Author's Note – Hey there! Yes, you, human: the one with the face and the hair and the clothes. Read and review the story please. A favorite/follow/review would make us very happy. =3
Tenneyshoes – SO MANY QUESTIONS! (;_;) Where to begin, where to begin...
Abaddon is the narrator, right? And you said in the last chapter that that wasn't his actual name?
Yes, Abaddon/Leviathan/Specimen #748 (yes, they all are the same being) is the narrator. His real name is not yet being revealed until later.
There isn't any chance he and Aang are one and the same is there? Or is Aang going to be a Lion?
There is absolutely no chance of Abaddon/Leviathan/Specimen #748 and Aang being the same, since Abaddon is such an amoral, sadistic, violent, ruthless, destructive, sinister, carnivorous character while Aang is carefree, naïve, respects life, and a vegetarian. Aang will not be a Lion.
You said something about a war against earth and sky? Is Aang in the City of Eden?
Yes, there was a war against the earth and the sky years before the story, a very important. In case you didn't read that part or skipped it, it all summarizes to the death of millions of people of earth and some of the earthlings sneaking into the City of Eden: Badgermoles. Aang was in the City of Eden, and should be in this chapter unless it once again gets too long or the storyline goes too fast.
Yes, the people here of Flipping Tables Productions love our wordplay. =3
So are some of the seven that survived the Unspeakable experiments Jet, Smellerbee, ect? And is Toph one of them?
I am neither allowed nor willing to say who the seven that survived the Unspeakable experiments. Sorry, you will have to read to find out that.
Are we ever going to actually 'speak' of these experiments?
We will 'speak' of those...terrible, horrendous, damnable experiments...those certain experiments even make me ashamed of thinking about it and actually putting it into a story.
Will we hear more about Teo?
We will hear about Teo's story and unfortunate demise eventually.
*Whistles* Wow. That was a lot of questions, Comrade Tenneyshoes. It took almost two hours to answer those at the Flipping Table Productions meeting. Authorization of revealing information takes forever, in my opinion. I'm the author even! What the heck! I'm the one who should authority of these things! Ah, oh well...
Thank you so much for reading and reviewing our story! And the answers to our unanswered questions are yet to be revealed.
Although Comrade Tenneyshoes had many good questions, he/she/it was the only two people to leave a review of a TEN PAGE LONG chapter... And that slightly aggravates me. If we work on a chapter for an entire week and all we get is two reviews. That offends, insults, and worries me at the same time. It worries me because I'm not sure if people have become disinterested or find the story boring. 0.0
Anyways, I will thank all those who have read this story. You know who you are. =3
Phalanx CIWS - an anti-ship missle defense system; consisting of a radar-guided 20 mm (0.79 in) Gatling gun mounted on a swiveling base, the Phalanx is used by the United States America on every class of surface combat ship.
Aggregat-4 / Vergeltungswaffe-2 / V-2 rocket - (German: Vergeltungswaffe 2, i.e. retaliation weapon 2), technical name Aggregat-4 (A4), was a ballistic missile that was developed at the beginning of the Second World War in Germany, specifically targeted at London and later Antwerp. The liquid-propellant rocket was the world's first long-range combat-ballistic missile and first known human artifact to enter outer space. It was the progenitor of all modern rockets, including those used by the United States and Soviet Union's space programs.
M4 Carbine - a family of firearms tracing its lineage back to earlier carbine versions of the M16 rifle, all based on the original AR-15 rifle designed by Eugene Stoner and made by ArmaLite. The M4 is a shorter and lighter variant of the M16A2 assault rifle, with 80% parts commonality.
"You're broken, so am I
I'm better off alone
No one to turn to and nothing to call my own
Outspoken, so am I
Explosive words that your world wouldn't understand
Turn away again
You're beaten, so am I
I've got a heart of stone
No medication can cure what has taken hold
You're hurting, so will I
When I awake and remember why I've been running from your
World
Dishonored by your world
Your world
I'm haunted by your world
My blood is cold as ice
Or so I have been told
Show no emotion, and it can destroy your soul
Another sacrifice
To a tormentor your world wouldn't understand
Turn away again
You're angered, so am I
A thousand fires burn
A land of darkness from which I cannot return
You're aching, so will I
When I awake and discover that I have been damaged by your
World
Dishonored by your world
Your world
I'm haunted by your world
You're frightened, so am I
A world of demons wait
Watching the movements and filling my heart with hate
You're burning, so will I
When I awake and discover how I have been ravaged by your
World
Dishonored by your world
Your world
I'm haunted by your world."
