Disclaimer: I do not own Kim Possible
IMPORTANT NOTE
This is a revised version that will be more compatible with actual mythology. Most of the chapter is relatively the same as before, with small add-ons to make it all work.
IMPORTANT NOTE
Here it is, the sequel, I'm sorry for the Chaos thing being too short. I wanted make it longer, but all the ideas I had come up with fled my brain. That's what I get for typing it at 12:30. Oh well, what's done is done, and no one can change it. I could, but won't. Most of you are probably wondering just why I put Bonnie in there. Well, unlike some author's, I don't think that something should be uploaded into a certain category unless it contains at least one character from the series it represents. And Bonnie seemed the best to be put in it, followed closely by Shego. With that said, here's the sequel.
*~*~* dreamscape
*~* flashback
The Assassin: Nemesis
Chapter 1
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
June, the first month of summer, the time when schools close and children are let out to enjoy summer. The months have passed by like nothing at all, with little happening that could take Nate from his home. Unless you count the little job he had being Prince Wally's bodyguard for a few months (let's just say that democracy is still a dream in that country). He thought she would be annoyed with him, or at least a little angry, and if she was, she was doing a great job of hiding it, but all she ever showed to him, and mainly him, was patience.
*~*~*
Nate stood by the bellows, pumping air into the large fire he had built. Sitting in that fire was a piece of steel, four feet long, and two inches wide. It was heated till it was red hot, once that was done he grabbed a pair of rather large tongs and pulled it from the fire, placing it on an anvil. He raised a hammer above his head and started to pound on the metal. The part of the metal he had been smashing was hanging off the edge of the anvil. It soon broke and folded beneath the other end of the metal. He pounded it until it was flat and then stuck it in the fire again. This technique is called folding, it was how the katanas of old were made.
The doorbell rang and he cut off the fire's supply of oxygen, it quickly died. Walking to the door of the small building, in which he had built a forge in, he removed the soot-covered apron he was wearing and looped it over a hook. He then took off the goggles, and placed those on top. The ringing of the doorbell almost drove him insane the whole walk to the door. Upon opening it a small, white ball of energy hit him. He staggered back and looked at the girl clinging to his waist.
"Hey Nate!" the girl said looking up at him.
"Sarah, what are you doing here?" he asked her.
Sarah Sindel, Nate's youngest cousin, she's about 3" feet tall, give or take. Her head was a mop of pure white hair (don't ask me why it's white, it just is); her eyes were large, and green, but not pale green like his, they were a dark, forest green. She wore a pair of blue jean shorts and a white t-shirt, which looked dirty compared to her hair.
"Mom and Dad had to work, so they told me to come here," she said looking up at him.
Nate almost let out a growl at his aunt and uncle. They were the two most irresponsible mercenaries he knew. By the laws set up by their family's guild, when a child is born the parents must stay home to teach the child. But the two of them were never big on following rules.
"You don't mind, do you?"
"No, of course I don't mind," he said reassuringly. "Come on, are you hungry?"
"Yeah!"
*****
The front door opened and Shego walked in with Kim right behind her. She looked around, noticing a bag next the door.
"Nate, I'm home," she yelled to the empty house, an ominous echo resounded back to her. "Where is he?"
"Don't you think he already knows we're here?" Kim suggested. "Hey, maybe he's out with Bonnie."
"Not likely, his coat's here," she pointed to his new trenchcoat (think of the one Vash the Stampede wears on Trigun, except its green).
They heard the back door open and close, and went to the kitchen. There was Nate, covered in snow, with an equally covered Sarah. Shego figured they had used the frost from the inside of the icebox they had built into the back of the house.
"Sammy!" she yelled and ran to hug Shego.
"Sammy?" Kim asked quirking an eyebrow.
"You didn't have to yell," Nate said nonchalantly as he removed his own boots. He reached up and slowly ran his hands through his snow-soaked hair. "I could hear you loud and clear."
He pointed to his ears, which had grown longer, pointier, like an elf's ears, but at the very, very tip was a small protrusion that told you it would become a horn. Of course, Sarah doesn't know what he is, and no one is going to tell her anytime soon.
"Kim, this is Sarah, Sarah, this is Kim Possible," Shego did the introductions between them. "My, uh, girlfriend."
"Sammy's got a girlfriend, Sammy's got a girlfriend," Sarah teased pointing at Shego and laughing.
Shego, still new to actually having Kim, blushed a little; it would have been a little, had she not been so pale.
"So, what's it t'you?" Shego asked with mock annoyance.
