Shawn, don't let me die…
…
Don't let him take me…
Shawn, wake up! C'mon, I can't drive your body for you! C'mon, wake up!
Shawn opened his eyes and gasped, limbs afire, and he let out a hissing exhale from the pain of everything hurting. He was lying prone, a hard and unyielding ground beneath him. Everything about his existence protested against this pain, and he squinted his eyes, too in pain to take in the brightness of the waking world. He felt a radiating pain in the core of his being, burning pain that followed his nerves and felt like every inch of his body had been in contact with a nine-volt battery.
But the pain was worst by his heart, burning and twirling. He had pushed his new body to limits he shouldn't have, and he clutched his hand to his chest, groaning and rolling to his side, tears of pain weeping from his eyes.
I'm alive. Pain was his signal he survived.
But that pain faded, receding from his limbs, his wings, back to his core, where that angry burning subsided to a sharp warmth, and the whirling stopped. He dared to open his eyes, now that pain didn't define his existence.
His first sight upon waking, up above him, was of a purplish-blue sky, at the dusk hour of the world. The specter of that otherworldly green and blue nebula was barely visible against the coming night. And up above…specks of light, raining down in small flashes on the horizon.
He coughed hoarsely, feeling like he'd been choking on his father's second-hand smoke. He blinked and tried to figure out what was in the sky–and his eyes widened when he realized what he was seeing.
That wasn't a meteor shower. It was the fractured remains of their lunar platform, disintegrating in orbit, bits at a time. Anyone left up there was now falling into orbit, to be incinerated to dust. He dared to move his head; he heard groans, crying, and the encouraging words of Claire.
"Garrett, use your belt for a tourniquet, or they're going to bleed out!" she called out, and he turned his head to gaze at her, bloodied but alive, helping the rust and green feathered Aveeran with a woman bleeding badly from a wound on her leg, screaming and crying, her fair skin covered in soot and grime. Telga was using her light ability to shine light and direct others in the waning light, and Regia was wrapping a bandage around someone with a bloody head wound, but they were still alert.
Shawn tried to rise, but tumbled back to the smooth stone beneath his feet. His claws found no purchase on the solid material, and a pulsing headache pierced his threshold for pain, and he groaned, feeling each throb of agony from the surface wounds in tune with his heartbeat. He felt searing pain coming from his beak, down the middle of his skull. He let out a stifled whimper and held his head with his hands, and scraped a sharpened nail against his scalp, trying to will the pain away. Halsey, do you have any kind of read of how badly I am messed up internally? Because this feels awful.
You're alive, for what it's worth. Don't push yourself that hard again if you can avoid it. You can kill yourself if you push your Etteria use too far.
He nodded weakly. Yep. I'm pretty sure that death would have been kinder than the agony my body is going through.
He winced and tried to pull himself off the ground–much to his surprise, his winged limbs were strong enough to help lift him up. Everyone who had been on the platform was still here, by his rough count. Injured, maybe, but alive. The runic-traced stone slab they were standing on appeared to be powering down, faint blue lines of energy receding and melting into the cold, uncaring stone.
Long, tall green grass surrounded the structure, with the metal and stone tri-tip claw structure arching above them. Beyond that, small insects buzzed about in the still-warm air, the air slightly humid. Alpine trees surrounded the meadow, towering tens of meters into the air, and looked not unlike what he would have observed on earth–except the bark was golden, and the needles seemed to form impossibly small fractal shapes, fluttering in a light breeze.
It was serene. And the epicenter of tragedy. If his head wasn't splitting and it felt like little splinters were digging into his arms, legs, and wings, he might have been able to appreciate the beauty of the landscape more, or that evergreen scent that reminded him of the forest retreats of home.
Claire finally noticed he was alert, and hobbled over to him, falling to her knees and giving him a deep hug. "Thank whatever divine power exists in this universe that you're alive. You were barely breathing for a minute, Shawn. I think…I think that golden barrier you put up is the only reason we aren't toast."
She finally let go of her emotions and sobbed on his shoulder. He let her, because he barely kept his own emotions from melting down, not accounting for the pain his body was in. He wrapped a hand around her back, to reassure her.
"I'm okay, Claire. I'm alright." He let out a shaky exhale, trying to fight at misty tears that threatened to betray just how out of sorts he was, and she ran her hands along the shoulder blades of his wings. For a moment, he hovered on the brink of breaking down, and just barely managed to keep from crying.
Claire had been there during his college years, when he was lost, always trying to get his attention during his engineering precursor classes, before their study paths diverged. She was always trying to put a smile on his face, pester him, tousle his hair, get him to socialize.
