Aeon Legion: Labyrinth

by Beaubien, J. P.

An optio brought Terra a short sword for which she felt thankful. A few of the others received larger more unwieldy blades to fix. Terra inspected the blade.

  The dull gray color contrasted with the pearl white or silver she had seen the other legionnaires carry. The blade was straight save for the small angular sections cut out of the middle edge and the tip was tapered. A fuller lay in the middle of the blade and panel seams made it distinct from ancient swords. The segmented grip and cylindrical blue ringed pummel made it appear as something that came from a factory rather than a forge.

  Terra thought it strange to look at up close. An ancient tool of war, thought dead in her time, now stood as the primary weapon of the far future. It seemed to fit Saturn City which itself stood on the Edge of Time where all things past and future merged in strange ways.

  Terra opened the clip housing. There was no clip inside and the housing area was dirty. She sat at a nearby table after gathering the tools the optios had laid out and went to work. Although she knew little of the aeon edge's technical details, she had watched Zaid when he showed Hikari how to fix her own blade. Hikari had learned how to care for the blade annoyingly fast. Terra took careful notes while they worked, and had already spent extra time in the strategy study learning about an aeon edge.

  Others hesitated to reach inside the strange inner workings of the aeon edge. Terra did not. Within moments, the timecore lay on the table with its the glass face cleaned. She then took out the burst trigger before removing the stasis cell clip housing. Soon she had the entire blade gutted, cleaned, and ready to put back together. As Terra stopped to wipe her brow, she looked up to see Roland. He sauntered around, brandishing his blade while talking with others. She ignored him.

  Roland wandered by several tables, chatting and telling stories. Terra wondered how he cleaned his blade so fast while still finding time to bluster. After a moment he moved to a small fountain to get himself a drink of water, but paused when he saw Terra.

  “You are still here?” he asked, raising an eyebrow.

  Terra looked up, wiping the sweat and grim on her forehead. Dirt lodged in the upper edge projector had soiled her hands. “Yes,” Terra said in a curt tone before turning back to her work.

  Roland grinned. “Well good. I had hoped, for lack of other hobbies, to continue our wonderful conversation. You are so charming with your words after all.”

  Terra's jaw muscles twitched while she worked. She struggled to bite back a response knowing that Roland was baiting her. He wouldn't make her mad again.

  Roland flourished the clean sword. “Not going to inquire as to how I cleaned my blade so quickly?”

  Terra stopped and looked at Roland. “You didn't clean it. You cheated somehow. Again. Who did you steal it from this time?”

  Roland put his hand on his chest in a mock wounded gesture. “Steal? Never. I am a knight of honor after all. No I exchanged it. There is a rack of perfectly clean swords right over there. I simply waited until no one was watching and switched them out. I can't believe no one else thought of it.”

  “Good for you then,” Terra said, trying in vain to not sound irritated. She relaxed a little when Roland offered no response. She then looked up to see Roland staring at her, his normal flippant expression gone. He gazed at Terra with those deep blue eyes. She felt unnerved by his gaze, like staring into the dark depths of the ocean without knowing what lurked underneath the high waves.

  “Why are you here?” Roland asked in a direct tone.

  Terra paused, taken aback by the candid question. “Why do you care?”

  Roland shrugged. “No real reason. Just curious. I had assumed you would be quickly eliminated and I don't like being proven wrong.”

  “I am here because I want to be heroine, unlike you who just wants to keep his stupid immortality. At least I still have my idealism.”

  Roland chuckled, his playful demeanor returning. “Idealism? If I had any of that left, I would be dead.”

  Terra's knuckles turned white on the part she held. “You can't be a real knight. You are some kind of con artist. You probably just got lucky with that sword the first day.”

  “Con artist? That is the first any have ever accused me of art,” he said, smiling. He walked over to the fountain before splashing water on his face. He then moved to an open area. Others watched as Roland assumed a fighting pose, aeon edge in hand as though to strike. After a moment of silence, he practiced with the sword. Everyone stopped to watch.

