SPECIAL TEASER CHAPTER: The Beginning of the End

Caleb watched closely as Kari moved around the room. His eyes were rapidly changing colors as the lenses embedded in them flipped on and off. His eyes were naturally blue, but Slim had changed that severely. Now each time his eyes changed color, he saw the world slightly differently. Each color was a different vision setting, and as he scanned the room, his different visions told him that his opportunity had arrived. He had been debating for ages what the best course of action would be, and he had finally decided on one. The only problem was that now he couldn't seem to go through with it. He blamed it primarily on his family, and particularly on Shadowfox. The time he had spent with them had numbed his natural killer instinct, and now he felt pity for the poor girl, and that kept him from drawing his sword. In his mind, he prayed that Mew would show up to stop him, so that he'd have an excuse for not going through with it. He could then say that Mew had talked him out of it, and nobody would be able to say he just didn't have the cold, unfeeling heart that he always claimed to have.

Sure enough, his wish was granted. The little pink creature floated down from a nearby rooftop and hovered behind him, letting her presence be enough to pull Caleb away from the back window of the apartment.

"Why did you even bother coming?" he questioned.

"I don't really think that needs discussing," Mew replied in her soft, singsong voice. Of course, the voice would sound like nothing more than a soft purr to anyone who did not have Caleb's mind, his command over languages, and his ability to understand other's emotions through the tiny movements in their body.

"I told you, there is no other way. We both know what will happen if I don't," Caleb retorted.

"Let's go up to a rooftop to discuss this," Mew said as she floated up into the air. "Coming?"

Caleb watched her go, and debated staying and making her come back, just to prove a point. In the end, however, he decided that if he stayed, he risked having her not come back, and thus losing his excuse for chickening out. He crouched down on his powerful legs, and then exploded upward with incredible power. He leapt from the fifth-floor rear balcony of the building all the way to the roof of the twelve-story apartment complex behind it, alighting softly upon the graveled roof.

Caleb was technically a zafara, although in many ways he was no longer a member of the species. He had a rabbit-like body, somewhat anthromorphic, but not extremely so. He was just under four feet tall, and stood straight up on his hind legs. He had very dark yellow fur covering his entire body, except for the short white fur around his muzzle and the similar white fur which ran down from under his chin, across his chest and stomach down between his legs and ran along the bottom of his tail all the way to the end, at which an exceptionally large tuft of fur made a flat spade-shape right on the tip. His feet were almost identical to a rabbit's but his powerful legs ran mostly straight up into his body, which was a slight abnormality for his species, which usually kept its knees bent and crouched forward even when standing up. His arms were not very rabbit-like either, being long and skinny, almost lanky if it was not for the muscle that was tightly packed onto them. Physically, Caleb did not appear that strong. The fur helped to cover up a body which was very well-built and covered with lean muscle, which almost made Caleb look skinny. The biggest separation from a rabbit, however, was his ears. They were much closer to dog ears, long and floppy, hanging down over the side of his head. Zafaras normally have exceptional hearing, but Caleb's hearing abilities had been dramatically enhanced by a very old friend of his who had passed on many years ago. The last highly distinguishable feature of his species was a line of dorsal fins, the largest about four inches high and steadily decreasing in size as the progressed down his back, spaced roughly an inch apart running all along his spine down to the last six inches of his tail. They were an archaic leftover of evolution, from a million or so years ago when zafaras had been aquatic mammals. Since moving to land, the zafaras had evolved many of their appendages for survival, but for some reason the fins remained.

Caleb wore blue jeans, no shirt, and no shoes. He had two leather straps across his chest which held the sheaths for three swords on his back. The swords formed an X on his back, with the largest by itself and the other two running mostly perpendicular to it. He also had a sheathed sword strapped at each hip, and at his left hip was arguably his most valuable blade. The sheath was solid gold, and was ornately carved with tiny pictures of dragons and human warriors doing battle. The hilt of the sword was coated in golden dragon scales, and decorated with various jewels and dragon's teeth. It was molded so that the sword appeared to come from the mouth of a dragon's head, which was shaped centuries ago by the sword's creators. The sword held a great deal of power, and Caleb knew every way possible to manipulate its magic for deadly purposes.