He studied, he excelled…
But he wasn't living. He hadn't felt alive since the day he woke up in the hospital after a near-death encounter with hypothermia and pneumonia from taking a lungful of water, and waking up with his mother sobbing…
…And getting the awful news. He'd wished he'd died in the water. It would have been less cruel.
Claire had been there in those bitter years, always pushing him forward, back into the light. Even when he hadn't realized he needed it. After what happened to his father…and later, Maggie, he was glad to have at least one family member to talk to in confidence.
She'd been the light to pull him back. Now, he had to do the same in turn, with her pulled to a hostile world, with no way home, after falling out of orbit. He could feel tears dripping on his shoulder, soaking into the fabric, and she shuddered uncontrollably.
"We're going to be okay, Claire. We're going to get through this." Even with his whole world in pieces, she needed to know he was looking out for her, no matter what.
"You're not okay, Shawn. You're a giant chicken. Our only way home is burning up in orbit, and we have no plan."
"Yeah, we do." His vocal cords felt weak, wavering on the brink, but he cleared his throat through force of will. "We're gonna find a place to shelter in. We're going to rally allies to stop that madman. We're going to beat him. And then, we're going to find Maggie, and go home. Easy plan, right?"
She laughed bitterly at that statement. "You're either naive or unhealthily optimistic, Shawn. I don't know which one is worse."
Hope isn't lost, Shawn.
Halsey's glyphs weren't just words he could see. It was a voice now, that he could feel, resonating deep in his mind. He'd barely even registered the transition, in the last few minutes. A feminine voice that almost borrowed the slight rolling accent of his own mother…but wasn't. It–she, was her own voice.
You speak, now?
Sort of. I think it's more like stimulation of the pathways that connect the ear to the audio-rendering portion of the brain, but–I'm just a lost soul stuck in your head, and I don't have all the answers. Sorry.
We're alive because of you. Don't be sorry. No one approached him and Claire, and he figured, most everyone knew how bad this moment must be for them. He let out a soft huff, while Claire shuddered. It feels like we have an uphill battle, Halsey. A big one.
And this gestalt you possess has limitless potential. You will need to master it at every level if you want to have a hope of pulling this off. Fire, ice, and force. Each one presents an aspect to pursue. Each one, working in unison, brings you closer to making that happen. And maybe, taking down a Radiant.
I…don't want to go back to that void, from before. I don't want to know what will happen if someone like Revarik is allowed to conquer, unchecked. Promise me you won't give up.
He gripped Claire firmly, and her trembling slowed. "We're going to get through this, Claire. You have my word." In a way, he was subtly making a promise to both of them.
Thank you, Shawn.
After a moment, Regia cleared her throat, and Shawn was helped to his feet by Claire. He still had the problem of wobbling on his clawed toes and felt like he was learning to walk, all over again. Claire getting a face full of feathers from his wings, did little to alleviate her mood. Regia looked relieved, at least.
"Hey, I see you're still in one piece, guys. But uh…" Regia pointed a thumb at Telga, who was staring upward, looking lost, running her fingers across her facial feathers.
He sighed when he saw the fallen goddess's point of fixation. "Yeah. This is not a great start, is it?"
"Nope." Regia gazed at the survivors wearily, and wiped the soot off her feathers, before wiping it on a legging, and returning her focus to him. Not like a bird of prey…but like a person. "You stood by us, Shawn. I'm glad you didn't listen to me and take off. Because, I doubt any of us would have made it out alive without your help, and Claire's."
"How many made it, total?" The question left him with a knot in his throat, and she grimaced, her fingers still gripping deadly tight against her rifle stock.
"There were two other teleport platforms, set to different locations. We did plan for a contingency like this. I know one of them triggered. I don't know how many made it, and our little communicators are too short-range to reach them." She tapped the silver disc for emphasis. Garrett, weary and bleeding from a cut on his cheek, took a resting stance next to her, hands bloodied from doing triage on a few others. "Garrett, any word on the third platform?"
His telling gaze upward, at the debris streaking across the evening sky; the way he clenched his beak, told Shawn the answer he couldn't say aloud. Regia's eyes dimmed, and she put an arm around Garrett, while that tough-as-nails warrior gazed with fervor at hapless victims turning into ash, as they fell planet side.
"It was my fault. I didn't see it coming. I thought we covered our tracks, they've never been able to find us–"
"Garrett." Shawn found his voice and got the warrior's attention. "I don't doubt you did your best. Who we're up against, seems to be exceedingly intelligent, and ruthless. We held them off long enough to ensure there were survivors. If we're lucky, Revarik's men will believe everyone died in orbit."
