Was it... Snow?
I am not sure, but they are cold.
I still remember, the bright blue snow, Me, Mommy,
I remember her warm hand holding mine,
The huge crowd, noises,
Light.
— — — — —
The crowd scattered to their posts, rushing here and there to finish the final preparations, jets and armored flight soldiers set off out of the wide-opened hangar to the dark skies beyond, the skies raining bright blue.
A young girl stood, next to a tall Figure holding her hand, in the Night.
An armored Figure of Light.
— — — — —
The Lights were bright.
It was a noisy place, with people talking loudly to one another.
Rushing all about.
Yet,
Everyone was hopeful and ready. Mommy was smiling too.
So I smiled.
— — — — —
" The moment is now, lieutenant." another commander donning a similar armor as the former dashing spoke in grave urgency to the one next to the little girl
" For her future, for humanity's future."
" Right away sir."
The little girl stared wide-eyed, moving not her glance away from the armored figure.
This armored figure, the Mother of the young infant, turned to her daughter, clasping the tiny hands in her iron gauntlets, kneeling down to bid her daughter one last goodbye.
— — — — —
They were setting off, to the skies and seas far away.
To save the dying earth.
Mommy will be leaving soon.
But I don't want mommy to leave.
I don't want to say goodbye.
Take me with you,
Please.
— — — — —
Before the mother could cease her daughter's tears and comfort her with assuring words,
Something flew into the headquarters from above, crashing the barriers and shattering glass all over the place.
A horrendous unearthly screech echoed across the spacious hangars of the facility, along with deafening explosions erupting all over, bringing down the large supporting cylindrical pillars of technology one after another.
In haste, the mother instinctively shielded her daughter behind her back as she produced her weapon which materialized through photon sparkling particles drawing out lines of golden light, into a long sword rifle out of thin air, pointing at what unsavory intruder that had just descended from the skies.
Lo, as all the armored personnel watched in horror, a Winged demonic form of darkness rose up as fast as it crashed, swooping here and there, striking at the soldiers in defense.
Yet one by one the seasoned defenders were stabbed and mauled by the one of darkness.
Following in through the hole above, more and more demons swooped in alongside huge tentacles of pitch-black nano ash crashing in and pulling the military hangar gates down.
Things had just escalated to a desperate downward spiral.
The mother held her child close, fighting her way for their survival.
— — — — —
Everyone was not confident anymore,
Everyone was afraid,
Everyone was screaming,
They ran, pushing me and Mommy back.
I was afraid.
I cried.
And we ran.
This was our home, our home of blue walls, of circular rings of lights that shine with our memories kept inside. Like living in a paradise under the sea.
It is the last beacon of hope, mommy would always tell me. The final station to the land of Light, of love, and bliss.
I loved this home, I wanted to stay here, with mommy. Forever.
But mommy won't stay.
I don't want to be alone.
" Yuri, are you Ready ?"
I was afraid.
" Good girl…listen, Mommy loves you very, very much."
There was something shining in Mommy's hand.
She buried it in my hands, and pushed it close to my heart.
Mommy never told me what it was.
Mommy was hugging me tightly now, the brightening light between us
bloomed greater and greater.
" Go, Yuri,
Fear No Darkness.
Seek… The Land of Light."
— — — — —
-BEFORE · LIGHT-
Pushing me away,
I fell,
into the Light.
<Ⅰ>
Call him Bradson, Captain of the lonesome skies. A tough man, tall and tout, seemingly close to his late fifties by the looks of his rough appearance and the wrinkled ashen facade, which abstrusely concealed his actual years before and behind the wheel marine. Built with a muscular frame hidden under the large commanding jacket upon his white straight uniform, his bushy mustache swayed slightly according to the captain's slow rhythmic inhalations like hills of sand surfing idly under the graceful winds, situated above the stern sealed lips that speak only when it is necessary.
As the Captain of the prestigious military Airship Betelgeuse, one among a small few that endured and kept the skies to their own. It was his duty to secure the final frontiers of man, along with the persisting other captains, dwindling in numbers, who had sworn an oath decades ago to strive and take back the lands lost, engaging in the never-ending war against vile Darkness. Demons.
Demons that now roam the lands and shattered the civilization of mankind. It was every captain's dream and calling to annihilate the spawns of malice and carnage which had brought upon the living race a tremendous descent from the dominance on their Earth before the fall. The Post-Earth Century, the years of mankind's wake.
Bradson Captain closed his eyes to center his sharpness, ushering the hate towards the mutual enemy away from his focus.
Right now, in this current moment, the Demon threat was not of Bradson Captain's concern.
There was a disturbance in his ship, an ominous foreboding that Bradson had not felt for a long time.
His dark gray eyes, which hide many unspoken hardships from the past, quickly scoured his cabin, at the surveillance systems monitoring his ship's integrity and also the many operating screens maneuvered by android pilots, automatons that facilitate the detection of danger outside and within.
Solar-powered droids have been his crew for years, having only the ability to act on simple tasks upon command and defensive actions upon Demon encounters. Droids of this time of age have abandoned the advanced calculative systems and their predictive learning patterns, which heralded the doom of mankind centuries ago. Bradson never trusted the decisions made by artificial intelligence. He'd rather believe in the motives of those he trusts, those that were the only four persons including Bradson himself on the Betelgeuse aside from the droid crew. One was his second-in-command and secretary Reina, a mature meticulously tasked woman in her late twenties, harboring a lean graceful aspect of understanding motherly nature, with long orange-red hair tied to a side ponytail, sitting at the front booth affront Bradson's deck, scanning the wide perimeter over the airship's exterior through the radar on her screen.
Aiding Bradson long before he was appointed captain has trained Reina's observant perception to recognize the Captain's needs and the contents of his brooding.
" There is no sign of them chasing after us, captain," Reina reported the scannings of the radar to the ruminating Bradson with much consideration.
" We have made it safely out of their reach."
