Issue 23: Rally to the Flag
Mortals are pathetic. Even Ethereal Titan spelled out the true danger of this trip! I’ll show them my fear. Like all things it will be debated until the end of time. They are profiling all of us. It is a sign: I will breach the inner circle of the Protectorate.--Lucifer
I won’t be able to hide it. I already accepted many different kinds of fears. On the surface. What still dwells deep within my mind? I must face what comes. No matter how it ends.--Eliza Murphy
Each Icath Ruling Pair will control 1 of 3 aspects. The 4th will be left to us. Mankind. Others spread throughout the multiverse. In a way? I am also a distraction. Chronos believes in power. So he would assume that the Oversoul would give my sister and I the most precious aspects of power. He keeps the missing Pair close on hand. Not realizing they desired to be captured.--Dexter Murphy: Private Logs.
Outer Sector
Soul Layer
February 16th 5490
There it was again.
That tiny blip on my radar.
Void Maiden and Mystic joined me. The portal before us interlocked with gold and silver sigils. I was decked out in Markav Soul Warden gear. It wouldn't be unusual for the high level Protectorates to be accompanied by such. Trickshot shared his HUD.
Icons flowed across.
Paw prints lined up with certain marks.
This would lead us to the “captured” Icath pair.
The portal swirled. Arthon took the lead. Paxon remained on Earth. It would look suspicious if all the Top Tier members of the Protectorate were “gone.” A black Pyramid lined with gold at the top dominated the landscape as we passed through. My mother crouched. My father cloaked all of us with a quick invisibility incantation.
For miles around the pyramid there were Drones.
Void Walker husks of Chronos’ appetites. Once he was done consuming a soul he converted their bodies into drones. A fact that Eliza wasn’t able to recall for this moment. Silver Fox had removed certain lines of knowledge. So it wouldn’t affect my sister when the battle arrived. Even one who shielded live would have to destroy the evil constructs. None of us wanted her burdened by certain truths.
It helped that Silver Fox had gained her consent before the separation ritual had commenced. My sister was often harshest on herself. But she genuinely had the worst poker face known to mankind. A flutter of wings made us all freeze.
This was where all the remaining White Owls had come to roost.
I checked my chrono. An infinity symbol crackled.
I motioned to my father.
He crept through the endless rows of pale white drones.
Each metallic sphere had been imbued with a drop of my mother’s blood.
They were about to see just how devastating gravity powers were. Trickshot teleported the rest on my command. The Drones keened. They had sensed the disrupted currents.
Perfect.
My mother pressed her palms to the earth. My father materialized behind her with Trickshot. I remained outside his protective wards. I wanted to see what kind of weight my mother could pull with her new bag of demi tricks.
Golden Host Sphere
Elysium
I dug frantically. The black thorns tore at my suit.
Didn’t matter. Fadeaway was pleading with his one remaining eye.
The plants hissed.
“Ours!”
I removed my cape and cowl.
The vines snapped. Branches coiled about my body.
A sharp crack filled the air as I pulled with all my strength. The temperature dropped as I froze the outer layer of demonic brambles. I pulled him from his thorny embrace. His other eye glowed orange in the moonlight.
His chest rose rapidly with each breath.
“What are you?!”
I replied calmly, “A friend.”
∞
Lucifer maintained a look of pure shock.
His thoughts raced along a new avenue.
What did the Protectorate hope to achieve by this? Letting this team know of her true origin. He saw the way her muscles bunched under that torn uniform. No wounds. Not even one tiny scratch on that perfect skin of hers. Which Key would the Oversoul use to capture the Nothing. The evil inside all men. They did not deserve the light or its gifts.
∞
Ludicrous Speed gawked as Titan removed the damaged outer layers of her suit.
All that remained was a simple white sleeveless shirt and her black and gold leggings.
“Ohmygod!Whatareyou!Whatdotheyfeedyou!HolysmokesLookatThat!”
He pressed a hand to her wrist. The flesh didn’t give. It was stronger than the best materials made for combat ships. He let out a startled yelp as her other hand shot out to grasp a pale blue snake. Its red eyes locked onto him.
“Nowaynottouchingthat!”
He vibrated in place.
Nothing scaly fell out.
Even her face had changed. She removed the dynamo mask. Her eyes swirled with cosmic power. As bright as two golden suns!
She pivoted.
His HUD outlined the beams that shot forth.
Dark Matter Energy?!
∞
I heard it before the creature appeared.
Moss and jungle detritus clung to its sides as it rose.
Its half broken wings expanded.
It raised a sword made of stone.
Lava dribbled down its chest. The original Thronebearer sigil for Light Extinguished carved across its stomach. That confirmed it. Lucifer was one of those within my new team. All of our fears were mixing together. Even if the Lightbringer would never directly admit to any kind of terrors. Its head formed into a snake. Black Scrawl ran down its mouth. Its wings a fragment of the Unity fiend that had consumed me back within the Eden Cycle. I pushed Lensflair back as shadowed forms rose to grab at his feet.
“Pride Consumes. Wrath Poisons….”
The shadows converged on me.
“...but you know Arbiter? To claw from Helios?! Realm of the Discarded!”
One formed into Meathook. Its yellowed skin riddled with ashen pockmarks.
The remnants of the jungle faded.
The volcanic steps of Helios formed.