Garrett clicked his beak and slung his rifle over his shoulder with a loop of a sling. "I know you mean well, Shawn. But people I knew were up there. And died up there." The subdued anger didn't speak to a lack of emotion; more likely, it wasn't the first time he'd taken a bitter loss. After a few seconds, he pointed to a small dirt path. "We set this contingency up a while ago; we're a few hours from the town of Vea'lant. No one knows about these escape platforms or their locations but myself, Regia, and Telga. We need to move, as soon as we're able. We're in the ass-end of nowhere, on the tectonic mass of Valtiria. One of the biggest chunks of rock on Remaria."
"Hold up. What is our plan?" Claire asked, having wiped the tears on her jacket sleeve. "Do we have allies we can count on?"
"You're looking at them," Garrett said gruffly. "Vea'lant is a town Telga kept watch over for years, sort of a home away from home. It's our new base of operations. Hopefully, it's how we left it–a frontier town, away from anything important."
"Someone better go shake Telga first," Shawn pointed out. "She does not look like she's taking it well."
"Shawn, she's gonna need a minute. All of our plans just went up in smoke. Unless you have a plan for taking a small, quiet lumber town and making it into a formidable bastion of industry, we are infinitely far from killing that son of a bitch, down in the core world," Garrett answered sharply.
"Sorry. Maybe I should say something?" he suggested in a low tone.
"No, you really shouldn't–"
"I'll be fine." Telga must have heard her name mentioned, because she approached the rest of them, her white feathers stained and ragged. This was not the composed, elegant goddess he'd seen before--it made her seem far more relatable. "I'll grieve later. But we need to move, now. Garrett is correct. Regia, get everyone mobile. We'll leave in a few minutes. I'll dismantle this platform, so no one can use it or back-track it."
"I've got explosives for that," Garrett replied casually, slinging an ominous-looking pack off his back, with a few wires sticking out of waxy blocks. "Telga, I have a few healing potions in my bag. Give them to the worst wounded, get them mobile. Are you good with that?"
"Yeah. Let's get to work."
Shawn glanced skyward one more time, before glancing at Claire. "Well, it sounds like we might be fighting for our survival for a bit, first. But, about Maggie–"
"I'm with you, all the way. If you think she's alive, then I should stop doubting that." Her movement was a bit stiff, but whatever triage efforts she had done, gave her back most of her mobility. She grabbed her rifle, checked the chamber, and nodded before grabbing the small case with the yet-unused Etteria. She said nothing about it, but Shawn pondered after what happened to him, if it was worth the risk of her using it. "Let's go kill a wannabe god, Shawn. And get Maggie home."
He smiled faintly. "Easy plan, right?"
"The best kind."
"Better plan fast," Garrett cautioned, and pointed to the wounded. "I know Vea'lant and its surroundings well enough to know that fresh injuries are going to slow us down. It's going to attract predators if we're unlucky. Stay sharp, shoot at what I tell you is killable…and run from whatever isn't."
Shawn glanced at his empty hands, and frowned. He was weaponless…but he still had his Etteria core. He dared to push a charge of energy to his hand from his core–and was rewarded with a light splintering pain behind his sternum. He grunted and rubbed at it gently. "Performance issue with my gestalt. I might have overdone it."
"After what you did, you're lucky you're not a corpse," Garrett said softly. But, he didn't hesitate to hand him a revolver from his thigh, and the holster. "Have you used something like this before?"
He took the weapon gently, spun open the cylinder, and looked at the design. He practiced removing the cylinder, then replaced it before snapping it shut again, and aimed down the sights toward a distant tree, feet planted and with a slightly staggered stance. "Yep." He holstered it gently. "Some variance in design, but functionally identical."
"Then don't waste the ammo, unless you can make your shots count." He handed him three more ammo cylinders, and gestured to both of them. "We have nightfall coming up fast. Take one thing to heart, you two: we are not the top of the food chain, out here."
A distant predatory shriek came from deep within the forest, echoing across the serene landscape. Shawn felt the feathers on his neck bristle. "Then we better get moving."
Without preamble, they got the survivors on their feet, with the two most injured being carried over the shoulder by the Vorhunde that had accompanied them. The path was faint, but visible, and Shawn kept glancing anxiously at the dimming light. This new, awkward stride was going to take some learning, not even accounting for the lower gravity. He was going to have to pick it up, fast.
Getting turned into avian species was the least of his worries right now, as he pushed forward and did his best not to trip on his own two feet. He kept his wings tightly pressed to his back, and hoped that whatever was in the forest, found easier prey elsewhere.
A second primal scream, somewhat closer, told him that happy wishes weren't a thing today.