Fanfiction:V Translanka Magness 3

<1025 A.D.>
TEMPORAL VORTEX REPORT

-REPORT NO. 3-

[UNKNOWN TRANSFER RATE, SYSTEMATIC DATA MALFUNCTION]
CRYPTIC TEXT SYNCH RESULT - MULTIDIMENSIONAL TIMELINES
CODE - "MAGNESS"
CODE EX. - "DYING FULL MOON"

Lucca Ashtear was in her late thirties. She had hit the middle of the road. From there on, she couldn't classify herself as living anymore. From there on, it was only a downward spiral of decay and eventual senility. Her peak had been hit well over ten years ago. Her research continually hit snags now that she could neither fix nor undo. Her once striking pink hair, which from afar and in the wrong lighting seemed brown, was now thinning and white sprouts were appearing. She was dying.

Her legacy was no longer her science or her own, now ephermeral brilliance. She had never had children. Had never had a partner with which to have any to start with. Her early years were spent formulating and adventuring. That isn't to say children were never or weren't a big part of her life though. She had started an orphanage no more than twenty years past. It had started with the last child to enter a gate; with her, with Kid.

She had gone away on her own quest as she grew and matured. Often times Lucca would wonder and reminisce about Kid, her "Little Sister". Was she doing alright? Of course she was she would tell herself. It was her after all. What was she doing? Where was she? When was she? Her amulet could have taken her to countless worlds. Or could it have? There were no more gates she would remind herself, she had made sure of it. Or were there? Obviously something was meant for Kid. She could feel it again, stirring, rising from its sleep.

Lucca wished she could have gone with her, but it wasn't her time anymore, she knew that, Kid knew that. Nothing was said. She left one chilly summer night. No good byes, no hugs or kisses, no tears. Just a sorrowful note filled with innuendos of unknown fates and burning fires of fervor that needed, no, demanded satisfaction. It was the sort of letter she too would have left her mother if her own adventure had called for it.

Yet, still, she shed no tears for her. Tears would be admitting something. It would be like saying out loud that Kid was no longer just a kid, she was grown and was facing similar perils. It would mean that she believed that Kid could be dead. Kid was tougher than that. Kid was stronger than anyone she had ever seen. Although she sacrificed her femininity to accomplish this, that tomboy part of her was just another quirk that made Kid unique.

Fortunately (or not), the orphanage still kept her busy most of the time. A few years back (Kid had yet to leave, she remembered), the whole place had almost been burnt down when a few components of circuitry in her room had overloaded. Luckily she was there and her Ice Gun put the flames out quickly. She had cursed herself for her carelessness, although it seemed as though she had taken every necessary precaution. The added distress wasn't needed, so she had a laboratory extension built onto the back of the house to keep the children safe.

There was always a fresh face every month or so in from Porre or the farming sections of Truce. The children were always there. She enjoyed the consistency of it all. It was all so neatly ordered and yet so overly chaotic at the same time. There was a feeling of content with her current life outside of her own diminishing scientific prowess. Adventuring was a part of her past that she told the children like fairytales. Older children could not find it within themselves to believe her stories, but nonetheless they did not question her. She was their Big Sis'; if she said it happened, then it must have. Her world was moving on.

It was night when he arrived. At least, it was night when his consciousness arrived. Enormous waves of self bashed-broke-into him long after his corporal body stood there beside an immense evergreen tree. He had only seconds to raise his arms to meet the ground after the waves smashed into him. It didn't help much.

He hit the firm, damp earth with a thud. The air was clean, pure, unadulterated. It was quite a quick distinction from the dank stench of that metallic future. Part of him hoped his being in the past again would upset the future and cause it never to exist.

A sudden occurrence came to his attention. His left had was working again. New, invigorating power filled him; he was refreshed, revitalized. The time spent in the time rift jolted his power somewhat and the pain of the travel was now somewhat lost unto him. It was a breezy cool night, with a lofty full moon gazing above, casting all its many shadows and darkness. He was deep in a rich and fertile forest; it was a good feeling.

"Could it be?" He said aloud to the memory laden forest. Another wave of self struck him and dropped him to one knee. But he had already felt whole.

A maniacal laugh broke through the empty sounds of the forest floor. It was his laughter and yet it was not. His legs quaked as they struggled to lift him back up. His scythe had fallen to his side. Fists clenched to solid bricks.

His hands hammered at his ribs wildly, possessed. Not his hands, but doubles of his hands, mirrors of his hands, ghost images of his hands that would not listen to his commands. One struck him square in the jaw and sent him reeling backwards into the base of the tree. He staggered and tried to gain his bearings. With a fierce and intense concentration he began to fight the ghost images back with his mind. They persisted for a moment, relented, and then the sound and feeling of a great, gusting wind flooded past him and through the surrounding foliage. The mad laughter echoed and finally faded throughout the woods.

