8.3
The Queen of Drangleic
The black rainclouds over the castle poured out their fury. The droplets sounded like a million little arrows striking the palace walls and ceiling, bouncing off the stained glass windows that depicted the chronicles of the kingdom's lifetime.
So much history. So many small glories that slipped away from them one after another. Piece by piece. Inconsequential at the time, but each one building on one another, piece by piece, until the Kingdom was a shadow of its former self.
It was difficult to determine what the first blow had been. When exactly it had changed. What the turning point was.
But… ultimately… whenever she thought of it, she could only imagine a single point as the one that turned their fortunes forever. The one that began the steady, inexorable decline of this, her Kingdom.
The day Raime was exiled, declared a traitor onto the realm.
That was the day the Kingdom lost its sword. The day the battles against the Giant's became harder to win, when the pitched struggles had turned into defeats, and the vigor and life seemed to drain from her once proud and powerful husband.
The day he could no longer carry the weight of his Soul…
The day she, Nashandra, took a step towards victory.
It was a bitter thought that… the one that told her in an insidious, hateful whisper that… had Raime won… had he succeeded in his venture… that the Kingdom would have survived. That it would have been better… even though she was the one that told Vendrick of the secret across the sea. She was the one that helped him create the Golems. She was the one that gave him the ambition, the drive, the strength to forge this… this wretched Kingdom and subdue all others.
She, Nashandra, made him King. She did.
And after all that… after all the effort, all the time and planning, all the sacrifice…
He never took it… He never took the true throne.
Worse, he denied her the chance to take it. The chance to do what he never did…
Ascend to a place worthy of herself…
Now he was hidden away. Protected by the mistresses of song, the guardians of the dead, phantoms of lords and kings past, and his ever loyal shield. A golden fool that followed him like a lost mongrel.
She was powerful. She was a daughter of the Abyss. But she… could. Not. Reach. Him.
It was a bitter pill to say the very least.
She could not take what was hers by right.
These were the thoughts that had plagued her for a thousand years… the regrets and seething hatreds that smothered any flicker of love or affection that may have ever existed in her heart for her would be king.
She knew of everything that transpired in the Kingdom. Her eyes and ears were everywhere. And she knew there was one. One out there, now, who fashioned himself the next Monarch, guided by the hand of her desperate enemy.
She knew all of this. And so she knew, that something… had changed.
Something new, shards, pieces of something scattered across the land come from a… different place.
One was here.
Right here within this castle.
When she found it, she was… perplexed.
She puzzled over this thing, this anomaly, tasting its soul, its essence, pulling at its strings even as the little phantom shard whimpered in confusion and fear.
When she received an answer, her confusion grew to amusement.
Sister…
She grinned, a smile of malice.
She received an answer, a flicker of thought, of emotion. She could recognize the touch of Nadalia upon her soul, even as she discarded the thoughts and pieces of the mortal that tried to make itself known, thinking itself important enough to warrant her attention, disregarding the emotions and memories held within this little sliver, focusing only on her sister.
"I was under the impression you were dead… but are now bound to a mortal instead. And such a frail little soul. You have fallen far sister. Such a shame."
She received her answer. One that amused her all the more.
"You want this one back? You always were one of whims and fancies. Why does this little mote of dust concern you so?"
She grinned, taking the small shard in hand, manipulating and breaking it further to force it back into its crystalline form, hearing the fragment of the soul scream under her grasp. How easy it is to make one squirm and suffer…
She heard it cry for her mother.
A second later, surprisingly, she felt… cold. A sensation of primal fear running down her spine that reminded her that this was her eldest sister for a very good reason…
And she was not quite so close to dead… that she hadn't fallen quite so far as she originally thought.
The amusement vanished, replaced by irritation and jealousy, that the most imbecilic, the most barbaric, of them was blessed with such strength.
It made her seethe. She would have such inconceivable strength when she did nothing with it. Put it to such little use. It was insulting. It was despicable. It drove Nashandra insane.
"And tell me." She continued with a snarl. "What is it that you will do for me Sister? I could very well crush this little soul and not play courier for you. Much less wet nurse for this mortal...
