It didn’t take that long for the group to figure out something was very wrong upon arrival. Mikel knew what he saw in the sky. Emperor Ijin was not dead. Emperor Ijin was here..so was the Demon Prince, The Reaper. The words spread among the demons were accurate. Ijin had finally arrived to get what he wanted- the destruction of Cyber, and every last angel with it. Mikel held Trixie tightly, and Paka, Crip, Zoy and Vercida found themselves hurrying in and out broken vehicles through the burnt out town looking for the bunker entrance Dr. Jen had built. Doors lagged open to the sound of the wanderer’s shoes, a hallow echo in the midday silence. People had already fled this area. A cold, frightened twinge wrenched Crip’s heart and the others at the very feel of looming disaster.
“Please tell me Paka, how far is this underground habitation from here?” Priest Mikel panted as they wove down the main street. Paka pointed to a near alley.
Paka directed them down a long cement corridor that cut to a dead end. Mikel spun around, “There’s nothing here!” he exclaimed. Crip jogged over to a sewer cap, squat down, and wrenched the lid off, “It’s here” Trixie’s Grandfather answered boldly.
Paka dropped into the dark sewer hole. The others climbed down the ladder quickly after, until they were enveloped below. Zoy held her nose at the smell and lifted up her dress while the others scanned the mucky place in sadness. The splash through the frozen gunk began. Before anyone else could catch up, Crip rushed in and scampered down the forty plastic white steps. The laboratory was silent, the normal commotion and chatter of remaining angels was gone.
Paka stepped down into the basement with the group scrambling behind. “This was my daughter’s and her husband’s lab..both who are gone now.” Paka said almost too blankly. “In here is the Tai ship for us to escape.. It is coated with Tai to pass the Hell Light barrier,” Paka paused, “but something tells me you two, and this child” he gestured at Zoy, Mikel, and Vercida, “..Do not need to be afraid as any angels are right now. I think you should leave now before you get caught”
Mikel handed Trixie over to Crip, who, not being much bigger than her, set her down but held her close. “I suppose you are right,” Mikel sighed, “I am grateful some of you have a way out.”
Zoy examined the packages strewn across the room. “Let us help you with packing first” she said slyly. With a flick of her finger and a whispered enchantment, the sacks and bags, entertainment devices, food, boxes, and endless heaps of storage floated up and sped through the Tanti ship’s open door, filing pragmatically into the correct order until everything had been packed. The hatchet gently closed shut.
“Thank you for helping us,” Crip spoke up.
Zoy, Mikel, and Vercida interlocked arms, “I can’t begin to imagine the fear you are all experiencing...If we could’ve gotten you out of the galaxy ourselves we would,” Zoy added. The shelves shuddered, pausing them all. Holding his staff high, Mikel chanted the same words he had before, returning the trio back to X. The wind encircled them, lifting their clothing and swirling their hair until it swung into a mind blowing blast and they were gone.
Another rumble hopped across the floor. Only this time the rumble didn’t stop, and it was getting shakier. “Paka....” Crip said. Trixie sat up beside Crip, finally awake. He knew his younger sister to stare blankly, but her face was even blanker than he had ever seen. He had said nothing and it was as if she had already caught up with everything. She registered their location, what was about to happen, and who was gone- too calmly.
The ceiling and walls started to shake harder. “Do it Paka.. start the ship now.” Crip urged. Paka nodded, already inside and starting the space vessel up. It roared to life. They filed in quickly, each buckling in the routine they knew to follow. The hatchet closed. The floor beneath them shifted and they were beginning to lift too fast. The horrifying dark Hell light quickly swarmed all sight out, flooding the window from any visuals.
Trixie fell back wide eyed into Crip’s arms as they watched the monstrous dark power obscure any visibility.
They continued to lift higher and faster and farther away- shaking in the air as the Hell-Light tried to pull them back down. The Hell Light mercilessly shook and licked at the vessel it couldn’t drown, the Tanti barely getting them through. Paka’s fists were red on the steer, his veins protruding like roots in his knuckles. His teeth were clenched, his head lowered, and his whole body shaking. Driving the ship farther upward, confident they would make it out- the strong old man finally let a tear slip down his cheek, then dropped his head and began sobbing into his arms for the loss of his daughter, Trine.
* * * * *
One little boy
Killer of the ploy
Been to underworlds
Seen the hellsome hurls
Crossed the pike of darkness
Melting pools of water
Pasts he cannot hide
The rain on Cyber had begun to cool down, the thick smog smothering acidic steam and vapor. Ijin turned around and paused, his jaw bone creaking as the sound stopped. The sound that stopped and planted its eyes on him. Ijin truly thought he had escaped, but the Reaper was again all too close and fully autonomous. “Start running,” Carris said.
