There was nothing I could have done to prevent the two Soul Reaver's from clashing. Had I not used my own sword to block the swing, the Reaver my former self wielded would have sliced me down the middle.

As soon as the two blades met, the rippling effect of temporary distortion smashed into the air. That uneasy feeling of imminent change, undeniable and iron clad was so strong it took all my concentration to ignore it.

There were now Two Raziel's and two Kain's here. Amplified by the Reaver the temporary distortion had to have been phenomenal.

"Get back you fool!" I declared, swinging my leg forward in a kick that knocked my younger self away from me. He staggered back a few paces, keeping hold of his Reaver tight. "Have you any idea what you're doing?"

He did not answer. He kept his unblinking gaze fixed sourly on me.

"What in the name of hell are you doing here? You should be fighting the Sarafan with the clans in the north."

Again he did not reply. Instead he lifting his broadsword and held it tight by his chest as if he intended to swing it.

"I don't want to kill you."

At this, his smirked.

"Of course you don't." He stated a little too merrily. "If you kill me, you cease to exist." He started forward, step by small step. "I know who you are."

That was not a hard deduction to be honest. We had the same hair, the same eyes and roughly the same height although I had gained something of a more noble stature during my evolution.

My younger self, at this time, had his white skin beginning to turn pale green and the ridge of horns emerge on his forehead. It was undeniable that we were extremely similar.

"If you know who I am then why are you doing this?" I asked him just before his Reaver swung around. Dodging the swipe by side stepping, I parried away another attempt before leaping back to moderate safety.

"The voices." He declared, stopping for a moment with a sudden panicked look on his face. "Every day and every night, never ceasing not even for a moment; a restless barrage of voices, all screaming at me and I can't make them stop!" There was something in his eyes that gave me the impression of utter terror. "They all declare; you killed me Kain, you killed me."

Suddenly he turned on me again, sudden determination flooding into him.

"I have to bring them appeasement; I have to give them what they want." He pointed the tip of his Reaver towards me. "They want Kain… and that's precisely what they'll get." He clutched the hilt with both hands; tensing himself and sprinting forward. "They get YOU!"

As he charged at me, I could hear the amused cackling of the Elder in the air.

This was a battle that was over before it started. How could I possibly hope to defeat him when if I did, I would be erased from history?

All I could do was parry away his strikes with my own blade.

I did not understand how this could be happening.

This was an event that was not in my memories, new or old, recreated by the rewriting of history. Of these voices he spoke of, I knew nothing. History says I was fighting the clans to forge my empire and according my memories, that was what I should be doing.

This was not the only thing to change however. The third rise of the Sarafan was something I did not remember either, nor the druids or indeed the Serloi Werewolves. It was as if history had been completely altered and I alone had been left oblivious to it.

"If you do this then you damn yourself." I told him but he didn't listen. Swinging his Reaver around in an arch he attempted to clash me across the middle. I blocked it, before parrying forward trying to disarm him.

Each and every time our two blades met I could sense Raziel's own conflict.

It was a conflict both physical and emotional for Raziel not only clashed with another version of himself trapped within the sword but with his future. A ravenous creature, driven insane by century upon century of entrapment; unable to form coherent thought anymore. Unable even to remember its own name, let alone its past all this spirit knew was its ravenous hunger.

This was the future Raziel was still faced with, a possibility of eternal insanity and damnation.

The two Raziel's clashed whenever our sword blades met, striking out at each other each attempting to both attack and defend at the same time; the struggle manifesting as the exchange of energies.

I had the physical advantage. I was stronger, faster and more evolved. Whenever he got too close to striking me, I could fade through his blade in my mist state to avoid it. Also, my Reaver was augmented by the elemental powers it had obtained along its journey and it maintained control over such energy by having a sane captive sprit within.

That advantage however meant nothing in this battle.

"Well Kain, can you grasp the beauty of this?" The Elder God announced with a stark laugh into the recesses of my mind. "While you face your unaccountable past, Raziel faces his undeniable future."

My younger self darted in close, nearly driving the tip of his blade through me. I dodged the attack and swung back out of the way.

I could not afford to let this happen. If either of us died…

Still with the Reaver in my grasp, I clenched a free fist and disappeared into the midst of a translocation spell. My essence moved through space a short distance, transporting itself away from the ancient Norse ruin deep underground and back up to the Hylden settlement above it.

"Running are we, little vampire?" The elder asked, all of his eyes infesting the submerged settlement opening as I manifested. "Abomination and a coward?"

I ignored him. Scooping the bronze canister from my back I kept on running, not wanting to give my younger self a chance to catch up.

I could already here the screeching of the bats that made up his form of flight as they flew up the shaft away from the ancient site of the Orrery. Nothing else mattered here besides the cure.