Nate just stood off to the side, smiling at the scene in front of him. He could feel that Chaos was in purgatory, limbo for those of you who don't know what that is, waiting for his chance to come back, which, by Nate's reckoning, would be fairly soon.
'Dammit, why can't people just stay dead,' he thought as a picture of the great scales in South America floated to his mind, the side of evil was beginning to slip down again. 'Not now, NOT NOW!'
His fist lightly punched the countertop behind him. Shego, Kim and Sarah stopped what they were doing and looked at him. It was silent for a full ten seconds before he looked around at them.
"I have to check on something," he said and headed for the door. Right before leaving he said, "If Bonnie calls, tell her I'll call her back, if she comes here, tell her to wait."
"Right," Shego nodded.
The door closed with a snap, and a few magnets on the refrigerator door fell. He ran to the shed he built for the forge and stepped inside, spreading his wings. The two extra appendages slipped around and around his body, fully covering him. The white light spread from the roots of his hair and along the lines of his feathers. The next moment he was gone.
*****
Nate appeared on a ledge before a large stone arch, the top of which had to be at least fifty feet above him. A mural of war, death, destruction and rebirth encircled it, starting where the left side rose from the ground, to where it touched down on the right side. He took out his pike, which extended itself instantly, and walked through the archway.
"Nate, where have you been, what's going on?" Sashna asked urgently.
"This is it, this is what I've been fearing, Midora" he said, his voice coming out in a hiss, revealing that he was not Nate at the moment. "Quetzalcoatl has somehow gotten loose."
"No, that's impossible, you sealed him in for all eternity," now Midora had taken over, bringing some reason to Sashna's mind.
"I know, that's what worries me, he couldn't possibly have gotten out without help," he growled and walked past her stomping into the temple. "The abyss's grip is unbreakable, only the unstoppable force of a juggernaut could escape. My twin brother...my evil, twin brother, how did you get out?"
His steps became so forceful as he walked that cracks began appearing in the millennia-old stones. Finally he found himself where he wanted to be, the balance room. The scales had dipped, and drastically, no human could possibly be that evil, not even Drakken. He took this in as well as everything else; on the outside he was calm, collected, but inside he was frantically trying to find ways to take control of the situation.
Leaving the balance room he quickly walked to the other side of his temple, there the abyss was. The heavy doors, he noticed as he pushed them open, were untouched. Inside was a swirling black mass in the center of a massive circular room. Four spires reached up from four points, equidistant around the pool. One of them had a small notch in it, for the key. And in that notch...was half the key.
"Shit," was all he said looking up at the gaping hole in the ceiling. Indeed he had come through the abyss, and with great force as well. He reached out and took the half of the key that was left and turned to leave the room. "Aeris must have gotten out as well."
*****
"Wait, let me get this straight," Bonnie said, she had just arrived a few minutes after Nate left (how's that for coincidence?), "you want me to believe that Nate just up and left, not a word about where he was going?"
"That's about the gist of it," Shego said sliding deeper into the cushy couch in the living room, Sarah sitting on her lap. "Just feel glad he mentioned you before he left."
"I guess, but it just feels like he's trying to get away from me."
"Well, I mean, you have been spending a lot of time together, maybe he just needs his space," Kim suggested. "Besides, he's got to do his 'job'."
"If Nate wanted his space, we'd know it, at least I think we would," Shego said while trying to keep the little girl on her lap to stay still.
-----
He had been gone for almost three hours at this point, without even a phone call. All was silent, since they had all talked about everything there was to talk about, and were bored out of their minds. The silence, though, didn't last as there was a small creak from the mantle, where Nate's scales were. They were beginning to tip, and tip fast.
"Oh crap," Kim said remembering what it meant all too well.
(These scales tipped now because it takes a little while for the signal from the main ones to reach it. Stupid? Yes, but it works.)
*****
He knew who had helped them, the only ones who could have helped them. The dark council of assassins, the people who had sent Chaos to kill him, and, of course, take his pike. It was his weapon that was used to create balance in the world, but it could also bring death and destruction of the highest caliber. The world would be thrown into complete and utter...chaos. Naturally the council would take control, and with his brother wielding his weapon, nothing would stand in their way.
"The armory, I have to get to the armory," he said as his feet left the ground and he literally flew to what appeared to be a stone wall. His feet touched the ground and walked right through the wall.