- Haunted by Disturbed
Groaning, the Lion soldier shifted his weight on the chair. Slowly, his eyes opened slightly, closed, and then burst open in shock. "What the—" He looked down at his wrists and felt that his ankles were tied harshly onto the blood-stained wooden chair. "Where am I!"
White bandages, slightly tinted pink, were wrapped tightly around his exposed abdomen. The small soundproof room was dark, only lit by a single, swinging light bulb. Across from the panicking and unarmored soldier was a long metal table; lying out on an equally long white cloth were many different types of deadly firearms.
"Oh look, you're awake." A devious feminine voice announced from behind him; causing the man to freeze. The sound of light footsteps approached his ears, and suddenly his captor walked in front of him. He gasped as she turned towards him, a smirk on the mercenary's pale face. A grin stretched across her face, long black hair held partially held up by covering one of her brown eyes. "Now we can get started. Just to let you know, this isn't personal, even if the Lions were the ones to blast my arm off. I'm just here for my payment."
The Lion soldier felt the blood drain from his face once he saw the girl's arms, uncovered by her dark red sleeveless shirt.
Replacing the arm from her elbow to her fingertips of her left arm was an exact metal replica, but a long slender backsaw with curved silver teeth extending out the back of the replaced joint.
He was petrified, not even reacting when the girl unexpectedly tied a thick blue blindfold around his head; her cold artificial fingers brushing against his skin, causing the soldier to shiver, chills rolling down his spine.
"Before we begin," She said, and he heard the sound of metal bumping against metal, and the familiar click of a gun being cocked. "I believe it would be rude if we don't introduce each other. So...what's your name?"
"M—my name is..." He gulped and felt sweat roll down his face. "My name is Qin Lee. A—and I—I worked in the communications department to send messages straight to Lord Ozai—"
The feeling of a metal barrel against his forehead caused the flow of words from his mouth at get caught in his throat, and his body involuntarily froze.
"Well then, Qin Lee today is the day you die. My name is June. I would say it was nice to meet you, but that would've been a lie. Goodbye."
"What? Wait, no, please! Don't fire! Please don't kill me—!"
The sound of a single gunshot rang into June's ears, and she smiled.
"Oh, don't worry, we've just started."
"Yes! 2400 Note Streak!"
"Ugh, stop showing off, Duke!"
"I already told you, it's the Duke!"
"Whatever!"
The argument was suddenly drowned out by music and the sound of tapping controllers as Smellerbee turned up the speakers with a remote. Empty plastic bottles and aluminum cans along with bags of various snacks were littered on the brown stained carpet, strangely in harmony with the wooden walls that had blueprints of machines and weapons, photos and portraits of different Badgermoles, and one of the walls completely covered in a white projector screen; the projector hanging from the ceiling.
A large glass cabinet overflowing with game disks and game controllers sat in the back of the room and a pool table with blood-stained leather armor piled onto it sitting next to the cabinet; a giant brown leather couch sitting in the center of the room. Jet, Longshot, and Pipsqueak crowded the old piece of furniture, Smellerbee sitting next to the couch on a faded beanbag, all of the Freedom Fighters watching as The Duke and Sneers violently slamming on their guitar shaped controllers, the Duke grinning toothily as sweat rolled down Sneers face. The screen had a startlingly fast song scrolling down the screen, the point counter pointing in the Duke's character.
Expectedly, Sneers' side of the screen was struck with computerized lightning, and The Duke's side lit on fire, the screen saying in large white letters: 'PLAYER ONE WINS'.
Everyone but Sneers burst out cheering, giving the youngest Freedom Fighter pats on the back a light hug from the colossal Pipsqueak. As Sneers almost had steam firing out of this ears, a light knock came from the wood sliding door, a muffled voice asking politely, "May we come in?"
"Sure!" Jet called over, standing up and muting the game. "Come on in."
The door slid open, Yugoda standing at the doorframe in her bloodied surgeon attire. She smiled sweetly, greeting, "Hello everyone, how are you today?"
A chorus of grunts and The Duke standing up and waving, shouting, "Hello!" answered her question. Somewhat expectedly, a tanned boney hand 'lightly' shoved the bloody surgeon to the side, and Kanna stepped forward, asking bluntly, "Where did General Bei Fong run of to?"
The Freedom Fighters exchanged confused and puzzled glances while Smellerbee answered, "I think Toph went to check on Hei Bai. Fang said the golem glitched out or something."
Kanna grunted and mumbled in annoyance, "I thought I told her if she moved too much her wounds would open again."
