Presenting the second chapter of Beyond the Light! :D Or actually the first, since the first upload was the prologue...Also, this upload time is VERY fast for my normal pace, but that's thanks to NaNoWriMo, I chose to use this project for it, so that means I literally was kinda forced to put out much in a short amount of time x) However, since school will be beginning again in two days, I don't expect to have that much time to work on it anymore, so...no expectations :/
That aside, I'm still excited to see this story start, and am curious what the responses are, so don't hesitate to leave a review or if you want, a PM if you have a question you'd like to have answered ASAP^^
Enjoy!
The Call
...
A long night of floating in between half sleep and tiring hours of doubt tormented by memories of the desolate destruction later, Lux finally saw the light of the sun slowly enter the bedroom, and figured it was a good time to rise, now that she had been completely woken up by the light anyway. Absentmindedly, she switched off the alarm clock on the bedstand, although it hadn't even gotten the chance to go off, being so early in the morning.
She dragged herself towards the bathroom and pulled a partly disappointed, partly having-expected-this face when she saw herself in the mirror. Her pink hair, normally just passing her shoulders, now faced a lot more directions than the smooth hair normally should, and it looked like it was going to put up a serious fight against any brush that would try to constrain it. Her face wasn't all that better, with slight bags starting to form under her evenly pink eyes from the somewhat turbulent night. Seems the nightmare and the following worrying had taken their toll more than expected. Lucky for her, she got the best makeup any girl could wish for.
Light bending.
She softly put her index fingers on the forming bags under her eyes and simply moved them over the affected spots. While moving, the fingertips started to glow, and under her touch, the bags seemed to simply disappear in thin air, replaced by healthy, spotless skin.
'Can't complain about what you can't see, can you?' she faintly smiled to no one in particular. Her eyes dropped down to the rest of her reflection's figure, and she jokingly gave herself hips and a bust twice the size that would probably be considered clinically healthy before letting the visual trickery fade away again.
'Although, if I could let the deceit continue into being actually tangible, I'd certainly give myself a slightly improved bust…' she pouted, moving her hands towards away from her breasts to where she'd like her chest to reach. While she was watching herself in the mirror, someone made a bed creak elsewhere in the house in their sleep, and the sharp sound made the booming thunder echo faintly in her memory, pulling her back to the situation at hand.
'...But I guess that's even less than trivial at this point, isn't it?' she sighed, letting her hands fall on her chest again and drawing a star shape on her pajamas right between her breasts.
'...Less time to worry about being a girl when you've got stars to protect.'
Lux took another look at her messed up hairdo and muttered something about at least wanting to look good while fighting evil by moonlight.
'Stay true, twintails…' she softly said while making the usual twintails in her hair, at least using a relatively easy exit for the bed hair that refused to listen. 'Not that I care too much today, anyway…' she ended while walking out of the bathroom, forcing her to halt in the doorway and retrace her steps backwards until she stood in front of the heap of clothes that piled up from not being able to choose the days before. 'Guess I'll at least dress…'
After she chose a random shirt and some comfortable shorts, not taking the effort to properly care today, she exited the bathroom again, waiting to see whether her stomach was ready to properly care for breakfast by the time she'd reach the kitchen.
Lux had to admit entering a completely unlit or unoccupied kitchen in the morning was something she wasn't really used to in her young life. Sure, she could be an early riser, but at least part of her family had almost always been already enjoying breakfast before she came walking into the kitchen. Now, the room was dusky and silent apart from the soft buzzing of several electrical devices, and the stark contrast with the still vivid nightmare made a shiver run down her spine. The teenager quickly tried to push the memories into the back of her mind again, absentmindedly gathered a frying pan and some eggs to get her breakfast started and tried her best to focus on starting properly preparing her meal.
Apart from accidentally adding more salt to her scrambled eggs than there was in her brother's latest -feigned- rant about Katarina and certainly tasting that, Lux didn't really have the energy to properly take in the breakfast when it was ready. She didn't even properly notice she was smearing the chocolate spread next to her slice of bread instead of in it until she started to notice her plate turned strangely brown when she lifted up her slice of bread. Neither did she notice she had probably been sitting at the kitchen table for an hour or more when her mother came walking into the room and saw her just spacing out, staring into the distant sunrise.
