Darkscribes.org

Moirae's Death

By: KawaiiChare

Chapter One: They Were Born

A/N: Although it's fantasy, it's still set in the future, and I'm pretty sure no matter how fantasy-like it is, they'll eventually develop modern-like technology.  Think FF7-like world. =D

+~+~+

        Seryn - the princess of Clio.  Seryn was proud to be of such importance in this spectacular little place - and it was indeed spectacular - and she felt she was suited for it, too.  Her people often referred to her as "Fair Seryn", for she appeared to be the ideal princess with her pretty face and petite body.  When she made public appearances, her smile warmed the hearts of citizens.  Her parents took pride in presenting her to the other nations of Moirae, as their daughter was just so perfect.

        It is truly unfortunate that her moment of jovial times would soon be replaced with trials and hardships.

+~+~+

        "That's her," a woman whispered to a man as a few strands of brown hair fell across her emerald eyes.  She pointed at Seryn, whom was sitting on the stage behind the king as he gave his speech.

        The woman was considerably a lot bigger than Seryn was.  She was not obese, to put it bluntly, but rather her body's skeletal structure was merely larger in size and she herself was muscular.  She was clothed in a white sleeveless turtleneck shirt and beige shorts.  Her right arm had something similar to a long glove from mid-bicep to the palms around it and was white as well; she wore black half-fingered gloves on her left hand.  Thick brown boots protected her feet from the ground.

        "...Thus, I am proud to announce that today Clio has gone five hundred years without war.  This, my people, is what our ancestors have valiantly fought for..."  Today was a national holiday known as 'Wini' where the people of Clio held festivals, feasts, parties, and other activities in the name of peace.

        "I know," the man whispered back.  He was built with the same structure as the woman, however was taller than her by a foot.  He, too, had brown hair that fell over his eyes, which were also brown although a shade darker.  His attire consisted of a long black trench coat, blue baggy pants, and black traveling boots.

        "... With that, I now begin Clio's five hundredth Wini!" declared the king.  He walked off the stage as his daughter and wife rose to follow him.  The two women looked very much alike except for their age - both had long flowing blond hair and crystal-like blue eyes, both wore dresses that no one else could afford no matter what status of nobility they possessed.  They were perfectly suited for the role of royalty.

        The people of Clio's capital city, Deo, cheered wildly before moving about and getting on with their own celebrations.  The pair of outlanders walked around the festive streets, talking amongst themselves, attempting a low profile.

        Of course, low profiles are hard to keep when one of the two has a sword on his back and the other has a spear.

        "Hey, you there!" a passerby hollered out.

        The two glanced in the general direction of the cry.

        Another voice, this time that of a woman's.  "Are you undermining peace?!"

        "Didn't you hear the king's words?"

        "Leave our country if you're to support fighting!"

        The two glanced at each other before looking out to the crowd again.  The man spoke, "Please...  We mean no harm, however we just came from a long, treacherous journey from afar.  There were many enemies along the way and we needed to defend ourselves."

        "We mean no disrespect to Clio," his companion added.

        The people shot critical glares at them, inspecting them, trying to see if their words are true.

        "So throw away your weapons!"  The owner of a fruit-stand spoke up.

        "We... can't do that."

        Tension filled the air.  Nobody needed to tell the outsiders that they had already overstayed their welcome.  Nobody needed to tell them that the citizens were planning schemes to turn them in to the king for disrespecting ways.

        As if their minds were connected, the woman and man both ran off in the same direction at the same moment.  People on the streets began throwing whatever they could get their hands on at the two.  Trampled tomatoes and apples quickly decorated the road, along with flowerpots dropped by people living in buildings nearby.

        "Avice, split!" the man commanded the woman as they came to an intersection.  He quickly bolted to the right as the woman dashed to the left.  By now an angry mob had gathered itself up and hunted down the two intruders.  Streets were filled with madness, avenues were clustered with confusion, roads were drowning in havoc.

