Author's Note: I just want to inform everyone that's reading this story that I'm going out of town on Monday (December 29th, 2003) and I won't be back until Sunday (January 4th, 2004). So go ahead review the story but I won't be able to e-mail anyone about questions they need answering to, or questions I have, or just to talk. I love all of you and enjoy Chapter 2…
A New Age. A New Team
Chapter 2: Destruction is the Friend of Death
A mysterious figure was wearing a long black robe with a large hood that covered the person's face. The person solemnly walked while holding a tall staff in thief right hand. As the person walked along, touching their staff to the ground with every step, there was no sound. Not even the sound of the staff could be heard as it touched the ground. The only sound around the mysterious figure, which could be heard, were heart-wrenching screams of horror.
The world around the figure was black and every shade of grey. The sky blazed a crimson red, like blood, with black clouds that seemed to fill the sky. The ground was a deep clack that looked like ash. There were trees in random places and they looked as though they were burnt but had managed to survive. The trees had no leaves and the branches stuck out in all directions. The land looked worse then The Hell Era. It was as if the figure was in another dimension or another realm.
There were people walking around as if they were zombies. They shuffled their feet as they walked and held their heads down. Occasionally, one of the people, which were walking around, would lift their head to let out a cream that told a story of the dead and of death. The people's faces were sad and terrified. Their eyes were bloodshot and their bodies were shades of grey and black, as if they had no souls to grant them color.
The mysterious person stopped. A little girl dressed in a small black dress with a white apron over the dress, stood before the person. The little girl's apron was the only color in this realm of death to be seen. Something about this little girl made her different from everyone else in this hellish place. Her head was held high and her left eye was a dark hazel while her right eye was a real light hazel, instead of being bloodshot like everyone else's. She had medium length black hair, which was held out of her eyes by a thick white headband, and three birthmarks in the shape of a triangle about an inch underneath her right eye.
"Linx, you came back." The little girl said with happiness in her voice.
The mysterious figure brought its hands to the brim of their hooded robe and pushed back their hood to reveal a girl. The girl, presumably Linx, had short flipped out hair that was completely black on the top and underneath it was mostly black with some tiny bright red highlights. Her eyes were just like the little girl's and she had the same three birthmarks underneath the same eye. Both of her ears were double pierced and her right cartilage had a small ear cuff in it.
"Of course I did Grim." Linx held out her right hand, which had a skull thumb ring on her thumb, to the little girl, whom was presumably Grim.
Grim gladly took her hand and the two began to walk around the strange dreadful world that crawled with the feel and smell of death. Among the screams of the zombie like people, there were whispers of the name "Scythe".
"Has the Dead Realm treated you well Grim?" Linx asked as she slightly swung her and Grim's hands along as they both walked side-by-side.
"Very well Linx." Grim looked up at Linx and smiled. "How's Hecate?"
"As well as she normally is. She's pretty much the same." She shrugged. "She still lives life as if it's a chore instead of a blessing."
Grim giggled, "Well that's Hecate for you. Tell her I say hi, alright?"
Linx nodded with a small, "Of course I will." Linx smiled and then her ears caught the name "Scythe" again. "What's with this talk of this "Scythe" character?"
Grim let out a small giggle. "That's you silly."
Linx stopped walking and looked down at Grim, "Me?"
"Yes. You." Grim pulled Linx along so that she began to walk again, "They nicknamed you that."
"But why?"
"Because they feel they have the right to call you Linx, like I do, just like in Limbo how they call you Mistress… So they nicknamed you Scythe." Grim said gingerly.
Linx nodded her head as she continued to walk along side of Grim for a few moments and then and looked down at Grim. "But why the name Scythe?"
Grim opened her mouth to answer Linx but a person from the Dead Realm grabbed onto Linx's free hand and dropped to their knees. "Please Scythe. Take me to Limbo. Please. I'm begging you… Oh please…" The grey and bloodshot man pleaded as he held onto Linx's hand.
Linx and Grim stopped walking and both stared at the man. Grim leaned forwards to get a better look at the man while Linx just stared down at him. "You cannot beg for your life back after it has been taken." Linx said bluntly before pulling her hand away from him.
Tears began to roll down the man's cheeks as he spoke to Linx, "But only you can bring the dead closer to life…"
"And only I get to choose when they get closer." Linx pulled Grim along.
As Linx and Grim walked along the man stayed behind and wept on the ground. "That's why they call you Scythe here. Because the Grim Reaper's Scythe can choose life and death for someone… Just like your powers let you do with letting you choose if the dead stay in the Dead Realm or if they get to move to Limbo."
Linx continued to walk with Grim as she glanced around at all the people who were walking around with their heads down, while they looked so grieve-stricken. Grim looked over her shoulder as she stared at the man and then looked up at Linx. "Linx?" She said softly as she stared at the crying man.
"Yes Grim?"
"Why couldn't you send him to Limbo?" Grim looked up at Linx, "I mean. Look at him…"
Linx stopped and turned around. She stared at the man who was still crying on the ashy ground. She bent down so she was crouching next to Grim and put her arm around Linx. "You see Grim… I can't send everyone to Limbo." She said softly. "People can't just beg for their lives back and expect them to be handed back to them. That's too easy. These people need to prove that they deserve their lives back, because I know most of these people deserve their lives back, but I need them to prove it to me."
Grim looked at the man and watched him wipe his bloodshot eyes, stand up, and began to walk around just like everyone else. "But one man can't change that much…"
Linx looked over at Grim, "One man can change everything." She whispered as she stood up and began to walk away again.
Grim walked along with Linx until they both came to a stop. "Linx?"