When the answer came, it was as though her sister's full attention turned on her, just for a moment as she delivered her clear warning, feeling her grip over her mind, even as she tried to subtly resist the force of the thoughts.
"Do not...Push. Me. Further."
She scowled and inside her mouth her teeth were gritting. She did fear Nadalia. It was painful to admit but it was true. She was the smallest fragment. The weakest. To compare herself to Nadalia was to compare a mound of dirt to a mountain.
Some of their other siblings in years long past, before they realized just how little ambition she had, feared that Nadalia would consume them all… assimilate them, the smallest pieces into her being. Snuffing them out like an infinitesimal flame before a torrent.
Elana had certainly lent credibility to such a fear… Her fleeing underground to gather strength from her King and that Dragon could not have come soon enough for most of their siblings.
Another fool… She would never be able to overpass the countless millennia of solitude their Father endured to the short, albeit seething, burst of wrath when he was awakened and tortured by his progeny.
Her strength, Nashandra's strength, was in her mind, her cunning. Nadalia was too… erratic. Overreactive. Insane. Given to simple whims.
But… in small doses… she could be maneuvered. Like a rabid dog set loose into a fighting pit...
"Fair is fair sister. If you wish my help, you will offer me something in return, or not receive it at all. And what would happen to this little thing I wonder? Left to rot here… tossed into the refuse with the depraved and toxic… Or into the copse filled with the Hollowed and tortured? Or perhaps locked away where the Sinner resides. Or even amongst the withering ruin of Tseldora. You do not possess the power here anymore my dear sister. I do."
There was a moment of silence, before her sister answered, and the scowl that had decorated her inhumanly beautiful features transformed into the smallest of smirks as she giggled to herself.
(X)
Missy Biron
Vista hopped on debris and cars like one would hop on rocks in a stream. Beside her, Kid Win hovered on his board as they made way through the quagmire. The young girl did her best to stay focused on the ruined building ahead of them. PRT HQ, which is somehow still standing.
Got to credit Foundation. She knows how to build them…
"I wonder why they are sending us here to HQ?" Chris said as he avoided an upturned truck. Vista remained quiet.
Leviathan was killed by Taylor. Aegis was dead. Velocity dead. Glory Girl dead. And Taylor…
She didn't know what had happened with Taylor. Whatever it was it gave her the power to kill Leviathan. Kill an Endbringer. Something even Scion apparently couldn't do.
She knew why a lot of capes practically jumped head first to volunteer to look for her. She was now the most valuable life on the eastern seaboard, hell, she was the most valuable life on the planet.
For her part… it was more complicated than that.
She just didn't know why they sent her and Chris to the PRT HQ.
"Think anyone got caught inside?" Chris asked as they approached the ziggurat-esque headquarters.
A fair question, evacuation of PRT troopers further inland had already started before all of the volunteer capes had even arrived but… still. Even the capes themselves had to scramble to get out with the suddenness of Leviathan's wave.
All the windows were completely destroyed. There was nothing left but empty cavities.
The first floor looked flooded out. Furniture no longer in their spots. This would take months to repair and renovate.
"I'll head through the first floor, see if I can get to the power room and make sure nothing screwed with the backup systems."
She nodded, and as he hovered into the first floor, she shortened the distance between herself and the second story as Chris levitated above the water on his board. Water must be two or three feet high now.
When she climbed through the second story window, even here, there was water, almost a foot deep, unable to properly escape due to the isolated nature of the building's construction. Each floor isolated from the others in case of a release of some kind of tinker tech nerve gas or other kind of attack. It would give the people on other floors time to either evacuate or take countermeasures. The only areas that connected the floors were of course, the stairs and elevators, but those parts of the building were equally cordoned off as much as they reasonably could be.
She hopped down into the water and began to wade through it, feeling the seawater soak into her costume, again. At this rate, she was going to catch pneumonia.
She put that thought out of her mind as her helmet flashlights flickered on, and she began to search.
She found office after office, room after room, moving with rapid speed as she warped space to cut down on her time. But there was nothing. The only room where she saw anything was one, with a floating body. She didn't bother to look and see who it was.
