Chapter 14 The Door
Three days later, Xero found himself in Revolution's cockpit; following Tyre out into the tundra of the southern ice cap. The trip had been silent so far except when they left; Xero asked where they were going after they got on the transport but only got the silent treatment.
They had been boosting for about two hours after the transport dropped them off in the middle of nowhere. Tyre would go straight for a while, then make a completely random, or so it seemed, turn and go off in that direction for a while before making another turn. And so they had traveled for the last two hours.
Tyre stopped quite abruptly. "we're here."
Xero stopped beside him and watched as Tyre went down to one knee and placed a hand into the snow. He pulled his hand back out holding a diamond white orb. He lifted the orb to shoulder height and let go of it.
Xero shot his hand out to catch it but the sphere stayed in the air. "what the hell is this?"
Tyre's red AC looked up at Xero, "that, my friend, is your door. Open it."
Revolution reached forward and grasped the orb in both hands, Xero being careful not to grab too tight, lest it shatter. Suddenly, blue-white snakes of energy burst forth from the orb and wrapped themselves around Revolution's arms and worked their way up towards the core.
Xero watched as the energy snakes slid through the video monitors on the inside of the cockpit and wrapped themselves around his body. The entire time he could hear Tyre's voice through the comm system, telling him to keep calm and to let things happen as they were.
"Xero, I've got three units on my radar, can you confirm?"
Xero struggled to move his head upward to check the radar and voiced through a strained neck, "confirmed."
"alright, Xero, once your in, you can take your time you wont have to worry. I can handle these. But more will come, once you get out, be prepared for a fight." Tyre's voice faded off with the last few words as Xero watched him boost off toward the three red blips on his radar.
Xero closed his eyes as the sound faded and the screens started going black around him.
When he opened his eyes he found himself in a white room, if one could call it a room, it had no visible end to it, no ceiling, no walls, the only confirmation that Xero had that there was a floor was the fact that he was not falling. And that was just the thing, it was only Him inside this place, Revolution was nowhere to be seen.
"Is he the One?" A shapeless voice said.
Xero spun around, there didn't appear to be a point of origin of the voice. It was just there. But upon spinning around, Xero did see an orb floating about five feet above to 'ground'. It was identical to the sphere that he had caught with his AC seconds later.
Xero took a step closer. "I'm not sure… what do you think Kirel?" another voice spoke out, different from the first but there still didn't seem to be any point of origin.
The voice of a woman answered, "He is the one, I'm sure of it. He is their son. The only problem is that he doesn't seem to know what that means exactly."
"but how can he not know? After all this time…" the first of the voices responded.
"He will still need to be tested of course." Kirel said, "But we should tell him first."
"and what seems like a good test to you Kirel?" the second voice rang.
"perhaps if he were to face and conquer the gifts himself he could be deemed ready to receive them."
Am I going insane?
Xero got a response.
He heard laughter, "surely you don't think your going insane? If you are thinking such things you truly are ignorant." Kirel spoke to him, "this is nothing as trivial as insanity, your fate is being decided."
My fate?
"It will all come full-circle in due time, my dear boy." Kirel assured him.
Wait, what test? What gifts? And what do you mean, 'their son'?
"well, the gifts you are to receive are the Shukkerra Katanas and the Kyrind Wings."
The What?
"They are the same weapons your parents used, they hold great power, but only if wielded by a great heart."
What do you mean?
"well, the weapons feed off of the pilot, off the emotions and drives of the pilot. They get stronger or weaker depending on the pilot."
That's kinda hard to believe, but here I am talking to voices in my head.
"How dare you!" the first voice rang out, "we are more than mere 'voices in your head', much more… we are the weapons, we are the souls of the weapons of the creators! Don't you understand that!"
"do not be so harsh on the boy, he still knows very little." Kirel spoke again, "I believe that is why he is here, to get some answers. Am I correct?"
I'm sorry for the disrespect, but yes I did come here for answers, and how can you be the souls of weapons?
Kirel laughed again, "you humans, you come seeking answers yet never cease asking questions." She continued, "it is actually quite easy for us to be the souls of the weapons, I am the spirit of the wings."
"I am the left katana," the second voice announced, "my name is Dogan."
"and I am the right katana," the first voice offered, "my name is Torrind."
Kirel spoke again, "that is who we are, how we came to be what we are is another story for another time. But the more important matter at hand is how we knew your parents and how we can help you. Correct?"
Right… Xero replied as best he could think, he still wasn't sure what exactly was going on.
"so then, to start, in order to understand all this, you must understand the background to the great struggle that all life on this planet is currently engaged in: Eons ago, there was a race that we shall call the 'creators', they obviously didn't create the universe so don't get the two mixed up. Now, these creators were searching for the ultimate power, and they were seeking to make it any way possible. They finally succeeded in creating a being of enormous power, Cataclysma; which is a being very much like your own ACs."