        Avice had no time to think, she did whatever her reflexes told her to do.  She dodged, weaved, and shoved her way through the confused crowd while a group of extremely upset citizens trailed her closely behind.  Her shoulder-length hair blew behind her while she fought to keep her cheek-length bangs out of her eyes.

        "Stop that wench!" some people yelled.

        She gasped as she felt air moving past her ear and noticed a flash of white fly past her shoulder, which she assumed to be an egg, but had no time to be sure as she passed it within a blink of an eye.  A few other objects flew past her head as she ran.  She jumped over obstacles, ducked beneath others, and swiftly avoided arms and hands trying to restrain her.

        Another intersection...  Within a split second, Avice turned a corner and-

        The world began to spin around her.  A splitting pain was running through her head; she found herself sitting on the ground and noticed a huge figure before her.  As her eyes focused and when the commotion halted, she saw that she must've ran into someone when she turned the corner blindly.  She opened her mouth to apologize and prepared herself to get up and continue running before she realized that not only was she face-to-face with someone tremendously larger than herself, but she was also surrounded by angry residents of Deo.

        Shit...

+~+~+

        Quickly, Silas dashed through the crowd and was careful to avoid as many obstacles as possible, although his mind was anywhere but on the road.  He was planning on what to do regarding Avice - how they will meet up after this, how they will execute their plan...  It was then that he realized splitting up was not exactly the brightest idea in the bag, but there was no way to turn back time.  He had to deal with the consequences himself.  He also regretted wearing his trench coat; it was catching too much air and slowing him down.

Leap over the dog...  What if Avice gets captured?

        Swerve to the left...  No, she wouldn't.

        Duck under the flying orange...  Did she say to rendezvous at the castle, or Main Square?

        His thoughts were interrupted as a strong blow was delivered to his face at unimaginable speeds, combined with the velocity that he ran into it.  It caused him to fall over onto his head, which gave him a pulsating pain on his skull.  He lay there for a moment, unable to process exactly what happened, unable to move until he did.  Finally he hauled himself up, but found that to attempt escape would be suicide as he was surrounded.

+~+~+

        "...Because of you, Wini is ruined!"  The king was busy criticizing Avice and Silas, who were sitting in chairs before the royal family.  They were inside the Grand Castle, and its name pretty much sums up what it was like.  Currently, they were sitting in a room that was one or two stories up with ceilings higher than any that they had seen.  There was a tall window reaching from the ground to almost the entire height of one wall that opened up a good view of the majority of Deo, outlined in gold.  A glass chandelier hung above their heads; marble tiles lined the floor.  The walls were made of dark gray slate stones stacked atop each other with cement, giving a rough yet very classy feel.

        The king continued, "Instead of celebrating peace, thoughts of violence and anger are festering people's minds!"

        Silas shifted his view to see Avice's face.  She stared intensely at the ground as her knuckles turned white with her tightly clenched fists.  He knew that this was not a good sign - she was angry, and Avice was certainly not one to cross paths with.

        As Silas expected, she spoke up.  "With all due respect, your Majesty," she began.

        "Avice," muttered Silas, signaling her to calm down.

        "With all due respect," she repeated, enunciating every syllable as she glared at Silas.  She turned her gaze back to the king.  "If you've noticed, we tried to avoid conflict at all costs..."

        "Avice."  Silas tried again, a bit louder this time.

        She ignored him.  "Your people were the ones that was causing all the commotion.  Someone punched my friend in the face, for God's sake!"  She stood up, getting caught up in her words.

        "Avice!"

        "No, Silas," she yelled, turning around, "we have reason for what we did.  We're not the ones at fault here, and I'm not about to let us take the blame for it, okay?  I'm going to-"

        "Avice," Silas cried and also stood up.  He paused and looked up in exasperation before continuing.  "Listen to yourself!  Calm down!"

        "Silence!" the king roared.  This shut them up.

