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fido dido
Rosalind
Dark Mark
Cyclone
Hybrid
Peace is good. The Blue Moon comes. I want the Blue Moon mummy.
It was dusk. The smooth night air was around us all as we sat, cross-legged, around the humble, yet satisfactory, fire. I could hear fido's teeth chattering, and as I looked round the group it seemed that it wasn't just the cold that was getting people down. The journey to Carcefors was still a while away, and although it was dark now, earlier, a black cloud had hung over the region. Rosalind seemed OK, and was cheery as ever, but as for the others, it wasn't the same story. Dark Mark was tired, Cyclone was simply asleep and Hybrid didn't look completely sane. As night dragged on, one by one, the group members just wandered off, back to their shelters. Waiting for another morning to wake them up from their god-forsaken sleep. fido was the last one at the fire. And began to sing. It was a lullaby her mother had taught her, when she was young. When her mother passed away, she found it extremely hard to cope. She joined us in our fight then, and has no regrets. Fido dido headed for bed, with a glint of a tear in her eye.
Morning woke the group one by one, and as each emerged from the little shelter they had they found Rosalind cooking breakfast for them. Each said very little, but of the understandable mumbles, 'thank you' seemed a common phrase. Once everyone had their meal, Rosalind sat down, as they discussed their next move. Cyclone started.
"It would seem he has crossed Shadose and into Colio. There have also been spottings of him in the skies, or more specifically, D Sector of the Saint system. If this is true, then we'll have to fix the teleporter we picked up in Elix,"
Dark Mark groaned. That meant more work for him. Being the only one in the group with any ability to fix things had its advantages, in the form of blackmail. It also had its disadvantages, (in that) he did almost all the technical work. And the teleporters in question were, to almost every technician except him, irreparable. Still, at least it's something to do, and if he does it, then it might impress the girls as well.
"I take it by 'we'll' fix the teleporters you mean 'I' will fix them?" said Dark Mark
"Yes. Anyway, we first need to get to Carcefors, to rest properly for the true journey. Archerald will not stop, so we must go faster. We cannot let him get to the Formian Council!"
Archerald was, in fact, a very evil man. To the extent that he'd kill to get his way, as fido and Hybrid knew. His mission was a simple one. He didn't like the way the world worked. He seeked revenge on the world. So instead of destroying the world, he seeked to destroy those who made it this way. Those people sat on the Formian Council. Each had a power which made them very valuable to the world. And once Archerald had the power, he would change the world. To be like his vision, a place of cruelness and suffering. The council members include:
Cara Sortias - A woman of powers to shape the land. She can control where a volcano's lava flows or whether the rain will fall on flooded lands.
Uio Wey - He has a more logical approach to things. He made the square have 4 sides and the circle be round. Logic is based around Uio's ideas.
Leo Formia - A member of the Formian royal family. He has no powers to control the world, but has the ability to charm and lead the people.
Archerald seeks the power that these three have, and combined, he would be an almost impossible force to reckon with. So stopping him before he reached the Council was important. What's ironic about it all is that a) the people do not know anything about what is happening and b) Leo Formia, being only 20, hasn't any clue either. The other Councillors feel it would panic Leo, therefore panicking the people. So the group had to be discreet as they passed through various towns, because even if Archerald passed through, the people would have no idea, except for that Archerald is kept alive by one thing. Death. And when Archerald passes through, at least a few people die. And that's the funny thing; it's not masses, but just, a few. Yet the speech continued.
"So, the route we must take will be north, to Carcefors. From there we will venture into the East over to Shadose and further east to Colio. It is their we can go to the Saints Point, use the teleporter we should have fixed by then to head up to D Sector of the Saint system. If our luck is in, we'll find him there. Any questions?"
The group was silent. For some reason, Hybrid still looked insane. And on those notes, the trek resumed across the Forest of Higer, into Carcefors.
The Forest of Higer was a serene place, filled with beauty. As the group passed through colours whisked passed them in the form of life, and a gentle hum could be heard. The place was so green that animals could easily survive, so untouched by progress and technology, yet so easy to walk through. And as the sun rises right over the forest, you can feel it beam down strongly over you, even though the towering trees sometimes block out its light. The Forest is true home to Rosalind, so as she walked through, she met people from her home village. Her parents had moved on, but all her old friends were here, and they were sad to see her leave herself as the group had to press on. It wasn't till dusk through the forest that anything nasty happened. Cyclone called out everyone's names, just to check no one had been left behind.
"fido, are you there?" A distant 'Yes' arose. "Dark Mark, Rosalind. You here?" Two distant 'Uh-huh's' were heard. "Hybrid, you still with us?"
Silence
"HYBRID! WHERE ARE YOU?" he shouted louder. Still no reply. The group set about looking for him in the area, but didn't want to venture too far at night. They continued the search in the somewhat limited area, until fido screamed.
"You guys, maybe you should come over here a sec..."
The sentence wasn't finished. The others ran over to see Hybrid standing there, with fido by his side. Both of them looked quite weird, especially Hybrid, who had looked slightly insane for a couple of days. He did an abnormally high jump and landed on all fours on the ground.
"Hybrid, what’s wrong with you?" shouted Rosalind
"WhAt'S wRoNg WiTh Me? It'S yOu!" he shouted, whilst twitching.
Hybrid then jumped and then jumped high off her head, using it as propulsion almost. fido fell to the ground, and Hybrid landed, took a few swipes at Cyclone and then headed back to where fido was.
"HeS oUr TrUe EmPeRoR!!!!!" he shouted at the remaining of the party, as he absorbed energy from Dark Mark. Dark Mark fell to the floor, and Hybrid laughed.
"WeAkLiNg!" he shouted, and ran off into the forest, taking fido with him.
Hybrid and fido were gone. Cyclone was hurt and Dark Mark simply tired. Only Rosalind remembered the things Hybrid said. Out true emperor? How? With 2 of the 5 gone, there was more pressure than ever to get Carcefors. Cyclone stood up as best he could.
"We must get to Carcefors by midday tommorow. Once their, we'll rest, and maybe be able to pick up some proper weapons. We had no chance against the 'possessed' Hybrid today with the equipment we had, so thats a top priority. Oh, Dark Mark, since we're going to space we'll need those teleporters." Dark Mark went from tired to depressed. "That's all tonight"
That night, Dark Mark stayed up all hours, simply to get the teleporters done. And at 3am, after bouts of swearing and a cut wrist, they were done.
The next morning it was time to start the final 2 hour leg of the journey to Carcefors. It wasn't even that, and after the uneventful walk they got into Carcefors at 11am. If they left at 9am the next morning, they could cross the Ice Sheet at 3pm, leading them closer to Colio, and they closer to Shadose also, Dark Mark's place of birth. And if the rumours of Archerald passing through are true, we'll probably find Hybrid and fido. I still wonder what happened to him. How did he turn into that? What we do know is the emperor he talks of is no random cult leader/Scout's PL but the face of evil himself. Archerald.
As they walked into the peaceful, slow moving town of Carcefors, the headed to the Lodges of Higer, a small collection of lodges for travellers to stay in. Going through the town was pretty uneventful. Kid's stared, but the adults just got on with their work. It would seem Archerald had in fact not gone through this town, instead choosing to go past Desperado's Point, to the east. Whether Hybrid had followed is another matter.
Before booking the lodge, they searched around for a small alley containing a shop owned by fido's parents (who had moved up here) selling various thing. However, fido's dad sold nice weapons. Cyclone picked himself up an energy gun, whilst Rosalind opted for a sword, for some reason, a pink one, and Dark Mark, already physically fit, chose not to have a weapon, but to use hand-to-hand combat.
After collecting their various weapons, the lodges were next on the list. Rosalind went to sleep first, whilst Cyclone talked with Dark Mark about their route over the ice sheet to Colio
“It's gonna get pretty cold, obviously, so we'll need to try and cross the ice sheet quick. Don't wanto be be hanging round there. It's also where the paths between Carcefors and Desperado's Point meet, so if we don't actually meet Archerald, we'll sure know he's been there. Across the ice sheet is the Water Gate. It will take us into the centre of Colio, which is actually on an island far out to sea. Once in Colio, the likelihood is that their will be panic, as the Saint's Gate can only be reached from Colio, and that's where Archerald will head to get into space, where he could well find the Formian Council. We cannot use the gate, simply because it will only carry people one way, and Archerald can rule from the skies. We must return. The journey is long, so we should sleep"
By the time Cyclone had finished, Dark Mark was already snoring.
Morning had come and it was time for the group to head off. As they left Carcefors, and headed out towards the ice sheet, it seemed to get warmer rather than cooler. The warmth soon faded though, because once Carcefors was out of site, the weather started to get stormy and cold. The ground underfoot changed from soily and grassy to hard, cold ice, and the outlook in front was bleak. As morning passed to day, the 3 could see nothing but snow. But as the day which they had now become accustomed to became night, it began to get so much colder. And a figure became apparent in the distant. At first it was a pinpoint, but as they got closer to it, it got bigger and bigger. It seemed to move towards them. Then it stopped, and a much smaller figure ran from behind him. It seemed that they had reached the Water Gate. That was the huge thing in the distance. But what was the smaller thing behind? As they got closer and closer, Rosalind recognised it.
"My god....it's Hybrid!"
Hybrid looked as insane as he had done in the Forest of Higer, if not moreso. fido wasn't with him this time, but if she wasn't with him...
Cyclone shouted at Hybrid.
"Stop this NOW Hybrid, PLEASE!"
"YoU tHiNk YoU cAn CoNtRoL mE? hA! i HaVe HeR aNd HiM!"
Suddenly, fido generated from nowhere, and stood beside Hybrid. Hybrid laughed an oh-so-evil laugh and clasped his hands together. Then, a huge ball of energy started generating between his hands, which had since been pulled apart like repelling magnets. The white ball of enery grew bigger, and Cyclone, in an attempt to counter the attack, charged up his energy gun, The ball of energy lay in Hybrid's hands for a few seconds until he threw it with almighty force at Cyclone. Cyclone, with his charged-up gun, shot hundreds of energy nets to catch and reflect the energy ball, or at least, stop it. The bolt of energy whacked through the first hundred or so nets, but slowed on the next few hundred. It stopped dead on the last 50 nets, and as soon as it did, Rosalind jumped in and swiped at Hybrid with her sword. Hybrid yelled.