With a snap, the emergency lights came on, individual boxes on the walls turning on, allowing her the luxury of turning off her helmet camera.
Good job Chris.
She made it to the emergency stairs, a whitewash of water pouring out of the door as she opened it, nearly dragging her along in the current before she grabbed hold of the railing and pulled herself two or three steps up, escaping the small current she could liken to that of a water-park ride. No reply from Chris, so he hadn't found anything.
When she reached the third floor she was careful to place herself at a safe distance from the door before she opened it. Another rush of water, this one beginning to taper off after just a few seconds. With fewer windows on their more secure floor, less water seemed to have gotten in.
When she made it inside she found the server room first, its delicate electronics no doubt completely ruined. She began to take a mental tally of what else was up here. The Ward's rooms, the Protectorate on-base apartments she knew were only being used by Mouse Protector and Miss Militia.
She decided to make her way to the Wards rooms. If for no other reason as to see how much of her home survived…
She swiped her ID card, more grateful than ever for Chris being able to turn on the backup power so quickly.
When she walked in she was… surprised.
The force of the wave had knocked over quite a few things, lamps, books, things like that, along with their kitchen cabinets. Specifically, the whole set of upper kitchen cabinets. But outside of the water she let in now with the door open, the room was unflooded.
Everything looked out of place. Near destroyed. But, frankly, this was the best looking place in the whole building. She stepped inside and turned her head right to look at the living room space.
She gasped.
Right there. Right on the couch, or where the couch used to be.
"I'm gonna be getting a plan soon. Do you want me to include yo-"
Missy stared, mouth agape in open confusion. "Kid… I found… something. Wards dorm."
"On the way. What is it?"
She opened her mouth. Trying to find the best way to phrase 'Taylor's ghost' without sounding like a stupid kid.
In the end, all she could come up with was, "You have to see it… yourself…"
"Immasupehero!" The spectre before her giggled, sitting on the couch and kicking her legs out like a schoolgirl.
'On my way.' She heard Chris say.
She stared, just watching the flickering smoke thing on the couch before she pulled on whatever courage she needed to step forward.
"Taylor?" Missy asked.
Then the apparition changed on the spot.
Taylor's memories. Or something… It changed. Before the apparition was giggling with delight, now she was huddled, arms wrapped around the knees.
"I want to go… leave..." Said the spectre.
"Go? Go where?" Missy thought.
"This is all… false… a smile to hide a sneer. It's a lie..."
She opened her mouth, about to speak when she saw it turn, look at her.
"I stayed because of all of you." It said. "I stayed because I don't want it to have all been a lie…"
She was confused, unsure of what to do, or even how much of this was coherent and not just confused babbling.
"Ummm." She ventured, unsure of herself. "What didn't you want to be a lie?" She heard Chris' hoverboard long before he came into the room, kicking off the thing and catching it with a smooth, practiced motion.
"Mis-T-Taylor?" He breathed, as flatly surprised as she was.
'The reason for my happiness…"
Missy took in what she said, beginning to piece together the whole.
Oh… Taylor…
"It wasn't a lie…" She said, emotion beginning to rise up in her throat. "Taylor… you were -are- our friend."
The ghost's head moved, tilting this way and that way.
Its words were a quiet thing… a whisper.
"No matter how beautiful… how comforting."
The smoke that made up this ethereal form suddenly flickered, burning like an angry, bright flame that cast long and dark shadows across the room.
A lie will remain a lie!
The whisper had turned into a roar across her mind. But the words themselves, more than anything, made her physically wince. They carried such hatred… such sheer loathing for the mere thought that Missy couldn't think of a single instance in which she'd heard such raw emotion in anyone else before in her life.
The brightness dimmed, once more becoming 'normal'. As normal as one could consider a talking ghost anyway.
She reached forward touching the spirit, feeling her hand pass through as though she was touching nothing at all.
"It wasn't a lie…" She promised again, looking to Chris, who still seemed to be trying to let his mind catch up to this. "If we… if I ever made you feel that way I'm sorry. I should have gone to see you more. Should have done more… And when you get back… I'll make sure you know that. From me and everyone else. Promise Tay."
The phantom said nothing, its answer was to become little more than a speck of light on the remains of the Ward's living room couch.