        "My apologies, your Majesty," Silas muttered before taking his seat once more.  Avice merely crossed her arms and gruffly sat down.

        "You dare say that my people are the reasoning of this... travesty?"  The enraged king glared at Avice and approached her as he scolded her.  "Had you two decided to give up your weapons instead of stubbornly keeping them with you, this could've been prevented!"  He narrowed his eyes at them and turned to one of the workers in the castle.  "Escort these vile felons to Prignis," he commanded.

        "Yes, your Majesty," the guard responded before he approached the two.  "Come along, now."

+~+~+

        Apparently, 'Prignis' was just the name of their local prison.  It was pretty empty, only a few guards roamed the place, but the security system was more than impressive.  In fact, the system was the main reason why they still had not broken free despite having stayed in their cell for almost the entire day.

        "In my defense," Avice stated, "this would've happened even if I hadn't said that stuff."  She sat down on the cold ground and leaned her back against a hard wall.  There was not much in the cell, only a bunk bed with stained thin sheets laid sloppily on them.  The walls were cracked, and floors were dusty as nobody has occupied the place for a very long time.

        "I know."  Silas was quiet; he kept staring out into the empty hallway, past the laser beams that held them in.

        What are we going to do? he thought, The Magieros will be coming for Hexelia tonight...  If we don't get out of here, we're all fucked...

        "How do you propose we escape?" Avice questioned after a few minutes of silence.

        "I... don't know..."  He sighed.  "Not one guard has passed by our hallway today.  They are probably in the other wing.  It'd be hard to trick them."

        Avice got up and walked towards Silas.  "I'm sorry."

        "It's okay," he responded.  They stood there together in silence once more, before they felt the ground tremble beneath their feet.  A large boom thundered through the air, and a siren located on the ceiling of the hallway wailed as red lights tinted surroundings.  The laser beams flickered a bit before disappearing completely.  Avice stared for a moment, then moved her hand forward to feel if the lasers were indeed gone.

        "They're here," Silas uttered to himself.  He looked down at Avice, who had a worried expression painted on her face.

        "Come on," he said, grabbing her wrist and dragging her out, "Time is money."

        First things first - they had to find their weapons.  They rushed out and found a few 'Employees Only' rooms, which they searched.  Eventually, they retrieved their sword and spear, and made their way quickly to the front entrance.

        "Hey, where the hell do you guys think you're going?!" a guard yelled at the very few criminals that took this opportunity to escape.

        "Especially you guys!" another cried, referring to Avice and Silas.

        The two ignored the guards and kept running.

        "Hey, what's the big idea?!" one of the criminals cried as he struggled to open the front doors.

        "It's a lock down," the guards explained, "No way that we'd let you guys out!"

        Avice narrowed her eyes at the guards.  "Do you realize what the hell is going on out there?!" she yelled.  Her temper once again got the best of her.

        This time Silas did not do a thing to stop her.

        "Take a gander outside, why don't you, and tell me if you like it.  Now personally, I don't, so why don't you let us loose and we can do something about it?" she hissed.

        The guards refused.

        "Fine," Avice grunted.  She strolled up to the door and nodded at Silas.

        Within a blink of an eye, he drew his elbows back and accumulated an energy ball in the palms of his hands before hurling it forward, aiming at the crack between the two front doors.  There was a smoking dent where the ball had made contact.  Avice jammed her spear in the crack and began prying open the entrance.  The other criminals - about ten - were cheering wildly, although the two were not quite as happy.

        The guards rushed to stop the two from doing any more damage.

        "Keep them busy!" Avice shouted.  Silas drew his sword and glared in a threatening manner at he guards.

        The guards responded by holding up their guns.

        Silas raised one of his hands and formed a protective sphere around himself and Avice.  "Why don't you put those guns down?" he spoke quietly, "After all, today is Wini.  No need to fight."