"ReVeNgE iS sWeEt, PaIn Is SwEeTeR"
He chanted an ancient language that noone had ever heard of. The sky turned from a cloudy murky grey to a vile black. And the black fell all around. Millions of tiny spikes hit Rosalind, and when the sky returned to normal, she was lying on the ground, not moving.
"He Is TrUe KiNg!" Hybrid yelled, as he launched another energy ball, this time at Dark Mark.
"YoUr ThE wEaKlInG, aReN't YoU!" he yelled again. Dark Mark ripped the energy ball from Hybrid's hands, pulled it into a spike shape, and threw it with all his might. fido still standing beside Hybrid, she started shaking. It was then that the spike hit Hybrid . Then followed a huge explosion. Not your run-of-the-mill explosion but an absolutely HUGE explosion. And it was bright. So bright you couldn't even look near the edges without sunglasses. Hybrid was gone, and so was the evil creature possesing him. On the other hand, fido was free, and ran towards the group, hugging everyone in relief. There was no time to waste though. They stepped inside the enormous Water Gate and began the transfer to Colio.
These gates were about the most technologically advanced things in this world (except maybe for our space technology). It was basically a warp between 2 places by splitting you up into trillions of pieces and buliding you back together at the end. It can go wrong though, as the Elephant man and Tony Blair both found out. If their is more than 5 travelling, it's automatic, but since their was only 4, Dark Mark had to enter in the commands himself.
GATEID?-WATER.....:D
PASSEN?-__4__.....:D
PROGRM?-5.287.....:D
EXITID?-COLIO.....:D
CONFRM?-YYYYY.....:D
TRANSFERRING......:D
The journey began, and within seconds, 4 people had become a trillion bits of dust. It wasn't long before they formed again at the Colio Gate.
TRANSFERRED.......:D
______THANKYOU______
SHTDWN//////////////
The exited the gate at the other end. The town of Colio was in front of them. Shadose (Dark Mark's home) was currently too dangerous to visit so Colio was the choice they had to take. As they were all tired after the day walk, and the fight with Hybrid, and the fact that fido had a lot to tell, it seemed a good idea to go to the Colio Rooms, a small place where travellers and researchers can rest for a night or two.
Researchers come to Colio because they want to know why this is the only place where you can use a Gate to get into space. There are 6 gates in Colio. One is the Water-Colio Gate, another is the Shadose-Colio Gate. There is the Elix-Colio gate (out of order) and there are the three space gates. Saint's Gate will take you up into D Sector of the Saint system (Saint's Point will take you up if you have a teleporter), God's Gate will take you into E Sector of the Zeus system and Council Gate will take you to the Formian Council (hidden in deep space, co-ordinates top secret). Due to Archerald being around, the Council Gate is closed, the co-ordinates destroyed. But the Saint’s Gate is rumoured to be close to the Council, so it has been made one-way. This is not good enough, though, to stop Archerald, so he must be destroyed in space, once the group rise up there. The Researchers mainly study God’s Gate, simply because it has a very strong link to the Line of Aries, which is rumoured to have warp crystals (used to make gates) imbedded on it.
As the group entered the Colio Rooms and got ready, fido started talking about what had happened whilst the late Hybrid had her,
“It was so weird! When he took me from the Forest of Higer, he was just muttering to himself, stuff about emperors and all that sort of crazy gibberish. We crossed the Forest in little time simply because Hybrid was bounding through it. We eventually emerged and I got a glimpse of him, of Archerald. He hasn’t changed much since we saw him last through Elix. They were talking about going through Carcefors, but Hybrid objected, simply because it was too populated. So instead they all trekked over the Lire Sands to Shadose. As we got closer to the city it just got darker and darker. And when we entered, even though the city has a reputation as ‘Shadose – City of Evil’, no-one knew of the enormous evil that walked through the city. The city inhabitants seemed to be singing a tune, but it wasn’t cheery, or even motivating. It was something like..
“The old dark city thou road passes through
seems like it was never ever new,
The sky is black, the ground is stone
People pass and people groan
Yet maybe when the darkness subsides
One day we shall maybe see thy light”
I’m sure I had heard it before, but that was thrown to the back of my mind when Hybrid, Archerald (whom I couldn’t see very well anymore) and his gang started to shout. It was shouting of the ancient, dark language, called Slangus. Although there were regional variations, including Txtus, the not-so-common stuck with English, simply because people who spoke in the dark language were often banished by the powers of Darkus. Anyway, as they were shouting, a made out a couple of words..
“Council we go, there time is now
The powers of thou will be mines ..”
The rest was in such a dialect I couldn’t make out. As we didn’t stop in Shadose, and continued our journey across ice, Hybrid suddenly stopped. Everyone proceeded as Hybrid paced up and down, and I sat in the corner. Then you came, and Hybrid absorbed, well, me into him. Scary stuff”
By this point, Dark Mark was snoring. fido dido, although not looking it, was in fact tired after the day, and Rosalind was looking unconscious. Although we all knew she was sleeping
Cyclone, however, was wide awake. All night long.
Morning spat light down on the group like they were the only people in existence. Cyclone was still awake from the previous night, but wasn’t tired. Rosalind woke up, still looking unconscious (thankfully, though, not *Hybrid* unconscious), Dark Mark simply grunted and waited outside and fido dido just jumped out of bed, got dressed, and went outside also. They got their things together and left for Saint’s Point.
It wasn’t much of a trek to get there. They just left Colio and headed North for about 10 minutes, then they reached it. You know, if you look up to the sky above a Space Point its completely black, with stars, all day long. All around it is either blue sky or overcast clouds, but they actual area is all black except for the stars. And when you use the teleporter it’s even more amazing, as you rise up through the gaping hole.
The point itself wasn’t as astonishingly grand as the Water Gate. It was a large, blue circle on the ground with ancient markings set in the blue marble. Whenever you stood in it, you could hear a warbled voice singing, and whenever you rose from it, the voice got louder.
The four of them stood on the plate. Dark Mark set the teleporter co-ordinates
X=34654.75
Y=54565.12
Z=88999.99
YES?=VALID
A huge cylinder of light surrounded them. The voice got louder. The light tube started swirling in and out, round and round. They were pulled upwards by extreme force. As they swirled around they could just make out different parts of the area. The Water Gate was the tiniest dot you could ever imagine. Colio was still quite big, and the ice sheet was simply expansive. After all this twisting and turning, they ended up on Saint’s Point Entry. They walked through the scanner and into the main complex.
Suddenly, all 4 of them just broke into pieces, shattering like glass, and in a flash (a white flash at that, courtesy of Mr Magnesium Co.) they were outside the Council. They looked around. Black. They looked in front. Black. So in an expectedly futile task, they looked behind. Black. Flickering Black. Flickering Black? They looked harder. It seemed it was the Formian Council! But how come it was spac….ah. The shield. It must be falling. They turned to face the front again. It was him.
Archerald.
He was a dark creature of the night, made to look human. He laughed and slammed fido dido with his enormous arms. She flew for metres and landed on a bright line. We were fighting on the Line of Aries. fido was warped to where she was struck, as Cyclone charged up his energy gun. Rosalind ran in and chopped one of his arms off. A loud shriek could be heard. Cyclone had his gun charged up and launched a huge ball of energy at him. It encased Archerald in a bubble. He floated off, up into space, until the bubble popped, and he fell painfully to the ground. Dark Mark ran in, and beat the living daylights out of him, then quickly scanned his mind. He shouted at the group.
“JUMP!”
The Line of Aries began to shake just as they all jumped. It cracked up along every possible place and fell into the special darkness. The Lin of Taurus approached. And when the group landed, they had missed the reaction. They were small, Archherald was now giant. Blood was dripping from every part of his body, and he no longer had eyes and a nose, he just had a mouth. A gruesome, sharp-teeth filled mouth. He scuttle across to Dark Mark and simply picked him up and ate him. Dark Mark fought bravely, and Rosaling ran him with her swor and cut a nice whole in the side of his face, but it wasn’t enough. He was gone. Cyclone’s gun was now at full power, and the bolt that shot from it was massive. A blue streak of energy bounced of the Line of Taurus, and hit Archerald in the torso. He shrunk back to normal size, but kept all the gruesome features he gained from the transformation. fido started to talk the ancient dark language. It seemed to be music to Archerald’s ears. That was, until, a huge cloud engulfed him, suffocating and blinding him. Then Rosalind went absolutely insane, chopping at him any way that she could with her sword, and Cyclone pumped the energy to full power before unleashing the Final Ray. The Final Ray was a huge beam of energy which essentially destroyed everything in its path. But it was hard to control, so he only managed to destroy Archerald’s limb’s. The head, and damaged torso, were still there. Both fell to the ground, but within seconds, they began to float. The torso flew towards Cyclone, turned horizontal, then actually morphed into stone and fell on him, crushing Cyclone quite violently. The head then proceeded to fly over to fido and actually just spin around and spin around fido. It then chanted and fido fell fast asleep. Rosalind jumped in. The sword became purple in colour, and started to turn white even. She raised the sword, and went straight through both the head and torso, cutting them in half. The 4 pieces of Archerald now lay on the floor for a few seconds, before burning in a black fire, and falling into space.
The Council was at last safe.
Later on, Dark Mark, and Hybrid, both had funerals. Funny, it was raining and overcast on both days. They were both held in Dreams, a small village which lives up to it’s name. Many people here find their dream. Dark Mark had always wanted to save the world and well, Hybrid always wanted to be himself, to never follow the crowd. He achieved that too, be it in an unconventional way. And after both ceremonies, people went to their homes, to mourn a loss of a loved one, or to celebrate life after death. But these two were never forgotten. Especially by fido, Cyclone and Rosalind. They had vivid memories, and although they had helped rid the world of a great evil, fido cried. Archerald had been so evil to even take others to his grave. Cyclone felt guilty. Had he sent Hybrid to his death? Rosalind was upset, yet happy. Peace had come, and just like mum said, in peace will cone the Blue Moon.
Archerald banished, Formia saved. Or at least, for now…
Cast
fido dido
Rosalind
Dark Mark
Cyclone
Hybrid
© Paul Holmes a.k.a Fuzzy
Rosalind
Dark Mark
Cyclone
Hybrid
Peace is good. The Blue Moon comes. I want the Blue Moon mummy.
