I'm sure you can imagine how emotionally draining Lux is. It hurts, letting go of your characters.
Well, here we are, at the end. Thanks so much for following me this far.
Chapter Sixteen: Lucifer
Her memories followed her like ghosts as she came to a slow stop in front of the iris hatch. Eyes as empty as water, body as brittle as glass, she looked around at the gloom that encompassed the giant chamber. The grate that she was standing on was the only thing separating her from a seemingly bottomless drop; likewise the ceiling was swallowed in darkness, so that she had the feeling of being in a breathless, soundless vacuum, with the only solid matter being herself and the circular hatch that glowed eerily in front of her.
Her memories followed her like ghosts as she walked towards the hatch and watched the grinding metal open like a flower in her wake. She stepped through the doorway, her ragged cloak snapping in the sudden breeze, her lips pressing together as she swept her eyes from one side of the room to the other. The circular walls flickered with an olive tone that they borrowed from the iridescent emerald beam that erupted from a circular hole in the floor like an illuminated tree trunk; it sliced through the ceiling and seemingly went straight on through to the Mothership stationed above. A circular platform roped around the space above her head, supported by several columns. The air smelled like moss and ozone.
Her memories followed her like ghosts as she stopped a few steps away from the energy beam, her skin alight with the color of spring grass. The once vast arsenal she had wielded was reduced to a handful of weapons; a shock rifle was slung over her right shoulder while a regular rifle occupied her left. The knife of a long-dead Nali was tied to her thigh; other than these three arms, and the Enforcer that was ever in her hand, she was stripped bare of any defenses.
It had been nine months since Prisoner 849 had set out from Nyleve's Falls. It had been four months since she had encountered the strange woman at the Trench, and two months since she had seen Kira's body.
That had been her last encounter with Nali or humans alike.
More than half of a Terran year had gone by and 849 had weathered the time day by day, with her memories following her like ghosts. Often she heard their footsteps echoing hers. Often she would see them traveling just behind her, but they were never there when she turned around. Still, she didn't complain. Mirages or not, they gave her the impression of having company, and any company on Na Pali that was not hostile was welcome indeed.
She ate little and slept even less. She was still living but she didn't feel alive. She didn't feel much, any more.
But she had reached her destination. She had crossed through valleys and villages, fields and facilities, canyons and castles and everything in between, and finally, she had ended up…here.
She had spent hours fighting her way through the huge circular Mothership and now she was teetering on the verge of death or victory. She would welcome either one, but at this point, she was most likely facing the former. There were so many Skaarj here that she had been forced to retreat several times.
However, they had all failed in keeping her from her target.
And now there was no going back.
A small tremor shook the ground beneath her feet, followed by a burbling hiss and the scrape of talons on metal.
And the Queen of Death stepped into the light.
It was 849's habit to always scan her target first, pinpointing any sort of weak spot that she could aim for to bring her adversary down more efficiently. A preexisting wound, a gap between plates of armor, even a bruise on the skin would be enough to alert her of a space that she could direct her aim towards.
She saw nothing of the sort on the twenty foot tall form standing in front of her. No scars. No wounds. Just pure muscle clad with scales that rivaled diamonds in their strength.
The creature stood on its avian back legs, balanced by a tail and a pair of razor sharp secondary feelers that were nearly twice as tall as the prisoner. Sweeping up from its powerful haunches was a torso that was lined with swells of scaly flesh that looked suspiciously like mammary glands, but seeing as Skaarj were reptilian, 849 highly doubted that the glands provided any sort of nourishment for the Pupae the Queen produced. Everything about the Source screamed 'deadly', but for all of her fierceness, the creature merely shook herself slightly at the sight of 849 and leaned forwards to rest on her clawed hands, her haunches swaying high in the air as she brought her great head down to the prisoner's level. 849 met the luminous gaze evenly, keeping herself perfectly still as the Queen approached, her silky opal scales rippling in taut waves. Her eyes winked color, like the memory of stained glass; the prisoner could see her own reflection on their liquid surface as the Queen's head dropped towards her.
And so she stood, the solitary ambassador of Earth, the weight of knowing that every other person she had encountered had been lost to Na Pali settling heavy in her chest. That's all they were. Scars on her heart. Ghosts in her memory.
