Hay Salamat! I'm finished with this chapter!
*looks at the readers* OH! ^_^' sorry guys, didn't notice you there... ehehehe...
Anyway, the second to the last part of my really long Prologue is finally here! YAY! XDD
Of Good and Of Evil: The Final Stand
Prologue - Part Three
(*A/N: This continues a few hours prior to Soron's death. This is what happened on Pacem in Terra while the Sentinels fought out in space)
As the four streaks of light left the planet, the fourteen of us stared with awe and amazement as the Sentinels made their flight to the battlefield out in space. When everything turned quiet again, we gave each other concerned and serious faces. As if we spoke without the use of words. None of us were telepaths, but words were not needed to understand the gravity of the situation.
Despite out concern for the on-going battle, we really couldn't stand but help but to really fight each other off, we've been conserving our energies for this fight, but we've waited for far too long for another chance like this. Having split up a year before, just after Sally and I mastered our elements, it drove our blood to a high boil as the anticipation for another fight made us become even more powerful. Of course, we would never ignore the fact that there was a war going on, but we just had to do it… we might never have another chance. So, as the old saying goes, "it's now… or never", and we chose now of all times to spar with old friends and rivals. For the sake of our friendships, our potentials, and our love for this place we call home and for each other.
The veteran generals have given us the go signal not too long ago, saying that the enemy's movements were stopped. They scouted ahead and found out that according to their scouts that four bright streaks of light blasted the enemies' camp to rubble, leaving us more territory on the outlying borders of No Man's Land.
That put aside, the fourteen of us began moving to a remote location close to No Man's Land. That way, no one would spy on us or on our whereabouts. The location was an old temple courtyard where the fourteen of us used to spar each other with one-on-one battles. However, the courtyard was big enough for all of us to fight each other. Being a male soldier, the other guys and I had to create saucers to attain flight, while the ladies could simply just "feel" flight, and they'd be on their way. Fortunately for some of us, namely I, Ricardo, DJ and Phelan respectively, had other methods of flight. Having mastered Wind and Fire, I could simply either command the wind to carry me, or have flame shoot out of my feet like a rocket. Since I couldn't decide, I use both elements, granting me the bonus speed in flight. Phelan, on the other hand, has a rather…unique method when it came to flying. He'd gather up a lot of dark energy and store it within himself, and when I it reaches a certain limit, he slowly lets out hell fires from the soles of his feet, powerful enough to grant him flight. Personally, I find him rather amazing, seeing that he could somewhat control fire, despite it still technically being darkness.
When we arrived, Sally let out a large aura ring around the temple. This she learned from the Sentinels whenever they had to camp but remain hidden. This way, any intruder that passes through her aura ring would notify her immediately. We landed with nostalgic smiles on our faces, our minds refilling themselves with memories of our past duels against each other, as the Sentinels and the other guardians would watch them spar on the courtyard. Cheers and applauds could be heard from all around as they fought each other in public. We all used to love the attention, especially when the girls light suits would show-off their angles as their sweaty bodies would shine in the sun. Having those past memories instilled in both our hearts and minds only made us want to fight each other sooner.
"This place brings back so many good times… I really wish we didn't have to go our separate ways here" Angel slightly sobbed with a few tears forming in her eyes.
We all prepared ourselves for our upcoming fight. We each chose a corner where we could begin our spar. The twelve of them choose the left side of the courtyard, leaving Sally and I to slug ourselves to the right side. We all then shared smirks as we refitted ourselves in our armor and readied our swords. The wind began to rustle violently as a river began forming in the middle of our battlefield; probably caused by Angel and Aaron. At that moment, light and shadow began taking their positions. Our hearts beating with both excitement and nervousness as we tapped deep within ourselves, our eyes now heavily a glow with our signature elemental color; the ground shaking violently as all fourteen of us let our full powers flow freely all over the battlefield. The elements now seemed to come to our wills. As Water, Earth, Fire, Wind, Light and Darkness have now converged… ready for the ultimate clash of super powers.