Ludicrous Speed dashed around me. Kicking up winds that tore through vines, ghosts and black scrawl alike. My back split open. My wings torn. Bloodied. Kaltesh. The Ruin of the Upper Steps gloated, “Do you remember Little Light?!”
The Grail Ceremony had saved us from the last gateway of the Climb.
He snatched Meathook. The hybrid twisted. A sickening crunch left the creature paralyzed. Lensflair inverted what light sources he could into barriers. He screamed as metallic thorns pierced his calves. He formed a sword of pure light. His swings went wild as White Owls converged on his position.
“False Light. Living Memory! Prison of the Mind!”
Fadeaway hurled bits of stone, lava and thorns at the Owls.
∞
Lucifer played his part.
He had never seen Helios. That had been before his creation. Figured. So he ate up the visions with proper shock. Kaltesh had been a legend even for the Golden Host. A fiend who had guarded the Oversoul’s prison. Sucking away at its light even as it tried to break free of the Devourer. Kaltesh had been a slave to his desires.
Murphy crouched. The ground trembled as she shot forward. Bits of White’s old wingspan apparent in the vision. What had compelled the Oversoul to use Demi flesh to repair those two? They had been defective servants from the start.
Made after the initial Golden Host.
Gabriel. Michael. Uriel. Chamuel. Raphael. Jophiel. Zadkiel.
Eliza’s dark matter beams bisected Kaltesh.
She was screaming. How delightful!
He savored the agony that flowed over her aura.
The illusion froze. He couldn't move. It was all gray.
That Lanis woman stepped past.
She spoke into a brilliant blue orb that formed next to her shoulder.
Lucifer tasted the ash in the back of his throat.
Azrael. Black’s original form. White was not included as a Thronebearer. No female could ever be one. Lucifer snarled. STUPID! How had he not thought of this! The Oversoul’s love of mortals should have clued him in. Murphy had never truly taken up the mantle of a Thronebearer. Not even to regenerate White.
White/Gaia had been siphoning power off of Eliza Murphy since she manifested her demi powers. Not to assist Azrael. That had been done by the brother. Dexter Murphy. Twin Suns. One eclipsed in the other’s shadow. No. Could it be that simple? One key to turn the other. Across all cycles.
Static white noise surfaced.
The thought stayed with him. The Ouros that regenerated souls. All of them.
One shared trait. Female.
Dexter Murphy had jury rigged certain aspects onto his sister due to what?! What would allow her body to mimic Thronebearer sigils?
His mind howled. The answer came to him as lightning.
Barren. She could not carry children!
The perfect form to transport the Ouro from Helios!
He knew nothing more.
∞
Memory crowded in.
At war with the visions of terror surrounding me. My eyes burned until I found myself on the ground once more. My chest heaving. Hands lifted me up. Hidan’s wings touched my face. “Focus on the orb.”
The ocean.
What I had dragged from Helios had not just been souls.
The template.
The first Ouroborous of Renewal. Stolen from the Oversoul by the Devourer. Hi’ulk. Titan and Son of Mi’thia. First Son of the Renewal. She had many sons. Always set to protect their mirrored sisters. Timat, the Silver Titan. Time stilled. Darva, the Black Titan. The Cage. To seal them all in.
Male Ouro: Spear/Barrier/Guardian.
Female Ouro: Renewal/Life/Soul.
Ouros sealed away the Ninth Circle. To prepare.
Dubbed Titans in later cycles to hide their true purpose.
Equal yet opposite. Different layers. Roles.
Not all Ouros guarded the boundaries of universes. As I had been healing White? She in turn had been feeding the powers of Mi’thia. First Ourobouros of Creation. The one that had guarded the mortal domains of Heaven. To keep her sane within Helios. She had sucked in all the innocent souls. Imprinting the soul memory of what awaited everyone should we fail.
No wonder the Devourer was hungry.
We had hijacked his dwindling supply of previous cycle souls.
Hidan smiled kindly down at me. “Easy now. Let the final pieces click into place.”
Ouroborous of Eden (Syncing with Past Cycles)
Cycle Rebirth (Helios Corruption Filtered)
Soul River of Primary Protectors
I floated along the current.
Age faded.
I glimpsed my former shell. The tribe had buried my brother and I within the upper reaches of the plains. We had done well. Many Void Walkers had fallen to our spears. Never to trouble the children. They always desired those who had the spark. Powers that the Devourer found robust. But its hunger was never ending. Endless faces rose next to me. Each was me. I knew this without asking. Because He had a purpose for me.
I would never bear children.
That was the secret. Even the false Lightbearer wouldn’t understand until it was too late.
He desired that crown of bleached bone.
I lived. Died. Regenerated countless times.
Always a woman. Always unable to bare children.
Each life added to the whole. The Wall that would remain unbroken.
No cycle had gone to waste. With our help he was learning what would protect our Final Home. Not the destruction of the Devil. That would never be purged. Just as God could never be purged. But the influence and claws of that fiend could be crippled.
I walked across the moons of Silandra.
The star fields of Greater Amu’grav.
Typha’s golden fields of Lower Karkland.
As a Commons tailor.
Reborn to an Ayeer 2nd Branch.
A J’kua wanderer.
Even as a Bardaxian. Always faithful. Always watching.
Then I see her face. Nyx. That crimson syringe.
Convergence. The Final Wall. Eden would be the heart of that bulwark.
A cascade of red, white and blue.
“The Wall Endures Against the Devourer.”
Issue 22: Here
Issue 24: Here
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