The two juggernauts of Na Pali stared each other down amidst the throbbing hum of the energy beam. Out of the corner of her eye 849 saw the flicker of a tall form crumpling to the ground— Myscha! —but she dared not turn her head away from the Queen. The image would go away— they always did.
Ghosts.
Memories.
Scars.
"You must know-" 849 said quietly, "-that I'm here to kill you." They were the first words that she had spoken aloud since she had left the Monastery.
The Queen's head tilted slightly to the side and she began to circle her prey. 849 could help but admire the flowing grace of her silent limbs and the way she seemed to blend in with the olive darkness. There was another flash, this time coming from underneath the Queen's massive body— it was the nameless girl this time, and then suddenly Ash was next to her, smiling— and 849 returned her eyes to the Queen's head. The words of a song her grandfather had sung, words whose meaning she had long forgotten, crept unbidden into her throat. She found herself whispering them and the sound of their song was like the scurrying of tiny paws.
"Hail holy queen enthroned above, oh Maria." Her words seemed to surprise the Skaarj matriarch; the great shimmering body danced backwards a step or two.
"Hail mother of mercy and of love, oh Maria. Triumph, all ye Cherubim. Sing with us, ye Seraphim." Her voice was ice, cold and cracked. "Heaven and earth resound the hymn."
The Queen hissed.
"Salve. Salve. Salve regina."
The Queen lunged forwards, talons outstretched. 849, with the uncanny speed of one who has been forced to live in a constant state of mortal danger, dove out of the way. She came out of her rather rough tumble with her Enforcer in her hand. She flinched when she saw a shadow come diving towards her from the darkness above.
If it's not the Queen, don't worry about it.
Again, the Queen made a swipe for the prisoner's body. If she had made contact, the Terran's body would've been broken to bits against the far wall. But again 849 evaded her, her clumsy poise pitiful even to her own senses. The Queen had her on the run, and they both knew it.
She heard Ash's laughter in her ears, followed by the sound of rushing water. One of the Queen's feelers came lancing down and scraped against 849's shoulder, ripping the skin all the way down to her wrist.
And the Manta flew up and away to gain momentum for its next attack—
Reflexively tightening the muscles in her injured arm, she glared up into her attacker's eyes. The look that the Source had on her inhuman face was almost gloating.
Suddenly it was very hard for her to breathe.
"You think…you've won?" she asked incredulously. "You think you can kill me that easily?"
Rearing up with a sharp cry, the Queen launched a barrage of electrical charges from the mammary gland-esque lumps on her torso. Several of them burnt into 849's skin, and her face twisted in pain.
"You must know that you've managed to kill me several times already. But I don't die as easily as your sons, do I?" She went down heavily on her knees, barely avoiding being decapitated. "If I think about it, I'd say it's a little unfair to send hundreds of Skaarj against one human." An electrical charge slammed into her chest, burning through her cloak and causing her heart to shudder.
Kira's body flickered on the ground at her feet, like a reflection of daylight. After a moment it was gone.
"But since I fucked up every one of the larvae and the parasitic scum you sent after me, I guess it worked out for humanity in the end." Clenching her hand around her Enforcer and pulling Myscha's knife out of its holster on her thigh, she mirrored the Queen's circular pace.
"I guess I just can't stay dead, can I, until I see you go before me. You've killed me so many times—"
The back of her boot knocked into something, and then a sharp pain filled her foot. Looking down, she saw a slimy green mass attached to her shoe. A Skaarj pupae. In one fluid motion, she knocked it away from her leg and then pinned the wriggling creature under her boot. Gathering her strength, she brought her entire weight down onto it, listening to the satisfying crunch of soft bones beneath her heel.
Enraged, the Queen swooped towards her but was stopped by a neatly aimed bullet to the temple. She shook her head and screamed, swiping at her eyes.
You ran me through in the shadow of a waterfall.
You gutted me and left me for dead.
You used me as a shield when I was distracted by a friend.
You trapped me in a bell tower.
"That I have nothing left to lose."
Her voice took on a steely chord and her entire body shivered like a drawn bowstring. The blank brown of her hooded eyes flashed with sudden wild wonder.
"I am all those whom you have slaughtered!" She screamed and her voice broke with misuse and the sudden wash of grief as she opened up to the memories of all those people who hadn't made it to where she had. "And you— you cannot kill me because I am already dead. I... we...are souls, and souls don't die! You can't kill me— you can't kill us!" She held her arms out crucifix-style, and instead of nails in her palms she held a Nali fishing knife and an ancient, bloodstained pistol. "Try to burst this body! Try to extinguish this light!"