Once it was released, the Elder Gods contingency plans and the Sarafan Order would crumble around them.

All I had to do now was find the device that opened the canister, the device that Vorador assured me would be here.

"Run, Kain, run." The Elder's voice chuckled in the darkness. "It's quite amusing."

It took quite a bit of self control not to angrily retort but as I hadn't the time nor the means, I decided not to dignify it with a response.

More than once, the Elder tried to impede my progress by dragging massive iron doors across my paths with his tentacles. Each and every time I slashed him back using the Reaver; his demonic green lifeblood made by the souls of those he had consumed spluttered out to stain the floor and scream in pain.

These tricks and traps were never meant to stop me, only to slow me down, to give my younger self enough time to catch up. That was a battle I could not win.

It was by either chance or fate that I ended up where I needed to be. Bursting through a large set of bolted doors I came running out into a large square chamber. The ceiling was a mesh of pipes all interconnected, running alongside one another like a nest of twisted serpents with valves along the walls.

All the pipes led to the back of the room were they culminated at the base of a tremendous machine. Two large, claw like, appendages hung by metallic limbs from gaps in the ceiling. A flat panel stood just before it, presumable as some means of controlling it. What gave the machines purpose away was the pedestal standing just between the two machine arms.

On its top was a flat surface with an engraved slot which happened to be the exact same size and shape as the canister on my back.

Against all odds I had found it, the opening device.

About turning, I seized both sides of the door with telekinesis and pulled them sharply back into position with an echoingly loud thud. It would not stop my pursuer, that I knew all too well but it would slow him down.

I rushed over to the machine and quickly placed the canister in its slot. As I worked trying to figure out the machines controls I tried to run this through in my mind.

I did not understand what could have changed so produce so drastically different a future from the one I knew. The events before this grand endgame started happening did not seem to me like enough to alter events this much.

Suddenly there was a loud clanking sound at the door. My younger self had arrived.

As the tip of his Reaver tired to pry the door open I figured out the complex ancient Hylden controls.

With a soft whir the large mechanical arms came to life, moving step by step down from the positions near the ceiling towards the pedestal. Simultaneously they took hold of both ends of the canister.

My mouth went dry at this point.

If this worked the way if was supposed to then it would be the beginning of something so grand and wonderful it transcended imagination.

The metal claws got to work, twisting this way and that still with each end of the canister is their grasp, as if they were unscrewing it like a cork in the top of a wine bottle.

Before they could finish the door flung open and Kain... that is the younger me… marched in.

"I know you're no idiot." I told him, about facing with my own sword tightly in my grasp. "This is suicide!"

"It is of no use." Raziel told me telepathically. "Both of them, your younger self and my older self have been driven insane."

"But that's impossible." I insisted despite this. "If he were insane, I would be too."

"Is there a crack in your omniscience?" The Elder asked with a humoured tone of voice, mirroring the words I had spoken to Moebius before killing him for the last time.

As if to confirm his madness, the younger vampire charged at me with a battle cry; his Reaver ready for a deadly swing. Instinctively I brought my own sword up for a block.

Before either could meet, the machine behind me gave off a loud hiss and vented a thick cloud of steam.

Both of us stopped in our tracks, turning to the machine which was now hissing steam. With a loud clank, the metal hands folded back taking the skin of the canister away with them.

"This is it!" I began with a sudden trembling feeling coming over me. Time seemed to slow down, every second seeming like an eternity.

And then, just as my hope reached its peek; the outer shell moved away to reveal that inside this canister was another container; a smaller one by undoubtedly made of the same indestructible metal.

The thick sadistic, mocking laugher of the Elder god stung my ears.

With renewed fervour, my young self charged.

I barely even noticed him. All I could hear was that invertebrate's sickening laugh, mocking me and my efforts.

It sent me into a blind rage.

"Kain, NO!" Raziel cried out.

Before I could stop myself, I parried away by younger selfs attack with ease and then I slammed the Reaver forward in such fury that I broke through all his defences and stabbed him through the stomach.

All of the Reaver's energy discharged in one sudden burst, washing over my former self and burning him as if by fire.

Gagging forward, he collapsed onto my sword blood flying from his mouth. He lost the grip of his own sword hilt, the remains of which clattered to the ground.

Realizing what I had done, I sharply drew the sword back out of him. Without its support, he collapsed to his knees, barley able to keep himself up.

History audible groaned, sensing its path had been blocked.

"YES!" The Elder God declared in absolute triumph. "History has once again changed. All that you have ever done or wherever meant to do has been nullified!"

His echoing laugher resonated throughout the empty hallways as I stood over my dying past, cut short by my own hand.