Inside was a long, narrow room. All along the walls were weapons of every type imaginable; from all around the world. There were katanas, naginatas, pikes, lances, spears, claymors, rapiers, two massive shotels (picture the ones that Gundam Sandrock Custom uses in Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz). Several kens, maces, clubs, flails, katars, picks, axes of all kinds, kukris, a ram dao, a few talwars (or tulwars, depends), khandas, several gauntlet blades, a firangi (it means foreign in India), dhas, wakizashis, a falchion, three bastard swords (funny name, but it's true). Tridents lined the walls, as well as a few halberds, and a bardiche, several glaive variants were also present. And to think, that's just the tip of the iceberg.
(That paragraph has got have the most amount of suggested spelling errors I've ever typed. I dare you to look up everything I've listed, it's all there; hey, I can't make this stuff up, someone already did.)
He continued to grab weapons from the walls as he walked by. All of them retracted to their most basic form, which he tucked into his belt; others went in his bag, which he grabbed before leaving the forge. They all retracted except for the two shotels, which he strapped to his back. He exited the room covered in weaponry, not to mention he was still carrying his pike.
"Kul, what do you plan to do?" Midora asked.
"I...don't know," he said dropping the bag and standing there. "Where are Tila and Mila?"
"Down in the valley, why?"
He gritted his teeth and growled, a low growl that couldn't possibly come from human vocal cords. Nothing was going right today, and to think everything had been going pretty good so far. Breaking into a run, the force of which blew Midora off her feet, he ran through the arch and jumped off the cliff, hoping his suspicion was wrong.
His feet hit the side of the mountain and he skidded all the way down to the small patch of jungle between that mountain and the next. In the forest was a river fed by melting snow, and, because of its altitude, it was usually quite warm. He had to make sure his children were alive. What he saw brought a smile to his face.
Two serpentine dragons were splashing around in the water, looking for all the world like the old pictures of sea serpents, the way their bodies came up from the water in arches. He breathed a sigh of relief that didn't go unnoticed by the two playing dragons. They turned to look at him, and what could only be described as two very toothy smiles crossed their faces.
*****
"So, you helped us out of the abyss, what do you want in return?" Aeris said as she stood in front a several shrouded beings. Quetzalcoatl was behind her, not really feeling like talking.
"We want you to kill Kukulkan's vessel, and take his balance pike," one of them said.
"And then help us to take over this world," another said.
"What if we don't want to?"
"We'll make it worth your wild, besides, you're tied to this council by your honor. We freed you, so now you must repay us," the one in the center.
"Well, I guess I must congratulate you on taking the time to properly prepare yourselves. But what will we be paid for our service?" Quetzalcoatl asked stepping out of the shadows.
"Control of the entire Western Hemisphere, to do with as you please."
The two carefully considered this offer; it was true that neither of them could just kill them and take the entire planet for their own. Even if they could kill the council there was no guarantee of disposing of her partner's brother, since his powers were much greater than hers were. But, as usual, there were other ways around such obstacles.
"Fine, why not," she said and was handed a document to sign. She made sure to read it thoroughly, and to ask a few questions about it, which were answered with lies. 'It doesn't matter, once my debt to them is repaid, I'll just kill them and take this planet for myself.'
'Don't you mean for ourselves, Aeris?' the god behind her asked.
'Yes, of course, how selfish of me.'
With a slight smile she signed the document with a thumbprint in blood. She then handed it to Quet and he signed it in blood. It was then carried over to the council member in the center to be signed.
You're probably all wondering what they look like in this form. Well, that can be answered without a lengthy description. All I have to do is ask you if you play the Yu-Gi-Oh card game. If you say yes, then here's what Aeris looks like. If you have the card Marie the Fallen One that's that she looks like. If you don't have the card, or don't play, look up the card name on some search engine, they'll have it. Quetzalcoatl looks like the card Harpie's Brother, except his hair is long, and white, pulled into a braid much like Nate's (you'll probably notice, in later chapters, that I will use many cards from the game as descriptions, I hope you don't mind).
*****
The door began to open at the Sindel house, and Nate walked in. There, in the next room, were all of the people he had just left, plus one more. Slowly he shut the door quietly, as to not alert them he was home. It worked, they all continued to talk, but he didn't listen in, didn't think it right to intrude. He was about to go up the stairs when he heard his name.
"I just can't help but wonder if Nate likes me," he heard Bonnie's voice. "I mean, really likes me."
"Well of course he does, whatever gave you the idea he didn't?" that was Shego.
"Yeah, Bonnie, if Shego says he does, then he does," there was Kim.
"Hi," he said walking in the room like he hadn't heard a thing.
"Nate, you're back," Bonnie got up and kissed him on the cheek. "Where did you go?"
"I can't tell you," he looked down at her, and she looked right back. "I'm sorry."