It was dusk. The smooth night air was around us all as we sat, cross-legged, around the humble, yet satisfactory, fire. I could hear fido's teeth chattering, and as I looked round the group it seemed that it wasn't just the cold that was getting people down. The journey to Carcefors was still a while away, and although it was dark now, earlier, a black cloud had hung over the region. Rosalind seemed OK, and was cheery as ever, but as for the others, it wasn't the same story. Dark Mark was tired, Cyclone was simply asleep and Hybrid didn't look completely sane. As night dragged on, one by one, the group members just wandered off, back to their shelters. Waiting for another morning to wake them up from their god-forsaken sleep. fido was the last one at the fire. And began to sing. It was a lullaby her mother had taught her, when she was young. When her mother passed away, she found it extremely hard to cope. She joined us in our fight then, and has no regrets. Fido dido headed for bed, with a glint of a tear in her eye.
Morning woke the group one by one, and as each emerged from the little shelter they had they found Rosalind cooking breakfast for them. Each said very little, but of the understandable mumbles, 'thank you' seemed a common phrase. Once everyone had their meal, Rosalind sat down, as they discussed their next move. Cyclone started.
"It would seem he has crossed Shadose and into Colio. There have also been spottings of him in the skies, or more specifically, D Sector of the Saint system. If this is true, then we'll have to fix the teleporter we picked up in Elix,"
Dark Mark groaned. That meant more work for him. Being the only one in the group with any ability to fix things had its advantages, in the form of blackmail. It also had its disadvantages, (in that) he did almost all the technical work. And the teleporters in question were, to almost every technician except him, irreparable. Still, at least it's something to do, and if he does it, then it might impress the girls as well.
"I take it by 'we'll' fix the teleporters you mean 'I' will fix them?" said Dark Mark
"Yes. Anyway, we first need to get to Carcefors, to rest properly for the true journey. Archerald will not stop, so we must go faster. We cannot let him get to the Formian Council!"
Archerald was, in fact, a very evil man. To the extent that he'd kill to get his way, as fido and Hybrid knew. His mission was a simple one. He didn't like the way the world worked. He seeked revenge on the world. So instead of destroying the world, he seeked to destroy those who made it this way. Those people sat on the Formian Council. Each had a power which made them very valuable to the world. And once Archerald had the power, he would change the world. To be like his vision, a place of cruelness and suffering. The council members include:
Cara Sortias - A woman of powers to shape the land. She can control where a volcano's lava flows or whether the rain will fall on flooded lands.
Uio Wey - He has a more logical approach to things. He made the square have 4 sides and the circle be round. Logic is based around Uio's ideas.
Leo Formia - A member of the Formian royal family. He has no powers to control the world, but has the ability to charm and lead the people.
Archerald seeks the power that these three have, and combined, he would be an almost impossible force to reckon with. So stopping him before he reached the Council was important. What's ironic about it all is that a) the people do not know anything about what is happening and b) Leo Formia, being only 20, hasn't any clue either. The other Councillors feel it would panic Leo, therefore panicking the people. So the group had to be discreet as they passed through various towns, because even if Archerald passed through, the people would have no idea, except for that Archerald is kept alive by one thing. Death. And when Archerald passes through, at least a few people die. And that's the funny thing; it's not masses, but just, a few. Yet the speech continued.
"So, the route we must take will be north, to Carcefors. From there we will venture into the East over to Shadose and further east to Colio. It is their we can go to the Saints Point, use the teleporter we should have fixed by then to head up to D Sector of the Saint system. If our luck is in, we'll find him there. Any questions?"
The group was silent. For some reason, Hybrid still looked insane. And on those notes, the trek resumed across the Forest of Higer, into Carcefors.
The Forest of Higer was a serene place, filled with beauty. As the group passed through colours whisked passed them in the form of life, and a gentle hum could be heard. The place was so green that animals could easily survive, so untouched by progress and technology, yet so easy to walk through. And as the sun rises right over the forest, you can feel it beam down strongly over you, even though the towering trees sometimes block out its light. The Forest is true home to Rosalind, so as she walked through, she met people from her home village. Her parents had moved on, but all her old friends were here, and they were sad to see her leave herself as the group had to press on. It wasn't till dusk through the forest that anything nasty happened. Cyclone called out everyone's names, just to check no one had been left behind.
"fido, are you there?" A distant 'Yes' arose. "Dark Mark, Rosalind. You here?" Two distant 'Uh-huh's' were heard. "Hybrid, you still with us?"
Silence
"HYBRID! WHERE ARE YOU?" he shouted louder. Still no reply. The group set about looking for him in the area, but didn't want to venture too far at night. They continued the search in the somewhat limited area, until fido screamed.
"You guys, maybe you should come over here a sec..."
The sentence wasn't finished. The others ran over to see Hybrid standing there, with fido by his side. Both of them looked quite weird, especially Hybrid, who had looked slightly insane for a couple of days. He did an abnormally high jump and landed on all fours on the ground.
"Hybrid, what’s wrong with you?" shouted Rosalind
"WhAt'S wRoNg WiTh Me? It'S yOu!" he shouted, whilst twitching.
Hybrid then jumped and then jumped high off her head, using it as propulsion almost. fido fell to the ground, and Hybrid landed, took a few swipes at Cyclone and then headed back to where fido was.
"HeS oUr TrUe EmPeRoR!!!!!" he shouted at the remaining of the party, as he absorbed energy from Dark Mark. Dark Mark fell to the floor, and Hybrid laughed.
"WeAkLiNg!" he shouted, and ran off into the forest, taking fido with him.
Hybrid and fido were gone. Cyclone was hurt and Dark Mark simply tired. Only Rosalind remembered the things Hybrid said. Out true emperor? How? With 2 of the 5 gone, there was more pressure than ever to get Carcefors. Cyclone stood up as best he could.
"We must get to Carcefors by midday tommorow. Once their, we'll rest, and maybe be able to pick up some proper weapons. We had no chance against the 'possessed' Hybrid today with the equipment we had, so thats a top priority. Oh, Dark Mark, since we're going to space we'll need those teleporters." Dark Mark went from tired to depressed. "That's all tonight"
That night, Dark Mark stayed up all hours, simply to get the teleporters done. And at 3am, after bouts of swearing and a cut wrist, they were done.
The next morning it was time to start the final 2 hour leg of the journey to Carcefors. It wasn't even that, and after the uneventful walk they got into Carcefors at 11am. If they left at 9am the next morning, they could cross the Ice Sheet at 3pm, leading them closer to Colio, and they closer to Shadose also, Dark Mark's place of birth. And if the rumours of Archerald passing through are true, we'll probably find Hybrid and fido. I still wonder what happened to him. How did he turn into that? What we do know is the emperor he talks of is no random cult leader/Scout's PL but the face of evil himself. Archerald.
As they walked into the peaceful, slow moving town of Carcefors, the headed to the Lodges of Higer, a small collection of lodges for travellers to stay in. Going through the town was pretty uneventful. Kid's stared, but the adults just got on with their work. It would seem Archerald had in fact not gone through this town, instead choosing to go past Desperado's Point, to the east. Whether Hybrid had followed is another matter.
Before booking the lodge, they searched around for a small alley containing a shop owned by fido's parents (who had moved up here) selling various thing. However, fido's dad sold nice weapons. Cyclone picked himself up an energy gun, whilst Rosalind opted for a sword, for some reason, a pink one, and Dark Mark, already physically fit, chose not to have a weapon, but to use hand-to-hand combat.
After collecting their various weapons, the lodges were next on the list. Rosalind went to sleep first, whilst Cyclone talked with Dark Mark about their route over the ice sheet to Colio
“It's gonna get pretty cold, obviously, so we'll need to try and cross the ice sheet quick. Don't wanto be be hanging round there. It's also where the paths between Carcefors and Desperado's Point meet, so if we don't actually meet Archerald, we'll sure know he's been there. Across the ice sheet is the Water Gate. It will take us into the centre of Colio, which is actually on an island far out to sea. Once in Colio, the likelihood is that their will be panic, as the Saint's Gate can only be reached from Colio, and that's where Archerald will head to get into space, where he could well find the Formian Council. We cannot use the gate, simply because it will only carry people one way, and Archerald can rule from the skies. We must return. The journey is long, so we should sleep"
By the time Cyclone had finished, Dark Mark was already snoring.
Morning had come and it was time for the group to head off. As they left Carcefors, and headed out towards the ice sheet, it seemed to get warmer rather than cooler. The warmth soon faded though, because once Carcefors was out of site, the weather started to get stormy and cold. The ground underfoot changed from soily and grassy to hard, cold ice, and the outlook in front was bleak. As morning passed to day, the 3 could see nothing but snow. But as the day which they had now become accustomed to became night, it began to get so much colder. And a figure became apparent in the distant. At first it was a pinpoint, but as they got closer to it, it got bigger and bigger. It seemed to move towards them. Then it stopped, and a much smaller figure ran from behind him. It seemed that they had reached the Water Gate. That was the huge thing in the distance. But what was the smaller thing behind? As they got closer and closer, Rosalind recognised it.
"My god....it's Hybrid!"
Hybrid looked as insane as he had done in the Forest of Higer, if not moreso. fido wasn't with him this time, but if she wasn't with him...
Cyclone shouted at Hybrid.
"Stop this NOW Hybrid, PLEASE!"
"YoU tHiNk YoU cAn CoNtRoL mE? hA! i HaVe HeR aNd HiM!"
Suddenly, fido generated from nowhere, and stood beside Hybrid. Hybrid laughed an oh-so-evil laugh and clasped his hands together. Then, a huge ball of energy started generating between his hands, which had since been pulled apart like repelling magnets. The white ball of enery grew bigger, and Cyclone, in an attempt to counter the attack, charged up his energy gun, The ball of energy lay in Hybrid's hands for a few seconds until he threw it with almighty force at Cyclone. Cyclone, with his charged-up gun, shot hundreds of energy nets to catch and reflect the energy ball, or at least, stop it. The bolt of energy whacked through the first hundred or so nets, but slowed on the next few hundred. It stopped dead on the last 50 nets, and as soon as it did, Rosalind jumped in and swiped at Hybrid with her sword. Hybrid yelled.