        "Got it!" Avice declared as the doors swung open.  Everyone flooded out, but stopped immediately as they were greeted by fire and destruction.  Screams were heard - those of children, mothers, fathers...  Men in black cloaks scoured the place, their faces hidden in shadows.  The sun was setting; an orange light decorated the sky and gave clouds a gold lining, completely contrasting the terror on the ground.

        One of the strange cloaked men turned his face to the escapees.

        "Magieros..." Silas whispered.

        The shrouded man approached the group.

        One of the criminals tried to run away.  To the right he leapt, until the cloaked man's arm extended out and stretched like rubber.  It grabbed him by the neck, lifted him up, and crushed his throat.

        Everyone watched in horror as the Magiero dropped the lifeless body onto the ground.

        Immediately, Silas and Avice both emitted fireballs at him, hoping to at least stun him for a moment.  As expected, the enemy flew backwards from the shock and landed on his back.  Everybody took that chance to make a run away from the Magiero.

        Avice and Silas ran faster, if possible, than earlier during the chase and headed straight for the castle.

        God, please, Silas thought, Please...  Don't let it be too late...

+~+~+

        Seryn gasped.  Her family and her were seated in the large dining room, heated by a nice fireplace in the corner, feasting upon the perfect meal.  The only sounds were the cracks the firewood made once in a while and the silent clatter of silver against ceramics.  That is, until the muted sound of an explosion rocked the castle.

        Then there was confusion.  They did not understand why this was happening - people killing, invading, destroying...  Not on Wini, not after five hundred years, not when Clio was most well known for its peaceful society.  Why?  Why?  Why?

        After confusion came panic.  What would they do?  They couldn't possibly leave the people, but they didn't have any methods of fighting.  None of them knew how to, and the only weapons they had were the broken antiques hanging on the walls.

        They heard loud banging sounds.  The entire castle shook every time it sounded.  Something was pounding at the castle doors, and they knew that it was not citizens begging for sanctuary.

        Everything flashed by in front of Seryn's eyes.  Killing.  Lots of it.  Blood.  Screams.

        Servants.

        Burnt.

        Pictures.

        Smashed.

        Mother.

        Crushed.

        Father.

        Stabbed.

        Herself.

        Herself...

        Herself...

        As a cloaked man, monster, or whatever it was transformed its arm in the shape of a sword and raised it, Seryn couldn't help but scream.  She shut her eyes in fear and prepared herself for the pain that would come.

        "GET UP!" a voice yelled.  She opened her eyes and saw a blur in front of her.  Standing up, she saw the man who was about to end her life on the ground, struggling to get up.  She turned to her right and saw familiar faces - a woman and a man.

        "You... you're the..." Seryn gasped.

        "We're the people your father locked up this morning," the woman finished for her.  She grabbed Seryn's wrist and said, "If you want to live, I suggest you follow us."

        Seryn had no time to do anything, not even give a timid nod, before she was yanked out of the castle's dining room.

        The woman pulling her ran forward and pulled Seryn, occasionally throwing a few energy balls at their adversaries.  The man was in front of them both, using his sword to slash and constantly launching fireballs.  Everything whizzed by her like lightning.  Fire, smoke, houses, people, streets...  Somewhere in the back she happened to catch a glimpse of a woman screaming for her children.  In that split moment, Seryn noticed that the woman had blood smeared everywhere; she would never forget the piercing shriek, nor her tainted red hands.  Before she knew it, she was out of Deo.  Was the city that small, or was she just running supersonic?

        They were now walking through one of Clio's many rolling green hills.  It was maintained pretty well for it would have been a beautiful place for scenery if Deo had not gone up in a blaze.  A few green trees dotted the land and underneath the purplish sky off in the distance were faint mountains, blue with white peaks.

        "Can...  Can we stop now?" Seryn pleaded.  Her legs were tired - she had never ran that far, nor at that speed, before.  She panted a bit.  Her two saviors turned around and noticed that her brows were sweating like crazy, while they weren't even hyperventilating.

        The woman shook her head.

        "We have to keep moving," the man explained, "or else they'll catch up."

