Eternity

Part 7

By Mieren

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Rowen flopped against a tree in defeat. Two weeks had passed since he had last seen Cye, since he had abandoned his weak, and possibly dying, grandson. He sighed dejectedly, wondering why it was so hard to admit the relationship now when he had believed himself to have grown accustomed to the strange fact. Perhaps it was simply because his grandson was now several centuries older than himself. Perhaps it was because he didn't want to believe that he had allowed another family member to die.

A soft rustling caught his attention and he glanced up in time to see a leather-clad figure with flawless obsidian skin hurdle past him. White wisps of escaped hair whipped behind the slender figure as he ran, further catching Rowen's attention. With his speed, it took almost no effort to pass the sprinting figure and draw him up short in his urgent quest.

"So where are you off to, Siellon?" he asked softly. The dark elf skidded to a halt before him, jaw working silently for a moment as he struggled to gather his wits.

"Where's Neris?" he snapped in Japanese, pleasantries forgotten in his haste. Rowen's eyebrows raised slightly. He obviously hadn't expected the elf to remember the language after so many years.

"I haven't seen him," he answered honestly. Siellon tensed.

"Where are the others? He was looking for them."

"Haven't seen them either," Rowen admitted. "What was it that was so urgent to have him running off alone?"

Siellon hesitated. His eyes spoke of something he didn't want to say, something that needed to be said. Rowen noted the slightly desperate look in his eyes and waited patiently for the dark elf to continue. Siellon sighed noisily and proceeded bluntly.

"He has your friends' armor orbs," he sighed. "He took them and left, telling me he wasn't coming back just before knocking me out cold."

Rowen was silent for a moment as he considered several possibilities. Several tense seconds passed before he spoke.

"How did he get them?"

Siellon shook his head. "I don't know," he admitted softly. "But they were covered in blood." Rowen stared at him blankly for a moment, eyes pained.

"When?" he asked in a strangled voice.

"Neris said he's had them since he was a child."

Rowen exhaled weakly and lowered his gaze. Cye's hand at time traveling was painfully obvious. The attempt to protect their friends had been a valiant one, but something had gone awry. He had to fight with himself to keep from opening a portal on the spot and searching for the time Cye had left them in. A time before they had been attacked. Only his firm conviction that a paradox would cause horrific problems prevented him from leaving.

He didn't realize he was moving until Siellon caught his arm, pulling him to a sudden halt. Worried ruby eyes met amused sapphire. The dark elf drew away, momentarily confused and all but sure that his friend had lost his mind. He tried desperately to think of something to say, cutting short when Rowen's lips twitched upwards into a knowing smile. A smile that made the blood in Siellon's veins run cold.

"How old is Neris?" he asked smoothly. Siellon blinked in shock, answering reflexively before he had time to consider the implications.

"A little over three hundred," he stammered. Understanding crashed into him almost before the words were out of his mouth and he grabbed for Rowen's arm again as the blue-haired man turned to leave. Rowen waved him away casually.

"Don't worry," he said simply. "For once, I know what I'm doing."

With that, a shimmering portal of sapphire flames sprang into existence, unraveling skillfully into nothingness once Rowen had stepped through. Siellon watched him go with unadulterated trepidation. Twice now he had been abandoned by friends leaving on futile missions that would undoubtedly lead to their deaths.

Muttering darkly in futile resignation, he returned to his journey. Dark comments were uttered about the various degrees of brain poisoning developing from the pigments that gave rise to blue hair. There was just no other explanation.

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Dais raised her hands meaningfully, the sheer power building at her fingertips nothing to be scoffed at. The pure essence of illusion flickered around one hand, darkness in the other. Without warning, she snapped the heels of her hands together, delicate strands of illusion mingling with the purest darkness.

For a moment, nothing happened. The tranquility around her was absolute for all of an uneasy heartbeat. Then, the twining powers merged into one. An explosion roared forth, rending the landscape asunder well into the looming mountain range. When the dust finally cleared, she grinned widely at her handiwork, at the crater that had removed more than half of the mountainside. Sehkmet whistled in appreciation.

"Neat trick," he conceded. "How did you figure that one out?"

For an answer, Dais grinned at him roguishly. "I got bored," she answered coyly.

"Bored my ass," Katari snipped, glaring at the two before their conversation turned truly sickening. She grudgingly admitted that it was understandable that her grandmother had begun flirting after so many years alone, but the target of her advances clearly left something to be desired. Her siblings agreed with her fully. Gau merely stalked off when he saw their poorly hidden grins and winks. Ella always scowled and flushed darkly before attempting to physically beat the poor green-haired schmuck into the earth.