Bradson Captain nodded back in silence, standing alone at his deck, looking beyond the clouded horizons outside his glass dome-shaped cabin, as the sea of fog below his feet rushed away ruthlessly as more pale smog emanated outwards without end.
Being out of their reach doesn't mean being safe, Bradson brooded as he checked their course hovering above his desk in holographic fashion. Completing one challenge means heading towards the next, and who knows from which direction the Demons would assault, especially when carrying a dangerously valuable asset on deck.
It is all for this one endeavor.
Planning over unresting nights, pondering on the ways to escort the crucial objective, and nearly risking everything and everyone around him, Bradson still considered it worth the toiling effort.
Now the only task at hand is to wait–
Out of the blue, breaking all expectations and assumptions, an explosion erupted at the next second, shattering the silence and jolting the world to an unwelcoming start somewhere located at the rear of this massive longitudinal airship.
Can it be…? Bradson captain rose back up to his feet quickly, flipping on the telegram of the Betelgeuse's' map, praying that the explosion is not where he feared the most.
It was.
" Captain!" Rushing into the cabin, entering the scene in hasting steps a figure of a tall masculine teen with red sharp spiking hair and crimson uniform approached the Captain's presence. With his muscular arms, the young man helped Bradson up to his desk.
" Firren, to the lab center, this instance!" This Bradson Captain ordered with much alacrity to this young uniformed soldier, ushering this well-trained fellow, Firren, commander of the Betelgeuse defenses, to the designated location.
"Engage the enemy if required. Make sure she's unharmed."
Silently, the bright red-haired youth nodded before leaving the cabin, rushing along the corridor as the young man tapped the golden buttons on his uniform, activating stardust particles that snaked over his body in liquidous fervor, enveloping his athletic features under a glistening red armor, helmet to breastplates, gauntlets to greaves, all in one flourishing set up glistening like raging flame of ornate golden lines of runes upon the futuristic metal.
The young soldier is ready.
His Starbreaker armor activated.
…
...…..
The explosion had occurred at the lower compartments located at the rear of the Betelgeuse's protruding flat structure, where the airship lab was located, smothered in smoke and flame. Shattered glass scattered among smithereens of equipments, among the broken shards from the lid of a long curved rectangular confinement, flipped to a side, opening ajar and its contents exposed.
There, lying on the cold floor adjacent to the imploded casket,
Was a young girl, naked, sizzling vapor drifting close to her pale skin.
Glowing under the dim flickering lab lights, her bright blue hair shimmered and flowed down upon her exposed curved shoulders.
Slowly, groaning, this teenage girl of bluish hair crawled up to all fours and sat up on her thighs, looking at the sluggishly swirling new world around her. Out of the blur and fog, her visual began to contextualize and a silver metallic room start to give shape.
She looked at her hands, which were trembling slightly still. Then down to her naked self. Staring but without recognition.
" ..... Where… am... I.....?" She asked in a distraught whisper.
what she saw felt distant.
A hollow blankness occupied her visuals, with incomprehensible happenings, scenes that made no sense but gave rise to a primordial fear inside of her, with the disarray in her mind and the confusion she now beheld, merging into a chaos of sharp screeching murmurs piercing her head and searing her nerve fibers that led the pain through her whole body.
At a far distance, the eerie screeching echoed onward, towards a direction that forced the young girl to follow, staggering out of the shaken lab, in hopes to free herself of the cold callous torment.
…
...…..
Young and dutiful, our soldier man Firren rushed passed many corridors, automatic doors sliding fast as he dashed forth in full incandescent red StarBreaker armor, resisting the frustration attacking his ears in the form of frustrating alarm sirens which grew louder and louder as he neared the exploded lab. Firren was expecting a Demon assault within the laboratory due to the fact that they have been carrying in their ship a subject of grave import, something, or rather, someone that meant more than any could ever conceive at the moment.
Raising his arms loaded with flaring shuttles and aiming affront with his wrists, Firren edged inside the lab from the shattered opening, only to find nothing.
No one.
Not a Demon in sight, nor the subject of import's essence.
Scanning with his sharp eyes protected under the luminant glass visor upon his helmet, Firren deducted the happenings from what he saw of the aftermath around him. Glass and metal shards scattering out from one common center, the casket-shaped box, teetered to a side, lying agape at the middle of the lab.
No signs of attack, or struggle. Nor impact from the exterior of the airship.
The cabinet imploded all by itself.
Firren frowned at the conclusion. It was pretty unlikely for the carrier to implode like this according to Firren's past experiences with this certain confining device. But indeed, the personnel kept a moment ago was someone extremely special, and crucial to each and every decision they make. Firren rose up from his deducting and skimmed the lab thoroughly, to see a thin path leading further deep into the insides of the Betelgeuse lab which harbors nearly most of their weapons against the Demons, and most prominently, where the Starbreaker Armors were kept.
Firren followed the path to a door cast in frosted glass and was about to open the door when he stopped.
The silver door handle was cold, icy cold.
A thin faint film of ice formed around the handle, growing intensely with each second passing.
…
...…..
Staggering against the wall, the girl stumbled her way to a bridge of glass, where the clouds underneath her feet bellowed, adding more to the chaos exasperating her confused mentality.
She ignored them all. Caring not the things and intrusions in her path.
Focusing only on the sharp muffled screeching whispers calling to her, as she careened on and on until the pain of the screeching in her head exceeded her physical limits, forcing the poor girl to her knees, moaning as the pain grew only stronger the more she neared the end of the glass bridge, that led to a dark chamber behind a steel veil.
She screamed, as the scenes that seemed incomprehensible at first, slowly grew familiar yet still devoid of meaning, ringing no bells whatsoever.
But they meant something. The girl told herself. There must be something, anything of meaning behind the dread she is experiencing now. She has a purpose, was all she could firmly grasp in the farce of her mind. She was meant for something…what she cannot recall. But it is here. It is calling.
Words that slowly become more and more audible under the deafening screech. Pushing her forward, without fear.
She needs only to persist, to fight through the tribulations to catch a glimpse of what lies ahead.