"What the hell was that?" He said aloud, spitting at the ground and noting the small spot of blood in it. More surprises, more annoyance. He snarled at the situation, but the vibrations of the forest had already calmed down, whatever it was had passed. He moved to and picked up his scythe, examining it momentarily. It was a long weapons, just over his height, and it had a long curved blade as well, "It is unnecessarily conspicuous..."

Soft-toned ancient words elegantly floated from his mouth as his hand and the scythe began to glow minutely. With a quick movement, he struck the handle, cutting it into two parts clean as a knife through warm butter. He grasped the end opposite the blade, which held a long metal spike, and whipped it through the air a dozen times. Each time, the shimmering spike would form a curved blade at one side that would grow and lengthen with the momentum. In the end, he had two uniquely matched twin sickles.

He nodded to himself with the slight and justified satisfaction like he would have seen as a child when he would finish a drawing or just when sitting in front of a fire petting his kitten. Taking the sickles, he latched them to the middle of his back in a neat "X" and into a loop of the blue cloth around his waise. Another spell stuck them in place.

He would still need to replace his cape to properly conceal them he thought. If the forest was the one he thought it was, then the Ashtear family was a ways to the north.

What would she do when she saw him? He was never friendly with any of them really, even her. She was smart, but she was also just as foolish. But he was one of them too, in the end, wasn't he? He continued to stalk out of the forest, keeping ever watchful of everything, fully aware of the scrutinizing eye of the forest.

There was something missing, was it something important? He didn't feel the same. Why would he think about Lucca and the others? Why would he place himself in their company outside of just to complete his undertaking? Simply put, he was lonely. No, not lonely. How could he be? Were not Slash and Flea his former companions to some degree? No, he thought, they were tools just like all the others. So was that despicable and loathsome Ozzie. Just the thought of that bulbous green and flaking skin made his stomach churn.

There it was again. Why would he feel the need for Slash and Flea to be his former "companions"? It must have something to do with that ghost, no, not a ghost, something else. Lucca would have given it a long, fancy name...a Temporal Apparition of Irrefutable Subconscious Development & Severance. But what did all that mean? What part of him left just then? Or was it a new part? Something wholly different from him and yet, completely like him. He didn't know. He didn't want to stop to think about it further.

"Think of her, damn it." He said to himself, carefully darting to and from the backs of remarkably mossy trees. He felt as though, if he wanted, he could just pick one of the trees up in both of his arms and toss it aside. They seemed so spongy and soft, even on the sections without as much o fthe lush, bottle-green moss, "You need to focus damn it. I cannot be defeated."

It was going to be a long trek before he actually got to his destination. First was the forest, then the bridge, and then he'd have to cut around Guardia & Truce down to the bridge to Ashtear Island. His skills would be tested, as well as his nerves, he knew. That's what it always came down to in the end.

He imagined himself here, in the kid's future, the Mystics were even more the embittered, loathsomely sad, and far worse, defeated, bunch, could see the dying race of Mystics joining the Humans and relations mending where once pure, unspeakable hatred and resentment stirred at the mere mention of the other race. And unsurprisingly enough, his thoughts weren't far from the truth.

In the South, Porre was creating a faction with the Mystic Village by way of ferry transportation. Mystics and Humans had been uneasily migrating inbetween the two towns for the past twenty years or so. Commerce was up, tourism for both was at an all-time high, and people were learning new things from each culture. It was an amazing time in history. He would hate it all if he actually knew.

The thought of co-existence had never been a thought in his mind before. The Humans just didn't deserve it and almost everyone knew it in the start. It was Mystic territory from the beginning, all of Guardia & Truce, was theirs before they were driven out like so many other had been before them and a multitude would be after. It was the cycle of the world. All he had done was pick the justified side to fight for. He had seen a vast majority of the dawn of the war, more than anybody really wanted to, and in the end, he didn't really care for either side. It was all frivolous to him anyhow.

Change was coming; The Wind was blowing strong again. He took the Amulet from his sack and looked at it for what must have been the millionth time since the seperation. It brought back burnt red memories of his life, embers of a past slowly turning to fragile ash. His sister Schala, his only friend Alfador, his mother-the Queen, his father-the King, the false Queen that took hi smother's place, the Mystics, the Humans, the War, that stupid, gutless frog, the bullheaded, order-driven knight, the kid & his friends, those enlightened "gurus".