"Cataclysma's power even surpassed the expectations, and fears, of the creators." Torrind continued, "And unfortunately, along with the ultimate power, came the ultimate evil, in a way. But, far too late to correct their own folly, Cataclysma escaped, the creators were all too powerless to stop it."
It acted on its own?
"yes, yes it did." Torrind answered.
"let me continue," Kyrind cut back in. "the creators could not let Cataclysma run amok unchecked throughout the universe, so they created Cataclysma's counter, Redemption."
"but," Dogan spoke up. "to prevent another 'Cataclysma' the creators made redemption in four parts, each on its own would have no chance against the ultimate powers of Cataclysma, but all together, they could stand at least some chance."
Torrind spoke next, "they built the four pieces as, the body of Redemption and three weapons; the Kyrind wings, and the Shukkerra Katanas."
"Although," Kirel spoke in again, "we were only used against Cataclysma once, when Redemption finally faced the beast on this very planet, the first planet it had ravaged. It took Redemption so very long to track Cataclysma down."
"when Cataclysma had arrived on this planet, it managed to use a corporation for its own uses, I believe it was known as Chrome. The corporation surged and prospered with the help of Cataclysma, and Chrome returned the favor by assisting Cataclysma when the time came for it to face judgment."
"Cataclysma met Redemption on the deserts of this planet with armies at its sides. Cataclysma stood back as Redemption easily swept aside these trifling adversaries. Only when all adversaries were defeated, leaving only Cataclysma, Redemption, and a blood-red sun to paint the battlefield, did Redemption summon us to its aide."
Kirel paused for a second. "The battle between Redemption and Cataclysma was long and hard. And so the Redemption began losing hope as the battle dragged on and on, and due to our abilities we began to lose our strength. Cataclysma was quick to take advantage of this by summoning its own great weapons into the battle; black devilish wings, and a blood red scythe.
After which Cataclysma mocked us and said that the four of us; Redemption, Torrind, Kirel, and Dogan were only as powerful as itself, but not anywhere as powerful as Cataclysma and its own weapons of great destruction. It then dashed forward with unimaginable speed and attacked the Redemption. Cutting the Redemption's left arm and wings clean off. Now armed only with Torrind, and with Torrind being very weak from feeding on all the despair from such a miserable battle-"
"-Redemption threw me aside!" Torrind interrupted, anger and sorrow filled his voice. "And overboosted straight for Cataclysma. Upon reaching him in full overboost he rammed Cataclysma and forced it back. With its remaining hand, Redemption grabbed the scythe from Cataclysma and spun it up and around then downwards, forcing the blade through the back of Cataclysma and-" Torrind shuttered and took a deep breath. "-and… through Redemption's chest."
Kirel spoke up again. "indeed it did, the large scythe went straight through Cataclysma as expected, but it also ran through the Redemption. After which the Redemption completed its final directive and activated its antimatter generator. The antimatter generator, is a special generator that creates intense amounts of energy and is only used for a single purpose, trans-dimensional transportation. Redemption opened up a dimensional transport hole and surpassed the standard 4th dimension that we used for transporting objects and proceeded to the 6th dimension. It then pulled the Cataclysma in along with it."
"wow." Croaked from Xero's mouth. he tried to absorb all that he had just learned. When he regained himself his head filled with even more questions. But if the Redemption pulled the Cataclysma in with it then where do my parents fit into all this and how did Cataclysma get out?
"this story is still far from over, my boy. she paused for a moment, almost as if to remember where she left off. "Cataclysma posessed the same kind of divice, just a smaller version. This smaller version is only capable of opening a hole large enough for a single AC. Whereas Redemption's generator could create a hole large enough for a quarter of a planet to slip through. Anyway, centuries later, Cataclysma managed to escape from its eternal prison and returned to this land; somehow. Here, it befriended the corporation called Mirage. It offered Mirage complete dominance and control over all except itself. In exchange, all Mirage had to do was assist and repair Cataclysma. The way Mirage did this was by giving legions of MTs over for Cataclysma to control. This happened about 26 or 27 years ago.
Now, Cataclysma closely observed that era's best ravens and ACs, and came to the realization that if they all banded together they could pose a serious threat, especially since he no longer possessed his own weapons of great destruction. So Cataclysma started hunting down the ravens individually. There were so many ravens all about and more people kept becoming ravens in the pursuit of riches and adventure that it became clear, hunting them down individually was out of the question. So Cataclysma eventually gave up on hunting them down. Instead he went only for the ones with the most potential for posing a threat. Naturally he went after the most talented and the most powerful ravens. At that time there were two people who were considered the best ravens alive. They were your parents, Xero."