Up came Myscha's knife. Up reared the indomitable force of a thousand different souls crying out for vengeance. Up came her grief-ragged, time-worn, heartsick cry of despair and anger against everything she had witnessed since she had first stepped out of her cell on the Vortex Rikers.
And when the Queen belled her challenge to the prisoner in front of her, 849 answered the call at a dead run.
The pounding stopped.
Twenty Nali hands were still pressed, trembling, against the door, but the wood was no longer rattling under their palms.
Those among the ragtag group of Harobed villagers who could not reach the wide wooden door that their fellow neighbors were steadying themselves against instead chose to brace their hands against the others' backs. A few women and children huddled near a fireplace situated between two bookshelves lining one of the walls, their faces illuminated with fear by the glowing coals.
Baran, his back aching from the blows and his fingers clutching the empty flak cannon, looked hesitantly up at Niori, who was bracing his entire upper body against the brass latch. If he had known, months before, that they'd be cornered one of the upper rooms of the Sunspire—so close, so close to the Skyelevator—he wouldn't have bothered trying to make contact with the Nali of Na Pali Haven. The siege had lasted for nearly a week and this was the last possible spot that the group could make their stand. He and Niori both knew that they were in the dwindling moments of their last stand—but….
"What are they doing?" he whispered hoarsely. Niori met his eyes and shrugged.
With the aid of the flak cannon and Baran's newfound leadership skills, the Harobed villagers had made it to the Sunspire only a few days after their intended arrival. That had been nearly four months ago. There were indeed Nali in the monument that were waiting for them, but as the months dragged by, visits from the Skaarj grew more and more frequent until the entire population had to actively start fighting off their adversaries. Baran had no idea what was going on in the outside world but, with the arrival of this latest group of Skaarj, he knew that something drastic had to have taken place. Normally only two Skaarj were sent to put down Nali resistance fighters, and there were five outside of the door, throwing themselves violently against the wood and tearing at it with talons and Razik blades alike. The last flak shell and long since been fired and there were no alternatives to their desperate situation. When the door caved in, they would all die.
But now…there was nothing.
Pressing his ear against the door, Baran struggled to listen for Skaarj movement above the pounding of his heart. There were dim shuffling movements outside and shadows moving between the crack of light under the door, but the assault had, for the moment, stopped.
"Do you think they'll leave now?" Diaba's voice was hopeful, but the idea was so ridiculous that Baran didn't bother to answer her. He instead put the empty flak cannon off to the side and crouched down on his hands and knees, bringing his face close to the floor. If he could manage to see what was the Skaarj were up to through that small opening, he'd be able to make a decision regarding their current situation.
A roar from the hallway shattered the nervous silence inside the room, and immediately the Nali's bodies seized up against the threshold, pressing even more firmly against the door. Baran was practically smashed against the doorframe until he managed to shove his way through the forest of limbs and stagger to his feet behind them.
"Not so much, not so much, you'll break through the door from this side if you keep that up," he said irritably. "Now stand back, I want to listen."
"They could be trying to trick us," one of the Nali said nervously. "At any moment they could rush the door when we're not ready for them."
"I said," Baran said, "stand back."
A low murmur breezed through the crowd, but the group of bodies parted to make way for Baran. He approached the door once more, placing his hands lightly on the wood and closing his eyes to focus his concentration.
Staggering footsteps. Short pants of breath. No growling. Never, in his experience with the Skaarj, had Baran known the Skaarj to be silent creatures.
"They're not communicating with each other anymore," he said. "I think there's something wrong."
"They're playing dead." Niori didn't sound convinced.
"No, no, they're walking around." Baran looked around at the villagers. Their eyes were wide in their pale faces. "I think something happened."
"The Messiah?"
Baran clenched his fist. Happy…! "Diaba. Please, no more foolishness. Did you hear any shots being fired? No. You didn't. The Messiah isn't here. We are our own messiahs now. We have to take what we've been given and make it work. Now," he turned his attention back towards the door, "I think I'm going to see what they're doing."
The Nali pressed forwards. "If you open that door you'll kill us all!" one of them cried.