"No, no, it's okay."
"Well, we'll just leave you two alone," Shego said and grabbed Kim and Sarah.
He sat down on the couch and Bonnie sat next to him, still watching him. He could sense her disappointment, her fear, her resentment; she really wanted to know him, but he never told her anything more than he felt she had to know.
'Dammit, this used to be so much easier,' he thought, 'now, with her, it's getting too complicated.'
"Bonnie?"
"Yes?"
"Do you trust me, I mean really, completely, trust me?"
"Of course I do, why wouldn't I?" she asked expecting bad news.
"You know what I do, and you also know that there's no way for me to stop doing it, no matter what, right?"
"Yeah, I keep telling you, I understand."
"I don't like keeping things from you Bonnie, it just comes with the job."
"What if I said I wanted in?"
"Well I suppose I would have to send a formal request to the guild and...WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY?"
*****
"Come on Shego, I thought you were fearless," Kim said as they approached the door to Nate's empty room.
"Fearless, yes, stupid, no," the older woman countered as she followed the teenager down the hall.
"Then what's the harm in looking?"
"The harm in looking is that he would beat us senseless if he found even one thing out of place. You know how meticulous he is with his stuff."
It was too late for Shego to protest anymore when Kim opened the door to Nate's room, and saw how empty it was. There was pretty much nothing but a computer, a bed, lamp, dresser, and a window. The room itself, though, was huge, must have taken up almost half the second floor (actually, my room looks like a tornado hit it).
On the dresser were a few pictures; which Kim just had to look at. One was of what she figured was the family: a very young Nate and Shego were in the front, with Erica and Matt Sindel in the back. Erica was holding an old 1928 Thompson SMG, while Matt was holding an SVD Dragunov. Another was of the entire family; grandparents, aunts, uncle, cousins, everyone Erica could round up.
"I remember that one," Shego said taking the panoramic picture from her. "This was taken the year that Sarah was born, see, there she is."
And, last but not least, there was a picture of Bonnie. Kim picked it up and looked it over, remembering what Bonnie had been like only a half year before, amazed at how far her former rival had come.
'At least she didn't go the other way,' Kim thought setting the picture back where she had picked it up from.
From the downstairs they heard the door open, then close, and they figured that Nate and Bonnie had left.
"He better not take my car," Shego said leaving Nate's room with Kim in tow. "We shouldn't even be in here. It's one thing to go into his room and find nothing, it's would be completely different if we had found something to tease him with."
"So, you weren't completely against it," Kim spotted.
*****
A few days later, across town, ten unconscious bodies laid on the ground in Middleton park. Their breathing was slow, but it was still there. Standing above them was Aeris, licking her lips, still tasting the souls she had just consumed. You would think that without souls these people would be dead, but as long as the mind and heart are active, the body remains alive, the soul is not truly needed.
"Yummy," she said and looked around for more.
"Nate, come on, I wanna show you this."
She turned and stopped, just stopped, frozen. There, across the field were two people, one of them dragging the other. What froze her was not the fear that they had seen her, it would have been no matter at all to just drain them as well. What kept her from moving what that the boy had a green braid, and three long scars on his right shoulder.
"Kul," she said in whisper, not really expecting to see him there.
-----
"Nate, come on," Bonnie said as she pulled him along.
"Okay, okay, don't pull so hard," he easily matched her speed and direction to keep from getting his arm dislocated.
Nate had completely given up trying to pry into Bonnie's mind, since she had figured out a way to keep him from it. She would began to think erratic thoughts, not one of them led to another, no complete thoughts were formed, which pretty much kept him guessing.
"Wait, stop," he planted his feet firmly on the ground, Bonnie stopped before she lost her balance.
"What?"
After looking around and not seeing anything, he shrugged his shoulders, saying, "I thought I felt something."
"Well, come on, we'll miss it," she said and began pulling him along again.
"Miss what?"
"You'll see."
-----
"That was close," Aeris said from the branch she sat on. "If he found me now, I'd be back in that abyss in no time."
She dropped down to the ground and walked off through the woods.
TBC
Who is Aeris? Why is there no mention of her in any of the mythologies of any ancient culture? What happened between her and Kukulkan that would cause her to act like that? The answer to the second question is simple: she is a product of my own imagination that I thought of while playing FF7, hence the name. You will have to wait for the other questions to be answered later on in the story. I realize I am taken several liberties as an author here, so there will be a small history/mythology note at the beginning of the next chapter. Whelp, I hope you've enjoyed reading this revised first chapter, I'll try to get the next one up real soon.
