Fall of Night
by Rhomulus
Night falls quickly here. This city of cold stone and tall mountain buildings is different from what I am used to. The air is dirty, the water unclean and spirits strain against the boundaries of life and death. Was this my fault??? Could the future have been different if I had only protected my tribe as my ancestors had done in eons now gone and lost to memory. I had contemplated this for many nights since my "arrival here" in this Paragon City. The land still talks to me and I feel the earths blood still flowing in my veins and the wind coursing in my heart.
A hard strike to my torso sent me flying into a metal box brought me back from my dream walk. A member of the troll tribe, a leader named ogre, stood with his tribe members surrounding me. The sudden realization of why I was hear returned to me. The man named Grodin had asked me to help the city with the problems in this boomtown. I got up as the troll charged me and easily leapt over his head as he slammed a stoney fist into the Metal box, making a large hole in it. Flames leapt to life around me as the earths blood raged to life and I became fire and ice merged. Forming a glittering blade of ice in my right hand, the next blow struck but did far less damage as the flames pushed back the blow from my body, making a fatal blow a mere nuisance bruise. I brought down my glittering sword, shattering it on his body, now coated with stone but opening a gaping hole to his bare skin. Grasping on to his stony body, I felt the Power of Wind flow from my heart and onto his body, causing a painful layer of frost to form and sent the ogre to the ground, grasping his frostbitten limbs and shivering uncontrollably.
His friends charged and blows battered my body, weaker than their leaders but while a single bee is a nuisance, a hundred can kill. Willing my flame to rage further, flames burned their bodies and bats became molten slags of metal as the fires burned hotter and hotter still. Their leader slowly rose and tore a chunk of man stone from the ground and hurled it at me with force. The boulder slammed into my body, digging a large valley in the ground before coming to a rest a top me. The ogre grinned with confidence as I lay there beneath the massive rock and walked towards my helpless body. I felt the weight of the boulder and knew I could not move it. Grasping the rock, I concentrated for a second and willed the power of ice within me out into the rock shattering it in an explosion of rock and ice. Leaping high into the air, I brought down pounding fists of ice and an aura of raging flames on my adversary, grinding his will down further and further. A Final blow from another sword of ice sent him crashing to the ground unconscious. I slumped against the metal box for a second to catch my breath and felt the dream walk come upon me again.
I reflected many times on that day the darkness overtook me out on the edge of reality and the day I had emerged from the darkness in the city. I wandered for a time, watching in wander and amazement the marvelous city held. The first time I helped a woman defend herself, she was more shocked of me than her attacker. Then I meet Grodin and Cipro. They explained who they were and where I was. We talked long and in time I grew to trust them. We meet with a shaman of the city and she discerned that I came from a time in the past and this was my future now. It was difficult to accept but the transformation I had undergone demanded my assisting in the defense of my tribe. With my old tribe with my ancestors long ago, I made a new tribe and joined Grodin and Cipro into forming a super group named Hero Dawn.
Shaking of the dream walk, I looked down and picked up the unconscious ogre, setting him down with his friends. They were a strong tribe but their want for destruction and the poison in their bodies made them dangerous. A flying metal spirits the others called the drone came by and took the troll tribe to the place where the unruly were kept, tho in my time they would simply be killed. That was time then tho, this was the time now. I still fight the darkness and night falls quickly here.