.

  ‘Ah. Now I understand. They are being controlled from the other side.’

  ‘What other side?’ asked the orb.

  ‘You cannot see it but there is a purple crystal pyramid in the centre of the room. I believe it is located in the realm of the spirits but somehow fixed so that it remains in this room. The dragons are being controlled by messages from the pyramid.’ said Qin.

  ‘That sounds incredible, My Lord. While I don’t disbelieve you, I would value some physical proof for my records, My Lord.’ replied the orb.

  ‘I can show you if we leave this arena.’ replied Qin.

  ‘Perhaps later My Lord. I have many questions that you might help me with.’ said the orb.

  ‘Qin, the gateway has just opened and Ignatius has charged in. There is trouble on Astaria’ yelled Qan.

  ‘I’m sorry Obphiscon I’ll have to go. Qan we need a pure heart to eliminate this arena.’ said Qin.

  Moments later the mind arena evaporated and Aquitain headed off to talk to Ignatius.

  ‘What’s happening?’ asked Qin urgently.

  Ignatius was standing in his Newman form looking around.

  ‘By the powers, this looks exactly like I remember it hundreds of years ago.’

  ‘Protect your mind.’ yelled Qin but it was too late. He saw Ignatius’s eyes glaze over.

  ‘I’m sorry Obphiscon but I have to go and I need Ignatius at the moment.’ said Qin and had Qan change to their big green rocky half dragon body form, which grabbed Ignatius bodily and ran off through the gateway. Ten paces on the other side of the gate Qin put Ignatius down and waited for his eyes to clear. When they did clear he pointed behind Aquitain. Hovering there was a silvery orb about two arm spans in diameter.

  ‘I still have questions My Lord.’ said Obphiscon using mindspeak.

  Qin dropped the pure heart protection and quickly slammed a mind arena on the orb then through their mindlink said to Qan.

  ‘I’ll keep the orb busy. Can you talk to Ignatius and Astaria and find out what’s happening.’

  ‘Okay.’ said Qan. ‘Leave it to me.’

  Suddenly the gateway closed.

  ‘What’s happening, Ignatius?’

  ‘What have you done to that thing.’ said Ignatius pointing at the orb.

  ‘I’ve used half my mind to side track it while I find out what’s happening. Now tell me why did you come through the gateway? You said before it would be too dangerous for you.’

  ‘I had no choice.’ said Ignatius.

  ’Something very powerful dominated my mind and said I was to go through the gate and get you to return quickly.’

  ‘By the Powers, I hope Adonis hasn’t got in here.’ replied Qan.

  ‘Qin, we have to leave this pathway. Your arena will disappear when we do. Obphiscon will be left trapped in pathway five. Tell him it’s an emergency. He will be safe. We’ll get back to him as soon as possible.’

  Qan changed form to their Zenostruct form and floated down to the hatchway at the other end of pathway five, opened it. Ignatius bolted to the gateway at the end of the corridor and vanished.

  ‘Gatekeeper. Thank you for returning so quickly. Many lizard creatures came through pathway one and teleported into the village area. They are fighting the people there. The control room is sealed off with some type of magic, which I cannot penetrate. What shall we do?’

  ‘By the Powers, the Yith couldn’t wait. What do they know that we don’t or are these a part of the hostile faction.’ said Qin to Qan.

  ’You handle the urgent stuff and I’ll try and figure out what’s going on.’

  ‘Astaria, first seal all gateways then teleport all the lizard invaders, and then all the uninjured Mentarin to the maze in Pathway Two. That area is sealed against magical escape. They can fight and wipe each other out there if they wish without affecting us.’

  ‘Gatekeeper, people have entered Pathway Three from the Mentarin end.’ said Astaria.

  ‘I asked you to close all gates.’ replied Qin.

  ‘I did.’ said Astaria, ‘but whoever’s in the control room has re-opened some of them manually.’

  ‘Damn.’ replied Qin. ‘We better fix that next.’

  ‘It’s a trap!’ said Qan suddenly. ‘We’ve fallen into a trap.’

  ‘Of course it’s a trap.’ replied Qin.

  ‘Everyone knows that we’re here, so they’re coming to get us.’

  ‘You keep trying to work out what the trap is supposed to achieve and I’ll try to recapture our control room.’

  Chapter 38 It’s All in the Mind

  Miranlla teleported to the southern gateway hoping that she could get in to be with Aquitain.

  She appeared about a hundred paces from the keep housing and protecting the Southern Gateway and she saw Rory sitting by a fire just outside the keep. She ran to him.

  ‘Rory, what are you doing here?’

  He jumped up on seeing her.

  ‘Lady Miranda, I’m being very happy to be seeing you. I am trying to be talking to the Lord Spirit Bear but he is not hearing me at the moment.’ he replied.

  ‘I have changed my name to Miranlla, Rori.’

  ‘That is being sounding like a spider name.’ he said thoughtfully.

  ‘It does, doesn’t it. Now what is your problem?’ she asked.

  ‘Kami, is being very worried that the spirits being called to the Great Council will be fighting and not be giving the little people any help. He was asking me to be asking the Spirit Lord Aquitain to be helping us.’