When our powers have reached a comfortable level, immediately we were rushed by Phelan and Amanda. Their swords glowed beautifully, blessed with their elements' blessing as they swung on our right and rear flanks. Sally easily parried their attacks, leaving me to conjure an enormous fireball in my mouth. Now that they were distracted, I quickly spat out the huge ball of flame toward the two. But, seeing that there were TWELVE of them, it was to be expected that they immediately came to assist one another. As the fireball made its way to the three of them, Sally suddenly vanished from their sights, leaving them to the fireball. However, it was blocked by a huge wall of ice, which turned into a gigantic wave of water, which froze once more and turned into hundreds of ice shards. It was definitely evident that Aaron was the munk responsible. He motioned his arms in a circular motion, and aimed the shards right at me. I quickly countered by slamming my palms into the ground and lifted a giant earth wall that shielded me from the shards, but not for long. While the wall protected me from Aaron's water attack, Phelan quickly made good use of my current situation to strike me. He merged with the shadows and vanished, only to reappear right below me, via my shadow, sword aiming for my throat.
As expected from the prince of darkness himself, he acted quickly to catch me off guard. But I knew his tricks, and he's used this one far too many times, and not only against me. I quickly evaded his strike using his own element against him, and I too, vanished into the darkness. When Phelan fully leapt out of the remains of my shadow, he was surprised to see five balls of light come at him from all directions. Panicking, he tried to use what remained of the darkness to produce a shield, but it was too late. The balls of light struck him hard, sending him flying upward, burns present on his fur. I smirked lightly as my plan had become a success.
Meanwhile, Sally was busy holding off Teresa and her burning sword, parrying and evading every burning slash that tried to hit her. When Sally had caught her off-guard, she took that split-second window of opportunity and blasted Teresa with a huge gust of wind. Teresa was sent back with such a great amount of force that her back slammed hard on the stone wall of the temple. Sally then slightly dropped her guard to recover from such a move. Unfortunately, Kat saw this, and quickly used her light-speed to strike Sally from behind. Least to her knowledge, Sally already knew what Kat was trying to attempt, and quickly faked her guard-break. She then countered Kat's light-speed with merging with the shadows. However, before becoming totally invisible to them, Sally was forced out of her hiding spot by several purple tendrils that tried to strike her from the shadow itself. Sally silently cursed under her breath, and blasted a wave of fire toward the shadows. But, instead of expecting a shadowy figure to evade her flame, she sensed a figure attempting to strike her with her sword. Sally quickly unsheathed her lightsaber and blocked her attacker's blade. Azrael struggled to keep up with Sally's amazing strength as their blades clashed. Sparks began flying everywhere as they parried each other's attack.
(A/N: I'm pretty sure you see now that it's a girl-to-girl and guy-to-guy fight…)
Back with the guys, I was already beginning to feel my body reel in exhaustion as I felt my limits approaching. Isley, being the leader of the twelve, was one really annoying pain-in-the-ass to deal with. With his mastery over light, he easily gets past my defenses and closes the gap between us with his sword aiming hungrily for me. Being adamant in defense, I sent a volley of rocks flying toward him, only to be blocked by Isley's solaris nova beam, a very powerful light attack. I was quick to avoid the rest of the beam that was headed toward me, and quickly gathered my shadow into myself, and released a volley of dark tendrils toward the other male munks, blocking out their attacks with sheer darkness.
Unfortunately for me, Phelan just had to be my opponent. He easily countered the tendrils aimed toward him with a wall of hell fire, and sent it in a wave toward me. I immediately tried to gather water to form into a wall of ice, but the wall of dark flame was already too close for me to completely avoid damage. When I created the ice wall, it immediately shattered under the immense power of Phelan's flame, and I was sent back with such a force that I almost slammed against the wall, had I not used my Earth abilities to hide within it. When I surfaced behind Phelan, Aaron came prepare for me with a huge wave of ice shards in front and water from behind me, his diamond gray eyes glowing immensely as he dragged his arms in a circular motion, sending them at me. I was just about to counter with an earth fort when CJ broke through my defenses as he shattered my fort with the elements of Earth and Nature to his will. His glamorous violet armor shinned in the light with his black fur. CJ was a unique chipmunk, for he was the only of us with black fur. I struggled to regain control over the fight. With Aaron's water attacks coming from in front and behind, and CJ preventing me from counter attacking or blocking, I concentrated hard on generating a lot of energy, and store it within me, like a bomb preparing itself to explode. I put my arms close to my chest as I bended down, creating and storing more and more energy. The more energy I made, the more difficult for me to hold in. But, I knew the right moment to strike was just merely seconds away, so I had no choice but to bear with it.