IMPORTANT NOTE
This is a revised version that will be more compatible with actual mythology. Most of the chapter is relatively the same as before, with small add-ons to make it all work.
IMPORTANT NOTE
Here it is, the sequel, I'm sorry for the Chaos thing being too short. I wanted make it longer, but all the ideas I had come up with fled my brain. That's what I get for typing it at 12:30. Oh well, what's done is done, and no one can change it. I could, but won't. Most of you are probably wondering just why I put Bonnie in there. Well, unlike some author's, I don't think that something should be uploaded into a certain category unless it contains at least one character from the series it represents. And Bonnie seemed the best to be put in it, followed closely by Shego. With that said, here's the sequel.
*~*~* dreamscape
*~* flashback
The Assassin: Nemesis
Chapter 1
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
June, the first month of summer, the time when schools close and children are let out to enjoy summer. The months have passed by like nothing at all, with little happening that could take Nate from his home. Unless you count the little job he had being Prince Wally's bodyguard for a few months (let's just say that democracy is still a dream in that country). He thought she would be annoyed with him, or at least a little angry, and if she was, she was doing a great job of hiding it, but all she ever showed to him, and mainly him, was patience.
*~*~*
Nate stood by the bellows, pumping air into the large fire he had built. Sitting in that fire was a piece of steel, four feet long, and two inches wide. It was heated till it was red hot, once that was done he grabbed a pair of rather large tongs and pulled it from the fire, placing it on an anvil. He raised a hammer above his head and started to pound on the metal. The part of the metal he had been smashing was hanging off the edge of the anvil. It soon broke and folded beneath the other end of the metal. He pounded it until it was flat and then stuck it in the fire again. This technique is called folding, it was how the katanas of old were made.
The doorbell rang and he cut off the fire's supply of oxygen, it quickly died. Walking to the door of the small building, in which he had built a forge in, he removed the soot-covered apron he was wearing and looped it over a hook. He then took off the goggles, and placed those on top. The ringing of the doorbell almost drove him insane the whole walk to the door. Upon opening it a small, white ball of energy hit him. He staggered back and looked at the girl clinging to his waist.
"Hey Nate!" the girl said looking up at him.
"Sarah, what are you doing here?" he asked her.
Sarah Sindel, Nate's youngest cousin, she's about 3" feet tall, give or take. Her head was a mop of pure white hair (don't ask me why it's white, it just is); her eyes were large, and green, but not pale green like his, they were a dark, forest green. She wore a pair of blue jean shorts and a white t-shirt, which looked dirty compared to her hair.
"Mom and Dad had to work, so they told me to come here," she said looking up at him.
Nate almost let out a growl at his aunt and uncle. They were the two most irresponsible mercenaries he knew. By the laws set up by their family's guild, when a child is born the parents must stay home to teach the child. But the two of them were never big on following rules.
"You don't mind, do you?"
"No, of course I don't mind," he said reassuringly. "Come on, are you hungry?"
"Yeah!"
*****
The front door opened and Shego walked in with Kim right behind her. She looked around, noticing a bag next the door.
"Nate, I'm home," she yelled to the empty house, an ominous echo resounded back to her. "Where is he?"
"Don't you think he already knows we're here?" Kim suggested. "Hey, maybe he's out with Bonnie."
"Not likely, his coat's here," she pointed to his new trenchcoat (think of the one Vash the Stampede wears on Trigun, except its green).
They heard the back door open and close, and went to the kitchen. There was Nate, covered in snow, with an equally covered Sarah. Shego figured they had used the frost from the inside of the icebox they had built into the back of the house.
"Sammy!" she yelled and ran to hug Shego.
"Sammy?" Kim asked quirking an eyebrow.
"You didn't have to yell," Nate said nonchalantly as he removed his own boots. He reached up and slowly ran his hands through his snow-soaked hair. "I could hear you loud and clear."
He pointed to his ears, which had grown longer, pointier, like an elf's ears, but at the very, very tip was a small protrusion that told you it would become a horn. Of course, Sarah doesn't know what he is, and no one is going to tell her anytime soon.
"Kim, this is Sarah, Sarah, this is Kim Possible," Shego did the introductions between them. "My, uh, girlfriend."
"Sammy's got a girlfriend, Sammy's got a girlfriend," Sarah teased pointing at Shego and laughing.
Shego, still new to actually having Kim, blushed a little; it would have been a little, had she not been so pale.
"So, what's it t'you?" Shego asked with mock annoyance.