Mew was almost nothing like Caleb. She was completely covered in very short fur of such a bright pink that it sometimes seemed to be nothing more than off-white. She appeared to be something of a short-limbed cat with bright pink fur and very large rabbit feet. She had a very long thin tail which, at the very end, grew thick for about a foot before ending. Her head appeared cat-like, but was always held very low, hiding her mouth close to her neck. Her big blue eyes seemed to penetrate everything she saw, which was not as much of an illusion as it initially seemed. Mew had the most powerful psychic mind that Caleb knew of, and Caleb knew about almost every powerful psychic in existence. Mew did not appear to be very strong, but those who knew about her knew that her docile nature masked the amazing power that she commanded.

"Let's hear it. Why are you stopping me?' Caleb demanded.

"Because you're not even giving her a chance. You have no faith in anybody but yourself, and that's your biggest problem," Mew told him.

"I have plenty of faith in people. I just don't have faith in their free will, so I'm going to take the tiny shred of free will that was given to me and use it to prevent you and Gaustal and all those other faggots from condemning her," Caleb said coldly.

"Once again, what makes you think she will fail? Even though you like to think so, you can't see the future any better than I can, and even if you could, it's not definite. Even Apocalypsering, who can look into the future, knows that what he sees can be changed by what people choose to do," Mew replied.

"You're right, Mew. I don't know what's going to happen. But spending a year on that ship, flying all over the place with all of Gaustal's little cronies will take its toll. If she dies now at least she'll have a fighting chance," Caleb said.

"Do you even understand how significant this event is, Caleb? This is the first time that all three of us have survived. This could be the last time that ever happens, and we have to give it a shot," Mew said.

"So you and Gaustal are willing to condemn her?" Caleb asked sarcastically.

"Caleb, you don't know that . . ."

"Shove it!" Caleb screamed. "I'm tired of hearing that. You know just as well as I do that there's no way she'll make it. Free choice isn't the reason to give it a shot; it's the reason not to! You know that she won't make it!"

"I won't let you kill her. You can do whatever you want to stop it from happening, but in the end the choices will be left up to her. If you try to lay a finger on her, I will stop you," Mew said slowly, staring coldly into Caleb's eyes.

Caleb pulled the sword from the golden sheath. The rubies that were the eyes of the dragon's head lit up brightly, and the blade sparkled and glowed with a mysterious golden light. "You're saying you'd fight me?" Caleb demanded. "Do you think you can win?"

"You're terribly confident for someone with your power. It's not an admirable quality," Mew said simply. She knew he understood, and she knew that those words would eat at him. He was very prideful that he didn't abuse the amazing power he had, just like she was.

Caleb sheathed his sword. He looked down at the roof, trying to think. He still knew that he wanted to stop everything from happening, but for some reason he was now unable to. He figured he could defeat Mew, though certainly not easily, but that was a fight he really wanted to avoid.

"What do I do, then? I want to stop this from happening. Give me an option," Caleb said.

"I don't see why you're so opposed to this. I think the fate of one is less important than the fate of the universe," Mew said.

"What if I don't really see it that way? I don't make very many choices, but this is one that I am making, that I don't want to have a hand in what Gaustal is going to do," Caleb said.

"Gaustal doesn't even know what you say he's going to do. Perhaps if you'd try to explain it to him, he would see things your way, but if you don't do that, then I'm afraid not even you can stop him from trying," Mew told him.

"I can't tell him. The last line of defense for me is the hope that he can't steel himself to it when he finds out at the last minute," Caleb explained.

"Then ignore it. Ignore everything we're doing. Go back home and sit and wait for it to be done," Mew told him.

"You know very well that I can't do that," Caleb said.

"Then I'm afraid I can't help you with this. I can only prevent you from making a big mistake," Mew said.

Caleb was silent. He had to think of some way to stop the events that had been set in motion, but he couldn't think of anything. For the first time in his life, he couldn't clearly see the way out of the mess that he was now in. The sensation of being totally at a loss for what to do was very new to him, and he didn't like it at all.

"Perhaps you should try to persuade Gaustal not to take them," Mew suggested, breaking Caleb's train of thought. "Despite what you may think, he has a great deal of respect for you. Even if he doesn't listen to you, you'll at least be a voice in his ear. In the end, that may very well help you, if, when he realizes the truth, he realizes all that you've done to prevent it from happening."