"You're not sure of anything, Baran! Why are you so quick to act? This could all be a trap!"
"Baran." Niori's face was troubled. "Don't you think we should think this through? We don't know what happened out there. Skaarj are not so easily dissuaded."
"Niori, we can't stay in forever. We have no access to provisions or ammunition and the Skaarj are going to get in sooner or later, through the fireplace or the ventilation tunnels or some other opening that we don't know about. I say we take the chance now while they're exhausted. They've been at this for hours—"
"So have we."
"—and we cannot die holed up in this room like animals. They're acting strange now and there has to be a reason for it. You don't have to come with me. Open the door and throw me out. But all I'm asking is that we look to see if we can get out of this situation. It's our only option. Please, Niori."
Niori sighed heavily. "I'll go with you," he said finally. He turned to the others. "Everyone, line up at the back wall, in the shadows. Make sure you have a clear path to the door if something happens."
Reluctantly the villagers did as they were told. Baran put his hand on the handle, breathing in to steady himself. Feeling Niori's reassuring hand on his shoulder, he turned the knob and slowly pushed the door open.
A pair of Razik blades buried themselves in the crumbling stone next to his head. Baran froze, hearing the collective gasps of the villagers behind him. His heart surged into his throat and he felt Niori's hand tighten, but he didn't move.
Neither did the blades.
His eyes traveled slowly over the gleaming metal, following the sleek silver line to where it connected to the mottled scales of the Skaarj warrior's arm. The creature's hand was clenched into a fist, the black talon on its thumb looking just as sharp as the blades embedded in the wall. The arm was trembling slightly, but otherwise was still.
After a moment, Baran exhaled in semi-relief. The Skaarj would have pulled back for another assault by now. With adrenaline rampaging through his body, Baran pushed the door open slightly more, keeping his watchful tawny eyes on the line of the Skaarj's muscled arm as it swelled into his shoulder. Following the column of its throat, Baran allowed his gaze to fall on the Skaarj's face, on the deep-set, red-rimmed eyes that bored into Baran's with the ferocity of a physical blow.
Forcing himself to stand firm under the stare of his mortal enemy, Baran swung the door fully open. The warrior's entire body was buzzing with fury, but it did not move. It could not move. Behind him, four more Skaarj were in various prone positions on the floor. One of them had its hand braced against the wall, its fingers crawling slowly up the stone, trying to gain purchase, but that was the extent of its movement.
"What's wrong with them?"
Baran shook his head slowly, but whatever it was, he was thankful that it had stricken the entire group of Skaarj at once. It couldn't be exhaustion, but he couldn't waste time speculating. They had to take action now, while they had a sliver of a chance at survival.
He ducked under the Skaarj's arm, reflexively recoiling when one of his arms brushed against its scales. He padded softly past the other three warriors and stood in the middle of the hallway, looking down the corridor at the space ahead.
Nothing else seemed to be moving. The Sunspire was holding its breath.
And then, in the distance, a low rumble, barely perceptible to his ears. But it was there.
"Something's definitely happened. I'm going ahead to the sky elevator platform!" he shouted back to Niori. "See if you can gather any medical supplies or fresh Redfruit seeds and meet me there as quickly as you can!"
He broke into a run, not waiting for an answer. Rounding the nearest corner and throwing himself into a door, he burst into an upper chamber, where he dashed up a flight of stairs and stumbled onto a grassy patch of land at the peak of the Sunspire.
He knew enough about the Skaarj to know that they operated under the complete behest of their Queen. Their lives were their own but they could not function without the influence of their lifesource. That was what she was. Their Source.
Something had to have happened to the Skaarj's collective mother.
The night stretched velvet and smooth above him but the air was distorted by the waves of heat from the lake of lava nearly a mile below. He ascended the steps that led to the elevator platform and breathed a sigh of relief that the elevator car was still there. It would take a few trips, but he was certain that he could get all of the villagers to Na Pali Haven before their luck ran out. Once they were there, they'd be safe. He was sure of it.
The rumbling hadn't stopped, though. Baran crept to the edge of the platform and looked down, trying to see if there were any distant forms making their way into the Sunspire. But then again, the only thing that could make such a sound would have to be something the size of a Titan—maybe two, now that he thought of it.