Linx stared out at a small area that had some people walking around. "Wait here…" Linx said absent-mindedly.
Linx untangled her fingers with Grim's and started to walk towards one of the people who were walking around. It was a little boy. She walked in front of him and crouched down.
"You're Scythe, aren't ya?" The little boy asked with fear in his voice.
"Yes." Linx nodded once, slowly. "What's your name?"
"Alex Williams."
"How did you die Alex?" Linx asked calmly.
"I-I don't 'member." Alex said in disappointment in himself for not remembering how he died.
"Try to remember."
Alex closed his eyes, and Linx could tell that his eyes were moving though his eyes were closed. He opened his eyes a few moments later and looked at Linx. "A mutant… He murdered me."
Linx looked down at the ash ground and then back up at Alex, "Do you know why this mutant murdered you?"
"To get to my sister." Alex's eyes filled with tears, but it didn't seem to effect Linx.
Linx placed her finger underneath Alex's chin and lifted his head up to face her. "Remember that not all mutants are bad."
Alex slowly nodded his head as he tried not to cry. "I know."
Linx leaned closer to Alex and her lips came close to the little boy's ear. "Don't let your heart be consumed by revenge and anger; otherwise your soul will be consumed by fear." She turned her head to the side and softly kissed Alex's cheek and then Linx stood up.
She stared down at Alex and watched as slowly Alex turned into what looked like dust. There was no wind in the Dead Realm but a mysterious gust of wind blew threw and picked up the dust of Alex. The wind carried Alex up into the sky where he disappeared.
Linx watched as Alex turned to dust and was carried away before she turned and walked back over to Grim. "Alright." She said calmly.
"Why him and not the man?"
"Because he had shown you that he deserved life, and since you are me, he also showed me that he deserved life." Linx glanced up at the sky.
"Oh…" Grim looked up at the sky also.
Linx looked down at Grim and then crouched down in front of her. "Alright Grim."
Grim looked at Linx and frowned. "Already?"
Linx let out a small laugh. "I have to go back."
"Will you be back?"
"You know I always will be."
Grim wrapped her small arms around Linx's neck, "Alright."
Linx smiled and returned the hug to Grim, "I'll see you soon Grim."
Grim let go out Linx and stepped back from her. She watched as Linx looked up into the sky and began to glow a bright red. Soon Linx transformed into a glowing red ball and then shot off into the Dead Realm's sky…
Linx's dark hazel and hazel eyes slowly fluttered open to a bright white light.
"Grim call?" A calm voice asked.
Linx slowly sat up and her dark hazel and hazel eyes came into focus. It was nighttime outside and the room she was in was dark except for one bright lamp that was on by a large plush red chair. In the chair sat a girl with platinum blonde hair that was held out of her face by a blood red clip. The girl in the chair was the only person in the whole room, so Linx knew she had asked about Grim, but it was strange because the girl in the chair hadn't looked up at Linx; she just stared at the book in her lap.
"When'd you come in here, Hecate?" Linx smirked as she stretched out her arms above her head.
"I came in about twenty minutes ago but you had already drifted." The girl, named Hecate, in the chair finally looked up at her best friend Linx. Hecate's deep, dark blue eyes looked black in the shadows of her face from the dark room and bright light.
Linx chuckled, "Yeah sorry about that. Grim called."
Hecate closed her book and set it on the small tap next to the chair. "How's Grim?"
Linx put the front parts of her hair behind her ears as she talked, "She's good, and she says hi, by the way."
Hecate smiled, "Well tell her I say hello… Why'd she call this time?" Hecate paused, "Is she alright?" Though the questions was a question of concern, Hecate's voice wasn't cold and emotionless but with the tone of voice she used someone wouldn't think she'd ask a question like that. A question of concern.
Linx laughed, "Because she was afraid I wasn't coming back."
"But you always come back."
"I know. That's what I told her, but she still had doubts." Linx chuckled as she lowered her head and shook it slowly, back and forth.
"She's a silly one." Hecate said with a smile laugh as she picked back up her book and began reading it again.
A few minutes passed, while Hecate read her book, Linx stared out the window into the darkness.
Finally, someone broke the silence.
"Hey Hecate?" Linx whispered as she zoned out on the darkness outside the window across from her.
"Yeah?" She asked, not looking up from her book.
"You ever find it weird that even though our world now is a high-tech war zone the Mansion itself seems to be a world of it's own?" She sighed, "I mean we have a beautiful garden that's untouched by any bombs, a fountain whose water doesn't run red. We're a house full of mutants and yet the Mansion grounds are an untouched utopia."
Hecate stopped reading, but didn't look up. "I find it beyond weird. It's unexplainable, but at the same time it's explained." She sighed and set her book on the table again then looked over at Linx.
"I know that Cerebro makes sure that the Mansion is alright and can't be harmed, but it's strange. The Mansion's like a fantasy world someone goes to in their mind to escape the horrors of the real world." Linx sighed. "I come back from the Dead Realm and I sometimes have to stop and wonder if this is all real."
Hecate stood up and walked over to Linx, offering her a hand to help her to her feet. "With all the mutants out there today with new powers we've never seen before it's hard to tell what's real and what's not." Linx took Hecate's hand and she pulled her to her feet. "Besides with the world today, itself, it's hard to tell what's real because it all seems so unreal."
Linx stood up next to Hecate, "Yeah…"
Hecate started to head out of the Living Room, which both of them were in. "I just wish it was the Renaissance Era again." She whispered as she left.
Linx looked down at the ground and got a flash of all the people dying during the Renaissance Era and the screams of horror. She blinked her eyes and whispered, "We all do." She took a deep breath in and walked out of the Living Room.