Tales are told and weaved throughout time
to one day join the archive of all.
Listen to this tale told long after Queen Serenity
and her beloved Silver Millennium,
long after Uther's son and his violent descent to Avalon,
long after the reign of King Endymion and Neo-Queen Serenity
and their precious Crystal Tokyo
and so long after the remembrance of time
in which our senshi have become mere shadows,
promoted to the wretched position of deities
from what they once were.
Where another figure of power is rising,
reborn in a time so familiar yet so alien.
Where the line of enemy and ally have been redefined,
where the rebirth of our heroes
is either a curse or a saving grace.
Temples of False Promise
Chapter One: Without a Name
Retold by Hel
The small boy ran through the twisting streets at a speed that the legendary Hermes would be in awe of. He was using every last bit of strength that his thin legs had. Three words echoed in his frightened mind.
RUN! HIDE! PRAY!
The first two words were words of instinct. Sewn in time over countless centuries, any expected reaction for your stereotypical Homo Sapien. The last word left a foul taste in the boy's mouth. It had been acceptable for his old life, but for what lay ahead it just wasn't the right thought to be having. The word was so embedded into his being. Whether he believed in the gods and goddesses or not was irrelevant, to pray to them was completely natural. The monks had taught him that harsh lesson that would probably never be forgotten.
Any memory he had of his few years on this Earth were terrible and he wanted to wipe them out of existence, but the real world had a way of sapping his will power and each day and night through his endless chores, studies, and prayers all dictated to the great god, Cronus. Every waking memory he had was at the temple, as far as he knew he had been there for all his life. He never left the walls only a few monks ventured out of the thick incredibly high stone walls to get food and supplies.
The temple and all its followers were dedicated to the great Cronus, god of time and space, or so they believed. Each different god or goddess was worshipped as the greatest by their loyal servants. Over time the tales had been twisted, but the monks of Cronus believed they had the truth, then again each different sect believed that. Many different temples and beliefs were at a sort of unofficial war with each other.
The monks had made a vow to celibacy. Cronus's followers were powerless and few between. Many of the goddess's religions were some of the largest cults and parents might send their children to become an active follower. Even noble parents sent their younger children. The monks of Cronus had thought of a different way to keep their religion prosperous. The orphanages were over-crowded and the city officials gladly forked over their abandoned male babies. The monks raised the children as "charity" meanwhile gaining a few extra hands to help out with the harder chores. This certain temple was one of the worst places for a child to spend his boyhood.
Each temple had different beliefs and customs. Each had different stories about how their deity gained their supreme power. Many temples undertook daily sacrifices of animals and even people.
Cronus's followers were strictly male. They strongly believed that the female race was a throng of evil seductresses and sly witted she-devils that beguiled mortal men into mindless imbeciles, only then craving the appetites of soft flesh and the tinkling sounds of their own money. All in all the monks believed that anyone who philandered with woman was a sinner of the highest kind.
This belief of evil women probably stemmed from one of the most well known Cronus stories, at least in this temple. Cronus had a daughter, Pluto, who plotted against her father from the day she sprang from his seed. So being the god of time, Cronus stood and guarded the Door of Mists, lost in the Mists of Time. He kept all knowledge of the place secret until one insistence when his daughter convinced Venus, goddess of love and beauty, to seduce Cronus and get him to reveal his secrets. Venus was quite friendly with the darker goddess and agreed to the terms. She bewitched the great god Cronus and he told her everything she wanted to know. When Pluto found out the knowledge of Cronus from her ally she rushed to the Door of Mists and retrieved Cronus's orb scepter from its clever hiding spot. When Cronus came back he realized how powerless he was to his daughter's stolen power. She gave no pity on her father as she sent him away without a key to wander the Mists of Time for all eternity. Since then the world has each year over the centuries become a desolate and unwanted living spot. The monks of Cronus believed there was hope though, one day Cronus would break out of his heartless wandering and defeat his malicious offspring. Each mortal man living and dead who had been faithful to the almighty Cronus would be saved and all unfaithful men and all women would become extinct with no chance of entering any after world.