It was only when he turned his quizzical gaze to the sky that he spotted the dimmest gleam of light above the mountains to the east. At first, he thought it was a star, but then he noticed it was moving, slowly, surely, doggedly upwards. The rumble was punctuated with sharp cracks of sound , reminding Baran of the sound that the sky chariots made as they tumbled through the air on their broken wings.
His heart full, Baran raised a hand to the light rising out of what Baran knew was the crater that the Skaarj mothership had settled in when it first landed decades ago. He watched the tiny glow until it punched a hole through the nighttime clouds, and, with a flash of fire, disappeared, leaving only a hairline trail of smoke in its wake.
You missed it, Myscha, he thought. I think Na Pali's just been saved.
When we meet again, I'll have to tell you everything.
Prisoner 472 escaping.
She was dead.
Prisoner 327 escaping.
Everything around her was dark and smooth and perfect.
She felt like she was floating.
So quiet. So free.
Prisoner 849 escaping.
It was the most peaceful sensation she had ever experienced.
There was nothing to worry about, no one to talk to or protect. There were no bullets to fire or wounds to bandage. She had passed the threshold and she was finally, finally free.
The last thing she remembered was a mass of black opal bearing inexorably down onto her body. That was it, then. She hadn't won against the Queen but maybe that was what was supposed to happen. She wasn't upset about it. Relieved, was more like it.
Her hands felt so light. Almost as light as her heart. She didn't have to fight any longer.
She could just float here, forever, in the calm, bitter-smelling quiet of wherever here was.
Until her thigh brushed up against something solid and her silent inner celebration was strangled with sudden, terrible realization.
Opening her eyes, she watched as her quiet dark heaven transformed into the cramped, alien metal of a Skaarj escape pod. She didn't know how her body escaped the safety harness that she had strapped herself into when she had first entered the craft, but somehow she was floating like flotsam in zero gee.
She looked down at her body and managed a weak smile. There was no point in being frustrated about being alive. Her body looked like she had jumped into an industrial meat grinder. Her clothes were gone, her skin was charred in the places where she didn't sport massive gashes, and she felt like every bone in her body had been crushed to dust. She was not long for life.
"Thank goodness," she whispered when she realized that most of her injuries were fatal. "It hurts. It hurts so, so much."
A little while later, the back of her head bumped lightly against one of the small portholes lining the fuselage of the escape pod. With some difficulty she put her hands out and reoriented her body so she could look outside. She soon noticed another oddity. The craft wasn't moving. There was no push of engine power through the hull of the ship, no echoing roar of machinery at work. When she saw the lazy trajectory of the stars and the luminious glow of her personal hell directly below the window, she let out a small sound of disbelief.
Barely managing to break Na Pali's orbit, the ship had run out of fuel.
This was the farthest she was going to get.
She had sojourned all the way from one end of Na Pali's horizon to the other, and yet she had returned to the very same circumstances she had fled from.
Hands cupping the alien metal on either side of her head, knees bent under her body, 849 let the irony engulf her. She was back in the Vortex Rikers, after all, except now there were no cell mates or block guards to share her confinement.
She had been used to this, once. How foolish of her to assume that, just because the Rikers had crashed, her situation had changed at all. Her time on Na Pali and been a beautiful and dangerous interlude, but when all was said and done, she never had a way out. She was still Prisoner UMS 849, high-level 800, second-highest level prisoner on the Rikers and second in line for the electric chair on the prison moon.
But now you don't have to worry about the prison moon, do you?
That voice again.
It was her time on Na Pali. She was sure of it. It had changed her. Her conquest of the Skaarj had doomed her more than any of the injuries she had sustained thus far.
From where many had died…
"I will live, Ash!"
…she had escaped.
She started laughing quietly, and the sound was so lost and lonely in her ears that her eyes misted over. It was the first time she had cried since Myscha's death.
There was hope in her, growing like a cancer. It flared out, sparking and white-hot, igniting something inside of her heart that made her traitorous mind convince her reason that she could live. It sucked the energy out of her hopeless defeat with the warm promises of life, of escape, of true and wonderful freedom. It was making her sob. It was making her human.
She had survived a crash that killed many others.
She had thrived on a planet where others were slaughtered.
She had killed an alien who lorded over an entire empire.
"Hush," 849 said aloud in a voice that sounded like dried leaves rustling. She scrubbed at her eyes with the back of her hand like a child, but the salt drops merely floated away from her face in wobbly, gleaming spheres. "Please, don't. Don't."