"what? My parents were ravens! My parents were the two top ranked ravens!" He was blown away. He had thought that his parents were drug lords or something like that, and they were murdered for some reason relating to that. But ravens? He now understood his "larger than average" bank account.
"yes, my boy, your parents were very talented in their field of work. In the arena they both climbed to the top very quickly, sometimes facing three of four opponents in one day. Your father especially was known for that. He would defeat one opponent in seconds then stay in the arena as the next opponent moved inside. Your mother was a little more subtle, only taking one to three people a day. But she enjoyed the challenge much more. She had the fastest AC in the arena, and her only weapons were laser-blade arms. She was a fan favorite, the stadiums would always be packed when she had a match. Everyone loved her overboost charges, how she would fly across the arena like a Phoenix and cut the head, arms, and legs off an opponent AC in an instant. Your father, on the other hand, was loved for his constant weapon bombardments. He would fire two linear cannon shots at the same time and have his EOs firing constantly, all the while boosting close up and firing both of his shotguns at the opponent; littering the opponent AC with holes. Your AC most resembles your father's."
after she said this, a small sphere appeared in front of Xero with the image of an AC in it.
"this was your father's AC."
Another orb appeared next to it.
"and this was your mothers."
His father's AC had a heavier set like his own but still had the look and most of the speed of the mid-weights. It had a yellow, double-barrel shotgun in the right hand. A black, quad-Barrel shotgun in the left hand. It also had two light-weight, linear guns on the back, and a mid-weight solid ammo EO core.
His mother's AC had the mid-weight "SPINE" legs, a light-weight, overboost core without missile interception. It had the "WAKE" back boosters, and the laser-blade arms. It did look really fast, Xero admitted to himself that he probably wouldn't have been able to control it himself.
"so, what am I supposed to do with all of this information?" Xero asked just before a huge quake rocked the 'ground' that he stood on.
"It appears that our friend Tyre is being overwhelmed." There was silence for a few moments, followed by another quake. "it appears you are going to have to contemplate these things later. But for now, you must accept your destiny."
"My destiny?"
"yes, you will have to take the weapons and defend yourself against the evil that threatens this planet. When you reemerge from this orb, your AC will be fitted with the weapons of Redemption" Kirel said.
"We will assist you with this battle and show you what the weapons are capable of. The only thing you have to do to repeat any of the actions you will see is imagine them, concentrate and do the action, we can do the rest. These drones will serve as good target practice for you." Dogan added.
"alright, I guess…." Xero replied. Then he was engulfed by darkness and the whistling of the wind.
When he opened his eyes, he found himself back on the snow covered ground of the arctic. Tyre was about fifteen hundred meters away and surrounded by the strange units that had been plaguing his dreams for the past few weeks. In fact, the units were everywhere, hundreds of them.
"Xero! You made it! And you brought them! They chose you!" Tyre was ecstatic about Xero's arrival.
Xero looked down at his hands and instead of his shotguns he saw two shimmering diamond blades as clean and clear as water. Xero looked straight ahead and saw nothing but feathers, or at least what seemed to be feathers, the feathers were also diamond but were not as clear as the blades.
This is what we are capable of… the wings unfolded, flexing outward, and every feather began to glow blue, suddenly the blue erupted into hundreds of blue-white burning tendrils that flew outward in every direction. The tendrils would arc up then come straight down through the bodies and heads of the drones surrounding him. The drones turned to dust and sand as soon as the tendrils touched their bodies. The sand would swirl around the blue energy for a moment before dissipating completely.
The wings folded back behind Revolution and charged up again. But this time, the energy exploded outward in the form of plasma thrust, shooting Xero forward, toward three more drones.
The blades came up and crossed outward once, the sand from the drones flew out in every direction and dissipated as Xero came to a stop again.
Xero turned and looked at the battlefield that he had just decimated. He wondered, "Rev, how many battle capable units were there out here at the beginning of this battle?"
"three hundred, two."
"so there were three hundred drones out here."
"And we destroyed them all in seconds. That is the power, the gift, which has been given to you. Use it well."
The voice faded from Xero's head and into memory.
"Xero!" Tyre boosted over to Xero, his AC had numerous holes in it accompanied with smoke and sparks coming out of every joint, but that AC kept moving, Tyre wouldn't let it fall.
"I wonder why they didn't choose him?" Xero said to himself, "look at how strong he is." Xero put that thought into the back of his mind as Tyre stopped in front of him.
"Xero, that was amazing! Holy crap, I thought I was screwed, but when you appeared out of that sphere with those wings and those swords… damn…" He started laughing as he turned away. "Let's get back home and get some sleep." He laughed again as he hit his overboost.
"Sleep… yeah right." Xero looked at the swords and the wings before boosting off as well.