"What do you mean?" The Duke asked. "Toph woke up a few hours ago to go to the training room before she checked on Hei Bai."
"What? Is that child trying to bleed to death?" Kanna nearly shrieked, and Yugoda shook her head in disapproval. "Oh well, I guess Katara will have to stay with you until General Bei Fong is found. Alright, Katara 1hese are the Freedom Fighters – wait a minute, where did Katara go?"
Kanna stuck her head back out of the room and looked up and down the stainless steel walls, only for hr granddaughter to have disappeared.
She muttered, "Oh crap."
"Hei Bai?"
"Yes Master?"
Toph paused in front of her room's large metal door, and sighed tiredly.
"Go check on the little sheep; if she's up...distract her until I get there. I...I have to go change my bandages. These things are getting really getting sticky and itchy."
Hei Bai sighed at the obvious lie but bowed. "Yes, Master."
She nodded slightly and turned to the door and placed a hand on the wide green scanner next to the door and a bright green line rolled across it's dark green screen, and the door abruptly slid open, revealing a excessively littered room overflowing with blueprints and notes; the rest of the room pitch black due to the lack of light.
A few blueprints flew out of the room by the hallway's cold draft, and the wounded automaton grunted lightly as she stepped inside, the lights automatically flickering to life. Picking up some of the papers, his eyes widened and he straightened up, asking, "Master, are you still working on planning to do the Magnum Opus Project...?"
Toph quickly snatched the papers out of his hands and growled, "No, of course not." Arms trembling slightly, her hands crumpled up the papers as she walked back in, leaving a very confused Hei Bai standing outside. But... He looked down at his hand and saw a small ink stain. There were fresh notes and observations on them...
"Darn it, how did I get lost?" An unfamiliar, female voice asked to no one in particular. The golem stopped his train of thought and froze, not recognizing the voice, and he knew all of the 5,211,314 of personnel, human and non-human, in the facility. He knew a Stray, fresh from the surface, would not comprehend a ten-foot-tall obsidian giant with glowing white eyes. Sounds of light footfall came closer and closer to the corner in front of him, and his radiating white eyes darted around the wide metal hallway, and spotted a large vending machine full of the Freedom Fighter's usual snacks (he really wondered why those adolescent agitators didn't just put the machine in their meeting room) and sighed at his ridiculous but only idea.
This place is like a huge metal labyrinth... Katara thought, and sighed in frustration. Walking down the hall, she wondered how she got lost in the first place, but was shaken out of her thoughts by the ground underneath her shake ever so slightly and the sound of large bulky footsteps.
"Is anyone there?" Katara asked, head darting around. Nothing responded but the sound of rustling...paper? Walking further into the immense hallway, she turned the corner to see a large bright colored rectangular machine she only saw when the Lion soldiers accidently left their base doors open. They called it a vending machine, Katara thought, walking forward cautiously. She repeated, "Is a—anybody there?"
As Katara approached, she heard the faint whirr of machinery and chill of a cold breeze. Looking farther down the hall, she saw a large metal doorway, with about a dozen loose blue papers scattered on the floor in front of it.
"Anyone there?" She strode forward, past the machine, only for her bar foot to bump into something hard and smooth, and instinctively she shifted back, thinking it just the vending machine.
Until, it moved.
She turned to the shaded side of the machine, and she gasped, scrambling backwards.
Looming over her with its impressive and brawny figure was a massive monster of darkened stone. To Katara's surprise, it seemed more like a large muscular man of stone than pictures of robots she's read, except it was twice her size and would have been a successful bodybuilder if human.
Burly arms and legs made from some dark stone were held together by an overlay of shining plates of silver, even small metal hinges on its sausage sized fingers. It stared down at her with pure white glowing eyes and in the center of the able-bodied golem's chest was an equally white shining orb floating in its spherical capsule. Small metal arms connected to its actual anatomy were only an inch from the pure sphere and small tendrils of white seemed to trail from the orb into the arms, and Katara saw between its metal overlay were thin grey lines travelling through its body; acting as a sort of robotic heart, pumping the pure energy as if it was blood.
Its head looked like a motorcycle helmet, except its 'neck' holding it up was made up of wires and metal coated pipes. Where a human's ears would have been were rounded rectangular buttons, and the dark tinted glass that took up most of the front of its face had its glowing eyes –which were wide with surprise – and suddenly a few small green bars appeared on where its right cheek would've been and the bars raised as its voice got louder, the colors turning from green, yellow, and red when he was speaking loudest.
Katara didn't hear what it was saying; all she heard was her startled gasp and the sound of her own footfall.
