Disclaimer: I own nothing all characters, plots and soap bars belong to their rightful owners.
Authors note: As I post this I'm currently working on chapter ten of this story so please don't worry, it will be finished.
CouplesThe main couple is DaiKen (sooooo cute!) however there are many hints at others from Yamari to Taishiro all you have to do is look for them
Chapter Dedication: This chapter is dedicated to Forest Girl Kaz. Though the passage of time has moved us away from one another my thoughts often reflect back to you I hope you're well.
The Fifth Element
It was 1913 and 'The War to End All Wars,' World War I, had not yet begun.
Other wars were raging, though.
The War of The Desert Against the Nile was continuing its eons-old pitched battle here at the desert's edge where the village fields met the dunes; the battle yielding up a little more sand one year, a little more cultivated the next.
The War of Animal Against Man was being fought out by a mule with a girl on its back, slowly plodding along a track leading into the desert, away from the village fields. The mule went slower and slower, until the girl hit him with a stick between the ears, gaining a temporary advantage in the war.
"Go," said Noriko in a native dialect as ancient as the tombs that dotted the landscape. "But not to fast," She added.
The girl was fighting her own war-the eternal War of Youth Against Age. She had been sent to fetch water, and she was in no hurry to get back so that the grown-ups could boss her around some more.
Meanwhile other, deeper wars were gathering, wars of which girls and mules knew not.
The track wound between the dunes, into the desert. The sun burned down on the scattered ruins. None of them had names.
Over the years the ancient tombs and temples came and went, like the clouds, uncovered and then covered again by the shifting sands. It sometimes seemed to Noriko that it was the ruins that moved and not the dunes; for indeed, the eternal desert seemed far more substantial than the tombs and temples that appeared and disappeared at the whim of the elements.
Noriko passed the professor's Model T, buried in the sand up to the tops of its wheels. Later today her uncle would come with a camel to pull it out. At a price.
Noriko and her mule plodded along the bottom of the wadi, and up the rise that led to the new tomb. Even from a distance it was impressive. It was one Noriko hadn't seen before. Her uncle had told her that it had appeared several times in the past, but had been ignored by the grave robbers, since it held no treasure.
"It is not for us," She said.
Noriko's uncle was a tomb robber. The locals robbed tombs and temples for greed. The Europeans came and robbed them for something called science. The Europeans intrigued Noriko. They were more like boys than men. They were cruel as boys, but as quick to laugh. Like boys, they didn't seem to care for gold or silver. The Italian professor was excited by the graffiti he had found as a 'real' robber would have been by circles of gold or baskets of precious stones.
Even half buried in the sand, the temple was extraordinary. Its huge pillared entrance dwarfed the two boys who stood on the sand outside, holding mirrors to reflect the light into the temple (a grave robber's trick).
The boys waved at Noriko as she passed. "Water!" they cried and Noriko stopped to share a few drops from the goatskin bags.
"You're not thirsty!" She cried accusingly, "Just bored. Be thankful you've got a job."
"Quit playing the sahib," Shuu shot back, he held the largest mirror. "You're just a water girl."
Noriko decided to ignore him.
She left the mule in the shade and hurried inside. Noriko knew the professor and his American helper, Michael, would be thirsty. The Europeans drank a lot of water.
The mirrors at the door shone down a long corridor. Noriko walked close to the wall so that she wouldn't block the light.
Another boy held another mirror at the end. His job was to direct the beam inside, and make sure the light followed the professor and his young American around the big chamber.
But the boy was already messing up. His head dropped as he dozed off, made drowsy by the dim light, the bad air, or perhaps the droning of the Italian archaeologist as he explained the hieroglyphics that covered the far wall of the great chamber.
"Hey, Takato!"
The professor's voice resounded through the chamber.
The boy sat up, his light flashing wildly around the inside of the room like silver lightning.
"You must pay attention!" Professor Pacoli called.
"Yeah, Takato!" Noriko whispered. She paused in the doorway, savouring the last moment of freedom before the grown-ups saw her. She was enchanted by the sight of the chamber with its far wall covered with scratching. In the darkness they looked like graffiti; yet when the light struck them they seemed to glow with magic, with promises, with power.
The professor stood on a rickety ladder pointing out the ideographs, while the young American, Michael, drew them in his sketchbook.
Noriko liked Michael. She liked to watch him work. Michael drew without even looking down at the sketchbook in his hand, and yet, his drawings were almost perfect as the new 'photographs' Noriko had seen in a 'magazine' from Cairo.