Ijin snarled and dove at the figure, but like an illumination Carris faded and turned up elsewhere. Ijin spun around, cautious, “Here, here, my prince...” he ridiculed into a whisper, “You deceptive little scoundrel.. I’ve already won.”
Carris appeared silently from behind and rushed at the Emperor with flashing speed. Ijin hadn’t even heard the clanking of chain mailed boots before his spine was torn from his back. Ijin stooped down from shock, and gingerly reached back for his flesh, now caked with starchy blood. Above him the Demon Prince glowered with disdain..Carris waited for the Emperor to get up so he could knock him back down again.
Ijin’s body went inflexible, and he rotated to face Carris with a quivering breath. Death. How could he ever say the word ‘son’ to the entity of Death itself? A horrid crow escaped Ijin’s esophagus. “You’re good and quick. I hardly noticed or felt that until the aftershock of pain...” Their silhouettes gleamed through the scarlet black mists, one crouched, lost of breath while the smaller towered over with more menace than ever.
The Emperor could feel his body growing weak to the unnatural form. “You’re a curse..” Ijin stated, “Before this you were a curse. Good, bad, and evil want to stop you. You’re worse than either of the three. You’re beyond them..Impatience is dancing on your face. Speak.”
When there was but a cold stare in answer from Carris, Ijin grunted,“What is your purpose in killing me? How is this defeat any different than the defeats you are condemned to direct..like the ones I completed today on this planet”
An ignition of fiery hatred flustered Carris’s face. His fingers tensed and he bound up and slashed wildly at Ijin with hands of knives, sending Ijin’s fluids and fats flying through the air like sodden feathers. “Why won’t you die!!” Carris roared. A spurt of blood splashed against the blackened air, followed by spewing corkscrews of more.
Ijin’s body stood as a jello but living mush. The Demon Prince watched the shadow grow into a reflection, oceanic waves of pulp overlapping itself until the guck molded into the form of Ijin once more, becoming a spongy solid. Carris started to be uncomfortable with the mutation. Ijin smiled at that, a smile of parting, a smile that said Ijin believed one of them was going for good. “I will conquer more than even your assignment forever..” Ijin declared. Without warning the Emperor finally collapsed to the ground. Carris watched the strange gray smoke dance around him, glowing through the black of settled Hell-light. Blood began to flood the cement, crawling farther and farther, wetting everything under the sickly black clouds with never ending rivers.
The haunted shadows crept in, and dusk sucked away the color until everything was a blank dark. The Hell Light had completely consumed Cyber. Carris was the last detectable life form- and Carris could not just die. Carris was Death itself... And Ijin had known this. Carris’s arrival here played right into Ijin’s backup plan for the boy. Even with Ijin dead.
Carris tried to move, but found himself immobilized. “You freaking cowards!!” Carris shouted to the air. Carris writhed through the paralysis, his eyes a blank blaze, his whole body burdened with a steaming throb that fought him from inside out. “It’s not like I chose any of this!!” Carris roared, tears arriving at his eyes, and streaking down- There was no one who would see, he was safe to cry finally.. in his most distressing state yet. “I never asked to be this way!!”
A soft laugh danced around him as all he could see was the grueling thick smoke. The smoke started evolving into strange pigments and forms while tearing at his flesh with excruciating pain that he couldn’t fight. The scars, the burns, the intrusions were raw and unending. The sensation would not stop, because he could not die.
His blood ceased to circulate. It was unutterable, indescribable, puncturing torture. Carris lifted his pulsating eyelids, feeling the pain of millions in and out of his very being, his limbs sewn and unsewn. His heart would not beat, his breath could not return, he could not yearn or revile. He saw it all...Felt it all. The boy struggled to congregate his disbanded parts back together, though they were congregated and disbanded. He persisted to fight at the cuts and unmanageable injuries as they meticulously and furiously changed location. His skull was fractured and yet together, his organs failing, exploding, and yet in place. He couldn’t close out all of the ways he ended- they all ended, and he was still here. Only his tears were free from the invasion, free to pour down his cheeks. He felt and suffered the horror, the disintegration, the death without redemption or end. The stench of rot and slaughter pilfered his every atom. “I’ll come back from this..” Carris sobbed, “I’ll come back and.. and.. ” The reality of his entire life sunk into his soul. He was just a child.. How could this be what his own Father had wished for him.