It was a flood; hundreds of names blurred and etched into him memory. Not even a handful of them were even his acquaintances. Only a couple he would call his friends. He was born the solitary life of the noble. Although he hadn't lived his productive years that way. Those years had been hard and merciless in their training for him to be more effective in achieving his one, ultimate goal in life. He was taken and he was hardened to long-smelted, galvanized steel. A warrior became of him, a wizard, a lone wolf, chasing the moon.

Nameless faces coming and going in and out of his life in a seemingly limitless cycle of pain and suffering. Was there an end to be had of all this? He had a reason, yes, but what of the rest of it? He walked on swiftly in his present, knowing his past, and foreseeing his cloudy future. What was he willing to do? What was he willing to give up?

Strange thoughts on this pale summer's night in Fiona's Forest...

It was a nice place, she thought. Not quite the grandiose 'temple' she had been told of. It was a simple cathedral building. High architecture, flying buttresses, heavenly and obvious religious over-tones all well maintained white and wooden decor. The sounds of a wolf's howling came in from afar in the darknened night. What she was looking for though, wasn't here. She didn't necessarily expect it to be, had begun losing hope.

Her long, lemon-blonde hair was wrapped up on her head in covered buns at each side. The candle-light at the head of the chapel flickered in her curiously attentive azure-colored eyes. She watched the nuns go about their daily (and nightly) chores, so neat, so orderly and routine, like all of them she'd ever seen before. When she found a temple or church, she would stop and pray, but it seemed like the whole world was deteriorating before her. Not just society as a whole, but nature as well. Something was swelling up in the world deep down, she could feel it.

She sighed soft, but long. All of fourteen now, she still hadn't found what she was looking for. So much had been given up just at the beginning and so little had changed. Another, smaller sigh came out of her as she picked up an unlit candle with her left hand and dipped its wick into the flame of another.

"Not many travelers, 'specially not ones so young, in this part anymore." One of the nuns said to her, coming up from behind her right side, "These candles are lit mainly by we nuns here now. In some ways it's good to know that no one's in need of 'em, but in other ways, we see it as people simply losing faith."

She held the lit candle in her small, clutching left hand. A tear almost escaped her.

"I'm so sorry, I should not be intruding." The nun turned to leave.

"It's for my brother." She said rather unexpectedly. She had never shared anything with any of the previous inquisitive nuns or church-hands. But they had all been less elusive about it; had asked it flat out, "I'm looking for him."

"I'm sorry. To lose a sibling is a hard thing to do."

"Where is God for these times, good sister?" She said, looking down into the flame's white eye. A bead of wax formed and trickled its way down to kiss her hand.

"God is always there, within us all. His plans are not always for us to understand." The sister took on a look of mixed shame and anguish at a buried memory suddenly surfacing again and she grasped for her subtle mask of happiness and relentless joy, "Sadly, everything that has form must eventually fade away...Such is life."

Looking back at the nun, she smiled and was about to say something along the lines of, "Are you nuns always so depressing?" This smile was wiped clean from her face. A look of mute dread replaced it and the only words that managed to escape her mouth were, "Oh, my god!"

The intricate stain glass windows shatters like so many soft eggs smashed into brick walls. The large, oak door began to creak, cringe and splinter with the outside weight. Large Wolfs heads protruded from the now windowless openings. There were easily a dozen, buth they saw hundreds.

He counted fifteen; a very large pack. They made their move towards the openings. Should he intervene? He didn't have any reason to. At least, he didn't think so. These problems with time were kind of confusing. Was he being manipulated to help this cathedral? No, too far-fetched.

But he was a long way from the nearest town, named Porre, which he was going to avoid and it was out of his way anyways. This chapel was a regular rest stop for people going to and from Guardia & Truce and Porre. It was also where they had reunited with the old Prometheus chip, which had at the time inhabited the circuit-driven iron hide known as Robo, serial number R66-Y.

It seemed almost too right for him to do. He stood there, in the total darkness of the tree up until the first of the Wolfs managed to break in. Then he started his spell.

The Wolfs just piled on top of each other, not caring for the ones beneath; the first Wolfs to smash the windows were also the first Wolfs to be trampled over to get inside. They were the first Wolfs to have their innards meet the sharp glass still spearing out from the bottom framework of the windows. They jerked and convulsed under the pressure of the others.

Wolfs don't need to be careful though. It's not hardwired into their nature to be so because they heal rapidly, especially so during the full moon. No one really knows any good ways to get rid of them. They're unstoppable.

"C'mon then!" She said, taunting the Wolfs. This was going to be the final battle. Here, in this chapel, with the nuns cowering behind the main area and Wolfs bearing down on her. It if was to come down to this, then she'd have to give it her all. Nothing so far had gotter her down-except time-and nothing was going to keep her down. She absorbed the moment in a heartbeat and became one with her emotions, "I won't be stopped here, so soon (outside of the moment, the words would have resounded in her mind with a dull aching) in my search. I hate you and you will die."