        The princess gave them a look, which asked for sympathy.

        "Fine," he sighed, "We'll walk instead.  But as soon as we see them again, we have to run."

        "Okay."  She quickly switched her expression.  "Now could you please explain to me what is going on?!" Seryn demanded.

        "My name is Avice," the woman said, "and this is Silas.  Those things back there, they're called Magieros.  They're very powerful magicians that decided to band together about a few millennia ago under the belief that they can gain all the magic in the world, and could possibly get everyone on Moirae that same ability, too."

        "So what are they doing destroying Deo?!" shrieked Seryn.

        "You see..."  Avice paused a bit, trying to think of how to word it.

        Silas continued for her.  "The easiest way for everyone to gain as much power as possible is to make everyone ascend to a higher state of existence and have no one existing in physical form," he explained, "so they set up a spell to burn away the universe when they first banded together.  Right now as we speak, planets and galaxies are being destroyed in a blaze.  Although it will take over ten thousand years for everything in the universe to be destroyed, it's still deteriorating very rapidly and in a decade or so the fire will hit our planet."

        "And what, exactly, do I have to do with this?" Seryn questioned.

        "You can stop the fire," Silas told her.

        "What?!" the princess exclaimed, "How, exactly, am I supposed to do that?!"

        Avice and Silas exchanged looks.  "Right now you don't need to know," he told her.  He glanced over his shoulder.  "We better get a move on.  They're starting to catch up."

+~+~+

        "This was the best I could get," Avice called, approaching Silas and Seryn with a dead hare in her hand.

        Midnight was drawing nearer.  If it were up to Avice and Silas, they would've kept traveling until through the night while the temperature was cool, and then resting, eating, and replenishing their supplies during the day when heat burns mercury.  However, Seryn was not used to their ways.  She was hungry and tired and demanded that they took a break.

        Under the dark navy sky and within the forest, which was thick with tall, majestic green pines, Silas had started a fire for Seryn.  He was a bit wary about doing so, for the smoke would be an easy indicator as to what their location was.  However, he knew that the princess would not stop nagging them until he gave in.

        "A rabbit?  That is what I'll be eating?"  Seryn wrinkled her nose, inspecting it with a disgusted look on her face.

        "High in proteins," Avice returned as she sat down beside the fire.  She handed the dead creature to Silas, who skinned it and sliced the meat.

        "How do I know that you guys aren't feeding me bogus?" Seryn hissed suddenly.  "What proof do you have that what you're saying is true?"

        "Deo.  That is our proof," Silas uttered half-mindedly, paying full attention to the serving of the meal.

        The princess kept silent.

        "Avice, would you like some?" Silas questioned as he handed Seryn a stick with a slab of rabbit meat on it.

        She nodded in response.

        "Ew!  It's all bloody!" the blonde cried, holding it as far away from herself as possible.

        "Why wouldn't it be?" the older woman asked as she received a stick and piece of meat as well.  Silas began preparing his own.

        "How am I supposed to eat this?!" Seryn demanded.

        Silas and Avice responded simply by holding the meat near the tip of the flame with the stick.

        Seryn blushed with slight embarrassment, but forced the blood away from her cheeks as she followed suit.

        The three sat in silence as they waited for their food to finish cooking.

        "How can you tell if it's done?" Seryn asked.

        "Well," Silas explained in a half-hearted manner, "you take it out once in a while to make sure it's not burning to a crisp.  When you take it out and it looks pretty brown-ish on the outside, it should be done.  You bite into it and if you find red meat, go stick it in the fire again."

        Seryn shot him a Look and turned her attention back to her 'cooking'.

        Which was currently catching fire.

        The princess screamed.  "Put it out!" she cried, stuffing the stick into Silas' hands.

        "H-hey!" he cried, shocked by the sudden outburst.  He fumbled with both his own meal and the princess' as he tried to figure out how to put out the fire without, well, stepping on it.