"ReVeNgE iS sWeEt, PaIn Is SwEeTeR"
He chanted an ancient language that noone had ever heard of. The sky turned from a cloudy murky grey to a vile black. And the black fell all around. Millions of tiny spikes hit Rosalind, and when the sky returned to normal, she was lying on the ground, not moving.
"He Is TrUe KiNg!" Hybrid yelled, as he launched another energy ball, this time at Dark Mark.
"YoUr ThE wEaKlInG, aReN't YoU!" he yelled again. Dark Mark ripped the energy ball from Hybrid's hands, pulled it into a spike shape, and threw it with all his might. fido still standing beside Hybrid, she started shaking. It was then that the spike hit Hybrid . Then followed a huge explosion. Not your run-of-the-mill explosion but an absolutely HUGE explosion. And it was bright. So bright you couldn't even look near the edges without sunglasses. Hybrid was gone, and so was the evil creature possesing him. On the other hand, fido was free, and ran towards the group, hugging everyone in relief. There was no time to waste though. They stepped inside the enormous Water Gate and began the transfer to Colio.
These gates were about the most technologically advanced things in this world (except maybe for our space technology). It was basically a warp between 2 places by splitting you up into trillions of pieces and buliding you back together at the end. It can go wrong though, as the Elephant man and Tony Blair both found out. If their is more than 5 travelling, it's automatic, but since their was only 4, Dark Mark had to enter in the commands himself.
GATEID?-WATER.....:D
PASSEN?-__4__.....:D
PROGRM?-5.287.....:D
EXITID?-COLIO.....:D
CONFRM?-YYYYY.....:D
TRANSFERRING......:D
The journey began, and within seconds, 4 people had become a trillion bits of dust. It wasn't long before they formed again at the Colio Gate.
TRANSFERRED.......:D
______THANKYOU______
SHTDWN//////////////
The exited the gate at the other end. The town of Colio was in front of them. Shadose (Dark Mark's home) was currently too dangerous to visit so Colio was the choice they had to take. As they were all tired after the day walk, and the fight with Hybrid, and the fact that fido had a lot to tell, it seemed a good idea to go to the Colio Rooms, a small place where travellers and researchers can rest for a night or two.
Researchers come to Colio because they want to know why this is the only place where you can use a Gate to get into space. There are 6 gates in Colio. One is the Water-Colio Gate, another is the Shadose-Colio Gate. There is the Elix-Colio gate (out of order) and there are the three space gates. Saint's Gate will take you up into D Sector of the Saint system (Saint's Point will take you up if you have a teleporter), God's Gate will take you into E Sector of the Zeus system and Council Gate will take you to the Formian Council (hidden in deep space, co-ordinates top secret). Due to Archerald being around, the Council Gate is closed, the co-ordinates destroyed. But the Saint’s Gate is rumoured to be close to the Council, so it has been made one-way. This is not good enough, though, to stop Archerald, so he must be destroyed in space, once the group rise up there. The Researchers mainly study God’s Gate, simply because it has a very strong link to the Line of Aries, which is rumoured to have warp crystals (used to make gates) imbedded on it.
As the group entered the Colio Rooms and got ready, fido started talking about what had happened whilst the late Hybrid had her,
“It was so weird! When he took me from the Forest of Higer, he was just muttering to himself, stuff about emperors and all that sort of crazy gibberish. We crossed the Forest in little time simply because Hybrid was bounding through it. We eventually emerged and I got a glimpse of him, of Archerald. He hasn’t changed much since we saw him last through Elix. They were talking about going through Carcefors, but Hybrid objected, simply because it was too populated. So instead they all trekked over the Lire Sands to Shadose. As we got closer to the city it just got darker and darker. And when we entered, even though the city has a reputation as ‘Shadose – City of Evil’, no-one knew of the enormous evil that walked through the city. The city inhabitants seemed to be singing a tune, but it wasn’t cheery, or even motivating. It was something like..
“The old dark city thou road passes through
seems like it was never ever new,
The sky is black, the ground is stone
People pass and people groan
Yet maybe when the darkness subsides
One day we shall maybe see thy light”
I’m sure I had heard it before, but that was thrown to the back of my mind when Hybrid, Archerald (whom I couldn’t see very well anymore) and his gang started to shout. It was shouting of the ancient, dark language, called Slangus. Although there were regional variations, including Txtus, the not-so-common stuck with English, simply because people who spoke in the dark language were often banished by the powers of Darkus. Anyway, as they were shouting, a made out a couple of words..
“Council we go, there time is now
The powers of thou will be mines ..”
The rest was in such a dialect I couldn’t make out. As we didn’t stop in Shadose, and continued our journey across ice, Hybrid suddenly stopped. Everyone proceeded as Hybrid paced up and down, and I sat in the corner. Then you came, and Hybrid absorbed, well, me into him. Scary stuff”
By this point, Dark Mark was snoring. fido dido, although not looking it, was in fact tired after the day, and Rosalind was looking unconscious. Although we all knew she was sleeping
Cyclone, however, was wide awake. All night long.
Morning spat light down on the group like they were the only people in existence. Cyclone was still awake from the previous night, but wasn’t tired. Rosalind woke up, still looking unconscious (thankfully, though, not *Hybrid* unconscious), Dark Mark simply grunted and waited outside and fido dido just jumped out of bed, got dressed, and went outside also. They got their things together and left for Saint’s Point.
It wasn’t much of a trek to get there. They just left Colio and headed North for about 10 minutes, then they reached it. You know, if you look up to the sky above a Space Point its completely black, with stars, all day long. All around it is either blue sky or overcast clouds, but they actual area is all black except for the stars. And when you use the teleporter it’s even more amazing, as you rise up through the gaping hole.
The point itself wasn’t as astonishingly grand as the Water Gate. It was a large, blue circle on the ground with ancient markings set in the blue marble. Whenever you stood in it, you could hear a warbled voice singing, and whenever you rose from it, the voice got louder.
The four of them stood on the plate. Dark Mark set the teleporter co-ordinates
X=34654.75
Y=54565.12
Z=88999.99
YES?=VALID
A huge cylinder of light surrounded them. The voice got louder. The light tube started swirling in and out, round and round. They were pulled upwards by extreme force. As they swirled around they could just make out different parts of the area. The Water Gate was the tiniest dot you could ever imagine. Colio was still quite big, and the ice sheet was simply expansive. After all this twisting and turning, they ended up on Saint’s Point Entry. They walked through the scanner and into the main complex.
Suddenly, all 4 of them just broke into pieces, shattering like glass, and in a flash (a white flash at that, courtesy of Mr Magnesium Co.) they were outside the Council. They looked around. Black. They looked in front. Black. So in an expectedly futile task, they looked behind. Black. Flickering Black. Flickering Black? They looked harder. It seemed it was the Formian Council! But how come it was spac….ah. The shield. It must be falling. They turned to face the front again. It was him.
Archerald.
He was a dark creature of the night, made to look human. He laughed and slammed fido dido with his enormous arms. She flew for metres and landed on a bright line. We were fighting on the Line of Aries. fido was warped to where she was struck, as Cyclone charged up his energy gun. Rosalind ran in and chopped one of his arms off. A loud shriek could be heard. Cyclone had his gun charged up and launched a huge ball of energy at him. It encased Archerald in a bubble. He floated off, up into space, until the bubble popped, and he fell painfully to the ground. Dark Mark ran in, and beat the living daylights out of him, then quickly scanned his mind. He shouted at the group.
“JUMP!”
The Line of Aries began to shake just as they all jumped. It cracked up along every possible place and fell into the special darkness. The Lin of Taurus approached. And when the group landed, they had missed the reaction. They were small, Archherald was now giant. Blood was dripping from every part of his body, and he no longer had eyes and a nose, he just had a mouth. A gruesome, sharp-teeth filled mouth. He scuttle across to Dark Mark and simply picked him up and ate him. Dark Mark fought bravely, and Rosaling ran him with her swor and cut a nice whole in the side of his face, but it wasn’t enough. He was gone. Cyclone’s gun was now at full power, and the bolt that shot from it was massive. A blue streak of energy bounced of the Line of Taurus, and hit Archerald in the torso. He shrunk back to normal size, but kept all the gruesome features he gained from the transformation. fido started to talk the ancient dark language. It seemed to be music to Archerald’s ears. That was, until, a huge cloud engulfed him, suffocating and blinding him. Then Rosalind went absolutely insane, chopping at him any way that she could with her sword, and Cyclone pumped the energy to full power before unleashing the Final Ray. The Final Ray was a huge beam of energy which essentially destroyed everything in its path. But it was hard to control, so he only managed to destroy Archerald’s limb’s. The head, and damaged torso, were still there. Both fell to the ground, but within seconds, they began to float. The torso flew towards Cyclone, turned horizontal, then actually morphed into stone and fell on him, crushing Cyclone quite violently. The head then proceeded to fly over to fido and actually just spin around and spin around fido. It then chanted and fido fell fast asleep. Rosalind jumped in. The sword became purple in colour, and started to turn white even. She raised the sword, and went straight through both the head and torso, cutting them in half. The 4 pieces of Archerald now lay on the floor for a few seconds, before burning in a black fire, and falling into space.
The Council was at last safe.
Later on, Dark Mark, and Hybrid, both had funerals. Funny, it was raining and overcast on both days. They were both held in Dreams, a small village which lives up to it’s name. Many people here find their dream. Dark Mark had always wanted to save the world and well, Hybrid always wanted to be himself, to never follow the crowd. He achieved that too, be it in an unconventional way. And after both ceremonies, people went to their homes, to mourn a loss of a loved one, or to celebrate life after death. But these two were never forgotten. Especially by fido, Cyclone and Rosalind. They had vivid memories, and although they had helped rid the world of a great evil, fido cried. Archerald had been so evil to even take others to his grave. Cyclone felt guilty. Had he sent Hybrid to his death? Rosalind was upset, yet happy. Peace had come, and just like mum said, in peace will cone the Blue Moon.
Archerald banished, Formia saved. Or at least, for now…
Cast
fido dido
Rosalind
Dark Mark
Cyclone
Hybrid
© Paul Holmes a.k.a Fuzzy
>people who spoke in the dark language were often banished by the powers of Darkus
hehe
P.S. i like my pink sword! :)
hehe
P.S. i like my pink sword! :)
Good story Fuzzy :)
fido dido
Rosalind
Dark Mark
Cyclone
Hybrid
Peace is good. The Blue Moon comes. I want the Blue Moon mummy.