Dais glanced at her nineteen-year-old granddaughter, wondering once again how it was possible that the girl looked exactly like her. She had inherited neither Sage's nor Kayura's looks, and as the years passed, the resemblance to herself was becoming uncanny. At the moment, though, the look she was receiving clearly told her that the huffy teen was in no mood to watch her flirt with a man she obviously didn't have much respect for. Not that her flirting ever accomplished anything anyways. Sehkmet wouldn't recognize an advance if it bit him in the ass. Dais grinned suddenly, now there was an idea to store for later.

Katari must have recognized the look on her face, because her expression darkened further in revulsion. Dais raised her hands defensively and returned to her training. No matter how things turned out, she knew that eventually she would end up fighting.

"Is it like this?" Ryoko asked suddenly, appearing at Dais's side. Katari bristled at the unexpected diversion, finally calming when she decided that her best friend would distract her grandmother from what she had been doing. Sehkmet ogling was just gross.

Ryoko's hands were already extended as she had seen Dais do only moments before. Dais scrambled to correct her posture before she hurt herself or someone else. Despite the obvious talents of the eighteen-year-old, she still needed close instruction before properly forming any attack. Dais had long ago summed the girl's clumsy attributes to her father, Kento having forever been a blockhead in most matters. Her only saving grace was that Ritsuko was her mother.

Powers of venom swirled around the cinnamon brown orb still in the back of Ryoko's arm, building with unfathomable speed as she called upon the armor for energy. For a moment she seemed hesitant, unable to continue. Between the abilities of manipulating life and controlling the darkness, she had never mastered either. Her decision was taken from her as Dais carefully pushed her other hand into the shadows, wanting to make sure she could easily control one of the energies if something went horribly wrong. Katari and Sehkmet scrambled for cover as she placed her palms together.

Instantly, the powers intertwined and erupted into an earthshaking explosion. Katari peeked over Sehkmet's shoulder when the shuddering of the planet had subsided, grinning to herself when she saw that the remainder of the mountain had been blown away by her friend's attack. She grinned even wider when she thought of how pissed Akira was going to be at having to rebuild the mountain again. This wasn't the first time they had blown it up. Hell, it wasn't the hundredth.

As if summoned by her smirk, Akira wandered into the small area they were gathered in, a disgruntled look coming to his face. A loud sigh escaped his lips as he flopped to the ground and rested his forehead on the stump of his left arm, raising his right hand towards the demolished landscape in the distance. Almost immediately, the earth heaved slightly, a new mountain range forming in the distance. His halfhearted glare dissipated when he saw his younger sister grinning bashfully at him from beside Dais. He couldn't easily stay angry with her when she looked at him like that.

"Now look, Ryoko," he started, giving in completely when Dais winked at him.

"She did it right, you know," she said, throwing girl a wide smile. Ryoko beamed at the praise. It wasn't often she managed an elemental attack without nearly blowing up everyone else in the process. Akira's eyebrow rose slightly.

"Did she?"

"Indeed," Dais answered, a trace of laughter entering her voice. "Why, at this rate, she may even be able to pull off my newest trick some day."

"Newest trick?" Katari asked. Having finally come out of hiding, she was seriously considering returning to a defensive crouch behind something to ensure her continuing health. The last time Dais learned a new trick, everyone within a fifty-yard radius had been sporting purple hair for two weeks.

"Wanna see?" she asked innocently.

Akira and Katari stepped back.

Sehkmet looked worried.

Ryoko grinned and nodded, earning several groans and worried looks.

"Alright," Dais purred. Without warning, she shifted forms, inadvertently tearing her shirt when four extraneous arms appeared.

"Ah, shit," Katari breathed. "You gotta be kidding me." Akira looked at her curiously, not quite understanding her trepidation.

"What?" Akira asked, not really wanting an answer.

"You'll see," Katari muttered. She raised her arms, pulling a protective barrier into existence and locking her mind to hold it in place. "Hey, Ryoko. Come over here, would ya?" Ryoko blinked at her, completely unaware of the danger she was in.

"Oh ye of little faith," Dais snorted. In one hand, powers of darkness gathered. Illusion began to build in another. Wisps of fire and air built in two others.