The boy had lived with the monks for about eight years or practically all his life. The monks never bothered to tell him his age or teach him anything important, only what could be used day to day in the worship of their beloved Cronus. But through it all, the boy had been able to count his years. It was through the sickening sacrifices he was able to do this. Each year, on the day called Wintertide, the day that possessed the fewest hours of the sun's rays, one of the "charity" boys would be sacrified for the almighty Cronus. It was so gruesome and inhuman that every sacrifice of one of the boy's friends had been etched into his memory, so bluntly and so plainly. The monks preached that a boy's youthful and energetic spirit would travel across the Plains of Nothingness and reach the Mists of Time and search out Cronus. This strength would one-day give Cronus the will to escape his banishment. Someday, with just a bit more strength, was all that was needed to rescue the god.
The first six sacrifices had been friends, all the boys stuck together to bring each other the courage to go on in the wretched temple. They were all so close in their harsh, humble lives.
The boy remembered the events of his seventh year so plainly, so vividly, that it left all the others in the dust of his imagination. He still remembered in sharp details the giant iron block that lay rooted to the floor of the small catacombs underneath the temple. One of his comrades, the chosen one, had been lead to the dark blood-stained block, while the other boys and monks watched silently. The boy's closest friend stood up there small, pale, stark naked, and way undernourished. His friend seemed to except his fate so calmly and completely the boy wondered if it was all a trick, some type of joke, but the monks had never laughed or said anything funny in all the time that the boy recalled. His friend climbed unto the block and laid there without moving, not even a shiver went through his friend, not even the rise and fall of his chest.
An old monk, one whom the boy had seen boss many of the younger ones around, stepped up to the stone. He started chanting in the confusing old tongue, his voice sounded scratchy and thin, but his hand was swift and precise when he slit the throat of the boy's closest friend. He then proceeded to make four more cuts around the body using a special ceremonial stone knife. Each time a different monk would race forward to catch the dripping blood in their crude wooden bowls. When the rich red blood stopped flowing five monks passed the five bowls around the room. This part was common to the boy, each monk and boy was required to drink a sip of the thick salty liquid, so as to renew their covenant with Cronus and to let a little of the dead child's strength seep into them and make them stronger for the day Cronus would escape from his dark abode and come back to the world of mortals.
As one of the blood bowls was handed to the boy he thought of the owner of the life's blood, the pale malnourished, lifeless body resting on the cold iron stone never to breathe, never to share future hardships with the other boys, never to be almost happy, almost a child.
All his life this boy had been taught submission and subertuge. He might survive boyhood to rise to the rank of monk if he lived, but was living truly real without love? Every other person in that room had given up and excepted a life of service to some unseen god. That boy was the only one in those catacombs that was able to think clearly, to be able to have his own will. Hibernating deep inside that boy was a fierce, fiery spirit not willing to be mentally chained to conform with his surroundings. He was noble and pure. One burning light in the whole dark and dreary tomb of the temple.
The boy gazed into the murky dark red depths of the bowl and thought he saw the smiling face of his closest friend. He had never seen the other boy smile, but it looked so natural. The boy grinned back, a first for him also and threw the tainted blood filled bowl at the old monk, the one who had sacrificed, no murdered, a child. The monks plain, coarse robes darkened on the spot the blood had spattered on, right over the old man's cruel and ice cold heart.
The boy was seized immediately and taken up to the open air of the weed choked courtyard where he was kicked, spit upon, and whipped by a group of a half dozen monks. After what seemed like a lifetime the boy was taken to see the old monk. He did not cry out as they roughly and unkindly pinched and grabbed his tender wounds as he had not cried out when they had inflicted them upon his personage.
The old monk still had on his blood soiled robes and looked positively enraged as the two were left alone.
The monk was quiet for a few moments looking and studying the boy more closely. He saw something in the boy that made him afraid, little did he know that it was the boy's own powerful life-force that threatened and puzzled the monk so.
"Who do you think you are?" The monk hissed. The boy stared calmly at the monk and titled his head to the side as if he was looking at the monk through a different perspective.
"I am more important than you are," the boy answered clearly and slowly. This just seemed to further anger the old monk.
"You are a wretched worm," the monk spat.
"No, I am your downfall, the downfall of all the evil on this precious Earth. I will put order back into this chaotic world," the boy talked like he was in a daze. He didn't seem to realize what he was saying until the words had already popped out of his mouth.