It was dusk. The smooth night air was around us all as we sat, cross-legged, around the humble, yet satisfactory, fire. I could hear fido's teeth chattering, and as I looked round the group it seemed that it wasn't just the cold that was getting people down. The journey to Carcefors was still a while away, and although it was dark now, earlier, a black cloud had hung over the region. Rosalind seemed OK, and was cheery as ever, but as for the others, it wasn't the same story. Dark Mark was tired, Cyclone was simply asleep and Hybrid didn't look completely sane. As night dragged on, one by one, the group members just wandered off, back to their shelters. Waiting for another morning to wake them up from their god-forsaken sleep. fido was the last one at the fire. And began to sing. It was a lullaby her mother had taught her, when she was young. When her mother passed away, she found it extremely hard to cope. She joined us in our fight then, and has no regrets. Fido dido headed for bed, with a glint of a tear in her eye.
Morning woke the group one by one, and as each emerged from the little shelter they had they found Rosalind cooking breakfast for them. Each said very little, but of the understandable mumbles, 'thank you' seemed a common phrase. Once everyone had their meal, Rosalind sat down, as they discussed their next move. Cyclone started.
"It would seem he has crossed Shadose and into Colio. There have also been spottings of him in the skies, or more specifically, D Sector of the Saint system. If this is true, then we'll have to fix the teleporter we picked up in Elix,"
Dark Mark groaned. That meant more work for him. Being the only one in the group with any ability to fix things had its advantages, in the form of blackmail. It also had its disadvantages, (in that) he did almost all the technical work. And the teleporters in question were, to almost every technician except him, irreparable. Still, at least it's something to do, and if he does it, then it might impress the girls as well.
"I take it by 'we'll' fix the teleporters you mean 'I' will fix them?" said Dark Mark
"Yes. Anyway, we first need to get to Carcefors, to rest properly for the true journey. Archerald will not stop, so we must go faster. We cannot let him get to the Formian Council!"
Archerald was, in fact, a very evil man. To the extent that he'd kill to get his way, as fido and Hybrid knew. His mission was a simple one. He didn't like the way the world worked. He seeked revenge on the world. So instead of destroying the world, he seeked to destroy those who made it this way. Those people sat on the Formian Council. Each had a power which made them very valuable to the world. And once Archerald had the power, he would change the world. To be like his vision, a place of cruelness and suffering. The council members include:
Cara Sortias - A woman of powers to shape the land. She can control where a volcano's lava flows or whether the rain will fall on flooded lands.
Uio Wey - He has a more logical approach to things. He made the square have 4 sides and the circle be round. Logic is based around Uio's ideas.
Leo Formia - A member of the Formian royal family. He has no powers to control the world, but has the ability to charm and lead the people.
Archerald seeks the power that these three have, and combined, he would be an almost impossible force to reckon with. So stopping him before he reached the Council was important. What's ironic about it all is that a) the people do not know anything about what is happening and b) Leo Formia, being only 20, hasn't any clue either. The other Councillors feel it would panic Leo, therefore panicking the people. So the group had to be discreet as they passed through various towns, because even if Archerald passed through, the people would have no idea, except for that Archerald is kept alive by one thing. Death. And when Archerald passes through, at least a few people die. And that's the funny thing; it's not masses, but just, a few. Yet the speech continued.
"So, the route we must take will be north, to Carcefors. From there we will venture into the East over to Shadose and further east to Colio. It is their we can go to the Saints Point, use the teleporter we should have fixed by then to head up to D Sector of the Saint system. If our luck is in, we'll find him there. Any questions?"
The group was silent. For some reason, Hybrid still looked insane. And on those notes, the trek resumed across the Forest of Higer, into Carcefors.
The Forest of Higer was a serene place, filled with beauty. As the group passed through colours whisked passed them in the form of life, and a gentle hum could be heard. The place was so green that animals could easily survive, so untouched by progress and technology, yet so easy to walk through. And as the sun rises right over the forest, you can feel it beam down strongly over you, even though the towering trees sometimes block out its light. The Forest is true home to Rosalind, so as she walked through, she met people from her home village. Her parents had moved on, but all her old friends were here, and they were sad to see her leave herself as the group had to press on. It wasn't till dusk through the forest that anything nasty happened. Cyclone called out everyone's names, just to check no one had been left behind.
"fido, are you there?" A distant 'Yes' arose. "Dark Mark, Rosalind. You here?" Two distant 'Uh-huh's' were heard. "Hybrid, you still with us?"
Silence
"HYBRID! WHERE ARE YOU?" he shouted louder. Still no reply. The group set about looking for him in the area, but didn't want to venture too far at night. They continued the search in the somewhat limited area, until fido screamed.
"You guys, maybe you should come over here a sec..."
The sentence wasn't finished. The others ran over to see Hybrid standing there, with fido by his side. Both of them looked quite weird, especially Hybrid, who had looked slightly insane for a couple of days. He did an abnormally high jump and landed on all fours on the ground.
"Hybrid, what’s wrong with you?" shouted Rosalind
"WhAt'S wRoNg WiTh Me? It'S yOu!" he shouted, whilst twitching.
Hybrid then jumped and then jumped high off her head, using it as propulsion almost. fido fell to the ground, and Hybrid landed, took a few swipes at Cyclone and then headed back to where fido was.
"HeS oUr TrUe EmPeRoR!!!!!" he shouted at the remaining of the party, as he absorbed energy from Dark Mark. Dark Mark fell to the floor, and Hybrid laughed.
"WeAkLiNg!" he shouted, and ran off into the forest, taking fido with him.
Hybrid and fido were gone. Cyclone was hurt and Dark Mark simply tired. Only Rosalind remembered the things Hybrid said. Out true emperor? How? With 2 of the 5 gone, there was more pressure than ever to get Carcefors. Cyclone stood up as best he could.
"We must get to Carcefors by midday tommorow. Once their, we'll rest, and maybe be able to pick up some proper weapons. We had no chance against the 'possessed' Hybrid today with the equipment we had, so thats a top priority. Oh, Dark Mark, since we're going to space we'll need those teleporters." Dark Mark went from tired to depressed. "That's all tonight"
That night, Dark Mark stayed up all hours, simply to get the teleporters done. And at 3am, after bouts of swearing and a cut wrist, they were done.
The next morning it was time to start the final 2 hour leg of the journey to Carcefors. It wasn't even that, and after the uneventful walk they got into Carcefors at 11am. If they left at 9am the next morning, they could cross the Ice Sheet at 3pm, leading them closer to Colio, and they closer to Shadose also, Dark Mark's place of birth. And if the rumours of Archerald passing through are true, we'll probably find Hybrid and fido. I still wonder what happened to him. How did he turn into that? What we do know is the emperor he talks of is no random cult leader/Scout's PL but the face of evil himself. Archerald.
As they walked into the peaceful, slow moving town of Carcefors, the headed to the Lodges of Higer, a small collection of lodges for travellers to stay in. Going through the town was pretty uneventful. Kid's stared, but the adults just got on with their work. It would seem Archerald had in fact not gone through this town, instead choosing to go past Desperado's Point, to the east. Whether Hybrid had followed is another matter.
Before booking the lodge, they searched around for a small alley containing a shop owned by fido's parents (who had moved up here) selling various thing. However, fido's dad sold nice weapons. Cyclone picked himself up an energy gun, whilst Rosalind opted for a sword, for some reason, a pink one, and Dark Mark, already physically fit, chose not to have a weapon, but to use hand-to-hand combat.
After collecting their various weapons, the lodges were next on the list. Rosalind went to sleep first, whilst Cyclone talked with Dark Mark about their route over the ice sheet to Colio
“It's gonna get pretty cold, obviously, so we'll need to try and cross the ice sheet quick. Don't wanto be be hanging round there. It's also where the paths between Carcefors and Desperado's Point meet, so if we don't actually meet Archerald, we'll sure know he's been there. Across the ice sheet is the Water Gate. It will take us into the centre of Colio, which is actually on an island far out to sea. Once in Colio, the likelihood is that their will be panic, as the Saint's Gate can only be reached from Colio, and that's where Archerald will head to get into space, where he could well find the Formian Council. We cannot use the gate, simply because it will only carry people one way, and Archerald can rule from the skies. We must return. The journey is long, so we should sleep"
By the time Cyclone had finished, Dark Mark was already snoring.
Morning had come and it was time for the group to head off. As they left Carcefors, and headed out towards the ice sheet, it seemed to get warmer rather than cooler. The warmth soon faded though, because once Carcefors was out of site, the weather started to get stormy and cold. The ground underfoot changed from soily and grassy to hard, cold ice, and the outlook in front was bleak. As morning passed to day, the 3 could see nothing but snow. But as the day which they had now become accustomed to became night, it began to get so much colder. And a figure became apparent in the distant. At first it was a pinpoint, but as they got closer to it, it got bigger and bigger. It seemed to move towards them. Then it stopped, and a much smaller figure ran from behind him. It seemed that they had reached the Water Gate. That was the huge thing in the distance. But what was the smaller thing behind? As they got closer and closer, Rosalind recognised it.
"My god....it's Hybrid!"
Hybrid looked as insane as he had done in the Forest of Higer, if not moreso. fido wasn't with him this time, but if she wasn't with him...
Cyclone shouted at Hybrid.
"Stop this NOW Hybrid, PLEASE!"
"YoU tHiNk YoU cAn CoNtRoL mE? hA! i HaVe HeR aNd HiM!"
Suddenly, fido generated from nowhere, and stood beside Hybrid. Hybrid laughed an oh-so-evil laugh and clasped his hands together. Then, a huge ball of energy started generating between his hands, which had since been pulled apart like repelling magnets. The white ball of enery grew bigger, and Cyclone, in an attempt to counter the attack, charged up his energy gun, The ball of energy lay in Hybrid's hands for a few seconds until he threw it with almighty force at Cyclone. Cyclone, with his charged-up gun, shot hundreds of energy nets to catch and reflect the energy ball, or at least, stop it. The bolt of energy whacked through the first hundred or so nets, but slowed on the next few hundred. It stopped dead on the last 50 nets, and as soon as it did, Rosalind jumped in and swiped at Hybrid with her sword. Hybrid yelled.