It was so close, she tried to convince herself.
Just one more push…Yuri!
…
.....
Firren backed, for the door before him turned into a tall obelisk of ice, cracking ominously about to fall apart.
Icy air snaked in through the thin crevasses around and under the rim of the exit.
There is a bridge behind this door, Firren recalled, and if his assumptions are correct, the bridge ahead leads too…
Before Firren could consider more, the cracks spread as the gnarled web sprawled across the glass in loud echoing splinters.
Like a beast, the cold bleak force from the other side raged, breaking through bit by bit.
…
...
With a violent shudder, the glass bridge pulverized under her feet into ice and frost, fierce winds of the skies swirled with might around the terrified girl, pained to an extent that her senses were slipping fast, unable to hide, unable to escape, as she lay, on the collapsing bridge of blistered glass.
But Lo, before the girl and the structures plummeted into the foggy depth, a cloak of warmth rested upon her frail posture in the form of a military jacket and a hug, from none other than the Captain, Captain Bradson, calming her in his caring embrace, ascending to her rescue. Behind the captain were his crew, Firren, and his secretary Reina, worried to the core as they secured the area from collapsing into the clouds.
As Bradson Captain supported the girl curled in his coat up to her shaking feet, lifting her away from the harmful glass carefully, listening to her crying patiently.
" Where…where am I…who…I….?!"
Overwhelmed by the disorders of her mind, the girl's senses slowly drifted to the void, falling to slumber in the captain's brawny arms.
" It's alright now, Yuri…it's alright. You are safe now."
The captain could but comfort her with words that fell to unhearing ears.
…
...
Call her Yuri, a girl in her blossoming teens, pale of skin and light blue of hair reaching to her shoulders with a single ponytail tied to her side. The energetic flare that once resided in those blue wide eyes now dimmed under the brow that locked to a constant frown. Her peachy cheeks that used to resemble her lively aura now diminished to pallid white, sagging and malnutritioned, accentuating her already slim and small frame.
The One that emerged out of the exploded lab, now lay in the infirmary bed as hospital Droids stood close by, scanning her body with lasers checking if her vitals were stable.
Bradson Captain sat beside her, looking grave and brooding as usual.
After the androids finished the assessments, Bradson Captain checked the data entry with deep frowned eyes, turning to Yuri to begin his own inquiries.
" How are you feeling, Yuri?" the Captain asked gently, to which Yuri shook her head wearily.
" I don't feel right." She answered in a weak whisper
" Like…many things popping out all at once that sound familiar, but I can't understand what they were. It's like something inside of me is missing…"
Bradson Captain nodded in silent understanding.
" Yuri, If I may, I need to ask you some questions to fully grasp your condition, to know what is the problem. If you don't know the answer to what I ask, simply shake your head. Shall we begin?"
Yuri nodded slowly, feeling distant about how the captain phrases the question. That is not how she remembered him to sound, but again, her memories aren't that capable to her now.
" Do you remember who I am, Yuri?"
The first question was somewhat easy for her.
" You are Papa Bradson. My dearest papa! Do you remember? You saved me from…from…"
That was Yuri realized she was the one that doesn't remember. But surely it was there, somewhere of Captain Bradson taking her…Yuri was confused and pondered for long until she finally shook her head
Bradson continued his next question.
" Do you know where you are now, Yuri?" The Captain's voice, calm and patient. Just like how Yuri's memories seem to depict the captain's vague image.
" I am on papa's ship. The Bat…Bate…The Batogeese!"
Yuri answered confidently.
Bradson nodded, however.
" Close enough. Next question, do you remember what happened the day before?"
Yesterday…? Yuri shook her head.
" The day before that?" Yuri shook her head.
Bradson pondered with his tapping finger above his kneecap. The captain hesitated before asking his next question.
" What do you remember,.....of your first memory, Yuri ?"
Yuri blinked at this question.
Scenes immediately started flashing in her head, distorted and with noise.
Light,
People,
And someone.
Someone in armor…
Yuri shook her head slowly.
" .... Except the blue snow, nothing else..."
Bradson Captain jolted slightly.
Blue snow…?
" ....I see."
Bradson Captain adjusted his seat, with a deeper frown.
" That will be enough, Yuri. You did well. Now, what you need more than anything is rest. This is for you." spake the Captain rising to his feet, placing a small tin rectangular box on the low table next to her bed
" And remember, call me or Reina through the droids if you need anything, We'll be here right away." with that said, Bradson turned to leave.
" Wait!"
Yuri's thin fingers hooked the rim of Bradson Captain's jacket sleeve.
" Across the bridge, the bridge of glass where you found me…there is a door. What is behind that door, papa?!"
Bradson Captain never would expect Yuri to ask such a question. But yet again, it seemed like fate for her to seek what is kept within.
" …Some equipment less of note, Yuri. Why ask?" Bradson brushed the question off swiftly.
" Fear No Darkness." Yuri's voice determinedly spoke out the three strong words, like a force that stunned the captain with a jolt.
Fear No Darkness.
" Fear No Darkness…and Seek, the Land of Light…Papa, someone is calling to me behind that door, asking me to do what it says! Papa, I need to find–"
" There is nothing behind that door, Yuri." thundering like a slamming door, sealing the possibility for her to explore the unknown, Bradson Captain's stern voice cut her request like a knife.
" You need rest, much rest. I need you to stay here and be safe, for all of us…Yuri."
Without another redundant word, Bradson left the scene, leaving Yuri alone with the buzzing androids, circling her bed stupidly. She felt bad for letting Papa angry. Yuri wasn't sure how, but the feeling of disappointing others was no stranger to her. Aside from the guilt, Yuri also felt another long-lost sensation evidently hitting her empty stomach, causing a low growl deep inside.
The androids detected Yuri's hunger but had no intellect to respond to the matter.
Yuri sighed, lonely and puzzled by all the things in her head, which seemed meaningful at first glance, but dissolved into incoherence as soon as she scrutinized.
She has to get to that room behind the door, but first, she needs to fill her starving belly.