"Cronus shall do that," the monk insisted. He needed to believe in his religion, keep strong, and here this boy was mixing up everything he had ever been taught. Pluto must have sent herself the boy. That was the only way to explain the boy's bewitching voice that almost made the old monk believe that his religion was a fake.
"Cronus is dead as are any these so-called gods and goddesses," the boy's voice was firm and never wavered. His spirit was very much alive and burning up inside his human husk.
This last statement made the old monk go pale. He was shaking as he ordered another beating upon the boy.
"You shall learn the error of your words. You shall regret blaspheming the name of Cronus. In the next year you shall cleanse your spirit enough to join Cronus in his eternal maze!" the monk shouted at the boy as he was dragged away.
Over the next year the boy was singled out for extra punishments and chores were issued to the boy from the old monk. Life was so much harder. He was completely alone now without his closest friend by his side to keep him company in those dark and terrible days. All the other boys ignored him, hoping his bad luck would not rub off on them. They deserted their once friend, the boy was left to bear up the load unto his own back. The yoke of labor was too much and eventually started wearing down his body and soul. His flame of newfound life was being slowly and painfully extinguished. The boy was as good as dead.
On the night before Wintertide the boy was awaken by a rough callused hand and a cold breath upon his cheek. There was a group of monks standing there, looking like all the powers of hell, their robes pulled over their heads and the black murky depths of their faces were impenetrable. The boy had no clue who the monks where, but he knew why they had come. He needed to be cleansed before they sacrificed him. The monk by his face whispered harsh words that commanded the boy to follow the group.
Without a word of defiance or an act of unwillingness he meekly followed the monks. His head was bowed as he exited the cramped sleeping quarters where all the boys slept. None of them awakened, sleep only lasted a few hours and the boys savored every minute of it. None of the boys even saw their once brave friend leave the room so submissively, so defeated, if they would have they would surely have cried at the cruelty they had bestowed the boy over the last year. They had abandoned him when he needed friends the most, they would one day regret their decision, but tonight they would sleep their heavy dreamless sleep without knowing what had become of the other boy.
The sacrificial boy was lead to the main temple room of worship to the supreme Cronus. One of the monks motioned for the boy to kneel and he did so. His knees giving way under his weak body as he slid to the ground. He got into the praying position; knees crunched under body with forehead just barely touching the ground. His hands stretched above his head almost to where his short bone thin fingers touched the bottom stair of the short staircase leading up to the altar.
As he lay in the uncomfortable position he knew he was suppose to reflect on his short pathetic life and how he would be better suited to serving Cronus in the Mists of Time. But as he crouched there he thought about his life and realized he had no life. He had been right a year ago to think of love. How dare the monks make a decision for him? He had no life because he had no love, but he also possessed no name. There were no names in the temple, only Cronus was worthy to have one. Names were not needed. Every child and man was known by face, voice, and actions. What greater gift to Cronus then to detach yourself from life so extremely as to have no name? Cronus would give all his children names fit for immortals in his re-awakening hour. The boy was as nameless and as lifeless as everyone else in that temple. One thing made him different, though, he wanted a name, and he wanted to live. His fiery spirit clung to the hope that he would realize this, it yearned to breathe life into the boy's empty husk.
The boy, with more courage then he had even a year ago, lifted his head up enough to see that he was indeed alone in the temple room. How arrogant those moronic monks were and how stupid their tiny minds were to leave the boy unattended. It was all so perfect. The monks had believed him so battered, so unspirited they trusted him to do, as they wanted him to, pray for the moment of his sacrifice. He had tricked them over the past year without him even noticing what he was doing, his spirit had taken over while his mind had given up. While the monks and all the "charity" boys saw a beaten, submissive child his spirit had hid and waited for the perfect moment, this moment. It was time to take matters into his own hand, gain a life. There was a need for action, to accomplish the most forbidden act of all.
The boy ran. He ran straight out the front temple doors, down the weed and thistle choked pathway. His bare hardened feet barely felt the rough and cruel edges of the badly cracked walkway.
As he passed the high, impressive front gate, the only way out of the temple. It was meant to deter him, but failed utterly. He thought he heard shouts and the thumping of feet behind him. The gates felt like passing through the gates of burning hell, at the end was his renewal, his freedom.
RUN! HIDE! PRAY!
No that wasn't right.
RUN! HIDE! THINK!
And so he did.