  ‘I am afraid of that too.’ replied Miranlla.

  ‘You are knowing of the problem?’ asked Rori a bit surprised.

  ‘Err … yes Rori. I have just found out what happened at the last Great Council. It may well happen again. I will try to help but if Aquitain is not watching the gateway then he will not know that we are here.’

  ‘The Spirit Lord was telling me that if ever I was needing his help that I should be sending a message to him using the spirits of the dead.’

  ‘Have you sent a message to him?’

  ‘I have been sending two messages to him but he has not been answering me yet Lady Miranlla.’ replied Rori.

  ‘Then we shall send another to him from me.’

  ‘Call on your spirits of the dead and I will send a message with yours.’

  Rori was pleased. He ran off and came back with an armful of deadwood and placed it on his small fire. As it began to catch alight he withdrew some ingredients from a pouch at his side and he began to chant and sprinkle the ingredients on the fire.

  The fire flared up a bright green colour then became black in its centre. He kept chanting and then suddenly said to Miranlla. ‘Tell the dead what you are wishing to be saying.’

  ‘Aquitain my love, this is Miranda. I have important news. I am outside the Mudrun gateway. Open it and let me in.’

  Rori kept chanting for another half minute thanking the dead then stopped.

  ‘The spirits have been telling me that they will be delivering the message. We must now be waiting.’

 
; ‘Good. I shall meditate.’ replied Miranlla and adopted the position and closed her eyes for prayer.

  Qan suddenly said to Qin. ‘We have received two sendings from Rori which we have ignored as we’re busy but we just received one from Miranda that may be important.’ and he passed the message on to Qin.

  ‘Sounds like we better talk to her.’ replied Qin.

  ‘However, we had better capture the control room first.’

  ‘Astaria can you create a small room as close to the control room wall as possible and move me into it?’ asked Qin.

  A few seconds later Astaria reported that it had moved all the lizards and the other Newman into the maze except for one big lizard that blocked any attempt to move it.

  ‘That will be the leader, quite possible Adonis. You can bet he wants to get even for us kicking him out of the Crin meeting’ said Qin.

  ‘Put up solid rock walls around him and move him by moving the chamber that he’s trapped in, to the edge of Astaria and dump him outside.’

  ‘I don’t understand what you want me to do.’ replied Astaria in a panicky voice.

  ‘I’m not used to doing so many things so quickly and I never want to hurt anyone. If I dump him outside he might die.’

  ‘Okay, okay, don’t worry. We’ll do things one at a time. Let’s make the room next to the control room our top priority and move me there.’

  Twenty seconds later Qan in control of their Zenostruct body was in a small room beside the darkened control room. He formed a hand and pressed it forward finding the wall of force he expected. He knew how to pass a wall of force now. If he changed to a Rock elemental he could adjust their phasing field to pass through it but was hesitant. Ignatius had shown him how to do this. Was it part of the trap? He asked Qin but he didn’t know so he pressed on.

  He changed form to a small Rock elemental and realized they could see into the room using their elemental vision. They saw a small form like a gnome and a rectangular object, probably the book, hovering in the room. They could also see the faint shimmer of a force dome occupying most of the floor space within the room. He aligned his phasing field with the force wall and passed through it then reformed their Zenostruct body with a set of eyes and created light.

  The book was hovering over the view panel apparently watching what was happening in one of the areas. Asterix was standing rigidly in front of the control panels with eyes glazed presumably ready to open the gateways should Astaria close them. The gateway to Mudrun in Pathway One was closed but both gateways to Moonmist in Pathway Three were open.

  ‘What are you doing?’ asked Qin.

  ‘How did you get here?’ said the book. ‘He promised me you couldn’t get in.’

  ‘Who promised you?’ asked Qin.

  The book didn’t answer; both it and Asterix fell to floor unconscious.

  ‘Damn. I hate it when they do that.’ said Qin to Qan as they went to the control panel and opened the gateway to Mudrun closely followed by closing the gateway to Moonmist at the Mentarin end.

  They went to the control panel and looked outside gateway one and saw Miranlla meditating and Rori sitting by a small fire.

  They teleported to the gateway portal and stepped through. The Keep was empty so they raced out the front door and yelled for Miranlla and Rori to come quickly. Rori shook Miranlla until she came out of her meditation and told her the Spirit Lord wanted her to come. She jumped up, quenched the small fire and together with Rori they ran into the keep and through to the gateway where Aquitain was standing. Qin asked them to hold his hands, they stepped through the gateway and he immediately teleported them to the control centre.

  ‘Things are a bit precarious here at the moment. We have a dragon running around in the town centre destroying everything in sight and Mentarin fighting Yith in pathway 3 but other than that everything seems under control.’ said Qin with a smile.

  ‘Which one of you am I talking to.’ she asked.

  ‘Both of us at the moment.’ replied Qin but I’ll fix that and moments later they were in a mind arena. Miranlla looked around. She recognized it immediately as her gully on Mudrun. She was in the flat area near the stream that ran through the middle. Mist swirled around her feet and she felt the moist air against her skin. It was the late afternoon and the light was muted. The ground felt substantial under her feet but there was no grass there and the ground was rock.