…
...…..
Bradson noticed he was not alone as soon as he slid the infirmary doors shut behind his back.
Firren, the young commander of the Betelgeuse squad was already waiting for him, leaning at the wall next to the shutting door.
" How much does she remember ?" the commander asked seriously.
" Enough. " Branson Captain's hid his thoughts behind his terse reply.
" How much did she Actually Remember, Captain?" Firren asked, his voice slightly raised, wishing hard for the captain to share his diagnosis.
" Little enough to keep her safe. " The Captain replied coldly.
Aghast by the reply given, the soldier of the barren lands, the StarBreaker of flame could but accept with a sunken heart.
" But I thought, the cabinet is able to…"
" The Restoring Device is destroyed from the inside, Firren," Bradson exclaimed of the scene in the lab, of the torn open container device.
" It, is defending her from those that seek its power. Including us. Perhaps…it is best this way."
" But surely there may still be a way." the young man tried to figure out his thoughts.
" Hints, or…something from before…a stimulant maybe?"
" Rash not, Firren." Captain Bradson admonished sternly
" Those that matter the mind and memory can not be treated through haste. Maybe it is best we hide it a little longer, from the world, from us. From herself even, if it is Its will."
Bradson Captain decided with a stern sigh, leaving Firren's qualms aside.
But the StarBreaker Commander persisted still.
" Why hide it from her, Captain?" Firren asked outright in wonder.
" That is not like you."
" It is for her own good." Bradson Captain's words like wrought in stone.
" For her. For all of us."
" If it is really for her good, then shouldn't she be learning about it, and how to protect herself, instead of hiding from what shall surely come?"
Firren inquired with his own aspects. Being the seasoned warrior as he is, battling Demons long before joining Bradson's league, strife has always been his preferation over stride.
But conflict shall undoubtedly lead to hurt, pain, to destruction. To regret. It is a path without return.
Yet the enemy, being as resilient and persisting as their determination, shall surely hunt them to their last breath. If so…mayhap it is proper to show her…
" Let her rest for now. She has yet to regain her usual resplendence." Bradson Captain decided, answering in rhetoric speech which abstractly meant "not now", leaving down the corridor in silence.
Unable to convince the captain, Firren too followed, but still, he was sure his words had made his stubborn captain reconsider.
…
...…..
Yuri stared at the tin box sitting next to her on the low table as she lay in bed.
The voices were still there, now but incoherent whispering instead of loud screeches, still the same that prevents her from rest. If only there was a way to make them silent, Yuri would definitely do it. Feeling bored and unable to sleep, Yuri took the tin box and held it above her face.
The lid she opened without a second thought.
Immediately, tiny wrapped objects started dropping from within the small container, cascading down onto her face, and hitting her nose and cheeks.
The hospital androids sensed Yuri's astounded squeak and came over to the bedside.
" Increased heartbeat detected. Light blood pressure rising." The Android confirmed without sentiment.
" Shoo." Yuri shushed the android, hugely troubled already by the constant noises in her head and now the unwelcoming surprise on her face. Yuri looked at one of the tiny wrapped squares closely.
" Edible substance detected." The Android confirmed once again.
" Go away." Yuri volleyed back at the confirmation, but after processing what the android just said in a split second, Yuri realized the android was right.
Peeling the wrappings upon the square object revealed a dark brownish substance that grew sticky the more she touched it with her fingers.
Yuri looked at the sticky square in wonder. The annoying murmurs in her head subsided at the sight of this tiny brown brick. It's the smell, the fragrance that blossomed the moment the wrappings were cast away, calming her senses and silencing the disturbance.
And also, triggering a gurgling moan deep in her stomach.
" Noise detected–"
" I said go away!" Yuri smacked the Android's face with her pillow, finally forcing the stout automaton to away and leave on its track-linked wheels.
Dismayed by the android, Yuri didn't realize she had put the brown square into her mouth. She was shocked by her own actions but at the same time sensing the familiar naturality in doing so. But that all went behind her head as soon as brown brick touched the surface of her tongue.
Sensations exploding, stimulants firing, the creamy sauce rejuvenated her with but that one bite, sending a satisfying warmth sweeping away her old chilling self, bathing her body anew in the creamy relaxation.
Yuri could feel the energy surging up her veins as she swallowed the captivating flavor after multiple cherishing crunches.
" So yummmyyyyyy !!!" Yuri squealed, kicking her legs in delight. One after another, she tore the wrappings of the bricks and stuffed them all into her mouth, feeling them melt into juicy essence and swallowing them slowly, savoring each and every last bit of joy they easily bring. She missed this sensation like it was embedded inside of her all this time, hiding among the incomprehensible things stuffing her mind. She loved the flavor the bricks induced as they dissolve welcomingly above her tongue. But something more behind this joy, this happiness that captivated her so.
She couldn't tell, yet. But this chest-warming feeling she now felt, reminded her of something far, a memory that started it all.
The blue snow.
The Light.
The people rushing by.
The someone standing next to her in armor…
holding her hand…
" Chocolate detected."
The android's voice pulled Yuri back to her cozy bed as the android placed her pillow back on her lap.
The word rang a bell echoing in Yuri's head.
" Come again?" Yuri asked the android.
" Chocolate detected," It answered monotonously
" Edible. Nutritious. Derived from cacao seeds, now extinct…Grade 5 rarity. Must collect."
Yuri wasn't listening to the rest of what the droid said. The name was so familiar, but something about it wasn't right. It had another name, a name which she used to call, to cry out to someone…
" Choco…" Like a missing piece of a puzzle, it materialized in a scene in her memory as the word was whispered out of Yuri's quivering lips.
" It's Choco…I had it before! I am remembering something!"
With her energy regained and curiosity fueled, Yuri bounced off the bed, reverting to her energetic resplendent self, sliding the door wide, and dashed out of the infirmary.
Only to return to the hospital android in the room.
" Where can I find more Chocos, android?" Yuri demanded.
The android scanned the small perimeter with its detection waves and responded blankly.