She had fought against and killed monsters two, three times her size.
She had seen such natural beauty as there never was on earth.
She had bathed in the silver shadow of twin waterfalls and grown whole—
"No more."
She had eaten with an alien and one of her sworn enemies from Earth and reveled in their friendship.
She had lived where others had died.
She had lived and left others to die.
She was alive and everyone else was dead.
And she was no better off now than where she had been months ago.
And yet hope fluttered in her ribcage like a hummingbird.
"I should be dead." 849 said firmly. "In a little while I will be. There is no reason to be proud of myself now."
Her words were hardly convincing.
You will not die alone. UMS and Inuit will send retrieval vessels for their downed ships. They will find you. You will live.
"Maybe. For now, I will live. But just for now. If I am not found, I will die. If I am found—"
You will live.
"—I will not live because I am Prisoner eight four fucking nine and I have a death sentence on my head."
Little matter.
The voice was tiny and insistent.
"I have gone from one end of that world to the other and I am tired of running."
You apparently seem to LIKE killing people!
"I no longer have anyone that would stand up for my name, anyway."
Watch what you say to the warrior princess.
"…But then again, I don't have a name to stand up for, do I."
The flame flickered on a doubt but held steady. When 849 raised her face to the window again, she carried all the light of a star falling from heaven in her eyes.
Far below, the eastern edge of the continent sleepily greeted the rising of its first sun. The dawn broke over hills and streams and sank its brilliance into yawning canyons, waking the world once more.
Perched atop the rusted fuselage of a weather-worn spacecraft, a cerulean-feathered bird spread its wings and launched itself into the air, joining its kin in their silent breathless dance above the falls of Nyleve.
Hovering wild and wingless above Na Pali, 849 curled her body around the shivering light of her hope, breathing it alive.
(end)
So that's where we leave her. If Luxie left you with even a fragment of nostalgia for the original Unreal game, then I've done my job. If it didn't, well, that's why I'm not a published author. :D
I originally had 849 singing Phil Collins lyrics ("Would you respect me if I didn't have this gun? 'Cuz without it, I don't get it, and that's why I carry one~"). I changed last minute because religion is a little more timeless than "Both Sides of the Story" and I wanted to have that last loophole in there where she actually remembers her name in a convoluted sort of way. She thinks she doesn't have a name to stand up for but she ends up singing about herself. So maybe that shows that she's gonna be okay after all.
I won't insult your intelligence by pointing out all the light imagery in Lux, but just in case, I will say that "Salus", the title of chapter thirteen, means 'salvation', and 'Lucifer' is 'light bearer'. Chapter fourteen gets its name from Creed's song.
Originally Norianna and Happy weren't going to be a part of the story, and I was only going to focus on Kira and 849. I'm glad I changed my mind because there are so many stories about Kira already and nobody's ever really written about the Dark Arena. 'Happyanna' scenes were definitely my favorites to write because they are my absolute favorite original characters I have ever created. I've got fanart of them, srsly. I bawled my eyes out while writing their deaths. I hope you enjoyed them while they were around.
There is a sequel to Unreal, so I might write a corresponding companion piece for Luxie. Fans didn't really like Return to Na Pali and the endings of both games were equally ambiguous, but if I think of a fun twist for a sequel, then I'll post it in the near future.
I think that wraps everything up. Thanks so much for reading. Every little bit helps. I'd like to send HUGE thank-you to Thug_4_Less. Not only did he consistently review Lux, but he was my faithful and brutal and wonderful beta-reader for the story from chapter six onward. Without him as my sounding-board, Lux would have been a badly written story, indeed.
Liandri Archives was my go-to source for all the hard facts in the story. I kind of bent some translator messages to do my bidding and the like, but any other mistakes I've made are mine and mine alone.
The only humans in this story that are actually mine are Happy and Norianna. I feel guilty about saying that I created Baran and the other citizens of Harobed because they are Nali and I certainly didn't come up with the idea for adorable four-armed aliens. :D Everyone, and everything, else is property of Epic and the creators of Unreal.
Thanks for all the love, guys, and thanks for reading and reviewing. There aren't many of you but I love you all very much for taking the time out of your busy schedules to read and review and favorite Lux. I hope you enjoyed the journey.