When the two of them launched their attacks with full force just inches away from me, the energy within me reached its limit, and I stretched out my arms and body to release a wave of purely concentrated power toward them. Their attacks were easily nullified against my wave, and it dealt them a lot of damage due to how close they were to me. They were sent flying back with such immense speed, that when they slammed against the wall, I was sure they left huge crack marks on it. The two munks fell unconscious after making face first contact with the wall. That was two down, four to go.
Despite knowing that I was in the safe zone temporarily, I consumed far too much energy than I had first expected. What's worse is that I only took two down. Phelan must've been aware of my presence from the very beginning, and vanished from sight when Aaron began to attack me. My heavenly white eyes, for the first time in two years, were their original emerald-green colors. I stabbed my saber onto the ground to carry my weight as I knelt to the ground, reeling from all that energy I wasted on taking out just two of the six male soldiers. Let's face it, I was spent.
When I regained whatever was left of my composure, I noticed Sally crash land a few meters away from me. Her once pure-white dress now covered with stains of dirt and her blood. She was quick to regenerate her wounds; however, I noticed that her eyes, which were pure white as well, had returned to their cerulean blue color. Both of us panting with sheer exhaustion as the remaining soldiers surrounded. Amazingly, Sally had taken out three of the six female warriors. To be specific, she defeated Cheryl, whose light blue armor and eyes gave her that "natural" and quiet sense of her mastery over wind, Teresa, otherwise known as the red queen bitch. She was always in her own league in terms of power, but she quieted down when Sally and I overpowered her. Much to my surprise, the last opponent she had recently knocked out before crashing to the ground, was Amanda, the very person who wanted this fight from the beginning. It seemed that Sally slammed her face to the wall during one of their hand-to-hand fights, and used her Earth powers to sprout out vines to keep Amanda down.
The last ten that remained began circling us, all of them smirking as they saw us at our limits as they marched closer and closer toward us, preparing to finish us off.
Fortunately and unfortunately, that final blow never came, as a sudden pang of pain suddenly surged through our hearts. All of us collapsed to the ground both in shock and in immense pain. When we looked up at the sky, we saw four bloody-red streaks of lightning slash through the sky. I swear I could hear a howl coming from outer space. We all felt a sudden sense of loss, like something… or perhaps, someone was missing. The howl's tone sounded so familiar, like it came from…
"Justice?" Sally panted, uneasy from the shock from the pain.
But it wasn't Justice… I could feel that she was fine, but my eyed went wide and tears began to spring from them when I couldn't sense the aura of the only being that had become my "father", the only one who I thought would not die during the entire battle. No one else knew, because only I was the only one that had this kind of special connection to him. I never believed it, but the evil truth had revealed itself.
Soron, my best friend, my adopted father, mentor, and guide… is DEAD.
"S-Soron…" I whispered loud enough for all to hear. Those unconscious were now awake and when the name had reached their ears, tears had begun springing from their eyes. I, myself, was already crying hysterically at the bitter truth. So many questions then started flowing into my mind.
'How? When? Why? This was impossible, how could he just die?' all this and more clouded my vision and clouded my judgment. I wanted to make it all go away. Like this was a bad dream that only required me to wake up. But no, this was no dream. My eyes are wide open, with tears flowing out of them like a stream; my heart, beating like a chanting drum, pounding heavily as my breathing became more and more tense. I immediately got up, looked at the same concerned eyes my comrades had, and we quickly dispersed out of the temple, and hasted our way back to the Command Camp back in No Man's Land. We had to confirm it for sure. Is Soron really dead? That, I wished I never found out.
Okay, there goes the second to the last chapter for this very long Prologue... I know Prologues are supposed to be one chapter, but then again, I'm slightly insane, Prologue limits serve no importance to me... XDD
Anywho, R&R! I really need your reviews to continue writing... :)
and I know this annoys the heck out of people when I write this... but guys, I still think this is very very true...
'I have no talent whatsoever...'
-Perry