(X)
Danny Hebert
"Do you know where these coordinates lead?" Yelled Danny as he looked up at the man holding him by his hands. "I can barely recognize anything!"
It was true. With the dark, the rain, the flooding and the fact that he was flying, the Bay seemed almost alien.
"I'm not sure." Legend shouted back. "We'll be there soon though." Legend responded, looking down at his arm. "The area we're going to is on a small rise, so thankfully it's not entirely flooded out, the water should only reach up to your ankles rather than your chest... Hopefully…" Danny looked back down at the swathe of destruction before him. It was… unreal. He heard of the sheer scale of damage Endbringers could cause, hell, there were still pictures of Behemoth's rampage across New York, the very first attack zone. Times Square was a heap of rubble and destroyed buildings, Central Park was a slagged wasteland, and Grand Central terminal had been torn in half.
But those had been pictures of a city he'd only lived in for a handful of years, to parts he'd seen only once or twice in his life.
To actually be here… to have your home like this…
And to think Taylor had gone out to fight the thing… He'd called PRT HQ of course, trying to get through the choked phone lines to no avail. To tell them that he did not consent to her fighting. He'd never even been close. And never had he detested her lack of a personal phone more than ever.
The thought that she'd been fighting the monster… even if she did manage to do what no one else could, kill it, made him sick.
Those hours in the shelter were the longest of his life. If he had his way, he would taken her and gotten her out of the city, PRT be damned.
When Legend started descending to a thicket of trees Danny had to wonder where exactly they were going. He couldn't really see anything but a solid wall of black that was the unlit ground.
When they finally came to just a handful of feet Danny's eyes widened in surprise.
A cemetery. They were in a cemetery.
"Do you know this place Daniel?" Asked Legend.
"My wife… she's buried here." Danny spoke softly, looking at the ground. The water was shallow, just reaching past the rim of his shoe. But the mud was thick and sucking him down.
The dark clouds overhead were just beginning to pass, and some rays of sun were breaking through the black rain-clouds and ashfall.
"Oh… I'm sorry." Legend replied sadly.
"Don't be… It was… a while ago." Danny looked at the blue-wearing hero. "So we're supposed to look around here?"
"That's what Con… Alexandria said, yes. If this is your wife's grave, then perhaps… we should visit it? We are looking for Taylor after all."
…
Danny remained silent. He hasn't been here almost since Taylor first became a Hero... giving Annette an update on Taylor's status.
He cried.
Nearly the latter half of his time here. He'd just cried. Staring at her name etched on the gravestone. And again on the way home.
He didn't like being here… he hated it, in truth. But he kept coming back. He always kept coming back. Annette had been the love of his life, and as painful as it was to see it, her headstone, again and again, knowing that this is all he had left of her. But… he had to keep seeing her. He couldn't explain it.
"Alright…" He nodded, hoping he'd have enough composure to not start bawling his eyes out in front of Legend of all people. "Let's go then."
As they made their way through the graveyard, Danny was dismayed to see several of the tombstones snapped and broken, the mausoleums split down their sides or caved in wherever the strongest waves hit them.
He started moving with a bit more urgency, a little more speed as he wondered at the fate of his wife's resting place.
When he got there, he felt his heart clench with pain, dropping into a pit in his stomach.
Annette's grave was shorn in half, the only letter's of her name he could see were the first two, 'An' and underneath, where it had her favorite quote 'We must become the change we wish to see' Only the first three words were there.
He reached the grave, not seeing the other half of it anywhere.
Legend seemed to catch on to the situation. "I'm sorry about this Mr. Hebert."
"Not your fault." He answered sincerely. "Gravestones can be rebuilt… no use crying over spilt milk, right?"
He looked around, finding nothing but more destroyed gravestones, mausoleums and snapped trees. He looked to Legend. "I don't see anything." He said.
"Let's split up and look around. If in five minutes we don't find anything we'll meet up back here and I'll call Alexandria. I know she wouldn't send us out here to not find anything."
He nodded. Seemed as sound a plan as he could measure.
Legend picked himself up, floating up and away, ten feet off the ground to search free of the ankle deep water.