"He won't listen. When he gets his mind set on something, he doesn't stop until he gets what he's after. That's why he was insane enough to chase his little dream in the first place," Caleb said.

"And you don't think that dream is worth chasing?" Mew asked.

Caleb looked up again, staring squarely into Mew's eyes. "At the cost of a person's soul, no dream is worth chasing."

"If I can't convince you otherwise, I suppose we'll have to fight. We knew this was coming sooner or later," Mew said.

"I won't fight you. There's no point in doing that," Caleb said.

"You won't have a choice if you try to harm that girl again," Mew told him. "I will come after you if you do."

"I'm not going to harm her. You've convinced me that it would be rather counter productive," Caleb began.

"I'm glad you have some common sense left in you," Mew told him.

"All the same, I will do everything in my power to prevent Gaustal from completing his little quest. I will take no mercies save death when it comes to this point," Caleb said.

"I will not stand in your way, but know that Gaustal will not hesitate to fight you if he thinks you are standing in his way. As much as you disagree with him, I don't think you could bring yourself to kill him." Mew reminded him.

"I won't be so unsubtle in my approach. However, you must trust me to keep my word about not harming the girl. I'm sure you know of my speed, and so when I attempt to scare them all into not following Gaustal on his crazy mission, you will stand aside and let me do my work. Do I have your word?" Caleb asked.

"As long as I have your word that neither she nor any other among them will be harmed by your little plan," Mew said.

"The children will not be harmed, and their partners will not be killed or severely wounded. I'll give you that much," Caleb offered.

"It's a deal, then. I'll stand aside for your little plot, and I'll not inform Gaustal of what you are doing," Mew promised.

"Very well, we have ourselves a deal," Caleb said.

"At least that's settled. I think I'll lave now. I have no more business with you at the moment," Mew said.

"Well I've got something to ask you, then," Caleb said. "You keep going on and on about how this time is going to be different, just because all three of us survived. I'd like to know why you think that."

"For starters, it's not only that we all survived, but that Kari survived, and we've just finished debating how important she is. Remember, the last time she did, neither you nor I did. Secondly, Gaustal has already made more progress than he has in the past," Mew said.

"Mind clueing me in? I haven't been on that stupid toy ship of his in ages," Caleb said.

"Well, you could say that he's found Almeadon," Mew told him.

"He found it!" Caleb said, astonished. "The ancient map?"

"The very one. Now, he hasn't found it yet, but he has learned of its existence, which is another thing that has never happened before," Mew said.

"Just out of curiosity, how'd you find out about all of the previous cycles? Did you read my mind or steal Slim's files?" Caleb asked.

"Well, you explained it all to Gaustal and Sablin, and they've made it public knowledge around his ship. I had a pretty good idea about it before he told me from reading your mind, though," Mew laughed, putting her small paws up to her mouth and rolling over backwards in mid-air.

"That's why I hate psychics," Caleb muttered to himself.

"I heard that," Mew told him, laughing again in her very high pitched-squeaky purr.

"My next question is how does he plan to find the pieces?" Caleb asked.

"I guess he'll just send out search parties. If you recall, the pieces are not randomly distributed. Each piece can be used as an important map within the world in which they're hidden. There's bound to be some kind of lore about the map pieces in each of the worlds," Mew explained.

"That's pretty typical of him. Assume that this thing will be handed to him on a silver platter," Caleb said sarcastically.

"I'm sure he doesn't take it that lightly. For one thing, he expects Almeadon to be guarded by something greater than just a little monster from that world. Chaos isn't stupid, and Gaustal knows it. That's why he's trying to gather up as much power as he can, he believes that it will be necessary for finding all of Almeadon," mew said.

"So he's going to come here before he even starts to look for it?" Caleb asked.

"Yes. I believe he is picking up supplies right now, and then he will come here. You probably have about a week before he arrives," Mew told him.

"That's plenty of time. I figure to stage my little confrontation with them tomorrow, and then when they see me on the ship, they'll know not to go anywhere near it," Caleb said with an air of simplicity.

"Do you really expect that to work?" Mew asked.

"What do you mean? If I didn't expect it to work, why would I bother?" Caleb retorted, angry that Mew was doubting him again.

"It's not that you'd lose. I know very well that you can beat the living daylights out of all of them at once without taking a single hit. But have you ever considered their position? Or their past reactions to overwhelmingly powerful opponents?" Mew questioned.