All in all, the morning seemed to go by in a haze, her thoughts troubled by the memories of last night, still gnawing at the edge of her consciousness. It was a relief that today was a Saturday, she was pretty sure she wouldn't be able to attend school in this state. With one part of her mind stuck in the vision's images and the other already edging towards preparing the Call, not much of the day really got her full attention.
Lux just wandered through the hours, catching herself nervously drumming her fingers on the edges of the table or her desk whenever her mind drifted off again whenever she was trying to relax. Eating, resting, listening to music, singing, hell, even fun-fighting with Garen or watching stupid videos about the most random things, nothing seemed to really do anything about the growing tension inside of her. Sighing, she let herself fall backwards on some cushions and tried to edge the day on to pass faster.
What is going to happen that could cause such a catastrophe?
Absentmindedly, she drew patterns in the air, leaving small trails of light magic as she tried to comprehend it all.
And who is so seemingly omnipotent that it can reach me across the realm of dreams and time-space?
The patterns over her head just glittered and slowly danced, not having any answers for her.
This whole thing feels like I'm trying to understand the plot of Evangelion...
At long last, evening came, and the sun slowly sank away behind the horizon, finally giving way for the starlit sky, signaling Lux the time had come to contact the other worlds. Not wasting time, Lux started everything she needed to perform a proper Call. Opening the large window, she got a whiff of the warm summer evening breeze that was dancing outside, carrying all the fragrances of the summer night, relaxed, yet brooding with an unique kind of passion.
She placed her baton on the edge of the windowsill, preparing it to gather as much energy as possible. The night sky was somewhat tainted by clouds today, but the girl figured now was as good as ever, certainly with the memories of the seemingly prophetic vision still pretty fresh in her mind. To affirm her thoughts, the edges of the baton started to glow, taking in the starlight. A small smile appeared on her lips when she saw the familiar aura, and it gave her determination a slight boost.
'Thanks, buddy.' the girl whispered, slowly passing the baton to sit down next to it at the other side of the open window, gazing at the constellations visible and letting her legs swing in the open space below. The girl edged her hand closer to the baton, which started hovering and slowly spiraling in place in response. With a final sigh, she called upon the Star Guardian power within her, triggering the transformation and revealing another side to her.
She felt the familiar, bonding power well up from the deepest part of her being, rising up to the surface of her essence and quickly taking over her whole person. Within less than a second, her normal, casual attire of tshirt and lazy home shorts had been blazed away by the magical power, replaced by a fabulous, literally sparkling attire in a range of bright colours, with a top as pink as originally only her hair and eyes had been, and a skirt in a flowing shade of purple to contrast the white, thigh-high boots and elbow-reaching gloves that had appeared on her legs and arms. To top it all off, a big purple ribbon with a golden star decorated her top, completing the sailor look with the white pieces of her top hanging over her back and frills decorating her skirt.
Lastly, she felt the tiara that adorned her forehead in Star Guardian form take shape, transforming the plain pieces of band she had used to quickly form her hair in twintails into majestic gold-white ribbons, almost in the shape of small wings, helping to elevate her to a new level of power.
Feeling the energy flow through her again, Lux stretched her arms in delight and formed her thumbs and index fingers into a triangle form, playfully creating an impromptu prisma, breaking the soft moonlight in almost invisible colours of the rainbow. Quickly getting her mind on the case again, she shook her head to get any diversions out and looked up at the starlit sky once more, solemnly raising one hand upwards, aligning it with the largest star in her vision, letting its light slip through her opened fingers. A last shred of doubt pulled at the back of her mind, but a flashback of the vision followed immediately after, pushing the emotion aside.
No turning back after I've prepared myself so much.
Behind her, the baton gave an affirmative hum and starting glowing brighter, as if it wanted to assure her everything would be just fine.
'I'm reaching out...I'm reaching out to the stars as descendant of the First Star...hear my plea…' she started to whisper, and while repeating these words as some sort of mantra, a barely visible string of light started to connect with her outstretched fingers. Suddenly, it seemed like the light of the stars started to distort, slightly bending towards the lone girl sitting on her windowsill, stretching her arm towards the sky. Lux felt the presence of the cosmos enter the realms of her mind, and knew the connection was made. This had been the last breach. Onwards, it would be become impossible to revert any action.