"ReVeNgE iS sWeEt, PaIn Is SwEeTeR"
He chanted an ancient language that noone had ever heard of. The sky turned from a cloudy murky grey to a vile black. And the black fell all around. Millions of tiny spikes hit Rosalind, and when the sky returned to normal, she was lying on the ground, not moving.
"He Is TrUe KiNg!" Hybrid yelled, as he launched another energy ball, this time at Dark Mark.
"YoUr ThE wEaKlInG, aReN't YoU!" he yelled again. Dark Mark ripped the energy ball from Hybrid's hands, pulled it into a spike shape, and threw it with all his might. fido still standing beside Hybrid, she started shaking. It was then that the spike hit Hybrid . Then followed a huge explosion. Not your run-of-the-mill explosion but an absolutely HUGE explosion. And it was bright. So bright you couldn't even look near the edges without sunglasses. Hybrid was gone, and so was the evil creature possesing him. On the other hand, fido was free, and ran towards the group, hugging everyone in relief. There was no time to waste though. They stepped inside the enormous Water Gate and began the transfer to Colio.
These gates were about the most technologically advanced things in this world (except maybe for our space technology). It was basically a warp between 2 places by splitting you up into trillions of pieces and buliding you back together at the end. It can go wrong though, as the Elephant man and Tony Blair both found out. If their is more than 5 travelling, it's automatic, but since their was only 4, Dark Mark had to enter in the commands himself.
GATEID?-WATER.....:D
PASSEN?-__4__.....:D
PROGRM?-5.287.....:D
EXITID?-COLIO.....:D
CONFRM?-YYYYY.....:D
TRANSFERRING......:D
The journey began, and within seconds, 4 people had become a trillion bits of dust. It wasn't long before they formed again at the Colio Gate.
TRANSFERRED.......:D
______THANKYOU______
SHTDWN//////////////
The exited the gate at the other end. The town of Colio was in front of them. Shadose (Dark Mark's home) was currently too dangerous to visit so Colio was the choice they had to take. As they were all tired after the day walk, and the fight with Hybrid, and the fact that fido had a lot to tell, it seemed a good idea to go to the Colio Rooms, a small place where travellers and researchers can rest for a night or two.
Researchers come to Colio because they want to know why this is the only place where you can use a Gate to get into space. There are 6 gates in Colio. One is the Water-Colio Gate, another is the Shadose-Colio Gate. There is the Elix-Colio gate (out of order) and there are the three space gates. Saint's Gate will take you up into D Sector of the Saint system (Saint's Point will take you up if you have a teleporter), God's Gate will take you into E Sector of the Zeus system and Council Gate will take you to the Formian Council (hidden in deep space, co-ordinates top secret). Due to Archerald being around, the Council Gate is closed, the co-ordinates destroyed. But the Saint’s Gate is rumoured to be close to the Council, so it has been made one-way. This is not good enough, though, to stop Archerald, so he must be destroyed in space, once the group rise up there. The Researchers mainly study God’s Gate, simply because it has a very strong link to the Line of Aries, which is rumoured to have warp crystals (used to make gates) imbedded on it.
As the group entered the Colio Rooms and got ready, fido started talking about what had happened whilst the late Hybrid had her,
“It was so weird! When he took me from the Forest of Higer, he was just muttering to himself, stuff about emperors and all that sort of crazy gibberish. We crossed the Forest in little time simply because Hybrid was bounding through it. We eventually emerged and I got a glimpse of him, of Archerald. He hasn’t changed much since we saw him last through Elix. They were talking about going through Carcefors, but Hybrid objected, simply because it was too populated. So instead they all trekked over the Lire Sands to Shadose. As we got closer to the city it just got darker and darker. And when we entered, even though the city has a reputation as ‘Shadose – City of Evil’, no-one knew of the enormous evil that walked through the city. The city inhabitants seemed to be singing a tune, but it wasn’t cheery, or even motivating. It was something like..
“The old dark city thou road passes through
seems like it was never ever new,
The sky is black, the ground is stone
People pass and people groan
Yet maybe when the darkness subsides
One day we shall maybe see thy light”
I’m sure I had heard it before, but that was thrown to the back of my mind when Hybrid, Archerald (whom I couldn’t see very well anymore) and his gang started to shout. It was shouting of the ancient, dark language, called Slangus. Although there were regional variations, including Txtus, the not-so-common stuck with English, simply because people who spoke in the dark language were often banished by the powers of Darkus. Anyway, as they were shouting, a made out a couple of words..
“Council we go, there time is now
The powers of thou will be mines ..”
The rest was in such a dialect I couldn’t make out. As we didn’t stop in Shadose, and continued our journey across ice, Hybrid suddenly stopped. Everyone proceeded as Hybrid paced up and down, and I sat in the corner. Then you came, and Hybrid absorbed, well, me into him. Scary stuff”
By this point, Dark Mark was snoring. fido dido, although not looking it, was in fact tired after the day, and Rosalind was looking unconscious. Although we all knew she was sleeping
Cyclone, however, was wide awake. All night long.
Morning spat light down on the group like they were the only people in existence. Cyclone was still awake from the previous night, but wasn’t tired. Rosalind woke up, still looking unconscious (thankfully, though, not *Hybrid* unconscious), Dark Mark simply grunted and waited outside and fido dido just jumped out of bed, got dressed, and went outside also. They got their things together and left for Saint’s Point.
It wasn’t much of a trek to get there. They just left Colio and headed North for about 10 minutes, then they reached it. You know, if you look up to the sky above a Space Point its completely black, with stars, all day long. All around it is either blue sky or overcast clouds, but they actual area is all black except for the stars. And when you use the teleporter it’s even more amazing, as you rise up through the gaping hole.
The point itself wasn’t as astonishingly grand as the Water Gate. It was a large, blue circle on the ground with ancient markings set in the blue marble. Whenever you stood in it, you could hear a warbled voice singing, and whenever you rose from it, the voice got louder.
The four of them stood on the plate. Dark Mark set the teleporter co-ordinates
X=34654.75
Y=54565.12
Z=88999.99
YES?=VALID
A huge cylinder of light surrounded them. The voice got louder. The light tube started swirling in and out, round and round. They were pulled upwards by extreme force. As they swirled around they could just make out different parts of the area. The Water Gate was the tiniest dot you could ever imagine. Colio was still quite big, and the ice sheet was simply expansive. After all this twisting and turning, they ended up on Saint’s Point Entry. They walked through the scanner and into the main complex.
Suddenly, all 4 of them just broke into pieces, shattering like glass, and in a flash (a white flash at that, courtesy of Mr Magnesium Co.) they were outside the Council. They looked around. Black. They looked in front. Black. So in an expectedly futile task, they looked behind. Black. Flickering Black. Flickering Black? They looked harder. It seemed it was the Formian Council! But how come it was spac….ah. The shield. It must be falling. They turned to face the front again. It was him.
Archerald.
He was a dark creature of the night, made to look human. He laughed and slammed fido dido with his enormous arms. She flew for metres and landed on a bright line. We were fighting on the Line of Aries. fido was warped to where she was struck, as Cyclone charged up his energy gun. Rosalind ran in and chopped one of his arms off. A loud shriek could be heard. Cyclone had his gun charged up and launched a huge ball of energy at him. It encased Archerald in a bubble. He floated off, up into space, until the bubble popped, and he fell painfully to the ground. Dark Mark ran in, and beat the living daylights out of him, then quickly scanned his mind. He shouted at the group.
“JUMP!”
The Line of Aries began to shake just as they all jumped. It cracked up along every possible place and fell into the special darkness. The Lin of Taurus approached. And when the group landed, they had missed the reaction. They were small, Archherald was now giant. Blood was dripping from every part of his body, and he no longer had eyes and a nose, he just had a mouth. A gruesome, sharp-teeth filled mouth. He scuttle across to Dark Mark and simply picked him up and ate him. Dark Mark fought bravely, and Rosaling ran him with her swor and cut a nice whole in the side of his face, but it wasn’t enough. He was gone. Cyclone’s gun was now at full power, and the bolt that shot from it was massive. A blue streak of energy bounced of the Line of Taurus, and hit Archerald in the torso. He shrunk back to normal size, but kept all the gruesome features he gained from the transformation. fido started to talk the ancient dark language. It seemed to be music to Archerald’s ears. That was, until, a huge cloud engulfed him, suffocating and blinding him. Then Rosalind went absolutely insane, chopping at him any way that she could with her sword, and Cyclone pumped the energy to full power before unleashing the Final Ray. The Final Ray was a huge beam of energy which essentially destroyed everything in its path. But it was hard to control, so he only managed to destroy Archerald’s limb’s. The head, and damaged torso, were still there. Both fell to the ground, but within seconds, they began to float. The torso flew towards Cyclone, turned horizontal, then actually morphed into stone and fell on him, crushing Cyclone quite violently. The head then proceeded to fly over to fido and actually just spin around and spin around fido. It then chanted and fido fell fast asleep. Rosalind jumped in. The sword became purple in colour, and started to turn white even. She raised the sword, and went straight through both the head and torso, cutting them in half. The 4 pieces of Archerald now lay on the floor for a few seconds, before burning in a black fire, and falling into space.
The Council was at last safe.
Later on, Dark Mark, and Hybrid, both had funerals. Funny, it was raining and overcast on both days. They were both held in Dreams, a small village which lives up to it’s name. Many people here find their dream. Dark Mark had always wanted to save the world and well, Hybrid always wanted to be himself, to never follow the crowd. He achieved that too, be it in an unconventional way. And after both ceremonies, people went to their homes, to mourn a loss of a loved one, or to celebrate life after death. But these two were never forgotten. Especially by fido, Cyclone and Rosalind. They had vivid memories, and although they had helped rid the world of a great evil, fido cried. Archerald had been so evil to even take others to his grave. Cyclone felt guilty. Had he sent Hybrid to his death? Rosalind was upset, yet happy. Peace had come, and just like mum said, in peace will cone the Blue Moon.