Nate just stood off to the side, smiling at the scene in front of him. He could feel that Chaos was in purgatory, limbo for those of you who don't know what that is, waiting for his chance to come back, which, by Nate's reckoning, would be fairly soon.
'Dammit, why can't people just stay dead,' he thought as a picture of the great scales in South America floated to his mind, the side of evil was beginning to slip down again. 'Not now, NOT NOW!'
His fist lightly punched the countertop behind him. Shego, Kim and Sarah stopped what they were doing and looked at him. It was silent for a full ten seconds before he looked around at them.
"I have to check on something," he said and headed for the door. Right before leaving he said, "If Bonnie calls, tell her I'll call her back, if she comes here, tell her to wait."
"Right," Shego nodded.
The door closed with a snap, and a few magnets on the refrigerator door fell. He ran to the shed he built for the forge and stepped inside, spreading his wings. The two extra appendages slipped around and around his body, fully covering him. The white light spread from the roots of his hair and along the lines of his feathers. The next moment he was gone.
*****
Nate appeared on a ledge before a large stone arch, the top of which had to be at least fifty feet above him. A mural of war, death, destruction and rebirth encircled it, starting where the left side rose from the ground, to where it touched down on the right side. He took out his pike, which extended itself instantly, and walked through the archway.
"Nate, where have you been, what's going on?" Sashna asked urgently.
"This is it, this is what I've been fearing, Midora" he said, his voice coming out in a hiss, revealing that he was not Nate at the moment. "Quetzalcoatl has somehow gotten loose."
"No, that's impossible, you sealed him in for all eternity," now Midora had taken over, bringing some reason to Sashna's mind.
"I know, that's what worries me, he couldn't possibly have gotten out without help," he growled and walked past her stomping into the temple. "The abyss's grip is unbreakable, only the unstoppable force of a juggernaut could escape. My twin brother...my evil, twin brother, how did you get out?"
His steps became so forceful as he walked that cracks began appearing in the millennia-old stones. Finally he found himself where he wanted to be, the balance room. The scales had dipped, and drastically, no human could possibly be that evil, not even Drakken. He took this in as well as everything else; on the outside he was calm, collected, but inside he was frantically trying to find ways to take control of the situation.
Leaving the balance room he quickly walked to the other side of his temple, there the abyss was. The heavy doors, he noticed as he pushed them open, were untouched. Inside was a swirling black mass in the center of a massive circular room. Four spires reached up from four points, equidistant around the pool. One of them had a small notch in it, for the key. And in that notch...was half the key.
"Shit," was all he said looking up at the gaping hole in the ceiling. Indeed he had come through the abyss, and with great force as well. He reached out and took the half of the key that was left and turned to leave the room. "Aeris must have gotten out as well."
*****
"Wait, let me get this straight," Bonnie said, she had just arrived a few minutes after Nate left (how's that for coincidence?), "you want me to believe that Nate just up and left, not a word about where he was going?"
"That's about the gist of it," Shego said sliding deeper into the cushy couch in the living room, Sarah sitting on her lap. "Just feel glad he mentioned you before he left."
"I guess, but it just feels like he's trying to get away from me."
"Well, I mean, you have been spending a lot of time together, maybe he just needs his space," Kim suggested. "Besides, he's got to do his 'job'."
"If Nate wanted his space, we'd know it, at least I think we would," Shego said while trying to keep the little girl on her lap to stay still.
-----
He had been gone for almost three hours at this point, without even a phone call. All was silent, since they had all talked about everything there was to talk about, and were bored out of their minds. The silence, though, didn't last as there was a small creak from the mantle, where Nate's scales were. They were beginning to tip, and tip fast.
"Oh crap," Kim said remembering what it meant all too well.
(These scales tipped now because it takes a little while for the signal from the main ones to reach it. Stupid? Yes, but it works.)
*****
He knew who had helped them, the only ones who could have helped them. The dark council of assassins, the people who had sent Chaos to kill him, and, of course, take his pike. It was his weapon that was used to create balance in the world, but it could also bring death and destruction of the highest caliber. The world would be thrown into complete and utter...chaos. Naturally the council would take control, and with his brother wielding his weapon, nothing would stand in their way.
"The armory, I have to get to the armory," he said as his feet left the ground and he literally flew to what appeared to be a stone wall. His feet touched the ground and walked right through the wall.