  Terra wasn't sure if Roland was a con artist, but Roland was an artist of sorts. His blade strokes flowed into each attack with a fluid speed that Terra's eyes couldn't follow. Each stroke of his sword seemed to have the power of a wave crashing over a rocky shore. He was a storm at sea. The poetry of his swordsmanship made Terra's awe grow with her hatred of him. Roland didn't deserve to be that good.

  As Roland finished the final stroke of his blade, Centurion Isra returned. Roland weaved the last stoke into a smooth motion that ended with his hand opening the stasis cell housing. He peered inside as though he had held this pose the entire time.

  “You were not practicing with the sword were you?” Isra asked, holding out her hand for the blade.

  Terra smiled. Finally, she thought. He's about to get busted.

  Roland handed the blade to Isra. “Just getting a better angle to look inside.”

  Isra took the blade and inspected it. “Good job, tiro. Two points. I seldom see a blade cleaned this well.”

  Roland smiled as Isra moved to the next person.

  Terra scowled, but didn't have time to dwell. She finished reassembling her aeon edge just as Isra arrived.

  Isra took the blade and thoroughly inspected it. Finally, she looked at Terra. “You are not very good at this are you?”

  Terra pursed her lips. “At least I tried to clean my blade, centurion. Roland just swapped his dirty blade for a clean one when no one was looking.”

  “Did he now? Are you so eager to betray one of your own?”

  “Centurion? He broke the rules.”

  Isra turned her gaze back to the blade. “I never said they were forbidden to do so. Attention to detail, tiro. If you have an issue with this tiro, then settle it with a Trial of Blades. Don't involve me in your personal feud.”

  Isra moved off after leaving Terra with instructions to fix the areas she had missed. Thankfully she did not lose a point, but had again lost her temper. Terra could weather Hikari's insults, Alya could test Terra's patience, but only Roland could make her angry with minimal effort.

  After Isra visited every tiro, murmurs rose of wishing to practice with the blades. Terra suspected Roland's little performance had something to do with that.

  Isra faced the group. “Not today. No sparring yet. Not until everyone has finished the safety qualifiers.”

  There was a collective sigh.

  “Safety?” asked a tiro in an irritated tone. “It's a sword. We don't need safety lessons for it.”

  Isra turned to the tiro. “Thank you for volunteering, tiro. Please step forward.”

  The tiro turned pale, but stepped forward.

  Isra took an aeon edge from the weapon rack. She pointed to a metal band near the glowing, glass faced timecore. “This is a safety lock. We take this off during the later parts of the Labyrinth. So long as this device is on, then a training aeon edge is locked into its nonlethal state.”

  “Why is that, centurion?” Roland asked.

  Isra loaded a clip into the aeon edge and the edge began to glow blue. “The blade will not cut living material when in the nonlethal stasis mode. Instead it locks everything it passes through into stasis. In simple terms, it will stun any living target or lock up moving parts for a machine.”

  Roland raised an eyebrow. “Interesting, centurion, but why would a sword need such an ability?”

  Isra pointed the weapon at the tiro who 'volunteered'. She then slashed at him with the blade passing right through him as though he were incorporeal. As the sword pas
sed through the tiro, color bled from where the blade touched. Although unwounded, the blade left a gray streak where it passed that took on a static grainy appearance. The tiro then fell to the floor, convulsing while crying out in pain.

  Isra turned to the other tirones. “The Legion is hesitant to take lives since it would erase their descendants from time. This problem becomes worse the further one travels back in time. The stasis mode prevents alterations to a continuum's history while still allowing the Legion to use force if needed.”

  After a moment the color returned to the tiro. He stood before shaking his head. “Does it have to hurt so much, centurion?”

  Isra nodded. “Yes it does. That prevents the target from reacting even from a partial hit.”

  “So there is no way to block it?” another tiro asked.

  “There is,” Isra said before throwing the aeon edge at the tiro again. The blade passed right through him and he again fell to the floor, stunned. Isra then turned to Roland and flung another blade at him.