" No chocolate detected."
" Never mind. I ate them all." Yuri sighed. Guess she had to find out by herself.
But wait! The door at the back of the lab, the calling mysterious gateway. Can there possibly be more hidden things from the past that brings as much joy as the Chocos behind those metal seals?
Dragging the Android behind her, Yuri eagerly headed down the empty corridors aimlessly.
But where is the lab?
…
...
Reina looked up from her radar to the automatic doors expecting to see the Captain return to deck, but instead, it was Firren alone who returned.
From the deepened angle of the soldier's frown, Reina knew the process wasn't as successful as he expected.
" Isn't the Captain with you?" Reina inquired curiously.
" Said he needs rest. Can't blame him." Firren sighed as he sat on the edge of his desk, activating his red blazing armor that materialized with a single command onto him.
" After all that, and now this…nothing goes as planned."
" At least she is fine, Firren." Reina the second-in-command reassured the young melancholy man who examined his armor at his post
" Isn't that what it's all about? To keep Yuri safe?"
" We can't run forever." Firren reasoned, adjusting his armor starting from the gauntlets, strapping them to stick tighter to his wrists.
" The Restoration Device worked on me, on all of us. Why not her…?"
" She is special, Firren," Reina answered with a soothing grin
" You know that well, don't you?"
" I know that she isn't safe when she knows nothing around her."
" She will." Reina assured him firmly, with those grey eyes teeming with patient encouraging spirits, like an older sister backing up a younger brother would.
" When you teach her and show her the way. Like how we showed you your path."
Firren's adjusting hands paused in deep consideration of the secretary's words. And the young man nodded slowly, grinning slightly in agreement.
" If so, Then I'd better get started."
…
...
Venturing through the maze of identical hallways, passing by steel doors that all seemed the same, Yuri traversed deep into the layers of the Betelgeuse, until she reached a grand foyer, lit on both sides with a distinct warm glow unlike the cold long bulbs on the ceilings of the corridors. A set of slanting metal doors, stabilized by golden thin tiles led altogether to two longitudinal thick handles of gold at the conjoining middle of the sealed entrance.
The Android behind Yuri started beeping as she neared the room.
" Can it be…!"
No doubt this must be a special door guarding a special room. Yuri wondered how many special rooms are hiding all over the ship behind special doors. At least this one isn't screeching weird voices at her.
Yet it was, to Yuri's surprise, making some kind of soft bright stepping sounds from behind the massive door.
Pacing fast and slow, ringing high and low altogether like numerous vibrations singing their own totally different verses but joining in to form one harmonious construct. Mesmerized by the incoming pleasant autistic lull, Yuri stood and listened, letting her cleansed mind dance gently and with the seemingly undulating notes, her body rocking along naturally without herself realizing.
It was a nice feeling, a far-away memory Yuri had forgotten but now revived by the tranquil mellow vibrations flowing out from within the sealed room.
She has heard of this before.
She knew this sound, coming from someone, or something, or both.
She knew this rhythm, she could nearly place it between her lips.
She knew this memory, brought her back to a world, a peaceful place.
Sitting in the dark, among many others, a single shaft of light dawned upon an object not far away, a big black…
" Sound detected." The android confirmed after scanning for a long moment
" Unidentified song. Five meters to the east."
So the past really is full of amazing discoveries.
Stirred by growing curiosity, Yuri hesitated not and pushed the handles to traverse further into the room.
A wide shining brown desk emerged into view. Elaborately-designed equipment stood well organized around the curved book-shelved walls surrounding the soothingly lit interior. The sound echoing around the splendid circular area made Yuri halt for a second.
The sound was playing elsewhere in the room.
Out of sight.
Yuri was perplexed. There was no one else in the wide cozy room, yet she could sense a familiarity in the still atmosphere of the well-tidied area as if someone has been staying here recently but absent for the time being.
The mellow sounds continued unperturbed, ringing melodiously around the office.
Yuri peered over the desk. The surface was mostly organized, save the few sheets of paper scattered in the middle, ink handwriting scribbled upon its surface. Curiously, Yuri leaned closer, her hand supporting the front rim of the desk, her fingers touching a chilling triangular plaque of steel on one side. Yuri looked down.
C. Bradson. Deeply carved onto the silver hard surface.
This is Papa Bradson's desk.
She is in Papa Bradson's cabin.
At that moment, the gentle ringing of sound came to its last note, and the cabin was silent.
Footsteps started to clatter, somewhere not afar, closer and closer.
Knowing that Papa Bradson had strongly advised her to stay in the infirmary, Yuri fears her unannounced intrusion into his personal office might upset the Captain.
Quickly, Yuri slid under the big desk and waited quietly, holding her breath.
A hissing sound erupted from the right side of the room as the shadow of a large matter slid aside with low creaking sonance.
The footsteps were clear and audible once more, nearing the desk where Yuri hid. Yuri snugged backward nervously, her heartbeat quickening, yet at the same time feeling slightly enjoying the excitement of hiding in plain sight.
Hiding in a place, waiting to be found.
As the finder shouted aloud, a countdown before the search.
It is all inside of her, the memories. She had experiences, adventures, and a wholesome joyous life behind her that has gone missing. She just has to find it back.
Again, it was the android's beeping sounds that pulled Yuri back to her senses, reminding her that she had forgotten to hide the android with her. Blanching in distraught, Yuri was about to reveal herself and apologize when suddenly the beepings of droid quickened and increased in volume into an alarming cry.
An urgent sirening did the android make, raising trepidation amongst those that heeded its cry.
" Demon alert. Demon alert. Incoming from the west. Demon alert…"
And the droid sped off across the corridors, warning in deafening howling as the alarms all over the ship rang in ominous chorus.
The footsteps in the room rushed off and left the office in but seconds, leaving the large doors swinging ajar.
Yuri poked her head out from under the desk.
Demons. Yuri frowned.
What demons?
She had no idea. No bells ringing and images flashing at the mention of the word. Yuri shrugged. Better get back to the infirmary bed before papa finds out.