Inside was a long, narrow room. All along the walls were weapons of every type imaginable; from all around the world. There were katanas, naginatas, pikes, lances, spears, claymors, rapiers, two massive shotels (picture the ones that Gundam Sandrock Custom uses in Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz). Several kens, maces, clubs, flails, katars, picks, axes of all kinds, kukris, a ram dao, a few talwars (or tulwars, depends), khandas, several gauntlet blades, a firangi (it means foreign in India), dhas, wakizashis, a falchion, three bastard swords (funny name, but it's true). Tridents lined the walls, as well as a few halberds, and a bardiche, several glaive variants were also present. And to think, that's just the tip of the iceberg.
(That paragraph has got have the most amount of suggested spelling errors I've ever typed. I dare you to look up everything I've listed, it's all there; hey, I can't make this stuff up, someone already did.)
He continued to grab weapons from the walls as he walked by. All of them retracted to their most basic form, which he tucked into his belt; others went in his bag, which he grabbed before leaving the forge. They all retracted except for the two shotels, which he strapped to his back. He exited the room covered in weaponry, not to mention he was still carrying his pike.
"Kul, what do you plan to do?" Midora asked.
"I...don't know," he said dropping the bag and standing there. "Where are Tila and Mila?"
"Down in the valley, why?"
He gritted his teeth and growled, a low growl that couldn't possibly come from human vocal cords. Nothing was going right today, and to think everything had been going pretty good so far. Breaking into a run, the force of which blew Midora off her feet, he ran through the arch and jumped off the cliff, hoping his suspicion was wrong.
His feet hit the side of the mountain and he skidded all the way down to the small patch of jungle between that mountain and the next. In the forest was a river fed by melting snow, and, because of its altitude, it was usually quite warm. He had to make sure his children were alive. What he saw brought a smile to his face.
Two serpentine dragons were splashing around in the water, looking for all the world like the old pictures of sea serpents, the way their bodies came up from the water in arches. He breathed a sigh of relief that didn't go unnoticed by the two playing dragons. They turned to look at him, and what could only be described as two very toothy smiles crossed their faces.
*****
"So, you helped us out of the abyss, what do you want in return?" Aeris said as she stood in front a several shrouded beings. Quetzalcoatl was behind her, not really feeling like talking.
"We want you to kill Kukulkan's vessel, and take his balance pike," one of them said.
"And then help us to take over this world," another said.
"What if we don't want to?"
"We'll make it worth your wild, besides, you're tied to this council by your honor. We freed you, so now you must repay us," the one in the center.
"Well, I guess I must congratulate you on taking the time to properly prepare yourselves. But what will we be paid for our service?" Quetzalcoatl asked stepping out of the shadows.
"Control of the entire Western Hemisphere, to do with as you please."
The two carefully considered this offer; it was true that neither of them could just kill them and take the entire planet for their own. Even if they could kill the council there was no guarantee of disposing of her partner's brother, since his powers were much greater than hers were. But, as usual, there were other ways around such obstacles.
"Fine, why not," she said and was handed a document to sign. She made sure to read it thoroughly, and to ask a few questions about it, which were answered with lies. 'It doesn't matter, once my debt to them is repaid, I'll just kill them and take this planet for myself.'
'Don't you mean for ourselves, Aeris?' the god behind her asked.
'Yes, of course, how selfish of me.'
With a slight smile she signed the document with a thumbprint in blood. She then handed it to Quet and he signed it in blood. It was then carried over to the council member in the center to be signed.
You're probably all wondering what they look like in this form. Well, that can be answered without a lengthy description. All I have to do is ask you if you play the Yu-Gi-Oh card game. If you say yes, then here's what Aeris looks like. If you have the card Marie the Fallen One that's that she looks like. If you don't have the card, or don't play, look up the card name on some search engine, they'll have it. Quetzalcoatl looks like the card Harpie's Brother, except his hair is long, and white, pulled into a braid much like Nate's (you'll probably notice, in later chapters, that I will use many cards from the game as descriptions, I hope you don't mind).
*****
The door began to open at the Sindel house, and Nate walked in. There, in the next room, were all of the people he had just left, plus one more. Slowly he shut the door quietly, as to not alert them he was home. It worked, they all continued to talk, but he didn't listen in, didn't think it right to intrude. He was about to go up the stairs when he heard his name.
"I just can't help but wonder if Nate likes me," he heard Bonnie's voice. "I mean, really likes me."
"Well of course he does, whatever gave you the idea he didn't?" that was Shego.
"Yeah, Bonnie, if Shego says he does, then he does," there was Kim.
"Hi," he said walking in the room like he hadn't heard a thing.
"Nate, you're back," Bonnie got up and kissed him on the cheek. "Where did you go?"
"I can't tell you," he looked down at her, and she looked right back. "I'm sorry."