Danny turned and started walking the other way.
He moved through the destroyed cemetery, panning his eyes around, irritated that he hadn't thought ahead and brought a flashlight or something.
He was about to turn around, walk back to Annette's grave, when a glimmer of light caught his eye, the barest edge of it peeking out from behind the walls of a mausoleum whose roof was destroyed by a fallen tree.
He moved forward, equal parts anxious and hesitant.
When he looked at the family name carved over the door, he realized he remembered this place.
It had been the day of the funeral. Taylor had hidden here, running from the coffin. He hadn't followed, not wanting to leave Annette as she was laid to rest. Emma, Kurt, and Lacey had gone after her. It was only after the service that he had found them, picking Taylor up as she kept crying, thanking Kurt and Lacey before Emma had gone back with Alan who had followed him.
When he rounded the corner… there she was.
There, but not there. A thin mirage of wispy silver smoke, it had form but few defining features.
"Taylor?" He asked, stepping forward, hesitating as his hands hovered, hesitant to touch her, unsure of what to do.
At the sound of his voice, the pantomime image seemed to curl in on itself further, whimpering.
"Legend!" He called, shouting into the faux night, and calling again when he got no answer.
Then, the Hero was there, flying over from wherever he'd been. How he'd managed to find him in the dark he had no idea.
"What's wro-" He stopped. "Oh…"
Legend, like Danny it seemed, was at a complete loss.
Taylor's ghost lay huddled in her corner hugging her legs, forehead resting on her knees as she cried.
"I- what do we do?" Danny asked, terrified of screwing this up, of somehow hurting her or making her disappear entirely.
Legend pressed his fingers to his communicator. "This is Legend, please put me through to-"
Danny heard the voice start to answer, unable to make out the words, but the tone and inflection made it out to be a woman, curt, to the point and seemingly answering Legend's questions before he could finish drawing a breath to to ask them.
"Okay then." The Hero responded, stepping forward around Danny and Taylor both to stand at her side.
"Taylor. Can you hear me?"
"Go away…"
Her voice was thin, strange. It carried a duality he'd never quite heard before, as if both the voice of Taylor today and her younger self of a few years ago were both speaking the exact same words at the exact same time with the same inflection, tone, and emotion.
"Why? You don't want to be alone do you?"
She didn't answer.
"Your father is here. Don't you see that?" The hero said.
"No he's not."
"Yes I am." He answered, kneeling in front of her, hoping she'd see him. "I'm right here Taylor."
The ghost shook its head. "No. Not here. Not here. Never here. Not with me."
The words felt like a knife to his gut, and the pain on his features must have been visible given the look of sympathy Legend tossed his way.
"Why…" Legend paused, clearing his throat. "Why do you say that Taylor?"
"Mom. He stayed with Mom. Not here. Not with me…"
"He's here now." Legend answered, kneeling beside him. "Your father is right here."
"Late." She said. "Don't want him..."
He felt like he was just punched in the gut.
"T-Tayl-"
"He… wasn't… there." She said, interrupting him, while still speaking to Legend. "I needed him there and he wasn't…"
She was still speaking past him, still speaking to Legend.
Was she… ignoring him?
He felt his face fall, the pain twisting his features as he struggled to hold back the tears he could feel burning at the back of his eyes.
Is this how she felt about him?
"So… I learned."
"What did you learn Taylor?"
"To be without him." She said simply. "Him… Emma… I… wanted them both to be there… but they weren't… so I learned to be without them."
"I'm here now… Taylor." He knelt in front of her, reaching to touch her hands when he felt his fingers pass right through the wispy smoke. "Taylor I'm here now…" He pleaded.
Perhaps it was his voice. His insistence, or even the physical contact with this ghost like form, but whatever it was, it finally seemed to break through the haze. She lifted her head, staring at him with eyes that glimmered like white flame.
When she spoke… the soft whisper of her words, was nearly lost in the hiss of the rain…
For all that… it was still the hardest blow he'd ever felt in his life.
"But I don't need you anymore."
Her ghost like form glimmered and vanished. Leaving behind nothing but a tiny, flickering shard as he felt his heart rip open.