Noriko figured the scientists (who loved the new) would have used photographs, but the light was to dim in the temple. Noriko picked up her goatskins again, and started to cross the room when she felt a bony hand land her shoulder.
She stared and jumped- then she looked back and saw a slight, stooped familiar figure. Noriko knew the old priest. He had been around for years, living at the edge of the desert. He wasn't quite European, but not quite Egyptian either. The priest gently lifted the goatskin bag of Noriko's shoulder.
"I will take it to them, my daughter."
Noriko nodded and handed over the water bag. The old priest made her nervous, though she didn't know why.
"Go with God," Said the priest, making the sign of the cross on the girl's forehead.
He left her in the shadows and crossed with the goatskin, toward the ladder where the Italian was going through the script, character by character: "…when the three planets are in eclipse," the professor said, his fingers travelling lightly across the strange characters, almost as if her where reading Braille. "The black hole, like a door, is open. Evil comes…sowing terror and chaos!"
He reached up and pointed to an ideograph of a snake slithering between three planets. The ladder rocked and almost fell.
"See, Michael?" he said to the young man with the sketchbook. "The snake, Michael. Make sure you get the snake!"
Michael sketched without looking down, his hand swift and his strokes sure.
"And just when is this snake act supposed to occur?" he asked dryly.
The professor ignored his sarcasm. He turned back toward the wall and ran his fingers along the script. "If this is the five, and this is the thousand…every five thousand years!"
"So we have some time then." Michael replied cynically.
The old priest paused, halfway across the chamber. He winced when he heard the sarcasm in the young American's voice.
If only he knew! For a moment, the priest wavered in what he was about to do. The young man was ignorant, after all. And ignorance was a kind of innocence. He knew nothing. Then he heard the professor's words, droning on as he followed then script:
"So here we have these different peoples or symbols of people, gathering together these four elements of life: water, fire, earth, air…"
The professor's fingers paused on the one ideogram that had a human shape.
"Around a fifth one, a Fifth Element,"
And the priest knew what he had to do what he was about to do.
He pulled the ancient vial out of the pocket of his rough black cassock. He opened it, and winced at the sharp smell that emerged from the dry powder. He opened the goatskin water bag as the professor droned on:
"It's like all these people gave something from themselves to make this being…"
"Lord forgive me," whispered the priest as he shook the powder from the vial into the waterbag. "They already know too much. Far too much!"
The professor looked down from the ladder and noticed him for the first time.
"Father Gennai!" He said, "It's the most extraordinary thing! The greatest find in history! I mean look…"
The priest nodded gravely.
Excited by his own words, the professor dropped his voice, and slowed his speech to the cadence of a prayer: "Here the Good, here the Evil and here-"
He pointed to the symbols of the four elements, arrayed around a central figure.
"A weapon against Evil! Amazing! I am going to be famous!"
"Then let us toast your fame!" The priest said. "Here Michael…" He handed the young artist the cup, and pored another for the professor. Michael began to drink as the professor climbed down the ladder.
"Drink!" said the priest, handing the professor another cup. The professor raised it. "To fame! Salud…"
But then-
He lowered the cup without tasting it, "We cannot toast with water. Michael! In my knapsack-the grappa!"
The priest watched, horrified, as the professor threw his water onto the floor of the temple. Michael drained his cup and ran off into the corridor.
A fitting beginning, thought the priest, disconsolate. I have killed the innocent one!
Not bad, thought Michael. Usually the water from the goatskin tasted too much of, well, of goat, to please his palate.
But this was sweeter.
Perhaps the watergirl, Noriko, had drawn it from a better well. Or perhaps this goatskin was less foul than usual. Whatever, Michael thought, as he scurried thought the long corridor that led out toward the brilliant light of the desert sun. He shielded his eyes to avoid the mirrors' glare.
Halfway down the corridor, he found the professor's bag. He was bending down to open it when he heard a muffled sound, and the light changed.
Something was happening outside the temple.
A sudden storm? Impossible, Michael thought. There were no sudden storms here. Egypt was not like New York, where a thunderstorm could blow up and blow over in minuets. Here the heat was restless, and the few clouds that appeared stayed high, as if fearing that if they came to low the people would pluck them from the sky and squeeze out whatever little moisture they held.
Michael was feeling dizzy. Was that lightning? Was that thunder? The muffled sounds were getting louder.
Michael unzipped the bag and found the machine gun the consulate had asked the professor to carry. The professor, who hated guns, had loaded it but left it in the bag. It was Sten-the latest model.