Archerald banished, Formia saved. Or at least, for now…
Cast
fido dido
Rosalind
Dark Mark
Cyclone
Hybrid
© Paul Holmes a.k.a Fuzzy
Rosalind
Dark Mark
Cyclone
Hybrid
Peace is good. The Blue Moon comes. I want the Blue Moon mummy.
It was dusk. The smooth night air was around us all as we sat, cross-legged, around the humble, yet satisfactory, fire. I could hear fido's teeth chattering, and as I looked round the group it seemed that it wasn't just the cold that was getting people down. The journey to Carcefors was still a while away, and although it was dark now, earlier, a black cloud had hung over the region. Rosalind seemed OK, and was cheery as ever, but as for the others, it wasn't the same story. Dark Mark was tired, Cyclone was simply asleep and Hybrid didn't look completely sane. As night dragged on, one by one, the group members just wandered off, back to their shelters. Waiting for another morning to wake them up from their god-forsaken sleep. fido was the last one at the fire. And began to sing. It was a lullaby her mother had taught her, when she was young. When her mother passed away, she found it extremely hard to cope. She joined us in our fight then, and has no regrets. Fido dido headed for bed, with a glint of a tear in her eye.
Morning woke the group one by one, and as each emerged from the little shelter they had they found Rosalind cooking breakfast for them. Each said very little, but of the understandable mumbles, 'thank you' seemed a common phrase. Once everyone had their meal, Rosalind sat down, as they discussed their next move. Cyclone started.
"It would seem he has crossed Shadose and into Colio. There have also been spottings of him in the skies, or more specifically, D Sector of the Saint system. If this is true, then we'll have to fix the teleporter we picked up in Elix,"
Dark Mark groaned. That meant more work for him. Being the only one in the group with any ability to fix things had its advantages, in the form of blackmail. It also had its disadvantages, (in that) he did almost all the technical work. And the teleporters in question were, to almost every technician except him, irreparable. Still, at least it's something to do, and if he does it, then it might impress the girls as well.
"I take it by 'we'll' fix the teleporters you mean 'I' will fix them?" said Dark Mark
"Yes. Anyway, we first need to get to Carcefors, to rest properly for the true journey. Archerald will not stop, so we must go faster. We cannot let him get to the Formian Council!"
Archerald was, in fact, a very evil man. To the extent that he'd kill to get his way, as fido and Hybrid knew. His mission was a simple one. He didn't like the way the world worked. He seeked revenge on the world. So instead of destroying the world, he seeked to destroy those who made it this way. Those people sat on the Formian Council. Each had a power which made them very valuable to the world. And once Archerald had the power, he would change the world. To be like his vision, a place of cruelness and suffering. The council members include:
Cara Sortias - A woman of powers to shape the land. She can control where a volcano's lava flows or whether the rain will fall on flooded lands.
Uio Wey - He has a more logical approach to things. He made the square have 4 sides and the circle be round. Logic is based around Uio's ideas.
Leo Formia - A member of the Formian royal family. He has no powers to control the world, but has the ability to charm and lead the people.
Archerald seeks the power that these three have, and combined, he would be an almost impossible force to reckon with. So stopping him before he reached the Council was important. What's ironic about it all is that a) the people do not know anything about what is happening and b) Leo Formia, being only 20, hasn't any clue either. The other Councillors feel it would panic Leo, therefore panicking the people. So the group had to be discreet as they passed through various towns, because even if Archerald passed through, the people would have no idea, except for that Archerald is kept alive by one thing. Death. And when Archerald passes through, at least a few people die. And that's the funny thing; it's not masses, but just, a few. Yet the speech continued.
"So, the route we must take will be north, to Carcefors. From there we will venture into the East over to Shadose and further east to Colio. It is their we can go to the Saints Point, use the teleporter we should have fixed by then to head up to D Sector of the Saint system. If our luck is in, we'll find him there. Any questions?"
The group was silent. For some reason, Hybrid still looked insane. And on those notes, the trek resumed across the Forest of Higer, into Carcefors.
The Forest of Higer was a serene place, filled with beauty. As the group passed through colours whisked passed them in the form of life, and a gentle hum could be heard. The place was so green that animals could easily survive, so untouched by progress and technology, yet so easy to walk through. And as the sun rises right over the forest, you can feel it beam down strongly over you, even though the towering trees sometimes block out its light. The Forest is true home to Rosalind, so as she walked through, she met people from her home village. Her parents had moved on, but all her old friends were here, and they were sad to see her leave herself as the group had to press on. It wasn't till dusk through the forest that anything nasty happened. Cyclone called out everyone's names, just to check no one had been left behind.
"fido, are you there?" A distant 'Yes' arose. "Dark Mark, Rosalind. You here?" Two distant 'Uh-huh's' were heard. "Hybrid, you still with us?"
Silence
"HYBRID! WHERE ARE YOU?" he shouted louder. Still no reply. The group set about looking for him in the area, but didn't want to venture too far at night. They continued the search in the somewhat limited area, until fido screamed.
"You guys, maybe you should come over here a sec..."
The sentence wasn't finished. The others ran over to see Hybrid standing there, with fido by his side. Both of them looked quite weird, especially Hybrid, who had looked slightly insane for a couple of days. He did an abnormally high jump and landed on all fours on the ground.
"Hybrid, what’s wrong with you?" shouted Rosalind
"WhAt'S wRoNg WiTh Me? It'S yOu!" he shouted, whilst twitching.
Hybrid then jumped and then jumped high off her head, using it as propulsion almost. fido fell to the ground, and Hybrid landed, took a few swipes at Cyclone and then headed back to where fido was.
"HeS oUr TrUe EmPeRoR!!!!!" he shouted at the remaining of the party, as he absorbed energy from Dark Mark. Dark Mark fell to the floor, and Hybrid laughed.
"WeAkLiNg!" he shouted, and ran off into the forest, taking fido with him.
Hybrid and fido were gone. Cyclone was hurt and Dark Mark simply tired. Only Rosalind remembered the things Hybrid said. Out true emperor? How? With 2 of the 5 gone, there was more pressure than ever to get Carcefors. Cyclone stood up as best he could.
"We must get to Carcefors by midday tommorow. Once their, we'll rest, and maybe be able to pick up some proper weapons. We had no chance against the 'possessed' Hybrid today with the equipment we had, so thats a top priority. Oh, Dark Mark, since we're going to space we'll need those teleporters." Dark Mark went from tired to depressed. "That's all tonight"
That night, Dark Mark stayed up all hours, simply to get the teleporters done. And at 3am, after bouts of swearing and a cut wrist, they were done.
The next morning it was time to start the final 2 hour leg of the journey to Carcefors. It wasn't even that, and after the uneventful walk they got into Carcefors at 11am. If they left at 9am the next morning, they could cross the Ice Sheet at 3pm, leading them closer to Colio, and they closer to Shadose also, Dark Mark's place of birth. And if the rumours of Archerald passing through are true, we'll probably find Hybrid and fido. I still wonder what happened to him. How did he turn into that? What we do know is the emperor he talks of is no random cult leader/Scout's PL but the face of evil himself. Archerald.
As they walked into the peaceful, slow moving town of Carcefors, the headed to the Lodges of Higer, a small collection of lodges for travellers to stay in. Going through the town was pretty uneventful. Kid's stared, but the adults just got on with their work. It would seem Archerald had in fact not gone through this town, instead choosing to go past Desperado's Point, to the east. Whether Hybrid had followed is another matter.
Before booking the lodge, they searched around for a small alley containing a shop owned by fido's parents (who had moved up here) selling various thing. However, fido's dad sold nice weapons. Cyclone picked himself up an energy gun, whilst Rosalind opted for a sword, for some reason, a pink one, and Dark Mark, already physically fit, chose not to have a weapon, but to use hand-to-hand combat.
After collecting their various weapons, the lodges were next on the list. Rosalind went to sleep first, whilst Cyclone talked with Dark Mark about their route over the ice sheet to Colio
“It's gonna get pretty cold, obviously, so we'll need to try and cross the ice sheet quick. Don't wanto be be hanging round there. It's also where the paths between Carcefors and Desperado's Point meet, so if we don't actually meet Archerald, we'll sure know he's been there. Across the ice sheet is the Water Gate. It will take us into the centre of Colio, which is actually on an island far out to sea. Once in Colio, the likelihood is that their will be panic, as the Saint's Gate can only be reached from Colio, and that's where Archerald will head to get into space, where he could well find the Formian Council. We cannot use the gate, simply because it will only carry people one way, and Archerald can rule from the skies. We must return. The journey is long, so we should sleep"
By the time Cyclone had finished, Dark Mark was already snoring.
Morning had come and it was time for the group to head off. As they left Carcefors, and headed out towards the ice sheet, it seemed to get warmer rather than cooler. The warmth soon faded though, because once Carcefors was out of site, the weather started to get stormy and cold. The ground underfoot changed from soily and grassy to hard, cold ice, and the outlook in front was bleak. As morning passed to day, the 3 could see nothing but snow. But as the day which they had now become accustomed to became night, it began to get so much colder. And a figure became apparent in the distant. At first it was a pinpoint, but as they got closer to it, it got bigger and bigger. It seemed to move towards them. Then it stopped, and a much smaller figure ran from behind him. It seemed that they had reached the Water Gate. That was the huge thing in the distance. But what was the smaller thing behind? As they got closer and closer, Rosalind recognised it.
"My god....it's Hybrid!"
Hybrid looked as insane as he had done in the Forest of Higer, if not moreso. fido wasn't with him this time, but if she wasn't with him...
Cyclone shouted at Hybrid.
"Stop this NOW Hybrid, PLEASE!"
"YoU tHiNk YoU cAn CoNtRoL mE? hA! i HaVe HeR aNd HiM!"
Suddenly, fido generated from nowhere, and stood beside Hybrid. Hybrid laughed an oh-so-evil laugh and clasped his hands together. Then, a huge ball of energy started generating between his hands, which had since been pulled apart like repelling magnets. The white ball of enery grew bigger, and Cyclone, in an attempt to counter the attack, charged up his energy gun, The ball of energy lay in Hybrid's hands for a few seconds until he threw it with almighty force at Cyclone. Cyclone, with his charged-up gun, shot hundreds of energy nets to catch and reflect the energy ball, or at least, stop it. The bolt of energy whacked through the first hundred or so nets, but slowed on the next few hundred. It stopped dead on the last 50 nets, and as soon as it did, Rosalind jumped in and swiped at Hybrid with her sword. Hybrid yelled.