"Come back!" It shouted, and to her utter shock it didn't sound like she thought it would, it had no robotic sound to it. It sounded like a young man with a deep voice, and a rough foreign accent she couldn't recognize. "Stop, please!"
On impulse, Katara kept running until she reached the open metal door, and her mind didn't register the unnatural darkness in the room. She just ran in, the sound of rustling paper under her feet.
"No! Don't go in there—"
The unexpected sound of the colossal metal door sliding close and the sound of multiple locks snapping shut rang in her ears, and she was plunged into darkness.
Unlike the rest of Toph's room, her private bathroom was bright and spotless. It was small, only having a shower, porcelain toilet and sink, medicine cabinet underneath the running sink and a plain rectangular mirror which Toph stared into, carefully watching her hands reflection as her metal hand began wrapping new bandages round her cleaned wounds; the old ones floating in the sink.
The exact moment she heard the main door close she finished wrapping the wound up. As she was about to get the sling for her arm, she heard the sound of rustling paper, that of which she knew wasn't from the air conditioning. She turned off the sink, and the rustling suddenly stopped.
Immediately when the door closed behind Katara, she couldn't see anything but darkness. As she shuffled forward, the low sea of papers underneath her rustled loudly.
Moving forward, she abruptly froze once she heard an unfamiliar noise: the noise of running water.
Turn slightly to the right of the darkness; she saw a small thin line of light coming from the underneath of the closed door. Katara began backing away as the sound of running water stop, and her hand bumped into a small wooden knob. As the first door opened, Katara was already closing the door to the large wardrobe, praying that whoever was coming out couldn't find her.
Opening the door, she leaned out and her eye automatically switched into thermal vision and scanned across the room, even if the bathroom lights lit up half of the room in weak light. Walking back onto the floor of blueprints and notes, the other sound of rustling had stopped, instead replaced by the slight creak of her practically empty wardrobe door.
Turning to the wardrobe itself, she slowly advanced forward to it, slowly unsheathing her three blades from her arm just in case.
Standing right in front of the door, she brought her metal arm back, ready to strike, and her bandaged hand slowly reached forward to the door handle. Just has her fingertips touched it, Toph got the sudden feeling of being plunged into freezing water, and, out of nowhere, the sounds of familiar, yet nonexistent, screaming filled her ears.
Katara almost sighed in relief when she heard the figure stumble back, but she felt her blood freeze once the figure started shouting and screaming, as if in pain.
"Augh!" Toph let out a short scream, and covered her ears with her hands and squeezed her eyes shut, only for the screaming to get suddenly louder, and voices, very familiar voices, backed up the screaming.
"...broken...defective...she's...defective product..."
"Stop it, shut up..." Toph grumbled, gritting her teeth.
"She's almost blind...weak...we're more deserving than her..."
"Shut up, shut up, SHUT UP!" Toph shouted, collapsing to her knees. "Abaddon, are you doing this...?"
"Toph?Toph, what's happening? Why are those men hurting mommy?"
"No." Toph's eyes shot open, and she stood up, shouting, "Stop it, Abaddon!"
"Those...Lions. They...they tried to break me."
Roaring in frustration, she dashed back into the bathroom, and nearly tore the cabinet door of its hinges and she began searching through the abundance of first aid supplements and medicines, until she found a well-known pill bottle.
"The bastards tried to break me Toph..."
With haste, she twisted the top off and took one of the pills and swallowed it. She gradually stood and sighed, putting down the bottle and sat on the closed toilet seat, head in her hands.
"...but, Toph...Tell them, tell those Lions... that I died smiling..."
"Damn it..." Toph muttered, and suddenly raised her head as the screaming abruptly ended, along with the voices. The noise was replaced by a low, whispering sound.
Turning her attention to the sink, and jumped slightly as the mirrors above it suddenly grew lips and whispered, "Come nearer..."
She blinked, and stood slowly, walking to the sink. Turning to the mirror, its lips slowly dissipated, and her reflection seemed to warp and shift, changing and morphing.
After a few seconds, staring and grinning at her from within the reflection was Abaddon, surrounded by my realm's darkness. The mirror had changed from a mirror into a simple piece of human glass separating real life for a puny human's subconscious.
I waved slightly, seeing Toph's stunned expression, greeting, "Hello, Subject Pi."
Her eyes changed from shock to anger, eyebrows narrowing. "What are you doing here?"
"Aw, why are you so angry, Toph? All I did was just murder you within your subconscious. You'll be able to come back and visit once your little broken mind cools off. So, how are you, monkey?"
"Leave me alone." Toph grumbled, turning to leave the room. "I have to go call General How."