The young Star Guardian felt the awareness of the greater stars approach her mind with the question for her summon, and she tried to put the memories of the vision yesterday night and her own feelings in an orderly fashion to present to them as good as possible, while trying to keep her mental link as stable as possible.
I request...a union...a team...I cannot do this alone. To prevent this chaos and utter destruction, I...I wish to spread my Call across this universe.
She tried to bring her request as gentle as possible, but the many awarenesses of the cosmos still started to clash and discuss the many outcomes possible across time-space, which put a massive strain on her mind, almost forcing her into breaking the link. Slowly, she reached for the magic wand hovering next to her, still gathering energy, and the accepting weapon granted her a bigger field of mind to accept the cosmos in.
Finally, after what seemed like hours under the unchanging stars, the presence of the stars in her calmed down, and slowly started to seep out of her mental being, leaving the link open with the message that her wish was granted, but any and all consequences would be her responsibility. With a sigh half filled with gratitude and half with exhaustion, she waited until the last of the stars' consciousness left her, and then strengthened herself for the last effort. The girl grabbed hold of her trusty baton, now charged with more than enough power, and gently raised the weapon up in the air, until it was aligned with the barely visible link of light still hovering towards her from the stars.
'Star Guardians across the stars...I cannot overcome the approaching events alone...let my voice reach you and hear my plea...accept my Call!'
Ending her words on a firm note, she pushed the wand in her hands somewhat higher in the sky as she felt the pure celestial energy hovering her body into the air and letting her weapon shimmer in the multitude of colours that could only be found in the night sky before it fired off a brilliant beam of light towards the stars, branching off towards all the directions of space, carrying her message across the many galaxies.
After the beam had set off, the link with the stars was forcefully broken and Lux tumbled backwards onto her bed, having lost so much of her strength that even her clothes had turned back to their normal attire. Taking deep, slow breaths, she placed her trusty baton on her chest, briefly distracted by the wand rising and sinking along with her breathing, but then closed her eyes and let her head lean backwards.
'Never thought I actually had to do this...never thought it was this exhausting either…'
Lux lazily opened one eye and looked at the starry sky again. 'I wonder who will come...'
She raised her right hand and traced a pattern of some stars in the air above her bed, softly smiling.
'Will I be able to make new friends?'
Tired, she let her hand drop again and closed her eyes, drifting off to sleep.
The next day, Lux was roughly woken from her slumber by her alarm, which she had forgotten to switch to weekend mode since she was up way too early intrusive beeping sound of the stupid thing made sure she was certainly awake, but at least she had actually gotten some sleep before it. The girl had more or less expected the excitement to wake her up way earlier, so she was glad her night's rest wasn't interrupted too soon.
After she half stumbled out of bed, Lux quickly checked the twilight sky for any notice of approaching Guardians, but the slowly brightening horizon was still void of any celestial movement. Slightly disappointed, the teenager left the curtains hanging half opened and let herself fall down on the bed again, not really knowing what to do while waiting. Absentmindedly, she summoned a few light sparks and let them dance around the still dimly lit room, softly adding glowing touches to everything they connected with. With a movement of her fingers, they merged together and mimicked the dawning light of the rising sun. After a few moments of letting the light wake her up, she made the miniature star dissolve and fade away.
Now that she was properly awake, Lux quickly grew impatient and practically rolled out of bed, pushing herself up from the floor and stretching a bit to get the last bits of sleep out of her system. In between poses, she subtly glanced at the sky outside every now and then, unable to contain herself, but she was rewarded equally as much as she was patient. After a quick visit to the bathroom to partly prepare herself for a probably unbearably long day of waiting, she half skipped to the kitchen, soon growing unable to contain her lingering excitement for the arrival of the other Star Guardians again. As she turned around a corner, she promptly bumped into her older brother, who was apparently on his way to the bathroom. Surprised by the collision and unstable because of her irregular skipping, Lux toppled over and crashed into the ground, not fast enough to find balance.
'Woops, sorry, Sparkles.' Garen grinned, bending over and reaching out his hand to help his little sister up again.