  Roland shifted his stance and brought up his shieldwatch arm, holding it out like a shield. The Blade bounced off with a disc shaped flash of blue translucent energy centered on the orb of Roland's shieldwatch. The flash reminded Terra of a round shield that a soldier might use in antiquity.

  “Good, tiro. You get a point for that,” Isra said before pointing to her shieldwatch. “Why do you think it's called a shieldwatch? The stasis shield is the only known protection against an aeon edge. This shield can also be extended to work around the entire body, but this weakens it and can only be used to keep out environmental hazards like radiation or poison gas. It can even block an aeon edge burst when used in its normal shield form, but it will not completely absorb the force of the burst. A burst can still knock you off your feet. Remember that. We will get into burst mechanics another day. Now everyone return to your cleaning.”

  Roland leaned forward. “Centurion Isra. If I may?”

  Isra faced Roland.

  “Mayhaps it's too soon to practice, but perchance it would be wise to show us the aeon edge's full capabilities? After all, you have already shown us some of what it can do. Would it not be prudent to show us the rest, including the more destructive modes? Especially since I heard some of the other centurions speak of your skill.”

  Isra glared at Roland.

  Terra smiled. She always knew Roland's charm would run out eventually.

  Isra grinned. “Of course they did. I am the Academy's blade master after all. I suppose I could show you more.”

  She touched her shieldwatch's holoface before motioning for everyone step back. A series of rings formed near the center of the room, fading to reveal a row of different objects. In a line stood a gray manikin with plate armor, a short stone pillar no taller than a man and twice as thick, a tall but thin metal beam, and last in the line loomed a huge solid steel obelisk ten paces thick.

  Isra moved in line with the objects as she pulled out a dagger sized aeon edge blade from her belt. It shimmered silver like Alya's aeon edge though much smaller. She loaded a small clip filled with a row of glowing blue cylinders into the back of the blade before shutting it. The orb on the guard lit up bright blue as a semi transparent edge formed on the blade. The edge glowed a faint blue while grainy static flickered on the surface.

  Isra turned her side to the row of objects and spread her feet out before throwing the blade at the manikin. It passed through the manikin, the stone pillar, and even the metal beam without slowing before gravity pulled the blade to the ground. The blade stuck downward into the floor while leaving a hole a little larger than the blade in the three objects it had pierced.

  She drew another dagger and loaded a clip. Isra charged the manikin, slashing through it with the dagger before weaving around it and cutting through the pillar. When she slashed at the metal beam, the manikin had fallen in half and the stone pillar began sliding in two with a clean slice. The blade passed through the first three objects as if she cut through air. A loud clang sounded when the metal beam hit the floor and Isra turned to the tirones. “This is what the blade does by itself. Now watch closely. This is what the burst function does when you pull the trigger.”

  Isra jumped and slashed at the large steel obelisk. Before her dagger connected, she pulled the trigger. A surge of power flared from the edge of the blade. The edge's faint glow bloomed into a blinding flash of pale blue light. The obelisk shattered into chunks with a loud crack. When the spots in Terra's vision faded, she saw the twenty foot tall, ten foot thick steel obelisk now laying as a pile of debris.

  “That,” Isra said as though she had done the most boring thing in the world, “was the burst function. Each burst takes one stasis cell in a clip so use it wisely,” she said as a spent cell ejected from the dagger clanged twice on the floor like an empty bullet casing.

  The rest of the tirones gawked in awe.

  “That was so cool!” Terra said after a moment of silence.

  Others gave her strange looks.

  Terra composed herself. “I mean that was an excellent demonstration, centurion!”

  ∞

  “You have to teach me how to use that sword,” Terra said as she looked up at Alya. Terra had gotten lucky when she went to the hill to study. Alya had showed up out of nowhere as usual. “Please! You have to. It's so cool!”

  Alya pursed her lips as a light breeze blew through her silver hair. “Minerva, what does cool mean? Context early 21st century Americas, Continuum Lambda.”

  “Cool. A slang term meaning something appealing, aesthetically pleasing, stylistically superior, or a state of behavior that is considered good amongst a social group. A close Saturnian equivalent would be infinite,” Minerva said from Alya's shieldwatch.