"Why does it matter so much?" Caleb asked, now very annoyed.

"I'm surprised you don't see it. You and I both know that you are and always will be much more powerful than they are. They will never be able to beat you no matter how hard they try. However, they don't know that. In the past, they've been beaten down by opponents who seemed invincible at the time, and they've always found a way to win. We both know they'll never win against you, but they don't know that, because they don't understand just how powerful you are. Even if you do beat them badly, there's no reason to expect them to just run away scared. No matter how many times you tell them that you are invincible, they will still believe that there is a way to beat you. When you show up with the ship, they may be surprised, but Gaustal will placate them easily, and play you off as an arrogant wacko who just likes to pick fights. He's a master of twisting people's minds with words. When they hear that, combined with their experience of overcoming seemingly impossible odds, the only thing you have left to hope for is that they simply refuse to join. I'm cannot see the future, but I think that is rather unlikely," Mew finished.

Caleb closed his eyes and sighed. For the second time that night, Mew had gotten the better of him because he had been blinded by his own faulty logic. It was rare for him to make such an error. For him to make two in the same night was clearly a sign that his mind was not in the right place. He was silent for a long time, contemplating the possibility that he shouldn't even try to stop this. Gaustal was far too arrogant; he would never give up once he learned everything that had to be done. Caleb's only chance was to keep it a secret the entire time.

"I'm still going to fight them tomorrow," Caleb said, looking up. "As futile as it may seem, if it has a chance of working, even a small one, I'm going to try it. I don't want to put the weight of the world on this kid's head, but Gaustal will once he discovers what she is. I'm going to prevent that at all costs."

"As I have said, I will reveal nothing to him," Mew said.

There was a long silence between the two. Caleb again closed his eyes and lowered his head, deep in thought. He wondered for a few second if it would be effective at all to explain everything to Kari, the child he was so concerned about. Perhaps if he told her everything that was about to happen, and most specifically what would happen to her, they would at least leave her behind. It would make sense to do so. Then again, eventually her guilt at not fulfilling this imagined duty that the universe had assigned to her might force her to attempt it anyways. It was something that Caleb had considered, but not at length. The idea that Kari might simply accept her fate was always a possibility, and if she did, Caleb figured that it would work in her favor, but he severely doubted it. He knew far too many people who seemed to have hearts of gold but were unable to steel themselves when the moments of greatest peril came, and this child was no different. It is the nature of life to cower in the face of death, even if a person denies that they are afraid and charges headlong into sure annihilation, there is always a shadow of a doubt floating in the back of their minds, telling them to turn and flee. Caleb had felt this fear before, but he also had the supreme confidence in his own ability that made him believe that nothing could kill him, even though he owed his life to another zafara named Shred back on Neopia. She wasn't strong enough to join Gaustal's foolish little dreamboat, but Caleb still kept in touch with her. Now, however, he questioned Kari's ability to face her fate. He sensed that she would falter at the last moment, like in the ancient Biblical story of the woman who looked back at the burning city only to be turned to salt, and ultimately prove Gaustal's mission to be nothing more than a pipe dream which he had roped an entire generation into believing in.

Mew, on the other hand, was more concerned about Caleb. She knew that he understood the prophecies and what Kari could be able to do for the universe, and yet he wanted to stop it. It didn't make a great deal of sense to Mew. Caleb had always been very logical, but his actions now seemed to be anything but. She was wondering if perhaps he wasn't in his right mind. She certainly knew how powerful psychics could be, being one herself, and though she believed that Caleb was too strong to control she had never tested him and thus did not have any real reason to believe that. She wanted badly to probe his mind for answers, but she knew that he could sense that and it would only anger him.

"What's Shadow been up to lately anyways?" Caleb asked suddenly, forgetting temporarily about the problem at hand.

Mew was surprised by the question. "Haven't you visited him lately?" she asked.

"I've been really busy looking through Slim's old records, mostly the chronosphere records. I haven't been near the ship in weeks," Caleb said.

"I guess he's okay, for now anyways. He still writes and sings and stuff. Why don't you go ask him yourself?" Mew questioned.

"I will. I'll be hitching on to the ship after my little escapade here, after all," Caleb reminded her.