"You seem rather distracted, monkey. Did you have another episode, hm?"
"I said, leave me alone—"
I kept on grinning, sarcasm slowly dripping into my warped voice. "Did you hear their voices again? Those white coats, your birthparents, and your little, sweet, innocent Teo—"
"AHHHHHHHHH!" She shouted, turning back to me and slamming her fists onto the counter, opening some of the wounds on her left arm and leaving a small crater where her right hand connected. "SHUT UP! I told you, leave me the fuck alone will you?"
"What are you talking about? I'm here ro rebuild you. You know, you haven't had such a violent episode since...well...General How's son's 'Noodle Incident'. This means something is breaking you apart. What could that be, I wonder?"
"If this is another one of your sick jokes, Abaddon, I'm not up to it." She sighed and curled her hands into fists. "I'm already on edge. Just get out of here."
I ignored her and began counting off my fingers what could be causing such stress. "Hm...Known causes, known causes...Well, I think I might know one of them. Think about your father."
Gritting her teeth in frustration, she asked, "Yeah, so what of him?"
"Well, think about what he did to you and your poor mother. All those experiments..."
"Fuck you motherfucker!" Toph roared, slamming her hands against the counter again, furious that I'd bring such a sensitive subject up. She spotted the pill bottle on the counter and said, "I had you beat."
"What, you think I'm just another one of your hallucinations that your shattered mind tricks you with? No, I'm much, much more than that. I've been with you since we watched your little girl grow up, and suddenly disappear. I've been here since your little Teo pushed his last breath out of his chest. Now, back to the subject at hand, we need to find what's causing all this stress. Should I bring up another memory?"
"NO!" Toph suddenly put her head against and counter and covered her head with her hands. "You fucking bitch, WHY!"
I smiled. "Now now, no need to swear. I'm just doing this for your own good."
Skyship Ursa was a relatively small vessel, handled by a small crew of cutthroats, captive thieves, and those who have dishonored themselves in some way. It was a rather old, outdated sky cruiser. The skyship sailed the dull orange sky, smokestacks spewing the grey pollution into the already ruined heavens. Three large nuclear reactors on the back of the ship propelled it forward, while seven smaller and thinner reactors on the underside of the ship held it in the air.
The ship was small, light, and unsuspected.
The perfect place to hide the world's most powerful Lapis Philosophorum.
Standing on the ship's deck, Lieutenant Jee gripped the rails, glaring down at the sea of garbage, rot, and death underneath him. His nose burned at the smell, and his fingers twitched for the M4 Carbine strapped to his back. For some bizarre reason, he had an unexplainable feeling that something, something big, was going to happen.
The Lion lieutenant sighed and turned away from the depressing sight and began walking back to his room, until an eerie red light moderately filled the ship's deck, stopping Jee in his tracks. Ever so slowly, he turned around, and stumbled backwards in surprise.
A large signal flare had flown from the ground below, but that wasn't what scared him. Flying over the light was a giant black and white missile, spinning and sailing toward the ship at blinding speed. The flare automatically distracted the ship's own missiles, and Ursa's torpedo sized missiles flew past the flare harmlessly, while the colossal V-2 missile was only yards away.
Jee was certain the ship was screwed, and he impulsively brought his arms over his head, only for the sound of sentry gun gunfire to ring in his ears, and a huge blast of heat and the earsplitting sound to knock the soldier back.
Once he opened his eyes, what was left of the missile was a vast cloud of smoke and small pieces of metal falling loudly onto the ship's deck.
Jee saw the six of the large sentry guns, Phalanx CIWS anti-ship missile defense system, sticking out of their metal base with trails of smoke flowing out of their barrels. The Lion soldier turned to ship's bridge and past the red tinted glass was a young man about sixteen years old and wearing an upgraded Lion's soldier uniform. His brown hair was tied in a top-knot and his hands were on the sentry guns controls.
The teenager's golden eyes bore down at Jee, and a large, red scar took of most of the left side of his face. "Prince Zuko," Je muttered, nodding in thanks. Zuko's face remained indifferent.
Just before Jee could even move, he heard the sound of metal against metal, too loud to be the remnants of the blasted missile. He turned around to see dozens of grappling hooks on the ships railing, and the sounds of sirens filled Jee's ears.
Zuko's voice then rang out from the intercom, shouting,
"WE'RE UNDER ATTACK! BATTLE STATIONS!"
Author's Note – Cliffhangers. Cliffhangers everywhere. 0.0
Now that you are finished reading, would you kindly review this chapter. The button's just down below. Review please!