"Ah, shit," Akira said numbly, echoing Katari's sentiments exactly, his brain too nuked to create an original expletive. Sehkmet started to before Akira automatically slammed a rock into the back of green-haired man's head. "Ryoko, come over here with Katari and me. You too, Sehkmet." Twined gazes of slowly dawning comprehension appeared on Ryoko's and Sehkmet's faces followed by horror. They virtually sprinted to hide behind the barrier Katari had raised, adding their own powers while trying to hide behind a miffed Akira.

"And for the finishing touches," Dais started again, her voice beginning to sound strained. "We have poison." A burst of power erupted around a fifth hand. "And spirit." Her final hand ignited into violet flames. She arranged her hands into a rough circle and snapped her six palms together.

"Hit the dirt," Akira advised weakly, vocal cords refusing to work. Though he and the others immediately dropped to the earth and tried to cover their ears, they were too slow to avoid the initial shock wave emanating from Dais.

For an instant, it appeared as though the world had disappeared in a blast of brilliant purple light. The blast had appeared, demolished everything in its path and dissipated so quickly that for a moment, Katari believed that the explosion had been silent. Her suspicion was quickly disproved in the deafening thunder that followed, uprooting trees and creating great fissures in the earth. By the time the roar had ceased and the dust had settled, Dais was already running forward, curses ringing in the air behind her as she picked her way across the melted earth.

"What is she doing?" Sehkmet asked stupidly.

"How should I know?" Akira groused. He glared unhappily at the devastation. The earth had simply vanished in the path of the explosion, creating a canyon to the horizon and beyond that he was going to have to close. Again.

"I'll find out," Katari sighed. She rose smoothly into the air and sped after the sprinting figure ahead of her, easily catching up to her grandmother in the span of a few seconds. "What's up?"

"I hit someone," Dais gasped, still pushing for speed. "I didn't see him in time to stop. There was someone there!"

"Not anymore," Katari muttered. At the foul look she received, she raised her hands defensively and pushed ahead. She circled the massive area of devastation several times. She was almost ready to give up and fly back to Dais when something moved in her peripheral vision. A charred figure pushed itself off of the ground and swore luridly.

"Dais!" he snapped. "If you were still pretending to be a man, I'd kick you in the nuts, you insane bastard! What in the hell do you think you're doing?"

"Uh," Dais slurred, unable to think of anything more intelligent to say. The blackened figure stormed over to her and scowled darkly. He looked as though he wanted nothing more than to throttle the platinum blond in front of him.

"Hold it," Akira snapped, moving between Dais and the charbroiled figure. "Just what were you doing out there anyways?" Dark blue eyes narrowed angrily and Akira almost stepped back before steeling his nerves. Anything that could survive a blast like that wasn't something he really wanted to mess with.

"I can't believe that you of all people would take the transvestite's side!"

Katari finally dropped out of the air and adopted a defensive posture in front of her grandmother beside Akira. Despite being perpetually displeased with the cross-dresser, she couldn't let some stranger rip her apart. Ryoko and Sehkmet joined her immediately.

"Who are you?" Ryoko spat.

The charred figure blinked, attention finally diverted from ripping Dais's throat out with his fingernails. He stared at Ryoko for several moments in silence.

"Ryoko?" he asked incredulously. "Is that you?" He produced a lopsided grin and a soft chuckle. "The last time I saw you, you were only twelve! You're dad's gonna freak when he sees you." With that, he dissolved into broken wheezing, fighting to draw breath in his spastic laughter. Sehkmet and Dais froze. Akira turned numbly to face his little sister.

"Ryoko," he said stiffly. "Go get Ella and Gau."

"But," she began.

"Now," he interrupted.

"Okay," she said uncertainly, circling back towards the house.

"And tell them to hurry," he called after her, his eyes never leaving the scorched figure in front of him. "What's going on? Why are you back and what the hell took you so long?"

"In that order," a wry voice answered. "We're getting our asses kicked, I need something and I miscalculated when I jumped. Does that cover it?"

"No," Akira snapped.

His next question was interrupted by a crack of thunder, lightening striking the ground a few feet from him. From the smoking ground, a heavily muscled blond scrambled to his feet, eyes locking onto the blackened form standing calmly beside Akira. Reorienting himself quickly, Gau rushed over to him, his hands already ablaze in peridot fires.

"Are you crazy?" Gau snapped over his shoulder at Dais. "You could have killed someone with what you were doing!"

The charred mess began laughing harder. The only thing that kept him from the ground was Gau's strong grip on his arms. He managed to choke out an explanation to the curious azure gaze between bouts of laughter.