Underneath the Sten gun was the grappa. The bottle had lost over an inch and a half since the morning. Michael had often suspected the professor used it to 'facilitate' his translations of the hieroglyphics. Doesn't matter to me, thought Michael. He would be back home in New York in a few months, unless-
But why was he feeling so dizzy?
The entrance to the temple was darkened now, and the 'thunder' grew louder and louder.
Then stopped.
Michael crept closer to the door. The boys, who had been holding the mirrors were staring up, dumbfounded. Michael looked up and saw an immense metal ship was opening.
What came out was- not human.
"This perfect person," The professor read. "This perfect being…"
He turned toward the old priest, who stood with his eyes closed and his fingertips touching, arched in an image of a steeple.
"I know this is the key," The professor said. "But I do not understand it. Perfect?"
"Perfect means perfect," offered the priest.
The boys ran off into the dunes, screaming. Michael ran back into the shadows of the temple. He didn't know what he was running for- his life, his sanity, or his sketchpad, which he had set down by the professor's bag. He was bending over to pick it up when he heard footsteps behind him in the corridor.
Whatever they were, they were coming in!
Pressing against the wall, Michael hid in the shadows as a line of huge figures moved swiftly past. They seemed to be moving slowly, yet they passed in an instant, as if they occupied a different Time.
Arrayed in glowing metallic armour, they were as massive as eight-foot turtles walking upright, though they moved with surprising speed and grace. They seemed headless- until Michael saw the small, bird-like heads that grew from the canters of their massive chests.
Michael reached into the professor's bag. His fingertips were tingling. He was dizzy.
Could it be that all this was a nightmare?
The dream turned to a cold reality as his fingers closed on the steel of the Sten.
"And this divine light the hieroglyphics talk about," The professor began. "What is divine light?"
At that moment, as if on cue, the chamber fell dark. A vast rumbling filled the air. The walls of the temple shook.
"Takato!" called the professor, without turning. "Light!"
Suddenly the chamber was filled with light.
"Much better!" The professor praised, from his ladder, "Thank you, Takato."
The professor continued to read the markings on the wall. The light was stronger than ever, revealing even more subtlety in the inscription
"Father, this is the most unbelievable thing I have ever seen," The professor said. "Don't you…" The professor turned and saw why the priest wasn't answering. He was keeling in front of a large thing that looked almost like a man. Almost, but not quite. It was eight feet tall and massive as a grizzly- in armor.
"…think?" the professor finished, as two strong hands (well, almost hands) grabbed him under his arms and lifted him off the ladder. "Are you German?" demanded the professor, his legs kicking futilely in the air.
No answer.
"Sprechen sie Deutsch?" the professor gasped.
No answer.
Where was Michael? Panicked, the professor looked around. A dozen more things stood around the walls, holding glowing globes that lighted the chamber. The old priest was lying flat on the floor. The professor had always figured he was Christian- Coptic, maybe, or one of those weird desert sects. But he seemed to be worshipping the leader of the things, who was standing over him. He was talking to it…
"Lord," said the priest. "He was about to discover everything. But I had the situation under control." He lay on the cold stone floor, looking up at the Mondoshawan commander.
The Mondoshawan held out his hand and helped the old priest to his feet. His voice was deep but surprisingly gentle. "Servant," he said, "you and the thousand guards before you have done your work well. But war is coming."
"War?" The priest shivered.
A tiny distant nod.
"We must keep them safe…"
"Keep who safe? Keep what safe?" asked the professor, trying unsuccessfully to keep his voice from squeaking. It was surprising how little dignity one had when one's feet couldn't touch the floor. The thing leader didn't answer. Instead it walked to the wall covered in hieroglyphics, and slid its hand along the smooth surface as if looking for an opening.
An opening that was not-could not-be there.
But it was.
"Unbelievable!" breathed the professor as the thing slid a metallic finger into the opening. The wall groaned and slid open, with a grating sound of stone on the sand.
The two things set the professor down. While he was still struggling to find his balance, their leader stepped through the door. The professor was just about to follow when one of the things that had stayed behind waved its great metallic hand over his head. Gently, like a prayer or spell. And he slumped to the floor unconscious.
The old priest had never been in this inner room before. It was made of a different material from the heavy, reddish stone that had formed the outer chamber of the temple. The walls were smooth and bright, like luminous marble. They rose to form a steep pyramid, with four sides.
In each corner of the room was a rectangular twelve-inch stone. Each glowed with a different colour; red, green, blue, and yellow.
In the centre of the room was a luminous sarcophagus, resting on a low alter. The Mondoshawan leader stopped at the altar and gazed down the sarcophagus reverently, as if to confirm that even the gods have gods.