As she stood up, facing the middle of the desk, her eyes met the scattered papers lying unkempt before her. The writings on the rectangular parchment were well-stroked and beautifully done, but what really caught Yuri's attention was something mostly hidden, but partially covered under the unruly pages above.
Yuri pushed the pages aside.
What beheld her eyes, made her heart skip a beat.
The murmurs slowly crept into her head.
It was a unique sketch. A circular disc-like apparatus hand-drawn, with runes of unknown meaning written around its surface elliptical, lines smoothly reaching out in a spherical manner all joining into that one disc-like core of runes.
There were texts written in haste sloppy writing that Yuri could barely recognize.
But the voices do, and they chant in ghostly whispers, reading them for Yuri.
" …The… Herunis Carna..." Yuri read the description to herself in wonder, mesmerized by the drawing which seemed to beam and glow before her eyes.
" …The core of…. the Earth…. Earth ?" Yuri wondered what earth meant, and why does it need a core.
But all that she tossed away out, for it is coming.
The pain, the voices, the calling.
It has returned in grave volumes.
…
...….
Bradson Captain was at the control center in no time, his many screens lit up as he entered to show him the crucial visuals of the approaching enemy.
" Unnatural movements northwest, Captain."
Leina reported hastily, showing Bradson the radar signals
" Beta type, singular incoming. No packs in sight."
Bradson Captain calmly nodded. At least there's only one.
" Is Firren ready?"
" Standing by, Captain !!"
Came the voice of burning enthusiasm vibrating the whole control center through the speakers.
Against the howling winds and turbulence, rising amongst the thick chaos fog, Firren walked out, standing tall on top of the great soaring Airship Betelgeuse, in his flourished golden-ornated armor of stark excellence, the StarBreaking Armor of Red, bursting bright flaring stardusts out of the twin thrusters sitting upon his broadened shoulders, drawing two valiant lines of red across the palish sky. His twin handgun blades seared with the flame of the sun, protruding out of his wrist armors slowly, menacingly.
" Good."
Bradson Captain motioned to the androids perched to their designated posts where the cannons and laser railguns were situated.
" Await my command."
Firren cocked his helmet slightly to the west, standing tall and vigilant on the back of the Airship, crouching to prepare his strike.
" Wait for it....."
As soon as the Captain's lips stopped, there came a tremendous outburst far below, several feet under the sea of clouds, a mass as threatening as another airship bursting upwards, as humongous as a mammoth leaping out and breaking the fogs, throwing dust and debris a thousand meters high in its wake. A being of dark emerged.
The shadow of the colossus slowed down in mid-air as it reached the Betelgeuse's level, its maniacal form revealed under the light, arms bulging with the sharp long wide claws stretching miles apart; a head so huge it merged to its body and a snout that prolonged and thickened like two crooked bloody mountains placed horizontally; its multi-paired insane eyes stared straight at each being that dared stare back,
Especially at Bradson's firm grave glance.
Widening the world-devouring mouth, bearing its countless teeth that ran unevenly across the oblique jawlines, letting out a roar of sheer demonry with its grotesque mouth so wide, and Lo !!
The Captain seized the moment.
" Fire !!"
Flames and missiles shot out across the sky and hit altogether in a marvelous explosion at the Demon's face as it kept on roaring. Zooming and zigzagging across the lasers and bullet showers, The flaming Starbreaker dashed forth in action, performing a cyclone fire strike with his two flaming gun-swords at the Demon as the humongous devilish beast dropped back in agony to the earth's surface with a rumbling bang, earthquakes emanated below as the smog lifted about below.
Firren didn't pause, pushing his limits and forcing unrest on his opponent, activating his Starlit flame. What was just armor, now burst into a conflagrating being, burning like scalding inferno, its helmet combusting, every bit of the armor on fire, with flourishing golden carvings shimmering red like lava upon its smoldering surface.
A StarBreaker has awakened.
" Permission to further engage, Captain !!!"
Firren spake valorously, readying to lunge down from the edge of the airship.
Bradson double-checked with his secretary Reina, who nodded back confirmingly.
Bradson Captain gave out the order.
" Permission granted."
And Firren leapt down with a skilled gymnastic flip of power and grace, diving down straight towards the earth to End this Demon in an earth-bending showdown.
Bradson Captain sent the Android gunner troops to Firren's aid.
" Analyze the Demon."
The captain bade quickly to Reina
" Search its weakness, before it sees ours."
…
...
Stop, please…
Yuri begged painfully, grasping her head on the ground. The high-pitched voices screeched all at once louder and louder.
She struggled to her feet, fighting the incoherent shouts and the suffering they weighed upon her. Staggering halfway, Yuri slipped and everything on captain Bradson's desk slid off the edge and fell with her.
" WHAT IS IT YOU WANT ?!?!"
Yuri screamed at the piercing nonsensical claims in her ears, biting her auric nerves and driving deep down to her forebrains.
Her eyes see not the room she was in but all that she barely understands, flashes of scenes, images, faces, all distorted and terrifying.
Why can't the memories all be like the melodious sounds and sweet chocolates? Why should there be such suffering in the past that hinders her to reach them.
The voice seemed to answer Yuri's qualms in an incomprehensible tone, echoing across a winding contorted path formed out of shards of broken memories.
What is it you want?
Yuri heard her furious shout echo in her ears.
" I want this…to STOP!" Yuri shouted back at the swirling world made of shattered past.
This is the price to remember.
Yuri froze at the answer of her own voice, cold, and devoid of pity.
" What…what do you mean…?"
This is the suffering you shall face shall you seek to remember.
The more you see, the greater the pain.
Turn back, and abide to oblivion.
Yuri considered long and hard the words she was told. The pain is killing her. She might explode.
Fear No Darkness, Yuri.
Yuri sat up with a jolt.
She heard it loud and clear.
It was not her own voice that just spoke.
It was someone else. Someone she knew, Someone she longed for.
Someone she wants to remember.