Caleb no longer had a biological connection to anything, really. Slim had rewritten Caleb's genetic coding, and now he was a zafara in appearance only. Shadowfox could be considered his father in the fact that Shadow had impregnated Caleb's mother, who then bore the little bundle of fur, but any remaining biological connection had been erased by Slim's tinkering with Caleb's genes.

"I think it's best that I leave now," Mew said. "Should I give any message from you?"

"Yeah, tell Gaustal that he's an ass," Caleb said, laughing for the first time that night. "You can quote me on that."

"I'll be sure to," Mew said. With a quick flash of light she disappeared. Caleb figured she had directly teleported to the ship. Not that it greatly mattered to him that she deliver the message, he told Gaustal his opinion of him on a regular basis. What mattered was that now he had a long wait until the morning, when he hoped to put his plan into action. He thought briefly about sleeping until morning, but he wasn't the least bit tired. He had just slept two nights ago, and wouldn't need to again for at least another two. So now he had to pass the long hours until it would be morning by himself.

He jumped from his current rooftop to the roof of a nearby building. He ran silently across it to the other side and proceeded to jump effortlessly up to s slightly higher roof. He continued along this roof and then hopped down to the next roof. He proceeded in this manner through the city until he reached a wide open park. He hopped down form the roof and landed softly on the grass, using one hand to steady himself. His eyes again began to flash in many different colors as he scanned the park, making sure that nobody was there to see him. A few nocturnal animals showed up in his infrared and night vision, and one or two wires and lampposts on his electrical vision, but nothing notable. His metal analysis vision, however, revealed a strange capsule buried about ten feet underground in the middle of the park. He figured it was supposed to be a time capsule, some kind of experiment being done by a school class in the city in order to learn about how time changes things. Of course, he had access to and had used the Chronosphere, which was far more complex than a simple capsule, but the thing still intrigued him.

He walked to the center of the park and looked down at the ground. Digging with his paws wasn't beneath him, but he wanted to think of an easier and less noticeable way to get to the capsule. He decided that magnetism was his best bet. He pulled out the sword that was bound at his right hip, a very long curved one-sided saber with the sharp edge forged of diamond. The rest of the sword was solid, high quality steel. He had used this trick several times, but never to pull something out of the ground. He held the hilt of the sword up to his mouth, pointing the blade away from himself, and then began to blow along the length of it. His breath quickened, and then he began to summon an amazing power that he had been given along with the golden blade which remained in its sheath. He charged his breath with electricity, sending shockwaves along the blade faster and faster, slowly beginning to magnetize it. He heard a bench about fifty feet away begin to squeak, and he paid close attention to it, just in case the magnet became strong enough to drag it over to him. Luckily, however, the ground below him split open as the capsule was dragged out of it.

It stuck to the sword until Caleb pried it off by shear strength and held it away, swinging the blade rapidly through the air to demagnetize it. He sheathed the sword and turned his attention to the capsule. He was stunned to find that it had no lid, nor any means of opening it. He began to examine it with his eyes again, checking for any kind of way that it could be opened. Finding none, he sat down in the grass, staring at the curious capsule. He couldn't fathom why any human on the planet would make a time capsule that couldn't be opened. At last his curiosity got the better of him, and he pulled out the diamond-edged saber once again. Holding the capsule out in front of him with one hand, he sliced cleanly through it with his sword. The end fell into the dirt, revealing a hollow center chamber.

Caleb once again sheathed his sword and looked inside. At first it appeared empty, but as he scanned it with his various vision settings again, he saw a rolled up piece of paper inside of it.

"Thank God I didn't accidentally slice this," Caleb said as he pulled the paper out. He unrolled it carefully. His eyes suddenly grew wide, and he stared at the paper in amazement. It was a square, about six inches by six inches, ripped on two sides, and obviously the corner piece of a map. The paper seemed very old, and yet not frail at all. The language of the few letters on it, however, gave away what it was. The language was that of Chaos, which he had only seen used a few times by Slim. This was a corner piece of Almeadon.

Caleb continued to stare at the map piece. According to Slim's records, no pieces of Almeadon had ever been found in past cycles. It slowly began to dawn on Caleb just how significant this cycle might be.

He shook his head quickly, shaking off the strange feeling that had overcome him. This was not the time or the place to reconsider his position. He picked up the capsule and tossed it in a nearby trash can, folded the map piece, shoved the slip of paper into his pocket, and walked quickly out of the park.