The pleats of her light-colored skirt flittered behind her as she swooped through the aisle of pews. The flames of the candle lighting around the cathedral glittered and glimmered on the face of the heavily polished, small, iron shield covering her left forearm. The sight stopped those Wolfs who had begun to climb in over the bodies of the first Wolfs for just a moment. A loud burst of a howl escaped each of the Wolf's large, gaping mouths. Bubbly, rabid saliva drooled out as they stared down the young girl with a horrible hunger in thier eyes.

"Miss, you mustn't! There's nothing you can do!" The nun she had spoken to pleaded from the back of the room.

"Die fighting, good sis'." She replied, not turning, lifting her smallish, gloved hands, clenched in fists. A thick, denadorite spike stuck out at each gloved knuckle, "Die fighting..."

Wolfs lept with claws bore. Fists blurred, pews shattered, blood sprayed and two Wolfs were knocked down, but not out. They each limped off to the side, inbetween shards of wood. Both had their faces turned into messes of concaved bloody and broken bones.

She was drenched in their blood: her face, her fists & her hair, the armor covering her dress, her pleated skirt, and even a multitude of tiny spatters running down her legs. A film of dark red Wolf's blood. Her shield took a little beating, but was still in good condition. She readied it, holding it up along with her other fist.

A bloody angel with no more shimmering, no more glimmer, no shine, no glitter, no more heavily polished, sparkle dances, just blood, until it hit.

An inferno of flickering flames scorched all the Wolfs from the outside. Hideous screeches of pain echoed in the forest night. Bursts of great scarlet fire bubbled in through the window openings and singed the hair of the two standing, bewildered Wolfs. A man crashed through the remaining, smoldering glass of the middle window, no, not just crashed, but he seemed to fly.

The shimmer was back. Though it wasn't held within any of the girl's objects, not even her eyes so much as twinkled. The candles had blown out with the explosion of flame coming from the outside. Moonlight poured in through the various new openings. It wasn't the moonlight either though. They glowed with a power of their own. Two brightly radiant new moons, one each held at attention in his hands.

The Wolfs had never seen anything like it. The girl had never seen anything like it. Not even the nuns in the back knew what was really happening. It was some kind of skill, but it was the kind of ancient or newly discovered skill none of them had ever seen. The two Wolfs that had ducked out earlier had now revived and were standing at the other Wolfs' sides. None of the other Wolfs moved; they were burnt and dead.

"Howwwwwww?" One of them bellowed and the word transformed into a long, angry howl. The girl was too stunned to move, the nuns had been already, far before her. Two Wolfs pounced at him. Flickers of the glowing light traced patterns into their skulls, their arms, and up their torsos. They toppled over in heaps of mangled flesh and severed intestine.

"Magically endowed mythril." The man replied as if it were the simplest and most obvious thing in the world. The sickles weren't tarnished at all, in fact, they seemed to pulsate and grow brighter. How else do you take care of Wolfs? He thought numbly to himself.

The last two looked at each other and began leaping over pews and throwing them back wildly at the entrance, at the man. He ducked and dodged their attempts to stop him.

"Stop, or the sister diessss." One of the Wolfs said. Its voice was slithering into that of a snake. It was regressing. A great clawed hand was stuck at the sister's throat. The Wolf's big eyes bulged with intensity as it struggled with its form, finally getting it back under control. The other Wolf held a nun in a similar manner. Beads of blood began at the sisters' necks, tears flowed down their cheeks like waterfalls, and their hands were clasped together in prayer.

He almost smiled at the attempt to persuade him to let them live by threatening the life of another. One he did not know and did not care about at that. Who did these silly Wolfs think he was? Of course, even in his former life, he had to cut the Wolfs down to size for their sheer stupidity. History, it seems, was repeating itself once again. What a fool he was to think of defying it.

The lone girl, dripping with blood, stood trembling between him and the Wolfs. He moved swiftly past her. Much too swiftly, faster than a man could move. He was somewhere behind her in a dark flash, an instant. His eyes flared and they saw the death awaiting them there.

His arms rose, as if pleading for them to stop. The hands were empty, his gaze was hard, burtal cold. The Wolfs' eyes rolled up into their heads. The great silver of the mythril sickles still glowed ever brighter and pulsated, spiking out, one each, of their foreheads.

Crimson smears of blood and gristly bits of brain spatter both nuns, each shining spike of the sickles coming within an inch of their faces. He had made no attempt to spare them, it was just how the cards were dealt, how the darts landed, how the sickles cut.

How ironic that, having been drawn into yet another portal, I would end up...[edit]

From: Fanfiction