"No, no, it's okay."
"Well, we'll just leave you two alone," Shego said and grabbed Kim and Sarah.
He sat down on the couch and Bonnie sat next to him, still watching him. He could sense her disappointment, her fear, her resentment; she really wanted to know him, but he never told her anything more than he felt she had to know.
'Dammit, this used to be so much easier,' he thought, 'now, with her, it's getting too complicated.'
"Bonnie?"
"Yes?"
"Do you trust me, I mean really, completely, trust me?"
"Of course I do, why wouldn't I?" she asked expecting bad news.
"You know what I do, and you also know that there's no way for me to stop doing it, no matter what, right?"
"Yeah, I keep telling you, I understand."
"I don't like keeping things from you Bonnie, it just comes with the job."
"What if I said I wanted in?"
"Well I suppose I would have to send a formal request to the guild and...WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY?"
*****
"Come on Shego, I thought you were fearless," Kim said as they approached the door to Nate's empty room.
"Fearless, yes, stupid, no," the older woman countered as she followed the teenager down the hall.
"Then what's the harm in looking?"
"The harm in looking is that he would beat us senseless if he found even one thing out of place. You know how meticulous he is with his stuff."
It was too late for Shego to protest anymore when Kim opened the door to Nate's room, and saw how empty it was. There was pretty much nothing but a computer, a bed, lamp, dresser, and a window. The room itself, though, was huge, must have taken up almost half the second floor (actually, my room looks like a tornado hit it).
On the dresser were a few pictures; which Kim just had to look at. One was of what she figured was the family: a very young Nate and Shego were in the front, with Erica and Matt Sindel in the back. Erica was holding an old 1928 Thompson SMG, while Matt was holding an SVD Dragunov. Another was of the entire family; grandparents, aunts, uncle, cousins, everyone Erica could round up.
"I remember that one," Shego said taking the panoramic picture from her. "This was taken the year that Sarah was born, see, there she is."
And, last but not least, there was a picture of Bonnie. Kim picked it up and looked it over, remembering what Bonnie had been like only a half year before, amazed at how far her former rival had come.
'At least she didn't go the other way,' Kim thought setting the picture back where she had picked it up from.
From the downstairs they heard the door open, then close, and they figured that Nate and Bonnie had left.
"He better not take my car," Shego said leaving Nate's room with Kim in tow. "We shouldn't even be in here. It's one thing to go into his room and find nothing, it's would be completely different if we had found something to tease him with."
"So, you weren't completely against it," Kim spotted.
*****
A few days later, across town, ten unconscious bodies laid on the ground in Middleton park. Their breathing was slow, but it was still there. Standing above them was Aeris, licking her lips, still tasting the souls she had just consumed. You would think that without souls these people would be dead, but as long as the mind and heart are active, the body remains alive, the soul is not truly needed.
"Yummy," she said and looked around for more.
"Nate, come on, I wanna show you this."
She turned and stopped, just stopped, frozen. There, across the field were two people, one of them dragging the other. What froze her was not the fear that they had seen her, it would have been no matter at all to just drain them as well. What kept her from moving what that the boy had a green braid, and three long scars on his right shoulder.
"Kul," she said in whisper, not really expecting to see him there.
-----
"Nate, come on," Bonnie said as she pulled him along.
"Okay, okay, don't pull so hard," he easily matched her speed and direction to keep from getting his arm dislocated.
Nate had completely given up trying to pry into Bonnie's mind, since she had figured out a way to keep him from it. She would began to think erratic thoughts, not one of them led to another, no complete thoughts were formed, which pretty much kept him guessing.
"Wait, stop," he planted his feet firmly on the ground, Bonnie stopped before she lost her balance.
"What?"
After looking around and not seeing anything, he shrugged his shoulders, saying, "I thought I felt something."
"Well, come on, we'll miss it," she said and began pulling him along again.
"Miss what?"
"You'll see."
-----
"That was close," Aeris said from the branch she sat on. "If he found me now, I'd be back in that abyss in no time."
She dropped down to the ground and walked off through the woods.
TBC
Who is Aeris? Why is there no mention of her in any of the mythologies of any ancient culture? What happened between her and Kukulkan that would cause her to act like that? The answer to the second question is simple: she is a product of my own imagination that I thought of while playing FF7, hence the name. You will have to wait for the other questions to be answered later on in the story. I realize I am taken several liberties as an author here, so there will be a small history/mythology note at the beginning of the next chapter. Whelp, I hope you've enjoyed reading this revised first chapter, I'll try to get the next one up real soon.