"ReVeNgE iS sWeEt, PaIn Is SwEeTeR"
He chanted an ancient language that noone had ever heard of. The sky turned from a cloudy murky grey to a vile black. And the black fell all around. Millions of tiny spikes hit Rosalind, and when the sky returned to normal, she was lying on the ground, not moving.
"He Is TrUe KiNg!" Hybrid yelled, as he launched another energy ball, this time at Dark Mark.
"YoUr ThE wEaKlInG, aReN't YoU!" he yelled again. Dark Mark ripped the energy ball from Hybrid's hands, pulled it into a spike shape, and threw it with all his might. fido still standing beside Hybrid, she started shaking. It was then that the spike hit Hybrid . Then followed a huge explosion. Not your run-of-the-mill explosion but an absolutely HUGE explosion. And it was bright. So bright you couldn't even look near the edges without sunglasses. Hybrid was gone, and so was the evil creature possesing him. On the other hand, fido was free, and ran towards the group, hugging everyone in relief. There was no time to waste though. They stepped inside the enormous Water Gate and began the transfer to Colio.
These gates were about the most technologically advanced things in this world (except maybe for our space technology). It was basically a warp between 2 places by splitting you up into trillions of pieces and buliding you back together at the end. It can go wrong though, as the Elephant man and Tony Blair both found out. If their is more than 5 travelling, it's automatic, but since their was only 4, Dark Mark had to enter in the commands himself.
GATEID?-WATER.....:D
PASSEN?-__4__.....:D
PROGRM?-5.287.....:D
EXITID?-COLIO.....:D
CONFRM?-YYYYY.....:D
TRANSFERRING......:D
The journey began, and within seconds, 4 people had become a trillion bits of dust. It wasn't long before they formed again at the Colio Gate.
TRANSFERRED.......:D
______THANKYOU______
SHTDWN//////////////
The exited the gate at the other end. The town of Colio was in front of them. Shadose (Dark Mark's home) was currently too dangerous to visit so Colio was the choice they had to take. As they were all tired after the day walk, and the fight with Hybrid, and the fact that fido had a lot to tell, it seemed a good idea to go to the Colio Rooms, a small place where travellers and researchers can rest for a night or two.
Researchers come to Colio because they want to know why this is the only place where you can use a Gate to get into space. There are 6 gates in Colio. One is the Water-Colio Gate, another is the Shadose-Colio Gate. There is the Elix-Colio gate (out of order) and there are the three space gates. Saint's Gate will take you up into D Sector of the Saint system (Saint's Point will take you up if you have a teleporter), God's Gate will take you into E Sector of the Zeus system and Council Gate will take you to the Formian Council (hidden in deep space, co-ordinates top secret). Due to Archerald being around, the Council Gate is closed, the co-ordinates destroyed. But the Saint’s Gate is rumoured to be close to the Council, so it has been made one-way. This is not good enough, though, to stop Archerald, so he must be destroyed in space, once the group rise up there. The Researchers mainly study God’s Gate, simply because it has a very strong link to the Line of Aries, which is rumoured to have warp crystals (used to make gates) imbedded on it.
As the group entered the Colio Rooms and got ready, fido started talking about what had happened whilst the late Hybrid had her,
“It was so weird! When he took me from the Forest of Higer, he was just muttering to himself, stuff about emperors and all that sort of crazy gibberish. We crossed the Forest in little time simply because Hybrid was bounding through it. We eventually emerged and I got a glimpse of him, of Archerald. He hasn’t changed much since we saw him last through Elix. They were talking about going through Carcefors, but Hybrid objected, simply because it was too populated. So instead they all trekked over the Lire Sands to Shadose. As we got closer to the city it just got darker and darker. And when we entered, even though the city has a reputation as ‘Shadose – City of Evil’, no-one knew of the enormous evil that walked through the city. The city inhabitants seemed to be singing a tune, but it wasn’t cheery, or even motivating. It was something like..
“The old dark city thou road passes through
seems like it was never ever new,
The sky is black, the ground is stone
People pass and people groan
Yet maybe when the darkness subsides
One day we shall maybe see thy light”
I’m sure I had heard it before, but that was thrown to the back of my mind when Hybrid, Archerald (whom I couldn’t see very well anymore) and his gang started to shout. It was shouting of the ancient, dark language, called Slangus. Although there were regional variations, including Txtus, the not-so-common stuck with English, simply because people who spoke in the dark language were often banished by the powers of Darkus. Anyway, as they were shouting, a made out a couple of words..
“Council we go, there time is now
The powers of thou will be mines ..”
The rest was in such a dialect I couldn’t make out. As we didn’t stop in Shadose, and continued our journey across ice, Hybrid suddenly stopped. Everyone proceeded as Hybrid paced up and down, and I sat in the corner. Then you came, and Hybrid absorbed, well, me into him. Scary stuff”
By this point, Dark Mark was snoring. fido dido, although not looking it, was in fact tired after the day, and Rosalind was looking unconscious. Although we all knew she was sleeping
Cyclone, however, was wide awake. All night long.
Morning spat light down on the group like they were the only people in existence. Cyclone was still awake from the previous night, but wasn’t tired. Rosalind woke up, still looking unconscious (thankfully, though, not *Hybrid* unconscious), Dark Mark simply grunted and waited outside and fido dido just jumped out of bed, got dressed, and went outside also. They got their things together and left for Saint’s Point.
It wasn’t much of a trek to get there. They just left Colio and headed North for about 10 minutes, then they reached it. You know, if you look up to the sky above a Space Point its completely black, with stars, all day long. All around it is either blue sky or overcast clouds, but they actual area is all black except for the stars. And when you use the teleporter it’s even more amazing, as you rise up through the gaping hole.
The point itself wasn’t as astonishingly grand as the Water Gate. It was a large, blue circle on the ground with ancient markings set in the blue marble. Whenever you stood in it, you could hear a warbled voice singing, and whenever you rose from it, the voice got louder.
The four of them stood on the plate. Dark Mark set the teleporter co-ordinates
X=34654.75
Y=54565.12
Z=88999.99
YES?=VALID
A huge cylinder of light surrounded them. The voice got louder. The light tube started swirling in and out, round and round. They were pulled upwards by extreme force. As they swirled around they could just make out different parts of the area. The Water Gate was the tiniest dot you could ever imagine. Colio was still quite big, and the ice sheet was simply expansive. After all this twisting and turning, they ended up on Saint’s Point Entry. They walked through the scanner and into the main complex.
Suddenly, all 4 of them just broke into pieces, shattering like glass, and in a flash (a white flash at that, courtesy of Mr Magnesium Co.) they were outside the Council. They looked around. Black. They looked in front. Black. So in an expectedly futile task, they looked behind. Black. Flickering Black. Flickering Black? They looked harder. It seemed it was the Formian Council! But how come it was spac….ah. The shield. It must be falling. They turned to face the front again. It was him.
Archerald.
He was a dark creature of the night, made to look human. He laughed and slammed fido dido with his enormous arms. She flew for metres and landed on a bright line. We were fighting on the Line of Aries. fido was warped to where she was struck, as Cyclone charged up his energy gun. Rosalind ran in and chopped one of his arms off. A loud shriek could be heard. Cyclone had his gun charged up and launched a huge ball of energy at him. It encased Archerald in a bubble. He floated off, up into space, until the bubble popped, and he fell painfully to the ground. Dark Mark ran in, and beat the living daylights out of him, then quickly scanned his mind. He shouted at the group.
“JUMP!”
The Line of Aries began to shake just as they all jumped. It cracked up along every possible place and fell into the special darkness. The Lin of Taurus approached. And when the group landed, they had missed the reaction. They were small, Archherald was now giant. Blood was dripping from every part of his body, and he no longer had eyes and a nose, he just had a mouth. A gruesome, sharp-teeth filled mouth. He scuttle across to Dark Mark and simply picked him up and ate him. Dark Mark fought bravely, and Rosaling ran him with her swor and cut a nice whole in the side of his face, but it wasn’t enough. He was gone. Cyclone’s gun was now at full power, and the bolt that shot from it was massive. A blue streak of energy bounced of the Line of Taurus, and hit Archerald in the torso. He shrunk back to normal size, but kept all the gruesome features he gained from the transformation. fido started to talk the ancient dark language. It seemed to be music to Archerald’s ears. That was, until, a huge cloud engulfed him, suffocating and blinding him. Then Rosalind went absolutely insane, chopping at him any way that she could with her sword, and Cyclone pumped the energy to full power before unleashing the Final Ray. The Final Ray was a huge beam of energy which essentially destroyed everything in its path. But it was hard to control, so he only managed to destroy Archerald’s limb’s. The head, and damaged torso, were still there. Both fell to the ground, but within seconds, they began to float. The torso flew towards Cyclone, turned horizontal, then actually morphed into stone and fell on him, crushing Cyclone quite violently. The head then proceeded to fly over to fido and actually just spin around and spin around fido. It then chanted and fido fell fast asleep. Rosalind jumped in. The sword became purple in colour, and started to turn white even. She raised the sword, and went straight through both the head and torso, cutting them in half. The 4 pieces of Archerald now lay on the floor for a few seconds, before burning in a black fire, and falling into space.
The Council was at last safe.
Later on, Dark Mark, and Hybrid, both had funerals. Funny, it was raining and overcast on both days. They were both held in Dreams, a small village which lives up to it’s name. Many people here find their dream. Dark Mark had always wanted to save the world and well, Hybrid always wanted to be himself, to never follow the crowd. He achieved that too, be it in an unconventional way. And after both ceremonies, people went to their homes, to mourn a loss of a loved one, or to celebrate life after death. But these two were never forgotten. Especially by fido, Cyclone and Rosalind. They had vivid memories, and although they had helped rid the world of a great evil, fido cried. Archerald had been so evil to even take others to his grave. Cyclone felt guilty. Had he sent Hybrid to his death? Rosalind was upset, yet happy. Peace had come, and just like mum said, in peace will cone the Blue Moon.
Archerald banished, Formia saved. Or at least, for now…
Cast
fido dido
Rosalind
Dark Mark
Cyclone
Hybrid
© Paul Holmes a.k.a Fuzzy