The old priest stood at his side.
"The Fifth Element," whispered the priest, his words holy, and softer than a prayer.
The Mondoshawan leader nodded, showing what might have been a smile. He took a case from one of his followers- a simple metal briefcase made out of what seemed to be aluminium, except that it looked warm. He opened the case and held it out. Four Mondoshawans went to the four corners of the doom, and brought their leader the four glowing stones, one by one. The stones fit into the case perfectly.
"Kommander-"
The leader closed the case and looked at the priest wordlessly.
"If you take the weapon, we will be defenceless if the Evil returns," Said the priest slowly.
The Mondoshawan nodded. "If the Evil returns, so will we."
The priest nodded and lowered his eyes.
"Hands up!!"
The voice came from the doorway.
The old priest turned and saw the professor's young assistant, Michael. The artist. But instead of holding his sketchpad and pencil, he was brandishing an evil-looking weapon.
"Nobody move!" Michael cried.
He staggered into the room as if drunk. Only the old priest knew that he was reeling from the effects of the poison in his water.
"Nobody move!" Michael shouted. "I'm warning you. I have a gun. And I know how to use it. Let the priest go!"
He thinks he's saving me, the priest thought amazed. And it is I who doomed him!
He ran across the room toward the young man. "No, my son!" He shouted. "The Mondoshawan are our friends. They come in peace. Put the gun down!"
"Friends!?" Michael hissed. He pointed behind him, to the professor's body on the floor of the outer chamber. "They killed the professor. They're monsters!"
"No, Michael!"
The priest slowed to a walk. The young man was swaying dangerously from side to side. The gun was waving precariously.
The priest held out his hand.
"Trust me!" he said in his most authoritative tone. "Put the gun down!" But the old priest's slow movements seemed to terrify than reassure Michael.
He backed up: "No. You're one of them! You're…"
He tripped, stumbled, fell- and as he fell the Sten gun clutched in his hands sprayed the ceiling and the walls of the inner room with a wild rain of bullets: Bratabratabrat!
"No!" Shouted the priest. "Don't!"
Stinging sprays of rock and sand, thrown up by the bullets, stung the old priest's cheeks. Behind him, he saw the Mondoshawan leader take a bullet and fall. The others closed in around him. Michael fell backward through the door, into the outer chamber. His head hit the stone floor with a crack.
It was over almost as soon as it had begun. Michael lay on the floor of the outer chamber, unconscious. The priest made the sign of the cross, then looked up.
The door was closing.
"Hurry!" The priest called anxiously. He ran to the side of the Mondoshawan leader, who had taken several hits from the Sten gun. Although there was not blood, the priest could hear the slow hissing as the alien's vital gases sublimated into the dry desert air.
The priest tired to pull the Mondoshawan leader to his feet, but it was like trying to move a piano. The leader handed the metal case to one of his followers. Another was already carrying the sarcophagus from the altar out through the closing door.
"Hurry!" the priest repeated.
The Mondoshawan leader shook his tiny head, slowly and yet firmly.
"Servant," he hissed weakly, "here is your mission now. Keep the temple ready. Pass on the knowledge as it was passed to you."
"I will do as you command," the priest answered. "But please hurry! You still have time."
The Mondoshawan rose off the stone floor, and pushed the priest through the rapidly closing door. "Time is of no importance," he said solemnly. "Only life is important."
"But…"
The door closed on the Mondoshawan leader's hand. The finger that was also a key snapped off. It was like a bell when it hit the floor at the priest's feet.
The mule was braying frantically, terrified. Noriko tired to quiet him, then backed up to get a better look at the gigantic ship. It was three times longer than any ships of the Europeans, and it stood straight up on the sand. Then with a roar, it was gone. Very slowly…and yet all at once.
Dazed, Noriko followed Takato into the temple. The corridor was dark. The door that had opened was closed, and the chamber was as it had been. The mirror still lay where Takato had dropped it, reflecting the light from the setting sun. One of the Mondoshawans' globes was in the corner, its light slowly fading. It popped like a soap bubble, and was gone.
The professor was crumpled on the floor, snoring noisily. Michael looked dead, but he was breathing, too. The old priest was kneeling in front of the scratchings on the wall. His hands were held upward in prayer-or triumph, maybe. Or despair. He held up a crooked metallic finger. Or maybe it was a key.
"I will be ready, my lord," he whispered boldly. "If the evil returns."
He pointed toward three suns on the sandstone wall.
End Prologue
Hope you all enjoyed. More soon.