'I don't sparkle…' the girl softly pouted in response to her brother's teasing, but took his hand nonetheless. While pulling her up straight, Garen keenly noticed his little sister being quite absent, almost unnaturally so, giving no further reply to his tease and just lost in her thoughts again.
'Hey, Lux, everything alright these days? You seem a bit distracted lately...'
Surprised that her brother switched tone so suddenly, the younger teenager looked up into the blue eyes of her sibling and saw a hint of concern reflected in those light coloured irises. Not wanting to raise worry, she quickly let go of his hand and began to diligently dust off the spots on her clothes where she had hit the ground to show nothing was wrong.
'It-It's nothing! Just-'
In a reflex, she turned her head away towards the window to avoid his gaze, and was captured by a faint light, shining high above the still slowly rising sun. As the small speck of light reached her eyes, she felt her staff vibrate in reaction to it, even while it was magically hidden away, and she knew this was a first signal.
'...Just thinking!'
Quickly, she jumped past her confused brother and raced back to her room, almost slamming the door shut and opening the window in one smooth followup movement. Knowing the apparition of light might just be temporal, she didn't waste any second summoning her magic baton and aimed it towards the small, distinctly coloured, shimmering dot of light in the sky. Almost instantly, she felt her baton respond with a warm shiver of recognition. Lux wasn't able to suppress the smile of excitement that followed on her face as she held onto her weapon some more. With her vivid eyes, she followed the distant trail the bright, celestial formation left behind in the sky as it made its way around the planet to warn her of incoming arrival in all the colours of the night sky.
They're here.
For a while, Lux had been watching the shimmering light in the sky as it leisurely moved across the skydome when it suddenly split up in two separate trails, one of which was clearly heading for her area. Feeling her baton react, she knew this was the final signal and the rest would be up to her. The teenager almost made a small pirouette in her haste to turn around and exit her room again, practically ramming open her door and sprinting towards the back door of the house, only to come to a slipping stop in the hallway and notice she was still in her pyjamas.
Good job, proud Star Guardian, you almost showed up in front of your future team members in your nightwear, idiot.
Lux kept scolding herself for her stupid impatience while she more or less went through all the clothes laying in the bathroom at full speed, to eventually end up with just regular jeans and a white t-shirt with some yellow motives. Quickly glancing out the window, she saw the part of the trail that had split off slowly lower altitude, renewing her excitement some more. Lux dashed out of the bathroom and almost bumped into Garen for a second time as he neared the kitchen, confusing him some more.
'Sorry! Goodmorningandenjoyyourbreakfast!' the pink haired girl rambled in one breath, not even looking at who she almost tackled before making a small drift around the corner and disappearing into the hallway with some slight slips.
'...Uh. Thanks, I guess.' Garen mumbled, scratching the back of his head, trying to figure out the behaviour of his little sister in her wake.
As she threw open the back door and jumped into the garden after wrestling to get her into her shoes properly, Lux had to use all her restraint to not transform into her Star Guardian form to chase the celestial light right here and now. Instead, she made a straight run for the hedge in the back of the yard that separated it from the forest. With minimum effort thanks to the adrenaline and her Star Guardian powers still acting up, she jumped over the two meters tall bushes with a controlled summersault, landing clean on the other side. Not minding the thought that anyone in the neighbourhood that happened to take a morning walk could've seen her pull that slightly inhuman stunt, she disappeared into the forest, focused on her goal.
Keeping up a fast pace, she looked up and tried to catch the slowly advancing trail of light through the foliage, but the branches hindered her view too much for her to decently keep the signal in sight. Shaking her head, Lux focused on the forest in front of her and decided to rely on her baton to guide her in the correct direction. A bit impatient and stressed by the turn of events, she started to disregard moderation and was soon jumping from branch to branch, relying on her Star Guardian powers to fuel her jumps.
Heading straight for her goal, Lux didn't even notice some of her Star Guardian attire started to show, for example the bright yellow star, the accompanying frills on her chest and the little wing-like decorations splitting her pink hair in cute twintails. Only after some of the clothing had actually settled down, the girl noticed some of her outfit was distinctively different from what she had been wearing when she left home. Lux slowed down a bit, doubting whether she should fully transform or revert back to her plain clothing, but the increased sensitivity towards the still descending celestial energy edged her towards the first choice more and more.