  “Oh,” Alya said. “So I guess that means you like the aeon edge sword then?”

  Terra nodded.

  “And you want me to train you in swordsmanship skills?”

  Terra nodded again.

  “No.”

  A chill wind swept across the hill, as if hastening winter's arrival to the city.

  Terra's smile faded. “Why?”

  Alya drew her aeon edge sword and pointed it at Terra. Her hushed tone held an edge of menace while she spoke. “You think this is cool?”

  Terra leaned back as the tip loomed in her face.

  “Do you know what this is?”

  The edge remained off, but Terra still winced when the blade drew close. “It's a sword.”

  Alya's eyes narrowed. “And what are swords made to do?”

  “Kill people,” Terra said while leaning away from the sword a little more.

  Alya lowered the sword. “Hammers build homes, bows hunt game, axes chop trees. Swords. Only. Kill.”

  Terra averted her gaze.

  Alya lifted the blade and studied it with narrowed eyes. “This is a tool of death. Too many see it as a tool for glory. They see it as a symbol of romantic ideals. I see a shining silver blade after I wash off all the blood. This isn't a thing you should admire, but a burden. You haven't seen an aeon edge cleave through a person yet. I have seen endless bloody fields so choked with corpses that one could walk from one side to the other without touching the ground. Swords do not make glory and if they do, then it is no glory any of us should wish for.”

  Terra continued to stare at the ground.

  Alya looked at Terra and her expression softened. The breeze around them became more gentle as she sheathed the blade. “Sword strokes given cannot be taken back. Time cannot fix everything. Don't repeat the mistakes of so many others who wielded an aeon edge without the sobering understanding of its true purpose. A tool for death.”

  Terra nodded.

  “How about I show you something else?”

  Terra looked up at Alya. “Really?”

  Alya smiled. “How is your shieldwatch training progressing?”

  Terra pouted.

  Alya grinned. “Sour expressions are not flattering. Trust me. This will be
, oh how did you put it? Cool.”

  They both walked into a nearby forest and hiked on a trail. The trail led to a stone path. As they followed the path Terra noticed the colors change from fall to spring. Terra wondered why this place was set to a different weather schedule. She had grown accustomed to Saturn City's precise weather control. Although Saturn City could schedule weather, it still followed the usual cycle of seasons for most of the city. This was the first exception she had seen.

  Brown faded to green when they reached a large glade. When she saw it her eyes widened as she gasped.

  The glade was vast, at least a mile wide and filled with every flower imaginable. Flowers bloomed in large colorful patches while the garden teemed with butterflies and birds of all kinds. All the garden gleamed like an eternal spring, though cold winter set in outside the forest.

  “It's beautiful. Is it a garden?” Terra said, still awestruck.

  Alya nodded. “This is Kairos's Garden. A garden for the fallen. I have a few things to show you here. Have you had much success with a shieldwatch yet?”

  “No. I can't get this stupid thing to work,” she said as she searched through the shieldwatch's menu.

  Alya shook her head. “It will take forever if you do that. The best thing about a shieldwatch is that it can work on mental commands.”

  Terra looked up at Alya, confused.

  “Think. Don't just press buttons. If you spend too much time searching through menus, then someone will cut you down while you stare at buttons,” she said before she walked into the glade. “The shieldwatch doesn't just allow you to control time, it connects you to time.”

  Terra followed as they moved through the garden. She tried to feel time like Alya had said, but she felt just as she always did. “I don't feel any different.”

  Alya grinned. She picked up a small stone and tossed it in her hand before slinging it at Terra's face. Then Terra sensed it.

  Like a reflex, Terra felt something coming towards her. Her hand moved to grab the rock so fast that she only saw a blur. Terra stared wide eye at the stone. “How?”

  Alya's grin widened. “The shieldwatch is linked to your nervous system. It's a part of you. It even Sped your reactions. Humans are already connected to time. We perceive time moving forward. A shieldwatch expands and strengthens that perception. The more you use your shieldwatch, the stronger the connection.”