        Avice pointed at his sword with one hand.  "Slap it against that to smother the fire," she cried quickly.

        Silas followed her directions and began smashing the meat against the weapon - which he used to cut open the hare.

        "Ew!  Now there's going to be rabbit hair on it!" Seryn wailed in objection.

        "Do you want food?" Avice snapped back.

        Soon, after a long moment of commotion, Silas had managed to put the fire out, revealing an extremely burnt piece of meat on a charcoaled stick.  His and Avice's food were no better; when they paid all their attention to putting the fire out, they forgot that there were still two other pieces still in the fire and ended up burning their own food.

        "Ugh.  Do I have to eat this?" Seryn asked.  Her face was scrunched up with a sickened look.

        "You were complaining about being hungry, weren't you?" Silas responded.  He was in the process of taking the rabbit meat off the stick and biting in to it.  A little burn couldn't be that bad.

        "Well..."  She paused, still grimacing.  "I was expecting you guys to have prepared something like a few biscuits..."

        "Normally we'd get something like that during the day," Avice explained as she lifted her head from the piece of meat.  She had the same logic as Silas did regarding charcoaled food.  "That's about the time we usually make it to the next town.  If it takes more than a few days, we'll usually stock up on extra supplies before we leave."

        "So you mean you basically only have one meal a day?!" Seryn questioned, shocked.

        "Yeah."  Silas shrugged and continue eating.

        "Ew..."

+~+~+

        It was about noon when they arrived at the next town, Aglaia.  It was considerably quieter than Deo - unlike the capital of Clio, Aglaia's street markets were small, modest, as were the stores.  Homes were a lot simpler and didn't have many 'luxuries' like fancy rugs or antique tables, despite that the people were certainly rich enough to afford such items.

        "Why is it so hot?" Seryn whined, wiping sweat off her brow with a swift motion of her arm.

        "We would've made it here when it was still cool if we hadn't stopped to rest," grumbled Avice.  She was upset that they had to slow down their pace for Seryn, but knew there was no other way.

        "Ever thought that maybe I get pretty tired?" the princess snapped back.  She glared knives at Avice as she spoke.  There was something about the older woman that made her a person anyone would love to hate.

        "Listen," Silas began, "I'll be buying some bread and filling up our water bottles from the well.  Avice, take her to the nearest inn so she can eat, get a drink, maybe sleep for a while?"

        Avice nodded.  "I need a bit of money, though," she stated.  Silas tossed her a small sack of gold.

        "Why can't you take me to the inn?" Seryn asked Silas, pouting, "She can get the water for us."

        "And why can't you," Avice hissed, shooting Seryn a glare twice as intimidating as the one the princess gave her earlier, "just shut the hell up and be 'Fair Seryn' like everyone in Clio seems to think you are?"

        Reluctantly, she obeyed.

+~+~+

A/N: Kissies and smooches to Crimson Goddess, Raiden X, and FinalEva for pre-reading this for me.  You guys rock.  Oh, yeah, and Zero Yuy pre-read this, too, but I'd rather not smooch him.  Ewwie...

Oh, the funny names?  Almost all of the proper nouns here except Seryn, Hexelia, Magieros, and Prignis and Deo (I made up Seryn, got Deo from a Christmas carol [I think it's Latin for God, but I'm not sure], and for everything else I went to Babelfish and fused different translation of a specific word to wind up with what I got...) was from this old, OLD Reader's Digest Encyclopedic Book Volume III or something rather, I can't really remember the name of it at the moment.  It was published sometime in the 60's or 70's, though, I'll tell you that much (probably why it was filled almost completely with names that no one even thinks about using anymore).  Anyways, Avice and Silas are the only names pulled from that book that belonged in the 'Christian Names' section.  Everything else was from the 'Mythology and Beliefs' section.  Well, since the idea of apocalypse or Armageddon or something-rather has been toyed with so much in fantasy fictions, having names revolving around human beliefs was a must.  So yeah.