And finally, it hit her.
She had been met with the same choices, the same pains and torment back then, back in the container, back in the lab.
Back in the glass bridge.
And despite all the pain, all the dread, all the suffering,
despite failing miserably and forgetting it all,
she always chose the same.
" Show…Me…" Yuri stammered, rising to her feet, only to fall back to a kneel by the stinging in her temple.
" Show me…show me all that I have forgotten…!"
Again, her feet rose slowly, shaking all over. Relentlessly.
" And I will find their meaning…I will recover what I have lost! What you have taken from me! I want them back…Give me back who I was!!"
Her legs failing, she descended.
But this time, her shivering arms supported her fall.
...
...
Scanning the demon before their visuals, crossmatching the defiling one with the large database of documented Demons, Reina soon got hold of the data she seeks.
" It's a Kau-Bog type Demon, captain!" Reina transmitted her results to Bradson
" Beta Grade Demon, impenetrable hide over its shoulders and thighs…negates damage physical gravely, especially flame originated…captain."
Bradson captain's frown deepened as he read the last documented site.
Firren had felt the words of the Demon Records quite true through his own endeavors of the past few minutes of strife. Dashing here and there around the huge Boar headed Demon, Firren could but evade the hulking muscular arms and claws thrashing all over him, landing damage that seemed too meager to stop its berserk even when the flames his StarBreaking armor cast upon the Demon had been like three suns combusting the void throughout.
His proud flame of the Stars is not in his favor right now.
At least the heat might muster and roast this Demon from the inside eventually, Firren decided to persist, switching his twin flare gun swords to twice its flame, engulfing the boar-headed beast thrice his size in a cyclone of nothing but fire.
A swirling pillar of bright embers seared the fields, emblazoning the barren lands.
Yet, with just one triumphant, taunting roar, it is enough to prove that the StarBreaker's efforts were futile.
…
...
" …Fear…No Darkness…"
Forcing her down, only for Yuri to rise up once more. The pain and the torment, only to bring her higher and higher to her knees.
She will not back down.
She will not let go.
She will take back what is hers, through any hardship that pursues to bring her down. She wants to. And that is reason for her enough.
To seek the truth.
" …seek the Land of Light…!"
There, as her blurring eyes vaguely beheld,
pale bluish light thinly beamed out of the linear cleft that slowly thickened to a glowing shaft, bringing light to her ashen sight.
Yuri's feet felt the cold glass,
her face kissed by the chilling breeze that sailed across her lightning blue hair, out of the room of calling, the room behind the lab.
The room that was sealed, now opened to revelation.
If it is as you choose
then the path so shall be.
Standing before the opening, the voices, the whispers, the shouts and screams, the laughter, the joy,
All of them left Yuri and swiftly disseminated to the immobile silhouette standing in the depth of the light.
A figure.
An armored figure.
A palish white StarBreaker.
Then, another piece of the missing puzzle emerged to light.
".....Mommy…?"
Yuri asked with her failing breath, leaning forward onto the icy metal which then glowed, a gentle welcoming luminescence.
Painful screeches turned to chiming song,
Incoherent screams became soothing Whispers,
The armor, like a sentient liquidus veil, opened its embrace, inviting Yuri to its brisk cradle.
Blue falling snow, drifting gracefully all around them.
Yuri felt at Home. Her lost home, taking shape and color,
the more she sank into the armor's shadow.
…
...….
" Bradson Captain! The second launcher... it's opening!"
Bradson Captain was out of his deck in a blink of an eye.
…
...…..
As the chest plates of the armor started to close in, like a luring hug of nanoparticle fingers caressing Yuri all over. Yuri lay back, and let them connect to her, pulling her deep into its layer, as she felt a current of unseen energy swim through her veins, up to her head, cleansing her mind with a new freshness.
She was ready, letting her body and instincts take over control.
The launcher sequence loaded, and the hangar gates rumbled in opening.
The light of the outer world dazzled, reflecting on her clear visor.
Three. She heard the hangar countdown afar.
Two.
Yuri closed her eyes.
" YURI ! ! ! ! ! !"
Yuri's eyes opened wide that instant.
Bradson Captain, his wrinkled gaunt expression said it all. As he stood at the gangway of the launcher, his long jacket flapping with the vehement winds.
Yuri looked at Papa Bradson.
Papa Bradson stared back.
She Smiled, leaving no resplendence cloaked and outshone by the morning glow.
" …Fear No Darkness, Papa!"
And Lo she went, the howling winds close to her ears, gravity her helping hand. Bradson Captain watched her dive further downward, sinking into the clouds, away, afar.
It was he, who set her on this path of no return.
…
...
Firren was a seasoned fighter, a well-trained Starbreaker in the arts and tactics under some of the most prominent of Starbreakers, and his skills and prowess had earned praise but his prestige seniors. But even as seasoned a warrior as Firren has times of shortcomings.
This is that moment.
The Kau Bog Demon had endured all that the Star Flames could bring, dispersing it all with thrashing fists and swiping claws. surviving the conflagrated hurricane, the Demon's steel hide ashen and its bare exposed flash roasted dry. Yet no mortal damage was inflicted, only its rage and fervor heightened to extent berserk.
With the supporting Android troops wasted and the ship cannons unable to penetrate the metal epidermis of the beast, Firren is alone in this tense stalemate. Exhausted his flame, Firren knew this is the farthest his element offensives could take him, and what was left is his martial talents to force his way to the finishing blow. One last stand.
Onward, even if it leads to his demise.
Still, Firren was confident his flames has done their part. From the Kau Bog's berserk ferocity instead of its initial accurate buffets, the Demon had now resorted to large swipes and frantic poses attempting to somehow catch a Starbreaker a quarter of its size. Its sight is impaired, as Firren expected. The heat of his flame has somehow penetrated the hide in a way unsensed by the corrupted animal and hurt its organs before the Demon itself realized.
It is a blind beast, battling a fast agent with nothing but his agility and strength.