"It's bad enough you look like your father," he gasped. "But for you to sound just like him too…"

He broke down into uncontrollable giggling, unable to finish his thought. Thick blue hair began to reform through the charring, already reaching his shoulder blades before Gau could stop that part of the regeneration. Streaks of black and white faded into existence almost immediately.

"Rowen," Gau breathed, faltering for a moment in his healing. He quickly resumed work. "What's going on? Is it over?"

Katari froze, her shocked gaze shifting to the blue locks of hair. The familiar voice finally registered in her mind. "My God," she breathed.

Rowen's amusement ebbed quickly and he craned his head back to stare at the heavens. The strained laughter faded into heavy breathing that no one could credit to the injuries fast fading along his gaunt form. He didn't lower his gaze from the sky even when a loud rustling in the grasses and shrubs in the area announced the arrival of many more people.

"Rowen?" Ryo called out softly. "Are you okay? What happened?"

He received no answer, the lifeless indigo eyes still locked onto the heavens above. It was as though Rowen hadn't heard him. Ritsuko and Kayura asked him the same thing with no better luck. Rowen seemed intent on staring at the sky and ignoring them utterly. When he finally spoke, it was to a silent audience.

"We're losing," he stated simply, not looking down at them. "We've lost the support of the youko. Their ranks have broken. Mouri's already been killed and brought back to life. Cye is slowly dying and there's nothing we can do about it." He finally dropped his gaze, laughing softly, slightly hysterically. "When he dies, all bets are off. They're going to take him when he's reborn and we won't be able to stop them."

"Why did you come back here to tell us this?" Mana snapped, her voice unnaturally loud in the horrified silence. Rowen looked at her bleakly.

"As I already told Akira, I need something."

"What?" Akira asked.

Rowen remained silent, pulling a small leather pouch out of his pocket and loosening the drawstrings at the top. For his answer, he reached out and grabbed Akira's arm, eyes locked onto the golden orb set just behind his wrist. Akira only had time to open his mouth to protest when Rowen summoned a fiery blue dagger from thin air and slashed the armor orb free from his arm with a simple thought. Rowen stared at the bloody crystal for a moment before dropping it into the leather pouch hanging from his fingers.

"Damn it, Rowen!" Akira snapped, pulling back his arm angrily. "You could have at least warned me! That's the only arm I have left, you prick!"

Rowen ignored him, reaching out for Gau's wrist. The blond stared at him heatedly but didn't protest or flinch when the orb was removed just as roughly from his arm. Ella and Nasuti held out their hands without being asked. Ritsuko and Katari leveled identical glares at him before complying. Ryoko made a face and wrenched the sphere out of her arm before Rowen managed to get anywhere near her with the blade of air. Rowen simply took the orb from her and dropped it into the pouch with the others.

"That's seven," he muttered to himself. He shook his head slowly and began to walk away from a very confused group. "Just missing water. Kenji is going to be pissed."

"Rowen," Mia asked carefully. "What exactly are you planning?"

"To have a little fun with the newly formed outlanders," he called back carelessly. "I don't care how strong they are. If you intertwine different powers sufficiently, you can do some serious damage. Dais just demonstrated that," he said, waving vaguely to the area behind him. Several glances flicked towards the devastation behind them. Rowen paused at a largish tree and stepped into the shadow it was throwing across the ground.

"Rowen, wait," Dais called. Dull blue eyes turned back to look at her. "You're time traveling. That means you can pause for a moment and talk to us."

"You can rest for a little while," Ryo added, catching on. "Logically, it can't hurt anything, right?"

"I can't stay here any longer," Rowen answered firmly. "I'm on borrowed time. I'm not supposed to be here. It's against the rules. Ritsuko shouldn't be here either. Neither should Ryoko." He sank up to his waist before pausing and craning his head to look back at the cluster of people staring at him in shock.

"Rules?" Kayura asked in confusion. "What rules?" Rowen didn't hear her.

"Oh, and Akira," he called. "If you're so worried about your arm, have Gau do something about it. He's more than strong enough."

Before anyone could respond to his last comment, he disappeared into the shadows. Akira turned to Ritsuko in shock.

"He's not that strong, is he?" he asked slowly.

"He's not," she answered stiffly. "And if Rowen seriously thinks otherwise…"

"Then he's lost his mind," Kayura finished for her. "And if both Cye and Rowen are out of the battle…"

"Then we've really lost," Ryo concluded grimly.

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TBC…

It's getting worse isn't it? You have no idea how bad it gets in my mind. It's like a slap to the face. Literally. Please R&R!