'Ah, fuck it!' the pinkette growled and changed into her full Star Guardian attire, feeling the celestial energy flow through her once more as she lastly summoned her trusty baton. Filled with a completely different energy again, Lux wanted to continue her chase of the light in the air, but as soon as she pushed herself off again, she felt the atmosphere around her change and transform along with her. In highway speed tempo, the morning sky started to blur and alter its colours, changing from an early morning sky to a bright late noon blue in the mere time it took Lux to advance maybe thirty meters. The teenager felt the influence of the descending starlight skyrocket alongside the strange behaviour of the sky and decided not to pay too much attention to the sky's colours as long as the reaction of her baton on the signal was this strong.
Her mindset only held out of a good ten seconds though, right up till the point where the sky overhead turned an unnatural dark shade, rapidly shifting into the colours of the night and pulling the forest into a twisted evening setting. Lux changed her pace from flying through the higher parts of the foliage to a sprinting tempo on the ground and finally into a slow walk as she was distracted by the psychedelic sky. She looked up, her eyes full of wary confusion as she beheld the drastically transforming skies. The girl felt the whole atmosphere around her change as she took a few more hesitant steps forward, nudged onwards by the constantly shifting world. Slowly, the leaves and branches of all the plants surrounding her began to lean in the direction of the still descending starlight, which started to appear as a more and more defined trail across the darkening sky. The girl waited a bit more, confused by the changing forest, but when a tailwind started to push her towards the descending celestial matter, she knew she had no choice anymore.
Not wasting any more time by being distracted, Lux cleared her head and took flight again, this time not even minding to stay below the forest canopy, figuring not many people would be busy with checking the treetops of the broad woodlands with the skies fucking their minds up in the city. Once she rose above the trees, she noticed the star energy had already split up in several smaller parts and had clearly set course towards a relatively open spot in the forest up ahead. She tried to increase her flying speed to catch up with the crashing pieces before impact, but it was impossible for her to reach them before they drastically lowered altitude and disappeared behind the trees. A split-second later, she heard a few dull thuds as the celestial matter finally connected with the ground.
A bit concerned about the condition whatever it was that the stars had sent her was in after the crash, she quickly closed the distance between her and the open spot. After the last trees stopped blocking the view, Lux was able to take in the full impact of what was in front of her. Close to the spot where she landed, four small craters were visible, each emanating their own unique aura, which was slowly dimming down as the celestial power that protected the contents during the galactic journey was slowly dissipating. While Lux was watching, four figures slowly rose up from their landing positions with careful and confused movements, having to get used to their new environment. With the slowly wavering auras, the teenage girl could start to see through the light they were giving off, making out four female figures, two childlike and two teenage sized, all with their own kind of clothes similar to her Star Guardian uniform, and simply seeing that filled her with an overwhelming mix of anticipation, pride, happiness and adrenaline because of what was to come.
Runeterra's first Star Guardian team had reached the planet.
...
End of, uh, chapter one!^^
Big thanks to everyone who decided to check it out and read the whole thing, I hope you enjoyed it:D And now, replying to the reviews some readers were so kind to leave behind:3
LadyFlame: "Aaaaaaaah a new story written by you! This is interesting, I actually forgot about the Star Guardians skins. Thanks for the chapter
-LF"
Glad I made you remember, those skins are fabulous~ Thanks to you for being such a faithful reader and checking out this story too:3 Hope you enjoyed this chapter too^^
CodyJaaxs:"was already excited to see that this has Lux, but not only her she's appears to be the main character also?! So much hype lol. I'm already hooked with what you got going man, can't wait to see you in the next chapter!"
I'm glad you pointed that out, it made me remember I forgot to put Lux as a character in the story description xD Hope I could keep you hooked with this chapter, it's a bit of a tone shift with the ominous first upload, but it was still fun to write^-^
Apetbrz: "Beautiful way to start. Your writing still amazes me~ -"
Thanks bud, glad you liked it^^ Also sorry I wasn't yet able to reply, I've practically been writing the entire time lel...Have this chapter to make up for it xD
That was it for now, short and simple:3 Another thanks for people who leave reviews, it warms my heart every time, no matter what^^
Enjoy the rest of your day!
ADamnGoodName
