Keeper of the Crown

An LLS Production

Prologue : Forever Sleep

Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.
– King Henry IV, scene I.

Within the anarchy of the Ghost Zone, sleeps Pariah's Keep. Though it, like all spectral immovables of the mutating world within emerald swirls and purple portals, remained upon an island of bedrock, an island it was in a miasma of green. No spirit ghosted near, and no ghost hovered; the remnants of a proud fortress eternally tinged a garnet colour of pigeon's blood was truly an island within an un-life. A raven cawed; green and black, the creatures made no sound save for the occasional warning to a passing spirit.

Here, the Sarcophagus of Forever Sleep stays. Having trapped the King of all Ghosts for nigh on a few years, it remained as it were a decade prior when a prepubescent halfa self-christened Danny Phantom trapped its current occupant within. The solid stone had stood a ghost siege, centuries of incredible ectoplasmic power, and the powers and enchantments wrought within the very rock itself was meant to keep its occupant asleep, safe, and trapped.

The first crack had an effect not unlike a crack within a high-pressure cooker; a geyser of power had erupted within a world that, on comparison, was not unlike a stew of electrochemical imbalances maintained only by the graces of thermodynamics and the law of equilibrium.

Across the Ghost Zone, though, this geyser was followed or even heralded by an outpouring of dread, that even half-formed, no-shape spirits felt to flee for their afterlives. Older ghosts, who had experienced the ectoplasm-curdling fear years ago, had already made their head-starts for the nearest portals into the mortal world, the news that every ghost knew on some level already echoing into the deep emerald recesses of the ghosts' world.

One ghost appeared in Pariah's Keep. Shrouded in purple, Clockwork waited until the tall female ghost arrived, shrouded in a peplos of gold and black specially made to accommodate her unique physique. On top of this ensemble she wore a gold helmet. The helmet did nothing to tame her wild pink hair, though.

"A Phrygian helmet?" Clockwork asked. "Very original, Pandora."

The four-armed ghost crossed the lower set of her arms. "And you're back to a baby again."

The cherubic face of Clockwork changed into a smirk as the Master of Time aged in a second. "My fashion is timeless. As you would know."

"Of all the times for him to awaken," Pandora commented, her voice deceptively light even as both ghosts kept their distance from the Sarcophagus. "So he will rampage, and destroy, and because of the curses of our betrayal, tragedy shall follow in his wake? What have we done, old ghost?"

"Nothing more, all-gifted one," Clockwork replied. "Yet we must fashion another Sarcophagus, before the last King of all Ghosts awakens. It had long been decided, after all, that Pariah Dark must hold the Crown of Fire."

"Since no one had wrested Crown and Ring from him, of course he would," Pandora bitterly replied. "It took seven of us the first time; I crafted the box, Nocturne wove his enchantments, and you froze time, then the other four suffered great pain to imprison the unwilling king, such that the Ghost King would become a symbol instead of a living ghost. There has been no one else to even come close to his power for centuries, and the young changeling has time to grow into strength. I shall ask Nocturne to help me. Will you help me?"

"No."

"... I don't understand," Pandora echoed at last once a silence to stretch unto eternity passed. "Do you want him to curse the Ghost Zone and the human world? I thought we established that he was a better choice of monarch than the others before."

Pandora and Clockwork paused to consider.

"Leviathan?" Clockwork suggested.

"Went on a mad rampage, killed by Aamon," Pandora recounted. "Who was also a fruit-loop."

"Who fell for Asmodeus who killed him," Clockwork picked up, "and made herself the first Ghost Queen-"

"-who was then sabotaged by Mammon-"

"-who was then eaten by Beelzebub, who then-"

"Anyway, Pariah did such a nice job of keeping order, we... maybe kind of screwed him up by keeping him as a literal figurehead for the millennia we forgot," Pandora concluded, somewhat quiet.

The pair of ghosts shared a moment of silence.

"Nocturne... he did very good work," Pandora related. "His Majesty did not seem to remember the monotony."

"Yes," Clockwork admitted, somewhat glumly. "The Crown and Ring cannot be destroyed. Neither you nor I, nor the ancient ghosts, can ever wear the crown. Therein lies the crux. I will maintain time here, and that is why I cannot help you."

"Time... I will seek out Nocturne and more everlasting stone, then," Pandora admitted. "We will build a second sarcophagus to contain His Majesty and the Sarcophagus of Forever Sleep. It will buy another few thousand years of time, until the last King of all Ghosts passes away. And then we can worry about who will be the next King... the next Pariah."

"Of course."

Clockwork nodded as Pandora left, her footsteps echoing in silence, leaving the Master of Time to watch the Forever Sleep receptacle crack open. Aside from the special effects, the overall impression was, rather, like watching stone break down. It gave him a quiet to ponder, and think... and then Clockwork could only feel rather lonely.

"The humans have a saying, Your Majesty," Clockwork stated to the Sarcophagus. "'Can'st thou, O partial sleep! give thy repose/ to the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude/ And, in the calmest and most stillest night,/ With all appliances and means to boot,/ Deny it to a king? Then, happy low, lie down!/ Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown'."

The clock-sceptre changed into a wheel of fortune, one that Clockwork spun on his finger even as he aged into an old man. "I can't say I blame you... as the pariah of an anarchic world... you are necessary, though you are hated."

The wheel continued to spin, and each time Clockwork spun it, again and again before the coloured wheel broke off of its axis, bouncing upon the stone floor... and remaining there, stuck in a crevice, between black and white.

Critiquez, s'il vous plaît!