Firren dashed under the bludgeoning clawed fists coming in all directions, piercing his wrist blades into the clefts of exposed flesh at high speed, accumulating damage one at a time while dashing in an accelerating zigzagging fashion to deceive and confuse the Demon, cutting the beast in many places under its steel protection, spilling black vile blood over the plain. Firren was turning the tide of the fight, the wave of aggression, about to overthrow the demonic's reign.
Only for the Demon to suddenly smash its claws together at high speed, trapping Firren amongst its savage grasp!
Impossible, Firren thought quickly and hard, arms and feet stretching hard against the crushing sharp fangs upon him. Has this Demon somehow caught his stride through sheer luck, or has this vile defilement somehow predicted his moves, or worse, feigned its blindness?!
The reason is not what matters now, his escape is! If only he could muster at least some more flame…But the demon has proved more than enough to withstand his embers, now trapping him in its game of pride, a clawed prison caving in with its beastly strength! In strength, Firren assumed he is not the Kau Bog's match, but in tactics, his part of profession, coming up with ways to astonish the enemy through the unexpected, even this can no longer fool the Demon.
Firren could feel his chances slipping out of his trembling numbing grips.
The grotesque shadow of the vile beast, loomed over him, posing a menacing taunting posture for the warrior's last sight of vision before his fall.
Firren's view started to blur, as does his strength edging to its limits.
Then Firren got a message from his visor screen. His heavy eyelids widened once more.
The young commander shook off his fatigue. This is not how it shall end! There might still be one way out of this.
Firren focused his will, his arms tensing as he pushed harder, and harder. The Starbreaker's flame lit up once more over its shimmering armor, bright sparks dazzling upon the crimson plates, like a ball of combusting embers trapped in the Demon's humongous grasp.
The Kau-Bog type stared down, watching what this cornered Starbreaker has in store to amuse itself before it crushes its captive like pulp, unrealizing the blinding pale blue light descending onto the field at full speed.
Lines drawn of gold materialized through photon particles, forming a long emblazoned sword rifle in her hands.
Blue stardust condensed and straightened to arched blades at the sides of her pale helm.
Runes of blue power carve themselves onto the pure white curved armor of grace and splendor.
As the figure out of light landed with elegance and power, snow erupting as she descended. Standing on the surprised Demon's bulging head, piercing the blade rifle through the fissures between its hide and fired, sending icy bullets down the defilement's scalp, spreading frost and chilling snow over the damaged aperture.
Yuri felt not her hands and legs, neither taking control over her actions. As if caught in a trance, doing as the armor so commands, Yuri's body was forced to execute the ruthless blows onto the confused struggling Demon, devoid of hesitation and emotions.
Firren stared in awe, unable to associate the one fiercely damaging the Demon with the teenage girl he once thought he knew.
The grasping claws loosened and Firren dashed out of captivity, piercing his flaming wrist blades deep into the exposed Demon belly, firing flames into the monster's obnoxious insides.
Fire and ice, burst on both sides of the angered Demon. Two elements of the polar spectrum of power, forcing their limits onto the Demon's hide, causing the metal epidermis to bend, yield, to finally crack and shatter.
The Demon knew its end was near.
But its madness, its hate towards the light would not give in without a final resorting struggle, smashing its overgrown snouted head back and forth to swung Yuri off its bloody pulverizing scalp, scratching frantically with its claws which finally scraped through Yuri's calf.
Still trapped in an actioning daze, Yuri's senses heeded not the wound but went on pulling the trigger, sending out as much damage as its rifle could, which was a detrimental move to ignore when the claws have sensed her location.
Firren shouted with brute anger as loud as he to attract the Kau-Bog's fury, only to witness the Demon clenching its sharp claws tightly onto Yuri's slim fragile frame. With one sole purpose to survive, the Demon pulled Yuri off its back and swung Yuri off to oblivion with all its mountain-moving might.
Firren let out a vehement cry.
Reina, watching over her screen on deck blanched in a terrified gasp.
Bradson Captain froze, mortified by what he beheld his saucer-wide eyes. This is what he feared the most. This is why he should have listened, and obeyed the message It has been trying to convey. He shouldn't have forced Yuri to remember, or leave hints of her past that shall inevitably lead to destruction, to suffering.
Yuri doesn't need to remember. She needs to be safe, at all costs of discarding anything Before–
" Captain, look!"
Before Bradson could blame himself any further, his eyes followed the flipping graceful body in the air, twisting to the air and the wind that brushed against her flight, turning fully around to face the one vile entity that had thrown her a million miles away.
It was as if time had slowed down for her to act her last move.
Arms outstretched, summoning the sword rifle in hand pointing affront, dazzling eruptions of snow burst behind her arched back, where six sharp ornate grappling hooks of sheer energy shot out, drawing through the skies with thin streams of blue light, twisting and turning before passing through the Demon's limbs and torsos and struck deep into the barren earth, locking the Kau-Bog in place.
Firren had little idea what he was witnessing, but his instincts pulled him out of the petrified Demon's presence, dashing away from under the Kau-Bog's shadow just in time to see a blinding blue flash searing his eyes through his visor and knocking him down skiing away with the blown dust and debris.
The smog of the sandy earth cleared in that sudden blow of unseen force before the main shower blasted in, a thick burning stream of light, shimmering with all hues of blue, light, and dark, protruding the stupified Demon through the bulky head, through the mouth and penetrating out to the other side onto the earth, cascading for a long thundering moment until the stream sucked in on itself, vanishing as miraculously as its descent.
The earth regained its stillness, all sound diminishing as the world was surely cleansed by the one surge of power.
Firren's palm caught some of the remains of the Kau-Bog, in the form of dispersing ash that dissolved as it landed at his touch.
A solid heavy clunk was what pulled Firren out of his thoughts of the happenings seconds before and the soldier sprang up to his feet, in time to see a dusty haze drift upwards from a dent in the ground, where the figure of tainted white motionlessly lay.
It had all happened so fast for Yuri to process before she fell back to abyssal slumber.
[.....to be continued]