  Two identical green muscular rock monsters that she recognized from the land of the dreams stood opposite Miranlla and she stood there in all her glory as an adult female Llanllean spider.

  ‘Most impressive!’ said Qin.

  ‘What is happening ? What did you do? Where am I? she asked.

  ‘Remember when we came into the control room in Astaria and had the fight with the book. Well it showed me how to do two things that are really useful. The first was how to create what’s called a mind arena. Your mind is in one now with us.’

  ‘I’ve just come from a council meeting where a lot of interesting things were revealed.’ she stated.

  ‘Granddad has unlocked some of his sealed memory and told us about your birth. He told us that you were born in your memcrystal Alpha and that one of the two dragons spirits in there was your father but he wasn’t sure which one. He told us that one of you is Aquitain and the other is his father’s avatar. Which of you is which?’

  ‘My avatar guardian is gone said Qin. We’re both Aquitain at the moment.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ she asked confused.

  ‘Let’s re-join.’ said Qin to Qan and they both formed bodies like oozes and merged reforming as the green crystal form.

  ‘Is this better?’ He asked.

  The second useful thing I learned from the book was how to split my mind into two. It’s been useful to control this Zenostruct body so that it doesn’t explode into a cloud of mist.

  ‘Doesn’t it get confusing?’ she asked a little puzzled.

  ‘Well it was at first but we’ve learned how to work as a team. Now tell me everything that you learnt at the council meeting.’

  ‘It looks so real in here. Where exactly are we?’ She asked.

  ‘We’re in your mind. We’re using your memory of your home gully as a meeting place. You can change the look of it if you like.’

  ‘It looks and feels a little like my home gully but … it’s not.’ she replied.

  ‘I don’t know it well enough to fill out the detail. You can do that if you wish.’ replied Aquitain.

  Suddenly it was bright daylight. There was grass underfoot and a myriad of flowers appeared. The stream appeared and its happy sound echoed across the gully.

  ‘This is how it should be.’ she said and she changed her form to that of a little girl and walked over and sat by the edge of the stream and dipped one foot in the water. ‘It … it feels so real.’

  ‘It is as real as you want it to be my love.’ replied Aquitain and he changed his form to that of a small boy and came and sat beside her.

  ‘But … how?’ she asked.

  ‘It’s something new I’ve learnt. Here we can be together regardless of what we look like in the real world.’ And her took hold of her hand.

  ‘I can feel you!’ she said ‘It’s like … you’re really here.’

  ‘Yes and I can feel you too. This is our world just for you and me. We can be anywhere and be anything and do what we want to. It’s like being in a dream but we make it real. Let me show you.’ And he changed to a bear on a secluded sandy beach and went running around roaring.

  The beach changed again. This time it was the place Miranda remembered in her dream and she changed to a female bear form and took off after him.

  ‘It’s true. We are free and we can be together at last!’ she yelled and then a thought came to her.

  She stopped running and turned into her female Newman form. She changed the scenery and she was outside a small cottage in the woods with a flower garden in the front and herb gardens on the sides.

 
Aquitain stopped in a paddock nearby wondering what she was doing. There were fruit trees with small birds flying among them. She picked a flower and breathed in its perfume.

  ‘Yes, this is my dream.’ she thought to herself.

  ‘We are in my dream the time I was overcome with magic narcosis. This is what I planned for us, until you lured me out with your passion flower.’ she shouted.

  She entered the cottage and saw the wonderful delicious meal she had prepared for Aquitain. The wooden table was set with the rainbow hued spider web tablecloth, the golden dishes and cutlery, the diamond crystal glasses of pale yellow mead. She glanced at the adjacent room and saw her bed, their bed and smiled.

  She clothed herself in the golden gown that he had made for her out of mind clay after their first adventure together and placed on her head a pure ruby tiara fashioned in the shape of a heart at the front. Inside the heart was a miniature copy of their passionflower beating in rhythm with her heart. She went to the door, opened it and called out to Aquitain.

  ‘Come my love, dinner’s ready.’ And closed the door and stood waiting apprehensively as she had done in her dream before.

  A few seconds later Aquitain stood outside the door in his Newman form, he clothed himself in a verdant silken gown, woven with images of creatures in gold thread and encrusted with gems in the style of a king that he had once seen in a book. The images were of a Newman, a Logicon, a bear, a little crystal figure, a cloud of mist with eyes and a big green stony monster and on his head he crafted a crown of emerald with the shape of a heart at its front. Inside the heart was a miniature version of the passionflower beating in rhythm with his heart.

  In his hand he held the real passionflower and its erotic aroma wafted through the cracks in the door and her mind reeled with its hypnotic effect.

  He knocked on the door. Tap, Tap, Tap. Her heart began to beat faster.

  ‘Come in my love, it’s unlocked.’

  He opened the door and was stunned by her beauty and she his beauty.

  ‘Here is the token of our love.’